The Return of Christ
Evangelicals hold to the personal, visible, bodily return of Jesus Christ. Not a metaphor for death. Not the spread of the gospel. A real event in real history when the real Jesus returns. These ten passages establish what the New Testament teaches about His coming.
What Scripture says
All quotations from the World English Bible (public domain).
-
Acts 1:11
They also said, "You men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who was received up from you into the sky, will come back in the same way as you saw him going into the sky."
"In the same way" — bodily, visibly, on the clouds. Not a different mode.
-
John 14:1-3
Don't let your heart be troubled. Believe in God. Believe also in me. In my Father's house are many homes. If it weren't so, I would have told you. I am going to prepare a place for you. If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and will receive you to myself; that where I am, you may be also.
Jesus' own promise. A place prepared, a return guaranteed.
-
1 Thessalonians 4:16-17
For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with God's trumpet. The dead in Christ will rise first, then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air. So we will be with the Lord forever.
A shout. A trumpet. A resurrection. Public and unmistakable.
-
Titus 2:13
looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ;
The "blessed hope" — the hope that defines the Christian future.
-
Revelation 1:7
Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, including those who pierced him. All the tribes of the earth will mourn over him. Even so, Amen.
Every eye will see. No private second coming.
-
Matthew 24:36
But no one knows of that day and hour, not even the angels of heaven, but my Father only.
No one knows when. Date-setters are by definition wrong.
-
Matthew 24:42
Watch therefore, for you don't know in what hour your Lord comes.
Watch. Not as anxiety, but as readiness.
-
Hebrews 9:28
so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, without sin, to those who are eagerly waiting for him for salvation.
He comes "without sin" — His atoning work complete — and "for salvation" of those waiting.
-
1 Corinthians 15:51-52
Behold, I tell you a mystery. We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we will be changed.
In an instant. The transformation is total and immediate.
-
Revelation 22:20
He who testifies these things says, "Yes, I come quickly." Amen! Yes, come, Lord Jesus.
The Bible's last word — Christ's promise and the Church's response. Maranatha.
A prayer
Lord Jesus, You said You would come again. Make us ready. Help us to live each day as if You might come tonight, and to work each day as if You would not come for a hundred years. Come, Lord Jesus. Amen.