This past Sunday, I quoted from an Advent sermon by Eugene Peterson which affirmed the reality and motivational power of the Second Coming. The whole sermon was convicting and compelling so I thought I would share the ending with you.
With this kind of rhetoric ringing in our ears, we might respond in a couple of different ways. One is to avoid dealing with the future by planning for it. Rationalizing that the future is a long way off, we work out elaborate insurance plans, retirement plans, and educational plans. We schedule the future on the calendar so that there is always a good distance between us and it. We live in a kind of “preparation complex.” As a result, we never give our attention to what is in the present. We subordinate present things - like loving our neighbors, for instance - to those far-off goals.
Another way to avoid dealing with the future is to simply deny it and wallow in the present. With this mindset, I just do what feels good at the time for me, reducing the world to my own pleasures and whims. Since the future is so ominous, so unthinkable, I don’t think about it. I immerse myself in presentness - a very characteristic response today.
Yet neither one of these responses is much good. The gospel alternative is to affirm the Second Coming. The overwhelming fact of the future is that God comes - the same God we know about in Jesus Christ.
Knowing this, we can go about our work in the present with calmness, peace, joy, and sureness. We know that the future holds not something foreign to the experience we already share in the gospel but the completion of it. Therefore, it makes sense to love my neighbor, feed the hungry, and be generous with the church’s mission. The future thus brings an intensity of grace into the present moment. Love, trust, hope, and faith make sense.
Saints, we need not fear the future. Why? Because it is already a settled matter He who has begun a good work in us will bring it to completion (Philippians 1:6). Nothing can stop it or alter it. Yes, the present suffering is not easy. But this light momentary affliction is not the end but is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond comparison (2 Corinthians 4:17). So, we feed our souls on the wonderful truth that Christ has come, Christ has died, Christ will come again! Come, Lord Jesus, come!!
