My project results – part 6 continued

 

When does Jesus come in the clouds?

 

Behold, He [Jesus] comes with the clouds and every eye will see Him and those who pierced Him, and will wail due to Him all the tribes of the earth. Yes, Amen. (Revelation 1:7)

 

To see happens in two ways. One way depends on time. An event, say an eclipse, is going to happen one hour from now – you go outside and look up at the time it happens and you see the eclipse. The second way you see doesn’t depend on time. Think of one of those visual puzzles, the page is just a bunch of lines, but when you look at it intently you suddenly see a picture pop into focus. The picture was there all the time in the lines on the page, you just were not seeing it.

 

In the same way see has two meanings, in the Greek language there are two word stems for the motion come. Jesus ‘comes with the clouds’. If it is an event that happens at a certain time, the word in Greek would use the stem for a complete single action. But the word stem used here is for a continuing repeated action. The Greek says: ‘Behold, he (continually repeatedly comes) with the clouds and every eye will see him and those who pierced him and will wail due to him all the tribes of the earth. Yes, Amen.’

 

So how do you make sense of this? Look at the old testament. The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Glory, is seen as the cloud throughout the old testament. (see 1 Kings 8:10-11) Jesus went away in a cloud and Jesus came back in a cloud. Jesus went up to heaven in Acts 1 and Jesus came back in Acts 2 when the Holy Spirit was poured out on all flesh. Jesus went up to heaven in a visible cloud because visible is temporary, he wasn’t going to be gone long, and Jesus came back in an unseen cloud, with the Holy Spirit, because what is unseen is permanent, it is eternal. Jesus comes and will never leave.

 

Jesus comes to us with the Holy Spirit. God is one. The Holy Spirit can not come without Jesus also coming.

 

Jesus is repeatedly coming. He comes to each one of us individually. It’s our sight being opened to see Jesus, that’s what is now happening.

 

Look at John 16:13 in the Greek: when that one comes, the Spirit of Truth, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak from himself, but what ever he hears he will speak, and the coming he will announce to you.

 

The Holy Spirit announces Jesus’ coming. It’s the Holy Spirit who guides us to see that we are no longer orphans, that Jesus is with us, that Jesus is abiding in us. The Holy Spirit announces the coming – how Jesus comes and that Jesus has come. The Holy Spirit witnesses to us about Jesus. The Holy Spirit is reassuring us that Jesus has returned to be with us. Behold, I am with you always. (see Matthew 28:20)

 

Every eye will see him. Believers can see Jesus now. Jesus reveals himself to us. (see John 14:15-24). Those who refuse to see Jesus during their life, will die and then stand before Jesus’ throne and see him then.

 

There is a fascinating parallel passage in Luke at the end of the sermon on the mount. ‘Everyone coming to me and hearing of me the words, and doing them, I will show you to whom he is like: he is like a man building a house, who dug and deepened, and laid a foundation on the rock, and a flood happening burst against that house and the stream could not shake it, for it had been founded on the rock.’ (Luke 6:47-48) It is the same Greek word stem for continually coming. ‘Everyone (continually repeatedly coming) to me and hearing of me the words and doing them’ – that is the man whose house can not be shaken.

 

Can not be shaken means can not die. Our body is our house. We are the house of God. A man whose house can not be shaken means a man who can not die.

 

 

I’m going away but I will come again. I won’t leave you orphans. (see John 14:18) When does Jesus come to us? At baptism. When does the Father and Son come to us? If you obey my words, we will love you and we will come and dine with you and make our home with you. (see John 14:15-24). They aren’t waiting to come. They are knocking on the door having arrived.

 

God is with us. Jesus is walking among the candlesticks, the churches, on earth today. (see 1 Corinthians 6:17, Revelation 1:10-20, Revelation 2, Revelation 3)

 

 

Click here to read more of part 6