THE DAY OF THE LORD IS COMING!
God now commandeth all men everywhere to repent, because He hath appointed a
day in which He will judge the world in righteousness by that Man whom He hath
ordained, whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that He hath raised
Him from the dead" (Acts 17:30-31).
This is a command from God, not to be lightly disregarded. It is universal,
for it includes all men, everywhere. It is a solemn warning that the day is
coming when every person will be judged by his personal relationship to
Christ. And the pledge of its fulfillment is the fact of His resurrection, for
Christ did not die in vain.
Salvation is personal and individual. Jesus did not die to save society, but
to save sinners. He was made in the likeness of man that He might take the
place of each one of us upon the cross and bear the penalty of our personal
guilt. "For He hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might
be made the righteousness of God in Him" (II Corinthians 5:21).
The historic fact that Jesus came once in accordance with prophecy is proof
that He will come again in accordance with prophecy, for both advents are
included in the same prophecy. Seven centuries before Jesus was born, Isaiah
Prophesied that He would come "to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord,
and the day of vengeance of our God" (Isaiah 61:2). Isaiah saw the two-advents
in line, like distant mountain peaks, and could not distinguish the time
interval between them. But when Jesus read His divine commission from this
prophesy in the synagogue at Nazareth, He stopped with the words: "the
acceptable year of the Lord," and closed the Book. The "day of vengeance"
awaits His second advent, when the world will be purged by fire.
At His second advent, Christ is coming for His own that they may escape God's
judgement on sin, for "our God is a consuming fire." The present interval
between these two advents is the day of grace in which we live, and choose our
eternal destiny. His first advent brought salvation to sinners; He is coming
again to take out of the world those who in their lifetime obeyed God's
command to repent, and received His beloved Son as their personal Saviour.
God's promise to believers in every age since Calvary is that: "The Lord
Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the
archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first;
then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in
the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the
Lord" (I Thessalonians 4:16-17).
There can never be world peace because men must first be reconciled to God
before they can be reconciled to one another. "There is no peace, saith my
God, to the wicked." The world system is essentially evil because Satan is the
prince of this world. Therefore it is written that: "If any man love the
world, the love of the Father is not in him" (I John 2:15). Christ is the
Prince of Peace, for we are reconciled to God through the blood of the cross
which covers our sin.
Salvation in Christ does not come by mental assent to His teaching or
acceptance of a creed, but by personal experience of His indwelling presence.
"Therefore if any man be in Christ he is a new creature; old things are passed
away; behold, all things are become new" (II Corinthians 5:17). Jesus said:
"Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God" (John 3:3). We
are born into this world individually, one by one; we are likewise reborn
spiritually, one by one. It is a transforming experience, whereby we go to
Calvary with our Lord, and henceforth see life from the standpoint of the
Cross.
In His final prayer in the Garden on the night of His betrayal, Jesus said: "I
pray not for the world, but for them which Thou hast given Me for they are
Thine" (John 17:9). Christ is the Hope of the world in this age of grace,
while He tarries and the Comforter abides, for: "There is none other name
under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved" (Acts 4:12). When God
commands, and the appointed day is sure, in which all will be judged by their
relationship to Christ, the question of supreme importance for each of us is:
Will I be found on the victory side of the Cross when Christ returns for His
own?
Stephen E. Slocum
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