Albert N. Martin

We’ve considered as to the event of the Lord’s return, it is certain; as to the place of the Lord’s return in redemptive history, it is central and climactic; as to the time of the Lord’s return, for us it is imminent, indefinite and unknowable.

Now in the fourth place, as to the events connected with the Lord’s return, they are clearly revealed and manifold.

When I sat at my desk seeking to collate the massive bulk of material in the New Testament on the return of the Lord, trying to think things through and how can they be laid out, I came afresh to the conviction that one can never take this biblical data on the return of Christ and try to put all of the pieces in a kind of sequential checklist: this, this, this, this, this. Rather, we should think of the major categories of what events will be connected with the Lord’s return and view them not in a checklist: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine..but in a circle, like a pie.

In that pie there are three major pieces. There are the events connected with what the Lord will do for His own when He comes—and though I’ll have to lay them out one, two, three, four, five, please don’t think of them in that kind of chronological or even logical sequence. They are things that cluster around the Coming of the Lord Jesus, and what the Scripture says He will do with this own.

Then the second big slice of the pie is what He will do with His enemies: the Devil and all the sons and daughters of the Devil, those who are not in Christ. What will He do with His enemies, with unbelievers? Again, we must not try to fit all of those in some kind of a strict, rigid category. There’s a cluster of things that Christ will do at His Coming, with respect to those who know Him not.

Thirdly, the third big slice is what He will do with the cosmos, what He will do with the created order at His Coming.

When we see the major events that are clearly revealed and are manifold, then I trust our minds and hearts will be settled with an even more intense and biblically-informed longing for the return of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Now, I want to show you from the Scriptures why we cannot take this atomistic approach and say, “Well, this passage puts this here and this here and this one puts…” no. Most of the passages—I’m not ready to say without exception, but I am ready to say most of the passages in which there is significant teaching on the Second Coming are passages in which a practical, pastoral issue is being addressed, and in the light of that pastoral issue certain aspects of the Lord’s Coming are highlighted and others are overlooked. Once we understand that, then we realize we cannot take one passage and say everything must fit rigidly into this. No, there was a reason for that particular emphasis in that particular passage, and that particular emphasis in that particular passage.

Now let me illustrate this in Paul’s teaching to the Thessalonians. 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, look at verse 13:

“But we would not have you ignorant, brethren, concerning..” here’s his focal of pastoral interest and concern. “But we would not have you ignorant, brethren, concerning them that fall asleep; [that is, those who die,] that ye sorrow not, even as the rest, who have no hope.”

So his pastoral burden is to dissipate the shades and the mist of their ignorance concerning their dead loved ones. Do you see that in your own eyes, in the Bible?

Verse 14, “For if we believe [and he knew they all did] that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also that are fallen asleep in Jesus will God bring with him.” (The spirits of your departed loved ones will be present with Jesus when He returns.) “For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, and left unto the coming of the Lord, shall in no wise precede them that are fallen asleep.” (I don’t know who’s been telling you that Uncle Harry’s going to be second-class or a caboose at the Second Coming, but by the very word of the Lord who is coming, I tell you: we who are alive and remain, we don’t get preferential treatment.) That’s what Paul is saying! (Whoever told you that, it wasn’t the Lord, because I tell you by the word of the Lord, we who are alive shall in no wise precede them that are fallen asleep!)

“For the Lord Himself shall descend from Heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God.” I must say that’s why there’s no left-behind theology here. Nobody’s scratching their head wondering where the bus drivers go and the airplane pilates go! All who hear the voice and the trump of God, what will happen? “And the dead in Christ shall rise first.” It’s the only place where you have that kind of language of sequential order. The dead who are united to Christ, they are going to rise first, no second-class, no caboose theology. They go first class!

When He has raised them up and joined them with their glorified spirits, then the Lord will take care of us who are alive. “Then we who are alive and are left shall together, with them, be caught up in the clouds.” They’re going to get first-class treatment; we’re going to catch up with them, and when we’re all caught up then the only thing that matters is that we’re with the Lord. So shall we ever be: with the Lord.

You see the focused, pastoral concern in the aspects of the Coming of Christ emphasized?

Now look at the same Apostle, to the same church, speaking of the same Coming, not another coming, the same Coming! 2 Thessalonians 2:

“Now we beseech you, brethren, touching the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and our gathering together unto him.” How anyone can say “this is another coming subsequent to the rapture” is beyond my understanding. He said, “So shall we be together with the Lord,” and he said now touching that event, when we will be “gathered together to Him to the end that you be not quickly shaken from your mind, nor troubled by spirit, by word, or by epistle, as that the day of the Lord has already arrived.”

Here was a different pastoral problem. Somebody, as we saw earlier, was teaching that the Day of the Lord had come, and people are troubled in heart, “What are we doing still here? The apostle said when the Lord descends there would be shout and voice and we would be caught up. How come the Day of the Lord has come and we’re still here, and we’re true believers?”

He says, “You don’t need to believe that the Day of the Lord has already come, because I’ve already taught you that day will not come until there is a great apostasy—whatever that is—and the manifestation of the man of sin—whatever that is.” Now, why didn’t he mention a great apostasy and the man of sin in 1 Thessalonians 4? That wasn’t the focus of his pastoral concern. No passage gives the full theology, and as each passage grows out of distinct, pastoral concerns—as we shall see when we come to the parables of our Lord of the ten virgins and of the pounds and of the talents—that all of those things were the Lord Jesus shepherding His people, giving them practical instruction, with respect to the Coming in glory and power of His own Person at the end of the age.

So, I trust that demonstrated, from the comparison of these two passages, that my method is a biblical method. Do you see that, or am I talking to myself?

Now, that just didn’t come in three minutes at the desk, and I hope you appreciate—if God helps you to get ahold of that—I hope you realize how that can just keep you from being shaken when people come on and say, “Ah, but look at this passage.” You can say, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute. That’s just a piece of the picture.”

It goes into slice number one: part of what the Lord will do with His own; slice number two: part of what He will do to the wicked; slice number three: what He will do with the cosmos.

Bible References: 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18; 2 Thessalonians 2:1-5