The Return of Christ

A shout from Heaven.

We’ve all heard about the return of The Lord Jesus Christ. We have read about it in Scripture and theology books and heard sermons about it at church. We have seen people talk about His return on television, YouTube, and heard about it on podcasts. The Return of Christ is big business¹ with all the books written about it, date setting², eschatology conferences, and theological gun fights across social media.³

I made this Microsoft’s Copilot. Maybe someone can use it for their next theological gunfight.

Let me ask you a question - what does the thought of Christ’s return do for you?

I’ve been pondering this question lately. What would it look like if I was blessed enough to see it?

For we say this to you by a word from the Lord: We who are still alive at the Lord’s coming will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep.

1st Thessalonians 4:15 CSB

Can you imagine seeing the return of The King of kings? To stand there in jaw-dropping awe as the world bears witness to His splendor.

I was reading 1st Thessalonians chapter 4 and what jumped off the page to me was Paul’s conclusion about the return of Jesus: “Therefore encourage one another with these words.” - CSB

1st Thessalonians 4:13-18 - CSB

How many times has another believer encouraged you with the truth of Christ’s return? We’re supposed to talk about it and we’re supposed to be encouraged by it. That truth is meant for encouragement and yet I rarely, to my shame, ever talk about it. We use words to encourage each other all the time - “I’ll pray for you.”, “Everything is going to be okay.”, “I’m here for you.”, etc. etc.

But what if instead, you received “Take heart, The Lord’s return is near!.”

Um… gee thanks?

You have heard about The Lord’s return all your life and you think “Yeah, I’ve heard this all my life, and every generation before me has heard it and He didn’t come then and He’s not coming now.”

I get it, we’ve all thought that or dealt with it at one point in our believing life. We develop an apathetic attitude about the second coming. It’s just more fun to argue about. I can guarantee you that right now someone is all jacked up on Postmillennial Milk Duds over footnote number 3 and will let me know about it in the comments because they stopped reading this after they read that footnote and just had to respond.⁴ It’s a joke⁵ and yet our current church culture cannot abide that. We are so divided right now on every topic that we go weapons-free at the first sign of disagreement.

So how about in the future we encourage one another with the return of Christ instead of arguing about it? Is that so hard? If the Apostle Paul told the Thessalonians to do it we should too.

“Then we who are still alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words.” - 1st Thessalonians 4:17-18 CSB

So let me encourage you today: no matter what you’re going through The Lord’s return is near!

1. Blood Moons anyone?

2. The year was 2011 and a man named Harold Camping said that May would be it.

3. Theological gun fights are fun to observe. Two rugged gun fighters staring each other down on the internet. Their libraries and fancy degrees are towering in the background as they parse Greek words and fire off bible verses at each other in an attempt to win an argument that will not matter in 10 years because the Rapture of the Church will have happened.

4. I’ve met plenty of Christians who believe that their spiritual gift is their 2 cents.

5. If people can’t handle a joke about the rapture of the church then heads will explode when I talk about The Chosen.