Sequence of Jesus Second

Matthew 24:29-31

Mark 13, Luke 21

Matthew 24:29-31, “Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. 30 Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. 31 And He will send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. Matthew ²⁴ and ²⁵ is known as “The Olivet Discourse.” It is a discourse by our Lord Jesus Christ, delivered on the Mount of Olives. Its subject is the second coming of Christ. His own message about His own second coming.

• Jesus came first time in humiliation to die.

Then there is a gap for a long period of time.

• Jesus will come again for the second time in glory to reign.

But they don’t see those two comings, they see it as one. Jesus has come, preached, taught, healed, cleansed the temple, they believe He is readying things for His kingdom. Jesus comes in glory to reign as King of kings and Lord of lords.

The Lord wanted to instruct His disciples on the matter of His second coming. In these three verses Jesus spoke about His coming. Very clear, straightforward, understandable terms, the Lord Himself tells us about the greatest event in anticipation of any believer about His second coming.

• The world is very familiar with the circumstances and the features of Christ’s first coming.
• The world is very familiar with Bethlehem, with the manger, with shepherds and wise men and a star and Herod.
• The world is very familiar with Joseph and Mary and gold and frankincense and myrrh and the song of the angels.

But the world is far less familiar with the story of His second coming with all its features and all its attendant circumstances. Yet the prophets have given us, including Jesus Himself, the greatest of all prophets, very clear instruction as to the character, the features, of the glorious second coming of Jesus Christ.

When Jesus ascended up into heaven, physically, bodily, taken away in a cloud after His resurrection.

Acts 1:9-11, Now when He had spoken these things, while they watched, He was taken up, and a cloud received Him out of their sight. 10 And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel, 11 who also said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw Him go into heaven.” Just the way He went away Jesus will come back. Since that time, believers have had hearts filled with hope through all the history of the church, looking for the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Titus 2:11-14, For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, 12 teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly

in the present age, 13 looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, 14 who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works.

Apostle Paul said we who are saved should live righteously, soberly, denying ungodliness, denying worldly lusts, and looking for the glorious appearing of our great God and Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ.

• As much as we are to live obedient lives,
• As much as we are to live righteous lives,
• As much as we are to live lives where priorities are set by God’s standards,

So much are we to live lives that focus on the return of Jesus Christ.

Philippians 3:20-21, For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, 21 who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself. That is our hope and glory.

Our Lord says very precisely and very concisely what He wants to say but has a way of opening up a universe of truth in the marvelous ability that He has to choose words. We feel like little children trying to understand complexity when we try to get all there is to get.

V 29, “Immediately after the tribulation of those days When is the second coming? Immediately after the tribulation of those days. A chronological indicator for us is that the Lord’s second coming in glory to set up His kingdom will follow immediately this time period called the Tribulation.

Greek word for tribulation is Thlipsis, means trouble, difficulty, and distress. Israel has always been in distress and tribulation. The church has always had distress and tribulation. The world has always had distress and tribulation.

Jesus said immediately after the tribulation “of those days.” Not just any tribulation but the tribulation of those days.

What days? Described in V 4-28.

They are days of great tragedy. V 21, For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be. It isn’t just any tribulation. The tribulation that is the worst tribulation the world has ever known.

What period is that? A trigger point which happens is known as abomination desolation. V 15, “Therefore when you see the ‘abomination of desolation,’ spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place” (whoever reads, let him understand), Israel in the end time will be in their land.

They will rebuild the temple. They will be worshiping God. They will be protected by the antichrist. But in the middle of the 7 years as mentioned in Daniel 9, the antichrist will break the covenant. He will blaspheme the sacred place of the Jews.

He will tear out the altar to God and he will establish an altar to himself. He will make himself the God of the world. This is described to us not only by the prophet Daniel but also by John in Revelation. Antichrist will demand that he is the one to be worshiped and therefore he desecrates and abominates.

He calls the whole world to worship him, then the signal has come that the Tribulation has begun. The events of the Tribulation are generally described in V 4-14.

• Deception,
• War,
• Famine, and
• Earthquake.

It was a time of persecution, hatred, and false prophecy. When evil is so rampant that many people who appear to be religious will defect from religion and abandon themselves to evil. It is going to be the worst time the world has ever known.

Time will be without an equal. Unless the days were shortened no one would survive. There will be time coming on the world this time of tribulation like no other time. A time of gross evil like no other time.

A time of murder, a time of slaughter, and antichrist is going to try to slaughter all the Jews. He is going to try to slaughter all those who would name the name of Christ. Jesus warned them it is better you flee to the mountains, because Judea, where Jerusalem is, is going to be the center of his attack as he tries to wipe out God’s people. Israel and any believing people from among the Gentiles who happen to be there.

• You had better run fast.
• Hope you are not pregnant,
• Hope you are not carrying a little baby,
• Hope it isn’t winter and raining,
• Hope it isn’t the Sabbath.

V 29, “Immediately after the tribulation of those days Not just any tribulation, but the tribulation detailed in V 4-28. Immediately after that, that is the time, that is the sequence for the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.

The disciples feel it must be very near.

• Because they know the Lord is the Messiah,
• Because He has cleansed the temple, threw out the moneychangers and the buyers and the sellers.

• Because He has promised that the whole temple will be torn down and not one stone will be left upon another.

They believe that He is going to come and wipe out hypocritical, false Judaism. He is going to wipe out the false religious leaders. He is going to purge the nation. With very anxious hearts, they sat down with Him on the Mount of Olives.

Asked Jesus the question what is the sign we look for that You are going to come into Your full presence and be King? The Lord answers saying that it can’t happen until immediately after this time period. They don’t realize that this time period is thousands of years into the future from where they are. But our Lord makes it very clear that it isn’t until that time period after which the second coming occurs.

Zechariah prophesied that two out of three will be killed and only a third will be preserved. God will save a third of them. The rest are going to die in this terrible holocaust. There will also be the saving of a 144,000 Jews, 12,000 from every tribe, according to Revelation 7, can evangelize the world.

No matter how the antichrist tries, or anybody else tries, you can’t kill them. Revelation 7 says they are sealed and protected. The Lord is going to spare some of those people but it’s going to be such a terrible time, unless there is supernatural protection.

Michael is going to be the one who comes down to taking care of them and sweeping them away into safety. In the case of the 144,000 Jewish missionaries to reach the world, God Himself supernaturally protects them. But the rest are going to be vulnerable to disaster and death, and so they are told in V16 to run. It won’t last long.

How long does the Great Tribulation last? 3 ½ years, 42 Months and 1,260 days. Immediately after that, the second coming. 1. Stage.

How does the Lord set up this event?

V 29, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. The whole universe, as we experience it, begins an instant disintegration.

Luke 21:25-26, “And there will be signs in the sun, in the moon, and in the stars; and on the earth distress of nations, with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring; 26 men’s hearts failing them from fear and the expectation of those things which are coming on the earth, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

There will be signs in the sun, moon, and in the stars. The earth distress of nations, with terrible confusion. The sea and the waves roaring. Men’s hearts fail them for fear. The powers of heaven shall be shaken. We have got a dramatic scene.

The thing is so dramatic and cataclysmic that men’s hearts will fail them for fear. Men will expire and it’s just a simple way of saying they are going to drop dead everywhere. People are going to literally drop dead out of total terror. Their hearts will stop.

Greek word Apopsuch means to say to breathe out. They will breathe out their last. They will die. When the Lord comes back in judgment, He will only slay with the sword that proceeds out of His mouth the wicked that haven’t already died of a heart attack or died in sheer terror so that their functions just shut down, the fear was so totally gripping.

It is hard for us to understand this and to conceive it. V 29, “The powers of the heavens shall be shaken.” The heavens, which encompasses the whole universe, everything is held together by power. There is a controlling influence.

Hebrews 1:1-3, God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, 2 has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; 3 who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,

How does the Son uphold all things? By the Word of His power.

It is God Himself in the Son who holds things together. Just as He created everything, He holds things together so that gravity doesn’t fluctuate. We send all kinds of satellites and space station based upon all calculations. But everything will come to an end. Everything will fall out of heaven on that day.

Our scientists can even mathematically predict things, years, centuries, thousands of years into the future because they have such uniformity from the past. The heavenly bodies are controlled by the upholding power of the Word of God.

But suddenly the Lord lets go, and the powers that normally hold the universe together no longer do that. The earth becomes a victim of this incredible breakdown of the whole universe. Specifically, Jesus says, the sun goes black.

The implications of that are just staggering. No sunlight. Man cannot survive without sunlight. The temperature changes are cataclysmic. Then the moon doesn’t give its light, obviously, because it’s reflected from the sun. The tides are instantly chaos. The stars begin to tumble out of their places.

Revelation 6:12-14, I looked when He opened the sixth seal, and behold, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became like blood. 13 And the stars of heaven fell to the earth, as a fig tree drops its late figs when it is shaken by a mighty wind. 14 Then the sky receded as a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island was moved out of its place.

The whole universe begins to fall apart, to disintegrate. It is inconceivable. The earth is held together by the power of the heavens, and when that power is not there, the chaos is going to be indescribable. How God can even preserve life for a few moments, or days, a few weeks, so that the kingdom can be established, is only by His supernatural overruling of the chaos of those natural forces disintegrating. It’s something we can only imagine.

The Lord is saying that just before Christ comes, this is going to take place. That sets the scene. This isn’t anything new. Many people believe that the Isaiah 13 passage should be related to Babylon’s destruction, that it is overemphasis

speaking of the destruction of the city and the kingdom of Babylon. But it must be far more than that. Yes, Isaiah is referring to Babylon. Yes, he does predict Babylon’s destruction. But, as so very often in the mind of the prophet, there is a historical fulfillment and there is a prophetic one as well.

Isaiah simply sees, in the destruction of Babylon for sin, a microcosm of what will happen in the devastation and destruction of the whole world in the coming of the Lord.

Isaiah 13:6-12, Wail, for the day of the Lord is at hand! It will come as destruction from the Almighty. 7 Therefore all hands will be limp, Every man’s heart will melt, 8 And they will be afraid. Pangs and sorrows will take hold of them; They will be in pain as a woman in childbirth; They will be amazed at one another; Their faces will be like flames. 9 Behold, the day of the Lord comes, Cruel, with both wrath and fierce anger, To lay the land desolate; And He will destroy its sinners from it. 10 For the stars of heaven and their constellations Will not give their light; The sun will be darkened in its going forth, And the moon will not cause its light to shine. 11 “I will punish the world for its evil, And the wicked for their iniquity; I will halt the arrogance of the proud, And will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible. 12 I will make a mortal more rare than fine gold, A man more than the golden wedge of Ophir.

There is going to be worldwide slaughter as God judges the ungodly and the wicked. The righteous will lives. But the ungodly will die, and men will be rare than wedges of Ophir gold.

Isaiah 13:13-16, Therefore I will shake the heavens, And the earth will move out of her place, In the wrath of the Lord of hosts And in the day of His fierce anger. 14 It shall be as the hunted gazelle, And as a sheep that no man takes up; Every man will turn to his own people, And everyone will flee to his own land. 15 Everyone who is found will be thrust through, And everyone who is captured will fall by the sword. 16 Their children also will be dashed to pieces before their eyes; Their houses will be plundered And their wives ravished. Isaiah the prophet sees an incredible day.

Isaiah 34:1, Come near, you nations, to hear; And heed, you people! Let the earth hear, and all that is in it, The world and all things that come forth from it. All those armies that have gathered to destroy the people of

God in Jerusalem in that great conflagration we know as Armageddon.

Isaiah 34:2-4, For the indignation of the Lord is against all nations, And His fury against all their armies; He has utterly destroyed them, He has given them over to the slaughter. 3 Also their slain shall be thrown out; Their stench shall rise from their corpses, And the mountains shall be melted with their blood. 4 All the host of heaven shall be dissolved, And the heavens shall be rolled up like a scroll; All their host shall fall down As the leaf falls from the vine, And as fruit falling from a fig tree.

The Lord and you know where John drew their imagery. They drew it right from the prophet Isaiah.

Isaiah 34:5-6, “For My sword shall be bathed in heaven; Indeed it shall come down on Edom, And on the people of My curse, for judgment. 6 The sword of the Lord is filled with blood, It is made overflowing with fatness, With the blood of lambs and goats, With the fat of the kidneys of rams. For the Lord has a sacrifice in Bozrah, And a great slaughter in the land of Edom.

The reason Edom is mentioned is because the southernmost place where that great battle is going to occur is in Edom. Bozrah was the main city in Edom. The battle of Armageddon is a 1600-furlong battle which is 200 miles. If we measure 200 miles starting with Bozrah it takes you just past Armageddon into Lebanon, and that is the range of that final great destruction in the battle of Armageddon.

Revelation 14:20, And the winepress was trampled outside the city, and blood came out of the winepress, up to the horses’ bridles, for one thousand six hundred furlongs.

The Bible is very accurate in describing the day of the Lord’s vengeance and the year of recompense.

Isaiah 34:8, For it is the day of the Lord’s vengeance, The year of recompense for the cause of Zion.

The prophet Joel speaks about the very same thing.

Joel 2:10-11, The earth quakes before them, The heavens tremble; The sun and moon grow dark, And the stars diminish their brightness. 11 The Lord gives voice before His army, For His camp is very great; For strong is the One who executes His word. For the day of the Lord is great and very terrible; Who can endure it?

• Joel sees a locust plague which blots out the sun and the moon because of the tremendous billions of locusts that make the day dark and the night, they block out the stars.
• Joel sees those locusts flying in the sky and it’s as if the heavens are trembling and he sees them landing on the ground and it’s as if the earth is shuddering.

• Joel sees that as an illustration of the ultimate shaking of the heavens and the ultimate shaking of the earth and the ultimate holocaust of divine judgment.

Joel 2:30-31, “And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth: Blood and fire and pillars of smoke. 31 The sun shall be turned into darkness, And the moon into blood, Before the coming of the great and awesome day of the Lord. Haggai, the prophet describes the end of the world in the same terms.

Haggai 2:6-7, “For thus says the Lord of hosts: ‘Once more (it is a little while) I will shake heaven and earth, the sea and dry land; 7 and I will shake all nations, and they shall come to the Desire of All Nations, and I will fill this temple with glory,’ says the Lord of hosts. Peter, preaching at Pentecost in Acts chapter 2, quotes the prophecy of Joel.

Revelation 6:12-13, which we read earlier, says the same thing.

The Lord’s imagery is consistent with the prophets before Him and even after Him in writing the New Testament.

Immediately after the Tribulation the setup. 2. Sign. V 30, Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.

Jesus sat on the Mount of Olives and the disciples came to Him privately asking Him when shall these things be?

When are You going to bring Your kingdom? They assumed all of that would happen at the same time. They didn’t understand the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. They were thinking it was all going to be the setting up of the kingdom.

Jesus gave them a list of general signs in verses 4 -14. Jesus gave them the signal that’s going to start it. But He still hasn’t given them the sign. V 30, Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven

The sign by which He reveals Himself. The Son of man in heaven is the sign. In the midst of this blackness will appear in blazing, infinite, unveiled glory, the Son of Man. V 30 end it says He will come not just with glory but with Great glory.

Glory like the world has never seen. The unveiled Shekinah. Revelation 6 says people scream for the rocks and the mountains to cover them up and hide them from the face of the One who sits on the throne, the One who comes in blazing glory. The Lord Himself.

They have seen a glimpse of His glory in Matthew 17 at the transfiguration. Jesus took James, Peter, John up to the mountain, pulled aside the veil of His flesh, and they beheld His glory. They did have a taste of what the second coming Shekinah was like.

It was only a small one and Peter never forgot it.

2 Peter 1:16-17, For we did not follow cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty. 17 For

He received from God the Father honour and glory when such a voice came to Him from the Excellent Glory: “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” We got a glimpse of the second coming glory.

• Adam had a glimpse of it in the garden when he walked and talked in the cool of the day with the presence of God.
• The people of Israel had a glimpse of the glory when it dwelt between the wings of the cherubim in the Holy of Holies in the tabernacle and the temple.
• They saw it as a pillar of cloud that led them by day and a fire that led them by night.
• They saw also when the glory of God departed.

But the world has never seen the unveiled glory and the world will see it then. The sign then is going to be the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ coming in majesty.

• He will be distinguishable.
• He will be recognizable.
• He will be in full glory.

V 30, they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.

On the clouds of heaven. In the same manner as you have seen Him go.

Acts 1:9-11, He will come. He went in the clouds. He will come in the clouds. Daniel says He will come with the clouds of heaven.

Daniel 7:13, “I was watching in the night visions, And behold, One like the Son of Man, Coming with the clouds of heaven! He came to the Ancient of Days, And they brought Him near before Him. John says He will come with the clouds.

Revelation 1:7, Behold, He is coming with clouds, and every eye will see Him, even they who pierced Him. And all the tribes of the earth will mourn because of Him. Even so, Amen. Mark says He will come in clouds.

Mark 13:26, Then they will see the Son of Man coming in the clouds with great power and glory.

Luke 21:27, Then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.

Matthew 26:34, Jesus said to him, “Assuredly, I say to you that this night, before the rooster crows, you will deny Me three times.”

All agree that Jesus is coming surrounded with clouds. Their way in the vision of seeing this glorious Shekinah. But there is some kind of a cloud, a cloud of light, a cloud of glory. Some kind of special clouds. The Old Testament tells us that clouds are the chariot of God.

Psalm 104:1-3, Bless the Lord, O my soul! O Lord my God, You are very great: You are clothed with honour and majesty, 2 Who cover Yourself with light as with a garment, Who stretch out the heavens like a curtain. 3 He lays the beams of His upper chambers in the waters, Who makes the clouds His chariot, Who walks on the wings of the wind, Vivid and beautiful language.

Isaiah 19:1, The burden against Egypt. Behold, the Lord rides on a swift cloud, And will come into Egypt; The idols of Egypt will totter at His presence, And the heart of Egypt will melt in its midst.

The scene is indescribable. The world is in panic. People everywhere are dying of sheer terror. They are in total blackness and only the Lord holds them together enough so that they can see the rest of these events.

In the midst of that black chaos appears the glory of the Son of God in heaven, in utter majesty, an unveiled holy Shekinah presence and riding on the chariot of God the clouds appears in the sky. As Revelation 1:7 says, “Every eye shall see Him.”

Zechariah 14:6, It shall come to pass in that day That there will be no light; The lights will diminish.

It refers to the stars, the sun, and the moon. All the lights go out. No light. Everything goes black. Zechariah saw it, just like Isaiah, Joel, Haggai, and John saw it.

Zechariah 14:7, It shall be one day Which is known to the Lord— Neither day nor night. But at evening time it shall happen That it will be light.

• Nobody could ever describe this day.
• Nobody could ever understand this day.
• There is no scientific explanation for this day.
• No human being could experience the full understanding of this day.
• It is one day that only the Lord can explain.

• It is one day known only to Him.

There will be no way to understand it.

Jeremiah 30:7, Alas! For that day is great, So that none is like it; And it is the time of Jacob’s trouble, But he shall be saved out of it. It’s a day that no man can know and no man can describe and there’s no explanation for it. Zechariah sees the same thing. Everything goes black. Nobody can figure out what happened. There is no human explanation. God only knows.

It isn’t day and it isn’t night. Then toward the end of that period of darkness, it is light.

What is that light? It is the sign of the Son of man in heaven coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. Unveiled majesty, the light of it.

Revelation 21:23, The city had no need of the sun or of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God illuminated it. The Lamb is its light.

Revelation 22:5, There shall be no night there: They need no lamp nor light of the sun, for the Lord God gives them light. And they shall reign forever and ever. If the Lord Jesus Christ will forever and ever light the eternal new heaven, it is bright. That is all we need. He will fill the heavens with the glory of His light.

We are going to be raptured before tribulation happens. The church is taken out before the Tribulation begins.

• We will already be with the Lord.
• We will be having the marriage supper of the Lamb.
• We will be having time of rewards.
• We will be with Him.

Revelation 3:10, Because you have kept My command to persevere, I also will keep you from the hour of trial which shall come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell on the earth.

We will be preserved and delivered.

1 Thessalonians 1:10, and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, even Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.

Colossians 3:4, When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.

When He appears, you who know Him and love Him, you who have been raised with Christ, you who are alive in Christ. We are not down here. We are already up there. When Jesus comes in glory, we will appear with Him in glory.

Revelation 19:7, Let us be glad and rejoice and give Him glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His wife has made herself ready.”

We have a picture of the marriage supper of the Lamb when the Lord is joined to His redeemed church, His bride. It’s called the marriage of the Lamb. The wife is ready and when the wife comes into the presence of the Lord, when we the church is raptured and taken into His presence.

Revelation 19:8, And to her it was granted to be arrayed in fine linen, clean and bright, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. So when the church is taken into the presence of the Lord at the marriage supper, as we sit down with the Lord to fellowship with Him during that 7 year Tribulation time on earth. As we have been delivered from the wrath to come, saved out of the redemption that comes on – out of the

damnation that comes on the earth. We commune with the Lord, rewarded, and clothed in fine linen.

Revelation 19:14, And the armies in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, followed Him on white horses.

The redeemed saints of the Old Testament also invited guests to the marriage supper. We don’t have to invite the bride. She is already going to be there.

Revelation 19:9, Then he said to me, “Write: ‘Blessed are those who are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb!’ ” And he said to me, “These are the true sayings of God.”

The Old Testament saints who are redeemed and all the church is there, all robbed in fine linen, white and clean, symbolizing their perfection in purity and righteousness. We all come riding out of heaven. We will have our own robe and our own white horse.

We will be there, only we will be up looking down, not down looking up. Some people who weren’t ready when the Lord took His church, who weren’t redeemed, will be left here. Many will die but many will be saved.

Many redeemed people will be looking up. There will be those who are redeemed in that day who were saved out of the Tribulation and who weren’t killed by the antichrist and who weren’t killed by the persecutors and the betrayers and the haters of God.

They survived, protected by Michael, protected 144,000 by the mercy and grace of God. There will be Jews and Gentiles, and they will be protected. When they see Him in the sky, they will rejoice. But the world will cry out in absolute terror and fear.

We will return. There won’t be any more scoffers saying, “Where is the promise of His coming?” 3. Power. V 30, with power and great glory. We can imagine the power to just set the whole universe reeling, to set the whole earth rocking on its axis. He has power over the whole universe created.

• He has power over Satan.
• He has power over demons.
• He has power to slaughter all the ungodly Christ- rejecting unbelievers worldwide.
• He has power to establish His kingdom.
• He has power to redeem His elect.

This is power without equal. Great power, no power like it. He comes with the holy angels, comes to sit on the throne of His glory.

Matthew 25:31, “When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the holy angels with Him, then He will sit on the throne of His glory.

Isaiah 63:1, Traveling in the greatness of His strength? As Jesus comes, His power is so great that the things that have been devastated in the chaos of blackness and the chaos of the earth immediately are made right.

When His feet touch the Mount of Olives everything begins to turn as Zechariah prophesied.

Zechariah 14:1-4, Behold, the day of the Lord is coming, And your spoil will be divided in your midst. 2 For I will gather all the nations to battle against Jerusalem; The city shall be taken,

The houses rifled, And the women ravished. Half of the city shall go into captivity, But the remnant of the people shall not be cut off from the city. 3 Then the Lord will go forth And fight against those nations, As He fights in the day of battle. 4 And in that day His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, Which

faces Jerusalem on the east. And the Mount of Olives shall be split in two, From east to west, Making a very large valley; Half of the mountain shall move toward the north And half of it toward the south. Jesus comes with a sword out of His mouth, Revelation 19, and He kills all the people who are ungodly and rejecting who aren’t already dead. He brings them to great judgment. Then He establishes the glory of His kingdom.

Daniel 9:24.

• He finishes sin.
• He ends transgression.
• He brings in everlasting righteousness.
• He sets up His kingdom forever and ever and ever.

When Jesus feet hits the Mount of Olives it splits. Zechariah 14, it says the sea in front and the sea in back, which would be the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea, a channel is cut so the water can flow freely. When the Lord comes, He splits the Mount of Olives, creates a valley, the Mediterranean empties into the desert. Summer and winter there is water all through the desert.

Since the Dead Sea area is so low, it will fill up and it must become a huge lake. All that area will have plenty of water for irrigation and there will never be a desert in the Millennium.

A canal from the Mediterranean to the desert, that’s just one thing. Lion lying down with a lamb, children playing with poisonous snakes and not being bitten, people living a long time, a restored earth. This is power! 4. Mourn.

V 30, Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, When Jesus comes, there will be sorrow. The sorrow of the unsaved Gentiles. For the most part, they are just going to be in sheer terror.

They are just going to cry out to be hidden from this. They are going to not be repentant for the most part, but they are going to curse God. They are going to scream at God. They are going to blaspheme God.

Revelation 18:21-23, Then a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone and threw it into the sea, saying, “Thus with violence the great city Babylon shall be thrown down, and shall not be found anymore. 22 The sound of harpists, musicians, flutists, and trumpeters shall not be heard in you anymore. No craftsman of any craft shall be found in you anymore, and the sound of a millstone shall not be heard in you anymore. 23 The light of a lamp shall not shine in you anymore, and the voice of

bridegroom and bride shall not be heard in you anymore. For your merchants were the great men of the earth, for by your sorcery all the nations were deceived. Suddenly the music will stop all over the world because the terror will be so great.

Not just the Gentiles but the Jews will mourn also.

Zechariah 12:10, “And I will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication; then they will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn.

They will realize that they’ve pierced their Messiah.

Zechariah 13:1, “In that day a fountain shall be opened for the house of David and for the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for uncleanness.

When all the work of the 144,000 and the fruit of the everlasting gospel preached by a supernatural angel is going to come together and they in that moment will see the One. In that moment that all Israel will be saved.

Romans 11:26, And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written:

Their redemption will draw near, and they will mourn that they have crucified their Messiah. Some of them will mourn to salvation. It will be godly sorrow to repentance. V 31, And He will send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.

When Jesus has judged all and the mourning has taken place, the mourning of those who are dying in the eternal judgment, the mourning of those who are repenting, He will send His angels. Angels are God’s gatherers. They are His collectors of men.

Matthew 13 we find them in several of the parables, sent out to gather people for judgment, to bring them before God. Here they are not gathering people for judgment but for gathering them for glory. The familiar Jewish means of calling an assembly is by blowing the trumpet. The angels, the messengers of God, go and they gather together His elect when the trumpet is blown.

They gather all those who have been scattered all over during the work of the 144,000 going all over the earth and preaching, there have been those who have been redeemed.

They gather all those who redeemed during the gospel preaching by the everlasting angel. There are still many of them are hiding from the terrors of the antichrist will be gathered. The angels go all over the world to gather them from the four winds, a colloquial expression similar to our expression “from the four corners of the world.”

North, east, south and west, and gather them in from one end of heaven to the other. Another way of saying from everywhere nobody is left out. The Lord sends the angels to collect all His elect for His eternal kingdom. Many shall wake. The bodies of Old Testament saints will come out of the grave to be joined with their redeemed spirits to enter into the glory of His eternal kingdom. So, the Lord will gather His people from all over the world to bring them into the kingdom.

That’s the Lord’s own description of His second coming. Now, the disciples got the sign. When you see the Son of man in heaven. They didn’t live to see that.

We by the grace of God, if we are redeemed, will be taken out with the church. I don’t really care to live on this earth to see that because I don’t care to go through the Tribulation. I had rather be with the Saviour than be here fulfilling my curiosity. If I am so curious about the Tribulation that it changes my theology, I am warped because I long to be with Jesus Christ.

Conclusion

Where are you? Your eternal destiny is at stake. This is just exactly how it’s going to end. Are you going to be a part of the disaster here or a part of the glory there? It’s your choice. By God’s grace as the Spirit prompts your heart, I pray you will respond to the Saviour.