Jesus Is Coming Soon

The message given in the Sunday night worship service in the Gettysburg United Methodist church on November 26, 2023.  The Bible verses used are Revelation 22:12-21.

            There’s one thing about me that really frustrates Wanda.  Well, actually, there are a lot of things about me that frustrate Wanda, but there’s one in particular that I’m going to talk about right now.  Wanda will ask me to do something.  And I’ll say “Yes, of course, dear, I’ll do it.  I’ll do it soon.”  And then some time passes--a few hours, a few days, a week, a year, whatever--and I have not done it yet.  And she’ll say, “You said you were going to do that.”  And I say, “I know.  I am going to do it.”  And she’ll say, “Well, when?”  And I’ll say, “Soon.”

            It seems to frustrate Wanda when this happens.  She gets kind of impatient when “soon” does not mean within a short period of time.  I’ve tried to explain to her that “soon” is a flexible concept, that it does not necessarily mean right away, but for some reason that explanation does not seem to satisfy her.  Does this sound familiar to anybody else, or am I the only one?

            The thing is, I think I’ve got some pretty solid backing on this one.  Look at our reading for today from Revelation.  At the start of it, Jesus says, “Look, I am coming soon!”  And near the end, he says it again.  “Yes, I am coming soon.”

            Well, it’s been nearly two thousand years.  And he has not come yet.  We say, “Jesus, you said you were going to come back.”  And Jesus says, I know.  I’m going to.  And we say, “Well, when?”  And Jesus says, “Soon.”

            Sometimes we get impatient with that.  In fact, it’s one of the ways non-Christians will mock Christianity.  “Well, your Bible said Jesus was coming soon.  Where is he?  Did he fall asleep?  Did he get stuck in traffic?  What’s taking him so long?”

            We wonder, too, why Jesus seems to be taking so long.  We look at the world.  Yes, I’ve said many times that there’s a lot of good in the world, and a lot of beauty, and I believe that to be true.  But there’s a lot of bad in the world, too.  And you know that–you don’t need me to go through the list for you. 

With all the trouble in the world, we may feel like maybe it’s time for Jesus to come.  And yet, he has not come.  So, if we assume that Jesus was telling the truth, what did He mean when He said He would be coming “soon”?

            Well, there are a few different explanations that people give.  One is that the word translated as “soon” does not refer to a specific period of time, but simply means “without unnecessary delay”.  In other words, Jesus will come when the time is right, and that any delay, if we want to call it that from our perspective, is necessary, even if you and I may not understand why.  

And I think that’s true.  Jesus will come when the time is right.  After all, he’s Jesus.  Whatever time he chooses will be, pretty much by definition, the right time.  If he delays, it’s for a good reason.  But while that may be true, it’s also pretty much Jesus saying, “I’ll come when I come.”  It may be true, but it does not really tell us anything.

            Another explanation is that the word translated as “soon”, again does not refer to a specific period of time, but instead means “suddenly”.  When Jesus returns, we’re not going to get any advance warning.  God is not going to give us a countdown.  It’s not going to be “Jesus will come in five months, so you’d better get ready.”  When Jesus comes, he’s going to come now, and we’d better already be ready, because we’re not going to get any more time.

            I think that’s true, too.  God has given us prophets, He’s given us the Bible, He’s given us theologians and preachers and teachers and scholars.  God gave us Jesus himself, the first time Jesus came to earth.  I suspect that’s all the warnings we’re going to get.  It’s up to us to be ready when the time comes, no matter when that time is.

            But I think there’s another aspect to this, too.  We’ve talked before about how God is a long-term God.  After all, God exists in eternity.  

Here are a couple of ways to think of this.  We think of someone who’s lived a hundred years as having lived a long time.  A hundred years is nothing to God.  The Bible tells us that a thousand years are like a day to God.  So while we’ve been waiting two thousand years, for God it’s only been a couple of days.  

Another way to think of this is to think of the Old Testament prophecies.  How long did it take some of them to come true?  Quite often, it was hundreds of years.  That includes the prophecies of the coming of the Messiah.  People waited and waited.  And some of them gave up.  But eventually it happened, because as the angel said to Mary in the first chapter of Luke, no word from God will ever fail.

Or, think of it this way:  our best scientific guesses are that the universe is about fourteen billion years old.  Our best scientific guesses are that the earth is about four and a half billion years old.  And of course, God existed before the beginning of the universe.  So what’s two thousand years compared to billions?  Almost nothing.  It’s like less than a second out of a day.  So when Jesus says He is coming “soon”, it may be “soon” to Him.  It just may not be soon to us.

But here’s the thing.  I think all these things are true.  Jesus will come when the time is right.  Whether that’s in the next week or in the next billion years, Jesus will come when the time is right.  He says, “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.”  Just as the first chapter of the gospel of John tells us that Jesus was involved in the creation of the world, this passage tells us that Jesus will be involved in the end of the world and in the creation of the new heaven and new earth.  We might live to see it, or we might be gone for many years.  But even if we’re not around to see Jesus come again, there will be a day when it’s time for us to leave this world.  Jesus will come for us, one way or another.  And you and I had better be ready.

Because this passage makes clear that not everyone is going to go to that new heaven and new earth.  It says, “Blessed are those who wash their robes, that they may have the right to the tree of life and may go through the gates into the city.  Outside are the dogs, those who practice magic arts, the sexually immoral, the murderers, the idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood.”  And later, it says, “I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this scroll:  If anyone adds anything to them, God will add to that person the plagues described in this scroll.  And if anyone takes words away from this scroll of prophecy, God will take away from that person any share in the tree of life and in the Holy City, which are described in this scroll.”

That phrase “wash their robes”--just to make sure we understand, the full phrase is to wash your garments in the blood of Jesus Christ.  It’s symbolism.  It means to accept the sacrifice that Jesus made on the cross.  It means to accept Jesus as the Savior.  To allow the blood of Jesus Christ to wash away our sins and allow us to come into the presence of God.  If we have accepted that sacrifice and accepted Jesus as the Savior, our sins are forgiven and we have salvation and everlasting life.

But some will not accept that sacrifice.  And while it might be nice to think they’ll go to heaven anyway, that’s not what the Bible tells us.  That’s not what the words of Jesus are.  We don’t have to like that.  In fact, as I’ve said before, there’s a part of me that does not like it, because there are people I know who have not accepted Jesus as the Savior, and there does not seem to be anything I can do about that.  I don’t like to think that they may miss out on salvation and eternal life.  And of course, it’s not up to me to decide whether they will.  But the Bible does make pretty clear that not everyone goes to heaven.  Whether I like that or not is irrelevant.  It’s just the way it is.

And if you and I ignore that, we just get ourselves into more trouble.  Again, if we add anything to this prophecy, God will add to us the plagues described in it, and they are some pretty awful plagues.  And if we take words away from it, God will take away our share in the tree of life and the Holy City.

So these are words we need to take seriously.  Jesus is coming soon.  We may not know what “soon” means to God, but we know what Jesus coming means.  If we’re ready, if we have faith, if we believe in and trust Jesus as the Savior, it means salvation and eternal life.  If we’re not ready, then it’s going to be too late.  Our fate will be set, and we won’t get another chance.  Not because that’s how I want it to be, but because that’s how the Bible tells us God said it is.

I can make an excuse to Wanda when I don’t get things done when I should.  But I don’t think our excuses are going to work with God.  So let’s be ready.  And let’s do what we can to help others be ready.  Because this is not just a matter of life and death.  It’s a matter of eternal life and death.