Copyright 2013 PJ Stassen
All Rights Reserved
The world is moving so fast these days that
the man who says it can’t be done is generally interrupted by someone doing it.
-
Elbert Hubbard, 1856-1915.
Why do
the much publicised story and promise of the Second Coming of
Christ take so long to come to fruition? I mean, for how many years have believers now (for
instance) been singing such songs as O
Jesus How Long; Jesus Is Coming and
The King Is Coming (?). And, for how many centuries have Christians
now been praying, Thy Kingdom Come (?). It would
almost appear as if Christ had completely forgotten about His promise, isn’t it? Well, the Bible
has anticipated this promise long before we were even born:
The
Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some count slackness; but is
longsuffering to you-ward, not wishing that any should perish, but that all
should come to repentance.
But the day of the Lord will come as a thief; in the which the heavens
shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall be dissolved with
fervent heat, and the earth and the works that are therein shall be burned up.
(2 Peter 3:9-10 ASV).
Bear in mind that a certain number of people
will, of necessity as decreed by God before the foundation of the world was
laid, probably still have to be born before the event of the Second Coming can
take place, and until the very last one of those designated to be born has been
born (the Anti-Christ included) the Second Coming
cannot take place.
Also, the Earth travels at approximately 107 000 k.p.h
through space in its orbit around the Sun … how do we know if the Earth is not
scheduled or programmed to cover a designated number of kilometres over a
specific course in space in order to (one day) in the near or distant future rendezvous
with the Second Coming ‘props’ on the other side of our space-quadrant? Anything
is possible ... truth can sometimes be stranger than fiction.
According to the Bible, the Second Coming is
going to be a grand affair accompanied by great power and glory commensurate
with the power, prestige and status of Jesus Christ as the Son of God; so, how
do we know if Heaven’s organising committee right now are not busy trying to
line up and synchronise all and diverse kinds of galaxies, stars, comets, novae and supernovae as the splendiferous fireworks and
background-effects with the express purpose and design to visually embellish,
at the right moment, the cosmic setting of the Second Coming? Rest assured, the Second Coming has been
programmed by God to take place at the most effective and ideal moment ever …
He does not make mistakes.
However, there is another reason I believe
that the Second Coming appears to be unreasonably delayed. I explain: Jesus Christ is described (among
others) as the Alpha and the Omega,
the Way, the Truth and the Life, and
also … as the Rock of Ages. Take us humans,
as an example: Often it is so ridiculously
easy to make and keep a promise to someone over a short period of time, say
three days, two weeks, or eight months. But to keep a promise over very many
years, even decades, becomes more difficult as time goes by. That is why marriage contracts have been
designed … given enough time, people tend to forget promises solemnly made to others.
In
the aftermath of the First World War, Germany, as the vanquished belligerent, was
bound by the victors of the war to a long list of war-reparations for the injured
parties in terms of the Treaty
of Versailles signed on 28 June
1919.
People like Field Marshall Jan
Smuts
even had, at the time, warned against forcing on Germany reparations that were considered
by some as hopelessly too harsh. Be that
as it may, the reparations-clauses contained in the Versailles Treaty left bitter resentment
on the part of Germany, and by 1932 had, over the short span of about 14 years,
been more or less abolished with the common consent of the major role players
among the injured parties.
From
the United States strong pressure had also
apparently been brought to bear on the participants to release Germany from
those reparations-obligations, as it was feared that the reparations-clauses,
so astronomical in scale, were badly convoluting the world-economy to the
detriment of all. And so it transpired that, by 1939, Hitler’s Germany (the Nazi-regime) was already embarking on a new war,
with the promises and agreements of the Versailles
Treaty already long forgotten and obscured by the mists of passing
time. Only the resentments have
lingered, sadly to spark a new war even worse than the one before.
However,
when Jesus finally returns, we will finally realise that His promises can be
fully and wholly trusted … also over the tall hourglass of time, in fact, can be trusted over millennia! His promises are not cheap as if made by a fly-by-night charlatan of
an operator. When the Second Coming
finally dawns, the credentials of Jesus Christ as the bona
fide
Son of God and our undisputed Rock of Ages will then have been finally vindicated … forever. We do not only stand on His promises; no, we fall prostrate on the promises of
God, the Rock of Ages. Where else can we
go? Only He has the Words of Life.
(R.
Kelso Carter, 1849-1928)
Standing
on the promises of Christ my King,
Thru
eternal ages let His praises ring;
Glory
in the highest I will shout and sing,
Standing
on the promises of God.
Standing
on the promises that cannot fail,
When
the howling storms of doubt and fear assail,
By
the living word of God I shall prevail,
Standing
on the promises of God.
Standing
on the promises of Christ my Lord,
Bound
to Him eternally by love’s strong accord,
Overcoming
daily with the Spirit’s sword,
Standing
on the promises of God.
Standing
on the promises I cannot fall,
List’ning
every moment to the Spirit’s call,
Resting
in my Savior as my all in all,
Standing
on the promises of God.
CHORUS
Standing,
standing,
Standing
on the promises of God my Savior;
Standing,
standing, I’m standing on the promises of God.
Piet Stassen
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Bibliography
1.
Andrews,
Allen (1969) Quotations For Speakers And Writers. Newnes Books. Hamlyn Publishing Group Ltd. London.
2.
Peterson,
John W. (1968) Great
Hymns Of The Faith. ‘Standing On The Promises’. Zondervan Publishing
House. Grand Rapids, Michigan.
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