As We Celebrate The Lord’s First Coming, We Should At The Same Time Celebrate His Second Coming

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As We Celebrate The Lord’s First Coming, We Should At The Same Time Celebrate His Second Coming

Amid our mad preparations for Christmas, it’s all too easy to lose… Christmas. So, it seems good for us to stop occasionally, and think about various aspects of the Christmas miracle. One of those aspects is that it’s still happening. We’re in the midst of the Christmas miracle right now. And from here, the glorious climax of the story looks extremely close.

The Old Testament prophets spoke of the Messiah almost as if He would be two different people. Isaiah 53:4-6 is a great example of prophecies depicting the Messiah suffering for our sins. “He is despised and rejected by men, A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief…. Surely He has borne our griefs And carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, Smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.”

Through the same prophet, Isaiah, God gave us what seems like an opposite picture in chapter 9, verses 6 and 7. “For unto us a Child is born, Unto us a Son is given; And the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of His government and peace There will be no end.”

How could the same Person die for our sins, yet rule the world forever? In retrospect, the answer is obvious. He would rise from the dead. We know from history that God resurrected Jesus. Hundreds of witnesses saw and heard the risen Christ. Jesus told us the eternal plan of God was for Him to die for our sins, rise from the dead, ascend into heaven, and return at the right time. In Matthew 26:64, Jesus said, “Hereafter you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Power, and coming on the clouds of heaven.”

At Christmas we celebrate the Lord’s first coming, but we should at the same time celebrate His second coming. It hasn’t happened yet, but one of the great messages of Christmas is that God keeps His promises. He kept His promises in the past, and, we can be sure, He will keep them in the future. In John 14:3, Jesus promised, “I will come again.”

After Jesus ascended into heaven, angels appeared to His disciples. They said, “This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw Him go into heaven.” (Acts 1:11)

This same Jesus will return! And when He returns, everything will change.

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#2

Jesus said, “Occupy until I come”.
Luke 19:13

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#3

How do you know it hasn’t happened yet? Everything sure seems to be a-changing.

#4

Amen!!! Glory To Our Almighty Lord For Everything … actually every day we are Celebrating all cycle of events especially in Solemn Ceremony on Liturgies in Orthodox Christianity … with all my lowliness I’ll say the expected Redemption through Jesus Christ as Mystery is present as always since our fall … (Harvest imagery abounds in the parables because there is a quality of prophecy that is now and yet to be; it is living the mystery [1]) …

still as we know there are cycles of days months years thus Celebrating the Incarnation of Christ at specific day is logical how became necessity even for the regular Laos, even more so we would give on the daily and weakly remembrance an yearly acclamation that we live expecting Eternal Life in Bliss as Christians … altho regarding the exact timeframe with all my lowliness I think that as Celebration Day foremost is chosen so would remove or better said push out the winter solstice tradition that was wide spread among gentiles, on what someone will argue that is kind of Church agitprop, yet knowing that there was no other way to be pushed out the pagan habits there was no other way but to substitute eg. winter solstice with Nativity or summer solstice with Resurrection, simply Christianity as nonviolent religion could not afford itself to act differently i.e. it would be not from Love to impose authority by force, now someone would probably claim this was also forcible approach, still noone was forced on Baptism in the early Church and Orthodoxy and once those who accepted Jesus while still couldnt brake free from their earlier festivals as traditional celebrations it popped up need for substitution so as Baptized would not astray, so its not forcible but educative substitution in my humble opinion …

… yet nowadays when west got humanistic, while also mammonism and consumerism hijacked the vibe, sadly we are seeing remix of that pagan traditions in form of venerated trees or santa clauses and his elfs even some grinch elf lately, probably some kind of neopagan agitprop restitution on small door, to be more ridiculous Kids nowadays know everything about santa but are not even close to feel with their hearts what is the True Meaning of Christmas, yep the feeling goes to the presents of santa, what is even more tempting if the gifted pine tree is absent somewhere the same absence its perceived by many as if there Christmas is not celebrated, but it is as it is, and if we start anyhow to judge the current trends we will become party breakers, thus it should be present demystification but not imposed in zealot way i.e. once someone matured it should evade linking Christmas to “modern” kind of wrapped in paganism celebration … hm Sorry for the sincerity, but if not else the same maybe will help out the Poor that cant jump on the expensive decorating bandwagon that is more facade than true meaning of Nativity … and this last sentence probably goes for the recent depre of my hometown where is huge fuzz how we still dont have lavish street light show, not that the Kids should be deprived from happy atmosphere, yet knowing how indebted and poor we are think its better to be invested in reusable equipment than throwing city money on private firms as in the past eg. investing the same amount of spending on phosphorescent [2][2] and fluorescent paints [3][3] or iridescent painting [4][4] for massive modular kirigami [5][5][5] or simple kinetic inflatables [5][5][5] maybe all decorations constantly pulled from “city plotter” from translucent plastic cut-out sheets so it would be even more kinetic … another good point from this would be engaging the Youth in doing something productive for its city or hood, while assembling tensile sculptures with the shapes … hm who knows maybe in the next year if recession hits the bell louder!? plus every piece in the end can land in some home as participation greeting … Sorry for thinking aloud but I really tilt around the spending for what? as Kid I was happy if have sparklers in hand, on streets hm everything was just about snow, coz anyway I couldnt wander at night beyond my hoods lamp posts …

#5

The Anti-christ may have come; he is probably here somewhere on Earth. Don’t think the Messiah has come because there are somethings that haven’t happened yet.

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#6

Jesus already came, and; unlike Hollywood, he did one-take.
That was all it took, for all: past present future.

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#7

Because the False 2nd Coming has not yet occurred.

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#8

Actually, when one thinks about it long enough, and puts some intuitive thought into the matter he already did come back. First, he was born into this world as a human, then he died, then he was resurrected back to Life. See it now?

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#9

The Word Is Always With Us Here Within Every Existence Constantly The Question Is When Will It Reveal Itself In Full Glory … and we are Informed About That As Event altho we are warned not to count the times, simply It Depends Of All That Are Existing In The Book Of Life and still didnt see the day of the World …

so its really fruitless to guess, altho we have free will to do so, but that dont means we will figure out by reasoning what is, for that we need to Rise in Spirit when actually we are even now sensing the Grace in All Its Glory depending of the purity of our hearth …

ON “THE MYSTERY OF JESUS FROM GENESIS TO REVELATION”—Why Did The Angels Announce “Good Tidings Of Great Joy”?
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nidster-in-a-nutshell!
Short & sweet. Nice…

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#11

A very popular thought, Rheba, and not an argument without merit. Mmmmm-let me think about Daniel’s vision in the 10th chapter of his book. To my knowledge no person has yet decoded the full meaning since it is hidden, secret, or in another word it is occulted. Persia, modern name is IRAN.

Something very strange ‘stuff’ has been going on there for a long, long time. So, lately it has become a subject of research for me. Here is one of the most interesting things we ought to pay attention to —

https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Ishtar_Gate

More… The material excavated by Robert Koldewey was used in a reconstruction of the Ishtar Gate and the Processional Way. In 1930 CE, the reconstruction was finished… wait for it… at the Pergamon Museum in Berlin, Germany.

1024×768 284 KB

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#12

Perhaps he was present during the Cosmic War?
In spirit?

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#13

By ‘he’, are you referring to Daniel?

#14

There is also this to consider:

Amazing Polly’s Spokesperson (official!) on Twitter:
“32 “Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened.” The developing evidence suggests that those things did happen, and that at some point our dating system added 7 or 8 hundred years to ‘history.’ https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke%2021%3A5-37&version=NIV" / Twitter https://mobile.twitter.com/FringeViews/status/1605004504453218304?cxt=HHwWgICw7frFj8YsAAAA

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#15

Pergamon, Berlin, èh? Isn’t that where the so-called “throne of satan” is supposed to be?
Persia/Iran is indeed very interesting and deep into the hoary past. Something to do with time travel, as far as I can tell. It does serm to be revealing itself, albeit slowly.

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#16

You are starting to ‘hone-in’ on the strange stuff that seems to swirl around the place called Iran, or is it Persia? I suppose ‘they’ need to keep changing its name in order to protect the guilty. As for Berlin there is a very deep story 'bout that. So, in order to be clearer, would you please give us a synopsis of what you have learned, where you want to lead the discussion? Thanks so much, and apologies for dragging out my Reply!

#17

Well to add ‘Time’ to ‘His-Story’ a person needs to know where the ‘starting point’ began. That issue could lead to a very, very interesting discussion on the Cosmos. I could offer a few interesting thoughts on that issue.

#18

Yes, I will offer a synopsis of sorts. It’s a longer, involved thing, and has to do with the “german problem”. However, I am busy just now and running back and forth doing christmassy things. I’ll be bach.
It also has to do with the starting-“point”.
:slightly_smiling_face:

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#19

Thanks! I fully understand. We also have plans for the upcoming shortest day of the year. All the best to you, and those you love.

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#20

@WuWu @nidster It would be great to have discussion such as you two have indicated. A discussion like the Forum used to do. This subject is so timely regardless of where one stands.

Let’s do this?

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