When Jesus Messiah appeared the first time, who missed Him?
The answer is anyone who was not prepared to receive Him as He was, anyone whose own thinking could not fathom the Messiah appearing the way God chose it to happen. His way did not register with them. It was off their radar. Rather than responding to God’s plan and signposts, they entrenched themselves in misconceptions and became captive to false assumptions. Unwilling to question their perspective, their minds led them astray.
They were looking for someone who would fit with their ideas from Scripture. Why should it be any different for the coming of Jesus from heaven a second time?
People who have preconceived ideas about how and when the second coming will take place run the same risk as the Jewish majority of the first century who were unprepared for Messiah.
The problem occurs at the worldview level. John the baptist said Jesus coming from above speaks from above. For us who claim to know Him, we better be listening in the right direction. We will not get the true picture from anyone else except from Him who is the Truth. We must allow Him to transform our paradigm.
New View for New Realities
The details in the Bible about Christ’s return are intentionally cryptic as are the details in the Old Testament about the Messianic ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus. This fact requires that we learn to hear God’s voice and obey what He says to us today, so we can be ready. Thinking we are good they way we are, we already know what we need to know, or worse, that we do not need to obey what He says because He no longer speaks, is like a deaf blind person stating hearing and sight really aren't necessary. We must admit to ourselves and to our Creator the desperate need for His words of life.
Christ Himself warned people about the disposition toward complacency and wrong thinking. He said to the Jews, don’t think to yourself you have Abraham as your father. He also said not to say in our hearts that He will be coming later not now. Believers in Jesus Messiah need to wrestle with the implications of these warnings, not discount them. Disconnect from Scripture indicates our need to draw near to God with all our heart to hear God’s thoughts in that area, where we cannot now hear God’s word. Not listening or hardening our hearts leads us away from Him.
No one should say the return of Christ will happen this certain or that certain way. No one knows for sure, and God’s will has never and will never conform to human understanding of it. Otherwise, humanity would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
Here is an example. The Christian understanding of sanctification can be a stumbling block if we use that belief to excuse ourselves from conforming to the will of Jesus because in our mind we know God already sees us as holy. God never ordained people to use doctrine to avoid accountability to God’s word, prevent us from making Him our all in all, and hinder us from entering into the place of being tabernacled over by God Himself, who is our protector.
The truth is that Jesus rewards overcoming and walking in obedience by clothing us in white, tabernacling over us, and protecting us. Sanctification is about obedience as God’s unique chosen person. Becoming faithful prepares us and aligns us with the purpose God has for us to accomplish leading up to and advancing Christ’s return, whenever it may be. We can know if we are responding rightly because rather than getting further away from God, Jesus makes the path to His return clearer and brighter.
If Christians don’t learn anything else from the way Christ came the first time, manifesting Himself as Savior when He lived on earth, we should learn that God's will unfolds in perfect harmony and in perfect contrast to what is going on in real life. He is not found in ivory towers or glass houses but appears in the nitty gritty of life to transform it and us.
God chooses imperfect people to speak to. He reveals His will in each life as needed to uniquely prepare us to faithfully live for Him. He has never given anyone the blueprint for His Son’s return, but He has given us Jesus and His word, so that we can know God and be prepared for that Day when the Son of God is revealed from heaven in glory and we are revealed together with Him.
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