Statement of Faith Article Nine

The summers between ages 11 and 15 were a sweet spot for me. I really enjoyed those summers because I was old enough to stay home alone, but not old enough that mom and dad made me get a job yet. And so I could wake up when I wanted. I could watch a full hour or two of SportsCenter. I was very aware of everything that was going on in terms of a bat or a ball or whatever was going on in the sports world.

And so I really enjoyed that. And I also got to also like my biggest worry of the day was if the neighbors were going to play wiffle ball or go on a bike ride with me later. And I got to make what I wanted and in the kitchen, which wasn't the downside of that is it was what I wanted and it wasn't very good. But also it was just a sweet time of getting to kind of just enjoy a summer. As we know in Wisconsin, summers are fleeting and it feels like they go by really quick.

But sometimes I would neglect that responsibility. Like I, I knew that mom and dad were going to come home and every day they left us with a chore list, do these things before I come home. And one time my siblings and I were really brilliant and said the chore list, said unload the dishwasher. And so we unloaded it, put all the dishes on the counter, did not load it back up. That's a mistake you make once.

And so we would do things like that. But we always had that chore list. And we always knew roughly that dad would get home from work around 3 and mom would get home from work about 4 or 4:30 somewhere in there. And we, we knew the amount of time we had to do these things. And so on days that we were functioning rights and we had our heads on straight, we did the chore list right away.

But in days where our heads weren't quite on straight, we waited until the last minute. And there was a couple of times where we waited till mom was pulling in the driveway or dad was pulling the driveway and you can't unthaw a 30 pound turkey in four minutes with the microwave.

But at the same time when things were not going well, like if we had to for one reason or another, turn off a circuit breaker, if we had to turn off the water heater, things like that, we knew that somebody was coming home to rescue us, somebody was coming home to make things right again.

We can look at Christ's return in a similar way. We know it's going to happen, so we shouldn't be surprised when it does. There are things we should be doing in the meantime, but we can also cling to the fact that it will happen. We should be getting prepared. We should be getting ready for his return.

But at the same time, it's a blessed hope. It's a promise. It's a good thing to know he's coming back one day. This morning we'll continue our Communion Sunday series of working through our statement of faith. This morning we'll be teaching on Article 9, the doctrine of Christ's return.

There's gonna be several passages referenced throughout our time together this morning and. But before we get to our first section, I want us to read together what we believe. Let's proclaim together what we believe about Christ's return. It'll be on the screen. Would you read with me?

We believe in the personal, bodily and glorious return of our Lord Jesus Christ. The coming of Christ at a time known only to God demands constant expectancy. And as our blessed hope motivates the believer to godly living, sacrificial service and energetic mission, Christ will return. That is the first thing we believe about Christ's return is he will return. And so throughout this there's we're going to reference at least one scripture passage.

For every statement of what we believe. There's often plenty more, but for the sake of time, we'll reference one that kind of highlights it. So Christ will return. The first thing we believe about his return is that he indeed will return. We see two supporting scriptures in Matthew 24:30 and Matthew 26:64, Matthew 24:30.

Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky. And then all the peoples of the earth will mourn and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And also Matthew 26:64. You have said it, Jesus told them, but I tell you, in the future you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of power and coming on the clouds of heaven. Part of the good news of the Gospel is that Jesus Christ will return one day and we will know that it's Him.

We'll see in Article 10 of our statement of Faith when we get to that. For those who trust in him, this will mean never ending good news. But we can confidently say that the Scriptures repeatedly and clearly teach that Jesus Christ is going to return. The Bible uses three descriptors for that return. It describes his return as personal, bodily and glorious.

Let's take some time to look at that first word. Christ's return will be personal. Acts 1:11 is our scripture support there it says they said, men of Galilee, why do you stand up looking into heaven? The same Jesus who has been taken from you into heaven will come in the same way that you have seen him going into heaven. We will have absolutely no doubt that it's Christ returning.

It's not as if it's going to be a guessing. I wonder if that's Jesus or not. There's going to be deceivers that come and try to and false prophets and false, false messiahs that come along and try to lead people astray. But we will know beyond a shadow of a doubt that it is the Jesus we know. It is the Jesus we worship.

We will know that it's him. It will be personal. He's not coming back as a spirit. He's not coming back as a vision. He we will know that it is him.

He himself will be coming. And this is important for a few reasons, but one but primary. The chief reason is he's making good on his promise. He promised to return, and we know that he will return. Every promise that God has made either has come true or it will come true.

When Christ will return, when he when there'll be a personal return, we can know and enjoy the fact that yes, he's making good on a promise. This is yes and amen. He said he was going to come back and he will. Everything he's promised either has come true or will come true. He can be trusted when he says something because he's proven himself to be faithful time and time again.

Jesus himself is going to accomplish what he said he's going to. Christ's return will be personal. It'll also be bodily. Christ's return will be bodily. Revelation 1:7 says, look, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him.

And all the tribes of the earth will mourn over him. So it is to be amen. Jesus Christ will return in his glorified, real physical body. He's not coming back as a vision or as a video or as a hologram. He will return in a body.

He will come in a glorified resurrection body. This tells us about the nature of the resurrection. Because Scripture says that Jesus is the firstborn of the new creation. It does not say that he's created, but he's first of what the new creation will be like. Because Jesus comes back with a real body, we know that we too will come back with a real body.

We'll be like Him. This Might not seem like a big deal. We might be thinking, okay, why does it matter? Great, I won't be a spirit. But in the early church, there was a heresy known as docetism.

And it essentially taught that this world is so wicked, so beyond repairs, so evil, that there's no way Christ could have had a body. But the problem with that is, of course, that it's contrary to Scripture. But Also too, Hebrews 9:22 says, there's no forgiveness about the shedding of blood. He could not have made a real sacrifice if he did not have a real physical body.

And if his return was not in a real physical body, then we would not rise to our real physical bodies. There's also a New Age heresy that claims that Christ will return his base. We'll just have this idea that Jesus exists like that. We'll be aware of his presence. This is really just docetism, repackaged.

Jesus Christ will return. It'll be personal and he will be in a body. And if the good news for us too is that since Christ will return in a body, we will receive physical bodies in the resurrection. A lot of times I think we think of heaven as being angels in the clouds and disembodied sort of experience. No, the new heavens and the new earth will be in glorified resurrection bodies.

Bodies that are incapable of breaking down, bodies that are incapable of getting sick, bodies that are incapable of sinning. We will have bodies, bodies. We will enjoy life to the fullest in the new resurrection. Why does it matter that Christ's return will be in real physical bodies? Because we too will receive a real physical, real physical body.

Christ's return will be bodily and will also be glorious. Christ's return will be glorious. In Luke 9:26, Jesus teaches, whoever is ashamed of me and my words, the Son of man will be ashamed of him. When he comes in his glory and that of the Father and the holy angels, he will return in glory. That's a word we use a lot around church.

What does glory mean? That he'll be getting honor and praise, as much of it as we can possibly give. Nobody will be able to deny him the praise that is due to him. Everybody will know it's him. Everyone will see him in his real physical resurrection body, and they will praise him.

And Philippians 2, 9, 11 captures this wonderfully. Paul writes there, for this reason, God highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name. So at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth. And every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. What a sight that will be to behold when everyone will know that Christ is Lord.

And for those who have trusted in him, the knee will bow in worship. And for those who have not trusted in him, it'll bow in a final submitting to. Okay, you actually are who you say you are.

But what a gift, what a promise, what an opportunity we have to bend the knee now and worship because it'll be glorious for us to know that he is Lord, that Christ is who he says he is. If you're a good EFCA history buff, which I'm sure so many of us in the room are, you'll notice this wording is new though. Up until 2019, our denominations still statement of faith used the word premillennial instead of glorious. I used the word premillennial in Article 9 instead of the word glorious. And so it's controversial, right?

The EFCA has been around for a decent amount of time and so we changed the word for one primary reason. It allowed for more orthodox positions to be considered part of our statement of faith. Our denomination would have never said that only premillennialists are going to heaven. But changing the word to glorious, we're hammering home what we believe is the essential that must be believed. And so it allowed for two more positions to be included that have been historically orthodox, that have Christ at the center of them.

So instead of the word premillennial, we change the word to glorious. And these two more perspectives are still biblical. And so I think it'd be helpful here to give kind of a short overview, like a 30,000 foot overview of the four position positions that are allowed within the EFCA that we would say, yes, those are orthodox positions and we use that word orthodox. It just means right or sound teaching. So there's four views that are considered biblical that are considered to be in right alignment with the Gospel.

The first one is premillennial. But there's really kind of two branches of premillennialism. A pre tribulational premillennial view holds to Israel being separate from the church and states that the church will be raptured or called up to be with Christ before the tribulation. And the tribulation is a time of where everything are going to get so bad that we don't even necessarily have words to describe how bad things will be.

This view teaches that in other words, those who follow Christ but are not ethnically Jewish will not experience a great time of suffering. And that's where we get the term rapture. That's what's used to describe that event. Pre tribulational premillennialists hold to Christ reigning for a literal thousand years before the final judgment. The other premillennial view is called historic premillennialism or post tribulational premillennialism using your context clues here.

So does not hold to a rapture and believes that Christ will set up his reign after the tribulation. Does not hold to a separate agenda for Israel and the church. And a lot of historic premillennialists hold to a literal thousand year reign still, but plenty don't. And they would also believe in a great tribulation before this thousand year reign. But the church will not be spared from it.

They see the church being grafted into believing Israel as is described in the book of Romans. And there's post millennialism, which I'm trying not to oversimplify any of this, but like I said, it's just giving you a 30,000 foot view. Post millennialism essentially teaches that everything will keep getting better and better until up until Christ's return. So everything's there's no great tribulation in terms of at least a very recognizable one. And then there's amillennialism that holds to a tribulation but not a literal thousand year reign of Christ on the earth and one singular judgment at the end of the days.

Maybe some of us, our heads are spinning like you just used a lot of annuals and is and pre and post. Why does that matter to me? Let me just say this in the most loving pastoral way I can. Because the Bible talks about and describes these things. We should care about them.

We absolutely should care about the essentials and agree to disagree on maybe some of the particulars. All four of these positions, as reflected in our statement of faith, believe that Christ will return, that it will be personal, it'll be in a real physical body, it'll be glorious, and that he will triumph over evil once and for all. Those are the essentials to the gospel that are plainly taught in the Scriptures. And sometimes, like I said, Christians will be like, I don't really care about the details. That's for pastors, that's for theologians, that's for people who love to study the Book of Revelation.

We should care about these things because they're in the Bible. And just because something's hard doesn't give us reason to not engage with it. We, we shouldn't just brush it off and say, I don't know. Because there's real ministry implications to what you believe about some of these things. For example, if you believe that God has two different plans, one for Israel, one for the church, that's going to affect how you treat Israel and interact and pray for them.

But if at the same time, if you don't believe in a real physical return of Christ, well, then you've lost the gospel. That is a hill worth dying on. I guess what I'm trying to say is we should focus our efforts on the central truths as outlining our statement of faith, but at the same time engage in good discussions because they have real implications for ministry. They have real implications for our life. I can tell you right now there's at least three different views of this on the Elder board, but every single one agrees with the essentials that are highlighted in the statement of faith.

Which one am I? I would hold to the historic premillennial position, but I consider amillennialism all the time. This is something you want to study. You're like, I really. That's just piqued my interest.

I want to study and know more of it. I've printed out exactly two articles. Well, two copies of the same article. And you're going to have to just run to the front to grab them after service if you want them, because I didn't print. They're 15 pages long.

I didn't print one for everybody. But if you'd like to know more, I've got two printed off for you. Christ's return will be glorious, and only God the Father knows when it will be. Only God the Father knows when Christ will return. Jesus shares this in Mark 13:32.

Now, concerning that day or hour, no one knows, neither the angels in heaven nor the Son, but only the father. In 1988, Edgar Wisenant, I believe I'm pronouncing that right, wrote a book called 88 Reasons why the Rapture Will Happen. In 1988, his intentions were pure. He's a very smart man, studied and worked for NASA, and his intentions were pure. He said, well, if I'm seeing all these signs that are leading to believe that Christ will return, then he was wanting to warn people and get people ready.

Because the fact of the matter is Christ can return at any point at a time only known to God the Father. And so while he wanted people to be ready, we really should be living in this state of constant expectancy. But ultimately only God the Father knows, because Only God the Father knows when Christ will return. We need to be constantly expectant. Because only God the Father knows when Christ will return.

We need to be constantly expectant. It could happen at any moment, even before I finish this sentence.

Okay, it didn't. But Revelation 3:3 says, Remember then what you have received and heard. Keep it and repent. If you are not alert, I will come like a thief, and you have no idea what hour I will come upon you. Similar to what I shared to start our time together, I should not have been surprised when my parents pulled in the driveway on those summer days.

I knew that they were going to come back. I even roughly had an idea of when they were going to come back in the same way too. We should be expecting Christ's return. Always ready, always expecting.

Because only the Father knows when Christ returns. We should be constantly expectant. Christ's return too is our blessed hope. Christ's return is our blessed hope. Titus 2:13 says, While we wait for the blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ.

If you've lived any amount of time, you know that life can be hard. It can be so hard. It can be things that you never would have thought, could have ever imagined or happened. Things that have been painful, things have been worse than fill in the blank. But we do not mourn or grieve like those who have no hope.

The book of Titus calls this hope blessed. It's just a catch all phrase of saying better than you could have imagined. So good, so wonderful, so beautiful, so, so incredible. And we don't hope in the same way as shrugging our shoulders and hoping that the packers are going to win on a Sunday afternoon. We hope in a certainty.

We know this will be happen. We know it's true. Because right God, everything God has promised either has come true or it will come true. This hope is certain. It is true.

It is good. A hope that will happen. A hope that will bring healing balm to the beat up and the broken. A hope for things to become unbelievably better. Remember the first person I ever met who was dying and is a Christian and he suffered well.

So his name was Brad. He was at the church I was a part of in college and he had terminal illness and it's not as if he was well advanced in years. He was in his mid-40s and he had a wife and three daughters. I remember talking to him and just I had never really been around somebody like that who was dying and I remember saying, brad, I'm sorry. And he said, I mean, yes, there's things that are going to be hard about this for leaving behind a wife and some daughters.

That'll be terrible. He said, but death can only make me better.

He said, I have this. And he quoted Titus 2:13. And he says, I have this blessed hope that if Christ does not return before I die, I know I'll be raised to new life with him in the resurrection. A lot of times we can get caught up in the battlefield of looking out into the world and seeing this hard thing that happened on Monday, Tuesday, six years ago, four months from now, we can see all that happening and we get so caught up with all of that. But what Brad gave me the gift of he brought me up into the tower to see beyond the trees, to see the horizon of knowing that Christ will return someday.

He is our blessed hope, and he's going to come for his own. In the Return of the King, a book in J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings series, we get a beautiful picture of what sort of hope this is, too. Sam Wise says, gandalf, I thought you were dead. Then I thought I was dead myself.

Is everything sad going to come untrue? What's happened to the world? A great shadow has departed, said Gandalf. And then he laughed. And the sound was like music, or like water in a parched land.

And as he listened, the thought came to Sam that he had not heard laughter, that the pure sound of merriment for days upon days without count. Yes, our blessed hope is that one day everything sad will come untrue. Jesus will right every wrong. There's so much more that we could say about that. But why don't we just linger on this?

Just linger on the sentence, just consider it for just a brief more moment. One day, for those who are in Christ, everything sad is going to come untrue.

What a blessed hope indeed. We also believe that in light of Christ's return, believers should live godly lives motivated by Christ's future return. Believers should live godly lives we read in 2nd Timothy 4, 8 there is reserved for me the crown of righteousness which the Lord the righteous Judge will give me on that day, and not only to me, but to all those who have loved his appearing. Both because we know Christ is returning, because we look forward to our blessed hope. We should live like Jesus.

First Peter 1 commands that we're to be holy because our God is holy. We should be in the act of becoming more like Christ as he's going to return. One Day we should live godly lives, and we should also serve sacrificially. Motivated by Christ's return, believers should serve sacrificially. 2Nd Peter 3:10 through 14 says, but the day of the Lord will come like a thief.

On that day the heavens will pass away with a loud noise. The elements will burn and be dissolved, and the earth and the works on it will be disclosed. Since all these things are to be dissolved in this way, it is clear what sort of people you should be in holy conduct, in godliness, as you wait for the day of God and hasten its coming. Because of that day, the heavens will be dissolved with fire and the elements will melt with with heat. But based on his promise, we wait for new heavens and a new earth where righteousness dwells.

Therefore, dear brothers, while you wait for these dear friends, while you wait for these things, make every effort to be found without spot or blemish in his sight, at peace. Giving of ourselves has always been the Christian way. Knowing that he's going to come and set up the ways of righteousness. Why don't we get in the habit of becoming righteous right now as we wait for his return? Knowing that he's going to come back and bring us not only a blessed hope, but a great reward is reason enough to serve in this way, to do what we can for him now, to enjoy it forever with Him.

And we should serve sacrificially, but we should also engage energetically in mission work motivated by Christ's return. Believers should energetically engage in mission work. In Hebrews 9:28 we read so also Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time. Not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for Him. If we know that Jesus is coming back, why would we not tell people?

Why would we not share the good news of the Gospel that Christ is our only hope in life and death? Acts 4:12 says, There is salvation in no one else, for there's no other name under heaven given to people by which we must be saved. As Christians, we know this to be true. We enjoy this to be true. It's a wonderful promise that we can trust in Christ and His finished work on our behalf.

And we should tell people that there's a way to be made right with God. There is a way to have our sin taken care of and be just restored to perfect relationship with him before it's too late, because he can return at any moment.

Penn Jillette from the famous magician duo Penn and Teller this as seen in a whole host of things. Penn Jillette is an atheist, and he's still an atheist, but he really respects Christians who share their faith. And asked once about this, he just shared a YouTube video from about 2009. Very grainy, but he kind of captures his thoughts pretty well. He says, I have always said that I don't respect people who don't proselytize.

That means just to share about your faith. He says, I don't respect that at all. If you believe that there's a heaven and a hell and people could be going to hell or not getting eternal life, and you think it's not really worth telling them because it would make it socially awkward. And atheists who think people shouldn't proselytize them just say, just leave me alone and keep your religion to yourself. He asked, how much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytize?

How much do you have to hate somebody to believe everlasting life is possible and not tell them that? I mean, if I believe beyond the shadow of a doubt that a truck was coming at you and you didn't believe that truck was bearing down on you, there's a certain point where I tackle you, and this is more important than that. It's not meant to make us feel guilt or shame, but brothers and sisters, this is the most important thing ever. A lot of times we fear the raised eyebrow. A lot of times we're so concerned with making things socially awkward, I lovingly say, so what?

We have to love the person more than we love the relationship or the convenience of the relationship. Brothers and sisters, this is what's at risk. English evangelist Glenn Scrivener offers a helpful well, it's really more of a paragraph. But he says Matthew 5 is fascinating because Jesus doesn't say, try and burn brighter. He says, you are light.

You're probably actively doing foolish things to mute your distinctiveness, to hide your light under a bushel. And it's imbecilic and it's against your nature and you're spending your time trying not to be weird. And that's the trouble. I think one of the huge issues for evangelism in the west is that most of the time my life looks indistinguishable from my non Christian friend's life. It's almost identical.

Maybe in the calendar, my Sunday mornings look different to his Sunday morning. Otherwise, how am I different from my neighbor? And one of the reasons why we get nervous about evangelism is because when we start to speak about Jesus, that's the first time that difference is injected into the relationship. And all of a sudden he says, I start to, because I feel wrongly that not being weird is the goal and blending in is the goal. And so I'm desperate to blend in.

And so I'm going to not talk about Jesus, because the moment I talk about Jesus, I'm injecting an awkward kind of difference into the relationship. Whereas I think in the New Testament it's the other way around.

Motivated by Christ's return, believers should engage in energetic mission work. We're going to read Article 9 again from our statement of faith, and we'll close with some time of application. Let's read that article again together. We believe in the personal, bodily and glorious return of our Lord Jesus Christ. The coming of Christ at a time known only to God demands constant expectancy.

And as our blessed hope motivates the believer to godly living, sacrificial service and energetic mission. We've covered a lot of ground this morning. We've read a lot of scripture, maybe heads are spinning. We're wondering what's the biggest big deal. This is just all doctrine.

Well, doctrine was never meant to just be this out there sort of idea. It always is forming our actions. So two points of application. What does this mean for us? Two points to walk out of here with.

1. Enjoy the fact that Jesus is returning and act like Jesus is returning. Enjoy the fact that Jesus is returning and act like Jesus is returning. How do you enjoy the fact that feels like a weird command. It feels like a weird thing to do.

What is that? How do I even do that? How do we do that? By knowing that this will not be how things always are. Like Brad gave me the great gift of bringing me up in the tower to see the things for the believer will only get better.

Yes, things here might be tough, might be hard. It might be worse than we could ever have imagined. But for the believer, if we look past the trees and see the horizon, we know that we will only be made better one day. This provides real relief and comfort regardless of circumstance. Let me just give you a really simple, practical thing I've done a handful of times.

Just have really enjoyed it. Read Revelation 21:1 5 for a week straight. And then when you're done reading it, think about heaven until it makes you happy. Just read Revelation 21:1 5, this beautiful picture of what heaven will be like, and just dwell on it, meditate about it, and think about it until it makes you happy and so you can feel your mood Start to change your physical demeanor. Maybe you're not a smiler.

I challenge you to smile. Thinking about heaven. A lot of times we don't think about it enough. That is the hope that is for the believer. One day is that we will get to enjoy these things.

Enjoy the fact that Jesus is returning and 2 act like Jesus is returning. Get to work. Serve in the church. Serve your spouse, serve your neighbor. Become like Jesus.

Tell people that he lived a perfect life, that he died innocent death and that he rose again to pay for his sin and they can trust him. Act like Jesus is returning. Like I said earlier, doctrine should never just sit as this 30,000 foot view. It has real implications. Every decision we make is rooted in a belief.

So it should never just sit here and be something we thought about or Talked about for 30 minutes on a Sunday morning. It should affect how we then live.

These are just two ways we can live. Knowing what we know to be true. Knowing that Christ will return. During this last song, you're invited to consider how you should respond this morning. I'm going to take the space to be quiet during the last song.

If you don't want to stand, you don't need to stand. But there'll be people in the back to pray with you to answer questions about who is this Jesus or my life just feels like something overwhelming to bear. Why does this return matter to me? If that's you this morning we invite you to go during there. Go back there during our final song.

Those people would love to help you. Our worship team is going to lead us in one last song. But just take even a brief moment to ask God, what is it that you'd have me do this morning? I'm going to pray and we'll give you the chance to do just that. God, thank you for this morning and the God that you are.

You are holy and your promises are yes and Amen in Christ Jesus. Thank you for the gift of gathering. We pray that our time together would not be in vain because we know that your word does not return void unto you. God, we pray that you would receive so much glory and honor because of our time here this morning. We pray that you would give us words, give us things, give us steps to do, to take part of and be a part of because of our time together as we live.

In light of Christ's return, it's in Jesus name we pray. Amen.