Statesman63
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 | | Subject: Revelation Chapter 1 (Part 4) (verse 7) Tue Oct 14, 2014 9:57 pm | |
| Revelation Chapter 1 (Part 4) (verse 7)
Verses 7-8 is a quick synopsis of the entire book. Verse 7 reads: “Look, He is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him; and all the peoples of the earth will mourn because of Him. So shall it be! Amen.” The beginning of this verse is the Second Advent of Christ, not the Rapture. The Rapture will not be too advertised. Concerning the Rapture, 1 Thessalonians 5:2 says that the “Lord will come like a thief in the night.” But concerning the 2nd Advent, we see that “every eye will see Him.” Not only will every eye on Earth see Him, but also the dead (in Hades) will see Him because it says, “even those who pierced Him.” Those who pierced Him were Jews, and they are currently dead, although it could be referring to their descendants. But recall what Jesus said to the high priest during Jesus’ trial in Mark 14:62, “‘I am,’ said Jesus, ‘And you [this high priest] will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and coming on the clouds of heaven.’”—that refers to Jesus’ Second Coming, A.K.A, 2nd Advent. Daniel 7:13-14 describes this same event: “In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a Son of Man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was lead into His presence. He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all peoples, nations and men of every language worshipped Him.” One day everyone will worship Him. Philippians 2:10 says, “...that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of the Father.”
The Second Advent technically refers to the event in Revelation 19 where Jesus returns to Earth with His saints. But the Bible seems to describe a sort of pre-Second Advent that only the 144,000 Jewish Christians get to experience. The 144,000 Jews get saved during the Tribulation, which means that they missed the Rapture. They missed the Rapture because during the Day of Grace, they rejected Jesus, the Messiah, as their Lord and Savior. Zechariah 12:10-14 seems to describe the moment that the 144,000 Jews discover Christ and get saved. I’ll include the entire passage here:
“And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on Me the One they have pierced, and they will mourn for Him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for Him as one grieves for a firstborn son. On that day the weeping in Jerusalem will be great, like the weeping of Hadad Rimmon in the plain of Megiddo. The land will mourn, each clan by itself, with their wives by themselves: the clan of David and their wives, the clan of the house of Nathan and their wives, the clan of the house of Levi and their wives, the clan of Shimei and their wives, and all the rest of the clans and their wives.”
To me, this implies that Jesus personally visits the 144,000 during the Tribulation and reveals who He is to them. He then shows them the nail piercings of His hands and feet, and they all realize who He is and repent, believe, and mourn for their prior lack of belief and mourn for what their ancestors did by crucifying Him. If this is the case, then these 144,000 are blessed with a pre-Second Advent personal visit, if you will. That would mean that the conventional Second Advent (i.e., Revelation 19) would really be the third time that Jesus sets foot back on the Earth in-between returning to Heaven. To clarify, the First Advent refers to the first time Jesus came to Earth as a baby in a manger.
Please look at 2 Chronicles 35:20-27 for information about Hadad Rimmon. Notice each of the clans mentioned: the clan of David represents the kingly division of the Jews; the clan of Levi is the priestly division of Jews. Nathan is David’s son (kingly division), and Shimei is Levi’s grandson (priestly division). Both divisions represent all of the unrepentant (yet soon to be saved) Jews at this time during the Tribulation, as they, that is, their forefathers, who had pierced Jesus at the Cross without realizing who He was and without submitting to Him. But the Spirit of grace and supplication will be poured out among them, namely, onto the 144,000 Jewish Christians that we will learn more about later in our study.
Keep in mind that the Church (believers) will not be on Earth during the 7 year Tribulation period. Jesus is going to Rapture us and the moment He does, the 7 year Tribulation will begin. We will study this. But during both the Rapture and Jesus’ Second Advent, the Church is going to be present with Him. When Jesus returns to Rapture us, the believers who died in Christ will return with Him in the clouds and the believers who are alive at the time will watch as the bodies of the dead in Christ resurrect from the grave and float up to the sky to unite with the respective soul/spirit and that soul/spirit will then have a newly resurrected spiritual body. Then the Christians who are alive and looking on, will float up to join them and while in the sky, they will have their new bodies put on, ridding their current, sin-filled bodies. Then we all leave together with Christ while the events of the Tribulation play out.
During the Second Advent of Jesus (in Revelation 19), we will again be with Him. We will be there to witness their end. Eventually, sometime near Revelation 20:11, we will be among the jury of their trials when the dead are judged. 1 Corinthians 6:2 says, “Do you not know that the saints will judge the world?” And 6:3 says, “Do you not know that we will judge angels (referring to fallen angels, or demons)?” So even though the believers have left Earth for a while (during the Tribulation), we will be back when Jesus comes back. With that in mind, let’s look at the last part of Revelation 1:7: “...and the peoples of the Earth will mourn because of Him.” Certainly, the Jews who pierced him will mourn, which we just read. They will mourn for obvious reasons when they see Him during this time as they just discover who He really is. All non-believers: atheists, all who confessed other religions, etc. will all mourn when they see the truth of Jesus because He will be here to judge and condemn them. At some point, even believers will mourn because of Him. Revelation 21:4 says, “He will wipe every tear from their eyes.” Now in order for this verse to apply, there must be tears there to be wiped at that time. The believers’ tears are not wiped until after the creation of the New Earth, well after the Tribulation period. There are many reasons why a believer would mourn because of Him, but let’s consider just a few: Christians will mourn because we will realize that we could have done much more for Him while alive on Earth; we will mourn because we will realize that we held on to idols (money, self) and did not put Jesus first in our lives; we will mourn because of the rewards we missed out in—the opportunities missed; we will mourn because of our sin. We will also mourn for those who are not with us that we failed to evangelize to. These will not be tears of joy. Jesus would not be wiping away tears of joy from our eyes, but rather, tears of sadness and regret.
I’ll cut it here because there is quite a bit to say about verse 8.
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