A gracEmail subscriber asks, "What does the Bible mean when it says that we are living in the end-time? How is that true since we live almost 2,000 years after such statements were first made? If this is the end-time, how should that affect the way we live?"
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First-century apostles and prophets repeatedly declared that the end-time had begun. Paul writes that the night is almost gone and the day is at hand (Rom.13:12). James and Peter say that the End is near (James 5:3, 8-9; 1 Pet. 4:7). Yet it would be a mistake to read these as "calendar" statements, as if Paul and Peter and James were looking into the future and reporting that they saw the End approaching. But if these are not "chronological" statements, what kind of statements are they and how are they to be understood?
The fact is that these are theological statements which occur against the background of centuries of apocalyptic literature and prophetic expectation. During the 700 years leading up to Jesus Christ, the Hebrew prophets -- men such as Isaiah and Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel, Joel and Zechariah -- had foretold a future age which would be marked by a variety of eschatological or end-time events. After Jesus had died and risen from the dead, after the remarkable day of Pentecost 50 days later, the early Christians looked back on what had taken place. What they saw boggled their minds and stirred their enthusiasm! For they saw many of the very end-time events the prophets had foretold -- the Jewish Messiah, the beginning of the resurrection from the dead, a message of salvation for all nations and the coming of God's Holy Spirit
Clearly, the End has begun. But equally clearly, as time went on, it has been interrupted -- for reasons flowing out of God's saving purpose, until a day and hour which even Jesus himself said that he did not know. "Watch, therefore," is Jesus' emphatic word. "Be ready!" The End began with Jesus' first advent. It will conclude with his second advent. We are people of the interim. We are end-time people. In the next gracEmail we will consider some implications this has for the way we think and live.
A gracEmail subscriber asks, "What does the Bible mean when it says that we are living in the end-time? How is that true since we live almost 2,000 years after such statements were first made? If this is the end-time, how should that affect the way we live?"
* * *
The resurrection of Jesus and the pouring out of God's Spirit on believers were two of several eschatological or end-time events foretold by the Hebrew prophets. The end-time has begun although it has not yet reached its finale. How should we live in this interim between the Messiah's first and his final appearing? How should we think and behave as end-time people, as "advent" Christians? Other than affecting our attitude toward purchasing real estate in perpetuity (is this part of the reason we don't read about church buildings in the New Testament?), apostolic writers give us at least four related answers to such questions.
1. We should live confidently, Paul says in Romans 5:1ff. We know what awaits us. We know where history is going. We know how God's final chapter will unfold in the story of human beings and this earth.
2. We should live moral lives that reflect the light God has shone through Jesus Christ. This involves personal holiness (Rom. 13:11-14) as well as the way we relate to the world (1 Cor. 7:29-31) and to each other (1 Thes. 5; 1 Pet. 4:7-11). It also calls us to live in love toward our neighbors in the world (Rom. 13:8-12).
3. We should live expectantly -- we are waiting for a Savior, our life, who is bringing the fullness of our redemption and our salvation (1 Cor. 1:7-8; Phil. 3:20-21; Heb. 9:27-28; Titus 2:11-13). Jesus can return any day!
4. We should live courageously, for God is on our side in Jesus Christ (2 Cor. 4:8-18). Work done for Christ will not be wasted effort (1 Cor. 15:58).
May God preserve us all, body, soul and spirit, until the coming of Jesus Christ our Lord. Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
For more on living in the end-time, click here.