Episode Details

“You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.”May I speak in God’s name, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.The Coming of the Son of ManThe context for our passage today is the coming of the Son of Man, meaning the return of Christ. This is a basic part of our orthodox profession of faith: ‘He shall come again in glory to judge both the quick and the dead’, as the Nicene Creed puts it.In this passage, Christ tells us some crucial facts about what his return will look like. And if we listen to him and really take him seriously then our mindset and our lives should change. We cannot possibly hear these words and believe that Christ really spoke them and not be shaken to the core.What, then, do we learn about his return from this discourse?Nobody knows when it will beFirstly, nobody knows when the return of Christ will be: not the angels of heaven, not even the Son himself, but only the Father. The precise timing of the return of Christ is a mystery hidden deep within the Godhead. Nobody knows it. (Matt. 24:36)There have been many attempts to predict the return of Christ but such attempts are folly and lead to disaster and distraction. There is a reason that God has kept this a secret. We can speculate that the reason is because God desires us to live the kind of life that Jesus tells us to live: one of spiritual alertness and preparation. We wouldn’t do that quite so readily if we had convinced ourselves that the return of Christ would not happen for, say, ten thousand years.The fact that we do not know and that it could be now or it could be in ten thousand years means that we must always be prepared for it.It will be as in the days of NoahSecondly, the return will be as it was in the days of Noah: “…in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage…they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away” (Matt. 24:38-39).Christ could not be plainer: the ordinary course of the world will be continuing as it usually does and people will not be expecting what is to come.In those days – that is the days of Noah – people were doing all the normal things – eating, drinking, marrying and giving in marriage. In the final days, it will be the same. People will be doing those things. In our day, we might say that people will be binge-watching TV and going to work and taking their children to birthday parties and going on holidays.All of those things will be going on as normal and most people will be oblivious.Again, we might be tempted to soften what Christ is saying here. But he is speaking of Noah’s flood as a literal historical event in which the vast majority of the human race were swept away. It will be like that before I come also, says Christ. Most people will be getting on with things as per normal and they will be taken by surprise.The Greek word from which we get “flood” in this passage is very resonant: kataklusmos. This is where the modern English word “cataclysm” comes from. Kataklusmos means literally a deluge that passes over everything. Nothing is untouched by it. It affects everything in the world.As was Noah’s flood, so will it be when the Son of Man comes.“One will be taken and one left…”“Then two men will be in the field; one will be taken and one left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one left” (Matt. 24:40-41).What does Christ mean by this? There is a very widespread misinterpretation of this passage that has been around for about two-hundred years. That misinterpretation says that the ones who are taken are those who are “raptured” by Christ into Heaven before a period of tribulation through which the rest of the earth’s population will pass. This interpretation did not exist in the Church until about 1830 and it is a misunderstanding.The immediate context helps us to see: “…they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away.” Those who are swept away are the same ones who are taken. The