Look Up

Luke 21:28 (NIV)

"When these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near."

Most mornings my eyes open once my wife has awakened the boys for school. The sound of their early morning chatter always makes me smile. I don’t get up just yet, though. I usually reach for my phone to catch up on the news from overnight. This past Friday morning was no different.

I grabbed my cell and quickly glanced at my twitter feed. Immediately I noticed a tweet from @BreakingNews. It spoke of an overnight earthquake off the coast of California. My interest was piqued only for a moment. After all, earthquakes have become a normal occurrence, and since I didn’t read of any major damage, I moved on down my timeline.

It didn’t take long to notice the next tweet from @BreakingNews. It was an update that told of the US sending 400 American Troops into Turkey. Alerted? Yes; but only for few moments. After all, we’ve been nation at war for most of my kid’s life. It’s become almost commonplace. It’s somewhat expected and didn’t seem to be cause for alarm.

But Friday continued. We said goodbye and sent our boys off to catch the bus and began our day, just as every other day. I had several things on the agenda and was anxiously looking forward to attacking my to-do list.

The day continued and it was time for lunch, so I decided to check out my timeline again. @BreakingNews this time told of police responding to a shooting at an elementary school in Connecticut. Are you kidding me?

With each timeline update, more reports came in and more questions accumulated. This one had my attention. This one had America’s attention. I couldn’t shrug it off. I had kids in an elementary school.

It was then that my mind reverted back to the previous news items from earlier that morning, and I felt my spirit alerting me. Jesus is coming!

The disciples had questions concerning His second coming and the end of the age (Matthew 24). Among other things, Jesus spoke of rumors of wars, earthquakes, kingdoms rising against kingdoms. He spoke of afflictions, offenses, betrayal, and hatred. He spoke of iniquity multiplying and love growing cold.

 

I have heard the message preached my entire life—Jesus is soon to come. I believed it then. But because it hasn’t happened yet doesn’t weaken my faith in His coming one bit. I have more faith in His appearing today than I’ve ever had. How can’t you? When you compare the Scripture to the daily events in our newspapers, it only builds my faith that what He said would happen is happening—daily.

 

Paul wrote to young Timothy concerning the last days. Take a look and see if what he mentioned seems familiar:

 

2 Timothy 3:1-5 (NIV)

 

1 But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. 2 People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3 without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, 4 treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God - 5 having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.

 

Without a doubt, we are living in that day. This isn’t the time for us to be half-hearted. This isn’t the day for us to be inconsistent or unfaithful. This isn’t the hour for hypocrisy. Now is the time for us to lean on the Lord, and upon the strength of brothers and sisters in the faith. Now is the time for the church to stand true and stand strong. Now is the time for those who have grown cold and turned away to return to the Father’s house.

It’s not time to put your head down in fear. It’s not time to look to the left or right for compromise. It’s not time to look back to the past in regret. Now, folks is the time to look up! Look up! For our redemption is near!