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Can We Welcome the Second Coming of Jesus Christ If We Only Wait for His Revelations?
By Wang Qiang
In 1989, I believed in the Lord Jesus with my wife. At that time, I was in my 30s and willingly spent and sacrificed for the Lord. Our pastor and elder thought I was a promising young man, so they thought highly of me. Before long, I became a good preacher and often preached the gospel with the pastor here and there, contacting many church leaders.
As I worked with the pastor, I often heard him say, “When the Lord comes back He will give revelations to those who work hard for Him and personally reveal to pastors and elders, for they are very familiar with the Bible and always work hard for Him.” These words were deeply rooted in my heart and I thought: If one wants to welcome the Lord’s return and receive His revelations, he must be a person who works hard for Him. Only such people can be approved by the Lord and gain His revelations. For this, I worked more diligently, spending and sacrificing for the Lord, and often did charity, donate. I preached the Lord’s gospel everywhere, and built more than ten churches in less than one year. Seeing the fruit of my hard work, I felt very flattered inside, thinking: When the Lord returns, He will surely give me a revelation …
One day, on my way home after a meeting, my co-worker Brother Zhang asked me, “Brother Wang, we have been waiting for the Lord’s return for these years. Now all the prophecies of the Lord’s return have basically been fulfilled. Why hasn’t the Lord come to receive us?” Hearing these words, I said confusedly, “Indeed, we watch and pray, wait for the Lord’s revelations every day, deeply fearing to miss the opportunity to be raptured by the Lord. Yet so many years have passed, we still haven’t received the Lord’s revelations. I really don’t know when the Lord will come back and receive us.” At this time, Brother Zhang said to me seriously, “Brother Wang, all these years we have been waiting for the Lord’s revelations and considering that when the Lord returns He will surely give revelations to us. The Lord is faithful. Since He has promised that He will come back, He will not delay. Now the prophecies of the Lord’s return have been already fulfilled. So, have you ever thought that the Lord may have returned but does not give revelations to us as we have imagined?” “It’s impossible.” Upon hearing his words I interrupted him immediately, “All these years I fast, watch, and pray without any interruption. It’s impossible that the Lord won’t give a revelation to me when He comes back.”
Brother Zhang said to me sincerely, “Please calm down and listen to me, Brother Wang. The Lord’s return is a great matter; we must take it seriously. Let’s think carefully; pastors and elders tell us to wait for the Lord’s revelations, but the Lord didn’t say He would give us revelations when He came back. The Lord Jesus said, ‘My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me’ (John 10:27). ‘Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me’ (Revelation 3:20). ‘He that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches’ (Revelation 2:7). These verses tell us that the Lord will speak words when He appears in the last days, and also tell us to pay attention to listening to His voice rather than receiving revelations. If the Lord would give revelations to man, then why did He say that His sheep hear His voice? Isn’t this a contradiction? Think again. When God comes, do you really think He’ll definitely give revelations to all those who have done extensive reading of the Bible and worked hard for Him? At that time, when the Lord Jesus came, He didn’t show revelations to the chief priests, scribes, and Pharisees who were constant readers of the Bible and had served God their whole lives. In our conceptions, those people served God for many years, worked hard for Him, and were familiar with the Bible, so they were best qualified to receive God’s revelations. However, God didn’t give any revelations to them. On the contrary, the Lord Jesus chose those who longed for and sought the truth, such as Peter, John, Matthew, Philip, and so on. Did any one of them receive the Lord’s revelations first before they followed the Lord Jesus? No one. The fact was that all of them heard the voice of the Lord and recognized from the Lord’s words and work that He was the Messiah who had been prophesied to come and thus followed Him. From this we can see that only those who humbly seek and long for the truth can receive God’s enlightenment and see His appearance, or else man will easily become an opponent of God. Through all the ages, the believers in God are as many as the stars in the sky, but those who can receive God’s direct revelations are few in number. When the Lord Jesus was born, God just revealed to the Magi, the shepherds and Simeon, but most followers of the Lord didn’t receive God’s revelations. The Lord Jesus said, ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. … Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled. … Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God’ (Matthew 5:3, 6, 8). As believers in the Lord, we should be wise virgins as the Lord Jesus asked, listening for God’s voice. Brother Wang, in the matter of welcoming the Lord’s return, we must seek and investigate carefully; only in this way can we hear the Lord’s voice and see His appearance. If we just blindly wait for the revelations from the Lord, but do not seek and investigate actively, then we will really become foolish virgins abandoned by Him. …”
That night, I lay awake tossing and turning, and thought to myself: What Brother Zhang said sounds reasonable. Among us believers, some came to believe in the Lord because of illness, some believe because of family misfortunes, some because of marriage setbacks, some others didn’t wholly believe until they received some grace and peace, and so on. None of us began to believe in the Lord after receiving a revelation. We accepted the Lord Jesus’ salvation because of others’ fellowship and testimony, and the accounts of the Bible. In the past, those Pharisees heard the Lord Jesus’ words and saw His deeds, but instead of seeking and investigating, they tried to find all kinds of accusations against the Lord Jesus and condemned Him, and moreover, they instigated people to resist Him. In the end, they joined forces with the Roman government to nail Him to the cross. Clearly, knowing the scriptures doesn’t represent being qualified to receive the Lord’s revelations, much less represent knowing the Lord. Jehovah God said, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways…. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Isaiah 55:8–9). God’s wisdom is unfathomable to man. Yet I delineated that the Lord will give revelations to pastors and elders first when He returns; isn’t this too arrogant, too self-righteous, and too unreasonable? Thus, it’s too prone for me to resist God. If I keep waiting for the Lord’s revelations and don’t believe until I see Him, then things would be like what the Lord Jesus said to Thomas, “because you have seen me, you have believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed” (John 20:29). If so, won’t I become the same as Thomas? Aren’t such people in trouble? The more I thought about it, the more scared I was, and I thought I must make it clear. The Lord’s return is a great matter. If I miss the opportunity to be raptured by the Lord, wouldn’t my believing have been in vain? Brother Zhang’s words were full of the enlightenment from the Holy Spirit, I must go to seek more from him …
Source The Internet
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