"the blessed hope" and the eager desire of every true believer. In Titus 2:13 Paul says, "Looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ." And Peter in II Peter 3:11, says: "Seeing that these things are thus all to be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy living and godliness, looking for and earnestly desiring the coming of the day of God, by reason of which the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat?" To the true believer, the Coming Again of Jesus Christ is not something to dread, but it is the brightest hope the future holds for us and it should be the object of our eager desire and longing anticipation. The last prayer in the Bible is also the cry of every intelligent Christian heart, "Amen; come, Lord Jesus" (Rev. 22:20).

But while the Return of our Lord is the blessed hope and eager desire of the true believer, it is the particular object of the hatred and ridicule of the mockers who walk after their own lusts. Peter's prediction has come true: "In the last days mockers shall come with mockery, walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of His

coming? for, from the day that the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation" (II Pet. 3:3, 4). A worldly Church and worldly Christians join with these mockers in their hatred of this truth. As a bride who is flirting with other men does not long for the return of her absent husband, so the faithless bride of Christ, who is flirting with the world does not long for the return of her Lord. But for the believer whose affections are all fixed upon Jesus Christ the Word of God contains no other promise so precious as the promise that He is quickly coming again. Our attitude toward the Coming Again of Jesus Christ is a good index of our spiritual state.

The fact that our Lord Jesus is coming again is the great Bible argument for a life of watchfulness, fidelity, wisdom, activity, simplicity, self-restraint, prayer and abiding in Christ. During the last week of His earthly life, our Lord said to His disciples, "Therefore be ye also ready; for in an hour that ye think not the son of man cometh" (Matt. 24:44). In our day we are constantly urging men to be ready because death may overtake them at any moment, but this was not the argument that our Lord Jesus used. It was

His own coming, not the coming of death, that He held up before His disciples as the incentive to live as they ought to live. Proceeding still further, He said, "Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom his lord hath set over his household, to give them food in due season? Blessed is that servant whom his lord when he cometh shall find so doing" (vs. 45.46). On another occasion our Lord was warning His disciples against the sins which are especially common in our day, overeating, over-drinking, and undue occupation with the cares of this life, "Take heed to yourselves," He said, "lest haply your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and that day come on you suddenly as a snare: for so shall it come upon all that dwell on the face of all the earth. But watch ye at every season making supplication, that ye may prevail to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man" (Luke 21:3436). It was not the physical effects of folly in eating and drinking that our Lord urged upon His disciples but rather the fact that these things would unfit them to meet Him upon His Return. The Apostle John writes to those whom he had led into the light, "Now,

little children, abide in Him; that, if He shall be manifested, we may have boldness, and not be ashamed before Him at His coming" (I John 2:28). There are many reasons why we should abide in the Lord Jesus but the pre-eminent reason in John's mind was that Jesus was coming again and that if we were to have confidence and not be ashamed before Him when He did come, we must be abiding in Him.

Our Lord Jesus tells us that His return is the one event for which we should be looking. "Let your loins be girded about," He says, "and your lamps burning; and be ye yourselves like unto men looking for their lord when he shall return from the marriage feast; that, when he cometh and knocketh, they may straightway open unto him.” (Luke 12:35, 36). In the next verse an especial blessing is pronounced upon those "Whom the Lord when He cometh shall find watching." The Holy Spirit in the 9th chapter of Hebrews and the 28th verse tells us that "to them that wait for Him," shall He "appear a second time apart from sin unto salvation." These words ought to lead us to some very deep and earnest thinking and to

ask ourselves whether we are really looking, watching, waiting for Him.

It is evident from what has been said above, that the truth of our Lord's Second Coming is a truth of the very first importance. To many the doctrine of the Second Coming of Christ seems like an impractical doctrine. I once so regarded it. In my early ministry, one of my members came to me and asked if I would speak upon the Second Coming of Christ. I knew nothing about the doctrine and put him off, thinking to myself, "You will be a much older man than you are now before I speak upon a doctrine so impractical." But the day came when I found it was not only one of the most precious but also one of the most practical doctrines in the whole Bible. There have been four marked epochs in my Christian experience: First, When I came to know the Lord Jesus as my personal Saviour and my Lord. Second, When I discovered that the Bible was indeed the inerrant Word of God, that its statements were absolutely reliable in every respect, and that everything any man needed to know was contained in this one Book. Third, When I learned that the baptism with the Holy Spirit was for the present day and claimed it for myself. And Fourth,