Louie Giglio - Jesus is Coming Soon
We are in Advent; we are on our way to Christmas. Advent is about waiting and expectation. However, we are also closing out our certainty series, and the message today is that there is something you can be sure of, even in a time of uncertainty and chaos. That certainty is that Jesus is coming soon. That’s the message today: Jesus is coming soon. You can be sure of it.
You may ask, «Well, Louie, how do you know this? Do you have inside information on some astrological phenomenon?» No. «Do you have access to some prophecy that maybe we haven’t heard yet?» No. Then how can you say with such confidence today and with certainty today that Jesus is coming soon? I can say this today, and you can receive it because Jesus told us he is coming soon. I’m certain that Jesus is coming soon because he said so. He told his followers in John 14, «Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me, that you also may be where I am. You know the way to the place where I am going.»
This has been the plan all along—that Jesus would come at Christmas and do what only he could do, but that he would come again to planet Earth. I want you to know Jesus is coming soon.
Now, we have an asterisk after the word «soon,» so we need to look into that for a moment and get our hearts and minds around it. Soon, in the biblical sense, is a relative term. When used in relation to the eternal nature of the Almighty, who exists outside time and space yet concurrently operates within the confines of finite human history, «soon» can be interpreted by the eternal mind to mean promptly, as in right now, or to mean a future time, say, within the next 100 to 1,000 years. The latter, in God’s time, is the equivalent of one human day. Therefore, soon, Jesus is coming soon.
The goal in this message is to listen to what Jesus has said, to make seven obvious observations, and then to offer seven essential applications. So number one: let’s listen to what Jesus said. I’m opening my Bible to Matthew chapter 24. In this text, we know that Jesus has arrived in Jerusalem prior to the crucifixion and resurrection, and theologians call these chapters and this teaching the Olivet Discourse because Jesus is on the Mount of Olives. That sounds intriguing and exciting! Don’t you want to text someone right now and say, «We’re in the Olivet Discourse today! Get on board, quick! Get online!»
But Jesus is in the last days, so he can see the cross from where he is right now. He can see the city; he knows how it’s going to play out. Passover is just a few days away, and Jesus is unpacking some incredible truth. In fact, when I look at the way my Bible is laid out, I see a little bit of chapter 23, all of 24, and the first few verses of 25—all in red except for two verses. One of the two verses is a descriptor telling us where Jesus is while he’s teaching, and the other of the two verses that’s not in red is a question that his disciples ask him. When they ask the question, he gives the answer and elaborates for a while.
So if it’s okay with everyone here, and even if it’s not, I would just like to read all of Matthew 24. So let’s take a deep breath and say, «Lord, thank you for the opportunity today to sit under the reading of the very words of the Son of God.»
The header says, «Signs of the End of the Age.» Jesus left the temple and was walking away when his disciples came up to him to call his attention to its buildings. «Do you see all these things?» he asked. «I tell you the truth: not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.» As Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately. «Tell us,» they said, «when will this happen, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?» Jesus answered: «Watch out that no one deceives you. For many will come in my name, claiming, 'I am the Christ, ' and will deceive many. You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of birth pains.»
«Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. At that time, many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other. Many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold. But he who stands firm to the end will be saved, and this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.»
«So when you are standing in the holy place—the abomination that causes desolation spoken of through the prophet Daniel—let the reader understand. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. Let no one on the roof of his house go down to take anything out of the house. Let no one in the field go back to get his cloak. How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers! Pray that your flight will not take place in winter or on the Sabbath, for then there will be great distress unequaled from the beginning of the world until now and never to be equaled again. If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive, but for the sake of the elect, those days will be shortened.»
«At that time, if anyone says to you, 'Look! Here is the Christ! ' or 'There he is! ' do not believe it. For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and miracles to deceive, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you ahead of time. So if anyone tells you, 'There he is, out in the desert, ' do not go out; or 'Here he is, in the inner room, ' do not believe it. For his lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Wherever there is a carcass, the vultures will gather.»
«Immediately after the distress of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken. At that time, the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn. They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory. He will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.»
«Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see all these things, you know that it is near, right at the door. I tell you the truth: this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away. No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.»
«As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left.»
«Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. But understand this: if the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into. So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.»
«Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom the master has put in charge of the servants in his household, to give them their food at the proper time? It will be good for that servant whose master finds him doing so when he returns. I tell you the truth: he will put him in charge of all his possessions. But suppose that servant is wicked and says to himself, 'My master is staying away a long time.' And he then begins to beat his fellow servants and to eat and drink with drunkards. The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not aware of. He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.»
Thank God for the power of his word.
Seven obvious observations:
Number one: There is a context within the context. As we think about the end times and realize today that Jesus is coming soon and we hear his teaching, there’s context, and then there’s context, and then there’s context. There’s the context of history that has passed—Daniel is in the mix. There’s the context of the present moment. There’s context of history that’s coming very soon, and then there’s the greater context of the end of the age.
We see two questions that are asked of Jesus: «Tell us, when will this happen?» In other words, you said this temple’s coming down; when is that going to happen? And the second question is, «What will be the sign of your coming and the sign of the end of the age?» You can’t get confused when you get down to verse 34 and Jesus says, «I tell you the truth: this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened.» Well, in context, the temple has already been destroyed; the temple is now rebuilt, but in A.D. 70, it’s going to be destroyed again by Titus. All the people listening to Jesus teach were actually going to see all the stones of the temple fall one on top of the other 40 years from this moment—in A.D. 70, as Titus destroys the temple.
So every time we’re reading through this, there’s going to be context within the context. That’s an obvious observation.
Secondly, deception is the enemy’s game. The first thing Jesus tells us as he begins to answer the two questions is, «Watch out that no one deceives you.» If you look through the text, I put a dot in my text every time the word «deceive» appears. You see that in verse 11 and verse 24—deception. The enemy’s plan for you and me, in light of the fact that Jesus is coming soon, is that you would get deceived.
The third big observation is that faith is going to wane. Verse 12 says that as wickedness increases, this is such a heartbreaking verse: the faith of most will grow cold.
The fourth big observation is that the hinge point in the coming of Jesus is the fulfillment of the Great Commission. It says in verse 14, «This gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations,» and that’s not necessarily all countries. The word is ethnos—to all peoples on Earth. Then the end will come. The thing that triggers all of this and sets it all in motion is the proclamation of the gospel of the kingdom of Jesus to every ethnos on planet Earth. The Great Commission, just to be clear, is still, «Go, therefore, into all the world and preach the gospel to all people.» This is still the mission of the people of God.
The fifth big observation is the abomination that causes desolation. This is one of those passages that a lot of theologians debate very robustly, but just to break it down into its obvious observation: Daniel was prophesying about the rise of a person who would absolutely come in abject opposition to the worship of God in the temple. Think about this: Daniel’s whole writing opens with the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego because Nebuchadnezzar built an idol of himself and said, «If you don’t bow down to this idol, you’re going in the fiery furnace.»
We’ve already got a ransacking of the temple in Jerusalem, and now we have exiles in Babylon and someone putting himself in a position to say, «I am God, and you bow down to me or you go in the fiery furnace.» That is the abomination of desolation in a nutshell. Daniel predicts that there’s going to be more of this. We see this in about 165 B.C. when Antiochus Epiphanes IV comes and invades Jerusalem—this Greek ruler of the Seleucid kingdom—and history tells us he came right into the temple and halted the worship of God, Yahweh. He sacrificed a swine on the altar and put up an idol of Zeus in the temple of God. The abomination comes against the temple and specifically against the altar, specifically coming against the blood of the Lamb.
This is idolatry, but it’s idolatry that’s so brazen that it would stand right in the midst of the story of Jesus and say, «Forget about the blood of the Lamb; I am the one who is to be worshipped and exalted.» The result of this act brings desolation, and desolation means a wasteland, barrenness, empty, meaningless, and futile. If you ask the average psychologist to describe the psyche of the human condition, they would say futile, meaningless, and empty. Why? Because man is already trying to supplant God, and the hearts are growing cold, brazen in the world, with people standing in the holy place saying, «Forget about the blood of the Lamb; we are good to save ourselves.»
The sixth big and obvious observation is that Christ’s return is a public event. Verse 27 says, «For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.»
The seventh big observation that I think is important for us to see is that everyone won’t make it in the end. Two men are in a field; one is taken, and one is left. Two women are using a hand mill; one is taken up, and one is left behind.
So what are the seven applications we should walk away with today? In other words, does Jesus' planned and clearly announced return impact our lives in significant ways?
The first application is to live alert, not alarmed. Don’t you love that in verse 6? These are Jesus' words, by the way: He said, «You’ll hear of wars and rumors of wars.» Now, every time we hear of wars and rumors of wars, or the moons are doing something, or the sun did something, or there’s an asteroid out there that’s coming near Earth in 20 years or 30 years, or the election went this way or that way, or some ruler in some country said this, or there was an earthquake or a tsunami, the average believer I know gets pretty alarmed. Jesus himself said, «Don’t be alarmed when you hear about wars and rumors of wars; when there are earthquakes in various places, don’t be alarmed.» Why shouldn’t we be alarmed? Because I’ve already told you how all this is going to play out.
So instead of being alarmed when you read or hear something, or when that little prophetic email comes in your inbox saying, «Oh my goodness, somebody knows something I need to know!"—no, you don’t need to be alarmed. What I would prefer is for you to be alert. I prefer for you to wake up tomorrow and say, «Jesus is coming soon,» and he could come imminently, immediately today. He could come in 100 years, which is also soon, but he could come right now. I want to live alert—I don’t want to be frantic, and I don’t want to live alarmed—why? Because Jesus said, «Don’t be alarmed.» I’m going to put my confidence in him.
The second application is to stay close to the original, the O.G. What do I mean by that? Well, if the enemy’s game is deception, what’s the best way to avoid being deceived? Stay real close to the O.G. Keep your eyes on Jesus. Keep your ears attuned to Jesus. Build your life on the words of Jesus, and don’t listen to anything else but him. Because deception wants to get our eyes off who he is and onto what they say.
Here’s a simple application takeaway: Knowing that Jesus is coming soon, focus your life on the revealed Jesus—not some hidden prophecy. In other words, keep leaning into Jesus every day instead of digging around and looking for and listening to the next prophecy that somebody will say. Just keep your eyes on Jesus because when he comes, if he’s coming soon, you’ll have your eyes locked on him when he arrives.
The third application is to live ready. This is what Jesus says in the text. In verse 44, he says, «So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.» If you expect him every hour, then be ready. You say, «Well, Louie, I would kind of like to know what day he is coming.» I would ask you why. You might say, «Because if I knew what day he was coming, that would set in motion a series of events.» I would respond: then you should set those events in motion. If I knew he was coming next Thursday, I’d call my aunt in Toledo, and I would get there. You should call her.
If I knew he was coming in February, I would take some of my cash out of my stash, and I would invest it in gospel proclamation among the ethnos. Well, then you should do that. You see, the enemy has us fixating on a specific day, when Jesus is saying, «Be ready today.»
The fourth application is to draw close to the flame. Have you ever been camping when it’s cold at night, and everyone just keeps scooting up closer and closer to the fire? By the end of the night, everyone’s knees are right up next to it because they are trying to get one more log on there. People are looking for twigs and sticks, trying to stay as close to the fire as possible. In this age, I believe that the number one operating mindset for believers is to stay close to the flame. We know in scripture the flame is the Holy Spirit of God.
So stay close to the flame and live in a community of people who want to get around that flame. Live among people who know Jesus is coming soon—who have a kingdom mindset and are on fire for Jesus. When your fire wanes a little, theirs doesn’t, and you’re not just hanging out with people who are talking about worldly concerns; you’re with people who want to stay close to the flame. Because in the end, the telltale sign of the Son of Man coming is that most will grow cold. So what am I doing today to make sure my heart stays close to the flame?
The fifth takeaway is to become an evangelist. Not everyone is going to make it, but everyone deserves an opportunity to hear the gospel. In this text, Jesus uses the term «elect» several times: he will gather the elect from the four winds. Some of these false prophets will perform great miracles—looking like the real thing—and they will deceive even the elect if that’s possible.
We could get into a debate about what the elect means, but if there are some called the elect, why should I care about sharing Jesus with my co-worker? Apparently, there are already some people who will make it and some who won’t. Skip the debate and spread the news because Jesus said, «Go, therefore, into all the earth and preach the gospel to all nations.» So, what about this and that? Just focus on the words of Jesus: «Go into all the earth.» Go to your work, your family, your neighborhood—wherever you go and become an evangelist. Why, you might ask? Because you are your evangelist for your people. If Jesus is coming soon, you want to arrive in heaven as an evangelist, and when he walks through the door, you want to be telling someone about him.
Number six: make the move. In other words, transfer into heaven whatever you’d like there. Now, this is a little interesting, but I haven’t thought about it quite like this. Heaven is an amazing accommodation. When Jesus said, «I’m going away to prepare a place for you, that where I am, you may be also,» there’s an accommodation being made for you in heaven—but it’s unfurnished. What do you mean? No, you furnish it!
You might say, «Well, that sounds a bit legalistic.» No, the grace of God gives you life forever and prepares a place for you in heaven, but it’s unfurnished currently. Jesus said, «Store up for yourselves treasures in heaven.» If you think, «I don’t have a lot,» or «I’m in debt right now,» there are ways to furnish it that don’t require a financial investment. Start now, knowing Jesus is coming soon.
Make the move from Earth to heaven. Some of us have spent the entire pandemic looking at houses but have never spent five minutes thinking about the one being prepared for us in heaven. You know how they say you can’t take it with you? You’ve never seen a hearse pulling a U-Haul trailer because the U-Haul trailer isn’t on the back of the hearse; it’s on the front. You put it there before you got in.
The seventh takeaway, and I hope I’m okay and not on too thin of ice here: go all in on red 14. Now, that’s a casino term, and I don’t know if 14 is red or black on the roulette table, but I know 18 is red. One time, we were in Las Vegas for a Christian event, true, but we went to see the fountains at the Bellagio. Has anyone seen them before? You just wanted to see the fountains; you didn’t want to go there to gamble or anything, but you can’t go anywhere in the Bellagio without passing through the casino.
So, we were walking through the casino, and a friend of ours was on the phone with someone who wasn’t with us, and he said, «Put something on red 18.» So, we walked over to the roulette wheel, put something on red 18, and bam—red 18! We cashed out and left the Bellagio. That might be a prophetic word for somebody: Jesus is coming soon, red 18.
But a better word is to go all in on red 14. This gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all peoples, and then the end will come. People often say, «I’m convinced Jesus is coming soon,» and I’m like, «No, you’re not.»
«Oh yes, I believe he’s coming soon; anyone could tell you I believe he’s coming right now!»
I’m like, «No, you don’t.»
They respond, «I’m telling you I believe Jesus is coming soon.»
Then I ask, «Have you cashed out your 401(k)?»
They say no. «Are you still living in your house?»
Then you don’t believe Jesus is coming soon. If you believe he’s coming soon, you’re going to cash out your 401(k), and you’ll hire someone to smuggle you into Yemen with a translator, going into the mountains of Yemen for about 48 hours before you’re dead. But, with all the money you took out, you’ve funded 100 others to get smuggled in, so you’ve got about 148 hours before 100 people are dead.
Why? Because the Yemenis are on the list of the top eight unreached peoples on planet Earth, right up there with North Korea, Somalia, Afghanistan, and Eritrea. «Oh, no! I believe Jesus is coming! Maybe this year, Louie.»
Well, if you do, then put it all on red 14. Because he’s not coming until all of them have heard the gospel of the kingdom, and if this is the way he’s coming and when he’s coming, then don’t we want to go all in for the 3.2 billion people on Earth who have this much access to the gospel or the one billion people who don’t have a word of this scripture in their heart language?
Jesus is coming soon; we better go all in on red 14. I believe God has spoken today in a specific way. It wasn’t in any of the notes, but just as we wrap up, I believe he’s saying to someone today, «Let go of that offense because Jesus is coming soon, and when he does, he’s going to make it right.» So, let go of it and get on with your life.
Oh man, I believe that’s a word for somebody today. It wasn’t even in the notes, but I can’t really say it’s in the text: let go of the offense that you are carrying around because Jesus is coming soon. When he comes, you’ll be the one carrying a 50-pound offense from something someone said to you 20 years ago. Let it go.
Let it go. «Yeah, but they owe me $75; well, they never paid me back for the thing when we sold the house.» Let it go! Jesus is coming, and when he comes, you’ll get your $75 back. When he comes, he’ll say, «You were right; you were wrong.» When he comes, he’s going to put everything right, and what are you doing? You’re missing out on your life because you’re holding on to some offense that Jesus is going to make right.
Let it go and get on with living your life. Jesus is coming soon. You can be sure of that.