4. The Second Coming of Christ: The Blessed Hope (Remastered)

The Second Coming of Christ: The Blessed Hope

R.J. Rushdoony

A young man once told me that he was shaken when he met for the first time, well up in his twenties, one of his grandfathers. The resemblance in person, aptitudes, and habits, was so striking that it humbled him and took away his arrogant self-sufficiency. He could not see himself as self-made, he saw the part heredity had played.

The same is true in the area of beliefs. Many of our beliefs are not biblical but pagan, a part of our inheritance. One Greek idea which has profoundly influenced the church is the ‘deus ex machina’ concept. This Latin phrase means literally ‘the god out of the machine.’ It refers to a device common in Greek and Roman theater, but it is found elsewhere also, in epics and poems. Instead of a moral and religious solution to a crisis, a ‘god’ appears to rescue the person in trouble, even though justice is about to catch up with him. For example; In Homer’s Iliad, Paris the adulterer, when about to be killed in battle by the angry Menelaus, is rescued by the goddess of love Aphrodite and brought into Helen’s bedchamber.

According to Homer, Menelaus confronted Paris in battle

“So saying, he leapt upon him and caught him by his horse-hair crest, and swinging him around dragged him towards the well-greaved Achaeans; and he was strangled by the embroidered strap beneath his soft throat, drawn tight below his chin to hold his helm. Now would Manalaus have dragged him away and won glory unspeakable, but that Zeus’s daughter Aphrodite was swift to mark, and tore asunder for him the strap of slaughtered ox hide, so the helmet came away empty in his stalwart hand.

There at Menalaus cast it with a swing toward the well-greaved Achaeans, and his trusty comrade took it out and himself sprang back again eager to slay him with a spear of bronze. But Aphrodite snatched up Paris very easily, as a goddess may, and hid him in thick darkness and set him down in his fragrant perfumed chamber and herself went to summon Helen.” 1

Now the basic elements of this episode was first that morality had nothing to do with divine action. The Greek gods acted never on a moral basis, only a personal one. Miraculous deliverance meant personal allegiance by a god, goddess, or the gods towards someone. Then second, causality was set aside. In fact, causality in any biblical sense is alien to classical thought. Greek tragedies stress the fact that human beings are the helpless pawns of the gods. Oedipus suffered great horrors at no fault of his own, and so on and on in the Greek tragedies and epics.

This ‘deus ex machina’ concept has infiltrated into the church. Over the years I have encountered examples of it both Protestant and Catholic, which are painful to hear or read! Some of the worst examples are St. Alphonsus de Liguori in his The Glories of Mary, 1750, which, we can be grateful, is now more or less forgotten. In that book, St. Alphonsus told a story of a nun who for fifteen years was absent from her convent and living in sexual sin. During that time, supposedly, the virgin Mary took her place and appearance at the convent, and she was able to return in due time without shame. Now, this tale of the nun Beatrice was a famous one in Liguori’s day, and many believed it! Such ‘deus ex machina’ stories have no relationship to the Bible, but over the generations they have been popular in Catholic and Protestant circles.

Of course some claim there are parallels to it in the Bible, the ascension of Elijah, but it is a radically different story in that Elijah is not being rescued from the consequence of sin, but entering into his reward. Or possibly the deliverance of Elisha from the Assyrian army, but this is simply God’s protection of His prophetic voice to that generation.

Paganism, with its deus ex machina perspective denied first that God’s moral order governs all things. Because paganism is radically antinomian where God’s Law is concerned, it denied the essential fact of causality; namely that God, with His law and His causal moral order governs all things whether directly or providentially. For Liguori’s nun, Beatrice, to resume her virginal status after fifteen years of whoring, was a denial of God’s order.

Then second, the deus ex machina mentality is a denial of responsibility and growth. Men have only to appeal to or await the deliverance of the gods or God without any growth on their part nor any biblical faith. All this is relevant to our subject, ‘the Second Coming, the Blessed Hope.’ It is not a ‘deus ex machina’ deliverance from the mess we are in! We are not raptured out of the mess we have made! It is a culmination of God’s plan, and a blessing to our faith, to our service, it is victory in and under Jesus Christ the King over all kings.

Our lord spoke repeatedly of his coming again, a single event.

“And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.” 2

At the ascension the angels declared Jesus Christ would return again, a single return. Certain events would occur between the first and the Second Coming. First, the gentiles will be brought into the kingdom. As Louis Berkhof pointed out, this means a full preaching to all the nations, for:

“…the evangelization of all nations… [is] the goal of history.” 3

A great task confronts Christ’s people before the end, and it will be a successful one because he is with us in it ‘til the end.

Second, the fullness of Israel will be brought in. This does not refer to a national restoration of Israel, but to the salvation of all who are in the true Israel of God; His elect people.

Third, there will be a great apostasy and tribulation, and while many will not agree with this as a sequential thing,our intention here is simply to list these events, not to give a chronology.

Fourth, there is what Berkhof calls, “the coming revelation of antichrist.” However, with this I would disagree because ‘antichrist’ is mentioned only four times in Scripture, and in none of these instances is he a single and exclusively future person, it is those who deny Christ, that He has come in the flesh. The reference 2 Thessalonians 2:3-5, to, “that man of sin,” is wrongly confused with antichrist. Many persons are antichrist, the man of sin is a person or a movement from within God’s Temple who makes ungodly claims for himself in the name of Christ.

Now, without going into the details of these intervening things, it is clear that a worldwide conversion and triumph precede the Second Coming. Christians have no warrant to sit back and wait for an any-moment return or to wait to be raptured out of tribulation. They have a world to conquer for Christ, and a world-order to establish for and in Him.

Paul writes in Titus 2:11-14

“For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ; Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.”

Now too often the words, “that blessed hope,” are abstracted from this text without giving the context. And as the old proverb has it, “a text without a context is a pretext.” Calvin said of Paul’s exhortation in all of this chapter, Titus 2, that it:

“...aims at nothing else than keeping the law…” 4

For Paul that blessed hope was not escapism, it was victory after battle. Christ rescues us from the curse, to deliver us into his service. Our hope is blessed because it assures us of happiness and victory, as Calvin in more than one place underscores. According to William Hendriksen:

“Our great God and Savior Christ Jesus to whose appearing in glory believers look forward with such hope and joy is the one who gave himself for us in order to redeem us from all lawlessness, and to purify for himself a people his very own with a zest for noble deeds.” 5

Hendriksen went on to point out, Paul tells us that Christ gave himself for us with a twofold purpose; first, to redeem us from the power of sin and death, from lawlessness, second, to purify for himself a people for his service. Moreover, again quoting Hendriksen:

“Formerly, Israel was Jehovah’s peculiar people, now the church is. And just as Israel was characterized by zeal for the law, so now Christ purifies his people with this very purpose in mind, namely that it shall be a people for his own possession with a zest for noble deeds, deeds which proceed from faith, and are done according to God’s Law and unto his glory.” 6

The purpose of verse fourteen is very clearly; Christ gave Himself for us, to redeem us from all iniquity in order that we might be a unique people zealous in obeying his Law-Word. By our good works we serve Him and further His kingdom. Thus, that ‘blessed hope’ is inseparably linked to the appointment and to our response of faithfulness and zeal in obeying His Law-Word. We thereby further His kingdom and bring nearer the great day of His coming again.

The Early Church had its share of faults, and it must not be idealized. But it must be noted as Graydon F. Snyder noted that it often had a very strong Old Testament emphasis firmly linked with Christ.i For example, one of the earliest preachers in the Early Church, Hermas, identified Jesus Christ and the Law saying:

“‘Listen,’ saith he; ‘this great tree which overshadows plains and mountains and all the earth is the law of God which was given to the whole world; and this law is the Son of God preached unto the ends of the earth.” ii

Now anyone who has studied the preaching of the Early Church can tell you it was ‘two ways’ preaching, this was the great and popular theme. It was preached to pagans, and it was simply this; on the one hand is sin and death, rebellion, lawlessness, discord, God’s wrath and man’s malice, on the other hand, there is life and righteousness, or justice, God’s salvation, His mercy law and providential care. The ‘two ways’ have their conclusion in Hell and in Heaven. This was in the Apostolic and Post-Apostolic church, the most popular preaching, to make clear to people that there was no middle ground, no place whereon to stand except either in terms of the way of death and Hell, or Christ and eternal life.

That blessed hope has long meant victory in time and in eternity. Calvin, Hendriksen, and a host of commentators all through the centuries have been emphatic, the blessed hope is something that begins here and now, when we become converted, and are made members of Christ, who is the firstfruits of the new creation. And we when we are made a new creation in Christ, become members of that community, and our blessed hope is that beginning here and now we have eternal life, and it will culminate with His coming again and the glories of an eternity where we serve Him, and there is no more curse, where sin and death are eternally abolished and, “His servants shall serve him,” joyfully.

Christ’s state of exaltation began with his resurrection it continued with His ascension, His ascension to the right hand of God the Father. It continues as we His people exalt Him by governing in every sphere of life and thought as his covenant people obeying Him when He says, “Occupy till I come,” and it climaxes with His coming again to inaugurate creation in all its fullness.

Thus, the church over the generations has seen that blessed hope as something that begins here and now with Christ’s resurrection and our being raised up again from sin and death into life in righteousness in Him, and it culminatesin His coming again so that we are now moving in that hope. A hope that, “maketh not ashamed,” we are told, because having been redeemed in Him, we are citizens of a kingdom which has no end, whose ruler is Jesus Christ, who is King of kings and Lord of lords. This is the blessed hope, amen.

1. Homer. The Iliad of Homer Done into English Prose. Translated by Ernest Myers, M.A., Andrew Lang, M.A., and Walter Leaf, Litt. D. Revised Edition. London: MacMillan and Co., 1892.

2. The Holy Bible: King James Version (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., Jn 14:3). (2009). Logos Research Systems, Inc.

3. Berkhof, L. (1938). Systematic Theology (p. 697). Wm. B. Eerdmans publishing co.

4. Calvin, J., & Pringle, W. (2010). Commentaries on the Epistles to Timothy, Titus, and Philemon (p. 319). Logos Bible Software.

5. William Hendriksen. New Testament Commentary: Exposition of the Pastoral Epistles. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1957, 376.

6. William Hendriksen. New Testament Commentary: Exposition of the Pastoral Epistles. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1957, 376.

i. See - Graydon F. Snyder, translator, editor: The Apostolic Fathers, vol. 6, The Shepherd of Hermas.

ii.  Joseph Barber Lightfoot and J. R. Harmer, The Apostolic Fathers (London: Macmillan and Co., 1891), 455.