But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone. For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah. For as in those days which were before the flood they were eating and drinking, they were marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away, so shall the coming of the Son of Man be. Then there shall be two men in the field; one will be taken, and one will be left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken, and one will be left. Therefore be on the alert, for you do not know which day your Lord is coming. But be sure of this, that if the head of the house had known at what time of the night the thief was coming, he would have been on the alert and would not have allowed his house to be broken into. For this reason you be ready too; for the Son of Man is coming at an hour when you do not think He will.

Who then is the faithful and sensible slave whom his master put in charge of his household to give them their food at the proper time? Blessed is that slave whom his master finds so doing when he comes. Truly I say to you, that he will put him in charge of all his possessions. But if that evil slave says in his heart, “My master in not coming for a long time,” and shall begin to beat his fellow slaves and eat and drink with drunkards; the master of that slave will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour which he does not know, and shall cut him in pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites; weeping shall be there and the gnashing of teeth. (24:36-51)

The familiar expression “Here I come, ready or not” could well be applied to Jesus’ second coming, because He is coming according to the sovereign plan of God, with no regard for worldwide or individual readiness. Jesus is coming when He is coming, because the when and how of His return have long since been predetermined in the sovereign wisdom of God.

In response to the disciples’ question, “Tell us, when will these things be, and what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?” (24:3), Jesus told them of the birth pains that would immediately precede His coming (vv. 4-28), of the abomination of desolation (v. 15), which would precipitate those signs, and of the supreme sign of His own appearing on the clouds of heaven (v. 30). Now He gives them a partial answer to the “when” part of the question.

Although there will be observable, worldwide, and unmistakable indications of His coming just before it occurs, the exact time will not be revealed in advance. Of that day and hour no one knows, Jesus declared categorically. The signs He had just been describing will be conclusive proof that His arrival is very near. Once they have begun, the general time period of His return will be known, because one of the key purposes of the signs will be to make it known. But even during those sign-days the precise day and hour of Jesus’ appearing will not be known, a truth He reiterates several times in this Olivet discourse (see 24:42, 44, 50; 25:13).

As has been noted, the books of Daniel and Revelation both make clear that the full Tribulation will last seven years and that the second part of it, the Great Tribulation, will last three and a half years (Dan. 7:25;9:27; 12:7; Rev. 11:2-3; 12:14; 13:5). Then, “immediately after the tribulation of those days,” Jesus said, “the Son of Man [will come] on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory” (Matt. 24:29-30). Precisely how is not immediately said.

Daniel and Revelation also speak of an expanded period of 1,290 days (Dan. 12:11; Rev. 12:6), 30 days more than the basic 1,260 of the Great Tribulation. Daniel also mentions a 1,335-day period (Dan. 12:12), adding another 45 days to make a total addition of 75. As suggested in chapter 3 of this volume, it seems that the best explanation for those additional days is that they will cover the time when the Messiah descends to the Mount of Olives, creates the great valley in which the nations of the world will be judged, and executes that judgment (see Zech. 14:45; Matt. 25:31-46).

Nevertheless, even with all those indisputable signs and precisely designated periods, the exact day and hour will not be known by any human beings, not even Tribulation believers, in advance. Although the Lord gives no reason for their not knowing, it is not difficult to imagine some of the problems that such knowledge would cause. For one thing, if unbelievers knew the precise time of Christ’s arrival, they would be tempted to put off receiving Him as Lord and Savior until the last moment, thinking they could make the decision any time they wanted before He actually is scheduled to appear.

But even if they planned to wait until the precise date and hour of Christ’s appearing, they would not know if they would live until that time. Like the rich farmer (Luke 12:16-20), they will have no guarantee of the length of their lives and therefore have no guarantee they will still be alive when Christ appears. Although the generation living when the signs begin will not pass away until Christ returns (Matt. 24:34), many individual members of that generation will pass away, some by natural causes and a large percentage at the hand of the Antichrist.

Even if they knew the precise time of Christ’s appearing and were certain they would live until then, they would be fooling themselves to think they could simply receive Him before that time. The fact that they will have put off trusting in Christ for as long as they have will be certain evidence they have no sincere desire to follow Him as Lord and Savior. If the indescribable perils of the Tribulation will not persuade them to turn to the Lord, the knowledge of His exact arrival time certainly would not.

As far as believers are concerned, knowledge of that specific time might also make them careless, causing them to withdraw and become spiritually sedentary, thinking it would be pointless to make plans for serving the Lord or to make further effort to win the lost. No one, believer or unbeliever, could think or function normally knowing the exact day and hour of Christ’s coming.

Neither will the supernatural world know the precise time, not even the angels of heaven. Although the righteous angels enjoy intimacy with God, hovering around His throne to do His bidding (Isa. 6:2-7) and continually beholding His face (Matt. 18:10), they are not privy to this secret. The angels will be directly and actively involved in the end time as God’s agents to separate the saved from the unsaved (see Matt. 13:41, 49), but for His own reasons God the Father will not reveal in advance exactly when He will call them into that service.

Still more amazingly, not even the Son knew at the time He spoke these words or at any other time during His incarnation. Although He was fully God as well as fully man (John 1:1, 14), Christ voluntarily restricted His use of certain divine attributes when He became flesh. “Although He existed in the form of God, [He] did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped,” that is, to be held onto during His humanness (Phil. 2:6). It was not that He lost any divine attributes but that He voluntarily laid aside the use of some of them and would not manifest those attributes except as directed by His Father (John 4:34; 5:30; 6:38).

Jesus demonstrated His divine omniscience on many occasions. “He did not need anyone to bear witness concerning man for He Himself knew what was in man” (John 2:25). When, for example, Nicodemus came to Him at night, Jesus already knew what he was thinking and answered his question before it was asked (John 3:13).

But there were certain self-imposed restrictions in His human knowledge. He told the disciples, “All things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you” (John 15:15). Jesus obediently restricted His knowledge to those things that the Father wanted Him to know during His earthly days of humanity. The Father revealed certain things to the Son as He reveals them to all men—through the Scripture, through the Father’s working in and through His life, and through the physical manifestations of God’s power and glory (see Rom. 1:19-20). Jesus learned much of His earthly knowledge just as every human being learns, and it is for that reason that He was able to keep “increasing in wisdom” (Luke 2:52). In addition to those ways, some truths were revealed to the Son directly by the Father. But in every case Jesus’ human knowledge was limited to what His heavenly Father provided.

Therefore, even on this last day before His arrest, the Son did not know the precise day and hour He would return to earth at His second coming. During Christ’s incarnation, the Father alone exercised unrestricted divine omniscience.

It seems probable that Christ regained full divine knowledge after the resurrection, as implied in His introduction to the Great Commission: “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth” (Matt. 28:18). Just prior to His ascension, He told the disciples, “It is not for you to know times or epochs which the Father has fixed by His own authority” (Acts 1:7). He repeats the truth that the disciples would not be told the time of His appearing, but He did not exclude His own knowledge, as He did in the Olivet discourse.

The three attitudes Jesus mentions in Matthew 24:37-51 are specifically addressed to the generation (Matt. 24:34) that will be alive during the Tribulation and that will witness the signs described in verses 4-29. Those attitudes are: alertness (vv. 37-42), readiness (vv. 43-44), and faithfulness (vv. 45-51).

ALERTNESS

For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah. For as in those days which were before the flood they were eating and drinking, they were marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away, so shall the coming of the Son of Man be. Then there shall be two men in the field; one will be taken, and one will be left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken, and one will be left. Therefore be on the alert, for you do not know which day your Lord is coming. (24:37-42)

Jesus used the Flood to illustrate the point He was making about the coming of the Son of Man, namely, that the attitude that prevailed during the days of Noah . . . before the flood will also characterize most people living during the end time just before Christ returns. They will not be expecting His coming and will not care about it. Despite the perilous signs and wonders, they will simply be unconcerned about the things of the Lord, especially the prospect of His imminent return to judge them.

Many people doubtless will try to explain the extraordinary end-time phenomena on a scientific and rational basis, expecting to discover a natural cause for the cataclysms. Like their counterparts today, they will look everywhere for answers except to the Word of God.

At Jesus’ first coming, most men refused to recognize Him for who He was. He healed every sort of disease, cast out demons, made water into wine, stilled a raging storm, and raised the dead, but even most of His own people refused to believe in Him. In fact the Jewish religious leaders were so determined to discredit Jesus that they accused Him of casting out demons in the power of Satan (Matt. 12:24).

Sinful, materialistic, hypocritical, godless mankind is willfully blind to God’s truth, no matter how compelling that truth may be. And when God’s truth exposes their wickedness, they make every effort to oppose and condemn it.

On one occasion “the Pharisees and Sadducees came up” to Jesus, “and testing Him asked Him to show them a sign from heaven. But He answered and said to them, ‘When it is evening, you say, “It will be fair weather, for the sky is red.” And in the morning, “There will be a storm today, for the sky is red and threatening.” Do you know how to discern the appearance of the sky, but cannot discern the signs of the times?’ ” (Matt. 16:1-3). By that time in His ministry the Lord had performed hundreds, perhaps thousands, of miracles, all of which testified to His divinity and His messiahship, yet those religious leaders refused to acknowledge Him. Because their hearts were determinedly set against Jesus, no sign could have brought them to belief. He therefore said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign; and a sign will not be given it, except the sign of Jonah” (v. 4). As Jesus explained on an earlier occasion, the sign of Jonah was His resurrection from the dead (12:39-40). That sign did not convince unbelievers, either. Just as most of their forefathers had done, they shut their minds to God’s Word and God’s messengers, even ignoring the teaching and miracles of the very Son of God. Worse even than ignore Him, they put Him to death.

During the time of the Tribulation, mankind will be hardened to sin and ungodliness as never before in history. As evil men get worse and worse (2 Tim. 3:13), the world then becomes spiritually darker and even physically darker. Unbelieving people will more intensely indulge their sins and more vehemently oppose God’s truth and God’s people. During the Tribulation the Holy Spirit will be removed from the earth, and evil and Satan will be unrestrained (2 Thess. 2:6-7). During the fifth trumpet judgment, demons bound in the bottomless pit will be unleashed on the earth to wreak unprecedented torment on unbelieving mankind, being forbidden to harm God’s people (Rev. 9:1-5).

As people run amok in sin and every form of debauchery and ungodliness, they will become more and more impervious to God’s truth and resentful of His standards of righteousness. They will be so vile, wretched, and preoccupied with sex, drugs, alcohol, materialism, and pleasure seeking that they will believe every explanation for the end-time signs except the one given in Scripture. Rather than turning to God in repentance, they will curse Him (Rev. 9:21).

In the days of Noah before the Flood, they were eating and drinking, they were marrying and giving in marriage. While Noah built the ark, he also preached (2 Pet. 2:5), but the people were just as unconcerned about his preaching as about the ark he was building, thinking both were meaningless and absurd. They laughed when he spoke of the coming flood. They had never seen rain, much less a flood, because until that time the earth was apparently covered by a vapor canopy that provided all the moisture necessary for life to flourish. Because they had never seen such a calamity, they discounted the idea that it could happen. They therefore went about their daily routines of eating and drinking and of marrying and giving in marriage. It was business as usual until the day Noah entered the ark and it started to rain.

Even when his prediction began to be fulfilled before their eyes, they did not take his warning to heart. Noah had built and preached for 120 years, yet without having the slightest impact on anyone outside his immediate family. The people were so untouched by God’s truth that they did not understand their perilous situation until the flood came and took them all away into a godless eternity. Flood translates kataklusmos, which means deluge or washing away, and is the term from which the English cataclysm is derived. Only after it was too late did the people of that generation understand their tragic destiny.

That is precisely the attitude and response that will prevail before the coming of the Son of man. The perilous signs, the abomination of desolation, the disruption of the heavenly bodies, and the preaching of God’s witnesses during the Tribulation will have no effect on the majority of men. They will see God’s signs but attribute them to natural causes or to supernatural causes apart from God. They will hear His Word, in one instance supernaturally preached worldwide by an angel (Rev. 15:6-7), but they will respond with disdain or indifference. They will heed neither warnings nor appeals from God up until the very moment the Son of Man appears to confront them in righteous judgment.

During the Tribulation there will be multitudes won to Christ (Rev. 7:9-14), including the 144,000 Jewish witnesses who will preach His gospel (Rev. 7:1-8), and there will be marvelous revival in the nation of Israel (Rom. 11:26). But that time will be dominated not by belief but by unbelief, not by holiness but by wickedness, not by godliness but by ungodliness. It will be epitomized by secularism and false religion, even as most of the world is today, but to an immeasurably worse degree.

Like the people of Noah’s day, the generation of the Tribulation will be warned and warned and warned again. Some of them will have been warned many times before the Tribulation, while the church is still on earth proclaiming the gospel.

When the Son of Man finally appears in His second-coming judgment, then there shall be two men in the field; one will be taken, and one will be left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken, and one will be left. Jesus is giving a figure parallel to the unbelievers of Noah’s day being taken away by the judgment through the Flood. When He returns, one will be taken to judgment and the other will be left to enter the kingdom. This is the same separation described in the next chapter by the figures of sheep and goats (25:32-46). The ones left will be Christ’s sheep, His redeemed people whom He will preserve to reign with Him during the Millennium.

But even until the very end, as Peter declared in his sermon at Pentecost, just “before the great and glorious day of the Lord shall come . . . it shall be that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Acts 2:20-21). In that final moment when the King comes to establish His kingdom, some people will turn to Christ in sincere faith and be redeemed. They will be set apart as the Lord’s sheep by the angels and will inherit the kingdom prepared for them.

Therefore be on the alert, Jesus said, for you do not know which day your Lord is coming. The phrase be on the alert translates a present imperative, indicating a call for continual expectancy.

When the Lord comes, the ungodly will be swept away, having forever lost their opportunity for salvation. Just as believers today do not know at what time the Lord is coming to take them to Himself in the rapture, the generation alive during the Tribulation will not know the exact time of His appearing to judge the ungodly and to establish His kingdom.

Malachi envisioned believers in the last day apparently discussing among themselves the possibility that they would inadvertently and mistakenly be separated out with the wicked and be condemned. But “the Lord gave attention and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before Him for those who fear the Lord and who esteem His name. ‘And they will be Mine,’ says the Lord of hosts, ‘on the day that I prepare My own possession, and I will spare them as a man spares his own son who serves him.’ So you will again distinguish between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve Him” (Mal. 3:16-18).

Peter declared,

For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly; and if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly thereafter; and if He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day with their lawless deeds), then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation [or trial], and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment. (2 Pet. 2:4-9)

Christians at that time must be alert, even though they will be secure and have no cause for dread.

READINESS

But be sure of this, that if the head of the house had known at what time of the night the thief was coming, he would have been on the alert and would not have allowed his house to be broken into. For this reason you be ready too; for the Son of Man is coming at an hour when you do not think He will. (24:43-44)

Be sure of this translates what could be either a Greek imperative or an indicative. As an imperative it would be a form of command, but that idea seems inappropriate here, because Jesus was simply stating ‘he obvious, a truism. As an indicative it would be a statement of fact as a reminder. “As everyone knows,” He was saying, “if the head of the house had known at what time of the night the thief was coming, he would have been on the alert and would not have allowed his house to be broken into.” No sane thief would announce his intention of robbing a house, and no sane head of the house who knew in advance at what time of the night the thief was coming would fail to be on the alert in order to prevent his house from being broken into.

The generation living during the Tribulation is specifically told they will not know the exact time of Jesus’ appearing, but they are informed in detail as to what the signs immediately preceding it will be. In other words, to carry out the figure Jesus uses here, they will know with absolute certainty that the thief will be breaking into the house sometime very soon and that they should be prepared accordingly.

It goes without saying that Jesus was not comparing Himself in character to a thief but was comparing His coming to the stealth and unexpectedness of a thief’s coming. The New Testament frequently compares the second coming to a thief’s coming (Luke 12:35-40; 1 Thess. 5:2; 2 Pet. 3:10; Rev. 3:3; 16:15), for the obvious reason that, as Jesus here points out, a thief never tries to rob a place where he knows he is expected, and certainly not at the exact time he is expected.

In one sense, however, Jesus will come in the role as well as with the unexpectedness of a thief. As far as the ungodly are concerned, He will come and take away everything they have, all the things they have cherished and trusted in instead of Him.

As already noted, it seems impossible that most people in that day will not be expecting Jesus’ coming. In light of the absolute destructiveness and horror of the signs of the end time they will witness, how could they not turn to God for help and mercy? How could they possibly attribute those things simply to natural causes? Yet most of them will be so overwhelmingly blinded by sin and self-will that no amount of evidence will cause them to seek God. Instead, hostility toward God will reach a fever pitch never known before on earth, not even during the times of Noah. For this reason, you be ready too, Jesus said, just as Noah and his family were ready.

In this context, being ready seems to refer primarily to being saved, of being spiritually prepared to meet Christ as Lord and King rather than as Judge. As Jesus had already warned (Matt. 24:37-42), everyone in the end time should be expectantly alert for His appearing, and as He mentions in verses 45-51, faithfulness to Him by those who are already saved is commanded. But the indispensable preparation for His coming, apart from which expectancy will be pointless and faithfulness will be impossible, is the preparation of salvation, of being redeemed through the blood of Christ. Otherwise a person will be ready only for judgment and damnation.

The Lord reemphasizes the fact that no one on earth will know exactly when He is coming, not even by an accidental right guess. He proclaims categorically: The Son of Man is coming at an hour when you do not think He will. In divine fury and glory, the Son of Man will come in total surprise to every human being. Even believers who are expectantly and faithfully ready for His coming will nevertheless be astonished when He actually arrives. Their readiness will enable them to meet the Lord with gladness and without shame, but it will not provide advance knowledge of His precise arrival time.

Luke reports a similar warning Jesus gave on another occasion. “Be dressed in readiness, and keep your lamps alight,” He said. “And be like men who are waiting for their master when he returns from the wedding feast, so that they may immediately open the door to him when he comes and knocks. Blessed are those slaves whom the master shall find on the alert when he comes; truly I say to you, that he will gird himself to serve, and have them recline at the table, and will come up and wait on them” (Luke 12:35-37). When the Lord returns, those who are ready not only will find themselves in their Lords gracious presence but will be served personally by His own divine hand.

FAITHFULNESS

Who then is the faithful and sensible slave whom his master put in charge of his household to give them their food at the proper time? Blessed is that slave whom his master finds so doing when he comes. Truly I say to you, that he will put him in charge of all his possessions. But if that evil slave says in his heart, “My master in not coming for a long time,” and shall begin to beat his fellow slaves and eat and drink with drunkards; the master of that slave will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour which he does not know, and shall cut him in pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites; weeping shall be there and the gnashing of teeth. (24:45-51)

Jesus now presents another analogy to reinforce His point, using the familiar imagery of a trusted slave whom his master put in charge of feeding the entire household. The particular responsibility of the slave is incidental to Jesus’ point, which is that every believer is a slave of Jesus Christ and therefore obligated to serve Him in every way. Every believer has been given a divine stewardship and responsibility in the work of Christ on earth, and in that stewardship he is to be faithful and sensible. His life, breath, energy, talents, spiritual gifts, and every other good thing he has are trusts from God to be used in His service and to His glory.

Blessed is that slave, Jesus said, whom his master finds so doing when he comes. Truly I say to you, that he will put him in charge of all his possessions. Here Jesus is obviously addressing believers, those who have submitted to Him as Savior and Lord, as divine master. The believer who is found faithful to the Lord in what he has been given will be given charge of all of the Lord’s possessions, having inherited the absolute fullness of the kingdom of God as a fellow heir of Jesus Christ (Rom. 8:17). Not only that, but “He who overcomes,” Jesus said, “I will grant to him to sit down with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne” (Rev. 3:21).

Unbelievers, represented by the evil slave, will also be held responsible for what they do with their stewardship from God. During the end time, some unbelievers will remain openly sinful and rebellious against God, caring nothing for His truth or His mercy. Others will be aware of their lost condition and of their need of a Savior but will put off believing, thinking they will have time after fulfilling their own selfish interests but before He comes in judgment. They will say by their lives if not by their words, My master is not coming for a long time.

Jesus is teaching that every person in the world holds his life, possessions, and abilities in trust from God, whether or not he acknowledges that trust or even acknowledges God. He will therefore be held accountable by his Creator for how he uses what he has been given. That truth is seen in the parable of the king recorded in Matthew 18:23-34. Even the prodigal son of Luke 15 demonstrates that an unbeliever is squandering God-given stewardship.

The evil activities Jesus then mentions, the beating of fellow slaves and eating and drinking with drunkards, are not meant to characterize every unbeliever during the Tribulation. But those activities reflect the attitude many of them will have. Because they think the Lord will not come for a long time, they will feel free to indulge themselves in whatever sins and pleasures they desire.

But the master of that slave will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour which he does not know. In this case the master will not come as Savior and King to bless and to reward but will come as Judge and Executioner to condemn and to destroy. He will cut the unbelieving slave in pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites in eternal fire.

The phrase cut . . . in pieces is from dichotome and literally means to cut into two parts. It is used in that strict sense in the Greek translation of the Old Testament in regard to the preparation of an animal sacrifice (Ex. 29:17). To Jews it would therefore carry the unmistakable idea of destruction and death.

The fact that such persons will be assigned along with the hypocrites suggests that they were not hypocrites. Just as today, many people in the end time will be open and honest about their unbelief, even wearing such honesty as a badge of intellectual and moral integrity. But honest unbelievers are just as lost as hypocrites who pretend to have faith. They will go to the same place as the religious phonies they feel superior to and despise.

When He appears, the same resplendent glory and power (see Matt. 24:30) that will draw His own people to Him in loving gratitude will repel most unbelievers in hateful indignation. For the former it will be the time of final reception and redemption; for the latter it will be the time of final rejection and judgment.

All unbelievers—those who completely reject the Lord and those who think one day they will trust in Him, those who are honest in their unbelief and those who are hypocritical in their faith—will suffer the same destiny of hell. In that place there will be weeping . . . and the gnashing of teeth, figures representing inconsolable grief and unremitting torment.

The thrust of Jesus’ warning is not simply to inform unbelievers about the horror of facing an eternal hell but to use that dreadful prospect as a motive for believing in Him in order to escape it. His appeal is to believe while there is opportunity, rather than foolishly wait for a supposedly more propitious time that might never come and might not be taken advantage of if it did come.

In his commentary on this passage, William Barclay relates the following story to illustrate the danger of spiritual procrastination:

There is a fable which tells of three apprentice devils who were coming to this earth to finish their apprenticeship. They were talking to Satan, the chief of the devils, about their plans to tempt and to ruin men. The first said, “I will tell them that there is no God.” Satan said, “That will not delude many, for they know that there is a God.” The second said, “I will tell men that there is no hell.” Satan answered, “You will deceive no one that way; men know even now that there is a hell for sin.” The third said, “I will tell men that there is no hurry.” “Go,” said Satan, “and you will ruin men by the thousand.” The most dangerous of all delusions is that there is plenty of time. (The Gospel of Matthew, vol. 2 [Philadelphia: Westminster, 1975], p. 317)

Why, one wonders, is Christ waiting so long to come again? First of all, He is waiting for evil to run its course. In his vision on Patmos, John saw an angel come “out of the temple, crying out with a loud voice to Him who sat on the cloud, ‘Put in your sickle and reap, because the hour to reap has come, because the harvest of the earth is ripe.’ And He who sat on the cloud swung His sickle over the earth; and the earth was reaped” (Rev. 14:15-16). The imagery depicts a field whose crop is completely ready for harvesting, here indicating the harvest of final judgment on unbelieving mankind. Not until the angel notifies Him that the harvest is ripe, will Christ come to earth and execute judgment. God’s sovereign purpose is to allow sin to reach its full evil limits, to run its complete destructive course.

Second, the Lord is waiting for all those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life to be saved. There must be the coming in of “the fulness of the Gentiles” (Rom. 11:25), the gathering in of Gentile saints into the church during the present age. It is also necessary for “all Israel [to] be saved” (v. 26), for all the believing sons of Abraham to be brought into the kingdom by faith in their Messiah and King.

Peter declares, “Do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance” (2 Pet. 3:8-9). What seems to human beings to be a long period of time is but a moment to God, and they should not rely on their own finite perceptions of time to judge the delay in fulfilling His promises. It is not that God could not act in judgment at any time He chose, but that in His sovereign patience and love He is allowing the fullest time possible for men to repent and come to Him in faith.

But because He has chosen to delay judgment for what has already been thousands of years, some people in the last days will mockingly declare, “Where is the promise of His coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation” (2 Pet. 3:3-4). Like scientific uniformitarians, who believe that natural laws have always and will always operate in exactly the same way they operate now, latter-day religious scoffers will assume that because God has not yet judged the world He never will. “It escapes their notice,” however, Peter goes on to say, “that by the word of God the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water, through which the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water” (vv. 5-6). The mockers will foolishly ignore the most catastrophic upheaval the world has yet experienced, in which every human being on earth was killed except for Noah and his family.

In Matthew 24-25 Jesus addresses those who will be alive during the generation of the Tribulation (Matthew 24:34). But believers today should be prepared for the Lord’s coming in the rapture of the church, in which the Lord takes them to heaven, just as believers in the end time should be prepared for His appearing in power and glory to establish the millennial kingdom.

To the church at Rome Paul wrote these sobering words:

[You know] the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed. The night is almost gone, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts. (Rom. 13:11-14)

Paul commended the first generation church in Corinth for “awaiting eagerly the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Cor. 1:7), and he reminded the Philippian believers that “our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ” (Phil. 3:20). The writer of Hebrews admonished believers, “Let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more, as you see the day drawing near” (Heb. 10:24-25).

James’s counsel is, “Be patient; strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand” (James 5:8). Peter wrote, “The end of all things is at hand; therefore, be of sound judgment and sober spirit for the purpose of prayer” (1 Pet. 4:7), and John declared, “Children, it is the last hour; and just as you heard that antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have arisen; from this we know that it is the last hour” (1 John 2:18). And the last words spoken directly by Jesus in Scripture are, “Yes, I am coming quickly” (Rev. 22:20).