As in
previous studies, we will look at
definitions,
scriptures, lexical, and commentary evidence
and confessional support for the
purpose to glorify God in how we live.
Definitions:
Advent: The
coming of Christ, used to refer to either
his incarnation (first advent), or
his future second coming (second advent).
Also used in reference to the season
of worship (or the period of the church
calendar) leading up to and
anticipating the celebration of the birth of
Christ. *
What
is Advent?
The word
advent itself means, “arrival” or “an
appearing or coming into place.” Christians
often speak of Christ’s “first
advent” and “second advent”; that is, His
first and second comings to earth.
His first advent would be the
Incarnation—Christmastime. **
The
English word 'Advent' comes from a Latin
word
'Adventus' that means “coming”.
Gleaning
from Strong’s
Lexicon:
3952.
Parousia -- a presence, a coming
Of
Speech: Noun, Feminine Transliteration:
Parousia
Phonetic Spelling:
(par-oo-see'-ah)
Short Definition: presence, a coming,
arrival, advent
1660. eleusis
- a coming
A coming.
Part of Speech: Noun, Feminine
Transliteration: eleusis
Phonetic
Spelling:
(el'-yoo-sis)
Short Definition: a coming, arrival, advent
2015. epiphaneia
-- appearance
Appearance,
brightness. From epiphanes; a manifestation,
i.e. (specially) the advent
Of Christ
(past or future) -- appearing, brightness.
See
GREEK epiphanes....
3824. paliggenesia
-- regeneration, renewal
3824
(“renewal, rebirth”) is used twice in the NT
referring to: a) the re-birth
Of at
Christ's return (Advent), which inaugurates
His
millennial kingdom (Mt 19 ...
Synonyms
for advent:
Advent is
a noun signifying the beginning or arrival
of something anticipated.
Arrival;
coming; appearance, visitation, second
coming; Parousia; incarnation.
From
the Scriptures and selected commentary
evidence:
Frist
Advent:
“Therefore
the Lord himself shall give you a sign;
Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a
son, and shall call his name
Immanuel.” (Isaiah 7:14)
“Behold,
a virgin shall be with child, and shall
bring
forth a son, and they shall call his name
Emmanuel, which being interpreted is,
God with us.” (Matthew 1:23)
“But when
the fullness of the time was come, God sent
forth his Son, made of a woman, made under
the law, to redeem them that were
under the law, that we might receive the
adoption of sons.” (Galatians 4:4)
Ellicott's
Commentary for English Readers
explains this passage from Galatians
nicely:
“(4) The
fullness of the time.—That which was
predetermined in the counsels of God as the
right and proper time when the
whole course of previous preparation both
for Jew and Gentile was complete.
Here we have a very clear expression of the
conception of religion as
progressive, divided into periods, and
finding its culmination in Christianity.
The phrase “fullness of the time”
corresponds to “the time appointed of the
father” in Galatians 4:2.
Sent
forth—i.e., from Himself; from that station
which
is described in John 1:1: “The Word was with
God.” The pre-existence of the Son
is distinctly recognised by St. Paul.
Made of a
woman.—Perhaps better translated, born of a
woman. There is no allusion here to the
miraculous conception. The phrase “born
of a woman” was of common use. Comp. Matthew
11:11: “Among them that are born
of women there hath not risen a greater than
John the Baptist.” So here, the
expression is intended to bring out, not the
divinity, but the true humanity of
Christ.
Made
under the law.—Born under law—i.e., born
into a
state of things where the whole world was
subject to law—born under the legal
dispensation, though Himself destined to put
an end to that dispensation.” (1)
Second
Advent:
“When the
Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the
angels with him, then he will sit on his
glorious throne.” (Matthew 25:31 ESV)
“Which of
the prophets have not your fathers
persecuted? And they have slain them which
shewed before of the coming [Advent]
of the Just One; of whom ye have been now
the betrayers and murderers.” (Acts
7:52)
“Looking
for that blessed hope, and the glorious
appearing of the great God and our Saviour
Jesus Christ.” (Titus 2:13)
From
the Jamieson-Fausset-Brown
Bible
Commentary on Titus 2:13:
“13. (Php
3:20, 21).
Looking
for—with constant expectation (so the Greek)
and with joy (Ro 8:19). This will prove the
antidote to worldly lusts, and the
stimulus to “live in this present world”
conformably to this expectation. The
Greek is translated, “waiting for,” in Lu
2:25.
that—Greek,
“the.”
blessed—bringing
blessedness (Ro 4:7, 8).
hope—that
is, object of hope (Ro 8:24; Ga 5:5; Col
1:5).
the
glorious appearing—There is but one Greek
article
to both “hope” and “appearing,” which marks
their close connection (the hope
being about to be realized only at the
appearing of Christ). Translate, “The
blessed hope and manifestation (compare
Note, see on [2533] Tit 2:11) of the
glory.” The Greek for “manifestation” is
translated “brightness” in 2Th. 2:8.
As His “coming” (Greek, “parousia”)
expresses the fact, so “brightness,
appearing,” or “manifestation” (epiphaneia)
expresses His personal visibility when He
shall come.
The great
God and our Saviour Jesus—There is but one
Greek article to “God” and “Saviour,” which
shows that both are predicated of
one and the same Being. “Of Him who is at
once the great God and our Saviour.”
Also (2) “appearing” (epiphaneia)
is
never by Paul predicated of God the Father
(Joh 1:18; 1Ti 6:16), or even of “His
glory” (as Alford explains it): it is
invariably applied to Christ's coming, to
which (at His first advent, compare 2Ti
1:10) the kindred verb “appeared” (epephanee),
Tit 2:11, refers (1Ti 6:14;
2Ti 4:1, 8). Also (3) in the context (Tit
2:14) there is no reference to the
Father, but to Christ alone; and here there
is no occasion for reference to the
Father in the exigencies of the context.
Also (4) the expression “great God,”
as applied to Christ, is in accordance with
the context, which refers to the
glory of His appearing; just as “the true
God” is predicated of Christ, 1Jo
5:20. The phrase occurs nowhere else in the
New Testament, but often in the Old
Testament. De 7:21; 10:17, predicated of
Jehovah, who, as their manifested
Lord, led the Israelites through the
wilderness, doubtless the Second Person in
the Trinity. Believers now look for the
manifestation of His glory, inasmuch as
they shall share in it. Even the Socinian
explanation, making “the great God”
to be the Father, “our Saviour,” the Son,
places God and Christ on an equal
relation to “the glory” of the future
appearing: a fact incompatible with the
notion that Christ is not divine; indeed it
would be blasphemy so to couple any
mere created being with God.” (2)
“So
Christ was once offered to bear the sins of
many;
and unto them that look for him shall he
appear the second time without sin
unto salvation.” (Hebrews 9:28)
Now for a
real gem in theology.
The
Personal Advent of Christ
by Charles Hodge:
“It is
admitted that the words “coming of the Lord”
are often used in Scripture for any signal
manifestation of his presence either
for judgment or for mercy. When Jesus
promised to manifest Himself to his
disciples, “Judas saith unto Him, not
Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt
manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the
world? Jesus answered and said unto
him, If a man love me he will keep my words:
and my Father will love him, and
we will come unto him, and make our abode
with him.” (John xiv. 22, 23.) There
is a coming of Christ, true and real, which
is not outward and visible. Thus
also in the epistle to the Church in
Pergamos, it is said: “Repent; or else I
will come unto thee quickly.” (Rev. ii. 16.)
This form of expression is used
frequently in the Bible. There are,
therefore, many commentators who explain
everything said in the New Testament of the
second coming of Christ, of the
spiritual manifestation of his power. Thus
Mr. Alger, to cite a single example of
this school, says, “The Hebrews called any
signal manifestation of power --
especially any dreadful calamity -- a coming
of the Lord. It was a coming of
Jehovah when his vengeance strewed the
ground with the corpses of Sennacherib's
host; when its storm swept Jerusalem as with
fire, and bore Israel into
bondage; when its sword came down upon
Idumea and was bathed in blood upon
Edom. 'The day of the Lord' is another term
of precisely similar import. It
occurs in the Old Testament about fifteen
times. In every instance, it means
some mighty manifestation of God's power in
calamity. These occasions are
pictured forth with the most astounding
figures of speech.”1 On the following
page he says he fully believes that the
evangelists and early Christians
understood the language of Christ in
reference to his second coming, as
predictions of a personal and visible
advent, connected with a resurrection and
a general judgment, but he more than doubts
whether such was the meaning of
Christ Himself. (1.) Because he says nothing
of a resurrection of the dead.
(2.) The figures, which He uses, are
precisely those, which the Jewish prophets
employed in predicting “great and signal
events on the earth.” (3.) Because He “fixed
the date of the events He referred to within
that generation.” Christ he
thinks, meant to teach that his “truths
shall prevail and shall be owned as the
criteria of Divine judgment. According to
them,” he understands Christ to say, “all
the righteous shall be distinguished as my
subjects, and all the iniquitous
shall be separated from my kingdom. Some of
those standing here shall not taste
death till all these things be fulfilled.
Then it will be seen that I am the
Messiah, and that through the eternal
principles of truth which I have
proclaimed I shall sit upon a throne of
glory, not literally, in person, as you
thought, blessing the Jews and cursing the
Gentiles, but spiritually, in the
truth, dispensing joy to good men and woe to
bad men, according to their
deserts.” It is something to have it
admitted that the Apostles and early
Christians believed in the personal advent
of Christ. What the Apostles
believed we are bound to believe; for St.
John said “He that knoweth God
heareth us.” That the New Testament does
teach a second, visible, and glorious
appearing of the Son of God is plain: --
1. From
the analogy between the first and second
advents. The rationalistic Jews would have
had precisely the same reasons for
believing in a more spiritual coming of the
Messiah as modern rationalists have
for saying that his second coming is to be
spiritual. The advent in both cases
is predicted in very nearly the same terms.
If, therefore, his first coming was
in person and visible, so his second coming
must be. The two advents are often
spoken of in connection, the one
illustrating the other. He came the first
time
as the Lamb of God bearing the sins of the
world; He is to come “the second
time, without sin, unto salvation.” (Heb.
ix. 28.) God, said the apostle Peter,
"shall send Jesus Christ, which before was
preached unto you: whom the
heaven must receive until the times of
restitution of all things, which God
hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy
prophets since the world began."
(Acts iii. 20, 21.) Christ is now invisible
to us, having been received up into
heaven. He is to remain thus invisible,
until God shall send him at the
restitution of all things.
2. In
many places it is directly asserted that his
appearing is to be personal and visible. At
the time of his ascension, the
angels said to his disciples, “Ye men of
Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into
heaven? This same Jesus, which is taken up
from you into heaven, shall so come
in like manner as ye have seen him go into
heaven.” (Acts i. 11.) His second
coming is to be as visible as his ascension.
They saw Him go; and they shall
see him come. In Matt. xxvi. 64, it is said,
“Hereafter shall ye see the Son of
Man sitting on the right hand of power, and
coming in the clouds of heaven;”
Matt. xxiv. 30, “Then shall all the tribes
of the earth mourn and they shall
see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of
heaven with power and great glory.”
Luke xxi. 27, “Then shall they see the Son
of Man coming in a cloud.”
3. The
circumstances attending the second advent
prove
that it is to be personal and visible. It is
to be in the clouds; with power
and great glory; with the holy angels and
all the saints; and it is to be with
a shout and the voice of the archangel.
4. The
effects ascribed to his advent prove the
same
thing. All the tribes of the earth shall
mourn; the dead, both small and great
are to arise; the wicked shall call on the
rocks and hills to cover them; the
saints are to be caught up to meet the Lord
in the air; and the earth and the
heavens are to flee away at his presence.
5. That
the Apostles understood Christ to predict
his
second coming in person does not admit of
doubt. Indeed almost all the
rationalistic commentators teach that the
Apostles fully beheved and even
taught that the second advent with all its
glorious consequences would occur in
their day. Certain it is that they believed
that He would come visibly and with
great glory, and that they held his coming
as the great object of expectation
and desire. Indeed Christians are described
as those who “are waiting for the
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1Cor. i.
7); as those who are “looking for
that blessed hope, and the glorious
appearing of the great God and our Saviour
Jesus Christ” (Tit. ii. 13) (it is to them
who look for Him, He is to “appear
the second time, without sin unto
salvation,” Heb. ix. 28); as those who are
expecting
and earnestly desiring the coming of the day
of God. (2Pet. iii. 12.) It is a
marked characteristic of the apostolic
writings that they give such prominence
to the doctrine of the second advent. “Judge
nothing before the time, until the
Lord come.” (1Cor. iv. 5.) “Christ the
first-fruits; afterwards they that are
Christ's at his coming.” (1Cor. xv. 23.) Ye
are our rejoicing “in the day of
the Lord Jesus.” (2Cor. i. 14.) “He. . . .
will perform it until the day of Jesus
Christ.” (Phil. i. 6.) “That I may rejoice
in the day of Christ.” (ii. 16.) “Our
conversation is in heaven, from whence also
we look for the Saviour, the Lord
Jesus Christ.” (iii. 20.) “When Christ, who
is our life, shall appear, then
shall ye also appear with Him in glory.”
(Col. iii. 4.) “To wait for his Son
from heaven, whom he raised from the dead,
even Jesus, which delivered us from
the wrath to come.” (1Thess. i. 10.) “What
is our hope . . . are not even ye in
the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his
coming?” (ii. 19.) “Unblamable in
holiness . . . at the coming of our Lord
Jesus Christ with all his saints.”
(iii. 13.) “We which are alive and remain
unto the coming of the Lord . . .
shall be caught up . . . in the clouds, to
meet the Lord in the air: and so
shall we ever be with the Lord.” (iv.
15-17.) In his second epistle he assures
the Thessalonians that they shall have rest,
“when the Lord Jesus shall be
revealed from heaven.” (2Thess. i. 7.) The
coming of Christ, however, he tells
them was not at hand; there must come a
great falling away first. Paul said to
Timothy, “Keep this commandment without
spot, unrebukable, until the appearing
of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1Tim. vi. 14.)
“There is laid up for me a crown of
righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous
judge, shall give me at that day:
and not to me only, but unto all them also
that love his appearing.” (2Tim. iv.
8.) The epistles of Peter afford the same
evidence of the deep hold, which the
promise of Christ's second coming had taken
on the minds of the Apostles and of
all the early Christians. He tells his
readers that they “are kept by the power
of God through faith unto salvation, ready
to be revealed in the last time . .
. that the trial of your faith, . . might be
found unto praise, and honour, and
glory, at the appearing of Jesus Christ.”
(1Pet. i. 5-7.) Men are to “give
account to Him that is ready to judge the
quick and the dead.” (iv. 5.) “Rejoice
that, when his glory shall be revealed, ye
may be glad also with exceeding joy.”
(verse 13.) “When the chief Shepherd shall
appear, ye shall receive a crown of
glory.” (v. 4.)“We
have not followed
cunningly devised fables, when we made known
unto you the power and coming of
our Lord Jesus Christ, but were
eye-witnesses of his majesty.” (2Pet. i.
16).
The transfiguration on the mount was a type
and pledge of the glory of the
second advent. The Apostle warns the
disciples that scoffers would come “saying,
where is the promise of his coming? For
since the fathers fell asleep, all
things continue as they were from the
beginning of the creation.” In answer to
this objection, he reminds them that the
threatened deluge was long delayed,
but came at last; that time is not with God
as it is with us; that with Him a
thousand years are as one day, and one day
as a thousand years. He repeats the
assurance that “the day of the Lord will
come as a thief in the night; in which
the heavens shall pass away with a great
noise, and the elements shall melt
with fervent heat; the earth also and the
works that are therein, shall be
burned up.” (2Peter iii. 3-10.)
From all
these passages, and from the whole drift of
the New Testament, it is plain, (1.) That
the Apostles fully believed that
there is to be a second coming of Christ.
(2.) That his coming is to be in
person, visible and glorious. (3.) That they
kept this great event constantly
before their own minds, and urged it on the
attention of the people, as a
motive to patience, constancy, joy, and holy
living. (4.) That the Apostles
believed that the second advent of Christ
would be attended by the general
resurrection, the final judgment, and the
end of the world.
As
already intimated, it is objected to this
view of
the prophecies of the New Testament
referring to the Second Advent, --
1. That
the first advent of Christ is predicted in
the
Old Testament in nearly as glowing terms as
his second coming is set forth in
the New Testament. He was to come in the
clouds of heaven; with great pomp and
power; all nations were to be subject to
Him; all people were to be gathered
before Him; the stars were to fall from
heaven; the sun was to be darkened, and
the moon to be turned into blood. These
descriptions were not realized by the
event; and are understood to refer to the
great changes in the state of the
world to be effected by his coming. It is
unreasonable, therefore, as it is
agreed, to expect anything like a literal
fulfilment of these New Testament
prophecies. To this it may be answered, (1.)
That in the Old Testament the
Messianic period is described as a whole.
The fact that the Messiah was to come
and establish an everlasting kingdom, which
was to triumph over all opposition,
and experience a glorious consummation, is
clearly foretold. All these events
were, so to speak, included in the same
picture; but the perspective was not
preserved. The prophecies were not intended
to give the chronological order of
the events foretold. Hence, the consummation
of the Messiah's kingdom is
depicted as in immediate proximity with his
appearance in the flesh. This led
almost all the Jews, and even the disciples
of Christ themselves, before the
day of Pentecost, to look for the immediate
establishment of the Messiah's
kingdom in its glory. Such being the
character of the Old Testament prophecies,
it cannot be fairly inferred that they have
as yet received their full
accomplishment; or that they are now being
fulfilled in the silent progress of
the Gospel. They include the past and the
present, but much remains to be
accomplished in the future more in
accordance with their literal meaning. (2.)
The character of the predictions in the New
Testament does not admit of their
being made to refer to any spiritual coming
of Christ or to the constant
progress of his Church. They evidently refer
to a single event; to an event in
the future, not now in progress, an event,
which shall attract the attention of
all nations, and be attended by the
resurrection of the dead, the complete
salvation of the righteous, and the
condemnation of the wicked. (3.) A third
answer to the objection under consideration
is, that the Apostles, as is
conceded, understood the predictions of
Christ concerning his second coming, in
the way in which they have been understood
by the Church, as a whole, from that
day to this.
2. A
second objection to the common Church view
of the
eschatology of the New Testament is, that
our Lord expressly says that the
events which He foretold were to come to
pass during that generation. His words
are, “Verily, I say unto you, this
generation shall not pass, till all these
things be fulfilled.” This objection is
founded upon the pregnant discourse of
Christ recorded in the twenty-fourth and
twenty-fifth chapters of Matthew. It
is to be remarked that those chapters
contain the answer which Christ gave to
three questions addressed to Him by his
disciples; first, when the destruction
of the temple and of Jerusalem was to occur
second, what was to be the sign of
liii coming; and third, when the end of the
world was to take place. The
difficulty in interpreting this discourse
is, to determine its relation to
these several questions. There are three
methods of interpretation, which have
been applied to this passage. The first
assumes that the whole of our Lord's
discourse refers but to one question,
namely, When was Jerusalem to be
destroyed and Christ's kingdom to be
inaugurated; the second adopts the theory
of what used to be called the double sense
of prophecy; that is, that the same
words or prediction refer to one event in
one sense, and to a different event
in a higher sense; the third assumes that
one part of our Lord's predictions
refers exclusively to one of the questions
asked, and that other portions refer
exclusively to the other questions.
The
rationalistic interpreters adopt the first
method
and refer everything to the overthrow of the
Jewish polity, the destruction of
Jerusalem, and the inauguration of the
Church, which is to do its work of
judgment in the earth. Some evangelical
interpreters also assume that our Lord
answers the three questions put to Him as
one, as they constituted in fact but
one in the minds of his disciples, since
they believed that the three events,
the destruction of Jerusalem, the second
coming of Christ, and the end of the
world, were all to occur together. Thus
Luthardt says: “There are three
questions according to the words; but only
one in the minds of the disciples,
as they did not consider the three events,
the destruction of Jerusalem, the
second coming of Christ, and the end of the
world, as separated
chronologically; but as three great acts in
the final drama of the world’s
history.”2 In this sense our Lord, he adds,
answered their inquiries. He does
not separate the different subjects, so as
to speak first of one and then of
another; but he keeps all ever in view. “It
is the method,” he says, “of Biblical
prophecy, which our Lord observes, always to
predict the one great end and all
else and what is preparatory, only so far as
it stands in connection with that
end and appears as one of its elements.”3
Although, therefore, the prophecy of
Christ extends to events in the distant
future, He could say that that
generation should not pass away until all
was fulfilled; for the destruction of
Jerusalem was the commencement of that work
of judgment which Christ foretold.
According
to this view, the first method of
interpretation differs very little from the
second of those above mentioned.
Both suppose that the same words or
descriptions are intended to refer to two
or more events very different in their
nature and in the time of their
occurrence. Isaiah's prediction of the great
deliverance which God was to
effect for his people, was so framed as to
answer both to the redemption of the
Jews from their captivity in Babylon, and to
the greater redemption by the
Messiah. It was in fact and equally a
prediction of both events. The former was
the type, and the first step toward the
accomplishment of the other. So also in
the fourteenth chapter of Zechariah, the
prophecy of the destruction of
Jerusalem, the spiritual redemption, and the
final judgment, are blended together.
As, therefore, in the Old Testament the
Messianic prophecies took in the whole
scope of God's dealings with his people,
including their deliverance from
Babylon and their redemption by Christ, so
as to make it doubtful what refers
to the former and what to the latter event;
so this discourse of Christ may be
considered as taking in the whole history of
his kingdom, including his great
work of judgment in casting out the Jews and
calling the Gentiles, as well as
the final consummation of his work. Thus
everything predicted of the final
judgment had its counterpart in what was
fulfilled in that generation.
The third
method of interpretation is greatly to be
preferred, if it can be successfully carried
out. Christ does in fact answer
the three questions presented by his
disciples. He told when the temple and the
city were to be destroyed; it was when they
should see Jerusalem compassed
about with armies. He told them that the
sign of the coming of the Son of Man
was to be great defection in the Church,
dreadful persecutions, and all but
irresistible temptations, and that with his
coming were to be connected the
final judgment and the end of the world; but
that the time when those events
were to occur, was not given unto them to
know, nor even to the angels of
heaven. (Matt. xxiv. 36.)
If this
be the method of interpreting these
important
predictions, then the declaration contained
in Matt. xxiv. 34, “This generation
shall not pass, till all these things be
fulfilled,” must be restricted to the “all
things spoken of, referring to the
destruction of Jerusalem and the
inauguration of the Church as Christ's
kingdom on earth. There is, however,
high authority for making h`genea
au-th,
here and in the parallel passages, Mark
xiii. 30 and Luke xxi. 32, refer to
Israel as a people or race; in this case the
meaning would be that the Jews
would not cease to be a distinct people
until his predictions were fulfilled.”4
There is nothing, therefore, in this
discourse of Christ's inconsistent with
the common Church doctrine as to the nature
and concomitants of his Second
Advent.” (3)
Notes:
1.Charles John Ellicott,
Bible Commentary
for English Readers, Galatians,
Vol.2, (London, England, Cassell and
Company), p. 449.
2.Jamieson, Fausset and
Brown, Commentary
on the Whole Bible, (Grand
Rapids, Michigan, Zondervan, 1977) p. 1388.
“To God,
only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ
forever. Amen.” (Romans 16:27) and “heirs
according to the promise.” (Galatians
3:28, 29)
Mr.
Kettler has previously published articles in
the Chalcedon
Report and Contra
Mundum. He and his wife Marea
attend the Westminster, CO, RPCNA Church.He is the author of the book
defending the Reformed Faith against
attacks, titled: The
Religion That
Started in a Hat. Available at: www.TheReligionThatStartedInAHat.com