Matthew 24 Part 4
Deception About the End
“Don’t be deceived.” Vss 23-28 tell you that if someone says that Christ’s final return in person has happened, don’t listen. His return will not be in secret or like that of a normal person; His final return will be so incontrovertible that no one will be able to miss it. Notice that the deceivers are wrong on at least two critical points: One, they’re wrong on the timing (there’s that word again). They’re too early! The deceivers are those who claim He’s walking around on earth as a regular person when He’s really in heaven sitting at the right hand of the Father.
Timing & Confidence
The Timing of the End Matters to Your Confidence
Timing is very important to your view of the last days or end times. My view is very different from most of the popularizations of these terms. Imagine, if you will, that you’re a player on a football team, and you show up for the game after it’s over but don’t know it. You might go out on the field to do battle for your school with no other team mates. You might end up playing for another team whose game was scheduled after yours. If you lost because you played another team all by yourself, having missed the game, you would go to school the next day and report your bad news. Your school mates might tell you, “Hey, we won, don’t be so down. But where were you?” You might be happy to know your team won but sad to know you weren’t part of the effort. What if no one told you and let you go away thinking you had lost the game? What if it were the championship game and ruined your entire year? You get the point. Timing is not everything, but it can sure mess alot of things up.