Hugging the Kaktus – week 47

Dan. 12:1–3 Heb. 10:11–25 Mark 13:1–13 At the end of the church year we get ready for the end of time. Daniel sounds just like Revelation, talking about the end of the world AND reminding us that some will go on to everlasting condemnation and others to everlasting life. How to know what will happen to me? God has not only saved us by grace through the redeeming work of Jesus Christ but God has also given the means of grace to assure us with objective, tangible, particular, and everlasting evidence. … That is the source of our wisdom and righteousness. Hebrews describes what we are experiencing; “the Day” is the end of the world. How do we know if we can look forward to that day or whether we should dread its coming? Lots of reasons, including the means of grace. We have Jesus, our everlasting Advocate who redeemed us with the single sacrifice of His life in exchange for ours – once for all and for all time. We have the Holy Spirit who is with us in the Word and sacraments, who remains alongside of us and counsels us (that’s what “paraclete” means, often translated comforter or counselor). God has regenerated us in the image of Christ, so we have the heart of Christ (Ezek 26), the mind of Christ (Phil 2), and the knowledge, determination, and love to care for others as He cares for us, especially during these last times. Mark records how corrupt human nature, materialistic as it is, always misses the point. What good are the buildings of human construction when our lives are in danger of everlasting judgment? Contrast buildings of human invention with the incarnation of Jesus. His incarnation is described as a Stone cut out of a mountain without human hands which became a mountain and filled the earth (Daniel 2.34-35). In the middle of Jesus description of the end times He gives this command, “Don’t worry.” God never gives a command that is not surrounded with promises of how He has, Himself, provided for the fulfillment of that command, first through the substitutionary life of Jesus and then actually through us according to our regenerate soul.