The Hour is Coming

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The Hour is Coming

Jesus was a preacher of the resurrection. Probably most people reading this statement will immediately think of Jesus’ resurrection. But that is not at all what Jesus went about preaching. Jesus preached the gospel publicly from town to town and from village to village. When Jesus preached he was like a town crier, a public Herald. He would raise his voice so all could hear, and he would conclude by urging his listeners “he who has ears to hear, let him hear.” His disciples went with him on his evangelistic crusades and repeatedly heard him preach the gospel (Luke 8:1). He gave his disciples additional teaching and training, away from the crowds, and made sure they understood the truths he was preaching about the Kingdom of God (Luke 8:10, Matt. 13:16,17,51). He sent them out to preach, and they went out and preached the gospel (Luke 9:2,6). Jesus and his disciples were out preaching the gospel over a period of three years. Jesus proclaimed the coming resurrection in the presence of his disciples time after time. Then he took them aside and told them privately that he was going to die and be resurrected (Matt 16:21-22, 20:17-19). The disciples didn’t believe him; they had no mental framework in which to put this information. It was not because the disciples were extremely dull. The resurrection Jesus had been talking about for over three years was not his own. In his gospel message of the coming Kingdom of God, Jesus had been preaching the corporate resurrection of that “great day” yet to come.

Jesus spoke these words, cited in John 5:28-29, “… the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear (the Son of Man’s) voice and come forth—those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation.”

There are several things to notice in these verses. First, Jesus puts this event in the future by saying “the hour is coming.” The fulfillment of this hour is still approaching. Second, this calling forth will be to people that are dead and in their graves. It is essential to realize that he is not calling people down from heaven or up from hell in order to resurrect them. Third, this coming forth of the dead from their graves will be for judgment, either good or bad. The writer to the Hebrews tells us that it is given unto men once to die and after that, the judgment. Jesus places the time of judgment at his return (see Matt. 25:31-46). Jesus also teaches a corporate resurrection and judgment. “The men of Nineveh shall rise up in the judgment with this generation and shall condemn it” (Luke 11:32). The tradition typically taught in most Christian denominations, that people go to heaven or hell after death, is incompatible with the resurrection as Jesus taught it. If people go to heaven or hell after death it would be apparent that they had already been judged worthy of heaven or hell.

Paul shows himself in agreement with Jesus’ testimony that the dead are in their graves. In 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 Paul comforts his readers, not wanting them to sorrow over those who have fallen asleep. Paul uses the common biblical metaphor of sleep to indicate death. He tells us that, at the sound of the trumpet of God, the dead in Christ will arise, i.e. be resurrected. This will result in the dead meeting the Lord, in the air, along with those in Christ who are alive and remaining at that time. This will occur as Jesus returns, descending from heaven with a shout and the voice of the archangel. Paul’s teaching here in 1 Thessalonians coincides with the first resurrection spoken of in Revelation 20:5. Dead and alive will be “gathered together to him” at the coming “day of the Lord” (2 Thessalonians 2:1-2)

In the middle of John chapter six, Jesus spoke four times of raising up those who believed in him. In each instance, this is to be “at the last day.” According to Jesus, it is the Father’s will that he should lose none of those that the Father has given him. Jesus will not lose them to death because he will raise them up “at the last day.” The “last day” is the end of this era or age. Jesus will return and bring both a close to this “present evil age” (Gal. 1:4) and the onset of “the age to come” (Mark 10:30).

“Hell” is commonly understood as a place of eternal torment and the abode of devils or demons, increasingly populated by those who have died without reciting or adhering to a specific formula required by one’s particular denomination or group. This misconception leads to some wild and crazy understandings of Matthew 16:18. Jesus points out that Peter’s confession of him, as the Christ, is a revelation from the Father. Jesus then declares that upon this revelation he will build his church and the “gates of Hades” will not prevail against it. “Hades” from the Greek and “Sheol” from the Hebrew mean the same thing. Hades and Sheol are synonymous with the grave or abode of the dead. When Hezekiah laments that he “shall go to the gates of Sheol” (Is 38:10) he is sorrowful that he is about to die in the prime of his life due to illness. Jesus is proclaiming in Matthew 16:18 that the grave will not prevail over his people, because he has full intention of raising them up from death to life “at the last day.” This amazingly powerful promise has been obscured by the erroneous Platonic idea of individual disembodied spirits departing to heaven or hell at death. “He that has ears to hear, let him hear” the words of Jesus.

The Hour is Coming mp3

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