A Word in Season: He is Coming (Psalm 96:13)

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The Lord is coming. The Lord is coming to judge the earth. He shall judge the world with righteousness and the peoples with his truth.

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I hope that you believe that. I hope that you know that it is true. I hope you are not like the scoffers of whom the

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Apostle Peter talks in one of his letters, who ask, where is the promise of God's coming?

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Everything keeps going the way it always has done. These promises, these threats, these warnings, they're just pointless and empty because nothing is ever really changing.

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And I hope that if you're a Christian, that you're not losing confidence in God's promises, that you're not losing sight of God's promises and God's warnings.

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For he is coming. He is coming to judge the world with righteousness.

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And the proper Christian response to that is one of joy. The prospect of judgment holds no fear for the believer in themselves, even though the reality as a whole may still make us to tremble.

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Christ is coming to judge, and that is a matter of joy. It's a matter of joy because it will be the moment of the believer's vindication.

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It will be the moment in which all those promises are brought into their fullest and final fulfilment, when we have everything that God has intended from the beginning in our possession, when we see the

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Lord in his glory. It will be the time when we see justice being done.

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Now that's not the same as being of a vengeful spirit, but it is the expectation that every wrong will be righted, that every wickedness will be punished, that every slander will be uncovered, that the perfect justice and the perfect blessing of God upon righteousness will be established.

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It is the moment when his people shout for joy because they see their King enthroned.

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It is also the moment when his enemies shout in terror because they too see the

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King on his throne, and they realise that all their rebellions and their follies were the wildest and most wicked of schemes.

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There is a holy rule that is going to be established when Jesus Christ returns, and that's why this

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Psalm 96, in which these words are found, begins, O sing to the Lord a new song, sing to the

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Lord all the earth, sing to the Lord, bless his name, proclaim the good news of his salvation from day to day, declare his glory among the nations, his wonders among all peoples.

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By the end of the Psalm, all creation, the heavens and the earth, the sea and the field and the trees of the wood, they're all rejoicing.

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Why? Because the wretchedness of sin is about to be forever undone, because the consequences of rebellion against God are not going to last, because those who have lived with their fists raised against the

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God of heaven are going to be brought down, because those who have practiced godlessness and unrighteousness in the earth are no longer going to appear to be getting away with their sins.

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See, that's so often one of the problems that people have, is it not, with the truth of the Bible. If there were a

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God, why doesn't he do something about this wickedness, about this sin, about this injustice?

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And the Christian's answer is, he will. He does now, and he will above all in the day when he comes.

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He is not ignorant of any of these things, not of the sufferings of his people, nor of the wickedness of the wicked.

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And when he comes, he will make all right, and everything will be made well in this world that has been wrecked by sin.

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Now, is that something that can make you rejoice? Are you on the right side of that equation?

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Can you anticipate the day of judgment with joy, because it is the return of your

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Redeemer, the one who shed his blood to save you from your sins, and that you can, with all creation, groan with longing at the expectation of that moment of adoption, when you will be brought at last, fully and finally, into the heavens and the earth in which righteousness dwells, where there's no more sin, sorrow or pain, and when justice will be established, mercy gloriously demonstrated, and the rule of your

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God and your King established beyond doubt, that is a day to make a saint rejoice.