When the son of man comes again?

Today's Gospel reading is about The Coming of the Son of Man, something that Christians strongly believe, but differ in how it would happen. If you open your Bibles, you will find it in Mark 13:24-32. "[Jesus said to his disciples,] 24"In those days after that tribulation the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, 25 and the stars will be falling from the sky, and the powers in the heavens will be shaken. 26 "And then they will see 'the Son of Man coming in the clouds' with great power and glory, 27 and then he will send out the angels and gather [his] elect from the four winds, from the end of the earth to the end of the sky.

28 "Learn a lesson from the fig tree. When its branch becomes tender and sprouts leaves, you know that summer is near. 29 In the same way, when you see these things happening, know that he is near, at the gates. 30 Amen, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place. 31 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. 32 "But of that day or hour, no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father."

Even those who do not read the Bible know the famous story of Sodom and Gomorrah and how the Lord God destroyed it with fire and brimstone because the people living there were all evil. All Christians and even the Muslims also know the story of Noah... where the Lord God destroyed the whole earth with 40 days and 40 nights of incessant rains, flooding the earth's land mass and destroying everything that lived. Noah as we all know was ordered by God to bring two kinds of animals, male and female so they can reproduce in the newly reborn earth after the flood subsides.

But because of the great devastation brought by the floods, the Lord God made a covenant with Noah that he will never destroy the earth in that manner... a covenant the God has kept up to this day. Yet the evil that curses human beings are far worse today than in the days of Noah or in Sodom and Gomorrah. Yet despite all the lessons we've learned from those Bible stories, man hasn't changed nor has he repented. He goes on today as if God doesn't even exist!

The United States for instance was created by its founding fathers based on Trust in God as stated in the declaration of Independence and in the US Constitution. Today, the US Supreme Court has removed crucifixes, the Bible from all public places and yes, praying to God before classes begins has even been stopped. Soon we can expect the words "In God we Trust" found in US coins will also be removed. Yet Americans complain that the USA is in trouble.

Certainly America is in trouble because they have completely forgotten that God is the central figure of our daily life. They can pretend that God doesn't exist... but that won't change the fact that God is the Alpha and the Omega... he was here before we were created, he is here with us today and he will still be around when heaven and earth will be extinguished!

History is replete with stories of man's inhumanity to man through the wars that have been fought throughout the centuries. The horrors of World War II are very well documented and the world knows that approximately six million Jews died in Adolf Hitler's crematoriums in Dachau, Auschwitz-Birkenau, Chelmno, Sobibor and Majdanek as the Nazi's "Final Solution" to the Jewish question. But now that the great Patriotic War is over, today we live in relative peace. But if you didn't know, the mass killings continues as the devil never stops thinking of creative ways to induce man to kill its own kind.

While we sleep soundly, abortion by the millions is done in countries that declared a one-child policy. Singapore had done this and China is still doing this. Millions or billions of babies killed in many forms, through the use of condoms, medicines and the most brutal act of aborting a child inside the mother's womb by scrapping it out! Yes God has all the reasons to wipe out the earth again because we kill innocent children. But somehow God's love for us has prevented his wrath from destroying the earth. But this is not to say that the end of times would never happen. As our Lord Jesus Christ predicted "the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, 25 and the stars will be falling from the sky, and the powers in the heavens will be shaken." Because the moon gets its brilliance from the Sun's brightness, indeed when the sun loses its light, so too will the moon lose its glow. When the sun darkens... the earth will wither and die.

So when will all this happen? You can be that we shall be marrying or giving to marriage, planting, drinking or working when that day comes. Yes but as the Lord Jesus Christ said, "Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. But of that day or hour, no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father."

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