The last 5 minutes of history?

With wars and rumours of wars filling news headlines many Christians have again asked, “Is the second coming of Jesus at hand?”  Inevitably Matthew 24 enters the conversation – the famous chapter in which Jesus gives us a glimpse of what times will be like towards the end of the age.

One thing is clear. No one knows exactly when Jesus will return. What is evident is Jesus’ instruction that we will have a role and a responsibility to play in the end times.

What stirs our excitement?

During this discourse, Jesus urges his disciples to keep watch (v. 42) and be ready (v.44). They would not know on which day he will return; for he will come at an hour no one expects.

What does it mean to keep watch? Or to be ready? Is it simply a state of mind and heart, or is Jesus asking us to do something? Perhaps anticipating the question, Jesus illustrates it by telling a parable: The owner of an estate leaves for an indefinite period and leaves the care of his estate and workers in the hands of a servant. “Who is the wise and faithful servant?” Jesus asks. “The one who takes care of his master’s property and does everything his master asked him to do while he is away.”

In other words, Jesus is saying that to be ready for His return, we should be executing the works or commands he gave us to do. The house and everything need to be in order on his return. It is not simply a state of heart and mind.

Consider your excitement when family members or good friends come to visit. Perhaps they haven’t visited in many months or years and you can’t wait to see them. How do you get everything ready for their visit? You make sure the house is clean, the dishes are washed and packed away, the water is boiling for coffee, the kids are all dressed up and clean and perhaps the food is in the oven or the cake has been baked. Everything is in place so that you won’t be caught by surprise. When you hear a car approaching or someone talking outside, you send one of the children to peek through a window or peer around the corner – to go and watch – and quickly come back with the message, “They’re here!”

“Build My House!”

How can we get ready for the second coming of Jesus? What can we do to get the house ready and everything in place for him to come? Well, like the good servant, we get ready by executing all the commands the master gave us before he left.  On his return, he wants to find us doing the things he told us to do.

Jesus gave us many commands throughout the gospels, but perhaps the one most overlooked is one Jesus alludes to in Matt 24:14: “And the gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.” At the end of Matthew, just before Jesus ascends into heaven, he gives another clear command to his followers to go and make disciples of all nations. 

What is Jesus saying? Essentially, we can get his spiritual house ready for his return by making sure that people all over the world hear his message. He is saying that he does not want to come back, like the master in the parable, only to see us scrambling in the last seconds to share his message with the whole world because we neglected to do it before.

This brings us to an honest question: “How is the Christian church doing today to reach the whole world?”

29 – 3 – 1

Available stats* show that 29% or a third of the world has NEVER heard the name of Jesus. Not only that, but they also have no way to hear about him – there’s no church or any Christians nearby; there’s no concerted effort by anybody to introduce them to Jesus. To make matters worse only 3% of our worldwide missionary force is focussing their work on this 29% of the world, and only 1% of all missionary funding supports their efforts.

This means that 97% of missionaries and 99% of funding are either going to places where people are already following Jesus, or where people have the opportunity to hear about Him. We are not prioritising or completing the task that Jesus gave us when he left.

Extreme passion

“It will mean tremendous focus, shall I say, passionate focus, or, extreme focus. While local churches continue to be preoccupied with self-preservation and church growth where they are, running bigger and better programs to attract more and more already evangelized people, we will never reach the unreached and respond to the poor of the earth.”

Floyd McClung

It’s time to realign our focus on getting ready for Jesus’ return and share his message to all nations. 

How can you do that?

• Start by living as a representative of Jesus wherever you are.
• Pray for the lost to know Jesus. Get informed about unreached people groups in the world and start praying for them and the believers in their country. Check out www.joshuaproject.net
• Join a short-term outreach with your local church or any missions organisation.
• Support a fieldworker or missionary financially.
• Move to another country and be a representative of Jesus!

*Check out this video for a full explanation of the statistics.