Jesus is Coming Again!

Posted on June 2, 2024 by His Way with Gary Curtis

John the Revelator recorded Jesus’ repeated promise to come again. Not only did He declare three times in the last chapter of John’s book of Revelation (verses 7, 12, and 20) that He was coming again, but clarified this future return would be “soon”:

  • “…behold, I am coming soon”
  • “I am coming soon”
  • “Yes, I am coming soon.”

Those declarations were recorded nearly two thousand years ago, and even abiding and faithful followers might reasonably question just how soon Jesus’ “soon” return was intended to be. Apparently, it was and is not “immediate,” but maybe it was what theologians term “imminent.” This word underscores the certainty of Christ’s second coming (Gr. parousia) in the future but with an uncertain timetable.

Disciples Question the Timing of End-Time Events

In Matthew 24 and 25, Jesus responded to key end-time questions from His disciples on the Mt. of Olives during Holy Week, before His death, burial, and resurrection. He warned them of seeing “the abomination of desolation spoken of by the prophet Daniel, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand)”… ”for then, there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be” (Matthew 24:15-16, 21). This time period corresponds to the prophecies and timing of events found in Daniel 9:24-27; 11:31-39; and 12:1-13.

In verses 29-31 of Matthew 24, Jesus explained that “immediately after the tribulation of those days,” discerning disciples “will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.” The book of Revelation reveals this “tribulation” will manifest as affliction, pressures, and even physical persecution and martyrdom for some of His chosen or “elect” ones. 

Troubles and Tribulation

Jesus seems to say that some of His followers will still be alive and on earth during at least part of the “tribulation” period. John the Revelator indicates the Beast will be allowed to “make war on the saints and to conquer them” (13:7) until “the hour to reap has come” and “the harvest of the earth” is consummated (Rev. 14:14-16). 

The Apostle Paul affirmed that though we may be oppressed, abused, or even killed for our faith, neither “tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword” or even “death” can separate believers “from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:35, 38-39). Ultimately, we will be victorious by relying on the atonement of Jesus Christ, our confident assurance that our names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life (Rev. 13:8), and the authority of God’s Word (Rev. 12:11).

God’s Time-table for Christ’s Coming

In his first letter to the believers in Thessalonica, Paul promised them future deliverance from the wrath of God (1 Thess. 1:10; 5:9). When someone deceived them into thinking the present afflictions and persecutions they were experiencing were part of the prophesied Day of the Lord, Paul wrote a second letter to calm their fears and settle their faith. 

He carefully explained that no matter the difficulties they were experiencing, they would not be part of the future Day of the Lord’s judgment and wrath because that Day could not unfold until certain other events had taken place. He then reviewed for them God’s Last Days time-table for the church.

First, Rebellion and Lawlessness

In his first letter, Paul taught them how the Lord would return and catch up His own to meet Him in the air (1 Thes. 4:13-18). Now, he speaks “concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him” (2 Thes. 2:1) and explains, “That day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God” (vv. 3-4).

The Greek word used here for “rebellion” is apostasia, which is transliterated in other versions as “apostasy” and means a “falling away.” But it is an active spiritual rebellion and not a passive proclivity. Some will deconstruct their faith spiritually, and the corrupting influence of an emerging Man of Sin (or Lawlessness) will precede the Day of the Lord.

The Revelation of the Antichrist

The term Antichrist is only used in the New Testament by the Apostle John in his short epistles (1 John 2:18, 22; 4:3; 2 John 7), where he also warns there are other, lesser  antichrists at work in the world. He identifies these as deceitful, destructive, and divisive “believers” who withdrew from the fellowship and mutual submission of the saints. 

The Greek prefix anti has two meanings: against and instead of. Satan not only opposes Christ, but he wants to be worshipped and obeyed instead of Christ. Jesus is the Prince of Peace and the counterfeit christ will begin as a peaceful, politial dictator who unites nations politically into powerful blocks of godless entities (Rev. 6:1-2).

Satan is restricted from revealing this “man of sin” earlier by a restraining force, that remains a mystery to us at this time (2 Thes. 2:6-7). Some believe it is the church before the rapture. Others think the

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What Can We Learn from Memorial Day?

Posted on May 26, 2024 by His Way with Gary Curtis

When we lived in the U.S. Midwest, Memorial Day weekend always seemed like the beginning of summer! For our family, it always included planting (or re-planting) annual flowers. Flower bulbs and seeds are somewhat homely, but they have hidden life and beauty within their uninteresting exterior. 

They actually have two realities: one flourishes underground, while the other emerges above ground. We planted the bulbs and seeds with a learned expectation that they would become beautiful flowers to enhance our yard and home! 

Memorial Day was also an occasion to remember loved ones, friends, first responders, or members of our military who had died. Often, bouquets of flowers were placed at their graves or places of memorial to remind everyone that we have two lives, living in physical and spiritual dimensions. As the Apostle Paul explained to the Corinthians:

They are buried as natural human bodies, but they will be raised as spiritual bodies. Just as there are natural bodies, there are also spiritual bodies. (1 Corinthians 15:44; NLT)

Natural Bodies and Spiritual Bodies

We might think of death as a doorway of transformation from the physical realities to the spiritual realities to come. When we die, we are not annihilated. We do not pass into oblivion or non-existence. Rather, our bodies and our spirit/soul have different destinies. 

In this Earth-based living, we have human bodies that were made to work in this physical reality. Likewise, when born-again believers in Christ die and shed this physical body (kind of like the separation of a booster rocket on a missile), we retain the senses of our soul and spirit. 1 Corinthians 13:12 indicates we will be the same person but an even better version–without the sin, sickness, or sorrows of our present physical realities.

Our Earthly bodies will be transformed into Heavenly bodies, made to work best in the spirit realm of the cosmos. We were born as creatures for this earth; we will continue as God’s eternal creations for the heavenlies (1 Cor. 15:39-41)!

Sin Separates Us from Our Spiritual Destiny

Dr. Robert Jeffress explains sin as “thumbing our noses at God’s moral code, which is punishable by death.” Paul explained the consequences of sin as “wages,” which we earn. So many hours worked at an agreed rate of money or exchange accumulate to determine the wages we have earned and must be paid.

Paul taught the Romans: “For the wages of sin is death” (6:23a). This death is eternal separation from God and the eternal plans and rewards He has intended for us! It would be a horrible and eternal loss if it were not for the rest of that verse. It is critically important: “…but, the gift of God is eternal life, in Christ Jesus, our Lord” (6:23b). 

No longer is Paul speaking about “wages.” Rather, he highlights the alternative to  eternal death as eternal life, for those who are “in Christ Jesus, our Lord.” And, it is a free “gift” for all who will “repent” (Acts 17:30) and turn away from their sins (1 Peter 3:11) and turn to Jesus (Acts 26:18), making Him our Savior and Lord of our lives (Philippians 2:9-11)! 

We Must Be Born Again

Jesus assured a religious leader named Nicodemus: “No one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit. Humans can reproduce only human life, but the Holy Spirit gives birth to spiritual life.” (John 3:5-6, NLT)

By Jesus’ redeeming work on the cross and the renewing power of the Holy Spirit, natural, sinful humans can be reconnected to Almighty God and “recharged” from “above” by the spiritual rebirth of the Holy Spirit. We are not only given new power but a new destiny!

For the Lord himself will come down from heaven with a commanding shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet call of God. First, the believers who have died will rise from their graves. 17 Then, together with them, we who are still alive and remain on the earth will be caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. Then, we will be with the Lord forever. 18 So encourage each other with these words. (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18; NLT)

Born-again believers can exchange this hope-filled farewell: I’ll see you again: here, there, or in the air!

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Pentecostal Power is Promised!

Posted on May 19, 2024 by His Way with Gary Curtis

Reflecting on Jesus’ earthly ministry, we see it was limited to only a few years. However, after the Resurrection and Pentecost, it was and continues to be multiplied through Spirit-empowered believers. Their ministries today, guided and equipped by the Holy Spirit, continue to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ and the future Kingdom of God. These called and chosen ones declare the biblical truths concerning justification, sanctification, and Spirit-empowered service.

Promised Empowerment with the Holy Spirit

Jesus is the prototype of the Spirit-filled, Spirit-empowered life (Acts 10:38, Luke 4:14-19; Matt. 4:23). Pastor Jack Hayford wrote: The Book of Acts is the story of the disciples receiving what Jesus received in order to do what Jesus did!

As Jesus was about to embark on His public ministry, He sought out John the Baptist to align with his ministry of repentance and confession of sin as a necessity for entering the kingdom of God. After His immersion in water by John, the Holy Spirit anointed Jesus for public ministry in a miraculous display of our triune God: 

As Jesus emerged from the water, the heavens were opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and settling on him. And a voice from heaven proclaimed, “This is my dearly loved Son, who brings me great joy.” (Matthew 3:16-17; NLT).

Then, on the day of Jesus’ ascension to heaven, He commanded the assembled disciples “not to depart from Jerusalem but to wait for the Promise of the Father…for John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now” (Acts 1:5, NKJV).

Jesus promised His disciples Spirit-filled empowerment for kingdom service: 

But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere—in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8; NLT). 

Notice that while the Holy Spirit draws us to Christ and is active in our repentance and conversion experience, this baptism “with” or “in” the Holy Spirit is a subsequent experience. It is received “when the Holy Spirit comes upon” us. We must be “plugged in” to our Pentecostal power source for effective living and ministry!

The clear purpose of the outpouring of the Spirit, as recorded in the “Acts of the Apostles,” is to empower believers for an invigorated living witness and each congregation for effective ministry. 

Have You Been Baptized in the Holy Spirit Since You Believed?

The Book of Acts relates six case history accounts of people receiving the fullness or infilling of baptism in the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:4, 11; 4:27-31; 8:14-25; 9:17-20; 10:44-48; and 19:1-7). 

Four of the six references specifically mention glossolalia (languages not formerly learned or known by the speaker). The term is coined from the Greek glossa (”tongue”) and laleo  (“to speak”). In two accounts (Acts 4:27-31; 8:14-25;), glossolalia (tongues) is inferred by the hearers’ reactions.

Pastor Hayford’s notes in the Spirit-Fillled Life Bible at Acts 2:4 explain the phenomenon of “speaking with tongues” within the classical Pentecostal tradition and among some other contemporary Christians and many Charismatics. Many within the classical Pentecostal viewpoints believe speaking in Holy Spirit prompted tongues accompanies the occasion of a person’s initial surrender to the fullness of the Holy Spirit. They might  express this as “the initial physical evidence of the baptism with the Holy Spirit.” Whereas others place less emphasis on the doctrinal terminology, they would still apply its fundamental implication in their continued exercise of tongue-speaking as a part of their private prayer language. (See 1 Corinthians 14:1, 2, 4, 15, 39, 40).

In Acts 10, the Jewish believers traveling with Peter were astonished because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles also, for they heard them speak with tongues and magnify God (Vv. 45-46; NKJV).

Praying (or singing) in an unknown tongue is communicating sounds and syllables that are unknown to the one praying. These flow out of their innermost being and not their intellect. We are privately praying to and praising God with expressions from our hearts and spirits. This way, we can speak “mysteries” to God and edify ourselves (1 Cor. 14:1-5). 

So, we can conclude where we began: Have you been baptized in the Holy Spirit since you believed? Let this Pentecost season be filled with a new desire to be filled (or refilled) with the Holy Spirit. Then, pray and sing to God with the spirit and with your understanding (1 Cor. 14:15) as the Spirit of God refreshes every fiber of your being! Amen!

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Happy Mother’s Day!

Posted on May 12, 2024 by His Way with Gary Curtis

Honoring your father and mother is described by the Apostle Paul as “the first commandment with a promise–that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on earth” (Ephesians 6:2-3 NIV).

Proverbs 31 tells us a mother should be honored by her husband and children. It urges this respect for a wife’s noble character and praises “a woman who fears the LORD,” whereas Proverbs 23 wishes happiness for mothers and urges respect for them, especially in their later years:

Listen to your father, who gave you life, and don’t despise your mother when she is old…So give your father and mother joy! May she who gave you birth be happy (Proverbs 23:22, 25; NLT).

An Angelic Announcement

The New Testament gospel of Luke tells the story of a young girl named Mary from Nazareth, a town in Israel’s northern area of Galilee. Like Moses’ sister, her Hebrew name was Miriam. Destined by God to become Jesus’ human mother, Mary was surprised when an angel greeted her and told her she had found favor with God and was to bear a son and call him Jesus.

This angelic “annunciation” went on to explain:

He will be very great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David.  And he will reign over Israel [the house of Jacob] forever; his Kingdom will never end!” (Lu. 1:32-33; NLT)

Jesus Christ’s Incarnation

When the time came for Jesus to be born, Mary, “of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ” (Matthew 1:16; NIV), and her espoused husband Joseph were compelled to travel from Nazareth in Galilee to Bethlehem in Judea, just south of Jerusalem (Vv. 18-24). This arduous journey was to comply with a Roman census based on the place of family origin.

The young family eventually returned to Nazareth, where Jesus obeyed his earthly parents, and “his mother treasured all these things in her heart.” The gospel writer Luke summarized Jesus’ early incarnation through childhood and adolescence, saying, “Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men” (Luke 2:52; NIV).

Mary Prompted Jesus’ First Miracle

John Chapter Two tells us of Mary’s involvement in a wedding reception in the nearby Galilean town of Cana. Jesus and his new group of disciples had also been invited. When Mary discovered the wedding wine was consumed, she alerted her son. Jesus responded that it was not their problem, saying His “time had not yet come.”

However, you can almost see this mother smiling knowingly as she turned to the servants and said, “Do whatever he tells you” (V. 5). The rest of the famous story of Jesus turning water into wine became known as “the first of his miraculous signs” as he “revealed his glory and his disciples put their faith in him.”

His Mother and His Crucifixion!

I recently officiated at a memorial service for the adult son of a widowed neighbor. The grief of a mother for her child–no matter the age or development–is almost incomprehensible to me. My wife has often said, “It is not right for a mother to have to bury her own child.”

Yet, John 19 includes a special glimpse of Jesus’s love and practical care for His mother at the crucial event of His crucifixion. Mary stood near the cross with her sister and several other female disciples, along with one of His close disciples, believed to be young John himself.

When Jesus saw his mother standing there beside the disciple he loved, he said to her, “Dear woman, here is your son.” And he said to this disciple, “Here is your mother.” From then on, this disciple took her into his home. (John 19:16-27; NLT)

Post-Resurrection Reflections

After His resurrection, Jesus showed himself to His disciples, giving “many convincing proofs” that He was alive! Over a period of forty days, He talked with them about the Kingdom of God and the future “gift of the Father,” where they would be “baptized with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 1:1-8) and empowered for spiritual service and ministry.

After Jesus was miraculously taken to heaven before their eyes, the disciples returned to the upstairs room in Jerusalem, where they were staying.  Luke’s historical account in Acts 1:12-14 lists all who “joined together constantly in prayer,” including “Mary the mother of Jesus, and…

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Jesus is Getting Our Rooms Ready!

Posted on May 5, 2024 by His Way with Gary Curtis

In the Gospel of John, chapter 14, verses 1-3 in the New Living Translation, Jesus tells his followers about our future in Heaven:

Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in me. 2 There is more than enough room in my Father’s home. If this were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you? 3 When everything is ready, I will come and get you, so that you will always be with me where I am. (John 14:1-3; NLT).

In this special, comforting passage, Jesus tells us of peace, a place, and a promise. First, He tells us not to be “troubled.” The way to inner peace starts when we resist anxiety and worry by believing in God, His word, and His ways!  

We can have inner peace, knowing where we are going after this life and who will be there! Our faith is in Father God and His only Son, Jesus Christ, Who paid the price for our redemption! They will both be with us in Heaven and are trustworthy enough to provide all we need for this life and our journey there (2 Peter 1:3)! 

Next, we can look forward to that place where we will have eternal fellowship and happiness with Jesus, our Lord. We can be encouraged to know we will always be with Him where He is (John 14:3). In The Message paraphrase of this verse, Jesus says “I’m on my way to get your room ready.”

The Holy Spirit of God currently lives with believers and is in them (14:16-17)! Scripture teaches when believers die on earth, we are transformed. Our spirits are absent from this natural body and instantly present with our Lord (2 Corinthians 5:7-9) in the Paradise of God (2 Cor.12-2-5).

Finally, we have Jesus’ personal promise that “When everything is ready, I will come and get you so that you will always be with me where I am.” As we have received Him by faith, now He promises us He is coming again to receive us and all who have been “born again” from above by the Holy Spirit (John 3:2-5).

We Must Be Born Again

In John 3, Jesus explained to a Jewish religious leader the necessity of being born again:

 Jesus replied, “I assure you, no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit. 6 Humans can reproduce only human life, but the Holy Spirit gives birth to spiritual life. 7 So don’t be surprised when I say, ‘You must be born again.’ (John 3:2-7; NLT)

Since sin entered the world (Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7), we have been cut off from our intended spiritual connection with God, Who is Spirit. The scripture says we are “dead” spiritually because of our disobedience and many sins (Eph. 2:1; NLT).

By the renewing and transforming power of the Holy Spirit, natural, sinful humans can be reconnected to God and “recharged” from “above” by a spiritual rebirth of the Holy Spirit. We are not only given new power but a new destiny!

We must not be passive listeners in the crowds around Jesus but committed followers and disciples! His ways must become our ways. We must want to please Him in all we are and do!

A story is told about an old-time evangelist who began his message by stretching out his arm and,

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