There Will Be A Day of Judgement As History Draws To A Close But The Bible Has Given Us Ample Warning

When-Will-the-Day-of-the-Lord-Take-Place-1024x535 — Ref: jashow.com

Our God is relational. From the day He created Adam and walked with Adam in the Garden, He has always been deeply concerned about our relationship with Him. As our Creator, He’s close to us. He communicates with us in multiple ways and He’s intimate with His children. We see this in His provision and the encouragements we receive in His Word.

God is hard at work redeeming our broken world that was tainted by the sin that came into it through Adam. One day He will bring His work to completion and all Creation will be restored to its original design. To complete His work, God will first exercise His prerogative as a holy God and there will be a day of judgement that will cleanse the world of wickedness and sin. It’s not going to be pleasant but God and the Bible have given us ample warning.

Warnings about the Day of Judgement (also known as the Day of the Lord)

The Bible mentions the Day of the Lord more than 50 times. It is described as a great (in the context of magnitude and not in the fun sense as we tend to use the word these days) and dreadful day (Malachi 4:5). The ‘Lord’ in this context means Adonai or Yahweh.

Isaiah 13:9-10 is another passage, even earlier than Malachi, that mentions this event, describing it here as cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, where the land would be laid desolate, and the sinners destroyed completely.

Zephaniah 1:14-15 states that even the mighty man shall cry bitterly. Verse 15 goes on to describe the day as one of wrath, trouble, and distress, where everything is laid to waste and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, of clouds and thick darkness.

In Amos 5:18-20, we read that the day is not one of light, but of darkness. It is as if where a man would flee from a lion and a bear would meet him, or if we went into a house and leaned against it in tiredness and a serpent bit him. Joel 1:15 describes it as a destruction from the Almighty.

As we can see, the Day of the Lord had already been mentioned in the Old Testament, within the context of the understanding Israel had of their relationship with God in those days. But Paul would also speak about it in the New Testament. In 1 Thessalonians 5:2-3, he wrote that the Day of the Lord would come as a thief in the night and that it would come suddenly when it is least expected. Peter wrote in 2 Peter 3:10 that the elements will melt with fervent heat, and the earth and everything thereon would burn in that heat.

In Acts 2:20, during the birth of the church, the Day of the Lord is also mentioned. It is said that the sun shall turn into darkness and the moon into blood. Jesus Himself describes it in Matthew 24:29-30 where He told the disciples that in the days after the Tribulation, the sun shall be darkened and the moon loses its light, the stars fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken. All the tribes of the world will mourn.

Why is the Day of the Lord mentioned so many times in the Bible and why is it important to know about it? It is an event that is going to come in the future. It is of such magnitude that it will be unlike anything that has occurred in our whole history, more dreadful than any upheaval, so much so that even the elements would burn. It is an event that no one would like to see happen in their lifetime. For this reason, the Bible gives us ample warning throughout Scripture.

As with any human being, we would lose hope if this event is all that we can expect from God. He is just and righteous and there is a reason and purpose for the Day of the Lord but it would not rest well with the peace of our minds. For we are all sinners in need of grace and mercy from God.

But there is also another day that is mentioned throughout the Bible and this is what gives every born-again Christian the blessed hope Paul described in 1 Thessalonians 5:8-9: for God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation from our Lord Jesus Christ.

The Day of Christ

This Day is known as the Day of Christ and it will take place before the Day of Judgement. On that day, Christ will come back for the faithful and take us to meet Him in the air, giving us new bodies like the one Adam and Eve had before the Fall in the Garden of Eden.

Paul gives much encouragement to us Christians about keeping an eye on the Day of Christ. In Philippians 1:6 he writes about the confidence we have that the good work God is doing in us He will bring to completion on the day of Jesus Christ. We are to hold firmly to the word of life so that on the Day of Christ we will be able to boast that we did not run or labour in vain (Philippians 2:16).

In 1 Corinthians 1:8, we receive the encouragement that the grace of God will help keep us firm to the end so that we will be blameless on the Day of Christ. Here, Paul also writes to the Corinthian Christians about the Day of Christ:

1 Corinthians 15:51-53

51 Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— 52 in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. 53 For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.

What then should our response be? Firstly, to hold firmly to the word of life and the grace of God. Secondly and decisively, we need to share the gospel with our loved ones. Jesus’s Great Commission was not an ego programme. There is purpose in it. We do not want our loved ones to go through the Day of the Lord. Neither does God want anyone to perish but all to come to salvation through repentance and renewal of relationship with Him (2 Peter 3:9).

Christ did not come into the world and walked among men more than 2000 years ago to judge the world but to save it (John 12:47). Sooner or later we will all have to make a decision which side we will stand on, and on the Day of Judgement, it will be much too late.