Knowing the Day and the Hour of Christ’s Return

Today is the Feast of the Ascension. This festival has been celebrated in the New Testament Church for centuries, and pre-dates Christmas. The readings for today make clear, again, that our heavenly Father has reserved some knowledge for Himself, to include the Day and Hour of the Son’s return on the clouds with power and glory. Perhaps if so-called “Christian” talk radio personalities were receiving God’s gifts in congregations which still use the more ancient lectionaries, people would be preserved from false prophecies about the coming of the end of the world. The first chapter of Acts, set alongside the 24th chapter of Matthew, gives comfort to believers that God holds all things in His Hand, to the good of the faithful, and that He will complete all things in His time. To help His people while they wait for the fulfillment of His promises, He has given them His Spirit, the Holy Spirit, Who brings Christ and Him crucified as a present and eternal reality to those who hear and believe God’s Word from its context. It is this Comforter, Who comes to any person through the Water and Word of Holy Baptism since the time of the apostles after the Day of Pentecost, who works sure and certain hope in God, His Promises, His Son who was crucified into death to pay the price the Holy God demands for sin.