Luke 17:22-37: The Day When the Son of Man is Revealed

INTRODUCTION

What is the meaning of history? Where is everything going? What is it all for? We live in a day of fear and uncertainty. Many are caught up in the fear of a future that is looking very bleak due to the effects of climate change; or a future living in a post-Covid world; or a future controlled by Neo-Marxist governments; or a future of constant digital surveillance. Many have a view of the future that is dark and hopeless. Every generation has lived with the harsh realities of living in a fallen world pressing in upon them. The threat of a nuclear world war 3; the threat of military regimes driven by godless philosophies taking over the world; the threat of AIDS. The Bible has always had a hope-filled view of the future. The Bible is able to explain why we suffer, why we die, why we do terrible things to each other. The Bible promises that the pain will one day come to an end with the coming of a promised Saviour from God. The Jews had set their hope on this day, the arrival of the Promised One. God’s plan, as it turns out has various parts and is not simple. In the section before us, Luke 17:20-37, Jesus first addresses the Pharisees and their question about the kingdom pointing to how His presence among them is an indication that the kingdom of God, the day of salvation has arrived. But God’s plan to make all things new doesn’t happen all at once, we know that there is a first coming and a second coming of Christ. That Christ comes but then goes away and that He will come back again. Last week we spoke about how the OT prophecies often present like a mountain range where the various peaks present as one peak from one perspective, but with hindsight we see the valley in-between. As we move into this next section, v22-37, we see that Jesus reveals the peaks, the valley, and some details relating to His second coming.

We can see in v22 that Jesus has stopped talking to the Pharisees about how His presence among them points to the fact that the Kingdom is in their midst, and is now talking to His disciples about His absence and Second coming. The details of v22-37 do not tell us everything that we would like to know about the second coming, but they do tell us some very important things. We will be looking at this section under 5 headings. The delay before the second coming, v22-24; The necessity of the first coming, v25; The conditions preceding the second coming, v26-30; The necessity of preparing for the second coming, v31-33; The judgement of the second coming, v34-37.