Appearing With Christ

The Apostle Paul taught us clearly that we will appear with Christ. I don't know what has happened to this clear scriptural truth. Whether it is the emphasis on the catching up ("rapture), or just our desire to get to Heaven and stay there, I do not believe we are placing nearly enough emphasis on the fact that we will return with Christ when He returns to earth to establish His Kingdom here.

(8/20/2006) The burden all day today had to do with Paul's statement that when Christ appears, we shall appear with Him. At the evening service I asked one of the ladies what she had been taught concerning our appearing with Christ. This particular person had been raised in Evangelical teaching.

I asked, "What were you taught concerning our appearing with Christ at His coming?"

She responded that we were to be caught up to be with Christ in Heaven in order to escape the Great Tribulation. Then seven years later we were to return with Him to earth.

I asked, "What were we to do when we returned?" She answered that we were to fight the Battle of Armageddon. (She did not seem too clear on this.)

I then asked, "What do we do after the Battle of Armageddon is over?"

She seemed not to sure of the answer. Then she said, "There will be a new heaven and a new earth."

I said, "What about the Millennium, the thousand-year Kingdom Age?" At this point she was not sure at all.

If I am not mistaken, our sister, a devout Christian, had been taught doctrine which unfortunately is common throughout the Evangelical churches. There has been no clear emphasis on our appearing with Christ or the reason for it.

Yet, according to the Apostle Paul in the third chapter of the Book of Colossians, the reason it is necessary that we put of our old earthly nature and put on the new man of righteous behavior is that we are destined to appear with Christ at His coming.

Since the one thing Satan fears is that the believers will begin to behave righteously, making it necessary for him to flee, Satan has sought to bury the concept that we are to appear with Christ.

Yet, the idea that we are to appear with Christ at His return is one of the cornerstones of our faith.

Why is this? It is because our return with Christ is for the purpose of installing the Kingdom of God on the earth.

Everything depends on our return with Christ. The creation itself groans in its slavery to sin, anxiously awaiting the revealing of Christ and the other sons so it, the creation, may be released into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.

Can you understand now why there has been such an effort to conceal this truth? It has to do with the removal of the chains of Satan from God's creation.

To grasp the importance of the appearing of the sons of God along with the Son of God, we might turn to the story of Adam and Eve.

When the Lord God created Eve from the substance of Adam, God placed in Eve all that was needed if Adam was to fulfill God will for him. Eve was created as a helper suitable for Adam. Thus she contained in herself all Adam needed to be successful.

God issued a decree concerning man: that man be in God's image; that man be male and female; that man be fruitful; and that man have dominion over all the works of God's hands.

It was impossible for man to be completely in God's image apart from Eve, because God is both Male and Female.

It was impossible for man to be male and female apart from Eve, because a man by himself cannot be both male and female. This, by the way, is why Satan places so much emphasis on homosexual relationships and transgender activities. In so doing Satan attacks the very root of God's intention concerning man.

It was impossible for Adam to be fruitful apart from Eve. God desires that mankind increase upon the earth; because from the ranks of mankind God draws out the ones He has chosen to be His ruling priests. Again, we see the purpose behind the emphasis on homosexual behavior, an attempt to frustrate God's original decree concerning man.

It was impossible for man to be have dominion apart from Eve, because dominion comes from fruitfulness. As man increases in number his power increases.

Such is God's original decree concerning man. However in addition to consisting of real circumstances and relationships, the account of the four decrees is, although imperfect, an allegory concerning Christ and His Church.

It is impossible for Christ by Himself to be in the image of God, because God is both Male and Female. The Church is the female counterpart of God's firstborn Son.

Is impossible for Christ by Himself to fulfill the Divine decree concerning male and female because Christ is not both male and female. Christ is the universal, supreme Male.

It is impossible for Christ to be fruitful and multiply apart from the Church, because Christ is the Vine. He does not bear fruit of Himself but through the branches, the members of His Body.

It is impossible for Christ to have dominion by Himself, that is, not the kind of dominion He desires. Two thousand years ago He could have commanded worldwide obedience by issuing commands to the warrior angels. But it is the Father's will that Christ gain dominion through His saints as His instrumentality.

Now we can understand why it is so important that we appear with Christ. The Father has chosen that Christ fulfill His Father's will according to the decree of image, male and female, fruitfulness, and dominion. But it is not good that the firstborn Son be alone. He must have a counterpart, a fullness, a helper suitable for Him.

Everything that Christ needs to fulfill His Father's fiat is in the members of His Church. We are His fullness, His Body, the Wife of the Lamb, the new Jerusalem.

Because our destiny is to be a suitable helper for the firstborn Son, our orientation to existence must be brought into conformity to this reality.

We are not our own. We have been purchased with a price. We belong to the Lord Jesus Christ as His helper.

Here we see the failure of Eve. She and her husband were together at the time of the awful incident. Notice that Satan did not approach Adam. It is likely that Adam was impressed with the beauty of the first woman to the point of worship. Satan new this. He knew if he could get Eve to disobey God, Adam would follow in order to please his wife.

Eve did not say to Satan, "My role is to help Adam succeed in fulfilling God's will for him. How will my becoming like God, knowing good and evil, help Adam?"

Rather, Eve became excited about the idea of being like God—never mind about Adam.

This is such a true picture of the Christians of our day. We want to have power so we can be like Christ, heal the sick, cast out devils, perform miracles, gather a great audience to ourselves. But we do not ask ourselves how this will help Christ be successful in carrying our God's will concerning Himself.

If the truth be known, we may be more interested in becoming something great rather than in finding out what Christ wants of us.

August of the year 2006 finds us at a turning point in the history of the Christian Church. While the various Christian institutions are busily carrying out their ideas of what God wants (much like the Jewish leaders in the Temple when Joseph and Mary walked in with the Child), God is opening His Word. We are seeing that our Evangelical teaching is missing God on many counts.

However, the primary problem is not our ignorance of the Bible, it is our behavior. We bear the name of Christ, but we are eating our own food and wearing our own clothes, so to speak. The churches are filled with worldliness, the lusts of the flesh, and self-will. Yet we blindly speak of being caught up to be with Christ to escape suffering, only to return to earth seven years later to do we know not what (nor do we care).

We have an incorrect view of the future, and it is causing us to remain spiritually immature.

The true vision of the future is that we (if we have been adequately prepared) shall return with Christ. Our world is in a valley overshadowed by the death that is between us and the Light of God. God has promised that the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the Glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. This glory shall come to the Satan-bound earth through the Son and His brothers, the other sons of God.

This is why it is absolutely necessary that we call upon the Lord until He enables us to prepare ourselves by putting of the old, earthly nature and putting on the new Nature of Jesus Christ.

When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. (Colossians 3:4)

Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices And have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. (Colossians 3:9,10)

For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea. (Habakkuk 2:14)

I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. (Romans 8:18)