Although the Protestant Reformers believed in the literal, visible, audible, and glorious return of Christ, gradually the understanding of this biblical truth changed. Popular nineteenth-century preachers taught that Christ would come to establish His kingdom on earth and usher in 1,000 years of peace. This led to spiritual lethargy and an apathetic commitment to spiritual values.

 Similarly, Christ’s disciples misunderstood the nature of the Messiah’s coming. They thought that He would come as a conquering general who would break the yoke of Roman bondage, not One who would deliver them from the condemnation and shackles of sin. Thus, they failed to understand the manner of His coming.

 Read Acts 1:9-11; Revelation 1:7; and Matthew 24:27, 30, 31. What do these verses teach us about the manner of our Lord’s return?

 When Christ came the first time as a babe in Bethlehem’s manger, very few people discerned His coming. But when He comes the second time, “every eye” will see Him come. Every ear will hear the trumpet blast of His return. Every human being on earth will behold His glory. We need not be deceived. The Scriptures have made the events surrounding His return abundantly clear.

 “One of the most solemn and yet most glorious truths revealed in the Bible is that of Christ’s second coming to complete the great work of redemption. To God’s pilgrim people, so long left to sojourn in ‘the region and shadow of death,’ a precious, joy-inspiring hope is given in the promise of His appearing, who is ‘the resurrection and the life,’ to ‘bring home again His banished.’ The doctrine of the second advent is the very keynote of the Sacred Scriptures. From the day when the first pair turned their sorrowing steps from Eden, the children of faith have waited the coming of the Promised One to break the destroyer’s power and bring them again to the lost Paradise.”—Ellen G. White, The Great Controversy,p. 299.

 An early Adventist leader, Luther Warren, used to tell young people, “The only way to be ready for the coming of Christ is to get ready and stay ready.” The message of Christ’s soon return is an urgent appeal to each one of us to examine our hearts and evaluate our spiritual lives. It is a call to godly living. There can be no neutrality in the blazing light of the glory of Christ’s return.