I Have No Idea When Jesus Will Return...I'm Serious (But I'm Working Until He Does)

“Watch therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming.” Matthew 24:42

I wonder how purposefully we live each day. Often we get caught up in Second Coming prophecy trying to decipher the times. We want someone to tell us which current regime on this earth will foster the Antichrist’s uprising. We buy series’ of books, watch prophecy television, and jot down everything we think point to Jesus’ return. I don’t want to be too critical, but it seems Jesus always was interested in how we are living right now, in light of His return.

He told the story of a manager who left his business in the hands of a group of employees. His simple instructions were, “Kept at it until I get back.” What if those employees gathered in the back room and started placing bets on which month their boss would return. From there they started telling all the other employees about their guesses. Everyone was certain that the boss would return within the next 60 days. Of course, when he actually stayed away longer, instead of heeding his original request to stay at their jobs, they recalculated and said he would actually arrive sometime in the next 120 days.

What a waste of time, at least from the manager’s viewpoint. He had one simple request, “Take care of my business until I return.” I think Jesus is asking to consider how purposeful we actually are. He will return, and that should be motivation to continue His plan. If I begin to live with a serious belief that “no one knows the day or the hour”, it encourages me to do all I can today. I don’t know if He might not come to check out how well we have done tomorrow morning.

Keep the image of the business manager in mind because it is the picture Jesus provided in His stories to us. He told them to keep them from doing exactly what many of us do; try to pinpoint His return as closely as possible. Maybe an illustration from my life will help.

When I was 18 my parents, along with my younger brother and sisters took a vacation in Europe. As I was newly anointed as an 18 year old adult, I chose to remain behind and see what it was like to be on my own for a whole summer. (Yes, I regret that decision now. How silly are our late teen choices!) For the sake of our story, let’s suppose my parents had no idea how long they would be gone. “We don’t know, Mark, only The Travel Agent knows for sure. Just keep the place up while we’re gone!”

For a few days I have friends over, we eat pizza, drink coke out of aluminum 16 ounce cans (it was 1973), and leave the boxes and empties sitting around for another time. But, as the weeks progress, I realize my parents could return any moment. I had no when. I could not leave it until the last moment to clean thing up.

So, I started taking out the garbage on a regular basis. I did my dishes at the end of the day. I dusted (at least the obvious places). I vacuumed. I even fed the dogs before their bowls were completely empty, and kept the water clean and full. I purposefully kept things up based on my parents’ statement that I wouldn’t have advance knowledge of their return. I couldn’t call all my friends the day before and say, “Come on guys, I’ll pay you if you help me to clean the house that I’ve trashed while the family was gone.”

I think that is something like what Jesus is saying to us. “Watch, stay focused, You don’t know when I’ll return.” Throughout Church history there have been those who thought they were the last generation before Christ’s Second Coming. Luther thought the popes were the Anti-Christ, Popes thought the Reformation was the final falling away. We would do well to learn from history.

There have also been those who, believing Jesus’ words, “You do not know on what day your Lord is returning”, strive to live purposefully each moment. They reach out to the poor and hope Jesus will say “Well done.” They know picture Jesus painted of the final days. He returns and tells one group, “Thank you for tending to My needs until I returned.”

“Your needs? What do you mean Jesus.” “Every time you visited the prisoner, healed the sick, gave to the poor, sat with the widow, lived among the outcasts, You did it all for Me.” (Yes, I was riffing from Jesus’ original words). I believe the attitude Jesus desires is exactly the same of these people who simply went about doing good to and for those they encountered.

Is Jesus returning? No doubt! Do I know when? Also, no doubt…no doubt that I do not know when. That’s the way Jesus left it and I am content with that. Instead of trying to decode political movements with cut and paste Scripture, I want to keep doing the things my King has asked me to do until He returns. And, for my way of thinking, a whole lot more will get done for Christ if the whole Church thought that way.

Let’s stay busy bringing the goodness of God’s kingdom here. As Jesus taught us to pray, “Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” And, having prayed it, let us get to work about it. We just might hear Jesus say, when He does finally return: “Well done good and faithful servants. Enter into Your Master’s joy!”