22. О Втором пришествии Бога и Спасителя нашего

This will happen at the Second Coming of our Savior, for He promised so to the Apostles: I will return and “come to you” (John 14:18); and again: “I will come again to you, and will take you to Myself” (John 14:3); and in another place: “Then you will see the Son of man coming on the clouds of heaven” (Matthew 24:30) “in His glory, and all the holy angels with Him: then He will sit on the throne of His glory, and all the nations will be gathered before Him, and He will separate... the sheep from the goats, and He will set the sheep at His right hand, and the heels of the goats” (Matthew 25:31-33). The divine Daniel also saw this coming of the Savior. “In vain,” he says, “the throne was set up, and the Old One was seated, His clothes were as white as snow, and the hair of His head was as pure as a wave, His throne was a flame of fire, His wheels were scorching.” A river of fire flows forth before Him: thousands of thousands served Him, and ten thousand stood before Him: the judgment sat, and the books were opened” (Dan. 7:9-10). “And behold, like a son of man, he walked on the clouds of heaven, and even came to the Ancient One in a day, and was brought before Him. And unto Him was given dominion... and a kingdom: His dominion is everlasting dominion... and His kingdom shall endure forever" (Dan. 7.13–14); “And the rulership of the beasts was removed, and the kingdom was given to the saints of the Most High” (Dan. 7:12, 27). Such is the agreement between evangelical preaching and prophetic prophecies, because both are the words of the one God. About this fire 1 the prophet Isaiah says: “Who will tell you the eternal place?” (Is. 33, 14) And at the end of the prophecy he says: “Their worm will not die, and their fire will not be quenched” (Is. 66, 24). And the divine David, foreshadowing this coming, said: “The God of gods, the Lord of the verb, and called the earth from the east of the sun to the west. From Zion is the splendor of His beauty. God will come, our God, and will not be silent: a fire will burn before Him, and a green storm will surround Him” (Ps. 49:1-3); and in another psalm: “Clouds and darkness are around Him: righteousness and judgment are the correction of His throne. Fire will go before Him, and His enemies will burn all around” (Ps. 96:2,3); and again: “As he comes to judge the earth: to judge the world with righteousness, and the people with righteousness” (Ps. 97:9). And through the mouth of the prophet Malachi, the God of all things Himself spoke: “Behold, I will send you Elijah the Tishbite,... lest I come and smite the earth to the end” (Mal. 4, 5, 6). And the divine Apostle, writing to blessed Titus, compared the second with the first coming of our Savior. For he says: “The saving grace of God has appeared to all man, punishing us, so that, having rejected ungodliness and worldly lusts, we may live chastely and righteously and piously in this present world, awaiting the blessed hope and the revelation of the glory of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:11-13). And this showed that the first coming was for the sake of the second. For this, he says, he appeared, so that, having delivered us from wickedness and lawlessness and taught us all virtue, to prepare us for the joyful expectation of the Second Coming. And the Thessalonians praise that, having got rid of idolatry, they decided to “work for the living and true God and wait for His Son from heaven, who rose from the dead, Jesus, who delivers us from the wrath to come” (1 Thessalonians 1:9-10). And in the Epistle to the Hebrews he mentioned this coming, giving prophetic testimony. For he says: “If He is yet to come, He will not come and be crushed” (Heb. 10:37). He also taught this to the Philippians, for he said: “Our life is in heaven; from there we also wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus” (Phil. 3:20). And the Thessalonians also taught, saying: “The Lord himself will come down from heaven by command, in the voice of the Archangel, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first,” and so on (1 Thessalonians 4:16). It would not be difficult to cite other testimonies announcing the Second Coming of our Savior, but these are also sufficiently convincing and extremely inquisitive. About the fire that the prophet David depicted in the above place. You might be interested in: