The World and the Word

             The Advents and Judgments of Christ

When Jesus walked the earth in human form, He dealt with the world as a whole when He preached to large crowds, to the Pharisees and Sadducees, and even to Pilate. He also dealt with individuals when He saved and healed them. Luke 7:36-50; Matthew 12:15. Jesus came to save all those who would not believe in Him at that time as well as all who would believe. The fact that Jesus would not judge the world while He was in it, but He reserved His final judgment of the evil, eternal deaths of humans until the end of the world and resurrects their living souls and spirits from the regions of the dead demonstrates the truth that Jesus came to the world to save every human who ever lived. John 12:47-48; Revelation 20:15; Matthew 15:13; Matthew 13:36-43; Matthew 13:47-50; Matthew 13:10-12; I John 3:8; I Timothy 6:13. When does Christ "quicken all things?" The only possible answer must be at the end of the world. Revelation 20:5. God never creates temporary life. Ecclesiastes 3:14; Luke 20:38.

After Jesus rose from the dead, He appeared in His spiritual body to His believers saved by grace. Jesus did this to instill faith in them that He was alive and had the power to save them forever. John 20:24-29. He did not appear to the world because from the time of His ascension He would deal with the world through His Church and the power of His Holy Spirit. He charged the Church to preach the gospel and witness to the world that He is alive and can save by His grace. Matthew 28:18-20; Acts 1:8. He also assured His Church that they can never lose their salvation that He had given them, and He promised them that He would always be with them. John 10:27-30; Matthew 28:20.

After His ascension, Jesus came back to His Church as the Holy Spirit to empower His Church to preach His gospel and to show the world that He can purify and change the hearts of men in order to give them His eternal life and to make them much better people. The Holy Spirit gave the Church "cloven tongues like as of fire" to symbolize that He would sanctify and purify His Church. Acts 2:3. God can cleanse sins with His fiery wrath against evil as well as with the blood of Christ. Isaiah 6:6-7. With this event, the Church became the body of Christ with His power to do His work in the world. I Corinthians 12:12-13. The Holy Spirit empowered the Church at Pentecost. He did not save the Church at that time. Christ saves only individuals one at a time. The Holy Spirit baptizes believers into the body of Christ when He washes them in the spiritual blood and water that flowed from Jesus' cross. John 6:63; I Corinthians 6:11. All of the Old Testament saints and Jesus' disciples, except for Judas Iscariot, became saved by grace in reservation before they became washed in Jesus' blood and water because God knew that He would certainly wash them from their sins in the future. In John 20:22, Jesus gave the Holy Spirit to His Church as individuals for the certainty of their salvation through His washing them in the spiritual blood and water from Jesus' cross. The Tribulation saints will be saved by grace in reservation until they get to Heaven when they will be cleansed by the blood and water from Jesus' cross. Revelation 7:11-17.