Dev: Dec 23 - Lo! He Comes with Clouds Descending

Lo! he comes, with clouds descending,

Once for favoured sinners slain;

Thousand, thousand saints attending

Swell the triumph of His train: Alleluia!

Christ appears on earth again.

Imagine the second coming. (Are you getting the sense that the second coming is an important Advent theme?) But imagine the second coming ...

This hymn proclaims part of what Jesus himself foretold about the second coming. At his final trial before Jesus and the Sanhedrin, Jesus said, "(You may think you're getting rid of me, but there will come a time when) from now on you will see the Son of Man ... coming on the clouds of heaven.”

Now, I added that first part, of course, but with wistful lovingkindness -- and without a hint of bitterness or sarcasm -- can't you hear Jesus pointing beyond the murderous present to the redemptive future. "When the time comes, lo, he will come on clouds, descending!"

Again ... picture it!

And who are the royal servants, attending the coming King?

The ultimate answer is "all the company of heaven." And we normally think of this as hosts of angels. But that's not what this hymn sings! Attending Jesus, making up his figurative train, are all the saints. "Thousand, thousand!"

And who are the saints? It's not just St. Peter and St. Paul and the like. Rather, any believer who dies and ascends to heaven becomes a "saint."

That's what we remember and proclaim, of course, on All Saints Sunday.

And that's what the Apostle Paul proclaimed in 2 Corinthians 5:8 - saying essentially, "to be absent from the body [is] to be at home with the Lord."

And that's part of what we should hopefully see when someone says, "Imagine the second coming" ...

Thousand, thousand saints attending

Swell the triumph of His train

In Christ's Love,

a guy who'll one day

be part of a train

(Ed Thomas the tank engine?

Probably not. I'll just be

satisfied to be a caboose

in Christ's entourage)

Sent from my iPhone