By Pastor Steve Nickodemus

There Will Come an End

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“His winnowing fork is in His hand, and He will clear His threshing floor, gathering His wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”
Matthew 3:12 New International Version

We picked our bush beans twice in our garden and then I decided to finish the harvest. I pulled them up by the roots and we picked the beans off the plants and threw the plants into the compost pile. It was a final harvest and “the wheat and the chaff” were permanently separated.

John the Baptist said that this is how it will be at the end of the world. The Lord Jesus will return with His angels and there will be a final harvest. Those who believe in the Son of Man will join Him for all eternity and those who reject Him will be like the chaff, burned up after the harvest. This picture teaches me three lessons:

Firstly, there will come an end. The Lord is very merciful and patient, desiring that all would be saved, but there will be an end to this sinful world and all things will be made new.

Secondly, there isn’t much time. The time for the final harvest is soon, and you and I do not have much time to bear witness to those who do not yet know Jesus. There is a great urgency in this verse, a sense of getting our priorities right in our relationships with others, a need to put first things first and share the Good News of Jesus now.

Thirdly, this verse is more promise than it is threat. Yes, God does punish sin but wants all to come to repentance. The main message here is that you and I are to be about our Father’s business, loving and saving this world.

We have been given such a great legacy, the wonderful Good News of Jesus. We must share that Good News while there is still time!

Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church Colorado Springs, Colorado