Whimpers or Rejoicing

Whimpers or Rejoicing

Zechariah 12:10

This is the way the world ends.

This is the way the world ends.

This is the way the world ends.

Not with a bang, but with a whimper!

These lines are the ending of one of T S Eliot’s famous poems The Hollow Men. It was written to describe the emptiness that man was feeling in Europe and America after the end of WWI. It was a time when man had lost faith in God and mankind. Society was gripped by fear, despair, anxiety, and hopelessness and along with the title, life felt hollow and meaningless. Eliot along with another poet of his day W B Yeats felt that the world had been thrusted into an apocalyptic age and many feared that it was the end of the world.

There has been talk all of my life that a nuclear bomb will bring the world to an explosive end. Many evolutionists were saying the the world began with a big bang and it will end with a big bang. This nihilistic philosophy toward life breeds hopelessness to their followers. I understand the threat that we are under, but I also believe the Bible. The Bible gives us a very different ending and depending on one’s view of Jesus and the salvation He offers it will either be a time of rejoicing or wailing.

Zechariah said that “they will look upon me, on in whom they pierced and wail because of him.” When Jesus comes everyone will behold him and many will come to learn that the Gospel was right! The wailing that will be heard by unbelievers will be just the beginning of a weeping and gnashing of teeth” that will continue throughout eternity in hell forever separated from God. Their last glimpse of Jesus will be one of which they see his glory mixed with the fire in his eyes pronouncing eternal judgment for sin.

We must remember that we all are responsible for our own sins and that it was because of our sins that Jesus was crucified on the cross. But by our acknowledgment, confession, and turning from sin we now are a peace with him and will look favorably on Jesus as he will look favorably on us on that day when he comes again. John said, “we don’t not what we will be like but when he comes, we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is.” (1 John 3:2) What a day that will be when my Jesus I shall see!

So how will your world end? Will it end in rejoicing and celebration at the sight of Jesus returning in his glory, or will it end with the whimpering, wailing, and gnashing of teeth?  I think the difference will be whether you are filled with His Spirit or hollow and empty without God in this world.

Pastor Robby