14 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who sleep in Jesus.
15 For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep.
16 For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.
17 Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord.
Of course, one of the questions is: are you ready? We can approach life with the confidence that when the Lord comes for His people, that we will be taken with Him. We can possess that assurance through a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. He will fulfill His promises to those Whom He has chosen, and if we respond to His call, then we can enter into a relationship with Him and be confident that we will be with Jesus throughout eternity.
In Matthew chapter 24, in what is called the Olivet Discourse, Jesus taught about a number of signs
of the end, of His return. We read:
4 And Jesus answered and said to them: "Take heed that no one deceives you.
5 For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many.
6 And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.
7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.
He taught about a time of tribulation for His people, and later in the chapter, He said:
29 "Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.
30 Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.
Sunday night, I began to see reports on Twitter from all over Alabama about a fireball that was seen in the sky from a variety of locales. Birmingham-based meteorologist James Spann issued a report on Monday morning that read:
Chinese scientists certainly want to know more, and they've built the world's largest telescope. According to the BBC, the dish is 1640 feet in diameter, and it has now received its first signals from space. It will take three years to calibrate.
The $180 million telescope is located in a large natural crater in Guizhou Province in southwest China. It has been quite a project for the National Astronomical Observatories of China. The dish consists of thousands of triangular panels that can be adjusted to study the parts of the sky that the scientists desire to explore.
BBC reports that, "The telescope works by 'listening' for radio waves emitted by objects in space.
Because this structure is so big, it is able to collect signals from the far reaches of the cosmos."
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In Matthew chapter 24, in what is called the Olivet Discourse, Jesus taught about a number of signs
of the end, of His return. We read:
4 And Jesus answered and said to them: "Take heed that no one deceives you.
5 For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many.
6 And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.
7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.
He taught about a time of tribulation for His people, and later in the chapter, He said:
29 "Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.
30 Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.
Sunday night, I began to see reports on Twitter from all over Alabama about a fireball that was seen in the sky from a variety of locales. Birmingham-based meteorologist James Spann issued a report on Monday morning that read:
Last night's fireball at 8:26:44 PM CT was a slow moving (22,500 mph) asteroidal fragment that burned up about 17 miles above Northwest Lowndes County Alabama.... via Bill Cooke of NASA in Huntsville.Well, that display in the skies definitely aroused some curiosity. And, there is fascination about what we see in those spaces above the earth.
Chinese scientists certainly want to know more, and they've built the world's largest telescope. According to the BBC, the dish is 1640 feet in diameter, and it has now received its first signals from space. It will take three years to calibrate.
The $180 million telescope is located in a large natural crater in Guizhou Province in southwest China. It has been quite a project for the National Astronomical Observatories of China. The dish consists of thousands of triangular panels that can be adjusted to study the parts of the sky that the scientists desire to explore.
BBC reports that, "The telescope works by 'listening' for radio waves emitted by objects in space.
Because this structure is so big, it is able to collect signals from the far reaches of the cosmos."
The Bible says that, "The heavens declare the glory of God." So our searches into space and the wonderment that we can experience by gazing at the moon, stars, constellations, and galaxies will result in a connection with the One made them all. If we want to get a grasp of the incredible majesty of our great God, we can take a moment to reflect on the universe and the One who created it.
And, we can also think about signs that will appear in the sky that will herald the coming of our Lord. The ruler of the universe will also display His glory in the end times. Jesus Himself will appear in the heavens and take His Church to be with Him, and the Bible says that upon His return, His saints - that's you and me - will be riding with Him. Not only will there be heavenly signs, but Jesus taught that there would be signs on earth that point to His soon return - as we behold those, it can develop a sense of urgency and expectation about His return.
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