Welcome to Defenders, the teaching class of Dr. William Lane Craig.

For more information and resources from Dr. Craig, go to reasonable faith.org.

We've been dealing with the question of the delay of the parusia.

And I suggested a solution to this question that I called contextual ambiguity. That is to say,

the sayings of Jesus concerning his coming apparently within the generation of his contemporaries

may reflect a quite different original context than the context in which

we find them in the Gospels. So they did not in fact originally claim that Christ

would return as the triumphant son of man within the lifetime of his hearers.

We had a good example of this in Matthew 1023, where you'll remember Matthew,

by inserting certain passages into the context of the mission charged to the Twelve made it sound as though Christ was going

to come again before the Twelve had returned from their mission trip to the towns and

cities of Israel. Moreover, we saw several parables of Jesus teaching that the parusia would in fact be

delayed. Today, I want to offer some final thoughts on the time of the second coming. First, Jesus emphasized that his second coming is something that will be

unexpected and could be delayed. That implies that we always need to be ready for it

since it is coming at a time when we are not expecting it to come.

Therefore, we should not use any unfulfilled signs of the second coming as an excuse for not living as disciples of Christ. In Matthew 24 verses 45 to 51, Jesus says,

who then is the faithful and wise servant whom his master has set over his household to give

them their food at the proper time.

Blessed is that servant, whom his master, when he comes, will find so doing.

Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions.

But if that wicked servant says to himself,

my master is delayed and begins to beat his fellow servants

...