No matter how awesome or breathtaking or unspeakable that event is going to be on that day

there'll be no curse in it for Christians, but only blessing and

blessedness.

There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, neither now nor when he appears in flaming fire bringing vengeance

upon those who do not know God. No curse, only rest and blessedness. So why shouldn't Christians fear the return of Christ?

That's the question John Piper answers from Titus 2, 11 to 13 in this episode of Light and Truth.

This sermon was originally preached at Bethlehem Baptist Church on May 18th, 1986.

Awaiting our blessed hope,

the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ.

So what's the content of our hope according to this verse?

What is our blessed hope?

The appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.

The second coming of our Lord. That's our hope. We could get into a lot of

controversies here at the outset with regard to the timing of this event in relationships say to the

millennium or to a period of tribulation at the end of this age. It's sort of an in-house debate among Christians or

brother against brother or sometimes son against father. I have another controversy I'm more interested in this morning.

I have something more important, though, to enter into.

Namely, there are people today who consider the thought of the second coming as an outdated

superstition or a mythology or something that is so utterly unscientific that it is not tenable. You can't hold it in the 20th century any longer with people flying around

the moon. We're prepared, for example, to hear Carl Sagan,

astronomer from Cornell say that the second coming

is in the same category with the cow that

...