“29 Brothers, I can confidently speak to you about the patriarch David: He is both dead and buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. 30 Since he was a prophet, he knew that God had sworn an oath to him to seat one of his descendants on his throne. 31 Seeing this in advance, he spoke concerning the resurrection of the Messiah:

“He was not left in Hades,

and His flesh did not experience decay.”

32 God has resurrected this Jesus. We are all witnesses of this. 33 Therefore, since He has been exalted to the right hand of God and has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit, He has poured out what you both see and hear. 34 For it was not David who ascended into the heavens, but he himself says:

“The Lord declared to my Lord,

‘Sit at My right hand

35 until I make Your enemies Your footstool.'” 

36 Therefore let all the house of Israel know with certainty that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah!”

Acts 2:29-36

—

“This Jesus…” the answer to prophecy, the long awaited Messiah. It was His life that David talked about, it was His suffering that was predicted and laid out hundreds of years before, and His sacrifice that the Father had called for all the way back in the garden of Eden. 

When we think about Jesus, there may be a tendency to think about Him only from a perspective of His walking-around life, and we forget about all the years, decades and millennia of anticipation  and waiting for His arrival. We sit on the edge of our seats today awaiting His return. We long for Him to peel back the sky and complete the work He began on the cross. 

But when we think about Him, we must remember that His time here was very brief in comparison to the time spent before and after His coming. All the long years…hoping, desiring His coming. Looking forward to what God would do. He would be the answer to everything, to sin, shame, sorrow, suffering, anger and hate. 

And today, we should be eagerly awaiting His return to see this work completed, sin done away with, once and for all. But sometimes the long years of waiting wear on us and we focus on today rather than on eternity. 

If we find ourselves lacking in enthusiasm, we need to stop and remember our first love. To separate our minds and hearts from the doldrums of daily life and remember what Christ has done for us. We cannot let that passion wane simply because we are waiting. We are still on the shorter end of time measured since His coming. So many had to wait so much longer and never saw His coming. We live in joyful anticipation, knowing that He has already begun the work, that He is working and that He is returning to make all things new. We need to live each day remembering that and anticipating His return. As we GoLove people in His Name, we must have a renewed urgency, a renewed compassion, a renewed sense of mission, for their sake as well as ours. 

2 Thessalonians 3:13

“Brothers, do not grow weary in doing good.”