Be Not Deceived offers detailed guidance for studying the Bible’s many passages that speak about the second coming of Jesus Christ. For each passage, it provides a condensed guide to the clear meaning of the verses, summaries of the work of past biblical scholars, and cross-references to other Bible passages. Author Robert Burke Burns also incorporates a variety of supporting articles that connect the words of the Scriptures to events in the contemporary world.

A curious reader of the Bible will come across passages that can present challenges for interpretation. In the same way, an attentive citizen will read and hear news reports that lead one to wonder about history’s sometimes confusing twists and turns. Be Not Deceived brings a wealth of faithful scholarship and study to bear on how the Bible anticipates and responds to the vagaries of history. By surveying the whole witness of the Bible, Be Not Deceived empowers its readers to respond knowledgeably to the world’s challenges and to live faithfully by the Word of God.

You may find yourself wondering about the world’s turmoil. You might ask how the Bible’s witness speaks of hope in the second coming of Jesus Christ. You may be seeking to equip yourself to make wise and obedient decisions to follow the Lord and to live in ways that glorify God. You will find in studying Be Not Deceived that it will speak to your questions and concerns, your search for a witness, and your desire for wisdom.

Matthew

26:64 Jesus answers the High Priest by referring to His presence with God, and His coming again “on the clouds of heaven”. It was a solemn confirmation of the truth involved in the High Priest’s question; “Tell us if you are the Christ, the son of God.” In other words, Jesus said, “I am!” For this affirmation of who He was (is), the High Priest charged Him with “blasphemy”.

When Jesus declared His Divinity, and His Second Coming “on the clouds of heaven”, He was claiming to be the Messiah who was seen by Daniel in his vision (Dan 7:13, 14). When He returns at the time of the end “every eye shall see Him”, as His return is visible to all. His coming will not be a secret event. (Mark 14:62; Luke 21:27; 22:67 - 70; Acts 1:11)

28:16 - 20 The writings of Matthew conclude with what is called “The Great Commission”. It is the “work” of the Believer. This work includes a lifestyle that produces “good” for other people, and the development of a Christlike character as lived by Jesus Himself, and further defined in the writings of the Apostles Peter, Paul, John and others in the New Testament. It is these testimonies and eyewitness accounts that ensure the validity of who Jesus was, and is. (Rev 1:8; 22:13)

Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

As Believers assigned such “work”, it is imperative that we understand our task, and the shortness of time. In Lockyer’s wonderful book, “All About the Holy Spirit”, is this comment:

“The Holy Spirit cannot fill the life of the Believer if it is full of something else. If full of pride, prejudice, preconceived ideas or of worldly pleasures, we cannot be full of the Spirit. We must be a willing vessel, available to be saturated and filled so as to allow the expelling of sin and sinful desire. Mere nominal Christians are of little account to the devil. He can afford to let them alone, seeing their unscriptural life is not disastrous to his cause.”

True Believers come with an honorable pedigree. Such is beautifully and wonderfully described by George Matheson in his “Voices of the Spirit”.

“We have an ancestry which goes back beyond nature, beyond maternity, beyond the flesh. We have a pedigree which is older than the mountains, older than the stars, older than the universe. We are come from good stock; we are branches of a high family tree; we are the scions of a nobel house, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. Nature is the parent of our flesh, but the divine is the Father of our spirits, the Spirit of God hath made us, and the breath of the Almighty has given us life.”

- Quoted from “All About the Holy Spirit”.