For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; And the government will rest on His shoulders; And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.

Isaiah 9:6

Jesus is the same yesterday.  He is the first and the last.

The Gospel brought God into the earth, the Divine clothed with flesh.  The Holy One, the creator of Heaven and Earth, stepped into His creation, and became a servant.  His own people, His own nation missed Him, and didn’t recognize Him.  They couldn’t see the man standing in front of them.

They expected a hero, and they got a slave.  They expected a conqueror, but they got a martyr.  They wanted national takeover, but His vision seemed a little bit different.

By comparison, His vision was larger.  They saw the national occupation, they saw the discomfort in life, but He saw Eternity.  He saw Heaven, and all the forces for and against, and He saw men whose souls were dead.  He saw the Heavens of God, and His holy angels, and He saw the prince of this world.

Yet, it was with a heart of perfect justice, and perfect righteousness, that He saw with perfect love and mercy.  The exact representation of the Father, He pierced through the veil of time and became man.

Everyone saw the miracles.  Everyone could see the mighty works and eat the natural bread and be satisfied.  But they missed the inside.  They missed what His Kingdom was really about.  They missed Him.  All because they didn’t understand the power of the seed, that what a thing grows out of is what is produces.

Anything birthed out of the flesh only produces flesh.  Anything birthed out of the Spirit produces Spirit.

They didn’t see the difference.

Yet He was the light.  He was pure holiness.  He was His kingdom.

Before them stood no ordinary man, but rather, the only man filled with the Holy Spirit of God.

He was before them, and they did not know Him.  They saw only the flesh, the saw only the carpenter’s son.  The despised Him for His simple upbringing.  They knew Him only after the flesh.

But, in His flesh, He knew God.  In His flesh, He was the perfect King.  What they couldn’t see was the that Kingdom must begin in the heart.  If a kingdom grows out of the old, it will be of the old.  But, because it came from the Truth, it would produce the Truth.

In the heart of each believer, Jesus has planted His word.  That word alone, the word of who He is, produces in us the totality of the Kingdom, if given the proper conditions.  It overflows and produces fruit after its kind.

Truth yields truth, and takes over an entire person.  There can be only one true master of a vessel.  Ultimately, either truth will have its full way, or the spirit of darkness will have a person.  You cannot serve two masters.  There is no way to live there.

We know that He is coming back, and that this time He will be triumphant.  But, He will not be looking for someone to ally with in order to make His case stronger.

He is the judge, He is the Truth, He is the Way.  The question should be, which side will we be on?

As He came then may not be the same way He will come, but the heart will be the same, the person will be the same, and the Kingdom will be the same.  The seed He planted, the fruit He bore, the multiplication He produced, do we live in that?  Will we look like Him when He comes?  As the scripture says, “I tell you that He will bring about justice for them quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?” (Luke 18:8).

It could be a presumptuous thing to think that, simply because we call Him “Lord, Lord” that we make Him happy in every decision in our lives.  But rather, the way He left for us to live, the very instructions He spoke about the Kingdom, He said we would obey if we loved Him.

This wasn’t just for the generation of the Apostles, or those still under the law, or He wouldn’t have finished the Sermon on the Mount the way He did.  No, it is for us, today now.

And, in the same way, if we do not love Him, if we do not desire to have the same heart regarding the miracles, faith, and the Kingdom that He did, we run the risk of missing Him the second time, as they did in the first coming.

Oh, it wont be missing Him in the same way as they did.  They missed Him because He was disguised.  No, instead, we run the risk, if we do not desire to be like Him, of missing Him by not looking like Him when He appears.  Of not having any notion of His words in our hearts.  Of not having Faith.

It is not enough just to go to church in these days.  We must sink our teeth into the meat of His flesh, we must drink deep of His blood, and become one in Him.  We must be unified with Him, lest we run the risk of being pulled off track.

He who eats His flesh and drinks his blood has life, and he who doesn’t, doesn’t.

What does He look like, what does He seem like?  What is the desires of His heart?  When He comes again, He will be a man of war, but will we stand with Him?  Will we resemble Him in any fashion?  Will He find faith on the Earth?