FINISHED
“And the angel which I saw stand upon the sea and upon the earth lifted up his hand to heaven, And sware by him that liveth for ever and ever, who created heaven, and the things that therein are, and the earth, and the things that therein are, and the sea, and the things which are therein, that there should be time no longer: But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished, as he hath declared to his servants the prophets.” — Rev. 10:5-6
God finishes what He starts. With respect to His grand work of creation we read, “And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day. Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made [Gen. 1:31; 2:1-3].” When He finished the work, He rested.
When God, the Son came into the world to rescue the sin fractured creation, He finished what He started. In His great prayer to the Father He declared, “I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.” Thus from the sacrificial altar of the cross He cried, “It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost. [John 17:4].”
Concerning the consummation of the Divine plan of the ages, Daniel the prophet said, “Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy [Dan. 9:24, my italics].” And the apostle Paul echoes, “For he will finish the work, and cut it short in righteousness: because a short work will the Lord make upon the earth [Rom. 9:28]. To this we might add the prophetic words of the Lord Jesus, “For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be. And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened [Mt. 24:21-22].” In other words, God will not only finish His work of redemption and judgment, but He will finish it in timely fashion, affording deliverance for those who have trusted the Savior and everlasting destruction for those who reject Him. Then, and not until then, when the “mystery of God” is finished, God will rest again.
Two things emerge from this in my mind. First, if you are a believer, but sometimes bewildered and perplexed by the course of the age and tempted to doubt, fear not. “Be…confident of this very thing, that He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ [Phjil. 1:6].” He will finish His work in you even as He finished His work for you. All the redeemed are “kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations: That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ: Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls [I Pet. 1:5-9].” He will finish the work!
Second, we must aspire to finish our work for Him. God has a purpose for every believer in the body of Christ, and our daily plea should be, “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do.?” In general, we are to “shine as lights,” even as the apostle counseled the Philippian believers, “Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. Do all things without murmurings and disputings: That ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world; Holding forth the word of life [Phil. 2:12-16a].”
By His grace and for His glory may we able able to say in that day, “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing [II Tim. 4:7-8].”
For His glory and our eternal good,
"Pastor" Frasier
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