The Timing of the Second Coming
In the Olivet Discourse the Savior said this about the
last days, “So likewise, mine elect, when they shall see all these things, they
shall know that he is near, even at the doors; But of that day, and hour, no
one knoweth; no, not the angels of God in heaven, but my Father only. But as it was in the days of Noah, so it shall
be also at the coming of the Son of Man” (JSM 1:40). Referencing this verse of scripture Elder
Ballard said this
many years ago regarding the Second Coming: “I am called as one of the Apostles
to be a special witness of Christ in these exciting, trying times, and I do not
know when He is going to come again. As far as I know, none of my brethren in
the Quorum of the Twelve or even in the First Presidency knows. And I would
humbly suggest that if we do not know, then nobody knows, no matter how
compelling their arguments or how reasonable their calculations.” Many of course over the years have tried to
pinpoint the exact timing of the Lord’s return, but if we believe the
scriptures then we must believe that nobody knows when the Savior is coming
again.
And
yet, I have heard it suggested that this statement from Amos means that the
Lord’s prophet must know when the coming of the Son of Man is: “Surely the Lord
God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets”
(Amos 3:7). I don’t know that we can use
that scripture to assume that the prophet must know when the Second Coming is, especially
given Elder Ballard’s statement. Perhaps
the Lord will simply tell the prophet the moment He is about to come—the verse
in Amos says nothing about the timing of when the Lord will reveal things to
the prophet. We might also take from the
Lord’s statement in JSM 1:40 that even the Savior doesn’t know when He is coming
again. But I don’t think that’s consistent
with other scriptures. For example, the
prophet Jacob said, “O the greatness of the mercy of our God, the Holy One of
Israel!... O how great the holiness of
our God! For he knoweth all things, and there is not anything save he knows it”
(2 Nephi 9:19-20). Given the way that
Jacob used the phrase the “Holy One of Israel” in 2 Nephi 6:9, it’s clear that
he is referring to the Son and not the Father.
When the Savior was among the Nephites after His resurrection, “he did
expound all things, even from the beginning until the time that he should come
in his glory—yea, even all things which should come upon the face of the earth,
even until the elements should melt with fervent heat, and the earth should be
wrapt together as a scroll, and the heavens and the earth should pass away” (3
Nephi 26:3). It seems to me pretty
unlikely that the Savior could explain all of that and yet still not know when
the Second Coming was. In our dispensation
the Savior said this about His knowledge, “Thus saith the Lord your God, even
Jesus Christ, the Great I Am, Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end…. The same which knoweth all things, for all
things are present before mine eyes” (D&C 38:1-2). Clearly the Savior knows all things (perhaps
He didn’t during His mortal ministry), and so He must know when He is going to
come again. Of course, the important part
for us is to simply prepare, for we will likely not know until it happens.
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