“Behold, He cometh with clouds,” the last book of the Bible proclaims, “and every eye shall see Him…” (Rev. 1.7).
This is the long-awaited appearing in glory of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; it is our “blessed hope” (Titus 2.13).
But note. That passage in The Revelation continues, “and they also which pierced Him.”
Every eye shall see Him, and they also which pierced Him, and all the kindreds of the earth shall wail because of Him. Even so, Amen.
This prophecy first appears in Zechariah, where it reads, “they shall look upon Me whom they have pierced” (Zech. 12.10). Me? Who is that? The words are in the mouth of the LORD, that is, Jehovah.
They appear again in the apostle John’s account of the crucifixion of Christ.
And again another scripture saith, They shall look on Him whom they pierced (Jn. 19.37).
I wonder how many of the onlookers that day on Golgotha realized that when the soldiers drove the nails into the hands of Christ, and pierced His side with a spear, it was actually Jehovah they were piercing. We make no attempt to dissect the holy unity between the Father and the Son; the prophecy simply states that the hour would come when those who crucified the Son of God would realize that it was Jehovah God the Father they had pierced.
I wonder, too, how many realize that Jesus Christ is still being pierced. Saul of Tarsus got that astonishing revelation one day. He had been persecuting the Christians, delivering them up to prison and death. One day he saw a light brighter than the noon-day sun and heard a Voice calling to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?”
What a stunning revelation it was to him. “Who are You, Lord?” “I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.”
You mean, Lord, these Christians… You?
He devoted the rest of his life to sharing the sufferings of the One he had been persecuting, and his writings are filled with the revelation he saw that day.
Now ye are the body of Christ…
Matthew in his account of the Gospel tells of the day when the Son of man shall come in His glory… and reveal to the dismay of all that even before then He was here, though many did not recognize Him. He said that He was here… hungry. He was here… thirsty. He was here… a stranger, here… naked. He was here… sick. He was here… in prison.
How so, Lord? You said “I was hungry, I was thirsty… I was sick. I was in prison.” How so?
He reveals that it was when “one of the least of these my brethren” was going through these things, it was He Himself who was suffering…
…And He Himself who was being ministered to by those who reached out to them, even though they were not conscious that this is what they were doing.
We anticipate the appearing of the Son of man in glory, and our cry is, make no tarrying, Lord!
But, beloved, do we see Him even now? Do we recognize Him… not in robes of glory, but in His humiliation?
Let us not miss out on His appearing even now in His humiliation—His privation, His alienation, His sickness, His distress, His shame, His unjust treatment… His sufferings.
We don’t want to be numbered among those who are wailing in that hour when they finally realize who it is they pierced.
A Mending Feast 