The Sky Is Falling

A small chick pecks at corn one morning until an acorn falls on her head. Startled, Henny Penny, better known in America as Chicken Little, concludes, “The sky is falling!” She believes the world is ending. She drops everything and rushes off to tell the king.

Along her journey, she meets others — Ducky Lucky, Goosey Loosey, Turkey Lurkey. She tells her tale; they join her mission. They never make it to the king, however, because sly Foxy Woxy leads them into his lair and eats them (as many versions tell it).

Moral of the story? Some answer, “Be courageous with your convictions.” Others reply, “Avoid hysterical theories of the world’s ending.”

Contrast the Christian story.

We have not journeyed to the King, but the King has journeyed to us. More than visiting our farm, he became one of us. He lived perfectly and died to save his own from the slaughterhouse. Sly Foxy Woxy did not take his life from him; the King laid down his life for his sheep. But then he rose again to life, victorious, promising to return soon to bring an end — and a new beginning — to the world.

Now the King has plainly told us: “Stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. . . . Be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect” (Matthew 24:42, 44). The trumpet will sound; the skies will fall; a new heaven and earth will descend. The knowledge of his glory will fill the earth. The wicked shall crawl into caves to hide as his people shout for joy. Stay ready.

Can you or I return to pecking at corn? Are we but half-awake?

I hope an acorn falls afresh on our heads as we observe an Old Testament saint who was the Chicken Little of his day. A man who remained awake and faithful with his back against the end of the world: a man named Noah.

Life in the End of Days

We all know the story. God told Noah that the sky was about to fall.

Every intention of the thoughts of the people’s hearts was only and continually evil (Genesis 6:5). God regretted that he made man on the earth. Yet Noah was a righteous man who walked with God and found favor with him (Genesis 6:9). God warned him about the impending doom and told him to build an ark. And while nothing from his experience suggested such a flood could actually come, he believed God and obeyed him (Genesis 6:22). His priorities changed overnight.

As did Chicken Little’s when the acorn hit her on the head. The thought of the world’s end could have taken on an air of intrusion — she hadn’t finished her breakfast yet; perhaps she planned to pick worms that afternoon or lay some eggs in the coming weeks. It can inconvenience the worldly to live in the last days. But not so with Henny Penny. It took only a moment to completely alter her life.

So it was with Noah. When told that the world would drown, he dropped everything in reverent fear and began building the stadium-sized boat (Hebrews 11:7). He stayed ready and packed for the unexpected end.

Jesus connects the world-ending days of Noah to the world-ending days of his own return. “As were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man” (Matthew 24:37). In what way?

As in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. (Matthew 24:38–39)

What was happening until the flood arrived? Men and women went about their daily concerns as if no one reigned on high; they pecked at corn. While Noah took decades to build the ark, these people did not heed his ministry or example. They saw an old man building a massive boat away from water. They wanted no part of that ridiculousness — until the rain came.

Work While You Wait

If you took Jesus’s return seriously, would you run off as Chicken Little? Despise movies, sports, and weddings? Live in a monastery? Quit your job?

“If our sons and daughters and wives are not blessed by our hope in the second coming, it hasn’t gone deep enough yet.”

Some have. After receiving Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians about the Lord’s imminent return, some stopped working. They sat on the couch, eating Cheetos, pretending to be waiting for Christ. This is the context for Paul’s famous indictment: “If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat” (2 Thessalonians 3:10). Some were idle, unwilling to work, for a mania of mind gripped them that the day of the Lord was at hand (2 Thessalonians 2:1–3).

How then shall we live in the last days? John Piper offers Paul’s solution:

We should avoid end-time hysteria and “not grow weary in doing good” (2 Thessalonians 3:13). There will be good work to do (vocationally and socially and personally) right up to the Lord’s coming. Our normal earthly duties will not end until the Lord appears. The rule then, until he comes, is, “Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men” (Colossians 3:23). (Come, Lord Jesus, 275)

The second coming of Jesus breaks us from the enchantment of life-as-usual to send us back into life-as-usual wide awake — infused now with purpose and perspective. The world is the same world; it is just turned upside down by news of a coming King ready to reward the faithful and repay to their faces those who rebelled against his rule. All is different because we know that Christ is near. We work and enjoy the things of earth as those who know the earth shall soon be invaded by its Maker.

Are You Awake?

Soul, are you really waiting for his return? Has the knowledge that the skies will soon fall kept you awake? If not, what’s lulling you to sleep? As were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.

Does Christ’s coming affect your spiritual disciplines? Are prayer, fasting, fellowship, worship, meditation, memorization filled with thrilled expectancy that Jesus is coming? Our communion with Christ dulls and the world grows more enticing when we forget where we are headed.

Does Christ’s coming affect your witness? Noah did not build the ark with his headphones on, unconcerned for the wicked around him. He preached to them. Peter wrote, “[God] did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a herald of righteousness” (2 Peter 2:5). With Chicken Little–like urgency, he warned of coming danger and beckoned others into the ark.

Does Christ’s coming affect your family life? Noah labored to save the lost and to save his family specifically: “By faith Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen, in reverent fear constructed an ark for the saving of his household” (Hebrews 11:7). He did not outsource their welfare to the local pastor or youth leader. He did not build a single-person kayak. He built an ark for the saving of his household. The second coming is not a doctrine just for individual application. If our sons and daughters and wives are not blessed by our hope in the second coming, our hope hasn’t gone deep enough yet.

Better News for Final Days

To prepare for Christ’s return, you don’t need to quit your job or build an ark. But you should read your Bible and share with Ducky Luckies, sing of coming salvation and savor the promises of the King with your family. Hope and love, wait and forgive, repent and believe the good news. Eat and drink together, live and laugh as a new redeemed people, expecting rain all the while — expecting Jesus.

We have better news than that the world is going to end. In a moment, the wall between this world and the next shall fall, and he will be standing there — the Lord of lords and King of kings, dazzling as the sun in all its strength.

Behold, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us.
This is the Lord; we have waited for him;
let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation. (Isaiah 25:9)

Until then, we are watchful. We do not know at what hour our Lord is coming, but he is coming. “Surely I am coming soon,” Jesus tells us at the end of the Book (Revelation 22:20). His hand, even now, turns the doorknob. Soon and very soon, we will finally be with him, like him, reigning beside him — forever.

Let the nearness of Jesus wake you to live unreservedly for him, resisting the deceptions of this world. We know too much to spend our lives pecking at corn.