Jesus is coming back to Jerusalem.
As the angels said to the disciples as they watched the Lord ascend to heaven from the Mount of Olives,
“Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven” (Acts 1:10–11, my emphasis).
Yes, in the same way He left, visibly, bodily, from the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, He will return, visibly, bodily, to the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem.
As noted by the late Bible teacher David Pawson in his book Defending Christian Zionism,
“Once you accept that his return will be physical as well as personal, tangible as well as visible, in a word ‘bodily’, then another adjective has to be added: it will be ‘local’. Once that has been said, the location needs to be identified. I have never heard anyone claim it will be Rome or Geneva, Canterbury or Moscow. Every opinion that I have come across plumps for Jerusalem.”
But this is not merely a matter of opinion. Zechariah 14 confirms this explicitly, stating, “On that day, He will set His feet on the Mount of Olives, near Jerusalem on the east” (Zechariah 14:4a). It is also confirmed by other passages, which will we examine shortly, affirming the central importance of Jerusalem during the Lord’s millennial reign.
“But,” Pawson continues,
“that raises real problems for the anti-Zionist. It is one of their basic axioms that the land of Israel and its capital city have long since ceased to have any significance for the Lord, even if he still has plans for the Jewish people. The question: ‘Why on earth would Jesus return to Jerusalem of all places?’ becomes a real embarrassment. The only possible answer is that the place as well as the people is still integral to his purposes.”
I say we let the Word speak for itself...
