PROOFS OF A
PRE-MILLENNIAL ADVENT*
By HORATIUS BONAR
[* From the Chapter
7 of the authors book: PROPHETICAL LANDMARKS]
--------
This is
purely a question of interpretation. The order in which events are to occur depends entirely on Gods
eternal arrangements; and our knowledge of that order must depend upon our
right understanding of what God has written in His Word concerning it. Man
theories cannot aid us here; nay, they may hinder us much. We must listen to
the voice of God. Let us calmly and simply interpret His Word, throwing aside
all bias, and being willing to learn of Him alone.
How often have human systems perverted the spiritual judgment,
and unfitted us for listening to what the [Holy] Spirit saith unto the Churches! Have they not been used as
instruments for corrupting the simple Word, and explaining away its natural
meaning? How frequently, when departing from the plain sense of the words, has
our only reason been, that, if interpreted thus our system must fall to pieces!
Had the fear of this collision not been in the way, the simpler view of the
passage would undoubtedly have been acquiesced in. This abuse of system needs
to be guarded against, and nowhere more than in the present discussion. Our
appeal is directly to the Word of God.
In more than one of the previous chapters I have had occasion
to touch upon the proof of the pre-millennial Advent; let me now take up the
question directly. It is impossible for me to adduce here the hundredth part of
the proofs on this point, which lie scattered over the whole of Scripture.
I.
Isaiah 34. - This chapter commences with a summons to all the nations of
the earth, announcing to them that the great day of Gods wrath had come. At
the third verse there is a description of
the terrible slaughter. Then, in the fourth,
we have picture which cannot be mistaken -
All the host
of heaven shall be dissolved;
The heavens shall be rolled
together as a scroll.
All their host shall fall
down,
As the 1eaf falleth from off
the vine,
As a falling fig from the
fig-tree.
This passage is very easily identified. It so corresponds in
word and figure with Christs description of His coming, and with Peters
description of the day of the Lord, that it is impossible not to conclude that
all three refer to the same day and the same desolation. Indeed, this vision of
Isaiah is one of the strongest passages which prophecy contains regarding that
crisis of vengeance and despair. If it admits of being explained away, so as to
mean nothing but mere natural disasters, such as the overthrow of kingdoms and,
the calamities of nations, then in truth it might be shewn that there is no
such day of judgment at all, as we have been accustomed to expect. All that is
written of the coming of the Lord, and the accompanying terrors of that day,
may be turned into figures signifying nothing but national overthrow and
slaughter.
Taking, however, this passage in its obvious meaning, until a
good reason can be shewn why we should use it in a non natural sense, let us mark what follows. In this day of the Lord,
this day of the dissolution of heaven and convulsion of earth, the awful doom
of the adversaries of Jehovah and His people is foretold, the utter desolation
of the people and the land. This occupies the remainder of the chapter; and
then comes the glowing picture of millennial blessedness - the times of
the restitution of all things. The wilderness
and the solitary place shall be glad for and the desert shall rejoice and
blossom as the rose. I need not quote the rest. It is obviously the conclusion of the whole
prophetic burden, and shews us very distinctly the order of events. The
millennial scene of the 35th chapter succeeds the Advent scene of the 34th.
In other words, the millennium follows the
coming of the Lord.*
* Louth,
in his notes upon this chapter, states the connexion thus. His interpretation
is given in very general terms, but it is very explicit as to the order and
connexion of events:- These two make one distinct
prophecy - an entire, regular, and beautiful poem, consisting of two parts; the
first containing a denunciation of Divine vengeance against the enemies of the
people or Church of God; the second, describing the flourishing state of the
Church of God, consequent upon the
execution of these judgments.
It seems reasonable to suppose, with many
learned expositors, that this prophecy has a further view to events still
future - to some great revolution to be effected in later times, antecedent to that more perfect state of the
kingdom of God upon earth, and serving to introduce it.- LOWTHS Isaiah, p. 296.
II. Isaiah 65: 17-25. - The former part of this chapter
describes the apostasy and punishment of
For, behold!
I create new heavens and a
new earth;
And the former shall not be
remembered nor come into mind.
But be glad and rejoice for
ever in that which I create.
For, behold!
I create
And her people a joy.
Now, here again we have an inspired interpreter to guide us.
The Apostle Peter quotes this very passage in his second epistle: We, according to his promise, look
for new heavens and a new earth. And in the 21st.
chapter of the Apocalypse the same language is used. In Peter, and in the Revelation,
there can be no doubt that the new heavens and earth are literal. Indeed, I do
not suppose that any one denies this. Moreover, they evidently are not created until the second coming of the Lord.
And if so, then we can be at no loss to discover the meaning of Isaiahs words,
which are the basis of
all the others. They cannot refer to the first, but to the second
coming of Christ. Nay, what follows in the chapter proves this. For none of the
blessed events predicted in the succeeding verses have yet been accomplished.
They are still future.
III. Daniel 7. - Here we have a description of the four successive Gentile
empires; Babylonian, Medo-Persian, Macedonian, and Roman. These extend over the times of
the Gentiles,
when
IV.
Daniel 12.
- The 11th and 12th chapters of Daniel are one continuous prophecy. The former chapter begins with a
prediction of Xerxes, King of Persia, and carries us downwards to the last
Antichrist, whose destruction is announced in the concluding verse. Then the 12th. chapter begins with predicting
V. Joel 3. - Twice over in this chapter God proclaims His purpose of gathering
the nations together in the
VI. Haggai 2. - This chapter contains a prediction of
the universal shakings which are to lead to the final establishing of all
things. Yet once, it is a little while,
and I will shake the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and
the dry land; and I will shake all nations,
and the Desire of all nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory, saith the Lord of hosts. And again, 5: 21,
I will shake the heavens and the earth; and I will overthrow the throne of kingdoms; and I will destroy the strength of the kingdoms of the
heathen; and I will overthrow the chariots,
and those that ride in them; and the horses and their riders shall come down, every one by the sword of his brother. This prophecy has never yet been
fulfilled. It was not so at the First Advent, because that period, instead of
being one of shakings, was a time of universal peace. The kingdoms of the earth
underwent no change at all. The heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and the
dry land have suffered as yet no convulsion, but continue firm and stable.
Peace not war, calm, not commotion, heralded the Saviours Advent. Besides, we
have the testimony of the Apostle Paul, that in his days it was unfulfilled. Whose voice
then (at Sinai) shook the earth, but now he
hath promised, saying, Yet once more I shake not
the earth only, but also heaven. The shaking is to be somewhat like
the former one, but far more terrible and universal. He contrasts the then and the now; the hath shaken with the hath promised. Then He actually
shook the earth, but now, at this
present time, we have His promise that He will shake it again, and not the
earth only, but also heaven. How distinctly he tells us that, at the time he
wrote, there was a promise of a future shaking! Of course that could have nothing to do
with the First Advent. But in connexion with the Second Advent there are
numerous predictions of earthquakes and convulsions.
Let me further observe, that it is after this mighty and universal commotion that the Desire of
all nations is to come. The shaking of all things is to precede and prepare the
way for His arrival. And, after this, comes the promised glory
(verse 7,) and the promised peace (verse 9); Jehovah at the same time as it were putting in His claim to
the precious things of earth, the silver and the gold to be used by Him as He
shall see fit (verse 8.) Then, as if
to give us the loftiest anticipations of coming grandeur, He tells us that
great as was the glory of the former temple, over whose fallen beauty the
ancient men of Israel wept, yet far greater shall be the glory of the future
house, of which He gives the promise; or rather, as it should be rendered, great shall
be the glory of this house, the latter glory
more than the former glory, for the comparison is not between a first and a second
temple, but between a first and a second glory, as is evident from the third verse of the chapter, where we read, Who is left among you that saw this house in her first glory? and how do
ye see it now? And from this we see that all the temples, beginning
with Solomons, are considered as one, even though they had been levelled and
rebuilt. There have been three temples; Solomons, Zerubbabels, Herods; but all these are regarded as but one house.
This promise of glory is a theme often sung by prophets. I will glorify the house of
my glory, says Isaiah;
and there are many such visions of future grandeur, which I need not quote.
They all concur in predicting the glory of the house and the people of God in
the latter day, when
There is peace, however, as well as glory, promised, after these convulsions,
and after the arrival of the Desire of all nations. This peace has not yet been
given to any land or city or nation of our troubled earth. But there shall be peace upon
Very distinct, then, is the order of the events here set forth to us by the Prophet
Haggai. There is first the universal shaking, and the removing of
those things that are shaken as of things that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken may remain. Then there is the arrival of Messiah.
Then there are the times of the restitution of all things, the glory and the
peace of the millennial reign.
VII. Zechariah 14 - The whole of this chapter points
forward to the day of the Lord, and the events which are to follow it. I do not lay
any stress upon the expression, day of the Lord, though in the original it is
different from and stronger than many similar ones. I do not say that this term
itself can determine the time here spoken of to be that of the Advent. It is on
what follows that I lean for fixing this.
The second verse predicts a
siege of
* So
thought John Bunyan, who thus writes in one of his works:- The Quakers are deceivers, because they persuade souls not
to believe that that Man that was crucified and rose again, flesh and bones (Luke 24: 38-40) shall so come again,
that very Man in the clouds of heaven to judgment, as He went away - and at the
very same time shall raise up all the men and women out of their graves, and
cause them to come to the valley of Jehoshaphat - because there He, that very
Man, sit to judge all the heathen round about. I say, they strive to beat souls
off from believing this, though it be the truth of God witnessed by the
Scripture, (Joel 3: 11, 12, as also Acts 1: 10, 11,) This same Jesus, which is taken up from you
into heaven, shall
so come (mark, the very same) in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven; And His feet shall stand in
that day (the day of His secoud
coming) upon the mount of Olives. Where is that? Not within thee! but that which is without
VIII. Luke 21:
24. -
Besides the proof derived from this verse, the whole chapter in
which it occurs is a testimony to the pre-millennial Advent. In it and in the
corresponding chapters of the other evangelists, our Lord is enumerating the signs of His coming. He points to not a
few, and on the ground of these He says, WATCH
- When ye see these things come to pass, then know that your redemption draweth nigh. Now, had the Millennium preceded the Advent, could He have failed to
allude to it? Would it not have been by far the most prominent, the most
striking, the most incontestable sign of His coming? It would truly have been
the sign of signs, which no man could mistake. If a thousand years blessedness
on earth were to be the forerunner of His Advent, why does He not point to this
sign as by far the most notable of them all? What reason can be conceived for
its not being enumerated among the many others, save this, that it was to follow, not to precede, the appearing of
the Lord?
The only answer I have heard to this is, that the millennial
state will not be so very different from the present as to make it a notable
sign at all. The binding of Satan is said to mean his having somewhat less
influence than he has at present, and the people being all righteous is called an Oriental figure. To this
I have no other answer to give than a repetition of the innumerable passages
which most broadly and most brightly declare the very opposite. Are these rich
visions of glory upon earth a mere shadow? Is the Word of God to be thus
diluted and made void? I cannot but think that there are few who have any real
reverence for Scripture that would allow themselves to be so blinded by system,
as to adopt such principles of interpretation. It is sad that men should deny
the literal reign of Christ; but it is matter of yet more solemn sadness, that
Christians should be found, who, in carrying out their spiritualising theory,
should have landed themselves in so meagre, so barren a vision of the future.
What though it should save their system, and harmonise its parts? Is that a
sufficient reason for representing the glory of the latter age as a mere
improvement and slight expansion of what is good in the present day? When God
tells us that Satan is to be bound, does that mean that he is not to be bound, but still to roam at
large? Incredible! When God presents to us prophetic pictures of universal
holiness, as the very scenes that are yet to gladden the earth, heaping figure
upon figure to exalt our conceptions of the universality of millennial peace,
does He really mean us to understand that these are exaggerations, mere Eastern
figures from which we must make large deductions, in order to arrive at the
truth? The prophetic scene is
certainly very glorious; will the real scene
only be an improvement upon what we see around us every day? I would not even seem
to use the language of unkindness, but I should be speaking untruly and
unfaithfully if I did not say that I regard such dilutions of Scripture with astonishment and alarm. First, we are
asked to believe in a Millennium without Christ in person, and then, as if that
were not enough, millennial blessedness must be stripped of all its glory, and
reduced to a shadow or a spectre!
IX. Acts 3:
20,
21.
- And he shall
send Jesus, which before has been preached unto
you; whom the heavens must receive until the
times of restitution of all things. Here it is distinctly asserted that Christ is to remain in
heaven until the times of
restitution of all things, and then He is to be sent. The times of restitution of all
things and the times of
refreshing explain
each other, for they obviously refer to the same period, a period which is to
be introduced by Christ in person. This is the natural meaning of the passage.
It is objected to this that the
expression times of restitution, &c., means times of the fulfilling of all things which God hath spoken of by the mouth
of all His holy prophets. On this remark, that this is not the meaning of the word as given in any dictionary. There it is said to
mean the bringing back of things to their former
state. And this surely ought to weigh with us. But let us see how it is
used in Scripture.
The noun itself
occurs nowhere else either in the Old or New Testament; but the kindred verb is
found frequently, and means invariably to restore, not to fulfil;
- as, for instance, Matt. 12: 13, It was restored whole like as the other; chap.
17: 11, Elias must first come and restore all things; Acts 1: 6, Wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel? Or, turn to the Old Testament - Jer. 16:
15, I will bring
them again into their land;
Ezek. 16:
55, They shall be restored as at the beginning. These instances are sufficient to
shew the meaning of the word, which is uniform in all the passages where it
occurs. It never means to fulfil; there are other words for that in frequent
use throughout Scripture. Our translation is, in truth, the exactest that could
be given; all our former English translators, Wicliff,
Tyndale, Cranmer, &c., give the very same sense; and thus Calvin expounds
the passage. After translating the words as we do, the times of restoring, he remarks, If at this time we see many things confused in the world,
let this hope refresh us, that Christ shall once come that He may restore all things.
How can anything, then, be more explicit? And looking at these words alone,
though no others were to be found, may we not (to use the words of Bishop
Horne) expect Christs second Advent to restore all
things, to judge the world, and to begin His glorious reign?
X. Rom.
8:
19-23.
- Here creation is spoken
of as being made subject to vanity, and lying under a curse, evidently the curse which was
pronounced against it for mans transgression. It groaneth and
travaileth in pain together until now. But there is a promise of deliverance, - a deliverance
which is evidently the same as the restitution of all things, or the millennial state of
blessedness. This, the apostle tells us, (ver. 23,) is to take place at the
redemption of the body - that is, the [first] resurrection,
which we know to be at the coming of the Lord. Thus creation is as looking
forward for its restoration to at very time to which the saints are looking
forward, the resurrection and the Advent. That event is to bring deliverance to
them and to the whole creation. Mr. Haldane, in his Commentary on this Epistle, brings out the sense
very forcibly, and at great length. He shews that it can have no meaning but
the one above. Thus he writes:- The apostle means to
say that the creation, which, on account of the sin of man, has, by the
sentence of God, been subjected to vanity, shall be rescued from the present
degraded condition under which it groans; and, according to the hope held out
to it, is longing to participate with the sons of God in that freedom from
vanity into which it shall at length be introduced, partaking with them in
their future and glorious deliverance from all evil.* The creation,
then, is to go on groaning and travailing, the curse still weighing it down,
and sterilising the soil until Christ shall come to make all things new.
* Vol.
2. p. 285.
XI.
2 Thess. 2: 1-8. - In both Epistles to the Thessalonians
the coming of the Lord is frequently referred to, and indeed the whole emphasis
and meaning of the Second Epistle rest on the literality of that event. Let us
gather out the different allusions to it which are scattered throughout both.
1. To wait for
his Son from heaven. (1 Thess. 1: 10.)
2. What is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing?
Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus
Christ at his coming? (Chap. 2: 19)
3. To the end he may establish your
hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even
our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ with all h saints.* (Chap. 3: 13.)
* This
passage has been quoted to prove that, after Christ comes, conversion cannot go
on upon earth, for all His saints are to come with Him. I confess I am surprised
at the stress laid upon the word all, as if it necessarily meant
every one. Owen, in his work upon the Death of Christ, after pointing out the many passages in which the all has a restricted
meaning, thus concludes:- Therefore, from the bare word nothing can be inferred,
to enforce an absolute unlimited universality of all individuals to be
intimated thereby. But passing from this, let me observe, that when
Christ is said to come with all His saints, it must of course mean all who are saints at the time
He comes. It can mean
nothing more. It cannot, of course, mean that He is to come with those who
shall be saints after He comes. That is an absurdity. And if this passage
simply means all who are or have been saints up to the time of His coming, it
of course settles nothing as to future conversions. That must be determined by other
passages. To determine it by this is an entire begging of the
question. There are many direct texts which prove that there are to be
conversions after He has come.
But I do not enter on this here.
4. We which are alive and remain unto
the coming of the Lord, shall not prevent
[or go before] them that are asleep: for the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the
voice of the archangel, and with the trump of
God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first.
(Chap. 4: 15,
16.)
5. The day of the Lord so cometh as a
thief in the night (Chap. 5: 2.)
6. I pray God that your whole spirit and
soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
(Chap. 5: 23.)
7. The Lord Jesus shall be revealed from
heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming fire,
taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ:
who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from
the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of
his power, when he shall come to be glorified in
his saints, and admired in all them that believe.
(2 Thess. 1:
7-10.)
8. We beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our
Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together
unto him. (Chap. 2: 1.)
9. As that the DAY OF CHRIST is at hand. (Chap.
2: 2.)
10. THAT DAY shall not come
unless there come a falling away first. (Chap. 2: 3.)
11. Then shall that Wicked One be
revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the
spirit of his mouth, and destroy with the
brightness of his coming. (Chap. 2: 8.)
12. The Lord direct your hearts into the
love of God, and into the patient waiting for
Christ. (Chap. 3: 5.)
Here, then, are no fewer than twelve passages in which the
coming of the Lord is spoken of; and this in two brief Epistles, or eight
chapters in all. The Thessalonians could attach but one meaning to all these
various allusions, and would never think of understanding them in different
senses, and with reference to different events. Besides, we know as an
historical fact, that they really did so. Before the apostle wrote, they
doubtless, like all the early saints, were looking for the Lords coming. His
First Epistle confirmed them in this, and awakened yet more fervent
expectations. They were now filled with one thought, the immediate Advent. Some
one, either belonging to themselves or another church, took advantage of this,
and wrote an epistle in the name of Paul, foretelling the instant appearing of the
Lord. They were thus shaken in mind, and troubled. On receiving intelligence of their
excited state, the apostle wrote his Second Epistle to allay this agitation. In
correcting their error, he takes for granted that they were right in waiting
for Christ, and also, that when he spoke in his First Epistle of the Advent, he
really meant Christs literal, visible, and personal coming, What, then, was
the error which he corrected? That the day of the Lord had arrived.* To correct this,
he points out an event which must occur before the Advent, - the rising of
Antichrist. But this is all. This apostasy was already in action;
it was to go on and exalt itself; and then, when this Man of Sin had
reached the very pride and pitch of his grandeur, the Lord was to come and
smite him to the dust.
* This
is the meaning of [the Greek word
]. See also Rom.
8: 38 - Neither
things present, not things to come; [
see Greek]. See also 1 Cor. 3: 22, 7: 26; Gal. 1: 4; Heb. 9: 9.
Thus it is very plain that the
destruction of Antichrist and the Lords Advent must be simultaneous, for He comes in order to destroy him. The apostasy
began in the apostles days. It has been growing and spreading ever since. It
is to increase in greatness, wearing out the saints of the Most High; writing the name of blasphemy upon
mens foreheads and hands; prevailing upon all the world to worship it and to
wonder after it. Then, when seated most proudly upon the throne of
iniquity, the Lord shall descend from heaven and destroy this destroyer of the
earth. How, then, can the Millennium be before the Advent? If the Lord comes to slay the Man of Sin,
He must also come to begin the millennial glory.
But must the coming of the Lord mean His personal appearing here? I
think it must. What was it that the Thessalonians were looking for? The literal
Advent. Then, by that Advent, Antichrist was to be destroyed. What event was it
that was agitating and which the apostle tells them was not to come till there should come a
falling away? The
literal Advent. Then it must of necessity be that Advent which, was to take place as soon as the falling
away had come to pass. Otherwise, how unmeaning the apostles argument! When Paul wrote to the
Roman Church - [the church at
But may the words not admit of a spiritual interpretation? The attempt has been made to
spiritualise them. Another sense has been given, which is certainly not the
natural, but the non-natural.
Whether it can stand, we shall see.
What, then, is the expression which requires to be
spiritualised? It is literally the epiphany of His presence,*
* I do not think it needful to quote the Greek, as I am not
writing a critical treatise: but if any one will carefully consult the
original, he will find the above statements not only verified, but mightily
confirmed. I might establish what is advanced here by reference to the ablest
critics; but I merely quote two, as a specimen of the rest. Schoettgen thus translates the
expression, The Advent of Christ, which shall refulgently strike every eye, and whose majesty and
glorious splendour no one shall be able to deny. - Horae Hebraicae, in loc.., p.846. - Again, Kuttner pharaphrases it, The Advent pf
Messiah, illustrious by its splendour and majesty. - Hypomnemata on Nov. Test., in loc., p. 465.
The two words, epiphany and presence, are frequently used separately, to
denote the literal Advent; and surely when they both occur together, we are
warranted in considering the expression as one of the most explicit that could
have been used to denote the literal coming. This double term is certainly
the strongest which occurs in these Epistles, and seems used, of purpose, by
the apostle, to prevent the possibility of its being explained away. There are
twelve references to the coming in these Epistles, - eleven are admitted by all
to mean the literal coming. Yet all these eleven are weaker than the one in
controversy, which is the twelfth. Is it not, then, most unaccountable, that
the weaker should be interpreted literally, and the strongest explained away?
Surely there is some bias warping judgment here.
But farther; the word epiphany occurs just six times in the New Testament. In one of these
it refers the first coming, which we know to be literal. In four others, it is
conceded by all to point to the literal second coming. The sixth is the passage
in question, and it is stronger than any of the five. They are as follows:-
1. Until the APPEARING of our Lord Jesus Christ. (1 Tim. 6: 14.)
2. Who shall
judge the quick and the dead at his APPEEARING
and his kingdom. (2 Tim. 4: l.)
3. To all them
that love his APPEARING. (2 Tim.
4: 13.)
4. The glorious APPEARING of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ. (Titus 2: 13.)
A little above we asked, Why, out of twelve passages all
apparently having the same meaning, make that one which is the strongest, and
least liable to suspicion, an exception to the rest? So, here we ask, Why, out
of six distinct passages, in which the word occurs, make that which (by being coupled
with another) is the strongest, an exception to the rest? Why spiritualize the strongest and leave the weakest to stand as it is? The natural meaning
may, no doubt, obstruct or dislocate your system; but will you allow that to be
sufficient reason for inventing a non-natural sense?
In reply, it is said, that the word coming is used spiritually
in the ninth verse of this very chapter. In
reference to this, I crave attention to the following remarks:-
1. This argument, even when conceded,
amounts only to a may be, and a may be - set in opposition to the strongest must be that I can conceive. What I have already
advanced appears to me to amount to a positive and irresistible must be. Of what force, then, is a mere may be in opposition to this? What critic can be
content to found his hermeneutics upon so precarious a basis?
2. Though a weaker expression
may be spiritualised, it does not follow that a much stronger one may
be, far less must
be, treated in the same way. A general term may be ambiguous, but that
is no reason for a particular and explicit one being equally so. Yet this is
the meaning of the objection!
3. The terms are
not convertible, which they
would be, if this argument be valid. If this brightness of His coming be applicable to Antichrist equally
with Christ, then there would be some force in the objection to our statements.
But if this be inadmissible, the objection breaks down. How can we argue thus,
- The word coming is applied spiritually to Antichrist,
therefore the words brightness of his coming (which cannot be used in reference to
Antichrist) may be applied spiritually to
Christ? If the words were synonymous, I could understand the argument, but when
they are not so, I confess I cannot. If a+b=b, and convertible with b, then whatever b represents, a+b may represent; but if a+b be much larger than b, and not convertible, then it is
absurd in me to say, because I have discovered that b represents a certain sum,
therefore a + b must represent the
same.
4. Our objector
seems to forget that he believes in a literal Advent of Christ as well as we,
however far we may be asunder as to the time of it; whereas his reasoning
proceeds on the supposition that the Advent of Christ is no more a literal
Advent than that of Antichrist. His syllogism halts grievously. It should run
thus: The word coming, when applied to Antichrist,
cannot be literal, because there is no literal Advent of Antichrist; therefore, the same word, when applied to Christ, cannot be
literal, because there is no literal Advent of Christ. Though Antichrists coming may not be personal, and therefore
we may be at liberty to spiritualise the word, is that any reason for saying
that we are at liberty to spiritualise that word (or, rather, a far stronger
one) as applied to Christ, when we do believe in His literal coming at some
time or other? The reason why the liberty was taken of spiritualising it, in
the case of Antichrist, was, that we believed he was not to come personally at
all. Had we acknowledged a personal coming in this case, we should not have
felt ourselves at liberty to do this. How, then. can we feel at liberty to
spiritualise the word, as referring to Christ, when our reason for spiritualising no 1onger exists? The figurative sense may be
admissible in the case of him who is to come spiritually, but is that a reason
for saying that it is admissible also in the case of Him who is yet to come
literally and personally?
5. Of whatever strength this objection
may be to those who deny a personal Antichrist, it has no force at all to those
who believe in his personality. Now, though I cannot agree with some of the
ancient, or others of the very recent, theories on the subject of a personal
Antichrist, yet I do believe that the great Antichristian system is to have an
individual head or king. This head or king is frequently prophesied of both in
the Old and New Testaments. He is the representative of the whole vast body of
iniquity with which the earth is to be overspread. And, as the head or
representative of that body, I, so far at least, recognise his literal
personality. And if so, then the objection I have been refuting, though
entitled to what weight it may have with a denier of Antichrists personality,
has no point or strength at all with a believer in that personality. It may be,
perhaps, used as argumentum ad hominem, but it can be nothing more.
Thus I have endeavoured to fix the
interpretation of this passage. I have given what appears to me very strong
reasons for taking it in its natural sense; it remains for others to produce
their strong reasons for understanding it in its natural sense; it remains for others to produce their strong reasons
for understanding it in its non-natural sense. They ought, however, to be
prepared, not only to shew reasons why it may be, but why it must be, or ought to be, so explained. Surely, if their system be strong and coherent, it will
be able to abandon mere negative ground, and advance to
something more positive and aggressive in the matter of Scripture
interpretation, by which lone the question between us can be finally decided.
XII. 2 Peter 3: 1-13. - The argument from this passage in favour of a pre-millennial
Advent, I have already stated. It is simply this, that the last days, which had been in the time of the
apostles, were to go on, abounding more and more in wickedness, scoffing,
apostasy, and atheism, till suddenly broken in upon by the coming of the day of
the Lord. I do not mean, however, to repeat what I have advanced. I wish merely
to notice objections.
The chief objection is somewhat of
this nature:- This universal conflagration must so
burn up and destroy every living thing upon the earths surface, that it is
impossible to believe that men can come forth out of it to people the earth, as
Millennarians believe. On
this let me observe:-
This is no answer at all to our argument. It does not touch
the difficulty. It may prove that there can be no Millennium at all; but what
else can it prove? I adduce the passage to shew, that wherever the Millennium
be placed, it cannot be between the
present time and the Advent. The objection may very aptly be used to prove that the Millennium in which we believe is
an impossibility;
but how can it answer our argument, that any Millennium between this and the Coming is an
impossibility, if those words of the apostle be true? It may compel us to alter
our ideas of the nature of the Millennium, but not of the time and place which
it occupies.
The truth is, that the passage presents difficulties to both
parties; and it would be well that, with this concession made, they should sit
calmly down to consider it. The Anti-Millennarian has to answer the question,
How can you, with such a passage before you, believe that there can be a
Millennium before the Advent? The Millennarian has to solve this other
difficulty, How can you believe that men can exist in the midst of such
wide-wasting fire, and come out of it to inhabit the earth? Leaving the former to
escape from his dilemma as he can, I shall try to help the latter out of his;
and, in doing so, I remark that this prediction of the apostle is not an
isolated passage, but one of a large class, all referring to the same time. I
take the first specimen of these from the Apocalypse. Under the sixth seal a
desolation equal to that predicted by Peter is described. What can be stronger
than this? - I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and lo, there was a great
earthquake; and the sun became black as the
sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood; and the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig-tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a wind. And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.
(Rev. 6: 12-14.) Yet after
this we find men inhabiting the earth. Again at the pouring out of the seventh vial, we read, Every island
fled away, and the mountains were not found;
yet after this we find men
still upon the earth, who have passed through this universal earthquake.
Again we read in Isaiah as follows:- Behold, the day the Lord cometh, cruel
both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the
land desolate; and he shall destroy sinners
thereof out of it. For the stars of heaven and
the constellations thereof shall not give their light: the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine. I will make a man more precious than fine gold; even a man than the golden wedge of Ophir.
Therefore, I will shake
the heavens, and the earth shall remove out of
her place, in the wrath of the Lord of hosts,
and in the day of his fierce anger. And it shall
be as the chased roe, and as a sheep that no man
taketh up. (Isa.
13: 9-14.) Can any intimation of destruction be stronger
than this? Yet immediately after it we find men inhabiting the earth, who have come out of it. Again, take the 24th chapter of the same prophet. I
need no quote it, for I have done so in another place; but I ask, can any
destruction be more complete and more universal, in the widest and most
unrestricted sense. It is not conflagration only, but convulsion, earthquake,
dissolution, and every form of most thorough destruction.* There is not in all
Scripture such a picture of entire, consuming desolation and passing away as
there is here. Every wasteful element is introduced. Every annihilating power
is brought to bear upon the earth as if for the purpose of making clean away
with it and its inhabitants. Yet out of all this men come forth to dwell upon
the face of the earth, after this universal earthquake and conflagration have
passed away.
* I
would notice here that many of the expressions in this passage are precisely
the same as in Peter, - only they are repeated and heightened, and magnified by
the prophet far beyond those of the apostle.
I need not quote other passages, though they are not a few. I
have these as specimens. Now, I ask our objectors what they make of these
passages? I point to these pictures of terrific wide-sweeping ruin, fire
and earthquake, lightning and hurricane,
all mingled together. I point to the plain statements which follow, as to men
surviving these infinite catastrophes. And I ask, if you do not stumble at
these, nor count them difficulties, why stumble at another of the same kind,
and pronounce it insuperable? Before you ask me to reconcile Peter with my
system, I ask you to reconcile Isaiah with yours. The difficulty exists. It
exists in both systems. Both, then, are equally concerned to adjust or remove
it. If it be solved against us, if it be found that we cannot account for such
a state of things, then our theory of the Millennium must, of course, break
down; but our first position remains un-assailed, that, let the nature of the
Millennium be what it may, its place cannot be between us and the appearing of
the Lord. No solution of the difficulty touches that position; and this is all
that we adduce the passage to establish.
But, besides this, there are, I think, allusions to this very
difficulty in Scripture, and to the true solution of it. The Church, we are
told, is to be taken up out of midst of that fiery desolation and lodged in THE
CLOUD with Jesus, safe from the wasting fire. But even though they remained,
could they not be as safe in midst of it as was Noah amid the swelling billows
the Flood; or, as the three Hebrew children in the fiery furnace?
* Job 38: 23.
XIII. 1 John 2: 18. - Little children, it is the
last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist
shall come, even now there are many antichrists;
whereby we know that it is the last time. I notice this passage in proceeding
onwards but I do not dwell upon it, as I have already taken out of it the
argument which it contains. It states that the last time was come, that the
mark of this time was the prevalence of antichrists, whose power was to
increase, as we have seen, until the Lord should come. There is no room, then,
for inserting the Millennium between the close of this time and the Advent.
XIV. Rev.
18: and 19. - The eighteenth chapter describes the
greatness and the ruin of
I had marked other passages to be adduced as proofs of the
pre-millennial Advent, but I have prolonged the discussion on some of the above
to such an extent that must set them aside. Those already dwelt upon are
sufficient. Each of them singly might be enough to determine the question; how
much more the cumulative demonstration afforded by the whole together? They are
not mere negative proofs, intended
to overthrow an Aversary; they are all positive, designed to build up a system. Would that our objectors
would try this more excellent way.
* *
* * *
* *
1
DEMOCRACY AND ITS COLLAPSE
By D. M.
PANTON
It is
essential that we should grasp the attitude of the Most High to modem
democracy. Democracy - the government of the people, for the people, by the people
- is the long-suffering of God granting to the less cultured classes such
political power as will prove whether the miscarriage of all human government
is due to its form, or to its sin; so that, when moral disaster overtakes* republics equally with empires, every mouth may be stopped,
and every order of sinner - whether Chaldean absolutist, Persian satrap, Greek
oligarch, Roman militarist, or modem democrat be proved, by sin, equally
incompetent to control the world. To prove whether bad government springs from ancient
barriers - monarchy, peerage, or sex -
God grants adult suffrage at last, until the whole Colossus-Man collapses in
ruin. And it is exceedingly remarkable that an exactly parallel test, with a
like piebald effect holds good in the Christian Church. For through Plymouth
Brethrenism, probably the most democratic polity ever known in the Church of
Christ God has appealed to a democratic age with a spiritual appeal of pure
democracy; and so also the last Church named in Scripture, and that which will
precede the final crash, is Laodicea - judgment by the people - Gods closing probation of
the organized Church, in which He entrusts the maximum of power to the
non-ministerial elements of the Assembly.
For in both State and
Church the whole organism is [now, more than ever,] being tested (in grace and love) down to the last man. He who can
spiritualize democracy, said Mazzini, will save the world.
*At the
same time it is true that exactly as Apostles, directly inspired and
miracle-gifted, ruled Gods ideal Church, so, even among nations wholly
regenerate at last, Gods ideal government is literally aristocracy - not rule
by the good, much less rule by the many, but rule by the best - Rev. 22.
For now we see the goal to which God is tending. Every form of
Government, when administered by righteous men, brings ample blessings in its
wake; it is iniquity, and not polity, that wrecks nations.* A Tsar who abandons Jehovah for a Rasputin is given over to be
shot: a Red Republic, abolishing all law courts (Times,
September 10th 1918) and flinging open all prisons, goes down in
blood and fire. The vast and changing forces which we are now confronting,
threatening not forms of government but government itself, have been thus
strikingly stated by a close and shrewd political observer, Mr. Frederic Harrison. Would that men could
see that we are living not only in the crisis of the greatest war that has ever
afflicted mankind, but also in the Advent of Revolution, at once material,
moral, and spiritual; wider, I believe, and deeper than any which in some
thousand years has transformed civilization on earth. The Russian Revolution,
in its scale of population and area, in its overwhelming changes, in its
suddenness and velocity, exceeds any revolution yet known. Now in a state of
revolution things move, change, appear and disappear with lightning velocity.
Things which we imagine to be trifles swell up into incalculable forces:
changes, which in normal times could hardly be worked through in generations,
spring up completed in months or weeks. For spiritual agents in the
unseen are precipitating a world-crisis at lightning speed. In the course of the present Armageddon,
says Mr. A. P. Sinnett, the Theosophist Unseen Powers embodying
loftier knowledge than common humanity has yet reached are taking part in the
struggle. Some of us are in conscious touch with them.
THE COLLAPSE OF DEMOCRACY
For it is slowly dawning on careful thinkers that world-salvation is no more lodged in democracy than in monarchy.
The idea that the world is safe in the hands of any class of the unregenerate
is a pure chimera. How stern was the disillusionment that awaited Charles James Fox when he cried, on the
fall of the Bastille: By how much is this the greatest
event that ever happened in the world, and by how much the best!
I am
sorry, exclaimed Mons Kerensky, in the crisis of the Russian Revolution, that I did not die two months ago; I should then have
expired still dreaming the splendid dream that Russia had awakened to a new
life. I no longer cherish my former certitude that what we see before us are,
conscious citizens and not mutinous slaves. More than one democrat
(like Rauschenish) is said, since the War, to have died
of a broken heart. So it was Grote who said,
heartbroken over democracy: I have outlived my faith.
In democracy we have reached human bedrock; if this last trusteeship of power
fails, there is nothing beyond. For the unregenerate democrat - as swift to shed blood as the
unregenerate autocrat - in war, in civil strife, or in persecution. The red
flag marches with the machine-gun and the black cap. No
prison for our enemies, cries
But a further fact unfolds itself.
Lawless democracy produces an invariable ultimate - dictatorship. Iniquitous
anarchy and iniquitous tyranny act and react in a vicious and ineludable
circle.
For democracy, in common with Imperialism and every other
modem movement, betrays most dangerous Messianic symptoms. It was a saying of Mazzinis that Great social transformations have never been, and never will
be, other than the application of a religious principle, of a moral
development, of a strong and active faith. On the day when democracy shall
elevate itself to the position of a religious party, it will carry away the
victory, not before. What is happening now
throughout the world, we are told, is equal
in importance to the events which occurred at the time of Christ and after. The
Russian Revolution may be said to herald the second Coming of Christ, the
revelation of which will come again out of the East - out of Russia; not the
end of the world, but the end of the false civilization of Europe. Lassalle, who
was, with Karl Marx, the founder of
Socialism, is looked upon by his disciples,
says
* For it
is the Beast, not the Woman - the imperial power, not the ecclesiastical -
which the [Holy] Spirit paints entirely scarlet (Rev. 17: 3.) Antichrist will be born in the cradle of
anarchy. Never was there such fanaticism as now, dominating everything
in
Incalculably impressive of the mystery of iniquity subterraneously at work, now shortly
to appear above the surface, are the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. A ruler must arise who will supersede the existing
governments, a King-despot of the blood of
Trinity of Hell: (Rev. 16: 13)] who initiated him,
will know the future. In the person of the Sovereign, who will rule with an
unshakable will, and control himself as well as humanity, the people will
recognize, as it were, Fate itself. None will know the aims of the Sovereign
when he issues his orders, therefore none will dare to obstruct his mysterious
path. They will worship the power of the Sovereign. For the King of Israel will
become the true Pope of the universe, the Patriarch of the
MARANATHA
In the days of those kings - could any
music be sweeter to our ears? - shall the God of Heaven set up a
kingdom, which shall never be destroyed.
(Dan. 2: 44) The epoch of the struggle of the Iron
and the Clay is the epoch of the return of Christ. The advance of democracy over the
ruins of monarchies is so sure and rapid that, were the Advent indefinitely
delayed, it is doubtful if many kings assumed by prophecy as present at the end
- would survive. The fallen thrones of the Tsars and the Kaisers; the seven
monarchies swept away in
* *
*
2
THE FIRST LAST
AND THE LAST FIRST
A momentous
principle uttered by no one but our Lord - there are last that shall he first,
and there are first that shall be last (Luke 13: 29) - is embodied for ever in Esau and Jacob,
the two patriarchs who are a set and studied incarnation of interchange of
destiny. For God had foretold the interchange ninety years before their birth (Gen.
25: 23); they were born twins and, in the
very act of birth Jacob sought to supplant Esau by a grip of the heel; the
interplay of their later life fills a large part of the Old Testament drama; the birthright - a Throne: let nations bow down to thee (Gen. 27: 29) - was the shifting prize: and Esau, to whom it belonged, lost it, and Jacob, whose it was not, gains it.* This is the concrete example for all
time of a dramatic interchange of position - the first last, and the last first
- possible, and perhaps frequent, among the [regenerate] children of God; and what reinforces our Lords words with tremendous emphasis is that the Holy Spirit applies the type, and on its dark and dangerous side, to Christian believers. Look carefully, He says, lest there be anyone [among you] that falleth short of the
grace of God: lest there be any fornicator or profane person, as Esau, who for one mess of
meat sold his own birthright (Heb. 12: 15). All down the ages, and in every camp
of the saints. Esau and Jacob reappear, and will to the end of time.
* Both (in type) are born of the Spirit: both emerge out of the
womb of the water (John 3: 5) in a simultaneous baptism, though Esau comes up
first: both thus start together on the base line of the Race, though Esau gets
the start. Yet even in the baptismal water Jacob grasps the heel he is about to
outstrip.
Now we have the Holy
Spirits own analysis of Esau:- a profane person, as Esau. Bluff, generous. Impulsive, daring, an athlete, living in the
open; a man of quick emotions and strong passions:- Esau had a large and
lovable character, and, as the oldest son of' the sole God-chosen family on
earth, what a primacy was his! But the Holy
Spirit says he was profane - unhallowed, unsanctified, defiled, polluted, common. In the
crisis of his life his inferiority, his unsanctity, sprang to light. For one mess
of meat he sold his own birthright. With tremendous irony and perfect truthfulness all earths
transient passions are catalogued under a mess of meat. It is the bartering, for present
passion, of future [Messianic] glory: it is mortgaging the
Both Esau and Jacob awake at last; but Esau wakes
only after the Prize is irrevocably forfeited. Esau cried
with an exceeding great and bitter cry, Bless me,
even me also, O my
father (Gen. 27: 34). It was the bitter cry of Mirabeau:- If I had not degraded my life by sensuality, and my youth by
evil passion, I might have saved
* That Esau receives a blessing (Gen.
27: 39),
though a blessing less than the forfeited - [Gods
promised millennial inheritance (Ps. 2: 8; cf.
Ps.
105:
9-11,
R.V.)] - royalty, proves that he stands for
one saved but unrewarded - saved, yet so as
through fire (1 Cor.
3: 15).
Now therefore the Lords principle, namely, the first slipping
back last - comes into operation. The moment comes when an oath of God makes
the forfeiture irrevocable. Millions of [regenerate] Christians have sung, every Sunday for centuries, the actual warning words which the [Holy] Spirit applies (Heb. 3: 11). How little they have thought what they sang! Esau had himself confined the barter with an oath: that is, he had called God in to see that it was a sale never to be recalled, never to be cancelled, never to be repented: and now the God of the oath has to act His
part. The sacrifice of the Age to
Come for the pleasures of this Age is ratified at the Bema. Even when he afterward desired to inherit the
blessing, he was rejected, though he sought it diligently with tears
(Heb.
12:
17).
Now we turn to the other twin in the great race. All down the
years Jacob - the word means supplanter - has
seen visions, but never lived them: the most defective of all Bible
saints, he is the man whose unsanctified subtlety, amounts to craft: now, in the
last lap, when ninety-seven years of age, we find him the only character in the
Bible a sudden complete victor in his sunset. For Jacob had originally bought
what Esau sold: that is, all his life. faultful and stumbling though he was, he
coveted Gods highest, he acted on the
prophecies, and never lost the heavenly vision: exactly reversing the action of
Esau, he barters earthly passion for coming - [offered millennial] - royalty,
and sacrifices the body to the spirit, the present to the future, time to
eternity.
Jacob is the embodiment of all the - [holy
and persistent] -
wrestlers who through the midnight of this dark Age reach the dawn, and supremely of racers who started badly. Through the
midnight at Peniel he wrestles until the dawn, with tears (Hosea 12: 4), a soul suddenly and for ever - [prophetically
conscious and] - awake. The literal in a type is the
spiritual in the antitype: the clenched fist, the taut muscle, the ceaseless
vigilance, the unyielding grip - it is not only strength, but concentration;
not only concentration, but intensity, not only intensity, but endurance. [Eternal] Salvation is received by resting, not
wrestling: the Prize is won by wrestling, not resting.* It is holy
tenacity of purpose, dogged refusal to be beaten, quick recovery when knocked
out. Gods tremendous earnestness - the wrestling Angel - must be matched by an
earnestness as tremendous by all who would be Godlike and God-crowned.**
* Our [eternal] heirship of God is unforfeitable; co-heirship with Christ is the birthright which, while open to
all, - [the
regenerate] - depends on the midnight wrestle: heirs
indeed of God; but joint-heirs with Christ, if so be
that we suffer with Him (Rom.
8: 17).
Thus the millennial birthright potentially belongs to all
believers, but actually to those who
fulfil the [divine] conditions
** Constancy, persistency, dogged tenacity is certainly, the
striking feature of Jacobs character, lie served fourteen years for the woman
he loved. In contrast stands Esau, led by impulse, betrayed by appetite,
everything by turns and nothing long (Marcus Dods, D. D). It is the violent who
take the Kingdom by force.
Parabolically we are next shown what invariably follows the
great awakening and the complete consecration. And when the angel saw that he
prevailed not against him - that no block, no barrier, not even the guillotine or wild
beasts in the Colosseum, could throw the wrestler - he touched the hollow of
his thigh - he shrivelled the sciatic nerve: and Jacob halted upon his thigh
- carried for ever the withering touch. God asks of His victors not medals or ribands, but scars. I bear in my body, says Paul, Christs stigmata, the
weals of the floggings. Exactly as Esaus sin pampers the body, so Jacobs
devotion withers it. As rocks are scarred and grooved with the convulsions of
long ago, so the saint carries the wounds of a lifetime of holiness: It is better, says the - [Lord, our] - Saviour, to enter life halt, like Jacob, rather than
having two feet to be cast into Gehenna (Mark
9: 45). Both Esau and Jacob had seen the vision: the one,
clutching at earthly pride and power, sells his glory; the other, wrestling
through the midnight, reaches the Dawn (Gen. 32: 31).
So now the Jehovah Angel sets His seal on the victorious
wrestler. And he said, Thy
name shall be called no more Jacob - supplanter,
layer of snares; for the old unsanctity has died in the midnight wrestle* - but
* Satans
wisdom turned to craft; Jacobs craft turns to wisdom: and such is the
remainder of his life that of all the Patriarchs his deathbed alone is singled
out (Heb. 11:
21) for it surpasses loveliness. His name was changed from Jacob to
** So
the birthright (both in the type and in the antitype) lies beyond the grave,
for only Jacobs dead bones ever entered the
All down the ages it is an ever-repeated story. The Cardinal
of
* The
Due de Guise was tile claimant to the throne of
-------
OVERCOMERS
The harvest is composed of those for whom Christ has overcome, the firstfruits are those in whom and through whom He has
overcome, as well as overcome for them.
The Apostle Paul had no doubt about a place in the main body,
for his testimony is clear. I am not ashamed, because I know Whom I have believed,
and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have
intrusted to Him against that day (2 Tim.
1: 12). When, however, (in Philippians ch. 3), he told them there was one thing he
was seeking above all else, the prize for which God had
called me heavenward in Christ Jesus, that he might by any means attain to the out-resurrection from
among the dead. He
was sure of having a place in the general harvest, but not sure, as
yet, - [at the time of his writing] - of being one of the firstfruits as an overcomer.
If Peter. James, John and Andrew needed the warnings given
them by our Lord to Watch out ... You must be on your guard
(Mark 13: 3,
5, 9, 23, 33), and
be doing (Matt.
24: 44),
it is clear that something more is wanted of us than faith in Christ for [initial] salvation
if we would be ripe enough for the firstfruits. The teaching that
everyone who believes is ready for the Coming of the Lord is a deadly narcotic.
No wonder the Church is asleep!
If, on the other hand, we see that, being [eternally] saved, there is yet a prize to be won which is worth the counting of all else
as refuse, then we find in it a powerful stimulant to
a holy and victorious life in union with our coming Lord.
When the teaching of the return of Christ (before the
Millennium) began to spread, it was the privilege of many to hear and accept
the truth. It was the message of the hour. There was, however, a note lacking. The lacking note was the imperative demand
(by Scripture) for holiness of heart and life as a necessary qualification for
this supreme event.
Today, the fact of our Lords return is all the people are
being prepared for; and even this is now resented by the vast majority of
Christians. There are instances when those who preach it are not only ostracized, but shamefully
entreated.
We have arrived at this conclusion: it is now no
longer acceptable in the churches and assemblies, and the preachers who
proclaim the near coming of Christ, and fail at the same time to stress the
necessity of sanctification, are deceiving their hearers, and
rocking them to sleep in a cradle of self-indulgence and sin.
The Word of God teaches us that It is not our union with Christ through faith; but
our walk
with Him by obedience to His commands, which qualify us for the
prize! Repent and do the things you did at first (Rev. 2: 5.) To him who overcomes, I will give the right to sit with me on my
throne, - that
is, the millennial throne - just as I overcame and sat down with my Father on
his throne (Rev. 3: 21).
*
* *
3
THE TRANSFIGURATION
By D.M. PANTON
The
cloud of nineteen centuries of doubt and dispute which has settled as an
impenetrable fog on what is meant by the
THE ADVENT
So the first great fact is that the Kingdom is literal, physical, and on - [this restored (Rom.
8:
19-22; cf.
Gen.
3:
17,
R.V.).] - earth.
And after
six days - a day with the
Lord, is as a thousand years (2 Peter 3: 8): after
six millenniums there follows the Sabbath
Rest (Heb. 4: 9), a sabbatic millennium -
Jesus taketh with Him Peter, and James, and John, and bringeth them up - [a Pre-tribulation (Lk.
21:
36;
Cf.
Rev.
3:
10)] rapture - into a high
mountain apart by themselves; for he must be a soul apart, and reach the spiritual summits, who would enter the Kingdom: and he was TRANSFIGURED
before them (Mark 9: 6). So the Kingdom is impossible,
on earth it is non-existent, without a physically transfigured Christ: the kingdom is an outburst of Christs glory ON EARTH: it is not the slow upbuilding of the
spiritual labour of centuries, but a sudden outburst as of lightning. For as the
lightning cometh forth from the east, and is
seen [translated, shineth] even unto the
west, so shall
be the Parousia [presence] of the Son of man (Matt. 24: 27). It is a purely earthly scene
- no angels are seen in it throughout (Heb. 2: 5);
Moses - the risen dead, Elijah - the rapt living; the three apostles,
unglorified, in the flesh - the living nations; and in the centre, visible,
God-anointed, unutterably glorious - the Son of man. It is heaven on earth. For the Transfiguration is an event absolutely and utterly unique in
the history of the world: it was no surface shining of the skin, as
with Moses after a long sojourn with God; it was not the face only, as
Stephens uplifted to Heaven, and catching its light: for it was at night (Luke 9:
32) - and therefore no reflected shine, but an inherent outburst.
His
garments - this is
unprecedented - became glistening - literally, lightening forth
- exceeding white; so as no
fuller on earth can whiten them (Mark 9:
3).
THE PAROUSIA
So therefore an exact duplicate of the Parousia is on the Mount. And behold
- as the point most closely germane to ourselves - there
appeared unto them - in simultaneous arrival of the [holy] dead and the
[rapt] living in the Parousia - and talked with Him - for the Kingdom will be
open and visible fellowship with Christ, who is anointed with joy, as with
glory, above His fellows (Heb. 1: 9) - two men - two carefully chosen - [witnesses and servants of God] - samples of Christs co-heirs - which were Moses - the chosen out of the Law - and Elijah - the representative of the Prophets [of
God] - WHO APPEARED IN GLORY (Luke
9: 30); that is, accepted
and supremely honoured, they are
glorified together with Him: a
specially guarded person and a specially guarded grave, because of specially faithful service. The avoider of death, the survivor of death, and the Conqueror of
death; the Law-giver, the Law-restored, and the Law-Fulfiller; the three
greatest fasters in all history - each for forty days in the wilderness - importing self-mastery, self-denial, tremendous overcoming power these - appeared unto them - that is, to
the Apostles in the flesh; exactly as the saints that broke out of the tombs appeared unto
many (Matt. 27:
53). So also we have the very Parousia itself limned forth. There came a
cloud - a cloud of dazzling
brightness - and overshadowed them, and
they feared as they entered the cloud (Luke
9: 34): that is, the cloud, containing the Shekinah, enfolds the Lord, the - [carefully
chosen] - risen, and the - [pre-tribulation and select (Rev.
3: 10.)] - rapt; and excludes the nations in the
flesh: it is the Parousia
overhanging earth and the Kingdom. The light-cloud becomes the
blinding, overshadowing darkness of the sanctuary: the two have already entered into it, the three are terrified without (Steir). It is the nations ruled and awed by the superincumbent Kingdom of God.
THE KINGDOM
Now Peter, as ever, voices the Churchs blunders of two thousand years. And it came to pass as they [Moses and Elijah] were parting
from him - for the great definition of the kingdom is over; and Calvary and two millenniums of Calvarys
fruition now lie between - Peter said to Jesus,
Master, it is good for us to be here - a profoundly true, but a completely premature, word; - Let us build - let us establish, let us make permanent, the
Kingdom at once.*
*
Consciously or unconsciously, Peter, by suggesting the erection of booths, was
forecasting, or even materializing, the Millennium, of which the supreme type
was the Feast of Tabernacles. But the
palm-bearers (Rev. 7: 9) are
not yet.
The words express his inward longing
after the
THE FIRST RESURRECTION
For resurrection sharply divides us off from the Kingdom. A
remarkable atmosphere of resurrection pervades this unique revelation of glory
on earth. Luke says - It came to pass about eight
days after
eight being the number of resurrection; and it was when they were in heavy
sleep - the death slumber - that, startled into wide-awakeness by the Glory as
by the switching on of an electric flare, they woke in the Kingdom; and
there, behold - Moses, the grave conquered; Elijah, the grave baulked. From this moment these three were lonely
initiates
(2 Peter 1: 16): the word eyewitness
properly means one initiated into secret and holy mysteries (Trench): even
Matthew, Mark, and Luke, its historians, knew nothing of the Transfiguration
until after the Resurrection. And so, as they descend the Mount, and as the
Lord seals their lips until after He has Himself risen, they
questioned among themselves what the rising
again - not of the dead, with which as devout Jews
they were perfectly familiar, but FROM AMONG the dead should mean
(Mark 9: 10).* Then linking the question with the
Transfiguration, they posed the Lord with the difficulty of the disappearance
of Elijah from the Mount: the Scribes say Elijah precedes Messiahs advent in
glory; he has so come, but why has he gone?
Could Malachi have meant that he was to come only for a few hours? But the
Lord counters thus: true, Elijah must so come; but how then do you explain
Messiahs rejection? If this coming of Elijah is final, what room is left for
[* Compare with Acts
4: 2, lit. Greek, -
they - [Peter and John
(3: 5)] -
TAUGHT the people and announced THAT resurrection out of dead ones.]
** Therefore
we know, when the Scriptures threaten disobedient and unholy
disciples with exclusion from the kingdom (Matt. 7: 21; 1Cor. 6: 9; Gal. 5: 21; Eph 5: 5, etc.), exactly what they will be excluded from.]
MILLENNIAL KINGS
Through ignorance of the great truth of reward according to
conduct and character, a most startling fact, of an importance (for us)
unsurpassed, has been wholly missed. Who are in this first resurrection? Out of
twelve apostles, seventy Evangelists. Five hundred witnesses of the Ascension,
Jesus selects only three. The Lord
had just enunciated (Luke 9: 23-26) the great truth no cross, no crown. And in the very breath with which He warned all his own that shame
of Him would bring shame for them, He took with him -
singled out for companionship: it is the word used for one is taken, and one if left (Matt.
24: 40) - no apostles but three* - [Both the taken three, and the left
nine, are disciples; nay, even apostles: the taken, to honour; the left, to
shame (Mark 9:
18).]; the flower and crown of the apostolic band, coryphaei, as
Chrysostom calls them (Trench): the lover, the confessor, and the
martyr. The glory Matthew compares to sun-glare; Mark, to snow; Luke, to
lightning: not the inherent glory of Deity, but the transformation of obedient
Humanity. His
face did shine as the sun (Matt. 17: 2): so also shall the righteous - the actively obedient - shine forth as the sun in the Kingdom of their Father
(Matt. 13: 43). For it is the coming of the Son of Man, and the Kingdom of the exalted
Manhood; and by the Fathers voice on the Mount (making up the sacred seven)
Jesus Himself is now formally appointed the Lord and Ruler of the earth,
receiving from the Father what in the wilderness He had refused from Satan: for
not until the Transfiguration did the Father give him glory and honour (2 Peter 1: 17), glory and honour as a man, who had
won the Kingdom; nay, by a perfect obedience had won the only perfect power - a
lonely obedience and a lonely power - which a man will ever have. So, with the
Apostles, it is impossible that this exclusive selection was accidental, or
arbitrary, or unintentional: it must have as profound a significance as any
other prominent feature of this studied forecast.*
* When Jesus took with him only three intimate and congenial
friends to behold His glory upon the holy mount, He did so because none others
were sufficiently advanced in spiritual knowledge and appreciation to be
capable of partaking and profiting by the privilege (Prof. J. R. Thomson).
Nor is it a selection that stands alone. On three occasions of
critical significance these three disciples were isolated alone with the Lord,
and by His own act:- (1) in
* *
*
4
THE MODEL MARTYRDOM
By D. M. PANTON.
The
first Christian martyrdom ever to occur, and the only one ever recorded in
detail, is put on record with such a fulness, and such a richness of
instruction on how (if called to do so) we are to offer our life for Christ, as
to make it the model martyrdom of all time. And the very name of the martyr
pours a searchlight on the record. Stephen - of whom we know practically nothing
except his martyrdom - means crown, or crowned; and the word means not a crown that is
inherited, but a crown that is won: It thus singularly embodies our Lords
assurance to every martyr down all the ages:- Be thou faithful unto death,
and I will give thee THE CROWN OF LIFE (Rev. 2: 10).
At once we are confronted with the kind of man that makes a
martyr. Stephen, full of
faith and the Holy Spirit (Acts 6: 5).
Stones
are not thrown, says the proverb, except at a
fruit-laden tree. No other man in the Bible has this particular
description - full of faith: that is, a man of
passionate conviction; with so complete a faith in
his facts that he can face death fearlessly. His obligations to the Throne of Mercy are so great, his
deliverance so gracious, his hope so animating, his responsibilities so awful,
that one master-feeling holds his mind - a desire to walk worthy of God, who
hath called him to His kingdom and glory (R. P. Buddicom, M. A.). So also he is
defined as full of grace - Gods favour permeating tone, words, thought, bearing - and power - the impress of character on action;
and all is summed up in a phrase twice repeated, full of the Holy Ghost - to a degree, alas, and possible
even to us, (by the power and gifts of the
Holy Spirit), for he wrought great wonders and signs.*
* And these signs shall follow them that believe; in my name they shall ... (Mark
16: 17): and we are told to covet earnestly the best
gifts (1 Cor. 12: 31.)
But a still intenser flash of light shows us exactly on what,
and on what alone, a martyrs faith is to rest. Stephens defence before the
Sanhedrin, the fullest record of a single address in the New testament, is solely Scripture so expounded as to
meet the charges against him; an appeal to documents (in this case)
acknowledged as divine by his opponents; and the documents which, in any case,
are the sole seat of authority.
The model martyr is no fanatic, rushing on death; but a
balanced mind, an informed judgment, passionately Scriptural: the martyr is a
man whose life-interests are bound up with the truth. It is for Scripture that
he dies.
Two fundamentally different groups of persecutors appear all
down the ages, and we do well to master the fact. The first group is utterly
unprincipled. When the Sword of the Spirit proves unanswerable, and the truth
irrefutable, the defeated disputant - [usually on grounds of Divine warnings,
conditional promises, or threats to disobedient believers] - takes up the
weapons of force and fraud: they seized him, and
set up false witnesses. A twisted, distorted charge - exactly similar to our Lords alleged
threat to destroy the
But there is another group with whom a martyr sometimes has to
do - the witnesses laid down their garments at the
feet of a young man named Saul; and Saul was
consenting unto his death. There are deeply religious men who confound
us, sincerely, with the Tares, and, contrary to the command of Christ, pluck up
the Tares in order (as they imagine) to save the Wheat.
An old letter came to light and has been published. It is
dated August 28, 1572, and addressed to the Presidents and Chancellors of the
King at Lille and written by Charles de Martigny, Lord of St. Remy. My
Lords: Having heard very good news this morning I have felt bound to
communicate it to you by the present letter. In the evening the King of France
in person, accompanied by Messieurs de Guise and burgesses of
Now before the martyr has uttered a word, and before
Theophilus, significantly the son-in-law of Caiaphas, has ever challenged the
prisoner, an extraordinary fact emerges. After the bribed witnesses have been
heard, and the fictitious charges formulated, all eyes are turned on the
prisoner in the dock; and all that sat in the council, fastening their eyes on him, saw
his face that it had been the face of an angel. Gods eagles soar highest in the
storm, and His stars are brightest at midnight. The perfected saint and an
angel are brothers. But why exactly did his face at this moment shine? The
shining face, a face radiant in the act of dying, is spoken alone of Stephen in
the New Testament, presumably because the martyr alone is sure of - [the inheritance in] - the Kingdom. Death, for us ordinary Christians, can have deep shadows, for
our heart trembles over our lifes record: the martyr, on the contrary, knows
that the Prize is within his grasp. He that loseth his life for my sake, our Lord says (Matt. 10: 39), shall find it, that is, in the first resurrection. And I saw
thrones; and I saw the souls of them
that had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus, and they lived*
- AND REIGNED WITH CHRIST A THOUSAND YEARS (Rev. 20: 4). But the glory does not save the martyr.
Men saw the face as of an angel, and crashed out the glory with the stones. The world would kill God if it could.
[* That is, when our Lord Jesus Christ
will return to establish His Kingdom, they will then be resurrected - like the
resurrection of our Lord -
out of dead ones, (Acts
4: 2, Lit. Gk): a select
out-resurrection of disembodied souls (Acts 2: 27; Psa.
16: 10; cf. 2 Tim. 2: 17-19, R.V.) from Sheol/Hades]
A very precious revelation follows. In that vast crowd there
was not one friendly face, so God - allowing no burden to be greater than we
can bear - opens Heaven, and shows Stephen the only Face that matters, in
radiant sympathy. He looked up steadfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. The help may not always be thus
miraculous. When John Huss of
It is extraordinary proof that this is the model martyrdom, that
on the dying lips are two of the very utterances that closed
* Here
is descriptive proof that the strongest language, in controversy, may be in
perfect keeping with the mind of God.
-------
THE FIRST RESURRECTION
NOT DEATH IS THE BELIEVERS HOPE
That disembodied
souls, dead men, are now reigning in heaven is the flawed
teaching of Protestantism. It is based upon the false hypothesis that death allows the soul to ascend into the presence of God in Heaven; but
the Scriptures, on the contrary, states that the soul descends into Hades in
the heart of the earth (Matt.
12: 40; Acts 2: 31; cf. John 3: 13; 14: 3; 20: 17, R.V.). The fundamental fact, so constantly ignored, is that, until resurrection, the body is unredeemed (Rom. 8: 23); and for disembodied souls
to enter the Divine presence is for ceremonial uncleanness to enter the Holy of
holies; for death, with the Curse clinging in disintegration, to enter the presence of Life. In the Lords trenchant
words: GOD IS NOT THE GOD OF THE DEAD (Matt. 22:
32). By resurrection only,
- [that is, when Christ returns and spirit,
soul, and body
are reunited] - can He show Himself the God of a Patriarch - [now
presently in Hades (Luke
16: 23;
Acts 7: 5ff.; cf. Acts 2: 27, 34; 2 Tim. 2: 17b, 18, R.V.)].
The soul is the person; the body is a tent; and the spirit is a breath of life from
God: ... they laughed him to scorn, knowing
that she was dead. And he took
her by the hand, and called, saying, Maid, arise. And her spirit
came again, - [into her dead body] - and she arose straightway (Luke
8: 53-55.) For as the body without the spirit is dead...
(James 2: 26).
At the time
of death, the animating spirit returns
to God in heaven:
Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit (Luke 23:
46): and the
soul descends into Sheol
/ Hades - Thou wilt not leave my soul in Hades ... seeing this before, spake of the RESURRECTION of Christ,
that his soul was not left in Hades (Acts 2: 27, 31).
The falling into oblivion of the truth of Hades not only
dislodged the doctrine of the millennium -
for who would wish to descend from the supernal Glory in Heaven even to a
millennial earth, after (in some cases) thousands of years in the immediate
presence of God? - but even more
disastrously dislocated the truth of the necessity of RESURRECTION, which,
for souls (supposedly now) in the full glory of God, becomes as fantastic as it
is unnecessary. (Robert Govett.)
Protestantism has made Death
to replace Resurrection; and the
time of the descent of the soul into Hades, is supposed to be the time of its ascension into the presence of God
in Heaven!
In the RESURRECTION therefore, when they shall rise .... Do ye not
err ... when they shall rise from the dead ... as touching the dead that they rise ... He - [our Father in heaven] - is not the God of the dead, but the God of the
living: ye
therefore do greatly err (Mark 12:
23-27).
Resurrection (not
Death)* is to rise from the husk of the
earth-sown wheat;
Resurrection is
to rise in glory from the dust of the incomplete;
Resurrection fills the hand with fresh cunning and fits it with
perfect tools;
And grants to the mind full power for
the tasks of its greatest school;
Resurrection gives
new breath to the runner and wings to the imprisoned soul,
To mount with a song of the morning
toward the limitless reach of its goal;
Resurrection is to throb with the urges of life that eternal abides,
And to thrill with the inflowing
currents of infinite loves great tides;
Resurrection is to see with clear vision all mysteries revealed,
All beauty to sense unfolded, and the
essence of joy unsealed,
Resurrection is
the end of all sorrow and crying and anxious care;
Resurrection gives fulness for loving, and the answer to prayer;
Resurrection is to greet all the martyrs and Prophets and sages of
old,
And to walk again by the still waters
with the flock of our own little fold;
Resurrection is to join in hosannas to a risen and reigning Lord,
And to feast with Him at His table on
the bread and wine of His board;
Resurrection is to enter a city and be hailed as a child of its
King, -
Oh grave, where soundeth thy triumph?
Oh death, where hideth thy sting?
* *
*
5
NO IMPOSSIBLE BURDEN
Exceeding great and precious
promises, the Apostle Peter says (2 Pet.
1: 4), God has given us in order that,
through them, we may become partakers of the divine nature; and one of the greatest and most
precious is the impossibility of an unbearable burden. It is a promise world-wide in its application. It has
been put to the test in every age, in every land, in every temperament, in
every experience. It extends to every moment of life: it covers every act and
need: it counters and masters every possible emergency. And it is particularly
precious to us, and of tremendous importance, because it is
given especially to those on whom the ends of the ages are come
(1 Cor. 10: 11).
The background of the promise is the clearest and fullest Old
Testament type of the New Testament Church ever given. With most of them - that is,
Take heed, brethren, lest haply there shall be in any of you an evil heart of
unbelief. For who, when they heard, did provoke?
Nay, did not all they
that came out of
Now two effects are possible, springing out of this tremendous
and dramatic background; and against these two effects the [Holy] Spirit first sets a sharp warning, and then a golden encouragement. The warning He puts first:- Wherefore - because the picture is not
imaginary, but actual - let him that thinketh he standeth -
either on the ground that the privileges of grace make such a fall
impossible, or that his own growth and achievements make him immune from peril
- take heed lest he fall. He who thinks he has nothing to
fear is the man who is most exposed to a peril. No height of progress we have reached; no natural or spiritual
abilities; no wealth or privileges peculiar to ourselves which we have enjoyed
through years of blessed experience - nothing can make us immune: the Tempter,
routed in ninety-nine contests, may be victorious in the hundredth. Let us therefore give
diligence to enter into that - [sabbath rest: it is of another day, and so therefore is the seventh millennial rest (3: 8, 9.)] - rest, that none
[of
us] fall after the same example of disobedience (Heb.
4: 11).
But the [Holy] Spirit now counters the second peril - despair;
despair of ever reaching the tremendous standard of Caleb and Joshua. Our
background is so overwhelming in its disillusionment - namely, that the vast
majority of Gods people lost the Kingdom - that the [Holy] Spirit devotes much
greater time and care to re-assuring us than to warning us; for the man who has mastered the historic facts is in greater danger of
despair than the presumption. So the Apostle first lays down a
universal fact:- There hath no temptation - no trial, no test, no pressure, no
seduction - taken you but such as man can bear - literally, but such as is human; that is, accommodated to human
strength; suited and fitted to man; such as every man may reasonably expect,
and has power, to conquer. That is, We can avoid
falling, inasmuch as we are not exposed to insuperable temptations
(Dean Stanley). Since the world was, no man has ever been compelled to commit a
single sin: all temptations have been such as men could resist, and have
resisted. For in the nature of the case it must be so. A temptation is an
experiment, to perfect us in doing good or resisting evil, and it must be in
our power to succeed, or it is no experiment. For we must bear in mind Gods purpose.
Temptation and trial are Gods drill and dynamite to
blow up the obstructions that choke the channels of our affections and energies
until the whole broad stream of Gods life shall course through our own and
have its own sweet will (A. J. F. Behrends,
D. D).
The second reassurance which the Apostle introduces is the
character of God. But God is faithful,
who will not
suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able. The critical fact
is here revealed that all temptation, without exception, is superintended by
God; and that every test applied to a soul - either by God Himself, or by the
Evil One: Satan obtained you by asking, that
he might sift you as wheat (Luke 22:
31) - is completely controlled and adjusted by God. God is the
surgeon who is never absent from a dangerous operation. The fidelity of God
therefore dominates the situation; for to allow a soul to be crushed, with no
power of escape, would defeat the very purpose for which God allows the
temptation - namely, the perfecting of
the character through tested development. There is no such thing as a
unique trial, peculiar to the person on whom it falls, and never occurring
before of after; but on the holiest of all ages the same faithful God has
perfected holiness through trial.
So now we get the crowning re-assurance. He will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are
able. That
is, He measures each assault to the exact proportions of the person assaulted:
the test is weighed before it is applied: he so adjusts the discipline that it
can quicken the hearts action without forcing hart-failure. Every temptation
is so weighed that it is never overweight; God will so adjust us to our
surroundings, and our surroundings to us, that we shall always be able to do
what is right. The Alpaca goat in
My Lord in
me has found a dwelling-place
And I in Him. Oh, glorious
boon to gain,
To be His temple! Gladly I
would face,
In His great strength, all
bitterness and pain.
So, under persecution, here is a letter from a Russian
prisoner:- When I found myself in prison, condemned
to hard labour, strange to say, I found myself wrapped up in a feeling of
liberty and of the presence of God. Prison for us is not the same as it is for
the Bolsheviks: tragedy and suffering. We are just as happy and joyful as
someone else. We are happy in our prison; we are happy on the way to it; I am
still happy here in O. I really see that all He sends is good, and only serves
to bring us nearer to each other and unite us more perfectly to Him. These
terrible outward and unbelievable conditions are very useful for our spiritual
life; they serve to purify and enlighten the inner man.
So, finally, the method God uses is disclosed. But WITH the temptation -
it may not be a moment before it,
but it is never after it - will make also the way of escape, that ye may be able to endure it. Experience shows the probably double meaning of the text.
Either we are removed bodily out of the region of danger - as Paul let down the
city wall, so escaping murder; or else there is escape from its power - as
Pauls thorn was not withdrawn, but neutralized by greater grace: the escape is either from the temptation
altogether, or else from its power.
God knoweth how to deliver the godly out of
temptation (2 Pet. 2: 9): whatever the deliverance, God is pledged to make it possible for us all, without exception, to be conquerors all along the line.
So then we reach the astounding truth that there is not one of
us who may not be a Caleb or a Joshua. If we fail of this marvellous goal, it
will not be because God over-tried us,* but because we allowed ourselves
to be conquered by circumstances over which God had made us masters. THE HIGHEST THRONES ARE WAITING. For our light affliction, which is for the moment, worketh
for us more and more exceedingly an eternal weight of glory, while we look at the things which are not seen (2 Cor. 4: 17). To take our eyes off the unseen is to imperil the glory. Walk worthily of
God, who calleth you - [is now calling
you] - into his own kingdom and glory (1 Thess. 2: 12); for we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God (Acts 14: 22).
* A
pitiful breakdown of faith when faced by an apparently impossible burden (martyrdom)
occurred in 1857 in the massacre of Cawpore. In a
Bible found afterwards one of the victims had underlined in blood the passage
from the eighteenth Psalm:- They cried, but there was none
to save; even unto the Lord, but He answered them not.
-------
HE THAT OVERCOMETH, I WILL
GIVE TO HIM TO SIT DOWN WITH ME IN
MY THRONE, AS I ALSO OVERCAME, AND
SAT DOWN WITH MY FATHER IN HIS THRONE (Rev.
3: 21).
These words were spoken directly by
the Ascended Christ, and they describe the
climax reward for all who will fulfil the conditions for obtaining it. Many
may ask why we should go forward in ceaseless conflict and warfare with the
forces of evil. It is for the PRIZE OF
THE THRONE. In His messages to the churches the Lord clearly holds out to
all the incentive of reward. Pauls writings are full of reference to reward,
to all who will fulfil the conditions.
* *
*
6
THE EARTH IN THE
AGE TO COME
The fact
must now be dawning on many minds that the denial of our Lords return and millennial reign by the vast majority of the Church, or at least their complete silence on it, will be one of the most powerful causes of
the
* That
it is no pre-Advent Kingdom of God by mans erection is obvious from the
appalling words that precede (34: 2, R.V.):- The Lord hath
indignation against all the nations, and fury
against all their host: he hath utterly
destroyed them, he hath delivered them to the
slaughter. Their slain also shall be cast out,
and the stink of their carcases shall come up, and the mountains shall be melted with their blood.
NATURE
For the Golden Age that is coming begins with a complete
revolution in nature. It is not a heavenly world that is described, nor a
freshly created earth, but the old earth fundamentally changed. The
wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad; and the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose (Isa. 35: 1); and the glowing sand shall become a pool, and the thirsty grounds springs of water (verse 7). All nature will be transfigured by the act of God.* Instead of
the thorn shall come up the fir tree, and
instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree (Isa. 55:
13); all curse on the soil is removed by Him who alone can remove
it; and the very earth bursts into song. It shall blossom abundantly, and
rejoice even with joy and singing: the glory of
* The most universal habit of spiritualizing this, and all
like prophecies, and allegorizing them into an exclusive application to present
Gospel blessings, has served to hide the chief significance of the passage from
the eyes of the ordinary reader (G. F.Pentecost,
D.D.
POLITICS
The second change is a complete revolution in politics. For
the next detail is not a prophecy, but a command, which sums up in itself the political
and social activity of the Age to Come; in
conduct so gracious, so kind, that the Writer quotes it (Heb. 12: 12) as a comprehensive vade niectim for the Church now. Strengthen ye
the weak hands, and confirm the feeble knees. All the men then (in natural bodies)
on the earth itself are in the flesh, though regenerate, and so, exactly as in
the Church today, there will be characters the strengthening and perfecting of
whom will be the very soul of all political and social effort. Say to them
that are of a fearful heart, Be strong, fear not: behold, your God* will come with vengeance, with
the recompense of God; he will come and save you. So Isaiah has already said (11: 4):-
With righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth,
and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the
wicked. Thus a
sympathy and succour characteristic only of the holiest in the Church to-day
will then be the standard of conduct for the whole earth.
* Behold your God as if
already present or in sight (J. A. Alexander, D.D.): the Lord Jesus, Himself personally on the earth, will come, or send His representatives, at
the call of the weak or the oppressed or the wronged.
HEALTH
The third change is a complete revolution in human physique.
When our Lord was formerly on earth, the blind saw, the lame walked, the lepers
were cleansed, and the deaf heard: so it is again, though on a far
vaster scale, when He walks the earth a second time, for His miraculous
blessings were but samples and foretastes of a redeemed earth. Then the eyes
of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of
the deaf shall be unstopped: then shall the lame
man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb shall
sing. For sin entered
into the world, and death through
sin (Rom. 5: 12); and therefore disease, which
produces death, will necessarily be an exception on a redeemed earth: the
inhabitant shall not say, I am sick (Isaiah 33: 24). It is characteristic of the Divine Utopia, unlike all human
utopias, that the principal actor is God; and so both the healing and
the disease in that day will be the act of God. It is written of the
instigators of rebellion against Christ:- their flesh shall consume away while
they stand upon their feet (Zech. 14: 12), in miraculous and instant disease.
Thus for all earth, apart from special judgment, no hospitals. no ambulances,
no lunatic asylums, with all the enormous cost which results from disease and
crime, will encumber a redeemed world.
SECURITY
The fourth change is a complete revolution in security. This
is aptly proved in that one of the four sore judgments of God - wild beasts - is unknown for
a pastoral people. And a highway shall be there, and
a way: no lion shall be there, nor any ravenous
beast go up thereon, they shall not be found
there. Danger
vanishes, and the security includes exemption from all the man-power of the
world. And it shall be called, the Way of Holiness; the unclean - the human
wild beasts - shall not pass over it - all forces hostile to the good are
utterly banished: all in the spiritual likeness of God, though intellectually
ungifted, pass on this main highway of the world in perfect safety:- The wayfaring
men, yea fools, shall
not err therein.
Security from the massacre of millions, the bombing out of whole cities, the
agony of a falling civilization is a dream for which the statesmen of the world
can now find no reality. Moral impurity alone, and neither physical nor
intellectual weakness, excludes from a world of perfect security for the holy. And in
that day I will make a covenant with them for the beasts of the field;
and I will break the bow and the sword and the battle
out of the land, and I will make them to lie
down safely (Hos. 2: 18). The Divine Judge, the international
court of appeal, is visibly and openly on earth, and because Grace is over all power is behind
all righteousness: Satan and his hosts are in chains, wicked men dead, and the
child who reaches millennial puberty - one
hundred years - suffers the death penalty if he refuses Christ (Isa. 65: 20).
REDEMPTION
The fifth change is a complete revolution in spiritual
standing. The irrigated
JOY
The sixth change is a complete revolution in destiny. And
everlasting joy shall be upon their heads. What tremendous force there is in the
description of the joy:- everlasting! They march to the music in their souls
that will never end. The joy of holy retrospect; the
joy of present possession of glory, the joy of fulfilled hope, perfected
manhood, satisfied life; the joy of prospective advance, intellectually and
morally, for ever and ever (J. O. Keen, D.D.)
TEARLESSNESS
The final change is a complete revolution in experience. They shall
obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing
shall flee away. Sin
and sadness are for ever wedded, and only a guilty world can know regret and
grief and shame; and therefore as surely as light expels darkness, and as
surely as day banishes night, so surely everlasting joy will be the eternal
death of sorrow. Grief, not the power to grieve, is gone: in the exquisite
words of the Apocalypse (7: 17) - God shall - not, remove the tear-duct from the resurrection body, or
harden against feeling, but - wipe away every tear from their eyes. Even sighing,
the lightest form that sorrow can take, will take flight and be unknown for all
eternity. The sorrow of bereavement and the death of loved ones; the sorrow of
poverty, of degradation, of dishonour; the sorrow caused by the sins of others,
and a world overwhelmed in danger; the sorrow of remorse, of dread, of
chastisement; the sorrow of disease, and the sorrow of dying:- all night
vanishes for ever from the coming morning without
clouds. It cannot be too strongly emphasized that this is no
description of heaven; or of the
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ACCOUNTED WORTHY
The phrase accounted worthy, if it means anything, must mean to
be deserving (a dictionary definition) of some
special distinction, merit or reward, not attained by all. It is significant
that the words are used in the Scriptures almost invariably in
connection with the coming of the Lord, or His
Again in 2 Thess.
1: 5 the same Apostle writes:- To the end
that ye may be accounted worthy of the
In Acts 5: 11, when the Disciples, beaten by the
Sanhedrin, rejoiced that they were accounted worthy to suffer shame for His name; and this also has reference to
the Kingdom, for only they reign with Christ who suffer for His
sake (2 Tim. 2: 12). ...We ourselves glory in you in the
churches of God for your patience and
faith in all the persecutions and in the
afflictions which ye endure; which is a manifest token of the righteous Judgment of God: to the end that ye mav be counted
worthy of the [millennial] kingdom of God for which ye also suffer: if so be it a righteous thing with God to recompense affliction
to them that afflict you, and to you that are afflicted rest with us,
at the
revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven ... (2 Thess. 1: 4-7).
THE END