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PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION.
This little book is intended for the use of beginners in the
study of the Scriptures concerning the Lord's Return. It is entirely
non-controversial, and no reference is made, therefore, to other views. The writer, however, is not unacquainted with
them.
Where a word of explanation not suitable for the text is
called for, it takes the form of a note at the end of the book.
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION,
1947.
The First Edition of this little volume was issued in or about
the year 1913, and was approved by Pastors Frank
H. White and James Stephens, M.A.,
whose views were in accord with those found in its pages. While not committing themselves to all its
details, Dr. Handley, G. C. Moule and Dr. Dinsdale T. Young also commended it with great
cordiality. I recall the kindness of
these servants of God, all now passed to their rest, with humble
thankfulness. It is thirty-four years
since it was first committed to print, but I have seen no reason to depart from
the beliefs which it expresses, and in which I was nurtured; I have therefore
gladly acceded to its being reprinted. I
must not, however, commit any branches of Christian work with which I am
associated to these my purely personal convictions. In that respect, in again issuing the booklet
I represent myself alone.
E. J. POOLE‑CONNOR.
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1. THE PROPHECY OF DANIEL.
Some six hundred years before Christ was born a great King lay
on his bed, meditating upon the future of the empire over which he ruled - an
empire daily growing in power and glory.
To what was it tending? How would
it end? Thus questioning, he fell asleep
and dreamed; and in his dream he saw a great image before him, curiously
composed. Its head was of gold, its
breasts and arms were of silver, its belly and thighs of brass, its legs of
iron, its feet part of iron and part of potter’s clay. As he contemplated it he saw a stone smite
the image upon its feet and break it; so utterly, that the image became as
chaff of the threshing floor, and the wind carried it away; while the stone
became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth.
Such was the dream of Nebuchadnezzar, king of
And God who gave the dream, gave,
through His servant Daniel, the interpretation.
The image, the king was told, symbolized the whole course of Gentile
rule; Nebuchadnezzar himself being the head of gold. His kingdom should be followed by one
governmentally inferior, set forth by the breasts and arms of silver, which in
its turn should be displaced by a third, of which the brazen portion of the
image was the type.
Concerning the identity of these kingdoms there is no question,
since Nebuchadnezzar was informed that his rule was indicated by the head of
gold. It is a matter of history that the
Babylonian empire was succeeded by that of Medo-Persia, and later by that of
The king was further informed that in process of time a fourth
world-power would arise, strong as iron, which, like iron, would break in
pieces all opposed to it. That this
fourth kingdom was that of
But this was not all.
The image of the king’s dream had ten toes upon its feet, and these ten
toes had their prophetic significance.
They represented ten kingdoms into which the Roman empire was itself to
be divided; and “in the days of those (ten) kings” - so Daniel was commissioned to declare – “shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom” (2: 44); and set it up by violence and destruction,
for “it shall break in pieces and consume all these
kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever.”
Later, as we are told in the seventh chapter, God was pleased
to confirm, by a dream given to Daniel, the revelation thus made. In his vision the prophet saw four wild
beasts rising from the
To Daniel also was given the interpretation of the dream. The four wild beasts, he was told, were four
kings which should arise out of the earth.
A comparison of the dreams of the King and of the Prophet makes it clear
that the same four kings, or kingdoms, are fore-shadowed in both, though under
different figures; while the “ten toes” of the
one correspond to the “ten horns” of the
other. But in the vision seen by Daniel,
we have this further revelation: out of the ten kingdoms into which the Roman
empire was to be divided there would arise a king who would “speak great words against the Most High, and wear out the
saints of the Most High, and think to change times and laws; and they shall be
given into his hand until a time, times, and the dividing of a time,”
that is to say, for three years and a half; for in chapter
4: 16 “seven times,” the period of King
Nebuchadnezzar’s affliction, clearly mean “seven years,”
so that “a time, (two) times,
and the dividing of a time” signify half that period.
Consider what this further revelation means. The first three kingdoms of which this
prophecy speaks have risen and passed away, but the division of the fourth into the final ten has never yet taken place.
This cannot be too strongly urged, nor too clearly
recognized. Here, then, is a portion of
God’s sure Word awaiting fulfilment, and with it, the fulfilment of the
prophecy concerning the blasphemous, persecuting king who shall arise from the
midst of the ten. When he appears the
end shall be very near.
Let the reader secure a map of the old
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2. THE OLIVET PROPHECY.
We have seen that God was pleased to give to Daniel a prophecy
of vast importance. But God Who “spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets hath in
these last days spoken unto us by his Son”; and not less important than
the prophecy of Daniel was the prophecy uttered by our Lord as He sat in the
midst of His disciples upon Mount Olivet.
This wonderful discourse (recorded for us in Matthew 24., Mark 13.
and Luke 21.), formed the answer to three
questions of the disciples, arising out of His statement that not one stone of
the Temple should be left upon another which should not be thrown down. “Tell us,”
they said, “when shall these things be? and what shall be
the sign of Thy coming? and of the end of the age?” To the first question, which had to do with
the destruction of the Temple, the Lord replied, “When
ye see Jerusalem encompassed with armies, then know that the desolation thereof
is nigh ... for these be the days of vengeance ... and
Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles till the times of the Gentiles
be fulfilled” (Luke 21: 20-24).
This prophecy, in so far as it concerns the destruction of
The question, third in the order of the disciples’ enquiry,
but second in the order of the Lord’s answer, was concerning the sign of the end of the age; and by “the age” was meant the period which should elapse
before the Lord returned.
In his reply (Matt. 24: 4-14)
our Lord gave first, an outline of what should be the general character of the
age. It would be marked by the recurrence of war, famine, pestilence and
earthquake. His followers would have to
endure persecution. False prophets would
arise and deceive many. The Gospel
should be preached in all the world for a witness to all nations; “and then,” said our Lord, “shall
the end come.” In other words,
the age would not terminate, nor the Lord return, till in every nation the
Gospel had been preached. Such was the
clear sign given by the Lord in His response to the disciples’ third question.
The question answered last by our Lord was one of such
importance that we must linger awhile over the reply, and consider it somewhat
in detail. The disciples’ enquiry was, “What shall be the sign of thy coming?” To which our Lord thus began to respond: “When ye therefore, shall see the abomination of desolation
spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy
place. ...
then let them which be in
It is evident that this tribulation will be the outcome of the
setting up of the idol. Some will submit
and worship, but others will resist and be persecuted. Probably few, if any, Christian believers
will suffer in Jerusalem (where the white heat of the furnace will be), owing
to our Lord’s warning to flee; nevertheless, the persecuting spirit will be
abroad on the earth, and all who “keep the commandments
of Jesus” rather than the commandments of the anti-Christian king, will
doubtless suffer in varying degrees. But
“for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened”
and “immediately after the tribulation of those days
shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light ... and the
powers of heaven shall be shaken; and then shall appear the sign of the
Son of Man in heaven.”
Such, then, is our Lord's answer to the question, “What shall be the sign of Thy coming?” On earth, the idol in the holy place, and the
ensuing tribulation; in the heavens, the darkening of the sun and moon, and the
falling of the stars. Amid such dread
scenes the day of deliverance and of doom shall be ushered in.
Our Lord’s discourse did not end here. He proceeded to say that neither men nor
angels knew the day and hour fixed in the divine purpose for His Return, and
that, to the world at large, His Coming would be as unexpected and as terrible
as the Flood. “As
in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying
and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and knew
not until the flood came and took them all away; so also shall the coming of
the Son of man be” (verse 38). And this would be so, not because that day
should come unheralded - for He had just foretold the events which would
signify its near approach - but because ungodly men would not regard His
warnings. Men “knew
not” that the flood was coming; yet for years the preaching of Noah and
the building of the ark foretold their doom.
Even so no man will know that Christ is at the door unless, by God’s
grace, he shall recognize the “knocking” (Luke 12: 36). To all, therefore, who would escape
the judgments His Coming will usher in, our Lord has uttered these solemn
words: “Take heed to yourselves lest haply your hearts
be overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness and the cares of this life, and
that day come on you suddenly as a snare; for it shall come on all them that
dwell on the face of all the earth. But
watch ye at every season, making
supplication that ye may prevail to escape all these things that shall come
to pass, and to stand before the Son of man” (Luke
21: 34-36, R.V.) - prevail, that is over the evil influences of that
hour, its materialism and unbelief; and so escape, not the tribulation,* which is one of the signs of the Lord’s Coming, but
the judgments which His Coming will bring.
[* Here we must differ from the author’s interpretation. Mr.Poole-Connor
believes all disciples of Christ must
pass through the Great Tribulation, but will ‘escape
… the judgments which His Coming will bring’!! See in ‘Selective
Quotations” – Numbers 9, 80, 166,
220, 228, 240, 261, 264, 306, and 331.]
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3. PAUL AND THE THESSALONIANS.
It will have been observed that in the Lord’s Olivet discourse
He not only delivered a prophecy of His own, but quoted and confirmed the older
prophecy of Daniel. We come now to a third
link in this prophetic chain - the Epistles of Paul to the Thessalonians; for
the Apostle, while imparting certain truths respecting the Lord’s Coming which
were directly revealed to him by God, nevertheless based the bulk of his
instructions upon the prophecy of our Lord and that of Daniel before Him.
That the Apostle was well acquainted with the utterances of
our Lord, there is abundant evidence. “Ye ought ...
to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, It is more
blessed to give than to receive,” he said to the Ephesian
Elders. “I command, yet not I, but the Lord,” he
wrote to the Corinthians in quoting another pronouncement of the Lord
Jesus. It need cause us no surprise,
therefore, to find his teaching on the subject of the Lord’s Coming
to be interpenetrated with that teaching which the Lord Himself delivered to
His disciples on Olivet.
In writing to the Thessalonians, his first detailed statement
is concerning the dead in Christ. For this
we say unto you by the word of the Lord (we take up His words at verse 15 of the fourth
chapter, 1st Epistle) “that we which are alive and
remain to the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which 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: then we which are alive and remain shall be
caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.”
In this utterance we have certain truths stated which were
known to the Apostle by direct revelation; to this fact he refers when he says:
“This we say unto you by the word of the Lord.” Nevertheless, his mind is still full of the
Olivet prophecy. “The voice of the archangel and the trump of God” is an
echo of the Lord’s words “He shall send forth his angels with a great sound of
a trumpet”; while the reference to believers who “are alive and remain unto the coming of the
Lord” being “caught up in the clouds to meet the
Lord in the air,” echoes that other word of the Lord concerning “the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven.”
The Apostle then continues: “But of
the times and seasons, brethren, ye have no need that I write unto you. For yourselves know perfectly that the day of
the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night.
For when they shall say, Peace and safety, then sudden destruction
cometh upon them ... But ye brethren are not in darkness that that day should
overtake you as a thief ... Therefore let us not sleep as do others, but let us watch and
be sober” (chapter 5: 1-6).
In these words we have nothing of the nature of a revelation
specially given to the Apostle. The Holy
Spirit was simply bringing to his remembrance prophecy ready uttered. His statement that the Day of the Lord would
come as a thief in the night was but another form of the Lord’s words – “If the good man of the house had known what hour the thief
would come, would have watched, and not suffered his house to be broken up.” His confident, declaration to the
Thessalonians that they were not in darkness: that the Day of the Lord should
not overtake them as a thief: was
evidently based upon his knowledge of what the Lord had said concerning the
signs which should herald His approach.
The Day of the Lord would come upon His people, as well as upon the
world, but it should not come on the former unexpectedly or hurtfully. God had not appointed them to wrath, but to
obtain salvation by Jesus Christ.
Nevertheless, they were not to be slothful or indifferent, but they
were, as the Lord had said, to watch.
Such was the teaching of the Apostle given in this First
Epistle; and such was the teaching given to Thessalonian believers by word of
mouth. Notwithstanding this, they fell
into a snare. They were persuaded to
think, in spite of the absence of the heralding signs, that the Day of the Lord
had set in. A spirit, probably speaking through some person in their assembly, had
misled them; specious teaching had beguiled them; a forged epistle of Paul had
been circulated among them supporting the error. The result was agitation, confusion, and a
neglect of daily duty. To them,
therefore, the Apostle wrote again – “Now we beseech
you, brethren, touching the coming of
the Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together unto him, that ye be not soon
shaken ... neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, to
the effect that the day of the Lord is come.
Let no man deceive you in any
way, for that day shall not come, unless
there shall have come the apostasy first, and the man of lawlessness shall have been
revealed” (2 Thess.
2: 3, Alford’s translation).
On what ground could the
Apostle so confidently assert this?
He did not say it “by the word of the Lord” - that is, by revelation
specially committed to him. Here, as
before, guided by the Holy Spirit, he bases his teaching on the prophecies of
Daniel and our Lord. Daniel had declared
that prior to the Coming of the Son of man there should rise one who should
speak great words against the Most High, and think to change times and laws:
till the “man of lawlessness,” therefore, had
been manifested, the Day of the Lord could not come.
But the Apostle continues his description of this terrible
being - still based upon Daniel’s prophecy (chapter
11: 36, 37) - and delineates him as “He that
opposeth and exalteth himself above every one called God, or an object of
worship, so that he sitteth down in the Temple of God, showing himself that he
is God” (Alford).
Once more we stay to recall prophecies going before. Both Daniel and our Lord foretold that this
blasphemous king should set up an idolatrous image in the
In that day shall the long tribulation of the people of God
come to an end. Then shall the justice
of God be vindicated. “It is a righteous thing with God,” says the Apostle in
an earlier passage, “to recompense tribulation to them
that tribulate you” - (we venture to coin a word to indicate
the original) – “and (to recompense) to you who are tribulated, rest, with us” (the apostles,
and the long line of suffering and persecuted saints) “at
the revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming
fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and 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 to be admired in all them that believe
... in that
day.”
Daniel in
The earthly work of both Prophet and Apostle has long since
ceased. In a far eastern city the dust
of Daniel mingled with the earth; the dust of Paul was scattered in the
imperial city of the west; but in
[* That is, all judged worthy to rise out from amongst the dead in Hades (Rev. 6: 9-11; Luke 20: 35; Heb. 11: 35b; Phil. 3: 11;
Rev. 20: 4-6), together with those rapt alive before and after
the Great Tribulation at the Second Advent of Christ/Messiah (Luke 21: 34-36; Rev. 3: 10), when He comes to
establish His Millennial Kingdom (Dan. 2: 44.)]
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4. THE LORD’S COMING IN RELATION TO
THE PROFESSING CHURCH
Hitherto we have followed the broad stream of prophecy, and
have spoken of our Lord’s coming as affecting two main classes: the people of
God and the people of the world. But as
we pursue our Lord’s teaching another aspect of the solemn subject comes to our
view. We find in His utterances repeated warnings that the Church itself
would become corrupt, and that at His Coming He will pronounce
judgment, not only upon those who openly reject Him, but upon His professed followers.
Nor need this fact, for all its sadness, greatly surprise
us. God’s work has ever been opposed by
a personal spirit of evil, as subtle as he is powerful. And while he has not been permitted to
prevent the setting up of the Church on earth, he has been allowed to hinder it
sorely, both from without and from within.
This aspect of the Lord’s return is particularly brought
before us in certain parables recorded in Matthew’s
Gospel, chapters 13., 22.
and 24.
In chapter
13. we have a series of parables setting forth some of the
methods of the enemy. In the Parable of
the Sower he is depicted as catching away the truth
as it is sown in men’s hearts. In the
Parable of the Tares he is seen planting unregenerate men in the professing
Church. In the Parable of the Mustard Seed
we are forewarned that the Church would forsake its lowly position and assume,
as we know it did under the Roman bishops, the place of a world-power; and in
this “tree” the “fowls”
- the powers of evil - should find their nest. And although in the Parable of the Leaven we have the picture of an
apostate system leavening wholesome truth with corrupting error, it is still
the enemy’s work which is being done.
How truly our Lord’s forewarning has been fulfilled let the present condition of Christendom
declare. When we call to mind
the history, from the Middle Ages till to-day, of the various sections of the
professing Church - Roman, Greek and Protestant; when we remember the errors
promulgated throughout the world in the name of Christ; when we contemplate the
number of those who, while bearing the title of Christian, have manifestly
never been born from above; we may well believe that when the Lord returns it
will be necessary for Him “to gather out of his kingdom
all things that offend, and them that do iniquity.”
The parable which sets forth most fully the necessity and
certainty of such a judgment is the Parable of the Tares. “The kingdom of
heaven,” said our Lord, “shall be likened to a man which sowed good seed in his
field. But ... his enemy came and sowed tares among
the wheat.”
The tares (zizania) to which our
Lord refers are semi-poisonous plants so like to wheat in their earlier stages
that even the experienced farmer does not venture to separate the two. The Lord, therefore, warns us that those
unregenerate souls planted in the professing Church by the Evil One will often,
in all external matters, be indistinguishable from the true children of
God. Nevertheless, the parable shows
equally clearly that when the Lord returns they shall be manifested and
separated. “In
the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the
tares and bind them in bundles to burn them, but gather the wheat into my barn.” When the zizania
and the true wheat are fully developed, the difference between the two is so
marked that a child cannot mistake them.
Even so in that “harvest” which is “the end of the age,” the Lord’s own people will be
distinguished from all others, for they shall be changed, in a moment, in the
twinkling of an eye (1 Cor.
15: 51, 52), and shall “shine forth”
bodily and literally, “as the sun.” But no such glorious change shall pass over
the unregenerate however lofty their religious profession. To-day there are many of whom it is
impossible to say whether they be wheat or tares. In that day there shall be no longer any
doubt. And then shall the angels “gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them
which do iniquity.”
In chapter
22. we have the Parable of the Wedding Feast; and in the closing
portion of the parable we find teaching of a similar import. A king, said our
Lord, made a marriage feast for his son, and sent his servants to call them
that were bidden, but they would not come.
A second messenger was sent. Some
of the invited guests made light of it; others ill-treated the servants and
slew them. The king being wroth sent his
armies, destroyed the murderers, and burnt up their city. He then sent his servants out into the
highways and commanded them to bid as many as they found to the feast, and the
wedding was furnished with guests, both bad and good.
Here we are on sure ground.
The bidden guests who refused to come, and slew
the servants, were the Jewish people in their rejection of the Gospel
call. The burning up of their city was
the destruction of
Let it be noted that this man had not refused the invitation,
but he had refused the wedding garment - a type of the man - who, while a
professed recipient of salvation, has never submitted himself to the “righteousness of God”; and in the “day of finding” he shall be severed from the company
of true believers and shall be cast out. It was doubtless this parable which
was in the mind of the Apostle Paul when, after enumerating to the Philipplans the things which constituted his own
righteousness, he wrote - “I have suffered the loss of
all (these) things and count them as dross that I may gain Christ, and be found”
- found by the King – “... not having
mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but ... the righteousness which is of God by
faith” (Phil. 3: 8, 9). “Be diligent,” says the Apostle Peter,
seeming also to echo the words “that ye
may be found of Him in peace, without spot and blameless” (2 Peter 14).
Finally, in chapter 25. we have the Parable of the Virgins, in which is
pictured a company of those who were waiting for the bridegroom; of whom some,
having oil in their vessels to maintain their lamps, went in to the marriage
feast; while others, having no [lasting supply
of (verse 7)]
oil, and not being ready to meet the bridegroom when he came, were shut
out. Here, once more, we have the same
truth taught us. The foolish virgins represent those who make
a Christian profession, but have not received [kept
or maintained (Acts 5: 32)] the Spirit in their hearts; and “if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.” To such the Lord, Who “knoweth them that are
his” shall say when He shall come, “Verily I say unto
you, I know you not.”
Such are the solemn truths stated and repeated by our Lord;
and in all considerations of His Coming they should be given their due and
serious weight. Far deeper than any
distinction between fruitful and unfruitful believers is the distinction
between believers and unregenerate professors of religion; between the
spiritually living and the spiritually dead.
Our Lord speaks frequently of
coming to His Church and finding His servants unready to meet Him. But many of His servants - servants in profession, that is - are even now unready to meet Him, in that they
are as truly strangers to the new birth as the avowed unbeliever. It cannot be too strongly insisted that
readiness to meet the Lord consists primarily in a renewed condition of heart;
in a personal experience of that change of nature which is wrought by the Holy
Spirit of God.
To the professing Church, therefore, Christ addresses Himself
- to the Church as He foreknew it would be: a mixed body of wheat and tares, of
wise and of foolish virgins, of faithful
and of wicked servants - and to all within its borders He gives His earnest
counsel, “Be ye also ready” - see that ye are children of the kingdom,
guests truly garbed in the righteousness of Christ, virgins having the oil of
the s[S]pirit in the heart – “for in
such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh.” To all merely human calculation the coming of
Christ will seem furthest off when it is most nigh. The heralding events will be as little
understood by the unsaved professor of religion as by the materialistic [regenerate] man of
the world. To the “evil servant” the Lord will come “in a day when he looketh not for Him” as truly as to
the man who is His open enemy. Ability
to recognize the signs will be found, not in a powerful intellect, but in a
renewed [and obedient]
heart. Of all mankind, it is only to the
regenerate believer it can be said – “That day shall
not overtake you as a thief.”
To this issue the Lord directs the weight of His
teaching. To be strangers in heart to
the grace of God is not only to be unready to meet Him, but is also to be
morally incapable of recognizing the events which tell that He is near. Therefore let every professed servant of His
- such is His solemn counsel - see to it that he belongs to the new and
heavenly order, that he has been born of the Spirit; for if that be not so, then,
whether he die first, or live till the Lord returns, the outer darkness shall
be his portion, for ever and ever.
And God grant that upon the conscience of no Christian teacher
may it ever lie that he has misinterpreted his Master’s words, and turned the
edge of these solemn, searching, and vital truths.
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5. THE BELIEVER’S SERVICE.
In Matthew
25. there
is recorded a further parable relating to the Lord’s coming, known as the Parable
of the Talents, which may thus be summarized: A certain man, going into a far
country called his own servants, and delivered unto them his goods. To one he gave ten talents, to another five,
and to another one, each according to his several ability;
and straightway took his journey. After
a long time the Lord of those servants returned, and reckoned with them, rewarding the faithful, but condemning
the wicked and slothful servant to be cast into outer darkness.
The general teaching here conveyed is similar to that found in
the parables already considered, and has reference to the “judgment which begins at
the house of God” (1 Peter 4: 17). The
wicked and slothful servant belongs to the same order as the man without a wedding
garment; both are cast into the outer darkness. The additional solemn suggestion of this
parable is, that a man may even be
entrusted with spiritual powers and opportunities of service, and yet prove to
be a son of perdition at the last; a sad possibility vividly made real by
the story of Judas, and foretold in
the words of our Lord, “Many shall say unto me in that day [at the time of judgment],
Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name, and in thy name cast
out devils, and done many wonderful works.
Then will I profess unto them,
I never knew you; depart from me, ye workers
of iniquity” (Matt. 7: 22, 23). But while the general teaching of the parable
is thus similar to that already met with, we find in the earlier verses a truth
indicated which we have not hitherto faced, namely, that the Lord’s Coming will
not only be to “gather out of His Kingdom all things
that offend, and them that do iniquity,”
but will also be to make enquiry into
the service of those who are really His own, and to reward them according to
their works.
Here, then, is a doctrine of great importance, concerning
which it behoves us to be clear. Let us
remember, on the one hand, that no child of God can fail of [eternal] blessings
secured to him by covenant-grace. Resurrection and transfiguration [after the kingdom age] cannot
be delayed even by unfaithfulness, nor can [eternal] glory be forfeited. “Christ the
first-fruits, afterward they that are Christ’s at His coming” is the divine order which nothing can
interrupt. All who are “children of the
kingdom” shall, whatever their attainments in holiness, “shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.” ... “If children,” says the Apostle, “then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ - [if indeed we share in His sufferings in order that we
may also share in His glory (Rom.
8: 17b, N.I.V.)].” “Whom he called, them he also justified; whom he justified,
them he also glorified” But let
us not forget that they who are children of God are also servants of Christ,
and as such must render to Him an
account of their stewardship - [and, “it is required that those given a trust must prove faithful” (1 Cor. 4: 2, N.I.V.)]. “The Lord of those
servants cometh and reckoneth with them.” All that which goes to make up the believer’s
life - his outward conduct and his
inward motives - shall one day be
brought under review. “We shall all stand,” says the Apostle, “before the judgment seat of Christ. For it is written, As
I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue confess to
God. So then every one of us shall give iccount of himself to God” (Romans 14: 10-12).
It was this great fact to which the Apostle Paul appealed in writing to the Corinthians concerning Apollos and himself, “Every man shall
receive his own reward according to his
own labour. ... Other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is
Jesus Christ. Now if any man build on
this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; every man’s
work shall be made manifest, for the day shall declare it, because it shall be
revealed by fire; for the fire shall try
every man’s work of what sort it is.” Apollos and he were alike true servants of Christ; were alike
building on the sure foundation; yet the ministry of neither could escape the
divine testing. Should it prove to be “gold, silver, precious stones,” all would be well;
should there be found “wood, hay, stubble,” it
would be consumed. “If any man’s work
abide,” the Apostle says, “he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work shall be burned, he
shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved*; yet so as by fire.”
(1 Cor. 3: 8‑15). “It is a very small
thing with me,” he says later, “that I should be
judged of you, or of man’s judgment: yea, I judge not mine own self. For I am conscious of nothing against myself;” - so may his words be translated – “yet am I not hereby justified; but he that judgeth me is the
Lord. Therefore,” he concludes, “judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness,
and make manifest the counsels of the heart; then shall every man have praise
of God.” And lest any should
imagine that the divine investigation did not cover every detail of life, the
Apostle was led to write to the Christian
slaves of Colosse, “Whatsoever
ye do, do it heartily as to the Lord
... knowing
that of the Lord ye shall receive
the reward ... but he that doeth
wrong shall receive for the wrong which he hath done; and there is no
respect of persons” (Col. 3: 24, 25).
[* NOTE. In this context of works
the salvation here cannot possibly refer to “the
salvation we share” (Jude 3, N.I.V.),
for that salvation is received without works! (Rom. 6: 23; Eph. 2: 8, 9.)]
Such is the clear teaching of our Lord and His Apostle
concerning the day when He shall come to reckon with His servants; and it is evident that the whole weight of the
emphasis is thrown on the fact that the entire life of the [regenerate] believer
will come under [His]
review. It will not merely be what
the servant was doing when the Lord came that will count in that solemn
enquiry, but how he was occupied during
His absence. The question as to the
actual employment of the believer when death, or the Coming, shall find him is
one of importance, but it is not the main consideration. The matter of supreme concern is how he shall have ordered his life from
the first day that grace called him into the service of Christ till the day
when earthly labour came to an end.
Thus regarded, the fact of the Lord’s coming has a sanctifying power
which is entirely unaffected by the knowledge of preceding events. If every servant of the Lord knew, as Peter
and Paul knew, that he should die before the Lord returned, the solemn
certainty of the judgment seat would not be altered thereby, nor would the
believer be deprived of a single incentive to holiness. It is the sure approach of that day, not when
and how it comes, that matters. Long years
have passed since the Apostle, who taught that every one must give an account
of himself to God, passed to his rest; yet the Apostle’s own service shall as
surely undergo the coming testing as
that of the last convert born of God before the trumpet sounds. “We make it our aim,”
said the same inspired teacher, “whether present or
absent” - whether present in the body or absent from it when the Lord
returns – “to be well-pleasing
unto Him. For we must all be made manifest before the judgment seat of Christ,
that everyone - [i.e., every regenerate believer of His, obedient
and disobedient alike] - may receive the things done in the body according to that he hath done,
whether it be good or bad” (2 Cor. 4: 9, 10, R.V.).
Here is the true perspective of the Lord’s Coming [and millennial kingdom], and here its true [sanctifying] power. The
motive for holiness of life and for earnestness of labour is found, not in a
fear that the Lord may stealthily come and catch His servants momentarily off
duty, but in a solemn conviction that
all our days of service must be accounted for to Him; that whether our lot
be [death,]
resurrection or translation, our lives shall equally be subjected to the
scrutiny of Him whose eyes are like a flame of fire; and that in proportion to our fidelity there
shall be, in ways but obscurely revealed at present, certain reward or certain
loss.
* *
* * *
* *
6. WATCHFULNESS.
In following the teaching of our Lord and His Apostle
concerning His Coming, we cannot have failed to observe the constant repetition of the exhortation to watch. It is the lesson, implied or stated, of
almost every parable; the warning
attached to almost every prophecy.
It behoves us, therefore, to ponder the word, and to ascertain all that
it is intended to convey. And having
learnt, in some degree, the relation of the Lord’s Coming
to the world, to the professing Church, and to the genuine servant of Christ,
we are so far better fitted to pursue the enquiry.
In turning to the passages in which the exhortation is found,
we at once observe that the word is used to convey more than one meaning. To be exact, two different Greek words are
used in the original; and while the difference between the two is very slight,
yet the fact itself is suggestive. And a
closer examination of the passages in question shows that the application of
the word is varied and distinct.
We find the word used by our Lord, for example, in urging upon
the members of the professing Church the
need for wakefulness concerning their spiritual condition. At the close of the Parable of the Ten
Virgins we read “Watch, therefore, for ye know not the day nor the hour” (R.V.). The wise virgins had been awake to their
need of oil, and alert to secure it;
and so, in spite of [their previous] slumbering while the bridegroom tarried, they went
in to the marriage feast. But the foolish
virgins had neglected so to do; and to them the, door was shut. In the Book of Proverbs - that book which
inculcates wisdom and dissuades from folly - frequent warnings are given against the sloth which imperils the future. “A little slumber, a
little folding of the hands to sleep; so shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man.” It is against the folly of such spiritual sloth that our Lord also gives
warning. If there be no recognition of
the need of grace in the heart [and the Holy
Spirit’s presence and power in the life], and
no earnestness to seek it, death or the Lord’s Return shall come, even to the
professed disciple, as something utterly unexpected and terrible. To all such, the Lord utters His
sternly-gracious words, first sent to the Church in
We find the word used also as a command to the Lord’s people
to be on their guard against influences hostile to the spiritual life. “Watch ye at every season, making
supplication, that (so) ye may prevail to escape all those things that shall come to pass” - [the Great Tribulation via rapture, (Rev. 3: 10)] – “and to stand before the Son of Man” (Luke 21: 36, R.V.).
The Lord’s own words have made it abundantly clear that the
days that will immediately precede His Return will be characterized by utter
absorption in the things of this life.
Eating, drinking, marrying, buying, selling, planting: these are the
terms used by the Lord to set forth the pursuits in which the world shall be
engrossed; so engrossed that in spite of solemn signs and arresting portents,
in spite of prophetic warning and corrective judgment, the Day of the Lord will
come as unexpectedly as a thief, and as fatally as a snare. Against this spirit the Christian warrior
must contend, with whole-hearted earnestness.
“Take up,” says the Apostle, in a passage
which echoes the words of the Lord, “the whole armour
of God, that ye may be able to stand in the evil day ... praying at
all seasons, in the Spirit, and watching thereunto in all perseverance” (Eph. 6: 18). The
grace of God assures that the believer will escape the doom of the ungodly; he
is not in darkness that the Day of the Lord should overtake him as a thief; God
has not appointed him to wrath, but to
obtain salvation – [the salvation of your souls,
(1 Pet. 1: 9, 10)]
- by Jesus Christ, who died for him, that whether he shall wake or sleep, he
shall live together with Him. But he shall escape, not by presumptuous
indifference, but by heeding his Lord's commands; by seeking and obtaining
strength to watch and to be sober, to put on the whole armour of God; and so to
resist the influences of the dark hour that precedes the dawn.
Yet again, the word is used in exhorting those who have the spiritual oversight of their fellows to
see to their charge, and to be on the outlook for the returning
Lord. There is a passage of great moment
to all such watchmen found in Mark 13: 33
(R.V.): “Take ye heed, watch and pray, for ye know not
when the time is. It is as when a man
sojourning in another country, having left his house, and given authority to
his servants, to each man his work,
commanded the porter to watch!” Observe the final clause. The absent Lord has not only left His
servants to work, but He has appointed a porter, and commanded him to give warning of danger to his
fellow-servants, and to announce their Master’s return. So
the Apostle Paul acted in his ministry to the
Finally, the word is used as counselling His
own servants to have ever before them the coming day of reckoning. “Let your loins be
girded about, and your lamps burning,” - the symbols of active service and holy living – “and be ye yourselves like men looking for their Lord, when he
shall return from the marriage feast,” - men who expect to render an
account; “that when he cometh and knocketh they may
open to him immediately. Blessed are those
servants, whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching” (Luke 12: 35-37).
With such varied application does the Lord bid His people to watch. To the
professing Church, with its admixture of the true and the false, the word is a
solemn counsel to awake to the need of regenerating grace, before the door is
shut. To the true believer it comes as a
warning to guard against the adverse influences which would dim his vision
of eternal and spiritual things; a
command to be vigilant concerning dangers which threaten the church, and to be
looking for the signs that herald His return ; an exhortation to have ever
before him the tribunal of his Master; and to know that whether the great “day” [2 Pet. 3: 8; Rev. 11: 15, 18; 20: 4.] be near or distant, its final approach is as
certain as the existence of the God who appointed it; it bids him expectantly
to wait for His Son from heaven, and for the dawn of the day of resurrection
and of rapture; the day of the [obedient] saint’s deliverance, and the day of the sinner’s
doom - [“For it is time for judgment to begin with the family of God; and if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those
who do not obey the gospel of God? And,
‘If it is hard for the righteous
to be saved, what will become of the ungodly and the sinner’” (1 Pet. 4:17, 18, N.I.V.)].
* *
* * *
* *
7. THE
PURPOSE AND METHODS OF GRACE.
The central
affirmation of New Testament teaching is that there are certain spiritual
blessings secured to the believer apart from his merit or desert. A clear knowledge of the privileges so
secured is of manifest importance in any enquiry concerning the Coming of the
Lord.
Moreover, “He who has ordained the end
has ordained the means”; and the methods by which God is pleased to
execute His plans are equally to be taken into account in the consideration of
the solemn theme. For these reasons
(although a reference has been made to these aspects of truth on previous
pages), we propose to examine, somewhat more in detail, what Scripture has to
say concerning the purposes of grace and the means by which those purposes are
accomplished. The great charter of the
believer’s privileges is found in Romans 8: 8-30.
It commences by clearly defining those to whom the privileges
belong. “So then
they that are in the flesh cannot please God. But
ye are not in the flesh but in the spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if
any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of
his.”*
[* See also Acts
5: 32; John 15: 1-17.]
Here are words which are perfectly lucid. They teach that mankind consists of two classes;
those who are “in the flesh,” that is, un-renewed
[but not necessarily unregenerate] sons of Adam, and those who are “in the spirit,” that is, believers, who by the new
birth are possessed of the spirit of Christ [and
indwelt by the Holy Spirit Himself]. Only those over whom the regenerating change
has passed can truly claim to be His.
But being His, certain consequences follow:- “If Christ be in you
the body is dead because of sin” - still liable to death, that is – “but the spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of him that raised up
Jesus from the dead dwell in you,
He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also
quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.”
This, then, is the first privilege secured by grace to the
believer; the quickening, or raising again, of the
body. While the indwelling of the Spirit does not preserve the outward man from
dissolution, it does assure his future resurrection [at the time of Christ’s
return]. In other words, a change of
nature here is the pledge of a change of body [to
serve the Lord] hereafter.
The words that follow emphasize this:-
“If ye live after the flesh ye shall die
[i.e.,
prematurely, (Acts 5: 5, 10)]; but if ye through the Spirit
do mortify the deeds of the body ye shall live.” If a man lives habitually in sin and
self-will, he is assuredly not born from above, and shall not share in the “resurrection unto life.” But if by the Spirit evil impulses and
actions are being slain, he is
spiritually alive now and shall live again bodily when the Lord returns.
The Apostle continues: “For as many as
are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. For ye have not received the spirit of
bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we
cry, Abba Father.”
Here the prospect broadens.
“Adoption”
(which means literally “placing as a son”) is a
Scriptural expression which is
associated with dignity and ruling power.
Emphasis is given to this truth by the statement that creation
is eagerly waiting not only for the manifestation of Christ, but of those also
who are co-heirs with Him:- “The
earnest expectation of the creature (or creation)
waiteth for the
manifestation of the sons of God.” This is so, not only because the final deliverance of God’s children coincides with
the deliverance of creation from the curse, but because they shall then resume,
with their Lord, the beneficent rule committed to Adam, and long since lost. This great thought finds expression in the
Apostle’s summary of the purposes of grace: “Whom he
did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son,
that he might be the first-born
among many brethren.” Conformity to the image of God at the first
creation was not only moral and physical, but governmental also. “Let us make man in our image and after our likeness”
God said “and let them have dominion...” (Gen. 1: 26).
Even so conformity to the image of the Son, as the issue of the new
creation, is to be construed in its widest sense as moral, physical, and
governmental. The sons of God will be
like their Lord in stainless holiness, in glorious immortality, and in kingly
power. This is the final privilege
secured by covenant grace; and so surely will God fulfil His purpose that it is
stated in terms of accomplished fact: “Whom He did foreknow
... them He
also glorified.” A voice from the
throne has said, It is done.
Similar teaching is found in the Epistle to the Ephesians, chapter 1. (R.V.): “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath
blessed us with every Spiritual blessing ... in
Christ; even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without
blemish before him in love; having foreordained us unto adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the good
pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace which he freely
bestowed on us in the Beloved.”
Here, however, the stress is laid upon the truth that every spiritual
blessing to which the [adopted] believer is heir has already been bestowed upon
Christ, as the representative of His people, as the Head over all things to the church, which is His body. Whatever variety there may be in the gifts,
or service, or rewards, of the individual members, whatever differences of
administration there may be in the kingdom which is yet to be revealed, the church is one. To every member of that
one body belongs, by inalienable right, participation in all that is bestowed
on Christ as the Head; and the “exceeding greatness of
the power” which lifted Him from the grave to the throne, and “put all
things under his feet,” is to be exercised to place beside Him every unit of that
blood-bought company.
These, then, are some of the Scriptural statements concerning
the goal to which grace will conduct
the people of God. But by what road must
they travel to reach this goal? What are
the means by which the ends of grace are achieved?
In the first place, the purposes of grace are wrought out in
perfect consonance with righteousness and truth. It is the repeated
affirmation of the Scriptures that in all God’s dealings with men no principle
of holiness or justice is ever violated.
It is so in the justifying of the sinner; it is not less so in the
glorifying of the saint. “We know,” says the Apostle, “that
the judgment of God is according to truth ... who will render to every man according
to his [i.e., the regenerate believer’s] works; to them that by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory
and honour, and immortality, eternal life; but to them who are factious and obey not the truth shall be wrath and
indignation, tribulation and anguish” (Rom.
2: 2-9, R.V.). No man is
justified by his works; his own holiness is no title to heaven; yet among all
those who shall share the heavenly [millennial] glory there shall not be found one who did not on
earth repent of sin, and set his feet
upon the King’s highway. “Be not
deceived, says the Apostle again, in writing to the Galatians, “God is not
mocked; for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he
also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption [for a thousant years]; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting [i.e., in this context, ‘age-lasting’ life]” (Gal. 6: 8).
No other highway but that of holiness can terminate in resurrection
life. No “worker
of iniquity” shall be recognized by Christ as His own when He returns.
Further, the purposes of grace are effected
by means of the diligence, the whole-souled
earnestness of the believer, in-wrought
by the [Holy]
Spirit of God. There is perhaps no
scripture which sets forth this fact more vividly than the utterance of the
Apostle Paul in Philippians 3: 8-14. “I count all things to be loss for the excellency
of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my
Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things. ... that I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of
his sufferings, becoming conformed unto his death; if by any means I may attain unto the resurrection [out] from the dead. ... I count not myself to have apprehended;
but one thing I do, forgetting the things which are behind, and stretching
forward to the things which are before, I press on toward the goal unto the prize of the high calling of God in Christ
Jesus.” (R.V.)
No doctrine of Scripture is clearer than that if a man attains
to the “resurrection [out] from among the dead,” it is due, not [only] to his own
efforts [in the power of God], but [also] to the
divine mercy. Eternal life of the
body, no less than that of the soul, is the gift of God. Nevertheless it is by the path of eager
earnestness, willing self-sacrifice, the spirit of the runner speeding on
toward the prize, that the God-given end is attained. It is thus a man works out his own salvation
with fear and trembling, while it is God who is working in him to will and to do of His good pleasure (Phil.
2: 12, 13). “Fight the good fight of faith,” the Apostle writes to
Timothy, using the same athletic figure as in the Philippian
passage, lay hold on eternal [age-lasting] life, whereunto thou art also called (1 Tim. 6: 12).
Strive, he says in effect,
like the wrestler or racer who calls forth every energy
of brawn and brain; “agonize” in the holy
contest, and lay hold of resurrection as the victor seizes the crown. It was not that the end was uncertain. The sovereign grace of God had called Timothy
to eternal life; but not through indolence was the purpose to be
fulfilled. Conflict
with the body, wrestling with spirits of evil, resistance of the world, fervent
labour in prayer - through such “agonia” as these lay for
Timothy the glory. “He that cometh to God,” the pathway to says the writer
of the Epistle to the Hebrews, speaking with reference to the translation of
Enoch, “must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder
of them that diligently seek him”
(Heb. 11: 6).
Further still, the purposes of grace are fulfilled through the
endurance of suffering borne for Christ’s sake. Persecution, in greater or
lesser degree, is the inevitable lot of the true disciple. “If they have
persecuted me they will persecute you.”
So said our Lord. By much tribulation must the Kingdom be entered. If any man
will not take up his cross and follow Christ he cannot be His disciple. It
is the man who endures testing, and endures it to the end, who shall receive
the crown of life (Matt. 24: 13; James 1:
12). “If so be that we suffer with him, that we may be glorified together,”
is not a qualifying clause threatening some of God’s children with the loss of their birthright, but
it is a declaration that for all the heavenly family the way of the cross is the only way to the crown.
Finally - nor is this fact the least important- the purposes
of grace are wrought out by means of the obedience of the Lord’s people to the
admonitions of His holy Word. Believers are matured in holiness by
being warned concerning the consequences of spiritual declension, as well as by
being instructed in the blessings of obedience.
Exhortations not to draw back, to hold fast their profession, to take
heed lest there be an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God,
are means continually used by the Holy Spirit for the preservation of His
people. The saints who are alive when
Christ returns will be saved from the Day of the Lord overtaking them as a
thief, not by any mechanical or unnatural methods, but by being led of the
Spirit to heed His counsels against spiritual surfeiting and drunkenness, and
by obeying His exhortations not to sleep as do others, but to watch and be
sober. The solemn warnings associated
with the Lord’s return are not contradictions or modifications of the purposes
of grace; they form part of the very means by which those purposes are wrought
out.
So, then, the believer is “to go to
both extremes.” He may rest with
triumphant security in all that grace assures.
Let him not be hardened or terrified by fears of being left behind when Christ
comes for His own, or weighed down with dread that he shall not sit down with
the Lord on His throne. He is the heir
of covenant blessings. Let the child of
God rejoice in these with all his heart.
Then let him give himself, with all diligence, to observe whatsoever the Lord has spoken, and to walk in the path by
which the covenant blessings are obtained.
Let no man vainly imagine that if he dallies with sin, and folds his
hands in spiritual slumber, if he shuns the cross, and habitually disobeys the
Word, he belongs to some order of “low-level
Christians,” who, although missing certain blessings, shall yet find
heaven at last. Let such an one look to his very beginnings, for assuredly the Spirit of Christ is not in him. “The foundation of
God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are His, and, Let him that nameth the name of
Christ depart from iniquity.” “The mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting
... to such
as keep His covenant and to those that remember His commandments to do them.”
* * *
* * *
*
8.
THE IMMINENCE OF THE LORD’S COMING.
In one of his
Epistles the Apostle Paul makes use of the word “Maranatha” - an Aramaic expression signifying “The Lord is at hand.”
This expression was apparently an early Christian watch-word, used not
only in reference to the spiritual presence of the Lord with His people, but in
reference also to the proximity of His personal return. That such a watch-word should be adopted by
these early believers clearly indicates the teaching current amongst them. “The coming of the
Lord draweth nigh,” “the end of all things is at
hand” - such utterances were manifestly integral portions of the Apostolic doctrine of the Lord’s Return. It is necessary, therefore, in the
consideration of this great theme, to ascertain in what sense this quality of Imminence, or nearness, is to be attributed to the Coming of the Lord.
In the pursuit of the enquiry, certain facts must be borne in
mind. The first is that the Lord Himself
definitely taught that His Coming would be long delayed. In Matthew
24. we have the following utterance recorded: “If that evil servant shall say in his heart, My lord delayeth
his coming and shall begin ...
to eat and drink with the drunken, the lord of that
servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he
is not aware of, and shall cut him asunder, and appoint him his portion with
the hypocrites there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”
The evil servant here is clearly a professed, but
unregenerate,* follower of Christ, to whom is meted out the special judgment
which falls on those who are “tares” amongst the
“wheat.”
His portion is appointed, not with the ungodly world, but with the hypocrites. Having no grace in his heart, he fails in day
of testing, and gives way to the moral surfeiting and drunkenness by which he
is surrounded. But the occasion of his falling
is the prolonged absence of his Lord.
His wickedness does not consist in saying “My
Lord delayeth his coming” - for therein he states the fact - but in
yielding to the temptation to which the fact gives rise.
[* If the evil servant is unregenerate, then eternal salvation is by
works! Is this what Paul concluded when
advising the church at
In the parable of the Virgins, which follows in chapter the
Lord again refers to the delay of His return.
“While the bridegroom tarried they all slumbered and slept.” It may be that these words were uttered as a
forewarning that the church would soon lose that alertness of the “blessed hope” which characterized the first generation
of believers. That such was the case we
know to be sadly true. From an early
period to late post-reformation times the doctrine of the Lord’s Coming as a practical factor in Christian life almost
disappeared. But here, as before, that
which would give occasion for this condition of oblivion is stated to be the
Lord’s delay.
Finally, in the parable of the Talents we have the passage, “After a long time the Lord of those servants cometh.” The words admit of no misunderstanding. They clearly affirm that the season of the
Lord’s absence would be, so far as men measure years, a protracted period.
The second fact to be borne in mind is that the two Apostles
who wrote most fully concerning the Lord’s Return knew it would not take place
during their life-time. To Peter the
Lord was pleased to say, “When thou shall be old thou shalt stretch forth thine
hands, and another shall gird thee and carry thee whither thou wouldest
not.” “This
spake he,” John adds, “signifying by what death he should glorify God” (John 21: 18, 19).
In this utterance Peter was told two things: first,
that he would live to be old, and, second, that during the lengthened
period of his earthly pilgrimage the Lord would not return. How or when a similar knowledge came to the
Apostle Paul we are not told. We find
him referring, in his farewell address to the elders at
The third point to be borne in mind is that certain prophecies
covering a considerable tract of time were necessarily to be fulfilled before
the Lord returned. Daniel’s prophecy
showed that the ten kingdoms were first to emerge: that scattered
These facts show that in apostolic days the Lord’s Coming was not imminent in point of time. In what sense, then, is the word to be
understood? What was the Apostles’
meaning when they declared it to be near?
The primary sense in which the Lord’s Coming is imminent is that it is the
next great event for which to look; the next crisis, introducing a new
order, in the history of mankind.
However long the present age lasts, it will not vary in its essential
characteristics, although toward its close those characteristics will be
accentuated. War, pestilence, and
earthquake have periodically devastated the earth from the beginning, and will
do so to the end. Persecution has been
the lot of God’s people, and will be their lot again. “As ye have heard that
Antichrist shall come,” says John “even now are there many antichrists.” The same beloved disciple could write truly,
“It is the last hour,” and though that hour has lengthened out, the age is no different in essence
to-day from what it was in the days of the Apostle. There is only one event which will terminate
the present order; which will introduce new conditions for the believer, for
There is, however, a secondary sense in which the Lord’s
Coming is imminent. After the first
generation of believers had passed away, the realization of “the blessed hope” became a possibility in any ordinary
lifetime. As we have seen,
the Apostles Peter and Paul knew that the Lord would not return in their day;
but when their period ended, the prophecies of Daniel and of our Lord might
conceivably have been fulfilled within comparatively brief limits, and the Lord
have returned. The slow evangelization
of the world was no necessity - nor is it still; rather has it been the
Church’s shame that it has been so long delayed; while the rapidity with which
apostasy may develop, or national changes be effected, has again and again been
demonstrated. For many centuries now there
seems to have been nothing to prevent the ante-Advent prophecies from being
fulfilled within a far briefer compass than three score years and ten.
One question remains for consideration. If the early disciples knew that it would not
be until “after a long time” the Lord would
come; if we to-day know that, late as it is, certain developments must still
take place before He appears; does not this fact rob the great doctrine of its
chief interest and moral power? To such
a question God has given an answer, complete and final. Two apostles definitely knew that they would
pass, not by translation, but by death, into the Lord’s presence. Yet to both the Lord’s Coming was the
glorious event on which their hearts were set; the hope that lightened their
labour and enriched their life. Peter
joyously speaks of “the salvation ready to be revealed in the last time”;
he exhorts believers to endure because their faith shall be found “to praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus
Christ”; he persuades his brethren to “hope to
the end for the grace that is to be brought unto us at the revelation of Jesus Christ”; he consoles suffering
saints with the prospect of being “glad with exceeding
joy” at the unveiling of the glory of their Lord; he holds up before the
elders the “crown of glory,” that the Chief
Shepherd shall bestow at His appearing.
Let these passages, from his first Epistle, and the whole triumphant and
urgent third chapter of his second Epistle, be read and pondered, and it will
be seen how little the moral power of the Lord’s Coming over the believers is
affected by a knowledge of preceding events. But more. We have said that the exact period when Paul
first knew that resurrection and not rapture should be his lot, is not told us;
but that he certainly knew it while at
“Looking for
that blessed hope.” It is the Coming
itself, not the method of it, nor what lies between, that fills the vision of
the believer. In that Coming is found
the crown of all his blessing, the consummation of all that he has longed
for. To reach that goal, “it were a well spent journey,
though deaths oft lie between.”
* *
* * *
* *
9.
In the background of the prophecies concerning the Lord’s
Return which we have passed in review, we have seen continually the shadow of
the sorrows of
In the
parable of the Wedding Feast, recorded in Matthew 22., our Lord
foretold the destruction of
In the “cutting
off” of Messiah we have a clear foreshadowing of the rejection and death
of the Lord Jesus, while the “people who destroy city
and sanctuary” are equally clearly the Roman forces, before whom
But it is not always
so to be. This nation, so highly honoured, so deeply
guilty, so sorely punished, is to be
restored. In the eleventh chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, the Apostle is led of God to state this
with a fulness and lucidity which admit of no question. He commences by propounding the great enquiry
“I say then, Hath God cast away his people?” and
answers with a vehement negative. “God forbid!” he cries, “for I
also am an Israelite ... God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew.” His argument seems to be that the greater
includes the less; if God has cast off the nation He has cast off every member
of it; but this He manifestly has not done, for the Apostle was himself one of
the chosen race. The true force of his
answer, however, lies below the surface.
As Saul of Tarsus he had been, in a peculiar sense, a type of unbelieving
This is his first answer.
But he repeats his question in another form:- “I say then, Have they stumbled that they should fall?” They had stumbled at Christ, as Isaiah had
foretold; were they in consequence to fall utterly, to lose all place in the
plan and history of redemption? “God forbid!” the Apostle cries again; “but through their fall salvation is come to the Gentiles, or
to provoke them to jealousy.” The
wedding feast was prepared, and when the bidden guests refused to come, the
King sent his servants to gather in, from the highways of the Gentile world, as
many as they could find; so that, if it were possible, the Jew might be filled
with a holy envy. (Alas, that there should have been so
little in Gentile Christianity to recommend Christ to the Jew!) “Now
if the fall of them be the riches of the world,” he continues, “and the diminishing of them be the riches of the Gentiles,
how much more their fulness?”
God has overruled their defection for good; but what good shall He not
effect through their repentance and restoration? The
conversion of Saul of
The Apostle resumes: “If the firstfruit be holy, the lump is also holy; and if the root
be holy so are the branches.” The
firstfruit of the dough, in the Levitical
economy, consecrated the whole mass; and in Abraham the whole nation was
sanctified, set apart for the redemptive purposes of God. Let the Gentile remember - so the Apostle goes
on to say -that the “breaking off” of some of
the unbelieving “branches” did not alter the
divine method of saving mankind. “Salvation is of
the Jews.” The church of God is far older than the
day of Pentecost. From Abraham,
“the root,” grew the “olive
tree” of Israel; and the “mystery” of the Apostle’s teaching was not that some
new body was to be formed, separate from, and superior to, the old covenant
saints; but that the Gentiles should be “grafted in”
among them, and be partakers of “the root and fatness.” If
any man be Christ’s then is he Abraham’s seed (Gal.
3: 29). Let the Gentile
remember this, and keep his place. “If some of the
branches were broken off, and thou, being a wild olive, wert grafted in among
them, and with them partakest of the root and fatness
of the olive tree, boast not against the branches ... thou bearest not the root, but the root thee. ... For I would
not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise
in your own conceits, that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles”
- the complete number whom grace, in this dispensation, shall save - “be come in. And so all
Such shall be the happy issue of the sorrows of
The prophecy concludes with a brief statement concerning the
certainty of the prince’s doom. “The consummation, and that determined, shall be poured upon
the desolator.” That he should be
destroyed by special judgment of God we learnt from Daniel’s vision of the four
beasts, and from the Apostle Paul. In
the Book of the Revelation, details of that judgment are given. “I saw,” says
the Apostle John in chapter 16: 13, R.V., “coming out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth
of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits,
as it were frogs; for they are the spirits of devils, working signs; which go
forth unto the kings of the whole world, to gather them together unto the war
of the great day of God the Almighty.”
This will be the last Satan-inspired effort of the terrible prince, as
leader of the great confederacy of kings.
Summoning their armies to Megiddo (the Armageddon of verse 16) to lead them against the barbarian “kings of the East,” it will come into his heart to
blot Jerusalem from the face of the earth; and marching them southward to the
valley of Jehoshaphat (Joel
3.) he will seek to effect his deadly purpose. Then shall “the
Redeemer come to
We see, then, the final form man’s wickedness will take; the
final abuse of ruling power entrusted to Gentile hands. It will all culminate in an effort to
exterminate
Thus to that land, where a manger
cradled Him; to that land where Jewish unbelief delivered Him to die beneath
[* Note.
When the Scripture says, “All flesh died that moved on the earth … and every man. All in whose nostrils was the breath of life,
all that was on dry land” (Gen. 7: 21, 22),
it does not include Noah, his family, or any of the animals in the
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