ARTHUR S. MAXWELL
War of the Worlds, Power and Prophecy
History’s Crowded Climax, These Tremendous Times,
This Mighty Hour, etc.
1943
PACIFIC PRESS PUBLISHING ASSOCIATION
Mountain View, California
All rights reserved. This book, or parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without
permission.
IN RECENT years, due no doubt to the confusion of the times and a general desire to discover the way to a better and happier world, there has been a widespread revival of interest in the subject of prophecy. More anxious than ever for a message of certainty concerning the future, people are turning with new eagerness to the writings of the seers of old.
That many fascinating predictions have been made in times past is common knowledge; but which of them may be considered trustworthy? Which have been proved true? Upon which of them may one rely for sure guidance concerning our day and the days to come?
It is the purpose of this book to consider some of these ancient prophecies -dating back, in certain cases, nearly three thousand years-and to note how they have been confirmed by history; how they are meeting their fulfillment in our time; and how they delineate events yet to take place.
We believe the reader will find it an absorbing study; for nothing stirs the heart more deeply than the first realization that this amazing epoch in which we live was foreseen in the long ago. That its tremendous happenings are not occurring in aimless, haphazard fashion, but in accord with a master plan designed to reach its climax in the immediate future. Even those who for many years have known and revered these inspired forecasts cannot fall to gather new faith, hope, and courage from their reconsideration.
May all who read these pages be led to a clearer understanding of the whole subject of prophecy, a new vision of the significance of the present world crisis,, and a deeper appreciation of their responsibilities both to God and man in this solemn hour.
ARTHUR S. MAXWELL.
MILLIONS in every land on earth are looking anxiously into the future, wondering what it holds in store for them. They yearn to peer behind its dark, mysterious veil, to learn what is to happen to them and to their loved ones in the days ahead. Parents are profoundly concerned for their children, while youth are wondering what destiny awaits them in a world so confused and distraught.
Gone is the blind optimism of other days, while confidence in the pledges and programs of even the greatest statesmen was never at so low an ebb. Alluring schemes for world reconstruction are everywhere viewed with suspicion. “They failed before,” men say, “and why should they not fail again?”
Hope has been raised so high and so often, only to be rudely quenched. that its flame is burning low in the human soul. Frequent disillusionment has produced widespread cynicism, and this in turn has destroyed man’s faith in his ability to deliver himself permanently from his present distresses.
There have been too many disappointments, “one towering frustration after another,” says Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick in Living Under Tension. “Our generation,” he continues, “has lived through a long series of major disappointments. To go no farther back than the Great War, we plunged into that hoping to make the world safe for democracy, only to recognize later that the outcome was futile. Then to plans of organized peace in the World Court and the League of Nations many of us turned with high hopes, but we have lived to see the great buildings on Lake Geneva empty shells, while millions march to war. Then a day of economic affluence seemed to dawn, filled with hope of the abundant life for all the people, only to fade into widespread penury that no help has reached. We have lived through a generation of successive and colossal disappointments, one frustrated hope piled on another.” Page 11.
Dr. Keller speaks of the great darkness which this sequence of tragedy has brought upon the heart of man darkness “where hunger and starvation are stalking,” darkness “where the last surviving inhabitants of bombed and burned villages hide themselves in moist cellars and muddy earth holes. Darkness in prisoners’ camps where millions of young men live in an atmosphere of despair and suicide. Darkness enveloping that caravan of utter hopelessness, refugees.” But worse darkness still, he says, lies where human beings ask whether God is absent from this world or is seeking an alibi! Darkness where it seems impossible to believe, even for Christians, in a God of love in the midst of a world of horror! -Adolph Keller, Christian Europe Today, page 3.
Surely if ever mankind needed powerful help from a source outside itself, it needs such help today. Surrounded by the chaos of a collapsing civilization, weighed down with many fears and sorrows, millions cry out for deliverance. Perplexed, bewildered, and despondent, they yearn for some word of encouragement, some confident assurance for the future. They crave some satisfying explanation of all that of their lives, the blasting of their homes, the wrecking of their cherished plans. They long for rest and peace of mind, and consolation for their aching hearts.
If you hold your ear close to the ground,” says Stuart Chase, the economist, “you can hear a muffled roar echoing around the whole world. It is the voice of the people demanding security.” http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auAnd no wonder. Can we forget the tragic happenings of these past few years and their crushing effect upon the human spirit? Consider all those who have endured bombing from the air, who have beheld their loved ones killed or burned, their farms or cottages - all that they have lived and worked for-smashed into smoldering rubble. Think of the wounded, the maimed, the blind, the shell-shocked, and all their unimaginable sufferings. Remember those who go down to the sea in ships-how their vessels have been sunk under them; how they have drifted, many of them for days and weeks in open boats, perishing of cold, hunger, and thirst. Think of those who have gone from home never to return, and of those who wait in silence for a footfall that never is heard.
A DISILLUSIONED WORLD
Think of it all-then translate it into terms of human fear, anguish, and sorrow; multiply it ten thousand fold. Envision it in all its vastness as it embraces the men, the women, the children of every race, every nation, every tribe on every continent and island; and you have a picture of a world of -human woe that must make the angels weep. No wonder there is a “muffled roar” echoing round the world. The multitudes are weary of strife, bloodshed, cruelty, misgovernment, and their hearts are aching for the dawn of a new and happier day.
Many people have had their whole outlook on life completely changed by the shattering blows of two world wars. They have beheld the dire results of materialism and the bankruptcy of humanism. They have penetrated the false-hoods of skeptical teachers and preachers. They have grown weary of the vanities of a godless age. Like the prodigal son they feel that they have eaten long enough of the husks of worldliness and paganism. They are looking again toward the Father’s house. They are yearning once more for truth and real religion. They are turning back to God.
Not long ago a writer in Harper’s Magazine stated that in his opinion the hills and valleys of America are “filled with people whose longing for religion is so great it is pathetic.” Today the same longing is rapidly spreading through all nations.
Soon after the war broke out, the United States Bureau of Census announced that during the preceding two years “the production of fiction stories in the United States dropped 50 per cent,” while during the same period the sale of the Holy Bible increased by two and a half million copies.
Commenting upon these amazing figures, the editor of Liberty remarked: “The trend revealed by the Census Bureau reflects a hunger for nourishment of the human spirit; a revolt both from the illusion of sugary romance and from the disillusion of ‘realistic’ skeptics; a flight back to pure truth....
“The people have seen what comes through paying tribute to the idol in the market place. They watch with horror the march of the Philistines. In agony they find that faith which ‘is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.’ So we are not reading so many frivolous novels, and we are buying more Holy Bibles. We are turning back to the white spires.”
This explains the rapidly growing interest in Bible prophecy, the widespread popularity of prophetic radio programs, and the phenomenal increase in the circulation of prophetic magazines. Sensing their need of divine comfort and counsel, men and women are earnestly seeking for an interpretation of the times and for some word of hope for the future.
Out of London has come a most illuminating book from the pen of Dr. Leslie D. Weatherhead, minister of the famous old City Temple. Written to the accompaniment of crashing bombs and roaring antiaircraft guns, This Is the Victory tells of the transformation that has taken place in the author’s thinking as a result of the sufferings of war.
WHERE IS TRUE PROGRESS?
In his first chapter, “Faith in Progress Shattered,” he makes the striking confession: “For years now the dominant ideas round about us have encouraged us to believe that humanity was progressing. The magic word ‘evolution’ played its part. The thought took root in men’s minds that physically, mentally, and spiritually mankind was in an elevator, and, as they say at the stores, ‘going up.’ How differently psychologists talk today!”
“Obviously,” he says, “so far from calling the present trend of things progress, we can only view it with dismay. When spiritual responsibility does not keep pace with material discovery and invention, true progress ceases.” “A good man on horseback is a better symbol of progress than a bad man in a plane.”
Dr. Weatherhead exhorts those who have been caught in the tempest of world conflict to continue to trust God no matter what happens. “Frankly,” he says, “if God be left out and the supernatural be http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auexcluded, I see no hope for the world. There is nothing in history which proves an inevitable progress, no ground for supposing that man-without God-will ever improve.”
The doctrine of inevitable human progress has indeed proved to be hopelessly unsound. Man’s best efforts to raise the quotient of his moral qualities, or to bring in a golden age, have consistently and pitifully failed. It should now be as clear as day that our only hope is in God.
But will God send help? Is it still possible for men to believe in Him, as Dr. Keller says, “in the midst of a world of horrors”? Has He some message of hope to impart to us in a time like this?
The answer is a great affirmative. God will send help; He has promised it a thousand times; and He will not fail. He is not absent from us, nor indifferent to our plight, but rather He is “touched with the feeling of our infirmities.” Hebrews 4:15. We can still believe in Him and trust Him, for’ as the comforting psalm says, His mercy is “from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear Him.” Psalm 103:17. And He has a message for this very hour, a message of courage and hope, redolent with love divine, bidding us look up and lift up our heads, for divine help is already on the way.
During the last days of Bataan, Frank Hewlett, United Press correspondent, was in Corregidor, and he wrote:
“I saw many things which affected me in Bataan. I saw the Cavite navy yard go up in flames, the destruction by fire of Nichols Field hangars and barracks, and the dynamiting of bridges and other key structures and installations. The great fires and explosions are still fresh in my mind, but I remember most vividly the little flashes of light I saw on the Bataan shore on the night of April 9, after the surrender.
They came from soldiers hidden on the shore, and were from flashlights. They all repeated patiently, to Corregidor five miles away:
Those dots and dashes, sent in flashes of light, spelled the old, familiar S 0 S, the universal call of men in distress. How many of those calls were answered we shall never know; but who can read of them without wishing that he might have been on Corregidor, just then, with a boat?
But if the appeal of those pathetic little lights along the shore touches our hearts even now, long after the tragedy has passed, how deeply must the heart of God be stirred as He beholds innumerable little lights around the war-scarred world making the signal call for divine deliverance!
SOS-SOS-SOS! The calls flash from the oppressed, the persecuted, the sorrowing, in all the dark places of the earth.
They ascend to God from millions who have lost their homes, their loved ones, their health, their liberty, in the wild confusion of these turbulent times. They flash from prisons and concentration camps, from bombed cities and sinking ships, and from a thousand other places where men and women are suffering and dying around the world. From unnumbered waiting, yearning hearts they speed to heaven with the added cry: “Even so, come, Lord Jesus.” Come! Come to the rescue! Come and deliver us from the power of sin and the dominion of evil men! Come and bring in the glorious years of everlasting peace!
S0S-S0S-S0S! The lights flash out along the shore. Are they seen? Does anyone understand? Will anyone send help?
Yes, indeed. Back from heaven comes the reassuring word: “Surely I come quickly.” Revelation 22:26.
The greatest rescue ever planned is in preparation. All heaven throbs with expectancy. Soon it will ring again with songs of deliverance.
Can we be sure? We can, for God has spoken. In the great prophecies for our time He has made plain, beyond the possibility of doubt, what shall come to pass in these latter days.
WHEN Woodrow Wilson landed in Europe in December, 1918, Romain Rolland addressed the president in these moving words: “You alone, monsieur le president, among all those whose dreadful duty it now is to guide the policy of the nations, you alone enjoy worldwide moral authority. You inspire universal confidence. Answer the appeal of these passionate hopes! Take the hands which are stretched forth, help them to clasp one another. The world hungers for a voice which will overleap the frontiers of nations and classes.”- Quoted by Pierre van Paassen, That Day Alone, page 413.
Rolland was right about the world hunger for a voice of leadership. Many years have passed since then, but the yearning for a prophetic voice has increased rather than diminished. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.au“Wanted, a prophet!” cried the editor of the Economist, quoting the prayer of Shelley’s “Ode to the West Wind”: Be through my lips to unawakened earth The trumpet of a prophecy!
In similar vein the editors of Fortune, having described some of the distressing conditions of our time, expressed their conviction that “the way out is the sound of a voice, not our voice, but a voice coming from something not ourselves, in the existence of which we cannot disbelieve.”
This almost universal desire is reminiscent of Lanier’s famous lines: A pilot! God, a pilot! For the helm is left awry.
But where shall man turn to find a voice of authority speaking with sanity and confidence amid the madness of our times, rightly interpreting current events and giving sure guidance for the future?
THE FUTILITY OF HUMAN SPECULATION
Surely not to the “typewriter strategists,” as President Roosevelt called those modern prognosticators of the press who have assumed the direction of our thoughts. One has but to look through a pile of old newspapers and magazines to be impressed anew with the inability of even the best news commentators to read correctly the signs of the times. Over and over again in such a search one comes across predictions of developments in national and international affairs which have been completely contradicted by the course of events.
We were told, for instance, that the Maginot Line was impregnable; that Singapore could never be taken; that the Philippines could be defended. Airplanes would never sink battleships. The United States would defeat japan in six months. And so on, ad infinitum.
Some well-informed and farseeing individuals, it is true, have occasionally made forecasts which have actually come to pass. Sir Isaac Newton, for instance, in the early part of the eighteenth century, believed that the day would come when people would travel more than fifty miles an hour. That was a great prophecy in his day, and time has proved it to be correct. In 1842Lord Tennyson, with rare foresight, long before anyone had flown a heavier-than-air machine, penned these oft-quoted lines in his poem, “Locksley Hall”:
For I dipped into the future, far as human eye could see, Saw the vision of the world, and, all the wonder that would be. Saw the heavens fill with commerce, argosies of magic sails, Pilots of the purple twilight, dropping down with costly bales. Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and there rained a ghastly dew From the nations’ airy navies grappling in the central blue.
Today we see the heavens “fill with commerce,” as giant cargo planes, laden “with costly bales,” speed from continent to continent, and we have become all too familiar with the terrors of modern aerial warfare as “the nations’ airy navies” have grappled “in the central blue.” Tennyson surely drew a remarkably accurate picture of these features of our modern world.
ONE SOURCE OF CERTAINTY
By reasoning from cause to effect, others have from time to time correctly calculated certain trends in business and finance; and men will no doubt continue to gamble on their estimates and opinions as long as time lasts; but accurate forecasts have been the exception rather than the rule. Man’s guesses concerning things to come have almost invariably proved his incompetence in this field.
What is needed today is a completely dependable source of information and guidance that will call to us continually and authoritatively: “This is the way, walk you in it.” Does such a source exist?
As if in answer to man’s earnest inquiry, the words of the apostle Peter come echoing down the years, saying: “We have also a more sure word of prophecy. Whereunto you do well that you take heed, as unto a light that shines in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the daystar arise in your hearts.” 2 Peter 1:19.
A more sure word! That is what we need in a time like this. A word that is more sure than sight, more sure than hearing; as certain indeed as the omniscience of God Himself can make it.
What is this “word of prophecy” to which the apostle refers with such unbounded confidence? It is all that body of prophetic writing to be found within the pages of the word of God. The prophecies of job and Moses, of Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel; of Hosea and Joel, of Zechariah and Malachi. Included also must be the apostolic prophecies in the New Testament.
But did not all these men write what was in their own minds? May it not be that their predictions are as fallible as those of others? No, says the apostle Peter, “for the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.” 2 Peter 1:21.
Dr. James Moffatt renders this verse thus: “Prophecy never came by human impulse, it was when carried away by the Holy Spirit that the holy men of God spoke.”
That is why Bible prophecy is reliable. It does not consist of human speculations. It is not a compilation of the vain imaginations of men. Those who wrote these prophecies did not invent them; they were merely the vehicles for the expression of the divine mind. Through their lips the voice of God became the voice of prophecy. They were literally “carried away by the Holy Spirit,” and thus were able to record God’s ideals, God’s counsel, and, most remarkable of all, God’s knowledge of the future which He revealed to men.
How many prophecies are there of this sort? There are scores of them, covering a wide range of subjects. Some deal with matters of local significance, now almost forgotten in the dusty archives of the distant past; others, with breath taking boldness, trace the story of the nations down the ages from the days of the prophets to our own time and beyond. They map the course of empires; they name the next world ruler; they warn of dangers ahead; they chart the future for a thousand years to come.
THE PURPOSE OF PROPHECY
These great prophecies are indeed a light shining “in a dark place,” dispersing the enveloping gloom of evil days, lifting the burden of perplexity and worry from the minds of men, and answering the deeper questions of their troubled hearts. True, they faithfully foretell troublous times, but they also describe how the promised help will come to suffering humanity, how we shall emerge from our seemingly insoluble problems, and how a lasting and completely satisfactory new order will finally be established. They explain the origin of evil and how its ultimate elimination from the universe will be achieved. They probe the mystery of death and give assurance of life beyond the tomb in a world without pain or tears.
Perhaps it would be well to add that these prophecies were not recorded to tell which nation, or group of nations, would be victorious in the many wars that have cursed mankind and soaked the earth with blood; nor how the various tyrants and dictators would be overthrown. They were designed to deal not so much with details-although at times they do mention details with great effect-as with the great epoch-making events of history. With majestic sweep they move across the centuries, touching the high points of each succeeding era.
In order that our faith may rest securely in this “sure word of prophecy;” in order that we may have perfect confidence in the voice that speaks from its sacred pages for the benefit and blessing of mankind today, God has seen to it that sufficient evidence has been preserved in ancient history to convince even the most skeptical of the accuracy, reliability, and inspiration of the Scriptures. This proof positive will be presented in the chapter that follows.
LOOKING back across the ages to that time when the ancient seers recorded their inspired predictions, we learn that God sought to prove His power and divinity through the accuracy of the words that these men uttered. Their fulfillment, He declared, would be the sign supreme of His sovereignty in heaven and in earth.
Knowing full well that none can read the future but Himself, He threw out this challenge to all false gods and to those who champion them: “Produce your cause, said the Lord. Show us what shall happen: let them show the former things, what they be, that we may consider them, and know the latter end of them; or declare us things for to come. Show the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that you are gods.” Isaiah 41:21-23.
To emphasize that the attribute of omniscience is His and His alone, He said: I am the Lord: that is My name: and My glory will I not give to another, neither My praise to graven images. Behold, the former things are come to pass, and new things do I declare: before they spring forth I tell you of them.” Isaiah 42:8, 9.
“I am God,” He added, “and there is none like Me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure.” Isaiah 46:9,10. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auSuch was the measure of confidence that God reposed in the predictions He caused to be made by His appointed messengers in the long ago. He had no doubts or misgivings concerning them. “My counsel shall stand,” He said, with full assurance in the outcome.
How wonderfully this confidence has been justified by events is patent for all the world to see. History affords instance after instance where the words of the Bible prophets have been fulfilled with astonishing accuracy and completeness.
Many of these prophecies referred to proud empires and great cities whose records are available today in every library in the land. If God had been doubtful about the results, He would have confined the predictions to little-known communities so that none could tell, after the lapse of centuries, whether they had been fulfilled or not. Instead, however, He chose to speak concerning such powerful empires as Assyria and Babylon. Deliberately He mentioned the famous cities of Nineveh, Tyre, and Jerusalem -historic capitals of the ancient world, whose names have been passed on from generation to generation, and are familiar to every schoolboy today.*
*The Assyrian Empire, centered in the fertile valley between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers of Mesopotamia, was a dominant power as far back as the thirteenth century BC, and for hundreds of years thereafter. The frequent references to Assyria in the Old Testament reveal how long the history of Israel was overshadowed by its might. Genesis 25:18; 2 Kings 15:29; Isaiah 37:36,37. In the early part of the seventh century B. c. the provinces of Babylon, Media, and Egypt revolted, and Nabopolassar, a general in the Assyrian army, was sent to subdue the rebels in Babylon. Successful in his enterprise, he was rewarded with the title of king of that city; but he headed a new revolt himself, and destroyed the city of Nineveh, capital ofAssyria. Upon his death in 605 BC his son Nebuchadnezzar came to the throne of Babylon. This famous king, by his conquest of all the surrounding territory, including Syria, Palestine, and Egypt, and by his amazing activities as a builder of cities, established the Babylonian Empire as the greatest kingdom of antiquity. However, it was destroyed soon after his death in 561 BC. There followed him five weak and wicked kings, the last being Belshazzar, in whose reign (538 BC) the empire fell to the combined forces of the Medes and Persians. Daniel 5:30, 31.
So abundant is the literature now available concerning these cities and countries that anyone who so desires may check with meticulous thoroughness each detail of the prophecies. Had this evidence been found to be in contradiction to the prophecies, they would have long since been discredited. In every instance, however, and in every detail, the word of the Lord has been proved true. To quote the words of King Solomon, “There hath not failed one word of all His good promise.” 1 Kings 8:56.
NINEVEH TO BE DESTROYED
To appreciate fully the marvelous nature of these predictions, one needs to permit his imagination to go back to the days when they were given. First let us picture ourselves in Nineveh, capital of Assyria, the city to which the prophet Jonah went so reluctantly to preach, about 860 B. C.
It is now the year 713 BC. Nearly one hundred fifty years have elapsed since Jonah’s day. The Assyrian Empire is at the zenith of its power, its soldiers noted for their arrogance and cruelty. Sargon 11, father of Sennacherib, is on the throne, confident that his dominion will never be overthrown.
But at this very hour a virtually unknown man in far-off Palestine - the prophet Nahum - takes up, as he calls it, “the burden of Nineveh,” and writes “the book of the vision of Nahum, the Elkoshite.”
He has good reason to do so, for it is but eight years since the Assyrians swept over his homeland, perpetrating all manner of atrocities, destroying Samaria, and finally taking captive ten of the twelve tribes of Israel.
Now, under inspiration of God, “carried away” by the Holy Spirit, he writes with deep feeling: “God is jealous, and the Lord revenges; the Lord revenges, and is furious; the Lord will take vengeance on His adversaries, and He reserves wrath for His enemies. The Lord is slow to anger, and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked: the Lord hath His way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of His feet.” Nahum 1:1-3.
Turning directly to Nineveh, terrible in its overwhelming might and apparent invincibility, he says: ‘We to the bloody city! It is all full of lies and robbery; the prey departs not; the noise of a whip, and the noise of the rattling of the wheels, and of the prancing horses, and of the jumping chariots. Behold, I am against thee, said the Lord of hosts; and I will show the nations thy nakedness, and the kingdoms thy shame. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auAnd I will cast abominable filth upon thee, and make thee vile, and will set thee as a gazing stock. And it shall come to pass, that all they that look upon thee shall flee from thee, and say, Nineveh is laid waste: who will bemoan her?” Nahum 3: 1-7.
Nineveh to be laid waste! Yes. “Empty, and void, and waste.” Nahum 2:10.
Impossible! Look at its impregnable fortifications. Remember its undefeated army, equipped with the finest chariots and the latest weapons of war. Consider its immense size and the vast number of its inhabitants. Even in Jonah’s day its population had exceeded 120,000. Jonah 4:11. How could it ever become empty -void -waste? Empty, of all things? The absurdity of it!
Who is this Nahum, anyway? the people ask. Why take notice of what he says? He is merely an alarmist.
So they thought. So, no doubt, did many of his friends and neighbors. And they became more and more convinced that they were right as the years rolled by and nothing happened to Nineveh. Probably they taunted Nahum with having “guessed wrong.”
But Nahum was not wrong. Go, search for that famous and populous city today. You will not find it. Save for a few moldering ruins to mark the spot where once it stood, it has vanished from the face of the earth. A hundred years after the divine pronouncement of her fate, Nineveh was overwhelmed by the superior might of Babylon, and from that moment gradually faded out of the history of nations.
In the seventh century AD a battle was fought between the Romans and the Persians on the very site where Nineveh once had stood in all her pride and majesty. Describing the terrain, the historian Gibbon wrote: “Eastward of the Tigris, at the end of the bridge of Mosul, the great Nineveh had formerly been erected: the city, and even the ruins of the city’ had long since disappeared; the vacant space afforded a spacious field for the operations of the two armies.”- Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 46, paragraph 24.
Thus the words that Nahum uttered came to pass. Nothing else indeed could have happened; for the voice of divine prophecy never fails.
Now we are in Babylon. It is 595 BC. Passing through one of the city’s many brazen gates that give entrance through the wide and lofty walls, we walk down its main thoroughfare, marveling at its majestic temples and gilded palaces and, in particular, at the famous “hanging gardens.”
BABYLON’S DOOM DECLARED
The people who throng the market place are discussing the latest conquests of their great king Nebuchadnezzar, rejoicing in his triumphs and the spoil he has brought back from foreign lands with which to enrich their city. They comment on the beauty and richness of the gold and silver vessels looted from the temple of Jehovah at Jerusalem and the exceptionally fine quality of the slaves brought back from the Palestine campaign. They talk of future victories to be made by their great monarch.
One man is reading from a parchment, his mouth curling in a sneer. “People of Babylon!” he cries to a group gathered around him, 1isten to this scurrilous document written about our glorious city!”
They press near at his invitation, and this is what they hear:
“The word that the Lord spoke against Babylon and against the land of the Chaldeans by Jeremiah the prophet.
“Declare you among the nations, and publish, and set up a standard; publish, and conceal not: say, Babylon is taken. For, lo, I will raise and cause to come up against Babylon an assembly of great nations from the north country. And they shall set themselves in array against her; from thence she shall be taken: their arrows shall be as of a mighty expert man; none shall return in vain.
“How is the hammer of the whole earth cut asunder and broken! how is Babylon become a desolation among the nations!...
“The Lord hath opened His armory, and bath brought forth the weapons of His indignation: for this is the work of the Lord God of hosts in the land of the Chaldeans.”
“And Babylon shall become heaps, a dwelling place for dragons, an astonishment, and an hissing, without an inhabitant.” Jeremiah 50:1-25; 51:37.
Raucous laughter resounds through the streets, mingled with indignant comments. “The man must be mad!” cry the people, pointing to the massive buildings and powerful fortifications surrounding them. “Nothing like this could ever happen to Babylon.”
“But see what I have here!” cries another. “This is worse still. It was written more than a hundred years ago by a man called Isaiah.” Then he proceeds to read the following:
“Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldees’ excellency, shall be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. It shall never be inhabited, neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation: neither shall the Arabian pitch tent there; neither shall the shepherds make their fold there. But wild beasts of the desert shall lie there; and owls shall dwell there. And her time is near to come.” Isaiah 13:19-22.
Incredible! Impossible!” they cry.
It must have seemed unreasonable, back in 595 BC, with the city so strong, with Nebuchadnezzar, one of the greatest monarchs of antiquity, upon the throne, for anyone to suggest that all this glory would pass away.
But, it is in such times, when the events appear utterly beyond the possibility of realization, that God does speak.
Years passed. Twenty years, forty years, fifty years. Still nothing happened to Babylon. Nebuchadnezzar died, but his dynasty continued. Those who knew of the prophecies of Isaiah and Jeremiah wondered why these men had spoken as they had, or they mocked at the prophets’ lack of discretion. Jeremiah himself passed away without seeing the fulfillment of his prediction, so long was it delayed.
Then came the year 539 BC. By this time Belshazzar was on the throne; and one riotous night, while he was feasting with a thousand of his lords, drinking impiously out of the sacred vessels brought long ago from Jerusalem, suddenly the fingers of a man’s hand appeared, writing a mysterious message on the palace wall. Terrified, the king called for someone to interpret the strange, ominous characters. Finally the prophet Daniel was called in, and he realized at once that this was a heaven-sent message of doom. Repeating it to Belshazzar, he said: “God hath numbered thy kingdom, and finished it. Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting. Thy kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians.” Daniel 5:26-28.
So God had not forgotten the prediction He had caused Jeremiah to utter nearly sixty years before, nor Isaiah’s warning given almost two hundred years before. All along He had been watching Babylon - numbering her years, counting her crimes, weighing her with infinite precision in the balances of divine justice.
Now the hour of judgment had come. Even as the drunken orgy was at its height, the armies of the Medes and the Persians were making their way through the unguarded gates into the very heart of the city. In that night was Belshazzar the king of the Chaldeans slain. And Darius the Median took the kingdom.” Daniel 5:30, 31.
But not only did the city change hands and become a prize of the victorious invaders. As century succeeded century its mighty walls were leveled, its proud temples and palaces were destroyed, until at last the site was buried by the sands that blew over it. Finally, overgrown with brush and weeds, it became veritably a lost city, with no one knowing where it once had stood, until in recent times it was rediscovered by archaeologists.
The famous archaeologist, Layard, who explored the site of Babylon in 1845 and in 1850, described it as follows: “Shapeless heaps of rubbish cover for many an acre the face of the land. On all sides, fragments of glass, marble, pottery, and inscribed brick are mingled with that peculiar nitrous and blanched soil, which, bred from the remains of ancient habitations, checks or destroys vegetation, and renders the site of Babylon a naked and hideous waste. Owls start from the scanty thickets, and the foul jackal skulks through the furrows.” - Austen H. Layard, Discoveries in the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon, chapter 21, Page 484 (1853).
Marvelous indeed was the detailed fulfillment of these predictions made by Isaiah and Jeremiah. Divine prophecy pitted itself against all the strength of Babylon’s fortifications, all the might of her powerful armies, all the boasted wisdom of her magicians, astrologers, and soothsayers-and won!
EGYPT’S FATE DECREED
Now in imagination let us visit the prophet Ezekiel in the year 589 BC. This fearless messenger of the Lord has a burden on his heart concerning Egypt, for he says: “The word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, set thy face against Pharaoh king of Egypt, and prophesy against him, and against all Egypt. Speak, and say, Thus said the Lord God; Behold, I am against thee, Pharaoh king of Egypt, the great dragon that lies in the midst of his rivers, which bath said, My river is mine own, and I have made it for myself.” Ezekiel 29:1-3. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auAs we listen, the prophet proceeds to tell in detail what is going to happen to this pharaoh. Nebuchadnezzar, the great king of Babylon, will utterly destroy him. Verses 5-12. This came to pass about 572 BC. Then Ezekiel utters these astounding words concerning the future of Egypt: It shall be the basest of the kingdoms; neither shall it exalt itself any more above the nations: for I will diminish them, that they shall no more rule over the nations.” Verse 15.
While it is true that in 580 BC the famous pharaohs who built the great pyramids had lain in their stone sarcophagi for more than a thousand years, yet Egypt as a nation continued to exist and to enjoy no small measure of importance. And who could tell whether or not it might experience a revival of its onetime glory? Some new pharaoh might possibly arise and build yet greater than his illustrious forefathers. But prophecy spoke and, with astonishing intuition and foresight, told what was to be. Not content with saying, as well it might have done, that some calamity was about to befall the nation and its ruler, it went far beyond, and in less than twenty words outlined Egypt’s history to the close of time! “It shall be the basest of the kingdoms; neither shall it exalt itself any more above the nations.”
From the human standpoint there have been a thousand chances for this prediction to be overthrown. At any moment in the past twenty-five hundred years some powerful leader might have arisen in Egypt and turned the tide of history. But no such leader has appeared. No such development has taken place. Instead, Egypt’s history has been one long, sorry record of subservience to the Romans, to the Mohammedans, to the French, to the British. Never since Ezekiel’s day has it exalted itself again over the nations. And it never will.
Who made this prediction? Did man? No indeed. As Ezekiel himself was so careful to point out, it was “the word of the Lord,” the voice of God speaking through human lips. And when that voice speaks, none can gainsay it.
About the same time that Ezekiel uttered this remarkable prophecy relating to the future of Egypt, he was given a similar message of doom concerning the powerful seaport and naval base of Tyre.
In the sixth century BC Tyre wielded an immense influence throughout Palestine, Asia Minor, and the entire Mediterranean seaboard. It is believed by some that her ships traded as far as the Spanish coast and that some of them even found their way through the Strait of Gibraltar to England.
TYRE’S OVERTHROW PROCLAIMED
Because of the destruction of near-by Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, additional trade and prosperity had come to Tyre. The city was congratulating itself on its good fortune when the voice of prophecy spoke.
Said Ezekiel: “The word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, because that Tyrus hath said against Jerusalem, Ah, she is broken that was the gates of the people: she is turned unto me: I shall be replenished, now she is laid waste. Therefore thus said the Lord God; Behold, I am against thee, O Tyrus, and will cause many nations to come up against thee, as the sea causes his waves to come up. And they shall destroy the walls of Tyrus, and break down her towers: I will also scrape her dust from her, and make her like the top of a rock. It shall be a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea: for I have spoken it, said the Lord God. Behold, I will bring upon Tyrus Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon.” Ezekiel 26:1-7.
Well might the rulers and the people of Tyre have trembled at these words! But probably they did not. They were too busy with their commerce and their shipping to bother about what some unknown Hebrew was saying concerning them. After all, what right had he to speak of such things when his own nation had suffered such a humiliating defeat at the hands of the Babylonians! So they continued with their business and their money-making, trusting for safety to their island fortress and their naval supremacy.
Soon, however, Nebuchadnezzar was at their gates; but Tyre was no easy prey. For thirteen years he besieged it, until his soldiers had labored so long at the battering rams that “every shoulder was peeled.” Ezekiel 29:18. Finally that portion of the city which was on the mainland was captured and laid waste, but Nebuchadnezzar was robbed of his expected booty, this having been removed to the adjacent island, half a mile away.
After Nebuchadnezzar’s departure many Tyrians may well have consoled themselves that, while they had suffered great damage, their main city remained and Ezekiel’s prophecy had therefore failed.
Years merged into decades. Ezekiel and his prediction were almost forgotten. It must have seemed-to those who knew of it-that the word of the Lord concerning Tyre would never come true.
Then, in the year 332 B. c., rumor reached the city that another conqueror was on his way seeking world dominion, and preparations were made to oppose him. Before long, Alexander the Great, with huge http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auforces, arrived outside the city gates and demanded that they be opened. The Tyrians refused, and the siege was on.
The section of Tyre on the mainland, known as the old city, was soon captured; but Alexander, having no fleet, was at a loss for means to reach new Tyre on the island. Then he decided upon a most unusual course. He completely demolished the old city and, with the debris, built a mole two hundred feet in breadth across the straits, erecting towers and war engines at its further end. When this task was completed, he was joined by the king of Cyprus, who had gathered some two hundred twenty warships from Mediterranean seaports, and the reduction of the fortress was soon accomplished. After a siege of seven months Tyre was taken, ten thousand of its citizens being slaughtered and thirty thousand sold into slavery.
Today the traveler to Syria may see the remains of Alexander’s mole. Broken pillars from the once-famous city strew the beaches. Fishermen from the village of Sur, which has grown up around the spot, spread their nets upon the bare rocks from which the very dust of Tyre was scraped by the famous Grecian conqueror nearly twenty-three centuries ago. “Once the great mart of the Mediterranean world,” says The Encyclopedia Britannica, “it has now an insignificant export trade in cotton and tobacco.”
Thus once more prophecy has been proved true. Indeed the accuracy with which the smallest details of Ezekiel’s prediction came to pass is remarkable. Tyre might have met its end in any one of a hundred ways. It might have endured to modern times. How could any man, unless divinely inspired, have known that Tyre would be so completely demolished? How could anyone, without God’s help, have foreseen the unprecedented means that Alexander would employ to destroy it?
No wonder Peter said, “Holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.” It is the only satisfactory explanation of their foreknowledge.
But let us turn for a moment to Jerusalem and listen to one of the most amazing predictions ever made. Christ is leaving the temple and His disciples are admiring its beautiful architecture. Suddenly He turns to them and says: “See you not all these things? Verily I say unto You, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.” Matthew 24:2.
JERUSALEM TO BE TRODDEN DOWN
He speaks like all the great prophets who have preceded Him, with their majestic authority, their serene confidence, their remarkable emphasis on detail. “All these things,” He says, shall “be thrown down.” “There shall not be left here one stone upon another.”
That such a disaster could come to their beloved temple is, to these citizens of Jerusalem, beyond belief. Had it not been built at enormous cost by Herod the Great? Was it not under the protection of the Romans? How then could any harm ever come to it? How could anyone descend to such depths of vandalism as to destroy anything so beautiful and historic?
But Christ with perfect vision looks beyond the immediate present and sees the foolish course the leaders of the Jews will follow, how they will anger their overlords, and how the Roman armies will come in all their might and fury, and raze the city. Knowing all this, He tries to warn His disciples, even telling them-nearly forty years in advance the event that will signal the right moment to escape. “When you shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies,” He says, “then know that the desolation thereof is nigh. Then let them which are in Judah flee to the mountains; and let them which are in the midst of it depart out; and let not them that are in the countries enter there into. For these be the days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled.” Luke 21:20-22.
Then He adds these doom-filled words: “Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled.” Verse 24.
Everything came about exactly as Jesus had said. In AD 66 the Roman armies attacked the city, but turned away. In AD 70 they returned, and then, after a furious assault, overpowered the defenders and proceeded to deal out death and destruction on a scale that left the historian Josephus aghast with horror. Those who, remembering Christ’s warning, fled the city after the first approach of the Romans, saved their lives; but for most of the thousands who remained, there was nothing but death or slavery.
THE SEAL OF AUTHENTICITY
Not only did the Romans fire the temple and the city; but in their mad search for hidden treasure they tore up the ground, until even sewers and aqueducts were uncovered. Finally, they drove a plowshare across the foundations of the temple, thus fulfilling the prophecy of Micah: “Therefore shall Zion . . . be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of http://www.ThreeAngels.com.authe forest.” Micah 3:12.
Then began the long period of subjection that Christ had foreseen. ‘7rodden down of the Gentiles.” Century after century the city was subject first to one conqueror, then to another. It was trodden down by the Romans, the Mohammedans, the Turks. Today Gentiles rule there, while a Mohammedan structure stands upon the site of the temple, a perpetual reminder of the truth of Christ’s words.
Well did H. L. Hastings write: “So long as Babylon is in heaps; so long as Nineveh lies empty, void, and waste; so long as Egypt is the basest of kingdoms; so long as Tyre is a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea. So long as Israelis scattered among all nations. So long as Jerusalem is trodden underfoot of the Gentiles. So long as the great empires of the world march on in their predicted Course, so long we have proof that one omniscient mind dictated the predictions of that Book, and ‘prophecy came not in old time by the will of man.” Will the Old Book Stand? page 19.
But what have these prophecies about ancient empires and cities to do with us today? They have met their fulfillment, so why concern ourselves with them? For the simple reason that they place a seal of authenticity upon the Scriptures. They guarantee the veracity of all the other predictions of the Bible which as yet are unfulfilled. They cry out to us from ages past saying, When you hear the voice of prophecy, trust it, believe in it; it will not fail. All that the Lord has spoken will surely come to pass.
IF THERE could be found in the Scriptures but one brief sentence relating indubitably to the President of the United States, or to the prime minister of Great Britain, or to some other prominent individual alive today, with what avidity it would be seized upon by news hungry press correspondents! And if a dozen, or fifty, such references could be discovered, then surely the statesman so designated would be heralded as the man of destiny for this hour.
What then shall be said of Christ, upon whom not fifty prophecies converge, but many hundreds of the most detailed predictions on record? For it is not only in the history of ancient empires that the accuracy of Bible prophecy has been demonstrated; the life and death of the Man of Galilee afford a still more amazing demonstration of the fact that the messengers of God spoke by divine inspiration.
“To Him give all the prophets witness,” said the apostle Peter, addressing the household of Cornelius. Acts 10:43. And no one can read the New Testament without realizing that the Christian church was actually founded upon the fulfillment in Christ of the Messianic prophecies of the Old Testament. Peter’s sermon on the Day of Pentecost, which so mightily moved thousands of listeners, was predominantly an exposition of prophecy. And again, in his address in Solomon’s porch, he said: “Yea, and all the prophets from Samuel and those that follow after, as many as have spoken, have likewise foretold of these days.” Acts 3:24.
THE FOCUS OF PROPHECY
The apostle Paul, speaking at Antioch in A. D. 45, reminded his hearers that “they that dwell at Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they knew Him not, nor yet the voices of the prophets which are read every Sabbath day, they have fulfilled them in condemning Him.” Acts 13:27. At Thessalonica he reasoned for three Sabbath days “out of the Scriptures, opening and alleging, that Christ must needs have suffered, and risen again from the dead.” Acts 17:2, 3. When called to appear before King Agrippa he inquired, “Believes thou the prophets?” (Acts 26:27), and in the eventide of his experience in Rome he was still expounding and testifying concerning “the kingdom of God, persuading them concerning Jesus, both out of the law of Moses, and out of the prophets, from morning till evening.” Acts 28:23.
Of Apollos, a converted Jew of Alexandria, it is said that “he mightily convinced the Jews, and that publicly, showing by the Scriptures that Jesus is the Christ.” Acts 18:28, margin.
Thus it was that the prophecies of the Old Testament were employed by the first zealous proponents of Christianity to break down prejudice and lay a basis for the faith of the new church they were endeavoring to establish. It was with this fact in mind that Paul told the believers in Ephesus that they were “built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone.” Ephesians 2:20.
When Christ lived among men He was fully aware that all these prophecies focused in Him; He http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auwas the Man of Destiny to whom they pointed. He understood the book of Daniel and counseled His followers to study it. Matthew 24:15. He knew the time when His ministry should begin (Mark 1:15) and when it was to end (Matthew 20:17-19). And when, following His resurrection, He met two discouraged disciples on the road to Emmaus, He said in loving rebuke: “O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken: ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into His glory? And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself.” Luke 24:25-27.
The phrase “in all the Scriptures” is suggestive of the abundance of the revelations concerning Him, and those two words “ought not” are also most significant. They indicate that the facts of His life, death, and resurrection had been plainly outlined in advance. Indeed, Christ’s whole life from Bethlehem to Calvary was lived in complete harmony with the prophetic description of Him set forth in the sacred writings hundreds of years before.
It has been said that if the portrait of Christ as drawn by the apostles in the New Testament were to be laid over His portrait as drawn by the prophets of the Old Testament, it would fit with perfect exactitude, line for line and feature for feature. The two are identical.
There was, of course, a profound reason for all this prophetic interest in one single individual. The work that Christ was to perform, the place He was to fill in history, were of such supreme importance that no possibility of error or misunderstanding could be permitted. One who was to be at once the Messiah of the Jews, the Founder of the Christian religion, and the Redeemer of all humanity, must necessarily be identified so clearly that no reasonable man could honestly question His position or His right to speak with authority on behalf of God and man. Hence the multiplicity of predictions concerning Him.
CHRISTIS BIRTH FORETOLD
Examining these Messianic prophecies in greater detail, one naturally thinks first of those that concern the manner of His first advent to the world. How was He to come? As a full-grown man, full of years and experience? No, said the prophet Isaiah, but “unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given.” Isaiah 9:6.
His birth was not to be, however, like that of other mortals, for, “Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a Son, and shall call His name Emmanuel.” Isaiah 7:14. Luke, the physician, tells us, in the most exquisite language, how this Came about. Referring to the annunciation to Mary, he records: “And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.” Luke 1:35.
Seven hundred years before this came to pass, the place where Christ was to be born was predicted by the prophet Micah: “But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah,” he wrote, “though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall He come forth unto Me that is to be Ruler in Israel. Whose goings forth have been from of old, from the days of eternity.” Micah 5:2, margin.
Consider the marvelous nature of this prophecy. Of all the countries in the world, little Palestine was chosen for this miracle of the ages. But even to point out the country where it was to happen was not considered by the Lord as sufficiently specific. Of the three main sections of the Holy Land, Judea was named. But in Judea were thousands of villages; so Bethlehem was appointed. Then in case there might be more than one village of this name, “Ephratah” was added-”Bethlehem Ephratah.” How infinitely precise! And how wonderfully it came to pass! For when the time approached for Jesus to be born, Mary was not in Bethlehem but in Nazareth, with no thought of taking the long, trying journey southward beyond Jerusalem. Then, “there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed” (Luke 2:I) a decree which compelled her to travel to Bethlehem and thus fulfill the prophecy. Another hour or two, and the prophecy might have failed; yet everything was fulfilled, as the word of God had spoken.
What was to be the nature of the ministry of this holy Child, when grown to manhood? Was He to become a leader of armies, or a loud-voiced orator clamoring for the rights of man? No. “He shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause His voice to be heard in the street (Isaiah 42:2) a most beautiful picture of the consistent gentleness and courtesy of Jesus, fully recognized by His contemporaries. Matthew 12: 14-20.
Isaiah further predicted that the Christ would be anointed “to preach good tidings unto the meek; to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound; to comfort all that mourn; to appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness.” Isaiah 61:1-3. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auHow fully Jesus followed this divinely- appointed program needs no proof or explanation. All the world knows how He “went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil.” Acts 10:38. For nineteen centuries men have loved and revered Him because of His love for the suffering and needy, His tenderness toward the weak and the aged, His selfless service to the sick and afflicted. By Him the eyes of the blind were opened and the ears of the deaf were unstopped. By Him the lame leaped as the deer, and the tongue of the dumb was made to sing. Isaiah 35:5,6. His infinite power was ever employed, not for self-aggrandizement, but for the blessing of those who were most in need of assistance.
Christ’s entry into Jerusalem “upon a colt the foal of an ass,” was foretold by the prophet Zechariah, who also predicted His betrayal by Judas for thirty pieces of silver. Zechariah 9:9; 11:12; Matthew 26:14-16.
But it was in relation to His sublime sacrifice on behalf of the human race that the greatest wealth of prophetic detail was provided, giving evidence that this was to be the all-important feature of His ministry for men.
In the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah, where, as Dr. Henry P. Liddon says, is to be found “the richest mine of Messianic prophecy in the Old Testament,” the vicarious nature of His suffering is revealed.
“He is despised and rejected of men,” said the prophet, “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from Him; He was despised, and we esteemed Him not. Surely He hath borne our grief, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned everyone to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” Isaiah 53:3-6.
SALVATIOIN PROMISED THROUGH CHRIST
Written in the midst of prevailing spiritual and intellectual darkness, when most of the then-known world groaned under the cruel oppression of Assyria, this gem of inspiration announced the coming of something new and unprecedented in. the experience of men and nations-an innocent Victim suffering willingly for the guilty, bearing their punishment and setting them free.
In Christ, and in Him alone, were these wonderful words fulfilled. As the apostle Paul wrote: “For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commends His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” Romans 5:6-8.
The apostle Peter emphasized that Christ did not need to die for Himself, for He “did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth,” but “His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness. By whose stripes you were healed.” 1 Peter 2:22-24.
As He proceeded to minister to human needs, Jesus recognized that He was to fulfill Isaiah’s prophecy concerning Himself-that He was to die for others. “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness,” He said, “even so must the Son of man be lifted up: that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.” John 3: 14, 15.
Again, to His disciples, He revealed His understanding of the supreme purpose of His mission: “The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many.” Matthew 20:28.
HIS SUFFERING AND DEATH FORESEEN
Turning to the twenty-second psalm, we can almost see Him on the cross and hear His last dying words of anguish in this amazing prophetic picture of His suffering. The psalm opens with the very words that fell from His lips as He expired: “My God, My God, why has Thou forsaken Me?” The manner of His death is indicated in verse 16, where we read, “They pierced My hands and My feet.”
Even the fate of His clothing is noted: “They part My garments among them, and cast lots upon My vesture.” Verse 18.
John, the beloved disciple, who remained at the cross and watched Jesus die, took pains to record: “Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took His garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a part. And also His coat now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout.
Jesus was taken from the cross and laid in the tomb of the rich man, Joseph of Arimathaea.
They said therefore among themselves, Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be: that the scripture might be fulfilled, which said, They parted My raiment among them, and for My vesture they did http://www.ThreeAngels.com.aucast lots. These things therefore the soldiers did.” John 19:23,24.
In the same chapter of John’s Gospel, the apostle also noted that, whereas the soldiers broke the legs of the two thieves who were crucified with Jesus, to make impossible their escape when taken from their crosses at the beginning of the Sabbath-they refrained from breaking the legs of Christ, as He was already dead. Thus, said John, another prophecy was fulfilled, “A bone of Him shall not be broken.” John 19:36; Exodus 12:46.
When He was taken from the cross-even in death Christ continued to fulfill the prophetic word. Isaiah had written, He made His grave with the wicked, and with the rich in His death.” Isaiah 53:9. How could this possibly come to pass? The normal fate of the crucified was to be thrown into the valley of Hinnom, amid the refuse of Jerusalem. But with Christ it was to be different; and in that dark moment of His utter helplessness, secret friends came boldly on the scene, and one of them, “a rich man of Arimathaea, named Joseph, . . . went to Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus. Then Pilate commanded the body to be delivered. And when Joseph had taken the body, he wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, and laid it in his own new tomb, which he had hewn out in the rock.” Matthew 27:57-60.
Nicodemus, the rabbi “which at the first came to Jesus by night,” assisted in these obsequies, and together they laid the silent form of their beloved Master in the “new sepulcher, wherein was never man yet laid.” John 19:39-41,
Thus, in the words of a famous commentator, He, who had come to earth in a virgin womb, found His last resting place in a virgin tomb. And every step of His way from the manger to the cross fulfilled the words of the prophets who had written the divine message under the inspiration of the Spirit of God.
THE TRIBUTE OF THE CENTURIES
“No miracle which He wrought so unmistakably set on Him the seal of God, as the convergence of the thousand lines of prophecy in Him, as in one burning focal point of dazzling glory. Every sacrifice presented, from the hour of Abel’s altar fire down to the last Passover of the Passion Week, pointed as with flaming finger to Calvary’s cross! Nay, all the centuries moved as in solemn procession to lay their tributes upon Golgotha.”- Dr. A. T Pierson, Many Infallible Proofs, page 39.
To Him indeed give all the prophets witness. He is the Desire of all nations (Haggai 2:7); the Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6); the Lord our Righteousness (Jeremiah 23:6); the Mighty One of Jacob (Isaiah 60:16). Our Redeemer (Job 19:25; Isaiah 59:20); the Chief Shepherd of the sheep (Zechariah 11:16; 1 Peter 5:4); and the bright and morning Star (Numbers 24:17; Revelation 22:16). The focal point of prophecy, He stands forth above all others as the Man of Destiny, the supreme character of history, the Ruler of time and eternity, to whom some day every creature in heaven and earth shall bow, confessing “that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Philippians 2:11.
IT WAS a night performance of the historic “Pageant of Empire,” at Wembley Stadium, near London, in 1925. A hundred thousand spectators waited breathlessly, as out of the inky darkness came the sound of marching men, the rumble of drums, and the faint strains of martial music. Something was about to happen. It was coming nearer and nearer; but what it was, no one could see. There was blackness, a sense of mystery, and eager expectation.
Suddenly, the floodlights were turned on; and what a thrilling picture burst upon our eyes! Battalion after battalion of soldiers was marching by, dressed in the various uniforms used by the armies of history from the earliest times to the present. day. Here in colorful pageantry, with glittering helmet, sword, and spear, urged on by the martial music of massed bands, were the embattled legions of the centuries.
Even so it is with this wonderful thing called prophecy. Directed not upon the past but upon the future, this floodlight from heaven illumines the course of history with a dazzling radiance which makes the distant happenings appear with perfect clarity. Where before there was only darkness and, perhaps, fear of the unknown, prophecy provides certain knowledge, and with that knowledge comes a quiet confidence and an abiding trust.
Some have been particularly worried over the fate of Europe and the destiny of the nations of that http://www.ThreeAngels.com.aublood soaked continent. They have beheld the up rush of powerful, dynamic forces which, for a time, swept all before them in their conquering, might; and they have become afraid lest one of them, overthrowing the rest, should seize the scepter of world power and rule unchallenged for evermore. Yet all such concern is needless. No such development as this is possible, for God has decreed that it shall never happen.
A DREAM OF WORLD EMPIRES
The particular prophecy that makes plain this important fact is among the most wonderful recorded in the Bible. For not only does it speak of the fate of ancient kingdoms, as did the predictions considered in a previous chapter, but it traces the course of history from Babylonian times down to our own day and beyond. Indeed, this shaft of light shatters the darkness of the long centuries, from 600 BC down to the end of time.
This astounding outline of coming events is to be found in the second chapter of the book of Daniel, where the thrilling dream of Nebuchadnezzar is told and interpreted by a courageous, God fearing Hebrew slave.
Again let us turn in imagination to those far-off times. We are back in Babylon. It is morning. The great king Nebuchadnezzar has awakened with a worried and impatient look upon his face. He has had a strange and impressive dream, but, try as he will, he cannot recall it. Convinced that he has received a revelation of unusual importance, and determined to find out what it was about, he sends for his counselors. Some of these are astrologers, some magicians, some sorcerers, all claiming profound knowledge of the occult.
To this assembly of “the wise men of Babylon” the imperious monarch brings his strange demand: “Tell me what I dreamed last night!”
None can answer. They offer to interpret the dream; but they first must know what it was.
The king is infuriated; his eyes are opened to the limitations of these palace sycophants. 1f you cannot tell me the dream,” he rages, I will have you destroyed.”
Helpless and frightened, the group repeats its request: “Let the king tell his servants the dream, and we will show the interpretation of it.” Daniel 2:7.
But Nebuchadnezzar will not be put off. He suspects that they are merely trying to gain time in order to prepare “lying and corrupt words,” and so, finally, becoming “very furious,” he gives the order for their immediate execution.
As the royal patrols go from house to house seeking their prey, they come upon Daniel, the youthful captive from Jerusalem, whose keen intellect and sterling character have already won him considerable royal favor. Informed of the reason why he has been suddenly condemned to death, he begs time to pray, and is soon on his knees before God.
That night Daniel is shown in vision the selfsame dream that had so deeply impressed Nebuchadnezzar but a few hours before. So overwhelmed is he by this amazing revelation of God’s mind and purpose, and its stupendous implications for the future, that he cries out in gratitude and awe:
“Blessed be the name of God forever and ever: for wisdom and might are His: and He changes the times and the seasons: He removes kings, and sets up kings: He gives wisdom unto the wise, and knowledge to them that know understanding. He reveals the deep and secret things. He knows what is in the darkness, and the light dwells with Him. I thank Thee, and praise Thee, O Thou God of my fathers, who has given me wisdom and might, and has made known unto me now what we desired of Thee: for Thou has now made known unto us the king’s matter.” Verses 20-23.
Ushered into the throne room, Daniel finds himself face to face with the greatest ruler of ancient times. The king is expecting him, skeptical no doubt as to the result of the interview, and perhaps regretting that his decree has made it necessary that this strong young man should be put to death. Then the prophet speaks:
“The secret which the king hath demanded cannot the wise men, the astrologers, the magicians, the soothsayers, show unto the king; but there is a God in heaven that reveals secrets, and makes known to the king, Nebuchadnezzar what shall be in the latter days.” Verses 27, 28.
The conviction in the young man’s voice, born of certain knowledge, stirs the king. One can almost see him leaning forward with eagerness to catch the next sentences.
“As for thee, O king, thy thoughts came into thy mind upon thy bed, what should come to pass hereafter: and He that reveals secrets makes known to thee what shall come to pass.” Verse 29. Daniel now proceeds to recount the dream.http://www.ThreeAngels.com.au “Thou, O king, saw, and behold a great image. This great image, whose brightness was excellent, stood before thee; and the form thereof was terrible. This image’s head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass, his legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay. Thou saw till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces. Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them. And the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth.” Verses 31-35.
It was the very dream the king had seen and forgotten! Every detail was perfectly drawn. Nothing was missing. His inmost thoughts had been read by another. This was miraculous! Breathlessly Nebuchadnezzar waits for the promised interpretation.
DANIEL INTERPRETS THE DREAM
“This is the dream,” says Daniel, “and we will tell the interpretation thereof before the king.
“Thou, O king, art a king of kings: for the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory. And where so ever the children of men dwell, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the heaven hath He given into your hand, and hath made thee ruler over them all. Thou art this head of gold.” Verses 36-38.
A smile of satisfaction must have passed over the king’s countenance. But the young man continues:
“And after thee shall arise another kingdom inferior to thee, and another third kingdom of brass, which shall bear rule over all the earth. And the fourth kingdom shall be strong as iron: forasmuch as iron breaks in pieces and subdues all things: and as iron that breaks all these, shall it break in pieces and bruise.
“And whereas thou saw the feet and toes, part of potters’ clay, and part of iron, the kingdom shall be divided; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, forasmuch as thou saw the iron mixed with miry clay.
“And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly broken.
“And whereas thou saw iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.” Verses 39-43.
In these few prophetic words Daniel outlines the course of empire for centuries to come. There will be, he asserts, four world powers; four, and no more. Then there will come a period of division and conflict, culminating in a divine intervention and the setting up of God’s eternal kingdom.
What has been history’s answer to this daring prediction? As to the first world power there can be no question. It was identified by the prophet when he said to Nebuchadnezzar, “Thou art this head of gold.” This great king was the personification of the might of Babylon, that greatest empire of the ancient world, which enjoyed full sovereignty from about 606 BC when the power of Assyria was broken - until its overthrow, less than sixty-eight years later, by the combined forces of Media and Persia, described so vividly in the fifth chapter of the book of Daniel.
Medo-Persia thus became the second universal empire, enjoying its supremacy for some two hundred years. Then, early in the fourth century BC, came the rise of Greece and the swift conquests of Alexander the Great. With incredible courage this youthful commander hurled his limited forces across the Hellespont at the vast hosts of Darius, utterly defeating them at Granicus, Issus, and finally at the decisive Battle of Arbela, 331 BC.
THE POWER OF GREECE
Greece continued her over lordship for another century and a half, although becoming ever more conscious of the growing might of her western neighbor. On June 22, 168 BC, at the Battle of Pydna, Perseus, king of Macedonia, was completely crushed by the armies of Rome, and on this day “perished the empire of Alexander the Great, which had subdued and Hellenized the East, one hundred and forty four years after his death.”- Theodor Mommsen, History of Rome, book 3, chapter 10.
From this famous battle is also dated “the full establishment of the empire of Rome,” the fourth universal empire of the prophecy, whose iron will was fastened upon the world for the next five centuries. But though Rome, with her invincible might, crushed all opposition and brought whole nations into http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auslavery; though her standards waved triumphantly from the Persian Gulf to the isles of Britain, and from the Baltic Sea to north Africa. Though her Caesars called themselves gods and demanded the subservience of all men everywhere; yet she too came to her end, even as the prophet had declared long years before. All through the fourth and fifth centuries A. D. the frontiers of the empire were harassed by barbarian tribes, which attacked with increasing boldness and frequency; and then, in AD 476, the imperial city of Rome fell before the terrible onslaught of Odoacer, king of the Heruli, and his warriors.
So the fourth or iron empire came to its end, to be succeeded not by another universal empire, but by a group of heterogeneous kingdoms established by her conquerors, a strange mixture of strength and weakness, of “iron” and “clay” which has remained until the present day.
LOOKING DOWN THE CENTURIES
Thus as Daniel addressed the mighty Nebuchadnezzar, the veil of the future was miraculously withdrawn, and both prophet and king found themselves gazing across the vast, enthralling landscape of history-to-be. In the foreground stood the golden domes of Babylon; not far distant rose the silvered heights of the coming Medo-Persian kingdom. Farther on appeared the brazen pinnacles of Greece, and beyond them loomed the dark outline of the seven hills of Rome. Then, in the far distance, their eyes beheld a time of confusion and chaos, of division and dissension, with Rome partitioned, and each separate nation fighting desperately for its existence. They saw mighty plans on foot to fuse the broken iron into one great whole again, and the invariable failures through the presence of the ineradicable clay. They looked upon events even of our own time and saw the main outlines of modern European politics.
Marvelous indeed was this revelation given through the prophet Daniel. Yet the wonder of it increases as one studies further into all its fascinating details. Notice again the specification -clear, definite, and unmistakable- that the fourth kingdom was not to be succeeded by another of similar extent and universal supremacy. Instead, it was to be divided.
This all-important fact was repeated and emphasized in three different and most significant expressions:
“And whereas thou saw the feet and toes, part of potters’ clay, and part of iron, the kingdom shall be divided; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, forasmuch as thou saw the iron mixed with miry clay.
“And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly brittle [margin].
“And whereas thou saw iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.” Daniel 2:41-43.
It is one of the most interesting, and indeed one of the most momentous, facts of history, that when the Roman Empire, weakened by internal corruption, was overrun by invading tribes from the north and east, it was divided into ten separate kingdoms. In fact, with the overthrow of the last of the emperors in 476, and the establishment of the Herulian kingdom in Italy, the fourth kingdom, which had been strong as iron and had broken in pieces and subdued all kingdoms, was now broken in pieces itself. “Ten kingdoms, ten distinct and independent nations,” no more, no less, had fixed themselves within the boundaries of Western Rome; and the prophecy, spoken and written more than a thousand years before, was literally fulfilled.” - Alonzo T. Jones, The Great Empires of Prophecy, page 676.
These ten kingdoms were the Anglo-Saxons, the Franks, the Alamanni, the Lombards, the Ostrogoths, the Visigoths, the Burgundians, the Vandals, the Suevi, and the Heruli; and the portions of Europe that they occupied are delineated as nearly as possible on the accompanying map. These peoples were the forerunners and progenitors of the nations of modern Europe.
All through the fifteen centuries that have elapsed since the breakup of the Roman Empire, despite the most desperate and determined efforts to bind these parts together into one great whole again, the task has been impossible.
UNITED CONTINENT IMPOSSIBLE
Boundaries have changed, of course; but the prophecy said nothing about boundaries, or about the depredations of one nation upon another. Some nations might expand and others shrink. Some might be eliminated altogether-and were, as we shall see in a later chapter. The strong might profit at the expense of the weak. The fragments of iron might penetrate into the frontiers of the helpless clay. But the clay would remain, defying the power of the iron to weld itself together again. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auSeen in the light of history, illuminated by the glow of a thousand battlefields where men by millions have struggled to defeat the divine purpose, the ancient dictum, “They shall not cleave one to another,” is one of the greatest prophetic utterances of all time.
It is amazing how many schemes have been laid to unite the nations of Europe. Men have made treaties until almost every nation was pledged in some way to every other nation. They have tried leagues with the hope that peaceful unity might be achieved. They have tried intermarriage until every ruling dynasty became related to every other dynasty and it was considered unethical for one of royal blood to wed outside this charmed circle. Yet every plan has failed. Every bond, durable as it seemed when made, has snapped under the strain of seething human emotions. While there has been “the strength of the iron” in these plans, there has always appeared the disastrous weakness of the clay.
Again and again down the centuries, ambitious, purposeful men have arisen, determined at all costs to abolish the frontiers of the ever-quarrelsome states, and rule over one united kingdom. Resentful of the differences of custom and language, angered by aggravating trade barriers, they have sworn to sweep them away once and for all, and so build afresh one undivided empire. Yet they have failed.
Sometimes they have come within sight of success just one more victory, or one more year of planning, and their ambition might have been achieved. But it was not to be. Every time, in some strange and unexpected way, they have been defeated.
As far back as the ninth century, Charlemagne made his attempt to unite Europe; he even permitted himself to be crowned emperor at Rome; but the iron and the clay that lie tried to blend together quickly fell apart after his death.
As one historian has said, “His scepter was the bow of Ulysses, which could not be drawn by any weaker hand.”
In the sixteenth century, Charles V became ruler of most of Europe, and had visions of completing the conquest of the Continent. It was said of him that “no monarch until Napoleon was so widely seen in Europe and in Africa.” Yet, in 1555, because of failing health, he was compelled to abdicate and to sign away his vast possessions to others.
Little more than a hundred years later, Louis XIV of France became the dominant figure on the Continent. He reached out in all directions for more and more authority, overrunning the Netherlands, laying waste the Palatinate, and exclaiming: “There are no longer any Pyrenees.” Nevertheless a combination of opposing forces finally brought his grandiose schemes tumbling about him like a castle of cards. By the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, his dominions “were pared away on every side.”
NAPOLEON’S HISTORIC FAILURE
Then, less than a century and a half ago, came Napoleon, perhaps the greatest of all these would-be lords of Europe and conquerors of the world. He may be considered a product of the French Revolution, and from 1795 to 1804, when he was proclaimed emperor, he consolidated his hold upon the people of France. Then for eight fearful years he swept over nation after nation, crowning himself king of Italy, placing his brother Louis on the throne of Holland, and his brother Jerome on the throne of the new kingdom of Westplialia, which he created. He made his brother-in-law Murat sovereign of his newly established Grand Duchy of Berg, and he gave his brother Joseph the throne of Spain. No other conqueror ever made such thorough preparation for the establishment and perpetuation of a united Europe. Nevertheless, even before his plans were completed, rumblings of the coming disintegration could be heard.
In 18o5, the French fleet was defeated at Trafalgar. In 1812 came Napoleon’s Russian expedition, his retreat from Moscow, the subsequent defeat at Leipzig in October, 1813, followed by his final overthrow at Waterloo in 1815.
In 19M, well within living memory, a similar attempt at European domination was made. The Kaiser’s armies swept over Belgium, rolled on into France, into Italy, into the Balkans. Their shattering blows seemed to indicate that the final triumph would be theirs. Those who lived through those dark and anxious days will not soon forget the gloom that settled over the world as retreat followed retreat before the advancing forces of the conqueror. Nor the tremendous feeling of relief as, miraculously, the course of events suddenly changed, and, before one could scarcely appreciate the magnitude of what was taking place, it had all ended at Versailles and Doorn.
Thus has it happened in the past. Thus will it happen again. When the seemingly irresistible force of the aggressor is spent, Europe will revert to its old divided state. After the overspreading eruption of iron has ceased, the elements of clay will reappear, cracking and breaking the mass of metal into its divisions. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auBut mark this well. Events may for a time appear, to our limited vision, to go absolutely contrary to the course that prophecy indicates. But in every time of totalitarian ascendancy-as already noted in considering the predictions regarding Nineveh, Babylon, Egypt, and Tyre-there has been a period when it must have seemed to onlookers as though the word of the Lord would never come true.
If one had been living in Rome in AD 800, three hundred years after the Roman Empire’s collapse,-and had beheld the coronation of Charlemagne as emperor, one would no doubt have been sorely tempted to doubt the prophecy of Daniel regarding, the divisions of the fourth kingdom. Yet only a few years later, not only was Charlemagne himself dead, but his empire had again been divided, and the prophecy wonderfully vindicated.
Again, imagine yourself living in those war-cursed years from 1800 to 1815, when the name of Napoleon struck terror to the hearts of men throughout Europe. Imagine news reaching you that nation after nation had been invaded and that the conqueror’s relatives had been placed on every vacated throne. Ask yourself what you would have thought then about the fulfillment of Daniel 2. For eight long years or more the prophecy might well have seemed in jeopardy. Yet it was not. After the weapons of war had been laid down, God’s word was seen to be more firmly established than ever. Can we not encourage our hearts from these clear lessons of the past? Shall we not believe in God and in His word and leave the fulfillment of it to Him?
We may rest assured that anyone who plans to dominate Europe permanently-no matter what his nationality-is doomed to failure. He may achieve temporary triumphs. He may even overrun most of the Continent. Yet along the trail of his conquests there will grow up and accumulate the forces that will ultimately destroy him. As “ the stars in their courses fought against Sisera,” so countless invisible forces will combine to thwart his purposes.
“If the emperor Napoleon,” wrote Frank Buckland, the famous naturalist, according to his biographer, “when on the road to Moscow with his army in 1811, had condescended to observe the flights of storks and cranes passing over his fated battalions, subsequent events in the politics of Europe might have been very different. These storks and cranes knew of the coming on of a great and terrible winter, the birds hastened towards the south, Napoleon and his army towards the north.” - George C. Bompas, The Life of Frank Buckland, page 352 (1885).
Thus were even the birds of the air far wiser than the greatest conqueror. As the prophet Jeremiah wrote, “Yea, the stork in the heaven knows her appointed times; and the turtle and the crane and the swallow observe the time of their coming; but My people know not the judgment of the Lord.” Jeremiah 8:7.
The divisions of the old Roman Empire will remain until the end, for it is “in the days of these kings” that the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, a kingdom that “shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever.” Daniel 2:44.
Wonderful prophecy! Like a mighty beacon it shines across the centuries, illuminating the greatest events of time with light from. heaven. Glittering on the gold of Babylon, shimmering on the silver of Medo-Persia, glinting on the brass of Greece, shining on the iron of Rome, lighting up the struggles and conflicts of the modern world, it glows at last upon the face of the King of kings as He comes back to the earth in His glory. For He is the stone that strikes the image and breaks in pieces “the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold.” His is the kingdom which “shall consume all these kingdoms, and. .. shall stand forever.”
MARVELOUS indeed was the power of the ancient prophets to read the future; but among all their amazing predictions regarding the rise and fall of empires, none is more fascinating than Daniel’s famous prophecy concerning the strange career of a great religious dictatorship.
Without divine illumination how could he, or anyone else for that matter, have surmised that such startling development would ever come about? The unaided human mind would naturally presume that empire would succeed empire through the centuries; surely only a man inspired of God would have dared to announce, a thousand years in advance, that the scepter wielded so proudly and confidently by the Caesars would fall into the hands of the popes! Yet this, in a word, was the exact prediction made by Daniel while Rome was an unknown village in-to him-an unknown world.
A great religious power, according to the divine word, was to rise to supremacy after the fall of the Roman Empire, and then, after a period of decline, was to grow strong again in the closing scenes of time. This heart-stirring revelation comes to us from the seventh chapter of the book of Daniel, where the future is unveiled with astonishing fullness. In this chapter, it should be remembered, the great empires of history are symbolized by various animals, or “beasts,” to use the Biblical term, as nowadays the eagle represents the United States, the bear stands for Russia, the lion for Great Britain, and the kangaroo for Australia. It is interesting to note that Babylon claimed the lion as its symbol, as the magnificent mosaic lion frieze, which once adorned the entrance to Nebuchadnezzar’s palace, and which now graces an archaeological museum in Berlin, so clearly testifies.
But to return to the prophecy, and the time it was given. Daniel is still in Babylon, but the passing of half a century has left its mark upon him. He is no longer the youth who stood so bravely before the king to interpret the dream of the great metallic image. Nebuchadnezzar has been dead some years. Belshazzar has come to the throne, the last of this imperial dynasty. The empire is tottering to its fall. Despite its colossal defenses, only a few years remain before its overthrow. The golden head of the great image is about to give place to the breast and arms of silver.
THE FUTURE AGAIN UNVEILED
It is night. The prophet is dreaming. He seems to be standing upon the seashore watching the waves lashed to fury by a mighty wind. Out of the storm-tossed waters there suddenly appears a strange creature resembling a lion, but with eagle’s wings. I beheld,” he writes, “till the wings thereof were plucked, and it was lifted up from the earth, and made stand upon the feet as a man, and a man’s heart was given to it.”
Following the lion comes another beast, “like to a bear, and it raised up itself on one side, and it had three ribs in the mouth of it between the teeth of it: and they said thus unto it, Arise, devour much flesh.”
The bear passes by, and, lo, another beast appears, “like a leopard, which had upon the back of it four wings of a fowl; the beast had also four heads; and dominion was given to it.”
Still watching the stormy sea intently. wondering what next it would bring forth, the prophet sees emerging a beast so terrible that he can find no name for it.
“This I saw in the night visions,” he records, “and behold a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly; and it had great iron teeth: it devoured and brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with the feet of it. And it was diverse from all the beasts that were before it; and it had ten horns.
I considered the horns, and, behold, there came up among them another little horn, before whom there were three of the first horns plucked up by the roots: and, behold, in this horn were eyes like the eyes of man, and a mouth speaking great things.” Daniel 7:4-8.
Notice at this point that four beasts are mentioned-even as there were but four main metals in the image of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream. Moreover, these four beasts represent the selfsame empires of Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome, the significance of which will appear with increasing clarity as the study of the prophecy proceeds.
Suddenly, as the prophet is shocked by the blasphemies issuing from the little horn, he lifts his eyes above the ugly creature before him, above the storm-tossed sea, and looks into heaven itself, where the Ancient of Days is seated upon the throne of judgment.
“A fiery stream issued and came forth from before Him: thousand thousands ministered unto Him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before Him: the judgment was set, and the books were opened.” Verse 10.
The constant repetition of blasphemies by the little horn recalls Daniel from this marvelous scene in the courts of glory, and he turns to watch the final act in this strange and terrifying drama.
I beheld then because of the voice of the great words which the horn spoke: I beheld even till the beast was slain, and his body destroyed, and given to the burning flame. As concerning the rest of the beasts, they had their dominion taken away: yet their lives were prolonged for a season and time.” Verses 11, 12.
HISTORY MARVELOUSLY SUMMARIZED
Then another thrilling picture passes before his eyes. I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought Him near before Him. And there was given Him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve Him: His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and His kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.” Verses 13, 14.
So the vision ceases. The prophet, greatly stirred and perplexed as to the meaning of it, suddenly becomes aware that he is not alone. Someone is standing by his side, someone from those courts of glory into which he has been privileged to peer. He asks for an explanation, and the angel answers: “These great beasts, which are four, are four kings, which shall arise out of the earth. But the saints of the Most High shall take the kingdom, and possess the kingdom forever, even forever and ever.” Verses 17, 18.
In these thirty-six words we have a marvelously succinct summary of all history-to-be -four world empires, and then the kingdom of God. But it does not satisfy Daniel. He is intrigued about that fourth beast. “I would know the truth of the fourth beast,” he says, which was diverse from all the others, exceeding dreadful, whose teeth were of iron, and his nails of brass; which devoured, brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with his feet. And of the ten horns that were in his head, and of the other which came up, and before whom three fell; even of that horn that had eyes, and a mouth that spoke very great things, whose look was more stout than his fellows. I beheld, and the same horn made war with the saints, and prevailed against them; until the Ancient of Days came, and judgment was given to the saints of the Most High; and the time came that the saints possessed the kingdom.” Verses 19-22.
The angel replies, in words of immeasurable importance: “The fourth beast shall be the fourth kingdom upon earth, which shall be diverse from all kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth, and shall tread it down, and break it in pieces.
“And the ten horns out of this kingdom are ten kings that shall arise: and another shall rise after them; and he shall be diverse from the first, and he shall subdue three kings.
“And he shall speak great words against the Most High, and shall 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 and times and the dividing of time.
“But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end.
“And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey Him.” Verses 23-2-7.
We have here not only one of the most remarkable but also one of the most daring predictions ever made. It mentions so many details, any one of which, if proved wrong, would discredit the whole prophecy. It gives numbers, which can be readily verified. It specifies the course that certain powers will pursue, in one case even setting the time of its sovereignty -features that history would inevitably prove or disprove.
COMPLETE FULFILLMENT
Nearly twenty-five centuries have passed since that night of Daniel’s dream, and every picture that he saw has come to pass except that of the ultimate triumph of the saints.
Out of the turbulent sea of warring peoples came first the lion with eagle’s wings, a noble figure. symbolic of the power of Babylon in its greatest days. As its power decayed and its lion like heart gave place to that of a man’s, Medo-Persia, the dual kingdom, symbolized by the bear that “raised up itself on one side,” strode forth to victory and dominion. When Medo-Persia’s day was almost done, suddenly Greece-the leopard with wings of a fowl with amazing swiftness swept upon the scene of action to grasp the scepter of world power.
Then came Rome, the fourth beast, “dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly.” With overwhelming might it stamped upon its enemies, enslaving multitudes, and well nigh crushing the early Christian church out of existence by frightful persecutions.
Century followed century, and then even Rome itself began to disintegrate, and the prophecy concerning the ten horns began to be fulfilled. As we have already noted, when the Roman Empire finally collapsed about the end of the fifth century, AD, ten kingdoms, made up of the invading tribes, were actually occupying her territory.
So far, the seventh chapter of Daniel, with some additional details, follows the main outline of http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auhistory already given in the second chapter of that wonderful book. At this point, however, an entirely new feature of the utmost significance is introduced.
It is the “little horn,” which comes up among the other horns, whose look is “more stout than his fellows,” which has “eyes like the eyes of man” and “a mouth speaking great things.”
What is this power? it is not hard to identify.
It was to rise in the midst of the ten kingdoms that succeeded the pagan Roman Empire, and was to be responsible for the subjugation of three of them.
It was to be an imperious, autocratic power speaking “great words against the Most High.”
It was to be a persecuting power which would “wear out the saints of the Most High.”
It was to be a religious power which would attempt to change times and the law of God.
It was to enjoy full sovereignty for a specific period “a time and times and the dividing of time,”-
which is 1260 literal years.
Only one power has arisen in history which has met in complete detail every one of these specifications and that is the mighty religion-political organization which even to the present day is centered in Rome.
THE PATH TO POWER
This interpretation, it is important to note, was first propounded as long ago as AD 1240, more than seven hundred years ago-at the Council of Regensburg, by Bishop Eberhard of Salzburg, near Vienna. This interpretation also formed the basis of the first sermon preached in Scotland by the stalwart reformer John Knox, in the sixteenth century; and it has been set forth again and again by hundreds of the best Bible commentators, since that day.
To those who object to this interpretation, and suspect personal prejudice, we would say at once that it is made here in no such spirit; but is merely a statement of an obvious and unchangeable fact of history. When one seeks to interpret the great prophecy of Daniel 7:25, there is no possible way of avoiding the conclusion that it applies directly to that vast, powerful, mysterious, partly religious, partly political organization which in the long ago grew to power upon the ruins of pagan Rome.
Trace the history of this church system from the day when the gospel of Christ was first preached in the Eternal City by the noble witness of faithful missionaries from Jerusalem; note the gradually increasing prestige of its elder, or bishop, because of his location at the seat of empire; recall his growing claims to leadership of the whole Christian church, which were challenged at first, by other bishops, but eventually conceded,-and you have a sequence of events fitting the rise of a “little horn.” It was a new world power amid the ten other kingdoms contending for the territory of the Roman Empire.
Even in the days of the apostle Paul, unfortunate trends were already making themselves manifest in the church, and he wrote to the Thessalonians: “The mystery of iniquity does already work: only he who now lets will let, until he be taken out of the way.” 2 Thessalonians 2:7.
Some power at that time was “letting,” or hindering, the expansion of the little horn. The Caesars still ruled, and as long as they did so the papacy could never develop as foreshadowed in the prophecy.
CAESAR’S SCEPTER SEIZED
Centuries rolled by; and as the power of the Caesars waned, the power of the bishops increased. When the last of the western emperors passed off the scene and the great Empire of Rome came to its end as a world power, the way was opened for the almost unlimited aggrandizement of the pope. The vacant throne presented an opportunity he was not slow to grasp, and it was not long before he had assumed much of Caesar’s surrendered authority and had entered upon a career of despotism and “power politics” to last a thousand years.
The historian Wylie, writing of the establishment of papal supremacy, says: “At last the empire of the West was dissolved. The seat which had been occupied so long by the master of the world was now empty. The overthrow of the empire contributed most materially towards the elevation of the bishop of Rome; for, first, it took the Caesars out of the way. ‘A secret hand,’ says De Maistre, ‘chased the emperors from the Eternal City, to give it to the head of the Eternal Church.’ Second, it compelled the bishops of Rome, now deprived of the imperial influence which had hitherto helped them so mightily in their struggles for pre-eminence, to fall back on another element, and that an element which constitutes the very essence of the papacy, and on which is founded the whole complex fabric of the spiritual and temporal domination of the popes. With Rome would have fallen her bishop, had he not, as if by anticipation of the crisis, reserved http://www.ThreeAngels.com.autill this hour the master stroke of his policy. He now boldly cast himself upon an element of much greater strength than that of which the political convulsions of the times had deprived him, namely, that the bishop of Rome is the successor of Peter, the prince of the apostles, and, in virtue of being so, is Christ’s vicar on earth. In making this claim, the Roman pontiffs vaulted at once over the throne of kings to the seat of gods: Rome became once more the mistress of the world, and her popes the rulers of the earth.” - James A. Wylie, The Papacy: Its History, Dogmas, Genius, and Prospects, pages 33, 34 (1852).
Cardinal Manning (1808-1892) himself recognized this transfer of authority from pagan to papal Rome, and wrote as follows concerning the growth of the papacy and its position of supremacy:
“The abandonment of Rome was the liberation of the pontiffs. Whatsoever claims to obedience the emperors may have made, and whatsoever compliance the Pontiff may have yielded, the whole previous relation . . . was finally dissolved by a higher power. The providence of God permitted a succession of invasions, Gothic, Lombard, and Hungarian, to desolate Italy, and to efface from it every remnant of the empire. The pontiffs found themselves alone, the sole fountains of order, peace, law, and safety. And from the hour of this providential liberation the chains fell off from the hands of the successor of St. Peter.
“A power had grown up in Rome, far more imperial over the reason and will of man than the iron despotism of the Roman Empire. This interior and supernatural power of direction and government over the actions and hearts of men flowed from one center, and was embodied in one person, the bishop of Rome. The floods which swept all the other authorities away threw out into bolder relief and more conspicuous prominence the supreme pastoral authority of the vicars of Jesus Christ.” - Henry E. Manning, The Temporal Power of the Vicar of Jesus Christ, Preface, pp. 28,29.
OPPOSING FORCES REMOVED
Three horns were to be “plucked up” or removed by the 1ittle horn.” In other words, three of the ten kingdoms established upon the territory of the old Roman Empire were to be eliminated in order that the papacy might have freedom of action and be in a position to exercise full dominion. All this occurred with remarkable precision according to the annals of history. Three kingdoms, the Heruli, the Vandals, and the Ostrogoths were overthrown.
Elliott, in his classic study of the prophecies, lists the ten kingdoms and adds this significant phrase, I might cite three that were eradicated from before the pope out of the list first given; viz. the Heruli under Odoacer, the Vandals, and the Ostrogoths.” - E. B. Elliott, Horae Apocalypticae, Volume 3, Page 152, Note 1 (1851).
These three kingdoms, so far as they were Christian, were of the Arian persuasion, and as such were reckoned as heretics by the Church of Rome, while they regarded her with equal enmity and suspicion. Their removal, so essential to papal supremacy, was earnestly sought by the pontiffs and was brought about by the aid of the emperors of the East. In AD 483 the emperor Zeno gave permission to the Ostrogoths to invade Italy and destroy the Heruli, which was accomplished after a three years struggle. Half a century later the power of the Ostrogoths was broken by the armies of Justinian under Belisarlus, particularly in connection with their unsuccessful siege of Rome in AD 538. For a more complete story of that important period read Chapter 41 Of The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, by Edward Gibbon.
The Vandals of North Africa, who, according to Elliott, “were not only Arians, but persecutors of the Catholics,” were overthrown in AD 534 by the same famous general.
It is important to recall that it was in AD 533 that the emperor Justinian, who was then about to embark upon his wars against the Vandals and the Ostrogoths, declared himself wholeheartedly in favor of the Catholic party, naming the bishop of Rome as “head of all bishops, and the true and effective corrector of heretics.” Thus, when the last of the three horns was uprooted in AD 538, the papacy was free to exercise the full authority it already claimed, and which had but recently been declared as properly belonging to it by the reigning emperor of the East.
Arius, priest of Alexandria, propounded the theory that Christ was created and, therefore, “was totally and essentially distinct from the Father.” This view was rejected by the Council of Nicaea in AD 325, which decreed that Christ was of “one and the same substance with the Father;” but the controversy raged on for centuries, dividing Christendom into two opposing camps, and leading to the most unchristian excesses on both sides.
Firmly established at last in his strategic position in the Eternal City, the bishop of Rome soon http://www.ThreeAngels.com.aubegan to assume powers, prerogatives, and titles no emperor, in the height of his ambitions, ever conceived. He not only styled himself “Vicegerent of the Son of God” and “Lord God, the Pope,” but approved such adulation as the following in an address given at the Fifth Lateran Council in 1512: “Thou art the shepherd, thou art the physician, thou art the director, thou art the husbandman. Finally, thou art another God on earth.” - Philippe Labbe and Gabriel Cossart, History of the Councils, volume 14, Column 109.
In an article on the pope, to be found in Ferraris’s Ecclesiastical Dictionary, are these extravagant words:
“The Pope is of so great dignity and so exalted that he is not a mere man, but as it were God, and the vicar of God.
“The Pope is of such lofty and supreme dignity that, properly speaking, he has not been established in any rank of dignity, but rather has been placed upon the very summit of all ranks of dignities. “He is likewise the divine monarch and supreme emperor, and king of kings.
“Hence the Pope is crowned with a triple crown, as king of heaven and of earth and of the lower regions.
“Moreover the superiority and the power of the Roman Pontiff by no means pertain only to heavenly things, to earthly things, and to things under the earth, but are even over angels, than whom he is greater.
So that it were possible that the angels might err in the faith, or might think contrary to the faith, they could be judged and excommunicated by the Pope.
“For he is of so great dignity and power that he forms one and the same tribunal with Christ.”-Lucius Ferraris, Ecclesiastical Dictionary, art. “Pope.”
Thus, in these typical utterances, did the 1ittle horn” speak great words against the Most High.
As the papacy grew in power, it did not hesitate to tamper with the law of God. Finding the second commandment out of harmony with its use of images, it attempted to eliminate this law from the Decalogue, especially in the catechisms used in most countries. Then, ignoring the plain requirements of the fourth commandment regarding the observance of the seventh day as the Sabbath of the Lord, it deliberately encouraged the keeping of Sunday, the first day.
This was indeed a grievous error, leading all Christendom astray upon a most important and vital matter. It destroyed the whole purpose of God in establishing the Sabbath as a memorial of His creative power, paving the way for the entrance of many false teachings. If the true Sabbath had been observed from week to week down the ages, reminding the people every seventh day of the power and love of the Creator, how different might have been the course of history!
The Sabbath was designed to be a beautiful blessing to the human race. We read that in the beginning “God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it.” Genesis 2:3. To sanctify is to set apart as holy. “The Sabbath was made for man;” it was to be a source of continual benefit to mankind through all the years to come. It was to be a physical blessing, giving man regular periods of rest and preserving him from the perils of overwork. It was to be a spiritual blessing, keeping him from the soul-destroying effects of a too-constant application to material pursuits, leading him to devote a portion of his time each week to the development of the nobler qualities of his being, and turning his thoughts God ward at frequent and constantly recurring intervals.
The incalculable importance of the weekly rest day established in Eden was made even more apparent when it was enshrined in the midst of the holy law of God as it was thundered from Sinai.
“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy,” was the divine command. “Six days shall thou labor, and do all thy work: but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God. In it thou shall not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day. Wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it.” Exodus 20:8-11.
In this commandment the fact was re-emphasized that it was on the seventh day that God rested; that it was the seventh day that God blessed and hallowed. Not the first or tile third or the fifth; only the seventh.
It should be remembered, too, that when the Son of God came to live among men it was this same seventh day that He observed all through His earthly life. He called Himself the “Lord even of the Sabbath day,” meaning the seventh day. Matthew 12:8. He went to the synagogue regularly on this day, “as His custom was” (Luke 4: 16), and He taught the Jews continually how the day should be kept (Matthew 12:1-http://www.ThreeAngels.com.au13). Moreover, the habit of proper Sabbath keeping was so deeply ingrained in the hearts of His disciples that when at last His wounded body was awaiting burial, they considered the day too holy to be used even to embalm the body of their Lord, “and they returned, and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment.” Luke 23:56.
Was the Sabbath changed by Christ after His resurrection? Certainly not. If so momentous an alteration in the law of God had been divinely intended, it would surely have been mentioned somewhere in the New Testament. But no such mention occurs. Indeed there is no text in the entire Bible which sanctions any change in the Sabbath day.
WHO CHANGED THE SABBATH?
Paul observed the seventh day Sabbath (Acts 17:2), and so did all the other apostles. True it is that John said that he was “in the Spirit on the Lord’s day,” but, as noted above, the Lord’s day is the Sabbath, the seventh day.
Who then changed the day, or at least attempted to do so? At first the change came gradually with the infiltration of pagan rites and customs, with the general apostasy from true religion, and with the increasing animosity toward anything supposedly belonging to the Jews. Then came the emperor Constantine’s famous decree in AD 321, setting apart “the venerable day of the sun” as the rest day for Christians. This first civil Sunday law in history was followed by other decrees made by various councils of the Roman Catholic Church, until the full responsibility for making the change is now acknowledged by its leading representatives.*
In a catechism by Rev. Stephen Keenan the following statements are to be found:
“Question. Have you any other way of proving that the church has power to institute festivals of
precept?
“Answer. Had she not such power, she could not have done that in which all modern religionists agree with her, she could not have substituted the observance of Sunday the first day of the week, for the observance of Saturday the seventh day, a change for which there is no scriptural authority.’~-A Doctrinal Catechism, page 174 (1851).
In another Catholic catechism, which received the “apostolic blessing” of Pope Pius X, January 25, 1910, we find these words:
“Question. Which is the Sabbath day?
“Answer. Saturday is the Sabbath day.
“Question. Why do we observe Sunday instead of Saturday?
“Answer. We observe Sunday instead of Saturday because the Catholic Church, in the Council of Laodicea (AD 336), transferred the solemnity from Saturday to Sunday.” Reverend Peter Giermann, CSSR, The Convert’s Catechism of Catholic Doctrine, page 50 (2d edition, 1910).
Grown to full stature, the papacy exercised the power of a supreme overlord in the affairs of the nations, threatening with interdicts and other pains and penalties all who dared to disregard its will, kings and commoners alike. In the winter Of AD 1077, the German emperor Henry IV, for presuming to disregard the authority of Pope Gregory VII, was forced to seek his pardon at the castle of Canossa, then kept waiting in an outer court, with uncovered head and naked feet for three long wintry days! In AD 1208 Pope Innocent III placed all England under an interdict, and then excommunicated King John himself.
*The full wording of the second and the fourth commandments are retained in the Roman Catholic (Douay) Bible and the Catechismus Romanus published by the authority of the Council of Trent; nevertheless the teaching catechisms for priests and teachers omit the second commandment and all of the fourth except the first sentence, “Remember that thou keep holy the Sabbath Day.”
WEARING OUT THE SAINTS
Having gathered so much authority to itself, the papacy inevitably became intolerant of all opposition, and embarked on a program of persecution which took the lives of millions of sincere followers of God’s word.
The historian Lecky declares: “That the Church of Rome has shed more innocent blood than any other institution that has ever existed among mankind, will be questioned by no Protestant who has a competent knowledge of history. The memorials, indeed, of many of her persecutions are now so scanty that it is impossible to form a complete conception of the multitude of her victims, and it is quite certain that no http://www.ThreeAngels.com.aupowers of imagination can adequately realize their sufferings.”-William Lecky, History of the Rise and Influence of the Spirit of Rationalism in Europe, Volume 2, page 32. Commenting on the prophecy that the little horn should “wear out the saints of the Most High,” Albert Barnes, writing on Daniel 7, says: “Can anyone doubt that this is true of the papacy? The Inquisition; the ‘persecutions of the Waldenses;’ the ravages of the Duke of Alva; the fires of Smithfield; the tortures of Goa; indeed, the whole history of the papacy may be appealed to in proof that this is applicable to that power. If anything could have ‘worn out the saints of the Most High’ could have cut them off from the earth so that evangelical religion would have become extinct, it would have been the persecutions of the papal power. In the year 1208, a crusade was proclaimed by Pope Innocent III against the Waldenses and Albigenses, in which a million of men perished. From the beginning of the order of the Jesuits, in the year 1540 to 1580, nine hundred thousand were destroyed. One hundred and fifty thousand perished by the Inquisition in thirty years. In the Low Countries fifty thousand persons were hanged, beheaded, burned, or buried alive, for the crime of heresy, within the space of thirty-eight years from the edict of Charles V, against the Protestants, to the peace of Chateau Cambresis in 1559. Eighteen thousand suffered by the hands of the executioner, in the space of five years and a half, during the administration of the Duke of Alva. Indeed, the slightest acquaintance with the history of the papacy, will convince anyone that what is here said of ‘making war with the saints’ (verse 21), and ‘wearing out the saints of the Most High’ (verse25), is strictly applicable to that power, and will accurately describe its history.” Notes on the Old Testament, comments on Daniel 7.
From a Roman Catholic source we have this appalling admission:
“The church has persecuted. Only a tyro in church history will deny that. One hundred and fifty years after Constantine the Donatists were persecuted, and sometimes put to death. Protestants were persecuted in France and Spain with the full approval of the church authorities. We have always defended the persecution of the Huguenots, and the Spanish Inquisition. Wherever and whenever there is honest Catholicity, there will be a clear distinction drawn between truth and error, and Catholicity and all forms of heresy. When she thinks it good to use physical force, she will use it. But will the Catholic Church give bond that she will not persecute at all? Will she guarantee absolute freedom and equality of all churches and all faiths? The Catholic Church gives no bonds for her good behavior.” The Western Watchman, December 24, 1908.
For “a time and times and the dividing of time” the 91ttle horn” was to exercise its power. How long is this period? It is not difficult to compute. In Scripture a “time” and a year are synonymous, as, “at the end of times, even years.” Daniel 11:13, margin. “Times” are two years, and “the dividing of time,” a half year. Adding these together, we have a total of three and a half years. Reckoning 360 days to a year, according to Hebrew usage, we find that three and a half years contain 1260 days.
Now, in symbolic prophecy a day stands for a year, for we read in Ezekiel 4:5, 6: I have appointed thee each day for a year.” See also Numbers 14:34. Thus the period of “a time and times and the dividing of time,” 1260 prophetic days, represents 1260 literal years.
Did papal dominance in Europe cover such a period? Taking AD 538 as the starting point,-this being the year when the Ostrogoths (last of the three powers to be uprooted) were driven from Rome,-the 1260 years ended in 1798; and in that year the French army under General Berthier entered Rome and took the pope prisoner.
“Broken with fatigue and sorrows, he died on the nineteenth of August, 1799, in the French fortress of Valence.” And at that moment, to all appearances, “the papacy was extinct: not a vestige of its existence remained; and among all the Roman Catholic powers not a finger was stirred in its defense. The Eternal City had no longer prince or pontiff; its bishop was a dying captive in foreign lands; and the decree was already announced that no successor would be allowed in his place.” - Reverend George Trevor, Rome and Its Papal Rulers, page 440.
This astounding event created a profound impression throughout Europe, and was recognized by many students of prophecy at the time as indicating that the long period of papal supremacy was over, and that the prophecy of Daniel 7:25 had been marvelously fulfilled.
In the face of such overwhelming evidence, there can be no shadow of doubt as to the true interpretation of the 1ittle horn.” History points accusingly and unerringly at this great religious dictatorship, proclaiming with a voice of thunder, “Thou art the man!”
Merely to identify this prophetic symbol, however, and trace its proud and baleful course through the centuries, until it received its seeming mortal wound in 1798, is to miss one of the supreme revelations of this prophecy. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auThere is a sequel of utmost importance to the world today; and this sequel will be considered in the chapter that follows.
OF ALL the phenomena of this amazing age none is more remarkable than the continued existence of a quaint, diminutive kingdom on the banks of the historic Tiber, relic of a dominion that once ruled a continent and indeed a world.
Many times I have wandered through its massive buildings, hoary with age and freighted with history. I have gazed, astonished, upon some of its most closely guarded treasures, its triple crowns and jewel-encrusted vestments, that recall forgotten triumphs and departed glory.
Never did this citadel of political ecclesiasticism assume such significance as it does at this moment. Amid the mighty upheavals of the European nations, this mysterious, tiny kingdom, richest of them all, its musty vaults crammed with gold, silver, and precious stones, has remained untouched.
In recent years ruler after ruler has been deposed or forced to flee from his capital, but the king of the Vatican has continued on his throne with poise and confidence.
Even more remarkable is the increasing influence of this kingdom and its ruler in many parts of the world. It is only a few years since the pope was known as “The Prisoner of the Vatican,” from which self-imposed bondage he was released by the concordat with the Italian government in 1929. Then it was that the modern Vatican state was organized, with its own territory, radio station, postal system, railroad station, and all essential signs of complete independence. Then it was that the pope became a king again -king of the smallest, but perhaps the most influential, dominion in all the world.
Following the close of World War I the papacy busied itself with the making of concordats with every state willing to accept such collaboration, until more than forty such documents had been signed, giving the Roman Catholic Church priorities in religious matters in these nations and bringing to the Vatican more rights and privileges than it has enjoyed at any time since 1798.
AMERICA AND THE VATICAN
In the United States the growth of Vatican influence is becoming more and more obvious. Nationally known newspapers are driven to devote ever wider attention to its activities. The radio carries more and more of its propaganda into the homes of the people. Noticeably, too, the pope is being set forth as the great peacemaker, the one to whom all the world should look for deliverance from the curse of war.
Early in 194o, despite many vigorous and influential protests, the President of the United States appointed Myron C. Taylor, retired steel merchant and head of the intergovernmental refugee committee, as his special representative to the Vatican. Though the appointment was only “personal,” Mr. Taylor was immediately accorded the full social status, if not the actual rank, of an ambassador at the Holy See. Why the head of this great Protestant country should feel it necessary to make such overtures to the papacy has not been fully disclosed; but whatever the real reason may have been, the effect of the appointment was undoubtedly to increase papal prestige immeasurably.
In an important letter to the New York Times, dated May 12, 1940, James H. Ryan, Roman Catholic bishop of Omaha, defending Taylor’s appointment, wrote the following significant statement:
“With the election of Pius XII now behind us, and the memory of the almost universal approbation it received still fresh in the public mind, the place of the Papacy in world affairs seems to stand out in bolder relief than at almost any other epoch of its long existence. In few periods of history have the Popes exercised a larger influence-an interesting phenomenon when one recalls the low political ebb to which the Papacy had sunk at the middle of the last century, when, on all sides, reputable statesmen predicted its final and definitive annihilation within their own lifetime. But from Leo XIII to Pius XII much water has flowed under the bridge of international politics. Kingdoms that were kingdoms in the days of Pius IX are no more; and empires that seemed eternal then have collapsed.
If history is any guide to the immediate future, state absolutism will not be any more successful in its efforts to humble Rome than was the dominant political ideology of the nineteenth century.”
Perhaps, after all, this great little kingdom has yet some important part to play in the stirring history of our time. Can it be that it will yet achieve its ambition to dominate the world again? What has the voice of prophecy to say on this absorbing theme?
It will be remembered that at the close of the prophecy in the seventh chapter of Daniel, which depicts the rise of the papacy and the outstanding features of its long and checkered history, there occur these solemn words of condemnation: “But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to, consume and to destroy it unto the end.”
These words were uttered concerning the little horn, and have reference, we must conclude, to its fate subsequent to the conclusion of the 1260 days. The disaster that befell this power in 1798 was not to be the final blow; it is doomed to utter and final extinction. Consequently, if the prophecy of Daniel 7:26 were the last word to be found in the Scriptures on this subject, we might well conclude that there is nothing more to fear from Rome; but this is not the last word. The Bible speaks again, illuminating the final phases of the age long drama of this religion-political power.
AN IMPORTANT REVELATION
In the thirteenth chapter of the book of Revelation there is a prediction which is the exact counterpart of the one in Daniel 7, but with added details of immense importance. Just as the seventh chapter of Daniel, in its grand sweep across the centuries, covers much the same ground as the second chapter of that book, but including additional features, so does the thirteenth chapter of Revelation similarly complement and fill out the thrilling outline of history provided in Daniel 7.
In this New Testament revelation is brought to view the selfsame power so accurately depicted by Daniel, but under different symbolism. The prophet John thus portrays what he saw in vision:
“And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy.” Revelation 13:1.
Here we read of a strange and terrifying beast which, while having “seven heads and ten horns,” resembles at once a leopard, a bear, and a lion -the first three beasts mentioned in Daniel 7. Obviously this is another symbol of world power, its religious nature emphasized by its “name of blasphemy.”
DEADLY WOUND HEALED
Reading on in the chapter, one notes how many features correspond exactly with Daniel’s description of the 1ittle horn.” This power speaks “great things and blasphemies;” it makes war with the saints, and continues for “forty and two months” which is exactly 1260 days or prophetic years. Moreover, “the dragon” gives the beast “his power, and his seat, and great authority” which is a remarkably accurate description of the transfer of power from pagan to papal Rome.
In the midst of the prophecy, however, there occurs one sentence of great significance. Referring to one of the heads of the beast, it says, “I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast.” Revelation 13:3.
Here is another of the daring predictions of the Bible. It announces that the mighty ecclesiastical power, whose rise and progress are foreshadowed here, will suffer a disastrous reversal that will cause its almost complete dissolution; and that then, contrary to all expectation, it will make a spectacular recovery.
Wounded to death but rising again-how perfectly does this depict the history of the papacy from 1798 until the present day! Suffering reverse after reverse, but ever striving to regain its lost power and glory; struggling against seemingly insuperable odds, yet finding its way back along the road to world dominion! Even so has it happened.
When, in August, 1799, Pope Plus VI passed away, a captive of France, “half Europe thought ... that with the Pope the Papacy was dead.”-Rev. Joseph Rickaby, S. J., The Modern Papacy, page 1.
Nevertheless today, as the bishop of Omaha said, “the place of the Papacy in world affairs seems to stand out in bolder relief than at almost any other epoch of its long existence.”
Despite all the setbacks received during the nineteenth century, and the still more damaging blows sustained in recent years in Germany, Poland, Russia, and Mexico, the papacy’s influence has continued to expand until now a vast host of adherents in every land on earth recognizes its authority. One need but recall the number of nations represented at the Vatican, or the multitudes that attend the frequent eucharistic congresses, to realize that the deadly wound is almost healed and that the papacy will soon be ready to play the part that prophecy has outlined for it in the closing scenes of history.
What that part will be, only the future can fully reveal. In the light of the prophecies we have studied, however, we may look with certainty for an upswing of papal fortunes.
FINAL OVERTHROW DECREED
Just as the papacy, despite all the losses it sustained during the war of 1814-1818, came out of that conflict with renewed vigor and prestige, so by means of its marvelous powers of adaptability, its incomparable political knowledge and skill, it will turn the current world confusion to its own advantage. Nevertheless, despite all pretensions to piety, it will still remain at heart the same cruel, tyrannical power that it has been since its foundation. Where it obtains the upper hand in affairs of state, it will still persecute with impunity.
It has been well said that the Roman ecclesiastical system is “in adversity a lamb, on an equality a fox, and in supremacy a tiger.” All history testifies to the accuracy of this apt summary of papal policy, and there is no reason to believe that it has changed. Sad indeed will be the day for the cause of truth and freedom when it shall be said again of this power, as indicated in Revelation 13:1 “And all the world wondered after the beast.” But, thank God, its revived dictatorship will be short-lived. Scarcely will its goal of universal supremacy seem to have been achieved when appalling disaster will befall it. Suddenly “shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judges her.” Revelation 18:8. Thus does the 1ittle horn” power of Daniel 7 come to its end in utter ruin.
A CALL FOR REFORMATION
Though it recovers from its wounds, though it fights its way back to a large measure of world power, yet the judgment of the great tribunal above cannot be reversed. This powerful, mysterious, religion-political system is to remain until the end of time, but its ultimate and complete destruction is inevitable. It “shall be broken without hand.” Daniel 8:25.
This does not mean, of course, that all who are now attached to its vast world organization will suffer this tragic fate. By no means. The Lord knows how many sincere people there are belonging to it-deeply religious men and women, devoted to good works, who would be the first to oppose any bigotry or intolerance toward others. But because of what must inevitably happen to the system itself, God sends to every one of them this urgent invitation: “Come out of her, My people, that you be not partakers of her sins, and that you receive not of her plagues.” Revelation 18:4
EARLY in the eighteenth century, George Berkeley, bishop of Cloyne in Ireland, wrote this remarkable stanza:
Westward the course of empire takes its way;
The first four acts already past,
A fifth shall close the drama with the day:
Time’s noblest offspring is the last.
This good Irishman, a keen student of history and literature, was a great lover of America, traveling across the Atlantic in 1728 to spend three quiet and happy years in Rhode Island. He was convinced from all he had read about the New World, and all that he saw of it for himself, that a glorious destiny awaited those who should dwell in its great open spaces and develop its illimitable resources.
But if the little that was to be seen here in those far-off times-long before the Revolution of 1776-was sufficient to persuade him that the course of empire was moving in this direction, what would he say could he visit the United States today?
Instead of a few small, struggling colonies he would find a mighty nation of more than one hundred thirty million people. Instead of the poverty and frugality of frontiersmen he would discover the richest country on earth, owning 40 per cent of the world’s wealth, though having but 7 per cent of the world’s population. He would find great cities, huge factories, and palatial government buildings. He would see magnificent highways and railroads stretching from coast to coast, carrying the vast traffic of a continent.
He would find himself among the best-paid workingmen on earth, receiving higher wages than any http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auof which he ever dreamed. He would learn that, in normal times, there are more young men and young women in colleges and universities here than in all the rest of the world put together. Visiting the homes of the people, he would come across more electrical equipment, more radios, more telephones, more bathtubs, than in the homes of any other country. He would find, too, that fourteen million people own their own homes that forty-five million have savings accounts that more than one hundred thirty million life-insurance policies are in force. Most important of all, he would discover that, after the lapse of two centuries, the people are still as devoted as they ever were to the cause of human liberty, still willing to dedicate all their wealth and all their energy to ensure that freedom “shall not perish from the earth.”
Facing such stupendous developments, Bishop Berkeley would no doubt agree that here was something far beyond his expectations when he wrote his famous lines two hundred years ago. Indeed America’s swift rise to power is so remarkable that it is only reasonable to expect that this nation is included among the great prophecies for our time. If the divine word has spoken of Egypt and Assyria, of Babylon and Greece, of Medo-Persia and Rome, and of the nations of modern Europe, surely, somewhere in the blueprint of the ages, some reference is made to this unique phenomenon of history, the great Republic of the West.
RISE OF THE UNITED STATES FORETOLD
There is. While it is true that most of the predictions of the Holy Scriptures have reference to nations of the Old World, there is one that indubitably points to the New, clearly indicating the time of the founding of the United States, the manner of its growth, the nature of its guiding principles of government, and the truly astonishing part it is destined to play in world affairs.
This prophecy is found in the thirteenth chapter of Revelation, beginning with verse ii. In the first part of this chapter, as already noted, there is a remarkably accurate picture of the rise of the papacy upon the ruins of pagan Rome, its progress through the centuries until it received its “deadly wound,” and then its slow, stern struggle to regain its lost pre-eminence.
In verse 10 we read, “He that leads into captivity shall go into captivity,” which would certainly seem to refer to the papal disaster of 1798, when the pope was taken prisoner by General Berthier, and the 1260 years of papal supremacy came to an end. It would also suggest that this is the period in history when the next nation of prophecy was to appear on the scene.
Then John writes: I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spoke as a dragon.”
Note well the details of this striking prophetic symbol. First, this new “beast,” or nation, or power, comes into the picture as the other goes into captivity.
Second, unlike the other beast, and in fact unlike all the symbolic beasts mentioned in the seventh chapter of the book of Daniel, this one comes up out of the earth. Now, “seas” stand for “peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues” (Revelation 17:15), so that by contrast “the earth” would seem to imply a more or less uninhabited region.
Third, this beast has two horns like a lamb,” suggesting the peacefulness and harmlessness of its principles and conduct, at least in the early stages of its development.
Fourth, and presumably after the lapse of time, “he spoke as a dragon.” Now it was “the dragon” which gave the previous beast “his power, and his seat, and great authority.” That dragon was Imperial Rome, whose assets were inherited by the papacy. The lamb like beast, therefore, is one day to exert an influence rivaling that of the ancient Roman Empire.
Now we may ask, What power was quietly and unobtrusively rising out of obscurity about the close of the eighteenth century when the papacy was going into decline, and finally into captivity? What power at that time was rising “out of the earth,” in a land which, unlike overcrowded Europe, was sparsely peopled and largely a wilderness? What nation, rising in such a place, and under such circumstances, based its constitution, and therefore its future power and influence, upon two such lamb like principles as civil and religious liberty?
There is only one nation whose history fits perfectly the prophetic outline drawn so briefly and yet so accurately almost nineteen centuries ago-the United States of America.
It would be superfluous for us to rehearse here the unique and amazing story of this country’s entrance into the family of nations, for everyone instantly recalls the coming of Columbus, the voyage of the Pilgrim Fathers, the War of Independence, the drafting of the Constitution, the acquisition of new territories, the ever-flowing tide of immigration, the opening up of the West, and the final unification of the http://www.ThreeAngels.com.aunation from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
CHAMPION OF LIBERTY
What was the secret of this rapid growth and expansion? It was the fundamental principle of freedom-freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, freedom of religion. This gave the whole nation the gentle characteristics of a lamb, so different from those of the ravenous monsters used to typify the war-born peoples of Europe. This, too, was the reason why multitudes from every nation under heaven flocked to this land of new hope and opportunity. Here they came to be free to live and work in safety, secure from age-old tyrannies. Here they came to worship as they pleased, unshackled by the conventions and restrictions that bound them in the land of their birth.
Thus under the providence of God-in little more than a century and a half-this nation has grown to maturity, mightily increased in population, possessions, prestige, and power.
And still, thank God, it retains its lamb like characteristics. It continues to maintain tolerance for all peoples and all religions; it stands ready to preserve the cherished liberties which made it great, as recent pronouncements of Government spokesmen have clearly testified.
To President Roosevelt belongs the credit for having enunciated and reaffirmed the “Four Freedoms”: “Freedom of speech and expression; freedom of every person to worship God in his own way; freedom from want; freedom from fear”-glorious ideals which have been echoed and re-echoed around the world.
And yet, according to this prophecy we are considering, a change is to take place. The lamb like nation is to speak as a dragon; that is, it is to speak with power and authority equivalent to that of Imperial Rome in the heyday of her ancient might.
Can it be possible that any such change will ever take place in the history of the United States? It is not only possible; it is already in process. The world-shaking upheavals of the past few years have gone far to prepare the way for the transformation indicated in this amazing prediction.
THE ROAD TO WORLD POWER
Many thinking people have become convinced that a destiny far beyond anything conceived by the founding fathers awaits this nation in the immediate future.
Long before America entered the Second World War, the editor of a nationally known newspaper declared: “All signs point to a greater role for the United States in world affairs.”
Discussing the suggestion that America might “run away with the prize of world dominion,” the foreign editor of the San Francisco Chronicle remarked that some have “expressed the conviction that the situation is developing in a direction to launch America into a career of triumphant imperialism.” Then he added, significantly, “There might be something in it.” Indeed, there may be something in it.
Fortune published the results of a survey of public opinion as to what should be the relationship of the United States to postwar problems. Summarizing the replies. given by those polled, the editor said: “With unbashful assertiveness the answers were 82.3 per cent that the United States should be the chief designer of the peace, and 59.7 per cent that we will be. This may spring from a deep realization that this is the American Century, in which our role is a world role in peace as well as in war.”
ARSENAL OF DEMOCRACY
Commenting on this survey the editor of Time significantly remarked, “It is time the United States knows it is a world power.”
Such opinions would, of course, be of little significance if they were not supported by facts; but the facts are present in abundance. One thinks immediately of the responsibilities this country has already assumed as the arsenal of democracy, of the quantities of armaments and materiel that have poured from the nation’s factories, and of the food, clothing, and other necessary supplies that have been made available to many countries.
Who can measure the effect of all this upon the minds of the inhabitants of these lands, and, perhaps more important still, upon the minds of the hundreds of thousands of American youth from Texas and Montana, from Colorado and Nebraska, indeed from all the forty-eight states of the Union, whose eyes have been opened for the first time upon the great world beyond the seas? New horizons have loomed before them as, under the stern pressure of global war, they have sallied forth to the distant battlefields of the earth. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auVice-President Wallace once made this remarkable statement: “If America is a chosen land, it is not for her sake that she is chosen of the Lord at a certain stage of the world’s history, but for the sake of all the world.”
America a chosen land? Yes, indeed, a land of destiny. Chosen long ago by Providence as a refuge for the oppressed and persecuted of the Old World, and chosen now for an even greater role as the champion of freedom.
But what will America do with the power that she obtains by these changes in the international situation and by her colossal expenditure of treasure and effort?
A CHOSEN LAND
The prophecy seems to suggest that there will be no bid for world supremacy on the part of this nation such as actuated the great empires of history. It will not seek dominion for dominion’s sake. It will not seek merely military victories, nor desire any sort of military dictatorship. Instead it will turn its mind again toward religion, possibly as a remedy for the world’s ills-a way of escape from its everlasting dissensions and disorders. However, it will not be the religion of its pioneers and Pilgrim Fathers, but the very religion they forsook!
Strange as this may sound, it is the word that the prophecy leaves with us. Here it is: “And he exercises all the power of the first beast before him, and causes the earth and them which dwell therein to. worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed.”
Now “the first beast,” as we have seen, is that ecclesiastical system known throughout history as the papacy, which grew up among the ruins of the old pagan Roman Empire.
Armaments and materiel have poured from the nation’s factories, and food, clothing, and other supplies have been made available to the world.
That, without doubt, is the beast, or power, whose deadly wound was healed. And the lamb like beast, when it is come to full strength, is to use its influence to persuade the peoples of earth “to worship the first beast.”
This does not mean, of course, that every American is going to become a convert to Rome! Of course not. But it certainly does suggest that the doctrines, practices, and ideals of the papacy will find increasing favor both in church and government circles. It implies that Protestantism will gradually lose its “protest” and become ever more tolerant of the beliefs it once taught were error; that Protestantism will be led into increasing collaboration with the system it contended against with such intrepid courage and passionate zeal in years gone by. It suggests also a growing movement for the reunion of the churches, with emphasis upon unity rather than upon truth; that this movement will not be confined to this country alone but, with strong American support, will be urged upon all the people of the world. These omens lead to the inevitable conclusion that the first principles of the Republic will be forgotten, and heavy pressure will be brought to bear on all who refuse compliance with the plan.
THE PRICE OF FREEDOM
Are there any indications as yet that any such lamentable development might take place? Though still vague and shadowy, they are surely taking shape. One recalls the rapid growth of Roman Catholicism in this country, its powerful influence in political affairs, the agitation for closer relations with the Vatican, and the appointment of a special presidential envoy to the Roman see.
Furthermore, no one who has followed religious trends for the past few years can have failed to note the increasing demand on the part of many religious leaders for a closer union, not only of the various Protestant bodies, but also of Protestants and Catholics.
At a joint meeting of the Anglican, Roman Catholic, and Free Churches held recently in St. Paul’s Cathedral, London, the archbishop of Canterbury stated: “The difference between Catholic and Protestant is very small, compared with Christian and non-Christian. Our differences remain. We shall not pretend that they are already resolved into unity or into harmony, but we take our stand on the common faith of Christendom.”
This attitude is typical of the new situation in all Protestant lands today, and particularly so in the United States. In religious matters the brandished fists are giving place to outstretched hands of collaboration. But while in many respects this new spirit of friendly co-operation is most commendable, it nevertheless contains one element of peril. Before unity can be achieved, one side at least must be willing to yield its old positions; and when Protestants and Catholics “unite,” it is the Protestants who must make all the concessions. Rome’s motto, always the same, -prevents her from changing, so the tendency of all such collaboration is to bring the participants into ever closer agreement with the papacy.
Many Christians who deplore the divided state of Christendom feel an imperative urge to achieve unity at all costs; but let them beware of the aftermath. They may discover that, having achieved a superficial unity, and having clothed it, perchance, with state authority, they have succeeded only in creating an organization so like the original papacy that people will say that it is the very “image” of it..
This peril is indicated in the prophecy under consideration, where we read that, when, America has grown to full power, “an image to the beast” will actually be established. Revelation 13: 14.
Protestants who are not prepared to surrender their convictions, or the fundamentals of their faith, will do well to watch these developments with great care. Present trends even in this “land of the free and the home of the brave” could lead easily into a period of intolerance toward those who refuse to co-operate.
We shall all need to be on the alert, therefore, for possible attempts to create an enactment which, though bearing innocent titles, and represented as being for the good of the community and the world in general, are at the same time out of harmony with that fundamental of the Constitution which prohibits Congress from passing any law concerning religion. In such a case all who understand the Bible and the great prophecies for our time will recognize the move for what it is -the “ image to the beast” coming to life and setting forth to intimidate and persecute those who “keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.” See Revelation 14:6-12. That will be the time for God’s loyal children to reveal the depth of their allegiance to His holy law, and to the true Sabbath of the fourth commandment.
All this is not a happy prospect, we agree, especially for those who have stood staunchly for Protestant principles, and for evangelical Christianity, through the years. Nevertheless it constitutes a solemn warning both to them and to all lovers of civil and religious liberty to be forever on guard against any encroachments upon these priceless possessions. There is danger ahead, and “eternal vigilance” is needed more today than ever before in America’s history.
It should be remembered, of course, that this remarkable prediction in the latter part of the thirteenth chapter of Revelation belongs to the closing events in the age-old drama of world history. That we can now see its fulfillment gradually but surely coming to pass before our eyes is another convincing indication that we are living close to that last sublime event when the Lord Jesus shall return in His glory, and “the kingdoms of this world” shall become “the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ; and He shall reign forever and ever.” Revelation 11:15.
Surely the momentous developments of these times challenge us to reconsider our responsibilities to God and man, “and so much the more” as we “see the day approaching.”
TERRIFYING as the progress of some vigorous aggressor may be during his lifetime, it is surprising how soon he fades from the minds of men once his career is ended. History books are cluttered with the names of forgotten conquerors whose conquests have passed almost completely from the memory of man. How true are the words of Shakespeare:
Glory is like a circle in the water, Which never ceases to enlarge itself, Till, by broad spreading, it disperse to naught. -King Henry VI.
Among the greatest conquerors of all time was a Mongol named Genghis Khan; but how many people today could tell when he lived or what he conquered? Born in AD 1162 he early revealed unusual gifts of leadership, and soon, at the head of massive armies, he swept over large areas of China, India, and Russia, until at last he had extended his empire from the China Sea to the banks of the Dnieper He sacked cities by the score, massacring the inhabitants. He assumed the titles, “Emperor of All Men, Mighty Ruler, Rider of Heaven,” while his deeds of cruelty struck terror into the hearts of millions. But the Encyclopedia Britannica summarizes its record of his exploits with this significant statement: “The empire which he created ultimately dwindled away under the hands of his degenerate descendants, leaving not a wrack behind.”
VANISHED VICTORIES
Tamerlane, or Timur, as he is sometimes called, was another such notorious character. During the latter part of the fourteenth century, from AD 1370 to 1400, he led his conquering legions through Persia to the Caucasus and as far east as Delhi in India. He established his power “from the Volga to the Persian Gulf and from the Hellespont to the Ganges.” He captured Bagdad, Aleppo, and Damascus, and he scored a great victory over the Turks at Angora in 1402. His soaring ambition led him to plan an expedition to China, but in 1405 death intervened and he was buried at his capital, Samarkand. Then, as the years passed, the memory of his greatness vanished, until at last doubt arose as to where he had been buried. In 1940 the government of the U. S. S. R. sponsored an investigation to discover the truth or falsehood of certain legends that had grown up about his resting place. Scientists were sent to Samarkand, and there they found the mighty Tamerlane- a skeleton amid a pile of dust! All the pomp and glory departed; all the pride and vainglory a shadow and a dream; all the triumphs forgotten; naught left but moldering bones!
Men whose names have crowded the headlines in our time with deeds of shame and cruelty are likewise doomed. They, too, will pass. They will be numbered among the forgotten conquerors, while their bones turn to dust, “unwept, not honored, and unsung.”
The message of Tamerlane’s tomb is indeed a solemn warning to all who seek to advance themselves and their causes by wickedness and terror; who exalt might above right, and who seek personal aggrandizement regardless of the sufferings of others. For them “the paths of glory lead but to the grave.”
“In sober, realistic earnest,” writes Dr. Fosdick, “there are eternal things in man’s experience, and they are the spiritual. Here, for example, are the names that filled the ears of men in one of the most significant centuries in human history. Consider how much you know about any one of them: Sultan Mohammed 11, Pizarro, Cesare Borgia, Charles the Bold, Solyman the Magnificent, Baber, Francis I-they were the great names of a century’s conquerors. But here are three other names out of the same century: Columbus, the discoverer of a new world; Copernicus, the revealer of a new universe; Luther, the forerunner of a new spiritual freedom. And now any school child can tell who they were, for when time has sifted the wheat from the chaff, it is the works of violence that perish and the achievements of the spirit that endure.”-Harry Emerson Fosdick, The Church of Christ in a Warring World, pages 12, 13.
On the eighth of December, 1840, a little more than one hundred years ago, a young man boarded a sailing ship at an English port and set off for a foreign land. He was quite unknown, except to a few friends who wished him Godspeed on his long, wearisome journey. No imposing committee saw him off, no newspaper announced his departure. It was David Livingstone leaving for Africa under the auspices of the London Missionary Society.
No doubt a thousand other things happened on that day of seemingly much greater importance. Many affairs of state and city loomed much larger in the eyes of London’s citizens. There were speeches in Parliament and guests arriving at the court. There were movements of the army and the navy, and developments, on the continent of no small moment. Nevertheless, the sailing of this youth for Africa was the greatest event of all.
CONQUERORS FOR CHRIST
For Livingstone had given his heart to Africa. He had dedicated his life to a great spiritual mission. His field, as he said, “was not a country but a continent,” and he was about to take the leading part in a world-changing enterprise. He was going to discover Africa as no one had ever discovered it before. He was going to open its long-barred doors and let in the light of the gospel to a people groping in heathen darkness. He was going to strip the mask of respectability from the slave traders, and the chains from the slaves themselves. He was going to blaze a trail of service and ministry that a host of other men would follow. He was going forth as a conqueror for Christ.
Truly he buried himself in Africa, yet it was like a corn of wheat falling to the ground and growing, not alone, but multiplied a thousand fold.
Although he did not live to see all his dreams come true, looking back from our vantage point a hundred years later, we can see the magnitude of his work and the far-reaching effects of the beneficent enterprises that his noble, self-sacrificing example inspired. Today his body lies among the great in Westminster Abbev, and his name is honored everywhere.
So shall it ever be. By some eternal law of the universe those who conquer for lust and pride and vainglory pass away with their evil deeds, but all who dedicate their lives to the service of others shall never perish.
GOD AND AGGRESSORS
These profound truths are emphasized again and again in the Scriptures to bring courage and hope to us “upon whom the ends of the world are come.” 1 Corinthians 10:11. There is no need to become discouraged even in the face of the most grievous depredations of unscrupulous men. As the psalmist says: “Fret not thyself because of evildoers. For they shall soon be cut down. Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him.” Psalm 37:1-7. God still lives, and in His own good time He will arrest their progress and bring them to judgment. And when it is all over, and the heat of battle has cooled, it will be found that the conquerors have vanished, while truth and righteousness, like the legendary phoenix in the fire, have emerged once more triumphant and unscathed.
Speaking through Habakkuk in ancient times, the voice of prophecy referred to the Chaldeans, or Babylonians, as a “fierce and fiery race, who march the broad earth over to seize homes not their own.” It described them as “a destructive power, swifter than leopards their horses, keener their cavalry than wolves by night, they swoop from far away like vultures pouncing on their prey; their host swarms up for havoc, eager and onward, sweeping up prisoners like sand.” Habakkuk 1:6-9, Moffatt.
The prophet then raised the question-one that is in the minds of millions today: “Are they to go on drawing the sword, murdering peoples without pity?” Verse 17. He waited for God’s answer, and finally it came.
“Then answered the Eternal, ‘Take down this oracle on your tablets plainly, that one may read it at a glance. The vision has its own appointed hour, it ripens, it will flower; if it be long, then wait, for it is sure, and it will not be late.”’
What was this vision that was to be so plainly, so indelibly, recorded? Here it is. Speaking of the proud, boastful leader of the Chaldean armies, God said:
“You impious man! his powers shall fall him. He is a braggart, restless, rapacious as the grave, like Death, he never has enough; he would sweep all nations in, he would rake in every race. Shall not they all taunt him in chorus, and shout this satire at him? Woe to him who heaps up plunder (ah, how long!), loading himself with what he must repay! You have planned the down come of your house, by cutting off many a nation-so have you forfeited your life.” Habakkuk 2:2, 4-10, Moffatt.
History tells us how the words of the prophet came to pass. The impious man, the braggart, who once boasted, “Is not this great Babylon that I have built by the might of my power, and for the honor of my majesty?” lost his reason and was driven from his palace to live like a beast in the field. Daniel 4:30, 33. His vast empire, built on the blood and tears of suffering multitudes, finally cracked and crumbled.
There have arisen numerous impious braggarts in this twentieth century. We are all familiar with them. They have marched “the broad earth over to seize homes not their own.” With their air armadas they have swooped “from far away like vultures pouncing on their prey.” But their end is certain. The face of God is against them.
A VISION OF CONQUEST
In the book of Revelation an amazing sequence of predictions brings out with striking forcefulness this same comforting truth. Chapters eight, nine, ten’ and eleven of this wonderful book deal with the sounding of the “seven trumpets”- symbolic imagery used by God to describe in advance the rise and progress of many a mighty, but now forgotten, conqueror, leading on to the crowning climax of the long trail of blood and tears to occur in our time.
This vision was given to the apostle John while he was in exile on the isle of Patmos, probably near the close of the first Century AD. Perhaps because he was a captive of the Roman Empire, God thus revealed to him the very forces which would bring that empire to dissolution.
As the trumpets sounded, wild, tempestuous characters charged on to the stage of history and rode roughshod over the proud possessions and institutions of the nation.
“The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth: and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up.” Revelation 8:7.
Here was a fitting picture of the terrifying invasion of Roman territory by the Goths, under their merciless leader, Alaric. This took place about the end of the fourth century AD, three hundred years or so after prophecy had spoken through the apostle John.
Twice did Alaric cross the frontiers of the empire, the first time ravaging Thrace, Macedonia, and Greece, and the second time crossing the Alps and the Apennines and storming the Eternal City itself. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.au“Hail,” “fire,” and “blood” accurately symbolized the ravages of his followers as they swept over all Italy and much of Gaul.
“And the second angel sounded, and as it were a great mountain burning with fire was cast into the sea: . . . and the third part of the ships were destroyed.” Verses 8, 9.
Following rapidly upon the heels of Alaric came the terrible Genseric, king of the Vandals. He made his capital in Carthage in north Africa and, having created a powerful fleet, he and his piratical bands swept far over the Mediterranean, leaving death and destruction in their wake. The prophecy indicated that his conquests would be naval, and such indeed they were. During the greater part of the fifth century A. D., Genseric triumphed over the waning power of Rome, and in his frequent onslaughts on her fleet and naval bases was indeed “as it were a great mountain burning with fire. . . . cast into the sea.”
MEN WHO VANQUISHED ROME
“And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters; and the name of the star is called Wormwood.” Verses 10, 11.
Even while Genseric was fighting against Rome upon the sea, Attila with his hordes of Huns was storming the empire from the north. Remarkably enough his principal operations were in the neighborhood of the Alps, “the fountains of waters” from which many a river is supplied; but wherever he and his followers proceeded they left nothing behind but ruin and devastation. In AD 451 he sacked most of the cities of Belgic Gaul, and the following year he treated the cities at the head of the Adriatic in similar drastic fashion, thereafter plundering and murdering through all western Lombardy. A contemporary has left on record the fact that “he walked with a proud step, darting a haughty glance this way and that as if he felt himself lord of all, and it was his boast that “the grass never grew on the spot which his horse had trod.” No wonder the prophet designated him “Wormwood,” suggestive of the bitterness and misery that the very mention of his name inspired among men.
“And the fourth angel sounded, and the third part of the sun was smitten, and the third part of the moon, and the third part of the stars; so as the third part of them was darkened, and the day shone not for a third part of it, and the night likewise.” Verse 12.
Now upon the scene of destruction and desolation came Odoacer, king of the Heruli, who with his Goths accomplished the final overthrow of the Roman Empire of the West in AD 476. The strange reference to the sun, moon, and stars suggests the passing of the various phases of the Roman government. As Elliott says: “The senate sent away the imperial insignia to Constantinople; professing to the emperor of the East that one emperor was sufficient for the whole of the empire. Thus of the Roman imperial sun that third which appertained to the Western Empire was eclipsed, and shone no more.” - E. B. Elliott, Horae Apoedypticae, volume I, Page 358.
Again quoting from the same source: “She saw her glories star by star expire,’ till not even a single star remained, to glimmer on the vacant and dark night.”
RISE OF MOHAMMED FORESEEN
“And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star fall from heaven unto the earth: and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit; and there arose a smoke out of the pit, as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit.” Revelation 9:1, 2.
Here and in the following ten verses the prophet’s vision was carried forward another two hundred years to the next spectacular period of conquest when, like smoke out of a bottomless pit, the fanatical followers of the mighty Mohammed swarmed out of the wild, desolate vastness of Arabia, carrying fire and sword through north Africa, Palestine, and parts of Asia Minor. Their leader, according to verse ii, was to be known as Abaddon, or Apollyon, meaning “Destroyer;” and certainly no one ever so well deserved this title as the conquering prophet of Allah and his successors. However, as the word “king” is employed, the title may apply particularly to Othman, who, in the thirteenth century, founded the powerful Ottoman Empire.
It is of special interest to note at this point the reference in the fifth verse of this chapter to a prophetic time period of five months, or 150 days, which on the Biblical basis of a day for a year, represents 150 years.
If, as many commentators agree, this period was designed to commence when Othman directed his http://www.ThreeAngels.com.aufirst assault upon the Greek Empire, which was coincident with the beginning of Ottoman power, that date would be according to the historian Edward Gibbon, July 27, 1299. See Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 54, paragraph 14. Adding i5o years to 1299would carry the story down to 1449, when the next epochal change was to take place, according to the symbolism of the sixth trumpet.
POWER OF THE TURKS DELINEATED
“And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God, saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates. And the four angels were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, for to slay the third part of men.” Revelation 9:13-15.
As the Ottoman Empire by this time covered the whole territory watered by the river Euphrates, it is clear that it was the sudden expansion of this power that was now brought to the prophet’s view. After having been under a certain measure of restraint for 150 years, it was released for further conquests. So in vision John may well have seen the virtual surrendering of national independence by the Greeks in 1449, when the new emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire would not venture to ascend his throne without seeking the consent of Amurath II, the Turkish sultan. John the revelator may well have seen also the capture of Constantinople by the Turks in 1453, followed by their conquering career through central Europe to the gates of Vienna. Certainly he noted one important reason for the swift Turkish successes - the use of firearms, with “fire and smoke and brimstone” seeming to come out of the heads of their horses when the warriors fired their guns over the heads of their horses as they rode into battle. He recorded also how long this cruel and despotic power would continue, narrowing the period of its aggressiveness down to exactly three hundred and ninety-one years and fifteen days.*
Adding this period of three hundred ninety-one years and fifteen days to July 27, 1449, carries us down to August 11, 1840, on which day the government of the once all powerful Ottoman Empire surrendered its independence to the four great powers, England, Russia, Austria, and Prussia.
It is interesting to recall in this connection that, two years before this happened, in 1838, Josiah Litch, a student of prophecy, announced from his calculations, based on the time periods of the fifth and sixth trumpets, that Turkish independence would cease on this date, August 11, 1840. As the day approached, thousands watched to see if his interpretation would prove correct.
All this time a war had been raging between the Turkish sultan and Mehemet All, pasha of Egypt, with the pasha enjoying such success that the four powers mentioned above became alarmed lest he take the sultan’s throne, a development they did not wish. So a conference of the powers was held in London,-with an Ottoman representative present, at which it was agreed that the sultan should offer terms of settlement to the pasha, on the understanding that, should the pasha decline them, the four powers would take the matter into their hands. The ultimatum was duly sent, and was placed in the hands of the pasha on August 11, 1840. By seeking and accepting the assistance of the four powers, the sultan openly acknowledged his dependence upon them. It was a pitiful end to the might of the Ottoman conquerors.
*An ordinary year in Jewish reckoning consists of three hundred sixty days. Ezekiel 4:6 and Numbers 14:34 help to establish the year-day principle of prophetic interpretation, as explained on page 102. Therefore, the prophetic “year” mentioned in this verse represents 360 literal years; a prophetic “month,” or thirty days, equals thirty literal years; one “day” equals one literal year; one “hour,” the twenty-fourth part of a day, represents one twenty-fourth of a literal year, or fifteen days. Thus the total is three hundred ninety-one years and fifteen days.
The exact fulfillment of the prophecy to the very day caused a great sensation at the time, and incidentally Provided a mighty impetus to the advent movement which was already attracting widespread attention.
THE SEVENTH TRUMPET SOUNDS
But now we come to the most astounding feature of this sequence of predictions. Turning to the eleventh chapter of the Revelation, we read:
“And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying. The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ; and He shall reign forever and ever. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auAnd the four and twenty elders, which sat before God on their seats, fell upon their faces, and worshiped God, saying, We give Thee thanks O Lord God Almighty, which art, and was, and art to come; because Thou has taken to Thee Thy great power, and has reigned.” Revelation 11:15-17.
Thus the prophet, after looking across more than seventeen centuries of conflict and turmoil, after watching conqueror after conqueror sweep on his devastating course across the blood-soaked earth, suddenly became aware of heaven’s interest in this tragedy. He looked above and saw
God still in control, still guiding human destiny; he saw Him preparing to bring all this horror to a close and take to Himself His own great power, and reign!
Remembering that the sixth trumpet ceased to sound in 1840, consider the enormous significance of the verse that follows:
“And the nations were angry, and Thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that Thou should give reward unto Thy servants the prophets, and to the saints, and them that fear Thy name, small and great. And should destroy them which destroy the earth.” Verse 18.
“The nations were angry.” Only God could have so perfectly summarized, in four short words, the history of the past hundred years. Looking down the ages, He saw that this would be the predominant feature of our time. How true it has proved to be! From the great revolution that swept Europe in 1848, through the Crimean War and the Franco-Prussian War and the Boer War, until the smoldering fires of international hatred burst forth in the World War of 1914-1918, there is observable a mounting fury that fulfilled this amazing prophecy. And what shall we say of the years that have elapsed since then? Of the systematic inculcation of hatred and revenge practiced by certain great powers on a scale never before contemplated? Of the ferocity of the fighting as war broke out again and spread abroad to embrace every continent, every ocean, every island, around the globe? Of the multiplied horrors of modern, scientific warfare? Of the barbarism and cruelty inflicted upon innocent millions by heartless, hate-filled enemies? What more accurate description of it all could there be than those four expressive words, “The nations were angry”?
That we are living “in the days of the voice of the seventh angel,” there can be no question. And before this voice ceases, the wrath of God shall be poured out upon all who are in rebellion against Him; while those who destroy the earth shall themselves be brought to destruction.
At this time also “the mystery of God” shall be finished. Revelation 10:7; Ephesians 1:9,10. The blessed gospel of redeeming love shall be carried to earth’s remotest bounds and shall be crowned by that glorious event when God shall give reward to His “servants the prophets, and to the saints,” and to them that fear His name, “small and great.” Thus the day of the vindication of the righteous is near at hand, and the humblest child of God may take fresh courage and look with renewed confidence toward the promised deliverance that cannot now be long delayed.
THE LAST MIGHTY CONQUEROR
Surely we have here another of the great prophecies for our time, full of counsel and warning, but filled also with cheer and encouragement for these latter days. Conquerors may come and conquerors may go, but not one of them can change the plans or deflect the purposes of the Almighty. They may work havoc in the earth; they may perpetrate the most fearful atrocities upon their fellow men; but God bides His time, keeping record of every act of cruelty and oppression until the day ofjudgment. As Job said long ago: “The wicked is reserved to the day of destruction. They shall be brought forth to the day of wrath.” Job 21:30. Fearful indeed will be the punishment of those who have brought immeasurable and needless suffering upon helpless and innocent human beings.
But when all battles are over, and all lighting has ceased. When all who have striven so desperately for world dominion have been forgotten. When all their ambitious plans have gone to pieces, and all their blatant boastings have been silenced; then “the kingdoms of this world” shall “become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ; and He shall reign forever.”
“And He shall reign.” Not Alaric or Genseric. Not Attila or Odoacer. Not Mohammed or Othman. Not Charlemagne or Charles V or Louis XIV or Napoleon. No; not one of them, but Christ! Already they, for the most part, have joined the legion of forgotten men-forgotten conquerors, indeed! But Christ, the Lamb of God, the suffering Savior who gave Himself for lost mankind, who came from heaven to earth “not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). Who came not “to destroy men’s lives, but to save them” (Luke 9:56); who came to help, to heal, to serve, to love-yea, “He shall reign forever and ever.” http://www.ThreeAngels.com.au“The Lamb shall overcome.” Revelation 17:14 There can never be the least doubt about that. His final victory is beyond question. He is the coming Conqueror. And because of this unalterable fact the voice of prophecy, full of glorious confidence, cries out across the centuries to every wavering, trembling heart: “Strengthen you the weak hands, and confirm the feeble knees. Say to them that are of a fearful heart, Be strong, fear not: behold, your God will come with vengeance, even God with a recompense; He will come and save you.” Isaiah 35:1 4.
NO ONE can read the Bible for long without coming to the conclusion that Jesus Christ was the greatest of the prophets. Not only did He inspire the words of Moses and Isaiah, of Ezekiel and Daniel, and the other mighty prophets of olden times, but when He came to earth, He spoke of things to come “as never man spoke.” He unveiled the future with divine authority and the unerring vision of omniscience. It is therefore of special interest to consider what He had to say concerning His second advent and the conditions that will prevail at that time.
We have already noted how accurately Jesus foretold the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70, and the signal which He gave to His followers that they might know the precise time to escape; but this was only the beginning of a series of revelations of even greater moment. He went on to tell of the coming travail in store for mankind, of the fearful persecution to befall His church, of centuries of sorrow and suffering to continue until the glorious deliverance He would bring at His own triumphant return.
It was His reference to the imminent destruction of the temple at Jerusalem which led Him to give this remarkable forecast of history-to-be. Soon after He had announced that there should not be left “one stone upon another” of that beautiful building His disciples “came unto Him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of Thy coming, and of the end of the world?” Matthew 24:2, 3.
They presumed that the destruction of the temple would synchronize with the end of the world, that nothing less than a supernatural upheaval of this sort could ever sweep away anything so stable as this stately edifice. Reading their thoughts, Christ seized the opportunity to illuminate their minds concerning the future and to warn them of the long period of time that must elapse before the final culmination.
Jesus had already spoken to them about His Second Coming. Interpreting the parable of the sower, He had said: “The harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels.... The Son of man shall send forth His angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; and shall cast them into a furnace of fire. So shall it be at the end of the world.” Matthew 13:39-49. Again, in describing the occasion, He said, “For the Son of man shall come in the glory of His Father with His angels; and then He shall reward every man according to his works.” Matthew 16:27. Nevertheless, despite all the emphasis He had placed on the fact that He must go away and then return some day, He knew full well that they did not understand the full significance of His statements; least of all did they comprehend how long would be the delay before His promised advent in glory.
As the disciples were gathered about Jesus on the Mount of Olives, the Master Prophet revealed to them signs that would precede His second advent to this world.
As the disciples were gathered about Him upon the Mount of Olives, high above the walls and flat roofed houses of old Jerusalem, the Master Prophet swung back the doors of the future.
“Take heed that no man deceive you,” He began. “For many shall come in My name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many.” Matthew 24:4, 5.
He was deeply concerned about the danger of deception, returning to the matter later, saying: “If any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or there; believe it not. For there shall arise false christs, and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.” Verses 23,24.
He wanted His disciples to be absolutely sure about the subject of His return, and to be fully fortified against all imposters. They were to be ever on guard, remembering the instruction He had given them concerning the nature of His return and the form in which He would reappear. He could not have made His counsel on these points more clear and definite. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auIf anyone should say to them, “Behold, He is in the desert,” or that He had appeared in some “secret chambers,” they were to give the report no credence. There would be nothing secret about His coming. Instead, it would be brilliant, glorious, spectacular, for all the world to see. “For as the lightning comes out of the east, and shines even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.” Verses 26,27.
But Christ was equally anxious that His disciples should not become discouraged as time would pass without their hopes being realized, and as each succeeding year would become more overcast with tragedy. So He said to them: “You shall hear of wars and rumors of wars: see that you be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.” Verse 6.
He was trying to extend their vision. He wanted them to know that the end was not immediately at hand in their day. Years- decades, centuries must pass; incredible suffering and disappointment must first be endured. “For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilence, and earthquakes, in divers places. All these are the beginning of sorrows.” Verses 7, 8.
In these words He let them glimpse something of the vastness and, constancy of international strife that would exist all down the ages-and how accurate was His forecast! Every generation has been cursed with wars; some small, some great, but always increasing in magnitude and destructiveness through the years, and always followed in dreadful but regular sequence by famines and pestilence.
THE BEGINNING OF SORROWS
It was a sad revelation of human folly, tragedy, and suffering; but even so all this was to be but “the beginning of sorrows.”
The beginning of sorrows? Yes, for still worse was to come. There would be persecution, bitter and cruel in the extreme. “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and you shall be hated of all nations for My name’s sake. And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another.” Verses 9, 10.
One can almost see the tense look of anxiety on the faces of the disciples as, with their Lord, they peered down the centuries and beheld the coming trials of the children of God, first at the hands of pagan Rome, then from the cruel overlords of the apostate church. They saw the true followers of Christ crucified by hundreds, thrown to the lions in the arena, tortured on the rack, burned at the stake, buried alive, sawn asunder, abused, tormented, massacred. It was a fearful and frightening picture, and there must have been a silence full of pain as Jesus quietly and sorrowfully continued: “Then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.” Verse 21.
His mind was now far down the ages, past the savagery perpetrated on the Albigenses and the Waldenses, past the worst horrors of the Inquisition, near the end of the dreadful period of papal persecution. He was thinking of the time period allotted to this medieval ecclesiastical despotism. The 126o days, or years, of its supremacy, during which it was to “wear out the saints of the Most High” (Daniel 7:25) and He added: “Except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened.” Matthew 24:22.
This was indeed a marvelous prediction, for it revealed amazing knowledge of the details of history that still lay centuries in the future. As the reader will recall, the i26oyear period began in AD 538 and ended in 1798; but persecution was not of the same intensity throughout its entire duration. It reached its peak between the eleventh and the sixteenth centuries; then, with the spread of democratic ideas, the increasing tendency toward toleration, and, not least, the opening up of the New World, it declined until it practically ceased over most of Europe in the latter half of the eighteenth century. About this same time, on July 21, 1773, the Society of Jesus-which had so ardently supported the Inquisition and the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes and other repressive measures against Protestantism -was dissolved by order of Pope Clement XIV. Thus the “days” were “shortened,” as Christ had predicted more than seventeen hundred years before.
But the most startling predictions of the Master Prophet were yet to come. Now He said: 1mmediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken.” Verse 29.
A SIGN IN THE SUN
Here was indeed a daring prophecy: “Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened.” But in Mark’s Gospel Christ’s words are even more specific: “In those days, after that http://www.ThreeAngels.com.autribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light.” Mark 13:24.
Here the possibilities of variation are narrowed to an exact order of events. “In those days,”-that is, before they should close in 1798 - but “after that tribulation” which ended about 1773, the sun was to be darkened and the moon would fail to give her light! Within the brief limit of these twenty five years these strange and spectacular phenomena were to occur. And there could not, must not, be a mistake, for these were to be outstanding signs of the approach of the Lord’s return.
Did it happen? On May 19, 1780, over a large area of the earth’s surface, the light of day turned suddenly and mysteriously into the blackness of midnight, and the moon was obscured.
This was the famous Dark Day of which Noah Webster wrote in his dictionary: “So called on account of a remarkable darkness on that day extending over all New England. Birds sang their evening songs, disappeared, and became silent; fowls went to roost; cattle sought the barnyard; and candies were lighted in the houses. The true cause of this remarkable phenomenon is not known.” - Edition 1869.
The New England Quaker poet describes the consternation in the Connecticut statehouse on that day as follows:
‘Twas on a May day of the far old year
Seventeen hundred eighty, that there fell
Over the bloom and sweet life of the spring,
Over the fresh earth and the heaven of noon,
A horror of great darkness.
Men prayed, and women wept; all ears grew sharp
To hear the doom blast of the trumpet shatter
The black sky, that the dreadful face of Christ
Might look from the rent clouds, not as He looked
A loving guest at Bethany, but stern As justice and inexorable Law.
John Greenleaf Whittier, “Abraham Davenport.”
This was the day described by the Boston Independent Chronicle on June 8, 1780, citing Thomas’s Massachusetts Spy, in the following graphic language: “During the whole time a sickly, melancholy gloom overcast the face of nature. Nor was the darkness of the night less uncommon and terrifying than that of the day. Notwithstanding there was almost a full moon, no object was discernible, but by the help of some artificial light, which when seen from the neighboring houses and other places at a distance, appeared through a kind of Egyptian darkness, which seemed almost impervious to the rays. This unusual phenomenon excited the fears and apprehensions of many people. Some considered it as a portentous omen of the wrath of Heaven in vengeance denounced against the land, others as the immediate harbinger of the last day when ‘the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light.”’
But the enthralled disciples, peering breathlessly into the future as they listened to the prophetic words falling from their Master’s lips, soon found themselves gazing upon another scene of celestial splendor. Said Christ, now giving in sequence and detail the signs of His imminent return: “And the stars shall fall from heaven.”
STARS FALL FROM HEAVEN
The stars fall! How could this be? Not the fixed stars, of course; but the meteors which rush into our atmosphere and give the impression that the heavens are crashing earthward.
According to Christ’s word, a celestial phenomenon on a stupendous scale was to follow the darkening of the sun. That is to say, it was to take place after A D 1780, a little farther on toward the end. And so it came to pass.
“On the night of November 12-13, 1833, a tempest of falling stars broke over the earth. North America bore the brunt of its pelting. From the Gulf of Mexico to Halifax, until daylight with some difficulty put an end to the display, the sky was scored in every direction with shining tracks and illuminated with majestic fireballs.”-Agnes M. Clerke, History of Astronomy in the Nineteenth Century, page 328.
“Though there was no moon,” wrote one observer, “when we first beheld them, their brilliancy was so great that we could, at times, read common-sized print without much difficulty, and the light which they afforded was much whiter than that of the moon, in the clearest and coldest night, when the ground is http://www.ThreeAngels.com.aucovered with snow. The air itself, the face of the earth, as far as we could behold it,-all the surrounding objects, and the very countenances of men, wore the aspect and hue of death, occasioned by the continued, pallid glare of these countless meteors, which in all their grandeur flamed ‘lawless through the sky.’ There was a grand, peculiar, and indescribable gloom on all around, an awe-inspiring sublimity on all above.
“There was scarcely a space in the firmament which was not filled at every instant with these falling stars, nor on it, could you in general perceive any particular difference in appearance. Still at times they would shower down in groups -calling to mind the fig tree casting her untimely figs when shaken by a mighty wind.”’-From a letter published in the American Journal of Science and Arts, vol. 25 (1834), Page 382.
“A magnificent display of shooting stars startled the inhabitants of the Americas on November 12, 1833. Beginning before midnight, the meteors increased in frequency until at dawn they were as thick as snowflakes. A single observer often saw twenty appear within a second.”- Fletcher G. Watson, Between the Planets, page 118 (1941).
FEAR GRIPS THE NATIONS
Scarcely had the disciples heard the description of this amazing spectacle to come, when the Master called their attention to the tragic conditions that would prevail throughout the world at that time. Not only would there “be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars,” He said, but also “upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity. The sea and the waves roaring; men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth.” Luke 21:25,26.
With these words He carried their minds forward through the nineteenth century into the twentieth, so that they beheld the fears and hatreds that led the angry nations into the World War of 1914-1918. They saw also the fearful famine, pestilence, and revolution which followed in the wake of that vast and terrible conflict.
They beheld all the world-shaking upheavals of our own time, with their incalculable human suffering, their attendant horror and cruelty, their heartbreaking misery and wretchedness. They saw all the frightful inhumanity of man to man, so prevalent in this midnight hour, all the destruction of man’s greatest works, all the blighting of his dearest hopes, all the quenching of his most cherished ambitions. They saw “men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth.”
Fear! How it dominates men’s thoughts everywhere today! Fear of the possible depredations of aggressive powers. Fear of bombs and sudden death. Fear of financial loss. Men are afraid that all they value most may be swept away in a wild tornado of universal trouble and disaster.
Many people are sick with fear. Their nerves are “shot to pieces” with the constant strain of anxiety. They worry about the ominous events that are taking place. They may put on a bold front for the sake of appearances, but somewhere within them their hearts are failing. They are worried about their children, their homes, their money, their future.
Describing conditions in Europe resulting from World War II, William Bayles, American war correspondent, reported: “Living in a free country you can’t know what life is like in a country where you may be suddenly called to die for something that may not remotely concern you.
“It means that people are afraid of their own shadows. Their spirit is numbed by a kind of paralyzing fear that makes life mere existence without hope or brightness. When I was in Prague the people kept their window shutters and blinds tightly drawn even in the afternoon. Friends I had known for years were afraid to meet or talk with me.... Fear dominated all their thinking, and with fear there was a black hatred that obscured everything else.
In the Polish town of Bromberg ... the people greeted one another only with their eyes. Fear filled the streets and empty cafes.
In Vienna the women in the endless food queues did not speak to one another. In Amsterdam it was the same. ‘Europe stinks with hate and fear,’ a Dutch professor remarked to me. He was right.”
“What is today the dominating force over great areas?” asked Sir Samuel Hoare in a recent address at Reading University. “It is fear, the most terrible fear, the fear of the nightmare that stops the blood and paralyzes the brain, the fear of the irresistible monster that overshadows the earth, spreading on all sides inescapable destruction.”
DARKNESS BEFORE DAWN
To such scenes of desperate trial and suffering Jesus directed the gaze of His astonished disciples. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auhttp://www.ThreeAngels.com.auHe portrayed to them the last signs that would herald His return to this earth.
Contrary to the expectation of some, the world would not, He said, evolve slowly into a new and better era; instead, conditions would steadily deteriorate until the distress and perplexity of mankind would become universal.
It was a discouraging picture, enough to depress the most optimistic spirit; and sensing this reaction in the hearts of His listeners, Jesus left them this cheering word: “When these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draws nigh.” Luke 21:28.
The darkest hour would precede the dawn. At the very time when conditions in the world would seem utterly hopeless, then would come the promised divine intervention, and they would “see the Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.” When hope and joy and peace have well-nigh perished from the earth, when all that is good and beautiful has been either destroyed or brought into imminent jeopardy, when human endurance has reached the breaking point and human need has plumbed its most abysmal depths. Then suddenly, gloriously, the heavens will part, and Christ will come to the rescue.
Of course Jesus knew that His first disciples would never live to see that day. When He said to them, “When you see these things come to pass,” He was not thinking of them in particular, but of disciples like them who would be living in the closing days of history. With His penetrating eye He looked beyond them to the vast world crisis in which we are living now. He was thinking of those who would love Him and acknowledge Him in this present “grand and awful time.” It was to this generation therefore that He said, “When you see these things come to pass, know you that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand.” Verse 31.
There can be no doubt upon this point. Look carefully at the warning He left on record in verses 34 and 35: “And take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares. For as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth.”
As the Master’s disciples sat on the Mount of Olives on that peaceful afternoon nineteen hundred years ago, what did they know about “the face of the whole earth”? Very little. In all probability their horizon was limited to Galilee and the environs of Jerusalem. One or two of them may possibly have traveled outside the borders of Palestine. It is clear, then, that when Christ uttered these words He was not thinking only of them, but rather of another generation of disciples who would live in that far-off day when all the world would be discovered. When the remotest regions of earth would be almost as familiar to everyone as their own home town; when men would awaken morning by morning to listen to news from Europe, Asia, Africa, America, Australia, and the islands of the sea.
LOOK UP!
Yes, the Master Prophet was looking down the ages to the wonderful and terrible hour in which we are living today. Ours is the privileged generation which shall see the grand deliverance, the long-hoped-for rescue that God has planned and promised “since the world began.”
To us, therefore, comes the inspiring, challenging exhortation: “Look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draws nigh”!
Dark and evil though this hour may be, bitter and cruel this tragedy, we are to look up, and lift up our heads!
Look up! Up toward the stars and God; and remember that the Most High rules in the kingdom of men. Look up! and tell yourself that God still lives and loves; that His “faithfulness reaches unto the clouds.” Psalm 36:5. Remember that “as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is His mercy toward them that fear Him.” Psalm 103:11. Look up! and review God’s plans, His resolute purpose, to cause truth to triumph and righteousness to cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. Behold with the eye of faith the Conqueror of Calvary sitting at the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens, and remember that the victory that He won on Golgotha ensures the absolute, total victory of justice, freedom, and goodness.
Thus from the lips of the Master Prophet Himself we have the blessed assurance that God is meeting the present world crisis with all the resources of eternity. His plans cannot possibly fail. Today His coming “is near, even at the doors.”
SEARCHING through history to find the first prophetic utterance on record, we discover it in the third chapter of the book of Genesis. There, in that familiar story of the beginnings of our world and of the human race, we read of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, and of a message of hope that came to them in their hour of sorrow.
Ashamed and afraid because of their disobedience to the plain command of their Creator, they were startled as they heard “the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day.” Genesis 3:8 They tried to hide, but God came ever nearer. His voice spoke again, this time in sad rebuke, announcing the dread penalty for sin: “Cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shall thou eat of it all the days of thy life. Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shall eat the herb of the field. In the sweat of thy face shall thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it was thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shall thou return.” Verses 17-19.
Out of Eden they must go-out into a world of hardship, struggle, and toil; of sickness, disappointment, and death. Yet as they turned their backs upon their beautiful home, so glorious in its pristine loveliness, there was a ray of hope to assuage their sorrow. For the Lord had said to the serpent concerning the conflict between the power of evil and the human race: “I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shall bruise his heel.” Verse 15.
Over and over again the unhappy pair must have repeated this promise as they constructed their new home, as they started work in the fields, as their family began to grow. The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent’s head! Surely that must mean ultimate victory and restoration!
HOPE FOR HUMANITY
How much significance Adam and Eve perceived in this promise no one can tell, but it was sufficient at least to implant within their despairing hearts a great new hope. Sometime, they knew not when; in some way, they knew not how; God would judge “that old serpent, called the devil, and Satan” (Revelation 12:9) for robbing them of their heavenly joys, and would mete out to him a just punishment for his crime. Someday, too, God would manifest His power on their behalf and give them back their Eden home.
They talked of it to their children; to their grandchildren, and to their great-grandchildren; for people lived long in those olden times. Some were glad for the promise, but many did not care. These had discovered that sin has its pleasures, and they were enjoying them to the full. In fact, that one act of disobedience in the Garden of Eden had started an avalanche of iniquity that soon swept over the majority of the human race.
When he was six hundred twenty-two years old, and still in his prime, Adam was privileged to look upon the seventh generation, when Enoch was born-the one who grew up to walk with God. He was different from other men, a man with a God-touched heart. He heard the story of the promise of the eventual triumph of right, and rejoiced in it. As he thought of it and prayed about it, God revealed to him some of the plans He had in mind for this world, how He was going to eradicate the evil that had marred its peace and beauty, and bring about a final restitution of all things.
Then, according to the inspired record in the epistle of Jude, “Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints, to execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.” Jude 14, 15.
This amazing prediction, dating back to within seven hundred years of creation, is remarkable not only because of its age, and because of the picture that it gives us of the state of the world in those early times, but even more because it was the first definite assurance that God’s plan of restoration involves His personal intervention. It was the first clear indication of His intention to come to this earth someday “to execute judgment upon all,” to reward those who have been loyal to Him, and to punish the wicked for “all their ungodly deeds.”
To those who, in that far-off day, were still striving amid widespread wickedness to serve the Lord, this message from heaven came upon their ears like a bugle call to a hard-pressed army. It revived their http://www.ThreeAngels.com.aufainting spirits and encouraged them to hold on to God no matter what should happen. From that time forward they could say triumphantly, “Behold, the Lord comes.”
FROM GENERATION TO GENERATION
The same stirring message was passed on by word of mouth from fathers to sons, from sons to grandsons. Stored in the heart of Noah and his children it leaped the Flood and was told again to their descendants. Like a cry across the centuries the blessed word has sounded from one generation to another: “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints.” It was a reminder of promised deliverance, an assurance of the final victory of truth and righteousness.
It lingered in the heart of Abraham, though he was reared in the pagan environment of Ur of the Chaldees. It made him ready to heed the call of God to leave his country and his father’s house and go forth to an unknown land. Again and again, as his faith was sorely tried, this hope sustained his courage. No matter how weary the way nor how bitter life’s disappointments, he whispered to himself: “Behold, the Lord comes.” “He looked,” we are told, “for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.” Hebrews 11:10. Through all his long, trying pilgrimage his eyes were ever turned heavenward for the fulfillment of the divine promise.
It reached into the home and heart of that godly patriarch Job, comforting him in the midst of his grievous trials. With awful suddenness, disaster after disaster befell him. Almost in a moment he was bereft of children, wealth, and honor.
As if this were not enough, he contracted a loathsome disease, and then physical and mental agony combined to crush his soul. Yet even then he refused to deny God. “Though He slay me,” he cried, “yet will I trust in Him.” Job 13:15. Something cheered him on, something caused him to look beyond the present hardship and agony to future joy. It was the same blessed word, “Behold, the Lord comes.”
At the height of his suffering he expressed a desire to record the secret of his endurance, the reason why the light in his soul could never be put out. He wanted others who might come after him to profit by his experience. “Oh that my words were now written!” he cried, “oh that they were printed in a book! that they were graven with an iron pen and lead in the rock forever!” And what was it that he wished to say in such enduring words? Listen to his testimony of hope and confidence: “I know that my Redeemer lives, and that He shall stand at the latter day upon the earth. And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another; though my reins be consumed within me.” Job 19:23-27.
So this precious word of cheer from the voice of prophecy rolled down the ages, bringing new courage and hope to every child of God.
Moses heard it during the persecution of his people in Egypt. No doubt his faithful mother had told him the story of the coming Messiah in his boyhood before he was taken to the royal palace by Pharaoh’s daughter. Then, when the supreme test came to him, and he had to make his choice whether to be king of Egypt or the leader of a nation of slaves, he decided to follow the counsel of the Lord, choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season. Esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt: for he had respect unto the recompense of the reward.” Hebrews 11:25, 26. He kept His eye on the future, upon that promised day of divine intervention and victory, and so “he endured, as seeing Him who is invisible.” Verse 27.
TWO ADVENTS FORESEEN
As years passed by and Israel became established in the Holy Land, that which had been but imperfectly understood in earlier times was more clearly revealed. With increasing frequency the voice of prophecy was heard. Through the great prophets of Israel the divine plan of salvation was ever more clearly unfolded. The word given through Enoch, “Behold, the Lord comes,” was seen to include two comings, the first in humiliation and suffering, the second in glory and power. Through the prophet Isaiah came the message that He would come first as a sacrifice and a burden bearer, to pay the price of sin. He would be “despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.” He would be “wounded for our transgressions” and “bruised for our iniquities” and upon Him would be laid “the iniquity of us all.” Isaiah 53:3-6. But beyond the sacrifice and sorrow there would dawn another and brighter day when He would “see of the travail of His soul, and be satisfied.” Verse ii. And in that day, at His Second Coming, the Lord would “destroy the face of the covering cast over all people, and the veil that is spread over all nations.” He would “swallow up death in victory; and wipe away tears from off all faces.” Then, said Isaiah, http://www.ThreeAngels.com.au“it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for Him, and He will save us: this is the Lord; we have waited for Him, we will be glad and rejoice in His salvation.” Isaiah 25:7-9.
Through the prophet Jeremiah came a similar announcement of the first advent of the Savior in meekness and humility, and of a second advent in glory and power. In a beautiful description of the coming of Jesus as the teacher of Galilee, he wrote: “Behold, the days come, said the Lord, that I will perform that good thing which I have promised unto the house of Israel and to the house of Judah. In those days, and at that time, will I cause the Branch of righteousness to grow up unto David; and he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land.” Jeremiah 33:14, 15. But in his twenty-fifth chapter, verses 30, 31, the prophet proclaimed, The Lord shall roar from on high, and utter His voice from His holy habitation; He shall mightily roar upon His habitation. He shall give a shout, as they that tread the grapes, against all the inhabitants of the earth. A noise shall come even to the ends of the earth; for the Lord bath a controversy with the nations, He will plead with all flesh; He will give them that are wicked to the sword, said the Lord.”
Speaking through Haggai, God said, “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, said the Lord of hosts.” Haggai 2:6, 7. Here was a clear reference to the first advent of Jesus and His coming to the temple; but in the same chapter we have this word which can only have its fulfillment in the final overthrow of evil in the last day: 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, everyone by the sword of his brother.” Verses 21,22.
THE ALL-IMPORTANT MESSAGE
Through all the writings of the major and minor prophets are to be found similar words of encouragement and warning. Essentially they are the same as the message given in the beginning through Enoch: “Behold, the Lord comes.” With one unanimous voice the prophets declare that He is coming, coming to serve, coming to die, coming to pay the price of sin; but coming also to reign as the world’s righteous Ruler through all eternity.
From the earliest times this has been the all-important message from God to man. Again and again it has been repeated, in one form or another, but always with the same insistence, the same tremendous emphasis. “Behold, the Lord comes.” Never was man to forget it. It was always to be uppermost in his thoughts, cheering him on his way, dispersing every tendency to discouragement, inspiring his zeal, and preserving his faith. Dark though the outlook might become, dreadful and terrible though the powers of evil might prove to be, yet in his heart the child of God was ever to cherish the blessed hope that someday the Almighty would intervene.
Turning to the New Testament we find that the apostles, having lived with Jesus and learned by the
closest possible association to regard Him with love and reverence, looked forward with expectation to the day of His reappearance in glory. Indeed, this became the constant theme of their preaching and teaching. Their writings are full of it. Three hundred eighteen times is the second advent mentioned in the New Testament. It is one of the main features of Paul’s epistles, and as for John, the beloved disciple, the subject of his Master’s return was clearly the focus of all his thoughts.
These men of God who walked with Jesus while He lived on earth heard the cry across the centuries; they heard it as it came echoing down from patriarchs, from prophets, and from the lips of Christ Himself; and then in powerful, living words they relayed it on to us. Hear it from the lips of the apostle Paul:
“For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto 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: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words.” 1 Thessalonians 4:15-18.
And again: “To you who are troubled rest with us, when 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.” 2Thessalonians 1:7, 8.
These words echo the original message of hope and cheer given through Enoch in the long ago! http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auAnd yet how much richer in content, how much fuller in detail! “The Lord comes” in very truth “to execute judgment upon all;” but He comes also to raise the dead to life, to gather the living righteous to Himself and carry them back to glory. He comes not only to deal with sinners but to reward the saints. He comes not only to destroy the ungodly but to give life, everlasting life, to all His faithful children-those who have loved Him and obeyed His will.
THE BLESSED HOPE OF THE AGES
The apostle Peter takes up the same glorious refrain, saying, “When the Chief Shepherd shall appear, you shall receive a crown of glory that fades not away.” I Peter 5:4. And again: “The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count slackness; but is long-suffering to us, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night. In the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.” 2 Peter 3:9, 10.
Turning now to the last book in the Bible we find the apostle John saying: “Behold, He comes with clouds; and every eye shall see Him, and they also which pierced Him: and all kingdoms of the earth shall wail because of Him.” Revelation 1:7.
“Behold, He comes.” Here again are the very words that Enoch had uttered more than three thousand years before. Thus they sound throughout the whole Christian Era to our own time. Down through the long periods of persecution and apostasy, through centuries of seemingly triumphant paganism, skepticism, and materialism, even to this present hour, they have been words of cheer to the hard-pressed soldiers of the cross, always reassuring them of ultimate victory and of an abundant reward in the everlasting kingdom of God.
This hope abides, and nothing can uproot it or remove it from the heart of man. Implanted there by God Himself it remains to this day. Prom age to age it has never died away or been forgotten. Always there have been some who have cherished it and passed it on to those who followed after them.
When Paul wrote to Titus he said that he was “looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ. Who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.” Titus 2:13, 14. It is still the blessed hope today for this tragic, sin-marred, war-shattered world. Only in the return of Christ in glory to assume His rightful lordship of the earth, to exert His illimitable power as supreme King and Conqueror of the ages, is there any prospect of those better times for which the aching heart of man so deeply yearns. Here is the remedy for all the world’s ills, the one way out of all its perplexities and tribulations.
“Behold, the Lord comes.” Across five thousand years and more this wondrous message from the voice of prophecy comes ringing down the centuries. May it ring in our hearts today!
IN OLD Jerusalem, by the sheep market, was a pool called Bethesda. Within its five arches. we are told, “lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water.” John 5:2, 3.
Of all the dark centers of human misery in that city this was probably the worst, for to Bethesda came all the incurables, old and young, with all manner of diseases. Their cases had been given up as hopeless by their physicians and their friends. Here, in physical and mental suffering, they waited for death with but one ray of hope to buoy them up. They believed that “an angel went down at a certain season into the pool, and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had.” Verse 4.
Some lay motionless on the hard ground; some sat doubled up with pain; some hobbled to and fro on crude crutches. Some gazed with almost sightless eyes toward the dark, still water below; but one and all they listened with tense expectancy for the agitation of the water which would tell them that the hour of their deliverance was at hand. Indeed, in imagination one can almost hear the blind calling to the lame, and the lame to the withered, saying: Was that a movement of the water over there? Did you see it? Surely the angel http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auwill come soon. I think I heard the rustle of his wings.
What disappointments there must have been around that pool, what broken hearts and bitter tears!
THE LODESTONE OF HUMAN NEED
And then one day, and a Sabbath day at that, Someone came. Not an angel, but, in very truth, the Prince of angels. He came quietly, unobtrusively, unexpectedly. While the sick folk were looking at the water, He came. Human need was like a lodestone to Him. And now, looking down in pity upon one of the sufferers, knowing that “he had been now a long time in that case, He said unto him, Wilt thou be made whole?” Of course the man wanted to be healed; but he had no one to put him in the water. “While I am coming,” he said, “another stepped down before me.”
Poor, lonely, helpless creature! Moved with compassion, Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up thy bed, and walk.”
The man stirred, rose to his feet, and leaped for joy, while a great new hope surged through the hearts of all who beheld the miracle.
How like is our world today to that place of suffering in old Jerusalem! On all the five continents, as under the five arches of Bethesda’s pool, are gathered “a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered, waiting.” They are waiting, hoping, longing for a deliverer to come.
They have their sorrows and heartaches, their personal troubles, their fears and perplexities. In every walk of life, in every nation, every city, every village, and almost every home, you will find them.
“BEHOLD, HE COMETH”
Will they be disappointed? No, indeed. The Man of Galilee still lives. He hears their cry in heaven, and never forgets one falling tear. And one day surely He will return. There can be no doubt about it. The prophetic evidence, as we have seen, is overwhelming. Suddenly, unexpectedly it will happen. He will come striding through the arches-down the spacious corridors of heaven.
How the world needs Him! More than anyone else, or anything else, the world needs Him. For no one else can solve its problems as He can. No one else can heal its naked wounds so swiftly and so well. No one else can restore all that has been lost and destroyed in the age long controversy between good and evil. No one else can plan so largely, so wisely, for the days to come. No one else has the power and the ability to reign as undisputed Ruler of a perfectly united world. No one else is so sure to make man’s brightest dreams of brotherhood and peace come true.
“Surely I come quickly,” He says again and yet again with ever-increasing certainty.
“Even so, come, Lord Jesus.” Revelation 22:20.
SINCE the dawn of the twentieth century there has come about, in every field of human activity, the most remarkable acceleration that the world has ever seen. It is as though someone suddenly had pushed the throttle of life to “full speed ahead!”
To quote an editorial statement in The Saturday Evening Post: 1nvention is shattering precedent in thousands of ways -unheard-of new materials coming into being-old ideas of speed and costs and efficiency fading into history.... Men in industry accomplishing undreamed-of miracles. Men of science casting into the discard the methods we called modern. Unbelievable speed is replacing what we called speed. New materials, new ways, progress.”
Speed and still more speed is the order of the day. Giant bombers and cargo planes, weighing thirty tons and more, hurtle through the air at more than three hundred miles an hour. Dive-bombers, in a power dive, have reached seven hundred twenty five miles an hour. Radio carries the human voice with the speed of lightning. Ten-thousand-ton ships are built in less than a week.
This is indeed the Air Age and the Electric Age; it is an age of research into all the secrets of Nature-a veritable golden era of material progress and wonders innumerable.
It is hard to believe that such extraordinary developments have taken place in so short a time; and harder still to realize what a different world it was only a hundred years ago. In the 1840’s there were no http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auairplanes, no cars, nor any sort of machine operated by an internal combustion engine. There were no trucks, no tractors, no tanks. There were no electric lights, nor any electrical appliances. One who had a gas jet in his house was regarded as a plutocrat. Railroads were in their infancy, and many people were still afraid of them. The sailing ship was sovereign of the seas, although a few primitive steamboats were making their appearance amid much public excitement. There were no thick newspapers with pictures in two or more colors; no telegraph or telephone. Antiseptics and anesthetics were unknown, and a visit to a hospital in those days must have been a nightmare indeed. Surgery was in the experimental stage, while dentistry and ophthalmology were barely beginning to open the way for scientific research in their fields. There was no antitoxin or insulin or sulfanilamide, or even a clinical thermometer!
AFTER DARKNESS, LIGHT
The fact is that a hundred years ago this world of ours was beginning to emerge from the mental torpor in which it had been languishing for ages. It was like a butterfly issuing from a chrysalis in which it had been mysteriously imprisoned from time immemorial. Indeed, prior to 1900, most people, even in so-called civilized lands, were living in much the same way that their forefathers had lived for thousands of years. They were still traveling from place to place on horseback; still plowing their fields with a single horse or ox; still for the most part living in houses without running water or bathrooms; still reading by candlelight; still doing most of their work laboriously by hand.
Our progress in this amazing century has not been confined, however, to mechanical contrivances. There has been a most extraordinary development in the realm of public education, with a consequent decrease of illiteracy. Less than a hundred years ago most of the inhabitants of the world, even in so-called civilized countries, could neither read nor write. One has only to turn to the graphic descriptions given by Charles Dickens of the English schools of the nineteenth century, to realize how appallingly incompetent they were; and even then only a small proportion of the population was able to benefit by the limited instruction bestowed. The rest had to rely on such scraps of information as they could pick up from their more fortunate friends. The elaborate system of colleges and schools familiar to us today, with compulsory free education for everyone, is a boon of recent acquisition. And it has resulted in an astonishing increase of knowledge and an expansion of vision never known before. It has opened up new fields of study and extended the horizons of human thought beyond any previous conception. Light has burst upon the mind of man after centuries of darkness.
Coincident with this expansion of knowledge and invention has been the complete exploration of the entire globe. A century ago much of the earth was enveloped in mystery, and only the most daring spirits set sail for lands afar. True, explorers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries had acquainted many people in the old world with the existence of great new territories beyond the seas, and occasionally ships would sail into home ports with all manner of strange tales and trophies from distant countries; but, for the most part, people were content to gossip about these unusual things and then continue with the regular routine of their lives.
Not until the nineteenth century was well advanced was any organized effort made to map the continents and chart the seas and open up their possibilities for trade and profit. Once this was started, however, there grew up fierce competition on the part of the empire-building nations and an eagerness to “get there first with the flag,” which soon carried the rival explorers to the very ends of the earth. Colonization then spread on in unprecedented scale. Men of courage and enterprise pressed their way through virgin forests, followed unknown rivers to their sources, crossed deserts, climbed mountains, and traversed prairies and plateaus never before seen by man. Great missionaries, like Livingstone and Moffat, Carey, Morrison, and J. Hudson Taylor, pioneered for God in Africa, India, and China. They were followed in turn by thousands of others of equal Christian fortitude who were spurred on by the power of Christ’s love to carry the gospel to “earth’s remotest nation.”
Today, with the advent of the airplane, the work of discovery has been practically completed. The last lost race -in the interior of New Guinea-has been found. Even the poles have been visited so often that an expedition to the arctic regions arouses no special public interest. As Jules Verne once wrote: “There are no more impassable deserts, no more unfathomable seals, no more inaccessible mountains.”
In a search for rubber, the United States Government arranged for no less than half a million rubber tappers and supporting staff to be sent up the Amazon Valley looking for wild rubber trees. Thus the Amazon jungles have already been explored on a scale no one would have dreamed possible in years gone by.
THE FINAL FRONTIERS
In like manner the deserts and jungles of Africa are stirring with sights and sounds never before experienced. For Africa has become the bridge between America and Asia, and particularly between America and the Near East. Across new highways, cut through vast wildernesses, supplies are moving to Egypt, Persia, India, and Russia. Over primeval forests, dotted here and there with new airfields, giant planes are constantly flying, startling the native peoples with the roar of their motors and the gleam of their wings.
In the far South Seas similar events have been proceeding. The Solomon Islands, so long regarded as of little consequence, a place for cannibals and missionaries have leaped to the front pages of our newspapers as “the key to the Pacific,” while even the smallest atolls have assumed immense and totally unexpected significance as possible air bases for future military or commercial use.
Thus the closing phases of modern world exploration are being completed with a thoroughness no one ever contemplated when it first began. The final frontiers are being reached and conquered.
Marvelous as all these developments undoubtedly are, however, the wonder of them is eclipsed by the fact that they were already foreseen by one of God’s prophets more than two millenniums ago. In other words, this amazing century is but another response of history to the voice of prophecy.
Turning to the twelfth chapter of the book of Daniel, we hear the angel of the Lord addressing the prophet in these words: “But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.” Verse 4.
The prediction finds its fulfillment in all the swift movements of travel and transport, all the unprecedented progress in science and invention, all the unexampled enlightenment of the masses, which are such outstanding features of this marvelous age.
A VISION OF OUR TIME
“Many shall run to and fro,” said the prophet. What a perfect description, in the simplest possible language, of the ceaseless movement of humanity in this restless age! Surely if, in his vision, Daniel glimpsed the thousands of planes now speeding from city to city and from continent to continent; if he beheld the liners and tankers, the battle ships and destroyers, moving swiftly over the oceans. If he saw the endless procession of passenger and freight trains roaring over the great steel roads that belt the continents; it must have seemed to him as though the whole population were in agitation, constantly on the move.
“And knowledge shall be increased.” How accurately these five prophetic words summarize all the scientific progress of our generation! Perhaps the prophet was permitted to behold the innumerable colleges and schools that now bring the treasures of learning within reach of the entire population. Perhaps there passed before him the flood tide of literature-of books and periodicals-now pouring from the printing presses of the world, and being eagerly devoured by multitudes. Then, too, he may have been shown the army of chemists now at work in their laboratories, searching out the secrets of nature. The specialists in electricity and aerodynamics bringing to light resources hidden for centuries; the archaeologists at work digging amidst the remains of buried civilizations, producing vital evidence to prove the accuracy of Bible history. And the astronomers with their sixty-inch, one-hundred-inch, and two-hundred-inch telescopes, peering ever farther into the mysteries of the universe, and establishing before the last generation of man the most overpowering proof of the reality and majesty of God. How better could Daniel have described his vision than in those meaningful words: “And knowledge shall be increased”?
It is important to notice the time when the fulfillment of this prophecy was to take place. It was not to happen in the days of Babylon, or Medo-Persia, or Greece, or Rome. It was not to follow immediately upon the breakup of the Roman Empire. This running to and fro, this universal increase of knowledge, was reserved for a special period of world history described as “the time of the end.”
“Shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end,” was the divine pronouncement.
To no other period in history than ours could these prophetic words be properly applied. As already noted, many Bible prophecies announce a time of trouble to occur prior to the final consummation. These words, however, suggest that, simultaneously, there will be an unexampled increase of knowledge. Both events will indicate that the time of the end has arrived.
OUR DAY IN PROPHECY
If we were surrounded by every comfort and convenience that science could provide, and at the http://www.ThreeAngels.com.ausame time there was not a cloud of trouble on the horizon, then indeed we might reasonably conclude that there had been some mistake about the interpretation of Daniel’s prediction, and that “the end” of which he spoke must yet be far in the future. But when we see about us a world full of confusion and perplexity,-and all this trouble coming about at the very climax of scientific research and accomplishment, -then we may know, from the mouth of these two witnesses, that the great prophecy of Daniel 12:4 has its application in our day, and that the unfulfilled prophecies that are closely related to the closing events of this earth’s history cannot be long delayed.
The question will no doubt arise in many minds, Why was the era of world enlightenment delayed until “the time of the end”? Why did not the increase of knowledge come in the days of Christ, or in the time of the Reformation? Why did the vast areas of the earth’s surface remain unknown and undiscovered until the eve of the twentieth century? Did it happen by chance, or did it come about in this way through another of the deep designs of Providence?
Without doubt, God has been behind it all. He knows “the end from the beginning,” and all down the ages He has been planning for this hour. He knew that the population of the world would multiply to fill the continents and spread forth to earth’s remotest bounds. He has been fully aware also of the magnitude of the problem of taking the gospel of His love to these vast hosts of humanity, and of the fact that this task must be completed before His eternal kingdom of peace can be established. Consequently, as the climax of history has come nearer, He has opened up long-closed resources of power; He has drawn aside the curtains that have hidden the secrets of science; and He has made available a thousand hitherto unimagined means and methods of quickly finishing His work in the world.
No, it is by no accident that this planet has suddenly become so small that it can be circumnavigated in less than a week; that the entire human race has been brought within range of a single voice; or that everyone is thinking today in global terms and studying global maps. Behind all these amazing developments a divine hand is at work; for God, too, has global interests and global responsibilities in this great hour.
The greatest words ever spoken tell us that “God so loved the world.” John 3:16. And because God so loved, -not one nation, not one hemisphere, but the whole globe, His message of mercy will be sent to all men everywhere around the earth. As Christ Himself said, “This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.” Matthew 24: 14.
From this latter verse it is clear that when the end of earthly history shall come-as one day it surely will-it will not come alone in central Europe, or in southern Asia, or in North America. It will come everywhere at the same time; and every nation, ‘kindred, tongue, and people will be immediately and directly affected.
For this reason-because this grand climax is fast approaching, and indeed is near, even at the doors -God is seeking to arouse mankind to perceive the seriousness of this solemn hour and the one hope of deliverance. Hence the increase of knowledge and the running to and fro; hence all the wonderful discoveries and inventions of our time. Hence also the global maps and the global thinking and the new and wider understanding of the world and its destiny.
Now, too, we can discern the profound purpose behind the great missionary movement of the past hundred years. It was indeed God-planned and God-inspired because the time of the end had arrived.
During this amazing century more missionary effort has been put forth and more money expended upon missionary enterprises than in all the years since Pentecost. From that historic day in 1793 when William Carey set forth on his lonely journey to India, until this present hour, there has been one continuous and ever-increasing effort on the part of Christian people to fulfill the Master’s commission to go into all the world and “preach the gospel to every creature.” Mark 16:15. Today the messengers of the cross are to be found in every country on the face of the earth, preaching in almost every language known to man, while the radio waves carry God’s last message to a dying world.
THE MIRACLE OF THE BIBLE
Moreover, during this same remarkable period the miracle of Bible translation and distribution has also been accomplished. Beginning in 1804, in the midst of the Napoleonic wars, the Bible societies expanded their efforts until they had built up one of the largest publishing businesses in the world. Indeed, in less than a century and a half, they have accomplished the greatest publishing feat in the story of books. They have taken a volume that has been subjected to more criticism and bitter enmity than any other book that ever came from a press, and they have made it better known and more popular than any other http://www.ThreeAngels.com.aupublication of any sort or description. More than that, they have given the Bible the largest circulation any book ever enjoyed, the grand total reaching well over a billion copies.
Of this vast total more than 305,000,000 have been distributed by the American Bible Society, 532,000,000 by the British and Foreign Bible Society, 139,000,000 by the National Bible Society of Scotland, and the balance by other smaller organizations.
These billion Bibles have been published in more than 1,050 languages. The whole Bible has been produced in 184; the New Testament in 227 more; and portions, consisting of at least one book, in 551 more. The remaining languages are those in which only portions of books have been printed.
Surveying the work of the Bible societies in a most informative pamphlet entitled Facts and Figures, published by the American Bible Society, the author says:
“This [billion sale] is a notable result solely as a business achievement. But, think of the millions of individuals in our own and other lands, known and unknown, who have been saved and blessed by the Scriptures sent out in such vast numbers, often unaccompanied by the human voice. Think, also, of the pastors and mission workers, the many churches and missions, which they have helped here in the homeland. What could the great foreign missionary enterprises of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries have done without these millions of Scriptures? The Christians of America have reason to rejoice in this supply of the word of God, accomplished by their aid.”
During the latter part of the eighteenth century, before the first Bible Society was established, Charles Wesley composed that beautiful hymn which begins:
O for a thousand tongues to sing
My great Redeemer’s praise!
The glories of my God and King,
The triumphs of His grace.
To Wesley this was, of course, but a dream. To the Christian church today it is a reality. In more than a thousand tongues the praises of Christ are sung each day around the world. The word of God is now available to more than 95 per cent of the world’s population, and somewhere every morning, “while earth rolls onward into light,” the voices of men, women, and children, belonging to every tribe on earth, are raised in praise and supplication to the Lord of glory. In the words of John
As over each continent and island
The dawn leads on another day,
The voice of prayer is never silent,
Nor die the strains of praise away.
The establishment of Christian missions in all the world is the crowning achievement of this age of wonders, the supreme end for which all the increase of knowledge and the swift means of transportation and communication were ordered by divine providence. And the work of salvation will continue despite every obstacle that may seem to hinder its progress, through war and peace, through storm and sunshine, until the purpose of God has been accomplished and “earth’s remotest nation has heard Messiah’s name.”
Then, when this gospel of the kingdom shall have been preached in all the world as a witness unto all nations, whether they accept or reject it-”then shall the end come.”
THERE has been but one other golden age in history and that was in the days before the Flood. Never since has the earth been fairer or more productive than it was then; for it had but recently come fresh from the hands of God, and was still unmarred by any catastrophe. A delightful climate and abundant means of sustenance made possible a life of luxury and leisure. Men of noble stature and giant intellect roamed the unspoiled countryside, enjoying such health, vigor, and longevity as have never been known since.
Yet even under such perfect conditions discontent crept in. Unbridled lusts clamored for http://www.ThreeAngels.com.ausatisfaction. Covetousness led to envy and hatred, followed by robbery and murder, until at last corruption and violence became well-nigh universal. It is said that even God, with all His infinite patience, grew weary of this fearful situation: “And it repented the Lord that He had made man on the earth, and it grieved Him at His heart. And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth.” Genesis 6:6, 7.
Then, with tragic suddenness, the triumphs of that first world civilization sank beneath the avenging waters of the Flood. The glitter of that golden age faded in the darkness that covered the stricken earth. The most highly privileged generation of ancient times, so richly blessed by a bountiful Creator, and so utterly forgetful of His mercies, perished in the judgment it so fully deserved.
Today our modern world stands in similar peril. Into our hands have been poured innumerable treasures of science and invention to minister to our comfort and happiness. Never was there such a brilliant era of material progress. Yet, morally and spiritually, the world is in much the same condition as it was in the days of Noah. Behind the gay, glittering exterior of our civilization there exists all manner of rottenness and decay. The termites of sin have been eating out its heart, leaving but a hollow, gilded shell.
It is indeed one of the strangest paradoxes of history that the generation most highly favored with mental enlightenment and mechanical devices should be blighted with crime and drift the farthest into godless paganism. Equally perplexing and disappointing is the way that the scientific products of this age have been prostituted to evil purposes. Thus the secret of photography has led to the production of many unseemly motion pictures; the secret of radio has become the vehicle for the broadcasting of jazz and nonsense. The secret of printing has provided the means for the universal dissemination of false teachings and ruinous philosophies; and the secret of flight has become the avenue to wholesale destruction.
It was not without deep meaning that Christ, the Master Prophet, looking down the ages to the years just preceding His Second Coming, declared: “As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man.” Luke 17:26.
He knew what conditions had been like in the days of Noah. He had seen all that had happened. He it was who, with such great long-suffering, “waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing.” i Peter 3:20. It was His Spirit that pleaded and strove with the rebellious people. Genesis 6:3. And, knowing all this, He said that it would happen again-that the days just before His return in glory would witness similar scenes of lawlessness.
IN THE DAYS OF NOAH
Here, then, is another of the great prophecies for our time, and we would do well to examine it in detail. What were the special sins of the antediluvians, and are they really to be seen in the world today?
The situation at the time of the Flood is not hard to discover, for the Bible provides a remarkably full description. Turning to the sixth chapter of Genesis, we read of three conspicuous elements of evil which are named as the triple invitation to divine judgment:
The first factor might be summarized as lustfulness, the second as mental and moral corruption, and the third as criminal disregard for all law and order. But before asking ourselves whether or not these conditions exist on any similar scale in our time, we should note that Christ also compared “the days of the Son of man” to the time when Sodom and Gomorrah were thriving cities.
“Likewise also,” He said, “as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built; but the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed.” Luke 17:28-30.
Now, while it is true that the main point that Christ was endeavoring to make in this particular passage was the suddenness of His Second Coming, the fact that it would come as a great surprise to people living at the time,-there can be no doubt that He also had in mind the resemblance of the closing days of history to the age preceding the destruction of those ancient cities of the plain.
And what were conditions like in those days? It is perhaps needless to ask, for the very names of Sodom and Gomorrah have become synonyms for wickedness. Nevertheless, it might be enlightening to note what the Bible says the sins of Sodom were. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auIn Genesis 13:13 we learn that “the men of Sodom were wicked and sinners before the Lord exceedingly.”
When the Lord discussed the matter with Abraham, He referred to the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah as being “very grievous.” Genesis 18:20.
The nineteenth chapter of Genesis records the sordid story of an attempted attack upon Lot and his guests, which is sufficient evidence of the depths of degradation to which the inhabitants of Sodom had descended.
Then in the book of Isaiah, when the prophet compared Israel to Sodom, he said: “Ah sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity. “From the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness in it; but wounds, and bruises, and putrefying sores.” Isaiah 1:4-6.
THE SINS OF SODOM
Ezekiel has provided us with a further description, giving additional important details: “Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fullness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. And they were haughty, and committed abomination before Me.” Ezekiel 16:49, 50.
One further reference to Sodom should be noted. It occurs in the second epistle of Peter, where we read that Lot was “vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked.” 2 Peter 2:7.
To summarize the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah: They were immorality, hopeless corruption, and lawlessness strikingly similar to those of the people who lived in the days of Noah. It would seem, therefore, that these are sins that God cannot tolerate. When they appear on a sufficiently wide scale, there is no way out except by overwhelming destruction. In Noah’s day this was accomplished by a flood, in Lot’s by fire. It therefore becomes a matter of vital importance to know whether the conditions referred to in this remarkable prophecy of Christ’s have appeared in our time, and to what extent they have spread around the world.
Take first the sin of lasciviousness and immorality. Only God can ever know how widespread it is today. Nevertheless there is sufficient evidence available to indicate the trend of the times in this matter. We have all become familiar with the appalling prevalence of the divorce evil in some countries, where, as in the United States, one marriage in every six is dissolved. But when people marry and divorce three, four, even five times and more, in what way does their conduct differ from that of the antediluvians who “took them wives of all which they chose”? Divorce proceedings have in many cases become little more than a legal screen for “consecutive polygamy;” and the pity of it is that the wealthy and socially prominent people are the worst offenders, their unsavory example being consequently publicized to all the world.
Yet this evil is not confined to the rich, by any means; it spreads like an unholy leaven through every strata of society, leaving behind a trail of tragedy in millions of broken homes and in the lives of love-starved children. It is one of the darkest blots on our modern civilization.
But the subject of divorce touches only a fraction of the social sins of our times. One is compelled to recall unpleasant though the facts may be-that the great cities of the world are honeycombed with vice and prostitution.
Intimately connected with these deplorable developments is the boom in the sale of salacious literature. One has only to look over the magazines displayed in any city bookstand to realize how much of it is published.
In the past decade,” says Courtney Ryley Cooper, “the growth of salacious literature has been the most rapid in history. During this period sex crimes have almost doubled, with one out of every four committed by youth under twenty. Rape cases have shot up 50 per cent in the past six years.”
That this sorry trend also is not restricted to any one section of the world is evidenced by what happened to the women of conquered Poland or China. One has but to read the fearful story of the capture of Nanking, or Hong Kong, to realize how evil the human heart can be in this enlightened age.
EVIL IMAGINATIONS
As to the second sin of the antediluvians, that of dwelling upon evil thoughts to their total moral corruption, it is again impossible to tell how many individuals have descended into such fearful depths. God alone can read the human heart. He alone knows how deceptive and desperately wicked it is. Jeremiah 17:9.
But again there are indications of the general trend. I have already mentioned the large circulation of erotic literature. There would have been no such development had not people desired it. No one pays http://www.ThreeAngels.com.augood money for this type of book or magazine unless he is interested in it and wants to feed upon the unseemly suggestions that it contains. And those who do buy it-and there must be millions-are in dire danger of reaching the place where their corrupted minds can only think evil “continually.”
Why is it that the motion-picture industry produces so many movies that are shocking in their vulgarity? There have been campaigns, carried on by public-spirited men and women, to “clean up the movies;” but it is like attempting to cleanse the Augean stables. The production of unseemly pictures that glorify everything evil continues for only one reason: The people want them.
But there is still another indication of this regrettable trend. It has been said that one can gauge people’s thoughts by what they say. As Christ expressed it to the scribes and Pharisees: “Those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornication, thefts, false witness, blasphemies: these are the things which defile a man.” Matthew 15:18-20. And what shall be said of the conversation of the average unconverted man today? If his unpleasant adjectives, his blasphemous oaths, and his smutty stories are an indication of the thoughts of his heart, then he indeed has a state of mind similar to that foretold in the prophecy.
There is yet the third pre-Flood sin to be considered, and that is violence. “The earth also was corrupt before God,” we are told, “and the earth was filled with violence.” Genesis 6: 11.
Is such a condition visible in these modern days? It hardly seems necessary to ask the question. It is perhaps the outstanding characteristic of our time.
Violence! How much of it we have seen in these past few years! We used to think this passage referred only to murder and assault, but we did not know what was coming. Such crimes are prevalent enough-with twenty murders a day throughout the United States. But now the word recalls the untold thousands who have been treated with unspeakable cruelty in prisons and concentration camps, who have been mercilessly done to death in a hundred horrible ways by heartless conquerors.
Violence! One thinks of murdered hostages, thousands upon thousands of them, whose only fault has been that they were on the losing side. One thinks of Lidice, a symbol of the great terror that threatens all humanity, Lidice, once a beautiful village of Czechoslovakia, but now razed to the ground, its men folk shot, its women removed to a concentration camp, its children taken to “educational institutions.” For sheer bloodcurdling torture of body and soul, this horror is unrivaled. Surely Noah never saw the like in his day.
Violence! There sweeps before us a panorama of all the destruction wrought since the global war began-the blasted cities, the flaming villages, the crushed and broken lives.
In the Manchester Guardian there appeared the following classic description of an air raid. Multiply it a hundred fold, a thousand fold, all over Europe and Asia, and you have some faint idea of all the wreckage and misery caused by aerial bombardment.
“The first crash brought the city to its feet with a start, only to fall back again blinded by the glare of fire and deafened by the roar of guns. Flying high against the hard stars, they looked down and saw Manchester choking and sprawling in the smoke and furiously fighting back the terror of the fires. They looked and saw the river gleaming dully in the glare, and, swooping down, they dropped their cargo of destruction into the heart of the blaze. They looked and saw the cathedral standing on the riverbank, and racing towards it they saw nothing but smoke and the fierce hunger of the fire. Manchester was a city of flame and thunder. The great fires burnt like torches, and the old places went roaring up to the sky in a torment of heat and smoke. Steel and brick, stone and timber, crashed down to the very foundations of the city. The streets were like rivers of fire, the buildings were lighter than they had been for months. A great light came over the city and fled hand in hand with Death through the little alleyways and byways, up stone staircases and over black-slated roofs, into church and theater alike, into hotels and warehouses, into shops and into homes. And everywhere was a great noise such as Manchester had never heard before. And everywhere were pain and misery and wanton destruction.”
Of how many cities, towns, and villages could a similar description be given! Surely this, above all others, is the age of violence!
WHY THIS DEGENERACY?
That we have arrived at the time foreshadowed by Christ in this great prophecy there can be no doubt. All the elements are present which He foresaw would emerge in the latter days. In many ways this generation resembles that one which lived in the time of Noah. The identification is almost complete, emphasizing yet again that we have come to the hour when “the Lord Jesus shall be revealed.”
But what is the cause of the degeneracy we have considered in this chapter? Why is our civilization http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auhttp://www.ThreeAngels.com.aufailing to live up to its unique and unprecedented privileges? Why is all its magnificence being engulfed in a morass of crime and immorality? Why is our golden age perishing in a sea of blood and tears?
There is a reason. The apostle James perceived it when he wrote, “From whence come wars and fighting among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?” James 4:1.
He was right. Probed to the bottom, all strife, with its attendant suffering and misery, emanates from the greed, envy, and hatred forever lurking in the human heart. Only God can change the heart, and when man steels his heart -as he has-against the pleadings of the divine Spirit, he finds himself surely devoting his thoughts to “the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.” 1 John 2: 16.
What depth of meaning there is in the word of the Lord to Israel of old: “O that thou had hearkened to My commandments! then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea.” Isaiah 48:18.
This is the way to peace and happiness, whether personal or national. It is the way of God’s commandments. To ignore or reject the law of the Lord is to invite every sort of trouble and disaster. True are the words of the psalmist: “Great peace have they which love Thy law: and nothing shall offend them.” Psalm iig:i65. With added meaning the margin reads, “they shall have no stumbling block.” Happy indeed is the person who regulates his life by the Ten Commandments through the enabling grace of the Holy Spirit. “Happy is that people, whose God is the Lord.” Psalm 144:3.
The prophets do not suggest that there will be any worldwide reform before the end. In harmony with the Lord’s prediction that the last days of human history will resemble the days of Noah, the prophet Isaiah declared: “Behold, the Lord makes the earth empty, and makes it waste, and turns it upside down, and scatters abroad the inhabitants thereof. The land shall be utterly emptied, and utterly spoiled: for the Lord hath spoken this word. The earth mourns and fades away, the world languishes and fades away, the haughty people of the earth do languish. The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore hath the curse devoured the earth, and they that dwell therein are desolate: therefore the inhabitants of the earth are burned, and few men left.” Isaiah 24: 1-6.
CAUSE OF THE CURSE
From this remarkable description of the convulsions of the earth in its final agonies the reason for the tragedy again becomes plain. It is because men have defiled the earth with their wickedness; because they have “transgressed the laws” of God and “broken the everlasting covenant.” Transgression brings inevitable penalties. “The curse causeless shall not come.” Proverbs 26:2.
And there can be no doubt as to when this passage was intended to apply, for the prophet continued: “The earth is utterly broken down, the earth is clean dissolved, the earth is moved exceedingly. The earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall be removed like a cottage; and the transgression thereof shall be heavy upon it; and it shall fall, and not rise again. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall punish the host of the high ones that are on high, and the kings of the earth upon the earth.” Isaiah 24: 19-21.
Clearly this has reference to the stupendous upheavals to take place when Christ returns in His glory, when the wicked shall be consumed “with the spirit of His mouth” and destroyed “with the brightness of His coming.” 2 Thessalonians 2:8. Note particularly that “the transgression thereof shall be heavy upon it.” Here yet once more the cause of the disaster is clearly defined. Loaded down with iniquity, the world will bring upon itself the fearful judgments of the wrath of God.
It was this that the apostle Peter had in mind when he wrote his memorable comparison between the fate of Noah’s generation and ours. “The world that then was,” he said, “being overflowed with water, perished: but the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.” 2 Peter 3:6, 7.
The same sins will bring the same result. But instead of a flood of water there will come this time a flood of fire, “in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.” Verse 10.
Well may we take to heart the apostle Peter’s closing exhortation: “Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in all holy conversation and godliness, looking for and hastening unto the coming of the day of God.” Verses 11, 12.
HOW many homes have been blasted and burned in the holocaust of World War II! In Russia, in Britain, in Scandinavia, in the Balkans, in Germany, in France and the Lowlands, in north Africa, in Malaya, in the Philippines, and in the Dutch East Indies, millions of them have been destroyed.
Yet much of this havoc can be repaired. Brick walls can be rebuilt. Frame dwellings and bamboo huts can be replaced. And except where death has come, families can be gathered together again and restored to even better homes than they had before. Loss of material things, though hard to bear, is not final. Courage and enterprise can re-create them out of the ruins of the worst of wars.
It is not such devastation that is most to be feared, but rather the destruction of spiritual values by false teachings that make wrong seem right, and right wrong, that lead men to choose evil rather than good. Such ideas have already, in this generation, destroyed more homes than all the bombing planes of all the nations.
Perhaps it is because the home is the foundation of civilization that the powers of darkness have leveled their most desperate attacks upon it. For if they can destroy the home, with all its love and loyalties, all its simple virtues, all its fostering of individualism, then they can destroy democracy, liberty, and everything worth preserving in life. If the fortress of the home could be reduced, and all its safeguards and sanctions dissipated, then the battle to preserve human freedom, ordered government, and equal justice under law, would be lost.
AN ALL-OUT ATTACK
That such an attack is being made upon the home is one of the most ominous facts of our time. In some countries it is being carried on openly, with brazen disregard of human feelings; in others it proceeds with sinister subtlety; but always, everywhere, with the same objective.
Just as Cato raised the cry in the Roman senate long ago: “Carthage must be destroyed,” so today it would seem that from other lips the word has gone forth, “The home must be destroyed!”
If any are inclined to think that the attack upon the home is confined to lands afar, and that there is nothing of which America need be afraid, they are sadly mistaken. It may be observed operating under various guises. One of the worst, already touched upon in the previous chapter, is the new attitude toward marriage. This sacred institution is no longer referred to as something holy, but rather as a topic for mirth and ridicule. As to its binding nature, which used to be “till death us do part,” how few accept it in such a light today!
Visiting a certain Christian college recently, I was shocked to discover how large a percentage of the young people came from divided homes. And by divided homes I mean homes where divorce decrees or the illegal separation of the parents has broken the family circle. Scores of those adolescent young men and women had no homes to which they could go at vacation time, and some had only half a home, with father or mother missing because one or the other had left to marry someone else. I found myself reflecting that if such a situation exists in such a place, what must be the condition in the secular colleges of the land? How many thousands of youth there must be who find themselves in this sad plight today!
Among the modern destroyers of the home none is more devastating than this evil of divorce; and let those who may be contemplating this course at this moment reflect upon the wreckage they are about to cause not only in their own experience, but in the hearts and lives of their children, and to the sacred institution of the home itself, the foundation and cornerstone of civilization.
In his history of ancient Rome, Ferrero reveals the secret of the decline and fall of that powerful empire. It was the home that collapsed first, long before the frontier bastions fell before the advancing barbarian invaders.
“An evolution which had transformed the family life, within four centuries changed the strength and rigidity of a despotic organization into the freest form of sexual union ever seen in Western civilization. If a man took a free woman honorably to live with her, the act made them man and wife and their children legitimate; if the marriage state proved displeasing, they separated, and the marriage was dissolved. Such, in its essential features, was marriage in the age of Augustus. It marked the downfall of family life, since the women of the upper classes had lost the old feminine virtues of modesty, obedience, industry, and self respect.”
In those far-off days the breakdown of family life brought the downfall of an empire. Today it may http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auwell bring the downfall of a world.
MENACE OF INTEMPERANCE
Still another enemy in the home is the menace of intemperance. All down the centuries the drinking of alcoholic beverages has proved a fearful curse to the race, but never more so than now. As it brought about the fall of Babylon in. 538 BC (Daniel 5:1-4,30,31), so it was in no small measure responsible for the fall of France in 1940. Shortly after this disaster occurred, the following dispatch from Vichy appeared in the New York Post: “A government spokesman said today that alcoholism was the chief cause of the moral collapse of the French army under the German attack. Drunkenness was rampant in the army during the eight months of inactivity at the start of the war.”
Before France fell she had 477,000 drink shops, from which a torrent of liquor poured to sap the morale of that unhappy nation. Today a similar flood from 400,000 liquor stores and taverns in the United States licks at the foundations of this great country, loosening the underpinnings of the home, and destroying much of priceless value in the lives of the people.
In the year that brought the tragic climax of Pearl Harbor, the United States spent $3,300,000,000 on liquor, $800,000,000 more than it spent on education. No nation, however rich and powerful, can afford such a drain upon its resources. Yet the financial loss is the least of the resultant evils. Far worse is the deleterious effect upon the health of the people. Still more damaging is the increase of crime of which it is the ever-present partner.
Anxious to make certain on this point, I visited the Michigan state prison not long ago, and spoke to the official whose duty it is to interview every prisoner as he enters to serve his term. From his many years of experience in meeting thousands of prisoners, this man assured me that more than 50 per cent of them attribute their downfall to drink.
Following up this information, I wrote a personal letter to every prison, penitentiary, and prison farm in the country, asking the question, What proportion of your prisoners are incarcerated because of liquor? When the replies came back they revealed the astonishing fact that not only 50 per cent, but 60, 70, even go per cent of the prisoners blamed drink for their misfortune.
How true it is that the liquor traffic has “broken more homes, saddened more hearts, impoverished more families, provoked more quarrels, fostered more fights, wrecked more lives, blasted more reputations, committed more crimes, lost more wars, and ruined more nations than any other evil agency in this world!”
Fortunate indeed is the home which never permits alcohol to enter its doors, where every member of the family has been trained from childhood to recognize this evil for what it is, and has been taught steadfastly to shun the allurement of its press, billboard, and radio advertisements. Equally happy, however, may be the home where those who have already been ensnared by this evil have had its shackles removed by the grace of God.
Still another peril menaces the home today, and that is the tragic indifference on the part of many parents concerning the welfare of their children.
Not long ago a mother complained to me about the disobedience of her children, how impudent they had become in the home, how little they cared for the church and for spiritual things in general. She wished so much that they were growing up like other fine Christian young people she knew. She couldn’t understand why she had been dealt with so unfairly in this matter. But she omitted to say that for years she had left her children on their own, day after day, while she went out to work to earn extra money to pay the installments on the car, the refrigerator, and other things she felt she must have in her home. She had sold her children for gadgets, and didn’t know it. All too many parents are following the selfsame course. One day they will wake up to discover they have lost something they can never regain.
PERIL OF INDIFFERENCE
Addressing the students of Notre Dame University not long ago, J. Edgar Hoover, Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, commented on the “tremendous increase in juvenile delinquency.” Searching for the cause he said:
“There has been a lack of parental control. No nation is stronger than its homes. The home is the cornerstone of democracy. We hear much talk about rights of all kinds, but not enough about the right of a child to be brought up in an atmosphere of decency in a good home. It is a lack of religious training in the home, and in the school, that usually breeds criminals. We must instill a moral sense of responsibility in our youth through religious instruction.” http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auOn another occasion, commenting on the fact that nearly one fifth of all crimes are committed by persons under twenty-one years of age, he laid the responsibility squarely upon the shoulders of their elders.
“I believe,” he said, “that a prime factor in the disregard by youth for law lies in an equal or greater disrespect for law and order on the part of the adults of our generation. I insist that no youth ever developed an heroic ideal that was not first centered about some adult. When the youngster begins to show disrespect for law and order, you can be sure he learned something of that attitude at home, or he was not taught to recognize right from wrong so that he could make his own decisions.”
A “NATIONAL DISGRACE”
What a challenge to parents! Yet how can all this good counsel be put into practice when fathers and mothers are too busy, too tired, too engrossed in their own pursuits, to give their children the time, the attention, and the love which they deserve?
We cannot expect that children left to entertain themselves for hours on end will just grow good anyway. There may be some rare exceptions where this will happen, but don’t bank on your children being the exception. There is too much truth in the old adage that “Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands to do.”
If parents valued their homes and their children’s welfare as they should, they would take a great deal more care than they are taking at present to supervise the literature the youngsters read. Into almost every home today there is filtering, openly or clandestinely, the most pernicious reading matter for children that ever rolled off a printing press. Calling it a “national disgrace,” Sterling North wrote this stirring denunciation in the Chicago Daily News:
“Virtually every child in America,” he said, “is reading color ‘comic’ magazines-a poisonous mushroom growth of the last few years. Ten million copies of these sex horror serials are sold every month. One million dollars are taken from the pockets of America’s children in exchange for graphic insanity. The bulk of these lurid publications depend for their appeal upon mayhem, murder, torture, and abduction-often with a child as the victim. Superman heroics, voluptuous females in scanty attire, blazing machine guns, hooded ‘justice,’ and cheap political propaganda are to be found on almost every page.
“The old dime novels in which an occasional red skin bit the dust were classic literature compared to the sadistic drivel pouring from the presses today.
“Badly drawn, badly written, and badly printed, a strain on young eyes and young nervous systems,-the effect of these pulp-paper nightmares is that of a violent stimulant. Their crude blacks and reds spoil the child’s natural sense of color; their hypodermic injection of sex and murder make the child impatient with better, though quieter, stories. Unless we want a coming generation ever more ferocious than the present one, parents and teachers throughout America must band together to break the ‘comic’ magazine.”
Sterling North is right. And he properly lays the blame upon the “immoral publishers” and the parents “who don’t know and don’t care what their children are reading.”
But what has all this to do with prophecy? Did the prophets of old foresee conditions of this sort as they looked upon the latter days of human history? Were they shown this widespread effort to destroy the home, and all the beautiful and noble things for which the home has stood throughout the ages? Did they see the growth of evils which would ultimately combine in an all-out attack upon this most precious and sacred institution, this foundation of civilization?
PAUL’S PREDICTION
There can be no doubt but that the apostle Paul had some such development as this in mind when he penned this great prophecy for our time: “This know also,” he said, “that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despising of those that are good, traitors. Heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof.” 2 Timothy 3:1-5.
Reading this prediction as rendered in Dr. Moffatt’s translation, its application to our day becomes still more obvious: “Mark this, there are hard times coming in the last days. For men will be selfish, fond of money, boastful, haughty, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, irreverent, callous, relentless, scurrilous, dissolute, and savage; they will hate goodness. They will be treacherous, reckless and conceited, preferring pleasure to God-for though they keep up a form of religion, they will have nothing to do with it http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auas a force.”
How accurate is this picture of the enemies that are gathering to battle against goodness in these latter days! With what detail does the prophet name the sins that even now are assailing our civilization! Thank God, however, this is not the only inspired prediction dealing with this theme. There is another, and it gives the other side of the picture. In the last two verses of the Old Testament we are told that immediately prior to “the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord,” a movement will be started to “turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers.” Malachi 4:5, 6.
Thus the dark picture painted by Paul is relieved by this word from Malachi, indicating that in these times, when a thousand evils are rampant in the world, and the destroyers of the home are more active than ever before, there will come upon many fathers-and mothers, too, of course -a great new sense of responsibility toward their children. They will have a new vision of what they should be doing for them, and with them, in this great and solemn hour. They will seek to save them from the snares laid for their unwary feet, not only by setting them a more worthy example of right living, but by leading them back to God and helping them to discover the way of salvation through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And the children, the boys and girls, the young men and young women, they, too, will feel the moving of the Holy Spirit, and realize their duty to their parents and the part they should be playing to make the home the place of happiness and helpfulness, of graciousness and goodwill, that God designed it to be.
Is it possible to create and maintain a godly home amid all the temptations and counter attractions of modern life? It is; but it takes much planning and praying and no little personal sacrifice. The ideal family, with children growing up to honor their parents, taking their proper share of home responsibilities, and preparing to be worthy citizens of their country, doesn’t merely happen. Nor does it come about in some mysterious, providential manner while parents are attending motion-picture theaters and cocktail parties, seeking their own amusement while their children are cared for by strangers.
PRESERVING THE HOME
The one sure recipe for building and maintaining a happy home is unremitting care prompted and sustained by constant love. To keep the family together, to save the children from hurrying off with worldly companions to questionable places of amusement, one must make home the stronger magnet of the two. A few practical suggestions may be helpful:
If at all possible, make available a playroom where the youngsters can keep their own toys, build their model planes, lay out their train tracks, or work out their own experiments. There are few stronger lodestones than this; and it will be found that the children will want to invite their friends to their own special den, rather than be forever running elsewhere for entertainment.
To eliminate unseemly comics and other undesirable literature, one must provide good reading matter. Subscribe for some good children’s or young people’s periodicals. Write to the various Christian publishing houses for catalogues of literature suitable for youth. Take the children to the local library and teach them how to choose the best books. If they have an abundance of good literature, they won’t have time to read the bad.
From earliest childhood teach your sons and daughters to take pleasure-yes, and a proper pride-in their own home. Let them realize that it is part of their responsibility to keep it clean and tidy. Help them to understand that “there’s no fun like work.” The doctrine advocated by some indulgent parents that daughter mustn’t wash the dishes because it will spoil her pretty hands is ruinous; and so is the idea that sonny must have every spare moment for play because father had to work so hard when he was a boy. Helping in the home-in moderation, of course-is a vital part of the training of every boy and girl.
Pocket money? Of course. But a certain set amount, and no more. Whatever you do, don’t pay for every little service, not even when the excuse is to raise money for philanthropic purposes. Such a course will turn the most generous child into a hateful money grabber.
However, merely to provide a playroom, good reading matter, and pocket money, is not enough. Far more important is it to take interest, in every little thing the children undertake. They expect it; they long for it; and they should have it. This means interest not only in their play but in their school work, all the way from grade school to college. It means interest in their arithmetic problems and their algebra equations; in their English compositions and their language studies. It means interest in the friends they make and the friends they lose, in their joys and disappointments and heartaches that seem so big and important to them.
Oh, yes, it takes time. Of course! But it is part of the price of keeping a family together. Then there http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auhttp://www.ThreeAngels.com.aumust be a religious background to all this planning. No home can be truly successful without it. That means grace at meals from the first lovely lisping of childhood until the deep-toned bass comes back from the university. It means family prayers and Bible reading.
There’s a difficulty here, I know. Life is so full nowadays; everyone, old and young, has so many interests that it is often impossible to have the family gather together. But meet the problem by teaching each child to read the Bible and to say his prayers at least once a day, and preferably twice, without fail. Build this priceless habit so thoroughly into the character of each one that, no matter what pressures may develop, no matter what interruptions may come to the family plans, each individual will maintain his own personal contact with God.
HEIRLOOM FROM EDEN
In my home there is a very old and very beautiful piece of furniture. Some have wanted to buy it, but how could I sell it? In a sense it is not mine; it belongs to the family. Long years ago it was my mother’s; before that it was my grandmother’s, and how much farther back it goes I shall probably never discover. But because of all these memories I feel that I want to preserve it to pass on to those who follow after.
And so it is with this precious institution of the home. It is not something to be bought and sold. It is not something cheap and transient to be built or torn down at some personal whim or fancy. It is a rich legacy from the past, a priceless heirloom from Eden, to be cherished and preserved at all costs. Those who found a home would do well to remember that this act links them with the infinite past and with the eternal future. That when the minister pronounces them ‘1usband and wife” they assume responsibilities of enormous potential importance which can never rightly be shelved and should never be ignored.
On one occasion Jesus spoke to His disciples concerning the building of a character that will be true and steadfast. He said: “Whosoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock: and the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house. And it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock. And everyone that hears these sayings of Mine and does them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand: and the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house. And it fell: and great was the fall of it.” Matthew 7:24-27.
This is also the secret of the successful home-the home that abides through the storms of life, and resists every attack the powers of darkness may make upon it. It is built upon a Rock-the eternal Rock of the life and teachings of the Lord Himself. On this sure and safe foundation, and on this alone, it can withstand all the buffeting of these tempestuous times.
SO FULL of trouble and violence is the world today, so stained with lust and cruelty, one cannot but wonder why God does not intervene at once, without any further delay. When the Eternal One sees so much that is lovely and beautiful being destroyed by the cruel, the selfish, and the unscrupulous, when He sees the weak and inoffensive being trodden down, why does He not hurl down the thunderbolts of heaven upon wicked men? When He sees the champions of truth and righteousness well-nigh overborne in the struggle with the forces of evil, why does He not rush to their rescue and turn the artillery of the skies upon His enemies? When He sees conditions becoming more and more like those in the days of Noah and Lot, why does He not act immediately and decisively with all His infinite power?
He does not for the simple reason that every day is not a judgment day. There is to be a day of reckoning between God and the modern world; let there be no mistake about that. Long ago the apostle Paul announced that God “hath appointed a day, in the which He will judge the world.”
Acts 17:31. However, the execution of divine judgment is still future. We may not understand the reason for the seeming delay in retribution, but that will not affect the outworking of His purposes. In His own time and in His own way the judgment will take place.
ENOCH FORETELLS THE JUDGMENT
Remember the prophecy of Enoch: “Behold, the Lord comes to execute Judgment upon all.” Jude 14, 15. That promise will not fail. And Peter has told us that even the evil angels are “reserved unto judgment.” 2 Peter 2:4. Over and over again in the Scriptures the assurance is given that the reign of sin will one day be brought to a close. That God will not suffer the enemies of righteousness to continue their wicked course forever.
In the thirty-seventh psalm we read this comforting word: “Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him: fret not thyself because of him who prospers in his way, because of the man who brings wicked devices to pass. Cease from anger, and forsake wrath: fret not thyself in anywise to do evil. For evildoers shall be cut off: but those that wait upon the Lord, they shall inherit the earth. For yet a little while, and the wicked shall not be: yea, thou shall diligently consider his place, and it shall not be.” Psalm 37:7-10.
Then follow these striking statements: “The wicked plots against the just, and gnashes upon him with his teeth. The Lord shall laugh at him: for He sees that his day is coming.” Verses 12, 13.
In the fiftieth psalm there is another most definite assurance of future judgment: “Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence: a fire shall devour before Him, and it shall be very tempestuous round about Him. He shall call to the heavens from above, and to the earth, that He may judge His people. Gather My saints together unto Me; those that have made a covenant with Me by sacrifice. And the heavens shall declare His righteousness: for God is judge Himself.” Psalm 50:3-6.
In the book of Ecclesiastes, King Solomon tells of his many experiments with worldly enjoyment and of the vanity of trying to satisfy the cravings of the human heart in this way. Then he says: “Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep His commandments.; for this is the whole duty of man. For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.” Ecclesiastes 12:13, 14.
This passage calls to mind the warning words of Christ, that for “every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment.” Matthew 12:36.
Addressing the city of Capernaum, where He had performed many miracles, He said: It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of judgment, than for you.” And again Jesus said: It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment, than for thee.” Matthew 11:22,24.
Here is clear indication from the Lord, who will be intimately connected with the judgment (John 5:27), that the evil deeds of Sodom and Gomorrah, of Tyre and Sidon, as well. as those of Capernaum, and hence of every other city in the world, will be recalled in that day, and just punishment awarded.
Turning to the writings of the apostle Paul we read, “We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that everyone may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.” 2 Corinthians 5: 10.
These many passages of Scripture emphasize the absolute certainty of a day of reckoning. If we have any confidence in the words of the Bible writers, and of Christ Himself, we cannot but believe that such a day is on the divine program and that at some time in the world’s history it will most assuredly arrive.
COMPLETE RECORDS PRESERVED
That God is watching all that is taking place in this world and is keeping a perfect record for the day of judgment, is made even more evident by the vision recorded by the prophet Daniel, already referred to in our study of the seventh chapter of his book. I beheld till the thrones were cast down, and the Ancient of Days did sit, whose garment was white as snow, and the hair of His head like the pure wool: His throne was like the fiery flame, and His wheels as burning fire. A fiery stream issued and came forth from before Him: thousand thousands ministered unto Him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before Him: the judgment was set, and the books were opened.” Daniel 7:9, 10.
“The books were opened.” Books in heaven? Yes. The prophet Malachi speaks of “a book of remembrance” (Malachi 3:16); and John tells of “the book of life” (Revelation 20:12). What type of books they are we are not told; but without doubt they are infinitely more wonderful and more elaborate than anything ever seen here on earth. They need not necessarily be books such as those with which we are acquainted, laboriously written by hand. One could imagine books built entirely upon the photographic principle, with some marvelous sound recording device to ensure that not only every act but every word is preserved. But whatever the method or the mechanism employed, we can be sure that the work of the heavenly “watchers” will be perfect and complete. See Daniel 4:17. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auBut what will God do with all these records? He must have millions and millions of them, covering the lives of every man and woman who has ever lived, and inscribed with such meticulous exactness that every life could be reproduced in detail at any time. There must be a purpose in such an infinitude of labor. And there is.
JUSTICE FOR ALL
If there is going to be a day of judgment, in the sense of rewards and punishments for everybody, a great many questions will be asked as to why some are saved and some are lost. Moreover, the day of judgment is going to be God’s final settlement with sin. He does not plan on its rising up a second time. Consequently He intends that all who are involved shall be absolutely satisfied that His judgment is just.
That is the reason for the records; and that is why the Bible teaches that there is going to be an investigation of the records before Christ returns in glory. The destruction of the wicked and the translation of the righteous will be no sudden decision of the moment. Indeed Christ will not return until all the decisions, affecting every living soul on the earth, have been made. “Behold, I come quickly.” He says, “and My reward is with Me, to give every man according as his work shall be.” Revelation 22:12.
Christ will bring His rewards with Him, as they have been decided previously in the courts of judgment in heaven. But what about those who are living on the earth at that time? Suppose that they want to change their status after the judgment is completed? Just before the second advent there will go forth the most solemn decree of all history: “He that is unjust, let him be unjust still. And he which is filthy, let him be filthy still: and he that is righteous, let him be righteous still: and he that is holy, let him be holy still.” Verse 11. There will be no changing sides after that.
But if there is to be an investigation of the heavenly records before Christ returns, when will it begin? Has the judging been a continual process, going on all down the ages, or will it commence at some precise moment? And another question: If, as seems so evident from the fulfillment of the great prophecies for our time, already considered in this book, we are now living close to the day when Christ will return, can it be possible that the work of investigation is even now proceeding?
These questions, which are some of the most important that could be asked at this time, should lead us to search the Scriptures. Has prophecy anything to say on these momentous issues? It surely has, as we shall see in the chapter that follows.
AMONG the many important prophecies recorded in the book of Daniel there is one that contains the longest time period mentioned in the Bible. It is found in the eighth chapter, and it is of particular interest at this juncture because of its clear reference to the coming judgment.
In the opening verses of Daniel 8 we find another remarkable symbolic summary of world history, this time beginning with Medo-Persia (the ram with two horns, verse 20) and following on through Greece (the he-goat, verse 21) to Rome, which is represented, in both its pagan and papal phases, by the 1ittle horn which “waxed exceeding great” and “cast down some of the host, and stamped upon them,” and “cast down the truth to the ground” (verses 8-12).
Following this recital of coming wars, strife, and persecution, the prophet hears a voice saying, “How long shall be the vision concerning the daily sacrifice, and the transgression of desolation, to give both the sanctuary and the host to be trodden underfoot?” Verse 13.
Now those two words “How long?” are reminiscent of a similar question found in the book of Revelation: “How long, O Lord, holy and true, does ‘Thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?” Revelation 6:10.
Both questions represent a deep yearning to know when the power of evil shall be broken and the supremacy of the wicked shall be brought to an end. Both ask, in different language, when the judgment day will come.
Then Daniel hears another voice speaking, a voice of great authority, and it says, “Unto two thousand and three hundred days; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed.” Daniel 8: 14.
There are several matters in this prophecy that need clarification, but first let us consider the time http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auperiod. If it is possible to determine when this period was designed to begin and end, the rest may become easy to understand.
As already pointed out, a day in prophecy corresponds to a year in history, so that the “two thousand and three hundred days” here mentioned represent 2300 years. That is a long time, longer than the entire Christian Era.
When was it to begin? In Daniel’s time? In Christ’s time? How can one tell?
“THE WONDERFUL NUMBERER”
Notice these important points: We learn that this great time period was announced by “the numberer of secrets,” or “the wonderful numberer” (margin, verse 13), which suggests that there is something of unusual importance about this revelation. If heaven’s greatest mathematician is responsible for it, it is surely worthy of our thoughtful study.
Notice also verse 17: “So he came near where I stood: and. . . he said unto me, Understand, O son of man: for at the time of the end shall be the vision.” In Dr. Moffatt’s translation this is rendered, It relates to the crisis at the close.” Evidently, then, this great time prophecy, announced by “the wonderful numberer,” was intended to stretch across the centuries to “the time of the end” mentioned in Daniel 12:4
Turn now to the ninth chapter of Daniel. Indeed, take time to read both the eighth and ninth chapters together, for they are among the most marvelous in all the Holy Scriptures. Notice how, at the conclusion of the revelation of the future sufferings of God’s people, given to Daniel in the eighth chapter, the prophet, appalled at the length of the period during which the powers of evil would predominate, is completely overcome. He faints, and is sick “certain days.”
Upon his recovery he begins to study the prophetic books in his possession and to pray for further light concerning the vision he has received. Daniel 9:3-19. It is a most beautiful prayer. Then of a sudden Gabriel returns and says to him, “At the beginning of thy supplications the commandment came forth. And I am come to show thee; for thou art greatly beloved: therefore understand the matter and consider the vision.” Verse 23.
Clearly Gabriel has been sent from heaven, by express command of God, to help the faithful and devoted prophet understand the vision already given him, as recorded in the eighth chapter. And the remarkable fact is that Gabriel begins with the matter of time, concerning which Daniel was so anxious to obtain further information.
“Seventy weeks,” says Gabriel, “are determined upon thy people [that is, the Jews] and upon thy Holy City, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy.” Verse 24.
That word “determined” would have been better rendered “cut off,”-as many commentators agree, for it is obvious that the seventy weeks mentioned by Gabriel are a part of, or cut off from, the longer period of 2300 days. They were allocated to the Jews for certain specific purposes which were to be accomplished during that time. These ‘seventy years formed the last period of probation offered to the Hebrew nation.
Now as a week consists of seven days, seventy weeks would total 490 days or, according to prophetic measurement, 490 years. If we can find out when they began we shall discover also the starting point of the 2300 years.
We are not left long in doubt. “Know therefore and understand,” continues Gabriel, “that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks: the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times.” Verse 25.
When did this commandment go forth? There were three such commandments made by various kings of Medo-Persia, following the Babylonian captivity of Israel. The first was proclaimed by Cyrus-the conqueror of Babylon -in 536 BC, exactly seventy years after Nebuchadnezzar’s capture of Jerusalem. The second was by Darius in 519 BC, and the third by Artaxerxes in 457 BC. All three decrees, remarkably enough, are grouped together in the book of Ezra, where we read: “And they built, and finished it, according to the commandment of the God of Israel, and according to the commandment of Cyrus, and Darius, and Artaxerxes king of Persia.” Ezra 6:14. All three edicts were necessary, but the last was the most important and comprehensive. This decree of Artaxerxes was issued in the seventh year of his reign (457 BC). See Ezra 7. Consequently it is from this date that the seventy weeks are reckoned.
From this date, when the command to restore and to rebuild the city of Jerusalem was given, to http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auMessiah the Prince would be “seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks” in other words, sixty-nine weeks. This represents 483 days, or prophetic years. To find when this period ends, one merely has to subtract 457 BC from 483, and the answer is AD 26. That is, calculating from the first day of 457 BC to the last day Of AD 26. The commandment to build and restore Jerusalem was not given, however, until the autumn of 457 BC; therefore the sixty-nine weeks reach over to the autumn Of AD 27.
EXACTNESS OF THE DATE
What happened then? That was the year when Jesus Christ was baptized by John the Baptist! That was when He was anointed by the Holy Spirit and began His Messianic ministry. As the “wonderful numberer” had said, the time period reached to “Messiah the Prince.” That is why Jesus said, “The time is fulfilled.” Mark 1:15. It was. The first part of the prophecy of Daniel 8 and 9 met its fulfillment in Him.
So important is this prediction in the sight of God that He has left no loophole for question concerning this date. He saw to it that Luke, when writing his record of the life of Jesus, made this vital notation: “Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea. ... the word of God came unto John the son of Zacharias in the wilderness. And he came into all the country about Jordan, preaching the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins.” Luke 3:1-3.
Here are two historical references which can readily be checked. First the fifteenth year of Tiberius, and secondly the governor ship of Pontius Pilate. History records that Tiberius began to reign in the year AD 12, so that his fifteenth year was AD 27. Pilate commenced his governor ship in AD 26 or early in AD 27.
Further powerful corroboration appears as one reads the following verses: “And after threescore and two weeks [that is, after AD 27] shall Messiah be cut off, but not for Himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolation are determined. And He shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week He shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease.” Daniel 9:26,27.
Notice that Gabriel says that “in the midst of the week” -that is, in the midst of the last week of the seventy “He,” the Messiah, shall “be cut off,” and “cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease.”
SEALED WITH BLOOD
The reference to the crucifixion is so clear that no one can fall to see it. And this supreme event, the greatest in all eternity, occurred at the very time announced to Daniel more than five hundred years before! In the midst of the last week allotted to the Jewish people, Christ suffered on Calvary. He died in the spring of AD 31, three and a half years after His baptism in the fall Of AD 27. He was cut off, but not for Himself.” “He died for all.” 2 Corinthians 5:15. That was the moment above all others when He demonstrated His love for us. Galatians 2:20. Then it was that He “gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity.” Titus 2:14.
And at that moment of sublime sacrifice, when the innocent Son of the eternal God died to redeem lost humanity, “the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom” (Matthew 27:51), indicating that type had met antitype and that any services held in that earthly sanctuary thereafter would be meaningless.
Now the crucifixion occurred in the spring Of AD 31, in the midst of the last week of the seventy. There remained therefore yet three and a half years for the entire period to be completed. It was during this time that the apostles carried the gospel of salvation through Jesus Christ particularly to the Jews. Thousands accepted it joyfully, as on the Day of Pentecost, but many more rejected the message, crowning their resistance and opposition by their murder of Stephen in AD 34.
About this time also the work of the early Christian church took on a new direction, as Paul and Barnabas later explained to the Jews at Antioch. They plainly declared, It was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you: but seeing you put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles.” Acts 13:46.
The prophetic period of seventy weeks had ended. The privileged position occupied by the Jewish nation for so many generations was over forever. Its final period of probation had closed. As a nation it had passed out of the plans of God. From this time on, the Jews could be saved individually, but not nationally. As if to emphasize this tragic fact, there came soon after, in AD 70, that most fearful destruction of Jerusalem at the hands of the Romans when more than a million Jews perished, and the rest, save only the Christians who escaped, were carried off into slavery. From that day to this the history of the Jewish people http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auhttp://www.ThreeAngels.com.auhas been one of endless suffering at the hands of their enemies, in harmony with the dread warning of Moses that, if they would not hearken unto the voice of the Lord their God, they would “be only oppressed and crushed always.” Deuteronomy 28:15,33.
Thus the evidence is overwhelming, beyond all possibility of question, that the date 457 BC is correct; and, consequently, that the long time period of 2300 years began in that very year. This crowning “vision and prophecy” of “the wonderful numberer” is sealed forever with the blood of Christ. Daniel 9:24.
TWO ADVENTS LINKED
But having found the starting point of this great time period, when does it end? A moment’s calculation will show that the 2300 years stretch down the ages from the days of Artaxerxes, when the commandment was given “to restore and to build Jerusalem,”- clear to the middle of the nineteenth century, or in other words, from the autumn Of 457 BC to the autumn Of AD 1844.
Here is a marvelous thought of the utmost importance and solemnity. This great prophecy was designed not only to announce the first coming of Christ, but also the second. It was planned by “the wonderful numberer” to link the two advents, to span all the intervening years, to tell of His coming in humility and sorrow, and to herald His return in glory as King of kings and Lord of lords.
Perhaps someone will say, “But 1844 is a long time ago.” Granted. But the prophecy does not state that Christ was to come again at the expiration of the 2300 years. Instead, according to Gabriel, “it relates to the crisis at the close.” It is intended to let the people of the world know when Christ is about to return.
It is well to remember that Christ-who was better informed concerning Daniel’s prophecies than any man ever has been or will be-asserted of His appearing: “Of that day and that hour knows no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven,” which is proof enough that the 2300 years were not intended to give the exact time of that great event. Mark 13:32.
CLEANSING OF THE SANCTUARY
Are we in that “crisis at the close” that the prophet had in mind? Does the history of the past hundred years fit into such a picture? Surely no one can reflect upon all the great prophecies of the Bible already considered in this book without instantly coming to the conclusion that they focus upon this mighty hour, this most momentous period of history the world has ever seen. Since 1844 there has been one succession of crises, mounting to a climax in the present day. In the words of that well-known editor, J. L. Garvin, there has been “crisis piled on crisis.” These fateful years have beheld the greatest wars, famines, pestilence, and earthquakes in all the annals of time. They have been crowded with more distress and perplexity, more violence and terrorism, more downright wickedness and rebellion against God, than any previous generation has witnessed. Surely this is, this must be, “the time of the end” spoken of by Daniel the prophet.
But let us look again at the prophecy in Daniel 8: 14. At the close of the 2300 days, in 1844, something of particular importance was to occur. Said Gabriel: “Then shall the sanctuary be cleansed.” What did this expression mean?
One thing is certain. It was not intended to refer to the earthly sanctuary at Jerusalem. “The wonderful numberer” would not make such a mistake. He knew that that sanctuary would be destroyed by the Romans and never be rebuilt. What other sanctuary, then, could he have had in mind? Naturally the one with which he was most familiar, the sanctuary in heaven.
That there is such a sanctuary is made plain in the book of Hebrews, where we read: “Now of the things which we have spoken this is the sum. We have such an high priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens. A minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man.” Hebrews 8:1,2.
The tabernacle that Moses built in the wilderness was but a miniature of the sanctuary in heaven, the pattern of which was shown to him on Mount Sinai. Verse 5. Of the glory of the original edifice, the dwelling place of the eternal God, no human being can have the faintest conception.
Why then speak of its cleansing? For the simple reason that it is there that the books of record are preserved-those books which tell of all that has happened on the earth, the tragic story of all its sins and sorrows; the books in which are to be found every idle word that men have spoken. Every unkind and blasphemous expression, every unworthy deed, every cruel and pitiless act-all are there!
TYPE OF THE JUDGMENT
The earthly sanctuary, first used by the children of Israel in the wilderness, affords, in its small and limited way, a type of the sanctuary in heaven and the final judgment scene. In ancient times, as sin was committed, a sacrifice was brought to the tabernacle. Its blood was presented before the Lord. Day after day this was continued, each sacrifice representing the transfer of confessed and forgiven sins to the sanctuary.
Then once a year came the cleansing of the sanctuary, when the high priest took the blood of the goat that had been slain as the sin offering, and entered into the most holy place. By his ministrations he cleansed the sanctuary of the accumulated sins of the previous year, and brought them forth and placed them, figuratively of course, upon the head of the live scapegoat, which bore them into the wilderness.
Now that day, known as the Day of Atonement, was to the people of Israel the most important and solemn day in all the year. “So awful was the Day of Atonement that we are told in a Jewish book of ritual that the very angels run to and fro in fear and trembling, saying, ‘Lo, the day of judgment has come!”’-Dean Farrar, The Early Days of Christianity, page 238.
Through all the centuries this impression has remained, and devout Jews in every land on earth still observe Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, with the greatest solemnity.
Dr. J. H. Hertz, chief rabbi, calls it “the most solemn day in the Jewish year,” and adds: “No other nation, ancient or modern, has an institution approaching the Day of Atonement in religious depth-’a day of purification and of turning from sins, for which forgiveness is granted through the grace of the merciful God, who holds penitence in as high an esteem as guiltlessness’ (Philo).” - J. H. Hertz, The Pentateuch and Haftorahs, vol. 3, page 252.
Of this special day The Jewish Encyclopedia says: “New Year’s and Atonement Days are days of serious meditation. The former is the annual day of judgment, when all creatures pass in review before the searching eye of Omniscience.”
In the same article the following description of the Day of Atonement is included: “God, seated on His throne to read, every man’s signature being found therein. The great trumpet is sounded; a still, small voice is heard; the angels shudder, saying, this is the day of judgment. On New Year’s Day the decree is written; on the Day of Atonement it is sealed who shall live and who are to die.”-Article “Atonement, Day of.”
If this is the understanding of modern Jewish authorities concerning the Day of Atonement-more than thirty five centuries after its institution in the wilderness tabernacle -it becomes yet more obvious that the expression “then shall the sanctuary be cleansed” has reference to the beginning of the judgment hour in heaven.
This means that in the year 1844, the year so clearly marked on the divine blueprint of history by “the wonderful numberer,” there began the examination of the books of record in preparation for the Second Coming of Christ. In that year God began to close up the account He has been keeping concerning this world and its affairs.
Thus, during “the crisis at the close” of world history, a work of still greater importance has been going on in heaven which is deciding for eternity the destiny of all who have ever lived.
Millions upon millions of cases must be considered. How far the work has proceeded no one knows, but that it will not be unduly prolonged is certain from the swift fulfillment of all the promised signs of Christ’s return.
If the task may seem too great, let it be remembered that God’s power and resources know no human measure. Nothing is impossible to Him, and He has been planning for this “from the foundation of the world.” Revelation 13:8. It was with such facts in mind that the apostle Paul declared, “He will finish the account, and cut it short in righteousness: because a short work will the Lord make upon the earth.” Romans 9:28, margin.
WHEN THE JUDGMENT ENDS
Some day this work of judgment must come to the cases of the living, and when that work has been completed, human probation will close. That will be the signal for the issuance of the decree fixing the status of all-just and unjust, holy and unholy-forever. Revelation 22:11.
Turning back for a moment to the typical service in the earthly sanctuary, we learn that the solemn Day of Atonement was preceded by the blowing of trumpets, the sound of shophar, as the Jews call it. This solemn sound, says Dr. Hertz, “has been looked upon from times immemorial as a call to contrition and penitence; . . . as a time of self-examination and humble petition for forgiveness.” Then he quotes http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auMaimonides as saying: “The scriptural injunction of the shophar . . . has a profound meaning. It says: Awake, you sleepers, and ponder over your deeds; remember your Creator and go back to Him in penitence. Be not of those who miss realities in their pursuit of shadows and waste their years in seeking after vain things which cannot profit or deliver. Look well to your souls and consider your acts; forsake each of you his evil ways and thoughts, and return to God so that He may have mercy upon you.”-j. H. Hertz, The Pentateuch and Haltorahs, vol. 3, page 251.
Surely this is good counsel for us all today. We all need to awake from spiritual slumber; to ponder our deeds; to remember our Creator and go back to Him in penitence. It is high time to “look well” to our souls and forsake all evil ways.
In this most solemn hour of history the trumpets of the Lord are sounding in all the earth, saying: “Fear God, and give glory to Him; for the hour of His Judgment is come: and worship Him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters.” Revelation 14:7.
God is calling men everywhere to remember Him, and to return to Him, before it is forever too late. His invitation of love is given to all who will hear His voice.
The modern world has a trysting place with God. This generation must appear “before the judgment seat of Christ.”
Cries the prophet Zephaniah: “Before the decree bring forth, before the day pass as the chaff, before the fierce anger of the Lord come upon you, before the day of the Lord’s anger come upon you. Seek you the Lord, all you meek of the earth, which have wrought His judgment; seek righteousness, seek meekness: it may be you shall be hid in the day of the Lord’s anger.” Zephaniah 2:2, 3.
Time is now fleeting, the moments are passing,
Passing from you and from me;
Shadows are gathering and death’s night is coming,
Coming for you and for me.
Come home, come home,
You who are weary, come home;
Earnestly, tenderly Jesus is calling,
Calling, O sinner, come home!
W. L. Thompson
SOME years ago, after several stormy days and nights on the Atlantic, I went to one of the ship’s officers and asked, hopefully: “Are we nearly there?” And he replied, “It’s not far now. We’ll soon be passing the Ambrose Lightship. And then New York’s just around the corner.”
Nearly there! The thrill of it! Forgetting all the discomforts of the voyage, I rushed on deck and peered eagerly for the promised sign that the voyage was almost over. And there was the lightship, still flashing its light faithfully in the early dawn.
Even so we have been told how we may know when history is drawing to its close, when time is about to merge into eternity. In addition to all the many prophecies we have studied, there is to be one last great sign whose meaning will be unmistakable. It will be the beacon at the entrance to the harbor of heaven.
In an earlier chapter, in connection with the study of this amazing century, attention was called to the prophecy of Christ that “this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.” Matthew 24: 14. Now we must link with this prediction another scripture of similar meaning but with even clearer reference to developments in our time. This is the passage in the fourteenth chapter of Revelation describing the three angels which fly around the world bearing the solemn tidings that the judgment hour has arrived. Writes the apostle John:
“And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, saying with a loud http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auhttp://www.ThreeAngels.com.auvoice, Fear God, and give glory to Him. For the hour of His judgment is come: and worship Him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters. And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God.” Revelation 14:6-10.
When are these three messages to go to the world? John makes this plain in verses 14 and 15, where he says: “I looked, and behold a white cloud, and upon the cloud One sat like unto the Son of man, having on His head a golden crown, and in His hand a sharp sickle. And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to Him that sat on the cloud, Thrust in Thy sickle, and reap: for the time is come for Thee to reap; for the harvest of the earth is ripe.”
Without question we have here a description of the Second Coming of the Lord when He returns to gather His redeemed. Did He not say that “the harvest is the end of the world”? Matthew 13:39. Consequently the messages of the three angels constitute the great pre advent proclamation that is to be made to the entire world immediately before the end. Furthermore, when this takes place, when these warning words are being heralded “to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people,” we are to know that the last events of history are upon us; that we are nearly home.
Is such a message being proclaimed in all the world today? Is there a movement in existence which is definitely proclaiming the arrival of the judgment hour, declaring the imminence of Christ’s Second Coming, and calling upon people everywhere to repent of their sins and turn to God for deliverance?
RISE OF THE ADVENT MOVEMENT
A revival of belief in the personal return of the Lord Jesus really began at the time of the Reformation. As the mental and spiritual gloom of the Dark Ages gradually passed from the minds of men, attention was again directed to the prophecies of the Bible, and before long many devoted Christians were preaching and writing about this great event as was done in the days of the early church before the great apostasy blotted out the truth.
Martin Luther, in the sixteenth century, declared: I persuade myself verily, that the day of judgment will not be absent full three hundred years. God will not, cannot, suffer this wicked world much longer. The great day is drawing near in which the kingdom of abominations shall be overthrown.”
“This aged world,” said Melanchthon about the same time, “is not far from its end.”
Calvin bade Christians “not to hesitate, ardently desiring the day of Christ’s coming.”
“Has not the Lord Jesus, in despite of Satan’s Milice, carried up our flesh into heaven?” cried John Knox, “and shall He not return? We know that He shall return, and that with expedition.”
This view has persisted through the years, and, despite the most desperate efforts of its opponents to extinguish it, has never since been quenched.
In 1627 Joseph Mede, a professor of Christ’s College, Cambridge, published his classic work on the book of Revelation, entitled Clavis Apocalyptica (Key to the Apocalypse), which perhaps more than any other book prepared the way for the advent movement of the nineteenth century.
Some years afterward, Johann Petersen, a German theologian, proclaimed the approach of the advent throughout his country, publishing, in 1692, a work entitled The Truth of the Glorious Kingdom of Jesus Christ, Which Is to Be Expected at (the Sounding of) the Seventh Trumpet.
Petersen was followed in Germany by Johann Bengel, another powerful preacher of the advent hope, while in England interest in the subject was kept alive by men like Sir Francis Bacon and Sir Isaac Newton. The latter’s work on the prophecies of Daniel and the Revelation, published in 1733, is well known. The bishops of Bristol, Gloucester, and Worcester, and other prominent persons, also wrote extensively during the eighteenth century on the fulfillment of prophecy, while Charles Wesley’s attitude is evident from the hymn:
Lo! He comes, with clouds descending,
Once for favored sinners slain;
Countless angels, Him attending,
Swell the triumph of His train: Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Jesus comes, and comes to reign.
In South America, a Jesuit priest, Lacunza by name, becoming convinced of the approaching advent, wrote a powerful work which not only stirred his own country but, translated by Edward Irving under the title of The Coming of Messiah in Glory and Majesty, had a mighty effect in other lands in later years.
THE GREAT REVIVAL
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, when all Europe was still shuddering at the grim tales of the French Revolution and the conquests of Napoleon, there was an extraordinary revival of interest in the subject of the second advent. In fact, from 1800 to 1844, as a direct result of the study of prophecy by many eminent preachers, not only the United States, but Great Britain, many parts of Europe, Africa, and South America were stirred to the depths by a conviction that Christ was about to appear in power and glory.
At one period, between 1830 and 1844, hundreds of clergymen of the Church of England preached this doctrine, convinced from their study of the prophecies of the book of Daniel, and particularly the prophecy of the 2300 days of Daniel 8:13,14, that the end of all things was at hand.
Dozens of books and periodicals appeared in America and Great Britain during these years, devoted entirely to the proclamation of the soon coming of the Lord. Indeed, the earnestness of those early nineteenth-century Bible students was truly amazing, and no one today can read the literature of their crusade-and much of it may still be found in the libraries of the world-without admiring their deep piety and fervent zeal.
Lord Macaulay referred to this remarkable revival in the following terms: “The Christian believes as well as the Jew, that at some future period the present order of things will come to an end. Nay, many Christians believe that the Messiah will shortly establish a kingdom on the earth and reign visibly over all its inhabitants. Whether this doctrine be orthodox or no, we shall not here inquire. The number of people who hold it is very large. Many of those who hold it are distinguished by rank, wealth, and ability. It is preached from pulpits, both of the Scottish and the English Church. Noblemen and members of parliament have written in defense of it.”-Thomas Babington Macaulay, Critical and Historical Essays, vol. I, PP. 306, 307.
ALL EUROPE STIRRED
In Holland the advent hope was fostered by H. Hentzepeter, keeper of the Royal Museum at The Hague. Germany was greatly stirred by Hengstenberg and others, and the movement spread through Russia. In Scandinavia there was a mighty revival; the ministry of the child preachers, who discoursed on prophecy, caused a great sensation.
The message was carried to Asia by Joseph Wolff, son and later a missionary of the London Society for Promoting Christianity Amongst the Jews. As such he proclaimed the Lord’s soon coming in Palestine, Egypt, Afghanistan, and as far east as Tibet-an amazing accomplishment at that time.
Meanwhile, in these United States, a similar movement was on foot, led by William Miller, a New England farmer, who gave himself to the study of prophecy and reached, independently, the same conclusion as hundreds of others in the Old World, that the return of Christ was near. He left his farming, started to preach, and soon had a large following. With him labored Josiah Litch, a Methodist minister, Charles Fitch, pastor of the Marlborough Street Chapel (Boston), Joseph Bates, and many others. Within a few years, as a result of their fervent ministry, the whole country was roused and thousands were looking forward to the speedy reappearance of the Lord.
Robert Winter, a disciple of William Miller, went over. to England and created a great sensation by his preaching of the advent message in Bristol and other cities, baptizing more than seven thousand converts. Great crowds gathered in the public squares of Liverpool, Leeds, Hull, Nottingham, Sheffield, Manchester, and elsewhere to listen to his message.
The time set by these earnest advent preachers for the Second Coming to take place was 1843-44, and, as the hour drew near, a deep solemnity prevailed everywhere.
The predicted time passed, however, and Christ did not come. Great was the resultant disappointment. Many gave up all interest in religion, and still more gave up all hope in a literal return of Christ; yet there were others who refused to lose heart, holding on loyally to God and believing that the prophetic word, though misunderstood, could not fail of ultimate fulfillment. These held that the time prophecy had been correctly interpreted, but that a mistake had been made in the event expected; that 1844 http://www.ThreeAngels.com.aumarked the beginning of the investigative judgment in the heavenly sanctuary, in preparation for the advent, not the advent itself.
Out of all this intense Bible study, and profound spiritual experience, the great second advent movement of our own day was born.
RECENT DEVELOPMENTS
In the very hour of disappointment over the seeming delay of Christ’s coming, there came upon a number of faithful Adventists -as they searched the Scriptures yet more carefully for guidance and comfort-the conviction that they should, in loyalty to the word of God, observe the Ten Commandments more faithfully. They realized, with sudden illumination and great joy, that the seventh day, rather than the first, is the true Sabbath of the Lord, and they decided to keep it at all costs. Thus these two great fundamentals of the Christian faith,-belief in the second advent of Christ and the observance of the seventh-day Sabbath,-long eclipsed by error, were at last fully brought to light. Like two streams of truth, hidden centuries ago by the accumulation of false tradition, they now reappeared and, uniting, flowed on together, broadening and deepening every passing year, and destined to reach at last to the very ends of the earth.
It became the burden of this growing company of Sabbath keeping Adventists to repeat, on a world scale, the work accomplished by John the Baptist before the first advent of the Lord. As John went before Him “in the spirit and power of Elias; to make ready a people prepared for the Lord” (Luke 1:17), so these Adventists of the latter half of the nineteenth century accepted the task of warning the world anew of His Second Coming (Revelation 10:11). They recognized as their standard of conduct “the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus” (Revelation 14: 12), and thus, by the grace of God, endeavored to prepare “the way of the Lord” (Isaiah 40:3).
INTO ALL THE WORLD
Unbelievable though it may seem to some, this second advent movement, with ever-increasing momentum, has now spread into every corner of the globe. Though unendowed by wealthy sponsors, like some other missionary organizations, it has established itself in more than four hundred countries, islands, and island groups; and, with almost thirty thousand full-time workers, is preaching the coming of the Lord in nearly nine hundred languages and modes of speech. During the first hundred years of the movement it raised and spent upon its missionary enterprises more than three hundred million dollars! Further, to hasten completion of its world task, it has established eighty-three publishing houses and branches,- printing in two hundred languages, -whose book and periodical sales exceed in value more than four million dollars annually. In addition, it has established a chain of hospitals, sanitariums, and dispensaries all around the world, each unit helping in a practical way to bring a knowledge of the love of God and His last message of mercy to suffering humanity.
No one can sincerely consider this amazing development without admitting that here indeed is the fulfillment of the prophecy of Revelation 14:6-12. The three angels’ messages are being given now. Here before our eyes are the people of the prophecy, preaching the everlasting gospel in all its beauty and fullness. Proclaiming that the hour of God’s judgment’ has arrived, and calling upon people of every tribe and tongue to acknowledge Jesus Christ as their Creator and Redeemer, their Savior and Friend. Surely here is the last great sign promised for this mighty hour.
THE grand old cathedral at Strasbourg has been famous for one of those marvelous clocks that marks not only the passing of seconds, minutes, and hours, but also of the seasons and the years. There are many such clocks in existence, but this one is perhaps the most elaborate of all.
As I stood one day in front of this incredible timepiece, looking up at it in wonderment and expectancy, suddenly the noon hour began to strike. Immediately a little door opened, and out onto a platform marched a group of tiny figures, representing, I believe, the twelve apostles. They stayed for a moment, and then vanished from sight.
It is like that with prophecy. When God-who made time in the beginning (Genesis 1:14)-sees that http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auHis great clock of the universe records the hour for the completion of some great time period which He has announced, nothing can prevent the happenings destined to occur at that moment.
Thus when God’s hour struck in 1844, when the last of the 2300 years of Daniel’s great prediction had faded into history, the judgment began in heaven and the judgment hour message began to be proclaimed on earth. In that hour there were men and women ready to give God’s message and to help to finish the work He had planned to accomplish in the earth.
Here we perceive anew the marvelous harmony in all the great prophecies for our time. Daniel’s words spanned more than two millenniums to reach to the middle of the nineteenth century, calling for events of tremendous importance to happen at that time. Then “the sanctuary” was to be cleansed; then the judgment was to begin. But John, who wrote during the closing years of the first century AD, more than six hundred years after Daniel, saw the same events. In addition, he foretold the giving of the warning message to all the world that the judgment had begun.
TRUTH RISES AGAIN
But there is something more of very great importance in all this. Look again at the prophecy in the eighth chapter of Daniel-the one concerned with “the crisis at the close.” Notice the statement that the 1ittle horn”-symbol of the great spiritual apostasy of the Dark Ages-would “cast down the truth to the ground;” then the question, “How long shall be the vision?” Daniel 8:9-13. The implication is, of course, that not only would the end of the 2300 years mark the cleansing of the sanctuary and the beginning of the judgment, but also the time when the truth, long trodden underfoot, would rise again and be seen in all its perfection in the closing crisis of the ages.
If this is a correct interpretation, then we should look not only for a world-wide proclamation of the judgment after 1844, but also for a spectacular revival of the truth. Did such a development take place?
Recall, for instance, the new frontiers of science that have been explored during the past hundred years, after being hidden for centuries under all manner of absurdities. The truth about the shape of the earth and the relation of the earth to the sun and the moon has been revealed; as has the truth about gravitation and the immensity of the universe, that astronomy has but lately made known.
Scientific medical facts, obscured for ages by superstitions, have also come to light, with exact information now available about every part of the human body and its functions, and with specialists delving ever more deeply into the mysteries of the brain, the eyes, the ears, the nerves, the glands. Science has discovered facts about vitamins and insulin, about viruses and vaccines. How much truth we have now on all these subjects compared to the darkness and appalling ignorance of a hundred years ago!
Truth about the Bible has likewise come to light in a wonderful way. Its critics used to say that the Book couldn’t be inspired, because of all its historical errors. But they do not say that any more because, as archaeologists have worked on the ruins of the cities and the villages mentioned in the Bible, all its historical references have been proved astonishingly accurate. Again and again the spade of the excavator has confirmed the Book and confounded the critics. Moses, they said, couldn’t possibly have written the Pentateuch, because the art of writing was not known in his day. But writing has been found long antedating the time of Moses. There never was a king of Assyria named Sargon (Isaiah 20: 1), they said, until the name turned up on some long-buried monument. The taking of Jericho was but a fable, they said with scorn, until Sir Charles Marston uncovered the ancient walls of the city and found that they had fallen flat. So, in scores of unexpected ways, the veracity of the Bible writers has been fully established, and only the ignorant profess doubt of its authenticity and the accuracy of its statements.
TRUTH ABOUT THE DEAD
Then there is the truth about the state of the dead and the afterlife. Thank God for the light in the Bible’s explanation of the mystery of death. Today we know from the Holy Scriptures that the dead are not in heaven, worrying over the plight of their loved ones left behind on earth; they are not in hell, suffering fearful torments; they are not in purgatory, making amends for past transgressions. They are merely “asleep” awaiting, in complete unconsciousness, the resurrection morning. In the words of Solomon, they “know not anything.” Their love, their hatred, their envy, their every emotion and every thought, have ceased. Ecclesiastes 9:5,6; Psalm 146:4 They have no knowledge of the world, nor their relatives (Job 14:21), nor even of God. Psalm 6:5. When Lazarus “had lain in the grave four days already,” the Master said of him: “Our friend Lazarus sleeps.” John 11:11-17.
In this dreamless sleep the dead remain until they are awakened by the voice of God. “So man lies http://www.ThreeAngels.com.audown, and rises not: till the heavens be no more, they shall not awake, nor be raised out of their sleep.” Job 14:12. Then, in that great day, “the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live.” John 5:25.
In harmony with this the apostle Paul declared: “Behold, I show you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?” 1 Corinthians 15:51-55.
And again: “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: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words.” 1 Thessalonians 4: 16-18.
This assurance of new life at the resurrection when the Lord returns is the enduring hope and consolation for the bereaved. It takes the sting out of death, and robs it of all its old-time terrors. It removes all fear about the present state of loved ones who have passed away, and it gives a blessed assurance of happy reunion in God’s sweet afterward, when “the shadows flee away.” With this hope “He heals the broken in heart, and binds up their wounds.” Psalm 147:3. Even so does He “comfort all that mourn,” giving them “beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness.” Isaiah 61:2, 3.
Truth! How precious it is! How good that it has been revived and restored! Consider for a moment the matter of the Lord’s day. For centuries, people had been taught to observe Sunday. Now light has shone anew upon the commandments of God, especially upon the fourth commandment, and tens of thousands realize that the seventh day-not the first-is the day God requires to be kept holy. And if someone says, Why wasn’t this found out before? the answer is simple: The truth was hidden for centuries by the enemies of God’s word.
TRUTH ABOUT THE SABBATH
All through the years God’s commandment has stood unchanged and as unchangeable as ever, saying: “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shall thou labor, and do all thy work: but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.” Exodus 20:8-10. But because the ruling church once said, We have changed the commandment: from now on you must keep the first day,” the majority of sincere Christians meekly obeyed. But no organization, however powerful, has any authority to change the law of God. Even to attempt to do so is gross presumption. “All His commandments are sure. They stand fast forever and ever.” Psalm 111:7, 8. And when Christ came to live among men He said: “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in nowise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.” Matthew 5:17, 18.
Now that the truth about the Sabbath has been “lifted up,” and is being proclaimed afresh in all its simplicity and beauty, those who love the Lord in sincerity are heeding His word concerning it. In so doing they are making the discovery that the Sabbath is not a day of misery and repression, but a day of delight, of happiness and refreshing in the Lord. They are proving in their own experience how true is the promise: “If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on My holy day. And call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honorable. And shall honor Him, not doing your own ways, nor finding your own pleasure, nor speaking your own words: then shall thou delight thyself in the Lord. And I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.” Isaiah 58:13,14.
And now we can understand more fully what the prophecy means when it says that the “everlasting gospel” shall be preached to all nations just before the end. The truth which was trodden down during the Dark Ages, rises again in the last days of human history and is carried in all its glory by faithful messengers to earth’s remotest bounds. The pure word of God is to be made known to the people. The truth about God and His creative power, about Christ and His redeeming love, about the inspiration of the Bible, and the perpetuity of the divine law, about the Sabbath, the nature of man, and about the state of the dead, is to be understood. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auGod is the “God of truth” (Psalm 31:5), and His only begotten Son is “full of grace and truth” (John 1: 14); while the “Spirit of truth” is sent to guide the erring mind of man “into all truth” (John 16:13). He desires truth upon our lips, truth in our actions, and truth in our hearts. Psalm 15:2. And it is “the righteous nation which keeps the truth” which shall enter at last through the gates of God’s eternal city. Isaiah 26:2.
When this gospel of the kingdom shall have been preached in all the world, as a witness unto all nations, then shall the end come.
GOD’S POWER IN RESERVE
How wonderful that we should be witnessing at this time-when falsehood is so rampant among the nations the most zealous and strenuous effort ever put forth by Christian people to preach the truth in all the world! Surely this is the greatest of all the signs of our times. Still more important, it is, as we have seen, the last great sign. For when this work has been accomplished, and this final witness has been given, the end will come.
How near are we to the finishing of this world task? Who can tell? If we knew that, then we would know also the day and hour of Christ’s coming, which is known only by the Father in heaven.
Some are inclined to say: Look at all the work that remains to be done. Look at all the unentered cities; look at all the tribes where so little has been accomplished! Yet who really knows how far the gospel has gone, or how many there are who have never, in some way, heard its witness?
Over the spillway at the mighty Boulder Dam there is flowing today a green tide of water. Fifteen hundred cubic feet a second, they say. And what a sight it is! So smoothly, so inexorably, it rushes on, plunging down with thunderous roar.
While I was watching this awe-inspiring scene not long ago, one of the guards came up and began to chat about the magnitude of the structure and to commend the ability and foresight of its engineers.
“But they were out in one calculation,” he said. “Though they built this spillway with elaborate care to provide for any eventuality, they did not expect it to come into use for possibly forty years. That is, they thought it might take that long for the lake to fill up. And now, in these few years, it is full and overflowing.”
As he spoke, it seemed to me that here was a powerful lesson for us today. Here was a mighty structure that man had made with scrupulous exactness and painstaking labor, with every detail most carefully planned, but which depended for its full functioning upon the ungovernable forces of nature. Despite all of man’s skill there was one factor that the original designers could not definitely forecast; and that was the amount of rain that might fall on the watershed. This was the point beyond which man could not go in his planning; where nature took control.
By human calculation it appeared that it would take forty years to fill the lake. But nature decreed otherwise, and in less than five years from the completion of the dam the water reached and passed the spillway.
Even so the Christian church may lay its plans for the finishing of its work in the earth. It may build churches and colleges and printing houses and all manner of religious institutions. It may raise large sums of money and send out missionaries into every land on earth. And having done all this it may say, “At this rate of progress we shall finish the work in so many years.” Some may say forty years, and some twenty, and some ten. But all such human calculations leave out one great possibility-the rain.
If only the rain of the Holy Spirit were to fall upon all these mechanical preparations, upon all the parched hearts and lives within and without the church, how soon might the holy task be completed!
Such a supernatural outpouring has been planned by the Lord. “It shall come to pass afterward,” He said through the prophet Joel, “that I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh. And your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions: and also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out My Spirit. And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the Lord come. And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered: for in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance, as the Lord hath said, and in the remnant whom the Lord shall call.” Joel 2:28-32.
What a dramatic picture of a flood tide of the Holy Spirit-of the latter rain falling in a deluge upon old and young, upon master and servant, galvanizing into action the entire congregation of the Lord for the final preaching of the gospel, the everlasting truth, in all the earth! http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auFor such a sudden in filling of divine power we should ever hold ourselves in hopeful expectation. When it happens, we shall understand more fully what God meant when He said, “A short work will the Lord make upon the earth.” Romans 9:28.
ONE very impressive fact brought out by a study of the great prophecies for our time is how little remains unfulfilled of all these inspired forecasts of the future. Look back for a moment at the predictions considered in this book. All that had reference to the empires of ancient history met their fulfillment long ago. Those referring to medieval and modern times have all come to pass save for their last few sentences.
Take, for instance, the prophecy of the metallic image in the second chapter of Daniel. How much of it remains to happen? Only verse 44, which reads: In the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever.” Everything else is past,-the sequence of world powers from Babylon to Rome, the breakup of the Roman Empire, the long struggle among the European nations for supremacy,-and now we may look to the final event, the setting up of the kingdom of God.
Look at the seventh chapter of Daniel, with its repetition of the pageant of world empires, followed by the amazing forecast of the rise and reign of the papacy. All this has come to pass, including the long period of papal supremacy lasting until 1798. What is left? Only the final phase of the judgment and the giving of “the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven,” to “the people of the saints of the Most High.” Verse 27. Nothing else.
Consider the eighth chapter. Its long time period of 23oo years stretched from 457 BC to AD 1844 to the beginning of the investigative judgment in heaven and the lifting up of the truth on the earth. And what remains? Only this: the power that magnified itself in its heart, and stood up against the Prince of princes, is to “be broken without hand” at the coming of the Lord. Daniel 8:25.
Turning to the book of Revelation, one thinks of the prophecy of the seven trumpets, for, as we have seen, the seventh trumpet is actually sounding now, and nothing is left save the coming of the final Conqueror to “destroy them which destroy the earth.” Revelation 11:18.
In the thirteenth chapter of Revelation the revival of the papacy is predicted, followed by the amazing forecast of America’s rise to world power. And what remains? Only the final attack on human freedom and the last persecution of the faithful children of God.
It is an impressive array of facts, enough to convince the most critical mind of the solemnity of the present hour. It also suggests the question, Are there other unfulfilled prophecies for the occurrence of which we should be watching now?
There are; and they deal with the very last scenes in the world’s history. In the sixteenth chapter of Revelation we are given a picture of the fearful events to take place in that little period immediately before the end between the completion of the investigative judgment in heaven and the coming of Jesus in glory. They are so terrible that one hesitates even to mention them; yet they are recorded for our admonition “upon whom the ends of the world are come,” and therefore cannot be ignored.
THE SEVEN LAST PLAGUES
Special importance attaches to “the seven last plagues” because they are referred to as the outpouring of the wrath of God upon the earth. Revelation 16:1. This step is so unusual on God’s part, so different from His familiar, gracious attitude toward the human race, that He Himself refers to it as “His strange act.” Isaiah 28:21. All down the ages God has poured out His love for man; indeed, He “so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16. But the day is corning-and is now not far away-when this love “so amazing, so divine,” will turn to wrath on a scale equally beyond our comprehension. When the plagues fall, men will understand how God hates sin. They will behold the tragic fate of all tyrants and persecutors, all who have cruelly tormented and killed their fellow men, all who have despised goodness, abused innocence, and trodden the truth into dust. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auAgain and again those who have stood valiantly for the rights of man, and suffered so much for their loyalty to the things God loves, have cried out in their agony, “How long, O Lord, does Thou not judge and avenge our blood?” Revelation 6:10. It has seemed to them that God did not care. The heavens were as brass above them; there was no answering cry. But when the plagues fall they will have a sufficient answer, for God will then deal with the wicked in a way that the whole universe will never forget.
The first plague, we are told, will be in the nature of a “grievous sore,” which will suddenly afflict all who have the mark of the beast, meaning those who have united themselves with the great apostasy and thus become associated with those evil powers which have scorned the commandments of God, trampled upon liberty, and sought to coerce the consciences of His faithful people. Fearful will be God’s judgment upon them.
The second plague turns the sea to blood, while the third has a like effect upon “the rivers and fountains of waters.” These terrors have a certain appropriateness, for the apostle John writes: “I heard the angel of the waters say, Thou art righteous, O Lord, which art, and was, and shall be, because Thou has judged thus. For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and Thou has given them blood to drink; for they are worthy.” Revelation 16:5, 6.
The fourth plague affects the heat of the sun, which is greatly magnified, scorching the enemies of God as with a raging fire. Under the fifth there is a sudden change, from brilliant light to Stygian darkness, as the seat of the beast -which must be Rome itself-is plunged into impenetrable gloom.
The sixth angel turns eastward and directs his vial “upon the great river Euphrates,” the water of which is dried up, “that the way of the kings of the East might be prepared.” Verse 12.
What can this mean? The drying up of the literal Euphrates would serve no historical purpose, nor would it have any special interest to the kings of the East. The expression must surely have reference to the power that possesses the territory watered by this river, as in Revelation 9:14. For hundreds of years this was the Ottoman Empire, and even today modern Turkey controls the headwaters of this famous river.
It is interesting to note in this connection that Turkey has for centuries been shrinking, until at the present moment it occupies but a small section of Europe around Constantinople, while in Asia Minor it extends only to the boundaries of Iraq.
BATTLE OF ARMAGEDDON
According to the prophecy, the elimination of this Moslem power is to prepare the way of “the kings of the East;” and while it is unwise for anyone to speculate how prophecy will come to pass, it is proper to point out that the recent epochal changes in the Far East, coupled with developments in the neighborhood of the old Euphrates, constitute a combination of events of great significance.
But this is not all. As the prophet observes the pouring out of the sixth plague, he sees “the spirits of devils, working miracles,” go forth “unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.” Verse 14.
“And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon.” Verse 16. Here is the Bible account of Armageddon, of which so much has been written and spoken in recent years. Notice these facts concerning it: First, it is engineered by devils, suggesting that the events leading up to it will be marked by such falsehood, deceit, and cruelty as men have never witnessed hitherto. Second, it involves the rulers of every nation on earth, and is obviously the climax of some vast world upheaval. Third, it specifically includes the kings of the East. Fourth, it occurs after the Euphrates power has been “dried up.” Fifth, it will be terminated not by the victory of one national army over another, as in every other battle ever fought, but by the appearance of Christ as King of kings and Lord of lords. See Revelation 19:11-16.
As “the kings of the earth, and their armies” (Revelation 19:19) gather together at Megiddo, the ancient battleground of Palestine,-the seventh angel will pour out his vial, and a great voice out of the temple of heaven will be heard saying, “It is done.” Revelation 16: 16, 17.
Then will come “a great earthquake, such as was not since men were upon the earth, so mighty an earthquake, and so great.” The cities of the nations will be shaken into ruin, as mountains sink and islands disappear. Next, as though this were not a sufficient manifestation of the wrath of God, there will fall “a great hail out of heaven, every stone about the weight of a talent,” to complete the discomfiture of those who have defied the Majesty of heaven and who, in their selfish pride and callous cruelty, have brought so much suffering upon the earth. Verses 18-21.
Is Armageddon near? The reader may answer for himself. Let him consider all that has happened these past few years, all that is happening today, and then make his own decision.
WATCHING FOR THE END
That is exactly what God has told us to do-to watch with all care for the signs of the approach of this last great battle of the ages. In the midst of this prophecy that sets forth the details of this supremely important event, the voice of the Lord is heard saying: “Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watches, and keeps his garments.” Verse 15.
So we are to watch for the fulfillment of the last words of prophecy; to be ever on the alert for indications that Armageddon is drawing near; and then to keep our “garments.” That means, of course, to keep ourselves, by the grace of God, pure and holy in His sight, “unspotted from the world.” James 1:27. It means that we are to keep ourselves ready for swift developments which will precipitate us with awful suddenness into the final scenes of history that are to precede Christ’s glorious coming.
Let us never forget that it was in connection with His own description of the events preceding His return that Jesus said, “Therefore be you also ready: for in such an hour as you think not the Son of man comes.” Matthew 24:44.
“Watch you therefore: for you know not when the Master of the house comes, at even, or at midnight, or at the cock crowing, or in the, morning: lest coming suddenly He find you sleeping. And what I say unto you I say unto all, Watch.” Mark 13:35-37.
MUCH has been said and written of late concerning the centuries to come. Some are expecting a millennium of peace, others a constant succession of wars, while every would-be builder of a new world order declares that all the future lies with him.
One well-known national leader, addressing his cheering followers from a certain historic balcony, announced that his empire would last a thousand years. He was mistaken.
The fact is that God has His own plans for the coming millennium -plans of epochal importance and world embracing magnitude, which will set aside the schemes of the most ambitious and determined men. We read of these plans in the twentieth chapter of Revelation, where the prophet, drawing aside the veil of the future, bids us look a thousand years ahead. This remarkable prediction begins with the following dramatic announcement:
“And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years, and cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled: and after that he must be loosed a little season.” Verses 1-3.
GOD’S PLAN OUTLINED
Having noted the binding of Satan, the prophet thinks of the faithful children of God-of all who have been “beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshiped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years.” Verse 4.
Thank God, He is not going to forget those who have loyally championed His truth through all the centuries of struggle with the powers of darkness! Their self-sacrifice has not passed unnoticed. Their faithfulness and devotion is to be rewarded with the fullness of divine gratitude and appreciation. God is planning for them to reign with Him - the greatest honor He could bestow.
John now makes this intriguing statement: “But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished.” Verse 5. Who are these dead? Seeing that he has just mentioned the righteous, we must presume that he is here referring to the wicked; and this is borne out by the next verse, which reads: “Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power.” Verse 6. The implication is plain that those who reign with Christ a thousand years-the righteous-are raised in the first resurrection, while those who are raised at a later resurrection -”the rest of the dead” are the wicked. http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auFollowing this, the prophet announces that “when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison,” and shall go forth once more to deceive the nations, causing them to gather in battle array around the city of God. At this point he beholds “a great white throne,” and the final judgment, as God intervenes once more to save His people.
Such, in brief, is the prophetic outline of the thousand years ahead; but let us study it in further detail. When is this thousand-year period to begin?
The clew is contained in the fact that it is to be marked by two resurrections, one at its beginning, the other at its close. These are the same two resurrections as mentioned by Christ when He declared: “Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth. They that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.” John 5:28,29.
When will the dead hear the voice of the Son of God? At His Second Coming in glory. For Paul says: “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.” 1 Thessalonians 4:16.
Here, therefore, is the starting point of the millennium. From the second advent it rolls on for a thousand years until the final destruction of evil at its close.
But now, having discovered the starting point, let us note all the events to occur at that time. First is the return of Christ. Second is the resurrection of the righteous dead. Third is the translation of the living righteous; for, as the apostle Paul says, “We which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.” Verse 17. Fourth is the destruction of the wicked who are living on the earth at the time of Christ’s return, for we must not forget that when “the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels,” it will be with “Taking fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.” 2 Thessalonians 1:7, 8. Fifth is the desolation of the earth; for then “the earth is utterly broken down, the earth is clean dissolved, the earth is moved exceedingly. The earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall be removed like a cottage; and the transgression thereof shall be heavy upon it.” Isaiah 24:19,20.
HOW SATAN IS BOUND
Having assured ourselves concerning these vital facts, we are ready to inquire what is to happen during the millennium, and how and where Satan is to be bound.
One point is perfectly clear. If the righteous have been taken to heaven, and the wicked have been slain by the glory of the returning Christ, there will be no one left on earth for Satan to tempt. This fact alone will bind him more thoroughly than any chain of steel could possibly do. Furthermore he will find himself alone in a desolate world, left for a thousand years to contemplate the frightful results of his wicked rebellion against the Most High. It is interesting to note that the Greek word from which “bottomless pit” is translated in Revelation20:i has the same meaning as “the deep” in Genesis 1:2, referring to the earth in its original chaotic state.
The prophet Jeremiah describes the conditions that will prevail during the millennium: I beheld the earth, and, lo, it was without form, and void; and the heavens, and they had no light. I beheld the mountains, and, lo, they trembled, and all the hills moved lightly. I beheld, and, lo, there was no man, and all the birds of the heavens were fled. I beheld, and, lo, the fruitful place was a wilderness, and all the cities thereof were broken down at the presence of the Lord, and by His fierce anger. For thus hath the Lord said, The whole land shall be desolate; yet will I not make a full end.” Jeremiah 4:23-27.
But is not the millennium going to be a time of universal peace and prosperity? There is no foundation in the Scriptures for such a view, nor for the teaching, so popular in some quarters, that Christ, during this long period, will establish His throne in Palestine and, with the help of the Jews, seek again the conversion of the nations. Certainly He will reign with His people during the thousand years, but it will be with those who have accepted His salvation; and it will take place not on earth, but in heaven. It is to the mansions prepared for them in glory that the redeemed will go at Christ’s Second Coming. John 14:1-3. There they will remain until the thousand years are, past. Revelation 20:4
The end of the millennium will be marked by many events of great importance. First, the people of God, together with their beautiful city, the New Jerusalem, will return from heaven to this earth. Christ will be with them, and at His appearance- which will be His third advent the wicked dead of all generations will be raised to life to take part in the final judgment scene, when the justice of God’s dealings with sin and http://www.ThreeAngels.com.ausinners will be demonstrated before the universe.
Naturally the resurrection of the wicked dead will bring about the loosing of Satan. Once more, for a little while, he will have a mighty host upon whom to work his wiles; and as a result the multitudes of the lost, stirred to insensate fury, will rush upon the New Jerusalem to destroy it. “And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city: and fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them.” Revelation 20:9.
THE FINAL JUDGMENT
Just before the fire falls, however, the last judgment will take place, as described by John in these heart-stirring words:
I saw a great white throne, and Him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.” Verses 1-13.
What a gathering that will be! All who have ever lived on this earth will be there. All the kings and their subjects; all the conquerors and the peoples they have subjugated; all the tyrants and the people they have persecuted. All the popes and the priests; all the preachers and their congregations; all the rich and the poor; all the cruel and the kind; all the mean and the generous; all-yes, all the people of all nations, all languages, all colors, and all climes. No one will be missing in that great day.
Some will be safe within the city; but the rest will be outside, forming the vast, teeming throng of those who have rejected the mercy of God. All will gaze fixedly upon that great white throne, so awful in its sublime majesty, as upon their ears there falls anew a recounting of God’s wondrous plan of salvation, of love unstinted, unmeasured and immeasurable, poured out for a race that was lost.
In some hearts will glow a sense of gladness as they recall how they accepted the call of the Lord and turned from sin to live a new and nobler life with Him. But into others will come an increasing realization of their blindness and folly in refusing to heed the pleadings of the Holy Spirit, and in turning from the good way to follow “the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.”
Where shall we be in that great day? Inside the city, or without? Shall we stand within its jasper walls or out there amongst the tragic multitudes of the ungodly, terror stricken, and condemned?
As the unerring records are produced from the books of heaven, the wicked will see where it was in their experience that they began to go wrong, how often they turned their backs upon God, how vile and sordid their lives must appear in His holy sight. Before the watching universe they will admit that the punishment about to be meted upon them is both just and inevitable.
When the great judgment scene is ended, devouring flames will consume every trace of sin and all the desolation it has wrought in the earth. Then will the prophecy of Malachi be fulfilled, which says: “Behold, the day comes, that shall burn as an oven. And all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that comes shall burn them up, said the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.” Malachi 4:1-3.
Then will dawn those glorious years of peace and joy which are not to be measured in centuries or millenniums, but which shall last through all eternity. Then shall it be that “the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High.” Daniel 7:27. Then also “they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars forever and ever.” Daniel 12:3.
Such are God’s plans for a thousand years to come and far beyond, into the infinite future. Are we looking ahead with Him?
DARK though the immediate prospect may appear, we are to know that better times will surely come, because God has planned it so. For a little while longer wicked men may spread themselves “like a green bay tree,” and gloat over their temporary successes and conquests, but their end will come. Their fate http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auis decreed. Their judgment is certain. “But the meek shall inherit the earth; and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace.” Psalm 37:11. “According to His promise” according to the great prophecies of His word-we look for “new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwells righteousness.” 2 Peter 3:13.
Cities may be destroyed and great empires crumble, but truth, freedom, justice, and love will never perish. They are as indestructible as God Himself. The future is theirs. Eternity belongs to them and to all who believe in them and love them. As the apostle Paul said, “Now abides faith, hope, charity, these three.” 1 Corinthians 13:13. They may be scorned and derided and trampled upon, but they will survive every attack and outride every storm. They abide forever.
Christ had the same thought in mind when He said of Himself and His teachings, “Upon this Rock I will build My church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” Matthew 16:18. The most precious things in human experience, the things God loves will outlive and outlast all that is ugly and cruel and hateful.
It is the divine purpose, as we have seen, to give “the kingdom and dominion to the people of the saints of the Most High;” and this purpose will not fail. Nothing can prevent its coming to pass; not “the gates of hell,” not all the powers of darkness.
So if we are true to God, we are on the winning side. If we stand for the things for which God stands, we shall succeed with Him. If we choose to obey Him now, we shall have the privilege of serving Him through all the ages to come. If we are His champions in this life, we shall be His heroes forever. 1f we suffer, we shall also reign with Him.” 2 Timothy 2:12.
In the seventeenth chapter of Revelation the evil forces of this world are represented as making war, with one united mind, upon “the Lamb of God.” It is a picture of concentrated human might directed, in the closing years of history, to the stamping out of Christianity, the obliteration of the name of Christ and all who cherish it. But we are told, thank God, that “the Lamb shall overcome them.” Revelation 17:14.
The Lamb-symbol of Jesus, and so of all that is gentle, gracious, and inoffensive shall overcome them! And why? Because the Lamb is also “the Lion of the tribe of Judah” (Revelation 5:5,6); and when He arises in majesty and strength, His enemies flee in confusion.
Notice, particularly, this phrase, so full of encouragement and cheer: “And they that are with Him are called, and chosen, and faithful.” Christ does not forget His devoted followers, nor does He leave them to the mercy of their enemies. Those who are loyal to the Lamb will find the Lion their Friend. They may share His trials now, but they will share His victory in the days to come.
TOTAL VICTORY
God’s victory is coming. The evidence presented in this book-and I have but touched the fringes of the subject leaves no room for question on that point. When Christ returns in glory and power; as He must and will return before many years have passed; a shattering blow will be dealt to all the powers of darkness-a blow from which they will never recover.
People talk today about “total victory;” and that is exactly the type of victory which God has in mind. He will be satisfied with nothing less. For this reason He has planned not only for the complete destruction of evil and of all who practice it, but also for the peopling of His kingdom with individuals who have fully given themselves to Him. The citizens of God’s new world will be those who have definitely broken with sin and who have demonstrated in their lives that they are, by their own free choice, wholeheartedly in accord with Him.
For this reason Jesus said to Nicodemus, “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” John 3:3. There must be a radical inward change, corresponding to a new birth, before one can have part in His plans for the future. Paul said, In Christ Jesus neither circumcision avails anything, nor uncircumcised, but a new creature.” Galatians 6:15. That is what God is seeking. New men. New women. People fully saved by His grace. He is seeking people who know what total victory means in their own lives through the in flowing of the power of the Holy Spirit. People who serve Him not because they are afraid of Him, but because they have in their hearts a deep and genuine appreciation of His kindness toward them in Christ Jesus. With eternity in mind, God is building His kingdom with those who hate iniquity and who rejoice to do His will.
When the final song of victory is sung upon the sea of glass before the throne of God (Revelation 15:2), it will be a song of victory “over the beast, and over his image, and over his mark, and over the number of his name” and that will mean victory over every evil power and influence in the modern world. In that day it will be realized that God’s plan for total victory was a triumph of divine strategy such as no http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auearthly nation ever conceived or attempted; indeed, His victory will be so complete, so absolute, that iniquity shall not rise up a second time. Nahum 1:9.
If we want a completely new order, a new world order, we must look to the one which God has designed, which will be based, not upon force, but upon love; not upon concentration camps, but upon conversion.
How true it is that “except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it”! Psalm 127:1. All who are expecting wicked men, by diabolical means, to build a better world, are going to be disillusioned. It cannot happen that way. “Before we can build a new world we must undergo a profound moral reformation. The good society can exist only where good men are.” Only God can build good men. By means of the gospel, which is “the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes” (Romans 1:16), He changes a man into “a new creature” in Christ Jesus; and those who in any way are co-operating with Him in this beautiful ministry are the real founders of the new world order-an order designed to last not for a thousand years, but through all eternity.
DOWN OUT OF HEAVEN
There is perhaps a deeper meaning than we have as yet perceived in those familiar words penned by the apostle: “I John saw the Holy City, New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven.” Revelation 21:2.
From time immemorial men have been trying to build the New Jerusalem on this earth by their own unaided efforts. They have planned and labored, fought and striven, yet they have failed. The most zealous efforts have collapsed in futility; the rosiest dreams have faded.
Today it is more evident than ever that all human schemes of this sort will never come to fruition. Dr. John S. Whale admits this in declaring, “How will you build Jerusalem in this green and pleasant land?” “You cannot do so. The political science of twenty-one civilizations has never yet achieved a just society, let alone a perfect one. Such is the meaning and the measure of our fallen state. Granted that the New Jerusalem must be planned if it is to be built, we dare not forget that man can never build it by trusting to his own poor resources. The New Jerusalem must come down out of heaven from God Himself.”
How true! If there is to be a new order or a New Jerusalem on this earth sometime, it will be because God brings it to pass. It will not be built by us, but by Him. It will come down “from God out of heaven.”
And we may safely leave all the planning of it to Him. In My Father’s house,” said Jesus, “are many mansions. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.” John 14:2, 3.
THE GLORIOUS TOMORROW
If we give ourselves wholly to the Lord and follow His counsel, this beautiful home will one day be ours. Ours will be the right to enter its pearly gates and walk its golden streets; and its glories will be ample recompense for all we may have endured in the conflict with evil, or, suffered for righteousness’ sake. Its dazzling splendor will make us wonder why we ever doubted God’s love or questioned His purposes.
When Jesus comes again, the children of God-including all who have been sleeping in the tomb - will be “caught up, .. . to meet the Lord in the air” (1 Thessalonians 4:17), and carried by the angels to the city He has prepared for them (Hebrews 11:16; Matthew 24:31). There for a thousand years they will revel in the wonders of God’s dwelling in the heavens.
During this millennium the earth will lie desolate, marked with the curse of sin. Jeremiah 4:23. Yet it will not be forgotten. It could not be; for here the Son of God died on Calvary, giving His life for the salvation of men; and the story of His sacrifice for this one lone, fallen planet will be told and retold through all the universe for evermore.
For this reason, when the thousand years have elapsed, the earth will be cleansed by fire, and all trace of the reign of sin will be removed. 2 Peter 3:9, 10. In that vast funeral pyre will be consumed the last moldering relics of a civilization that forgot its God and suffered the judgments of His wrath. All the paraphernalia of destruction, for which nations beggared themselves, and which, by that time, will be rusted and useless, will dissolve in the scorching heat of that raging holocaust, and mingle again with the earth whence it was taken.
Then, when the flames have done their work, at the fiat of the Almighty, there will emerge a dream http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auworld more wonderful than the mind of man ever conceived. Indeed, the fullness of God’s creative power and genius will be employed upon this re-creation of the world that was lost.
The transformation which will then take place was shown to the apostle John, who described his vision in the following exquisite language: I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea. And I John saw the Holy City, New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. And He that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new.” Revelation 21: 1-5.
All things new! Yes, all the tragedy, all the suffering, all the sadness, will be gone forever. No more sorrow; no more pain; no more death. No more worry; no more heartache; no more fear. No more disease. No more feebleness; no more old age. Only happiness, perfect and unalloyed for all eternity.
NO MORE TEARS
“And God shall wipe away all tears.” In all the Bible there is no promise more beautiful than this. The marvel of it! The Lord of glory, Creator of the heavens and the earth, stooping low to wipe the eyes of His sorrowing children! As William Cullen Bryant says in “The Flood of Years”
Beyond That belt of darkness, still the years roll on More gently, but with not less mighty sweep. They gather up again and softly bear All the sweet lives that late were overwhelmed And lost to sight, all that in them was good, Noble, and truly great, and worthy of love. As its smooth eddies curl along their way They bring old friends together; hands are clasped In joy unspeakable; the mother’s arms Again are folded round the child she loved And lost. Old sorrows are forgotten now, Or but remembered to make sweet the hour That overpays them; wounded hearts that bled Or broke are healed forever. In the room Of this grief-shadowed present, there shall be A present in whose reign no grief shall gnaw The heart, and never shall a tender tie Be broken.
But not only will God remove the tears, He will take away every cause for crying, and no one will ever weep again. No one will have a single unhappy memory. There will be no more disappointments, no more partings, no more saying good-by.
In the words of the apostle Paul, “Eye hath not seen, nor car heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him.” 1 Corinthians 2:9. Indeed, the half has never been told of the innumerable joys of the home He is preparing for His people.’ No one has imagined a tithe of its glories, nor of the endless variety of interests and delights that will unfold unceasingly through the ages to come. Each day will bring its own surprises and increase the wonder of the redeemed at the exhaustlessness of the resources of God.
Men shall come from earthly wanderings to celestial homes: From dens and prisons here to joys and
mansions there; Out from iron doors and in through pearly gates.
And feet that woke the dull echoes of the gloomy dungeon floors shall stand within thy gates,
O Jerusalem.
Hands that clanked their chains with slow and tedious move shall strike the instruments of heavenly
melody, and wake the harp notes of enduring joy.
Brows once crowned with thorns and grimed with smoke and burning shall grow smooth and fair and
royal, beneath the crowns that never fade.
Sackcloth shall be exchanged for fine linen, clean and white; And gazing on the least of all the gathered
throng, we may says “Solomon in all His glory was not arrayed like one of these.”
H. L. Hastings
The earth itself will he changed. Dreary deserts and great wastes of water will disappear. The whole globe will return to Edenic fertility. “The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose. It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing: the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon, they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency of our God.” Isaiah 35:1, 2.
More beautiful than Yosemite, more marvelous than Yellowstone, more majestic than the snow-http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auhttp://www.ThreeAngels.com.aucapped Rockies, will be this wonderland of God’s redeemed. Vistas of unimaginable loveliness will stretch in every direction, while upon the ear will fall the most exquisite harmonies, wafted from the angelic choir around the throne of God.
HEAVEN ON EARTH
No wail of air-raid sirens will chill the soul, or whistle of falling bombs, or crash of guns, or cries of frightened children. Through unending ages nothing for one single moment will disturb the tranquility of that blessed land.
There will be no more war, no more labor strife, no more bickering and quarreling at home; for all will be at peace with one another, abundantly satisfied with the overflowing goodness of God. As the prophet Zephaniah wrote: “Then will I turn to the people a pure language, that they may all call upon the name of the Lord, to serve Him with one consent.” Zephaniah 3:9.
Truly, it will be heaven on earth at last, for the principles of heaven will be enshrined in the heart of every inhabitant. By beholding Jesus, all will have become like Him. Their lives will bear in rich profusion the fruit of the Holy Spirit, which is “love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.” Galatians 5:22, 23.
Everyone will be contented. No one will cherish unholy ambitions. Greed, envy, and jealousy will be unknown. There will never be anything to be sorry about, no unkind words to recall, no wounds to heal. Never will the golden rule be forgotten, and love eternally will be supreme. “The remnant of Israel shall not do iniquity, nor speak lies; neither shall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouth: for they shall feed and lie down, and none shall make them afraid.” Zephaniah 3:13.
THE JOY SUPREME
Everyone will enjoy abounding health and vitality. “The inhabitant shall not say, I am sick.” Isaiah 33:24. Nor will there be any cripples in that glorious land, no deaf or dumb or blind: for “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 sing.” Isaiah 35:5, 6.
Everyone will be housed in comfort. There will be no slums, no ugly buildings. The Great Architect of the universe will see to that. And there will be plenty of food for all, so that there will be no need to worry about the provisions of the morrow. Says the apostle John, “In the midst of the street of it,”-right at hand!-”and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing [service] of the nations.” Revelation 22:2.
But far above and beyond every other joy will be the continual presence of Jesus. Nothing in all the glory land will afford such lasting satisfaction as direct and constant companionship with Him. Golden streets, pearly gates, beautiful homes, exquisite scenery, would indeed afford little satisfaction without this priceless privilege.
Oh, heaven without My Savior would be no heaven to me; Dim were the walls of jasper, Rayless the crystal sea.
But He will be there. There is no doubt about that, for “they shall see His face.” Revelation 22:4. King of the undivided earth and beloved of all His people, He will “lead them unto living fountains of waters,” studying with them the mysteries of the universe and acquainting them ever more fully with the length and breadth and height and depth of the wisdom and love of God
Can it be true? It is true. And you who sit beside Bethesda’s pool today, weighed down with many a burden, many a care, waiting for “the troubling of the water,” yearning with a great heart-hunger for something, you know not what-look up and see all that God has planned to do for you in the days to come! Consider the great prophecies for our time and their mighty message for you. Remember the glorious promises of better times to come, of endless years of peace and happiness with Jesus.
Take courage! Hope on! The great Healer is coming. The King is on His way. Lift up your hearts! The long dark night of sorrow and suffering is almost over. Eternity’s dawn is near.
ONCE in the long ago, Christ said, there was a man who “made a great supper, and bade many: and sent his servant at suppertime to say to them that were bidden, Come; for all things are now ready.” Luke 14: 16, 17.
It is not difficult to picture the circumstances-the months of planning, the renovation of the home, the preparation of the food. A thousand things had to be thought of; an immense amount of work had to be done; but at long last everything was completed, and the final invitation was sent forth.
Even so it is with the supper-and the home-which God has prepared for those who love Him. There has been infinite planning and labor through the years, even “from the foundation of the world, but that is all over now. “All things are now ready.”
They are ready in heaven and ready on earth. Indeed, “all things are now ready.” They are ready in the social and the religious worlds. They are ready in Europe, in Asia, in Africa, in Australia, in the Americas. Everywhere one looks., all things are ready.
NO ROOM FOR DOUBT
As Jeremiah said: “Certainly this is the day that we looked for; we have found, we have seen it. The Lord hath done that which He had devised; He hath fulfilled His word that He had commanded in the days of old.” Lamentations 2:16,17.
“Certainly this is the day”! There is no room for question. All about us we behold the fulfillment of the words of God which He commanded in the days of old. A thousand evidences provide proof positive that prophecy spoke truly of our time. Surely a divine hand has made every possible preparation for the final scenes attending the coming of the Lord. As Jesus said: “When you see these things come to pass, know you that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand.” Luke 21:31, 28.
Nevertheless, in the midst of all these preparations for the greatest event of the ages, there is still something that is unready. That is the heart of man. A great many people, even professed Christians, are totally unprepared for what is coming. They are indifferent and careless, or, as the prophet so well describes them, “lukewarm,” “neither cold nor hot.” Revelation 3:16. They scoff at the idea of coming judgment. They scorn the prophecies of the word of God.
No wonder the prophet says, I counsel thee to anoint your eyes with eye salve, that thou may see.” Verse 18. See! That is what we all need to do today; to have the scales removed from our eyes by the Holy Spirit that we may sense the solemn meaning, of these epochal times, and realize in our hearts that “all things are now ready” for the supreme crisis just ahead.
In the book of Acts, there is recorded the story of Paul’s last voyage across the Mediterranean. A tempest had arisen, terrible in its violence, and all hope of deliverance had faded. Then, “about midnight the ship men deemed that they drew near to some country; and sounded, and found it twenty fathoms: and when they had gone a little further, they sounded again, and found it fifteen fathoms.” Acts 27:27,28.
It was midnight, midnight in the raging storm, but in the darkness and the terror of that night the ship men deemed they drew near to some country. Even so, in this darkest hour of history, we may know that the country for which our hearts have longed through many years is not far away. Take soundings where you will, when you will, the water grows shallower every day! Heaven is near. The storm, the strife, the stress, the suffering, will soon be over. What a message of hope for a troubled world! How it should move our hearts to action splendid and divine!
This brings us face to face with most vital questions, personal questions, which each must ask himself: “Am I ready for the climax of history which I know must be near at hand? Have I made everything right with God? Have I accepted His offer of pardon and peace through Jesus Christ? Have I brought my life into harmony with His will? Am I living in obedience to all His commandments? Do I really love Him with all my heart, in all sincerity?”
The voice of the Lord is even now calling each one of us to come to “the marriage supper of the Lamb.” Revelation 19:9. He is pleading with us all, saying, Put on the wedding garment, and come. Put away sin, and come! If we have been lukewarm; if we have been indifferent; if we have wandered-still we are to come. And here we catch anew a glowing vision of the cross, as it were with outstretched arms of infinite love, entreating with divine eagerness, “Come; for all things are now ready.”
NEED FOR HASTE
The last plane was about to leave Bataan. Shot down earlier in the war, dragged from Mariveles Bay, and rebuilt with parts taken from other wrecked machines, it was anything but a desirable means of http://www.ThreeAngels.com.auhttp://www.ThreeAngels.com.autransportation. But the enemy was closing in, and this was the last chance of escape from the oncoming army.
Soon after one o’clock in the morning, the pilot managed to start the engine. A brief warm up, and. the plane took off. But even as it left the runway and soared seventy feet above the water, shots rang out, and bullets hurtled by.
The pilot tried to climb, but the motor was weak, and he could not get an inch more altitude. Knowing that he dare not go back, and fearing that the machine might plunge into Manila Bay, he shouted to his passengers, “Throw out your baggage! Hurry!”
The passengers obeyed. It was not enough. Tin hats and other gear went twirling down into the bay. The rickety plane pushed up to one hundred feet, faltered, and then gradually gained altitude.
Thus they flew until they reached the safety of a friendly island. But it was a close call, and there was need to hurry and to throw away every earthly possession in order to save their lives.
Thus it was with the rescue of Lot and his family from the doomed cities of the plain. “Up, get you out of this place,” was the warning word that rang in their ears. “Escape for thy life; look not behind thee, neither stay thou in all the plain; escape to the mountain, lest thou be consumed.” Genesis 19:14, 17. They fled, barely in time.
So again today, if we could see as God sees, we would behold the angels, as it were, tugging at our hands and imploring us to escape the wrath of God while yet there is opportunity. We would realize how near we are to that great day when divine judgments will be poured out on “an evil and adulterous generation;” and we would hear the urgent pleading of the Holy Spirit to make our peace with Him before it is forever too late.
There is indeed no time to lose. “The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light.” Romans 13:12.
“Hurry! Hurry!” is the word the Master Pilot sends to each one of us today. Let us give up everything earthly, if need be, for Christ and eternity.