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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/30573-h.zip b/30573-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..6e032e4 --- /dev/null +++ b/30573-h.zip diff --git a/30573-h/30573-h.htm b/30573-h/30573-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..71473bb --- /dev/null +++ b/30573-h/30573-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,3666 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN" +"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Why I Preach the Second Coming, by Isaac Massey Haldeman</title> +<style type="text/css"> + body {font-family:'Bookman Old Style', 'Book Antiqua', 'Garamond'; text-align:justify; margin-left:3em; margin-right:3em} + p.pnn {margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0} + p.pn {text-indent:1.5em; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0} + p.pns {text-indent:1.5em; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:1em} + p.p0s {padding-left:3em; text-indent:-2em; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0.5em} + p.rt {text-align:right;margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0} + p.pt1 {padding-left:1.5em; text-indent:-1.5em; font-size:117%;margin-top:0; margin-bottom:1em} + + .sc {font-variant:small-caps} + .dc { float:left;font-size:400%;line-height:0.9em;margin-right:0.05em;padding-bottom:0.1em} + .ls1 {letter-spacing:0.06em} + .ls2 {letter-spacing:0.2em} + h1 {text-align:center;margin-top:5em;margin-bottom:1em;font-size:117%;font-weight:bold} + h1.pg {text-align:center;margin-top:0em;margin-bottom:0em;font-size:190%;font-weight:bold} + + table { background-color: #ccccff; } + .center { text-align: center; } + div.pg { font-family: Times-Roman, serif; } + hr.full { width: 100%; + margin-top: 3em; + margin-bottom: 0em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + height: 4px; + border-width: 4px 0 0 0; /* remove all borders except the top one */ + border-style: solid; + border-color: #000000; + clear: both; } + a:link {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none; } + link {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none; } + a:visited {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none; } + a:hover {color:#ff0000; + text-decoration: underline; } + pre {font-size: 85%; } +</style> +</head> +<body> +<div class="pg"> +<h1 class="pg">The Project Gutenberg eBook, Why I Preach the Second Coming, by Isaac +Massey Haldeman</h1> +<pre> +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: Why I Preach the Second Coming</p> +<p>Author: Isaac Massey Haldeman</p> +<p>Release Date: December 1, 2009 [eBook #30573]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: UTF-8</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHY I PREACH THE SECOND COMING***</p> +<br><br><h4 class="center">E-text prepared by Keith G. Richardson<br> + from page images generously made available by the<br> + Google Books Library Project<br> + (<a href="http://books.google.com/">http://books.google.com/</a>)</h4><br><br> +<p> </p> +<table border=0 cellpadding=10> + <tr> + <td valign="top"> + Note: + </td> + <td> + Images of the original pages are available through + the the Google Books Library Project. See + <a href="http://books.google.com/books?vid=etoOAAAAIAAJ&id"> + http://books.google.com/books?vid=etoOAAAAIAAJ&id</a> + </td> + </tr> +</table> +</div> +<p> </p> +<p class="pnn"><a href="#Title">Title Page</a></p> +<p class="pnn"><a href="#Copyright">Copyright</a></p> +<p class="pnn"><a href="#Foreword">Forward</a></p> +<p class="pnn"><a href="#Contents">Contents</a></p> +<p class="pnn"><a href="#I">Text</a></p> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full"> + +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:150%;margin-top:13em;margin-bottom:0"> +Why I Preach the Second Coming</p> +<hr style="margin-top:29em;margin-bottom:2em"> +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:192%;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:2.8em"> +<a name="Title" id="Title">Why I Preach the Second<br> +Coming</a></p> +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:108%;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0.5em"> +By</p> +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:117%;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0"> +I. M. HALDEMAN, D. D.</p> +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:88%;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:10em"> +<i>Pastor First Baptist Church, New York City</i></p> +<div style="text-align:center"><img alt="Illustration: Graphic" +src="images/graphic.jpg" style= +"width: 58px; height: 87px;"></div> +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:83%;margin-top:10em;margin-bottom:0.1em"> +N<span class="sc">ew York</span> + C<span class="sc">hicago</span></p> +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:138%;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0.2em"> +Fleming H. Revell Company</p> +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:83%;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0"> +<span class="ls2">L<span class="sc">ondon</span> +<span class="sc">and</span> E<span class= +"sc">dinburgh</span></span></p> +<hr style="margin-top:6em;margin-bottom:3em"> +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:79%;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0.1em"> +<a name="Copyright" id="Copyright">Copyright, 1919, by</a></p> +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:79%;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:43em"> +FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY</p> +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:79%;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0"> +<span class="ls1">New York: 158 Fifth Avenue</span><br> +Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave.<br> +London: 21 Paternoster Square<br> +<span class="ls1">Edinburgh: 75 Princes Street</span></p> +<hr style="margin-top:6em;margin-bottom:9em"> +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:154%;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0.8em"> +<a name="Foreword" id="Foreword">Foreword</a></p> +<p class="pnn"><span class="dc">T</span>HE subject of this volume +is an address delivered by the Author before the World’s +Conference on Christian Fundamentals at Philadelphia, May 30, +1919.</p> +<p class="pn">The reasons for preaching and teaching the Second +Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ are manifold and each one worth +while.</p> +<p class="pns">The Author has contented himself with presenting a +few as follows:</p> +<p class="pns">The Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ is the +one event most often recorded in Holy Scripture.</p> +<p class="pns">It is bound up with every fundamental doctrine, +with every sublime promise and every exhortation to high, to holy +and practical Christian living.</p> +<p class="pns">Only at the Second Coming of our Lord will +redemption be complete and the blood of the cross be +justified.</p> +<p class="pns">Not till our Lord Jesus Christ comes the Second +time will the Church be exalted into her true function of +rulership over the world.</p> +<p class="pns">Only at the Second Coming will the solemn and +covenant promises of God to Israel be fulfilled.</p> +<p class="pns">Only at the Second Coming of the Christ of God +will a government of everlasting righteousness and peace be +established on the earth.</p> +<p class="pns">It is at the Second Coming of Christ alone that +the earth will be delivered from the bondage of corruption and +transformed into the paradise of God.</p> +<p class="pn">The Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ <span class= +"sc">for</span> His Church is the most imminent event on the +horizon of time.</p> +<p class="rt">I. M. H. </p> +<p style= +"text-indent:1.5em;font-size:75%;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:1.5em"> +<i>New York, 1919.</i></p> +<hr style="margin-top:16em;margin-bottom:7em"> +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:142%;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:1em"> +<a name="Contents" id="Contents">Contents</a></p> +<div style="font-size:83%"> +<p class="p0s">I. <a href="#I">T<span class="sc">he Second +Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ is the One Event Most Often +Recorded in Holy Scripture</span></a></p> +<p class="p0s">II. <a href="#II">T<span class="sc">he Second +Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ is Bound Up With Every +Fundamental Doctrine, Every Sublime Promise and Every Exhortation +to High, to Holy and Practical Christian Living</span></a></p> +<p class="p0s">III. <a href="#III">O<span class="sc">nly at the +Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ Will Redemption be Complete and +the Blood of the Cross be Justified</span></a></p> +<p class="p0s">IV. <a href="#IV">N<span class="sc">ot Till Our +Lord Jesus Christ Comes the Second Time Will the Church be +Exalted into Her True Function of Rulership Over the +World</span></a></p> +<p class="p0s">V. <a href="#V">O<span class="sc">nly at the +Second Coming Will the Solemn and Covenant Promises of God to +Israel be Fulfilled</span></a></p> +<p class="p0s">VI. <a href="#VI">O<span class="sc">nly at the +Second Coming of the Christ of God Will a Government of +Everlasting Righteousness and Peace be Established Upon the +Earth</span></a></p> +<p class="p0s">VII. <a href="#VII">I<span class="sc">t is at the +Second Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ that the Earth Will be +Delivered from the Bondage of Corruption and Transformed into the +Paradise of God</span></a></p> +<p class="p0s">VIII. <a href="#VIII">T<span class="sc">he Coming +of Our Lord Jesus Christ for His Church is the Most Imminent +Event on the Horizon of Time</span></a></p> +</div> +<hr style="margin-top:7.5em;margin-bottom:8em"> +<h1><a name="I" id="I">I</a></h1> +<p class="pt1">The Second Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ is the +One Event Most Often Recorded in Holy Scripture</p> +<p class="pnn"><span class="dc">I</span>T is recorded in type, in +figure, in symbol, in analogue, in parable, in hyperbole and +metaphor, in exalted song, in noblest poetry and in rarest +rhetoric. It is set before us in dramatic and dynamic statement, +in high prophetic forecast, in simple narrative, close linked +logic, expanded doctrine, divine exhortation and far-reaching +appeal.</p> +<p class="pn">The first promise of the Second Coming was made in +Eden. It was made in the promise given to the woman that her seed +should bruise the serpent’s head. On the cross the serpent +bruised the heel of the woman’s seed, but her seed did not bruise +the serpent’s head. Never was his head more uplifted and +unbruised than now. The promise of the bruising is of God and +must be fulfilled. The record of that fulfillment is to be found +in the twentieth chapter of the book of the Revelation where our +Lord descends and in the plenitude of His power by the hand of an +angel binds Satan for a thousand years beneath His feet and the +feet of His saints. As the bruising of the serpent’s head takes +place at the Second Coming, and the promise of the bruising is +made in Eden, then the first promise of the Coming is made in +Eden; and as you see rising above the figure of the fallen first +man the figure of the Second man, you hear for the first time the +story of the Second Coming of the Second man; and thus the story +and the doctrine of the Second Coming begin with the very +beginning of the Book.</p> +<p class="pn">For three hundred years Enoch walked amid the +slime, the slush and the uprising tide of human iniquity in a +God-hating and God-defying world. Then one day God took him out +of all the riot and wrong of it without dying into the heaven of +His glory; and the Apostle Paul writing to the Corinthians of the +Second Coming affirms there will be a generation who will +continue alive till the Lord comes; and thus Enoch is a type of +that deathless generation and by so much a prophecy of the Second +Coming.</p> +<p class="pn">For one hundred and twenty years Noah preached +righteousness to a world from which the death penalty had been +removed, a world surrendered to conscience (and let it be well +remembered conscience is not the gift of God nor evidence of +grace but mark of fallen man, the shadow of God’s throne before +which the “accuse” and “excuse” of the soul witness to human +guilt), a generation given over to unrestrained fallen nature; a +generation of murder, assassination, violence, war, utter +brutality, sickening sensualism, the invasion of fallen and +lust-seeking angels, rank spiritism, diabolism and mocking +laughter at God and the things of God.</p> +<p class="pn">Suddenly, without warning, God called Noah into the +ark (the building of which had awakened the derision of the +revellers in sin and the would-be wise men of the hour) shut the +door and bolted him in. At the end of seven ominous days in which +the darksome clouds hung low and threatening, the windows of +heaven were opened, the fountains of the deep broken up and the +flood fell, sweeping away all save Noah and his family in the +ark. When the judgment waters had subsided Noah and his family +came forth to set up a new and distinct dispensation in the +world.</p> +<p class="pn">Seated yonder on the Mount of Olives in the shadow +of the cross, looking forward to His Second Coming and backward +for an illustration that should forecast the times and leave no +excuse for exegetical and interpretative theological blundering +our Lord said as it was in the days of Noah so should it be when +the Son of man should come the Second time.</p> +<p class="pn">Without warning, out of a world of increasing +materialism, self-sufficiency, boasting, pride, violence, war and +multiplied peril, a world that under the guise of general +indifferentism and cultivated cynicism mocks at the things of God +and denies we have a written, final and sure revelation from Him, +the Lord will snatch away the genuine, regenerated Church (the +dead raised, the living changed) and take them to Himself, into +the place prepared. For at least seven years spiritual blackness, +measureless woe and indescribable anguish will fall upon a +Devil-deceived and Devil-ruled world. Then will the Lord come +with His previously gathered Church, execute judgment on the +ungodly, sweep away all iniquity and set up the new +administration of righteousness and truth. Noah is therefore a +figure, a prophecy of the closing hours of this age and its +climax in the Second Coming of the Lord.</p> +<p class="pn">One day Lot went into Sodom, took office, tried to +reform the evil city, succeeded in vexing his righteous, but +unspiritual soul with the filthy conversation of the wicked, got +down to the level of the natural man, lost his testimony and +seemed to his friends and intimates like a madman or the most +excuselessly inconsistent trifler when he attempted to take up +once more his damaged testimony.</p> +<p class="pn">Then there was a night when God’s angels came and +snatched him out of the doomed city. The next morning the fire of +God fell and Lot “saved so as by fire” looked on at the blaze and +the burning of all his works of righteousness as wood hay and +stubble, big in bulk but rejected of God.</p> +<p class="pn">Looking forward to His Second Coming and backward +for an illustration the Son of God declared as it was in the days +of Lot so should it be when the Son of man should come again.</p> +<p class="pn">There are good and righteous Christians—righteous +enough but wholly unspiritual who are seeking to make spotless +town of a world God has judged and doomed, failing to see the +cross is not only the judgment of the individual, but equally the +judgment of the world; that not only does the cross reveal the +end of all flesh but the end in God’s sight of that system of +things which men call the world; that on the cross the world is +crucified to the Christian and the Christian to the world; and +failing to see this, failing to get the mind of God are daily +descending to the plane of the natural man, are losing and in +many cases deliberately setting aside the testimony once for all +delivered to the saints.</p> +<p class="pn">Without warning, they will be snatched away to meet +a descending Lord (if they be real and regenerated Christians) +and this alone because their faith be it never so small holds +them securely in the bonds of the covenant. After that the Lord +will be revealed in flaming fire to execute judgment on the world +and all the works of misguided social reformers because these +works are built, not upon the righteousness of God, but the +righteousness of man.</p> +<p class="pn">According to the Word of the Lord Himself therefore +Lot is a picture and prophecy of the closing hours of the present +age with its climax the Coming and Appearing of the Lord.</p> +<p class="pn">After Abraham had typically offered up his son on +Mount Moriah and typically received him from the dead on the +third day the son for a number of chapters in the record +disappears from view. Then Abraham the father sends his servant +Eliezer into a far country to get a bride for this now invisible +son. Eliezer meets the intended bride at a well from whence she +is drawing water, goes with her into her brother’s house, takes +out a pack of precious things sent from the father in the name of +the son, displays them to her and invites her to become the bride +of the son. She consents. The servant leads her forth. On the way +he talks to her of the promised bridegroom. Suddenly she beholds +him coming to meet her. He receives her, takes her into his +prepared tent and she becomes his wife.</p> +<p class="pn">On the same mount nearly two thousand years later +God the Father offered up His only begotten Son. On the third day +He raised Him from the dead. For two thousand years He has +disappeared from view. The Father has sent forth the Spirit to +obtain a bride for His Son. He meets her at the Gospel well from +whence we draw the waters of salvation. He is calling her through +individual selection that she may become the corporate bride. He +has brought spiritual gifts which He seeks to display in all her +assemblies. He is endeavouring to lead her along the highway of +time and to speak to her in the heaven speech of the Coming +Bridegroom. Suddenly the Lord will come to meet her and take her +into the place prepared and keep her for the marriage hour. In +this simple story the analogue finds its prophetic climax in the +Second Coming of our Lord.</p> +<p class="pn">Jacob fled from his home, the brother he had +outwitted and the father whom he had deceived. As night drew on +footsore and weary he cast himself upon the plain with a stone +for his pillow. Visions came to him in the night. A ladder of +gold reached from earth to heaven. At the top of it was a host of +angels and the Lord Himself in glory. The Lord spoke to him and +assured him he and his posterity should have the land on which he +was lying for an everlasting possession. It was a confirmation of +the oath to and the covenant with Abraham and Isaac. As the +covenant can find its fulfillment only at the actual Second +Coming of our Lord as the God of Jacob, this vision is the +prophetic anticipation of that hour and the heaven-proclaimed +assurance the Lord is coming a Second time.</p> +<p class="pn">Joseph was sent by his father to his brethren. They +despised and rejected him. They cast him into the pit of death. +He was taken out alive. He was carried away into a far +country—even into Egypt. There he was exalted to become co-ruler +with Pharaoh. In the hour of famine he became the bread giver, +the saviour of a hungry world. At the same time he got a Gentile +bride. In the hour when tribulation and sorrow came upon his +brethren he revealed himself to them the second time and was +owned and acknowledged by them. With his wife he came in his +chariot of kingly glory and established his father and his +brethren in the promised land of Goshen.</p> +<p class="pn">The application is so simple it applies itself.</p> +<p class="pn">God the Father sent His Son to His brethren in the +flesh. They despised and rejected Him. They put Him in the place +of death. He was raised up alive. He has gone into a far country +—even into heaven itself. He is there now as one who has been +exiled from earth. He has been exalted to the throne of His +Father. For two thousand years of spiritual famine and hunger in +the world He has been the giver of the bread of life, the saviour +of men. During these years of His exile He has been obtaining a +bride from among the Gentiles—that is the Church. When the hour +of tribulation and anguish shall come upon His brethren in the +flesh, even as He Himself has warned, He will appear in His +glory, the scales will fall from their eyes as they did from Paul +and they will own Him as their Messiah and Lord, the Holy One of +Israel. With His Church in associate power and glory He will +deliver them and place them forever in the promised land—the land +of their fathers.</p> +<p class="pn">No sooner has Moses with the host of Israel crossed +dry shod through the divided waters of the Red Sea than he lifts +up his voice and sings, not of the first, but the Second Coming +of the Lord. He sings of Him as a man of war, as the head of +celestial armies, coming to execute judgment, overthrow iniquity +and establish His reign and rule of righteousness.</p> +<p class="pn">When you open the historic pages of the Bible, +along the seemingly driest and coldest paragraphs you may if you +will behold the wheels of the King’s chariot flashing by and +catch a gleam of His radiant features, now as the man of war in +David, and then as the Prince of peace in Solomon.</p> +<p class="pn">Yonder, under the far-away stars, Job sat at his +tent door and as he meditated on the brevity and vanity of human +life, its hopes deferred that make the heart sick, the sound of +the clods as they fall upon the coffin lid, he asked the question +that has quivered down the ages—“If a man die, shall he live +again?”</p> +<p class="pn">He answers his own question. He says he knows he +will die. He knows his soul will go into the underworld of the +dead. His body will be laid away in the dust. It will become +nothing more than a bundle of skin and bones. He knows, also, +this bundle of skin and bones is the work of God’s hand. The Lord +will have respect to His work. He will remember He wrought it. At +a given time He will call to Job and Job will answer; then in +anticipation of the supreme moment he cries out exultantly he +knows his redeemer liveth; that he shall stand in the latter day +upon the earth and covered with his own flesh once more shall see +his incarnate God.</p> +<p class="pn">Thus in those wondrous days of the long ago Job +caught the shining of the morning star, heard the trumpet of the +first resurrection and caught the vision of the Second Coming of +his Lord.</p> +<p class="pn">David sweeps his fingers across the answering +chords of his golden harp and sings of that hour when the Lord +shall come in His glory; when the trees of the wood shall clap +their hands; when the mountains shall flow down at His presence, +the waves of the sea fling their hallelujahs on the resounding +shore; and when the earth shall own the Lord is coming, coming +not the first time to die, but the Second time as the risen one +to live and reign and with none to dispute Him.</p> +<p class="pn">In the Song of Songs we who believe are by nature +before God as black and uncomely as the sun-burned tents of +Kedar, but by grace in God’s sight as beautiful as the Tyre-woven +curtains of Solomon.</p> +<p class="pn">The breath of the spring time is in the air. The +voice of the turtle dove is to be heard in the land. It is the +time of love and for hearts to find their mates. The leaves of +the fig tree of Israel are beginning to put forth. The seeds of +hope sown in the graves of the Christian dead and watered with +tears from the anguish of the living are ready to bud and blossom +forth in the full flower of their assured immortality. The voice +of the Bridegroom may be heard saying to the Church: “Come away +my beloved. Come thou rose of Sharon and thou lily of the +valley,” and presently we see the Bridegroom Himself descending +and the Church going up out of the wilderness leaning on the arm +of her Beloved.</p> +<p class="pn">So we may learn and quickly if we will, that the +Song of Songs which is Solomon’s is the celebration of the +nuptial hour when our Lord shall come the Second time to take His +affianced Church to Himself and make her the heavenly bride of +His unfolding and unfading glory.</p> +<p class="pn">The prophet Isaiah hears the seraphs sing their +“holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full +of his glory” till the posts of the door are moved at the wonder +of the song. He sees the glory of the Coming of the Lord. He +tells us the Lord is coming with fire and with His chariots like +a whirlwind, to render His anger with fury, and His rebuke with +flames of fire.</p> +<p class="pn">Jeremiah announces the Lord is coming the Second +time. When He comes He will make Jerusalem the throne of His +glory. Unto it shall be the gathering of the nations. They shall +gather unto it in the name of the Lord, and neither shall they +walk any more after the imaginations of their evil heart.</p> +<p class="pn">Ezekiel beholds the Lord seated on a throne high +and lifted up. He sees Him coming out of the purple dawning of +the east. He restores Jerusalem. He builds the temple till the +shining spendour of it shall fill the promised land; and in a +voice as the sound of many waters He says this temple shall be +the place for the soles of His feet and thus rebukes those who +try to keep Him from dwelling bodily in the land as though +forsooth He should lose His heavenliness by so doing, forgetting +that earth is His rightful home and is to be His eternal dwelling +place. Yea and Amen when He comes to His own again He shall dwell +in the midst of His ransomed forever. And the nations of the +earth as they ascend to the heights of Jerusalem to behold His +glory and to worship Him in His holy temple as they catch the +first glimpse of the city, its gardens like unto the garden of +the Lord, the temple with its shekinah cloud by day and the +flaming fire by night that shall make it to be no more night but +day, shall cry out, not “Jerusalem,” but “Yaveh Shamma—the Lord +is there.” And from henceforth this shall be the name of the +city.</p> +<p class="pn">Daniel has visions in the night. He beholds the +Lord as the Son of man, as eternal judge and king of all the +earth. He sees Him coming to the Father to receive His title +deeds and then descending in clouds of glory to establish the +kingdom that shall never pass away.</p> +<p class="pn">From Hosea to Malachi the Minor Prophets echo with +the declaration the Lord is coming and always this coming is the +Second.</p> +<p class="pn">Hosea foresees Israel will forsake the Lord and for +many days be as a dead man out of sight and forgotten. But in the +latter times when the Lord Himself shall return Israel will +awaken and own Him as Lord and king.</p> +<p class="pn">Joel tells us the armies of the world league shall +be gathered against Jerusalem and under their godless, +Devil-incarnate head shall defy the Lord of hosts; that the Lord +will come, overthrow them with a great slaughter and deliver the +holy city from the treading down of the Gentiles forever.</p> +<p class="pn">In Amos the Lord is coming to restore the kingdom +to Israel and set up and establish the throne of David.</p> +<p class="pn">Obadiah warns us of the day of the Lord, the day +that is introduced by the Second Coming of the Lord.</p> +<p class="pn">Joel teaches us under the madness and folly of +Gentile rule ploughshares are to be beaten into swords and +pruning hooks into spears and the nations are to give themselves +to war and all the horror and desolation of it. But this +Scripture is never quoted by those who preach peace where there +can be no peace. Always they quote Micah who tells us the swords +will be beaten into ploughshares, the spears into pruning hooks +and the nations shall learn war no more.</p> +<p class="pn">The two prophets seem to stand in absolute +opposition to each other.</p> +<p class="pn">They do not.</p> +<p class="pn">Joel tells us what will happen just before the Lord +comes.</p> +<p class="pn">Micah tells us what will take place after the Lord +comes.</p> +<p class="pn">In Joel the Lord will come, meet the armies of the +League in the valley of decision, the valley of Jehoshaphat, and +overthrow them; then will the implements of war be beaten into +the implements of peace and war be at an end forever.</p> +<p class="pn">Micah announces the end of war and the beginning of +lasting peace will come as the consequence of the Lord’s +appearing in glory and not till He does so appear.</p> +<p class="pn">Nahum proclaims the Second Coming. The Lord’s way +shall be in the whirlwind and the storm, the clouds shall be the +dust of His feet, the mountains shall quake at Him, the hills +shall melt and the very earth burn at His presence.</p> +<p class="pn">In Habakkuk the Spirit carries human language to +its loftiest height till it glows on peaks of thought +sublime.</p> +<p class="pn">The prophet sees the Lord coming the Second time. +His brightness is as the shining light. In His hands once pierced +for such as we is the hiding of His power. Pestilence and burning +coals are His vanguard. He stands and measures the earth. He +drives asunder the nations. The everlasting mountains are +scattered. The perpetual hills bow before Him and the inhabitants +of the onlooking worlds lift up their voices and sing: “His ways +are everlasting.”</p> +<p class="pn">Zephaniah proclaims the Second Coming.</p> +<p class="pn">The Lord will come and smite the world league in +the pitifulness of its gathering and the pigminess of its might. +He will pour forth His indignation and fierce anger upon all the +exaltation and pride of man. He will devour the earth with the +fire of His jealousy, deliver Jerusalem, turn to the people the +pure speech of the old Hebraic tongue, bid Zion to sing, Israel +to shout and calling Jerusalem her daughter, bid her to rejoice. +He will overthrow the false Christ and as the true Messiah will +Himself dwell in the midst of Jerusalem forevermore.</p> +<p class="pn">Haggai declares the Lord will come and will shake +all nations so that only the things which are of God may +remain.</p> +<p class="pn">Zechariah tells us in terms so plain, so clear no +one need misunderstand nor be in darkness for a moment that the +Lord is coming the Second time.</p> +<p class="pn">He will come with all His saints. His feet shall +stand in that day on the Mount of Olives; and that no false +teacher nor wilful perverter of the truth about the reality of +the Lord’s bodily presence on the earth at that time may have +even the shadow of a shadow to rest on, and as a proof that this +coming is not spiritual but actual and the testimony of His very +feet under the most pronounced topographical conditions, the +prophet says the mount on which those blessed and real feet shall +descend is not only on the Mount of Olives, but that “Mount of +Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east.”</p> +<p class="pn">At the touch of the Lord’s feet this wondrous and +sacred Mount of Olives will split in twain. One half of it will +roll like a wave northward. The other half will roll to the +south. A great valley will be formed. That valley is named in +Scripture, but never has been found on any map and cannot be +found in Palestine to-day. It is the valley of Jehoshaphat, the +valley of decision, the valley of judgment of the nations. And +into this valley pell-mell shall rush the Antichrist-led and +Devil-deceived armies of the league of ten nations to find their +overthrow at the hand of the Lord and the inauguration of that +hour when the once despised and crucified Christ shall be the +revealed and recognized God of the whole earth; when there shall +be one Lord and His name one—even that name which is above every +name whether in heaven or on earth—the name of Jesus.</p> +<p class="pn">Malachi closes the book of the Old Testament. He +beholds our Lord Jesus Christ coming the Second time. He sees Him +coming as the rising sun filling the heavens and flooding the +earth with the benediction of His majesty and might.</p> +<p class="pn">From Malachi to the New Testament we pass over four +hundred years of prophetic silence and then we are in the book of +the Gospel according to Matthew.</p> +<p class="pn">Here we are face to face with the night of +nights.</p> +<p class="pn">The stars like silver squadrons sail close to the +waiting earth. The angels fling down their wreath of natal song +and the virgin mother cradles upon her white and unsullied breast +the Christ of God.</p> +<p class="pn">We follow Him in the days of His unfolding +ministry. Every time He touches the earth His footsteps leave a +benediction. Each time He breathes the air He sweetens it. His +low and modulated voice starts a note of music whose rhythmic +accents have not done sounding and whose heavenly harmony +outsings the discords of earth. He looks daylight into blind +eyes. He cools the fever pulse to quiet beating. He makes the +lame man to leap as a hart. He hushes the storm on Galilee till +the ruffled, windswept waters are as calm and peaceful as a babe +upon its mother’s breast. With a word He raises the wept-for +dead. Everywhere and at all times His miracles are wrought, not +merely that He may do good and bring needed blessings as He +passes by, but as the credentials and sign warrant of the +truthfulness of His claim that He is Son of God, God the Son, the +Anointed of the Lord and Israel’s king.</p> +<p class="pn">But in all His ministry of hand or word never does +He speak save incidentally of His first coming. Always and in +fullest degree He speaks of His Second Coming. Seated upon the +Mount of Olives He affirms, after the cross shall have slain and +stained Him and the grave shall have briefly held Him He will +come again; but, just before He comes it will be as it was in the +days of Noah—a time of materialism, sensualism, the culture of +self-consciousness, an hour of boasting, pride, lawlessness and +war; and when He is revealed it will be as with the driving +judgment of the flood.</p> +<p class="pn">In the twenty-fifth chapter of Matthew and the +first part of the chapter He declares He is coming as the +bridegroom comes—seeking the marriage hour of his bride.</p> +<p class="pn">In the last part of the chapter and as the climax +of His bridegroom coming He will appear as the king of glory and +the judge of the living nations.</p> +<p class="pn">When He stands before His guilty judges and their +suborned witnesses and while they mock and deride Him He breaks +His hitherto amazing silence not to demonstrate to them the truth +of His incarnation nor the proof of His preexistence, but in calm +and measured utterance to tell them that after they shall have +put Him to death He will come the Second time; and they shall see +Him descending from heaven seated upon the cloud of shekinal +glory and with the power of God.</p> +<p class="pn">In Mark He is the householder who goes into a far +country, gives to each of His servants a work to do, puts the +porter on guard to watch the door of the house and announces that +no one in heaven nor on earth knows when He will return. He will +return, He will come the Second time. It will be in one of the +four watches of the spiritual night. It may be at even, it may be +at midnight, it may be at cockcrowing and it may be in the +morning. Because it is certain He will come, but uncertain when +He will come, each one who claims to be His servant is under bond +to watch. The whole household must be in the attitude of +watching, of readiness and expectation; and His word of +exhortation and warning to His Church is:</p> +<p class="pn">“What I say unto you, I say unto all—watch.”</p> +<p class="pn">In Luke He is the nobleman who goes into a far +country to get the title deeds of His kingdom and return. When He +returns He comes first to His servants, gathers them to Himself +and rewards them. After that with them He executes judgment on +His enemies and then sets up His kingdom.</p> +<p class="pn">In the Gospel of John He eats with His disciples +the last and memorial supper. He goes out with them, bids them +lift their glances to the wide, extended sky where the jewelry of +the night as the scattered largess of a king burns in the fire of +opal, the purple and violet of amethyst and the white splendour +of uncounted diamonds. He assures them these gleaming things are +no fiction fire-flies of gaseous worlds in the making, but +illuminated dwelling places in His Father’s house. He is going +thither. He will ascend into that congeries of inhabited worlds +and will prepare a place for them, a glorious palace home +befitting their high estate; when all is ready He will come back +and receive them in corporate unity to Himself.</p> +<p class="pn">His words are simple, but the simplicity is the +simplicity of light and every accent is as the touch of peace to +troubled hearts; for this is what He said:</p> +<p class="pn">“In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were +not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for +you.</p> +<p class="pn">And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will +come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there +ye may be also.”</p> +<p class="pn">In the book of Acts, in the first chapter you have +a scene no artist has really ever painted, no writer ever fairly +portrayed and no mortal tongue can fittingly describe.</p> +<p class="pn">Our Lord is going up from the Mount of Olives. He +is going up from the midst of His disciples. He is going +heavenward. The disciples watch Him as He ascends. He enters a +cloud. Do not, I beseech you, imagine for a moment this cloud is +a fog bank, a mass of watery mist and vapour; it is the shekinal +cloud which once covered the tabernacle in the wilderness and was +the vehicle of His presence when Israel in that far time marched +on their way to the promised land. It is His chariot of state. In +this chariot sent to meet Him He passes between the onlooking +worlds ever higher and higher till at last He takes His seat upon +the throne of the Highest at the right hand of the invisible +majesty.</p> +<p class="pn">Then, as through the dimness of their tears the +disciples watch Him disappear, they hear a voice which says to +them:</p> +<p class="pn">“Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into +heaven? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, +shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into +heaven.”</p> +<p class="pn">“This same Jesus.”</p> +<p class="pn">Mark that well!</p> +<p class="pn">The Jesus who on the Sunday night of His +resurrection did meet these disciples in the upper room and said +to them as they shrank back into a frozen silence of hope and +fear:</p> +<p class="pn">“Peace be unto you.”</p> +<p class="pn">“Why are ye troubled?”</p> +<p class="pn">“And why do thoughts arise in your hearts?”</p> +<p class="pn">“Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: +handle me and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye +see me have.”</p> +<p class="pn">Still these disciples were afraid, afraid it could +not be true.</p> +<p class="pn">Then He showed them His hands and His feet that +they might see where the nails had gone in, torn through the +flesh and left eternal wounds as the chevrons of glory.</p> +<p class="pn">And still the silence of hope mingled with +fear.</p> +<p class="pn">Then he said:</p> +<p class="pn">“Have ye here any meat?”</p> +<p class="pn">And they gave Him a piece of a broiled fish, and of +an honeycomb.</p> +<p class="pn">And He took and did eat before them.</p> +<p class="pn">He had said to them He was flesh and bones, not +flesh and blood.</p> +<p class="pn">He was not flesh and blood because in the +sin-offering all the blood must be poured out at the bottom of +the altar, and He was Himself the antitypical sin-offering. He +had poured out His blood. It had run as a living stream from +every vein and artery.</p> +<p class="pn">Because He was the sin-offering in death, in +resurrection He became for the first time a priest—high priest +after the order, not of Aaron, but Melchisedec.</p> +<p class="pn">That very morning as the high priest He had +ascended to heaven, within the vail, and sprinkled His redeeming +blood (how is not revealed) on the eternal throne, changing it +from the throne of judgment to a throne of grace. That night He +stood before them He was their high priest, not of earth, but +heaven. He breathed upon them, imparted to them the Holy +Spirit—the Comforter—linking them to His immortal body. He +remained with them, going and coming, during forty days, +operating with them officially by and through the Holy Spirit as +His unseen executive; for we are told that, “until the day he was +taken up he through the Holy Ghost had given commandments unto +the apostles;” and then, finally, as this scene in the book of +Acts shows us, ascended to His high-priestly function and +unceasing service of intercession.</p> +<p class="pn">He is seated in heaven now, seated there as the +same Jesus who met His disciples that first Sunday night, the +same Jesus who ascended out of their midst from Olivet. This same +Jesus! The same not only in realistic, human body, but the same +in character, full of the same measureless compassion and grace +as when He sat on the well curb in Samaria and though thirsting +as a real man for real water offered to give to the sinful woman +who by divine and eternal ordination met him there, the water +that should be in her as a well of water springing up into +everlasting life.</p> +<p class="pn">This same Jesus is coming again, not a phantom, not +an impalpable spirit, not a ghost Christ, but a Christ who is a +real man of real flesh and real bones.</p> +<p class="pn">This is the key-note of the book of Acts.</p> +<p class="pn">He who died for men, who has sanctioned the Holy +Spirit to operate in His name, speak in His name, reveal to us +the things that are His and show us things to come concerning +Him, He is coming again, coming not only as very God, the Holy +One of Israel, He who has been exalted to be both Lord and +Christ, but as this loving, tender, compassionate Jesus, and in a +body that may be seen and handled—a body of flesh and bones.</p> +<p class="pn">In Romans we have the promise the Lord is coming to +bruise Satan under His feet and the feet of His saints; and +according to the calendar of heaven and the way in which they +measure time there this great event must come to pass, as it is +written, “shortly.”</p> +<p class="pn">In First Corinthians the Lord is coming to raise +the dead who shall be His “at his coming.”</p> +<p class="pn">In Second Corinthians He is coming to transfigure +the living who believe in Him and thus clothe them with their +“house from heaven,” give them the body that shall be the +handiwork of God and not man.</p> +<p class="pn">In Philippians our citizenship is in a country +which is in heaven from whence we are to look for a Saviour, even +the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change this body of our mortal +humiliation that it may be fashioned like unto His immortal and +glorious body, a change which He will effectuate by that mighty +power according to which He is able to subdue all things unto +Himself.</p> +<p class="pn">In Colossians our life is hid with Christ in God, a +double environment of security, and when Christ who is our life +shall appear, we shall appear with Him also in glory.</p> +<p class="pn">In the epistles to the Thessalonians each chapter +closes with a testimony to the Second Coming.</p> +<p class="pn">In the first epistle in the first chapter the +Apostle commends the Thessalonian Church because they had turned +to God from idols to serve the living and true God and to wait +for His Son from heaven. From the beginning the Apostle Paul +taught the new converts the next possible event might be the +Coming of that Lord whom he had declared had been sacrificed for +them, was now risen and in heaven. This was the one supreme thing +for which they were to be in readiness every day—the Second +Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.</p> +<p class="pn">In the second chapter he assures the Thessalonians +he will meet them in the presence of the Lord at His Coming; when +He comes and they are all gathered before Him, saved through the +Gospel Paul has preached to them in the demonstration of the +Spirit and power, they will be the guarantee and occasion of the +crown he shall receive.</p> +<p class="pn">In the third chapter he exhorts them to increase +and abound in love to one another that their hearts may be +established unblameable in holiness before the Lord when He shall +come the Second time with all His saints.</p> +<p class="pn">In the fourth chapter he announces as a special +revelation from the Lord that the Lord Himself is coming to +awaken those whom He has put to sleep in His name. He will +descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel +and the trump of God. The dead in Him shall rise first, then we +who are alive and remain shall be caught up with them in clouds +to meet the Lord in the air; so shall we ever be with the Lord +and with one another.</p> +<p class="pn">In the fifth chapter the Coming of the Lord for His +saints as just noted in the fourth and preceding chapter will +bring in the day of the Lord; and we further learn this coming +for the saints not only precedes the day of the Lord, but as the +introduction to it will be as secret, sudden and unknown to the +world as is in general the coming of a thief.</p> +<p class="pn">In the second epistle, in the first chapter the +Lord is seen coming with all His saints to execute judgment on +the ungodly and the unbelieving.</p> +<p class="pn">In the second chapter we learn the word, “Rapture,” +so often given as the name and title for the translation of the +Church to meet the Lord, while it may be a deducible truth and +exegetically, or, rather philologically sustained, is not the +Holy Ghost title. The true and Scriptural title is: “Our +gathering together unto Him.”</p> +<p class="pn">In this chapter we learn also when the Church has +been gathered to the Lord in heaven the man of sin, the +Antichrist will be revealed; then will the Lord appear in glory, +overthrow him and his league of nations and set up the +heaven-ordained kingdom of righteousness and peace.</p> +<p class="pn">In the third chapter the Apostle prays the Lord may +direct their hearts into the love of God and into—patient waiting +for Christ.</p> +<p class="pn">In the First Epistle to the Thessalonians the Lord +comes <span class="sc">for</span> His Church.</p> +<p class="pn">In the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians He comes +<span class="sc">with</span> His Church.</p> +<p class="pn">In First Timothy He is coming that He may be shown +forth as the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and +Lord of lords.</p> +<p class="pn">In Second Timothy He is coming to judge the quick +and the dead and to give reward to all those who love His +appearing.</p> +<p class="pn">Titus gives us the inspired and official title of +the Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ as, “That Blessed Hope.”</p> +<p class="pn">In Hebrews we see this age is the antitypical Day +of Atonement; just as at the close of the day in Israel the +people were waiting for the man who led away the scapegoat into +the wilderness to come back without it as evidence their typical +redemption was complete and secure for another year; just so our +Lord Jesus Christ having appeared in the end of the age to put +away sin by the sacrifice of Himself, reconcile the world to God +and bring in the day of grace and salvation, to them that look +for Him shall He come the “second time, without sin, unto +salvation”; that is, He will come back not as the sin offering, +but as the triumphant Redeemer and as witness that our redemption +will then be completed by Him in the immortal bodies He shall +give us.</p> +<p class="pn">James testifies that in the closing hours of this +age Capital and Labour will look at each other with wrinkled +brows, clenched hands and nervous, impatient expectation.</p> +<p class="pn">He exhorts the Christian labourer to be patient +because, as he says, “the Coming of the Lord draweth nigh,” is so +near, so imminent He standeth as a judge—verily “at the door”—and +ready to intervene.</p> +<p class="pn">In the First Epistle of Peter the Lord is coming to +justify the faith of His elect.</p> +<p class="pn">In the Second Epistle He is coming to bring in the +new heavens and the new earth.</p> +<p class="pn">In the First Epistle of John we who believe are +sons of God. It is not yet manifested to the world what we really +are, nor what we shall be; but we know when He shall appear we +shall be like Him for we shall see Him as He is. When He shines +out we shall shine out with Him.</p> +<p class="pn">We are told every one who has this hope in him, +purifieth himself even as he is pure.</p> +<p class="pn">And thus in this special fashion the Holy Spirit +affirms the Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ is not only +the climacteric of our avouchment as sons of God, but, when held +as a hope in the heart, will keep us pure and clean as the Holy +Christ Himself.</p> +<p class="pn">In the Second Epistle of John we are warned false +teachers will abound; teachers who shall deny the eternal +incarnation of the Son of God. They will deny He is coming the +Second time; but, above all, they will deny He could possibly +come in the flesh.</p> +<p class="pn">The Apostle unhesitatingly affirms those who hold +and teach this falsehood are nothing less than antichrists; and +he warns us as faithful followers of the true Christ not to +receive them into our houses, nor bid them Godspeed.</p> +<p class="pn">Jude is the smallest, that is to say, the shortest, +of all the epistles. It is a clasp between the Old and the New +Testaments.</p> +<p class="pn">Jude tells us Enoch the seventh man who lived on +the earth testified, not of the first, but the Second Coming, +saying:</p> +<p class="pn">“Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his +saints.”</p> +<p class="pn">Then we find ourselves in the Revelation.</p> +<p class="pn">This is the book of the Consummation.</p> +<p class="pn">The supreme subject is the Second Coming.</p> +<p class="pn">There are twenty-two chapters.</p> +<p class="pn">Each of the chapters portrays conditions and +circumstances leading up to the great climax—the Second Coming +and the immense and measureless consequences—the millennial reign +and the eternal state.</p> +<p class="pn">The book is like the roof of a great cathedral, +like the interior of the roof, groined and panelled—each panel a +chapter.</p> +<p class="pn">It is like the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in +which, however, may be found figures and forms such as Michel +Angelo never drew nor such even as his imperial and suggestive +mind could conceive.</p> +<p class="pn">You will find in these chapters the figures of wild +beasts, the dragon, fallen angels, fiends from the pit, that old +Serpent called the Devil and Satan. If you will read and listen +you will hear the blast of trumpets, the breaking of vials, the +sounds of woe, the tramp of marching feet, the clash of battle, +fire falling out of the heavens, trees and grass in flame, the +waves of the sea turned to blood, fountains and streams become as +wormwood and gall, the sun as black as a starless midnight, the +moon hanging in the lowering heavens like a clot of blood, +earthquakes, the scarlet tongues of outpouring volcanoes, +thunderings and lightnings, all manner of wickedness and +pervading sin, a world quivering as a ship in the storm, the +bending heavens as though unbolted and insecure, all foundations +apparently shattered and the universe itself as though rushing +forward to its funeral pyre.</p> +<p class="pn">Heaven opens and the Lord comes forth riding a +white horse, followed by armies on white horses, the horses the +symbols of His power, each hoof beat as it smites the slant of +heaven the sound of swift descending judgment.</p> +<p class="pn">On the Lord’s head are many crowns.</p> +<p class="pn">He is wrapped in a garment dyed in blood.</p> +<p class="pn">His eyes are as a flame of fire. His glances +penetrate to the secret intents and purposes of the heart. They +get behind every cloak of deception and every pretense. All the +spotted nakedness of interior and intensive sin is revealed. +Nothing remains in shadow, everything is illuminated to bareness, +and the searching light of His looks goes through every fibre of +being.</p> +<p class="pn">He is coming to reign and rule.</p> +<p class="pn">All the things the chapters record have been +driving us to look forward to that; the woe, the anguish and the +hell on earth have been pleading and crying out for a master to +master and put an end to the cataclysms of catastrophic iniquity; +the very nature of things has been testifying that He must +come.</p> +<p class="pn">He is responding to the demand that lies in the +nature of things.</p> +<p class="pn">He is coming to reign and rule as a king. He is not +coming with an olive branch in one hand and a cooing dove on His +shoulder.</p> +<p class="pn">Nay!</p> +<p class="pn">He is coming with a rod of iron. He is coming to +trample all opposition beneath His feet, put down all rule and +authority, break to pieces and shatter as a potter’s vessel the +pride of nations and the self-exaltation of man.</p> +<p class="pn">He is coming to establish peace, but not by means +of compromise, by gentle and persuasive ways, but by war and as a +man of war, as the man who is very God and judge omnipotent.</p> +<p class="pn">The book closes with the thrice repeated +announcement from the Lord Himself:</p> +<p class="pn">“Behold, I am coming quickly.”</p> +<p class="pn">This is the last utterance of the Lord from +heaven.</p> +<p class="pn">To this the Church replies with its last recorded +prayer:</p> +<p class="pn">“Amen, even so, come, Lord Jesus.”</p> +<p class="pn">When you close the book you feel the next thing +is—the Coming of the Lord.</p> +<p class="pn">If the value of a statement or doctrine is to be +measured by the number of times repeated, then, since from +Genesis to Revelation, in every form of human language the Second +Coming is proclaimed, is stamped upon almost every page of the +Bible, is inwrought with every fibre of truth it finally +presents; since in the New Testament alone it is mentioned +directly and indirectly more than three hundred times, as there +is no other theme in the Bible that approaches it in frequency of +repetition, it should seem that this event and doctrine of the +Second Coming with all its promises and certified consequences +should easily be of supreme and all-compelling importance; and +because the Holy Spirit has made it of such importance I am under +bonds to preach it.</p> +<p class="pn">Those who persist in saying it is incidental, +secondary and sporadic might well be said to be of that class of +theological disputants who never study their Bible; for the fact +is should you cut out every reference to the Second Coming, its +cognate truths and all the events to which it gives emphasis, you +would have but a fragment of the Bible; and the Book upon which +faith is founded, from which hope casts its glances heavenward, +sees light in the grave and immortality assured, would be but as +a broken reed, a garment of beauty torn and shredded, or as a +harp whose main chord had been snapped asunder.</p> +<h1><a name="II" id="II">II</a></h1> +<p class="pt1">The Second Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ is +Bound up With Every Fundamental Doctrine, Every Sublime Promise +and Every Exhortation to High, to Holy and Practical Christian +Living</p> +<p class="pnn"><span class="dc">I</span>T is bound up with every +fundamental doctrine.</p> +<p class="pn">The resurrection from the dead, the transfiguration +of the living, the judgment seat of Christ, the judgment of the +living nations, the consequent judgment of the white throne, the +rewards of the righteous and the punishment of the wicked.</p> +<p class="pn">It is bound up with every sublime promise.</p> +<p class="pn">The recognition of the dead, the overthrow of +Satan, the deliverance of creation, the triumph of God and Christ +and the eternal felicity of the saints.</p> +<p class="pn">It is bound up with every exhortation to high, to +holy and practical Christian living.</p> +<p class="pn">We are not to forsake the assembling of ourselves +together as the manner of some is. On the Lord’s day we are to +break bread and drink the fruit of the vine, show forth the +Lord’s death and make known to heaven and to earth that the only +ground of approach to a holy God is the sacrificial offering and +vicarious sufferings of the Son of God and God the Son, and that +on the ground of His atoning blood as our sin offering and +personal substitute we claim Him as redeemer, saviour and +interceding priest.</p> +<p class="pn">We are to love God and love one another.</p> +<p class="pn">We are not to judge one another.</p> +<p class="pn">We are not to cast stumbling blocks in each other’s +path.</p> +<p class="pn">We are to walk worthy of our vocation.</p> +<p class="pn">We are to let our moderation be known to all +men.</p> +<p class="pn">We are to be patient, long-suffering and +forbearing.</p> +<p class="pn">We are to engage continually in prayer and +supplication.</p> +<p class="pn">We are to live blamelessly before men and holily +before God.</p> +<p class="pn">As pastors we are to shepherd the sheep over whom +God has made us to be overseers.</p> +<p class="pn">We are to feed the flock, not with the philosophies +and fictions of men, but with the truth of God.</p> +<p class="pn">We are to restore the wandering, sustain the weak +and comfort the sorrowing.</p> +<p class="pn">We are to go to the house of mourning and give +consolation to those who are Christians and who weep above their +Christian dead.</p> +<p class="pn">As preachers we are to preach the Word. We are to +preach in season and out of season, and to exhort with all +long-suffering and doctrine.</p> +<p class="pn">We are exhorted to this high, this holy, this +exalted and practical Christian living, this reincarnation of +Christ in daily experience, this translation of His character, +this manifestation of His guiding and ruling presence, not by the +fact that we must die and appear before God, but by the fact the +Lord Himself is coming, may come at any time, that any moment we +may meet Him at His judgment seat.</p> +<p class="pn">In all the universe of God there is nothing so +impressive as the thought that you, that I, that we must give a +personal account to God for the manner in which we have used our +time, our talent, our opportunity and substance; and when we are +told—as we are told in Holy Scripture—that any moment we may be +summoned to give an account of our stewardship, and that without +dying, just suddenly, without a moment’s warning, translated +bodily and with all the sense of the daily life we have been +living upon us into the presence of Him whose name we have been +professing—impressiveness has reached its ultimate and +exhortation the fullest leverage of appeal.</p> +<p class="pn">And he who says the Coming of Christ considered as +a doctrine, as a truth or a motive, is not intensely practical +and all-compelling to Christian devotion and service, is either +blindly and excuselessly ignorant of the Word of God or brutally +and perversely guilty of denying a truth that flashes like +lightning from one end of the Bible to the other and illuminates +every hortative passage in the Word of God.</p> +<p class="pn">When thus you are face to face with the +indisputable fact that every basic doctrine of the Christian +faith, every outshining promise of hope, of comfort, of +consolation, of abiding peace, every appeal to the noblest and +purest life as a Christian, every demand that the Christian shall +unceasingly be the light of heaven in the spiritual darkness of +earth is bound up inextricably with the fact of the Second +Coming, it carries with it the inevitable corollary that the +Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ as a certified and +imminent event is the very sum and substance of all available +motives that can lead to a life of practical service to God and +man.</p> +<h1><a name="III" id="III">III</a></h1> +<p class="pt1">Only at the Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ Will +Redemption be Complete and the Blood of the Cross be +Justified</p> +<p class="pnn"><span class="dc">O</span>UR Lord Jesus Christ did +not come into this world that He might go through the unspeakable +horror of the cross; He did not hang on that brutal and torturing +instrument of death as the criminal of the universe; He did not +receive the down sweep of the essential antagonism of a holy God +against the sin He represented; He did not cry the cry of the +lost, “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?”; He was not +flung out like a derelict thing into the black, starless night of +God’s inexorable law, measureless wrath and indignation where His +humanity unanchored and alone was forsaken both by God and man; +He did not hang there in the torment of His body, suffering all +the agony the most exquisitely wrought, nerve-centered body of +the universe could suffer of physical pain and anguish; God did +not make Him to be sin and treat Him as the blackest and most +repulsive thing in existence; He did not lay upon Him the weight +and demerit of a world’s guilt that He might suffer in His +innocence, His purity and innate sinlessness on behalf of the +vilest outcast this side of Gehenna, the lake of fire, just that +He might keep us from lying, cheating, swearing, getting drunk, +giving ourselves up to immorality, licentiousness and sensualism; +He did not send Jesus Christ His only begotten and well-beloved +Son to die a spectacle to heaven, to earth and hell that He might +make us merely decent and right and morally correct in our +relations to one another. All that is involved in the fact of +redemption just as fragrance is involved and included in the +rose, as harmony is expected to be a part of music and rhythm as +well as metre a part of verse and song.</p> +<p class="pn">Cleanness and morality are involved quantities in a +Christian. The moment the new life of the risen Christ is wrought +in a believer and he is linked up by the Holy Ghost to the +glorified body of the Son of God he has in him all the impulse +and power of the highest morality, the most exalted purity, the +rarest spirituality and the discernment of spiritual things. All +that is self-evident—but the Son of God came into this world and +went through the amazing tragedy and sacrifice of the cross to do +something more than to make us merely moral and good. He came +into the world, He died the foreordained death of the cross that +He might deliver us from death and the grave.</p> +<p class="pn">Death is the blackest and most shameful blot on the +face of the earth, the grave the most repulsive of scandals, +drawing the trench of its corruption and stain round the girdle +of the globe.</p> +<p class="pn">To bring a human being into the world, give him no +choice of father or mother, of place, of time and circumstance, +endow him with a brain to think, a heart to feel and love and +then set him face to face with death, hide from him the hour of +his going like a criminal who knows not the hour of his +execution; to allow the old to live till they are withered, +shrivelled and helpless, a burden to others and a still greater +burden to themselves, cursing the fact they must live and yet +afraid to die; to take a young man in the splendour of his youth, +on the threshold of assured success, snatch him away without +warning from the parents devoted to him, the wife who loves him +and the children dependent on him; and then leave them both, the +decrepit and useless old and the needed young to drop into the +tongueless silence of the grave, that silence broken only by the +sound of the clods as they fall on the coffin lid or the plash of +tears, or the choking sob; to allow the living whose hearts are +torn and twisted and smashed by the robbery that death brings +upon them to stand there and strangle themselves with the +unanswered and unanswerable questions: “Whence,” “What,” and +“Whither,” and then say all this is the work of a good, a +compassionate, a tender and loving God, and that death is as +natural as birth?</p> +<p class="pn">Nay!</p> +<p class="pn">Those who say and teach that death is as natural as +birth are guilty of pure unintellectualism and are unwarranted +deniers of the facts.</p> +<p class="pn">The birth of a child is like the coming of the +dawn. It is like the note of a new and joyous song. It is the +revelation of a new world, a world of life, of hope, of promised +and larger activities. No one who is sane and true and wise will +deliberately seek to hinder birth; but death! ah! everything is +against death and by right against it.</p> +<p class="pn">Every fibre in the body repudiates death. Pain is +the protest of life against it and the scout that brings in news +of its approach. The brain, the mind, the heart shiver at it, not +merely because of the native fear at the unknown, but at the +mockery it makes of life, the uselessness of living a time, at +the longest, so brief, so full of disappointment and bitterness, +a life where plans are never accomplished nor hopes fulfilled, +where tears and sorrow outweigh laughter and song.</p> +<p class="pn">Every remedy taken from materia medica, every +operation of the surgeon’s knife that adds even a day to the +sufferer’s existence, every hospital, every precaution and +invention to prevent accident, all the genius exercised by man to +conserve health and strength are a protest against death and a +proclamation that it is unnatural, a discord and a wrong.</p> +<p class="pn">Every human being who has the slightest pulse of +sentiment, who is not sunken in the soddenness of moral +unconsciousness feels that death is the shadow shutting out the +sun of day and hiding the stars of night, the false note that +breaks the lilt in any song, the thief who takes the treasure no +money can replace, the mocker who bids us readjust our days and +live as though those whom we have loved and lost had never been a +part of us, so that their going has put more of death in those of +us who remain to live than life—even the brute beast feels and +knows death is—an enemy.</p> +<p class="pn">Nor does God Himself leave us in any doubt about +it.</p> +<p class="pn">He says death is an enemy; even as it is +written:</p> +<p class="pn">“The last enemy that shall be destroyed is +death.”</p> +<p class="pn">And since in itself it is an enemy, it is, +necessarily, the work of an enemy.</p> +<p class="pn">It is the work of an enemy who has the power of +death.</p> +<p class="pn">He who has the power of death is—the Devil; even as +it is written:</p> +<p class="pn">“Him that had the power of death, that is, the +devil.”</p> +<p class="pn">The Son of God came into the world that He might +destroy the Devil and his work of death.</p> +<p class="pn">He came to abolish death and bring life and +immortality to light.</p> +<p class="pn">He came to make us something more than—just +moral.</p> +<p class="pn">He came to make us—immortal.</p> +<p class="pn">There is only one man in the universe who has +immortality; and that man is He who is our Lord Jesus Christ, +very God and yet true and actual man.</p> +<p class="pn">There is not an immortal human being on earth +to-day.</p> +<p class="pn">There is no such thing as an immortal soul.</p> +<p class="pn">But here I bid you halt!</p> +<p class="pn">Let no one take up this statement and go hence and +say I teach the final annihilation of the soul.</p> +<p class="pn">He who should go forth and say that would be, after +what I shall further tell you, a robber of truth and +character.</p> +<p class="pn">On this round earth at this hour there is no man +who has spoken more, written more and, under God, done more to +rebuke and smite this slavering, slobbering, unintellectual and +Devil-inspired deception known as Russellism, Christadelphianism +and Seventh Day Adventism than the man who now speaks to you.</p> +<p class="pn">I affirm here that by the will of God the soul must +exist forever whether it be in heaven or in hell; but, I say to +you the preacher who seeks to deny and overthrow the doctrine of +annihilation by defending the immortality of the soul is beaten +before he begins. He has his pains for his labour. He can find no +such expression as “immortal soul” in the Bible nor any such +doctrine taught there. Above all, he is guilty of excuseless +philological blundering. The soul is immaterial. Immortal is +applied to that which is material. The words, “immortal,” and +“immortality” are never applied in the New Testament to the +soul—never! but always and exclusively to the body.</p> +<p class="pn">To be immortal means to have a deathless, +incorruptible body like unto that of the Son of God.</p> +<p class="pn">This, and this alone—as related to man—is +Scriptural immortality. The Son of God came into the world to +give this boon of immortality to men.</p> +<p class="pn">This is the supreme objective of redemption.</p> +<p class="pn">Till that objective is obtained redemption is not +complete and the blood of the cross is not justified.</p> +<p class="pn">Do you call the redemption of Paul complete so long +as his body lies mingled with the dust of the highway by the +banks of that yellow Tiber where he was slain?</p> +<p class="pn">Do you call complete the redemption of those you +love and I love so long as the Devil like the strong man armed +with the law holds the mortgage on their bodies and keeps them in +his dark and worm-filled house—the grave?</p> +<p class="pn">It is true, blessedly true, thank God, the moment a +believer dies he is absent from his home in the body and +immediately present at his home with the Lord in the third +heaven, in the beautiful country of Paradise, in the Holy City, +the place prepared.</p> +<p class="pn">It is true the dear departed ones are clothed with +the white robe of immaculate light woven on the unjarring looms +of heaven, a temporary clothing which preserves their form and +makes them visible and recognizable to one another; but with it +all they are disembodied, and in spite of the comfort and the +consolation of it, in spite of the fact that their state is “far +better” than this at its best, still they are souls whose vehicle +is no longer body, but spirit (wherefore after death they are +sometimes spoken of as spirits); nevertheless, the Son of God did +not come to make us eternal, even if happy—ghosts.</p> +<p class="pn">If Christians should continue to die and should +remain as white clothed ghosts in heaven forever they would be an +incongruous environment and abiding scandal to the immortality of +the Son of God Himself. A living, immortal man shining in a +glorified human body surrounded by bodiless souls forever! What a +contradiction that would be, what a scandal, indeed. It would be +the declaration that the Son of God had power to rise from the +dead, make His own body immortal, impervious to death, but in +respect to those for whom He died and who died trusting in His +promise He either did not have the power or did not care to keep +His promise.</p> +<p class="pn">Such a conclusion in either member of the +proposition is impossible. It is impossible, for no such +postulate as inability or faithlessness can be laid against the +Son of God.</p> +<p class="pn">By His own immortality as the first-fruits of them +that slept, as the ordained forerunner and sample of all those +whom He has redeemed He is, and in the nature of things, under +bonds to give immortality to each, to raise the dead and +transfigure the living in His likeness.</p> +<p class="pn">As the dead can be raised and the living changed +only when He is personally present then He must come to this +world again to give that immortality of which seated on yonder +throne in heaven He is the promise and the pledge.</p> +<p class="pn">He made this promise by the grave of Lazarus.</p> +<p class="pn">Standing there with His cheeks wet with tears of +sorrow over the one He loved and in profound sympathy with the +grief-stricken sisters, groaning in Himself, not merely as one +who was under the spell of sorrow and heartache, but full of +“indignant protest” (this is the meaning of the word “to groan”) +against the havoc of death as the work of that being whom we so +familiarly call “Devil,” without stopping to measure his dignity, +malignity and power, He said:</p> +<p class="pn">“I am the resurrection and the life; he that +believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live:</p> +<p class="pn">And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall +never die.”</p> +<p class="pn">Wondrous, gracious, far reaching and full of +measureless comfort is the promise, but nine out of ten who +repeat it seem never to have comprehended the full import of +it.</p> +<p class="pn">For this is what He meant.</p> +<p class="pn">Listen to it as I quote it in its fullness of +intent:</p> +<p class="pn">“I am the resurrection and the life: he that +believeth in me, though he were dead, yet—when I come again—shall +he live:</p> +<p class="pn">And whosoever liveth and believeth in me—when I +come again—shall never die.”</p> +<p class="pn">Nor is this a fictional fancy of mine, but the +direct declaration of the Holy Spirit to the Church speaking +through the Apostle Paul; for he says:</p> +<p class="pn">“Behold, I shew you a mystery: we shall not all +sleep, but we shall all be changed,</p> +<p class="pn">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.</p> +<p class="pn">For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and +this mortal must put on immortality.</p> +<p class="pn">So when this corruptible shall have put on +incorruption and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then +(and not till then—not when we die and go to heaven, but when the +dead are raised and the living are changed—then—and not till +then) shall be brought to pass the saying that is written +(written by the Prophet Isaiah in the twenty-fifth chapter of his +prophecy), death is swallowed up in victory.</p> +<p class="pn">O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy +victory?”</p> +<p class="pn">And mark it well, the context of this Holy Ghost +promise is the declaration that the resurrection of the dead, the +transfiguration of the living, this changing from mortality to +immortality will be the resurrection and the transfiguration of +those who are “Christ’s at His coming.”</p> +<p class="pn">Yes! He will come.</p> +<p class="pn">He will descend from heaven with a shout of +command. He will pass it on to the archangel. The archangel will +pass it to the angel who is called the “trump of God.” He will +cause a sound, a blast, an utterance of power at which the doors +of graves of every sort shall open outward, every secret hiding +place of the purchased dead will be revealed and the sacred dust +will bloom with life; for, in the body of every regenerated soul +there is planted the germ of the new body; and just as the buried +seed is linked by the unseen air to the fructifying sun in heaven +and as at a given moment we call the germination is quickened and +at last comes forth in new form yet the same essential embodiment +as when planted; so, the regeneration nucleus of the new body is +held by the Holy Spirit (of which the air is the symbol) to the +risen, glorified body of the Son of God in heaven; and no matter +what may befall the body in which it was buried it will abide to +that hour we call the resurrection and transfiguration and at the +shout, the voice and action of the trump of God will come forth +in the glow of unfolded and eternal beauty as the sheath, the +house, the home, the perfect dwelling place, the royal robe of +the souls the Lord shall bring with Him; while the living shall +flash forth in the same immortality and glory.</p> +<p class="pn">Yes! the dust of death shall bloom and mortality +shall put on immortality at the Coming of the Lord.</p> +<p class="pn">And I for one want Him to come.</p> +<p class="pn">I have loved ones waiting within the gates of the +upper city for that morning hour.</p> +<p class="pn">I have one there my heart in these days yearns to +see.</p> +<p class="pn">But a short time ago death with rude and sudden +hand snatched from me my only child, the son of my heart; a son +grown to splendid young manhood; a son who loved me, reverenced +me, believed as I believe, a member of my own Church, baptized by +my own hand in early days: a son on whom I hoped to lean in peace +if the shadows should deepen round me ere my Lord might come. And +in the going of that beloved son of mine the light of day has +seemed at times to fail, the stars of heaven have grown so dim +and far away I think of them often as tears of distant eyes that +pity me. There are moments when I crave him as a hungry man does +food and as a thirsty man in desert ways yearns for a draught of +limpid waters. I have a hurt here in the heart of me no medicine +of earth can cure; but because I know when the Lord comes this +son of mine shall rise and I shall meet him and the old glad life +renew in larger, richer, fuller measure; and because I know there +is only the sound of the trump between me and that longed-for +hour; that the door of heaven is always ajar and my Lord may come +at any moment and bring us to the hand clasp and the love embrace +again, I bear my hurt, I rest in the Lord and preach this blessed +hope to other hearts that ache—the Coming of Him who is the +resurrection and the life and whose last earthward utterance to +His Church is:</p> +<p class="pn">“Behold, I come quickly.”</p> +<h1><a name="IV" id="IV">IV</a></h1> +<p class="pt1">Not Till Our Lord Jesus Christ Comes the Second +Time Will the Church be Exalted into Her True Function of +Rulership Over the World</p> +<p class="pnn"><span class="dc">T</span>HE Church was not sent +into the world to convert or Christianize it.</p> +<p class="pn">It was sent into the world to preach the Gospel to +every creature.</p> +<p class="pn">It was not to condone the world but to condemn +it.</p> +<p class="pn">With its twin doctrines of Incarnation and +Regeneration it was to ring the knell of evolution and deny the +hope of any saving energy in the flesh.</p> +<p class="pn">It was not to flatter, to paint, to gild nor +endeavour in any wise to reform or organize the world.</p> +<p class="pn">It was to deal with the world, with the system +called the world, as a ship pounding to pieces, and pounding +helplessly, upon the rocks of fallen human nature, the +dethronement of God in the soul and the enthronement and +exaltation of self-interest in the soul.</p> +<p class="pn">The Church in its ministry and widely commissioned +effort was to plunge, as a well-equipped and perfectly manned +life-boat may do, into the sea and surf of natural and Satanic +things and get men out of an old system under the doom and +judgment of God into Christ as the head of a new system under +grace and the coming glory of God.</p> +<p class="pn">The Church was not to build up a kingdom during the +absence of the Lord.</p> +<p class="pn">On the contrary, she was to recognize herself as +the affianced bride of a rejected king and coming bridegroom.</p> +<p class="pn">She was to walk in separation from the world, +refusing the seductive enticements of her would-be lovers and +with an upward and heavenly look serve while she waited for a +returning Lord.</p> +<p class="pn">The Lord did not come.</p> +<p class="pn">The Church grew weary of her vigil.</p> +<p class="pn">She exchanged the heavenly for the earthly +look.</p> +<p class="pn">She met the Devil and felt the magic of his +bewitching glances.</p> +<p class="pn">He had led her Lord to the mount of temptation. He +had shown Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. He +offered them to Him on condition that He would turn His feet out +of the pathway that led to the sacrificial cross. He offered them +on condition that He should refuse to go to the cross and there +in the agony of His soul and body and on the loom of His +vicarious sufferings weave the seamless robe of divine +righteousness for sinful men.</p> +<p class="pn">The Lord refused.</p> +<p class="pn">The Devil turned and slew Him.</p> +<p class="pn">He now led the willing Church to the same mountain +height of temptation.</p> +<p class="pn">He tempted her with the same temptation he had +offered her Lord: The rulership of the world.</p> +<p class="pn">If she would turn aside from a heaven-ordained +bridegroom and a king whose face she could not see, she might win +the world as her kingdom and rule it in spite of the cross.</p> +<p class="pn">The offer of world rulership sounded pleasant in +her ears.</p> +<p class="pn">She yielded.</p> +<p class="pn">She fell into the arms of the world.</p> +<p class="pn">The world became her paramour.</p> +<p class="pn">She became the world’s mistress.</p> +<p class="pn">Out of that ungodly and sensual alliance was born +the illegitimate child, that woful ecclesiastical offspring, we +call the Roman Catholic Church.</p> +<p class="pn">The Roman Catholic Church became the Holy Roman +Empire.</p> +<p class="pn">The Empire was the Church.</p> +<p class="pn">For long and dismal ages the Roman Church exhibited +to perfection the evil, the folly and fatality of that false and +deceptive proposition that the Church is the kingdom of Christ on +earth.</p> +<p class="pn">Then came the Reformation. It so smote the Catholic +Church that men imagined the tiara to be broken, crushed and +scattered to the winds forever.</p> +<p class="pn">They were mistaken.</p> +<p class="pn">It came from underneath that blow almost as if it +had risen from the dead.</p> +<p class="pn">To-day it is more populous than ever, having a +membership of at least two hundred millions. It has a more +intensely emphasized solidarity. It is filled with enthusiasm, +with ever-increasing arrogance and persistent aggression.</p> +<p class="pn">It is the religious incubus of the hour, the +spiritual paralysis of nations and their most dangerous political +menace.</p> +<p class="pn">With brazen effrontery and calculating boldness it +has its clutch upon the throat of this Republic, controls its +government from the Presidential office down through army and +navy, has open mass in the shipyards of the latter, in camp and +barracks its priests are masters and its wily knights of Columbus +have obtained governmental favours and consideration the Young +Men’s Christian Association would not dare to claim.</p> +<p class="pn">It rules your cities, holds the balance of +political power and can, when it will, elect a President, and +will promptly do so when the candidate for that high office shall +be willing, as already it has been done by the present occupant +of that office, to visit the Vatican or officially recognize the +civil as well as religious authority of the Pope or receive the +Apostolic delegate of the Papal See.</p> +<p class="pn">The clutch of Romanism with its strangle hold is on +the throat of what remains of Protestantism.</p> +<p class="pn">Protestantism is the after birth of the +Reformation.</p> +<p class="pn">Protestantism repudiated all the temporalities of +Rome but held on to the proposition that the Church is the +kingdom of Christ on earth.</p> +<p class="pn">Protestantism is to-day broken up into multiplying +fragments. If there be any unity remaining in it it is the unity +that comes from the compromising denial of the convictions that +led to the original break into fragments; a unity that hopes to +maintain itself by classifying many of its former convictions as +“non-essentials” and thus constitutes a combination that must +become more and more colourless and inefficient in respect to +doctrine.</p> +<p class="pn">Some of its theological institutions are nothing +better than clearing houses of infidelity and the curricula made +up of Jericho theology. It has universities in which many of the +professors have been graduated in Germany, having passed through +the poison gas factory of the Berlin university, and under the +camouflage department of “sacred literature” are sending out the +mentally and spiritually asphyxiating poison of German +rationalism, inoculating every fresh lot of newly made ministers +and would-be missionaries with rank unbelief and Bible +repudiation, distributing the poison into the back counties as +well as municipal centers until there are scores of men who once +stood for a whole Gospel and a certified Word of God who now +stand first on one foot then on the other debating with +themselves whether this Scripture that was once considered holy +and sufficient is after all a revelation from God or an invention +of man.</p> +<p class="pn">A large number of men who are at the front in the +teaching, the management, the organization and control of the +churches of the different denominations repudiate practically +every fundamental doctrine of the Christian faith.</p> +<p class="pn">They deny the Virgin birth.</p> +<p class="pn">The denial of the Virgin birth puts a stain upon +the mother of Jesus as of a woman who has broken wedlock and +sends her son forth as a bastard, an illegitimate who had no +legal right to come into the world; and then illogically, if not +hypocritically, those who deny it bid us take this son and make +Him the exemplar of righteousness, forgetting or ignoring the +self-evident fact that if, indeed, He had but a human and natural +father then was He bred in sin and unfit to be set up as the +supreme standard of righteousness and holiness among men.</p> +<p class="pn">There are those who deny the sacrificial character +of the death of the cross.</p> +<p class="pn">They repudiate atonement by the shedding of +blood.</p> +<p class="pn">When we tell them it is written without shedding of +blood there is no remission and it is the blood of Jesus Christ, +God’s Son, that alone cleanseth from all sin they fling up their +hands in protest, tell us we are to be numbered among the figures +of the past and that the theology we seek to maintain is the +theology of the butcher shop, the barbarous doctrine of the +shambles and the shadow of old-time tribal gods whose +vengefulness and wrath could be appeased only by the murder of a +victim.</p> +<p class="pn">They repudiate the doctrine of the bodily +resurrection of the Lord.</p> +<p class="pn">His body has long ago mingled with the dust of +Palestine and been blown afar by careless winds. If He rose at +all it was as the principle of righteousness and truth, whatever +such a resurrection may mean. They will no longer tolerate the +insistent need of regeneration. It has been said that “if a man +is well born the first time he does not need to be born the +second time.”</p> +<p class="pn">In the nature of the case such teaching rejects our +Lord’s bodily ascension to heaven and His session as a glorified +man who is very God at the right hand of the Father.</p> +<p class="pn">Above all, and as a further consequent of such an +attitude, teachers of this class repudiate with an almost +hysterical outcry, not only the thought that the Lord will come a +second time to this world, but that those who love Him and yearn +to see Him will ever behold Him coming in visible glory so that +they may stand face to face with Him and get the very touch of +His hands upon them in the vital benediction for which they are +longing.</p> +<p class="pn">These advanced teachers repudiate the Bible as the +inspired, infallible, inerrant Word of God,</p> +<p class="pn">The Pentateuch, the writings of Moses, is a bundle +of folk lore, Moses himself a fiction no more substantial than +Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The historic books of the Old Testament +are unreliable and therefore not history at all. The book of the +prophet Isaiah instead of one author has many, each in turn +contradicting the other. The book of Ezekiel from its +incomprehensible wheels as they flash by the banks of the river +Chebar to the impossible temple and its animal offerings with the +ever-deepening river flowing out of it, is as mystic as the +amazing cherubim which the prophet seeks, but apparently fails, +to describe. The prophecies of Daniel were written long after the +events they pretend to foretell. From Genesis to Malachi the Old +Testament is in reality the mixed history of a tribal people with +a national god whose attributes and demands are no more authentic +and authoritative than those of the gods of Greece and Rome.</p> +<p class="pn">The New Testament while a degree of advance on the +Old by reason of the progress of the times and the more +cultivated environment of its origin is not a whit more divinely +inspired. The three Synoptic Gospels are witnesses summoned to +court where their success is the contradiction and confusion of +the story they attempt to tell. The book of Acts is a combination +pamphlet put together by the followers of Peter and Paul as an +attempt to compromise between the one who was the Apostle to the +Circumcision and the other who was the Apostle to the +Gentiles.</p> +<p class="pn">The epistles of Paul are filled with the pernicious +influence of apocalyptic, Jewish fictions and the crass concept +the Apostle had of the kingdom of Christ. Page after page is +filled with proof that he expected the Lord to come in his day +and was sorely mistaken, making that confession at the close of +his writings and turning his attention to death and the grave, no +longer having expectation of the Coming of the Lord as the daily +hope of the Church.</p> +<p class="pn">It is these palpable errors of Paul, his honest, +but undoubted mistakes that are wholly responsible for that +strange thing (so the Post-millennialists think it) known as +Pre-millennialism, a system of teaching which stands for a whole +Bible, a Gospel of redeeming blood, a risen and actually coming +Saviour, coming again in the flesh, and seeks with an insistent +and constant “thus saith the Lord” to win the souls of men to a +grace-given and grace-dealing Saviour. (And I may say in passing +that Paul, under God, is undoubtedly responsible for this +doctrine so persistent and aggressive, this doctrine of +Premillennialism.)</p> +<p class="pn">To the advanced theological professor Revelation is +a piece of crazy quilt patchwork, so full of symbols that have no +intelligent meaning, symbols that can be interpreted by twenty +different expositors in twenty different ways, is so full of +monsters and nightmare doings that only an unbalanced mind could +have written it and one equally unbalanced would alone attempt to +decipher it.</p> +<p class="pn">To these teachers and leaders who count themselves +as progressive followers of the Christ of God, who practically +set aside the matter of miracles as no more worthy of credence +than the stories of Alice in Wonderland, the final place of the +deposit of authority is in the individual and subconscious +mind.</p> +<p class="pn">These professors, teachers and leaders to a large +degree are an expression of Protestantism.</p> +<p class="pn">Protestantism to-day stands for everything in +general and nothing in particular, except its protest against +being definite and particular.</p> +<p class="pn">It has thrown eschatology overboard.</p> +<p class="pn">It no longer has any interest in hereafter +things.</p> +<p class="pn">There may be a holy city in heaven; it does not +know, it will not affirm for nor against; but it does know there +are unholy cities on earth.</p> +<p class="pn">The streets of the upper city may be paved with +gold; it will not enter into controversy about it; but it is +certain the streets down here are paved with poor asphalt and +trodden by footsore and weary men.</p> +<p class="pn">Heaven may be more desirable than earth. The +condition there may be a great advance on this. Advanced thinkers +in Protestantism will neither affirm nor deny that; but they are +convinced the conditions down here should be made much better and +if possible even that of heaven on earth.</p> +<p class="pn">The truth is, both heaven and hell, like +angelology, have fallen out of modern theology. Heaven is too +high and hell too deep. No telescope has ever revealed the one +and modern sweetness, gentleness and light repudiate the cruelty +and sufferings of the other.</p> +<p class="pn">The Gospel for the individual soul, the soul the +Son of God once outweighed against a whole world in all that the +world might stand for of wealth and riches and power and attained +ambitions, saying the profit in the gain of a whole world would +not equal the loss of one soul, has been set aside.</p> +<p class="pn">Instead we have that modern and amazing evangel +known as the “Social Gospel.”</p> +<p class="pn">Here for illustration are two old people living in +a miserable cabin in a reeking, malarial swamp with a dozen +children drinking in the poison of their environment. What folly +to spend time and money on the father or mother. How inefficient +any effort to save the children just one by one. Get to work at +once and drain the swamp, drive out the poisonous and infectious +insects with which the place is swarming, fill in the land with +fine clean earth, plant flowers and sow seeds of fruitful +harvests, let the salt sea blow in and breathe across the +spot.</p> +<p class="pn">The old people may die, in all probability they +will, but under right and sanitary conditions the children will +grow up into vigorous elements of a strong and worthful +society.</p> +<p class="pn">Why spend time, money, heart and enthusiasm in +seeking to overcome or straighten out and make correct the bent +lives that have come down to us through the unsanitary moral +conditions of a previous generation? We have had wretched laws, +desperate customs, children have grown up under them to become +fathers and mothers of generations no better than themselves.</p> +<p class="pn">It is neither economy of mind nor matter, so the +modernists teach, to build mission houses, gather the people, old +and young, and frighten them with the thought that when they die +they shall pass into an environment worse than the one in which +they are endeavouring to eke out a handicapped existence. Let us +do the wise thing—go not so much to the prayer meetings, but to +the legislatures, get bills passed, laws made that will drive out +the false and disastrous conditions now obtaining; legislate so +that it will no longer be possible for people to drink themselves +drunk, steep themselves in drugs, smoke themselves yellow with +tobacco, yield to the fascination of gambling in any form. Let +society be cleaned from these evils and the result will be +certain. A generation that shall never see a saloon, a bottle of +wine or whiskey; a generation that will never know the meaning of +rum and tobacco and will never see a house of ill fame will be a +generation that must grow up in righteousness and truth. There +will be no more drunken brawls, no multiplied lawlessness, no +diseased bodies, no moral leprosy. The world will be safe for +each individual. Each individual will have a saved, moral life +here, a life lived in obedience to the laws of nature, and as the +laws of nature are the laws of God, in obedience to God. And what +danger can the hereafter, if there be such a thing as the +hereafter, hold for any one who is so obeying the laws of +God?</p> +<p class="pn">Get society right and the individual will become +right.</p> +<p class="pn">That is the modern Gospel.</p> +<p class="pn">That is the message to a needy world:</p> +<p class="pn">“Get society right and the individual will become +right.”</p> +<p class="pn">I do not interject here in full testimony the +nevertheless fact that such a pagan city as Rome, or licentious +Corinth or idolatrous Ephesus were lifted into cleanness and +moral decency, not by legislative action, by reorganization of +local conditions, but by the regeneration of one individual at a +time until the divine sanity and personal spirituality enthroned +in them built up societies, assemblies of such heaven-given +health that the old social conditions were overthrown; so +overthrown by the personal Gospel Paul preached that throughout +Asia Minor the people had been turned away from the worship of +their gods, in Ephesus the temple of Diana was largely deserted +and the craftsmen who made the silver, souvenir images of the +goddess complained their business was almost at an end.</p> +<p class="pn">Strangely enough the advocates of this social +Gospel set up the individual life of the Son of God as the means +by which society is to be made right; but they set up, not the +life He is living now as the risen, glorified God-man; on the +contrary the life He lived before He died, the character He +exhibited as a social reformer and an exemplar in righteousness. +Men, they say, are not to be saved by the death Christ died, but +by the life He then lived. He is to be taken as the proof of the +doctrine of evolution and the possibilities in the natural man. +He is the most advanced son of God who ever lived. All other men +are innately sons of God, but undeveloped.</p> +<p class="pn">The fact of Christ, it is said, is a sublime +encouragement to any man. He has only to copy Him in His words +and deeds to find the divine life unfolding. Get away from the +sacrificial Christ, this modern Gospel teaches, to the social +Christ, the Christ who was interested in the poor and needy and +who arraigned wrong social conditions; take the attitude of +Christ in relation to the evil of His times and with Him as the +inspiration institute right legislation and right social +conditions and the world will soon approach the condition of +heaven on earth.</p> +<p class="pn">This is the infidellic drive of Protestantism +today.</p> +<p class="pn">Protestantism has come down from the plane of the +supernatural to the plane of the natural.</p> +<p class="pn">Every day Protestantism is becoming more and more a +society for competitive morality.</p> +<p class="pn">In short, the Protestantism of the hour is a +combination of religiousness, civilization, Christianity, +socialism, pagan philosophy, unitarianism and the energy of the +flesh.</p> +<p class="pn">Nor need we be startled at this as though some +strange thing had taken place. Long ago the Apostle warned us +that it would be necessary to preach the Word in season and out +of season—just as a watchman is under bonds to flash light in the +darkness—because the time would come when the Church should have +a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof; when it would +not endure sound doctrine, but in obedience to the itching of the +flesh should heap to itself teachers who should endeavour to +respond to these worldly demands; teachers who in the end should +turn the people away from the truth and turn them to the fictions +and fables of men; teachers of whom the Apostle Peter warned who +should bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord who had +bought them, teachers whom Jude foresaw would creep in +unawares.</p> +<p class="pn">Men who consult the chart of a seacoast which marks +the place of breakers and treacherous, hidden ledges, now and +then thrust out through the white foam like the gleaming sharp +teeth of waiting sharks, are not startled when they see the surf +breaking at the indicated spot and hear the roar of the waters +where it was announced they should lift up their thunder; they +are not surprised, instead their confidence in the accuracy of +the chart is emphasized.</p> +<p class="pn">Likewise when those who have read the forecast in +Holy Scripture, while they may feel a certain grief at the facts +as they are, rejoice when they see these things that even the +failure of man as man and the betrayal of committed trust bear +witness to the accuracy of Holy Writ.</p> +<p class="pn">With all its failure the professing Church still +claims to be the kingdom of Christ on earth and asserts its +determination to rule the world. Rome holds to the idea with +unfailing faith and with consistent Jesuitical and political +scheming is moving forward with united front to temporal +sovereignty. Protestantism with its new watchword of a +“reorganized world” is making all its plans to attain the place +of power by social, moral and political means.</p> +<p class="pn">What would be said of a queen who entered into +partnership with men whose hands were still red with the blood of +her murdered husband and rejected king? What could be said but +that she had wholly forgotten or proved totally false to the +principles for which her husband had died?</p> +<p class="pn">What shall be said of a Church which seeks to enter +into partnership with a world that slew her Lord; which under all +the smile and smoothness of moral, social and philosophical +phrases and all the hypocritical laudations of His human +character rejects His deity and hears in His cry of agony on the +cross the proof that He was only a man who failed as other men +have failed at the last.</p> +<p class="pn">Such a Church as that has lost the vision of its +true attitude during the absence of its rejected Lord and is +well-nigh to forfeiting its commission.</p> +<p class="pn">Over the professing Church is sounding to-day with +ominous significance the Apostolic words of warning:</p> +<p class="pn">“What, know ye not that the friendship of the world +is enmity with God; and that whosoever will be the friend of the +world, is the enemy of God?”</p> +<p class="pn">The Corinthian Church attempted to take the place +of rulership in the world.</p> +<p class="pn">With keen and biting words the Apostle rebukes +them.</p> +<p class="pn">Thus he writes to them:</p> +<p class="pn">“Now ye are full, now ye are rich, ye have reigned +as kings without us: and I would to God ye did reign, that we +might also reign with you.”</p> +<p class="pn">Then he adds by way of contrast:</p> +<p class="pn">“I think that God hath set forth us the apostles +last, as it were appointed to death: for we are made a spectacle +unto the world, and to angels and to men.”</p> +<p class="pn">It is this same apostle who under the inspiration +of the Spirit in his second epistle writes to Timothy:</p> +<p class="pn">“If we suffer, we shall also reign with him.”</p> +<p class="pn">It is not while her Lord is the crucified and +rejected that the Church is to reign and rule over the world. Not +while He is seated on His Father’s throne in heaven and His own +throne on earth is cast down and trampled in the dust. Nay! if +the Church is faithful she will walk in separation from the +world. If the Church is faithful she will testify against the +world, not testify merely against certain abuses, but against the +world as a system, that it is built upon the principle of the +enthronement of self and not God, the exaltation of the flesh and +not spirit.</p> +<p class="pn">If the Church shall be faithful and like Noah in +the building of his ark condemn the world; if the Church will +take up earnestly the solemn truth of God and warn men that no +matter how good a government may be established by human means, +no matter what culture and morality may fill the earth, no matter +to what extent advance may be made in art, in science, nor no +matter how safe a place the world may be made to live in, no +matter to what heights of natural morality and righteousness man +as man may attain, the judgment of God against this system of man +called the world is certain, and that He will arise in His +majesty to shake terribly the earth, and that only the things +that are built on God can remain, the Church will suffer and be +rejected even as was her Lord.</p> +<p class="pn">The Church is to be faithful to the testimony of +Christ and enter into the fellowship of His sufferings.</p> +<p class="pn">The day of her triumph will come.</p> +<p class="pn">She is yet to rule over the world.</p> +<p class="pn">The hour and the circumstances are fixed.</p> +<p class="pn">Listen, I pray you, to the words of the Spirit as +He speaks through the Apostle Paul:</p> +<p class="pn">“When Christ who is our life shall appear—then (and +not till then) shall ye also appear with Him in glory.”</p> +<p class="pn">Only when Christ shall come to take to Himself His +long deferred rulership can the Church enter into her rulership +over the world. In the fifth chapter of the Revelation you have +the new song of the Church, the song of redemption and rule.</p> +<p class="pn">This is the triumphant song; it is a song of praise +addressed to the Son of God Himself:</p> +<p class="pn">“Thou wast slain and hast redeemed us to God by thy +blood, out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and +nation:</p> +<p class="pn">And hast made us unto our God kings and priests; +and we shall reign on the earth.”</p> +<p class="pn">But mark the moment when that song is sung, the +occasion of occasions!</p> +<p class="pn">It is at that supreme moment when as the Lion of +the tribe of Judah yonder in His risen and glorified humanity in +heaven He steps forward, Son of man, king of the Jews and king of +Israel to take the title deeds of His kingdom from the hand of +the Father; that moment when He is getting ready to cast His +judgments on the earth and come forth as in the days of Noah to +sweep away all iniquity and unrighteousness. It is at this moment +when He is about to take to Himself His great power and descend +in judgment glory that the Church bursts forth into her song of +redemption and rule.</p> +<p class="pn">It is at the Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ +alone that the Church will enter upon her function of rulership +over the world. She cannot reign till He comes and puts her in +the place of His queen and in associated power with Himself.</p> +<p class="pn">And because I want to see the Church lifted up out +of social, political and fleshly partnership with the world; +because I want to see the Church in the place of authority and +power making and fulfilling the edicts of God; because I want to +see the Church so exalted into the place of rulership that all +the nations shall walk in the light of her excellency, her +righteousness and holiness; and because this high and glorious +state will be attained alone at the Coming of our Lord Jesus +Christ I preach His Second Coming.</p> +<h1><a name="V" id="V">V</a></h1> +<p class="pt1">Only at the Second Coming Will the Solemn and +Covenant Promises of God to Israel be Fulfilled</p> +<p class="pnn"><span class="dc">G</span>OD sware to Abraham that +he and his posterity should have the land of Palestine for an +everlasting possession.</p> +<p class="pn">Abraham never got a foot of the land under covenant +promise.</p> +<p class="pn">The only bit of ground he was able to call his was +the burial plot he purchased with his own money.</p> +<p class="pn">The children of Israel never entered the promised +land under the Abrahamic covenant.</p> +<p class="pn">The Lord redeemed them from Egypt, brought them +through the divided waters of the Red Sea, led them by His +presence, bore them up as on eagle’s wings and dealt with them in +pure, unconditional grace till they came to Sinai.</p> +<p class="pn">There in all the pride and self-sufficiency of the +flesh they took themselves off the ground of grace and +unconditional covenant and put themselves under the covenant of +the law.</p> +<p class="pn">This covenant was a covenant of good behaviour.</p> +<p class="pn">They were to possess the land as long as they +fulfilled the terms of the covenant under the seal of its +blessing and cursing.</p> +<p class="pn">After the first generation had perished in the +wilderness because of their unbelief, the second generation +crossed the Jordan dry shod as their fathers had crossed the Red +Sea and entered the land under pledge and bond of good +behaviour.</p> +<p class="pn">They were not able to keep the covenant of their +own suggestion. Ten tribes went into an abomination of organized +and politically inspired idolatry.</p> +<p class="pn">In judgment and according to His warning He caused +them to be carried away captives and buried nationally among the +people whither they were led and for twenty-five hundred years +have been nationally lost to view.</p> +<p class="pn">For two thousand years because of similar and +aggravated offenses and finally, because as a nation guilty of +manslaughter in slaying the Lord their covenant king, the Jews +have been the wanderers of the earth, the people of the restless +foot, finding a home in every land but their own.</p> +<p class="pn">Has God failed to keep His promise?</p> +<p class="pn">Has He been unable or unwilling to keep His +promise?</p> +<p class="pn">Neither postulate is possible.</p> +<p class="pn">God’s counsel is immutable.</p> +<p class="pn">He confirmed it by an oath. And since He could +swear by nothing greater He sware by Himself.</p> +<p class="pn">In the nature of the case then scattered Israel and +wandering Judah must be gathered. They must return to their own +land.</p> +<p class="pn">God has so promised.</p> +<p class="pn">These promises are to be found upon the pages of +Holy Writ like the leaves of autumn—so many, so thickly strewn, +now in single phrase, in connected passages, in whole chapters +that should I attempt to read them slowly and distinctly, giving +the sense, it would take me till the morning light.</p> +<p class="pn">The Lord declares He has written their names upon +the palms of His hand.</p> +<p class="pn">They are as near and sensitively dear to Him, He +says, as the apple of His eye. He is so interested, so determined +concerning their restoration that He uses the most intensive +language to express it, language that almost thunders aloud from +the page as you read it.</p> +<p class="pn">He uses language no less intense than this:</p> +<p class="pn">“Yea, I will rejoice over them to do them good, and +I will plant them in this land (the land of Palestine) assuredly +with my whole heart and with my whole soul.”</p> +<p class="pn">Try and think of that! Let it penetrate your mind. +The Lord who made heaven and earth, whose very name is +omnipotence, says He will put the whole of His omnipotent heart +and the whole of His omnipotent soul into the execution and the +accomplishment of His determination and purpose to plant the +children of Israel once more and forever in their own land.</p> +<p class="pn">In the face of that registered will and purpose +what power is there of man or Devil; what force is there in all +the sweep of the universe that can hinder the chosen and covenant +people of God from going back to Palestine and possessing that +land as theirs and theirs alone, forever?</p> +<p class="pn">But what evidence have we, what demonstration and +proof that God will fulfill this postscript promise and plan?</p> +<p class="pn">What evidence have we from the bare statement of +God that He will keep this promise?</p> +<p class="pn">The evidence is manifold and overwhelming.</p> +<p class="pn">Before even the children of Israel crossed the +Jordan the Lord warned them in language which burns and blisters +that if they did not keep the law covenant and walk in the ways +of righteousness and truth He would cause them to fall before +their enemies. They should go out one way before them and flee +seven ways. Their cities should be taken and their wives +ravished. They should be led captives into every land. They +should become a proverb, a byword, a hissing and a scorn. Every +hand should be against them to do them ill. They should find no +ease whither they went, nor should the soles of their feet have +rest. Amidst those nations the Lord should give them a trembling +heart, failing eyes and sorrow of mind. Their life should hang in +doubt. They should fear night and day, and have no assurance of +life. In the morning they should say, Would God it were even, and +at even they should say, Would God it were morning.</p> +<p class="pn">Their land should be made desolate and be an +astonishment to the passer-by. In its desolation it should keep +the sabbaths they should fail to give it. If they would not allow +the land to rest in its sabbatic years, the Lord would cause it +to have its ordained and natural rest by driving them out of it +and allowing wind and rain and sun to take care of it and keep it +fruitful.</p> +<p class="pn">Later on all this warning of woe and terror of +judgments was emphasized by the prophets against the Jews.</p> +<p class="pn">They should become a nation of sorrows and +acquainted with grief.</p> +<p class="pn">But while the Lord should use the nations to +correct them He would not make a full end of His own people.</p> +<p class="pn">He would use the nations as the rods of His anger, +as the instruments of discipline. He would use them by taking +advantage of their own aggressive desires and ambitions, then +after using them He would turn upon them, punish them for their +pride and godless enmity to His people and make a full end of +them.</p> +<p class="pn">Then as the hour should draw nigh for the +restoration to the land He would cause the Jews as the national +representatives of all Israel to bud, to blossom and fill the +face of the whole world with fruit.</p> +<p class="pn">They should be the first to be restored to the +land.</p> +<p class="pn">They would go back in unbelief.</p> +<p class="pn">And mark how the prophecies have been +fulfilled!</p> +<p class="pn">The illustration of this fulfillment finds its most +tragic emphasis in the history of the Jews since that day when +their king, the Son of God and the Holy One of Israel was hung as +a malefactor on a Roman cross.</p> +<p class="pn">They have not only been wanderers in every land, +but they have suffered an agony no tongue can fittingly tell.</p> +<p class="pn">The men have been robbed. They have been broken on +the wheel. They have been stretched on the rack. They have been +flayed alive. They have been burned alive. They have been sent to +sea by thousands as herded cattle; and they have been sent +thither in rotting and sinking ships. Their wives and daughters +have suffered worse than torture or death. Their children have +been mutilated; and when they failed to bring a full and +satisfactory price in the public market, men, women and children +have been given away as worthless slaves, not worth even the +price of a kennel dog.</p> +<p class="pn">They have been hunted like wild beasts of the +mountain. Like frightened beasts they have trembled at the sound +of approaching footsteps and the sound of a shaken leaf has +caused them to flee.</p> +<p class="pn">If their Lord was a man of sorrows and acquainted +with grief, truly may it be said of them that they have been +through the centuries a nation of sorrows and acquainted with +grief; but the sorrows were unlike those of their Lord. He +carried the sorrows, the griefs and woes of others that He might +relieve them; they carried their own sorrows put upon them by the +wickedness and cruelty of others until tears were their meat and +drink night and day.</p> +<p class="pn">Behold how the prophecies have been fulfilled in +respect to their land.</p> +<p class="pn">For centuries it has kept a sabbath of rest.</p> +<p class="pn">It has rested from the toil of man; harvests have +neither been sown nor reaped, nor the vintage gathered save here +and there as with the sword in one hand and the sickle in the +other.</p> +<p class="pn">The land is there as a land just as it was in the +days when the man of Nazareth walked by the shores of blue +Galilee or trod the hills of Judah. The mountains of Moab draw +their lines of beauty against the measureless deeps of an orient +sky. The valleys lie between like fruitful bosoms where wheat and +barley may grow. The olive trees stand dusky in the deepening +shade. Pomegranate and apricot stretch forth their weighted +boughs and the grapes in Eschol clusters hang purple in the slant +of westering suns. It is even yet a land of brooks and fountains +of waters and men may still dig iron and brass from out of its +rugged hills.</p> +<p class="pn">Yonder in Bashan within the range of your eyes you +may count sixty cities of stone, walls and roofs and windows of +stone, great swinging doors of stone. The centuries have beaten +the wind, the rain, the storms and flying sand upon them. They +remain. They have outworn the centuries. They are silent. No +footfall is heard upon the threshold. The houses are empty save +for a fox, a swiftly gliding viper, or a belated Bedaween who may +stable his horse in a deserted room where once a happy family +dwelt in the long ago.</p> +<p class="pn">The stone cities are waiting and every stone in +door and window seems to be crying out:</p> +<p class="pn">“We are waiting till they return whose right alone +it is to live and dwell here.”</p> +<p class="pn">But what of the nations that scattered them and +made them to suffer?</p> +<p class="pn">Where is Babylon the proud empire that took them +captive; where is Babylon the golden city that saw them hang +their harps upon the willows, sit down upon the banks of the +strange river and give way to weeping as they yearned for their +own land again?</p> +<p class="pn">Where is Greece whose phalanxes swept through their +fields and spoiled their vineyards?</p> +<p class="pn">Where is Rome whose iron legions took their city, +put thousand on thousands to the sword, destroyed the beautiful +temple once hallowed by a Saviour’s feet and then drew a +ploughshare over Zion that it might become a ploughed field as +foretold? The Rome that sculptured on its triumphal arches the +figures of the captive Jews it had led in boastful mockery at the +chariot wheels of returning conquerors?</p> +<p class="pn">These nations in their ancient glory have +disappeared, the Lord as He promised has made a full end of +them.</p> +<p class="pn">But what of Israel?</p> +<p class="pn">The Jews have answered for them.</p> +<p class="pn">There are fifteen millions of Jews to-day.</p> +<p class="pn">They are the most vital and vigorous race on the +earth. They are five times the number of all Israel who left +Egypt; and they are but a sixth part of them—two tribes, Judah +and Benjamin.</p> +<p class="pn">They are the money makers and money loaners of the +world. They are the merchants, the bankers, the musicians, the +professors in school, in college and university. They are the +philosophers, the scientists, the electricians and chemists. They +have furnished prime ministers, statesmen, judges and generals. +Such a statesman as Disraeli who glorified England, such a +general as Massena whom Napoleon characterized as the “child of +victory.”</p> +<p class="pn">If to-day you should seek a representative in every +department of human genius and endeavour you would find that +representative to be either a Jew or a Jewess.</p> +<p class="pn">Fifteen millions of Jews!</p> +<p class="pn">What are these fifteen millions of Jews but fifteen +millions of proofs that the book we call the Bible is true, is +inerrant, infallible?</p> +<p class="pn">Fifteen millions of demonstrations and fifteen +millions of indubitable proofs.</p> +<p class="pn">By so much as they prove that God keeps faith with +His warnings of woe and judgment, by so much will He keep faith +with the promise of good He has made; by so much is it sure He +will yet plant them as He has said in their own land and will do +so with His whole heart and His whole soul.</p> +<p class="pn">Already the sound of their footsteps may be heard +on the homeward march.</p> +<p class="pn">Zionism is now an immense fact.</p> +<p class="pn">The spirit of nationalism has come back to +Judah.</p> +<p class="pn">The blue and white flag of David has been +unfurled.</p> +<p class="pn">Diplomats in the nations’ counsels agree there can +be no settled peace between Europe and the East till the Jew is +back in his own land and Judah once more a recognized political +state; that the Jews are the only people all the nations will +agree should have Palestine, and the words, “Jewish State” are +words repeated in common speech round the globe.</p> +<p class="pn">England has driven the Turk out of Jerusalem.</p> +<p class="pn">The corner-stone of a five million dollar +university has been laid upon that Mount of Olives where once the +Son of God amid its lonely shades prayed and agonized, a begun +fulfillment of the prophecy of Zephaniah that in the latter days +the Lord would execute judgment on the Gentile nations that +should be gathered there and to His restored and delivered people +turn again a pure speech, no longer the stuttering and smattering +phrase of Yiddish, but the old Hebraic tongue of their +fathers.</p> +<p class="pn">Already there are papers in Jerusalem published in +Hebrew, schools are taught and many speak in the ancient +language.</p> +<p class="pn">Many Jews are going back to Palestine.</p> +<p class="pn">Many more are there now than returned from +Babylon.</p> +<p class="pn">They are going back as the Word of God foretold, in +utter and absolute unbelief and bitter repudiation of the idea +that Jesus of Nazareth was their foretold and foreordained +Messiah.</p> +<p class="pn">They are going back with the vail upon their eyes +and as blind as in the day when their fathers caused Him to be +crucified by Roman hands.</p> +<p class="pn">They are going back to a time of anguish of which +Jeremiah solemnly warns as “the day of Jacob’s trouble,” and our +Lord describes as the tribulation, “the great one,” the like of +which the world has never seen and will never see again.</p> +<p class="pn">They are going back to be set up by a league of ten +nations and to enter into an alliance and covenant with its +godless head as their political and false Messiah.</p> +<p class="pn">They will suffer until there shall come upon that +generation all the righteous blood shed upon the earth from the +blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zacharias, the son of +Bacharias who was slain between the temple and the altar, and the +blood of the Son of God which they invoked in judgment on +themselves and their children in that fatal hour when Pilate +convinced of the innocence of Jesus and wishing to let Him go had +washed His hands in water, putting the responsibility of the +crucifixion upon them as a people. Then it was they cried that +terrible cry:</p> +<p class="pn">“His blood be on us, and on our children.”</p> +<p class="pn">But then as now, and always since the days of +Elijah, there was and is an elect remnant in Israel.</p> +<p class="pn">For their sakes the Lord will come.</p> +<p class="pn">He will descend with His host to Mount Sinai, the +place of the law; the spot where Israel rejected grace and sought +that covenant which neither they nor their children have ever +been able to keep.</p> +<p class="pn">He will sweep with His mighty army to +Jerusalem.</p> +<p class="pn">He will overthrow the Gentile nations gathered +there under the Devil-incarnate Antichrist.</p> +<p class="pn">He will stand upon the Mount of Olives.</p> +<p class="pn">The elect remnant will behold Him come.</p> +<p class="pn">They will look upon Him whom their fathers +pierced.</p> +<p class="pn">They will fall down in anguish before Him.</p> +<p class="pn">They will mourn for Him as one mourneth for his +only son.</p> +<p class="pn">They will take up the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah +and make it their confession of faith and bitter, self-accusing +lamentation.</p> +<p class="pn">They will say:</p> +<p class="pn">“We did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and +afflicted.</p> +<p class="pn">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.</p> +<p class="pn">All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned +every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the +iniquity of us all.”</p> +<p class="pn">And in that hour, in that day of days shall there +be a fountain opened to the house of David, and to the +inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and uncleanness.</p> +<p class="pn">The Lord will cause Jerusalem to be rebuilded “upon +her own heap.” He will ordain the erection of that temple in +which He shall establish the throne of His holiness.</p> +<p class="pn">Like David He will reign first over Judah. After +that He will send Gentile messengers like “fishers” to seek out +and find the descendants of the ten lost tribes. They will +respond to the proclamation that will be made and to the search +that will be instituted in that eastern land and among those +peoples whither they were first carried away. There will be many +impostors among them; but the Lord will make them to “pass under +the rod” as when the true sheep are struck with the owner’s mark +and as they take up their journey Zionward all who are not of +Israel will be purged from their midst.</p> +<p class="pn">Those who are really of the covenant people will be +quickened, regenerated, and when they enter the land will be +welcomed by Judah and Benjamin.</p> +<p class="pn">They shall become one nation in the land upon the +mountains of Israel. One king shall be king to them all. They +shall not be two nations any more, neither shall they be divided +into two kingdoms at all. The Lord will make a covenant of peace +with them and multiply them and set His sanctuary in the midst of +them forever. His tabernacle shall be with them. He will be their +very God as He shall be the God of the whole earth. They shall be +His peculiar people. All the Gentiles shall know that He has set +them apart for Himself when they behold His temple erected in +their midst, the most wonderful building in all the earth.</p> +<p class="pn">And thus will be fulfilled the prophecy concerning +Israel quoted and emphasized by the Holy Spirit through the +Apostle Paul that the Deliverer should come to Zion and turn away +ungodliness from Jacob and that all Israel—that is—Israel united +and as twelve tribes, should be saved.</p> +<p class="pn">It is at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, then +and not till then that the solemn and covenant promises of God +made to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob will be fulfilled and +united, redeemed, regenerated and saved Israel set in their own +land as the center and channel of blessing to the earth.</p> +<p class="pn">And because there can be no permanent peace in the +world till Israel has been restored; and because I wish to see, +not only peace among the nations and Israel reaping the blessings +of the unconditional covenant of God’s grace and unchanged +faithfulness, but because I yearn to see the hour when the Lord +shall enter upon His own inheritance and justify Himself before +heaven and earth as Judah’s Lord, as Israel’s God and turn the +accusation of His cross: “This is Jesus of Nazareth, the king of +the Jews” into the pean of His coronation as such, I preach the +Second Coming.</p> +<h1><a name="VI" id="VI">VI</a></h1> +<p class="pt1">Only at the Second Coming of the Christ of God +Will a Government of Everlasting Righteousness and Peace be +Established Upon the Earth</p> +<p class="pnn"><span class="dc">I</span>T was the original +purpose of God to make the people of Israel the head of nations, +place them in Palestine as the geographical center of the earth, +make them its political center, send His own Son to be their +incarnate king, use them as a channel of earthly and spiritual +blessing and make this world the most perfect and happiest spot +in all the wide universe.</p> +<p class="pn">They failed to meet their opportunity.</p> +<p class="pn">Then the Lord transferred the possibility of world +rulership from the Jews to the Gentiles.</p> +<p class="pn">He did this by handing political power and +authority to Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon.</p> +<p class="pn">This rulership and sway of the world descended in +its ordained and foretold succession down through Medo-Persia +with its incorporation of Babylon, through the temporary but +immensely extended empire of Greece which under Alexander +included both Babylon and Medo-Persia, and after that the +colossal and magic empire of Rome, swallowing up as it did the +three empires or kingdoms which preceded it.</p> +<p class="pn">Since the division of Rome into Western and Eastern +empires the rulership of the world has been maintained by the +various nations composed of those people dwelling in the +territory once occupied by Rome.</p> +<p class="pn">The world has been ruled by Turks, Spaniards, +Germans, by the French and by the English.</p> +<p class="pn">The Gentile nations in this special and prophetic +territory have been the world rulers.</p> +<p class="pn">It has been peculiarly Gentile rulership and in +Scripture is called, “The times of the Gentiles.”</p> +<p class="pn">Gentile times, Gentile rulership has lasted for +twenty-five hundred years.</p> +<p class="pn">It has been an amazing rule.</p> +<p class="pn">It has been a rulership that has revealed the +genius, the brilliance and the God-given powers of man.</p> +<p class="pn">It has been a rulership that has revealed the +iniquity, the sin, the mad ambition and devil-inspired policies +of man.</p> +<p class="pn">In all the twenty-five hundred years of this +Gentile rule there have not been one hundred consecutive years of +universal peace.</p> +<p class="pn">It has been twenty-five hundred years of war, of +rapine, murder and measureless lust.</p> +<p class="pn">Cities have been destroyed, fields have been laid +waste, women have endured the last outrage. Children have been +orphaned, right has been upon the scaffold and wrong upon the +throne, prison chains have been for virtue, silk and velvet for +vice, civilization after civilization has been destroyed, the +earth has been filled with anguish beyond the power of tongue or +pen to describe, and blood enough has been shed through man’s +inhumanity to man to float all the navies of the world, and money +and treasure enough wasted to have provided a palace for every +man and woman on earth.</p> +<p class="pn">A little less than five years ago men everywhere +were talking of peace and safety.</p> +<p class="pn">Christianity and civilization were walking hand in +hand.</p> +<p class="pn">Christianity or that which professed to be +Christianity had accepted all the claimed benefits of +civilization.</p> +<p class="pn">Rapid transit, the telephone, all the triumphs of +applied science were announced as the by-products of the Gospel. +Even though the churches were becoming more or less empty and the +people were turning away to other centers of instruction or +enlightenment or consolation or hope, preachers were everywhere +and with great insistence announcing that the world was growing +better every day and that we were rapidly approaching the purple +and the gold of millennial times. The hour was not far distant +when the lion and the lamb should lie down together. There was +much talk about the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. +People were coming together and having a better and more +disinterested estimate of each other. Religion was ceasing to be +dogmatic and precise and becoming more and more a profession that +was free from restraint.</p> +<p class="pn">Christian ministers in the pulpit and supposedly +wise men in the counsels of the nations with optimistic utterance +announced that the days of barbarism had passed away, the +brutality of war was at an end. Men and nations would no longer +adjourn their differences to the field of battle. A magnificent +palace of peace had been erected in that country that had for +centuries been the bloody ground where Europe settled its +political issues. In this splendid home of arbitration the +nations were to meet as friends and brothers and calmly arrange +and solve all matters that had hitherto kept them menacingly +apart.</p> +<p class="pn">War had become so abhorrent to what was called the +Christian sense of the nations that mothers were exhorted to +banish from the nurseries anything that might suggest the thought +of war, such as trumpets, drums or toy guns. So completely had +the peace idea pervaded the mind of the people, the idea that +peace had come to stay and nothing must be tolerated that would +even hint at war, that a soldier or a sailor wearing the uniform +of his country was no longer acceptable in a public place, were +it a restaurant, a music hall or even a church.</p> +<p class="pn">Men who were opposed to spending a dollar to make a +nation ready for the possibility of war were hailed as the +advanced thinkers and the men worthy of the suffrage of the +people; while those who contended human nature had not been +changed, that a nation was simply the individual grown large and +the jealousies, the covetousness and ambitions of governments +would always make it possible for the strong to prey upon the +weak and for the unprincipled under the guise of national +necessity to attack their unprepared neighbours and therefore +just as much as a city rests in confidence with the presence +within it of a well-equipped police force, equally so the comfort +and security of peace could be best maintained by a nation +governed by right principles whose army and navy were ready to +resist successfully any unjust assault upon its honour or +integrity, were treated with pity, if not scorn, as still under +the spell of benighted and barbaric days.</p> +<p class="pn">“Peace and safety!” these were the pleasant words +that lulled a pleasure-seeking and money-making generation into +self-satisfied rest and the mirage of millennial days already +arrived.</p> +<p class="pn">Then, suddenly, like a bolt out of a clear sky, or +the overflow in raging lava tide of an unsuspected volcano, the +most stupendous, ghastly and brutally devilish war the world has +ever known was on in all its fiendish fury, sweeping from England +to the Euphrates and from the Rhine and Danube on the north to +the glittering sands of Africa on the south, rolling its waves of +blood and sending its sickening and indescribable horrors through +those lands and among those people at one time constituting the +four kingdoms to whom God had committed the rulership of the +world; that region occupied by Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece and +Rome and whose administration of world affairs is called “the +times of the Gentiles.”</p> +<p class="pn">To-night ten millions of the world’s flower of +manhood lie rotting in their graves. Six millions of women and +children have been starved to death. Women have been unspeakably +ruined, children mutilated and flung as helpless debris upon the +charity of strangers, suffering their orphaned estate and not +knowing why.</p> +<p class="pn">All the genius, the science and invention of man +with poured out, unlimited wealth, have been drafted to produce +the most terrifically destructive means of war. All the boasted +progress and culture of the preceding centuries were called upon +to wage the contest until it should affright even the +participants themselves. Clouds of poison gas filled the once +sweet and vital air of spring time and summer mornings. Human +beings wearing hideous masks and looking like other world +monsters rushed in mad onslaught upon one another. They burrowed +in holes and trenches like wild beasts concealed in their lair +and waiting for the prey. Through the startled heavens winged +things like huge vampires vomiting fire and blood took their way +over cities, towns and unprotected hospitals, leaving behind them +the dead, the dying and the tortured. Hunger with its sunken +cheeks, and pestilence with its green eyes, its slavering lips +have trod the earth till horror with wordless anguish has kept +vigil by the blackened hearthstones of ruined homes and deserted +firesides.</p> +<p class="pn">To-night, the fields of Flanders where the poppies +grow and where the dead who died too soon and lie almost too +thick to count, are as though a mighty juggernaut had rolled its +fearful wheels over them, crushing both man and earth together +into one monstrous pulp of hopeless ruin.</p> +<p class="pn">To-night France, where the lilies were wont to +bloom, is torn and ripped in all the one-time beauty and +fascination of her white and winding roads, poplar fringed, in +the culture of her fruited gardens, her orchards and her royal +forests, as though some monstrous creation of pre-Adamite days +had survived and broken through all restraint of all the ages to +riot and gorge himself with unlimited delight of destruction.</p> +<p class="pn">All this after two thousand years of professed +Christianity and the constant iteration that the Church was +slowly winning its way to the ruler-ship of the world; that each +hour the world was growing better and more and more the +principles of the Christ of God dominating the universal heart of +man.</p> +<p class="pn">The world awoke to find its heart unchanged and war +with aggressive animalism still the underlying and primal force +in man.</p> +<p class="pn">To-night in face of all this, in face of the solemn +declaration of the Son of God that during the whole time of His +absence there would be war and rumours of war, and specially +within the territory once occupied by Rome; that there would be +distress of nations with perplexity, men’s hearts failing them +for fear for looking after the things that should be coming on +the earth; that the people like the waves of the sea should be +roaring, uttering their discordant voices in the thunder of +protest and bitter discontent, breaking the bonds of old customs +and lashing the times with lawlessness and unprecedented crime; +in face of the warning of the Apostle Paul that in the last days, +that is to say in the closing hours of this age, there should be, +not peaceful but perilous times; that evil men should wax worse +and worse, deceiving and being deceived; in the face of the +inspired assurance of the Apostle James that as this dispensation +should draw to its close Capital and Labour should stand in +bitter attitude to each other; that the accumulated wealth of a +special class called “rich men” should be “heaped together” that +they might be spoiled and that miseries should come upon them; +that on the one side should be the aggression of the profiteers +and on the other the violence of those who would refuse to be +exploited; in face of this assurance of industrial and class war; +in face of the fact that the softest toned apostle whose pen is +always transcribing the word “love,” and who has reached the +highest and most sublime definition of God as love; in face of +the fact that this apostle affirms the hour will come when the +whole world under religious, political and devilish inspiration +will rush to conflict, that everywhere will be heard the tramp of +armed men and the gathering of the nations for a war such as the +world has not yet seen; in face of the picture which this apostle +of love paints where the armies of the world are seen gathered in +battle array against the Lord Christ and His right to reign; in +the face of this divine warning the statesmen of the world are +assembled in counsel at Paris, the world’s capital of pleasure, +in a palace once dedicated to lust and wanton self-gratification, +whose panelled ceiling and mirrored walls are filled with and +reflect the scenes and glorification of war, that by the stroke +of a pen, by a series of resolutions, they may constitute a +league of nations bulking so big that every threatened wave of +future war may be flung back as when the dykes of Holland reject +the sea.</p> +<p class="pn">The astonishing and suggestive thing is that in the +making and remaking of the map of Europe and Asia undertaken by +the framers of the league, they are, all unconsciously, restoring +the outlines of the old Roman Empire and preparing the way for +the final and desperate revival of Rome under the form of ten +confederate nations, with its last kaiser, that dark and woful +figure, the man of sin, the son of perdition, the Antichrist.</p> +<p class="pn">And there are Christian teachers who see in this +league another herald of the millennium before Christ comes which +they so sedulously preached previously to the war. They see in +this league an evidence that the Lord Jesus Christ as the Prince +of Peace is in reality reigning over the earth and bending the +nations to His will for the reign of peace.</p> +<p class="pn">In the whole history of theological exegesis and +interpretation I know of nothing so utterly faulty, illogical and +wholly unscriptural as that exegesis which teaches the angel song +at Bethlehem to be the announcement of the birth of our Lord +Jesus Christ as the Prince of Peace and that as such He should +establish it among the nations after His ascension to heaven and +during His absence from the world.</p> +<p class="pn">The angels sang glory to God in the highest and on +earth, peace to “men of good will.”</p> +<p class="pn">The angel who spoke to the shepherds keeping the +temple sheep for the morning and the evening sacrifice was +testifying to them that there was no longer need to keep the +sheep for such a purpose. The day of animal sacrifices had +passed, the living God had provided the true sacrifice, He who +was born beneath the chaplet of heaven’s music, the Lamb of God +ordained before the foundation of the world. He had been born +into the world that He might make peace by the blood of His +cross, not between man and man, not between nation and nation, +but between man and God. He had been born to die and by His death +reconcile a rebel world to God; on the basis of this sacrifice +yet to be and when He should have risen from the dead as witness +of the efficacy of His death He would bring peace to every soul +that should be of good will—every soul that should surrender to +the will of God by believing on Him, offering Him by faith as a +sacrifice and claiming Him as a substitute. Every such soul +should be at peace with, and have the peace of, God.</p> +<p class="pn">This was the meaning of that natal hour at +Bethlehem.</p> +<p class="pn">The angels were not singing over Him as the Prince +of Peace who had come to abolish war among the nations, but as +the ordained sacrifice who should bring peace between the +individual man and his God. And yet—He is to be the Prince of +Peace and reign and rule as such over the earth, putting an end +to war and establishing perfect peace among the nations.</p> +<p class="pn">The promise of His reign and rule as the Prince of +Peace is clearly set forth in Scripture; as it is written in the +book of the prophet Isaiah:</p> +<p class="pn">“Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. +His name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, +The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. Of the increase of +his peace and government there shall be no end.”</p> +<p class="pn">But when? Where?</p> +<p class="pn">Listen:</p> +<p class="pn">“Upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom to +order it.”</p> +<p class="pn">And hear what Gabriel says to Mary when he comes to +announce to her that she has been chosen of Almighty God to give +birth to the Messiah of Israel.</p> +<p class="pn">The angel says:</p> +<p class="pn">“Thou shalt call his name Jesus . . . He shall be +great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord +God shall give unto him the throne of his father David:</p> +<p class="pn">And he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever; +and of his kingdom there shall be no end.”</p> +<p class="pn">He is to be the Prince of Peace when He sits upon +the throne of united Israel in their own land and not before.</p> +<p class="pn">He was born in fulfillment of the prophecy of +Isaiah.</p> +<p class="pn">He was a Son given. The Son of God who was God the +Son.</p> +<p class="pn">He was a Son given and became a child born.</p> +<p class="pn">He grew up to the station of manhood.</p> +<p class="pn">He entered upon His pre-arranged ministry.</p> +<p class="pn">At the appointed hour and to the very second +foretold by Gabriel to Daniel and in the exact manner announced +by the prophet Zechariah He rode into Jerusalem, went into the +temple, claiming it as His Father’s house of prayer and by so +much declaring Himself to be the Son of the Highest and the heir +of David’s throne.</p> +<p class="pn">The shout of the multitude had announced Him +officially.</p> +<p class="pn">They had said:</p> +<p class="pn">“Hosanna! Blessed is the King of Israel that cometh +in the name of the Lord.”</p> +<p class="pn">In crying this aloud they were fulfilling the +prediction of Zechariah.</p> +<p class="pn">He had, under the vision of God, looked forward to +this hour and with the Spirit of God upon him had exhorted the +people who should be alive when Jesus should come to acclaim +him.</p> +<p class="pn">He said:</p> +<p class="pn">“Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem; behold thy King +cometh unto thee; he is just, and having salvation (political as +well as spiritual salvation); lowly, and riding upon an ass, and +upon a colt the foal of an ass.”</p> +<p class="pn">The multitude were shouting as Zechariah said they +should shout. They were confessing that He who came that day up +the slopes of Zion was the Prince of Judah and King of +Israel.</p> +<p class="pn">He came to His own, but His own received Him +not.</p> +<p class="pn">Instead of the diadem of David He got a crown of +thorns. Instead of the sceptre of Israel He got the vine stick of +a Roman centurion thrust through His rope-tied hands. Instead of +a throne He got a malefactor’s cross. Instead of a robe of royal +purple He got the winding sheet of the dead. Instead of a palace +He got a borrowed grave.</p> +<p class="pn">The Jews have paid the price of that blindness and +betrayal. The man-slayer who unwittingly slew his neighbour or +was even ignorant of it at the moment sooner or later found he +had to flee from the avenger of blood instantly upon his track. +He became an exile from his home, forced to dwell in a provided +place called the city of refuge. He could not return to his home +till the second coming of a priest.</p> +<p class="pn">The Jews were guilty, as a nation, of +manslaughter.</p> +<p class="pn">They were deceived and involved by their leaders. +They really did not know that He whom they hounded to death at +the last was not only the covenant king of Israel, and the Holy +One of their fathers, but the Prince of life.</p> +<p class="pn">Because of their blindness, blunder and sin they +were cast out of the land. Because, even though in ignorance, +they slew their King, they were exiled by the judgment of God +from their home. They deprived the Lord of that land that was His +through the covenant of Abraham, and the Lord in turn deprived +them of the right of dwelling in the land. They should be exiles +so long as He was an exile. Nor can they return till He comes the +second time as a priest, not after the order of Aaron, but +Melchisedec; for it is written that He shall be both a king and +priest upon His throne.</p> +<p class="pn">Only can the Jews return and be owned nationally of +the Lord when He shall come.</p> +<p class="pn">He will come and He will come as the Prince of +Peace.</p> +<p class="pn">He will not come, I repeat, with the olive branch +in His hand and the cooing dove nestling upon His shoulder.</p> +<p class="pn">Nay! not at all!</p> +<p class="pn">He will come as the Avenger of His elect, as the +Son of man, as the judge of all flesh.</p> +<p class="pn">He will come to overthrow the combination of Devil +and man.</p> +<p class="pn">His Coming will be the climax of old and outworn +ages, the beginning of the new.</p> +<p class="pn">The glory of His Coming cannot be described.</p> +<p class="pn">Through years of meditation and continued effort at +description I have exhausted my vocabulary and worn to tatters +the oft-repeated phrases with which I have sought with heart full +of adoring enthusiasm to announce the wonders of that hour.</p> +<p class="pn">If all the suns and systems were turned into speech +till every flaming center of light were an adjective with +increasing emphasis of qualification and expression the attempt +to put into words the glory of that Coming would be a pitiful and +overwhelming failure.</p> +<p class="pn">He will come surrounded by an innumerable host +whose hallelujahs shall so vibrate that the very heavens will +roll apart at their soundings.</p> +<p class="pn">The Lord will come in His threefold glory, the +glory of the Father, the glory of the angels and His own glory: +the glory of His eternal and unbegun sonship with the Father, as +chief of the angels and as that man who is very God, as that God +who is real and immortal man. Then will He set up the kingdom, +the government for which the ages have dreamed and groaned and +guessed and prayed.</p> +<p class="pn">That hour of hours!</p> +<p class="pn">Satan bound, iniquity overthrown, God and Christ +and the Holy Spirit ruling in the lives of men. The very air +surcharged with the righteousness of God; so surcharged that he +who thinks a lie shall fall dead in the tracks where he meditated +it. No longer need of judge, of jury, of prison bars, nor +hangman’s rope, nor electric chair.</p> +<p class="pn">An hour when no longer the scarlet poppies of hate, +of jealousies and mad ambition shall bud and blossom into war. +War over forever, swords beaten into ploughshares and spears into +pruning hooks. Every man the same right as any other man, the +right to sunshine, to air, to water, the beauty of the landscape +and all the usufruct of earth.</p> +<p class="pn">That hour when no man shall call another his +master; when no longer a man shall toil and bend his back and +break his heart for a stipend of bread; for a hole in the ground +and the worm of corruption as mistress of his bed.</p> +<p class="pn">That hour when life shall be worth while and when +the centuries of peace and perfectness of actual being shall pass +on till they are counted as eternity.</p> +<p class="pn">And because this government of peace and splendour +and all the outflowing possibilities of a world in which +righteousness shall reign and God shall be first can be brought +about only by and at the Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ; +because until He does so come wars and sorrows and the darkness +of sin will continue; because all the legislation of man and all +the leagues of nations will utterly fail to establish permanent +peace; because in spite of the best endeavours of all the merely +moral forces in the earth there is nothing can keep this system +called the world from going on the rocks; because only the hand +of God’s Christ can break the bands of iniquity, quiet earth’s +fever pulses and putting down all authority bring in the peace +that never can be broken; because when He comes the government of +right and truth and the life that is really worth while shall +come; and because from my heart I want to see that longed-for +hour of heaven on earth, I preach the Second Coming of our Lord +Jesus Christ.</p> +<h1><a name="VII" id="VII">VII</a></h1> +<p class="pt1">It is at the Second Coming of Our Lord Jesus +Christ that the Earth Will be Delivered from the Bondage of +Corruption and Transformed into the Paradise of God</p> +<p class="pnn"><span class="dc">W</span>HEN man fell creation +fell.</p> +<p class="pn">It fell because creation in respect to this earth +was headed up in him.</p> +<p class="pn">God placed a ban upon it, a restraint of its +fruitfulness.</p> +<p class="pn">Instead He gave liberty to thorns and briars and +poisonous, creeping things.</p> +<p class="pn">You may plant your garden, you may plant your +orchard, set your vines and sow your fields. You may go to sleep +and rest and think your work is done, that nothing remains but to +awake again and receive the looked-for fruit and harvest.</p> +<p class="pn">When you do awake you will find the poisonous, +creeping things have climbed over your wall and fence, have +glided in among the good seed, flung their tentacles of death +about them and are slowly, surely strangling the life out of +them.</p> +<p class="pn">If you would have your garden to grow, your orchard +to yield its fruit, your vineyard to hang out its purple +clusters, your harvests to ripen in the kiss of sun and +developing touch of caressing winds, then you must rise early and +toil late. For every acre of worthful land you must crown your +brow with the sweat of unceasing and exacting toil.</p> +<p class="pn">The earth is in bondage. It is held in the close, +the gripping and relentless bonds of corruption.</p> +<p class="pn">Everywhere and in all things is the corruption of +the dead.</p> +<p class="pn">The very air you breathe is dust from the mingled +bones of the dead. The earth is crammed with the dead of man and +beast. The grain that is reaped and the flowers that bloom grow +forth from the fatness of the grave and the impulse of +corruption, watered by tears distilled from the heartache of the +generations old who have sorrowed above that grave and wept and +hoped in vain.</p> +<p class="pn">Put your ear to the bosom of old mother earth and +you will hear a moaning and lament like unto women in travail who +seek to bring to the birth.</p> +<p class="pn">I am told the whole creation groaneth and +travaileth in pain together until now; that it is on the tiptoe +of expectation with neck and head stretched out waiting for the +Coming of the Son of God and all the sons of glory.</p> +<p class="pn">O yes! creation in all her borders is crying out +for the Son of God to come.</p> +<p class="pn">It is crying out from all its rivers, from the moan +of the sea, in the shiver of earthquake and the rush of the lava +tide from the red throat of the flaming volcano. It is crying out +in the heat of burning deserts, in every pain that is felt, in +every tear of anguish that stains the face and speaks the agony +of the heart, in every clod that falls with its accent of woe +upon the coffin lid, in all the bitterness, the shame and tragedy +of a sin-smitten and Devil-hurt world; everything in nature from +rock and worm to man is crying out: “Come, Lord Jesus, and build +again this broken and ruined earth of thine.”</p> +<p class="pn">He will hear the cry.</p> +<p class="pn">When He comes He will take off the ban.</p> +<p class="pn">He will deliver from corruption.</p> +<p class="pn">The earth will no longer shiver as an aspen.</p> +<p class="pn">Fear will no longer walk forth like a tyrant and +set the pulses beating or hold them strangling.</p> +<p class="pn">Briars and thorns and fiend-like weeds and +smothering, choking things that have kept the earth in barrenness +where Eden-like gardens should have bloomed, and, thank God, all +graves, will disappear. The desert shall bloom as the rose, the +earth shall be renewed, made beautiful, and all creation loosened +from its prison bonds shall sing and echo with unending harmonies +in every freely fruiting and growing thing throughout all its +delivered and happy borders.</p> +<p class="pn">For a thousand golden years under a new heavens and +beneath a pure sky where the air shall flow round it as a river +of crystal from the throne of God the earth will roll onward to +the music of its sister spheres keeping time in the great +diapason of the universe that owns and celebrates the glory of +God; then, at last, it will pass through gates of fire and come +forth into that new orbit, as that new earth wherein is no more +dividing sea, storm swept and full of the wrecks of ships, of +greater wrecks of hopes, and tiled with the white bones of the +dead; that new earth where there shall be no more night with its +hidden evil and its long and darksome hours in which the sufferer +yearns for morning light, no more tears, nor sorrow, nor pain, +nor any more that black and ever multiplying horror they call +death; that new earth that shall be no longer the footstool, but +the exalted and special throne of God—the center of the +universe.</p> +<p class="pn">Into this new and perfect earth the Church shall +descend—a company of redeemed, blood-washed, immortal sons of +God.</p> +<p class="pn">The Son of God and God the Son Himself shall +descend and dwell there. Then for the first time shall the +children of God behold in Him the full lineament of their +Father’s face; for, though He be the eternal Son He shall be seen +and known as the “everlasting Father,” or “the Father of the +everlasting age.”</p> +<p class="pn">The onlooking worlds as they swing in their chorus +of adoration about this radiant and omnipotent center will learn +and proclaim the immense truth that this earth was created, not +merely as an expression of the wisdom, genius and might of God in +His function as a creator, but as the arena of redemption, as the +spot whence in all the wide empire of His power might be known +and felt the pulse beat of His heart. As the innumerable hosts of +heaven sweep around this center of grace and redemption, as they +behold beings who once were lost in sin, wrecked and ruined +beyond human hope or angelic aid, now immortal, holy, happy sons +of God, they will break forth in ever increasing songs of +adoration and shall say as they sing till the universe shall +repeat it again and again:</p> +<p class="pn">“Behold, the glory of God is not alone in his +majesty and might, in his holiness and omnipotence, but in his +love.”</p> +<p class="pn">They shall take up that marvellous passage in John +3: 16 and cry it aloud so that it will ring with accumulating +praise to Him who first uttered it:</p> +<p class="pn">“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only +begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, +but have everlasting life.”</p> +<p class="pn">And all the host of heaven shall proclaim:</p> +<p class="pn">“God is love. God is love.”</p> +<p class="pn">All this consummation is to find its initial at the +Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.</p> +<p class="pn">And because I want to see this earth freed from the +stain of sin, the torture of pain, the accents of sorrow, the +terror of tears, the hour of dying, the black and shameful grave, +the trench of corruption and the Devil’s ministry of death; +because I want to see a worth-while world where no longer the +earth shall turn from night to morn and then from morn to +disappointing night again, but shall glow forever in the light of +an endless morn; because I want to see a world where the purposes +of God in love, in benediction and unfailing grace are no longer +seemingly contradicted by untoward events and conditions, by +problems that with the best apologies for the divine character no +human genius can solve or balance, but are written in high and +lifted testimony brighter than the stars of any night and +stronger shining than any sun of day; because I want to see a +world where man shall be the enthronement of God and shall +glorify Him as such, and where every atom of earth shall be full +of His love and redolent with His praise, and where life shall be +only another name for joy and the unending and the ever new +unfoldment of it, the actual joy of unreserved, unlimited living; +and because this desire in all its full accomplishment can come +and the first notes of infinite triumph alone be struck and the +song begin by the Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ—I preach His +Second Coming.</p> +<h1><a name="VIII" id="VIII">VIII</a></h1> +<p class="pt1">The Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ for His Church +is the Most Imminent Event on the Horizon of Time</p> +<p class="pnn"><span class="dc">B</span>ETWEEN us and the Coming +of our Lord Jesus Christ in glory to Mount Zion to set up and +establish His kingdom there are many predicted and consecutively +fixed events.</p> +<p class="pn">Between us and the moment when our Lord shall +suddenly and secretly descend to take the Church to Himself into +the place prepared, hold her in security above the woe hour +coming on all them that dwell on the face of the earth and then +bring her back to reign and rule with Him in glory, there is not +a single, predicted event; and this—in the very nature of the +case.</p> +<p class="pn">In the nature of the case because this age in which +we live is a parenthesis between the kingdom postponed upon the +one side and the kingdom to be brought in upon the other.</p> +<p class="pn">In this age God is not seeking to convert the +world, but to take out of it a people for His Name.</p> +<p class="pn">It is an age of selection and therefore an age of +election.</p> +<p class="pn">When you take some things out of the midst of other +things there will be, not only a first one, but necessarily a +last one.</p> +<p class="pn">As there was a first one elected, called out and +taken into union with a risen Lord, so must there be a last one +who shall be called through the Gospel, quickened by the Spirit +and bound up in indissoluble union with a living Lord.</p> +<p class="pn">When that last one is called and responds to the +life-giving power of the Spirit the Lord will descend into the +upper air and take the completed and corporate Church to +Himself—the dead raised, the living changed.</p> +<p class="pn">When that last elect one will be called you do not +know, it is not known to a single soul on earth.</p> +<p class="pn">Since you do not know when the last elect of God +shall be called, and it is sure the Lord will come when that last +elect one is called, then you do not know when the Lord will +come; and so far as you are concerned, and so far as any +revelation otherwise is given, it may be any hour and, therefore, +“any moment”; consequently the Coming of the Lord for His Church +is—imminent.</p> +<p class="pn">Thus the imminency of the Lord’s Coming for His +Church is grounded on election.</p> +<p class="pn">Imminency is so absolutely linked up with election +that you cannot deny imminency without denying election; and to +deny election is to deny God Himself, deny Him in the very +essence of His own prerogative, the prerogative of +foreordination, of decree.</p> +<p class="pn">The imminency of the Lord’s Coming for His Church +is grounded on the Lord’s own declaration that He is coming for +her as a thief comes.</p> +<p class="pn">This is His declaration and warning to the Church +at Sardis, that Church which is the symbol of Protestantism in +the closing hours of the age. The warning is given to the pastor, +through the pastor to the Church and through the local assembly +at Sardis to the whole Church.</p> +<p class="pn">This is what the risen Lord actually says:</p> +<p class="pn">“Remember therefore how thou hast received and +heard; and hold fast, and repent. If therefore thou shalt not +watch, I will arrive over thee as a thief, and thou shalt not +know what hour I will arrive over thee.”</p> +<p class="pn">The characteristics of thief coming are marked and +clear.</p> +<p class="pn">The thief does not come with strident voice, with +thunderous noise, nor in open daylight, but between the midnight +and the morn, with shodden feet, silently, softly, and takes the +treasure while all in the house are sunken in the depths of +sleep.</p> +<p class="pn">When the sunbeams of the morning pelt the eyelids +of the laggard sleepers they awake to find the thief has come and +gone and in his going has taken the treasure with him.</p> +<p class="pn">If the symbol be of avail and not a mere exercise +in logomachy then will the Lord, indeed, descend in the moral and +spiritual night of the world while men are sleeping and in +fancied security pleasantly dreaming.</p> +<p class="pn">He will descend unseen, unnoted. If men shall hear +the sound of a trump it will have no greater significance to +their spiritually deaf ears than any other passing sound. He will +take, not the “great house” of religious profession, but those +alone in that profession who have been regenerated and are +indwelt by the Spirit, the dead who have fallen asleep in His +name and the living who abide in Him.</p> +<p class="pn">Above all—imminency is grounded in the integrity of +the Son of God and His apostles.</p> +<p class="pn">Unless all language is a deception; unless the +promises of God are a baited lie; unless the apostles of Christ +are the most shameless of all wanton tricksters; unless the Son +of God Himself is the coolest traitor to truth who ever fooled +the trusting hearts of needy men; unless He is the one being of +all others who had the subtle and effective genius of making +promises that fill the ear and are broken to the heart; unless He +was the most skillful of all deceivers and rejoiced with +malignant delight in deceiving the souls of men and thus proved +Himself to be not the Son of God at all but the very son of +falsehood, then seeing He is the reverse of all that, is in truth +the very Son of God and truth itself, by His own unqualified +statement, by its very character as exhortative warning His +Coming must be and is—imminent. It is on the threshold of +unfolding history and the gates of heaven are ajar ready for His +Coming. So imminent is it that there is nothing between us and +that event of events but the shout of command, the voice of the +archangel and the shattering sound of the trump. So imminent that +there is not the thickness of an eyelash between us and that +moment when the door in heaven shall open wide and His voice with +all compelling power shall say, “Come up hither.”</p> +<p class="pn">Listen to what He says:</p> +<p class="pn">“Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your +Lord doth come.”</p> +<p class="pn">Watch! because He is coming.</p> +<p class="pn">Watch! because you do not know what hour He will +come.</p> +<p class="pn">Watch! because as the householder He said He might +come in any one of the four watches, at even, at midnight, in the +cockcrowing or in the morning.</p> +<p class="pn">He did not come at even.</p> +<p class="pn">Surely the midnight has come. It is dark enough +spiritually. There is not only enough of sorrow, sin, confusion +and unbelief in a godless world, but rank treason to the truth +and repudiation of the written Word in the professing Church to +call it spiritual midnight.</p> +<p class="pn">It seems sometimes like the cockcrowing.</p> +<p class="pn">There are sounds of chanticleer, blasts of +trumpets, changing of the guards and sentinels of old customs and +ways, and echoes in the events now unrolling that prelude the +great morning and the great day.</p> +<p class="pn">There is nothing certain about the hour but +its—uncertainty.</p> +<p class="pn">Watch! because you may be alive at His Coming.</p> +<p class="pn">That is the word of Holy Scripture and not my +suggestion.</p> +<p class="pn">Listen to the Apostle: “We which are alive, and +remain unto the coming of the Lord.”</p> +<p class="pn">The Apostle said that for his generation.</p> +<p class="pn">He said it not under his own mistaken idea as the +Chicago department of “sacred literature” would suggest, but +under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit of the Holy God.</p> +<p class="pn">Paul as a mere man might make mistakes just as the +modern theological professor not infrequently does.</p> +<p class="pn">The Holy Spirit speaking through Paul could not +make a mistake Himself, neither could it be possible for Paul +under the direction of the Holy Spirit to make a mistake.</p> +<p class="pn">Paul was led by the Holy Spirit to believe it +possible the Son of God might come in his day.</p> +<p class="pn">What Paul under inspiration said for his +generation, he said for our generation.</p> +<p class="pn">He said it for you and for me.</p> +<p class="pn">Because no man knows the hour when the Lord will +come it might be in your hour and my hour.</p> +<p class="pn">The Master Himself said:</p> +<p class="pn">“You know not what hour your Lord doth come.”</p> +<p class="pn">Who is he who will have the hardihood to fix the +hour when the Master has said no man knows?</p> +<p class="pn">Who is he who will put a thousand years between the +Church and her returning Lord?</p> +<p class="pn">Where is the difference between a thousand years’ +delay and one moment that can be fixed by any man?</p> +<p class="pn">If the Lord says you do not know the hour and +necessarily do not know the minute of the hour, if you fix a +minute between us and the Coming you deny the words of the Son of +God Himself that the minute and the hour are unknown.</p> +<p class="pn">Who is he who has it all fixed and polished and +pumice stoned to the exact date?</p> +<p class="pn">The Lord has said no man on earth knows, not an +angel in heaven knows. He Himself took the place of a servant and +by the exercise of His omnipotent will residing in His eternal +and unchanged personality as Son of God and God the Son, shut out +the knowledge of it from His humanity, from Himself as man, and +said He did not know when He should come.</p> +<p class="pn">Admit that a revelation has since been given to Him +as a man or that He has taken the ban off His human side Himself +and that He knows when He will come for the Church and the exact +hour of His appearing in glory; admit this if you like and for +the sake of argument (although there is not the slightest shade +of a shadow of evidence for such an argument) it still remains +that no such revelation has ever been given to the Church; +neither has the restriction of the Son of God to His disciples +been removed. You remember what He said just before He +ascended!</p> +<p class="pn">This is what He said:</p> +<p class="pn">“It is not for you to know the times or the +seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power.”</p> +<p class="pn">That this restriction was for the Church is the +declaration of the Apostle. This is what he said to the Church at +Thessalonica:</p> +<p class="pn">“Of the times and the seasons, brethren, ye have no +need that I write unto you.”</p> +<p class="pn">Why had he no need to write to them?</p> +<p class="pn">Because the day of the Lord, he said, should come +as a thief, and as that day is introduced by the Coming of the +Lord for His Church, then His coming for the Church was, as He +Himself afterwards declared in his letter to Sardis, like the +coming of a thief. This Coming Paul had described in the fourth +chapter of his first letter to the Thessalonians.</p> +<p class="pn">It was not for the Church to know in Paul’s day +when the Lord should come as the bridegroom for His bride.</p> +<p class="pn">No revelation has been given in any epistle to the +Church since. What was true in Paul’s day as to the attitude of +the Church is true in this day. Listen to the commended attitude +of the Thessalonian Church:</p> +<p class="pn">“Ye turned to God from idols, to serve the living +and true God; and to wait for his Son from heaven.”</p> +<p class="pn">There you have it.</p> +<p class="pn">The Church is to wait; that means to watch, to +expect, to be ready.</p> +<p class="pn">This is what the Apostle said.</p> +<p class="pn">This is what the Son of God Himself said and still +says to-day.</p> +<p class="pn">He affirms we do not know the hour.</p> +<p class="pn">He exhorts us to watch.</p> +<p class="pn">The affirmation and the exhortation hold for this +hour.</p> +<p class="pn">If therefore the Son of God be not incarnate +falsehood; if He seek not to play with my heart and make me a +spectacle to the lost souls of the pit as well as to the mockers +among men—He means what He said.</p> +<p class="pn">If He meant what He said, then He means that any +day, and any hour of the day so far as I know I may meet Him at +any turn of the road.</p> +<p class="pn">And what would that mean if He should come to-night +or to-morrow?</p> +<p class="pn">I have told you what it would mean to me.</p> +<p class="pn">What would it mean to you, to some of you who have +so much invested in Laurel Hill, in that white and beautiful city +of the dead, by the banks of your winding river?</p> +<p class="pn">When I was a boy my father took me there and I +watched as the winds rippled through the long grasses, and I +could hear the wash of the river below, I was startled and +sometimes shivered as I walked under the shadow of tall +monuments, carved figures, and by stately tombs of marble. And +once I started back and broke into tears at the sight of the +sculptured form of “Old Mortality” bending above a slab with +chisel and mallet in hand—and I suppose is there still, grown +older in his stony face because more stained with the passing +years.</p> +<p class="pn">What would it mean to you whose loved ones are +lying in that cemetery or any other of the sleeping places of the +dead?</p> +<p class="pn">Ah! it would mean the home-coming, the greeting, +the rapturous kiss and hand-clasp of recognition, the joy of that +heaven life that shall know no end and that immortality that +shall compensate for all the weariness and the heartache of the +mortal path here below.</p> +<p class="pn">Yes! it would mean to those of us who by faith in +Christ Jesus are children of the living God, the gathering to our +arms again of those who have left us and for whom our arms still +ache to enfold them once more. And O my soul! it would mean the +seeing of Him whom our soul loveth and who unfailingly has loved +us; it would mean that boon of boons—seeing Him face to face.</p> +<p class="pn">Do you wonder the Holy Spirit who is the finger of +God has written over against the word “hope,” that qualification, +“blessed,” and affixed to it the demonstrative, “that,” so it +doth read: “That blessed hope”?</p> +<p class="pn">And yet! and yet! there are men who call themselves +the ministers of Christ who would blot out that hope and take +away the vision of it from our souls.</p> +<p class="pn">With cold, acute, metallic voices in which you may +hear the sound of the wheels of machinery and the buzz of +business, they tell us that should the Lord suddenly come it +would paralyze all industry, put an end to commerce and to trade, +overthrow all progress, make worthless every high endeavour for +the betterment of man, shut the doors of school, of college and +university, render useless the architect’s and builder’s plans, +throw down the mechanic’s tools, the artist’s brush, the +sculptor’s chisel, the writer’s pen, still the orator’s tongue, +make null and void the legislator’s high emprise and draw a line +of atrophy across the unfolding processes of human life.</p> +<p class="pn">Oh, foolish, blind and slow to believe, do you not +see that if the Lord should come it would lift our so-called +civilization out of the slime and shame of its brazen folly and +reeking, though perfumed sin into the glory of eternal +righteousness and peace?</p> +<p class="pn">Do you not see that it would, at last, make men +immortal and give them such beauty of form, such sanity and such +culture and worth of being as all the gymnasia and all the +eugenics of the hour have failed and will ever fail to +achieve?</p> +<p class="pn">Do you not see that if the Lord should suddenly +come it would at once open the gates of knowledge and bring us +face to face with the secrets of the universe and make us masters +under God of all natural laws such as all the curriculæ of all +the institutions of learning, of applied science and philosophy +have failed to impart?</p> +<p class="pn">Do you not see it would be the fulfillment of the +highest ideals and aspirations and would make man what the +creator of heaven and earth originally intended man should be—not +an animal working with tools and breaking his heart in vain +finally to achieve—but a very God who should speak and it should +be done, command and it should stand fast; and who should be the +incarnate revelation, the eternal enthronement of the invisible +God, in power, in character and holiness?</p> +<p class="pn">Do you not see it would change this old earth from +the swinging cemetery of the dead into the home of deathless men, +the home of the eternal and worth-while life?</p> +<p class="pn">Oh, listen to me all who hear me!</p> +<p class="pn">The hope for this world of daily toil and tears, of +graves and unceasing tragedy, of pitiful woe, is not that slow +creeping thing called evolution, wallowing on its serpentine +belly amid the dust of death and the crime and sin of unchanged +and unchangeable human nature—but God Himself—God in Christ, the +personal Coming of Him who is the maker of heaven and earth, +coming to bring in the new dawn, the new day, the new earth and +the new empire of God and man.</p> +<p class="pn">Oh, tell me those of you who have been redeemed by +blood, regenerated by the Spirit, made partakers of the divine +nature, turned heavenward by the power of God, who see cloudless +daylight in the Bible, even in the darkness of a spiritual night, +hear music in its promises and whose souls are filled with love +to God and love to man, tell me would you like Him to come, would +you like to see your Lord face to face?</p> +<p class="pn">Oh, you who have had the vision of His cross behold +it, I beseech you, there!</p> +<p class="pn">The head crowned with thorns, the nailed hands, the +nailed feet, the pierced side, the blood pouring out of those +hands, gliding round His body, weaving itself in its sinuous +course over the white flesh into a robe of crimson, and then +streaming out into a fringe of intense scarlet as it drops, drop +by drop to the thirsty ground, dripping, dripping there. Oh, I +can see it and I seem to feel the warm touch of it, the strange, +the wonderful cleansing touch of it, the only thing that can make +a blackened sinner white; and as it drops each drop seems to say +till it turns to very music in the soul:</p> +<p class="pn">“Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be +white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as +wool.”</p> +<p class="pn">Listen to the dropping of that blood out of the +heart of God, every drop the price current of the merchant, the +half shekel of the sanctuary, the purchase price of your +redemption and mine and the seal of infinite love, of measureless +grace.</p> +<p class="pn">Oh, tell me would you like Him to come, transfigure +you into the beauty of His likeness and put the benediction of +His peace upon this old sin-smitten, tear-stained earth?</p> +<p class="pn">Do you ever pray the last prayer recorded in Holy +Scripture, the last prayer of the Holy Apostolic Church?</p> +<p class="pn">Listen to it! Listen to it well!</p> +<p class="pn">“Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.”</p> +<p class="pn">Is this prayer in your heart?</p> +<p class="pn">Does it ever come to your lips?</p> +<p class="pn">Do you ever genuinely and openly offer it, wishing +with all your heart it might be so, might be answered in your +time; or, have you forgotten it like the Church at large?</p> +<p class="pn">Do you feel ashamed or afraid to offer it in +public?</p> +<p class="pn">When you try to offer it in private or public does +unbelief smother it?</p> +<p class="pn">I once heard a boy say to his mother:</p> +<p class="pn">“O mother, don’t do so much for me; love me +more.”</p> +<p class="pn">I tell you the truth whether you hear or forbear: +as preachers and teachers many of you are doing too much for the +Lord. You are busy, morning, noon and night in His name, running +here and there, tinkering religiously and morally, putting things +together and increasingly active; so busy doing for the Lord that +like Martha you have no time to sit still at His feet as did Mary +and hear His Word, hear what He has to say to you; so busy doing +for Him that you are losing sight of Himself. This was the +“somewhat” He had against the Ephesian Church.</p> +<p class="pn">That Church was full of works and labours. They had +tested false doctrines and false teachers. They stood squarely +for fundamentals and were theologically sound; but they had left +their “first love,” love to Himself, love to His person, devotion +to His person, a flaming, outbreaking, overflowing enthusiasm for +a personal, a realistic Saviour and Lord. They were taken up with +what they were doing for Him rather than with Himself. They had +got away from the loving, impelling touch and contact with +Himself.</p> +<p class="pn">The personal touch with Christ!</p> +<p class="pn">That is what He wants from us. Not so much what we +are doing for Him, but what He is to us personally. He wants to +be the first and the last, the chiefest among ten thousands and +the one altogether lovely. This is the definition of true and +efficient Christianity—personal devotion to a living and loving +Saviour.</p> +<p class="pn">Looking down from heaven He is saying to us, no +matter how much we may be doing for Him, He is saying this to +us:</p> +<p class="pn">“Love me more.”</p> +<p class="pn">And until there is this flaming, burning, +out-flowing enthusiasm for and devotion to a personal Lord, to +Him for what He is as well as for what He has done for us, there +can be no sweeping, wide, resultant revival and ingathering of +the elect of God. You may plan and organize and get together, you +will have only a flame that will flare for a time and then go +out.</p> +<p class="pn">Nay! only when we are on fire for Him can we make +the hearts of men to burn with the faith that shall turn them to +Him and make them hate and forsake whatever does not honour and +glorify Him.</p> +<p class="pn">Over all the noise and rush of things, and all the +machinery well motived men sometimes set going in His name He is +saying:</p> +<p class="pn">“Love me more! love me more!”</p> +<p class="pn">When some one you love with this intense personal +love is absent you are not satisfied till that absent one +returns, fills your vision and responds to the touch of your +greeting and your love.</p> +<p class="pn">If you love the very person of the Son of God; if +you have a quivering, all-pervading enthusiasm for Him so that He +is, indeed, above all personalities in the universe to you, you +will want Him to return where you may look upon Him—not as Thomas +did for doubt’s sake and stumbling hope’s sake—but for the very +joy of it until the print of the nails in His hand and the print +of the nails in His feet shall be to you as the apocalypse of His +glory and the illumination of your soul.</p> +<p class="pn">Do you really want Him to come—this long absent +Redeemer and Lord?</p> +<p class="pn">He is listening to hear whether you want Him to +come; whether above every plan and scheme you may have been +building in His name; above any religious, even spiritual +ambition you may have, you want Him to come for—Himself.</p> +<p class="pn">He is very still. He is listening to hear whether +you will say that one little word that has in it such vibrant +meaning, that one word:</p> +<p class="pn">“Come.”</p> +<p class="pn">The Church as a Church has long ago ceased to +say—“Come.”</p> +<p class="pn">But the old prayer is still written here in the +closing page of Holy Scripture:</p> +<p class="pn">“Amen. Even so, Come, Lord Jesus.”</p> +<p class="pn">Are you willing to-night to put your faith and your +heart into that old prayer and bid Him come?</p> +<p class="pn">Have you the faith and sincerity to do it?</p> +<p class="pn">You say, “Yes.”</p> +<p class="pn">Then rise to your feet as one person and say that +prayer as I line it out to you until it shall roll upward like a +wave on the infinite shore and break on our Lord’s listening ears +with the music of love’s unfailing appeal:</p> +<div style="font-size:108%"> +<p class="pn">“A<span class="sc">men</span>. E<span class= +"sc">ven so, come, Lord Jesus</span>.”</p> +</div> +<hr style="width:4em;margin-top:2em;margin-bottom:2em"> +<div style="font-size:92%"> +<p class="pn">In response to Dr. Haldeman the great audience +filling the building from pit to dome rose to its feet as in a +flash and repeated the prayer as he gave it out. It was a moving +sight and full of impression as the mighty volume of united +voices rose and swelled upward to that throne where our Lord sits +as Bridegroom as well as King and yearns in these days to hear +His true Bride in all the wonder of her spiritual beauty and the +strength of her essential unity say—“Come.”</p> +</div> +<p style= +"text-align:center;font-size:83%;margin-top:7em;margin-bottom:10em"> +<i>Printed in the United States of America</i></p> + +<hr class="full"> +<div class="pg"> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHY I PREACH THE SECOND COMING***</p> +<p>******* This file should be named 30573-h.txt or 30573-h.zip *******</p> +<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br> +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/3/0/5/7/30573">http://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/5/7/30573</a></p> +<p>Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed.</p> + +<p>Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Why I Preach the Second Coming + + +Author: Isaac Massey Haldeman + + + +Release Date: December 1, 2009 [eBook #30573] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHY I PREACH THE SECOND COMING*** + + +E-text prepared by Keith G. Richardson from page images generously made +available by the Google Books Library Project (http://books.google.com/) + + + +Note: Images of the original pages are available through + the the Google Books Library Project. See + http://books.google.com/books?vid=etoOAAAAIAAJ&id + + + + + +WHY I PREACH THE SECOND COMING + +by + +I. M. HALDEMAN, D. D. + +Pastor First Baptist Church, New York City + + + + + + + +New York Chicago +Fleming H. Revell Company +London and Edinburgh + +Copyright, 1919, by +Fleming H. Revell Company + +New York: 158 Fifth Avenue +Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave. +London: 21 Paternoster Square +Edinburgh: 75 Princes Street + + + +Foreword + + +THE subject of this volume is an address delivered by the Author +before the World's Conference on Christian Fundamentals at +Philadelphia, May 30, 1919. + +The reasons for preaching and teaching the Second Coming of our Lord +Jesus Christ are manifold and each one worth while. + +The Author has contented himself with presenting a few as follows: + +The Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ is the one event most +often recorded in Holy Scripture. + +It is bound up with every fundamental doctrine, with every sublime +promise and every exhortation to high, to holy and practical +Christian living. + +Only at the Second Coming of our Lord will redemption be complete +and the blood of the cross be justified. + +Not till our Lord Jesus Christ comes the Second time will the Church +be exalted into her true function of rulership over the world. + +Only at the Second Coming will the solemn and covenant promises of +God to Israel be fulfilled. + +Only at the Second Coming of the Christ of God will a government of +everlasting righteousness and peace be established on the earth. + +It is at the Second Coming of Christ alone that the earth will be +delivered from the bondage of corruption and transformed into the +paradise of God. + +The Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ FOR His Church is the most +imminent event on the horizon of time. + + +I. M. H. + + +_New York, 1919._ + + + +Contents + + +I. THE SECOND COMING OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST IS THE ONE EVENT MOST +OFTEN RECORDED IN HOLY SCRIPTURE + +II. THE SECOND COMING OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST IS BOUND UP WITH +EVERY FUNDAMENTAL DOCTRINE, EVERY SUBLIME PROMISE AND EVERY +EXHORTATION TO HIGH, TO HOLY AND PRACTICAL CHRISTIAN LIVING + +III. ONLY AT THE COMING OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST WILL REDEMPTION BE +COMPLETE AND THE BLOOD OF THE CROSS BE JUSTIFIED + +IV. NOT TILL OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST COMES THE SECOND TIME WILL THE +CHURCH BE EXALTED INTO HER TRUE FUNCTION OF RULERSHIP OVER THE WORLD + +V. ONLY AT THE SECOND COMING WILL THE SOLEMN AND COVENANT PROMISES +OF GOD TO ISRAEL BE FULFILLED + +VI. ONLY AT THE SECOND COMING OF THE CHRIST OF GOD WILL A GOVERNMENT +OF EVERLASTING RIGHTEOUSNESS AND PEACE BE ESTABLISHED UPON THE EARTH + +VII. IT IS AT THE SECOND COMING OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST THAT THE +EARTH WILL BE DELIVERED FROM THE BONDAGE OF CORRUPTION AND +TRANSFORMED INTO THE PARADISE OF GOD + +VIII. THE COMING OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST FOR HIS CHURCH IS THE MOST +IMMINENT EVENT ON THE HORIZON OF TIME + + + +I + + +The Second Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ is the One Event Most +Often Recorded in Holy Scripture + + +IT is recorded in type, in figure, in symbol, in analogue, in +parable, in hyperbole and metaphor, in exalted song, in noblest +poetry and in rarest rhetoric. It is set before us in dramatic and +dynamic statement, in high prophetic forecast, in simple narrative, +close linked logic, expanded doctrine, divine exhortation and far +-reaching appeal. + +The first promise of the Second Coming was made in Eden. It was made +in the promise given to the woman that her seed should bruise the +serpent's head. On the cross the serpent bruised the heel of the +woman's seed, but her seed did not bruise the serpent's head. Never +was his head more uplifted and unbruised than now. The promise of +the bruising is of God and must be fulfilled. The record of that +fulfillment is to be found in the twentieth chapter of the book of +the Revelation where our Lord descends and in the plenitude of His +power by the hand of an angel binds Satan for a thousand years +beneath His feet and the feet of His saints. As the bruising of the +serpent's head takes place at the Second Coming, and the promise of +the bruising is made in Eden, then the first promise of the Coming +is made in Eden; and as you see rising above the figure of the +fallen first man the figure of the Second man, you hear for the +first time the story of the Second Coming of the Second man; and +thus the story and the doctrine of the Second Coming begin with the +very beginning of the Book. + +For three hundred years Enoch walked amid the slime, the slush and +the uprising tide of human iniquity in a God-hating and God-defying +world. Then one day God took him out of all the riot and wrong of it +without dying into the heaven of His glory; and the Apostle Paul +writing to the Corinthians of the Second Coming affirms there will +be a generation who will continue alive till the Lord comes; and +thus Enoch is a type of that deathless generation and by so much a +prophecy of the Second Coming. + +For one hundred and twenty years Noah preached righteousness to a +world from which the death penalty had been removed, a world +surrendered to conscience (and let it be well remembered conscience +is not the gift of God nor evidence of grace but mark of fallen man, +the shadow of God's throne before which the "accuse" and "excuse" of +the soul witness to human guilt), a generation given over to +unrestrained fallen nature; a generation of murder, assassination, +violence, war, utter brutality, sickening sensualism, the invasion +of fallen and lust-seeking angels, rank spiritism, diabolism and +mocking laughter at God and the things of God. + +Suddenly, without warning, God called Noah into the ark (the +building of which had awakened the derision of the revellers in sin +and the would-be wise men of the hour) shut the door and bolted him +in. At the end of seven ominous days in which the darksome clouds +hung low and threatening, the windows of heaven were opened, the +fountains of the deep broken up and the flood fell, sweeping away +all save Noah and his family in the ark. When the judgment waters +had subsided Noah and his family came forth to set up a new and +distinct dispensation in the world. + +Seated yonder on the Mount of Olives in the shadow of the cross, +looking forward to His Second Coming and backward for an +illustration that should forecast the times and leave no excuse for +exegetical and interpretative theological blundering our Lord said +as it was in the days of Noah so should it be when the Son of man +should come the Second time. + +Without warning, out of a world of increasing materialism, self +-sufficiency, boasting, pride, violence, war and multiplied peril, a +world that under the guise of general indifferentism and cultivated +cynicism mocks at the things of God and denies we have a written, +final and sure revelation from Him, the Lord will snatch away the +genuine, regenerated Church (the dead raised, the living changed) +and take them to Himself, into the place prepared. For at least +seven years spiritual blackness, measureless woe and indescribable +anguish will fall upon a Devil-deceived and Devil-ruled world. Then +will the Lord come with His previously gathered Church, execute +judgment on the ungodly, sweep away all iniquity and set up the new +administration of righteousness and truth. Noah is therefore a +figure, a prophecy of the closing hours of this age and its climax +in the Second Coming of the Lord. + +One day Lot went into Sodom, took office, tried to reform the evil +city, succeeded in vexing his righteous, but unspiritual soul with +the filthy conversation of the wicked, got down to the level of the +natural man, lost his testimony and seemed to his friends and +intimates like a madman or the most excuselessly inconsistent +trifler when he attempted to take up once more his damaged +testimony. + +Then there was a night when God's angels came and snatched him out +of the doomed city. The next morning the fire of God fell and Lot +"saved so as by fire" looked on at the blaze and the burning of all +his works of righteousness as wood hay and stubble, big in bulk but +rejected of God. + +Looking forward to His Second Coming and backward for an +illustration the Son of God declared as it was in the days of Lot so +should it be when the Son of man should come again. + +There are good and righteous Christians--righteous enough but wholly +unspiritual who are seeking to make spotless town of a world God has +judged and doomed, failing to see the cross is not only the judgment +of the individual, but equally the judgment of the world; that not +only does the cross reveal the end of all flesh but the end in God's +sight of that system of things which men call the world; that on the +cross the world is crucified to the Christian and the Christian to +the world; and failing to see this, failing to get the mind of God +are daily descending to the plane of the natural man, are losing and +in many cases deliberately setting aside the testimony once for all +delivered to the saints. + +Without warning, they will be snatched away to meet a descending +Lord (if they be real and regenerated Christians) and this alone +because their faith be it never so small holds them securely in the +bonds of the covenant. After that the Lord will be revealed in +flaming fire to execute judgment on the world and all the works of +misguided social reformers because these works are built, not upon +the righteousness of God, but the righteousness of man. + +According to the Word of the Lord Himself therefore Lot is a picture +and prophecy of the closing hours of the present age with its climax +the Coming and Appearing of the Lord. + +After Abraham had typically offered up his son on Mount Moriah and +typically received him from the dead on the third day the son for a +number of chapters in the record disappears from view. Then Abraham +the father sends his servant Eliezer into a far country to get a +bride for this now invisible son. Eliezer meets the intended bride +at a well from whence she is drawing water, goes with her into her +brother's house, takes out a pack of precious things sent from the +father in the name of the son, displays them to her and invites her +to become the bride of the son. She consents. The servant leads her +forth. On the way he talks to her of the promised bridegroom. +Suddenly she beholds him coming to meet her. He receives her, takes +her into his prepared tent and she becomes his wife. + +On the same mount nearly two thousand years later God the Father +offered up His only begotten Son. On the third day He raised Him +from the dead. For two thousand years He has disappeared from view. +The Father has sent forth the Spirit to obtain a bride for His Son. +He meets her at the Gospel well from whence we draw the waters of +salvation. He is calling her through individual selection that she +may become the corporate bride. He has brought spiritual gifts which +He seeks to display in all her assemblies. He is endeavouring to +lead her along the highway of time and to speak to her in the heaven +speech of the Coming Bridegroom. Suddenly the Lord will come to meet +her and take her into the place prepared and keep her for the +marriage hour. In this simple story the analogue finds its prophetic +climax in the Second Coming of our Lord. + +Jacob fled from his home, the brother he had outwitted and the +father whom he had deceived. As night drew on footsore and weary he +cast himself upon the plain with a stone for his pillow. Visions +came to him in the night. A ladder of gold reached from earth to +heaven. At the top of it was a host of angels and the Lord Himself +in glory. The Lord spoke to him and assured him he and his posterity +should have the land on which he was lying for an everlasting +possession. It was a confirmation of the oath to and the covenant +with Abraham and Isaac. As the covenant can find its fulfillment +only at the actual Second Coming of our Lord as the God of Jacob, +this vision is the prophetic anticipation of that hour and the +heaven-proclaimed assurance the Lord is coming a Second time. + +Joseph was sent by his father to his brethren. They despised and +rejected him. They cast him into the pit of death. He was taken out +alive. He was carried away into a far country--even into Egypt. +There he was exalted to become co-ruler with Pharaoh. In the hour of +famine he became the bread giver, the saviour of a hungry world. At +the same time he got a Gentile bride. In the hour when tribulation +and sorrow came upon his brethren he revealed himself to them the +second time and was owned and acknowledged by them. With his wife he +came in his chariot of kingly glory and established his father and +his brethren in the promised land of Goshen. + +The application is so simple it applies itself. + +God the Father sent His Son to His brethren in the flesh. They +despised and rejected Him. They put Him in the place of death. He +was raised up alive. He has gone into a far country--even into +heaven itself. He is there now as one who has been exiled from +earth. He has been exalted to the throne of His Father. For two +thousand years of spiritual famine and hunger in the world He has +been the giver of the bread of life, the saviour of men. During +these years of His exile He has been obtaining a bride from among +the Gentiles--that is the Church. When the hour of tribulation and +anguish shall come upon His brethren in the flesh, even as He +Himself has warned, He will appear in His glory, the scales will +fall from their eyes as they did from Paul and they will own Him as +their Messiah and Lord, the Holy One of Israel. With His Church in +associate power and glory He will deliver them and place them +forever in the promised land--the land of their fathers. + +No sooner has Moses with the host of Israel crossed dry shod through +the divided waters of the Red Sea than he lifts up his voice and +sings, not of the first, but the Second Coming of the Lord. He sings +of Him as a man of war, as the head of celestial armies, coming to +execute judgment, overthrow iniquity and establish His reign and +rule of righteousness. + +When you open the historic pages of the Bible, along the seemingly +driest and coldest paragraphs you may if you will behold the wheels +of the King's chariot flashing by and catch a gleam of His radiant +features, now as the man of war in David, and then as the Prince of +peace in Solomon. + +Yonder, under the far-away stars, Job sat at his tent door and as he +meditated on the brevity and vanity of human life, its hopes +deferred that make the heart sick, the sound of the clods as they +fall upon the coffin lid, he asked the question that has quivered +down the ages--"If a man die, shall he live again?" + +He answers his own question. He says he knows he will die. He knows +his soul will go into the underworld of the dead. His body will be +laid away in the dust. It will become nothing more than a bundle of +skin and bones. He knows, also, this bundle of skin and bones is the +work of God's hand. The Lord will have respect to His work. He will +remember He wrought it. At a given time He will call to Job and Job +will answer; then in anticipation of the supreme moment he cries out +exultantly he knows his redeemer liveth; that he shall stand in the +latter day upon the earth and covered with his own flesh once more +shall see his incarnate God. + +Thus in those wondrous days of the long ago Job caught the shining +of the morning star, heard the trumpet of the first resurrection and +caught the vision of the Second Coming of his Lord. + +David sweeps his fingers across the answering chords of his golden +harp and sings of that hour when the Lord shall come in His glory; +when the trees of the wood shall clap their hands; when the +mountains shall flow down at His presence, the waves of the sea +fling their hallelujahs on the resounding shore; and when the earth +shall own the Lord is coming, coming not the first time to die, but +the Second time as the risen one to live and reign and with none to +dispute Him. + +In the Song of Songs we who believe are by nature before God as +black and uncomely as the sun-burned tents of Kedar, but by grace in +God's sight as beautiful as the Tyre-woven curtains of Solomon. + +The breath of the spring time is in the air. The voice of the turtle +dove is to be heard in the land. It is the time of love and for +hearts to find their mates. The leaves of the fig tree of Israel are +beginning to put forth. The seeds of hope sown in the graves of the +Christian dead and watered with tears from the anguish of the living +are ready to bud and blossom forth in the full flower of their +assured immortality. The voice of the Bridegroom may be heard saying +to the Church: "Come away my beloved. Come thou rose of Sharon and +thou lily of the valley," and presently we see the Bridegroom +Himself descending and the Church going up out of the wilderness +leaning on the arm of her Beloved. + +So we may learn and quickly if we will, that the Song of Songs which +is Solomon's is the celebration of the nuptial hour when our Lord +shall come the Second time to take His affianced Church to Himself +and make her the heavenly bride of His unfolding and unfading glory. + +The prophet Isaiah hears the seraphs sing their "holy, holy, holy is +the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory" till the +posts of the door are moved at the wonder of the song. He sees the +glory of the Coming of the Lord. He tells us the Lord is coming with +fire and with His chariots like a whirlwind, to render His anger +with fury, and His rebuke with flames of fire. + +Jeremiah announces the Lord is coming the Second time. When He comes +He will make Jerusalem the throne of His glory. Unto it shall be the +gathering of the nations. They shall gather unto it in the name of +the Lord, and neither shall they walk any more after the +imaginations of their evil heart. + +Ezekiel beholds the Lord seated on a throne high and lifted up. He +sees Him coming out of the purple dawning of the east. He restores +Jerusalem. He builds the temple till the shining spendour of it +shall fill the promised land; and in a voice as the sound of many +waters He says this temple shall be the place for the soles of His +feet and thus rebukes those who try to keep Him from dwelling bodily +in the land as though forsooth He should lose His heavenliness by so +doing, forgetting that earth is His rightful home and is to be His +eternal dwelling place. Yea and Amen when He comes to His own again +He shall dwell in the midst of His ransomed forever. And the nations +of the earth as they ascend to the heights of Jerusalem to behold +His glory and to worship Him in His holy temple as they catch the +first glimpse of the city, its gardens like unto the garden of the +Lord, the temple with its shekinah cloud by day and the flaming fire +by night that shall make it to be no more night but day, shall cry +out, not "Jerusalem," but "Yaveh Shamma--the Lord is there." And +from henceforth this shall be the name of the city. + +Daniel has visions in the night. He beholds the Lord as the Son of +man, as eternal judge and king of all the earth. He sees Him coming +to the Father to receive His title deeds and then descending in +clouds of glory to establish the kingdom that shall never pass away. + +From Hosea to Malachi the Minor Prophets echo with the declaration +the Lord is coming and always this coming is the Second. + +Hosea foresees Israel will forsake the Lord and for many days be as +a dead man out of sight and forgotten. But in the latter times when +the Lord Himself shall return Israel will awaken and own Him as Lord +and king. + +Joel tells us the armies of the world league shall be gathered +against Jerusalem and under their godless, Devil-incarnate head +shall defy the Lord of hosts; that the Lord will come, overthrow +them with a great slaughter and deliver the holy city from the +treading down of the Gentiles forever. + +In Amos the Lord is coming to restore the kingdom to Israel and set +up and establish the throne of David. + +Obadiah warns us of the day of the Lord, the day that is introduced +by the Second Coming of the Lord. + +Joel teaches us under the madness and folly of Gentile rule +ploughshares are to be beaten into swords and pruning hooks into +spears and the nations are to give themselves to war and all the +horror and desolation of it. But this Scripture is never quoted by +those who preach peace where there can be no peace. Always they +quote Micah who tells us the swords will be beaten into +ploughshares, the spears into pruning hooks and the nations shall +learn war no more. + +The two prophets seem to stand in absolute opposition to each other. + +They do not. + +Joel tells us what will happen just before the Lord comes. + +Micah tells us what will take place after the Lord comes. + +In Joel the Lord will come, meet the armies of the League in the +valley of decision, the valley of Jehoshaphat, and overthrow them; +then will the implements of war be beaten into the implements of +peace and war be at an end forever. + +Micah announces the end of war and the beginning of lasting peace +will come as the consequence of the Lord's appearing in glory and +not till He does so appear. + +Nahum proclaims the Second Coming. The Lord's way shall be in the +whirlwind and the storm, the clouds shall be the dust of His feet, +the mountains shall quake at Him, the hills shall melt and the very +earth burn at His presence. + +In Habakkuk the Spirit carries human language to its loftiest height +till it glows on peaks of thought sublime. + +The prophet sees the Lord coming the Second time. His brightness is +as the shining light. In His hands once pierced for such as we is +the hiding of His power. Pestilence and burning coals are His +vanguard. He stands and measures the earth. He drives asunder the +nations. The everlasting mountains are scattered. The perpetual +hills bow before Him and the inhabitants of the onlooking worlds +lift up their voices and sing: "His ways are everlasting." + +Zephaniah proclaims the Second Coming. + +The Lord will come and smite the world league in the pitifulness of +its gathering and the pigminess of its might. He will pour forth His +indignation and fierce anger upon all the exaltation and pride of +man. He will devour the earth with the fire of His jealousy, deliver +Jerusalem, turn to the people the pure speech of the old Hebraic +tongue, bid Zion to sing, Israel to shout and calling Jerusalem her +daughter, bid her to rejoice. He will overthrow the false Christ and +as the true Messiah will Himself dwell in the midst of Jerusalem +forevermore. + +Haggai declares the Lord will come and will shake all nations so +that only the things which are of God may remain. + +Zechariah tells us in terms so plain, so clear no one need +misunderstand nor be in darkness for a moment that the Lord is +coming the Second time. + +He will come with all His saints. His feet shall stand in that day +on the Mount of Olives; and that no false teacher nor wilful +perverter of the truth about the reality of the Lord's bodily +presence on the earth at that time may have even the shadow of a +shadow to rest on, and as a proof that this coming is not spiritual +but actual and the testimony of His very feet under the most +pronounced topographical conditions, the prophet says the mount on +which those blessed and real feet shall descend is not only on the +Mount of Olives, but that "Mount of Olives, which is before +Jerusalem on the east." + +At the touch of the Lord's feet this wondrous and sacred Mount of +Olives will split in twain. One half of it will roll like a wave +northward. The other half will roll to the south. A great valley +will be formed. That valley is named in Scripture, but never has +been found on any map and cannot be found in Palestine to-day. It is +the valley of Jehoshaphat, the valley of decision, the valley of +judgment of the nations. And into this valley pell-mell shall rush +the Antichrist-led and Devil-deceived armies of the league of ten +nations to find their overthrow at the hand of the Lord and the +inauguration of that hour when the once despised and crucified +Christ shall be the revealed and recognized God of the whole earth; +when there shall be one Lord and His name one--even that name which +is above every name whether in heaven or on earth--the name of +Jesus. + +Malachi closes the book of the Old Testament. He beholds our Lord +Jesus Christ coming the Second time. He sees Him coming as the +rising sun filling the heavens and flooding the earth with the +benediction of His majesty and might. + +From Malachi to the New Testament we pass over four hundred years of +prophetic silence and then we are in the book of the Gospel +according to Matthew. + +Here we are face to face with the night of nights. + +The stars like silver squadrons sail close to the waiting earth. The +angels fling down their wreath of natal song and the virgin mother +cradles upon her white and unsullied breast the Christ of God. + +We follow Him in the days of His unfolding ministry. Every time He +touches the earth His footsteps leave a benediction. Each time He +breathes the air He sweetens it. His low and modulated voice starts +a note of music whose rhythmic accents have not done sounding and +whose heavenly harmony outsings the discords of earth. He looks +daylight into blind eyes. He cools the fever pulse to quiet beating. +He makes the lame man to leap as a hart. He hushes the storm on +Galilee till the ruffled, windswept waters are as calm and peaceful +as a babe upon its mother's breast. With a word He raises the wept +-for dead. Everywhere and at all times His miracles are wrought, not +merely that He may do good and bring needed blessings as He passes +by, but as the credentials and sign warrant of the truthfulness of +His claim that He is Son of God, God the Son, the Anointed of the +Lord and Israel's king. + +But in all His ministry of hand or word never does He speak save +incidentally of His first coming. Always and in fullest degree He +speaks of His Second Coming. Seated upon the Mount of Olives He +affirms, after the cross shall have slain and stained Him and the +grave shall have briefly held Him He will come again; but, just +before He comes it will be as it was in the days of Noah--a time of +materialism, sensualism, the culture of self-consciousness, an hour +of boasting, pride, lawlessness and war; and when He is revealed it +will be as with the driving judgment of the flood. + +In the twenty-fifth chapter of Matthew and the first part of the +chapter He declares He is coming as the bridegroom comes--seeking +the marriage hour of his bride. + +In the last part of the chapter and as the climax of His bridegroom +coming He will appear as the king of glory and the judge of the +living nations. + +When He stands before His guilty judges and their suborned witnesses +and while they mock and deride Him He breaks His hitherto amazing +silence not to demonstrate to them the truth of His incarnation nor +the proof of His preexistence, but in calm and measured utterance to +tell them that after they shall have put Him to death He will come +the Second time; and they shall see Him descending from heaven +seated upon the cloud of shekinal glory and with the power of God. + +In Mark He is the householder who goes into a far country, gives to +each of His servants a work to do, puts the porter on guard to watch +the door of the house and announces that no one in heaven nor on +earth knows when He will return. He will return, He will come the +Second time. It will be in one of the four watches of the spiritual +night. It may be at even, it may be at midnight, it may be at +cockcrowing and it may be in the morning. Because it is certain He +will come, but uncertain when He will come, each one who claims to +be His servant is under bond to watch. The whole household must be +in the attitude of watching, of readiness and expectation; and His +word of exhortation and warning to His Church is: + +"What I say unto you, I say unto all--watch." + +In Luke He is the nobleman who goes into a far country to get the +title deeds of His kingdom and return. When He returns He comes +first to His servants, gathers them to Himself and rewards them. +After that with them He executes judgment on His enemies and then +sets up His kingdom. + +In the Gospel of John He eats with His disciples the last and +memorial supper. He goes out with them, bids them lift their glances +to the wide, extended sky where the jewelry of the night as the +scattered largess of a king burns in the fire of opal, the purple +and violet of amethyst and the white splendour of uncounted +diamonds. He assures them these gleaming things are no fiction fire +-flies of gaseous worlds in the making, but illuminated dwelling +places in His Father's house. He is going thither. He will ascend +into that congeries of inhabited worlds and will prepare a place for +them, a glorious palace home befitting their high estate; when all +is ready He will come back and receive them in corporate unity to +Himself. + +His words are simple, but the simplicity is the simplicity of light +and every accent is as the touch of peace to troubled hearts; for +this is what He said: + +"In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would +have told you. 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 ye may be also." + +In the book of Acts, in the first chapter you have a scene no artist +has really ever painted, no writer ever fairly portrayed and no +mortal tongue can fittingly describe. + +Our Lord is going up from the Mount of Olives. He is going up from +the midst of His disciples. He is going heavenward. The disciples +watch Him as He ascends. He enters a cloud. Do not, I beseech you, +imagine for a moment this cloud is a fog bank, a mass of watery mist +and vapour; it is the shekinal cloud which once covered the +tabernacle in the wilderness and was the vehicle of His presence +when Israel in that far time marched on their way to the promised +land. It is His chariot of state. In this chariot sent to meet Him +He passes between the onlooking worlds ever higher and higher till +at last He takes His seat upon the throne of the Highest at the +right hand of the invisible majesty. + +Then, as through the dimness of their tears the disciples watch Him +disappear, they hear a voice which says to them: + +"Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same +Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like +manner as ye have seen him go into heaven." + +"This same Jesus." + +Mark that well! + +The Jesus who on the Sunday night of His resurrection did meet these +disciples in the upper room and said to them as they shrank back +into a frozen silence of hope and fear: + +"Peace be unto you." + +"Why are ye troubled?" + +"And why do thoughts arise in your hearts?" + +"Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me and +see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have." + +Still these disciples were afraid, afraid it could not be true. + +Then He showed them His hands and His feet that they might see where +the nails had gone in, torn through the flesh and left eternal +wounds as the chevrons of glory. + +And still the silence of hope mingled with fear. + +Then he said: + +"Have ye here any meat?" + +And they gave Him a piece of a broiled fish, and of an honeycomb. + +And He took and did eat before them. + +He had said to them He was flesh and bones, not flesh and blood. + +He was not flesh and blood because in the sin-offering all the blood +must be poured out at the bottom of the altar, and He was Himself +the antitypical sin-offering. He had poured out His blood. It had +run as a living stream from every vein and artery. + +Because He was the sin-offering in death, in resurrection He became +for the first time a priest--high priest after the order, not of +Aaron, but Melchisedec. + +That very morning as the high priest He had ascended to heaven, +within the vail, and sprinkled His redeeming blood (how is not +revealed) on the eternal throne, changing it from the throne of +judgment to a throne of grace. That night He stood before them He +was their high priest, not of earth, but heaven. He breathed upon +them, imparted to them the Holy Spirit--the Comforter--linking them +to His immortal body. He remained with them, going and coming, +during forty days, operating with them officially by and through the +Holy Spirit as His unseen executive; for we are told that, "until +the day he was taken up he through the Holy Ghost had given +commandments unto the apostles;" and then, finally, as this scene in +the book of Acts shows us, ascended to His high-priestly function +and unceasing service of intercession. + +He is seated in heaven now, seated there as the same Jesus who met +His disciples that first Sunday night, the same Jesus who ascended +out of their midst from Olivet. This same Jesus! The same not only +in realistic, human body, but the same in character, full of the +same measureless compassion and grace as when He sat on the well +curb in Samaria and though thirsting as a real man for real water +offered to give to the sinful woman who by divine and eternal +ordination met him there, the water that should be in her as a well +of water springing up into everlasting life. + +This same Jesus is coming again, not a phantom, not an impalpable +spirit, not a ghost Christ, but a Christ who is a real man of real +flesh and real bones. + +This is the key-note of the book of Acts. + +He who died for men, who has sanctioned the Holy Spirit to operate +in His name, speak in His name, reveal to us the things that are His +and show us things to come concerning Him, He is coming again, +coming not only as very God, the Holy One of Israel, He who has been +exalted to be both Lord and Christ, but as this loving, tender, +compassionate Jesus, and in a body that may be seen and handled--a +body of flesh and bones. + +In Romans we have the promise the Lord is coming to bruise Satan +under His feet and the feet of His saints; and according to the +calendar of heaven and the way in which they measure time there this +great event must come to pass, as it is written, "shortly." + +In First Corinthians the Lord is coming to raise the dead who shall +be His "at his coming." + +In Second Corinthians He is coming to transfigure the living who +believe in Him and thus clothe them with their "house from heaven," +give them the body that shall be the handiwork of God and not man. + +In Philippians our citizenship is in a country which is in heaven +from whence we are to look for a Saviour, even the Lord Jesus +Christ, who shall change this body of our mortal humiliation that it +may be fashioned like unto His immortal and glorious body, a change +which He will effectuate by that mighty power according to which He +is able to subdue all things unto Himself. + +In Colossians our life is hid with Christ in God, a double +environment of security, and when Christ who is our life shall +appear, we shall appear with Him also in glory. + +In the epistles to the Thessalonians each chapter closes with a +testimony to the Second Coming. + +In the first epistle in the first chapter the Apostle commends the +Thessalonian Church because they had turned to God from idols to +serve the living and true God and to wait for His Son from heaven. +From the beginning the Apostle Paul taught the new converts the next +possible event might be the Coming of that Lord whom he had declared +had been sacrificed for them, was now risen and in heaven. This was +the one supreme thing for which they were to be in readiness every +day--the Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. + +In the second chapter he assures the Thessalonians he will meet them +in the presence of the Lord at His Coming; when He comes and they +are all gathered before Him, saved through the Gospel Paul has +preached to them in the demonstration of the Spirit and power, they +will be the guarantee and occasion of the crown he shall receive. + +In the third chapter he exhorts them to increase and abound in love +to one another that their hearts may be established unblameable in +holiness before the Lord when He shall come the Second time with all +His saints. + +In the fourth chapter he announces as a special revelation from the +Lord that the Lord Himself is coming to awaken those whom He has put +to sleep in His name. He will descend from heaven with a shout, with +the voice of the archangel and the trump of God. The dead in Him +shall rise first, then we who are alive and remain shall be caught +up with them in clouds to meet the Lord in the air; so shall we ever +be with the Lord and with one another. + +In the fifth chapter the Coming of the Lord for His saints as just +noted in the fourth and preceding chapter will bring in the day of +the Lord; and we further learn this coming for the saints not only +precedes the day of the Lord, but as the introduction to it will be +as secret, sudden and unknown to the world as is in general the +coming of a thief. + +In the second epistle, in the first chapter the Lord is seen coming +with all His saints to execute judgment on the ungodly and the +unbelieving. + +In the second chapter we learn the word, "Rapture," so often given +as the name and title for the translation of the Church to meet the +Lord, while it may be a deducible truth and exegetically, or, rather +philologically sustained, is not the Holy Ghost title. The true and +Scriptural title is: "Our gathering together unto Him." + +In this chapter we learn also when the Church has been gathered to +the Lord in heaven the man of sin, the Antichrist will be revealed; +then will the Lord appear in glory, overthrow him and his league of +nations and set up the heaven-ordained kingdom of righteousness and +peace. + +In the third chapter the Apostle prays the Lord may direct their +hearts into the love of God and into--patient waiting for Christ. + +In the First Epistle to the Thessalonians the Lord comes FOR His +Church. + +In the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians He comes WITH His Church. + +In First Timothy He is coming that He may be shown forth as the +blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords. + +In Second Timothy He is coming to judge the quick and the dead and +to give reward to all those who love His appearing. + +Titus gives us the inspired and official title of the Coming of our +Lord Jesus Christ as, "That Blessed Hope." + +In Hebrews we see this age is the antitypical Day of Atonement; just +as at the close of the day in Israel the people were waiting for the +man who led away the scapegoat into the wilderness to come back +without it as evidence their typical redemption was complete and +secure for another year; just so our Lord Jesus Christ having +appeared in the end of the age to put away sin by the sacrifice of +Himself, reconcile the world to God and bring in the day of grace +and salvation, to them that look for Him shall He come the "second +time, without sin, unto salvation"; that is, He will come back not +as the sin offering, but as the triumphant Redeemer and as witness +that our redemption will then be completed by Him in the immortal +bodies He shall give us. + +James testifies that in the closing hours of this age Capital and +Labour will look at each other with wrinkled brows, clenched hands +and nervous, impatient expectation. + +He exhorts the Christian labourer to be patient because, as he says, +"the Coming of the Lord draweth nigh," is so near, so imminent He +standeth as a judge--verily "at the door"--and ready to intervene. + +In the First Epistle of Peter the Lord is coming to justify the +faith of His elect. + +In the Second Epistle He is coming to bring in the new heavens and +the new earth. + +In the First Epistle of John we who believe are sons of God. It is +not yet manifested to the world what we really are, nor what we +shall be; but we know when He shall appear we shall be like Him for +we shall see Him as He is. When He shines out we shall shine out +with Him. + +We are told every one who has this hope in him, purifieth himself +even as he is pure. + +And thus in this special fashion the Holy Spirit affirms the Second +Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ is not only the climacteric of our +avouchment as sons of God, but, when held as a hope in the heart, +will keep us pure and clean as the Holy Christ Himself. + +In the Second Epistle of John we are warned false teachers will +abound; teachers who shall deny the eternal incarnation of the Son +of God. They will deny He is coming the Second time; but, above all, +they will deny He could possibly come in the flesh. + +The Apostle unhesitatingly affirms those who hold and teach this +falsehood are nothing less than antichrists; and he warns us as +faithful followers of the true Christ not to receive them into our +houses, nor bid them Godspeed. + +Jude is the smallest, that is to say, the shortest, of all the +epistles. It is a clasp between the Old and the New Testaments. + +Jude tells us Enoch the seventh man who lived on the earth +testified, not of the first, but the Second Coming, saying: + +"Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints." + +Then we find ourselves in the Revelation. + +This is the book of the Consummation. + +The supreme subject is the Second Coming. + +There are twenty-two chapters. + +Each of the chapters portrays conditions and circumstances leading +up to the great climax--the Second Coming and the immense and +measureless consequences--the millennial reign and the eternal +state. + +The book is like the roof of a great cathedral, like the interior of +the roof, groined and panelled--each panel a chapter. + +It is like the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in which, however, may +be found figures and forms such as Michel Angelo never drew nor such +even as his imperial and suggestive mind could conceive. + +You will find in these chapters the figures of wild beasts, the +dragon, fallen angels, fiends from the pit, that old Serpent called +the Devil and Satan. If you will read and listen you will hear the +blast of trumpets, the breaking of vials, the sounds of woe, the +tramp of marching feet, the clash of battle, fire falling out of the +heavens, trees and grass in flame, the waves of the sea turned to +blood, fountains and streams become as wormwood and gall, the sun as +black as a starless midnight, the moon hanging in the lowering +heavens like a clot of blood, earthquakes, the scarlet tongues of +outpouring volcanoes, thunderings and lightnings, all manner of +wickedness and pervading sin, a world quivering as a ship in the +storm, the bending heavens as though unbolted and insecure, all +foundations apparently shattered and the universe itself as though +rushing forward to its funeral pyre. + +Heaven opens and the Lord comes forth riding a white horse, followed +by armies on white horses, the horses the symbols of His power, each +hoof beat as it smites the slant of heaven the sound of swift +descending judgment. + +On the Lord's head are many crowns. + +He is wrapped in a garment dyed in blood. + +His eyes are as a flame of fire. His glances penetrate to the secret +intents and purposes of the heart. They get behind every cloak of +deception and every pretense. All the spotted nakedness of interior +and intensive sin is revealed. Nothing remains in shadow, everything +is illuminated to bareness, and the searching light of His looks +goes through every fibre of being. + +He is coming to reign and rule. + +All the things the chapters record have been driving us to look +forward to that; the woe, the anguish and the hell on earth have +been pleading and crying out for a master to master and put an end +to the cataclysms of catastrophic iniquity; the very nature of +things has been testifying that He must come. + +He is responding to the demand that lies in the nature of things. + +He is coming to reign and rule as a king. He is not coming with an +olive branch in one hand and a cooing dove on His shoulder. + +Nay! + +He is coming with a rod of iron. He is coming to trample all +opposition beneath His feet, put down all rule and authority, break +to pieces and shatter as a potter's vessel the pride of nations and +the self-exaltation of man. + +He is coming to establish peace, but not by means of compromise, by +gentle and persuasive ways, but by war and as a man of war, as the +man who is very God and judge omnipotent. + +The book closes with the thrice repeated announcement from the Lord +Himself: + +"Behold, I am coming quickly." + +This is the last utterance of the Lord from heaven. + +To this the Church replies with its last recorded prayer: + +"Amen, even so, come, Lord Jesus." + +When you close the book you feel the next thing is--the Coming of +the Lord. + +If the value of a statement or doctrine is to be measured by the +number of times repeated, then, since from Genesis to Revelation, in +every form of human language the Second Coming is proclaimed, is +stamped upon almost every page of the Bible, is inwrought with every +fibre of truth it finally presents; since in the New Testament alone +it is mentioned directly and indirectly more than three hundred +times, as there is no other theme in the Bible that approaches it in +frequency of repetition, it should seem that this event and doctrine +of the Second Coming with all its promises and certified +consequences should easily be of supreme and all-compelling +importance; and because the Holy Spirit has made it of such +importance I am under bonds to preach it. + +Those who persist in saying it is incidental, secondary and sporadic +might well be said to be of that class of theological disputants who +never study their Bible; for the fact is should you cut out every +reference to the Second Coming, its cognate truths and all the +events to which it gives emphasis, you would have but a fragment of +the Bible; and the Book upon which faith is founded, from which hope +casts its glances heavenward, sees light in the grave and +immortality assured, would be but as a broken reed, a garment of +beauty torn and shredded, or as a harp whose main chord had been +snapped asunder. + + + +II + + +The Second Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ is Bound up With Every +Fundamental Doctrine, Every Sublime Promise and Every Exhortation to +High, to Holy and Practical Christian Living + + +IT is bound up with every fundamental doctrine. + +The resurrection from the dead, the transfiguration of the living, +the judgment seat of Christ, the judgment of the living nations, the +consequent judgment of the white throne, the rewards of the +righteous and the punishment of the wicked. + +It is bound up with every sublime promise. + +The recognition of the dead, the overthrow of Satan, the deliverance +of creation, the triumph of God and Christ and the eternal felicity +of the saints. + +It is bound up with every exhortation to high, to holy and practical +Christian living. + +We are not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together as the +manner of some is. On the Lord's day we are to break bread and drink +the fruit of the vine, show forth the Lord's death and make known to +heaven and to earth that the only ground of approach to a holy God +is the sacrificial offering and vicarious sufferings of the Son of +God and God the Son, and that on the ground of His atoning blood as +our sin offering and personal substitute we claim Him as redeemer, +saviour and interceding priest. + +We are to love God and love one another. + +We are not to judge one another. + +We are not to cast stumbling blocks in each other's path. + +We are to walk worthy of our vocation. + +We are to let our moderation be known to all men. + +We are to be patient, long-suffering and forbearing. + +We are to engage continually in prayer and supplication. + +We are to live blamelessly before men and holily before God. + +As pastors we are to shepherd the sheep over whom God has made us to +be overseers. + +We are to feed the flock, not with the philosophies and fictions of +men, but with the truth of God. + +We are to restore the wandering, sustain the weak and comfort the +sorrowing. + +We are to go to the house of mourning and give consolation to those +who are Christians and who weep above their Christian dead. + +As preachers we are to preach the Word. We are to preach in season +and out of season, and to exhort with all long-suffering and +doctrine. + +We are exhorted to this high, this holy, this exalted and practical +Christian living, this reincarnation of Christ in daily experience, +this translation of His character, this manifestation of His guiding +and ruling presence, not by the fact that we must die and appear +before God, but by the fact the Lord Himself is coming, may come at +any time, that any moment we may meet Him at His judgment seat. + +In all the universe of God there is nothing so impressive as the +thought that you, that I, that we must give a personal account to +God for the manner in which we have used our time, our talent, our +opportunity and substance; and when we are told--as we are told in +Holy Scripture--that any moment we may be summoned to give an +account of our stewardship, and that without dying, just suddenly, +without a moment's warning, translated bodily and with all the sense +of the daily life we have been living upon us into the presence of +Him whose name we have been professing--impressiveness has reached +its ultimate and exhortation the fullest leverage of appeal. + +And he who says the Coming of Christ considered as a doctrine, as a +truth or a motive, is not intensely practical and all-compelling to +Christian devotion and service, is either blindly and excuselessly +ignorant of the Word of God or brutally and perversely guilty of +denying a truth that flashes like lightning from one end of the +Bible to the other and illuminates every hortative passage in the +Word of God. + +When thus you are face to face with the indisputable fact that every +basic doctrine of the Christian faith, every outshining promise of +hope, of comfort, of consolation, of abiding peace, every appeal to +the noblest and purest life as a Christian, every demand that the +Christian shall unceasingly be the light of heaven in the spiritual +darkness of earth is bound up inextricably with the fact of the +Second Coming, it carries with it the inevitable corollary that the +Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ as a certified and imminent +event is the very sum and substance of all available motives that +can lead to a life of practical service to God and man. + + + +III + + +Only at the Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ Will Redemption be +Complete and the Blood of the Cross be Justified + + +OUR Lord Jesus Christ did not come into this world that He might go +through the unspeakable horror of the cross; He did not hang on that +brutal and torturing instrument of death as the criminal of the +universe; He did not receive the down sweep of the essential +antagonism of a holy God against the sin He represented; He did not +cry the cry of the lost, "My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken +me?"; He was not flung out like a derelict thing into the black, +starless night of God's inexorable law, measureless wrath and +indignation where His humanity unanchored and alone was forsaken +both by God and man; He did not hang there in the torment of His +body, suffering all the agony the most exquisitely wrought, nerve +-centered body of the universe could suffer of physical pain and +anguish; God did not make Him to be sin and treat Him as the +blackest and most repulsive thing in existence; He did not lay upon +Him the weight and demerit of a world's guilt that He might suffer +in His innocence, His purity and innate sinlessness on behalf of the +vilest outcast this side of Gehenna, the lake of fire, just that He +might keep us from lying, cheating, swearing, getting drunk, giving +ourselves up to immorality, licentiousness and sensualism; He did +not send Jesus Christ His only begotten and well-beloved Son to die +a spectacle to heaven, to earth and hell that He might make us +merely decent and right and morally correct in our relations to one +another. All that is involved in the fact of redemption just as +fragrance is involved and included in the rose, as harmony is +expected to be a part of music and rhythm as well as metre a part of +verse and song. + +Cleanness and morality are involved quantities in a Christian. The +moment the new life of the risen Christ is wrought in a believer and +he is linked up by the Holy Ghost to the glorified body of the Son +of God he has in him all the impulse and power of the highest +morality, the most exalted purity, the rarest spirituality and the +discernment of spiritual things. All that is self-evident--but the +Son of God came into this world and went through the amazing tragedy +and sacrifice of the cross to do something more than to make us +merely moral and good. He came into the world, He died the +foreordained death of the cross that He might deliver us from death +and the grave. + +Death is the blackest and most shameful blot on the face of the +earth, the grave the most repulsive of scandals, drawing the trench +of its corruption and stain round the girdle of the globe. + +To bring a human being into the world, give him no choice of father +or mother, of place, of time and circumstance, endow him with a +brain to think, a heart to feel and love and then set him face to +face with death, hide from him the hour of his going like a criminal +who knows not the hour of his execution; to allow the old to live +till they are withered, shrivelled and helpless, a burden to others +and a still greater burden to themselves, cursing the fact they must +live and yet afraid to die; to take a young man in the splendour of +his youth, on the threshold of assured success, snatch him away +without warning from the parents devoted to him, the wife who loves +him and the children dependent on him; and then leave them both, the +decrepit and useless old and the needed young to drop into the +tongueless silence of the grave, that silence broken only by the +sound of the clods as they fall on the coffin lid or the plash of +tears, or the choking sob; to allow the living whose hearts are torn +and twisted and smashed by the robbery that death brings upon them +to stand there and strangle themselves with the unanswered and +unanswerable questions: "Whence," "What," and "Whither," and then +say all this is the work of a good, a compassionate, a tender and +loving God, and that death is as natural as birth? + +Nay! + +Those who say and teach that death is as natural as birth are guilty +of pure unintellectualism and are unwarranted deniers of the facts. + +The birth of a child is like the coming of the dawn. It is like the +note of a new and joyous song. It is the revelation of a new world, +a world of life, of hope, of promised and larger activities. No one +who is sane and true and wise will deliberately seek to hinder +birth; but death! ah! everything is against death and by right +against it. + +Every fibre in the body repudiates death. Pain is the protest of +life against it and the scout that brings in news of its approach. +The brain, the mind, the heart shiver at it, not merely because of +the native fear at the unknown, but at the mockery it makes of life, +the uselessness of living a time, at the longest, so brief, so full +of disappointment and bitterness, a life where plans are never +accomplished nor hopes fulfilled, where tears and sorrow outweigh +laughter and song. + +Every remedy taken from materia medica, every operation of the +surgeon's knife that adds even a day to the sufferer's existence, +every hospital, every precaution and invention to prevent accident, +all the genius exercised by man to conserve health and strength are +a protest against death and a proclamation that it is unnatural, a +discord and a wrong. + +Every human being who has the slightest pulse of sentiment, who is +not sunken in the soddenness of moral unconsciousness feels that +death is the shadow shutting out the sun of day and hiding the stars +of night, the false note that breaks the lilt in any song, the thief +who takes the treasure no money can replace, the mocker who bids us +readjust our days and live as though those whom we have loved and +lost had never been a part of us, so that their going has put more +of death in those of us who remain to live than life--even the brute +beast feels and knows death is--an enemy. + +Nor does God Himself leave us in any doubt about it. + +He says death is an enemy; even as it is written: + +"The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death." + +And since in itself it is an enemy, it is, necessarily, the work of +an enemy. + +It is the work of an enemy who has the power of death. + +He who has the power of death is--the Devil; even as it is written: + +"Him that had the power of death, that is, the devil." + +The Son of God came into the world that He might destroy the Devil +and his work of death. + +He came to abolish death and bring life and immortality to light. + +He came to make us something more than--just moral. + +He came to make us--immortal. + +There is only one man in the universe who has immortality; and that +man is He who is our Lord Jesus Christ, very God and yet true and +actual man. + +There is not an immortal human being on earth to-day. + +There is no such thing as an immortal soul. + +But here I bid you halt! + +Let no one take up this statement and go hence and say I teach the +final annihilation of the soul. + +He who should go forth and say that would be, after what I shall +further tell you, a robber of truth and character. + +On this round earth at this hour there is no man who has spoken +more, written more and, under God, done more to rebuke and smite +this slavering, slobbering, unintellectual and Devil-inspired +deception known as Russellism, Christadelphianism and Seventh Day +Adventism than the man who now speaks to you. + +I affirm here that by the will of God the soul must exist forever +whether it be in heaven or in hell; but, I say to you the preacher +who seeks to deny and overthrow the doctrine of annihilation by +defending the immortality of the soul is beaten before he begins. He +has his pains for his labour. He can find no such expression as +"immortal soul" in the Bible nor any such doctrine taught there. +Above all, he is guilty of excuseless philological blundering. The +soul is immaterial. Immortal is applied to that which is material. +The words, "immortal," and "immortality" are never applied in the +New Testament to the soul--never! but always and exclusively to the +body. + +To be immortal means to have a deathless, incorruptible body like +unto that of the Son of God. + +This, and this alone--as related to man--is Scriptural immortality. +The Son of God came into the world to give this boon of immortality +to men. + +This is the supreme objective of redemption. + +Till that objective is obtained redemption is not complete and the +blood of the cross is not justified. + +Do you call the redemption of Paul complete so long as his body lies +mingled with the dust of the highway by the banks of that yellow +Tiber where he was slain? + +Do you call complete the redemption of those you love and I love so +long as the Devil like the strong man armed with the law holds the +mortgage on their bodies and keeps them in his dark and worm-filled +house--the grave? + +It is true, blessedly true, thank God, the moment a believer dies he +is absent from his home in the body and immediately present at his +home with the Lord in the third heaven, in the beautiful country of +Paradise, in the Holy City, the place prepared. + +It is true the dear departed ones are clothed with the white robe of +immaculate light woven on the unjarring looms of heaven, a temporary +clothing which preserves their form and makes them visible and +recognizable to one another; but with it all they are disembodied, +and in spite of the comfort and the consolation of it, in spite of +the fact that their state is "far better" than this at its best, +still they are souls whose vehicle is no longer body, but spirit +(wherefore after death they are sometimes spoken of as spirits); +nevertheless, the Son of God did not come to make us eternal, even +if happy--ghosts. + +If Christians should continue to die and should remain as white +clothed ghosts in heaven forever they would be an incongruous +environment and abiding scandal to the immortality of the Son of God +Himself. A living, immortal man shining in a glorified human body +surrounded by bodiless souls forever! What a contradiction that +would be, what a scandal, indeed. It would be the declaration that +the Son of God had power to rise from the dead, make His own body +immortal, impervious to death, but in respect to those for whom He +died and who died trusting in His promise He either did not have the +power or did not care to keep His promise. + +Such a conclusion in either member of the proposition is impossible. +It is impossible, for no such postulate as inability or +faithlessness can be laid against the Son of God. + +By His own immortality as the first-fruits of them that slept, as +the ordained forerunner and sample of all those whom He has redeemed +He is, and in the nature of things, under bonds to give immortality +to each, to raise the dead and transfigure the living in His +likeness. + +As the dead can be raised and the living changed only when He is +personally present then He must come to this world again to give +that immortality of which seated on yonder throne in heaven He is +the promise and the pledge. + +He made this promise by the grave of Lazarus. + +Standing there with His cheeks wet with tears of sorrow over the one +He loved and in profound sympathy with the grief-stricken sisters, +groaning in Himself, not merely as one who was under the spell of +sorrow and heartache, but full of "indignant protest" (this is the +meaning of the word "to groan") against the havoc of death as the +work of that being whom we so familiarly call "Devil," without +stopping to measure his dignity, malignity and power, He said: + +"I am the resurrection and the life; he that believeth in me, though +he were dead, yet shall he live: + +And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die." + +Wondrous, gracious, far reaching and full of measureless comfort is +the promise, but nine out of ten who repeat it seem never to have +comprehended the full import of it. + +For this is what He meant. + +Listen to it as I quote it in its fullness of intent: + +"I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, though +he were dead, yet--when I come again--shall he live: + +And whosoever liveth and believeth in me--when I come again--shall +never die." + +Nor is this a fictional fancy of mine, but the direct declaration of +the Holy Spirit to the Church speaking through the Apostle Paul; for +he says: + +"Behold, I shew 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 (and not till then--not +when we die and go to heaven, but when the dead are raised and the +living are changed--then--and not till then) shall be brought to +pass the saying that is written (written by the Prophet Isaiah in +the twenty-fifth chapter of his prophecy), death is swallowed up in +victory. + +O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" + +And mark it well, the context of this Holy Ghost promise is the +declaration that the resurrection of the dead, the transfiguration +of the living, this changing from mortality to immortality will be +the resurrection and the transfiguration of those who are "Christ's +at His coming." + +Yes! He will come. + +He will descend from heaven with a shout of command. He will pass it +on to the archangel. The archangel will pass it to the angel who is +called the "trump of God." He will cause a sound, a blast, an +utterance of power at which the doors of graves of every sort shall +open outward, every secret hiding place of the purchased dead will +be revealed and the sacred dust will bloom with life; for, in the +body of every regenerated soul there is planted the germ of the new +body; and just as the buried seed is linked by the unseen air to the +fructifying sun in heaven and as at a given moment we call the +germination is quickened and at last comes forth in new form yet the +same essential embodiment as when planted; so, the regeneration +nucleus of the new body is held by the Holy Spirit (of which the air +is the symbol) to the risen, glorified body of the Son of God in +heaven; and no matter what may befall the body in which it was +buried it will abide to that hour we call the resurrection and +transfiguration and at the shout, the voice and action of the trump +of God will come forth in the glow of unfolded and eternal beauty as +the sheath, the house, the home, the perfect dwelling place, the +royal robe of the souls the Lord shall bring with Him; while the +living shall flash forth in the same immortality and glory. + +Yes! the dust of death shall bloom and mortality shall put on +immortality at the Coming of the Lord. + +And I for one want Him to come. + +I have loved ones waiting within the gates of the upper city for +that morning hour. + +I have one there my heart in these days yearns to see. + +But a short time ago death with rude and sudden hand snatched from +me my only child, the son of my heart; a son grown to splendid young +manhood; a son who loved me, reverenced me, believed as I believe, a +member of my own Church, baptized by my own hand in early days: a +son on whom I hoped to lean in peace if the shadows should deepen +round me ere my Lord might come. And in the going of that beloved +son of mine the light of day has seemed at times to fail, the stars +of heaven have grown so dim and far away I think of them often as +tears of distant eyes that pity me. There are moments when I crave +him as a hungry man does food and as a thirsty man in desert ways +yearns for a draught of limpid waters. I have a hurt here in the +heart of me no medicine of earth can cure; but because I know when +the Lord comes this son of mine shall rise and I shall meet him and +the old glad life renew in larger, richer, fuller measure; and +because I know there is only the sound of the trump between me and +that longed-for hour; that the door of heaven is always ajar and my +Lord may come at any moment and bring us to the hand clasp and the +love embrace again, I bear my hurt, I rest in the Lord and preach +this blessed hope to other hearts that ache--the Coming of Him who +is the resurrection and the life and whose last earthward utterance +to His Church is: + +"Behold, I come quickly." + + + +IV + + +Not Till Our Lord Jesus Christ Comes the Second Time Will the Church +be Exalted into Her True Function of Rulership Over the World + +THE Church was not sent into the world to convert or Christianize +it. + +It was sent into the world to preach the Gospel to every creature. + +It was not to condone the world but to condemn it. + +With its twin doctrines of Incarnation and Regeneration it was to +ring the knell of evolution and deny the hope of any saving energy +in the flesh. + +It was not to flatter, to paint, to gild nor endeavour in any wise +to reform or organize the world. + +It was to deal with the world, with the system called the world, as +a ship pounding to pieces, and pounding helplessly, upon the rocks +of fallen human nature, the dethronement of God in the soul and the +enthronement and exaltation of self-interest in the soul. + +The Church in its ministry and widely commissioned effort was to +plunge, as a well-equipped and perfectly manned life-boat may do, +into the sea and surf of natural and Satanic things and get men out +of an old system under the doom and judgment of God into Christ as +the head of a new system under grace and the coming glory of God. + +The Church was not to build up a kingdom during the absence of the +Lord. + +On the contrary, she was to recognize herself as the affianced bride +of a rejected king and coming bridegroom. + +She was to walk in separation from the world, refusing the seductive +enticements of her would-be lovers and with an upward and heavenly +look serve while she waited for a returning Lord. + +The Lord did not come. + +The Church grew weary of her vigil. + +She exchanged the heavenly for the earthly look. + +She met the Devil and felt the magic of his bewitching glances. + +He had led her Lord to the mount of temptation. He had shown Him all +the kingdoms of the world and their glory. He offered them to Him on +condition that He would turn His feet out of the pathway that led to +the sacrificial cross. He offered them on condition that He should +refuse to go to the cross and there in the agony of His soul and +body and on the loom of His vicarious sufferings weave the seamless +robe of divine righteousness for sinful men. + +The Lord refused. + +The Devil turned and slew Him. + +He now led the willing Church to the same mountain height of +temptation. + +He tempted her with the same temptation he had offered her Lord: The +rulership of the world. + +If she would turn aside from a heaven-ordained bridegroom and a king +whose face she could not see, she might win the world as her kingdom +and rule it in spite of the cross. + +The offer of world rulership sounded pleasant in her ears. + +She yielded. + +She fell into the arms of the world. + +The world became her paramour. + +She became the world's mistress. + +Out of that ungodly and sensual alliance was born the illegitimate +child, that woful ecclesiastical offspring, we call the Roman +Catholic Church. + +The Roman Catholic Church became the Holy Roman Empire. + +The Empire was the Church. + +For long and dismal ages the Roman Church exhibited to perfection +the evil, the folly and fatality of that false and deceptive +proposition that the Church is the kingdom of Christ on earth. + +Then came the Reformation. It so smote the Catholic Church that men +imagined the tiara to be broken, crushed and scattered to the winds +forever. + +They were mistaken. + +It came from underneath that blow almost as if it had risen from the +dead. + +To-day it is more populous than ever, having a membership of at +least two hundred millions. It has a more intensely emphasized +solidarity. It is filled with enthusiasm, with ever-increasing +arrogance and persistent aggression. + +It is the religious incubus of the hour, the spiritual paralysis of +nations and their most dangerous political menace. + +With brazen effrontery and calculating boldness it has its clutch +upon the throat of this Republic, controls its government from the +Presidential office down through army and navy, has open mass in the +shipyards of the latter, in camp and barracks its priests are +masters and its wily knights of Columbus have obtained governmental +favours and consideration the Young Men's Christian Association +would not dare to claim. + +It rules your cities, holds the balance of political power and can, +when it will, elect a President, and will promptly do so when the +candidate for that high office shall be willing, as already it has +been done by the present occupant of that office, to visit the +Vatican or officially recognize the civil as well as religious +authority of the Pope or receive the Apostolic delegate of the Papal +See. + +The clutch of Romanism with its strangle hold is on the throat of +what remains of Protestantism. + +Protestantism is the after birth of the Reformation. + +Protestantism repudiated all the temporalities of Rome but held on +to the proposition that the Church is the kingdom of Christ on +earth. + +Protestantism is to-day broken up into multiplying fragments. If +there be any unity remaining in it it is the unity that comes from +the compromising denial of the convictions that led to the original +break into fragments; a unity that hopes to maintain itself by +classifying many of its former convictions as "non-essentials" and +thus constitutes a combination that must become more and more +colourless and inefficient in respect to doctrine. + +Some of its theological institutions are nothing better than +clearing houses of infidelity and the curricula made up of Jericho +theology. It has universities in which many of the professors have +been graduated in Germany, having passed through the poison gas +factory of the Berlin university, and under the camouflage +department of "sacred literature" are sending out the mentally and +spiritually asphyxiating poison of German rationalism, inoculating +every fresh lot of newly made ministers and would-be missionaries +with rank unbelief and Bible repudiation, distributing the poison +into the back counties as well as municipal centers until there are +scores of men who once stood for a whole Gospel and a certified Word +of God who now stand first on one foot then on the other debating +with themselves whether this Scripture that was once considered holy +and sufficient is after all a revelation from God or an invention of +man. + +A large number of men who are at the front in the teaching, the +management, the organization and control of the churches of the +different denominations repudiate practically every fundamental +doctrine of the Christian faith. + +They deny the Virgin birth. + +The denial of the Virgin birth puts a stain upon the mother of Jesus +as of a woman who has broken wedlock and sends her son forth as a +bastard, an illegitimate who had no legal right to come into the +world; and then illogically, if not hypocritically, those who deny +it bid us take this son and make Him the exemplar of righteousness, +forgetting or ignoring the self-evident fact that if, indeed, He had +but a human and natural father then was He bred in sin and unfit to +be set up as the supreme standard of righteousness and holiness +among men. + +There are those who deny the sacrificial character of the death of +the cross. + +They repudiate atonement by the shedding of blood. + +When we tell them it is written without shedding of blood there is +no remission and it is the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, that +alone cleanseth from all sin they fling up their hands in protest, +tell us we are to be numbered among the figures of the past and that +the theology we seek to maintain is the theology of the butcher +shop, the barbarous doctrine of the shambles and the shadow of old +-time tribal gods whose vengefulness and wrath could be appeased only +by the murder of a victim. + +They repudiate the doctrine of the bodily resurrection of the Lord. + +His body has long ago mingled with the dust of Palestine and been +blown afar by careless winds. If He rose at all it was as the +principle of righteousness and truth, whatever such a resurrection +may mean. They will no longer tolerate the insistent need of +regeneration. It has been said that "if a man is well born the first +time he does not need to be born the second time." + +In the nature of the case such teaching rejects our Lord's bodily +ascension to heaven and His session as a glorified man who is very +God at the right hand of the Father. + +Above all, and as a further consequent of such an attitude, teachers +of this class repudiate with an almost hysterical outcry, not only +the thought that the Lord will come a second time to this world, but +that those who love Him and yearn to see Him will ever behold Him +coming in visible glory so that they may stand face to face with Him +and get the very touch of His hands upon them in the vital +benediction for which they are longing. + +These advanced teachers repudiate the Bible as the inspired, +infallible, inerrant Word of God, + +The Pentateuch, the writings of Moses, is a bundle of folk lore, +Moses himself a fiction no more substantial than Abraham, Isaac and +Jacob. The historic books of the Old Testament are unreliable and +therefore not history at all. The book of the prophet Isaiah instead +of one author has many, each in turn contradicting the other. The +book of Ezekiel from its incomprehensible wheels as they flash by +the banks of the river Chebar to the impossible temple and its +animal offerings with the ever-deepening river flowing out of it, is +as mystic as the amazing cherubim which the prophet seeks, but +apparently fails, to describe. The prophecies of Daniel were written +long after the events they pretend to foretell. From Genesis to +Malachi the Old Testament is in reality the mixed history of a +tribal people with a national god whose attributes and demands are +no more authentic and authoritative than those of the gods of Greece +and Rome. + +The New Testament while a degree of advance on the Old by reason of +the progress of the times and the more cultivated environment of its +origin is not a whit more divinely inspired. The three Synoptic +Gospels are witnesses summoned to court where their success is the +contradiction and confusion of the story they attempt to tell. The +book of Acts is a combination pamphlet put together by the followers +of Peter and Paul as an attempt to compromise between the one who +was the Apostle to the Circumcision and the other who was the +Apostle to the Gentiles. + +The epistles of Paul are filled with the pernicious influence of +apocalyptic, Jewish fictions and the crass concept the Apostle had +of the kingdom of Christ. Page after page is filled with proof that +he expected the Lord to come in his day and was sorely mistaken, +making that confession at the close of his writings and turning his +attention to death and the grave, no longer having expectation of +the Coming of the Lord as the daily hope of the Church. + +It is these palpable errors of Paul, his honest, but undoubted +mistakes that are wholly responsible for that strange thing (so the +Post-millennialists think it) known as Pre-millennialism, a system +of teaching which stands for a whole Bible, a Gospel of redeeming +blood, a risen and actually coming Saviour, coming again in the +flesh, and seeks with an insistent and constant "thus saith the +Lord" to win the souls of men to a grace-given and grace-dealing +Saviour. (And I may say in passing that Paul, under God, is +undoubtedly responsible for this doctrine so persistent and +aggressive, this doctrine of Premillennialism.) + +To the advanced theological professor Revelation is a piece of crazy +quilt patchwork, so full of symbols that have no intelligent +meaning, symbols that can be interpreted by twenty different +expositors in twenty different ways, is so full of monsters and +nightmare doings that only an unbalanced mind could have written it +and one equally unbalanced would alone attempt to decipher it. + +To these teachers and leaders who count themselves as progressive +followers of the Christ of God, who practically set aside the matter +of miracles as no more worthy of credence than the stories of Alice +in Wonderland, the final place of the deposit of authority is in the +individual and subconscious mind. + +These professors, teachers and leaders to a large degree are an +expression of Protestantism. + +Protestantism to-day stands for everything in general and nothing in +particular, except its protest against being definite and +particular. + +It has thrown eschatology overboard. + +It no longer has any interest in hereafter things. + +There may be a holy city in heaven; it does not know, it will not +affirm for nor against; but it does know there are unholy cities on +earth. + +The streets of the upper city may be paved with gold; it will not +enter into controversy about it; but it is certain the streets down +here are paved with poor asphalt and trodden by footsore and weary +men. + +Heaven may be more desirable than earth. The condition there may be +a great advance on this. Advanced thinkers in Protestantism will +neither affirm nor deny that; but they are convinced the conditions +down here should be made much better and if possible even that of +heaven on earth. + +The truth is, both heaven and hell, like angelology, have fallen out +of modern theology. Heaven is too high and hell too deep. No +telescope has ever revealed the one and modern sweetness, gentleness +and light repudiate the cruelty and sufferings of the other. + +The Gospel for the individual soul, the soul the Son of God once +outweighed against a whole world in all that the world might stand +for of wealth and riches and power and attained ambitions, saying +the profit in the gain of a whole world would not equal the loss of +one soul, has been set aside. + +Instead we have that modern and amazing evangel known as the "Social +Gospel." + +Here for illustration are two old people living in a miserable cabin +in a reeking, malarial swamp with a dozen children drinking in the +poison of their environment. What folly to spend time and money on +the father or mother. How inefficient any effort to save the +children just one by one. Get to work at once and drain the swamp, +drive out the poisonous and infectious insects with which the place +is swarming, fill in the land with fine clean earth, plant flowers +and sow seeds of fruitful harvests, let the salt sea blow in and +breathe across the spot. + +The old people may die, in all probability they will, but under +right and sanitary conditions the children will grow up into +vigorous elements of a strong and worthful society. + +Why spend time, money, heart and enthusiasm in seeking to overcome +or straighten out and make correct the bent lives that have come +down to us through the unsanitary moral conditions of a previous +generation? We have had wretched laws, desperate customs, children +have grown up under them to become fathers and mothers of +generations no better than themselves. + +It is neither economy of mind nor matter, so the modernists teach, +to build mission houses, gather the people, old and young, and +frighten them with the thought that when they die they shall pass +into an environment worse than the one in which they are +endeavouring to eke out a handicapped existence. Let us do the wise +thing--go not so much to the prayer meetings, but to the +legislatures, get bills passed, laws made that will drive out the +false and disastrous conditions now obtaining; legislate so that it +will no longer be possible for people to drink themselves drunk, +steep themselves in drugs, smoke themselves yellow with tobacco, +yield to the fascination of gambling in any form. Let society be +cleaned from these evils and the result will be certain. A +generation that shall never see a saloon, a bottle of wine or +whiskey; a generation that will never know the meaning of rum and +tobacco and will never see a house of ill fame will be a generation +that must grow up in righteousness and truth. There will be no more +drunken brawls, no multiplied lawlessness, no diseased bodies, no +moral leprosy. The world will be safe for each individual. Each +individual will have a saved, moral life here, a life lived in +obedience to the laws of nature, and as the laws of nature are the +laws of God, in obedience to God. And what danger can the hereafter, +if there be such a thing as the hereafter, hold for any one who is +so obeying the laws of God? + +Get society right and the individual will become right. + +That is the modern Gospel. + +That is the message to a needy world: + +"Get society right and the individual will become right." + +I do not interject here in full testimony the nevertheless fact that +such a pagan city as Rome, or licentious Corinth or idolatrous +Ephesus were lifted into cleanness and moral decency, not by +legislative action, by reorganization of local conditions, but by +the regeneration of one individual at a time until the divine sanity +and personal spirituality enthroned in them built up societies, +assemblies of such heaven-given health that the old social +conditions were overthrown; so overthrown by the personal Gospel +Paul preached that throughout Asia Minor the people had been turned +away from the worship of their gods, in Ephesus the temple of Diana +was largely deserted and the craftsmen who made the silver, souvenir +images of the goddess complained their business was almost at an +end. + +Strangely enough the advocates of this social Gospel set up the +individual life of the Son of God as the means by which society is +to be made right; but they set up, not the life He is living now as +the risen, glorified God-man; on the contrary the life He lived +before He died, the character He exhibited as a social reformer and +an exemplar in righteousness. Men, they say, are not to be saved by +the death Christ died, but by the life He then lived. He is to be +taken as the proof of the doctrine of evolution and the +possibilities in the natural man. He is the most advanced son of God +who ever lived. All other men are innately sons of God, but +undeveloped. + +The fact of Christ, it is said, is a sublime encouragement to any +man. He has only to copy Him in His words and deeds to find the +divine life unfolding. Get away from the sacrificial Christ, this +modern Gospel teaches, to the social Christ, the Christ who was +interested in the poor and needy and who arraigned wrong social +conditions; take the attitude of Christ in relation to the evil of +His times and with Him as the inspiration institute right +legislation and right social conditions and the world will soon +approach the condition of heaven on earth. + +This is the infidellic drive of Protestantism today. + +Protestantism has come down from the plane of the supernatural to +the plane of the natural. + +Every day Protestantism is becoming more and more a society for +competitive morality. + +In short, the Protestantism of the hour is a combination of +religiousness, civilization, Christianity, socialism, pagan +philosophy, unitarianism and the energy of the flesh. + +Nor need we be startled at this as though some strange thing had +taken place. Long ago the Apostle warned us that it would be +necessary to preach the Word in season and out of season--just as a +watchman is under bonds to flash light in the darkness--because the +time would come when the Church should have a form of godliness, but +denying the power thereof; when it would not endure sound doctrine, +but in obedience to the itching of the flesh should heap to itself +teachers who should endeavour to respond to these worldly demands; +teachers who in the end should turn the people away from the truth +and turn them to the fictions and fables of men; teachers of whom +the Apostle Peter warned who should bring in damnable heresies, even +denying the Lord who had bought them, teachers whom Jude foresaw +would creep in unawares. + +Men who consult the chart of a seacoast which marks the place of +breakers and treacherous, hidden ledges, now and then thrust out +through the white foam like the gleaming sharp teeth of waiting +sharks, are not startled when they see the surf breaking at the +indicated spot and hear the roar of the waters where it was +announced they should lift up their thunder; they are not surprised, +instead their confidence in the accuracy of the chart is emphasized. + +Likewise when those who have read the forecast in Holy Scripture, +while they may feel a certain grief at the facts as they are, +rejoice when they see these things that even the failure of man as +man and the betrayal of committed trust bear witness to the accuracy +of Holy Writ. + +With all its failure the professing Church still claims to be the +kingdom of Christ on earth and asserts its determination to rule the +world. Rome holds to the idea with unfailing faith and with +consistent Jesuitical and political scheming is moving forward with +united front to temporal sovereignty. Protestantism with its new +watchword of a "reorganized world" is making all its plans to attain +the place of power by social, moral and political means. + +What would be said of a queen who entered into partnership with men +whose hands were still red with the blood of her murdered husband +and rejected king? What could be said but that she had wholly +forgotten or proved totally false to the principles for which her +husband had died? + +What shall be said of a Church which seeks to enter into partnership +with a world that slew her Lord; which under all the smile and +smoothness of moral, social and philosophical phrases and all the +hypocritical laudations of His human character rejects His deity and +hears in His cry of agony on the cross the proof that He was only a +man who failed as other men have failed at the last. + +Such a Church as that has lost the vision of its true attitude +during the absence of its rejected Lord and is well-nigh to +forfeiting its commission. + +Over the professing Church is sounding to-day with ominous +significance the Apostolic words of warning: + +"What, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with +God; and that whosoever will be the friend of the world, is the +enemy of God?" + +The Corinthian Church attempted to take the place of rulership in +the world. + +With keen and biting words the Apostle rebukes them. + +Thus he writes to them: + +"Now ye are full, now ye are rich, ye have reigned as kings without +us: and I would to God ye did reign, that we might also reign with +you." + +Then he adds by way of contrast: + +"I think that God hath set forth us the apostles last, as it were +appointed to death: for we are made a spectacle unto the world, and +to angels and to men." + +It is this same apostle who under the inspiration of the Spirit in +his second epistle writes to Timothy: + +"If we suffer, we shall also reign with him." + +It is not while her Lord is the crucified and rejected that the +Church is to reign and rule over the world. Not while He is seated +on His Father's throne in heaven and His own throne on earth is cast +down and trampled in the dust. Nay! if the Church is faithful she +will walk in separation from the world. If the Church is faithful +she will testify against the world, not testify merely against +certain abuses, but against the world as a system, that it is built +upon the principle of the enthronement of self and not God, the +exaltation of the flesh and not spirit. + +If the Church shall be faithful and like Noah in the building of his +ark condemn the world; if the Church will take up earnestly the +solemn truth of God and warn men that no matter how good a +government may be established by human means, no matter what culture +and morality may fill the earth, no matter to what extent advance +may be made in art, in science, nor no matter how safe a place the +world may be made to live in, no matter to what heights of natural +morality and righteousness man as man may attain, the judgment of +God against this system of man called the world is certain, and that +He will arise in His majesty to shake terribly the earth, and that +only the things that are built on God can remain, the Church will +suffer and be rejected even as was her Lord. + +The Church is to be faithful to the testimony of Christ and enter +into the fellowship of His sufferings. + +The day of her triumph will come. + +She is yet to rule over the world. + +The hour and the circumstances are fixed. + +Listen, I pray you, to the words of the Spirit as He speaks through +the Apostle Paul: + +"When Christ who is our life shall appear--then (and not till then) +shall ye also appear with Him in glory." + +Only when Christ shall come to take to Himself His long deferred +rulership can the Church enter into her rulership over the world. In +the fifth chapter of the Revelation you have the new song of the +Church, the song of redemption and rule. + +This is the triumphant song; it is a song of praise addressed to the +Son of God Himself: + +"Thou wast slain and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood, out of +every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation: + +And hast made us unto our God kings and priests; and we shall reign +on the earth." + +But mark the moment when that song is sung, the occasion of +occasions! + +It is at that supreme moment when as the Lion of the tribe of Judah +yonder in His risen and glorified humanity in heaven He steps +forward, Son of man, king of the Jews and king of Israel to take the +title deeds of His kingdom from the hand of the Father; that moment +when He is getting ready to cast His judgments on the earth and come +forth as in the days of Noah to sweep away all iniquity and +unrighteousness. It is at this moment when He is about to take to +Himself His great power and descend in judgment glory that the +Church bursts forth into her song of redemption and rule. + +It is at the Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ alone that the +Church will enter upon her function of rulership over the world. She +cannot reign till He comes and puts her in the place of His queen +and in associated power with Himself. + +And because I want to see the Church lifted up out of social, +political and fleshly partnership with the world; because I want to +see the Church in the place of authority and power making and +fulfilling the edicts of God; because I want to see the Church so +exalted into the place of rulership that all the nations shall walk +in the light of her excellency, her righteousness and holiness; and +because this high and glorious state will be attained alone at the +Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ I preach His Second Coming. + + + +V + + +Only at the Second Coming Will the Solemn and Covenant Promises of +God to Israel be Fulfilled + + +GOD sware to Abraham that he and his posterity should have the land +of Palestine for an everlasting possession. + +Abraham never got a foot of the land under covenant promise. + +The only bit of ground he was able to call his was the burial plot +he purchased with his own money. + +The children of Israel never entered the promised land under the +Abrahamic covenant. + +The Lord redeemed them from Egypt, brought them through the divided +waters of the Red Sea, led them by His presence, bore them up as on +eagle's wings and dealt with them in pure, unconditional grace till +they came to Sinai. + +There in all the pride and self-sufficiency of the flesh they took +themselves off the ground of grace and unconditional covenant and +put themselves under the covenant of the law. + +This covenant was a covenant of good behaviour. + +They were to possess the land as long as they fulfilled the terms of +the covenant under the seal of its blessing and cursing. + +After the first generation had perished in the wilderness because of +their unbelief, the second generation crossed the Jordan dry shod as +their fathers had crossed the Red Sea and entered the land under +pledge and bond of good behaviour. + +They were not able to keep the covenant of their own suggestion. Ten +tribes went into an abomination of organized and politically +inspired idolatry. + +In judgment and according to His warning He caused them to be +carried away captives and buried nationally among the people whither +they were led and for twenty-five hundred years have been nationally +lost to view. + +For two thousand years because of similar and aggravated offenses +and finally, because as a nation guilty of manslaughter in slaying +the Lord their covenant king, the Jews have been the wanderers of +the earth, the people of the restless foot, finding a home in every +land but their own. + +Has God failed to keep His promise? + +Has He been unable or unwilling to keep His promise? + +Neither postulate is possible. + +God's counsel is immutable. + +He confirmed it by an oath. And since He could swear by nothing +greater He sware by Himself. + +In the nature of the case then scattered Israel and wandering Judah +must be gathered. They must return to their own land. + +God has so promised. + +These promises are to be found upon the pages of Holy Writ like the +leaves of autumn--so many, so thickly strewn, now in single phrase, +in connected passages, in whole chapters that should I attempt to +read them slowly and distinctly, giving the sense, it would take me +till the morning light. + +The Lord declares He has written their names upon the palms of His +hand. + +They are as near and sensitively dear to Him, He says, as the apple +of His eye. He is so interested, so determined concerning their +restoration that He uses the most intensive language to express it, +language that almost thunders aloud from the page as you read it. + +He uses language no less intense than this: + +"Yea, I will rejoice over them to do them good, and I will plant +them in this land (the land of Palestine) assuredly with my whole +heart and with my whole soul." + +Try and think of that! Let it penetrate your mind. The Lord who made +heaven and earth, whose very name is omnipotence, says He will put +the whole of His omnipotent heart and the whole of His omnipotent +soul into the execution and the accomplishment of His determination +and purpose to plant the children of Israel once more and forever in +their own land. + +In the face of that registered will and purpose what power is there +of man or Devil; what force is there in all the sweep of the +universe that can hinder the chosen and covenant people of God from +going back to Palestine and possessing that land as theirs and +theirs alone, forever? + +But what evidence have we, what demonstration and proof that God +will fulfill this postscript promise and plan? + +What evidence have we from the bare statement of God that He will +keep this promise? + +The evidence is manifold and overwhelming. + +Before even the children of Israel crossed the Jordan the Lord +warned them in language which burns and blisters that if they did +not keep the law covenant and walk in the ways of righteousness and +truth He would cause them to fall before their enemies. They should +go out one way before them and flee seven ways. Their cities should +be taken and their wives ravished. They should be led captives into +every land. They should become a proverb, a byword, a hissing and a +scorn. Every hand should be against them to do them ill. They should +find no ease whither they went, nor should the soles of their feet +have rest. Amidst those nations the Lord should give them a +trembling heart, failing eyes and sorrow of mind. Their life should +hang in doubt. They should fear night and day, and have no assurance +of life. In the morning they should say, Would God it were even, and +at even they should say, Would God it were morning. + +Their land should be made desolate and be an astonishment to the +passer-by. In its desolation it should keep the sabbaths they should +fail to give it. If they would not allow the land to rest in its +sabbatic years, the Lord would cause it to have its ordained and +natural rest by driving them out of it and allowing wind and rain +and sun to take care of it and keep it fruitful. + +Later on all this warning of woe and terror of judgments was +emphasized by the prophets against the Jews. + +They should become a nation of sorrows and acquainted with grief. + +But while the Lord should use the nations to correct them He would +not make a full end of His own people. + +He would use the nations as the rods of His anger, as the +instruments of discipline. He would use them by taking advantage of +their own aggressive desires and ambitions, then after using them He +would turn upon them, punish them for their pride and godless enmity +to His people and make a full end of them. + +Then as the hour should draw nigh for the restoration to the land He +would cause the Jews as the national representatives of all Israel +to bud, to blossom and fill the face of the whole world with fruit. + +They should be the first to be restored to the land. + +They would go back in unbelief. + +And mark how the prophecies have been fulfilled! + +The illustration of this fulfillment finds its most tragic emphasis +in the history of the Jews since that day when their king, the Son +of God and the Holy One of Israel was hung as a malefactor on a +Roman cross. + +They have not only been wanderers in every land, but they have +suffered an agony no tongue can fittingly tell. + +The men have been robbed. They have been broken on the wheel. They +have been stretched on the rack. They have been flayed alive. They +have been burned alive. They have been sent to sea by thousands as +herded cattle; and they have been sent thither in rotting and +sinking ships. Their wives and daughters have suffered worse than +torture or death. Their children have been mutilated; and when they +failed to bring a full and satisfactory price in the public market, +men, women and children have been given away as worthless slaves, +not worth even the price of a kennel dog. + +They have been hunted like wild beasts of the mountain. Like +frightened beasts they have trembled at the sound of approaching +footsteps and the sound of a shaken leaf has caused them to flee. + +If their Lord was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, truly +may it be said of them that they have been through the centuries a +nation of sorrows and acquainted with grief; but the sorrows were +unlike those of their Lord. He carried the sorrows, the griefs and +woes of others that He might relieve them; they carried their own +sorrows put upon them by the wickedness and cruelty of others until +tears were their meat and drink night and day. + +Behold how the prophecies have been fulfilled in respect to their +land. + +For centuries it has kept a sabbath of rest. + +It has rested from the toil of man; harvests have neither been sown +nor reaped, nor the vintage gathered save here and there as with the +sword in one hand and the sickle in the other. + +The land is there as a land just as it was in the days when the man +of Nazareth walked by the shores of blue Galilee or trod the hills +of Judah. The mountains of Moab draw their lines of beauty against +the measureless deeps of an orient sky. The valleys lie between like +fruitful bosoms where wheat and barley may grow. The olive trees +stand dusky in the deepening shade. Pomegranate and apricot stretch +forth their weighted boughs and the grapes in Eschol clusters hang +purple in the slant of westering suns. It is even yet a land of +brooks and fountains of waters and men may still dig iron and brass +from out of its rugged hills. + +Yonder in Bashan within the range of your eyes you may count sixty +cities of stone, walls and roofs and windows of stone, great +swinging doors of stone. The centuries have beaten the wind, the +rain, the storms and flying sand upon them. They remain. They have +outworn the centuries. They are silent. No footfall is heard upon +the threshold. The houses are empty save for a fox, a swiftly +gliding viper, or a belated Bedaween who may stable his horse in a +deserted room where once a happy family dwelt in the long ago. + +The stone cities are waiting and every stone in door and window +seems to be crying out: + +"We are waiting till they return whose right alone it is to live and +dwell here." + +But what of the nations that scattered them and made them to suffer? + +Where is Babylon the proud empire that took them captive; where is +Babylon the golden city that saw them hang their harps upon the +willows, sit down upon the banks of the strange river and give way +to weeping as they yearned for their own land again? + +Where is Greece whose phalanxes swept through their fields and +spoiled their vineyards? + +Where is Rome whose iron legions took their city, put thousand on +thousands to the sword, destroyed the beautiful temple once hallowed +by a Saviour's feet and then drew a ploughshare over Zion that it +might become a ploughed field as foretold? The Rome that sculptured +on its triumphal arches the figures of the captive Jews it had led +in boastful mockery at the chariot wheels of returning conquerors? + +These nations in their ancient glory have disappeared, the Lord as +He promised has made a full end of them. + +But what of Israel? + +The Jews have answered for them. + +There are fifteen millions of Jews to-day. + +They are the most vital and vigorous race on the earth. They are +five times the number of all Israel who left Egypt; and they are but +a sixth part of them--two tribes, Judah and Benjamin. + +They are the money makers and money loaners of the world. They are +the merchants, the bankers, the musicians, the professors in school, +in college and university. They are the philosophers, the +scientists, the electricians and chemists. They have furnished prime +ministers, statesmen, judges and generals. Such a statesman as +Disraeli who glorified England, such a general as Massena whom +Napoleon characterized as the "child of victory." + +If to-day you should seek a representative in every department of +human genius and endeavour you would find that representative to be +either a Jew or a Jewess. + +Fifteen millions of Jews! + +What are these fifteen millions of Jews but fifteen millions of +proofs that the book we call the Bible is true, is inerrant, +infallible? + +Fifteen millions of demonstrations and fifteen millions of +indubitable proofs. + +By so much as they prove that God keeps faith with His warnings of +woe and judgment, by so much will He keep faith with the promise of +good He has made; by so much is it sure He will yet plant them as He +has said in their own land and will do so with His whole heart and +His whole soul. + +Already the sound of their footsteps may be heard on the homeward +march. + +Zionism is now an immense fact. + +The spirit of nationalism has come back to Judah. + +The blue and white flag of David has been unfurled. + +Diplomats in the nations' counsels agree there can be no settled +peace between Europe and the East till the Jew is back in his own +land and Judah once more a recognized political state; that the Jews +are the only people all the nations will agree should have +Palestine, and the words, "Jewish State" are words repeated in +common speech round the globe. + +England has driven the Turk out of Jerusalem. + +The corner-stone of a five million dollar university has been laid +upon that Mount of Olives where once the Son of God amid its lonely +shades prayed and agonized, a begun fulfillment of the prophecy of +Zephaniah that in the latter days the Lord would execute judgment on +the Gentile nations that should be gathered there and to His +restored and delivered people turn again a pure speech, no longer +the stuttering and smattering phrase of Yiddish, but the old Hebraic +tongue of their fathers. + +Already there are papers in Jerusalem published in Hebrew, schools +are taught and many speak in the ancient language. + +Many Jews are going back to Palestine. + +Many more are there now than returned from Babylon. + +They are going back as the Word of God foretold, in utter and +absolute unbelief and bitter repudiation of the idea that Jesus of +Nazareth was their foretold and foreordained Messiah. + +They are going back with the vail upon their eyes and as blind as in +the day when their fathers caused Him to be crucified by Roman +hands. + +They are going back to a time of anguish of which Jeremiah solemnly +warns as "the day of Jacob's trouble," and our Lord describes as the +tribulation, "the great one," the like of which the world has never +seen and will never see again. + +They are going back to be set up by a league of ten nations and to +enter into an alliance and covenant with its godless head as their +political and false Messiah. + +They will suffer until there shall come upon that generation all the +righteous blood shed upon the earth from the blood of righteous Abel +to the blood of Zacharias, the son of Bacharias who was slain +between the temple and the altar, and the blood of the Son of God +which they invoked in judgment on themselves and their children in +that fatal hour when Pilate convinced of the innocence of Jesus and +wishing to let Him go had washed His hands in water, putting the +responsibility of the crucifixion upon them as a people. Then it was +they cried that terrible cry: + +"His blood be on us, and on our children." + +But then as now, and always since the days of Elijah, there was and +is an elect remnant in Israel. + +For their sakes the Lord will come. + +He will descend with His host to Mount Sinai, the place of the law; +the spot where Israel rejected grace and sought that covenant which +neither they nor their children have ever been able to keep. + +He will sweep with His mighty army to Jerusalem. + +He will overthrow the Gentile nations gathered there under the +Devil-incarnate Antichrist. + +He will stand upon the Mount of Olives. + +The elect remnant will behold Him come. + +They will look upon Him whom their fathers pierced. + +They will fall down in anguish before Him. + +They will mourn for Him as one mourneth for his only son. + +They will take up the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah and make it +their confession of faith and bitter, self-accusing lamentation. + +They will say: + +"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 every one to his +own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all." + +And in that hour, in that day of days shall there be a fountain +opened to the house of David, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, +for sin and uncleanness. + +The Lord will cause Jerusalem to be rebuilded "upon her own heap." +He will ordain the erection of that temple in which He shall +establish the throne of His holiness. + +Like David He will reign first over Judah. After that He will send +Gentile messengers like "fishers" to seek out and find the +descendants of the ten lost tribes. They will respond to the +proclamation that will be made and to the search that will be +instituted in that eastern land and among those peoples whither they +were first carried away. There will be many impostors among them; +but the Lord will make them to "pass under the rod" as when the true +sheep are struck with the owner's mark and as they take up their +journey Zionward all who are not of Israel will be purged from their +midst. + +Those who are really of the covenant people will be quickened, +regenerated, and when they enter the land will be welcomed by Judah +and Benjamin. + +They shall become one nation in the land upon the mountains of +Israel. One king shall be king to them all. They shall not be two +nations any more, neither shall they be divided into two kingdoms at +all. The Lord will make a covenant of peace with them and multiply +them and set His sanctuary in the midst of them forever. His +tabernacle shall be with them. He will be their very God as He shall +be the God of the whole earth. They shall be His peculiar people. +All the Gentiles shall know that He has set them apart for Himself +when they behold His temple erected in their midst, the most +wonderful building in all the earth. + +And thus will be fulfilled the prophecy concerning Israel quoted and +emphasized by the Holy Spirit through the Apostle Paul that the +Deliverer should come to Zion and turn away ungodliness from Jacob +and that all Israel--that is--Israel united and as twelve tribes, +should be saved. + +It is at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, then and not till then +that the solemn and covenant promises of God made to Abraham, to +Isaac and to Jacob will be fulfilled and united, redeemed, +regenerated and saved Israel set in their own land as the center and +channel of blessing to the earth. + +And because there can be no permanent peace in the world till Israel +has been restored; and because I wish to see, not only peace among +the nations and Israel reaping the blessings of the unconditional +covenant of God's grace and unchanged faithfulness, but because I +yearn to see the hour when the Lord shall enter upon His own +inheritance and justify Himself before heaven and earth as Judah's +Lord, as Israel's God and turn the accusation of His cross: "This is +Jesus of Nazareth, the king of the Jews" into the pean of His +coronation as such, I preach the Second Coming. + + + +VI + + +Only at the Second Coming of the Christ of God Will a Government of +Everlasting Righteousness and Peace be Established Upon the Earth + + +IT was the original purpose of God to make the people of Israel the +head of nations, place them in Palestine as the geographical center +of the earth, make them its political center, send His own Son to be +their incarnate king, use them as a channel of earthly and spiritual +blessing and make this world the most perfect and happiest spot in +all the wide universe. + +They failed to meet their opportunity. + +Then the Lord transferred the possibility of world rulership from +the Jews to the Gentiles. + +He did this by handing political power and authority to +Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon. + +This rulership and sway of the world descended in its ordained and +foretold succession down through Medo-Persia with its incorporation +of Babylon, through the temporary but immensely extended empire of +Greece which under Alexander included both Babylon and Medo-Persia, +and after that the colossal and magic empire of Rome, swallowing up +as it did the three empires or kingdoms which preceded it. + +Since the division of Rome into Western and Eastern empires the +rulership of the world has been maintained by the various nations +composed of those people dwelling in the territory once occupied by +Rome. + +The world has been ruled by Turks, Spaniards, Germans, by the French +and by the English. + +The Gentile nations in this special and prophetic territory have +been the world rulers. + +It has been peculiarly Gentile rulership and in Scripture is called, +"The times of the Gentiles." + +Gentile times, Gentile rulership has lasted for twenty-five hundred +years. + +It has been an amazing rule. + +It has been a rulership that has revealed the genius, the brilliance +and the God-given powers of man. + +It has been a rulership that has revealed the iniquity, the sin, the +mad ambition and devil-inspired policies of man. + +In all the twenty-five hundred years of this Gentile rule there have +not been one hundred consecutive years of universal peace. + +It has been twenty-five hundred years of war, of rapine, murder and +measureless lust. + +Cities have been destroyed, fields have been laid waste, women have +endured the last outrage. Children have been orphaned, right has +been upon the scaffold and wrong upon the throne, prison chains have +been for virtue, silk and velvet for vice, civilization after +civilization has been destroyed, the earth has been filled with +anguish beyond the power of tongue or pen to describe, and blood +enough has been shed through man's inhumanity to man to float all +the navies of the world, and money and treasure enough wasted to +have provided a palace for every man and woman on earth. + +A little less than five years ago men everywhere were talking of +peace and safety. + +Christianity and civilization were walking hand in hand. + +Christianity or that which professed to be Christianity had accepted +all the claimed benefits of civilization. + +Rapid transit, the telephone, all the triumphs of applied science +were announced as the by-products of the Gospel. Even though the +churches were becoming more or less empty and the people were +turning away to other centers of instruction or enlightenment or +consolation or hope, preachers were everywhere and with great +insistence announcing that the world was growing better every day +and that we were rapidly approaching the purple and the gold of +millennial times. The hour was not far distant when the lion and the +lamb should lie down together. There was much talk about the +fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. People were coming +together and having a better and more disinterested estimate of each +other. Religion was ceasing to be dogmatic and precise and becoming +more and more a profession that was free from restraint. + +Christian ministers in the pulpit and supposedly wise men in the +counsels of the nations with optimistic utterance announced that the +days of barbarism had passed away, the brutality of war was at an +end. Men and nations would no longer adjourn their differences to +the field of battle. A magnificent palace of peace had been erected +in that country that had for centuries been the bloody ground where +Europe settled its political issues. In this splendid home of +arbitration the nations were to meet as friends and brothers and +calmly arrange and solve all matters that had hitherto kept them +menacingly apart. + +War had become so abhorrent to what was called the Christian sense +of the nations that mothers were exhorted to banish from the +nurseries anything that might suggest the thought of war, such as +trumpets, drums or toy guns. So completely had the peace idea +pervaded the mind of the people, the idea that peace had come to +stay and nothing must be tolerated that would even hint at war, that +a soldier or a sailor wearing the uniform of his country was no +longer acceptable in a public place, were it a restaurant, a music +hall or even a church. + +Men who were opposed to spending a dollar to make a nation ready for +the possibility of war were hailed as the advanced thinkers and the +men worthy of the suffrage of the people; while those who contended +human nature had not been changed, that a nation was simply the +individual grown large and the jealousies, the covetousness and +ambitions of governments would always make it possible for the +strong to prey upon the weak and for the unprincipled under the +guise of national necessity to attack their unprepared neighbours +and therefore just as much as a city rests in confidence with the +presence within it of a well-equipped police force, equally so the +comfort and security of peace could be best maintained by a nation +governed by right principles whose army and navy were ready to +resist successfully any unjust assault upon its honour or integrity, +were treated with pity, if not scorn, as still under the spell of +benighted and barbaric days. + +"Peace and safety!" these were the pleasant words that lulled a +pleasure-seeking and money-making generation into self-satisfied +rest and the mirage of millennial days already arrived. + +Then, suddenly, like a bolt out of a clear sky, or the overflow in +raging lava tide of an unsuspected volcano, the most stupendous, +ghastly and brutally devilish war the world has ever known was on in +all its fiendish fury, sweeping from England to the Euphrates and +from the Rhine and Danube on the north to the glittering sands of +Africa on the south, rolling its waves of blood and sending its +sickening and indescribable horrors through those lands and among +those people at one time constituting the four kingdoms to whom God +had committed the rulership of the world; that region occupied by +Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece and Rome and whose administration of +world affairs is called "the times of the Gentiles." + +To-night ten millions of the world's flower of manhood lie rotting +in their graves. Six millions of women and children have been +starved to death. Women have been unspeakably ruined, children +mutilated and flung as helpless debris upon the charity of +strangers, suffering their orphaned estate and not knowing why. + +All the genius, the science and invention of man with poured out, +unlimited wealth, have been drafted to produce the most terrifically +destructive means of war. All the boasted progress and culture of +the preceding centuries were called upon to wage the contest until +it should affright even the participants themselves. Clouds of +poison gas filled the once sweet and vital air of spring time and +summer mornings. Human beings wearing hideous masks and looking like +other world monsters rushed in mad onslaught upon one another. They +burrowed in holes and trenches like wild beasts concealed in their +lair and waiting for the prey. Through the startled heavens winged +things like huge vampires vomiting fire and blood took their way +over cities, towns and unprotected hospitals, leaving behind them +the dead, the dying and the tortured. Hunger with its sunken cheeks, +and pestilence with its green eyes, its slavering lips have trod the +earth till horror with wordless anguish has kept vigil by the +blackened hearthstones of ruined homes and deserted firesides. + +To-night, the fields of Flanders where the poppies grow and where +the dead who died too soon and lie almost too thick to count, are as +though a mighty juggernaut had rolled its fearful wheels over them, +crushing both man and earth together into one monstrous pulp of +hopeless ruin. + +To-night France, where the lilies were wont to bloom, is torn and +ripped in all the one-time beauty and fascination of her white and +winding roads, poplar fringed, in the culture of her fruited +gardens, her orchards and her royal forests, as though some +monstrous creation of pre-Adamite days had survived and broken +through all restraint of all the ages to riot and gorge himself with +unlimited delight of destruction. + +All this after two thousand years of professed Christianity and the +constant iteration that the Church was slowly winning its way to the +ruler-ship of the world; that each hour the world was growing better +and more and more the principles of the Christ of God dominating the +universal heart of man. + +The world awoke to find its heart unchanged and war with aggressive +animalism still the underlying and primal force in man. + +To-night in face of all this, in face of the solemn declaration of +the Son of God that during the whole time of His absence there would +be war and rumours of war, and specially within the territory once +occupied by Rome; that there would be distress of nations with +perplexity, men's hearts failing them for fear for looking after the +things that should be coming on the earth; that the people like the +waves of the sea should be roaring, uttering their discordant voices +in the thunder of protest and bitter discontent, breaking the bonds +of old customs and lashing the times with lawlessness and +unprecedented crime; in face of the warning of the Apostle Paul that +in the last days, that is to say in the closing hours of this age, +there should be, not peaceful but perilous times; that evil men +should wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived; in the +face of the inspired assurance of the Apostle James that as this +dispensation should draw to its close Capital and Labour should +stand in bitter attitude to each other; that the accumulated wealth +of a special class called "rich men" should be "heaped together" +that they might be spoiled and that miseries should come upon them; +that on the one side should be the aggression of the profiteers and +on the other the violence of those who would refuse to be exploited; +in face of this assurance of industrial and class war; in face of +the fact that the softest toned apostle whose pen is always +transcribing the word "love," and who has reached the highest and +most sublime definition of God as love; in face of the fact that +this apostle affirms the hour will come when the whole world under +religious, political and devilish inspiration will rush to conflict, +that everywhere will be heard the tramp of armed men and the +gathering of the nations for a war such as the world has not yet +seen; in face of the picture which this apostle of love paints where +the armies of the world are seen gathered in battle array against +the Lord Christ and His right to reign; in the face of this divine +warning the statesmen of the world are assembled in counsel at +Paris, the world's capital of pleasure, in a palace once dedicated +to lust and wanton self-gratification, whose panelled ceiling and +mirrored walls are filled with and reflect the scenes and +glorification of war, that by the stroke of a pen, by a series of +resolutions, they may constitute a league of nations bulking so big +that every threatened wave of future war may be flung back as when +the dykes of Holland reject the sea. + +The astonishing and suggestive thing is that in the making and +remaking of the map of Europe and Asia undertaken by the framers of +the league, they are, all unconsciously, restoring the outlines of +the old Roman Empire and preparing the way for the final and +desperate revival of Rome under the form of ten confederate nations, +with its last kaiser, that dark and woful figure, the man of sin, +the son of perdition, the Antichrist. + +And there are Christian teachers who see in this league another +herald of the millennium before Christ comes which they so +sedulously preached previously to the war. They see in this league +an evidence that the Lord Jesus Christ as the Prince of Peace is in +reality reigning over the earth and bending the nations to His will +for the reign of peace. + +In the whole history of theological exegesis and interpretation I +know of nothing so utterly faulty, illogical and wholly unscriptural +as that exegesis which teaches the angel song at Bethlehem to be the +announcement of the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ as the Prince of +Peace and that as such He should establish it among the nations +after His ascension to heaven and during His absence from the world. + +The angels sang glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace to +"men of good will." + +The angel who spoke to the shepherds keeping the temple sheep for +the morning and the evening sacrifice was testifying to them that +there was no longer need to keep the sheep for such a purpose. The +day of animal sacrifices had passed, the living God had provided the +true sacrifice, He who was born beneath the chaplet of heaven's +music, the Lamb of God ordained before the foundation of the world. +He had been born into the world that He might make peace by the +blood of His cross, not between man and man, not between nation and +nation, but between man and God. He had been born to die and by His +death reconcile a rebel world to God; on the basis of this sacrifice +yet to be and when He should have risen from the dead as witness of +the efficacy of His death He would bring peace to every soul that +should be of good will--every soul that should surrender to the will +of God by believing on Him, offering Him by faith as a sacrifice and +claiming Him as a substitute. Every such soul should be at peace +with, and have the peace of, God. + +This was the meaning of that natal hour at Bethlehem. + +The angels were not singing over Him as the Prince of Peace who had +come to abolish war among the nations, but as the ordained sacrifice +who should bring peace between the individual man and his God. And +yet--He is to be the Prince of Peace and reign and rule as such over +the earth, putting an end to war and establishing perfect peace +among the nations. + +The promise of His reign and rule as the Prince of Peace is clearly +set forth in Scripture; as it is written in the book of the prophet +Isaiah: + +"Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. His name shall be +called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting +Father, The Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his peace and +government there shall be no end." + +But when? Where? + +Listen: + +"Upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom to order it." + +And hear what Gabriel says to Mary when he comes to announce to her +that she has been chosen of Almighty God to give birth to the +Messiah of Israel. + +The angel says: + +"Thou shalt call his name Jesus . . . He shall be great, and shall +be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto +him the throne of his father David: + +And he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever; and of his +kingdom there shall be no end." + +He is to be the Prince of Peace when He sits upon the throne of +united Israel in their own land and not before. + +He was born in fulfillment of the prophecy of Isaiah. + +He was a Son given. The Son of God who was God the Son. + +He was a Son given and became a child born. + +He grew up to the station of manhood. + +He entered upon His pre-arranged ministry. + +At the appointed hour and to the very second foretold by Gabriel to +Daniel and in the exact manner announced by the prophet Zechariah He +rode into Jerusalem, went into the temple, claiming it as His +Father's house of prayer and by so much declaring Himself to be the +Son of the Highest and the heir of David's throne. + +The shout of the multitude had announced Him officially. + +They had said: + +"Hosanna! Blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the name of +the Lord." + +In crying this aloud they were fulfilling the prediction of +Zechariah. + +He had, under the vision of God, looked forward to this hour and +with the Spirit of God upon him had exhorted the people who should +be alive when Jesus should come to acclaim him. + +He said: + +"Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem; behold thy King cometh unto thee; +he is just, and having salvation (political as well as spiritual +salvation); lowly, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal +of an ass." + +The multitude were shouting as Zechariah said they should shout. +They were confessing that He who came that day up the slopes of Zion +was the Prince of Judah and King of Israel. + +He came to His own, but His own received Him not. + +Instead of the diadem of David He got a crown of thorns. Instead of +the sceptre of Israel He got the vine stick of a Roman centurion +thrust through His rope-tied hands. Instead of a throne He got a +malefactor's cross. Instead of a robe of royal purple He got the +winding sheet of the dead. Instead of a palace He got a borrowed +grave. + +The Jews have paid the price of that blindness and betrayal. The +man-slayer who unwittingly slew his neighbour or was even ignorant +of it at the moment sooner or later found he had to flee from the +avenger of blood instantly upon his track. He became an exile from +his home, forced to dwell in a provided place called the city of +refuge. He could not return to his home till the second coming of a +priest. + +The Jews were guilty, as a nation, of manslaughter. + +They were deceived and involved by their leaders. They really did +not know that He whom they hounded to death at the last was not only +the covenant king of Israel, and the Holy One of their fathers, but +the Prince of life. + +Because of their blindness, blunder and sin they were cast out of +the land. Because, even though in ignorance, they slew their King, +they were exiled by the judgment of God from their home. They +deprived the Lord of that land that was His through the covenant of +Abraham, and the Lord in turn deprived them of the right of dwelling +in the land. They should be exiles so long as He was an exile. Nor +can they return till He comes the second time as a priest, not after +the order of Aaron, but Melchisedec; for it is written that He shall +be both a king and priest upon His throne. + +Only can the Jews return and be owned nationally of the Lord when He +shall come. + +He will come and He will come as the Prince of Peace. + +He will not come, I repeat, with the olive branch in His hand and +the cooing dove nestling upon His shoulder. + +Nay! not at all! + +He will come as the Avenger of His elect, as the Son of man, as the +judge of all flesh. + +He will come to overthrow the combination of Devil and man. + +His Coming will be the climax of old and outworn ages, the beginning +of the new. + +The glory of His Coming cannot be described. + +Through years of meditation and continued effort at description I +have exhausted my vocabulary and worn to tatters the oft-repeated +phrases with which I have sought with heart full of adoring +enthusiasm to announce the wonders of that hour. + +If all the suns and systems were turned into speech till every +flaming center of light were an adjective with increasing emphasis +of qualification and expression the attempt to put into words the +glory of that Coming would be a pitiful and overwhelming failure. + +He will come surrounded by an innumerable host whose hallelujahs +shall so vibrate that the very heavens will roll apart at their +soundings. + +The Lord will come in His threefold glory, the glory of the Father, +the glory of the angels and His own glory: the glory of His eternal +and unbegun sonship with the Father, as chief of the angels and as +that man who is very God, as that God who is real and immortal man. +Then will He set up the kingdom, the government for which the ages +have dreamed and groaned and guessed and prayed. + +That hour of hours! + +Satan bound, iniquity overthrown, God and Christ and the Holy Spirit +ruling in the lives of men. The very air surcharged with the +righteousness of God; so surcharged that he who thinks a lie shall +fall dead in the tracks where he meditated it. No longer need of +judge, of jury, of prison bars, nor hangman's rope, nor electric +chair. + +An hour when no longer the scarlet poppies of hate, of jealousies +and mad ambition shall bud and blossom into war. War over forever, +swords beaten into ploughshares and spears into pruning hooks. Every +man the same right as any other man, the right to sunshine, to air, +to water, the beauty of the landscape and all the usufruct of earth. + +That hour when no man shall call another his master; when no longer +a man shall toil and bend his back and break his heart for a stipend +of bread; for a hole in the ground and the worm of corruption as +mistress of his bed. + +That hour when life shall be worth while and when the centuries of +peace and perfectness of actual being shall pass on till they are +counted as eternity. + +And because this government of peace and splendour and all the +outflowing possibilities of a world in which righteousness shall +reign and God shall be first can be brought about only by and at the +Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ; because until He does so +come wars and sorrows and the darkness of sin will continue; because +all the legislation of man and all the leagues of nations will +utterly fail to establish permanent peace; because in spite of the +best endeavours of all the merely moral forces in the earth there is +nothing can keep this system called the world from going on the +rocks; because only the hand of God's Christ can break the bands of +iniquity, quiet earth's fever pulses and putting down all authority +bring in the peace that never can be broken; because when He comes +the government of right and truth and the life that is really worth +while shall come; and because from my heart I want to see that +longed-for hour of heaven on earth, I preach the Second Coming of +our Lord Jesus Christ. + + + +VII + + +It is at the Second Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ that the Earth +Will be Delivered from the Bondage of Corruption and Transformed +into the Paradise of God + + +WHEN man fell creation fell. + +It fell because creation in respect to this earth was headed up in +him. + +God placed a ban upon it, a restraint of its fruitfulness. + +Instead He gave liberty to thorns and briars and poisonous, creeping +things. + +You may plant your garden, you may plant your orchard, set your +vines and sow your fields. You may go to sleep and rest and think +your work is done, that nothing remains but to awake again and +receive the looked-for fruit and harvest. + +When you do awake you will find the poisonous, creeping things have +climbed over your wall and fence, have glided in among the good +seed, flung their tentacles of death about them and are slowly, +surely strangling the life out of them. + +If you would have your garden to grow, your orchard to yield its +fruit, your vineyard to hang out its purple clusters, your harvests +to ripen in the kiss of sun and developing touch of caressing winds, +then you must rise early and toil late. For every acre of worthful +land you must crown your brow with the sweat of unceasing and +exacting toil. + +The earth is in bondage. It is held in the close, the gripping and +relentless bonds of corruption. + +Everywhere and in all things is the corruption of the dead. + +The very air you breathe is dust from the mingled bones of the dead. +The earth is crammed with the dead of man and beast. The grain that +is reaped and the flowers that bloom grow forth from the fatness of +the grave and the impulse of corruption, watered by tears distilled +from the heartache of the generations old who have sorrowed above +that grave and wept and hoped in vain. + +Put your ear to the bosom of old mother earth and you will hear a +moaning and lament like unto women in travail who seek to bring to +the birth. + +I am told the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain +together until now; that it is on the tiptoe of expectation with +neck and head stretched out waiting for the Coming of the Son of God +and all the sons of glory. + +O yes! creation in all her borders is crying out for the Son of God +to come. + +It is crying out from all its rivers, from the moan of the sea, in +the shiver of earthquake and the rush of the lava tide from the red +throat of the flaming volcano. It is crying out in the heat of +burning deserts, in every pain that is felt, in every tear of +anguish that stains the face and speaks the agony of the heart, in +every clod that falls with its accent of woe upon the coffin lid, in +all the bitterness, the shame and tragedy of a sin-smitten and +Devil-hurt world; everything in nature from rock and worm to man is +crying out: "Come, Lord Jesus, and build again this broken and +ruined earth of thine." + +He will hear the cry. + +When He comes He will take off the ban. + +He will deliver from corruption. + +The earth will no longer shiver as an aspen. + +Fear will no longer walk forth like a tyrant and set the pulses +beating or hold them strangling. + +Briars and thorns and fiend-like weeds and smothering, choking +things that have kept the earth in barrenness where Eden-like +gardens should have bloomed, and, thank God, all graves, will +disappear. The desert shall bloom as the rose, the earth shall be +renewed, made beautiful, and all creation loosened from its prison +bonds shall sing and echo with unending harmonies in every freely +fruiting and growing thing throughout all its delivered and happy +borders. + +For a thousand golden years under a new heavens and beneath a pure +sky where the air shall flow round it as a river of crystal from the +throne of God the earth will roll onward to the music of its sister +spheres keeping time in the great diapason of the universe that owns +and celebrates the glory of God; then, at last, it will pass through +gates of fire and come forth into that new orbit, as that new earth +wherein is no more dividing sea, storm swept and full of the wrecks +of ships, of greater wrecks of hopes, and tiled with the white bones +of the dead; that new earth where there shall be no more night with +its hidden evil and its long and darksome hours in which the +sufferer yearns for morning light, no more tears, nor sorrow, nor +pain, nor any more that black and ever multiplying horror they call +death; that new earth that shall be no longer the footstool, but the +exalted and special throne of God--the center of the universe. + +Into this new and perfect earth the Church shall descend--a company +of redeemed, blood-washed, immortal sons of God. + +The Son of God and God the Son Himself shall descend and dwell +there. Then for the first time shall the children of God behold in +Him the full lineament of their Father's face; for, though He be the +eternal Son He shall be seen and known as the "everlasting Father," +or "the Father of the everlasting age." + +The onlooking worlds as they swing in their chorus of adoration +about this radiant and omnipotent center will learn and proclaim the +immense truth that this earth was created, not merely as an +expression of the wisdom, genius and might of God in His function as +a creator, but as the arena of redemption, as the spot whence in all +the wide empire of His power might be known and felt the pulse beat +of His heart. As the innumerable hosts of heaven sweep around this +center of grace and redemption, as they behold beings who once were +lost in sin, wrecked and ruined beyond human hope or angelic aid, +now immortal, holy, happy sons of God, they will break forth in ever +increasing songs of adoration and shall say as they sing till the +universe shall repeat it again and again: + +"Behold, the glory of God is not alone in his majesty and might, in +his holiness and omnipotence, but in his love." + +They shall take up that marvellous passage in John 3: 16 and cry it +aloud so that it will ring with accumulating praise to Him who first +uttered it: + +"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, +that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have +everlasting life." + +And all the host of heaven shall proclaim: + +"God is love. God is love." + +All this consummation is to find its initial at the Second Coming of +our Lord Jesus Christ. + +And because I want to see this earth freed from the stain of sin, +the torture of pain, the accents of sorrow, the terror of tears, the +hour of dying, the black and shameful grave, the trench of +corruption and the Devil's ministry of death; because I want to see +a worth-while world where no longer the earth shall turn from night +to morn and then from morn to disappointing night again, but shall +glow forever in the light of an endless morn; because I want to see +a world where the purposes of God in love, in benediction and +unfailing grace are no longer seemingly contradicted by untoward +events and conditions, by problems that with the best apologies for +the divine character no human genius can solve or balance, but are +written in high and lifted testimony brighter than the stars of any +night and stronger shining than any sun of day; because I want to +see a world where man shall be the enthronement of God and shall +glorify Him as such, and where every atom of earth shall be full of +His love and redolent with His praise, and where life shall be only +another name for joy and the unending and the ever new unfoldment of +it, the actual joy of unreserved, unlimited living; and because this +desire in all its full accomplishment can come and the first notes +of infinite triumph alone be struck and the song begin by the Coming +of our Lord Jesus Christ--I preach His Second Coming. + + + +VIII + + +The Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ for His Church is the Most +Imminent Event on the Horizon of Time + + +BETWEEN us and the Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in glory to Mount +Zion to set up and establish His kingdom there are many predicted +and consecutively fixed events. + +Between us and the moment when our Lord shall suddenly and secretly +descend to take the Church to Himself into the place prepared, hold +her in security above the woe hour coming on all them that dwell on +the face of the earth and then bring her back to reign and rule with +Him in glory, there is not a single, predicted event; and this--in +the very nature of the case. + +In the nature of the case because this age in which we live is a +parenthesis between the kingdom postponed upon the one side and the +kingdom to be brought in upon the other. + +In this age God is not seeking to convert the world, but to take out +of it a people for His Name. + +It is an age of selection and therefore an age of election. + +When you take some things out of the midst of other things there +will be, not only a first one, but necessarily a last one. + +As there was a first one elected, called out and taken into union +with a risen Lord, so must there be a last one who shall be called +through the Gospel, quickened by the Spirit and bound up in +indissoluble union with a living Lord. + +When that last one is called and responds to the life-giving power +of the Spirit the Lord will descend into the upper air and take the +completed and corporate Church to Himself--the dead raised, the +living changed. + +When that last elect one will be called you do not know, it is not +known to a single soul on earth. + +Since you do not know when the last elect of God shall be called, +and it is sure the Lord will come when that last elect one is +called, then you do not know when the Lord will come; and so far as +you are concerned, and so far as any revelation otherwise is given, +it may be any hour and, therefore, "any moment"; consequently the +Coming of the Lord for His Church is--imminent. + +Thus the imminency of the Lord's Coming for His Church is grounded +on election. + +Imminency is so absolutely linked up with election that you cannot +deny imminency without denying election; and to deny election is to +deny God Himself, deny Him in the very essence of His own +prerogative, the prerogative of foreordination, of decree. + +The imminency of the Lord's Coming for His Church is grounded on the +Lord's own declaration that He is coming for her as a thief comes. + +This is His declaration and warning to the Church at Sardis, that +Church which is the symbol of Protestantism in the closing hours of +the age. The warning is given to the pastor, through the pastor to +the Church and through the local assembly at Sardis to the whole +Church. + +This is what the risen Lord actually says: + +"Remember therefore how thou hast received and heard; and hold fast, +and repent. If therefore thou shalt not watch, I will arrive over +thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will arrive +over thee." + +The characteristics of thief coming are marked and clear. + +The thief does not come with strident voice, with thunderous noise, +nor in open daylight, but between the midnight and the morn, with +shodden feet, silently, softly, and takes the treasure while all in +the house are sunken in the depths of sleep. + +When the sunbeams of the morning pelt the eyelids of the laggard +sleepers they awake to find the thief has come and gone and in his +going has taken the treasure with him. + +If the symbol be of avail and not a mere exercise in logomachy then +will the Lord, indeed, descend in the moral and spiritual night of +the world while men are sleeping and in fancied security pleasantly +dreaming. + +He will descend unseen, unnoted. If men shall hear the sound of a +trump it will have no greater significance to their spiritually deaf +ears than any other passing sound. He will take, not the "great +house" of religious profession, but those alone in that profession +who have been regenerated and are indwelt by the Spirit, the dead +who have fallen asleep in His name and the living who abide in Him. + +Above all--imminency is grounded in the integrity of the Son of God +and His apostles. + +Unless all language is a deception; unless the promises of God are a +baited lie; unless the apostles of Christ are the most shameless of +all wanton tricksters; unless the Son of God Himself is the coolest +traitor to truth who ever fooled the trusting hearts of needy men; +unless He is the one being of all others who had the subtle and +effective genius of making promises that fill the ear and are broken +to the heart; unless He was the most skillful of all deceivers and +rejoiced with malignant delight in deceiving the souls of men and +thus proved Himself to be not the Son of God at all but the very son +of falsehood, then seeing He is the reverse of all that, is in truth +the very Son of God and truth itself, by His own unqualified +statement, by its very character as exhortative warning His Coming +must be and is--imminent. It is on the threshold of unfolding +history and the gates of heaven are ajar ready for His Coming. So +imminent is it that there is nothing between us and that event of +events but the shout of command, the voice of the archangel and the +shattering sound of the trump. So imminent that there is not the +thickness of an eyelash between us and that moment when the door in +heaven shall open wide and His voice with all compelling power shall +say, "Come up hither." + +Listen to what He says: + +"Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come." + +Watch! because He is coming. + +Watch! because you do not know what hour He will come. + +Watch! because as the householder He said He might come in any one +of the four watches, at even, at midnight, in the cockcrowing or in +the morning. + +He did not come at even. + +Surely the midnight has come. It is dark enough spiritually. There +is not only enough of sorrow, sin, confusion and unbelief in a +godless world, but rank treason to the truth and repudiation of the +written Word in the professing Church to call it spiritual midnight. + +It seems sometimes like the cockcrowing. + +There are sounds of chanticleer, blasts of trumpets, changing of the +guards and sentinels of old customs and ways, and echoes in the +events now unrolling that prelude the great morning and the great +day. + +There is nothing certain about the hour but its--uncertainty. + +Watch! because you may be alive at His Coming. + +That is the word of Holy Scripture and not my suggestion. + +Listen to the Apostle: "We which are alive, and remain unto the +coming of the Lord." + +The Apostle said that for his generation. + +He said it not under his own mistaken idea as the Chicago department +of "sacred literature" would suggest, but under the inspiration of +the Holy Spirit of the Holy God. + +Paul as a mere man might make mistakes just as the modern +theological professor not infrequently does. + +The Holy Spirit speaking through Paul could not make a mistake +Himself, neither could it be possible for Paul under the direction +of the Holy Spirit to make a mistake. + +Paul was led by the Holy Spirit to believe it possible the Son of +God might come in his day. + +What Paul under inspiration said for his generation, he said for our +generation. + +He said it for you and for me. + +Because no man knows the hour when the Lord will come it might be in +your hour and my hour. + +The Master Himself said: + +"You know not what hour your Lord doth come." + +Who is he who will have the hardihood to fix the hour when the +Master has said no man knows? + +Who is he who will put a thousand years between the Church and her +returning Lord? + +Where is the difference between a thousand years' delay and one +moment that can be fixed by any man? + +If the Lord says you do not know the hour and necessarily do not +know the minute of the hour, if you fix a minute between us and the +Coming you deny the words of the Son of God Himself that the minute +and the hour are unknown. + +Who is he who has it all fixed and polished and pumice stoned to the +exact date? + +The Lord has said no man on earth knows, not an angel in heaven +knows. He Himself took the place of a servant and by the exercise of +His omnipotent will residing in His eternal and unchanged +personality as Son of God and God the Son, shut out the knowledge of +it from His humanity, from Himself as man, and said He did not know +when He should come. + +Admit that a revelation has since been given to Him as a man or that +He has taken the ban off His human side Himself and that He knows +when He will come for the Church and the exact hour of His appearing +in glory; admit this if you like and for the sake of argument +(although there is not the slightest shade of a shadow of evidence +for such an argument) it still remains that no such revelation has +ever been given to the Church; neither has the restriction of the +Son of God to His disciples been removed. You remember what He said +just before He ascended! + +This is what He said: + +"It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the +Father hath put in his own power." + +That this restriction was for the Church is the declaration of the +Apostle. This is what he said to the Church at Thessalonica: + +"Of the times and the seasons, brethren, ye have no need that I +write unto you." + +Why had he no need to write to them? + +Because the day of the Lord, he said, should come as a thief, and as +that day is introduced by the Coming of the Lord for His Church, +then His coming for the Church was, as He Himself afterwards +declared in his letter to Sardis, like the coming of a thief. This +Coming Paul had described in the fourth chapter of his first letter +to the Thessalonians. + +It was not for the Church to know in Paul's day when the Lord should +come as the bridegroom for His bride. + +No revelation has been given in any epistle to the Church since. +What was true in Paul's day as to the attitude of the Church is true +in this day. Listen to the commended attitude of the Thessalonian +Church: + +"Ye turned to God from idols, to serve the living and true God; and +to wait for his Son from heaven." + +There you have it. + +The Church is to wait; that means to watch, to expect, to be ready. + +This is what the Apostle said. + +This is what the Son of God Himself said and still says to-day. + +He affirms we do not know the hour. + +He exhorts us to watch. + +The affirmation and the exhortation hold for this hour. + +If therefore the Son of God be not incarnate falsehood; if He seek +not to play with my heart and make me a spectacle to the lost souls +of the pit as well as to the mockers among men--He means what He +said. + +If He meant what He said, then He means that any day, and any hour +of the day so far as I know I may meet Him at any turn of the road. + +And what would that mean if He should come to-night or to-morrow? + +I have told you what it would mean to me. + +What would it mean to you, to some of you who have so much invested +in Laurel Hill, in that white and beautiful city of the dead, by the +banks of your winding river? + +When I was a boy my father took me there and I watched as the winds +rippled through the long grasses, and I could hear the wash of the +river below, I was startled and sometimes shivered as I walked under +the shadow of tall monuments, carved figures, and by stately tombs +of marble. And once I started back and broke into tears at the sight +of the sculptured form of "Old Mortality" bending above a slab with +chisel and mallet in hand--and I suppose is there still, grown older +in his stony face because more stained with the passing years. + +What would it mean to you whose loved ones are lying in that +cemetery or any other of the sleeping places of the dead? + +Ah! it would mean the home-coming, the greeting, the rapturous kiss +and hand-clasp of recognition, the joy of that heaven life that +shall know no end and that immortality that shall compensate for all +the weariness and the heartache of the mortal path here below. + +Yes! it would mean to those of us who by faith in Christ Jesus are +children of the living God, the gathering to our arms again of those +who have left us and for whom our arms still ache to enfold them +once more. And O my soul! it would mean the seeing of Him whom our +soul loveth and who unfailingly has loved us; it would mean that +boon of boons--seeing Him face to face. + +Do you wonder the Holy Spirit who is the finger of God has written +over against the word "hope," that qualification, "blessed," and +affixed to it the demonstrative, "that," so it doth read: "That +blessed hope"? + +And yet! and yet! there are men who call themselves the ministers of +Christ who would blot out that hope and take away the vision of it +from our souls. + +With cold, acute, metallic voices in which you may hear the sound of +the wheels of machinery and the buzz of business, they tell us that +should the Lord suddenly come it would paralyze all industry, put an +end to commerce and to trade, overthrow all progress, make worthless +every high endeavour for the betterment of man, shut the doors of +school, of college and university, render useless the architect's +and builder's plans, throw down the mechanic's tools, the artist's +brush, the sculptor's chisel, the writer's pen, still the orator's +tongue, make null and void the legislator's high emprise and draw a +line of atrophy across the unfolding processes of human life. + +Oh, foolish, blind and slow to believe, do you not see that if the +Lord should come it would lift our so-called civilization out of the +slime and shame of its brazen folly and reeking, though perfumed sin +into the glory of eternal righteousness and peace? + +Do you not see that it would, at last, make men immortal and give +them such beauty of form, such sanity and such culture and worth of +being as all the gymnasia and all the eugenics of the hour have +failed and will ever fail to achieve? + +Do you not see that if the Lord should suddenly come it would at +once open the gates of knowledge and bring us face to face with the +secrets of the universe and make us masters under God of all natural +laws such as all the curriculae of all the institutions of learning, +of applied science and philosophy have failed to impart? + +Do you not see it would be the fulfillment of the highest ideals and +aspirations and would make man what the creator of heaven and earth +originally intended man should be--not an animal working with tools +and breaking his heart in vain finally to achieve--but a very God +who should speak and it should be done, command and it should stand +fast; and who should be the incarnate revelation, the eternal +enthronement of the invisible God, in power, in character and +holiness? + +Do you not see it would change this old earth from the swinging +cemetery of the dead into the home of deathless men, the home of the +eternal and worth-while life? + +Oh, listen to me all who hear me! + +The hope for this world of daily toil and tears, of graves and +unceasing tragedy, of pitiful woe, is not that slow creeping thing +called evolution, wallowing on its serpentine belly amid the dust of +death and the crime and sin of unchanged and unchangeable human +nature--but God Himself--God in Christ, the personal Coming of Him +who is the maker of heaven and earth, coming to bring in the new +dawn, the new day, the new earth and the new empire of God and man. + +Oh, tell me those of you who have been redeemed by blood, +regenerated by the Spirit, made partakers of the divine nature, +turned heavenward by the power of God, who see cloudless daylight in +the Bible, even in the darkness of a spiritual night, hear music in +its promises and whose souls are filled with love to God and love to +man, tell me would you like Him to come, would you like to see your +Lord face to face? + +Oh, you who have had the vision of His cross behold it, I beseech +you, there! + +The head crowned with thorns, the nailed hands, the nailed feet, the +pierced side, the blood pouring out of those hands, gliding round +His body, weaving itself in its sinuous course over the white flesh +into a robe of crimson, and then streaming out into a fringe of +intense scarlet as it drops, drop by drop to the thirsty ground, +dripping, dripping there. Oh, I can see it and I seem to feel the +warm touch of it, the strange, the wonderful cleansing touch of it, +the only thing that can make a blackened sinner white; and as it +drops each drop seems to say till it turns to very music in the +soul: + +"Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though +they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." + +Listen to the dropping of that blood out of the heart of God, every +drop the price current of the merchant, the half shekel of the +sanctuary, the purchase price of your redemption and mine and the +seal of infinite love, of measureless grace. + +Oh, tell me would you like Him to come, transfigure you into the +beauty of His likeness and put the benediction of His peace upon +this old sin-smitten, tear-stained earth? + +Do you ever pray the last prayer recorded in Holy Scripture, the +last prayer of the Holy Apostolic Church? + +Listen to it! Listen to it well! + +"Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus." + +Is this prayer in your heart? + +Does it ever come to your lips? + +Do you ever genuinely and openly offer it, wishing with all your +heart it might be so, might be answered in your time; or, have you +forgotten it like the Church at large? + +Do you feel ashamed or afraid to offer it in public? + +When you try to offer it in private or public does unbelief smother +it? + +I once heard a boy say to his mother: + +"O mother, don't do so much for me; love me more." + +I tell you the truth whether you hear or forbear: as preachers and +teachers many of you are doing too much for the Lord. You are busy, +morning, noon and night in His name, running here and there, +tinkering religiously and morally, putting things together and +increasingly active; so busy doing for the Lord that like Martha you +have no time to sit still at His feet as did Mary and hear His Word, +hear what He has to say to you; so busy doing for Him that you are +losing sight of Himself. This was the "somewhat" He had against the +Ephesian Church. + +That Church was full of works and labours. They had tested false +doctrines and false teachers. They stood squarely for fundamentals +and were theologically sound; but they had left their "first love," +love to Himself, love to His person, devotion to His person, a +flaming, outbreaking, overflowing enthusiasm for a personal, a +realistic Saviour and Lord. They were taken up with what they were +doing for Him rather than with Himself. They had got away from the +loving, impelling touch and contact with Himself. + +The personal touch with Christ! + +That is what He wants from us. Not so much what we are doing for +Him, but what He is to us personally. He wants to be the first and +the last, the chiefest among ten thousands and the one altogether +lovely. This is the definition of true and efficient Christianity +--personal devotion to a living and loving Saviour. + +Looking down from heaven He is saying to us, no matter how much we +may be doing for Him, He is saying this to us: + +"Love me more." + +And until there is this flaming, burning, out-flowing enthusiasm for +and devotion to a personal Lord, to Him for what He is as well as +for what He has done for us, there can be no sweeping, wide, +resultant revival and ingathering of the elect of God. You may plan +and organize and get together, you will have only a flame that will +flare for a time and then go out. + +Nay! only when we are on fire for Him can we make the hearts of men +to burn with the faith that shall turn them to Him and make them +hate and forsake whatever does not honour and glorify Him. + +Over all the noise and rush of things, and all the machinery well +motived men sometimes set going in His name He is saying: + +"Love me more! love me more!" + +When some one you love with this intense personal love is absent you +are not satisfied till that absent one returns, fills your vision +and responds to the touch of your greeting and your love. + +If you love the very person of the Son of God; if you have a +quivering, all-pervading enthusiasm for Him so that He is, indeed, +above all personalities in the universe to you, you will want Him to +return where you may look upon Him--not as Thomas did for doubt's +sake and stumbling hope's sake--but for the very joy of it until the +print of the nails in His hand and the print of the nails in His +feet shall be to you as the apocalypse of His glory and the +illumination of your soul. + +Do you really want Him to come--this long absent Redeemer and Lord? + +He is listening to hear whether you want Him to come; whether above +every plan and scheme you may have been building in His name; above +any religious, even spiritual ambition you may have, you want Him to +come for--Himself. + +He is very still. He is listening to hear whether you will say that +one little word that has in it such vibrant meaning, that one word: + +"Come." + +The Church as a Church has long ago ceased to say--"Come." + +But the old prayer is still written here in the closing page of Holy +Scripture: + +"Amen. Even so, Come, Lord Jesus." + +Are you willing to-night to put your faith and your heart into that +old prayer and bid Him come? + +Have you the faith and sincerity to do it? + +You say, "Yes." + +Then rise to your feet as one person and say that prayer as I line +it out to you until it shall roll upward like a wave on the infinite +shore and break on our Lord's listening ears with the music of +love's unfailing appeal: + +"AMEN. EVEN SO, COME, LORD JESUS." + + + +In response to Dr. Haldeman the great audience filling the building +from pit to dome rose to its feet as in a flash and repeated the +prayer as he gave it out. It was a moving sight and full of +impression as the mighty volume of united voices rose and swelled +upward to that throne where our Lord sits as Bridegroom as well as +King and yearns in these days to hear His true Bride in all the +wonder of her spiritual beauty and the strength of her essential +unity say--"Come." + + + +_Printed in the United States of America_ + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHY I PREACH THE SECOND COMING*** + + +******* This file should be named 30573.txt or 30573.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/3/0/5/7/30573 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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