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Surely no doctrine, in the Word of God, presents a deeper motive for crucifying the flesh, and for separation unto God, and to work for souls, as our hope and joy and crown of rejoicing43 than this does.
No! Not at all. Think a moment. Do you condemn the Jews for rejecting Christ, when He came in such literal fulfillment of prophecy, and yet reject the same literalness about his second coming? This is not consistent, and while we believe Luke 1:31, to be literally true, let us believe likewise in regard to verses 32 and 33.
The inconsistency of accepting literally verse 31, and ‘spiritualizing’ 32 and 33, is clearly illustrated by the following account of a conversation between a Christian minister and a Jew:
Prophecies Literally Fulfilled at the First Coming.
The list which follows here is powerful and will answer many questions...
Prophecies to be Literally Fulfilled at the Second Coming.
The list which follows will also answer many questions about the second coming...do not quickly move past this list...
There will be one generation, at least, who will realize that the coming of our Lord is not death.
It is assuming too much, to say that death is practically, to the believer, the coming of the Lord. For we do not know it, and the Scriptures do not assert it. On the contrary, the events which occur, as the Scriptures teach us, when the Lord comes, do not occur at the death of a Christian. The dead are not then raised, nor are the living believers changed, as they will be when the Lord comes.
Nowhere in the Savior’s teachings are we commanded to watch or prepare for death. But we are commanded to watch and prepare for Christ’s coming.
Will you study it? Will you search for yourself, as did the noble Bereans?21 not merely to read through this little book, but to use it simply as an index, and go to the Word, search out the passages herein referred to, read them and pray over them, until the Holy Spirit guides you into the truth? If so, we believe that you will see the light, and find comfort to your soul.
He Promised, “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.” John 14:2-3. He gave us this promise as our hope and comfort while He is away.
Nothing can be more comforting to the Church, the bride of Christ,5 then this precious promise which our absent Lord has left us, that He will come and receive us unto Himself, and that we shall be with Him, to behold his glory.6
It is a constant reminder of His promise, pointing our eye of faith to His coming again. “He is faithful that promised”12 and we are exhorted to have confidence and patience, that we may “receive the promise,” “for yet a little while, and He that shall come, will come, and will not tarry.” Heb. 10:35-37.
But in the third century there arose a school of interpreters, headed by Origen, who so “spiritualized” the Scriptures that they ceased to believe in any literal Millennium whatsoever. Their system of interpretation has been severely condemned by Martin Luther, Dr. Adam Clarke and other commentators.
Pre-millennial Christians hold much in common with the Jews, but also that our Lord Jesus Christ is the Messiah; that He is to return to the earth and overthrow Satan, all ungodly government and lawlessness, and establish a kingdom of righteousness, having the Church, with Himself as sovereign, Jerusalem as the capital, regathered and converted Israel as the center, and all nations included in a universal, world-wide kingdom of pure and blessed government.
Post-Millennialism. About the year seventeen hundred a new error crept into the Church, to-wit, Post-millennialism.
This, then, is the principal point of the question, namely: Will the coming of Christ occur before the Millennium, and may it therefore happen at any moment, as Pre-millennialists believe, or will it occur after the Millennium, and thus be, at least, a thousand years in the future, as Post-millennialists believe?
This absolutely precludes the idea of a millennial reign of righteousness in this dispensation.
All the dead will be raised, but, as Jesus was raised out of the dead and the rest of the dead were
left, so the dead in Christ that are His at His coming, will be raised out of the dead, and the rest of the dead will be left until another and final resurrection, and the Millennium will occur between these two resurrections, thus clearly showing Christ’s coming to be pre-millennial.
Order of the Resurrection.
Another great list that merits study and discussion follows...
For IF WE BELIEVE that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him. . . . . .For the Lord Himself shall descend from Heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first.
OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED.
“That Day” is the key to the book of Isaiah and many of the other prophets. Note how frequently it occurs. Isa. 2:11; 3:7, 18; 4:1, 2; 5:30; 7:18, 20, 21, 23; 10:27, etc.; Jer. 25:33; Ezek. 38:14, 16; 39:11; 48:35; Joel 3:18; Amos 9:11; Micah 4:6; 7:11, 12; Zeph. 3:11, 16; Hag. 2:23; Zech. 9:16; 12:3, 4, 6, 8, 9, 11; 13:1, 2, 4; 14:6, 8, 13, 21; Mal. 3:17; Mat. 7:22; 24:36; Mark 13:3; Lu. 21:34.
But shall we,—who believe that Isa. 7:14 has been literally fulfilled—condemn the Jews for not accepting it, and yet justify ourselves in rejecting the literal fulfillment of this plain statement in Rev. 20? God forbid.
Resurrection From the Dead.
The resurrection νεκρων or των νεκρων (nekron, or ton nekron—of the dead) is applied to both classes because all will be raised. But the resurrection εκ νεκρων (ek nekron = out of the dead) is not once applied to the ungodly. [Mat. 22:31; Acts 17:32; 23:6; 24:15. 21; 1 Cor. 15:12, 13, 21, 42 and especially John 5:28-29 (R. V.): 28.
Olshausen declares that the “phrase would be inexplicable if it were not derived from the idea that out of the mass of the dead some would rise first.”[Vol. 2, p. 183 Am. Ed.]
He is faithfu’ that hath promised, an’ He’ll surely come again, He’ll keep his tryst wi’ me, at what hour I dinna ken; But he bids me still to wait, an’ ready aye to be, To gang at ony moment to my ain countrie. So I’m WATCHING aye, and singing o’ my hame as I wait, For the soun’ing o’ His footfa’ this side the gowden gate, For His bluid hath made me white, and His hand shall dry my e’e When He brings me hame at last to my ain countrie.
Stackhouse, in his “Complete Body of Divinity” (Vol. 1, p. 597), says: “It cannot be denied but that this doctrine (Millenarianism) has its antiquity, and was once the general opinion of all orthodox Christians.”
Bishop Newton says: “The doctrine of the Millennium (as held by Millenarians) was generally believed in the first three and purest ages.” [Dissertations on the Prophecies, p. 527.]
Bishop Russell, though an anti-millenarian, says: “Down to the beginning of the fourth century, the belief was uni...
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Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis in Phrygia, who was a disciple of St. John, or who at least received his doctrines from the immediate followers of the Apostle, was an extreme Millennialist, and has been called the father of Millenarianism.
The Revelation can not occur, until Antichrist be revealed, and all the times and seasons (which point to the day of the Lord) in Lev. 26, Daniel and Revelation be fulfilled.
Another evidence of the difference between the Rapture and Revelation consists in the fact that the Church is to escape the Tribulation, which precedes the Revelation. (Mat. 24:29-30.) Enoch, a type of the Church, by his rapture,—that is by being caught away or translated (Heb. 11:5)—escaped the flood.
The second point is: The distinction between the Church and the Millennial Kingdom.
For, until after Christ came, it was a thing of the future. This is proved by his assertion in Mat. 16:18, “On this rock will I build my Church,” showing that it had not yet been built.
But the Jews rejected it and slew their King. They were not willing to have this man reign over them, and therefore the Kingdom did not “immediately appear.” It became like a nobleman which “went into a far country, to receive for himself a kingdom and to return.” See Luke 19:11-27. By this parable Jesus distinctly taught that the Kingdom was in the future.
So we see that there is no place in the whole earthly history of such a persecuted Church, for the Millennial Kingdom.
This spirit of antichrist, now possessed by many, will culminate in one person, the Antichrist, who will deny both the Father and the Son.4
This mystery of Lawlessness (so the Greek) already worked in the days of the apostle, but there has been a hindering power, which, we believe, is the Holy Spirit, in His present manifestation, or office, viz.: as the reprover of the world and gatherer of the Church.
If, even in the present dispensation, we cannot explain the doctrines of “Free Will,” and “God’s Sovereignty,” to our mutual understanding,—much less can we comprehend the glory, which shall be revealed in us, in the coming Kingdom. Let us not be disturbed, then, by the questions which they ask;
Post-millennialists seem to think that all must be accomplished under the Church, and with present instrumentalities. Pre-millennialists look for the main accomplishment under Christ Himself, who will cut short the work in righteousness,10 and with different instrumentalities.11
Post-millennialism exalts the Church: Pre-millennialism exalts Jesus and fills the heart of the believer with a LIVING, PERSONAL, COMING Savior.
It is the MOST PRACTICAL DOCTRINE in the Christian faith, for “every man that hath this hope in Him (Christ) purifieth himself even as He (Christ) is pure.” 1 John 3:3. And do we not want PRACTICAL HOLINESS?
Some object that they have so many unsaved friends, they cannot wish Jesus to come. WORK THEN, for we read “all that my Father giveth me shall come to me” (John 6:37-39), and whosoever will may come.3 Knowing the terror (fear) of the Lord, let us persuade men. 2 Cor. 5:11.
He dld not say that the kingdom of God was within, or in the hearts of those wicked Pharisees, but that it was among them, viz.: within the Jewish nation.
It is said that it makes the gospel a failure. But this is not so. Man is a failure. The gospel is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth (Rom. 1:16). It is not the incompetency of the gospel, but the willful unbelief of sinners that prevents the conversion of the world.
So then we may rest confidently on the plain statement of Col. 1:23, as being such fulfillment of Mat. 24:14, that the Church from that day to the present has not had, neither can have, in this, any sign or prophesied event standing between believers and the Lord’s coming.
We answer—The Holy Spirit is a distinct person, not to be confounded with the person of Christ. The Savior expressly said: “I will pray the Father and He shall give you another comforter” (John 14:16), and if it be another, it cannot be Himself. He, the Holy Spirit, came according to the promises,67 and it is entirely inconsistent to confound this event with Christ’s return, which latter is in accordance with other promises, that He should Himself come again. They are two events, as distinct as the births of Moses and John.
John Saw It. We have only to turn to Revelation, where we find that He “which is and which was, and which is to come” permitted John to see (Rev. 1:2, 11, etc.) it most definitely.
