Here it may be well to pause for a moment, and notice the order in which the important events of this period occur. We have seen the saints caught up to meet the Lord according to His own promise in John 14. They pass into heaven, and, all things being ready, the marriage of the Lamb takes place according to the vision of the Apostle John (Rev. 19). “The marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready.” He presents her to Himself a glorious church, holy and without blemish. What a day that will be! What a day even for heaven, so long accustomed to glory. But this will be a new glory, the bridal glory of the Lamb! As the bride ranks with her Bridegroom, and the wife with her husband, so will the church rank with Christ on that day of wondrous, transcendent glory!
The marriage scene and the marriage supper being over, the blessed Lord, or the last Adam, with His beloved Eve, the glorified saints, and the angelic hosts prepare, for His appearing in glory, and to take possession of the earth. But during the interval between the “coming” and the “appearing,” God’s love has been active in gathering out His own, and the earth has been ripening for judgment. When the true church has left the scene of testimony, and the merely nominal part has been rejected forever, the Spirit of God begins to work in the Jewish remnant; and they, as the missionaries of the new testimony, preach “the everlasting gospel to them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people.” The judgment of the living nations in Matt. 25, discriminates as to the results of this mission. And Rev. 7 shows us the saved multitudes of both Jews and Gentiles by means of “the everlasting gospel,” as preached by the Jewish “brethren” of the blessed Lord. But while the love of God is thus active, and the power of the Spirit thus manifested, Satan is exerting all his power, and bringing up all his forces, to corrupt the whole earth, and dispute its possession with the Lord’s Anointed. But the hour of their judgment is come.
“And I saw heaven opened,” says the apostle, “and behold a white horse, and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he doth judge and make war.” (Rev. 19). The Lord is coming; He is on His way. Heaven is open; but He comes not alone; the armies of heaven follow Him. He comes to take vengeance on them that know not God, and them that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. “He shall smite the earth with the rod of His mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked.” Apostate Christendom, and the Jews who have returned to their own land in unbelief, and formed an alliance with Antichrist, will be the special objects of judgment, but a remnant of Israel shall be saved. The heavenlies cleared of Satan and his angels; the earth cleared of its wicked kings; the beast and the false prophet cast into the lake of fire, and Satan bound in the bottomless pit; the whole scene being thus cleared by judgment, and victory complete, the blessed Lord takes the kingdom. “The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ; and he shall reign forever and ever.” (Rev. 11:15). The spared remnant of Israel and their offspring, and the remnant of Gentiles which survive the awful judgments, with their posterity, will form the population of the earth during the millennium, while the church reigns with Christ her Head and Bridegroom in heavenly glory. “Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection; on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years.” Rev. 20:4-6.
The Past and Present State of the Professing Church
We can never be sufficiently thankful to the Lord for reviving by His Spirit the blessed truth of the coming of the Lord, and for giving it, in these last days, such prominence in the teaching of so many of His people. If this truth be overlooked, only a very small portion of the Word of God can properly be understood. The first resurrection, for example, and the millennial reign of Christ with His glorified saints, with other collateral truths, must be entirely lost sight of. Formerly the thought that the coming of Christ was at the close, not at the commencement, of the millennium was almost universal. The idea was, and in many parts perhaps still is, that the world, or Gentiles, will be converted by means of the Gospel; after that, “all Israel shall be saved.” Then intervenes a spiritual millennium before the Lord comes. But in all this the purpose of God concerning the church is overlooked, which is an outcalling from Jews and Gentiles. We cannot be too zealous as to the spread of the gospel, the commission being, “Preach the gospel to every creature.” But each conversion is an addition to the church, which will be translated to heaven before the millennium.
If, as is often said, “Christ will not come till after a thousand years of blessedness on the earth,” what has the believer to look for now? Necessarily for death as the end of his course, and for the fulfillment of the predicted events, while his body lies slumbering in the grave during the earth’s great jubilee. What a prospect for the true spouse, the beloved bride of the heavenly Bridegroom! True, the souls of believers would be with Christ, but their bodies would be in the silent grave, while all earth was rejoicing under His so-called spiritual scepter. Every true believer should reject this theory as utterly opposed to all Scripture. In place of looking for death and a thousand intervening years before his Lord comes, he is looking for Him as the sustaining, consoling, comforting hope of his daily life. The true effect of conversion―unless the convert is blinded by false teaching―is to wait for his Savior from heaven.
When the Lord comes, as we have seen, the church meets Him in the air. She is ushered into heavenly bridal joys, and into the endless blessedness of the Father’s house. Then will follow―when judgment shall have cleared the scene―the peaceful glories of the kingdom. All that psalmists have sung, and prophets predicted of the blessedness of the earth during that joyous period shall be fully accomplished. Satan and his hosts, the evil angels banished from the heavens and the abodes of men, Christ reigning, and His risen saints associated with Him on the throne of His heavenly and earthly glory, must essentially distinguish the millennial period from all preceding dispensations. Then shall come creation’s day of boundless exultation and universal gladness in the Lord’s presence, so constantly spoken of in the Old Testament. “The Lord reigneth, let the earth rejoice; let the multitude of isles be glad. The hills melted like wax at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the Lord of the whole earth. Let the floods clap their hands: let the hills be joyful together before the Lord; for he cometh to judge the earth: with righteousness shall he judge the world, and the people with equity.” Psa. 97 & 98.
Beautiful beyond all description are the holy strains of triumphant joy which flow from the lips of Old Testament seers in anticipation of this day of gladness. All nature is called upon to swell the chorus of universal joy. The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad, and the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose; the parched ground shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water. The mountains shall drop down new wine, and the hills shall flow with milk and honey. The wild beasts of the field―shorn of their ferocity―shall become gentle and harmless as the lamb, and warfare and strife shall cease from amongst the children of men. Thus will God reverse the history of man; He will heal his sorrow, relieve his misery; crown him with health, peace, and plenty, and spread joy throughout the restored creation, according to His estimate of His beloved Son. In that day it will be seen and acknowledged that the cross of the Lord Jesus is the foundation of the widespread scene of millennial glory and blessing. Col. 1:20; Isa. 11; Psa. 72.
“Kings shall fall down before Him,
And gold and incense bring;
All nations shall adore Him,
His praise all people sing.
Outstretched His wide dominion,
O’er river, sea, and shore;
Far as the eagle’s pinion,
Or dove’s light wing can soar.”
The Great White Throne
Nothing can be more humiliating to man than what we find at the end of the millennium. God will then show that a thousand years of manifested glory will not convert the human heart without His saving grace. The moment Satan is again free, and exercises his power, the unconverted portion of the Gentile nations is deceived by him. He gathers them together in rebellion; but fire comes down from God out of heaven and devours them utterly. And this brings us to the last and closing scene in the history of man―the eternal judgment. “And I saw,” says John, “a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the heavens and the earth fled away; and there was found no place for them.” There need be no difficulty on the reader’s part in distinguishing between this last sessional judgment, and the judgment of the living nations. (Matt. 25). Whom the Lord comes at the beginning of the millennium, the earth, as we have seen, is universally blessed under His reign for a thousand years. But such is not the case here. It is the resurrection and judgment of the wicked dead at the close of the millennium. The general idea that Christ will not leave the heavens till the end of the millennium, when there will be one general resurrection and one general judgment of the righteous and the wicked, is utterly without the least foundation in Scripture; and not only so, but is directly opposed to the very nature of Christianity and the purposes of God in Christ Jesus.
At the commencement of the millennium, the risen saints are seen sitting upon thrones in association with Christ. “They lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years.” (Rev. 20:4). This was their time of public reward for service or for suffering with Christ during His absence. “The time is come,” says the seer, “that thou shouldest give reward unto thy servants the prophets, and to the saints, and to them that fear thy name, small and great.” (Rev. 11:18). But on the great white throne Christ is seen alone. While it was a question of governing the millennial earth, the saints governed with Him. Now it is a question of eternal judgment, and He acts alone. Stripped of every false covering―no purple, no miter, no crosier, no mantle of mere profession to screen their guilt now―each one is seen in his real character, and with all his sins; not one has been blotted out―all must be there. “And the sea gave up the dead which were in it: and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them; and they were judged every man according to his works.” The depths, the unseen world, are forced to deliver up their miserable prisoners, that they may hear from the lips of the once-rejected Jesus their final sentence.
All are now gathered, and time is no longer. The created heavens and earth are fled away; nothing is now to be seen but the great white throne of dazzling brightness, and the glorious majesty of the Son of man.
The awful sentence, uttered amidst the dreadful silence of that solemn scene sends back the wicked into the depths of hopeless woe. But the glory and beauty of the Savior Jesus, whom they despised in time, and the myriads of happy saints who surround Him, can never, no, never be forgotten. Thus closes the history of man and the events of time. Eternity begins―the wicked judged, the righteous blessed, and all the ways of God forever vindicated. “Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him (the once lowly Jesus), and given him a name which is above every name: that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things on earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.” (Phil. 2:9-11). This done, love creates new heavens and a new earth, as the future dwelling place of the redeemed; and God comes down to dwell among them. “Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell among them; and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.” Rev. 21:1-7
Conclusion
The foregoing pages were written, we believe, more than eighty years ago: and it is with shame and sorrow we look back over these years: worldliness, strife and divisions have come in amongst those so-called “Brethren” during this time, so we can only take our place alongside of Daniel, and with him pray and make our confession. We have sinned, and have committed iniquity, and have done wickedly; neither have we hearkened unto Thy servants. O Lord, righteousness belongeth unto Thee, but unto us confusion of faces, as at this day. O Lord, to us belongeth confusion of face, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against Thee. To the Lord our God belong mercies and forgivenesses, though we have rebelled against Him. Now therefore, O our God, hear the prayer of Thy servant, and his supplications, and cause Thy face to shine upon Thy people, for the Lord’s sake: for we do not present our supplications before Thee for our righteousnesses, but for Thy great mercies. O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive; O Lord, hearken and do; defer not, for Thine own sake, O my God; for Thy people are called by Thy name.
The Author of this book gives a closing word of warning: What the people of God have chiefly to watch and pray against is the world. It is difficult, we know, to maintain a steady walk in the path of rejection outside the world, but this is the only consistent path for the saints of God. “They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.” (John 17). Death, resurrection, and ascension, separate Christ from the world; this is the believer’s measure, and the believer’s responsibility. And it is this we are apt to forget, and to lose sight of in the innumerable details of daily life. But the believer is one with Christ, united to Him in heavenly glory, though still here, and ought to be diligent and attentive to all his duties, for the Lord’s sake. But thus to live here while we cherish the spirit of our heavenly citizenship, requires watching and prayer in communion with the Lord. The trial and difficulty will be, in maintaining that place of separation and rejection which the blessed Lord so plainly marks out for them in His prayer to His Father. But if He gives them His place of rejection on earth, He at the same time gives them His own place of acceptance in heaven. When we enjoy the latter, it is not difficult to accept the former.
Having thus spoken plainly, we can retire into the sanctuary, and pray for all who love the Lord, by whatever name they are called. We feel as if we must say, Be united; abound in prayer, in united prayer, and in the full confidence of brotherly love. We would only further add―and that from the depths of our hearts―in the earnest entreating language of the apostle, “I BESEECH YOU THEREFORE, BRETHREN, BY THE MERCIES OF GOD, THAT YE PRESENT YOUR BODIES A LIVING SACRIFICE, HOLY, ACCEPTABLE UNTO GOD, WHICH IS YOUR REASONABLE SERVICE; AND BE NOT CONFORMED TO THIS WORLD: BUT BE YE TRANSFORMED BY THE RENEWING OF YOUR MIND, THAT YE MAY PROVE WHAT IS THAT GOOD, AND ACCEPTABLE, AND PERFECT WILL OF GOD.” Rom. 12:1, 2.