What has been already said as to Christ's Second Coming is greatly confirmed by a fuller consideration of the misuse of the Apocalypse which is alike prevalent in, and characteristic of, this society. To state the truth it enunciates is in itself the best disproof of the wrong done, partly in ignorance, partly by party spirit. In the great book of N. T. prophecy there are well-defined landmarks which afford the most seasonable help and yet demand no sustained attention or study, but he may run that reads them. The first and very essential distinction for all right understanding of it as a whole is that laid down by our Lord Himself in chap. i. 19, “the things which are, and the things which shall be after these,” not a vague “hereafter,” but what next follows. There are in fact three divisions; “the things which thou rawest,” namely, the Lord Jesus as presented after a new sort in the midst of the seven golden lamp stands (chap. 1.); “the things which are,” or the seven churches shown out in the seven letters respectively (chaps. 2.,; “and the things which shall be after these,” that is, after the church-state closes (chaps. 4-22.). The bearing of this on the application of the prophecy, simple as it seems, is immediate and immense, neglected by none more than by Irvingite interpreters. This is the more regrettable as they are among the few exceptional communities that really ponder the Book. For the most part in Christendom only individuals here and there appear to pay it any marked attention. As the Catholic Apostolics must be pretty familiar with its contents, they ought to have noted well the divinely registered postponement of the strictly prophetic visions to “the things that are"; especially as their ablest leader, Mr. Irving, devoted the greater portion of his Exposition of the Book (4 vols. 12 mo, 1831) to the seven Epistles, and with no small measure of truth. They constitute the mystery of the church-condition, or “the things which are,” from the days of the prophet till it vanishes from the earth, the faithful to meet the coming Lord in the air, the faithless to sink into the corrupt or apostate evils that await His day. Of the church, as a recognized object on earth, we never hear again in the Revelation, till the visions of the future are closed (chap. 22: 6). In ver. 16 of the last chapter John is instructed to testify “these things,” that is, the sum of these inspired communications, in or for the churches. Also in ver. 17 the church symbolically is shown longing for Christ. But this leaves the fact untouched in all its force, that the outwardly prophetic visions follow the seven-fold picture of the church, till it is no more seen or heard of on earth.
This again is corroborated by the opening vision of “the things that must come to pass after these” in Rev. 4; 5 The scene is transferred from earth to heaven, where the prophet in the Spirit sees a throne set, and One sitting on it, Who is celebrated as Holy, Holy, Holy, the Lord God, the Almighty, which was, and which is, and which is to come—the Eternal. But an absolutely new element appears. Around the rainbow-encircled throne were four and twenty thrones, and upon them four and twenty elders sitting arrayed in white, and on their heads crowns of gold. Now, without going into debatable and delicate questions, these elders are admitted, with or without the four living creatures, to represent the heavenly redeemed. It was a new sight for Stephen to see at God's right hand the Son of man. Now in heaven John looks on the symbol of the glorified saints as the chiefs or heads of the royal and heavenly priesthood. Never before had man even in the Spirit beheld them there. Their number is complete, twenty-four elders answering to the four and twenty courses of the Levitical priesthood. Others are called on earth to suffer and blessed subsequently, as we learn (Rev. 6 to chap. 18.); some are seen to go up to heaven (chap. 11.); many sufferers are raised at the last moment, earlier or later in the Book (Rev. 20:44And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. (Revelation 20:4)) priests of God and of Christ, to share in His reign for a thousand years; but not one is ever added to the twenty-four elders, or chief priests.
The inference is irresistible. There can be no fall complement of the glorified Old and New Testament saints, as we see in the symbol of Rev. 4, till the Lord comes and gathers them to Himself on high. For though the O. T. saints could have none added after Christ's first advent, they are but disembodied till He comes again. Then alone the church His body will also be complete, both being changed in a moment, the dead and the living, into the likeness of His glory, as these demonstrably are here. For separate souls no more sit on thrones than angels do. Here the saints are crowned and glorified, which can only be after He comes for them. They re-appear expressly in Rev. 7; 11; 14, and in the early part of chap. 19. taking the deepest interest in what is done to God's glory; but they are to the last mention “the four and twenty elders,” whatever and wherever the blessing of others; for the book lets us also into no small variety of blessing to Come in God's mercy. But the blessed are others, after the church is taken to heaven, and presented separately.
Be it observed again, “out of the throne proceed lightnings, and voices and thunders” (ver. 5). It is not a throne of grace as in Heb. 4 to which the Christian approaches boldly now; nor yet is it the throne of millennial glory on high (Rev. 22:11And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. (Revelation 22:1)), out of which proceeds a river of water of life, bright as crystal. Most commentators interpret Rev. 4; 5 of the present period, whereas it is only applicable in reality to a transition yet future. The throne expresses such providential inflictions as fill the hour of temptation that is coming, after the church goes to meet the Lord before the appearing. So too the Spirit of God assumes henceforth from Rev. 4 a judicial character (“seven lamps of fire burning before the throne”); for it is no longer sovereign grace gathering into one, the body of Christ. Further, the sea before the throne is as it were “of glass” like unto crystal; for the elders no longer is the washing of water by the word needed, as once necessarily to have a part with Christ, whatever Peter foolishly thought. Theirs is now, not a purifying process, but fixed purity and in its highest form, “like unto crystal.” The difference of Rev. 15 makes the meaning all the more striking; for there also we see another company of saints at the close who come off victors over the Beast and over his image and over the number of his name, not by any means characterized as the elders, yet singularly honored, standing upon the sea of glass, and having harps of gold. But in their case the sea is as it were glass “mingled with fire.” These do pass through the fiery tribulation at the end of the age, whereas the saints symbolized by the elders were caught up before; even as the Lord had promised the faithful who were awaiting His advent, to keep them out of the hour of temptation which is about to come upon the whole habitable world (Rev. 3).
Certainly Irving was behind few and not more negligent than most Christian teachers, who allow in word the meaning of the elders and living creatures, and yet fail to hold it fast when they proceed to interpret the visions that follow. The consequence is the inevitable confusion which prevails. They almost all overlook that, instead of churches, Jewish or Gentile saints, no longer forming one body, are seen as the object of divine care but of the world's hatred throughout the external predictive visions of the Revelation. Hence in Rev. 6 the cry of the martyrs of the fifth seal takes us back from the grace of Stephen and the church of God as seen in the N. T. to the cry of the righteous in the Psalms and the O.T The reason is evident. The church must already be caught up, in order that the vision of Rev. 4; 5 should be verified. Hence the saints subsequently called in that hour of trial which succeeds have a relationship, and therefore experience and affections, according to those that preceded the actual heavenly parenthesis of grace, whilst Jews and Gentiles are gathered in unity. Beyond controversy the holy sufferers, that had been slain for the word of God and for the testimony which they held, are represented as crying aloud, “How long, O Sovereign Master, the holy and true, dost Thou not judge, and avenge our blood on those that dwell on the earth?” They are in unison with a God Who will then be dealing judicially; as we ought to be with His grace Who is now not only longsuffering but saving and blessing the lost gratuitously to the uttermost. It is a day of salvation; by-and-by it will be one of solemn judgments. Why confound them?
Rev. 7 affords ample and distinct evidence of the change which then will follow, anticipative though it is, as being an evident parenthesis between the sixth and seventh seals, answering to a similar case in the trumpets and the vials. Therein first is pledged a numbered company from each of the twelve tribes of Israel; as next the prophet sees a countless crowd from out of the Gentiles, both blessed, but quite distinct, and declared (of the latter at least) to come out of the great tribulation: in neither case the church, but by one of the elders explained, as far as the Gentile multitude is concerned (for the twelve tribes are so expressly described as to need no explanation), to be a special class of that still future period. The promised blessing snits, not heaven but the millennial earth, where the sealed of Israel are also to be. The church is exalted far beyond either.
In Rev. 8:3-53And another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given unto him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne. 4And the smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the angel's hand. 5And the angel took the censer, and filled it with fire of the altar, and cast it into the earth: and there were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake. (Revelation 8:3‑5) farther proof appears, indicating that all the saints then on earth are witnesses, not of heavenly grace, but of God's intervention in judgment. For the effect of their prayers is that the angelic high-priest cast from the altar fire on the earth; “and there were voices and thunders and lightnings and an earthquake:” the premonitions, not of the gospel of the grace of God, but of His displeasure and ways that express it unmistakably; and the trumpets follow without further delay.
The only allusion bearing on this in chap. ix. is the negative one of ver. 4. The men not sealed on their foreheads are to be smitten. There is not a trace of the church on earth. Other witnesses follow.
So in Rev. 10 it is God's prophetic testimony as to many peoples and nations and tongues and kings, but neither the gospel nor the church as now.
More than this is made plain in Rev. 11, where the witnesses of that day, clothed in sackcloth, have power to inflict judgments such as those of Moses and Elijah, till their brief term of testimony is completed when the Beast kills them. What can be more in contrast with the apostolic witnesses or of the true men in their day who heard God's beloved Son rather than the law and the prophets, however truly they believed both?
Rev. 12 opens what may be called the second volume of the prophecy, and shows a retrogressive vision. For assuredly we err if we fail to see that the seventh trumpet brings us in a general way to the end. Momentous matters which take us back in time had to be particularized; and the birth of the Man-child Who is to shepherd the nations with a rod of iron is mystically before us, in order to link on with God's future designs and ways in Israel. Hence it is not the bride, but the mother here, the clear symbol of Israel according to God before the day of deliverance shines. The remnant of her seed that keep the commandments of God and have the testimony, as it is here, are clearly Jewish, and not what we now know as Christian. This book is admirable not only to clear the eyes as to the future, but to enlarge hearts. The church, incomparably blessed as it is, does not cover all the plans that are before God or revealed in His word.
In Rev. 13 those who have their tabernacle in heaven are definitely distinguished (6, 7) from the saints on earth with whom the Beast makes war. Cf. ver. 8, 9, 10. Not a word hints at the assembly, Christ's body; but there are saints Jewish and Gentile, and separately viewed.
This is palpable in Rev. 14 where we hear of 144,000 with the Lamb on mount Zion, a remnant of Judah, yet more honored and more closely associated with the earth-rejected Christ than the sealed company out of all Israel in chap. 7. After this scene, the everlasting gospel goes out to those settled down on the earth, and to every nation and tribe and tongue and people, but no hint of baptism into one body as now in the church. We have afterward (12) the endurance of the saints noted who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus—this is indispensable, but the church nowhere on earth; and no wonder if caught up to heaven before the accomplishment of Rev. 4; 5 The blessedness from henceforth of those who die in the Lord is proclaimed (13); and immediately after the Son of man's appearing to judge, whether discriminatively, or unsparingly.
Then comes in Rev. 15 the vision of those who overcome the Beast and sing the song of Moses as well as of the Lamb, owning the King (not of saints but) of nations, as in Jer. 10:66Forasmuch as there is none like unto thee, O Lord; thou art great, and thy name is great in might. (Jeremiah 10:6). That these follow on earth the church gathered already to heaven has been fully shown.
In Rev. 16 the vials contemplate the awful hour of man's and Satan's worst evil with God's last judgments, before He sends the Lord in person to inflict vengeance, and then introduce the reign of righteousness and peace. Hence the Lord comes as a thief, unwelcome and unexpected; but blessed will he be who then watches, even if it be not the bridal joy of those caught up before.
Rev. 17 is a description which strictly has nothing to do with the three great series of judgments in the book to occupy the book from chap. 6. and onward, though we may gather from Rev. 14:88And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. (Revelation 14:8) and 16. 18 its relative place in the last of these dealings of God. But being descriptive it can show us Rome's corruption all through her lofty and false history, as Rev. 12 connected Christ in the past with God's purposes about Israel in the future. The blood of the saints and that of the witnesses of Jesus (6) seems purposely general, as we see most pointedly in Rev. 18:2424And in her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth. (Revelation 18:24). But it is certain that the one chapter speaks of the glorified saints coming with the Lord Jesus when He overcomes the Beast and the kings; and that the other gives a final call of God to His people, true in spirit ever since the Roman pseudo-Christian Babylon persecuted, but pointedly to the Israel of the future before judgment destroys. “My people” properly designates (not Christians but) the elect nation, and the execution of external widespread judgment is the purpose of the warning as usual. The heavenly redeemed have been already caught up and come with the Lamb.
Chap. 19. is another evidence of the same truth; and it is plain, full, and precious. Here the symbols of the twenty-four elders and of the four living creatures appear for the last time after the judgment of the great harlot, the corrupt pretender to that place of holy privilege which belonged to God's church Immediately follows the announcement of the Lamb's marriage-supper, and His wife has made herself ready, and the guests are called blessed, even if they have not her relationship, the O. T. saints, in glory as well as the church; to both of whom answers the uniting symbol of “the armies which were in heaven” that follow our Lord when He is seen, not as the Bridegroom though ever so, but for the while as the Warrior in righteousness. To this we must add the weighty fact that the martyred remnants of the earlier and later persecutions during the Apocalyptic hour of temptation are seen raised from the dead in time for the millennial reign in chap. 20: 4: “the souls of those that had been beheaded for the witness of Jesus and for the word of God (cf. 6: 8); and such as worshipped not the Beast nor his image, and received not the mark on their forehead and on their hand.” The O.T saints and the church had been already raised or changed, and had followed the Lord out of heaven in the glorified state. Indeed this state was made true ever since Rev. 4 showed them crowned and enthroned. Now they are seen on the millennial thrones, before those slain under the Apocalyptic visions join them in resurrection bodies for the reign with Christ.
If all this evidence be justly weighed, the Irvingite application of the Revelation is seen to be thus far a tissue of mistake. The sealed on their foreheads in chap. 7. are the “Israel of God” at a future epoch after the translation to the Father's house of the church as well as of the O.T. saints; when the same chapter next reveals an innumerable throng of saved Gentiles unmistakably distinct. This is enough to put to the root the allegorizing view of the twelve tribes in the preceding vision. But what they teach is worse than mere error of interpretation; it is a “strange doctrine,” which upsets a cardinal truth and standing privilege of God's church. For every member of Christ is and has been sealed of the Holy Ghost since Pentecost. “He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit.” “If any man hath not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.” “If then God gave unto them (Gentiles) the like gift (δωρέαν) as unto us (Jews), on our having believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God?” “By one Spirit were we all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether bond or free, and were all made to drink into one Spirit.” These scriptures suffice to prove the indispensable and universal character of that great gift for every Christian: without it one cannot be a member of Christ's body. To allow a constant line of such members since the twelve died, and to aver that sealing can only be by the imposition of apostolic hands, such as they and they only have in the Irvingite community, is obviously and unanswerably to contradict themselves.
Here their system is inexcusably astray. It is scriptural to affirm that the gift of the Spirit, and also gifts, were conferred for special ends by the imposition of apostolic hands. It is the grossest ignorance of scripture to overlook the fact that on still greater occasions the Spirit was given, even where an apostle was present, or all the apostles, without any such laying on of hands, as we have already shown; how much more where apostles were not present and could not be? How has so serious a heterodoxy pervaded these men? A snare of the enemy working on the pride or vanity of would-be apostles designated by modern false prophets. These apostles forsooth can seal, they only now: what follows logically, but that none are sealed outside Irvingism? none since the apostles till these men? That there is no mistake about their arrogant pretensions, built on a total misconception of the Scriptural doctrine and facts, will be plain to any upright Christian on reading the following statements from their most authoritative document, “The Great Testimony,” given in a footnote.