In resuming the subject of the coming again of the Lord Jesus, I shall take up in their order the various testimonies of the Gospels and the Acts, and the other books of the New Testament, to this wonderful event, so full of terror to the world, because of its rejection of Christ and the salvation which was wrought by His first coming, but so full of hope and triumph to those who, through grace, have been taught to love His appearing.
As an introductory remark it may be said, that the coming again of the Lord as presented in the Gospels and the Acts in its general aspect is connected with the establishment of His power on earth, in what is designated " the kingdom of the Son of man." There is a sphere of divine power and rule, which in Matthew is characteristically called " the kingdom of heaven," or the reign or rule of heaven; and in Luke, " the kingdom of God," or the reign or rule of God. In this sphere, whether for judgment or subsequent blessing-so largely dwelt on in Old Testament prophecy-the power of the Lord Jesus Christ will be exercised on His return. The Gospel of John, however, is an exception to this. In the opening of Christ's ministry in John, we do not find Him calling the nation of Israel to repentance, and announcing " the reign of heaven" as at hand; but the declaration of this truth, that " he came to his own and his own received him not. But as many as received him, to them gave he power (or privilege) to become the sons (or children) of God." In accordance with this, therefore, in the fourteenth chapter, which I do not now dwell upon, He speaks of His coming again in the sole and single aspect of coming to receive these children of God to Himself, that they may be with Him, where He is, in the place which He has prepared for them in His Father's house. This is not His rule or reign. It is the promised introduction to His own eternal home-the Father's house in heaven -by Jesus as the Son of God, of those whom His unbounded grace has made partakers of life and the privilege of sonship with Himself. It is this His people are called to look for. O infinite joy to find at last such a home, and such a welcome there!
But there are other aspects of his coming. In the mere reading of Matt. 24, which I now briefly notice, it is impossible, I think, not to see that our Lord's announced return here connects itself, and its results, especially with the people among whom He exercised His personal ministry in His first advent. It presents to us emphatically the sign of His coming as " the Son of man"-the title he assumed in Israel on the rejection of His claims as the Messiah-and " the end of the age." Now it is important to remember that Matt. 13, shows the judgment of the wicked, under the figure of the tares of the field, to be in " the end of the age." And it is also said in the same chapter, " the harvest is the end of the age." But this plainly, as the chapter skews, closes the history of Christianity upon earth, as commenced by the ministry of Christ. He Himself explains the parable thus, " He that sowed the good seed is the Son of man," Sze. So that we have thus the main statements of our chapter totally taken away from any supposed connection with the destruction of Jerusalem.
The question of the disciples, in the third verse, was, " Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of thy corning, and of the end of the age?" To this our Lord replies by presenting (as He only could, for time and eternity are alike within His view) the general course of things in the world, in the declaration that " nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom," &c., giving at the same time a specific warning against false Christs and false prophets. This is closed by the statement (in verse 14) that this gospel of the reign should be preached in all the habitable earth for a witness to all the nations, and then the end would come. From verse 15 and onward, it is plain that Jerusalem and Judea become the center of that scene upon which the coming of the Son of man breaks with the suddenness and vividness of the lightning's flash, which covers the whole horizon with its lurid gleam, and arrests the attention of every eye. This is not the symbol of hope and peace, like " the morning star," but of terror and of judgment. Moreover, the corning of " the Son of man in the clouds of heaven," links this event with that which is given in the prophet Daniel, chapter vii. 13, 14: " I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before him. And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed."
In consonance with this, our chapter presents the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place, and the shortening of the days of tribulation lest " no flesh -should be saved." That is, if they were not shortened all living men in the sphere of this " great tribulation" would be cut off. There is also the warning against false Christs and false prophets: and it should be remarked that this is a second warning of the like kind. The first evidently connected itself with what took place before the destruction of Jerusalem and at the time. The second (ver. 23, 24) as certainly looks on to the closing scenes, precursory of the coming of the Son of man " with power and great glory." Then there is the sign of vengeance taken upon an apostate people-the eagles gathered to the carcass. Fur-Other, there is the warning of the days of Noah and the judgment of the flood; and, finally, there is the gathering together of the elect from the four winds." This gathering, it is to be remarked, takes place after the coming of the Son of man is seen, at least where His glory is first displayed.
From verse 45 to the end of the chapter it is plain that our Lord's instructions are moral, and not local in their application, as before. But I quote the passage in full. " Who then is a faithful and wise servant, whom his lord hath made ruler over his household, to give them meat in due season? Blessed is that servant, whom his lord when he cometh shall find so doing. Verily I say unto you, That he shall make him ruler over all his goods. But and if that evil servant shall say in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming; and shall begin to smite his fellow-servants, and to eat and drink with the drunken; the lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not aware of, and shall cut him asunder, and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Here we have the Lord's committal of a trust to his servants for the care and instruction and ordering of His household, while He is away and until His return. This trust was to be exercised in the constant sense of responsibility to Christ as Lord, and could only be duly kept alive by the habitual expectation of his coming again. Then follows the blessing and reward of those who have faithfully and watchfully fulfilled this allotted trust; and the unexpected coming of the Lord in judgment upon those by whom it has been betrayed. But if this be the plain expression of the general thoughts of the passage, its own vividness and force will be returned to by every faithful heart. By its terms alone a chord is struck which no comment can ever reach.
Now it is apparently on the consummation of this scene of betrayed trust that our Lord introduces the parable of the ten virgins, and in just sequence. Few can have read chapter xxv. without having been arrested with the peculiar form of its commencement. " Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened," &e. It seems as if the contemplation of the ecclesiastical domination and worldliness, of which Christendom presents so striking an example, and to which this figurative language of our Lord has been, I believe, justly applied, afforded a starting-point for the parable by which it is followed. In the previous chapter we have seen unfaithfulness and the spirit and habits of the world traced back, by an unerring hand, to the thought of the heart which is thus expressed, " my lord delayeth his coming"-he will not come yet. Now the special object of the parable of the ten virgins is to recall what was the first animating hope and position of Christians, and to restore them again to it, after it had been long forgotten and practically lost. If this be a just conclusion, it will at once be felt that those who desire to be faithful to Christ have a more than ordinary interest in the right apprehension of this divine instruction. For, if the parable shows a long period in which the true hope of the Christian had lapsed and become practically extinct, it also presents the recovery of this hope, and the practical position connected with it, on the part of those who are truly Christ's, just on the eve of His return..
The history of Christianity, alas! is too faithfully sketched in this parable, to allow of mistake in its application. Christians mingled with an increasing mass of false profession, and gaining power and position in the world, in very early times were tempted to give up, in heart, at least, the vivid hope and expectation of the Lord's return, which characterized the Church in apostolic days. The power and wealth and corruption which flowed in upon the so-called church, and so abundantly generated the spirit of ecclesiastical and worldly ambition, under the Roman Caesars, obliterated from the minds of the professed followers of Christ the words that were addressed to the men of Galilee as they stood gazing up into heaven after their departed Lord-" 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." Nursed in security and ease, what had the Church then to do with the thought of the Lord's return? It could only be like a nightmare, to alarm and oppress the slumbers of people in such a case. But, as I have said, the parable glances back to the original call of Christians to be separate from the world while they waited for God's Son from heaven; and it looks forward also to a time when there shall be an awakening up from a state of supineness to resume the original position of preparedness and expectancy.
In the interpretation of the passage, however, it must be remembered that it is a similitude. It is a similitude of the reign of heaven-" Then shall the reign of heaven be likened," &c. The coming of the Lord is not here presented as the attractive hope of the Christian, but in its bearing on the duty of watchfulness and separation from the scene around. It is a figurative representation of what takes place in the history of Christianity, from the period of Christ's departure until all responsibility is closed by His return. That which is in prominence in the figure, is the preparation of persons to join a bridal procession at night, the moment it appears. But let us have the inimitable scene before us.
Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom. And five of them were wise, and five were foolish. They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them: but the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. While the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight there was a cry made, Behold, the bridegroom cometh, go ye out to meet him. Then all those virgins arose, and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said unto the wise, Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out. But the wise answered, saying, Not so, lest there be not enough for us and you, but go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves. And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came, and they that were ready, went in with him to the marriage, and the door was shut. Afterward came also the other virgins, saying, Lord, Lord, open to us. But he answered, and said, Verily I say unto you, I know you not. Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour." - (Matt. 25:1-131Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom. 2And five of them were wise, and five were foolish. 3They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them: 4But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. 5While the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept. 6And at midnight there was a cry made, Behold, the bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet him. 7Then all those virgins arose, and trimmed their lamps. 8And the foolish said unto the wise, Give us of your oil; for our lamps are gone out. 9But the wise answered, saying, Not so; lest there be not enough for us and you: but go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves. 10And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came; and they that were ready went in with him to the marriage: and the door was shut. 11Afterward came also the other virgins, saying, Lord, Lord, open to us. 12But he answered and said, Verily I say unto you, I know you not. 13Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of man cometh. (Matthew 25:1‑13).)
Now, though we know from other scriptures that Christ sustains the character of bridegroom, it is not the purpose of the parable to present him in that title here. Neither are Christians in it viewed in any corporate character as the bride. Other scriptures present that. But here the bride is not in the scene at all; nor the bridegroom, except in figure. What is presented, is Christians in their individual capacity, and especially in their being called out to separation in heart and purpose from the world, to be waiting in the expectation of Christ's return. True Christians are represented as having forgotten this (alas! how true in fact!), and the mass of those who are Christians only in profession have forgotten it too. There is, however, this distinction-true Christians have that within them which is divine, and answers at once and fully to the announcement of the Lord's return. But mere profession can in no sense answer to this. It may indeed supply people with notions and forms, and perhaps build them up in orthodox views; but it can never separate them from the world, or impart to them the love of Christ's appearing. The difference is expressed by those who " took their lamps and took no oil with them," and those who " took oil in their vessels with their lamps." In the ordinary history of profession, the two classes may have gone on together, but the parable teaches us that there will come a time when this will be no longer possible. The midnight cry may awaken all-but it is only those that are ready who go in with the bridegroom to the marriage. The others, alas! are awakened, but it is only to the consciousness of their own unpreparedness, and come but to find that the door is shut. While the solemn admonition to all is, " Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour."
It is not in the scope of the parable to present the catching up of the saints, nor even the joyous thought of the Father's house. These are the subjects of other revelations. Here it is that which comes within the range of " the reign of heaven."
Mark 13 gives the same general truths as those presented in Matt. 24; but it does not, in the object of the present paper, demand any special remark. It is well to observe, however, that no truth which we may have received, or position in which we may be placed by it, puts us beyond the application of the exhortation of the closing verses of the chapter-" Take ye heed, watch and pray: for ye know not when the time is. As a man taking a far journey, who left his house, and gave authority to his servants, and to every man his work, and commanded the porter to watch: watch ye therefore (for ye know not when the master of the house cometh, at even, or at midnight, or at the cockcrowing, or in the morning.) Lest cowing suddenly, he find you sleeping. And what I say unto you, I say unto all, Watch." (Mark 13:33-3733Take ye heed, watch and pray: for ye know not when the time is. 34For the Son of man is as a man taking a far journey, who left his house, and gave authority to his servants, and to every man his work, and commanded the porter to watch. 35Watch ye therefore: for ye know not when the master of the house cometh, at even, or at midnight, or at the cockcrowing, or in the morning: 36Lest coming suddenly he find you sleeping. 37And what I say unto you I say unto all, Watch. (Mark 13:33‑37).)
As presented in Luke 12, to which I now turn, it is the " kingdom of God," or reign of God, that gives its special character to the coming again of the Lord Jesus. In verse 31 The Lord places it before his disciples as the supreme object of their desire and care. If they had belonged to the world, in estrangement from the knowledge of a Father in heaven and His gracious care, whether Jew or Gentile, they must needs have other and inferior objects to seek. But His disciples through this revelation are delivered from this. To them he says, " But rather seek ye... the kingdom of God, and all these things shall be added to you." They would be secured by their Father's care to those whose hearts were given up to the accomplishment of His will. And the Lord adds, " Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell that ye have and give alms; provide yourselves bags which wax not old, a treasure in the heavens that faileth not, where no thief approacheth, neither moth corrupteth. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." Upon the kingdom of God their interests were to be henceforth concentrated, and to them it was their Father's good pleasure to give it. Their position in the world, as we see, was to be at once adjusted to this hope and expectation. Earthly possessions were no longer to be esteemed by them as their proper portion; but on the contrary the incumbrance of them was to be got rid of; and what was possessed was to be used alone and supremely in the objects of the Lord's beneficence; while they reserved to themselves an unfailing treasure in the heavens. This is a result that is instinctively reached wherever the paramount interests of that kingdom strongly seize upon the heart—for where the treasure is, there the heart will be. Such can have no part in this world but that of strangers in it, acknowledging allegiance and loyalty only to an absent Lord.
In verses 85, 36, are sketched in a brief and graphic manner what is the truthful moral position of those who are the expectants of this kingdom. " Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning, and ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their Lord, when he will return from the wedding, that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open unto him immediately." This figure is the same as that of Matt. 25, but varied thus, that here it is the master of the house returning from the wedding to his house, and the responsibility of his servants is not to go out to meet him, but to be in instant readiness to receive him when he comes. It is the beautiful and varied instruction of one who does not confound the different aspects in which his people are viewed. The application of the figure to His disciples, is given by the Lord in verses 37, 38. " Blessed are those servants, whom the Lord when he cometh, shall find watching; verily, I say unto you, that he shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meat, and will come forth and serve them. And if he shall come in the second watch, or come in the third watch, and find them so, blessed are those servants."
How the heart at once feels that the grace here presented is altogether and absolutely divine! Such a result of watching and service, if that service were far different from what we are conscious it is, might well seem strange to us. But it is not strange to his heart who has already sacrificed so much to gain us for Himself. And well sure we may be of this, that if His life of humiliation and sorrow has been so fruitful of love and grace to us, His life of glory will present Him still the same in unchanged affection, and will yield its correspondent results. But so it is. That which the blessed Lord presents to His disciples is this, that in His reign in glory, when the kingdom of God shall indeed be come, He will in a sense change places with them; so that as they had owned Him as their Lord and Master, and had watched and waited for Him, in a world that was contrary to them and Him, so now he will serve them in a sphere where all is correspondent to His will, and all subordinated to His infinite love. When will the day dawn and the shadows flee away?
I connect this 37th verse with what is presented by the Lord in chapter xxii. 18. " I will not drink of the fruit of the vine, until the kingdom of God shall come." He had said that He would not eat any more of the passover, which was the symbol of redemption, until its fulfillment in the kingdom of God, when He would again participate with His followers in its accomplished results. So also He would reserve His joy, of which the cup was the symbol, until He could share it with them in the kingdom of God, who, on earth, had been rejected for His sake. In Matt. 26:29,29But I say unto you, I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom. (Matthew 26:29) He also says," But I say unto you, I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom." This gives the other aspect of the kingdom, and corresponds with that which he taught his disciples to pray for:-" Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven." In this sphere will eventually be found the blessed results of earthly service and responsibility. Other scriptures open other relationships to Christ and other positions of those who are partakers of His grace, but here it is His relationship of Lord to His disciples and their responsibility toward Him, and their reward. This is especially seen in verses 41 to 48, where the responsibility of " the faithful and wise steward" is brought out; and who at his Lord's cowing is made ruler over all that he has. It presents also the punishment of the unfaithful servant who said in his heart " my lord delayeth his coming." It was no object to him that his lord should soon, or at all, return; but the reverse. It is true that he bore the name of servant, but he had carried himself like one who was a stranger to all subjection, and had used his lord's household as if it were his own, and made it only the sphere for the indulgence of his lusts and domination. Its moral application is, alas too plain to require being pointed out.
The instruction of Luke 17 concerning the coming of the Lord is introduced by the question of the Pharisees, verses 20, 21, " And when he was demanded of the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God should come, he answered them, and said, The kingdom of God cometh not with observation. Neither shall they say, Lo here, or lo there: for behold the kingdom of God is within you" (or among you). It was an answer appealing to their moral condition and responsibility. Here was the Lord in the midst of them, who had already proclaimed that kingdom, and whose character and works proclaimed it more fully; but they still remained ignorant of Himself and of the character of that reign about which they as ignorantly inquired. His doctrine had unfolded the principles of that reign, but they neither understood it nor received it. For, as Scripture declares, " the kingdom of God is not meat and drink [this they could have comprehended] but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost." These are the principles which characterize the kingdom or rule of God; and within the sphere of divine power and goodness so designated, they will be established by Christ. In the subsequent verses the same subject is opened to His disciples. " And he said unto the disciples, The days will come, when ye shall desire to see one of the days of the Son of man, and ye shall not see it. And they shall say to you, See here, or see there: go not after them, nor follow them. For as the lightning that lighteneth out of the one part under heaven, shined' unto the other part under heaven: so shall also the Son of man be in his day. But first must he suffer many things, and be rejected of this generation. And as it was in the days of Noe: so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark: and the flood came, and destroyed them all.
Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot, they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded: but the same day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all: even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed. In that day he which shall be upon the housetop, and his stuff in the house, let him not come down to take it away: and he that is in the field, let him likewise not return back. Remember Lot's wife. Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it, and whosoever shall lose his life, shall preserve it. I tell you, in that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left. Two women shall be grinding together; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Two men shall be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left. And they answered, and said unto him, Where, Lord? And he said unto them, Wheresoever the body is, thither will the eagles be gathered together."
(Ver. 22-37.) Here the condition of the world is especially presented, and the effect upon it of the revelation of the Son of man. It is the even course of the world's procedure, and the total discomfiture that the coming of the Lord will bring upon all that men are enjoying and pursuing; of which the judgment of the flood and of Sodom, from which Lot escaped as by fire, are the foreshadows. " Remember Lot's wife" has at least a moral warning for us all. It is a warning against a Christian's having his affections lingering in the world, upon which the coming of the Lord will bring certain judgment. And of this we may rest assured that there is nothing in the calling or hopes of Christians that legitimately takes them out of the range of such a warning.
We have advanced, as yet, but a, little way in the testimony of Scripture, but it is striking to observe how entirely it presents this event as bounding the horizon of the Christian, in whatever aspect he may be viewed. If he be ensnared by the world in the pursuit of its gains, its luxuries, or ambitions, so as to feel that he has a stake in its continuance and prosperity, this he is told will be suddenly and rudely broken up by the coming again of the Lord. If Christianity be looked at in its course on the earth, this, we are told, will be cut short by the coming of the Lord, resulting from the cry at midnight, " Behold the bridegroom cometh." Men may have other thoughts, and Christians too; but whether we contemplate the world or the Church; the destinies of Israel or the career of the nations; whether it he judgment or deliverance that is looked for-all will be met, and alone met, in its varied aspects, by the coming of the Lord. But the Christian alone, who is watching and waiting, can say, " Even so come, Lord Jesus."
" Lord Jesus! come
And take thy people home;
That all thy flock, so scatter'd here,
With thee in glory shall appear.
Lord Jesus come!"
(Continued from page 92.)
(To be continued)