“My Lord Delayeth His Coming.”
By Uriah Smith
If, says Christ, the evil servant shall say in his heart, My Lord delayeth his coming, the Lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and cut him asunder. Matt. 24: 48–51. According to this language, the evil servant is developed among those who are believers in the second coming of Christ. They believe, or profess to believe, that the Lord is coming; but his coming is delayed; we have been mistaken, they say, in supposing he would come so soon; it may be a long time yet before he appears; let us calculate a little more for this world, and secure some of the good things, the eatables and drinkables of this life. Thus the person seems to reason with himself who is falling into this snare of the enemy. We may, moreover, look for this class of persons to appear in the very concluding period of the church’s history. This follows inevitably from the fact that the Lord is to come upon that servant when he is not looking for him. Thus, up to the very point of the coming here brought to view, some will be looking for that event to a period much later than that of its actual occurrence, and so will be found unprepared. And are we not even now near enough to the coming of Christ to look for this class to appear? So we think. Beware, then, of this delusion. Do not put off the coming of that day. Because the Lord has not come so soon as was expected—this, instead of leading us to feel that it is still farther away, should rather deepen in our minds the impression that the day must be now at hand. Paul says that it is now “high time to awake out of sleep; for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.” The position for the church to occupy in this momentous hour is that set forth by the apostle in Heb. 10: 35–39; namely, not to cast away their confidence but to have patience till the promise is received, knowing that it is but a little while before He that shall come, will come and will not tarry (though he has seemed to tarry), and that now the just are to live by faith; but if any man draws back, he will lose the favor of God, and receive perdition as his doom. “But we,” continues the apostle, “are not of them who draw back unto perdition; but of them that believe to the saving of the soul.” Who compose this blessed we? Reader, are you one of the number? May it be so. U. S.