The Master’s Coming by Charles L. Taylor

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Dec 6, 1910

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 37, No. 48.

The Master’s Coming

By Charles L. Taylor

VI. What His Coming Will Mean to His Own Children

BLESSED hope! Jesus will come again! The hope of a coming Redeemer has been the joy, and comfort, and strength, and blessing not of one age, nor of two, nor of three, but of all ages since man was placed upon earth.

Could we summon from the tomb the patriarchs, the prophets, the apostles; could we bring from slumber the fathers, the mothers, the children, of ancient days; were it possible to call forth the army of martyred ones; were all these united, as they by and by will be, in one innumerable company, and were they asked to express the great truth which through life enabled them to be joyful, faithful, victorious,—there would go up from the mighty host in thunder tones, the wonderful testimony uttered by Job so long ago: “I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that He shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: and tho after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold.” Job 19:25-27.

The Gateway to Immortality

Through God’s revelation the gateway to the eternal world has always been known as the second coming of the Lord Jesus. Not one single Bible character ever expressed any other thought. Righteous men had no thought of entering upon their reward at death; but instead, their faith grasped the promise of a coming Life-giver, who should break the power of death, and bring them forth from the tomb.

This was the faith of Abraham. Of him it is written, “By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac: and he that had received the promises offered up his only-begotten Son, . . . accounting that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead; from whence also he received him in a figure.” Heb. 11:17-19.

This was also the faith of Moses. Said Jesus, “Now that the dead are raised, even Moses showed at the bush, when he calleth the Lord the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” Luke 20:37. Moses understood the great plan of the resurrection; and seeing the day when all God’s children should rise from their beds of dust, he saw them living unto God, and thus spoke of them.

And what a remarkably clear testimony was borne to King David by the wise woman of Tekoa. “We must needs die,” she said, “and are as water spilt on the ground, which can not be gathered up again; neither doth God respect any person: yet doth He devise means, that His banished be not expelled from Him.” 2 Sam. 14:14. The “means” which God had devised was the resurrection of Jesus Christ, which opened the tomb for all who would believe.

The Resurrection-Hope

The resurrection at the second advent was the blessed hope of the psalmist. Ps. 17:15. Isaiah, “the Gospel prophet,” believed likewise. His clear, ringing message is worthy our careful study. “Thy dead men shall live,” he declared, “together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead.” Isa. 26:19. “He will swallow up death in victory; . . . and it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for Him, and He will save us: this is the Lord; we have waited for Him, we will be glad and rejoice in His salvation.” Isa. 25:8, 9. Yes, death should be swallowed up, and the dead made to live in that glory day of His coming, the day for which the church had waited.

Ezekiel looked to the resurrection (Eze. 37:12-14), Daniel prophesied regarding it (Dan. 12:1, 2), Hosea foresaw it (Hosea 13:14), and Jeremiah, through prophetic message, ministered comfort to the mothers of Israel (Jer. 31:15-17).

A Great Future Event

That the children of God had an intelligent faith, that they understood the time of the resurrection to be identical with that of the Messiah’s coming, is beautifully delineated in the words of Martha to Jesus When the Saviour said, “Thy brother shall rise again,” Martha replied, saying, “I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day.” John 11:23, 24. And Martha was only one of that people who for ages had cherished the same hope.

The great truth of the resurrection and the second advent was most fully brought home to the hearts of men in apostolic days. It was the very crux of the teaching and preaching of God’s chosen servants. See Acts 2:24, 33; 3:15; 4:2, 10; 10:40, etc. It was the personal hope of the apostle to the Gentiles (Acts 24:15); and when he would appeal to the king in behalf of his faith and hope, the uppermost thought of his anxious heart was, “Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you, that God should raise the dead?” Acts 26:6-8.

How Did It Originate?

Dear reader, right here ask your own heart these questions: Whence came this belief to men? How did it originate? And why so long perpetuated? Only one answer to the questions can be found; namely, that God Himself, at the very first, planted it in man’s heart, and by divine revelation has repeatedly brought it home to his soul to comfort and to encourage him, and to cause him to hope, to trust, to endure to the end. It is a path of life as old as the world, and one that God’s peculiar people will travel until time is finished. Moreover, it is a blessed hope, that will know no disappointment either in life or in death.

It was no new truth, no new promise, that Jesus gave to His disciples when He was about to leave them. John 14:1-3. Glorious and full and clear tho it was, yet, after all, it was only an iteration of summed-up Scripture promises, and to the sorrowing believers should have been quickly comprehended and received. But certainly Jesus gave them to understand that His coming again was to them of the supremest importance. To be with Him, to enjoy the inestimable privilege of life in His unending kingdom, depended altogether upon His personal return to earth. “I will come again,” He said, “that where I am, there ye may be also.”

What It Means

The coming of the Lord Jesus means, therefore, the final gathering of the saints of all ages. “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.” 1 Thess. 4:16. The voice that sounds from out the vaulted dome of ether is the voice of roll-call. By the King Himself the name of every faithful child of God, from that of Abel to the last one who surrendered life, is read from that wonderful Book of Life; and as the name is called, the guardian angel that watched over and cared for the soul through its earthly pilgrimage, speeds like lightning flash from the Master’s side to receive the resurrected one as he comes forth from his place of long sleep.

What a wonderful day that will be! In the glad company that respond to the call of the Author of life are all who have died in the faith of the Son of God. There are Abel, Adam, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Samuel, David, Peter, Paul; there are saints of all ages, all climes, all nations; there are young and old, black and white, free and bond; there are children and parents, brothers and sisters, lovers and friends; there are preachers, teachers, and learners; there are philosophers, schoolmen, and illiterates; there are men, women, and children from all states, all persuasions, all vocations. But now they all know the Christ, and in Him they all stand complete in holiness, happiness, harmlessness.

A Mighty Contrast

By open graves they stand for an instant, as between two great worlds. Behind them lies the world that was,—the world of sin, of sorrow, of affliction, of sickness, of death. Before them lies the world to come,—the world of holiness, of joy, of blessing, of health, of eternal life. But the world that was, is a thing of an absolute past, and is now forgotten as the redeemed stand face to face with the mighty and blessed realities of the new kingdom. They now see the King in His beauty. Isa. 33:17. They are like Him. 1 John 3:2. They are clothed with incorruptibility (1 Cor. 15:52), and fashioned after His own glorious image. Phil. 3:20, 21. Sickness is forever gone. Isa. 33:24. And bidding farewell to the narrow prisons which for days, or years, or perhaps centuries have held them, they join their angel escorts to meet their Lord in the skies, and as they ascend they sing the glad song of victory over death and the grave. 1 Cor. 15:55.

Then comes another triumph in the work of man’s redemption. Said the apostle, “Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.” 1 Thess. 4:17. The coming of the Lord was resurrection to the dead; now it is translation to the living. They are changed from mortality to immortality “in the twinkling of an eye.” 1 Cor. 15:51, 52. Like Enoch and Elijah, they are taken without seeing death. Filled with the buoyancy of Spirit life, they find themselves freed from the laws which bind matter to matter, and with angel body-guard they too ascend the skies and join the loved and the lost who have come forth from death’s charnel-house.

“In My Father’s house are many mansions,” said Jesus. To those mansions the redeemed now find their glad way. With the glorified Son of Man at their head, the host of the saved come to their long lost home, the city of God. In tones of command, but rich with heavenly melody, the Saviour speaks, saying, “Lift up your heads, O ye gates; and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors; and the King of Glory shall come in” (Ps. 24:7), and when in answer to His word an angel hand throws back the pearly gates upon their glittering hinges, He enters with His ransomed into rest.

Beautiful story! Blessed hope!

Ah, there are untold worlds of light and blessing in the truth of the Master’s coming. “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,” its precious realities; but to the faithful ones God reveals them by His Spirit. 1 Cor. 2:9, 10. Like the apostle Paul, let us enter so fully into its blessedness, that even while in the very shade of death we may be able to say, “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day.” 2 Tim. 4:7, 8.

May He indeed come quickly, and may it indeed be your happy lot, dear friend, to be ready to welcome Him when He appears.

— —