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Notes on Important Eras of Fulfilling Prophecy

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Aug 15, 1912

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 89, No. 33.

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Notes on Important Eras of Fulfilling Prophecy

By W. A. S.

The Hand of God in History — No. 18

Notes on Important Eras of Fulfilling Prophecy

The Time of the End

“OUT of the darkness of night The world rolls into light; It is daybreak everywhere.”
Again and again the Lord had caused to pass before Daniel in vision the course of human history to the end of time. The prophet had watched the panorama of the rise and fall of empires, and had groaned in spirit as he was shown the great apostasy warring against the truth. But at the end of each prophetic outline there appeared the glorious assurance of the final triumph of the right.
As Daniel was about to lay down the pen that had traced these views of future events, the word of the Lord came to him, saying:—
“But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.” Dan. 12: 4.
Thus Inspiration announced the opening of a new era of enlightenment when “the time of the end” should come.
Those in ancient times who looked for “that blessed hope,” the second coming of Christ, had to look forward toward it through the dark night of apostasy and trial. The apostle Paul must needs write to the believers at Thessalonica: “That day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed.” 2 Thess. 2: 3.
It was a wonderful time in the pilgrimage of the people of God through this world when the believers could see the long period of papal supremacy at last behind their backs, and a new light dawning. Then began the time of the end, the latter days indeed, when the prophetic book was to be unsealed, and light and knowledge spread abroad over the world.
It is clear that with the close of the period of papal supremacy the world entered upon this “time of the end.” In every outline of prophecy the events of the latter days are represented as beginning to follow on directly after the prophetic period of the 1260 years. Christ’s outline in Matthew 24 so represents it. He refers to the time of “great tribulation” to the church, and says:—
“Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken: and then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.”
In the eleventh of Daniel the period of persecution is mentioned as reaching to “the time of the end.” After predicting the setting up of the apostasy, the prophecy describes the persecution of the people of God:—
“They shall fall by the sword, and by flame, by captivity, and by spoil, many days. . . . And some of them of understanding shall fall, to try them, and to purge, and to make them white, even to the time of the end: because it is yet for a time appointed.” Verses 33-35.
Thus the age following the appointed period of persecution, the 1260 years of papal supremacy, is given the specific designation of “the time of the end.”
“The time of the end,” then, began in the last decade of the eighteenth century. The prophetic period closed amid the scenes of the French Revolution, culminating in that stroke by the sword of France at Rome, in 1798, advertising to the world that the Papacy had received a “deadly wound.”
And if the last decade of the eighteenth century closed one long and dark chapter in the history, it opened a new and brighter one, a chapter of fulfilling signs of the coming of the Lord. To the new era then opening belong the angel’s words to Daniel, which we repeat:—
“Shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.”
It is a remarkable declaration; and in a remarkable way the events centering around the opening years of “the time of the end” bear witness to a divine hand very definitely moving forward the cause of truth on earth in harmony with the voice of the prophecy.
There has come in this new era exactly what the angel said would come:—
1. An unsealing of the book of prophecy—a special opening up of prophetic truths to the understanding.
2. A running (or searching) to and fro among men—a world-wide awakening, with great diffusion of the light of the Word, and increase of knowledge.
It is not sufficient to look upon the fulfilments of prophecy simply as proofs of the inspiration of the Scriptures written in ancient times. It is true that the testimony of history to the fulfilment of prophecy is an infallible proof that holy men of old spoke by the Holy Ghost. But the great aim of the prophecies is to reveal the course of development on earth in the great controversy between truth and error, to forewarn and teach concerning present duties and dangers, and to cause men to see that the same God who spoke to the prophets so long ago is still, in every time, the living God, doing things on earth before men’s eyes; so that all may find in him a present helper and savior.
“I am God,” he says, “and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand. . . . I have spoken it, I will also bring it to pass; I have purposed it, I will also do it.” Isa. 46: 9-11.
In the study of every crisis in the history of fulfilling prophecy we are watching the living God doing things on earth. And now, with the coming of the last great era that is to reach to the end, we shall see the arm of the Lord indeed made bare in the sight of all the nations. Thank God for the “sure word of prophecy;whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day-star arise in your hearts.”
W. A. S.