PREPARATION TO MEET THE SON OF MAN AT HIS COMING.
“WATCH ye therefore and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man.” Luke. The Lord had previously admonished his disciples to the same import. But having for a moment left the thread of his exhortation, for the purpose of adding a fact that was well calculated to deepen the impression which he desired to produce, he now resumes his exhortation to watchfulness and prayer. But at this point he assigns the ultimate object of faithfulness; that we may be accounted worthy to escape the predicted evils, and to stand before the Son of man. Here several things should impress us: 1. That watchfulness and prayer are indispensable to a full preparation for the day of the Lord. A spirit of devotion and sobriety, carried into appropriate practice, is the great essential in our present duty. And this should be secured in view of the fact that we are all hastening to meet the day of the Lord Jesus. 2. It is only in this way that we can escape the calamities which, at the coming of Christ shall be visited upon the unprepared. What these will be, the Scriptures have sufficiently revealed. The previous predictions of Christ, and the parables following, set forth these calamities in a manner which would almost shake the world if they had not been so generally Jerusalemized away, that they are read with little or no impression that they are intended for us, as well as for the ancients; that our destiny is to be thus affected and determined. Who can calculate the tremendous consequences of stripping this portion of the divine word of all its direct, literal, and intended bearing upon the millions who are hastening to meet the great day, with almost no conception of its nature and reality? 3. It is by obedience to these directions that we may expect, through grace, to stand before the Son of man. “The ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.” They shall be “punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power, when he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believe in that day.” This will be the portion of the wicked; and they will not “love his appearing.” But the righteous shall “stand in the day of judgment;” they shall receive “a crown of righteousness” at “that day.” 2 Tim. iv, 8. Then the pious dead “shall behold his face in righteousness;” they “shall be satisfied when” they “awake in his likeness.” For in his presence is fullness of joy, and at his right hand are pleasures for evermore. “Wherefore, beloved, seeing ye look for such things, be diligent, that ye may be found of him in peace, without spot and blameless.” It is esteemed a great privilege to stand before kings; but it will be a still greater to “stand before the Son of man.” For when he cometh, he will come as “King of kings, and Lord of lords.” “But as the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. For as in those days that were before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark; and knew not until the flood came and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. Matt. xxiv, 37–39. Terrible history! Terrible prediction! But the prophecy will prove to be as true as the history. The world had been duly warned of the threatening deluge; but they heeded it not. They continued to live as they had lived; contracting marriages, celebrating marriages, giving and enjoying festivities until the day that Noe entered into the ark. These things are not mentioned by the Saviour on account of their being necessarily wrong, but to show how little the doomed world heeded the warnings of “the preacher of righteousness,” or anticipated so sad, so sudden and terrible a catastrophe as was long impending over them. The reason was, they knew not what was about to burst upon them, and forever terminate their plans and pleasures. The treasured up wrath that was to drown a teeming world gave no outward indications of either its nearness or severity. For aught that appears to the contrary, the sun that morning rose as smilingly, the winds breathed as refreshingly, the waters flowed as peacefully, the birds sung as cheerily,107the dance led forth as merrily, as ever since the birth-day of sin. There were happy bridegrooms and brides; there were proud fathers and mothers; there were rejoicing sisters and brothers; there were admiring lovers; there were jealous rivals; there were lords in state, and servants in waiting; there were rich counting over their treasures; there were thieves intent on robbing; there were lecherous in search of victims. In a word, a world in wickedness; warned, but heedless; doomed, but reckless; rushing on to meet its ruin. So shall also the coming of the Son of man be. The day of God will come upon the unexpecting world, as a snare upon the unwary game, that knows not its danger until it is too late to escape