CONDITION OF THE WORLD AND CHURCH.
By R. F. Cottrell
It is admitted on all hands that the world is in a terrible state of wickedness. And this state of things is growing worse and worse. And what hope of reformation is there, while the professed church looks on with indifference, seeing, unless they are blind, the world, according to the prediction of our Saviour, as it was in the days of Noah, and does not raise the voice of warning to flee from the wrath to come! nay, but even covets to be in darkness and not to realize that the day of the Lord is about to come upon them as a thief. They propose to attend to the practical part of religion, and let the prophecies alone; which is equivalent to having a form of godliness, denying the power—the very position the unbelieving Jews occupied at the first advent of Christ, and which caused their rejection of God. And is there not learning with the ministry of these days? And do not learned ministers know that such a line of prophecy as that of Dan. 7, and being so clearly interpreted, is fulfilled in every particular but the very last—the utter destruction of the Antichristian, papal power, and of the body of the beast itself, and the establishment of the everlasting kingdom of God under the whole heavens? Do they not see that Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome, have all had their day of rule; that Rome has been divided into ten kingdoms, that the papacy arose among them, before whom three fell, and that its full time of 1260 years is run out, and its dominion is gone and its influence being consumed; and nothing is left but its destruction by the brightness of Christ's coming? 2 Thess. 2. And professing to be the teachers of the people in divine truth, can they hope to escape the coming wrath, and be guiltless of the blood of souls, while they do not, and will not, warn the people of impending danger, but oppose every effort in that direction? Wo! to Babylon; she is fallen, and about to be destroyed.
R. F. COTTRELL.