Studies in the Prophecies
“Babylon the Great”—No. 5
The gospel is God’s provision to save men from their sins. The great central fact in this provision for salvation from sin is the gift of the Son of God to take our flesh. Only divine wisdom could devise, and only divine love could execute, such a plan as this. This is “the gospel of God, which he promised afore through his prophets in the holy Scriptures, concerning his Son, who was born of the seed of David according to the flesh, who was declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead.” It was the purpose of God that man should be a temple for his indwelling, but sin interfered with this purpose. Through Christ in the flesh divinity and humanity are again united, and the original plan of the Creator is carried out. This great truth is set forth in many places in the Scriptures: “Behold, the4virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel; which is, being interpreted, God with us.” “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. . . . And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us (and we beheld his glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father), full of grace and truth.” “When the fulness of the time came, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, that he might redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.” “Have this mind in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: who, existing in the form of God, counted not the being on an equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, becoming in the likeness of men.” “And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness; he who was manifested in the flesh, justified in the spirit, seen of angels, preached among the nations, believed on in the world, received up in glory.” “In taking our nature, the Saviour has bound himself to humanity by a tie that is never to be broken. Through the eternal ages he is linked with us. ‘God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son.’ He gave him not only to bear our sins, and to die as our sacrifice; he gave him to the fallen race. To assure us of his immutable counsel of peace, God gave his only begotten Son to become one of the human family, forever to retain his human nature. This is the pledge that God will fulfil his word. ‘Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder.’ God has adopted human nature in the person of his Son, and has carried the same into the highest heaven. It is the ‘Son of man’ who shares the throne of the universe. It is the ‘Son of man’ whose name shall be called, ‘Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.’ The I AM is the Daysman between God and humanity, laying his hand upon both. He who is ‘holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners,’ is not ashamed to call us brethren. In Christ the family of earth and the family of heaven are bound together. Christ glorified is our brother. Heaven is enshrined in humanity, and humanity is enfolded in the bosom of Infinite Love.” Of those who had accepted this gospel of God manifest in the flesh, the apostle Paul wrote, ‘We are a temple of the living God; even as God said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.’ And each one who has experienced this blessing is able to say with the same apostle, ‘Christ liveth in me: and that life which I now live in the flesh I live in faith, the faith which is in the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself up for me.’ Of the church which is composed of such members as this the same apostle writes, ‘So then ye are no more strangers and sojourners, but ye are fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God, being built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the chief corner-stone; in whom each several building, fitly framed together, groweth into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom ye also are builded together for a habitation of God in the Spirit.’ This is the true gospel of the living temple. In direct contrast with this truth of the gospel of ‘Christ in you, the hope of glory,’ this gospel of salvation through faith in a Saviour who has shared our flesh and blood, this gospel of righteousness by faith, is the creed and teaching of Babylon. Babylon stands for another way to heaven. Babylon did not acknowledge the need of, or the necessity for, the atoning work of a divine Saviour, the eternal Son, who could transform a habitation of demons into a temple for the living God. ‘The principle that man can save himself by his own works, lay at the foundation of every heathen religion,’ and Babylon was the fountainhead of the teaching of righteousness by works. All this is bound up in that one statement which the wise men of Babylon made before King Nebuchadnezzar when they were urged under threat of death to tell him his dream and to make known its interpretation. They said, ‘It is a rare thing that the king requireth, and there is no other that can show it before the king, except the gods [or that God], whose dwelling is not with flesh.’ This is the creed of Babylon. It had no place for the mystery of godliness, and it knew nothing of the possibility of becoming the temple of the living God through that wondrous union of divinity and humanity which is the foundation experience of the gospel of Christ. But this denial of the very essence of Christianity was zealously promulgated by Babylon, so that the nations became drunken with the wine of her teaching, and her abominations filled the earth. Thus it was with ancient Babylon. We have already seen that ancient Babylon was a type and a prophecy of modern Babylon, the papacy. It is proper therefore to inquire whether we find in modern Babylon the same rejection of that vital principle of the gospel as we have found in ancient Babylon. In the creed of ancient Babylon the union of divinity with humanity was openly denied. In modern Babylon it is apparently accepted, but in reality it is rejected. The formal statement of the creed is found in what is called the dogma of the immaculate conception of the virgin Mary, which runs as follows: ‘By the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the blessed apostles Peter and John, and by our own authority, we declare, pronounce, and define, that the doctrine, which holds that the most blessed virgin Mary, in the first instant of her conception, by a special grace and privilege of Almighty God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Saviour of mankind, was preserved free from all stain of original sin, has been revealed by God, and, therefore, is to be firmly and steadfastly believed by all the faithful.’ Put into plain language, this dogma means that Mary the mother of Jesus was in her nature different from other women, and that her son Jesus took his human nature from an incorrupt human source instead of from a corrupt one, as do other members of the human family. It follows at once that Jesus was not made like unto his brethren in all things, and that although he took the flesh, yet he is still separated from us by a gulf which must be bridged in some other way. This is supplied in the papal creed by the intercession of saints, angels, and the blessed virgin herself. But the very fact that other intercessors are necessary in order to bring us into fellowship with the Saviour shows that modern Babylon does not teach the gospel of God manifest in the same flesh that we bear. In this respect her creed is but a variation of the creed of ancient Babylon, and the result is the same in both cases,—man is cut off from God. In this connection it may be well to mention that teaching which attempts to make every man the temple of God irrespective of the gift of Christ to take the flesh, or of any personal faith in his atoning work. While this doctrine seems to bring God very near, it really shuts the true God away from man, for the reason that only through Christ and the ministry of his Spirit does God dwell in humanity and make it his temple. Whatever it may appear to be, it is not in reality the gospel of God manifest in the flesh, and it just as truly leaves man without a barrier against sin as do the creeds of both ancient and modern Babylon. The alpha of all this teaching may seem plausible, and even pleasing, to the natural heart, but the omega will be seen when Babylon ‘is become a habitation of demons, and a hold of every unclean spirit, and a hold of every unclean and hateful bird.’ If the God of heaven does not dwell in the flesh, the god of this world will ultimately take complete possession, and the ruin will be complete. It is therefore necessary5to emphasize the everlasting gospel of the Word made flesh. In this experience is the barrier against sin.