WITH A SHOUT by H. A. St. John

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Feb 4, 1903

WITH A SHOUT.

By H. A. St. John

The walls of Jericho went down with a shout. The hosts of Israel went up with a shout, and took the city. That was a shout that meant something; it was a shout of triumph; for God told the people to shout. When God puts the shout into a person, or a people, it is no empty sound, but a genuine exclamation of praise to God for a great victory achieved, or about to be achieved.

When Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a colt followed by a vast multitude of people, the Lord said to them by the Spirit of prophecy long before, and by His Spirit at the time, “Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem; behold thy King cometh unto thee.” Does the reader say that was not a triumph, but a signal defeat, for Christ was not made King then, but crucified by His bitterest enemies? Very true. He was crucified, but His crucifixion was His real coronation. When Jesus on the cross cried with a loud voice, “It is finished,” it was the grandest shout of triumph ever heard in the universe of God since the time when all the sons of God shouted for joy, when the same Jesus announced that “the foundations of the earth” were laid. The disciples did not understand the matter. If they had, instead of being disappointed, they would have been shouting happy when Jesus triumphed over the powers of darkness on Calvary’s cross. Satan understood the significance of the triumphant death of Christ far better than the disciples; for he well knew that it sealed the doom of his principles, his kingdom, and himself. When Jesus cried, “It is finished,” shouts of joy went through all Heaven and all the unfallen worlds of God’s creation.

Not many days after the victory of the cross, Jesus went up to Heaven with a shout. That meant victory over death forever, for Himself, and finally, a like victory over the same last enemy of man for all His true disciples. By Jesus’ victory then achieved, the same glorious and eternal victory over all foes was assured to all His true followers.

And when Jesus comes to earth the second time, when the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven, it will be “with a shout, with the voice of the Archangel, and the trump of God.” The time will then have come when the Lord of glory will unlock the prison-house of death, loose His prisoners homeward, forever break the bands of mortality and death, change the vile bodies of His children, and fashion them like unto His own glorious body. He then beholds “the travail of His soul,” victors over every foe, to ever dwell in His presence, to behold and show His glory eternally. ’Tis no wonder, then, that He comes “with a shout.” Reader, will you shout then? Will you join in that everlasting song of triumph? Jesus triumphed, that you might triumph with Him. H. A. St. JOHN.