BEHOLD, I COME QUICKLY by E. E. Gardner

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · May 21, 1902

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 28, No. 21.

“BEHOLD, I COME QUICKLY.”

By E. E. Gardner

Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of this coming. Jude 14, 15. Job, looking forward from his night of suffering, exclaimed, “For I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that He shall stand at the latter day upon the earth.” Ch. 19:25. Likewise the psalmist prophesied, saying, “Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence. . . . He shall call to the heavens from above, and to the earth, that He may judge His people.” Ps. 50:3, 4.

The doctrine of the second advent is the key-note of Inspiration. That the dark shadow of sin should not forever obscure hope’s pathway, the children of faith have seen bright visions of a return to Eden, and a healing of the wounds of sin. The ushering in of the reign of righteousness, and the “restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began,” has been an inspiration to the true followers of Christ in every generation.

But why have not the faithful in the earlier ages, so far distant from this event, simply been instructed in the way of righteousness, and exhorted to be “faithful unto death”? Why has this hope, so long deferred, and which so many have desired in their day, been so faithfully kept before generations that must die, and for their part await the resurrection many centuries in the future? Is it not that when that day breaks every heir to immortality may open eyes on a scene familiar and long expected? God’s people will not then be amazed at what they behold, but they will be prepared to unite in the exclamation, “Lo, this is our God; we have waited for Him, and He will save us; this is the Lord; we have waited for Him, we will be glad and rejoice in His salvation.” Isa. 25:9.

To all who have died, the great event of Christ’s second coming will be their next conscious moment. Heb. 9:27, 28. This truth adds force to the Saviour’s declaration, “Behold, I come quickly.” For will not that be the realization of every soul who is redeemed? Every believer looks forward hopefully to the great consummation, and has only to wait the brief span of human life for the fulfilment so far as his consciousness is concerned. To every one who hears His voice at His second advent, notwithstanding he may have been waiting in the grave thousands of years, it will seem that this event has immediately followed his last earthly scenes.

So the reign of sin, until the long hoped-for dawn of the perfect day, will not be a tedious, wearisome waiting time to any of our race. But to each one it will seem that after living this life, which “appeareth for a little time,” and then “vanisheth away,” the next real experience, the next moment in his existence, is the change from corruption to incorruption, from the dusty beds of earthly graves to the glittering mansions of the kingdom of glory.

Many wonder that the Lord permits Satan and his followers to harass and persecute the righteous on earth so long; and to look back over our world’s history it seems a long period. But not so to Him who comprehends eternity. For the psalmist says, “A thousand years in Thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.” Ps. 90:4–6; 2 Peter 3:8–15.

To the righteous, from the death of Abel to the voice of the Archangel which wakes the sleeping saints, the waiting period is a brief one—only this short lifetime.

Let none of us who have the assurance that we live in the last generation say, “My Lord delayeth His coming,” but rather, “Even so; come, Lord Jesus.” E. E. GARDNER.

Cresco, Iowa.