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The Advent Doctrine

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Pacific Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Oakland, California · Jan 23, 1879

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 5, No. 4.

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The Advent Doctrine.

THE doctrine of the advent is being pretty well advertised. Even its enemies will not let it rest, and the people are becoming aware of its importance. A writer in the New York Evangelist, signing himself "Westminster," because, we suppose, he considers himself the defender of the "Confession," insists that it is heresy to believe in the second advent near, and that all who so believe, or who deny the hope of the conversion of the world, shall be disciplined as heretical, and excommunicated! But the Evangelist corrects his error in the following style:—
"Let it be clearly understood, that the real objection made to Premillennial views, is not against their interpretation of the prophetic Scriptures on the fact and nature of the Millennium; but against making 'the great crisis' to be expected the second advent.' Say these modern interpreters of the Standards, the world must first be converted before Christ will come. Do our Standards teach this? Luther pronounced this notion 'a falsehood forged by Satan, and a delusion.' Nor is it found in the Standards of any of the churches of the Reformation.
Calvin, who repudiates a Millennium, says:— 'The Scriptures uniformly command us to look forward with eager expectation to the coming of Christ,' and commenting on Matt. 24:30, he says 'There is no reason why any person should expect the conversion of the world.'
"John Knox in his letter to the faithful in London, on the Redeemer's advent, asks 'Has not the Lord Jesus carried up our flesh into heaven? and shall he not return? We know he shall return, and that with expedition.' And does not our Confession teach that Christ's second coming is always to be watched for, and because it is always imminent? . In the 'Directory for Worship' of the Church in Scotland, whose Standards are the same as ours, ministers are taught to pray for 'the fall of Antichrist, and the hastening of the second coming of our Lord, and for a 'watching for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.'"