A GREAT LITERAL PROPHECY.
MOSES, the type of Christ more emphatically than any other prophet, (Deut. 18:15-19, compare with Num. 12:6-8) left no symbolical prophecy. He foretold many things in regard to the Jews and their future in Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy528, and these things have been literally fulfilled. Even so the Prophet like unto Moses, Jesus, left no symbolic prophecy. He foretold many things, but they were tremendously literal. Among these predictions was His great discourse, answering the threefold question of His disciples: "When shall these things [the destruction of the temple] be? and what shall be the sign of Thy coming, and of the end of the world [age]?" Matt. 24:3. Portions of this great answer of our Lord are found in each of the synoptical Gospels, Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21—but not all is given in any one. All three bring out with great emphasis some portions of His instruction, but all are needed in order to grasp the fulness of its meaning. Matthew 24 is the fullest account. We shall take that as the basis of our study, using the American Standard Revised version. If our quotations are sometimes unlike Matthew, it will be because we have used Mark or Luke. The disciples may have had, and doubtless did have, vague ideas of the end of the age and the Master's second coming. Evidently they connected both of these with the destruction of the temple. However this may be, our Lord had no such misapprehension of these events; while He regarded their inquiries, He did not confirm their wrong views. First of all let it be noted that Jesus does not rebuke the questioners. He did not even intimate that other questions would be more proper or pertinent, or profitable. On the other hand He clearly indicates that the disciples need instruction lest they should be deceived, and this instruction He proceeds to give. The answer of the Master in Matthew naturally divides into four sections as follows:
I. Events to occur before the consummation of the age. Verses 4-14.
II. From the destruction of Jerusalem forward to the second coming of Christ. Verses 15-28.
III. Signs, specific and definite, which should precede His second coming. Verses 29-31.
IV. Practical lessons and exhortations to His people. Verses 32-51. Let us study these sections in detail as far as space will permit, and learn what our Lord has Himself told us. I. The Consummation of the Age.
In this we have a series of events, occurring all through the Christian era, generally increasing in frequency toward its close. 1. False Christs.—"Many shall come in My name saying, I am the Christ, and shall lead many astray." After the crucifixion they multiplied rapidly. Buck's Theological Dictionary gives a list of twenty-four false leaders and messiahs between the time of the destruction of Jerusalem and the year 1682. As the result of these delusions and deluders, hundreds of thousands perished. If the words of our Lord and the character of His work had been regarded, no one would have been deceived by these impostors. They will increase again as the end draws near. Verse 11. 2. Wars and Rumors of Wars.—Luke adds, "and tumults." "See that ye be not troubled; for these things must needs come to pass, but the end is not yet." These are not precursors of His coming, but characteristics of the age. "Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom." One thought here. We are sometimes told that all the events of Matthew 24 occurred before the destruction of Jerusalem. But between our Lord's words and the destruction of Jerusalem it could not be said that there were wars and rumors of wars, and nation and kingdom against nation and kingdom; for the Roman empire during that period ruled the world. But from the weakening of imperial Rome to the present time all these things have been plenarily fulfilled, till the world is one vast arsenal and the sea a harbor for the world's navies. 3. Famines.—History is a record of our Lord's prophecy: "There shall be famines." And with famine stalks pestilence and sorrow and travail. Uncounted millions have died from hunger and starvation as the slow centuries tolled their time. Witness the famines and plagues which devastated Europe in the middle ages and the millions of India who have perished in the last few years. One graveyard in London in 1345 contained 50,000; in Venice the same year 100,000 died of the "Black Death;" the same in Florence; in Oriental nations 20,000,000. And so the gruesome record could be multiplied. There have been and are to-day "famines." 4. "Earthquakes."—"There shall be . . . earthquakes in divers places, and there shall be terrors, and great signs." We need not rehearse the tale. Earthquakes have multiplied with the centuries. The earth has waxed old like a garment." Islands have sunk and risen; whole cities and provinces have been ruined, and thousands upon thousands destroyed by convulsions seismological. Meteorological disturbances, producing storm, tempest, hurricane, tornado, cyclone, tidal wave, need not be numbered here. All have heard of them; some have experienced their awful power. All these signs are the beginning of the birth-pangs of the earth which culminate in the end of this sore-travailing age. 5. "Tribulation."—The persecuting, bruising, crushing, pressing of God's people till the perfume is exhaled and the good wine pressed out. From nation to nation, from city to city, from synagog and church to prison, the suffering ones of God have been prosecuted, have been hunted and hounded and haled. Kinsfolk and companions, parents and brethren, have become enemies to prosecute instead of friends to comfort and shield, till it seemed that even God had forgotten. But these very trials have scattered the Gospel seed; the ashes of martyrs have enriched the soil; the blood of souls has watered the seed, and God has used the seeming adversity of His children to bring the testimony of Christ before kings and rulers. But the promise is, even tho killed of men, "not a hair of your head shall perish." The Promisor is the Author of life, and His power reaches beyond the martyr's pyre or the cruel grave. 6. Multiplied Iniquity.—Do we need to say that the fulfilment of this sign is clearly evident in the world to-day? As never before we read of graft and fraud and licentiousness and every vice and crime in the catalog, in all circles, where civilization has reached its highest mark, in our own land, and often in professedly-religious circles. These are the words of Jesus: "And because iniquity shall be multiplied, the love of the many shall wax cold. But he that endureth to the end, the same shall be saved." We know the prediction to be true. We know that this is a time which demands patient endurance. Every day witnesses sad falls from grace through the overwhelming influence of abounding worldliness and iniquity. 7. Evangelization of the World.—Not its conversion. "And this Gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world [Greek "the inhabited earth"] for a testimony unto all the nations; and then the end shall come." This is not the mere proclamation of the Gospel, but the Gospel with the present truth of a near-coming kingdom, set up at Christ's coming; the same everlasting Gospel, going to every nation, tongue, and people, proclaiming, "the hour of His judgment is come." Rev. 14: 6, 7. The Priest is to become the Judge; the Judge the King. And this Gospel is going. It has belted the globe. Its light has entered the darkest lands. It has stretched across the autocratic Russias from north to south. It is winning souls to Christ in the "Hermit Kingdom," in the "Island Empire," in "Darkest Africa," in the heart of the "Celestial Empire," in "far Cathay," in the islands of the sea. In a little while and the warning, the instruction, the message, the plea, from God will have been given. God will have borne witness to the nations of the one only remedy to save, the last willing soul will have yielded to the pitying Christ; and then the end shall come. "It is near, it is near, and hasteth greatly."