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The Last Day

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Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Apr 19, 1910

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 37, No. 15.

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The Last Day

By Rev. E. Guy Talbott

By Rev. E. Guy Talbott
Text: "What shall be the sign of Thy coming, and of the end of the world?" Matt. 24: 3.
Introduction: Universality and Importance of Eschatological Beliefs. I. The Second Coming of Christ. II. The End of the World. III. The Resurrection. IV. The Judgment. V. Heaven or Hell?

Universality and Importance of Eschatological Beliefs

It may be objected by some that questions regarding the second advent of Christ, the end of the world, the resurrection, the last judgment, and the future existence of the soul, are purely academic, and barren of practical results. This is not true. Those religions are the most exalted and pure that have strong eschatological hopes and doctrines. Those individuals who have the strongest eschatological beliefs, live the purest and highest moral and religious lives. It is this exalted and complete eschatological hope and doctrine that distinguishes and differentiates Christianity from ethnic and positivist religions.
Eschatological hopes and formulated doctrines of the future are common to all races and peoples. Eschatological beliefs lie near to the heart of all mankind. The ideas of a final judgment, of a future resurrection, of a coming Deliverer, and of future eternal estates of blessedness and of misery, are innate in the human breast. In the records of almost all peoples, we find traces of a past golden age, and hopes of a future restoration of that age. The Greeks in their mythology had this idea of a past and future golden age. Homer describes the Elysium of the happy, and the Hades of the doomed. The Romans had like conceptions. Virgil depicts the coming golden age. Similar ideas were held by the Persians, the Babylonians, and the Scandinavian peoples. The natives of the Hawaiian Islands have legends of a beautiful Edenic place from which they were driven; and they look forward to a future restoration of that state.
The Jews and other Semitic peoples point back to the primitive Garden of Eden as the happy abode of their first parents. In the dark days of Hebrew history, their eschatological hopes were strong. Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Daniel voice the expectations of the people.
Christianity has the highest and best developed doctrine of eschatology of any religion. These ideas all center around the Christ and His return to earth. When eternal hopes of the future have been strongest, Christianity has been purest. When the eternal truths of Christianity are subordinated or lost sight of, as is largely the case in the present age, the result is materialistic conceptions and a consequent decadence of true Christianity. Paul says, "If in this life ONLY we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable." It will be a sad day for the church of Jesus Christ if these basic beliefs lose their hold upon the popular mind as a result of present-day materialistic conceptions and teachings. What the church of to-day needs to vitalize it and make it a power in the world, is a firm belief in, and a sane teaching of, these five basic Christian eschatological doctrines: 1. The second coming of Christ; 2. The end of the world; 3. The resurrection; 4. The last judgment; 5. Future rewards and punishments.

The Second Coming of Christ

"He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus." Rev. 22: 20.
A hunter was forced to seek shelter from the rain in the vestibule of a Negro church in which a service was being held. The Negro preacher had been preaching on the second coming of Christ, and the importance of being ready. He closed the sermon, and began to pray. Finally, when he and the whole congregation were worked up to a high ecstatic state, and "amens" were heard all over the house, the preacher said: "Blow, Gabriel, blow! We're ready. Blow, Gabriel, blow!" Just then the hunter in the vestibule could not resist the temptation to blow his horn and see what would happen. In a second all was confusion in the little church. Men and women rushed from the building in the greatest fear and terror—led by the preacher. They were not so ready for Gabriel's horn as their prayers indicated. Perhaps the same thing would be true of most congregations, white as well as black.
One Sunday evening during the session of the Southern California annual conference in the First Methodist Church of Los Angeles, Dr. Mahood preached a sermon on the second coming of Christ. He had given a dramatic illustration of his text, and the large congregation was in the grip of a tense excitement. All of a sudden Dr. Mahood said: "Jesus is coming! He is coming." He had scarcely said these words when the vast audience rose as one man and rushed from the church. There had been a cry of "fire" out on the street, heard by only a few in the back of the church; yet as the people crowded out of the building, many faces were blanched by fear. You will say the first incident was caused by superstition, and the second by excitement—a mere coincidence. How would it be if Jesus were to come suddenly to each of our churches? How many would be ready to greet Him with joy? If Jesus should come here, now, while I am speaking, how many of you would have joy written on your faces? How many would have fear and horror that you were caught unprepared?
Jesus is coming. His coming is CERTAIN. He said—and this is His last recorded revelation—"SURELY I COME QUICKLY." John said of Him, "Behold, He cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see Him." Jesus said to His disciples who were troubled because He had told them that He was going away: "I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I WILL COME AGAIN, and receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there ye may be also." After Jesus had ascended into heaven, while the disciples were steadfastly looking heavenward, angels said to them: "This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, SHALL SO COME IN LIKE MANNER as ye have seen Him go into heaven." Paul, in writing to the Thessalonians, said: "For the Lord Himself SHALL DESCEND FROM HEAVEN with a shout, with the voice of the Archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord."
Jesus is coming. His coming will be SUDDEN. We are certain that Jesus is coming. We have His own promise and express statements, and in addition, the witness of the angels, and of the Holy Spirit through the apostles. On the same grounds, we know that
His coming will be sudden and unexpected.
Three times in the last chapter of the book of Revelation Jesus says, "I come QUICKLY"—suddenly. Again He says, "Behold, I come AS A THIEF"—unexpected. He compares His coming to swift lightning: "For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of Man be." He also says it will be like the destruction of Sodom: "Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded; but the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed." It will be like Noah's Flood: "But as the days of Noah were, so shall also the coming of the Son of Man be. For as in the days that were before the Flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and knew not until the Flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of Man be." Paul compares the suddenness of Christ's coming to a thief: "For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh AS A THIEF IN THE NIGHT. For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then SUDDEN destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape."
From these passages we are led to believe that the last great day—the day when Jesus shall appear—will be just like other days; everything will be going along in the accustomed order. But, O, what a change when Jesus comes! "There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Then men will pray for the rocks and the mountains to fall on them and hide them from the face of the Son of God, whom they reviled and persecuted and crucified. "Therefore be ye also ready: FOR IN SUCH AN HOUR AS YE THINK NOT the Son of Man cometh."

The Imminence of His Coming

Jesus is coming. He is coming SOON. For the same reasons that we believe in the certainty and suddenness of Christ's coming, do we believe in the imminence of His coming. We can not know the exact time. Jesus told His disciples regarding the time of His coming, "But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but My Father only." We know with Paul and Peter that "the day of the Lord will come AS A THIEF IN THE NIGHT;" and we know that it is the will of the Master that we should be prepared, whether the coming be "at even, or at midnight, or at the cockcrowing, or in the morning." We know that this is His will; for He has commanded us, "WATCH therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of Man cometh."
However, Jesus has given us some signs that are to precede His coming. Every child of God should be able to read these signs. Many of them are given in the 24th chapter of Matthew, and in the 21st chapter of Luke. These chapters are little understood, and are constantly misinterpreted. God surely meant them to be understood and followed.
A few years ago, Dr. Arthur T. Pierson wrote an article with this heading: "Reasons for the Belief that Christ May Come within the Next Twenty Years." He said: "Seven signs hinted at in the Word of God may be selected as prominent: (1) A widespread witness to Christ, with (2) A widespread decline in godliness; (3) A marked movement among the Jews, with (4) The fulness of the Gentiles; (5) A singularly unresting state of society, with (6) A daring development of iniquity, and (7) A confident sense of false security. These seven indications must bestudied in the light of seven conspicuous passages of Scripture, such as Matthew 24, Luke 21, Romans 11, 2 Thessalonians 2, 2 Peter 3, 2 Timothy 3, and Jude."
The signs suggested here are most striking when carefully studied; and we find that an increasing number of devout scholars, as well as multitudes of humbler folk, are anxiously awaiting the return of the Lord, assured that “THE END IS AT HAND,” even as He said.
It is interesting and instructive to make a comparison of the seven parables in the 13th chapter of Matthew with the letters to the seven churches in the 2nd and 3d chapters of Revelation. There is an apparent chronological correspondence between the parables and the letters. Especially is this noticeable with the two last,—the parable of the drag-net and the letter to the church of the Laodiceans. The drag-net certainly refers to world-wide evangelization. The Laodicean church is a self-conceited, worldly church. Dr. Pierson says: “When in history did these two conditions ever meet as they do now? On the one hand a wealthy, self-satisfied, lukewarm Christianity, and on the other a casting of the Gospel net into the world sea, and gathering of every kind of fish! For the first time in this Gospel age, ecclesiastical degeneracy and evangelistic activity curiously blending—fulfilling before our eyes our Lord’s paradox—world-wide witness side by side with love waxing cold!” The last state of Christ’s Gospel work is thus seen to be world-wide evangelism; the last state of the CHURCH is deep-seated apathy and lukewarmness.
Dr. Pierson gives the following methods of computation used by various devout scholars to show the imminence of Christ’s parousia: 1. The times of the Gentiles; 2. The sabbatic system; 3. The millennial standard; 4. The historical method; 5. The antichrist period; 6. World witness; 7. Laodicean lukewarmness; 8. Development of anarchism; . . . 10. The Spirit’s withdrawal.
We know with absolute CERTAINTY that Jesus is coming, and that He will come SUDDENLY. We have all the assurance that reasonable men should require that He is coming SOON. What is the Christian’s duty in view of these facts? God’s Word tells us: WATCH and BE READY. “Then shall two be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Two women shall be grinding at the mill; the one shall be taken, and the other left. WATCH therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come. But know this, that if the goodman of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have WATCHED, and would not have suffered his house to be broken up. Therefore BE YE ALSO READY: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of Man cometh.”
Thinking of the second advent, Paul prayed this prayer: “And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless UNTO THE COMING OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST.”
“He which testifieth these things saith, SURELY I COME QUICKLY. Amen. EVEN SO, COME, LORD JESUS.”
(Concluded next week)