Should Know the Generation
By A. S. Booth
“WATCH therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come. But know this, that if the good man 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.” Matt. 24: 42, 43. All depends upon knowing at what “watch” the Lord will come. They that know the “watch,” will watch, that they may stand at His coming. In Matthew 24, the Lord reveals the various signs that definitely point out the last generation, and compares that generation to the “watch.” And though He has not seen fit to reveal the day or the hour, yet He is anxious that His people should know the generation, or “watch.” The day was divided into four watches, “even,” “midnight,” “cockcrowing,” and “morning.” The time from the first to the second advent of Christ is therefore divided into four watches, as far as the signs given by Jesus in Matthew are concerned: the even watch, that of the first great sign given in this chapter, the destruction of Jerusalem; the midnight watch, the Dark Ages and the shortening of those days, marked by the darkening of the sun, May 19, 1780; the cockcrowing watch, that of the next sign in the heavens, the falling stars, which occurred November 13, 1833; and the last watch, the morning watch, in which we should look for the coming King, when “He shall send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.” We are living in the last watch. Let us remember the admonition of the Master, “When these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.” “I say unto you, . . . Watch.” A. S. BOOTH.