p. 118 | THE THREE WORLDS by H. L. Hastings

Publishing Committee · Rochester, N. Y. · Nov 21, 1854

THE THREE WORLDS.

By H. L. Hastings

[Concluded.]

There was a new earth, but not such an one as that whose beauty called forth the anthems of the morning stars and the shouts of the Sons of God. That was a comely structure, this a disordered ruin. That was hallowed by God's blessing, this was stricken by his curse. That was the peaceful home created for the abode of the happy and the blest, this the dilapidated habitation which God's mercy had spared from utter and eternal ruin, and which his love permitted man to inhabit as the scene of new mercies and of a continued probation. That world was good, this evil. That full of bliss, this, alas, destined to be full of woe. But still it was a rest after the tossings on the waves. It was a home for those who deserved no better, and who had no other,—it was a place where God could bless man with summer, winter, seed-time, harvest, food, raiment, grace, mercy, peace, and truth; and where man might honor God by faith, hope, love, obedience, self-denial, and unchanging fidelity; and so seek for glory, and honor, and immortality, and eternal life in the world to come. This was the theatre of man's extended probation.

The rainbow had spanned the heavens with its arch of glory, a new covenant had been made with the race, the oath of God was pledged that the waters of Noah should no more cover the earth, and immediately the race commenced anew their course of sin. Let us proceed to briefly sketch the course of empires and events which go to fill the history of this present world.

The first object of note is the unfinished Tower of Babel from which the bewildered hosts are retiring confused and dismayed. The families of man thus dispersed, establish their settlements in various quarters of the globe. A brief period develops their true and proper character, and nothing but a storm of fire and brimstone from heaven on the cities of the Plain is sufficient to strike terror to the hearts of offenders, and prevent the universal extension of disorder, sin and shame. The example of "the world that was" availed little towards the reformation of the race. The current of sin rolled on apace. Oppressive and mighty empires arose. We see the proud and cruel dynasty of the Pharaohs, (worthy prototype of American slaveholders and slavehunters,) oppressing and pursuing the weak and the fearful, until finally amid the closing waves of the Red Sea their crimes were expiated, and their power and glory overwhelmed. We see the commencement of the Assyrian empire, founded by Nimrod, rising in strength and grandeur—heaping its gathered treasures within the ramparts and palaces of Nineveh, until at length the increasing and insulting impiety provoked the indignation of the Almighty, and beneath it the power of Assyria was broken for ever.

Next upon the stage came Babylon—raging like a mighty lion, scattering and devouring the flock of God, ruling over all the earth, holding its court and displaying its glory upon the banks of the Euphrates, until God numbered the kingdom and finished it, and divided it, and gave it as the spoil and the reward of the Medes and Persians.

The Mede-Persian empire carried its conquests far and near. It was cruel, fierce, and ravenous, in its character; despotic and oppressive in its administration, and continued until smitten by the fierce onslaught of the Macedonian conqueror, its diadem was trampled in the dust.

The Grecian empire sped in its course of conquest to the far distant Indus, spreading the name and fame of the world's conqueror, Alexander, to the remotest lands, and to the remotest ages, until its divided governments, weakened by mutual conflicts, fell a prey to the mighty rulers of the West.

The Roman empire rose from the robber city on the Tiber to be the robber and the ruler of the world—oppressing with an iron hand—breaking in pieces other kingdoms—expanding in its full glory—then broken up and dismembered by external incursions and internal divisions—rearing its "Ten Kingdoms" like so many "horns" of cruelty upon the head of a ferocious beast—exalting the triple-crowned Pontiff to the temple of God, and running on through the years of many generations, a course of sin and blood and strife until the present day.

The Eastern empire maintained a struggling existence for many centuries, until swallowed up by the great eastern Antichrist—the dominion reared by the ambitious fanaticism of the Prophet of Mecca, and perpetuated through periods of national vigor and conquest, of national strength and security, to its present state of dotage and dependence, while the Papal Antichrist of the west arose, founded in priestly usurpations, up-built by iniquity, cemented by blood, sustained by cruelty, and crowned by crime—with its wide-spread influence, its unlimited power, its unceasing impiety, its protracted war with Jehovah, with its bulls, its edicts, its decrees and its anathemas—with its filth, its corruption, its covetousness and its idolatries—with its tortures, its poisons, its engines of hellish cruelty and malignant hate—and wearing out the remnant of the flock of God, and making this world the theatre of crimes enormous beyond the power of human understanding, and marking with blood and agony no small portion of the history of the world.

The Asiatic nations with their huge and gory systems of idolatry, with their cruelty, oppression, and perfidy, the inhabitants of far distant China, the dwellers in the palm groves of Hindostan, the inhabitants of the islands of the sea, all these have sinned till their iniquities have arisen before the Almighty and provoked his wrath. Shall we go further, and speak of the modern nations of Europe? Even now the cup of punishment is placed to their lips, the sword of vengeance gleams above their heads, and ere long prince and ruler, emperor and sultan, kaiser and autocrat, must meet in their exterminating destruction, the reward of national perjury, oppression and perfidy.

Shall we follow the star of empire in its westward course? The groans of four millions in a bondage bitterer than that of Egypt, rise mournfully on our ears, and convince us that earth has nothing to expect from man but the most determined and invincible iniquity which he is capable of committing.

Oh, how sad the history of the present world! "The whole world lieth in the wicked one," and the refinement and politeness of the present age contrasts strangely with the constant effort to bind heavier burdens on the weak, to rule with more relentless rigor the trembling sons of want, to fraudulently retain the hire of the suffering laborers, to fill up in common with all the nations of the earth the cup of human transgression, and to awake to judgment the vengeful ire of the Lord God omnipotent.

Let us turn from this picture and contemplate the history of the elect disclosed in the records of inspiration.

Shall we commence with Abraham as he forsakes his fathers house, as he wanders a pilgrim in many lands, as he builds his altar and erects his tent, as he talks with God and joyfully embraces the promises from his lips? Shall we follow his descendants in all their changeful histories? We see them journeying toward the realm of the Pharaohs, a famine-stricken company of "threescore and ten." We hear their groans beneath the oppressor's iron hand—we behold them marching forth by hundreds of thousands, defended by that God whose angel of destruction had passed by their sprinkled doors—we hear their cries on the one bank of the Red Sea, and their shouts and songs on the other—we journey with them through the wilderness—we pass Mount Sinai with its robe of cloud and its crown of fire—we see the overthrow of the rebellious—we behold the sweltering carcasses of the disobedient—we feed on the dropping manna—we drink from the smitten rock—we behold the flying hosts of Amalek—we see the heaped up Jordan stay its flow, the ramparts of Jericho fall, the rulers of the heathen flee, the usurping nations driven asunder, and finally, amid the vine-clad hills and verdant vales of Palestine, amid the water-brooks and springs, the milk and honey, and surrounded by every privilege, they find at last the goodly promised land.

Here we might expect obedience. But alas! to the disgrace of humanity be it told, that the constant tendency of this favored people was to apostasy and sin. Their history is a history of sin and punishment; of repentance and blessing; of revolt and judgment. The writings of the prophets are thickly strewn with reproofs, and are finally closed with the prediction of a threatened curse. The Judges ruled till the people rejected their Almighty King, and received in stead a man who was given in anger and removed in wrath.

The reigns of David and Solomon were measurably prosperous, but still marked with guilt, which augmented with succeeding generations, causing them to mock God's messengers, despise his prophets, and murder his children, until from the lips of an insulted God pealed forth the mandate, "Remove the diadem, take off the crown, abase him that is high, and exalt him that is low. I will overturn, overturn, overturn it, and it shall be no more until he come whose right it is, and I will give it him." Ezek. xxi, 26, 27. Thenceforth no king possessed the throne of David. The nation of God's choice became the portion of contending powers until well nigh destroyed.

At length, infinite wisdom and compassion manifested itself in one great effort to rescue men from ruin. The herald-angels sang the song of peace o'er the plains of Bethlehem—the star walked on in its brightness to mark the spot where Jesus lay, and a Prince and a Saviour was granted to the world. But said the chosen race, "This is the heir: let us kill him, that the inheritance may be ours." It was done. Upon a hill-top strewn with skulls and bones, between two malefactors, beneath darkened skies, amid the tears of disciples, the mocking of Jews, the rocking of earth and the rending of graves, the Son of man expired. Sinner, he died for you! Believer, he died for you! Reader, he died for you!

Thus earth was moistened by the tears and crimsoned by the blood of the Son of God. But from his death came pardon, and from his resurrection came peace. To his disciples he gave a message of salvation, bidding them to carry it to earth's remotest bounds, and then passed away from earthly shame to heavenly glory, awaiting at God's right hand the subjugation of his foes.

His gospel has been preached. Beginning at Jerusalem, faithful men have published it in every land. They have thirsted in the desert and chilled upon the mountain; they have crossed the seas and penetrated the forests—they have parted with ease, and perilled even life itself, bearing this blessed message to perdition-bound men. Some have heeded it. For a while it sped swiftly in its conquering flight; but at length it assumed the places and habiliments of human pride and power. Woeful were the succeeding ages. The Church fled to dens and caves, and her pathway was marked by the blood of the faithful, and lit by the martyr's faggot-fires. Thus the Church went on till the religion of Christ became the occasion of bloody conflicts, and the man of sin enthroned himself in God's own temple. The dawning light of the Reformation gave a ray of hope to the struggling Church and by the movements of Divine providence they have been for the most part delivered from their persecutions. But still they turn away from God. The spirit and practice of holy men of old is rarely to be found. Garnished temples, gorgeous altars, broad phylacteries, and long prayers, are numerous; but faithful ministers, reprovers of wrong, pleaders for right, haters of evil, rebukers of oppression and sin, are very few indeed.

A sickly, hollow religion, is the religion of the day—an educated, polished, and attenuated religion—a polite and fashionable religion—a religion that cuts the rebukes of slavery out of Sunday-School books and Tract Society volumes. A religion whose minis-ters go to the communion table and break the consecrated bread to oppressors, to slave owners, and buyers and sellers, and breeders! And shall not God judge and visit upon such a church? Shall not fearfulness surprise the hypocrites? Shall not the sinners in Zion be afraid?

Earth speeds on in her course of folly. She hastens to her goal—the goal of destruction. Already the premonitory throes of her final travail are coming upon her. The nations are awake! The ring of hammer and anvil are heard as they beat their plowshares into swords, and their pruning-hooks into spears. Strength is infused into the weak. Men, have gone forth to make the stirring proclamation, "prepare war among the Gentiles!" The clouds gather. The thunders mutter. The storm of wrath rolls up the sky. O Earth! Earth! EARTH! Thou hast drunk the blood of prophets, and hidden the ashes of saints, and borne, the curse of God for long, long ages past. Thy final travail shall speedily come.

But while the world that now is, moves onward in its mighty race, the inhabitants of it are, and are to be, mostly unconscious of the nearness of the impending catastrophe: not on account of lack of evidence, but on account of the lack of faith. Men are not necessarily in darkness, that that day should overtake them as a thief. The bursting buds of the forest trees are not more unmistakable indications of the approach of summer, than the signs of these times are of the speedy consummation of the present age. The child of God is warned to know by these unmistakable tokens that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand.

But what availeth warning? Did it save Jerusalem? Did it save Tyre? Did it save Babylon? Did it save Egypt? Did it save the Antediluvians? Did it save the Sodomites? And will it save this present generation? Of what avail are signs in heaven above and in earth beneath? Of what avail are the mighty roarings of the sea and the waves thereof? Of what avail is the distress of nations and perplexity that pervades the world? Of what avail are the premonitory thunders that mutter in the distant heavens, and the premonitory shocks that jar the distant earth? Of what avail are those portentous clouds of darkness that overhang the nations, or those fierce lightnings that gleam in red fury above them? Will all these things be heeded by wicked men? Hark! "The wise shall understand, but the wicked shall do wickedly, and none of the wicked shall understand." And so notwithstanding the amazing efforts put forth in this last hour of this dispensation

—notwithstanding God has sent his messengers, rising up early and sending them,—yet, "As it was in the days of Noah and as it was in the days of Lot, so also shall the coming of the Son of man be."

Alas that it must be so! But so it is. Men will dream on until God shuts the door, breaks up the foundations of the great abyss and opens the floodgates of heaven. Men will riot on till the angels gather the just from their midst and pour the fiery storm upon their heads. Men will say, "My Lord delayeth his coming" until his sign glares in the darkened sky, and all heaven is flooded with the glory of his presence. Men will jest and mock until all the tribes of the earth begin to mourn. Men will sleep in sin till the last trumpet wakes them, and refuse to pray till they pray to rocks and mountains! Ah, yes, and scoffers will inquire in mockery, Where is the promise of His coming, until the heavens are kindling with nature's final fires.

The concluding period of the history of the world that now is, as sketched by inspiration, is dark, cheerless, and stormy. Iniquity abounds. Love waxes cold. Evil men and seducers wax worse and worse. Men will not endure sound doctrine. Perilous times come. Men have a form of godliness, and deny the power thereof. Men, like Jannes and Jambres of old, resist the truth by their counterfeits and imitations. Scoffers walk after their own lusts. Evil servants smite their fellows. Faith is almost extinct in the earth. The Church is like the widow crying, day and night. The world are secure and careless. The elements of strife are abroad. The whirlwind rises from the coasts of the earth. The unclean spirits gather the nations to battle. The kings of the earth assemble for fierce and final conflict. Armageddon gleams with glittering armor, and then it swims with flowing blood. The dispensation of God's mercy to this present world closes up. The night grows darker and darker, the clouds thicker and thicker, the storm fiercer and fiercer, the riot wilder and wilder, until the red blaze of the conflagration bursts along the darkened heavens, and the Son of God is revealed.

"But the heavens and earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto FIRE against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness, but is long suffering to us ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the WHICH the HEAVENS shall pass away with a great noise, and the ELEMENTS shall MELT with fervent HEAT, the EARTH also; and the works that are therein shall be BURNED UP. Seeing then that all these things shall be DISSOLVED, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness, looking for and hastening unto the coming of the day of God, WHEREIN the heavens being ON FIRE shall be DISSOLVED and the ELEMENTS shall MELT with fervent HEAT? Nevertheless we according to HIS PROMISE, look for NEW HEAVENS and a NEW EARTH wherein dwelleth RIGHTEOUSNESS." 2 Pet. iii.

Here is the conclusion of the history of the world that now is, as fore ritten by the inspired penmen. In the midst of earth's carnal and ungodly slumber the day of the Lord shall come. And oh! what a day! Silent, stealthy, thief-like it comes. That day is a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness. That day, like the pillar of cloud, is light to Israel and dark to Egypt. Light to those weeping ones who will find that joy cometh in the morning. But that day of joy is the night of despair to a guilty world! What a day! How the thunders shall shake the departing heavens. How the flames shall melt the solid ground! How the works of man shall perish and the joys of man depart! O, reader, will that day bring joy or sorrow to your heart? Thus shall God purge the world of sin. Thus shall the works of man be burned up, ere the works of God can be displayed in the fullness of their perfection So God shall wipe out the serpent's burning trail, and unbind the burdening curse from the bosom of a groaning earth.

But what is beyond? Is it non-existence? Is it a sea of lava? Is it a world-ruin left floating a vast wreck in space, to show the danger of transgression and of sin? Ah, no.

A glorious future is yet in reserve for this curse-burdened groaning world. Yes, notwithstanding iniquity must come, and judgment must come, and fire must come, and ruin must come, yet that God who rolled back the surging waters of the deluge, and smiled benignly on the emerging earth, shall call forth "from the conflagrant mass, purged and refined," a fairer world; shall clothe it with a deeper verdure, shall beautify it with the trees of God, shall garland it with Sharon's roses, shall roll crystal rivers through its wastes, and call forth sparkling fountains in its deserts, shall hang a brighter bow of promise in its heavens than Noah ever saw, shall bless it as he never blessed Eden of old, shall plant Jerusalem from above as a gem of unfading beauty upon its verdant bosom, and shall welcome His people to it as their resting place, the Paradise of God.

This was the blest landscape that lay before the eyes of the Apostle. And it was no phantom of his imagination, it was no dream of a disordered brain. Nay! "We, according to his promise, look for a NEW HEAVEN and a NEW EARTH. Listen to that Prophet whose lips were enkindled by fire from the altar of God. "Behold I create NEW HEAVENS and a NEW EARTH, and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind." This is the imperishable "promise" that stands written in the Scriptures of Truth, and which is handed down for the consolation of the exiled flock of God. And then as we reach the last pages of divine revelation, we discern the same glowing scenes. "Behold I create all things new!" peals forth sublimely from the eternal throne. The work is done. The rubbish and wreck of a former creation has passed away. The sea is no more. The palace of the King of kings descends—heaven and earth are filled with one glory—God dwells with men and wipes away their tears—and death, and sorrow, and crying, and pain have disappeared forever. The gates of pearl are wide open. The streets of gold echo the tread of immortal hosts, the jasper walls resound with matchless melody, as the ransomed come with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads. The palms wave on high—the harpings swell amid the golden arches—the song of Moses rolls its rapturous melody around—and mingling with it, and rolling full and free its thundernotes as high as heaven, is heard the song, "Worthy the Lamb that was slain!" Reader, will you be there?

This is the third world, and here the "third heaven" to which Paul in rapturous vision was caught away, shall bend lovingly to embrace an earth so fair. It is termed by the Saviour "the Regeneration" in which the apostles shall be enthroned beside their Lord. Matt. xix, 28. It is an uncursed, a sorrowless, a tearless world. It is a world where righteousness dwells. Sin and pollution are eternally exiled from its holy borders, and naught shall mar the peace of the blessed or cast gloom upon its beauteous face.

Friend, Three Worlds are before your mind as exhibited in the Word of God. One of them is past. Another is now in being, but it "passeth away," its course is well nigh run, it waxeth old as doth a garment, and groaneth beneath the burden of the curse of God. It rolls on towards a fiery abyss—it is "reserved unto fire." Another is "the world to come whereof we speak." Heb. ii, 5. Choose now your world! Remember that Jesus died to redeem you from "this present evil world." Will you then cling to it? Will you choose it as your home? Will you have your treasure here? Will you seek earth's honors? Will you share its pleasures? Will you love its wealth? Have then the world! Riot on. Sin on. Forget God. Forget Christ. Forget Gethsemane. Forget Calvary. Forget the deluge. Forget the cities of the Plain. Forget alike God's mercies and his judgments until they burst upon you and then!—"weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth."

Christian, seeing we look for such things, let us be holy. Eternal glories are in prospect. Let us seek them. Cast off the world. Throw pleasure aside. Strive for an abundant entrance. Fight the good fight. Run the race. O, hasten to finish thy work. Weep over the perishing. Beseech men to be reconciled to God. Save some. One at least. One to sing eternally. One to dwell in Paradise restored. Delay not. The Judge is at the door. May we escape the things that are coming on the earth, and meet at the judgment uncondemned. Amen.