WHY INCREDIBLE? by Editor

Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Oct 9, 1856

WHY INCREDIBLE?

By Editor

As Paul once found it necessary, owing to the unbelief of the Jews, to inquire, why it should be thought a thing incredible that God should raise the dead; so may we now inquire of the skeptics and unbelievers of these last days, why it should be thought incredible that the Lord should appear in the clouds of heaven, gather his people, and destroy his enemies.

We are not at all unacquainted with the fact that much is sneeringly said of the disciples of Mr. Miller, the foolish vagaries of Millerism, and the like, as if the idea of the literal advent of our Saviour was the deformed offspring of some disordered imagination, the climax of human absurdity. There may be, we have no doubt, on the part of most of those who thoughtlessly thus give expression to their feelings, a candid belief, that the views we entertain, are the wildest that human credulity can be brought to endorse; but we are inclined to regard this as the result of their never having given to the subject a candid or a serious investigation. We would therefore invite them with a mind unswayed by prejudice, to bestow a serious thought upon this subject, and if they do indeed, think this belief so wide of truth and so incredible, to inquire candidly upon what grounds they thus regard it.

With Bible believers, all views claiming to be founded on the Bible, are entitled to, and may justly claim, an examination; nor can we consistently withhold from them a careful investigation till we detect in them some palpable departure from known and acknowledged rules of interpretation.

We inquire then, What teaching of the Bible does the doctrine of the Lord's coming oppose, or what proper method of interpretation, violate? Is it contrary to the testimony of the two witnesses clothed in white apparel, who, when Jesus was taken up from his sorrowing disciples, strove to comfort them with the assurance that he would come again in like manner as he was taken away from them? Acts i, 10, 11. Is it contrary to the testimony of Job? Chap. xix, 25-27. Is it contrary to the testimony of David? Ps. xcvi, 10-13; xcviii, 9. Is it contrary to the testimony of Paul? 1 Cor. xv, 23; Phil. iii, 20, 21; 1 Thess. iv, 16-18; 2 Thess. i, 7, 8; ii, 8; 2 Tim. iv, 1; Titus ii, 13; Heb. ix, 28. Is it contrary to the testimony of Peter? 1 Pet. i, 13; v, 4; 2 Pet. i, 16. Is it contrary to the testimony of James? Jas. v, 7. Is it contrary to the testimony of John? 1 John iii, 2; Rev. i, 7. Is it contrary to the testimony of Christ himself? Matt. xvi, 27; xxiv, 30; xxv, 31; Mark xiii, 26; Luke xvii, 24, 30; Rev. xxii, 7, 12.

In this testimony which we have quoted, and which is only a part of what might be given, we see that the Scriptures speak out most explicitly on this subject.

But do you say that there is no probability that such an event will ever happen; that it is too marvelous and mysterious to be entitled to our belief; that all things continue as they were from the beginning? and do you look abroad upon the world and feel safe in the assurance that things will yet take the same course that they heretofore have done? If we are to talk of the marvelous and mysterious, there is no greater mystery than our very existence. Why are we here? Why are the heavens spread out above us, and the earth, clothed in verdure, beneath us? Why was this earth ever set in motion, and all those other revolving planets which course their harmonious way through the immensity of space? All these viewed independently of their great Maker and Controller are unfathomable mysteries. No rational view can be taken of all these but that they are the handiworks of God. It becomes then with this view among the least of his mysteries to say that he will send his Son from heaven to put the finishing stroke to the work of man's salvation.

When we consider further the events that are made to depend on the coming of the Lord, it will appear to any one less surprising still that he should be revealed from heaven. The saints' hope of heaven is everywhere made in the Scriptures to depend on the resurrection; but the resurrection itself is dependent on the coming of the Lord; for one great object of his coming is to raise his sleeping saints from their dusty beds. 1 Cor. xv, 23; 1 Thess. iv, 16.

Will then, the Lord fail in the accomplishment of his plans? Will he suffer his purposes to be partly carried out and then thwarted? Have the good of all ages lived and suffered and hoped in vain? Were they allured by a false prospect? Was it in vain that the ancient worthies looked for a heavenly country, a celestial city? for if our hope is vain, theirs also was: seeing that we have the same; and the promise is, that they without us should not be made perfect. Heb. xi, 40.

No: God has not instituted a work to fail in the accomplishment of its design; the people of God have not been led out in all ages by prospects which they will never realize; and we may be assured that the patriarchs and prophets have not suffered and died in vain in the cause of their Redeemer; for the hope of the church—theirs and ours—will be gloriously consummated in the revelation of the Son of man from heaven.

There is nothing then strange or incredible in the fact that such an event should take place; but do you say that the absurdity consists in the time in which we locate it? that there are no indications that it will take place at present, in our own day, or for centuries to come? Before we settle down into this conclusion, we do well to mark the language of those scriptures which tell us of the stealthiness of its approach and the suddenness with which it will burst upon us, lest by listening to this syren song, we identify ourselves with the world upon whom the divine declaration is that it shall come as a thief, and unawares.

Upon this point we shall find by a little consideration, that the evidences that this event is just upon us are as great as that it will take place at all. We have reached almost the end of every line of prophecy. We are fast hastening to that point, to which all prophecy converges as to a common center. In the language of a recent writer, if the world continues much longer, its history will be beyond the limits of inspiration. To this conclusion all candid students of prophecy are compelled to assent. The signs in the natural, moral, and political worlds, which inspiration has given us as precursors of the great and notable day of the Lord, are being rapidly accomplished. The signs in the heavens above which now stand amid the historical records of the past; the perplexities of the nations, which are now convulsing the world; the waxing worse and worse of evil men and seducers; the fearfully increasing multitudes of the deceiving and deceived; all these, to a degree never before witnessed, are casting their dark shadows o'er the earth. Why then, we ask, should it be thought with you a thing incredible that the Lord should come, and this world end. In view of these facts we trust it is not, and cannot be. This matter is not to be understood as it was by a certain professor, who told the class of which we had the privilege of being a member, that "if Miller's theory was true, and the world should be burned up, it would so interfere with the nice arrangement of our own solar system, and consequently with those still more remote, that the whole universe would finally be reduced to chaos and ruin." We do not claim that the earth will be burned up to nothing, and blotted out of the universe; for out of this earth a new one shall be formed; and any one can see that this may be purified by fire, and the "elements melt with fervent heat," without reducing its mathematical weight or its power of attraction to the amount of one grain, if it be necessary that those properties be so accurately preserved.

The word of warning therefore which we would give to all those who have ears to hear is, to make haste to prepare for the coming day; escape for thy life, tarry not; for

"The judgment day is rolling on, The appointed hour makes haste."