Christ's Second Coming.
By Rev. Henry Varley
The Second Advent of Christ is no question of sentiment or opinion, but a great fact which the Lord Himself has revealed. Let us seek to answer the question, not by any trick of argument, but by the application of God's own word to the subject. You have only to get two men clever on either side of their argument to confuse their audience. That is not my desire, nor did I get the deep conviction I have on this subject from reading the books of men, but by simple and earnest study of God's word. If people would only get the word and study it for themselves, how many questions would be settled at once! Let us search the Scripture, and we shall see the fact of the Lord's second coming, and in that study we shall find good reasons for believing that under present agencies we shall not see any improvement in the governmental policy of the world. Verily do we believe that human rule has nearly run its course. "The six thousand years are nigh their close," and are consummating the highest national responsibility ever known. Without egotism it may be said that England is the representative nation of the earth. Her power is the might of a highly civilized and intellectual people, and she has gradually come to her meridian life, side by side with an open Bible, and the wonderful privilege of the dispensation of the Holy Spirit. No other nation on the face of the earth has known to anything like the same extent, these high privileges, and we are watching with intense interest the result. Is it too much to say that the intellectual culture of England is throwing aside the Bible as the word of God, thus rejecting the testimony of the Holy Spirit, and while complimenting the Lord Jesus Christ upon his system of morals, and the tone of his personal life, nevertheless arraigns him before the world as guilty of the most awful blasphemy, by denying his Godhead and impugning his creative power? That this unholy spirit will increase, and ripen into an intellectual skepticism that will ere long deny openly both the Father and the Son, the word of our Lord solemnly declares (1 John 2 : 22); and at this point let me say, there are no reserves of power to be put forth by the mighty God—his Son, his work, his word, his Spirit, his ministry, all have been given, and the chief nation in the world rejects his government, and is rejecting his grace. This momentous experience and history marks, as we believe, the crisis of this world's course, and the end of the age. Should centuries again be given there are no other nations of the earth to rise higher than England, and if it were so, what reason have we to suppose that they would receive the Lord to reign over them? Seeing that human nature is the same all the world over, and that the most powerful and intelligent nation of the earth, having come to maturity in its national life, has rejected, and is now rejecting, the Lord, his word, and his Spirit, with deeper emphasis than ever sending the insulting message to the Lord God of Sabaoth, "We will not have this man to reign over us," we may be assured that the insults offered to his grace and government will bring speedily the great day of his power, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from Heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ (2 Thess. 1 : 7, 8.)—Rev. Henry Varley.