NOAH-HIS AGE AND OURS by Cumming

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jun 25, 1861

NOAH—HIS AGE AND OURS.

By Cumming

(Concluded.)

THE associations of the antediluvians were all essentially depraved. “The sons of God married the daughters of men,” an expression which denotes that the pious mingled with the depraved, without discrimination and without distinction. The Apostle lays down what is duty always—that they that marry are to marry in the Lord. The antediluvians thought that that was good enough for the transcendentalist, but not for practical and every day life. And many think now that it may be very beautiful for a higher dispensation, but that we must take other, and more sublunary, even mercenary, elements into our estimate now. And again, “whether we eat or drink, we are to do all to the glory of God,” is the christian maxim, but that was not the maxim then. It was thought good enough for monks, and nuns and hermits, but not for the business men of this world. Christianity ought to be the cement of every association, Exhaust it from a nation, and it will fall to pieces; let marriage be separated from christianity as its basis, and what will it be? Just what it has been among the Socialists—bargain, a piece of convenience, and to be broken as soon as one party is dissatisfied with the other; and held as ceasing to be seen in heaven, it soon comes to be broken upon earth.

There was in the antediluvian world total disbelief of the testimony of Noah as to the coming judgments that should burst upon the earth. When Noah predicted, yet a hundred and twenty days the flood should come, how did they receive it? Just as men will receive those who prophesy the coming of Christ at the close of this dispensation. “Knowing this first,” says Peter, confirmatory of the passage we are now commenting upon, “that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation. For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water; whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished; but the heavens and the 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. But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slack concerning his promise as some men count slackness, but is longsuffering 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 we to be in all holy conversation and godliness, looking for and hasting 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.”

Those that lived in the days of Noah despised Noah’s prophecy of a coming flood. Their conclusion was, There is not water enough in the basin of the ocean to rise to the great height on which it would be requisite it should rise in order to destroy the world. But just as scientific men had decided that Noah’s prophecy was the mere crotchet of an old man who had lost his mind, the fountains of the great deep burst, the windows of heaven were opened, and the earth that then was, perished. To argue, therefore, that the laws of nature prevent the fulfillment of God’s word, is to assert that the law is greater than the Lawgiver, and the thing created greater than the Creator himself. Those who perished in that great and awful judgment had an offer of escape. The old and venerable preacher of righteousness stood upon the steps of the ark he had built by the prescriptions of his God, and told them that every one that would believe God’s testimony by his lips, and come into that ark, should be saved from the deluge that would soon sweep the earth and depopulate it. They were, in the language of scripture, disobedient then. “As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man.” When you are told of the awful baptism, not of flood, but of fire, and when you are invited to escape, not by the ark of a temporal deliverance, but by Christ the great Deliverer, many thousands will despise the prophecy, deride the prophet, and turn aside, one to his farm and another to his merchandise, and care for none of these things. Nevertheless it shall be true, as stated by an Apostle in the epistle to the Thessalonians, where he tells us that “Christ shall be revealed from heaven taking vengeance in flaming fire on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power; when he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believe.”

We have it recorded in the antediluvian days that the Spirit ceased to strive with man any more. When the Holy Spirit ceases to bless the preaching of the Gospel, it fails to have effect. When he ceases to imprint upon the heart the truths that are addressed to the ear, all preaching and all hearing is vain. And just before the close—before the lightning cloud shall come, in which Christ shall be seen as in heaven with power and great glory, God’s Holy Spirit will cease to strive; that day of grace will be finished, the day of judgment will have begun—cut it down, it only cumbers the ground that is now to be blessed and sanctified with His presence, and become the bright dwelling-place of all that believe forever and ever. To show that we have not exaggerated in the least, I will read the summary of all that shall be in the last days from 2 Tim. iii: “This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, truce-breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof.” Such is the picture that will be a sign of the times in the days preceding the coming of the Son of man.

Christianity is not to be a progressive development from what it is now to its millennial glory. The idea of many excellent Christians—excellent in all that constitutes the vitality of the truth, but I think deceived and mistaken in this—is that by the aid of missions, by the distribution of the Bible, by the pouring out of the Holy Spirit of God, this present dispensation shall have its piety so deepened that the millennium shall be its coronal, a millennium the product of elements that are now in action; and not a new age and a new dispensation altogether. Now, if I understand the Bible, it says that the last days of this dispensation shall be worse than the first—that when the Son of man cometh shall he find faith on the earth?—that as it was in the days of Noah, just before the judgment of water came, so shall it be in our days, just before the judgment of fire comes; men living without God, marrying and giving in marriage, eating, drinking, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasure more than lovers

of God. Judging from the Bible the millennium belongs to a distinct dispensation. I do not believe that it is the complement of the present age, but the commencement of a new one. This dispensation is the dispensation of the Spirit, where the Holy Spirit is electing a people out of this world to be a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a peculiar people; the next dispensation is when Christ—the King, the true Shekinah, the glory of God—shall personally be revealed, shall personally reign, and all shall be righteous, none depraved, the lion lie down with the lamb, and there shall be no more tears, nor death, nor weeping, nor sorrow, nor crying; the millennium, the beautiful morning dawn of the everlasting heaven that spreads over all the universe, and earth undergo a re-Genesis, just as the body undergoes a resurrection, and be the heaven of God's people, more beautiful than Paradise, and the first home of man, when he came from the hands of his Creator.

We look, therefore, for matters to get worse as the end approaches. And whilst there are more of the people of God than there have been, and more in our own land than in any land upon earth, yet the vast majority of Christendom answers too terribly to the portrait given by the Apostle. Many Christians feel it difficult to entertain the idea that this world is to be the abode of the saints in the future age. But why should you suppose we are to live in some etherealized atmosphere, intangible and invisible? Adam and Eve held communion with God in Eden, and is it impossible that we shall be made so pure, morally so perfect, and the earth our dwelling-place so cleansed of every impure element, that it shall be the loveliest orb in the universe, because the prodigal one restored to its Creator's presence, to its Father's bosom; while all the sister orbs of creation sing for joy, 'Let us rejoice, for this our sister orb was lost, and is now found; was dead and is now made alive?'

But if we are—and I believe we are now—rapidly approaching the close of this dispensation, our first inquiry is, Are we Christians?—are our hearts changed?—are we sprinkled with atoning blood? In other words, is religion anything to us, and are we anything to it? The religion of our Bible is not something within its boards, to be read when we open it, and to be forgotten when we put it in our library. But if I understand it, the religion of this book is to go into every nook and corner of the human heart, to penetrate every by-way of private life, every broadway of public life,—to regenerate men, influence and make them wiser, happier, holier, and more like God. Has it done so? What better are you for the fact that this book was written? Would you be just as you are now, if you had never heard that Christ was crucified? Would you have been just at this moment as you are and have been, if there were no such thing as religion in the world? You may estimate the influence religion has had upon you, and the connection you have had with it, by this:—How much has it done for you? What has it made me that I could not have been made without it? What hopes has it kindled in my heart that I could not have without it? What blessed prospects has it opened up? How far has it lifted my heart above the world, and taught me while in the world not to be of it? If this book, this religion, this Christ crucified, be your trust, your hope, your peace, the anchor of your soul, sure and steadfast, then, whether Christ takes you to him, or becomes to you, 'Blessed are ye, enter into the joy of your Lord,' will be your glad and welcome summons.—Cumming.