THE AGE TO COME by R. F. Cottrell

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Sep 3, 1861

THE AGE TO COME.

By R. F. Cottrell

THE doctrine that is served out under this title gives no place for the proclamation of the third angel's message. Consequently one or the other must be false. If the threatening and the outpouring of wrath so dreadful is to take place in the age to come, instead of a glorious age it will be an age of woe. Deliver me from anything worse than the age we live in. If the severest threatening of wrath, and the only one of unmingled wrath in the Bible applies over there, it must be a worse age than any that shall have preceded it. And this is called a glorious age to come.

The message does not apply there. There is no possible place for it to apply except just before the second advent. And it is evident that probation closes with the close of the message. Then there will be no probation in the age to come. If no probation, there will be no such age—an age of a thousand years of mortality without probation. No use whatever of such an age.

Christ is now a merciful High Priest. With the close of his ministration in the temple of God in heaven, he will put on the garments of vengeance for clothing, and come to "repay fury to his adversaries, recompense to his enemies." Isa. lix. Probation then will have closed; for he says, "He that is unjust, let him be unjust still; and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still; and he that is righteous, let him be righteous still; and he that is holy, let him be holy still. And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give to every man according as his work shall be." Rev. xxii, 11, 12. This text applies itself to the second advent, and proves that there will be no conversions in the age to come. When Christ, who now offers mercy to sinners, says, Let them be filthy still, they will remain as they then are till every man is rewarded according to his works.

It is essential to salvation that Christ should enter into the heavenly holy places to offer the merits of his own blood to cleanse us from sin. Heb. ix, 11-14, 23-24. He enters them but once. Verses 12, 25-28. Therefore none can be saved by his blood after he comes "the second time without sin unto salvation."

The present age is to close with the battle of the great day of God Almighty. This battle will leave the earth utterly desolate of all its inhabitants. Isa. xxxiv, 1, 2; Zeph. i, 14-18; iii, 8; Isa. xiii, 6, 9; xxiv, 1-3; Jer. xxv, 15-33. Notice particularly verses 26, 29-31. Therefore the age next to come will be an age of desolation to the earth.

All the wicked once dead, there can be none of them living upon the earth till they have a resurrection. This cannot take place till a thousand years from the first resurrection which takes place at the second advent. Rev. xx, 4, 5. Therefore the earth will remain desolate of wicked men for one thousand years.

During this thousand years the saints will reign with Christ. Where? Not on the earth still lying under the curse, and desolated by it. Isa. xxiv, 6. They will be caught up to meet the Lord at his coming. 1 Thess. iv, 16, 17. They would go to be with Christ and behold his glory, that glory that he had with the Father before the world was. Jno. xvii, 24. Christ is gone to his Father. Jno. xiv, 12; xvi, 16. In his Father's house are many mansions. He has gone to prepare a place for his disciples, and has promised to come again and receive them to himself; or, as Campbell renders it, "I will come again and take you with me, that where I am, there ye may be also." Jno. xiv, 1-3. Immediately before making this general promise to his disciples, Jesus made a positive promise to Peter that he should afterward follow him to the place where he was about to go. "Simon Peter said unto him, Lord, whither goest thou? Jesus answered him, Whither I go, thou canst not follow me now; but thou shalt follow me afterwards." Jno. xiii, 36. When Jesus comes again, Peter will certainly follow him to the place where he is now gone, that is, to the Father. Yes, all the saints will be taken to those mansions in the Father's house. This is a necessary conclusion.

The saints are to reign with Christ a thousand years from the first resurrection. But they go immediately to heaven at the coming of Christ and the resurrection. Therefore the reign with Christ a thousand years will be fulfilled in heaven. During their reign in heaven they can sing in truth, "Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation; and hast made us unto our God kings and priests; and we shall reign on the earth." Rev. v, 9, 10.

At the close of the thousand years, the saints and the holy city descend to earth. The wicked are raised and come up on the breadth of the earth, and compass the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city. Here they see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of God and themselves thrust out. Fire comes down from God out of heaven and devours them. Rev. xx, 9; Luke xiii, 28. That is the fire to which the earth is reserved "against the day of judgment and perdition (utter destruction) of ungodly men." "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, 7, 12, 13. Beyond the burning day, that destroys ungodly men, the new earth appears. The earth will not be defiled with sin or sinners thereafter forever. The righteous alone shall dwell there. They shall reign there, not merely for a thousand years, but "forever and ever." Rev. xxii, 5.

Should Christ reign with the saints on earth a thousand years immediately following the second advent, and, at the close of this period, continue to reign on the earth forever and ever, many of the scriptures referred to in this article would never be fulfilled. With the view presented here, there is a place for them all. There are a few prophecies used by our Age-to-come friends which present some difficulties in the minds of those that have not taken a close and definite view of the plan of salvation as revealed in the Bible. But when we learn what is clearly revealed of the close of the mediation of Christ in heaven, and the events which are to follow, we find established truths, with which every prophecy and every part of revelation must agree. And there is nothing very difficult in any prophecy, nothing that contradicts those great, first principles.

Probation closes before the second advent, and there are no conversions in the age to come.

The nations are dashed in pieces at Christ's coming. The earth is laid desolate. There is a remnant of the wicked, but they are slain. Rev. xix, 21.

The saints reign with Christ a thousand years, commencing at the first resurrection. But the earth, their promised inheritance, lies under the curse, and desolated by it, till the close of that period—reserved unto fire to the day of the perdition of ungodly men, at the second resurrection. Therefore the saints reign with

Christ a thousand years somewhere else.

But I must close. I did not intend to write one-fourth part so much. Having no order in my mind for a lengthy article, I have thrown out these thoughts in the manner I have, hoping to aid some inquiring minds, bewildered in the midst of the doctrine called Age-to-Come. If you and I, dear reader, spend the remaining moments of the present age in keeping the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus, we shall not only be raised up together, and made to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus for a thousand years in the age to come, but in the "ages to come" we shall still taste of the riches of his grace in the inheritance of the earth made new. Eph. ii, 6, 7.

R. F. COTTRELL.