“Can ye not discern the signs of the times?”—Jesus.
“When ye shall see all these things, know that He is near, even at the doors.”
Multiplied Evidences
Not only is the Word of God very explicit regarding the great fact of the literal second coming of Christ, but it also very clearly shows that we may know when that coming is near. One of the striking words in connection with the evidences of the last days is the little word “know.” “This know also,” says Paul in 2 Tim. 3:1. “Knowing this first,” says Peter in his second epistle, 3:3. “Know that He is near,” says our Lord Himself regarding His second coming.
In our diagram on this page some of these signs are strikingly portrayed. The great spokes in the wheel represent various lines of prophecy, including four in Daniel, seven in Revelation, and one in the Gospels. Each of these lines of prophecy begins at a different period or date in the world's history, but all culminate in the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Noted in several of these lines of prophecy is a point which marks the beginning of “the time of the end.” That point is 1798, when closed the first great prophetic period of the “time, times, and a half time” of Daniel; the twelve hundred and sixty days and the forty and two months of the Revelation. “The time of the end” is a period in which all of these various prophecies meet their fulfilment, and which reaches to the second coming of Christ, or the close of probation, which immediately precedes His second coming. Within that time of the end God gives certain great signs, which we can but little more than mention here, with the scripture which predicts the omen, and appeal to our readers as to its fulfilment in this our day. We begin with
1. THE INCREASE OF KNOWLEDGE.—
Looking forward to the time of the end, the prophet declares:
“But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.” “Go thy way, Daniel: for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end. Many shall be purified, and made white, and tried; but the wicked shall do wickedly: and none of the wicked shall understand; but the wise shall understand.” Dan. 12:4, 9, 10.
Our readers know how literally this prophecy has been fulfilled. In science, in discovery, in invention, the period of the time of the end is marvelous in fruitfulness. This has also been true in the knowledge of the Word of God. Within that period of time the great Bible societies have been formed, and millions upon millions of copies of the Word have been translated into more than 400 of earth's languages and dialects. Knowledge too on the prophecies of Daniel has been increased, and many have been stirred and cheered by the developments which show that the kingdom of God is near.
2. INCREASE OF RICHES.—
One striking prediction upon this is found in the New Testament. James 5:1-5:
“Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten. Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days [“in the last days,” A.R.V.]. . . . Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton; ye have nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter.”
And the next admonition is, “Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the COMING OF THE LORD.” Verse 7.
Never were such mighty fortunes piled up in so short a time as in these last days. Take for instance the case of Mr. Harriman, who began practically a poor man, and within a short lifetime piled up a fortune of $300,000,000; and he is one among many. Graphically, clearly, and forcibly has the prophet drawn a picture of these times.
3. INCREASE OF CALAMITIES.—
This comes through the aging earth, as we are told in the 104th Psalm and in the first chapter of Hebrews that the earth shall wax old as does a garment. With its waxing old there will come weaknesses, and these weaknesses will be manifest in the various functions of the laws of nature. Our Lord also predicts as the beginning of earth's travail, “earthquakes in divers places.” We see these evidences of the earth's waxing old, in the storms and cyclones increasing as the years have gone by; in the uncertainty of the seasons; in the remarkable increase of earthquakes—not simply the mere perturbations noted by sensitive seismographs, but destructive earthquakes. The records are that these have been much more numerous during the last fifty years. Take simply from the year 1906, Mexico, Colombia, Ecuador, Italy, Formosa, San Francisco, Valparaiso, the West Indies; and later on Mexico again repeatedly, and Southern Italy, Greece, Japan, and elsewhere. Men are startled when these things occur at home; they forget in a day those which occur in distant lands. Yet are they voices of God telling us that the earth's last pangs will soon be over.
4. INCREASE OF CRIME.—
Nowhere in God's Word are we told that this world is to be converted. Among the good seed of the Son of Man the enemy has sown tares, and the tare-sowing has gone on to the present time, not only in the great world itself, but in the church as well. Those who ought to be the conservators of righteousness, the salt of the earth, have themselves been weakened by the seed-sowing of the enemy; and the result is a very carnival of crime, as the secular press has named it again and again.
It is said in the sixth chapter of Genesis, in speaking of the antediluvian world, that “the earth is filled with violence;” and our Lord tells us in the twenty-fourth of Matthew and elsewhere that as were the days of Noah, so shall be the days of the Son of Man. The apostle Paul declares in his third chapter of Second Timothy, that “evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived.” The prophet Isaiah, looking forward to that period just previous to the time when the Redeemer shall come to Zion, declares that “judgment is turned away backward, and justice standeth afar off: for truth is fallen in the street, and equity can not enter.” And another prophet, contemporary with Isaiah, takes his own time as typical of the last days, and declares what so many of our municipal, state, and national investigations show, that “Their hands are upon that which is evil to do it diligently; the prince asketh, and the judge is ready for a reward; and the great man, he uttereth the evil desire of his soul: thus they weave it together. The best of them is as a brier; the most upright is worse than a thorn hedge. The day of thy watchmen, even thy visitation, is come; now shall be their perplexity.” Micah 7:3, 4, A.R.V.
In the last prediction rests the hope of the prophet.
5. SIGNS IN THE SUN AND MOON AND STARS.—
So our Lord in Luke 21:25-27 declares there will be:
“And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.”
More specific are Matthew, Mark, Joel, and the Revelation concerning these signs in the sun and the moon and the stars, predicting the darkening of the sun, the darkening of the moon, and the falling of the stars, giving the very time in which the first of these events6were to occur, the others to follow after as confirming signs of the first. The darkening of the sun occurred May 19, 1780; the night following came the darkening of the moon; the falling of the stars, Nov. 13, 1833; and the other signs in the elements are rapidly following.
6. A WARNING MESSAGE.—
Of every great judgment which has come upon the world God has given warning.
“Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but He revealeth His secret unto His servants the prophets.” Amos 3:7.
“Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in My holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand.” Joel 2:1.
“And this Gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.” Matt. 24:14.
These scriptures clearly teach that God will through His prophets give warning of the judgments; that this warning will first of all go to His own professed children, and through those who will receive it, it will go to the great world. In larger, fuller detail God has described this message in a great threefold movement, prophesied in Rev. 14:6-14. Under three mighty angels—for God's spiritual messengers always cooperate with His earthly ones—are these messages represented as going to the world, pleading with them to return to His Word and His Gospel, telling them that all the great Babylon of this world must necessarily fall, and warning them against all the confederated wickedness which shall join together against Christ and His Gospel in the last days.
We appeal to our readers as to whether this message is not going to the world; whether amid all the voices of all the false isms, there are not yet voices heard here and there and everywhere pleading with men to return to God's Word, to the creative power of the Gospel of life, to Jesus the only Saviour, to the commandments of God as the only rule of living.
7. PEACE AND SAFETY.—
Yet we are told that notwithstanding all the warnings that God will give of coming judgment, there will be cries of “peace and safety” by false prophets. That has ever been true. Isaiah met them in his day; Jeremiah met them; Ezekiel met them. When the prophets prophesied calamity following wickedness, the false prophets predicted peace; and so we read that in the last days this peace cry will become so persistent that even the very nations will confederate and come together and declare that swords shall be beaten to plowshares, and spears into pruning-hooks. This false cry is predicted in Isaiah 2 and Micah 4. Read the context of these prophecies, and read that God calls them soothsayers. The apostle Paul, referring to this very thing, declares, “When they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, . . . and they shall not escape.” 1 Thess. 5:3.
8. PREPARATIONS FOR WAR.—
It is a strange thing, and yet so emphatically true that all the world sees it, that right in connection with the peace congresses, and the cry of a converted world, and the prediction of peace soon to come, never were such preparations for war made in all the history of mankind as are making now. Never in all the centuries have such preparations been made as in the last few years of the century just closed and the years of the present one. And we may go farther than this, and say that all the preparations of the century previous have been dwarfed by the preparations made in the first few years of the present century. Money is taken from the treasuries of governments until in many countries the people's backs are bowed to the very earth in order to support the tremendous war burdens. Great battle-ships are built, costing ten to thirty million dollars, to be relegated to the junk heap in a few years because some greater ones have been built by some other nation. All this is predicted by the Word. Again and again and again is the warning sounded forth. Take for instance the fourth chapter of Jeremiah, and the twenty-fifth of Jeremiah, in which the prophet looked forward to the period just before the day of the Lord, when all the nations are preparing for the great “battle of Armageddon.” It has become a newspaper term now. Listen to the prophet Joel:
“Proclaim ye this among the nations: Prepare war; stir up the mighty men; let all the men of war draw near, let them come up. Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruning-hooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong. Haste ye, and come, all ye nations round about, and gather yourselves together: thither cause Thy mighty ones to come down, O Jehovah. Let the nations bestir themselves, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat; for there will I sit to judge all the nations round about. Put ye in the sickle; for the harvest is ripe: come, tread ye; for the wine-press is full, the vats overflow; for their wickedness is great. Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision! for the day of Jehovah is near in the valley of decision.” Joel 3:9-14.
“The harvest,” Jesus tells us, is the end of the world. Matt. 13:39. So He is represented as coming with a sickle in His hand to reap the harvest of the earth. Rev. 14:14.
9. CONFEDERACIES.—
In the coming of calamities, in threatening clouds of war, in perplexity and strife among the nations, it is natural for men to confederate together. Professing belief in God, yet failing to live for Him, they combine with each other to press back the tide of calamities, to hold in check if possible the mighty tide of evil which threatens to engulf them. So it was in Israel anciently. When Judah was menaced by Syria and apostate Israel, the prophet pleaded with the king to make God his hope. But in spite of that, God's children sought to combine with Babylon on the one side, or Egypt on the other; and God uses those circumstances as a prediction of the last days, when men are waiting for the Lord. When Christ is about to come the second time, men will combine even against His truth; and so He addresses those who go on in their own evil way regardless of duty to Him:
“Associate yourselves, O ye people, and ye shall be broken in pieces; and give ear, all ye of far countries: gird yourselves, and ye shall be broken in pieces; gird yourselves, and ye shall be broken in pieces. Take counsel together, and it shall come to naught; speak the word, and it shall not stand: for God is with us. For the Lord spake thus to me with a strong hand, and instructed me that I should not walk in the way of this people, saying, Say ye not, A confederacy, to all them to whom this people shall say, A confederacy; neither fear ye their fear, nor be afraid.” Isa. 8:9-12.
One links up with wicked men, feeling that the bread for himself and family is dependent upon it; even religious bodies are thinking that the only way by which wickedness can be stayed is by federating with other religious bodies, compromising truth in the doing of it. The prophet points out a better way:
“Sanctify the Lord of Hosts Himself; and let Him be your fear, and let Him be your dread. And He shall be for a sanctuary.” Verses 13, 14.
And a little later he tells us how we may discern the false from the true:
“To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.” Verse 20.
The end of Babylon and all its confederacies is shown us in Revelation 18.
10. FALSE ISMS.—
Among other signs of the last days are the false isms which have arisen. Very clearly the Lord predicts this in Matthew 24. Jesus, speaking of His coming, declares:
“Then if any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or there; believe it not. For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect. Behold, I have told you before. Wherefore if they shall say unto you, Behold, He is in the desert; go not forth: behold, He is in the secret chambers; believe it not. For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of Man be.” Matt. 24:23-27.
Mormonism went away into the desert. They even named their church organ, which exists to-day, “The Deseret News,” or the news of the desert. They predict that Christ is coming there, and through them will conquer the world; and thousands upon thousands have been deceived by their insidious doctrines and gross materialism.
Spiritualism declares that He comes in the secret chambers; that His coming is not a literal coming. Christian Science repudiates a literal coming; He comes in Christian Science. But our Lord declares that when He comes, His glory will fill the heavens, even as the vivid flash of lightning does to the human eye that beholds it.
Spiritualism is also predicted elsewhere, but notably in Rev. 16:13, 14, where it is represented as the agency which will stir up all the world to the great battle of Armageddon. Satan is a real being; and Satan has his army of false messengers, endeavoring, by all the malicious power that he has, to counterwork the Gospel of Christ; and just as God is sending His angels, working with His people throughout all the earth, to induce men to accept the only thing which will save—His Gospel, so Satan has his agencies throughout all the earth, working with wicked men to turn the world to war and strife.
11. GREAT SPIRITUAL DECLENSION.—
One of the saddest of all signs which God has given of the last days is the backsliding, the spiritual declension, among His children. Of this Jesus speaks:
“And because iniquity shall be multiplied, the love of the many shall wax cold.” Matt. 24:12.
Listen again to the apostle Paul:
“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.” 2 Tim. 3:1-4.
This is a fearful arraignment, isn't it? and yet you could say the world has been always such. These are the simple fruits of the carnal heart. They are just what Paul declares, in the last part of the first chapter of Romans, existed in the heathen world in his day. Compare the two, and note the striking likeness of the condition of the heathen world, and his picture as presented in the passage above quoted. But the great, sad thing is that this picture which we have just transferred to this page, all these eighteen different sins, are among those “HAVING A FORM OF GODLINESS, but denying the power thereof.” Verse 5. We know that we can appeal to every true Christian heart, to every one who truly observes, and thinks, and compares with the life of Christ and the Word of God, as witnesses that these various sins are among those who profess the name of Jesus Christ.
Note also that this is “in the last days.” The peril of the last days, to the individual soul, is not because of earthquakes or calamities or war; it is because those who profess to be children of God are turning from their allegiance to Him; it is the hauling down, so to speak, of the great Christian standard, to which the world ought to look for guidance; it is the salt of the earth losing its savor. Out of this naturally grows the last sign which we will mention, although there are others.
12. LAST-DAY SCOFFERS.—
They scoff, too, at the second coming of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; at the last great act in the wonderful drama of redemption. Here is the prophecy:
“Knowing this first, 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.” 2 Peter 3:3, 4.
The apostle further says that they deny the record of the Word of God concerning creation, and concerning the Deluge.
Now note this. The wonderful thing is not that any one of these signs has been fulfilled and is fulfilling in these our days; it is not one sign or two which show that the coming of Christ is near. Periods in earth's history may be pointed to in which some one or more of them have been tremendously in evidence; but never in all the history of the world and of God's people have they been all so in evidence as they are now, and to this our Lord refers when He declares concerning this last generation:
“Now learn a parable of the fig-tree; When his branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is nigh: so likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it [He, margin] is near, even at the doors. Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled. Heaven and earth shall pass away, but My words shall not pass away.”
We are setting no time for our Lord to come; that is forbidden in His Word. But we may know that He is near; for “ye, brethren,” says the apostle, “are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief.” 1 Thess. 5:4.
Value Your Bible
The Bible is a book for use, tho not for abuse. It is most honored when it is most put to work; it is best served when it is most studied. However many fine copies of the Bible one may possess, he should have at least one volume of the Scriptures which he can freely handle, and, with discriminating care, mark and annotate, as great thoughts upon sacred themes come to him from time to time. Never let the dust gather on your Bible, or be obliged to look long before you find your copy of the Word! No character can be well and firmly built on a mislaid Bible. Keep your Bible by you, and by it you will be kept.
— New York Observer.
“Thy Kingdom Come”
By Joseph A. Seiss, D.D.
We say the prayer, “THY KINGDOM COME!” but so cold and lifeless is the petition on our lips, that we scarcely know what we are asking. Jesus says, “BEHOLD, I COME QUICKLY;” but we fold our arms, and answer, NO, NO; it will yet be a thousand years or more. He says, “WATCH;” but we say, There’s no danger that He will come in our day. . . . Alas, whose heart now thrills to the startling announcement, “THE LORD COMETH”? Who looks, and sighs, and prays now, for the return of our Saviour to our world? Who is waiting for, as he is hastening unto, the coming of the day of God? Who is keeping himself in readiness for its solemn revelations?—Joseph A. Seiss, D.D.
Office of the Angels
By Bishop Mant
THEY are God's minist'ring spirits, and are sent,
His messengers of mercy, to fulfil
Good for salvation's heirs. For us they still
Grieve when we sin, rejoice when we repent;
And on the last dread day they shall present
The sever'd righteous at His holy hill,
With them God's face to see, to do His will,
And bear with them His likeness. Was it meant
That we this knowledge should in secret seal,
Unthought of, unimproving? Rather say,
God deign'd to man His angel hosts reveal,
That man might learn like angels to obey;
And those, who long their bliss in heaven to feel,
Might strive on earth to serve Him even as they.
— Bishop Mant.
The Extent of Islam in Europe
Many do not realize the number of Mohammedans in Europe. Prof. Martin Hartmann, of the Berlin Seminary of Oriental Languages, in his recent book on “Islam,” gives some startling figures concerning the number of followers of Mohammed in Europe. Of the total population of the continent, 13,000,000 are Mohammedans, 3,295,000 of whom are living in the Turkish Empire (51 per cent of its inhabitants), while Russia contains almost 8,500,000 Mohammedans, or about 8 per cent of its total population. Bulgaria contains 603,000 Mohammedans, Bosnia and Herzegovina 549,000, Greece 60,200, Rumania 45,000, and Servia 15,000. In Great Britain there are enumerated 2,700 followers of the false prophet; in France, 2,600; but in Germany, Spain, Italy, Holland, and Scandinavia there are few or none at all.—The Missionary Review of the World.
Personal Responsibility for Human Salvation
Where people are governed from above by a class of men in political or religious affairs, they are not affected by a sense of personal responsibility for the salvation of man as those whose salvation is individual. Among Christians of the evangelical type there is a strong sense of personal accountability to God and man, and a development of common or public sentiment which works along the same line of promoting human salvation. Each individual and the whole body feel the need of casting into the scale all possible weight of conduct, example, and influence, to promote the welfare of man in all respects.—The Watchman, Baptist.
Let Them Remain Until the Harvest
By Delwin Rees Buckner
THE goodman slept and dreamed of fields of gold—
Had not he sown his land with golden seed?
Each furrowed row was free from noxious weed,
Prepared to yield at least its hundredfold.
But while the sower took his well-earned rest,
By night an enemy brought bags of tares
And subtly scattered them—and unawares—
In that rich soil where they would thrive the best.
The husbandman soon learned the evil plot
The enemy successfully had tried.
“‘But then,’ said he, ‘let both of them remain,
And grow together in the selfsame lot
Until the reaping at the harvest-tide,
When we can burn the tares, and save the grain.’”
DELWIN REES BUCKNER.
Ambato, Ecuador.
Care of the Angels
By Johann Rist
'Tis your office, spirits bright,
Still to guard us night and day,
And before your heavenly might
Powers of darkness flee away.
Ever doth our unseen host
Camp around us, and avert
All that seek to do us hurt,
Curbing Satan’s malice most.
And ye come on ready wing.
When we drift toward sheer despair,
Seeing naught where we might cling,
Suddenly, lo! ye are there!
And the wearied heart grows strong,
As an angel strengthened Him,
Fainting in the garden dim,
’Neath the world’s vast wo and wrong.
— Johann Rist.
Cooperation in God’s Work
Angels and Men
God is one. His work is a unit. No part of His manifold and diversified operations counterworks any other part. His work in heaven for man corresponds with His work in the earth. Never does invisible influence touch a human soul but that some visible influence on earth is moved to cooperate with it. His servants above cooperate with His servants upon earth.
His servants in heaven are the shining messengers of light who wait upon His Word; ready ever to go at His bidding in silent and swift obedience. Of those servants it is written by one whose eyes were anointed to see within the heavenly portals, “Thousand thousands ministered unto Him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before Him.”
Of these shining messengers, whose service is as swift as the light, as sure as the morning, as mighty as the infinite power of God which rests upon them as they do His bidding, it is said, “Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to do service for the sake of them that shall inherit salvation?” What a wonderfully comforting thought!
Angels are interested in man’s salvation, and glad they were when the offer of salvation was first made to fallen man, when Christ the Creator under God “gave Himself” that the fallen might be saved; for as there is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, we cannot believe that the myriads upon myriads of angels round about the throne are not partakers in that joy.
God does not permit His messengers to appear in their glory to men. Man could not endure it. It is only with certain of His chosen ones that angels are allowed to converse. God would not frighten the wicked by any appearance of glory. When men serve God they must do it from choice, from love, and not from fear. All the gods of the heathen have worked upon humanity through fear. Sometimes God reveals the wonderful effects of sin and just what sin will work out. All the revelations of His righteous judgments against the wicked are but the developments of unrestrained sin. He manifests them that men may see the evil of sin. But His shining glory can be revealed only to those who have received so much of His presence that they can bear the sight.
God’s plan of working is abundantly set forth in innumerable scriptures. Through His angels clothed with His Spirit, He sends His messages to the human messengers. The soul to whom God’s angel may come knows God’s voice. He is not deceived. The angel is in harmony with the Christ who is formed within. Then that HUMAN soul is sent to the sinner. The Spirit of God ever goes before to convince the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment; and the same Spirit goes with the human messenger as he bears to the sinner the message of life. In God’s plan not one single soul will be saved in His kingdom through a single soul. Angels of God and humanity have cooperated with Divinity in the work of salvation.
Cornelius, the Roman centurion, earnestly longed to receive fuller revelation of God’s light and blessing. Already he had been accepted of God because of the heart to do; “for the eyes of Jehovah run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward Him.” And so He sends the angel to Cornelius as recorded in the 10th chapter of Acts. But He does not send him to give the message. He simply sends the angel to tell Cornelius that God looks upon him with favor, and that his prayers and alms are accepted; for the message must be given by the human, and therefore he tells Cornelius to send for Peter to Joppa, and he will tell him what he ought to do. And so Cornelius sends to Joppa after Simon Peter. Peter goes down there and preaches the Gospel message, and Cornelius and all his house embrace the Christ.
The Lord in His mercy and glory struck down the zealous Saul as he was on his way to Damascus to persecute God’s children; but no being of exceeding glory tells him what to do; again that must be left to the human; and so Ananias comes in to see Paul and to tell him what to do: “Arise, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins.”
It is ever so. God’s angels cooperate with God’s children here in the flesh. The angel would frighten the human, so human is sent to human; and the human who has received the great message, to tell the story of that message to others who are longing for it. Why does God do thus? Infinite love prompts Him to do it.
Just a short time ago we had the news ringing through the land that a certain man had made a great discovery. He knew that he was on the way to make that discovery; but he sent back every one who was with him of the same nation and race, in order that he might make it alone and have all the glory to himself. Not so does God work.
Some day there will come into this universe great rejoicing. Some day the great problem of wickedness and misery and evil will be settled forever. Some day the reign of sin will be over. Some day sin and death, and all the wo which has come by sin, will be swept away from God’s universe, so that every creature in heaven and in earth shall laud and magnify Jehovah. But Infinite Love will not rejoice alone, Infinite Love could not rejoice alone; and therefore in the working out of that wonderful problem, and in the accomplishing of that wonderful work, eternal in its importance and its bliss, God has enlisted every agency in heaven and earth that will cooperate with Him. “He shall see of the travail of His soul, and shall be satisfied;” but those who have used the talents which He has given, in that same precious work, shall enter into the joy of their Lord.
It is a common thing for revivalists and evangelists to tell us that so many souls were saved here and there by their labors. We do not know. It is impossible for men to divide the meed of the harvest now. Sometimes the poor who have in love contributed to the evangelist’s support will receive the greater share when God shall apportion what belongs to each, because the very means they have used to send the Word through him had more of love in it than had his labors. Sometimes ministers have had a fruitful harvest from a very few sermons, but the one who has travailed in agony for souls may have been some poor and unnoticeable person who longed for the salvation of the very ones who have yielded under the word of the minister. So Jesus tells us that in that field of His, one sows and another reaps, and both gather fruit to life eternal; and when the great harvest day comes, both sower and reaper will rejoice together. God shall apportion to each one his share in the golden harvest.
What a blessed thing it is, isn’t it? What a wonderful plan by which all may cooperate with the Deity Himself.
How good it is to the poor, stumbling, halting human to know that there are others higher than he, stronger than he, wiser than he, yea, truer than he, who have learned, even as he longs to learn, to resist temptation, and who are able by the power of God to help him in the trying times and in the struggles through which he passes. For “the angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear Him, and delivereth them.” How many times this has been done, and we have not recognized the goodness of our God, when we have been going on perhaps blind and selfish, and thinking almost that God had forgotten us. The darts of evil have been turned aside, faithful hands have guided us away from the deep, dark pit into which we might have fallen to destruction. Mighty, helpful hands have held us up when to fall would have been our last. Sometimes we see the great deliverance and thank God; but many times there are more common deliverances which we shall never know until that great day when the infinite hand shall take away the veil which has shrouded the earth because of sin, and we shall see written in the books of life the wonderful work of God for His children. Then in that great day God’s angels shall be revealed, and He shall send them forth as ministers of light and power to gather His saints from the graves and sleeping caverns of the sea, immortal, forever immortal, to go out from their heavenly home to worlds yet to be created, and bear to them the wonderful story of the love and sacrifice of Jesus their Lord, who has redeemed from utter ruin the universe.
Then, reader, let us yield ourselves to God to serve Him; and with His invisible helpers always and forever in harmony with His holy law we shall by His grace be able to work out that character which shall endure forever. “Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.”
