Christ, Christianity and the Bible

The prophets said God would make a full end of the nation which persecuted them; but he would not make a full end of them, he would preserve and multiply them.

The promises have been kept.

Rome has become a past tense. With thoughtful steps we pause amid her ruins, painfully locate the palace of her kings, the arenas of her pleasure, the abodes of her vice; on fallen column or broken tablet, we read the story of her past victories, her mighty conquests, and standing beneath a crumbling triumphal arch, gaze on the sculptured figures of Jewish captives who once followed in an emperor’s triumphal train, more enduring to-day with their stony faces than the ruined city which lies prostrate at their feet; for while Rome has passed away, the Jew still lives, he has been preserved and has multiplied. The Jews to-day number twelve millions of people; and these represent but two tribes out of the twelve; so that the two are four times as numerous as the whole nation when it came out of Egypt under Moses. Their vitality is phenomenal – it is miraculous – their multiplication is against all the laws and precedents of history. Persecution and trial have but increased their fecundity. Like the burning bush ever burning but never consumed, they continue to exist; and when you draw nigh and consider their strange story, out of the midst, as of old out of the bush, the voice of him who is the “I am, that I am” is heard saying – “These are my disobedient but covenant people, whom I have sworn shall be to me as the ‘apple of mine eye’”; saying, “Whosoever toucheth them toucheth me.”

It was foretold that in the closing hours of this age and as a prelude to their final restoration, they should bud and blossom and fill the face of the whole world with fruit.

If to-day you seek a representative person in every department of human genius and achievement, you will find that representative in a Jew.

The Bible testifies, and testified it centuries ago, that in the closing hours of this age, the Jews should turn their faces towards Palestine and ask (or plead) their way to Zion.

The prophecy has been, and is being, fulfilled to the letter. The faces of thousands of Jews are being turned towards Palestine; thousands of Jews are asking how is it possible to return to Zion. Zionism has passed from the realm of dreams to the solid ground of fact. Everywhere over the earth societies are formed among the Jews to emphasize the return to Zion and the setting up of the Jewish State.

It was further foretold that many should return thither in radical unbelief and open materialism; that at the entering in of the gates of Jerusalem land should be bought and sold and speculation become rife.

To-day there are more Jews in Palestine than at any time since the return from Babylon. Land is bought and sold at the gates of the city, and speculation in real estate values is running high. There is the hum of expectation in the sacred city. Palestine is being colonized by Jews. The Turkish government has taken off the ban, the Jew is owned as a citizen and may become a representative in its administration. The deserted cities are being occupied. Millions of Mulberry trees are being planted, the desert and the waste places cultivated. The lowing of cattle and the bleating of sheep are heard once more. In Jerusalem, the wailing place of the Jews is more crowded than ever. The penitential psalms are recited, tears are shed and the cry goes up with keener lamentation that the city, beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, has become the prey of the Gentiles; that the walls are broken down, the holy places laid waste, “our holy and beautiful house,” they cry, “where our fathers praised thee, is burned up with fire: and all our pleasant things are laid waste. Wilt thou refrain thyself for these things, O Lord? Wilt thou hold thy peace, and afflict us very sore?” And the prayer ascends with ever-increasing supplication that Jehovah will again make bare his arm in the sight of the Gentiles, build up the place of the holy assemblies, beautify Jerusalem and establish his people. Synagogues are built within the shadow of the sacred rock, the one-time threshing floor of Ornan, which David bought and whereon the holy temple stood. The latter as well as the former rains are falling. Everywhere it is evident that the land is reviving, and the thought of Judah as a kingdom and power among nations, finding utterance on the lips – both of Gentile and Jew.

And all this activity and Zionward movement taking place with the Jew in a condition of spiritual blindness, unbelief and godless materialism – as foretold. The very leaders of Zionism (some of them) the most outspoken in their repudiation of our Lord Jesus Christ as Messiah of Israel.

The Bible foretold that the Jews as a people would never receive the Gospel: “As concerning the gospel they are enemies for your sakes” (the Gentiles). On the other hand, it was announced that the Gentiles, who despise the Jews, should receive the Gospel, accept a rejected and crucified Jew as Israel’s king, and own and acknowledge him as the redeemer and saviour provided for themselves.

This prophecy has been fulfilled.

For nineteen hundred years the Jew – as a Jew – has steadily rejected a crucified Christ. Here and there an individual, paying the penalty of scorn and contumely from his own people, has believed the Gospel and owned the crucified and despised man of Nazareth as his very Lord and God. He has done so according to that election of grace which the Bible foretells (an elect remnant is seen through all the ages, under one dispensation or another, responding to the call of God – like the seven thousand who would not bow the knee to Baal; and belonging to that election of grace the believing Jew stands out marked and sealed of God) but the Jew as a nation with unbroken solidarity refuses to-day the only Jew who can establish him in the land of his fathers and fulfil the covenant promises.

Equally fulfilled is the other side of the prophecy.

The Gentiles, who, racially considered, despise the Jew and everything of the Jew, to-day own and accept this rejected and crucified Jew of Calvary, not only as Israel’s Messiah and king, but as the redeemer and saviour provided of God for Gentiles; so that the Gentile world now worships and adores him as very God, holding up the cross of his shame and death as the symbol of highest honor and most radiant glory.

The Bible has predicted the final characteristics of the present age in terms precise and clear.

By type, figure and direct prophecy it announces that the last form of government among the nations just previous to the Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ will be democracy– the rule of the people: “The government of the people, by the people, and for the people.”

That prophecy practically has been fulfilled.

Democracy is, nearly, the universal mode of government. England in some respects is more democratic than the United States. France, Portugal and Switzerland are republics. Spain, Italy and Greece are constitutional monarchies; that is to say, the people are recognized as the ultimate authority. The Northern nations, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Holland and Belgium, are liberal kingdoms. The monarchy is simply a fashion – the people are the rulers. Germany is a military nation. The Kaiser, speaking at times as the war lord, gives the impression that he is absolute emperor. He is far from it. The socialists count their votes by millions, and while the German people accept the empire, they do so because it is the most satisfactory agent for their business and prosperity. The German people behind the throne are the absolute power; and the voice of democracy makes no more radical utterance and demand than in the German kaiserreich. Recently, in a public interview, the Kaiser is reported to have said, he expected his son to be the last emperor of Germany, as within fifty years the whole world would become democratic. Austria is still more or less under the influence of Cæsarism, but beneath the surface, the various peoples and nationalities constituting that empire are restless, feverish, and full of democratic ideas. Turkey has been shaken by a revolt of “The Young Turks,” and the demand for more popular government. Japan has broken loose from the customs and traditions of centuries – her flag is the symbol of the rising sun, and indicates that she is seeking to take her place in the new dawn of popular sovereignty. China, the oldest civilization and the mightiest population, has become a republic, her young men returning from the universities of Europe and America having sown broadcast the seed of democracy and the claim of the people. Russia, alone, remains absolute in name, but the absolute has been shattered even there – it is supported only by bayonets and drawn swords. Every now and then a sullen sound is heard, dying away to be renewed in deeper tones; it is the voice of the people, in spite of the knout, the prison and Siberian exile, calling for what they claim to be their “rights.”

Everywhere the evidence is manifest that the prophecy of Daniel announcing the rise of the “clay” (Daniel’s symbol of the people) and the warning of Isaiah that “the nations should rush like the rushing of many waters,” and “make a noise like the noise of the seas,” are being fulfilled.

After “Clay,” or Democracy, there remains only anarchy, or power in the hands of an absolute ruler. That absolute, world-wide ruler is declared by all the prophets to be the Son of God, and his kingdom is symbolized by a stone– a stone is the very opposite of clay.

THE CLAY IS HERE!

Centuries ago the Bible declared that in the closing hours of this age the whole world would be under arms, preparing for a gigantic and final war; that each nation would turn itself into a vast army, and that the whole earth would become a military camp and field of manœuvre.

This prophecy is being fulfilled.

A universal preparation for war is going on with maddening haste. Nations are seeking to outdo each other in their colossal preparation for the approaching strife. Armies are no longer mere levies or hired cohorts, every man in the nation capable of bearing arms or in any wise doing military duty is enrolled, and must take his place as a soldier. During the summer immense armies move out of their barracks and play seriously the game of war. Each nation has its field manœuvres and theme of attack and defence. On every side is heard the tramp of marching feet, the sound of bugle call, the rumble of artillery, the sharp word of command.

Nations are vying with each other in the endeavor to cover the sea with the swiftest and most powerful battleships. Millions are being put into guns and ammunition. The money of the people is being poured out like water to obtain war material. Forges and foundries are working to turn out the most destructive implements. The arsenals are being gorged with cannon, with shot and shell. Enormous sums of money in gold are stored away in impregnable fortresses that, as the sinew of war, it may be ready to respond at a moment’s notice. Never before in the history of the world has there been such a spectacle.

On land and sea men are silently, ceaselessly preparing for the irrepressible and impending conflict. Each nation feels its existence is at stake; not a thinking statesman who does not feel assured that, sooner or later, the clash will come. All feel it will be fierce, titanic, fateful and final.

The Bible foretold the great apostasy as manifested in the Roman Catholic Church, the rise of Protestantism, its ultimate breakdown in rationalism and open infidelity (that condition of which it should be said, “they will not endure sound doctrine”). It foretold the rising again of Romanism into the place of power and authority (as we see it to-day in the United States, where it holds the balance of political power and is fast becoming a social triumph).

Who would have had the hardihood to prophesy in the hour when Protestantism was delivering its terrible blows against Romanism, overturning the tables of the priests, who sold their infamous wares of papal indulgences, breaking idols and images in the churches, and driving the church of the priesthood, the mass and auricular confession swiftly downwards to the waters of the Mediterranean and, while it was repudiating this apostate church (which set up saints and images in the place of the Son of God, exalted works of merit instead of the cleansing power of the blood) continually cried aloud the glorious doctrine of justification by faith, and whose supreme watchword was – “The Bible and nothing but the Bible”; who, under such conditions as these, would have had the courage to proclaim that in the closing hours of this age, this aggressive and biblical Protestantism should break up by self-division, become fragmentary, its leading thinkers and teachers repudiating the Bible as the infallible Word of God? Who would have dared to say that Rome would come back, ascend into the place of authority, sit upon the throne of the world’s respect and receive its honors? Who would have said that this church which has set itself up above the Bible, claimed the right to change times and seasons in defiance of a “thus saith the Lord,” and has burned men at the stake for their love and devotion to this very Bible, should, at the last, by reason of the infidelity of Protestantism, its recognition of divorce and its indifference to a “thus saith the Lord,” come forth as the defender of the Bible, the champion of the home and the guardian of the sacredness of marriage, concentrating all its thunders against the shame and indecency of divorce?

Yet these prophecies are written on page after page of this book, and their complete and amazing fulfilment looks us in the face.

What a picture is painted for us in the words that follow:

“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.”

“The time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine: but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned to fables.”

It is a picture which finds its counterpart in the Protestantism of to-day – a Protestantism full of worldliness, having a form of godliness, a great religious profession, but denying its only power (the Holy Ghost), repudiating doctrine and listening to every fable of rationalistic philosophy sooner than to the truth of God.

In the letter to the church at Thyatira it is written:

“That woman Jezebel which calleth herself a prophetess (a teacher) to teach and seduce my servants to commit fornication (fornication in the book of Revelation signifies idolatry – image worship and, also, union with the principles and ways of the world) and to eat things sacrificed unto idols.”

Jezebel was the Pagan wife of Ahab, king of Israel. Jezebel stands for the union of Paganism and Judaism. But Jezebel here represents a professed church of Christ. In Jezebel, therefore, you have a professed church of Christ in which there is a combination of Paganism and Judaism. This symbolic Jezebel teaches the servants of Christ to commit fornication – that is, not only identification with the world, but idolatry (image worship).

In its full detail, then, we have a professed church of Christ in which may be found a mixture of Paganism and Judaism. A church where the professed followers of Christ are taught to worship by means of images.

Could you find a better, more accurate delineation of the apostate Church of Rome – a Church which borrows the priesthood of Judaism and the idolatry and image worship of Paganism?

In this book of the Revelation there is still another picture.

In the seventeenth chapter a woman is seen seated upon a scarlet colored beast. She is arrayed in purple and scarlet. She is decked with precious stones and pearls, and in her hand holds a golden cup full of the abomination and filthiness of her fornication (idolatry). She is seen to be drunken with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. The woman is, also, said to be seated on seven mountains and is, finally, spoken of as that great city which rules over the kings (nations) of the earth.

The woman is called “MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.”

In the twenty-fifth chapter of the book, the BRIDE OF THE LAMB, the true church of Christ, is symbolized by a city – THE NEW JERUSALEM. Babylon and Jerusalem stand always opposed to each other. Babylon is the centre of Satanic power and testimony – its name signifies mixture, confusion. Jerusalem is the centre of God’s dealings and testimony – it signifies peace and righteousness. If, therefore, the city of New Jerusalem is a symbol of the true church of Christ and the church of Christ is called a “mystery,” then this woman called Babylon, said to be a City and also called a “mystery,” is a symbol of the false church of Christ; and, being a harlot, and the mother of harlots, or churches like herself (and thus the Mother Church), and harlot signifying fornication, and fornication, idolatry – image worship – then a professed Church of Christ, which teaches and practises image worship.

The great city ruling over the kings of the earth in John’s day and situated on seven mountains, or “mounts,” is ROME; as the city represents the woman Babylon who is the symbol of the false Church of Christ, then you have a false church of Christ seated (and remember, the word is “seated”) in Rome. A Church seated in Rome is a Roman Church; and as the city rules over the earth, over the world; and a world-wide rule is a universal rule; and the word for universal, worldwide, is, also, “catholic,” you have a catholic church; and, seated in Rome (Rome its capital centre), THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH.

This Church is said to be drunken with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus; and the pages of history glued together with the blood of these same martyrs, and the burning, blistering record of the “Holy Inquisition,” affirm that the astounding picture is true in all its crimson and scarlet details.

But the striking feature in the picture, and the one that is first presented to us, is that the woman (the Church) is carried by a beast. This beast is a symbol of government and teaches that the Church “rules” over the governments of the world, is sustained by the State, has attained to “temporal power.” As the picture occurs in the third division of the book, and that division relates to things still future, we have here a distinct prophecy that this Apostate Roman Church shall again attain to temporal power, become a State Church, supported and carried officially by the nations of the earth.

The exactitude with which the picture has been painted, and that, too, at a time when Rome had not yet come into the place of full-blown apostasy and power; the startling way in which, step by step, the prophetic outlines have been fulfilled even in our day, are tremendously suggestive concerning the possibility of its complete and final fulfilment; and bid us ask most earnestly – whence came the mental eyesight which enabled the writer of the book to sketch out for us centuries ahead of time, that which the page of after history reveals to us as facts?

The social, financial, governmental, religious and moral condition of the present time have been portrayed in the book we call the Bible. The coming of a special class called “rich” men as a particular characteristic of this age, the revolt of labor, and its cry against the wrongs of capital, were all set forth in the epistle of James, nigh two thousand years ago, with an accuracy that is not to be explained on natural grounds. So absolutely unnatural is it, that it is perfectly safe to say – these things are not such as a man could write if he would.

That the book is not to be explained on natural grounds is evident from the fact that it is not a CONSTRUCTION, but a GROWTH; not an ORGANIZATION, but an ORGANISM, growing up from Genesis to Revelation like a tree from root through trunk and branch to leaf and fruit.

Each book of the Bible will be found on examination to stand related organically to one another; and that each occupies its necessary and sequential order.

In Genesis, you have the beginning of things, the germ and outline of everything afterwards revealed.

Exodus gives the redemption by blood of a people foreseen and covenanted in Genesis, their deliverance by the hand of God from the power of the king and the dangers of the land.

In Leviticus, the redeemed people draw nigh to God by virtue of the blood of sacrifice and find access to the presence of God through the intercession of a priest.

In Numbers, this blood-redeemed people are seen on their journey to the better land; we read of their trials, their temptations, their unbelief, their backslidings and continual moral failure by the way, and the never-failing grace and love of a covenant-keeping God who leads them in a pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night.

In Deuteronomy, the people have the way over which they have come, and the dealings of God, rehearsed to them, and are instructed and prepared for the land whither they go.

In Joshua, the second generation (which stands always for regeneration) gets into the promised land.

Judges tells how, after being blessed with all covenant blessings in the covenant land, the people fell into a state where every man did that which was right “in his own eyes.”

Ruth, the Gentile woman, becomes the bride of a Hebrew Lord; and the covenant promise of God concerning Israel goes straightway down from a Gentile mother and a Hebrew father towards the throne which is set up in David and owned of God as the throne of Christ.

The books of Samuel, Kings and Chronicles, take up the story of the kingdom, and the Old Testament leads us on through symbol, figure and open prophecy, to a Coming Messiah and a glorious kingdom till, when we reach the last verse in Malachi, we lean across four centuries of prophetic silence, waiting to greet that promised Christ who shall be born in Bethlehem; and who is to be called the Son of the Highest; who is to sit on the throne of his father David, “to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice, from henceforth even forever.”

We listen for the angelic song and the salutation to men of good will; and we are expecting, later on, to see Zion’s king riding up the slopes to the Holy City and all the people coming forth to cry, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” and “Blessed be he that cometh in the name of the Lord.”

When you open the New Testament you find four books – Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

The order of these books is fixed – it cannot be changed.

If Mark be substituted for Matthew, then the New Testament begins without an account of the birth or genealogy of our Lord Jesus Christ; no intimation is given that he is born king of the Jews, and is the expected Messiah.

If Luke be given the place of Matthew, little mention will be found of the Jewish kingdom of heaven; and our Lord will be seen with a leaning towards the Gentiles.

If the Gospel of John begin the New Testament instead of Matthew, then we shall read of him who is Son of God rather than King of the Jews, and the expectation raised by Malachi will seem unfulfilled.

But the moment the order named is followed all is perfect, all is harmony.

Matthew presents our Lord Jesus Christ as the Son of Abraham and Son of David; heir of the covenant land, and the covenant throne, and at once links the New Testament with the Old.

Mark announces that this King of the Jews came into the world to be the Servant of God and a blessing in his service to men.

Luke, although he announces our Lord Jesus Christ as King, sets him forth pre-eminently as The Man, going among men, eating and drinking with them, and speaking in such plain and simple terms that the “common people heard him gladly.”