We have dwelt the longer upon this point of essen- tial and permanent hostility, because the belief that the Church and the world can dwell peaceably to- gether, and jointly serve God, though in different ways; and that to this end the claims of Christ, as held at first in the Church, may now be greatly modi- fied, and His headship made of little account, is one
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very powerful means, as we shall see later, in pre- paring the way of the Antichrist.
2. Let us now note what the Lord said of the spiritual condition of the Church just before His return. It would be one of great worldliness. "The love of the many shall wax cold." (Matt, xxiv, 12.) It would be at the coming of the Son of man as in the days of Noah and of Lot, when the ordinary pursuits of life, building, planting, marrying, and the like—things in themselves right and necessary—so engrossed men that they were wholly unmindful of God's warnings, and therefore His judgments would come upon them unawares. (Luke xvii, 26—.) He speaks of the time as one of greatest temptation, when false Christs and false prophets would arise, showing great signs and wonders, and through them many would be deceived.* (Matt, xxiv, 23-4.) Iniquity—lawlessness—would abound, and many be offended, and hate and betray one another. The faith that prays for His return, though greatly
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* There seems to be good reason for believing that the clause in the prayer of the Lord which He gave His disciples: "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil," "Bring us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one," (R. V.), refers to the great temptation, and to the power of Satan, at the time of the end. As the second petition is a prayer for the coming of the kingdom, so the last petition a prayer that the dis- ciples may escape the great and final temptation immediately preceding it, and be delivered from the Tempter, who would then put forth all his power through "the son of perdition." (See Rev. xii, 12 : xiii, 6—.) This is wholly in accordance with the Lord's general teaching with reference to the fu- ture, and especially to the tribulation of the last days. This time of trial and temptation He does not put far distant, but would have it ever remembered, and it was clearly in the mind of the disciples as near at hand.
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strengthened in a few, would be well nigh extin- guished in most; and that day come upon all that dwell upon the face of the whole earth, as a snare. It would be a time so fearful, that He commands His disciples "to watch and pray always that they may escape the things which shall come to pass"; for there are some who, like Noah and Lot, shall escape the sore judgments. (Luke xxi, 86 — .)
Let us consider the Lord's actings as Judge at His return. The time having come when the tares and the wheat must be separated, the Lord begins with His Church, and separates in several successive judicial acts the faithful from the unfaithful, and gathers the faithful to Himself. (Matt, xxiv, 40; xxv, 10, 11, 31—) This done. He proceeds to set the Jews in their place, separating in like manner the believing from the unbelieving among them; and finally judges the nations, making a like separation among them. Thus His kingdom is fully established —all things that offend and them which do iniquity being gathered out, and all classes of His subjects put in their right places—and the predictions of the prophets are fulfilled. These events, doubtless, occupy a considerable period of time, and this whole period is "the day of judgment," "the great day of the Lord."
This summary of the Lord's teaching shows us that anything like a conversion of the world before His return by the preaching of the gospel, was not in His thoughts. Had it been. He could not have failed to comfort His mourning disciples, and encourage them to vigorous action by assurances of the success of their mission. But he persistently holds up before them hatred, persecution, death. His life on earth
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was prophetic of the history of the Church; and the greatest manifestation of hostility to her, as to Him, would be at the end. Then would she go down into her Gethsemane; then would be "the hour and the power of darkness " ; and it would be the time of "the per- plexity and distress of the nations." Only His return could bring deliverance; for that she must ever watch and pray.
III. The person and work of the Antichrist.
1. Let us examine the Lord's words to the Jews. We have already seen reason to believe that the Jews looked for some great one to appear in the last days, in whom the enmity of the nations against them would be headed up, and by whom they would be grievously persecuted and oppressed; and who would set himself in opposition to the Messiah, and finally be destroyed by Him. Does the Lord in His teachings to the Jews allude to such a person? The only passage bearing on this point is that in John (John v, 43), "I am come in My Father's name, and ye receive Me not; if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive." It is here clearly inti- mated that someone would come presenting himself to the Jews as their Messiah, and would be received by them. Jesus, the true Messiah, had come in His Father's name, and they had rejected Him; another would come claiming in his own right the Messianic rule, and him they would receive. The Lord does not say that he would be a Jew, and yet we can scarce suppose that, with the then prevalent conceptions of their high place as God's covenant people, they could have thought of a heathen Messiah. It is possible that he may be both a Jew and a Christian, an apostate from both covenants.
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2. The Lord's words to His disciples. In these does the Lord speak of an individual in whom the enmity of the world to the Church would be headed up? We find no distinct reference to one, except in the words already quoted which were spoken to the Jews, and have no direct reference to His Church. He speaks of false Christs, but not of an Antichrists Yet there may be one implied in His reference to Daniel. (Matt, xxiv, 15.) "When ye, therefore, shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place (whoso readeth, let him understand),—then let them," etc. The question arises, what did the Lord mean by "the abomination of desolation"? The phrase occurs three times in the prophet, (ix, 27 ; xi, 31 ; xii, 11.) In the last two it is rendered "the abomination that maketh desolate"; but in the first (R. V.), "and upon the wing of abominations shall come one that maketh desolate; and even until the consummation, and that determined, shall wrath be poured out upon the desolator." Most interpreters suppose that the Lord referred to this passage of the prophet, and if so, He intended to have the disciples understand that some one person would come—an abominable desolator—who would stand in the holy place. Thus understood, this teaching of the Lord would serve as the foundation of the later teaching of St. Paul (2 Thess. ii, 4).
If, however, we suppose the Lord to have referred to all the passages in which "the abomination that maketh desolate" is spoken of, and His general warning—"Let whoso readeth, understand," im- plies this, we can scarce avoid the conclusion that He would teach us that at the end the enmity against