HAT if you "do
not believe?" shall your "unbelief" altar, or change the promise and
oath of God? or, "make it of none effect?" Do these objectors not
believe that angels visited Abraham, Lot and others, and conversed
with them? yea, even eat with them? And more strange still, do they
not believe that the only begotten Son of God, came to this earth,
and dwelt among mortal beings many years? and even laid down his
life among and for mortal beings? Yes, and after his resurrection
still remained among mortal beings forty days teaching and
instructing them in "the things pertaining to the kingdom of God?"
Ac 1:3. All this the objectors believe, we presume. Is the disciple
above his Lord? If our LIFE-GIVER has done these things, is it
either impossible, improbable, or unlikely that his immortal saints
may be among, teach and rule over mortal beings? Shall we say "any
thing" is "to hard for God?" If God has said it shall be, is not
that sufficient to satisfy faith? And what, we pray, are the
immortal saints to be kings over and priests to, during the reign of
Christ on earth? Who, if not those who are "left of the nations,"
after the "Lord my God shall come and all the saints with" him?
The idea that mortal and immortal beings cannot dwell together, is
founded in prejudice; is unscriptural, and subversive of the
Christian faith. It limits the power of God, and makes our weak
judgment the rule to determine what God can, or will do. If He
please to have it so, it can be done. The only thing faith asks, is,
the proof that God has said it. That point settles, faith asks no
more: it "staggers not," but is "strong, giving glory to God." "That
point was "settled" in our mind years ago; and nothing that we have
since seen or read has changed it; but we do not disfellowship those
who see not as we do.
It no more follows that all mortals will cease to live when this age
is followed by another, than it did when the antediluvian age ended
in the patriarchal age, or that in the Mosaic age, or that in the
gospel age. In neither case were all mortals cut off. Enoch was
translated, still mortals were left and propagation went on. Jesus
was raised from the dead, yet there were mortals still. What then
shall hinder there being mortals in a future age, or under the
administration of the kingdom of God which is the next dispensation?
True, they that attain that age by a resurrection from the dead,
will not marry nor be given in marriage: they are immortal like
their risen Lord. But does that prove that none others in that age
will marry or be given in marriage? Not at all. Those who use the
words of our Lord in Lu 20 as proof that there are no mortals
in that age read carelessly, we think: they overlook the subject of
discourse and the important conjunction "and." The Sadducees held
that there was "no resurrection of the dead." If such were the case,
in their estimation, there would be a difficulty in marriage
matters. Our Lord tells them, "They which shall be accounted worthy
to obtain that world, [ aionos —age], and the resurrection from the
dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage," etc. The question
was not about the living, but about "the dead." Those who attain to
that age, by a resurrection from the dead, are clearly distinguished
from mortals by the conjunction "and," which would have been
needless if all in that age were immortal.
Jesus told his disciples, "Ye which have followed me, in the
regeneration when the Son of man shall sit in the throne of his
glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones judging [ruling] the
twelve tribes of Israel." - Mt 19:28. The immortals are the
rulers in the kingdom of God "under the whole heaven" { Da 7:27} ;
that kingdom is an everlasting one, and its rulers "cannot die any
more." In that day "the LORD shall be King over all the earth: in
that day shall there be one Lord and his name one... And it shall
come to pass that every one that is left of all the nations which
came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year to worship
the King, the LORD of hosts, and to keep the feasts of tabernacles:
and it shall be, that whoso will not come up of all the families of
the earth unto Jerusalem to worship the King the LORD of hosts, even
upon them shall be no rain: and if the family of Egypt go not up,
and come not, that have no rain, there shall be the plague,
wherewith the LORD will smite the heathen that come not up to keep
the feast of tabernacles. This shall be the punishment... of all
nations that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles." -
Zec 14:9,16-19.
Thus we see there will be mortals when the LORD is King over all the
earth, and punishments will be inflicted on the disobedient.
"Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God," etc. True:
because to inherit is to be an heir. Christ is the primal heir. "If
children (of God) then heirs, heirs of God, and joint heirs with
Christ." { Ro 8:17}; and we become children of God, in fact, by
"being the children of the resurrection." - Lu 20:36. These
are those who "inherit the kingdom." But the subjects of that
kingdom are not heirs, and do not inherit it, though they are
greatly blessed in living under the rule of the heirs of it. The
heirs are immortal and cannot die any longer. Does that prove all
mortals are excluded from being citizens there? We have shown that
there are mortals there, who are liable to "punishment," in our
remarks on Zec 14, which is only one scripture among many of
the same character.
We think we have produced abundant evidences that Christ, after he
takes his father David’s throne, is to reign over "all people,
nations and languages," which includes a wide domain, even over
"kings and princes" of the earth, who shall become subject to his
government, and offer Him gifts and do Him homage, as saith the
prophecy.
Do not let us drop into the narrow notions of the ancient Jews, who
supposed they were the only favorites of heaven, and all others
reprobates. These ancient, self-righteous Jews had no heart to
receive the promise of God to Abraham, that "all the families of the
earth," or "all nations," were the objects in that love which led
God to give His Son. { Joh 3:16}. To suppose the few saved in this
and previous ages, are all who are to be saved into eternal life by
Him who "tasted death for every man," and "is the propitiation for
the sins of the whole world," { 1Jo 2:2}, is a view, to our minds,
as narrow as the selfish platform of the old Jews. "O, but the saved
in this and past ages are a great multitude." Jesus calls them a
"little flock," and saith but "few find the strait gate." The "great
multitude" of saved ones may be found to belong to "the ages to
come." God’s love hitherto has been eclipsed by the traditions of
men and the selfishness of the human heart: but that obscuration
will vanish away when the Sun of righteousness shall arise to shine
on this benighted world and a pur-blind church, and "the knowledge
of the LORD shall fill the earth, as the waters cover the sea."
It is asserted, by some, that the Scriptures have been translated
into all the earth’s dialects, and so all nations have them in their
own language. This is an assumption which we do not accept: but
suppose it were true. What then? How long ago was that accomplished?
If at all, it has been done only recently. Does that cover the broad
promise and oath of God? By no means. Four thousand years have
passed since the promise was made, and hardly a century has passed
since the Scriptures have been accessible to one in ten thousand,
and even now, out of Christendom, not one in a million, probably,
have the Bible within their reach. That fulfills the promise and
oath of God, in the estimation of some men. If such a meager
fulfillment is all we are to look for, who can tell us how much can
be relied on of God’s promises in other matters? We are thrown into
the mazes no of uncertainty in regard to the future. If there is no
more certainty of a literal fulfillment of God’s promise and oath to
Abraham than some professed believers in the Bible would have us to
think, then all faith, in any of His promises, is but a fancy; they
may possibly come to pass some how, or in some way, but they say;
and what ground for faith that Christ will ever come again to this
earth? "O, the Bible says He will." We know it does, and God says,
and confirms it with an oath, that in Abraham and his seed all the
families of the earth shall be blessed; yet some men do not believe
it means just that: for they know that very few of the families of
the earth have ever yet been thus blessed, and they do not believe
they ever will be, for millions on millions and thousands on
millions have gone down into the grave without ever having heard of
Abraham or his seed; and they think God’s promise and oath cannot
reach them now; as if their thoughts could bind God’s power. "O, but
God has said" —! No matter what He "has said," they are not sure
that He means what He has said to Abraham; and hence, they have no
foundation on which to stand in regard to anything else He has said:
it may mean something very different from what the language
expresses.
This same principle prostrates nearly all that God has spoken of the
future in the Old Testament, and carries the idea, that God’s
thoughts cannot exceed our thoughts, nor His ways our ways. But we
care not to press this last point, though it is clear to us, it saps
the foundation of all faith, and leaves men exposed to be "tossed to
and fro by every wind of doctrine’ that happens to blow with most
positiveness.
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