September, 1934
T H E K I N G ' S B U S I N E S S
308
come in my Father’s name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive” (John 5 :43 ). Then “ the time o f Jacob’s trouble” ( Jer. 3 0 :7) will have come, and nothing save the return o f the Lord from heaven can save Israel from utter destruction. However, because of God’s covenants with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Israel “ shall be saved out o f it” (Jer. 3 0 :7 ; cf. Rev. 12:13-16). In marvelous faithfulness to His immutable covenants, Omnipotence Incarnate will return to earth. He will come at the moment when Armageddon’s guns are shaking the hills o f Palestine, threatening the utter annihi lation o f the children o f the covenants. In that awful hour o f Israel’s anguish, as their houses are being rifled and their women ravished, and the whole city falling cap
o f an event. The coming and going of the above-mentioned “ Messiahs” is not sufficient. The prophecy awaits its com plete fulfillment, for only in the complete fulfillment we shall find the “ sign” that shall indicate the fall o f the cur tain upon the age. A careful study o f the entire prophecy reveals that it is only at the end o f the age, when the “ great tribulation” is at hand, that “ there shall arise [the] false Christs, and false prophets, . . . [who] shall show great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall de ceive the very elect” (vs. 23, 24). It is at the time o f the revelation o f “ that man o f sin” that there will be “ the working o f Satan with all power and signs and lying won ders” (2 Thess. 2:3, 9 ). While false “ Messiahs” have come and gone ever since the prophecy was uttered, and
tive to the maddened sons of lust and helLI- “ then shall the Lord go forth, and fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day o f battle. And his feet shall stand in that day upon the mount o f Olives” (Zech. 14 :2-4). “ O J erusalem , J erusalem ” On the very spot where He stood, despised and rejected, weeping over the city, there His feet again shall stand! There, in the loving kindness o f Joseph, He will mingle His tears o f love with the penitential tears o f His erring brethren who hated Him without a cause! There, where His bitterest tears of sorrow fell, will fall His gladdest tears of joy, as He lifts again the wings whose shelter was once scorned and spurned (Lk. 13 :34). There He will lift up His voice and cry again, but not with sobs: “ 0 Jerusalem, Jerusalem.” And His wandering sheep— “ the lost sheep o f the house o f Israel”— astray in the wake o f hireling shepherds for centuries upon centuries— shall hear that cry, the voice o f the true Shepherd, and shall know! Out o f the
most o f them professed the power to work miracles, yet among them all there has been no resurrection! No great mir acle o f any sort has marked their advents or their descents. “ Great signs and wonders” are reserved as accompaniments for the final “ false Christs and false prophets.” Though they will be energized by Satan, as were Jannes and Jambres when they withstood Moses by casting down their rods to become living serpents, yet neither the “ false Christs” nor the “ false pro phets” will be able to show forth their “ power and signs and lying wonders” except by the permis sive will o f the Almighty. It is “ God [that] shall send them [the people left on earth after the translation o f the church] strong delusion, that they should believe a lie.” The “ strong delu sion” comes as a judgment— sent “ because they received not [in an age o f grace] the love o f the truth, that they might be saved.” “ Damned” in judicial blindness because they “ believed not the truth, but had pleasure in un righteousness” (c f. 2 Thess. 2 :8-12) !
0 Through the Golden Gate of Jerusalem the true Messiah passed in triumph, to be rejected a few days later. This gate is now sealed, for devout Jews believe that only the Lord's Anointed, the Conqueror, may enter the city through this portal. No impostor, but the "King of Icings," may enter here.
flames o f Armageddon’s furnace they will leap— forth from their hiding places in the wilderness beyond Jordan they will spring—back from “ the four corners o f the earth” they shall assemble— under His wings to trust. In that day, beneath that shelter, Jacob shall rest securely in the homeland, and none shall make him afraid. “ F alse C hrists ” among the G entiles But Israel is not the only nation to be led astray by “ false Messiahs.” Scarcely a nation on earth has not seen at some time the advent o f a deceiver, saying, “ I am Christ!” Lilliputian “ Christs” swarm through every age and every land. This past week, a newspaper gives us a huge headline, telling us of a Los Angeles negro who brazenly announces: “ I am Christ!” Even as we write, a card comes to us through the mail and lies here on the desk, addressed to the “ Members and Officers o f the First Brethren Church, Long Beach, California,” announcing: , Many are looking, hoping, and even expecting the Second Coming of the Messiah! . . . I have come. . . . Wherefore you must receive ME, or it proves you
T he F inal F ulfillment of the O livet P rophecy Thus the long line o f “ false Christs, and false prophets” will culminate in the visible manifestation of their supreme heads, “ the beast” [Antichrist] and “ the false prophet” (Rev. 19:20), whose activities and whose final doom are set forth quite vividly by the seer of Patmos (cf. Rev. 13 and 19 :2 0 ). When to Israel “Messiah the [true] Prince” came, He was “ cut off, but not for himself” (Dan. 9:25, 26). “ He came unto his own, and his own received him not” (John 1 :11 ). When to Israel shall come “ the [false] prince that . . . shall destroy the city . . . he shall con firm the covenant [enter into an alliance] with many [of the Jews] for one week [seven years] : and in the midst o f the week” (Dan. 9:26, 2 7 )— ah! then they will realize their folly when they “ shall see the abomination o f deso lation, spoken o f by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place” (Matt. 2 4 :15; cf. 2 Thess. 2 :4 ) . Then shall Israel’s eyes be opened— alas! too late!-—to the true character of the last o f all the “ false Messiahs.” Then shall they re member the words o f the Messiah they rejected: “ I am
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