Signs of the Times
By Dr. French E. Oliver Evangelist at the Bible Institute of Los Angeles during July
Note.— Thé discourses of Dr. O liver w ere so learned and com prehensive; so sincere and eloquent, as to cause the w id est comment. N one stru ck harder a t the presen t-day stubborn blindness to prophecy, on the p art of m an y C hristians, than th is address on “ T h e Sign s of th e T im es.“ — Editor.
reference to His imminent and glorious re turn. Nevertheless, He is coming. “Behold He cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see Him, and they also which pierced Him, and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of Him” (Rev. 1 :7). But before He returns to inaugurate the Millennium, to execute judgment upon the Gentile world-system, which is owned root and branch by the Devil; He is coming Secretly to call His saints, and His call of the saints will in augurate the beginning of the missing week of Daniel’s prophecy, or the seventieth week, which is so vital in moment, so tre mendous in warning, so terrible in the in auguration of trouble and bloodshed. LACK OF VISION Christ’s reference to the condition of the church at His appearing is made very clear in His parable of the Ten Virgins—five were foolish and five were wise. It seems to indicate the lack of vision and spirit ual unction on the part of the blind leaders and the blind followers of churchianity, who have substituted formality for regeneration and pure and undefiled religion. The cur rent phrase on the part of modern religious leaders has been worn threadbare, the state ment, “I am an optimist; the world is get ting better.” It has been worked overtime. There is such a thing as intelligent opti mism, but it is absolutely different from blind and consummate ignorance. I heard
F ALL of the kings of Eu rope were assembled in Lon- 1on tonight and I should present the question, “Do you think Jesus Christ will
return to earth tonight?” the unanimous an swer would doubtless be, “We think not.” If our President should call the two legis lative bodies into a conference and have the governors of all the States and mayors of all of the great cities as guests and the question, “Do you think Jesus Christ will return to earth within a short time?” should be presented, the concensus of opinion would be hastily stated. They would say, “We think not.” I will go farther: if all the ministers of the Gospel were called to gether in one gigantic conference and were asked the same question, I think the ma jority of them would say, “We do not ex pect Him.” But the text I have chosen for this ad dress which is recorded in Matthew 24: 44, says: “Therefore be ye also ready, for in such an hour as ye think not, the Son of Man cometh.” It is pathetic when you con sider the fact that the second coming of Christ is mentioned about five times to where His first coming is mentioned once, that so many of the people who believe that He came as a Man of sorrows and died on the cross to save sinners are not only in the dark concerning the fact of His return, but many of them bitterly oppose every
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