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T H E K I N G ’ S B U S I N E S S
April, 1940
the Merchantman, paid His own pre cious blood (1 Pet. 1:18,19). The church has been purchased (Màtt. 20:28) and has been left in the world to grow (Matt. 16:18), awaiting time of deliv ery. At the appointed hour, the Lord win step from the Father’s throne for a moment and will come down to re ceive His pearl personally (1 Thess. 4:16, 17). Then will be completed the purpose of God with respect to the call ing out of this Gentile age a people for His Son. Then will be “the day of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Cor. 1:8); the day of “the fulness of the Gentiles” will be ushered in. The Terminus Ad Quem of “ Until” How long may we expect Jerusalem to be trodden down of the Gentiles? How long may we expect Israel to be in part blinded to spiritual things? The answer to both questions is this: Until the Son steps from His Father’s throne to assùme the gubernatorial reins of thi3 old earth; until the hetavens open, and the “Kings of kings and Lord of lords,” seated on a white charger, "clothed with a vesture dipped in blood,” and followed by the redeemed saints, rides to earth in glory and power (Rev. 19:11-16). “Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil. 2:9-11). In this scene, His day of humiliation is past, and now is the day of His exaltation. The full fruition of “until” is at hand and its prophetic significance realized. The clock of God strikes the hour prophesied in Psalm 2: “Yet have I set my King upon my holy hill of Zion” (v. 6). Then the Son will receive the nations for His inheritance and the uttermost parts o f' the earth for His possession (v. 8, R.V.). Then divine grace will be poured out upon Israel, blindness will be removed, and Israel will accept as their Messiah the One “whom they have* pierced” (Zech. 12 : 10 ) . “Lo as some ship, outworn and over laden, Strains for the harbor where her sails are furled; Lo as some innocent and eager maiden Leans o’er the wistful limit of the world, So even I, and with a pang more thrill ing, So even I, and with a hope more sweet, Yearn for the sign, O Christ! of Thy fulfilling, Faint for the flaming of Thine advent feet.”
Significance of "Until"
By KENNETH M> MONROE* Los Angeles, California
ences to the same individual, each sepa rated by a millennium. Additional light is shed on Psalm 110:1 by Hebrews 1:3: “When he had by himself purged our sins, [He] sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high.’’ The Psalm is prophetic, while the passage from He brews is retrospective. The incarnate Son, having accom plished our redemption on the cross, returns to heaven to share His Father’s throne until the hour is come for Him to return to earth as “King of kings and Lord of lords,” to occupy His own earthly Davidic throne (cf. 2 Sam. 7:12-17, confirmed by Lk. 1:30-33). The enemies of the Son are now hav ing their day. This is Man’s Day, and he is going his own way, humanizing God, deifying himself, minimizing sin, and ostracizing Scripture. Paul well describes him in 2 Timothy 3:1-7. Enemies of Christ, His gospel, His church, and His way of life are ram pant everywhere. Nations, as well as citizens, are lawless and godless. Many lands in theory follow the Russian communistic practice of ridding the earth of churches and the heavens of Almighty God. Why does God not do something about it? The answer is bound up in the little word “until” of the Psalm we are discussing. The Times of the Gentiles Since, as is showft in Luke 21:24, the ,“until” of Psalm 110 is related to “the times of the Gentiles,” it is important to learn just what period is indicated. A study of the dream imagé of Nebuchadnezzar, as recorded in Daniel 2, leads us to the conclusion that the image portrays “the times of the Gen tiles’’ as extending from the head to the toes, or from the Neo-Babylonian kingdom of Nebuchadnezzar to the ten- power Roman kingdom just prior to the establishment of the millennial reign of
Christ. Therefore, the terminus a quo, the starting point, of our three “untils” is the old empire of. Nebuchadnezzar of the sixth century B. C.; and the ter minus ad quern, the “end toward which,” is the return of Christ to establish the kingdom, which “ thé God of heaven” shall set up and '''which shall never be ' destroyed” (Dan. 2:44). A proper understanding and relating of the “ days of Scripture” will aid in making more clear the significance of “until.” Four distinct periods or occa sions are referred to in prophecy as Man’s Day, Christ’s Day, Jehovah’s Day, and God’s Day. Man’s Day may be used in designa tion of “the times of the Gentiles,” con summating in the reign of the Anti christ, who has “the number of a man” (Rev. 13:18). Christ’s Day Is the day of our Lord’s return for His church (1 Cor. 1:8; 5:5; Phil. 1:6). Jehovah’s Day or the Day of the Lord (1 Thess. 5:1-3) is the day of judgment seen by Joel (ch. 2), Christ (Matt. 24:15-21), and John the reve- lator (Rev. 4 to 18). It is the last of the seventy “week” years of Daniel 9. God’s »Day is the kingdom in mani festation in contradistinction to man’s day, which, as we shall shortly see, contains the kingdom in mystery form (Matt. 13), The Fullness of the Gentiles , This phrase must not be confused with the one discussed above. Whereas the expression, “ the times of the Gen tiles,” refers to Gentile nations, “ the fulness of the Gentiles” refers to saints of the true church. In the parable of the “one pearl of great price" (Matt. 3:46), we see the church in the triple darkness of this world, even as the pearl is in the sea, in the sand, and in the oyster. The church is the “one pearl of great price,” for which Christ,
*Dean, Bible Institute of Los Angeles.
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