The Three Messages

THE next inquiry relates to the past. Have not these messages met their fulfillment in the history of the church in past ages? We think not. Our reasons for this conclusion are, in part, the following:—

1. No proclamation of the hour of God's Judgment come, has ever been made in any past age.

2. If such a proclamation had been made many centuries in the past, as some contend, it would have been a false one.

3. The prophecies on which such a proclamation to men in a state of probation must be based, were closed up and sealed to the time of the end.

4. The Scriptures plainly locate the message of warning respecting the Judgment in a brief space immediately preceding the advent of our Lord; thus directly contradicting the view that locates these messages in past ages.

We now offer proof in support of the foregoing propositions. If they are sustained, they establish the fact that the present generation is that one to which the angel's messages are addressed. We earnestly invite all who wish the truth, to weigh this part of the argument with especial care.

1. Has the proclamation of the hour of God's Judgment come, been made in any past age? If such a proclamation has never been made in past centuries, there is an end to controversy on this part of the subject. No persons have ever been able to show any such proclamation in the past. The apostles did not make such a proclamation. On the contrary, they plainly inform us that the day of the Lord was not then at hand. Martin Luther did not make this proclamation; for he thought the Judgment about three hundred years in the future. And finally, the history of the church presents no such proclamation in the past. Had the first angel preached to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, that the hour of God's Judgment had come, the publicity of such a proclamation would be a sufficient guaranty that the history of the world would contain some record of the fact. Its total silence respecting such a proclamation, is ample proof that it never was made, and should put to silence those who make such an affirmation.

2. We are on firm ground, also, when we say that had such a proclamation been made to the world in past ages, it would have been a false proclamation. Four reasons sustain this statement: (1) There is no part of the Bible on which such a message, centuries in the past, could have been based. Hence had such a proclamation been made, it would have been without scriptural foundation, and consequently not from Heaven. (2) It wouId have been in direct opposition to those scriptures which locate the Judgment, and the warning respecting its approach, in the period of the last generation. The scriptures which sustain these two reasons we shall presently cite. (3) The history of the world amply evinces that the hour of God's Judgment had not come ages in the past. (4) Nor would it be true of past ages, if limited to Babylon. For Rev. 18:8-10 clearly shows that the hour of Babylon's judgment is yet in the future. It is certain, therefore, that the angel with the proclamation respecting the hour of God's Judgment has not given it at a time when it would be not only destitute of scriptural support, but would absolutely contradict their plain testimony.

The prophecies which give us the time of the Judgment, and which present the succession of events, leading down to that great crisis, were closed up and sealed till the time of the end. We refer particularly to the prophecies of Daniel. See chaps. 8:17, 26; 12:4, 9. Hence it is evident that God reserves the warning to that generation which alone needs it. Noah's warning respecting the flood, was alone applicable to those who should witness it; thus also the warning respecting the Judgment is alone applicable to that generation which lives in the last days.

4. The Bible locates these messages in the period which immediately precedes the second advent, and plainly warns us against the proclamation of the Judgment at hand prior to that time. Here we join issue with our opponents. Instead of finding that the apostles gave this proclamation, as some teach, we shall find indubitable evidence that they located this warning far in the future, and that they admonished the church to heed none that should precede a given time. If we recur to the book of Acts, we shall find Paul preaching before Felix of the Judgment to come; and before the Athenians, that God hath appointed a day in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by Jesus Christ. Acts 24:25; 17:31. But that book nowhere intimates that Christ was immediately coming to judgment. Peter points his hearers to the future, saying that the heavens which had then received Christ, must retain him until the times of the restitution. Acts 3:21.

The first epistle to the Thessalonians may seem to teach that the apostles expected the coming of Christ to judgment in their day. Indeed, it is evident that such an idea was received from it by the Thessalanian Church. Hence it was, that in his second epistle to them, Paul found it necessary to speak explicitly on the point. He tells them that the coming of Christ to the Judgment could not take place until the great apostasy; and as the result of that apostasy, that the Man of Sin should be revealed, showing himself that he is God, and exalting himself above all that is called God, or that is worshiped. That this mystery of iniquity is the great Romish apostasy, none but a papist will deny.

Paul reminds the Thessalonians that he had told them of these things when he was yet with them. And where could Paul have learned this fact, which he had thus stated to them? He was accustomed to reason from the Scriptures, and not to deal in assertion. Hence it is very evident that he refers to the prophecy of Daniel, which in its seventh chapter has given the successive events which intervened between its time and the Judgment. In this series of events it has with wonderful precision described the power to which Paul has referred, as the Man of Sin. No Protestant will deny the identity of Daniel's little horn and Paul's Man of Sin. And as Daniel has brought it into a series of events which ends with the Judgment and the setting up of the everlasting kingdom, it was an easy matter for Paul to tell where in this series of events he stood, and whether the Judgment was its next event or not. The apostle, therefore, plainly tells them that that day was not at hand. For the Man of Sin, the little horn, must arise and perform his predicted work, and when that should be accomplished, the coming of Christ should transpire, to consume "that Wicked" with its brightness.

Now when was the little horn to arise? Daniel was told that it should arise after the ten horns upon the fourth beast; or, in other words, after the fourth empire should be divided into ten kingdoms, which was accomplished about five hundred years after Christ. The Judgment, therefore, could not come prior to that time. But how long was this little horn to have power to wear out the saints? Daniel informs us that it should be for "a time, and times, and the dividing of time." How long is this period? Rev. 12 shows that it is 1260 prophetic days, or years. Verses 6, 14. It follows therefore that the apostle carries the mind forward five hundred years to the development of the Man of Sin, and thence 1260 years for his triumph, before the Judgment could be preached as an event immediately impending. Whoever will carefully read Dan. 7, will get the original of Paul's argument in 2 Thess. 2, and will not fail to see the force of his statement.

The papal supremacy began 538, and ended in 1798, with the overthrow of the pope's temporal power. The warning of Paul against a false proclamation respecting the Judgment at hand, therefore, expires at that time, and not before. For we have then reached the point of time where the last important event in Dan. 7, before the Judgment has transpired. An angel from Heaven, preaching the hour of God's Judgment come, many years in the past, would be giving a different gospel from that preached by Paul. Those who locate the angel of Rev. 14:6, 7, in past ages, virtually place upon his head the anathema of Paul in Gal. 1:8.

And what is of very deep interest, the point of time at which Paul's warning expires, is the commencement of the time of the end—the very point to which the visions of Daniel were closed up and sealed. Compare chap. 11:33, 35; 7:25, and the fact that the 1260 years' persecution of the saints terminates with the commencement of the time of the end, will appear obvious. How gloriously does this view of the subject make the truth of God shine out! For the warning of the apostle against a false proclamation of the Judgment at hand, expires at the very point where the seal is taken from those prophecies which show when the Judgment sits. And it is respecting this period, the time of the end, that it is said, Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge (on the very subject which was before concealed) shall be increased. Then the time of the end is the period in which the Judgment-hour cry, and the subsequent messages are to be given. Dan. 8:17, 26; 12:4, 9.