: W. E. Vine, C. F. Hogg
: The Second Coming and the Last Days Studies in Eschatology
: Kingsley Books
: 9781912149551
: 1
: CHF 10.50
:
: Religion/Theologie
: English
: 320
: kein Kopierschutz
: PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
: ePUB
Premillennialism is an understanding of God's plan for the end times which says, in the words of F.F. Bruce, that there is 'an interval between the resurrection-rapture of the Church and the return of Christ to earth 'with power and great glory,' and places in this interval the great tribulation of the end time.' W.E. Vine, with the help of C.F. Hogg, explores this doctrine. The Second Coming and the Last Days contains W.E. Vine's two best-known books on eschatology and numerous shorter articles. 'Touching the Coming of the Lord,' written with C.F. Hogg, is, says one reviewer, 'The best book I've ever read on the subject. It is breathtakingly spiritual, rigorously sequent (logical). This book is well worth your while.' When World War I broke out in 1914, W.E. Vine was asked how then-current events fit into an understanding of prophecy. 'The Roman Empire in the Light of Prophecy,' which discusses 'the rise, progress, and end of the fourth world-empire,' has been called 'classic Bible prophecy study.' Other articles in The Second Coming and the Last Days are 'The Church and the Tribulation,' 'The Rapture and the Great Tribulation,' Witnesses to the Second Advent,' 'The Coming Priest-King,' 'The Sealed Book of the Apocalypse,' and 'The Four Women of the Apocalypse.'

CHAPTER ONE

The Expectancy of Christ

God loves to be longed for, He longs to be sought,

For He sought us Himself with such longing and love:

He died for desire of us, marvelous thought!

And He yearns for us now to be with Him above.

— Frederick William Faber

When men permit themselves to contemplate the future, when they project their thoughts beyond the grave, the natural tendency of the mind is to become overcast by fear. Fear draws its strength from the unknown, and is accentuated by the consciousness of failure and the sense of accountability. Fear demoralizes men, robs them of courage and of hope, and drives them to new depths of evil. Fear, anticipating the adverse verdict of the Day of Judgment, causes suffering even here and now; “fear hath punishment.” There is but one way of dealing with fear, this natural tenant of the human mind; fear must be cast out. But how? Love alone is equal to the task. “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear.” “Perfect love,” that is the love manifested in the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is only in the knowledge of the purpose of His death that the believer is able to think without fear of the Day of Judgment, for “as He is, even so are we in this world” (1 John 4:17, 18).

The tenses must be closely followed here. The Apostle does not say as He is so we shall be, nor that as He was so we are, but quite plainly, and by the addition of the unmistakable phrase “in this world,” as He is now at the right hand of the Majesty on High, so are we here and at this present time. What, then, is His place or condition there to which our present state here corresponds? Surely this, that He, after He had borne our sins in His body on the tree, experiencing there that separation from God which is the consequence of sin, was raised from among the dead and exalted to the Throne of God. He is thus on the other side of the Judgment, so to speak; having suffered in the flesh for sin, He has now passed out of any relation with sin,i.e. He is no longer a sin-bearer (1 Peter 4:1).

And as He is, so are all they that have put their trust in Him. The Christian is not a man who contemplates the Day of Judgment with mingled feelings, hoping that it will see him exculpated on the ground of the death of Christ, and yet fearing lest it should not. Rather, he is one who shall not come into the Judgment of that Day at all (“shall never stand in the dock,” John 5:24), since he knows himself to be already justified by Christ and accepted in Christ, seated with and in Him in the Heavenlies (Eph. 2:6). This the perfect love of God has accomplished for him, and the assurance of this has set him free from fear.

The Promise to the Son

John’s statement is a particular instance of a general principle; the principle itself is capable of wide application. Thus, if it is asked why the Scriptures insist so much on the waiting attitude of the believer, that he is ever to be on his watch for the Coming of the Lord, the answer assuredly is that that is the attitude of the Lord Himself toward the future, and that as He is in this respect, so also are we. O