HOMILETICS
SECT. XLIV.—THE GREAT TRIBULATION. (Chap. Daniel 12:1.)
The angel continues his discourse regarding the things that should befall Daniel’s people in the last days. He had shown him the fall of their last great adversary in the “glorious holy mountain” where, in his pride and indignation against the people of God, he had planted the tabernacles of his palace. He now describes what should be the experience of men in general at that period, but with a special reference to Daniel’s own people. “There shall be a time of trouble, such as there never was since there was a nation even to that same time.” To this, the great tribulation, we now turn our attention. The Lord the Spirit give light!
That there should be such a time of trouble previous to the period of lasting peace and prosperity to Israel and the world, Daniel might have already read in the sacred books which he possessed. The song of Moses in the law had concluded with intimations of such a time (Deuteronomy 32:34-43). Isaiah had been led more than once to enlarge upon it, when foretelling the year of the Lord’s redeemed. It was with reference to it that the Lord exhorts His people when He says: “Come, My people, enter into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee, and hide thee for a little season, until the indignation be overpast. For, behold, the Lord cometh out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the world for their iniquity; and the earth shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain” (Isaiah 26:20-21). In reference to the same period the prophet had asked, “Who is this that cometh from Edom, with dyed garments, from Bozrah? This that is glorious in His apparel, travelling in the greatness of His strength?” The answer is given by the Redeemer and Deliverer of His people, “I that speak in righteousness, mighty to save.” The prophet asks again, “Wherefore art thou red in Thine apparel, and Thy garments like him that treadeth in the wine-fat?” To which the answer is returned, “I have trodden the winepress alone; and of the people there was none with Me: for I will tread them in Mine anger, and trample them in My fury; and their blood shall be sprinkled upon My garments, and I will stain all My raiment,”—the blood here that of his enemies, not His own. “For the day of vengeance is in Mine heart, and the year of My redeemed is come” (Isaiah 63:1-4). That day of vengeance was to follow “the acceptable year of the Lord;” and hence His object was only to declare the latter when, reading in the synagogue at Nazareth from Isaiah 61:1-2, Jesus stopped at the words, “the day of vengeance of our God.” Zephaniah had also predicted the same time of trouble as ushering in the glory of the future age. “For My determination is to gather the nations, that I may assemble the kingdoms, to pour upon them Mine indignation, even all My fierce anger; for all the earth shall be devoured with the fire of My jealousy. For then will I turn to the people a pure language, that they may call upon the name of the Lord, to serve Him with one consent” (Zephaniah 3:8-9). Jeremiah had written of the same period of tribulation, adding, “It is even the time of Jacob’s trouble; but he shall be saved out of it” (Jeremiah 30:7). Ezekiel, about half a century before this last vision of Daniel, had been inspired to predict the same time of trouble in the following sublime and terrific language:—“Speak to every feathered fowl and to every beast of the field, Assemble yourselves, and come; gather yourselves on every side to the sacrifice that I do sacrifice for you, even a great sacrifice upon the mountains of Israel, that ye may eat flesh and drink blood. Ye shall eat the flesh of the mighty, and drink the blood of the princes of the earth, of rams, and of lambs, and of goats, of bullocks, all of them fatlings of Bashan. And ye shall eat fat till ye be full, and drink blood till ye be drunken, of My sacrifice which I have sacrificed for you. Thus ye shall be filled at My table with horses and chariots, with mighty men, and with all men of war, saith the Lord God. And I will set My glory among the nations, and the nations shall see My judgment that I have executed, and My hand that I have laid upon them. So the house of Israel shall know that I am the Lord their God from that day and forward. And the nations shall know that the house of Israel went into captivity for their iniquity; because they trespassed against Me, therefore hid I My face from them, and gave them into the hand of their enemies; so fell they all by the sword. According to their uncleanness, and according to their transgressions, have I done unto them, and hid My face from them. Therefore thus saith the Lord God, Now will I bring again the captivity of Jacob, and have mercy upon the whole house of Israel, and will be jealous for My holy name” (Ezekiel 39:17-25). This was, doubtless, the same tribulation of which Jesus forewarned His disciples when He said, “There shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to that time, no, nor ever shall be;” adding, “Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken. And then shall appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.” This time of tribulation the Saviour, like the prophets before Him, connects with that of His people’s redemption, adding, according to Luke, “When these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads, for your redemption draweth nigh” (Luke 21:28).
We may notice in connection with this time of trouble—
I. The time of it. The angel says, “At that time,” [340] i.e., when the last hostile power shall, as had just been mentioned, “go forth with great fury to destroy and utterly to make away many,” and shall “plant the tabernacles of his palace between the seas in the glorious holy mountain,” there to meet with his end (chap. Daniel 11:44-45). The last clause of the verse connects it with the time of returning mercy to the covenant people, when “all Israel shall be saved” (Romans 11:26); while the second verse connects it with the resurrection of the dead, both events being elsewhere connected with the Lord’s second appearing (Zechariah 12:10; Revelation 1:7; Matthew 24:39; Acts 3:19-21, R.V.; 1 Corinthians 15:23; 1 Thessalonians 4:15-17). So Jesus, as we have seen, connects the time of tribulation with that of His own coming “in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.” From the events which are to follow it, however, it is obviously not to be confounded with the time of the general judgment. The fulfilment of the promises regarding Israel is to follow.
[340] “At that time.” Keil remarks that the expression points back to the “time of the end “(chap. Daniel 11:40), the time when the final hostile and persecuting power rises up to subdue the whole world, and sets up his camp in the Holy Land, to destroy many in great anger, and totally to uproot them. He observes that the description of this oppression seems to be based upon Jeremiah 30:7, the time of trouble being the climax which the hostile king shall bring upon Israel, and occurring with the expiry of the last or seventieth week (chap. Daniel 9:26); while, with Kranichfeld, he identifies Israel’s deliverance out of it with the setting up of Messiah’s kingdom as described in chap. Daniel 7:22-27. He agrees with Hävernick in opposing those who refer this verse to the period of persecution under Antiochus, on the ground that the statement regarding it is far too strong for such a period, while the promised deliverance of those “written in the book “does not accord with that Syrian oppression. Hävernick understands the “trouble” of the sufferings and oppressions which the people of Israel should endure at the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, but which should be most fully realised only at the second coming of the Lord (Matthew 24:21-22). Hofmann finds in this and the two following verses the prophecy of the final close of the history of nations, the time of the great tribulation at the termination of the present course of the world, the complete salvation of Israel in it, and the resurrection of the dead at the end of the world. Calvin interpreted the words of the increased troubles and heavier afflictions to be endured by the Church after the manifestation of Christ. Chrysostom, Grotius, and others understand them of the persecutions of Antiochus while his armies were still in Judea. Junius, with Calvin, applies them to the troubles of the Church in the times of the Gospel. Calovius limits them to the last times, in the “end of the days.” Brightman remarks that the tribulation cannot be applied to any trouble from Antiochus or the Romans, as after it no calamity is to be expected by the Jews, the suffering inflicted on them by those powers being insignificant compared with this misery in which, after sixteen, now eighteen, centuries, the Jews still lie buried. He considers the tribulation to have reference to the Jews, Daniel’s own people, of whom, however, he thinks, some will very likely hold obstinately to their legal rights and institutions, notwithstanding the deliverance of their nation, and the glory with which the truth shall then flourish.
II. The subjects of the tribulation. These, apparently, are twofold:
(1) The nations of apostate Christendom forming the great confederacy under the leadership of the infidel and final Antichrist, who is then to come to his end; and
(2) Israel or the Jews, whose great and final trouble it is to be, previous to their restoration as God’s covenant people,—“the time of Jacob’s trouble.” In regard to the former, the tribulation will apparently be both immediately from the hand of God, whose sacrifice their destruction is said to be, and who speaks of “raining upon the infidel leader, and his bands, and the many peoples that are with him, an overflowing rain, and great hailstones, fire and brimstone;” and also mediately, through the instrumentality both of others and themselves, as God declares by the same prophet, that He will call for a sword against the invading enemy throughout all His mountains, while every man’s sword shall be against his fellow, and that He will “plead against him with pestilence and with blood” (Ezekiel 38:21-22). In reference to Israel, the cause or instrument of the tribulation will apparently be the hostile power itself, whom God however brings up against them, and gives into his hand (Ezekiel 38:16-17; Ezekiel 39:23-24). The procuring cause of the tribulation in both cases is sin. On the part of the infidel leader and his followers and abettors throughout the nations, it is pride, infidelity, defiance of God, covetousness and rapacity, the enmity against God and His people culminating in one grand attack upon Israel now apparently prosperous and at ease in their own country (Ezekiel 38:8-13). On the part of Israel, it is unbelief and rejection of their Saviour-King yet unrepented of and unforgiven (Ezekiel 39:23-24), the curse called down upon themselves and their children now taking its full and final effect, when they shall have filled up the measure of their iniquity (Matthew 27:25).
III. The greatness of it. It is here spoken of as unparalleled, and is so characterised by Jeremiah: “Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it: it is even the day of Jacob’s trouble” (Jeremiah 30:7). The same language used by the Saviour in reference to it. The unparalleled greatness of it seen both in the extent and intensity of it. Terrible indeed the tribulation that shall exceed that of the Deluge, the Cities of the Plain, Jerusalem in its siege and capture by the Chaldeans and then by the Romans, the French Revolution and the Reign of Terror. Its greatness inferred from the exhortation of Jesus to His disciples and people in every age: “Watch and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man” (Luke 21:36). The same to be inferred from the object of it. It is the day of recompenses, both in regard to Israel and the nations of Christendom, when the blood of God’s saints shed from the beginning shall be avenged on Jew and Gentile, when “the earth shall disclose her blood—the blood which she has been caused to drink,—and shall no more cover her slain” (Isaiah 26:21). Its greatness may be inferred also from its results. It is to terminate, in a general sense, not only the sins and sufferings of Israel but of the world at large, and to usher in a period of righteousness and peace that shall continue for at least a thousand years. It is in reference to that period that the prophetic Psalmist writes, “Come, behold the works of the Lord, what desolations He hath made in the earth. He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth; He breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; He burneth the (war-) chariot in the fire. Be still and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the heathen; I will be exalted in the earth” (Psalms 46:8-10). It is as the result of it that God will turn upon the peoples a pure language, so that they shall all serve Him with one consent (Zephaniah 3:8). The greatness of the tribulation may also be gathered from its character and the agents in it. Proceeding, as in great part it is to do, from the great infidel leader and his Antichristian host, whose coming as the Man of Sin, the Son of perdition, and that Wicked or Lawless one, is after the power and energy of Satan, it shall inaugurate a time of unbridled wickedness, fully-developed ungodliness, and daring God-defying infidelity; and who, in his fury at the evil tidings that are to reach him in the midst of his triumphant iniquity, shall “go forth to destroy and utterly to make away many.” Of all evil times it will be the most evil, faith being scarcely any longer to be found in the earth, few if any godly men left, those there are being hidden as in a pavilion in the chambers of God’s protection provided for them, and the restraints of His grieved and insulted Spirit being for the time withdrawn from the earth; a period of which the three years and a half at the commencement of the French Revolution, during which religion was publicly and openly proscribed, the Sabbath abolished, the Bible dragged through the streets of Paris at the tail of an ass, and a beautiful but profligate woman worshipped in the church of Notre Dame as the Goddess of Reason, may have been an instalment and a type. Physical disturbances and commotions seem to be indicated both by the prophets and the Saviour Himself, as accompanying these civil and religious ones; signs appearing in the heavenly bodies, and the powers of heaven being shaken, both as symbols and accompaniments of the distress of nations; the godly being taught to sing in the prospect of that time of trouble: “The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge: therefore will we not fear, although the earth be removed, and the mountains be cast into the depths of the sea: though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof” (Psalms 46:2-3). Nothing is said in the text to indicate the duration of this time of trouble; but we may gather from other places that its brevity will be in proportion to its intensity. The godly are to hide themselves “for a little moment, till the indignation be overpast.” “A short work will the Lord make upon the earth.” For the elect’s sake “the days will be shortened,” for otherwise, according to the Saviour’s declaration, “no flesh should be saved” (Matthew 24:22).
The subject calls for solemn thought and earnest preparation. That this time of great and unparalleled tribulation shall come cannot be questioned by any believer in Revelation. The words of a great writer, philosopher, and divine, now passed away, express the conclusion of a simple-minded, unbiassed reader of the Word: “I utterly despair,” said the late Dr. Chalmers, “of the universal prevalence of Christianity as the result of a painful missionary process. I look for its conclusive establishment through a widening passage of desolating judgments, with the utter demolition of our present civil and ecclesiastical structures.” [341] How near we may be to this predicted state of things, or how far off from it, it is impossible for any one to say. Whether perceptibly or not, we are doubtless approaching to it. Signs are not wanting to indicate that such is the case. “This gospel of the kingdom,” said the Saviour when speaking of that future period, “shall first be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations”—preached, not believed in—“and then shall the end come” (Matthew 24:14). This is rapidly taking place. Missionary operations are constantly multiplying. So also are infidelity and its agencies. It has recently been said by a high authority, that religion seems to be unsettled, and almost going away from various countries. [342] The rapidity with which great changes at present take place is the subject of general remark. A few years may suffice to bring the predicted period. For ought we know, the present living generation may see and participate in the great tribulation. It is for all to seek earnestly to secure for themselves and others a place of security in time, while the doors of the provided ark are open. “Seek righteousness; seek meekness; it may be ye may be hid in the day of the Lord’s anger” (Zephaniah 2:3). The present time is to be embraced by earnestly laying hold of the gracious covenant held out to us in Christ, and persuading others also to do the same; and thus being prepared for the time when it will be said, in connection with predicted judgments, “Gather My saints together unto Me, those that have made a covenant with Me by sacrifice” (Psalms 50:5). “Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and ye perish from the way, when His wrath is kindled but a little: blessed are all they that put their trust in Him” (Psalms 2:12).
[341] The same writer, in his “Sabbath Scripture Readings” on Revelation 15. says: “Can this sea of glass on which the saints might stand and look on the execution of God’s righteous sentence on the earth at large,—can it be what my friend Edward Irving imagined it to be,—one country in the world that should stand exempted from the desolations which are to go abroad over the face of it, and that country to be the evangelical and missionary Britain, standing aloof from popery, and actuated generally and throughout, or at least infiuentially, though it might be partially, by a pure, and scriptural, and Protestant faith? The song of Moses, as commemorating the destruction of the enemies of the Church, and the Church’s safety as well as prospects, might well harmonise with the song of the Lamb; and both together might harmonise with the circumstances of that transition period, when plagues were to be sent down from heaven upon the earth, and, as the fruit of God’s judgments being made manifest, all nations were to come and worship before Him.”
[342] “Any one,” said Cardinal Newman lately in a sermon at Birmingham, “who looked into the news of the day, would see quite enough in the state of things at home and abroad, to understand the great need of intercession. There was certainly a very dark prospect before them with regard to religion; and without saying whether the troubles were greater or less than those which had previously tried the Church, they had a depth which, to those who only saw the present, was more serious and more dangerous than any depth that had been.”
HOMILETICS
SECT. XLV.—THE DELIVERANCE OF THE JEWS. (Chap. Daniel 12:1, last clause.)
The object for which the angel was sent to Daniel was to communicate to him what should befall his people in the latter days. He had already intimated to him the coming of Messiah at a definite period, with the calamities which should follow their wicked rejection of Him even to the time of the end. These calamities, however, were to culminate, as the end approached, in a time of trouble such as had never yet been since there was a nation. It is now promised, however, for the comfort of Daniel and his godly countrymen, that his people should be delivered out of that tribulation, at least a portion of them,—“every one that shall be found written in the book.” We notice, in connection with this promised deliverance—
I. The deliverance itself. “Thy people shall be delivered.” Daniel’s people were the Jews, the descendants, with himself, of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; those for whom he had so earnestly prayed, and whose sins he had so penitently confessed (chap, 9.) The whole twelve tribes are included. These, in consequence of Solomon’s apostasy, had indeed been divided into two kingdoms, those of Judah and Israel; the former consisting of the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin, the latter of the remaining ten (1 Kings 11:9-13). They formed, however, but one people, and were yet again to be united in one kingdom (Ezekiel 37:16-24). Those constituting the kingdom of Israel, having been the first to apostatise to idolatry, were the first to be led captive from their own land, which was done by the Assyrians, who placed them in various cities of the Medes (2 Kings 15:29; 2 Kings 17:5-6). The two tribes forming the kingdom of Judah, having imitated the apostasy of the kingdom of Israel, were carried captive, on three separate occasions, by Nebuchadnezzar into Babylon. It was more especially those two tribes who returned to Judea after the edict of Cyrus; and of these only a portion. The whole twelve tribes, however, were regarded as existing in the days of the apostles, though mostly scattered among the Gentiles (Acts 26:6-7; James 1:1; John 7:35). It is more especially those who formed the kingdom of Judah, the tribes of Judah and Benjamin, with a sprinkling from the other tribes, that are now known as Jews, the ten tribes being as yet comparatively unknown, though doubtless to be found in various parts of the world. It seems to be more especially those of the kingdom of Judah that are here indicated, as it appears to be they who shall be found in Jerusalem and Judea at the period referred to (Zechariah 12:2; Zechariah 12:4; Zechariah 12:6-10). These apparently intended to be the means of seeking out and bringing back their scattered brethren after their own conversion and acceptance of the Saviour (Isaiah 66:19-22). Even of those, however, who, being in Judea and Jerusalem at the time of the great tribulation under their final adversary, only a portion will be delivered. [343] Zechariah predicts that in all the land two-thirds should be cut off and die, but the third should be left therein, to be brought through the fire and refined as silver is refined, and be made God’s people, not merely in name as before, but in reality and truth (Zechariah 13:8-9). They are here spoken of as those “written in the book;” that book being doubtless the secret register of those whom, as an elect remnant, it was the Lord’s sovereign purpose to spare, as the nucleus of the future Church of Abraham’s seed; and doubtless those who, according to the prophet’s exhortation, had truly and in time sought righteousness and meekness, and under the outpoured Spirit of grace and supplication had looked to Him whom they had pierced, and had mourned because of Him, and had thus been led to the fountain opened for sin and uncleanness (Zechariah 12:10; Zechariah 13:1). Such a book frequently referred to as “the book of life,” or “of the living” (Philippians 4:3; Revelation 3:5; Revelation 13:8; Luke 10:35; Exodus 32:35; Psalms 69:28). The deliverance is, in the first instance, one from death by the sword of the enemy. According to Zechariah, all nations will be gathered at that time, doubtless under this same infidel chief, against Jerusalem; and the city shall be taken, the houses rifled, and the women ravished, and half of the inhabitants shall go into captivity; but “the residue of the people shall not be cut off from the city” (Zechariah 14:2). This residue doubtless the remnant in the text. This deliverance from death, however, to be followed with a still more important and blessed one, the deliverance from spiritual death and introduction into Messiah’s kingdom.
[343] “Every one that shall be found written,” &c. According to Professor Lee and others, these are not to be the Jews at large, but the holy remnant who embraced Jesus as the Messiah, and escape to carry the tidings of salvation to the ends of the earth. Speaking of Isaiah 24:6, “Few men left,” Dr. Chalmers remarks: “a remnant, however, will be left, and a good remnant; and this not confined to the land of Israel, but among all the neighbouring countries that had been laid waste; for the voice of praise was to arise from the sea and from the isles, and this too to God as the Lord God of Israel. This voice was to arise from the midst of cruel sufferings, even ‘in the fires’ wherewith (Daniel 12:6) the houses were burnt by their invaders.” He adds: “In this prophecy is foreshown a visitation upon the earth still future, which is to emerge in the Millennium—how emphatically told in this place!—when the Lord shall reign in Jerusalem, and before His ancients gloriously.”
II. The agency employed in effecting it. This is said to be “Michael,” called elsewhere “Michael your prince,” and “the prince that standeth up for the children of thy people.” [344] In the New Testament called Michael the archangel (Jude 1:9). Represented in the book of Revelation as, in conjunction with the angels under him, fighting with the devil and his angels (Revelation 12:7). He appears especially charged with the defence of God’s ancient people. The ministry of angels with their allotment to various charges already referred to under chap. 10. Michael, as the chief of the angel princes, and especial intrusted with the defence and care of Israel, naturally introduced in this their final conflict with the powers of this world, under the leadership of one whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and deceivableness (2 Thessalonians 2:9), and against whom, with his mighty force, it might seem impossible that Israel should be able to stand. Quite in accordance with the economy of God’s providential government of the Church and the world, to employ angelic agency for the accomplishment of His purposes, whether of mercy or of judgment. In what particular manner Michael executes the charge committed to him on this occasion, it is not for us to inquire. An angel smote in one night a hundred and eighty-five thousand Assyrians that lay encamped about Jerusalem. “The stars in their courses fought against Sisera.” In a thousand ways of which we have now no conception the angelic agents fulfil their ministry.
[344] “Michael.” Regarded by Calvin and some others of the older commentators as Christ Himself. So Hävernick interprets the text of the first appearance of Christ. Most understand Michael to be the archangel. Dr. Cox thinks that the standing up of Michael for Daniel’s people corresponds with the going forth of Him who is called Faithful and True upon the white horse; the trouble here predicted agreeing with the mighty overthrow of the Antichristian powers, who are to be cast into the “lake burning with brimstone,” as there represented. Brightman thinks Michael to be some certain angel, whose ministry the great Prince will employ in that battle.
III. The results of the deliverance. The deliverance, in the first instance, was one from the sword of Antichrist and his infidel host. It is also the deliverance of Israel from their last oppressor, and the termination of that captivity under which, in consequence of their unbelief and rejection of their divine King and Saviour, they had lain for so many centuries, as the curse which their fathers who crucified their King called down upon themselves and their children. The time of their rejection by God, and their scattering and crushing under the hand of the Gentiles into which they had been delivered, will now come to an end. The “seven times” of punishment that were to pass over them for their sin will now have expired. The time to favour Zion, even the set time, will now have come. He that had scattered Israel is now, according to the promise, to gather him. [345] The threatenings and the curses had in righteous judgment been executed, and now in like manner the promises made to their fathers were in unmerited mercy to be fulfilled also. The curse can now be removed and the blessing bestowed, because Israel, through the Spirit of grace and supplication poured upon them, will have penitently accepted their long-rejected King and Saviour. They will have been brought, with the veil removed from their hearts, to say in faith, “Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord,” and their house is to remain no longer desolate. They are now to be betrothed in righteousness, and in judgment, and in loving-kindness, in mercies, and in faithfulness,—to be betrothed for ever (Hosea 2:19-20). The blindness that in part overtook Israel as the result of their rejection of their Messiah, was to be taken away when the fulness of the times of the Gentiles should be come in, when all Israel should be saved. That time will now have come. The Deliverer was to come out of Zion to them that turn from ungodliness in Jacob, and to those who have looked on their once pierced Redeemer. That Deliverer now comes. He comes to turn away ungodliness from Jacob, and to graft the natural branches, broken off on account of unbelief, again into their own olive tree. The casting away of Israel for a time was the reconciling of the world; the receiving back of them again was to be to that same world “life from the dead.” [346] They are now to be restored to the high and holy position originally intended for them, as a kingdom of priests unto God in the service of humanity. [347] A mere external deliverance without this spiritual one would have left Israel but as they were. But now the new covenant is to be made with them, in virtue of which, while their iniquities are all forgiven, God’s law is put within their hearts and written indelibly on their minds by the Holy Ghost. That better covenant they accept when they look by faith on Him whom they pierced and mourn for Him, a covenant made through the sacrifice of the Son of God (Psalms 50:5).
[345] Auberlen remarks: “The predictions contained in Leviticus 26:31-45; Deuteronomy 28:62-68; Deuteronomy 29:22; Deuteronomy 30:14; Deuteronomy 32:15-43, concerning Israel’s apostasy and dispersion among the heathen, and then concerning their conversion and glorious re-establishment in the Holy Land, were not exhaustively fulfilled in the short decennia of the Assyrian and Babylonian exile, and in the troublous centuries of the restoration that followed those captivities. On the contrary, the curse lies even this day on the Jewish nation; and the promised restoration awaits yet its fulfilment and realisation. For him who believes in the fulfilment of prophecy, it is only necessary to read the words of Scripture in order to be persuaded of this. The great commentary on the history of revelation is given us in the miraculous preservation of the Jewish nation through all centuries to our time, while other nationalities are either destroyed or have mixed to such an extent with other nations, that they are disfigured to such a degree that they can scarcely be recognised,—a preservation which is doubly miraculous; since Israel is dispersed in all countries of the earth, while other nations have their filed stationary residence.”
[346] “The conversion of Israel stands in a causal, and not merely temporal or chronological connection with the coming of Christ; and is succeeded by a new state of the world in which a new ‘life,’ in a greater, more richly characteristic fulness of Spirit, will spread from the people of God to all the nations of the earth; and in comparison with which the life of nations, during the preceding ages, might be called ‘death.’ The Apostle designates this new state of the world by the same expression which he uses when speaking of the regeneration of individuals, as ‘life from the dead’ (Romans 6:13, compare Ephesians 2:5; Colossians 2:13). As there is at present a regeneration of individuals, so in the future the life of nations, as such, shall be renewed: there shall be a world-regeneration. Quite in accordance with this is the expression used by our Lord when He denotes the new Æon or age Palingenesia, or ‘the regeneration’ (Matthew 19:28); and by Peter when he designates it as ‘the times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord’ (Acts 3:19-21).”—Auberlen.
[347] “The people of Israel,” says Auberlen, “receives for all time the destiny to be the recipient and mediator of divine communications.” Referring to Exodus 19:5-6, he says: “Israel stands in the same relation to humanity as a priest stands to the nation; a mediator in the relations of humanity to God. Hereby the relations of Israel are fixed; not merely for the times of the old covenant, during which Israel did not even exercise his priestly office as regards the heathen; but for all times and forever.… From the religious point of view, in their relation to God and Christ, as needing mercy and salvation, Gentiles and Jews stand on a perfect equality; the same righteousness is imputed to them; the same glory is given to them; they have the same participation in Christ, and by Him both have access to the Father in one Spirit. We see this also in the transfigured (or glorified) church, which consists of both Jews and Gentiles. But from the standpoint of the history of revelation, as regards the way in which God uses men as instruments to bring about the objects of His kingdom, the case is altogether different. From this point of view, Israel is, and ever shall be, the chosen people through which God executes His plans concerning humanity.”
We may make one reflection. The deliverance in the text suggests the deliverance which every individual, whether Jew or Gentile, needs, and that which, procured by the Son of God incarnate for us, is freely held out to each in the Gospel; that with which no external deliverance is once to be compared, but of which Israel’s deliverance from their external enemies is a type. It is deliverance from the curse of a broken law from the deserved wrath of God, from the dominion of sin, from the power of Satan, and from the pains of eternal death. It is deliverance from a tribulation with which that of Israel under Antichrist, great as it will be, is only as a shadow; a tribulation from which, beyond a certain period, deliverance will be impossible. “After death, the judgment.” It is a deliverance, too, Which, like that of Israel in the text, places the subjects of it in the glorious position of kings and priests to God. This deliverance also, like that in the text, is experienced in looking through the Spirit of grace and supplication, believingly and penitently, on Him whom we too, by our sins and unbelief, have pierced, and, as penitents, washing our guilty souls in the fountain of a Redeemer’s blood, opened for sin and for uncleanness. That deliverance is freely offered in the Gospel. A believing, humble, hearty acceptance of it makes it our own. And it is to be accepted now. “Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.”