prehension of Christ is first of all necessary, absolutely necessary for us, in order that we may avoid the "hay, wood and stubble, which will be destroyed in time of judgment upon our works. Look into that important text, Colossians 2. 19. "NOT HOLDING THE HEAD," &c. The apostle desired that his "great conflict," for christians at Colosse, Laodicea, and in other places, should be known, for he ardently desired that they might arrive to the "full assurance of understanding, the acknowledgement of the "Mystery of God, "In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." Is not the mystery of God (the Holy Ghost) set forth by Gabriel, the angel of the Lord; Luke i. 35.? Is not the mystery of the Father proclaimed by that same angel, in v. 32.; and by Jesus Christ to Nicodemus? (see John's Gospel, iii. 16); and by the great apostle of the Gentiles; Rom. viii. 32.? And by Christ Himself, the mystery, of His humiliation, "Thus it is written; and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day?" What would Paul say to the present generation, who trample the literality of the Holy Scriptures beneath their feet, by rejecting the person of Jesus Christ, as to visibility in the millennium? It is an awful heresy-it is a damnable heresy, to preach a spiritual reign of the Lord upon earth, without His literal presence upon the throne of David; for Gabriel was sent from the invisible Holy of Holies, to declare that event; and it is a fact, that thus, and not by the Spirit's unction upon preaching the gospel, is JESUS made the Head of the corner stone in Zion. The Jewish builders rejected the corner stone, and now the Gentiles reject the Head Stone of the corner; but what is the result at last? Hear the very words of the Blessed One, and tremble at His word-"Whosoever shall fall upon this stone shall be broken; but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder. Matt. 21. 44. Luke 20. 18. See Dan. 2. 34, 35. 45. Mark the expressions in verse 35, "chaff of the summer threshing floors," &c. compare with Isaiah 17. 11-14; particularly note the 13th v., "chaff of the mountains," "thistle down before the whirlwind." See Jeremiah 30. 23, 24; also, Malachi 4. 1; and Psalm 35. 5. Psalm 37. 35, 36, 38. It is very plainly taught by the Blessed Jesus, that blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, which hath no forgiveness provided for it neither in the Gospel age nor in the Jubilee, ("year of his redeemed,") is the result of denying Christ, whose works declared Him-"if I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God is come unto you," Matt. 12. 28; read the chapter through, crying to the Lord to save you now, that with your heart you may "believe unto righteousness, and with your mouth make confession unto salvation." twelfth chapter of Matthew warns faithfully-O! let anti millennarians now take warning, for the last error is worse than the first; for Jesus rose from the dead-He ascended upon a cloud; and Stephen beheld Him standing on the right hand of God," while the Jews "gnashed on him (Stephen) with their teeth." The The real Jubilee is the Rest of God. When Noah built an altar to the Lord, in the new world, and offered thereon "of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl," it is written that "the Lord smelled a savour of rest," (see the marginal reading); and He blessed Noah and his sons. But this Rest is not to take place till the times of restitution arrive; and the latter commence in judgments upon the quick who reject the Lord of the Rest, which is Jesus Christ. Mark 2. 28. Luke 6. 5. In this Rest the twelve tribes of the children of Israel have a special interest by election of God; and to them, as "the congregation of the Lord," the sign of a Rest, in which the Lord would participate with his chosen people, is given in the holy law, by which statute of God we understand that in the seventh age of the world, Christ, the Lord of the Sabbath, enters upon His rest, with "the Ark of His strength," (i. e. His glorified body), and that era He hath blest in His unchangeable mind, and hallowed in the purpose and counsel of His own righteous will, as the Rest of God. In paying particular attention to the subject before us, it is necessary to regard three things, 1. The original institution of the Sabbath. Gen. 2. 1-3. 2. Its recognition in the fourth statute of the moral law. 3. The people to whom it was given, and its perpetuity as a token of God's covenant with them for ever. We are, from the latter, to acknowledge that the farther institution of a sabbatical year, which is to be preceded by six years of working and toil, is also a type of the age of Israel's Rest. See Lev. 25. 4-8; and that the fiftieth year is the grand era of blessedness by the reign of Israel's Shepherd, Judah's Shiloh, and David's Lord. The ushering in of this Glory is represented in the nineteenth chapter of the Book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ; and its establishment is set forth in the twentieth chapter. The outward return of a literal jubilee year, according to the reckoning of time, we allow must at this day be particularly interesting to the Jewish nation, and it seems that the seventieth anniversary of this trumpet announced feast takes place in A. D. 1841. I find it my indispensable duty to declare that the said year (if chronology be correct, as made out by Jews and Christians of the literal event) will witness the loud blast of the second woe trumpet, which is to usher in the day of Jacob's seventh trouble, "out of which," however, "he shall be saved." How can this declaration possibly suit the letter of the law? I must answer, that it is very evident the Jews are mistaken in making the return of their seventieth jubilee year the commencement of their elect year, or era of Rest. The latter cannot take place till after a siege against their holy city brings such distress upon them, that they will confess Christ, and call upon Him to come and save them. It is under terror to the very extreme that the Jews will do this, and upon the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of grace will then be poured, and they shall look upon Him whom they have pierced, (see Matt. xxiv. 30,) and they shall mourn, &c. See Zech. 12. 10-14. They shall repent as Job did, and believe as Saul of Tarsus did, submitting to Christ in "the Day of His power,” see Psalm 110; and with the spirit of supplication upon them, they shall cry, "Return, O Lord, unto the many thousands of Israel;" for the cloud-the covenant cloud-shall return and rest upon them, therefore they can cry, as in days of old. That a trumpet may sound in 1841 I grant, and I believe it too; but not the real jubilee. This blessed trumpet the Lord Jesus Christ will sound Himself, (see Zech. 9. 14. Isaiah 18. 3, 27, 13;) and His elect shall be gathered from the four winds. See Matt. 24. 31. Israel, poor outcast from the land of the Lord for the space of 2,500 years, shall be restored, and take possession, with their brethren the Jews, of their proper lots in the land of ancient promise, even the original paradise of God. Glorious Jubilee! Blessed God! hasten the day! If 1841.is indeed a year of jubilee, it seems that there must be decreed seventy jubilees before the keeping of that everlasting, or rather, 1000 years' rest which remaineth for the people of God; and if the first jubilee was a type, (and I believe it is,) I suppose that we are to reckon upon the outward return of Judah with his companions to the land of promise as a remarkable forerunner of the jubilee, and as such it may be "an ensign upon the mountains;" but the real jubilee cannot take place "until the Lord have given their brethren rest, (who were cast out of Samaria), and they also return to possess the land which the Lord their God giveth them— and this takes place after the coming of the Son of man," whose day opens against the usurper of His reign, who is the Holy and True, having the keys of hell and death; the key of David also, to open the kingdom of heaven, and power to shut the gates of hell. The grand jubilee feast is dependent upon the presence of the Son of man upon the throne of his glory, which throne is Mount Zion, even Jerusalem, the elect place of His rest, "the city of the great King," His literal sanctuary, where the house of David shall have a lamp for ever, even salvation in an age without end. Judah, as the kingly tribe, of whom cometh the Shiloh, to whom all the children of Israel shall ascribe honour and blessing, glory and praise, (see Gen. 49. 8,) is still the sanctuary in a spiritual sense; for to him the Levites appertain, and the latter shall teach Jacob the judgments and Israel the law of the Holy One. The cleansing of the literal and the spiritual sanctuary is dependent upon the coming of Jesus the second time without sin unto salvation; that is, not a man of sorrows, or a poor scape goat to bear upon his head "all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins;" but as a |