13 But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.

14 And this gospel of the kingdom be preached in all the world for a witness all nations; and then shall the end come.

n ch. x. 22. Mark xiii. 13.

shall

Heb. iii. 6, 14.

Rev. ii. 10.

unto

och. iv. 23. &

ix. 35.

P Rom. x. 18.
Col. i. 6, 23.

13. "He that shall have endured;" perseveraverit. (Vulg.)

duty which the whole discourse from beginning to end was to impress upon the Church and every part of it, the duty of 'watching for an unknown day '—a day which was not to come upon each soul separately, as the day of death; but a day known only to the Father, which was to come upon the world; a day of judgment both sudden and universal ["as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west, so shall also the coming of the Son of Man be"], a day which might come at any moment, “ at evening, at midnight, at the cock-crowing, in the morning."

66

Then (in the next chapter) there follows, as part of the same discourse, the parable of the Ten Virgins, setting forth the duty of having and retaining grace, not only for the general need of the Christian life, but for the particular need of being ready to welcome, to meet, and to accompany the Bridegroom. Then (xxv. 14-30) a further parable setting forth the strict account that the Judge will take, at His coming, of all that He has committed to His servants; and then (xxv. 31-46) a vision of the general judgment of all nations, heathen and Christian, and the final award. But though the contents of chap. xxv. naturally follow on, and are the necessary completion of those in this chapter, they must be examined separately.

The great lesson of the prophecy of this chapter is a moral onemoral inasmuch as it necessitates a certain frame of mind and conduct with reference to our absent and yet returning Saviour and Judge; which frame of mind is that, over and above our loving Him, obeying Him, and serving Him, we are also to look for and expect His Second Coming, as at once the Bridegroom, the Master, and the Judge: and yet we are not to be "troubled in mind," and throw up our daily task, and go out gazing, as it were, for the signs of His appearing; but we are to do our allotted duty calmly, quietly, earnestly, lovingly, not with a view to an account after death, which may be

15

When

ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place (whoso readeth, let him under stand :)

far distant, but to an account to which He may call us at any moment by His own Appearing.

The teaching, then, of this prophecy is the return of Christ suddenly, in person, as a Judge Who will open an assize without warning; or after warnings which only those who look for it will realize.

Now first we must consider the question, Has it been successful in teaching this lesson, or in impressing this particular frame of watchfulness upon Christians? It has undoubtedly been so successful. It has taught the first and best Christians, the Pentecostal believers, the Christians of the first century, and various generations of Christians since, to look for the coming of the Son of Man. And yet such Christians have actually been blamed, and, if Apostles, have been held to have been not fully inspired, and mistaken, and even somewhat enthusiastic and superstitious, because they looked for it in their lifetime. That is, they have been blamed, and looked down upon, for having had that very frame of mind which this and all other prophecies of our Lord inculcate. I say "all other prophecies of our Lord," but, in point of fact, our Lord delivered but one, or at the most, two prophecies-His own Advent and the fall of Jerusalem, and these are so blended that they seem but one.

The earliest Christians lived in constant expectation of the coming of Christ; and this long before the destruction of Jerusalem, or, indeed, before any of the signs of its immediate downfall could have appeared. St. Peter, immediately after the day of Pentecost, addresses the Jews,“ Repent ... that your sins may be blotted out . . . and he shall send Jesus Christ, who before was preached unto you," &c. (Acts iii. 19-21), evidently meaning that the times of refreshing by the coming of Jesus might be close at hand. St. Paul in his first letter, written about twenty-five years before the destruction of Jerusalem, so moved the Thessalonian converts with expectations of the near approach of the Second Advent, that he had to write a second letter, exhorting them "not to be shaken in mind, or troubled," as if the Second Coming was necessarily so close that they might throw up the performance of their daily duties. But even in this letter he

16 Then let them which be in Judea flee into the moun

tains:

17 Let him which is on the housetop not come down to take any thing out of his house:

17. "Anything;" rather, "the things."

speaks of the one thing which must develop immediately before the coming of Christ, i.e., the mystery of iniquity, as "already working:" so that the coming of Christ, though not absolutely impending, was not to be long delayed. In his Epistle to the Corinthians, he speaks of the Christians of Corinth "waiting for the coming of our Lord." (1 Cor. i. 7.) He tells the Philippians that " God, Who had begun a good work in them, would perform it until the day of Jesus Christ," that "our conversation is in heaven, from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ;" and that "the Lord is at hand” (Phil. i. 6; iii. 20; iv. 5). St. James also speaks of the "Judge standing at the door" (James v. 9): So that the im. pression produced by this one great prophecy of Christ was such that, years before the fall of Jerusalem, long before any of the immediate signs which preceded it could be recognized, and in cities which could not possibly be affected by it, Christians of all nations were living in the thought that at any moment Christ might come. And this impression has continued, and has reappeared constantly. It seems to have been peculiarly prominent at certain epochs of great change. About the year 1000, when the Church had finished its first millennium, many thought that at such a marked period Christ must be looked for. Also at such times as the Reformation, and the French Revolution of 1789, there was such a moving and shaking of the oldest and most venerated institutions, such an upheaval of the strata of society, such a letting loose of the winds of human opinion and speculation, that men, the best of men, thought that the time of the end was come.

Now all these good men in these several ages have, in the eyes of the world and of mere human reason, been mistaken. They have looked for Christ to be at hand, and He has not yet come. But have they also been right? Yes. They have been mistaken in their calculation, and they have been right in their state of heart. They have been mistaken in their expectation that Christ would come in their lifetime, but they have been right in their attitude of mind and

18 Neither let him which is in the field return back to take his clothes.

29.

Luke xxiii.

19 And woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days!

20 But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the sabbath day:

18. "His clothes;" literally, "his cloak."

heart with respect to the suddenness, the stealthiness (if one may reverently use the word), the impendence of His coming. In one word, they have, through the Spirit of God, both learned and acted upon the one great lesson which this prophecy of Christ was intended to teach.

For Christ, in uttering this prophecy, had evidently in His Mind two things. He had to hold up before His Church in ALL ages-in the first age, immediately after His Ascension, as well as in the last -its one hope, the hope of His Appearing; so that each generation of Christians should live in the thought and expectation of it. And yet He had to prepare one particular generation, that of His own apostles and first followers and believing countrymen, for a catastrophe of a more temporal, but yet most fearful character, which they must, if possible, escape. Now this was effected by two things-1st. By setting forth as signs of the impending destruction of Jerusalem certain signs which would be partially and yet truly fulfilled then, and yet which would be far more effectually and universally fulfilled just before the Second Advent. 2ndly. By a certain indistinctness respecting the termination of the" wrath" upon the Jews, and the treading down of their city, and their dispersion, and its attendant persecutions.

Take, for instance, as an illustration of the first of these, verse 14: "This Gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come." This occurs in that part of the prophecy which seems to look to the de struction of Jerusalem; and we have evidence in St. Paul's Epistles, all written before that event, that he considered, and on good grounds, that in his time the Gospel had been so preached. From Jerusalem round about unto Illyricum he had preached it himself. (Rom. xv. 19.) He probably knew more accurately than we do how

21 For "then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.

Joel

u Dan. ix. 26.
& xii. 1.
ii. 2.

shortened, there

22 And except those days should be should no flesh be saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened.

Is. lxv. 8, 9. Zech. xiv. 2, 3.

21. "Was not; " properly, "hath not been."

widely the college of the Apostles had been dispersed. He had heard of one preaching in Parthia, another in India. He had probably received invitations from Christians in Spain to come and impart to them apostolical gifts. (Rom. xv. 24.) He must have known that the eunuch of Candace would convey the knowledge of Christ to what was then considered as the extreme south; and so he spoke of the Gospel having "come to all the world." (Coloss. i. 6.) The world then was one empire, and Jerusalem was a great fact and power in it; and so such a general preaching was true, and a true token for the then race of believers, of what concerned that city. But the "world" has since become enlarged; continents have been added to it; and now there is required, and so there is, a far more widespread preaching; and many children of God, rightly or wrongly, think that we are nearing the End, and are watching and keeping their garments accordingly.

As an illustration of the second, viz., the obscurity respecting the termination of the wrath and tribulation, take this. A Christian, immediately after the fall of Jerusalem, would think the visible Coming of Christ close at hand; but he would then, and in after years, hear of revolts among the chosen people, and consequent massacres; and if he lived about seventy years after, he would hear of the revolt under Barcocabas, and its subsequent horrors; and he would say, "The tribulation is not yet ended, and the Coming of my Lord may be delayed," but he may also have said, "The tribulation may be drawing to a close, and so the Coming may be fast drawing nigh."

In this discourse, then, and in the wondrous composition and arrangement of it, the Lord prepares His whole Catholic Church to look for His Coming at any time, and at all times, and yet prepares a part of that Church-the part which, speaking after the manner