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Last Updated on :
Saturday, November 22, 2014

 

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Contents|| Preface || 1 || 2 || 3 || 4 || 5 || 6 || 7 || 8 || 9 || 10 || 11 ||12 ||13 || 14 ||

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Christ on Earth Again

 


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Chapter II

THE AFFLICTED WORLD'S NEED


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To see this conclusion in all the fulness of the force that belongs to it, it is necessary to realize the work that belongs to the Second Advent of Christ. In its briefest form, it is this: to fill the earth with God's glory and remedy all the evils to which man is subject. How entirely those evils are the result of the withdrawal of God's open countenance and direction of man (consequent on human insubordination) is not discerned till after much experience and reflection, and then the discernment comes with terrible power. When men multiplied upon the earth, and grew into communities, the evil involved in this withdrawal became apparent. Instead of divine power controlling and regulating, there was nothing to restrain human rapacity but human force, and force fighting force resulted in the earth becoming "filled with violence". Wars in endless succession ensued, and have continued to the present day. In the intervals, there is "law and
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order", but it is such law as man pleases to devise, and such order as comes from mere repression. The result is seen in the extreme affliction of mankind.
Peace and liberty-much vaunted terms-are much of a mockery under the prevailing conditions. The arrangements enforced by human law are not only such as do not ensure blessedness, but they produce evil in endless variety. They give the land to a few, and limit the rights of the many to the receiving of wages equivalent for what they actually do when they can get it to do, and to go short when they cannot: while an open door for endless competition puts it into the power of energetic and ingenious exploiters still further to impoverish the result of labour when it can be got by reducing its productiveness to the individual. The poverty thus induced compels incessant labour for mere subsistence, which in its turn degrades and brutalizes the labourers who have no strength left for mental culture, and whose offspring necessarily inherit the same evil in an exaggerated form.*
The evil is cumulative from generation to generation. The evils are slow in growth, and when they come, their origin is not quite apparent, and so human affairs settle into a frightful quagmire, from which no human power can extricate them. Socialism is a furtive and unavailing look in the direction of a remedy. Men require more means of living-better food, better clothing, better houses. They require more leisure, so that the higher faculties may have opportunity of expansion by travel and otherwise. They require more instruction, and that of a correct sort. They require a complete education, and an education that should embrace the highest relations of man as well as the lowest. Man should be instructed not only in the arts that concern the
*This was written in 1892. The form of the evil issomewhat changed to-day.
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relation of man to Nature, but in those that affect his relation to God and to his kind. He should be led and held in the channel of the highest truth, as well as truth of history or truth of science. The duty of veracity and love and honesty should be enforced as rigorously as the payment of rates. The crime of unchastity should be punished as severely as the crime of theft or forgery. The obligation to worship God should be upheld with as firm a hand as that which now exacts respect and reverence for authority in the courts.
The work of Christ at his second advent is to secure these conditions as the rule of human life upon the earth, with a view to the removal of death itself at last. The object is to bring back mankind to the service and friendship of God, in which alone his true well-being can be found. This can only be done by an open and visible manifestation of power. How is the present system to be removed without force ? And if the force were human force, it would be powerless to establish a system that would either be good or lasting. :rhe work of abolishing the present evil order requires divine force; and the language promising the change admits of no other: The
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God of heaven shall set up a Kingdom, which . . . shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdomS ".
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Thou (the Messiah) shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel." I will execute vengeance in
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anger and fury upon the nations, such as they have not heard." I will overthrow the throne of
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kingdoms, and destroy the strength of the kingdoms of the nations."
And if it require the open visible interposition of divine force to remove the present system, what but that force could build the new system-U the new heavens and new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness "? Who could devise and establish the new institutions needful to secure the blessing of man,
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and the glory of God, but God Himself? Mortal erring man could not do it: he has had his day: a poor day it has been at its very best, even when man has been acting as an instrument under divine direction, as in Israel's past history. It is now the Spirit of God that is to enter into the arena, as saith God, "Not by (human) might, nor by power, but by my spirit ". And the form of its instrumentality is revealed, as well as the nature of its work. " My King" (Psa. 2: 6), "the Son" (verse 12), " My servant, whom I uphold; mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth; I have put my spirit upon him:
HE SHALL BRING FORTH JUDGMENT TO THE GENTILES" (Isa. 42: 1). To whom God says: "I HAVE PUT MY WORDS IN THY MOUTH, AND I HAVE COVERED THEE IN THE SHADOW OF MY HAND, that I may plant the heavens, and lay the foundations of the earth, and say unto Zion, Thou art my people" (51 : 16).

 


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