It was Paul’s confident and inspiring belief that when the fullness of the Gentiles should have come there would be a union of all believers in God; “and so all Israel shall be saved.” And this is the truth to which the writer of the Apocalypse bears witness in his vision of the saints who “lived and reigned with Christ” in one united and concordant kingdom.
If, then, the attainment of so desirable and blessed a result as that of the consummation of Christ’s kingdom upon earth is contingent upon the unity of believers it surely behooves the disciples of Christ to labor more earnestly than ever before for this unity. The magnitude of the result is worth the sacrifices needed to gain it.
In what this unity shall consist, in what sense believers are to be one, is a question upon which lawful difference of opinion may be allowed, and it is to be settled only by a sympathetic and careful study of the Scriptures. But as to the mode of its attainment and as to what must precede its realization the Bible is sufficiently precise and [♦]explicit. It will not be secured by a conventional agreement to accept any common and universal symbol, sacrament, or organization; unity means something too vital for that. It will not be founded upon the basis of any past fact, upon any historical creed or institution or order of ministry; unity is something akin to life, and life is progressive, anticipative, not retrospective. The Jewish people were of one common lineage, having the same fathers, the same oracles, the same institutions, but it was by no chain descending from past times that they were held in unity; as soon as the hope of a future Messiah vanished their past associations became a rope of sand.
[♦] “explict” replaced with “explicit”
The Lord Jesus Christ has himself most plainly and authoritatively announced to us the processes by which alone this unity can be attained. In the ever memorable words of his prayer as our great High Priest he said, “Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth,” and then almost immediately added, “That they all may be one.” The unity which he anticipated and now desires is one that must be preceded by sanctification. This is fully in accordance with the prophecy of Ezekiel, for the union by which Judah and Ephraim were made one was preceded by the resurrection to life which occurred when the dry and withered bones had been breathed upon by the Spirit. And, in the paragraph of the Apocalypse now under consideration, it was only after the souls of the witnesses and followers of Jesus had been raised by the first resurrection that they lived and reigned with Christ. Nor can any unity be real which is not preceded by a spiritual resurrection from the death of sin into newness of life through the power of the Holy Spirit.
What is here said of unity as applied to the body of believers is equally applicable to each individual. The kingdom of Christ does not reach its designed consummation in the individual until the heart is united to fear the name of the Lord. The exclusion or omission of any part of our composite nature from the sanctifying influences of the Holy Spirit in so far mars the integrity and concord of the kingdom and is below its ideal. Entire sanctification is, as has been said by John Fletcher, a constellation made up by the union of all the graces in a glorious galaxy. And St. Paul teaches us that it is only when we shall “come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God,” that we shall have attained “unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.”
4. Final Triumph over the Carnal Mind, or Barbarism. Emblem of Gog and Magog.—With this glorious picture of the outpouring of the Spirit and the complete union of the Church of Christ in his mind, the apostle passes on to the decisive conflict and crowning victory of the kingdom. “When the thousand years are expired,” he says, “Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go out to deceive the nations.”
It is worthy of note that the word which is used by St. John for “expired” is the same used in the fourth gospel in several important and significant places, although differently translated. It is found in the prayer of Jesus (John xvii, 23) in connection with the thought of unity, as in the section of the Revelation just considered, and is there rendered “may be made perfect.” It is found in the same prayer (John xvii, 4), and is used by our Lord in speaking of his active work upon earth, being there translated “have finished.” It is also recorded by St. John as being one of our Lord’s exclamations while on the cross (John xix, 30), and is there also rendered “finished.”
From these uses of the word the inference is very reasonable that it signifies, not so much the termination of a period of duration, as the completion of a process. The thousand years may be said to have expired, not at the close of any number of years of time, but whenever the ends for which the kingdom of Christ is established are attained. Until those purposes are accomplished the power of Satan is restrained and he is not allowed to exercise the full measure of his strength. He who makes “the wrath of man” to praise him, while “the remainder of wrath” he restrains, guards his Church and his servants as “a garden inclosed.”
History and experience furnish many an example of the providence that shelters and shields the infancy and immaturity of Churches and believers until adult strength has acquired power to resist. The storm that bends the reed will not move the sturdy oak; and one “rooted and grounded in love” can withstand blasts that would be disastrous to the growing and tender shoot. All progress in human laws, in fact, tends to surround the evil-disposed with increasing restraints, in order that the weak and helpless and inexperienced may have an equal chance to develop their individuality.