9:7. And He said unto them, Defile the house, and fill the courts with the slain: go ye forth. And they went forth, and slew in the city.—Typically the house of God was defiled by a dead body. The Temple, the Body of Christ, the true Church, is defiled by the presence in it of any one who has become spiritually dead. The priests and Levites alone might enter the priests' court; and this types that many professing to be consecrated Christians will lose all claim to being followers of Christ—be slain religiously. So many will thus lose belief that Christendom will be filled with them. Literally the sanctuaries and the streets of Christendom will be filled with the slain of the Time of Trouble.
9:8. And it came to pass, while they were slaying them, and I was left, that I fell upon my face, and cried, and said, Ah Lord God! wilt Thou destroy all the residue of Israel in Thy pouring out of Thy fury upon Jerusalem?—It will almost seem that none in Christendom will escape alive; and, indeed, “Except those days be shortened, no flesh should be saved.”—Matt. 24:22.
9:9, 10. Then said He unto me, The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah is exceeding great, and the land is full of blood, and the city full of perverseness: for they say, The Lord hath forsaken the earth, and the Lord seeth not. And as for Me also, Mine eyes shall not spare, neither will I have any pity, but I will recompense their way upon their head.—On account of the light of the Gospel of Love they possess, both Romanism and Protestantism are guilty to an extraordinary degree before God. Christendom, through its savage wars, is drenched with blood. Churchianity is full of wilful sin. God will seem to have left the social order to its own destruction.
9:11. And, behold, the man clothed with linen, which had the inkhorn by His side, reported the matter, saying, I have done as Thou hast commanded me.—Pastor Russell was faithful to his great task of writing and publishing the Truth and imprinting the “tav” of Present Truth in the minds of the spirit-begotten. In October, 1916, he died, and beyond the veil has, ere this, undoubtedly, reported in the presence of Christ that he has done the work he was given to do.
“Faithful when with tears thine eyes were dim,
Faithful when joys' cup o'erflowed its brim;
Faithful when God seemed to veil His face,
Faithful when He crowned thy work with grace,
Faithful till was fled life's fleeting breath,