Rome, Turkey, and Jerusalem

by Edward Hoare

I am persuaded that all those who are thus looking for the coming of the Lord must feel the greatest possible interest in the last of the three subjects proposed for our consideration with reference to the exhaustion of the Turkish Empire, as symbolized by the drying up of the Euphrates. We have seen that the exhaustion which is now attracting the anxious attention of all the politicians of Europe was foretold more than eighteen hundred years ago in this remarkable symbolic prophecy. We found also in the last lecture that the internal decay of Turkey is a warning to us all to be on the watch against the seductive spirits of the latter days; and we now have to examine whether there is any connexion between that decay and the glorious advent of the Lord Jesus; whether, in other words, the decline of the Ottoman empire is not like the cry which aroused the ten virgins in the parable, ‘The Bridegroom cometh.’ There are two questions which will clearly require our careful study. (1.) What light does the decline of the Ottoman Empire throw on the near approach of our Lord’s return? And (2), if it does throw such a light, how are we to understand His declaration that He will come as a thief? May God Himself, who has inspired His own word, be graciously pleased to direct us in the study of it; and to lead us, every one of us, to be perfectly ready, waiting for the Lord Jesus!

I. What light, then, does the decay of the Ottoman Empire throw on the prospect of the near approach of our Lord’s return? Has it any bearing on our Christian hope? and may we regard it as a signal from God that the time is come when we may soon expect the Advent?

In order to answer this question we must examine:—

(1.) The position of the prophecy in the general structure of the Book. The prophecies of this wonderful book are arranged on a divinely ordered plan. There are some chapters to which it is difficult to assign their place; but it is easy to see what may be termed the backbone running through the whole. To use a very homely illustration, there is the main line of rail conspicuously running through the whole, and you may trace that clearly, though you cannot always trace the branches. Now in this outline there are three great series of prophetic periods—the seven seals, the seven trumpets, and the seven vials; and these three series appear in a remarkable manner to follow each other. First there are the seals, as in chap. vi.; and when the sixth seal is opened, and the seventh about to follow, there appears a general expectation of the coming of the Lord. But when the seventh seal is actually opened, instead of our coming to the end, as apparently was expected, we find a second series developed. The seven trumpets were wrapped as it were in the seventh seal (viii. 1, 2), so that when it was opened they appeared, and a fresh series commenced, and the trumpet-angels one after another blew their blast. At length the seventh trumpet is sounded, and again it appears as though you had reached the end. But like the seventh seal, it, too, is found to contain within itself a third series. The seven vials are wrapped within it, and when that last trumpet is blown they are poured forth in awful succession on a wicked world. Thus the seventh seal contains all the trumpets, and the seventh trumpet all the vials. Now if this be the case it is clear that the sixth vial must come very near the end. The trumpets are none sounded till the six seals are passed and the seventh seal is opened. The vials do not begin till the six trumpets have completed their blast and the seventh has sounded; and of the vials five must have been poured out already, so that there can be nothing remaining but the seventh, or the last.

To take the very homely illustration of a railway. Suppose a series of stations on a line, the seventh being a junction; suppose that on the branch from that junction there was another series of stations, the seventh again being a junction; and from that second junction there was another line of seven stations, the last being your home. What would you think of your position when you had travelled the whole length of the main line, and the whole of the first branch, and when you had gone so far along the second branch that you had actually reached the sixth station on that last line? You would say, surely, that you were near the end of your journey, close to home. Now whenever the Church of God reaches the sixth vial that will be its position. All the seals will have been opened, all the trumpets blown, and six of the seven vials poured out.

But that I believe to be our position now, and that we are at this present time living under the sixth vial. I believe that the great public, political event of the sixth vial, is the drying up of the Ottoman Empire, and that we can all see to be in progress. There can be no doubt about the great, public, political fact. It is confirmed by every newspaper, and is forced on the attention of England by the sore distress brought on many families through the Turkish bankruptcy. But if this be the fact predicted by the symbol of the drying up of the Euphrates, then it follows that we are living under the sixth vial, and that the seventh vial is all that remains of the great prophetic series.

(2.) But consider next the contents of the seventh vial. The seventh seal contained the series of seven trumpets, and the seventh trumpet the series of seven vials. May there not be some similar series wrapped up in the seventh vial?

Such a question would be perfectly reasonable, but the only answer that we can give is that we do not find any such series described in the prophecy. On the other hand, everything in it looks like the end. When the seventh angel poured out his vial there came a great voice out of the temple of heaven from the throne, saying, ‘It is done!’ It certainly did not look like the commencement of another series, but taught us rather to look out for the great winding up of the whole and the final close of the great prophetic plan. So in the account of the seventh vial you may see four things plainly revealed;—the fall of Babylon, which I believe to be the fall of Rome, chap. xvi. 17, to the end of xviii.; the marriage supper of the Lamb, chap, xix. 1–9; the triumphant victory of the Son of God, chap. xix. 11, 12; and, last of all, the millennial reign, chap. xx. Surely, then, this vial brings us to the end. Surely when it is poured forth we shall have done with the politics of the world, and shall cease to look for the gradual development of history. All thoughts will then be occupied by the unspeakable blessedness of the marriage supper of the Lamb.

It seems clear, then, that the seventh vial is the close of the series, and that under it we are to expect the final victory of the Lord Jesus Christ. The conclusion, therefore, is plain, that if the exhaustion of the Ottoman Empire is the event symbolized by the drying up of the Euphrates, it is high time that we awake out of sleep: for the sixth vial is already begun, and we must soon expect to behold Christ Himself, with all the joys of His kingdom and all the terrors of a crushing victory. I say ‘soon,’ not ‘immediately,’ for it does not appear that this passage teaches us to expect it any day or hour, for it describes certain great political events which have not yet taken place. The Euphrates is drying, but not yet dry. The kings have not yet passed over from the East, and the battle of Almighty God, whatever it may symbolize, has not yet been fought. All, therefore, that we can say is, that we appear to have reached what Daniel terms ‘the time of the end;’ that now it is high time to awake out of sleep, for we already begin to see the first streaks of morning dawn. We have already witnessed some of the great events that must very shortly precede the Advent, and we may begin to look out full of hope for the actual return of the Lord Himself.

(3.) This conclusion is confirmed by the words of our Lord Himself. I need not stop to prove that He is the speaker in this passage, but we must carefully observe His words. What does He say when the sixth vial is poured out, and the Euphrates is drying up, and when the three evil spirits are gone forth through Christendom? What is the warning voice which He Himself then gives out with reference to His coming? What lesson would He have us learn from these great events? Of what are they His signal? Does He not teach us to be looking out for His coming? Does He not say, ‘Behold, I come as a thief?’ Does He not call us to a double watchfulness, and teach us not merely to watch against the seductive influence of these foul spirits, but to watch also for His own appearing, and for the bright hope of joyfully meeting Him? But if this be the case, and if the prophecy of the sixth vial is really being now fulfilled, as we believe it to be, by the drying up of the Turkish power; then every fresh symptom of decay in that power, every loss of territory by the Turks, every fresh insurrection, and every proof that the empire is reduced to hopeless bankruptcy, is like a clarion blast of the trumpet of God ringing through the ears of Christendom; and proclaiming, with a distinctness which cannot be mistaken, ‘Watch, therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour when the Son of Man cometh!’