Rome, Turkey, and Jerusalem

by Edward Hoare

II. But if this be the case, it behoves us carefully to examine our second question. If such a warning is so clearly given, how can He be said to come as a thief? He Himself teaches us perfectly clearly that the meaning of the illustration is that, as the thief comes without giving notice, so He will return without previously giving any such notice of His approach as will arouse the sleepers. The thief does not tell you when he is coming; and when he comes, he neither knocks the door nor rings the bell. But he comes quietly. He does nothing to disturb those that are asleep, and His object is to enter unobserved. So our Lord teaches us, that when He comes He will do nothing to startle the world. There will be nothing to prevent men eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, right up to the very end. The men of the world will find Him in the house before they have the least idea of His approach. That this is the meaning of the words is perfectly clear from what He said (Matt. xxiv. 42–44): ‘Watch, therefore; for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come. But know this, that if the goodman of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken up. Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not, the Son of Man cometh.’

But, you may say, how far is this consistent with what has been said of the probability of His return following quickly on the exhaustion of the Ottoman Empire? If there be a prophetic series in the book of Revelation, and we have already reached the last station on the last branch of the line, how is it that He can be said to come upon us without notice as a thief does? Has He not given us notice in this prophecy?

In answer to that question we must observe the clearly marked distinction between His own believing people and the unbelieving world. To His own people He will not come as a thief, for we read in 1 Thess. v. 4, 5, ‘But ye, brethren, are not in darkness that that day should overtake you as a thief.’ You are in the light, i.e., for you can see Him coming; so you will not be found asleep. So He Himself taught us distinctly in the very passage in which He uses the illustration; for He there shows that His own disciples are to expect His coming when they see the predicted signs, just as they expect the summer when they see the budding of the trees in spring (Matt. xxiv. 32, 33). Nor are they to wait in their expectation till they see these signs fully developed; not to wait, i.e., till the young branch is fully grown; but they are to watch beginnings, and learn from them. They are to draw their conclusion when the branch is yet tender, without waiting till it is fully ripened; as He Himself taught us in Luke, xxi. 28: ‘When these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads, for your redemption draweth nigh.’ If, therefore, you be amongst the people of God, you need never be taken by surprise. We do not know the exact time, but we may study the predicted signs, and, having them before us, may look out for the second advent just as Simeon and Anna looked out for the first. We may be like the servant of Elijah, going up again and again to the hill-top to watch for the coming rain; or like the loving servant watching for the footsteps of the master whom he loves, and perfectly ready, whenever he returns, to open the door, and welcome him to his home. The Lord came suddenly to His temple, but He did not come suddenly to Simeon; and the Lord will come as a thief to the world, but if you hold fast to His own word He will never be as a thief to you.

I have already said, it is the world that will be found asleep, and to whom He will really come as a thief. But some man may say, ‘If there be these signs beforehand, will they not arouse the world as well as believers? Will they not awaken society? Will they not compel men to prepare?’ I answer that by another question, Do they? There are certain signs already given; do they wake up society? Have they produced such an impression as to arouse the great mass of worldly men? There are the Jews preserved as a separate people, in fulfilment of a prophecy given more than three thousand years ago; what effect has such a fulfilment of God’s word had in the City? There are all the politicians of Europe at their wits’ end because of the decay of Turkey; how many even of yourselves have been led thereby to look out for the near approach of our blessed Saviour? There is Rome stripped of its temporal power in fulfilment of great prophecies given, some of them, more than two thousand years ago; how many are there that have been led by that fulfilment to look out even for the fall of Babylon? The simple fact is, that these great fulfilments, though conspicuous to the eye of those who study them, completely fail to produce the least impression on the deep sleep of the unconverted world. The prophecies are not read; the facts are not compared with them; the lessons are not learned; and the soul is not aroused to preparation. How many are there even in this very town on whom the fulfilment of God’s prophetic word has never produced the slightest effect? They are living just as they would have lived, or rather sleeping as they would have slept, if there had been no prophecy to give the warning, and no history to confirm its truth. Can you wonder, then, that the Lord Jesus should come upon such persons as a thief?

But I trust, dear brethren, that He may not come as a thief to you, but that you may be found in the light and awake, not in darkness and asleep; or, to use the illustration of this text, that you may not wake up naked to your everlasting shame. I am sure you desire when He comes to be found awake, looking out, ready to welcome Him. You wish to be found clothed. Oh, think what it would be to be found naked, when all the saints of God are standing around you in their resurrection robe! We have lately read of poor people startled in the night by shipwreck, and rushing as they were to the deck, utterly unprotected against the bitter blast of the winter’s snow-storm. Think what it would be to be suddenly aroused from your own deep sleep, to see all that you have in the world wrecked around you, and to find your poor soul quite naked, while the terrible storm of God’s most just judgment beats upon you, and breaks down every hope of escape! Oh, dear brethren, may it never be so with you! May you be amongst those who can peacefully look for His appearing, because you are clothed in His righteousness! May you be kept walking in the light, and cleansed from all sin through His most precious blood! Then you will have nothing to fear, but everything to hope for, in the thought of His coming. Then He will never come as a thief to you, for you will be ready at any time to open the door and welcome Him. As the bride delights in the bridegroom, so will you delight in Him. Your trial will consist, not in the dread of His coming, but in the difficulty of patiently waiting for His return, and when He comes you will find no language to bless and praise His holy name, for His boundless and unmerited love in having redeemed you by His atoning blood; in having called you by His sovereign grace; in having forgiven you through His finished atonement; in having sanctified you by the Holy Ghost; and in having preserved you in His own unchanging faithfulness, till He shall have finally presented you spotless and faultless before the throne of His everlasting glory.

JERUSALEM.

There is no city in the whole world which fills so important a place in the Word of God as Jerusalem. There are several others which are more prominent in the world’s politics, but in the great economy of God, as revealed in Sacred Scripture, Jerusalem stands out pre-eminent above them all. We Englishmen think of London, with its vast population and enormous wealth, as the leading city of the world; but except in so far as it is the capital of one of the isles of the sea, it has no place in prophecy. The French look upon Paris as the most beautiful city of Europe, and the centre of European influence; but, unless it is the predicted seat of the Beast, which some persons are disposed to consider it, it is literally nowhere in the Word of God. And Rome, which all regard with something of awe and veneration, as being associated with the most thrilling histories of the past, is described in the Prophetic Word as the seven-hilled city on which is seated the mystic Babylon, the great whore of the Apocalypse. But the whole of Sacred Scripture abounds in allusions to Jerusalem. History, poetry, and prophecy are all full of it. It is described as ‘beautiful for situation,’ and ‘the joy of the whole earth.’ The people of God are taught to pray for it, and the promise is given that those who love it shall prosper. The sacred feet of the Son of God trod the pavement of its Temple, and we are assured that it will never disappear from God’s great dealings with mankind, until the New Jerusalem shall descend from heaven from our God, and there shall be new heavens and a new earth at the coming of the Lord of glory.

It was the sight of this beautiful city, with its magnificent Temple crowning the heights of Mount Moriah, that drew from our blessed Saviour the remarkable prophecy contained in the 24th of St. Matthew and the 21st of St. Luke. The disciples had pointed out to Him the buildings of the Temple; and afterwards, as they sat together on Mount Olives, on the opposite side of the valley, He taught them the vanity of all earthly strength. He told them that of the beautiful Temple not one stone should be left upon another. And He also taught them that there would be a lengthened period of desolation and humiliation; for that Jerusalem should be ‘trodden under foot of the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles should be fulfilled.’ Jerusalem was to be not merely beaten down, but kept down, until a certain predicted period should expire. But while the words distinctly predict a long period of desolation, they no less clearly imply the assurance of an ultimate restoration. They teach that Jerusalem is not to be trodden down for ever, but only till the times of the Gentiles shall be fulfilled; implying, as clearly as words can, that, when those times are expired, the Holy City shall rise again in its beauty. The words predict a desolation for a limited period, and at the close of that period restoration.

I have not time to discuss what is meant by ‘the times of the Gentiles.’ Suffice it to say, that I believe it to be this present Gentile dispensation; this time of Gentile power, and Gentile opportunity; this time during which God is gathering out his elect people from the Gentile world, and is employing a Gentile Church in the sacred ministry of the Gospel of His grace. It seems to be the time of the ingathering of the Gentile Church, for it is to last, according to St. Paul, ‘until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in;’ and it is clearly the time of the exercise of Gentile power, for they are Gentiles by whom Jerusalem is to be trodden under foot.

But I do not wish to occupy time in any discussion of this period, but rather to invite your special attention to those Gentile powers which have trodden Jerusalem under foot. Which are they? and how do they now stand?