Our Day / In the Light of Prophecy

by William Ambrose Spicer

The Prophecy Unsealed

The angel's words to Daniel were,

"Shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased." Dan. 12:4.

"The words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end." Verse 9.

This means that as the time of the end came, men would be impelled to search diligently for light in the prophetic word. Events taking place in fulfilment of the prophecy would be recognized, and with the coming of the time there would come the opening up, or unsealing, of the prophetic scriptures, with their message for men in the last days.

As the time drew near, Bible students were led more and more to search the word of prophecy. Sir Isaac Newton, called "the greatest of philosophers," wrote of prophetic study:

"The giving ear to the prophets is a fundamental character of the true church. For God has so ordered the prophecies, that in the latter days 'the wise may understand, but the wicked shall do wickedly, and none of the wicked shall understand.' Dan. 12:9, 10."—"Observations on the Prophecies of Daniel" (London, 1733), part 1, chap. 1.

Again, this man who had delved so deeply into the laws of nature, but who bowed his heart in childlike faith to listen to the voice of Inspiration, declared his hope that the time of the end was near at hand in his day (he died in 1727). Of this prophecy of the unsealing of the book he wrote:

"'Tis therefore a part of this prophecy, that it should not be understood before the last age of the world; and therefore it makes for the credit of the prophecy that it is not yet understood. But if the last age, the age of opening these things, be now approaching, as by the great successes of late interpreters it seems to be, we have more encouragement than ever to look into these things. If the general preaching of the gospel be approaching, it is to us and to our posterity that those words mainly belong: In the time of the end the wise shall understand, but none of the wicked shall understand.... 'Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein.'"—"Observations on the Apocalypse" (London, 1733), chap. 1.