| Christian Life and Doctrine | June 1949 |
The Hope of the World
THE hope for the world lies in the blessings of knowledge and opportunity to be brought to all by Christ’s millennial kingdom—the restitution of all that was lost in Adam, to all the willing and obedient, at the hands of their Redeemer and his glorified church—when all the willfully wicked will be destroyed.—Acts 3:19-23; Isaiah 35
“Eschatology” is a word not often met with in ordinary conversation today. It is a word of Greek origin—“eschatos”—and literally means the furthest, the last. Applied to scriptural matters it may be called “the doctrine of last things.” It has to do with the subjects of death, resurrection, judgment, immortality. This was early a subject of vast and wide debate in the church and whole sects were built, on this, that, and the other interpretation of the words of Jesus and the teachings of the apostles concerning the end toward which the Christian was tending.
There has, since those early days, been much speculative philosophy about these same subjects, and perhaps as much confusion exists now as then as to just what was to be the end of the earthly life. Does man go to heaven? Does he abide for ever in a hell of flames and torment? Does he enter at death into a purgatory of cleansing experiences? Does he ultimately earn a place in paradise? Is death the end of everything, and is this life man’s only experience? The questions seem endless; the answers however are even more numerous, with conflicting answers for every question.
Is there a true answer? And, if so may it be easily found?
Let us take the last two-part question first, and reason out an answer from God’s Word. God says, “Come now, and let us reason together” (Isa. 1:18), and the Psalmist says, “Thy Word is true from the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth for ever.” (Psa. 119:160) Jesus himself declared concerning his Father, “Thy Word is truth” (John 17:17), and concerning himself, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.” (John 14:6) The Apostle John also declared Jesus to be the Word of God (John 1:1), and Jesus taught both the multitudes and his disciples privately concerning the hope that the world might find salvation through him and his ministry of reconciliation.
Reconciliation of man to God through Jesus Christ is the central doctrine of the Christian faith, and at the heart of this central and most important teaching is Jesus the atoning sacrifice for man’s sins.
In parable after parable Jesus declares the purpose of God to be, that through his, Jesus’ sacrifice, man might again find life: that even as the first Adam lost life for his children, so the last Adam, Jesus himself, should purchase the world of mankind, buy it back from out of the hands of divine justice, and having bought it, should restore it to life. To restore is to replace, to re-establish, to return, and in the case of the human race it could only mean a giving back to them of something they had once possessed, otherwise it could not be a matter of restoration at all.
What was it man had once possessed, lost and, through the mediatorial work of Jesus, could have restored? Life for one thing; a sinless state for another, though without the sinless state life could not be restored; and a perfect earth in which to live.
Mark well this fact! Jesus could not give to man a spiritual reward, for man had never possessed a spiritual nature. Man, accepting the begetting of God to a spiritual nature is no longer by God counted as human, but is described by the apostle as “a new creature” in Christ.—II Cor. 5:17
Yet the vast majority of men who have been born into this world have no conception of being children of the Spirit, new creatures. They are human and have no defined spiritual aspirations. They are of the earth, earthy. Hence to impose upon such a reward of heaven as a dwelling place for eternity would be to compel them to live under conditions for which they had no taste, no desire, and for which they were in every way unfitted. Jesus, therefore, in his many parables speaks of his going away from the earth, but that he would return in due time and take over the rulership of earth’s affairs. Dr. Augustus Neander in his “General History of the Christian Religion and Church” has this to say concerning the views held in the church of the third century:
“The teleological [Webster: “the fact or the character of being directed toward an end or shaped by a purpose”] point of view was in every respect inseparable from the Christian mode of contemplation. The kingdom of God, and each individual life thereto pertaining, must be carried onward to perfection. … They framed a spiritual idea of happiness, since they understood by it nothing else than the universal dominion of the divine will, the undisturbed and blissful reunion of the whole communion of the saints, and the restoration of harmony between a sanctified humanity and all nature raised to the glorious state of its primitive innocence.”
That such a viewpoint would logically be held by the Early Church may be adduced from the fact that in most communities the churches still had only the ancient Jewish scrolls of what we term the Old Testament as a source of scriptural information.
But through these old testimonies of the prophets, the mind of God concerning his plan for world restoration could be traced, for Peter, the apostle, declared that these “times of restoration” which should come from “the presence of the Lord” had been “spoken by the mouth of all his [God’s] holy prophets.” (Acts 3:19-21) These times of restitution consisted entirely of a giving back to mankind of his lost heritage, the earth, which had been prepared for God’s human creation—for men made of such a form and nature as fitted them perfectly for an earthly environment.
Moses had spoken of the coming of One who should speak with such authority that all would have to hear him and obey if they desired life, and all the prophets from Moses to Jesus also spoke of a time of restoration which should apply to all mankind. True, the people of Israel gradually came to the viewpoint, which was encouraged by their leaders, that they as a nation were to be the chief recipients of God’s restoring favor, and assumed to themselves all the values inherent in the promise made by God to Abraham, that through Abraham should come the “seed” that would carry out the work of blessing.
The Apostle Paul, however, in the masterly argument presented in his letter to the Galatians, punctured this theory by the fact of the universality of the promised blessing. He identifies the “seed” of Abraham with Jesus Christ, and shows Israel that their position was assured only by and through the Law Covenant which was “added” to the original promise, and which, having done the work for which it was intended, had ceased to be of any further value in the outworking of the divine plan for man’s salvation. The original promise, however, remained and would be fulfilled in due time through the redeeming work of the Messiah, the Savior, which work would apply to all people—“all the families of the earth.”
First, however, must be accomplished the work of selecting from all kindreds, peoples, and tongues those who should constitute finally the bride of Christ, the co-workers who were to have the oversight of humanity’s affairs in the re-establishment of peace and happiness on the earth.
The “times of restitution” or restoration which should be ushered in during the millennial reign of Christ and his church, his bride, are spoken of by another, and one of the greatest of God’s prophets, Isaiah. He refers to this great work under the symbol of a road along which mankind would travel toward the new paradise. In the thirty-fifth chapter of his prophecy he speaks of the wilderness of this earth restored to beauty and perfection. He describes the blinded sin-sickened masses of humanity, having lost all physical vigor and spiritual strength in their long struggle to establish themselves without God’s aid, finally being brought to hear the true message of hope, and to see the blessings they might enjoy under the rule of the glorified Christ.
And then he describes the onward march, during the thousand years of the messianic reign, of the people of earth, all who respond to the voice of the risen Lord calling them back from the tomb and from among the shambles of a fallen man-made “civilization.” (John 5:28; Rev. 18:4) “An highway shall be there,” he says, “the way of holiness.” Unclean ones shall not reach its end uncleansed, but it is for such. Foolish, headstrong men shall not repeat their former mistakes, for all things that formerly caused them to stumble shall be removed. These, ransomed from sin and death by the great sacrifice of Jesus, shall reach the end of this trial period rejoicing, and shall “come to Zion” with “joy and gladness.”—Isa. 35, paraphrased.
The prophet-apostle, John, sees the completion of this picture and records it in Revelation 21:3-5:
“Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, … and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new.”