THE THREE WORLDS. THE THREE AGES OF THE SECOND WORLD. 

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THE WORD world in the Bible has as its general meaning the thought of an order or arrangement of affairs. From the standpoint of this general thought the Bible applies the word, world, to a number of things in which the idea of an order or arrangement inheres. Thus it is used Biblically in the sense of (1) the universe (John 17:5; Acts 17:24); (2) the earth (John 11:9; Matt. 26:13); (3) the human family (John 1:10, 29; 3:16); and (4) the order of affairs in the human family (Gal. 6:14; 1 John 2:15-17; 5:4, 5; Jas. 4:4). As occurring in the subject of this article the word, world, is used in the sense of the fourth definition just given—the order of affairs in the human family; therefore our subject implies three orders of affairs in the human family. In this treatise we desire to describe these in their turn. The first of these worlds was the order of affairs among men before the Flood, called, "the old world" (2 Pet. 2:5), and "the world that then was" (2 Pet. 3:6). The second of these worlds is the order of affairs among men from the end of the Flood until Christ's Second Advent and the establishment of God's kingdom, variously called "this world" (John 14:30), "the present evil world" (Gal. 1:4), "this present world" (2 Tim. 4:10; Tit. 2:12), and "the heavens and the earth which are now" (2 Pet. 3:7). The third of these worlds will be the order of affairs among men from Christ's Second Advent and the establishment of the kingdom unto all eternity, variously called "the world

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to come" (Heb. 2:5), "world without end" (Is. 45:17), "new heavens and a new earth" (2 Pet. 3:13), "the dispensation of the fulness of times" (Eph. 1:10), etc. These three worlds can probably be made clearest to our minds by the following diagram: 

The first world—"the world that then was," "the old world"—was from the creation and fall of man until the flood, lasting 1656 years. It was the order of affairs that prevailed among men especially from the fall into sin and the curse until it was blotted out by the flood in the days of Noah. It was an evil order of affairs, because in it sin, error and death prevailed; but not being so evil as that one which followed, it is not, like the present order of affairs, expressly called the "evil world." "The world that then was," or "the old [evil] world," consisted of two parts: (1) its heavens, and (2) its earth. But when we speak of its heavens and its earth, we are not to be understood as meaning the literal heavens and earth of those days; but are to be understood as meaning figurative or symbolic heavens and earth. But one might ask: "What is the difference between the literal and the figurative heavens and earth?" The literal heavens are, of course, the stellar systems that we see above us on cloudless nights; while the literal earth is the planet on which we live, build our houses and plant our gardens. These literal heavens and this literal earth are used in the Bible in a natural figure to represent symbolic heavens and earth. The following thought-likeness underlying these things suggests the use of the heavens in a symbolic sense: As the natural stars give light, so that we 

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may find our way in the natural night; so teachers of religion are to shed the light of truth on the pathway of sinners, that they may find their way in the night of sin. As, therefore, all of the literal stars constitute the literal heavens, so all of the religious systems and their teachers in any of the Bible's three worlds constitute the heavens of that world. That the Bible speaks of a teaching class or system in the sense of symbolic stars is apparent from many verses, of which we will quote a few: "They that be wise [literally teachers; see margin] shall shine as the brightness of the firmament [the sun]; and they that turn [convert] many to righteousness, as the stars for ever and ever" (Dan. 12:3). The Christ from the standpoint of giving the world the light of truth during the Millennium is called the Sun of Righteousness and the Sun (Mal. 4:2; Matt. 13:43). False teachers are called wandering stars (Jude 13). The special teachers of the Church in her seven epochs are called stars (Rev. 1:20). The twelve Apostles as the teachers of the entire Church are symbolized by the twelve stars crowning the woman who symbolizes the Church (Rev. 12:1). And Jesus, from the standpoint of giving the Truth in the dawn of the Millennium, is called the Day Star and the Morning Star (2 Pet. 1:19; Rev. 22:16). These passages, proving that religious teachers are symbolic stars, enable us to see how all of the symbolic stars of a world would be the symbolic heavens of that world. 

In the Bible, angels—the spirits that God made as His servants (Heb. 1:14)—are called stars—teachers. In job 38:7, they are spoken of as the stars that sang together early in human history, rejoicing in God's creation. Lucifer, light—bearer, who later became Satan, was like the morning star—"son of the morning"—and later in unholy ambition sought to mount above [to become supreme over] the other stars—angels (Is. 14:12, 13). According to these verses, the angels have been teachers—symbolic stars. When? 

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Evidently they will not be the heavens—the teacher—sin the world to come; for St. Paul expressly says, "Unto the angels hath He [God] not put in subjection the world [or Age] to come" (Heb. 2:5). Nor are they the religious teachers of "this present world"; for the Lord has made certain men teachers of religion in "this present world," as can readily be seen from Cornelius' experience, to whom an angel was sent to show where a teacher might be found; but the angel was not himself privileged to teach Cornelius the truth unto Salvation; for instead of attempting to teach Cornelius, the angel said to him, "Send … for … Peter, who shall tell thee words whereby thou and thy house shall be saved" (Acts 11:13, 14). Therefore, not being the symbolic heavens of the second and third worlds, if the angels ever were symbolic stars—teachers of the human family—it must have been before the flood—in the "world that then was," in "the old world," i.e., in the first dispensation. 

The angels are expressly spoken of as having been the authorized teachers of the human family, and as having been clothed with power to reward the obedient and punish the disobedient, in the following verse: "For if the word spoken by angels was steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense of reward" (Heb. 2:2). This passage in the light of the foregoing considerations implies that before the flood the symbolic heavens—the symbolic stars—light or truth bearers—were the angels who were the authorized teachers of the people, rewarding them for obedience and punishing them for disobedience. It is true that the Bible does not give us details as to their administration of affairs; but piecing together the thoughts Scripturally indicated and implied, it seems that they were permitted by the Lord, who foreknew their failure, to seek the uplift of mankind after sin had entered the world, and thus were made the religious teachers—the stars, the symbolic heavens—in "the world that then was." But instead

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of success crowning their efforts, matters became worse and worse, until man's wickedness required the punishment of the flood, which was effected by God's causing the canopy of water that enveloped the earth—"the waters above the heavens" or earth's atmosphere—to drop upon the earth in a worldwide deluge. 

But not only did mankind steadfastly continue its downward course; but many of the angels were misled into sin in an unauthorized attempt to stem the tide of human wickedness and to restore mankind unto perfection. While the Bible does not give us the details, yet from the facts that it does give us we may properly infer that the following things occurred: Satan, who originated sin among men and angels, seems to have suggested the following thoughts to the angels while they were somewhat discouraged by their failure to uplift fallen man: "Your failure is due to your use of an inadequate remedy for man's sin. He is becoming worse because of hereditary depravity. A pure fountain is indispensable to pure water. If you make the fountain pure, you will have pure water. The race is impure because it comes from an impure fountain through heredity. You have the power to materialize human bodies (Gen. 18:1, 2; 19:1; Judg. 6:11-22; 13:20; Luke 1:11-22, 28-38; etc.). Use this power, marry women and raise families; and you will impart your sinlessness to your posterity, and by and by, through a pure heredity, sin will be blotted out of the race." We say that Satan suggested such thoughts, because (1) apart from Satan other angels did not sin until just before the flood (1 Pet. 3:19, 20; 2 Pet. 2:4, 5); (2) he led many angels into sin; and (3) the angels sinned by marrying women and raising families (Gen. 6:2, 4; Jude 6, 7; see American Revised Version), thus leaving their own habitation—their mode of living as spirit beings—and becoming guilty of fornication and going after strange flesh—a different nature from their own; as St. Jude tells us, they in these matters did as the people of Sodom did 

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later. But, instead of the offspring of these angelic fathers and human mothers being sinless, they seem to have increased the wickedness of the antediluvians (Gen. 6:4-6). The procedure of the angels in this matter was entirely unauthorized. We may assume that when Satan first made his suggestion, it appealed to all as plausible; but doubtless some of them had doubts as to its propriety, because God had never authorized such a procedure. Some of the angels refused to enter into the suggestion unless Divinely authorized so to do. But there were others that allowed their zeal to reform the race to set aside proper caution; and these, following Satan's suggestion, instead of reforming the race, plunged themselves into sin, and the race into deeper sin. Thus the heavens—the symbolic heavens—of "the old world" became unfit for Divine use as religious leaders and teachers—symbolic stars. What a solemn lesson to us always to find out the Lord's will on everything before attempting it! 

Let us briefly look at the symbolic earth before the flood. We understand the symbolic earth of any world to be the organized society of that world. Often the word, earth, is symbolically used in the Bible to mean society. For example, when Jesus said, "Ye are the salt of the earth" (Matt. 5:13), He certainly did not mean that we are literal salt placed in the literal earth to season, nourish and preserve it; but that in human society-the symbolic earth-Christians are a seasoning, nourishing and preserving factor. Evidently Is. 60:2 does not refer to the literal earth being in gross literal darkness; for if such were the case, it would be dark wherever the sun does not shine on the earth, no matter how many saints were there; and it would be light wherever the sun shines, no matter how many sinners were there. Evidently the thought of the verse is that while society in general would be in the darkness of error, the faithful would be in the light of truth. How apparently does the word earth mean society, in its first use, and the planet on which we live, 

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in its second use in Gen. 4:14: "Thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the earth [society]; and from Thy face [favor] shall I be hid; and I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth [our planet]"! Again, "the whole earth [human society] was of one language" (Gen. 11:1). Other illustrations of the symbolic sense—society, as being given to the word, earth, could be cited; but the above are sufficient to prove the point under consideration. 

It being established that the symbolic earth of the Scriptures means society, we now remark that the symbolic earth upon which the angels as the symbolic heavens shone before the flood was human society as then constituted. From the fact that the earth was not divided up into private property until in the day of Peleg [divider] after the flood (Gen. 10:25); from the fact that the first human government was organized by Nimrod (Gen. 10:10); and from the fact that the first business transaction on record is that of Abraham's purchase of the field and cave of Machpelah (Gen. 23:3-20), we infer that before the flood there was no private ownership in property, no governments among the people, and no competition in business. In other words, society seemed to be organized on a more or less communistic basis somewhat after the manner of the social organization of the North American Indians. It was this peculiar social arrangement combined with man's increasing selfishness and sinfulness and the greater selfishness and sinfulness of the giant offspring of the angels (Gen. 6:4) that made the earth—society—"corrupt" (Gen. 6:5, 6, 11-13)—an expression that cannot be applied to the literal earth. The reader will note that in every use of the word, earth, in the above cited verses it means society. Thus the order of affairs before the flood—the angels in charge of the race and the race organized on a sort of communistic basis—proved to be a failure, as far as concerns the reformation of man from sin and his restoration to his Edenic perfection. 

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The foregoing discussion proves that both the symbolic heavens—the angels as the teachers of the human family, and the symbolic earth—society organized on somewhat of a communistic basis, became corrupt—unfit for the Lord's further use and tolerance as such. Hence He determined to destroy the world—not the physical, but the symbolic world, consisting, not of the physical, but the symbolic heavens and earth (Gen. 6:3, 5-13, 17). That the symbolic world is referred to as being destroyed by the flood in 2 Pet. 3:6, and not the literal world, nor the human family, is evident from the fact that we still have the same literal heavens and earth that existed before the flood and that the human family still exists; for had the world, in the sense of the human family, been destroyed by the flood, a new human race would have been created, while the Bible shows that a part of the human race survived the flood. Therefore it was the symbolic world that was destroyed by the flood (Gen. 6:13; 9:11), i.e., the order of affairs in which the angels were the teachers of the human family, and in which the human family was socially organized on a somewhat communistic basis, was forever set aside by the flood. Thus ended "the world that then was," "the old world"—not the human family, nor the universe, nor the literal earth, but the order or dispensation of affairs existing in the human family before the flood. 

This brings us to the second world or dispensation. We have already noted its names and its duration. Of its character we may say that it is an evil world, even as St. Paul calls it "this present evil world" (Gal. 1:4). It is an evil world, because Satan, its prince or ruler, is evil (John 12:31; 14:30; 16:11; 2 Cor. 4:4; Eph. 2:2; Luke 4:6). When the Bible calls Satan the prince or the god of this world, it certainly does not mean that he is the prince or god of this world in the sense of the universe or of the literal earth; for Jehovah alone is the Prince and God of such universe and earth. Evidently Satan is the prince 

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or god of this world in the sense of the present evil order of affairs among mankind, as each of the above citations clearly proves. He was not the prince of the first world, though he had more or less influence therein. He being ruler of this present world, it is very manifest why the present order of affairs among mankind is evil—its ruler is evil and desires evil in his empire. 

The two parts—the symbolic heavens and the symbolic earth—of this present evil world are discussed in 2 Pet. 3:7, 10-12, especially with reference to their end. As in the first world, so here the heavens are the powers of spiritual control. The powers of spiritual control in the second world or dispensation are the symbolic stars—the false religious systems and teachers that Satan has since the flood been using to deceive the human family. Every religious system, sect, sectlet or teacher—whether in heathendom or in Christendom—that has been used by Satan since the flood to palm off false doctrines, practices or organizations on mankind, is one of the stars of this present evil world. Truth in doctrine, practice and organization is from God and is given us through His Word (John 17:17; 2 Tim. 3:15-17). Error in doctrine, practice and organization is from Satan (John 8:44; 2 Cor. 4:4; Rev. 20:1-3). Consequently false religious teachers, as Satan's mouthpieces, are the symbolic stars in the symbolic heavens of the second world or dispensation (Jude 13). These have deceived the heathen into accepting all sorts of false religions; yea, they have even entered Christendom and introduced doctrines of devils into various sects (2 Thes. 2:3-9; 1 Tim. 4:1-3; Rev. 17:3, 5; 18:3, 23; 19:2). So deftly have the fallen angels used such religious bodies and teachers to palm off error, that through them Satan has put light for darkness and darkness for light unto the deception of almost the entire race (Is. 5:20). Among other false doctrines, these have especially spread such doctrines as the Divine Right of Kings, Aristocrats

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and Clergy, and the consciousness of the dead and eternal torment. Satan has exalted to high station, honor and influence such false teachers as best served his purposes, and has advanced in worldly prosperity those who became subject to them; while at the same time he has fiendishly opposed and persecuted the Truth teachers and their supporters both in heathendom and in Christendom. 

The light that Satan's stars shed upon the people is of a very delusive kind. It prevents their seeing things aright, even as another expressive Scriptural figure, that of drunkenness, suggests. This delusive light is well illustrated by a phosphorescent light recently invented by scientists—it puts everything into a false position before one's eyes. Near objects are made to seem far away and changed in form, while distant objects appear changed and near at hand, as a result of its peculiar working. Just such symbolic light is emitted by the symbolic stars of the second world's heavens. This is exactly what we should expect in Satan's symbolic heavens; for the prince of the power of the air (Eph. 2:2) is a liar and the father of lies, and when he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own (John 8:44). Let us beware of his false—heavens! 

As the symbolic earth of the first world was society organized on a sort of communistic basis, so the earth of the second—the present evil—world is society based on private ownership in property, governmental control in civil affairs and competition in business. All three of these principles are in themselves good, but the selfishness and wickedness of man have led to great abuses in their application, as all history since the flood abundantly attests. These abuses have resulted in society, as now organized, becoming more selfish, corrupt and unjust. As Satan has rewarded his representatives in his symbolic heavens—erroneous religious systems and teachers—so has he also in his symbolic earth advanced his representatives to honor, station, influence and riches, in State and Aristocracy. 

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As soon as these cease to be serviceable to him, he ruthlessly overthrows them. The rest of mankind he has in his symbolic earth subordinated as "the common laity" to the clergy—the stars of his symbolic heavens—and as subjects to the rulers, and as slaves, serfs or employees to the aristocrats—the great ones of his symbolic earth. This has resulted in the division of mankind into the classes and the masses. There has always been more or less dissatisfaction in the human family with the arrangements of Satan's evil world. Sometimes this dissatisfaction has been among the classes, where envy, covetousness, ambition, etc., have led to much strife and change in Religion, State, Aristocracy and Commonality; and sometimes it has been among the masses, where oppression, want, resentment, etc., have led to strife and change in the same spheres. Surely the evils—religious and social—that the human family have done and suffered in Satan's order of affairs as a result of his rulership, justify the Scriptures in calling it "this present evil world." 

We desire now briefly to examine two sets of passages which would flatly contradict one another unless we apply one set of them to the literal heavens and earth, and the other set of them to the symbolic heavens and earth; for one set of these passages tells us that "the heavens and the earth which are now" will abide forever, while the other set states that "the heavens and the earth which are now" will be destroyed during our Lord's Second Advent to give place to new heavens and a new earth. For example, Gen. 13:14, 15 pledges Canaan—a part of the literal earth—as an eternal possession to Abraham's descendants. Hence this part at least of the literal earth will be eternal. Ps. 72:7, 17, by the eternity of Christ, pledges the eternity of the sun and the moon—parts of the literal heavens. Prov. 2:21 proves that the literal earth will last forever, from the fact that while evil-doers will be cut off from the earth, the righteous will remain there. Eccl. 1:4 contrasts the transitoriness of the generations

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of mankind with the permanence of the earth—the literal earth as the verse implies. Is. 60:21 shows that the land—hence the literal earth—will be a perpetual inheritance. Jer. 31:35, 36 pledges Israel's eternity by the eternity of the literal heavens and the literal earth. Amos 9:14, 15 clearly shows that Israel will inhabit Palestine forever. If these passages are carefully studied, it will be readily recognized that they undoubtedly refer to the literal "heavens and earth which are now" and teach their permanence. 

On the other hand, Bible passages just as pointedly teach that "the heavens and the earth which are now" will pass out of existence. Matt. 24:35 contrasts the transitoriness of the heavens and earth with the permanence of God's Word. Since God's Word is the Truth (John 17:17), the contrast of Matt. 24:35 suggests that the heavens and earth there referred to must be erroneous—Satan's false religious systems and teachers and his falsely developed order of society. Thus the contrast of this verse proves that the symbolic heavens and earth are meant in this passage. So understood, it does not contradict the passages quoted above that teach the permanence of the literal heavens and earth. Rev. 20:11 cannot refer to the literal heavens and earth; for these, having been before the Lord's face for thousands of years, would long ago have passed away, if they were here meant. Here evidently the symbolic heavens are meant. By the Lord's face is meant the Truth—God's Word (Rev. 1:16; 2 Cor. 4:6). The Lord's Truth according to Rev. 20:11 will shine out so brightly that it will annihilate Satan's evil order of affairs—his false religious systems as the symbolic heavens, and his selfish, unjust and corrupt social arrangements as the symbolic earth. This thought is certainly in harmony with Matt. 24:35, just considered, and with reason; and its fulfilment, we believe, belongs to the very near future. Evidently "the first [former] heaven and the first [former] earth" of Rev. 21:1 are the symbolic heavens and earth of the present evil world, as the 

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"new heaven and the new earth" of the same verse refer to Christ and the faithful Church as the new powers of spiritual control (Dan. 12:3; Matt. 13:43) and the new society that they will develop, based upon truth, righteousness and love: These will be in the third world or dispensation (2 Pet. 3:13; Is. 65:16-25; 66:22-24; Rev. 21:2-5). 

Rev, 6:14 interpreted of the literal heaven would teach unthinkable nonsense. Separated by millions of miles of space, how could the literal heavens roll together? On what, as a surface, would they roll? How could they form a scroll? Think of the billions of planets and suns in the universe, most of them much larger than our earth, and then ask yourself the question, How could they be rolled up; and, even if they could be rolled up, what kind of a scroll would they form? At once one sees the folly of attempting to apply Rev. 6:14 to the literal heavens. But applied to the symbolic heavens, everything is Scriptural, reasonable and factual, as the following will show: In Christendom sectarianism is of two general kinds, Protestant and Catholic. There are many Protestant sects, as all know, and there are a number of Catholic sects, of many of which most Protestants seem to be unaware, e.g., Syrian, Nestorian, Coptic, Greek, Orthodox, Anglican, Roman, etc. We understand Protestant sectarianism to be represented by one roll of the scroll and Catholic sectarianism to be meant by the other roll of the scroll. And what in our times suggests a rolling together of the two rolls of the scroll? The efforts at uniting the Protestant sects with one another and the Catholic sects with one another, and at making Protestantism and Catholicism more friendly. These efforts have resulted in the Federation of Churches, which is destined to increase until almost all Protestant sects are in it. On the other hand, unionistic efforts are manifest in the Catholic roll of this symbolic scroll. These are manifest in the high Church party of the Anglican Church making overtures to 

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Rome for union, in the present efforts of the pope to unite the Greek and the Roman Catholic Churches, etc. Thus each end of the scroll is being rolled up, and both rolls as parts of the one scroll are drawing near to one another, i.e., Protestant and Catholic sects are becoming more and more friendly, though they will never become one body, which fact is symbolized by the passing away of the scroll, while rolled up at both ends, maintaining both rolls intact until it passes away—is destroyed. Should we not rejoice that sectarianism—not Christian people, but sectarian systems—will shortly be destroyed as the symbolic heavens of the present evil world? Every lover of truth and righteousness should rejoice in this. 

As viewed above—the distinction between the literal heavens and earth on the one hand and the symbolic heavens and earth on the other hand—the harmony of these two apparently contradictory sets of Scriptures becomes manifest. So far as we know, there is no other Scriptural, reasonable and factual way of harmonizing these Scriptures. It will not do for us, as devout students of the Word, to ignore the presence of these two sets of Scriptures. It is for us, by devout study and by the use of Divinely provided helps (Eph. 4:11-13), to seek their harmony along Scriptural, reasonable and factual lines, even as the Scriptures exhort us to do: "Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth" (2 Tim. 2:15; Is. 1:18). As we have above distinguished between these two lines of passages, we believe that we have rightly divided the word of truth on the permanence and transitoriness of "the heavens and the earth which are now." 

Since the world that was destroyed by the flood (2 Pet. 3:6) was not the literal universe nor the human race, but was the then existing order of affairs-the communistic society under the charge of angels as the powers of spiritual control, since the literal "heavens 

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and earth which are now" according to the above passages are to last forever, and since the symbolic "heavens and earth which are now" are to be destroyed during Christ's Second Advent, we conclude that "the heavens and the earth which are now," referred to in 2 Pet. 3:7, 10-12, are the symbolic heavens and earth, and not the literal heavens and earth. We would, therefore, conclude that the fire that is to destroy these heavens and this earth, like the pertinent heavens and earth themselves, will also be symbolic. This symbolic fire, which in its widest sense has been burning since the beginning of the World War in 1914, and which in its narrow sense is still future, we will now proceed to describe. 

In the preceding part of this chapter we discussed the Three Worlds of the Bible up to the point treating of the end of the second world, and we have just seen that the symbolic heavens and earth that constitute the second world are to be obliterated by symbolic fire. Those who understand St. Peter (2 Pet. 3:7-12) to mean the literal heavens and earth insist that the fire of vs. 7, 10-12, is literal. The absurdity of such a view becomes apparent when we remember that most of the elements of the literal earth and heavens are not carbonaceous and therefore cannot burn up. But having already seen that the heavens and earth that are to be destroyed are the symbolic heavens and earth—the present order of affairs based upon more or less of sin, error and selfishness—it is logically to be expected that the fire that will destroy them, in keeping with the symbols used, is figurative. Biblical investigation proves this logical expectation to be true. Fire naturally destroys combustible things, and upon this fact is based the symbolic use of fire in the Bible in the sense of destructive troubles and destruction. 

A few passages will show this to be true: The destruction of evil from our characters by tribulations is spoken of as being wrought by fire, which proves that things and processes destructive of evil are meant by

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the fire (Mal. 3:2, 3). Again, the wicked in their destruction are spoken of as symbolic stubble with symbolic roots and branches, all to be destroyed by symbolic fire (Mal. 4:1, 3). Likewise, the symbolic fires of trial, in our times especially, burn up the wood and hay of human error and the stubble of a correspondingly faulty character, in certain ones among God's people (1 Cor. 3:12-15). Speaking of the destruction that the great tribulation will work upon human society as now organized, the Lord declares, "All the [symbolic] earth [society] shall be devoured with the fire of My jealousy (Zeph. 3:8). Surely the word, fire, as well as earth, in this passage is symbolic, and means destructive troubles; for the literal earth not being combustible cannot burn up literally. John the Baptist, prophesying of the destruction of the unbelieving Jews as a nation and as God's people, uses the word, chaff, to symbolize them as such, and the word, fire, to symbolize their destructive war with the Romans from 66 to 73 A. D., whereby the symbolic chaff as such would be burned up (Matt. 3:11, 12). When St. James tells us that the tongue of the wicked is a fire and sets on fire the whole course of nature, he of course does not mean a literal fire; but as the connection shows, he means that such a tongue is destructive in its effects—a symbolic fire; and true enough such tongues caused the World War and will cause the rest of the fire of the day of the Lord. When the apostate church—an organization, a system, not a combustible material thing at all—is spoken of as being burned by fire (Rev. 17:16), of course a literal burning with a literal fire is not meant; but a consuming destruction is designated. These passages are only a few taken from among many which show that fire is used symbolically in the Scriptures to represent destruction and destructive troubles. 

It is just such a fire that is referred to by St. Peter in vs. 7, 10-12 of our text. This fire represents the destructive forces and effects of the Great Tribulation.

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As we have repeatedly shown in our writings, the Great Tribulation consists of five great evils, by which the present evil order of affairs—in reality Satan's empire—will be blotted out. These evils are worldwide war, revolution, anarchy, famine and pestilence. For their destructive nature and effects, in harmony with Scriptural symbols, they are very properly symbolized in the Bible by fire. We have described this symbolic fire together with its kindling and burning somewhat in detail in The Herald of the Epiphany, 1922, pp. 9-13 and in the book on the Millennium, under the subject, The Overthrow Of Satan's Empire. We, therefore, refer our readers to that article for these details and will not give them here. Rather here we will show how the symbolic language of our text, in vs. 7, 10-12, refers to them. In these verses the heavens—powers of spiritual control—and the earth—society—are spoken of as burning until they will melt, and all their elements—constituent parts: Church, State, Aristocracy and Labor—will dissolve because of the fervent heat caused by the friction arising from their hostile rubbing against one another. 

In the article above referred to, we showed how the national elements—the various nations—through their national grudges, envies, suspicions, hatred, ambitions, rivalries, fears, covetousnesses, etc., caught on fire which flamed up into the World War. As a result President Wilson, using the same forceful symbols that our text employs, described the nations in war—the bulk of the human family—as "the world on fire" and the spreading war spirit as burning sparks blown about by the winds of strife and setting various other national houses one after another on fire. By the fire of the World War the national, clerical and aristocratic elements began to melt from the fervent heat thus generated. Famine and pestilence were, so to speak, so much more fire added to the fire of war and contributed their share to the melting, until the nations in State, Church and Aristocracy, emerged from the

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first stage of the fire considerably melted—weakened. Thus national friction resulted in a practically universal war—"the world on fire." But the revolution stage of the Great Tribulation—fire—will be caused by the friction arising from the conservative elements in State, Church and Aristocracy violently rubbing against the radical elements of Society in the field of Labor. This friction will cause a conflagration to burst out, setting every nation on fire within itself. So intensely will this fire of revolution burn, and so widely will it spread that it will burn down every national government on earth together with the religions and the aristocracies of all nations. Famines and pestilences more severe than those of the World War period will add more flames to the fires of revolution, making the conflagration more universal, intense and destructive. A government probably socialistic in character, but certainly under the control of Labor, will arise amid and out of the revolution; but it will last only a few years. Anarchy—the last stage of the trouble involving mankind—assisted by still worse famines and pestilences than the former ones, will like a devouring fire lay hold on this governmental structure with its accompanying social and religious organizations and burn it completely down, not leaving one vestige of Satan's evil heavens and earth in existence. 

That the fire of our text is symbolic does not only follow from the fact that the heavens and earth that it devours are symbolic, and from the fact that it consists of worldwide war, revolution, anarchy, famine and pestilence, but also from the numerous other Scriptural figures used to designate the self-same destructive troubles. The following are the chief symbolic designations of these destructive troubles: a battle (Rev. 16:14; Zeph. 3:8; Is. 13:4, 5), Armageddon (Rev. 16:16), an earthquake (Rev. 16:18; Heb. 12:26), a whirlwind and a storm (Nah. 1:3, 6, 7), a tempest of hail, a destroying storm and a flood of mighty waters (Is. 28:2; Nah. 1:4, 5, 8), the besom

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[broom] of destruction (Is. 14:23), a furnace of fire (Matt. 13:42), a lake of fire (Rev. 19:20), the supper of the Great God (Rev. 19:17), and a winepress (Rev. 14:19). All of these figures expressive of destruction referring to the same thing as the fire of our text, conclusively prove that destruction is symbolized by the fire. Thus through the symbolic fire of the Great Tribulation will Satan's evil order of affairs—his world consisting of its symbolic heavens and earth—be burned up, be completely destroyed. Thus will end never to rise again the second world—this present evil world or order of affairs—with its symbolic heavens and earth, in anticipation of which let us thank and praise God. 

But our text in verse 13 and many other Scriptures (Is. 65:17; 66:22; Rev. 21:1) tell us that the present symbolic heavens and earth will give place to new symbolic heavens and earth—new powers of spiritual control and another form of society organized on a new and good basis. This will be in the third world, "the world to come," which will last forever. It will have new heavens or powers of spiritual control—Jesus and His faithful followers (Dan. 12:3; Mal. 4:2; Matt. 13:43; 1 Cor. 15:41, 42; Rev. 22:16). In very important and essential respects will the new heavens differ from the old heavens. The new symbolic heavens will shine the pure light of truth with healing effects upon the new symbolic earth of that time, driving away the miasma of ignorance, error, sin and all other effects of the curse, such as sickness, pain, sorrow, sighing, crying, tears, blight, famine, pestilence, death and the grave (Mal. 4:2; Matt. 13:43; Is. 65:17-25; Rev. 21:1-7; 22:1-3; Is. 35:1-10). Jesus and His Church, filled with God's love sufficient for the recovery of the human family, endowed by Divine power and wisdom commensurate to the task of uplifting the race, and permeated with Jehovah's righteousness indispensable to rulers of mankind for the good of their subjects, will have the qualities 

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needed for the faithful and merciful ministry of curing the ills of the curse and of supplying unto perfection all the needs of the race. Under their benign reign mankind will be restored to human perfection and Edenic conditions, as they obey the righteous, loving and wise arrangements of the new earth instituted by Christ and the Church for and among the whole race, the dead as well as the living (Ps. 22:29; 86:10; Is. 29:18, 24; 35:10; Rom. 14:9; Phil. 2:9-11).

The new earth—the earth of the third world or the world to come—will consist of human society organized on the basis of truth, righteousness and love, as against the erroneous, unjust and selfish arrangements of the present evil earth (Jer. 31:31-34; Is. 35:4-10). The nucleus of the new earth will be the Ancient and Youthful Worthies (Joel 2:28; Dan. 12:3). Humbled by, and converted to Christ amid Jacob's trouble just at the end of the anarchy stage of the Great Tribulation (Jer. 30:7-9; Ezek. 38 and 39; Zech. 12:914), Israel, first of all, will rally about these Worthies, accepting the new social arrangements of the Christ at their hands and will be greatly blessed by them. The news of these things will be spread among the Gentiles, exhausted, humbled and made docile by the tribulation, who will desire the same social arrangements established in their midst, and whose desires in these respects will be gratified (Is. 2:2-4; 19:23-25; Zech. 8:20-23; Hag. 2:7). Through obedience to these social arrangements all Jews and Gentiles alike will be blessed and uplifted until society gradually attains to physical, mental, moral and religious perfection. A brief trial will at the end of the Millennium be put upon the race to test their worthiness of living forever amid those perfect social arrangements; and the unfaithful in that trial will be cut off in the second death—everlasting destruction—(Rev. 20:7-9; Acts 3:23; 2 Thes. 1:9; Ps. 145:20; Prov. 2:22), while the faithful in that trial will be privileged to enjoy this new earth forever (Prov. 2:21; Is. 66:22; 2 Pet. 3: 

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13; Ps. 37:9-11, 29). As a consequence, in the Ages of the endless third world as these follow the Millennium, will the new heavens and the new earth and all in them glorify God (Rev. 5:13). Thus will God by His plan operating through the three dispensations or worlds of the Bible emerge from His conflict with Satan as complete Victor, having destroyed all evil and all incorrigibly evil beings, and brought the faithful to everlasting perfection, some on various planes of being in heaven as the new heavens and others, perfect human beings, on earth as the new earth wherein righteousness shall dwell forever (2 Pet. 3:13). What a glorious consummation and devoutly to be desired 

Having studied the three worlds of the Bible, it would now be in order to study the Ages of the Second World. The First World was not subdivided into Ages, because from the Fall of Man until the flood there was no variation in the method of the Lord's dealings with man-He left them all under the rulership of the angels as the powers of spiritual control. He did not enter into covenant dealings with any of mankind during that period, though He was pleased to bless, under the limitations of the curse, any who drew near to Him, even as prison officials give trustworthy convicts certain advantages not given to other convicts. In harmony with this principle God showed certain favors, compatible with the curse, to Abel, Enoch and Noah, without making a special covenant with them before the flood, though after making His covenant with Abraham God retroactively included Abel, Enoch and Noah under its gracious provisions (Heb. 11:4-7, 39, 40). It is because there was neither a covenant nor a variation in covenant operation between God and man from the Fall to the Flood that there were no Ages in the First World. But there have been three variations of covenant operation between God and certain select persons and nations during the Second World or Dispensation, and for this reason there have been three Ages in the Second World-the Patriarchal

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Age, the Jewish Age and the Gospel or Christian Age. These Ages as parts of the Second World may be clarified to the mind through the eye by the following diagram 

Properly to understand the ways of God toward man during the Second World, it is necessary for us not only to see, as we did above, mankind's condition and course without God and Christ in, and under control of, Satan's evil—the Second—World, but also to see the condition and course of certain elect classes under God's rulership during the same Dispensation. These two standpoints will give us a fuller understanding of the ways of God toward man during the Second World or Dispensation. It is from the viewpoint of the three Ages of this World that we come to see God's dealings with the elect classes; for during these three Ages He dealt on covenant basis with the elect alone. From the standpoint of covenant and persons, the Lord's dealings differed in three ways during this period; hence as corresponding to these differences there are three Ages in the Second World. They differ especially as follows: In the Patriarchal Age God dealt on covenant basis with certain patriarchs individually—Abraham, Isaac and Jacob—and through them with their families, but with no one else; during the Jewish Age God dealt on covenant basis with the Israelites as a fleshly nation and with no one else; and during the Gospel or Christian Age He has been dealing on covenant basis with the Christian Church—spiritual Israel—as a spiritual nation and with no one else. As these three classes have differed from one another, so the predominant covenant has been a different one in each 

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of these Ages. Thus during the Patriarchal Age God dealt with the Patriarchs and their families on the basis of an earthly elective feature of the Abrahamic Covenant; during the Jewish Age, while permitting faithful individuals to enjoy the same provisions of that covenant in a less open way after the Sinaitic law was given, God openly dealt with fleshly Israel as a nation on the basis of the Mosaic Covenant; while during the Gospel Age God has been dealing with spiritual Israel on the basis of certain spiritual elective features of the Abrahamic Covenant. 

Having seen the general differences in the Lord's dealings during these Ages, we will now study some of the details of these Ages, considering each one in its chronological order. We will therefore begin with the first of them, the Patriarchal Age. Generally speaking, the Patriarchal Age began at the end of the flood, partly because at that time God made a special covenant with Noah and his descendants never again to destroy the—symbolic—earth with a flood (Gen. 9:8-17); but specifically speaking, the Patriarchal Age began with the covenant made with Abraham (Gen. 12:1-5). Because of the retroactive operation of the blessings of the Abrahamic Covenant, they were anticipatorily applied to Noah, and even to Enoch and Abel (Heb. 11:4-7, 39, 40). It is because of the retroactive effect of this covenant on Noah, that we are also partly warranted in beginning the Patriarchal Age with the end of the flood. The word patriarchs means first fathers; and it is because Noah, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were the first fathers of Israel in this period, that we call this period the Patriarchal Age, which we represent by the first semi-circle within the large semi-circle in our diagram. Apart from the covenant never again to destroy the earth with a flood, during this period God did not deal on covenant basis with every human being, i.e., did not extend anticipatorily or otherwise the blessings of the Abrahamic Covenant to everybody living in that time, e.g., to the 

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Babylonians, the Canaanites, the Egyptians, etc. The Scriptures teach that the Lord let them go their own chosen sinful way, winking at their ignorance (Acts 17:23, 30; Rom. 1:21-25, 28). On the contrary, during that period He dealt on the Abrahamic Covenant basis with Abraham and through him with his family, then with Isaac and through him with his family, and then with Jacob and through him with his family. Thus God's dealings were of an elective character during the Patriarchal Age. And He allowed all the rest of mankind to go their own way, lost under the curse, without doing anything during that time to or for them directly for their salvation. 

From this fact we conclude that it was not God's intention to save them or to attempt to save them at that time. This we know to be true; for had it been His will to attempt to save them at that time, He would have made the attempt, which the facts just given and the Scriptures last cited prove He did not do; and if it had been His intention to save them at that time, His intention would have been realized; for all His purposes shall surely come to pass (Is. 46:10, 11). Therefore we reason that since He did not attempt to save the world at that time, and that since the world was not at that time saved, it evidently was not His purpose at that time to save the world. Rather He let it in general remain without God and without hope, to learn by experience what frightful and detestable task-masters sin, error, death and the grave are, and how desirable deliverance from them is. On the contrary, He confined His salutary works and efforts on behalf of the few patriarchs above mentioned and their families. Therefore His salutary work of that period was demonstratedly of an elective character, confined to a very few persons indeed. 

If it was not Jehovah's purpose at that time to save or to attempt to save the world, what then were His purposes during the Patriarchal Age? In reply we would say that He had a variety of purposes, every one 

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of which He realized, just as we should expect a God of perfect wisdom, power, justice and love to do. The first of these purposes was to reveal in a nutshell His glorious plan. This He did in a very terse form by and in making His covenant with Abraham and His Seed (Gen. 12:1-4; 22:16-18, etc.). Certain of the blessings referred to in this covenant belonged to Abraham (Gen. 12:1-4); and certain of them belonged to his Seed (Gen. 22:16-18). In the latter passage, by the expression, "as the stars of the heaven," the heavenly Seed is meant; and by the expression, "as the sand which is upon the seashore," the earthly Seed is meant. These promises are a summary of the Divine plan; therefore St. Paul calls them the Gospel (Gal. 3:8, 16, 29). They imply (1) that Abraham and his Seed would be greatly blessed; (2) that they would in due time do a work of blessing to others; and (3) that their work of blessing would include the whole human family. Thus the Abrahamic Covenant is the Bible in a nut shell; and though at the time God made it with Abraham and his Seed He was doing nothing directly to and for the world in the way of salvation, it nevertheless proves that it was His plan sometime to bless all the non-elect race—the dead as well as the living—through Abraham and his Seed with the opportunities of salvation. This covenant, as St. Paul teaches, implies the resurrection of the dead (Acts 26:6-8). The time for this work of blessing the world with such privileges other Scriptures show us is after all the Elect of all their classes—the earthly and heavenly classes—are complete, i.e., during the Millennium. The first purpose of God during the Patriarchal Age—giving a terse revelation of His plan for human salvation—was thus realized. Given first to Abraham, then to his descendants, it was after more than 430 years by Moses reduced to writing, when the latter wrote the book of Genesis. Let us from this actualized purpose realize that all God's purposes will surely come to pass, and thus doubt Him in nothing. 

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God had a second purpose during the Patriarchal Age—to furnish many types shadowing forth a great many details of His plan. Thus by Abraham, his three wives, Sarah, Hagar, Keturah, and their children in his relations to them, God shadowed forth Himself and three of His covenants, the New Creaturely, Law and New Covenants, and the children of these covenants—The Christ, fleshly Israel and the saved World—in His relations to them. Again, by Abraham and Isaac in their mutual relations God shadowed forth Himself and the Christ Class in their mutual relations. By Abraham, Lot and Lot's wife in their mutual relations He typed the Little Flock, Great Company and the Second Death Class. Further by Isaac and Rebekah in their espousal and marriage God shadowed forth the espousal and marriage of Jesus and His Faithful. Moreover by Jacob and Esau in their mutual relations God shadowed forth spiritual Israel and fleshly Israel in their mutual relations. By Jacob, Laban, Jacob's four wives and twelve children in their mutual relations God shadowed forth the faithful Christians as servants of the truth, the sectarian leaders of the Gospel Age, four classes of Gospel Age truths and twelve religious movements of the Gospel Age with the twelve classes who took part in them. Finally, by Pharaoh, Joseph, his brethren and the Egyptians God pictured forth Himself, The Christ, their brethren and the world of mankind; and by the salvation that Joseph wrought out for his brethren and the Egyptians God pictured forth the salvation that The Christ will work for His brethren and the world of mankind. According to this, especially from Gen. 12 to the end of that book, God through its narratives furnished us typical representations of a multitude of details in His plan, which He so briefly summed up in Gen. 12:1-4 and Gen. 22:16-18. His purpose in furnishing us these typical pictures has been realized—He never fails in any of His purposes. 

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Jehovah had a third purpose during the Patriarchal Age: the selection of certain persons for Princeship and Leviteship in the earth during the Millennium. This He accomplished by winning to Himself for truth and righteousness Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, etc., for such. Let us explain: Before man fell, God foreknowing his sin, planned to redeem and deliver him. This redemptive plan centers in The Christ, the Deliverer. As we have seen, The Christ consists of Jesus and all His faithful footstep followers. These God intends to make Kings and Priests during the Millennium (Rev. 1:5, 6; 5:9, 10; 20:4, 6). Further, Jehovah designs to associate with these Kings and Priests, certain Princes and Levites. In David and Solomon we have the figures of the Great King, Head and Body, and in the princes of their times we have the types of the Millennial princes. In Aaron and his sons we have the type of the Great High Priest and the Under-priests, and in the three groups of Levites—Kohathites, Merarites and Gershonites—we have the types of the three Millennial Levite groups—the Ancient Worthies, the Great Company and the Youthful Worthies. These four groups will constitute the ruling and blessing classes-the Seed of Abraham—during the Millennium. While Jehovah graciously permitted the privilege of princeship anticipatorily to include Abel, Enoch and Noah, it began to operate in a proper sense with the giving of the covenant to Abraham and his Seed. Ps. 45:16 is a passage that treats of these princes. From Heb. 1:8, 9 we know that Ps. 45 is a prophecy addressed to our Lord Jesus Christ. He is the one whose "fathers," ancestors, are mentioned in this verse. Instead of [remaining] Thy fathers [they] shall be[come] Thy children. These fathers or ancestors of Jesus according to the flesh were Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, etc. According to this passage they are to become His children. How, one asks in surprise, can one become the father of his ancestors? We answer what man cannot do God can

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accomplish, as the following will show: A father is a life-giver. Jesus as the Second Adam (1 Cor. 15:45-49) will regenerate the obedient of the race in life and righteousness (Matt. 19:26, 28; Acts 3:19-21). When He as the Second Adam gives His ancestors life, He will thereby become their Father—Life-giver. Thus we see how He will become the Father of His ancestors. But the passage further says that He will be privileged to make them princes throughout the whole earth. When? After He becomes their Father, i.e., after their resurrection. 

There are other passages that treat of the Ancient Worthies. Of these we will cite a few: Is. 1:26; 32:1; Luke 13:28, 29; Heb. 11:39, 40. In all of these passages the Christ Class as the heavenly, and the Ancient Worthies as the earthly, phase of the kingdom are set forth. In Is. 1:26 the "judges" are The Christ and the "counselors" are the Ancient Worthies. In Is. 32:1 the "king" is The Christ and the "princes" are the Ancient Worthies. In Luke 13:28, 29 those that come from the East, West, North and South are the Christ, and "Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and all the prophets" stand for the Ancient Worthies. The "us" of Heb. 11:40 refers to the Christ Class, while the "all these" of verse 39—referred to in Heb. 11:4-38—are the Ancient Worthies. The superiority of the Christ Class over the Ancient Worthies is expressly taught in all except Luke 13:28, 29, where the matter of rank is not touched upon. In Matt. 11:11 John the Baptist as the last of the Ancient Worthies (Luke 16:16; Matt. 11:12, 13) is described; and though set forth in this verse as one of the very greatest of the Ancient Worthies, he is nevertheless expressly called less—inferior to—than the least one of the Kings who will constitute the kingdom. John expressly calls attention to the fact that he was not of Christ's Bride, rightly esteeming himself as the friend of the Bridegroom whose highest privilege, therefore, was to seek to win the Bride for Christ, and to rejoice in the 

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measure of success that he attained therein (John 3:28, 29). The inferiority of the Ancient Worthies to the Christ Class is implied in the term "counselors" in contrast with the term "judges" (Is. 1:26); in the term "princes" in contrast with the term "king" (Is. 32:1); in the clause "God having provided some better thing for us; (Heb. 11:40); and in the earthly phase as contrasted with the heavenly phase of the kingdom implied in Gen. 22:17; Matt. 11:11-13, etc. During the Old Testament period God was selecting these faithful Ancient Worthies; and He began this work on the basis of certain earthly features of the Abrahamic Covenant which He graciously anticipated on behalf of Abel, Enoch and Noah, though they did not begin to work until Abraham entered the land of Canaan. The above considerations prove that God succeeded during the Patriarchal Age in winning some of the Ancient Worthies for Himself in the interests of truth and righteousness for Princeship and Leviteship in the Millennial Age. Summing up we may say that God's three Patriarchal Age purposes were realized—giving a terse revelation of His plan in the Abrahamic Covenant, giving many typical details of that plan and selecting some of the Ancient Worthies for Millennial Princeship and Leviteship. Thus all His purposes as to the Patriarchal Age came to pass. 

The Patriarchal Age lasted 659 years—from the end of the flood until the death of Jacob. The reason that we say that the Patriarchal Age ended at Jacob's death is that from that time on God ceased to deal on covenant basis with only one patriarch at a time and through him with his family; for at the death of Jacob God began to deal on covenant basis with one nation—the twelve tribes of Israel, who at Jacob's death are for the first time called the twelve tribes of Israel, i.e., the nation of Israel (Gen. 49:28). This change of procedure on God's part brought the Patriarchal Age to an end, and it also introduced the 

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Jewish Age, so called because the Jews alone were then by God dealt with on covenant basis. 

The Jewish Age began at the death of Jacob and lasted unto the death of Jesus—a period of 1845 years. During this Age it was evidently not God's purpose either to attempt to convert or to convert the whole world; for if such had been His purpose, the attempt to do so would have been made, and the attempt would have resulted in the world's conversion. The fact that neither of these things was done of itself proves that neither of these things was during the Jewish Age the Divine purpose, even as the passage cited above proves: "My counsel shall stand; and I will do all My pleasure … I have spoken it, I will also bring it to pass; I have purposed it, I will also do it" (Is. 46:10, 11). Let us have done with the God-dishonoring teaching that God's purpose will fail of success because of the opposition of men or devils. Let us rather believe that He is so supremely wise, powerful, just and loving that He will succeed in all His undertakings. Such a faith is as honoring as the other thought is dishonoring to God. There is one other fact that demonstrates completely that during the Jewish Age God neither designed the conversion of the world nor attempted it—the fact that during that Age He offered a covenant to no other nation than Israel and entered into no covenant relations with any other nation than Israel; for God directly said to Israel, "You only have I known [recognized as a covenant people] of all the families of the earth" (Amos 3:2). Since God never offers salvation apart from a covenant, and since He then offered no covenant to the Gentiles, it follows that He then neither attempted to convert nor designed to convert the Gentile world. In other words, God's dealings during the Jewish Age were, like His dealings during the Patriarchal Age, of an elective character. 

If God neither designed nor attempted to convert the world during the Jewish Age, what were His purposes 

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at that time? He had a variety of purposes. Of these we will especially discuss seven: The first of these Divine designs was to give a further revelation of His plan. God's revelatory thoughts were not in their entirety given instantly, but gradually. From the time He first indicated His purpose to destroy evil through The Christ (Gen. 3:15) until He gave us the last revelations of the Gospel Age, there was a flight of about 4225 years. The Jewish Age covers with the exception of about the last 70 of these years, 1845 of their last part. And during about 1200 of these 1845 years Jehovah gave by far the largest, though not the clearest, parts of His revelation. These revelations He caused to be reduced to writing and they constitute the 39 books usually called the Old Testament. The revelations constituting the book of Genesis were given before the Jewish Age, but were not committed to writing until the Jewish Age. God's revelations in the Old Testament were given at different times and in different manners (Heb. 1:1). Sometimes they were given by direct speech, sometimes by visions, tableaux and dreams, sometimes by immediate inspiration, sometimes by typical acts and institutions, and sometimes by covenant arrangements. Very many of these God gave by Moses and the rest of them by other Old Testament prophets and writers. 

The reduction of the Old Testament revelations to writing was begun by Moses at Mt. Sinai, 1615 B. C., and was completed by Malachi about 400 B. C. Everything in the Old Testament is revelatory—even its histories, which typed coming features and phases of God's plan. Thus the deliverance of Israel from Pharaoh's power types the deliverance of all who will ever become God's people from Satan's power; the various features of the Law Covenant type the various features of the New Covenant; the journey from the Red Sea to Sinai types certain general features of the Gospel Age; the journey from Sinai to Canaan types especially the Gospel Age experiences of spiritual 

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Israel while journeying to the heavenly Canaan. Joshua's conquest of Canaan types the Church's present and the world's future conquest of the enemies of truth and righteousness. The book of judges types experiences of God's people in more or less of apostasy and their deliverance therefrom on repentance. Eli and his two sons are used to type the Great Company, and Papal and Protestant sectarianism. Generally speaking, Saul types the nominal people of God, and David, the real people of God, during the Gospel Age. Solomon, generally speaking, types The Christ during the Millennium; while various Gospel Age persons, movements and events are typed by the kings of Israel and Judah, Elijah and Elisha, etc. 

The institutions and arrangements of the Mosaic Covenant are a marvelous set of types representing in great detail the institutions and arrangements connected with the New Covenant. Thus Moses as Israel's mediator types The Christ as the world's Mediator; Aaron and his sons type Christ and the Church as Priests. The Levites for Millennial purposes type the Ancient Worthies, the Great Company and the Youthful Worthies; the ten commandments type the law of justice in the New Covenant; the Sabbaths and the jubilee type the Millennium; the clean foods type the true teachings; the unclean foods type the false teachings; the Most Holy of the tabernacle types the Divine condition of God and The Christ; the Holy types the spirit-begotten condition of The Christ; the Court types the justified condition, and the camp types the condition of the nominal people of God. The atonement sacrifices that Aaron brought represent the "better sacrifices" of Jesus and the Church; while the sacrifices that the people brought type the sacrifices that the world will bring during the Millennium. Every piece of furniture, every vessel, curtain, board, pillar, bar, socket, cord, instrument and service of the tabernacle were "shadows of better things to come." Lack of time and space forbid our going into these details

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which, D. v., we may do later. But the generalities above given furnish us a clue to the amazing revelations given by God in the Jewish Age. Surely He succeeded during the Jewish Age in accomplishing His purpose of giving a revelation of more details of His plan in the form of types. 

God's second design during the Jewish Age was to select a people to be the custodian of His revelations given during that Age. The descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob to whom God gave the Abrahamic Covenant were selected to be such a custodian, even as the Apostle Paul explains, "What advantage then hath the Jew? … Much every way; chiefly because that unto them were committed the oracles of God" (Rom. 3:1, 2). According to this passage the Old Testament, God's Jewish Age written revelation, was committed to Israel as its caretaker and preserver. This was one of the most sacred of all Israel's missions; and while faithful, Israel cared for and preserved these writings, as during the periods of their apostasy they almost lost them, as can be seen, e.g., from the story of finding the Pentateuch in the temple by Hilkiah, the priest, in the days of Josiah (2 Chro. 34:14-33). Indeed from shortly after the death of Joshua onward, except during times of reformation, Israel was careless of its duties as the custodian of God's oracles until after the exile. Thenceforth they guarded the Old Testament with most jealous care; so that when the time came for making the Gospel Church the custodian of God's oracles, Israel transmitted to the Church the Old Testament entire. This fact proves that God's second Jewish Age purpose was successful. 

God's third purpose during the Jewish Age was to demonstrate that none of the fallen race could perfectly keep God's Law, that thus none of them could through keeping the Law gain everlasting life, and that thus all stood in need of a Savior (Rom. 3:9-28; 7:5—8:4; Gal. 2:16—3:25). God, knowing that 

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to keep the Law was the full measure of a perfect man's ability, of course knew that imperfect men could not keep it, because their ability was less than that of a perfect man; but fallen human beings as a rule do not know or believe this to be true. Therefore God designed to prove it by an actual experiment. Accordingly He selected a people—Israel—having the best physical, mental, moral and religious heredity and training among men for such an experiment, gave them the best covenant, country, surroundings, teachers and helps for man's imperfect conditions compatible with the purposes of the experiment, and made them the offer of life by the deeds of the Law (Lev. 18:5; Deut. 30:15, 19; Rom. 10:5). He set before them rewards to arouse obedience, and threats to discourage disobedience. After their repeated failures and repentances He as frequently forgave, corrected and gave them further opportunities to demonstrate whether they could keep the Law or not, and thereby gain life or not. This He continued to do for 1647 years, i.e., from Nisan 10, 1615 B. C., to Nisan 10, 33 A. D. And what was the result of the experiment? What God foreknew would be its result—fallen man's failure to keep the Law and to gain life through the works of the Law and thus his need of a Savior to keep it for him and to deliver him from its curse. This failure was not due to the fact that none tried their best to keep it; for such men as Moses, Joshua, Samuel, David, Elijah, Daniel, Ezra, Nehemiah, John the Baptist, etc., certainly made a most noble effort so to do, and thereby staid the increase of depravity in themselves; but their failure to keep the Law perfectly proves that they were fallen, depraved, therefore imperfect, and therefore unable to keep a law that taxed perfect human powers to their utmost to keep under similar conditions. Hence everyone of these as well as the less faithful demonstrated under the experiment that he was a sinner, that he was guilty before God, 

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that he could not save himself, and that therefore he needed a Savior. But, one may ask, how does Israel's failure prove that all others would have failed? The answer is simple: Israel being the least fallen of any of the nations, hence closer to human perfection than any other race, and yet failing under the test, those more fallen and imperfect would have done even worse under the trial; and therefore Israel's failure proves that every imperfect man would fail to obey the Law perfectly and thereby fail to gain life by the works of the Law. Israel's repeated failures in this matter wrought in the more faithful among them an earnest longing for a Savior, for whom they looked in the Messiah. Thus we see that Jehovah's third design during the Jewish Age was realized—"He faileth not." 

Jehovah's fourth purpose during the Jewish Age was to manifest the righteousness of any one who would fulfill the Law. But none of Adam's fallen race could fulfill it; and after 1613½ years had passed evidencing man's inability to keep the Law, God carnated the Word—the Logos—caused the Word to become flesh—human (John 1:14). Ages before, the Word—the Logos—had been created by, and was with, the Father, and had been His Special Representative in the works of creation, providence and revelation (John 1:1-3; Col. 1:15-17; Rev. 3:14). But in the fulness of time He divested Himself of His prehuman nature, office and honor and became a human being, born of the Virgin Mary, but not begotten by a human father (John 1:14; Phil. 2:6, 7; 2 Cor. 8:9; Heb. 2:9, 14, 16; Gal. 4:4, 5; Luke 1:31, 34, 35; Matt. 1:18-25). Since one's soul, and thus the Adamic sin and sentence, comes from the father, and since God was the Father of the Logos, when the Logos became the child Jesus, He was without sin and its sentence. He was thus born a perfect babe and grew up to perfect manhood—sinless (John 1:14). This made it possible for Him with His perfect powers

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perfectly to fulfill the Law. And He did fulfill its every requirement (Heb 1:9; Is. 53:9; Zech. 9:9; John 8:46; 14:30; Acts 3:14; Rom. 10:4; 2 Cor. 5:21; Heb. 4:15; 7:26; 1 Pet. 1:19; 2:22; 1 John 3:5). Thereby as a human being He maintained, proved His right to, the Law's reward of everlasting life for the obedient (Lev. 18:5; Deut. 30:15, 19; Rom. 10:5; Gal. 3:12). Instead, however, of using His right to human life for Himself, He, bearing our penalty, sacrificed this right that the condemned world under certain conditions might obtain it as a gift from God and Himself (Is. 53:4-6, 8, 10-12; Dan. 9:26; John 1:29; 3:14-17; 6:51; Rom. 3:24-26; 4:25; 5:6-11; 1 Cor. 15:3; 2 Cor. 5:14, 15, 19, 21; Gal. 3:13; Eph. 5:2; Col. 1:14, 20-22; Heb. 2:9; 9:14; 1 Pet. 3:18; 1 John 2:2; 4:10). This transaction is sometimes set forth in the Bible as a commercial one in which Adam and his condemned race are represented as bankrupts, in debt to the extent of the right to life and its accompanying life-rights; God, as the creditor requiring the payment of the debt; and Christ, as the friend of the debtor paying his debt by His right to human life and its life-rights as a ransom, a corresponding price, and thus gaining the right to free the debtor (Rom. 5:15-19; 1 Tim. 2:4-6; Matt. 20:28; Acts 20:28; 1 Cor. 6:20; 1 Pet. 1:18, 19; Rev. 5:9). The involved propositions are simple and clear. By sin Adam forfeited his right to life and his life-rights for himself and race. These were taken from him through death. By righteousness Jesus maintained His right to life and His life-rights; but instead of keeping them for Himself He sacrificed—not forfeited—them through death that He might give them as a purchase price to Divine justice as an absolute equivalent for Adam's forfeited life-rights and right to life. Thus by purchase in harmony with God's design He becomes the possessor of a right to life and its life-rights, which He gives now to the Church imputatively, and which later 

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He will give to the world actually. And the Law accepting and sanctioning His redemptive work in this way, most gloriously manifests Him as the fulfiller of its righteousness (Rom. 10:4; 3:24-26; 1 Cor. 1. 30; Gal. 3:22; Phil. 3:9). Here is our hope; here is our well-spring of life; here is the Law-approved redemption of the lost Adam and his lost race. Praised be our God that the Law so gloriously recognizes Jesus' righteousness! Thus this—the fourth Jewish Age design of the Lord—was gloriously realized. 

The fifth design of God during the Jewish Age was the winning of the remaining Ancient Worthies; for not enough of them were won during the Patriarchal Age to supply the required number for their Millennial and post-Millennial work. It is due to this fact that St. Paul in Heb. 11:22-40 refers to the Jewish Age faithful ones as awaiting the same reward as the previous Ancient Worthies. During the Jewish Age, therefore, those who sought faithfully to keep the Law, in faith embracing the Abrahamic promises and faithfully seeking to serve Jehovah's interests, were accounted among the Ancient Worthies. St. Paul expressly mentions Moses' parents, Moses, Rahab, Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephtha, David, Samuel and the prophets, also speaking of other faithful souls. Finishing their course they fell asleep to await the completion and glorification of the Church, after which they will receive the promise-the blessings God has provided for them (Heb. 11:39, 40). From Heb. 11:22-40 we readily recognize that God's fifth Jewish Age purpose came to pass. 

Jehovah had a sixth purpose for the Jewish Age, i.e., gathering at the end of that Age the Israelites indeed through the ministry of Jesus, the Apostles and their co-workers into a new fellowship and making them the nucleus of the Christian Church. This work is Scripturally designated as a harvest work (Matt. 9:36-38; John 4:34-38; Matt. 3:12). From this

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standpoint Jewry was a wheat field; the sown seed was the Word of Truth, and it produced ripened wheat in the obedient—the Israelites indeed in whom there was no guile (John 1:47). All through the Jewish Age the sowing and growing went on; and when Christ and the Apostles appeared they preached the kingdom of God; the Israelites indeed, having an affinity for the Word, responded. Thus the sickle was the Word of Truth, Jesus, the Apostles and their co-laborers were the reapers, and the work of winning Israelites for the Lord by the Truth was the reaping. This work began at our Lord's baptism, when He was won as the first ripe grain of wheat in Israel. Jesus, both while in the flesh and after His glorification, was the Chief Reaper. While in the flesh He won above 500 grains of wheat (1 Cor. 15:6). At Pentecost the work took on a larger phase, thousands being won on that day. The reapers of the Jewish Harvest at Pentecost began their larger work at Jerusalem and by 69 A. D. had not only reaped all the ripe wheat in Palestine, but also in all other countries. The work greatly expanded, persecution only serving to extend it (Acts 8:1-4). Shortly the Samaritans and the Gentiles received the Word. Then the Grecian and Roman world was invaded by the soldiers of the Cross, who first searched out the Jews and then later turned to the Gentiles-this was because they were first to reap the plantings of the Jewish Age before sowing the seed for the Gospel Age Harvest. But reaping is not the only phase of harvest work—it is the first of seven. The other six are: sheaving, drying, threshing, winnowing, sifting and garnering. And all of these, like the reaping, have their counterparts in the figurative harvest at the end of the Jewish Age. The sheaving corresponds to the gathering of the Jewish converts into fellowship with like believers; the drying corresponds to their development in grace, knowledge and service; the threshing corresponds to their testing with view to strengthening their characters;

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the winnowing corresponds to their separation from outsiders; the sifting corresponds to their separation from the unfaithful and measurably unfaithful; and the garnering corresponds to their transfer into the Church at Pentecost and afterwards. These operations were all performed in the Harvest of the Jewish Age and resulted in gathering out of fleshly Israel all Israelites indeed as the nucleus of spiritual Israel—the Christian Church. Thus we see that Jehovah's sixth Jewish Age purpose succeeded. 

The seventh and final purpose of God as to the Jewish Age was to separate those who were not Israelites indeed from those who were, and then figuratively to burn them as symbolic chaff—the refuse of the nation. John the Baptist mentions this phase of the harvest work as accompanying the phase of that work just considered (Matt. 3:12). He compares our Lord to a winnower who with his fan and shovel thoroughly purges the threshing floor and burns up the chaff. With the fan and shovel of God's Word and providences such a symbolic wind—strife and other troubles—was engendered as separated the chaff—the unfaithful Israelites—from the wheat—the faithful Israelites. The latter were gathered into the garner of the Christian Church by the baptism of the Spirit, and the former were hurled into the destructive war with the Romans, 66-73 A. D., the baptism of fire, whereby they were burned up as chaff—destroyed as a nation and as God's people. Thus the seventh purpose of God—the separation of the unfaithful Israelites from the faithful Israelites, and their destruction as a nation and as God's people—was, like all God's other Jewish Age purposes, successfully realized. 

In treating on the baptism of the Spirit and of fire it might be well for us to point out a very common mistake—the thought that these two baptisms are one and the same thing. If we remember that John addressed all Israelites—the faithful and the unfaithful 

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—when he said, "He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire," we will be shielded from the error. Of course the baptism of the Spirit was not for the unfaithful, but for the faithful Israelites. Hence the baptism of fire must have been for the unfaithful Israelites as the remaining part of those whom John addressed, else they would have had no baptism at all; whereas John's language, addressed to all Israelites, implies that the baptism would reach all and that therefore the unfaithful Israelites would receive that of fire, as we have explained above. Therefore, while we should pray for an ever increasing measure of the Holy Spirit, let us not pray for the baptism of fire, for thereby we would be praying for a curse to come upon us, even as Israel's baptism by fire was a curse. 

In concluding our study of the Jewish Age we note that Jehovah succeeded in His seven Jewish Age purposes—giving the Old Testament revelations in writing, selecting a nation—Israel—to be the custodian of His oracles, demonstrating man's sinfulness, inability to save himself by the works of the Law and his need of a Savior, demonstrating the righteousness of Him that kept the Law, completing the selection of the Ancient Worthies, gathering the Israelites indeed as symbolic wheat into the garner of the Christian Church, and destroying as symbolic chaff the unfaithful Israelites nationally and as God's people. 

Above we studied two of the three Ages of the Second World, i.e., the Patriarchal and Jewish Ages. We trust that this study has refreshed and enlightened all of us and has given us zest for the study of the third and most important Age of the Second World, i.e., the Gospel or Christian Age. It is called the Gospel Age, because during it the choicest favors set forth in God's Word operate toward certain people. These favors are good or glad tidings indeed, even as the word gospel means good or glad tidings. There were more or less of good or glad tidings—gospel— 

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given in the preceding Ages; but the message of this Age is preeminently good or glad news; hence by preeminence this Age is called the Gospel Age. It is also proper to call this the Christian Age, because its purposes center in the work toward and of The Christ Class. Its beginning was of a lapping character, i.e., in so far as it covers the period of the development of Jesus as the Head of The Christ and that of reaping the fruitage of the Jewish Age, it lapped into the Jewish Age for 40 years—from Oct. 29 to Oct. 69 A. D. In so far as it covers the period of the call of the Church as the Body of the Christ it began at Pentecost, thus also lapping into the Jewish Age, considered from the standpoint of the Harvest of that Age. As there were these inter-lappings of the Jewish and Gospel Ages, so there has been an inter-lapping of the Gospel and Millennial Ages, just 1845 years subsequent to the corresponding inter-lappings of the Jewish and Gospel Ages. The main parallel lappings are in the years 29 and 1874, 33 and 1878 and 69 and 1914. And just as special favor was limited to Israel until Oct. A. D. 36, when Cornelius the first Gentile was called, so special favor was limited to denominations of Christendom until Oct. 1881, when special calls went out to not a few outside of all denominations—in the world. Thus the duration of the Gospel Age may be said to be 1845 years, with lappings into the Millennial Age; even as the duration of the Jewish Age may be said to be 1845 years, with lappings into the Gospel Age. 

As above in this treatise we studied the purposes of the Patriarchal and Jewish Ages, so herein we would study the purposes of the Gospel Age. On account of the Jewish and Gospel Ages being parallel dispensations, not only are they of equal length in their corresponding time features, but are also related very much to one another as type and antitype and in corresponding events. For this reason there are in the purposes of these two Ages a number of striking 

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similarities, which will be brought out as we proceed. The first purpose of the Gospel Age is very much like the first purpose of the Jewish—the selection of a new custodian of God's oracles. As Fleshly Israel was in the Jewish Age selected to be the custodian of the oracles of God (Rom. 3:1, 2), so during the Gospel Age Spiritual Israel has been made the custodian of God's oracles. (1 Cor. 4:1, 2; John 17:8, 14; 2 Tim. 3:15-17; 2 Pet. 3:16.) Therefore the Lord not only gave Spiritual Israel the Old Testament Scriptures to guard and preserve, but also did the same with the New Testament Scriptures. Spiritual Israel has not only guarded them in their original languages, but has also translated them into hundreds of other languages, guarding and preserving them therein. And the fact that we who are living in the end of the Gospel Age have these Scriptures, not only not a book, but not even an essential part of a book having been lost, proves that the Lord has succeeded in the first purpose of the Gospel Age—the selection of a new custodian of His oracles—Spiritual Israel, to take care of the entire Bible during the Gospel Age. 

Then just as God's second purpose during the Jewish Age was to give revelations additional to those given during the Patriarchal Age, so God's second Gospel Age purpose was to give revelations additional to those given during the Jewish Age. These revelations He began to give by John the Baptist in announcing Messiah's coming, continued to give in the preaching and Acts of Jesus and the Apostles and completed in inspiring and causing to be written the 27 books of the New Testament. These revelations, like the Old Testament ones, were given sometimes by direct speech, sometimes by visions, tableaux and dreams, sometimes by immediate inspiration, sometimes by symbolic Acts and institutions and sometimes by covenant arrangements. They were given in different times, places, manners and circumstances; and it was

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nearly a hundred years from their beginning until their completion. When the last book of the Bible was written, the Gospel Age revelation was complete and was completely deposited with Spiritual Israel as its custodian. This revelation centers in The Christ—primarily in the Head and secondarily in the Body. It makes more fully known to us the one supreme God as the originating Creator, Provider, Redeemer, Teacher, Justifier, Sanctifier and Deliverer. It makes more fully known to us the one supreme and only begotten Son of God as God's Special Agent in the works of Creation, Providence, Redemption, Instruction, Justification, Sanctification and Deliverance, begotten by the Father before the world was, carnated in the Virgin Mary, and, after dying for our sins, resurrected to the Divine nature as the glorified executor of God's Plan. It makes more fully known to us the Holy Spirit of God as the Channel of God's creative, providential, redemptive, instructional, justifying, sanctifying and delivering work. 

It makes more fully known to us man in his original, in his fallen and in his restored condition. It makes more fully known to us sin, in its nature, permission, penalty, guilt, atonement and overthrow. It makes more fully known to us the angels, good and bad—their past, present and future. It makes more fully known to us The Church with Christ as the mystery of God in its creation, instruction, justification, sanctification, deliverance, predestination, organization, order, discipline, mission, law, rest, trial, baptism, passover, earthly privileges and obligations, foes and inheritance. It makes more fully known to us the Worlds, the Ages with their Harvests and the Planes of being in God's plan. As its central theme—the hub of the Divine plan—it makes more fully known to us the ransom-sacrifice of Christ with the resultant high calling of the Gospel Age to the Divine Nature, to be received in the first resurrection, and restitution

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of mankind to the original perfection in the after resurrection of the Millennial Age, in connection with which it makes more fully known to us the Ancient Worthies, Great Company, Youthful Worthies and Second Death Class, as well as the Second Advent, the Kingdom, final rewards and punishments and God's ultimate triumph over all evil persons, things and principles. In short, it makes more fully known to us the entire plan of God. Most marvelous indeed is the second purpose of the Gospel Age in its sweep of teachings for belief and practice-the whole counsel of God. Our knowing and understanding these things proves that God succeeded in the second Gospel Age purpose, as He succeeds in all His purposes. 

As the third purpose of the Jewish Age was to prove that man was unable to save himself by the works of the Law and therefore needed a Savior, so the third purpose of the Gospel Age was to testify that man could be saved by the Gospel, and that Jesus Christ is the Savior of men. That this testimony might be given, Jesus not only Himself preached these things, but prepared others, like the Twelve and the Seventy, etc., who in turn trained others, and these still others, etc., unto the end of the Age, to herald this testimony. In giving this testimony they pointed out the salvation for the Church during the Gospel Age, and the salvation of the World in the Millennial Age (Joel 2:28, 29: Acts 3:19-26; 15:13-18; Rom. 8:16, 23; 11:25-33; Gal. 3:8, 13-16, 29; John 17:20-23; Eph. 1:3-12; Rev. 22:17). In giving this testimony-the testimony of the kingdom-they preached the Gospel and circulated the Bible in every national language of the earth (Matt. 24:14), as they also reproved the world for sin, righteousness and judgment to come (John 16:8-11). In harmony with our Lord's charge, they began this testimony at Jerusalem, continued it in Judea and Samaria and completed it unto the ends of the earth. (Matt. 28:18-20; Mark 16:16; Luke 24:47-49; Acts 1:8), offering it to every Jew.

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As the third purpose of the Jewish Age wrought a sense of guilt and condemnation (Rom. 3:20; 7:7-20; Gal. 3:10), and a deep longing on the part of the faithful Israelites for a Savior (Gal. 3:22-24; Rom. 7:21-25); so the third purpose of the Gospel Age is to present the Gospel as the means of salvation which the Law could not work (Rom. 8:1-4), and Jesus Christ as the Savior presented in the Gospel. Precious indeed is this evangel; for here is new hope, health and life for the world, and immortality for the Church clarified by Jesus Christ through the Gospel (2 Tim. 1:10). And as the Jewish Age accomplished its third purpose—in proving all men sinful, unable to save themselves by the works of the Law and needing a Savior, so the Gospel Age has succeeded in its third purpose—preaching in the entire world among every nation the great salvation for the Church during the Gospel Age and the less great salvation for the world during the Millennial Age. Surely all of us have the privilege of praising, thanking and blessing God for the realization of the third purpose of the Gospel Age. 

There is a close relationship between the fourth purpose of the Gospel Age and the fourth purpose of the Jewish Age; for as the fourth purpose of the Jewish Age was to reveal the righteousness of Christ, the Law's Fulfiller (Rom. 10:4), so the fourth purpose of the Gospel Age is to give imputatively the righteousness of Christ, the Law's Fulfiller, to all true believers through faith. To secure this, repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus were preached throughout the Age, for the forgiveness of sins (Luke 24:47; Acts 2:38; 3:19; 5:31; 10:43; 11:18; 20:21) and the imputation of Christ's righteousness (Rom. 3:21-28; 4:2-8, 22—5:1; 10:4; 1 Cor. 1:30; Gal. 2:16; 3:21-24; Phil. 3:9). In some of these references the expression "the faith of Jesus Christ" is used. It means the faithfulness—righteousness of Jesus Christ. Additionally, among others, the following

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passages use the word faith in the sense of faithfulness: Matt. 23:23; Philemon 5; Rom. 3:3; 1 Tim. 5:12; 1:19. The reception of the righteousness of Christ was conditional, firstly on repentance, which implies knowledge, sorrow, hatred, confession, abandonment, desire for forgiveness, amendment as to sin, and secondly on faith, which as mental appreciation implies knowledge, understanding and assent as to the pertinent things of God and Christ, and which as heart's reliance implies confidence, appropriation and responsiveness as to the pertinent things of God and Christ. Whoever fulfilled these two conditions—repentance and faith as just described—was justified by faith—his faith was the only quality of righteousness in him that God counted as full righteousness, because it laid hold on the righteousness of Christ as its own and acted upon it in all matters. 

The justification that one had at such a stage of his experience we might call tentative or partial justification; because it was not full or complete, but was merely temporarily and suppositionally imputed to him to enable him to take advantage of the privilege it gave him to draw closer to God in an acceptable manner for purposes of consecration and Spirit-begettal. He was therefore treated as though the righteousness of Jesus had actually been imputed on his behalf—a thing that actually did not take place until he responded so fully as to consecrate himself to the Lord, when Jesus became his Advocate by actually imputing His righteousness for him, and by actually procuring for him the cancellation of the Adamic sentence and God's imputation of Christ's righteousness to him, things that were only tentatively and suppositionally done before his consecration when he first exercised the required repentance and faith. In distinction from partial or tentative justification, which is experienced before consecration, and in which there is actually no imputation of Christ's merit, we may call that

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justification which follows consecration and the actual imputation of Christ's righteousness, vitalized or full justification. In neither case is it produced by our works, but by Christ's righteousness through faith, in the former case tentatively and suppositionally imputed, and in the latter case finally and actually imputed. The former made one available for consecration, the latter for Spirit-begettal. All through the Gospel Age such justification has been going on for those who took the pertinent steps; and in its thus operating throughout the Gospel Age it was fulfilling the fourth purpose of the Gospel Age, giving imputatively Christ's righteousness through faith to all true believers. 

As the fifth and chief purpose of the Jewish Age, like the chief purpose of the Patriarchal Age, was the selection of the Ancient Worthies as Millennial Princes and Levites, so the fifth and chief purpose of the Gospel Age has been the selection and development of the Church to become Millennial Kings and Priests. Accordingly, like the Patriarchal and Jewish Ages, the Gospel Age is elective in character, i.e., God has not been seeking during the Gospel Age to save the world, but has been seeking by elective, selective, processes to save the Church, leaving the world to go on its ways unhelped and lost in the Adamic condemnation. 

This brings us to the discussion of the centuries-long debated doctrines of predestination, reprobation and election on the one hand, and of free grace on the other hand, and leads us to point out the merits and defects in the teaching of Calvinism on predestination, reprobation and election—championed especially by the Presbyterian, Reformed and Congregational Churches, and of Arminianism on free grace—championed especially by the Lutheran and Methodist Churches. Calvinism, stressing mainly God's sovereignty as exercised by His attribute of power, and subordinately His fore-knowledge as exercised by His attribute of wisdom, teaches that God regardless of all

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other considerations, out of His mere pleasure and for His own glory predestinated unchangeably a few individuals of mankind's billions to eternal bliss and predestinated unchangeably the rest—the bulk of humanity—to eternal torment. Arminianism, on the other hand, stressing God's free grace, as exercised mainly by His attribute of love and subordinately by His attribute of justice as related to the Ransom, teaches that God loves all mankind, Christ died for all mankind, and the Holy Spirit works on behalf of all mankind, for salvation. Each of these parties denies the other's opposing doctrines. But there are merits and defects in the doctrinal presentations of each party. Calvinism is right in stressing the operation of the attributes of power and wisdom in predestination, reprobation and election, but wrong in impinging against the operation of Divine love and justice connected with the Ransom in free grace. Arminianism is right in stressing the operation of love and justice in free grace, but wrong in denying God's sovereignty in power and in wisdom operating in predestination, reprobation and election. Calvinism is right in claiming that the Scriptures, reason and f Acts prove that hitherto predestination, reprobation and election has been operating; while Arminianism is wrong in denying this. On the other hand, Calvinism is wrong in claiming that with the completion of the election God's plan is finished; while Arminianism is wrong in teaching that free grace is now operating toward all men, that God is doing all He can to save everybody—and is failing with the vast majority. Both are wrong in teaching as to the outcome of their views—that very few will ultimately be saved, and that the rest of the earth's billions will be lost in eternal torment—a blasphemous teaching. 

The fact that each side quotes large numbers of Scriptures in its favor and against the other ought to convince us that both views contain elements of truth 

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and error. If we reject the errors in each view and combine the elements of truth in each view and apply the elective passages as operating in times prior to the Millennium and the free grace passages as operating during the Millennium, we will have the Scriptural Truth on the subject. On account of the un-Scriptural, unreasonable and unfactual way that Calvinism presents certain features of predestination, election and reprobation, these subjects have become repulsive to thinking people who do not understand them Scripturally. But the Biblical doctrines of predestination, election and reprobation in these phases are far different from the pertinent teachings of our Calvinistic brethren. Calvinism presents these subjects in such ways as shock the moral sentiments implanted in us by God, dishonor the Divine character and darken the Divine plan. With Calvinism we agree that there is a Divine predestination, reprobation and election; but we deny its teachings that predestination and reprobation apply to individuals and affirm that they apply to classes; for as a government, by legal enactment, predetermines that there shall be a national army with so many corps, brigades, regiments, companies, etc., that the officers and privates shall have certain qualities as to age, size, weight, health, intelligence, etc., and predetermines the exclusion of all who have not these requirements without at the time selecting or rejecting one individual for that army, which is done afterwards in connection with the application for a place in the army by the military training of cadets and examination of recruits or drafts; so God before the world began predestinated every feature of His plan, including as one of its features an elect Church as a class, divided into twelve groups, that shall have certain characteristics fitting it for its intended use, without predetermining one individual of the class, at the same time predetermining that none without these qualities should be of this

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class (Rom. 8:28, 29; Eph. 1:3-11; sometimes, as in verse 4 of this text, the word chosen is used for predestination). This is the Bible teaching on predestination and reprobation and is quite different from their Calvinistic misrepresentations. 

Generally, the words, election and to choose, are Biblically used to designate God's act of selecting the elect as individuals during the Gospel Age (Ages after the predestination of the class occurred). Thus we read: "Many are called [justified], but few are chosen [nominated from among the justified for joint-heirship with Christ by Spirit-begetting after their consecration]" (Matt. 20:16); "Have I not chosen you twelve [when I called you to follow Me]" (John 6:70; compare 15:16, 19); "God hath [not had, before the world was] from the beginning [of your acceptance of the Gospel and sanctification of the Spirit] chosen you unto salvation in [while engaged in the Acts of] the sanctification of the Spirit and the belief of the Truth" (2 Thes. 2:13); "Hath not God chosen the poor of this world rich in faith [people are not rich in faith until after they have and exercise faith; hence the choice came after justifying and sanctifying faith were exercised]?" (Jas. 2:5; compare with 1 Cor. 1:26-29); "Those with Him, the called [in justification], chosen [in sanctification] and faithful [in deliverance]" (Rev. 17:14; compare with 1 Cor. 1:30). Thus we see that while the predestination or election of the elect classes occurred before the world was made, the selection of the individuals of the elect classes occurs at the time that they respond loyally to God's invitation to become wholly His, even as the officers and privates of our army are selected long after the government decrees by law that there be an army consisting of officers and privates. And as there is a preliminary and contingent call and selection of these officers and privates, so there is a final selection of these, the cadets by their training and final examination, and the 

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recruits by their final examinations after their preliminary examination; so our calling and election must be made sure by faithfulness unto death, (2 Pet. 1:10; Rev. 17:14), after we have had the preliminary call of justification and preliminary election by Spirit-begetting. And as cadets and recruits who fail under final examination to qualify, long after their preliminary call and examination, are rejected; so those who fail to be faithful are rejected from the finally elect, though they had the preliminary call and election (John 6:70; 17:12; 1 Cor. 9:24-27). 

The Calvinistic doctrine of the arbitrary predestination of individuals to salvation is accompanied with the doctrine of the arbitrary predestination of all nonelect individuals to eternal torment—their view of reprobation. On the contrary, the Bible doctrine of predestination of the classes and the selection of the individuals is for the very purpose of training the elect to become qualified deliverers of all the non-elect (Ob. 17, 21; Acts 3:19-21; Rom. 8:16-23; 11:25-33; Gal. 3:8, 16, 29; John 17:20-23; Eph. 1:9, 10; Rev. 22:17). And this is what we should expect from our perfect God. For if we select officials in our elections, not that we may suffer all kinds of evils while they are blessed, but that they may make such legislative, executive and judicial arrangements as will bless us and advance our interests; so God makes His selection of the legislative, executive and judicial officials of His Millennial Kingdom to bless through them all the nonelect. And as all citizens are not selected for legislative, executive and judicial functions in our government, but only certain persons actually or supposedly qualified thereto; so God does not select all mankind for legislative, executive and judicial functions in His Millennial Kingdom (the very idea of election implying the existence of the non-elect), but only certain persons qualified thereto. If we keep in mind the facts 

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that no individuals are predestinated either to salvation or condemnation, that the preliminary selection of individuals occurs in connection with their favorable response to the justification and sanctification invitations of God, that their final election is conditional on their faithfulness unto death and that the purpose of the predestination of the classes before the world was and the selection of the individuals of those classes while such individuals are in this life is not only that the elect should be blessed, but also that they become the Divine Agents during the Millennium to make free grace operative, i.e., blessing with a favorable opportunity for obtaining salvation all those who in this life were not given an opportunity to be of the elect, and who consequently died as non-elect and lost under the Adamic condemnation; then we will be able to see the glorious and harmonious display of God's perfect wisdom, power, justice and love in the doctrines of predestination, reprobation and election, and in the doctrine of free grace in their relations. Let us thank, praise and worship our God through Jesus Christ our Savior for such a glorious plan! 

Let us briefly point out how the Scriptures teach the selection of the Church for the blessing of the world. St. Peter exhorted certain ones to take the steps necessary for them to become the elect seed of Abraham, so that seasons of refreshment and times of restitution of all things may come to the world (Acts 3:19-26 R.V.). St. James said that God is now visiting the nations to take "out from them a people [the elect] for His name [character and honor], and that this does not contradict, but is in harmony with the Scriptures which show that afterwards, after the selection of these elect, the Lord's Second Advent will take place and will be for the purpose of blessing all the rest of mankind, the non-elect (Acts 15:13-18). St. Paul points out the two classes—the elect and the nonelect—showing that both are awaiting deliverance

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and that the world will get its long-awaited deliverance when Christ and the Church as God's Sons, revealed in the glory of the Millennial Kingdom, will reign over the race for its deliverance from the curse (Rom. 8:17-23). He also shows that blinded Israel will remain in their blindness until the full number of the elect is won, when through the mercy that the elect will show Israel they will be recovered from their blindness and be accepted again into God's favor (Rom. 11:25-33); and Simeon speaking by the Holy Spirit says this blessing will be for all Israelites who during the Gospel Age stumbled over Christ (Luke 2:34). St. Paul tells us that Christ and the faithful Church—the elect—are the seed of Abraham (Gal. 3:8, 16, 29), who, God by an oath promised, will, after their selection is completed, bless all the families, nations and kindreds of the earth (Gen. 22:16-18; 12:3; 18:18; Acts 3:25). 

Our Lord Jesus expressly says that He prayed for the perfecting of the Church that (after this perfecting is completed in the Gospel Age, i.e., after the Gospel Age, hence in the Millennial Age) the world might believe and recognize that God has loved the elect Church with the same kind of love that He gave Jesus (John 17:20-23). St. John tells us that the Bride—the newly married wife—will invite everybody to partake of the favors of God, and since the Church is now Christ's Espoused (2 Cor. 11:2), and becomes His Bride at the Lord's Second Advent to reign over the earth (Rev. 19:6-21; 21:2-22:5), the blessing of the world is to be in the Millennium after the Gospel Age ends in making the espoused Church ready to become the Bride (Rev. 22:17). And Joel, inverting the chronological order of the events, shows (Joel 2:29) that now is the time for pouring out the Holy Spirit for the Elect Church—"the servants and handmaids" and that "afterwards," after the Gospel Age, i.e., during the Millennium, will be the time to pour 

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out the Holy Spirit "for all flesh," the non-elect. Every one of the above passages proves that now is God's time of blessing the elect, and that the next Age, the Millennium, will be God's time of blessing the nonelect; and most of these passages show that God is now selecting the elect for the very purpose of using them, after their selection is completed and they are glorified with Christ, as His agents under Christ to bless all the non-elect in the Millennium. Therefore, if we apply the elective features of God's plan as operating before the Millennium, and the free grace passages (those that teach God's love, Christ's death and the Spirit's work as becoming operative on behalf of all mankind unto salvation) to the Millennium, the Bible will be found completely harmonious on the doctrines of predestination, reprobation, election and on the principles of free grace. 

Believing that our readers would be pleased to have a list of the main Scriptures treating of election and a list of the main Scriptures treating on free grace, we take pleasure in giving them. The following are the main Scriptures treating of election: Is. 42:1; 65:9, 15, 22; Amos 3:2; Matt. 20:16; 24:22, 24, 31; Mark 4:11, 12; Luke 18:7; John 6:44; 15:16; 17:9; Rom. 8:28-30, 33; 11:11, 15, 5, 7, 29; 1 Cor. 1:26-29; Eph. 1:4, 5, 12; Col. 3:12; 1 Thes. 1:4; 2 Thes. 2:13; 2 Tim. 2:10-12; Tit. 1:1; Jas. 2:5; 1 Pet. 1:2; 2:9; 2 Pet. 1:10; 2 John 1, 13; Rev. 17:14. In view of these and other Scriptures let us not deny the Bible doctrine of election, even if it should not agree with some preconceived view of ours on free grace. Rather let us humbly believe that the Bible teaches the doctrine of election and wait upon God in sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the Truth to enable us to harmonize it with the doctrine of free grace. On the other hand, if we believe in election, let us not deny free grace, but in view of the many passages so pointedly teaching free grace—God's love, 

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Christ's death and the Spirit's work on behalf of all mankind for salvation-let us rather in sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the Truth wait upon God to enable us to harmonize both doctrines, which are beautifully harmonious when viewed as above explained. The following are the main free grace passages of the Bible: Gen. 12:3; 18:18; 22:18; Ps. 2:8; 22:27-29; 86:9; 98:2, 3; Is. 2:2; 11:9; 25:6; 29:18, 24; 35:5, 6, 10; 40:5; 45:22, 23; 52:10; Jer. 31:34; Joel 2:28; Ob. 21; Luke 2:10, 31-34; John 1:9, 29; 3:16, 17; 12:32, 33; 17:21; Acts 3:19-26; 15:15-17; Rom. 5:18, 19; 8:19-21; 11:25-32; Eph. 1:10, 11; 1 Tim. 2:4-6; 4:10; Tit. 2:11; 3:4; Heb. 2:9; 1 John 2:2; Rev. 15:4; 22:17. May the Lord bless to our heads and hearts the consideration of these Scriptures. The doctrines of election and free grace in their mutual relations have greatly perplexed Christians for centuries, but when viewed as above they are most harmonious, soul-satisfying and refreshing, in perfect agreement with each other, and with the Scriptures, reason and all facts so far unfolded, as well as with the character of God, the Ransom of Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit. 

Let us linger a little longer in studying the election of the Church to be Christ's Bride and Joint Heir. A very large part of the Bible is devoted to this subject: for Jesus and the Church as God's Anointed are the mystery hidden from ages and generations, but now (during the Gospel Age) made manifest to the saints (Col. 1:27). This mystery is the chief subject of the Bible, inasmuch as Jesus and the Church are the hero and heroine of the Divine plan, which is truly a most marvelous drama, and inasmuch as Satan and the fallen angels as a company under him are its villain and villainess. The Scriptures treat of Christ and the Church in literal and symbolic passages, therein giving doctrinal, ethical, promissory, hortatory, typical, historical and prophetical thoughts pertaining to them. The 

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figures describing their relations are both beautiful and meaningful. The controllership of Christ and the subordination of the Church to Him are brought out in the figure of the head and the rest of a human body—Jesus the Head and the Church His Body (Eph. 1:22, 23). Her dependence on Him for sustenance and fruit-bearing is brought out in the figure of the vine and its branches (John 15:1-8). So, too, are they a holy spiritual nation in which He is King (1 Pet. 2:9; Col. 1:13). They are the seed of Abraham, the Blessers of the world (Gal. 3:16, 29; Gen. 22:16-18). They are the Bridegroom and Bride, beloved of One Another (Rev. 19:6-8). They are the Second Adam and Eve to regenerate the race in righteousness and life (1 Cor. 15:45; 2 Cor. 11:2, 3; Eph. 5:31, 32, 25-30; Matt. 19:28). In the family of God He is the Firstborn and they are the Afterborns (Rom. 8:29; Eph. 3:14, 15). They are God's Elect (Is. 42:1; Rev. 17:14). He is the Captain and they are the Soldiers in God's army of truth and righteousness (Heb. 2:10; Eph. 6:12-18; 2 Tim. 2:3, 4). They will be the Kings to rule in righteousness over the world in the Millennium, He being the King of these Kings (Rev. 19:16; 5:10; 20:4, 6). They will be the judges to give the world a trial for life in the judgment Day, He being the Chief Judge (Matt. 25:31-46; Jer. 23:5, 6; Matt. 19:28; 1 Cor. 6:2). He is the High Priest of their profession and they are Under Priests for the blessing of the world in the next Age (Heb. 3:1; 1 Pet. 2:5; Rev. 1:5, 6). He is the Chief Corner stone and they are the other stones of God's temple wherein man will worship God in the Millennial Age (Eph. 2:19-22; 1 Pet. 2:4, 5; Rev. 21:3-5). She is the New Jerusalem and He with God is its light and temple for the blessing of all mankind in the next Age (Rev. 21:2, 9-22:5). He is the Shepherd and they are the Sheep of God's Flock (John 10:1-18). He is in God's school the Teacher

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and they are His Disciples, Pupils (Matt. 23:8; 16:24). They ran in the race for the prize, He being the Forerunner (Heb. 6:20; 12:1, 2.). They were travelers to the Heavenly Country, He going before, leaving them the example to follow His steps (1 Pet. 2:11, 21). He is the Chief and they are the Under-fishers and reapers of men (Matt. 4:19; 9:38; John 4:34-38). Surely these figures are meaningful and beautiful. Their great variety and nature show the importance of Jesus and the Church in God's plan. 

All through the Age the selection of this class has been going on. God has been gathering them out of all nations (Rev. 5:9), but especially out of the nations of Christendom. They approached God through the steps of "repentance toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus" in justification, and through the steps of deadness to self and the world and aliveness to God in sanctification. They experienced the Spirit's begettal, quickening, growth, strengthening, cleansing, balancing and perfecting. They denied self and the world, studied, spread and practiced God's Word, as well as suffered for it and watched and prayed according to it. Like their Master, they have been unrecognized, despised and rejected of men, accounted and mistreated by the mass of religious people as cranks, fools, madmen, blasphemers and rebels. All this has inured to their development and fitting for the kingdom. The faithful have responded all through the Age until according to the evidences of the signs of the times and the prophetic chronology, the entire elect number was won by the Fall of 1914. Thus God succeeded in realizing the fifth purpose of the Gospel Age. 

The sixth purpose of the Gospel Age sets in at the end of this Age, and is the reaping of its ripened fruitage, even as the sixth purpose of the Jewish Age was the reaping of its ripened fruitage. That such a harvest work following the sowing and growing work of the Gospel Age is reasonable to expect, is manifest from

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what we see in natural agriculture, and in the parallel work of the Jewish Age and its Harvest. Accordingly quite a few Scriptures treat of the Harvest of the Gospel Age. Jesus in the parable of the sower (Matt. 13:3-23) set forth the Lord's Gospel-Age work of winning His people, under the figure of an agricultural scene; and in Matt. 13:24-30, 36-43 He enlarged on the thought in the parable of the wheat and tares, stressing especially the two kinds of seed sown and the resultant growth and harvest. Under another figure—the net cast into the sea catching good fish and bad fish, and the selection of the former and rejection and destruction of the latter (Matt. 13:47-50)—He sets forth a very similar line of thought. Other Scriptures describe the same general work as a gathering of the saints (Ps. 50:5); a gathering of the Elect from every quarter of the symbolic heavens, i.e., out of every denomination of Christendom (Matt. 24:31); and as a reaping of the earth by Christ, the Heavenly Reaper (Rev. 14:14-16). 

Just as in the end of the Jewish Age it was the Israelites indeed who were reaped as the ripened grains of wheat (John 1:47; Matt. 3:12); so now it is the children of the kingdom who are the ripened wheat (Matt. 13:38; it is the saints (Ps. 50:5) and the elect (Matt. 24:31) that are gathered together. As in the Jewish Harvest Jesus was the Chief Reaper and Fisher of men; so has He been the Chief Reaper and Fisher of men in the Gospel Harvest (Rev. 14:14-16). As in the Jewish Harvest the Lord's followers were the under-reapers and fishers of men (John 4:34-38; Matt. 4:19); so now are the Lord's followers the under-reapers and fishers of men—the human angels or messengers of the Lord (Matt. 13:39; 24:31). As in the Jewish Harvest the sickle was the Word of God which the symbolic reapers used in proclaiming the kingdom of God (Matt. 9:36-10:7); so now the sharp sickle is the Word of God which 

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the proclaimers of the kingdom of God have been preaching (Rev. 14:14-16). As then the ripened wheat were brought into the garner of the Christian Church; so now the ripened wheat are being gathered into the Heavenly kingdom (Matt. 13:30, 43). As in the Jewish Harvest many, as ripened wheat, responded to the symbolic sickle, so now have many done likewise (Matt. 24:31; Rev. 14:16). In both Harvests there have been present the six harvest processes other than reaping, such as sheaving, drying, threshing, winnowing, sifting and garnering. The sheaving corresponds to their experiences in being gathered into churches; the drying, to their experiences in growth in knowledge and grace; the threshing, to their experiences in being separated from sin and error; the winnowing, to their experiences in being separated from worldliness; the sifting, to their experiences in being separated from selfishness; and the garnering, to their experiences in being changed from earth to heaven. 

The Lord has given much of seasonal truth in order to accelerate the Harvest work. He made this available through suitable literature in the form of tracts, magazines, printed sermons, newspaper articles, booklets, books, etc., so that practically all could find convenient access to the Truth. Moreover, varied agents were used in circulating this literature, such as tract distributors, colporteurs, newspaper circulators and literature loaners. Furthermore, the Lord used many of His people to give the message by word of mouth, like preachers, lecturers, teachers and conversationalists. This work began in the Fall of 1874 through the Lord making clear the first harvest truth—that the Lord would as a spirit being be invisible in His second advent. Hundreds of thousands have been blessed by the work and tens of thousands have participated in it. It occasioned a very earnest study, spread and practice of the Truth (Matt. 25:6, 7, 10). It was an undenominational movement voluntarily entered

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into by those who appreciated its glorious privileges. Its reaping ended by the Fall of 1914, and by Passover 1916 its gleaning and sheaving was completed. Since then only the drying, threshing, winnowing, sifting and garnering processes have been active, which processes, though in a less general sense, were also in evidence between 1874 and 1914 and 1916. 

All the circumstances of the Harvest have been Divinely arranged so that the wheat would be gathered, sheaved, dried, threshed, winnowed, sifted and garnered. To effect the first three of these processes new truths as meat in due season have been given, adapted to the times, conditions and needs of the Lord's people. And to effect the fourth, fifth and sixth of these processes, the Lord has permitted all sorts of trials, temptations and pertinent experiences and conditions to come upon the people in what the Bible calls the hour of temptation (Rev. 3:10). Especially severe have six features of these temptations been. These have been of such characters as to test crucially the hearts and minds of all, especially of the consecrated. In 1878 the first of these began, having as its leading characteristic the denial of the ransom. Among the consecrated it took the form of the direct denial that we are purchased by Jesus as our Substitute. The same ransom-denial is manifest in movements among the unconsecrated, e.g., by Christian Science, Spiritism, Materialism and Evolution. The second general trial time set in 1881, and had as its chief characteristic infidelism. Among the consecrated it led to a denial of the Divine Plan by the substitution of human imaginations for Divine thoughts as the elements of God's Plan. Among the unconsecrated it assumed the forms of Higher Criticism, Rationalism, Agnosticism, Atheism, Deism and Pantheism. These two general lines of error, no-ransomism and infidelism, attacked the Truth, especially as exhibited in the Plan of God, and thus tested the loyalty of the consecrated toward the Truth. 

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But the other four features of the hour of temptation worked more on the heart's attitude toward righteousness. In 1891 there began a combinationism movement that sought to compromise between truth and error, righteousness and unrighteousness, by ignoring principle in the desire to unite as many as possible in various combinations, the desire for large numbers and not loyalty to principle characterizing the movement. Thus among the consecrated efforts were made, on the one hand, to use worldly methods of spreading, and for policy's sake, on the other hand, to conceal the Truth in order to win larger numbers that could not be won without such methods. Among the unconsecrated it assumed the forms of religious, proletarian, governmental, capitalistic, social, financial and commercial combinationism, regardless of principle. In 1901 reformism began to work as a feature of the hour of temptation. Ignoring God's Millennial arrangements for reforms, this perversion sought among the consecrated to introduce freak views on "women's rights" in the home and Church and the Church's participation in various social and political reforms, usually with the backing of the State, as means of establishing the Millennium. Among the unconsecrated it took the forms of prohibition agitations, crusades against vice and uplift from slum, poverty, disease, etc., conditions, with the thought of introducing Millennial conditions without the Millennial King and Kingdom. Thus external reforms, often enforced by the State, were substituted for converted hearts and minds—a perversion subversive of true godliness. 

In 1908 murmursome contradictionism began its activity among the consecrated, seeking to set aside vital Truth teachings on the Sin-offerings, Mediator and Covenants; and among the unconsecrated it expressed itself in contradicting almost every feature of the harvest Truth and work. In 1916 revolutionism appeared among the consecrated, dividing them into their two parts: the Little Flock opposing, and the 

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Great Company practicing revolutionism. Its spirit is working among the unconsecrated, and will ere long break out in the Great Revolution of Prophecy, which will overthrow the present governmental, capitalistic and ecclesiastical powers. 

Amid all these trials the Faithful have stood forth in the Lord's Spirit and on the Lord's side. Faithfully has the Lord ministered to them in this hour of temptation, and gloriously has He been bringing them out of their manifold trials as more than conquerors. And by their toward and untoward experiences, amid which they have demonstrated their loyalty to truth and righteousness, there has been developed in them the Lord's character likeness, which having been completed in them, makes them meet for the Kingdom of God, for which they also suffered (2 Thes. 1:4, 5). The result was that as each one completed his course, he was granted his change and a glorious place in the Kingdom—he was garnered into the Kingdom of God. Thus when the completed Church appears with Christ in glory, which will be before the end of the Epiphany (Col. 3:4; 1 Pet. 1:13), the sixth purpose of the Gospel Age will have been realized. 

The seventh purpose of the Gospel Age is to gather the tares in bundles and to cast them into the furnace of fire, even as the seventh purpose of the Jewish Age was to separate the chaff from the wheat and to burn it in unquenchable fire (Matt. 3:12). Such a purpose as setting in at the end of the Gospel Age is brought to our attention in many of the symbols of the Scriptures. Matt. 13:30, 41, 42, is a passage to the point, showing us how in the end of the Age the tares—imitation Christians, in reality children of Satan (Matt. 13:38) who have been developed by the errors of doctrine and practice that Satan sowed—as such will be thrown into the symbolic furnace—the great tribulation, consisting of war, revolution, anarchy, famine and pestilence. These tares were first to be bound in bundles and then cast into the furnace 

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(Matt. 13:30). These bundles correspond to the various human combinations—national bundles, like alliances, etc., capitalistic bundles, like trusts, etc., proletarian bundles, like unions, etc., ecclesiastical bundles, like federations, etc., social bundles, like orders, etc., professional bundles, like learned associations, etc. Such a bundling work has been going on especially since 1874. It proceeded so far that the national, and in part capitalistic and ecclesiastical, bundles were begun in 1914 to be cast into the fiery furnace in its war features. The fire and the furnace are no more literal than the tares are literal. The furnace represents the great tribulation and the fire its destructiveness. The symbolic tares will be destroyed in the sense that they, through and amid great troubles, will cease to pose as symbolic wheat; for natural tares, so to speak, pose as wheat—they are imitation wheat. The Christian professions of the symbolic tares will be so grossly belied by their unchristian course in these troubles that, unmasked, they will cease to claim that they are Christians. E.g., who thinks the Kaiser or Hitler a Christian? Their grossly unchristian conduct in the war—the first part of the furnace—has unmasked them, as it has also done with many others. 

In Matt. 13:48-50 under the figure of the fish in the net being sorted, the good and the bad being separated, and the latter cast into the sea, the separation of hypocritical Christians from faithful Christians and the disposal of the former as unfit, are set forth. It gives the same general line of thought as we saw above in connection with the disposal of the tares. In Rev. 14:17-20 under the figure of a vine and its ripe clusters gathered together and thrust into a winepress, where they are trodden out, we have another representation of the same general line of thought. The vine of the earth is a counterfeit of the vine of God's right hand planting (John 15:1-8), and as such a counterfeit with all its baleful fruitage it was cast into the first stage of the winepress experience—the World War—in 1914. 

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The same counterfeit kingdom of God is in its nature and overthrow presented to us in the symbolic heavens and earth being destroyed by fire (2 Pet. 3:3-12; Zeph. 3:8; Mal. 4:1). A similar thought under the representation of an earthquake is brought to our attention in Ps. 46:1-3, 6-9; Heb. 12:26, 27 and Rev. 16:18-20. Under a variety of figures, this experience is described in Ps. 18:7-15. Ps. 50:3, 4 describes it as a fire and tempest. Ps. 107:23-30 and Nah. 1:3, 6, 7 describes it as a storm at sea and a whirlwind. It is called a battle in Rev. 16:14; Zeph. 3:8; Is. 13:4. It is called a tempest of hail, a destroying storm and a flood of mighty waters in Is. 28:2; Nah. 1:4, 5, 8. It is called the besom (broom) of destruction in Is. 14:23. Thus the Scriptures give us many descriptions of this great destructive trouble into which the unfaithful and false Christians will be cast at the end of the Age, even as the chaff of Israel was treated in the end of the Jewish Age. In the movement to organize every one into something, we recognize the tare bundling as taking place before our very eyes; and in the World War Phases I and II we have seen the beginning of the bundles being cast into the figurative furnace of fire; and thus we see the seventh purpose of the Gospel Age going into realization. Its results will be so to sicken mankind of sin and its concomitants as to prepare them to receive the kingdom of God. 

While the seven purposes of the Gospel Age so far considered are similar to the seven purposes of the Jewish Age, for the remaining three Gospel-Age purposes there are no parallels in the Jewish Age. These three purposes, therefore, are new things in their nature in the Plan of God. 

The first of these three and thus the eighth purpose of the Gospel Age is the preparation of the Great Company for everlasting life and its future office work. We have in other volumes described the Great Company, and for details we refer our readers to these volumes. Here we will make but a few explanations 

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respecting them. Nobody was originally called to the Great Company; for we were all called in the one hope of our calling—the Divine nature and joint heirship with Christ (Eph. 4:4). Some of the called—the Little Flock—win out under the terms of the call and become the Bride of Christ (Rev. 19:6-8); and some make complete ship-wreck, losing everything, including life itself (Heb. 6:4-9; 10:26-31; 1 John 5:16). But there is a class who spot their garments—more or less corrupt their characters (Jude 23; James 5:20), fail to overcome their fear of the sacrificial death (Heb. 2:14-15), and thus fail to prove more than conquerors. Yet by the experiences and teachings that the Lord gives them, they are brought to their senses. They repent and cleanse themselves (Rev. 7:14); and while they lose the prize, they are saved so as by fire—tribulatory experiences (1 Cor. 3:12-15). While denied the privilege of being of the Bride of Christ, they will be privileged to be her brides-maids (Rev. 19:9). They will not as the Queen sit in the throne; but as nobles they will stand before it (Rev. 7:9). They lose the priesthood (Rev. 1:6; 5:10; 20:6); but as Levites they will minister to the Priests and the people (Ezek. 44:10-16). 

All through the Gospel Age there have been individuals who have failed to retain their crowns, but have afterwards repented and been restored to a measure of the Lord's favor (1 Cor. 5:1-5, 9-11; 2 Cor. 2:5-11; 1 Tim. 1:19, 20). But until the Fall of 1914, God did not deal with them as a class, but did deal with them individually. After the last member of the Little Flock was won, then God began to deal with them as a class. The time of trouble, i.e., the Epiphany, is the time assigned by God for their development (Rev. 7:14; 1 Cor. 3:12-15; Matt. 7:26-28). In the Atonement day type (Lev. 16) God represents the Little Flock by the Lord's Goat and the Great Company by Azazel's (Satan's, see Revised Version) Goat (1 Cor. 5:4, 5). The type shows that 

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immediately after the Little Flock has in its entirety been atoned for, and this occurred when its last member was accepted by God in Sept. 1914, the Lord caused the dealing with the Great Company to begin; therefore in Sept. 1914 (Lev. 16:20—22). The confession by Aaron of the wilful sins of Israel over Azazel's Goat types the declaration and explanation by the World's High Priest of the wilful sins of Christendom, which produced the World War in both Phases, in the hearing of the Great Company. This confession lasted nearly two years and two months, i.e., until early in November 1916. The loosing of the Goat types the removal from the Great Company of restraints that hindered their doing what their double-mindedness prompted them to do (James 1:8). This in the Fall of 1916 was followed by the leading brethren among them revolting against the Lord's teachings and His arrangements for their doing His work. The revolutionism of the leaders, in addition to substituting false teachings and arrangements for the Divinely given ones, consists largely of clericalism—a grasping for power and a lording it over God's heritage (1 Pet. 5:3), and of sectarianism, in which their partisan supporters share—antitypical of Baal worship and Baal kissing (1 Kings 19:18; Rom. 11:4, 5), whose participants cease to be of the very Elect. 

These revolutionisms were resisted by the Faithful, on this and the other side of the vail, as antitypical Aaron. Such resistance corresponds to Aaron's leading the goat to the gate of the court preparatory to delivering it to the fit man. Such revolutionism has been increasing in momentum ever since, and would certainly result in setting aside entirely the Harvest's truths and the Divinely indicated arrangements for the Great Company's work, if it had not been resisted at every point by the antitypical Aaron. These revolutionisms have become so great, as the evidences of Great Companyship (Ps. 107:10, 11), that the Priesthood has withdrawn priestly, but not brotherly, fellowship

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from such revolutionists and their partisan supporters (1 Cor. 5:9-13). Such withdrawal of priestly fellowship antitypes Aaron's putting Azazel's Goat outside the gate and into the fit man's hands. As Azazel's Goat—typical of the humanity of the Great Company—passes out of the gate, their new creatures come out of the antitypical Holy and enter the antitypical Court—they as new creatures cease to be Priest and become Levites. We understand the fit man to represent unfavorable experiences and persecuting people that cooperate in destroying the Great Company's fleshly minds by bringing much suffering upon them. Amid these experiences they act so out of harmony with truth and righteousness as to necessitate the Priesthood's withdrawing all brotherly help and favor from them. This is done as the antitypical fit man lets them go into the antitypical wilderness—isolation from God's people. Their falling into Azazel's hands follows quickly upon the Priesthood's withdrawal of all brotherly help and favor; and in his hands they are being led into such excesses of revolutionism as will eventually make it undeniable even by themselves that they have been wrong in their whole course. Their experiences in Azazel's hands will be so sad that ultimately, like the prodigal son, they will with the destruction of their fleshly minds and works, be led to repent and return to the Father's favor—but as members of the Great Company. 

After their cleansing and their recognition of their place in God's Plan, they will take a very prominent and fruitful part in proclaiming the Kingdom and the preparation, completion and qualities of the Bride (Rev. 19:6-8). They will be invited to prepare themselves for brides-maids at the marriage supper of the Lamb, at which they will be the honored guests (Rev. 19:9). One of the great works that they will succeed in accomplishing is the conversion of Israel to Christ (Cant. 5:8-6:1), this work coming to its completion in the time of the second phase of Jacob's trouble 

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(Jer. 30:4-24; Zech. 12:9-14). Another of their great works will be to stir up in the Gentile world a deep and widespread longing for the Kingdom. A still greater work of theirs will be their winning many for Youthful Worthiship and their helping one another to truth and righteousness. After their cleansing, theirs will indeed be a very fruitful work for the Lord. The Lord will be merciful and forgiving toward them, helping them to right themselves before Him. In Num. 8:5-26, among others, they are typically set forth from a variety of standpoints by the Levites. After their faithful cleansing of themselves and their faithful service of God's Plan after the End of the Epiphany, the time of trouble (Rev. 7:14), they as a class will experience their change of nature. They will become spirit beings of a lower nature, however, than the Divine (Ps. 45:14, 15; 1 Cor. 5:5; Rev. 19:9; 7:17). Their Millennial service will, from the standpoint of the Kingdom, be that of noblemen (Rev. 7:9), and, from the standpoint of the temple, will be that of Levites (Rev. 7:15)—Merarite Levites, according to the Tabernacle picture in Numbers 3 and 4. In the privileges of their position, they will no more grieve at their loss of the high calling, and will be abundantly blessed (Rev. 7:16, 17). From the above discussion we see that the Lord is now engaged in the first stages of their development as a class, and that He will ultimately complete them as a class for His glory, thus succeeding in His eighth Gospel-Age purpose. 

The ninth purpose of the Gospel Age is the selection of a consecrated class for Youthful Worthiship. We have in Epiphany Vol. 4 given a general description of this class, and refer our readers to it, and here will stress such lines of thought as are not emphasized there, omitting those lines of thought there stressed. Their name is suggested by the age contrast in Joel 2:28 between the "old men"—the Ancient Worthies, and the "young men"—the Youthful Worthies. We have shown elsewhere that the Jewish and the Gospel Ages

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with their harvests, as parallel dispensations, are of equal length and of similar events. Thus the time from the death of Jacob to the death of Jesus, the respective heads of fleshly and of spiritual Israel, was 1845 years, and the time from the call of the Gentiles (Cornelius, etc.), Oct. 36, to Oct. 1881 was also 1845 years. The call of Cornelius ended the exclusive favor to natural Israel; and the call that went out in Oct. 1881 ended the exclusive favor to spiritual Israel, which was brought about by the call of people outside of the churches as well as in the churches. Let no one, from this statement, understand us to mean that nobody was any longer called to Bride-ship with Christ after 1881; for such a special call was extended to individuals in and out of the churches until the full number of the Elect in Sept. 1914 was fixedly complete, even as the call of Cornelius and other Gentiles in Oct. 36 did not exclude individual Jews from the call thereafter, though it ended Israel's exclusive favor. But we do mean that as the fulness of the Gentiles probationarily came in by the Spring of 1878 (Rom. 11:25), and as some of them fell away from their steadfastness by Oct. 1881, only such a number of subsequent respondents to the invitation to consecrate could be Spirit-begotten as were needed to take the crowns lost by those who fell away from their steadfastness. But hundreds of thousands consecrated, while only a few thousand crowns were available, and thus there were more consecrators than available crowns. For the surplus consecrators the Lord has provided Youthful Worthiship. Therefore ever since 1881 those surplus consecrators have been forming a new class in God's Plan. And as since just after mid-September 1914 the fulness of Gentiles fixedly came in, i.e., since the full number of those who would prove faithful came in by that time, it follows that all consecrators since that time are probationarily Youthful Worthies. For a few years yet this class will be forming and developing. 

To some of them it has been a keen disappointment 

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to learn that they are too late to obtain Little Flockship. However when the matter is rightly considered, they will recognize that they have not been unjustly treated, rather that they have been graciously treated. The following thoughts will, we trust, help to clarify the situation. God does not owe the Divine nature to anyone; therefore to offer it to any one is an act of grace, favor, and not of justice, debt. Hence if this favor is not offered to certain ones, no injustice is done them. Furthermore, since the Divine class is a limited number—144,000, according to the book of Revelation—it is evident that a time must come when that number would be complete, and of necessity no others could be henceforth called to it. Thus in some generation the call to the Divine nature would have to cease, which means that no more could be called to it in that and in subsequent generations. It might therefore happen in one generation as well as in any other. And no one excluded would have a right to complain, since the call is not owed to him. It has actually come to pass that the call has ended in our generation; but if any of us should be too late for it, we would have no more right to complain than the Millennial people would have a right to complain that they will not be offered the Divine nature, or that a dog or any other animal lower than human would have the right to complain at not having been made human. The Creator reserves to Himself the right of making beings of various natures and is in debt to nobody to make him of another nature, since it is of grace that He favors any animate thing with existence as such (Rom. 9:20, 21). Finally, in offering the surplus consecrators Youthful Worthiship, God is giving them the highest favor now available; for He thereby is offering them the "better resurrection" to human perfection at the beginning of the Millennium and princeship throughout the Millennium, as well as to a spirit nature and a heavenly home, honors and reward in the end of the Millennium—things that He will not offer to

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the world in the Millennium at all. Thus they are greatly favored. Rather than complaining and giving up because they cannot have the Divine nature and joint-heirship with Christ, let them praise God that they are so highly favored as they are, and earnestly endeavor to carry out their consecration to the Lord. 

To overcome and be meet for their glorious Millennial inheritance, it will be necessary for them to be faithful, which implies that they be and remain dead to self and the world and alive to God. They should faithfully study, spread and practice God's Word, as well as watch, pray and suffer according to God's Word. It is their highest privilege now to be associated in fellowship and service with the Epiphany Truth people, though the majority of them are associated with groups of the uncleansed Great Company. With the latter's errors of doctrine and practice this part of them are more or less contaminated and hindered; but with them they will later be freed from these, and make decidedly more advancement than they now do, handicapped by these errors. Among other untruths, they have imbibed from their Great Company associates the thought that the call to the Divine nature is yet open, and that they participate therein. This means a terrible disappointment to them, when they learn the truth on this subject. Those associated in the light of the Epiphany Truth on this point will not have to experience that future disappointment, as also their work will not have to be largely "burned by fire," as will be the case with a large part of the work of those Youthful Worthies now mingling with uncleansed Levites. More and more such persons are being won for the Lord; and the humble, honest and good among men should be lovingly invited to consecrate in harmony with Rom. 12:1 and Prov. 23:26. These facts prove that God is realizing His ninth Gospel-Age purpose. 

The tenth and final Divine purpose of the Gospel Age is Israel's conversion to Christ and return to 

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Palestine as a nation. From the fact that the Great Company, while in the flesh, will be the instruments of Israel's conversion (Cant. 5:6-6:1), from the fact that the latter's conversion occurs in the time of trouble—Jacob's trouble (Zech. 12:9-14) and from the fact that it was to be gradually wrought onward from the time the fulness of the Gentiles probationally would come in—the Spring of 1878 (Rom. 11:25), we infer that Israel's national conversion is pre-millennial, and therefore a work of the Parousia and Epiphany of our Lord. In 1878 both aspects of the tenth purpose of the Gospel Age—Israel's conversion to Christ and return to Palestine as a nation—had their beginnings. In April 1878, Delitzch's Hebrew translation of the New Testament began its work among the Jews, and in June 1878 the Berlin Congress of Nations made Israel's return to, and favorable conditions in, Palestine a matter of international law. From that time forward new agencies, movements and events have set in, with powerful results toward accomplishing these two ends. In 1878 Jewish prejudice against Christ seemed unchangeably fixed. Now the average Jew considers Jesus one of the greatest of Israel's prophets and His sayings are quoted with enthusiasm in Jewish pulpits, seminaries and social circles. Besides this, there are now probably 100,000 Jews who openly profess faith in Christ as Israel's Messiah and man's Savior. Coincidentally and increasingly Israelites are returning to Palestine, especially as a result of special privileges extended them since the War, Phase I, which served to accelerate the movement of Israel to Palestine by rooting them up from their European homes and by making many of them homeless. America's immigration restrictions have tended and increasingly tend to turn them toward Palestine, where about a million of them already are. Britain has been forced to remove its restrictions on their return. As they increasingly return, they will quickly build up the country and make it enormously wealthy, which will excite the covetousness

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of the anarchistic remnants of European, Asiatic and African nations (Ezek. 38:10-13, 1-9, 14—39:29). These will bring upon them Jacob's trouble, Phase II (Jer. 30:4-8)—the last dregs of Israel's cup of woe. But our Lord will give them such a signal deliverance (Ezek. 38:18—39:29), which will be foretold to them by the Great Company, whose teachings and preachings will then sink so deep into Israel's heart, that as one man they will turn to the Lord (Zech. 12:9-13); and the Holy Land will thenceforth be indisputably theirs. Thus as a nation in their home land, converted to Christ, they will be the nucleus of the world of mankind, fitted for and waiting to receive the earthly phase of the Millennial Kingdom which first is to be set up in their midst. Thus will the Lord with His tenth Gospel-Age purpose complete the purposes of the Gospel Age-the greatest of the three Ages of the Second World—and open the door of the Millennial Age, with the Priests, the three classes of Levites and a humbled race ready for restitution (Acts 3:19-21).