of the good news that come through Christ Jesus: the one to the Jew, the other to the Gentile. That to the Jew is "the Gospel of the Kingdom;" it takes up the notices of the King and Kingdom which the Jewish prophecies present, and urges the repentance of Israel, in order that all the promised glory may appear. Such was Peter's sermon to Israel in the temple after the healing of the lame man; Acts iii. But the Gentile Gospel is "the Gospel of the grace of God:" Acts xx, 24; which dwells on the mercy of God in visiting the Gentiles, while Israel is impenitent; and by faith unites the receiver of its truths to Christ Jesus as a member of his mystic body. The first is called "the Gospel of the circumcision;" the second, "the Gospel of the uncircumcision:" Gal. ii, 7. Paul also calls it, "that Gospel which I preach among the Gentiles :" Gal. ii, 2; and in several places," my Gospel," because peculiarly committed to himself: Rom. ii, 16; xvi, 25.

The former of these views of the Gospel is to be preached in the whole habitable earth. It will be, I judge, in fulfilment of the Savior's words: Matt. xxviii, 19. "Go ye therefore, disciple all the Gentiles;" for we do not read in the Acts that this command was put in force by those Jewish disciples to whom it was first given. But now it will. And of such a Jewish mission to all the Gentile nations, several passages in the prophets give intimation, "The glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it. The voice said, Cry. And he said, What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field:" Isa. xl, 5, 6. "The mighty God, even the Lord hath spoken and called the earth from the rising of the sun unto the going down thereof." And this is just before the Savior appears. "Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined. Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence :" Psa. 1,∙1, 2. "Declare his glory among the Gentiles; his wonders among all the nations." And the message is, as we

* Παντα τα εθνῆ.

בגרים * העמים !

might expect, against idolatry. "For the Lord is great, and greatly to be praised: he is to be feared above all gods. For all the gods of the nations are idols; but the Lord made the heavens." 66 Say among the Gentiles that the Lord reigneth; the world also shall be established that it shall not be moved: he shall judge the peoples righteously:" Psa. xc, vi. 3-5, 10.

"Thou, O God, didst send a plenteous rain, whereby thou didst confirm thine inheritance when it was weary.' Here is the preceding work of the Holy Ghost on Israel itself. Then follows the result. "The Lord gave the word; great was the company of the preachers:" Psa. lxviii, 9, 11.

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And again, "All ye inhabitants of the world, and dwellers on the earth, see ye when he lifteth up an ensign upon the mountains, and when he bloweth a trumpet, hear ye." The Lord then describes himself as retiring from Israel and taking his rest in heaven, while Israel, his vine, is pruned before the harvest, and the, worthless boughs are left to wild beasts and birds. Then is Israel after that day of chastisement brought back to their own land by the Gentiles: Isa. xviii, 3—7.

The word employed to describe this mission imports that its message will be a short and authorative proclamation. The nature of the proclamation that will then be made may be gathered from several passages. "There was given to him (the Son of Man) dominion and glory, and a Kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, shall serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away; and his Kingdom that which shall not be destroyed:" Dan. vii, 14. It is intimated pretty clearly in another place. Thy saints+ shall bless thee." They shall speak of the glory of thy Kingdom, and talk of thy power. To make known to the sons of men his mighty acts, and the glorious majesty of his Kingdom. Thy Kingdom is an everlasting Kingdom, and thy dominion

* 12 Ευαγγελιζομενοι. LΧΧ.

The title given to the Jewish saints as distinguished חסידיך. + קדשיך .from the saints of the New Testament

endureth throughout all generations:" Psa. cxlv, 10-13; xlv, 7.

2. It is to be preached, not with the result of converting the whole world, but to render a testimony to it, and to make it inexcusable. The Lord sends notice of what he is about to do, before he does it; that men may escape the coming wrath. And a remnant will be converted by it; the rest remaining in unbelief and opposition to the Most High. Nay, it ends in the Gentiles' rage against the Most High, and casting off the religion of Jehovah and his Messiah. "The nations are angry," when God's wrath come: and they are found treading down, in fierce enmity, the city of God.

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But who are the witnesses that are to bear this testimony to the nations? "Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen that ye may know and believe me and understand that I am he: before me was there no god formed; neither shall there be after me.' "Let all the nations be gathered together; and let the people be assembled: who among them can declare this, and shew us former things? let them bring forth their witnesses, that they may be justified; or let them hear, and say, it is truth:" Is. xlii, 10,9. "Fear not, O Jacob my servant; and thou Jeshurun, whom I have chosen. For I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground: I will pour my Spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thine offspring." Fear ye not, neither be afraid; have not I told thee from that time, and have declared it? Ye are even my witnesses:' Isa. xliv, 2, 3, 8. Thus it is apparent that God has appointed the Jews as his witnesses to the nations.

As the hour of temptation is coming, to try all them that dwell on the habitable earth; (Rev. iii, 10) so is it agreable to God's mercy that the truth should first be proclaimed to the same extent. The glad tidings of God are to go to the ends of the habitable earth: Rom. x, 18. Yet Satan will deceive it wholly (Rev. xii, 9) before that Christ is the second time introduced into it: Heb. i, 6. And the scene of terror at his

coming is given by Luke, "men fainting for fear, and for looking after those things that are coming to pass upon the habitable earth :" xxi.

3. After this preparatory testimony, THE END is to come. That day is to be like Noah's; and in Noah's day, the End came. "And God said unto Noah, THE END of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and behold I will destroy them with the earth :" Gen. vi, 13.

Concerning the end or consummation, the prophets often speak. "What do ye imagine against the Lord? he will make an utter end; affliction shall not rise up the second time. For while they be folded together as thorns, and while they are drunken as drunkards, they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry :" Nah. i, 9, 10. "They hunt our steps, (saith Israel,) that we cannot go in the street; our end is near, our days are fulfilled, for our end is come. Our persecutors are swifter than the eagles of the heavens: they pursued us upon the mountains, they laid wait for us in the wilderness :" Lam. iv, 18, 19. Hence the necessity of that headlong flight to the mountains, which the Lord Jesus enjoins, when the signal of the time of the end is given, as we shall see in the next division. But the viith of Ezekiel testifies most largely of it. "Son of man, thus saith the Lord God unto the Land of Israel: An end, the end is come upon the four corners of the land. the end is come upon thee, and I will send mine anger upon thee, and will judge thee according to thy ways, and will recompense upon thee all thine abominations. And mine eye shall not spare thee, neither will I have pity but I will recompense thy way upon thee, and thy abominations shall be in the midst of thee, (the abomination of desolation in the temple,) and ye shall know that I am the Lord. Thus saith the Lord Godan evil, an only evil behold, is come. An end is come: the end is come: it watcheth for thee: behold it is come! The morning is come unto thee, O thou that dwellest in the land; the time is come, THE DAY OF TROUBLE IS NEAR; and not the sounding again of the mountains." That then is the day of Great Tribula

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tion, of which the Savior speaks; and the time of retribution for Israel's overflowing sins, especially for the blood of saints and prophets. It is the time too of the preceding plagues. The sword is without, and the pestilence and the famine within: he that is in the field shall die with the sword, and he that is in the city, famine and pestilence shall devour him. But they that escape of them shall escape, and shall be on the mountains, like doves of the valleys, all of them mourning, every one for his iniquity.' In this passage again the remnant escape, as Jesus enjoins, to the mountains. But it is the time also of the abomination of desolation, and defilement of the temple. "As for the beauty of his ornament, he set it in majesty; but they made the images of their abominations and of their detestable things therein; therefore have I set it far from them. And I will give it into the hands of the strangers for a prey, and to the wicked of the earth for a spoil; and they shall pollute it. My face also will I turn from them, and they shall pollute my secret place: for the robbers shall enter into it and defile it." ("Ye have made it a den of thieves.") "Make a chain, for the land is full of bloody crimes, and the city is full of violence. Wherefore I will bring the worst of the heathen, and they shall possess their houses: I will also make the pomp of the strong to cease; and their holy places shall be defiled:" Ez. vii, 2-7, 15-24. How exactly does this agree with God's purpose, expressed in the Revelation, to give the outer court of the temple and the holy city to be trodden down by the Gentiles for fortytwo months: Rev. xi, 2. See also Amos viii, 1, 3, 8, 9; Jer. iv, 19—13; Isa. x, 2, 3; xxviii, 22.

But Daniel especially has many notices of "the time of the end." His vision of the ram and he-goat refers

* It has been objected against taking this passage literally of the Jewish temple, that the opinion is inconsistent with itself. For it is not the outer court but the very holiest that is to be defiled, by Antichrist sitting in the temple of God. True, but the objector did not see that the temple at Jerusalem, in the language of the Apocalypse, is itself but the outer court; the true temple is in the heaven, and the earthly temple only its outer verge.