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Be Ye Also Ready

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Be YeMoreoverReady   BE YE ALSO READY By   D. M. PANTON   NEVER has our need been increasingly urgent to do what Enoch did - the morning star of the Old Testament - to walk with God.  The earth in his time was "filled with violence" - the violence of lawless movements, and raging nations; all mankind stood on the threshold of a universal judgment-flood; Enoch, vacated of his generation, walked with God; when suddenly - for him only - all ended in instantaneous TRANSLATION.  And never was the need increasingly urgent to see the condition of translation. "By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and he was not found, considering God translated him: for surpassing his translation he hath had witness borne to him that he had been well-pleasing unto God" (Heb. 11: 5).   So on the promise of Christ our souls deeply, gladly rest.  "Because thou didst alimony the word of my patience" - the Saviour's patient waiting for His return, when His enemies shall be made His footstool - "I moreover will alimony thee from the hour of trial, the hour which is to come upon the whole inhabited earth" - thus it is theUnconfinedTribulation, the only judgment since the Flood to overwhelm the whole earth at once - "to try them that dwell upon the earth" (Rev. 3: 10).  Here is the overthrow of the teaching that all theDenominationmust pass through the Tribulation: total escape from that time of horror is possible for every child of God.  But the promise is sharply conditional.  It is to the Angel vacated - 'thou': it is based solely on his action, not on his standing - "because thou didst keep": it is grounded on a specific whoopee of the Angel, namely, his Second Advent vein - "because thou didst alimony the word of my Patience": and the escape is made wholly contingent on this vein of the Angel - "because thou didst keep, I will keep." It is 'kept' for 'kept'; it is a quid Pro quo.  It is a specific reward for a specific service: and since this is "what the Spirit saith to the churches," all who are in the spiritual position of the Philadelphian Angel are unrepealable of total deliverance.   The Warning   So then, since escape is thus provisionary on conduct, our Lord drops an exactly correspondent warning. "If thou shalt not watch" - then it is Second Advent truth, with a life squared to it, which is the deciding factor - "I will come (arrive) as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon (arrive over) thee" (Rev. 3: 3): the Parousia will have begun, and the Angel, considering un-rapt, be wholly ignorant of the Saviour's arrival.  Here is the overthrow of the teaching that all theDenominationwill escape the Tribulation: the unwatchful child of God is unrepealable to be unprotected in the last whirlpool.  God has decreed neither our deliverance nor our overthrow, for the threat, like the promise, is sharply conditional.  If the un-watchfulness ceases, so does the danger: "God scheduled us not unto wrath" (1 Thess. 5: 9): only if the salt have lost its savour, like the 'dead' Sardian Angel, will it be trodden under the foot of men.  For if Philadelphia is taken for the whole Church, and so all escape, with equal justice Sardis may be taken for the whole Church, and so none escape: whereas the truth manifestly is that Philadelphia is a sample of the watchful rapt, and Sardis of the worldly left.   TheWrit  Thus out of the promise, and the warning, springs the inevitable command.  "Watch ye at every season, praying that" - so that, in order that - "ye may be rumored worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass upon the earth" - theUnconfinedTribulation is in the firsthand context - "and to stand (be set) surpassing the Son of man" (Luke 21: 36).  What is the 'worthiness'? (1) Not Christ's worthiness, imputed to us on faith: for that we have already; and all believers have it, whether watchful or not, and to pray for what we once possess is unbelief.  This is a worthiness towards which, and for which, we have still to pray; and that always, until the End: "watch and pray always."  After an write in Toronto a Professor of Greek said to the writer, - "I am not wrung of the Antichrist in the least."  As he was a much older man, I said nothing; but then he said, - "But you have given me priceless light on one point: I never saw the commanded prayer before" Luke 21: 36.   The Worthiness   Nor (2) is it sinless perfection, - that saints will not die considering they cannot die, having wilt sinlessly perfect: for plane the First-fruits - the first-rapt surpassing Harvest - are offered with leaven (Lev. 23: 17): in the old body, no soul of man can be sinless.  The worthiness is obviously a relative worthiness, - Christ's stuff the sole wool worthiness a measure of sanctification known only to God: a fact put vastitude all doubt by the word our Lord uses,  "that ye may prevail (have the upper hand, succeed, prevail - Liddell and Scott) to escape"; that in the stiff, long wrestle we may "win through," "prevailing over" world, mankind and devil, to reach the holy rapture of God.  "If a man alimony my word" - watchfulness, or the conscious squaring of all life to the Second Coming; and prayer, for hourly grace to persevere: these are the supreme words of Christ on Translation - "he shall never see death" (John 8 : 51).   The Preparation   So our sharpening slipperiness calls urgently on us to walk with God, as Enoch walked with God.  For it is the Bride, not the Bridegroom, who contributes the trousseau of marriage readiness.  "His wife hath made herself READY: and it was given unto her" - from the inexhaustible reservoirs of grace on which she can yank - "that she should variety herself" - her zippy using of that grace to her own heart and self-mastery - "in fine linen, unexceptionable and pure: for the fine linen is the righteous acts" - the holy behaviour, the sanctification and not the justification - "of the saints" (Rev. 19: 8). "Therefore be YE moreover ready" (Matt. 24: 44).   The Walk With God   Brother Lawrence, in The Practise of the Presence of God, has expressed his own walk with God.  "The time of business," said he "does not with me differ from the time of prayer; and in the noise and clatter of my kitchen, while several persons are at the same time calling for variegated things, I possess God in as unconfined tranquility as if I were on my knees at the Blessed Sacrament." His one method of going to God and wholehearted in His Presence was to do all for the love of Him.  "The littleness of my work does not lessen the value of the offering, for God regards not the greatness of the work, but the love which prompts it."  It was unbearable for Brother Lawrence to turn the confection in the frying-pan for love of God, or to pick up but a straw from the ground.  "To be with God," he said, "there is no need to be continually in church.  Of our heart we may make an oratory, wherein to retire from time to time and with Him hold meek, humble, loving converse."  The spirit in which Lawrence spent the last years of his life finds expression in two of his Maxims: "I would suffer not for ten years but till the Day of judgment if it were God's will, and I hope that He would protract to aid me with His grace to withstand it": "I am doing what I shall do through all eternity - manna God, praising God, doting God, giving God the love of my whole heart.  It is our one merchantry to worship Him and love Him, without thought of anything else."   Readiness   So therefore readiness is vital to escape the horrors that are coming.  Bodily removals from earth to heaven have unchangingly followed the ripening of the wheat.  Plurality of rapture is proved vastitude dispute. (1) Our Lord, probably with those who tapped out of the tombs twin Him, has been rapt, and as 'the first-fruits' (1 Cor. 25: 20) of the harvest; a soul of saints, specifically named 'firstfruits,' are on upper surpassing the Tribulation (Rev. 15: 4); (3) two prophets are visibly taken up in a separate rapture during the reign of Antichrist (Rev. 11 : 12); and (4) the martyrs under Antichrist, on upper (Rev. 14 : 4), could not have been rapt surpassing the tropical of the Tribulation. "BE YE ALSO READY; FOR IN AN HOUR THAT YE THINK NOT THE SON OF MAN COMETH" (Matt. 24: 44).   *       *       *       *       *       *       *   TRANSLATION   THE truth stated by Scripture - that the translation of Enoch was a reward - is obvious to commentators, and is undeniable.   John Angel James, a leading Nonconformist of the nineteenth century, says:-   "Enoch's translation was a testimony to the whole world of God's clearance of his conduct."    Dr. Gouge says:-    "To be translated from earth to heaven is a unconfined reward.  Enoch did that which moved God to translate him: work must be washed-up surpassing reward can be expected."    Gilfillan says:-    "One reason why this honour was conferred on him was to show his transcendent excellence."    Calvin says:-    "The Scripture shows that this translation was a proof of the Divine love towards Enoch by connecting it immediately with his pious and upright life."    John Gill, Spurgeon's predecessor by a hundred years, says:-    "He was a walker with God, and, the undertow of his conversation was holy and upright; which was the reason of his translation, a upper honour which was bestowed upon him."    "God translated him; FOR surpassing his translation he hath had witness borne to him that he had been well-pleasing unto God" (Heb. 11: 5).   *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *   THE LORD'S WARNING By  R. H. BOLL   "But watch ye at every season, making supplication that ye may prevail to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand surpassing the Son of man" (Luke 21: 36).   This sentence concludes our Lord's prophetic spiel as recorded by Luke.  It is very evident from this:- (1) that unrepealable things shall come to pass; these are in part mentioned in the preceding part of the spiel (v. 25 ff); (2) that by watchfulness and supplication we may prevail to escape all those things; (3) that those who so escape shall stand surpassing the Son of man.   First let us examine some of the peculiar and meaningful words the Saviour used in this sentence.   Agrupneite - watch ye; not the usual word gregoreo, but a term implying sleeplessness, as of a taxed heart.  It is the word used in Mark 13 : 33; also, significantly, in Eph. 6 : 18.   Deomenoi - making supplication; meaning to make urgent request; stronger word than proseuchomai, to pray.   Katischuste - prevail; ischuo ways to prevail; katischtio, to prevail versus or over something or somebody; to overcome, to get the upper hand.  The mob cried out till their voices prevailed; (Luke 23: 23) and they got their wish.   Ekphugein - to escape; the simple word "phugo" ways to flee when strengthened with "ek" it ways to flee out of some danger or evil situation, to escape.   Stathanai - to stand; but to be word-for-word it ways "to be stationed," for it is a passive form of "histemi," to stand.   Emprosthen - before; increasingly literally "in front of."   These are remarkable words.  That the heavenly wisdom of the Lord Jesus used them with purpose and determination needs not to be said.  Let us then, having examined these outstanding words, try to take in the meaning of the verse.  It forms the final word of the conclusion.  To get its gravity we must squint at the two verses preceding :- "But take heed to yourselves, lest haply your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and that day come on you suddenly ...  as a snare; for so shall it come upon all them that dwell on the squatter of all the earth" (Luke 21: 34, 35).   It is worthy of particular notice how the Lord distinguishes between His own, the disciples He addresses, and "them that dwell on the squatter of all the earth."  These latter are "earth-dwellers," in the bad sense; people who have settled lanugo here below, "men of the world whose portion is in this life" (Ps. 17: 14) as contrasted with those who are "sojourners and pilgrims" (1 Pet. 2: 11).  Upon such "that day" will come "suddenly, as a snare" - which obviously, in the Lord's warning, must be considered as a dreadful calamity, by all ways to be avoided.   He solemnly cautions His disciples not to let their hearts be taken up with self-indulgence, drunkenness or the cares of this life which wring the word, and it becometh unfruitful (Mark 4: 19); for in that specimen would "that day" come upon them "suddenly, as a snare," precisely as it will upon the earth-dwellers (Comp. Rev. 3: 3).   Now to our verse.  Here the Lord Jesus marks out the undertow necessary for His own who are to escape the terrible things that shall come to pass and who shall be permitted to stand surpassing the Son of Man.  It is for them:-   To watch at every season.  Though He points out unrepealable signs, at the inception of which they should squint up and lift up their heads, for the time of their redemption draweth nigh (Luke 21: 28) - there is never a time when they should not watch - signs or no signs.  For the signs may go unnoticed, and we may hands misjudge our times.  The only safety lies in watching always. (See here Mark 13: 35-37).   Making supplication.  This, stuff a participle, shows that the supplication is to go on during the unvarying watching.  If they are to watch at every season, so must they be making supplication at every season, constantly.   And for what this constant, urgent prayer?  That they may prevail to escape all the things that are to come to pass, and to stand surpassing the Son of man.  Both the escape, on the one hand, from the calamities and judgment of that day and the privilege of stuff placed "in front of" the Son of man are here made contingent on watchfulness and prevailing prayer.   If anyone asks how this harmonizes with the widely-held tenet of "the eternal security of the believer" and the doctrine of salvation by grace - I would be far from detracting one whit from the plain squatter value of any of God's precious promises.  But let me say this - that if your faith in those promises sets your soul on fire to serve God, to work and watch and pray, and to do all His good will gladly, then there is no doubt that you have truly understood, and your faith in His gracious promise is having its intended result and manifestation.  But if yours is a sort of pleasant fatalism that tends to make you wasteful and easy going, you have surely misunderstood something and you surely need the Lord's warning.   Let us watch and make supplication unchangingly that we may escape the things that shall come upon the world and be rumored worthy of the Kingdom of God, unto which we labour and strive and suffer.   - Herald of His Coming.   *       *       *       *       *       *       *   THE MILLENNIAL KINGDOM   The Lord is now selecting and training the kings and rulers for the coming new age in His unconfined plan of redemption.  "Unto him that suffuse loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father" (Rev. 1: 5, 6).  "And we shall reign on the earth" (Rev. 5: 10).  A warless world to last 1,000 years will some day be a reality, but only those who have parted visitor with sin and the world will overly have any place in that profoundly to be desired "New Order." "Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection of such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years." - W. F. BEIRNES.