The Perfect Storm Is Coming – Part XII

KING OF KINGS

It is at midnight that God manifests His power for the deliverance of His people.
The sun appears, shining in strength. Signs and wonders follow in quick succession.

The wicked look with terror and amazement upon the scene, while the righteous behold with solemn joy the tokens of their deliverance. Everything in nature seems turned out of its course. Streams cease to flow. Dark, heavy clouds come up, and clash against each other. In the midst of the angry heavens is one clear space of indescribable glory, whence comes the voice of God like the sound of many waters, saying, “It is done.” Revelation 16:17.

That voice shakes the heavens and the earth. There is a mighty earthquake, “such as was not since men were upon the earth, so mighty an earthquake and so great.” Revelation 16:18. The sky appears to open and shut. The glory from the throne of God seems flashing through. Mountains shake like a reed in the wind. There is a roar as of a coming tempest. The sea is lashed into fury, and there is heard the shriek of the hurricane, like the voice of demons upon a mission of destruction. The whole earth heaves and swells like the waves of the sea. Its surface is breaking up. Mountain chains are sinking. Inhabited islands disappear. Great hailstones, every one “about the weight of a talent,” are doing their work of destruction. The proudest cities of the earth are laid low.

Thick clouds still cover the sky; yet, the sun now and then breaks through, appearing like the avenging eye of God. Fierce lightening leap from the heavens, enveloping the earth in a sheet of flame.

Above the roar of thunder, voices, mysterious and awful, declare the doom of the wicked. Those who a little before were so reckless, so boastful and defiant, so exultant in their cruelty to God’s faithful ones, are now shuddering in fear. Their wails are heard above the sound of the elements. Demons acknowledge the divinity of Christ, and tremble before His power, while men plead for mercy, and grovel in abject terror.

LORD OF LORDS

Soon there appears in the east a small black cloud. It is the cloud which surrounds the Savior, and which seems in the distance to be shrouded in darkness.

The people of God recognize this to be the sign of the Son of Man. In solemn silence, they gaze upon it as it draws nearer the earth, becoming lighter and more glorious, until it is a great while cloud, its base a glory like consuming fire, and above it the rainbow of the covenant. Jesus rides forth as a mighty conqueror. Not now a “Man of Sorrows,” he comes, victor in heaven and earth, to judge the living and the dead. “Faithful and True… in righteousness He doth judge and make war.” And “the armies in heaven follow Him.” Revelation 19: 11, 14.

Holy angels, a vast, unnumbered throng, attend Him on His way. The firmament seems filled with radiant forms-“ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands.” No human pen can portray the scene; no mortal mind is adequate to conceive its splendor. “His glory covered the heavens…. And His brightness was as the light.” Habakkuk 3: 3,4. As the living cloud comes still nearer, every eye beholds the Prince of life. No crown of thorns now mars that sacred head, but a diadem of glory rests on His holy brow.  His countenance outshines the dazzling brightness of the noonday sun. “And He hath on His venture and on His thigh a name written King of kings, and Lord of lords.” Revelation 19:16.

 Before His presence, “all faces are turned into paleness;” upon the rejecters of God’s mercy falls the terror of eternal despair. “The heart melteth, and the knees smite together,” “and the faces of them all gather blackness.” Jeremiah 30:6; Nahum 2:10.   Even the righteous cry with trembling, “Who shall be able to stand?” Then the voice of Jesus is heard saying, “My grace is sufficient for you.” The faces of the righteous are lighted up, and the angels strike a note higher, and sing again, as they draw nearer to the earth. 

The King of kings descends upon the cloud, wrapped in flaming fire. The heavens are rolled together as a scroll, the earth trembles before Him, and every mountain and island is moved out of its place. “Our God shall come, and shall devour before Him, and it shall be very tempestuous round about Him. He shall call to the heavens from above, and to the earth, and He may judge His people.” Psalm 50: 3,4.

‘And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every freeman, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains; and said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of Him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of His wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?” Revelation 6: 15-17.

The derisive jests have ceased. Lying lips are hushed into silence. Naught now is heard but the voice of prayer and the sound of weeping and lamentation. The cry bursts forth from lips so lately scoffing, “The great day of His wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?”

The wicked pray to be buried beneath the rocks of the mountains, rather than meet the face of Him whom they have despised and rejected. Those who have held fast their integrity in the very face of death have been suddenly delivered from the dark and terrible tyranny of men transformed to demons. Their faces, so lately pale, anxious, and haggard, are now aglow with wonder, faith, and love. Their voices rise triumphantly: 

“God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof.” Psalm 46: 1-3.

Amid the reeling of the earth, the flash of lightening, and the roar of thunder, the voice of the Son of God calls forth the sleeping saints. Raising His hands to heaven He cries,  “Awake, awake, awake, ye that sleep in the dust, and arise!” Throughout the length and breadth of the earth, the dead shall hear that voice; and they that hear shall live. And the whole earth shall ring with the tread of the exceeding great army of every nation, kindred, tongue, and people. From the prison house of death they come, clothed with immortal glory. And the living righteous and the risen saints unite their voices in a long, glad shout of victory.

All come forth from their graves with the freshness and vigor of eternal youth. All blemishes and deformities are left in the grave. Restored to the tree of life in the long-lost Eden, the redeemed will grow to the full stature of the race in primeval glory. The last lingering traces of the curse of sin will be removed, and Christ’s faithful ones will reflect, in mind, soul, and body, the perfect image of their Lord. Oh, wonderful redemption! Long talked of, long hoped for, contemplated with eager anticipation, but never fully understood.

The living righteous are changed “in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye.” At the voice of God, they were glorified; now they are made immortal, and with the risen saints are caught up to meet their Lord in the air. Angels ”gather together the elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.” Friends and families long separated by death are united, nevermore to part.

Christ presents to the Father the purchase of His blood, declaring, “Here am I, and the children whom Thou hast given Me.” What wondrous joy when the infinite Father, looking upon the ransomed, shall behold His image, sin’s discord banished, its blight removed, and the human family once more in harmony with the divine!

The cross of Christ will be the science and the song of the redeemed through all eternity. In Christ glorified, they will behold Christ crucified. Never will it be forgotten that the Beloved of God, whose power created and upheld the unnumbered worlds through the vast realms of space, humbled Himself to uplift fallen man; that He bore the guilt and shame of sin, and the hiding of His Father’s face, till the woes of a lost world broke His heart, and crushed out His life on Calvary’s cross.

That the Maker of all worlds, the Arbiter of all destinies, should lay aside His glory, and humiliate Himself for the love of man, will ever excite the wonder and adoration of the universe. As the nations of the saved look upon their Redeemer, and behold the eternal glory of the Father shining in His countenance; as they behold His throne, which is from everlasting to everlasting, and know that His kingdom is to have no end, they break forth in rapturous song, “Worthy, worthy is the Lamb that was slain, and hath redeemed us to God by His own most precious blood!”

It will be seen that He who is infinite in wisdom could devise no plan for our salvation except the sacrifice of His Son. The compensation for this sacrifice is the joy of peopling the earth with ransomed beings, holy, happy, and immortal.

When the voice of God turns the captivity of His people, there is a terrible awakening of those who have lost all in the great conflict of life. While probation continued, they were blinded by Satan’s deceptions, and justified their course of sin. They neglected to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to deal justly, and to love mercy. They exalted themselves. Now they are stripped of all that made them great, and they are left destitute and defenseless. The result is, their lives are a failure; their pleasures are turned to gall, their treasures to corruption. The gain of a lifetime is swept away in a moment.

The Lord cometh out of His place to punish the inhabitantsof the earth for their iniquity; the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain.” Isaiah 26:21. “And this shall be the plague wherewith the Lord will smite all the people that have fought against Jerusalem: Their flesh shall consume away while they stand upon their feet, and their eyes shall consume away in their holes, and their tongue shall consume away in their mouth. And it shall come to pass in that day that a great tumult from the Lord shall be among them; and they shall lay hold everyone on the hand of his neighbor, and his hand shall rise up against the hand of his neighbor.” Zechariah 14: 12, 13.

At the coming of Christ, the wicked are blotted from the face of the whole earth – consumed with the spirit of His mouth, and destroyed by the brightness of His glory. “Behold, the Lord maketh the earth empty, and maketh it waste, and turneth it upside down, and scattereth abroad the inhabitants thereof.” “Because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore hath the curse devoured the earth, and they that dwell therein are desolate; therefore the inhabitants of the earth are burned.” Isaiah 24: 1, 5, 6.  

At the close of the thousand years foretold in Revelation chapter 20, the second resurrection will take place. Then the wicked will be raised from their graves, and appear before God to receive the execution of “the judgment written.” Thus the Revelator, after describing the resurrection of the righteous, says, “The rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished.” Revelation 20:5. And Isaiah declares, concerning the wicked, “they shall be gathered together, as prisoners are gathered in the pit, and shall be shut up in the prison, and after many days shall they be visited.” Isaiah 24: 22.

“And I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away.” Revelation 21: 1. The fire that consumes the wicked purifies the earth. Every trace of the curse is swept away. God’s original purpose in the creation of the earth is fulfilled as it is made the eternal home of the redeemed. The righteous shall inherit the land, and dwell therein forever.” Psalm 37: 29.

Human language is inadequate to describe the reward of the righteous. Only those who behold it will only know it. No finite mind can comprehend the glory of the Paradise of God. “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered in to the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him.” 1 Corinthians 2: 9.

It is impossible for pain to exist in the atmosphere of heaven. There will be no more tears or funeral processions: “There shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. Revelation 21:4. “The inhabitants shall not say, I am sick; the people that dwell therein shall be forgiven their iniquity.” Isaiah 33:24.

There is the New Jerusalem, the metropolis of the glorified new earth. “Her light was like unto a stone most precious, even like a jasper stone, clear as crystal.” “The nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it; and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honor into it.” Revelation 21: 11, 24. In the City of God, there will be no weariness in doing the will of God and offering praise to His name. We shall ever feel the freshness of the morning, and shall ever be far from its close.

There, immortal minds will contemplate with never failing delight the wonders of creative power and the mysteries of redeeming love. There every faculty will be developed and every capacity increased. The acquirement of knowledge will not weary the mind or exhaust the energies. There the grandest enterprises may be carried forward, the loftiest aspirations reached, the highest ambitions realized; and still there will arise new heights to surmount, new wonders to admire, new truths to comprehend.

With undimmed vision, the redeemed will behold the wonders of creation. And the years of eternity, as they roll, will bring richer and still more glorious revelations of God and of Christ. As knowledge is progressive, so will love, reverence, and happiness increase. “And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard saying, Blessing, honor, and glory, and power, be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb forever and ever.” Revelation  5: 13.

The great controversy is ended.

Sin and sinners are no more. The entire universe is clean. One pulse of harmony and gladness beats through the vast creation. From Him who created all, flow life and light and gladness. Throughout the realms of illimitable space, from the minutest atom to the greatest world, all things, animate and inanimate, in their unshadowed beauty and perfect joy, declare that God is love.

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