There is no "fact of the future" more clearly revealed in Scripture,
or more certainly believed in by the Christian Church, than that "God
hath appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness
by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance
unto all men in that he hath raised him from the dead."
No doubt this fact is denied or explained away by many modern critics.
But it would be difficult to say what revealed fact, from Genesis to
Revelation, is admitted by them, or what things may now be "_most
surely_ believed among us." We retain our first faith in the future
judgment, and shall endeavour to look at it in a practical rather than
in a speculative light.
There is, indeed, among mankind a general anticipation of a coming
time when the mystery of God's providence will be cleared up, and His
righteousness displayed in the final judgment to be then passed on the
evil and on the good. What the human race are led to anticipate, as
likely to occur hereafter, from the many unsettled questions here
between man and his brother, and between man and his God, Scripture
reveals to us as certain.
While, however, every Christian believes in the coming of Jesus to
judge the world as firmly as he does in the fact of His having risen
from the dead, there seems to us to be very inadequate conceptions in
the minds of many as to the designs of this day, or the ends which it
is fitted to accomplish in the kingdom of God.
It is hastily assumed, for example, that the _day_ of judgment will be
short as the period included between an earthly sunrise and sunset;
and that, during this brief interval, the dead shall rise, and be
judged before the throne of Jesus Christ, along with fallen angels. It
is accordingly asked, with doubt and wonder, what good can be gained,
or what purpose served, by this summoning those whose doom has long
been sealed to appear at the bar of Jesus, and there to receive a
formal sentence? If Judas goes to his own place, and Stephen to the
arms of his Redeemer; if the wicked rich man departs to the burning
flame, and Lazarus to the bosom of Abraham; if Satan and his angels
have long ago experienced the horrors of a state which they know to be
unchangeable, because they are themselves unchanged; what conceivable
reason can there be for appointing a day in which all the wicked and
the righteous are to be assembled, only to receive their respective
sentences of condemnation or acquittal?
I know not how such questions can be answered by those who suppose the
day of judgment to be nothing more than one on which Jesus Christ will
_publicly_ declare what the eternal fate of His creatures is to be for
ever; without any trial beyond that which has already taken place in
the court of each man's conscience, and in the presence of the living
God.
We at once admit that the difficulty, or impossibility even, of
answering such questions, is no adequate reason for our denying any
fact clearly revealed in Scripture which may suggest them. But if
these belong, not to the fact itself, but to what appears to us to be
a wrong interpretation of it; if a different view is freed from
such difficulties, without others, more numerous and serious, being
evolved; if the information afforded by Scripture is to be received as
authentic; and if, moreover, while keeping strictly to the letter
of Scripture, it is more in harmony with the grand ends to be
accomplished by the kingdom of Christ, and discloses more of the glory
of the great King, surely a presumption is thereby afforded in favour
of its truth, though, perhaps, at first sight it may interfere with
preconceived opinions.
Instead, then, of the day of judgment being a day of twenty-four hours
merely for the passing of a righteous sentence upon the good or bad,
it seems to us to be clearly revealed in Scripture that it will be a
period of time long enough for the peaceful and orderly ongoing of
all its august proceedings;--when Jesus Christ will summon to His
immediate presence all who have been the subjects of His mediatorial
kingdom, or have been placed under His authority for accomplishing the
purposes of His reign;--when each person will be tried in the presence
of the assembled universe, and his true relationship to his King must
be proved upon evidence minute, sifting, and unquestionable;--in one
word, when the whole government of the Mediator, from the beginning
till the end of time, over men, angels, and devils, shall be fully
disclosed, and its excellence manifested to the confusion of the
wicked, the joy of the righteous, and the glory of the Triune God!
Difficulties will, no doubt, be suggested by the view we have thus
so briefly stated, as well as by the others I have been obliged to
discard. But instead of attempting to remove these, I shall at present
pass them by, leaving them to be tacitly and satisfactorily answered
by the positive truth regarding the judgment, which I shall now
endeavour to establish.