Chapter 8

The great city ruling over the kings of the earth in John's day and situated on seven mountains, or "mounts," is ROME; as the city represents the woman Babylon who is the symbol of the false Church of Christ, then you have a false church of Christ seated (and remember, the word is "_seated_") in Rome. A Church seated in Rome is a _Roman Church_; and as the city rules over the earth, over the world; and a world-wide rule is a universal rule; and the word for universal, worldwide, is, also, "catholic," you have a catholic church; and, _seated_ in Rome (Rome its capital centre), THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH.

This Church is said to be drunken with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus; and the pages of history glued together with the blood of these same martyrs, and the burning, blistering record of the "Holy Inquisition," affirm that the astounding picture is true in all its crimson and scarlet details.

But the striking feature in the picture, and the one that is first presented to us, is that the woman (the Church) is carried by a beast. This beast is a symbol of government and teaches that the Church "rules" over the governments of the world, is sustained by the State, has attained to "temporal power." As the picture occurs in the _third division_ of the book, and that division relates to things still future, we have here a distinct prophecy that this Apostate Roman Church shall again attain to temporal power, become a State Church, supported and carried officially by the nations of the earth.

The exactitude with which the picture has been painted, and that, too, at a time when Rome had not yet come into the place of full -blown apostasy and power; the startling way in which, step by step, the prophetic outlines have been fulfilled even in our day, are tremendously suggestive concerning the possibility of its complete and final fulfilment; and bid us ask most earnestly--whence came the mental eyesight which enabled the writer of the book to sketch out for us centuries ahead of time, that which the page of after history reveals to us as facts?

The social, financial, governmental, religious and moral condition of the present time have been portrayed in the book we call the Bible. The coming of a special class called "rich" men as a particular characteristic of this age, the revolt of labor, and its cry against the wrongs of capital, were all set forth in the epistle of James, nigh two thousand years ago, with an accuracy that is not to be explained on natural grounds. So absolutely unnatural is it, that it is perfectly safe to say--these things are not such as a man _could_ write if he _would_.

That the book is not to be explained on natural grounds is evident from the fact that it is not a CONSTRUCTION, but a GROWTH; not an ORGANIZATION, but an ORGANISM, growing up from Genesis to Revelation like a tree from root through trunk and branch to leaf and fruit.

Each book of the Bible will be found on examination to stand related organically to one another; and that each occupies its necessary and sequential order.

In _Genesis_, you have the beginning of things, the germ and outline of everything afterwards revealed.

_Exodus_ gives the redemption by blood of a people foreseen and covenanted in Genesis, their deliverance by the hand of God from the power of the king and the dangers of the land.

In _Leviticus_, the redeemed people draw nigh to God by virtue of the blood of sacrifice and find access to the presence of God through the intercession of a priest.

In _Numbers_, this blood-redeemed people are seen on their journey to the better land; we read of their trials, their temptations, their unbelief, their backslidings and continual moral failure by the way, and the never-failing grace and love of a covenant-keeping God who leads them in a pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night.

In _Deuteronomy_, the people have the way over which they have come, and the dealings of God, rehearsed to them, and are instructed and prepared for the land whither they go.

In _Joshua_, the _second_ generation (which stands always for regeneration) gets into the promised land.

_Judges_ tells how, after being blessed with all covenant blessings in the covenant land, the people fell into a state where every man did that which was right "in his own eyes."

_Ruth_, the Gentile woman, becomes the bride of a Hebrew Lord; and the covenant promise of God concerning Israel goes straightway down from a Gentile mother and a Hebrew father towards the throne which is set up in David and owned of God as the throne of Christ.

The books of _Samuel, Kings_ and _Chronicles_, take up the story of the kingdom, and the Old Testament leads us on through symbol, figure and open prophecy, to a Coming Messiah and a glorious kingdom till, when we reach the last verse in Malachi, we lean across four centuries of prophetic silence, waiting to greet that promised Christ who shall be born in Bethlehem; and who is to be called the Son of the Highest; who is to sit on the throne of his father David, "to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice, from henceforth even forever."

We listen for the angelic song and the salutation to men of good will; and we are expecting, later on, to see Zion's king riding up the slopes to the Holy City and all the people coming forth to cry, "Hosanna to the Son of David," and "Blessed be he that cometh in the name of the Lord."

When you open the New Testament you find four books--Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

The order of these books is fixed--it cannot be changed.

If _Mark_ be substituted for _Matthew_, then the New Testament begins without an account of the birth or genealogy of our Lord Jesus Christ; no intimation is given that he is born king of the Jews, and is the expected Messiah.

If _Luke_ be given the place of _Matthew_, little mention will be found of the Jewish kingdom of heaven; and our Lord will be seen with a leaning towards the Gentiles.

If the Gospel of _John_ begin the New Testament instead of _Matthew_, then we shall read of him who is Son of God rather than King of the Jews, and the expectation raised by Malachi will seem unfulfilled.

But the moment the order named is followed all is perfect, all is harmony.

_Matthew_ presents our Lord Jesus Christ as the Son of _Abraham_ and Son of _David_; heir of the covenant _land_, and the covenant _throne_, and at once links the New Testament with the Old.

_Mark_ announces that this King of the Jews came into the world to be the _Servant_ of God and a blessing in his service to men.

_Luke_, although he announces our Lord Jesus Christ as King, sets him forth pre-eminently as _The Man_, going among men, eating and drinking with them, and speaking in such plain and simple terms that the "common people heard him gladly."

In _John_, this Jewish King, this Servant of God and men, this Man among men, who received sinners and ate with them, is revealed as the Mighty God, the eternal _Word_, the Holy One of Israel, who came down to visit his people, was made flesh and "tabernacled" among them, as of old he dwelt in the tabernacle of the wilderness in the Shekinal glory above the Mercy Seat and between the outstretched wings of the golden Cherubim.

Take away the book of _Acts_, and nothing can be known of the origin of the church and its apostolic history. Without the book of Acts the epistles are wholly unintelligible when they refer to the Church.

Do without the _Second_ epistle to the _Corinthians_, and you have no revelation of the state of the Christian dead either as to their location or condition.

Without the _Second_ epistle to the _Thessalonians_ you cannot fix the identity of the Antichrist.

Leave out the epistle to the _Hebrews_ and there is no key to _Leviticus_.

Without the book of _Daniel_ it is impossible fully to understand the book of _Revelation_.

No matter at what period the book of _Revelation_ may have been written, it can have but one place in the Bible, and that the last. It must have this place because it shows us the foreview of Genesis fulfilled: the seed of the woman has bruised the serpent's head, Satan has been bound and Paradise is regained.

The Old and New Testaments stand related to each other as the two halves of a perfect whole. In the Old Testament the New is _concealed_; in the New Testament the Old is _revealed_.

_Genesis_ finds its key in the first chapter of _John's_ Gospel, and identifies the creator of heaven and earth with him who was made flesh and dwelt among us as the Son of God.

_Exodus_ is explained by the _First_ epistle to the _Corinthians_, in which we learn that "Christ" is the "Passover sacrificed for us."

_Leviticus_ is expounded by the epistle to the _Hebrews_.

_Numbers_ has its correspondence in the book of _Acts_.

In Numbers you have the experience of the Children of Israel in their journey through the wilderness. In Acts we get the story of the Church in its pilgrimage through the world.

_Deuteronomy_ is to be read with _Colossians_.

In Deuteronomy the people of Israel are being prepared for an earthly inheritance. In Colossians the Church is being prepared for a heavenly inheritance.

_Joshua_ stands over against _Ephesians_.

In Joshua the redeemed people have to fight with flesh and blood in order to possess the covenant land. In Ephesians "we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against wicked spirits in the heavenly places."

_Judges_ may be understood by reading the _first_ chapter of the _first_ epistle, and the _twelfth_ chapter of the _second_ epistle to the _Corinthians_.

The book of _Ruth_ is illuminated by the _third_ and _fifth_ chapters of the _Ephesians_.

In Ruth you have the Gentile bride of a Hebrew Lord, the kinsman, redeemer and advocate; who presents his bride to himself in the gate before all the assembled judges.

In Ephesians, the Gentile Bride is seen to be the Church, the kinsman, redeemer and advocate, our Lord Jesus Christ, who, having loved the Church and given himself for it, will "present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing."

The books of _Samuel_, _Kings_ and _Chronicles_, may be read with the four _Gospels_ and the book of _Revelation_.

In Samuel, Kings and Chronicles, you have the story of David, the anointed king, man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, triumphant warrior, exalted king--Solomon, prince of peace, ruling over the established kingdom and the queen of Sheba coming from the uttermost parts of the earth to own and celebrate his glory.

In the Gospels we get the story of our Lord Jesus Christ as anointed king and man of sorrows. In Revelation he is seen coming forth at the head of the armies of heaven, a mighty warrior, a triumphant king and, at the last, as Prince of Peace ruling in splendor over his established kingdom; while the Gentiles, coming from the uttermost parts of the earth to Jerusalem, bow the knee before him and acknowledge his glory.

_Ezra_ may be read with the latter half of the _second_ chapter of the _Ephesians_.

In Ezra you have the building of the material temple. In Ephesus the building of the spiritual temple.

_Nehemiah_ can be read with the twenty-first chapter of the _Revelation_.

Nehemiah gives us Jerusalem below. Revelation, Jerusalem above.

In the book of _Esther_ the name of God is not once mentioned; but it shows us the unseen God acting in his secret providence to deliver his covenant people, the Jews, from the hand of the Gentile oppressor, and setting them in the place of authority and power over the Gentiles.

The _eleventh_ chapter of the _Romans_ explains the book of Esther.

In the eleventh chapter Paul shows that God has not forgotten the people whom he foreknew. The nation as such has been set aside. It is now, as Hosea says, _Lo Ammi_, _"not my people,"_ not the people of God.

An election according to grace is going on among the Jews. These are being called into the Church and will form a part of the Body and Bride. The Gentiles have come dispensationally into the place of Israel, and God is sending his Gospel among them--calling out those whom he has foreseen and known among the Gentiles. The nation as such would seem to be cast aside. The people are walking in darkness and the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their true God and only Saviour, is not owned among them; but while the Lord is thus denied by them, he has not forgotten them. His providences are round about them in their preservation and multiplication, and in his judgment of the nations which persecute them. Their present condition nationally is temporary. Paul warns the Gentiles that the Jews have been cut off and set aside because of unbelief. The Gentiles have been brought in, and stand alone by faith. It is well for them not to be "high-minded," but "to fear"; for so surely as God spared not the nation and set it aside because of unbelief, just so surely will he deal with the Gentiles if the Gentiles fall into unbelief.

The Gentiles must not be wise in their own conceits. The blindness and the setting aside of Israel will last only till the "fulness of the Gentiles be come in," that is, till the election among them is complete; then the Lord will take up Israel as a nation again, and precisely as he delivered Mordecai and the Jews of Esther's and Ahasuerus' time and made them to be accepted and feared, so, it is written, the Lord himself will come forth in behalf of his ancient people. "There shall come out of (unto) Sion the Deliverer," and, "so all Israel shall be saved."

The book of Esther read in the light of the eleventh chapter of the Romans is illuminating as to the unchanging faithfulness of God and his unceasing love for the nation and people of his choice.

Thus book after book of the Bible may be studied; and the more they are examined and studied, the more manifest will be the intimate relation and marvellous correspondence between the Old and the New Testaments.

When you realize the fact that these Old and New Testament books, so remarkably related and inter-explanatory of each other, have been written by different authors, without possibility of collusion or agreed plan; that each part fits into the other; that it cannot have one book less or one book more; that to take from it would destroy the completeness, to add would mar the harmony; that it is perfect in itself, having the key of each book hung up at the entrance; that it gives but never borrows light; that it cannot be explained or interpreted outside of itself; that to him who diligently searches it, it will reveal itself and make him wise both for this world and for that which is to come; when all these facts are faced, it ought to be evident that in the Bible we have a living thing and not a mere handiwork wrought by man; that man can no more claim to be the actual author of it than of the mountains that are round about Jerusalem or the heavens that are high above them.

The unity of a book demands unity of objective.

This book has a great objective--a supreme theme.

That theme is not Israel--although two-thirds of the book considered as a whole are taken up with the history of that people. The great theme is not the Church of Christ--although the Church in this age is the supreme thing in the sight of God. The one great theme, the one immense objective of this book towards which it moves through history and prophecy, through figure and symbol, through self -sustained prose and musical song--the one great objective is--

OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST.

It seeks to present him in his person, his work, his present office and coming glories.

It sets him before us as,

The Child born.

The Son given.

The Counsellor.

The Mighty God.

The Prince of Peace.

The Everlasting Father.

The Lily of the valleys.

The Rose of Sharon.

The Branch.

The Lord our Righteousness.

The Lord's Fellow.

The Man of God's Right hand.

He whose Goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.

The Burnt Offering.

The Meat Offering.

The Peace Offering.

The Sin Offering.

The Trespass Offering.

The Sum of God's Thoughts.

The Man of Sorrows and acquainted with grief.

Son of Abraham.

Son of David.

Son of Mary.

Son of Man.

God the Son.

King of the Jews.

King of Israel.

King of Kings.

Lord of Lords.

God the Creator.

God manifest in the flesh.

The Second Man.

The Last Adam.

The First and the Last.

The Beginning and the Ending.

The Way, the Truth, the Life.

The Light of the world.

The Bread of life.

The Good Shepherd, who lays down his life for the sheep.

The Great Shepherd who came again from the dead.

The Chief Shepherd, who shall appear with his flock in glory.

The Sin-bearer.

The Rock.

Our Great God and Saviour Jesus Christ.

He who is.

He who was.

He who is to come.

He who before Abraham was, is, by his own announcement, the "I am."

The Almighty.

THIS SAME JESUS.

And to these might be added more than five hundred other names and titles, together with their cognates, to say nothing of the various characteristics assigned him, the things predicated of him, until it is found that he is the very warp and woof of the book.

To proclaim him, exalt him, make him known, set him forth in his many roles, his functions, his offices and his covenant glories, prophets recite their visions, a Psalmist sings his rarest songs, and apostles unfold their matchless doctrines.

When you contemplate the fact of this one objective; this tremendous unity of intention in the book, you have an overwhelming demonstration of the unity of its inspiration. Whether the inspiration be a true or a false one, it is beyond all question one inspiration. A book whose construction extends over centuries, written by men separated by time and distance from each other, with no possibility of personal or mental relation to each other--all writing to one objective--and that to set forth the Christ of God in his varied relations--a book with such a unity of purpose demonstrates in the most self-evident fashion that the writers were moved by a common impulse and, therefore, a common inspiration.

And this unity of objective and inspiration coordinates with the wonderful fact that the book has but ONE KEY.

The key which can alone open this book and make every line intelligible from Genesis to Revelation is Our Lord Jesus Christ.

Take Christ out of the Bible and it is a harp without a player, a song without a singer, a palace with all the doors locked, a labyrinth with no Ariadne thread to guide.

Put Christ into the Bible, and the harp strings will be smitten as with a master's hand.

Put Christ into the Bible, and the voice of song is heard as when a lark from the midst of dew-wet grasses sings, as it soars aloft to greet the coming dawn.

Put Christ into the Bible, and all the doors of the palace are swung open and you may pass from room to room, down all the ivory galleries of the King, beholding portrait and landscape, vista of beauty and heaped-up treasures of truth, of infinite love and royal grace.

Put Christ into the Bible, and you will have a scarlet thread--the crimson of the blood--that will lead you through all the winding ways of redemption and glory.

Put Christ into Genesis, into the verses of the first chapter, and it will chime like silver bells in harmony with the wondrous notes in the first chapter of the Gospel of John, and tell you that he who created the heavens and the earth is he who in the beginning was the eternal Word, the voice of the infinite silence, and who, creating for himself a human nature, and clad in mortal flesh, walked on earth among the sons of men as Jesus of Nazareth.

Put Christ into the twenty-second, the twenty-third and the twenty -fourth chapters of Genesis, and you will have placed before you in perfect type the birth of Christ, the sacrifice, the resurrection on the morning of the third day, the setting aside of the Jewish nation as the first wife, the coming of the Holy Spirit in the name of the Father and the Son to find a Bride for the Son, the calling out of the church, the endowment of the church with the gifts sent from the Father in the name of the Son, the pilgrimage of the church under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, the Second Coming of Christ, the Rapture and meeting of Christ and the church in the "field" of the air, and the marriage of the Son.

Put Christ into the dryest and dullest page of the book of Kings and Chronicles, and it will bloom with light and glory; and if you watch in faith, you will see the King's chariot go by, and catch a vision of the King himself in his beauty.

Put Christ into the Tabernacle, and it will cast its treasures like a king's largess at your feet.

You will see the brazen altar to be the cross, the brazen laver, the bath of regeneration, even the Word of God. In the Holy Place the table of shew bread will speak of him who once said, "I am the bread of life." The golden candlestick will remind you that he said: "I am the light of the world." The golden altar and the priest with his swinging censer of burning incense standing thereat will proclaim him as the great high priest. The beautiful veil of fine linen embroidered with figures of the cherubim in blue, purple and scarlet color is (according to a direct Scripture) the symbol of his flesh, his mortal humanity while on earth. Every board and bar, every cord and pin, the coverings, the curtains, the blue, the purple and the scarlet color, the golden vessels as well as the furniture, each and all, proclaim him, illustrate and illuminate him in his person, his work, his present office and coming glories.

All these are analogies, types, pictures, are so related to Christ that he alone explains them; the explanation is filled with such perfection of harmony in every detail, the relation between them and our Lord Jesus Christ as the Antitype is so strikingly self-evident, that any discussion of it would be useless.

When you find a key and lock which fit each other, you conclude they were intended for each other.

In the light of facts already cited, what other conclusion can be drawn than that Christ and the Bible were intended for each other?

And when you see this Bible coming together part by part, foretelling the Christ and explained alone by him, what sane conclusion is possible other than the book which is opened and explained by him who is not only the Christ but the Personal Word of God, _must be_, and _is_, THE WRITTEN WORD OF GOD!

Let your mind dwell for a moment on the style of the book.

It is so simple that a child may understand it; so profound, that the mightiest intellect cannot go beyond its depths. It is so essentially rich that it turns every language into which it is translated into a classic. At one moment it is plain narration; at another, it is all drama and tragedy, in which cataclysmic climax crashes against climax.

It records the birth of a babe, the flight of an angel, the death of a king, the overthrow of an empire or the fall of a sparrow. It notes the hyssop that groweth out of the wall and speaks of the cedars of Lebanon. It shows us so pastoral a thing as a man sitting at his tent door in the cool of the day, and then paints for us a city in heaven with jasper walls, with golden streets, and where each several gate that leadeth into the city is one vast and shining pearl.

It is full of outlines--outlines as large and bare as mountain peaks, and then it is crowded with details as minute as the sands of the sea. There are times when clouds and darkness float across its pages and we hear from within like unto the voice of him who inhabiteth eternity; in another moment the lines blaze with light, the revelation they give is high noon--and all the shadows are under the feet.