Jonathan Edwards · 174 of 409

PART III. Objections answered · sect. iii

That such agreement is premature, answered.

another objection, very likely to arise in the minds of many against such extraordinary prayer for the speedy coming of Christ’s kingdom, is, that we have no reason to expect it, till there first come a time of most extreme calamity to the church, and a prevalence of her antiChristian enemies against her; even that which is represented in by the slaying of the witnesses; but have reason to determine the contrary.

It is indeed an opinion that seems pretty much to have obtained, that before the fulfilment of the promises relating to the church’s latter-day glory, there must come a most terrible time, a lime of extreme suffering, and dreadful persecution of the church of Christ; wherein Satan and antichrist are to obtain their greatest victory over her, and she is to be brought lower than ever by her enemies. This opinion has chiefly risen from the manner of interpreting and applying the fore-mentioned prophecy of the slaying of the witnesses; and must needs be a great hinderance, with regard to such an affair as is proposed to us in the Memorial. If persons expect no other, than that the more the glorious times of Christ’s kingdom are hastened, the sooner will come this dreadful time, wherein the generality of God’s people must suffer so extremely, and the church of Christ be almost extinguished, and blotted out from under heaven; how can it be otherwise than a great damp to their hope, their courage and activity, in praying for, and reaching after the speedy introduction of those glorious promised times? As long as this opinion is retained, it will undoubtedly ever have this unhappy influence on the minds of those that wish well to Zion. It will tend to damp and keep down joyful expectation in prayer; and even in great measure to prevent all earnest, animated, and encouraged prayer, in God’s people, for this mercy, at any time before it is actually fulfilled. For they who proceed on this hypothesis in their prayers, must, at the same time that they pray for this glorious day, naturally conclude within themselves, that they shall never live to see on earth any dawning of it, but only the dismal time that shall precede it; in which the far greater part of God’s people who shall live till then, shall die under the extreme cruelties of their persecutors. And the more they expect that God will answer their prayers, by speedily bringing on the promised glorious day, the more must they expect themselves to have a share in those dreadful things, that nature shrinks at, and also expect to see what a renewed nature dreads; even the prevailing of God’s enemies, and the almost total extinction of true religion in the world. And on this hypothesis, these discouragements are like to attend the prayers of God’s people, till that dismal time be actually come: and when that is come, those who had been prophesying and praying in sackcloth, shall generally be slain: and after that time is over, then the glorious day shall immediately commence. So that this notion tends to discourage all earnest prayer in the church of God for that glorious coming of Christ’s kingdom, till it be actually come; and that is to hinder its ever being at all.

This opinion being of such hurtful tendency, it is a thousand pities it should be retained, if truly there be no good ground for it. Therefore in answer to this objection,

I would, with all humility and modesty, examine the foundation of that opinion, of such a dreadful time of victory of antichrist over the church, yet to be expected: and particularly shall endeavour to show that the slaying of the witnesses, foretold, Rev. xi. 7-10. is not an event that remains yet to be fulfilled. To this end, I would propose the following things to consideration.

1. The time wherein the witnesses lie dead in the streets of the great city, doubtless, signifies the time wherein the true church of Christ is lowest of all, most of all prevailed against by antichrist, and nearest to an utter extinction; the time wherein there is left the least visibility of the church of Christ yet subsisting in the world, least remains of any thing appertaining to true religion, whence a revival of it can be expected, and wherein all means of it are most abolished, and the state of the church is in all respects furthest from any hopes of its ever flourishing again. For before this, the witnesses prophesy in sackcloth; but now they are dead: before this, they were kept low indeed, yet there was life, and power to bring plagues on their enemies, and so much of true religion left, as to be a continual torment to them. But now their enemies rejoice and feast, have a general public triumph, as having obtained a full victory over them. They have now entirely extirpated them, are completely delivered from them, and from all that might give them any fear of being troubled with them any more. This time, wherever it be fixed, doubtless, is the time, not only wherein fewest professors of the true religion are left in the world; but a time wherein the truth shall be farthest put of sight, and out of reach, and most forgotten; wherein there are left fewest beams of light, or traces of truth, fewest means of information, and opportunities of coming to the knowledge of the truth; and so a time of the most barbarous ignorance, most destitute of all history, monuments, and memory of things appertaining to true religion, or things the knowledge of which hath any tendency to bring truth again to light; and most destitute of learning, study, and inquiry.

Now, if we consider the present state of mankind, is it credible that a time will yet come, exceeding, in these respects, all times before the reformation? and that such a time will come before the fall of antichrist, unless we set that at a much greater distance, than the farthest that any have yet supposed? It is next to impossible, that such a change should be brought about in so short a time: it cannot be without a miracle. In order to it, not only must the popish nations so prevail, as utterly to extirpate the protestant religion through the earth; but must do many other things, far more impossible for them to effect, in order to cover the world with so gross and confirmed a darkness, and to bury all light and truth in so deep an oblivion, and so far out of all means and hopes of a revival. And not only must a vast change be made in the protestant world, but the popish nations must be strangely metamorphosed; and they themselves must be terribly persecuted by some other power, in order to bring them to such a change: nor would persecution without extirpation be sufficient for it. If there should be another universal deluge, it might be sufficient to bring things to such a pass; provided a few ignorant barbarous persons only were preserved in an ark: and it would require some catastrophe not much short of this to effect it

2. At the reformation, in the days of Luther, Calvin, and others their contemporaries, the threatened destruction of antichrist, the dreadful enemy that had long oppressed and worn out the saints, was begun. Nor was it a small beginning; for antichrist hath fallen, at least half-way to the ground, from that height of power and grandeur he was in before. Then began the vials of God’s wrath to be poured out on the throne of the beast, to the great shaking of its foundations, and diminution of its extent; so that the pope lost near half of his former dominions: and as to degree of authority and influence over what is left, he is not possessed of what he had before. God now at length, in answer to the long-continued cries of his people, awakened as one out of sleep, and began to deliver his church from her exceeding low state, under the great oppression of this grand enemy, and to restore her from her exile and bondage in the spiritual Babylon and Egypt. It is not agreeable to the analogy of God’s dispensations, that after this he should desert his people, hide himself from them even more than before, leave them more than ever in the hands of their enemy; and is it credible that all this advantage of the church against antichrist should be entirely given up and lost, his power and tyranny be more confirmed, the church more entirely subdued than ever before, and further from all help and means of recovery? This is not God’s way of dealing with his people, or with their enemies. His work of salvation is perfect: when he has begun such a work he will carry it on: when he once causes the day of deliverance to dawn to his people, after such a long night of dismal darkness, he will not extinguish the light, and cause them to return again to midnight darkness. When he has begun to enkindle the blessed fire, he will not quench the smoking flax, till he hath brought forth judgment unto victory. When once the church, after her long and sore travail, has brought forth her man-child, and wrought some deliverance, her enemies shall never be able to destroy this child, though an infant; but it shall ascend up to heaven, and be set on high out of their reach.

The destruction that God often foretold and threatened to ancient Babylon (which is often referred to in the revelation, as a great type of the antiChristian church) was gradually accomplished, by various steps at a great distance of time one from another. It was begun in the conquest of Cyrus; and was further accomplished by Darius, about eighteen years after, by a yet greater destruction, wherein it was brought much nearer to utter desolation; but it was about two hundred and twenty-three years after this, before the ruin of it was perfected, and the prophecies against it fully accomplished, in its being made an utter and perpetual desolation, without any human inhabitant, becoming the dwelling-place for owls, dragons, and other doleful creatures. But yet when God had once begun to destroy her, he went on till he finished, and never suffered her any more to recover and establish her former empire. So the restitution of the Jewish church, after the Babylonish captivity, was by various steps; there were several times of return of the Jews from captivity, and several distinct decrees of the Persian emperors, for restoring and rebuilding Jerusalem, and re-establishing, the Jewish church and state. It was also done in turbulent times; there were great interruptions, checks, and violent oppositions, and times wherein the enemy did much prevail. But yet when God had once begun the work, he also made an end; he never suffered the enemies of the Jews to bring Jerusalem to such a state of desolation as it had been in before, till the promised restoration was complete. Again, the deliverance of God’s church from the oppression of Antiochus Epiphanes, (another known type of antichrist,) was gradual; they were first assisted a little by the Maccabees; afterwards, the promised deliverance was completed in the recovery of Jerusalem, the restoration of the temple, the miserable end of Antiochus, and the consequent more full deliverance of the whole land. But after God once began to appear for the help of his church in that instance, though it had seemed dead and past all hope, he never suffered Antiochus to prevail to that degree again. The utmost strength of this great monarch was used, from time to time, in order to it, and his vast empire was engaged against a handful that opposed them; yet God never forsook the work of his own hands; when he had begun to deliver his people, he also made an end. And so Haman, that proud and inveterate enemy of the Jews, who thought to extirpate the whole nation, (who also was probably another type of antichrist,) when he began to fell before Esther and Mordecai, never stayed, till his ruin and the church’s deliverance were complete; Haman’s wife speaks of it as an argument of his approaching inevitable full destruction, that he “had begun to fall,” Esth. vi. 16.

3. If antiChristian tyranny and darkness should hereafter so prevail against the protestant church the true religion and every thing appertaining to it as to bring things to the pass fore-mentioned, this would not so properly answer the prophecy of slaving the two witnesses; for doubtless, one reason why they are called two witnesses, is, that the number of witnesses for the truth was (though sufficient yet) very small. This was remarkably the case in the dark times of popery; but since the reformation, the number of those appearing on the side of true religion has not been so small. The visible church of Christ has been vastly large, in comparison of what it was before. The number of protestants has sometimes been thought nearly equal to that of the papists; and, doubtless, the number of true saints has been far greater than before.

4. It seems to be signified in prophecy, that after the reformation antichrist should never prevail against the church of Christ any more, as he had done before. I cannot but think, that whoever reads and well considers what the learned Mr. Lowman has written on the five first vials, (Rev. xvi.) in his late exposition on the Revelation, must think it to he very manifest, that what is said (ver. 10.) of the pouring out of the fifth vial on the throne of the beast (for so it is in the original) is a prophecy of the reformation. Then the vial of God’s wrath was poured out on the throne of the beast, i. e. according to the language of Scripture, on his authority and dominion, greatly to weaken and diminish it, both in extent and degree. But when this is represented in the prophecy, then it is added, “and his kingdom was full of darkness, and they gnawed their tongues for pain.” If we consider what is commonly intended by similar phrases in the Scripture, I think we shall be naturally, and as it were necessarily, led to understand those words thus: their policy, by which heretofore they have prevailed, shall now fail them; their authority shall be weakened, their dominion greatly diminished, and all their subtlety shall not avail them to support the throne of the beast, or even again to extend his authority so far as it had been before extended, and to recover what is lost. All their crafty devices to this end shall be attended with vexatious, tormenting disappointment; they who have the management of the beast’s kingdom, shall henceforward grope as in the dark, and stumble, and be confounded in their purposes, plots, and enterprises. Formerly their policy was greatly successful, as a light to guide them to their ends; but now their kingdom shall be full of darkness, and their wisdom shall fail them in all their devices to subdue the church of God.

The Scripture takes notice of the great policy and subtlety of the powers that support this kingdom, Dan. vii. 8. “And behold, in this horn were eves like the eyes of a man.” So it is said of Antiochus Epiphanes, that great type of antichrist, Dan. viii. 23. “A king of fierce countenance, and understanding dark sentences, shall stand up.” Ver. 25. “And through his policy also, shall he cause craft to prosper in his hand.” This understanding and policy is the light of this kingdom, as true wisdom is the light of the spiritual Jerusalem; and therefore, when the light fails, then may the kingdom of this spiritual Egypt be said to be full of darkness. God henceforward will defend his people from these mystical Egyptians, as he defended Israel of old from Pharaoh and his host, when pursuing after them, by placing a cloud and darkness in their way, and so not suffering them to come nigh. He will protect his church from the men of that city that is spiritually called Sodom, as Lot’s house, wherein were the angels, was defended from the men of Sodom, by their being; smitten with darkness or blindness, so that they wearied themselves to find the door; and as God defended the city in which was Elisha, the prophet and witness of the Lord, from the Syrians, when they compassed it about with horses and chariots, and a great host, to apprehend him, by smiting them with blindness. The Scripture teaches us, that God is wont in this way to defend his church and people from their crafty and powerful enemies; Job v. 11,. &c. “To set up on high those that be low, that those which mourn may be exalted to safety: he disappointeth the devices of the crafty, so that their hands cannot perform their enterprise: he taketh the wise in their own craftiness, and the counsel of the froward is carried headlong: they meet with darkness in the day-time, and grope in the noon-day as in the night; but he saveth the poor from the sword, from their mouth, and from the hand of the mighty.” (See also Psal. xxxv. 4, 6.) On account of such defence of God’s protestant church, with the disappointment and confusion of all the subtle devices, deep-laid schemes, and furious attempts of their antiChristian enemies, to root them out, while they see them still maintaining their ground, in spite of all they do, it makes them as it were gnash their teeth, and bite their tongues for mere rage and vexation; agreeably to Psal. cxxii. 9, 10. “His righteousness endureth for ever, his horn shall be exalted with honour: the wicked shall see it and be grieved, and gnash with his teeth and melt away: the desire of the wicked shall perish.”

Hitherto this prophecy has been very signally fulfilled; since the reformation, the kingdom of antichrist has been remarkably filled with darkness in this respect. Innumerable have been the crafty devices and great attempts of the church of Rome, wherein they have exerted their utmost policy and power, to recover their lost dominions, and again to subjugate the protestant nations the northern heresy, as they call it. They have wearied themselves in these endeavours for more than two hundred years past; but have hitherto been disappointed, and have often been strangely confounded. When their matters seemed to be brought to a degree of ripeness, and they triumphed as though their point was gained, their joy and triumph have suddenly turned into vexation and torment. How many have been their politic and powerful attempts against the protestant interest in our nation, in particular! And how wonderfully has God disappointed them from time to time! And as God has hitherto so remarkably fulfilled his word in defending his protestant church from antichrist, so I think we have ground to trust in him, that he will defend it to the end.

5. The hypothesis of those who suppose that the slaying of the witnesses yet remains to be fulfilled, makes the prophecies of the Revelation to be inconsistent one with another. According to their hypothesis, that battle (Rev. xi. 7.) wherein the beast makes war with the witnesses, overcomes, and kills them, is the last and greatest conflict between antichrist and the church of Christ, which is to precede the utter overthrow of the antiChristian kingdom. And they must suppose so; for they suppose that immediately after the sufferings the church shall endure in that war, she shall arise, and as it were ascend into heaven; i. e. as they interpret it, the church shall be directly advanced to her latter-day rest, prosperity, and glory. And consequently, this conflict must be the same with that great battle between antichrist and the church, described (chap. xvi. 13., to the end, and more largely chap. xix. 11., to the end. For that which is described in these places, is most indisputably the greatest and last conflict between the church and her antiChristian enemies; on which the utter downfall of antichrist, and the church’s advancement to her latter-day glory, shall be immediately consequent. And so the earthquake that attends the resurrection of the witnesses, chap. xi. 13. must be the same with that great earthquake described, chap. xvi. 18. And the falling of the tenth part of the city must be the same with that terrible and utter destruction of antichrist’s kingdom, chap. xvi. 17. to the end.

But these things cannot be. The battle, chap. xi. 7. cannot be the same with that last and great battle between the church and antichrist, described, chap. xvi. and xix. For the things that are said of one and the other, and their issue, are in no wise consistent. In that battle, chap. xi. the church of God conflicts with her enemies in sorrow, sackcloth, and blood: but in the other the matter is represented exceedingly otherwise; the church goes forth to fight with antichrist, not in sackcloth and blood, but clothed in white raiment, Christ himself before them, as their captain, going forth in great pomp and magnificence, upon a “white horse, and on his head many crowns, and on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, King of kings and Lord of lords. ” And the saints who follow so glorious a leader to this great battle, follow him on “white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean,” in garments of strength, joy, glory, and triumph; in the same kind of raiment that the saints appear in, when they are represented as triumphing with Christ, with palms in their hands,.chap. vii. 9. And the issue of the latter of these conflicts is quite the reverse of the former. In the battle, chap. xi. 7. “The beast makes war with the witnesses, and overcomes them, and kills them:” the same is foretold, Dan. vii. 21. “I beheld, and the same horn made war with the saints, and prevailed against them.” And Rev. xii. 7. “And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them.” But in the issue of that last and great battle, which the church shall have with her antiChristian enemies, the church shall OVERCOME THEM, AND KILL THEM; Rev. xvii. 14. “These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them; for he is Lord of lords, and King of kings; and they that are with him, are called, and chosen, and faithful,”

In the conflict that the beast shall have with the witnesses, the “beast kills them, and their dead bodies lie unburied;” as though they were to be meat for the beasts of the earth, and fowls of heaven: but in the last battle, it is represented that Christ and his church “shall slay their enemies, and give their dead bodies to be meat for the fowls of heaven.” (Chap. xix. 17,. &c.) There is no appearance, in the descriptions given of that last great battle, of any advantages gained in it by the enemies of the church, before they themselves are overcome; but all appearance of the contrary. The descriptions in the 16th and 19th chapters of the Revelation. will by means allow of such an advantage, as overcoming God’s people, and slaying them; their lying dead for some time, and unburied, that their dead bodies may be for their enemies to abuse, trample on, and make sport with. In chap. xvi. we read of their being gathered together against the church, a mighty host, into the place called Armageddon; and then the first thing we hear of, is, the pouring out of the seventh vial of God’s wrath, and a voice saying, “It is done.” And so in the 19th chap, we have an account of the “beast, and the kings of the earth, and their armies, being gathered together to make war against him that sat on the horse, and against his army.” And then the next thing we hear of, is, that the “beast is taken, and with him the false prophet; and that these are both cast alive into the lake of fire; and that the remnant of their vast army are slain, and all the fowls filled with their flesh.” The issue of the conflict of the beast with the witnesses, in the triumph of the church’s enemies over God’s people, looking on them as entirely vanquished, and their interest utterly ruined, past all recovery; “they that dwell on the earth shall see the dead bodies of the saints lying in the streets of the great city, and shall rejoice over them and make merry, and send gifts one to another.” But the issue of that great and last battle is quite the reverse; it is the church’s triumph over her enemies, as being utterly and for ever destroyed.

Upon the whole, I think there appears to be no reason from the prophecy concerning the two witnesses. Rev. xi. to expect any such general and terrible destruction of the church of Christ, before the utter downfall of antichrist, as some have supposed; but good reason to determine the contrary. It is true, there is abundant evidence in Scripture, that there is yet remaining a mighty conflict between the church and her enemies the most violent struggle of Satan and his adherents in opposition to true religion, and the most general commotion that ever was in the world, since the foundation of it to that time and many particular Christians may suffer hard things in this conflict But in the general, Satan and antichrist shall not get the victory, nor greatly prevail; on the contrary, they shall be entirely conquered, and utterly overthrown, in this great battle. So that I hope this prophecy of the slaying of the witnesses will not stand in the way of a compliance with the proposal made to us in the Memorial, as a prevalent objection and discouragement.