PROPHETIC NOTES

 

100 Year Old Reprint from Word and Work April, 1916 Issue

Now and then someone expatiates on the fact that the word “millennialism” is not in the Bible. It certainly is not. Nor is the word “century,” or “decade;” nor the expression “Patriarchal dispensation,” nor “Jewish dispensation,” nor “Christian dispensation” nor is the phrase “The Great Commission” found in the Book. But the exact ideas for which these words stand are found there.

To a man who contended that the word “Immersion” is not in the Bible, a wise brother replied, “Ί will not insist on your being “immersed” either: only see that you go “down into the water;” that you are “buried;” that you “rise,” that your body is “washed with pure water,” and that you “come up out of the water”— that is quite sufficient.”

So, if any brethren should stumble at the word millennium, we can call it “the thousand years” for them (Rev. 20 : l – 7 ) . And instead of “pre-millennial,” we can say “before the thousand years;” and instead of “post-

millennial”— “after the thousand years are finished.” Will that help any?

I believe it was John McNeill who thundered (from his pulpit) at some of the old standbys: “Brethren, if you don’t loosen up a little I ’m going to throw something at you. No man is as good as you are trying to look!”

Pre- and Post ? Are you a Premillennialist or a Post-millennialist? My brother, are you an Immersionist, or an Affusionist? You say “neither?” But unless you deny baptism entirely, you are one or the other. Nor would it help you to disclaim those terms, for they stand for facts. So likewise unless a man deny the Millennium entirely, he is bound to believe either that Christ comes before or after that era; and in denying the one he subscribes to the other. Nor is the term “Premillennialist” a sectarian designation— no more than the term

“Imm ersionist;” or, for that matter, such terms as truth seekers, Bible readers, etc. It is only when such terms (or any Bible terms, even the name “ Christian” itself) are applied in a sectarian and proprietary sense, that they

become sectarian proper names, and lose their simple original meaning.

“I Know Him Not.”  “I know nothing about prophecy,” you say? And why not?  Is it that you have ignored it? And do you mean that you do not intend to know anything about it? Did you fear it would involve you in a controversy? Or have you some notions of your own that will not bear day-light? Or are you afraid you may be

discredited by some? It sounds like an echo of “I know not the Man.” May it be that some today are again ashamed of Him and of His words in the midst of an evil generation?

A man may know but little about it— but let him love God’s word and seek and rejoice and speak it— just to the limit of all God says, which is sufficient; but that much without fear or favor. For God may hold us not only for what we know, but for what we might have known had we not for one motive or another closed our minds.

No New Thing. How did the blind leaders of Ezekiel’s day break the force of his prophecies? Precisely as it is done today. They made two points: 1. The fulfilment is not imminent, or of immediate importance. “He speaketh of many days to come.” (Ezek. 12:23-2 7 ).  2. I t is all “highly figurative.” Nobody in the world can

understand it until after  it has come to pass. It is all “speculation.” See how the wearied prophet, when he had uttered his prediction against “the forest of the South,” turned to God with a sigh: “Ah Lord Jehovah, behold they say of me, Is he not a speaker of parables?” (Ezek. 2 0 :4 9 ) . The flesh can invent no new ways to evade the word of God.

-Robert H Boll, was Editor of Word and Work 1916-1956