THE SAINTS JUDGE THE WORLD
THE SAINTS JUDGE THE WORLD
We have already seen that the Lord says, “I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also” John 14: 3); and this is what will take place, either by resurrection, or by being changed; for “we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,” 1 Corinthians 15: 51. This is the entrance of the church into glory, as we are taught in detail by 1 Thessalonians 4: 16, 17: “The Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”
One may read in Revelation 19 the description of this scene — the marriage supper of the Lamb, and the subsequent judgment of the earth, or at least of the heads of the antichristian revolt. This judgment is again described in more general terms in Jude 14, 15: “Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, to execute judgment,” etc.; and in Zechariah 14: 5, it is said, “The Lord my God shall come, and all the saints with thee.”
How blessed the time when Christ shall have presented the church to Himself, as a glorious spouse, “not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing!” Ephesians 5: 27. Clothed with the beauty and glory which belong to her, seeing in her Lord the beauty and glory of the Father, she is moreover associated with the glory of her Bridegroom in the power of that love wherewith He loved her, and in which He gave Himself for her, that she might be perfectly cleansed and made glorious with Him, even where He is; then manifested in glory, surrounded with honours such as He receives Himself; made partaker of all His glory, of that glory which the Father gave Him, that the world might know that the Father has loved her, as He has loved Him. Associated with the Lord of glory, the saints will judge angels and the world; they will be the servants and instruments who will dispense the light and the blessings of His kingdom over an earth delivered of all its sorrows, and where Satan is no longer. “For unto the angels hath he not put in subjection the world to come, whereof we speak,” Hebrews 2: 5. “They which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world [age]” to come, “and the resurrection from the dead,” can die no more; Luke 20: 35, 36. “On such the second death hath no power,” but they live and reign with Christ a thousand years; Revelation 20: 6. Happy those believers!
[p. 276] At the coming of Christ, these (already risen as to their souls) will rise as regards their bodies, by His Spirit that dwells in them; Romans 8: 11. This is that resurrection — not of judgment, but of life (John 5: 29) — which belongs to the church in virtue of her union with Christ by the Holy Ghost. It cannot therefore concern the wicked; although they also must be raised up in their own time by the word of Christ, but to be judged. Those who belong to Christ will be raised at His coming; as for the rest of the dead, their resurrection will take place when Christ, after having delivered up the kingdom, will be seated, as Son of man, on the great white throne, to judge the dead, when the earth and the heaven have fled away before His face; Revelation 20: 11.
Such is the teaching of the word of God. The taking possession of the kingdom by Christ is described in Daniel; but to treat this subject would lead to our second part, the earthly glory: we shall therefore lay it aside for the present. Our only desire here was to shew the place which the church occupies in this scene, and the connection which exists in Scripture between that doctrine — well understood — and the most fundamental and comforting truths which form the hope and the joy of the believer.