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Spiritual Gifts, Volume 3
tion between the two classes in our Lord’s prayer.
John 17
. We reply
to this by quoting the words of our Lord in the original commission,
as follows; “And these signs shall follow them that believe.” or, as
Dr. Geo. Campbell translates, “These miraculous powers shall attend
the believers.” or, as Wakefield renders, “These signs will accompany
believers.” when it can be shown that to believe was required of the
first Christians only, then it may be proved that the gifts were for them
alone.
The gracious promise of our Lord in this commission, when He
says, “And lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world,”
is the strongest proof of the perpetuity of the gifts. He was not to be
personally with His people, no; but how was He to be with them? The
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inspired record states that after the Lord was received up into heaven,
“they went forth, and preached everywhere, the Lord working with
them, and confirming the word with signs following.”
This promise cannot be restricted to the lifetime of the chosen
twelve, nor to the Christians of the first century, for it extends to the
end of the world [aion] age. “Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the
end of the world,” to the end of the Christian age. If it be said that
the Jewish age is her meant, we reply, that dispensation closed with
the death of Christ, forty-two days before this commission was given.
We give two passages as proof.
Colossians 2:14
. “Blotting out the
hand-writing of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to
us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross.”
Daniel 9:27
. “In
the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and oblation to cease.”
This prophecy was fulfilled at the death of the Messiah, in the middle
of the last of the seventy weeks. There the Jewish typical sacrifices
ceased to be of any virtue, when the great antitypical sacrifice was
offered. Christ gave this commission just before His ascension,
Mark
16:19
, which was at least forty-two days after His crucifixion.
Again, to suppose that the end of the world here means the close
of the Jewish age, would be to carry back the gospel, with all the other
specifications in the commission, to the Jewish age, to close with that
dispensation, and leave the present without it. This view is too absurd
to need any further comment.
We now come to the testimony of Paul.
Ephesians 4:4-13
. “There
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is one body and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of
your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father