On the Mount of Olives
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Christ? And from thousands of gatherings where men profess to hold
communion with departed spirits is not the call now heard, “Behold,
He is in the secret chambers”? This is the very claim that spiritism
puts forth. But what says Christ? “Believe it not. For as the lightning
cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also
the coming of the Son of man be.”
The Saviour gives signs of His coming, and more than this, He
fixes the time when the first of these signs shall appear: “Immediately
after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the
moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and
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the powers of the heavens shall be shaken: and then shall appear the
sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the
earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds
of heaven with power and great glory. And He shall send His angels
with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together His
elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.”
At the close of the great papal persecution, Christ declared, the sun
should be darkened, and the moon should not give her light. Next, the
stars should fall from heaven. And He says, “Learn a parable of the fig
tree; When his branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye know
that summer is nigh: so likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things,
know that He is near, even at the doors.”
Matthew 24:32, 33
, margin.
Christ has given signs of His coming. He declares that we may
know when He is near, even at the doors. He says of those who see
these signs, “This generation shall not pass, till all these things be
fulfilled.” These signs have appeared. Now we know of a surety that
the Lord’s coming is at hand. “Heaven and earth shall pass away,” He
says, “but My words shall not pass away.”
Christ is coming with clouds and with great glory. A multitude
of shining angels will attend Him. He will come to raise the dead,
and to change the living saints from glory to glory. He will come to
honor those who have loved Him, and kept His commandments, and
to take them to Himself. He has not forgotten them nor His promise.
There will be a relinking of the family chain. When we look upon
our dead, we may think of the morning when the trump of God shall
sound, when “the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be
changed.”
1 Corinthians 15:52
. A little longer, and we shall see the
King in His beauty. A little longer, and He will wipe all tears from