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Chapter 28—Facing Our Life Record
“I beheld till thrones were placed, and One that was ancient of
days did sit: his raiment was white as snow, and the hair of his head
like pure wool; his throne was fiery flames, and the wheels thereof
burning fire. A fiery stream issued and came forth from before him:
thousands of thousands ministered unto him, and ten thousand times
ten thousand stood before him: the judgment was set, and the books
were opened.”
Daniel 7:9, 10
, R.V.
Thus was presented to Daniel’s vision the great day when the
lives of men pass in review before the Judge of all the earth. The
Ancient of Days is God the Father. He, the source of all being, the
fountain of all law, is to preside in the judgment. And holy angels as
ministers and witnesses, attend.
“And, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of
heaven, and came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought him near
before him. And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a
kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him:
his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away.”
Daniel 7:13, 14
.
The coming of Christ here described is not His second coming
to the earth. He comes to the Ancient of Days in heaven to receive
a kingdom which will be given Him at the close of His work as
mediator. It is this coming, and not His second advent to the earth,
that was to take place at the termination of the 2300 days in 1844.
Our great High Priest enters the holy of holies to engage in His last
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ministration in behalf of man.
In the typical service only those whose sins were transferred
to the sanctuary had a part in the Day of Atonement. So in the
great final atonement and investigative judgment the only cases
considered are those of the professed people of God. The judgment
of the wicked is a separate work at a later period. “Judgment must
begin at the house of God.”
1 Peter 4:17
.
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