[132] Isa. lxiv. 1.
[133] Isa. xli. 2.
[134] Ezek. vi. 11; Matt. xxiv. 6-8.
[135] Isa. xxxii. 18.
[136] Lev. xxvi. 26.
[137] Ezek. iv. 16, 17.
[138] Comp. Matt. xx. 2.
[139] Ps. xxiii. 5.
[140] John x. 10.
[141] Ps. civ. 15.
[142] Ps. ix. 15.
[143] Lev. iv. 7.
[144] Comp. chaps. i. 2, 9; xi. 7; xii. 11, 17; xix. 10.
[145] Margin of Revised Version.
[146] Chap. iii. 4.
[147] Chap. iii. 5.
[148] Chap. iii. 18.
[149] Chap. xix. 8.
[150] Acts xiii. 39.
[151] Ps. li. 7.
[152] Isa. lxi. 10.
[153] Ezek. xxxvi. 25-29.
[154] Matt. xi. 11.
[155] Heb. xi. 39, 40.
[156] John viii. 56.
[157] 1 Pet. i. 8 (R.V., margin).
[158] Joel ii. 30, 31; iii. 15.
[159] Acts ii. 16-21.
[160] Haggai ii. 6, 7.
[161] Heb. xii. 25-29.
[162] Mal. iv. 1, 5; Mark ix. 11-13.
[163] Isa. ii. 19.
[164] Isa. xiii. 9, 10.
[165] Isa. xxxiv. 2, 4.
[166] Matt. xxiv. 29.
[167] _Lectures on the Revelation_, p. 170.
REV. vii.
Six of the seven Seals have been opened by the "Lamb," who is likewise the "Lion of the tribe of Judah." They have dealt, in brief but pregnant sentences, with the whole history of the Church and of the world throughout the Christian age. No details of history have indeed been spoken of, no particular wars, or famines, or pestilences, or slaughters, or preservations of the saints. Everything has been described in the most general terms. We have been invited to think only of the principles of the Divine government, but of these as the most sublime and, according to our own state of mind, the most alarming or the most consolatory principles that can engage the attention of men. God, has been the burden of the six Seals, is King over all the earth. Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? Why do they exalt themselves against the sovereign Ruler of the universe, who said to the Son of His love, when He made Him Head over all things for His Church, "Thou art My Son; this day have I begotten Thee;" "Rule Thou in the midst of Thine enemies"?[168] Listening to the voice of these Seals, we know that the world, with all its might, shall prevail neither against the Head nor against the members of the Body. Even when apparently successful it shall fight a losing battle. Even when apparently defeated Christ and they who are one with Him shall march to victory.
We are not to imagine that the Seals of chap. vi. follow one another in chronological succession, or that each of them belongs to a definite date. The Seer does not look forward to age succeeding age or century century. To him the whole period between the first and the second coming of Christ is but "a little time," and whatever is to happen in it "must shortly come to pass." In truth he can hardly be said to deal with the lapse of time at all. He deals with the essential characteristics of the Divine government in time, whether it be long or short. Shall the revolving years be in our sense short, these characteristics will nevertheless come forth with a clearness that shall leave man without excuse. Shall they be in our sense long, the unfolding of God's eternal plan will only be again and again made manifest. He with whom we have to do is without beginning of days or end of years, the _I am_, unchangeable both in the attributes of His own nature, and in the execution of His purposes for the world's redemption. Let us cast our eyes along the centuries that have passed away since Jesus died and rose again. They are full of one great lesson. At every point at which we pause we see the Son of God going forth conquering and to conquer. We see the world struggling against His righteousness, refusing to submit to it, and dooming itself in consequence to every form of woe. We see the children of God following a crucified Redeemer, but preserved, sustained, animated, their cross, like His, their crown. Finally, as we realize more and more deeply what is going on around us, we feel that we are in the midst of a great earthquake, that the sun and the moon have become black, and that the stars of heaven are falling to the earth; yet by the eye of faith we pierce the darkness, and where are all our adversaries? Where are the kings and the potentates, the rich and the powerful _of the earth_, of an ungodly and persecuting world? They have hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains; and we hear them say to the mountains and to the rocks, "Fall on us, and hide us from the face of Him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: for the great day of their wrath is come; and who is able to stand?"