PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS, RELATIVE TO THE PLAN OF REVELATION IN contemplating the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, a careful observer will necessarily remark, not only an uniformity of design, but also one continued well organized system of conduct, established from the beginning of the world, and predicted to continue to the end of it. This authentic history of God's providence through. out, points with an uniform direction to one great object. It is kept constantly in view, amidst all the dark and mysterious, or bright and luminous conduct of the supreme and adorable Creator of the universe, relative to the government of the world; and the final disappointment and overthrow of the powers of darkness, in the restoration of our guilty race, to the favor of God our maker. If the scriptures be true, this can only be done by the establishment on earth of the glorious kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ, the mediator between God and man, on his second coming, to the glory of God C the Father, and the joy and comfort of his faithful people, of all nations, languages and tongues. To this end, all the vast apparatus of nature and providence, from the beginning of the world, has con stantly hastened.-All the partial or particular dispensations of the governor of the universe towards individual nations or people, have been merely so many necessary steps or means to elucidate, foretel, or accomplish this all important event. In short, to use the words of an eminent writer,* "the history of the Old and New Testament," hath a secondary or prophetical sense in many instances. Its great events, are signs and figures of things not seen as yet, and many of them are in force as such, at this hour.-Great things are still to be expected, of which we can form no conception, but as they are set before us in the figures of sacred history. God shall descend, and this earth be on fire; and the trumpet shall sound; and the tribes of mankind shall be assembled, as formerly the Jews were at Mount Horeb-" Distress shall come on a wicked world, when its iniquity shall be full, as destruction did on devoted Canaan, proud Babylon and apostate Jerusalem." In this world, the blessed Redeemer, God's only begotten son, the express image of his substance† * Jones. † Person, as mentioned in our translation, is certainly not the meaning of the Greek word Uposaseos. vide Parkh in loco and Campbell on the gospels, Diss. x. part v. Sec. 9, &c. received insult, contumely and reproach.—In this world, he was cruelly scourged, mocked at and spit upon-In this world, he was condemned at Pilate's bar as a common malefactor-crowned with a crown of thorns, and crucified between two thieves-In this world, since his resurrection and ascension, he hath been despised, rejected of men, crucified afresh, and his blood shed for the remission of the sins of ungrateful men, denied by those who profess his name, and treated as an unholy thing. How consonant to reason then is it? How analagous to all the dispensations of the righteous gov. ernor of the universe? How agreeable to the terms of the covenant of grace, and the promises to the suffering redeemer, that in this world, and by its redeemed inhabitants, for which he has given himself up to affliction and death, he should also receive honor and glory, power and dominion, homage and adoration? Thus he shall see the blessed effects of the travail of his soul and therewith be satisfied. The Lord Jesus Christ could only suffer in his human nature-He was never despised or rejected in heaven, as to his divinity-He was always, as God and the lamb, loved, adored and worshipped by all the heavenly host.-St. John, the beloved disciple, testifies, "that he heard the voice of many angels round about the throne; and the living creatures and the elders: and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, worthy is the lamb that was slain, to receive power and riches, and wisdom and strength, and honor and glory and blessing! and every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard he saying, blessing, and honor, and glory, and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the lamb for ever and ever!* And the four living creatures said amen! and the four and twenty elders fell down and worshipped him that liveth for ever"+-After this "he beheld and lo a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the lamb, clothed with white robes and palms in their hands, and cried with a loud voice saying, salvation to our God whe sitteth on the throne, and unto the Lamb.”‡ The angelic host esteemed it their highest honor to attend him, in his first advent in the flesh, to this our world; and did joyfully recount the glad tidings to the wondering shepherds of Bethlehem. They also, with wonder and amazement, attended his temptation in the wilderness; and comforted him in his agonies in the garden of Gethsemane. They devoutly attended his resurrection, and with hosanna's ascended with him' to glory. Indeed, legions of angels were always ready to obey his commands, * This is exactly the description given of the throne of God by Daniel. † Rev. v. 11. to end Ibid vii. 9 and 10, even while sojourning in the flesh. It was daily their anxious solicitude to look into the mysteries of his incarnation and sufferings. It was, then, in his flesh as mediator-as the substitute and propitiation for the sins of men, that he received all the obloquy and abuse. It was in the flesh he suffered and died. In the flesh, therefore, as our mediator and great high-priest-the captain of our salvation; and in this same rebellious world, and from this same guilty race, must he receive the glory, honor, power, majesty, praise and dominion, that are so justly due to him, for all that he has done and suffered for the sons and daughters of Adam. Hence we find the earliest dawn of grace and hope to our guilty and despairing first parents, was ushered in, though obscurely, with the blessed promise, that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head, while he should only bruise his heel. The next encouragement given to them, and which has been preserved on record by the apostle Jude, in his 14th and 15th verses, is more encouraging:-" And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold! the Lord cometh, with ten thousands of his saints, to execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of their ungodly deeds, which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches, which ungedly sinners have spoken against him." |