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The Secret and Imminent
Coming of Christ

"Behold I come as a thief." (Revelation 16: 15.)

"Behold he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him." (Revelation 1:7.)

In the first text the Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ is compared to that of a thief who comes secretly and of course unseen. The other is a declaration that He will come publicly and be visible to all.

The texts appear to contradict each other. Actually, they do not. Each is the description of a distinctive part of the Second Coming. The Second Coming of Christ has two well defined parts. In the one He comes secretly for His Church. In the other He comes publicly with His Church.

In presenting the theme I shall follow three lines of development:

The Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ while one great event is twofold in order: He will come for His Church and after an interval with His Church.

The Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ for the Church will be secret and is imminent.

As a Church we are to wait and be ready for the secret, and imminent Coming of the Lord.

I. The Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ while one great event, is twofold in order. He will come FOR His Church and after an interval WITH His Church.

The twofold order of the Second Coming is set forth in type, symbol, parable, construction of Scripture, specially inspired words, direct declaration and scenic illustration.

It is set forth in such typical personal figures as Enoch, Noah, Lot, Joseph, Moses and Zipporah.

Enoch lived at a time antecedent to the flood when the sin, the iniquity and shame of the world rolled the slush and the slime of the festering, thick waves of an indescribable materialism over every possible foundation of righteousness. It

was a time of lawlessness, lechery, measureless violence and civilization, a civilization founded by Cain and set up in the blood of his murdered brother.

Although living in the midst of this civilization, violence, crime and lust; in an environment that made an appeal through every avenue of the senses to the flesh and to its innate desires for gratification, Enoch walked apart from it all. He lived, not merely a negative life, refusing to have fellowship with the world and walking apart from it; but, on the contrary, made his walk a positive and aggressive testimony against it; for three hundred years, which eventually swept all but eight persons into the uprising and irresistible tide of evil, he walked with God, went on with God, in God's way, taken up with the things of God, holding converse and intimate communion with God, pleasing God at every step till, at last, one day, he walked on so far and intimately with Him he found himself, suddenly, and without dying, in Heaven with God.

The Lord had translated Enoch from earth to Heaven.

The Church has been set up of God in a world of sin, a world which in proportion as it shall increase in knowledge, in wisdom, in culture and civilization, will repudiate the mind and thought of God and refuse to walk in His way.

The Church is not here to modify human nature, become a factor in its civilization, make the world a better world for the natural man to live in, or make the natural man a better man to live in the world.

The very name and title of the Church repudiate such an idea. The word, "church" signifies in its root meaning a body of persons called out and separated from the world, separated from it as a system whose principles and way are not the principles and way of the Spirit, but of the flesh.

By its constitution and calling the Church is here to protest against the world, and no matter how refined and beautiful that world may become, no matter how efficient as a system, to protest against it and refuse its civilization.

The Church like Enoch is to walk the path of separation, to walk with God, to be taken up with the things of God and to live such a

heavenly life, a life of obedience and guidance by the Spirit, that man shall see in that Church the manifestation and revelation of God, and receive from it the impact of divine power and presence; in short, the Church is here to be a spiritual light in spiritual darkness, and the voice of God warning the world against the evil of its way, the certainty of coming judgment and inviting men to faith in a crucified and risen Christ as the only path by which the sons of men may find the Fatherhood of God and life eternal.

The course of the Church has its limit. Christianity was never intended to be permanent in the world. Like Enoch the Church will be translated, the dead in Christ will be raised, the living will be changed and together caught up to meet the Lord. The Church will be taken into the place the Lord has gone to prepare and will be at home in Heaven with Him.

Noah was a preacher of righteousness. The Spirit was his coadjutor. For one hundred and twenty years he strove with men. Under detailed instructions from the Lord he builded an ark for the saving of his household. It was a

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