No. 16
A Sermon delivered by D. L. Moody, the Evangelist,at the Great Chicago Tabernacle, Jan. 5, 1877.Repeated in the Boston Tabernacle, April 29th.
In 2 Timothy, 3:16, Paul declares: "All scriptureis given by inspiration of God, and is profitablefor doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instructionin righteousness;" but there are some people who tellus when we take up prophecy that it is all very wellto be believed, but that there is no use in one tryingto understand it; these future events are things thatthe church does not agree about, and it is better to letthem alone, and deal only with those prophecieswhich have already been fulfilled. But Paul does nottalk that way; he says: "All scripture is ...profitable for doctrine." If these people are right, heought to have said: "Some scripture is profitable;but you can not understand the prophecies, so you hadbetter let them alone." If God did not mean tohave us study the prophecies, he would not have putthem in the Bible. Some of them are fulfilled, and heis at work fulfilling the rest, so that if we do notsee them all completed in this life, we shall in theworld to come.
I do not want to teach anything to-day dogmatically,on my own authority, but to my mind this preciousdoctrine--for such I must call it--of the return of theLord to this earth is taught in the New Testament asclearly as any other doctrine is; yet I was in thechurch fifteen or sixteen years before I ever heard asermon on it. There is hardly any church that doesnot make a great deal of baptism, but the New Testamentonly speaks about baptism thirteen times, whileit speaks of the return of our Lord fifty times;and yet the church has had very little to say about it.Now, I can see a reason for this: the devil does notwant us to see this truth, for nothing would wake upthe church so much. The moment a man takes holdof the truth that Jesus Christ is coming back again toreceive his friends to himself, this world loses its holdupon him; gas-stocks and water-stocks, and stocks inbanks and horse-railroads, are of very much less consequenceto him then. His heart is free, and he looksfor the blessed appearing of his Lord, who at hiscoming will take him into his blessed kingdom.
In 2 Peter 1:20, we read: "No prophecy of thescripture is of any private interpretation." Somepeople say: "O yes, the prophecies are all well enoughfor the priests and doctors, but not for the rank andfile of the church." But Peter says: "The prophecycame not by the will of man, but holy men spake asthey were moved by the Holy Ghost," and those menare the very ones who tell us of the return of ourLord. Look at Daniel 2:45, where he tells the meaningof that stone which the king saw in his dream thatwas cut out of the mountain without hands, and thatbroke in pieces the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver,and the gold. "The dream is certain and the interpretationthereof sure," says Daniel. Now we haveseen the fulfillment of that prophecy all but the closingpart of it. The kingdoms of Babylon and Medo-Persiaand Greece and Rome have all been broken inpieces, and now it only remains for this stone cut outof the mountain without hands to smite the image andbreak it in pieces till it becomes like the dust of thesummer threshing floor, and for this stone to becomea great mountain and fill the whole earth.
We are told how he is going to come. When thosedisciples stood looking up into heaven at the time ofhis ascension, there appeared two angels, who saidActs 1:11: "Ye men of Galilee, why stand