CHRIST’S SECOND ADVENT

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIV, 23 February 1931, Page 2

CHRIST’S SECOND ADVENT

LANTERN TALK BY MR FRANK VARLEY Marsden Church Hail held a large and apparently deeply interested audience of persons representative of all evangelical congregations in Nelson to hear the first of Mr Frank Varley’s lantern talks on Christ’s Second Advent. Lieut. Col. E. Bisset occupied the chair, and after prayer briefly introduced the speaker. Mr Holland led the singing and effectively rendered a solo “One Day,” the audience joining in the chorus. Mr Varley’s talk began with two extracts from Scriptures thrown on the screen from John 14 and Acts 1. The first of these was Christ’s own promise that He would come again, and the second the message of the angels immediately after the Ascension. Mr Varley said he did not propose to attempt to debate the truth of the Second Advent. He would no more do that than argue as to the fact of the first Advent. Both advents were clearly revealed in Scripture, and as a reverent believer in the full authority and integrity of the Whole Bible as the Word of God, he accepted its statements as true, and looked for the fulfilment of its promises.

There was no doubt that the world as a whole was in very serious trouble. Look where we would, nations everywhere were confronted with problems that seemed to threaten their very foundations, and concerning which no solution was apparent. Before the war, there was in many quarters an optimism which had very slender foundation. Some were foolish enough to say the Millenium had already begun. But there came the awful four and a-half years of bloody warfare, and ever since there had been trouble on trouble, until the nations were almost at their wits’ end. To-day’s outlook was dark, but he (Mr Varley) was not pessimistic as to the issue. Earth’s golden age would come, not by the wit and device of man, or the wisdom of the League of Nations. No man or company of men could grapple successfully with to-day’s world conditions. There was only One who -was strong and wise and good enough to put things right and that One was the Lord Jesus Christ, the Divinely appointed Blessed and only Potentate, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. What the Bible called the times of the restitution of all things would come when Jesus Christ took His great power and reigned. This w T as no mere flight of imagination, It was truth revealed in the Word of God, and was as certain as the Throne of God Himself. Mr Varley said it was good to remember that God was still on the Throne of His Omnipotence. He was the Sovereign Lord. He had not abdicated the Throne of the Universe, and though at times it almost seemed as though Satan and his evil work had triumphed, yet the ultimate victory of God and righteousness was never for a moment to be questioned.

Mr Varley proceeded to show from a chart thrown upon the screen how since the creation God had for nearly 6000 years past dealt with man in successive dispensations. There was first the age of innocence, which terminated with the sin of our first parents, and the judgment of their expulsion from the Garden of Eden. Mr Varley accepts the literal story of Genesis without question. Then came the age of conscience,‘‘‘terminated by the judgment of the worldwide flood. Long before God gave to Israel the Ten Commandments, He established three statutes for the race, in the sanctity of the sabbath, of marriage, and of human life—three statutes, said the speaker, which were becoming almost a dead letter in the world to-day. Then came the Jewish age terminated by the world-wide dispersion of the chosen people, and the destruction of Jerusalem. Some 2500 years ago, God transferred world sovereignty into the hands of Gentile nations, and so it continued till this day. Jesus Christ had named this age as the “Times of the Gentiles.” The next age was the Millenial age, the earthly reign of Christ. This present age would, like all the others, end in world-wide judgment, ushering in the blessedness which would cover the whole earth when Jesus Christ returned with glory and majesty. Mr Varley briefly traced from Scripture the course of Gentile dominion through successive world empires from the time of Nebuchadnezzar down to our own day, showing how there was to come a revival of the Roman Empire, a Federation of Ten Kingdoms, under the last and greatest and most terrible of world monarchs the awful being named in Scripture as the Antichrist, the Satanic counterfeit of the Christ of God. In concluding his talk, Mr Varley briefly leferred to the Great Tribulation which should come in the last days of this age, followed by the overthrow of the world armies under Antichrist, and the triumph of the Host of Heaven under the Lord Jesus Christ, Thus should earth’s golden age be inaugurated. Mr Varley will continue his lantern talks to-night, to-morrow and Wednesday. To-night’s subject is “The Next Great Event.” To-morrow, he will speak on “The Jew—a World Portent,” concluding on Wednesday evening with “Present- Day Signs.”