“Thine eyes shall see the King in His beauty: they shall behold the land that is very far off.” Isaiah xxxiii. 17.
1 Before Christ came, the faithful remnant of Israel were consoled with the promise that “their eyes should see” Him, who was to be their “salvation.” “Unto you that fear My Name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in His wings.” Yet it is observable that the prophecy, though cheering and encouraging, had with it something of an awful character too. First, it was said, “The Lord whom ye seek shall suddenly come to His Temple, even the messenger of the Covenant whom ye delight in.” Yet it is soon added, “But who may abide the day of His coming? and who shall stand when He appeareth? for He is like a refiner’s fire, and like fullers’ soap.” [Mal. iv. 2; iii. 1, 2.]
The same mixture of fear with comfort is found in the Disciples after His Resurrection. The women departed from the sepulchre “with fear and great joy.” They “trembled and were amazed: neither said they any thing to any man, for they were afraid.” The Apostles “were terrified and affrighted, and supposed that they had seen a spirit.” “They believed not for joy, and wondered.” And our Lord said to them, “Why are ye troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts?” On another occasion, “None of the disciples durst ask him, Who art thou? knowing that it was the Lord.” [Matt. xxviii. 8. Mark xvi. 8. Luke xxiv. 37, 38. John xxi. 12.] It might be from slowness to believe, or from misconception, or from the mere perplexity of amazement, but so it was; they exulted and they were awed.
Still more remarkable is the account of our Lord’s appearance to St. John in the Book of Revelation; more remarkable because St. John had no doubt or perplexity. Christ had ascended; the Apostle had received the gift of the Holy Ghost; yet he “fell at His feet as dead.”
This reflection leads us on to a parallel thought concerning the state and prospects of all Christians in every age. We too are looking out for Christ’s coming,—we are bid look out,—we are bid pray for it; and yet it is to be a time of judgment. It is to be the deliverance of all Saints from sin and sorrow for ever; yet they, every one of them, must undergo an awful trial. How then can any look forward to it with joy, not knowing (for no one knows) the certainty of his own salvation? And the difficulty is increased when we come to pray for it,—to pray for its coming soon: how can we pray that Christ would come, that the day of judgment would hasten, that His kingdom would come, that His kingdom may be at once,—may come on us this day or tomorrow,—when by so coming He would be shortening the time of our present life, and cut off those precious years given us for conversion, amendment, repentance and sanctification? Is there not an inconsistency in professing to wish our Judge already come, when we do not feel ourselves ready for Him? In what sense can we really and heartily pray that He would cut short the time, when our conscience tells us that, even were our life longest, we should have much to do in a few years?
I do not deny that there is some difficulty in the question, but surely not more so than there is on every side of us in religious matters. Religion has (as it were) its very life in what are paradoxes and contradictions in the eye of reason. It is a seeming inconsistency how we can pray for Christ’s coming, yet wishtime to “work out our salvation,” and “make our calling and election sure.” It was a seeming contradiction, how good men were to desire His first coming, yet be unable to abide it; how the Apostles feared, yet rejoiced after His resurrection. And so it is a paradox how the Christian should in all things be sorrowful yet always rejoicing, and dying yet living, and having nothing yet possessing all things. Such seeming contradictions arise from the want of depth in our minds to master the whole truth. We have not eyes keen enough to follow out the lines of God’s providence and will, which meet at length, though at first sight they seem parallel.
I will now try to explain how these opposite duties of fearing yet praying to have the sight of Christ are not necessarily inconsistent with each other. Why we should fear it, is not strange. Surely when a man gets himself steadily to contemplate a state of things beyond this life, he is in the way to be overpowered by the thoughts which throng upon him. How dreadful to the imagination is every scene of that unknown hereafter! This life indeed is full of dangers and pains, but we know what they are like; we do not know what shall be in the world to come. “Lord, whither goest Thou?” said the Apostles; “we know not whither Thou goest.” Supposing a man told that he should suddenly be carried off to some unknown globe in the heavens,—this is the kind of trouble in its least fearful shape, which the future presents, when dwelt upon. And still more trying is the peculiar prospect which presents itself of Christ’s coming in judgment. What a prospect, to be judged for all our doings by an unerring Judge. Try to trace back the history of your life in memory, and fancy every part of it confessed by you in words, put into words before some intimate friend, how great would be your shame! but how gladly would you in that day resign yourself to a disclosure to a fellow-sinner, how gladly to a disclosure to a world of sinners, compared with the presence of an All-holy, All-seeing Creator with His eyes upon you, “beholding you,” as the gospel speaks of Him in the days of His flesh,—and one deed of evil after another told forth, while all your best actions and best qualities fade away and become as discoloured and unsightly as if there were nothing good in them; and you the while uncertain how the decision shall be. I do not presume to say that all this will happen in detail; but this is what is meant by a judgment in the earthly sense of the word, and that awful trial is surely not called a judgment for nothing, but that we may gain some ideas from it. Think of all this, and you will not deny that the thought of standing before Christ is enough to make us tremble. And yet His presence is held out to us by Himself as the greatest of goods; all Christians are bound to pray for it, to pray for its hastening; to pray that we may speedily look on Him whom none can see “without holiness,” none but “the pure in heart;“—and now the question is, How can we pray for it with sincerity?