Page:The Last Judgement and Second Coming of the Lord Illustrated.djvu/165

 dition of ungodly men." Although the Apostle in these words speaks in general terms, according to the letter of the Mosaic narrative, yet he recognises the spirit of it with great plainness; indeed, in another epistle he treats it as figurative. It is important to notice that he grounds his statements on the idea that the phenomena referred to were the results of the word of God. He declares that "the heavens which were of old, and the earth" were "by the word of God:" and goes on to say that "the heavens and the earth, which are now," are "by the same word." This perfectly agrees with the exclamation of the psalmist, "By the word of the Lord were the heavens made; and all the hosts of them by the breath of His mouth." But what are the heavens and the earth which the Word creates? Are they the natural things of the universe, or the spiritual things of the Church? About the origin of physical things we can know nothing; we know that they are, and believe that God created them, but beyond this the Scriptures do not furnish us with any information. That, in our opinion, is not the subject of Revelation. The assertion that the natural universe was made by a word, expresses an idea not to be comprehended. But about spiritual creation we can know something. The Scriptures provide us with a variety of statements concerning this important subject. That being, as we believe, the subject of the first chapter of Genesis, the assertion that the Church was made by the word of God is easily understood. Hence the creations effected by the Word are the living things of the Church. How plain is it to see that it was the word of God which created the Israelitish and Christian Churches; and doubtless it was the Divine word which created the religious dispensations that existed during the Adamic and Noetic periods. The