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GOD IN
EPIPHANY LIGHT
Scripture references are to the King James Version
(KJV)
Looking for that blessed
hope, and the glorious appearing of the
great God and our Saviour
Jesus Christ
Titus 2: 13
IF IT WERE true when Charles Dickens wrote about the ‘best of times and the worst of times’, perhaps his words are more apt in this high-speed, complicated twenty-first century.[fn1] This ‘modern’ world in which we live began with the dramatic wide-ranging re-development of the late 1700s, the beginning of a period styled by some dispensationalists as the ‘Time of the End’, after Daniel 12: 9:
But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.
According to this view, during this long period from 1799 to the present, Jehovah would prepare the world for eventual collapse in the time of ‘great tribulation’ of Matthew 24: 21. The years from 1775 to 1799 constituted a period of revolution: the War of American Independence (1775-1783), followed by the decade of the French Revolution (1789-1799). These events, by introducing a more or less radical approach to national governance, helped to shape the course of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, leading us to where we are now. The breaking away by the United States stimulated Britain to fortify its empire elsewhere and to consolidate its control in India, accruing the advantages of economic and military dominance. Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821) stabilised France after its revolution and proved an important factor in the dilution of papal authority. His various campaigns against the British and her allies had the unintended effect of cementing Britain’s dominance in world affairs.
Breaking New
Ground
The acceleration of the Industrial Revolution in Britain, then in Europe and North America, brought a new style of prosperity, rising levels of education and technical skills, and a growing urbanisation stimulated by the new railways, encouraging a massive migration of workers from field to town. The resulting dislocation and shift from an agrarian order to one run by and in the service of the machine was on a scale unlike anything seen before. Mushroom-like, wealthy industrialists and paupers sprang from the same economic soil, defining the social landscape which Dickens would immortalise in his novels.
The humane response to the distresses aggravated by these phenomena led to religious and secular movements intended to address the problems of overcrowding, pauperism, and ill-health. By the end of the 1800s there was a general expectation that a sort of utopia was nigh, a new order in which the peoples of the world would live in harmony, their daily routine simplified by the new labour-saving devices and the thousand-and-one innovations in science, engineering, philosophy, chemistry, medicine and hygiene.
The expectation was immature. The beginning of the Great War in 1914 shattered the naive hope. That gruesome, drawn-out conflict and its aftermath set in motion what we might term the second phase in the development of the modern world. The economic, social, and political upheavals, resulting in geographic re-alignments of national boundaries and the dissolution of established sovereignties and modes of governance, set the stage for the frenetic events of the 20s and 30s and the outbreak of another, bigger, ‘total’ war in 1939. The ending of the Second World War in 1945 introduced what might be termed the third phase in the development of the modern world, signalled – if any one event could be said to do so – by the introduction and use of the atomic bomb. The decades which followed have been overshadowed by the spectre of this weapon, and the dark fears of humanity have coagulated around it.
When I Was a
Lad
Lionel Bart’s popular British song of the 1950s declared that ‘Fings Ain’t Wot They Used to Be’, comically enumerating how old-fashioned virtues and simplicities had been displaced by the ‘modern’ and the sophisticated. It is the common lament of each one of us as we grow older that things are worse today than they used to be. In reality, conditions were rarely as good as nostalgia portrays them. As the old man said, ‘I never used to be what I thought I used to be.’ Vague pronouncements that conditions are intolerable and that terminal catastrophe lurks around the corner have been proven wrong many times. Human society is resilient, with a boundless capacity to adapt to radical alterations in the basic conditions.
Imagine that collective human suffering was graded on a scale of one to ten. No one at the time of the greatest difficulty can know what point of the scale he or she is at, but must base a judgement on a perceived tolerance for distress or, perhaps, on the sum of their worst fears. God has not granted us clear insight into the as-yet-unrevealed future. This is not to say that there is no limit and that society will not reach it. But it is apparent that it has not been reached. A hole in the house roof left unattended may one day, through the action of rain, snow, and infesting vermin, bring down the whole structure. But a sensible person will plug the hole long before that eventuality. So the world. There yet remains in society a recognition that problems must be tackled. As our Lord declared, the children of this generation (the world at large) are in many ways wiser than the children of light (Luke 16: 8).
At some point, however, the remedies employed to combat widespread social decay will be ineffective. From the Biblical standpoint we may be many years away from this outcome. Nonetheless, anecdoteses and statistics appear to join in broad agreement that the state of British society is less satisfactory than it used to be or ought to be. Nor is this disgruntlement confined to our own prosperous and beautiful country. Most Western nations are experiencing broadly similar upheavals.
The
Epiphany
The word ‘appearing’ in the Scripture at the head of this article (Titus 2: 13) is the translation of the Greek word, epiphaneia (‘epiphany’). Its basic meaning is that of ‘bright light’ or ‘manifestation’.[fn2] The Biblical context is that of the return of Christ in His Second Advent, and denotes His work in bringing to an open scrutiny things formerly hidden. The term may be applied both to a period of time and a process. In this article we will concentrate on the latter – the process – and the evidences for the assertion. However, we should not lose sight of the fact that this process would not be possible without the preceding events of history sketched above.
There are good reasons to believe that the times in which we live exemplify this Epiphany process more than any previous age. Though it is not possible to point to one single cause or event, the general results of this bright shining are radical, overturning long-held opinions, valued traditions, exposing falsehood, corruption, and casting doubt on all roots of authority. In short, it is iconoclastic – a destructive force, and will eventually lead to a dissolution of the prevailing order. The searchlight of the Epiphany shines on all. Today there is no question left unasked, no subject too cheeky, tawdry, vulgar, or obscene to be broached, dissected, deconstructed.
Nothing is too sacred to be investigated.
Not even God.
The New ABC: Anything But
Christianity
‘When the Son of Man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?’ So asked Jesus rhetorically (Luke 18: 8). There is a crisis of faith in this country. Not that Christianity is a spent force. It isn’t. There are many hundreds of thousands in this land who are passionate about their belief in God and in Christ as Saviour, and who have not bowed to Baal. But in the modern soil of cynicism, faith is a difficult plant to nurture and Christians will be severely tested.
Tinted as they were by the notions of Christianity, secular traditions in Britain and the Western world as a whole kept at bay a complete dissolution of morality and veneration for the sacred. An implied truce existed at the popular level whereby certain subjects were protected from mockery. The truce has been broken, and there is now a rising and unapologetic assault on the doctrines and virtues of the Christian faith.
Unpleasant this trend may be, but it is the logical outcome of the epiphany. No field of investigation will be overlooked, no stone unturned. To worry, for example, about the effects of pesticides on community health is to doubt the claims of the manufacturers. Subsequent recommendations to desist from or modify one’s use of such products is the result of inquiry – a welcome addition to the field of knowledge.
And so now, as in all departments of life, God and His ways are in the spotlight. The favourite question for the unbeliever is that of the permission of evil. ‘Why’, so the argument goes, ‘if God is good does He allow suffering and random destructive events?’
It’s not an unreasonable question to ask. It follows in a long train of such questions, many of them in the Bible, and from the friends of God. ‘Wilt thou also destroy the righteous with the wicked?’ (Abraham of God, Genesis 18: 23). ‘Why standest thou afar off, O Lord? why hidest thou thyself in times of trouble?’ (The psalmist of God, Psalm 10: 1). ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me’ (Jesus of God, Matthew 27: 46).
Doubt is not a sin. Faith is the satisfaction of doubts, the answer to questions asked.
God’s ways will be vindicated for all to see. The Almighty is self-sufficient and independent of all outside forces and influences and does not exist to please. He cannot be pressured to explain Himself on demand or to modify His plan to satisfy His critics, who queue up to condemn Him. Perhaps it’s not too much to assert that God’s humility is demonstrated in His willingness to be criticised and cross-examined, not only by His enemies, but also by His friends.
Hurry Up and
Wait
For the foreseeable future, Faith and Doubt must jostle uncomfortably side by side. And to what extent the unravelling of society will run before God says ‘enough’ is not for us to know. In every era there is an inclination to exaggerate the severity and variety of the difficulties on hand. We would do well to resist the temptation, lest we compound our dismay.
Our short lifespan tends to focus our attention on the more immediate, so troubles loom large when they are close. And without a thorough understanding of the past, and being unable to predict the future, we are often left confused as to where we stand in the stream of time. It’s unlikely that any one of us has been untroubled by such questions or the seemingly long delay in the setting up of God’s Kingdom on earth.
‘Surely I come quickly.’ So says Jesus (Revelation 22: 20). For Him to come quickly is to come without unnecessary delay or undue haste. On this fact we may rest with full assurance of faith.
____________
Notes
^[fn1] From the one-sentence
paragraph which begins A Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens
(1812-1870), published 1859: ‘It was the best of times, it was the worst of
times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch
of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was
the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair,
we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct
to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so
far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on
its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of
comparison only.’
^[fn2] Five other texts in the KJV New Testament also translate
epiphaneia as ‘appearing’: 1 Timothy 6: 14; 2 Timothy 1: 10; 4: 1, 8. It is rendered ‘brightness’ in 2 Thessalonians 2: 8. (See: Paul S.L. Johnson. 1938.
The Bible Epiphany (7- ). In The Epiphany’s Elect.
Philadelphia.)
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Copyright September 2009
ukbiblestudents.co.uk
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