And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go
up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he
will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of
Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.
And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people; and
they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into
pruninghooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither
shall they learn war any more."--Isaiah 2:2-4; Micah 4:1-4.
THE LIVING FIRST
[558]St. Paul emphatically states that the Lord Jesus shall judge the
quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom. (2 Timothy 4:1) In
this he is corroborated by St. Peter (1 Peter 4:5) The word _quick_ here
means the living, those who have some measure of life; and the text is
so rendered in the Weymouth translation. When the new covenant is made
and the Lord begins to deal with the people, it will be with the living
first. It would be unreasonable to suppose that he would first awaken
the dead and deal with them, and then with the living later. Jesus,
speaking of the great time of trouble with which the present world
reaches a final conclusion, indicated that many human beings will pass
through the trouble. (Matthew 24:21,22) The prophet Zechariah informs us
that a portion of the people will be brought through the fiery trouble,
and refined, and then will call upon the name of the Lord and he will
hear them.
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