The European Union in Prophecy The EU in Prophecy I | Page 286
The European Union in Prophecy
with grief," he saw that the prophecies bring to view with equal clearness His second
advent with power and glory. And while he sought to lead his people to Jesus of
Nazareth as the Promised One, and to point them to His first coming in humiliation
as a sacrifice for the sins of men, he taught them also of His second coming as a king
and deliverer.
"Jesus of Nazareth, the true Messiah," he said, "whose hands and feet were
pierced, who was brought like a lamb to the slaughter, who was the Man of Sorrows
and acquainted with grief, who after the scepter was taken from Judah, and the
legislative power from between his feet, came the first time; shall come the second
time in the clouds of heaven, and with the trump of the Archangel" (Joseph Wolff,
Researches and Missionary Labors, page 62) "and shall stand upon the Mount of
Olives; and that dominion, once consigned to Adam over the creation, and forfeited by
him (Genesis 1:26; 3:17), shall be given to Jesus. He shall be king over all the earth.
The groanings and lamentations of the creation shall cease, but songs of praises and
thanksgivings shall be heard. ... When Jesus comes in the glory of His Father, with
the holy angels,... the dead believers shall rise first. 1 Thessalonians 4:16; 1
Corinthians 15:32. This is what we Christians call the first resurrection. Then the
animal kingdom shall change its nature (Isaiah 11:6-9), and be subdued unto Jesus.
Psalm 8. Universal peace shall prevail."-- Journal of the Rev. Joseph Wolff, pages 378,
379. "The Lord again shall look down upon the earth, and say, 'Behold, it is very
good.'"-- Ibid., page 294.
Wolff believed the coming of the Lord to be at hand, his interpretation of the
prophetic periods placing the great consummation within a very few years of the time
pointed out by Miller. To those who urged from the scripture, "Of that day and hour
knoweth no man," that men are to know nothing concerning the nearness of the
advent, Wolff replied: "Did our Lord say that that day and hour should never be known?
Did He not give us signs of the times, in order that we may know at least the approach
of His coming, as one knows the approach of the summer by the fig tree putting forth
its leaves? Matthew 24:32. Are we never to know that period, whilst He Himself
exhorteth us not only to read Daniel the prophet, but to understand it? and in that
very Daniel, where it is said that the words were shut up to the time of the end (which
was the case in his time), and that 'many shall run to and fro' (a Hebrew expression
for observing and thinking upon the time), 'and knowledge' (regarding that time)
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