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 ) ' shall be increased .' Daniel 12:4 . Besides this , our Lord does not intend to say by this , that the approach of the time shall not be known , but that the exact ' day and hour knoweth no man .' Enough , He does say , shall be known by the signs of the times , to induce us to prepare for His coming , as Noah prepared the ark ." --Wolff, Researches and Missionary Labors , pages 404 , 405 .
Concerning the popular system of interpreting , or misinterpreting , the Scriptures , Wolff wrote : " The greater part of the Christian church have swerved from the plain sense of Scripture , and have turned to the phantomizing system of the Buddhists , who believe that the future happiness of mankind will consist in moving about in the air , and suppose that when they are reading Jews they must understand Gentiles ; and when they read Jerusalem , they must understand the church ; and if it is said earth , it means sky ; and for coming of the Lord they must understand the progress of the missionary societies ; and going up to the mountain of the Lord ' s house , signifies a grand class meeting of Methodists ." --Journal of the Rev . Joseph Wolff , page 96 .
During the twenty-four years from 1821 to 1845 , Wolff traveled extensively : in Africa , visiting Egypt and Abyssinia ; in Asia , traversing Palestine , Syria , Persia , Bokhara , and India .
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