The Great Controversy The Great Controversy | Page 667
In the presence of the assembled inhabitants of earth and heaven
the final coronation of the Son of God takes place. And now, invested
with supreme majesty and power, the King of kings pronounces sentence
upon the rebels against His government and executes justice upon those
who have transgressed His law and oppressed His people. Says the
prophet of God: “I saw a great white throne, and Him that sat on it, from
whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no
place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God;
and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the
book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were
written in the books, according to their works.” Revelation 20:11, 12.
As soon as the books of record are opened, and the eye of Jesus
looks upon the wicked, they are conscious of every sin which they have
ever committed. They see just where their feet diverged from the path of
purity and holiness, just how far pride and rebellion have carried them
in the violation of the law of God. The seductive temptations which they
encouraged by indulgence in sin, the blessings perverted, the messengers
of God despised, the warnings rejected, the waves of mercy beaten back
by the stubborn, unrepentant heart—all appear as if written in letters of
fire.
Above the throne is revealed the cross; and like a panoramic view
appear the scenes of Adam’s temptation and fall, and the successive
steps in the great plan of redemption. The Saviour’s lowly birth; His
early life of simplicity and obedience; His baptism in Jordan; the fast
and temptation in the wilderness; His public ministry, unfolding to
men heaven’s most precious blessings; the days crowded with deeds
of love and mercy, the nights of prayer and watching in the solitude
of the mountains; the plottings of envy, hate, and malice which repaid
His benefits; the awful, mysterious agony in Gethsemane beneath the
crushing weight of the sins of the whole world; His betrayal into the
hands of the murderous
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