THE PSALMIST'S REVELATION. 5. God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved: God shall help her, and that right early. PARALLEL PREDICTIONS. great multitude of fish, because these waters shall come thither: for they shall be healed; and every thing shall live whither the river cometh. And by the river upon the bank thereof, on this side and on that side, shall grow all trees for meat, whose leaf shall not fade, neither shall the fruit thereof be consumed it shall bring forth new fruit according to his months, because their waters they issued out of the sanctuary: and the fruit thereof shall be for meat, and the leaf thereof for medicine. Ezek. xlvii. 1, 9, 12. And it shall be in that day, that living waters shall go out from Jerusalem; half of them toward the former sea, and half of them toward the hinder sea; in summer, and in winter shall it be. Zech. xiv. 8. They shall call thee, The city of the Lord, The Zion of the Holy One of Israel. Isaiah lx. 14. Glorious things are spoken of thee, O city of God. Psalm lxxxvii. 3. And he said unto me, Son of man, the place of my throne, and the place of the soles of my feet, when I shall dwell in the midst of the children of Israel for ever, and my holy name shall the house of Israel no more defile. Ezek. xliii. 7. Thus saith the Lord, I am returned unto Zion, and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem. Zech. viii. 3. Look upon Zion, the city of our solemnities thine eyes shall see Jerusalem a quiet habitation, a tabernacle that shall not be taken down; not one of the stakes thereof shall ever be removed, neither shall any of the cords thereof be broken. Isaiah xxxiii. 20. Behold, all they that were incensed against thee shall be ashamed and confounded: they shall be as nothing; and they that strive with thee shall perish. For I the Lord thy God will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not, I will help thee. Fear not, PARALLEL PREDICTIONS. thou worm Jacob, and ye men of Israel; I will help thee, saith the Lord, and thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel. Isaiah lxi. 11, 13, 14. Therefore thus saith the Lord God; Surely in the fire of my jealousy have I spoken against the residue of the heathen, and against all I dumea, which have appointed my land into their possession with the joy of all their heart, with despiteful minds to cast it out for a prey. Therefore thus saith the Lord God; I have lifted up mine hand, Surely the heathen that are about you, they shall bear their shame. Ezek. xxxvi. 5, 7. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. Matt. xxiv. 7. The Lord shall roar from on high, and utter his voice from his holy habitation; he shall give a shout, as they that tread the grapes, against all the inhabitants of the earth. Jer. xxv. 30. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up. 2 Peter iii. 10. But thou, Israel, art my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraham my friend. Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness. Isaiah xli. 8, 10. Come near, ye nations, to hear; and hearken, ye people: let the earth hear, and all that is therein; the world, and all things that come forth of it. Isaiah xxxiv. 1. Behold, the Lord maketh the earth empty, and maketh it waste, and turneth it upside down, and scattereth abroad the inhabitants thereof. The land shall be utterly emptied, and THE PSALMIST'S REVELATION. 9. He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth; he breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; he burneth the chariot in the fire. 10. Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth. PARALLEL PREDICTIONS. utterly spoiled for the Lord hath spoken this word. Isaiah xxiv. 1, 3. And they shall beat their swords into plough-shares, and their spears into pruning-hooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. Isaiah ii. 4. They that dwell in the cities of Israel shall go forth, and shall set on fire and burn the weapons, both the shields and the bucklers, the bows and the arrows, and the hand-staves, and the spears, and they shall burn them with fire seven years: So that they shall take no wood out of the field, neither cut down any out of the forests; for they shall burn the weapons with fire. Ezek. xxxix. 9, 10. So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the Lord, the Holy One of Israel. And I will set my glory among the heathen, and all the heathen shall see my judgment that I have executed, and my hand that I have laid upon them. So the house of Israel shall know that I am the Lord their God from that day and forward. Ezek. xxxix. 7, 21, 22. A. A. THE SPIRITUAL OBSERVANCE OF THE LORD'S DAY. BY THE REV. EDWARD BICKERTETH, RECTOR OF WATTON, HERTS. THE Lord's Day is a beautiful and endearing title given to the Christian Sabbath in the New Testament. This title is recorded on a most interesting occasion. The Apostle John was banished by the Emperor Domitian to the Isle of Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ. While thus suffering for the truth, it pleased the Lord Jesus, who always regards his suffering people with special kindness, to favour him with those sublime and glorious visions of all that should happen to his Church, till its full and everlasting triumph, which we have recorded in the book of Revelation. These visions were revealed to him when he was "in the Spirit, on the Lord's Day." He was brought, that is, under the immediate impulse of the spirit of prophecy; as we read afterwards, the voice as it were of a Trumpet talking with him, said "Come up hither, and I will shew thee things which must be hereafter; and immediately I was in the Spirit." The Holy Ghost thus honoured the Lord's day by communicating upon it those invaluable prophecies-prophecies so to be studied by us, that He has begun and closed the Book of Revelation with promising the Divine blessing (Rev. i. 3; xxii. 7,) on reading and keeping them. Let us consider, 1. THIS PECULIAR TITLE GIVEN TO THE SABBATH : THE LORD'S DAY. It cannot here mean the great and final day of the Lord's Advent, anticipated; the words which immediately follow shew that the instruction was adopted to the state, and suited to the circumstances, of the then existing Churches in Asia. The expression kuplakî is peculiar, and applied only in the New Testament to the Lord's Day and the Lord's Supper. It points out to us an ordinance set apart by the authority, and for the special honour of our Redeemer. Thus it signifies to us the passing away of the peculiarities of the Jewish Sabbath. Ths Sabbath day was indeed appointed at the creation, and made thus universally obligatory on every human being. But when the law of Moses was given for the Jewish nation under peculiar circumstances, in addition to the explicit command of the Sabbath, as a moral duty included in the Ten Commandments, there were special directions as to their observance of it: which were of a positive character, imposed by the command of the great lawgiver with reference to that particular nation. As the Sabbath was made for man, and not for the Jews only, and as it is natural and reasonable that we should give portions of our time to the worship of God, it is a natural and moral law. As to the appointment of the particular day, it was positive and changeable; and the Son of Man, who is Lord of the Sabbath, has in this particular changed it, and so made the peculiarities of the Jewish Sabbath no longer binding. (Exod. xxxv. 2, 3. Numb. xv. 30-35. Psalm cxviii. 22-24. Acts xx. 7. Gal. iv. 10. Col. ii. 16.) But the commandment of the Sabbath as a natural and moral law, given at the creation, has never been repealed. It was spoken by the mouth |