Thief in the Night or The Strange Case of the Missing Millennium
The strange case of the missing millennium
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- 3. The first promise
2. The strange case of the missing millenniumI soon discovered that the year 1844 figured more prominently in the calculations of millennial Bible scholars than any other year. Many of these students of Scripture, working independently of each other in separate continents, arrived at almost the identically same time for the return of Christ. It was the period 1843–5. Wolff in Asia, Edward Irving in England, Mason in Scotland, Davis in South Carolina, William Miller in Pennsylvania, Leonard H. Kelber in Germany, and many others in various parts of the world believed that this was indeed the ‘time of the end’.1 These Bible scholars did not all agree on the exact date, nor did they all explain the prophecies in a like manner. However, it was said of them: “… In America, Europe, and Asia the clear message of the ending of the prophetic time in 1844 was proclaimed with power by many voices.”2 Andrew Jackson Davis delivered 157 lectures in New York in 1845. Edgar Allen Poe attended regularly, and heard Davis foretell the time when travel advertisements would read, ‘Through to California in four days!’ Davis also foretold the future speed of air travel. He repeatedly lauded the wonder of the new age that was coming, calling it a material heaven that was a preparation for the spiritual kingdom. He said, “A glorious period is before mankind. … Fall in love with the new dispensation.”1 William Miller began lecturing in 1831 concerning the return of Christ. He declared that he couldn’t help himself, that a voice kept urging him on, saying, ‘Go tell the world.’ In 1832, he wrote: “The evidence flows from every quarter … Behold the Saviour comes!”2 Forman, in his Story of Prophecy says, “The causes for religious stirrings were at that period in the air and umbiquitous”.3 He points out that Emerson attended a convention on Universal Reform and himself commented on the wide variety of those present, from madmen to philosophers. In Emerson’s own words, they were “madmen, madwomen, men with beards, Dunkers, Uggletonians, Come-Outers, Groaners, Agrarians, Seventh-Day Baptists, Quakers, Abolitionists, Calvinists, Unitarians and Philosophers.”4 No wonder Clara Endicott Sears subtitled her book, A Strange Bit of History. Just as 1844 approached, a clergyman of the Church of England, Mourant Brock, made the following statement: “It is not merely in Great Britain that the expectation of the near return of the Redeemer is entertained, and the voice of warning raised, but also in America, India, and on the continent of Europe. In America about three hundred ministers of the Word are thus preaching this gospel of the kingdom; whilst in this country, about seven hundred of the Church of England are raising the same cry.”5 I realized that with over a thousand clergymen in two countries alone preaching the return of Christ at that period, The case of the missing millennium became a story well worth investigating further. W. A. Spicer, in Our Day in the Light of Prophecy, wrote: “Here and there students of the Word saw that the 2300 year period of Daniel 8:14, as explained in the ninth chapter, would end soon … and looked to the year 1844 as the time when the judgement would come.” Speaking of this unique convergence of prophecies upon the year 1844, Spicer wrote: “Witnesses were raised up in Europe, in Holland, Germany, Russia, and the Scandinavian countries. Joseph Wolff, the missionary to the Levant, preached in Greece, Palestine, Turkey, Afghanistan, and other regions, the coming of the judgement hour.” The millennial zeal reached its climax in the year 1844. I wanted to know exactly why. What had led all these people to the same year? I found the answer. This date in history had been chosen primarily because of three specific promises made by Christ Himself to His disciples. He gave three promises, saying that when these three things came to pass, He (Christ) would return to earth. The promises are as follows: 1. His Gospel would be preached everywhere on earth. 2. The ‘times of the Gentiles’ would be fulfilled, and the Jews would return to Israel (Palestine). 3. All mankind would see the ‘abomination of desolation’ foretold by Daniel the Prophet. My next step, therefore, was to take up these three promises in order, and to follow this clue to its conclusion. My plan was simple. I would (1) find each promise made by Christ in the Scriptures, (2) decide exactly what Christ had promised to His disciples, (3) determine if these three prophesies had actually been fulfilled, and (4) if they had been fulfilled, just when and how. I was no longer dealing with theory: I now had something specific to consider. 3. The first promiseThe first promise of Christ was easy to find. He made it to His disciples in direct reply to their questions. They asked Him: “Tell us, when shall these things be? And what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?”1 This verse is found in the twenty–fourth chapter of Matthew. Christ then gave His disciples in the following words: “But he that shall endure until the end, the same shall be saved. And this gospel of the Kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness … then shall the end come.”2 This was clear enough. The end would come, and Christ would return, when His Gospel was preached throughout the world. My next step was to discover when the Gospel of Christ was considered to have been preached throughout the world. A study of the spread of Christianity made by scholars of the 1840’s, convinced them that the message of Christ had, by their day, already encircled the globe. The Gospel was being taught in all the continents. By 1844 it was being taught even in the interior of Africa, not by solitary missionaries, but on an organized scale. A commercial history of East Africa states: “Christian missions began their activities amongst the African people in 1844.”1 Dr D. L. Leonard, historian of the Mission movement, in his A Hundred Years of Missions, says of the spread of the Word of Christ and His Gospel: “… for the first time since the apostolic period, (there) occurred an outburst of general missionary zeal and activity.” He is speaking of the last years of the eighteenth century, leading to the nineteenth century, to 1844, and beyond. “Beginning in Great Britain, it soon spread to the Continent and across the Atlantic. It was no mere push of fervour, but a mighty tide set in, which from that day to this has been steadily rising and spreading.” Another account states: “In 1804 the British and Foreign Bible Society was organised. Students of the prophetic word felt at the time that these agencies were coming in fulfilment of the prophecy.”2 This was a direct reference to the prophecy of Christ that He would return when His gospel was preached everywhere in the world. Before 1804, the Bible had already been printed and circulated in fifty languages. In 1816 the American Bible Society was formed. George Storrs in the newspaper, Midnight Cry, on 4 May 1843, stated that these two societies (British and American) with their innumerable branches were spreading the Gospel of Christ in every part of the world. G. S. Faber in Eight Dissertations, which was completed in the very year of greatest prophetic fervour, 1844, declares: “The stupendous endeavours of one gigantic community to convey the Scriptures in every language to every part of the globe may well deserve to be considered as an eminent sign even of these eventful times. Unless I be much mistaken, such endeavours are preparatory to the final grand diffusion of Christianity, which is the theme of so many inspired prophets, and which cannot be far distant in the present day.’ M. H. Goyer writes in his book on prophetic fulfilment: “The British and Foreign Bible Society (for one example) has issued, since its foundation in 1804, over 421 million copies of the Scriptures, in practically every country known throughout the globe.” In Our Day in the Light of Prophecy, Spicer wrote that the Gospel in his day had been spread ‘to ninety-five per cent of the inhabitants of the earth.’ He added: “It was in 1842 that five treaty-ports in China were open to commerce and to missions—advance steps in the opening of all China to the Gospel. In 1844 Turkey was prevailed upon to recognise the right of the Moslems to become Christians, reversing all Moslem tradition. In 1844 Alan Gardiner established the South American Mission. In 1842 Livingstone’s determination was formed to open the African interior.” Dr A. T. Pierson in Modern Mission Century wrote: “India, Siam, Burma, China, Japan, Turkey, Africa, Mexico, South America … were successively and successfully entered. Within five years, from 1853 to 1858, new facilities were given to the entrance and occupation of seven different countries, together embracing half the world’s population.” There were many additional references which made it clear that the Gospel of Christ, and its teachers, had entered every continent by the year 1844, spreading the Word of Jesus the Christ throughout the world. This was considered by the students of Scripture to be in exact fulfilment of the words of Christ given in Mark: “And the gospel must first be published among all nations.”1 In this same chapter, Christ warns that when this takes place: “Take ye heed, watch and pray: for ye know not when the time is.”1 When this Gospel is published in all nations, Christ again promises: “… then shall they see the Son of man coming in the clouds with great power and glory.”2 The millennial scholars of the 1840s felt that Christ’s first promise had been fulfilled. They felt it had been clearly demonstrated that the Gospel of Christ had been ‘preached in all the world for a witness’ and, therefore, the hour for His coming must now be at hand. I was convinced myself that the first promise of Christ had indeed been fulfilled by the year 1844. There could be no doubt of this. It was an interesting beginning. 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