CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX: Summing Up the Evidence of Volume I

In surveying so many centuries, from Old Testament prophecy to the Renaissance, this volume has necessarily hurried the reader by forced marches over too vast a territory to permit a proper perspective of the route that has led to the present point of vantage. After the journey from day to day through the underbrush of details, over rough trails, across plains where sometimes the track fades to almost invisible marks, up one path and then down another, we must look back to view the picture as a whole from the eminence on which we stand, and trace the towering peaks, the dark valleys, and the landmarks which show us the course of the trail from the beginning of the journey.PFF1 887.1

We have seen, to begin with, that prophecy is not simply a magic formula by which to foreknow or forecast coming events; it is a speaking for God. Sometimes the message from God involves no foretelling at all; sometimes it is of specific and immediate application. Sometimes it is an inspired pre view, in miniature, of major events in the divine plan of the ages, or the advance schedule of the master plan of redemption in action, centering around the two epochal advents of Christ: the first, which provides the divine sacrifice for sin and assures the redemption of man; and the second, which is to bring the plan of redemption to completion by the resurrection of the righteous dead and the translation of the righteous living, the eradication of sin and the inauguration of the reign of righteousness forevermore.PFF1 887.2