Proclaiming the Blessings That Are Coming! -- By: Mal Couch
Journal: Conservative Theological Journal
Volume: CTJ 06:18 (Aug 2002)
Article: Proclaiming the Blessings That Are Coming!
Author: Mal Couch
CTJ 6:18 (August 2002) p. 146
Proclaiming the Blessings That Are Coming!
President, Tyndale Seminary
At the turn of the century the great dispensational Bible teachers roamed the land spreading the gospel of the Lord Jesus, and the anticipation of the blessed hope of His return to take believers home. These men taught in churches, at summer encampments, at youth retreats, in Bible institutes, and seminaries. Many were simply self-taught, like C. I. Scofield, and before him, D. L. Moody. But they were well self-educated. They had done their biblical homework. In a sense, they did an end-run around the stuffy seminaries and brought home to the average little Christian the great unfolding truths of the Word of God.
These men also inter-twined the message of salvation with exciting teachings on prophecy. Neither subject was simply an intellectual study, but a breath of fresh spiritual air that give meaning to life and eternity. We need to go back to this kind of fervor, spiritual warmth, and verse-by-verse study depth.
Recently I was stirred by a great chapter in Isaiah that I can imagine these men teaching. Isaiah 32 tells us, “Behold a king will reign righteously, and princes will rule justly” (v. 1), and each will be like “streams of water in a dry country.” Spiritual blindness and stubbornness will flee away when “the eyes of those who see will not be blinded, and the ears of those who hear will listen” (v. 3).
Before the kingdom of the Messiah arrives, evil will be rampant. Women will be complacent (v. 10), the land “of my people” will bring forth thorns and briars (v. 13), and the palace will be abandoned (v. 14). However, all will change with the Holy Spirit begins to move upon the Jewish people.
The Spirit of God “will be poured out upon us from on high, and the wilderness will become a fertile field” (v. 15) with righteousness and peace, quietness and confidence, security and rest (vv. 15–18). With a spiritual analogy, Isaiah says, “How
CTJ 6:18 (August 2002) p. 147
blessed will you be, you who sow [crops] beside and the [refreshing] waters!” (v. 20).
My great and godly Hebrew professor, Dr. Merrill F. Unger, wrote about this passage in his commentary:
The effect of righteousness, q...
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