Editorial December 29, 1917 Issue

The Second Coming

William P. McKenzie

This season and the thoughts mankind have been cherishing make it a suitable time to recall Mrs. Eddy's words (Miscellany, p. 122): "Beloved brethren, another Christmas has come and gone. Has it enabled us to know more of the healing Christ that saves from sickness and sin? Are we still searching diligently to find where the young child lies, and are we satisfied to know that our sense of Truth is not demoralized, finitized, cribbed, or cradled, but has risen to grasp the spiritual idea unenvironed by materiality?"

The disciples of Jesus made slow gains in understanding, but at last it seemed to dawn upon them that the kingdom of God would mean the presence and rule of the Christ, and the ending of earthly injustice and human animalism; so they asked of their Master, "What shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?" Warning them of the crowding deceptions of the eras to come, of misleading prophets, even of "false Christs" aiming to "deceive the very elect," he bade them no longer look for a Christ who could be "here" or "there." "If they shall say unto you, Behold, he is in the desert; go not forth: behold, he is in the secret chambers; believe it not. For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be." He who fulfilled the expectation of the prophet Isaiah, and, coming as the messenger of God, was "despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows," because he "carried our sorrows," looked forth and forward to the era when the spiritual idea would come as light; when the kingdom of God would be present with no outward show, except that men would cease to say "Lo here! or, lo there!" because they would find within consciousness divine enlightenment, and recognize Sonship with God.

Paul when he speaks to the Corinthians of their "waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ" uses in this one instance the same word that John uses when he speaks of "the Revelation of Jesus Christ;" but elsewhere when he speaks of Christ's coming the word means presence, as when he foretells the ending of the mystery of iniquity, saying, "Then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming." Here again is the victory of light proclaimed, and from this figure we are able to understand what Mrs. Eddy says in "A Christmas Sermon" (Miscellaneous Writings, p. 165): "The last appearing of Truth will be a wholly spiritual idea of God and of man, without the fetters of the flesh, or corporeality. This infinite idea of infinity will be, is, as eternal as its divine Principle. The daystar of this appearing is the light of Christian Science—the Science which rends the veil of the flesh from top to bottom. The light of this revelation leaves nothing that is material; neither darkness, doubt, disease, nor death."

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