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NASB | Ephesians 5:1 Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children; |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | Ephesians 5:1 Therefore become imitators of God [copy Him and follow His example], as well-beloved children [imitate their father]; |
Subject: there's many denomination yet 1 spirit |
Bible Note: The Millenarian Revival - Part 4 Several incidents before and after this visit seemed to confirm Scott's teaching. Two or three years earlier, Isabella Campbell, a young woman ill with the tuberculosis that took her life, Isabella Campbell, spontaneously burst forth in ecstatic speech in communion with God. After her death, her sister Mary began to look for the gifts of tongues and prophesy in order to equip her to do missionary work. In March of 1830 she spoke in tongues, and soon was added the gift of "automatic writing" (writing in strange characters with amazing speed while in a trance-like condition). News of these things spread like wildfire. And others also received the gift. A few miles from the Campbell home in Gare Loch, in the town of Port Glasgow lived the Macdonald family. The influence of Scott and Irving, and of another, Mcleod Campbell, had stirred up their expectations for the gifts as well. Margaret Macdonald was reportedly healed upon the command of her brother James. But before this took place, according to her narrative, she had lengthy visions of the end times. A record of these visions is given in Dave MacPherson's, The Unbelievable Pre-Trib Origin.18 The meaning of her recorded visions is at many points difficult to decipher because of the meandering style of her descriptions, but she seems to speak of a secret coming of the Lord for the saints that cannot be seen by the natural eye. She then speaks of the appearance of "THE WICKED" (one individual) "with all power and signs and lying wonders, so that if it were possible the very elect will be deceived." It is difficult to determine whether this one is to appear before or after the Lord comes for His own. Therefore it seems that MacPherson's thesis that this is the origin of the pre-trib rapture theory is surrounded by questions. He records a letter written by Francis Sitwell to his sister Mary in which Sitwell says he writes ". . . because the time of the world's doom draweth nigh . . . because the time of the sealing is come . . . because there is no safety where you are, because you cannot be sealed where you are, it is because if you are not sealed you must be left in tribulations, while those who have obeyed His voice shall be caught up to meet Him."19 MacPherson deduces from this letter that Sitwell wrote under the influence of Margaret Macdonald. But the letter was written in 1834 and by then the Powerscourt Conferences had occurred (1831 and 1833) at which the doctrine of the secret rapture had been given a considerable measure of acceptance. It is true that Irving was present at these conferences and may have passed on impressions received from the Macdonald visions, but it is also true that it was J. N. Darby who introduced this topic into the discussions. However, this is not the only theory that associates the beginning of the secret rapture theory with the charismatic revival of the early nineteenth century. In September of 1830 a party of Londoners was sent to examine the Gare Lock phenomena for themselves, and upon receiving their positive report, a number of people in Irving's church began praying for the same. In April of 1831 the answer came, when Mrs. J. B. Cardale "spoke in tongues." Soon others were the "gifted ones." S. P. Tregelles, known for his scholarship in the history of the Greek text, and one of the early leaders in the Brethren movement, tells us in The Hope of Christ's Second Coming (1864) that a secret coming of Christ had its origin in an "utterance" in Irving's church. He writes: I am not aware that there was any definite teaching that there should be a Secret Rapture of the Church at a secret meeting coming until this was given forth as an ‘utterance' in Mr. Irving's church from what was then received as being the voice of the Spirit. But whether anyone ever asserted such a thing or not it was from that supposed revelation that the modern doctrine and the modern phraseology respecting it arose.20 |