Baptist, by Christ and His disciples. This announcement was simple
and plain: "The kingdom is at hand." The expression "at hand" here used
is significant; indicating not necessarily the immediate future, though
the kingdom was definitely offered to that generation; but that the
earthly kingdom was the next event which had been clearly announced by
the prophets. When the Messiah had been positively rejected by the Jews,
He began, alone, without even the sympathy of His disciples, to unfold
this forthcoming mystery-age, which had been kept secret in the councils
of God, and which was more perfectly revealed to Paul, the first
messenger to the Gentiles. Of this revelation of a hitherto unknown age,
Paul writes in Eph. 3:1-11: "For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of
Jesus Christ for you Gentiles, if ye have heard of the dispensation of
the grace of God which is given to me to you-ward: how that by
revelation he made known unto me the mystery; (as I wrote afore in few
words, whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the
mystery of Christ) which in other ages was not made known unto the sons
of men, as it is now revealed unto His holy apostles and prophets by the
Spirit; that the Gentiles should be fellow-heirs, and of the same body,
and partakers of His promise in Christ by the gospel: whereof I was made
a minister, according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by
the effectual working of His power. Unto me, who am less than the least
of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the
Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ; and to make all men see what
is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world
hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ: to the
intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly _places_
might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, according to
the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord."

The same truth is emphasized in Rom. 16:25: "Now to him that is of power
to stablish you according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus
Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept
secret since the world began."

This new age of the Gentiles was also to have its hope centered in Jesus
Christ, but in His sacrificial death rather than His kingly reign. It
was to be an age in which the Gentiles were to be visited and a people
called out from them for His own Person (