o wait and watch for. The dead are already
passed into glory. They do not wait for the trump for their judgment and
blessedness."

But when about to leave His disciples, Jesus did not tell them that they
would soon come to Him. "I go to prepare a place for you," He said. "And
if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you
unto Myself."(970) And Paul tells us, further, that "the Lord Himself
shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the Archangel,
and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then
we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the
clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the
Lord." And he adds, "Comfort one another with these words."(971) How wide
the contrast between these words of comfort and those of the Universalist
minister previously quoted. The latter consoled the bereaved friends with
the assurance, that, however sinful the dead might have been, when he
breathed out his life here he was to be received among the angels. Paul
points his brethren to the future coming of the Lord, when the fetters of
the tomb shall be broken, and the "dead in Christ" shall be raised to
eternal life.

Before any can enter the mansions of the blest, their cases must be
investigated, and their characters and their deeds must pass in review
before God. All are to be judged according to the things written in the
books, and to be rewarded as their works have been. This judgment does not
take place at death. Mark the words of Paul: "He hath appointed a day, in
the which He will judge the world in righteousness by that Man whom He
hath ordained; whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that He
hath raised Him from the dead."(972) Here the apostle plainly stated that
a specified time, then future, had been fixed upon for the judgment of the
world.

Jude refers to the same period: "The angels which kept not their first
estate, but left their own habitation, He hath reserved in everlasting
chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day." And again he
quotes the words of Enoch: "Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of
His saints, to execute judgment upon all."(973) John declares that he "saw
the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened;
... and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the
books."(974)

But if the dead are already enjoying the b