nd learn how they are
affected as this age progresses and nears its end.

+First+, as to the Lord Jesus Christ in glory. Enthroned in the
highest glory He can never be affected by what is going on down here.
Satan's power cannot reach Him. The Lord Jesus is the same, yesterday,
today, and forever. Whatever man does on earth, however great the
hatred may be against Him, even if the nations unite to cast off His
cords and bands, in the language of the second Psalm, "He that sitteth
in the heavens shall laugh at them and hold them in derision." But
there is a comforting truth in connection with this, the comfort of
which has been the blessed portion of all God's people as the age
progressed, and its true character became more and more known. "Saul,
Saul, why persecutest thou me," was the word the Lord Jesus addressed
to the persecutor of the Church of God. It shows His loving interest
and sympathy for His suffering members on earth. And so as the age
progressed in the pagan persecutions and the equally bad, if not worse,
Papal persecutions, He has sustained His people on earth, He has never
failed them, He has carried them through the water and through the
fire. He has presented their petitions before the Throne of God, and
answered their prayers. Nor will He ever fail His people until they
are gathered home into His presence, the trophies of His grace.

+Second+. Nor can the Holy Spirit and His work be affected by what the
progress of this age brings. He knows no failure. His Divine mission
cannot fail. In every generation during this age, no matter how dark
it may have been, He has continued successfully His work and added to
the Body of Christ, in each generation those who believed on the Son of
God.

+Third and Fourth+, as to the Gospel and the Truth of God it is
different, for we shall notice here at once what the progress of the
age has brought about in connection with what God has given to this
age. Our Lord tells us in the second parable, in Matthew xiii, that no
sooner had the wheat, the Truth, been sown in the field, which is the
world, but that an enemy came and sowed the tares. Then He revealed
this fact that the wheat and the tares were to grow together until the
harvest, which is the end of the age. There is then a development in
the progress of this age, a development in the wheat, which is ripening
for the harvest, and the development of the tares. The Truth is to
shine more brightly as