The Gospel age: Call and Trial of Christ’s “Body”

The Gospel Age is the continuation of the Jewish Age in point of time; yet there is great difference between them, even as the Grand Gallery which symbolizes the Age of Grace, although in direct upward continuation of the First Ascending Passage which symbolizes the Age of Bondage, differs from it in most other respects. We have already fully described the symbolism’s by which the Grand Gallery represents the upward walk of those who partake with Christ in the high-calling of God (See Vol. I, Pars. 199-209, On the Forum this can be found under, The Great Pyramid, Part 39), we now draw attention to the fact that the total length of this passage in Pyramid inches corroborates our understanding of the Scriptural teaching regarding the complete period of the Gospel Age.

There are two modes of entrance to the Grand Gallery. The most direct is the First Ascending Passage up which the people of Israel (“Israelite’s Indeed”), typically cleansed through the atonement-day sacrifices, are represented as going. Those who had faith in the ransom-sacrifice and thus received Jesus as their Savior passed directly from Moses into Christ. They accepted the special privilege of the Gospel Age (John 1:11-13) and, figuratively, followed Christ up the Grand Gallery. The majority of the nation, who rejected him, however, were turned aside into the Well-shaft; that is, because of their blind unbelief they lost the opportunity of the Age of Grace, and were cast into the hadean condition. (See number (1) at bottom of page)

The other way into the Grand Gallery is the Well-shaft, which symbolizes the death and resurrection, i.e., the ransom-sacrifice, of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is by this way, faith in the ransom-sacrifice that the Gentiles have passed from the Plane of Condemnation represented by the Descending Passage, up to the Plane of Human Perfection represented by the level of the Queen’s Chamber floor. They are not actually perfect, but are “justified by faith“, (Rom. 5:1) and “accepted in the beloved” (Eph. 1:6). If they now comply with the request to present their bodies a living sacrifice (Rom. 12:1), and so accept the “High-Calling,” they are urged to forget those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus (Phil. 3:13, 14). With the exception of these few followers of Christ, the whole world of mankind on their downward way pass the lower mouth of the Well, the ransom-sacrifice of Christ, without seeing it, or if they do they have no faith in it as a way of escape to the upper passages of life. To the Jew it is a cause of stumbling, and to the Gentile it appears to be foolishness (1 Cor. 1:23).

Jesus was called from his birth, in the sense that he was born into this world for the purpose of accepting the call to sacrifice when the due time should come; and this as we have seen was at his baptism (Sec. X, Part 14 of our study). But although the “Call” began there so far as Jesus was concerned, it was not until after his resurrection that the “new and living way” was opened up, first to the people of Israel, and afterwards to the Gentiles. Good men, like John the Baptist, who died prior to the actual payment of the ransom by means of the precious blood, could not have part in this high-calling (Matt. 11:11). It was not until Jesus ascended and presented the merit of his sacrifice to the Father, that the Call was extended to the members of the Body of Christ. The first to take advantage of the Call were the Disciples at Pentecost (Acts 2:1-18); and on these, in token of his acceptance of them, God poured out his Holy Spirit, just as 3½ years before he had poured it upon his beloved Son Jesus at Jordan. The exact day when the Holy Spirit first descended upon the members of Christ’s Body, was foreshadowed in the types of the law (Lev. 23:4-17).

The privilege to suffer with Jesus Christ and to be on trial for a place in the Body, which began to close in 1878 A.D., will continue until the last member has completed his course. (See number (2) at bottom of page) But with the completion of the membership of the Body, and the completion of their testing as to faithfulness unto death, and their exaltation with their Head, will come the conclusion of this Gospel Age. This, we believe, will coincide with the end of the “Times of the Gentiles,” Autumn of the year 1914 A.D. (See No. 3 on page 24, below).

The above paragraphs appeared in the 1913 edition of this 2nd volume. While we believe we are right in maintaining that all the members of the Body of Christ are not yet joined to their Head, Jesus Christ, in glory as spirit beings, their activity as “feet” members in publishing the glad tidings, in publishing salvation by proclaiming that “Millions now living will never die,” and in declaring that the reign of Christ is now begun, can be said to have been legally due since 1914 A.D. To quote the late C. T. Russell:

“It is to this mission of the feet or last members of the Church, who will declare upon the mountains (kingdoms) the reign of Christ begun, that (Isaiah 52:7) refers

“A great and important work, then, is given to the remaining members: Kingdom work it is indeed, and accompanied also by Kingdom joys and blessings. Although yet in the flesh and pursuing their appointed work at the expense of self-sacrifice, and in the face of much opposition, these are already entering into the joys of their Lord,—the joy of a full appreciation of the divine plan and of the privilege of working out that plan, and, in conjunction with their Lord and Redeemer, of offering everlasting life and blessings to all the families of the earth.”

We read that “the Lord knows them that are His.” From the date of our Lord’s death and resurrection, Spring of the year 33 A.D., till the date when he took up his great power and began to reign at the completion of the Seven Times of the Gentiles, Autumn 1914 A.D., is a period of 1881½ years. This period is corroborated by the total length of the Grand Gallery which represents the Gospel Age; for the Pyramid-inch distance along the floor-line, from the north wall which convincingly marks the date 33 A.D., up to the virtual floor-end at the vertical line of the upper south wall, is 1881.598+, that is, practically 1881½ Pyramid inches.

This measurement is confirmed in so many distinct ways by the scientific features of the Great Pyramid, that we cannot doubt its accuracy and intentional design. Jehovah, the Great Master Architect of the Pyramid, so designed the dimensions of the monument, that it might monumentalize the date 1914 A.D. not once, but many times over, that we might have confidence in the wonderful events connected with that year. The most important of these is that Christ, “whose right it is,” began his reign as earth’s INVISIBLE King (Ezek. 21:25-27).

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(1) Although the Well-shaft particularly symbolizes the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, it also symbolizes hades or the death-state in the wider sense Christ’s soul was not left in hades—Acts 2:27.

(2) See Studies in the Scriptures, Vol. II, chap. 7; Vol. III, chap. 6.

Great Pyramid Passages Page 61-64, par. 116-124