Long ago Moses told his people that in time to come there would be raised up from the midst of their nation a great prophet to whom they should hearken. We read that this promise was made to Moses on mount Horeb, and that God said of the prophet who should come in the fulness of time, "I will . . . put my words in his mouth." It was further declared by God, "Whosoever will not hearken unto my words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him."
Christian people in' general are agreed that this divine promise was fulfilled in the coming of Christ Jesus, but perhaps very few of his professed followers have thought of him as a prophet, one whose spiritual gaze pierced the densest clouds of materialism and beheld the divine idea as the only reality in all human history,—past, present, or future. Mrs. Eddy's definition of prophet as given on page 593 of Science and Health is as follows: "A spiritual seer; disappearance of material sense before the conscious facts of spiritual Truth."
Christian people in general have dwelt longingly upon the promises found in Scripture of what they regarded as the second coming of Christ Jesus; and as the different passages are looked up, many of the statements seem to imply that he would come with clouds. In the twenty-first chapter of Luke a great struggle on the human plane is outlined, with distress and perplexity among the nations of the earth, and "men's hearts failing them for fear;" but in the very midst of this we find the reassuring words of the Master: "And then shall they see the Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh."
