Sunday, December 5, 2021

Wiley Jones (1835-1898): Christ is the "Ancient of Days" as He Will Come Clothed "In the Glory of His Father"

  

9th. Daniel describes four great empires closely succeeding one another, and rooted in the head of the fourth is a little horn, or persecuting power, that “makes war with the saints and prevails against them until the Ancient of days or Christ comes.”— Dan. vii, 19-22. He does not say “until a thousand years before the Ancient of days comes.” Of course the little horn will have to cease making war with the saints and prevailing against them before the Millennium can begin; but it does not cease before Christ comes, who, I suppose, is here called the Ancient of days because “His goings forth have been from of old,” and He will come clothed “in the glory of His Father.”—Mic. v, 2; Mat. xxv, 31. In the same manner Paul too has put the destruction of the persecuting power at the coming of the Lord.—2 Thes. ii, 8. Thus I find neither in the prophecy of Daniel nor Paul any space or room for the Millennium before the advent. (Wiley Jones, The Gospel of the Kingdom, 4 vols. [ed. J.M. Morgan; Bristow, Okla., 1947; orig., 1879], 4:7)

 

For an overview of Jones and his interaction with various figures of the American Restorationist movement (e.g., Thomas Thomas; Benjamin Wilson), see J. Turner Stilson, Biographical Encyclopedia: Chronicling the History of the Church of God Abrahamic Faith 19th & 20th Centuries (Stillman Valley, Ill.: Word Ege, 2011), 143-45.