Matthew 11:12

THE GREATEST REVIVAL OF THE AGES

Matthew 11:12. “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of the heavens suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force;” i.e., strong, vigorous, muscular, nervous men and women, from Dan to Beersheba, from the great sea to the Arabian desert, are rising up, leaving their homes, dropping everything in their enthusiasm for personal salvation. Four hundred years had rolled away since an inspired prophet had preached in Israel. The ministry of John the Baptist was like an effulgent noonday, suddenly breaking the black darkness of midnight. Never had Israel seen or known such a revival as swept the country, like a cyclone, under the ministry of the eloquent Baptist. Before John's revival was arrested by his imprisonment and martyrdom, he enjoyed the honor of administering the inaugural baptism to the Son of God, thus introducing Him into His official Messiahship, who immediately began to preach and perform the most stupendous miracles, not only healing the people by hundreds and thousands, administering infallible cures to lepers, cripples, and all sorts of invalids, well known to be hopeless by human agency, but, under the ministry of Jesus, not only was all Israel aroused from the slumber of bygone ages, and thrilled with an electric-shock which emptied their cities and depopulated their towns, to run away and see the mighty works and hear the paradoxical preaching of the Galilean Prophet, but heathen nations from all parts of the country rise up, and come in multitudes, pressing pell-mell, precipitately, shouting as they come, “Only let me into the kingdom!”