Lord, that the judge was at the door;” Peter, that delay was not “slackness concerning promise, but the long-suffering of God, not willing that any should perish;” the Lord Himself, hanging all in suspense over them, saying words, already then misinterpreted, “If I will that he tarry till I come;” but all marking the decay and ruin, and teaching to look forward to the coming of the Lord.
But Paul, especially the apostle of the church, and who alone, indeed, formally speaks of it, gives us more precise and definite statements. “I know that after my decease grievous wolves shall enter in, not sparing the flock, yea, even of your own selves shall perverse men arise to draw away the disciples after them; wherefore watch, and remember,” &c. &c.; thought of a successor, in these days called bishop, he had none; the existence of such, then or after his departure, is a thing unknown to him. He commends them to God and the word of His grace (compare the language of Ignatius in similar circumstances), which was able to build them up, and give them an inheritance among all them that are sanctified. The time, he tells us, would come when they would not endure sound doctrine, but after their own lusts heap to themselves teachers having itching ears, and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and be turned unto fables. This, mark, is a general character of the state of things. There were many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, specially they of the circumcision, whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses. The result he fully states in 2 Timothy iii., “that in the last days perilous times should come,” and then, giving a description answering to that in which he shews the state of heathenism, he closes by saying, “having the form of
