"Judgment must begin at the house of God." 1 Peter iv. 17.
This judgment is effected by a new revelation of divine truth, which always involves mighty changes both in the spiritual and natural worlds.
The perishing Church does not realize its condition, nor does it know that it is undergoing a judgment, but repudiates the new truth, and struggles desperately to maintain its ecclesiastical life.
"He that loveth his life shall lose it, and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal."
V.
There is an internal and an external Church which ought to cohere and correspond, but often do not.
The internal Church is "the kingdom of heaven" within the individual soul. Conjugial love is its centre, for the love between husband and wife is the effect of the Lord's love to His Church and the reciprocal love of the Church to the Lord.
The unregenerate who live in mere natural love, know nothing of the spiritual origin of conjugial love, nor can they understand or believe it.
The spiritual state of the individual, the family,
