Mystery of the Ages Preface

DID you ever ask yourself: "Who am I? What am I? Why am I?
The world about you is a mystery. You yourself are a mystery. You have never seen your brain, the seat of your intellect and all that you are.
Your life is engulfed in mysteries. On reflection, your very existence is a mystery. Did you simply happen by unintelligent resident earthly forces without meaning or purpose, or were you intelligently designed and created by an all-powerful God of supreme mind for a purpose that also has been hidden in mystery? In fact, the persistent tradition throughout human history about the Creator God has been such a mystery that higher education in the Western world has sought to erase the mystery by giving its virtually unanimous acceptance to the theory of evolution.
Diffusion of education did not begin among the human race until after the invention of printing in the 15th century. As education became more widespread--as intellectualism developed--as knowledge of astronomy expanded knowledge of the universe about us--thinking minds began to ask questions. What of the whole vast universe? How did it all originate? Rational, scientifically oriented minds found themselves unable to explain the developing knowledge of an expanded universe with the teaching of religion as they knew it through the Roman Catholic Church and Protestantism, which had dominated the thinking of the Western world. The teaching of a long-haired, semi-effeminate picture of Jesus and the concept of a God composed of invisible spirit was not intellectually satisfying to them. It was all a colossal mystery. In the vanity of their self-professed scholarly minds they tried to evade the mystery entirely on the basis of materialism. They appeased their curiosity by attempting to work out a solution to the mystery of origins, existence, and life by reasoning out a self-satisfying, materialistic explanation.

Gradually the theory of evolution evolved in thinking, yet ignorant, minds filled with intellectual vanity. This thinking evolved into the theory of "use and disuse" by de Lamarck.

On the heels of de Lamarck's theory came Charles Darwin with his theory of the "survival of the fittest." Actually Darwin died unsure of his own theory. However, two colleagues, Haeckel and Huxley, fought vigorously to promote the Darwinian theory into public acceptance.
But were created human minds of intellectual vanity, who created a theory, more all-knowing than the supreme mind that created them? The evolutionary theory has been invented by human minds in an effort to explain the presence of a creation without the preexistence of a divine Creator.
And if the all-powerful God was your Maker, and exists as the divine Creator of all that is, then the mystery about God emerges, in order of time sequence, as the first and paramount mystery of all.
Who and what is God? That is a mystery not understood by any religion, not explained by science, untaught by higher education. The intellectually vain originators of the evolutionary theory found the existence of God, as presented by religion, a mystery they could neither understand nor accept. But the religionists whom they rejected did not themselves understand the mystery of God. Yet God does reveal himself through his Word the Holy Bible, if these religionists would only believe God's own revelation. God reveals himself in his Word the Holy Bible, yet almost none has understood it. The Bible, as author Bruce Barton said, is "the book that nobody knows." The Bible itself is the basic mystery that reveals all other mysteries.

If the truth about God is mystery number one revealed in the Bible, assuredly the truth about angels and evil spirits is second in order. Is the existence of spirit beings fact or a myth? Is there, after all, a devil? Did God create a devil? If there are holy angels, what is their purpose and function? The Bible clearly states that this world is actually ruled by unseen principalities of evil spirits. Do evil spirits affect and influence humans and even governments today? Do evil spirits affect even your own life? This question seems enveloped in total mystery.

Certainly third in order is the mystery of your own life--of humanity as a whole. What and why is humanity? Is man an immortal soul? Do the dead know what the living are doing? Is man a flesh and blood being with an immortal soul within? Is there meaning and purpose to human life? Did we evolve through unintelligent material forces without meaning or purpose? Why are humans beset with seemingly unsolvable problems?
Fourth in line of the not-understood mysteries is the civilization that has developed in man's world. How did it develop? Why do we find a world of awesome advancement and progress, yet paradoxically with appalling and mounting evils? Why cannot the minds that develop spacecraft, computers and marvels of science, technology and industry solve the problems that demonstrate human helplessness?
Next, in the development of human society on earth, is the mystery of the Jew and the ancient nation of Israel. Are the Jews the ancient nation of Israel? Why did God raise up one special nation? Why are they God's "chosen people"? Are they God's favorites? Does God discriminate against other nations? Is God a respecter of persons? What is Israel's purpose in the divine order of things?
Come now to the mystery of the Church. Why should there be the institution of the Church in the world? Is there some purpose for it, not understood even by the religion of traditional Christianity? Is the Church one Christ-originated Church or does it consist of many differing sects and denomination? Is the Church well organized on a definite pattern originated by Christ? Is there government and authority in the Church? Is it a large universal Church of many millions of members or a small and persecuted Church? How could one recognize the true Church today?
Finally, why the mystery of the kingdom of God? Jesus' gospel message was "the kingdom of God." Is the kingdom of God something within each person? Is it something that may be set up in men's hearts? Is it the institution of the church? Or is it something else altogether? Why this mystery of the very gospel of Jesus Christ?
These are the SEVEN GREAT MYSTERIES that concern the very lives of every human being on earth. The PLAIN TRUTH of all these mysteries is revealed in the Bible, but none of the churches or theologians seem to have comprehended them.
WHY? The Bible is the basic mystery of all.
If one begins reading the Bible continuously from beginning to end, one becomes bewildered. The Bible simply cannot be read like any other book. It is a mystery because it is a coded book. It is like a jigsaw puzzle, with perhaps thousands of various pieces of different forms and shapes that can be fitted together in only one precise pattern. The truths of the Bible are revealed here a little, there a little, scattered from beginning to end, and revealed only through the Holy Spirit within those surrendered and yielded to God, willing to have confessed error and wrongdoing, and yielding to BELIEVE Christ the Word of God. Jesus was the Word in Person. The Bible is the same Word in print.
No one can have the Holy Spirit, which alone can open the human mind to understanding of this Word of God, without a complete repentance and an implicit belief in Christ as well as believing what he says. Repentance can only follow admission of being wrong--of wrongdoing and wrong believing. The most difficult thing for any human seems to be to admit being wrong--to confess error of belief and conviction--to unlearn false knowledge as well as to learn true knowledge.
Is it any wonder, then, that the Bible is the book that nobody knows or understands?--or certainly almost nobody.
God deliberately coded his book so that it would not be understood until our modern time. Why was this purposely done? Even that is a mystery. The pages that follow will explain.
In the 12th chapter of Daniel we read even that devout man of God could not understand that which was given to him to write as part of the Bible. He said he heard, but understood not. The revealing angel said, "Go thy way, Daniel: for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end" (Authorized Version).
Today we have reached that time. God has opened to understanding his Word to those he has chosen, who have yielded and surrendered to him and to his blessed sacred Word. In the 12th chapter of Daniel, it says at this time of the end the "wise" would understand, but "none of the wicked shall understand." Who, then, are the "wise" who may understand the Bible?
"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom" (Ps. 111:10) and "a good understanding have all they that do his commandments" (same verse). Yet traditional Christianity has generally denied God's commandments--says they are done away, nailed to the cross. The clergy and theologians of organized "Christianity," therefore, cannot and do not understand the Holy Bible.
How, then, can we, in this book, understand and reveal to the reader these boggling mysteries? That question will be answered in the Introduction to follow.