The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 4

VI. Edson View of Sanctuary Definitely Adopted

They held that the view of the heavenly sanctuary and of the twofold mediatorial service of Christ our great High Priest therein, advocated by Edson, was a truth that had been swept aside by the rising Man of Sin, who had opposed God and truth and had “exalted himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped,” so that he, as God, had planted himself in the temple of God, “showing himself that he is God.” They believed that the Papacy had interjected its own earthly priesthood and sacrifice between God and man and obscured and distorted the work of Christ our great High Priest and His one, all-sufficient, vicarious, atoning sacrifice, and that the Protestant world had only partially freed itself from such errors. The sanctuary service, shadowed forth in the Mosaic ritual, and clearly explained in the book of Hebrews, was but dimly understood until it was brought forth in its beauty by the joint study of Edson and his associates. This sanctuary light-which had long been cast down by the dominant apostasy-was, however, to be more fully studied and amplified. But its essence had already been perceived. PFF4 1040.2

So they reaffirmed their stand on the doctrine of the day of judgment—that on October 22, 1844, according to type, Jesus our High Priest entered the most holy place in heaven and began to cleanse the sanctuary. The examination of the lives of men through all past ages had begun in what came to be called the investigative judgment. That of the living would follow. When that work is finished and probation closed, then Jesus leaves the temple of God to come to earth in glory as King, to reward the righteous and execute judgment on the wicked. Satan, not Christ, was the scapegoat. But the atonement for man was made and completed by Christ the Lamb of God before the visitation of punishment upon the scapegoat as the great instigator of sin. Yes, the transaction with the scapegoat was after the atonement was finished. PFF4 1041.1

Meantime, the righteous dead will all have been raised and the righteous living caught up to Christ, at the—second advent. Then the millennium begins, which the redeemed spend with Christ in heaven. At the conclusion Christ and the saints return with the New Jerusalem from heaven to the devastated earth, the wicked dead are raised, and their final march of desperation upon the Holy City begins. Then Satan and all his hosts are destroyed, and the earth and its sin-scarred works are burned up. This is the executive judgment. And all this is followed, in turn, by the creation of the new heaven and new earth “wherein dwelleth righteousness.” Paradise is fully restored. That was their glorious prospect, and their faith. PFF4 1041.2