chastisement (Jer. xxx. 7-9), ending in Israel's repentance and conversion. "Thus saith the Lord God, because

ye are all become dross, behold therefore I will gather you into the midst of Jerusalem. As they gather, silver,

and brass, and iron, and lead, and tin into the midst of the furnace, to blow fire upon it, to melt it; so will I

gather you in mine anger, and in my fury, and I will leave you there and melt you. Yea I will gather you, and

blow upon you in the fire of my wrath, and ye shall be melted in the midst thereof. As silver is melted in the

midst of the furnace, so shall ye be melted in the midst thereof; and ye shall know that I the Lord have

poured out my fury upon you" (Ezek. xxii. 19-22). Zechariah also speaks of this "elect remnant" when God

says "And I will bring the third part through the fire and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them

as gold is tried: and they shall call on my name, and I will hear them; and I will say, it is my people: and they

shall say, The Lord is my God" (Zech. xiii. 9).

This "elect remnant"14 is doubtless the 144,000 of Rev. vii. sealed, and preserved through, the great

Tribulation; thus refined, and purified.

Thus while this first instalment of the Restoration of Israel is in anger and judgment; there is another, stage

-- a larger and final gathering spoken of, after the Lord has appeared in glory. Isaiah xi. seems to clearly

point to this when he calls it the "second": "And it shall come to pass in that day." What d ay? The day

when, according to verse 4, He has destroyed Anti-christ with the breath of His lips and the glory of His

coming. (2 Thess. ii. 8). "And it shall come to pass in that day that the Lord shall set His hand again the

second time, to recover the remnant of His people which shall be left from Assyria, and from Egypt, and from

Pathros, and from Cush, and from Elam, and from Shinar, and from Hamath, and from the Islands of the Sea.

And He shall set up up an ensign for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather

together the dispersed of Judah, from the four corners of the Earth... And the Lord shall utterly destroy the

tongue of the Egyptian Sea; and with His mighty wind shall He shake His hand over the river, and shall

smite it in the seven streams and make men go over dryshod. And there shall be an highway for the remnant

of His people, which shall be left, from Assyria; like as it was to Israel in the day that he came up out of the

land of Egypt" (Isaiah xi. 11-16).

Again "and they shall bring all your brethren for an offering unto the Lord out of all nations upon horses,

and in chariots, and in litters, (margin coaches), and upon mules, and upon swift beasts, to my holy

mountain Jerusalem, saith the Lord," (Isaiah lxvi. 20). When shall this gathering be? After the judgment and

war already referred to, for verses 15, 16, says: "Behold the Lord will come with fire, and with His chariots

like a whirlwind, to render His anger with fury, and His rebuke with flames of fire. For by fire and by His

sword will the Lord plead with all flesh, and the slain of the Lord shall be many." And then, after verse 19

shall have been fulfilled (where the Lord says: "and I will send those that escape of them unto the nations,

to Tarshish, Pul, and Lud, that draw the bow to Tubal and Javan, to the Isles afar off, that have not heard my

fame, neither have seen my glory among the Gentiles") THEN we come to the gathering described in verse

The means employed in this gathering will be partly instrumental, as we learn from this Scripture (Is. lxvi. 19,

20, and from others, such as Is. xlix, 22, 23), "Thus saith the Lord God, behold I will lift up mine hand to the

Gentiles, and set up my standard to the people; and they shall bring thy sons in their arms, and thy

daughters shall be carried upon their shoulders, and kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and queens thy

nursing mothers, &c." But we have just seen that the means shall be also miraculous; God's own act (Is. xi.

15, 16). It is in this respect, that this second part of the ingathering, differs from the first, of which nothing is

said about the means beyond ordinary natural causes such as we now see going on around us.

We must distinguished between this "Elect remnant" (Joel ii. 32, &c.), saved through and out of the

Tribulation; and the "Elect nation" (Isaiah lxv. 9, 22, &c.), which is All Israel as chosen out of, and

distinguished from all other nations; and "the Remnant according to the Election of Grace" (Rom. xi. 5),

which is the company of Israelites saved now by grace, and made members of Christ's body of the Church.