1. Because, as I have already said, ‘all Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.’ No portion, therefore, of God’s word, whether it be prophetic or historical, ought to be set aside by those who really desire to know God’s truth. If we wish to know the whole mind of God we must be prepared to study the whole of the Holy Scriptures which God has given us.
2. But, besides that, we must remember that our whole faith depends on Holy Scripture. All that we know of the Lord Jesus Christ, of His great high-priesthood, of His atoning blood, of His free salvation, of the gift of the Holy Ghost, of the new birth, and of the coming Advent, all our hope for the future, and all our rest for the present, depend simply and entirely on the Word of God. In it we find all; without it we have nothing. When, therefore, we see a great prophecy of Holy Scripture fulfilled in our own day, within reach of our own observation, traceable on our own maps, and included within the range of our own memory, we ought not to pass it by, but should accept it with thankfulness in these days of rebuke and infidelity, as a most blessed confirmation of our faith. Let any one who has the slightest doubt as to the inspiration of Scripture look at the facts. Two thousand four hundred years ago there was a prophet, the prophet Daniel, by the river of Ulai, and he foresaw in a vision the rise and progress of a mighty power, telling us at the same time how long it was likely to continue. Six hundred years after him there arose another prophet, who described what appears to be the same power, and gave a graphic picture both of its progress and decay. Students of Holy Scripture have since been diligently occupied in the study of these two prophecies; and by comparing Scripture with Scripture were long since brought to the conclusion that in the course of this century the decline of the Ottoman Empire would take place. And now we see it going on. Just when the students thought it would begin, then it began, and just as the prophet described its decay, so it is decaying. The prophets themselves could have known nothing about it when they prophesied, for the empire did not arise till many centuries after they had foretold its fall. But God knew all, and a thousand years were to Him as one day. These prophecies, therefore, did not arise from any private interpretation or human calculation of probabilities, but ‘holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.’