“Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.” Matt. 24:35.
It is very obvious that the question of the essential truthfulness of Scripture is not to remain open until all its manifold facts are seen to form a harmonious and symmetrical whole. Every candid objector must concede that there may be evidence sufficient to produce the conviction of essential truthfulness, although many details and minutiae may appear exceptional. Not until we know all things can we see all truth to be perfectly harmonious with itself. In our study of nature and of history, after being perfectly convinced of certain truths, we always find ourselves carrying along packages of exceptional facts, which we cannot at the time adjust to others, but which we are sure that we can, as we grow wiser, drop into their proper places. “Nature,” says Tyndale, “is full of anomalies which no foresight can predict, and which experiment alone can reveal. From the deportment of a vast number of bodies, we should be led to conclude that heat always produces expansion, and that cold always produces contraction. But water steps in, and bismuth steps in, to qualify this conclusion.”
Yet the anomalies of which Tyndale speaks, when followed out, lead to the discovery of higher harmonies in nature. By a bold sweep of inductive reasoning, Newton grasped the truth of universal gravitation. He came into that close sympathy with nature that led him to judge by unmistakable intuition that he felt the throb of her heart. There were certain facts that could not then be reconciled with this induction, yet so overwhelming was the evidence in its favor that he felt sure that deeper study and broader observation would bring them into harmony. The history of physical science has justified this faith.
Apparent irregularities in celestial phenomena have led to some of the grandest discoveries of astronomy. Mysterious variations in the position of certain fixed stars, carefully observed and studied for more than twenty years, led Bradley to the discovery of the great and fruitful facts of aberration and nutation; the first furnishing final proof of the progressive motion of light, and the second showing that the pole of the earth, instead of describing a smooth and uniform circle in its revolution, traces a wave-like curve among the stars. These two facts have given to modern astronomy its precision and accuracy. Planetary perturbations have been the harvest field of recent astronomical discoveries. Certain irregularities in the path of Uranus led some who feebly held the clue of nature to speculate whether the law of gravity, at that immense distance, operated in all its rigor; but the true astronomer saw mirrored in these perturbations another world, pacing its solitary rounds as the outmost sentinel of the solar system. Nature’s laws are thus often found by the philosophers to be knotted in discrepancies, which, when patiently disentangled, have furnished him threads to guide him through new labyrinths of fact and law. Scripture discrepancies are thus the clues to higher harmonies. The true philosopher does not demand a demonstrated theory of these irregularities in nature. The logical understanding is not troubled by them if a plausible hypothesis of reconciliation can be invented. A reasonable mind, which has satisfied itself on independent evidence as to the essential truth, is content if imagination can suggest any adjustment of exceptional facts. In this respect, we should go to Scripture as the true philosopher goes to nature.
It may be in the first place remarked that modern criticism, with all its acuteness, has not discovered new discrepancies of any importance. Colenso and Strauss repeat objections that were urged against the first Christian apologists. The Wolfenbüttel Fragments urge the same difficulties in the gospel genealogies, and the same differences between the Jesus of John and the Jesus of the Synoptics that were fully discussed by the early Christian fathers. Mr. Parker thus stated the discrepancy between the law and the gospel: “Here are two forms of religion which differ widely, set forth and enforced by miracles: The one, ritual and formal; the other, actual and spiritual; the one, the religion of fear; the other, of love; one, finite, and resting entirely on the special revelation made to Moses; the other, absolute, and based on the universal revelation of God, who enlightens all that come into the world; one offers only earthly recompense, the other makes immortality a motive to divine life; one compels men, the other invites them. One-half of the Bible reveals the other half; the gospel annihilates the law.” (Disc., p. 324.) But we find the original apostles themselves profoundly pondering this problem of the antithesis between the law and the gospel, and the first generation of Christians bewildered and confused about its solution. Paul’s acutest logic and profoundest spiritual apprehension were taxed to the utmost to clearly state and fairly solve this problem. It rent the first church at Jerusalem; it brought upon Paul his heaviest labors and fiercest persecution; it gave rise to the epistles to the Romans, the Galatians, and the Hebrews; the echoes of this controversy ring through every Pauline speech and letter; it was one of the causes or occasions of the formidable and wide-consuming heresy of Gnosticism. Mr. Parker declared this discrepancy irreconcilable and fatal. So did the heretics and persecutors of the first two centuries; and the Gnostic philosophers stated this discrepancy at least as sharply, and urged it more vehemently, than Mr. Parker. Yet, in spite of it, Christianity has become what she is. In her very cradle she throttled this dragon, and will she tremble before the dragon’s seed to-day? If she proved the old and the new covenants to be identical in essence, when it was only by faith that she saw the Christian flower and fruit in the Judaic husk, much more will she triumph when the fragrance of those flowers comes wafted to us through historic centuries, when those ripened fruits are dropping on all lands.
Another preliminary thought of special importance is this: The perfect simplicity, the guileless confidence, with which the Scripture writers spread apparently conflicting statements before us, is most suggestive and instructive. While the earliest commentators, Jewish and Christian, often manifest the greatest anxiety to reconcile and harmonize these discrepancies, the Scripture writers calmly go on their way without giving them the least attention. No editorial explanation is offered to adjust the two narratives of creation. They are simply set side by side with all their divergences and contrasts. There is no editorial weighing of conflicting statements in the gospels, no word of comment to harmonize the different accounts of Christ’s birth and resurrection. Thus is spread over all the Scripture the artlessness of conscious truth. To the candid mind, this impression is irresistible. Everywhere assuming in the most solemn manner its divine truthfulness, yet nowhere anxious to vindicate its consistency with itself, it reveals a sublime consciousness of integrity that, to a healthy soul, is most impressive and convincing. So when Moses wove into his history the patriarchal narratives of creation, he left each to tell its own story. So he wrote down the decalogue of Exodus and of Deuteronomy, without minute reference to the stony tablets, not careful—as a forger would be sure to be—to use the identical words in both copies. So Ezra gives us the first and second records of the kings of Judah and Israel, without any editorial alterations and corrections to bring them into harmony.
The value of these discrepancies is thus very high in enabling us to understand the real nature of the documents in which they occur. They show that we have in the Scripture narratives the original documents, the genealogical records, statutes, speeches, songs, having all the flavor of contemporary authorship, such as would be called in our day the raw material for history, rather than history itself. These materials have never been digested and assimilated into a uniform whole in the mind of any philosophical historian. No Thucydides has woven them into an artistic treatise. So the gospels are memoirs, memorabilia of Christ’s life, sayings, and doings, set down by different authors, at different times and places. The original facts have not been filtered through the imaginations or judgments of professional authors, but are spread before us in what criticism calls rawness, incompleteness, and redundancy—not fitted to each other, or adjusted to any system or theory whatever. Thus the narratives are often abrupt, fragmentary, assuming and suggesting much that is not said, and disappointing by leaving much unsaid. Thus Mark assumes that the reader is already acquainted with Jesus and with John the Baptist. John adds a supplement to his gospel, giving an account of Christ’s appearance at the Lake of Tiberias. The history of the Acts breaks off abruptly in the midst of Paul’s imprisonment without hinting anything about the result of his appeal unto Cæsar. Discrepancies are inevitable in such a mass of materials; but how valuable are they as showing the real character of the materials themselves, proving them to be the original data on which all systematic history must be founded. We have here no secondary formations of critical conclusions or mythical imaginings to dig through in order to reach the primitive facts. The discrepancies of the gospels thus furnish weapons with which Strauss’ whole theory may be overturned. This must be admitted by any candid mind that does not start with the dogmatic assumption that the supernatural, being unnatural, is never to be believed on any evidence whatever.
(To be Continued.)
A Sign Fulfilled.
By Uriah Smith
WITH what startling distinctness prophetic features are developed in the age in which we live. As an illustration look at Heb. 10: 29: “Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace.”
From a hasty reading, this passage might appear to be only a terrible denunciation against a Heaven-daring crime; but we believe it is also a prophecy, which is to be fulfilled at a certain and specified time. Let us consider first what acts will answer to the crimes described in this passage, then notice the time of its fulfillment.
To tread under foot the Son of God, is evidently to occupy a position of hostility to him; to deny his divine nature and divine mission; to regard him as only a man, and his works as only those of human agency. It is no mitigation of such a sin to say, as some do who deny his divinity, that he was a very good man, the best that ever lived; for he claimed to be the Son of God; and if he was not, he was an impostor; and to say that the best man that ever lived was a deceiver and an impostor, is not speaking very well for the race.
To count the blood of the covenant an unholy thing, is to count it a common thing, as the word unholy might properly here be rendered; that is, of no more value or efficacy than any other blood. Millions are to-day doing this by asserting that the blood of Christ is no more than the blood of any man, or, even, than the blood of an ox.
To do despite to the Spirit of grace, is to grieve the Spirit of God, to deny its existence, its operation and its power; or to make its holy work the same as that of the prince of evil.
We see, then, the characters described in the text. They are such as war upon Christianity, reject Christ, ridicule the idea of atonement through the blood of the Redeemer, and sin against the Holy Ghost. Now when are we to look for the development of such a class of persons?
Verse 25 exhorts us not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together, and to exhort one another, and so much the more as we see the day approaching. In other words it plainly points out the Advent people; and the time to which we are introduced is the time of, or the time immediately following, the great Advent movement.
Then we have the verses concerning those who sin willfully, and the punishment of which they are worthy for committing the sins described in verse 29; and following this we are again introduced to the Advent movement, Paul illustrating the spirit that would characterize it by the spirit of noble self-sacrifice with which he was treated by his Hebrew brethren; and with an exhortation to hold fast in view of the coming of Christ, the chapter closes.
We now inquire, Why these verses concerning a class of willful and Heaven-daring sinners are thrown in between the introduction of the great Advent movement in verse 25, and the testimony on the same subject at the close of the chapter? Inspiration does not speak at random, and this has its meaning. It is, evidently, to show that during the progress of the Advent movement, after its commencement, but before its close, while the people of God are patiently waiting for Him that shall come, there will be a wonderful development of a great infidel and anti-Christian class, concerning whom the apostle warns those who have received a knowledge of the truth, and against whom he utters the threatening of verses 25–31.
But, it may be said, there have always been infidels; and how, then, can this mark a certain time? It cannot, unless there is at the time a more than ordinary development of infidel and anti-Christian principles. Has there been any such manifestation within the time specified? There has. Not only have we had infidelity in the usual sense and form, but there has arisen a gigantic organization, or association, spreading with unprecedented rapidity, counting its disciples within a few years by millions, and attacking Christ and Christianity with unwonted virulence and malignity. This outburst from the realms of darkness, the name of which is Spiritualism, comes in at the exact time to answer to the prophecy; nor does the date of its advent answer more fitly than does its character. Spiritualists above all others, make it their business to scout the idea of the divinity and sacrificial work of Christ. Against this they utter their bitterest spite. It is apparently the supreme object of their hate. They pre-eminently tread under foot the Son of God, count the blood of the covenant an unholy or common thing, asserting that it is no better than the blood of an ox, and do despite to the Spirit of grace, denying in toto its existence and office as described in the word of God.
How plain the prophecy! How clear the fulfillment! How eventful does it make the times appear in which we live! And what is the duty of the people of God in these days? The apostle tells us: Cast not away your confidence. Have patience. Let faith grow strong; for that is your life. Now the just live by faith. Draw not back; for that will result in perdition. Believe; for that will be to the saving of the soul. “For yet a little while, and He that shall come, will come, and will not tarry.” U. S.
A Presbyterian Minister upon the Second Advent.
[I HAVE just read an excellent little tract upon the second advent by Rev. E. P. Marvin, Presbyterian minister, Lockport, N. Y. Outside of professed Adventists, I have never seen a better statement of the subject. We prize it not only for the good words which it contains, but because we are glad to know that ministers in other denominations are waking up to this glorious subject. May the Lord bless this tract to the good of many. Believing that the readers of the SIGNS will appreciate it, I send it for publication. D. M. CANRIGHT.]
CHAPTER I.
As the first appearing of Christ was the great and blessed hope of the old dispensation, so his second appearing is the great and blessed hope of the new. As that was the supreme event of the past, so this is the supreme event of the future. His second appearing “without sin unto salvation,” in its manifested grandeur and glory, will contrast amazingly with his first appearing, in sorrow and shame to put away sin.
He came once to be “despised and rejected of men.” He will come again “to be glorified in his saints and to be admired in all them that believe.” He came once as a servant of servants; he will come again as the King of kings. He came once as a lamb; he will come again as a lion. He came once as a man; he will come again as God. He came first as a light to lighten the Gentiles; he will come again as a “flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. He came first as a suffering Saviour; he will come again as an awful judge.
The world saw him last on a cross; it will see him next on a throne. The world saw him last crowned with thorns; it will see him next crowned with glory. Through all eternity we shall look back upon the first and second advents of Christ as the supreme events in the history of time.
“That day” is the great central subject of unfulfilled prophecy. On that day the only king who has a right to reign, will receive his crown and his kingdom; his people will be glorified, and the groanings of creation will cease.
The New Testament points us forward to his second appearing more frequently than it points us backward to his first appearing. The subject is met several hundred times in the New Testament. One verse of about every twenty-five contains such a reference. Peter devotes a large portion of two epistles to this theme, and tells us that Paul spoke of these things in all his epistles. No other theme is used more frequently to stimulate the church to fearless witness bearing, patient suffering, heavenly-mindedness, and to universal diligence. No other theme is used more frequently to arouse a deluded and slumbering world. It is held forth in the New Testament everywhere, as the very pole-star of the church. But the eye of the church has not always been clearly and steadily fixed upon this ever brightening star of hope.
The apostolic church, for three centuries, was all alive to this hope. Tertullian calls it “the common doctrine of the whole church.” Mosheim, though a disbeliever in the doctrine, acknowledges its general prevalence in the early church. Says the commentator Hodge, “The second advent of Christ so clearly predicted by himself and his apostles, was the object of long-cherished expectation to all the early Christians. So general was this expectation that Christians were characterized as “those who love His appearing.” Says Mr. Barnes, “The earnest expectation of the coming of the Lord Jesus became one of the marks of early Christian piety.”
The church, secularized by Constantine and corrupted by the Romish Hierarchy, was too well pleased to reign as kings and priests without Christ, and that “blessed hope” was obscured. Origen, the first great rationalizer and Universalist, labored to rob the church of pre-millennial faith.
During the great Reformation of the sixteenth century and the times of the English Commonwealth, this hope was again revived. Then followed a season in which the doctrine of his personal appearing and reign passed somewhat into neglect and contempt.
Mr. Whitby, who was an Arian, wrote against pre-millennialism, and introduced the idea of the spiritual reign of Christ for a thousand years, which he confessed as a new hypothesis. This mystical view which postpones his appearing for at least a thousand years, and relaxes that constant watchfulness enjoined by the Scriptures, has prevailed widely for one hundred and fifty years. But this neglected and glorious doctrine, which is related to almost every other doctrine of the Scriptures and almost every duty of life, is reviving again throughout all Christendom. Most of the great symbols of the church, ancient and modern, are pre-millennial; none of them are post-millennial.
The founder of Methodism was probably a pre-millennialist. The prayer-book of the Church of England is clearly pre-millennial. The last article in the Westminster Confession of Faith is absolutely incompatible with any other view. The marginal references used by the American Bible Society are pre-millennial in their bearing. They cannot be made otherwise without wresting the Scriptures. Lange’s Commentary on Revelation is pre-millennial. Dean Alford, one of the greatest scholars and critics of the age, says in his Greek Testament (a work which continues unparalleled): “The majority of writers, both in number and in learning and research, adopt the pre-millennial advent, following, as it seems to me, the plain, undeniable sense of the sacred text of the book itself. I have again and again raised my earnest protest against evading the plain sense of words, and spiritualizing in the midst of plain declarations of fact. That the Lord will come in person to our earth; that his risen elect will reign here with him and judge; that during that blessed reign the power of evil will be bound and the glorious prophecies of peace and truth on earth find their accomplishment; this is my firm persuasion, and not mine alone, but that of multitudes of Christ’s waiting people, as it was that of his primitive apostolic church, before controversy blinded the eyes of the Fathers to the light of prophecy.”
Some tell us that they see no interest or practical importance in it. I will select from the multitude, some specimen passages to show what interest the New Testament writers felt in this subject, and what use they made of it:—
Does the spirit of slumber come over you, and do you long for livelier emotions and a more wakeful spirit? Read and ponder the Saviour’s repeated account of the awful condition of the infatuated world, the electric suddenness of his appearing, and the thrilling admonitions to unceasing watchfulness. “At midnight the cry was made!” “Watch therefore,” etc. “Therefore let us not sleep,” etc. “Let your loins be girded about,” etc. Do you need motives to diligence in the service of the Lord? Read the parables that set forth your duties in his absence, and your proportionate reward when he comes. Talents are committed to you for use in his absence. Diligence on your part will secure a plaudit and a reward when he comes. Pounds are delivered to you with the injunction, “Occupy till I come.”
When he returns your reward is proportioned to your fidelity. “Behold I come quickly and my reward is with me.” The apostolic church, in its unequaled missionary zeal, was inspired largely by this “blessed hope.” The most solemn and emphatic admonitions to preachers are enforced by the coming of the Lord. “I charge thee therefore, before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom; preach the word; be instant in season, out of season.” “When the chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away.”
Church and State.
By John Norton Loughborough
CONSIDERABLE has been said through the press concerning the movement in this nation to obtain a religious amendment to the constitution. I have read these statements with carefulness, and am watching with interest, as must be the case with every student of prophecy, the strides that are being made in this direction. That this movement will result, when it obtains its object, in a union of Church and State, is apparent to a class of persons who never looked at the subject in the light of prophecy.
In the Weekly Alta California, some time since, the editor said: “The parties who have been holding conventions for the purpose of procuring an amendment to the constitution of the United States, recognizing the Deity, do not fairly state the case when they assert that it is the right of a Christian people to govern themselves in a Christian manner. If we are not governing ourselves in a Christian manner, how shall the doings of our government be designated? The fact is that the movement is one to bring about in this country that union of Church and State, which all other civilized nations are now trying to dissolve.”
In the dominions of the papacy, it is apparent to all that the favorite theory is that Church and State should be united. If “words are the signs of ideas,” and I suppose they are, when papists and Protestants express their ideas on these matters in about the same words, a careful reader would naturally think they were aiming at about the same object. To show how they do talk, I wish to place in comparison with each other, three canons of the Ecumenical Council, held in Rome in 1870, and three resolutions of the Pittsburg Convention, that were passed in its sitting in March of the same year.
ROME.
“CANON XVIII. Whosoever says that the power necessary for the government of a civil State does not emanate from God, or that one is not bound by Divine law to submit himself to such power, is repugnant to the natural liberty of man—let him be anathema.”
PITTSBURG.
“Resolved, That civil government is grounded, like the family, in the principles of the nature of man as a social creature; and that it has its powers and functions thus determined by the Creator, and is, therefore, like the family, an ordinance of God.”
ROME.
“CANON X. Whosoever says that the church is not a perfect institution, but merely a corporation, or that it is of such a nature, with regard to civil society or the State, as to be subject to temporal power, let him be anathema.”
PITTSBURG.
“Resolved, That nations as sovereignties, wielding moral as well as physical power, and having moral as well as material effects, are morally accountable to God.”
ROME.
“CANON XII. Whosoever says that Christ, our Saviour and Sovereign, has conferred upon the church the power to direct only by advice and persuasion those who turn aside, not to compel them by orders, by coercion, by external verdicts and statutory punishments, let him be anathema.”
PITTSBURG.
“Resolved, That the proposed religious amendment to our national constitution, so far from infringing any individual’s rights of conscience, or tending, in the least degree, to a union of Church and State, will afford the fullest security against a corrupt and corrupting church establishment, and form the strongest safeguard of both the civil and religious liberties of all citizens.”
A friend on hearing this last resolution read, suggests that “the liberty of conscience guaranteed by it, is such as that of a man would be, who was tied hand and foot, and then told that he was at liberty.”
Rev. Mr. Trefren of Napa, in speaking of Seventh-day Adventist ministers in 1870, said: “I predict for them a short race. What we want is law in this matter.” Then he said, referring to the present movement for a law: “And we will have it too; and when we get the power in our hands we will show these men what their end will be.”
Our Saviour said of trees, “By their fruits ye shall know them.” It is true also that we may judge of the kind of fruit to look for when we have decided what the tree is. If the saying be true that “Words are leaves, but deeds are fruit,” it is certain that the leaves already appearing on this “national” religion tree, indicate a fruit similar to that borne by the papal tree in its palmiest days.189
My dear brethren, the times in which we are living demand activity. Shall we slumber while others are forming fetters with which to retard the work? But even this work is in our hands a help to show the fulfillment of the prophetic word as to what is coming.
The time was when we could present but few facts to show the formation of an image to the papacy in this government, but we relied on the sure word of prophecy, that such a state of things would come. Now the facts pointing that way accumulate at a rapid rate. Men of the world are awaking to these things, and plainly see union of Church and State in this matter. May God help us all to be active, to do what we can to get the word of God on these matters—truth for this time—before them. May God stir us all up to activity. May our watchword be Work! WORK!! WORK!!!
J. N. LOUGHBOROUGH.
Thy Will Be Done.
By J. H. W.
This is the second petition in the “Lord’s prayer;” and this prayer was given to the disciples in answer to their request, “Lord, teach us how to pray.” These words are very often spoken, but, as has been said on another subject,
“Who has ever duly weighed
The meaning of the words he said?”
It is a great misfortune to the human race that they do not better know how to appropriate and apply things. Sick people are the only ones who really prize health, or place anything like a just value on it. Orphans realize that it is a great blessing to have a good father and mother. None but the destitute know the value of a dollar. To the starving poor a crust of bread is of immense value. But none of these blessings are appreciated under other circumstances. The pampered child throws his bread away as worthless; the spendthrift, spoiled by indulgence, gives the money he never earned, for trifling toys; the healthy and strong violate the laws of their being as if life and health were of no importance; and the child who has been tenderly cared for by kind parents, neither thanks them for their services, nor cares for their feelings. And much of these same traits of character we carry into our religious experience.
The most important and valuable blessings Heaven can bestow are viewed with comparative indifference because they are common; they are enjoyed by so many, and from day to day. And yet, daily as they come, so regularly are words of thanksgiving offered; and too often words only, because there is no realizing sense of the goodness of God in bestowing blessings we do not appreciate.
Thus it is also, that in hours of ease and prosperity, we say the words of the petition, Thy will be done; but when adversity comes, when trials and afflictions are before us, we quickly show that we have a will to be consulted in the matter! Few, very few, when trials press upon them, stop to inquire how God is to be glorified, or whether the hand of a loving Father has ordered them—whether they are among the “all things” that “work together for good”—to be glorified in as the means of working patience and “a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.” Rom. 5:1–5; 2 Cor. 4:17. But trials and tribulations are generally regarded as unmitigated evils, to be escaped from as soon as possible, and almost by any means.
In nothing was Jesus a perfect pattern and example more than in humility and submission. In no point did he more beautifully and forcibly illustrate the spirit of the prayer which takes his name than in the part above referred to. Circumstances led him to adopt these words as his own request; and we may be instructed to mark those circumstances—among the most interesting in our Lord’s history. It was not in Cana of Galilee, at the marriage; not at the supper made for him by wealthy friends; not even while he was going about doing good, admonishing the erring, setting free the captive, and comforting the disciples. But it was in the garden; in the hour of his agony, alone, and uncared for by his chosen followers; when his soul was sorrowful even unto death; after three times asking his Father to remove the bitter cup if it were possible; there was the triumph of submission; there he meekly desired that his own will might be set aside, and only his Father’s will be done.
If we would indeed follow our Saviour and be like him, we must learn to submit cheerfully to the will of God, and resign our own wills in the hour of affliction and trial. Trial tests our faith; it tests our professions of resignation. Many have prayed, “Thy will be done,” who had yet all imaginable reservations for contingencies. To utter these words “in spirit and in truth,” we must earnestly desire that, under the most bitter trials through which we may be passing, and under all circumstances in which we may yet be placed, our will may not be consulted, but that God may use us to work out his own will in all that we can do or bear; and this not by constraint because we must, but cheerfully, because it is the will of our Father in Heaven. Thus only shall we follow Jesus and bear his cross; thus may we find rest to our souls.
J. H. W.
Love is the Fulfilling of the Law.
By D. H. Sanborn
This is a part of a text often quoted. What does it teach? How does love fulfill the law? To fulfill a law, according to Webster, is to perform what is required; to answer a law by obedience. Then love fulfills the law by leading to the performance of those acts which the law requires; and any love which does not lead to obedience to every precept of God’s holy law is not the love of which the apostle is speaking, and shows its possessor to be “carnal, sold under sin.” For the apostle declares that to be carnally minded is death; because the carnal mind is not subject to the law of God; and from its not being subject to God’s law, he proves that it is enmity against God. Rom. 8 : 7.
But to the text. The whole verse reads, Love worketh no ill to his neighbor; therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law. Rom. 13 : 10. Then love fulfills the law because it works no ill to his neighbor. The law was given to guard the rights of God and the rights of men; and true love will lead us not to invade our neighbor’s rights. But how does profaning God’s holy name work ill to his neighbor? Because it is breaking the third precept of the law of God, and as far as the example goes it leads to sin; and the wages of sin is death. But the fourth precept of that same unchangeable law brings to view another object which God claims as his, declares to be holy, and commands us to observe accordingly. Why and how does profaning God’s holy day injure our fellow-men? In the same way that profaning his holy name does. It is treating as profane what he has solemnly declared to be holy, and required us to keep. It is taking for our use for secular purposes that which God claims as his own, and set apart to a holy use. It is setting at nought the authority of the great Lawgiver. It is encouraging rebellion against his government. It is rebellion, robbery and profanity, all in one. Tell me, ye that refuse to keep holy the day that God commanded, are ye not profaning the holy things of God?
Perhaps you say the Lord has changed the day of his rest; that another day is now his holy day, and the day he blessed and hallowed is no longer holy time. We know full well a change has been made; but where, and by whom?
We know that many claim to be worshipers of the God that made the heavens and the earth, who yet refuse to regard the sanctified rest-day. But what evidence is there in the word of God that he has changed his holy day, any more than that he has changed his name; and that therefore the names by which he has made himself known to us in his word are no longer to be reverenced, but may be treated as common.
Perhaps you say, If I keep one day in the week holy, I think it is all that is required. And so you keep a day which the Lord has nowhere required you to regard as sacred, and treat his sacred day as common time. If this is obedience to the fourth commandment, then the Romanist, who profanes the name of God every day, may yet fulfill the third precept of God’s law by reverencing the name of the pope; for neither you nor he are doing the work which God commands, but you are doing what he has forbidden. And the Lord has told us just as plainly in the one case as the other what is holy.
I appeal to honest first-day keepers if there is any unfairness in this reasoning. Search the Scriptures daily and faithfully to see if these things are so. And may you be led to look into that perfect law of liberty, and continue therein, being not forgetful hearers, but doers of the work, that you may be blessed in your deed.
D. H. SANBORN.
A Busy World.
By R. F. Cottrell
This is a busy world. The people are too busy in its affairs to attend to the interests of the future. All is bustle and hurry; railroad speed is too slow to suit the times. The pursuit of wealth is ardent. There is no lack of activity and zeal in this direction. Pleasures also are sought; and these only weigh anything against the pursuit of riches. The people being lovers of pleasures will sacrifice some of their time and wealth at the altar of pleasure. Hence the only successful appeal in behalf of religion or charity, must be addressed to the love of pleasures and the gratification of the appetites. If means are to be raised for some charitable purpose, to aid the poor or to build places of worship, a grand festival is the best means to reach the sympathies of the people. If means are to be raised to support the minister, a pleasure party, a feast and a ball is the surest bait.
But the people have no time to devote to the service of God. No time to learn what God requires of them. No time to pray. No time to seek for salvation in the world to come. Sometimes an hour can be spent at the prayer-meeting on the way to the theater. But religious meetings must be short, or they cannot be endured. Time is too precious to spend much of it in the duties of religion. The sick and needy would be visited and cared for, but that there is no time for it. An hour or two on Sunday is all there is to spare.
Ask people to hear upon the all-important subjects of the word of God, on the thrilling theme of prophecy and the signs of the times, and they have no time for it. No time to learn that the Lord is coming, no time to prepare for it. No time to study the Bible, or read the papers and publications which teach the doctrines of the Bible. Really they have more reading than they can attend to without any of these. The farmer, the mechanic, the merchant, the teacher and the professional man, are all busy.
What shall be done? “The day of the Lord will come,” whether men have time to prepare for it or not. It will not wait till each one has gained the whole world and got time to attend to a preparation for the world to come. Whether men are prepared for it or not, it will come. It will come as a thief in the night; because men have not had time to take warning. It will come as a snare. While the flock of birds are feasting upon the wheat which has been spread out to allure them, suddenly the snare is sprung upon them, and they cannot escape. So while the world are absorbed in their feasting and pleasures, the day of the Lord will come on them as a snare.
Oh, that they had time now to learn the truth and prepare for the day! But alas! alas! they are too busy. Too busy to take warning and secure eternal life. The cry of “peace and safety” is in their ears from week to week, and they have no time to learn that “sudden destruction” is about to come, and they and their seducers who cry, Peace, will not be able to escape. Oh, that they might be saved from that awful destruction! Time flies; and soon it will be true that we have no time in which to prepare for the great day of the Lord. Now is the time. R. F. COTTRELL.