Signs of the Times, Vol. 27, No. 46.
IF ANY MAN THIRST, LET HIM COMEPage 1
Earlier text: IF ANY MAN THIRST, LET HIM COME“THE GREATEST THING IN THE WORLD.”
By G. E. Fifield
[Sermon by Pastor G. E. Fifield, preached at the camp-meeting at Ellsworth, Me., 1900, and written out for publication in the SIGNS, by request of the editor, who was present.] TEXT.—“And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.” 1 Cor. 13:13. “Add to your faith virtue.” The word virtue here means courage and fortitude. The Greeks were a warlike people. With them cowardice was the greatest vice, and courage the greatest virtue. Christianity took this word and lifted it, as it did many other Greek words, out of the mere physical realm, into the spiritual. While not excluding the physical courage, it here means that higher spiritual courage and fortitude which dares to do right and to continue steadfast in the right under all circumstances. Without faith this is impossible. Moses was learned in all the learning of the Egyptians, and Egypt stood at the very front of the world’s civilization. He was heir to the throne of the Pharaohs. Held in abject bondage under his taskmasters was a race of despised slaves. The truth of the unity of Deity is the most sublime and the most sacred truth that the human mind and heart has ever known. This truth the Egyptians had once known, but they had departed far from it into the grossest polytheism. In his study Moses discovered these facts, and his soul was thrilled with this truth; he saw also that the Israelites, tho held in slavery, were the one people who stood for this sublime truth before the world. He stepped down from the throne of Egypt, refused the honor of being called Pharaoh’s son, and took his place with those slaves to stand with the truth. What gave him the courage to do it? We are told that “He had ‘respect unto the recompense of the reward.’” While not denying that Egypt, with its temples and pyramids, and worldly honors, and magnificent ceremonials, was good to the carnal eye and heart, he saw that it was all transient, and faith beheld the “far more exceeding and ‘eternal weight of glory;” faith grasped the eternal city with its infinite and eternal and soul-satisfying love. Because Moses had faith, he had also courage. The time for such heroic decisions is not yet passed in this world, but will come, sooner or later, to each soul. Ah, then, we, too, shall need faith in order to have courage! “And to courage knowledge.” Sometimes it seems to me that the devil, the world, and the church have all combined to keep men in ignorance, while the Lord says, “My people perish for lack of knowledge.” Men write out their little creeds, and look askance with scorn, and socially, politically, and financially ostracize the man who dares to think and believe beyond the narrow boundaries they have established. And all the while beyond these barriers which pride and bigotry have raised, the infinite ocean of divine truth and limitless love lies all unexplored. In order to gain the knowledge which God would gladly give to each soul, one must have faith enough to get courage enough to dare to walk alone with God. To that soul God will verify His promise, “I will give you the ‘Spirit of Truth, ‘. . . and He shall guide you into all the truth.’” “And to knowledge temperance,” or self-control. One can readily see that self-control depends upon knowledge,—the knowledge first of our own weakness, and then of God’s willingness and power. “And to temperance patience.” Without temperance, or self-control, it is clear that it is impossible to be patient. Patience is not one of the striking virtues like courage or heroism, but it is the secret charm of a beautiful life. We visit some grand scene in nature, and at first we are impressed only with the towering rocks and the yawning chasms. It is only after repeated visits and much thought that we discover that much of the secret charm of the place depends upon some little ferns growing out of a crevice high up, or upon some delicate tinting of the rocks, which has come only by years and years of frost and sunshine and shadow. So patience is the secret charm of that perfect life of Him who “was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and ‘as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he opened not His mouth.’” “And to patience godliness.” Godliness is God-likeness, and this is but the sublimity of patience. How it tests our patience if some one lies about us and misrepresents us before our friends! But Satan lied about God in the beginning, and all the mythologies, and all the theologies of the world have picked up those lies and perpetrated them. The best of us are only beginning to be able to testify now and then in the social meeting without misrepresenting God, and charging up to Him much of the misery which has resulted from our own and others’ misdeeds. And all the while God has been patiently waiting through the centuries for the time to come when truth and love shall finally, grandly, eternally, universally triumph over falsehood and hate. “And to godliness brotherly kindness.” Now we are getting up into the neighborhood of charity, where we can begin to smell the aroma of this lily of the valley. There are two English words “kind.” We spell them alike and pronounce them alike, but we are wont to consider them entirely separate words. We speak of a kind of wheat, and we speak of a kind man. In reality the words are the same word from the old English kinned or related. The kind man is the man who owns his kinship to all men, and treats them as tho they were, as indeed they are, brothers. Than brotherly kindness, there is only one grace higher, and that is charity. “And to brotherly kindness [add] charity.” What is charity? Some one replies that it is love, and that the word is so translated in the Revised Version. Yes, but what kind of love? I love my wife and my children; is this charity? They surely would not like to think so. We all love our friends. Is this charity?—Most certainly not. What kind of love, then, is charity? Let us illustrate. A mother has a family of children. There is John and Henry and Mary and Tom and perhaps others that I have not counted. The other children are all right, but Tom is a bad boy. He drinks and stays out late nights in bad company, and sometimes almost curses his mother to her face. The neighbors all say there is no hope for him; that he is an irreclaimable reprobate. How does mother feel about Tom? Does she hate and condemn him with the rest of the world?—Ah no! God help him if she does. But mother does not. She thinks more about Tom than about any of the other children, for she has to think about him when all the others are safely in bed, and she does not know where he is. It often happens that mother, in thinking more about Tom than about any other child, comes to think more of Tom than of the other children. And mother thinks more of Tom than any one else does, because she has studied him with love’s keen and sympathetic eyes till she sees possibilities of good in him which no one else sees. When all others speak against Tom, mother constantly says, “I don’t know, ‘somehow I think there is yet hope; and that Tom will make a man ‘yet, only give him time, and a good man, too.” Ah! love’s keen eyes can see good in embryo, and so discover possibilities that to all others are hidden. What a blessed thing it is that a mother looks thus upon a child with perennial hope and faith! Would it not be more blessed still if this way of looking at men and women extended beyond the family circle, including uncles and aunts and cousins and second cousins and thirty-second cousins until it reached the whole race, which is one in Adam? Would not this transform even this old earth into a heaven! This is charity,—the love that has no place for cruel criticism and condemnation6 the love that sees good in the embryo, that beholds the ideal, and discovers possibilities that are hidden to other eyes by the rubbish and weeds of present evil. PHOTOGRAPH OF A REAL CHRISTIAN.
By Pastor A. Sims
Taken from the Saints’ Guide Book.
[Pastor A. Sims, in the Wesleyan Herald.] If you are a true Bible Christian, such as you may and should be, then you have present peace with God, all your sins are forgiven, and your name is registered in the Lamb’s book of life. “Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Rom. 5:1. “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” Rom. 8:1. You have the witness of the Spirit that you are now a child of God and an heir of glory. “The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God; and if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified together.” Rom. 8:16, 17. You are saved from the love of the world. You are not eagerly seeking its wealth, and striving to lay up for yourself treasures upon earth; you do not desire the honors and praise of men, neither do you follow their customs and fashions; for you have learned and proved in your own experience that there is something better. “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” 1 John 2:15. “For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world; and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.” 1 John 5:4. “And be not conformed to this world; but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind.” Rom. 12:2. You either keep out or come out of all secret, oath-bound societies. “Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers; for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? and what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? and what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.” 2 Cor. 6:14–18. See also Eph. 5, 11–15 and Jas. 5:12. You give freely and liberally of your means to relieve the poor and advance the truth. Isa. 32:8; Eph. 4:28. You love the Word of God and delight in its study; you have great peace, and do not stumble into sin. “O how love I Thy law! it is my meditation all the day.” Ps. 119:97, 103, 148, 165. “When quiet in my house I sit,
Thy Book be my companion still;
My joy Thy sayings to repeat,
Talk o’er the records of Thy will,
And search the Oracles Divine,
Till every heart-felt word be mine.” You love the prayer-meeting, and are constant and active in your support of it as far as possible. “Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another; and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.” Heb. 10:25. “Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another; and the Lord hearkened and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before Him, for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon His name.” Mal. 3:16. You make no attempt at outward display, either in style of living or by personal adornment with gold, precious stones, and costly array. “Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel,” etc. 1 Peter 3:3; 1 Tim. 2:9. You are saved from the bondage of depraved appetites and habits. Strong drinks, tobacco, opium, cards, rink-going, dancing, horse-racing, gambling, lying, swearing, stealing, cheating, scolding, Sabbath-breaking, fornication, adultery, pride, and all uncleanness and foolish talking and jesting do no longer bind you and bring you under their power. The ruling power of sin is broken, and your emancipated soul has victory over the world, the flesh, and the devil. There is no law out against you, but you are free, yes, “free indeed.” “If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.” John 8:36. “Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.” Gal. 5:16. You do not run in debt without knowing how or when you will be able to pay. “Provide things honest in the sight of all men.” “Owe no man anything, but to love one another.” Rom. 12:17; 13:8. You have confidence toward God, and are entirely uncondemned, either of God or of your own heart. Your own communion with Him is real; often sweet and precious beyond expression, and your prayers are most graciously heard and answered. “And whatsoever we ask, we receive of Him, because we keep His commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in His sight.” 1 John 3:22. By constantly abiding in Christ you are saved from committing all known and outward sins. In loving obedience to God’s Word, and under the gentle movings and clear enlightening of the Holy Spirit, while constantly and fully trusting in God for His promised grace, you are kept from yielding to any temptations of the adversary or the uprisings of the carnal mind. “Whosoever abideth in Him sinneth not.” 1 John 3:6. You love God, and know it. You love, and are patiently waiting for, the second personal appearing of Christ, sure, if faithful unto the end, of a crown of righteousness at His coming. “Unto them that look for Him shall He appear the second time without sin unto salvation.” Heb. 9:28. You know that when Christ does appear, you also will appear with Him in glory; and that then you shall see Him as He is, and be like Him forever. And having this hope, you purify yourself, even as He is pure. See 1 John 3:3. You suffer in some form, and to a greater or less degree, from the persecuting spirit of the ungodly; and are not loved, courted, and sought after by the world. “Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.” 2 Tim. 3:12. “If ye were of the world, the world would love his own; but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.” John 15:19. You hunger and thirst after righteousness. Walking after the Spirit, you are led to see the need of an experience beyond what you now enjoy, and you are eagerly desiring and pressing on for the whole will of God to be done in your soul, and to know more and more of the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, until you comprehend it in its breadth and length and depth and height, and are filled with all the fulness of God. “Be ye holy; for I am holy.” 1 Peter 1:16. “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.” Heb. 12:14. Reader, are you a Bible Christian? CONFESSING THE SINS OF THE WORLD.
WHEN a man manifests a righteous indignation at the wrong-doing of others, it is not always safe to infer that he possesses a like indignation at his own wrong-doing. Indeed, it sometimes happens that the man who is loudest in condemning some particular form of evil doing, is himself the greatest sinner in some other form which is just as grossly sinful. Every one possesses in himself a share of universal human nature, and there is no evil which others do which he will not find in himself, as a possibility at least, if he looks for it. One who recognizes this truth will be more likely to be merciful in his judgment of the sins of others, and to be stern in his judgment of his own. Frederick D. Maurice recognized this truth, and acted upon it. “I ‘wish to confess,” he wrote, “the sins of the time as my own. Ah! ‘how needful do I feel it; for the sins of others produce such sin in ‘me, and stir up my unsanctified nature so terribly.” Most people would be willing to go with Maurice as far as confessing the sins of the world—that is easy enough; but few are willing to confess that the sins of the time—the sins which are chronicled in the newspapers, for instance—are their own. And yet any one who recognizes the seeds of these evils in his own heart will not be sure, outside of divine protection, that the grossest wickedness of the world will not be paralleled openly by his own evil deeds. To one thus aware of his peril every newspaper will be a chart of dangerous rocks, and every new crime a new warning of his own possibilities of evil.—S. S. Times. Worthiness Without Dishonor
By George Willis Cooke
NO ONE is worthy of the best the world can afford who has not schooled himself to do without it when it can not be obtained except at the price of dishonor.—George Willis Cooke. A BROTHER asks for our “ideas” of 1 John 3:9. Every scripture that is properly studied will give us “ideas.” And the individual to whom we may impart these “ideas” should be able to see them in the scripture itself, rather than in what is said about the scripture. The text in question reads, “Whosoever is born of ‘God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in ‘him: and he can not sin, because he is born of ‘God.’” I John 3:9. A little study of the foregoing text in connection with some other portions of Scripture will show that the “seed” which “remaineth in him,” and keeps him so that “he can not sin,” is the Word of God. The following is one of the scriptures:— “He spake by a parable: A sower went out to sow his seed: and as he sowed, some fell by the wayside, . . . and some fell among thorns; . . . and other fell on good ground, and sprang up, and bare fruit an hundred-fold.” In His interpretation of the parable, Jesus said:— “The seed is the Word of God. Those by the wayside are they that hear; then cometh the devil, and taketh away the Word out of their hearts, lest they should believe and be saved. They on the rock are they, which, when they hear, receive the Word with joy; and these have no root, which for awhile believe, and in time of temptation fall away. And that which fell among thorns are they, which, when they have heard, go forth, and are choked with cares and riches and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to perfection. But that on the good ground are they, which, in an honest and good heart, having heard the Word, keep it, and bring forth fruit with patience.” Luke 8:4-15. “The seed is the Word of God;” and they who produce fruit,—the ones who are the final overcomers, and the inheritors of everlasting life,—are the ones who have “an honest and good heart,” who hear the “Word,” and “keep it.” All such have the “patience” necessary for fruit-bearing, and no other class can do it. Then it is perfectly plain that the power which enables one to experience in his own life the fulfilment of 1 John 3:9, is the power of the Word of God itself. In speaking of his own experience, the psalmist says: “Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse ‘his way? by taking heed thereto according to Thy ‘Word.” Ps. 119:9. And again he says, “Thy ‘Word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin ‘against Thee.” Ps. 119:11. The whole question resolves itself into a matter of divine philosophy. If we would experience the power of living above the malarial swamps of sin, it is necessary for us to have the experience of feeding continually upon the active words of Jehovah. We trust that no one will look upon this as merely our “ideas” about 1 John 3:9, but rather that all will seek for the life-giving experience of eating the words of life. T. GOD'S WAY TRIUMPHANT.
By S.
JESUS CHRIST came to the world to do just what the sower did in the parable which the Saviour put forth; that is, to sow seed. In all His work for man, from the baptism in Jordan to the death on the cross, it is simply a record of the sowing of seed. There were flourishing kingdoms in the world at the time of Christ's personal ministry here; but Christ made no attempt to overturn them or interfere with their functions. There were many heads wearing crowns whose possessors coveted the crowns on the heads of others, and schemed for their possession; but the crowns of earthly potentates were not the object of Christ's mission in the world. There were civil laws in vogue at the time, some good, and some inexpressibly oppressive; but Christ did not consider it His mission to overthrow or interfere with these. There were rulers of many and rulers of few; but Christ declared that He came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and taught His followers that they should imitate His example, and be servants rather than masters or rulers. He did not do any of those things which the ambitious members of the Jewish hierarchy expected to see done by the One who should come to liberate Israel. Instead of the crash of overturned kingdoms, the world heard, “Blessed are the peacemakers; for ‘they shall be called the children of God.’” Instead of a command for the marshaling of the nation, the people heard the voice: “Let your light so shine ‘before men that they may see your good works, and ‘glorify your Father which is in heaven.’” Instead of a call for the subjugation of the world, the people heard: “Blessed are the meek; for they shall inherit ‘the earth.’” Instead of placing His followers on earthly thrones, and surrounding them with fawning courtiers and overflowing luxury, He commanded them: “Go ye into all the world, and preach the ‘Gospel to every creature;” “Go ye therefore and ‘teach all nations.’” The nation was disappointed; but it was because the nation was not walking in the light of God. They were looking for a Saviour who could not have saved them if He had come as they had pictured Him. But He came—came sowing seed; and appointed every one who would be His to the work which He had made sacred by His own life-work. It was not done with outward show, pomp, and worldly glory; but look at what the fruit of that peaceful seed-sowing will be. He would not uproot with violence the kingdoms existing while He was upon the earth; but from the seed-sowing which He did a kingdom shall come that will fill the whole earth, and “it shall break in ‘pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall ‘stand forever.’” Dan. 2:44. He did not covet the crowns of earthly rulers, yet in derision was crowned with cruel thorns; but as the result of the work which He did here, we find Him finally crowned with many crowns,—symbols of His everlasting victory (Rev. 19:12),—and crowns of victory also on the heads of His faithful followers. Rev. 4:4; 2:10; 2 Tim. 4:8. He did not displace, or interfere with, the civil laws then in existence; but as the result of the seed-sowing of the Gospel, all the laws that human minds have framed will one day be swept out of existence, and then the law of the all-wise God will be the only code as far as the works of God extend, and as long as eternity shall last. With God's eternal law the rule in all His realm, there will be no place for the ponderous, confusing legislative inventions of puny man. Righteousness will take the place of sin, and He who would not overthrow the kingdoms of this world in the way in which the Jews hoped to see it done, will sit then as the ruler of the universe. Instead of laws engraved on stone, or pressed into tablets of clay, or printed on perishing parchment or paper, God's one universal law will be written in the heart of every creature in His kingdom. Heb. 8:10; 10:16, 17. That is the triumph of the seed-sowing of the Gospel; that is the triumph of Divinity's plan for removing from the universe the incubus of sin; it is the triumph of God's way over man's way; of righteousness over sin. And that work will be done, no matter how we, as individuals, may relate ourselves to it. It is our blessed privilege—each son and daughter of Adam—to triumph with that work; but the wrecking of our glorious opportunity does not mean that God's work will come to naught. It will triumph, and we may triumph with it if we will to do His will. Everything else to which God has spoken has heard His voice and obeyed. When God said, “Let there be light,” nature obeyed Him, and light sprang into being. When He commanded the waters to divide and the dry land to appear, they obeyed Him, and have never yet disobeyed. When He said, “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the tree yielding fruit after his ‘kind,’” they obeyed, and are obeying still. Every tree that grows upon the earth, every blade of grass that comes up out of the earth, every herb that grows, is a living, growing example of obedience to the Word of God. And so, while men have disobeyed through all the ages, nature puts forth in her buds and blades, her flowers and fruits, a continual testimony of obedience to our common Maker. In the growth of plant life from the seeds scattered over the earth, we have a perpetual symbol of what is being done, and will be done, by the seed-sowing of the Gospel; and in the obedience which these things manifest, we have a symbol of that universal obedience which will come as the final result of the seed-sowing of the Prince of peace in a world that had well-nigh forgotten God. There is power in the tiny seed to break the hardest rocks, and burst through the hardest soil; likewise there is power in the seed of God's Word to soften the hardest hearts, and break the strongest bands of selfishness in them who will to do His will. S. KNOW ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey? There is no such thing as an independent creature. The Creator “giveth to all life and breath and all things.” The service of all is due to Him, yet He allows a free choice to each one as to whom he will serve. To each one He is saying, “Choose ye this day whom ye will serve,” making the fact clear that we are all servants of some master, “whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness.” Every person is either a servant of God or a servant of Satan. To serve means to obey. To serve God means to obey His law. To serve Satan means to yield to his inspiration not to obey God. The fall of the first human pair illustrates this principle. They disobeyed God, and became the servants of Satan. To transgress the law of God is to serve Satan; “sin is the transgression of the law;” the service of Satan is sin. Every person in this world is being tested as to whether he will serve God or serve Satan. Duty is made plain in the Word: “Fear God, and keep His commandments; for this is the whole duty of man.” It is certain that “no man can serve two masters.” We must either serve God or the adversary of God. The results of the two services are plainly stated: “The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Naturally all men are sinners—servants of Satan—because of Adam’s fall. “Death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.” A servant is powerless to serve any but his own master. The servant of Satan can not serve God, because his master will not let him. A stronger power than that of Satan must set him free. He must be drawn away by the power of God. Even tho a Saviour has been provided, Jesus says, “No man can come to Me, except the Father which hath sent Me draw him.” God will deliver all from Satan’s service who will choose to be set free. Jesus Christ is “the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey Him.” He will help to throw off the shackles of sin. He is “a propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God.” Every inducement is on the side of choosing Him for our Master. “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.” G. Some years ago a steamer was coming up the Firth of Clyde on a stormy night. Careful watch was kept, and all was going well till suddenly a dim, flickering light appeared right over her bows. In another instant the steamer went crashing into a ship which was lying at anchor. Several lives were lost, and much damage was done. What was the cause of the accident? The anchored ship had allowed her light to grow dim for want of oil. It was only neglect! This is just what many Christians do; they forget to read the Word of God, to meditate upon it, and to watch with prayer; therefore their light is almost out, to the injury of themselves and others. “Ye are the light of the world.” Christ’s churches are golden candlesticks, planted in a dark world. They are to hold forth the Word of life. Dear young Christians, watch and pray, and see to it that your lamps are trimmed and burning, and ye yourselves like “men that wait for their Lord.” “If any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” “WHERE your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” (Archbishop Ireland, in North American Review.) A MAN'S right to work is one of the most intimate rights of his being. It is the right to the exercise of his mental and bodily faculties. It is more—it is the right to his life, which depends for sustenance on the fruits of his labor. It is for the same reason the right of his wife and children to their lives. Of this right no man can, with any shadow of equity, deprive another; neither can any man by his own authority dictate to another when and how this right is to be used; else this other were his subject, his slave. And when, in order to deprive a man of this right, violence is done to him and bodily injury inflicted, then there is no measure to the injustice put upon him; all semblance of liberty is effaced; physical force becomes the ruling law in the relations of man to man. A SIGNIFICANT FALLING AWAY.
By S.
Statistics of the Presbyterian Church (North) record a decrease of ten per cent. a year, during the last three years, in the number of candidates for the ministry. In the Presbyterian Church (South) the decrease for the same time has been five per cent. A similar state of affairs is reported to exist among the Congregationalists. Statistics have not been published along this line by other denominations; but there is no reason to suppose that this is a feature of these two denominations only. It is more reasonable to look upon it as a symptom of the times, and indicative of the condition of things in the church generally. Various reasons are given for this condition, such as the increasing spirit of worldliness in the church, commercialism, low state of vital piety, materialism, lust for luxury, and the worship of mammon. Some do not regard these as the cause, but declare unqualifiedly that the true cause lies in the tyranny of creed; that young men shun the pulpit because it is not a place of intellectual freedom; that the higher education brings with it a horror of creedal bonds, and leads them to see a contradiction between the belief of the church and the more advanced “modern knowledge.” To such as hold this view the remedy lies in permitting the younger ministers more freedom of teaching in the pulpit, bringing their religious teaching “into harmony with the facts known,” which have been learned “in library and laboratory,” and discarding “useless tradition.” Certainly “useless tradition” has never been an essential of salvation, and such dogmas as are founded upon it are founded upon sand, and the sooner they are discarded the better for all concerned. Every creed that has been formed is an attempt to bind and hinder the growth and progress of the advancing truth of God. Creeds were not intended so to be by the men who formulated them; but such they have proved to be. The creed thrown over the church is the bushel turned over the candle. So the church can well afford to let it go—it can not afford not to. Banish tradition, banish the creed, and let the church and the world have the pure Gospel of Jesus Christ, untrammelled, unfettered, unhindered. But what of the “modern knowledge” and “the ‘facts known,’” which have been found out “in ‘library and laboratory,’” and with which the young minister would seek to harmonize his religious teaching? This is but another way of stating that modern religious teaching must harmonize with evolution and the higher criticism, and that the churches must allow their ministers to teach this clerical infidelity, or see the pursuits of the world swallowing up the young men who started out to study for the ministry. Higher criticism—which is but an attempt to vivisect the living Word, and evolution—which is but an attempt to unthrone the Creator of the heavens and the earth, have combined their forces to overthrow faith in God and in His Word. These studies have been fostered even in theological schools, and some who had started out to be ministers have been stranded on these rocks. Others are being stranded every day before they have left the academies by the apparently learned disquisitions of these philosophers, and have gone into the great drift of unbelief. Now comes the proposition that this “modern thought” shall have free course in the pulpit to finish off in the congregation the damage which it began in the minister in the course of his theological training. This will be done under the plea that it will unhamper the minister, give him a more inviting field, and thus increase the number of candidates for the ministry. The result will be that these twin deceptions will perform the same undermining work in the congregation that they have done in the ministry, discrediting in one breath, as both of these evils do, both the Word and the Author of the Word. We cannot tell how rapidly these errors will work in undermining faith. They have been working rapidly idly in that direction; they are working more rapidly now. The great majority formerly looked upon them with distrust. Now, because they are advocated by those high in sacred office, the mass are more ready to accept, and so more easily deceived. The decrease of real Christian faith goes on as rapidly as this philosophy prevails, and the ratio increases as the philosophy gains adherents in the sacred desk. We are not advocating that the minister of the Gospel shall be held down to preaching the tenets of a creed; but that the minister of the Gospel preach the Word, be ready at all times to give the reason of his hope, to teach faith, and trust, and hope in God; and then leave to the enemy of souls every work whose tendency is to undermine, to tear down, and to scatter. There is no law to prevent a man teaching the higher criticism or the “science” of evolution; there is no law to prevent men listening to such teachings. As far as human rights are concerned, it is the right of every man to be privileged so to do if he chooses. But God did not include this work in the Great Commission to His followers. Theirs was to be the work of propagating faith and the knowledge of God—not the “science” of the evolution of man from the ooze of the ocean bed. Theirs was to be a work of teaching faith in God’s own record of His work, and the surety of His purpose concerning man—not a scheme of proving Nature her own author, life a spontaneous phenomenon, and man an evolved bit of protoplasm, whose evolver was purposeless, and whose end is shrouded in mystery unfathomable. Theirs was to be the work of preparing men to meet their Lord when He should return to this earth. Let them do that. The creed can not tell them what to teach; but the great Word and the Holy Spirit can. There is the source of true evangelical preparation, and of true evangelical success. That will mean freedom in the pulpit, freedom in the truth; but it does not mean freedom to preach faith-destroying, soul-destroying philosophies, while professing the name of Christ, and the occupation of His servant. Men may teach these philosophies if they will; but it is dishonoring to the Most High to claim that such is the message of Christ for this time. To attempt to remedy this falling away in the ranks of the clergy by teaching to the congregations these same philosophies of distrust and unbelief, is only to increase the malady, and make the situation more hopeless. Christ Himself asked the question: “When the ‘Son of man cometh, shall He find faith on the ‘earth’?” Luke 18:8. Every power of the enemy is now in full swing to make the answer, “No!” and he has found many stalwart lieutenants in the pulpits of Christian lands. The philosophies above referred to, and the plan suggested for making them the burden of the ministry, are in the direct line of the work of the enemy in destroying faith. The question of the Saviour implies that when He comes, genuine faith will be rare; that a powerful effort will have been put forth to sweep faith entirely out of the earth. That work is going on now. Higher criticism is the right wing; evolution the left; and in the center the enemy of all good comes on with all the other elements of discord and doubt. The faith of many will be destroyed, and they will be lost; but it is the privilege of every true child of God to be so anchored to the Infinite that he shall not be moved by any of these things. Salvation is possible to every one that willeth to do His will, and he need not be ensnared in the great falling away.