The pope sent the Golden Rose to Bomba, king of Naples, and in less than twelve months he lost his crown and kingdom. He sent his blessing to Francis Joseph, emperor of Austria, and in less than twelve months he was defeated at Sadowa, and lost his Venetian dominions. He sent it then to Queen Isabella of Spain, and in a short time she lost both crown and dominions. He next sent it to Louis Napoleon, or rather to the Empress Eugenie, which is more remarkable still, as she called the war with Germany her war. In less than twelve months France was defeated by Protestant Germany, and the emperor had to flee to Protestant England for shelter, where he died in exile; the Prince Imperial fell by the hand of the Zulus, and the papal favorite alone is left to mourn the extinction of that once proud dynasty.
Mrs. W. T. Sherman got the Golden Rose as a special mark of favor for her service to the church; and it was too much for her, as she died soon after. The pope cursed Italy as he had cursed England, and excommunicated King Humbert for taking the papal dominions, and making Rome the capital of the kingdom. Since then she has risen from being a cipher among the nations to be a voice and a power in the council of Europe. He cursed Germany, and she became the greatest power on the continent.
The pope blessed the French showman, Boulanger, and in less than two weeks he had to flee to Germany for refuge, and is now an exile in Guernsey. The princess of Brazil, when near her accouchement, requested the interposition of the pope, and his blessing on her child. She received it, and the child was born deformed. Maximilian was killed a short time after being blessed by the pope as emperor of Mexico, and his wife became insane after going to Rome, and receiving the benediction. The pope neglected some official business in order to give his special blessing to an English steamer laden with Sisters of Charity for South America in 1870, and it never reached its destination. Every soul on board perished. The empress of Brazil was blessed but once; that was enough, she broke her leg three days afterward. It may be remembered that the floating palace delayed its starting from Montevideo to Buenos Ayres until it received the assurance of safety in the papal blessing. It then raised its anchor, sailed out to sea, and went down in two days. “The order of Christ” was conferred by the pope upon Dr. Windhorst, his great champion in Germany. He died in less than a year.
August, 1895, the Archbishop of Damascus, in addressing the Spanish troops at Vittoria, when about to start for Cuba, declared that the pope, like a new Moses, had raised his hands to heaven, and prayed for victory. We know the result. The Spanish arms, the queen regent, and boy king have had his blessing many times. On the last occasion it was at the commencement of the Spanish-American war, and the result was that Spain was miserably defeated, her navies sunk, her foreign possessions dropped from her grasp, and the once proud and leading State in Europe sank into insignificance; the remnants of her troops returned home ragged, miserable, and sick.
The Grand Bazaar de Charite in Paris, on May 4, 1897, had the papal nuncio to deliver the benediction. It was scarcely five minutes afterward when the building was in flames, and nearly 150 of the society ladies of Paris lost their lives. The late empress of Austria was the recipient of the Golden Rose, accompanied by Leo's blessing. That did not protect her from the dagger of the assassin.
It is not superstition to regard with dread the special marks of the pope's favor with such a history. It would be madness to ignore this dreadful record and its manifest instruction to the Christians of the globe.—Primitive Catholic, Nov. 15, 1898.
How They Became Convinced
[Believing it would be of interest to our readers, the editor of the SIGNS OF THE TIMES has asked Sabbath-keeping ministers and evangelical workers to tell in a few words the scripture or scriptures, the truths and principles, which constrained them to accept the unpopular truth of the seventh-day Sabbath. These testimonies must not exceed 300 words. Let us hear from all.]
LIII.
In 1871 I was converted and joined the Methodist Church in Perth Amboy, N. J. Thinking Sunday was the Sabbath, I kept it as the Sabbath should be kept. Out of this grew the following conversation between my sister and myself:—
She,—“If you are to be as careful as the Jews, you ought to keep the Sabbath.”
I,—“Do I not?”
She,—“No, Saturday is the Sabbath.”
I,—“How say you Saturday, when God says the seventh day?”
She,—(smiling at my ignorance) “Saturday is the seventh day.”
I,—“Can you prove that?”
She,—“See for yourself” (handing me an almanac), and for the first time I noticed that the week commenced with Sunday and ended with Saturday.
I,—“What has the almanac to do with religion?”
She,—“True, but on what day did Christ rise?” (handing me a Bible open to Mark 16:9.)
I,—“On the first day of the week.”
She,—“Then, according to your own idea and Mark 16:9, Sunday is the first day of the week, and therefore Saturday is the seventh.”
I,—(in deep thought) “Yes, but then we ought to change.”
A brother then tried to show how Jesus and the apostles had changed the day, and it seemed so plausible I believed it, but asked where it was written. He became confused and I became suspicious, and pressed him for a “thus saith the Lord,” when he openly confessed that there was no scripture for it. I therefore sought God in prayer, searching His Word, but the only facts I could there gather were, “The seventh day is the Sabbath.” The whole world agreed with God that Sunday was the first day of the week, and therefore the day before was the seventh. I kept the following Sabbath, not knowing but what I was the only man in the world doing so. For obedience I soon lost my job as a carpenter, and was disfellowshipped by the church I loved.
I moved to Texas to farm, where I lived five years alone. Having in the meantime heard of the Seventh-day Adventists, I went to Battle Creek, Mich., in 1876, where I soon learned more about the Sabbath. But for me to know beyond doubt what day was the seventh day, and that God said (Ex. 20:11), “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God,” was sufficient to cause me to change, and to keep me, this alone, for five years. And what was sufficient for me seems might be sufficient for any honest person.
Keene, Texas. A. W. JENSON.
LIV.
My parents were members of the Methodist Church, and I was early taught to reverence the Bible as God’s Word. In 1852, when but a child, I listened to my aunt as she read the Bible to mother, and as she read, “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God,” it made a great impression on my mind. My mother soon commenced to obey, and after that Elders J. B. Frisbie, M. E. Cornell, Joseph Bates, J. N. Loughborough, and Brother and Sister White, and other pioneers in the message, came into Jackson County, Mich., where we lived, and held meetings, all of which made a deep impression on my young mind. When quite young, my parents moved to Battle Creek, Mich. The words of my first Sabbath-school teachers greatly impressed me.
When a little past twelve years of age, a series of meetings was held in our church for the young people. This, and my mother’s earnest talks and prayers, decided me to give myself to the Lord. From the time I made a start in the service of God I felt that I wanted to work for others. I shall always remember one of my schoolmate’s meeting with a serious accident, and my going and talking and praying with him. Now, for more than twenty years, my life has been given to the work of the Gospel ministry. GEO. O. STATES.
UNDER CHRIST'S RULE.
By Andrew Murray
LET our temper be under the rule of the love of Jesus. He can not alone curb it—He can make us gentle and patient. Let the vow that not an unkind word of others shall ever be heard from our lips be laid trustingly at His feet. Let the gentleness that refuses to take offense, that is always ready to excuse, to think and hope the best, mark our intercourse with all.
Let our life be one of self-sacrifice, always studying the welfare of others, finding our highest joy in blessing others. And let us, in studying the divine art of doing good, yield ourselves as obedient learners to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. By His grace, the most commonplace life can be transfigured with the brightness of a heavenly beauty, as the infinite love of the Divine nature shines out through our frail humanity.—Andrew Murray.
THE LIFE OF GOD.
Does the Christian possess a life which the worldling—the unbeliever—does not? Nay, more, is he a Christian if he does not possess a life which the unbeliever does not? We do not mean by these questions the hope of a life to come, or the promise of a life to come, but life now, actual and manifest.
“But is there more than one source of life?” “Does not all life come from God?” “Are not all living things, then, partakers of His life?” “And do not all, therefore, have the same life?”
These are all pertinent questions, and are worthy of candid consideration. Let us study the matter.
1. There is but one source of life—God; for “with Him is the fountain of life.” Ps. 36:9. “As the Father hath life in Himself, even so gave He to the Son also to have life in Himself.” John 5:26. And from the Father and Son, through the Spirit, life pulses out to all parts of God’s living universe. For “by His Spirit the heavens are garnished” (Job 26:13); “by the word of Jehovah were the heavens made, and all the host of them by the breath [Spirit] of His mouth” (Ps. 33:6); “Thou sendest forth Thy Spirit, they are created; and Thou renewest the face of the earth” (Ps. 104:30).
2. The life of “the everlasting God” is everlasting life. We could not conceive of it as otherwise. From His throne flows out unceasingly, eternally, unfailingly the river of life. Rev. 22:1, 2.
3. But His life is given in different ways, conditioned upon different laws. The life in the mineral follows its forms of crystallization, always reproducing with more or less modification the characteristics of that mineral. The earth, too, is alive, and the life received from the great Fountain follows the perverted law of a sin-cursed planet. The life is given to the vegetable, according to a different law, which forever perpetuates vegetables, but each vegetable according to its kind. One step higher, in numerous species and kinds, is the manifestation of life in the animal, each according to the law of its physical being, each perpetuating its kind and receiving the life according to that law.
4. So far as this world is concerned the highest creature is man, the link between all lower creatures and the Creator, possessing both physical and spiritual natures, having moral sense and conscience, with implanted divine aspirations after the infinite.
5. The life of all the lower orders of creation was perpetuated through physical food. The vegetable fed upon the mineral and upon sunlight, air, and water. The animal fed upon the vegetable, and received life therefrom. Man fed upon the vegetable for the sustenance of his physical being, drank in the sunshine, breathed the air, and quaffed the sparkling water. But all these lower laws were subject to the higher law of man’s spiritual nature, his moral image in God. That nature could not be fed on physical food. It must receive God’s life according to a higher law, which is the only law of unending existence—righteousness. And, therefore, it is written: “In the way of righteousness is life; and in the pathway thereof there is no death.” Prov. 12:28. “The Spirit is life, because of righteousness.” Rom. 8:10. Man’s higher nature, receiving the words of God, receiving them by living faith from the great Fountain, through them, fed directly upon the life of God, drank directly from the unadulterated streams of the living Fountain.
6. Man’s spiritual life—the life of God in man—sanctified, shaped, controlled all lower life. As long as man’s heart was in harmony with the law of his existence—God’s righteousness—all life to all things was eternal life in all; for life in all was flowing in perfect harmony with the laws of being in all.
7. But when man sinned, when he broke his connection with God, and transgressed the law of His spiritual life, all laws beneath him were perverted. “The creation was subjected to vanity, not of its own will, but by reason of Him who subjected it.” Rom. 8:20. When man, the king of the world, under God, failed to recognize his Creator and Ruler, failed to recognize his responsibility to the creatures under his care, he cut off from the world eternal life by perverting every law through which life came. Righteousness perverted became sin, and life perverted became death.
8. From the great Fountain of God, life—His life—still flows. It leaves Him as eternal life, as it must, but it is received by perverted channels of law. Hence we see written on rock and tree and bird and animal disease, decay, death. Only from lower creatures subject to decay, can each order in God’s creative plan obtain its life, life sooner or later to end. Unbelieving man stands on the same plane. From vegetable and animal, from water, air, and sunshine—all existing under perverted law—he receives a perverted life. Men live and move and have their being because of God’s goodness and mercy in prolonging life, but the life is not God’s life; they are “alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardening of their heart.” Eph. 4:18. Therefore, it is true that as regards future life, man of himself has no pre-eminence above a beast. “As the one dieth, so dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath [margin, spirit].” Eccl. 3:18–20.
9. Man’s only hope is that the broken channel of everlasting life be restored. This God has done in Jesus Christ. He is the Righteous One; therefore, He is the Living One, the Quickening One. He not only has life, but gives life. The law in the sinner is perverted, and is a law of sin and death. The law in Christ Jesus was and is normal, and is the law of righteousness and life. As by faith God’s life was in the beginning perpetuated by man, and as by unbelief man lost it, so by faith in Jesus Christ harmony is restored between man and God; man accepts, receives the righteousness of God in Christ, and the life of God is restored in the restored law of righteousness. “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.” Rom. 8:1, 2.
10. That life, that higher life, that all-sufficient, eternal life of God, comes to us only through Jesus Christ, through perfect submission to God’s will. “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.” John 3:16. “He that eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood hath eternal life.” John 6:54. “And the witness is this, that God gave unto us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He that hath the Son hath the life; he that hath not the Son of God hath not the life. These things have I written unto you that ye may know that ye have eternal life, even unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God.” 1 John 5:11–13.
11. Surely this is conclusive. The true believer in Jesus Christ has a life which the unbeliever knows not. Like Paul he can say: “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I that live, but Christ liveth in me; and that life I now live in the flesh, I live in faith, the faith which is in the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself up for me.” Gal. 2:20. It is this life which makes a man a new creation; which takes from him the love of the world and implants in its place the love of God; which makes the drunkard a temperate man; which makes of the profane swearer a reverent man; which makes the lustful man a pure man; of the stingy man a liberal man, which enables a man to pass through the world and not be moulded by the world. O that God’s people might know that this life were theirs, actual, genuine, mighty, as long as faith was in exercise. How that life would move the world!
PRESUMPTION
By G.
The Word of God lays particular stress on the heinousness of the sin of presumption. David prayed that he might be kept back from “presumptuous sins,” that they might not have dominion over him. And well he might, for even before his day there was abundance of historical evidence of the consequences of presumption. The destruction of the antediluvian world by a flood of water was because of their presumption. In the face of God’s care and great mercy “all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth,” until few, indeed, walked with God.
When the people had again multiplied in the earth, they again departed from the Lord, and presumed to build a city and a tower to make for themselves a name. Then the Lord confounded their language, in order to restrain them from the thing they had “imagined to do.”
When Moses went before the king of Egypt to demand the release of Israel in the name of the Lord, Pharaoh said: “Who is the Lord, that I should obey His voice to let Israel go? I know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go.” Several times, after promising to let the Lord’s people go that he might be spared further affliction, the king went back on his word and compelled them to remain at their tasks. Then, after letting them go, he again falsified his word and sent an army to compel their return. And when the Lord opened a way in the Red Sea, and Israel were passing through by faith, the Egyptian host went into the way by presumption, and were all destroyed.
When Israel fell to worshiping a golden calf, altho the festival was proclaimed as “a feast to the Lord,” the anger of the Lord was kindled against them, with the result that three thousand perished. Again, when Israel demanded flesh instead of the manna that was given from heaven, their demand was gratified, but the result was a great plague, which destroyed many lives.
Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, with two hundred and fifty princes, rebelled against the authority of Moses and Aaron, and assumed an equal prerogative with the Lord’s chosen. But God showed His estimate of such presumption by an earthquake that swallowed up the whole company of rebels, together with their households and goods.
When Israel had sorely provoked Moses and Aaron by their continual murmuring, Moses “spake unadvisedly” at Meribah. God had told him to speak to the rock that it might give forth water for the people. But Moses smote the rock with his rod, and said to the people, “Hear now, ye rebels; shall we bring you forth water out of this rock?” This is the only fault recorded against Moses after leaving Egypt as leader of Israel; but it was presumption, and must receive marked rebuke, as a noted example. Even the making of the golden calf by Aaron was overlooked after a rebuke by Moses, he being actuated by fear of the people; but here was presumption, and a memorable judgment must be recorded against it. “And the Lord said unto Moses and Aaron, Because ye believed not in Me, to sanctify Me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore ye shall not bring this assembly into the land which I have given them.”
When Israel “presumed” to go against the Amalekites and Canaanites at Kadesh, after the Lord had said He would not go with them, they were sorely beaten. When in their own strength they attempted to take the little city of Ai, thirty-eight years later, they were again humiliated in the eyes of the enemy. But the story of illustrations is too long to repeat in a brief article. Conspicuous, however, are the cases of the Bethshemites, who looked into the ark of the Lord (1 Samuel 6); of Uzzah, who put his hand to the ark to steady it (2 Samuel 6); of King Uzziah, who went into the house of the Lord to offer incense (2 Kings 2:26); of Nebuchadnezzar, who assumed the glory of building Babylon (Daniel 4); of Belshazzar, who used the holy vessels at a riotous feast (chapter 5); and of Ananias and Sapphira, and Simon Magus, who used the Christian profession to further their selfish ends.
We might also note the case of the Jewish exorcists (Acts 19:13–16), who undertook to cast out devils in the name of Jesus, and were badly discomfited. But enough has been cited to show that the sin of presumption will bring its sure and sore consequences. To attempt to walk in the way of the Lord without faith is presumption. To invoke the power of God7for an unholy purpose is presumption. To ask the blessing of God upon any work or institution that has not the sanction of His holy Word is presumption. To place any decree of man in the place of the commandment of God is presumption. To assume a duty or responsibility which God has plainly placed upon another is presumption. Presumption is the extreme of lawlessness, the persistent continuance in well-known sin, and is virtually setting self above God.
Peter, speaking by inspiration of the Spirit, shows how God will deal with the unrighteous in the judgment, adding, “But chiefly them that walk after the flesh in the lust of defilement, and despise dominion. Daring, self-willed, they tremble not to rail at dignities.” These presumptuous souls are compared to Balaam, who tried to curse Israel for reward, after the Lord had plainly shown him that His desire was to bless His people.
It behooves us all to pray with David, “Keep back Thy servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me.” G.
Who Pays for Labor Strikes?
The victories that labor strikers gain over corporate employers are, as a rule, only victories over the people at large, most of whom are comparatively poor, and many of them extremely poor. The corporations are seldom losers. For instance: The United Mine Workers have succeeded in getting an advance of 12½ cents a ton for mining bituminous coal, with the result that the wholesale price goes up 30 cents per ton, and that will advance the price to consumers considerably more.
DEATH AND THE RESURRECTION.
1. Death is the result of disobedience.
“The Lord God commanded the man, saying, ‘Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat; but of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.’ Gen. 2:16, 17.”
2. Through Adam’s transgression death comes to all men.
“By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men.” Rom. 5:12.
3. Man is unconscious in death.
“In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken, for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.” Gen. 3:19.
“The dead know not anything, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten. Also their love, and their hatred, and their envy, is now perished; neither have they any more a portion forever in anything that is done under the sun.” Eccl. 9:5, 6.
4. Spiritual death is a condition in this world.
“And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath He quickened together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses.” Col. 2:13.
“Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink His blood, ye have no life in you.” John 6:53.
“To be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.” Rom. 8:6.
5. The Son of God suffered death for us all.
“When we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.” Rom. 5:6.
“We see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor, that He by the grace of God should taste death for every man.” Heb. 2:9.
6. Christ regained life through a resurrection.
“I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.” 1 Cor. 15:3, 4.
“Declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead.” Rom. 1:4.
7. So we can gain a future life only through a resurrection or translation at the coming of Christ.
“Since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For, as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.” 1 Cor. 15:21, 22.
“The Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the Archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first; then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord.” 1 Thess. 4:16, 17.
8. Christ has the power of the resurrection.
“As the Father hath life in Himself; so hath He given to the Son to have life in Himself. Marvel not at this; for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth.” John 5:26–29.
“I am He that liveth, and was dead: and, behold, I am alive forevermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell [hades, the grave] and of death.” Rev. 1:18.
9. The resurrection is shown in baptism.
“We are buried with Him by baptism unto death; that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection.” Rom. 6:4, 5; also Col. 2:12.
10. There will be two resurrections.
“All that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.” John 5:28, 29.
“And I saw two thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them; and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshiped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection; on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years.” Rev. 20:4–6.
“For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Rom. 6:23.
GROWING IN HIM.
By S.
Growth and fruit-bearing are the characteristics of the true Christian; and the fruit is a sure result of the growth. God has furnished all the requisites in unstinted quantity; but the responsibility for the growth and the fruit rests upon us, and they are the result of our choice.
The right way is faithfully pointed out; the right food is set before us; and then our responsibility begins. The Lord’s instruction to us through Peter is this: “Putting away therefore all wickedness, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil speakings [the paths which we are to avoid], as new-born babes, long for the spiritual milk which is without guile, that ye may grow thereby unto salvation.” 1 Peter 2:1, 2. That spiritual milk is the Word of God in its own purity. Partaking of that, growth is as certain as that water seeks its level; as much a fact as that the sun shines and men live. It is a result as sure as the melting of ice by heat or the congelation of water by cold. We feed upon the Word and we “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.” 2 Peter 3:18. We neglect it and feed upon the food of our fleshly desires, and our souls shrivel and our hearts grow cold toward God and all His purposes. And such, Inspiration tells us, “are springs without water, and mists driven by a storm; for whom the blackness of darkness hath been reserved.” Such a spring is a hollow promise; and such a mist deposits no moisture and blinds the eyes of those who should be rejoicing in the light.
Our material body depends for sustenance upon the food apportioned to it. Our soul must live and grow by the spiritual food suited to its necessities. There is life in the Word, and God designs that we feed upon that and receive that life. He knows better than we, but He will not compel us to go other than the way of our own choice.
God likens His children to stones in His temple; but He calls such “living stones.” There is no place in the plans of God for anything that has not life. Death came as the result of sin. Sin cursed the earth as well as those upon it, and we see death in what we term “inanimate nature” as well as in the human being. It is around us and beneath us, because we are in the land of the enemy, surrounded by the subjects of the king of sin. When the curse is removed, life will throb through every atom of the handiwork of God, even as through redeemed humanity. So God does not use dead things to represent those whom His renewing life has vivified. Christ was a “tried stone,” a “living stone.” He bore the cruel weight of sin, but it did not crush Him. He was tried and found true. The stone upon which the weight of the temple rests must be able to bear that weight—it must not crumble. A dead stone will not stand the test; it will crumble to powder and the building will fall.
Christ not only stood that test, but He has made it possible for every one who will be His to stand with Him every test that will come; and whether we stand or whether we crumble depends upon whether we choose to stand in the strength of Christ or to stand in our own frailty.
The ability to bear burdens in the cause of Christ is a precious gift, and He who has that gift will not consider work a hardship. The food he has taken has made him strong for the burden, has produced for him living tissue for the load he is to bear. Let us then eat of that spiritual food and drink of that spiritual drink, that we may grow and lift and bear as God designed we should. S.
Please explain Job 14:22: “But his flesh upon him shall have pain, and his soul within him shall mourn.” H. E. D.
The passage is descriptive of man’s present state here. True, the verse previous speaks of his condition of death, but in verse 22 Job returns to man’s condition here. The American Standard Revision reads: “But his flesh upon him hath pain, and his soul within him mourneth.” The verse expresses a part of the trouble of the few days mentioned in verse 1. It is because of the trouble, the pain, the mourning of the few days that Job thought the grave would be desirable. Verse 13.
“And they [the righteous] shall go forth and look upon the carcasses of the men that have transgressed against Me; for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an abhorring to all flesh.” The text is a description of what is stated in other words in Rev. 20:7–9. Note first that it is not upon the writhing bodies of agonized souls that the righteous look, but upon the carcasses of the wicked, the dead bodies. The undying worm and unquenchable fire are illustrations borrowed from Tophet, or the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, just outside of Jerusalem. It was at one time noted for its idolatry. It was afterward degraded to a place where the offal and refuse of the city and the bodies of animals and malefactors were cast. Upon this filth, worms constantly preyed, not to keep alive, but to devour; and to avert pestilence by such a mass of filth, constant fires were kept burning to consume what the worms left. The worms died not and the fire ceased not to burn as long as there was aught to consume. Both symbols became symbols of utter and complete destruction. See Isa. 51:6–8. Then will the enemies of God be seen to be identified with sin, to have chosen sin in preference to God and good, and they shall be an abhorring to all the righteous forever.
Will the SIGNS please give us a little light on 1 Tim. 2:14: “And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression.” C. S. D. F.
The woman was deceived by Satan through the serpent. She believed him instead of God. Adam seems to have yielded so as to be with her in the sin, because of his love for her. She was deceived; he entered into the thing openly.
The application of the text is the time of judgment, when by fire and sword the Lord will plead with all flesh, and the slain of the Lord shall be many. Verse 16. See Jer. 25:32, 33. Verse 17 mentions certain classes whose religion consists in idolatrous ceremonies, while they give themselves up to feasting and gluttony. They shall all come to destruction together. The margin seems to give a clearer sense.
Sirs,—Through the Question Corner of the Signs of THE TIMES, kindly explain Rom. 2:12. K. P.
Let us paraphrase the text: “For as many as have sinned without [the knowledge of the written] law [as the Jew had] shall also perish without law [shall not be held to strict account as those who have had greater light]; and as many as have sinned in the law [having a knowledge of the law] shall be judged by the law.” This is explained in verses 13–15, showing that it is to the heathen who have no knowledge of God’s law and to God’s professed people who do that the text refers. Verses 13–15 are a parenthetical explanation. For the time of the judgment read verse 12 with 16.
