p. 7 | Review and Herald, Vol. 89, No. 12. (3/21/1912)

Editorial Correspondence

By F. M. W.

St. Helena, Cal., Feb. 25, 1912.

For many years we have been urged by the instruction through the spirit of prophecy to establish schools for the education of our young people in the rural districts, removed from the evil influences of our great cities.

An effort has been made, in the establishment of the Pacific Union College, to follow this instruction. Located eight miles from St. Helena and five miles from the sanitarium, up among the mountains of the Cascade range, the location is most ideal. The estate comprises nearly sixteen hundred acres of land. More than one hundred acres, which consists of rich valley land, has been cleared, and is set out to fruit, consisting of apples, peaches, plums, pears, prunes, grapes, and blackberries. There are also a number of nut-bearing trees. The land abounds with springs, which yield a bountiful water-supply, not alone for domestic uses, but for irrigating purposes as well. It is estimated that the flow from the springs amounts to more than three hundred thousand gallons daily. The larger part of the land is covered with a heavy growth of timber, amounting to several million feet, furnishing an unlimited supply of firewood and building material.

The altitude of the school is nearly two thousand feet above sea-level. The climate is mild and healthful.

A number of buildings were acquired with the land purchase. These consist of one large building now occupied as a boys’ dormitory, a hall now being used for the college building, six cottages, three barns, a laundry, numerous other small buildings, and a swimming-pool.

Since the school opened, two years ago, a sawmill has been erected, and from timber cut upon the land building material has been prepared for the erection of a ladies’ dormitory, which has been nearly completed, largely by student labor. It contains dining-room facilities for the entire school. Ordinarily a building of this character would cost from thirty to forty thousand dollars; but when completed, the cost will be less than twenty thousand dollars. While a large saving has been effected in this way, it has also furnished a large amount of work to the students, enabling some to take school work who otherwise would be deprived of the privilege.

This school possesses one of the very strongest faculties of experienced teachers to be found in any of our educational institutions. Prof. C. W. Irwin is the president of the school. His successful experience in connection with our school in Australia has well fitted him to take charge of the development of this new and pioneer work. With him are associated Profs. C. C. Lewis, M. W. Newton, F. W. Field, H. A. Washburn, and J. H. Paap, and Elder W. A. Hennig, whose long experience in school work makes them strong factors in the carrying forward of Pacific Union College.

The enrolment this year consists of about one hundred fifty students. Some excellent young men and women are attending the school, and we believe that from this institution will go out, in the years to come, many strong workers to carry this gospel message not only to the fields at home, but to the great, unworked fields abroad. As we have said before, in the scores of young men and women who are fitting for active service in connection with this great movement lies the hope of its success, under God. This is the age of opportunity for the young. Wherever we go, we find young men and women occupying positions of responsibility. This is true not only in the world at large, but is coming to be true in connection with our own work. The great demands of our mission fields today are for strong young men and women, with quick, active minds, with adaptable spirits, who can acquire new languages and prove themselves strong and willing to toil and labor for the Master.

In saying this, we by no means depreciate the value of those of older years. The men and women of gray hairs will always fill an important place in the great work of God. They can speak from a rich experience of years, and their mature judgment can shape and mold the plans and policies of the work; but in the closing years of this message the strong young men and women must stand as God’s minutemen, ready to answer his call and to go where his providence shall lead. May God grant that they will hear the call of the Master, and that the answering of this call will become the great and mighty purpose which will move their hearts and inspire their lives.

We were pleased to meet, at Angwin college, Elder and Mrs. G. A. Irwin. Brother Irwin is the president of the Pacific Union Conference, and Sister Irwin assists in the work of the school.

It has been our privilege, during our short stay at St. Helena, to visit Sister E. G. White. This aged servant of the Lord, now in her eighty-fifth year, is still seeking faithfully to act her part as the messenger to this people. While bearing the physical infirmity of declining years, her mind is still clear, and her interest in the work of God unabated. She is engaged in the preparation of important manuscript to be published in the near future. Elder W. C. White, who has been called to stand by his mother in her responsible work, and her other faithful assistants are endeavoring, in the fear of God, to unite with her in the carrying forward of the work which has been laid upon her in presenting to the church and to the world the light which God has graciously sent. The precious instruction given has done much for this people during the years in the past. It has averted many disasters which otherwise would have befallen this movement. It has saved the cause of present truth from many specious errors and crafty designs of the enemy. It has incited God’s people to deeper consecration, and given them new views of God’s love and their relation to him. This counsel should be cherished by every believer, and, next to the Scriptures of truth, should be read and studied in every household.

“Believe in the Lord your God, so shall ye be established; believe his prophets, so shall ye prosper.” 2 Chron. 20: 20.

F. M. W.

Notes on Important Eras of Prophecy

By William Ambrose Spicer

The Hand of God in History — No. 4

Notes on Important Eras of Prophecy

The Witness to Alexander the Great

One incident illustrative of the way in which divine prophecy bore witness to kings and conquerors of old, is so strikingly related by Josephus that even in this brief review it should not be passed over.

A new era was dawning in the history of the world. The dominion so long held by Asia was to pass into European hands. The “sure word of prophecy” had declared it generations before. In the last year of the Babylonian monarchy, Daniel the prophet was shown in vision the ram with two horns, pushing westward, and the goat that “came from the west,” with a “notable horn between his eyes.” The prophet saw this fleet goat from the west run upon the ram, and trample it underfoot. The angel gave a plain interpretation of these symbols:—

“The ram which thou sawest having two horns are the kings of Media and Persia. And the rough goat is the king of Grecia: and the great horn that is between his eyes is the first king.” Dan. 8:20, 21.

This vision was given about the year 538 B. C., and was written down on the parchment scroll. Two hundred years later Alexander of Macedonia, “first king” of united Grecia, was coming swiftly from the west to smite the power of Persia to the earth. Already he had won the decisive victories of the Granicus and the Issus; and Persia lay prostrate. As the great conqueror approached Jerusalem, he was determined to punish the city. It had been slow to transfer its allegiance from Persia to Grecia. But Josephus says that as Alexander drew near the city, the gates were flung open, and a procession of priests and citizens moved out to meet the great conqueror. The priests bore in their hands the book of the prophet Daniel. The historian gives a graphic description of the meeting:—

The procession was venerable, and the manner of it different from that of other nations. It reached to a place called Sapha; which name, translated into Greek, signifies a prospect, for you have thence a prospect both of Jerusalem and of the temple; and when the Phoenicians and the Chaldeans that followed him [Alexander] thought they should have liberty to plunder the city, and torment the high priest to death, which the king’s displeasure fairly promised them, the very reverse of it happened.

For Alexander, when he saw the multitude at a distance, in white garments, while the priests stood clothed with fine linen, and the high priest in purple and scarlet clothing, with his miter on his head, having the golden plate whereon the name of God was engraved, he approached by himself, and adored that name, and first saluted the high priest. The Jews also did all together, with one voice, salute Alexander, and encompass him about; whereupon the kings of Syria and the rest were surprised at what Alexander had done, and supposed him disordered in his mind.

However, Parmenio alone went up to him, and asked him how it came to pass that, when all others adored him, he should adore the high priest of the Jews? To whom he replied, “I did not adore him, but that God who hath honored him with his high-priesthood; for I saw this very person in a dream, in this very habit, when I was at Dios, in Macedonia, who, when I was considering with myself how I might obtain the dominion of Asia, exhorted me to make no delay, but boldly to pass over the sea thither, for that he would conduct my army, and would give me the dominion over the Persians; whence it is, that having seen no other in that habit, and now seeing this person in it, and remembering that vision, and the exhortation which I had in my dream, I believe that I bring this army under the divine conduct, and shall therewith conquer Darius, and destroy the power of the Persians, and that all things will succeed according to what is in my own mind.”

And when he had said this to Parmenio, and had given the high priest his right hand, the priests ran along by him, and he came into the city; and when he went up to the temple, he offered sacrifice to God, according to the high priest’s direction, and magnificently treated both the high priest and the priests. And when the book of Daniel was shown him, wherein Daniel declared that one of the Greeks should destroy the empire of the Persians, he supposed that himself was the person intended; and as he was then glad, he dismissed the multitude for the present, but the next day he called them to him, and bade them ask what favors they pleased of him; whereupon the high priest desired that they might enjoy the laws of their forefathers, and might pay no tribute on the seventh year.—“Antiquities,” book II, chap. 8.

Alexander was familiar with the oracles of Greece, and their enigmatical sayings, capable of double interpretation. But here was no blind, oracular utterance. The Hebrew prophet’s words, which he could see on the page before him, written two centuries before, declared in plain language the course of history. And what God had declared was fulfilling before the eyes of men in that generation. The conqueror of the world knew that the God of heaven had borne witness to him in the high tide of his career; and for the moment he bowed before the living God.

W. A. S.

The Purpose of the Sacrifice

By C. M. S.

He who knows the Father by living, his personal knowledge knows that to reconcile God to us was not the purpose of the sacrifice on Calvary. The purpose of the gospel and of the life and death of Christ upon this earth was to bring to man a knowledge of God’s undying love for humanity, so reconciling man to God.

When man sinned in Eden, and fled to hide from God’s presence, he was simply fleeing from life to the silence of an eternal death. If God had needed to be reconciled, he would simply have allowed man to continue to flee from his presence, and go down into a grave that would hold him forever.

Satan, in the beginning, taught the innocent pair that God was unjust in withholding from them even one tree of that glorious garden. His deception succeeded; man sinned, fled from God’s presence, and, as a race; has been fleeing and ever since. Now he comes with the second accusation against God, teaching that he must needs be reconciled, appeased, like the gods of the heathen; and that, too, by the sacrifice of his own Son.

But our blessed Lord was not sacrificed for that purpose. If Satan can succeed in making man believe that he was, he has accomplished a master-stroke in the war of the ages against the best interests of man. If he can induce religious teachers to teach that, then is his success the more complete, his charge against God so much the more convincing. Accusing God of injustice in the beginning, and then making it appear that God must be reconciled, Satan attempts to shut the door of salvation in the face of man. He succeeds in the case of those who believe his sophistries. Let us see what Inspiration teaches in reference to this matter of reconciliation.

God has never been the enemy of man. His own declaration is, “I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn thee.” Jer. 31: 3. He says of himself, “I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, . . . wherefore turn yourselves, and live ye.” Eze. 18: 32. “The mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting.” Ps. 103: 17. “The Lord is good; for his mercy endureth forever.” Jer. 33: 11. “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3: 16.

It has always been man’s sin that has put a cloud between him and his Maker. It is not that God has withdrawn himself from his faulty children; but, as in Eden of old, when man has sinned, he has hid himself from his Maker. “Your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you.” Isa. 59: 2.

In view, then, of God’s everlasting love toward men, of his ever-enduring mercy, and the fact that man has hid from God and not God from man, who is it that is to be reconciled? What was the purpose of Christ’s ministry? what the purpose of his life and sacrifice upon the earth? Let us answer in the language of the Bible: “But all things are of God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and gave unto us the ministry of reconciliation; to wit, that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not reckoning unto them their trespasses, and having committed unto us the word of reconciliation.” 2 Cor. 5: 18, 19. Thus has the Word made plain that it is man who must be reconciled to God, not God who must be reconciled to man. God never has been unreconciled. His arms have ever been stretched out toward the erring race

and are stretched out still. Christ’s work in the earth was “to reconcile all the things unto himself.” “And you . . . hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death.” Col. 1: 20-22. We are told in Rom. 5: 10 that “we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son.”

So the plea of God’s representative in the land of the unreconciled is, “We pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God.” 2 Cor. 5: 20. The ministry of Christ, the ministry of those who are Christ’s, is the “ministry of reconciliation,” the reconciliation of an unreconciled and a needy and perishing world to the great God whose love is everlasting, whose mission is ever-drawing, whose kindness never faileth, and whose arms will continue to be stretched out to the human race as long as there is hope of saving a single soul. Christ died that he might ransom out of the enemy’s land those who had forfeited their heritage, bartered their souls, and fled from the face of God,—that he might turn them, win them, and bring them back with him, the fruits of his ministry in this world. C. M. S.

Protestant Principles Condemned

By W. W. Prescott

An organization called the “Guardians of Liberty” has recently been formed in New York City, with the avowed purpose of preserving civil and religious liberty in this country. The leading promoters of this organization are former Congressman Charles D. Haines, of New York; Charles R. Skinner, former superintendent of public instruction in the State of New York; and former Congressman Thomas E. Watson, of Georgia. The principles of this organization are thus stated:—

We stand unalterably for the complete separation of church and state.

We unite to protect our country and its free institutions from the efforts of any religious-political organization which may attempt to manipulate or influence the political or social development of our country.

We concern ourselves with no religious faith, but we take issue with any church or other organization interfering with established American institutions and civil government.

We maintain it to be the right of the state to give free education and public instruction, but the religious instruction of children we hold to be the exclusive duty and prerogative of parents.

We are opposed to the use of public funds, local or national, for any religious purpose whatever.

We maintain it to be inconsistent with, and destructive of, free government to appoint or elect to political or military office any person who openly or secretly concedes superior authority to any foreign political or ecclesiastical power whatsoever.

These are sound principles well stated, although we would suggest that before the word authority in the last paragraph the word political might be inserted, in order to avoid any possible ambiguity.

Special attention has been recently directed to this organization by the publication in the New York and Washington papers of articles of some length, calling attention to the fact that Lieut.-Gen. Nelson A. Miles, U. S. A., retired, is a member of this organization. In a published interview General Miles said that he did not read the principles closely before becoming a member, and that he was unaware, till his attention was called to the matter, that these principles contained several alleged attacks on Roman Catholicism. But there is no attack on Roman Catholicism in these principles, unless Roman Catholicism stands for un-American and unchristian doctrines.

In an interview with a newspaper correspondent, Cardinal Gibbons, of Baltimore, condemned in strong terms the Guardians of Liberty, and declared that “this order is plainly nothing more than an attempt to revive the bigotry of the A. P. A., which was presumed to have died of inanition.”

According to a despatch from Rome this statement was authorized by the Vatican, and it may therefore be regarded as an official utterance. It is in perfect harmony with the Vatican’s policy to answer any opposition to Rome with the cry of bigotry, but what is there in these principles of the Guardians of Liberty which savors of bigotry? The mere fact that they are condemned at Rome is weighty testimony as to Rome’s attitude on these questions.

One paragraph from the interview of Cardinal Gibbons is worthy of special attention:—

In his spiritual affairs every Roman Catholic owes allegiance to a foreign ecclesiastical power, namely, His Holiness the Pope. But it is only in his spiritual affairs. In matters concerning his civil welfare or that of his country, every Roman Catholic is as free as any other American citizen to act as his wisdom and conscience dictate.

Whether Roman Catholics do it freely or not, it is evident that the time is rapidly approaching when Roman Catholic voters will be expected to act in a solid body under the guidance of their spiritual superiors, for the purpose of defending by political means the tenets of their faith. That this is admitted by Roman Catholic authority is plainly shown from an extract from an editorial in the Catholic Universe (Roman Catholic), quoted in the Literary Digest of March 9, 1912:—

The great body of Catholic voters are slowly but surely coming face to face with a condition where they will have to be one thing or the other, either loyal to their faith or recreant to their duty, accordingly as they choose their political alinement. It may not come for twenty years, or for fifty years, and it may come in ten. But it is coming, and a little practise of practical Catholicity now in their political relations will be an excellent preparation for the fight that is prophesied by events.

To those who hesitate to carry their religion into politics the editor, in the same article, gives this frank advice:—

Those who timorously recoil even now from any suggestion that Catholics should take an active part in public affairs, with a saving thought always of their Catholicity, will do well to have gone to their reward before that struggle comes, for it will be one in which there will be no quarter asked or given and no compromise possible.

The Roman Catholic idea of civil government is so absolutely at variance with the Protestant idea, that if a Roman Catholic is loyal to the teachings of his own church, he must of necessity cast his influence and his vote in favor of establishing the Roman Catholic view to the exclusion of the Protestant view. A basic principle in the republican form of government is that authority is derived from the people, but this principle is absolutely condemned by Pope Leo XIII, in his encyclical letter Libertas Præstantissimum, issued June 20, 1888. To quote:—

For, when once man is firmly persuaded that he is subject to no one, it follows that the efficient cause of the unity of civil society is not to be sought in any principle external to man, or superior to him, but simply in the free will of individuals; that the authority in the state comes from the people only; and that, just as every man’s individual reason is his only rule of life, so the collective reason of the community should be the supreme guide in the management of all public affairs.—“The Great Encyclical Letters of Pope Leo XIII,” New York, Bensiger Brothers, Printers to the Holy Apostolic See, page 145.

This idea of the origin of authority in civil government, which is unsparingly condemned by this Pope, is by him declared to be the result of the Reformation of the sixteenth century, which he designates as a climax of “the harmful and lamentable rage for innovation.” Among the evil principles flowing from this source he classes the claim “that no man has any right to rule over other men,” and declares:—

In a society grounded upon such maxims, all government is nothing more or less than the will of the people, and the people, being under the power of itself alone, is alone its own ruler.—Id., page 120.

It is thus perfectly clear that according to the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church there is an authority from without which is above the will of the people, and there is a certain class of men who have an inherent right to rule

over other men. That this authority from without is the authority of the Roman Catholic Church is abundantly evident from the clear statement made by Pope Boniface VIII:—

One sword must be under another, and the temporal authority must be subject to the spiritual power; . . . whence, if the earthly power doth go astray, it must be judged by the spiritual power.—Extrav. com., lib. 1, title 8, cap. 1.

According to the Roman Catholic view of civil government, it is the duty of the state to enforce the Roman Catholic religion. As authority for this statement we quote again from “The Great Encyclical Letters of Pope Leo XIII”:—

Justice therefore forbids, and reason itself forbids, the state to be godless, or to adopt a line of action which would end in godlessness, namely, to treat the various religions (as they call them) alike, and to bestow upon them promiscuously equal rights and privileges. Since, then, the profession of one religion is necessary in the state, that religion must be professed which alone is true, and which can be recognized without difficulty, especially in Catholic states, because the marks of truth are, as it were, engraven upon it. This religion, therefore, the rulers of the state must preserve and protect, if they would provide—as they should do—with prudence and usefulness for the good of the community.—Pages 150, 151.

The separation of church and state, which is a fundamental principle of the American government, is stigmatized by Pope Leo XIII as a “fatal theory” and as a “fatal principle,” and he further declares:—

Many wish the state to be separated from the church wholly and entirely, so that regard to every right of human society, in institutions, customs, and laws, the offices of the state, and the education of youth, they would pay no more regard to the church than if she did not exist; and, at most, would allow the citizens individually to attend to their religion in private if so minded. Against such as these, all the arguments by which we disprove the principle of separation of church and state are conclusive.—Id., page 160.

The quotations which we have made are sufficient to show the irreconcilable antagonism between Roman Catholic and Protestant ideas of civil government, and that if a Roman Catholic citizen attempts to act upon the Protestant principle, he is untrue to the ex cathedra utterances of the Roman pontiffs, and for this reason there is good ground for the suspicion that in their political actions Roman Catholics are under the direction of a foreign power which really claims both temporal and spiritual jurisdiction throughout the world.

As copies of our two magazines, Liberty and the Protestant Magazine, had been sent to the headquarters of the Guardians of Liberty for free distribution, and were found there by a reporter for a New York paper, inquiry came to Washington for information concerning these magazines, and a representative of one of the papers interviewed the writer on this question. As a result there appeared in the Washington Post for March 12, the following paragraphs:—

At the national headquarters of the Guardians of Liberty in New York, copies of two magazines, the Protestant and the Liberty, both published in Washington, are being distributed. Both magazines contain much anti-Catholic matter. It has been ascertained that both publications are published by one concern, although edited by two separate editors. When asked to tell the purposes of the Guardians of Liberty, W. W. Prescott, said to be one of the editors, disclaimed any knowledge of the workings of the order.

“It has been only during the past few weeks that I have been aware of the existence of such an order,” he said. “Just what are its purposes or its religious beliefs I am at a loss to say.

“A number of copies of the Protestant have been sent to the Guardians of Liberty purely as a matter of courtesy. We send any number of copies of the Protestant to other patriotic orders throughout the country, and it was at the request of the officials of the Guardians of Liberty that we have been furnishing them free copies of the magazine.”

We shall follow with interest the future developments of this subject, as it is more than likely that the matter will be further exploited in the daily press.

W. W. P.

In Some of the Desert Places

By William Ambrose Spicer

THE waste places were to blossom under the closing message. While spending two weeks and more with the brethren in Peru and Bolivia, I have felt to thank God anew for his fulfilling word in this time.

Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia are the least-worked countries in the South American Union Conference. They have seemed truly desert places. We are getting only the barest foothold now in Ecuador and Bolivia; but what we see in Peru gives courage to press the work in these other countries. Peru was opened earlier with systematic work, and at first presented as forbidding an aspect as do these other countries. But the sowing of the seed and the preaching of the message in Peru is surely bringing the results.

At the general meeting in Lima the brethren reported interests here and there, and Sabbath-keepers springing up at widely separated points. Our foreign workers, Brethren A. N. Allen, O. H. Maxson, and W. R. Pohle, have their hands more than full of work, and a little band of Peruvian workers is already raised up. Last year Peru paid a tithe of one thousand dollars, half of which came from the believers raised up in the field. Peru still forbids open Protestant assemblies. But the liberal construction of the law in most places of importance allows sufficient liberty to admit of public meetings. I found our Lima meeting hall opening directly on the street, with only a screen built up a few feet inside the door, to prevent the passer-by from looking in upon the congregation and service. This meets the requirements; and at every evening service our brethren have numbers of strangers standing in the doorway and listening and looking round the screen, besides those who fully enter.

On the Sabbath about fifty or sixty persons are present, and there is every prospect of having a good church company built up in Lima, the capital.

With Elders J. W. Westphal and A. N. Allen, I have visited the scene of our chief Indian work in Peru, on the shores of Lake Titicaca. Though in the mountains near Lima Indian believers are springing up. We have all read the reports from Brother F. A. Stahl and others of this really wonderful development among the Aymara Indians.

Some societies have been specially organized to work for the Indians of Peru, but with meager results. It seems, therefore, a distinct providence that we, who have so slender resources and so few workers, should have suddenly placed upon us the largest Indian work in these countries.

The mission is twenty-one miles from Puna, near the shore of Titicaca. On Sabbath the valley was dotted with men, women, and children coming to the meeting. Between two hundred twenty-five and two hundred fifty, we estimated, were present. Of these about fifty are baptized members. Quite a company are considered ready for baptism, and Brother Stahl will have to attend to this on his return from the union conference. The work is spreading still farther into remote villages. Some came to the meeting from distances of ten and fifteen miles; and these are very regular attendants. Some are regularly at the mid-week prayer-meeting from distances up to ten miles, coming over the mountains.

One can readily see that the truth is doing its sure work in the hearts of these people. They come out of a Catholicism that is but a sprinkled heathenism. The truth has put hope in their hearts, has separated them from vices, and they are growing into a bright, clean, wholesome, and loving body of Seventh-day Adventist believers. They look altogether different from the groups seen in villages all about.

Our brethren have neither the men nor the means to prosecute this work vigorously. But they mean to hold the base that Providence has so wonderfully given them, and to put their strength into training a band of workers among the Indians who can be used in pushing out into other

regions as this leaven of truth spreads. And it is spreading.

The altitude is so high, about thirteen thousand feet, that it seems necessary to have two sets of workers, to labor by turns. A man and wife must be secured at the union conference to work with Brother and Sister Stahl, each couple taking turns of a few months. The brethren hope the way may open for an Indian work at a much lower altitude in Bolivia, where the workers may find relief, while at the same time keeping among the same people. The larger proportion of the population of Peru and Bolivia are Indians; and thus we may see how directly the Lord is leading our brethren into the way by which these lands are to be evangelized.

This rapid development is one of the assurances of the quick work that is some day to be done in these waste places. The vast distances, the mountainous areas to be covered, the dense darkness of centuries of Catholicism and native heathenism, will be no impenetrable barrier, and the message will spread with blessings over these lands as the work closes.

God has wonderfully protected the work and workers on the shores of Titicaca. Their death and destruction had been decreed by the local church authorities, but the Lord has overruled the plans of violence to bring protecting influences to bear from Lima, and altogether the workers and believers rejoice that the covering of the Almighty has been over them.

We are now in La Paz, Bolivia, for a few days, before going on to the union conference in Chile. There are interests here, and one strong Bolivian woman has fully accepted the truth. Here Brother and Sister Stahl have made many friends by their nursing work. Elder I. Kalbermatten and wife are working here, and Sister Stahl will remain in La Paz while her husband is in Chile.

Our workers in these newer fields I find of good courage. They have many perplexities to meet, and unfavorable conditions for their children. Pray for them, and stand by them. W. A. S.

“This Same Jesus”

By C. M. S.

INEXPRESSIBLY comforting to the disciples was the assurance of the angel that “this same Jesus,” who was taken up from which they were suffering; comforting the hearts of the mourners, no matter how deep their grief; releasing those possessed of demons from the bondage in which they suffered; feeding the multitudes that hungered for food; and bringing back to life those who had passed under the power of death.

This was the man now being received up in a cloud, and disappearing before their wondering eyes, as they continued to look “steadfastly toward heaven.” Notwithstanding the promise of the Comforter, there is no doubt that a feeling of unutterable loneliness and sadness came over the disciples, while the One who had been so much to them was disappearing in the blue dome of the sky. It meant to them that never again in this life would they see his face.

But right at this time, while their eyes are fixed upon the sky that seems to be swallowing up the object of their great love, two others “in white apparel” join their company.

Now comes the assurance which means so much to the bereaved disciples: “This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.” There was to them a world of meaning in the words “this same Jesus.” It meant to them what it could not mean to those who had not known him as they had. To them it meant that he was coming as the same object of love to fill the same place in their hearts that he had filled during the years they had been with him. Of course, he was coming as King and Saviour; but he was coming, too, as “this same Jesus.”

Often relatives or friends go away, and are gone for years, and we remember them as they were when they went away; we love them with that memory of them in mind; but when they return, changed in looks, changed in disposition, changed in their likes and dislikes, with new ambitions and ideas at variance with what we had known of them, while we love them still, yet there seems to be something lost out of our life; and while we are glad to see them, that gladness is mingled with a feeling of sadness and disappointment. It almost seems as if the past had entombed that subtle something which had been cherished through the years.

Not so with the return of our blessed Lord. He is “this same Jesus.” Job, in declaring his belief that he would see God, says, “Whom I, even I, shall see, on my side, and mine eyes shall behold, and not as a stranger.” We shall know him by the very perfection of his character. He will not be a stranger there to those who have yielded to him here, and have had his abiding presence with them through the varied experiences of life.

While upon this earth, he healed the sick of all manner of diseases; but still were they subject to death. But when the redeemed of earth stand before the throne of God, they are also in the presence of that tree of life whose leaves are “for the healing of the nations.” Blessed healing, from which there is no return to the jurisdiction of disease! Blessed healing, which closes the healing work of Jesus begun on earth on behalf of his people! Thus do they know him as “this same Jesus.”

On earth, Jesus was the comforting and consoling Brother. In heaven, “the Lamb that is in the midst of the throne shall be their Shepherd, and shall guide them unto fountains of waters of life: and God shall wipe away every tear from their eyes.” Rev. 7:17. On earth, Jesus broke the bands of death on more than one occasion, and set free its captives. When he comes, it is to usher in the culmination of that work, send the thrill of life through bodies long held in the prison-house of death, and start the grand chorus from lips of resurrected men and women and children: “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?”

On earth, Jesus fed the hungry multitudes on the bread of physical sustenance, as well as upon the bread of life. When the reign of the tomb-king is past, the tree of life in the garden of God holds out its twelve manner of fruits, and Jesus himself comes forth, the great and beloved Host of the reunited family, and serves them with the fruits of paradise. On earth, Jesus found many occasions to cast the emissaries of Satan out of the bodies of men and women who had been tormented by them. What a prophecy of the time when Satan and all his angels will be cast into the lake of their final destruction, and the universe will be forever rid of sin and all its dire consequences!

It is this same Jesus, the carpenter of Nazareth, the victor of the wilderness, the teacher in the temple, the healer of the sick, the stiller of the storm, the feeder of the multitudes, the silent prisoner of the railing mob, the thorn-crowned “King of the Jews,” the nail-pierced sacrifice upon the cross, the death-bound occupant of Joseph’s new tomb, the risen and ascended Christ, the anointed of God,—this is he for whom we look, soon to appear in the opening heavens. They who have known and loved him here will still know him and still love him, and will not fear to meet him. Blessed assurance! blessed comfort! blessed hope! We can then say, “Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the Lord; we have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation.”

C. M. S.

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