Earlier text: THE WORK AND THE WORKERS“Thou Art Peter”
By MARY C. MC REYNOLDS
“Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” The words of Jesus to Peter foretold the work of the shepherd, who was to feed the sheep and lambs of the early church. While Peter immediately left the ship and followed Jesus, there was much to be done for Peter before he could preach the Pentecostal sermon and be intrusted to bring thousands into the fold in a few days. Knowing his impulsive nature, his strong self-assertiveness, Jesus kept Peter close to himself. One of the inner circle, Peter followed his Lord daily, sharing his hunger, his weariness, his work. “Line upon line” he absorbed the messages of heaven, until he felt confident that he was ready to go with Jesus even to death. But Peter must learn his own weakness, and the great lesson so hard for all, “Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.” Out of Peter’s very strength and assertiveness had come that positive declaration, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.” With what longing did Jesus yearn over Peter! How he desired to see Peter fully converted without drinking the bitter cup! Tenderly and earnestly Jesus had cautioned Peter and his associates on that memorable night in Gethsemane: “Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation; the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” Had Peter’s heart been fully ready to learn, he would have heeded the caution and fortified himself in prayer. But Peter slept. Had he not a sword for protection? Ah! Peter, so self-confident, so rash, so headstrong, always the spokesman, and yet so slow of heart to understand that warning, “Satan hath desired to have you, . . . but I have prayed for thee.” When Peter realized little of his need for prayer, his Saviour prayed for him. Happy that son or daughter who, not realizing the need for prayer, has the faithful mother or father that keeps the erring child before the same Heavenly Father to whom Jesus cried for help. Lodged by the throne, those prayers and tears are not forgotten, and many a straying one is brought back by the angel commissioned to guard the weary, wandering one. In his effort to defend his Master, Peter added another grief to the great heart of Love. So, too, Peter, added another lesson to the long list. With the vision of the miraculous healing of the servant’s ear still before his mind, Peter “forsook him, and fled.” Surely Jesus will conclude that the labor has been lost, and all the love expended in vain. No, he reads the heart; it must be broken, and then all that pent-up love will gush forth in strength and loyalty, and Peter will be faithful, even as he declared, “to death.” A few hours later, when Peter had thrice denied his Lord, and those loving, sorrowful eyes sought him out, far back in the judgment hall, then he remembered the warning, “Thou shalt deny me thrice,” and Peter “went out, and wept bitterly.” Out of that broken heart there sprang forth the stream of the water of life to sustain the sheep and the lambs who were to pass through the trying experiences of the days of persecution. In those tears are born tenderness, love, and consideration. Out of the night of Peter’s experience he came forth subdued, refined, ennobled, and enriched by the indwelling of the Spirit of his Master. He had the training, and when the angel bade the women, “Go tell his disciples and Peter,” that apostle was ready to preach the resurrection message in its fullness when the “power” should be given. “When the day of Pentecost was fully come,”—only a few days, but what a change in Peter! His spirit was blended perfectly with “the eleven” and in harmony with his Master. Lifting up his voice, he poured forth that powerful sermon that convicted hearts and brought three thousand souls into the fold of the believers. Delivered from himself, Peter worked mightily for the spread of the message, and miracles witnessed to his spirit. To guard the infant church from the invasion of hypocrites, Peter was given divine discernment, as manifested in his reproof of Ananias and Sapphira. Recognized as a leader in the early church, Peter confined his work largely to Jerusalem and the Jews, witnessing boldly for the risen Lord in the very hall where he had denied his Lord but a few months before, and before many of the same men who had heard his denial. Stronger and more bold than any of Peter’s own self-assertions was the Spirit that then spoke and worked through him. Years full of faithful service followed, and about the time of Paul’s imprisonment in Rome the faithful Peter had the privilege of following Jesus—as he had failed to do before—even unto the very cross, upon which he, like his Master, sealed his life work with his blood. Let those who, like Peter, have struggled with the waves, smitten a brother, forsaken and denied their Lord, now return, and like Peter, fall on the Rock and be broken, yielding to God their lives filled with loving, loyal service. NONE but the incapacitated or the indolent have time to idle away. There are no lazy Christians. This term is a misnomer. If a man is lazy and indolent, no matter how high his profession, he is not a Christian. It has been said, and we believe truly, that there will be no starless crowns worn by the redeemed. Every one who gains a home in the kingdom of God will have been an instrument in the hands of Heaven in winning or helping to win some soul for Christ. Indeed, to show our allegiance to God, to labor for his glory and the upbuilding of his kingdom in the hearts of men, is the great purpose of our existence. Too many have failed to realize the exalted position to which God calls them in making them coworkers with himself. They live selfishly, for their own personal pleasure or aggrandizement. Such fail to appreciate the true spirit of the cause they have espoused. They need a new view of the cross of Calvary, a new sense of the spirit which actuated Christ to lay aside the riches of glory for the salvation of the lost and perishing. When once we see Christ as he is, see him in the supreme loveliness and unselfishness of his character, a great longing will possess our souls to be like him; and in the satisfying of that longing every selfish desire and purpose will be subordinated. The Cultivation of Confidence and Brotherly Love
By F. M. W.
THE spirit of the age in which we live tends toward distrust and alienation. Unrest and uncertainty exist throughout the world. Many who have been old-time neighbors and friends are engaged in a life-and-death struggle. Smoldering personal antipathies and national animosities have been fanned into new flames. Human passion has been aroused to a terrible pitch. The result of all this is the very opposite of that which tends to promote peace, good will, and good fellowship among men. The same elements of unrest are at work not only in the political world, but in the commercial, social, and religious worlds. The human family is drifting away from its old standards of belief. Revolution permeates the very air. Doctrines which for long centuries have been held as cardinal are discredited. In the midst of this growing disquietude and gathering gloom, God has raised up a people to stand as the conservators of his Word. He has intrusted them with a message of reform for their fellows. Amid the gathering darkness they are to erect a standard of truth,—the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus,—and rally their fellows to that standard. The position as conservators of Bible truth which Seventh-day Adventists have maintained for so many years has been dearly purchased, and it should be as sacredly maintained. False philosophy and specious reasoning should not lead us to turn aside in any particular from the message which God has committed to us. No dross of worldliness should corrupt the simplicity of our Christian experience. We should stand jealously and contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints. The great principles of truth which constituted the foundation of this message and movement in its beginning, which have been its strength throughout its history, will prove its bulwark in the times of stress and storm ahead. But on the other hand, we must realize that the truth of God is progressive, and that the Scriptures of Truth are an inexhaustible mine into which we may dig and delve continually and ever discover new gems of richest quality. It is not for us to take the truth we possess, and by some unwritten law coin it into a creed, saying, Thus far will we go, and no farther. In doing that we should do like the churches around us; and, just as God has been compelled to call into being new movements to carry his advancing truth beyond the narrow scope of stereotyped creeds, so, if we who are connected with this movement refuse to do. But this we do not believe will be necessary. In the church of God in every age there has been a commingling of various elements of the conservative and aggressive, of the fast and the slow. The ardent and impulsive Peter was linked with the quiet, loving John. It must be so in the work of God today. Some there are who will dig out of the treasure house things both new and old. To their ardent minds the new may appeal with greater force, and therefore the emphasis of their teaching will be placed upon the new. Others less inclined to investigation will hold to the old things, and their danger will be in growing stereotyped and narrow. To whichever class we may belong, let us exercise long patience and great brotherly kindness toward those who may not view things from our particular standpoint. It would be sad indeed if workers in this cause, who by their lives of devotion and steadfastness have demonstrated their love for and loyalty to the principles we hold, should be alienated over minor details of belief. And yet this is possible, unless we seek to draw near to one another, unless we cultivate that love and confidence which should be found between brethren in the same cause. Why, because a brother differs with me over some minor questions which in reality do not affect the integrity of this work, should I regard him unkindly or look upon him as a heretic? Why should I call my brother to question because he does not meet my standard in the cut of his clothes or in the articles of his diet? Do I feel that I have light in advance of that which he follows? Then I should seek to come near to him and lovingly win him to the better way. In the church of God as in the family relationship, it is necessary to bear and forbear. We must learn to live with one another, to overlook one another’s peculiarities and idiosyncrasies, to exercise patience and long-suffering toward those whom we regard as holding to error or as recreant to Christian duty. We are spending great sums of money today for the conversion of the heathen; we are sending missionaries to the ends of the earth to bring the light of the knowledge of God to those in darkness. It is well that we should do this. The millions of souls going down to darkness and destruction cry out to us to put forth every effort within our power. But while we are seeking to save the lost in heathen lands, let us not fail to appreciate the value of souls nearer home. Let us turn our eyes to our own homes, to our own communities, to our own church relationships, and consider whether we are maintaining that attitude toward our flesh and blood, toward our brethren and sisters in the church, toward our neighbors, which will draw them to Christ and not8 scatter abroad. We should recognize in our brethren the precious purchase of Christ’s blood. We should count no effort too costly to gain their confidence and love. It will take from our hearts the spirit of gossip and criticism and censure. The possession of this spirit of the Master will make us none the less careful to maintain in the church of God proper discipline. We shall deem it necessary to cut off every contaminating branch, even as we amputate a diseased member of the body. But before the amputation takes place, we must be sure that every means has been employed to restore the disaffected one, and to bring him back in his experience into the love and harmony of the gospel of Christ. The word of God to the believers in this movement is, Pull together; come near to one another; walk in love and in the unity of the Spirit. Where differences exist, by personal counsel, by united study of the Word, by earnest prayer, seek for divine guidance. Heaven will not delay to bless this spirit of co-operation. God today desires his people to see eye to eye. Let us seek earnestly the cultivation of confidence and brotherly love. Is There Still a Religious Liberty Issue?
By C. M. S.
We would fain believe that there is no longer any need of delivering lectures, preaching sermons, writing articles, or publishing magazines in behalf of religious liberty, freedom of speech, and freedom of the press. We would be glad to believe that the principles of religious liberty have become so firmly implanted in the hearts of all Americans that there is no longer any danger of those principles being attacked by any one. But whoever feels that such is the case is deluding himself and “living in a fool’s paradise;” for at no time in the history of the world were those principles in greater danger than they are at the present moment. At no time since the adoption of those principles by the American nation were the forces of their opposers better organized and more determined than now. Organizations that were not in existence when we began to contend for these principles are now firmly established, enrolling their adherents by the millions, and setting for themselves a definite program whose success means the positive abandonment of religious liberty principles and the adoption of principles that made the Dark Ages dark, enslaved the consciences of the multitude, and through long, sad centuries fed to the flames the best people the nations could produce. Those organizations are here in America today. We were not surprised when we saw them organized; for we knew the formation of some such organizations was necessary to the fulfillment of the divine prediction. The third angel’s message, given to us to give to the world, is as plain a declaration as man needs to show that the religious liberty issue will be the dominant issue in the last hours of time. That message reads: “If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation.” Rev. 14:9, 10. That plain declaration, with the statement of the fearful consequences of not heeding the warning, is given because of the action and the decree of a certain power called by the inspired writer “another beast.” Of him it is said that he “causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast.” This other beast says “to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live. And he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed. And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: and that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.” Rev. 13:12-17. That is worship by force of compulsory laws and edicts. That is compulsion in religion. That is apostate Christianity compelling men to worship a false god and perform some religious act or acts that contravene God’s law and contradict the principles of his government. But this scripture shows us that the last clash between the enemies of God’s government and his obedient followers comes over the matter of freedom of worship. That other “beast” proposes to compel all the world to worship “the first beast,” whose deadly wound was healed, and to give power to the “image of the beast” and cause that to give a similar demonstration of religious tyranny. God, on the other hand, declares that this can be done only under pain of his greatest displeasure and in the face of the most terrible judgment. Apostate Protestantism the Chief Factor
Thus do we see the issue joined between the Almighty and the apostate religions of this world. Rome does not appear to be the chief working factor in this particular struggle, the open and avowed instigator of the movement. It is “another beast” that fills the world with its intolerant decrees, and causes the people to “make an image to the beast,” and gives “life unto the image of the beast,” etc. That is apostate Protestantism. It is apostate Protestantism that is to marshal Christendom under the banner of a compulsory religion. With apostate Protestantism, then, we have our chief concern in the climax of the controversy. True, the time will come when the Roman Church will say, “I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall in no wise see mourning.” But she comes to that position because of what apostate Protestantism does in swinging the world over onto Roman grounds. If Protestantism stood faithful to its principles, Rome never would see the day when she could say, “I sit a queen, and am no widow.” Is Protestantism swinging over onto Roman grounds?—It is. How is this demonstrated?—By the formation of powerful societies whose fundamental principles call for a violation of the Christian and Protestant and American principles of religious liberty. One such organization is the Lord’s Day Alliance, and it is not confined to the United States. In both England and Canada that organization is alive, active, and growing; and the one great object of its existence is the exaltation of the Sunday sabbath and its compulsory observance under force of national law. That organization does not brook opposition, nor look with kindly allowance upon those who put conscience and the Word of God above blind obedience to the decrees of the alliance. From the twenty-fifth annual report of the Lord’s Day Alliance of the United States we glean the following concerning the alliance and its attitude toward those who oppose its program:— The Lord’s Day Alliance of the United States is becoming better known every year to the people of the nation and in the halls of state and at the national Capitol. A communication was received from Dr. W. W. Davis [secretary of the Maryland Lord’s Day Alliance], urging that our alliance keep in more frequent touch with Washington; that at least once every week while Congress is in session we ought to be in close personal touch with affairs. . . . We note here the fact that Seventh-day Adventists have a regular force of workers against the Christian sabbath in Washington, and we must have a care lest these troublers of Israel do violence to our Christian sabbath. In the eyes of that organization, Seventh-day Adventists are to this world what Elijah was to Ahab and what Mordecai was to Haman—the “troublers of Israel” and the “Mordecai in the gate;” and there is much evidence that they feel toward us as Ahab did toward Elijah and as Haman did toward Mordecai. In fact, the thirteenth chapter of Revelation plainly declares that in the close of the conflict the promoters of compulsory religion will assume the same attitude toward the bearers of the third angel’s message that Ahab and Haman did toward the loyal people of Jehovah in their days, and will take similar means to get rid of them. The following statement from the spirit of prophecy will emphasize this thought:—9 “And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.” In the near future we shall see these words fulfilled, as the Protestant churches unite with the world and with the papal power against commandment keepers. The same spirit which actuated papists in ages past, will lead Protestants to pursue a similar course toward those who will maintain their loyalty to God. Church and state are now making preparations for the future conflict. Protestants are working in disguise to bring Sunday to the front, as did the Romanists. . . . The decree which is to go forth against the people of God will be very similar to that issued by Ahasuerus against the Jews in the time of Esther. The Persian edict sprang from the malice of Haman toward Mordecai. . . . The Protestant world today see in the little company keeping the Sabbath a Mordecai in the gate. . . . To secure popularity and patronage, legislators will yield to the demand for a Sunday law. Those who fear God cannot accept an institution that violates a principle of the decalogue. On this battle field comes the last great conflict of the controversy between truth and error.—“Testimonies for the Church,” Vol. V, pages 449-451. We have maintained for years that the time will come when those who are working for compulsory Sunday observance will attribute the calamities of earth to the failure of the people to observe the Sunday, and that when the last plagues are falling upon the world, those who have stood for the true Sabbath of Jehovah will be charged with responsibility for these manifestations of the divine wrath. We have already seen indications of that trend of opinion. At a meeting of the Lord’s Day Alliance held in Washington on Jan. 24, 1915, the declaration was made that the fearful conflict now going on in Europe was because of the carelessness of the people in observing God’s law. In other words, God was punishing Europe for not keeping Sunday. It may readily be seen that it is not a far step from such an idea to the idea that they who teach the people that Sunday is not the Lord’s true Sabbath are the primary cause of that calamity. Preparing for Aggressive Work
At the same meeting of the alliance the following declarations were made:— As sure as you are sitting in your seats, a Sunday law will be passed by Congress. I am well acquainted with President Wilson. Before he gets out of office, I will get word to him that the time has come to clean up Washington in the line of Sunday desecration. A Sunday law can be secured more quickly by the cooperation of all the churches. The Lord’s Day Alliance is now backed by sixteen denominations, and soon will be backed by thirty. We will soon stir up every community. When we speak, we will be heard. We are already beginning to speak. By the strength of our organization we will get anything we want. We are going into schools and colleges to educate the future leaders of thought. About one year from now a big meeting will be held in Washington to crystallize all the effort for Sunday observance. We will bring influence to bear upon all Christian Congressmen. Congress has been flooded with petitions and letters from Seventh-day Adventists until one would have thought that they were in the majority in this country. This proposed course of procedure indicates a carefully laid plan for educating the public away from the principles of freedom that have made America a refuge for the oppressed of every land, and for securing that oppressive legislation which will culminate in the decrees of oppression soon to be issued against God’s commandment-keeping children. At the same meeting to which reference has been made, Dr. T. T. Mutchler, of Philadelphia, president of the International Federation of Sunday Rest Associations, made the following statement:— When stringent Sunday laws are enacted and enforced, the consequence will be that the Sunday schools and churches will be filled, and the ministers and missionaries will then have a chance to reach the people and do Christian work. Note the similarity between this declaration and one made in the Homiletic Review for November, 1892, by Rev. S. V. Leech:— Give us good Sunday laws, well enforced by men in local authority, and our churches will be full of worshippers, and our young men and women will be attracted to the divine service. A mighty combination of the churches of the United States could win from Congress, the State legislatures, and municipal councils all legislation essential to this splendid result. This was the very plea made by the leaders of the apostatizing church in the early centuries when they demanded that the public shows be transferred to some other day than Sunday. Compulsion in religious things has always been a characteristic of an apostatizing church. When the compelling power of the Holy Spirit is waning in a church, the compelling power of the civil law is brought in to supply the lack. But Jesus said, “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.” At the meeting in question, Dr. Bowdy, general secretary of the Lord’s Day Alliance, made the following statement:— In advocating Sunday laws, we are the church in action,—securing the sabbath-day rest to the people. There is just one difficulty, and that is to get the principles of Jesus Christ into the hearts of the people. Protestantism and Catholicism will strike hands alike in this movement. As churches we must march through Congress and our State legislatures, and demand legislation for the protection of the Lord’s Day, that the kingdom of Jesus Christ may be advanced. Dr. W. W. Davis, secretary of the Maryland Lord’s Day Alliance, made the following statement at the same meeting:— In the next session of Congress we expect to introduce a Sunday law which will give the District of Columbia a clean white sabbath. We are going to organize our forces so that we will have a key man in every State, and he will have three leading representatives of three leading denominations in every Congressional district. These men will so organize the churches on a cooperative basis that when Sunday bills are introduced, instead of Seventh-day Adventists sending in one barrel of petitions against these bills from all over the United States, we will be able to send in one barrel from every State in the Union. It is not difficult to see who these people look upon as their “Mordecai in the gate,” their “troublers of Israel,” whose activities endanger their success in the work of fastening the Sunday sabbath upon all the people through force of law. With the same idea in mind, the general manager of the National Reform Association made the following declaration on Aug. 17, 1910, at Winona Lake, Ind.:— Among all the foes of our country, we have none to fear even half so much as those who, in the name of religious liberty and of individual rights of conscience, are infringing upon the rights of the Christian people and of the state itself. Most of our readers are familiar with the program of the great organization known as the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America. It also has set for itself the task of establishing the Sunday institution by force of law. It is working now along the line of creating a force which lawbreakers and lawmakers will respect and heed where questions in which it is interested are involved. The World’s Christian Citizen Conference also has for one of the chief purposes of its existence the compulsory observance of the Sunday sabbath, as has also the National Reform Association, out of which it developed. All these organizations look one way and aim at10 one common purpose—compulsory religion; and they are better organized and more determined than ever before to accomplish their purpose. They purpose also to unite with the Roman Catholic Church in the work of enforcing the Sunday institution upon all the people. It is the purpose of this confederation of religious forces to introduce identical bills for a compulsory Sunday in all the State legislatures, and work persistently and unitedly for their adoption at the same time that they are besieging Congress for a federal law to the same effect. The third angel’s message indicates that in the culminating struggle the inhabitants of this world will be lined up on opposite sides of one question—compulsory religion. We see the forces of the churches mobilizing for the part they are to play in that contest. They have but one foe, and they are naming that foe now. What the Word declares they would do, they are now getting ready to do. The enemy at whom they will level the shafts of their decrees will be those that are keeping the commandments of God. They are doing it now. This prophecy, fulfilling before our eyes, should arouse us to greater diligence and greater vigilance than ever before. If we have in the past circulated religious liberty literature by the thousands of copies, we ought to circulate it now by the hundreds of thousands of copies, that the people may be duly warned of what is involved. If we have circulated the Liberty Magazine by scores of thousands, we ought to circulate it now by the hundreds of thousands. Every Seventh-day Adventist should be a radiating center from which would flow out a constant stream of religious liberty literature to friends and neighbors. From this year until time closes, we should be increasing our energies and our activities to enlighten the world upon these matters. The issue is joined; there is no evading it; it will not be ignored. The last test question that will be put to the inhabitants of this world will be, Will you worship in harmony with the law of the land, or refuse, and take the consequences? That the people of this world may know what they are doing when they answer that question, let us do our duty in placing in their hands such literature as will make it plain. Deliverance of Hans Brael From Roman Persecutors
By W. A. S.
In the year 1557, Hans Brael, a member of the Baptist brotherhood of believers in Moravia, was traveling in the Tyrol, visiting fellow believers. In this region, in those times, determined efforts were being made to stamp out the witness to Bible truth, particularly Baptist teaching; for these Baptists were especially active and devoted in working for souls. Having visited his brethren, Brael was turning homeward toward Moravia, when he met a judge traveling with his secretary. The judge nodded and passed on, but the secretary questioned Brael, and soon found that the stranger would not deny being a Baptist. The judge was called back, and Brael was haled to court and held prisoner till he should renounce his faith. For months he was kept in an underground dungeon of the castle, where clothing rotted away, and he felt his life was surely sustained only by the interposition of God. Winter coming on, he was moved to a room in the castle, and for thirty-seven weeks remained with one hand and one foot in the stocks. One day the young man felt that the Spirit of God had given him a message for his persecutors. Van Braght says (in his 'Baptist Martyrology'):— He sent for the secretary that had apprehended him, wishing him to come to him in the prison. He very speedily came and sat down, and asked what he desired that he had sent for him there. The brother said, 'The only reason is that I cannot forbear showing you that, as you well know, you are the most guilty cause of my imprisonment and miserable sufferings, while never in my life did I do you any injury.' The secretary sat alarmed and silent, and said not a word, except that he had been obliged to do it. The brother said: 'Yes, the judgment of God impelled you to do it, because you thirsted for the blood of the godly; it has therefore befallen you to have brought a heavy judgment upon yourself. God will assuredly visit you for it, demand it at your hands, and punish you for your sins.' The secretary was silent and could say nothing, so alarmed and stupefied was he. Thus he went away. In about fourteen days he died suddenly in the night. In one quarter of an hour was he well and dead. Great dread was upon him, so that he cried fearfully and moaned, lamenting that he had acted unrighteously and committed iniquity. . . . In the same night in which this man died, the brother experienced great joy, so that he could not, by prayer and thanksgiving, sufficiently praise the Lord; for it occurred to him in the night that he should yet be restored to the brethren and the church. In the morning there came an officer, who told him that the secretary had that night suddenly and awfully died. The fate of the secretary produced great alarm in the mind of his lordship [the lord of the castle]. These things determined the persecutors to be rid of the prisoner, and it was decided to send him to the galleys, those prison pens of the sea. But the Lord, who had not suffered his servant to perish, and who had given him the token of final deliverance, frustrated their purpose. First Brael was left to go about the castle yard for two days, 'that he might learn again how to walk.' Then he was sent off with an officer on the road to the seaport. But at one of the first inns at which they halted, the officer drank himself to sleep, with the door open, and Brael walked out at liberty. 'Thus God on that night delivered him,' says the martyrologist, 'and he came in peace and with joy to his brethren and the church of God.' Discouragement
By G. B. THOMPSON
HAVE you ever felt downcast, dejected, discouraged? A Christian ought never to be found in this sad condition. The outlook often may present discouraging features, but the uplook is always as bright as the promises of God. The following is quite to the point:— “In a fable it is told that Satan one night held a sale and offered his tools to any one who would pay the price. These were all spread out for sale, some labeled hatred, envy, malice, jealousy, sickness, despair, crime,—a motley array. Apart from the others lay a harmless-looking wedge-shaped implement marked ‘discouragement.’ It was much worn and was much higher-priced than the others, showing that it was held in higher esteem by its owner. When asked the reason for this, Satan replied, ‘I can use this one more easily and more effectively than any of the others because so few persons know that it belongs to me. With this I can open doors that I cannot budge with the others, and once I get inside I can use whichever of the other suits me best.’” Of Christ it is written, “He shall not fail nor be discouraged, till he have set judgment in the earth.” Isa. 42: 4. For almost six thousand years he has endured sin, and the rebellion and hatred of wicked men and devils. In love and tenderness he has dealt with men, who through the obstinacy of the deceitful heart have turned a deaf ear to all his pleadings. But he has patiently waited. He who knows the end from the beginning never fails nor grows discouraged. The indwelling Christ in us knows no discouragement either. It is unbelief which creeps into the heart, causing darkness and despondency. Why should we not believe God, and be happy? Bibles for Seamen at Panama Canal
The American Bible Society plans to put up in Balboa, at the Pacific entrance to the Panama Canal, a $30,000 building from which Bibles will be given to the passing seamen. The plan is to give every sailor passing through the canal a Bible in his own language. The society will ship to this station 10,000 Bibles printed in 127 different languages. In this work the American Society follows the action of the British and Foreign Bible Society in its distributing work at Port Said, on the Suez Canal.