To find man and the law of his being in normal conditions we must go back to "the beginning."
The soul who is translated will not be hard of heart; he will be content with nothing given or allowed for that reason; he will go to the beginning, to the upper source, to God's pure ordinances given for an eternal race. There he will find God's law in all its fulness in revelation, in nature, in human nature. There he finds the earth "very good." There he finds the Sabbath as it came from God's hand, a delight, a refreshing, even to its Maker. There he finds the true marriage law, the man and woman one. And there also he finds the true law of man's best, purest, primitive diet. What was it?—Fruits and grains. Here is the record: "And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat [food]." Gen. 1:29. And then God planted for man a garden, planted with "every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food." Gen. 2:9.
Grains and fruit composed man's ideal, perfect diet. This Infinite Wisdom called "very good," and designed that man should live upon it forever. No creature should suffer, not even a vegetable, that man's appetite might be satisfied. The ripened grain, the luscious, perfect fruit, furnished him all that was needed to make and preserve him a perfect physical man. Partaking of this with the fruit of the tree of life, man would have lived forever.
But sin came in to mar God's fair handiwork. God's laws were perverted. Upon all creation rested the curse. "For the creation was subjected to vanity [death], not of its own will, but by reason of him who subjected it." Rom. 8:20. When the prince, man, yielded, all below him fell under the curse. God enlarged his diet to take in the food He designed for the lower animals. "Cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth unto thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field." Gen. 3:17, 18. Compare 1:30. God's appointed and permissive diet consisted of fruits, grains, and vegetables (herbs). Yet, notwithstanding sin, on this simple diet God's servants lived to nearly the age of a mil-5lennium. Read their obituaries in Genesis 5. Note the ages—930, 912, 905, 910, 895, 962, 969, 950.
What was the result of these long lives?—To the few who were faithful to God, of course, long life was a blessing; but to the wicked many years were a curse. Character generally becomes fixed at a comparatively early period; and a fixed wicked character in the antediluvians meant years of transgression and greater opportunity for evil, plotting, planning, concocting, devising more and more wickedness, till in the short period of sixteen centuries "the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and every imagination ["purposes, desires," margin] of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually." "The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. . . . All flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth." Gen. 6:5, 11, 12.
To the great righteous message of reform preached through Noah by the power of the Spirit, that generation turned a deaf ear. They demonstrated that a long life in sinful earth was a curse to man and his posterity.
Then came their destruction in the Deluge. They would not separate from sin and were destroyed with it. And even some of those who were carried through the Deluge in the ark were saved, not because of their own righteousness, but for the sake of Noah and the race. God knew that the same history of sin and righteousness would be repeated. Few would walk the narrow way; many would pursue the broad path to death. Continuance in life hardened them in sin. "Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil." Eccl. 8:11. "Let favor be shown to the wicked, yet will he not learn righteousness;" but when God's "judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness." Isa. 26:10, 9. So the antediluvian reasoned, "I shall not be moved; for I shall never be in adversity." Ps. 10:6.
Therefore, for man's sake, his life was shortened, and as a help to this end he was given flesh to eat. "Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things. But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat." Gen. 9:3, 4.
There was at that time a distinction between "clean" and "unclean" beasts. And immediately upon going out from the ark, only clean beasts would have been obtainable, as but one pair of each kind of unclean beasts were preserved, while seven pair of the clean kinds were kept through the year. All vegetation was destroyed. But in a little time after the Deluge the earth brought forth, and the beasts multiplied, and man by divine permission (not appointment) became a flesh eater; and with this came an almost immediate shortening of life, till a few generations after the flood human life was reduced to little over a century; and a few hundreds of years later, to threescore and ten. "And Haran died before his father" (Gen. 11:28), comes in the long muster roll as a note of discord. Such a thing was then strange.
Two facts stand prominently forth in this consideration,—a flesh diet and shortened life. God permitted it that man might more vividly see and know the consequences of transgression,—death,—and, seeing it, turn from the sin. And yet it is probable that in general the true people of God ate only what would be regarded as clean beasts.
Abraham, the friend of God, leaves his father's house, kindred, and country for a better land. He wanders a pilgrim and a stranger in the land of his inheritance. His descendants went down into Egypt, as foretold by the Lord to the patriarch. Gen. 15:13. Here they mingled with the true worship of God the nature-worship and unholy idolatry of Egyptized Babylon, and educated appetite to love the "flesh-pots" of the land of the Pharaohs. At the end of the four centuries of prophecy they had sunken low in slavery, both spiritual and physical. God's promise and covenant, confirmed by an oath, had been given to Abraham (Gen. 13:14-17; 15:4-18; 22:16-18) that at the end of the four hundred years He would deliver them. This promise included ultimately the world (Rom. 4:13), renewed, as God would renew the people, by His creative power (Heb. 11:9-16). That the Lord did not then do this is no evidence that He would not have done it. X.
(To be continued.)
EXPANSION.
By W. N. Glenn
THE Lord Jesus Christ was and is an expansionist. At the time of His first advent to earth, the people who were reckoned as the people of God, who nominally represented His kingdom, had so far departed from its true principles that they had utterly ignored His law and were guided by their own traditions. They had so far wandered from the truth concerning the kingdom that they rejected the rightful King, and finally put Him to death. They were looking for a temporal king, who would give them pre-eminence as a temporal nation. But He set on foot a reformation, beginning at fundamental principles, in order to place the kingdom in its true light before the world.
In starting this reformation, His first admonition to His own people was, "Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand." The injunction to repent showed that they were sinners, transgressors of the law of the kingdom, which He, as well as His forerunner (John the Baptist), was proclaiming. That Jesus Christ began at first principles, of which even His own people had lost sight, is also shown by His declaring to one of their leaders: "Ye must be born again;" "that which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." Why must the natural man (of whatever nationality) be born again?—Because, "except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he can not enter into the kingdom of God." Thus, the very first thing that Jesus Christ sought to impress upon the people was that His kingdom was a spiritual kingdom.
This is further emphasized in the fact that He in no way sought to interfere with the affairs of civil government as then being administered. Much as the world needed reforming in every department of life, He made no demand upon, or appeal to, the civil government for legal enforcement of reformatory measures. The Holy Spirit, with which He was imbued and led, was the source of reformation, and the Word of God was the standard which He continually held forth.
Being baptized with water and with the Spirit, Jesus Christ set out upon His mission single-handed. Before calling for a single recruit, He met, and personally overcame, His greatest adversary, Satan. Having thus established His right to the dominion, and His ability to maintain it, without other aid than the power of the Spirit, through the Word, He began the work of expansion. In course of time, He had twelve chosen followers, having previously set forth the principles of His kingdom in the Sermon on the Mount. His own character and mode of operation had been given by the prophet David: "I will, O My God; yea, Thy law is within My heart. I have preached righteousness in the great congregation." Ps. 40:8, 9. In sending proof of His Messiahship to John the Baptist, in prison, He said, "The blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the Gospel preached to them." Matt. 11:5. Not one word about having secured reformatory ordinances in this or that city, or the formation of any kind of league or civic association. The attitude of the civil powers toward Him is also told by David: "The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord, and against His Anointed, saying, Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us." Ps. 2:2, 3.
Carrying out His theory of expansion, the Lord sent out His twelve followers to disseminate the principles of His kingdom amongst His own people, those who should have known it already. How were they to do this?—His command was, "Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils; freely ye have received, freely give." Here is emphasized the difference between the mode of extending the spiritual kingdom and that of expanding earthly nations. The motto of the latter is, Freely take. These "ambassadors" were not sent to negotiate with civil governments for territory, or for the modification of existing laws; they were sent to negotiate with individuals—to offer them eternal life in Christ in exchange for a devotion of their temporal lives to His service; to offer them the true righteousness of Christ in exchange for simple faith and a surrender of their own righteousness, which was as "filthy rags;" to offer them purity of life in exchange for sin; in short, to beseech them for Christ’s sake to be reconciled to God, and thus become heirs of the kingdom prepared from the foundation of the world.
Further along in His ministry, Jesus secured and sent out seventy other disciples. He sent them "two and two before His face into every city and place, whither He Himself would come." What were they to do? Were they to "work up a sentiment" by circulating petitions and agitating municipal reforms, and be ready by the time He came to make a popular appeal to the civil authorities for reformatory ordinances?—No; they were to preach the Gospel, and heal the sick, etc. Their mission was the same as that of the twelve; they were to tell the people that "the kingdom of God is come nigh unto you;" but there was no intimation that the kingdom was to be expanded by means of any laws that they could enact. The complaint that Jesus made against them and their rulers was that they had already made void the law of God by their own traditions. A reformation, therefore, meant that they should forsake their own ways and return to the law of the kingdom which had been promulgated ages in the past—a law one jot or tittle of which was not to be abrogated. Jesus Christ continued this manner of expanding His kingdom throughout His earthly ministry, at the very close of which He declared that His kingdom was not of this world. When on trial before a Roman governor on the charge of endeavoring to interfere with the then existing government, His accusers could not convict Him. Moreover, He permitted His life to be taken by sanction of that government, when all the power of earth and heaven was at His command. But God raised Him from the dead, and He again proceeded with the work of expanding His kingdom. By what means? Read the commission to His ambassadors: "Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature. He that believeth and6is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned."
Note that the Gospel (good news) of the kingdom goes to every creature; it is a peaceful message; but the kingdom includes only such as believe. The government of which Jesus Christ is the head absolutely rejects all who will not believe the Gospel, and show their faith by their voluntary obedience. While His government is an absolute monarchy, it operates only through the "consent of the governed." Not only are they who refuse allegiance left out, and not forced into acquiescence, but if by any means they show a merely nominal adherence, they are cast out. "Whosoever believeth not shall be condemned."
That the present governments of earth have no part or lot in the kingdom of Christ, and that His kingdom will expand to include the whole earth, is amply shown in the Scriptures, emphatically so in the prophecy of Daniel. In explaining the meaning of the image which Nebuchadnezzar had seen in a dream, given by the Lord to show him what should come to pass in the future, Daniel showed him that the God of heaven would eventually set up a kingdom that would "break in pieces and consume" all human governments; and would fill the whole earth. This kingdom of God was represented in the dream by a "stone cut out without hands." Thus, the Lord’s system of expansion, by means of preaching the Gospel of peace, will result in a kingdom that will fill the whole earth, utterly annihilating all the human systems and schemes that ever have existed.
W. N. GLENN.
THE DECALOGUE AND THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT.
By E. Lanphear
WHEN the principles involved in the Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount come to pervade the lives of men, few difficult problems will remain unsettled. We will need no Sunday laws, nor will we need the name of God inserted in our national Constitution.
When our preachers and teachers bring all their preaching and teaching into conformity with these, the people will be able to understand the Word of God without text-books or the theology by doctors of divinity. So much false theology is thrown over the Gospel that it distracts the masses, and they do not know what to believe.
But few, comparatively speaking, ever study to know the real meaning of the Ten Commandments, or what the Sermon on the Mount means to them. One must know spirituality by personal experience before he can successfully impart that truth.
Spiritual truth and spiritual life are essentially identical. The imparting of spiritual truth is the imparting of life. In this was the unexampled power of Christ as a teacher of spiritual truth. He asserted this when He said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life."
Herein is seen the supreme necessity of spiritual life on the part of every Christian teacher. Doctrine is but a skeleton of life. Hence it is that many preachers whose sermons are ponderous with theories, copious as to their quotations from the Father, have little power to develop life. One may analyze the metaphysics of Paul's theology to the nicety of a hair's breadth, but leave his congregation as poor as Pharaoh's lean kine, unless, back of the metaphysical analysis, in some degree he reveals the spiritual life. The secret of the failure of many Sabbath-school teachers is found here. Their knowledge of the Scriptures is mainly historical and theoretical, but they do not possess that spiritual life which is higher than all theories, and which more than words imparts its blessings directly to the hearts of the pupils.
Then he who would successfully teach in spiritual things must teach them through the power of actual spiritual life. All life is soul-inspiring. For example, if the life of a given teacher along the line of honesty is the embodiment of all that is honest and true, that life will beget honesty in those who are taught, when all theories concerning honesty, put forth by the same teacher, without the embodiment of those theories in his own life, would be futile.
Every Christian, whether officially commissioned as preacher or teacher, is a help or a hindrance along spiritual lines. If his soul be filled with spiritual life, with consecration and devotion, it matters little whether he can formulate beautiful theories concerning life or not. Those who come in contact with Him will be inspired to live as He is living, to think as He is thinking, to be what He is.
No man or woman is fit to teach the Word of God until he or she has been converted and can teach in the Spirit of Christ and His Gospel. I think some of the Sabbath-school superintendents and teachers in our schools are capable of teaching the true Spirit of the Gospel, and the rest are as liable to teach wrong as right, and the pupil is worse off than if he had never been taught. Parents should guard their children against such teaching.
E. LANPHEAR.
QUALITY NOT NUMBERS.
By John G. Woolley
[John G. Woolley, in the New Voice.]
"The people that are with thee are too many." Judges 7:2.
It is the common frailty of leaders that they get enamored of numbers.
Gideon thought that in order that Israel should be able to destroy the Midianites, "the people ought to get together." He had gone from tribe to tribe and held meetings, made red-hot anti-Midian speeches, taken up a collection, and organized an anti-Midianite league. He had asked for a show of hands of all who were opposed to Midian, and had explained that he had no purpose to separate anybody from anybody else, that what he wanted was what everybody wanted,—a crowd of good people.
The thing was a great success, naturally. The woods were full of people, who, upon one ground or another, were opposed to the enemy. But comparatively few of them had formed any purpose about it. Most of them would have cheerfully let the foe alone forever if they could have simply had "prosperity."
But Gideon got them together, and they had conventions and consecration meetings and sung Moses' psalms, and the presidents of the local societies made speeches, and the "general staff" fixed upon an official badge, and it sold like hot cakes. And Gideon made his report, and showed that new societies were forming every day, and that he was expecting the movement to break out among the Midianites themselves; and he proposed for the watchword, "Going and growing."
And they went—one fare for the round trip—and grew and grew, until they struck the enemy's camp in the valley of Jezreel; and there were of the Israelites in rendezvous at Harod thirty-two thousand men.
And God said to Gideon: "You have too many people—of the kind." They would be all right for a convention, but this is a fight, and twenty-two thousand of these are ready to cut and run now." And Gideon said, "O, I guess not!"
God said, "Try them." And when a general furlough was offered to all who didn't feel very well, twenty-two thousand quit the service.
Gideon was thunderstruck for a moment, of course, but his blood was warming, and when the last of the quitters had shuffled by, he closed up the ranks, and, saluting, said with kindling eye, "Behold, O Lord, ten thousand heroes!"
But God said: "You have yet too many people. These were all too proud to run away, but there is a lot of them who think too much of their own comfort. They would complain at overwork and criticize the rations. What you want is a few men who will not think of themselves, who will not recognize a hardship when they meet it. However, try these ten thousand. Give the order to 'charge across the creek.'"
The command was given. At the waterside ninety-seven hundred picked out a good place to kneel, and got down on their knees to have a comfortable drink, and by the time they were too full of water to run at all, three hundred lean, dry-lipped, obedient, uncalculating, fighting men were leaping up the far bank toward the hill of Moreh.
And God said: "Gideon, that army of yours is all right at ninety-seven per cent. discount for cash. Blow your trumpet now, and stop those three hundred fanatics, until you provision them. Send these others to the tents; they are not cowards, but selfish. You can use them for garrison duty, after the fight. Then take your three hundred fighters and go in."
Gideon learned enough that day to entitle him to a Ph.D., and after he had bivouacked his reserves, he gathered his devoted handful and outlined his plan of battle; and there was no namby-pamby brag about "going and growing," but the slogan was, "The sword of the Lord and of Gideon."
It was this same lesson that, fifteen hundred years later, Jesus tried to teach in the discipleship of peace: "Whosoever will come after Me let him" go in for quality, not numbers.
GOD'S SIGNS.
GOD looks up at us from every sweet flower that blooms. The beauty that fills our earth is a pledge to us of God's thought and love for us. We all know the familiar story of the great traveler who was saved from perishing on the desert where he had fallen, faint and famishing for water, by seeing a little speck of green moss peeping up out of the hot sand. This gleam of life assured him that God must be near, thus putting new hope into his heart, and giving him strength to rise and struggle on until he found water. Every plant or flower should remind us of God, make us reverent. A writer says:—
"We are not left of God
So long as a rose blooms at our window-pane;
So long as the sun shines, and the soft rain
Calls forth the early violet from the sod.
"If but a wild brier by our pathway nod,
After its winter death wakened again,
Seeing its life we may forget our pain
Of unbelief. Who brings forth life but God?
"He stains with tender tint the lily's lip;
Feeds with incessant care the insect crew;
Drops honey for the wandering bee to sip,
In a white chalice set with pearls of dew.
The glowworm hath its lamp; the firefly's light
Is but a pledge of love writ on the night."
—Selected.
THE RESURRECTED LORD AND THE LORD'S DAY.
By G. E. Fifield
IT has been made clear, we think, that the Sabbath is the seventh day of the week, blessed and consecrated by Christ at creation, enshrined by Him in the heart of His law, and, during His incarnate life, rescued by Him from pharisaical formalism, and made honorable once more, as the seal of love's sacrificing service.
Jesus said, "The Son of man is Lord of the Sabbath day." This, then, is the Lord's day, and "this same Jesus," speaking by His Spirit, through Isaiah, calls it, "My holy day." Isa. 58:13. Thus it is evident that the expression "Lord's day" is only another title for the Sabbath, and that the apostle John, when he says, "I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day" (Rev. 1:10), if he refers to any day of the week, must intend us to understand that day.
Still we are told that all the meetings of Christ with His disciples after the resurrection were held on the first day of the week.
With almost a unanimous voice the church asserts this, and then assumes that, by this means, the first day was made to take the place of the seventh in the early church, and that the change thus received the Lord's sanction, and that thus arose the title "Lord's day" in commemoration of the resurrection.
Such a claim as this deserves thorough investigation. We have already noticed that the New Testament record, in speaking of the first day of the week, only mentions it eight times, and never calls it either the Sabbath or the Lord's day, and never hints, far less directs or commands, that it should be religiously observed.
This fact should lead us to suspect that the assertion concerning these meetings must be a mistake.
But the record will surely tell. In John 20:19 we have a record of the first meeting of Jesus with His disciples after the resurrection:
"The same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you."
It is assumed that this was a religious meeting; that the disciples were assembled to commemorate the resurrection; and that Christ's meeting with them sanctioned the object of the gathering and lent to the practise the weight of His example. All this is not only assumption, but it is directly contradicted by all the facts. They were not assembled for the purpose of commemorating the resurrection, for they did not believe that Christ had arisen from the dead. The holding of a religious service with such a purpose would be the one thing that would madden the Jews to desperation, and their disciples were assembled "for fear of the Jews."
In the first chapter of Acts and the thirteenth verse it is plainly stated that the disciples had in Jerusalem an upper room where they all abode. Mark, in speaking of this meeting, says plainly that when Jesus unexpectedly appeared among them "they sat at meat." Evidently they were eating their evening meal in this upper room.
The record Mark gives of all Christ's appearances up to and including this time is as follows:—
"Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom He had cast seven devils. And she went and told them that had been with Him, as they mourned and wept. And they, when they had heard that He was alive, and had been seen of her, believed not."
"After that He appeared in another form unto two of them, as they walked, and went into the country. And they went and told it unto the residue; neither believed they them."
"Afterward He appeared unto the eleven as they sat at meat, and upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not them which had seen Him after He was risen." Mark 16:9-14.
Nothing could more clearly show that this was not a religious meeting held to celebrate the resurrection.
Two questions remain concerning it: What was the object of Christ's meeting with His disciples at this time? and why is it so definitely stated that it was on the first day of the week? The record ought to answer these questions, and if Sunday observance can gain any sanction from this meeting, the answer to these questions must make it plain. Unfortunately for those who seek here for divine authority for Sunday observance, the Bible does answer these questions, but not as they would wish.
Surely it is no wonder that the merciful Jesus should take the first opportunity to meet with His disciples, on the very day of His resurrection, when their hearts were breaking with sadness at His death. It was like Him to appear first to Mary Magdalene, addressing her with the familiar "Mary," which must have so thrilled her heart, for she it was who, in return for His loving service for her, had broken at His feet the precious box of ointment, and given Him all the fragrance of her heart's unselfish love.
How like Him, too, it was to go with these two disappointed souls, who, as they walked and went into the country, talked together of His death, and of all their disappointed hopes, and were sad! And now it is evening, and for the first time since His resurrection the disciples are with one exception all together where He can see them as of old.
Object of Christ's Meeting with His Disciples.
But, beyond all this, there is a definite reason why He must appear to them there, on that very first day of the week.
The proof of His Messiahship, as that truth should be proclaimed to the world, would be that He, and He only, fulfilled the prophecies concerning the Messiah. It was prophesied that the Messiah should rise the third day after His crucifixion. Jesus Himself had referred to this prophecy and repeated it when He gave it as a sign to the unbelieving Jews that He would destroy the temple of His body and after three days raise it again.
It was recorded that He was crucified on the preparation, the sixth day. He must, therefore, rise on the first day of the week. He must not only rise on that day, but He must have witnesses who can refute the lying testimony of the Jews and the hired soldiers, by testifying that He rose on that day. To testify to His resurrection on that day they must have seen Him on that day, after He arose. Now see how plainly the record states that this, and not, therefore, the consecration of Sunday, was the object of this meeting.
Luke's record is:—
"And as they thus spake, Jesus Himself stood in the midst of them, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. But they were terrified and affrighted, and supposed that they had seen a spirit. And He said unto them, Why are ye troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself; handle Me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see Me have. And when He had thus spoken, He showed them His hands and His feet. And while they yet believed not for joy, and wondered, He said unto them, Have ye here any meat? And they gave Him a piece of broiled fish, and of an honeycomb. And He took it, and did eat before them." Luke 24:36-43.
Having thus convinced them that He was no phantom, but His real self, He immediately adds the lesson He wanted them to learn. He says: "These are the words I spoke unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning Me." "And He said unto them, Thus it is written, and thus it behooved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day." "And ye are witnesses of these things." Luke 24:44, 46, 48.
This, then, and not the consecration of the first day of the week as the Christian sabbath, is the plainly-stated object of this meeting.
In the tenth of Acts we find the apostle Peter witnessing as Christ commanded. Of himself and of the other disciples He says: "And we are witnesses of all things which He did both in the land of the Jews, and in Jerusalem; whom they slew and hanged on a tree: Him God raised up the third day, and showed Him openly; not to all the people, but unto witnesses chosen before of God, even to us, who did eat and drink with Him after He rose from the dead." Acts 10:39-41.
This, then, is the first meeting after the resurrection. The reason why it was held, and the reason why it was held at that time, are plainly stated, but it is not hinted that it was any part of the Saviour's design to consecrate that day to be observed by His church.
"And after eight days again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them; then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in their midst, and said, Peace be unto you." John 20:26.
The record makes the object of this meeting evident. It was to reclaim Thomas from his doubts and unbelief. (See verses 24-29.) There is no hint that there is any object save this, and to teach all the disciples how blessed is faith. The first meeting was on the afternoon, or early evening, of the first day of the week. It is plainly stated that this was "after eight days" from that time. This meeting must, therefore, have been on Monday or Tuesday. No honest count can make it come on the next seventh day from the time of the first meeting, and so on Sunday.
Yet for the sake of the argument for Sunday sacredness, it is boldly asserted that this was on the next Sunday, and then assumed, contrary to the plainly-stated facts, that it was to sanction the observance of that day.
G. E. FIFIELD.
(To be continued.)
Welcoming Intellectual Progress
By S. S. Mumaugh, M.D.
WE should adhere to nothing because it is old. On the other hand, we should reject nothing because it is new. Let us be ready to receive, willing to communicate, eager to hail with delight all intellectual progress.—S. S. Mumaugh, M.D.