What Both Protestant and Catholic Authorities Affirm
THIS is not a new question. It is as old as the ancient pagan apostasy. It was revived by Constantine’s Sunday enactment of A. D. 321, and its papal enforcement during the following centuries.
True Sabbath observance has ever been the seal of loyalty to God and of observance of His law.
Sunday observance has ever been the mark of apostasy from God and His plainly revealed truth.
The great pagan and papal apostasies were especially distinguished by this mark of apostasy; and the Protestant Reformation, while approaching the issue between true Sabbath observance and Sunday worship, passed the question as untimely. There are 250,000,000 Mohammedans who appeal to the command of their great prophet for Friday observance. (Gibbon’s Rome, volume 3, page 515.) How do we know that their claim is incorrect, if we disregard the Bible command?
Eusebius, who was bishop about A. D. 313–338, and was associated with Constantine in the enforcement of his Sunday law of A. D. 321, said, “All things proper to do on the Sabbath we have transferred to the Lord’s day.”—Buton’s “Dictionary of Universal Information,” page 249.
IN HONOR OF THE SUN
The ecclesiastical and civil rulers of that time were Constantine, Pope Sylvester, and Eusebius. “A coin of the reign of Constantine still exists which bears on its obverse the monogram of Christ, while its reverse exhibits the figure of Phœbus, with the inscription ‘Sol Invictus’ (the invincible sun), denoting his predominance and power. The first of the Christian emperors still consulted the entrails of beasts for omens; and the weekly Christian festival which he appointed to be observed throughout the empire, he associated with the first day of the week, not because it was to Christians the day of the resurrection, but because it was to pagans the venerable day of the sun.”—Cassell’s “Illustrated Universal History,” chapter 40, page 561.
GUIDED ONLY BY TRADITION
A tract entitled, “Why Don’t You Keep Holy the Sabbath Day?” issued by Burns and Otis, a Catholic publishing company of London, after reviewing the customary texts used in support of Sunday observance, on page 6 says:
“It is absolutely impossible that a reasonable and thoughtful person should be satisfied, by the texts that I have quoted, that almighty God intended the obligation of Saturday under the old law to be transferred to Sunday under the new. And yet Protestants do so transfer it, and never seem to have the slightest misgivings lest, in doing so, they should be guilty of breaking one of God’s commandments. Why is this?—Because, although they talk so largely about following the Bible and the Bible only, they are really guided in this matter by the voice of tradition. Yes, much as they may hate and denounce the word, they have in fact no other authority to allege for this most important change. The present generation of Protestants keep Sunday holy instead of Saturday, because they received it as a part of the Christian religion from the last generation, and that generation received it from the generation before, and so on backwards from one generation to another, by a continual succession, until we come to the time of the (so-called) Reformation, when it so happened that those who conducted the change of religion in this country left this particular portion of Catholic faith and practice untouched.”
The Literature Committee of the Methodist Conference of Victoria, Australia, has recently strongly approved a work written by the Rev. A. Madsen, bearing date 1912, entitled, “The Question of Baptism.” On page 74 of that work the following truthful admission in regard to the observance of Sunday solely upon the authority of tradition, is made:
“Why do they, in common with other Christians, observe the Lord’s day? The Baptists set aside a positive command in Scripture to keep holy the Sabbath day, and regard the first day of the week—Sunday—as the Christian sabbath, and they do it on the ground of usage alone. There is no other. Nevertheless, Methodists are upbraided in unmeasured terms because they practice infant baptism, and cannot produce a Scripture passage which commands it, except by inference and implication. But the people who, in all moods and tenses, denounce infant baptism, and call it a ‘pious fraud,’ thereby most seriously reflecting upon the Christian integrity of the churches which practice it, have no better authority than usage for observing the Lord’s day as the Christian sabbath. And, moreover, on the strength of usage alone, they set aside a positive command in Scripture. . . . If usage and reasonable inference from statement and practice in the New Testament are pronounced to be invalid arguments to support infant baptism, by what logic can the denomination which repudiates these arguments make good its observance of the Lord’s day in the absence of express command for it—and, indeed, in the face of positive command to keep another day holy—when the only warrant available is evidence of a similar character?”
A BAPTIST AUTHORITY
A statement made by E. T. Hiscox, D. D., author of the “Baptist Manual,” before a Baptist minister’s meeting in New York City, presents the Baptists’ view. We quote from the New York Examiner, November 16, 1893:
“There was and is a commandment to keep holy the Sabbath day; but that Sabbath day was not Sunday. It will, however, be readily said, and with some show of triumph, that the Sabbath was transferred from the seventh to the first day of the week, with all its duties, privileges, and sanctions. Earnestly desiring information on this subject, which I have studied for many years, I ask, Where can the record of such a transaction683be found? Not in the New Testament—absolutely not. There is no Scriptural evidence for the change of the Sabbath institution from the seventh to the first day of the week.”
GOD’S COMMAND
God’s command says, “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God,” and it requires that the seventh day be kept holy.
These facts, gleaned from an article by R. Hare in the Australasian Signs of the Times, are worthy a more extensive circulation. I have taken the liberty to pass them on, with the hope that they may impress others as they have me, with their forceful statements of facts concerning one of God’s plain commands.
Reader, should we follow tradition or the command of God in Sabbath observance? More than 11,000,000 Jews witness to the correctness of the calendar which still marks the definite day enjoined by the command of God. More than 125,000 seventh-day Christians observing that day in all the world witness to the possibility of observing that command. What excuse shall we render if, in the face of such plain facts, we set aside God’s command by our traditions? R. C. P.
Science and the Horrors of War
Underwood & Underwood
Helmet worn by the soldiers in Europe to protect them against the poisonous gases released by newly devised bombs. The glass in front of his eyes enables the wearer of this helmet to see, and a sponge in front of the nose and mouth is saturated with a chemical that neutralizes the poisons of the gases.
The present age has made a god of science; but how terrifying are scientific developments manifested in the wholesale slaughters and barbarities of the European war!
QUESTION CORNER
By Milton C. Wilcox
CONDUCTED BY MILTON C. WILCOX, MOUNTAIN VIEW, CALIFORNIA
Note.—This department is for the purpose of helping Bible students. Answers must of necessity be brief, often only suggestive, never exhaustive, never infallible, only as they agree with the infallible Word. Such questions only will be answered as seem to the editors to minister to the mission of the paper. Questions of the same import cannot be answered repeatedly in the same volume. Name and address must be given, not for publication, but as evidence of good faith and to insure reply by letter if thought best. It is well always to inclose stamp, not stamped envelope, unless answer is desired by letter alone.
187 — OLD AND NEW COVENANT AND THE LAW
I have been told that we are now under a new dispensation, a new covenant; that the Ten Commandments were the old covenant. Now what is the new? If the new covenant affected the commandments, and we should keep them, why are they not in the New Testament?
J. W. S.
First of all, the Ten Commandments are not the old covenant. That is shown in both accounts in which the covenants are mentioned together. See Jer. 31: 31-33; Heb. 8: 8-10. The old covenant was a covenant made between God and the Hebrews, or between God and the nation of Israel. Its making is recorded in Ex. 19: 5; and its sealing, or approval, finishing, in Ex. 24: 3-8. In that covenant between God and Israel, God Himself promised that He would be a God to His people, and that He would do great things by them, if they were faithful and obedient. The obedience was a condition of that covenant. It reads:
“Now therefore, if ye will obey My voice indeed, and keep My covenant, then ye shall be Mine own possession from among all peoples: for all the earth is Mine: and ye shall be unto Me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel.”
Israel agreed to those words, knew that they were to keep God’s covenant as a condition. The Ten Commandments may be called His covenant—God’s covenant which He commanded. See Deut. 4: 13: “And He declared unto you His covenant, which He commanded you to perform, even the Ten Commandments; and He wrote them upon two tables of stone.”
This is what God means by the covenant which He made with the children of Israel, by “My covenant” and “My voice.” The children of Israel again and again failed to keep that covenant. That is, they broke God’s commandments. But that did not affect the commandments. A foreigner comes to America; he takes upon himself citizenship here; he agrees to obey the laws, and takes the oath of allegiance to do that. But he fails. Does that do away with the law of the country? Of course we know that it does not change the law in the least. It simply makes the man who failed to keep it a criminal. So it was with the old covenant. God’s law stands just the same, forever, perpetually binding upon all mankind. The children of Israel promised to keep that in their own strength, and failed.
Under the new covenant, the Lord declares that He will write that law in their minds and upon the tables of their hearts. His power is to be wrought in mankind; comes home to each individual heart, in living connection with God. But you will notice, in the promise given of that in Jeremiah 31, that the law is the same. There is to be no change regarding the law; the change is simply between not observing that law and observing it. Of man, no promise could avail. The new covenant, by putting the law into man’s heart, places him where he can observe the law. The New Testament is not a book of laws. There is no reason why God should repeat the law which He had Himself spoken from heaven. The New Testament is the good tidings of that gospel which is able to write God’s law in the hearts of all mankind.
The covenant question is a very simple question. God’s government is eternal, and His law is eternal. And His great, everlasting gospel, if received, will so change man’s heart as to make the keeping of the law a delight. Ps. 119: 97; 1 John 5: 3.
188 — GEHENNA
You state that the Greek word “Gehenna,” in Mark 9: 43, 44, is an allusion to a fire kept burning in the Valley of Hinnom, to consume the offal of the city—Jerusalem. Now as I have never succeeded in finding any evidence or proof of the fact of such a fire, I will be greatly favored if you will tell me where that proof is to be found.
A. H. S.
We think our querist is mistaken in saying that this word apparently implies that there is a constant fire burning there which seems to be of a supernatural character. The thought is that constant fires were kept burning by those who had charge of Jerusalem. The “Popular and Critical Bible Encyclopedia,” published by the Howard-Severance Company, edited by the Rt. Rev. Samuel Fallows, A. M., D. D., LL. D., under the term “Gehenna,” the Greek for the Valley of Hinnom, refers for explanation to the Valley of Hinnom; and under “Hinnom” it gives us these definitions:
“1. An unknown person, whose name is given to the ‘Valley of Hinnom’ (Joshua 18: 16; Neh. 11: 30).”
“2. The valley which bounds Jerusalem on the south, below Mount Zion, and which in Scripture is often mentioned in connection with the horrid rites of Moloch, which under idolatrous kings were there celebrated (Joshua 15: 8; 18: 16; Neh. 11: 30; Jer. 7: 31; 19: 2). When Josiah overthrew this idolatry, he defiled the valley by casting into it the bones of the dead, the greatest of all pollutions among the Hebrews; and from that time it became the common refuse of Jerusalem, into which all refuse of the city was cast, and where the combustible portions of that refuse were consumed by fire. Hence it came to be regarded as a sort of type of hell, the Gehenna of the New Testament being no other than the name of this Valley of Hinnom (Ge-Hinnom); see Matt. 5: 22, sq.; Mark 9: 43.”
“The Standard Bible Dictionary” says: “Hinnom was the place where children were sacrificed to the god Moloch (q. v.), according to 2 Kings 23: 10; Jer. 2: 23; 7: 31; 19: 2, 6; 32: 35. Later Jewish abhorrence of this practice caused the name Gehenna, or Valley of Hinnom, to be used as a name for hell.”
All that is implied in the type is that the dead carcasses that were cast in that valley, the worm preyed upon continually; and what the worm could not consume, constant fires that were kept burning by the authorities did consume. In other words, it was fire unquenchable and worm undying until their work was done. All that is meant in the Scripture, by “unquenchable fire,” is the fire which does its work. “He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” So the fire that was kindled in Jerusalem by the Babylonians, in the burning up of the temple and the various buildings, was fire that should not be quenched. And that was true. It was not quenched till it accomplished its work. Other authorities give the same idea.
“The International Bible Dictionary,” by the John C. Winston Company, says of that valley: “In it was probably burned all the refuse of the city, including the dead bodies of men and animals. From its ceremonial defilement, and from the detested and abominable fire of Moloch, if not from the supposed ever-burning funeral piles, the later Jews applied the name of this valley—Ge Hinnom, Ge-henna (land of Hinnom)—to denote the place of eternal torment.”
The passage in Ex. 22: 28 doubtless refers to rulers among the Jews. The marginal reading of the Revised Version is, “Thou shalt not revile the judges.” Ps. 82: 6 simply speaks of the children of God as gods because they are His sons. “I said, Ye are gods, and all of you sons of the Most High.” And yet the psalmist tells us that these are mortal people. “Nevertheless ye shall die like men.” Verse 7. Jesus quotes this in John 10: 34 to justify Him in calling Himself the Son of God. His argument is that if the Lord called people gods to whom His word came, certainly He was not perverting God’s truth by calling Himself the Son of God. This is simply another way of speaking of God’s children.
190 — BIBLE DATES
In my Bible, the date of Christ’s birth is given in the margin as B. C. 5; His anointing, 26 or 27 A. D.; His crucifixion and resurrection, A. D. 32. Wherein is the error? This makes Christ thirty-six years of age at His death.
R. R. M.
The marginal chronology of the Bible is not the most definite thing in the world, and that is especially true in the chronology commonly followed by Bible teachers; namely, Usher’s chronology. It gives us a fairly good working basis. It is practically correct in the anointing of our Lord, but not in the crucifixion. According to Hales’s chronology, the crucifixion occurred in the spring of A. D. 31. We have not space to explain that here. It will be found in “Christ Our Advocate,” B. S. L. No. 128, price ten cents; in “The Sanctuary and the Twenty-Three Hundred Days,” by Uriah Smith—a book now out of print—and its later revision, “Looking unto Jesus.” Paper covers, 25 cents.
In response to the question, “When did Stephen’s death occur?” it is generally given as 34 A. D.
Rush, Rivalry, and Strenuosity
By Mary Alice Hare Loper
Social Rivalry and Extravagance — The Amusement Craze — The Unnatural Educational Grind — Religious Fanatical Enthusiasm
By MARY ALICE HARE LOPER, M. S.
The celestial universe, with its millions of revolving suns and systems, preserves, in its onward trend through space, the same speed that has ever characterized it since the beginning of things. The great Creator set the pace, and He never changes. He set the pace for the revolutions of this little mundane sphere upon which our humble lot is cast. He made laws to govern man in his speed upon life's journey, and gave him minute instructions as to the importance of living in harmony with those laws. But some way, after nearly six thousand years, great changes have taken place in earthly affairs, in every line of human thought and action, everything seemingly having gathered a terrific momentum.
EVERYBODY IN A HURRY
This is an age of rush, of breathless hurry, of breakneck speed. The old-fashioned ox-cart is now preserved in paintings or statuary as a relic of the dead past, while the dear old horse-drawn vehicles are fast falling into disuse; for we have entered upon the strenuous age of automobiles and flying machines, when everything—to use the vernacular of the small boy—goes like whiz. Everybody seems to be in a hurry, whether he is accomplishing anything worth while or not. And it seems utterly impossible to supply the demand for speed in travel, no matter how dare-devil the attempts may be, or how many human lives may be sacrificed as the result.
“THE AGE OF RUSH, OF WORRY, OF STRENUOUSNESS, OF UNCERTAINTY”
Social rivalry is everywhere prevalent, even among the professed followers of Christ. It is a selfish process by which one seeks to outdo others, and which never brings real satisfaction to anybody. The lavish expenditure of money upon social functions knows no limitations, and the keen rivalry among society people grows more and more intense with passing years. Social standing is determined by dollars and cents, and not by “going about doing good.” The woman of fashion who dislikes to appear in society twice in the same gown, finds so much to occupy her time in trying to keep up in her line, that she is likely to have no time for either God or humanity.
The night was made for sleep, but it has been turned into a time for revelry and social whirl; and the direful physical results are seen on every hand in pale faces, weakened constitutions, and chronic invalidism. Multitudes are kept in a continual round of perplexity, trying to ape that which brings neither profit nor happiness; and the strenuous efforts constantly put forth, breed discontent, misery, and unhappiness, and too often result in the severing of sacred home ties.
Society rush and slush are undermining the foundations of the American home, bringing in alienation of affections, and all the misery that goes with it. Many a man gives up in despair the task of trying to satisfy the needless and extravagant demands made upon his hard-earned income. Many a woman loses her courage, and has her hopes shattered, because her husband spends his evenings at the social clubs and elsewhere, lavishing money actually needed to supply the necessities of life in the home which it is his bounden duty to support. “If any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel.” 1 Tim. 5: 8.
THE AMUSEMENT CRAZE
There is to-day a world-wide craze for amusements. This calls for the expenditure of vast sums of money, which is worse than wasted, causing some to deprive themselves of common necessities of life. Multitudes habitually attend theaters and picture shows where crime and immorality are vividly depicted, which leave hideous impressions upon the minds of old and young. The restless discontent and feverish excitement seen among children are deplorable. The yellow-back novel finds its rival in the moving-picture show, where in one evening may be absorbed the vile contents of a whole volume, and in such a vivid manner that one need not be surprised to find children playing murder as a mere pastime, and many crimes are committed as the direct result of this demoralizing education.
SUGGESTIVE OF VICE AND CRIME
Not content with cheap, vulgar pay shows, the archenemy has on exhibition many free suggestions of vice and crime, such as that mentioned in the Fresno Morning Republican of July 25, 1915:
“Los Angeles, July 24.—Anthony Comstock, secretary of the Society for the Suppression of Vice in New York, who took a casual stroll to-night, discovered objectionable pictures in photographers’ windows to which he took personal exception. ‘These pictures are disgraceful,’ he said. ‘They are a menace to morals, and should be suppressed. If such pictures should be displayed in New York, the person responsible would be sent to the penitentiary for a year, and fined $500.’”
THE EDUCATIONAL GRIND
These are also the days when parents seem to think that the quicker their children are ground through the educational mill, the greater their life possibilities. So they are put into the kindergarten hopper when mere babies, and are ground from that time on for an indefinite number of years, unless “notebookitis,” “history-mania,” or some other modern malady puts an untimely end to their earthly career—such a result, of course, being considered a “mysterious dispensation of Providence.” Parents consider skipping grades a mark of intellectual superiority to be encouraged, not realizing that “much study is a weariness of the flesh,” and that there are limitations to the endurance of the human mechanism. Children gone to seed educationally are as verily dwarfed as is the plant that receives too much sunshine or too much water. The pretentious class picture may be a precious relic of a child’s early achievements; but when, as a result, health is impaired, and the higher culture and education are sacrificed, it has been purchased at too dear a cost.
Business is rushed until it becomes fagged out, and too often one man’s success means another man’s ruin. There are too many human parasites, who live by sapping the life of others. There are honest men in all legitimate lines of business; but there are so many fakers in every line, that voyagers on the sea of life have become accustomed to be constantly on the lookout for human sharks, who are ever ready to seize upon their prey. Then there are so many lines of illegitimate business, so many bent upon evil, that business ventures of a good character have become very uncertain. Truly men’s hearts are “failing them for fear.”
This is a time of religious rush and fanatical enthusiasm. Roads purporting to lead to heaven have been adroitly laid out, with flowers of self-indulgence all along the way. Thousands have their names upon church books who do not possess passports to the heavenly country. Many professed Christians “having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof,” are so absorbed in earthly things, that they have no time to read the blessed Bible or to pray.
At the present hour, standing on the very verge of time and the threshold of eternity, they rake, as Bunyan says, among the chaff and rubbish of earth, and are too busily engaged in their pursuit for perishable riches, to cast one glance upward at the golden crown that is held within their reach. But at the close of life, they always find time to die. Earthly schemes and treasures affording no comfort, some, even at that late hour, have made their peace with Him in whom every hope centers.
But it is hazardous to put off the day of salvation, knowing that this earthly career often terminates suddenly.
And how unjust to use the loaf of time
In service of—not Christ, but self and sin;
Then, when life’s end is surely drawing near,
To give the last remaining crumb to Him!
But the melancholy picture of the world to-day, with all its rivalry, war, and turmoil, is sure evidence that the end of all things is at hand. This age of rush, of worry, of strenuousness, of uncertainty, will shortly give place to one of tranquil and everlasting peace. The mad efforts for earthly treasures will be succeeded by contentment and perfect satisfaction. But even now, amid all the uncertainties of life, and all the evils and vexations that abound on every hand, it is our blessed privilege to possess that heavenly peace, “the peace of God, which passeth all understanding,” which makes the path from earth to heaven more and more enjoyable as the end draws near.
Overcoming Sudden Impulses and Temptations
By Josef W. Hall
SUDDEN impulses and temptations to do wrong are remnants of habits not yet completely conquered. God flows in and overfloods evil impulses as soon as we yield Him absolutely the desire, continuous or instantaneous, to indulge the habit.
Josef W. Hall.
MOTTOES, MOTTOES
Bible mottoes are selling as they once did. One agent who has sent in for another 1,000 to-day, says to rush his order. We would like to see many more agents in the field. 200 for $7.50, 1,000 for $25.00, express prepaid. We are headquarters for fine Vegetable Cooking Oil. Two 5-gallon cans, $7.40. The more you buy, the less the price will be. Hampton Art Co., Nevada, Iowa.
The Faith That Works by Love
By A. C. Anderson
Works Cannot Save Us — But if We Are Saved, Our Works Will Show It
By A. C. ANDERSON
WITHOUT faith it is impossible to please God; “for he that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him.” Heb. 11:6.
One writer has said that faith must have no companion, which is obedience. Faith never walks alone. Faith may see God, but obedience must serve Him. “Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” Rom. 10:17. We must hear, and then do what God says. “What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him?”—No, indeed; “for as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.” James 2:14, 26.
SALVATION A FREE GIFT
Yet we are told that works avail nothing in Christ Jesus; only “faith that works by love.” Therefore “being justified freely by His grace” (Rom. 3:24), salvation becomes the free gift of God, “not of works, lest any man should boast.” Eph. 2:9.
“Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly; his faith is counted for righteousness.” “Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness.” Rom. 4:4, 5, 3.
“Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in His sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin.” Rom. 3:20. “By grace are ye saved through faith.” Eph. 2:8.
UNMERITED FAVOR
Grace is unmerited favor. “Thy word is true from the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth forever.” “My tongue shall speak of Thy word: for all Thy commandments are righteousness.” Ps. 119:160, 172. When compared with, or tried by, the law of God, all men are shown to be sinners, shut up under righteous condemnation, without the possibility of ever being saved on the ground of their own works, or righteousness. Our works will avail nothing. “We are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.” Isa. 64:6. Yet “sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.” Rom. 6:14.
ARE WE LICENSED TO SIN?
“Sin is the transgression of the law.” John 3:4. There are some men, however, who think that grace grants license to sin. But the question is asked by Paul: “What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.” Rom. 6:15. “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.” Rom. 3:23. Yet all can be freely justified by the grace of Christ, “whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time His righteousness: that He might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith. Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.” Verses 25-28.
Were this not true, the thief on the cross would not have been saved; he must have lived to produce works. All have sinned, and therefore sin ought to be imputed to all men; but God be blessed, for He “imputeth righteousness without works” (Rom. 4:6), not only to the repentant thief, but to all who will receive Christ as a propitiatory sacrifice.
HOW TRUE FAITH IS SHOWN
“Under the law,” men sought to keep the law in order to be saved. “Under grace,” men keep the law because they are saved. They are not saved because they obey, but they obey because they are saved. This is true faith; and to all such, the blood of Christ has become a cleansing stream. “And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as He is pure.” 1 John 3:3.
“As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.” James 2:26. The so-called faith in Christ which professes to release men from obedience to God’s law, is not faith, but presumption. Jesus says: “I am the true vine, and My Father is the husbandman. . . . Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in Me.” John 15:1, 4. The branch that bears no fruit, is taken away, and cast into the fire. “If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you” (verse 7), is the one explanation of answered prayer; and apart from this, it is folly to ask for anything in His name. “He that turneth away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer shall be abomination.” Prov. 28:9.
HOW TO ABIDE
To obey is to abide. “If ye keep My commandments, ye shall abide in My love; even as I have kept My Father’s commandments, and abide in His love.” John 15:10. This is the only process that knits the branch to the vine. Thus the life becomes one, and the desires one. Disobedience severs the life-giving connection with Christ. His will ceases to be our will, and we become barren and unfruitful branches. Jesus declared, “I have kept My Father’s commandments, and abide in His love.” “He that saith he abideth in Him ought himself also so to walk, even as He walked.” 1 John 2:6.
DISOBEDIENCE IS OFFENSIVE
No precept of God’s law may be set aside on the ground that we may consider it of comparative unimportance; for the least disobedience to any command of God is highly offensive to Him, while obedience in all things is His delight. Jesus said of Himself before He came to earth: “I delight to do Thy will, O My God: yea, Thy law is within My heart.” Ps. 40:8. And again: “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill.” “Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” Matt. 5:17, 19. This was the true test of His Messiahship.
“Look upon Jesus. Sinless is He.
Father, impute His life unto me.
My life of scarlet, my sin and woe,
Cover with His life, whiter than snow.
“Deep are the wounds transgression has made.
Red are the stains. My soul is afraid.
Oh, to be covered, Jesus, with Thee,
Safe from the law that now judgeth me!
“Reconciled by His death for my sin,
Justified by His life pure and clean,
Sanctified by obeying His word,
Glorified when returneth my Lord!”
Home Workers’ Books
“You must not under any consideration tell the child an untruth, for he will not know when to believe you and when not to believe,” said the great Italian educator, Dr. Maria Montessori, to the teachers at the recent National Educational Association in San Francisco. It was something of a bombshell to people who had been accustomed to the teaching of myths and fairy tales contained in the ordinary books of the day.
AND YET the principle set forth by the doctor—and who will say that it is not scientifically and morally correct?—is not a new one. Thoughtful, sensible people have been demanding a change; and as a result there is a growing demand for children’s and young people’s books of the better class. This demand is met in part by the justly popular HOME WORKERS’ BOOKS. More than two million of them have been sold. If stacked up in a single pile they would tower over fifteen miles high.
A WIDE RANGE of subjects is covered by these books—simple Bible stories, missionary stories, other moral stories, animal stories, nature studies, and beautiful spiritual themes—several of each.
NOVEMBER AND DECEMBER are the big selling months for these juvenile books. Some agents at work already. Others are wanted at once. 40% commission to you. Our representative in your state (see list on page 15) will help you get started.
