p. Page Fourteen | Signs of the Times, Vol. 57, No. 39. (10/7/1930)

Earlier text: Was Christ CRUCIFIED on WEDNESDAY?

Sanctifying Suffering

ALL suffering is an opportunity for sanctification, but all suffering does not sanctify. There are vain griefs, sterile tears, profane sobs. One can have been beaten by all the floods of life, and shaken by all its hurricanes without being better for it, or wiser, or humbler. One can have suffered much, have suffered always, without getting from one's trial more than a little experience and much bitterness. One can be tired of life before having learned what it ought to have taught. The important thing is not merely to suffer, but to suffer in the sanctuary. What is important is to know how to sanctify the grief which God imposes.—Gaston Frommel.

Energy and Invincible Determination

The longer I live, the more deeply I am convinced that that which makes the difference between one man and another—between the weak and the powerful, the great and the insignificant—is energy, invincible determination, a purpose once formed and then death or victory.—Powell Buxton.

The BLUEBIRDS and Their NEIGHBORS

By Neil Wayne Northey

by NEIL WAYNE NORTHEY

This is Volume One in a series of four new books of nature stories called OLD HOMESTEAD TALES. Each book is a complete story in itself, covering a certain phase of the Wild Life found on the Old Homestead.

$1.25 POSTPAID (In Canada, $1.50)

IN THIS BOOK is told the story of the more trustful Little Wild Creatures which prefer to live near the habitation of man. It is the story of the Bluebirds, who always came back to the Old Homestead to live during the summer, and of the Feathered Friends and Furry Friends who were their neighbors. In it you read about Molly Cottontail's visit to the Black Forest and about Shaggy the Wolf seeing her; and how Tattler the Jay tried to steal Robin Red's babies. It tells about Johnny Chuck's narrow escape from Aquila the Golden Eagle; and how Spot the Skunk found Whiskers the Mouse under the granary; and why Hunting Cat wore a bell; and about many others of the Bluebird's neighbors.

There are 160 pages containing thirty chapters of entertaining and instructive reading in Volume One, including almost seventy pen and ink drawings. After reading it you will want the other three Old Homestead books, each telling about different Little Wild Creatures on the Old Homestead. Order “Bluebirds” now and add to the set as the other volumes are published. Order from our nearest representative, or

PACIFIC PRESS PUBLISHING ASSOCIATION Mountain View, California

These Stories Delight the Children!

Tested in the Commonplaces of Life

By G. Campbell Morgan

The real crises that test men invariably occur in the commonplaces of life. No man is tested in the economy of God by foreannouncement and prearrangement. The whole system of human expectations is entirely out of harmony with the divine method of examination. God's visits for testing are always unannounced, and by that method a man is revealed for what he really is. It is not the critical hour, my brother, that will prove you, you are being proved every day in the commonplaces of life.—G. Campbell Morgan.

The Life Boat

This magazine, published at Hinsdale, Illinois, is now running a series of articles of great value to conference and institutional workers. These articles have been culled from the personal files of Dr. David Paulson, founder of the Hinsdale Sanitarium, and former editor of the Life Boat. By subscribing at once, you will get all these articles, which began with the June issue. One dollar a year. Fifteen cents a copy.

The Ladder of Life

By William L. Brownell

The ladder of life is full of splinters, but they always prick the hardest when we're sliding down.—William L. Brownell.

The Cleansing Effect of Churchgoing

Habitual going to church has a cleansing effect that is needed. One’s mind picks up dirt from contacts with the world. It is odd that mental purification is neglected.—The Lutheran.

Helping Others Wisely

ONE of the truest and purest pleasures of life is to help others. But to help people we must understand them, and above all, we must love them. The impulse to do good, if not wisely directed, may often do harm. It is impossible to benefit others by mere good will without good judgment, founded on knowledge and experience.—Lord Avebury.

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Fundamentals

By B.

The recent Seventh-day Adventist General Conference in San Francisco voted unanimously the adoption of a resolution that we think should have a wider circulation than in the cumbered files of a convention report. It has to do with present trends in religion that are avowedly modernistic and materialistic, and in antidote thereto it states lucidly and forcefully certain basic truths of Christianity that need constant asseveration in these days when every wind of doctrine and theory is blowing. Here is the resolution in part:

“We affirm that recognition of a personal God is fundamental, not only to Christian doctrine, but also to a correct interpretation of natural phenomena.

“While we accept fully and without question the remarkable discoveries regarding the laws of nature, we deplore the tendency to regard these laws as self-operating, thereby endowing nature with inherent powers. We repudiate the materialistic interpretation of science, and believe that in all fields of scientific research we must look for the cause of natural phenomena, not in resident forces, but in the active will of God, who is the source of power in the original creation and the continued maintenance of the universe.

“Believing the Bible to be the revealed word of God to man, we accept the Genesis record of a literal creation in six twenty-four-hour days as an authoritative statement of a historical fact. We deplore the present tendency to interpret the age of the earth in terms of long geological periods. We maintain that the theory of evolution rests on unproved hypotheses, and that the facts of science support the great fundamental doctrine of creationism, and also the idea of a flood as portrayed in the Bible.

“We affirm that the variations occurring in plants and animals do not indicate evolutionary processes, resulting in the formation of new species, and we utterly repudiate the teaching that man originated from any lower form of life.

“Accordingly, we declare our allegiance to God as the Creator, and our acceptance of the seventh-day Sabbath as the memorial of His creation; and recognizing that the reign of evil has brought in many disturbing influences in the natural world, as well as degeneracy among plants, animals, and human beings, we look forward with faith and hope to the soon coming of Christ, which will usher in the final restoration of nature to its original perfection.”

Seventh-day Adventists believe that the questions alluded to in this resolution are not side issues or of little import. They concern the life and continuance of Christianity itself. They hold that the truth that is at stake in the Fundamentalist-Modernist controversy these days is most vital because it affects most profoundly one’s belief in God, which is the basis and starting point of religion. Every one who names the name of Christ should think these questions through in the light of Scriptural truth, so that he will not be deceived by the sophistries of a “science, falsely so-called.” B.

Appalling

By B.

The National Commission on Crime Prevention Through Moral and Religious Education has recently told us that “of thirty-four millions of youth in America between five and eighteen years of age, only about one half are now receiving religious training, either Catholic, Protestant, or Jewish. This is a seed plot of enormous proportions out of which criminals may naturally develop.”

The report goes on to state that “many judges, prison wardens, chaplains, and others in close touch with delinquents and criminals declare that the vast bulk of crime is committed by young men whose home influences have not been helpful or whose moral and religious training has been neglected.”

The three outstanding figures of the World Conference of Christian Youth held in Berlin, Germany. They are, left to right, Dr. Kelley of Glasgow, the European president of the federation; Dr. Daniel Poling of New York; and Dr. Gustav Schuermann, the world president of the conference. There were 14,000 youth from more than a score of nations in attendance, which is said to be the greatest convocation of Christian young men and women ever held.

Calvin Coolidge has recently stated that crime is costing this nation some $7,500,000,000 annually, or about 8 per cent of the national income. Half of this amount is lost through theft, burglary, larceny, stock frauds, credit frauds, mercantile frauds, insurance frauds, and a thousand and one swindles and confidence games. The other half is paid in taxes for the prevention, prosecution, and punishment of crime, including police, courts, prisons, district attorneys, sheriffs, et cetera.

These appalling figures should stir every parent in the land to a sense of his obligation for the religious training of his children. The principles of religion embedded in the character during the days of childhood and youth are the greatest bulwark against moral delinquency the world knows. God will hold the parents of the seventeen million children and youth who are receiving no religious instruction responsible for the future acts of their children, for upon parents rests the prime responsibility of religious training. The parents of the land are the ones chiefly responsible for the so-called crime wave, for if the parents and the home had done their part thoroughly and well, there would be no crime wave. And there will be no great diminution of crime until the parents do their rightful part.

Children who are brought up without the benefit of regular instruction in the principles of Christianity will be lacking in their moral and ethical concepts. There is no substitute for religion in the inculcation of right moral values and the establishment of high ethical standards. It would be much better for the child and for society at large to omit the child’s formal education in reading, writing, and arithmetic than it is to omit his religious education. If the child should grow up having to sign an X for his name, and yet knew the difference between right and wrong, he would be better off than if he could read and write a half-dozen languages but had no appreciation of the line of demarcation between goodness and wickedness, righteousness and sin. B.

Superstition

By B.

The noted Englishman, Prof. John MacMurray, has recently said that “modern science is very liable to superstition, and tends to breed superstition in its devotees.”

That is a startling pronouncement, isn’t it? The scientists have long told the religionists that they were superstitious; but here is one of their own number asserting that they are liable to superstition too. We are inclined to agree. The idea that the world and life came into being without the direct action of God is the greatest superstition of all time. B.

Earthly judges instill fear in a criminal’s heart; but think how much greater that fear will be when face to face with the Great Just Judge, unless your sins have been confessed, and your record is clear.