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The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Third-day, August 27, 1867

CHRISTIAN HOLINESS.

CHRISTIANITY requires holiness of the most elevated kind, but connects this holiness with the deepest humility. “Be ye holy for I am holy.” “Follow holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.” The Scriptures recognize not as a thing of any value, that negative kind of virtue, which consists in doing no harm. To leave undone what we ought to do, is as really sin, as to do what we ought not. Accordingly, the Christian’s faith is represented, not merely as faith which preserves him from evil, but which “works by love.” The Christian’s love is described, not as love which evaporates in empty professions, but which constrains him to live not to himself, but to the Lord Jesus Christ. The servant who had one talent entrusted to him which he neglected to improve, is declared to be a “wicked and slothful servant;” not because he had wasted that talent, but because he had made no improvement of the trust. The blessed Saviour describes myriads as condemned to destruction with the Devil and his angels, not for crimes they had perpetrated, but for the neglect of duties they should have performed.

When the different virtues that should adorn the Christian character are compared to fruit, this fruit is represented as indispensably necessary. This lesson is indicated by the Lord in various expressive ways. He taught it by the parable of the fig-tree planted in the vineyard. The owner sought fruit not leaves; and his forbearance was extended to the tree, under the hope of its producing fruit. The great Husbandman expects the fruits of piety; and the leaves of a fair profession will not be valued when the fruit is wanting. By an expressive miracle the Lord taught the same important lesson, when he said to the barren fig-tree, “Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward forever.”

Many professors of religion appear satisfied if they disgrace not their profession by flagrant inconsistency; yet, let such consider that the fig-tree in the vineyard was not ordered to be cut down because it bore pernicious fruit, but because it bore no fruit. The tree which withered at Jesus’ word, was not blasted because it was covered with poisonous berries, but because it had nothing but leaves. As the adorable Jesus thus declares that his followers will produce the fruits of holiness, he also declares that this will not be in a small and inconsiderable degree. When he compares himself to a vine, and his disciples to the branches, he says of those disciples, “He that abideth in me and I in him, bringeth forth much fruit. Herein is my Father glorified that ye bear much fruit.”

In the parable of the sower, he describes his disciples as producing thirty, sixty, and some a hundred fold; some rising to piety much more elevated than others; yet while some yield a hundred fold, those who yield the least yield thirty fold. This is no inconsiderable increase. Conformable to these representations are the divine admonitions: “Be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord.” “Be diligent that ye may be found of him in peace, without spot and blameless.”—Selected for Review from Pike’s Guide.