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Editorial

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Oct 10, 1907

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 84, No. 41.

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Editorial

By Editor

To confess, to weep, to pray, to resolve—all these are of no avail unless we believe. It is by believing that we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. It is by believing the “exceeding great and precious promises” that they are realized in our experiences. In order to receive any benefit from the work of Jesus we must believe that he is “able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think.” To the blind men who sought his help, Jesus said, “Believe ye that I am able to do this? They said unto him, Yea, Lord. Then touched he their eyes, saying, According to your faith be it unto you. And their eyes were opened.” To the ruler of the synagogue Jesus said, “Fear not: believe only.” We must remember, however, that “a nominal faith in Christ, which accepts him merely as the Saviour of the world, can never bring healing to the soul. The faith that is unto salvation is not a mere intellectual assent to the truth. He who waits for entire knowledge before he will exercise faith, can not receive blessing from God. It is not enough to believe about Christ; we must believe in him. The only faith that will benefit us is that which embraces him as a personal Saviour, which appropriates his merits to ourselves. Many hold faith as an opinion. Saving faith is a transaction, by which those who receive Christ join themselves in covenant relation with God. Genuine faith is life.” Believe, and live in obedience to the will of God.

The Old-New Gospel

Creation and Redemption

THE one great theme of the Scriptures is Christ and his salvation. “Ye search the Scriptures,” said Jesus to the Jews, “because ye think that in them ye have eternal life; and these are they which bear witness of me.” After Philip had become acquainted with Jesus, he said to Nathanael, “We have found him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.” Whether it be in history or in prophecy, whether it be in discourse or in song, the subject of the revelation is the person, the attributes, the position, the work, the grace, the merits of the eternal Son of God, in whom the Father of all is made known, and through whom salvation is brought to the human family. And such a revelation is made concerning the eternal Son as to furnish a sound basis of confidence in the provisions of the gospel of salvation from sin.
It is by no mere chance that the first chapter in the Bible is occupied with a brief outline of the great facts of creation; for when the foundations of the earth were laid, the material foundation was laid for faith in the gospel of salvation. The opening words of this chapter are significant: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Elsewhere it is revealed that God wrought through his Son in making the worlds, giving voice through him to those creative facts which brought all things into existence, so that “by faith we understand that the worlds have been framed by the word of God so that what is seen hath not been made out of things which appear.” In the first chapter of Genesis we have the only reliable account of creation, a revelation of facts which it would be beyond the power of the human intellect to search out; and yet this information has not been given primarily in order to establish physical science upon a sound basis, although it may very properly be used as a means of testing the so-called scientific theories concerning the origin of things and beings. The Bible is the text-book to be used in the study and the teaching of the science of salvation. It gives us knowledge of the true God, and of Jesus Christ his Son, whom he has given to be the Saviour of the world. It reveals to us the purpose of God concerning the earth and its inhabitants. It makes known to us the plan of the divine government, and the thought of the Father concerning his Son in his relation to the animate and inanimate creation; and inasmuch as the basal question in religion is the relation which God sustains to all things and all beings, the opening chapter in this text-book on the science of salvation deals with the origin of things. Here we learn that the God of the Bible, the God who invites us to worship and obey him, is the Creator of the material universe, the one whose infinite power and wisdom are revealed in the things that are made. This is the foundation truth of Christianity, and the first chapter of Genesis is “the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.”
This thought of God as the Creator is almost continuous throughout the Bible, and this manifestation of power and wisdom in the things which can be seen is made the basis for understanding, so far as finite minds can understand, and for having confidence in, the same power and wisdom as manifested in the plan of salvation. Some quotations from the Scriptures will help us to see this: “Hast thou not known? hast thou not heard? The everlasting God, Jehovah, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary; there is no searching of his understanding. He giveth power to the faint; and to him that hath no might he increaseth strength.” “Thus saith God Jehovah, he that created the heavens, and stretched them forth; he that spread abroad the earth and that which cometh out of it; he that giveth breath unto the people upon it, and spirit to them that walk therein: I, Jehovah, have called thee in righteousness, and will hold thy hand, and will keep thee, and give thee for a covenant of the people, for a light of the Gentiles; to open the blind eyes, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison-house.” “But now thus saith Jehovah that created thee, O Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel: Fear not, for I have redeemed thee; I have called thee by name, thou art mine.” “For thus saith Jehovah that created the heavens, the God that formed the earth and made it, that established it and created it not a waste, that formed it to be inhabited: I am Jehovah; and there is none else. I have not spoken in secret, in a place of the land of darkness; I said not unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye mein vain: I, Jehovah, speak righteousness, I declare things that are right. . . . Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is none else.” “For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth; and the former things shall not be remembered, nor come into mind. But be ye glad and rejoice forever in that which I create; for, behold, I create Jerusalem a rejoicing, and her people a joy.” “Thus shall ye say unto them, The gods that have not made the heavens and the earth, these shall perish from the earth, and from under the heavens. He hath made the earth by his power, he hath established the world by his wisdom, and by his understanding hath he stretched out the heavens. When he uttereth his voice, there is a tumult of waters in the heavens, and he causeth the vapors to ascend from the ends of the earth; he maketh lightnings for the rain, and bringeth forth the wind out of his treasuries. Every man is become brutish and is without knowledge; every goldsmith is put to shame by his graven image; for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them. They are vanity, a work of delusion: in the time of their visitation they shall perish. The portion of Jacob is not like these; for he is the former of all things; and Israel is the tribe of his inheritance: Jehovah of hosts is his name.”
“O come, let us sing unto Jehovah; Let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation. Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving; Let us make a joyful noise unto him with psalms. For Jehovah is a great God, And a great King above all gods. In his hand are the deep places of the earth; The heights of the mountains are his also. The sea is his, and he made it; And his hands formed the dry land. O come, let us worship and bow down; Let us kneel before Jehovah our Maker: For he is our God, And we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand.”
Thus in these and other places in the Old Testament the fact is repeatedly recited that Jehovah, the true God, is the Creator of the heavens and the earth, and this is made the basis of the appeal for confidence in him and his saving power. In the more complete development of the gospel of Christ, as set forth in the New Testament, the foundation laid in the Old Testament is built upon, and the identity of creative power and saving power is clearly established. Let us note some of these statements: “I am not ashamed of the gospel: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For therein is revealed a righteousness of God from faith unto faith.” That creative power which is inherent in the very nature of God, and which was revealed through his Son, is the power of the gospel for righteousness, the power which transforms character. “The invisible things of him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made, even his everlasting power and divinity.” The very essence of the gospel is infinite power as the revelation of a divine nature working through the eternal Son, “the power of God, and the wisdom of God,” “who was made unto us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption.” In the things that are made we have constantly before us the visible working of that power, the proclamation of the gospel of the glory of the blessed God; for “the heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth his handiwork.”
Furthermore, in direct and positive statements it is made clear that the process by which sinners are made righteous through faith in the Son of God, is a creative process. Here are some of these statements: “Wherefore if any man is in Christ, there is a new creation: the old things are passed away; behold, they are become new.” “For neither is circumcision anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation.” “By grace have ye been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not of works, that no man should glory. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God afore prepared that we should walk in them. . . . For he is our peace, who made both one, and brake down the middle wall of partition, having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; that he might create in himself of the two one new man, so making peace.” “But ye did not so learn Christ; if so be that ye heard him, and were taught in him, even as truth is in Jesus; that ye put away, as concerning your former manner of life, the old man, that waxeth corrupt after the lusts of deceit; and that ye be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new man, that is after God, created in righteousness and holiness of truth.” “Lie not one to another; seeing that ye have put off the old man with his doings, and have put on the new man, that is being renewed unto knowledge after the image of him that created him.”
The true God, who calls us to his kingdom and glory, created all things through the eternal Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. At the close of creation week “God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good.” Through sin man, who had been created in the image of God, lost that image, the curse came upon all things, and the creative work was marred. The gospel is the provision for a new creation through the same eternal Son, so that the image of God may be restored in the soul of man, the face of nature may be renewed, and a perfect creation may again appear. And this leads us to the conclusion that redemption is creation—the carrying out, in spite of sin, of the original purpose to create through the Son a world in which righteous beings should dwell. “Remember now thy Creator.”