A Controversy by C. M. S.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jun 22, 1911

A Controversy

By C. M. S.

As we see in the signs fulfilling around us the unmistakable evidences of the culmination of the work of God, it is well for us frequently to stop and consider what this warfare means to the world and to us. It is a struggle in which every individual in this world is interested. We read of a war in some far-off land, and our interest is not strikingly and personally aroused. That is their war, and not ours. But this conflict is our conflict; this war is our war; this victory may be our victory. And if not, then it will be our defeat. Victor or vanquished every one of us will be when the final accounting is made.

The controversy of the ages between Christ and Satan has been reproduced in each individual in the perpetual struggle between Soul and Self. Satan would place himself above God, and rule the realm for his own glorification,—unapproachable monarch, unyielding tyrant. And Self has set for itself the same object—the “rule or the ruin” of the soul of man. Every soul lost through the triumph of Self is a fitting figure, an eloquent and sad object-lesson, of what the rule of Satan would have meant in the universe of God. Satan would have trampled upon and exterminated, if he could, that One who was the source of life itself, and thus have brought death, in the end, to every creature of the universe. Not only so; but his triumph would have flung confusion and destruction into all the matchless movings of suns and systems as far as the creation of God extended.

That struggle between good, personified in God, and evil, personified in Satan, is reproduced in miniature, but none

the less really, in the person of every intelligent human being. There is a struggle in every one of us between obedience and disobedience, loyalty and insurrection. It is a struggle between Soul and Self—which shall be master? If Soul wins, it is a victory for good, for God, and for the individual. If Self wins, it is a victory for evil, for Satan; and the ruin of the individual is as sure and as complete as would have been the ruin of the universe had Satan won in heaven. God’s victory over him there was certain, and the final ridding of the universe of his presence and of all the results of his deceptive operations is sure. But that victory over Satan is no more sure and substantial and complete than ours as individuals may be through our complete acceptance of the gospel and of the work of our Saviour in our behalf.

God’s purpose means life; Satan’s purpose means death. Soul ruling over Self means the triumph of God’s purpose; Self ruling over Soul means the triumph of Satan’s purpose.

In the unfolding of God’s purpose of perpetual love and life this world has made the acquaintance of Jesus Christ, Immanuel, God with us; and to us, “who were dead in trespasses and sins,” that purpose has brought life and immortality through the atoning life and sacrifice of the Son of God. In his baptism into death, he held the hand of the human race; and when he came forth from the tomb, he held the guaranty of a race’s resurrection from the dead. So “out from among the dead ones” Christ will bring every soul that has, through his strength “gotten the victory” over Self in the conflict between Self and Soul. That victory symbolizes the final triumph of truth and righteousness over error and iniquity, and is in itself a part of that triumph. It means for the individual what the triumph of Christ means for the universe. It means the setting up of the throne of God in sole sovereignty in the individual heart.

Christ himself said of his mission, “I am come that ye might have life.” Again: “In him was life; and the life was the light of men.” And as death could not hold him, he came forth from the tomb bringing with him life for every soul that wills to do the Father’s will. The believer follows him through the symbol of his sleep (baptism), and rises from that symbolic grave to “walk in newness of life.” The same physical life is in the body, but Soul is no longer chained to the chariot wheel of Self to do its bidding and perish with it. God is acknowledged sole ruler of that realm—the soul is manumitted. Every day lived by such a soul should remind the world of the resurrection of Christ, and preach his power to save from sin and sinning. Our old nature has gone to the tomb in the crucifixion of Self, and now must be made manifest in our lives the saving and vivifying power of the life of Christ in us. We thus become partakers with Christ in the death which he died, are “baptized into his death.” Out of that he came forth triumphant to live eternally unto God. So out of the symbolic grave Christ bids us come forth to live unto him for time and eternity, and to preach him and his saving power in the new life which he gives us grace and power to live.

So let us who have followed our Lord in the likeness of his death, arise with him, and walk with him in that newness of life which will preach the resurrection and the power which it gives. Let us “walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us.” Let us also remember these words of Christ himself: “As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.” He was sent into the world for the salvation of men. He accomplished his purpose by his life among men. Christians are here for the same purpose, that they may, through him, be a “savor of life unto life,” thus carrying forward the same work of salvation, messengers of life in a world of death, harbingers of a better day. But we can not do this work if our life is out of harmony with the message of life which we bear. We must subjugate the fleshly mind and accept in its place the mind of Christ; dead continually to the ambitions and lusts of this world, and thus truly “alive unto God in Christ Jesus.” Then will the light of God’s truth shine out in us, and glory will come to him in the sheaves which we shall bring with us from the tare-strewn fields of this world. “He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked.” Let us, therefore, arise and walk in that “newness of life” which his life and resurrection have made possible for us, that Self in us may be vanquished, and God and Christ be all in all. C. M. S.