Be Ye Clean by C. M. S.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · May 4, 1911

Be Ye Clean

By C. M. S.

This world is the thrashing-floor of God. Here is to be thrashed out literally the harvest of sin. Here is to be winnowed the result of the thrashing; and the day of that last great winnowing is not far in the distance.

The following words are a prophecy of our Saviour and of the work which he would do in putting a full end to the tragedy of sin:—

“Whose fan is in his hand, and he will thoroughly purge his floor, and will gather the wheat into his garner; but the chaff he will burn with fire unquenchable.” Luke 3:17.

When God speaks of winnowing, or fanning, his words are addressed to his people, or are spoken concerning them. With them and through their instrumentality he has been doing a work for the whole world, using them as a winnowing machine to separate the chaff of this world from the wheat of the kingdom. But when it comes time for him to bring his work to a close, he performs upon them a winnowing, or fanning work; and the text proclaims that it is to be a thorough work. He will thoroughly purge his floor, and the chaff he will burn up with “fire unquenchable.” That is the burning of the great day of God, “wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat.” That is the day “that shall burn as an oven,” wherein all that do wickedly “shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.”

We are in the day of the Lord’s winnowing; his fan is in his hand; we must expect him to do a clean work, a thorough work. If we are of the wheat, we shall not be blown away, by his winnowing, into the fire with which he will consume the chaff. So we need not fear. If we are of the chaff, we need not expect him to spare us. Any such expectation will be vain. God has borne long with sin and sinners; but he has not promised to bear with them and with it forever. We have reached a time when not to be serious in this work is a sin, and when not to be serious will be a most serious thing for us. God demands of us that we be a clean people. Of those who triumph in the closing work of this world the Word says: “In their mouth was found no guile: for they are without fault before the throne of God.” Rev. 14:5. The admonition to God’s people through the prophet Isaiah ought to be ringing in the ears of every professed believer in the third angel’s message: “Be ye clean, that bear the vessels of the Lord.” Isa. 52:11.

When the Lord’s fan is in his hand, it is a time for heart-searching in Israel. “Be ye clean,” is God’s message to us now. Soon all the filth and débris of sin will be cleaned out of the entire universe of God, and there will be a “new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness,”—a clean universe. Only the clean will be in it; only the clean will have a part in ushering it in. “Be ye clean.” C. M. S.