Letter and Spirit by Dudley Marvin Canright

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 24, 1874

Letter and Spirit.

By Dudley Marvin Canright

The following article under the above heading is so sound, practicable, and important that I wish the readers of the REVIEW to have the benefit of it:—

“We have always admired the accuracy and comprehensiveness of the language in which Thomas Campbell announced the purpose of the reformatory movement which he initiated: the restoration of the Christianity of the New Testament “In letter and in spirit, in principle and in practice.” Nothing short of this filled his conception of the reformation to be aimed at. We fear that the conceptions of many professed reformers are less worthy. There are zealous adherents of the letter, who are strangers to the spirit of Christianity; there are boisterous advocates of the principles we teach, who have little to do with these principles in practice. We are aware that law and gospel are contrasted as letter and spirit, and that even the letter of Christianity is more spiritual than the spirit of the law. The letter of the gospel is freighted with weighty spiritual ideas and aims, and its very words are said to be “spirit and life.” They relate to spiritual things and are pregnant with spiritual meaning, and are to be interpreted in view of the spiritual economy to which they belong. Yet it is possible to make, in Christianity itself, a distinction between letter and spirit, and, resting in the letter, to be destitute of the spirit which seeks embodiment and expression there. The spirit of Christianity can only find expression through the letter; but the letter is capable of being so held and used as to fail of its proper office in conveying the spirit to the reader. Here are words—words in certain combinations—words capable of this or that meaning, and capable of serving this or that end. Nothing easier than to get up a “strife about words,” and make a battle-cry or a shibboleth of certain words which the Holy Spirit gave for no such purposes. How readily we enter the strife, and spend our lives in maintaining certain forms of words, or certain interpretations of them, transforming into a causa belli that which came from Heaven as a messenger of peace and love! The earth has long resounded, and yet resounds with the fierce controversies of mere logomachists, to whom the real office of the words they strive about is as foreign as is the spirit of the gospel to their perpetual gabble and babble.

When Paul says, “The kingdom of God is not in word, but in power;” 1 Cor. 4:20; again, “Our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Spirit, and in much assurance” (1 Thess. 1:5), we do not understand him to allude merely to the miraculous accompaniments and demonstrations that belonged to his ministry, but power over mind, heart, conscience and life which came through the apprehension and reception of gospel truth and grace; hence he adds, “Ye became followers of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Spirit.” There is such a thing as having the gospel come in word only. There is special danger of this in times of controversy when dispute as to the proper meaning of words is a necessity; for such controversy, however necessary, is apt to attract a class to which the clatter of the strife and the jingle of the words has a much greater charm than their spiritual meaning.

It is easy, for instance, to get in earnest over the question of creeds, and to become very zealous for the Bible as against all human creeds, and to read the Bible diligently to obtain proof texts as ammunition for the warfare; and all the while fail of the least interest in the word of God as a rebuker of one’s sins or as an instructor in righteousness. It is not the bread of life to one’s soul, but death and destruction to one’s opponents. It may be said with enthusiasm, “Thy word was found, and I did search it, and thy word was unto me a rich storehouse of arguments with which to vanquish my enemies;” but it is not said or felt, as the prophet said: “Thy word was found, and I did eat it, and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of my heart.” It is possible to be very earnest about Christ, to win a victory over a foe in behalf of some special notion of being able to say with Paul, “I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.” One may become very anxious over some theory of the atonement, and be willing, in a mere party spirit, to spend and be spent in maintaining “soundness” of doctrine, and yet be an utter stranger to the sentiment of Paul when he says, “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, whereby the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.”

It is possible, too, to spend the time and strength in demolishing infant baptism, which is due to our own children in training them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord; or to lavish time and money in defense of the proper meaning of baptizo, with little regard to what scriptural baptism imports—a death to sin and a resurrection to a new life. How much easier it is to declaim against the assumption and corruptions of a hireling priesthood than to walk humbly ourselves before God, or spend liberally and unostentatiously of our own means to spread the knowledge of the truth! It is possible to get ill-natured even to spleenishness and strife over the question of Christian union, and to contend spapishly and rudely for a theory of union, while alienations and bitter strifes abound among the zealous champions of love and harmony. In all these cases, the gospel has come in word only. It is the restoration of Christianity in letter, without the spirit; in principle, without the practice. It is the knowledge that puffeth up without the love that buildeth up. It is the form of godliness without its power.

We need careful attention to the letter of the New Testament. We have no sympathy with the sentimental twaddle so often indulged in about the insignificance of the letter and the supreme importance of the spirit, as if it were possible to know anything of the spirit of the gospel except through its letter. The spirit of the gospel is the true meaning of its letter. With disembodied spirits we are forbidden to consult. But the letter should ever be regarded as important, not for the mere sound of the words, or as formulating some item of sound doctrine to be used as a party watchword or a heretic detector, but as the embodiment of the thoughts and sentiments of the divine mind, and as conveying the life of God to our own souls. The critical reading of the Scriptures is important, since an error in the letter corrupts the channel through which the spirit of truth is conveyed to us. But the devotional reading of the word of God is that which we most need, with the sentiment of the psalmist ever-dwelling in our hearts: “Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my thoughts; and show me if there be any wicked way in me; and lead me in the way everlasting.”

If we are able to read the signs of the times with any approach to correctness, the tendency is on one hand to a latitudinarianism which sneers at literalism, and rejoices in a hazy, dreamy, speculative view of divine revelation which, without any fixed principles of interpretation, enables each teacher to find in the Bible that which gratifies his own pet notions, and leaves the people, as Paul says, to be “tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive;” and on the other, to a pompous formalism—a trust in externals, a content with that which is merely mechanical and artistic, decorous and impressive to the senses. With the increase of business enterprise, absorbing thought and life, leaving neither time

nor inclination for spiritual pursuits; and the increase of wealth, and pride, and extravagance, leaving their bewitched worshipers to adore appearances, to conform their lives to factitious standards, and to seek their happiness in the phenomenal rather than the essential, men walk by sight rather than by faith, and the glare of the sensuous rather than the simplicity and purity of the spiritual carries them captive.

Both these tendencies are inimical to the interests of Christianity. We must beware how we drift into these popular currents. There is constant danger that the church of God will be invaded by these subtle and powerful influences. We need to cling to the gospel “in letter and in spirit, in principle and in practice.” We especially need so to study the word of God, with diligence, constancy and devoutness, that it shall be unto us sweeter than honey, or the droppings of the honey-comb, and more precious than rubies or than fine gold. We need its daily study in our families. We need to talk of it by the way, in coming in and going out, in sitting down and rising up. We need to be instant in prayer. We need to cultivate faith, and attain to a readier communion with the invisible. We greatly need more hours of retirement for the closet, where we can be alone with God, and bare our hearts before him. We need larger supplies of the spirit of Jesus Christ. We need more Bible reading, Bible exposition, and Bible study in our congregations. We need Christ in us the hope of glory.—Christian Standard.

These remarks are certainly worthy of careful attention. Compelled as we are to be constantly engaged in controversy, there is great danger that we overlook the spirit of the holy work in which we are engaged—the heart work which we must have wrought in ourselves by it. While we closely adhere to the letter let us also carefully cultivate the spirit. Safety lies only in the union of the two.

D. M. CANRIGHT.