The Key of Knowledge by Joseph Clarke

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jul 15, 1875

The Key of Knowledge.

By Joseph Clarke

“And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of Heaven.” Matt. 16:19. “Woe unto you, lawyers! for ye have taken away the key of knowledge.” Luke 11:52.

What is meant by the key of knowledge which the Lord gave to his apostle and through him to his church and people? The papist would reply that power is here granted to the popes of Rome. May we not praise God that he sent a Luther, and a host of reformers, to destroy that false claim to the keys here alluded to? But what are the keys given to Peter and the church, and which had been taken away by the lawyers of the Jewish age in its latest closing scenes? May we not suppose that the word “key” here means power, or ability to unlock the entrance to the celestial regions, the word key being used figuratively?

To chosen ministers, especially, is this power given, by their deep devotion, and humility, and zeal, to save their fellow-men from the second death, and to see them reinstated in the favor of God. And in a greater or less degree, every true follower of Christ, who has learned of him to walk in lowliness and meekness, has this power. By prayer and supplication, and by every other lawful and praiseworthy means, he labors to convert souls to God.

He who has this power makes converts to righteousness; but without this power, he only makes proselytes; and thus it was with the apostle Peter and his associates. They made converts to God, while the Jewish lawyers only made proselytes, who, when made, turned out to be ten times worse than the men who had the credit of bringing them in as converts. Proselytes do no good to the cause of God; they do not get the key; they are blind, like the Jewish lawyers in Christ’s age who only wore religion as a cloak, while their hearts were full of evil.

It is a sad mistake to think of opening Heaven’s door without the true key. Heaven’s door has a lock which cannot be picked by the burglar; it is of no use; nothing will do but the key. There is no such thing as a Presbyterian key, or a Baptist, or a Methodist, or a Congregationalist, a Papal, Universalist, or a Lutheran key; nothing will do but the genuine key. All these churches have among their numbers godly men and women who have used this key, that is, repentance towards God, and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Without this, profession is vain.

Sin, sin is the burden of the good man, and he cannot rest till he is free from its weight; and he humbles himself continually, lest it again weigh him down in the dust. The lawyers in Christ’s day, and many in our time, by failing to do this, fall into the error of formalism; while true penitence and brokenness of heart is exchanged for pride, and severity, and hardness of heart.

The example and teachings of Christ both contributed to form a whole system of life; and this system his followers accepted and adopted as theirs, and, with the sweet good spirit accompanying the same, have handed it down to us. But alas! the viperous race of Rome, came near exterminating the good from the earth by their errors, by their policy, by their craft, and by their power. The influence of Romanism in corrupting the nations, and thus bringing dishonor upon Christianity, and also labor and sorrow and affliction, and darkness upon the humble people of God, is now felt everywhere. From north to south, from east to west, this influence is felt in some form or other.

Luther and his associates only began the work of reform; there was a coarseness, and a severity, and a tinge of bigotry, in most of the early reformers, which they seemed incapable of throwing off at once; they had formed characters more or less affected by the church which had first nourished them, and the rough and tumble of debate with brutish papal doctors, such as Eck, and Tetzel, only aggravated the difficulty. It seemed almost impossible to retain the sweet spirit of Christ in such councils and debates as were held in those times.

It was no marvel that the reformers were severe. It seems a miracle that they did so well; but it is lamentable that the Protestant churches, instead of following out the love and zeal of the reformers, have, to so great a degree, kept up the bigotry and the heat of ecclesiastical debate and exclusiveness, to the loss of spiritual power over the heart, a power to soften and subdue men by the cross of Christ, a power to unlock the gates of Heaven for themselves or others.

Few can agonize in prayer, or labor for the salvation of men as did the early reformers. Instead of going with their Lord in prayer for one hour in Gethsemane, they rush with one accord to a place in the temple, where the money-changers are, to learn the prices of bonds and merchandise. Instead of abiding in the upper room in prayer with the disciples, they are too often in the market-place, not to scatter light, but to mingle in trade.

All this secularization of Christianity is from Rome, who, seated on her seven hills, gave law, secular and ecclesiastical, to the world, for a thousand, two hundred, and threescore days (or years) and now her power is greater than ever. Why? Because it comes to us in many very many dangerous and subtle forms. To say nothing of the apparent power of Rome, in her bigoted membership, we have a legion of errors and influences on every hand, which have been handed down from sire to son, from the sun-worshipers of Persia in Ezekiel’s time to the errors, superstitions, and habits, which were adopted from the heathen systems of the age of Constantine, and baptized into the most ancient Catholic church of Rome. And here we are; and where are the keys of knowledge? Has Rome retained them? Let the martyrs answer this question. Let the dungeons of the prisons of all Roman Catholic countries answer as the groans of a Huss and Jerome go up to Heaven.

To regain the keys of knowledge, as the church had them in the time of the apostles, the church must be as pure and as free from error as then. Then, the man of sin had not been revealed. Then, the influence of the popes and their minions had not been felt. Like some foul bird, swooping down upon its prey with terrible power, Romanism has alighted upon the earth, and good and bad have felt her influence. While the bold have fallen by the hand of cruelty, the weak and timid have been affrighted and panic stricken. Partial reforms have been effected, but the leaven of error has been everywhere at work, the Spirit of God has been grieved away, and the various sects seem weak and powerless. So long has the form of Christianity passed for the power that the gifts originally in the church have most of them been withdrawn, and the poor deluded people think it a matter of course and in the order of Heaven. Perhaps China has been more wise. See REVIEW of Feb. 18, 25, 1875.

To regain the keys, all the errors of the papacy which have corrupted Christianity and the world must be hunted out and corrected. Not an iota of papal doctrine (strictly such) can enter Heaven, for it is an abomination in the sight of God. Doctors of divinity may talk of doctrines that are non-essential; there are no such doctrines in the Bible. You might as well talk of non-essential signs in algebra or non-essential characters in arithmetic. All those doctrines which the Romish harlot has defiled by her impure touch must be restored as they were in the days of the apostles, and the church must be in the same attitude as then. While the Saviour lay in the tomb, holy women kept the Sabbath, according to the commandment; so must God’s people now keep the Sabbath. Paul preached on the Sabbath to Sabbath-keepers; so now it must be. Peter preached that David had not yet ascended into Heaven; so now must men teach that the reward is yet in the future. All the Bible authors, without any exception, wrote of the second coming of Christ, and we must now look for him; for the man of sin has now been fully revealed in all his hideous deformity, and then when all errors are corrected and all are humbly praying, and waiting, and working, then the keys, will be given as in apostolic time. See Acts 3:19–21.

JOSEPH CLARKE.