p. 44 | TO CORRESPONDENTS by Uriah Smith

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Aug 3, 1876

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 48, No. 6.

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TO CORRESPONDENTS.

By Uriah Smith

Is it proper for a brother not an ordained elder to dismiss a meeting with the benediction?

L. A. G. of N. Y.

ANS. We think not.

The six following questions are asked by H. H. B. of O.

1. If the living wicked are destroyed at Christ's second coming, and the living righteous changed and with the resurrected righteous go to Heaven. Where are the nations, Rev. 20:8, that Satan shall go out to deceive at the end of the thousand years?

ANS. They are the wicked who are raised from the dead at the end of the thousand years.

2. A Disciple says that a prayer cannot be heard nor answered before baptism. A reference is wanted.

ANS. The case of Saul, Acts 9, and the case of Cornelius, Acts 10, show that prayers are heard and answered before baptism.

3. Rom. 13:1, 2; 1 Peter 2:13, 14 are quoted as an objection or excuse for not keeping the Sabbath.

ANS. Paul and Peter both speak of such rulers as enjoin “good works,” and to obey whom would be “well doing.” When they enjoin upon us duties contrary to the will of God, Acts 4:18, 19, tells us how we should act.

4. It is urged that our nation could not have prospered as it has, had it not been right to observe the first day as a Sabbath.

ANS. Ps. 37:35; 73:3–8; Acts 14:22, and ten thousand other like statements. Strange that any one should be so foolish as to urge temporal prosperity in proof of the truthfulness of an unscriptural doctrine or practice.

5. If the dead sleep until the day of Judgment, who compose the present inhabitants of Heaven?

ANS. The angels.

6. How do you harmonize the word end in 1 Peter 4:17 with Psalm 37:37?

ANS. End does not always mean termination of existence. The result of a life of transgression, and a life of righteousness is stated in Rom. 6:21, 22. The “end” of the one is “death,” the “end” of the other is “everlasting life.” So in Ps. 37, the end of the righteous is peace, but in Peter, the end of the wicked is death.

Please explain John 21:22, 23.

J. L. L. of Minn.

ANS. Jesus did not say that John should tarry till he should come, but only rebuked the propensity of some of the disciples to meddle in the affairs of others. But the verses show that the disciples did not understand death to be the coming of Christ, but just the reverse. Any Christian who should tarry, or remain to the

coming of Christ they understood would not die.

P. R. DE FORD: There is no Sunday law in Canada, Europe, or other foreign country that we are aware of. We think Isa. 66:17 refers to sinners of that time, not to those of the present.

A. H.: We understand Heb. 8:10–12 to teach that the law is written in the heart of the believer when he is converted, and thus brought into covenant relation with God.

What did Christ mean by the expression, “Let the dead bury their dead,” in Matt. 8:22?

J. W. S. of Illinois.

ANS. The comment of Dr. Clarke on this verse is as much to the point as anything we have ever seen. He says:— “It was usual for the Jews to consider a man as dead who had departed from the precepts of the law; and on this ground every transgressor was reputed a dead man. Our Lord’s saying, being in common use, had nothing difficult in it to a Jew. Men who live in sin are dead to God. Leave the spiritually dead to bury their naturally dead. All the common offices of life may be performed by any persons; to preach the glad tidings of the kingdom of God is granted but to a few, and to these only by an especial call; these should immediately abandon worldly concerns and employments, and give themselves wholly to the work of the ministry.”

It is not considered by commentators, so far as we have examined, that this man had a dead father at home whose burial was to be immediately attended to, but that his father was advanced in years, and he had the care of him; and he asked to be excused from following Christ, till in the natural course of events, this special duty should be off his hands. And Christ by his reply teaches that those who are not called to special service in spiritual things, should attend to matters that pertain so wholly to this life.

What is the meaning of Luke 23:31: “For if they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry?”

Id.

ANS. The contrast presented is between a green tree and a dry. The green tree still has life. The dry tree is dead and withered. The Jews were not yet rejected of God; their cup of iniquity was not yet quite full. And if they would condemn the innocent to death now, to what lengths would they not go, when entirely cut off from God they had become a withered and lifeless tree? Then they would call down upon themselves the judgments mentioned just before.

ANSWERED BY LETTER. J. B. Goodrich, R. A. Dunbar, C. H. Chaffee, E. G. Rust.

U. S.