Question Corner

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Sep 29, 1909

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 36, No. 38.

[To Our Inquirers.— (1) The name and address of all who ask questions must accompany questions, not necessarily for publication, in token of good faith, and that we may reply by letter if thought best. All communications will be considered confidential if so desired, and no name will be published unless requested. But we have no time to give to anonymous or unsigned epistles or articles. (2) Let the questions be to the point. Do not say, “Explain Josh. 7:1-8;” but state the thing upon which help is desired. (3) Questions can not be answered immediately in this department. Sometimes it will mean a month or more of waiting. We can not reply to the same question frequently. Read answers to other questions; you may find reply to yours. (4) Members of the Bible Band will kindly enclose stamp if answer is desired by letter. Others will please enclose ten cents. This does not begin to meet expenses oftentimes. (5) “Foolish . . . questions avoid.”]

2944.— Signs of a Divine Mission

Are miracles of healing a sign that the healers are God’s messengers or disciples? M. D.

It would be unsafe to say that. Some are healed by hypnotists; some through Spiritualist manifestations and manipulations. “Christian Science” claims to heal. Many of all sorts and classes of people claim to heal. The Bible declares of a certain apostate power that it works miracles. Rev. 13:13. Nowhere in God’s word are miracles of healing said to be a test of the genuineness of truth. We have two remarkable expressions in the Scripture; both referring to the last days. The first, characteristic of apostasy; the second, of His own true people. Of the Satanic workings of apostasy it says that they are “with all power and signs and lying wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness.” “Deceivableness of unrighteousness” is making unrighteousness appear like righteousness. 2 Thess. 2:8-10. Again: “There shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders; so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect.” Matt. 24:24. But of God’s children who shall await in triumph His coming, it is said: “Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.” Rev. 14:12. The one great test of truth is: “To the law and to the testimony; if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.” Isa. 8:20. And our Lord confirms this by saying: “Many will say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy by Thy name, and by Thy name cast out demons, and by Thy name do many mighty works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from Me, ye that work iniquity.” Matt. 7:22, 23. “Iniquity” means lawlessness. Loyalty to God is in harmony with His law, obedience to every precept of that law so far as the soul understands.

2945.— Cain’s Wife

Will you please explain how Cain took a wife from the Land of Nod, as there seemed to be the family of Adam only? S. H.

It is always well to remember that the Lord does not seek to satisfy our curiosity. The Bible is not written for that. There are clear evidences enough, however, to show that Cain’s wife was Adam’s daughter. The Bible does not tell us how many years elapsed before Cain took his wife. So far as we know there may have been a hundred or more years between the time that Cain was driven out because of his crime, and the time that he took his wife.

It must be remembered that the book of Genesis, with 50 chapters only, covers a period of twenty-five hundred years of the world’s history. And there is not space for all the details which would satisfy human curiosity.

2946.— Change of the Sabbath

Where do you find that Constantine changed the Sabbath? W. B.

We do not find that he changed it, nor have we said that he changed it. We do not believe that he did change it. What we have said is this: that the first Sunday law on record is one made by Constantine in A.D. 321. That Sunday law reads as follows: “Let all the judges and town people, and the occupation of all trades, rest on the venerable day of the sun; but let those who are situated in the country, freely and at full liberty attend to the business of agriculture; because it often happens that no other day is so fit for sowing corn and planting vines; lest, the critical moment being let slip, men should lose the commodities granted by Heaven. Given the seventh day of March; Crispus and Constantine being consuls, each of them for the second time.”

It is not a Christian law, for Constantine was then a heathen. The very next day, he issued another edict which was purely heathen in its character, giving instruction to the heathen haruspices concerning the examination of the entrails of beasts in the foretelling of future events.

The change of the Sabbath was a gradual work. Little by little, men lost their regard for the holy day of the Lord, while Sunday was kept as a great feast-day. In fact, in all the early ages of the church, Sunday was not considered a sacred day; a small portion of it was used for religious services, and the remainder for labor or recreation. As late as the fourth and fifth centuries, the two days were kept together as sister days, but more than a thousand years passed before Sunday was called the Sabbath. The Sabbath was crowded out largely in the fourth and fifth centuries. At last as in the council of Laodicea, A.D. 538, those who kept the seventh-day Sabbath were anathematized.

2947.— The Laodicean Church

Does the Laodicean Church mean the Seventh-day Adventist Church, or all denominations? B. F. C.

The Laodicean Church represents a condition. There are three conditions set forth pertaining to the last days, regarding the church of Jesus Christ; one of these is represented by Sardis, one by Philadelphia, and one by Laodicea. All of these exist in the time of the coming of Jesus Christ. The Sardis condition represents those who have departed from God, who have a name to live, but are dead. Against the Philadelphia Church God has no word of condemnation whatsoever; for those in the Laodicean condition He has no word of commendation. All who are in the condition represented in the description given in Rev. 3:14-21 are in the greatest danger. Lifted up in their own self-sufficiency, they know nothing of the richness of God’s grace. His appeal to that church is to each individual; and if each individual will hear the Master’s call and come out of that condition, he will become a member of the Philadelphian body, or will come into the true relationship of brotherly love. The church which will be translated at Christ’s second coming is the church of brotherly love, the Philadelphian Church. Out of the Laodicean, or lukewarm apathy every true believer will come, while the self-satisfied will go on as individuals to destruction.

2948.— Religion of Gibbon

Was Gibbon, who wrote the Roman history in five volumes, an atheist? W. B.

Gibbon’s history, better known as “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,” is published in different editions; generally found in five volumes, but sometimes in eight, sometimes in twelve, sometimes in one. The author was what might be considered a skeptic. He seems to have believed in a God, but very clearly was not in harmony with the prevailing form of Christianity in his time.