Working for Jesus

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, Cal. · Oct 18, 1883

Working for Jesus.

THE honesty which is necessary in every-day buying and selling appears discarded, and lotteries, grab-bags, and other auxiliaries are employed in churches, to the dishonor of the Christian cause, and oftentimes to the encouragement of the young to subsequent evil courses. And yet not sinful! God help his people, who are becoming entirely blind.

The world sees differently, and the New York Times gives us a key to their knowledge concerning them, and proves them sinful. It says: "The Texas Siftings defends the crowds who thronged to the late prize fight between Wilson and Sullivan. Church fairs encourage grab-bags, lotteries, and various other gambling devices. At a church fair in this State not so long ago, the young ladies sold kisses to the highest bidder for cash, and that variety actors assist in making church fairs successful, is getting to be a very common occurrence, in some of our larger cities. Under these circumstances, may not the time come when a soft-glove matinee between two bruisers will be one of the chief attractions of an entertainment to lift a mortgage off the church?" The world in this makes them sinful, and looks to an increase in that direction. Brethren, does the work of Jesus ever bring real, deserved reproach?

But, says one: "That church entertainments have been overdone and mismanaged, no reasonable person can doubt; but whether their existence should be called in question, is another point." Churches have now reached a point in their experience in this matter where they are inclined to stop and reflect. After such deliberation, some, no doubt, will cast all overboard. Others will go on as heretofore, and still others of us are inclined to weigh the subject with candor, "and then blow away the chaff and retain the wheat only." Thank God for this much. But that was the cry in the North New Jersey Association, about six years ago, when our beloved Judson and Lodge drew a resolution condemning these non-scriptural practices from beginning to end. They were asked to reconsider; and how some of our hearts beat as they left the main audience room to do so, and wondered whether they would falter. They returned with no compromise. They could not make it less strong. What they had written must remain. How we thanked God for the unfaltering purpose, as far as they were concerned. But there were some warm speeches, sad to say, against it; and it was proposed that they be carried on in halls instead of the meeting-houses.

But the resolution said nowhere. It was not adopted. Since then it has grown worse; and a grain of "wheat" is not yet to be found, but all "chaff." Well may devoted ministers and laymen pray "that God will defend his cause." Away with your entertainments where you get a reward for your money, and pray for a willing, self-denying offering unto your God! Away with your "kitchens," full of pots and kettles, before you soil your heavenly dress! Away with your oysters, cakes, and dainties, lest you make your belly your god! Away with church parlors and comfortable trappings before you become at ease in Zion! Away with stiff necks and unbended knees, and let "my house be a house of prayer"! Away with spurious books which fill our libraries, and give the children the bread of heaven! Away with the impression that a meeting-house filled with hypocrites, worldlings, is the church! Away with speculative preaching and universal salvation, and give us the simple truth.

— Watch Tower.