One Law, One Disease by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Apr 8, 1897

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 23, No. 14.

One Law, One Disease

By Editor

Editorial

God Is One.—Therefore his law is one. His character is not one thing to-day and another to-morrow. It is the same to all eternity. As “God is love” (1 John 4:8) his law is the law of love, and it can only be kept by love (Deut. 10:12; 1 John 5:3). The one law of love is the one law of life; for “in the way of righteousness is life, and in the pathway thereof there is no death.” “He that doeth these things shall live in them.” The commandment “was ordained to life” (Rom. 7:10), life ever and always to the doer.

From the Christmas number of Leslie's Weekly, by permission of the publishers.
THE POPE'S DREAM. — From the Christmas number of Leslie's Weekly, by permission of the publishers. THE POPE'S DREAM.

The Disease Is One.—The reason why men do not do God’s will, do not walk in his law of love, is that they are sick. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and it is desperately sick; who can know it?” Jer. 17:9, R. V. “The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness in it; but wounds, and bruises, and putrefying sores.” Isa. 1:5, 6. The disease is one disease, but with many forms and manifestations and symptoms; it is the leprosy of sin. Sin is responsible for it all. “By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin,” and now the whole world is a lazar-house of disease, not primarily of many diseases, tho the moral physicians have numbered them by the scores and hundreds, but primarily one disease, sin; and “sin is the transgression of the law.” 1 John 3:4. All sin is the transgression of God’s law of love, summarily comprehended in the Decalogue. That law is righteousness; “all unrighteousness is sin.” 1 John 5:17.

The One Physician.—The one Physician able to save all, to heal the worst cases, the most hopeless paralytic, the most loathsome case of leprosy, is Jesus Christ. “Thou shalt call his name Jesus,” said the angel; “for he shall save his people from their sins.” Matt. 1:21. He “died for our sins.” He “bore our iniquities.” “With his stripes we are healed.” God “hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.” He “took our infirmities and bare our sicknesses.” His is the one only name whereby we may be saved. Acts 4:12. All other ways are human. They may promise salvation from floods that are in the past and which will never come again; but they will bury in their ruins those who have trusted in their vainly promised shelter.

The One Method.—There is but one method of applying the remedy, the life of Christ, and that is faith in the living Word of God. Faith means submission. It means saying with all the heart Amen to all that God says. Naturally we are at disagreement with God. That is sin. God says we are sinners, and how; we say, It is so, Lord. He tells us to turn from the sin and submit to him absolutely, unconditionally, and to that we respond Amen. We do so, and the Spirit, the life, the love of God, enter the heart. The sin is taken away. Its fetters are shattered. The broken heart is healed. The guilt is cleansed away. We are in harmony with God. His law is just and right and pure and good. We love its every precept; we delight ourselves greatly in his commandments. Jesus Christ is living in us the same life he lived on earth. All is unity and harmony; for God’s blessed Spirit reigns triumphant over the heart erstwhile a slave of sin. Blessed unity in God through Jesus Christ! Blessed law of love and life! Blessed Saviour and Healer! Blessed communion by the one faith into the one Gospel of the one Word! Who would not prefer it to all the Babylon of earthly creeds and schemes of men?