Union Means Ruin and Death.
There are certain foods, both nutritious and palatable when eaten separately, but which form an unwholesome and loathsome dish when mixed together. There are certain chemicals which alone are harmless and useful, but which combined form powerful explosives or poisons. So it is with church and state. Each is of divine origin, yet both came in consequence of sin. The church is the body of Christ, and designed to be his means of gathering out from the world of sin those who desire the eternal salvation to be found in him. Its source of power, strength, life, wisdom, and authority are all direct from Christ. In the world, it is not of the world. The civil power, or the state, is ordained of God to protect the rights of all irrespective of class or religious belief. It came in as a consequence of sin, to protect the weak and to punish the uncivil. Each (church or state) has its appointed place in the divine plan. Separated, they will always be blessings, but united they form a virulent poison in the body politic, and mine deadly explosives underneath the dearest and most sacred rights of the people. Strange that the great masses of the people can not see this in our own land to-day. The blindness of death seems to be upon the people. They do not know, hence the work of destruction goes on in our own land. The Jews and powers of earth in Christ’s time did not know, “for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.” “It is high time to awake.”