p. 50 | Pity the Poor Blind! by Chas. B. Reynolds

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Feb 11, 1875

Pity the Poor Blind!

By Chas. B. Reynolds

Spiritual blindness is a lack of appreciation of the loveliness, beauty, and glory, of divine things. There are beauties in the sun, moon, stars, earth, flowers, etc., which men not physically blind, see and appreciate; and there is a holy beauty and glory in divine things—in God, Christ, the holy and perfect law of God, and in the gospel, which all see and appreciate who are not spiritually blind. The apostle declares, “But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost; in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.” 2 Cor. 4: 3, 4.

A blind man has no more idea of natural beauty than one spiritually blind has of divine beauty; yet there is this great difference between them—blindness of the eyes is a calamity, but blindness to divine beauty and loveliness is a crime, resulting from a vicious and depraved mind; for if a man were not naturally vicious, he could not be blind to the beauty and perfection of that divine nature which calls forth the adoration of all the pure and holy hosts of Heaven.

A cruel, vicious, depraved nature we should despise; a pure, noble, virtuous nature we should admire; yet there are those who love the depraved. On account of the corruption of their own hearts they are blind to vice; and because goodness and purity of life are to them a reproach they fail to see the excellence of justice. The miser denounces the philanthropist as a fool; the thief hates the honest man, while he admires and applauds the successful villain.

When Christ was upon earth, the Pharisees, the most ostensibly religious sect then in the world, joined unanimously in hating him, at the same time pretending great love to the God of Israel. But Jesus insisted that if they really loved God, they would love him; and if they hated him it was full proof that they hated God; for Christ exemplified the character of the Father. “If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also; and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him.” John 14: 7.

The Pharisees, depending on the traditions, creeds, and teachings, of their priests and great men, had lost the true meaning of the law of Moses. “If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin; but now they have no cloak for their sin. He that hateth me hateth my Father also. If I had not done among them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin; but now have they both me and my Father.” John 15: 22-24. They ceased to revere the God of the Scriptures. They made for themselves a god to suit their own desires, and this god they loved and worshiped; but Christ, who exemplified the true character of God, they hated—the clearest proof that they really hated the true God himself.

And it is just so to-day. New Christs and new gospels have been invented, more agreeable to the taste of an apostate world, but of a character essentially different from the God of Israel. Blinded by the god of this world, men hate the character of God as exhibited in his law, yet pretend dearly to love his character as exhibited in the gospel. But if Jesus exemplified the character of the God of Israel as exhibited in his law, and died to prove the perfection of that character—to do honor to that law—then no man can be his disciple but he who loves that character. To hate that character is to be an enemy to the cross of Christ; for it was the very design of the mediatorial office and work of Christ to assert his Father’s character, as exhibited in the law, to be an absolutely perfect character. He came to magnify the law and make it honorable. Isa. 42: 21.

The disciples, men comparatively illiterate—yet honest in their simplicity, saw the purity, holiness, and beauty, of the character of Christ, and loved him for it; but the Scribes and Pharisees, gentlemen of great learning and ability, blinded by the god of this world, could see no perfection in him. They cried out against him, “He is a Samaritan, and hath a devil.” John 3: 48. Despite all their great ability and profound erudition, they were blind to the beauty of his character. This was because of the depraved state of their hearts, and our Saviour declares they had no cloak for their sin. They were altogether criminal in their blindness.

So we find now those whose hearts are devoted to the things of this world. Satan dazzles, blinds with the glitter of riches, honors, and pleasures, and turns their thoughts from God, Christ, and the impending Judgment. “Therefore they say unto God, Depart from us; for we desire not the knowledge of thy ways. What is the Almighty, that we should serve him? and what profit should we have, if we pray unto him?” Job 21: 14, 15. Thus multitudes live and die, utterly indifferent to, and never caring to acquire, a true knowledge of the religion of Christ.

The young, the gay, the worldly, are eager in pursuit of pleasure, fun, and excitement, entirely blind to divine things—to the fearful precipice on the very brink of which they stand. Reveling in lust, folly and carnal delights, the gospel is to them a dark, blank mystery.

But if, by some great calamity or sudden fear of death, they are rendered attentive to the claims of the gospel, if they do begin to examine into things pertaining to their eternal interest, if they are urged to examine the Bible for themselves, to take a nearer view of God’s requirements, their dislike to God’s holy law will induce them to reject the true gospel of Christ and keep them forever blind to its glory. Refusing to see the binding force of the pure, perfect, and holy law, they wander into secret skepticism. They prefer to trust in the creeds, counsels, and traditions, of their mighty men rather than to obey the plain declaration of God’s holy word. Others, again, by prejudice against the divine law, are driven into open and avowed infidelity. Many, through a mistaken flight of feeling, form a groundless faith and hope, imagine they can dispense with the law, by professing the greatest love and zeal for the gospel, which, at the same time, rightly understood, they hate with all their hearts.

All who will study the Bible for themselves will find all mankind are under a law which requires perfect obedience on pain of eternal death; that this law, by which all mankind stand guilty before God, is esteemed holy, just, and good; and that because of the holy perfection and immutability of that law, God gave his only son to die in our stead, to be made a curse to redeem us from its curse. Why is God angered at sin? Because God is love. He loves his creatures and desires their happiness. Sin destroys their happiness and brings to them sorrow, misery and death; therefore, sin calls forth the wrath of God.

How blind must they be to whom the divine law appears so far from deserving such high honor that they regard it as a blemish, a fault in God that he ever made such a law; and how shocked, humbled, and confounded, must they be at the cross of Christ: “Jesus died for me,”—“he paid it all—all the debt I owe” (meaning all the obedience I owe to God’s law); “I know I am saved by him. I have salvation full and free,” &c., &c. Thus blinded by Satan, all difficulties are unseen. Such a one feels he is safe—and that is all he cares. Feeling takes the place of clear sight and understanding. He despises the light of truth—feels—declares he is safe, and cares not how if he is only freed from the duty of obedience to the law. He is ever willing the law should be reputed holy, just, and good, so that he does not have to square his life by it. For his part, he is no longer under the law, but under grace; for he still regards its sacred precepts with hatred. Alas, poor blind!

“He died to purchase an abatement of the law, to fulfill it, to do away with it, to make an easier way,” says another, so blinded he cannot see that if the law was before just what it ought to be, it needed no abatement; and if the law was not just, holy, perfect, exactly what it ought to be; the perfection of God’s character must have prompted him to make it perfect, and no mediator would have been needed at all.

Blind! blind! how shall we help them? Groping in darkness on the perilous road to death, shall we not stretch forth a hand to save? Stumbling in the darkness of creeds and traditions, shall we not make more earnest efforts to give to them the light of present truth? Are we doing all we can? are we agonizing before God for blessings on the efforts being made? or are we lukewarm and indifferent to the condition of those around us? Let us pity the spiritually blind. Shall we grudge our means, our labor, our prayers, to the great Physician, that they may receive their sight? Are we hindering or helping them? What would be thought of those who should lay obstacles in the way of the blind for them to stumble over, to the danger of life and limb? Oh! monsters! But how infinitely worse to be guilty of sins and shortcomings over which these spiritually blind shall stumble, laying obstacles in the way of their attaining eternal life.

May we seek the help of the great Physician, and learn of him, so that we may be instrumental in diffusing the light of present truth. God help us to so let our light shine, that others, seeing our good works, may glorify our Father which is in Heaven.

CHAS. B. REYNOLDS.