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DEBATE AT ONAWA, IA

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 29, 1877

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 50, No. 22.

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DEBATE AT ONAWA, IA.

By J. Bartlett

WHEN I returned from Logan, I found that a Mormon preacher was to speak on the Sabbath question at the south school-house. I went to hear him, and made a reply. The Mormons found that his arguments could not stand before the truth, so they sent for agun of larger caliber to come, which he did with all haste. He challenged me to debate on the Sabbath question and the state of the dead.
His position was that the law was abolished. His strong point was the two covenants. He said that Paul declared he was made an able minister of the new testament, or covenant, and we could not find the Sabbath in the new covenant. I gave him the testimony of Paul in Heb. 9:16-19: “For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator.” The new covenant was sealed with the blood of Christ; then after the death of the testator the will could not be changed. I then referred him to Luke 23:56; which says that the disciples rested according to the commandment; so I found the Sabbath of the fourth commandment after the death of the testator.
He stated that we had no law to keep but the law of Christ. But John says in chap. 2:1: “If any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father.” If the Father has no law, why do we need an advocate with him? I found in the revelations of Joseph Smith, in the book called “Doctrines and Covenants,” the testimony that Christ suffered more than any man can suffer, but notwithstanding all this he kept the law of God, and remained without sin, showing thereby that it is in the power of man to keep the law and remain without sin also, and all who walk not in the law of God may justly be condemned, and have no excuse for their sins. This testimony was too hard for him. He did not know what to do with it.
This debate made those who had decided for the truth stronger, and made some decide in its favor. One very intelligent lady said to me, “You could not stand before that man one moment, only that you have the Bible on your side.” I told her that was the great secret; we have the truth on which to depend. This lady had never heard anything on this question before, yet she came out fully on the side of truth. The Lord gave us the victory, for which I feel to praise his name. When I heard that the great Goliath of Gath had come, I went to God for help, and I received evidence that the Lord would stand by me. The Lord gave me great freedom in presenting the truth.
The minister said we must not kindle a fire on the Sabbath; that a law without a penalty is not worth anything; and that we could not keep the Sabbath on the round world; but when we discussed the next question, he taking the position that the first day, or Sunday, is the Sabbath, I asked him if he could kindle a fire on that day, what was the penalty for its violation, and if the world was round on the seventh day and immediately became flat on Sunday or first-day.
The question on the state of the dead was next discussed. He took the position that man has a spirit that survives the death of the body in a conscious state. I tried to get him to say whether this spirit was material or immaterial. I referred him to a debate that he had at Little Sioux with a minister of the M. E. Church, in which he said that an immaterial God was an immaterial nothing. So I told him that the inward man, as he called it, was the immaterial man. Then he had an immaterial nothing. If the spirit was material it could not occupy a place smaller than itself. The result was that his spirit man was very small, as it must come out of the nose or mouth of the body.
When he came to the case of the rich man and Lazarus, he said that it was not a parable, but a real matter of fact, and that it proved his position. Thus he admitted that the spirit is material, as one had a finger and the other a tongue. I forced him to the position that all spirits were made in the beginning; that when God made man, he made all the spirits that ever had been for five thousand years. Then I asked him where he had been for five thousand years. I asked him to tell me what he was doing all that time, but he could not tell.
I had a warm time. There were two Disciple ministers preaching against us at Modale, and two Mormons at the south school-house, at the same time; so I had more irons in the fire than I could well attend to; but the Lord was with me, and helped in the defense of the truth. J. BARTLETT.