UNITED STATES IN PROPHECY.
By Uriah Smith
Let us look a moment at the fitness of the material furnished by the Protestant churches for the image of the beast. We are not unmindful of the noble service these Protestant churches have rendered to the world, to humanity, and to religion, by introducing and defending, so far as they have, the great principles of Protestantism. But they have made a fatal mistake in stereotyping their doctrines into creeds, and thus taking the first step backward toward the spiritual tyranny of Rome. Thus the good promise they gave of a free religion and an unfettered conscience is already broken. For, if the right of private judgment is allowed by the Protestant church, why are men condemned and expelled from that church for no other crime than honestly attempting to obey the word of God, in some particulars not in accordance with her creed? This is the beginning of apostasy. Read Chas. Beecher's work, “The Bible a Sufficient Creed.” “Is not the Protestant church,” he asks, “apostate? Is not the apostasy which we have reason to fear already formed?” But apostasy in principle always leads to corruption in practice. And so Paul, in 2 Tim. 3:1–5, sets forth the condition of the professed church of Christ in the last days. A rank growth of twenty heinous sins, with no redeeming virtues, shows that the fruit of the Spirit will be choked and rooted out by the works of the flesh. We can look nowhere else for this picture of Paul's to be fulfilled except to the Protestant church; for the class of which he speaks maintain a form of godliness, or the outward services of a true Christian worship. And is not the church of our day beginning to manifest to an alarming degree the very characteristics which the apostle has specified? Fifteen clergymen of the city of Rochester, N. Y., on Sunday, Feb. 5, 1871, distributed a circular, entitled “A Testimony,” to fifteen congregations of that city. To this circular the Rochester Democrat of Feb. 7, made reference as follows: “The ‘Testimony’ sets out by stating that the foregoing pastors are constrained to bear witness to what they ‘conceive to be a fact of our time; viz., That the prevailing standard of piety, among the professed people of God, is alarmingly low; that a tide of worldliness is setting in upon us, indicating the rapid approach of an era, such as is foretold by Paul in his second letter to Timothy, in the words, ‘In the last days perilous times shall come.’ These conclusions are reached, not by comparisons with former times, but by applying the tests found in the Scriptures. They instance as proof, ‘the spirit of lawlessness which prevails.’ The circular then explains how this lawlessness (religious) is shown. Men have the name of religion, but they obey none of its injunctions. There is also a growing disposition to practice in religious circles, what is agreeable to the natural inclinations, rather than the duties prescribed by the word of God. The tendency to adopt worldly amusements, by professed Christians, is further stated in evidence.” This testimony is very explicit. When men “have the name of religion, but obey none of its injunctions,” they certainly may be said to have a form of godliness, but to deny the power; and when they practice in religious circles what is agreeable to the natural inclinations, rather than the duties prescribed by the word of God, they may be truthfully said to be “lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God.” And Rochester is not an exception in this respect. It is so all over the land, as the candid everywhere, by a sad array of facts, are compelled to admit. That the majority of the Christians in our land are still to be found in connection with these churches, is undoubtedly true. But a change in this respect is also approaching. For Paul exhorts all true Christians, in his words to Timothy above referred to, to turn away from those who have a form of godliness, but deny the power thereof; and those who desire to live pure and holy lives, who mourn over the desolations of their Zion, and sigh for the abominations done in the land, will certainly heed this injunction of the apostle. There is another prophecy which also shows that when the spirit of worldliness and apostasy has so far taken possession of the professed churches of Christ as to place them beyond the reach of reform, God's true children are every one of them to be called out, that they become not partakers of their sins, and so receive not of their plagues. Rev. 18:4. From the course which church members are everywhere pursuing, it is plain to be seen in what direction the Protestant churches are drifting; and from the declaration of God's word it is evident that all whose hearts are touched by God's grace and molded by his love, will soon come out from a connection in which, while they can do no good to others, they will receive only evil to themselves. And now we ask the reader to consider seriously for a moment what the state of the religious world will be when this change shall have taken place. We shall then have an array of proud and popular churches from whose communion all the good have departed, from whom the Holy Spirit is withdrawn, and who are in a state of hopeless departure from God. God is no respecter of persons nor of churches; and if the Protestant churches apostatize from him, will they not be just as efficient agents in the hand of the enemy as ever pagans or papists have been? Will they not, then, be ready for any desperate measure of bigotry and oppression in which he may wish to enlist them? After the Jewish church had finally rejected Christ, how soon they were ready to imbrue their hands in the blood of his crucifixion. And is it not the testimony of all history that just in proportion as any popular and extensive ecclesiastical organization loses the Spirit and power of God, it clamors for the support of the civil arm? Let, now, an ecclesiastical organization be formed by these churches; let the government legalize such organization, and give it power, (a power which it will not have till the government does grant it) to enforce upon the people the dogmas which the different denominations can all adopt as the basis of union, and what do we have? Just what the prophecy represents: an image to the papal beast, endowed with life by the two-horned beast, to speak and act with power.