PERFECT FAITH by E. J. Rogers

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Jan 6, 1888

PERFECT FAITH.

By E. J. Rogers

We must make our faith perfect by works. If we see it to be our duty to keep the Sabbath, we must begin to keep the Sabbath. If we see it to be our duty to be baptized, we must go forward in that ordinance. If we see it to be our duty to partake of the Lord’s Supper, we must eat of the bread and drink of the wine, consecrated for this service. If we believe it to be our duty to follow Christ in the ordinance of humility, we must wash one another’s feet. If we believe we should have a family altar, we must establish and maintain it.

We have not a perfect faith in these things unless we put them in practice. We must reduce to practice the whole of present truth, or we have not a perfect faith in it. If we have a knowledge of some of the truths intended for this time and reduce them to practice, we are in a fair way to get hold of other kindred truths of equal importance. If we receive these truths in the love of them, we shall rejoice in them. If they abide in us we shall rejoice without ceasing. If they be in us and abound, the blessing of the God of truth will roll in upon us like a flood. All who truly abound in faith are active in diminishing human woe. If we think we hold a perfect faith and do not put it in practice we deceive our own selves. It will surely slip from us, we shall backslide, and our light will become darkness. Faith is brightened, burnished, polished, and perfected by use; by disuse it is sure to rust and decay. All are dead in trespasses and sin who are not living by a perfect, active faith in the Son of God.

E. J. ROGERS.