Editorial by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Mar 27, 1893

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 19, No. 21.

Editorial.

By Editor

"All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable."—2 Tim. 3:16.

IS THE trial such that we cannot endure it?—Call upon God for strength. Is the discipline such that we cannot submit to it?—Cry to God for help, and he will enable us to submit. God will give help for every time of need; and he invites us to come, that we may obtain the help.

God's church does not command duty, but instructs in the commands of Christ. She is his divine messenger to proclaim his wonderful love in command and promise and the sad consequences of rejecting that love. The motive power to do comes direct from Christ as the result of the soul's personal relation to him.

It is not so much the particular scripture that is studied, or just the form of the lesson in which that scripture is placed, which brings knowledge of the truth and of God, as it is the spirit in which we approach that scripture. Humility, meekness, and hungering of soul will find God anywhere in his word. He who has these graces will find less cause for criticism than gratitude.

Discouragement is the result of selfishness. We never become discouraged only when things fail to go our way. Selfishness is sin; therefore the primary cause of all discouragement is sin. God cannot use a discouraged man. Whenever he has committed to his people the carrying forward of some great enterprise, he has chosen as a leader for that work a man of strong faith and indomitable courage. Such a man was Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles. Such an one was Nehemiah, who could ask in the strength of Jehovah, "Shall such a man as I flee?" To this same class belonged Moses, who united the courage of the warrior to the tenderness of the shepherd and the meekness of the teacher and prophet. The successor of Moses, Joshua, the son of Nun, was likewise possessed of that strong faith in God that eminently fitted him for the task imposed upon him. And no doubt the great success that attended Joshua in the conquest of Canaan was his heed to the admonition given him of God in the beginning of his work, advice as applicable to us to-day as to Joshua then: "Be strong and of good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed." The basis for this courage God gives in the next clause: "For the Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest." With such a basis as that for courage, why need we be disheartened? "For the Lord thy God is with thee." This gave courage to Paul, to Nehemiah, to Moses, to Joshua. This was not only the basis for courage, but it was their courage—God in them. God in us will make us as true, as valiant, as noble; for he cannot fail, nor can he be discouraged.