Preaching Christ in the Churches
By Editor
THE pastors of this city are seemingly afraid that preaching Christ will not draw the people. On Sunday, the 5th inst., one of them preached Blaine, one preached Gough, and another one preached an ex-mayor of the city. A few weeks ago most of them preached Phillips Brooks. The subjects of all these sermons are dead. When ministers of the popular churches get through preaching a living Christ, we may well conclude that "Babylon is fallen." A PARIS dispatch of February 28 says: "The Waldenses, the descendants of the famous sect so cruelly persecuted for centuries on account of their religious opinions, and who still inhabit a mountain district on the Italian side of the Cottian Alps, are preparing to emigrate to the United States. Their chief business, cloth making, has become so depressed that even with their frugality it is difficult to live. They are sending agents to North Carolina to make inquiries looking to settlement there. If the reports are favorable, 2,000 of them will emigrate in the spring. They are a hardy, thrifty people, retaining to a remarkable degree the virtues of their ancestors." HOW LONG it will be before the winds of national conflict and war are let loose, is difficult to determine. Each month witnesses an increase of war preparations on the part of European nations. Every passing year, by her new military laws, France will add 42,000 men to her army. Russia, on an outbreak of hostilities, could now place in battle line twenty-five army corps; and, not content with this, the army drill still goes on, and new men are trained for service. Even in our own country each year makes our relations with other countries more strained and complicated, and material increase in our navy is already talked by the new administration. Surely all of these preparations for war denote that the world is preparing for future conflict. We are on the eve of startling developments. These are small indications of a reign of peace among the nations of men. Rather do they denote a fulfillment of the prophecy in Joel 3:9, 10, a condition precursory of the coming day of wrath and the destruction of every earthly power. The nations are fast preparing for the last great conflict, the battle of the great day of the Lord. May we see in the omens around us the signs that indicate our nearness to the day of wrath, and be led thereby to sustain that relation to the King of kings and Lord of lords that we shall be found of him in peace when he comes. THE children of God, as they witness the power of Satan around them and his control of the nations of men, oftentimes feel that they themselves are in the small minority, and, so far as this earth is concerned, this is indeed true. But when God's great universe is considered, the "whole family in heaven and earth," they may feel that they are in the majority after all. They can feel as did Elisha, that "they that be with us are more than they that be with them." But if the lonely Christian felt that every power in God's universe, and every created being in the universe, were opposed to him, and God only was on his side, he might ask by way of challenge to all the opposing hosts of evil, "If God be for us, who can be against us?" Let the Christian not seek counsel or encouragement from men, but realize the exhaustless and never-failing source of strength to be found in Him who created the worlds and all the intelligences of his great universe by the breath of his mouth. REV. DR. VAN NESS (Unitarian) is quoted by the San Francisco Leader as follows:— The Unitarian Church is but a continued existence of what was once the Puritan Church. And the Puritans—who and what are they? They were a righteous, fearless, and trusting communion. They possessed an intense conviction of the truth of their dogmas. They were blessed with a tremendous courage, which nothing could daunt when support of their faith was at stake. Furthermore, they were noted for their superb self-sacrifice and an intense sense of righteousness. The Leader comments in these words:— We easily recognize the Puritans from the pen picture drawn, but look about the Unitarian camp of to-day in vain to find the least "hint of a tint" resembling that picture. We did see their solitary missionary on a foreign field at a late day when it was fairly safe to reach any religion anywhere, but we also saw him return to Boston after two long years, and heard him confess that the little difference between his "faith" and that of the heathen was rather in favor of the heathen and hence he became a Buddhist. NEW diseases are continually springing up that are unknown to the medical fraternity, and for a time at least baffle professional skill. The latest report we have of this character is a dispatch from St. Petersburg, which says: "Advices have been received from the province of Astrachan, in Southeastern Russia, adjoining the Caspian Sea, to the effect that a strange epidemic, whose character is as yet unrecognized, is killing thousands of people in the transcaspian region." Not many years hence, if years at all, a greater epidemic than anything that has yet befallen the human race will afflict the people. It will not only be incurable, but it will be universal, affecting all who have rejected the salvation offered in Jesus Christ. This epidemic is called in the Scriptures the "seven plagues," and is particularly described in Revelation 16. This will be the end of human probation, when all who are at all susceptible to the truth will have been sealed by the Spirit of God. The only escape from these plagues is in prevention, and that prevention is faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. The people who will escape are designated as "they that keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus." Rev. 14:12. A short time ago there was formed in the city of Boston a society for the purpose of investigating Spiritualism. This society was composed of many great minds, and at its head stood a prominent minister of a professed Christian church. It is now stated that some of the leading scientific lights of Italy are banded together for a similar purpose. At the head of the Italian enterprise stand "Schiaparelli, the astronomer, and Lombroso, the greatest expert on criminology." Satan is well pleased to measure strength and compare notes with these great men, and we may be assured that he will in no way make the comparison unfavorable to his own interests. Spiritualism will be the gainer by all these investigations. It cannot be combated by scientific means. Man cannot hope to successfully cope with the rulers of darkness. God's word reveals that Spiritualism is but the modern manifestation of old-time sorcery and necromancy, and that through it in the last days Satan will work with "all power, and signs, and lying wonders," "to deceive if possible the very elect." God's truth is the only safeguard of his children. To its decision every theory in the world must be submitted. God has not left his people to cope with the adversary single-handed, nor by the methods of human reasoning or scientific research. He that gives heed to divine revelation will not be misled nor deceived. IN a recent lecture by Joseph Cook upon the subject "Is the Fourth Commandment Binding upon Christians?" the noted Boston lecturer is reported by the Advance of February 23 as using the following words with respect to the commandments of the Decalogue:— While God remains God, and man is man, the Decalogue must stand. It seems beyond human efforts, and is written in the very constitution of things. Where it has been obeyed even partially it has poured out blessings on the people. It is worthy of such an origin as it claims. It is of this Decalogue that Christ said he did not come to do away with the law, and said, "Keep the commandments." Is the fourth different from the other nine? Any authority they may have belongs to it. The civil and ceremonial laws of the Jews were superseded, but not the moral, and the Decalogue belongs to the moral. A day of rest is in the laws of nature. It was made for man, not for the Jews only, but for all mankind. The week is of immemorial antiquity. The very latest rationalistic discussion against the Decalogue admits that a sacred seventh day existed among the Jews when they first left Mesopotamia. The week is probably as old as the family. Mr. Cook then proceeds to argue that no particular day is enjoined in the commandment, but that the observance of one day in seven is all it requires. If this were true, which we by no means admit, why do Mr. Cook and his coworkers contend so zealously for the observance of a particular definite day, the Sunday sabbath—a day too that is neither enjoined nor even hinted at in the Decalogue? Why should these same Sunday advocates, who claim the binding obligation of the Decalogue, and yet hold that it does not command the observance of a definite day, demand that seventh-day keepers should violate their consciences and observe a definite day contrary to what they believe the law of God commands? If no particular day is enjoined, why not leave it to every man to choose the day he desires in which to worship? But the Decalogue does enjoin a definite day. "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." God does not leave the matter of religious duty at loose ends, to be defined or determined by the caprice of men. As Mr. Cook truly says, "While God remains, and while man is man, the Decalogue must stand," and we may also add that the day enjoined by the Decalogue will be obligatory so long as the law of which it is a part shall endure. God's requirements are not mystical nor uncertain, but they are yea, and amen. God says what he means, and when all men shall stand or fall, as their allegiance to God shall be determined by the law of liberty, it will then be seen, if not before, that God means what he says.