Editorial Notes by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Aug 14, 1893

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 19, No. 40.

Editorial Notes

By Editor

READ the article on "The Church of Christ," beginning on page 629.

THE various articles of Brother Corliss on the power and Spirit of God in us and in the world, with its various manifestations and gifts, close with this number. We know that all have been carefully read, and we ask for such a reading of the one in our present issue on "The Gift of Prophecy."

FROM a circular issued by the publishers of the STANDARD DICTIONARY, the Funk & Wagnalls Co., 18 and 20 Astor Place, New York, we learn that it is probable that the dictionary will be published before 1893 closes. We know many are anxiously waiting for it, and we believe that we can assure those who have subscribed through the influence of the SIGNS, that they will not be disappointed when they receive the work. We believe that the "Standard" will be the standard.

WE are about to begin a series of articles on the question of religious legislation as related to spiritual and religious things from the standpoint of the word of God. These will be written by different persons who have given this subject special thought and study, and we hope that the series when completed will form a complete groundwork of the Bible teaching on this important subject. If the articles we present cover this ground, they will help our readers who really desire the truth, to become intelligent upon that subject which erelong will shake the religious and political worlds as they have never before been shaken. To be forewarned is to be forearmed.

SOME of our Oakland contemporaries which have spoken so emphatically against the unchristian boycott of the World's Fair because it opened on Sunday, are justifying the very things they have condemned, in their appeal for the Clerks' Union. They really advise a boycott of those merchants who will not close Sundays. Now we believe that every clerk ought to have his day of rest, but we do not believe in coercion or oppression to force someone to give them that day of rest. Let them have the manliness to stand by principle, whether the merchants will stand with them or not; it always pays in the long run, and principle which will not endure a little test is worthless. In fact, it isn't principle. It is policy or expediency.

THIS is the Christian(?) spirit of the Christian Statesman as expressed in its issue of July 29:—

We hear of a preacher who did not mention on July 16, either in prayer or preaching, the great Sabbath-closing victory at Chicago. He would do for the leading part of another story on "The Man without a Country." He ought to be anchored in a balloon between heaven and earth, as useless for either.

Probably this minister felt that he was called upon to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ, the word of God; with that the Sunday-closing question has no common interest.

REALLY how strong is Germany against Socialism? By concessions she purchased the Polish vote. Had she not done this, the Army bill would have been defeated. Imperialism is doomed, and the pope is about the only great ruler who is astute enough to see it. He declares in his recent Encyclical on Labor that "economists and lawmakers" "must acknowledge democratic socialism to have ripened into a power of which it is necessary to take account, and in face of which it is incumbent to adopt wise and prudent tactics." And the pope is doing it. His horn has eyes; the horns of the powers of Europe are not only blind but eyeless.

OUR ably edited Presbyterian contemporary across the Bay, the Occident, has again changed its form and dress. It is now published by the denomination. Dr. W. W. Faris, who has published and edited it for some months in the past, is still retained on the editorial corps of twelve, the first named of whom is Dr. R. F. Coyle, of Oakland. The office editor is Florence H. Miller. The appearance of the Occident in its enlarged form is much improved, with the exception of the heading, "The Occident," which is about the worst-looking specimen of its class we remember ever to have seen, unless we except one of the several styles tried in the space of a few months by our W. C. T. U. sisters on the Union Signal. We advise the Occident to try again.

God Is the Same.—The following is the introduction of a sermon on John 14:7, by Dr. A. J. Gordon (Baptist), preached in Chicago, and reported in the Inter Ocean of July 17:—

This text, containing the promise of the Comforter, marks the transition from the old dispensation to the new. Hitherto the Spirit had moved men from without; henceforth he was to impel them from within. The external commandment written on tables of stone had up to this time given guidance to men; now the inward decalogue, "the law of the spirit of life" written on the tables of the heart, was to give direction to Christ's disciples. It is a great word of the new covenant: "He shall be in you."

This is a sample of modern day theology. It does not know God's word. Men who were truly moved in the past dispensation were just as much impelled by the Spirit of God within them as they are in this dispensation. Read David's prayer: "Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts [a work which the Spirit of God alone could do]; and in the hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom." "Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me [compare with Acts 15:9; Eph. 2:10; Col. 3:10]; cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy Holy Spirit from me. Restore unto me thy salvation and uphold me with thy free Spirit." Ps. 57:6, 10-12. Compare with Rom. 3:9; Eph. 4:30; and 2 Cor. 3:17. Even Pharaoh recognized that the Spirit of God was within Joseph (Gen. 41:38), and Nebuchadnezzar saw the same power in Daniel (Dan. 4:8, 18). The same Spirit was in Joshua (Num. 27:18), and dwelt in all the holy prophets (1 Peter 1:10, 11). It was by that Spirit that Noah was impelled to preach (1 Peter 3:18, 19; 2 Peter 2:5); and through faith by the power of that Spirit he was made righteous (Heb. 11:7), even as we must exercise the same faith and lay hold of the same Spirit (Gal. 3:14). And the context of the last scripture shows that it was in this very way that Abraham became righteous. See Isa. 63:10, 11, 14. The wrong idea comes from ignorance of the simple facts that men are ever the same in nature, and God is ever the same in every respect. God's Spirit has been working in the world and in man since it brooded over the primitive waters and brought order out of chaos.