What's in a Word? by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Oct 15, 1894

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 20, No. 49.

What's in a Word?

By Editor

Words count for much in this present state of things, even when there is nothing behind them. This is especially manifest in several particulars just now. The Roman Catholics, for instance, have whistled temperance, and all at once many of the temperance people have executed a lively dance, only to find when all tired out that the Roman Catholics did not mean temperance very much after all, certainly not enough to exclude saloon keepers from either church or societies. The same thing is manifest in the religious world. Let a man or organization show honor or reverence for "Sunday" and straightway he is a "Christian." Not long ago we gave an instance of where a congregation of Hebrews had been characterized as such, because they had left the faith of their fathers and the word of God and had adopted for expediency's sake a day in which they did not believe. Words count with God if there are deeds behind them. "Why call ye me Lord, Lord," says Christ, "and do not the things which I say?" Says the beloved apostle, "My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth."