At What Are You Aiming?
By Helen Adair
OR what are you steering, Christian? Are you heading toward the broad and traveled Incline of the Sinner? to the respectable, dead-level Road of the Pharisee? or to the steep and narrow Way of the Saint's "High Calling"? The marksman knows that if he would hit the target, he must aim at the target. The chauffeur has learned that if he would keep out of the ditch, he must steer for the roadway. In like manner, the Christian should learn that he will reach only that for which he aims. At what, then, should the Christian aim? Is it possible for him to hit it, if he does aim at it? If so, how? Attach yourself, for a moment, to that crowd of scribes and Pharisees in the temple court. Draw a little nearer. They have dragged a poor, cringing sinner before the Master, and ask Him if they shall stone her. Jesus reads their hypocritical hearts, and stoops down and writes with His finger in the sand. Like bloodthirsty wolves, they press nearer and nearer, vehemently urging the Master to tell them if they shall stone her. Rising, the Lord looks on them, and says, "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her." Again He stoops down and writes in the sand. Self-condemned, one by one, the accusers quietly withdraw, leaving the One who makes no mistakes, to deal with the sinner. Lifting Himself up, and seeing none but the woman, He says, "Woman, where are those thine accusers? hath no man condemned thee?" She replies, "No man, Lord." Jesus says to her, "Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more." Now, must we give this message all away to this sinful woman? We are told, sometimes, how business men have mistaken their places in life and have never succeeded in finding them, how square men have tried to fit themselves into round holes, and round men into square holes; but when we remember that we "all have sinned and come short of the glory of God," it need not take us many moments to discover that we belong in the same hole with this sinner in the temple. Even tho we are considered respectable, and are found among the proud accusers, as soon as our false wigs and broidered coats are removed, we find that we slip into the sinner's hole without the slightest difficulty. Hypocrite, or common sinner, then, whoever we may be, we may claim this message of mercy, and also this God-given aim. Tho we are among those who have always declared that they would not try to be Christians for fear of becoming hypocrites, like so many others, yet we may take this message to our hearts. When received, by faith, it precludes all possibility of our becoming hypocrites. By the way, let us not call every professed Christian who makes mistakes, a hypocrite. There is a wide difference between hypocrites and inexperienced Christians. It takes time for any novice to learn how to use his tools; and many are the blunders he makes before he becomes a really skilled workman. When a wolf, however, dons a sheepskin, and slyly creeps into the flock, he is apt to do it knowingly; and so does the hypocrite. When the Lord says, "Go, and sin no more," does He really mean that we need not sin any more? that we are to aim at perfection? He says so, in the Sermon on the Mount; and Moses, Peter, James, and Paul, moved by the Holy Spirit, assure us that we are to be perfect, even as our Father in heaven is perfect. Paul reiterates that we are to be partakers of His holiness, "without which no man shall see the Lord;" and John, the beloved, adds, "Every man that hath this hope in him [the hope of seeing Him as He is] purifieth himself, even as He is pure." Paul goes so far as to say that God sent His Son to earth "that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us." "Impossible!" you say. "I am utterly powerless to do right. I've tried often enough, and failed. Nobody can." Not so fast! Look at that trolley-car. Are you any more helpless than that car? Watch it suddenly put on power and fly through our streets and up our hills with its living freight. Is the man who gave that inanimate car the power to move, greater and wiser than the Creator of the heavens and the earth and all things therein? Might not the Creator, if He willed, put puny, helpless men in touch with a power by which they, too, could renew their strength, and "mount up with wings, as eagles," "run, and not be weary," "walk, and not faint"? Was it not to Nicodemus, a teacher of Israel, that the Lord once explained how it could and must be done, if any man ever entered the kingdom of heaven? As silently and invisibly as a summer's breeze, this wonderful power — the Spirit of God — descends upon the praying publican, taking away his old, sinful nature, and leaving in its stead the divine nature; shedding abroad in his heart the love of God, which love, and no other, can fulfil the law. Go on, now, dear publican, says Paul; by faith ye have received the Spirit, by faith go on walking in the Spirit, and "ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh." As a new-born babe desires its milk, so desire the sincere milk of the Word, "that ye may grow thereby," chimes in Peter; "for," adds the Lord Himself, of His words, "they are spirit, and they are life." Back comes the voice of Peter: That is why ye are given these exceeding great and precious promises — that by these ye might be "partakers of the divine nature." Those incorruptible seeds of God's nature and power received into your heart, caused you to be born again [from above]. Yes, says John, and this is why "whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for His seed remaineth in him: and he can not sin." "O Israel," pleads the Lord, "if thou wilt harken unto Me; there shall no strange god be in thee;" thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image; thou shalt not take God's name in vain; thou shalt remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy; thou shalt honor thy father and mother; thou shalt not kill; thou shalt not commit adultery; thou shalt not steal; thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor; thou shalt not covet. I PROMISE thee, that if thou wilt harken unto Me, thou shalt not do one thing that is wrong, thou shalt do what is required of thee. (If we can keep the first commandment by harkening to His words, we can keep the second, third, and all the rest of them, in the same way.) David witnesses, That is true, Lord, for "Thy Word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against Thee." The Word is profitable, agrees Paul, "for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works." John, in vision, looking into the future, sees a hundred and forty-four thousand on Mount Zion, who have conquered by the Word, and are "without fault before the throne of God." Joshua encourages us to try, by reminding us of the mother and her babe. The babe is learning to sit alone; the mother sets it before her and spreads out her arms to catch it if it falls. Again and again it wobbles from side to side and almost topples over; but it persists in straining its little muscles to their utmost, sometimes falling into the outstretched arms, but immediately getting up and trying again — until it finally can sit up strong and well. Then, not content, it rises to its feet and tries to stand. When that is accomplished, it learns to walk, and then to run, constantly going on, and on, and on, to perfect manhood. As we stand in awe before this moving picture, Joshua whispers, "The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms;" and the voice of a trained singer is heard chanting the words, "Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him." As tho that were not enough, lo, a voice from heaven says, "Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of My righteousness." "The omnipotent power of the Holy Spirit is the defense of every contrite soul. Not one that in penitence and faith has claimed His protection, will Christ permit to pass under the enemy's power. The Saviour is by the side of His tempted and tried ones. With Him there can be no such thing as failure, loss, impossibility, or defeat; we can do all things through Him who strengthens us." Perfection, then, shall be our aim; the Spirit of Almighty God, our power; His words, the channel through which His power can flow; faith, childlike faith in His words, that which transmits His power to us. Despairing Christian, "go, and sin no more!"7 to a mere sullogus." It was therefore an assembly regularly summoned, lawfully called, opposed to a coming together without call. God's church is called out by His sent messengers, and that call is always "the Gospel of truth," to a life of truth and righteousness. Those who yield to that regular summons constitute God's Ekklesia. Such in times of crisis have been His faithful remnant, either to abide steadfast when all fell away, or to come out from apostasy when apostasy possessed the material citadel and center of God's work in the earth. In the light of the foregoing propositions, facts, and principles, trace the church of God from the beginning. In the dawning of time the church was Abel, not Cain, tho Abel was the younger. In the time of the Deluge it was Noah and his family, tho with the multitude who were lost were the "men of renown." A few generations later that church centered in Abraham, who obeyed God's call and left apostatizing kindred and friends. Out of Egypt it was the nation of slaves led by Moses. In the apostasy of that people priestly houses and royal houses were set aside, and others honored who hitherto had not so served. God's remnant — His people in the ten-tribe division — were not the people of the tribes, but the seven thousand loyal souls who had not bowed the knee to Baal, unknown even to God's prophet. And when apostasy in Israel became so grievous that there was danger that God's truth would be lost to the earth, He brought upon them the Chaldeans, suffered them to go into captivity, so that their very apostasy witnessed to the truth of His word given by His prophets, while the positive power of His truth in holy character was manifest in Daniel and his fellows and an erstwhile heathen king. At the close of that captivity it was not the many thousands of scattered Israel in Babylon and elsewhere that constituted His church, but the called-out ones — less than fifty thousand — who returned to Jerusalem. It was not the scribes and Pharisees and doctors of the law and chief priests who were His church in the crisis of John the Baptist's mission, but the repentant people and publicans; for "all the people that heard Him, and the publicans, justified God [witnessed to His truth], being baptized with the baptism of John. But the Pharisees and lawyers rejected the counsel of God against themselves, being not baptized of him." Luke 7: 29, 30. When our Lord died upon the cross, it was not Israel after the flesh, through whom God had kept His truth, that constituted His church; but it was the few loyal ones who had heard the call, who met in the upper room, who were together — of one accord — by the Word on the Day of Pentecost. The nation was rejected with all their appointments, all their priestly authority, all their succession of priesthood, all their honored tradition. The humble fishermen and artisans, clothed with the Spirit, loyal to His truth, bearing His Gospel, were leaders in His church. In the time of the Reformation the church was again constituted of those that heeded the call of God and were loyal to His Word. This must be ever so. For when men in positions of trust in God's work apostatize — when they prove disloyal to His Word — He must set them aside and call out those that will be loyal, or suffer His truth to be lost to the earth. The latter He will not do; can not do, and be true to Himself and those for whom Christ died. Now this whole career of God's church has been set forth in prophecy always years and sometimes centuries before the events in her history took place. Her backsliding, her apostasy, her captivity, the gathering of the remnant, the rejection of the nation at our Lord's first advent, the "remnant according to the election of grace" at that time, the later apostasies, and wandering in the wilderness of trouble, persecution, error, and confusion, have all been set forth in the Word of God; and the church even in her wandering and scattered condition has witnessed to it all. Despite all the planning and plotting of her enemies, despite anathemas and persecutions, nay, more, despite utter rejection and death even as her Master suffered, she has witnessed in character and career to the Word of God. And so has apostasy witnessed. The career of the apostate system has been foretold. Her exaltation of man in the place of God, her substitution of the traditions of men for the Word of God, mere material substance in the place of the Real Presence, succession of men instead of living call and connection with Christ, the worship of the dead, the changing of the times and the law of God, the claim to universal and sole rulership, the usurping of authority over kingdom and conscience, and the logical consequent persecution, — all these and much more have been foretold in the "sure word of prophecy," and abundantly fulfilled, it seems to us, in the Roman Catholic Church, to whom many are now turning as the living spouse of God. Let us say that in this we are not condemning Catholics; we have naught but the kindliest feelings toward them all, and doubtless there are many among them whose hearts are perfect toward God and all the light they have. But we would not be true to our Lord and Master did we not warn against the marvelous, mighty system of error with which they are connected, and which still exists in vigor, as declared by prophecy. So it will increase till the nations shall again acknowledge it as the church of God, and former persecutions will be repeated. In all this apostasy, in all its career, the Papacy has witnessed to the truth of God's Word by doing in its entire career just what the Word declared she would do. From all these errors, out of all wrong systems, God is calling His people by the living message of the everlasting Gospel. He knows they are scattered through Babylon, the organized confusion in the religious world. He is calling them out by His Gospel, His eternal truth. He is calling them to a character that will bear witness to His holy law, to a faith that will witness to the faith of Jesus. And that called-out church, small in comparison with the world, God's "little flock," will bear these characteristics of prophecy, named eighteen centuries ago by the prophet of Patmos: "Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus." Rev. 12: 17; 14: 12. Are you looking for the true church in these days of peril? Are you looking for God's remnant church that will be — is — waiting for His coming and working for souls? She will bear the above divine marks of authenticity, the twofold infallible witness of the Word of God.