QUESTION CORNER by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Aug 8, 1900

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 26, No. 32.

QUESTION CORNER

By Editor

1072. "A Sister." Sin against the Holy Ghost.—There is but one unpardonable sin—that against the Holy Ghost. Matt. 12:31. (2) Blasphemy against the Holy Ghost was on the part of those Jews attributing the working of the Spirit, or Holy Ghost, in Jesus to the power of Satan. Compare with Mark 3:28-30. (3) We do not believe that those who commit that sin generally or rarely ever know it. If they did, they would not commit it. We may know that we have not committed it. But Satan takes delight in making some poor discouraged soul believe that he has committed the unpardonable sin when he has not. The Spirit's power is the means by which God cleanses the sinner. Heb. 10:29; 1 Peter 1:2. There is no other means, no other power. If man utterly rejects that power and utterly turns from its wooing, God has no other means of working. The soul cuts itself off from God. That is the only reason why it is unpardonable—the soul will not be pardoned or cleansed in God's way.

1073. A. G. Asking and Giving. Matt. 5:22.—Our correspondent wishes to know the meaning, and says that we can not give everything that is asked, or lend to every one that asks. The Saviour is not giving arbitrary rules. He did not teach in that way. He lays down principles. His followers must make the application in their individual lives. Read on to the twelfth verse of chapter 7, and there is the summing up of the whole matter in the Golden Rule, the working out of God's law. The text does not say, "Give to every one that asketh everything that is asked," nor even, "Give to every one that which is asked." Perhaps a man asks you for a dollar, when you can plainly see he simply wants it to spend for liquor. Instead of giving him money, you take him in, wash him, feed him, and give him good brotherly kindness and advice. Have you not given "to him that asketh," and thus fulfilled in principle and in all fact Christ's command? The text teaches that we should be courteous, kind, and attentive to any appeal for aid that may come to us; and we should act as we believe Christ would act under the same circumstances, in other words, live the Golden Rule.

1074. E. O. Matt. 9:16, 17.—The "old garment" and "old bottles" represented human creeds and those bound by them. The "new cloth" and "new wine," the living teachings of the Gospel. The worn-out creed can not be patched up by the living truth of God. The hardened wine skins, representing men hardened by dead creeds and forms, could not hold the new expansive wine of the Gospel. The new wine must be put into new bottles, lives regenerated by Christ Jesus, which will grow with the ever-disclosing truth.

1075. M. E. S. The Sealing Work.—The expression, "ascending from the east," in Rev. 7:2 refers to the manner of the rise of the message, ascending like the sun, rather than to any particular source or point of compass.

1076. A Reader. Plowshares into Swords.—The prophecy of Joel 3:9-12 is now being fulfilled in all the nations of earth. There was never such a time of preparation for war. And it is all a sign of the great battle of Armageddon and the nearness of Christ's coming. The binding of Satan (Revelation 20) refers to a different period. When Christ comes, all the wicked will be destroyed (2 Thess. 1:7-9); all the righteous will be taken to the mansions above (John 14:1-3; 1 Thess. 4:16, 17), and Satan will be confined for one thousand years to this desolate earth, to meditate on the ruin he has wrought.

1077. Matt. 24:21, 22.—The days of tribulation here referred to are the days of papal persecution, foretold in Dan. 7:25; Rev. 13:7, and elsewhere. They began in A.D. 538 and ended in 1798. The days of tribulation of the people of God, of Matt. 24:21, must not be confounded with the "time of trouble" upon the wicked mentioned in Daniel 12:1. The latter takes place in connection with the close of probation, and includes the seven last plagues. Revelation 16. In the "tribulation," God's people suffer at the hands of the wicked. In the "trouble," God's people are delivered, while the wicked suffer. Matt. 24:6, 7 refers to the various troubles which take place all through the Christian era, gradually increasing toward the end.

1078. B. Babylon's Destruction.—Babylon's destruction was predicted by both Isaiah and Jeremiah. See Isaiah 13, and Jeremiah, chapters 50 and 51. The prophecy does not imply that the utter destruction should come when Babylon was overthrown by the Persians, but that it would ultimately be destroyed. When Isaiah uttered his prophecy, Babylon had not yet reached the height of her glory. Alexander died there. After that the city gradually fell into decay, and for many centuries has been utterly desolate. For a time even its size was disputed. The prophecy has been literally fulfilled. Smith's Bible Dictionary says: "The natives regard the whole site as haunted, and neither will the 'Arab pitch tent, nor the shepherd fold sheep there."'