Question Corner by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · Oct 4, 1905

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 31, No. 40.

Question Corner

By Editor

From time to time under this head, we will answer pertinent questions, the answers to which we believe will be generally helpful to our readers. Some questions we can not answer here. They are of special interest only to the person who asks them. We will not answer what seem to be mere quibbles or cavils. We do not propose, for instance, to explain, more than once a year, where Cain got his wife. In all cases we must have the name of the questioner. We may wish to write them. To the questions we sign only the initials, or another term, if preferred by the questioner. But we have neither time nor space to bother with unsigned letters or questions. One more thought: "Foolish and unlearned questions avoid."

1724.—Will Solomon Be Saved?

D. M. G.

We hope so. It is always sad to think of one's utterly failing for whom God has done so much. We believe he will be saved, because Ecclesiastes, written after his idolatry and worldliness, shows that he clearly saw them to be folly, and repented of his sins. Eccl. 12:9-14.

1725.—Will the Rich Man Be Lost? Matt. 19:22.

A preacher stated that the rich young man, who said he had kept all the commandments, was lost. Is this so?

We do not know. God has given us no revelation of his eternal future. But he was not keeping all the commandments, whatever he thought, and the test that Jesus gave him showed this. He loved his riches more than he loved God. Of course, after this he may have repented.

1726.—Turning from Light.

If a Seventh-day Adventist who, for fifteen years, had lived up to the doctrine, turned from it, joined another church, and gave up the Sabbath, could he be saved?

This is not for us to say, what can or can not be done for such an one. We can say this, that no man goes into greater light by giving up one ray of light. God has many souls in other churches to whom the truth of the Sabbath has not yet come. These He is blessing, and has blessed because they are living up to the light they see; but He can not bless one who has seen the light of the Sabbath, or any other truth, and turns from that truth to nothing or to a substitute. "The path of the just is as a shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day." Prov. 4:18. He that turns from a single ray of light walks in darkness; for all light shines from the one central Sun of Righteousness.

1727.—The Eagles and the Carcasses. Matt. 24:28.

What is the meaning of Matt. 24:28?

The connection in Matt. 24:28 might seem to invite the application you make of the carcasses to false doctrine; but the use of the same expression in Luke 17:37 would exclude this meaning, and the meaning of the terms would, also, it seems to us. The eagles or vultures would better apply to the false doctrines. Is not this the better meaning: Probation is past. Humanity is being divided into classes. Luke 17:27-36. The last plagues stand like vultures, waiting for their prey. The decree of God goes forth. Rev. 22:11. The plagues fall upon those who have rejected all truth and all mercy. The wicked are spiritually dead, carcasses fit for the plague birds of prey.