THE WORD OF GOD by Frederick Griggs

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Apr 16, 1902

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 28, No. 16.

THE WORD OF GOD.

By Frederick Griggs

GOD'S Word is given to us in two different forms—the spoken and the written. The spoken was before the written, and man in his Edenic purity could read from the spoken Word or the works of God spiritual lessons, which, when he lost this purity, he failed to see. Then God in His mercy gave him the written Word. The lessons of God are still in nature, but man will rarely ever see them except as his vision is enlarged by the telescope of the written Word. Now, the laws of God may be clearly known without the written Word, for they appeal to the senses; but when that faith which comes by hearing and that hearing which comes by the Word of God, enter into man's study of God's works, then may he come to know fully the "invisible things of Him from the creation of the world, even His eternal power and Godhead." No man has a just excuse for his ignorance of the law and ways of God.

The Word has much to say concerning the laws of nature. Not only so, but it has been saying it for many generations and long ages. Wise men of the world who lived at the time when the Bible was written, placed in their teachings many ideas which have been proved false by recent discoveries; but it is to be noted that under the direction of the Holy Spirit, the writers of the Bible avoided all such errors in their writings.

Let me mention some of the scientific truths which the Bible taught for ages before they were discovered. The written Word affirms that light existed before the sun. Men did not believe it, and said that the Word was not inspired because it taught this. Now it is known and very generally accepted that light did exist before the sun, and men now are praised for so teaching. For many ages men held that the world was flat, while God in the Word kept saying, He "sitteth upon the circle of the earth." During these many years they were searching for some support for the world, and in their imagination placed it upon the backs of turtles, elephants, or strong men; but the Maker of the earth declared plainly that He had hung it "upon nothing." Now men have shown the Word true, and we call them wise.

Astronomers were continually endeavoring to count the stars. Hipparchus counted 1,022 and Ptolemy 1,026. They could count only those visible to the naked eye. All this time the Word was saying that these stars were as innumerable as the sands of the sea. Men would not believe it until science, coming along with the telescope, revealed the fact that indeed God alone could number all the stars, or could call them by their names; for the telescope revealed that something over 18,000,000 were to be found in a single system, and that there are systems beyond count. And where the telescope fails to reveal anything, photography discloses myriads.

In the realm of meteorology the same experience has been met. Men scouted the idea that the air had any weight, little dreaming that this weight was necessary to propel ships, or that by it their works were overturned; hundreds of years ago God said through Job, "He maketh a weight for the wind." The Word has been saying for centuries that "the wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits. All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full: unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again." During nearly all these centuries men have thought that the wind moved by caprice—it happened to blow as it did; but by careful observation the very laws here spoken of by God have been discovered. The earth's revolution on its axis is clearly recognized in the Bible, when, in speaking of the dayspring, God says that the earth is turned to it as clay to the seal. Even the fact that the earth had an axis was not believed by men for ages after God inquired of Job, "Whereupon are the sockets of the earth made to sink?" If they did not know that the earth turned, they could not well conceive of the sockets necessary to its axis.

Men have been studying the proper lines upon which boats should be built for many generations, and they are just now reaching the observation that the lines which the Lord gave to Noah in the building of the ark were correct; and the most seaworthy boats of to-day are being built in the same general proportion as this bark which rode the most tempestuous seas of all time. If men had taken the Word simply as it said, there would indeed have been far greater advancement in science than there has been. God intends that faith shall go before sight. There are indeed many scientific truths to which the Bible gives a leading-string, and which, if men would believe and follow them out, would result in a greater understanding of the workings of nature's laws.

We have now come to the conclusion of this series of articles. I have enjoyed writing them; for there have been opened to my mind, as I have studied these subjects for this series, many ideas concerning God's laws and their application to our lives which I had not seen before. The more closely we come in touch with God in nature, the more closely can He reveal Himself in our lives; but it is through the Word first, last, and always, that we are to know and see Him in all of His manifestations to the saving of our souls and the souls of our children.

His wonderful power is nowhere more strikingly revealed than in our bodies. The laws of health, which are but God's laws working through us, may not only be an increasingly delightful study, but one than which there is none more important. Look at the wonderful work of the heart, its immense lifting power, doing a work equal to the lifting of one pound 434,112 feet from the earth's surface in a day. We eat food. It passes through various changes, and reveals itself in the energy with which we walk and think. The energy manifested in growth is beyond our comprehension. Professor Clark, of Amherst College, Amherst, Massachusetts, found that even a squash, soft and pulpy as it is, has the power of growth to such an extent that it lifted and held up 5,000 pounds day and night for months. To do this marvelous work, its substance became compact like an oak as it grew and labored under its heavy load. All over the earth this wonder-working power goes silently on. We wonder at it. It passes our comprehension; yet it is but one letter of the alphabet of God's power.

We stand by thunderous Niagara, as with a mighty power that will grind to powder the solidest substance it pours its immense volume of water over the great precipice. Whence came all this great amount of water?—From the power of God, that lifted the tiniest drops from the sea, wafting them over land, condensing them until they fell in little rain-drops upon the land, and, collecting, wended their way from rill, creek, and lake onward to the mighty river, brought by main force perhaps even from the far-away Pacific. So we might go on, ever enumerating some new manifestation of this marvelous power. God is love, and every manifestation of His power is a manifestation of His love, which is His law.

"Hear therefore, O Israel, and observe to do it; that it may be well with thee, and that ye may increase mightily, as the Lord God of thy fathers hath promised thee, in the land that floweth with milk and honey. Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord; and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart; and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up."

So. Lancaster, Mass.