One good brother wants to know why you request two cents sent by the Bible Band readers who ask questions and ten cents from those outside. S. M. K.
First of all our Bible Band readers are those who are specially studying the Bible and who are supposed to be really and truly interested in the Word, and we are endeavoring to encourage them in that study. We have asked from each of them ten cents for schedule of readings. This year we are doing more than that for them; we are giving them the full worth of their money in a commercial way.
2. A great many questions come to us which demand the expenditure of a good many dollars in the course of the year for postage. It is but right certainly that at least two cents should be enclosed by a Bible Band member. His question may be answered in the paper. We may think best to answer it by mail; if so, it is but right that he should furnish the postage.
3. A great many questions are asked which require very much time on the part of the editors in looking up. If we could charge simply time on each question, that would be a different matter; we would make the price of course different to each one in proportion to the amount of time required. This we can not do, therefore we have tried to place it at a low minimum rate. If one wishes questions answered by letter, he certainly ought to be willing to pay the expense connected with it. Many times, ten cents does not begin to meet the expense connected with the answering of the question. Most of our readers appreciate this. Once in a while one will send us a dollar for the answering of the questions, and feel that the information is worth the amount. Some have even sent more than this. We are endeavoring to do in our Question Corner and in our Bible Band the best that we possibly can do with the time and limitations considered, for our readers and our Bible Band members. We are willing to spend our own time to the fullest extent in order to help them; but it is not just that the house of publication should be at expense which is almost if not wholly for the benefit of others. Therefore for the sake of the house of publication we are asking our inquirers, as we have done, to enclose postage. We are not demanding it of any; and if any think the price is too high, that will accommodate us just as well, because we have always on hand more questions than we can answer promptly.
3028.—The Seventh-Day Sabbath
Will you give me the reasons for keeping the seventh day of the week for the worship of God by His people, and where I may find the "Thus saith the Lord"? INQUIRER AFTER TRUTH.
First, the institution of the Sabbath. God rested upon the seventh day, blessed the seventh day, sanctified the seventh day, which means set it apart for a holy service. Gen. 2:2, 3. He did that in the very beginning for man. Mark 2:27. He did it before sin entered. He did it for the head of the race, hence for all his children, all that should come afterward.
Secondly, when He committed to Israel the law and the oracles of God (Rom. 9:4), and made them priests to all the nations, He guarded and enjoined that Sabbath by one commandment in His holy law which reads as follows:
"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work: but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man servant, nor thy maid servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it." Ex. 20:8-11.
Thirdly, our Lord Jesus Christ declared that it was easier for heaven and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to fail. Luke 16:17. He kept those commandments in His own blameless life, and died upon the cross in order to save men from their transgression. John 15:10; 1 Peter 2:22. The holy women who had followed Him all through His life, kept the Sabbath after Jesus died, and kept it "according to the commandment." Luke 23:56. His own beloved apostle tells us that "he that saith he abideth in Him [Christ] ought himself also so to walk, even as He walked." See the last few numbers also of the SIGNS.
3029.—Forgiveness of Those Who Pierced Jesus
Those who crucified Jesus believed after He was crucified that He was the Son of God. See Matt. 27:35, 36, 54. And seeing that those things were hid from them, and they perceived not the things that were said (Luke 18:34), did they not do those things through unbelief? See 1 Tim. 1:13. In the light of the above scriptures, would not they be saved through the prayer of Jesus when He said, "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do"?
There is forgiveness for every soul of man if he will only accept it. The prayer of Jesus shows the divine disposition. "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do." It does not mean that such would be cleansed of their sins whether they desired it or not. It simply means that the One who suffered all those things had nothing in His heart but forgiveness for them, and that forgiveness of Jesus Christ is purchased for every soul, tho his sins be as scarlet or crimson; but in order that the sinner may avail himself of that wonderful life of God, he must yield the sin, give it all to God, that God may take it away. There must be cooperation on the part of the sinner; and in all probability those who pierced Him will be among those who would not avail themselves of the benefits of His crucifixion. The words of the centurion in Matt. 27:54 do not necessarily mean that he saw in Christ the Messiah, the Saviour of men; only that that idolatrous man saw in Him a divine personage. "Truly this was the Son of God," or as rendered by some, "a Son of God." He saw in Him divinity just as Nebuchadnezzar saw in the form of the Fourth a divine person; but Nebuchadnezzar did not accept of that divine person at that time, nor have we any reason to believe that the Roman soldier did.
To our minds, they who pierced Him, noted in Rev. 1:7, refer more to the very ones that compassed His death, having every evidence in the world to show them that He was indeed the Messiah, the Son of God; namely, the Jewish priests and rulers. The Romans were simply instruments which executed their will. All these things we must leave with the Master, and to the disclosures of the future.
Please explain the 10th and 11th verses of Ezekiel 19. "Thy mother is like a vine in thy blood." B. B. 392.
Read the margin for the better meaning. "In thy blood" means "of thy kind." See also margin of the Revised Version, "Thy mother was like a vine in thy likeness, planted by the waters: it was fruitful and full of branches by reason of many waters." Jerusalem or Israel is likened to a vine. The degenerate king was the son of that vine. At one time in her better days she was full of vigor, and full of strong branches, and these branches were like rods for scepters used by kings. Then she was exalted among the nations of the earth. In the days of Solomon all kings of the earth came to hear his wisdom; but she had lost her glory, was plucked up by the Lord and cast down and consumed. The whole chapter is a lamentation, a dirge, for the sorrows that came upon Jerusalem, at one time likened to a lioness, the strongest of all beasts; to a vine, the strongest of plants; but strength and beauty and fruitfulness had departed because of sin.
3031.—The Sanhedrin.
What is the reason that the Sanhedrin was composed of both Pharisees and Sadducees at the time of Christ's trial? B. J.
Simply because men of influence were elected to that position. Sometimes those in the priesthood were Pharisees and sometimes Sadducees. Positions of influence had become a matter of barter and traffic in the days of our Lord and previous to that time, just as they are in some circles at the present time. If one had sufficient money or influence or both, he could secure the coveted position; consequently men of both classes, Pharisees and Sadducees, were elected to the office.
For Rom. 14:6 see Question No. 2981, Signs of Nov. 24, 1909.
3032.—J. S. D.—Animals in the Desolate Earth.—Will there be animal- and bird-life in the desolate earth when the saints are in heaven during the millennium? From Isaiah 34, in which Idumea is used as a type of the earth, it seems clearly evident that there will be wild beasts and birds of prey left in the earth after men are destroyed. The expression, "All the birds of the heavens were fled," in Jer. 4:25, would be no more than what would take place in any time of great commotion. That would not necessarily mean their destruction. Then, too, when the wicked are raised and come upon the new earth, the animal life will furnish them food as they come up around the camp of the saints and the beloved city to destroy it. Later, in the last great conflagration, in which the earth, saturated with sin, will be set on fire by the presence of the Lord, all flesh shall perish together; that is, all those who are not identified with Him.
3033.—J. S. D.—Matt. 24:29.—The shaking of the powers of heaven we understand to be just as literal as the darkening of the sun and the moon and the falling of the stars which are mentioned in the same connection. The shaking will be a literal shaking. See Heb. 12:25, 26, where the shaking of Mount Sinai is referred to, when the whole mountain quaked greatly. We read further, "Whose voice then shook the earth: but now He hath promised, saying, Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven. And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things which can not be shaken may remain." See also Joel 3:16; Rev. 16:17-21.
3034.—J. S. D.—Isa. 65:23; 11:6.—We do not understand that there will be children born in the earth made new. We read in Luke 20:35, "They which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage." The prophet is there speaking of conditions which would have come to be true even in this world if God's children had been faithful to Him; but as they were not, these prophecies will be fulfilled in far more blessed fruition in the world to come.
3035.—J. S. D.—Matt. 24:14.—The passage in question refers to the destruction of Jerusalem, and it also may be typical of troubles which will occur in the last days; for in the last days, as in that time, God's people will have to flee into the mountains to escape the persecution.