A New View of the Bible
By E. Inman
BRO. SMITH : It has been about five months since my companion and myself commenced keeping the Sabbath of the Lord. Since that time we have been blessed in our family devotions and in secret; in short, whenever we come to God through Christ by faith and prayer, and ask him, we receive a blessing. I praise the Lord that I ever heard the present truth and was brought to see a beauty in it. I have studied the Bible for twenty-seven years, and searched diligently with a prayerful heart to find out the truths it contains : but I never was able to see it as I now see it. It is a new book. Instead of its being a book of darkness and mysteries, it is a book that lights up the pathway of the weary traveler. It points out his pathway through this dark and dreary world of sin; it gives him faith and hope that is like an anchor to the soul, sure and steadfast, that reaches to that within the vail. It also points out to the sinner his awful doom; not eternal life in torment, but eternal death in everlasting silence. "They shall be as though they had not been." Obd. 16. In short, it is a book to be desired. It contains all that is necessary for man's salvation, and what is not taught therein we are not bound to believe nor obey. What is taught therein I am determined, God being my helper, to obey every word of it. I love the Bible. I love its laws. I love to keep them. Religion is my theme, eternal life at Christ's right hand is my object. I want to see the inside of that city, the New Jerusalem, that shall soon descend from God out of heaven, that glorious home of the blessed. I hail the weekly visits of the Review with pleasure on account of the truths it contains, and the glorious news it brings from brethren and sisters scattered abroad. This is a blessed privilege, to have an opportunity of talking to each other through the Review, but I see, by faith, a time when we shall not have to write to each other, but can talk face to face, and praise God where all tears shall be wiped away from our eyes, where sickness, sorrow, pain and death will never come, where the wicked shall cease from troubling and the weary be at rest. O brethren and sisters, do we bring that day as near to us as we ought, or do we put it far away in the future? That day is near at hand; the signs are to be seen, the Scriptures are fast fulfilling, men saying, Peace and safety, scoffers asking, Where is the promise of his coming, many are becoming traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God, having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof. They will not endure sound doctrine, but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching ears. They have turned their ears from the truth unto fables and though ever learning are never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. All these things portend the coming of Christ near at hand, even at the door. Let us look up and rejoice, for our redemption draweth nigh. Let us obey God and not the teachings of men. Yours in hope of eternal life.
E. INMAN.