Extravagance in Church Building
The Protestants are out-doing the Popes, Babylon of old, the mother of harlots, in splendid, extravagant folly in church building. Thousands on thousands are expended in gay and costly ornaments to gratify pride, and a wicked ambition, that might and should go, to redeem the perishing millions! Does the evil, the folly, and the madness of these proud, formal, fashionable worshipers stop here? These splendid monuments of popish pride, upon which millions are squandered in our cities, virtually exclude the poor, for which Christ died, and for whom he came especially to preach. There is not a vestige of proof, authority, example, or intimation in the New Testament to justify this splendid folly, not a particle. “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach to the poor.” “He that oppresseth the poor, reproacheth his Maker.” See also 1 Cor. i. 26, 27. No wonder God withholds his holy influences! No marvel the heavens are brass, and the earth iron! Go into one of these fashionable, costly, highly ornamented popular church edifices, what do you see and hear? Christ? Sinners weeping between the porch and the altar? Do you? “Wo to the crown of pride,” “Wo unto the idle shepherds,” “Wo to you ye blind guides,” “Wo unto them that are at ease in Zion,” Wo! wo! wo!—Golden Rule.