The Bible Alone by John McMillan

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Aug 8, 1865

The Bible Alone.

By John McMillan

The profession of Protestants is, that the Scriptures are the only rule of faith and practice. But among the different bodies of professing Christians there are three classes:

1. Those who read but little on the subject of religion, or living holiness. These believe pretty much as their fathers did, and think the greatest danger is in changing their opinions.

This class virtually deny the deceitfulness of the heart, and the necessity of self-examination; and in their willful ignorance are in danger of claiming the favor of the Lord, when he will profess unto them, "I never knew you, Depart from me, ye that work iniquity."

2. There is another class who are more progressive, but who read more at the feet of Gamaliel, than from the mouth of Christ, and the teachings of his Spirit.

They believe that the opinions of the great and learned in this enlightened age are the essence of all that is good and lovely in the dark and foggy teachings of the Bible. Among this class are many honest unsuspecting souls who admit the Scriptures as the only rule of faith and practice, but who are somewhat stupefied by their early mysticism and dare not venture a dissent from the wisdom of the learned. This class is in danger of placing an undue estimate on the wisdom of the world, which is foolishness with God, and thereby make their worship vain or unacceptable, by teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.

3. There is a third class though few in number, who believe that God has hidden many things from the wise and prudent and revealed them unto babes; that not many wise, not many mighty, are chosen; that God looks to the man that is of a humble and contrite spirit. They believe that they should obey God rather than man, and that God has given his creatures a revelation of his will, and what is their duty; that it is able to make them wise unto salvation; that it is so plain in all the essentials pertaining to the glory of the Creator, and the happiness of the creatures, that he that runs may read.

Serious candidate for immortality, to which class do you belong? If you profess to take Christ as your guide, be consistent at least with yourself. Christ said, Search the scriptures for in them you think you have eternal life, and they are they that testify of me. To the law and the testimony should be your appeal for the truth of every statement of doctrine. There are some that "cannot endure sound doctrine," and their number is on the increase. In the struggle that is fast approaching between truth and error, those only will be the "invincible," who understand the Holy Scriptures, and have felt their sanctifying power.

As corroborative evidence of the completeness of the Scriptures as their own interpreter, I give the following remarks of Bishop Horsley:

"It should be a rule with every one who would read the Holy Scriptures with advantage and improvement, to compare every text which may seem either important for the doctrine it may contain, or remarkable for

the turn of the expression, with the parallel passages in other parts of holy writ; that is, with the passages in which the subject matter is the same, the sense equivalent, or the turn of expression similar.

"It is incredible to any one who has not in some degree made the experiment, what a proficiency may be made in that knowledge which maketh wise unto salvation, by studying the Scriptures in this manner, without any other commentary or exposition of them, what the different parts of the sacred volume mutually furnish for each other.

"I will not scruple to assert that the most illiterate Christian, if he can but read the English Bible, and will take the pains to read it in this manner, will not only attain all that practical knowledge which is necessary to his salvation, but by God's blessing will become enlightened in every thing relating to his religion, to such a degree that he will not be liable to be misled, either by the refined arguments, or by the false assertions, of those who endeavor to engraft their own opinions upon the oracles of God.

"He may safely be ignorant of all philosophy except what is to be learned from the sacred books, which indeed contain the highest philosophy adapted to the lowest apprehensions.

"He may safely remain ignorant of all history except so much of the history of the first ages of the Jewish and Christian church, as is to be gathered from the canonical books of the Old and New Testaments. Let him study these in the manner I recommend, and let him never cease to pray for the illumination of that Spirit by which these books were dictated, and the whole compass of abstruse philosophy and recondite history will furnish no argument with which the perverse will of man shall be able to shake this learned Christian's faith. The Bible thus studied will indeed prove to be what we Protestants esteem it, a certain and sufficient rule of faith and practice, a helmet of salvation which alone may quench the fiery darts of the wicked."