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Review and Herald, Vol. 77, No. 41.

A NEGLECTED WORK

Review and Herald

Oct 9, 1900

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Oct 9, 1900

A NEGLECTED WORK.

By Ellen G. White

MRS. E. G. WHITE.
Every Christian family should illustrate to the world the power and excellence of Christian influence. God designs that every family on earth shall be a symbol of the family in heaven, and parents should realize their accountability to keep their homes free from every taint of moral evil. [Fathers and mothers should teach the infant, the child, and the youth, of the love of Jesus. Let the first baby lispings be of Christ.] The father, the priest of the family, if he is connected with God, will feel a divine charge to set himself apart to the grand and elevating work of saving the souls of his children.
But the work of parents, which means so much, is greatly neglected. Awake, parents, from your spiritual slumber, and understand that the very first teaching the child receives is to be given to him by you. You are to teach your little ones to know Christ. This work you must do before Satan sows his seeds in their hearts. Christ calls the children, and they are to be led to him, educated in habits of industry, neatness, and order. This is the discipline Christ desires them to receive.
Parents, your children's future success depends on the home discipline they receive during their early years. If you have allowed Satan to discipline and control them, if you have not taken up and fulfilled your God-given responsibilities, if you have neglected to seek the Lord for wisdom to enable you to co-operate with him in the work of training your children, if you have not taught them what it means to do the will of God, their lives will testify to your neglect.
The lessons given during the first years of life determine the future of the child. In husbandry, plants need constant and diligent care at the very first, that they may grow symmetrically. So it is with children. From the earliest moments of their life the children are learners. They are built up by what they see and hear, and parents are sowing the seed that will yield a harvest, either for weal or for woe. If pleasant scenes are kept before them in the home, they will become familiar with Christian courtesy, kindness, and love. But if parents are Christians in name only, and are not doers of the word, they place on their children their own superscription, and not the superscription of God. Children long for something to impress the mind. For Christ's sake, parents, give their hungering, thirsting souls something upon which to feed.
Children are naturally active, and if parents do not furnish them with employment, Satan will invent something to keep them busy in an evil work. Therefore train your children to useful work. But do not feel it your duty to make their lives unpleasant. The unpleasantness will come fast enough. Bring all the pleasure possible into your exercises as teacher and educator of your children. Encourage them to make a companion of you. Sinful impulses, sinful inclinations, and objectionable habits you will surely find in your children; but if you encourage them to seek your society, you can give a right mold to their tastes and feelings, and banish discontent, repining, and rebellion. Overcome their pride by giving them an example of meekness and lowliness of heart.
A woe rests upon parents who have not trained their children to be God-fearing, but have allowed them to grow to manhood and womanhood undisciplined and uncontrolled. During their own childhood they were allowed to manifest passion and willfulness and to act from impulse, and they bring this same spirit into their own homes. They are defective in temper, and passionate in government. Even in their acceptance of Christ they have not overcome the passions that were allowed to rule in their childish hearts. They carry the results of their early training through their entire religious life. It is a most difficult thing to remove the impress thus made upon the plant of the Lord; for as the twig is bent, the tree is inclined. If such parents accept the truth, they have a hard battle to fight. They may be transformed in character, but the whole of their religious experience is affected by the lax discipline exercised over them in their early lives. And their children have to suffer because of their defective training; for they stamp their faults upon them to the third and fourth generation.
This is a serious question, and one that should be carefully and prayerfully studied by those who have children, that they may know how to educate their little ones to be Christians. How many parents there are who are too careless and selfish to try to overcome the rude traits in their own characters lest they be perpetuated in the characters of their children. Such parents need to think solemnly of the training they are giving the younger members of the Lord's family.
The neglect of parents to train their children makes the work of the teacher doubly hard. The children bear the stamp of the unruly, unamiable traits revealed by their parents. Neglected at home, they regard the discipline of the school as oppressive and severe. Such children, if not carefully guarded, will leaven other children by their undisciplined, deformed characters. They practice deception by misrepresenting their school matters to their parents. They complain of their teachers and the rules, and parents believe their testimony before the testimony of Christian teachers who are seeking to do their duty in the fear of God. Thus the work of the teacher is made much more taxing than it should be, because parents have not the truth stamped upon their hearts. The good that children might receive in school to counteract their defective home training, is undermined by the sympathy which their parents show for them in their wrong-doing.
Shall parents who believe the word of God continue their crooked management, and confirm in their children their evil propensities? Fathers and mothers professing the truth for this time might better come to their senses, and no longer be partakers in this evil, no longer carry out Satan's devices by accepting the false testimony of their unconverted children. It is enough for teachers to have the children's influence to contend with, without having the parents' influence also.
This great work is a work that can be done only by the Holy Spirit. And the Spirit can not do this unless parents welcome Christ into their hearts as an abiding guest. The Holy Spirit must be honored in the temple of the soul, where he delights to dwell.

Gifts Differing.

By Minnie L. Upton

See how the flowers of the wood and field Look upward to the sun, And take the wondrous largess he doth yield To each and everyone:
The daisy needeth whiteness like the snow, And store of sunny gold; The stately lilies crave the power to glow In colors manifold;
The honeysuckle asketh perfume sweet To glad both great and small; Still other suppliants, other gifts entreat — The great sun giveth all.
O brothers, sisters,— ye who strive to be All ye can be for God,— The Sun of righteousness doth shine, and ye, With feet on common sod,
May look above for aid. What do ye need— Patience for ills that grieve? Strength? gentleness? faith? hope? Ask ye with speed. Freely shall ye receive.
Thou with the need so sore thou scarce canst pray Thou with the need so small That thou dost blush to voice it, ask — ye may! The great Sun giveth all.
— Minnie L. Upton.

A STUDY IN THE PSALMS.

By Rev. Wm. P. Pearce.

REV. WM. P. PEARCE. (Golden, Ind.)

PSALM 117.

There are just as many books in the Bible as there are chapters in Isaiah—sixty-six; but there is no book which contains stronger appeals to human experience, and better fits every circumstance of life,—a book which is read more, sung more, memorized more,—than the Psalms, which consists of one hundred and fifty lyric poems. In this psalmody is a variety of themes, dealing with the practical, experimental, and doctrinal. It sings of the law and history. It glows with Messianic promise and prophecy. It denounces sin, aids to repentance, and points to a future life. The whole book is one rainbow of mercy, a mine of treasure, and a hive of the sweetest honey.
No doubt David sang some of the psalms to the accompaniment of the harp, and Isaiah, Jeremiah, and the prophets chanted them. With psalms, Jehoshaphat and Hezekiah celebrated their victories. From them, the Maccabees drew courage in their struggles to achieve their country’s independence. Verse 12 of Psalm 118 was sung louder than the din of battle, as the Protestant army achieved their victory at Cortas. Psalm 58 gave the Huguenots their “Song of Battles.” Cromwell and his Invincibles, after the battle of Dunbar, sang Psalm 107. Luther called the forty-sixth his “Battle Hymn.” Daniel Webster listened to the reading of the twenty-third as he lay dying. The Scotch Presbyterians sing only psalms in their worship; and all lovers of the sacred Scriptures find great comfort in their inspired truths.

SHORTEST PSALM.

The one hundred and nineteenth is the longest psalm, the one hundred and seventeenth the shortest. Yea, more, it is the shortest chapter in the Bible; but, as Spurgeon said: “Though very little in its letter, it is exceedingly large in its spirit.” It takes in the whole world; for it says: “O praise the Lord, all ye nations: praise him, all ye people.” The longest verse in the Bible is Esther 8:9, with ninety words, or four hundred and twenty-six letters. Psalm 117 contains but thirty-three words, or one hundred and thirty-three letters. But of so great importance was it that Paul, in his address to the Romans, refers to it when speaking of the dissemination of the gospel among the Gentiles and heathen: “Praise the Lord, all ye Gentiles; and laud him, all ye people.” Rom. 15:11.

MIDDLE CHAPTER.

Not only is Psalm 117 the shortest chapter, but it is also the middle chapter, of the Bible, and, doubtless because of its brevity and character, was used in the worship of the pious Hebrews in the same connection as we use the doxology. Regarding each psalm as a chapter, and each book which is too short to be divided, there are eleven hundred and eighty-nine chapters, this being the middle one, with five hundred and ninety-four on each side of it.

PRAISE.

Praise is the beginning and also the closing thought. In fact, the author repeats the words, “Praise ye the Lord,” a score of times in this book. Praise to God is as indicative of our love to him as is prayer. Prayer helps us to resist temptation, but praise says that we have gained a victory over it. Prayer precedes, but praise succeeds. Prayer helps us to take hold of God; but by praise God takes hold of us. How beautiful has Kempthorne written:— > “Praise the God of our salvation; > Hosts on high, his power proclaim; > Heaven and earth, and all creation, > Laud and magnify his name.”
But the praise of this chapter is specific rather than general. It is specific in its character: “For his merciful kindness is great toward us: and the truth of the Lord endureth forever.” It is specific in its utterance: “Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto thy name give glory, for thy mercy, and for thy truth’s sake.” Ps. 115:1.

GOD’S KINDNESS.

The first thing in the analysis of this chapter is God’s kindness; or, in other words, his affectionate disposition toward the human race. The history of life is a history of kindnesses. But this kindness here mentioned is of no ordinary kind. There is a kind of kindness without the mercy. Kindness will assist the starving enemy; but merciful kindness will forgive him also.
During the Revolutionary War a Dunkard leader named Miller was grievously insulted by a man named Widman, who was afterward sentenced to be hanged as a British spy. Miller went to General Washington and begged for Widman’s life. The commander-in-chief replied: “I would like to release Widman, because he is your friend; but I can not, even for that consideration.” “Friend!” cried Miller, “why, he is my worst enemy, and therefore I want to save him.” That was merciful kindness, and such kindness won his pardon. How true of God with us! Were we not enemies? Had we not sinned against him in an awful manner? But— > “He saw me ruined in the fall, > Yet loved me, notwithstanding all; > He saved me from my lost estate; > His loving-kindness, O how great!”

HIS TRUTH.

The second thought in this analysis is his truth. This means the whole word of God intact. Here, in plain language, we have his revealed will by which we can learn to live and die. It matters little to me if some men declare that it contains errors; for I believe it to be as unerring as the “loadstone” that attracts the needle and makes it point to the north. I care little whether men declare it uninspired; for I see that it inspires others. It worries me not, if “higher critics” and agnostics oppose it; for, bless God, his truth can never be deposed. It “endureth forever;” and Christ added to this when he said: “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.” Matt. 24:35.

RESOLUTION.

This being the case, let us all form this resolution, “I will walk in thy truth.” Ps. 86:11. To walk in the truth is to walk with God as Enoch walked, and as the two disciples walked with Jesus on the way to Emmaus. Let us lift up our voices and say:— > “Let the sweet hope that Thou art mine > My life and death attend; > Thy presence through my journey shine, > And crown my journey’s end.”

PHILIP GIDDINGS

By Philip Giddings

“Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and your labor for that which satisfieth not?” Isa. 55 : 2. They waste talent and toil who spend this life in seeking only earthly things. Vanity of vanities, all is vanity—a vain shadow—a hallucination, “as when an hungry man dreameth, and, behold, he eateth; but he awaketh, and his soul is empty: or as when a thirsty man dreameth, and, behold, he drinketh; but he awaketh, and, behold, he is faint, and his soul hath appetite.” Isa. 29 : 8.

PHILIP GIDDINGS

RELATIONSHIPS

By Della Rees

Della Rees, in Triumphs of Faith.
It is a very common thing for Christians, and even deeply spiritual ones, to give much of their attention to the matter of experience; and it is perhaps a fact that a large per cent of our spiritual instructors call our attention in this direction.
People are frequently asked, “What is your experience?” or, “What kind of an experience have you to-day?” Some are much elated, and rejoice to tell of a very blessed experience in Christian life; while others are much distraught, because they have not found such blessedness; and yet others realize they have not so good an experience as they once had. And many become morbidly occupied with their mental and spiritual conditions, utterly failing to see that it is our relationships that may be secure and eternally the same, and not our experiences.
Experience is a transient—that is, an ever-changing—fruit of life. We are not called to experiences; they are incidents of our calling. We are called “unto the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord.” And what does fellowship mean? Something more than a fellow feeling. Fellowship involves companionship, and companionship must rest upon common relationship.
So the question that should occupy our attention is one of relationship. And our relationships, settled and kept right, make experience a subservient thing in all its varied phases, working hope in the heart. The life that has its source deeply hidden in the settled relationships of the will of God, will find a continual flow of living water, and will be “like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not;” while the life that has its source in the surface springs of experience must fluctuate, and frequently find itself dried up in the sand-bogs of self and worldliness. Such a one will often find a time of drought.
But you ask: Are not relationships experimental?—Indeed, they are. They belong to the realm of experimental knowledge and real consciousness; but they exist in the will, and not in the sensibilities of man. My relationship toward God has to do with the attitude of my will toward God’s will; and if this is perfect, if my will unreservedly and deeply choose his will, it will draw my entire being to share the same, my powers to do his will, and finally my feelings to rejoice in his will.
It is well to note the passing conditions of experiences of a life in Christ and a walk with God; but it is a sad thing to become so occupied with these that the relationship of the will becomes unbalanced, and no longer draws the individual, consciously and unconsciously, to choose and delight in the will of God outside of selfish interests. All of the abiding fruits of a Christian life must spring from the facts of relationship to God. O soul, distraught and troubled from a morbid habit of looking inward on the mental and spiritual conditions of self, look up, see Jesus, and believe that he has chosen you to certain ends in life, which will involve the unfolding of his will in every day; and you have but to choose his choice, and acquiesce in the actual unfailings of his purpose, as the days go. And in this attitude you will, like the flower that ever turns its opening petals toward the sun, unconsciously be taking on in character the beautiful colorings of his own personality, while the word of his truth will fructify in the unselfish soil of your heart, and yield in your life a harvest of good for others.

Visit the Sick

By S. O. JAMES

WHEN you feel terribly afflicted, visit the sick. S. O. JAMES.

THE SABBATH-SCHOOL WORK.

By Alonzo T. Jones

A. T. JONES.
If on this occasion I can say something to enable you to see the fullness of the truth expressed in the Sabbath-school lesson that you have studied and recited, I shall be satisfied. I do not know whether in this hour I shall get beyond the first verse of your Sabbath-school lesson. It will make no difference if I do not, because to know the truth, with its consequences, that is expressed in that verse, is to know everything. Indeed, all the verses that follow but express the consequences of the truth of that verse.
That verse reads: “By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.” Rom. 5: 12.
Whosoever believes that, and grasps the fact there stated, is prepared to understand the fullness of the salvation that the Lord Jesus brought to the world. And whosoever does not so grasp that which is stated in this verse as to recognize it constantly, can not grasp, in its truth, in its sincerity, the salvation that Christ has brought.
All have sinned: and death came by sin. But all of us have sinned as the consequence of that which was brought to the world,—because of our being in that vortex into which the world was plunged by the sin of that “one man” to whom God gave the world in the beginning. “By one man sin entered into the world.” When sin had so entered by that one man, it was impossible for any of his, of themselves, to rise above that which he had entailed. It was impossible for any of us to receive from him more than he had. And after he had sinned, sin only was that which he had. Consequently, he sunk the human race under the power of sin—in the sea of sin; and because of that sin we all have sinned; and so death has passed upon all. When that one man sinned, death passed upon him; and he never could draw any of us, any of his posterity, higher than he was. Consequently, when he became subject to death, by sin, we all became subject to death, because, being thus crippled, we all have sinned.
But it is the great problem, to begin with, to get mankind to realize that each one is the subject of death,—that only death is that which belongs to us, as we came into the world, and as we are naturally in the world. If each person in the world would hold upon his heart, would hold in his very consciousness, the truth that death has hold on him,—that to death he is subject, as expressed in the Scripture, though not in our translation: “Death is their shepherd,”—that death is the watchman over all mankind,—that death is to each one as a shepherd herding his flock,—there would be a universal readiness to believe the gospel. But by thousands, even of the people who fear the Lord, and who have a heart to serve him, that truth is not recognized, and by the vast multitudes of people it is not believed at all. And that is why the gospel is allowed so little place in the lives of men.
The deception of thinking that they have life in themselves has been for ages, and is still, the bane of mankind. This deception is couched in the conception of the immortality of the soul. Vast multitudes of the human race, and indeed the whole human race, naturally, as it is, have come under the power of that deception—of thinking that they have life themselves so certainly that even the Lord himself can not deprive them of it. Through the deception in which they are involved, they have come to believe that a part of themselves is “immortal,” and, logically enough, that, therefore, it is “a part of God”—and then the conclusion, “How can God destroy a part of himself?” By that argument they convince themselves that the Lord himself could not destroy them, if he wished to.
The whole human race is naturally under that deception. And the way in which they came under this deception is precisely the way in which they came under the deception of sin. It is a part of the original deception: yea, rather, it is the very kernel of the original deception. For what was it that the deceiver said to the woman, to get her to depart from God into sin? What was it?—“Ye shall not surely die: for God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be like God.” You will be like the divine, and not subject to death. That was the original proposition in the original deception that brought us under sin; that was the original deception into which the race went by that “one man,” by whom came sin and death; and it is not strange that this deception of men’s thinking that they have life in themselves should be as widely disseminated as is sin. The two things came in together; and they belong together forever.
But the Lord spoke otherwise. Before this deceiver spoke, the Lord had said: “In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.” Gen. 2: 17. And this was the truth. It was the truth when he spoke it; it was the truth the day they ate of the tree; and it is the truth forever. And the only reason that Adam and Eve did not die in the very hour that they ate, is that Jesus Christ stepped in between, and took upon himself the curse of sin, and its penalty of death. And this he did in order that mankind might be delivered from the death into which they had been plunged by that “one man.” Therefore, since the Lord Jesus stepped in between, and himself received the stroke of death that must come upon the man the day he sinned; and since the Lord Jesus did this solely in order that the man might have the opportunity to receive life instead of death, it became essential, and in the gift of Christ that day it was given, that the man and all mankind should have sufficient space in which to breathe to allow them to live long enough to fix each his choice of life or death.
That is the origin, that is the source, and that is the philosophy, of the life which now we have in the breath that we draw moment by moment. It all lies solely in the gift of Christ: it is indeed Christ, and only Christ. Each person to-day and ever is directly indebted to Christ for the life which he has in the breath that he draws moment by moment.
But now, this which we have, which mankind call life,—this is not in reality true life. The Scripture has defined it: the word of God has named it, not in a figure, but in a statement of truth in answer to the over-pertinent inquiry, “What is your life?” And you know the answer. “It is even a vapor, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.” James 4: 14.
This life which we have is truly only a vapor. It is given merely as a breath,—“for a little time,”—in order to extend to us the opportunity to seize upon life indeed. Without this life which is but a vapor, we should have no opportunity, man himself anywhere never would have had any opportunity, to partake of life indeed. Surely, if it were not that this life, even though it be truly a vapor, were given us, mankind would never have had any opportunity to breathe at all after Adam sinned. And let it be repeated, for it can not possibly be repeated too often, this breath itself is given us by the gift of the Lord Jesus; and for the breath drawn moment by moment, every soul in the world to-day, and ever, is dependent upon the gift of Christ, which he made when man had sinned.
The word that Jesus spoke, therefore, is literally true,—true in every sense,—when he spoke of himself as “the living bread which came down from heaven,” and “giveth life unto the world.” For all the life that the world has to-day, is because the Lord Jesus gave himself to receive the stroke of death that otherwise must have come upon the man at the beginning, because of the sin that he had sinned. And, in another place, Christ himself said: “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.”
Oh, that tells the whole story again! When did Jesus come, in the meaning of that text? When was his coming? When was he offered? At what time was the offering of Christ made? He is the Lamb “slain from the foundation of the world.” The offering of Christ, in its very substance, was when, in the beginning, the man had sinned, and had become subject to death because of the sin. Then and there Christ gave himself: there he set himself forth as the offering. Though not actually appearing in flesh, as afterward, though not actually dying the death, yet there he gave himself: the gift was as certainly made then as it is now. Consequently, when he came thus at the beginning, he came that mankind might have life; because just then mankind needed life.
Adam and Eve needed life from that day in the garden; for if Jesus had not then offered himself, if he had not then thus “come,” death would have come to them the day that they sinned. But the Lord Jesus came and gave himself, and thus took upon himself all that was to fall upon them, or upon us, that Adam and Eve might receive what was better. And in the nature of things, they must have breath to enable them to live long enough to give them time to choose that which God had brought,—the gift of himself, which is life. Consequently, at that point he came, that mankind might have life. Then, whosoever will take the proper advantage of this breathing space, of this life which is but a vapor, which is given to us solely that we may choose that which is life indeed,—life eternal,—receives life more abundantly. At the moment when the man had incurred death, He came that we might have life, even life enough to allow us to breathe, in order that we might make use of this breathing spell of life in such a way that we should have life more abundantly, even the life which is eternal substance, even as the fullness of the life of God.
So, you can see that this life which all men have for the mere passing moment, is not real life: it is “even a vapor.” And this death that we meet when that vapor “vanisheth away”is not real death: it is a sleep. Only that life which is the life of God is life indeed; and only that death from which there is no resurrection, from whose power there is no possible deliverance,—only that is death indeed. This life which is but a vapor, and this death which is but a sleep, form for mankind a valley of decision between the life which is life indeed and the death which is death indeed. And this life which is life indeed, is the life, and that death which is death indeed, is the death, referred to in the gospel of Christ, in the word of God, in calling us unto himself, and in giving the gift to deliver us from the curse under which we are: “I have set before you life and death. . . . Choose life that you may live.”
So, then, death has passed upon all men: death is the master, death is the sovereign, death is the shepherd, of the human race. But thanks be to God, who gave his only begotten Son; and blessed be the name of the only begotten Son, who gave himself, that we might have life, and that the death might not fall upon us without our deliberate choice.
And behold! in the abundance of his mercy and the greatness of his grace, God gave not merely a single breath to breathe; not haply an hour in which to live; but has given to every one in the world, time upon time, time upon time, hour extended upon hour, day upon day, of this breathing spell, so that, if by any means in the long-suffering of God, each one might receive the gift and lay hold upon life indeed, instead of receiving death indeed at the last, as that which he has fixedly chosen.
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