Review and Herald, Vol. 39, No. 17. (4/9/1872)

Review and Herald

Apr 9, 1872

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Apr 9, 1872

CONCERNING THE CHANGE OF THE SABBATH TO SUNDAY

By M. E. Cornell

Testimony of Eminent Authors.—No. 5.

BY ELD. M. E. CORNELL.

CONCERNING THE CHANGE OF THE SABBATH TO SUNDAY.

Many suppose that if there is no Scripture proof for the change of the Sabbath, there is, at least, some good, reliable history in favor of the change, showing that it was effected as early as the second or third century, and giving an opinion that it was done by the apostles. But when we carefully examine all the evidence, we find that the proof against Sunday-keeping and in favor of the ancient Sabbath, is overwhelming. It appears that the substitution of the Sunday in the place of the ancient Sabbath was at first a matter of mere human policy, to please the pagans, by imitating them in the observance of their chief day dedicated by them to the god of day.

Dr. Priestley well observes: “The primitive Christians had no festivals besides Sunday on which they always met for public worship, as may be inferred from Justin Martyr. This day Constantine ordered to be observed as a day of rest from labor; but husbandmen were allowed to cultivate the earth on that day. By degrees, however, in imitation of the Jews or heathens, but chiefly the latter, Christians came to have as many annual festivals as the heathen themselves.”—Corruptions of Christianity, p. 131.

Dr. Cox, in his Literature, &c., says: “All who claim any knowledge of the works of the fathers say that these ancient writers usually, if not invariably, speak of the Lord’s day [Sunday] as an independent institution, of which neither the fourth commandment, nor a primeval Sabbath, is once referred to as the foundation.”—Cox’s Lit., p. 12. See also Heylin, part ii, chap. ii; Taylor’s Life of Jesus, part ii, sec. xii, dis. x, § 24; Baxter’s Practical Works, xiii, 386; Cook, ii, 291–303; Holden, p. 334; Bannesman, 130; Neale, 90, 237; Domville, i, 291–9; Bunsen, Hippolytus, iii, 76.

IMPORTANT QUESTION.

Did the fathers ascribe the observance of Sunday to the injunctions or example of Jesus or his apostles?

“In regard to the fathers who wrote before the reign of Constantine, and whose opinions are alone of importance, Domville, after elaborate inquiry, answers this question in the negative, nor can he discover that any of them has appealed to the Christian Scriptures in proof of a Christian Sabbath. Equally unable is Mr. Baden Powell to find that these writers, in any instance, pretend to allege any divine command, or even apostolic practice in support of its observance.”—Kitto Cyc. Bib. Lit., ii, 270; Cox, p. 125.

Of Luther, Calvin, and others, Dr. Cox says: “They failed to see in the New Testament any of those indications which the puritans were the first to discover, of a transference of the Sabbath to the first day of the week, by Jesus or the apostles.” Cox, vol. i, p. 127.

In a note in vol. i, p. 257, Cox says: “The early fathers give no support, direct or indirect, to the notion that the Sabbath had been transferred at all; but it is not surprising that those who wrote after the enactment by Constantine that Sunday should be kept as a Sabbath, were more apt to discover reasons for such observance of it.”

Of the change of the Sabbath, John Milton says: “The reason for which the command itself was originally given, namely, as a memorial of God’s having rested from the creation of the world, cannot be transferred from the seventh day to the first; nor can any new motive be substituted in its place, whether the resurrection of our Lord or any other, without the sanction of a divine commandment.” “If we under the gospel are to regulate the time of our public worship by the prescriptions of the decalogue, it will surely be far safer to observe the seventh day according to the express commandment of God than on the authority of mere human conjecture to adopt the first.”—St. John’s ed., B. iv.

The National Cyclopedia has the following: “It has been held by many eminent divines, that there is not sufficient evidence in the New Testament for such an institution; that the change of day from the seventh to the first day of the week is an insuperable difficulty.”—Nat. Cyc., Art. Sabbath.

On keeping Sunday, Taylor remarks: “The historic reason for believing that they did so is drawn partly from the two or three allusions to it in the New Testament; and partly, we might say chiefly, from the incidental and the explicit mention of the practice by the early Christian writers, as well as by Pliny, Plutarch, and others. “If we imagine ourselves entirely deprived of this latter portion of the evidence on this point, it must be admitted that the argument in support of an institution so vitally connected as it is found to be with the very existence of religion in the world, would be reduced to a slender and precarious inference, or argument from analogy. Here, then, we are absolutely compelled, and those especially who are rigid more than others in their regard to the Lord’s day are compelled to resort to the aid of ancient usage, as recorded, not by inspired, but by uninspired, writers.”—An. Christianity, p. 51.

Gregory says: “Constantine commanded the first day of the week to be celebrated with peculiar solemnity: and, in time, this practice extended over the whole Christian world.”—Hist. Church, p. 190.

Dr. Peter Heylin, on the festivals, Sunday, and saint’s days, inquires: “Indeed, why should not both be observed alike, the saints’ days being dedicated unto God as the Lord’s day is, and standing both of them on the same authority,” &c. “The choosing of the times was left to the church’s power, and she designed the saints’ days as she did the Lord’s; both his, and both allotted to his service only. This made St. Bernard ground them all, the Lord’s day and the other holy days, on the fourth commandment.”—Hist., p. 457.

Alexander Campbell, on the change of the Sabbath, says: “But some say it was changed from the seventh to the first day. Where? when? and by whom? No man can tell. No; it never was changed, nor could it be, unless creation was to be gone through again; for the reason assigned must be changed before the observance or respect to the reason can be changed! It is old wives’ fables to talk of the change of the Sabbath from the seventh to the first day. If it be changed, it was that august personage changed it who changes times and laws ex officio. I think his name is Dr. Antichrist.”—Christian Bap., vol. i, p. 44.

Family Divisions.

By Dudley Marvin Canright

BY ELD. D. M. CANRIGHT.

Division in the family is a very unhappy circumstance, looked at in its best light, and a thing to be avoided as far as possible, when it can be done without sacrificing principles of right. “How can two walk together except they be agreed?” and how can two live together except they be agreed? Harmony and unison of sentiment and action in a family is a thing greatly to be desired. Yet the religion of Christ and of the Bible, from the days of Abel and of Cain till the present time, has often had to bear the responsibility of making a division of families; and no slight odium is brought upon it by this fact, though very unjustly.

The advocates of present truth have to meet this in almost every place they go. Some member of the family, frequently the wife, sometimes the husband, perhaps a son or daughter, becomes convicted of their duty to obey God and keep all his commandments. They fear God—they have a regard for the right, and they are conscientious in obeying what they are convinced is the law of God; but other members of the family do not see the arguments of God’s word in the same light, or do not care to obey if they do see, and feel much opposed to having any members of the family obey it. Often a strong and violent opposition is raised in this manner, hard things are said, threats are made, and all the blame is thrown on the one who wishes to embrace what he or she regards as God’s truth.

What shall be done in such cases? We think there can be no question as to what is duty; and it is very clear with whom the responsibility should rest. There was a division in Adam’s family between Abel and Cain. It was carried so far as to finally result in Abel’s martyrdom. Cain slew Abel—“and wherefore slew he him? Because his own works were evil, and his brother’s righteous.” 1 John 3:12. Cain’s hatred of God and of his truth was the immediate cause of this division. All the responsibility rested with him, not with Abel.

Abraham’s family was divided—Isaac and Ishmael. Isaac’s family was divided—Jacob and Esau. Yet in each case the one that made all the trouble and division was the one who did not care to obey God. When Christ came, though the Prince of Peace, and though his advent was heralded with these gracious words, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men” (Luke 2:14), and though he said, “Blessed are the peace-makers” (Matt. 5:19), yet no man ever made greater division, ever divided more families—husband and wife, parents and children, than this same Prince of Peace. Hear his own words: “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me. He that findeth his life shall lose it; and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.” Matt. 10:34–39.

Thus Christ announces the fact beforehand that his religion would have the effect to divide families, one member against another. The result has fully proved his words to be true. The most bitter hatred and lasting divisions, in every age, have been produced by the preaching of Christ.

But, if such fruits follow, should we not then reject the gospel? No, indeed; for really it is not responsible for any of these things, though they always follow with it. Every individual, whatever his or her social condition in life may be, whether it be husband or wife, son or daughter, is under the highest obligation to obey the just and holy God, and love Christ who has died for us. Neither of these duties is inconsistent with the proper discharge of our duties in the family, and to all around us. Indeed, the very aim of true religion is to make better husbands, better wives, and better children.

But why then is there division? For this good reason, namely: It very frequently happens that, while one member of the family, say the wife, fears God, has a tender conscience, and wishes to be a true child of God, the husband, or some other member of the family, does not feel so inclined. One wants to do right, the other does not. This necessarily produces division; but who is to blame? Not the one who does right, but the one who does not do right; and it will always be found that the last-named persons are the ones who make all the trouble when there is any division in the family. They are the ones who find fault, who say hard words, who make unreasonable demands, and who produce all the ill feelings and inconveniences that grow out of the division. They do not obey God themselves, and they are determined that no one else shall, so far as they are able to prevent it. They claim the right to believe and act just as they think proper without any compulsion from anybody else. But this right they are not willing to concede to their companions and other members of the family. All must think and act just as they do or there will be a fuss. This is the reason why the gospel and the truth always have produced divisions, and always will.

Paul encountered the same difficulty in his labors, to such an extent that he found it necessary to give to husbands and wives directions how to act in such cases. He says, “If any brother hath a wife that believeth not, and she be pleased to dwell with him, let him not put her away. And the woman which hath an husband that believeth not, and if he be pleased to dwell with her, let her not leave him. For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband; else were your children unclean; but now are they holy. But if the unbelieving depart, let him depart. A brother or a sister is not under bondage in such cases; but God hath called us to peace. For what knowest thou, O wife, whether thou shalt save thy husband? or how knowest thou, O man, whether thou shalt save thy wife? But as God hath distributed to every man, as the Lord hath called every one, so let him walk. And so ordain I in all the churches.” 1 Cor. 7:12–17.

His advice then is that the believing husband or wife should not depart from, or leave, the unbelieving companion. Though they do oppose them, they are not at liberty to do this. But he does say that, if the unbelieving husband or wife is so much displeased with them for obeying the Lord as to leave them, let them go. The truth and the service of God should not be compromised to serve them. We should obey God rather than man, whoever that man may be. This is the teaching of the Holy Bible on that point, and it is certainly in

harmony with sound sense and common justice. But let us be a little more particular, and illustrate what we mean.

Sister A., after proper investigation and due consideration, is thoroughly convinced that the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord, and that every Christian ought to keep it. She desires to be a true child of God—to obey every known requirement of his. She fears the Lord and has a tender conscience; but her husband does not see it in that light. He does not believe that the seventh day is the Sabbath, or else thinks it does not make any difference what day she keeps; or, not choosing to obey God himself, he does not wish her to keep the Sabbath at any rate. He argues that it will be inconvenient in the family for him to keep one day and her another, &c. Finally, he becomes very much opposed, and requires her to give it up. Now what is her duty in that case? We answer, If the word of God is of any authority, there is no question as to her duty. She must obey God rather than man.

The first and great command is to love God with all thy heart. No relation in life, neither that of wife, nor child, nor citizen, nor subject, can free any one from this duty. As a wife, she is under many and great obligations to her husband and family; but none of these interfere with her proper obedience to the law of God. The man who will not allow his wife this privilege is exceedingly unreasonable. 1. She is a moral, responsible, and personal individual, as well as himself. She does not lose this individual responsibility by her marriage. 2. Her conscience, her sincere belief, her judgment, her convictions of duty, should be respected as well as his. 3. He has no right, in the eyes of God or man, to make his conscience and his desires the rule for her conduct. 4. Any man who has proper love and respect for his wife will be willing to grant her these rights. 5. None but an unreasonable and tyrannical husband would require his wife to yield her conscientious convictions of religious duty, to please him.

If the case be reversed and the wife opposes her husband, the same principle holds good. If these principles are not correct, then we can see no meaning to the language of Christ previously quoted, and the following: “If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.” “So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple.” Luke 14:26, 33. The desires or commands of a husband or wife, father or mother, do not release any one from obeying the requirements of God. God will hold them accountable in the Judgment.

During an experience of several years, I have had a good chance to observe the different plans which some members of the family will use to hinder others from obeying God. The first, and most violent, class make a great ado—threaten to part with their companions, to leave them, to turn them out of doors, and even to kill them, &c., if they do not give up the truth. Too frequently they succeed by this means in scaring them out of it. But frequently I have seen persons who could not be scared in that manner. They had too much common sense, moral courage, and fear of God, to yield to such unreasonable demands and threats. What has been the consequence? Invariably, without a single exception so far as I have ever known, they have succeeded in getting along first rate, and without any further trouble.

The opposing party never carry out their threats. They are the very last ones that will do it. It is a common proverb, but a very sound one, that barking dogs never bite. If the believing companions, in such cases, will take a straightforward, calm, and consistent course, they will gain the victory, and be left ever afterward to enjoy their religious freedom; but, if they yield on the start to the unreasonable and unjust demands of the opposing companions, their liberty is gone, and gone forever. They can set it down as a settled fact that they can never enjoy any liberty of conscience after that. This I have seen tried so many times that I know whereof I affirm.

A second class of opposers take a little more gentle course. They say, You can live out your religious convictions privately, if you will only stay away from the meetings, will not be baptized, will not join the church, &c. After a year’s trial, if you still wish to go, then you may do so. This seems to be more plausible, but it accomplishes its purpose full as effectually as the other, if not more so. The person who yields to this, in the first place, gives up his or her rightful liberty into the hands of another; and in the second place, is shut away from all privileges of the house of God and of receiving any further instructions or encouragement from the prayers, example, exhortations, and teachings of the brethren. Very few persons will continue faithful to the light first received. Their former convictions wear off. They forget the evidence in favor of the truth, lose sight of the importance of obeying it, become discouraged, and finally give it up. The devil rejoices, and a soul is lost.

It is a peculiarly trying position, as we well know, for one in the family to embrace the truth and live it out, while all the rest are opposed to it. It brings great responsibility upon that individual, and he will need much wisdom, prudence, and the help of God. But there are many considerations which should strengthen them for this task. 1. Their own soul’s salvation is at stake. They cannot afford to lose this for family, for friends, or for the world. 2. If this truth is important for them, it is equally important for their family. In the providence of God, one member of the family has been reached and made to see the importance of the truth, while the rest of the family are still blind, and have no love for it. Now, if the one who sees the light turns from it, in all probability none of the rest of the family will ever embrace it, and thus all will be lost together.

On the other hand, if any one member of the family will consistently live it out before them daily, it will keep the truth constantly before them, keep their attention called to it, and give them a living example of its power and beauty. By such a course, if there is any tender spot in their soul, any desire to know the right and to do it, they will sooner or later be brought to embrace it. How often, how repeatedly, I have seen this accomplished. Sometimes it is months, frequently years, and sometimes ten or fifteen years. What a glorious victory! worth a life’s effort. It is an end to be coveted rather than to be shunned. If, by patience, by a faithful life of earnest, daily prayer, we can finally succeed in bringing our dear friends to love and obey the Lord and his truth, how great a satisfaction it will be to us, and what a glorious reward in the kingdom of God. All should view it in this light, and then set themselves determinedly to accomplish it. There is a power in the truth lived out in a godly life, that few can resist.

Sometimes we see great lack of wisdom and lack of the spirit of Christ manifested in those thus situated. They make their views too prominent in the family conversation. They urge them too strongly and too frequently. They do not show that respect for others’ views and feelings that they should. They are too ready to condemn everybody and everything but themselves. They are not as gentle and as accommodating as they ought to be. While they should never yield the truth, nor sacrifice their religious principles, yet in everything where these are not at stake, they should be as gentle and yielding as doves, show daily by words of affection and little acts of kindness that, in receiving the truth, you have received the good spirit of Christ.

Finally, be firm in the truth, never yielding that for friend or foe, but be ever ready to sacrifice anything else to win your friends to the Lord.

“NONE BUT CHRIST.”

CHRIST—none but Christ! to him I sing; To Christ the contrite spirit bring, In humble, grateful lays, To him, most dear, least understood, Who waits, when fails all other good, To take that love which, bought with blood, The soul reluctant pays.

Oh! sick of disappointment’s pain, Of friendship false, ambition slain, Of pleasure’s vain control; Weary and worn to him apply; Learn from the Meek and Lowly why There’s none but Christ can satisfy The restless, longing soul!

In none but Christ all fullness dwells— The love that evermore upwells— From its pure source unspent; The mortal feels immortal might; Opposing natures yet unite; The finite claims the Infinite, With none but Christ content.

Oh! none but Christ remains the same, While faints and flickers every flame By human passion fed; He living food alone supplies; The heart, a-hungered, eager tries Earth’s nourishment—grows sick, and dies; Christ only is true bread.

Grow strong, my soul, on Christ alone! Shine in the likeness of his own; Filled with his fullness be; Cherish no hope, no love, no aim, That is not blended with his name; His glory be thy only fame; None, none but Christ for me!

—New York Observer.

Turning the Tables.

In an address before the Sunday-school Teacher’s Institute lately held at Plainfield, N. J., the Rev. Dr. John Hall spoke to the question of alleged scientific objections to the truth of the Bible:

When I speak in the tone necessary and proper for me to speak to you now and here, there are some who may be liable to the impression that we, who love and stand up for the Bible, have some kind of hostility to science—that we dislike it. I testify for myself, and for a great mass of intelligent people that love the Bible and teach it, that we have no hostility to science. On the contrary, we are very thankful for it; we are glad for the information it furnishes; and we do not hesitate to remind scientific men that the sciences that they and we love, have always flourished most where the Bible has had most sway. It is to the quickening of the intellect by revelation that scientific inquiry owes its most splendid progress and most magnificent triumphs. We are not to be interpreted, then, as being unfriendly to scientific inquiry and research.

But I make a distinction. Humboldt, Agassiz, Franklin, Lyell, Darwin, Huxley, Tyndall, Faraday, and many other highly thoughtful men, have the opportunity given to them that is not given to me, of observing, describing, and circulating, the knowledge of facts. I am very grateful to them for the facts. I should not know about them but for their researches. But when they come to reason upon these facts, they use just the same kind of mind that God has given me; and I endeavor to use my mind upon these facts aright, just as truly as they claim to use their minds upon the facts. Hence, while I am grateful for the facts, when they have been put down upon the table before me, and I look at them and they look at them, I claim the right to reason upon them just as truly as they can claim it; and I do not think the less of myself if in many instances I draw conclusions from the facts that have thus become common property, that are not the conclusions that they venture to draw!

Sometimes these good friends are apparently exceedingly indignant when we, who are ministers, venture into the domain of science. They think it a kind of impertinence! I have just as good a right to count it impertinent on their part to enter into the domain of theology. Nay, more, I venture to say that many of us who are ministers, know more about science than they do about theology. I remember saying in the midst of a crowded meeting of very highly educated men in the city of New York—of whom I am afraid a goodly number were not very warm believers—that I should like to have the chance of examining a class selected from among them upon the evidences of the Christian religion! And I say that I have just as much right to criticise Huxley and Darwin, when they travel out of the scientific into the religious and theological, as they do when I travel into the domain of their science.

Making this explanation, I turn now to the statement, from which this is a diversion, namely, that Sir Charles Lyell has made many contributions to our knowledge of geological facts. I do not mean to say that he has always been precise and accurate in his statement of facts. He has taken a good deal on trust, and his facts, as well as his conclusions, have to be sifted. But he has told us a good many facts, and suggested a good many, to the effect that we can no more stand up for the historic truth of the Bible as to creation.

Here is one of his arguments, for example. The banks of the Mississippi are a rich alluvial soil, supposed to have been deposited by successive overflowings of the stream in pre-historic ages. There was a bone of a man found—one bone—near Natchez, in Mississippi. That one bone of a man has achieved rather more celebrity, I think, than almost any living man in the State. It has been a more famous bone, I presume, than ever the owner of it expected himself to be.

That bone was found under such circumstances that by a very convenient law of generalizing, Sir Charles Lyell concluded that it must have been deposited at a certain depth beneath the surface. Now he had a calculation. He held the uniformitarian theory, and labored to establish it with success for a while. He had the theory that when the Mississippi deposited one-fiftieth part of an inch of soil this year, it deposited one-fiftieth part of an inch last year, and one-fiftieth part the year before, and so on; so that in fifty years it deposited one inch of soil. Very well. You can then calculate how long it would take to deposit a foot, and ten feet, and twenty feet, and two hundred feet; and then, if you should find a human bone at the depth of two hundred feet, what follows? Why, that when those two hundred feet began to be deposited, there were human beings on the soil. If, mind you—a big IF—this conclusion is just, then it follows clearly that America has been peopled by a human race one hundred thousand years before the beginning of our Mosaic Creation! That was the argument.

Well, but wiser men than Sir Charles Lyell doubted. They said, Let us see. Will this uniformitarian theory stand? Can it be proved that just as every leaf of this book is equally thick, so every year deposited an equally thick stratum? Can it be proved, Sir Charles? No, it cannot be proved. A rainy year will make a thicker deposit than a dry one; some years there would be no deposit at all, and other years it would be heavier and thicker. There is no such thing as uniformity in it. . . . The officers of the United States Survey having occasion to examine with the utmost care and scientific research the whole of that deposit about the mouths of the Mississippi, have come to the conclusion, and established it upon scientific ground, that the whole of that deposit is less than five thousand years old! Thus not only completely upsetting, in that department, Sir Charles’ uniformitarian theory, but so far as they have contributed anything to the subject, it has been completely corroborative of the Mosaic account of creation and of the early history of our race.

No. There are things that are obsolete. There are old objections to the Bible that are obsolete. There are scientific theories opposed to it that are obsolete. There are charges against it that are obsolete. There are educated men who have called it “obsolete,” but they have only in every case confirmed the old aphorism of Lord Bacon, “that a little learning has led many men away from Revelation, but more has served to bring them back to it!”—Sel.

An Hour’s Talk.

John Janway once sat silent, and wrote down in short hand the discourse of some that professed to have a peculiar acquaintance with religion, and afterward read it to them: “Oh!” said he, “to spend an hour or two together, and to hear scarcely a word for Christ, or that brings people’s hearts in love with holiness! Where is our love to God and souls all this while? Where is our sense of the preciousness of time, of the greatness of our account? Should we talk thus if we believed that we should hear of this again at the day of Judgment? And do we not know that we must give an account of every idle word? Did saints in former times use their tongues to no better purpose? Would Enoch, or Paul, have talked thus? Is this the sweetest communion of saints upon earth? How shall we spend an eternity in speaking the praises of God if we cannot find matter for an hour’s discourse?”

Advent Thoughts.

“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good-will toward men.”

“Whatsoever things were written aforetime, were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope.”

THE word advent is itself calculated to awaken thought and kindle expectation. It summons me to watch and prepare for One who is coming; it says, “Awake, thou that sleepest, and Christ shall give thee light.” It calls upon me to make ready my heart to receive with joyful welcome Him who bringeth salvation; and if I fully realized my fallen, lost condition by nature, should I not rejoice with joy unspeakable in the belief that there is One who is able to save to the uttermost those who come to him?

While bearing, then, in my heart this precious truth, all through the days and months of the year, as the “chief corner-stone” of my hope, let me endeavor to remember the subject of the advent with peculiar reverence and joy. Let me meditate more upon that wondrous love which brought the Son of God down from Heaven to this sinning, suffering, lost world; and let me remember that if I fail to profit by the blessings of the first advent, that there is another, when his coming shall be in “glorious majesty to judge both the quick and dead.”

Almighty God, give us grace, that we may cast away the works of darkness, and put upon us the armor of light now, in the time of this mortal life, in which thy Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great humility—that in the last day, when he shall come again in his glorious majesty, to judge both the quick and dead, we may rise to the life immortal, through Him who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, now and ever! Amen.—Churchman.

The Lord Is My Shepherd

THE Lord is my Shepherd, first, in watchfulness; he is quick to see our dangers; second, in tenderness—carrying us in his arms in trouble and depression; third, persevering fidelity; fourth, boundless power. When the thorns pierce, turn to him. When you feel the burden of sin, think of him. The most secret sin of conscience he can light upon and heal.

Dried-up Christians.

By T. L. Cuyler

THIS is the season of droughts. To-day I went up to re-visit the picturesque little waterfall on the Caldeno Creek, which lies up on the mountain back of the Delaware Water Gap. When I saw it last it was foaming over the mossy rock like a miniature Minnehaha. But this morning I found only a bare, dry rock, over the center of which trickled a slender thread of water which was soon lost among the bare stones beneath. The evergreens and the rhododendrons encircled the sweet spot as before; everything was there but the water. The cascade had died of drought.

As I looked at the feeble dribble over the rock, I saw in it a picture of more than one professed disciple of Jesus. There is my friend Hopeful, who was once among the foremost in our Sabbath-schools and our prayer-meetings. He was full of zeal, and beneath all the sound, there seemed to be a great deal of substance. We expected him to prove a perennial disciple, “always abounding” in the work of the Lord. But he has unaccountably dried up. His forsaken Sabbath-school class are dependent on “stated supplies,” or go without a teacher; his seat in the prayer-meeting is empty, and when he comes in to the table where the band of Christ’s followers are commemorating their Master’s love, he is a Thomas among them. The difficulty with our backsliding brother is the same as that with yonder creek on the mountainside. The fountain-head of his graces has run dry, and he has had no heavenly rains upon his parched soul for months. I suspect that he has about abandoned secret prayer, or maintains it as an empty form. When prayer stops, death begins. Just as soon attempt to keep up a fresh fruit-bearing piety without prayer, as to make a tea-rose bloom in a Greenwood vault. I fear, too, that with the decline of secret prayer there has been a stealthy growth of secret sins. The root of the whole melancholy declension is in the heart; and nothing but a thorough heart-work, a deep re-conversion, can ever make brother Hopeful what he was in his days of hale and happy usefulness.

I observe, too, a sad falling off with my neighbor Lovetrade. He was once an open-handed contributor to every enterprise of charity. There was a full stream from his liberal purse which watered many a thirsty spot. But now he gives rarely and stingily. What is to pay? I suspect that somewhere above the falls he has opened a sly cut-off of self-indulgence, which drains away nearly all his income. The water runs into another channel. He has built a four-story “brown-stone front.” I hear of him as driving a pair of full-blooded bays in the Park. His spouse gives grand entertainments, and there are big bills at the wine-merchant’s and the confectioner’s. The “lust of the eye and the pride of life” are drawing off through their greedy outlet the bounteous stream which once made many a heart green with gladness. He only trickles now; he used to pour. Poor Lovetrade will never be a rich man again “toward God,” until he stops up that waste-pipe of selfish extravagance, and lets the current flow back into the old channel. To-day he is sorely tempting Providence to bankrupt him; for his prosperity is fast turning him into a spiritual pauper. The worst of it is that Lovetrade is tainting others by his bad example, and his stingy contributions are finding imitators in the fashionable church he “patronizes” by his presence.

We might multiply these cases of dried-up Christians. Nay, we could point to whole churches which have run as low as Caldeno waterfall. In the pentecostal days of revivals, how they gushed forth in gladness, and sparkled with spiritual joys in the sunshine! What music there was in the cataract! But when the freshet had spent the surplus waters, the rejoicing river shrank back again into a slender rivulet; and they are now “parched with the drought of summer.”

What is the remedy for this fitful, periodic piety, this disgraceful alternation of revival and declension, of foaming fullness and a pitiful dribble of August drought? Did God decree that his people should run low like summer brooks, and is this the normal condition of the church which Jesus redeemed unto himself? Is there not divine fullness which can keep a believer always full to the brim, and can make the whole church as steady in its flow as the majestic currents of Niagara? It is an insult to the divine Author of our holy religion to suppose that, either in its constitution or in that of human nature, there is a necessity for such periodic alternations. Our God is not a fickle, fitful giver of his grace, and his service is not a temporary spasm of excitement; and when the all-sufficient Saviour said, “I am with you alway,” he made no provision for an intermittent Christianity. When Jesus is thoroughly within a man’s heart, and that soul replenishes itself with him, then is he a “well of water springing up into everlasting life.” As Christ is inexhaustible, why should a Christian ever run dry?

Paul was never parched with drought. That stream of living waters which irrigates the earth to this hour had its fountain-head in Christ. “Not I,” exclaimed the glorious old apostle, “not I, but Christ that liveth in me.” And the only reason why any healthy, effective Christian runs full to the banks is that the love of Jesus is welling up into his soul by day by night. His reservoir is infinite, and he is “filled with all the fullness of God.” There are some Christians whom you could no more exhaust by drafts on their graces than you could drain Niagara by tapping its banks with mill-races. And when I meet with a perennial Christian, who never disappoints me, who is always abounding, who is ready for any service, who is as good behind the counter as he is on his knees, who can be as cheerful in a storm as in the sunshine, whose words fall upon a prayer-meeting like the music of an April rain, who lives near to God and yet quite as near to his fellow mortals—when I meet such an one, I know that his inner life is hid with Christ. That everlasting fountain in his heart is as exhaustless as the Godhead!—T. L. Cuyler.

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