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Review and Herald, Vol. 45, No. 21.

HAVE SALT IN YOURSELVES

Review and Herald

May 20, 1875

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · May 20, 1875

HAVE SALT IN YOURSELVES.

By A. C. Bourdeau

BY ELD. A. C. BOURDEAU.
TEXT: “Have salt in yourselves, and have peace one with another.” Mark 9:50.
In harmony with this text and its connection, we have the following interesting Scriptures:—
“Ye are the salt of the earth; but if the salt have lost his savor, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.” Matt. 5:13.
“Salt is good; but if the salt have lost his savor, wherewith shall it be seasoned? It is neither fit for the land, nor yet for the dunghill; but men cast it out. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.” Luke 14:34, 35.
The figures used in these texts are very forcible. The salt referred to had the quality of being savory, having a flavor perceivable, as some claim, by the taste and by the smell; and the quality of preserving, as it is used for the preservation of meats, etc.
Those who have salt in themselves in the sense of the text have the grace and favor of God. They abide in Christ, receiving sap and nourishment from the Living Vine; believe, and receive the truth into their hearts in the love of it, and practically carry it out in their lives; and thus preserve themselves, and preserve others by having a salutary influence over them. They have the Christian graces, adding to faith, virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, godliness, etc.; bear the fruits of the Spirit, which are love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, etc.; are Christ’s, having crucified the flesh with its affections and lusts; and are epistles known and read of all men—the light of the world—the salt of the earth.
But many claim to have salt in themselves while they have lost saltness, or savor. They have let the things needful slip; they say, Lord, Lord, but do not the will of God, having the form of godliness, but denying the power thereof; they grieve away the Spirit of God, whereby we are sealed unto the day of redemption; they sow to the flesh, as the non-professor and the ungodly do, and shall of the flesh reap corruption. They cannot preserve themselves, and have no influence for good upon others; the salt in them is “good for nothing, but to be cast out and to be trodden under foot of men.”
“YE ARE THE SALT OF THE EARTH.” The course that our first parents pursued in yielding to temptation and sin, affected not only themselves and their offspring, but the earth also: “Cursed is the ground for thy sake; . . . thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee.” Gen. 3:17–19. The course of Cain in slaying his brother Abel also affected the earth which opened her mouth to receive his brother’s blood from his hand. “When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength.” Gen. 4:12. The wickedness of the antediluvians was great in the earth: “And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; . . . and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.” Gen. 6:12, 13.
The effect of their wickedness, and the traces of the flood which followed, are visible over the whole earth’s surface, which is broken, and has not the appearance that it had before the deluge. And, though after the flood “God said, . . . I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth; . . . and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh” (Gen. 9:12–15); yet had there not been righteous persons—some salt to preserve the earth—all the way along since that time, the whole earth, and the inhabitants thereon, would long since have been destroyed by the terrible judgments of God, as were Sodom and Gomorrah. The sin of those cities was “very grievous;” yet if ten righteous had been found there, the Lord would have spared all the place “for the ten’s sake.” Because that number of righteous persons was not found, only righteous Lot and his two daughters escaped; the Lord “overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities.” Gen. 19:24, 25.
In the last days, at the coming of the Son of man, it will be as it was in the days of Noah, and as it was in the days of Lot. The times will be perilous; the love of many shall wax cold; iniquity shall abound; and “evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived.” Only a few will be found having faith, watching the fulfillment of prophecy, and preparing for Christ’s appearing. And, owing to the increasing wickedness upon the earth, appalling changes and phenomena will take place in the earth and in the heavens also. That the wicked course of the people will affect the earth then, may clearly be seen by the following prophecy which evidently applies in the time of the end: “The earth is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore hath the curse devoured the earth, and they that dwell therein are desolate.” Isa. 24:5, 6.
This principle is made further apparent by the blessings that would attend the children of Israel if they would hearken diligently unto the voice of the Lord their God, to observe and do all his commandments, and by the curses that would attend them if they should disobey, as brought to view in Deut. 28. To those who would obey, the Lord said, “If thou shalt keep the commandments of the Lord thy God, and walk in his ways, . . . the Lord shall make thee plenteous in goods, in the fruit of thy body, in the fruit of thy cattle, and in the fruit of thy ground,” etc. We read further: “The Lord shall open unto thee his good treasure, the heaven to give the rain unto thy land in his season, and to bless all the work of thine hand; . . . if that thou hearken unto the commandments of the Lord thy God, which I command thee this day, to observe and to do them.” Verses 9–14.
We have this principle illustrated also in a prophecy, which applies in the day of Christ’s coming, and which brings to view a system to raise means for the support of those who labor in word and doctrine, and to aid in the advancement of the cause of truth. Through the prophet the Lord addresses his people, who have gone out of the way in robbing him, and “are cursed with a curse,” and says, “Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour out you a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it. And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruits of your ground.” Mal. 3:10, 11.
The righteous few for whom Christ died, have always in every age been very precious in the sight of the Lord; and though the earth has groaned even, under the curse, ever since the fall, and the wickedness of the majority of mankind has been very great; yet, for the righteous’ sake, the earth has been in a measure preserved, and will not “be utterly emptied, and utterly spoiled” (Isa. 24), until that great day when the wickedness of men comes to the full, and their grievous sins come in remembrance before God, to give unto the wicked “the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath.” Rev. 16. Then “the earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall be removed like a cottage; and the transgression thereof shall be heavy upon it; and it shall fall, and not rise again.” Isa. 24:20. But “the meek shall inherit the earth.” After the great burning day—at the end of the thousand years; for the sake of the righteous the earth will be made new, and will become their everlasting inheritance. Then “there shall be no more curse.” Rev. 22:3; 21:1.
Examples of holy men, who had salt in themselves, are placed on record in the Scriptures, to encourage us, and for us to imitate, some of which we may here notice with profit.
“ENOCH walked with God; and he was not; for God took him.” Gen. 5:24. And “before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God.” Heb. 11:5. In his religious experience Enoch pursued a straightforward course. He was not spasmodic; but, constantly and perseveringly he moved along under all circumstances, walking in the way of God’s commandments. And, as one who muses and is communicative with his friend on the way, he always kept near the Lord, and held sweet communion with him; and, in turn, God gave him manifold tokens of his love and approbation, and then translated him that he should not see death. Enoch pursued a course to preserve himself, and had a salutary influence upon others, such as will affect even those whom he represented, who will be translated alive at Christ’s coming.
NOAH was “a preacher of righteousness;” hence he kept God’s commandments. He had faith and works; and, having salt in himself, “found grace in the sight of God.” The experience that Noah had—the manner in which he heeded the warning of God about the then coming flood, the course he pursued in preparing the ark on dry land, amid the derisions and sneers of nearly all the beholders, and the welcome he and his house received as they went into the ark, etc., fitly represented the experience that the remnant people of God were to have, in heeding the warning messages of Rev. 14:6–12, in preparing for themselves a shelter against the time of trouble by keeping the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus Christ, fearless of reproaches and revilings, and in the welcome they shall receive into the mansions prepared for the holy and the blest. Noah gladly heard the words, “Come thou and all thy house into the ark; for thee have I seen righteous before me in this generation.” Gen. 7:1. And the saints, in the end, will hear with joy the words, “Come, ye blessed of my Father;” Matt. 25:34; “Open ye the gates, that the righteous nation which keepeth the truth may enter in.” Isa. 26:2.
ABRAHAM was faithful in obeying God’s voice; and keeping his charge, his commandments, his statutes, and his laws (Gen. 26:5), and he pursued a commendable course in commanding his children, and his household after him, that they should keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment. Chap. 18:19. Therefore, the Lord greatly blessed him, making him the father of the faithful in all the nations of the earth, so that they that are of faith, in any nation, are blessed with faithful Abraham. And to him and to his seed, which is Christ, were precious promises made; namely, that he should have an inheritance, and become heir of the whole world. “And if ye be Christ’s,” says Paul, “then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” Gal. 3:29. Thus Abraham had salt in himself. His faithfulness was availing in his own case and in the case of all the faithful, and also in reference to the inheritance which will be the future and eternal abode of all the saints.
ELIJAH is described as a prophet “who stood up as a fire, and whose word burned as a lamp.” In his time nearly all the professed people of God had forsaken, almost entirely, the faith in Jehovah, and adhered strongly to the foreign religion of king Ahab’s wife’s family, the worship of the Phœnician Baal. The prophet came forward as a witness against this evil. In the spirit and power of his reproofs he was a striking type of John the Baptist, the forerunner of the Saviour at his first advent, and a type of the true servants of God who, in the end of the world, are engaged in proclaiming the truth that will prepare a people for the second advent of Christ. He had strong faith in prayer, and God frequently manifested his power miraculously through him; he endured strong opposition; and when he had to flee for his own safety, he was directed to places, by divine guidance, where he was supported in a miraculous manner with which we are all familiar. The prophet’s entire experience in his warfare on earth, before God translated him in a special manner to Heaven, was a striking representation of the experience that the last church will have in their warfare, just prior to the time when they shall be translated as was Elijah.
DANIEL was a celebrated prophet. In his early years he was taken to Babylon among the captives of the people of Judah, together with three other youths of rank, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. At an early period he acquired renown for wisdom, piety, and strict adherence to the requirements of God. The prudent proceedings of Daniel and of his three companions, in resolving to abstain from the “king’s meat,” were crowned with divine blessings; and had the most important results. They strictly adhered to temperance in diet during their three years’ discipline, preparatory to their standing in “the king’s palace;” and they were found in all matters of wisdom and understanding that the king inquired of them, “ten times better than all the magicians and astrologers that were in all his realm.” Dan. 1:21. By the divine aid, like Joseph of old in Egypt, Daniel successfully exercised his gift of interpreting dreams. He also had visions which disclosed to him the future course of events relative to leading powers or universal kingdoms, which would bear rule successively upon the earth, and, particularly, to the kingdom of God which is finally to be established and to be possessed by the saints forever. Among the prophetic periods of his visions, one extended to the end of Judaism (Dan. 9); one to the time of the end (chap. 7:25; 11:40); and another to the period of the Judgment (chap. 8:14). This devoted servant of God frequently engaged in earnest prayer to God. Three times a day he bent the knee in prayer, the windows in his chamber being open toward Jerusalem. Even the enactments of the Medes and Persians could not make him deviate from his course in this direction. And when he was cast into the lions’ den, an angel of God shut the lions’ mouths, that they did not hurt him; but when he was taken out, his accusers were all cast into the den of lions, and were devoured. Thus he was not without the “salt” recommended in our text. “Forasmuch as he was faithful, neither was there any error or fault found in him.” Dan. 6.
The three worthies, Daniel’s companions, were also faithful, and strictly observed God’s commandments. And when they were boundand cast into the burning fiery furnace by the urgent command of the king of Babylon, because they would not fall down and worship the image of gold that he had set up, though the furnace was so exceedingly hot that the flame slew the mighty men that cast them into it, yet the king saw four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire, and they had no hurt; “and the form of the fourth,” exclaimed the king, “is like the Son of God.” They had what could preserve them, even while in the midst of the fire, so that when they came out of the furnace, the fire had no power on their bodies, “nor was an hair of their head singed, neither were their coats changed, nor the smell of fire had passed on them.” Dan. 3:27.
Besides these personages, and many others that we might notice, we have the case of Paul and Silas, who, while they were in prison with their feet fast in stocks, praying and singing praises to God at the midnight hour, were set at liberty by the miraculous power of God, witnessed the conversion of the jailer, and that same night baptized him and all his house. Acts 16. We have also the case of Peter, who was in prison, soon to be killed as James was. “But prayer was made without ceasing of the church unto God for him;” and the Lord, by his angel, brought him out of the prison. Acts 12. These are striking cases of those mentioned in the Bible, who had salt in themselves in the sense of the text.
We are evidently living in the last days. Solemn scenes are just before us; and we need to have salt in ourselves. We need to be wholly sanctified by obeying the whole truth, and by availing ourselves of all the means of grace, in order to be preserved blameless through the time of trouble that is before us, until the appearing of Jesus Christ. We should be really in earnest in having the truth affect our words (see Col. 4:5, 6), thoughts, and actions, that we may have nothing in us to molest or annoy, and may ever “have peace one with another.”

FATHER! O HEAR ME NOW!

By Ann W. Hall

Father, O hear me now, Father divine; Thou, only thou, canst see The heart’s deep agony; Help me to say to thee, “Thy will, not mine.”
O God! be thou my stay In this dark hour; Kindly each sorrow hear, Hush every troubled fear, Then let me still revere, Still own thy power.
In thee alone I trust; Thou Holy One! Humbly to thee I pray, That through each troubled day Of life, I still may say, “Thy will be done.”
—Ann W. Hall.

Conditional Immortality.

By Samuel Minton

We find the following article in The Christian World, of April 9, 1875, a paper published in London, England. It is the third and concluding letter of a series the preceding numbers of which we have not seen. But the very able manner in which the subject is treated in this number, and the conclusions which Mr. Minton shows to be both logical and scriptural, we are sure will greatly interest our readers. This subject is attracting great attention in England.
(To the Editor of the CHRISTIAN WORLD.)
Sir,—I think Mr. Baldwin Brown would scarcely deny that it is on the moral aspect of the question he mainly rests his case. “The larger teaching of Scripture” simply means the teaching of those particular texts which appear to support his own view. The natural meaning of a vastly larger number of texts cannot be their real meaning, because it would teach something “degrading to man and dishonoring to God.” This is just the most difficult part of the subject to deal with concisely, because of its intimate connection with the great moral mystery—the permission of evil. The moment we attempt to grapple with any aspect of that portentous fact, we get enveloped in such a cloud of smoke that it is difficult to know where we are. But still I will endeavor, with the very limited space at my command, to show that the moral difficulties which our brother has raised are very far from sufficient to overthrow the plain and positive declarations of Holy Writ.
It certainly cannot be degrading to any creature however exalted, to say that it must necessarily be forever dependent upon the Creator for the continuance of its life, and that the same power which created can at any time destroy it. Does any one feel that man is being degraded when we sing of Jehovah, “He can create and he destroy?” Nay, can we conceive of the Creator bringing any being into existence that he could not put out of existence? I cannot; I believe such a thing would be utterly impossible.
The only question, then, is, whether man would be degraded by any single member of his race being actually put out of existence. Surely Mr. Brown will admit that an affirmative answer to this question would be about as tremendous a stretch of human pride as could well be conceived. Immortality is such a marvelous gift to be bestowed upon any creature that it is hard enough to believe in it at all. But for a whole race of beings to say they will feel degraded if any one of their number is not allowed to live as long as the Creator himself must surely be the ne plus ultra of self-exaltation. Mr. Brown cannot mean this. But, then, what does he mean?
He is so undiscriminating in his allegations against “these annihilationists,” that he may perhaps refer to some views which he supposes us to hold as to man’s nature being reduced to the level of the brutes by his fall, and only restored to its original condition in regeneration; so that the regenerate are a “caste of immortals,” moving about among beings of another order. If any one holds such a view, let him defend it. For myself, I believe that every man’s physical constitution remains to the day of his death exactly the same in kind as it was created in Adam, though probably with a considerable loss of its original power and beauty. The only difference between one man and another is of a moral kind; and on that difference, whether it become unalterably fixed in this life or the next, depend the issues of life and death. What is there “degrading” in this? Mr. Brown may be right or wrong in his severity to “saints” and tenderness to “sinners,” but he will not deny that there are such distinctions, or that our Lord and his apostles make them to be of tremendous importance. The difference between wheat and tares, between “the children of God and the children of the devil” is not one of “caste;” neither does it make the one to be “mortals,” and the other “immortals.” They are both alike mortal; but those who have “counted themselves unworthy of eternal life” will “perish,” while those who have believed in God’s only begotten Son, and sought for immortality by patient continuance in well-doing, will “not be hurt of the second death,” for “if any man eat of this bread he shall live forever.”
Well, then, if there is nothing in this “degrading to man,” is there anything in it “dishonoring to God?” How? I confess I am at a loss to conceive, except on the assumption that the Creator must never withdraw from a creature any gift that he has once bestowed upon it. But that would require every animal to be immortal, or, at the very least, to be compensated hereafter for its sufferings here. Mr. Brown speaks of their life being a pleasure to them. To some of them it is. But what are we to make of those animals whose lives few of us would be willing to endure, even to obtain an eternity of blessedness? If the intelligent, confiding, faithful, affectionate dogs, whom friends in human form have subjected to the frightful agonies of vivisection, were gifted with our friend’s eloquence, they might declaim against the “pitilessness” of those who would deny them immortality, in as burning words as any that he has used of those who, while overwhelmed with gratitude for the marvelous gift of eternal life, which they believe has been bestowed upon them in Christ, and deeply sympathizing with the groans of creation, can feel no confidence that all their suffering brethren will sooner or later partake of the same stupendous blessing.
But has not man a vastly higher nature than the brute? Assuredly. And that tells tremendously against his prospect of immortality, if he violates it. For, difficult as it is to conceive of the Creator’s bestowing such a gift upon a creature that could never know or love the Giver, it is infinitely more difficult to conceive of his bestowing it on one who might, but would not, love him for it. I very much doubt if infinite love could bear never to be loved by an immortal dog; I am quite sure that it could not bear to be eternally hated by an immortal man. Our friend hopes that this will never occur; he trusts to the power of the cross to bring every human being into loving harmony with the Creator. But he admits that the absolute “freedom of the human will” must render it uncertain. And that alone would require some limitation to be put upon the scope of those “particular texts,” on which he mainly depends, and which, if taken alone, would undoubtedly lend him strong support. We go further, and maintain that other declarations of Holy Scripture too numerous to be overlooked, as well as too plain and positive to be evaded, absolutely forbid us to understand this “larger teaching” in the extreme sense for which Universalists contend. They assert in every shape and form that some men never will yield to the power of the cross; that they will “receive this grace of God in vain,” that the gospel which proclaims it will prove to them “a savor of death unto death;” that it will become “impossible to renew them again unto repentance;” and that for them “there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries.” To pronounce it “dishonoring to God” that such should perish, is to say, either that God dishonored himself by creating free agents liable to evil, or that, having created them, he is bound in honor to keep them alive forever at any cost to himself, to the universe, and to them. So far from their destruction being inconsistent with perfect love, it is only one manifestation of that love. To borrow the language of the Rev. Samuel Cox from his article in Good Words, “For those who will be evil, what greater mercy can be shown than that they should be destroyed out of their misery by the love from which they will not accept any higher boon?”
The amount and kind of mental or bodily suffering which will precede or accompany that destruction we may contentedly leave with the Judge of quick and dead. That it will be something very terrible, much more terrible in some cases than in others, neither reason nor the language of Scripture can permit us to doubt. But whatever may be the actual process by which the consuming fire of divine wrath will devour the adversaries—and of that we can form not the slightest conception—we may be perfectly sure that there will be nothing in it to shock the deepest instincts of righteousness or love, but that the conscience of the whole universe will be satisfied, and all creation will say, Amen.
So likewise may we confidently trust God to wipe away the tears that may start to our eyes at the thought of those whom we loved, as long as there remained anything in them to love; but it will not be the “doomsman’s stroke” that causes our regret; it will be that, through “judging themselves unworthy of eternal life,” they sunk to a depth of moral corruption which rendered that stroke inevitable. The reconciliation in Christ of all things that were created by Christ—“and without him was not anything made that was made”—will be none the less “real,” because countless forms of life have passed away forever, some without immortality being placed within their reach, and some through refusing to accept it. All things will be none the less “very good,” because many things once became so hopelessly bad as to necessitate their removal. The dark cloud of evil that had once been allowed to settle on creation will have been rolled away. And as eternity unfolds the ever-extending glory and happiness which have been evolved out of it, and which, unless the Creator loves evil for its own sake, could not possibly have been obtained in any other way, we shall be less and less inclined to ask, which now sometimes we can scarcely help doing, whether any conceivable result can be worth such a cost. Our lips will never falter as we exclaim, “Oh, the depth of the riches, both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!” nor shall we have to add from the bottom of a trembling heart, and in the perplexity of a bewildered intellect, “How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!”
What is there “miserable” in this? Nothing, that I can see; nor, I believe, that my honored friend can see. It is not the doctrine of conditional immortality that excites his “intense repugnance,” but certain other doctrines, which he supposes to be connected with it, and which certainly are sometimes conjoined with it in a more or less definite form. Transubstantiation has been engrafted on the incarnation; but it would hardly be fair to make it a prominent feature, if not the main foundation, of an attack on “the miserable doctrine of incarnation.” We hold that “mortal man” is offered immortality in Christ; and that this is the plain, natural, and intended meaning of “the record which God has given of his Son.” We hold that “the crown of life” is a prize freely offered to us in Christ, to be sought for “by patient continuance in well-doing,” and, if won, to be cast at the feet of Him who purchased it for us with his own blood. A variety of answers may be given to the multitude of questions that naturally arise as to the practical consequences of this doctrine; each of which answers should be discussed on its own merits. But the doctrine itself should not be made responsible for any consequences except such as necessarily result from it. For myself I am unable to see one that creates any moral difficulty in accepting what, after having for years considered everything that can be said on all sides of the question, still appears to me the undoubted, consistent, and most emphatic testimony of holy Scripture.
We are no more the “discoverers” of this truth than Luther was the discoverer of justification by faith. On the contrary, we have always declared that it was the prevalent, if not universal, faith of the church for the first two centuries; that it is taught in the writings of later “fathers;” and that although, like many other truths, it was almost buried out of sight during the Dark Ages, it has never been without witnesses since the Bible itself was disentombed at the Reformation. Luther wrote: “I permit the pope to make articles of faith for himself and his faithful, such as, that the soul is the substantial form of the human body, that the soul is immortal, with all those monstrous opinions to be found in the Roman Decretals.” In the Book of Common Prayer we ask “that we may rise to the life immortal,” “that we may so pass through things temporal as finally to lose not the things eternal;” and for our Queen, that God may “crown her with immortality in the world to come.” Locke maintained that only “he who doeth the will of God abideth forever;” Milton expressed it in the Paradise Lost; Olshausen, no mean scholar or divine so far from holding that the necessary immortality of every human soul is “always assumed in holy Scripture as unquestionable,” declared that “the doctrine and the name are alike unknown to the entire Bible;” Archbishop Whately argued in his own pointed way that life means life, and death means death, in the Bible as well as in any other book; Archbishop Thompson says in his Bampton Lectures, “Life to the godless must be the beginning of destruction, since nothing but God, and that which pleases him, can permanently exist.” But time would fail to tell of Watson, of Foster, of Alford, with a host of other divines, great and small, living and dead, in our own and other lands, who, though neither individually nor collectively infallible, have cast into the scale a weight of authority which can scarcely be neutralized by the remark, that “very clever men” can make Scripture say anything. Some of those who are weak in this world may of late have been chosen to popularize this doctrine in a way that, for more reasons than one, would have been hardly possible to the great and the learned. But in either case, the only question is, whether the doctrine be of God or not. “To the law and to the testimony; if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.”
Thanking you for your courtesy in granting me so much space, and sincerely hoping that I have not said a word to wound the feelings either of Mr. Baldwin Brown or of those who sympathize with his views—I am, Sir, your obedient servant, SAMUEL MINTON. 20 Warwick-square, S. W.
Continue reading: No Apostasy, or Once in Grace, Always in Grace