Earlier text: The Star of HopeMisrepresenting Our Father
By C. M. S.
The writer of the Proverbs declares that “a man that hath friends must show himself friendly.” Prov. 18:24. It is equally true that a person who would be loved must show himself lovable. Love begets love, but selfishness repels. The heart instinctively turns away from one who shows that his motives are selfish motives. We see nothing in the attributes of Satan that we can love, for the reason that we see in him and in his purpose the embodiment of selfishness. He designed to elevate himself to a place where he would be above everything and every being in the universe. “I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the Most High.” Isa. 14:13, 14. There is the supreme personification of selfishness. Is it a divine attribute? It is the attribute of one who would dethrone divinity and overthrow the government of the whole universe to satisfy personal ambition. It is not an attribute of God, but the chief distinguishing attribute of the sworn enemy of God. Satan, expelled from heaven, brought that wicked attribute, selfishness, with him to this world, and contaminated the inhabitants of Eden with it. He said: “Ye shall not surely die [for disobeying God]: for God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as God, knowing good and evil.” Gen. 3:4, 5. Exalted through disobedience and self-seeking, that is the doctrine of Lucifer. But it is the very antithesis of godlikeness. It is unthinkable that the great actuating attribute of Lucifer, the enemy of God, should be identical with the dominating attribute of the Most High. And yet the editor of a journal which speaks for one of the greatest component parts of Christendom, in an editorial sermon based upon one of the proverbs (“Jehovah hath made everything for his own purpose.” Prov. 16:4, margin), teaches as a fundamental principle of his church the following:— God is the most selfish being that the mind of man can, contemplate, and he is selfish because he has nobody to share with; he is alone. And he would not be God if he was not absolutely selfish. He has nobody to share anything with, he has not a partner in any sense; he is alone, and he is everything. Therefore, everything comes from him and everything must return to him. So the highest attribute of God is his absolute selfishness. . . . There is only one God; everything comes from that one God, and everything revolves around that one center of the one God. Talk about divine selfishness; it means simply truth.—Western Watchman (Catholic), May 13, 1915. Can that be true, and God be the God he represents himself to be? Powerful, compelling love and supreme selfishness cannot actuate the same being at the same time. And yet what God is today he was through all past time and will be through all time to come. He is “the same yesterday, and today, and forever.” He says of himself, “I am the Lord, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.” Mal. 3:6. If God is supremely selfish, he cannot be a God of love. Yet the Word declares of him:— “He that loveth not knoweth not God;7for God is love.” “God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.” 1 John 4:8, 16. Nowhere in the Bible do we read that God is selfishness. Nowhere in the Bible do we find a record of any of the acts of God which indicates that selfishness is one of his attributes. But we do read that “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16. In other words, he so greatly loved those who were in rebellion against him that he deprived himself of his own Son, permitted him to be offered a living sacrifice, that those who were turning their feet in the ways of death might find again the path to everlasting life. That does not look like the act of a selfish being, the act of one who was seeking only his own aggrandizement. The Lord himself speaks of himself in these words:— “Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love; therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn thee.” Jer. 31:3. “And Jehovah, the God of their fathers, sent to them by his messengers, rising up early and sending, because he had compassion on his people, and on his dwelling place.” 2 Chron. 36:15. These are not the manifestations of selfishness. They are demonstrations of God’s undying love for his people, even while denying him by a course of conduct that did despite to the principles of his kingdom. We get a little glimpse of God’s unselfishness and of his deep interest in the happiness of his children from such scriptures as the following:— “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.” 1 Cor. 2:9. Surely, he who would teach that God is the embodiment of selfishness has need that one teach him what are the first principles of the gospel and what are the fundamental principles of God’s government. The editor of the Western Watchman bases his astonishing charges against our loving Father in heaven upon another unwarranted assertion: “He has nobody to share with; he is alone. . . . He has not a partner in any sense.” It is true there can be but one God the Father; but he is not alone; and he does have a partner. We read of this partnership and this companionship in the first chapter of Hebrews:— “God, who at sundry times and in diverse manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds; who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high.” Heb. 1:1-3. It is impossible from such scriptures as this to draw the conclusion that God sits in austere and lonely isolation upon the throne of the universe, demanding love, but manifesting only selfishness. One sits beside him whom he took into his counsel before the world was made. God said to his Son at that time, “Let us make man in our image.” They were then in the same image; and this agrees with the words just quoted from Hebrews: “Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person,” etc. The apostle John, writing with the pen of inspiration concerning this same Son and companion of the Most High, says:— “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made. . . . He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. He came unto his own, and his own received him not.” John 1:1-11. That is Jesus Christ, our Saviour, one who “was in the beginning with God,” who was the active agent of God the Father in the creation of the worlds. The declaration that God is companionless is thus just as untrue as the charge that he is the embodiment of selfishness. The incongruity and inconsistency of such charges ought to be apparent to any one; and yet the editor, failing to appreciate the logic of his own position, makes this declaration:— God has made us, made us here and now; he has given us a task; and that task is, we must love! That is the first duty of man, to love. . . . Our first duty is to know God, and, knowing him, to love him. It is little wonder that he calls it a “task” to love God, when he has painted God as the embodiment of selfishness. He asks us, then, to manifest an attribute more exalted and far more praiseworthy than the chief attribute of God; for he asks man to love a selfish God and expect only a manifestation of selfishness on the part of God to repay man’s love. Surely, it would be a task to love God if he were such a one as Editor Phelan pictures him. And in spite of all this, the aforementioned editor denounces human beings for manifesting in their own lives what he says God manifests in his life. He says:— I have known selfish people, but the most selfish people I have ever known have been Catholics. And among selfish Catholics the most selfish I have ever known have sometimes been pious Catholics. Selfishness in the church of God, selfishness among Catholics, selfishness in religion, selfishness in the sanctuaries, selfishness among those who are nearest to God,—O, it is something painful to contemplate! But there are selfish monks, selfish nuns, selfish priests, selfish bishops, and selfish popes, none but God knows how many. . . . To enter heaven we must be unselfish, absolutely unselfish. What the editor declares to be the condition in his church is but the logical consequence of the teaching that God is the embodiment of selfishness. If that were true, then it must follow that they who were nearest to him were most selfish. And why should the priest-editor complain of the people’s selfishness when that is an attribute of divinity? According to the logic of his argument, when he condemns selfishness in his people, he is denouncing a divine attribute. But all this is an utter perversion of the truth, a wicked misrepresentation of the character of God. It is the same charge that Lucifer brought against the Almighty when he entered upon a propaganda of misrepresentation and calumny among the angels in heaven. It is implied in Satan’s blandishments to Eve in Eden. God was there accused of selfishly withholding from man what man was entitled to receive. Let us think for a moment what such a charge would involve if it were true. If God were supremely selfish, our Saviour must be the same; for he is the express image of the Father’s person. We are told that, if faithful, “we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is,” and also that we ought “so to walk, even as he walked.” In that case, when the redeemed enter heaven the dominating, all-pervading influence and characteristic of that place would be selfishness. But surely we have seen enough of that and the consequences of it in this world. Selfishness has been the dominating note in all earthly affairs. It has seared and blighted every land and wounded every heart. It has paved life’s path with sorrows and watered it with tears. And is the God of selfishness to be the God of heaven? It will never be. “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest,” is not the language of selfishness. Neither does this scripture speak in that language: “The Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.” God is an exemplification of love, benevolence, and unbounded generosity. He filled heaven with sadness that he might give man the best that he could give, and bring back man’s bartered soul from the slave pen of Satan. God having done all this for man, how must heaven look upon such an accusation against God as that to which we have referred? It is a fearful thing thus to misrepresent our loving8Father and charge him, as Lucifer charged him, with being the embodiment of selfishness. But we know him as the God of love, and long for the day when we shall see his face with no dimming cloud between. The Home of the Saved
By F. M. W.
For long centuries salvation from sin in an eternity of bliss has been preached to the nations of men as the grand objective of the Christian’s hope. Has this faith a foundation in the Sacred Scriptures? What will constitute the abode of everlasting bliss? Where will the saints of God spend eternity? An answer to these questions will be found in considering the eternal purpose of God in the creation and peopling of this earth. As this planet came from the hand of its Maker, it was without the mar of sin. The divine record states that “God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good.” And the creation upon which this divine approval was pronounced included Adam, the father of the human family. Created in the image of God (Gen. 1:27), made upright in character (Eccl. 7:29), Adam was a worthy representative of his holy Creator. To him as that representative was given dominion over the entire earth. Gen. 1:28; Isa. 45:18. He was commanded to be “fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it.” The beautiful garden of Eden was given him as a home, and as a model in his labor of subduing the earth. Adam’s possession of the earth was made contingent upon his obedience to the requirements of his Creator. He was given unrestrained access to the fruit of the garden of Eden, with the exception of one tree. On this was placed the prohibition of the Most High. Adam and Eve were commanded neither to taste nor to touch its fruit. The sad record of their fall marks the entrance of sin into this world. In an evil hour they were beguiled by the tempter. Persuaded that the forbidden fruit would open to them rich avenues of knowledge, Adam transgressed the divine command. In consequence our first parents were driven from Eden, and a flaming sword barred their return to this holy place. Gen. 3:24. Upon Adam and his descendants and upon the earth there rested the curse of sin. As Adam passed under the dominion of the great adversary, in the same manner this earth in a measure became subject to Satan’s power. But God did not leave man without hope. In his defeat and humiliation there was given him a promise of deliverance through the coming Saviour. The Word declares:— “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; and it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.” Gen. 3:15. To our first parents and to the powers of darkness it might seem that the purpose of God in peopling this earth with a holy race had been forever thwarted, but not so. That purpose was turned aside for a little time, but it remained unchanged. Later, to Abraham, the father of the faithful, was the same eternal purpose expressed in these words:— “And the Lord said unto Abram, after that Lot was separated from him, Lift up now thine eyes, and look from the place where thou art northward, and southward, and eastward, and westward; for all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed forever. And I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth: so that if a man can number the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be numbered. Arise, walk through the land in the length of it and in the breadth of it; for I will give it unto thee.” Gen. 13:14-18. That this promise was not restricted to the local country in which Abraham dwelt, but embraced the whole earth, is apparent from the words of the apostle Paul. Speaking of the promise made to the patriarch, the apostle says:— “For the promise, that he should be the heir of the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith.” Rom. 4:13. The promise to Abraham was to him and to his seed. Who was represented by the seed? Again we are indebted to the Word of the Lord, through the apostle Paul, for answer to this question. He states plainly that the seed is Christ:— “Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ.” Gal. 3:16. Through Christ the seed includes the righteous of every age and of every nationality, for the apostle adds: “And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” Verse 29. In other words, the promise of God to give to Abraham and to his seed this earth was a promise to give the earth to the righteous nation whom God will gather out from this world, composed of every nationality and every tongue, high and low, rich and poor, free and bond, from every social state and condition, all who accept Jesus Christ as their Saviour. Has this promise been fulfilled? First let us inquire whether or not it was fulfilled to Abraham. It was not. Stephen, the great martyr to the Christian faith, declares this. Recounting the history of9God’s dealing with his people, he declares of Abraham that he was called out of the land of the Chaldeans, and came to dwell in the Land of Promise. Of Abraham’s possession Stephen says:— “And he gave him none inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his foot on: yet he promised that he would give it to him for a possession, and to his seed after him, when as yet he had no child.” Acts 7:5. Stephen’s statement was illustrated in the experience of the patriarch when Sarah died. Abraham was not the possessor, so far as the record goes, of any territory on this earth. He found it necessary to appeal to others to sell him ground for a burying place. Making his appeal to the sons of Heth, he said:— “I am a stranger and a sojourner with you: give me a possession of a burying place with you, that I may bury my dead out of my sight.” Gen. 23:4. His appeal met with a response on the part of his neighbors. There was sold to him the field of Ephron; “and the field, and the cave that is therein, were made sure unto Abraham for a possession of a burying place by the sons of Heth.” Did Christ as the specific seed inherit the earth? Listen to his words when one professed willingness to follow him in the hope of temporal gain: “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head.” Luke 9:58. A wayfarer during his earthly ministry, after his crucifixion the Promised Seed was buried in a donated sepulcher. Did Abraham die a disappointed man? When he came down to the close of his earthly career, did he feel that he had been deceived, and that the promise of God had not been verified to him? Abraham understood too well the nature and import of the divine promise. He never expected its realization during his earthly life. He looked beyond the present to the eternal state for the fulfillment of the word of the Lord. “By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise: for he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.” Heb. 11:8-10. And this is the faith that has sustained the believers in every age. Of those who sprang from Abraham, the children of faith, the apostle declares:— “Therefore sprang there even of one, and him as good as dead, so many as the stars of the sky in multitude, and as the sand which is by the seashore innumerable. These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country. And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned. But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; for he hath prepared for them a city.” Heb. 11:12-16. We are brought, then, to the conclusion that the promise of God, made to the faithful of all ages that they should receive this earth as an everlasting habitation, is yet to be fulfilled. It has been and is the grand objective of the Christian’s hope. Of it prophets have prophesied and bards have sung. David, the sweet singer of Israel, expresses this faith: “The meek shall inherit the earth; and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace.” “Evildoers shall be cut off: but those that wait upon the Lord, they shall inherit the earth.” The Great Teacher himself, in his Sermon on the Mount, pronounces upon the meek a blessing, and the blessing is that they shall inherit the earth. Matt. 5:5. With the eternal God there is no wavering. He has confirmed his promise with an oath, guaranteeing absolute fulfillment. Heb. 6:13-20. The Redemption of the Earth
The arrow of God will at last reach its mark. It may seem to swerve at times, to be turned aside by the enemy, but it will reach its goal in the end. The eternal purpose of God will be fulfilled. The redemption of the saints of God will be shared by this material earth. Christ not only will lift the curse of sin from the human family, but from his material universe as well. Says the apostle:— “For the earnest expectation of the creation waiteth for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to vanity, not of its own will, but by reason of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only so, but ourselves . . . groan within ourselves, waiting for our adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.” Rom. 8:19-23, A. R. V. Before the earth is restored to Adam and to his righteous seed, the purifying fires of the last day will have accomplished their work. Like a beautiful ball this earth came from the hand of its Creator. In the hands of man it has been marred and mutilated and defiled. God takes it again and places it in his great crucible. From the refining fires it will come forth purified, redeemed, and fitted for the abode of the ransomed of all ages. The dross of sin will forever be removed. Says the apostle Peter:— “But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. . . . Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness, looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat? Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.” 2 Peter 3:7, 11-13. Then the city for which Abraham looked, whose builder and maker is God, will descend as the capital of that glorious country. “And I John saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.” Rev. 21:2-4. The Glories of the New Earth
Of the glories of that eternal state the prophet writes:— “The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose. It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing: the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon, they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency of our God. . . . Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing: for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert. . . . And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads: they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.” Isa. 35:1-10. Thus will be accomplished God’s eternal purpose in the creation of this earth. Sin has sought the subversion and the defeat of that purpose, but every word of God is sure and standeth fast forever and ever. This reward awaits the faithful in Christ Jesus. May God grant that we shall become so intimately acquainted with the Lord Jesus here, so filled with his holy presence, that we shall be enabled by his grace to spend with him, and with the holy of every age, an eternity of bliss in the earth made new. A Rising Power in the West
By William A. Spicer
Synopsis of Present Truth — No. 7 — The Great Prophetic Outline of the World’s History
A Rising Power in the West
SOME of the ancient writers say that at the time of his death Alexander had in mind to push westward to strike down the growing power of the city of Rome, of which he had heard. Plutarch says that this man, Alexander,—who shot like a star, with incredible swiftness, from the rising to the setting sun, was meditating to bring the luster of his arms into Italy. . . . He had heard of the Roman power in Italy.—“Morals,” on “Fortune of the Romans,” sec. 13. Lucan, the ancient Roman poet, repeats the thought,— “Driven headlong on, by Fate’s resistless force,
Through Asia’s realms he took his dreadful course;
His ruthless sword laid human nature waste,
And desolation followed where he passed. . . .
“Ev’n to the utmost West he would have gone,
Where Tethys’ lap receives the setting sun.”
—“Pharsalia,” lines 48-60. But in the prime of his years Alexander was cut down, and Rome had yet more time in which to develop its strength preparatory to the deciding contest for the mastery of all the world. Sure it is that after Grecia, there followed the Roman Empire, the strongest and mightiest and most crushing of them all. This fourth universal empire the prophet proceeded to describe, as represented by the legs of iron in Nebuchadnezzar’s dream of the great image:— “And the fourth kingdom shall be strong as iron: forasmuch as iron breaketh in pieces and subdueth all things: and as iron that breaketh all these, shall it break in pieces and bruise.” Verse 40. How appropriately the iron of the image fits the character of the fourth great empire! Gibbon, the historian, calls it “the iron monarchy of Rome.” It broke in pieces the kingdoms, subduing all, just as the prophecy had declared so long before. As iron is strongest of the common metals, so according to the prophecy—“as iron that breaketh all these”—this fourth kingdom was to be more powerful than any before it. Strabo, the geographer, who lived in the days of Tiberius Cæsar, said:— The Romans have surpassed (in power) all former rulers of whom we have any record.—“Geography,” book 17, chap. 3. The Catholic Father, Hippolytus, who lived in Rome in the third century,—under the “iron monarchy,”—wrote thus of this prophecy:—10“Already the iron rules; already it subdues and breaks all in pieces; already it brings all the unwilling into subjection; already we see these things ourselves.—“Treatise on Christ and Antichrist,” sec. 33. Hippolytus also saw clearly from the prophecy that the empire of his day would be divided, and he wrote of the kingdoms that were “yet to rise” out of it. For Daniel’s interpretation explained clearly the meaning of the mingling of clay with the iron in the feet and toes of the great image:— The Kingdoms of Modern Europe
“And whereas thou sawest the feet and toes, part of potter’s clay, and part of iron, the kingdom shall be divided; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, forasmuch as thou sawest the iron mixed with miry clay.
“And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly broken.
“And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.”—Verses 41-43. “The kingdom shall be divided.” True to the word of the prophet, the Roman Empire was divided. Broken up by the invasions of the fresh nations from the north, the Western Empire was divided into lesser kingdoms, out of which have grown the modern nations of western Europe. Not one word in the outline of the prophecy thus far has failed of fulfillment. These modern kingdoms growing out of divided Rome have never been reunited. “They shall mingle themselves with the seed of men,” said the prophecy. Nearly all the reigning houses of western Europe today are related by intermarriage. The prophecy said it would be so; but “they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.” So we see it. No statesman, no master of legions, has been able to join these nations together in one great empire again. Charles V had the thought in mind, some think. Napoleon dreamed of doing it. But it was not to be. Nevermore was there to be one universal monarchy. We may know that as surely as the course of world empire has followed the exact outline of the prophecy, put on the inspired record in the days of Babylon of old, just so surely the specifications of the closing portion of the outline will be fulfilled. The fourth great kingdom was to be divided. Rome was the fourth empire. It was divided. The kingdoms of the divided empire are acting their part before our eyes today. What Is the Next Great Event?
And what next? That is the question for us. Now the prophetic outline that began with ancient Babylon touches the things of our own day. The word spoken before Nebuchadnezzar so long ago is now spoken especially to us:— “And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever.
“Forasmuch as thou sawest that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it brake in pieces the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold; the great God hath made known to the king what shall come to pass hereafter: and the dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure.” Dan. 2:44, 45. “In the days of these kings,”—these kingdoms of our own time,—the next great world-changing event is to be the coming of Christ to begin the setting up of his everlasting kingdom. That is the grand climax toward which all the course of history has been tending. At last the end is to come. As the stone, cut out of the mountain “without hands,” smote the image, so that all its parts, representative of earthly dominion, were ground to dust and blown away, so Christ’s coming kingdom, set up “without hands,” by no human power, but by the power of the eternal God, will end all earthly dominion and bring the utter destruction of sin and sinners out of the earth. “And the dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure.” Then may all eyes well be turned toward the next great step foretold in the prophetic outline—the coming of Christ’s glorious everlasting kingdom, which shall not pass away. Blessed Are They That Do His Commandments
“BLESSED are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.” Our Goal for 1915
By I. H. Evans
A GOAL is the objective to be gained. In athletics, it is the line or mark to be reached in a race or game; in work or service, it is the point to be attained, the purpose for which we labor. One cannot conceive of two athletes doing their best if there were no goal before them. How would they know when they had accomplished their purpose if they had no purpose for which to strive? A young man says, “I am going to finish a college course;” that is his goal. A newly married couple say, “We will work and economize until we have $10,000;” that is their goal. Nearly every industry that succeeds, succeeds because its managers and promoters have a goal. What would the pioneer railroad builders have accomplished, who constructed transcontinental roads of steel from the Atlantic coast to the Pacific coast, if they had had no goal to reach? Who would have completed the feat of engineering in the11were to bring to Christ an average of ten souls each during the remainder of this year, we should more than reach the desired goal. Ten souls for Christ, for each worker, would mean that every one on the pay roll had obtained results. There are always some who do more than their share, but not a few fall so far behind that the average of the whole working force is very low. Is this always to continue? Last year was the most successful in soul winning that we have seen in America for fifteen years. We increased our church membership 4,700, or an average for our entire licensed working force of 3 1-3 souls each. Surely this is not our limit. It can only be the sign of a much-needed reform and careful elimination, to be set in operation by union and local conference officers. Why should papers of recognition be given to nonproducers? If we cannot win souls to Christ, should we take papers from a conference and expect support? We have a great corps of colporteurs, a strong band of workers scattering the printed page. During 1914, the sales in the Division Conference territory aggregated $1,330,466.66, and this year promises more. Then, there are our schools and sanitariums. Our schools should count their work incomplete unless every person who attends is won to Christ. The whole organization of the school should be set to accomplish this purpose. Our sanitariums should become centers for winning souls to Christ. This goal must never be lost sight of. As the mariner watches his chart and compass, and turns the wheel again and again to offset the force of tide and storm, so must the heads of these institutions continually aim to reach the goal of winning souls to Christ. Then, too, there is the great, mighty, irresistible force of our church membership.—73,600 men and women, united in faith and prayer, to win souls to Christ. Our goal, 80,000 church members for this Division, can be realized if once we get the spirit of labor, and every Seventh-day Adventist steps to the front as a campaigner for Christ. Let us talk and pray about it each day, and possess the spirit of laboring for souls. Remember the goal—80,000 church members by the end of the year. The Importance of Goals in Christian Work
Panama Canal if no one had had a goal in view? We expect men who do things to have a fixed purpose in mind. We admit it to be proper and right for worldly men and successful promoters to have an objective; but, when it comes to religion, we hear people say, “O, this is different! We must just do the best we can, and the Lord will have to do the rest.” But if this same person had to build a house, or plant a crop, he would plan and think and set a goal before he started. It seems natural, when we work for ourselves, to have a goal; but in God’s work, we are often willing to drift and not get results. Some years ago there were not a few who complained about trying to raise ten cents a week per member for missions. Today we all believe in it, and now have united to raise twenty cents a week; we know it can be done. It is possible because we have a goal before us. When we center our efforts upon a purpose, we can get the desired results. In winning souls to Christ, we often hear people say, “Well, in many matters it is all right to have a goal, but in winning souls it is all a matter of faith.” Now, if it is all a matter of faith, and the worker does not need to plan nor have an objective, how will faith operate? If a man has no plan, no purpose, no determination, how is he to believe? Who can have faith without works? But if we have to work to show our faith, then we can show large faith as well as little faith. Suppose I say, “I am going to try to win five souls to Christ this summer.” With that as my goal, what shall I do? I shall plan on a five-soul campaign. Shall I work, or speak, or act as if I had given myself the task of winning fifty souls to Christ?—No. My goal for five souls will mean work planned on that scale; but when I enlarge my faith to fifty souls, I shall enlarge my plans. Then, my preaching will have a fifty-soul ring in it, and my efforts will be put forth on a tenfold larger scale. The first day of April, this year, our church membership in the North American Division Conference was 73,605. If we say that on the last day of December, 1915, our membership shall be 80,000, that will be our goal. Can it be done? “According to your faith, be it unto you.” An eighty thousand church membership would mean that from now to the close of this year, there must be 6,400 persons won to Christ and baptized, plus the number of deaths and apostasies that will occur. What are our agencies for accomplishing this result? First, we have our force of evangelical workers. Including secretaries and licensed missionaries, these number 1,407. If this corps of workers