LESSON II.—DECEMBER 13.—TAKING AWAY THE REAL PRESENCE.
The sanctuary and its services constituted a parable of the Messiah. Heb. 9:8, 9, R.V. “The whole worship of ancient Israel was a promise, in figures and symbols, of Christ.” Christ Himself associated the temple with His own body. John 2:19-21. “He was the One in whom all the Jewish ceremony and typical service was to find its fulfilment. He stood forth in the place of the temple; all the offices of the church centered in Himself alone.” Christ is the eternal Priest. Heb. 5:4-6. Christ is the real Sacrifice. Heb. 7:26, 27; Eph. 5:2. When Christ was lost out of the sanctuary and its services, then what was an actual provision for a defense against sin became mere ceremonialism, an excuse for sin and an offense to God. Isa. 1:10-18. The continual service of the sanctuary (1 Chron. 16:37) found its fulfilment in Christ. He is a Priest “after the order of Melchisedec” (Heb. 5:10), whose priesthood is expressly declared to be a continual priesthood (Heb. 7:1-3). In the type the priesthood passed from one to another in a continual succession (Heb. 7:23), but in the fulfilment of the type Christ is the only Priest, “because He continueth ever” (Heb. 7:24). In the type the priests offered continually and repeatedly the same sacrifices, but Christ’s one sacrifice is continual. Heb. 10:1, 11, 12. (Note.—In the Greek the same expression is used in verse 12 and translated “forever” as is used in verse 1 and there translated “continually.” In Rotherham’s translation the expression “for the uninterrupted continuance” is used in both verses.) Thus the continual priesthood and the continual sacrifice of Christ are the assurance of a complete salvation. Heb. 10:7, 24, 25. The typical service had no efficacy in itself. Heb. 10:1, 4. There must be spiritual worship with God in Christ as the center upon which faith must be fastened. Phil. 3:3.
In the Revised Version of the eighth chapter of Daniel the word “burnt-offering” is supplied after the word “continual.” This was doubtless done because the expression “the continual burnt-offering” occurs so frequently in the directions concerning the service of the tabernacle. But the ground covered by the word “continual” in the eighth chapter of Daniel is plainly broader than merely one feature of the tabernacle or temple service. It includes the permanent essence of the whole service, that “which can alone make the worship of sinful beings acceptable to God,” whether that worship is offered with or without any ritual service, with or without any typical temple and typical sacrifices. See 1 Peter 2:4, 5; Ps. 4:5; 51:16-19. This essential thing in the continual service is a present Christ, “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world,” as “the living sacrifice for a fallen world.” To offer up such spiritual sacrifices demands such a union between Christ and the believer that the believer himself, in Christ, becomes a priest (Rev. 1:6), he becomes the temple (1 Cor. 3:16), he becomes the offering (Rom. 12:1). This is that union of divinity and humanity which is “the mystery of godliness,” whereby the church becomes the body of Christ (Eph. 1:22, 23), and each individual a member (1 Cor. 12:27). It follows, then, that to take away the continual service, or that which is continual, is to have a temple without Christ in it, a priesthood without Christ, a sacrifice without Christ, and a church without Christ. But this changes the worship of God into idolatry, and substitutes paganism for Christianity, while retaining the names and forms of Christianity. And this is just what the little horn, the Papacy, has done.
QUESTIONS.
What was the teaching of the sanctuary and its services?
What connection did Jesus make between the temple and Himself?
Who is the real Priest represented by Aaron?
Who is the real Sacrifice?
What would change the ritual service into ceremonialism and make it offensive to God?
What kind of service was maintained in the temple? In whom did it find its fulfilment?
What was the order of Christ’s priesthood? What is stated concerning this priesthood?
How many priests were there in the type? Why?
How many priests are there in the antitype? Why?
How many sacrifices were offered in the type? Why?
How many sacrifices are offered in the antitype? Why?
What blessed consequence grows out of the continual priesthood and the continual sacrifice?
Was there any benefit from the mere ritual service? Why not?
What kind of worship only is acceptable to God?
What is included under the expression “the continual” in the eighth chapter of Daniel? Show the force of this in the texts to which attention is directed?
What is this essential thing in the service and worship of God?
In the genuine spiritual worship what does the believer become through his union with Christ? Give three answers.
What does such a union with Christ constitute? What does the church thus become? What does each individual become?
What then is the result of taking away “the continual”?
What does the worship of God thus become? What is substituted for Christianity?
What power has exactly fulfilled these specifications?
OUR WORK AND WORKERS.
The brethren at Westlake, Idaho, are erecting a new house of worship.
The Arkansas brethren have decided to send the Sentinel of Christian Liberty to the members of the State Legislature for three months.
The address of Brother J. W. Watt, president of Vermont Conference, is changed from Barre to North Walcott, Vt. Correspondents will please take notice.
A church of thirty-one members was organized, and a new house of worship dedicated, at Saranac Lake, N. Y., on the 26th ult., by Brethren G. B. Thompson and F. H. De Vinney.
Brother A. G. Bodwell, of Mexico City, reports good success in selling our Spanish paper on Sundays. The sales on three Sundays were 800, 941, and 1,000. The time occupied each day was less than four hours.
The Reaper, College Place, Wash., says: “Brother Turner reports a good experience selling books among people of the Catholic faith. He left a book with the Mother Superior of a hospital. After having it examined by the priest, she bought it. He has sold several others to Catholics, and hopes to sell many more.”
At Coshocton, Ohio, November 2, a church of twenty-three members was organized by Brethren H. H. Burkholder, J. O. Miller, and W. W. Miller. Seventeen of the number have lately accepted the faith under the labors of Brother W. W. Miller. There were five others not present who expected to unite with the church at the first opportunity.
Because a number of the members of the church at North Yakima, Wash., reside on Natchez River, several miles from the town, it has been decided to conduct two church-schools, and to erect two school-houses. The house in the town has been completed and is now occupied, while the other one is under way, the school being carried on temporarily in a private house.
The new Iowa Industrial Academy, located at Stuart, forty miles west of Des Moines, was opened December 1. The Bulletin says: “There is a church-school in connection with the academy. Good, thorough work will be done in the academy up to the tenth grade. Students who finish the course will be as well equipped as those who teach in the public schools and have first-grade certificates.”
Sister Clara Pease, of Skippers, Va., writes to call attention to the importance of that locality as a missionary field. There is need of families to live out the truth in various parts of the country, and thus bring it to the attention of the people. It is an excellent place to raise fruit and vegetables, and therefore just the place for vegetarians to live and prosper. Many of the people have never heard of the message for these last days. For any information, address Clara Pease, Skippers, Va.
A sister writing to the corresponding secretary of the Sabbath-school Department of our General Conference, concerning the branch Sabbath-school work, gives an interesting experience. She began with but few children, but says in her letter: “Last Sabbath we had an attendance of forty-two. I am having some blessed experiences that give a deeper joy than anything the world can give. It means hard work, O yes, for every Sabbath we have to go out and bring them in, but the Lord has richly rewarded our efforts. I am becoming acquainted with many of my neighbors whom I would probably not have met in any other way, and almost without exception they are warm friends.”
A letter from Brother E. H. Wilbur and wife, who left Iowa in September for China, appears in the Workers’ Bulletin, from which we take this extract: “October 6 we came on board the Empress of India, at Vancouver, British Columbia, and after a continuous voyage of fourteen days, during which we sailed 4,200 miles, we arrived at Yokohama, Japan, Monday morning, October 21. We encountered two hard storms at sea, but the Lord verified His promise, ‘When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee.’ At Yokohama, Brother W. D. Burden came on board to meet the Drs. Lockwood, from the Portland Sanitarium, who will open up the medical work in Tokio, while we proceed to Hong Kong, China. Our address will be 3 Arsenal Street.”
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DONATIONS TO BARBADOES.
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THANKSGIVING
By Susan Birdsall Roberts
“Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful noise unto Him with psalms.” Ps. 95:2.
WAKE, O my soul, and sing aloud
With psalm and grateful song,
The praises of our God and King,
And loud the strains prolong,
Deep are His works, and all His ways,
When finite mind would try
The most to fathom His designs,
And grasp such mystery.
The sea is His, He formed its depths;
He made the rolling earth,
And every star that gleams above
Thanks Him for glorious birth.
Those myriad orbs, majestic forms!
Beyond conception grand!
As singing on they ceaseless roll,
Are held within His hand.
That hand almighty, ne’er too full,
Holds us in close embrace,
And e’en the lowliest humble soul
Supplies with richest grace.
That hand that bears creation up
And stays the surging waves,
Heeds the young ravens when they cry,
And His dear children saves.
With harp and instrument attuned
Repeat the thanks we owe,
Till heart and pulse shall cease to throb
Adoring thanks below.
Unceasing praise, and worship true,
Be Thine our Saviour, King;
Let sea, and sky, and earth, and heaven,
With hallelujahs ring.
Elmira, N. Y. SUSAN BIRDSALL ROBERTS.
ACROSS AFRICA.
It will be remembered that the late Robert Arthington left to the London Missionary Society and the Baptist Missionary Society of England a large sum of money to be devoted entirely to the opening of new missions. In the use of this money the Baptist Missionary Society has now inaugurated an exploring expedition, with a view of opening stations in the region between the upper Congo and Lake Albert, where the Church Missionary Society is at work, thus forming a chain of mission stations directly across Africa, from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean. A company has been formed in Brussels to construct a railway from Stanley Falls to Lake Albert, and another from Nyangwa to Lake Tanganyika. This will be a mighty stride toward the civilization and evangelization of the Dark Continent.—Missionary Herald.
(16) “And Ruth said, Entreat me not to leave thee, and to return from following after thee; for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God; (17) where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: Jehovah do so to me, and more also, if aught but death part thee and me. (18) And when she saw that she was steadfastly minded to go with her, she left off speaking unto her.
(19) “So they two went until they came to Beth-lehem. And it came to pass, when they were come to Beth-lehem, that all the city was moved about them, and the women said, Is this Naomi? (20) And she said unto them, Call me not Naomi, call me Mara; for the Almighty hath dealt very bitterly with me. (21) I went out full, and Jehovah hath brought me home again empty; why call ye me Naomi, seeing Jehovah hath testified against me, and the Almighty hath afflicted me? (22) So Naomi returned, and Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter-in-law, with her, who returned out of the country of Moab: and they came to Beth-lehem in the beginning of barley harvest.”
Golden Text.—“Be kindly affectioned one to another.” Rom. 12:10.
SUGGESTIVE QUESTIONS.
(1) What circumstances led up to the subject of this lesson? Note 1. (2) When Naomi advised her daughters-in-law to remain in Moab, what was Ruth’s reply? Verse 16. Note 2. (3) How long did she propose to remain constant? How did she emphasize her determination? Verse 17. Note 3. (4) On hearing this earnest expression of fidelity, what did Naomi do? Verse 18. (5) To what place did the two women then journey? How were the people of the city affected by the arrival and appearance of Naomi? How did they express their surprise? Verse 19. Note 4. (6) How did Naomi express her grief? Verse 20. Note 5. (7) What did she say of her changed circumstances? What of the providence of God? Verse 21. Note 6. (8) What time of year did they arrive in Beth-lehem? What is revealed by the rest of the story of Ruth? Verse 22. Note 7.
NOTES.
1. About ten years previous, owing to a famine in the land of Israel, a Bethlehemite family left their home and went into the land of Moab to live. The man’s name was Elimelech, his wife’s name was Naomi, and their two sons were named Mahlon and Chilion. The young men married Moabite women, one named Orpah and the other Ruth. When her husband and two sons died, Naomi decided to return to Bethlehem, for she heard that everything was prosperous there. The daughters-in-law started with her, but Naomi told them they would better remain with their own people, for she had no more sons, and was too old to marry again. She said, “It grieveth me much for your sakes that the hand of the Lord is gone out against me.” The student should study all the chapter.
2. Altho Naomi had lost her husband and sons, as well as losing financially, her life among the heathen had won the affection of her Moabite daughters-in-law, and Ruth had been won to her religion.
3. A sense of duty so impressed Ruth that she called dire punishment upon herself in case she should prove untrue.
4. “Is this Naomi?” The friends and former acquaintances were evidently surprised to see Naomi coming home in poverty and bereft of her husband and sons. It was indeed a sad ending to what the family had deemed a prosperous outlook. Their strange move and its results have had many counterparts.
5. Naomi’s arrival in such a plight, and amid the scenes of happier days, evidently brought to her mind a keener sense of her poverty and bereavement. The very name she asked to be called, Mara (bitter), seemed to her the true expression of her condition.
6. The expression “I went out full” indicates that altho there was a severe drought, or “hard times” from some cause, Naomi’s family were not obliged to move to Moab. They were evidently well-to-do, and could have remained in Bethlehem as well as others. Naomi acknowledged that the Lord had not approved of the move, yet He overruled it for good in the conversion of Ruth. Elimelech had disobeyed God in going away to live among the heathen for mere mercenary purposes, and his sons had also disobeyed in marrying Moabite women.
7. The two women came to Bethlehem at an opportune time, the beginning of barley harvest—in the spring of the year. The rest of the story of Ruth reveals her fidelity, faithfulness, and virtue, and how the Lord rewarded her by bringing her into the royal line, from which came the Messiah. Her son Obed was the grandfather of David.
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Notes on Revelation Study, Hymn Author, and Giving
Read the second page of this paper. There are publications noticed there that you may wish to get.
Our study on the book of the Revelation is omitted this week; it will appear next. The scripture is Rev. 2:12-17, the Pergamos church.
The author of the hymn and melody found in this issue, A. Rosaltha Carey, a cousin of Pastor M. H. Brown, is totally blind. She lives at Chaumont, N. Y. She has written other songs and poems, sometimes when passing through the deep waters of affliction. She and a widowed, invalid sister are earnest Christian workers.
One wealthy New Yorker pays $9,000 a year for a jockey to ride his racers, and he paid $13,000 to another man to get release for the jockey so he could hire him. It would be interesting to know how much this gentleman gives for religious or benevolent purposes. And yet, why know? God knows, and our doing does not depend on him or any one else. Every one must give an account of himself to God.
Sabbath-keepers Arrested.
—The Morning Albertan of November 10 quotes from the Ponoka (Alberta) Herald the following: “A case which is creating considerable interest, and which will serve as a test case, is being tried at Wetaskiwin this week. A party adhering to the Seventh-day Adventist faith has been charged with Sabbath desecration by laboring on Sunday in violation to the Sabbath-observance Ordinance. There has been a considerable amount of discussion as to whether the Adventists should be permitted to engage actively in labor on Sunday.” Always let it be understood that these persons worked six days as did Jesus Christ, and observed the same day that He did. We would not by this imply that there ought to be a human law to protect or compel true Sabbath observance. There ought to be no Sabbath or Sunday law. Religion is a matter of choice and motive, and to seek to compel it is to make men hypocrites, or else to persecute the righteous.
FOR THE YEAR 1903.
By Editor
This number of the SIGNS OF THE TIMES will reach many new readers, and also many of our old ones. Do not they wish the SIGNS for 1903? We wish to tell them some of the things which the SIGNS will set before its readers during the coming year. We can not tell them all; it would, in the first place, take too much space, and, in the second place, we do not know ourselves; for in these days of mighty and rapid fulfilment of prophecy and promise we can not say all that God has for us to say. Besides the exposition of current events in the light of Bible prophecy, besides the great and vital teachings of the righteousness by faith of Jesus Christ and all that it means in the transformation of character, besides many other things too numerous to mention, we wish to name six specific things which, the Lord willing, the SIGNS will contain in the coming volume:—
I. In our General Department.
1. A striking series of articles on the signs of the times, not the paper, but the great events which have taken place and which are every day occurring, and which clearly show from the “more sure word of prophecy” where we are, and what to soon expect.
2. There will be a series of articles on the government question. God has permitted and will permit man to try every scheme of government he could devise to control turbulent humanity. The outcome of all these will be shown; and the only successful, enduring government, in which all may have a part, will be presented.
3. The exposition of the book of the Revelation. Do you not wish to know the meaning of the seven-sealed book of chapter 6? of the sealing work of chapter 7? of the two witnesses of chapter 11? of the great controversy opened in chapter 12? of the messages of chapter 14? Then study it with the SIGNS in the year to come.
II. The Home Department.
1. Beginning with January, we shall publish a series of articles written expressly for the SIGNS OF THE TIMES by that Christian mother and physician of large experience, Mrs. Mary Wood-Allen, M.D., on the youth of both sexes from adolescence to maturity. There will be fifteen of these articles as follows: Four papers on Adolescence, its Physical, Mental, and Religious Significance, with Instructions for Parents and Children for this most critical period; three articles on the Home and its various relationships; eight articles on Society, Courtship, Love, Engagement, Heredity, The Gospel of Heredity, Founding a Home, and others which follow logically. We especially appeal to parents and youth to read these articles. Here is an extract from the first of the fifteen:
“In order to act with wisdom parents should understand the physical, mental, and moral significance of adolescence; should realize that it is a crisis of grave import to boy or girl. Most mothers do realize that this is to the girl a critical time, and they watch with much anxiety the physical unfolding of their daughters. . . . Few parents, however, realize that this crisis [from about the age of twelve to sixteen] to the boy is equally grave, is marked by physical changes of equal importance, that the crisis is for him of even graver import, because the inner forces work with greater energy and the outer temptations come with stronger power.”
2. Some practical home talks by an experienced woman, a close observer, and author of repute, which will be of help in the home.
3. A series of plain studies on the anatomy, physiology, and hygiene of the human, stripped of technical terms,—a blessed gospel of health which will prove of many times more value in the home than the cost of the paper.
Do you not wish the SIGNS for the year to come? We desire your help in the publishing of the Gospel. Shall we not have your co-operation?
The Lowest Depth.
It is one of the saddest things to see religious people professedly running after and defending the theater when the secular press are deploring its decadence as never before. Three different plays have recently been before the New York public, each successive one exceeding its predecessor in indecency. The New York World declares that this last drama touched “the lowest depth”; that “it shines and stinks with the slime of Sodom.” “There can be nothing worse to come,” it declares, “as an example of degenerate art than this play, whose motif is incest, complicated with adultery, and crowned with the murder of the innocent.” And yet all the witchery of scenery, the power of eloquence, and the pathos of sorrow are used to make the accursed thing popular. The critic of the Evening Post declares it to be “a work horrible in conception, ruthless in execution, poisonous in spirit, but full of tragic power, poetic imagination, and literary splendor,” and that “not even genius could make this piece fit for public performance.” The New York Tribune characterizes it as “particularly foul and offensive.” And the World’s critic proclaims it to be “the most malignant example of lust, cloaked with the flowers of poetic eloquence, that the stage of New York has yet seen.” But it tells us—sad it is ’tis true—that “the theater was filled with a large and brilliant audience, including the usual proportion of young women and their young-men escorts. Doubtless the matinée girls, if they have the opportunity, will flock like doves to this feast of buzzards.” And from the horrible depths of this foul thing the theater grades up to that which is almost innocuous. O, Christians can find a better place in the real dramas and tragedies of life than in the theater. Doubtless men and women who have lived with it have been kept pure in spite of it; but many, many have gone down to destruction because of its ever-downward influence.
A Gospel Object-lesson.
By Editor
Ye editor lives—sleeps—one and one-half miles from his office. “What a beautiful, glorious world, despite of sin,” he mentally remarked this morning. The full moon was sinking toward the western horizon as he arose at 5 o’clock, and yet in a room that faced the west he had sufficient of the silver radiance, without artificial light, for a morning bath and the necessary toilet preparations of the morning. One hour and a quarter later he mounted his wheel for office bound. What a grand morning it was in the twilight of the moon and the dawn-break of the sun. The receding moon hung low over Mt. Tamalpais. The sea-fog like a black wall shut out the stars, but as it floated past the radiant moon it was dissipated into a gauzy veil that scarce dimmed her brightness. In the orient the dull red of morn was tinting the eastern side of the clouds three-fourths athwart the sky, rapidly changing to gold, and leaving an ever-narrowing dominion to the queen of night. Soon after the day burst, the moon sank from sight, and the light of the sun illumined all the dark places of earth. Thus will be the Lord’s coming. We are now in earth’s night of sin, lighted with the reflected light of the Sun of righteousness, the Gospel of Jesus Christ. There is sufficient to prepare for His coming; but before the surpassing glory of the coming eternal day, all the glory and light of this world of sin will vanish, even as the light of the moon before the rising sun. “The night is far spent, and the day is at hand;” “be ye therefore of sound mind, and be sober unto prayer.” Every day has its Gospel object-lessons.
Magazine Printing Advances Shown by Delineator Anniversary Issue
What a stride has been made in magazine-making during the last thirty years. The December Delineator shows the high-water mark. That issue is its thirtieth-anniversary number. Its color work, and it has twoscore pages in two or more colors, is superb. To print it 728 tons of paper were used and six tons of ink. Its issue is 91,500 copies, representing over 20,000,000 sections to be gathered by hand. There are in this number 230 pages, and it took 91 presses, running 14 hours a day for a month, to print it.
