IN a recent article contributed to The Independent, giving “An Outsider’s Experience in Politics,” Mr. Eltweed Pomeroy summarizes the methods of “machine” politics for defeating justice, thus:—
“What are the means used by the bosses? Five. First, corrupted judges at the primaries and bulldozing tactics there. Second, a browbeating comity and delegation chairman, with his attendant thugs. Third, a properly managed Credentials Committee, with the proper arrangements made beforehand, so that there will be contests, and the contests decided their way. Fourth, a tactful chairman, who will have fine presence, be a hypocrite and pretend to fairness, but never recognize any but machine men. And, fifth, the presence of the boss, with his ever-ready check-book and his fine knowledge of men to know what he must do to win his way with them.”
“I have repeatedly read wise editorial exhortations,” Mr. Pomeroy says, “declaring that if only the average man would attend primaries and conventions, all the evils of the body politic would be remedied. On April 6 last, I attended a primary for the first time in my life, and on April 14 I attended my first Democratic convention. My time and effort were misspent, and I felt that the only value it had for me was an experience as to what not to do. I will not go again unless I join some organization to raise a row about the way it is being conducted. It is utterly useless for the average man to attend a primary or convention, unless my experiences are exceptional and not the rule.”
Mr. Pomeroy is, as he states, “only an average business man, living in a nice and quiet neighborhood in East Orange, N. J., a suburb which prides itself as being one of the last places where there could be any political corruption.”
These statements and others that we might quote from Mr. Pomeroy’s article may profitably be pondered by those Christians who argue that it is a wise thing to dismiss the prayer-meeting to attend the primary, and who are ever preaching moral reform by the ballot. The saints are to be the light of the world and the salt of the earth, not by trying to outvote the sinners, by whom they are largely outnumbered, but by the use of those more powerful spiritual weapons of warfare which God provides in a sphere of activity which sinners, while they remain such, can not enter. The mightiest weapon in the world today, whether of offense or defense, is the Word of God.
L. A. S
Nothing to Pay
By Frances Ridley Havergal
Nothing to pay! Ah, nothing to pay!
Never a word of excuse to say!
Year after year thou hast filled the score,
Owing thy Lord still more and more;
Hear the voice of Jesus say,
“Verily, thou hast nothing to pay!
Ruined, lost, art thou, and yet
I forgive thee all that debt.”
Nothing to pay! The debt is so great;
What will you do with the awful weight?
How shall the way of escape be made?
Nothing to pay! yet it must be paid!
Hear the voice of Jesus say,
“Verily, thou hast nothing to pay!”
All has been put to my account,
I have paid the full amount.”
Nothing to pay; yes, nothing to pay!
Jesus has cleared all the debt away,
Blotted it out with his bleeding hand!
Free and forgiven and loved you stand.
Hear the voice of Jesus say,
“Verily, thou hast nothing to pay!
Paid is the debt, and the debtor free!
Now I ask thee, lovest thou me?”
— Frances Ridley Havergal.
The Promise of the Spirit
By Ellen G. White
MRS. E. G. WHITE
CHRIST declared that after his ascension, he would send to his church, as his crowning gift, the Comforter, who was to take his place. This Comforter is the Holy Spirit,—the soul of his life, the efficacy of his church, the light and life of the world. With his Spirit Christ sends a reconciling influence and a power that takes away sin.
In the gift of the Spirit, Jesus gave to man the highest good that heaven could bestow. The Saviour looked on humanity, and saw that it was under the power of the prince of darkness; but he saw also that there was hope for human beings because there was power in the divine nature successfully to contend with evil agencies. With glad assurance he said, “Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.”
The Spirit was given as a regenerating agency, and without this the sacrifice of Christ would have been of no avail. The power of evil had been strengthening for centuries, and the submission of man to this satanic captivity was amazing. Sin could be resisted and overcome only through the mighty agency of the third person of the Godhead, who would come with no modified energy, but in the fulness of divine power. It is the Spirit that makes effectual what has been wrought out by the world's Redeemer. It is by the Spirit that the heart is made pure. Through the Spirit the believer becomes a partaker of the divine nature. Christ has given his Spirit as a divine power to overcome all hereditary and cultivated tendencies to evil, and to impress his own character upon the church.
Christ said of the Spirit, “He shall glorify me.” As Christ glorified the Father by the demonstration of his love, so the Spirit was to glorify Christ by revealing to the world the riches of his grace. The very image of God is to be reproduced in humanity. The honor of God, the honor of Christ, is involved in the perfection of the character of his people.
At the cost of infinite sacrifice and suffering, Christ has provided for us every essential to success in the Christian warfare. The Holy Spirit brings power that enables man to overcome. It is through the agency of the Spirit that the government of Satan is to be subdued. It is the Spirit that convinces of sin, and, with the consent of the human being, expels sin from the heart. The mind is then brought under a new law,—the royal law of liberty.
The Spirit works in us by bringing to mind, vividly and often, the precious truths of the plan of redemption. We should forget these truths, and for us God's rich promises would lose their efficiency, were it not for the Spirit, who takes of the things of God, and shows them to us. Our hearts are warmed by the contemplation of Jesus and his love, and we long to speak to others the comforting assurances that have been brought to our minds.
It is the privilege of every son and daughter of God to have the indwelling of the Spirit. If those who know the truth would love and fear the Lord alway, if they would abide in Christ, they would have moral and spiritual power. The grace of Christ would be in them as a well of water, springing up unto everlasting life, and would flow from them as streams of living water.
The Spirit illumines our darkness, informs our ignorance, and helps us in our manifold necessities. But the mind must be constantly going out after God. If worldliness is allowed to come in, if we have no desire to pray, no desire to commune with him who is the source of strength and wisdom, the Spirit will not abide with us. Those who are unbelieving do not receive the rich endowment of grace that would make them wise unto salvation, patient, forbearing, quick to perceive and appreciate heavenly ministrations, quick to discern Satan's devices, and strong to resist sin. God can not do his mighty work for them because of their unbelief.
Christ has promised the gift of the Spirit to his church, and the promise belongs to us as much as to the first disciples. But like every other promise, it is given on conditions. There are many who believe, and profess to claim the Lord's promise; they talk about Christ and about the Holy Spirit, yet receive no benefit. They do not surrender the soul to be guided and controlled by the divine agencies. We can not use the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is to use us. Through the Spirit God works in his people “to will and to do of his good pleasure.” But many will not submit to this. They want to manage themselves. This is why they do not receive the heavenly gift. Only to those who wait humbly upon God, who watch for his guidance and grace, is the Spirit given.
Christ declared that the divine influence was to be with his followers to the end. But the promise is not accepted and believed by God's people; therefore its fulfilment is not seen. The promise of the Spirit is a matter little thought of; and the result is only what might be expected,—spiritual drought, spiritual weakness, spiritual declension and death. Minor matters occupy the attention, and the divine power that is necessary for the growth and prosperity of the church, and which would bring all other blessings in its train, is lacking, though offered in its infinite plenitude.
Just so long as the church is satisfied with small things will it fail of receiving the great things of God. Why do we not hunger and thirst after the gift of the Spirit, since this is the means by which we are to receive power? Talk of it, pray for it, preach concerning it. The Lord is more willing to give the Holy Spirit to us than parents are to give good gifts to their children.
If our workers realized the responsibility resting upon them, would they enter the work without cherishing a deep sense of its sacredness? Should we not see the deep movings of the Spirit of God upon the men who present themselves for the ministry? For the baptism of the Holy Spirit, every worker should be offering his prayer to God. Companies should be gathered together to ask for special help, for heavenly wisdom, that they may know how to devise and execute. Especially should men pray that God will baptize his missionaries with the Holy Spirit.
There is no limit to the usefulness of one who, putting aside self, makes room for the working of the Holy Spirit upon his heart, and lives a life wholly consecrated to God. If men will endure the necessary discipline, without complaining or fainting by the way, God will teach them hour by hour, and day by day. He longs to reveal his grace. If his people will remove the obstructions, he will pour forth the waters of salvation in abundant streams through human channels. If men in humble life were encouraged to do all the good they could do, if restraining hands were not laid upon them to repress the zeal, there would be one hundred workers for Christ where now there is one.
God takes men as they are, and educates them for his service, if they will yield themselves to him. The Spirit of God, received into the soul, will quicken all its faculties. Under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, the mind that is devoted unreservedly to God develops harmoniously, and is strengthened to comprehend and fulfil the requirements of God. The weak, vacillating character becomes changed to one of strength and steadfastness. Continual devotion establishes so close a relation between Jesus and his disciples that the Christian becomes like8him in mind and character. Through a connection with Christ he will have clearer and broader views. His discernment will be more penetrative, his judgment better balanced.
The presence of the Holy Spirit with God's workers will give the presentation of truth a power that not all the honor or glory of the world could give. The Spirit furnishes the strength that sustains striving, wrestling souls in every emergency, amid the unfriendliness of relatives, the hatred of the world, and the realization of their own imperfections and mistakes.
A union of divine and human endeavor, a close connection first, last, and ever, with God, the source of all strength,—this is absolutely necessary in our work.
Christian Unity
Let us consider first a few verses found in the seventeenth chapter of John, beginning to read at the sixteenth verse: “They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth. As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world. And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth. Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word. That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.”
In these few verses we have brought before us the aim of the gospel, the object of Christ's mission to this earth, the true purpose regarding the church of God,—“that they may be one.” This is the mystery of godliness, how men and women of different minds, plans, and ideas can unite together, all speak the same thing, and be of the same mind, and yet be so different in their individuality. It is a mystery how there can be unity in diversity, and yet this is what the gospel is to accomplish, and is to be the greatest evidence to the world of the power of Christianity. Satan knows this, and so his plans are constantly to keep people divided. God's purpose is to unify.
I have thought a great deal of this lately. Although a member of the church, I now believe I held views which had in them the very element of separation that is in the world. I used to feel that it was necessary for every man to live up to his own convictions, regardless of what others might think. I must be true to myself. This is the position I have maintained for years. Now, while there is truth in this, there is also a great error in it.
When Peter came to the Saviour and said, “What shall this man do?” referring to John, the Saviour said, “What is that to thee? follow thou me.” This says clearly that God never has given authority to one man to dictate to another what he should do, that we stand related to God as individuals, and that it is impossible for any man to exercise authority of this kind. In another place the Saviour said that among the Gentiles, that is, among men of the world, they do exercise this authority one over the other, but “it shall not be so among you;” for “all ye are brethren.” While it is a sublime truth that man has an individuality, and is to sustain it, yet the carnal heart readily receives this also, and naturally cherishes its own plans, opinions, and ideas; but a sanctified individuality and conscience will feel the need of the counsel, advice, and help that can be received by fellowship; and it is for this very reason we are told that in the closing days “they that feared the Lord spake often one to another: and the Lord hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon his name. And they shall be mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels.” That is why the apostle Paul exhorts us not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is, and so much the more as we see the day approaching.
I wish to refer to a few texts to show you that the conscience is not a safe guide. It can not always be relied upon. I will speak first of the experience of St. Paul. In the twenty-third chapter of Acts, the first verse, we find the following words: “And Paul, earnestly beholding the council, said, Men and brethren, I have lived in all good conscience before God until this day.” I have no doubt that Paul stated the truth, and he was thoroughly conscientious, as we call it. He had lived in all good conscience before God and man up to that time, and thought he was doing right. He had thought that he had a conscience of his own, and that he must be true to it. “I have lived in all good conscience before God until this day.” The twenty-fourth chapter of Acts and the sixteenth verse makes it plain that this was Paul's idea, he must be true to his conscience. “And herein do I exercise myself,” he said, “to have always a conscience void of offense toward God, and toward men.”
In the third chapter of Philippians, the third verse, we find that Paul had a conversion upon this point; for the time came in his experience when he said, “For we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh. Though I might also have confidence in the flesh. If any other man thinketh that he hath whereof he might trust in the flesh, I more: circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews; as touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless. But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ.”
Turning again to the twenty-sixth chapter of Acts, beginning at verse nine, we notice some of the things this conscience led Paul to do. “I verily thought with myself, that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth. Which thing I also did in Jerusalem: and many of the saints did I shut up in prison, having received authority from the high priests; and when they were put to death, I gave my voice against them. And I punished them oft in every synagogue, and compelled them to blaspheme; and being exceedingly mad against them, I persecuted them even unto strange cities.” This is what conscience led Paul to do; and what it caused him to do it will cause any other man to do who takes the same position, who makes a god of his conscience.
I think we might with profit study the experience that came to Paul, as recorded in the ninth chapter. In the record of the stoning of Stephen, in the seventh chapter, it is stated that “the witnesses laid down their clothes at a young man's feet, whose name was Saul.” The first verse of the eighth chapter says, “And Saul was consenting unto his death.” The third verse of the same chapter says, “As for Saul, he made havoc of the church, entering into every house, and haling men and women committed them to prison.” The first verse of the ninth chapter speaks of the continued attitude of opposition to the church of God that Saul adopted: “And Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, went unto the high priest, and desired of him letters to Damascus to the synagogues, that if he found any of this way, whether they were men or women, he might bring them bound unto Jerusalem.” While Saul was journeying to fulfil his mission, “he came near Damascus: and suddenly there shined round about him a light from heaven: and he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks. And he trembling and astonished said, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?”
The Lord could have told Saul what he had for him to do. The Lord could have said, I want you to go into Arabia, or to such a place, and preach the gospel. But if the Lord had done that, it would have forever kept him separated from the body of believers, the church of God. So when Saul said, “Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?” the Lord said to him, “Arise, and go into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must do.” God by this action united Paul to the church, and showed that he was to recognize God's voice through the church. From this we see that the true object of the gospel is to draw men together, to lead men to feel that although they have an individuality of their own, they can9not get along without one another, that they are dependent upon one another for counsel and help; to recognize that they are not a complete whole in themselves, but that it takes different members to make the body. “The eye can not say unto the hand, I have no need of thee: nor again the head to the feet, I have no need of you.” A true, sanctified individuality leads men and women to feel their dependence one on the other, and will lead them to submit one to the other in the fear of God.
Notice now a verse in the eleventh chapter of Proverbs: “Where no counsel is, the people fall: but in the multitude of counselors there is safety.” What is the good of counsel if a man feels that he is a complete whole in himself, and that he is directed by God, and must under all circumstances be true to his own convictions or feelings? If we have this confidence in the flesh, what is the need of counsel? There is no safety in that, but there is safety in the multitude of counselors. Again, notice the scripture in the fifteenth chapter and the twenty-second verse: “Without counsel purposes are disappointed: but in the multitude of counselors they are established.” Again in the twentieth chapter, the eighteenth verse: “Every purpose is established by counsel.” Also in the twenty-fourth chapter and the sixth verse: “For by wise counsel thou shalt make thy war: and in multitude of counselors there is safety.” There is safety in nothing else.
Here is a statement from a little work I have that sets the matter very clearly before us, and what is addressed to one is addressed to all: “The Lord saw the danger that would result from one man's mind and judgment controlling decisions and working out plans, and in his inspired Word we are commanded to be subject to one another, and to esteem others better than ourselves. When plans are to be laid that will affect the cause of God, they should be brought before a council composed of chosen men of experience; for harmony of effort is essential in all these enterprises.”
“Many of your councils do not bear the stamp of Heaven. You do not come to them as men who have been communing with God, and who have his mind and his merciful compassion, but as men having a firm purpose to carry out your own plans, and to settle questions according to your own minds.”
“God has made his church a channel of light, and through it he communicates his purposes and his will. He does not give one an experience independent of the church. He does not give one man a knowledge of his will for the entire church, while the church, Christ's body, is left in darkness.”
“You do not realize that independence is a poor thing when it leads you to have too much confidence in yourself, and to trust to your own judgment rather than to respect the counsel and highly estimate the judgment of your brethren, especially of those in the offices which God has appointed for the saving of his people. God has invested his church with special authority and power which no one can be justified in disregarding and despising; for in so doing he despises the voice of God.”
“Christ and his church are inseparable. To neglect or despise those whom God has appointed to lead out, and to bear the responsibilities connected with his work and with the advancement and spread of the truth, is to reject the means which God has ordained for the help, encouragement, and strength of his people. To pass these by, and think your light must come through no other channel than directly from God, places you in a position where you are liable to deception, and to be overthrown.”
“Christ is the fountain. The church is the channel of communication. Those who boast of personal independence need to be brought into closer relationship to Christ by connection with his church upon the earth.”
“I have been shown that no man's judgment should be surrendered to the judgment of any one man. But when the judgment of the General Conference, which is the highest authority that God has upon the earth, is exercised, private judgment and private independence must not be maintained, but be surrendered.”
“You greatly err in giving to one man's mind and judgment that authority and influence which God has invested in his church in the judgment and voice of the General Conference.”
“When this power which God has placed in the church is accredited to one man, and he is invested with the authority to be judgment for other minds, then the true Bible order is changed. Satan's efforts upon such a man's mind will be most subtle and sometimes overpowering, because he thinks he can affect many others through this mind. Your position on leadership is correct if you give to the highest organized authority in the church what you have given to one man. God never designed that his work should bear the stamp of one man's mind and one man's judgment.”
“As all the different members of the human system unite to form the entire body, and each performs its office in obedience to the intelligence that governs the whole, so the members of the church of Christ should be united in one symmetrical body, subject to the sanctified intelligence of the whole.”
“Unbelief suggests that individual independence increases our importance, that it is weak to yield our own ideas of what is right and proper to the verdict of the church; but to yield to such feelings and views is unsafe, and will bring us into anarchy and confusion.”
“Christ is leading out a people and bringing them into the unity of the faith, that they may be one as he is one with the Father. Differences of opinion must be yielded, that all may come into union with the body, that they may have one mind and one judgment.”
From these extracts it is clear that it is God's plan to unify, to bring together, and that it is the work of the enemy to scatter, and sooner or later we must all learn this, and this very experience we shall have to pass through.
(To be concluded)
L. H. CHRISTIAN
By L. H. Christian
Sabbath-Keepers in Scandinavia Before and After the Reformation—No. 3
L. H. CHRISTIAN
ONE interesting feature of the ancient Sabbath movement in Scandinavia is that it was connected with the spirit of prophecy. Many historians declare this belief in Saturday-keeping to be a direct result of visions and dreams. One writer also claims that the chief cause of the rapid spread and growth of this belief lay in the fact that it purported to be of divine origin—given by “revelations and angel visions.”
This seems very probable, at least to those who understand the close relation between the prophetic gift and genuine Sabbath reform in our day. One thing is certain, “the law and the prophets” can not be separated. Whenever God’s people have returned to a full obedience of his holy law, he has graciously given them the gift of prophecy. It was so in the great advent movement, and there is the best of reason for believing that it has been thus in every full reformation of the past.
As to the origin and genuineness of the visions among the Scandinavian Sabbath-keepers most of the historians are nearly silent. They seem rather to take it for granted that these were but strange psychological phenomena peculiar to those times. Of this, however, there is not an iota of solid proof. On the other hand, there is all the evidence we can desire for believing that those visions were genuine manifestations of the Holy Spirit.
Bishop Anjon, from whose history a paragraph was quoted in the preceding article as proof of the Bible origin of this Saturday-keeping, gives the most impartial account of this doctrine in Scandinavia. He says in part:—
“The belief that Saturday ought to be kept holy as the Sabbath originated as far as we know in the middle of the sixteenth century. In the year 1544, King Gustaf I issued a writing that warned against those in Finland who pretended to have the conviction through visions and dreams, that famine and other plagues are a judgment from God because the people refuse to keep the Sabbath day.
“In the beginning of the seventeenth century we find the same belief in Sweden, and here, as in Finland, it was based professedly on revelations. King Carl IX (1603) opposed the Sabbath doctrine with the most burning zeal, thinking it to be connected with some Catholic deceptions and errors which to his mind were the root of all evil.”
“This claim regarding the sacredness of Saturday was urged by two very different sects or parties.”
“One of these was connected with, and possibly itself the cause of, a certain leaning toward Judaism, and consequently led to a departure from the Christian church. This party first appeared about 1590 in Westeraas diocese. . . . We know but little about the growth of this sect, or the lives of its adherents.10One of them from Grytuos was beheaded in the year 1619, ‘because he always disputed with the schoolmasters, priests, and higher clergy, and because he despised the true faith and church discipline.’ Another, Hans Jonsson, died of the torture to which he was subjected during the trial.”
“This antichurch movement was very different from the other party, whose members, while they kept Saturday holy by abstaining from all work on the Sabbath, did not separate themselves from the church. We have no evidence that these who observed the Sabbath followed any other Jewish custom. If the movement had led to anything that could be regarded as an apostasy from the church, the rulers would have enacted far stronger edicts against it.”
“This Saturday-keeping did not generally stand alone, but was a part of the revival work of those days. It was found in connection with a solemn and warning preaching against common sins and evils, such as pride, surfeiting, luxurious and changeable fashions of clothing, as well as vice and dissensions. The Lord should be pleased or appeased, and a better character secured by keeping the Sabbath holy. This belief obtained so great an influence and power that not only a very large number of laymen, but many even of the priests, who were kindly disposed toward this zeal for piety, stopped all work on Saturday.”
“In the province of Ueriko the sacredness of the Sabbath was defended by the daughter of a priest from Kumla. She received this belief through angel visions, which she faithfully reported, though not before she had passed through very severe trials on account of doubts as to her own acceptance with God, and because of opposition from others. After this she preached repentance and a reform of life and habits. Her work attracted so great attention that immense crowds gathered to hear and see the then renowned woman, who also had the gift of prophesying. Bishop Paulinus took the matter up and delivered a special lecture on it at a conference of the clergy in Strengnas. At about the same time a number of peasants in the county of Vesta decided that they would agree to keep Saturday holy.”
“This zeal for Saturday-keeping continued many years, while the government in the meantime made stricter and more sweeping laws in favor of Sunday. The widespread tendency to rest on Saturday was bitterly opposed by the church, and many attacked earnestly even little things that would seem to strengthen its continuance. A priest in Orsa, Dalarne, for instance, went up to a distant farm of his to oversee the men at work. While there, some older members of his parish asked him to preach and administer the sacraments to them, as they were going away. He did so, and it happened to be on a Saturday. Because of this the church council of Westeraas had him punished, since by conducting this service on Saturday he encouraged the error of those who had a Jewish leaven.”
“Twenty years later than this (1667) a boy in Agunnaryd, Vexio diocese, began to preach. He claimed that an angel had revealed to him that he should warn against the great sins of the day, especially pride, and admonish the people to be converted and keep Saturday.”—L. A. Anjon’s “History of the Church in Sweden from the Council of Upsala,” page 353f.
There is reason to believe that this Sabbath-keeping continued in Sweden at least a century after the last-named date. Gradually, however, the constant and combined opposition and persecution from both church and state silenced its adherents. The light was put out; but only to be rekindled in brighter rays by a mighty proclamation of the third angel’s message. The past revivals and religious movements carried on by the Scandinavians give promise of a large and glorious harvest among these nations in the closing work of grace on earth.
Duty to Church-Members
By GEO. O. STATES
GEO. O. STATES
For some time in the past I have seen notices in our church paper to absent members of various churches, stating that unless they reported within a given time, they would be dropped from the church records, and would be no longer members. There is no question but that in most of our churches there are members who are not living out their church vows, but is it not a fact that many of us in our zeal to get people to unite with the church do not properly instruct them? And not being thoroughly established in all points of the message, they soon become discouraged, and finally their names are dropped from the church records.
I believe that we should instruct those uniting with our churches on every point of the message, and that after they become members of the church, we should realize that we are indeed our brother's keeper.
It is a solemn fact that during the closing time of the sealing message “Satan will use every device to keep the minds of God's people from the present truth, and cause them to waver.”
About thirty-five years ago the church of which I was clerk passed a resolution that all who did not report each quarter, either by person or by letter, would be disfellowshipped. As a result of trying to live up to that resolution, we turned out some God-fearing members, and had to acknowledge our mistake. It is hard for some people to express their desires on paper, and while they are isolated, shall we make their lot harder by dropping their names?
I recently visited a council meeting in one of our churches where the names of those who had not been heard from for a long time were read, and among them was the wife of one of our ministers in the early days of the message. I believe that if the officers of that church could have visited that sister, who was living near by, it would have been a blessing to her in her old age.
God has told us in the eighteenth chapter of Matthew just how to deal with the erring, and unless we follow his instructions, we shall make matters worse. “Testimonies for the Church,” Vol. VII, pages 262-264, also tells us how we should proceed:—
“No church officer should advise, no committee should recommend, nor should any church vote, that the name of a wrong-doer shall be removed from the church books until the instruction given by Christ has been faithfully followed. When this instruction has been followed, the church has cleared herself before God. The evil must then be made to appear as it is, and must be removed, that it may not become more and more widespread. . . . Matters of grave import come up for settlement by the church. God's ministers, ordained by him as guides of his people, after doing their part, are to submit the whole matter to the church, that there may be unity in the decision made.”
Our church books contain the names of many from whom the church has not heard for years, but no doubt it might have been different had the church been faithful in looking after them. May the great Head of the church help us all to realize that during the closing message Satan is working with all power to draw away the remnant people, that they may not receive the seal of God.
Let us move carefully in dealing with these erring ones, and first do all we can to win them back. O for more of the gentleness of Christ in dealing with one another in our conference, in our church, and in our home work, and then we shall not see so many giving up the truth!
Bible Study
No man can study the Word of God until he has learned that he needs for every part of it the guidance of the great Author; while the law of advance in the study of Scripture is the law of obedience to all light already received. There must be willingness to learn and readiness to work. We can never know the Word of God save as we are prepared to put it into practise.
We must (1) read the Bible (2), examine it, and (3) meditate upon it—not only think but bring the life into the light of the thing discovered. Let the student take a single book, read it again and again until he has a clear idea of the argument, analyze and examine. Then each section should be taken more minutely in the same fashion; and lastly, the book must be taken word for word until the structure and purpose of each has been appreciated. Then there ought to follow prayerful meditation.— Dr. Campbell Morgan.
Little Faults Hide God’s Light
By H. W. Beecher
You need not break the glasses of a telescope or coat them over with paint in order to prevent you from seeing through them. Just breathe upon them, and the dew of your breath will shut out all the stars. So it does not require great crimes to hide the light of God's countenance. Little faults can do it just as well.—H. W. Beecher.