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Review and Herald, Vol. 79, No. 25.

The Greatest of These Is Charity

Review and Herald

Jun 24, 1902

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jun 24, 1902

The Greatest of These Is Charity

Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.
2 And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.
3 And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.
4 Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up.
5 Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil;
6 Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth.
7 Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.
8 Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.
9 For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.
10 But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.
11 When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
12 For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.
13 And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity. 1 Corinthians 13.

The Great Nations of To-day.

By Alonzo T. Jones

By Alonzo T. Jones.
A presentation of the great nations of the present time, their rise, relations, career, and their destiny, in connection with a clear and concise treatise on the Seven Trumpets, the Three Woes, the Third Angel’s Message, the Threefold Messages, Babylon, the Beast of Revelation 13, its Image in all its phases and workings, the Commandments, the Hour of the Judgment Come, and the Setting up of the Everlasting Kingdom of God.
An excellent volume to loan and to place in general circulation.
257 pages; paper covers, 25 cents.
Order of the State Tract Societies.

The Two Republics.

By Alonzo T. Jones.
A COMPREHENSIVE HISTORY OF THE Two Great Republics, Rome and the United States.
The errors of the great Roman republic are cited, and lessons of warning drawn for the guidance of the people in the present republic of the United States. The true principles of religious liberty are contrasted with the enforced religious observances.
Of great importance to every American citizen.
“It seems to us as though it has left nothing unsaid which needed to be said on the subject.”—New York Sun.
896 octavo pages. Prices, $2.50 to $4.75.
Order of the State Tract Societies.

Marvel of Nations.

OUR COUNTRY,

Its past, present, and future, and what the Scriptures say of it.
in the English, German, Danish, and Swedish Languages.
A new book, up to date in every particular. The foreign editions are of a high grade in the construction and in the translations. The subject matter is of great importance to all classes.

Of the United States

it records an amazing historical past and a prophetic future. All the prophecies referring to this nation are clearly explained and given a Scriptural application. It is an important, message-bearing volume, pleasing in appearance, interesting in matter, and an excellent authority in prophecy.
Prices, in all languages, $1.25, $1.50, postpaid.
An Easy Seller; Agents Wanted.
Order of the Tract Societies.

INTERNATIONAL Sunday School Lesson Topics

For the Third and Fourth Quarters of 1902.
The Giving of the Manna, The Commandments, Worshiping Idols, Study of the Sanctuary, Nadab and Abihu, Journeyings, Report of the Spies, The Brazen Serpent, Life of Moses, Obedience to the Lord, General Review.
“Patriarchs and Prophets,”
beginning with the creation, and thoroughly considering all the principal Biblical events and characters down to the close of David’s life, includes much important matter and many special truths for this time on the International Lesson Topics, and is therefore an excellent book for study in connection with these lessons, it being a special commentary upon the subjects considered. There is a demand for “Patriarchs and Prophets” now.
Agents are wanted to solicit for it.
Published in English, Danish, Swedish, German, and Holland.
Correspond with the State Tract Societies.

The Marshaling of the Nations

By Alonzo T. Jones
A brief yet comprehensive outline of Assyria, Babylon, Medo-Persia, Grecia, and the division of the Roman empire into the ten kingdoms; the source and gradual development of the great powers of to-day; their strategical positions on the maps of the world, and their part in the great Eastern question; the United States as a prophetic nation, and the Scriptural predictions pertaining to the part that each of the great governments is to act in the coming conflict.
An important publication for this time.
Pamphlet, 44 pages; price, 10c. postpaid.
Order of the State Tract Societies.

THE EMPIRES OF THE BIBLE.

FROM THE FLOOD TO THE CAPTIVITY OF BABYLON.
By Alonzo T. Jones
A THOROUGH yet concise history of the peopling of the earth, the origin of nations and of the state, and the course of empire from the time of Nimrod to the captivity of Judah. The courses of empires are fully shown by 21 especially prepared maps. The design of the book is excellent, and the classified arrangement of the subject matter is especially helpful to all Bible and history students.
410 large pages, neatly bound in cloth; $1.50, postpaid.
Order of the State Tract Societies.

GREAT EMPIRES OF PROPHECY.

FROM BABYLON TO THE FALL OF ROME.
THE GREAT empires of prophecy are Babylon, Medo-Persia, Grecia, Rome, and the ten divisions of the Roman empire. The history of these is foretold in the prophecy of Daniel, and to this Biblical record, the “Great Empires of Prophecy” adds over eighty testimonials of the best historians, thus rendering this volume a cyclopedia of prophetic history fulfilled.
712 large pages; 22 full-page colored maps made especially for “Great Empires of Prophecy.” Price, $2.
Order of the State Tract Societies.

Gifts and Giving

By Editor

Editorial

Gifts and Giving

GIVING is just as much a part of Christian experience as praying. In giving we simply allow the Lord’s character to find expression through us, and in this way his character becomes wrought into us. It is evident that it is not the market value of the gift which is of the greatest importance in the Lord’s sight. According to heaven’s estimate the poor widow who cast two mites into the temple treasury gave more than any of the others. This shows that it is the giving spirit, rather than the material gift, which determines the value of the offering as entered in the books of heaven. And this is what makes it possible for every member of the Lord’s family to give just as much as any other member when the heavenly standard of value is used in measuring the size of the gift. It might surprise some who have been praised by the world as liberal givers to find how small their benefactions have really been. On the other hand, there have been many poor widows’ accounts opened in the books of the bank of heaven with a large balance to their credit, although the world has not been made aware of the fact through the columns of the newspapers. It is because of the very principle here set forth that every Christian will give something to the Lord and for his work in the earth. The spirit of giving is the Lord’s own spirit, and when the Lord quickens us by his spirit which dwells in us, that Spirit will reveal itself in doing through us what the Lord himself is constantly doing. The Lord is continually giving. This is the essence of love. “God so loved . . . that he gave.” Christ came “to give his life.” He who is born of God and conformed to the image of his Son will reveal the same disposition. This is the joy of heaven. This is why Jesus said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive.”

A Sure Defense

FALSE teaching abounds. Every right principle is being perverted. The plain “Thus saith the Lord” is either ignored or is interpreted to bring it into harmony with tradition or with “science falsely so called.” The people are being fed upon human speculation instead of upon “the sincere milk of the word.” Few are taught how to bring every action to the test of divine principles, and to govern their daily conduct by the law of the heavenly kingdom. Some who have had better advantages than others to become established upon right principles do not seem to have improved these opportunities in the most profitable way, and they are consequently weak when they ought to be strong. What is our defense against every form of error? It is the simple revealed truth of God. The poorest defense against error is to study error. No one would think of advising a friend who had an appetite for strong drink to try all the different kinds of liquors so that he might be prepared to recognize them and avoid them in the future. This sort of preparation would entangle him in the very snare which he is seeking to shun. He is best fitted to recognize error who is the most fully acquainted with the truth. The Spirit of truth has been given to us to make us acquainted with the truth. Christ came that he might bear witness to the truth. Through the truth we are to be sanctified. It is the Lord’s will that all should “come unto the knowledge of the truth,” and “the truth of the Lord endureth forever.” Against every threatening evil “his truth shall be thy shield and buckler.” “Buy the truth, and sell it not.”

A Stormy Time

IN the part of the world where we are living, the storms are frequent and severe. Last week the record was an unusual one. This whole section of the country was storm swept day after day. Many lives were lost, and much property destroyed. These frequent storms are the forerunners of the final storm when the earth will “be visited of the Lord of hosts with thunder, and with earthquake, and with great noise, with storm and tempest.” But this is a sign of soon-coming salvation to those who believe the Lord, and know his way of salvation. “The Lord hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm.” A forty-days’ storm brought destruction upon the old world, but Noah’s faith turned the flood of waters into a means of salvation for all who were in the ark. “By faith Noah . . . prepared an ark to the saving of his house.” In this ark it is said that “few, that is, eight souls were saved by water.” The same storm which flooded the earth floated the ark. The hosts of Israel were delivered from Pharaoh’s army in a fearful storm. “Thou hast with thine arm redeemed thy people, the sons of Jacob and Joseph. Selah. The waters saw thee, O God, the waters saw thee; they were afraid: the depths also were troubled. The clouds poured out water: the skies sent out a sound: thine arrows also went abroad. The voice of thy thunder was in the heaven: the lightnings lightened the world: the earth trembled and shook. Thy way is in the sea, and thy path in the great waters, and thy footsteps are not known.” “By faith they passed through the Red Sea as by dry land: which the Egyptians assaying to do were drowned.” In the same storm the Israelites found salvation and the Egyptians destruction. “And there shall be a tabernacle for a shadow in the daytime from the heat, and for a place of refuge, and for a covert from storm and from rain.” Have you found the place of refuge?
“Thou blest Rock of ages, I’m hiding in thee.”

The Real Work

THERE is the constant danger that we should be “cumbered about much serving” even while trying to do the Lord’s work. It is so easy to have our minds occupied with plans for organizations and institutions, and our energies spent upon that which is, after all, only a means to an end. We need frequently to be reminded that our one work is to be witnesses for God and his truth, to come into personal touch with those who are “strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world,” that we may “turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God.” Any work which does not contribute in somedegree to this result must be wasted effort, so far as the kingdom of God is concerned.
There is a world to be warned. There are souls to be rescued from sin. There are victories to be gained for the cross of Christ. There is need that humanity should come into close touch with humanity in order that divinity may have a channel through which it may reach after the lost. No organized effort can take the place of personal ministry. The world was not redeemed by heavenly council meetings and resolutions merely. Jesus came to seek and to save that which was lost. To how many are we personally ministering help and blessing? How many have been rescued through our direct effort? “Let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way, shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins.”
“Rescue the perishing, duty demands it, Strength for thy labor the Lord will provide: Back to the narrow way patiently win them; Tell the poor wanderer a Saviour has died.”

Private Interpretation of the Scripture

By L. A. S.

Of the Word of God it is declared by inspiration that “no prophecy of the Scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old times by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.” 2 Peter 1:20, 21.
What, then, is private interpretation of the Scripture? This involves a point upon which the Catholic Church, as opposed to Protestantism, lays much stress.
According to the language of the text quoted, the true interpretation of the Scripture—that interpretation which is not private—is from the Holy Ghost. And to this agree the words of John 16:13-15: “Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth. . . . He shall receive of mine, and shall show it unto you. All things that the Father hath are mine: therefore said I, that he shall take of mine, and shall show it unto you.” Further proof might be cited from the same authority if it were needed.
What, then, shall we conclude with reference to “the right of private judgment”? Manifestly, private judgment has no place in God’s plan of bringing mankind to a saving knowledge of the truth. Human judgment is left out altogether; for human wisdom is wholly insufficient to comprehend truths so deep as those which have to do with the salvation of the soul from sin. No man can advance a single step heavenward by the aid of his own private judgment; and if it were to affirm this truth that We Roman Catholics contend with Protestants over “the right of private judgment,” their position in the matter would be well taken. But in reality, the very opposite of this is the case.
The Catholic theologian points the seeker after divine truth to the church “fathers,”—to the decrees of councils and of popes, and the word of priest and prelate. Through them, and them only, must come his knowledge of the divine will and of all gospel truth. But this is only a human source of information; for pope and prelate and church father are no less human than is the one who is pointed to them as being the oracles of truth. And this being so, theirjudgment, their interpretation, is no less private than is that of any individual who may have no official standing in the church at all. Official standing does not in the least lessen the gulf between man’s wisdom and God’s. Adoration of the human does not in any degree invest what is human with the attributes of divinity.
The pronouncements of church councils and of popes, the commands of priest and of prelate, represent therefore only private judgment and private interpretation of the will of God, in the strictest sense. The “right of private judgment” is one which the Catholic Church not only claims for its spokesmen, but sets up as overshadowing the equal right of all other persons; all persons, it declares, must accept the private interpretation of Scripture given by the church authorities. What it points to as the fatal flaw in the Protestant system, is a fundamental error in its own system. It puts the human in the place of the divine, and points mankind to that in which there can be no salvation.
He who would know the truth as it is in Jesus, he who would be made wise unto salvation, must pass by all private, human judgment respecting the will of God, and accept that interpretation which comes from the Holy Spirit. Though all men should unite in declaring a doctrine to be taught by the Word of God, it would constitute but a private interpretation, unreliable and wholly unsuitable as a foundation of faith. God’s Word alone is infallibly true, and the Holy Spirit is the one infallible guide. A knowledge of gospel truth does not depend upon the possession of worldly wisdom, upon scholarly attainments, or high intellectual endowments. It does not depend for one person upon the will or wisdom of another. It depends upon faith, and is therefore equally free to all. Things hidden from the wise and prudent are revealed unto babes because the latter are willing to give God the glory. The Holy Spirit can illuminate the lowliest mind, and will never fail the humble seeker after heavenly wisdom.
L. A. S.

How to Dispose of Trouble and Care

By Uriah Smith

In Peter’s manifold economic instruction to Christians, he lays down the following directions: “Casting all your care upon him [that is, Jesus]; for he careth for you.” The Interlinear Translation, by Bagster, expresses a part of this passage in these words: “Casting all your care upon him, because with him there is care about us.” The Sermon Bible says there is nothing so beautifully true to the real meaning of this passage as this translation. At the same time we must guard against confusion of thought in regard to this word “care.” Care can never be to God what it is to us. Therefore the instruction to cast all our care upon him, can never make him weary or unhappy. The expression as applied to God is very different from what it is when applied to us. We can read the text (1 Peter 5:7) thus: “Casting all your anxious care and perplexity upon him; for to God all that concerns you is dear.” This carries the thought, and conveys the comfort it is meant to express. The word “care” is used in the Scriptures in both a good and a bad sense; as, for instance, cares “choke the word.” Matt. 13:22. Yet we are to have “care one for another.” 1 Cor. 12:25. But we are instructed to “take no thought for the morrow,” that is, no troublous thoughts, or anxiety, for the future, which we cannot change in any respect, even to the changing of one hair white or black, or adding to, or taking from, our stature one cubit, to make it longer or shorter. We are to understand in this sense what Paul says in Phil. 4:6: “Be careful for nothing; but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.”
Inspiration here uses a word to carry out the full idea, which is another matter, and in some respects a more difficult matter. The word used is “casting all your care upon him.” It does not say, simply placing, or laying, as if quietly, all your care upon him, but “casting.” This word requires an earnest, and it may be persistent, effort. The instruction is to remove the burden of care from where it has been to the place where we wish it to be, where it will not be to us a galling and wearing load. The psalmist uses the same word: “Cast thy burden upon the Lord.” Ps. 55:22. When we do this, casting all our burden, or cares, upon Christ, then comes “the peace of God which passeth all understanding,” which is promised to keep our minds and hearts through Christ Jesus. Phil. 4:6.
Christ is not only the sin-bearer, but the care-bearer, for his people. But many people seem to think it more easy to cast their sins upon Christ than to cast their cares upon him. Why is this? — Because they trust God as a God of grace, and not as a God of providence. The forgiveness of sin they seem to look upon as something that takes place in the spiritual realm, far out of their sight. Therefore they can more easily bring themselves to believe that that work has taken place. But cares are something that is present to our senses, that we take cognizance of with our own minds. Therefore it is harder or more difficult to believe that these have been removed, and that it is our privilege to believe that they are cast upon him, and have been removed, and we need not bear them any more ourselves. And here is the difficulty we find in believing this. And there is danger too; for we are liable to deceive ourselves, and think we have trusted in Christ when we have not, because the plane of action is so far from our plane of perception and from our own senses.
But can this really be the case? Can we really believe in a God of grace and not believe in a God of providence? We are to believe him and trust him in spiritual things. When we confess our sins, we are to believe that he forgives us our sins, and cleanses us from all unrighteousness. Is it not just as much our privilege to believe in regard to our temporalities, and when we cast our cares upon him, believe that he receives them, and that they are in his keeping, and we can confidently and cheerfully go on our way, leaving all our cares on his unburdened shoulders, where they will remain, pressing us down no more? Here is the difference between the Christian and the man of the world: The Christian is not a man who has no burdens, but one who knows where to place them, and find rest and support in all his troubles. The Christian is not a man who has no cares, but the man who, when he has them, casts them on the Lord, and in place of them comes away with the peace that passeth all understanding, which is able to keep his heart and mind in Christ Jesus. This is one of the unlimited promises of God. There are no reservations made. It embraces “all your cares.” And sin is one of them. Let them all go. U. S.

Studies in the Gospel Message

The subject of the Sabbath-school lesson for Sabbath, July 5, is The Gospel Message Is for All the World.
God's plan for making known his salvation to the world seems simple enough. It is clearly stated in the promises to Abraham: “I will bless thee, and make thy name great: and thou shalt be a blessing.” God's blessings are bestowed upon a man or upon a people with the expectation that these blessings will be shared with others. Indeed, this is the primary condition upon which the blessings can be received in their fullness. When the Saviour sent out his disciples to minister blessings to others, he said to them, “Freely ye have received, freely give.” It is this very sharing with others which opens the channel of supply. The selfish attempt to hoard up God's blessings for our own use apart from others cuts us off from the source of blessing. “Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.”
The Lord is teaching us these principles in the great object lesson of nature. “The hillsides and plains that furnish a channel for the mountain streams to reach the sea, suffer no loss thereby. That which they give is repaid a hundredfold; for the stream that goes singing on its way, leaves behind its gift of verdure and fruitfulness. The grass on its banks is a fresher green, the trees have a richer verdure, the flowers are more abundant. When the earth lies bare and brown under the summer's parching heat, a line of verdure marks the river's course: and the plain that opened her bosom to bear the mountain's treasure to the sea is clothed with freshness and beauty,—a witness to the recompense that God's grace imparts to all who give themselves as a channel for its outflow to the world.”
These principles are entirely contrary to human reasonings, and are revealed only in the lives of those who have become “partakers of the divine nature,” and who maintain their fellowship with God. All this is clearly shown in the history of God's people. Their experience has proved, over and over again, that when the principles of the heavenly kingdom were actually applied in their individual and national life, they enjoyed the greatest prosperity, and were able to maintain their position and influence among the nations of the earth; when they imparted most freely to others the spiritual gifts of which they were partakers, they were themselves the most completely filled with all the fullness of God; when they mingled with other people in order that the light of God might shine upon them, they were a free people, and the most separate from the world; when these conditions were reversed, and they followed the example of the nations about them, they became worse than the people whom the Lord had driven out before them, they lost the blessing of God out of their own hearts, and they lost their place as a free and separate people.
These principles apply with equal force to our own time. God has raised up this people for no other purpose than that he may use them in giving this last gospel message to THE WORLD. The only excuse for our existence as a separate body of people, and the only power for maintaining this existence, are found in giving ourselves wholly to God for the accomplishment of his purpose in this people. Just as soon as we lose sight of this purpose, become conformed to the other churches from which we have been called out, and settle down in a complacent way to a selfish sort of enjoyment of the blessings which we have received, we forfeit all our right to the place to which we have been appointed, and we shall individually lose from our own hearts the message committed to us. The opportunity of giving his last message to the world is the Lord's final call to his own people for their salvation. This was the experience of the Jews in the time of Christ. The sending of his Son was the Father's last call to his own people. “Having yet therefore one son, his well-beloved, he sent him also last unto them.” Their refusal to receive him and to make him known to the world sealed their own destiny. “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.”
It may emphasize anew in our minds the great fact that this gospel is for all the world if we read some of the simple statements of the Scripture which teach this: “The field is the world.” “Ye are the light of the world.” “Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached throughout the whole world.” “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.” “This is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world.” “And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.” “This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations.” “And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people.”
The message which is to go to all the world is the message of God's love forthe world. This message of love for the world can only be given by loving the world with the love which God has planted in our own hearts. This love is not a mere sentiment, not a mere impulse of feeling. It is simply the outflow of the life which has been freely given to us. To preach the gospel to all the world is simply to become the channel through which the tide of love and mercy can flow from the throne of God to every needy soul. Thus we become associated with the heavenly agencies who are “sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation.”
We need to make this lesson very practical and very personal. We are living in the generation when the whole earth is to be lighted with the glory of God by the proclamation of the message, “Behold your God!” Every gift which God has bestowed upon us should now be devoted to this work. Money, time, and talent are to be consecrated to this one purpose, that the way of the Lord may be speedily prepared. Let each one ask himself, Do I make it manifest by the use which I make of money, time, and talent that I really believe that the gospel message is for all the world, and that it is to be given to all the world in this generation? “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations. . . . Lo, I am with you alway.”

Be Content to Be as Your Master

“Be content to be as your Master, God, and your Master will not be content without making you as he is.”

England’s Corn Import Duty

FOR some time past England has imposed an import duty on corn, apparently as a war-revenue measure; but now that the war is ended, the chancellor of the exchequer announces that this duty will not be repealed. This is taken to indicate that England is considering the advisability of changing her traditional policy of free trade for a protectionist policy, or at least that there are divided counsels in the British Cabinet on this subject.

Art Thou a King?

“UNTO Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father.”
To know the place that God designed, and still designs, that we, his children, shall fill, and to receive the grace of Christ in order that we may fill that place, is the sum and substance of Christianity. He has called us “unto his kingdom and glory.”
He has washed us from our sins, and made us kings and priests unto God and his Father. We know that “the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.” The work of the devil through sin has been to make us something else than kings and priests—slaves. God designed that we should be kings, but Satan’s work is to make us slaves. The gospel is the good news of deliverance. It says to the prisoners, “Go forth;” and to those in darkness, “Show yourselves.” It is the freedom, the liberty, wherewith Christ makes us free. And because of that freedom and liberty, and through it, we are restored to the place and to the power that belong to us. The place is that of kings and priests, and the power is kingly power,—the power to rule.
If we had ever seen ourselves in the place that belongs to every one of us, we would understand what has been lost through sin. There is only One who has ever occupied that place in the earth, and that is Jesus Christ. In the second chapter of the epistle to the Hebrews we see the place that belongs to man. Beginning with the fifth verse, we read, “For unto the angels hath he not put in subjection the world to come, whereof we speak. But one in a certain place testified, saying, What is man, that thou art mindful of him? or the son of man, that thou visitest him? Thou madest him a little lower than the angels; thou crownedst him with glory and honor, and didst set him over the works of thy hands.” Thus he was made king over all. But continuing, we read, “But now we see not yet all things put under him.” This is a complete reversal of God’s way. But while we do not now see man where God placed him, yet we do see Jesus, just as man was, made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death. We see him crowned with honor and glory; and because he was thus crowned, he tasted death for every man.
In the place where God placed the first Adam we see Jesus Christ, the second Adam. He was a king because of his character. When Jesus was here as a man, he was making clear to all the universe what God’s real purpose was and still is for us. Where we see Jesus as a man on the earth, with everything in subjection to him, we see clearly what God’s will is for us; and that which gave him that place was the fact that he was without sin. He “did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth.” Because he was righteous in character, he could take the place of a king, although he was a man. When the storm arose, he could say, “Peace, be still,” and it was so. The devils obeyed his voice, and he was ruler over disease, for at his word or touch it left.
Now we who were made in the image of God are not really men as God looks upon men, unless we are free from the power of sin. True manhood is freedom from sin, and true kingship is kingship of character, and it is revealed first of all in a person’s own experience. In the first chapter of Genesis man is put in a king’s place by virtue of what he was made to be. “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion.” That is the place of a king, and the last chapter of Revelation puts him there again: “And there shall be no night there; and they need no candle, neither light of the sun; for the Lord God giveth them light: and they shall reign forever and ever.” In the beginning man was given dominion, and at the close of the gospel work, man is in his place again; but between the two there is the experience of sin and the gospel work. What sin has wrought, the gospel of Christ can undo, and restore. And if that gospel is received for what it really is, the restoring life of God, it will put every one in his place again, and he will be a king, and will reign with Christ.
The crown of honor and glory that man had in the beginning was lost, and so we read in Rom. 3:23, “All have sinned, and come short of [or lack] the glory of God.” That is the crown gone. The gospel is the good news of the restoration of that crown through faith in Jesus Christ—the restoration of the character of God, which constitutes the crown.
To-day a king among men is one who is waited upon—has many servants to do his bidding, and an army to enforce his word. It does not seem to enter into the minds of men that the one who is in a high position is put there to serve others. How contrary all this is from God’s idea of true kingship. In Matt. 20:20 and onward is given the account of the mother of Zebedee’s children coming to Jesus, and asking that her two sons might sit one on either side of him in his kingdom. Jesus replied, “Ye know not what ye ask.” They did not understand what it meant to be a king with Jesus, because they did not understand the nature of his character. Then Jesus asked them if they were able to be baptized with the baptism that he was baptized with; and when the answer was that they were able, he told them that they should drink of his cup, and be baptized with his baptism, but that to sit on his right hand or on his left was not his to give, but it should be given to them “for whom it is prepared of my Father.” “And when the ten heard it, they were moved with indignation against the two brethren. But Jesus called them unto him, and said, Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority upon them. But it shall not be so among you: but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister; and whosoever shall be chief among you, let him be your servant: even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.”
The Son of God is the example of what it means to be greatest. “Whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister.” This is just what Christ was, when he was a man among men; and in this he was revealing the character of the King of the universe. God serves every creature he has made, even those creatures that are so small that we are obliged to use a microscope to find them; and the greatness of his kingship lies in the fact that he is able to serve the smallest. “Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing.” He ministers to all.
The place in which he put man was at the head of all created beings on this earth, and with the authority he gave him ability to serve “every living thing that moveth upon the earth.” His kingship consisted in the fact that he was able to render such a service to the creatures that God had made,—not independently of God, but standing between all living things and God to minister God’s gifts to them.
God asks us to be his servants, not because he needs any man to serve him. He is not worshiped with men’s hands, “seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things.” But he has given to man the privilege of occupying a kingly place with him as his servant, that he may receive the gifts of God to minister them to others. This is the character of God, and it is all summed up in one statement,—“God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” And receiving that life gives one the place of king. The very first place where that kingly life is shown is in one’s own character—his daily experience. He cannot be king over others until he is first king over himself. So the gospel is the gospel of kingship of character in Jesus Christ,—self-control, not by one’s self, but through Christ who overcomes. Instead of being a servant of sin, he is made king; instead of being beneath, he is to be above.
The estimate placed upon such a service by the world is far different from the way that God regards it; for man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks upon the heart. As history shows, many of the kings have been more distinguished by their vices than by their virtues, and they have been recognized more by the outward adorning than by the inward. But the meek and quiet spirit is in the sight of God of great price.
Continue reading: The Majesty of the Divine Humiliation