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Signs of the Times, Vol. 28, No. 10.

NIAGARA

Signs of the Times

Mar 5, 1902

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Mar 5, 1902

NIAGARA

By John G. C. Brainard

The thoughts are strange that crowd into my brain, While I look upward to thee. It would seem As if God poured thee from His "hollow hand," And hung His bow upon thy awful front; And spoke in that loud voice, which seemed to him Who dwelt in Patmos for his Saviour's sake, "The sound of many waters;" and had bade Thy flood to chronicle the ages back, And notch His centuries in the eternal rocks. Deep calleth unto deep. And what are we That hear the question of that voice sublime? O, what are all the notes that ever rung From war's vain trumpet, by thy thundering side? Yea, what is all the riot man can make In his short life, to thy unceasing roar? And yet, bold babbler, what art thou to Him Who drowned a world, and heaped the waters far Above its loftiest mountains?—A light wave, That breaks and whispers of its Maker's might.
—John G. C. Brainard.

THE FALLS OF NIAGARA

By Earl of Carlisle (Viscount Morpeth)

There's nothing great or bright, thou glorious Fall, Thou may'st not to the fancy's sense recall; The thunder-riven cloud, the lightning's leap, The stirring of the chambers of the deep, Earth's emerald green, and many-tinted dyes, The fleecy whiteness of the upper skies, The tread of armies, thickening as they come, The boom of cannon and the beat of drum, The brow of beauty, and the form of grace, The passion and the prowess of our race, The song of Homer in its loftiest hour, The unresisted sweep of Roman power, Britannia's trident on the azure sea, America's young shout of liberty. O, may the wars that madden in thy deeps, There spend their rage, nor climb the encircling steeps; And till the conflict of thy surges cease, The nations on thy banks repose in peace.
—Earl of Carlisle (Viscount Morpeth).

Niagara Falls in Winter

Pictures of Niagara Falls are not uncommon, and many of our readers have looked upon the mighty original, and listened to the sublime and awful music of its sub-bass solo. But rarely is the mighty cataract seen with surroundings like the above. The photographs from which the above engravings were made, were taken after the mighty waterfall, in conjunction with the frost king, had been building and decorating mountains and palaces, and covering with resplendent tapestries of crystals, diamonds, and sapphires every object in sympathy with its plan.
“When thou didst build, no quarry sent its stones To enrich thy walls; but thou didst hew the floods, And make thy marble of the glassy wave.”
The great mound before the falls is a hill of ice. The falling spray from the mighty volume of water has frozen as it fell till a mountain of crystals is formed. On the left is a view of a bit of landscape in the near vicinity. In the foreground is a tree loaded with ice. No ordinary tree of the forest could bear the load. Its branches would be broken. But the tree began to bear its annual burden of ice when but a little shrub, and its fibers have grown strong, fitted for its loads. The burdened tree, bearing so strongly its load, is a moral lesson to parents and youth. When the sun falls on the crystal mountain and the bejeweled rocks, trees, and shrubs, the scene is one of indescribable splendor, of scintillating, sparkling, shining, iridescent beauty, far surpassing all that man can do. And yet Niagara in all its phases is but one of many of the glorious works of God, designed of Him to lead poor mortals away from the worship and service of the perishing and evanescent to that of Him who liveth and abideth forever, whose dwelling is in the light, and whose capital city, with its streets of gold, gates of pearl, and walls of jasper, surpasses all the beauties of earth.

He Is Not Here; He Is Risen

“He Is Not Here; He Is Risen.”—Jesus Christ, or His truth, or His work, can not be imprisoned, or bound, or stayed by stone, or creed, or tradition, or resolution. All the progress of God’s work has been over broken resolutions and wrecked constitutions made by men. He is the Living One. He arose to burst every tomb and bond that binds men, and to set them free. He could not be holden of the grave. Acts 2:24. Nothing in which Christ abides can be bound by man. The life may be crushed out, and the dead grave may remain with us; but “He is not here; He is risen.” Because He is risen, His Spirit is come. It is being poured out. It brings all blessings in its train. It fits men now, as of old, if they will permit, to witness for God. “Ye shall receive power, when the Holy Ghost is upon you; and ye shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.” These are the words of the risen Christ. He waits to bestow that Spirit upon every soul consecrated to His work. He pleads with His unbelieving disciples, “Receive ye the Holy Ghost,” “the Spirit of truth.”—Apples of Gold Library. No. 36.

THE ETHIOPIAN CONVERTED.

By J. O. Corliss

A FEW of the disciples were left behind at Jerusalem, when the persecution led by Saul dispersed the believers from that center. Peter and John were among these. So when tidings came to Jerusalem of Philip’s wonderful experience at Samaria, these two apostles were sent to assist him in his closing labors at that place. When they considered their mission in Samaria ended, they returned on their way to Jerusalem, leaving Philip alone to go on with his work.
Almost immediately, however, an angel of the Lord visited Philip, and directed him to “go toward the south, unto the way that goeth down from Jerusalem unto Gaza, which is desert.” Acts 8:26. This definite instruction for the evangelist to go south by a certain route to the intersection of another road leading west from Jerusalem, was for a purpose. The sequel will show that the Lord not only knew who Philip would meet there, but also the condition of mind in which he would be found when met at the designated place. This reveals that the Lord saw just the occupation the stranger would have been previously engaged in, to bring about the certain frame of mind which it was foreknown he would have.
The order was also timely. Arriving at the designated spot, Philip looked up and saw coming from toward Jerusalem a very influential man from Ethiopia, the treasurer, in fact, of Queen Candace’s dominion. He had been to Jerusalem to worship, and returning, was reading the book of Isaiah’s prophecy while riding in his chariot. Philip had then followed faithfully to the end of his previous instructions, and this incident probably awakened some inquiry in his mind as to the design of his mission. What was to be his next step, he had not yet been informed. But while God does not point out all the detail of men’s missions at once, upon sending them forth, He does not leave the faithful messenger to fall under perplexity. At the proper moment the Spirit said plainly to Philip, “Go near, and join thyself to this chariot.”
This was all that was necessary for the time. Without hesitation the evangelist gathered his garment about him, ran toward the coming traveler, and heard him reading aloud in a studious way. The passage which so seriously engaged his mind was this: “He was led as a sheep to the slaughter; and like a lamb dumb before his shearer, so opened he not his mouth; in his humiliation his judgment was taken away; and who shall declare his generation? for his life is taken from the earth.” Verses 32, 33.
Hearing this, and seeing the troubled look of the Ethiopian, the evangelist’s mission was plainly defined. He needed no more direct instruction. Looking up at the puzzled man in the chariot, Philip ventured the question, “Understandest thou what thou readest?” Looking up from his task, the mystified reader said, “How can I, except some man should guide me?” Then making room beside himself, he asked the evangelist to sit with him. Philip being seated in the chariot, the officer of state turned to him with the question, “I pray thee, of whom speaketh the prophet thus? of himself, or of some other man?”
Whatever query might hitherto have been in the evangelist’s mind regarding his mission to that desert region, it was all clear when this question was offered. There was now no doubt that God had sent him to preach Christ to that one lone man, so desirous to know the meaning of God’s Word. True, it was in wide contrast to the work he had just left, where thousands hung upon his words; but it was God’s lesson to him that heaven’s help is sent just as readily to a single individual who is desirous to know the way of righteousness as to the vast multitudes who sit in darkness. It is also our assurance that Jesus would have given His life for one individual as freely as for all the world. It also tells us that no one need lack for the sympathy and care of the Lord Jesus now, however isolated he may be.
The text selected by the Ethiopian could not have been more wisely chosen. From this Philip pointed out the fulfilment of the Scriptures in the revelation of the Messiah. We are not instructed as to just how long Philip preached, or what definite line of thought he followed. But we are told that at just the proper time,—when the Ethiopian saw clearlythe claim of the Messiah upon men, and the relation believers should sustain toward Him,—they approached, in their journey, a certain body of water. Beholding it, the eunuch cried out, “See, here is water; what doth hinder me to be baptized?” The ready reply was, “If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest.”
That was the only pre-requisite,—“believe with all thine heart.” No list of lifeless creeds or senseless forms was to be first mastered, but the simple expression of faith in Christ as the Saviour from sin, was enough. Conformable to this requirement, the eunuch fervently said, “I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.” The chariot was then halted, and, attended by Philip, the eunuch went down into the water, and there in that stream of the desert, in sight of only the angels of heaven, he gave himself into the hands of his teacher to be buried beneath the yielding flood, as his silent testimony of faith in the burial and resurrection of Christ for sin. Rom. 6: 3, 4; Col. 2: 12.
This act completed, God’s design in sending Philip to the desert, instead of to some large city teeming with sin and degradation, was fully met. That was the only favorable time and place when and where the eunuch could be rescued. True, he had just come from Jerusalem, where were some of the leading apostles, and the eunuch had gone there expressly to worship. Why not have the church intercept him there? God knew best about that. He knew that in the midst of all the confusion of the Jewish ceremonies, there was little hope of winning the sturdy statesman to the truth. To meet him alone, in the midst of the desert, where he would have a reflective turn of mind and be free from class prejudice, there was hope that he would be brought to see the truth in its clearness. God’s plan of arrangement for securing the conversion of this single sincere soul, is but another evidence, not only of God’s general love for the world, but of His personal care for every one who desires it. True faith in God must embrace this thought. It is not enough to believe that God loves the world in general, but that He loves me in particular. With this in mind, prayer and praise will be more direct, because the mind centers on the relation between myself and God. Then we may say with the psalmist: “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures; He leadeth me beside the still waters.” Psalms 23.
Philip’s mission being completed, he was not anxiously concerned about his next station, yet he readily found it; for as soon as the baptism of the eunuch was accomplished, the evangelist was caught up by the Spirit, and borne to the next place where God desired to use him. But the eunuch “went on his way rejoicing.” Such was then, and should be now, the way of witnessing for Christ.
J. O. CORLISS.

MRS. E. G. WHITE

By Ellen G. White

A LESSON FOR MOTHERS.—NO. 2.

It was not enough that the child who was to deliver Israel should receive a good legacy from his parents. This must be followed by careful training. From infancy he was to be trained to habits of strict temperance. From his birth he was to be a Nazarite. Thus he was placed under a perpetual prohibition against the use of wine and strong drink.
So to-day lessons of temperance, self-denial, and self-control are to be taught to children from babyhood. It should be the constant effort of every mother to conform her habits to God’s will, that she may work in harmony with Him in the training of her children. Let mothers place themselves in right relation to their Creator, that by His grace they may build round their children a bulwark against intemperance. If they would but follow the course God has outlined for them, they would see their children reaching a high standard in moral and intellectual attainments, see them becoming a blessing to society and an honor to their Creator.
If mothers studied the Scriptures more and the magazines of fashion less, if they realized that their course affects the destiny of hundreds and perhaps of thousands, how different would be the condition of society. The cause of reform is suffering for want of men and women of integrity and steadfastness, men and women whose lives are an illustration of the self-denial and self-control that bar the way against intemperance.
Can we look upon the unbelief, the intemperance, the crime, that seem to be deluging the earth, without feeling our souls stirred to their very depths? Infidelity is rearing its proud head, saying, “There is no God.” Intemperance marches boldly through the land, carrying with it degradation, desolation, and death. Ere long the cry of men and nations that have forsaken God, and have been forsaken by God, will rend the heavens. What can hinder the crime, what stay the woe, that is filling the world? The evil might have been prevented, had past generations been trained to fear, love, and obey God. Let us now do what we can to bring about the change that needs to be made. Explicit instruction has been given in the Word of God. Let these principles be carried out by the mother with the co-operation and support of the father. Let children be trained from infancy to habits of self-control. Let them be taught that the object of life is to bring blessing to one another and honor to God.
Fathers and mothers, labor earnestly and faithfully, trusting in God for wisdom. Let your aim be the highest good of your children, and then require obedience. Keep yourselves constantly under the control of the Spirit of God. Then indeed may we hope to see our sons “as plants grown up in their youth,” and our daughters “as corner stones, polished after the similitude of a palace.”

MRS. E. G. WHITE

CHRIST IN THE GARDEN.

By W. S. Bissonnette

Slow, slow that figure roams The evening dusk always: as slow, more still Than eve's brown shadow comes. Deep, deep, those footsteps thrill The world's dumb hollow where the wild earth homes. Her old low language yearns; The lights are in the vault, The starlight burns Along the stony track of some lost rill That scars the lonely hill, Streaking a silver path, a tender thread, But hard as wintry iron to the tread; Not there His feet may halt. But walk the teeth instead The world's bright ridge has set for whoso spurns. Slow, slow, He turns, Seeks, enters in,—a garden dry as salt
O lonely weight Bowed lowly down, and sunken head, All hungered, yet all consecrate; Be still unfed, Still desolate. That tired woe may find a bed, And every homeless pang an open gate Where famished hope is handless led, O House and Hearthstone of our fate.
O brooding brow, Where, moonlike, burns a tender place Of high and lonely sorrow; Thou, O mystic face, Dimmed mutely now, Through human woe for human grace,— Plead still, yearn on, ye wist not how, Wild lips, thy trembling warmest space, Thou buildest our far bliss, O brow.
O hallowed eyes, And bosom deepened for our rest,— The home of tears, the haunt of sighs,— O brow, O breast Where sorrow lies, Where trouble turns as to a nest; O breath, O tears that sink and rise, Sink low, be lost, rise far and blest, The wind and dew of Paradise!
W. S. BISSONNETTE.
Colorado Springs, Colo.

A Lay Discursus on the Soul

By J.A.L. Derby

By Prof. J.A.L. Derby.

Natural Immortality and Character.

It is perhaps best, before passing to an examination of particular texts concerning the soul, to bestow a comment or two on a few of the common extra-Biblical arguments for natural immortality, with especial reference to their bearing upon the great questions of character and sin. We shall do this briefly without transgressing our intention of avoiding the metaphysical.
1. In the past we have dealt with a contention for inherent immortality based upon a fact (the dignity of man) which is urged under various phases, only one of which we have given. But we have seen that whatever the inferences derived from this fact, they lose their force when the character of the beings God had in mind in creation, the kind of persons He intended to perpetuate, fails to be found in sinful men.
It is urged that to say man ends in extinction argues a waste of energy not to be supposed of God. This might have some weight when applied to the whole race, regardless of character, and of free will as a necessary gift to creatures from whom God would receive honor; but it is of no value against the destruction of the sinner who perversely refuses to fulfil the divine purpose.
The eternal purpose requires holiness, righteousness. This is the one eternal, immortal thing. The grave could not hold a sinless Saviour. But holiness is not inevitable in creatures of free will. Hence some may perish—must perish. And that many would refuse holiness and therefore must be rejected, with an apparent waste of energy, before His sovereign purpose of saving “all Israel” (Rom. 11:26), “the Israel of God” (Gal. 6:16)—not literal Israel—could be accomplished, He thus announced to the mother of the race and through her to her daughters: “I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception.” Gen. 3:16. Thus sin is found to occasion all the apparent waste of energy. Nor does this prove that God is not absolute; for His purpose is conditioned by sin through His forbearance and permission, not of necessity. But as this involves both a problem of metaphysics and a different line of thought, we shall not pursue it. The fate of the disobedient must be learned from Scripture itself. Science and philosophy shed no light upon this problem; but since science itself is placing unbounded confidence in the “survival of the fittest,” and the fittest in God’s purpose are those that fulfil it, the inference would certainly be against unfit souls.
2. Another argument for natural immortality is drawn from the incompleteness of life.
Must all our longings and aspirations, it is asked, have nowhere their fruition? Is man born only to be tantalized with a mirage? Are these hopes and desires correlated to nothing in the universe? The eye pre-supposes light, the ear sound, the nerves objects of sensation, the instinct of love an object to love; but are the organic impulses of the human soul the only class of facts having no correlative? Can it be that man has been endowed with reason, only that he may the more keenly realize the meaning of disappointment? Is the broken shaft of marble, so often seen in our graveyards, a true symbol of life in its entirety? Was the innocent babe that burned to death in the explosion of a gasoline stove, born only for that?
“The existence of an organic or constitutional instinct,” science says, “is adequate proof of its correlative. Therefore the instinctive desire for a complete life, which can never be fully realized in this state of being, proves the future life.”
We admit with thanks to God the feeble light of this reasoning! We would that it were a demonstration of the future life! But natural present immortality for good and bad alike, is a very different thing from a future life not necessarily begun at, nor continuing in death, but which may begin a million years after mortal dissolution; a future life confined to those that are “Complete in Him” (Col. 2:10), that is, to the righteous. No, no; the possibility, or, rather, the certainty, praise the Lord! of a future life beginning after the resurrection, based upon righteousness in this state of existence, is a totally different thing from a soul-life of righteous and wicked alike, beginning with birth, first connected with a mortal body; second, existing independent of any sort of a body; and third, re-united to an immortal body.
Let it be emphasized that future immortality, commencing at the resurrection, founded on character, meets perfectly every requirement of the argument drawn from the incompleteness of life. Indeed, the person who talks of a complete realization of every instinct and aspiration without righteousness, is neither a psychologist, moral scientist, nor philosopher; for he disregards the fact that aspirations after holiness, after mastery of self, after freedom from bondage to habit, a longing for peace of conscience, for certainty of knowledge concerning life’s meaning and the destiny of man, and the instinct of prayer, are as truly desires of the soul as others mentioned above.

Immortality and Sin.

But this failure of natural immortality to reckon with character, is the negative side of the case. Let us view the positive bearing of this well-nigh universal hypothesis upon the estimate it places on sin. If it condemns sin, there may be good in it; if it ignores, minimizes, depreciates, its desperate nature, we may be sure the subtle snare of the devil is hidden there. It is when we focus upon this phase that the insidious nature of the belief becomes apparent. It is perhaps nothing more than might be expected that the mind of the carnal philosopher, too full of pride of self to admit his necessity of a Saviour’s deliverance from sin, should fail to notice this side of the question, evident and decisive as it is.
When Achilles was dipped in the river Styx to render him invulnerable, he was held by the heel, the Achilles tendon. Hence that part, being untouched by the magic waters, was still unprotected against the mortal stroke. To my mind every argument for universal conscious soul-continuance in and after death, possesses this vulnerable heel. More than this, as the fangs of a wolf would betray him, tho clad in the skin of a sheep, so in each of these plausible reasonings there lies, not quiteconcealed, the glitter of the serpent’s cunning logic. Every argument for inherent immortality ignores the fact and consequences of sin. This puts the devil’s trade-mark upon every invention of the sort.
If all men are alike immortal, then sin does not affect that fact in any way; it can not possibly hinder them from being immortal. According to this belief, soul-perpetuity is in no manner dependent on sin or righteousness. None of the arguments for natural immortality dare mention sin; while some positively require, in order to have any force in that direction, that the fact of sin go absolutely for nothing.
Take, for instance, the inference of immortality from the incompleteness of life.
If the incompleteness of this life argues the conscious soul-continuance of all persons, it can do so only with the implied conclusion that all shall become complete in the future life. If all there realize in their experience that completeness for which the life is given, then sin in this life can not possibly hinder them from attaining all their aspirations, can not possibly frustrate them in the next. Hence how one lives here is a matter wholly indifferent. This savors of the pit; for such reasoning positively requires that unrighteousness, with all its hideous deformity, be ignored as a factor of any consequence in the life to come.

Immortality and Eternal Torment:

Natural immortality, when coupled with eternal torment, makes God a fiend. The result is atheism, infidelity, agnosticism, skepticism. Immortality without conscious eternal punishment is practical Universalism. Either way, the devil has the case. It is, “Head up, I win; tail up, you lose,” and the master trickster flips the penny.
But we are not yet done with the tendency of this doctrine. If the devil can lead a man to believe that the Creator will not destroy, annihilate if you please, the work of His hands for any reason, his Satanic subtlety will shortly lead that same man to doubt that God would do what is infinitely more fearful, namely, torture him eternally. Few minds, no matter what they think they believe, actually do hold that a Being of infinite love can take pleasure in insatiable hatred. Few minds are acute enough to see how darkness and light can occupy the same space at the same time, or understand how freezing can melt a substance. Likewise, few minds can grasp the paradox of a God of boundless benevolence eternally tormenting a victim whom His irrevocable decree has made incapable of repentance. The enormous disproportion between just one unforgiven sin,—sufficient to entail (according to popular orthodoxy) an ever-enduring anguish in the Gehenna of sulphurous flame,—or even between several years of a sinful lifetime, and never-ending woe, an eternity of excruciating agony, is too monstrous for common sense to span or ignore.
The pleasure some persons find in gloating over the miseries of the damned seems to us more truly diabolic than divine. The scope of these articles will not permit us the ecstasy of paralyzing the fears of sinners with the terrors of ghastly clippings we have on this subject from orthodox sources. Our Catholic brethren may get large, copious doses of this brain-palsying dogma from almost any of their regularly ordained spiritual doctors, saying nothing of the poetry of Dante. Protestants who wish to revel in horrors so hideous that the gaping jaws of the tiger, which finally kills its prey (and the tortures of inquisitors and savages are symbols of benevolence compared with them), may read Jonathan Edwards on the state of the lost and Michael Wigglesworth’s “Day of Doom,” from the latter of which the following verses are reproduced from memory:—
“With iron bands they bind their hands And cursed feet together, And cast them all, both great and small, Into that lake forever.”
“Where day and night, without respite, They wail and cry and howl, For torturing pain which they sustain In body and in soul.”
He is never weary of impressing the fact that eternally “their torment’s smoke ascendeth,” and “their torment never endeth,” and—
“Live they must, while God is just, That He may plague them so.”
Doubtless little children that are made to stand forever on white-hot griddles should be very thankful for the fact that they are not roasted all over.
It has been estimated by a German scientist that it takes about 20,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (twenty sextillion) atoms of hydrogen to make a grain, a grain being less than an ounce. All the water of the globe is two-thirds hydrogen. Let us remember that when from the endless punishment of the lost there have been counted off as many years as there are atoms of hydrogen in the waters of the earth, eternity has scarcely begun to dawn. And still the wretched creatures of God’s handiwork languish on and on without hope of any amelioration of their condition, still blaspheming High Heaven who has made them incapable of repenting; while saints, angels, and the King of kings look over the battlements of the celestial city, and regale themselves with the delightful spectacle! And all this the work of One whom we must worship as the personification of love. But enough. I know not what baseness of spirit, what sycophancy of action, what hypocrisy of service, the reality of suffering might beget in me; but certain I am, when left free to judge, that I would rather bear the stigma of atheism in this life and blister in hell in the next, than degrade and stultify the dignity of reason and manhood by bowing in adoration before a monster like that! If the tender minds of children could grasp in its entirety this fearful doctrine, and the alternative of worshiping such a fiend, they would go stark mad, as some have gone. The results in the minds of older persons who get a slightly broader view is, that they tacitly repudiate or mollify this condition of the unsaved. Those that reject it adopt some form of Universalism or become infidels. Those that soften the state of the lost, either accept purgatory with an ultimate exit, or something very much less than literal fire. Rather than impartially and candidly search the Bible to see what it actually does teach, they will discard all, or a large part, of what they think it teaches; but hang they must, at all events, to the evil, illogical, unphilosophical, unscriptural doctrine of natural immortality.
The result of all this on the sinner is, that when he sees pretended believers disbelieving their own standard of doctrine, interpreting it in spiritual ways, toning it down to appeal to common sense, he concludes that either revelation is a very dim and uncertain light, or that after all sin and iniquity can not be so very bad. So sin itself is lightly esteemed.
“Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel that prophesy, and say thou unto them that prophesy out of their own hearts, Hear ye the Word of the Lord: Thus saith the Lord God, Woe unto the foolish prophets, that follow their own spirit, and have seen nothing! . . . They have seen vanity and lying divination, saying, The Lord saith; and the Lord hath not sent them; and they have made others to hope that they would confirm the word.” Eze. 13:2, 3, 6.
It can thus be seen that the whole tendency of the immortal-soul idea is to depreciate the sinfulness of sin. Its most probable consequence to those who try to form some idea of the future consistent with this theory is belief in such a one as is taught by Spiritualists; namely, that the after-life consists of all grades of morality, each individual gravitating naturally to his own sphere, no other punishment involved, and capable of progression to higher spheres. If this doctrine does not reveal the stamp and finger-touches of the old arch-enemy of God and righteousness, it would be difficult for me to find any teaching that does.
If there is anything taught in the Word of God; if there is any meaning to the Gospel; if the infinite gift of the Son of God has any significance; then character in man is the very purpose of creation and redemption. If not, why was the very first command a prohibition against sinning?
But we have before indicated this line of study, and therefore we shall not enlarge upon it here.
[The next article, No. 6 of the series, is entitled, “The Necessity of a Revelation.”]

Fresh Life in God’s Service

NOWHERE in the Bible do we find any intimation that God wishes people to “wear themselves out in His service.” This does not mean that He would have them look out for themselves, and consider their own selfish ease. Far from it; on the contrary, He would have all do with their might what their hands find to do. But it does mean that whole-hearted, intelligent devotion to God’s cause brings fresh life. The truth of this is seen in the case of Moses, who at the age of one hundred and twenty was as young as at forty; yet he did enough work each day for seventy men. God is “the living God,” Christ is “the Prince of Life,” and He gives eternal life to as many as believe in Him.—Present Truth.
Continue reading: DIVINE HEALING VERSUS THE WORKING OF SATAN