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Signs of the Times, Vol. 27, No. 33.

BLESSINGS THAT BECOME CURSES

Signs of the Times

Aug 14, 1901

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Aug 14, 1901

BLESSINGS THAT BECOME CURSES.

OUR illustration this week is strikingly suggestive. It is from a photograph of a modern encampment of the little remnant of that ancient people, the Samaritans, at Mt. Gerizim.
THE Samaritans were the mixed people brought to desolated Israel by the king of Assyria when the ten tribes were taken captive.
The graphic record is found in the seventeenth chapter of 2 Kings. The half-dozen nationalities and tribes among them had as many gods and numerous images, which they brought with them or made, as convenience and devotion dictated. They mingled this idolatry with the worship of the true God, taught them by an Israelitish priest, who was probably himself a worshiper largely in form. The result was that “they feared Jehovah, and served their own gods,” and so continued. Verses 32–41.
WHEN the Jews came back from their Babylonian captivity, the Samaritans desired to unite with them in the rebuilding of the temple; but on account of their mixed worship, Zerubbabel would have none of it. Ezra 4:1–3. From that time forth there was continual strife between Jew and Samaritan. The Jew considered the Samaritan without hope. The Samaritan hated the Jew because of his exclusiveness and spiritual pride. The Galilean Jew, to escape insult and violence, avoided passing through Samaria on his way to Jerusalem, and a Samaritan in Judea would in all probability have fared little better. The seventy disciples were forbidden to go to Samaria, evidently because their Jewish prejudices were so great that they could not help the Samaritans. It took the great love of Jesus to reach them, who saw in Samaritan as in Jew the purchase of His blood.
UNDER the ministry of Jesus and His apostles, many were converted. They did as the converted Jews,—went out into the great, needy world to save the lost. Of both the world has kept little record; but when God writes up His people, He will place the names of all faithful ones, Jew or Samaritan, American or Chinese, among the true Israel of God.
SINCE the beginning of the Christian era the traditionary Samaritans have rapidly grown less. Vespasian slew 11,600 at one timebecause they offended him. Now all that remains of those who still cling to the dead past is a little company of forty or fifty families, represented in our illustration. These, three times a year—at the feasts of unleavened bread, of weeks, of tabernacles—make a pilgrimage to Mt. Gerizim. At the feast of the Passover they still offer sacrifice. A copy of the Pentateuch, very ancient, is possessed by them. Thus much for the people.
MOUNT GERIZIM is the mount of blessing. Deut. 27:12. On the other side of the valley is Mt. Ebal, the mount of cursing. Verse 13. Mt. Gerizim was to the Samaritan a holy mountain, simply and solely because God there at one time pronounced His blessing. The mountain, because of that, was the place of worship. John 4:20. This is superstition, not faith.
FOR all that brings the blessing of God, is God’s presence. All that will insure continued blessing is His abiding presence. And all that will secure His abiding presence is harmony with God, faith in Him, a heart of obedience to do His whole will. God comes with blessing even to the sinful and unjust, to win them to repentance; but if men continually by disobedience turn the channel of His mercies and blessings as selfish hearts will, they pervert the blessings to curses, and drive from them God’s presence.
THE blessings of Gerizim were blessings to the obedient. “All ‘these blessings shall come on thee and overtake thee, if thou shalt ‘hearken [“to observe and to do”] unto the voice of the Lord thy ‘God.’” And then follow the blessings which would shower upon them, which would pursue and overtake them. See Deut. 28:1–14.
THE poor superstitious Samaritans, like many others to-day, believed that the blessing was in Gerizim, in the thing,—the spot, the place. And vainly each year they seek to the thing for the blessing which is not. They offer the sacrifice of the paschal lamb, when the one great Passover is sacrificed once for all. The lesson of Gerizim is that God’s blessing continues to the faithful and obedient. Heeded, it is a growing, flowing stream of blessings, filled with the vitalizing, expanding, beneficent presence of God. If His Word and counsel be rejected, Gerizim becomes as Ebal, the blessings become curses.

“ASK, AND IT SHALL BE GIVEN YOU.”

By Ellen G. White

  • (Concluded from last week.)*
EVERY one that asketh receiveth, and he that seeketh findeth.” Christ is here presenting a law of the divine government. Asking for the Holy Spirit is connected with receiving this gift. The Lord reads the hearts of all men. He selects from His subjects those He can use, choosing material which can be worked. He selects—

The Most Unpromising Subjects,

and through them magnifies His own wisdom and power by causing them to sit among princes. In all ages He has used human beings to carry out His purposes. He chooses subjects who will not be perverted, who in all righteousness and faith will honor His name. He passes by the men who have perverted the capabilities He has given them, and selects men of His own wisdom, who make Him their trust, their dependence, their efficiency. He hews and polishes the rough stones He has quarried out of the world. He works through men who realize that they must submit to the ax, the chisel, and the hammer, lying passive under the divine hand. Through those who voluntarily submit themselves to Him in all matters, who seek Him in faith and hope, He works out His plans.

Rightly Asking.

Those who ask because they wish to impart to others will not be disappointed. God will reward those who come to Him in earnest faith. He assures us that the thought of His majesty and sovereignty should not keep us in fear. He will do much more graciously than we suppose if we will come to the footstool of His mercy. He urges His sovereignty as a reason for His great and merciful bountifulness in supplying the demands upon Him. He pledges Himself to hear our prayers, declaring that He will hear them. He condescends to appeal from the instinct of parental tenderness to the infinite benevolence of Him whose we are by creation and redemption. He says, “If ye then, being evil, ‘know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall ‘your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him.’” The needy and soul-hungry never plead with God in vain.

Humanity and Divinity Must Be Linked Together

in the experience of every overcomer. In our weakness we are to accept Christ’s power. He gives us the assurance, “All power is ‘given unto Me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach ‘all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the ‘Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all things ‘whatsoever I have commanded you; and, lo, I am with you alway, ‘even unto the end of the world.”
In view of this tell me who should wear countenances more bright and cheerful, more full of sunshine, than those who live by faith in the Son of God. In Him the needy and hungry find all their wants supplied. But let us not forget that those whom God has blessed with the good things of this life are to be His helping hand, to supply the necessities of His needy ones. They are to be laborers together with Him. They are—

His Stewards in Trust,

and are to use their goods for the advancement of His work, that His name may be glorified. The Lord desires to employ the church as a channel through which to communicate His bounties. If His people would keep the channel open, receiving the spiritual and temporal gifts of His grace, and imparting them to the needy, there would be no sick ones neglected, no orphans crying for food. The hearts of the widow and the fatherless would sing for joy.
God has given man the richest of His gifts. This He has done that man may dispense His bounties. Medical missionary work and the Gospel ministry are the channels through which God seeks to pour a constant supply of His goodness. They are to be as the river of life for the irrigation of His church. There is not the semblance of an excuse for the lifeless condition of a people who know the plain “Thus ‘saith the Lord.’” God calls their attention to the words, “Ye are the ‘light of the world. . . . Let your light so shine before men, that ‘they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in ‘heaven.’” He reminds us that we have only to ask, and we shall receive; to seek, and we shall find; to knock, and it shall be opened unto us.

Throw Open the Windows of the Soul Heavenward,

and close them earthward. The Lord has made His church the repository of divine influence. The heavenly universe is waiting for the members to become channels through which the current of life shall flow to the world, that many may be converted, and in their turn become channels through which the grace of Christ shall flow to the desert portions of the Lord’s vineyard.
The heavenly universe is burdened with the magnitude of the divine gifts which it has to impart. Angels are longing for the great joy of imparting the grace of God to men who will impart it to their fellow-men. The commission is, “Go ye therefore, and teach all ‘nations.” All who belong to the church are commanded to shine. Every receiver of divine grace is held accountable for the souls of those within his reach who are in the darkness of unbelief, ignorant of the rich blessings God is waiting to bestow upon them.
“As many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the ‘sons of God, even to them that believe on His name.” Those who take part in the solemn rite of baptism, in the name of the highest authorities of heaven, pledge themselves to come out from the world, to separate themselves from its idolatrous practices. God places His sign upon them, making them members of the royal family. And they on their part pledge themselves before angels and before men to live for Christ. They are buried with Him in baptism in the likeness of His death and raised in the likeness of His resurrection. “If ye then ‘be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, ‘not on things on this earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with ‘Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ‘ye also appear with Him in glory.”
In the day of final accounts, what will the church give as a reason for her strange indifference to bring souls to a knowledge of the truth? My brethren and sisters, keep the temple of God pure and holy, that He may use it to the glory of His name. God will enlarge His faculties and multiply His gifts to you, as you make use of them to gather souls under the blood-stained banner of the Redeemer. Draw nigh to God, and He will draw nigh to you. By yielding to the temptations of the enemy, by losing sight of God, you have lost the sense of what a child of God ought to be. Your powers of perception are clouded. But the way is open for your spiritual life to be reinforced with new power. “Ask, and ye shall receive.”
MRS. E. G. WHITE.

A LESSON FROM THE LILIES.

By Ellet Joseph Waggoner

“Consider the lilies how they grow; they toil not, they spin not; and yet I say unto you, that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. If then God so clothe the grass, which is to-day in the field, and to-morrow is cast into the oven, how much more will He clothe you, O ye of little faith?” Luke 12:27, 28.
Jesus has sent us to school to the lilies, and has appointed them our teachers in the way of life. We have not by any means exhausted the lessons that they have to give us; indeed, few of us have made more than a beginning, for altho the instruction that they give is so simple that a child can understand it, yet no philosopher of the schools can compare with them in depth of wisdom.
What are we to consider about the lilies?—“How they grow.” It is not how they look, but how they grow. One would naturally suppose that, since Jesus was talking of clothing, and how we are to be provided with what is necessary, He would have directed us to the looks of the lilies, to see how tastefully they are dressed; but such a supposition is evidence of our need of instruction. We are so ignorant of the first principles of the wisdom which the lilies teach.
“The Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.” It is not that the Lord despises outward beauty; far from it. “Strength and beauty are in His sanctuary;” and He has promised to “beautify the meek with salvation.” He delights in beauty; but He knows that as corruption comes from within, and not from without (Mark 7:18-23), so beauty, to be real, must come from within. He severely rebuked the scribes and Pharisees, because they made clean the outside of the cup and the platter, while within they were full of impurity, and said, “Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also.” Matt. 23:25, 26.
Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like a lily. How is that? Is a lily, then, so much more wondrously beautiful than other things? Jesus did not say so. Some lilies are most gorgeous, but others are very plain, and scarcely noticeable. It is quite likely that when Solomon was arrayed in his royal apparel on State occasions, his clothing would outshine a whole bed of ordinary lilies. Yet in all his glory he was not clothed like the most modest lily that grows. Why?—Because no matter how gorgeous and beautiful his clothing was, it was all put on; it was no part of himself; but the beauty of the lily’s dress is the lily itself. All that it looks to be, it is.
Thus it is that the lilies, who are teachers by divine appointment, teach us that the only clothing that is of any real value is that which can not be put on and off, but that which grows; that which is formed from within. Even such clothing did the apostle Peter write about, saying to the women, “Whose adorning let it not be the outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing jewels of gold, or of putting on apparel; but let it be the hidden man of the heart, in the incorruptible apparel, of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price.” 1 Peter 3:3, 4.
How strange that people should proudly boast of that which is no part of themselves! Not only is our clothing no part of ourselves, but the very fact that we are obliged to wear manufactured clothing at all, is proof of our fallen and degraded state. God is clothed with light as a garment, for He Himself is light. His clothing is the beauty of His own character. His clothing, like that of the lily, is what He is. Even so it was with man in the beginning, for man was made in the image of God. It was not until they lost their first estate through sin, that our first parents had any need of clothing that must be put on from the outside. So that upon which most people bestow so much care and worry, and in which they take so much pride, is the mark of their shame.
Until the kingdom is again restored as in the beginning, all mankind, the children of God as well as the wicked, will be obliged to wear manufactured clothing; but let them not worry about it, nor be proud of what is no part of them. What should they do?—“Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness.” Then clothing and everything else that is necessary will be added.
This agrees with the exhortation to put on apparel that is “the hidden man of the heart.” Where the King is, there is the kingdom; and the King is the Word of God, that “was made flesh.” This Word is in us, in our mouth, and in our heart, that we may do it. If we yield ourselves to it, we shall be filled with righteousness. We shall grow up “trees of righteousness,” and our clothing will be “the robe of righteousness,” the product of the growth from within. He who is able to supply us with this beautiful clothing, of which no one can boast, because it comes only with humility, can very easily provide the other necessary clothing. Temporal things are very easily managed by Him who handles eternities.
The lesson therefore which we learn from the lilies is that of absolute dependence and trust. “Consider the lilies how they grow.” How do they grow?—They simply grow. They grow by the power of God in them, which they do not try to resist. You will remember that the name “Israel” was given to Jacob when he ceased all his struggling against the Lord, and cast himself wholly upon the Almighty. His strength was demonstrated to be nothing, and so he let the Lord support him. Now the Lord says, “I will be as the dew unto Israel; he shall blossom as the lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon.” Hosea 14:5. That is, “they that wait on the Lord shall renew their strength.” Their beauty will be “the beauty of holiness.” Their clothing will be not simply that which can be put on and off, but, like that of the lily, it will be the product of the growth of grace within; it will be themselves, and will endure to all eternity. E. J. WAGGONER.

THE SACREDNESS OF OPPORTUNITY.

By W. S. Sadler

“I must work the works of Him that sent Me, while it is day; the night cometh, when no man can work.” John 9:4.
The one thing that comes and goes with time is opportunity. Every moment of time marks the birth of an opportunity; it also marks the decline of another; and perhaps the death of still another. Opportunities are coming and going perpetually. When time has passed, the opportunities are gone, and gone forever. We can no more recall a lost opportunity than past time. So the passing of time, under any and all circumstances and conditions, must mean at least this much to every one of us—the passing of opportunity. It may only be possible to seize the seed of an opportunity in a passing moment; but in that seed there are concealed untold possibilities, which may bud, blossom, and bear fruit in the future. But if the seed is lost, all the possibilities of that opportunity have passed with the passing of time.
The only possible good that can come from lost opportunity is its reflex action when we discover the value of that which we have lost. This realization of lost opportunity may arouse us to seize with greater alacrity those which are now before us, and which are to come in the future—to produce such a real regret and remorse on our part that we shall ever be more on the alert to grasp opportunities during their lifetime, just while they are before us, ere they pass on to leave only a trail of sadness behind.
Human opportunities all have their dawn, their noontime, their eventide, and last of all, their night. It is true that sometimes the dawn comes gradually, like the break of day. Sometimes but a short while after the dawn of an opportunity, its noontide seems to have been reached;—the time of greatest good is here. Did we make the most of the noontime, or did we let it pass, thinking that the noontide blaze would shine on indefinitely? Just as surely as an opportunity has dawned and high noon is reached, now is the time for our greatest effort, for night is surely drawing on. The time of darkness is coming, when you will not be able to carry forward your chosen work.
See how our Saviour looked upon the sacredness of human opportunity. In the closing part of the eighth chapter of John we see Him driven from the temple court by an angry mob, with stones in their hands, ready to cast at Him. It would seem that He almost miraculously took Himself from their midst. The blind man, a beggar, is sitting by the wayside; Jesus is passing by, with an angry mob not far away; His disciples are hurriedly fleeing with Him; all is excitement, but the Master sees a blind man, and that is enough. He recognized the afflicted man’s need. Human souls, spiritually blind, morally crippled,—how many such have we passed by, without so much as seeing them? But Jesus saw a man who was blind from his birth. His disciples might have paid no attention to this blind beggar. But the procession is suddenly brought to a standstill. There Christ stands before the blind man. The sightless man can not see Him, but He can see the blind man. Let us remember this case when the hours are dark, and things look discouraging. We may not be able to see Jesus, but we have the assurance that Jesus sees us.
You may be in the night-time of some trial, and unable to see Jesus; but He sees you. The day will break soon, and you will see Him. So the disciples pause with the Master, who sees the blind man. That is all the Saviour sees—the blind beggar. The silence is painful. The mob is not far distant. The disciples break the silence by asking, “Who did sin, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” He was a well-known character. The disciples knew he had been blind from his birth. The blind man is entirely ignorant of the fact that theMaster of heaven and earth is looking upon him. How many times He has graciously looked upon us, and we have been blind to His watching, searching gaze.
How it pained the Saviour to have this question of idle, morbid curiosity intruded upon this sacred and solemn occasion. Jesus had seen an opportunity, and it was the most sacred thing in all the world to Him. Ah, yes, the eye that could see the blind man is the eye that recognized the opportunity of the hour.
The Master brushes aside the disciples’ question, for here is an opportunity; He must seize it now, right now; He must strike while the iron is hot. So we hear Him say, “I must work the works of ‘Him that sent Me, while it is day; the night cometh, when no man can ‘work.” Says Jesus to His disciples, “I must work.” It is not enough for Me to teach. It is not enough to send you out to work, etc.; but “I must work.” Jesus recognized the individual responsibility to do something. “I must work the works of Him that sent ‘Me.” There is a certain kind of work I must do. I recognize it, and I recognize it in this blind man. “I must work the works of ‘Him that sent Me, while it is day; the night cometh, when no man can ‘work.” The Saviour recognized that the noontime of His opportunity had arrived for this blind man. And with the mob at His heels, and His disciples asking idle questions, the Master keeps His thoughts centered on one thing, and that is the opportunity. For many years divine Providence has designed to bring about this occasion. It is now or never with Jesus. Perhaps if the blind man had been passed by on this occasion, he would never again have met the Master, and one of the most remarkable miracles on record would not have been worked, and so its lessons would have been untaught.
I pray God to anoint our eyes with eye-salve that, as time passes, we may see the blind men, the lame ones, the discouraged souls, the broken hearts, the poor in spirit; that we may “work the works of ‘Him that sent’ us, ‘while it is day;’ for it is just as true of us that ‘the night cometh, when no man can work.’” As surely as the night-time of this world’s history is drawing on, and we may even already have entered its eventime; just as truly as this world’s probation will one day be closed, and its day of opportunity be forever past; so the day whereon we can help any soul, heal any broken heart, find the blind man, and anoint the blind eyes of the soul, comes and goes. It may even now be passing. The Lord may choose you or me as the instrument to be brought around in the last tick of time just before the sun sets, that we may feed a hungry soul, that we may point the dying soul to “the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world,” that we may say, “Daughter, brother, thou art loosed from the spirit ‘of thine infirmity.’” Let us study Jesus’ life, and learn how carefully He recognized opportunities. As we see Him on the cross, He recognizes the thief. He listens to his cry, and forgives his sins; and in the last moment of his life, the thief is given the promise of eternal existence. The Saviour recognized the opportunity. He saw that the last moment had arrived; and He was there to improve it. Shall we be quick to recognize the dawn of an opportunity? If we seize it as a dawn, we can march on with it and gain a fulness of experience in the good things that are stored for us in every opportunity.
W. S. SADLER.
(Concluded next week.)

THE WORK OF THE INVESTIGATIVE JUDGMENT.

By J. O. Corliss

Two phases of the final judgment are plainly set forth in the Bible, and altho these are not designated by separate names, the work done under each of them is so clearly distinct, that we are justified in speaking of them as the “investigative” and “executive” parts of that decisive work. It must be apparent to all that before any intelligent creature can be brought to punishment for his misdeeds, his life-work must be examined in order to show the cause of his condemnation. This is done even in human courts of justice, and for good reason. If this order were not followed, even tho the condemnation of a criminal were really deserved, occasion would be given for a popular cry of arbitrary injustice. God, too, deals in judgment with intelligent beings, and is therefore willing that all the universe may know the reason why some are to be treated differently from others in the matter of final awards. A time must therefore be devoted by Him to the examination of all the conduct of all His creatures, prior to the coming of the Saviour to make the final awards. This work may properly be termed an investigative judgment.
From the very nature of the case, such a process must go on, and the cases examined be decided by records preserved in the court of heaven itself, where God, Christ, and the holy angels shall constitute the infinite court of assize. Dan. 7:9, 10, 13, 14. In this work, it is not necessary to have present in person, those whose cases are under investigation, since the accurate records of their lives are in possession of the court, and testify more fully in each case than the interested person could possibly do. Rev. 20:12, 13. Such work could therefore begin and go forward without disturbing men’s earthly relations, since from its arrangement, the cases of past generations would naturally first come under consideration. But God could consistently announce through His prophets the time when this work would begin, that those then living might prepare for the time when their own cases would quickly come up for examination.
It is true that sometime in the distant past, God set the limit for the world’s course, prior to His calling it to judgment. Nearly nineteen hundred years ago, at least, the great apostle declared that God had appointed a day in which He would judge the world in righteousness. Acts 17:30, 31. On the arrival of that appointed day, a methodical investigation of every person’s case is sure to be undertaken. This must be so from the fact that there will be brought into this examination every work, with every secret thing, whether it be good or evil. Eccl. 12:14. So, then, there must be adequate time given to consider, not only every purpose of men, and the work they have directly done, but that indirectly wrought upon the lives and purposes of others. Eccl. 3:17.
All this work is absolutely necessary, when we consider the eternal nature of its results, and the unqualified holiness of the future home of the saints. No faintest taint of original sin can be permitted to enter that place again, because its complete purity must not again be sullied by such foreign matter. So every one who reaches that holy region must first be accounted worthy of such honor. Luke 20:35. Inasmuch as these worthy ones are to be raised immortal from their graves in an instant, “in the twinkling of an eye,” at the sound of the trumpet note which heralds the coming of the Lord, it is evident that their cases have been fully decided beforehand. 1 Cor. 15:51, 52.
Thus it is seen that the coming of Christ to earth the second time is not to convert men, or to decide their cases for weal or woe, but simply to execute the decisions already made. Jude 14, 15. So when He appears in mid-heaven, instantly following the mighty sound of the trumpet voice, the host of angels accompanying Him are despatched to receive those who have been counted worthy to meet Him, and as these rise from their dusty beds, they are “caught up” in the embrace of their guardian angels, and borne aloft to meet the Lord in the air, ever to remain in His presence. Matt. 24:31; 1 Thess. 4:16, 17.
In previous studies of this series, it has been shown from comparison of type with antitype, that the Jewish day of atonement was a yearly day of judgment, when everything bearing sin was removed from the camp and people of God. In fact, that day of atonement was entirely devoted to cleansing from the sanctuary the accumulation of sins, brought there through the year by personal confession. As the work there and then done was but a shadow of the work to be accomplished in the greater and more perfect tabernacle (Heb. 9:8–14, 24–26), so the single cleansing of the heavenly sanctuary must be the completion of Christ’s atonement for the world, when the accumulated sins thereof, lodged in the sanctuary through individual confession, shall be borne away from God’s sight,—cast behind His back (Isa. 38:17), dropped into the depths of the sea (Micah 7:19), and so removed from the individual “as far as the east is from the ‘west.’ Ps. 103:12. Thus men’s sins are blotted out (Acts 3:19), and God remembers them no more, according to the conditions of His everlasting covenant with Jesus Christ. Heb. 8:12.
This cleansing of the heavenly sanctuary was to begin with the ending of the 2300 days of Dan. 8:14, which we have seen came to pass in the autumn of 1844. At that time, therefore, the closing work of Christ for the world was begun, preparatory to His coming to earth to gather His saints to Himself. More than half a century has since elapsed, and it must be, therefore, that the judgment work in heaven is nearly done, and the coming of the Master imminent. Who is ready to meet Him? Let the question be thoughtfully studied by all.
J. O. CORLISS.

Earnestness in Preaching

THE preacher who is without earnestness has mistaken his calling. He may have some beautiful things to say—he may have nicely arranged “heads,” and sweetly-rounded periods. But if this matter does not pass through the fire of a burning earnestness for souls, it will leave no lasting impress on sinners’ hearts.—Christian Worker.
Continue reading: THE MONARCHICAL PRINCIPLE ESTABLISHED