King's Business - 1915-07

THE KING’S BUSINESS 561 ministers. With reference to some, it may be said that it would be a bless­ ing to their people, salvation to their souls, and glory to God if all else were pitched out of the window and they compelled to resort to the Word of God, and to rely on that alone. There is wisdom as well as folly in Omar’s philos­ ophy, at whose command the treasures of the Alexandrian library vanished in smoke, “If its books contain anything contrary to the Koran they ought to be destroyed, and if they contain what is in the Koran, there is no need to spare them.” What we would emphasize, however, is that the normal service of the minister is to apply the Word of God immediately to the conscience, heart and conduct of the people, and that he should not permit himself to be turned aside from this his work by any specious exhortations to the attain­ ment of literary culture, scholarship, scientific or critical expertness, though the eschewing of these useful, and very desirable accomplishments, may be like the cutting off of a hand, or the plucking out of an eye. Let him rather remember that he has a specialty which requires all his energies, the- mastery of thè Bible of the people, for the people. With the Bible in the mother tongue the “man of God is thoroughly furnished” for his work. What the late Dr. Stuckenberg said of social science is equally true of every branch of learning, and with every beneficent end the minister is bound to attain, namely, “social science, ethical questions, and the like are good as playthings for philosophers, but for a thorough renovation of -the social classes . . . the open Bible, sanctioned of God, alone is sufficient. That, and that alone constituted the furnishing of the Apostles. With it they went forth conquering and to conquer ; wrought righteousness, waxed valiant in fight, turned the edge of the sword, put to flight the armies of the aliens, and were mighty to the pulling down of strongholds.—5V and inspiring teaching. We take pleasure in commending it to the refin­ ers of T he K ing ’ s B usiness , knowing that they will prove a sympathetic constituency^ . Few men are so competent to conduct such a periodical as our brother, A. C. Gaebelein, its editor, steeped as he is in the letter and spirit of the Word. He scarce needs an introduction to Bible students and lovers of the “blessed hope” in the United States or Canada, and he is well known and read on the other side of the Atlantic. _ He inaugurated our current series of Bible conferences in the month of April, the whole of which he spent among us in Los Angeles, speaking twice daily from the platform of Immanuel Presbyterian Church. Great interest was shown in his addresses and they will be long remembered by a multitude of those who know the truth. “Our Hope” is now in its twenty-first year. Its brief editorials are always welcome. They are full of comfort, of evangelistic suggestion, of terse critical comment on current events relating to prophecy and the progress of the Kingdom, and give sharp, telling blows to “them that oppose themselves.”—S. ' [“Our Hope” may be secured through the Biola Book Room.] This happy phrase is the appropriate title of a valued monthly which we have read with interest, profit and spiritual comfort for the last twenty years. B u r own hope has been clarified and quickened by its sound “Our Hope,” ,a Periodical

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