VOL. V.
AUGUST—SEPTEMBER, 1914
No. 8-9
F I F T Y C E N T S A Y E A R
(Ilu> Ifatg s Ihxmntm MOTTO : " / the Lord do keep it, I will water it every moment lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day."—Isa. 27:3.
R. A . TO R R E Y , EDITOR
J. H. S a m m is
J. h . H u n t e r
T . C. H o r t o n
»--ASSOCIATE EDITORS— '
Organ of the Bible Institute of Los Angeles, Inc. Los Angeles, California, U.S. A. Entered as Second-Class Matter November 17, 1910, at the postoffice at Los Angeles, California, under the Act of March 3, 1879.
DIRECTORS
Lyman Stewart, President. William Thorn, Secretary. T. C. Horton, Superintendent. E. A. K. Hackett. S. I. Merrill.
Rev. A. B. Prichard, Vice-President. J. M. Irvine, Treasurer. - R. A. Torrey, Dean. Giles Kellogg. H. A. Getz.
DOCTRINAL STATEMENT We hold to the Historic Faith of the Church as expressed in the Common Creed of Evangelical Christendom and including: The Trinity of the Godhead. The Deity of the Christ.
The Maintenance of Good Works. The Second Coming of Christ. The Immortality of the Spirit. The Resurrection of the Body. The Life Everlasting of Believers. The Endless Punishment of the Im penitent. The Reality and Personality of Satan. Bible Women. House-to-house visitation and neighborhood classes. (8) Oil Fields. A mission to men on the oil fields. (9) Books and Tracts. Sale and dis tribution of selected books and tracts. (10) Harbor Work. For seamen in Los Angeles harbor. (11) Yoke Fellows Hall. Thoroughly manned. Our Mission for men with Boot Black and Newsboys Class and Street Meetings. (12) Print Shop. For printing Testa ments, books, tracts, etc. A complete establishment, profits going to free dis tribution of tracts.
The Personality of the Holy Ghost. The Supernatural and Plenary au thority of the Holy Scriptures. The Unity in Diversity of the Church, which is the Body and Bride of Christ. The Substitutionary Atonement. Thfe Necessity of the New Birth. PurpOSS Institute trains, free of cost, accredited men and women, in the knowledge and use of the Bible. Departments: H The institute Classes held daily except Saturdays and Sundays. (2) Extension work. Classes and con ferences held in neighboring cities and towns. (3) Evangelistic. Meetings conducted by our evangelists. (4) Spanish Mission. Meetings every night. (.5) Shop Work. Regular services in shops and factories.
OUR WORK iii
(6) Jewish Evangelism, work among the Hebrews.
Personal
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He will come w;ith His believing peo ple to the earth, then there will fol low a long succession of events con nected with His coming. Second, The Bible makes it very plain that the Coming of the Lord Jesus will be a personal coming. In Acts 1:11 we read, “ This same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven." And Paul said, “ The Lord himself shall descend from heaven.” And Jesus Himself said, “ I will come again (John 14:3"). ■ The Second Coming o f Christ then is not merely the coming of some great moral reformation or spiritual uplift; it is the coming of Jesus Himself. We have a way o f speaking of a re vival of religion as the coming of Christ. In a sense it is a coming of Christ, but there is to be a personal return of our Lord, a coming of this very same Jesus in His own person Nothing else will satisfy the heart of the believer. When I was a pas tor in Minneapolis, a godly minister of the Gospel, a man who I believe really loved his Lord, for he had made sacrifices for Him, wrote an essay on The Second Coming of Christ in which he said, “We must not look for the personal return of our Lord, but must learn to see Him and be satisfied with Him as coming more and more in all the wonders and glories of this closing 19th cen tury.” In other words, we were not to exoect the Lord Himself to come but should see the fulfilment of His promise of coming again in the elec tric telegraph, in the telephone, in the improvement of our steam railways, in the advance of social conditions and civilization; this, according to this minister, was the coming prom ised in the Bible. I have said that I believe this minister really loved his Lord, but I could never understand
shout, with the voice of the arch angel and the trump of God; it is certain that on that occasion those who sleep in Jesus were not raised and living believers were not trans formed and clothed upon with a body like unto the glorious body ’of our risen Lord, they were not caught up to meet the Lord in the air. All things were not restored at that time. Besides this, years after the destruc tion of Jerusalem, we find John still looking forward to the Lord’s com ing (Rev. 22:20). And it was long after the destruction of Jerusalem that John himself wrote the record of the Lord’s words to Peter at Gali lee concerning himself: “ If I will that he tarry till I cpme, what is that to thee? follow thou me. Then went this saying abroad among the brethren that that disciple should not die; yet Jesus said not unto him, He shall not die; but, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee ?” It is clearly evident then that the very plain, explicit and definite pre dictions of Christ Himself and the Apostles regarding our Lord’s Return which were quoted above have not yet been fulfilled in any historic event that has yet occurred nor in any series of events. The coming again of our Lord Jesus so frequently men tioned in the New Testament as the great hope of the Church lies still in the future. II. The Manner of His Coming. Now let us turn to the manner of our Lord’s Coming Again. First of all, it needs to be said that there will be different stages in our Lord’s Return. He is to come first in the air whither His believing peo ple are caught up to meet Him. After a period of dealing with His people' in the air, judging them and reward ing them according to their works,
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riage a beautiful girl in his church to an officer in the United States army. Very soon after the marriage this officer was sent to a new post where he was not permitted to take his bride with him. As he left her in obedience to the government, he said to comfort her, “ I will come back soon. I do not know how soon. These appointments are often brief. It may be for a day; it may be for a longer time, but not for a very long time.” During his absence, he wrote her many letters telling her o f his love. He sent her beautiful gifts as tokens of his love. One day she sat in the parlor with a letter in her hand that she had just received from him and looking through the box of beautiful gifts he had sent her. Sud denly, she heard a sound at the door, she heard a familiar footstep; looking up, there he stood in the door; she threw down the letter, stumbled over the box, scattered the gifts, ran to him and was clasped to his heart. What did she care for letters and gifts, she had himself. And the day is not very far away when we shall have, not merely those treasured mes sages from Christ that we find in the Bible and when we shall have not merely the many wondrous gifts of His grace, but when we shall have the Lord Himself. Third, Our Lord’s coming again will he bodily and visible. We read in Acts 1 :11, “ This same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.” Now our Lord went up into heaven before their eyes, visibly and bodily, and so He will come again. I was once on the Council examining a brother minister for installation. The man was thoroughly orthodox on all the fundamental doctrines. In the course of the examination I put to him the question, “Do you believe in the oer-
how any one who really loved the Lord could write these words. It is not merely social improvements that we need and long for, it is not even the messages and gifts o f grace of our Lord that we long for; the one who really loves his Lord longs for the Lord Himself. Suppose when I go East in a few weeks I should say to my wife, “ I am coming back again and I wish you to be watching for my return.” She certainly would be watching for it and longing for it without my telling her to. Every day during my absence I write her a letter full of expressions of my love to her. Now and then I send her some beautiful gift as a token of my remembrance, but all the while she is watching for me. Some day a friend comes in and says to her, “ Is your husband coming back again ?” “ Yes, certainly.” “ When is he com ing back ?” ‘I d o . not know but I trust soon.” “Why do you believe he is coming back?” “ Oh, he said he would.” Then suppose this friend should say “ He did not meah he was coming back personally. . You must not expect him to return personally. Is he not writing you frequent letters, and sending you gifts as tokens of his love now and then?” “ Yes.” “Well, what he meant was that you must ‘see him and be satisfied with him as coming more and more’ in these letters which he is writing vou and these gifts which he is sending you.” What do you think my wife would say ? I know well what she would say. Her eyes would flash with indignation and she would say, “ T do not want his letters and his gifts. I want himself.” And the true believer wants the Lord Himself and it is the Lord Jesus Himself we are going to have. “ The Lord Himself * shall come; “ this very Jesus” will come. The late Dr. James H. Brooks of St. Louis, once united in mar
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don’t believe, do you, that the Lord Jesus will come in a way that He shall be seen with our physical eye?” I replied, “ It does not make a parti cle of difference what I believe, the only question is what God says, and God says, ‘Every eye shall see Him’.” The coming of Christ plainly pre dicted in the Scriptures is an entirely different sort of coming from that which Pastor Russell assures us took place in October, 1874. Fourth. In the next place, Jesus Christ is coming again with great publicity. We read in Matthew 24: 26, 27, R. V., “ If therefore they shall say unto you, Behold, He is in the wilderness; go not forth: Behold, He is in the inner chambers; believe it not. For as the lightning cometh forth from the east; and is seen even unto the west; so shall be the coming of the Son of man.” Every little while some one appears in some ob scure corner of the earth and sets himself forth as the Christ come again. Now it is Schweinfurth; again it is Dora Beekman in Minnesota, and then it is Prince Michael in Detroit, Michigan; then it is Tead in Chi cago; still again Mary Baker Glover Patterson Eddy in Concord; again the Bab in Persia; still again Mrs. Annie Besant’s pet boy, “ The Star of the East.” But all of these “ inner chamber” Christs and obscure corner Christs are a humbug long since pre dicted and exploded. They would have no power over any one if peo ple were not ignorant of their Bibles. Some years ago a young friend of mine who was assisting B. Fay Mills in his work, came to me and asked me if it might not be possible that the Christ had already come and was here and waiting to manifest Him self. I knew what he meant: at that time B. Fay Mills was much carried away with Prof. Herron. I knew that this young man was wondering
sonal return of our Lord?” He re plied, “ No, I do not.” Then I asked him, “What do you do with Acts 1:11, ‘This same Jesus shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven’ ?” He replied, “ This simply sets forth a certainty that He will come but not that He will come personally and bodily.” But the Greek words do not admit of any such interpretation. The words trans lated “ So come in like manner” have and can have hut one meaning, liter ally translated they mean “ Thus in the manner which.” They never de scribe mere certainty; they always and necessarily describe manner, they cannot mean anything else, and God sent His own heavenly messengers to tell us that as Jesus was seen going up bodily and visibly that He would come again in the very j manner in which He was seen going. Again in Hebrews 9:28, R. V., we read, “ So Christ having been once offered to bear the sins of many, shall appear the second time.” Now the Greek word translated “ shall appear” in this passage means “ shall be seen.” The first meaning given in the best Greek Lexicon of the New Testament to the word is “ to see with the eyes,” and that is what this passage means, that Jesus “ shall be seen with the eyes” the second time,” that He shall come visibly and bodily. We read again in Revelation 1 :7, “ Behold, He cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see Him; and they also which pierced Him; and all kin dreds of the earth shall wail because of Him.” Some years ago I was nreaching one morning in the Moody Church in Chicago on the Second Coming, of Christ. One, who was not merely a disciple,- but an apostle of Pastor Russell and his Millennial Hawn vagaries was in the audience. He came to me at the close of the address and said, “ Mr. Torrey, you
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“ I did not like it at all.” “Why not?” “ First of all, you had no ser mon.” “What do you mean,” said the Christian Scientist, “ by a ser mon?” My sister replied, “ An ex position of the Scripture.” “ Oh,” said this woman, “ we would not have that, that would be human and we have nothing human in our gather ings.” “ But,” my sister replied, “ they read Mrs. Eddy’s ‘Science and Health’ for half an hour.” “ Oh, yes, but that is not human, that is the second coming of Christ.” If she had said it was a coming o f the anti christ there would have been more reason in it. All of these inner cham ber Christs and obscure corner Christs are, as we- have said, a long since predicted and exploded humbug. One does not need to go to hear them or see them. Christ Himself has told us all about them and exposed them centuries before they appeared. Pas tor Russell’s Christ who came in Oc tober, 1874, belongs with the rest; certainly His coming was not the coming described by our Lord Him self in Matthew 24 :26, 27; on the contrary, it was a kind of coming against which our Lord Himself warned us. You may be able to see Pastor Russell’s moving picture shows .for nothing but none the less you are being humbugged if you go. Fifth, When the Lord Jesus comes again, He is “ coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.” In Matthew 24.30 He says, “ They shall see the Son of man com ing on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.” Some one may ask, “What does it mean by say ing, He is coming on the clouds? If you will look up with your concordance all the passages in the Bible in which any one is said to come with clouds, you will find that there is but one person who came in the clouds, or on the clouds, and that person was
if Prof. Herron might not be the Christ come back again. I pointed him to the passage given above, which, of course, utterly exploded that nonsense. When Mr. Moody was' holding his last meetings in De troit I assisted him in the work. One day a long-haired disciple o f Prince Michael, who was at that time in the Jackson State’s Prison for a statutory offense, came to Mr. Moody to explain to him his opinions and to get Mr. Moody to accept them. Mr. Moody turned him over to me, as he usually did cranks of various kinds. I took this disciple of Prince Michael to my room and let him ex pound his views. Then I said to him, “ Do you really think that Prince Michael is Christ come back again?” He said that he did. Then I asked him what he did with Matthew 24: 26, 27, “ As the lightning cometh forth from the east, and is seen even unto the west; so shall be the coming of the Son of man.” He gave me this very illuminating answer, “When Christ appeared first, did He not come in Palestine?” “ Yes.” “ Is that not in the East?” “ Yes.” “ And is not Michigan in the West?” “ Yes.” “Well, then, in the coming of Prince Michael is He not coming from the East to the West?” This apostle of Prince Michael afterwards deserted Prince Michael and came to me and wanted me. to put him into Christian work, but I fear that his grasp of truth was not very strong, for he was soon involved with Ann O ’Delia Dis de Bar. A very enthusiastic disciple of Mrs. Eddy invited my youngest sis ter a number of times to go with her to the Christian Science meeting in the leading Christian Science church in New York. Finally my sister yielded to her importunities and went. As they came home from the meeting this ardent Christian Scientist said to my sister, “ How did you like it?”
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down in front of me and Mr. Moody’s eldest sister, Mrs. Walker, was sit ting there. Her face was a study. It was radiant with joy and peace un speakable. After the lecture I went down to speak to her, “ Oh,” she said as she took my hand, “ Mr. Torrey, it was the gladdest moment of my life. I thought the Lord had really come.” Suppose He should come at this moment, suppose right now there should be the shout and we should hear the voice of the archangel and the trump o f God and the Lord Him self should descend with power and great glory, would it be the gladdest moment of your life? Sixth, When our Lord Jesus comes again, He is coming in the glory o] His Father with the holy angels. In Matthew 16:27, R. V., He is re corded as saying, “ For the Son of man shall come in the glory of the Father with His angels; and then shall He reward every man accord ing to His. deeds.” All heaven will empty itself to follow in His train when He comes again. How many angels there may be I do not know, myriads and myriads of them. Men of our day have a w'ay of thinking that the human race are the only persons there are in the universe; how stupid and unreasonable, to say nothing about how unscriptural the thought. Are we to believe that all these countless worlds of light that dot the heavens by night are not in habited? Some one will say, “ Astron omy teaches us that many of them could not be inhabited for they have no atmosphere that a human being could breathe.” Yes, but are there no beings but human beings ? Are there no beings that can live under other conditions than those under which we can live? This earth that man inhabits is a very small portion of the universe. It is so small a speck in space that compared with one of
Jehovah (see Ex. 19:9; 34:5; Ps. 91: 1, 2 ; Matt. 17:5;: Ps. 104:3; Isa. 19:1). For our Lord to say that He was coming in the clouds was as much as for Him to say that when He came again, He was coming as Jehovah. Before His incarnation our Lord existed in the form of God (Phil. 2 :6 ), that is to say, as the Heavenly world beheld Him they be held Him in a visible form of such infinite glory that it told at once that He was God. When He came to this earth, He came as a man, wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in a manger. They did what they pleased with H im ; they despised and rejected Him; they spat upon Him, they slapped Him in the face, they scourged Him, they nailed Him to the cross of Calvary, they killed Him, but when He comes again, He will come as Jehovah, when every knee must bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord (Jehovah) to the glory of God the Father (Phil. 2:9-11). The glory of His coming is beyond description. No earthly pageant that this world ever saw can, for a moment, be compared with it. Some years ago, I was speaking in the auditorium at Northfield on the Second Coming of Christ. It was a hot, sultry day. As I spoke the clouds gathered and it became very dark, black clouds gathered right above the auditorium. I had just read Matthew 24:30 and said “ The Son of man is coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.” The word “ glory” had scarce ly fallen from my lips when there was a sudden flash and an awful crash, the whole auditorium was a blaze of light—the lightning had struck the building where we were gathered! Some sprang to their feet and screamed. I simply said, “ This is nothing to what it will be when the Lord really comes.” I looked
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the heavenly bodies, and that by no means the largest, the sun, that if the sun were, hollow and a hole were bored into it, you could pour into it 1,200,000 earths like ours and still there would be room for them to rattle around, and there are millions of these worlds. If every member of the human race were lost, the num ber of holy and blessed beings would immeasurably surpass the number of the lost. And not only may some of these wondrous worlds of light be in habited. by countless angelic beings but the aerial spaces themselves are inhabited by spirits good and evil, demons and angels, “principalities, powers, world rulers,” and in the train o f our returning King shall come these wonderful angels of light. Seventh, When Jesus Christ comes again, He will come as a thief, i. e,. unannounced, without warning, unex pectedly, suddenly. In Revelation 16: 15, the Lord Jesus says, “ Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.” In 1 Thessalonians 5 :2, 3, the Apostle Paul tells us, “ Yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night.” There will be no previous announcement of the coming of our Lord. The world will not be expect ing Him. He Himself says in Mat thew 24 :44, “ Therefore be ye also ready: for in cm hour that ve think not, the Son of man cometh.” He will take every one unawares. Men will not be standing out on the hill tops in white robes waiting for Him. The world will be taken up with its usual occupations. Our Lord says, “ As were the days of Noah, so shall be the coming of the Son of man. For as in those days which were before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, unto the day that Noah en
tered into the ark and they knew not until the flood came and took them all away, so shall be the coming of the Son of man” (Matt. 24:37-39). Everything will be going on as usual; women will be in the istores buying dress cloth for dresses and all man ner of finery; they will be in the jewelry stores buying diamonds ana pearls and rubies and emeralds; the theatres will be in full blast, crowded with the eager seekers after pleasure; throngs will be going up and down the streets; the dance halls will be crowded; society people will be tan going, maxixing, hesitating, waltzing, bunny-hugging, grizzly bearing, Tex as Tommying; there will be wild hilarity with no thought o f judgment near at hand. Wedding parties will be in full swing, when suddenly without a moment’s warning there will be the shout, the voice of the archangel will ring out, the trump of God will reverberate, the sleeping saints will be raised, and true be lievers will be caught up together with them to meet the Lord in the air, and the worldlings and worldly professors of religion will be left behind to meet the tribulation and the judgment. III. The Results of His Coming Again. We have no time left to speak of the results of our Lord’s Return; they will be glorious; they can be summed up under seven heads: 1. The results of His coming as regards God. 2. The results o f His coming as regards the Church. • 3. The results o f His coming as regards Israel. 4. The results of His coming as regards the nations and unregener ate individuals. 5. The results of His coming as regards human society as a whole.
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in 10,000 years and well may we cry, “ Amen, come Lord Jesus.” Jesus 5s coming again! How those words ought to thrill our hearts! How they do thrill ouf hearts! Jesus is coming again. It may be in a year; it may be in a month; it may be in a day; it may be tonight ! Would you be glad if right now we should hear the shout and the voice of the archangel and the trump o f God and all true be lievers should this moment begin to rise and pass right up to meet our Lord Jesus to be forever with Him?
6. The results of His coming as regards the Antichrist and the Devil. 7. The results of His coming as regards the physical universe. To sum it all up, every loftiest dream of social philosopher and en thusiast for humanity will be more than realized; there will be a new and glorious man, in a new and glori ous body, in a new and glorious so ciety in a new and glorious universe. The coming again of Christ will real ize more for this world in a day than all the peace conferences and peace palaces at the Hague could realize
Behold He Comes By J. H. SAMMIS A LITTLE longer, and the silent skies And hymn the anthem of the Christ again. A little longer,—Bride of Christ awake! Make thyself ready for the Bridegroom’s sake. Behold, He comes to bear thee to His rest As once He winged His way from Olives’ crest. A little longer, and the mists between My face and His whom I have loved unseen, Shall part asunder and my Sun shall shine Eternal summer on this soul, of mine. A little longer,—oh, my soul, be strong, Hold fast the Hope, He cannot tarry long; One blissful moment with Himself to be And what were earthly good or ill to thee? A little longer,—oh, my feet, be swift, On every mountain top the Cross uplift ; To mart and jungle, palaces and slums, Bear on the tidings, for He quickly comes. Shall sing again, and on our upturned eyes Pour out the splendors of the saintly train,
The Fundamental Principles of Christianity in the Light of
Modern Thinking. * By JOHN M. MACINNIS, B. D. VII. SALVATION—Luke 19:9.
S ALVATION ” is a very familiar word, but what do we really mean by it? Jesus said, “ Sal vation” came to the house of Zac- chseus on that memorable day on which Jesus went home and abode with him. What did really happen in that house that day? To answer this question correctly will involve a clear definition of what the New Tes tament means by Salvation In order to bring the question be fore us in a concrete way let me briefly call your attention to the ex perience of two men in the. State of New York. On one occasion the late Dr. Parker, of New York City, was asked to go to Rochester to hold a series of evangelistic meetings. While there he became acquainted with a man by the name of Samuel Lee. He was a silversmith, and was ordinarily upright and moral. He was a good citizen but a most self- righteous man. He prided himself on his morality, his kindness as a hus band, father and neighbor and when ever the gospel was presented to him he thrust it aside with the idea that he did not need Salvation. He was good enough as he was. Dr. Parker became interested in him and sought an interview with him. At last he went to his shop and found him standing before a little anvil working away with his hammer in beating a vessel out of solid silver. He asked 1 An address delivered at the Montrose Bible Conference. Copyright, by John M. Maclnnis, 1913.
him why he was not a child of God. Mr. Lee very bluntly told him that he did not see that there was any necessity for his being any better man than he was. He thought he was just as good as most Christians and a great deal better than some of them. After considerable conversa tion during which time he made the sorry excuse that a man of his type is wont to make Dr. Parker felt that he was not making any impression on him. As he was about to leave he said, “ Mr. Lee, I am going to say one word to you, and I defy you to forget what I say.” “Well, what is that?” “ It is this, Mr. Lee: there will be no excuses at the bar of God, Mr. Lee.” Having said this he turned and left the shop. “ Oh, well,” Mr. Lee thought to himself, “ I will soon forget that.” He went on with his work and tried to get his mind on other things. The harder he worked and the more he tried to think of other things the more that word would come back, “ There will be no excuses at the bar of God, Mr. Lee.” As the words rang out in his con sciousness he tried to justify himself in the position he had taken, and to make himself believe that he was a good man for he had done many good and kind things. But the voice would not be silenced, again and again it rang out in the silence of his heart, “ no excuses at the bar of God.” At last he threw down his hammer, put on his hat and went home and en tered the room where his wife, who also •was unconverted, was sitting.
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He took hold of her hand and said, “Wife, there will be no excuses at the bar of God: let us pray.” They got down together on their knees and earnestly, cried to God for mercy. When they arose from their knees they were changed— fundamentally changed. During that very afternoon he went out and no less than twenty of his companions were won to God through his testimony and pleading. He lived that changed and trans formed life for many years in the city of Rochester. What happened to that man that day? You say “ Sal vation came to his house'.” But what was this thing that you call salvation ? What was the essence of the things that happened to him? It was some thing very real, and it caused a very real and fundamental change in the man’s life. An article in the will of the late J. Pierpont Morgan brings this mat ter of salvation to our minds from another angle. This remarkable arti cle reads as follows: “ I commit my soul into the hands of my Saviour, in full confidence that, having redeemed it and washed it in His most precious blood, He will present it faultless be fore the throne of my Heavenly Father.” What did he mean by this article? Did he mean that God was going to do something for him in the crisis of death that had no relation with the life that had gone before, in the way of immediately presenting him faultless irrespective of the kina of life he had lived up to that mo ment ? At first Mr. Lee spoke of his good works, and he did not evidently feel the need of any outside help to save ,him from anything. On the other hand, Mr. Morgan had nothing at all to say about his good life or works, but he simply talked about what Jesus did and was going to do for him. These two attitudes represent two
conceptions o f salvation which have been more or less prominent through out history. They seem absolutely contradictory. The one seems to say that we are saved by works irrespec tive of faith. The other seems to say that we are saved by faith irre spective of life and works. But Mr. Lee had a very real experience which fundamentally changed both his atti tude and his life, and we think that the New Testament answer to our questions will come along the line ol that experience. Let us now endeavor to get the New Testament answer. The New Testament answer is Christ’s answer to the questions. There is no contra diction between the answer that Christ gave to. these questions and the answer which Paul and the rest of the apostles gave later on. The word salvation was only used ' two times by Christ, so far as the record is concerned. Once when speaking to the woman of Samaria and once in the house of Zacchaeus. But the cognate word “ to save” was quite frequently used by Him in ref erence with different phases of human life. Let us take a few examples from this gospel of Luke. In chap ter six, verse nine, Jesus used it in His question to the Pharisees, “ Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good, or to do harm? to save a life or to destroy it?”. Then in chapter seven, verse fifty, it is used to define what happened to the woman who anointed the Saviour’s feet. “ Thy faith saved thee.” In 8:50 Jesus used it to de scribe what happened to the daughter of the ruler of the synagogue when she. was raised from the dead. In the same chapter He used the word to describe what happened to the woman who was cured of an issue of blood. “ Thy faith made thee whole.” Again in chapter 17:19 He used it to de scribe the healing of the leper. “ Thy
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while he was still wrong. When he met Jesus there was no change in him. What Jesus said to him while He was with him in his home we do not know. But we know that some thing happened. Something very real and definite happened for it changed the man to the very roots of his being. This was evident by what he said and did. It was not the old tax gatherer that stood ready to make restitution and fulfill his obligations to his fellowmen. It was a new man who said, “ Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have wrongfully exacted aught of any man, I restore fourfold.” It was at this point that Jesus an nounced that Salvation had come to his house. The moral and spiritual faculties were restored and the man began to live right because he was saved. The man with the withered hand began to use his hand and the fact that he used it was the evidence that his hand was saved. So Zac chseus began to live right and that was the evidence that he was a saved man. The new life and powers began to show themselves in his moral and spiritual life. Once life comes it straightway manifests itself in vari ous expressions. From this we get our definition of salvation,—Salvation is the infusion into life of a new power that restores incapacitated faculties so that life can be lived normally. It is the introduc tion of a life or a power that makes it possible for a man to live right in all his relations in life. In the third place, let us note how this came about in the life of Zac chseus. It was through his contact with Jesus, and it is very obvious that this contact meant that Zac chseus yielded himself to the Lord- ship of Christ and allowed Him to reign in his life. From that time on he had a new viewpoint of life which
faith had made thee whole.” In all these casés of healing and moral restitution we have literal illustra tions of what Jesus meant when 'he spoke of men and women being saved. In every instance there was an impartatioii of life that resulted in the restoration of health and faculties - which had been wholly or practically incapacitated by sickness or death. The things that were wrong in the bodies of men and women and made them abnormal were put right and they were able to live a normal physi cal life. The people who were healed believed that Jesus could heal them, but that was not salvation. This atti tude of mind made salvation possible but it was not salvation. Salvation was the thing that restored them and made them new men and new women. It was the thing in the physical realm which gave the leper new flesh and the man with the withered hand a new hand. In the moral life it was the thing that gave men and women new moral life and power. In the spiritual realm it cannot mean some thing else. Here also it is the im- partation of a new spiritual life which restores spiritual faculties which are just as real as the restored* flesh or hand. That is the thing that came to the house of Zacchseus on that memorable day—When Jesus entered the home life entered it. The en trance of this life made a fundamen tal difference. In the light of this fact let us look at the story a little more in detail. First of all, let it be noted that this man was wrong in his life and in his relations with his fellow men. He was not wrong because he was rich, but he happened to be rich because he was wrong. He got his riches through wrong relations with his fol lows. In the second place, note “that he came face to face with Jesus Christ
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reflected the viewpoint and life o f Christ. Submission to Jesus Christ in this sense means the reconciliation and surrender of the life to God. To give Christ the place of Lordship in the life means to come into right relations with God. Right relations with God means that the life is so adjusted that it becomes the channels of the divine life as manifested in Christ. Prof. Wheeler Robinson says, “ A man who is converted in the New Testament sense is one who has sur rendered to forces immeasurably greater than anything he has of him self: one who has awakened to the overwhelming consciousness of a spir itual world brought to a focus be fore him in the person of Christ.” First you have the surrender and then follows the new consciousness through the introduction of a new life. This is a restoring o f the life with its possibilities to the purpose for which it was created. Dr. M. Scott Fletcher in his book, “ Psychology of the New Testament” says, “ The distinctive fea ture in the Christian idea of person ality is that the whole man—emo tional, thinking, and willing, stands in closest and most intimate relationship with the divine spirit from whence he originated and under whose per sonal influence and power he alone reaches his consummation in Christ.” Salvation therefore is primarily and essentially a bringing of man into right relations with God. A man sim ply cannot be right until he is in that relationship. He cannot realize his life apart from this relationship. This connection with the divine life is made in Jesus Christ. He is the one in whom God is reconciling the alien life of the world to Himself. Here we are brought face to face in our study of the Incarnation. At this point God made a new departure in which the new manhood is made
possible. There is nothing arbitrary about the New Testament insistance upon the fact that we must accept Christ as our Saviour. There is no other way in which we can be saved. We cannot be saved until we are in right relation with the divine life and Christ is the point at which God and man meet and make the connection that makes possible the flow of the divine life through the human instru ment. It seems to me that this makes very clear the reason why a man may be quite moral and good and kind as in the case of Mr. Lee and still not be saved. A man may have a wonder ful measure of these things in his life and still not be right with God. History is full of illustrations of this fact. Perhaps Dr. Chalmers is one of the most striking illustrations of the fact that we have in modern times. He was good, kind and hon est and a powerful preacher of the Gospel for years before the great crisis in his life in which he got right with God. This fact of vital relation with God also explains how it is that a man can be quite orthodox in his belief concerning Christ and the Bible and yet not be saved. Salvation is not a creed, although a saved man always has a very definite creed. By faith we make the surrender that makes possible the control of the life by Christ which issues in the new relationship. The faith or belief that leads to action, namely the act of definite surrender to God, saves. Sal vation is the thing that results from this action. Prof. Eucken tells us that society must go on to failure and ruin unless there is a new infusion of the trans cendent life into the life of humanity. This need is met by this fact of the gospel. Here is the way in which we are to get this new infusion of
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it is a regeneration of life (John 3 :16). Second, having been rightly related to God we are being saved through the overflow of His life through us. In this we are realizing the purposes of the life as the branch realizes its life through the flow of the life of the vine. That is known as growth in grace and sanctification. Third, in this flow of the divine life through us God is moving to the consummation of His purpose in which the life is perfected. Hence Salvation is an experience that "can be experienced in a moment of time, and a process of culture that continues through life and a climax which shall be realized at the consummation of the age.
transcendent life. It must come through men and women that are right with God. The man who in sists upon the old-fashioned doctrine of conversion is right in line with the deepest and best things brought to us by modern thought. In other words he is fully abreast of the times. In closing this study may I call your attention to the fact that salva tion as we have endeavored to define it at this time has three aspects whicft we would do well to keep in mind when reading the New Testament. First, we are saved in the sense of coming into right relations with God. That experience is what is known as regeneration. Men often speak o f it as conversion. Essentially, however,
Our Salvation By J. DENHAM SMITH "N ow is our salvation nearer than when we believed.” —Rom. 13:11.
N OT nearer being saved; For all who have believed Are saved; the Eternal word is pledged W e cannot be deceived.— Rom. 10:9. Not nearer having peace, For peace we have with G od; Sweet peace and pardon through the price O f sin-atoning blood.— Rom. 5:1. Not nearer being meet For our divine abode; Even now, “as He is so are we,” The righteousness of God.— Uohn 4:17.
Not nearer as to rank, Our title is secure;
Now are we sons and heirs of God Our heritage is sure.—1 John 3:1-3.
But we are nearer now (Oh, blissful, wondrous day!) The full redemption promised long, When death shall die away.— Eph. 1 :14.
The body, though redeemed, Must wait till Jesus come; >
He’ll call from earth, and from the grave, His ransomed people home.— Rom. 8:23.
High time it is to wake, With hope of bliss so dear; High time with earth’s dark night so spent, And heaven’s bright morn so near. — Rom. 13:11, 12.
Insanity and Lightning One Day’s Experience in a Young Missionary’s Life
O N the morning of April 16th 1 awoke to find myself sitting up right in my bed, eyes wide open and all my senses keenly alert. There was a strange glare lighting the pic ture that should have been only dimly visible at that hour in the morning. The trees about me, the compound wall 50 feet away, and beyond it the roofs of a Chinese village all were clearly visible in the strange yellow light. Only an instant the picture was there and then all was dark again. Beside the strange sight I was con scious of having been awakened by two tremendous reports such as one would expect to hear on the discharge of two sixteen-inch guns almost sim ultaneously at one’s bedside. AfteT feeling of myself to make sure that I was alive and not stunned I settled back on my bed for a time to enjoy my first tropical electric storm. The booming continued through the fore noon, although with the exception of one terrible crash at 10:30 a. m., I heard nothing as thrilling as the one that set me bolt upright in bed. Being a young missionary who had only been in China five and one half months, and April the 16th being neither Sunday nor a holiday, my day’s program was easily followed, consisting in an hour of language study and an hour of study of the language alternately for the better part of the day. After tea it was time for exercise and recreation and since we have not yet invented a water proof style of tennis, I took my um brella and started for a short walk to terminate in a call on my friend Dr. Ross. My walk was uneventful ex cepting a little delay I experienced chasing some gamblers who had set
their tables and paraphernalia on our Mission property. As I had long since been initiated and had taken my degree in the gentle art of routing gamblers and raiding opium dens, this little side trip provided but little recre ation and I walked on through a Chinese village to the compound of my friend Dr. Ross. Here I found real diversion in playing with the doc tor’s two lively boys and later listen ing to some delightfully restful opera sent out from America boxed in a Vic- trola talking machine. It took little urging to induce me to stay for dinner and Dr. and Mrs. Ross and I were soon seated at a little table eating corn cakes and other extravagant dishes. Our conversation on this occasion con sisted in swapping tales of college and Seminary stunts which never seem to be forgotten by the missionary who has to look back to college days as his most recent escapades in society. A f ter dinner we returned to the library to enjoy the entertainment of the Vic- trola. We were deep in the dreams inspired by Alma Gluck’s wonderful voice when a servant announced a man to see the doctor. Here let me say that Dr. R. M. Ross, formerly of our Lienchou sta tion is with Dr. Seldon in charge of a large refuge for the insane, and is doing wonderful work by his sym pathy and skill with these more than 500 Chinese men and women who would be outcasts or in prison were it not for the open doors of this refuge. The man who had come for the doc tor was one of these patients prac tically cured who was acting in the capacity of a helper at the refuge. On this rainy night he came to take the doctor to the home of a friend who
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to send for their friend, the conva lescent insane man, we did not learn, but in some way they had turned to him for help in this time of trouble. You cannot quite appreciate their anxiety unless you know the universal Chinese belief regarding those struck by lightning. Until very recently the Chinese were never known to attempt to rescue anyone who might fall into their rivers or canals. The reason was their fear of offending the river spirits who had evidently claimed this unfor tunate man, woman or child as a vic tim or sacrifice. So hundreds of lives were lost that might have been saved by an outstretched hand or a rope. But to be struck by lightning is a still more dire disaster, not only for the victim but for his family and friends, for it is a sure sign that the victim has committed some heinous • crime, perhaps secretly, and the gods have inflicted swift and terrible pun ishment. Recall to your mind the strength of family ties in China arm the interdependence of the father and sons in escaping future punishment, and you will get some idea of how this stricken family felt and what they would have given to save the life of this man that he might in some way atone for his sin. This, their extremity, alone could have induced them to turn to, their strange friend for help, for he was avowedly a Christian, having accepted Christ while in the refuge for the insane. How I wish I could make you all see the picture as I saw it that evening. Every detail in it spoke eloquently of facts that one can read about but can never realize until he sees them in real life. Let me try to help you to see the picture as I saw it. As we entered the door, the on.y door open that night on the street at 10 o’clock, I saw the interior of an ordinary dwelling of a poor Chinese. It was not the dwelling of a coolie,
he feared was dying. I asked the privilege o f going with the doctor and what I heard arid saw that evening has led me to write this account of one day’s experience of a young mission ary. Dressed in water proof clothes and carrying lanterns we followed our strange guide avoiding puddles and mudholes, in one place crossing a canal on a small ferry, winding through the crooked streets of the vil lage, none of them more than 8 feet and most of the only about 4 feet wide, until we came to the dwelling, place of the dying man. Chinese fear the dark or rather the evil spirits that roam about after nightfall, and all houses and stores whose fronts are open to the street in the day time, are closed tight at night and were it not for the muffled sound of voices or the clink of the coins in a gambling game, one could walk, through the streets at night and think himself in a deserted village. While threading the narrow streets on the way to this house our guide told the doctor the cause of this night call. When the heavy crash of thun der startled us at 10:30 that morning, I was seated studying by the fire place. The fire place and grate were of cast iron and I had thought at the time that my position at the foot of the chimney was not the safest one during an electric storm. Now from the lips o f our guide I learned that at the foot of another chimney another man had been sitting, not recklessly as I had been but ignorant of his special dan ger. That bolt at 10:30 had struck the chimney, ripped it open at the bottom and grounded itself through the man’s body. From the top of his head and all down his back he was badly burned and the bolt had shocked his organs as it passed through his body. The rest o f the family were uninjured and immediately laid the man on his bed. Just how they came
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was no sound but the groans of the sufferer and the patter of the rain on the room. As I lookjed about the room now, I saw the family, and no longer the furnishings. Standing near the doctor as he worked were three younger brothers of the one in pain. All were grown men but still living in their childhood home. The oldest of the three was the spokesman and in case his brother died he would become the head of the house. All three of them at first watched the doc tor with suspicion, but as they saw his sympathetic face and heard his occa sional quiet word of assurance, the suspicion vanished from their faces. Sitting upon the bed holding the sick man’s head on her knee was his wife, tender, and showing a remarkable de gree of cool common sense as she now and then spoke to hef husband, telling him not to fear, for the doctor could help him. This reminds us that if the man suffered terribly from pain, he suffered still more from the horri ble haunting superstitions that filled his thoughts as he lay there. This woman, his wife, undoubtedly shared his fears, but was bravely trying to quiet them. Now and then she would have to reach behind her to pat her tiny baby that was strapped to her back and covered with the cloth sling that held it. Further in the shadows beyond the foot o f the bed stood the old mother and grandmother of the household. In her eyes there was a different look, suspicion and even hatred of those foreign' devils whose coming to the house she had doubtless tried to prevent. Her mind, bound and fettered by fears of evil spirits and steeped in superstition which she had breathed from her infancy, could not believe that the foreigner was not a devil, worse indeed than the thunder devil. Her hope for her son’s recovery rested solely in the incense burning at the little family shrine by the door,
but of a man who would correspond to the working man in America. I do not know but I judge the head of the house had been a member of the car penters’ or masons’ guild. The floor was of dirt, the walls of the house were of one thickness of board un finished. It would be considered a very cold arid ramshackle barn in America. There was a ladder leading to a loft where I did not go but where we can safely say at least 4 or 5 of the household slept. This loft cov ered only half of the entire floor space, leaving the front part of the room hign with the roof for a ceiling. There were no chairs such as we have, only a few stools made of bamboo made in a style used by the Chinese for cen turies. There were two plain tables that served as dining tables and catch alls for pipes, books and junk of all kinds. There were three large beds in this room, where at least five of the family slept. The beds, of course, are plain boards covered with a piece of matting. All this interior was visible by the dim light of two small peanut-oil lamps. As we went in, the whole household rose and came to meet us, with the exception only of the stricken man and the two sleeping children. There were the customary polite sal utations consisting chiefly of grunts which one soon learns to understand and to answer with similar grunts throwing in one of his few new words with more or less discretion. Then the family resumed their positions about the sick man, the doctor sat down at one of the tables after exam ining the man who was moaning with pain and fear. The doctor’s helper was tending his alcohol lamp while the doctor prepared his hypodermic needle and I stood near by although I had been urged to sit down, pre ferring to stand rather than lose any of this picture. For some time there
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