August, 1941
TH E K I N G ’ S B U S I N E S S
293
and thus obeyed your instructions. You would not permit me to go beyond the barrier without my passport. Now that you are assured that I have one, the way is clear. Tell me, friend, have you your passport to heaven?” Then fol lowed an intimate conversation on eternal things. How tragic it would be for one to reach the borderline of eternity without a passport to heaven! Can you read your title clear to mansions in the skies? If not, take out your passport—receive Christ—and_ then no refusal will be yours at the entrance to the eternal city. Sin’s One Remedy Several months ago, a friend of the writer returned, from a rather extensive tour of foreign mission fields. One thing particularly impressed him in all the countries he visited. In Africa, China, Korea, India, and Palestine, he was amazed at the zeal with which representatives of some of the principal cults which are operating in the homeland were introducing their wares. He found them rushing here and there, selling their literature • freshly translated, sowing down the areas where true gospel work once prevailed, or following on the heels of faithful mis sionaries of the cross. Our friend discovered, however, that none of these busy workers were in pioneer fields. They were “ correctors,” traveling the paths cleared by other mis sionaries. By many of the natives they were looked upon with suspicion, mere propagators of western culture which is not wanted in any Oriental country. The people seemed to sense that these mes sengers had no remedy to offer for the curse of sin, and their efforts to shade off the Bible truths or to spread their own shibboleths only met with contempt. Only the old gospel is “the power of God unto salvation.” No true spiritual revival has ever centered in any other teaching. Our friend happily bore tes timony that only where he found the faithful missionary or layman going in the highways and byways with the mes sage of Christ crucified and risen did he find rapt attention being paid by the people and lives being transformed by the Spirit of God. Oh, that we could get the ear of all the self-sent “missionaries” and remind them that until men have within them the very life of God they are powerless to do the works of God! That life they can never know apart from acceptance of the finished work of Christ. Brethren, let us waste no time wash ing corpses (cf. Eph. 2:1), cultivating moving carcasses, and jollying along people who are in a state of protracted death. If you know not the message that “is quick and powerful,” „find it before seeking to minister to dying souls.—Keith L. Brooks.
Significance of the News By DAN GILBERT Washington, D. C , and San Diego, California
COMMUNISM’S ANTIRELIGIOUS EDITCATIONt • “Godlessness is identical with Communism. Therefore, every effort must be made to stamp out of the lives of the Russian people the last vestige of religious belief. World- Wide propaganda for atheism must be intensified." Thus declared the official Communist newspaper published in Moscow, Pravda. In a long editorial, reviewing the course of the Red war against God,, Pravda laments the “laxity in the antireligious campaign.” The editorial explains: “Many have not yet understood that antireligious propaganda is an integral part of all Soviet political and cultural education. Certain re gional committees of the Party do not introduce in their-conferences any antireligious subjects, or con sider that antireligious propaganda has any relation to the election cam paign. There is a neglect of anti- religious work. . . . “Numerous Soviet organs do not understand that antireligious propa ganda in our country has an official status. Thus, organs of the Com missariat of Public Education and the schools do not inculcate anti- religious education in the children, and even those who leave school sometimes entertain religious senti ments. , “The Soviet press and that of the Party do not pay enough attention - to the warfare against religious sur- ' viváis. . . . We mugt utilize all ■ organizations and furnish them with the essential e l e m e n t s of anti- religious propaganda to accelerate the suppression of religious surviv als among the millions of workers. Then only will socialist society free itself from one of the reactionary heritages of the past and the move ment toward Communism become more rapid.”
A BIBLE-BASED FOREIGN POLICY! • Some correspondents have asked for a “recommendation” as to what Amer ica’s foreign policy should be. This writer offers no such formula. He goes no further than tp suggest that it should be based upon the sound judgment and conscience of the people looking to the Word of God for guidance. Whatever the agreed-upon policy, it should be made honestly and should be honestly proclaimed. Bluff and pretense have no place in the policy of a self- respecting democracy. . America dan afford to act in the open. America can afford to be honest. America can afford to let her own peo ple and the whole world know where she stands. „I t must be confessed that, in the past, our policy has been confused and even concealed behind the distortion of the very phrases of international law. America should set an example to the world for truthfulness, honesty, and fair dealing. In the long run, that policy will win, because God is on the side of • The forces of totalitarianism are car rying on the struggle for conquest on two fronts—one is on the military battle field, the other is “behind the lines.” Dictatorship may be defeated on the military front, and yet may conquer be hind the lines. Whenever and however the war in Europe may end, the war behind the lines in America must be carried for ward to a successful conclusion if our nation is to be made safe. Our harbors and cities may never be occupied by the military forces of dictatorship. But as long as the hearts and minds of large groups of our people are occupied by alien isms, totalitarianism will be a menace to the security of America. Revolution, bloodless or bloody, usu ally comes as the aftermath of war. Lenin, the Bolshevik dictator, said, “The first World War produced a Bolshevik Russia. The second World War will pro duce a Bolshevik Europe.” War paves the way for revolution. It creates the hatred, the chaos, the disillusion, the suffering, the cynicism, the unemploy ment and the depression—out of which anarchy and revolution are apt to grow. America needs now to take effective measures of defense against the sub versive intellectual forces which are de termined to win by propaganda and in ternal revolution, even if they lose with submarines and bombing planes. truth, and God is almighty. WAR ON TWO FRONTS:
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