VOL. VIII
APRIL, 1917
No. 4
ONE DOLLAR A YEAR
ì f a u f s l U t s t o s s MOTTO: " I the Lord do keep it, / will water it every moment lest any hurt it, 1 w ill keep it night and day . Isa. 27:3. R. A. TORREY, D. D , Editor T. C. HORTON, J. H. HUNTER, WILLIAM EVANS, D. D„ Associato Editors A. M. ROW, Managing Editor Published by 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. Cal., under the Act of March 3, 1879. Copyright by R. A. Torrey, D. D., and Bible Institute of Los Angeles, for the year 1916.
DIRECTORS
R. A . T o rrey , vice-president Leon V. Shaw, treasu rer. W illiam Evans. N athan Newby
Lyman Stew art, president. W illiam T horn, secretary. T . C. H orton, superintendent. H . A . Getz.
J. M. Irvine,
DOCTRINAL STATEMENT W e hold to th e H istoric F aith of th e C hurch as expressed in th e Common C reed of Evangelical Christendom and including T h e T rinity of th e Godhead. T he Deity of th e Christ.
T h e M aintenance of Good W orks. T he Second Coming of Christ. T he Imm ortality of th e Spirit. T he R esurrection of the Body. T he Life Everlasting of Believers. T he Endless Punishm ent of th e Im penitent. T he Reality and Personality of Satan. THE WORK (7 ) Bible W omen. House-to-house visitation and neighborhood classes. (8 ) Oil Fields. A mission to m en on th e oil Helds. (9 ) Books and T racts. Sale and dis tribution of selected books a n d tracts. (1 0 ) H arb o r W ork. F o r seam en a t Los A ngeles harbor. (1 1 ) T h e Biola C lub. D aily noon m eetings fo r m en in th e dow n-tow n d istrict, w ith free re ad in g -ro om p riv i leges. (1 2 ) P rin t Shop« F o r p rin ting T esta ments, books, tracts, etc. A complete establishment, profits going to free dis tribution of religious literatu re.
T he Personality of th e Holy Ghost. T he S u p ern atu ral and P lenary a u th o rity of th e Holy Scriptures. The Unity in D iversity of th e C hurch, th e Body a n d Bride of Christ. T he Substitutionary A tonem ent. T h e Necessity of th e New Birth. P u r p o s e . oi co, t> accredited m en and women, in th e know ledge a n d use of th e Bible. _ , . (1 ) T h e Institute Departments: Classes held daily except on Saturdays and Sundays. (2 ) Extension w ork. Classes s n a conferences held in neighboring cities and towns. (3 ) Evangelistic. Meetings conducted by o u r evangelists. (4 ) Spanish Mission. Meetings every night. (5 ) Shop W ork. R egular sendees in shops an d factories. (6 ) Jew ish Evangelism. Personal w ork am ong th e Hebrews. SCOPE OF • T he Institute trains, free
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THE KING’S BUSINESS VOL. VIII. APRIL, 1917 No. 4 TABLE OF CONTENTS Editorial: Pleasing Jesus Christ— Manuscripts Not Desired — Dead with Christ— Persuasiveness vs. Pugnacious ness— Ought Christians to Go to W a r?— Entangled— The Increasing Darkness— Enduring Hardness— Mo rality of the Modern Thea ter............................................... 291 Is the Bible in Danger? By Dr. R. A. T o rrey__*_.................... 297 “V ictor Over D eath.” (P o em ).................................................. 305 A Call to World-w ide P rayer......................................................... 306 Punishment of Evil. By Rev. W. L. W atkinson........................ 307 Our Folks............................................................................................... 31 5 The Berean Band................................................................................ 3 I 6 Through the Bible with Dr. Evans................................................. 31 7 Evangelistic D epartm ent. By Bible Institute W o rkers........... 323 Puzzling Passages and P roblem s................................................ 332 Hom iletical Helps. ByWilliam Evans.............................. ........... 334 The F ar Horizon................................................................................... 338 International Sunday School Lessons. By R. A. To rrey and T. C. H o r to n ...................................... _■...................................... 340 Daily Devotional Studies in the New Testam ent for Indi vidual Meditation and Fam ily Worship. By R. A. Torrey .......................................................................................... 360
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« a__----------------------- ------------------------- ---------------------------- ; Ü ........................................ ...................ilium..................... "I.................... niiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii^ | HELP THE | I “K. B.”Subscription Fund\ E Through the Generosity of Appreciative Christian People, this = 5 Magazine goes to MANY MISSIONARIES = E \ \J HO cannot afford to pay the sub- E ZZ * * scription for themselves. The fund S E for this purpose is now exhausted but,the E — requests continue to come. Last year one ZZ j| lady sent us $ 2 S to be so applied, and here E S is a sample expression of gratitude: “It ZZ 5| helps me in so many ways that I look for- 5j E ward to its coming each month. I hope’ E — my few words convey some idea of the Z E gratitude I feel, through being one of those E = fortunate ones who receive your magazine.” ZZ | BIBLE INSTITUTE OF LOS ANGELES | TmiiiiiiiiimiiiimiimiiimiiimiiiimiiiiiimimiiMiimmimimiiHiimiiimiimmiimimiir,
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E D I T O R I A L To please Jesus Christ should be the great ambition of the Christian’s life. Everything that he does should be done as unto the Lord and not unto men, and for that reason, done heartily (Col. 3:23). In our every
Pleasing
Jesus Christ. .
day secular work we should aim to please" Christ. Paul sought just as much to please the Lord when he wove goats hair into tent cloth as when he preached to philosophers on Mars Hill. In our distinctly Christian wdrk our aims should be to please Christ. If we please men, well and good, but please Christ anyway.
A number of friends are submitting manuscripts to us for acceptance for the columns of T he K ing ’ s B usi - ness . We do not doubt that if we made a request for manuscripts1to be submitted that many would come
Manuscripts Not Desired.
of great value, but with our numerous duties we find it impossible to read manuscripts in order to select from the mass of them some that we could use. We therefore pursue the policy of not receiving manuscripts at all. We are forced to dox this for lack of time to give them proper consideration. The policy of the magazine is to write to specific persons from whom we wish manuscripts on any given subject, instead of the policy of having manuscripts submitted to us for approval.
Twelve of the most searching words that Paul ever wrote are found in 2 Tim. 2:11, “If we be dead with Him, we shall also live with Him.” There must.be death before there can be real life. We must be dead
Dead With
Christ.
with Him if we, are to live with him. To be dead with Christ is to have renounced the things that living men ordinarily long for, the things that appeal to them, ease, reputation, wealth, pleasure, comfort, and life, to be dead to the world and its allurements, so that they have no power over us, to be to them as a man literally dead is to them. To be dead with Christ is also to renounce any powers and strength of our own that we possess, or fancy we possess, and let Christ live in us with His power and strength. The Christian worker should be thus dead. The cross of Christ should make him dead to sin, to the world, and to self. One of the greatest needs of the church today is a few dead men, dead in the sense explained above. We have plenty in our churches today who are dead in another sense, but what we need is men “dead with Christ.” Reader, are you dead?
THE KING’S BUSINESS We can persuade a hundred men of the truth where we cannot knock it into the head qf one. Every Chris- tian worker should learn and never forget the immeas urable superiority of gentle and patient persuasiveness
292
Persuasiveness vs. Pugnaciousness.
to contentious and dictatorial argumentativeness. The wife of one of the great est religious leaders that America ever knew once said of him to the writer, “He is the most yielding man I ever knew, but he always has his way.” They certainly should. That is what Christ has called Ought Christians us to be, soldiers (2 Tim. 2 :3). But what war should to Go to l War ? they go to ? Ah ! that is the question. The war against Satan (Eph. 6:12, 13); the war against sin and unbelief and error in all its countless forms. We should fight the good fight of faith (2 Tim. 4:7). Oh, that Christians, in these days of courageous, merciless war, would be as courageous in the warfare to which God has called us as the armies of the world are at the present time in defense of national interests and ambitions. Oh, that we might be as merciless in dealing with sin and error and unbelief as the armies of the world are in dealing with their fellowmen to whom they are opposed in battle. If there is any fact that Christians in the présent day need to be impressed with it is the fact that they aré in this world as soldiers, soldiers of Jesus Christ. We are not here for a picnic or a frolic, we are here to fight. It is a hard battle that we have on hand. In order to win in this battle we need to take unto us the whole armor of God, and having put the armor on we need to stand, withstand and fight. We are not to be “carried to the skies -on flowery beds of ease,” we must fight to gain the-prize, and it may be sail through bloody seas. We should rejoicé that we are called to be soldiers. I do not believe much in man fighting his fellowmen, but I do believe in fighting the devil and sin and unbelief, and I do not believe in com promise or arbitration in this war. x In these days the thoughts of most men are more occu- Entangled. , pied with soldiers and war than with any other subject. Paul says, “No man that warreth, entangleth himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please Him who hath chosen him to be a soldier” (2 Cor. 2:4). The thought is, if we are to be efficient soldiers for Jesus Christ we should keep free from everything that would entangle us and impede us in our warfare. This, of course, does not mean that a Christian soldier should withdraw himself entirely from secular life or pursuits. Paul himself wrought as a tent maker while preaching the gospel. But it does mean to avoid all business, social, or domestic entanglements that will interfere with our successful warfare as good soldiers of Jesus Christ, and so render it impos sible for us to please Him who enrolled us as soldiers. How many a Christian allows himself to get entangled, to the great hindrance of his warfare for Christ. Before entering upon any business, social, or domestic enterprise we should first ask ourselves very honestly and prayerfully, will this be an entanglement, will it in any way interfere with the consecration of my every power and every moment to Christ and His holy war, will it interfere with my moving out where He may lead at a moment’s call? It is a blessed thing to be thoroughly disentangled and ready to move out at a moment’s call, to the great Captain’s call.
THE: KING’S BUSINESS 293 As we write these words (February 15th) the dark- ness, that overshadows the earth is rapidly becoming deeper. A month ago there seemed to be a rift in the clouds, but today the clouds are thicker and blacker
The Increasing Darkness.
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than ever. There seems to be no possibility of America’s being kept out of this most appalling war in all the world’s history.. The course being pursued by Germany has no shadow ’of excuse in international law or humanity. In their desperation that nation and its rulers seem to have gone mad. It looks as if there was nothing left to be done but to utterly crush the nation, to bring it to its sense's. But however indignant we may be at the utterly inhuman methods now pursued by Germany, no thoughtful Christian can contemplate the humiliation and suffering that awaits them, and the burden of debt that they will have to carry for years to come, without deepest pain. Many of the Germans are among the most enlightened people of the earth, and some of the finest Christians in the world are found among the Germans, and to think of the sorrows that must overtake them in common with the rest of the people, must fill the heart of any true Christian with heavy grief. • But that is not all, there is a great peril for all Europe from Russia, and Germany has been the bulwark that stood between Russia and the countries lying to the west, and when this bulwark is thrown down, as now seems almost certain, there will most likely be in coming years awful experiences for the whole of Europe. Dark indeed is the future of Europe and the world. One cannot look into the next ten years of world history without the deepest apprehension and fore boding. In such an hour as that in which we livei what shall the Christian do ? Christ Himself answers the question; He tells us that when men’s hearts are “fainting for fear, and for expectation of the things which are coming on the world” we should “look up, and lift up our heads; because our redemption draweth nigh” (Luke 21:26-28). He also tells us that at such a time as this we should watch at every season and give ourselves to earnest prayer that we “may prevail to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man.”
• Out of the many increasing evils of our time there is at least one good coming, and that is that many Chris- tians are being shaken out of their false conception of the Christian life as an easy-going life. We are
Enduring Hardness.
beginning to appreciate the fact that the one who would work effectively for Christ must beready to suffer. A new meaning is coming for many of us, into the words of our Lord, “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.” The Christian worker who wishes an easy place is not a Christian worker after God’s pattern. The Chris tian worker who shrinks from hard knocks better go out of the business. Paul -wrote to Timothy (and the words apply to all who would be Christian workers after God’s pattern), “Suffer hardship with me as a good soldier of Jesus Christ” (2 Tim. 2:3, R.V.). The kind of hardship that is meant that we must suffer is the kind of hardship that Paul himself suffered, it is interpreted by 2 Cor. 11:24-27, “Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one, thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night
294 THE KING’S' BUSINESS and a day have I been in the deep; in journeyings often, in perils of rivers, in perils of robbers, in perilsL from my countrymen, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; in labor and travail, in watching often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness.” We had fallen into the way of thinking that the day was past for this kind of suffering, but the events of the past few/ months have awakened us to the fact that if we are loyal to Christ we will find that the time for suffering for Christ is not past. There never was a day when men and women who are willing to be persecuted and lied about and hated and stoned for Christ’s sake, men and women who are willing to hunger and thirst and be wearied and sicken and die for Christ’s sake, were more needed than today. But this suffering has its abundant reward, “If we suffer, we shall also reign with Him” (2 Tim. 2:12); “The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us” (Rom. 8:18). Paul called his afflictions, which were among the heaviest that any man ever bore for Christ;, “light afflictions,’’ and said further, “Our light -affliction which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and, eternal weight of glory” (2 Cor. 4:17). When, in the world to come, we see the glory that has come to us from the suffering that we have endured in this present life for and with Christ, we will not regret that we suffered so much, but that we suffered so little for him. has naturally stirred up the theatrical profession and they have objected to what they call the “loose employment of stich phrases.” Mr. H. B. Irving, the well known English actor, has especially attempted to take the Bishop to task for his utterances. He says that such plays as the Bishop describes “ do not pass the censor; and if a play in any way answering to that description has found its way upon the stage, it has been a very rare occurrence and has generally met with the fate it deserved.” It could be wished that Mr. Irving’s statement were true, but those who have studied the stage know very well that plays that well deserved the characterization that the Bishop of London gave them have had a large stlccess from a financial standpoint, and it is well known that there is an increasing tendency in this direction. It is true that the stage has not gone to the appalling extreme in this direction that the movies have, and the moral tone of the stage, as far as the plays are concerned, has been far higher than that of the movies, but there has been much produced on the stage that is altogether deplorable. Mr. Irving says, “In point of actual decency the English stage always has been, and is, the most decent in the world.” We are inclined to think that this statement of Mr. Irving’s is true, but that is not saying much. While the English stage may be “the most decent in the world” there has certainly been vast room for improvement. Mr. Irving 'goes on to ask church people to deal more kindly with the theatre and to recognize its necessary place in life and help to realize its highest ideal. This suggestion has nothing to it. For a generation, perhaps for many generations, The Bishop of London has shown his fearlessness time and time again. Recently he has done this in a cour- ageous attack upon the stage, speaking of the demoral izing influence of “lecherous and slimy plays.” This Morality of the Modem Theatre.
THE KING’S BUSINESS 295 the attempt has been made to lift the stage to where people-of decent morals would have it, but the attempt has failed and always will fail. The people who desire (that which is evil, at least in suggestion, far predominate among theatre going people over the men and women of high moral standards, and theatrical managers feel that they must appeal to the people from whom they get the largest patronage, and the largest patronage of the theatre always has come and always will come from those whose moral standards are not high. Many and many a woman has gone on the stage with high moral ideals, but as a rule they have soon discovered that they must either lower their moral standards or give up the stage. Mr. Irving says that people “must be amused, just as they must be fed and clothed.” That is true, but the question is how to make amusements elevating and not demoralizing, and the general influence of the stage from time immemorial has been demoralizing, and it is certainly increasingly demoralizing. Mr. Irving discloses his superficiality and utter lack of sense of moral propriety in a comparison of the church with the stage, in which he says, “The preaching must be, if possible, stirring and exciting— even in the gloomiest religions the hell fires to which the sinful are assigned must be made to flame brightly.” His words need no comment, they are a sad revelation of the lack of depth and moral earnestness of the man who wrote them. Mr. Irving himself admits, though apparently somewhat uncon sciously, “the steady growth of every form of lighter and more frivolous entertainment.” He says further, “There is a spiritual side to the theatre as well as to religion.” This is simply an illustration of the very loose way in which the word spiritual is used. Evidently Mr. Irving has no conception of what the word means in its proper sense from a Christian standpoint. " One of his strongest statements in defense of the stage is, “If the primary object of the theatre must always be to amuse and interest, yet it can interest in such a way as to elevate men’s minds arid make them think of something higher and nobler than the mere trivialities of life.” This is entirely true from the the oretic standpoint. It is very easy to conceive of a theatre from the mere stand point of theory, that would elevate men’s minds, but the question is not what is theoretically possible,, but what is an actual fact, and beyond an honest question the effect of the theatre as a whole has been extremely demoralizing, though it i$ only fair to admit the theatre at its worst was never as demoraliz ing as the movie shows which are so largely taking its place. The movies put on the stage without the slightest hesitation, things so vile and foul as the theatre would never have thought of staging, and yet the movies resent all censorship. They have recently seen the commercial peril that there is before them from an aroused public, and therefore, while resenting outside censor ship, have promisedi that they themselves will organize and suppress the vicious, but their ideas of what is vicious are so unsatisfactory that nothing can be hoped for from that source. If the church undertakes to elevate either the stage or the movies it will undertake an impossible task. The true attitude of the church toward the stage and the movies is that set forth by the Holy Spirit in 2 Cor. 6:17, “Touch not the unclean thing.” The Bishop of London is to be congratulated that his words had such force as to awaken opposition.
(Eífnat, tfyp îCarît, ta SUaett toòatj! ÎS ja lW u ia ii!
Bible Is the in Danger?
B y D r. R . A. T o r r e y 5D®aaa ©2 t h e B ib le llaastltaat® ®2 IL©s J ta g e le s
HERE are two classes who think that the Bible is in danger: First, there are those who think it is in danger because they are
more dangerous because they do not make the mistake that he did of thinking that the world would accept caricature for argument, and ridicule for reason, and rhetoric for logic. They are more danger ous also because they do not come out into the open, as he did, and frankly avow themselves to be infidels. They claim, in some sense, to believe in the Bible, but all the while that they claim it they are seek ing, consciously or unconsciously, to under mine the faith of others in the absolute inerrancy and authority of the Bible. The most dangerous enemies of the Bible today are the college professors and principals of high schools, and even theological pro fessors, who, while they claim to be endeav oring to establish faith upon a broader, and therefore better, basis, are all the time attempting to show that the Bible is full of errors and not in accord with the assured results of modern science and history. These enemies are legion, they are found practically everywhere, many of them are able men, and some of them are brilliant men, and they have formulated a skillfully planned campaign against the Bible. Nevertheless, the Bible is in no danger. There are six reasons why the Bible is not in. danger.
glad to think so; because it gives their consciences some little consolation in a life of sin to think that the Bible will not stand. But there is another class who fear the Bible is in danger, and 'it is with great reluctance that they think that it is, they love the Bible, they would be glad to believe the Bible, but they are afraid the old Book must go. Let us then honestly face the question, is the Bible in danger? I shall prove to a demonstration that it is not in danger. I will not deny that the Bible has enemies, and most able enemies, most persistent enemies. Eighteen years ago when Colonel Irigersol suddenly died there were many who breathed a sigh of relief, for they thought that the most dangerous enemy of the Bible was gone. But Col. Ingersol was not the most dan gerous enemy of the Bible. There were more dangerous enemies of the Bible even during his lifetime than he himself, was, and there are far more dangerous enemies of the Bible than he today. They are
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Indeed, many of the arguments urged by the destructive critics today are cen turies old, as old as the time of Celsus. With all the researches and all the labored effort to find something against the Bible, not one. single new argument has been forged in the last twenty years. There have been times in the past when the Bible has seemed to be in more peril than today, but when the storm of battle was over and the smoke of conflict had cleared away from the battle field, this old, impregnable citadel of God’s eternal truth has been seen standing there absolutely unhurt and unscarred, and the battle has only served to illustrate how impregnable was the citadel. Those who fancy that they are going to destroy the Bible with their puny weapons, and those also who fear it is going to be destroyed, would do well to reflect upon its history. The book that has so triumphantly withstood the terrific assaults of eighteen centuries is not likely to succumb in a day. Voltaire, a far more gifted, versatile and skillful enemy of Christianity than any enemy living today, once boasted, “It took twelve men to estab lish Christianity. I will show the world it takes but one to destroy it.” But somehow or other it did not destroy as easily as he imagined it would. Voltaire has passed into history, and largely into oblivion, and he will soon pass into utter oblivion, but the Bible has gained in power, and the very room in which Voltaire wrote the words has been packed from floor to ceiling with Bibles for distribution, owned by the Brit ish and Foreign Bible Society. The advance of research from excavations in Bible lands, the advance of historical investigation, and the advance of science, have all served to confirm the truthfulness of the Bible. For example, the unearthing and deciphering of the cuneiform inscrip tions, and the Moabite stone have shown the truth of Bible statements that were once questioned by scholars. As another illustration, not so many years ago ridi cule was heaped upon the Bible implica tion of the existence of a great Hittite
I. B ecause th e Bible h a s a lre ad y s u r vived th e a tta c k s of m o re th a n 1 8 0 0 y ears. The attacks now being made upon the Bible are not something new. The Bible has always been hated and assaulted. The Bible’s stern denunciation of sin, the Bible’s uncompromising demand of a holy, unself ish, consecrated life, the Bible’s merciless laying of human pride in the dust, have aroused for the Bible a more bitter hatred from men than any other book has ever met. No sooner was the Bible given to the world than it met the hatred of men, and they tried to stamp it out by every method and instrument of destruction they could bring to bear against it. The arguments that are brought against the Bible today are not new arguments, all of them were met and answered long ago. I am not aware of one single new argument that has been brought forward against the Bible in the last ten years. The antagonists of the Bible have tricked out the old argu ments in new and more attractive gar ments, but they are. the same old argu ments. The arguments brought forward by the most learned and most able enemies of the book today are the very arguments that have been employed for more than a century. If any one will take the trouble to read Tom Paine’s “Age of Reason,” he will be amazed to discover how many of the positions which men persist in calling “the new views” of the Bible were exploited by Tom Paine in his “Age of Reason” more than a century ago. Dr. Howard Osgood, a great scholar, in a discussion with the destructive critics some years ago, read a statement of the positions of the destructive critics as he understood them, and then turned to President Harper and inquired if the statements that he had read were Hot a fair statement of the positions they held. President Harper replied they were, and then Prof. Osgood startled his auditors, and especially his opponents, by saying, “In this statement that I have just read of your positions, I have been reading verb atim from Tom Paine’s ‘Age of Reason.’ ”
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people. The investigations of compara tively recent years have proven the Bible right, and the critics utterly wrong. The skeptics' of my early years made merry over the Bible mention of light before there was a sun, but today every man of science knows that according to the gen erally accepted nebular hypothesis there was light, cosmic light before the sun became a separate body, and he also knows that even after the sun had become a separate body and the earth had been thrown off from the sun and the moon from the earth, that such dense clouds surrounded the earth for a long period of time that no light either from sun or moon could reach the earth, and that after wards the clouds became thin and dissi pated and then, and only then, in that day, or period, of the earth’s history, did the ,sun and moon appear as definite heavenly bodies, giving light upon the earth by day or night. A very few years ago the destructive critics ridiculed the 14th chap ter of Genesis and its mention of Amra- phel, whom they asserted was an alto gether mythical character, and many of them asserted that Abraham himself was a mythical character, but inscriptions made by this very Amraphel, or to use the mod ern name Hammurabbai, have been dis covered, and a code of laws issued by him has been found, a code of a very lofty character, and now instead of sneering at Amraphel 9 s a mythical character, the critics are trying to make us believe that Moses derived his legislation from him. The greatest scientist that America pro duced in the nineteenth century, my own friend and beloved instructor in geology, Prof. Dana, said, “The grand old book of God still stands; and this old earth the more its leaves are turned and pondered, the more will it sustain and illustrate the sacred word." Eighteen centuries of triumphant history and eighteen centuries of accumulating confirmation show that the Bible is not in any peril.
II. T h e Bible is n o t in d a n g e r b ecau se it m eets a n d satisfies th e deepest needs of m an in ev ery g en eratio n . Arthur Hallam said, “I see that the Bible fits into every fold and crevice of the human heart.” This is true, but more than this is true. The Bible has an answer to every cry of the human soul, a balm for every wound of the human/heart, a .supply for every need of man. What are the deeper needs of man? 1. First of all, the need of pardon and peace. We are all sinners. We may try to dispute or obscure that fact, but we all know it is true. The Christian Scientist may assert that there is really no such thing as sin, that sin is only “mortal thought,” or “illusion,” and, yet the Chris tian Scientist himself shows that he really believes that there is such a thing as sin by his holding other men responsible for their wrong acts. New theologians of the Reginald Campbell type may assert that the supposed fall of man was a fall upward, and that even man when he gets drunk or goes into lust is seeking after God, but in our deeper moments we all know that this is utter nonsense. In our deepest moments we all know we are not right and though we may try to question it, we also fear that there is a holy God to whom we shall have to give answer for this sinful life of ours, and even if there is not such a holy God we know we shall have to give answer to our own consciences, whose accu sations like Banquo’s ghost, will not down. Man is a sinner. Every man is a sinner.. The great question then is, is there, any place where pardon from God and peace in our own consciences can be found? The Bible answers this all-important question. It tells us that pardon and peace can be found in Jesus Christ through His atoning blood, and when we seek pardon and peace in Him we find that what the Bible says on this point is true. There are many on every hand who can testify that they have found pardon and peace in Jesus Christ to whom the Bible pointed them. Years ago in Chicago a woman came to me who had been in a very real hell for fourteen years.
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poor, and dirty, and quarrelsome, that today are clean, and well supplied and loving through the influence of this book? How many men and women have been saved from lives of sin by this boqjc? With this, contrast infidelity. Where is the man who has been saved from drunkenness by the power of infidelity? Where is the home that was once poor, and dirty and quarrelsome that is today clean; and well supplied arid loving, which has been made so by the power of infidelity? Where is the sinning woman who has been saved from a life of sin by infidelity in any form? 3, The next need of man is comfort in sorrow. We live in a world that is full of sorrow and bereavement. Families are broken up, dear ones taken away. Man needs consolation as he stands by the dying bed of wife or child or mother; he needs consolation as he looks in the grave into which the dearest one of earth has been lowered. Where can he find consolation in such an hour ? In the Bible, and in the Bible alone. On October 19, 1894, five years after the Johnstown flood, I stood in Johnstown cemetery. I looked upon the graves of several thousand who were in one day, May 31, 1889, swept into eternity; 816 unknown ones lay in a single plot. I read the inscriptions on the tombstones. What stories of sorrow they told. There lay side by side a young mother and her baby child; in another place lay “father, 34 years; Anne, 10 years; Tommy, 6 years; Elmer, 2,” and the rest of the family were left to mourn. In another place lay seven of one family side by side. There was need of consolation in those days in Johnstown. Was there any place where it could be found? Yes, in the Bible, and in Jesus Christ of whom the Bible tells. On one tombstone I read, “Annie Llewellyn, died May 31, 1889, five years, three months, seventeen days, ‘Safe in the arms of Jesus.’ ” Was there any comfort in that for those parents as they thought of their little one caught by the swirling flood, tossed about mid trees and
For fourteen years conscience had tor mented her with the thought of the man into whose throat she had driven a dagger and killed him. Oftentimes in her agony she had gone down to Lake Michigan by night and thought of plunging into its dark waters to drown herself in order to be free from her accusing conscience, but she hesi tated .to do it for fear of the awakening that might lie beyond death. I pointed her to Isa. 53:6 and she found pardon and perfect peace through the One who had borne in her place the murder she had committed. The last three days of week before last and the first two days of last week I was in Chicago again. The first day I was there this woman came to me with a smiling face and told me how happy she was in Christ, and time and again she came to me at the close of some of the meetings, telling me how God was using even her in service for Him. This book has saved many a conscience tortured one from suicide and despair. 2. The next need of man is, deliver ance from sin’s power. Men are in the grip of sin, we all know that. They are unable to break away from the grip of sin. It is well enough to tell a man to assert his manhood, but it don’t work. The very lecturer who tells men that they do not need a Saviour, Jesus, to set them free from the power of sin, that all they need to do is to assert their manhood, has not asserted his own manhood and broken away from sin’s grip. This slavery of sin is awful; the soul cries out, where is deliverance to be found? The cry of Paul in his failure and defeat is the universal cry of the thoughtful heart, “Oh, wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me out of the body of this death?” (Rom. 7:24). The Bible answers the question in John 8:36, “If the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.” When we try it we find it is true. How many men there are whom we know who have been saved from lives of drunkenness and sin by this book? How many homes there are in Los Angeles and throughout the land that were once
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crashing-ruins, buried at last in the awful mass of drift and dying ones at the bridge? On the family tombstone named above I read these words, “Be ye also ready, for at such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh” (Matt. 24:44). I read not one single inscription from Tom Paine, Voltaire, Col. Ingersol, or from any infidel writer or speaker, ancient or modern. Why not? Because there is no comfort in them. A few years before his death Col. Ingersol wrote recommending suicide as the best refuge he could suggest in great sorrow and failure. The Bible has something im measurably better to offer. 4. Man’s next need is hope in the face of death. We must all sooner or later stand face to face with death, then the soul of man, unlessJt has been burned out by sin, cries, Does this end all, is there no light in the grave? The Bible again meets and satisfies this cry. Col. Ingersol once asked in a lecture delivered in Chicago (October 13, 1894), “Why did not He (Christ) say something positive, definite and satisfactory about another world? Why did He not turn the tear-stained hope of heaven into glad knowledge of another life?” Then he answered his own question in this way: “I will tell you why. He was a m&n and did not know.” The audacity of such an answer to an intelligent audience with an open Bible, is amazing. To imply that Christ did not tell something “posi tive, definite, and satisfactory about another world.” To imply that He did not- “turn the tear-stained hope of heaven into glad knowledge of another life,” and then try to account for His not doing so! Col. Ingersol must have thought that his hear ers either had no Bible or else would not read it. Jesus said in John 14:1-3, “Let not your, heart be troubled: believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not "so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and will receive you ilnto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.” Is not that
something positive, something definite, something satisfactory about another world? Again Jesus says in John 11:25, 26, “I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead yet shall he live. And whosoever liveth, and belieyeth in me shall never die,” Is not that something positive, something definite, something satisfactory about another world? Again He says in John 5 :28, 29, “The hour is coming, in which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come forth, they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life, and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of judgment.” That certainly is plain enough, definite enough, positive enough, though it is not very satisfactory to those who are living lives of sin. But has the critical Colonel himself ever said anything “positive, definite and satisfac tory” about another world? He had a most excellent chance to do So if he had anything to say, when he stood beside the •grave of his own brother, but his pathetic but hollow eloquence on that Qccasion served only to illustrate the utter hollow ness and emptiness of skepticism. The Bible has given men courage to die bravely and triumphantly in all the ages of its history. Infidels sometimes die stolidly and clinch their teeth and face it out, but they never die joyously and gloriously. We might go on and show other needs of man that the Bible meets, but enough has been said to show that the Bible meets the deepest needs oTman. As long as man needs pardon and peace, as long gs man needs deliverance from the power of sin, as long as man needs comfort in sorrow, as’ long as man needs hope in the face of death, the Bible is not in danger. Man will not give up to satisfy any number' of keen satirists or carping critics or plausible rea soned, the book that meets his deepest needs, that brings pardon and peace instead of guilt and remorse, that brings liberty, manhood and nobility instead of bondage to sin, that brings comfort in the darkest hours of sorrow, transforming the thunder
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wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his own wife loveth himself. For no man ever hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherfsheth it, even as the Lord the church.” And then he might have read two verses still further down, “For this cause shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they two shall be one flesh.” All the respect and honor and love and care bestowed upon woman today, woman owes to the Bible. But not only can we find every truth in the Bible that we find elsewhere, but there is more truth in the Bible than all other literature put together, and it is in portable compass. In the lecture already referred to Col. Ingersol proposed to give to the world another and better Bible in place of this one, but where is it? Listen tp what he says: “For thousands of years men have been writing the real Bible, and it is being written from day to day and it will never be finished' while man has life. “All the wisdom that lengthens and ennobles life—all that avoids or cures dis eases, or conquers pain—all just and per fect laws and rules that guide and shape our lives, all thoughts that feed the flames of love, the music that transfigures, enrap tures, and enthralls, the victories of heart and brain, the miracles that hands have wrought, the deft and cunning hands of those who worked for wife and child, the histories of noble deeds, of brave and use ful men, of faithful loving wives, of quenchless mother-love, of conflicts for the right, of sufferings for the truth, of all the best that all the men and women of the world have said, and thought and done through all the years. “These treasures of the heart and brain— these are the sacred scriptures of the human race.” That sounds pretty, don’t it? I challenge any man to say that that is not a master piece of diction. But after all it is only rhetoric. Where is this Bible of which Ingersol spoke? People want a Bible that they can lay their hands on, that they can make use of, that they can carry with them.
cloud into the rainbow, that inspires man with unquenchable hope in the face o f 1 death and its terrors. III. T h e Bible is n o t in d a n g e r because th e re is n o th in g else to ta k e th e p lace of th e Bible. The Bible contains all the truth ,on moral and spiritual subjects that all other books together contain. It contains more than all other books put together, and it contains all this in portable compass. Not a truth on moral or spiritual topics that cannot be found for substance within the covers of this little book. Even infidels’ best thoughts are stolen from this book. For example, Ingersol once said, “The doctrine that woman is the slave, or serf of man—| whether it comes from hell or heaven, from God or demon, from the golden streets of the New Jerusalem or the very Sodom of perdition—is savagery pure and simple.” This statement 'is true, but where did Col. Ingersol learn this doctrine of woman’s equality with man? He either learned ifi from the Bible or from some one else wno had learned it from the Bible. What is the first thing that the Bible says about woman? You will find it in Gen. 2:18, “And the LORD God says, it is not good that man should be alone ; I will make him a help meet for him.” Here in its opening chapters- the Bible proclaims the equality of woman with man. It declares that woman is not “the slave, or serf of man,” but his compaion and equal. Ingersol was all right “in his doctrine about the equality of woman, but he was unfortunately three thousand five hundred years behind the book that he sought to hold up to scorn. Turning to the New Testament he might have read in Gal. 3 :28 the statement that in Christ Jesus “there is neither male nor female.”’ He might have read again in Eph. S:25, “Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ- also loved the church, and gave Himself up for it.” Certainly there is no suggestion there that woman is the slave, or serf of man. And he might have read a few verses further down in verses 28 and 29. “So ought men to love their
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A poor man cannot very well carry a Carnegie library in his trunk, and it would not do him much good in the great emer gencies of life if he could. But here in this book we have a Bible that a man can carry in his pocket wherever he goes, and in this one small book he has more of truth of eternal value than in all the libraries of the world. No, the Bible is not in any danger, for there is nothing else to take its place. IV . T h e Bible is n o t in d a n g e r because The Bible has the distrust and hatred of some, but it has the confidence and affec tion of the wisest, and especially the holiest of men and women. The men who know the Bible best are the men who trust it most and love it best. A superficial knowledge of the Bible, such as Col. Ingersol, for example, had, or Tom Paine had, or that many a college and even theological professor today has, may lead one to distrust it and hate it, but the deep and thorough knowledge of that book that comes from a pure heart and profound study will always lead one to love and trust it. The. Bible is distrusted and hated by those whose influence dies with them. The Bible is loved and trusted by those whose influence lives after them. Lucian, Celsus, and Porphyry were great men, but their influence died with them, but the influence of John and Paul lives on in ever widening power. Voltaire and Volney were able men, among the ablest men of their day, but their influence belongs wholly to.the past, but the influence of Whitfield and Wesley is greater today than when they were here on earth. Col. Ingersol was a man of brilliant gifts, but his influence has not lived after him. Indeed it is amazing how completely he has sunken out of sight in the eighteen years that have elapsed since his death. But the influence of Spurgeon and Moody is with us still. No, the Bible is not in it h as a ho ld th a t c an n o t be sh ak en , on th e confidence an d affection of th e w isest a n d best m en a n d w om en.
danger, for it has the ever-increasing con fidence of the best men and women, of those men and women whose influence lives after them, and only - the distrust and hatred of those whose influence dies with them. V . T h e Bible is n o t in d a n g e r because it is th e W o rd of God. I have not space to go into that at this time. Many things prove that the Bible is the Word of God: its fulfilled prophecies, its unity, its Divine power, its inexhaustible depth, the fact that as we grow in knowl edge and holiness-^grow Godward—we grow toward the Bible. Just a moment on its fulfilled prophecies. Look at the 53d chapter of Isaiah. This chapter has been the rock upon which infidelity has always gone to pieces. Men have tried to get around the force of the argument by the desperate expedient of saying that the chapter does not refer to Christ but to suffering Israel, but even one careful read ing of the chapter will show that it cannot refer to suffering Israel. Look at Daniel 9:25-27 with its prediction of the exact time of the manifestation of the Messiah to Israel and its prediction of His death and what Would follow. Look at Micah 5 :2 and its prediction of the very place in which the Messiah should be born. Right before our own eyes in the last two years we have seen predictions from the Bible fulfilled that men said never could be ful filled. They told us that wars were at an end forever, that man had made such pro gress in his evolution that a great war would never be possible again among civil ized nations of the earth, and that the pre dictions of the Bible that greater wars and times of distress were coming than the world had ever seen were foolish and im possible of fulfillment, but today we see these prophecies being fulfilled before our very eyes. The other arguments to prove that the Bible is the Word of God I have not time to go into at all, but they are absolutely conclusive. The Bible is not in danger because it is God’s book. “Heaven and earth may pass away, but God’s Word
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The Bible is in no danger. As far as the Bible is concerned all these attacks from different sources upon the Bible do only good, they set people to thinking about the Bible, they set preachers to preaching about the Bible, they serve to illustrate the invincible truth and power of the Bible by showing the ease with which such fierce attacks upbn it are repelled. But while the Bible itself is in no danger, those who vent their spleen upon it are in danger. It is no small sin to ridicule the Word of an all holy and all mighty God. There are . others also who are in danger. Those who listen to the fascinating eloquence of gifted unbelievers and allow it to lull them to repose in a life of sin, they are in danger. Men, and especially young men, your con sciences were once troubling you and you were contemplating forsaking your folly, but you have allowed yourselyes to be blinded by the voice of some brilliant agnostic and you are now about to trample under foot the.Word of God and the Christ of God. Do not be deceived, these voices that speak to you are not the voices of, truth, but the voices of falsehood, infa mous, dastardly, soul-destroying falsehood. To listen to these voices means ruin, eter nal ruin. Do not listen to such voices, listen to the voice of God that speaks to you in wondrous love from this book and says, “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and He will have mercy upon him, and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon.” Yes, and there is another class in danger. All those who do not accept Jesus Christ are in danger. This book is not in danger, -every utterance of it will stand, and this book declares in John 3 :36, “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.” It is true, and if you do not believe on Christ, if you do not speedily give up your unbelief and put your trust in Him, you must perish. i T ' . '
shall not pass away” (Matt. 24:25), or to put it as Peter puts it in 1 Peter 1:24, 25, “All flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away: but the word of the Lord abideth forever.” V I. T h e Bible is n o t in d a n g e r b ecau se In John 7:17 Jesus offers a test that aiiy man can try for himself. He says, “If any man willeth to do his will, he shall know of the teaching, whether it is of God, or whether I speak from myself.” Many have tried this test and it has never failed. A few weeks ago, at the close of one of our evening services, a man came to me saying that he was full of doubts, that while he believed that there was a God, he doubted that Jesus Christ'was the Son of God, or that the -Bible" was the Word of God. He said furthermore, he had been advised to accept it 'on blind faith without evidence. I told him to do nothing of the sort. I told him that believing without evidence was not faith but credulity, and that God did not ask any man to believe without evidence. Then I gave him the passage just quoted, “If any man willeth to do his will, he shall know of the teach ing, whether it is of God, or whether I speak from myself.” I told him to sur render his will to God and then ask God to show him whether Jesus Christ was His Son or not, and whether the Bible was His Word or not, and to take the gospel of John and read it, not trying to believe it, but being willing to be convinced if it was true, and promising God that he would take his stand upon everything in it that he found to be true. Within a week I received a letter from this man telling me how he had come out into the clear light of faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God. I have seen the man again today, and not only has his scepticism utterly vanished, but he is leading other sceptics to Christ. an y h o n e st an d e a rn e st seek er a fte r tru th c an find o u t fo r h im self th a t th e Bible is G od’s W ord.
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