Modern Jeroboams The Attempts to Popularize Religion and Make It Easier and Pleasanter for the People By C. H. FOUNTAIN, England
If they believed that Word, as they must have done for their own salvation, how can they preach something diamet rically opposed to it for the salvation of others? And if they have not believed it, and will not, how can God do other than re fuse them as His messengers? For the Word, says Peter, is the very seed from which springs that new birth, without which all the acquirements and graces, the “ outward appearance,” so highly esteemed among men, are as nothing in the sight of Him before whom all things are naked and open, and who looks only on the heart. They may be, and no doubt many are, filled with a desire to make the world, better; but if.they do not begin at the heart, and are trying to bring it about simply by better social, moral, and polit ical conditions, their work, however ap parently successful for the moment, is, in the ultimate, worthless. It is simply making clean the outside of the cup and platter. Any departure from God’s Word and from His plan of salvation, and any at tempt to popularize religion and make it easier and pleasanter for the people by pandering to the demands of the worldly, are not only predestined to fail ure, but are in the sight of God of all things most reprehensible. In reading through the Book of Kings, one is struck by the frequent repetition of a phrase used of one king after another who slept with his fathers. It becomes almost monotonous. Yet it is a sad refrain. “ He departed not from the sins of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin.”
EADERS among men in re ligion, as in every other sphere of life—and every preacher is to some extent a leader— are
too often estimated by the worldly, and those who are unlearned and unstable in the Scriptures, with an utter disre gard to their real value in the sight of God. Learning, eloquence, asceticism, and a name among men who earnestly con tend, not for the faith, but for social and political betterment, are looked upon as the highest credentials. Sound ness of doctrine and adherence to the Scripture are oftentimes the last con sideration; from the worldly stand point, indeed, they are a positive de fect. Yet many who have given themselves over to the preaching of every kind of spurious doctrine, carry everything be fore them by the weight of their author ity, their learning and their fascination, and men looking upon the height of their stature and the piety of their counten ance, say, like Samuel, “ Surely the Lord’s anointed is before Him.” But that is not God’s judgment. “ Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature, for I have re fused him.” “ For man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord look eth on the heart.” The heart always has been, and always will be, the stand ard, and it seems inconceivable that men who have really been “ born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incor ruptible, by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth forever,” can utter such emphatic contradictions of that Word as we hear all around us today.
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