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THE KING’S BUSINESS
by men. This fact, if it stood alone would be sufficient proof o f its Divine origin. 1. There are whole volumes o f meaning in a single and apparently simple verse. A single verse o f Scripture has often formed the basis upon which a literature o f many volumes, both o f prose and poetry, has been erected. This is true for example, o f John 3 :16, “ For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him, should not perish but have everlasting life.” It is true o f I John '4:8, "God is love.” It is true jjof Ps. 23:1, “ The Lord is my shepherd; f shall not want.” What single utterance o f any other book could be the founda tion o f so much thought and expression as these utterances o f the Bible. Who but God could pack so many volumes into one little verse, or part o f a verse? 2. The Bible is always ahead of man. The world is certainly making progress in its thinking. It is constantly leaving behind the scientists, philosophers, and sages o f the past. When the librarians o f Edinburg University some years ago were rearranging the books in the Library, they asked a distinguished professor what books they should remove in his department and he replied, “ Remove every volume over ten years old.” But the world never leaves the Bible behind. It has never caught up with it, Show me a man who says he has outgrown the Bible and I will show you every time a man who is ignorant o f the Bible and is talking o f something that he knows nothing about. Whence comes this Book which is always ahead o f the age? What other book ought to command the attention, the time, and the study that this book does, which is deeper than all other books, ahead o f all other books, and ahead o f every age ? You study today the latest thing in science and it will be out o f date in less than ten years, but the Bible is never out o f date. It is always not only up to date, but always ahead o f date. I f you wish to be not only abreast o f the times, but ahead o f the times, study the Bible. Jesus was ahead o f His times because He studied
so much o f the Bible as then existed. Paul was ahead o f his times for the same rea son. Huss, and Wycliff, and Luther, and John Knox, and Wesley, and Finney, and Moody, were ahead o f their times simply because they sought their wisdom from this book. II. In the Absolute Accuracy of Its Statements. The Bible differs from other books in the second place in the absolute accuracy o f its statements. The Bible is the only book that always says all it means to say and never says anything more than if means to say. The more rigidly one exam ines the Bible and the more closely and exactly he studies it the more will he be filled with admiration for the accuracy with which it expresses the truth. It never over-states, it never under-states the truth. There is pot one word too many and not one word too few. It is the model wit ness: it “tells the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.” A very large part o f man’s difficulty with the Bible comes from not knowing exactly what it says. Time and time again men have come to me and said, “I cannot believe this which the Bible says,” and then quoted something which they supposed the Bible said. But I have replied, “thp Bible does not say that,” and when we have looked it up, lo, it is some minute modification of what the Bible really says that has given rise to the diffi culty. The Bible is always so absolutely exact, I have found the best solution for very many apparent difficulties in the Bible to be to take the difficult verses precisely as they read. III. In Its Power. In the third place the Bible differs from all other books in its power. There is per haps no other place where the supremacy and solitariness o f the Bible shines out as in its power. Col. Ingersol once said in Chicago that the money expended in teach ing the supernatural' religion o f the Bible was wasted, and advised the ministers to take for a series o f sermons the history
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