Dr. Louis T. Talbot, BIOLA Chancellor, will be happy to answer your question concern ing any portion of the Word of God which may be perplexing you. A free booklet of questions and answers is available upon re quest.
DR TALBOT Praying to Mary Q. Why not pray to the Virgin Mary and to other departed saints? Why are Protestants so opposed to the Roman Catholic practice of praying to the Virgin Mary and to saints? Protest ants ask their Christian friends to pray for them here. I have heard you request your radio audience to pray for you personally. Why, not, then, ask the departed saints to pray for you? If their prayers availed while they were here on earth, surely they would have greater efficacy if offered in the presence of God. A. My friend, in stating your ques tions, you have answered them. You ask, “Why not request the departed saints to pray for you?” Just simply because they are “ departed” ! How can I ask them, seeing they have departed? I can request my radio listeners to pray for me because they are here on earth, and near enough to hear the request. But Mary and other saints of past generations are “ departed.” The real Mary was never omni- presentT omniscient, or omnipotent. And though she is now in heaven, yet she still does not possess these attri butes, which belong only to God. Millions of Roman Catholics scattered all over the earth pray to her at the same time. How can she hear them, unless she can be everywhere at once? If she were omnipresent, she would be divine, for omnipresence is an at tribute of deity. To pray to her is a waste of time and to say that God takes the prayers of His people and presents them to Mary, is to make Him the petitioner, thus putting Him in a subordinate position. Mary confessed her need of a Sav iour. She made a statement to Eliza beth, the mother of John the Baptist, which forever settles the question as to whether or not a Christian should pray to her. To Elizabeth she said, in
the beautiful Magnificat, “My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour” (Luke 1:46, 47). Here is the definite statement that Mary was a sinner, needing a Saviour. She was an admir able character, to be sure, but it was necessary for her, like any other sin ful human being, to be bom again by faith in the atoning work of the eternal Son of God. Mary prayed with the disciples and the other women in the upper room. The last reference in the Bible is found in Acts 1:14 where she was with the disciples and the other women in the upper room, praying and waiting for the promise of the Holy Spirit, in accordance with the express command of the risen Christ. Not only was she obedient to Him here, but she made no claim to super iority. She is listed just as one with the other believers on the Lord Jesus, praying to the Father in the name of the Son, even as He had commanded. There is not the slightest suggestion in all the Word of God that we are to pray to Mary. If God had intended that we pray to her, would He not have said so in His Word? Moreover, to kneel down before her image is nothing short of idolatry, as I see it. Every Christian is a saint, meaning one set apart by God from the Christ- rejecting world, unto Himself. One is a saint the moment he puts his trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. If you want a “ saint” to pray for you, find a real Christian and ask him to share your need with you before the throne of grace and he will be glad to. But, best of all, we may all go to the Lord Jesus Christ directly. “ There is . . . one Mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus” (I Tim. 2:5) He as our Great High Priest ever lives to make intercession for us, and we are to bring all our needs to God, at any time, in any place, under any circum stances, in His Name, and He will
hear us and answer, for the sake of His Son. The Great Tribulation Q. I heard someone say from the pulpit that since God did not spare the church of the second and third centuries from the terrible persecu tions of pagan Rome and the cruel inquisition of papal Rome in the Dark Ages, why should He spare the church in the last days — the persecutions mentioned in the book of Revelation? A . The Great Tribulation will be different from any other time of per secution that ever took place on this earth. In the first place, it will be the most severe. You may think that the persecutions endured by the early Christians could not be worse but they can for we read in Matthew 24:22: “And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened.” In the second place, the Tribula tion is not a time of chastening for the church. I am not saying that there will not be great times of trou ble for the church before that time. We do not know what the present generation of Christians are going to have to suffer at the hands of a god less civilization before those days come. But none of these things will be the Great Tribulation. We are not appointed to wrath, God’s Word says, and this is to be a day of wrath. But the wrath is not against the church. For in the third place, the tribula tion is the time of Jacob’s trouble, God’s time of dealing in judgment with the unbelieving Israel. It is the time of purification of Israel. It is primarily Jewish. This is brought out plainly not only in the Olivet Dis course of Matthew 24, but by many other Scriptures such as Deuteronomy 4:30; Jeremiah 30:7; Ezekiel 20:37; Daniel 12:1; Zechariah 13:8,9 and Revelation 7:4-8; 12:1,2,17.
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THE KING'S BUSINESS
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