T he thoughts and purposes of men bear the impress of the mind from which they emerge as much in their decision as in their general character. As earth’s streams are decided in their flow and owe the measure of their decision to the elevation of the mountain range down whose steeps they pour, so is it with the opinions and actings of men. Decision is no proof of weakness; it is not bigotry nor intolerance nor ignorance, though it has sometimes been the emanation of these and identified with them. Everything in the Bible is decided; its statements of fact, its revelations of truth, its condemnation of error, its declarations respecting God and man, re specting our present and our future. Its characters are decided men—Abraham, Moses, Joshua, Elijah, Paul. It speaks always with authority, as expecting to be implicitly credited. It reckons on our receiving its teaching, not doubtfully but certainly; and it leaves us only the alternative of denying its whole authenticity or of accepting its revelations without a qualification and without a subterfuge. To excuse ourselves for doubt and indecision and oscillation of faith, by pointing to differences of creed is to suggest either that Scripture is not infallible or that it is not intelligible. The Bible is God’s direct revelation to each man into whose hands it comes; and for the reception of all that it contains each man is respon sible, though all his fellows should reject it. The judgment day will decide who is right; meanwhile it is to God and not to man that we are to listen. For the understanding of God’s revelation, each one is accountable. If it can be proved that the Bible is so uncertainly written as to render diversity of thought a necessity,' or so obscurely expressed as to keep men in ignorance, then when the day of reckoning comes the misled man will have opportunity of substantiat ing his charges against God and claiming deduction from his penalty on the plea of the ambiguity of the statute. Meanwhile we are responsible for decision —decision in thought and action on every point which the Holy Spirit has written; and it is not likely that the Spirit of wisdom and love, in writing a book for us, would write so darkly as to be un intelligible, or should give such an uncertain sound that no man could be sure as to which, out of a score of meanings suggested by man, was the genuine. Man’s usual thought is that the want of explicit ness in the Bible is the cause of diversity of opinion and that a little more fullness of statement and clear ness of language would have prevented all sects and confusions. The answer to this is twofold: 1) That greater fullness would have only opened new points of divergence and variance, so that instead of a hun dred opinions we should in that case have a thou sand; 2) That the real cause of all the divergence and unsettlement is to be found in man’s moral state; that there is not a veil upon the Bible but scales on human eyes; and that, were that spiritual imperfec tion entirely removed, the difficulty would be not how to believe but how not to believe; and the wonder would be how it was possible for us to attach more than one meaning to words so significant and simple.
discovered to have been a poor attempt to accomplish an impossibility; a failure—a failure for eternity, a failure as complete as it is disastrous and remediless. Egypt and Canaan cannot coalesce; Babylon and Jerusalem can never be one. These are awful words, “We are of God, and the whole world lieth in wick edness” and surely the Holy Spirit meant what He said when He enjoined, “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). The cross then makes us decided men. It brings both our hearts and our wills to the side of God. It makes us feel the cowardice as well as guilt of in decision, bidding us be bold and stable, “ holding faith and a good conscience” ; all the more because the wide “ liberality” of modem freethinking has con founded skepticism with candor and recognizes in religious indifference a virtue and a grace. Not to take any side strongly is no evidence of a large soul or a great purpose. It is generally an indi cation of littleness. The furrows drawn by a firm hand are strongly and deeply drawn. It is no surface work; soil and I ..... 7 | coming ; soon i
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Recently several e v a n g e lic a l magazines published in the East have carried articles endorsing the Seventh-day Adventist faith. The topic naturally holds great interest for most Chris- tians and The King’s Business has asked Dr. Louis T. Talbot to do a new series of articles on the subject. This highly in formative series will start soon in The King’s Business.
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subsoil are turned over with a decision which implies that if the work is worth doing at all it is worth doing well. The man of true purpose and strong mind handles his plow resolutely, from end to end of the longest furrow, till the whole field be wrought. Thus do men of true will and aim proceed, both in belief and action. Having put their hand to the plow, they do not so much as look back.
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JANUARY 1957
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