formation that takes place. It sup posedly actually becomes the body and the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Martin Luther could not hold to this particular doctrine and this was a part of the reformation truth. He used the word “consubstantiation.” He meant that the body and the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ is in, with, and under these elements. Then there is the third view and the one which we believe to be that which is valid and Scriptural. This is that the ele ments remain the same and that there is the spiritual application as they are partaken of. We are to meditate upon the broken body and the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is far too beautiful a service to make it a matter of argumentation. Like baptism it does not mean that we are saved or lost by partaking or abstain ing. We come to the communion table in simple faith believing and confess ing our sin. We rejoice over the fact that the Lord Jesus Christ shed His blood for our transgressions. Q . Vancouver, Washington — “Please ex plain Isaiah U1:25 which states, ‘I have raised up one from the north, and he shall come: from the rising of the sun shall he call upon my name: and he shall come upon princes as upon mortar, and as the potter tread- eth clay.’ What does all of this mean?” A. Chapters 40 to 48 of Isaiah deal with the comfort of God for His chosen people. Why do they need this consolation? Although Isaiah was liv ing in th e eighth century B.C., through the Spirit of God and by prophecy, he was projecting himself beyond the exile into a future time. He didn’t want them to feel that their captors’ gods were greater than Jeho vah. He was pointing out that their difficulty came because God used them to chasten them. Here are proofs that their God is the greatest of all in the world. He can foretell something and He brings it to pass. He not only has power to predict, but inherent in the militant prediction is the power to bring it to pass. God says so and it is 18
in Amos 9:15 in which we read, “And I will plant them upon their land and they shall no more be pulled up out of their lands which I have given them, saith the Lord thy God.” The world famous archaeologist and Palestinian scholar, Dr. William F. Albright, has stated, “It has never been known in the history of the world that a nation should be in en slavement and bondage to another world power for over 400 years and then be delivered, only to go back and start their lives all over again in their own land.” (He refers, of course, to the Egyptian bondage.) " It has never been heard of in the history of the world that the same nation, cen turies later, should be taken off into another captivity for 70 years, and five sixths of them (the ten tribes) taken away 150 years before that into the northern part of Mesopotamia, namely into the land of Assyria, and then come back and reinstitute their political life, and their religious cus toms, once again. Finally, it has never been known in the history of man that a nation should be, for almost 2,000 years, scattered world-wide, and then be brought back again. But we have seen it in our own day. It has hap pened before our very eyes. Once I did not believe in prophecy, but now I can wait, with full assurance, for the literal fulfillment of other prophecies that have not yet been realized. They will be completed with equal literal ness and exactness.” God’s Word standeth sure! Man can speak and it will come to naught, but God speaks and it must stand. We have a sov ereign and an omnipotent God. Q . Newport, Washington — "A t the Lord’s Supper did Jems say, ‘This is my body and blood,’ meaning that it was real or only symbolic?” A. This is a very significant question. There are three views held concern ing this phrase. One large ecclesiasti cal body holds to the doctrine of “transubstantiation.” When the offici ating clergyman prays over the ele ments there is a supernatural trans
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