The Gospel Day Part 28

It is said that some people are mistaken as to which family they belong, but it is "not every one that saith, Lord, Lord, that shall enter into the kingdom of heaven." G.o.d's family are righteous, they are holy, they are pure, they are saints. Satan's family are unrighteous, they are unholy, they do not believe in purity, they commit sin. The Savior has gone to prepare a place for his own so that where he is there they may forever be-glory! glory! Those who live and die in sin can not go to that pure and happy place. John 8:21. Dear friend, get ready. Live a pure, holy life and spend an eternity in the blissful presence of our dear Redeemer. G.o.d bless you, is my sincere prayer.

The Two Ways.

This earth is only man's transitory home. He lives here a few years, then goes to an eternity. There are two abodes or dwelling-places for man in that eternity. One is called heaven, the other is called h.e.l.l. One is a place of peace and joy, the other a place of torment and woe. One place is called eternal life, the other is called eternal death.

As man enters upon his journey of life two ways are set before him. Deut.

30:15, 19. One way leads to heaven, and is called the way of life and good. The other way leads to h.e.l.l, and is called the way of death and evil. The way to heaven is denominated the holy way, where walk the redeemed. The ransomed ones go singing on this way with crowns of joy upon their heads. This way shines more and more, brighter and brighter, as it nears the end.

The way to h.e.l.l is denominated the way of the transgressor. It is a hard way. There is no peace there, no rest. The darkness becomes more dense, and fears increase as it nears the end. The way to everlasting life in heaven is called a narrow way. Mat. 7:14. There are few that walk this way. The way that leads to destruction is a broad way. Mat. 7:13. There are many who are walking in that way. Dear reader, will you not choose the way of life and make heaven your eternal and happy home?

Conclusion Of Part First.

We have now reached the conclusion of the first division of the Gospel Day, namely, The Morning. We have not given the reader our opinion, or our interpretation of the Scriptures, but we have given the pure, simple Bible truths as taught by Christ and the apostles. It is not our doctrine, but the doctrine of him that sent us. What we have taught is in perfect accord with the Bible, and who can gainsay it?

To believe, experience, and live the truths of G.o.d's Word is to be a light in the world. To disbelieve any part, to come short of any part in practical life, is to be to the same extent in darkness. Christ was a light because he was the Word. The early church and apostles were a light because they believed, experienced and practised in life the whole Word.

The Bible was written in their hearts as well as in the book. The Bible never changes. G.o.d never changes, the nature of faith and grace never changes, and true gospel light never changes. What created light in the first century of this Christian era will create light in any other century, and nothing but what was light in the primitive days of Christianity will be light at any other time. Whatever may be claimed to be light, if it is not the light of Christ, is a false light.

May G.o.d help people to see the true light. Oh, glorious light of the morning! Christ and his church in all humility, gentleness, spotlessness and love. In their lowly, inoffensive walk with G.o.d, holy, harmless, undefiled, unblamable, separated from and unspotted by the world, persecuted, rejected, and despised by men. Enduring all without a murmur, contented in any and every circ.u.mstance of life; counting everything joy, glorying in tribulation, patient in imprisonments, in stripes, in tumults, in hunger, in fastings, in necessities, in afflictions, in distresses, always rejoicing. When reviled, they reviled not again; when they suffered they threatened not, but showing all meekness and gentleness unto all men, loving and praying for their enemies, feeding them when they hungered and giving them drink when they thirsted, preaching the gospel without money and without price, led exclusively by the Holy Spirit, having power with G.o.d over devils to cast them out, to heal the sick and lame, to restore sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf, to give speech to the dumb, and to raise the dead. Wonderful light of the gospel morning! Dear reader, we invite you to look upon the picture. See it in its beautiful transparent effulgent light. Pure as heaven, holy as a band of angels, peaceful as the silent, flowing river, harmless as the gentle dove, in a oneness equal with the holy trinity, and conquerors of sickness, sin and Satan. Such was the pure virgin bride of Christ-the church-when she was the light of the world.

O Moon-so fair in the rosy morn, Reflecting the light of Christ-the Sun, So spotless and pure in robes of white, Beautiful, wonderful city of light.

PART II. THE NOONDAY.

Or, The Doctrines Of An Apostate Religion Obscuring The Gospel Light.

The prophet Isaiah said. "The morning cometh, and also the night." Isa.

21:11, 12. A dark night succeeded the morning of this gospel day. Jesus said to his disciples, "But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light." Mark 13:24. The tribulation here spoken of was the siege and destruction of Jerusalem, the city of the Jews, by the son of Vespasian, A.D. 70, in which eleven hundred thousand persons perished. Josephus says of this time, "The sufferings indeed of the devoted inhabitants are such as humanity shudders to contemplate, and over which pity is glad to throw a veil." This is the tribulation of which our Lord spoke. The darkening of the sun and moon was the fading away of the gospel light.

About the year 96 A.D. the writings of the New Testament were closed. From that time we have only history to tell us of Christianity and its light in the life of men. That the noontime of this gospel day was dark, is unquestionable. To ascertain as near as possible the date of the close of the morning light and the beginning of the dark noonday we must resort to history. No one can rightly object to this. We a.s.sure you we will extract nothing that will conflict with the inspired and infallible Word of G.o.d.

Where the Word of truth is silent and we can gain information from authentic history it must certainly be proper and right. Historical facts only verify and explain the truthfulness of the Scriptures.

Chapter I. The Date Of The Beginning Of Noonday.

Sabine's Ecclesiastical History.

In speaking of Constantine's expedition to Rome in the year 311, when there appeared supernaturally a cross above the sun, he says: "During the vicissitudes in the state, the church exhibits nothing peculiarly great.

Among the common people there were doubtless many truly devoted in the spirit of their mind, and among them many that loved the divine Savior above life itself; but among the bishops and pastors nothing like what we saw in the past century. Indeed the princ.i.p.al events in the internal department of the church are rather more to its disgrace than its honor."

Speaking further of this time in another chapter he says: "The pagan temples were pulled down or converted into Christian churches: the exercise of the old priesthood was proscribed and the idols destroyed; elegant structures for Christian worship were raised, and those already erected, enlarged and beautified; the episcopacy was increased and honored with great favors and enriched with vast endowments; the ritual received many additions; the habiliments of the clergy were pompous, and the whole of the Christian service at once exhibited a scene of worldly grandeur and external parade. What a mighty change! But a short time since, and Christianity was held in sovereign contempt: now she is a favorite at court, and the companion of princes. Alas! such is the change, that it scarcely affords ground for triumph. The kingdom of our G.o.d and his Christ is become a kingdom of this world, and the church of Jesus reduced to a mere worldly sanctuary. The glory is departed, the gold is become dim, and the fine gold is changed.

"Indeed prelatical pride had been rising very high for a century before this. The pastors had forgotten their Master's instruction. 'Be ye not called Rabbi: for ye are brethren.' Lord bishops and archbishops and all the spirit of such distinction had been long enough upon the advance to congratulate such an emperor as Constantine. The materials for a hierarchy having been prepared it was no difficult thing for a set of worldly-minded bishops, countenanced by a prince, to put them together. Under all these circ.u.mstances, real religion was not likely to be bettered by such a reverse in external affairs, and so the event proved. The ancient contest, which was for the faith once delivered unto the saints, declined apace, and a strife for worldly honor, fleshly gratification, and spiritual dominion subst.i.tuted in its stead."

Such was the true condition of things in the year 311. Surely there had been a change, the kingdom of G.o.d had become the kingdom of the world, the glory was gone, strivings for worldly honor, fleshly gratification, and spiritual dominion had taken the place of "striving for the faith once delivered to the saints." What a change from the humble, self-denying, flesh crucifying days of Christ and the apostles. Truly we can say sometime before this the morning light had dimmed and died, and darkness intervened. The historian does not fix this date (311) as the beginning of the dark noonday. (The reader already begins to see, no doubt, why it was dark at the noontime.) He says in a preceding chapter, "About A.D. 264, a considerable stir was made by Paul of Samosata, bishop of Antioch. 'Great was the falling off in this church since the renowned Ignatius. The principles of Paul were exceedingly loose, and his practise was correspondent.' He rejected the divinity of the Son and subst.i.tuted his own reason for the light of the Spirit. The way in which he lived fully proved that he was a man of the world."

The historian proceeds to tell more of this bishop's wicked life. The Scriptural qualifications of a bishop are, blamelessness, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behavior, given to hospitality, apt to teach; "not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre; but patient, not a brawler, not covetous; one that ruleth well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity." 1 Tim. 3:3, 4. The seventh verse adds: "Moreover he must have a good report of them which are without." Such a bishop must be, in the very strictest sense, to be a light in the world. Here was a bishop, of perhaps the strongest Christian congregation in the world, almost everything to the contrary. How true the Savior's prophecy: "The moon shall not give her light, and the stars of heaven shall fall." Paul, of Samosata, became so wicked he was deposed from his office and became a "fallen star."

Sabine speaking of divisions and their causes says: "In this century the general church was rent in twain. This century also produced a train of other officers (beside bishops and deacons), such as subdeacons, who were all to the deacon what the presbyter was to the bishop; acolytes, persons to attend at service time on the ministers; ostiaries, doorkeepers; readers, men who were appointed to read the Scriptures in public; exorcists, officers of weak and superst.i.tious appointment, whose business was to pretend to expel the devil from the candidate for baptism. All these encroachments and changes mark, strongly mark, a great decline in the spirit and power of primitive Christianity."

All of these things, and many more similar ones, were occurring in the latter part of the third century.

In the year of our Lord 248 Cyprian was ordained a presbyter in the church at Carthage. Ten years later he laid down his life for Jesus. It is said of him that he "displayed a benevolent and pious mind and evinced much of the character of the Christian pastor in the affectionate solicitude with which he watched over his flock." In epistle eleven he says: "It must be owned and confessed that the outrageous and heavy calamity which hath almost devoured our flock, and continues to devour it to this day, hath happened to us because of our sins, since we keep not the way of the Lord, nor observe his heavenly commands, which were designed to lead us to salvation. Christ our Lord fulfilled the will of the Father, but we neglect the will of Christ. Our princ.i.p.al study is to get money and estates; we follow after pride, we are at leisure for nothing but emulation and quarreling, and have neglected the simplicity of faith. We have renounced this world in words only, and not in deed. Every one studies to please himself and to displease others."

This account of professed Christianity at this time by Cyprian is confirmed by the testimony of Eusebius, who was nearly contemporary with him. "Through too much liberty they grew negligent and slothful, envying and reproaching one another, waging, as it were, civil wars among themselves, bishops quarreling with bishops, and the people divided into parties. Hypocrisy and deceit were grown to the highest pitch of wickedness. They were become so insensible as not so much as to think of appeasing the divine anger; but like atheists they thought the world dest.i.tute of any providential government and care, and thus added one crime to another. The bishops themselves had thrown off all concern about religion, were perpetually contending with one another, and did nothing but quarrel with and threaten and envy and hate one another: they were full of ambition and tyrannically used their power."-_Eusebius' History_, Book VIII, Chap. I, as quoted in _Jones' Church History_.

Ruter's Church History. (Third Century.)

"With the opinions, the Christian teachers had adopted the habits and manners of the philosophic school. They a.s.sumed the dress of the pompous sophist, and delivered the plain doctrines of the gospel with strained and studied eloquence."

"This season of external prosperity was improved by the ministers of the church for the exertion of new claims and the a.s.sumption of powers with which they had not previously been invested."-p. 52.

"Several alterations in the form of church government appear to have been introduced during the third century. Some degree of pomp was thought necessary to render so singular an inst.i.tution respectable to the minds of a gross mult.i.tude who are only capable of judging from external appearances. As their numbers increased their labors became proportionally greater, and it was necessary to provide a.s.sistance and more agreeable to good order to a.s.sign to each his proper function. Inferior ministers were therefore inst.i.tuted, who derived their appellations from the office they filled.

"These ministers probably derived their emoluments, not merely from the precarious bounty of the society, but from a certain proportion of the fixed revenues of the church. The princ.i.p.al of them had obtained before the close of this century the possession of several considerable estates, which had been bequeathed or presented to the church. The external dignity of the ministers of religion was accompanied by a still greater change in its discipline. The simple rules prescribed by the apostles for the preservation of good order in the church branched out into so many luxuriant shoots that it was difficult to recognize the parent stem."-p.

53.

"A regular form of discipline began to take place during the third century in every matter which fell within the cognizance of the church." p. 51.

Following this, Ruter gives an account of the penitents seeking salvation who had to proceed step by step. The first degree was to prostrate themselves in the avenues of the church building. Here they were called _flentes_. In the second degree they were allowed to enter the building and hear the sermon. Here they were called _audientes_. In the third degree they were allowed to unite in prayers offered in their own behalf.

Here they were called _genuflectentes_. In the fourth degree they were allowed to approach the altar and were called _consistentes_. In the taking of these degrees the penitents were compelled to appear in sackcloth and ashes, and in some places the men were obliged to shave their heads and the women to wear veils. The duration of their penitence was regulated by the bishop. He could make the time of taking these degrees short, or extend it to any length. This was called an indulgence.

This is shocking in the extreme. Where in the humble acts of Jesus and his apostles do you hear of such an order of things? Truly at this time the sun was darkened, and the moon did not give her light, and the stars had fallen. How true now appears the prophecy of Isaiah: "The people of thy holiness have possessed it but a little while: our adversaries have trodden down thy sanctuary." Isa. 63:18. Jesus says, "Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon the earth," and Paul says to the bishop to be "not greedy of filthy lucre"; and Peter says, "Taking the oversight not for filthy lucre's sake"-and here before the close of the third century we find the bishops coming into possession of large estates through the revenues of the church, and as Cyprian has said of the bishops of this time, "Our princ.i.p.al study is to get money and estates."

We have before us Mosheim's Church History. In speaking of the internal history of the church in the third century he says that "the bishops of Rome, Antioch and Alexandria had a kind of preeminence over all others, and particularly the bishop at Rome." There was a change in the form of government and this change was followed by a train of vices. "Many of those who had the administration of the church affairs were sunk," he says, "in luxury and voluptuousness, puffed up with vanity, arrogance and ambition; possessed with a spirit of contention and discord. They appropriated to their evangelical function the splendid ensigns of temporal majesty: a throne, surrounded with ministers, exalted above his equals, the servant of the meek and humble Jesus.... The t.i.tles of subdeacons, acolythi, ostairii, readers, exorcists, copiatae, would never have been heard of in the church if its rulers had been a.s.siduously and zealously employed in promoting the interest of truth and piety by their labors and their example." He gives an account of the trouble in the church of Rome between Cornelius and Novatian, in the year 250, who were aspirants for the Roman See.

Eusebius tells of the increasing vices, schisms, quarrelings of the bishops, of their greed for money and preeminence in the last half of the third century. In speaking of the bishops and pastors who had the administration of church government in the year 260, he says: "But some that appeared to be our pastors, deserting the law of piety, were inflamed against each other with mutual strifes, only acc.u.mulating quarrels and threats, rivalship, hostility and hatred to each other, only anxious to a.s.sert the government as a kind of sovereignty for themselves." Then he adds, "As Jeremiah says, 'The Lord in his anger darkened the daughter of Sion [the church or moon], and hurled from heaven to earth the glory of Israel.' "