HE leads us on, by paths we did not know,
Upward He leads us, though our steps be slow,
Though oft we faint and falter on the way,
Though storms and darkness oft obscure the day,
Yet when the clouds are gone
We know He leads us on.
He leads us on through all the trialsome years;
Past all our dreamland hopes, and doubts, and fears
He guides our steps. Through all the tangled maze
Of sin, of sorrow, and o'erclouded days
We know His will is done;
And still He leads us on.
And then, at last, after the weary strife,
After the restless fever we call life,
After the dreariness, the aching pain,
The wayward struggles which have proved in vain,
After our toils are past –
He'll give us rest at last.
This section of the Report is more in the nature of a letter, or series of letters, to the home folks – THE INTERNATIONAL BIBLE STUDENTS – rather than to the public in general.
(The public report of the Committee, as to its findings along the lines of missionary activity, can be had upon application to the International Bible Students' Association, 13-17 Hicks Street, Brooklyn, N.Y.)
As a basis for this report of their ORIENTAL EXPERIENCES, letters will be used, which the compiler of these "SOUVENIR NOTES" sent home from time to time, to the Chicago Class of International Bible Students.
These letters have been revised, and discourses, descriptive matter and interesting incidents inserted from place to place.
Thus all the International Bible Students reading these notes may mentally go over the route of some thirty-five thousand miles traversed by the Committee.
On Board S.S. Shinyo Maru, Mid-Pacific Ocean, December 28, 1911.
To the Ecclesia of I.B.S.A., at Chicago, Ill., U.S.A. Dearly Beloved in the Lord: –
Grace, Mercy and Peace be unto you. IN accordance with my promise to send you word from time to time of our movements, I am writing this first general letter. I can, of course, give you but a brief outline, trusting that if it is the Lord's will to give further details in the next Souvenir Report.
After leaving Chicago the night of Monday, December 4th, and saying good-bye to the twenty or more friends who sang me off with "God be with you till we meet again," also over the phone to many others, whose loving words were much appreciated, I arrived in St. Louis the next morning. I was met at the station by Bro. Hoeveler, and, after breakfast, looked around for some of the rest of the committee, who were to come by different routes. Soon I saw Bro. Ernest Kuehn of Toledo, and a little later Bro. Maxwell of Mansfield, and still later the rest of the committee, Bro. Russell, Bro. Robison, General Hall and Bro. Pyles; also Bro. Margeson of Boston, who, though not a member of the committee officially, is making the tour with us, and incidentally acting as conductor of the party, thus making himself very useful in looking after many little details.
After exchanging greetings with a large number of friends from the St. Louis class, and nearby places, we went to the parlor of a hotel in connection with the station, and here Brother Russell talked to the friends for about three-quarters of an hour.
He called attention to the fact that many people were in bondage to the various sects, denominations, organizations, etc., and stated that as soon as we discover that we are in bondage to anything that limits our serving the Lord with our whole heart, then is the time to step aside. He then asked the question, Are we, then, in bondage to Christ? Yes, he said, bondage of the most absolute kind – for then we have no will of our own. This he illustrated by calling attention to the various members of our natural body, how they were all in bondage to the head, and this is the way we should be, as members of the Body of Christ, in bondage to him as our head. He stated that our finger, for instance, might wish to become independent. Very well, call in a surgeon, cut off the finger and lay it on the table. There it is, it is independent, is it not? But what good is it? it can do nothing, because it is severed from all connection with the head, the directing power. The only way we can be of use is to be bound to one another in the body of Christ, and then to keep our wills fully submissive to that of our great Head. We are like sheep, not like dogs which bite and devour one another.
He then called attention to the friction that is bound to occur among the members of this wonderful body, because they are all characters of much firmness, characters which will not be afraid if someone says "boo" to us. Otherwise the Lord would not be able to use them as jewels in His temple or crown. Each one as he rubs against another does two things – knocks off corners and polishes. He said we should not try to see how many corners we can knock off of others, but rather watch to see how much polishing we are receiving from our contact with each other. Then he called attention to gelatine, which can be made into as beautiful colors as real jewels, but there is no firmness to it – no hardness, and if it rubs against other masses of gelatine, it does not affect it at all. He then spoke about the holy Spirit, which, like oil, will do away with all fraction and make matters go smoothly in the classes.
He then had considerable to say about the election of elders, stating that in our elections, while having in mind the perfect elder, yet we must realize that none of us are perfect, and none will measure up to the full requirements. Some will seem to possess certain qualities to some of the friends, while others do not see those qualities. He suggested that if the majority agreed that a certain brother had the qualities of an elder, then the others should consider the matter and note if they were mistaken, and if possible try to make it unanimous. He said we should not be like the juryman who claimed the other eleven were stubborn because they did not see the matter just as he did.
Brother Russell then told a story on himself, how that, on one occasion he explained a certain matter in a way that he thought would be very simple and plain to all, but that somehow the friends could not see it. Then one sister got up and said something which he thought would surely mix up the friends completely. But just then one of the party arose and said, O, now I see. Thus he said one brother may be apt to teach some, even though many thought he did not have the qualifications. He stated there was too much splitting [CR185] of hairs, rather that we should look at the matter from a more general standpoint.
At 10 o'clock we were obliged to say good-by and started for Dallas, Texas. As there are just eight in our party, we occupy two tables in the dining car, and eat at the same time, which gives special opportunity for fellowship. It was a ride of a day and night to our next stop.
WE arrived here about 9 o'clock in the morning, with the rain coming down plentifully. A number of the Dallas friends were at the station to meet the party, and gave us the usual Southern hearty welcome and all had the "Millennial Dawn Smile," notwithstanding the rain.
Here we were met by Brother and Sister George F. Wilson, of Oklahoma City, Okla., who will make the tour with us. Others also had expected to be in the party, but at the very last were prevented from so doing because of sickness.
Pastor Russell twice addressed the Dallas Bible Students, much to their pleasure and profit.
Early the next morning I went over to the railway station to see if any friends were there waiting for the train with the rest of the party, which was due at 7:30. The first person I saw that I knew was Sister Ida Zalmanzig, a sister who has helped to translate the 1st volume of "Scripture Studies" into the Spanish language, and who is doing colporteur work amongst the Mexicans who live in San Antonio, of which there are a great many. When I saw her she was handing out Spanish tracts to the Mexicans sitting in the station, and conversing a little with them.
Soon a number of others came to the station, some from nearby cities. Among them was Brother Seth Moore, of Crystal City, Texas. He is a blind brother, but he said he was glad to see me, notwithstanding his natural sight is gone.
The train with the rest of the party was also late and did not arrive for several hours, so I could not wait, but took the morning train for Los Angeles.
I TRAVELED two days and nights, arriving at Los Angeles about noon. Brother Mitchell met me and took me in his auto to the Alexandria Hotel, and after registering I went with him to Boos Bros. Cafeteria, where a number of friends meet every noon for lunch – both spiritual and natural. (Such an arrangement obtains among friends in other large cities – those who work down in the cities – and it affords a splendid opportunity for discussing matters of interest.) There I met about a dozen of the friends.
That evening we all went to the station to meet the rest of the committee, having received word that they would be in about nine o'clock. It seems that their train out of San Antonio was very late, but, providentially the Lord had just put into service a few days before a brand new, handsome deluxe train, very rapid and extra price – I do not know that there was anything providential as to the price, but the speed was at any rate, for without it Pastor Russell could not have kept his appointment at Los Angeles the next day. The committee saw that this was the only chance to reach Los Angeles in time, so paid the extra fare and boarded the train.
On account of the high speed of that train the other members of the committee thought that they had passed Brother Jones' slow train somewhere out in the deserts of Arizona or New Mexico, and that he would be coming along some time after midnight; so they had a laugh to themselves, thinking that though I had started from Dallas twenty-four hours ahead of them that they would beat me into Los Angeles. However, they had the laugh to themselves, for when they stepped off the train at Los Angeles, I was there to meet them, having arrived that noon.
A LARGE delegation of the Los Angeles Class of International Bible Students escorted the committee to the Alexandria Hotel, and, after registering, we all went to the parlor of the hotel, and Pastor Russell told the friends about the meetings at Dallas and San Antonio.
The next morning, Sunday, was the day to which the friends had looked forward, and for which they had made preparation for a long time. The hall in which the morning services were held – the capacity of which was several hundred – was packed to its limit with Bible students. After an enjoyable Praise and Testimony Service, Pastor Russell was introduced, and spoke from the texts found in Romans 18:18, and 1 John 5:17, on the topic:
WE showed "how" and "why" it was revealed, and made very clear that ALL unrighteousness is sin, and not, as the old adage puts it, "To steal a pin is a sin, but to steal a tatter is a greater." It was sin in God's sight, whether Adam ate an apple or killed a man – "All unrighteousness is sin, and the wrath of God is revealed against all unrighteousness." The following is a brief synopsis of his remarks:
The wrath of God is revealed, the pastor emphasized, and we see it all about us. Every cemetery witnesses to it, so does every coffin, every hearse, every piece of crape, every doctor's sign. Pain, suffering, speaks of disease; disease of decay; decay of death working in the human family and bringing all, rich and poor, bond and free, to the grave, the great prison house, from which none can escape until the resurrection, at the coming of Messiah.
Death, the penalty of sin, the manifestation of God's wrath against sin, began to be revealed six thousand years ago when our first parents disobeyed the Divine command. Every day and every hour since, the world has been witnessing that God's wrath is against it, that the death penalty is being inflicted. As the scriptures declare, the world has been under a Reign of Sin and Death. However sympathetic and loving the Heavenly Father has been, he has allowed stern justice to mete out this penalty against every member of our race. He is thus giving us a great lesson on the exceeding sinfulness of sin – its pernicious, injurious influence and results under Divine law. He wishes this lesson to be so thoroughly impressed upon our race that when in due time, He shall bring in relief we will never forget the lesson, to all eternity, but will hate sin and dread it as our worst foe.
We may understand the Apostle to lay special emphasis upon the word "all" in our text – "The wrath of God is revealed against all unrighteousness" – not merely against great [CR186] sins and gross violence, but against every form of sin – even the slightest. Thus the scriptures declare that God's law is one, and that a violation of it in one point means the violation of the entire law. To break one commandment would be sin and merit the death penalty; and to break all the commandments would be sin and merit the death penalty. Eternal life is provided only for those who are perfect and who maintain that perfection and harmony with God by full obedience to the Divine law in every particular.
Do not misunderstand me to teach that it makes no matter whether one be a gross sinner or only a minor offender. In one way it will matter, and in another way it will not. Adam's transgression was, in some respects, a minor one, as compared to that of his son, Cain. Adam stole and ate a forbidden apple, and the penalty was death – the very strongest penalty of God's law. If he had murdered his wife the penalty would have been the same – death – not eternal torment.
Whatever Adam's transgression, divine law would have hindered him from ever again coming back to God. It would have cut him off from everlasting life, and he would have need of a Savior, just the same for one sin as for another. Murder would have been sin, and the disobedient eating of the apple was sin, and sin cannot be condoned by the divine law. It requires a Redeemer, and to be the Redeemer He must suffer death, the penalty that was against Father Adam.
Now notice the case of Cain. He was shapen in iniquity; in sin did his mother conceive him; the condemnation upon our first parents extended to him; he was born with a fallen nature, he was born under the death sentence. The killing of his brother Abel did not increase the penalty, which stood the same – death – cutting off from life. "The wages of sin is death"; "The soul that sinneth it shall die."
There would have been no message sent to mankind exhorting to righteousness and to turn from sin had God not intended to redeem man by the death of His Son; and redeeming them means to give each and all of the human family another opportunity, another trial, another judgment – to test their worthiness or unworthiness of everlasting life – to prove to what extent their acquaintance with sin and its penalty has taught them the great lesson respecting the sinfulness and undesirability of sin and the sureness of its penalty – death.
Accordingly, for 4,000 years God sent no message to the world in general – until Jesus came and died, the Just for the unjust, and thus made possible the release of mankind from the death sentence – a resurrection from the dead. The only exception to this rule was God's Covenant with Israel, under which they tried to gain eternal life by keeping the law, and became a great example of the fallen man's inability and of the need of the Savior.
For more than eighteen centuries this message has been going forth – namely, that God has provided for the race a redemption from the original death sentence, and that there is to be a "resurrection of the dead, both of the Just and the unjust." All mankind who hear this Message are thereby warned that every art of the present life will have its weight, either in the uplifting or in the degrading of his own character, and thus have a bearing upon his future interests. It is in view of this future opportunity for life or death everlasting that our conduct in the present time has a bearing.
Those who have the hearing ear and the eyes of understanding opened, discern, as the Apostle says, that in God's estimation all unrighteousness is sin – however great or small. Those who now accept God's invitation are informed that if they make a consecration of their lives to follow in Jesus' footsteps, God will deal with them as with new creatures, and no longer impute to them their share of Adam's condemnation, but treat them as having passed from death condemnation to life justification.
Moreover, their flesh will be reckoned as dead; full arrangements will be made for the covering over of all their unintentional weaknesses, and their judgment in God's sight will be according to their will or intention. If their intentions are perfect they will be counted as perfect through the merit of their Redeemer and Advocate. But St. Paul admonishes the church, saying: "If we sin wilfully, after that we have received a knowledge of the truth," "and have tasted of the good word of God and the powers of the age to come and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit, it is impossible to renew us again to repentance" – wilfulness in the matter would seal our case, however small the transgression – just as it sealed Adam's fate with his minor transgression.
But let us not forget that the Apostle limits this possibility of sin – the sin unto death – to the church – to the Spirit begotten ones. These, receiving their share of the great Atonement sacrifice of Jesus, and failing to conform to the divine requirement, come under the divine penalty a second time, and theirs will be the second death, from which there will be no resurrection, no recovery. – Compare Hebrews 6:4-6 and 10:26-31.
It should be clear to us then, that, in harmony with our text, the whole world is now under the wrath of God, which came upon the race through the disobedience of our first parents; and the only ones who have escaped from that wrath and gotten back into harmony with God are the saintly few, begotten of the Holy Spirit. The escape of these from Divine wrath or the death sentence is not actual, but by faith. They reckon themselves as having passed "from death unto life."
As for the remainder of the world, they are not thus reckoned, for they are yet in their sins, still children of wrath and experiencing the penalty of sin. The world will continue under these conditions until the completion of the election of the church, and then the Redeemer, who now occupies the position of Advocate toward the church, will assume a new office; He, with His church associated with Him, will become the great Mediator between God and men. He will mediate for Israel and for all the families of the earth – appropriating the merit of His sacrifice for the sins of the whole world, even as in the beginning of this age He imputed this merit to the church for the covering of her sins.
Thenceforth, as soon as the great High Priest shall have sealed that New Covenant for the world, and the Father shall have accepted it, the sins of the world will be cancelled. That is to say, death, the wrath of God revealed against all unrighteousness for six thousand years, will immediately be cancelled as respects all who will then avail themselves of the privilege and enter into the New Covenant relationship. The glorious mediator of that New Covenant will bind Satan for 1,000 years and scatter all the ignorance and superstition which now darken the human mind and cause misapprehensions of the Divine Word and character. Simultaneously He will get loose the blessed influences of truth and enlightenment and the "whole earth shall be filled with the light of the knowledge of the glory of God."
Thenceforth the wrath of God will no longer be revealed against any on account of Adam's transgression. It will no longer be necessary to be sick or in pain, or dying. On the contrary, all may be making good, rapid progress up, up, up, out of weakness and dying conditions, back toward the full perfection of human nature which Adam had before he sinned, when he was in the image of his Creator. There will still be the marks of the wrath upon mankind, the weakness and imperfections of the human flesh. These marks will not be fully blotted out until toward the close of the 1,000 years of Messiah's reign. This agrees fully with St. Peter's words, "That your sins may be blotted out when times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord." (Acts 3:19.) It is therefore one thing to have our sins forgiven and to realize that God is no longer angry with us but reconciled, and it is quite another thing to know our sins are blotted out.
The sins of the church are forgiven the moment we are accepted of God through Christ and made partakers of the Holy Spirit and are styled children of God and heirs. But the marks, the blemishes of sin, continue with us as long as we have our present, imperfect bodies. This to the church will mean that the blotting out of their sins will be in death, because the church will be awakened in the resurrection perfect, "spotless," "without blame," "irreprovable." The Apostle describes this resurrection as the Chief Resurrection, saying, "It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown an animal body, it is raised a spiritual body." – 1 Corinthians 15:44; Rev. 20:6.
If we have seen what has constituted the divine wrath as it has been revealed for 6,000 years, we will be the better prepared to understand what to look for in respect to any [CR187] future manifestations of Divine wrath – "wrath to come." We are to clearly distinguish between the wrath of a good man and the wrath of a bad man, and how these would manifest themselves; and, similarly, we should be able to discern between the wrath of God and the wrath of the devil. The wrath of God, as exhibited to us for 6,000 years on the pages of history, has been a just dealing – the abandonment to destruction of those who are not worthy of everlasting life, by reason of disobedience to divine law.
The redemption accomplished for these through the death of Jesus will eventually be gloriously worked out, and give to every man a full opportunity of recovery, harmony with God and everlasting life. The reason why God makes this provision for redemption is because only one man sinned wilfully and intelligently. All the remainder of his children were "born in sin" and under the death sentence. The redemption, therefore, is in order that every individual may have an opportunity for reaching a decision as to obedience or disobedience.
It had been arranged to hold the public service at 3 o'clock in a large auditorium, but at the last moment it was found that the hall could not be put in readiness, and the next best thing was a large tent. This proved to be just the thing, as it held a large number of people who filled every seat and listened with very great attention for about an hour and a half while Bro. Russell spoke on "Which Is the True Gospel?" At the close of the service hundreds of people took the "Hell Tower" as copies of it were handed out.
THE San Francisco and Oakland Classes consolidated for the day and all meetings were therefore held in Oakland. The morning service was a Testimony Meeting, participated in by the audience in general, and the members of the committee.
The afternoon service consisted of a discourse by Pastor Russell, then a Symposium by members of the touring party. Brother Russell called attention to the wonderful things which the Church has been called to, and how we should bend every effort to attain to that for which we have been called. He spoke especially about the future work of the Church, after the Millennial Age, and stated that, while there is no positive statement from the Scriptures, yet there is much that points to the fact that inasmuch as "God created not the earth in vain, but formed it to be inhabited," so with all the other planets around our sun. Then would that be all? he asked. No, he said that astronomers tell us that there are planets around all the other stars, which are themselves suns, and that beyond the millions of stars or suns that we can see, each having their own set of planets revolving around them, are millions upon millions of other stars. And, that doubtless the work of the Church throughout eternity to come would be to people, govern and direct the affairs in connection with those billions of planets. In support of this he called attention to the text in Ephesians 2:7, "That in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in His kindness toward us through Jesus Christ."
TUESDAY, Dec. 31, 1911 – The great day came when we were to leave America for the far East, and hurry home, by way of India, Egypt, etc. Arrangements were made to sail on the Japanese boat, "Shinyo Maru," which signifies "Springtime on the Ocean." The weather was almost like July, the air brisk and the skies as blue as indigo. There were about fifty friends at the wharf to see the party off. Besides these, there were many others, friends of the other passengers. Our friends came on board and inspected our new home for the next few weeks. Incidentally, they left Brother Russell many bouquets, decorated his berth with flowers, gave him several boxes of candy, etc., all tokens of their Christian love and esteem, for his work's sake. Just before leaving the ship they assembled before the stateroom door and sang, "God be with you till we meet again." In response he offered a brief prayer and a parting blessing upon them all.
We lifted anchor at one o'clock, the immense crowd of people on the wharf waving their handkerchiefs to their friends on board. It was a very impressive sight.
We soon passed out through the "Golden Gate" and were then on the great Pacific Ocean, with an average depth of two miles, and six thousand miles across. This reminded us of the hymn, "There is a wideness in God's mercy like the wideness of the sea"; also of the one, "His love is deeper than the deepest sea"; also of the Scripture, "The knowledge of the glory of the Lord shall fill the whole earth, as the waters cover the great deep."
ALL then went to our state rooms and began to arrange our things for about a four weeks' stay on the boat. She is comparatively a new boat, 550 feet long, 63 feet wide, and 38-½ feet deep. This is her third voyage.
On board such a ship as this one is surrounded by all the comforts and requirements that can be desired. The spacious dining-saloon, social hall and library, and – what is so essential to comfort on a steamship – the large, well ventilated cabins and bath rooms, make the traveler feel that he has left none of the luxuries of modern life behind him.
The captain is an Englishman, the purser, first mate, steward and doctor are Americans, but the rest of the officers are [CR188] Japanese. The rest of the crew are mostly Japanese, and some Chinese. It seemed queer at first to have so many Japs and Chinamen about us, but we have gotten so used to it now that we think nothing of it. The dining room is very nice and the bills of fare elaborate and wholesome.
Brother Russell was soon ready to begin work and began dictating. Very little time goes to waste if he can help it, and he is a wonderful example for all. The rest of the party put in the time in various ways, some walking the decks, the others reading, and some taking it rather easy, for they began to have queer feelings, even though the sea was quite smooth. All were at dinner, however, some appreciating it more than others. Everything is very nice on board the ship, meals good, and the state rooms quite large, and in fact, the appointments of the entire ship are first-class. While not as large as the great Atlantic liners, it is equal to them in many respects.
It is said that a trip around the world in this day of rapid, inexpensive and luxurious travel – the very contemplation of which would have awed our grandparents, is looked upon now almost as an essential part of the education of a scholar, the politician, and the man of business.
The days on the water are much alike, nothing but water in sight. We have not passed a ship. During the day Brother Russell is busy dictating, part of the time to me and part of the time to Brother Robison. The rest of the committee meet each morning for a Dawn Study, which Brother Kuehn conducts. Occasionally some of the passengers come in also, but the hearing ears are few and far between. Occasionally the wind gets boisterous and kicks up quite a sea, and the presence of a number of the passengers is conspicuous by their absence. I have been feeling fine and have not lost a meal, either by not eating it or after eating it.
The dining-saloon is an oft-recurring attraction. The sea air, the sea breezes, the exercise on deck (on board this ship a walk eight times around the deck equals a mile), the joys of good company, all tend to put the traveler on the best of terms with his appetite. The well equipped tables, the snowy damask, the silver and the other accompaniments, joined with the triumphs of kitchen art placed before one by Oriental waiters, in spotless white, all tend to bring joy and content.
December 14, 1911. This is Wednesday, and a very clear day, though somewhat chilly. They tell us that we will strike warmer weather in a day or two. As it is, an overcoat is quite welcome, even inside, but especially out on the deck. All seemed to have had a good night's rest. A number got up at what they thought was reasonable time for breakfast, but after waiting quite a while, they learned that the time drops back about thirty minutes every half day, so that it was really thirty minutes earlier. It is now three hours and a half earlier here than in New York, or two hours and a half earlier here than in Chicago, because we are running away from the sun all the time. Soon we will come to a place, they tell us, where we cross a certain line and will have lost an entire day. In other words, at that time, today will be yesterday.
Brother Russell and his two stenographers have been busy all the morning, while the rest of the party have begun the reading of the Scripture Studies, hoping to read them all during the trip. It is now afternoon. All the party except two were at the tables for lunch, which was nicely prepared and served by Japanese and Chinese waiters. The Japs wear white jackets, while the Chinese wear long blue aprons, reaching nearly to the floor. Some have queues and some have cut them off. They seem to understand us pretty well, but we cannot understand much they say, and, of course, absolutely nothing when they talk in their native tongues.
BY special request from Captain Smith, of the Shinyo Maru, Pastor Russell conducted a service for Divine worship from eleven to twelve o'clock. A number of the passengers were present, besides the committee and those traveling with them. Bro. Ernest Kuehn presided at the piano, and the entire congregation joined in the singing. The service opened with the singing of "All Hail the Power of Jesus' Name."
Prayer by Pastor Russell.
Hymn, "The Church's One Foundation."
Reading of 27th Psalm by Pastor Russell.
Hymn, "How Firm a Foundation."
Text: "When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; what is man, that thou are mindful of him? and the Son of man, that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honor. Thou madest him to have dominion over the work of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet: All sheep and all oxen, yea, and the beast of the field; the fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas. O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth." – Psalm 8:3-9.
THE suggestion of the prophet respecting man is one which we believe has occurred to every intelligent being. As we look out upon the vast expanse of water and the riding of our vessel upon it, we think, How little is man; how small a speck in the universe. When we look up into the heavens and realize that they represent so much more of divine power, we are still more surprised. When we consider the heavens and realize that all these stars, except the planets which belong to our own system, are really suns and that around each of these suns revolve planets as our earth revolves around our sun, and when we think of the number of those suns and their planets, we are amazed, and we feel [CR189] our own littleness all the more. We ask astronomers as to the number of those suns, and they tell us that there are a hundred million of them in sight, and if we would average the planets around those hundred million suns at ten, it would be ten hundred millions of planets. And then they tell us further that if we could take our stand upon the very farthermost one of these we would see still beyond us as many more, and as many more. Our minds are appalled as we begin to think of the heavens, the work of God's fingers, and then to consider man, how small a work in God's sight. We have an appreciation then of what the Scriptures say man is like in God's sight, as "the dust in the balance," that is not worthy to be taken into account. We have all been in the grocer's shop and noticed that he pays no attention to the dust in the scoop of his scale. So man is so small in the sight of the great Divine Creator that we wonder that God should have any interest at all in humanity.
Only for the Bible, dear friends, we should have no knowledge of God's interest in us, and we might think that God is so great that he would have no heed for us. But, when God reveals himself to us in the Bible, we begin to see that there is not only divine power exercised and manifested in the creation of all these worlds, we also have this divine power manifested in God's dealings with us, and also the love of God which the Scriptures state, "Passeth all understanding." What wonderful condescension on the part of the Creator that he should have heed to us.
But our text goes on to give us further information on this subject. "What is man that Thou are mindful of him, and the Son of man that Thou visiteth him, for Thou hast made him a little lower than the angels." Only a little lower is the thought. Of the angels the Scriptures give us to understand there are various ranks, some higher and some lower, but all perfect. Then in the world we have various orders of animal life, the beast of the field, the fish of the sea, the fowl of the air, and man as the highest of these earthly beings, and he stands related to all these lower creatures as God does to the entire universe, and this is the honor with which our great Creator endowed his human creatures. So we are told in this Psalm, "Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of Thy hands; Thou hast put all things under his feet." What a wonderful creature man is, then, from this standpoint! While he is a little lower than the angels so far as his nature in connection with the earth is concerned, whereas the angels are more excellent so far as their natures are concerned, but in this psalm it speaks of man as being superior in this respect, that he has a dominion. The angels do not have dominion over other angels, but all are subject to the great Creator, God. But man, in the likeness of his Creator, has been given a dominion over the lower creatures, and in this respect it is a wonderful honor with which he has been crowned – "Thou crownedst him with glory and honor, and hast set him over the work of Thy hands."
It might be said with great propriety that if God is thus careful of humanity and has so highly honored his human creatures, why should He not have made a still better preparation for us in the world? Why is it that they are subject to such unfavorable conditions under which we now exist? Why is there sorrow, pain, sighing, crying and dying? Why have we tempests, storms, cyclones and tornadoes, famine, drought and pestilence – why all these things if God is so careful of us as his creatures? We would have no answer for all these questions were it not provided in the Bible. In this wonderful book of all books, we have the key to the answer, the explanation, and that is: Originally God provided that man should be subject to none of these difficulties and disasters. Man was made perfect and placed under favorable and perfect surroundings in a perfect garden, Eastward in Eden with everything necessary for his welfare. No storms, no sickness, no tempests, no difficulties, and man himself might have lived forever. Such was the wonderful dominion of this human Son of God.
Why then the change? This wonderful book answers that the change all came about because of sin, and so we read. St. Paul says, "By one man's disobedience sin entered into the world." (There was no sin in the world before) "and death came as a result of sin." There was no dying on the part of man until sin came. So, all the aches, pains, sorrows and sicknesses which we experience are all part of this dying process. And so the difficulty with us all, then, my dear friends, is that by nature we are children of wrath. Is divine wrath torture? No, indeed. That was handed down to us, perhaps, by our well-meaning forefathers. Oh no, Oh no. The wrath of God we see on every hand, as the Apostle Paul declares. "The wrath of God is revealed" – in our own bodies, our aches and pains, mental imperfections, physical imperfections and moral imperfections, all of which are parts of this great penalty for sin, because we read that when man became a transgressor God sent the holy angel to drive our first parents out from the Garden of Eden, away from the trees of life that were to sustain them in perfection, out into the unfinished earth. While the whole earth could have just as easily been made perfect, God left it unfinished, unprepared for man, and merely prepared a garden Eastward in Eden for the trial of our first parents; because divine wisdom foresaw that man would sin, and instead of making the whole earth perfect, God left it in an imperfect condition, except the Garden of Eden. So we read that when God thrust our first parents out of the Garden of Eden, he said, "Cursed is the earth" (not that I will make it unfit, but it is already) for thy sake. Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth, and in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, until thou return to the ground, for out of it wast thou taken. Dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return."
In other words, dear friends, the great penalty against our race is a DEATH PENALTY, "Dying thou shalt die." Gen. 2:17. This has been upon our race for six thousand years, from the time that sin entered into the world. So all the pages of history from Adam's day to this are marked with sin and sorrow, pain and sighing; because we are all sinners, and because we are sinners God is treating us according to His own purpose, "Dying thou shalt die."
But this is the sad side of the matter. Is there no other side to the matter, is there no hope for us? The same blessed book – the Bible – tells us. The Gospel message, which signified "good tidings," tells us that God has some good tidings for those whom he condemned to death. We inquire, What is this good message? The Scriptures answer, the good message is that he who condemned us as unfit for eternal life has provided for our redemption, that his Son became our Redeemer, that Christ died, the "just for the unjust," that he might bring all back into harmony with God. Oh, we say, but did not Jesus die eighteen hundred or more years ago? Yes, truly. And have we not the same reign of sin and death as then? Yes. Where, then, is the blessing which has come through Jesus. Well, we answer, a two-fold blessing has been provided. First of all, a blessing of hope which some of God's people enjoy, a blessing of knowledge that in God's due time He will bring in the great blessing that this gospel message tells of.
Oh, it is that God provided a Redeemer and that, therefore, there shall be a resurrection of the dead; they shall [CR190] not remain dead, but come forth. There shall be a new dispensation, a glorious morning in which all sin and sorrow will be done away. So, the Scriptures assure us of that time that there shall be no more sighing, no more crying, no more dying, because all the former things, all the things of sin, the things of death will all have passed away. And we inquire, who is so powerful as to overthrow sin and death, and lift up humanity from death out of sin and weakness and imperfection and bring him back? The bible answers this question that the One who will do this is the great One who sits upon the throne of God, as we read, "He that sitteth upon His throne said, Behold, I make all things new." But who is this? Oh, the very same One, who, by the grace of God became our Redeemer, Jesus; He is to be the great King of Kings and Lord of lords, and is to reign from sea to sea, and from the river to the ends of the earth, and under the blessed influence of that kingdom the full blessing of God shall come to the earth again. "All the blind eyes shall be opened and all the deaf ears shall be unstopped," the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together. These are words of the prophet given to us for our hope and strengthening of our hearts that we might turn from sin and become more and more the children of God.
We have spoken about the world and how it is to be blessed by the Messianic Kingdom, the Kingdom of God's dear Son, the Kingdom Jesus taught us to pray for, "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is done in heaven," but we see not all these things accomplished yet. We see not mankind brought back to perfection, nor the great work of good tidings accomplished amongst men. But we have a word from the Apostle upon this subject. He said, But we see not all things put under man, but out of harmony. But, says the Apostle, we see a beginning of God's work; we see Jesus, who by the grace of God has tasted death for every man. We see more than that, my friends. More than eighteen hundred years have passed. Not only Jesus has tasted death, but a great many have been going into death, in answer to the call to be of the Bride of Christ, the Church of the First Born, to be associated with our Lord – this is the church we sang about in our second hymn:
"The Church's one foundation,
Is Jesus Christ her Lord;
She is His new creation
By water and the Word.
From heaven He came and sought her
To be His holy Bride;
With His own blood He bought her,
And for her life He died."
This is the first work, then, of God in the redemption of mankind – the gathering of the Bride of Christ, the Church, to be associated with Christ, and to share in His glory, honor and immortality. We hope to be of this class, and to this class belong all the great promises that they with Him shall share with Him in the first resurrection, and then bless all the families of the earth with restitution. The world of mankind is to be restored to all that Adam had and lost, all of which Jesus redeemed at Calvary, and associated with Him will be the Church, called out of the world, a saintly class who have been walking in the footsteps of Jesus, as we read again in the words of Jesus, "Blessed and holy are those who have a part in the first resurrection, on such the second death hath no power; they shall be priests unto God and Christ and shall reign with Him a thousand years." The thousand years of Messiah's reign, the thousand years of the world's uplift, the thousand in which Satan will be bound, the thousand years in which knowledge shall fill the whole earth, the thousand years in which the world shall be brought to the paradisaic condition, which was symbolically represented in the Garden of Eden, and when every creature in heaven and earth and under the earth shall be brought to that glorious condition where they will sing praises to God and to Him that sitteth upon the throne and to the Lamb for ever and ever.
And yet there is another side, for the same Scriptures which tell us of the exaltation of the Church to glory and the blessings of the world through the Kingdom of Messiah, which tell that the earth will be the Paradise of God, they also tell us of a class of incorrigibles which will be punished. After this class have been brought to a full knowledge of God and then wilfully sin against divine light and blessings, the punishment against these will not be eternal torment, but destruction from the presence of the Lord and the glory of His power, as said St. Paul.
The service closed with the use of "Nearer my God to Thee."
FROM San Francisco a voyage of six days, with gradually increasing temperature, brought us in sight of Diamond Head, the landmark of Honolulu. The Hawaiian Islands, our beautiful territory in the Pacific, have been aptly called the "Paradise of the Pacific." The sensuous beauty of the tropics is there mingled with the inspiring grandeur of high and rugged mountains and volcanic formations; the warmth of the torrid zone is tempered by the ever-present ocean or mountain breezes. Honolulu, the capital is a handsome city and with embowered streets, electric cars, electric lights and modern hotels. The houses are surrounded by gardens ablaze with blossoms, palms and all the wonderful foliage of the tropics. The population is most cosmopolitan and picturesque, including the "dark-eyed Kanakas," Chinese, Japanese, Portuguese, East Indians and many other nationalities.
We arrived there early in the morning, and soon the government doctors came aboard and inspected the ship and passengers. Then the pilot came aboard and steered the ship through the narrow channel in to the beautiful harbor. In it were all kinds of ships, a number of them being United States war ships. From the harbor we had a beautiful view of the mountains and could see some craters of extinct volcanoes.
Our visit here was one of great interest and profit. Providentially a gentleman came to the ship to meet a party of missionaries whom he had been expecting, but they failed to arrive on our ship. He made the acquaintance of our party and kindly volunteered to act as our guide, whose kind services we gladly accepted. If we had looked the islands over for weeks and made arrangements in advance for a guide, we could not have secured one better known or better posted than this gentleman. He had lived there nearly thirty years; he had been a sugar planter, but now retired from active business. The population held him in high esteem; he seemed to know everyone, and every turn in the road. He is a hard worker in the churches and in missionary work, and connected with several of the mission schools. We, therefore, considered his presence providential. Therefore, with trolley cars, automobiles and his assistance, we [CR191] secured information which otherwise would have consumed considerable time.
THE next afternoon on board ship we all got together in the parlor and this time had with us a lady passenger who was becoming interested. Brother Russell talked to her, and we all occasionally put in a question. He talked truth to her and we all asked questions as to the missionary work in Japan. She is or has been an Episcopalian, but is disgusted with the churches. She is a very fine lady and I believe is a real grain of wheat. Sister Wilson got her started, so you see the Lord has a reason for sending Sister Wilson along, the only lady in the party. This lady married a Japanese some twenty-five years ago, and he is connected with a large factory for the manufacture of Japanese pottery, which is shipped all over the world; they employ about three thousand people. The Missionaries have often tried to get her to co-operate with them because of her great influence on the Island, but she said she could not believe what they taught.
The next night a heavy wind came up and as a result many of the people the next morning had that peculiar expression that goes with sea-sickness. It must be experienced in order to be appreciated. It is a good deal like the little girl described her feelings when "looping the loop" on one of the figure of eight coasters. She said, "Mama, it felt like I had freckles on my stomach."
The next day the wind had subsided somewhat and the friends gradually came forth from their places of refuge. Your humble servant, however, has not been troubled so far, but we are not out of the woods yet, so I will not crow.
When I had opportunity I conveyed to Brother Russell the greetings sent by me, some in particular and others in general. To all of which he said, When you write back, kindly express to the friends my appreciation of their kind words.
It is a great comfort to know that you are all remembering us in your prayers to the throne of grace, and we feel that much of the success of this tour will be due to your prayers. Keep them up.
As we are running away from the sun, the time here is about a half day earlier with us than with you. I am now writing this two days out from Honolulu, and so far I have lost over seven hours since leaving Chicago. Therefore, when it is one o'clock in the morning with me, it is eight with you. When we get to Yokohama it will be a great deal more. Saturday night we will pass the 180th meridian, and here we drop a whole day, namely, December the 24th, which with you will be Sunday, but we will not have any Sunday this week. As Monday, the 25th, is Christmas, and all the stores out here on the ocean will be closed, it will be a holiday, and there is to be on board ship a combined Sunday and Christmas. Brother Russell has been invited by the captain to give an address appropriate to the occasion, and they will have the ship decorated and we will have a high time. Don't you wish you could celebrate with us? Last Sunday Brother Russell, by request, had charge of the Divine Worship, and gave a splendid address for three-quarters of an hour, covering the entire plan.
The rest of the passengers on board amuse themselves in various ways. There are a number of ship games that can be played on the deck. Evenings they have moving picture shows, dances, sleight of hand performances, etc., etc.
Friday, Dec. 22. The days have been much alike and nothing of special interest has occurred. Today, however, we pass the 180th meridian, which we pass about midnight. Our time now is called West Longitude, but as soon as we pass that meridian it will be called East Longitude, and in order to have the same time as the folks at home when we arrive at home, it will be necessary for us to skip an entire day. Therefore, we will drop tomorrow, Saturday, the 23d, entirely out of our calendar, so that after midnight tonight, Friday night, it will be Sunday morning. Since we left Chicago, for instance, we have been going away from the sun, or, in other words, the sun would rise at Chicago about half an hour earlier every day than it does with us on the ship. By the time we get to this meridian, while it is only Friday night at midnight on the ship, it will be 9 o'clock Saturday morning in Chicago, that is, the sun will rise there nine hours earlier than with us. However, we will just skip right over Saturday and instead of calling it Saturday the next minute after midnight Friday, we will call it Sunday morning. So that, while it is still 9 o'clock Saturday morning in Chicago, we will have jumped over Saturday and it will be Sunday morning with us on the ship. In other words instead of being nine hours behind Chicago, we will be fifteen hours ahead. We will, however, keep losing half an hour per day while traveling West, so that by the time we get to Chicago again we will have exactly the same time.
Our text is chosen from the chapter read, Romans 1:16
This morning, in harmony with our text, we propose to compare the religion of Jesus to all other religions. In the beginning, we state with the Apostle, "I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ." Whatever may be said of other gospels, we believe, as Christians, that in the Christian religion we have that of which no man need be ashamed. There may, perhaps, be certain features and forms of certain creeds of which we might be ashamed – they do not come up to our highest ideals. But the Christian religion, as presented in the Word of God, should be the standard of Christianity, and of that we are not ashamed. It will compare with all other religions in the world, and come off victorious in every sense of the word. All of these various religions seem to recognize that man is in an imperfect, unsatisfactory, sinful condition; therefore, each of these religions seek to present certain tenets, or teachings, that will help him up out of his imperfect condition, back into harmony with his God.
If we consider the teachings of the Mohammedans, they have certain qualities which are very advantageous, and other qualities that we could not so highly recommend. Their endeavor is not to do injury, but to make man better. Their theory is that mankind are fallen and need lifting up out of their fallen condition. The same may be said of the Brahmin, the Confucian and the Buddhist. They are all more or less presentations of what are supposed to be cures for man's fallen condition, cures for his unsatisfactory attitude. Some of these religions offer one kind of a penalty for those who will not accept them, and others offer other kinds. Some offer one kind of reward for those who accept and follow their teachings, while others offer other kinds of rewards. But all agree that man needs to be elevated and lifted up out of his fallen condition, which is sinful and unsatisfactory. There seems to be in every man naturally, without any education on the subject, something which tells him that he is not perfect, not in full accord with his own conscience, not in accord with his own highest ideals of the divine mind. All religions, therefore, recognize this principle of sin and propose remedies therefor. We see the evidence of these as manifested in their disciples everywhere. Some seek to crucify the flesh in one form or another – some by flagellations, some by restraints upon the various liberties of life, some by holding their hands in the air for days, seeking to become holy and thus appease their god. None of these things seem, to our minds, in the light of the gospel of Christ, to be the highest and noblest ideals. Doubtless all have done some good and uplifted some men out of the degradation in which they were. Mankind might have been worse off if it had not been for these religions.
But now, if we compare these with the religion of Jesus Christ, we believe everything is to be said in favor of the religion of Christ. In the first place, all of these religions more or less resemble the Jewish religion, which is of God, and hence all of these religions are all more or less in harmony with God's proposition. His proposition to the Jews was, "Do these things and ye shall live," have everlasting life. That was the Covenant made by God with them at Mount Sinai at the hands of Moses. They thought at first that they would surely be lifted up out of sin, because God had given them a law, and by keeping it they would be perfect and be brought into harmony with God. In this they were mistaken, because, as they found out, that as the centuries passed, none of them were able to keep the law, because it is the measure of the perfect man's ability, and none of them could measure up to the perfect man. The Jews found, as the Apostle states it, "By the deeds of the Law shall no flesh be justified in His sight." But they found, also, that the Law, instead of perfecting, justifying them and giving them eternal life, the Law brought to them a greater realization of sin than they ever had before, and this was the real blessing of the Law Covenant – it showed them their sinful condition and their inability to lift themselves out of it. The Jews do not recognize that great fact today, for if they did they would be crying to God for mercy instead of trying to keep the Law and thus justify themselves.
But the same thing might be said to be true of all the heathen religions. All offer help by which mankind may make themselves perfect, but none are able to make themselves perfect, and they all realize that they are sinners and imperfect to the last degree. There is, therefore, nothing that is logical in any of these, because they all start out to claim that a man ought to be perfect, ought to be holy, [CR193] and are agreed that he is not. This agrees with the words of God with respect to Israel. "By the deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified in His sight." It agrees with all of these that man is a sinner, that he cannot do the things that he would, that his ideals are to be and are higher than his capacity and ability. And so St. Paul declares, "We cannot do the things which we would."
Christianity answers that the reason is that we are fallen creatures, sold under sin. Who sold us, when and where? The bible answers that, "By one man's disobedience sin entered into the world and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men." Death has passed upon the entire race and thus impoverished it mentally, morally and physically, so that now, because of the fall, we cannot do the things which we would like to do.
The bible tells us that originally Adam was not in our condition, but was perfect and he could do and could keep the divine law perfectly, but that we are sold under sin. And so the Prophet David expresses that same thought, "I was born in sin, shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me." So we behold, my dear friends, that we are a race of sinners, imperfect mentally, morally and physically; and, therefore, unable to keep the divine standard or law. What, then, does Christianity offer us that no other religion offers us? Christianity offers us a Saviour, and no other religion offers a Saviour. Christianity recognizes that the condition came about by one man's disobedience, Adam, and it sets forth Jesus as the One who redeems man from that death sentence that came upon our first parents, "As by a man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead," writes St. Paul. "For as in Adam all die, even so all in Christ shall be made alive," writes St. Paul – "Every man in his own order." Here, then, Christianity has a superiority logically, in that it provides for a satisfaction of divine justice. All religions say that it is divine justice that is opposed to sin, but Christianity offers a satisfaction for divine justice. "Christ died for our sins," "Gave Himself a ransom for all." "He is a propitiation (satisfaction) for our sins (writes the Apostle) and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world." So, then, Christianity is not only more logical, but is more just – it recognizes Divine justice. We must recognize that if God condemned the world understandingly and truly, as the Great Judge of mankind, there must be some satisfaction of justice ere the Chief Justice of the universe could set aside the penalty and release the culprit. Man has sinned and the great Chief Justice has passed the sentence, and there is no way to revoke that sentence except by meeting it. And so, Christianity sets forth that our Lord Jesus came into the world to meet the penalty, and that He by the grace of God tasted death for every man.
Christianity has another superiority over all other religions, and it is this: That it recognizes a love and compassion upon the part of God that no other religion recognizes. All these religions do recognize a God, and I claim it makes very little difference whether they call him Allah or Jehovah or some other name; they recognize, we believe, the same one God, but they do not recognize His real traits of character. They perceive His justice, and their own transgressions of Divine justice, but they do not see the merciful provision that God has made. Their god is represented by the Chinese idol, which pictures the character of God. I remember a Chinese banner I once saw – the figure on this banner represented a very demon-like character, and lightning was represented as flashing from his closed fist. He was a god to be feared, one who would take vengeance upon them.
The God of the bible, while just, is not a vengeful God, not unkind; but, on the contrary, He is the God of all grace, the Father of mercies, from Whom cometh every good and perfect gift. And the great gift that He gave is the greatest of all gifts, the gift of His Son for man's sin, that thus He might offer a satisfaction to His own Justice. Nor was this at the expense or contrary to the will of the Redeemer; because the Scriptures make clear that it was by virtue of the prize set before our Lord, as we read, "For the joy that was set before Him He endured the cross despising the shame."
This love of God is not content with merely the provision of the Saviour, and the arrangement that if anybody shall hear and believe he shall be blessed, but this love of God proposes to go still further, namely: That he who thus redeems the race shall become the King of earth, and his scepter of rule shall be from sea to sea and from the river to the ends of the earth, until every knee shall bow and every tongue confess to the glory of God, and the knowledge of the Lord shall fill the whole earth as the waters cover the great deep, and every creature shall come to know that there is a God, and that the way He proposes to be just and merciful is through His Son, Who is to be the great Deliverer of the race.
In what way will this great Deliverer come? This is a part of the gospel, a part of the good tidings – it is through His great Kingdom which He will set up in His own due time. His Kingdom shall not be merely for the rich, or powerful, but for the poor. He shall lift up the poor from the dunghill, is a part of the prophecy. His power and influence shall be the great lifting principle that will level the whole world of mankind. As the Scriptures declare, all men are on a common level before God, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God and all are recipients of Divine mercy. The blessing of the Lord is that all may come back, and when thus brought back to all that was lost in Adam and redeemed by Christ, they will be able to keep the Divine law perfectly and will, therefore, to all eternity be in covenant relation with God. Those who refuse to enjoy that blessing prepared for them, the Scriptures clearly declare that God has not prepared a place of torment for them, but has provided a second death – "The soul that sinneth it shall die," "The wages of sin is death."
So, then, my dear friends, the gospel of Christ is world-wide. [CR194] But, you say, What about the Church? You have been speaking about the world and what Jesus will do for it, What about the Church? Oh, my dear friends, those of us who have experienced the power of this salvation know that as a power it has not lifted us physically to perfection, but has a power that has come into our hearts, into our minds, through faith, by transforming, by converting us, our minds, our wills. I recognize some in our midst whom I know were once aliens, strangers and foreigners to the Lord, who by a knowledge of the Saviour have become transformed in their lives so that now they are seeking to walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit, the Spirit or mind of God, after the Divine will so far as possible according to the Divine law. Here we see the difference between the Jew under his covenant of law and the Christian under the higher covenant that the Lord has made at the present time. The Apostle said that the Jew could not do the things that He would, but he declares equally strongly that the righteousness of the Law is fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit. How, then, is this possible? Are we better than the Jews? Are we of less fallen nature than the Jews, and made perfect? Nay, verily. The Apostle explains that for the class now called out during this Gospel Age there is a special arrangement in operation, and God deals with these according to their minds, their wills, their intentions, so that under this Covenant of Grace, which we are enjoying, we are counted as fully keeping the Divine Law, the righteousness, the full meaning of the Law is fulfilled in us who are walking not after the flesh but after the Spirit. Not up to the Spirit, but after the Spirit. But how could we be fully justified if not able to walk up to the Spirit? The answer is, that the blood cleanses us and commutes our sins, and he imputes his perfection and righteousness to us so that our best endeavors are accepted in Jehovah's sight as perfect, for we are justified, not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.
Another way in which the Gospel of Christ is superior to all others is that this gospel is world-wide. No other gospel of which I have knowledge is world-wide. The Gospel of the Son of God is that "Jesus Christ by the grace of God tasted death for every man," rich and poor, Jew and Gentile, every nation and people and kindred and tongue. "There is a wideness in God's mercy like the wideness of the sea." I know of no other religion that is so unbiased, that recognizes no national lines, that has the thought that we are one race, which sprang from one man, condemned through one man, and redeemed through the man Christ Jesus, and that all are to have a blessing – no other religion under the sun.
The religion of Christ, of which we are not ashamed, is best in this that it is the most God-like religion, because of its breadth, because of its justice, because of its impartiality, because of its love, its goodness and merciful qualities; it shows forth as does no other religion the Justice, Wisdom, Love and Power of Jehovah, our God.
To Him be glory and honor and dominion forever.
MONDAY, December 25 – CHRISTMAS DAY. The ship's officers did everything to make this day a pleasant one for the passengers. It seemed rather strange to celebrate Christmas out on the big Pacific Ocean, without a tree in sight and no snow on the ground. However, they decorated the dining room with about four hundred flags of the various nations, also with colored trinkets, and we also had a real Christmas tree. Elaborate meals were prepared, also special programs for the afternoon and evening. All are feeling well and happy.
Pastor Russell was requested to conduct another service, which we report as follows:
THERE is a great deal of interest, my dear friends, centered around this Infant, whose birth is celebrated by this day. It might be well, perhaps, to have in mind the basis for this Infant's birth and what it imports. I have, therefore, before my mind several questions:
Why was the expected babe?
How was this Babe peculiar – holy, harmless, undefiled?
Who was He who was thus born?
Why did He die?
What results have followed?
What may we expect?
Why were all men in expectation of Him at the time of His birth? What was there peculiar about Him to lead them to expect His birth?
The answer to this question is that God had made a certain promise centuries before and that promise had not been fulfilled. That promise contained the thought that a holy child would be born, and, that in some way, not explained in the promise, that child would bring the blessing the world needed. Therefore it was that every mother amongst the Israelites was very solicitous that she might be the mother of a son rather than a daughter, that, perchance, she might be the mother of this promised Child. Thus the matter went on for years, until finally the Child was born.
The promise back of the expectation was the promise God made to Abraham, saying, "In thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed." From that time forward Abraham began to look for that promised seed – that promised child. He looked first of all to his own children, and was finally informed that it would not be his children direct, but that through their children at some remote date this Child should be born, the seed of Abraham. So, from that time onward, all the Israelites were waiting for the birth of this Child to bring the blessing.
But why was a Messiah necessary, and why wait at all for the birth of the child? The answer to that question is that sin came into the world; that, while God placed our first parents, holy, pure and free from sin in the glorious condition of the Garden of Eden, with every favorable prospect and everlasting life at their command if they continued in harmony with God, but, by virtue of their disobedience they came under Divine displeasure and sentence of death. This sentence of death has brought along in its wake aches, pains, sorrows, tears, sighing, crying and death – all of these experiences as the result of sin. Our heavenly Father said to our first parents, the first intimation that He gave them, "The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head." The serpent in this expression means Satan, all the powers of evil, everything adverse to humanity, everything adverse to the blessings which God had given them, and which they had lost by disobedience. But the promise was vague and they understood little about the "seed of the woman," and "bruising the serpent's [CR195] head." It merely means, in an allegorical way, a great victory over sin and Satan, without explaining how it would come. So mankind continued to die, so mankind continued to have aches and pains and sorrows and continued going down to the tomb, and they realized what they needed was some Saviour to come and deliver them from the power of sin, to deliver them from the death penalty of sin. A Saviour who would be, in other words, a life-giver. They were dying and needed fresh life. This is the meaning of the word Saviour in the language used by our Lord and the Apostles. They were hoping and expecting that God would send a life-giver. It was on this account they were so greatly concerned in the promise made to Abraham, reading, "In thee and thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed," a release from sin and death. In no other way could mankind be blessed. It is impossible to bless mankind except by releasing them from sin and death. Hence, the Scriptures tell us of God's sympathy, that God looked down from His holy habitation and He beheld our sorrow, and he heard, figuratively, the groaning of the prisoners – humanity – all groaning and travailing under this penalty of death. Some with few aches and pains, and some with more aches and pains; some with few sorrows, and some with greater sorrows, but all groaning and travailing in pain. But, God's sympathy was manifested, and we read that when He looked down and beheld that there was no eye to pity and no arm to save, with His own arm He brought salvation. This is what was promised to Abraham, that one should come from his posterity who should be the Saviour of the world, and because this was made to Abraham and to his seed, they were marked out as separate from all other nations and peoples and nationalities. To the Jewish nation alone belonged this great honor that through them would come the salvation. Hence, from that time onward the Jews spoke of themselves as God's people, the people whom God had promised to bless, and through whom He would bring a blessing to all others. Therefore, all other people were called heathen, or nations, which the word means. Israel was thus separated because God's Covenant was with Israel, and not with the others. But God's Covenant with Israel was for the blessing of all the others, "In thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed." So, we have the "Why" of our Babe being born on Christmas day.
How could He be a Saviour? In what way could He be different from any other babe? Why not use some other babe as the one through whom salvation should come? The answer of the bible is that salvation could not come to mankind unless there would be a satisfaction of justice on account of original sin. That must be the first consideration. The penalty, "Dying thou shalt die," was pronounced against the first man and must be met before the world could be blessed. Why not let any man die? Because they were all under the sentence of the original condemnation, and none could be a ransom-price or a substitute. Hence the necessity for a specially born babe different from any other babe. In what way was this One differently born? The bible explains to us very distinctly that He was not begotten of an earthly father. Although Joseph was espoused to Mary, yet this child was not the result of Joseph, but the bible explains that this child was specially begotten by Divine power in the mother, though she was still a virgin and brought forth this child. This is the Scriptural proposition, and while it may not seem clear to some, yet the Word of God standeth sure. If the Redeemer was not perfect then he could not be the saviour of the world. The redemption required that Jesus must be perfect, based upon the statement that He was fitted to be a Redeemer as perfect as the first man that sinned, "For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead." "As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." So this one must be, as the Apostle declares, "Holy, harmless, undefiled and separate from sinners." (Heb. 7:26.) He must be entirely distinct and separate from humanity so far as sinful features are concerned. If we had time it would be interesting to go into the scientific features of how a perfect child could be born from an imperfect mother. We see this in a natural way: If a breeder of stock wishes to raise the standard of his stock he selects a fine bull, or goat, or a ram, and thus he improves the entire herd. And so, if we had perfect fathers we would soon have a perfect race. But that is impossible. No father can produce a perfect child. Hence it was necessary in this case, which the Scriptures declare was accomplished, that God begot this Son with power from on high; and, therefore, that born from the virgin was separate and distinct from all humanity. His life came not from His earthly father, but from His heavenly Father.
The Scriptures tell us that He had a pre-existence. We have an account given in the first chapter of John's gospel. It is written that before He became flesh Jesus had an existence, as he declared, "Before Abraham was I am." Again, in one of His prayers, "Father glorify we with the glory that I had with Thee before the world was." So the Apostle Paul tells us that He was the very beginning of the creation of God and that by Him all things were made. The Apostle's declaration is that our Lord Jesus was the beginning of the creation of God, and then the active agent of the Father in all the creative work in the angelic world and humanity, in all things that were created. The whole matter is summed up by John. I will give a more literal translation, "In the beginning was the Word" (this expression, Word, in the Greek is Logos. The thought behind the word Logos is that in olden times a king, instead of speaking his commands directly to his people, sat behind a lattice work, and his Logos, or messenger, or word, or representative, stood before the lattice work and gave the message of the king to the people in a loud tone of voice. The king himself was not seen by the people – the Logos was the one seen. So this is the picture the Scriptures give us of how Jesus was the express representative of the heavenly Father, the one through whom the heavenly Father made Himself known – the word, or the Logos). So we read in the first chapter of John, "In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with the God, and the Logos was a god. The same was in the beginning with the God. By Him were all things made and without Him was not anything made." In other words, He was the direct creator of all things. He was the divine Power, Agent, Word, Messenger, Logos of Jehovah. He did all the great work of creation, but He Himself was the first of God's direct creation, the first born of all creatures that in all things He might have the preeminence of the first place. And so, when the time came that our heavenly Father made known His great purpose that He would bless the world, He gave opportunity to this first begotten One, this One begotten of the Father, to be the servant in this great work He intended to accomplish for mankind. And so, the Scriptures state, "That for the joy set before Him He endured the cross despising the shame." And now He has sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high. He has this great reward because of His obedience, even unto death, the death of the cross. The Apostle speaks of Him as having been rich, but for our sakes became poor, that through His poverty we might be made rich. He tells us how He left the glory he had with the Father and humbled Himself to the human nature. Why? Because, as already stated, it was necessary that someone should become man's Redeemer, and [CR196] as an angel could not redeem man, neither could a lower animal redeem man; because the Divine law is, a man's life for a man's life; an eye for an eye; a tooth for a tooth; a life for a life. This was to teach us a great lesson, that human life, having been condemned to death, it would require a human life to redeem. It was, therefore, necessary that Jesus should become the "Man Christ Jesus," in order that He, by the Grace of God, might taste death for every man.
The results that have followed have been that He himself proved His own faithfulness. Being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient unto death, the death of the cross, the most ignominious form of death. It pleased the Father to thus prove Him, not only by death, but by the most ignominious form of death, hence dying as a culprit, being crucified between two thieves. What a terrible ignominy to die thus! It would be ignominy enough for us in our imperfection, but for Him, "Perfect, harmless, holy, undefiled and separate from sinners," it must have been a deep and poignant cause for sorrow. Having completed the laying down of his life during the three and a half years, he cried: "It is finished." What? Not his work, for that lay before him. He merely finished this part of the work, finished laying down His life for a ransom price. What next? After His death came His resurrection; and we read that, "God raised Him from the dead on the third day." According to the Scriptures, He was raised up from death a glorious being: "Sown in corruption, raised in incorruption: sown in dishonor, raised in honor: sown in weakness, raised in power: sown a natural body, raised a spiritual body." "Wherefore, God hath highly exalted Him and given Him a name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and of things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every knee should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." But we see not yet all knees bowed to him.
Oh, the Scriptures tell us that before He begins His great work for the world of mankind, He does first a work, for the elect, the Church, those who desire to walk in his footsteps, to gather out of the world a Bride to be co-workers with Him in all of the great work of the Father. This is the only work yet accomplished, and this has been going on now for over eighteen centuries. We see how He gathered out the saintly ones from amongst the Jews, Israelites in whom there was no guile; they were gathered to Him. Not finding enough to make the desired number, He proceeded to gather them from all nations, peoples, kindreds and tongues, and people, until the foreordained and predestinated number of the Bride shall be completed. So the Apostle tells us that when this Bride-class is united with Him they will be parts of the Seed of Abraham, as we read, "And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed and heirs of the promise." (Galatians 3:29.) That promise, dear friends, is the promise made to Abraham that through him and his seed all families of the earth should be blessed. So, then, this is the work that Christ is accomplishing now.
This is a very special invitation and they that would be his must also walk in the narrow way. If they will sit in His throne, they must suffer with Him. If they suffer with Him they shall also enter in and share His glory. So the suffering of the present time, and the glory that shall follow was not only accomplished in our Lord Jesus personally, but He was an example for all the Church, justified through faith in His blood; they have a share with Him in his sufferings and will also have a share in His glory, and will also have a share in the first resurrection, which is for the Church. The Apostle says, "I do count all things but loss and dross for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, that I might know him and the power of his resurrection" (the special one) to the divine nature. How? By being made conformable to His death; for, "If we suffer with Him we shall also reign with Him." "If we be dead with Him we shall also live with Him." Thus far has this message of the Babe of Christ gone.
All the families of the earth are to be blessed, as originally promised in Eden, "The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head." Also as St. Paul states it in the 16th chapter of Romans, "The very God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly." So, then, the next thing in order in the outworking of God's plan will be to bruise Satan and destroy sin.
Just as soon as this age shall end; because this age is merely for the development of the Bride-class, then will come the free grace to all the families of the earth. Messiah's kingdom shall come. He has promised that when He shall reign, all His faithful shall reign with him. "To Him that overcometh will I grant to sit with Me on My throne, even as I overcome and am set down with My Father on His throne." So all the Church shall be associated with Him in His great Messianic Kingdom, and "He shall reign from sea to sea, and from the river to the ends of the earth," and "Unto Him shall every knee bow and every tongue confess to the glory of God the Father." "The knowledge of the glory of God shall fill the whole earth," and the whole earth shall become as the Garden of Eden – Paradise lost will be Paradise restored. The Divine image lost in Adam will be restored to man. Human nature will be brought to perfection. But the glorious reward to the Church will be to have the divine nature, to be like her Lord and to sit at His right hand and to bless the world of mankind. Not only perfect and having all that Adam had, but with an additional knowledge and character, and there is every evidence that this shall be an eternal blessing.
Oh, yes, the Scriptures tell us that some will be lost, and that the loss they will sustain will be loss of life, of all the pleasure of life, loss of God's favor, of everything. They shall be as though they had not been. They shall be destroyed from amongst the people. St. Peter says, "They shall be taken and destroyed as brute beasts."
When? When the eyes of their understanding have been opened to see the Lord and understand His glorious character, and shall appreciate and enjoy His blessing, when such intentionally reject the grace of God, they shall die the second death, from which there is no resurrection, no hope. But thank God also, there shall be no knowledge or suffering for them, as they shall be destroyed as brute beasts.
Our rejoicing, then, today, my dear friends, is in proportion as we believe in this Babe of Bethlehem; in proportion as we believe he was manifested on our behalf; in proportion as we believe he died for our sins; in proportion as we recognize Him as the glorified Saviour; in proportion as we have rendered our hearts to Him, and seek to do the things well pleasing to Him.
Our hope on behalf of mankind in general is that in God's due time His blessing shall reach all mankind – not the same as that for the Church – but as St. Peter tells us in Acts 3:19-21, Times of refreshing shall come from the presence of God the Lord, and He shall send Jesus, whom before was preached unto you, whom the heavens must retain until the times of restitution of all things spoken by the mouth of all the holy prophets.
Closing hymn: "All Hail the Power of Jesus' Name."
THIS is the 28th, and we are due at Yokohoma Saturday, the 30th. The sea is getting rather rough. We have all had an invitation from the President of this Japanese steamship company, who lives in Tokyo, to take tea with him at his house on the 30th. He has the finest house in Tokyo. We have accepted the invitation. Will tell you about it later.
Will now close this letter with much love from all to all. Titus 3:15.
L. W. Jones, M.D.
(Mailed from Tokyo, Dec. 31, 1911.)
To the Ecclesia at Chicago, Ill., U.S.A. Dearly Beloved in the Lord:
I am writing this to you on board the steamship "Shinyo Maru," as we are sailing down the Straits of Formosa, en route for Hong Kong, China, which we expect to reach early the morning of the 10th.
Since writing Letter No. 1, we have been to many places, and our experiences have been varied. I will begin with our landing in
OUR ship anchored out in the harbor of Yokohoma, the seaport of Tokyo. Our big ship could not go up to the wharf, so we were landed by means of small boats. In America when we arrive at a station one usually sees a line of cabs, hacks or carriages waiting, and immediately there is a rush on the part of the drivers to secure your patronage. In Yokohoma, however, it is different. Instead of carriages, we found a long line of vehicles waiting for us, which to our western eyes were very strange. They are called "jinrickshas," and are like a large baby buggy on two wheels, but with a pair of shafts. The whole thing is pulled by a man who gets between the shafts and trots along, sometimes for miles without stopping. The men in charge of these made a rush for us as soon as we set foot on land, each trying to get a customer. Soon we were each seated in one of these queer conveyances, and off trotted our human horses. It was rather hard to reconcile oneself to such an experience of having another human being act as a beast of burden and pull you around while you sit comfortably in the ricksha. However, a person can get accustomed to almost anything, and as that is the custom in not only Japan, but in most of the Oriental countries, we soon forgot the contrast between our position and the man pulling the ricksha, especially in view of the fact that it was his business, we paid him for his services and he was well satisfied.
We rode through the city and out into the country, a ride of about three-quarters of an hour, until we came to the home of Mr. S. Asano, President of the Toyo Kisen Kaisha, the company which owns the Shinyo Maru steamship. Upon arrival at the home we dismounted from our rickshas and, upon ascending the steps to the house, were met by several prominent Japanese gentlemen, dressed in European clothes, Prince Albert suits, etc. Then, after greetings were exchanged, we were invited into the reception hall, then several Japanese young ladies, in Oriental costumes came forward, invited us to have seats and then proceeded to fasten on our feet, over our shoes, some knit shoes. We were then invited to inspect the home. The cloth shoes were worn as a means of protection to the highly polished floors and expensive matting in the various rooms. The home is very expensive, in the way of mattings, tapestries, carvings, etc., but did not appeal to us very much from the standpoint of comfort. There were a great many ugly old images scattered through the house which seemed to be highly prized, but which were enough to give one a nightmare to even think of. However, every person to his taste – a thing of beauty is a joy forever – but our ideas of what constitutes beauty differ considerably.
Then there was some entertainment provided for us – not only our party, but all the cabin passengers who came on the Shinyo Maru. This entertainment consisted of a Japanese lunch of tea and sweet cookies, and then an exhibition of jugglery by some of the best actors along that line to be found anywhere in the world, and they performed some wonderful feats and tricks. We would have preferred being somewhere else, but knew not that we were to be so entertained, and being inside had to remain. After the entertainment we got into our rickshas, which were waiting for us, and trotted off to
THIS the capital of the empire, is the home of the imperial family, and in many respects is quite modern. We stopped at the Imperial Hotel, which is quite European, though under Japanese management. Here we remained for a number of days.
Our visit to Japan was during their holiday season, for they, instead of observing the first day of January as a holiday, observe the entire week, and they certainly make the most of the occasion. Stores are not closed on any other days in the year, not even Sunday, but they are during this entire week. The people dress up in their best clothes and spend the time calling upon one another, leaving their cards if the people are not at home. The homes are all decorated with a peculiar combination of evergreen, bamboo and straw, placed beside the doors or nailed over them. Each of the articles in the decorations signifies something suggestive of luck, good omen or charm [CR198] such as should represent the propitious occasion on which new hopes and happiness are ushered in.
On these New Year days all girls, young and old, and many of the boys play battledore and shuttlecock. This game seems to be an endeavor to keep a little thing with feathers attached to it, or made of paper, in the air as long as possible, by means of a bat, something on the order of a tennis racket. All the streets of the resident districts and yards are crowded with the players, in their gay new year costumes. Also in every direction one sees many soldiers, on foot and mounted, dressed in their gay uniforms, all bent upon calling on someone.
THIS was the big day for us, as arrangements had been made for two meetings in the Y.M.C.A. There were fully thirteen hundred present, mostly young Japanese men, at the afternoon meeting, and seven hundred at the evening service. While there were some white people present, most of them were conspicuous by their absence. Pastor Russell spoke on the topic, "Signs of the Times." It was my privilege to introduce him, which I had to do through an interpreter, and then to lead the singing. Some sang in English and the rest in the Japanese language. The deep, reverent, earnest simplicity of those young men was very impressive and caused one to feel that he would like to do everything in his power to help them out of the darkness of their superstitions. Brother Russell then spoke and I never saw better attention from any gathering. The following is an introduction to the afternoon's discourse:
In the Y.M.C.A. at Tokyo, Japan, December 31, 1911.
I AM glad to welcome you here today. I am glad to see so many young men present. I am glad to see so many, whether you agree with what I say or not.
The topic for this afternoon, as advertised, is "The Signs of the Times." I need not remind you that we are living in a most wonderful day, such a day as the world has never before seen. You yourselves know something about the changes that have occurred in Japan within the last forty years. You may perhaps suppose that equally great changes have not taken place in other parts of the world, but they have taken place all over America and Europe, but not quite so recently. Let me illustrate to you: One hundred and five years ago we did not have a steamboat in the world. Eighty years ago we did not have a locomotive or train of cars in the whole world. Still more recently was the invention of the telegraph and telephone. Now more recently the wireless telegraph. What we note in these direction are all indications of what have occurred in other directions. In all the great sciences we find there have been great blunders. Scientific works on chemistry written within the last twelve years are of no value whatever. I mention these things that you may see that the inventions that have come to Japan recently are shared by the whole world. So in religion, we all find that there have been great changes in the religious thought during the last few years. As a result, not only Brahaminism, Buddhism, Confucianism, but Christianity are all on the defensive. We who are Christians cannot deny the fact that we have all had errors in the past. We look back but a little distance and admit that there was a period of darkness in the world. We find that superstitions are breaking away; we find that the shackles are breaking away from our minds, and we are glad of it. It becomes us as Christians to be quite understood in this matter. We have nothing to gain by pretending that our forefathers were all right. We find, on the contrary, that out of the 600 denominations of Christians there must have been a good deal of error in every one of them. We are glad to believe that there was truth in every [CR199] OUR PARTY PHOTOGRAPHED AT TOKYO (Picture only) [CR200] one of them, but now we wish to get rid of the error that was in them. More and more we are finding that the simplicity of the early Church is what we need. Christian people then of all denominations are desirous of getting back to the teachings of Jesus and the Apostles. But while we are glad and rejoice that the shackles of superstition are breaking, we need to rejoice with fear. The pendulum that has swung too far to the one side is apt to swing to the opposite side. Finding we are throwing away the superstitions, we are in danger of also throwing away with the superstitions the truth, and this we find to be the case amongst Christian people. For instance, we find that there are many Christian people leaving Christian doctrines entirely, and not only throwing away the creeds, but throwing away the Bible. Indeed, we have found a good many, not only in Europe but also in America and here as well. Many are disposed to not only deny the inspiration of the Bible, but also to even question the existence of a God. We believe that this is a most dangerous condition to be in. In our judgment, it would be far better to consider God to be the god of Confucianism, or the god of Brahminism, than to have no god, and if we believe in a god we would expect that he would make some revelation of his will. We have today in all of our great colleges and seminaries those who are teaching that the Bible is not the Word of God. They tell us that Moses did not write the first books of the Bible. They tell us that Isaiah did not write the prophecies that bear his name, nor Jeremiah, nor Hosea, nor any of these. We must allow that the people have intellects and they will reason that if Jesus said, "Moses wrote of me," and we find that Moses did not write of Him, then Jesus was mistaken. Jesus and the Apostles all quoted from Moses and the prophets. If they were mistaken in this, they must have been mistaken in everything. We hold that Jesus and the Apostles were correct, and that the Higher Critics are in error. In line with the Higher Critics' denial of the Bible comes the doctrine of Evolution.
Pastor Russell then spoke at considerable length along the lines of Daniel's Prophecy.
MR. YAMMAMATO, Secretary of the Tokyo Y.M.C.A., arranged for a photograph of the committee and others, which we reproduce herewith. Mr. Yammamato is the Japanese gentleman to the extreme left in the picture.
I took down both the afternoon and evening discourses in shorthand, while Brother Russell was speaking in English, and at the same table with me sat a young Japanese, who took down in shorthand the two discourses, while the interpreter spoke in that language. It is a mystery to me how he could report such sounds, but he did it.
The attention at the evening service was also excellent, at the close of which several hundred of the Japanese young men wrote their names and addresses on slips of paper requesting literature. Some of them said they could read English and would translate the literature for the others. Following this was the evening discourse on
OUR subject for this evening is "The Great Hereafter." This afternoon we considered "The Signs of the Times." We found the signs of the times indicated in the Bible. We find the Bible telling exactly the signs we see about us today. We quoted from Daniel's prophecy, written twenty-four hundred years ago. Through that prophecy God tells us of these days when many are running to and fro with railways, steamships and every means of locomotion, and a great time of trouble.
Now we connect this matter up with "The Great Hereafter." What will come after this time of trouble? The Bible answers that God will set up His Kingdom under the whole heavens, that this will be Messiah's Kingdom, the Kingdom of Christ, and he shall rule from sea to sea and from the river unto the ends of the earth. As a result it tells us that the knowledge of the glory of God shall fill the whole earth. The effect will be that every knee shall bow and every tongue confess to the glory of God. These are the very words of God through the prophet. The Bible proceeds to say that when Christ shall take His Kingdom, the first work will be the binding of Satan. "He shall lay hold upon that old serpent, the devil and Satan, and bind him a thousand years." The Bible tells us that this has been the difficulty of the world for the past six thousand years, the reign of Satan. On the contrary, we see what Jesus said was fulfilled. He declared that Satan was the prince of this world. St. Paul tells us that Satan is "the god of this world who now worketh in the hearts of the children of disobedience." Satan has been using himself to blind the minds of mankind. We believe he has had much to do with many of the religious systems of the world. The Apostle Paul tells us this, "The god of this world has blinded the minds of those who believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine into them." (2 Cor. 4:4.) Therefore, it is very appropriately set forth in the Bible that just as soon as Jesus takes the reign of the governments of the world in his hands, the kingdom of Satan will fall. And so, after Jesus said that Satan should be bound for a thousand years, he added, "that he may deceive the nations no more until the thousand years are over." Satan is called the "prince of darkness," while Christ is spoken of as "the Prince of Light." Which has been reigning, dear friends, the Prince of Light or the prince of darkness, for the past six thousand years? Some of us Christians have been trying to make ourselves believe that what we call Christendom was Christ's Kingdom. We speak of the [CR201] United States, Canada, Germany and France and Great Britain as being Christian nations. But the Bible does not agree to that. The Bible says that all are under the reign of the prince of the world, Satan. Could we suppose that Christian England, Christian France and Christian Germany would be building great guns to blow the others off the face of the earth if they were Christ's Kingdom? I tell you nay. None of these are Christ's Kingdom. We are still praying for Christ's Kingdom, "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is done in heaven." Is there any place on earth where God's will is done as it is done in heaven? There is no such place. There can be no such condition until Christ's Kingdom shall be established, and even after His Kingdom is established, it will take quite a little while to bind Satan and convert the world. This is the glorious hereafter the Bible points out. Not only will peace reign from sea to sea, and from shore to shore, but the blessing of the Lord will be upon the earth. God's blessing is not upon the earth now – God's curse is on the earth now. Not until the curse is removed will the blessings go forth. That is what we are all waiting for. You remember where the curse came in. The curse is a curse of death, and the cause of death was sin. The effect of sin and the effect of death is all the sickness, pain, and sorrow and tears. The Bible clearly sets forth that if our first parents had not sinned, the sentence of death would not have come upon them. When God drove our first parents out of the Garden of Eden, "Cursed is the earth for thy sake. Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth unto thee, and in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, until thou shalt return unto the ground from whence thou wast taken, for dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return." That is the explanation to us why we have all these disadvantages in the world. Why must the farmer battle with the thorns and thistles and weeds? Because of the curse. Why do we have storms, droughts, pestilences, etc.? Why do we have aches, pains, sufferings, etc.? Because of the curse. Why do we have dying and why do we have cemeteries? Because of the curse. There are no doctors nor undertakers in heaven, because there is no sin there, there is no curse there. And so, just as soon as the curse will be taken away from the earth, the blessing of the Lord will be upon mankind again. Now this is the whole gospel of the Lord, about the taking away of the curse and bringing in the blessing of mankind.
THE interpreter, Mr. Obata, a professor of theology in the Methodist College, has a good understanding of both the Japanese and English languages, so the next day arrangements were made to publish the first volume of "Studies in the Scriptures" in book form in Japanese; also to have sections of it appear month by month in the magazine for which this young stenographer was writer and a partner in. So you see the work is going on way off here in Japan. Other things were arranged for and much information gathered as to results of missionary work all of which shows their evident need in that Oriental land, as well as in all other lands, namely, the Kingdom of Christ. Altogether we feel that our stay in that part of Japan was a success.
Some of the party went on to Kyoto, Osaka, Kobe and other places, while I remained behind at Tokyo to attend to some matters. I joined the party later at Kobe. The train on which I went down to Kobe was their fastest express making an average of twenty-six miles an hour – it did not take our breath away. I managed to secure an upper berth, which is a single one, and it was a good deal like a shelf, with a pad on it, on which a bed is made up. They gave me a hard pillow and, altogether, I slept very comfortably, better than I had expected, notwithstanding the fact that both men and women were allowed to smoke those terrible smelling cigarettes – and there was plenty of smoke, I assure you. The dining cars, or restaurant cars, as they call them, serve very good meals.
When we again boarded our ship at Kobe we found the Chinamen waiters had all had their queues cut off. China has just declared itself a Republic. Before that act the Chinamen would not have dared to go back without their queues, but now they do not dare to go back with them. If they were to wear them now they might be taken for imperialists and would be likely to have their heads – queues and all – cut off.
FROM Kobe the course of our ship was through the Inland Sea, the most picturesque stretch of enclosed ocean in the world, for over 200 miles, an all-day scenery-feast. Silently the ship threads the narrowest of channels; square-sailed junks float by; towns, villages, castles, temples, forests, cultivated vales and terraced hills, sharply cut peaks and low-running mountain chains succeed one another for a whole day, until we came to the city of Nagasaki, where we stopped to take on coal.
This is a most interesting scene and I must tell you about it. The work is all done by men and women, using little baskets holding two shovelfuls of coal each. As soon as we steamed into the harbor many small boats, holding about thirty people, and other larger boats, each holding about thirty tons of soft coal, came along side our big ship, tied to her, and soon the natives had bamboo stagings erected from the barges up along our ship to an opening where they could dump the coal into a bunker. There were probably a score of these stagings on either side of the vessel, and each staging had several landings, like large steps. On each of the landings two people would be stationed; sometimes two men, again two women, or one man and one woman. The people below in the coal barge would fill the baskets with coal, and then they would be passed up from one landing to the next. They were so skillful at the work that the baskets moved along in regular streams and seemed to bound up from one to another like rubber balls. About seven hundred and fifty people worked on either side of the ship, fifteen hundred in all, from ten o'clock in the morning until four in the afternoon, and during that time they placed three thousand tons of coal in our vessel. One can hardly believe such a thing [CR202] possible, but such is the case. The accompanying picture is an actual photograph of such a scene. It is considered the fastest coaling station in the world, faster even than where they have modern machinery. The wages that these people receive is the large sum of twenty cents per day – less than an English shilling. If any of you are out of a job, here is your chance. It is not a case, either, of everyone working but father, for the whole family work together. We even saw women passing up the coal and rowing the boats with babies strapped to their backs, and the babies seemed to enjoy it too, and some would sleep as contentedly as though in an aristocratic down crib. The needs of the people are very simple, both as respects food and clothing.
At Nagasaki we found a different type of people. They are much poorer. All over Japan, however, the customs and costumes were new and strange to us. We soon got used to them and then all looked much alike and we were ready to leave the little narrow streets, etc. As a whole, our impression of the Japanese is much better and we find them a very thrifty, industrious and polite set of people. We noted, especially, how the husbands and wives work together, and here many people in both America and Europe could learn some valuable lessons. We noted many instances where the men would have the children strapped to their backs, also boys doing the same, walking about the streets, while on the other hand, the women would work on the boats, handle coal, carry vegetables on their backs to market, etc. We heard no bad language or cross words – all seemed like one great family trying to help each other. They are very polite and obliging to foreigners. Our stay amongst them will long be remembered with pleasure.
AFTER a night and day's ride across the Yellow Sea we arrived at the mouth of the Yangtze River, and then a small steamer took us up the river about nine miles to the city of Shanghai. Here we found a very busy cosmopolitan city, with three general divisions, English, German and French, besides, of course, the Chinese. Some people, learning that we were coming, arranged for an afternoon and evening meeting on Sunday, and so Brother Russell spoke twice that day.
On account of the war in China many missionaries were there who had been forced out of the interior, some coming as far as two thousand miles. There were quite a number of these missionaries at the meeting who listened quite attentive for the time being, but that was as far as it went, they seemed to care little for the Gospel of God's love, which shows the ultimate blessing of all the families of the earth through His Kingdom, but preferred to hold to the gospel (?) of damnation.
It would have been impossible under the existing war conditions to have gone into the interior, but through these missionaries, fresh from the interior, and through other sources, were received a [CR203] great deal of information, which otherwise would have necessitated a trip into the interior.
The condition in China in some parts is something terrible. Certain sections are overflooded with water and thousands of people are dying daily of starvation, and there are millions who have absolutely nothing on which to live or with which to do. Some of the people are floating around on the tops of their houses. Others wade in the water up to their necks and try to reach down and cut some of the rice. I do not see how trouble could be much worse for them than it is in the interior of China. All we who live in the United States, especially, have much for which to be thankful, and our sympathies ought to go out to those poor people. We who know God's Great Plan can well be thankful that we see the silver lining of this terrible, black cloud, and that we know that soon Messiah's Kingdom will be established, when the knowledge of the glory of the Lord shall fill the whole earth, and the desire of all nations shall come. It requires faith, however, and strong faith, too, to "Wait ye upon me saith the Lord," "Stand still and see the salvation of the Lord." What we want to do is to develop the fruits and graces of the Spirit that in due time we may be accounted worthy a place in the glorious Bride-class, to sit with Him on His throne and to dispense the Kingdom blessings to the whole world, China included. Then we can do what we now only long to do, but have not the power to do. Then "All power in heaven and earth" will be ours, and not for our own selfish purposes, but for the poor groaning creation, every people, nation, kindred and tongue.
Our party split here and we left Brothers Pyles and Robison in Shanghai, where they will for some time make further investigations, interview missionaries, etc., and they will later meet the rest of the party who will go to Hong Kong, then to Manila and back to Hong Kong.
There goes the gong, announcing lunch, or "tiffin," as it is called; and, as I have not missed a meal yet, I will have to take this one in also. Come and join us – there are several vacant tables. I am sure you are here by faith anyway. As to the time of day here, Monday, one o'clock in the afternoon, it is about two o'clock early this morning with you. You have passed through the Sunday services and are now home and in bed. May you all have sweet dreams.
The rest of the party all send Christian love and greetings. I remain, as B 4,
Dearly Beloved in the Lord: GREETINGS to one and all! We are now on board the Steamship Delta, enroute from Hong Kong to Singapore, where we expect to arrive on the 24th. My last letter (No. 2) was mailed upon arrival at Hong Kong from Shanghai. Since then we have had a very interesting time.
A three-day voyage, often in view of the coast or islands and amidst hundreds of fishing junks, transports one to South China, a different world.
AT last the blue islands and headlands around Hong Kong are sighted, and if approach is in daylight the passage of Lymoon Pass is most interesting and the farther panorama of Victoria, rising in terraces 1,800 feet to the Peak, and Kowloon opposite, with the great harbor, full of the world's shipping, is a sight to thrill and excite, a memory for life.
A speedy landing by steam launch throws one into a cosmopolitan whirl that is a kaleidoscope of pigtails, sampans, rikishas, electric cars, sedan chairs, English shops and Chinese signboards. Sikh policemen and Parsee bankers, Malay seamen and pole-carrying coolies – and the end is not yet, nor ever, for variety is every-day fare in Hong Kong. The vegetation along certain walks and in the Botanical Gardens is a riot of luxuriance. The cement walks all over the mountain, the viaducts and water supply, cause wonder and admiration. Villas and clubs are veritable palaces, and below huddle in crowded tenements a quarter of a million Chinese, part of the groaning creation, waiting for the "times of restitution," when Messiah sets up His glorious Kingdom to bless, not only these poor Chinese, but ALL families of the earth.
After spending a day there our party was split up still more, part remaining and using that as headquarters, while they investigated in various directions. The rest of the party, Brothers Russell, Hall, Kuehn and Jones, went to Manila for a ten-day trip. By dividing forces at these various points and each acting more or less independent of the others, much more was accomplished.
OUR tropical island possessions naturally arouse much curiosity in American world-tourists, and certain of our party are scheduled to visit Manila, the gem of the Orient.
In the midst of luxuriant vegetation, fronting on a splendid bay, American enterprise has transformed a sleepy and unhealthy Spanish colonial city with native population into a bustling and well-ordered capital. The combination of Filipino, Spanish and American elements makes it fascinating.
The trip to Manila is usually rough, and we were looking for a hard time, but were agreeably surprised. It took us two days and three nights to make the trip, and our boat was many, many times smaller than the boat we had been on; it was a freighter and carried only about a dozen passengers. The Lord's hand was certainly with us on this trip. Before our steamer could come to the dock, launches came out bringing various people, and among them was a Mr. Hashim, a prominent merchant of Manila, and owner of the Opera House, which Brother Driscoll, who had preceded us by several weeks, had engaged, in which Pastor Russell was to lecture. Mr. Hashim is a Syrian, but is thoroughly Americanized; he is a man of about 35 years old. If he had been a brother in the truth he could not have done more for us, and he seemed to know all about everything and everybody.
Next, as we landed and went to the Custom House to have our baggage examined, to see how much stuff we were smuggling into the Islands – whisky, cigars, etc., the first gentleman we met was a Mr. Vaughn, one of Uncle Sam's soldiers, and a nephew of Sister Dakin, of the Chicago Class. She had given me a letter of introduction to him, and had written him a letter concerning our coming. He was very kind to us, and personally looked after our baggage for us.
General Hall then called up on the phone the Army and Navy Club, got in touch with the officers, and arranged for [CR204] our entertainment there. This club is much like a fine hotel, though not for the public – only for army and navy officers and their families and friends. About ten years ago General Hall was stationed in the Philippines and still knows a great many of the men there. He also arranged with General J. Franklin Bell, Commander-in-Chief of the twenty thousand troops stationed in the Islands, to introduce Pastor Russell at the public meeting in the afternoon.
We found that one of the papers had voluntarily announced that we had not arrived, and also published a lot of "stuff" about Pastor Russell, which they copied from the Brooklyn Eagle. Thus, you see, Satan came also. Well, as usual, it turned out to be another illustration of how God will cause "the wrath of man to praise Him." I have learned that whenever you see some wrath of man, there will shortly be some praise come out of it for the Lord. Of course this opposition, and especially the false notice to the effect that we had not arrived, probably kept some away. However, we had fully a thousand present, and, to our surprise, instead of being the white people of the Islands, the majority were Philippinos, bright and intelligent, most of whom could read English. The rest of the audience was composed of Army officers, regulars, and some of the general public.
General Bell then introduced Pastor Russell, and as he stands high in the respect and esteem of the people on the Islands, it was cause for much comment the next day, as to why the newspaper should publish what they did, when General Bell, General Hall, Colonel Histand and others were on the platform, and General Bell introduced such a man as the paper tried to make Pastor Russell out to be. The paper published what one of Pastor Russell's enemies had to say about him, and an enemy is a poor source to which to go if you wish to get the truth concerning a person. The next day one of the papers said:
"The Free Press (Manila) frankly confesses that after hearing both sides of the matter, it does not feel qualified to express an opinion, but it believes that when such men as Major-General Bell and General Hall identify themselves with Pastor Russell and his propaganda, there cannot be anything very seriously wrong with him or it. Possibly the best criterion, however, is the address itself."
Thus many more people were interested in looking into the matter and reading the address than otherwise would have been. The Free Press of Manila reported the discourses of the day, as follows:
In a few well chosen words General Bell introduced Pastor Russell, as follows:
LADIES and Gentlemen:
"We have gathered together to listen to a lecture upon the greatest work which has been produced in the world, the Holy Bible; a book which stands alone, without a rival. I have been requested to introduce the lecturer.
"Time was when any minister of the Gospel, speaking in the holy name of religion, could depend upon the acceptance of his word with unquestioning faith, but, with the progress of the world in scientific education, the time has come when people demand proof, and when he who would convince must speak with authority, and to speak with authority he must qualify as an expert.
"The gentleman who is to lecture this afternoon is known the world over as an authority upon the bible. His sermons are printed in more than a thousand English and American periodicals, and he has written works upon the bible, six volumes in all, which have reached the extraordinary circulation of three million copies more than any other work, save only the bible.
"This gentleman has been elected as a delegate by the International Bible Students' Association to make a tour around the world in the interest of Foreign Missions.
"I have the exceptional privilege of presenting to you Pastor Russell of Brooklyn and London Tabernacles."
MY topic, Where are the dead? must appeal to every thinking hearer, for we all expect to die, and we all have friends and neighbors who have died, and for whose condition we have deep concern. Besides, our topic stands related to every religious system in the world, Christian, Confucian, Brahmin, Buddhist, all; because all religions purport to be preparations for the future beyond the tomb. Although I am a Christian and a firm believer in the bible as the one and only message from God, nevertheless in my bible I find many things which I did not suppose were there, and I do not find other things which I once supposed were there. In the bible I find special hope, and a very special provision for Christians – real Christians, saintly Christians, and I also find in my bible divine promises to others besides these; namely, blessings for Brahmins, Buddhists, Confucians, Mohammedans, etc., namely, for "All the families of the earth." But the bible does not reveal the same blessings for all mankind, nor even the same blessings for all the saintly and conscientious of the various religions.
I admit at the beginning that Christians have made serious mistakes in their interpretation of the Divine purpose, and I claim the same in respect to all the heathen religions. This is not assailing the honesty or integrity of our forefathers. They were as honest as we, but lived in a darker period – they stumbled more than we now need to stumble. This is shown in the variations of doctrine of all the great religions, including Christianity. Our six hundred creeds tell us of six hundred variations of theory in respect to the Divine program. It is not to find fault with these, but accepting the situation to turn away from all the human misconceptions and creedal errors – back to the foundation of truth, the Word of God as represented in the Old and New testaments.
I refresh your minds respecting the teachings of all the great systems of religion, including Christianity. They all give us a dark picture respecting man in his fallen, imperfect, sinful condition; respecting matters for the present life, and for the future life; respecting punishments for sin, and in regard to a hope of future blessings for all who will seek righteousness. Instead of hiding or apologizing for your Christian views on these subjects, I will candidly and truthfully acknowledge that during the dark ages the followers of Jesus got into a more confused condition than any other religious people, in respect to the Divine plan, in respect to [CR205] the dead, good and bad, civilized and barbaric, Christian and heathen. But to see our error is the first step necessary for its correction. And how glad we are and ought to be that life in this glorious epoch, in which the electric arc light is eclipsing the tallow candle, we are able to see the mistakes of our forefathers, and wherein they left the inspired words of Jesus, the Apostles and the Prophets. Surely we are living in the day mentioned by our Lord when he that hungereth and thirsteth after righteousness shall be filled.
My assumption, my dear friends, is that all honest people desire the truth, that no true child of God wishes to spread confusion in the world, but that all of them desire to know the truth, to be sanctified by it, and to propagate it for the sanctification of others. So then, if what I shall say conflicts, is found to be in contradiction of many or all of the six hundred creeds of Christendom, and with the various theories of other religions, bear with me remembering that none of us are or ever were satisfied, and that as one of the dissatisfied ones I claim that we were all partly right and partly wrong, and that now, all lovers of the truth and righteousness may see eye to eye and come to the glorious condition mentioned in the Scriptures where we shall recognize one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, one Redeemer and one Church of the first born, and a glorious work to be accomplished by that Church, for the blessing of all the families of the earth. The Scriptures foretell of the period of darkness, yea of gross darkness upon the earth and upon Christendom, but they foretell also the scattering of this darkness, this night time, and the dawning of a new day, the new dispensation – the kingdom of Messiah, for which many of us have prayed long, "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth even as it is done in heaven."
Buddhists, Brahmins, Confucians, etc., all intimate that the majority of mankind at death pass into most undesirable conditions, but it remains for Christendom to give forth the most serious misrepresentation of the Divine character and plan. Our Roman Catholic friends have a hell of eternal torture indescribable, but it is for a comparatively small number. The majority, according to them, go to purgatory, to suffer torture in one form or another for centuries and thus to be purified and made ready for heavenly bliss. Many of our forefathers were Catholics and shared in the protestations against purgatory and refuted it because not found in the bible. But did they not go to a worse extreme by enlarging hell and consigning to it all except a mere handful of saintly believers in Jesus. This is certainly the teaching of all our Protestant creeds, which none of us now really believe. Nevertheless, those creeds still more or less bind and blind God's people and hinder the presentation of the bible by branding everything out of accord with themselves as heresy. I urge all of you who are true Christians to set up before your hearts and minds God's words as the only standard of truth, of orthodoxy, and that you recognize everything else as heresy however honestly held.
As you are all familiar with this discourse, we will not give it more space here.
As the close of his lecture Pastor Russell announced that a special meeting had been arranged for the evening, at which General Wm. P. Hall, from the War Department, Washington, D.C., would speak on "The Bible and Christianity from the Standpoint of a Soldier."
WE had expected to leave that evening for our return to Hong Kong, but our boat would not wait and so we had to remain over until Monday night. Arrangements were, therefore, made for a meeting between seven and eight o'clock, as the Opera House was engaged for the rest of the evening. It was announced to the afternoon audience that General Hall would speak in the evening on the subject of "The Bible and Christianity from the Standpoint of a Soldier." This was our only opportunity of advertising the meeting, and was at a very inconvenient hour, as it was the dinner hour in the city of Manila. Well, the evening came, and we had a fair audience. General Hall spoke for about half an hour, then Brother Kuehn for a short time on the same subject, from a Merchant's standpoint, and then I followed for a short time on the same subject from a Physician's standpoint.
Following is what the Philippine Free Press had to say about our three discourses:
COL. H. O. S. HEISTAND introduced his long-time friend, Gen. Wm. P. Hall. He said:
There is no country and no people without a religion. We of the Philippine Islands, and our whole country, and all of the countries that have ever been represented in this country, are Christian countries. They belong to that great class who adhere to and believe in the Christian religion.
Religions are antagonistic. The Christian religion sprang from a country of poverty. The wealth and culture of the world were against it. Notwithstanding all the persecution, notwithstanding all the efforts to destroy it, yet it stands the tests of time, and when understood and reasonably accepted offers no difficulty. I have some difficulty myself, but I am glad that I was here today to hear Pastor Russell on "Where are the Dead," and had some of those difficulties removed.
It is a very dangerous point when a person gives up one religion or a tenet of his religion and has nothing else to substitute for it.
I am to have the pleasure of introducing a soldier whom I have known all my life, an intimate associate, a Christian man. And when he was not a Christian he was always upright and never approached any subject without the broadest sympathy and justice. He is going to speak on "The Bible and Christianity from the Standpoint of a Soldier." I am glad to have men of my own profession hear from a soldier of high rank, of long experience, who finds Christianity a help to the soldier, and he will give you a basis upon which soldiers may find Christianity a help to them in their profession.
I need merely mention his name – he is well known. I have great pleasure in introducing Brigadier-General Wm. P. Hall of the United States Army.
GEN. HALL said in part:
Fellow Soldiers, and fellow Christians:
It affords me great pleasure to be with you tonight, and to make some remarks on "The Bible from a Soldier's Standpoint," because since I left the Philippines God has blessed me with a view of the bible which I never had before, and which I desire now to present to you. As you all know, the bible has much to say respecting the fighting of a good fight, as loyal soldiers of the Lord Jesus Christ – warring against sin in ourselves and everywhere. But before I come to that feature of my subject, I ask your attention to another feature of the subject, not so generally discerned. It came but recently to my attention and has appealed to me as nothing else [CR206] ever did. In this view the Almighty is a great King or Monarch. The entire universe is His dominion. Our earth, a small fraction of the universe, is a scene of anarchy, rebellion against God and His righteousness.
According to the bible, man was created perfect, so man was made to be the ruler of the earth. So the Prophet David declared, "Thou madest him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honor. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of Thy hands; Thou hast put all things under his feet; all sheep, and the beasts of the field; the fowls of the air, and the fish of the sea." Man lost this noble state, this grandeur of his own personality and all this dignity and honor as the god of the earth. He lost this through disobedience to his Sovereign, the Almighty. The penalty against him was, "Dying thou shalt die," "Dust thou art and unto dust thou shalt return." Most of the animal creation is in rebellion against man, because, having lost his original perfection of being he no longer can fully control the lower creation, although some members of the race possess still a considerable measure of this power to tame the wild beasts and to command their obedience.
The reign of death, the penalty for sin, has wrought havoc with mankind, mentally, morally, physically. In consequence hundreds of millions have gone into the tomb, and of those now living all are blemished physically, mentally and morally. Some so much so that many of them are confined in prisons. Many others in lunatic asylums, and altogether, as St. Paul declares, "The whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together." This is a sad picture. There is a brighter side to it, however, as we shall see presently, for God does not intend that this province of His empire shall be permitted to continue in a condition of rebellion. It is neither to Divine glory, nor to man's advantage that the present order of things should last forever. The bible declares that God will permit the present disorder, the present reign of sin and death only for a certain limited time. Then He will bring in a glorious reign of righteousness through the Redeemer.
According to the bible there is no such reign of sin and death in heaven amongst the angels as we have here on earth amongst men, and the explanation is simple: There is no sin in heaven. Everything there is operating in harmony with the Divine will and all God's spiritual creatures enjoy their heavenly blessings, because God is pleased to grant them every good thing because of their obedience.
This implies that the reign of sin and death for six thousand years is because of man's rebellion. More than this there is no hope that man will ever recover himself out of his present conditions, and bring himself to such a state of perfection as that God would be willing to receive him again. Everywhere in all our personal experiences we perceive that the tendency of sin is always downward. Any hope for recovery must rest upon Divine mercy, forgiveness of our sins, and an uplift out of our degradation by a superhuman power. And this is just what the bible tells us God proposes.
The bible promises that Divine power will introduce a new order of things, that the Divine curse, or sentence of defeat will be lifted from humanity, and every member of the race will be granted every assistance necessary to rise up out of sin, ignorance, superstition and degradation. Yes, out of the tomb also – up and up to the full perfection of the human nature which father Adam had and lost. Additionally we see that these will have a knowledge of sin and a knowledge of Divine mercy which father Adam did not have when he transgressed. There is a certain test before any will be decreed worthy of everlasting life, and that test will be obedience to the heavenly Emperor, and to the laws of His heavenly empire.
Some of you may not be aware, as I was not aware until recently, that the bible teaches such a restitution from the power of sin and death. The Divine promise is that then all who wilfully, deliberately, intelligently love sin and hate righteousness will be destroyed in the Second Death, as St. Peter says: "They shall perish like natural brute beasts." Notice that this does not mean an eternity of torture, but destruction. These shall perish, as St. Peter says. "They will be punished with an everlasting destruction." Then will be fulfilled the glorious promise of the Scripture to the effect that "every knee will bow and every tongue confess to the glory of God," while "the knowledge of the glory of the Lord will fill the whole earth." Then will be the time mentioned by our Saviour in His prayer, when God's kingdom will come and God's will be done on earth even as it is in heaven. Of that glorious period the bible tells us, "There shall be no more crying, no more sighing, no more dying, because the former things (or sin and death) will have passed away."
I know well, my dear friends, that you are thinking: How does General Hall expect that all this wonderful transformation will be accomplished? Does he forget that the gospel has been preached for eighteen centuries and that the conversion of the world is practically as far away as ever? Does he forget that, according to the United States statistics there are today twice as many heathen as there were a century ago? Does he forget that if the entire world were brought to a condition of as great enlightenment as prevails in Manila, or in London, or in any other city or town that God's will would still not be done on earth as it is done in heaven?
No, my dear friends, I am not forgetting these things. I am not hoping for the conversion of the world by the preaching of the Gospel of Christ. I find that the bible does not so teach; that the Gospel is being preached for the purpose of calling and perfecting a saintly few, and that as soon as these shall have been found that Divine election will be complete, and God's very elect from every nation, people, kindred and tongue and denomination – shall be glorified with Jesus in the [CR207] first resurrection – then will come the reign of Messiah which the Scriptures everywhere declare. God's Kingdom shall come into power, Messiah shall take unto Himself His great power and reign, His reign will not be for the purpose of personal aggrandizement. Messiah's Kingdom shall be under the whole heavens, as the bible declares, "He shall reign from sea to sea, and from the rivers to the ends of the earth." Under the sway of His kingdom and its righteous arrangements, every feature of the blessing will be brought out. Earth will become a Paradise, the wilderness shall blossom as the rose, the solitary place shall be glad, the streams shall break forth from the desert, ignorance and superstition shall flee away. The sun of righteousness shall arise with healing in his beams." All shall be brought to a knowledge of the truth.
We might, dear friends, rightly say that a republican government, a government of the people by the people is the noblest of all. If all men were perfect and all the conditions were perfect it surely would be ideal. Indeed, I understand the bible to teach that a republic will be the ultimate form of human government after Messiah's reign shall have brought the willing and obedient of humanity to perfection, and the earth to a paradise. But Messiah's kingdom will not be a republic, it will be a theocracy – a Divine will of government. Right will be the law and every transgression will be punished in proportion to the wilfulness of the transgressor until all shall learn righteousness from the least to the greatest, until all the willing and obedient shall have been gradually uplifted and strengthened mentally, morally, physically, and shall have attained perfection.
Of this glorious kingdom of Messiah which is to accomplish so much for mankind Saint Peter tells us, saying, "Times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord and He shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you; whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets." Saint Paul gives us the particulars of this in a few words, saying of Messiah: "He must reign until He shall have put all enemies under His feet." "The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death." He proceeds to tell us that after Messiah shall have thus conquered sin and death and shall thus have released mankind from death and brought them, the willing and obedient, back into full accord with the Almighty, then the Messianic Kingdom will cease, because Messiah will deliver up the Kingdom to God, even the Father that He may be all in all.
While I am glad to find this glorious outlook for the world clearly set forth in the bible, I am glad, also, of another feature in the Divine plan. I am glad that the Kingdom has not yet begun. I am glad that you and I and all of God's consecrated people have the invitation to become associates in that glorious reign of righteousness – actively associated as joint-heirs with our Lord Jesus Christ as co-workers with Him for that thousand years of His Messianic reign for the overthrow of death and the deliverance of humanity.
But there are conditions upon which we may reign with Messiah – upon which we may be accounted worthy of membership in that Bride class, His companions in glory. We all know these. We are called to suffer with Him as good soldiers, enduring the cross, despising the shame. We are called to fight a good fight now under the standard of Jesus, as soldiers under Him, the Captain of our salvation. We are called to endure hardness for His sake, for the truth's sake, for righteousness' sake, for the sake of those who need our assistance. My exhortation to you is that those of you who have not yet enlisted under the banner of Jesus the Son of God should do so at once and that with the full understanding that the terms of our enlistment are: "Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life," and to those who hear me who have already enlisted, as I have done, under the banner of Jesus, I quote the Master's words, "Be of good courage, greater is He who is on our part than all that could be against us." A little while and our battling against sin, selfishness, meanness and the adversary will all be ended, and if faithful we shall receive the crown of life, which fadeth not away, which God hath in reservation for them that love Him.
MR. E. W. V. KUEHN was selected by the International Bible Students' Association as one of the seven gentlemen to make a tour of the world and to give a report on foreign missions. For years Mr. Kuehn has been a contributor to Christian missions and it was partly on this account, and partly because the views of a keen business man were desired, that he was chosen. He said:
I am not a sermonizer, I am a business man. But I find in the bible matters which deeply interest me – especially so since I came into contact with Pastor Russell's books. A Christian from youth, the son of Christian parents, I always reverenced the bible, but only quite recently have I learned to love it, and to know of the wonderful plan of God which it contains. I am not to discuss all the features of the Divine plan. We have already today heard much that has been deeply interesting to us. I am merely to supplement what you have already heard with some remarks respecting God's word from a business standpoint.
A business standpoint necessarily means standpoint of profit and loss. Every business man purposes a gain, a profit, otherwise he would go out of business. Although the Great Teacher said, "What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul" (his own life, his own being), nevertheless, I believe that the profit and loss account with the religion of the bible has not had sufficient consideration from the majority of us in the past.
I remind you of Jesus' words to the effect that the kingdom of Heaven is likened unto a merchant man seeking goodly pearls, who found one of great value, and went and sold everything he possessed and bought that pearl. The pearl was for sale, the price upon it was fixed, he took no advantages of the seller. The two points of the parable are (1) The great value of the pearl and, (2) That it was cheap to the man who purchased it, although it cost him everything he had.
This is the proposition which the bible sets before us. You and I are seeking the best there is in life. We have something to invest a certain amount of money, a certain amount of influence, a certain amount of time, a certain amount of talent; these are our capital. We are desirous of using these most wisely, most advantageously, most judiciously. Various matters present themselves as investments and the question is, which will be the best investment that you can make with your capital, and that I can make with mine? To illustrate: In this community there are some who have said, we will invest in a newspaper enterprise, because this will give us not only comfortable remuneration, but influence and power amongst our neighbors, and the opportunity for much good and proving ourselves honorable citizens and useful ones. Other have said, we will go into this or that line of merchandise. We will serve the public and incidentally we will reap our reward of public confidence, business prosperity and the comforts of this life. Others have said, we will enter the military service, we will be faithful soldiers and win honors and spurs, and a good name amongst our fellows and by our patriotism we will be an example to posterity. Others have said, we will be teachers and use time and influence for the assistance of the rising generation, helping them to qualify for the duties of life and to become useful citizens. Others have said, we will be Missionaries and Pastors, and help people along religious lines. All of these employments and ambitions leading up to them are laudable. Every man should have an ambition and it should be not merely for self, but along generous lines, it should include his fellowmen.
But to which of these positions or services did the Great Teacher refer as the Pearl of Great Value, for which life and all we possess should be given. They are all honorable as we have set them forth. How shall we decide? The bible answer is that while all of these are pearls of a certain value, none of these is the Pearl Of Great Value. The Pearl Of Great Value is the Kingdom. For it we may sell all that we possess of every kind to purchase it, to become possessors of it. No man, however, gives all that he has to his profession as a physician, teacher, business man or a soldier. There are limitations. It would not be wise to sacrifice life for business, nor for honor, nor for any earthly project. Life is too precious for that. But when we come to see the Pearl of Great Price, the Kingdom, we realize that it will be cheap [CR208] and desirable at any cost – even life itself and health and strength – even though it cost us every cent that we possess and every power of mind and body. This is the suggestion of the Great Teacher as to the value of the Kingdom.
It was in respect to this same Pearl of Great Price, the Kingdom, that St. Paul declared that he counted all other things, great and small, of an earthly kind, as "loss and dross." Yea, said he, "these are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us" – the Kingdom glory. Nor was it an idle boast. God put him to the test and he showed his appreciation by the things which he endured, and by the willingness with which he endured them. Few young Jews had the same brilliant prospects as his. He was of a wealthy family, he had a splendid education for his day, he had wonderful natural talent as a lawyer, he was a wonderful logician, and to back all this up, he was a Roman citizen, which of itself was worth a "great price." Like other men, he surely perceived the possibilities which lay before him in life, how prominent he might become, how he could surround himself with ease and comfort, the joys of a home and a family, the sensual pleasures of the world in general, and especially attain a good name amongst men, which is rather to be chosen than great riches, but with every prospect, also, of adding great riches to those which he had already inherited. These things were before him for a time, until in God's providence he caught a glimpse of the "Pearl of Great Price." Once having seen it, all other things lost their value in his estimation. He gladly covenanted with God to give up everything that he might become the possessor of the Pearl of Great Value.
And how faithful he was the New Testament abundantly testifies. He gave his all, he gave it freely, he gave it gladly, he gave it joyfully. So high was his appreciation of the prize he was gaining that all he gave for it in the way of sacrifice, suffering, self-denial and misrepresentation, slander, poverty, imprisonment and death he counted to be but loss and dross in comparison with the riches of this inheritance, the Pearl of Great Price – the privilege of joint-heirship with Messiah in His glorious Kingdom.
What, then, is this pearl? The Great Teacher tells us that it is the Kingdom of Heaven! It is the Kingdom which God for ages has promised shall be established under the whole heavens for the blessing of all the families of the earth. It is variously styled: The Kingdom of God, the Kingdom of Christ, the Kingdom of Heaven. It signifies the rule, the government, the dominion. Particularly, it signifies to us the privilege of being joint-heirs with Messiah in that glorious reign of righteousness which He will establish as God's representative in the earth – the Kingdom which eventually shall overthrow all sin, which shall cause the knowledge of God to fill the whole earth, and which eventually will produce on earth the same blessed condition which prevails in heaven. It is the Kingdom referred to by Jesus when He told us to pray, "Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is done in Heaven."
This Kingdom has not yet come. Satan is still the "Prince of this world." We are still under the reign of sin and death. The only work thus far accomplished is the redemptive work of Jesus finished at Calvary, and the further work of showing amongst men this Pearl of Great Price – the privilege of joint-heirship with Jesus in His Kingdom, and of permitting a limited number to purchase this Pearl of Great Price. It is offered to each one who is willing to give all that he has, whether that all be much or little. He can not have it for less. It is worth a thousand times more.
The Great Redeemer Himself was offered this Pearl by the Heavenly Father. Thus the apostle declared of Jesus, "Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God." (Heb. 12:2.) And in harmony with the Divine plan Jesus, during the past nineteen centuries, has been offering a share with Himself in this Glorious Kingdom, to such as rightly value it and are willing to give all they have therefor. But the opportunity will not continue long. Very soon we believe this opportunity will cease, because the elect, predestinated number will have accepted, and thus the opportunity will cease.
But where the opportunity of the Church to gain the Great Prize ends, the opportunity for mankind in general to be blessed will begin. As soon as the Kingdom Class shall be completed and glorified, the Kingdom reign will begin, bringing light, knowledge, blessing and privilege to all the sons and daughters of Adam. "The Sun of Righteousness will arise with healing in his beams." But that Great Sun of righteousness is the Kingdom, and whoever would have a share in it must now purchase the same by walking in the footsteps of Jesus, who has set us an example that we should walk in His steps.
I am glad, my dear friends, to tell you that I for one have consecrated my little all to the Lord, and am planning to lay it down in His service as the days go by. I trust that many of you have done similarly, and that others, seeing the value of the prize, may at once go to the Lord and make a full consecration to Him, that they also may be counted in as members of His Bride, as members of the Kingdom Class. The gaining of this Kingdom, the sacrificing of our all to the Lord will mean the giving up of all earthly ambitions, but it will not necessarily mean the giving up of our earthly occupations, if these seem to be the ones by which we may best glorify God and serve His cause. You see, then, the difference between ambitions of a merchant or a physician, or a teacher, and the mere following of these in a secondary sense, not as our ambition, but as our labor in life. Thus Saint Paul, in giving up all for the prize, the Pearl, the Kingdom, on occasion became a tentmaker, working to supply the needs of himself and others, but tentmaking was no longer his ambition, no longer his aim or prize, but merely an incidental stepping stone in connection with his purchase of the great Pearl of the Kingdom. God grant that it may be so with you and me as we seek to purchase the Pearl of Great Price by the sacrifice of every earthly interest and ambition.
AMONG the members of the Missions Investigating Committee who visited Manila Sunday was Dr. L. W. Jones, a physician and surgeon of Chicago, who has traveled extensively in the interest of bible study, for he has found time amidst other duties to give considerable study to Holy Writ. He supplemented the remarks of the other members of the committee by giving a short address. His remarks were in substance as follows:
Ladies and Gentlemen:
I desire to briefly give you my views of the bible from the standpoint of a doctor. I have always been interested in the Scriptures, but not until some ten years ago did I come to see how reasonable and consistent the bible was, and how in harmony it was with what we ought to expect of a great being like the Almighty, whose attributes we have learned to recognize as Justice, Wisdom, Love and Power.
As doctors we go about from day to day, year in and year out endeavoring to relieve the poor world of its aches and pains. We use our best judgment and endeavors, bring to our assistance all the aids known to the medical and surgical world, but the best we can do is to palliate and give temporary relief, for death claims all sooner or later and we are helpless to withstand its reaping hand. Therefore, questions come to the mind of every thinking physician and surgeon: Why are all the aches, pains, sickness, death and sorrow? Has this condition of things always existed? If not, when and how did it begin? Will it ever cease? If so, when and how? We realize that we can do very little this side of the grave, and so another question comes to us, Is there hope beyond the grave?
For answers to all of these questions we may study all the known sciences such as mathematics, astronomy, chemistry, geology, biology, etc., and study the histories of the world, but our search is in vain; they can tell us nothing. The only answers are found in that great "book of books" – the bible. It answers all questions and in a way that appeals to any unbiased and reasoning mind. We, therefore, turn to the bible for a little while this evening to be instructed therefrom.
Turning to the Bible and citing such texts of Scripture as Genesis 2:7, Gen. 1:31, Deut. 32:4, Psalms 18:30 and Ezekiel 28:15, he declared that God created man perfect, in His own image and likeness, not in the image and likeness of a monkey, as our Evolutionist friends would have us believe. He further demonstrated from the Scriptures that the perfect man was placed in the perfect Garden of Eden, with [CR209] all the requisites necessary for his sustenance throughout all eternity, upon the one condition of obedience, that disobedience in God's sight is sin, and that God clearly stated that the penalty of sin is DEATH, and not something after death, such as eternal torment. (Gen. 2:17, Romans 6:23, James 1:15). In answer to the argument that might be brought to the effect that the soul cannot die, he stated that never in the chemical laboratory with any of the various analyses, or with the microscope having the highest power lens or with the scalpel in either the dissecting room or at the operating table has any scientist ever been able to discover that a man has a soul that could not die. He refuted the argument by quoting Ezekiel 8:4,20, Isa. 53:12, and Matthew 10:28. From these texts he showed that man is a soul, as are all breathing, sentient beings – not that man has a soul.
He then called attention to the fact that Adam did sin, he did not go into eternal torment, but he did die, and that as a result he brought the whole world into sin, condemnation and death, as shown in Gen. 5:5; Rom. 5:12,18, 1 Cor. 15:21,22. He then declared that the condition of death, instead of being a condition where a man was more alive (in heaven, hell or purgatory) than he was before he died, and where there was blazing fire, cursing and blasphemy, shrieks and groans, pains and sufferings and remorse, great activity and anxiety for friends who have not yet died; was a condition of extinction – oblivion, of darkness. (Job 10:21); no remembrance (Psa. 6:5); place of silence (Psa. 115:17: land of forgetfulness (Psa. 88:11) where there is neither work nor device, wisdom nor knowledge (Eccl. 9:5,10; Job 14:21).
He further called attention to how the world is dying mentally, morally, and physically, as illustrated by all our insane asylums, hospitals, jails, work-houses and penitentiaries and stated that breathing your last breath was not all there is to death, but that death included all of the concomitant symptoms of the multitude of diseases with which mankind is afflicted.
He described all of the misery, sorrow, sickness, suffering and depravity that is about us, as being part of the awful curse that is upon mankind, stating that the world was practically one great, foul abscess as prophesied by the Prophet Isaiah, 1:6. Thus people estimated as twenty thousand million have come into the world through much pain and suffering, there have been twenty thousand million death-bed scenes, and twenty thousand million funerals. Thus mankind have been going down into the grave "sheol," "hades," the tomb, and are now dying at the rate of ninety thousand a day, without any hope so far as they themselves are concerned of stopping the dying process or of recovery of themselves from the death state, for the Scriptures state in Psalm 47:9, "None of them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him."
Dark as is the awful picture which he described, he stated that there is a silver lining to this dark cloud. The speaker then showed how God came to the rescue of mankind nearly two thousand years ago and provided a Great Physician who would be able to do for mankind all that we would like to do, but which we are unable to accomplish. He showed from John 3:16 that "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son (The Great Physician) that whosoever believed in Him should not perish, but might have everlasting life." Also from 1 John 4:9 and Romans 5:8 he called attention to the fact that Jehovah God, instead of being a terrible tyrant and vengeful God, was a God of love and in the giving of His Son for us while we were yet sinners, He manifested His love as fully as He demonstrated His justice in carrying out the death penalty which He had pronounced upon Adam for his sin.
While on earth Jesus demonstrated the authenticity of His claims as the Great Physician by performing many miracles while on earth, opening the eyes of the blind, curing the palsied, the lepers and many others, and even awakening the dead. These, he said, were but samples of the work the Great Physician would do in His due time. Eventually He would fulfill the oath-bound promise God made to Abraham, saying, "In thee and in thy seed will I bless all families of the earth," and the promise given by the angel at the birth of our Lord and Saviour when he said, "Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be unto ALL people.
But, he stated, in answer to the query, When and how will this all be accomplished, and why the delay since Jesus came, died and paid man's penalty, by going into death for him? – he stated that the Great Physician intends to have a whole corps of under physicians and nurses, and is now enlisting recruits for his hospital service. He showed that it requires time to find sufficient who are willing to enlist and undergo the training necessary for the great work of restoring all the mentally, morally and physically sick. He then showed how God went to the Jews to find enough who were willing to enlist under the banner of the Great Physician, who showed them that they must go through a similar course of training to that which He experienced, that they must be touched with the feelings of the infirmities of mankind, must become acquainted with all of their trials, temptations and besetting sins in order to properly deal with them in the due time. However, as shown from Romans 11:5, He found but a remnant, and the rest were blinded for a season, and God's favor has gone now for the past nineteen hundred years to the gentiles (Acts 15:14), "to take out of them a people for His name," called the "fulness of the Gentiles" (Romans 11:25). These have been taken out of every people, kindred, nation and tongue; Americans, Europeans, Chinese, Japanese, Indians – from all nations. Why? In order that no person who ever lived will be able to state that his condition is such that none can sympathize with him or understand his disease. There will be some from amongst all of these under-physicians to the Great Physician who will have gone through similar experiences, mentally, morally and physically.
The bible shows that this full number of recruits has nearly been filled, that they have been tested and glorified on the Divine plane with the Great Physician, and that just as soon as the last few have finished their training and qualified, then they, too, will be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, and be with the Great Physician. This means the blindness upon the Jews, God's originally chosen people, will be removed, and the Apostle Paul tells in Romans 11:15 that it will mean the resurrection of the dead.
Jesus also declared that "All in their graves shall hear the voice of the Son of Man and come forth." Paul further attests this in Acts 24:15, that "There shall be a resurrection of both the just and the unjust." Thus is shown that All, both just and unjust are dead, and Jesus said in John 3:13, "No man hath ascended into heaven." Not even David, the man after God's own heart, went to heaven, as said the Apostle Peter, Acts 2:34.
Then, said the speaker, will begin the great judgment day of a thousand years, when those on earth will be cured of all their troubles, physical, mental and moral, and also those under the earth. The world's great hospital will be in full operation for the next thousand years blessing all the willing and obedient, at the hands of the Great Physician and His under-physicians. The work will be done by processes [CR210] of testing, trial and judgments or disciplines. The time is spoken of when the "highway of holiness" shall be opened up, on which all the redeemed may walk, step by step, to the perfection once enjoyed by father Adam when fresh from the Creator's hands. (Isa. 35:10.)
The speaker declared that then would be fulfilled the prophesies spoken by the mouths of all God's holy prophets. (Acts 3:19-21) Quoting a few, such as Isaiah 61:1-3, Isa. 35:5-6, "Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the dead shall be unstopped, the lame man shall leap as an hart and the tongue of the dumb shall sing." "In that day none shall say I am sick." "And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain; for the former things are passed away." And there shall be no more curse." (Rev. 21:4, 22:3.)
Thus, my friends, the bible gives the only answer to the many questions that have arisen in our minds. God has permitted all of this trouble in order that man may learn the great lesson of the exceeding sinfulness of sin, so that through all eternity they may live here on this restored earth in peace and happiness, and serve their God from the standpoint of love.
The speaker declared that the reverent study of the bible was the grandest study of all the sciences, the study which "addeth wisdom to the wise and maketh wise the simple." He urged that all Christians throw away their creeds and unite upon the study of the bible. He stated the greatest helps to bible study had come from studying the wonderful writings of Pastor Russell, the speaker of the afternoon.
WE then returned to the Army and Navy Club for meals and for rest, and I can assure you this was greatly appreciated, for here we got some American cooking which tasted "like mother used to cook." We had been eating food cooked by Japanese and Chinese. Here at the Club we had opportunity of meeting many of the officers of the Army and some of the Governors and Judges of the Island Provinces. Through all of these men whom we met and our travels about the Island we learned a great deal about the conditions there. So at this point of my letter I want to say that I am proud of the United States in what she has done for the Philippinos and the country. It is something marvelous and in such decided contrast with the way the European countries have done with their colonies. Here we saw improvements on every hand and the people being educated, lifted up and civilized, while in other countries they have been kept in subjection. They have free compulsory education, and of the original 1,000 teachers taken over from the United States, 800 still remain, and these are supplemented by 8,000 native teachers; and besides the schools they now have, arrangements are now under way for 400 more to be put up at once, as the present accommodations are inadequate for the needs of the people, who are waking up to their privileges. It is now necessary to have half day sessions, one set of pupils coming in the morning and the other half attending in the afternoon. Then I want to speak a word for the personnel of the officers and men that our Government has sent out there. I never saw better specimens of men, far superior to what I had expected to find. Uncle Sam has done more in the last ten years with his gunboats and soldiers for the civilization of the Philippinos than Missionaries could have done in a hundred years. Now is the time for the truth to gain an entrance and the natives are hungry to read. Announcement was made at the meetings that free literature would be sent to any who would write their names and address on slips of paper. Several hundred slips were handed in.
We left Manila Monday afternoon, and were told to hurry and get aboard our ship, which was at anchor out in the harbor, so at three o'clock we went in what they told us was the last launch. However, we found they had an immense cargo of hemp to load, 4,000 bales, each weighing 260 pounds. This took them until after eleven o'clock at night to load, so it was nearly midnight when we lifted anchor. We had a very quiet sea all the way to Hong Kong, arriving there on the 18th.
In our absence arrangements had been made for Brother Russell to address a gathering of Chinese Christians in the City Hall that evening. We found about one hundred and fifty assembled, who paid close attention to all that was said, and wanted another meeting the next night. Brother Russell was scheduled to speak to English-speaking [CR211] people the next day at four and nine o'clock. The only time, therefore, for another Chinese meeting was between those two meetings, so arrangements were accordingly made. All were greatly surprised to find nearly four hundred Chinese present, and they, too, gave close attention. Of course an interpreter was used at those meetings. Their language is the funniest ever. It sounds as though the speaker had a hot potato in his mouth and at the same time was troubled with cleft-palate and had a bad cold. They wanted more meetings, but those could not be supplied. They also want literature, and this they will be able to have soon, as arrangements were made for some to be printed; also for the first volume to be printed in Chinese. It seems that the Lord is turning from the white people and going to the natives in these various countries, similar to His turning from the Jews to the Gentiles at the first advent.
Regarding the meetings addressed by Pastor Russell while in Hong Kong, the South China Press wrote up the following:
PASTOR RUSSELL.
"Where are the dead?" asked Pastor Russell at the City Hall last evening, and in the course of an hour and a half he supplied an answer to the question. The Hall was crowded, many people having to be content with standing room, and throughout strict attention was given, the audience very evidently being given seriously to thinking.
The famous preacher is no sensationalist. A venerable looking gentleman, with white hair and white beard, he speaks with great earnestness in a clear voice in which the American twang is just to be traced, and an occasional flash of gentle humor lends point to an affective though unassuming platform style.
The Bible the speaker advanced as the one true basis of life, and he lamented that although all the denominations agree there is one God, one faith, one baptism, and one Church of the Living God, yet there should be such discrepancies as now exist. Where were these denominations authorized in the Bible? Nowhere, and the simplest and the best way for them all would be to throw aside all those creeds which had divided people into sections and come together on one platform with the Word of God.
They wanted to see what the Bible said about where the dead were. It said the dead know not anything; their sons come to honor and they know it not, to dishonor and they perceived it not. Why was it? Let the Bible answer again – because there was neither wisdom nor knowledge in Sheol. And was not Sheol hell? Yes, Sheol was hell, and all were going to the Bible hell, but the Bible hell was not a hell of torture. The Bible hell was the grave. If all were doomed to be eternally roasted it would not be just. It was time they got to the truth and rid themselves of a lot of rubbish of the dark ages.
Ultimately, said Pastor Russell, there would be a great manifestation, and then all would see that God's ways were wise and just and loving and altogether right, and that he was able to do according to His good pleasure not a God with good intentions but lacking in power, nor a God with bad intentions abusing His power, but a God with good intentions gradually working out all things according to the guidance of His own will. By Adam's sin all died; by the death of Jesus all were redeemed. All their creeds told them the dead were really more alive than they were alive, but the dead were really dead, and the hope of the dead was the resurrection of the dead, when there should be a glorious awakening.
Following the City Hall meeting Pastor Russell addressed between 300 and 400 Chinese.
Later in the evening there was a question meeting, when there was again a large attendance. Pastor Russell delivered a short address and afterwards answered various interrogations on points raised by his two addresses or such as perplexed his questioners. The meeting lasted till close on 11 o'clock.
IT is a very sad sight in China to see human beings doing the work of beasts of burden, and especially the women. There are many large buildings all the way up the sides of the high hills, almost mountains, and all the material for these buildings is carried by men and women up these hills. The material is put in two baskets hung on a pole which is carried across the shoulders. They will carry as high as fifty bricks, twenty-five on each side, and other things in proportion. The amount they carry in each basket is all I would care to lift with both hands. Some of the people are very, very poor, and in the interior, in the famine district, thousands are at the point of starvation, and that section of the country is just between the territory of the two sections at war with each other, and so is not under the rule of either faction of the government.
MONDAY, the 22nd. Well, we are on board ship again, headed for Singapore. Hong Kong is now a matter of history so far as our work is concerned. While there we came into close touch with the existing conditions and have a clear insight as to the results of missionary work activities of the past. Results were what we were looking for and not merely to interview missionaries, although our interviews with many missionaries indicated the condition of their minds as to the hope of converting the world, etc. The members of the committee which we left at Shanghai caught up with us just before we left Hong Kong and are now on board this ship with us. We were very glad to see them again, for our close fellowship for several weeks has brought us very [CR212] near and dear to one another – like the members of a family, and when one or more is absent from the rest of the party, the rest miss them and their prayers are continually with them.
The same ship which brought them to us from Shanghai also brought nearly a dozen missionaries who had spent years in the interior of China, but the war and famine have driven them out and they are now on their return to their homeland, which I believe is Great Britain, at least that is the home of some of them.
Yesterday was an interesting day. At 10:45 there was divine service, conducted by an Episcopal minister, using the Church of England service. After thirty-five minutes of preliminaries, reading Scripture, singing hymns, prayers already printed, and responsive readings, he discoursed for thirteen minutes, using for a text the 38th verse of the 12th chapter of Matthew, where it speaks of a certain generation desiring a sign, but that they should have none, save the sign of Jonah. The sum of his talk was to get into the Church by baptism and there rest quietly, trusting implicitly for the final outcome, not inquiring into doctrines, etc. He used the illustration of a ship, and how we get into a ship, not knowing anything about the engines or charts and maps, but leave it all to the captain and officers. He failed to state, however, how we would know that the Episcopal Church was the right boat and how we should look upon the other churches or boats. There was little to satisfy a thinking or inquiring mind.
In the evening our party all went to another part of the ship to visit the missionaries, above mentioned.
Brother Russell was requested to give them a little talk, which he did from eight o'clock until ten o'clock, treating on the fall, ransom, restitution, resurrection, judgment and a lot of parables. They seem like an earnest band of men and women, and have certainly gone through a great deal and sacrificed much for what they think is the Lord's will. We trust something said may have a tendency to open their eyes and ears to the truth if it is the Lord's will.
FIVE days on the ocean from Hong Kong, passing the coast of French China, brings our party to Singapore, where the whole steamer traffic of the Orient passes in review. Here through passengers for Colombo only call for the day, with chance to visit the fine Botanic Gardens and lunch at one of the great hotels. Those bound to Java, or transferring to the steamer for Rangoon, disembark and have more time to inspect this most cosmopolitan city – beautiful in many parts and curious in all. Swarms of Chinese, black Madrassi and Tamils from India; Malays, Hindus, Javanese, Siamese, Cingalese, Afghans, Burmese and other strange races fill the streets.
This is Thursday morning, January the 25th. We are now leaving Singapore for Penang, our next stop. Yesterday we arrived at Singapore early in the morning and found that our ship would lay over here all day and night. Some of us, therefore, started out to see what could be done about a meeting. We had to go by faith, for we did not know a soul here. However, one thing led to another and finally we got into touch with the Chinese Anglo Mission School, a school which is under the supervision of the Methodist Church. We visited only the school for boys, which has over 1,200. We learned that there was a still larger school for the girls. It was my privilege to visit a number of the rooms. The scholars range in age from six to twenty-six years of age. The higher grades take up a good deal of high school work and also a business course in shorthand, typewriting, bookkeeping, etc. There is also considerable Bible study – Gradually while in the lower grades the prejudice against the Christian religion is broken down and by the time the boys finish school they claim one-third of them are professed Christians, although not many join the churches. The boys are Chinese, Malay and Indian. We continue to hear splendid reports regarding the Chinese and their ability, trustworthiness, etc. It was very interesting to listen to them in school and to examine their written work. Their work would compare very favorably with that in our schools. I was especially impressed with one room containing about forty little tots of about six years old, nearly all Chinese. They started in school last November, only two months ago, at which time they did not know a word of English. The teacher had them recite for me three stories, Jack and Gill, and two others. They all recited together and I never heard a class anywhere speak more in unison than they, and pronounced their words well. Pastor Russell was invited to speak to the [CR213] school, so we got him up there at twelve o'clock, and the teachers gathered the scholars, especially the older ones, in the drill hall, and he spoke to about 300 for nearly an hour. He used a great deal of tact in his remarks and gave them much to think about. His address in brief was as follows:
INTRODUCTION of Pastor Russell by one of the teachers: We are always very glad to have men come to us from other parts of the world. Today we have with us Pastor Russell, of Brooklyn, New York. I do not know what he has to say, but it will be something good. He spoke in China through an interpreter, but he will not have to do that here.
Pastor Russell: It affords me a great deal of pleasure to be here. I had a somewhat similar audience in Manila, and I thought as I looked over this audience and arrangement, how similar it was to that in the Philippine Islands. There, under the care of the United States Government, schooling is given great attention, and they tell us of the wonderful interest being aroused in the people of Manila and all through the Philippine Islands. One thousand teachers were brought over by the United States Government a short time ago, and now there are six thousand Philippine teachers also, so that you see the people of the Philippine Islands are hungry for education. We inquired whether or not they had compulsory education, and they answered, Oh, no, we cannot get the schools built fast enough! They tell us they are obliged to run two different sessions a day. They are building more schools, also. When I came here and looked over the school you have I was impressed that there was the same thought here of desiring to have education. Then while thinking about what I would say to you, a text of Scripture came to my mind. We believe that the Bible is God's Word, a revelation of what His purposes are; He tells us of matters that are going on. I will take that passage in the 12th chapter of Daniel, in the Old Testament. There God told Daniel in advance, 2,500 years ago, about our very day in which you and I are living. This is the circumstance – I believe you will all be interested in it, because it shows the fulfillment of that prophecy. God had told Daniel in advance certain things that would take place in respect to the Jews, and then added some other things that did not apply to the Jews, but to other nations, and Daniel was very anxious to know, and God said, through the angel, Go thy way, Daniel, for those things are closed up and sealed until the time of the end – not the end of time – you see there is a difference between those two thoughts, the end of time and the end of the age. So he explained what it would be like in the time of the end or the end of the age. So that those living in the end of one age might know when it was, and when was the beginning of another age. He pointed out that we are living in a different time, not only in Singapore, but everywhere. You see the electric cars running here, the telephone and the telegraph and steam trains, and you see that you are getting things in this land that we have in other lands. It is not very long since we had the first steamboat and the first tramcar, and not very long since we had the first electric car. These are all new in America and Europe and nearly as new as here in the Straits. Now all these things belong to this new age, and the Bible tells us that the time before us is to be still more wonderful than anything in the past. We are only on the verge of a more wonderful period than the world ever knew, and it is of that time that Daniel's prophecy tells us. (Brother Russell then talked to them for about an hour along the line of "The Signs of the Times," as elsewhere reported in this volume.)
ABOUT eighty of the boys and a number of the teachers board in their boarding school. Brothers Kuehn, Margeson and myself were invited there for dinner, which invitation we accepted. It reminded us considerable of the Bethel dining room. We had an excellent opportunity of getting better acquainted with the teachers, who are a fine class of ladies and gentlemen – all Methodists. They seem earnest and sincere. That evening was the evening for the Epworth League to meet in the Wesley Methodist Church, and as Brother Russell had been asked, while at the school, at noon, to speak at the Epworth League meeting, we all went there after dinner. There were probably fifty all told, nearly all adults present. The minister in charge gave Brother Russell a splendid introduction, stating that he had heard of him through his home paper from England, which he received regularly each week, and whose sermons he was enjoying. Brother Russell then gave another masterly discourse on the Church, the high calling, etc., and the steps leading up to joint heirship with Christ, etc. I took down in shorthand quite a full synopsis of the discourse, which you may read as follows:
THE assistant pastor of the church introduced Pastor Russell by saying, "We have tonight a great privilege, Pastor Russell of London and Brooklyn Tabernacles is to speak to us. I have known of Pastor Russell for some time and have been reading his sermons, which are published each week in the paper I receive from my home in England. I do not know how to better introduce him than to read to you a clipping from the London Graphic, as follows:
"Pastor Russell, who for a number of years has been a frequent visitor to our shores, is about to become more permanently located in Great Britain. He has accepted the pastorate of the London Tabernacle, which is shown in the accompanying picture.
"The advent of Pastor Russell brings to this city and country a man of international reputation, who is known almost as well in Great Britain as he is in America. He has addressed immense audiences in the Royal Albert Hall, London, and in the most prominent provincial cities and towns, and is well known upon the Continent, where he has traveled and lectured extensively.
"He almost always lectures under the auspices of the International Bible Students' Association, which is very strong in Great Britain.
"It is a noteworthy coincidence that just at this time, [CR214] when England is bidding good-bye to one of its most prominent religious leaders, who is taking up a fresh field of activity in the New World, that Pastor Russell, who is reputed to be the most popular preacher in America, should become, almost simultaneously, prominently identified with religious effort in England. However, he retains his charge in New York, and will endeavor to make the voyage to America twice a year to look after the spiritual interests of the Brooklyn Tabernacle congregation."
Pastor Russell will now speak to us.
Pastor Russell: I am very pleased, dear friends, to be with you this evening, and am pleased to have the opportunity of congratulating you upon the work I see here in progress. I had the pleasure of meeting with your school today at the noon hour and am pleased to see the practical way in which you are trying to help the people of this vicinity with better ideas with respect to civilization, and God, and to help them in their present and eternal welfare. I am sure, however, that you may have some discouraging features here, as are found elsewhere, so as I thought about a text several came to my mind. I will take them all and condense as much as possible, but this one specially came before my mind.
Hebrews the 10th chapter, verse 35, "Cast not away, therefore, your confidence, which hath great recompense of reward."
It seems to be a part of the Divine arrangement that God's people should be required to exercise faith. The Apostle writes, "Without faith it is impossible to please God." And this matter of faith is one that is gradually developed in us. We grow in grace, we grow in knowledge, we grow in faith and obedience to the Lord. It is a matter of progress. In the matter of faith, I suppose you feel as the Apostle suggests, and that you will not cast away your confidence in the Lord. It might be very unsafe, dear friends, to have too much confidence in ourselves, but when we think of our great heavenly Father, let us have renewed confidence in Him. Let us remember what the prophet says in Isaiah 55:11, "So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it." That has been a very great consolation to me during experiences when things were not so favorable, and other experiences that were favorable, to remember that God is at the helm in respect to all his own work, and that He is working and operating all things according to the counsel of his own will.
I am glad to address you from the standpoint of the Church of the one God. The hymn selected at the opening is very precious to me, "The Church's one foundation is Jesus Christ her Lord." And further that she in the Divine arrangement is to be the Bride of Christ, and is to be associated as co-worker with Him; hence it strikes me very favorably; it seems to me it is one song that all Christians should learn to sing. It may be that we are of different denominations, under different control, but in deed and in truth there is but the one Church of the living God, whose names are written in heaven. I am glad, dear brothers and sisters, to tell you that I hope and believe that I belong to that one Church, and it is my hope for you also that you belong to the same one Church. It is the one mentioned here in the hymn to which the Apostle refers in his letter to the Ephesians [2 Corinthians], "I have espoused you as a chaste virgin unto one husband, which is Christ." This was not only applicable to the Church at Corinth, but to all people in every age from that time to the present; we are all espoused to the Lord. This matter of espousal is one of the beautiful illustrations in which the Lord tells us of the very close relationship between Himself and His people – the thought is that of a true bride and true bridegroom. We could imagine, as the Scriptures tell us, that there have been failures in the Church to live up to their true privileges, because worldliness has come in, but let us think of it from the Apostle's standpoint of the true virgin class and endeavor to hold this position, and not seek to become contaminated with the spirit of the word, but to seek to have that meekness and purity of heart, which the Lord, the great Bridegroom, approves, and which alone will make us acceptable to Him when He comes to make up these chaste virgins, the Church of the Living God. And when we think of the virgin Church of Christ it calls to our mind, you remember, our Lord's expression in reference to His second coming, for I presume that all the Lord's people here in the Straits of Malay have before their minds the same thought, the Apostle enunciated, that we are all to look for our Lord as the great heavenly Bridegroom. If we are espoused to Him and are to have a share in the marriage with Him, we are necessarily interested in his second coming when He will receive us to Himself, and must have in mind that at His second coming the marriage will take place.
This leads to the thought that marriage was not the same amongst the Jews in the times of our Lord and Apostles as today. We have a very different ceremony. Now a contract is made and they come before some authority representative of the Lord and they make their acknowledgement and are pronounced husband and wife. But this was not the same at the time of our Lord. The custom was very different. What they did was to have an espousal which might last for perhaps a year, and during all that time of espousal the virgin was expected to retain her virginity, her purity, her loyalty to whom she was espoused. And so this was the Apostle's thought, when He said, I have espoused you, the Church at Corinth, as a chaste virgin, unto Christ. What do we mean by this espousal? Oh, we have entered into a contract, as did the Jews. They made the contract either with the Bride's brother, or her father, who represented her, and obligations were entered into by which it was determined what the bridegroom would give to the bride, and her obligations. So we have entered into a special contract with our heavenly Father. We have learned that through Him we are to have everlasting life, and He has given us this great honor of becoming the Bride of His Son and his heir and joint-heir with the Son. Of what? Oh, of all that He has and what He is to have. What is He to have? Oh, things that eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of natural man, but God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit.
Oh, how much love will He require? What tests will He have upon us if He would have us worthy? How much love does he require? Oh, a great deal, my dear brothers and sisters; a great deal of love is required! He has expended a great deal of love upon us, "He so loved us that He gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believed on Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." And He was obedient, even to the death of the cross. Wherefore, God hath highly exalted Him, has given Him a name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee shall ultimately bow, not only on earth but the things of heaven. These are the things to which we may be made joint-heirs, "If so be that we suffer with Him that we may be also glorified together." But do you say the sufferings of Christ are linked in with that? Yes, it seems that the heavenly Father wishes to prove the degree of our love, for if we do not love much we will not be willing to suffer for the Truth and Christ's sake, and if we do love much we will be willing to suffer and endure hardness as good soldiers, and to count everything else as loss and dross that we might become a joint-heir, and be His Bride in the great work that He is to accomplish. It seems to me, my dear brothers and sisters, that this is a wonderful hope He has set before us. We who were children of wrath as others, and not worthy to be sons of God, He hath brought nigh, and has given us this invitation that we may become followers of God, that we may be children of God, that we may become the Bride of Christ. How wonderful it is! What does it imply? Suppose we should become the Bride of Christ, is there anything great attached to that? To the saints the various names given to God's people, whether Methodist saints, Episcopal saints, Roman Catholic saints, Congregational saints, or Baptist saints, does not matter, for the important feature is not the label, but the fact that they are saints and belong to Christ, and so the Apostle says in Gal. 3:29, "And if ye are Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise."
"If ye be Christ's," coming back to the statement when writing to the Corinthians. If you are espoused to Christ, if you belong to the chaste virgin Church, then what? Oh, it means so much, dear friends. How much? Why, said one, Brother Russell, I never thought it meant so very much. It means we will get heaven? Oh, yes. Like the angels? Yes, but more. How much more than angels will we have? Oh, well, we must take what God has said; God said that we shall be joint-heirs with Christ. The angels are not joint-heirs with Christ; they must all worship Him. It is different to be made a joint-heir with Christ and a worshipper – "Let all the angels of God worship Him." But there is a difference between the worship that will come to Christ from the angels and from mankind, and the special relationship that [CR215] will be between Christ and the Church. This is the particular thought that is given us in telling us that we are the espoused Church. So Jesus said, "He that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I overcame and am set down with my Father in His throne."
Then the Apostle goes on to tell us further that in our glorious resurrection change we shall be like Him and see Him as He is. How like Him, and what is He? The express image of the Father's person. Is He higher than angels. Far above angels. And we shall be like Him? Yes, and we will be far above principalities and angels. And all of this is implied in the statement, "Heirs of God and joint-heirs with Jesus Christ." It represents us as being on the same plane. It is like a joint stock company; all the members of that company have equal share. So that when we read we are to be joint-heirs with Christ, we are to share or participate with Him in all that He has. I remind you of what Saint Peter Said, "Wherefore are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises that by these (promises working in us, inspiring hope, giving courage, urging us to endeavor and bring to greater and greater faithfulness) we (the espoused Church) might become partakers of the divine nature." Now what do you think of that? Is it not too wonderful to believe? Higher than angels, cherubim and seraphim, still higher, to the plane of the divine nature, which will be the divine Father, the divine Son, and by and by the divine Bride, the Lamb's wife. Is it not too much to believe? Yes, if God did not make it so plain in His Word. No wonder Saint Paul calls it a high calling – this very high invitation which God has given us to be associated with His Son in all these wonderful things.
Now again, referring to Gal. 3:29, "If ye be Christ's." How much hangs on that word Christ! Not merely the first steps to be Christ's. If we take the first step, and if we come then to take the next step, and if we abide in Him, and if we shall by faithfulness come off conquerors, and more than conquerors, if all that is there (and never forget it), then what about the if? "If ye be Christ's then are ye Abraham's seed." Abraham's seed? Yes. I thought that was for the Jews. Well there are two seeds; the Jews are a part of that seed, but there is another, the spiritual seed, and we may be members of the spiritual seed. This espoused virgin of Church is invited to become the Bride of Christ in exactly the same way that Rebecca became the wife of Isaac. This is the Apostle's thought. There are two seeds, the first, the spiritual seed, is higher, then comes the earthly seed. So God said to Abraham, "Thy seed shall be as the stars of heaven (that is, Christ and the Church), and as the sands of the seashore" (the earthly seed). One is heavenly and the other is earthly. You and I could never be of the earthly seed because we have been invited to become the Bride of Christ and He is the heir of that Abrahamic seed. If ye be Christ's – if you are espoused to Him and make your calling and election sure, and become a member of the Bride of Christ, then you are Abraham's seed. Well, what of it? Oh, that seed of Abraham is the most wonderful promise in the Bible, everything in the Bible is about that seed of Abraham. I remind you of what the Apostle says of the matter in Hebrews 6th chapter, verses 18 and 19, where he is talking about this promise that God made to Abraham. God knew that it would be 3,500 years before it would be fulfilled. God not only promised Abraham these things, but He swore to them by two immutable things, that God could not change, that we might have strong consolation. It was not for Abraham's benefit, but it was necessary for us that God added his oath that we, the Gospel Church, might have strong consolation, we who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us, as an anchor to our souls, both sure and steadfast, which anchoreth within the vail, which Jesus has entered. What hope? This hope of becoming Abraham's seed; this hope that we might inherit those promises made to Abraham. What is it? My dear brethren, the fact that you are here and are deeply interested in this work shows that you are deeply interested in the promise; that all the families of the earth shall be blessed. That is why you are here, because you are interested in humanity, and you would like to carry the blessings of God to every creature, and God's promise to Abraham is eventually that all shall be blessed. Oh, but you say, Brother Russell, it is six thousand years and we hear by the statistics of Great Britain and the American government that there are twice as many heathen now as there were a century ago. Well, do not become discouraged and cast away your confidence. How shall we understand it? If there are twice as many heathen now as there were a century ago, in another century would not there be twice as many more? How can the Abrahamic promise be fulfilled? Just this way, my dear friends, when we see God's plan which is so wonderful and beautiful.
God has not yet finished this work of making up this seed of Abraham. He began it with Jesus, who is the Head, and we are the under-members. Jesus is the Bridegroom, but we are the espoused virgins, to be His Bride; but not until the whole Church is completed will the Seed of Abraham be complete. "If ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed." Now, if the Abrahamic seed is not completed we see a reason why all the families of the earth are not blessed. We are not to expect all the families of the earth to be blest until the Abrahamic seed is complete, and this is what God has been doing the past 1,800 years, selecting the seed, Jesus the Head and the Church His Body. "If ye are Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed."
You remember when Jesus came, the first offer was given to the nation of Israel; they got all these opportunities. He told His disciples, "Go not into the way of the Gentiles and into the cities of the Samaritans enter ye not." And so you remember Saint Paul said to the Jews, It was necessary that the Gospel should be preached first to you, but it did not end with you; seeing you count yourselves unworthy, lo, we turn to the Gentiles. So God did take out some from the Jews, to be members of this spiritual Seed of Abraham. On Pentecost there were several thousand and the Holy Spirit adopted them into God's family, no longer belonging to the house of servants, as we read in Hebrews 3:5,6: "And Moses verily was faithful in all his house as a servant for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken after; but Christ as a Son over His own house; whose house are we, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end." We belong, you see, to the house of Sons – spiritual, not the natural seed. This spiritual seed God has been gathering during 1,800 years from all nations, and after being called they are to be proved, and tested, and found worthy. You know how it is, and I know. "Through much tribulation shall ye enter into the Kingdom." Every one of that class must endure trials. So if you and I have a share in it let us remember what the Lord said to the Apostle, Rejoice that you are counted worthy to suffer for His sake. It is just like a piece of money. If it did not seem right, you would say, that does not look right, does not look good, and you would test it with acid, to see if it was good. If it were copper you would not test it at all. You would not waste the acid. So with the trials of God's people, they are only put upon those who give at least an outward appearance of obedience. This experience is only preparing us for a glorious place in the Bride of Christ.
Another thing about this is the text of Brother Wesley, it is found in Revelation and reads, "And the spirit and the Bride say, Come, and let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." At one time we had not noticed the meaning of this text, but when we carefully investigate now we see that we as God's Church are merely espoused virgins; we are not the Bride yet; we are not the Bride until the marriage. We are espoused to Him as a Bride, and at the second coming He is to receive us to Himself, and the marriage of the Lamb will come. Then we will be the Bride. So you remember that our Lord in the parable represented that at his coming there would be a class, all virgins, some wise and some foolish. You and I want to be of the wise class, having our lamps trimmed, not merely the light of God's Word, but also oil in our vessels, – the Holy Spirit in our hearts, – so at the second coming of our Lord, whenever that time shall come, we may be ready with our lamps trimmed and burning, because none but the wise virgins shall go in. Will there be any more Brides? No. Only one Bride. No polygamy, just one Bride of Christ, and she will be His and the marriage will take place at the second coming, and the door will be shut. No one else will ever become of that Bride class. They will fail of that particular blessing which we have already seen is the most wonderful proposition that could be made before human minds, heirs of God and joint-heirs with Jesus Christ our Lord, to an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and which fadeth not away, but is reserved in heaven for you who have been kept by the power of God, ready to be revealed at the end of this [CR216] age – that will be the time. What kind of salvation then? Oh, the salvation of the first resurrection. His words are, Rev. 20:6, "Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection; on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years." What, is the Bride going to reign with the Bridegroom a thousand years? That is what Jesus said, She shall sit with Him on his throne and reign with Him a thousand years, share His glory, honor, immortality, etc., in all the great work of his Messianic Kingdom. Now, don't you and I want to be members and prove faithful so that we who have been invited to be His Bride may be received to Himself? I am sure that we do, and so this text that we have been discussing has a wonderful force. The Spirit of the Bride were not saying Come at the time it was written; it is a future text. There is no Bride yet to say Come. Neither is there any river of water of life. Suppose some one should ask, where will you find the river of the water of life? My dear friends, there is none now, but God has promised it. Hear what Jesus said, "That water that I shall give him shall be in Him a well of water springing up unto everlasting life." You see it is a well spring, you have it in your heart if you have the begetting of the Holy Spirit, and I also in my heart. Some have the wells of water springing up, bubbling up. If we are faithful more and more each day this water of life is more and more precious to us. It is my own experience as the days go by that the water of life springing up is all the more precious. And where will this great river of the water of life come from? Let us go and see. It is all written how the Redeemer who is to be our Bridegroom, said in Revelation, Come hither, John, and I will show you the Bride, the Lamb's wife. That means, I will show you the Church, after her change, after the marriage has taken place, because now she is the virgin, espoused, then she will be the married wife. The marriage of the Lamb will come for his wife hath made herself ready. John turned and looked and he said, I beheld the New Jerusalem, etc., filled with the glory of God. That is a picture of the Church in glory, after the Church has been completed, and the marriage shall have taken place, pictured by the New Jerusalem; not literal golden streets, not literal walls. A city in symbol represents a Kingdom, and authority, and rule. God has promised that His Kingdom shall come as Jesus taught us to pray. How could we ever pray if we did not believe; but we are praying and striving in connection with this, that the Kingdom is to come and that it is to accomplish wonderful things, that God's will is to be done on earth even as it is done in heaven. What a wonderful change! Yes, it will be the Kingdom power. Under Him every knee shall bow and every tongue confess. All the blind eyes and all the deaf ears shall be opened, thank God! You and I have tried also to open some blind eyes and found ourselves totally unable to do so, for several years, because it was absolutely beyond our power. All we can do is not much; you are doing what you are doing, and I am doing what I am doing. Jesus said he that hath an ear to hear let him hear. We cannot make him hear. He that hath an ear – tell it not only with your lips but with your lives. Show forth the praises of Him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Not all have the hearing ears and the seeing eyes. The glorious time is coming when all the blind eyes shall be opened and all the deaf ears shall be unstopped and unto Him every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess, and the glory of the Lord shall fill the whole earth.
What shall we be doing then, my dear brothers and sisters? Oh, we will be associated with Him in all that great missionary work. It is a blessed privilege, whether in a foreign country, or in a city, or in the home land, to do anything that we can now. But it will be grand that if we have the blessed privilege of service, and shall by and by have the privilege of lifting up the whole world. When the glorious Kingdom of Messiah shall be established, when we shall be reigning, that will be the time. Notice this statement, the New Jerusalem comes down out of heaven, from God, and then what? Note what John tells us about the New Jerusalem; it is the one Church that is pictured, which has twelve foundations, no more, no less; and in the twelve foundation stones were the names of the twelve Apostles of the Lamb. That is our Church, is it not? It surely is. It is the one for which all Christians pray, whose names are written in heaven, founded by the Lord Jesus Christ, whose primary teachers are Christ and the Apostles. That is our Church. Well, what about it? Listen: And John watched and saw from underneath the throne – not through the throne – a river of water of life, beautiful, clear as crystal, pure, clean truth, proceeding from under the throne. Where was it going? It goes outside the city itself. The city is the Church. Where is it going? Way out to the world. Then what? On either side of the banks of the river there were twelve manner of trees, and their leaves were for the healing of the heathen. What? Yes, and the leaves were for the healing of the people. What more? This water of life that flowed out is that of which the Bride said Come and take of the water of life freely. Oh, how wonderful it will be! Everybody will have a good chance to come. Are you not glad? I am. Oh, I am so glad that these poor people who have not yet heard will have such a glorious opportunity then, when the Spirit and the Bride shall say come. It will be with power. There will be a river of water of life then.
But, Brother Russell, was not the spirit merely poured out on the handmaidens and servants at Pentecost and the same now? Why speak about the spirit in the world? That is a part of the prophecy of Joel. We did not notice how it read, – after those days, and in those days. We are in those days, in which God pours out his spirit upon his servants and his handmaidens, and if you and I are such we get a portion of it, and if we remain his servants we continue to have the Holy Spirit. And after those days then I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh. Not merely upon the servants and handmaidens. Now it is only for them, but after these days it will be upon all flesh.
Come back to Gal. 3:29, "If ye are Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed and heirs, according to the promise." What promise? The promise made to Abraham. What is the promise? It is this: Abraham, I intend to bless the world, not merely the Church. Abraham, I will tell you what I intend to do; that blessing to the world shall come through your seed. It has taken God all this time to get this seed of Abraham. If you belong to Christ you are heirs of that [CR217] promise. The world is to be blessed and it is to be by you and by me, if we are members of the Abrahamic seed. I tell you, my dear friends, I want to be a member of the Abrahamic seed, and an heir of God, and a joint-heir with Jesus Christ. I am glad every day I live of having the privilege of showing to those who have the eyes to see, the ears to hear, and the hearts to appreciate, about God's great plan. But when I look down upon the world in general and see the thousands of millions, and their hopeless condition unless God does something, and then to see that God has it all planned out and intends to do it all, and that you and I may have a share not only in the present missionary enterprises at home and abroad, but by and by, if faithful here, we will reign with Him, and if we are dead with Him we shall live with Him, I tell you there is something worth living for and enduring for. That is the pay that God gives us, the trials and difficulties now and testings of faith because He does not intend that any shall share that blessing in the future if not faithful now. But if we deny Him He also will deny us, and if we confess Him, and are loyal to Him, He will take pleasure in confessing us to the heavenly Father and the holy angels, and we shall be absolutely blameless when the Bridegroom will present the Bride to the Father.
In the 45th Psalm we read that She, the Church, is all glorious within: Oh, my dear brothers and sisters, within – in the heart. Without it is not always what we would like to be. But this Bride is all that she should be; she shall be brought in, in fine needlework. The gold represents the divine nature, the white linen represents the purity, and the needlework the beautiful outworkings of Christian character. The picture of the Scripture is that when we come to the Lord in our own imperfections we are not acceptable; but He gives us a wedding garment, without which we can never enter and become a member of the Bride class. We must have the justification by faith first. You cannot buy it; it is the gift of God through Christ, and it is represented in the fine linen of righteousness of the saints, to cover all our imperfections. "Blessed is the man whose sins are not imputed, whose sins are covered," figuratively, with this robe of Christ's righteousness. This robe has a stamping on it just the same as you would find if you go to some of your stores and get a pattern all stamped on it. Then you would need to take a needle and work out the pattern. The stamping has been given us in our Lord Jesus and we must work it out. The robe is free and the stamping is given us, but we must do the embroidery work. "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling," for it is God that worketh in you to will and to do His good pleasure. It is more and more inspiring as the days go by.
Assistant Pastor: Any other remarks would be entirely out of place, except to say that we appreciate the visit of Pastor Russell with us.
The closest attention was given and at the close they said they wished he was to remain longer, and that if we ever came this way again to be sure to look them up. They certainly have something to think about, which is logical, reasonable and Scriptural. Good results surely ought to come from our visit here. There was one missionary present from Java, and she was much interested and gladly received a tract at the close. Who knows that that may mean the start for further work in Java?
Down here we are only about thirty miles from the equator. We expected to be a shadow or grease spot by this time, but to our surprise found it only about 85 degrees and a nice breeze blowing. However, the rays of the sun are very direct and it is necessary to wear one of their special topies or helmets, otherwise one is liable to experience bad effects from the sun. This is a very tropical country, as you may imagine. We took a ride out some distance in the country and saw rubber plantations, cocoa-nuts growing and all kinds of tropical vegetation.
SATURDAY, Jan. 27th. Well, we have just been doing the city of Penang, which is about two hundred miles on the way from Singapore to Colombo. It has been very hot here, at least 100, so that if you are having zero weather up there you can imagine that we notice some difference here. It is a thoroughly tropical place, and the inhabitants are Malay, Indian and Chinese, the latter predominating. It being Saturday the schools are closed, and as we are here but a few hours could not arrange for any meetings. Several of us took Jinrikshas and rode out to the home of the superintendent of the Methodist Mission Schools, which are branches of the schools we saw at Singapore. They have about 2,000 pupils in all, 200 of these being girls and the rest boys. We had a nice visit with the superintendent and his family and gathered considerable information. They are evidently doing good restitution work here. On our return we visited some large botanical gardens and here saw many tropical plants and trees, cocoanut, clove, cinnamon, acacia, and many, many others. Further along on our way we passed a large race track, and as Saturday afternoon is observed here as a holiday, we met all kinds, shapes and colors of people, wearing all kinds of clothing, and some of them not much of anything. It was the strangest sight I ever saw – it beat any Midway. It was a kaleidoscopic phantasmagoria of miscellaneousness, and then some. The riksha men who pulled us about were Chinese and could not speak English, so we had a great time making them understand where we wanted them to go, and when we finally did get back to the boat we had our trouble in trying to settle with them. No matter how much you may pay them, they always want more. Although all business men speak very highly of the Chinese and have little use for the Japanese, my experience has been just the contrary, and the impression I got of the Japanese is still more favorable than that I have received of the other nations. We are still tied up to the dock and they are loading the cargo, which consists mostly of some kind of flour in bags and great blocks of tin, each block weighing about 75 [CR218] pounds or more. It is said that two-thirds of the tin of the whole world is shipped from Penang. I will be glad when the ship starts up again so that we will get some breeze. We will probably pull out in about two hours.
There is a party of about ten returning missionaries on board, but we cannot do anything with them, as they have ears, but they hear not; eyes, but they see not, and as we are not in the business at present of manufacturing eyes and ears, we have decided to leave them alone. Brother Russell gave them a splendid discourse last Sunday night, which ought to have done them good, and we thought possibly it would, but at Singapore they got hold of some tracts written against Millennial Dawn, and instead of using their own judgments in regard to what they themselves had heard from Brother Russell himself, they preferred to condemn the whole matter because of what they read in that little four-page sheet. We are glad that we can appropriate the passage to ourselves, which reads, "Blessed are your eyes and your ears that they see and hear." There is nothing like the Truth in the whole world.
Jan. 31. Well, this is early Wednesday morning, and we awoke to find the Island of Ceylon in sight, and we are due to land by noon, which is a day earlier than we had expected. Brother Driscoll is probably waiting for us. Since leaving Penang we have had a quiet time; the sea has been very smooth. We have been very busy, however, writing up matter to mail back from Colombo. The weather down here is not half as hot as we had expected, more like our June weather. We are now more than half way around, and are going down the hill, so to speak. Eight more weeks from today and we expect to land in New York.
There is nothing special to write about this morning. We are all well and are looking forward with considerable curiosity to our visit in India, which will be three weeks or more. We will have to purchase bedding to take along with us for use in both hotels and on the trains, as they do not supply any.
With much Christian love to all, I remain, as B4,
Dearly Beloved in the Lord: – HERE we are at the above place, about as far from home as we could well be. This is the Society's headquarters in southern India. I am writing this in the new "Bethel," just finished the day before we arrived. The work here is in charge of Brother L. P. Devasahayam, but now known as Brother Davey. He is the brother many of you will remember having met at the Saratoga Convention. Then he was dressed in Oriental costume, with turban, etc. He had come to America some seven years before to study to be a missionary so as to return to India and instruct his people. Well, after studying for seven years in one of the Methodist colleges in Ohio he graduated an infidel, having no faith in the Bible. About that time some International Bible Students induced him to attend the convention at Saratoga, which he did, began to get back his faith in the Bible, went to Brooklyn, where he remained some time, studied the Bible diligently with the aid of "Millennial Dawn" (that terrible book), or "Studies in the Scriptures," as they are called. He is now a firm believer in the Bible as the revealed Word of God and has returned to India, and since that time has been actively engaged in preaching to large numbers of natives the unsearchable riches of God, and telling them of the wonderful Kingdom which God is about to establish, through which not only they, but also their forefathers (whom they have been taught have gone to a hell of torment), and all others will be blessed with an opportunity of returning to harmony with God. That was "good tidings" to them, for they had never heard anything like it in the past, and the more they hear the more they want to hear and they tell it abroad to every one they can find. As a result, great crowds have been coming to hear Brother Davey expound the gospel, and about thirty traveling workers are associated with him in the work. Of course, as might be expected, the preachers of the eternal torment gospel (?) do not like the advent of this pure light and considerable opposition has been the result. Nevertheless the work pushes on.
Well, I am getting ahead of my story, and must go back to Ceylon, where I mailed letter No. 3, and tell you what has transpired from that time to this. It will be impossible, however, to portray matters as vividly as I would like, because it is impossible to put down on paper all the sights, sounds, and odors which we experienced.
AS our great ship anchored in the harbor of Colombo many small boats full of people hovered around, waiting until the health officers should come on board and inspect the vessel and people who expected to land. We soon noticed in one of the boats the familiar figure of our dear brother, G. C. Driscoll, who had preceded our party several weeks. He, of course, had to wait his turn to come on board, the same as the others. Here he comes up the ladder now, dressed in the tropical garb worn by Europeans and Americans when in this hot country. It was the first time since last November that we had seen him, so it is needless to say that the greetings all around were very hearty. He had many interesting things to relate of his experiences along on the route.
We then got in the small boats, which took us ashore, and went direct to our hotels, met some of the class of Bible Students there and then prepared for business. I will not go into details, but merely mention two meetings at Colombo and one out on Leper Island.
The meetings at Colombo were well attended, but mostly by Orientals the whites as a rule being indifferent to the gospel message. Deep interest was manifested and many handed in their names for literature, so as to learn more about this glad message.
The city itself is quite modern in some respects, but here the customs and costumes, service at hotels, money, language, etc., is all different. We no sooner get accustomed to the manners, money, etc., in one place than we are obliged to begin all over in another.
THE next thing of special interest about which I wish to tell you is a visit we paid to what is known as Leper Island. This is a place where the government of India has isolated about two hundred and ninety lepers, as there are that many there at this time. To reach the island we rode in carriages through the narrow, ill-smelling streets to the outskirts of the city, then walked some distance to a river, up which we must go for a short distance in a boat. The governor of the colony, Dr. R. Pestonjee, or medical superintendent, as he is also called, had kindly volunteered to us, through Brother Driscoll, the use of his boat and men to take us over to the island. Therefore, upon arrival at the river bank we saw a queer looking craft out in the stream. It consisted of two canoes, dug out of logs, about twelve or fourteen feet long and placed about ten feet apart, on which was built a platform having a canvas cabin built over it. It was quite a palatial affair for that section, and there were even several chairs for us within the cabin. The river was [CR219] so shallow that it could not come within fifty or a hundred feet of the shore. The crew, however, which consisted of two natives, wearing only breechcloths, waded ashore, made a seat of their hands and carried us, one by one, to the boat. As they carried Pastor Russell, I thought it too good a chance to miss, so took a snapshot of him (picture). When we were all on board the natives pushed and paddled the craft up and across the stream, and soon we were tied up to the landing, where the water was deeper. As we ascended the steps we were met by the doctor himself, who gave us a hearty welcome.
The doctor told us that the missionaries and preachers in Colombo had tried to influence him to not permit Pastor Russell to speak to the poor lepers. However, he paid no attention to them, and after showing us through the grounds, which are very beautiful, with houses and other buildings scattered here and there among the trees of various kinds, he then picked out a place where we could hold a service and gave instructions that any of the lepers, men or women, might come out and listen to the lecture. The men and women are segregated and never meet except on some such an occasion as this. Leprosy is a terrible disease, and we are very sorry for these poor creatures, but as they are so afflicted one can hardly see how they could be more comfortably situated than they are here. There are attendants to look after their wants, doctors and nurses to assist them; they have comfortable places in which to sleep and an abundance of food.
A table was soon put into commission under the trees as a platform, upon which stood Brother Russell and Brother Pieres, who acted as interpreter. (Picture.) The people were gathered around in a semi-circle, some squatting on the ground and others standing. Besides taking some snap-shot pictures I succeeded in taking down a shorthand synopsis of Brother Russell's remarks to the lepers, as follows:
BROTHER RUSSELL: I am very glad to be with you today. My heart goes out to you. I am glad to see such good provision made for you that you can be clean.
The disease of leprosy in the Bible is made a picture of sin. Not that only the lepers are sinners, but it is a type, or picture, or figure, of sin. It is a picture of sin because it cannot be cured. Only the power of God could cure leprosy, and just as the Bible teaches that only God can forgive and cleanse us from sin. All men are sinners, and all women are sinners, but God has made a gracious provision by which sinners may be forgiven. As yet He has only begun this great work. Those who specially believe in the Lord may have forgiveness of sin now. But God has a gracious provision in the future when He is going to blot out sin. That is a part of the Bible teaching that we had not noticed a short time ago. The Bible tells us that there is a glorious time of restitution coming. By the word restitution we mean, to restore, to bring back to perfection. Surely that is what is needed. You need not only to have your flesh restored, but to be otherwise restored. Not only you need to have restitution, but all the rest of us need restitution. Some of us have not the leprosy but have other diseases. The whole world is lying in sin and, therefore, the penalty of sin is upon the whole world. God did not place us in this imperfect condition in which we are now; it is not given to you to have the leprosy, and given to me to have some other disease. It is not God that brought death upon us, considering that this is the proper condition. The Bible tells us that all these sicknesses and dying are the result of sin. It was not because you did some sin before you were born that you were imperfect, and because I did something before I was born that I am imperfect. The Bible tells us that we were all born in sin. We ask where did the sin come from? The Bible says that the first man, Adam, our father, sinned. And when he sinned he brought the penalty of death upon him. But he was so perfect, so in the image of God, that it took him nine hundred and thirty years before he died. Then His children were born in sin and so his race gradually deteriorated because of sin. This is the penalty for sin; not that God said that we should have a life of sorrow and trouble and then at death go to a purgatory of torment. We made a mistake in reading our Bible. And just so the Buddhists and the Shintoists and the Brahmists are finding that they made mistakes in the past. But the Bible shows us that God is a god of love. A god of love would not provide eternal torment or even provide purgatory for us. Because God is love, therefore He loves all mankind, because they are all His creatures. Of course He loves the saintly ones best. But the Bible tells us that most of the people are unsaintly, because they do not know God. The Bible says that after a certain number of people have been born into the world, and a certain amount of experience has been had, that God intends to wipe out all sin. And when sin is wiped out it will mean the wiping out of all the pain, sickness and dying. God proposes to give everlasting life to as many as will come back into harmony with Him.
The Bible tells about two different salvations. The principle salvation is for the saintly ones now. They in the resurrection will be changed and made like unto the angels, spirit beings, holy. Now we would all like to be saintly and [CR220] like to get that great blessing. But we would not have very much hope for the people of India and Europe and China; we could not hope that many of them would become saintly. So, if only the saintly are going to be saved nearly everybody is going to be lost. God shows us, though, that He is going to have a different plan for that. Then all the saintly ones will be gathered, we believe, very soon. The saintly ones will be what the Bible calls the Bride Class. They will be associated with Jesus in the great work which He will do then. The Bible tells us that Jesus is shortly to set up his Kingdom. That Kingdom is to bless all the world of mankind, everybody. Now that Kingdom is just waiting until the saintly company is complete. Then the blessing will begin to come to the whole world. All the lepers will be healed, all the blind eyes will be opened, all the deaf ears will be unstopped, all the sick will be healed, and in due time gradually all the dead will be raised; but they will not come back to the earth in the present condition. The Bible tells us that the earth is to be made wonderfully beautiful and wonderfully fruitful, and the earth is to become the paradise to the world of mankind. And all mankind may thus come up to full perfection. By perfection we mean that condition in which Adam was created. Adam was never an angel, and never lived in Heaven; he never lost Heaven, never lost an angelic station. He was a perfect man, had a perfect home, and was an earthly being. He was a great king; he had control over all the earth; and so God says in the Bible that He gave Adam whole control of the whole earth, over the beasts of the field, over the fowl of the air and the fish in the sea; all were in subjection to him. But he sinned and came under the sentence of death. And he began to lose all this and became mentally imperfect; so that today some are insane altogether; and he became sick in body, and today very few people live to be more than one hundred years old. But when mankind is brought back he will be brought back to perfection. This is called restitution in the Bible. He will restore them again to that which they were. This is what Christ has come to do. At his first advent He came to pay man's penalty. What penalty did he pay? Did he go to purgatory? No, no. Purgatory was not the penalty. Did Jesus go to eternal torment for us? No, no. Why not? Because this was not the penalty. What was the penalty for sin? Hear what the Bible says, "The soul that sinneth it shall die." "The wages of sin is death." Hear Saint Paul's words, By one man's disobedience sin entered into the world, and death as the penalty of sin, and thus death passed upon all men, because all men are sinners. So you see the reason we are all dying is because we are not fit to live. God is pleased to have perfect beings live. God does not wish to give everlasting life to sinners and those who love sin. God does not propose that imperfect people shall have everlasting life. Therefore, this plan that God has made is, first, that Christ should die for our sins, the very penalty that God pronounced against Adam and all his race. Now Christ died for our sins – "Jesus Christ, by the grace of God, tasted death for every man," the Scriptures say. And the great outcome is to be the giving of life to everybody and the healing of sickness. So the Bible says that Jesus will reign for a thousand years to bless all mankind. He will bless the world in different ways. He will bless the minds of the world, take away the ignorance, superstition and blindness. Here we are in Ceylon, near India, with perhaps several hundred religions. Why so many religions? Because we are ignorant. Because we do not know the Truth, and God proposes that during Christ's reign of a thousand years ignorance will be wiped away. So the Bible says that the light of the knowledge of the glorious God shall fill the whole earth. "The sun of righteousness will arise with healing in his beams" to scatter all the darkness, ignorance, superstition, and bring in the true light. The Bible says that we have been in darkness during all these six thousand years. Not merely the people in India have been in darkness, but the people in Europe, America and everywhere have been in darkness, too. There is what the Bible says: "Darkness covers the earth and gross darkness the heathen." Some have it darker and some not so dark, though they are all in darkness; but when the time comes God's Kingdom will be set up and all darkness will disappear. Why does God delay? The Bible represents that God is not slow in this matter. The Bible tells us that God has a great week of seven days and six of these great days in which he permitted sin, trouble and labor, are past, but now comes the great seventh or Sabbath day. These great days are thousand year days. So the Bible says, "A day with the Lord is as a thousand years." We have just come to the beginning of the great seventh day, and it is because we are in the morning of this great seventh day that we are getting so many blessings.
Do you notice how many great blessings have come during the past century? Steam railroads, steamboats, electric fans, and electric lights, and all the blessings of our day, have come during the last century. Only eighty years ago there was not a single railroad in the world. But here we are now with railroads everywhere. These things are all getting ready for the great time of Christ's reign. They are all a part of the plan for the blessing of all the families of the earth. And it is in line with this now that the terrible darkness is fleeing away – our misunderstanding of God, our misunderstanding of the Bible. The true light is beginning to shine into our minds, into our hearts. Buddhists and Brahmins, and Christians, and Mohammedans, are all finding that we had things that were wrong. All true people are glad to get rid of their ignorance and their wrong. As we get rid of our errors we begin to see more and more of the [CR221] glorious character of our God. The angels are not sinning, and the angels are not dying, and the angels have no hospitals, and the angels have no lepers, and the angels have no consumption, because they are in harmony with God. Man has all the sickness, and sorrow, and pain because he is out of harmony with God. We all see that we could not help ourselves. You and I might do a little bit to help one another and ourselves, but very little. We cannot lift ourselves out of sickness, pain and imperfection. The Bible tells us that God looked down from his holy habitation to behold the sinful condition of man, and beheld and heard the groanings of the prisoners. We are all prisoners, we are all in slavery to sin. We are all enslaved to sickness and death. We can do something to help one another and we try to do so; we have medicine for the mind, and we have medicine for the body, and we have medicine for the heart, but we cannot get rid of sin. It is like leprosy, it cannot be cured. But now when the Scriptures say that God looked down and beheld our condition, prisoners of sin and death, what does He say He did? Does the Bible say that God was indifferent, and that he did not care for those millions of people? Oh, no! God sympathizes with us. We read this in the Bible: He beheld that there was no eye that could see, no arm that could deliver man from sin and death, and so God provided Jesus. And what must He do? Oh, He will set up this glorious kingdom which will help all mankind. The healing of the sick and the blind at his first advent were only samples of what He will do for all mankind. But before He could do this something else must be done. The death sentence that was against us must be paid, not a purgatory sentence, not an eternal torment sentence, but a death sentence; a death sentence that carries with it sickness, sorrow, pain and suffering. Now Jesus has done this part of the work. He paid the penalty. He died the just for the unjust. The Bible says, He tasted death for every man. The Bible says that, As by one man sin entered into the world, so by the death of another man, Jesus, sin is to be canceled. The Bible says that as by a man (Adam) came death, even so through Jesus will come the resurrection of the dead. So then we are waiting now for the Kingdom of Christ. He has paid the penalty, but something must be done first before He sets up His Kingdom. And this is to gather the saintly few, some from Ceylon, some from India, some from China, some from Japan, some from Australia, some from Europe, some from America – not many, only saintly ones. All these saintly ones will be glorified in the first resurrection. Then they will be like God. The Bible says they will have the divine nature. They will be associated with Jesus in the great Kingdom that will bless all the families of the earth.
Now, is not that a glorious outlook that we have? Saint Peter says that times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord and He shall send Jesus Christ, whom the heavens must retain until the times of restitution of all things which God has spoken by the mouth of all the holy prophets.
I am very glad to have had this opportunity of meeting with you and I hope that this message that I bring you will do you as much good as it does my heart. I am looking forward to that glorious day that the Bible tells about when Satan will be bound for a thousand years, when mankind will be lifted up out of sin, ignorance, sorrow and death. All will have a full opportunity to come back to the perfect condition enjoyed by father Adam, and the only ones who will not be permitted to live are those who will not obey. Will God torture them? No, I would not think you would torture your enemies. The Bible tells us that God will destroy these. They will not live for all eternity in torment. Hear what the Scriptures say, "All the wicked will God destroy." "The soul that sinneth it shall die." They shall be like the brute beast. I hope none of us will be of those. I hope we are all turning our hearts to the Lord and seeking righteousness. God is pleased to bless more and more all who are feeling after Him. When we come to understand how good and loving and kind He is it draws our hearts out in love to Him.
I would like very much to have had some pamphlets to give you free, but I have nothing. How many would like to have some pamphlets in your own language, and I will send them free? Will you raise your hands so that I will know how many to send you? (Quite a number signified their desire to have reading matter.)
Let us rise and close with a word of prayer; we will all offer each for himself a prayer to God thanking Him for His goodness.
God has promised a glorious day,
And by faith we now see it draw near;
Our Redeemer has opened the way,
And soon will its glory appear.
There the dead shall arise from the tomb,
And the living to health be restored;
And away from all sorrow and gloom,
They'll be led by the life-giving Lord.
A highway shall there be cast up,
And the stones shall be all gathered out;
And errors no weak ones shall trip,
And no lions of vice stalk about.
There nothing shall hurt nor offend,
In God's kingdom of glory and peace;
The wicked their ways shall amend,
And the righteous their joys shall increase.
There God's hand shall all tears wipe away;
He'll the joys of His favor restore;
And the light of that glorious day,
Will bring life, joy, and peace evermore.
Well, we managed to secure two compartments and we were soon off, headed for Quilon, the terminus of one branch of this railroad, which we reached about 8:30 that night. We were met at the station by Brother Davey, who had come down from Neyattinkara. He had tried to secure sleeping accommodations for us, but as the only place like a hotel in the town, a government bungalow, had just been taken by some young English planters, there seemed to be nothing for us.
I might here explain that throughout India exists a system of Dak Bungalows. These are rest houses where travelers can put up. They are of three classes. The first class are fully equipped with furniture, crockery, and cutlery, while there is a cook and servants. The second class are very similar to the other, but there is only a man in charge and no servants. The third class vary greatly in many parts of India and frequently are quite unfurnished and afford nothing but shelter. These bungalows are government property and are clean and comfortable, while the charge for staying in a first class bungalow for 24 hours is about a shilling for each person. Throughout India a second class bungalow may be relied upon at intervals of about 30 miles, and a first class every 100 miles. In addition to these there are Inspection Bungalows which are used by government officials, but permission must be obtained to use them. Almost every large town has its Dak Bungalows as well as its hotels, which are generally good and clean. The prices vary but may be put down at 7 to 9 shillings per day. Frequently the motorist will find a second class bungalow where there is a railway [CR223] station with a refreshment room, which will afford him an excellent stopping place. You must furnish your own bedding if you wish any. If there are not enough cots, then the soft side of the stone floor is available, and we all made use of that from time to time. One can become accustomed to a great many things when compelled to.
We finally prevailed upon the station master to let us use the waiting rooms of the station; also to make up our beds in one of the cars on which we had come up. Brother and Sister Wilson, Brother Robison, and Brother Tussaint occupied the station; Brothers Russell, Pyles, Maxwell, Pieres, boy and Chapman occupied the car. This left Brother Kuehn, Brother Davey and myself to find quarters at the bungalow, as they had promised Brother Davey he could have one room. In this room we found two cots and a table, and on these we made our beds. About midnight the young English planters came in half drunk, and forgetting that they had given up this room for us, came in, and thought we were some of their friends, so began to pull us out of bed. They broke into the room twice that night and we began to wonder how it would all end, but they finally got it through their heads who we were and quieted down for the night.
The next morning the rest of the party came up to the bungalow, where breakfast was served to all, and then we started on a trip never to be forgotten by those participating. Shortly after breakfast a large sight-seeing motor car drove up and we all got in. Until a few months before we arrived the fastest means of travel from Quilon to this place, Neyattinkara, and a little farther on, was by ox cart, but now a company has established motor service for some seventy miles. So we secured the use of these cars for our various trips during our stay in the Travencore district.
Well, it was Sunday morning and our ride of about forty-four miles was a delightful one, over the hills, through the valleys, between the tapioca and rice fields, and every now and then passing through a grove of cocoanut palms and other tropical shrubbery. The day was perfect and we wished all could have been with us.
ARRIVING at Trivendrum, we stopped at the "Travelers Bungalow," which, by the way, was first class, a very pretty and comfortable place, and here we rested for a few hours and secured a good dinner, which was much appreciated after our ride in the open air. Our "Fire Car" was a curiosity to all. Every few minutes we would either meet or catch up with some ox cart, in which were a few people, or they would be hauling a great load of brush, fodder or grain. As the drivers would hear us coming they would scramble out of the carts, rush to the heads of their little bullocks, and do all in their power to prevent a runaway when we passed. It was an exciting time. Then other natives, hearing the tooting of the horn on our motor car, would come running over the hills and out of the houses to see us go past. Not very many automobiles or white people pass through that section. Children up to six years of age wear no clothing at all, and those older do not wear enough to be burdensome – all are barefooted. They would stand at the edge of the road, climb on the fences, anywhere to get a glimpse of us. [CR224]
Every few miles we would pass through some native village, and they were real natives living there. The houses and stores are constructed mainly of mud walls, with a thatched roof of cocoanut palm branches, supported by bamboo rafters.
After we had traveled about fifty miles in the motor car and were within about three miles of "Russellpuram," we suddenly turned a curve in the road – and the sight that greeted our eyes we will never forget. Brother Davey knew all about it, but had said nothing, as he wanted to surprise us. There, in the road, were about two thousand natives, representatives from various classes, which Brother Davey had interested more or less in Present Truth. They had been preparing for months, the same as we do in Great Britain or America for a convention, and the results of their preparation with small means and little to do with, certainly manifested their zeal. If the friends and people in general in our home lands would put forth the same amount of energy and sacrifice in trying to demonstrate their love for Pastor Russell in the way of a royal welcome that those natives did, there would be such a demonstration and reception as the world has never known. The natives that could be called dressed wore varied colored clothes, and had all kinds of banners on bamboo poles; the banners were made of paper, with crosses, stars, etc., pasted on them, some cut square, some like pennants, etc., and the larger ones having various lettering in colors, with words of welcome to Pastor Russell, [CR225] etc. When they saw us they shouted and sang, and shouted and sang. It was such a surprise that we hardly knew how to take it. Brother Russell stood up several times in the car and bowed to them, to their intense pleasure.
After considerable difficulty, like trying to get a large herd of cattle on the move, this strange reception committee of at least two thousand, were started up the road – and such a sight and such noises. In front of the motor car was a fife and drum corps; behind us were bagpipes, tom-toms and other native musical instruments, while alongside of the motor car a man marched beating some cymbals. The crowd filled the road completely on both sides and for a long distance in front and stretching far in the rear. The men blew the fifes as though they would blow their heads off while the man playing the bass drum was so happy he could not walk, but fairly danced along – none of them kept in step. Part of the music they played was hymns and many of the crowd would try to sing the words in their native tongue, and we joined in English. Farther up the road the din was increased by loud reports from explosives, which they set off, further attesting their welcome. All this was surely a strange procedure on a bright Sunday morning. It was necessary to constantly toot our motor horn, which, together with the noise of our musical instruments and the explosions, attracted large crowds of natives from quite a distance, and we from our exalted position on the high seats of our sight-seeing motor car, could see them coming from all directions over the hills, and they too joined in the procession. The crowd was so great that we could not go faster than a man could walk, so we had the procession with us all the rest of the way to "Russellpuram," where a great tabernacle of bamboo poles and cocoanut palm branches had been erected. By the time we arrived there our procession had increased to about five thousand, and they stretched out ahead of us for fully a mile, filling the road completely. Then at the tabernacle we found still more waiting for us, so that altogether we estimated that there was seven to eight thousand natives.
Upon arrival, the committee were invited to the platform to seats around a table, on which were glasses of cocoanut milk, which, by the way, is a very refreshing drink in this warm climate.
Then some girls came forward and put around the neck of each a wreath of flowers, woven together in a peculiar way, and handed each of us a bouquet, also put together in a peculiar manner. This bouquet I must describe, because of its significance. It had seven prongs or divisions to it, and the center prong had fastened to its top a lime (sour lemon). In America we call it a joke to hand a person a lemon, but here it is a token of love, hope and respect, and is the highest token of esteem that they can pay. We, of course, accepted all these kindnesses in the spirit in which they were offered. While these people are simple and poor, yet they have good hearts and when, in God's due time He lifts the veil of ignorance from off their eyes and they rise to their restitution rights, they will do so quickly and make noble specimens of humanity.
After our rest and refreshment we then went to the main part of the platform, which was probably thirty by fifty feet in size, with a gable roof about twenty feet in height. The auditorium proper was about seven or eight feet high and consisted merely of a flat tent of cocoanut palm branches supported on bamboo sticks. There were no chairs or benches for the audience, for they would not know what to do with this if there had been any. In fact, all over India the great masses of the people all squat down, whether resting or working. Even blacksmiths and other tradesmen squat down on the ground. I even saw some people who did have benches or chairs on which to sit, instead of sitting on them with their feet on the ground, as we would, they had their feet on the benches and squatted down. Well, the audience was soon squatted and the meeting opened. The opening feature was a song, "Joy to the World the Lord Has Come," which was rendered by a choir of some sixty native girls. These had been under instruction of Brother Davey and his helpers, and one or two could read and speak [CR226] English, but the rest could not. However, they sang the song in English, and pronounced the words as distinctly as I have heard many classes of children sing in America. It was certainly very pleasing to hear them. Prayer was then offered by Pastor Russell, who acknowledged the goodness and greatness of God, stating that our hearts were overflowing with gratitude, and asked the heavenly Father to grant His blessing. He prayed that while we did not know how to ask as we ought, yet we wanted to ask according to His will and His Word, because that Word assured us that God is a God of love, that He is more willing to give us the Holy Spirit than we are to give good gifts to our children. He therefore asked for the Father's blessing upon that assembly, according to the wisdom God would see best, especially for all who were truly His children, and declared that he asked not because of any merit of ours, but for Jesus' sake.
I should have said that before the prayer was offered an interpreter took his place at the side of Pastor Russell, and then several others were scattered throughout the audience, who stood up while the others squatted on the ground. Brother Russell would speak a sentence or two, the interpreter at his side would repeat the thought in the native tongue, and then the interpreters scattered through the audience would repeat that thought together. Thus, about three thousand of them could hear what was being said. The others, most of whom had come out of curiosity from hearing the din as we came up the road, soon left and went home. Brother Russell's remarks were as follows:
THE subject announced for this afternoon is "Glad Tidings." I will remind you of the words of the angels when they announced the birth of our Saviour. He said, "Fear not, behold I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be unto all people." That message of good tidings has not yet reached every creature of all nations. Why is this? Jesus died for our sins more than eighteen hundred years ago. Now the question is, Why did not God see to it that this message reached all creatures if it is for all? The Bible gives us the answer to this question. The Bible tells us that God not only intended that Jesus should die for our sins, and thus pay our penalty, but something more; another thing that is to come is the Kingdom of Jesus. Many of us Christians with the very best desires have overlooked the importance of this part of the Lord's Word, the Kingdom. We all see the great need of a Kingdom in the world, but we all see, also, how there are great kingdoms in the world, but all these have a selfish impulse. Selfishness seems to be at the base of all kinds of wrong doing. If we could only have some very wise leaders who were very good and loving and considerate, that is what we would want, and that is exactly what God proposes to give us. God acknowledges that we have not had any good government yet, not because people have not good impulses, but because sin and selfishness are in our hearts. As long as there is sin and selfishness in the heart we cannot trust anybody fully. But when God arranges the matter we find no objection to His arrangement. As we come to know that it is Jesus who redeemed the world with His own life that is to be the great King, we realize we can all trust Him fully. And this is exactly what God has promised. He is about to set up His Kingdom. You may ask why God did not set up His Kingdom long ago? I answer, the Bible tells us that God has another part of His plan that will come in first, and that part is the selection or election of the Church. The Kingdom cannot be set up until first the Church is found. There was one time when we all supposed we had found the true Church. Our Catholic friends said that they were the true Church, our Anglican friends said they were the only true Church, and so said the Methodists, and the Baptists, and the Presbyterians, and all, but now we all acknowledge that we made a mistake. We all acknowledge that the Church is not in any one of these systems. According to the Bible we find that the Church is composed of God's saints, and these saints of God may be found in one or all of these; so if there are any saintly Roman Catholics they belong to Christ's Church. And so with the Church of England, the Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian and all. The Lord says that He knoweth them that are His. He tells us that His Church is the Church of the First born ones whose names are written in Heaven. The writing of our names on earth does not effect very much. But if we have our names written in Heaven and are faithful the Lord says that He will not blot out those names. He tells us that the Church which He has been selecting for eighteen hundred years is to be His associates in the Kingdom. He tells us that when the time for the setting up of Kingdom shall come these will share in the first resurrection. What will be their work? The Bible tells us that they will be kingly priests, or priestly kings. So the Apostle Peter says, Ye are a royal priesthood, [CR227] a peculiar people, who should show forth His praises, etc. Now, how will this Church, when it is completed, serve this work of kings and priests? The Bible explains to us that they will have a glorious change from earthly to heavenly conditions and this change will make them perfect and complete. This is called the resurrection change. It is called the first resurrection, and the word first here means chief resurrection, because those who get a share in that resurrection become spirit beings. God promised that they shall be made like unto the angels. They will not be men any longer. They will be higher than angels, and so Saint Peter says, "God has given unto us exceeding great and precious promises that by these we might become partakers of the Divine nature." The Divine nature, as we know, dear friends, is above angelic as well as above human. Now I quote our Lord's word about this Church. He said, "Blessed and holy are all those that have part in the first resurrection; on such the second death hath no power; but they shall be priests unto God and unto Christ and shall reign with Him a thousand years." (Rev. 20:4,6.) That is the promise to the Church, you see. There was a while that we Christians tried to think the Church was reigning now, but we have come to see that we are not reigning at all. We are not intended to reign until the resurrection, when we get our chance. Therefore, we do quite right when we pray the Lord's prayer, "Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth, even as it is done in Heaven." And then the prayer tells how completely it will be done on earth, even as it is done in Heaven. Now think of that, think of God's will being done here on earth as completely as it is done in Heaven! Would it not be a grand world then? That is all we need, you see, the Kingdom of Christ, to put down sin and lift up mankind. You may say Christianity has already been reigning for eighteen hundred years. Now, I answer, Christianity has merely been trying to find the Bride of Christ, the Church. God is now having the Gospel preached to call out this class that will be the royal priesthood. Things will be very different when the Kingdom of God is set up. Jesus will not ask the people whether they like or whether they do not like to be bossed. The Bible explains when once his Kingdom is established all people will know just what is right and just what is wrong. Darkness will flee away and the light will shine out. We have a great deal of darkness in Europe and America, but you, perhaps, have still greater darkness here in India. That is what the Bible says, you remember. Darkness covers the earth (the civilized world) and gross darkness the heathen.
With the establishment of the Kingdom, then, will come the reign of righteousness. All of mankind will be helped up out of their superstition and mental blindness. For a thousand years the Bible says that the Church shall live and reign with Jesus. When the required number which fill the earth then every one who sins shall receive punishment and every one who seeks to do right shall be helped and blessed and lifted up and made strong in character. And more than this, the uplifting will take hold of his body and his mind and he will be altogether lifted up. This in the Bible is called restitution. Restitution means to lift up or restore to that which was before. This is the salvation that God is providing for the world. For a thousand years Christ will be restoring all things. You ask, what will He restore? The Bible tells us that the earth itself is to be brought to perfection. The Bible also tells us that God made a sample of Paradise when He created Adam in the Garden of Eden. The Bible tells us that man lost that Garden and perfection on account of sin. The Bible also tells us that Jesus became the Redeemer. The Bible also tells us that Jesus died to redeem not only the earth but the world. I will quote you a text of Scripture, "Now we see Jesus who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor, that by the grace of God might taste death for every man." (Hebrews 2:9.) Again we read in 1 John 2:2, "He is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world." So you see God recognizes the sins of the Church as one thing and the sins of the world as another. The same death of the same Jesus makes satisfaction for both. But the world does not get her salvation at the same time that the Church gets hers. Now is the time for the Church to get everlasting life. Those who miss this great prize miss a great deal. But there are millions of people who will miss that. God never intended to have any more than a few, so the Bible speaks of the Church, as the "little flock." I quote you His words, "Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the Kingdom." But after the Church, the little flock, is complete, [CR228] then what? Then comes the blessing of the world. We all ought to be very glad to know that the whole world is going to be blessed. When I was a child I read in the Bible that only those who have a knowledge of Jesus would ever have salvation. For there is no other name given among men under Heaven whereby we shall be saved except the name of Jesus. But now, dear friends, we see that your forefathers and my forefathers did not know about Jesus. They, therefore, could not be of the Church class. They can not have their share in the chief salvation. What, then, will be their fate? Notice in our text, "Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be unto all." That includes your forefathers who lived before Jesus came, and mine that lived before Jesus came, and it includes all who have lived since Jesus came.
Jesus Himself said that this is the true light that lighteth every man that cometh into the world, and God has provided that all shall come to a knowledge of the truth. The hundreds and thousands of millions who never had a knowledge of the truth are to have an opportunity to hear it. When will they ever hear it? After the Kingdom of Christ is established. How will it do anything more than now? Oh, God's promise is that the Kingdom of God shall be established and He shall reign for a thousand years to bless all the families of the earth. What will be the result? The Bible tells us, "Unto Him every knee shall bow and every tongue confess, to the glory of God." Does that prove that everybody is going to be saved, that there is to be universal salvation? Oh, no! It means that an opportunity for coming to a knowledge of God, and to be restored to the perfection once enjoyed by father Adam, is the promise to all; but it also means that all who will refuse to walk in the light of that knowledge will die the second death. As Saint Paul says in 1 Cor. 15:25,26, "He must reign until He has put all enemies under His feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death." What does that last part about death mean? It means dying. We are all dying as a result of sin. Father Adam was to die and it was his disobedience that brought death. "The wages of sin is death." These statements of God's word have been in fulfillment for six thousand years and, therefore, our race has been a dying race, and because they are under this sentence of sin that they are all having sickness, pain and sorrow. It is on this account that we have our mental, moral and physical weaknesses, and so the race has been going down in sin and death. So the Scriptures say that it has been a reign of sin and death. It has been a terrible reign, ninety thousand people dying every twenty-four hours throughout the world. Very few of these ever heard of the name of Jesus, the only name given for salvation, the true light that shall yet enlighten every man, and that true light will shine out through Christ's Kingdom. You remember how the Scriptures tell that it is a dark time at the present time; the Psalmist says, figuratively, "Thy Word is a lamp to my feet and a lantern to my footsteps." That means that the pathway is now dark. The pathway is dark here in India, Europe and America. Some of us have had God's word shining upon the pathway. It has brought a great blessing wherever it shines. The Bible proposition is that the darkness shall flee away, for it tells us that this new dispensation is to be the morning of the new day. The sun of righteousness shall arise with healing in his beams. The knowledge of the glory of God shall fill the whole earth as the waters cover the great deep. Thus, eventually, there shall be no need to say any further, "Know thou the Lord, for all shall know Him from the least unto the greatest." Is that good tidings for us? Does it make your hearts happy? Does it make you love God more to know that He is a God of justice, love and kindness? This is what Jesus said it would do, "Sanctify them through thy word, thy word is truth."
Now, this salvation that is coming to the world is altogether different from the one that is coming to the Church; remember the Scriptures tell us that those who will be with Christ will be like Him. They shall see Him as He is and share His glory; they will sit with Him on His throne, share in the work of blessing and ruling the world. I urge you all to become saints, to become sanctified in Christ, to make your calling and election sure. But I bid you not to think of our heavenly Father as intending to eternally torture your forefathers. Think of Him as the great God that has provided the salvation for your forefathers, a great blessing for those who have not been called to the high calling of this age. As we said before, that blessing is called restitution. Let me quote you Saint Peter's words in Acts 3:19,21
. Pointing down to the second coming of Jesus he says, not that the world will be burned up, not that a general destruction of the world will come, but this is what he says would come: "Repent ye, therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord; and He shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you; whom the heavens must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began." God has been telling us of this blessing that is to come, but we have overlooked that part. Now we see still more beauty in the call of the Church. What a grand privilege it will be to be co-laborers with Christ in the blessing of all the families of the earth. It is blessed now to help somebody to know the Lord, and the way of righteousness; surely it will be a hundred times more blessed when we will be able to lift them up out of their weaknesses, etc. This, then, my dear friends, is the meaning of my text: "Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be unto all people." The basis of that good message is, Jesus Christ has already died. His death was necessary as our redemption price. Then the first work to be accomplished by Christ's death is the selection and election of the Church. This part of the work we believe is being completed. In other words, we believe this Gospel Age is very near at hand, but this does not mean the end of the world, but the end of the Age. Where this Age ends the next Age begins. The next Age, the Bible tells us, will be a thousand years long and one of the very first works Jesus will do in that next Age will be this: He shall bind Satan a thousand years, so he shall deceive the nations no more. We are not to think, my dear friends, that all of our various errors have come of our own intentions. We are to remember what the Scriptures say, for Saint Paul says: "The god of this world hath blinded the minds of those who believe not." Why would Satan seek to blind our minds? The Apostle tells us why – "lest the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ, which is the image of God, should shine unto them." In other words, Satan would like to have us all misunderstand our heavenly Father. See how he has succeeded all the world over. See what Hinduism is, what Buddhism is; see what Shintoism is; see what Mohammedism is; and see how much Christianity has been in error, too. We charge it all against Satan. No doubt many of these Buddhists and other men were good in some of their intentions, for some of their [CR229] teachings are very good, but they have beclouded our minds. The god of this world, Satan, has blinded our eyes. He did not want us to see God's goodness and God's love, therefore he often led the Christians to misrepresent our heavenly Father. I, for instance, with just as good intentions as I have today, once misrepresented my heavenly Father. Satan had helped to blind my eyes with the erroneous doctrine of eternal torment, misrepresenting the Father's grace and mercy. And so, when once we misunderstood God and preached what we believed, we misrepresented Him further. Now, when we come to understand God's word aright, we see what gross darkness we were in. Our Roman Catholic friends, for instance, teach that God has a purgatory in which some of our forefathers and some of ourselves are to be roasted for centuries. And we Protestants had it worse in some respects. We said that the heavenly Father was going to have merely an elect Church, and roast everybody else in eternal torment. I trust the Lord has had mercy upon me for thus misrepresenting His glorious character. We remember how Saint Paul, before he came to the Lord, before his eyes were open, persecuted the true Church. He tells us that God had mercy upon him for he did it ignorantly, and I trust that God had mercy upon me because I ignorantly misrepresented Him at one time and now I am trying to do all I can to make known the goodness of God to all people, and this can best be done by showing the real truth of the Bible. When we come to understand the Bible rightly it is the most wonderful book in the world. I hope, then, as you come to know of the real God, that this knowledge of Him will draw your hearts "Nearer, my God, to Thee." Amen.
AT the close of the service we were introduced to a number of the public officials of the town of Neyattinkara, and these were men of education and splendid specimens of manhood. We talked with these for some time, some were native preachers, others doctors, lawyers, merchants, etc. Then our committee had supper at "Bethel." Meantime, the natives hung around and tried every possible way to get a further look at us. Then, when evening drew on, we had another service in the Tabernacle, at which Brother Russell spoke, as follows: