Retrospection

"Thall shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy

God led thee."-Deut. 8: 2.

He was better to me than all my hopes;

He was better than all my fears;

He made a bridge of my broken works,

And a rainbow of my tears.

The billows that guarded my sea-girt path

But carried my Lord on their crest;

When I dwell on the days of my wilderness march

I can lean on His love for the rest.

He emptied my hands of my treasured store,

And His covenant love revealed,

There was not a wound in my aching heart

But the balm of His breath hath healed.

Oh, tender and true was the chastening sore,

In wisdom, that taught and tried,

Till the soul that He sought was trusting in Him,

And nothing on earth beside.

He guided by paths that I could not see,

By ways that I have not known;

The crooked was straight and the rough made plain

As I followed the Lord alone.

I praised Him still for the pleasant palms,

And the water-springs by the way,

For the glowing pillar of flame by night,

And the sheltering cloud by day.

There is light for me on the trackless wild,

As the wonders of old I trace,

When the God of the whole earth went before

To search me a resting place.

Has He changed for me? Nay! He changes not;

He will bring me by some new way,

Through fire and flood, past each crafty foe,

As safely as yesterday.

Never a watch on the dreariest halt

But some promise of love endears;

I read from the past that my future shall be

Far better than all my fears.

Like the golden pot of the wilderness bread

Laid up with the blossoming rod,

All safe in the ark with the law of the Lord

Is the covenant care of my God.

--Anna Shipton

I Give Thee Thanks

My God whose bounty fills my cup

With every blessing meet!

I give Thee thanks for every drop,

The bitter and the sweet.

I praise Thee for the desert road,

And for the riverside,

For all thy goodness hath bestowed,

And all Thy grace denied.

I thank Thee for both smile and frown,

And for the gain and loss;

I praise Thee for the future crown,

And for the present cross.

Isaiah’s Thanksgiving

            Heaven will be an eternal Thanksgiving Day.  And for me to enjoy it my harp must be tuned today to fit into the heavenly orchestra tomorrow.

            Man is bon far below pitch.  It is natural for him to be flat.  Only the touch of god’s redeeming grace will bring him back up to pitch where he will be neither flat nor sharp, but perfectly in tune with heaven.  Blessed is the man who is striving to this end.  He will reach it if he strives lawfully.

            The person whose heart can be melted by the attitude of praise to God will find his spirit being more and more conformed to the Divine Image.  Ingratitude works spiritual numbness and brings paralysis to the soul, leaving its victim in the gall of bitterness and in the bondage of Satan.

            The prophet Isaiah, in chapter 12 of his book, breaks forth in thanksgiving to his God.  Evidently he discovered in his day, as many a humble person has since, that walls, troops, mountains—every satanic force—must give way before the forward march of the heart that is full of praise and gratitude.

            In this chapter four statements stand out in Italic type.

            “O Lord, I will praise thee.”  There is no defeat to the person who will make no provisions for defeat.  Satan knows that a man wholly given over to God and bold enough to praise God before, during, and after every battle is invincible.  He who lives by faith waves his banner of victory before the battle as well as after because Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”  It is the Lord Himself that “giveth us the victory.”

            “I will trust, and not be afraid.”  It has been said that a dog bites only the fearful, never the man who is not afraid. Whether this is true or not (and I greatly question it) it is true that when Satan sees our knees shaking he presses in to force a final victory.  He makes daily rounds among God’s ranks looking for feeble knees.  He will never find them among the soldiers who have their trust in Jehovah and are marching on with Him, but he will find them among those who are standing still.

            The cure for fear when the enemy is attacking is to trust in the Captain that has never lost a battle, and to begin marching.  In the face of the fact that according to Scripture a darker day is coming than the one through which the Church is now going, victory is sure to every Blood-washed member of the Church who will say with the prophet, “I will trust, and not be afraid.”

            “Sing unto the Lord.”  In the train of simple trust in God is a song, a new song, even praise unto our God.  Spiritual singing is divine joy in action.  It is the true language of the heart expressing the fact that He “hath don great things…whereof we are glad.”

            The man who will keep his song will never know defeat.  Someone has rightfully said, “Could Miriam have kept the children of Israel singing, they would have crossed at Kadesh-barnea.”

            The early Methodists sang themselves into trouble and out gain.

            Our hearts thrill while reading of the thanksgiving song service when Paul and Silas, in adverse circumstances, sang songs at midnight.

            Under the leadership of David, the greatest choir and orchestra leader that Israel ever knew, she marched on to victory that subdued all her surrounding enemies.  Perhaps David will be leading a choir in heaven.

            If we will keep our song we will always have something to sing about.

            “Cry out and shout, thou inhabitant of Zion.”  The shout of victory felled the walls of Jericho and brought Gideon’s little corps through with banners waving.  And according to the Book of Revelation there will be shouting in heaven.  How edifying and how glorifying to the Lord are the shouts of grateful praise and thanksgiving to Him.

            “Praise is comely to the upright.”  Better than a joyful Thanksgiving Day is a whole calendar year of heartfelt thanks to Him who has redeemed us with His own precious blood.

--Melvin E. Winkelmann

One Returned to Thank God

   Luke 17:12-16         

     Ten men came to Jesus one day-ten men with nothing to be thankful for.  They were lepers.  Then in one glorious never-to-be-forgotten moment they had everything to be thankful for.  They had been cleansed from their leprosy.

            This hour of glorious triumph faded into regrettable moments of tragic thoughtlessness.

            Nine of the ten men walked on out of the range of revelation to be forever branded as charter members of the society of the “thankless nine.”  Beyond this segment of revelation we know not another thing.  However, knowing they never said “thank you” to anyone.  They may have considered themselves to be special objects of providence—“We must be remarkable men else this healing would never have occurred.”

            How prone we are to look upon blessings with the attitude that, being who we are, it is not strange such a favor should come to us.

            “Pride slays thanksgiving but a humble soul is a soul out of which thanks naturally grows.  A proud man is seldom a grateful man.  He never thinks he gets as much as he deserves,” says Henry Ward Beecher.

            He who cultivates a thankful spirit lives in a palace and feasts at a banquet table every day.  When the heart is thankful scanty blessings appear as underserved riches.

            Do not let the empty cup be your first teacher of the blessing you had when it was full.  Cultivate a happy response to the undeserved kindnesses that come into your life.

            Be thankful that you have a tomorrow, and that you tomorrow may merge into timeless tomorrows in the Land where they need no sun.

            Be thankful there is a remedy for the guilt of sin—a remedy that goes “deeper than the stain has gone.”

            Be thankful for the cleansing fountain, for the energy and the dynamic of the spirit to live as pleaseth Christ.  If environments of your life are not satisfactory, thank God for the wider vision, and then go out to make your vision come true.

            “Enter into His gates with thanksgiving and into his courts with praise, be thankful unto him and bless his name, for the Lord is good and his mercy is everlasting and his truth endureth to all generations” (Ps. 100:4,5)

Oliver G. Wilson

When Darkness Is Better Than Light

Often in the Bible the phrase to "walk in darkness," means to "walk in sin" (I John 1: 6), to disobey the truth as revealed in God's Word.

     But sometimes walking in darkness stands for those tunnels of uncertainty through which believers pass at times. In such a tunnel Job lamented, "Behold, I go for ward, but he is not there; and backward, but I cannot per ceive him . . . he hideth himself on the right hand that I cannot see him" (Job 23: 8, 9). While walking in such darkness David sighed, "I have cleansed my heart in vain ... for all the daylong have I been plagued, and chas tened every morning" (Ps. 73: 13, 14). And enshrouded in such a cloud of doubt was John the Baptist when he inquired of Jesus, "Art thou he that should come, or do we look for another?" (Matt. 11: 3).

Isaiah gives the clearest picture of this uncertain point:

     "Who is among you that fearetl1 the Lord, that obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness, and hath no light?" (Isa. 50: 10).

     Isaiah then gives the "dimmed out" saint solid words of comfort: "Trust in the name of the Lord, and stay upon God." Stay where you are. Do what you are doing. Pray as you are praying. No man can see what he is accom plishing in the dark, but he should keep on working any way. This saint fears God and obeys the ministering serv ant of God. Why should he change? What else could he do?

      Some of us remember that in World War II there were practice "black-outs" in our cities. Enemy bombers never flew over the United States, but if they should come by night we were to fail to give them any guidance by our light. It may be that God suffers these "black-outs" to be fall saints to protect us from more vicious attacks of Satan, for when we are in darkness, we feel caution. Light brings assurance. Sometimes caution is more vital than assurance. The truth is, a saint can be assured while he is cautious.

     That "darkness" is better than "self-made" light. "Be hold, all ye that kindle a fire . . . walk in the light of your £re ... ye shall lie down in sorrow" (Isa. 50: 11). Here is the self-made and self-assured religionist. Gathering from this source and that, he "kindles a fire," then makes that his religion and his god. He glories in it and calls all men to praise it. He seems to pass through no tunnels and is beset with no doubts. But the end is "sorrow." There is a dark night of disillusionment, disappointment and death awaiting him. Let no saint envy him.

     It is better to walk in darkness, sure of God, than to walk in light, sure of ourselves!

--George E. Failing

Give Me The Book

            I am a creature of a day, passing through life, as an arrow through the air.  I am a spirit come from God, and returning to God; just hovering over the great gulf till a few moments hence, I am no more seen!  I drop into an unchangeable eternity!

            I want to know one thing, the way to heaven: how to land safe on the happy shore.  God Himself has condescended to teach the way; for this very end Jesus came from heaven.  He hath written it down in a book!  Oh, give me that Book!  At any price, give me the Book of God!  I have it.  Here a knowledge enough for me.  Let me be homo unius libri (a man of one book).

            Here then I am, far from the busy ways of men.  I sit down alone; only God is here.  In His presence I open, I read this Book, for this end, to find the way to heaven.  Is there a doubt concerning the meaning of what I read?  Does anything appear dark or intricate?  I lift up my heart to the Father of lights.  Lord, is it not Thy Word.  “If any…lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth…liberally and upbraideth not..”  “If any man will to do his will, he shall know.”  I am willing to do; let me know Thy will.

            I search after, and consider parallel passages of Scripture, “comparing spiritual things with spiritual.”  I meditate thereon, with all the attention and earnestness in the things of God, and then, the writings whereby, being dead, they yet speak.  And what I thus learn, that I teach.

--John Wesley

A Lesson on the Three-In-One

            Archibald Lang Fleming, in his book Archibald the Arctic, writes: “On Trinity Sunday I preached at the morning service and Pudlo [one of his Eskimo preachers] was to speak at the afternoon service.  After my midday meal I had just begun to read when there was a knock at my door and Pudlo entered.  In his very direct way he said that he did not understand how there could be three-in-one.  Was it that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit were a family of three?... We knelt together and prayed God to guide us into a knowledge of this truth.  As we arose from our knees my eye caught sight of some artificial roses in a vase and in that moment I felt our prayer had been answered.

            Taking one of the roses, I gave it to Pudlo to examine, explaining that it had form but was not like an Arctic poppy; that it had color which was  quite different from the wild heather; and that it also had smell.  (I explained that because it was made of cloth the perfume had to be sprinkled on and that real roses that grew in the lands far to the south had their own fragrance.)  To these statements Pudlo readily agreed.  I then asked: Is the form the rose?  No. Is the color the rose?  No.  Is the smell the rose?  No.

            Yet, I pointed out, these three—form, color, and smell—together make up the complete flower and no one of the three is more important than the other.  Again, I said, in the white man’s country it is common to have many roses in vases in the houses where we live.  When you come in at the door you know because of the sweet perfume that there are roses in the house even when you don not see them.  So it is with God the Holy Spirit.  We don’t see God but we know he is near.  If we follow Jesus, then the Spirit speaks to our hearts and we do the thing that is right.  Pudlo’s face lighted up with a smile and he said “How wonderful!”

            And in that afternoon service Pudlo pleaded with his people to follow only the Great Spirit who is “from everlasting to everlasting”—since now they had been given His Holy Spirit to guide them day by day.

Doctrine of the Trinity (Part II)

   The doctrine of the Trinity is seen in the life and work of the Lord.

1. It is clearly implied in the annunciation to Mary (Luke 1:35; Matt 1:18).  Here the Holy Ghost is the active agent.  The Child brought into the world is the Son of God.
2. It is seen in the openings of Jesus’ ministry (Matt. 3:16, 17; Mark 1:10, 11; Luke 3:21, 22; John 1:32-34).  The three Persons are thrown up to sight in a dramatic picture in which the Deity of each is strongly emphasized.  From the open heavens the Spirit descends in visible form, the voice out of the heavens declares:  “My beloved Son.”
3. It is boldly stated by our Lord in the final commission and His give baptismal formula in Matthew 28:19:  “Baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”  Of this baptismal formula the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia says:  “There can be no good reason to doubt that it was made by Him, when it is expressly attributed to Him by the record.”  According to this accepted authority, “The Hebrew did not think of the name, as we are accustomed to think of it, as a mere external symbol, but rather as the adequate expression of the innermost being of its bearer.”

     The doctrine of the Trinity is positively taught in The Acts and The Epistles.  Acts 5:31:  “Him hath God exalted...to be Prince and a Savior…we are witnesses…so is also the Holy Ghost.  To deny the Trinity is to make this passage of Scripture meaningless if not absurd.

• I Corinthians 12:4-6:  “There are diversities of administrations, but the same Spirit; and there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord.  And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all.”
• II Corinthians 13:14:  “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost be with you all.”
• Ephesians 2:18:  “For through him [Christ] we both [Jew and Gentile] have access by on Spirit unto the Father.”
• Ephesians 3:16-19:  Strengthened by the Spirit; indwelt by Christ; filled with all the fullness of God.

            These sublime passages become confusing and filled with meaningless repetition by denial of the doctrine of the Trinity.

            The doctrine of the Trinity is the historic teaching of the Church.  From the first the Christian church taught three Persons in one Godhead.  But heresy swept the church again and again, often involving the Deity of our Lord.  So to consolidate the beliefs of the Church, the great Church Council in Nice 325 A.D. declared that belief in the Trinity was to be the doctrine of the Church.  It was to safeguard the doctrine of the Deity of our Lord that this article was proclaimed with great vigor.  It is generally true that those who deny the doctrine and inadequate views of the person and work of the virgin-born Savior.

            But John Wesley made a vital statement when he said:  “Let man firmly believe, there is but one God, the object of any divine worship whatever.”

            The doctrine of the Trinity is boldly stated by our Lord in His final commission and His given baptismal formula; “God ye therefore, and teach all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost” (Matt. 28:19).

--Oliver G. Wilson 

Doctrine of the Trinity (Part I)

              The doctrine of the Trinity is given to us not in formulated definition but in fragmentary allusions which, when assembled into an organic unity, are clearly Scriptural.  The doctrine of the Trinity is a genuinely Scriptural doctrine.

            “The doctrine is purely a revealed doctrine.  It embodies a truth which has never been discovered, and is indiscoverable, the natural reason…. As it is indiscoverable by reason, so it is incapable of proof from reason.  There are no analogies to it in nature, not even in the spiritual nature of man.” –International Standard Bible Encyclopedia.

            Dr. Wiley, in Christian Theology, says: “The Father is specially related to God’s work in Creation; the Son by incarnation is specially related to God’s work in Redemption; and the Holy Spirit by His indwelling is specially related to God’s work in Sanctification…. In this sense we may (1) the Father is God above us, (2) the Son is God with us, (3) the Holy Spirit is God in us.”

            Mr. John Wesley said: “Let man firmly believe, there is but on God, the object of any Divine worship whatever; and think and speak of Him under that plain Scriptural distinction of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; leaving the incomprehensible nature of that union and distinction to the great Author of our faith Himself.”

            That God is regarded as a trinity is clear from the Scriptures.  The proofs offered by the theologians are:

1. At the baptism of Jesus, God the Son is approved, God the Holy Ghost descends as a dove upon Jesus.
2. Works that only God can do are ascribed to God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost.
3. That all are worshiped is clearly taught in the Bible.
4. Believers are to be baptized in the name of the Father, in the name of the Son, and in the name of the Holy Spirit (Matt 28:19).
5. The gifts would teach us of the three Persons to be worshiped and obeyed (I Cor. 12:4-6).
6. In the inspired benedictions all three names are linked together as of equal importance (II Cor. 13:14).

            Do you say you cannot understand this idea of the Trinity?  That does not make it untrue.  I do not understand the telephone, I understand less about radio, and television is entirely beyond my comprehension, yet all are facts of everyday life.

--Oliver G. Wilson

I Hate Liquor -- Moral Awareness

Perhaps one of the bravest and most influential opponents of the liquor traffic in his day, or in any day, was former Governor J. Handley, of Indiana, who attained national prominence.  He had remarkable ability as a speaker, as the following article will show.

“I bear no malice toward those in the liquor business, but I hate the traffic.  I hate its every phase.”

“I hate it for its intolerance; for its arrogance; for its hypocrisy; for its cant and false pretense.

“I hate it for its domination of politics; for its utter disregard of law; for it ruthless trampling on the solemn compacts of state Constitutions.

“I hate it for the load it straps to labor’s back; for the palsied hands it gives to toil; for its wounds to genius; for the tragedies of its might-have-beens.

“I hate it for the human wrecks it has caused-for the almshouse it people; for the prisons it fills; for the insanity it begets; for its countless grave in potters’ fields.

“I hate it for the mental ruin it imposes upon its victims; for its spiritual blight; for its moral degradation.

“I hate it for the crimes it commits; for the homes it destroys; for the hearts it breaks.

“I hate it for the malice it plants in the hearts of men; for the poison; for the bitterness; for the dead sea fruit with which it starves the soul.

“I hate it for the grief it causes womanhood—the scalding tears, the hopes deferred, the strangled aspirations, its burden of want and care.

“I hate it for its heartless cruelty to the aged, the infirm and the helpless; for the shadow it throws upon the lives of children; for its monstrous injustice to blameless little ones.

“I hate it as virtue hates vice, as truth hates error, as righteousness hates sin, as justice hates wrong, as liberty hates tyranny, as freedom hates oppression.

“I hate it as Abraham Lincoln hated slavery, and as he sometimes say in prophetic vision the end of slavery and the coming of the time when the sun should shine and the rain should fall upon no slave in all the republic; so sometimes I seem to see the end of this unholy traffic, the coming of the time when, if it does not wholly cease to be, it shall find no safe habitation anywhere beneath Old Glory’s stainless stars.”

-- in "The Message" 1959

Separation

            A Lovely Girl, the daughter of a proud English family, had given her heart to Christ.  Her father, a man of the world, was bitterly disappointed, especially when he found her religious principles were going to separate her altogether from his worldly pursuits and pleasures.  Earnestly did he plead with her that she would attend one party and sing with her superb voice to entertain his fashionable friends.  At length she yielded and, while a strange hush fell upon all the brilliant company, she allowed him to lead her to the piano,  Sitting down, she touched the keys and, looking into the faces of her friends while tears sprang from her eyes, she sang as never before:

    Jesus, I my cross have taken,

     All to leave and follow Thee.

                  * * * * *

Let the world despise, forsake me;

  They have left my Savior, too.

            The notes were lost in the sobs of many voices; but for her the blessing was beyond all that they received; it committed her forever to the unreserved confession of Christ.

            If we a going to separate unto Christ, the more thoroughly we do it, the easier it will be in the end.  One bold, fearless plunge, and we shall find ourselves on the ground of entire consecration, where alone we shall be able to stand.

--A. B. Simpson