The British Millennial Harbinger

Harbinger, Mar. 1. '65,

SIN AGAINST THE HOLY GHOST.

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who make our blood chill as we contemplate the despite which they do to the gracious Spirit. They worship God by a man-constituted worship-they repeat the so-called Apostles' Creed, and many things far worse than that religion is regulated by act of Parliament-the semi-popish prayer book they take as the light of life, and by its help the Bible goes into the back ground as too dark to be understood by the people generally. True, the Bible is admitted as the Divine Directory, but not the Bible in the hands of every man for himself, but the Bible interpreted by the church. Can you find infant baptism in the Bible? 66 'No, but it is there, for so the church has determined." Can you find the order of worship common in your church in the Bible? No, but it is according to Scripture, for so the church has decreed." Have you examined the Bible on these points for yourself? "O dear, no! I received my views on these things from the church-chiefly from a very devoted minister, who subsequently, I am sorry to say, went into the Church of Rome." But are you not responsible to God to use his word and learn his truth for yourself? We are not supposed to be able to understand it for ourselves-we are to receive the truth from the church." This is what Dogmatism leads to, and thus do thousands sin against the Holy Ghost by despising his testimony and rejecting his word. Most wide-spread is this sin. Without it the Greek, the Roman, and the Anglican churches could not stand. It may be quite right to view them as sister churches, or as branches of one church, and not inconsistent to pray for their reunion as thousands are doing, for by this one sin they live, without it they perish. Give but the Bible to the people, and the people to the Bible, and all that will remain of the vast conglomeration will be the ruined piles of Babylon the Great. "Very true," respond the throng who march under the banner upon which Mysticism is inscribed. "We yield no authority to church decisions, and would as soon appeal to a menagerie to learn the meaning of the Bible as to any church." Step over here, young man. You speak boldly against the churches. We would talk with you a little. You believe that Christ commanded believers to be baptized? "I do." You understand that the act intended by the Saviour is immersion ? "Of that I have no doubt." Have you, then, been immersed? "I have not." Do you intend shortly to do so? "I don't know that I do." But do you not say the Lord commanded it? "Yes." Then why do you not obey? "I do not think it essential." Not essential to keep Christ's commands? Yes, when the Spirit lays them upon my heart." What do you mean? Why, the Holy Spirit has shewn me that faith and repentance are essential, and if baptism had been important it would have been revealed to me also." How do you interpret the Bible? "I take the interpretation the Spirit gives me. What the Spirit reveals to me I see, and he has not revealed baptism." Yet you know Christ commanded it? "O yes, that is plain."

Now here, just as much as by the former method, the Divine Directory is made void. Under the idea of depending upon revelation the only and all-sufficient revelation is despised-by a supposed appeal to the Spirit, the Spirit is resisted, the word is dishonored. Here, too, is sin against the Holy Ghost.

We are not saying that in these examples is found the sin which cannot be forgiven, but that we have here a fearful sin against the Spirit of God. When a man's word is despised the man is dishonored. When the words of the Holy Spirit (given for our guidance and complete to that end) are disregardedtreated as a mass of confusion out of which we can make nothing-and the priest and the church, or a supposed inward illumination, put in their placethen the Spirit is insulted. Reader, do you thus sin against the Holy Ghost?

WILL-WORSHIP.

Harbinger, Mar. 1, '65.

"In vain do you worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.' JESUS THE MESSIAH.

THE fundamental thought in the true religion, is the subordination of the human will to the will of God. I do not mean a dreamy, sentimental, halfhypochondriac resignation to what may be called the dispensations of Providence'; but rather a healthy, vigorous, self-control-a mastery of all the appetites, passions, and impulsions of our being, the bringing of every volition, and every action into conformity with the divine will, as expressed in the divine commandments. This idea of the subordination of the human will to the will of God, is that in which consists the very essence of true piety. It belongs to all dispensations alike. For while a change of dispensation brings with it a change of law, the principles which underlie the law never change. God is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. He changes not. The principles of the divine government, therefore, never change. This "principle is the very foundation stone upon which that government rests. Nay, without it, there could be no such thing as a divine government at all. The universe would fall at once into utter chaos.

What is will-worship? Is it true, or false worship? In what does it consist? Let me quote from the New Testament the only passage in which it is found : "Which things have indeed a show of wisdom in will-worship, and humility, and neglecting of the body; not in any honor to the satisfying of the flesh. Col. ii 23. This is a very obscure verse. Indeed, as I quote it here from the Common Version I should pronounce it, as a whole, decidedly unintelligible. And yet, even from this it is easy to perceive that will-worship is utterly valueless. I will now quote the passage at length, as translated by Conybeare. (Life and Epistles, Vol 2, page 390.) If then, when you died with Christ, you put away the childish lessons of outward things, why, as though you still lived in outward things, do you submit yourselves to decrees (hold not, taste not, touch not-forbidding the use of things which are all made to be consumed in the using) founded on the precepts and doctrines of men? For these precepts, though they have a show of wisdom, in a self-chosen worship, and in humiliation, chastening of the body, are of no value to check the indulgence of fleshly passions.

Without stopping to say much that might, perhaps, be profitably said, in connection with this passage, it is sufficient for my present purpose, to call the reader's attention to a fact that lies upon its very surface, namely, that willworship and true worship, are the two opposing points of an antithesis-that they stand over against each other in direct and palpable antagonism. In true worship, God chooses for us what we shall do ; in false worship, we follow our own choice. The former is "founded" upon the will and commandments of God-the latter, upon "the commandments and doctrines of men." This is the grand fundamental distinction between all that is true and all that is false in religion. The spurious worship to which the Apostle here alludes is by him expressly styled a self-chosen worship." It has no power to check the indulgence of fleshly passions. It can help no man onward in the struggle for eternal life. It does not even burnish the weapons with which he fights the battles of the great King. But as it can do him no good, it must do positive harm. It leads him away from God, away from the truth, and induces him to trust in the traditions and philosophies of men, while he wastes his strength and his life in keeping" the commandments of men."

But I desire to make this distinction between the true and false in religion as plain as possible. God is the Moral Governor of the universe. All men and angels are under law to him. Loyalty to the divine government requires a hearty obedience to divine law. Whatever God commands, therefore, we must do. To hesitate, to falter, is to forsake our allegiance. To set up any commandment of men," and honor it as a command of God, is treason. God's will

Harbinger, Mar. 1, '65.

is expressed in his commandments. Every commandment, even the least, is an expression of his will and an embodiment of his authority as the monarch of the universe. To obey his commandment, to do his will, is, therefore, the very essence of true piety. Everything else is mere will worship. It is self-chosen, and for this single reason is a departure from our allegiance to God. However plausible and specious such worship may appear, however much of the show of wisdom it may exhibit, the Holy Spirit has written its fully and emptiness so plainly, that none but the wilfully blind can fail to see.

Passages in the word of God, establishing what I have here written beyond a doubt, will at once occur to the mind of the thoughtful reader. "Not every one that says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he that does the will of my Father who is in heaven." There is a volume in this single declaration. Not loud professions, not sanctimonious countenances, not clappings and shoutings, not zeal however earnest and devout, in the observance of a self-chosen and self-imposed ritual, will admit men either into the kingdom of heaven here, or into heaven itself hereafter. The condition is a very simple one indeed; but with all the temptations of the Devil, with all the blandishments of the world, with all the weaknesses of the flesh, who shall say it is not a difficult one? Still it is simple-exceedingly simple. It is only to do the will of God-to keep his commandments. Let the words of the Saviour be written on every heart" He that does the will of my Father who is in heaven."

Take the text which stands as the motto of this article: "In vain do you worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men." Here the Saviour makes a bold thrust at the hypocrisy and will-worship of his cotemporaries. The religion of the Jews, in those days, was an apostacy from the religion given them by Moses. They were overburdened with the traditions and commandments of men. Their worship was emphatically a self-chosen worship, founded upon the precepts and doctrines of men." The Lord Jesus tells them plainly, that while these self-imposed observances were an insult to him, they were utterly vain as regarded themselves. True religion then, as now, consisted, not in following human traditions, and obeying uninspired human precepts, but, in doing from the heart the will of God as written in his own holy commandments.

When God, through Moses, instructed the children of Israel how they should worship him, he expressly forbade them to inquire into the human ceremonials of the idolatrous nations that he had cast out before them. They were not to do to the Lord their God as these foolish heathen had done to their false gods. The law was very plain. "What thing soever I command you, observe to do it; you shall neither add thereto, nor diminish from it." The principle which underlies this law has never changed. The Israelites were to do the very thing that God commanded. They were neither to add to it, nor to diminish from it. This holds good yet. Every super-addition to, or substraction from the divine commandments, is a daring and presumptuous attempt to infringe upon the prerogative of Jehovah. This is what renders will-worship so odious in the sight of God. It is contempt for his authority. It is rebellion against his government. Whatsoever thing God commands us to do, that very thing we must do. We have no election in the matter. We must do the very thing commanded, or incur the displeasure of Jehovah. No human substitute will do. The law is plain, and from it there is no appeal. Whatsoever thing I command you, observe to do it; you shall neither add thereto, nor diminish from it."

When Saul went out to battle against the Amalekites, he had special instructions from the Lord." Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, oxen and sheep, camel and ass." With this commission he went out and smote the Amalekites from "Havilah to Shur, that is over against Egypt." He took Agag the King, and destroyed his entire people. But he forgot the commandment of Jehovah, and saved Agag alive; also the best of the sheep and the oxen, and of the fatlings, and the lambs. "Then came the word of the Lord to Samuel saying, It repenteth me that I have set up Saul to be king, for he is turned back from following me, and hath not performed my commandment."

But Saul insisted to Samuel that he had peformed the commandment of the Lord. "Yea," said he, "I have obeyed the voice of the Lord, and have gone the way which the Lord sent me, and have brought Agag the king of Amalek, and have utterly destroyed the Amalekites; but the people took of the spoil, sheep and oxen, to offer to the Lord in Gilgal." Oh, yes!" says Saul, apparently in good faith, and without the slightest suspicion that he had done more than vary just a little, very slightly, and that in mere circumstantials, from the instructions he had received, "Oh, yes! I have obeyed the voice of the Lord, and have gone the way which the Lord sent me." But what said the Lord to him? "Behold to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, he also hath rejected thee from being king." Here we learn, that to vary from a divine commandment, even in its most unimportant circumstantials, is rebellion against Jehovah. When will men cease to stumble at the commandments of God? Alas! that Saul's case should be the type of so many cases in Christendom to-day! How many proud Pharisees, who curl their lips in scorn, when even the name of my brethren is mentioned, are destined yet to learn that to obey God is better than sanctimonious cant, better than blessings of orthodoxy, better than all the visionary experiences born of the dreamy and superstitious teachings of apostate sects! But the oldest case of will-worship on record is the case of Cain. Perhaps also, whether we consider the circumstances under which it occurred or the unhappy tragedy that grew out of it, it deserves to be classed_among the most inexcusable. God had commanded the shedding of blood. In this there is no mistake. For though we are not told in the book of Genesis in so many words that such was the case, yet the fact is deducible by a logical process that admits of no doubt whatever.

1st. God had either given to men instructions in regard to what worship would be acceptable to him, or he had not. He had either given them a commandment to be governed by, or he had not. Say, if you please, that he had given them no instructions on the subject. If this were so, then the whole transaction was an unauthorized procedure on the part of both Cain and Abel. If they were left to follow their own views of the fitness of things there could have been no crime in being mistaken, and Cain, even if his offering had not been accepted, would not have been adjudged a sinner. Besides, if God had given no commandment-expressed no choice-then any form of worship they might have adopted would have been a "self-chosen worship," and according to the teaching of the Holy Spirit by Paul, would have been utterly useless. In this case, Abel's sacrifice of blood would have been no better than the offering of Cain.

2nd. But Paul tells us (Heb. xi. 4), by faith, Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain. Now, it is very clear that if God had given no commandment neither Cain nor Abel could have acted "by faith." For in the absence of any revelation from God, faith is simply impossible. Where there is no divine command, there can be no such thing as the obedience of faith. If there be any one who has yet to learn these things, with him I will not now attempt to reason Because Abel is said to have made his offering in faith we know, therefore, that God had given a command, and that Abel did the very thing which he was required to do.

But the entire institution of sacrifice is so manifestly supernatural, that to argue the question of its divine origin would seem a waste of time. No process

of reasoning ever could have led to it. There is no apparent connection between the thing done and the proposed end, so that no human philosophy ever could have suggested it. Indeed, considered from a mere human stand-point, the whole institution must have appeared not only unmeaning, but supremely foolish. Yet it has a rationale, a most touching and impressive one. But to see it you must scale the heights of Calvary, and stand by the side of the dying Saviour. You must listen to the exclamation-" My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" as the words come bursting from his noble heart in that sad hour of agony. You must hear that tender, apologetic prayer for his enemies

Harbinger, Mar. 1, '65.

and murderers. You must draw very near, and see the precious blood as it trickles from his thorn-pierced_temples, and courses its way along the lines of his divinely benevolent face. You must watch the rugged soldier as he pierces his side with the pitiless spear, and look at the crimson tide that gushes forth, when it is withdrawn. You must hear him say, "It is finished!" and gaze upon his heavenly countenance as he calmly breathes out his life, an offering for the sins of the world. From this bloody, but glorious eminence, and with these surroundings, you may look back over the four thousand years of human folly and crime that had gone by, and see the meaning of all the sacrificial blood that has ever been shed. But for this scene, present in the mind of God from the beginning, present before the first altar was reared or the blood of the first victim shed, the institution of sacrifice had never been. But for this, and without a divine commandment, had it been possible to conceive the thought and to embody it in an institution, still the whole thing would have been an unprofitable and senseless farce.

We are forced, therefore, to the conclusion, that in the very infancy of the world, when our race was as yet a single family, God made a revelation that has not, in words, come down to us. In that revelation was the insitution of sacrifice. Here he commanded the shedding of blood for the remission of sins; and may be, gave some kind of intimation of the great event the institution was intended to foreshadow. At least, we know that he ordained sacrifice, and that the shedding of blood was in the command, for such was the offering of Abel, and he made it "by faith"--that is, according to the divine appointment.

But what shall I say of Cain? He was the first born of a fallen, yet noble pair. The mother of all living had not only hailed his birth with joy, but had watched over his infancy and childhood with all a mother's tenderness and solicitude. She had labored hard-who can doubt it ?-to mould his heart to noble and lofty purposes Her nursery stories had been glowing and eloquent recitals of her own happy experiences in the garden of delights, or thrilling and rapturous descriptions of the beauty and magnificence of her once happy home. Often, no doubt, with a heart chastened and subdued by suffering, she spoke of her own sad mistake and fearful fall; not in words of complaint or murmuring against the kind Creator, whose sentence, she felt in her very heart, had in it more of mercy than wrath; but rather in warning and admonition to her beloved boy. His noble father did not neglect the training of his first-born son. He was the pride and joy of that father's existence. With earnest words, he sought to direct his young heart to the highest and noblest ends of human life. With intense solicitude, as in view of his own sad remembrances, he strove to lift his soul to God, as the Father of mercies and Fountain of all good, and to impress upon his yet susceptible heart the importance of the most scrupulous fidelity to him in all his holy appointments. Thus nurtured, thus trained, Cain should have been a noble specimen of our race. But, alas! for human frailty. Alas! that so dark a page should record the history of one so nurtured, so idolized, by the noblest human pair that ever yet graced our earth?

God had said, "Let the altar be reared, let the blood of the victim be spilled, and let it be offered up as an atonement for sin." But Cain was a tiller of the earth. His wealth consisted not in flocks and herds, but rather in the direct produce of the soil. It was neither so cheap nor so convenient for him to offer a lamb in the sacrifice of God. His heart began to rebel. His imagination went eagerly to work. Why so particular about a mere form? If the heart is right, then surely God will be satisfied. The salvation of the soul cannot depend upon an outward act. As Cain, probably reasoned then, so we know that many most foolishly-not to say wickedly-reason now. Strange, that men who make everything depend upon the state of the heart, should, in the very logic by which they attempt to sustain themselves, give evidence of the rebellion of their own hearts against the wisdom and the will of Jehovah. But so it is now, and the circumstances indicate that so it may have been then. He set his wits to work to fix upon a plausible substitute for the divine appointment. The historian tells us what the result of his cogitations on this subject was. His expedient was a very specious, and under the circumstances a very natural one,

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