The task of dealing with evil is always sorrowful. To one walking in the spirit. For charity rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth. Paul wrote. Even weeping when he had to testify of some in the church who were enemies of the Cross of Christ. But though to testify of evil, be an occasion of sorrow. Yet it is a needful service. Especially amidst the perilous times of the last days.
The truths of God are perverted and denied. The principles of God are misapplied and perverted. And. Consequently, the most delusive errors. About. Respecting both the foundation and the methods of personal salvation. The latter form of evil. Is a subject. Of present remark.
The principles of God in respect to the secondary methods of his wisdom. For effectuating his eternal purposes in the salvation of his church. Are. In these days. Systematically misapplied and perverted. For the production of a carnal religion. A substitute for a spiritual life and genuine godliness.
I will first intimate the principles of divine wisdom. And then consider their Perversion and abuse.
1. The primary acts of God's creative power were immediate and direct. But subsequently to these. The entire process. Of nature and Providence in respect to his world. Have been carried on by means of physical and organic laws. Causes, means, and instrumentalities. And even these, it may be, are under the supervision and direction of angelic beings. This latter thought is apparently countenanced by inspired truth.
2. When the law was given at Sinai, Moses was the national legal mediator between Jehovah and the people of Israel. Angels also were media of communication. The law was "spoken by Angels," was "ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator." Israel "received the law by the disposition of angels." Thus by the will of God, both human and angelic ministries were employed.
The mission of Moses in Egypt, at the Red Sea and in the wilderness, and Joshua leading Israel into the promised land. Are instances of the mediate methods of the interposition and action of God. The Ministry of the Ancient Prophets also exemplifies the same divine principles. As it is said, God "spoke unto the fathers by the prophets."
God sustains a beneficient general Providence over all creatures on Earth. Mankind included. But besides this, he exercises a particular regard towards his confiding Saints. This is the watchful care of the father over his own children in respect to the things that are seen and temporal. And the economy of the fatherly care. Is to a great extent carried out through Angelic Ministry. For the angels. Of God are "all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for them. who shall be heirs of salvation."
Now all the ways of God are in perfect unison with Himself. They are therefore in harmony with each other. The Christian economy fully exemplifies the immediate principles and arrangements of divine wisdom. Our risen and ascended Lord "gave some apostles, some prophets and some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers. For the perfecting of the Saints, for the work of the Ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ. Till we all come into the unity of the faith. And of the knowledge of the son of God unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ."
The apostles and prophets, through their inspired writings, still ministered to the saints as really as they did to those among whom they rendered their living services. And for whose immediate use they wrote their inspired compositions.
From the days of Timothy and Titus. Evangelists have been seasonably raised up and sustained for the work of the Lord. And pastors have been successively given to the church. Redeemed regenerate men have been endowed by the Holy Spirit with spiritual gifts and qualifications for their several and distinctive ministries. And all divinely instituted Christian ministries have their origin in the incarnation of the Son of God. The mysterious fact that "the Word was made flesh" their model in his personal ministry on Earth; and their foundation in his perfect work of atonement and redemption.
It is undoubtedly true that God could carry on the entire work of conversion, edification and comfort, in the state and experience of his elect without any such means and ministries. This he could have done from the beginning, but it was his good pleasure according to the eternal purpose and grace. To institute an employee, visible and audible ministries, ministries not of angels, but of men, as it is said. "We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us."
In the act of quickening or giving life, the divine regenerator acts directly upon and within the person whom he quickens. The only instrument recognized in connection with this direct physical act of the spirit is the truth - the expressed and apprehended thoughts and testimony of God. It is true, however, that Peter was sent to the House of Cornelius, that the Lord opened Lydia's heart and she attended to the things spoken by Paul. And that Paul has said, "I have planted Apollos watered, and God gave the increase." A word to the wise is sufficient.
It cannot, then, be wisely doubted that God has, according to the council of his own will, instituted a system of suitable means and ministries in subserviency to his own work of saving sinners, by his own grace. Through the death and resurrection of his own Son. But is it the truth of this that men intend to signify, by the very popular phrase the "means of grace?" It is not. For that phrase in complexion and usage is popish and not Protestant. The ideas it is used to signify have been derived from Rome. And its clerical and popular use is a radical perversion of the ways and principles of God.
Papists. And semi-papists. Speak of the"grace of sacraments." But pseudo-Protestants prefer to speak of the "means of grace." The theory, however, of both classes is one and the same. For the apparent difference consists only in words. What the papist intends by the grace of sacraments is well known. And that which is clerically and popularly intended by the "means of grace" is certain practical observances by which sinners may hope to attain to the grace of God. Hence men are exhorted, yay commanded to "attend the means," "observe the means," "wait on the means," and "be found in the means." But this is only a device of Satan. It is a cheat and delusion. Though it may not be in all cases so intended, its radical principle is that of the letter that kills. This "do, and you will live", its prominent doctrine is by works are you saved through means of grace; and its inspiring genius is confidence in the flesh. The boastful animus of self-reliance and of glorifying only in man.
It may be here be useful to amplify a little the means theory which in substance is advocated. By the papist proper and by the Papal-Protestant. It may thus be accurately described:
"That certain ritual or ceremonial observances, (chiefly of human origin,) and certain mental, moral, and legal exercises are the media of saving grace; that the observance and practice of these rewarded by the present advantage of salvability, which suggests the hope of ultimate salvation as a contingent possibility. And that at the head of these visible "means of grace" stands the "priest" the main channel to which men are to expect to "get religion," and, if they use in practice it rightly, to get to heaven at the end."
Such is the evil theory, couched under apparently harmless words, the "means of grace." Not only does it deceive the hearts and mock the expectations of men, but it's so exceedingly evil, that it represents the incarnation, death, and resurrection of the son of God as being only accessory and subservient to the will and efforts of men, in affecting a salvation for themselves.
This destructive theory. Is that very perversion of the Gospel of Christ. Which was once disseminated in Galatia. Which Paul so firmly condemned. And against the promulgators of which he denounced a terrible because inspired - anathema. In a word, this theory is of the very essence of legal and papal teaching; the anti-evangelical doctrines of Romanism. Far from being limited to the pale of the papal church. Pervade the extended area of Christendom. And thrive even to its extremities. But in the midst of all this evil, God has his chosen witnesses; who need always to remember the counsel of their Lord and master: "be wise as serpents and harmless as doves."
The theory now expressed has led to the adoption of systematic means for producing what is called "religious concern" and "religious effort." Among the means device for this purpose, "protracted meetings" with their several appliances have a notorious provenance. The human origin and control of these is self-evident. This cannot be denied: because they are commonly appointed and held at seasons when they interfere the least with the occupations and pecuniary interests of the world. "Snow and harvest" would not be a more wonderful phenomena than a revival would be at the same season of the year. Therefore, to attribute the origin and history of modern protracted meetings to God would be gross impiety and hypocrisy if not done ignorantly, and as the effect of a blinding delusion.
Among the actors on such occasions, some are more successful than others; and of these, there are two classes. The one consists of men who have studied the laws, faculties and susceptibilities of the human mind and have acquired the art of practicing skillfully on the same. with a view to a predetermined result. The other consists of men who are not possessed of such intellectual and artistic qualifications, but who are imaginative, impassioned, and enthusiastic, and act upon others by an infectious exhibition of the earnestness, energy, and excitement of the flesh in themselves. These men are sincere in purpose, though fearfully erroneous in mental effort and aim.
In the case of those acted upon, the natural faculties most sensibly affected are conscience and caution. Hence fear, alarm, anxiety are produced. "Good resolutions" and "religious efforts" are made in the excited confidence of the flesh. And not infrequently scenes occur, worthy of that on Mount Carmel when the worshippers of bail by their incensed cries and infuriated self-torture provoked the scorching sarcasm of the faithful witness of Jehovah.
Poor deluded devotees! They are quickly constituted a semi-Popish order of "penitents." The anxious seat is there appointed place of in the active penance, and of mental purgatory. They are set before the assembly as decoy birds are used by the wily fowler for the sake of attractive effect, through the well-known laws of sympathy and initiation. And by such means and processes, at certain seasons of the year, a legal, and therefore delusive, religion is extensively produced. A religion of the flesh set up by the flesh and which must perish with the flesh. God may sometimes overrule, these and such like things even as he does all kinds of evil. But overruled evil is still in itself evil and not good.
2. The divine institution of spiritual Ministries is a prominent part of the Christian economy.
These ministries require the possession of spiritual gifts. Which are bestowed by the Holy Spirit. Mental qualifications which consist chiefly of divine illumination and experimental training, which can be received only in the School of God. But how extensively and systematically has this divine institution been perverted and abused? I speak not now of false prophets who have glared in the ecclesiastical atmosphere, but of the ordinary forms of human evil, by which the order of God has been rudely invaded by the untaught energy of the flesh on the one side, and by the literary refinement of the flesh on the other.
One class of men, without the advantages of a liberal education, but of constitutional vigor and mental activity, have urged their way, unbidden, into ministerial positions. They have mistaken their natural impulses for divine promptings, their untrained powers of identity for divine illumination, and their self-confidence and assurance for divine assistance and sufficiency. But a much more numerous class of unauthorized men have assumed the office of "Ministers of Christ." By virtue of certain accredited substitutes for spiritual gifts and qualifications. Substitutes supplied by the literary institutions which have been founded and sustained by ecclesiastical action, with the approval and aid of the ruling powers of the world. These substitutionary supplies are classical tuition. prescribed credenda, rhetorical training, and academic diplomas and degrees. Thus as the commodities of civilized life are supplied through the main factories of commerce. So from the halls of science and reputed schools of theology, communities, and bodies of professed Christians are supplied with pastors and teachers whose qualifications being endorsed by such "high authorities" are recognized as valid and complete.
I do not undervalue educational advantages but cordially maintained their relative importance, in the case of spiritual men, particularly with respect to a sound and instructive exposition of the inspired writings. And I delight in knowing that the Lord Jesus does sometimes take up literary men as he did Saul of Tarsus and qualify them with spiritual endowments as chosen vessels to instruct his saints and defend his gospel. But the highest degree of mental culture, classical attainment, acquaintance with a prescribed creed, and rhetorical training can never constitute a real fitness and adequacy for the Christian ministry; can never supersede the necessity of spiritual gifts, divine illumination, and experimental training in the School of God. But because this is disbelieved, the ministry is regarded as a learned "Profession," held in repute by the world. The professed church delights like the lights to adorn itself with the possessors and advocates of academic honors, and those who are called by God into the service of his son. But those who do not rank with the learned of the world, are generally unrestrained, scoffed at, and despised.
William Morris
Glendale Ohio
July 15, 1853
Signs of the Times
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