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Little-Known Facts About Hell.

BY C. J. WOODWORTH.

The average man believes in hell, but thinks few people go there and nobody knows much about it. The Bible is the only authority on the subject, and no one can know anything about it, aside from the Bible.

When we consider Christ’s statement that unless a man loves Him more than “father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethern, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:26), and reflect that probably not one professed Christian in a hundred has reached either this standard or the other one which He set in the same chapter, that “Whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be My disciple” (Luke 14:33), it should make us willing to consider carefully what is to become of the 9,999 out of every 10,000 of earth’s population that do not meet these conditions.

We all know that “The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God” (Psa. 9:17) ; but how many of us know that they will be re-turned there; that the passage, correctly translated, reads, “The wicked shall be returned into hell, all the nations that forget. God”—showing that there are nations which go into hell once, come out of hell, learn of God, forget Him and are returned there.

We may all know (Judges 11) that Korah or Core went to hell, but how many of us know that he was accompanied to this place by his house, with all his household goods, and two other establishments similarly equipped?— Hum. 16 :32, 33.

We may all know that the Sodomites went to hell (Gen. 19), but how many know that they were accompanied by the city in which they lived and that there are other cities there?—Matt. 11:23.

We may all suppose that many heathen wafriers~oflong ago"went to hell, but how many of us know that they took with them their weapons of war, and that their swords are there now, under their heads, with what is left of their bones?—Ezek. 32:27.

We may understand that the wealthy go to hell, but how many of us know that in the same place are sheep, gray hairs, worms, dust, trees and water?—Psa. 49:14; Gen. 44:31; Job 17 :13-16; Ezek. 31:16.

We may all know that bad men go to hell, but how many of us know that the Ancient Worthies, Jacob and Hezekiah, fully expected to go there, and that faithful Job prayed to go there?—Gen. 37 :35; Job 14 :13.

We may all wish to keep out of hell, but how many of us know that David said there is not a man that liveth that shall deliver his soul from its power and that Solomon says thou goest there, whosoever thou art?—Psa. 49:10; Eccl. 9:10.

We may think that those who go to hell go there to stay forever, but how many of us know that Samuel said, “The Lord killeth and maketh alive; He bring-eth down to hell and bringeth up” out of hell, and that David said God has the same power to aid those in hell that He has to bless those in heaven?—1 Sam. 2 :6; Psa. 139:8.

We may think that those who go into hell never come out, and that there is no record that any have come out, yet there are at least two persons in history who have been in hell and come out pf hell. One is Jonah, who prayed in hell and was delivered from hell (Jonah 2:2), and the other is Christ, whose soul went to hell, but “His soul was not left in hell,” for God raised him up out of it. (Acts 2 :31.) And when Christ came out of hell He brought with Him “The keys of hell” and now has the power and the right to let all its captives free.—Rev. 1:18.

We may suppose that hell is to last forever, but the Prophet speaks of its coming destruction, and John the Reve-lator says that it is to be made to “deliver up the dead” which are in it, and it, itself, is to be destroyed.—-Hosea 13:14; Rev. 20:13.

The last passage cited affords the explanation of the whole subject, for in the margin opposite Rev. 20 :13 the translators have explained that the word ■“hell” means “grave.” Reversely, in the margin opposite 1 Cor. 15 :55, the translators have explained that “grave” means “hell.” The terms are interchangeable and the meaning is the same. In every place in this article in which the citations appear in italic type, the translators have rendered Sheol or Hades by “g^pave” or “pit” instead of “hell.”

A STRONG BLEA FOR A UNITED CHRISTENDOM.

(.Continued from 1st page, 4th coltunn.)

Christ, not living stones in the Temple, not branches of the True Vine, not members of the “little flock.” They have been worldly people with religious sentiments and good desires, who misunderstood the Bible teaching that only the sanctified are in Christ Jesus, called to be saints. (1 Corinthians 1:2.) What these large numbers of well-meaning but mistaken people have done in the way of organizing churches, lodges, banks, etc., has had nothing whatever to do with the great organization which God effected eighteen centuries ago and. which has persisted as a unit ever since,/

The True Church has never, been divided. Each member is united with the Lord, the Head, and through Him to every _vother member of His Body, which is the Church. In this one Church there has always been maintained one Lord Jesus, one faith—His Word of Promise —and one baptism—consecration into His death.—2 Timothy 2 :11, 12; Ephesians 4 :4-6.

Does some one say, “Where is the history of this Church?” We answer in the words of the Apostle, “The world know-eth us not, even as it knew Him not.” (1 John 3:1.) The world of Jesus’ day were the professed religionists. Yet they knew not the great Redeemer whom God had sent; and they crucified Him. Similarly, all down the Gospel Age, the great religious teachers of the various systems have not recognized the members of the Body of Christ.

This is the very point which St. Paul emphasizes. He declares that the fact (and the philosophy of the fact) that the Church are members of Christ is to the world—both the religious world and the irreligious world—a Hidden Mystery. It is outside of their theory, their understanding. Hence it is that the most saintly characters, both Catholic and Protestant, have been martyrs, as Jesus was, as St. Stephen was, as all the Apostles were, as all the faithful were during the intermediate centuries; and as some yet may be if an outward union be effected such as once prevailed—in the Dark Ages.

Counterfeiting the True Church.

If we now declare that to a certain extent the True Churh has been counterfeited by both Catholics and Protestants, let no one suppose that we wish to speak unkindly. We do not charge that these counterfeits of the True Church were made intentionally, but merely that the Church, coming under the control of brilliant minds not spirit-begotten, followed their misrepresentations of God’s Word.

For instance, the average Roman Catholic does not know that he is not a member of the Church. But Cardinal Gibbons will not deny the fact, neither will any other ecclesiastic. Their teaching, most explicitly, is that the Pope and the other religious instructors compose the Church, and that the people are the children of the Church. Thus the Catholic Church appropriates the words of Jesus respecting the “little flock,” etc., and applies them to the clergy, not to the congregation. This is the secret of Papacy’s great mistake. In their ecclesiastical system they have a counterfeit of the True Church. Because the Scriptures declare that the Lord’s faithful “little flock,” “the Church of the living God,” will reign with Christ, therefore Papacy claims the right to reign with Heavenly authority over the kingdoms of earth. Papacy’s endeavor to carry out this erroneous reasoning has led to many grievous persecutions and wars.

If Papacy has the counterfeit of the True Church and the True Reign of Christ, what does the Bible teach respecting the genuine? This: That the experiences of the unknown, despised, saintly followers in the footsteps of Jesus constitute their preparation for a share in the Kingdom with their Lord. When the full number of the elect Church, predestined of the Father, shall have been gathered out of the world and glorified, then God’s Kingdom shall be established on earth, and they shall be joint-heirs with the King of kings—Jesus Christ. His Kingdom will rule the world, not by guns and swords, not by burnings at the stake and inquisitionary torments, but by Heavenly power.

What our Catholic friends have is merely a foreshadowing of the Truth respecting the Church as a mother. The Scriptures teach that when Christ shall institute His Millennial Kingdom for the uplifting of mankind, He shall have a Bride—the Church (Revelation 19:9) — and shall figuratively beget children. That is, during the thousand years of His Reign the glorified Jesus will be the Everlasting Father, Giver of everlasting life on the earthly plane, to Adam and all of his children who will accept it on the Divine terms. Then the Church will be the mother, the caretaker, of all mankind, to bring the willing and obedient up to full human perfection and life everlasting. All who refuse this grace of God will be destroyed in the Second Death.

Question.—Are the promises to the saints of the Gospel Age heavenly or earthly promises?

Answer.—“As ■ we have borne the image of the earthly, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.” We are “partakers of the heavenly calling.”—1 Cor. 15 :49; 2 Tim. 4 :18 ; Heb. 3 :1; 6 :4 ; Phil. 3:14; Eph. 2:6, 7; 2 Thess. 1:11, 12 ; 2 Tim. 1:9, 10.

Question.—Will the elect Church, the “overcomers,” the “saints,” continue to be human beings, “of the earth earthy?”

Answer.—“God hath given unto us exceeding great and precious promises, that by these we might become partakers of the divine nature”—“new-■creatures.”-— 2 Pet. 1:4; 2 Cor. 5 :17; Rom. 8:17, 18.

Question.—When will the full change (begun in us by a change of heart, called the begetting of the Spirit) be completed? -—When shall we be made like Christ our Lord?

Answer.—“We [saints] shall all be changed.” * * * “The dead [saints] shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye * * * this mortal shall put on immortality.” “Sown a natural [animal] body, it is raised a spiritual body.” “Thus is the [special] resurrection of the [special, elect] dead.” —1 Cor. 15 :50-53, 42-44 ; Phil. 3 41.

Question.—Are full recompenses, either rewards or punishments, to be expected before the resurrection?

Answer.—“Thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just.”—Luke 14 :14; Rev. 11:18; Matt. 16:27.

Question.—What is the hope held out for all except the elect Church of the Gospel Age?

Answer.—The whole [human] creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now, waiting for the manifestation of the sons of God [the saints].” Then shall follow “times of restitution of all things which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began,” in which “all the families of the earth shall be blessed” through the elect “Seed” of Abraham.—Rom. 8:22, 19; Acts 3 :19-21; Gal. 3 :16, 29.

Question.—Are the dead conscious or unconscious ?

Answer.—“The dead know not anything.”—Eccl. 9:5; Psa. 146:4; Isa. 38 :18, 19.

Question.—Have the departed saints been praising the Lord all along during the past ages?

Answer.—“The dead praise not the Lord.”—Psa. 115:17, 6:5; Eccl. 9:6.

Question.—Did the prophets receive their reward at death? or was it reserved in God’s Plan to be given them at the beginning of the Millennium, the age of judgment?

Answer’—“The time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that thou shouldst give reward unto thy servants the prophets,” is at the beginning of the sounding of the last trumpet, the seventh trumpet, at the end of the Gospel Age.— Rev. 11:15, 18; Psa. 17 :15.

Question.—Were the apostles promised translation to heaven at death?—or must they wait for the Lord’s second coming?

Answer.—“As I said to the Jews. Whither I go ye cannot come; so now I say to you [apostles],” “I will come again and receive you unto myself.”—John 13:33; 14:3.

Question.—Was it proper for the saints we have presented; namely, that the Royal Priesthood is composed exclusively of . saints, whether clergy or laity; that this One Church is indivisible; that the Heavenly Father, the Husbandman ot this True Vine, permits none to remain as branches, members of the True Church, unless they bring forth the true fruit of the Vine. We ask the Cardinal to consider the Scriptural teaching that this saintly class is now the Espoused Virgin mentioned by St. Paul (2 Corinthians. .11:2); and that these are now awaiting the completion of their number’, when the Heavenly Bridegroom, at His Second Coming, will receive them to Himself. By the power of the First Resurrection they will “be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye,” to be like their Lord. Then, as the Scriptures declare, will come the Marriage of the Lamb. (Revelation 19:7.) Shortly after that event will come the Millennial Kingdom and the regeneration of Adam’s race—the giving to them of new life from the Life-Giver.

As for the great human institutions which more or less counterfeit Christ’s Kingdom, these are also called vines in Scripture—the vine of the earth, in contrast with the Vine of the Father’s tight-hand planting. It is not for us to determine how much good and how much harm these earthly churches, vines of the earth, have accomplished. This our Lord will declare in His own season. But He tells u« that the grapes borne by the-se vines—anger, malice, hatred, envy, strife, evil-speaking, etc. — will overflow the Winepress of the Wrath of God in the near future, and bring upon mankind that great Time of Trouble which our Lord declares will be such as never was before known.—Matt. 24 :21; Dan. 12 :1.

of the Gospel Age, except such as would be living at the time of the Lord’s return, to expect to be crowned at death?

Answer.—“When the chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away.”—1 Pet. 5:4; 2 Tim. 4:8; 1 Pet. 1:4, 5.

Question.—Did the Apostles expect glory at death or at the second coming of Christ ?

Answer.—“When Christ who is our life shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.”—Col. 3 :4; 1 John 3:2.

Question.—David was one of the holy prophets: Was he rewarded by being taken to heaven ? .         . ... „

Answer.—“David is not ascended into the heavens.”—Acts 2 :34.

Question.—How many had gone to heaven up to the time of our Lord’s ascension ?

Answer.—“No man hath ascended up to heaven but He that came down from heaven, even the Son of Man.”—John 3 :13.

Question.—Can He who created man destroy him? Can the soul be destroyed by its Creator

Answer.—“Fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in Gehenna [the ‘Second Death’].” “He spared not their souls from death.” “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.”—Matt. 10:28; Psa. 78:50; Ezek. 18:4, 20; Psa. 22:29; Joshua 10:35; Isa. 38:17; Psa. 56:13; 30:3; 119-175; Matt. 26:38; Isa. 53: 10, 12.

Question.—How great importance did the Apostle Paul attach to the doctrine of the resurrection?

Answer.—“If there be no resurrection of /the dead, then is not Christ risen. * * * Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished.”—1 Cor. 15 :13-18.

Question.—Are the unjust now being tormented in some unknown hell? or do they always meet the full penalty of their unrighteousness in the present life?

Answer.—“The Lord knoweth how to * * * reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment [the Millennial Day] to be punished.”—2 Pet. 2:9; Job. 21:30.

Question.—What will be the end of those who when tried are found incorrigible—wilfully wicked?

Answer.—They shall “go away into a cutting off from life,” “be punished with everlasting destruction [a destruction which will never be terminated by a resurrection] ;” for still “The wages of sin is death,” “the Second Death;” and still the gift of God, eternal life, is to be had only in Christ. “He that hath the Son hath life;” he that hath not the Son shall not receive that gift.—Rom. 6 :23; Rev. 20:14, 15; Matt. 25:46; 1 John 5 :12 ; 2 Thess. 1:9.

What say the Scriptures about

SHEOL—HADES—HELL?

A very interesting pamphlet, explaining every verse in the Bible in which the original words are found that are translated into the English as “Hell,” will be sent on postal-card request, free of charge, to any one. Address I. B. S. A., 15 Hicks Street, Brooklyn, N. Y.

THE Gi/eat Teacher said of the lilies of the plain, “They toil not, neither do they spin; yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one ’df these” (Matthew Vi, 28, 29). Similarly we believe that in heaven the angels are free from toil. Divine power exercised in their interest makes toil unnecessary. He who created the angels and made the lilies is the same God by whose omnipotent power we human beings came into existence. We are surrounded by conditions which call for labor, toil, and sweat of face, as indicated in our text. Why are these things so? Why is man less favored by his Creator than the angels and the lilies? The answer to this query is found in God’s great Book, the Bible. As Bible Students the majority of us know, of course, the answer to this query. And yet it may prove beneficial to us to examine the question afresh.

I remind you that the words of our text are God’s comment upon the conditions which now obtain and which were made necessary by man’s disobedience and the terms of his sentence. As originally created the conditions of sweat of face and battling with thorns and insects too numerous to mention were not necessary and were not imposed upon mankind. On the contrary, Adam w^ras placed in Paradise, in the Garden of Eden, whose every prospect was beautiful. Its trees were fruitful, yielding a variety and an abundance of life-giving fruit for the maintenance of the king of earth and his queen, mother Eve. The responsibilities of the situation were merely to dress, or keep, the garden— to pluck its fruits and to prune the waste foliage to Adam’s pleasement. Every necessity was provided, as surely as in the case of the angels and the lilies. The gredt change which thrust our first parents from Paradise is the result of “Original Sin”—disobedience to God.

The basis of the fall may be said to have been the temptation of the Serpent, but otherwise, too, we may say that it was the loss of faith in God on the part of Mother Eve. Had she properly continued in faith and trust, the Tempter’s suggestions of disobedience would have been promptly rejected. His suggestioh that the great' Creator had been prompted by selfish motives in forbidding the. fruit of one particular kind of tree should have been promptly recognized as slander. And the further suggestion that the God of all Grace and Truth lied to them and distorted the facts when he warned that disobedience would result in death—this misrepresentation should have been indignantly resented. But, alas! Mother Eve had not yet reached that degree of character development; she succumbed to the temptation, crude as it was. Her desire for knowledge ensnared her. A lesson to us in this connection is that any knowledge which may come to us as Bible Students, or come to others, along any dines out of accord with the Divine testimony, would be costly knowledge indeed.

“The Wages of Sin is Death”

The result of the disobedience might have been the smiting of our first parents by a thunderbolt, but, with gracious purposes, God permitted them to have what they undoubtedly preferred ■—death by a dying process of centuries. This gave Adam and his posterity contact with sin. and its penalty. The Divine object in so doing is Scripturally declared to be that all mankind may learn of the “exceeding sinfulness of sin,” its undesirability and the sureness of its penalty—death. Had it not been for God’s intention by and by to send the Redeemer and to pay man’s death penalty, and thus to make possible his reclamation from death conditions by re-creation processes, our race might better have been instantly smitten to oblivion in our first parents; and the Twenty Thousand Millions of Adam’s children might better have remained unborn. However, the Bible clearly reveals that “as by man (Adam) came death, even so by a man (Jesus) also comes the resurrection of the dead. For as all in Adam die, even so all in Christ shall be made alive, every man in his own order.” (I Corinthians xv, 21-23.)

The purpose of the Lord, clearly expressed, is that mankind in general shall have the blessed opportunity of sharing'in the blessings of the Messianic Kingdom—the uplifting blessings, the restitution blessings, the resurrection blessings. St. Peter speaks of that thousand years of blessing as “times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began” (Acts iii, 21). Very clearly we discern God’s wise purpose to be that as mankind through Adam are

being made acquainted with Sin, calamities, death, so in due time all shall be made acquainted with righteousness, Truth and the boon of life eternal in harmony with their Creator. In that “restitution time,” by the contrast of the rewards of righteousness with the rewards of sin, the whole world shall be brought to a knowledge of the Truth and shall discern, not only the Justice of God, but also his Wisdom, Love and Power.

The Tree of Knowledge.

Truly enough, the forbidden fruit was of the tree of knowledge. The eating of that fruit did indeed bring with it to Mother Eve and to all her children knowledge. It has required Six Thousand years of experience under the reign of Sin and Death to learn one side, and it will require another One Thousand Years, the period of Christ’s reign, to teach Mother Eve .and her family the other part of the great lesson, namely, the knowledge of Good. By the conclusion of Christ’s reign the entire race of Adam will know both Good and Evil experimentally and, we trust, the majority of them will have learned the lesson so thoroughly that they will be fully out of accord with sin in its every phase. But while acknowledging that the eating of that fruit has become the channel of these lessons in evil, as in good, we can see that these same lessons might have been much more readily inculcated otherwise, had our first parents rejected the temptation and proven loyal to their Creator.

Many misunderstand these words, “Cursed is the earth,” to signify that our Creator put a special blight upon the fruitful and beautiful earth. On the contrary, while he could have brought the entire earth to full perfection before man’s creation, he did not do so, but left the greater part of it in a condition accursed or unfit for human use and habitation even while man was in harmony with God. God merely “Prepared the Garden Eastward in Eden” for the trial, the testing, the proving of our first parents, because he knew what would be the result of that trial. He knew the end from the beginning. Divine foreknowledge is the basis of the statement, “Cursed is the earth for thy sake;” it is thus unfit for you, in your own interest, because I foreknew your transgression and what conditions would be most favorable for you, that your death sentence might bring you the largest degree of knowledge and the largest degree of experience in the most helpful manner.

Is it asked how the unfitness of the earth could inure to man’s advantage as a sinner and why the Lor_;d placed the cherubim with flaming sword to keep the way to the Tree of Life? We reply that all of the experiences of the wisest of mankind corroborate the Divine decision that it was wisest and for the best interests of Adam and his children that the curse, the sentence, should affect him in all of his relationships of life and particularly in respect to his earthly home. “Cursed is the earth for thy sake. Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth unto thee.”

Greed—Selfishness—Meanness.

The battle for bread which started when our first parents were thrust out of the Garden of Eden and obliged to labor for their sustenance is a battle which has kept up ever since. It has had the effect of developing more and more in the human mind that evil quality called greed and selfishness. It has had the effect of making our race ignoble, mean. Father Adam, as the bread-winner of the family, surely had noble and generous qualities of heart and a great love for Mother Eve; yet one could imagine that, as age advanced upon him and he became six or seven hundred years old, the toil connected with his battle with the thorns and thistles was the more severe and that this would, of necessity, make him the more careful, the more frugal, even, perhaps, to the extent of parsimony and meanness. Similar experiences developed the same quality in all of his children, and the habit so grows upon us that, not merely are those who have the barest of necessities impelled to be stingy and close, but even those who come into possession of fabulous wealth have this parsimony ingrained in their very being.

We may indeed see a blessing in the Divine provision of this condition of things. Were it not for selfish ambition and pride what would become of the race, under the reign of “the Prince of this world”? If every man, upon obtaining a competence, were to sit down and be satisfied, where would be the world’s progress? How could it carry on the great projects of life—the public utilities, the public charities? Some motive is necessary to keep in bought us with his precious blood. Further be it remembered it served as the occasion for the testing of Lucifer, the proving of his disloyalty, when he became Satan, the Adversary of God, Additionally it furnished the opportune test of the loyalty or disloyalty of all the angels of heaven, as recorded in Genesis vi, Jude vi, and II Peter ii, 4, as we have previously seen.

“The Mystery of God.”

And now we come, dear friends, to that feature of the great Divine Plan which is so peculiarly interesting to tis —to us who are Bible.Students; to us who are disciples of Jesus; to us who are trusting that he has accepted us as “members of the Body of Christ,” as members of the Bride, the Lamb’s Wife, and his Joint-Heir in the Kingdom. Without the permission of sin there ■would have been no such opportunity as we now enjoy of experiencing a “change” of nature from earthly to heavenly—human to Divine. As our Lord would not have left the heavenly glory to become a man and to suffer and to die, the Just for the unjust, unless there had been sin in the world; unless sinners had needed redemption; so likewise we would have had no opportunity or privilege of joining with our Lord in his sacrifice of himself! We would have had no opportunity of joint-heirship with him in his Kingdom!

Indeed, had there been no sin to conquer, to down, to overthrow, there would have been no need for Christ’s Mediatorial Kingdom — for Christ’s reign of righteousness. Had there been no fallen condition of humanity in sin, in degradation, there would have been no work for the Royal Priesthood to accomplish during the “times of restitution,” during the existence of the Messianic Kingdom. So, then, while appreciating the terrible devastation of sin in the world, its terrible consequences upon the human family, we see behind the glorious Advent of our Lord in Kingdom power a full recovery of the race from All that was Lost in Adam and Redeemed on Calvary. From this standpoint we have a glimpse of the length and breadth and height and depth of the Love and Justice, the Wisdom and the lower of our God. From this standpoint we worship and adore our /J-mighty Creator and our precious Redeemer! From this standpoint we may have full confidence in the outcome, that ultimately all shall have the fullest opportunity of eternal life and that

destroyed in the Second Death, from which there shall be no redemption, no resurrection.

From this standpoint we may rejoice to suffer with our Redeemer, that we may be glorified with him in his Kingdom and participate with him in its glorious work of uplifting the poor, fallen race to Paradise, and to all the perfections of Adam. Yea, we may rejoice even in the Second Death of the unwilling and ■disobedient, realizing that true and righteous is the Divine edict under which they shall perish (II Peter ii, 12).

"LJAVING been asked to state concisely his position in reference. to Catholicism and Protestantism Pastor Russell recently gave out the following statement: For some unaccountable reason numerous Catholics have gotten the thought that I am their foe, just as' Presbyterians, Methodists, Episcopalians, Baptists, etc., have the impression that I am their foe. I am a foe to no human being, especially to no Christian. I believe more fully in Free Grace than do Methodists—that ultimately God’s grace will reach every human being. I believe more emphatically than do most Presbyterians that the Church is an especially elect class, and is now being gathered out of the world to be God’s agents in the ultimate blessing of all the non-elect. I believe with the Baptists that only the Elect, the immersed, will constitute the Kingdom of God, although I deny their claim that baptism in water is the real immersion. I hold, with the Apostle, that it is a baptism into Christ’s death. Similarly I hold to the great Catholic doctrine that there is only one true Church, founded Ly the Lord Jesus Christ through His Apostles, nearly nineteen centuries ago.

I am aware that several churches claim to be Catholic, each declaring itself the true Church and reprobating the others as heretical. I take the still broader catholic ground—that the word catholic means general; and that any limitation such as Roman Catholic, Greek Catholic, etc., to that extent denies their catholicity. Perhaps, therefore, I am really saying that I am more catholic than any of these brethren.

I must prove my point or be misunderstood. I hold, and few, if any, will dispute it, that the one catholic or general Church of Christ is that mentioned in boras, written in Heaven.” If this be admitted, my next proposition is that the Lord in Heaven records as members of His true Church all the saintly—whether Roman Catholics, Anglican Catholics, Greek Catholics, Baptists, Methodists, or Presbyterians, etc.—and none others.

Have we not here the one Church, catholic, universal, the only Church which the Bible recognizes? In the past we have been too narrow and have supposed that God was as narrow as ourselves. It was on this account that Presbyterians, Roman Catholics, Anglicans, Baptists, Methodists persecuted and were persecuted, each thinking itself the true Church. Are we not all getting broader conceptions of our God and of His Church? Do we not see that we were mistaken in calling the outward organization the Church of Christ instead of remembering that the Lord alone writes the names of the Church, that He alone reads the hearts, that He alone is the Judge, and that He alone has the right to blot out the names of reprobates ?

St. Paul wrote against sectarianism, already manifest in his day—some saying : “I am of Paul”; others, “I am of Peter”; etc. The Apostle asks. “Is Christ divided?” (1 Corinthians 1:10-13.) He explains that these sectarian names signified a spirit of division that failed to recognize the true Head of the Church. His true representatives and His true members. The entire foundation of divided Christianity would disappear and the true Church of Christ be speedily knowledged.

The great obstacle to unity is the erroneous doctrine of eternal torment. We must open our eyes wider and see that many of our theories were not taught by Jesus and the Apostles. We must see that the Church is a comparatively small company of Jesus’ footstep followers, irrespective of sectarian lines; and that the Bible teaches not that these are to look over the battlements of Heaven to all eternity and see all others in torment, but that they are to demonstrate their loyalty unto death and in due time be associated with Messiah in His Millennial Kingdom, which will bless all the families of the earth—the living and the dead, who will then be resurrected.

The Twelve Foundation Stones.

St. Paul declared that the saints of God, the true catholic Church, “are built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the Chief Corner Stone.” (Ephesians 2:20.) The Twelve Apostles are here referred to in their double office—Apostles especially commissioned by the Lord as His representatives, and Prophets, mouthpieces, for the proclamation of His Message. Jesus pictures the Church of Glory as the New Jerusalem, and its twelve foundations as twelve precious stones, in which are the names of the TWELVE Apostles of the Lamb—no more, no less —St. Paul being God’s choice to take Judas’ place.

To think of St. Peter as the only foundation for the Church would be to deny Christ’s teaching and St. Peter’s own statement—that the entire Church is symbolically represented as living stones built together by the Lord through the Holy Spirit. (1 Peter 2 :4-10.) It was a costly mistake when our forefathers, overlooking this well-established point of Scripture, thought of their bishops as Apostolic Bishops, and took their decisions in councils assembled as the voice of God. The voice of God to and through the Church came only through “the twelve Apostles of the Lamb.” All others claiming this authority are denounced by Jesus Himself as pseudo-Apostles—false Apostles.—Revelation 2:2.

Power in Heaven and in Earth. ^f

As St. Peter was only one of the twelve foundation stones of the Church, so, likewise, he was only one of The Twelve to whom the Lord declared, “Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in Heaven; and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in Heaven” (Matthew 18:18)—the same statement exactly that on another occasion He made to St. Peter only. But He gave the keys to St. Peter alone.

Would it seem reasonable that Jesus

The Church Upon the Rock.

“Other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, Jesus Christ.” (1 Corinthians 3:11.) In the Divine arrangement Jesus Christ is the Foundation, the Rock, upon which is built the entire superstructure of His Church—the one Catholic, world-wide Church. The New Jerusalem, the Church in glory, had twelve foundation stones, built upon the one Foundation Rock, the Lord Jesus Christ. It would manifestly be erroneous, therefore, to suppose that our Lord abdicated His own place in the Church in favor of St. Peter, as much as He loved him. St. Peter was merely one of the twelve precious-stone foundations.

What, then, did Jesus mean when He called St. Peter a stone, spoke of building His Church upon “this rock,” and declared that the gates of Hell (Hades, the grave) would not prevail against it? We reply, Jesus went down into the prison-house of death, Sheol, Hades, the tomb; but on the third day these gates

Keys of the Kingdom.”

Peter our Lord said, “I will the keys of the Kingdom of

newspapers are stupid enough to think Jesus meant that Heaven is locked up, and that nobody could get in except as St. Peter would admit them. True, some have voiced such fantastic notions. But we refuse to believe that intelligent people could be in earnest in any such view.

St. Peter was honored in being permitted to do an opening work connected with the inauguration of the Church. The Bible shows us two different keys. A

THERE is wisdom in the Proverb which says that dead flies cause precious oint-juent to stink. This is particularly true in respect to the Bible. It is a precious ointment of sweet odor, but certain flies have gotten into it whose corruption have destroyed the perfume of the Divine records in the estimation of many—an intelligent and growing number. Some of these dead flies were mistranslations; some of them misinterpretations, and some of them, including the text, were interpolations—unauthorized additions to the Scriptures as originally written.

Many Use Spurious Texts.

All of the sixteenth chapter of Mark, from the ninth verse to the end, is now well known to all scholars as an addition made to what St. Mark wrote. _ It has been known for years to all Bible scholars that the two oldest Greek manuscripts known to the world end the Book of Mark with the preceding verse (8). And these two oldest manuscripts belong to the Fourth Century. Evidently, therefore, this addition to the Scriptures was made about four hundred years after St. Mark’s death. Why the ministers _ of Christendom fail to inform the Christian public of what they all know or should know we do not here pretend to say. Why many of them use these spurious verses as texts to sermons without explaining that they are spurious is not for us to judge. We would say, however, that some use these verses because they suit their theories as no other verses in the Bible would do.

Some zealous Christians use this text as a club upon other Christians, claiming that if they are not baptized with water they will surely be damned, millions of them even claiming that it must be by an immersion in water. And by damned they mean eternally, everlastingly tormented by fireproof devils. They go further and make this spurious addition to God’s Word the basis of the theory that the Church is responsible for the Christianization of the world, and that every heathen who does not believe and who is not baptized—some say immersed— will be damned to eternal torture for their unbelief and lack of baptism. Thus this spurious statement dishonors God, antagonizes all sensible minds, and makes narrower and harder those who can and do believe.

Ability to Drink Poison.

Many Christian people have their faith shaken in respect to their own relationship to God because of the statements following this text—to the effect that all believers would have the power to cast out devils, to speak with new tongues,. to handle serpents without injury, to drink deadly poison without injury, and to lay key is a symbol of power or authority or an initiative. St. Peter used his first key of privilege on Pentecost. When the Holy ■Spirit came upon the early waiting Church, St. Peter explained the situation and opened the door into the Church of Christ for the Jews, admonishing them to enter. He told of the merit of Christ’s death, resurrection and ascension, and how forgiveness of sins was, therefore, preached in His name.—Acts 2:14-36.

The second key to the Kingdom of Heaven—the Church, the embryo King-' dom preparing for glory—St. Peter used three and a half years later. Then the seventieth week of Divine favor prophet-iscally appointed to the Jews expired, and ' the time came that “the Gentiles might be fellow-heirs with the Jews of the same Promise.” The opening work was with the household of Cornelius, to whom St. Peter preached Christ. Thus the Gentile door into the Kingdom was thrown wide open.—Acts 10.

Repentance and Remission of Sins.

“That repentance and remission of sins might be preached in His name to all people.” (Luke 24:47.) God never gave power to bishops, priests or ministers of any denomination to forgive sins. “Who can forgive sins but God alone?” Nor did Jesus give authority to His Apostles to forgive sins. They might preach repentance and forgiveness, but ONLY IN HIS NAME. Nowhere in the Bible is there a statement to the effect that the Apostles undertook to forgive sins.

In proportion as God’s people throw away their sectarian spectacles they can read God’s Message in the words of Jesus and the Apostles. Let us hold fast the precious Word, which Jesus exhorts us to search and which is sufficient that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished.

Let us remember that there is only one true catholic, universal Church, each member of which is a saint, related to God and the Lord Jesus Christ through faith, repentance and remission of sin and begetting of the Holy Spirit; and that a member of the Body of Christ is a member of that Body anywhere. “Now are ye the Body of Christ, and members in particular.”—1 Corinthians 12:27.

hands on the sick and cause recovery. Many worldly-minded people, reading these statements, declare them to be buncombe, or else that the Church of Christ has lost a power which it should still possess. And yet intelligent ministers quote these spurious words instead of informing the people that they are no part of God’s Message and that they are not true. The Scriptures do teach that miracles of tongues, healings, etc., were permitted in the days of the Apostles for the purpose of establishing the infant Church. But it is true that such powers were communicated, according to the Scriptures, by the laying on of the Apostles’ hands; and hence, as soon as the Apostles were dead and those upon whom they had laid their hands, and consecutively those who had' received the Apostolic blessing and gifts of the holy Spirit were dead, all those miracles and healings naturally ceased, as St. Paul foretold.—1 Cor. 13 :8.

“Let Him That Hath an Ear Hear” the Good News.

While the Gospel is to be preached in every nation, it is not with a view to converting all of mankind, but, as many Scriptures show, as a witness to the world and for the selection from among the world of a “little flock” of saints— “called, chosen and faithful”—to constitute Messiah’s associates in his Mediatorial Kingdom, which shortly is to bless humanity with glorious opportunities of knowledge and uplifting influences, which will restore the willing and obedient to full harmony with God, full release from sin and death, sorrow and pain, to life eternal as perfect men in a world-wide “Paradise restored.”

FACTS FOIL THE ASSASSINATION OF

PASTOR RUSSELL’S CHARACTER

A post card request brings free a clear cut statement of the facts at issue. Address Watch Tower, Brooklyn, N. Y.

Those who read carefully and get the benefit of the pure spiritual atmosphere into which Pastor Russell leads them, need not be told that the many vile printed and pulpit attacks are wholly false and merely the desperate efforts of opponents whose nefarious schemes to keep the people in ignorance of the truth on all subjects Pastor Russell is so fearlessly and thoroughly exposing. '

It is for this reason that the millions of newspaper readers continue to enjoy Pastor Russell’s pen products. The fact is that not a soul on earth has the slightest cause for grievance against Pastor Russell, except that he is telling the common people truths the clergy wish them not to know.