TIMOTHY MISSION FUND

Our hearts were gladdened this past month with the receipt of $536.00 in donations to our mission fund. Many thanks for your gifts, especially to the friend who, after recovery from a serious accident, sent us a liberal donation as a thankoffering for God’s mercy bestowed upon him. Our thanks also to those who have been sending in postage stamps from time to time. To all of our friends we extend our best wishes for the year 1971, praying that the Lord will bless them with their needs for the body, but more especially with those spiritual blessings so necessary for the welfare of their souls.

During the month of November checks in the amount of $200.00 each were sent to the cattle fund of Rev. Kuijt, to Mr. and Mrs. Jan van Woerden (Ebenezer Scripture Mission) in Rhodesia, and to the Mbuma Mission Hospital in Rhodesia. The balance in the fund at the end of November was $40.40. Donations to this fund should be sent in care of Miss Adriana Kievit, 1121 N. Westnedge Avenue, Kalamazoo, Michigan 49007.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT FROM WYCLIFFE BIBLE TRANSLATORS IN BOLIVIA —

Dear friends,

Thanks very much for the gift you sent to the Wycliffe Bible Translators. Since our family does not receive full monthly support, it is gifts like yours which are used to supplement our income. We appreciate your interest very much.

Perhaps you’d like to know something about our family. I was born in Iowa and my husband John is from Brooklyn. Our four children are Steve, 16; Ruth, 14; Tommy, 9; and Mickey ,6. We came to Bolivia nine years ago and work as translators to the Tacana Indians.

The Tacanas are a friendly, progressive people who live in the western part of the country along the Andean foothills. They are farmers who hunt for their meat. The women weave interesting bags and belts from home-spun and dyed cotton thread. In the village of Tumupasa, where we live, there are 31 believers and they are starting to build their own church. Will you pray for the little, struggling Tacana church? It’s not easy for an Indian to be faithful to Christ in his own village, because the non-believers don’t want anyone to change from the old ways.

We have published the book of Mark in Tacana and a number of Bible stories, primers, and other booklets. John has the pastoral epistles ready for printing and now is going to start working on the prison epistles. I am working on more primers and an Old Testament Bible story book. Within a few days we plan to leave on a two-week river trip to visit Tacanas who have left their home country and migrated to work in the rubber and Brazil-nut plantations.

The Lord bless you and thanks again.

Ida Ottaviano

Light in dark Africa. Peter, the young attendant of little Ruth, reads to her from the children’s Bible story book. She is anxious to learn and enjoys the pictures. Please remember these people with your gifts, but above all in your prayers.

Abenago,31 October 1970

Dear Mission Friends,

By the goodness of the Lord, my family and I arrived safely on our mission station. It took us many hours to reach Djakarta, and from Djakarta to Sentani, we flew another five hours, first to Biak and two more hours to Sentani. We were very scared when on our last trip, Sentani-Abenago, about half-way smoke developed in the cabin of the little Cessna Airplane. The pilot, Ken Sem-melink, some of you know him, managed to quit the smoke which apparently was caused by wrong electrical connections. I thought it was the end and prepared for eternity. We had had a flight in several kinds of planes of over 30 hours and during the last flight it might have been the end. How we should be always prepared to meet our Creator! And this is only possible if we get to know Him and His Son Whom He has sent, because this knowledge will mean eternal life.

The Lord did not wish our deaths yet, and we arrived safely and were welcomed by our European and West Irian friends. Although there is a scarcity of food in our valley, the Jali people had prepared a potatoes meal which was served in a pouring rain, (you have seen these servings, how they go!) After, we had a meeting in our church.

The work has developed nicely and many are in school now to learn to read, many come for medical aid, and many ask for baptism and the Word is spreading through the valley.

Personally, we feel that our work has been completed in this area, others are building on our foundation. And we believe the Lord is leading us to the Nipsanma area, about which I talked to many of you, so that we may lay the foundation of Christ, not where Christ was named (Rom. 15:20). Preparations are made in that direction. We do hope you will support us by your prayers and that many gifts may enter the American General Mission Fund by which part of the new enterprise will be financed. In this way you will have your share in connection with the proclamation of the Everlasting Gospel unto the uttermost part of the earth. That many, up till now, blind and blinded people of the Nipsanma area may come to a saving knowledge of the Lord, Who came to seek and to save sinners.

After our arrival here, we found several packages which were opened by our permission, however, the addresses were thrown away. So we cannot thank you personally for the goods you sent. I do hope you will accept our thanks, on behalf of the Jali people, for all the things you sent.

Yesterday there was “toko”, which means the Jali people could shop. Afterwards, my wife gave the following list of items we could use. These items are the only things we need at the moment for the people:

1. Men’s shorts, sizes 28,30, 32, 34 (30 and 32, especially)

2. Men’s shirts, MEDIUM.

3. Men’s underwear.

4. Women’s underwear, slips.

These items all in

extra-good condition or new!

5. Pans WITH HANDLES.

6. Belts

7. Sweaters from boys’ sizes to men’s sizes.

8. Scissors.

All Packages / Parcels should be sent to the following address:

Rev. G. Kuijt (N.R.C.)

THE MISSIONS FELLOWSHIP

Box 99

WEWAK

Territory of Papua and New Guinea.

All LETTERS to the following address:

Pdt. G. Kuijt

Neth. Ref. Congregations

Via M.A.F., SENTANI

West IRIAN

INDONESIA

Please do not mix the two addresses and their purposes. Once more, I thank you very much for all you did already. The Lord looks upon us all and He knows our hearts. Knowing this we sometimes tremble and pray: Search me. O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

Kind regards in Christ,

Rev. G. Kuijt

GIFTS RECEIVED FOR MISSIONS IN NOVEMBER 1970

CLASSIS MIDWEST SOURCE AMOUNT

A friend in Kalamazoo Gift $ 5.00

In G.R. Ch. Col. Gift 75.00

In G.R. Ch. Col. Gift 25.00

Friend in So. Holland Gift 5.00

Friend in Ann Arbor Gift 50.00

G.R. Cove 11 Ave. Church Gift 200.00

G.R. Ch. Col. Collection 2001.25

A Friend in Zeeland Gift 200.00

CLASSIS WEST

Friend in Pella Gift 10.00

CLASSIS FARWEST

Pt. Alberni Gift 70.02

Lethbridge Ladies Aid Gift 750.00

TOTAL: $3391.27

In the first place we would like to thank you all for the kind and generous support of the mission work. May the Lord bless you and your gift. We are glad through the goodness of the Lord that we may let you know that the mission work is progressing under the blessing of the Lord. Again Rev. Kuijt hopes to baptize about a hundred people. It must touch our hearts to think that the Lord has given a desire in the hearts of the heathen people to be baptized in His Holy Name. We know that it is not enough for eternity but nevertheless, it is a sign that they realize something of religion. We hope amongst that number, that there are also some that realize the need of a Savior. Then we would say to the people at home, do we, too, realize the need of a Savior? May the Lord pour out His Spirit amongst young and old to convince of sin, righteousness and judgment. That we may be taught our lost condition, when we lost God, we lost everything. But the Lord has revealed unto us a way, in His Son, that a poor lost sinner can receive everything back, and Jesus stands with open arms to receive the guiltious sinner. That should encourage us all to seek Him for mercy, here and on the mission field. May the Lord go with us all into the New Year. What it will hold, we don’t know, but this we know, that the Lord will not forsake His people, and his covenant bonds he will not sever. Receive our best wishes for the New Year.

American General Mission Fund

Netherland Reformed Churches

of America and Canada

John Spaans, Treasurer

Box 106 RR1

Plankinton, South Dakota 57368

THE PILGRIM FATHERS

Continued

Then came the inquiry, What part of America should they select for their future home? Guiana was named, and its claims enforced on the ground of its being blessed with perpetual spring and a flourishing greenness; but it was objected that the climate was bad, and, especially, that the fierce, intolerant and jealous Spaniard was already there. At last Virginia was selected as, on the whole, a more favorable spot. Two were sent to England to confer with the Virginia Company, and to gain, if possible, the King’s broad seal to authorize the undertaking. The Company entered into their views, but the King, as was to be expected, refused his sanction, though he was not unwilling to connive at their proceedings, provided they went on peaceably. The want of the seal became a trouble to some, but others shrewdly observed ‘it would not be of much use if they had it, “for though the seal were as broad as the house floor”, there would be means enough found, if the author wished, to recall or reverse it.’ There was much arguing on the subject; deputations crossed and re-crossed the German Ocean; many letters were written; consultations held, and prayers offered, till, ultimately, the emigrants resolved upon going to New England, with no other patent than what they had at first obtained under the idea of colonizing Virginia, and with no other seal than the broad one of the Divine sanction, which they were persuaded they had obtained.

It was arranged that some should go before the rest, under the direction of Mr. Brewster, an elder of the Church. In prospect of their departure, the whole Church spent a day of humiliation, and Robinson preached from the beautiful text, ‘And there, at the river by Ahava, I proclaimed a fast, that we might humble ourselves before our God, and seek of Him a right way for us, and for our children, and for all our substance’ (Ezra. 8:21). It was an affecting occasion — the pastor’s heart was full; and it is reported that he spent a good part of the day very profitably and suitably to the occasion. Only a brief outline of that memorable sermon has been preserved. We would gladly give whole shoals of published discourses in exchange for that one homily. While, however, the far greater portion is lost in the long silence of the past, the fragments of this great man’s utterances on the occasion happily spared to us we will gather up and preserve among our richest relics. We seem to be sitting among the congregation. Many around us are in tears. Amidst the deep stillness of the place, an audible sob now and then breaks out as the preacher proceeds:

‘Brethren, we are now ere long to part asunder, and the Lord knoweth whether ever I shall live to see your faces again. But whether the Lord hath appointed it or not, I charge you before God and His blessed angels to follow me no farther than I have followed Christ. If God should reveal anything to you by any other instrument of His, be as ready to receive it as ever you were to receive any truth by my ministry, for I am very confident the Lord hath more truth and light yet to break forth out of His holy word.

‘Miserably do I bewail the state and condition of the reformed Churches, who are come to a period in religion, and would go no farther than the instruments of their reformation; as, for example, the Lutherans, they could not go beyond what Luther saw; for whatever part of God’s will he has further imparted by Calvin, they will rather die than embrace it. So, also, you see the Calvinists, they stick where he left them — a misery much to be lamented; for though they were precious shining lights in their times, yet God did not reveal His whole will to them; and were they now living, doubtless they would be willing to embrace further light as that which they did receive.’

Much is said in these davs about the development of Christianity. The sage Robinson understood this matter. The Bible, not the fathers, formed his text-book; but he saw there depths of truth and glory into which he was persuaded thoughtful minds might penetrate farther and farther as time rolled on. The Bible was to him like the universe, a system unchangeable in its great facts and principles, but ever opening wider and brighter upon studious and devout minds. He knew there would be no change in God’s Word, and no addition made to its contents; but he looked for beautiful and improving changes in men’s views — for broader, clearer, and more powerful conceptions of God’s truth. There was deep philosophy as well as sound practical direction and Christian pathos in Robinson’s sermon. But he was neither Rationalist nor Mystic, and knew how to guard his notion of development from abuse.

‘Remember your Church covenant,’ he says, ‘in which you have agreed to walk in all the ways of the Lord made known, or to be made known, to you. Remember, your promise and covenant with God and with one another to receive whatever light or truth shall be made known to you from His written word; but withal, take heed, I beseech you, what you receive for truth, and compare it and weigh it with other Scriptures of truth before you receive it; for it is not possible the Christian world should come so lately out of such thick anti-Christian darkness, and that full perfection of knowledge should break forth at once.’

Robinson was no snarling schismatic, but a friend to Christian Union, for he goes on to say, in his practical directions, ‘Another thing I commend to you. By all means shake off the name of Brownist. It is a mere nickname and brand to make religion odious, and the professors of it, to the Christian world. And to that end I should be glad if some godly minister would go over with you before my coming (Robinson meant to follow with the rest of the Congregation), for there will be no difference between the unconformable (the Puritan, or nonconforming clergy, who had not renounced the Church of England) and you, when you come to the practice of the ordinances out of the kingdom. By all means close with the godly party of the kingdom of England, and rather study union than division — in how nearly we may possibly, without sin, close with them, than in the least measure to affect division or separation from them.’

‘Be not loth,’ he further enjoins, ‘to take another pastor or teacher; for that flock that hath two shepherds is not endangered but secured by it.’ With this commendation of a plurality of Bishops in a Church the fragment abruptly terminates. ‘There were other things of great and weighty consequence’, we are told, uttered on the occasion. Would we could recover them, with all their touching appeals and farewells; but with many other precious things said by tongues long since silent, they lie beyond our reach. What remains, however, is of the greatest value, and worthy of the study, the careful study, of all who, like Robinson, are called Independents.

Before the pilgrims embarked, a parting entertainment was given them by their brethren at the pastor’s house, where they refreshed their hearts by fraternal intercourse and devotional exercises. On the 21st July they left the city of Leyden, which had been their quiet resting-place for 11 years, and journeyed to Delft Haven, where a ship waited to receive them. Their removal must have required some preparation, and must have excited some attention, for ‘the number of the names was about a hundred and twenty’, and they were accompanied on their journey by most of the members of the Church, especially the more aged people, who, though from their infirmities they could not undertake a long voyage, and encounter the difficulties of a new colonial settlement, entered with the deepest sympathy into the spirit of the enterprise. They tarried in Delft Haven that night, and were joined by another party from Leyden, who had followed them as early as possible, to take a parting look and hear the last farewell. To many it was a sleepless night, and was spent in Christian conversation and expressions of true Christian love. The morning sun must have gleamed mournfully upon their eyes through the windows of the apartments where they were assembled. It told them the last day of their pleasant intercourse with old and endeared friends had come, for the wind was fresh and fair, and the vessel was ready to weigh anchor and depart. And so they went down to the shore, where the scene at Miletus was literally repeated, save that the people were the voyagers instead of their apostolic father. ‘He kneeled down and prayed with them all, and they wept sore, and fell upon his neck and kissed him, sorrowing most of all for the words which he spake, that they should see his face no more; and he accompanied them to the ship.’ Even the Dutch strangers, who saw the parting, stood and wept. Many eyes full of tears watched the sails of that vessel as they shone upon the distant waters, like a flake of snow, till the little white speck quite melted from their view.

That vessel, with its rich cargo of true-hearted men, speedily reached Southampton. The voyage answered the name of the vessel, and the Speedwell entered port to join the Mayflower — ships whose names have become hallowed.

It pertains not to our office to tell the story of the voyage, of the parting of the Mayflower from the Speedwell, and the solitary course of the former vessel, containing all the party who at that time went, and the incidents on the way, and the battling with the elements, and the landing at Cape Cod, and their adventures there, and their coasting expedition, till the feet of the pilgrims stood on Plymouth Rock. The story belongs to the heroic age of America, and may well inspire the enthusiasm of her historians, for no other nation can boast of such an origin, and can adorn its earliest annals with a tale as true as it is beautiful, as authentic as it is sublime.

Robinson’s heart was with the pilgrims, but there were insuperable difficulties in the way of his following them. The want of sufficient means was the main hindrance, but he also had to struggle with contentious spirits at Leyden, and to meet the opposition of some in New England, who, knowing the energy of his mind and the weight of his character, feared, on selfish grounds, his influence in the rising colony. But it mattered little. His Lord and Master had other designs respecting him, and on the first of March, 1625, took him away, ‘even as fruit falleth before it is ripe, when neither length of days nor infirmity of body did seem to call for his end.’ His remains were interred in the chancel of one of the churches at Leyden, allotted by the Dutch for the use of the English exiles; and the magistrates, ministers, professors, students, and most of the gentry of the place followed him to the grave.

Robinson was a great man. The allusions made to him in the documents connected with the Leyden Church and the Pilgrim Fathers show him to have been one of those superior spirits who are born to lead their fellow-men, and on whom feebler natures can rest with confidence and love. ‘Strength and beauty’ were finely blended in his composition. With a strong mind he had a tender heart. His understanding was of a manly make, calm, clear, vigorous. His writings attest his theological skill, and his practical compositions evince his reflective habits, and his sound views of morals and religion. He was a man of superior learning, of which the reputation in which he was held by the University of Leyden is a proof; but he blended with the pursuits of the scholar habits of enlarged intercourse with mankind, and shrewd, business-like observation of human character and things. Though he did not cultivate the graces of style, nor adorn his pages with the flowers of imagination, we cannot peruse his writings without feeling that they possess the charm of practiced thought and earnest truthfulness. He was no enthusiast. ‘To trust to means is idolatry, to abuse them want of wisdom or of conscience’, is a remark he makes in his ‘Essays’, and it is one which we find illustrated by his prudent conduct throughout his history. His lot was a troubled one, but he had not learned to look upon the world with a jaundiced eye; and it was in no ‘sour, Puritanical spirit’ that he said, ‘If a man set his thoughts a-work upon inconveniences and discommodities alone, he shall heap sorrow on sorrow; but if, on the contrary, he draw into consideration such inconveniences as usually fall in with their contraries, he shall always find some matter of ease, and sometimes that meat comes out of the eater, and that which at first seemed a cross is rather a benefit.’ He was a specimen of the true Reformer, well described as one ‘who supposes no wonders in himself, and expects them not in others; and is rather the sower who goes forth to sow his seed, than the lord who comes to gather into barns.’

MARTIN LUTHER

A VISIT TO ROME

Last month an account was given of the way in which, by a divine work, the light of Gospel truth began to dawn upon Luther’s soul. The freeness of God’s forgiveness of sins astounded him, for the Spirit caused him to realize that it was without money and without price; in other words, without the painful toiling that he had engaged in while under the law, as he strove to merit the favor of God. The Spirit-taught lessons now impressed upon the Reformer never left him, and when the Reformation began in Germany it was simply a pouring out of blessing similar to that which had already been bestowed upon the monk in the monastery at Erfurt. The Reformation, it has been truly said, was first worked out in Luther’s own soul. Not that he was as yet clear of many superstitions and misbeliefs. Unlike John Calvin, who passed from darkness to light with remarkable speed, Luther grew in knowledge over a period of years, and it is needful for students of his theology to take careful note of its chronological development.

Luther remained in the monastery for a little more than three years and then his friend Staupitz secured him an appointment as Professor of Theology in the University of Wittenberg. At first he found little pleasure in the work, for it was expected that his lectures would expound man’s words and man’s wisdom rather than the divine wisdom found in Scripture. But shortly Luther is found delivering evangelical sermons in profusion. Indeed, the old clay-plastered wooden chapel, a mere thirty feet in length and twenty in width, in which the sermons were delivered to ‘a handful of monks and professors’, has been described as ‘the cradle of the German Reformation’. Although these early sermons fell far short of the ‘full-orbed Gospel’ which Luther later proclaimed, yet they reflected his new-born experience of the grace of God. Much truth he had yet to learn. Meanwhile the Word was fulfilled to him: ‘If any man will do His (God’s) will he shall know of the doctrine.’ If Luther’s beginnings were small, his latter end was destined greatly to increase.

While the Reformer was thus occupied at Wittenberg, he was suddenly called aside to undertake a mission to Rome on behalf of Staupitz. The prospect of such a journey filled him with delight, for to him Rome was a veritable holy of holies, where lived the choicest of saints, and not least the Pope himself, whom Luther regarded as a kind of god upon earth. Accompanied by a brother monk, he set out across the Alps and so came into Italy, expecting to find that the nearer he got to Rome the more holy everything and every place would appear. But to his intense horror and deep sorrow he found, on the contrary, that Italy was a land of darkness rather than light. Many of the churchmen with whom he came into contact revelled in the lap of luxury, and gave to the simple-minded Germans the impression that there was in them more of that carnal-mindedness which is death than of that spiritual-mindedness which is life and peace. Of bodily discomfort, also, the travellers had experience, for the hot Italian sun caused them no small distress. On one occasion they were taken ill, solely in consequence, it is said, of having slept with the casement open, thus admitting the pestilential night air for which certain parts of Italy had an ill fame. Another account, however, ascribes their illness to the fact that they drank some stagnant water from a wayside pool. It is recorded that their cure was effected by the eating of pomegranates.

When the two men arrived within sight of Rome, Luther fell upon his knees, raised his hands to heaven, and exclaimed with deep emotion, ‘Hail, holy Rome! made holy by the holy martyrs, and by the blood which has been spilt there.’ His admiration for the so-called holy city was, however, soon dispelled, but the explanation of this is best given in Luther’s own words, written twenty years after his visit. ‘I remember,’ he says, ‘that when I went to Rome I ran about like a madman to all the churches, all the convents, all the places of note of every kind; I implicitly believed every tale about all of them that imposture had invented. I said a dozen mases, and I almost regretted that my father and mother were not dead so that I might have availed myself of the opportunity to draw their souls out of purgatory by a dozen or more masses and other good works of a similar description. Tis a proverb at Rome, “Happy the mother whose son says mass for her on the eve of St. John.” How glad I should have been to have saved my mother. We did these things then, knowing no better; ‘tis the pope’s interest to encourage such lies. Now, thank God, we have the Gospels, the Psalms, and the other words of God. To them we can make pilgrimages more useful than any others; in them we can visit and contemplate the true promised land, the true Jerusalem, the true paradise. In them we walk, not amid the tombs of saints, or over their mortal relics, but in their hearts, their thoughts, their spirit.’

Luther was repeatedly shocked in Rome by the wicked and worldly lives lived by many of the highest officers of the church, by their lust after the rich things of the world, and, most of all, by the lightness with which they often referred to the most sacred names or subjects. Julius II, the Pope at this time, was scarcely anything more than a scheming statesman, greedy of gain, and willing to obtain his ends by fair means or foul. When our Reformer arrived in Rome, Julius was engaged in a war against the French. From such scenes Luther turned with a sorrowful heart to try to find consolation in the performance of the various works which engaged the attention of Christendom’s pilgrims. It was customary, for example, for a pilgrim to climb on his knees, while muttering prayers, the marble staircase which, it was claimed, had belonged to the Judgment Hall of Pontius Pilate in Jerusalem. Accounts of what happened to Luther vary as between 19th century and 20th century historians. The former tend to make much of Luther’s experience at this crisis of his career, the latter to play it down. The fact is that such records as exist supply somewhat divergent accounts of the climbing, and it is not easy to weave them together into a consistent narrative. On the one hand there is a letter preserved in the handwriting of Paul Luther, Martin Luther’s younger son, in which he states: ‘In the year 1544 my late dearest father, in the presence of us all, narrated the whole story of his journey to Rome. He acknowledged with great joy that, in that city, through the Spirit of Jesus Christ, he had come to the knowledge of the truth of the everlasting gospel. It happened in this way. As he repeated his prayers on the Lateran staircase, the words of the prophet Habakkuk came suddenly to his mind: “The just shall live by faith.” Thereupon he ceased his prayers, returned to Wittenberg, and took this as the chief foundation of all his doctrine.’

On the other hand, in a sermon on Colossians 1:9 ff., preached on September 15, 1545, Luther himself stated: ‘As at Rome I wished to liberate my grandfather (Heine Luther) from purgatory, I went up the staircase of Pilate, praying a pater noster on each step, for I was convinced that he who prayed thus could redeem his soul. But when I came to the top step, the thought kept coming to me, “Who knows whether this is true?” ‘

Maybe, if we had fuller details of the event we could see how the two narratives fit together. It is certainly unwise to dismiss the one of them, according to choice, as a fiction, as does Roland H. Bainton in his popular life of Luther entitled Here J Stand. His words run, ‘At the top, Luther raised himself and exclaimed, not as legend would have it, “The just shall live by faith” — he was not yet that far advanced. What he said was, “Who knows whether it is so?” ‘

It is clear that the visit to the imperial city was of crucial importance to Luther’s development as a reformer. In his anticipation Rome was an earthly Paradise, the scene of all that was fairest and most to be revered in Christian story. In the outcome his reverence was turned into loathing. As T. M. Lindsay said: ‘The city which he had greeted as holy was a sink of iniquity; its very priests were openly infidel and scoffed at the services they performed; the papal courtiers were men of the most shameless lives; he was accustomed to repeat the Italian proverb, “If there is a hell, Rome is built over it.” it was much for him in after days that he had seen Rome for that month which he had spent in the papal capital.’ ‘I must see Rome,’ the apostle Paul had once exclaimed (Acts 19:21), and in the Lord’s good time he arrived in the pagan capital. Luther’s visit, a millenium and a half later, must have caused him to wonder whether in any respect at all Rome’s professed Christianity was superior in moral and spiritual value to the ancient paganism.

Yet it must be confessed that the German Reformer did not lack credulity. He seems to have believed that the relics which he saw were genuine. Rome was filled with them. Says E. G. Schwiebert, Professor of History in Wittenberg College, Ohio: ‘He was shown the wall behind which the three hundred slain children of Bethlehem lie buried . . . the chain of St. Paul, and the column next to which the great Apostle had once preached . . . He saw the rope used to drag Jesus to His Passion, eleven thorns from Christ’s crown of thorns, the sponge used to give Him drink . . . a nail from the cross, the inscription of Pilate, a large and a small piece of the cross, another from the cross of one of the malefactors . . . some milk and some hair of the Virgin Mary . . . a cross made out of the shining sword with which St. Paul had been beheaded, the table on which John read Mass on the Isle of Patmos, two pieces of the five loaves with which Jesus fed the five thousand . . . the stone that had sealed Christ’s grave, the rope with which Judas hanged himself ... All that Luther saw, he later related, he believed at the time to be genuine, and did not have the slightest doubt as to its authenticity.’ Obviously Luther still had to learn the difference between blind credulity and Spirit-imparted faith, and from this point of time that knowledge came with increasing rapidity. Later he said, ‘I would not have missed seeing Rome for 100,000 florins; I should have always felt an uneasy doubt whether I was not, after all, doing injustice to the Pope. As it is, I am quite satisfied on the point.’

As for Christian doctrine, it is clear that, by this time, Luther had become well established in the great truth of Justification by Faith, and as the apostle Paul’s Epistle to the Romans was of vital importance to him in this connection, we conclude this ‘Visit to Rome’ by quoting the opening and closing paragraphs of the Preface to the Epistle which Luther prepared when his translation of the Bible into German was made at a later date. ‘This Epistle,’ he wrote, ‘is the right corner-stone of the New Testament, and the purest gospel, and is in itself so valuable that a Christian should not only know it by heart, word by word, but should have daily intercourse with it as with the daily bread of the soul. For it can never be too much and too well read and considered, and the more it is examined the more precious it becomes, and the more it will be relished . . . We find in this Epistle most copiously treated whatever a Christian ought to know, namely, what are the Law and the Gospel — sin, punishment, grace, faith, and righteousness, Christ and God, good works, charity, hope and crosses; how we ought to act towards every one, whether he be a religious man or a sinner, strong or weak, friend or foe, and how we ought to act towards ourselves. And all this so admirably laid down with examples from Holy Writ, and so exemplified both by himself and from the Prophets, as to leave nothing to wish for. It would seem as if St. Paul in his Epistle wished to epitomize the whole faith and doctrine of the Gospel of Christ, and thus prepare us an introduction to the whole of the Old Testament. For without doubt he who has this Epistle well by heart has in him the light and the power of the Old Testament. Every Christian should, therefore, make it his own, and observe it constantly in practice. May the grace of God be with him! Amen.’

EVIDENCES OF THE FLOOD

We saw last month how Peter tells us that in the last days scoffers would willfully ignore the flood. Now by saying there was no flood the so-called scientists left the way open for inventing the ridiculous dates which they attached to rocks all over the earth. However, since they had no possible way of finding out the age of a rock, they decided to “date” the rocks according to the types of fossils found in them, pretending of course that simple animals came before complex ones, etc., which has already been shown to be false. Secondly since all animals were created at the same time, that is, within six days of each other, their fossils in the rocks could not possibly be of any use in dating them. Anyhow the dates are known to be utterly false. The deep-sea mullusc was said to have died out 280 million years ago, but some have recently been fished up alive in the Acapulco Trench off Central America. The Tua-tara was supposed to have died out 135 million years ago but has recently been found alive in New Zealand. Many other similar cases could be quoted, including that of the coelacanth caught in 1939. Could anything be more useless, misleading and unbelievably stupid than to pretend to date rocks from their fossils? And as we saw last month, many of the supposed “earlier” fossils appear in strata higher than the “later” ones. Hence the invention of the “thrust” theory. Instead of all this self-contradictory theory, how clearly and logically it is explained by the fact that all these rocks which are water-laid, were washed into place by the flood.

Another thing which tends to impress the student is the calm way in which the so-called “scientist” speaks of ice-ages of the past, as if there was some proof of this. But some scientists speak of four ice-ages, others of three, and some think only one has occurred. Without going into all the so-called evidences of ice-ages, the evidence must be very faulty or doubtful, if we do not know whether it is supposed to show four ice-ages or only one. Also it must be completely misread or it would give the same ideas to all. Furthermore, the famous geologist, Sir Henry Howorth stated that the marks which are supposed to be evidences of ice are much more logically understood if taken as evidences of flood water. As he did not uphold the Bible he was not trying to make the evidence support the Genesis account. He however did think the marks were signs of a flood, and not of ice.

Perhaps the most misleading thing about the word “ages” is the way it is used to denote periods of time when a much better word and meaning would be “districts”. For instance the only distinct proofs we know of an ice-age exist at the poles today. “Ice-districts” would be a much more accurate term. In the polar areas, hundreds of miles of land are under ice, some of it thousands of feet thick. Thus the ice-age is on now, in those districts. The stone-age was not a period of time when all the people of the earth used stone tools and weapons, hundreds of thousands of years ago, but the “stone-age” is on now in some of the South Sea Islands and in Central Australia where the people have nothing to use but stone and wooden tools. Cave-men did not live several thousands of years ago in all parts of the earth, where for the most part there were no caves anyway, but some men have lived in caves and some still do where caves exist, here and there. These “cave-men” are ordinary people living where caves are conveniently situated for them. Some even make their own caves by hollowing them out. In some countries today the iron-age is on, in some the atomic-age is on, and in others the space-age. Thus the supposed datings of the stone-age, iron-age and bronze-age, etc., are false and misleading. Another fact seldom realized is this, that if people had been on the earth 500,000 years as pretended by evolutionists (instead of the nearly 6,000 years of the Bible) the whole earth would have been so over-populated that there would not have been standing room on the earth for a hundredth of them. The same is also true of the animals. It has been calculated that at the usual rate of doubling of population the eight persons in the ark would have produced the present world population if the flood was about 4,500 years ago, which of course it was.

This date of the flood is approximately supported by the fact that many inland salt-water lakes existed in early historical times, but have completely dried up now. Professor Fessenden mentions geological evidence that a sea once reached from the Caucasus to Mongolia, about 1,850 miles, and says that as late as 300 B.C. the Caspian and Aral seas were joined. Marco Polo found numerous lakes across Asia in 1280 A.D. but a few years ago Citroen travelled the same route and found none. The flood that had filled those lakes could only have left them full enough to have lasted to these dates, if the flood itself had not been very long ago, or else the lakes would have dried out long before. Thus geological facts and history agree with the Bible account in a very convincing manner.

It is hoped that our young readers are keeping these facts very carefully, as their accumulation has taken many years.

So-called scientists have stated that various animals not only were supposed to have lived, but also to have become extinct hundreds of millions of years ago, but they have been proved wrong by the fact that those very creatures have been found alive today. If their “datings” of animals were so utterly false and they have no method of dating rocks except from the animals in them, the “ages” they assign to rocks are equally useless. The Geological theory of “uniformity” which pretends that things have always been taking place in the past as they are today, without interruption or catastrophe, is also shown to be false, by the vast sediments which have been washed into position, even to the mountain tops, in the past, but are nowhere being laid today. Thus the fossils are completely false. The point of all this is that all man’s pretended-dating of things not seen by man and recorded as history can only be based on assumption and guesswork. The only reliable source of knowledge of pre-historic happenings is the Bible. No other knowledge is possible.

If our young readers realize this, they will not be disturbed by such guesses at the moon’s “age” as 3.5 billion years, although one bit of rock on it as big as an orange was “dated” at 4.5 billion years. Could anything be more silly and impossible to imagine? One thing does appear certain however, that the moon was never formed from part of the earth, as has been suggested in schools for many years. “He taketh the wise in their own craftiness”.

Here again the only true guide as to the origin of the earth, moon, sun and stars, as well as to the early happenings on the earth is the Bible. This gives an accurate account which fits in with all the verified geological, geographical and scientific facts observable.

There is no way apart from the Bible of knowing either the age or beginning of things. But as regards the flood God has seen fit to leave vast amounts of evidence visible all over the earth, of the fact that all the earth has been unmistakably flooded. It is the purpose of these notes to mention the main evidences, which cannot be contradicted.

Now there is no scientific reason at all for thinking that the strata were laid in any other way or at any other time than by the Flood, and in fact science agrees that all the strata we are considering are sedimentary or water-laid. Common sense observation also agrees. Moreover all the varying orders of the strata with their topsy-turvyness fit in exactly with the kind of currents we should expect with world-wide flood. There is no doubt at all that these vast sediments were water-laid. But being so vast they required a world-wide flood to lay them, and in any case they are found all over the world. Also a world-wide flood would certainly be capable of laying them. Even the tiny floods we know today are far more powerful than is often realized. An account of flood streams in the Assam area says that although the water had only risen thirteen feet, huge pieces of rock measuring some feet across were rolled along with an awful crashing, almost as easily as pebbles in an ordinary stream. An account from Utah says a flood there left a deposit several feet thick containing boulders up to 20 tons in weight. Others weighing 200 tons were washed down a slight slope. But the Flood was not merely river water but far more awful than this, flooded seas. In Scotland around 1880, a concrete block weighing 2,600 tons at the end of a breakwater was removed boduy and thrown into the water nearby, and this was just an ordinary storm at sea.

The Flood lasted over all the earth for 5 months, was thousands of feet deep covering all the mountains, and was thrown about by submarine earthquakes which would have made the deposits a natural consequence. Also the Flood took another 4 months to recede enough for the tops of the mountains to be seen. After another 3 months the ground was dry.

These considerations, carefully weighed, will convince any level-headed person that the Flood would be required to lay the deposits all over the earth and nothing else but the Flood can be imagined which would have done this.

Science is the observation and study of things and happenings as they are going on now, but science cannot possibly be the observation of things being created at the beginning. Therefore any pretense of explaining how things began is only based on assumption and guesswork. The only possible way of knowing anything at all of how everything began is to read the Bible, where it is revealed or shown to us by God who created it by the word of His mouth, and Who alone knew about it till He revealed it. Therefore scientists can tell us nothing about how things began.

We saw recently how totally false were their “datings” of fossils and rocks. Their “dating” of the age of oceans is even more ridiculous. The method is based on the quantity of salt in the sea. Now salt is composed of Sodium and Chlorine united together. When their “dating” is based on one of these it comes to 50 million years, while if based on the other part of the salt it comes to 90 million years. This is unbelievably stupid and puts the “dating” method to shame, and its results are utterly useless and impossible.

When we come to “historical” dating, we have often read of the discovery of the ruins of some ancient city or village and calmly been told that the pottery shows it to have been perhaps 8,000 years old and sometimes much more. Further investigations have shown however that the “ages” were wrong and they have been reduced to 5,000 years, and again to 3,000 years. This has been done in Egypt, and Babylon, and many other places. It is now known that the earliest verifiable dates from secular history were around 2,200 B.C. which is not long after the Flood. If man had been on the earth hundreds of thousands of years as evolutionists pretend, surely his history would have been recorded long ages before this date.

Older readers may have wondered how far to believe the claims of astronomers that they can measure the distances of the furthest stars and galaxies, and of course from this to estimate the age of the Universe. This is impossible in the extreme. The assumptions and sheer guesswork which are allowed in this “estimating” shakes the imagination. Dr. T. Jacobsen of the University of Washington tells us that the measurements are based upon “a pure guess that the present radius of curvature is about 100 times the original Einstein radius”. If this does not show how utterly false is the claim to be able to measure the distances of the stars, what does? However it is pleasant to find two scientists, Moon and Spencer, in “Binary stars and the velocity of light,” saying that if their view is correct that the speed of light is not relative to the observer as Einstein thought but constant, then the light from the furthest stars would reach the earth in 15 years. Anyhow the millions of light years calculation is based upon a “pure guess,” and is impossible to obtain in any factual way whatsoever. It is disastrous that these facts are so rarely made known that diligent search is needed to find them. Jacobsen adds, “The result is that we know nothing certain about the age of the universe.” (Review of Space, Time and Creation).

Another very striking discovery has been made recently when scientists discovered a group of bristlecone pines growing in the White Mountains of California and by counting the rings in 17 or them, found the ages of the trees to be between 4,000 and 4,500 years. Many of these trees are still growing. A similar discovery of giant sequoias showed that their ages were also similar. This appears as though these trees, which seem to be immune to pests, have been living from the days soon after the Flood which of course swept away the previous generation of trees, and these apparently sprouted from their cones soon after the Flood abated. So these trees would appear to give us an approximate date of the Flood if they began to grow as soon as possible after the Flood.

Thus the most reliable dates of man, and even the ages of the oldest trees agree closely with the dates in the Bible.

It is very clear from what we have seen that the evidence of fossils, proves beyond doubt that the whole earth was entirely flooded. Many people would however like to forget God. But we cannot forget God in anything for “In Him we live and move and have our being” and all things come from Him. Creation shows Him everywhere. Creation shows the existence of unthinkable energy, exquisite order in everything whether tremendously great or unimaginably small, and meticulous timing. But energy must be produced, order requires a controlling mind, and accurate timing requires a perfectly controlled flow of energy. To pretend that things could just come without a Creator is unintelligent atheism. To pretend that chaos could produce order is as ridiculous as thinking that a cement mixer if filled with millions of letters of the alphabet could churn out an encyclopedia. To pretend that everything in nature with its existence, its order, and its beautiful timing could just happen by chance is less intelligent than thinking that a lorry-load of cricket balls if over-turned in a huge field would just sort themselves out into the most beautiful patterns, and start orbiting within these patterns and keep it up continuously without colliding, and without any force to start them or keep them moving. It requires an Almighty Power with an infinitely wise mind to create a universe, place all the stars in their courses, and keep them moving in perfect timing from creation till now. We see this Power working in placing the earth at such a distance from the sun that animal and plant life can exist upon it, while the size of the earth is just right to exert the correct gravity on the atmosphere to keep the exact amount of it at the right density to suit animal and plant life, on the earth. Again the speed of the earth in travelling round the sun is just right to keep it at its correct distance from the sun in spite of the gravitational pull of the sun upon it. Since these two forces of gravitation and movement along an orbit or path are working against each other, and yet never diminishing, one is compelled to agree with the great astronomer, Sir James Jeans, when he says that the more one considers the universe, the more one is compelled to recognize that an Almightly Being started it all, and keeps it going.

When we consider the immense size of the universe with the countless stars all moving in exact paths, in perfect timing without stopping, we see both God’s power and His wisdom. When we think of an atom, unbelievably small, as an orderly arrangement yet filled with tremendous energy, again we are amazed at God’s power and wisdom. When we think of the various parts of a cell of a plant or an animal all beautifully made, perfectly arranged and all working harmoniously with each other part although the cell may be only a hundredth of an inch across, again we have to say, “All Thy works shall praise Thee, O Lord; and Thy saints shall bless Thee,” Psalm 145:10.

WHAT WILL BE THE FRUIT OF THE COMING YEAR?

“Lord! let it alone this year also, till I shall dig about it, and dung it: and if it bear fruit, well; and it not, then after that thou shall cut it down. “

Luke 13:8 & 9.

Do I not behold the Lord Jesus here represented in his glorious office of our High Priest and Intercessor? And it is thus that he so mercifully pleads for the unawakened and unprofitable among his people? Pause, my soul! Was it not from the effects of his intercession that the world itself was spared from instant destruction, when Adam first brake through the fence of God’s law? It is not now by the same rich grace that thousands are spared from year to year in Christ Jesus, before that they are called to the knowledge of Christ Jesus? Nay, my soul! pause once more over the view of this wonderful subject, and ask thyself — was it not from the same almighty interposition that thou wast kept from going down to the pit during the long, long period of thy unregeneracy, while thou were wholly unconscious of it? And was it from thy gracious intercession, blessed Jesus, that I then lived, that I am now spared, and after all my barrenness, that another year of grace is opening before me? Oh precious, precious Jesus! suffer me to be no longer unfruitful in thy garden! Do, Lord, as thou hast said. Dig about me, and pour upon me all the sweet influences of thy Holy Spirit, which, like the rain, and the sun, and the dew of heaven, may cause me to bring forth fruit unto God. And, Lord, if so unworthy a creature may drop a petition at thy mercy seat for others, let the coming year be productive of the same blessings to all thy redeemed; even to my poor unawakened relations among them; and to thousands of those who are yet in nature’s darkness. Oh that this may be to them the acceptable year of the Lord!

Rev. Robert Hawker

THROUGH BACA’S VALE

“Hold up my goings in thy paths, that my footsteps slip not.”

Psalm 17:5

Without scrupulously or superstitiously observing “days and months, and times, and years,” few of us altogether pass by so marked an epoch as the dawning of another year upon our path without some acknowledgment of it both to God and man. When we open our eyes on the first morning of the year, we almost instinctively say, “This is New-year’s day.” Nor is this, at least this should not be, all the notice we take, all the acknowledgment we make of that opening year of which we may not see the close. When we bend our knees before the throne of grace, we mingle with thankful acknowledgment for the mercies of the past year, both in providence and in grace, earnest petitions for similar mercies to be experienced and enjoyed through the present. Last evening witnessed our confessions of the many, many grievous sins, wanderings, backslidings, and departings from the living God during the year now gone; this morning witnesses our supplications for grace to hold up our goings in his paths, that our footsteps slip not through the year just come. Tears are most suitable at the burial of the dead; hopes and desires at the birth of the living. The past year was the departed sire, worn out with age and infirmity; the present year the new-born babe in the arms of the smiling nurse. It is still, however, mid-winter. Today, the first of the present year, differs little in outward appearance from yesterday, the last of the past. But the thoughtful, prayerful mind takes little notice of wintry skies. It feels that the old, worn-out year has sunk into its grave with all its trials and afflictions, and that a new year has come in its place, with its new hopes and new mercies; and if it bring new trials yet that the promise still stands, that new strength will be given to meet and overcome them. Refreshed and strengthened at the throne by such or similar communings with the God of all our mercies, we go down to meet our families, and are at once greeted on all sides with, “I wish you a happy new year,” a greeting which we as warmly and affectionately return. Almost every friend, well-nigh every acquaintance that we meet with in the course of the day, greets us with the same kind wish. Now in all this there may be a great deal of formality, lip-service, and traditional usage; but there may be also a good deal of sincerity, kindness, and affection. We are not, surely, so shut up in miserable self as to have no desire for the health and happiness, the temporal and spiritual welfare, of our families, our friends, or even our acquaintances. And if we desire their good, we need not be backward or unwilling to express it in a few words of friendly greeting. “Be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted;” “Be pitiful, be courteous;” “If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men,” are precepts imbued with all the spirit of the gospel, and may be, indeed, should be, attended to without the least sacrifice of that faithfulness which becomes those who would daily walk in the fear of the Lord, There may be a form of kind words as well as “a form of sound words;” and as we may use the latter in perfect harmony with the doctrines of the gospel, so we may use the former in perfect harmony with the spirit of the gospel.

J.C. Philpot

“I FELL IN LOVE WITH A CATHOLIC”

Four years ago I fell in love with a Roman Catholic. What a lot of heartache has resulted! It seems that no one understands what really goes on in their lives when a Catholic and non-Catholic contemplate marriage. People say that when you love someone, that love will overcome all problems. But it just is not so. My advice is, Open your eyes by a study of the Catholic’s religion as I did, and you will never marry one. Until people study it, they have no idea what that religion is, and what a threat it is to the world. I studied it to please Joe, and I’m so thankful I did. Only then did I realize I would be making the one big mistake that would ruin my life. Not that I would ever become a Catholic. I just could not face the fact of raising my children in the Catholic faith; and that I would have had to do, if I had married him.

The more I studied, the more appalled I became with the Catholic faith. Many of my good friends are Catholic. They are good people, but you cannot judge a book by its cover. That’s why I say, if more Protestants would delve into the Catholic religion, and not accept just what they hear and see, there would be a lot more Protestants, and a lot less Catholics everywhere. And there would be less mixed marriages, too. I thank God that I have had good teaching and had strong enough faith to choose the right. This teaching and faith will prevent many heartaches for me. I hope my experience will help keep other Christians from making the mistake I almost made.

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