Chapter 15—Admonition Will Be Heard
[
Appeared in Notebook Leaflets, Methods, No. 1
.]
We are living in the last days of this earth’s history, and we may
be surprised at nothing in the line of apostasies and denials of the
truth. Unbelief has now come to be a fine art which men work at to
the destruction of their souls. There is constant danger of there being
shams in pulpit preachers, whose lives contradict the words they speak;
but the voice of warning and of admonition will be heard as long as
time shall last; and those who are guilty of transactions that should
never be entered into, when reproved or counseled through the Lord’s
appointed agencies, will resist the message and refuse to be corrected.
They will go on as did Pharaoh and Nebuchadnezzar, until the Lord
takes away their reason, and their hearts become unimpressible. The
Lord’s word will come to them; but if they choose not to hear it, the
Lord will make them responsible for their own ruin.
In John the Baptist the Lord raised up for Himself a messenger to
prepare the way of the Lord. He was to bear to the world an unflinching
testimony in reproving and denouncing sin. Luke, in announcing his
mission and work, says, “And he shall go before Him in the spirit and
power of Elias, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the
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disobedient to the wisdom of the just; to make ready a people prepared
for the Lord” (
Luke 1:17
).
Many of the Pharisees and Sadducees came to the baptism of
John, and addressing these, he said, “O generation of vipers, who hath
warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth therefore fruits
meet for repentance: and think not to say within yourselves, We have
Abraham to our father: for I say unto you, that God is able of these
stones to raise up children unto Abraham. And now also the ax is laid
unto the root of the trees: therefore every tree which bringeth not forth
good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. I indeed baptize you
with water unto repentance: but He that cometh after me is mightier
than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: He shall baptize you with
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