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Solemn Appeal to Ministers
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Bible Religion
Bible religion is very scarce, even among ministers. I mourn day
and night for the coarseness, the harshness, the unkindness in words
and spirit, that is manifested by those who claim to be children of
the heavenly King, members of the royal family. Such hardness of
heart, such a want of sympathy, such harshness is shown to those
who are not special favorites, and it is registered in the books of
heaven as a great sin. Many talk of the truth, they preach the theory
of the truth, when the melting love of Jesus has not become a living,
active element in their character.
This is an age of almost universal apostasy, and those who claim
to hold advanced truth mislead the churches when they do not give
evidence that their character and works harmonize with the divine
truth. The goodness, the mercy, the compassion, the tenderness, the
loving-kindness of God are to be expressed in the words, deportment,
and character of all who claim to be children of God, especially in
those who claim to be messengers sent by the Lord Jesus with the
word of life to save the perishing. They are enjoined by the Bible
to put away all that is harsh and coarse and rough in their character,
and to be grafted into Christ, the living vine. They should bear the
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same quality of fruit that the vine bears. Thus only can the branch
be a true representation of the preciousness of the vine.
Christ came to our world to reveal the Father amid the gross
darkness of error and superstition which then prevailed. The disci-
ples of Christ are to represent Him in their everyday life, and thus
the true light from heaven will shine forth in clear, steady rays to the
world; thus a character is revealed entirely different from that which
is seen in those who do not make the word of God their guide and
standard. A knowledge of God must be preserved amid the darkness
that covers the world and the gross darkness that envelops the people.
Age after age the pure character of Christ has been misrepresented
by those who claimed to be believers in Him and in the word of God.
Hardness of heart has been cultivated. Love and kindness and true
courtesy have been fast disappearing from ministers and churches.
What can the universe of God think of this? Those who claim to be
representatives of Christ show rather the hardness of heart which
is characteristic of Satan, which made him unfit for heaven, unsafe