05 - The World and Its Works

The assertion that the works of the world are all evil is one that is hard for many of God’s children to receive. They have been so used from their very infancy to hearing the praises of the age and its marvelous progress chorused on every side that they do not readily receive the clear witness of the Word of God on this weighty subject. Then, moreover, the devil is so exceedingly clever, and has elaborated in his world-system so many works and enterprises that seem to be good and praiseworthy, that we poor silly sheep would be led astray did we not hear the voice of the Shepherd, who is “the faithful and true witness” declaring of the world “but Me it hateth because I testify of it that the works thereof are evil.” What, all its works? Yes, all of them. Our Lord makes no exception, and we dare make none.

And how could it be otherwise? How could the unregenerate man do any but evil works? It is impossible. Indeed, his best works are his very worst. Take, for example, the world’s moral agencies, such as its temperance movements. Suppose a poor drunkard is induced, by signing a pledge or otherwise, to “reform” and “quit his bad habits,” instead of being led to Christ to receive from Him a new nature and eternal life. That man has been taught that something has been done for him without Christ, and the work of the temperance society may be the means of carrying that soul to Hell. Any scheme which offers improvement or help apart from a change of nature is directly opposed to the work of the Holy Spirit, and is in the interest of the spirit of the world. And yet the children of God are drawn into these things and help them along. But, apart from the benevolences and moral agencies of the age (which, I say with all deliberation, are its very worst features, except its Christless churches and religions), what are the leading characteristics of the age, upon which it chiefly prides itself? If we were to ask this question of one of the leaders of the age we should get an answer something to this effect: “The present age is chiefly characterized by a great extension of man’s knowledge of, and of his control over, the resources and forces of nature. It is an age of applied science, that is to say, of science applied to practical ends (as distinguished from pure science) looking to the betterment of mankind. It is an age of marvelous progress in discoveries and inventions; of the unprecedented advancement of the arts and industries; an age of steam and electricity, of rapid movement of men and merchandise, of instantaneous communication of messages to the ends of the earth; an age of wireless telegraph and horseless carriage; of turbine engine and dyno-electric generator.” Or, briefly, in the inspired words of Scripture it is emphatically “man’s day” (1Co 4:3, marg.). And if we were to ask how long this is to continue we should be informed that no limit can be set to material development or to man’s career of prosperity. The apostles of progress, on the contrary, look forward to greater and still greater conquests over nature in unending vistas of the future. This description would tally exactly with the inspired descriptions of the age, as, for example, the designation “man’s day,” also Eph 2:2. But God’s word, instead of saying that the career of humanity as now directed is to continue indefinitely, says on the contrary that the day of man will end (describing the character of its last hours so that they can now be readily recognized), and declares further that it will be followed by “the day of the Lord,” “that great and terrible day.”