Matthew 16

Matthew 16:1-12

THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES Matthew 16:1-12. SERMONS on “The Signs of the Times” have had little or no fascination for me. It is difficult to get a proper perspective of the thing close at hand, and well-nigh dangerous to dogmatically interpret the events of which one’s life is a very part.For just thirty years, therefore, we thought upon this subject without daring to speak to the same; and in making it the theme of this chapter, we confess to both fear and trembling. The difficulties of a duty, however, do not absolve one from obligation to the same; and the much teaching of the Word of God concerning “the signs of the times”, and the remarkable movements of the century to which we belong, combine in calling attention to this important and tremendous subject.The men to whom Jesus addressed this text were neither ignorant nor unlearned; they were the religious leaders of the hour. The Pharisees were the conservatives in theology and traditionalists in teaching; the Sadducees were the religious skeptics—the self-named scientists, who took little stock in supernaturalism. The charge of the text is that neither of them properly discern and interpret “the signs of the times”; and that for this stupidity they are inexcusable.Certainly, then, the children of the twentieth century are still more remiss if they give no time or thought to those great movements that have marked the approaching of the end of the age; and for this well-nigh universal ignorance, the preachers and teachers of Christendom are responsible, if not reprehensible!It is with a hope of both discharging the minister’s duty, and of making more clear to “the Body of Christ” the religious significance of current events, that we propose this theme.THE SIGNS OF THE TIMESinvolve the crises of the Church and the call of God. What are some of these signs? Out of a vast number, let us select a few for brief consideration. Of first importance is the proclamation of peace, and the preparation for war. It is now almost two score years since the first Peace Conference was called at The Hague, and the “arbitration” of international difficulties became the slogan for representatives, statesmen, philosophers, scientists, and plainer folk. Newspapers have made this slogan the big head line; magazines have multiplied articles devoted to its treatment; kings, emperors and presidents have found in it a popular theme for great public addresses, and ruling political parties have woven it prominently into their platforms. If one judged only by what has been taking form in public sentiment, phrasing itself in public speech, and finding place on the printed page, he would naturally conclude that the armies and navies of the world were just ready for dissolution; and that in another decade neither uniformed soldier would mark the land, nor government-garbed sailor be seen at sea. But often philosophy falls dead before the mailed fists of fact, and the fact is, that never since nations had a being has the world been so well armed for war; and while “Peace Conferences” are in session, the fighting crowd on land and sea are alike being increased.In 1914, we joined with Dr. James M.

Gray of Moody Institute of Chicago, and a number of other brethren in calling a prophetic conference to the Moody church in the month of February. It was so largely attended that at times four buildings were required to accommodate the audiences that gathered, and the impetus of the same sent the assembled speakers across the continent on three different great trunk lines holding kindred conferences in scores of cities concluding with one in Los Angeles, California.

In connection with this series, I spoke in each city on “The Significant Signs of the Times” and called attention to the world equipment for war; to the fact that England, France, and one or two Southern European nations had an effective army of 500,000 men each; Germany was supposed to have a million men ready to march at her command; Japan, one-half million in the field, and back of them, a million disciplined reserves; that China was asking for one-half million for self-defense; that Turkey, Greece, and the Balkan states were even then seething with the war spirit. The “Christian Advocate” of the Pacific Coast, edited by a modernist, in an editorial on this prophetic conference, said that it was misnamed; it should have been called the pathetic conference, for it was nothing short of pathetic to have any man talk as the writer had spoken of war clouds, when intelligent people knew that there was no prospect of war whatever. The Hague was an established fact; socialism, the greatest single political movement of the century, was opposed to war; University presidents and professors were teaching against it; for twenty centuries the Church had moved toward a condition of peace, that hereafter arbitration would determine international disputes, etc.The editor refused to publish a reply when we asked him his view of prophetic Scriptures. In April the editorial appeared, and in August 1914, the dogs of war were unloosed. Swords leaped from their scabbards; submarines were set to deadly action; flying machines added new terror to the world experience, and the diabolical invention of deadly gases made the world war a literal hell, and the prophetic Word of God stood fast—“nation rising against nation and kingdom against kingdom” (Matthew 24:7).And, in this, the Son of God was only saying to His auditors what God’s true Prophets had proclaimed as the “Sign of the end”. It is an ever increasing marvel to the student of the Scripture to see how perfectly Daniel foresaw events, and over what a long period of time his clear vision swept; and Daniel, speaking of the nations that should succeed the breaking up of the Roman empire, said,“In the latter time of their kingdom, when the transgressors are come to the full, a king of fierce countenance, and understanding dark sentences, shall stand up.

And his power shall be mighty, but not by his own power: and he shall destroy wonderfully, and shall prosper and work: and shall destroy mighty ones and the holy people. And through his ability he shall magnify himself in his heart, and prosper in his hand, and by peace shall destroy many; he shall also stand up against the Prince of princes; but he shall be broken without hand” (Daniel 8:23-25). What a wonderful interweaving of the proclamation of “peace” and the execution of war in the Seer’s words. It is another instance of the Jeremiah “Peace! Peace! when there is no peace” (Jeremiah 6:14).The very conditions that now exist are as strange as the world has ever known; and while the orators of the earth are giving the people promise of a cessation from all war, the most intelligent and observing of men know full well that oratory and peace are sometimes sadly separated. Lord Grey of England, a few months since, said, “There will be no secure peace till the great nations of the world have a consensus of opinion among them sufficient to inspire confidence that they will stand by each other to avoid, to suppress, or to localize and insulate war. Little concrete advance has yet been made.”Only two months since, Pravda, the organ of the central committee of the Russian Communist Party, said, “Imperialistic capitalism is unthinkable without wars. But if bloody collisions and devastating wars are inherent in the very nature of imperialism, it does not mean that the leaders of imperialistic states—all governmental ministers, diplomats, politicians, journalists, and others—speak against peace and in favor of war.

Quite the contrary. The tongues of the imperialists are much more pacific than are their teeth.“Since the year 1921, when the Washington treaties were signed, the signatory Powers have built a fleet of 53 large cruisers, 23 of them being British.

The total number of ships built by them is: 2 superdreadnoughts, 4 airplane carriers, 53 large cruisers, 144 destroyers, 154 submarines, that is to say, 357 units in all. Such is the eloquent prose of the imperialist armaments, the prose which can be disguised by no fountains of pacifist poetry * *. While preparing for new wars these gentlemen dupe the masses by conversations on ‘peace’, on ‘guarantees’, on ‘arbitration’, on ‘justice’, etc. No, there can be no peace in the imperialistic world.” “Bernard M. Baruch, chairman of the War Industries Board, denies that disarmament would produce even disarmament, which sounds like a paradox, but is not. Mr.

Baruch said, ‘The removal of instruments with which to fight will not remove the incentive to fight. An industrial nation can soon become an armed camp in the state of the highest efficiency known to the art of destruction.’”A second sign is the search for truth and the acceptance of lies.

Paul, speaking of “the latter time” and “the revelation of that wicked one, whom the Lord shall consume with the breath of His mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of His Coming” prophesies not only a large following for this man to come, but, concerning his disciples, declares, “God shall send them a strange delusion, to believe a lie, that they shall be judged who believe not the truth” (2 Thessalonians 2:8-12).“Strange delusion” is the adequate phrase! There never was a time when so many men were giving themselves to “scientific investigation”, and when so many things were exploited as “scientific” certainties. Indeed, we are told that it is the “Age of Science”, and the men who employ the phrase mean by it that it is not the age of Biblical or other religious authority. The result of this philosophy in the lives of men is as strange as Scriptural. Those who have set themselves to know the whole truth, have, in their very search, accepted “strange delusions”; and in their rejection of all sacred authority, have fallen into the most egregious scientific errors, thus becoming teachers of thoughts and systems that are irrational to the point of folly, if not of insanity.Haeckel, one of the most noted among them, in his “Riddles of the Universe” rules God out of it, and so becomes an advocate of the insane philosophy that power does not involve personality, wisdom does not involve thoughtfulness, design does not involve a designer! In other words, the heavens do not “declare the glory of God”, nor doth “the firmament show His handiwork”.

This justifies the language of the Psalmist, “The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God”.The conclusion of their reasoning is no more false than the process of the same. Take, for instance, the theory of Evolution, now widely declared in scientific circles as the basis of all scientific investigation—a base in a hypothesis which has never had any existence other than the vaporings of a man who made his reputation in science as Robert G.

Ingersoll made his in religion, by departing so far from the truth as to call universal attention to himself.And yet, men, by the tens of thousands, in the Old World, and in the New, are holding to this theory, and preaching it as a “scientific certainty”, when there has never been found, on land or sea, a scintilla of evidence in favor of the same.These same scientists have also denied the supernatural simply because the scalpel will not uncover and explain the same, and rejected it with bitterness on account of its having eluded their analysis. By the same process of reasoning they would be compelled to ally themselves with Mary Baker Eddy and deny the reality of human existence. “A scholarly physician who went to Dr. P. H. Mell, that notable Southerner, and said, ‘Doctor, I would believe in Christianity if I could explain the supernatural generation of Christ’, was sufficiently answered by Dr. Mell, who replied, ‘Can you explain natural generation in any case?’ The physician hesitated, and then admitted, ‘I cannot.’”One could push this inquiry into a multitude of additional fields, and when he had finished, he would find the notable scientists of the world standing forth with such folly in their lips as President Elliot once expressed when he said, “The religion of the future will be bound by neither dogma nor creed,” as if a creedless conception could ever command attention or adoption from men; such folly as Dr.

J. Woodland, of the university of Rochester, uttered, when he said, “The myths and fables of the Bible will be laid aside, and the Church will be founded on truth,” as if “Truth” had an existence independent of the faithful record of human experience!

To reach the acme of folly, let the late much-advertised Prof. Foster of the Chicago University, voice himself: “Man cannot live without science! * *. Gone are the old ideas of religion; gone is the old notion of the divinity of the sacrament, of the efficacy of prayer, of the authority of the Scriptures, of the Divinity of Christ; gone, even, is the former view of the immortality of the soul. And, there is in its place only the modern idea of efficiency, which emphasizes temporary success and does not answer the question of the rest of the spiritual. Caught up in the world-agony, the poor soul must find rest and refuge in the very bosom of reality.”All of this is again in fulfillment of the Scriptures, concerning those who “become vain in their own reasoning, and have their senseless hearts darkened; professing themselves to be wise, they become fools, exchange the truth of God for a lie, and worship the creature more than the Creator”.The profession of godliness and the practice of godlessness is a third sign. Paul wrote to his junior, Timothy, saying,“Know this, that in the last days perilous times shall come, when men shall be self-lovers, money-lovers, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, unforgiving, false accusers, incontinent, savage, haters of good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures rather than lovers of God; having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof” (2 Timothy 3:1-5). Have you never noticed that in the seven Epistles to the seven Churches (the great periods of church history are plainly marked), John, coming to the Laodicean period—the last of the seven, consequently the approaching end of the age—finds the Church luke-warm, boasting itself, however, as “rich and increased with goods, and in need of nothing”; but, regarded from a spiritual standpoint “wretched and miserable, and poor and blind and naked”. How graphic the words! “Laodicea” indicates that it is the popular church or church of the people; and the very boast reveals its aristocracy, and lays bare its spiritual poverty. When did the world ever see so many institutions bearing the Name of Jesus and yet answering to this inspired description? Think of the Lenten season; lo, the impious of ten months and two weeks have turned to piety, and for full forty days propose to refrain, in part at least, from the devil’s devices—from dance hall, show house, and the more extravagant of the so-called social functions, that they may take on the forms of religion and profess the power of the same, till the Lenten days be passed; then to return to a worldliness which is but slightly exceeded by the world itself; and which, in most cases is identical with the same.The most of us remember Dr. Astley Cooper’s famous painting, “The Pursuit of Pleasure”; and intelligent people perfectly understand that many of the members of the modern church neither find it in their heart to condemn that young Roman’s pursuit, nor to refrain from scenes and occasions as inimical to the cause of Christ. The simple truth is that many modern churches are now planning in their new structures, smoking rooms, dance halls, and an up-to-date stage, in the midst of which setting stands the Cross of Christ, involving an inharmony which would be unthinkable to our puritan ancestors, but which is a fulfillment of prophecy, presenting the “abomination of desolation” spoken of by Daniel the prophet, “standing in the holy place” (Matthew 24:14). “Then shall the end come.”Now all of this involvesTHE CRISES OF THE CHURCH. It is a singular thing that Jesus turned immediately from making this charge against the Pharisees and Sadducees of the hour to the instruction of His disciples. Instruction is involved in the charge itself, and the Church should attend, since her interests are at stake; and “the last days” are her testing time.This is true in many respects. Of three of them let me speak!The creed of the church is involved. That is the meaning of Mat 16:4-12.“A wicked and adulterous nation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given unto it, but the sign of the Prophet Jonas. And He left them and departed. And when His disciples were come to the other side, they had forgotten to take bread.

Then Jesus said unto them, Take heed and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees. And they reasoned among themselves, saying, It is because we have taken no bread. Which when Jesus perceived, he said unto them, O ye of little faith, why reason ye among yourselves, because ye have brought no bread? Do ye not understand, neither remember the five loaves of the five thousand, and how many baskets ye took up? Neither the seven loaves of the four thousand, and how many baskets ye took up? How is it that ye do not understand that I spake it not to you concerning bread, and ye should beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees?

Then understood they how that He bade them not beware of the leaven of bread, but of the doctrine of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees” (Matthew 16:4-12). There are a great many people who seek after signs rather than walk by the Scriptures. That is natural to a wicked and adulterous generation. Spiritual vision is blurred; spiritual things cannot be discerned of them; and yet God in Christ throws them back upon the Word, demanding that they believe it, yea even its Book of Jonah.The Pharisee falsehood of self-conscious superiority and the Sadducee boast of intellectual attainments, were indeed a like leaven, working corruption in the churches. The first results in the false doctrine of salvation by social service, and the second, in the new skepticism of the natural in all things—supernatural in none. A deliberate effort to destroy doctrinal teaching out of the churches is a Satanic stroke at both the Holy Scriptures and the Son of God. You can examine almost any evangelical denomination today and discover in it the evil fruits of this endeavor.Every fundamental doctrine, framed by its authors, is popularly flouted!

For a long time the teachings of Scripture concerning “sin” were undisputed; the world was sane enough not to deny its own experience; but alas, the time has come when teachers from the church have told us that there is “no such thing as sin.” Instead of “transgression of the Law” of God, we now have, as one writer puts it, “Failure to attain the ideal.” Instead of “conviction of sin” we now employ “the pain of conscious imperfection.”One modernist recently voiced with appalling candor what many ministers are now believing and teaching. Of regeneration, he said, “I never experienced it; neither did any member of my family.

When I first began to preach, I made the common mistake of compelling people to believe that they must be born again before they could become children of God.” In other words, when first he began to preach, he was foolish enough to follow the Christ.This all looks to another step, namely, the repudiation of the supernatural. We quote in exact words, “The New Theology denies absolutely the old assumed distinction between the natural and the supernatural.” And yet, as they hesitate to part company entirely with the very terms of Scripture, modernists identify the new birth with “adolescence”, taking the same to be “physically, intellectually, and spiritually the new birth.”But this is not all! The Christ Himself is questioned. Beginning with an inoffensive speech akin to that which a recent writer employs, the Man from Nazareth is made the youthful prodigy of His period, whose growth in physical stature and mental acumen marks Him as a man of unusual might, to conclude at last, as another does, with a mythical figure whose historical standing is little more substantial than that of “the modern Santa Claus”. Here again is the fulfillment of prophecy—“false teachers”, destined to arise in the latter times and bring in “destructive heresies”, are even now “denying the Lord who bought them”, and “many are following in their pernicious ways”, forgetting the plain teaching of John that “whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father”.Nor is this the end:The course of Christianity is threatened. The hour of “Lo, here!” and “Lo, there!” has arrived.

Men are declaring the Second Coming of Christ to be not “in person” as was prophesied and promised, thus fulfilling Peter’s words (2 Peter 3:3-10). The Socialists, after having anathematized His Name, are now claiming to embody His spirit.A few days since a “New Thought” woman came to me and said, “I am so glad you are looking for the coming of the Great Teacher, so am I”; to which I was compelled to say, “I fear we are looking for different teachers, and certainly for very different individuals.” Behaia, with his three millions of dupes, was at once fulfilling prophecy and threatening Christianity, while the men and women of America who have adopted the phrase “Social service” and “Social reconstruction” (ignoring the spiritual element, and seldom naming Christ Himself), are even more to be feared.We are being told now that what men need is soup and sandwiches, not sermons and Scriptures; and that to provide the former is a far more Christian act than to speak the latter; that the needs of the man are recreation, not re-creation; and that the pulpit, supposed to be sacred to theology, would serve a more useful end if converted into a theatrical stage.

Those who speak after this manner are in increasing demand at six o’clock clubs; and are cheered to the core on after-dinner occasions! The old statement, “The Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which is lost”, is well nigh laughed out; and the plain meaning of “As the Father hath sent Me, even so send I you”, is no longer interpreted into a soul-winning responsibility.And yet the world is dying, and men and women with sin upon them are going before God to give an account for the deeds done in the body. It might not be a bad thing if some eloquent occupants of modern pulpits could have the experience of the late Charles Berry! You will remember the Lancashire girl, with a shawl over her head and clogs on her feet, who came to his door and asked, “Are you a minister?” “Yes!” “Then I want you to come with me and get my mother in.” Thinking it was a drunken brawl, he asked, “Why do you not get a policeman?” “No, no,” answered the girl, “my mother is dying, and I want to get her into salvation.” “Where do you live?” “About a mile and a half from here.” “Why don’t you get some one nearer?” “We want you and you have got to come!” At first he was horrified with the thought of walking the streets at night in company with a girl with a shawl over her head, and he tried to dissuade her; but she would not be put off. At last he went! It was, as he suspected, a house of ill-fame, and the old woman was dying.

Sitting down by the bed, he talked to her of Jesus as a beautiful example. She answered, “Mr., that is no good for the likes of me!

It is too late for an example; I can’t live to imitate Him and I am a sinner!” He tried other philosophies. They were equally in vain and unsatisfying to the perishing soul. Then he remembered his mother’s faith and began to tell her the Old Story of God’s love; of Christ who died for sinful men. She cried, “Now you are getting at it! Go on; that is what I want, and that is what I must have or be lost forever I” And so, says Charles Berry, I got her in; and while I was about it, I got myself in!”This leads to the last point of the discussion.THE CALL OF GOD. What is it? Perhaps no single sentence would suffice for its expression. Permit us three!It stands for “the faith once for all delivered”. We confess in advance that this is not a popular thing to defend today. The twentieth century calls for compromise, and absolutely demands “smooth” speech; and the man who will not accommodate it, comes in for harsher criticism of his conduct than he himself has ever pronounced against a creedless and Christless religion.And yet, only cowards surrender to that twentieth century call for “smooth words”. One of Mazzini’s declarations never had better occasion than now, and men called of God to preach the Gospel “once for all delivered”, ought to be reminded of what Mazzini said, “Neutrality—that is to say, indifference between good and evil, the just and the unjust, liberty and oppression—is simply atheism.” After all, is it not ours to “fill up the sufferings of Jesus Christ”?

And if the teachers of His revealed Truth should find it necessary to go with Him into the waves of calumny and be “baptized with the baptism that He was baptized with”, or to the Cross of Calvary and feel its cruel nails, still those apostles, if true, ought to hesitate in nothing, knowing that the only victory that can ever “overcome the world is the faith of those who love not their lives unto the death”, but who at any cost will preach Christ and Him crucified as the solitary hope of sinking souls.It matters little what demands modern society may make upon us, or even what representatives of the modern church express! Jude enjoins us to tell its teachers and leaders that “the faith once for all delivered” is its solitary hope, the only basis upon which it can stand and be blessed.

To fail in this is indeed, as one has declared, “to fall under the psychology of the religion of actual materialism, culture, license, and of the self-satisfied proclamation that man is God.”“Strengthen the things that remain”! This is the word of Jesus to the Church at Sardis; and, for that matter, the word of Jesus to every true churchman the world over. The very phrase employed, “The things that remain”, indicates that much has been removed already. That is the truth of history! Thousands of ministers have had their standing ground taken away, and hundreds of churches have had their doctrinal foundations loosened; and Christians, out of number, have surrendered the most cherished convictions of Christian history. God is not giving to the world a fresh revelation. In fact, He can both sustain His own glory and conquer against any possible odds the world may present, without “the wise men after the flesh, and with not many mighty nor many noble”, but rather with “the weak things of the world, He can confound the things which are mighty; and base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to naught things that are: that no flesh should glory in God’s presence” (1 Corinthians 1:26-29). There are those who say that the battle has gone against us. I confess I do not belong to that company. My own ministry keeps me from any pessimism regarding this. It is forty years since, as a lad, I was ordained to this high calling. While holding a pastorate during this entire time, it has been my high privilege to put in from three to four months every year in evangelistic work, and the old “Sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God” is certainly as effective today as it was then; and whether employed by the pastor in his own pulpit, or by the evangelist in the pulpit of others, I find it is unfailingly “the power of God unto salvation”. I am fully persuaded, therefore, that victory is to be the portion of that preacher and of that people who stand for the “faith once for all delivered” and that the endeavor “to strengthen the things that remain” is as certain of success as are the power and promises of God assured.Let me conclude by an appeal that we strive together for the bringing back of the King.

Skepticism will never die while an unchained devil goes forth deceiving even the very elect. Sin will never cease to be the experience of men until Satan has felt the hand of the Coming King.

As for “social reconstruction”, that will never be accomplished by the combined wisdom of the wise apart from the coming of the crowned Christ. We have something to do with His Return! We have something to do with His ascension to the throne. We have more to do than John did when he cried, “Come Lord Jesus, and come quickly”! In one sense His crown is in our hands, and it will never bedeck His brow until by our loyalty and love, and unselfish service, and, may be, unthinkable sacrifice, we have placed it there.Let no one say, “This is asking too much of mortal men and weak women.” The history of yesterday is the encouragement of tomorrow. Joan of Arc was an unknown girl, with neither wealth, nor office, nor honor at her command.

But she heard the voice of God calling her to crown Charles king of France, and so she deliberately set herself to the task! There were a thousand obstacles, and they looked insurmountable, everyone!

And yet within three months she had lifted the siege of Orleans, and within six months she had seen the second part of the promise fulfilled and had sat with her banner in her hand at the high altar at Rheims while Charles was anointed, and she had crowned him. From the day this despised man received his anointing at the altar, the very people whose affections had been estranged, turned to him again, cured, as Creasy says, of their skepticism by the certainty they now felt that Charles was the favorite of Heaven. The national feeling revived; people and soldiers rallied to his standard and the enemy became divided and dispirited; and poor, distracted France found peace and repose.It is only a little type of the greater truth that human hands can crown Christ King, and loyal hearts can make way for Him to the throne of the world; and, when that is done, and not till then, shall His Name be blessed forever, and the whole world become filled with His glory. Oh, to have part in that crowning! Oh, to lead one’s people to join in that enthronement! It were worthy the years!It is related of the great Dr.

Schauffler that when he was doing his work in Constantinople, the Russian officials gave him no small annoyance, and he went one day to see the Russian ambassador. He heard Dr.

Schauffler, and then said, “I will say to you frankly that my master, the Czar of all the Russians, will never suffer Christian missions to set their feet in the Turkish empire.” Dr. Schauffler looked at him a bit, and then replied, “Your excellency; my Master, the Czar of all Heaven, will never ask the Czar of all the Russians where He may set His feet.”Thank God the spot is located, “They shall stand on Mount Zion” and when He comes, not the Czar of Russia only, but every king shall fall down before Him, and all nations shall serve Him. It is ours to hasten that day! The Lord help us!

Matthew 16:13-28

THE CHRIST EVER ASKED Matthew 16:13-28. IT was as Jesus approached Caesarea Philippi, that He, with His little company, halted, probably to rest a few minutes from a weary journey, and possibly to prepare and take the next meal. While waiting He snatched opportunity of some further instruction for those first students in the true “Christ’s College”.Like all great teachers He questioned, and like the wise teacher He prepared His questions with reference to their progress in study and understanding. The time of His decease at Jerusalem was not far away; and that it might be properly understood and sanely interpreted, they must properly understand Him and sanely interpret Him. Hence the question, “Whom do men say that I, the Son of Man, am”?Beyond controversy, this is the greatest question that Christ ever asked! The question with Peter’s reply and Jesus’ remarks involves the three central facts of the New Testament Scriptures. These facts might take the form of themes and be expressed in three phrases, around which every word uttered from Matthew 1:1 to Revelation 22:21 clusters and circulates.

They would be these: The Christ of God, The Church of God, and The Kingdom of God. The order of their statement is the order of their appearance in Scripture, and suggests also the program which inspiration follows in the development of the themes themselves.THE CHRIST OF GOD. He was the occasion of this question of the centuries. “Whom do men say that I, the Son of Man, am”? Before that question all others pale, even the most important ones seem insignificant indeed.To that question there are three answers that claim attention, at least upon the ground of age: The answer of natural reason; the answer of scientific research, and the answer of Divine revelation.The answer of natural reason. Possibly the most ancient exponent of this was Satan himself. Whether he actually doubted the Deity of Christ, not recognizing Him when first he saw Him in the flesh, we do not know; but certainly it is that in the wilderness, following our Lord’s baptism, he called into question every essential feature of His Deity.He questioned His power to work miracles and proffered Him a stone to be turned into bread as a test! He questioned His captaincy of the angelic host and dared Him to cast Himself down and give proof of their allegiance in the swiftness of their descent from Heaven to suspend Him in mid-air; and he questioned His inheritance of the earth or His final Lordship in the same, and asserted a self-ownership.The leading modern exponent of this satanic rationalism was Strauss. In the last century, that great skeptic gave to the world his, mystical theory of Jesus, contending that no such person as pictured in the New Testament ever lived, save in the minds of the imaginative apostolate.

Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, Peter, Paul and others “materialized Him out of the star dust of their Messianic hopes and training”, as one expressed the Strauss conception. In other words, by that infatuation which sometimes befalls men as a result of an inordinate affection for a natural leader, they magnified a plain peasant into a god of all grace and power, and by a process of corporate scheming, palmed Him off on the world as a supernatural being.

The weakness of the modern mind and the intellectual incapacity of some modern ministers was never more clearly demonstrated than by the fact that Strauss’ irrational explanation has been so widely received.The time came, however, when the more thoughtful doubters reached the logical conclusion that the disciples of Jesus were no more able to invent such a character as the Christ of the Gospels than they were to create the character itself. Beyond dispute, one colossal figure has crossed the centuries and that figure is Christ. Who is He? This fact gave rise to the second reply.The answer of scientific research. That answer is in line with what some said even in Jesus’ time. Peter reports their opinion of Jesus after this manner, He was “John the Baptist”, or “Elias”, or “Jeremiah” or “one of the Prophets”.

They had seen too much of Him; they had studied Him too carefully; they had examined His conduct and character too scientifically to join in the Strauss skeptic reply.The true scientist conscientiously tries never to ignore facts. Even so long ago as Christ’s time, honest students saw that while He looked like a man, behaved like a man, He was both in appearance and accomplishment more than the ordinary man.

They deemed that He was at least such as John or even Elias or Jeremiah. How modern that sounds! How much in line with the clerical skeptic of this day! He consents that Jesus was not an ordinary man, but seeks to explain Him by saying, “He is only a man, yet He is the only man” That paradox, however, while seeking a way of escape, put its author into much more perplexing questions still. We cannot overlook its utter lack of logic. The poet says:“If Christ were a man, And only a man, I say That of all mankind, I would cleave to Him, And to Him would I cleave alway.” “If Christ were a man and only a man”, He is a dead man; and those who lean on Him lean on one who long since failed. “If Christ were a man and only a man”, He was a deceiving man, for He said, “I and my Father are One”, and the deceiver is always an insufficient support. “If Christ were a man and only a man”, He is unworthy of worship, and to cleave to Him alway is a violation of the first commandment.The skeptical scientist of the present moment likes to style himself an “advanced thinker.” He makes the same answer now that the scribes and Pharisee—the learned men of two millenniums ago—made then. His answer involves Mary in harlotry; Joseph in fornication; makes Jesus a bastard; leaves the Church without an explanation and the Kingdom of God without promise or prospect!But that Christ was not content with such a reply is evident in the fact that He pressed His disciples for yet another answer, and by Peter’s lips it was voiced.The answer of Divine revelation. Simon Peter said, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God”. Jesus reminded him that that was the greatest thought he had ever had since his birth. It was not the flash of wit; it was not the expression of genius; it was not the speech of the clever “revelation” from God. Like all other good and perfect gifts, that knowledge came down from above.

Peter was at his best when he made that reply. But the human voice is only at its best when it expresses the Divine mind.Someone says, “How do we know that this is the Divine mind?” Our reply is “Because it is in accord with the Divine Word—in accord with the prophecy, ‘The seed of woman shall bruise the serpent’s head’; in accord with the statement, ‘Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a Son and shall call His name Immanuel’; in accord with the announcement of Gabriel, ‘Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found favour with God.

And behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a Son, and shalt call His name Jesus’; in accord with the angel’s statement to Joseph, ‘Fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife, for that which she has conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost’; in accord with the Divine voice to Mary, ‘The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee; for that Holy Thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God’; in accord with the life He lived; the death He died; the resurrection He accomplished; the ascension that occurred before the eyes of hundreds.”Ah, Peter, God made to you the revelation of the ages; He was, He is “the Christ, the Son of the Living God”! To deny that is to leave His birth, His life, His death, His ascension without explanation. To deny that is to dispute the history of the rise and growth and power of the Christian Church, and to deny that is to put one’s self in opposition to the promised Kingdom to come, with this Prince of Peace in the place of power. Certainly one day men who still believe in the authority of the Sacred Scriptures will cease from denying the Virgin Birth, the attested Miracles, the matchless Words, the sacrificial Death, the certain Resurrection, the glorious Ascension, and even the promised Second Coming of the Christ; for if the Scriptures have any weight, any value, they testify to all these as they testify to Peter’s declaration that He was “the Son of God”.So much then for the first portion of the text, the Christ of God. Let us turn now to the second portion of the text.THE CHURCH OF GOD. “I say unto thee, That thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build My Church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it”. The Church of God rests upon the Divine Christ. It was not Peter upon whom the Church was built, or it would have crumbled when they crucified Him. It was not even Peter’s confession, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God”, for a mere statement is not a sufficient foundation stone. It was the fact to which Peter replied, namely, that Jesus was “the Christ, the Son of the Living God”, for facts are sufficient and stable. Upon that foundation-fact the Church stands, and upon that the Church will forever stand. You cannot build a church upon any other basis.

You can construct a house and call it a church; you can gather the people into some sort of an assembly and call it a church; you can get the newspapers to say it is a church, but you do injustice to the biblical term. A house and an assembly do not necessarily mean a church.

Where Christ is not honored as God, there can be no church. The Millennial Dawnites cannot build a church; they deny that Jesus is the equal of the Father, calling Him “creature” instead of “Creator”. Christian Scientist can never build a church; they deny that Christ is God and call Him either the “Great Teacher” or “Truth”. Unitarians can never build a church; they have for their airy fabric no foundation-stone. These, and others which might be mentioned, construct houses and call them churches, but they rest upon the sand and are destined to go down in that distressing storm which will surely sweep the earth, and illustrate for us the fact that “other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Christ the Lord”. One has said, “When Milton speaks of the ‘earth’s base as built on stubble’ he describes the attempt of those who set Christ—the very Son of God—aside and then seek to build a church.Superficial and thoughtless men are always liable to be deceived by appearances.

One passes a street and sees a house built in churchy form and folks entering it with demure mien, and standing up together, read the Scriptures, and render songs, and passing out at its close in perfect decorum, and he says, “That is a church.” Not if it rests on other foundation than “Christ, the Son of God”. It may have the lines of a church but it is without its life.Dr.

Jefferson says, “The difference between a pool and a spring is that a spring is fed from within while a pool: is fed from without.” That is the very difference between the True Church and the counterfeit. Every counterfeit church lives as a parasite lives, by sucking its very existence as a pool does; it never overflows and refreshes the world as a spring does. Where did the Millennial Dawn movement get its membership? Whence do Christian Science churches bring their recruits? How does Unitarianism manage to live at all? None of them make converts from the world by seeing men and women regenerated, saved from sin; they draw upon other churches as a pool draws upon a fountain; and they have their existence only because the Church that has accepted Jesus Christ as the Son of God has power to make converts; power to overflow as a spring overflows; power to contribute to every piece of low ground about it as a spring makes contribution; power to fill up the pools and save them from utter and even foul stagnation by pouring fresh streams into them. It ought not to be difficult, then, for one to tell whether he is connected with a Church of Christ or with an institution that has stolen the livery of Heaven to serve the devil in.But mark the second fact here stated concerning the Church.“The gates of hell shall not prevail against it”. The word “hades” translated “hell” is practically synonymous with “the grave.” How logical the suggestion; the grave, though its appetite be insatiable, can never conquer against the Church of God. It has claimed the bodies of the saints for centuries; it is claiming them now with every tick of the clock; it comes as a demon, determined to depopulate the Church. It gathers to its rapacious maw the minister today; it strikes down the deacon tomorrow; on the third day it will lay low the noblest woman that ever graced the membership of the local body of believers; and the day after it will throttle the life of the child that confessed Christ but yesterday. One who looks upon this devilish, devastating work might imagine that the Church of Jesus Christ would perish before this persistent enemy. But no! The birth rate of those begotten by the Spirit has forever exceeded the death rate of the redeemed; and we have the sure promise of the Son of God that it will forever remain so; indeed we “baptize for the dead” and replenish the Church.Tertullian was one day addressing the Roman officials and he voiced that fact when he said, “We are but of yesterday; and yet we have filled every place belonging to you, cities, islands, castles, towns, assemblies, your very camps, your tribes, companies, palace, senate, forum; we leave you your temples only.”Truly of Christ, the Head of the Church, it has been written “He walks down the centuries with the tread of the Conqueror, and though nineteen hundred years have passed since He died on the Cross, in all these centuries He has been lifting empires off their hinges, and turning the stream of history into new channels.” Emerson was right, therefore, when he said, “His name is ploughed into the world.” Renan was right when he remarked, “His life has been made a cornerstone in the building of the race.” Lecky was right when he declared, “The simple record of three short years of His active life has done more to regenerate and to soften mankind than all the disquisitions of philosophers and all the exhortations of moralists.” He who conquered in the regions of the Sea of Galilee and called to Himself the thousands by the great Atlantic, and on the shores of the great Pacific—His influence is felt in every continent of the world, and His conquests increase with every passing day.

It must be evident even to the unthinking that He is making good to His Church His Word, “The gates of hell shall not prevail against thee”. I pity the men who have linked their fortunes to a failing enterprise.

I find a justifiable pride and an unspeakable pleasure in the fact that I linked my life to Jesus Christ, and allied my fortune with that of an institution, the success of which is as sure as the Word of God, and the sweep of which is as wide as the world itself.Premillennialists have been charged with a declaration of the failure of the Church. It is a false indictment. In the Divine program the Church has a place; and it is filling it, and will not fail. But that place is not the final place in the Divine scheme of the world’s redemption. That belongs rather toTHE KINGDOM OF GOD. Is not the progress marked in this Scripture both marvelous and suggestive? The Christ of God, first; the Church of God, second; the Kingdom of God, last.Listen:“I will give unto thee the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in Heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in Heaven. “Then charged He His disciples that they should tell no man that He was Jesus the Christ. “From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto His disciples, how that He must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day. “Then Peter took Him, and began to rebuke Him, saying, Be it far from Thee, Lord: this shall not be unto Thee. “But He turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind Me, Satan; thou art an offence unto Me: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men. “Then said Jesus unto His disciples, If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. “For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for My sake shall find it. “For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul f or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? “For the Son of Man shall come in the glory of His Father with His angels; and then He shall reward every man according to his works. “Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of Man coming in His Kingdom” (Matthew 16:19-28). From this concluding Scripture, three suggestions:Christ has authority in the Kingdom of God. It is well known that the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Heaven, as employed in the New Testament, refer to one and the same period of time and describe the same Divine institution; one of them possibly suggesting the heavenly character of the Kingdom and the other the Divine government of the same. Christ who is “Head over all” to the Church by Divine appointment, is also Lord of the Kingdom. As the man who carries all the keys to the house is master of the same, so Jesus of Nazareth— God manifest in the flesh—is to be the natural Master in that Kingdom where all potentates shall fall before Him and all nations shall serve Him.As one reflects upon this text, he wonders if there is not this further suggestion here. You will remember that Paul teaches that “flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God” (1 Corinthians 15:50), and immediately explains by reminding us that when the Kingdom comes it will be made up of “incorruptible” and “immortal” men who through His reappearance have conquered against death, and have been changed in a moment from mortal to immortal, and men who though dead, by the same event shall have been brought back in body, changed from the corruptible to the incorruptible, and of these two classes the Kingdom of God is constituted (1 Corinthians 15:51-57)Christ Himself is the King who brings men from the bondage of mortality to the freedom of immortality, and from beyond the bars of death to the liberty of an everlasting life; and He fits them alike for place, privilege and power in the Kingdom. Is not that the very significance of what John saw in the Patmos vision? On the part of Christian believers there is universal agreement that he had a vision of Jesus in His glory, and when he saw Him he looked upon“One like unto the Son of Man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle. “His head and His hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and His eyes were as a flame of fire; “And His feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and His voice as the sound of many waters. “And He had in His right hand seven stars: and out of His mouth went a sharp two-edged sword: and His countenance was as the sun shineth in His strength. “And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. And He laid His right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the First and the Last; “I am He that liveth and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore. Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death” (Revelation 1:12-18). “I have the keys of hell”. The word means “hades” or “the grave—the place of the dead” and of “death”. Yes, He holds the keys to both; He can bring the Elijahs out of the prison house of mortality; and He can bring the Lazaruses from beyond the bars of corruption; and when these types have been multiplied in the last living, or buried believer, the Kingdom of Heaven will have come; not to be inherited by “flesh and blood”, as the Church of God is constituted, but to be made up of the “immortal” (1 Corinthians 15:50), and the “incorruptible” (1 Corinthians 15:55), as God has ordained from the first, and as His ruling Son shall finally order.In that Kingdom He will share office with the saints. To Peter, at first, He said, “I will give unto thee the keys of the Kingdom, and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in Heaven”, but at that moment He was speaking to Peter as a representative only, Peter as spokesman for the disciples. Turn but a single page in your New Testament and Jesus is speaking to His disciples, and to the whole company of them He said, “Verily I say unto you, 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). Dr.

John Monroe Gibson in the Expositor’s Bible, commenting upon this passage, says, “When the Master’s voice shall be silent, the voice of the rock disciple shall have the same authority to bind and to loose, to regulate church offices as of He Himself when with them.” But unfortunately for such a comment, it misses the main point of both prophecy and history. Historically Peter had no such power, else Paul would not have successfully withstood him concerning his mistake; and from the Scripture standpoint let it be understood that this was never spoken at all with reference to the Church.

When the statement was made to Peter, the Kingdom was the subject of discussion; and when the promise was made to all the disciples, the Kingdom still remained the subject of which the Master was speaking. Scripture has a marvelous habit of harmonizing with Scripture, and in these sacred pages you will never find the Church and the Kingdom confused or used interchangeably. Peter was given no special power in the Church! The Papacy, therefore, has missed the whole point of the Master’s promise, and in imagining that the keys of the Church were hung at the girdle of Peter, has indulged in a monstrous assumption, involving at least two mistakes. The first is that this promise was ever restricted to Peter; it was first spoken to him, but only a little later it was given to all the disciples (Matthew 18:18). Among His brethren Christ is no respecter of persons.The second mistake is to apply it to the Church when it was promised for the Kingdom.

Having gotten the correct perspective, behold how Scriptures harmonize! Even the Old Testament Prophets declare for the day of the Lord that “saviours and judges shall come upon Mount Zion”; the New Testament tells us how this will be fulfilled, for Christ promised those who were to follow Him in the regeneration that they should “reign with Him”, and His Apostolic company enjoyed special premise in this matter (Luke 22:30).

To them Jesus said,“Ye are they which have continued with Me in My temptations. “And I appoint unto you a Kingdom, as My Father hath appointed unto Me; “That ye may eat and drink at My table in My Kingdom, and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel”. This Scripture provides no basis whatever for Papal priesthood and none whatever for the Catholic confessional. It relates to that day when judgment will have come to the world, and when the incorruptible saints shall share with Jesus in determining whose sins are remitted and whose are retained; who shall be bound and consigned to everlasting punishment; and who shall be received into eternal life (Matthew 25:46), The biblical distinction between the Church period and the Kingdom period brings to instructed believers a blessed suggestion. Concerning the Church no believer has a right to be discouraged; “the gates of hell shall not prevail against it”. But, anticipating the Kingdom, every instructed believer should be buoyant with the assurance that it will prevail against death and hades, for when the Kingdom shall come “death will have no more dominion” over God’s people, and the believer’s grave will be instantly robbed of its inmate; and the immortal and incorruptible, robed in the glory of new life, “shall shine forth as the sun in the Kingdom of their Father. Who hath ears to hear, let him hear” (Matthew 13:45).It is a remarkable speech with which this sentence is followed and this study is closed;“Then charged He His disciples that they should tell no man that He was Jesus the Christ. “From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto His disciples, how that He must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day. “Then Peter took Him, and began to rebuke Him, saying, Be it far from Thee, Lord: this shall not be unto Thee. “But He turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind Me, Satan: thou art an offence unto Me; for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men. “Then said Jesus unto His disciples, If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. “For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for My sake shall find it. “For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? “For the Son of Man shall come in the glory of His Father with His angels; and then He shall reward every man according to his works. “Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of Man coming in His Kingdom” (Matthew 16:20-28). The Kingdom completed, Christ will efface His official self. Here we have a suggestion that becomes a symbol, a statement that takes on the proportions of a type. Immediately He set about trying to prepare His disciples for that effacement, telling them that He must “go into Jerusalem and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day”.Peter could not comprehend either such an end for His Lord or such a paling of his personal and professional glory, and his rebuke was “Be it far from Thee, Lord: this shall not be unto Thee”. The Master’s answer, “Get thee behind Me, Satan: thou art an offence unto Me: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men”, was true to every fact. Peter represented the others doubtless in his low view of the coming Kingdom and Christ’s supremacy therein. He thought it to be of the earth, earthy, and that it would be wrought by human wisdom and implements of warfare.Jesus seeks to correct this view by showing that a cross versus a canon, and self-sacrifice versus a sword, was the way to victory in the Kingdom.

It is not only the way chosen for the servant, but the way that the Master has chosen for Himself. Joseph Parker teaches that Christ’s statement, “What is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul”, was not intended for disciples but applied by Himself.

It was an answer to Peter’s suggestion that He turn aside and escape the destiny which He came to fulfil; a proposition that He instantly repudiated. Self-sacrifice was not to be escaped by Him; and official effacement would in no wise be the end of His glory, the “glory which He had with the Father from the foundation” and in which He should continue to share for all eternity; but not in His own name. He wanted the glory to be given to God, the Father. His whole plan is that that should be the final effect of His ministry. In the fifteenth chapter of First Corinthians, Paul, writing by the pen of inspiration, tells us that when He has rendered the last service He came to perform, namely, that of having put down “all rule and all authority and power”, having abolished death itself, which is “the last enemy”, then, when all things shall be subdued unto him”, when all saints and all angels will be ready to break forth in praises beyond anything He has heard or known in the eternity of the past, at that time He will efface Himself again, having turned all over to God the Father, that “God may he all and in all”.

Matthew 16:18

IS THE CHURCH DEAD OR DYING? Hebrews 12:22-23; Matthew 16:18. TRAVEL by auto is not conducive to reading nor compatible with book study. And yet, a while ago on a western auto trip certain articles upon which my eyes fell suggested this sermon; and to them I may appeal in quotations.On that trip I purchased and read Leslie H. Allen’s volume on “Bryan and Darrow at Dayton” —the famous Scopes’ trial. In the office of a brother pastor I found the Baptist of November 16th, 1929, carrying an article on “The Church’s Deepest Wound” by Dr. Charles E. Jefferson of New York City.

On another day I read with interest, in the “Literary Digest” of November 30th, 1929, an article on “The Coroner Not Needed for the Church.” Inasmuch as these three publications all dealt with the same subject, the life or death of the Church, my mind naturally dwelt much upon the question, “Will the Church Live or Die?”The two texts to which I call your attention would seem to be the inspired answer to this uninspired query. In the first of these texts we are told what the Church is: “new born ones” whose names are “written in Heaven”. That fact would, to say the least, mean its immortality. But in the second, we have the assurance of Jesus, the infinitely wise Son of God, that “the gates of heir shall “not prevail” against it.However, neither text promises the Church exemption from test, trial, or even temporary defeat. There are three things, then, that one may say concerning the Church; and in each statement be assured of the backing of the Bible: 1. The Church Must Suffer! 2.

The Church Cannot Die! 3. The Church Will Conquer!THE CHURCH MUST SUFFER It is an interesting study to see at what points Christ suffered and, then, to parallel His experiences as the Head with that of the Church, which is the Body of Christ.Christ suffered at the hands of His enemies; Christ endured the betrayal of professed friends; and Christ was sorely disappointed in genuine disciples.The Church was never promised exemption at any of these points.It has, and will continue to have, its bitter enemies. The Pharisees were never more determined upon His death, and the Sadducees were never more ready to lend assistance in the same, than certain individuals and organizations of the present are set upon the destruction of the Church.For the first time in American history a great state, through one of its judges, has provided a charter to an organization, the express purpose of which is “to destroy the Church.” And while Atheism is brazen enough to thus avow its definite intention, there are literally scores of individuals, and no small number of organizations, that entertain the same malignant purpose.But this is nothing new under the sun. Christ Himself said,“If the world hate you, ye know that it hated Me before it hated you. “If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. “Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you * *. “All these things will they do unto you for My Name’s sake, because they know not Him that sent Me” (John 15:18-21). It is most amazing what calumnies can be hurled against the Church. Atheism charges her with “ignorance,” “bigotry,” “oppression,” with being “the chief foe of progress,” “the malignant enemy of man”; but it remains for the professed churchman, a prominent modernistic pastor, to charge her with all the brutalities of the late war—yea, with the war itself. As Judas Iscariot, who was a professed Apostle of the Christian faith, sought to incriminate Jesus, as a self-seeking waster of precious perfume, when Mary, without announcement, broke the vial over His head, so this disciple of the new theology charges the Church of God with the selfish waste of the war that broke unexpectedly over the Church, and brought her nothing but sorrow and sobs.From avowed enemies cruel charges are to be expected; but alas, for the deeper betrayal of professed friends.The true Church of God, the “Heaven born,” whose names are “written in Heaven”, had nothing to do with the late war, except to grieve it. And they had no responsibility whatever to either prevent or bring that war to an end, since the Church is not commissioned as a peace-maker.Christ, its great Head, was clear upon this point. He came not to control the conduct of the unregenerate world, nor yet to arbitrate disputes as between nations. “Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division” (Luke 12:51).The most superficial student of the Bible would see that Christ’s first appearance was not as “the Prince of Peace”, but rather, as a personal Saviour.

That coming was to the end that the lost might be sought and found (Luke 19:10), and that individual regenerations, in response to faith, might be wrought. I challenge any student of the Book to find within the pages of the New Testament any Church commission which looks to the arbitration and possible adjustment of international difficulties.It is little wonder that modernism, in discussing “The Church’s Deepest Wound” never makes a remote reference to a Bible text; and, by thus ignoring what that sacred Book has to say, it joins the enemies of the Church itself to send into her side another stab.The betrayal of professed friends is most painful.

Jesus faced His open enemies; but never did He suffer by their acrimonious speech, never from the spit that fell upon His face, nay, not even from the nails that pierced His hands and feet or the thorned-crown that bled His brow, as He did when He looked into the face of Judas and realized that He was betrayed by a professed friend. Perhaps in all human or even Divine speech, no more withering sarcasm was ever employed than this: “FRIEND, wherefore art thou come?” (Matthew 26:50)?In view of that fact I have been running through my New Testament to see who, in the Church, stabbed it the deepest. I suspect that the inspired record of human conduct is very incomplete, and that many disciples betrayed the Church in one way or another, and the inspired Book flung over their conduct the merciful cloak of non-record. But there are some men’s behavior blazoned on the sacred page. The Book of Acts, if not a full record, is at least an efficient one of the early Church history. Did it ever occur to you that Ananias and Sapphira held the highest place of infamy in that record because of their attempt to deceive and even betray the Church of the Living God?

Has it ever occurred to you that, in all probability, few sins have smitten the Church more often than that of falsifying facts concerning one’s wealth and gifts?Second to these, stands Simon, the sorcerer, who thought to make the Holy Ghost a medium of personal profit.Ray Stanard Baker, in an article published in the “Literary Digest” some years ago, called attention to the real wounds from which the Church of God is suffering when he said, “In recent years the unthinkable sum of billions of dollars has been given by American people for various philanthropies,” and although prominent Christians are named by him as the most munificent of these givers, he is compelled to say, “Only a small proportion of this, goes to the churches.” And he adds, “Not only the dollars of the rich, but the pennies of the poor have been diverted, in large measure, from the Church.”This past week I walked daily to the end of the blind street in Los Angeles, on one side of which stands a great Bible Institute, erected very largely by the gifts of one consecrated Christian, but now suffering for funds; exactly opposite it is being perfected, at the present time, a club house, the elegance of which will beggar description. For this building a few hundred men, many of them church-members, are laying on the altar of personal pleasure $1,000 per month each, until the same shall be completed.

And since this building, stretching skyward in height and swept about with decks that would do credit to the greatest steamer that ever sailed the seas, is due to the club’s choice, it is natural to suppose that these contributions are willingly made.The Church of God in America carries on its rolls a multitude of men whose hands are open for every social or semi-religious, or purely secular enterprise, that makes appeal to their office, but closed against the only institution that has brought light to the world’s darkness and salt to its moral rottenness; and therein the Church suffers.But a further step must be taken: The Church suffers at the hands of its best representatives. Here again the parallelism between the experiences of the Head, Christ, and the Body, the Church, is evident.It was Christ’s best disciples who slept while He faced Gethsemane alone; and it was Christ’s most notable Apostle, the greatest preacher of the Twelve, who denied Him in Caiaphas’ porch. The simple truth is that the Church suffers after a kindred manner. The best of us are but poor representatives of His Spirit. We fail Him in His hour of need. We shrink when there is opportunity to fill up His sufferings.

We employ condemnable speech and indulge in unchristian conduct at the very hour when He needs us most. Henry Mabie said what should be true, but what we fear is not the fact, when he declared: “As God in Christ spared not Himself, so, we, who believe, are to spare ourselves no conformity to the Redeemer’s will.” We are to stop not short of complete crucifixion; to stop on nothing that stands between us and obedience to Him.

The Pauline confession is the ideal expression of it: “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me”. Said the eloquent Lacordare, “The Church was born crucified.”But is it not a fact that we have now come upon a time when those of us who constitute it, are seeking to draw out the nails, remove the crown of thorns, push aside the sword, and live a life of selfish and personal comfort rather than share with Him the Cross?These are the true wounds of the Church and they have little or nothing to do with “the late war,” save as some men, who named the Name of Christ, incited that war to gratify pride of station, extent of country, or to seek the filthy profits of the same. It is a strange thing to charge the Church— “little flock”—in the minority everywhere, with what the godless majority wrought.But, such a charge is in perfect keeping with the false notion that because there are Christians in Germany, the German nation is a Christian nation; that because there are Christians in England or America that England and America are Christian nations. There are no Christian nations! The Bible knows no such thought for this era. The Church is in the world, but not of it. Here, it is a pilgrim and a stranger; and destined to the treatment to which pilgrims and strangers have always been subjected.But this only leads up to my second remark:THE CHURCH CANNOT DIE Its Head, Christ, is not more immortal than is “His Body, the Church”. They wreathed the Head about with thorns; they drove nails through the hands and feet; they thrust a sword through the body. But both “Head” and “Body” of Christ came back from the grave. The lesson is not far to seek!The wounds of the Church will never prove fatal. The one who charges it with responsibility of the late war has been mistaken in many things. His disloyalty to the authority of the Book is as widely known as is his name. But he was never more mistaken than when he said of the late war: “It was a Christian war; fought by Christian nations.”A sentence like that stabs afresh the Church of Christ. But that is not the first stab from this source.

It was the same author who wrote of the Bible, “The Bible is not infallible in its words, for no translation is faultless. It is not infallible in its language; for though the style is good, it is not perfect. It is not infallible in its facts, for an historian occasionally slips. It is not infallible in its theories, for its theories of the physical universe are mistaken. It is not infallible in its arguments, for some of its arguments are weak. It is not infallible in its moral sanctions, for the Hebrews undoubtedly sometimes confounded their own impulses with the voice of God.

It is not infallible in the expectations of even its greatest men, for all the Apostles expected Jesus to return within their own lifetime.”Is it a strange matter that the man who removes “the foundations” should have some fears lest the house collapse?But this is not for believers; they hold another and a better view of that blessed institution, “His Body”.It is not chargeable with the world’s follies. The late war was a world-folly; nothing was ever more so.

It was born of world-ambitions; it was carried forward by world-inventions; it crushed and destroyed world-discoveries.Sir Robert Anderson, a man who was the head of Scotland Yards, knew perhaps as much of the ways of the world, the flesh and the devil as any living human being; and yet, a man who, as a student of the Sacred Scriptures, was unquestionably Spirit-taught, said, “False conceptions of the Church are working great mischief. The most of the perverts to Rome are duped by them; and advocates of the sham, ‘Higher Criticism’, appeal to them to justify their rejection of Scripture, for with mingled effrontery and folly they make the doctrine of the Spirit’s presence in the Church an excuse for rejecting the teaching of the inspired Apostles and Prophets of the New Testament. It is essential to distinguish between The Church’ as a society, the administration of which was entrusted to men on earth, and ‘the Church’ as the Body of Christ, dependent only upon Himself as its Lord and Head. The building of ‘the Church, which is His Body’ is His own work, and it cannot fail. But surely fanaticism or folly alone can refuse to recognize that The gates of hell’ have prevailed against the organized society on earth— The outward frame’ as Alford calls it, which, in its full and final development or evil will appear as ‘the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus’.”That there is a great proportion of the Church, apostate now, keen observers do not deny. But that many in it are yet loyal is evidenced in certain facts to which the “Literary Digest” recently called attention.Mr.

Ramsey MacDonald is quoted as having declared that the peace movement of the present is due to the advocacy of the Christian churches; while the vociferous Mr. Shearer, would-be wielder of international thunderbolts, bewails the attempt of the Church to further international good will.

Professor Millikan, one of the best known and highly honored of America’s physicists, writing on, “What I Believe,” declares that “a large fraction of the altruistic, humanitarian, and forward-looking work of the world in all its forms, has today its mainspring in the Christian churches. My observation is that about 95 per cent of it has come, and is coming, from the influence of organized religion.”These are tributes to the vitality of the Church of God; to the evidences that there remains a spiritual and self-sacrificing Body of which Jesus spake when He said, “The gates of hell shall not prevail against it”.But to the last question,WILL THE CHURCH CONQUER? It is a question to which the believer can give but one answer—Yes!It has immortality itself. It is “His Body”. He is not dead; He is alive! That is more than an Easter message; that is a fact of history. As Christ conquered against death and the grave, so for 2,000 years the Church has risen from every coffin in which men sought to shut her up. It has come out of every grave in which they expected to permanently place her form.The Church is not a short-lived individual to be judged adversely by a single incident. The Church is old; 2,000 years she has walked bravely on. The fires of persecution have wrought for her only what they did for the three Hebrew children, namely, burned her bands away and brought her to greater liberty.

The sword has accomplished for her only what it did for Christ—it has thrust her side only to prove her immortality. Betrayal has wrought for her only what betrayal wrought for Jesus—it has flung her but temporarily into the hands of enemies, while her betrayers have gone to an eternal doom. As Christ lives, the Church lives. As the powers of Heaven and earth are lodged in Him, so also with it. By faith it can remove mountains; and by obedience it has determined the courses of the streams of the centuries.Its success is assured by His Word. It was Christ who said, “The gates of hell shall not prevail against it”.

Even now when it is attacked, the secular press rises to its defense and says, ‘“The minister of religion is not manning a sinking ship; not serving a lost cause, or debating a dead issue. He is the servant of a living Master and a living Church, mediating the truth of an eternal life to men in the midst of their brief and fleeting years.” Those lukewarm friends of the Church—“modernists”—admit that practically every beneficent feature of modern civilization reveals the touch of the Church. “Wherever man has been bettered and society has been made more beautiful, the good seed of God’s Word has been sown by the Church.” One Sunday afternoon I called on Dr.

O. P. Gifford, that most lucid thinker, that compiler of perfect sentences; and while the years are upon him, his mind knows nothing of senility, and the visit brought to memory the days of our fellowship in Chicago, when as neighbor pastors the lad listened to the more mature man, to be always interested and profited in all that he said. It was Gifford who said, “The greatest man that ever entered Europe was Paul, the Apostle. He has done more for her civilization than all her armies and navies. Near Blair castle in Scotland, was a bare grim crag, one of the unsightly features of the great estate. No one dared climb its face to conquer its ugliness. There were two small cannon on the castle grounds.

Alexander Nasmyth had a number of canisters made to fit the cannon, filled them with living seeds of grass, shrub and tree, and fired them against the rocky face. The blow shattered the shells, scattered the seeds, and the seeds transformed the crags into; living beauty.” So thought Gifford, the eternal seeds of truth, scattered over the nations by the hand of the Church of God, have produced all that is worth while in every civilization.This is true of Asia and of Europe. It is true of Africa and the Americas. It is true of every spot that the true Church of God has touched. It is the Church of God that has brought man from barbarism and savagery; that has created all moral and ethical interests and brought society more and more toward the ideal that Christ had and holds for the future world. The Church has been His instrument in all this work.The Church will conquer by Christ’s presence.

He is now its Saviour. His one mission in this age is to turn men from sin to holiness.

But He will come again to take the throne, wear the crown, rule from sea to sea. Then He will sit as the Prince of Peace; and at that time—not now, but then— bloodshed will end. The Prophet’s vision will find a perfect fulfilment:“He shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more”. “For the mouth of the Lord of Hosts hath spoken it”.