A. T. JONES
IT has also been said, already, that these lessons “are too tedious—ask a question, and then answer the question by perhaps one or two words in a verse, and over and over so, before you get through a single verse. Why, to get the lessons the way that the lesson pamphlet requires, we should have to go over it fifty times a day!” Well, suppose you should. Is it a dreadful thing, a toilsome, burdensome thing, to drink in eternal life “fifty times a day”? “Oh, well, it does not seem like that to me.” No, of course not! That is why it is so tedious. There is nothing tedious, there is nothing toilsome, there is nothing monotonous at all, in drinking in eternal life by the word of God, even in the book of Galatians, “fifty times a day.” And in the book of Galatians you have the eternal life which comes by the word of God in a way that an angel could not better. And in receiving this eternal life, there is nothing monotonous, there is nothing wearisome, in any sense whatever. It is simply joy, joy, joy—“joy unspeakable and full of glory.” [Voice: “Good!”] ARSH August 14, 1900, page 514.1
Then, if to me it is a task, if it is a weariness, if it becomes so monotonous as to grow dull; and I can not stand it to go over that thing fifty times a day, to get the Sabbath-school lesson, so that other persons who do not know it may have it,—then it is not eternal life at all to me: I have not yet found the fountain; I am not drinking at the fountain. I am away off on the dry mountains: I am away in the desert, where that lost sheep is. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 514.2
However, that is not particularly against me, if I will only listen to the call of the Shepherd, and become a found sheep. It is nothing against a man that he is a lost sheep; for the Lord has sent Jesus to seek and to save us. But it becomes a terrible thing for a man to stay lost, when Jesus has come to save, and when that man is actually in a position where he is required to read over and over every day the lesson of salvation. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 514.3
I call your attention to these things, not for the things themselves, but for illustration. These statements that the lessons are “very dry” and “so tedious,” when the lessons are simply the very words of Scripture itself—this illustrates exactly the evil which the book of Galatians is given to correct. It illustrates exactly the condition of things that is considered and refuted, and annihilated by the book of things as that—a condition of things in which a people professing to be Christians were not Christians—a condition of things in which a people professing to be in the way of God knew not the way of God. It was a condition in which all was only formalism: their profession was a form; what they did was a form; all their service to God was a form; it was formalism and ceremonialism altogether. That is how it is that there came “some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 514.4
What is the gospel of Christ?—It is God’s free salvation to every soul in the wide world. It is the power of God to lift a man up from deadness in trespasses and sins, and make him a partaker of that salvation, to hold him in the way of that salvation, and to work out the righteousness of God through him. This is what the people in Galatia had received in receiving the gospel, concerning which it is said that if even an angel should preach any other, he would be under the curse. But here were those who had gone down to Galatia, and had confused—yes, had even “bewitched”—the people, and would have perverted the pure gospel that the Galatians had first heard and received by the Holy Spirit. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 514.5
These troublers of the Galatian Christians were “Pharisees which believed.” Remember they were “Pharisees which believed.” They had come from among the Pharisees into the church of Christ. They professed to believe in Jesus, professed to have received the gospel, professed to be Christians. But they were Pharisees before; and they were still Pharisees, after they professed to be Christians. They were formalists before, when they were only Pharisees; and now, when they became “Pharisees which believed,” they were still only formalists: even their belief was only a form. And these were opposed to the gospel. Indeed, it was such a “dry thing” that they could not be content until they had followed Paul everywhere that he went, turning the people away from this gospel that he preached, which was “so dry.” And in perverting the gospel of Christ, they were presenting “another gospel,” another way of salvation. Therefore the Word says: “I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 514.6
“Another gospel”! What is the gospel?—It is “the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth,” “for therein is the righteousness of God revealed.” What I wish to impress upon you just now is not particularly that the gospel is “the power of God,” but WHY it is the power of God. Why is the gospel the power of God unto salvation?—The reason is given in Romans 1:16, 17. In the sixteenth verse the statement is made that the gospel “is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.” The reason is given in the seventeenth verse; and that reason is that “therein is the righteousness of God revealed.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 514.7
That is to say, the power of the gospel lies in the righteousness of God revealed in the gospel. The power that comes by the gospel to the sinner,—that power that changes his life; that puts in him the new way, and holds him in that way,—that power comes to him in the righteousness of God. And the gospel is the power of God because the righteousness of God revealed therein imparts the power. So the power of God in the gospel lies in the righteousness of God revealed in the gospel; and that righteousness is revealed only to faith, and “from faith to faith.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 514.8
Well, here come those “Pharisees which believed,” preaching “another gospel.” These who professed the true gospel become confused, and turned aside unto this “other gospel.” Another what?—“Another gospel;” another way of salvation; another power unto salvation. And this other power unto salvation must derive from some sort of righteousness whatever power it may have. But what other power can there be to work salvation, than the power of God?—None but my own. So far as my salvation is concerned, there is nobody but God and me. And in this God is dealing with me, and I must deal with God, just as if there was nobody in the universe but God and me. And the true gospel is the power of God unto salvation. Another gospel would be another power unto salvation; and that could be only my own power—the power of self. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 514.9
Further: since the true gospel derives its power from the righteousness of God therein revealed, “another gospel” must derive whatever power it may have, from some sort of righteousness. It can not derive its power from the righteousness of God, because it is “another gospel.” Being “another gospel,” it must derive its power from another righteousness. And as in this there is no other power than my own, so in this there is no other righteousness than my own. Therefore the only righteousness that could possibly be revealed in this “other gospel” would be self-righteousness. But self-righteousness is sin. Whosoever has self-righteousness is under the curse. Consequently “another gospel” is indeed “not another,” because it is no gospel at all. It is no gospel at all, because it is no power at all: it is wholly impotency, and is simply the way of perdition. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 514.10
Such was the question among the Galatians—a question as to whether the true gospel is the one in which the righteousness of God is revealed, or one in which self-righteousness is revealed. That is the question that called forth the book of Galatians. The book of Galatians was written especially to show the utter fallacy, the utter destructiveness to all who might receive it, of anything claiming to be the gospel that does not reveal the righteousness of God which is by faith. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 514.11
(To be continued.)
THE trumpet is the symbol of war; as it is written: “Thou hast heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war.” Jeremiah 4:19, “For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle?” 1 Corinthians 14:8. “Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain.” Joel 2:1. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.1
We have found that the Seven Trumpets prophesy the consequences of the making of the Beast, which grew out of the great apostasy from Christianity. The Beast was made in the Roman Empire by the union of the apostate church with that republic which had degenerated into an imperial despotism; and the result to the Roman Empire, of the making of the Beast, was the utter ruin of that empire. This ruin was accomplished by the mighty armies of the peoples of the north, which, in a succession of mighty tides, overflowed the western empire of Rome, in the time covered by the first four of the Seven Trumpets. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.2
At that time, and for five hundred years before, the Roman Empire, as a whole, had “filled the world.”—Gibbon. “Coming last among what are called the great monarchies of prophecy, it was the only one which realized in perfection the idea of a monarchia, being (except for Parthia and the great fable of India beyond it) strictly coincident with the civilized world. Civilization and this empire were commensurate; they were interchangeable ideas and coextensive.” And when that empire perished, to those unenlightened by the word of God it really seemed, in the violence of the times, that the world was at its end. No man can imagine the terror of the times. Of the fall of that empire it has been said that— ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.3
Never had the existence of a nation been more completely overthrown; never had individuals had more evils to endure and more dangers to apprehend. Whence came it that the population were dumb and dead? How is it that so many sacked towns, so many ruined positions, so many blasted careers, so many ejected proprietors, have left so few traces. I do not say of their active existence, but only of their sufferings?—Guizot. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.4
Although it was not the end of the world, yet, like the fall of Babylon of old, the fall of Rome is full of lessons that indicate exactly the things that will be at the end of the world. For that, with all its terrors, was the consequence of the evils heaped upon society by the making and the working of the Beast. And when the world shall really end, that, with the terrors that accompany it, will be but the consequence of the evil that is heaped upon the society of the world at this time, by the making and the working of the Image of the Beast. And as the Beast itself is the standard of comparison in all things respecting the making and the working of the Image of the Beast, so the state of society and the affairs of the empire and nations of that time of the Beast are a faithful standard of comparison by which to read correctly the course and condition of the nations in these times of the Image of the Beast. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.5
A brief sketch of the condition of society at that time will therefore be of double value just here. The same corruptions that had characterized the former Rome were reproduced in the Rome of the fifth century. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.6
The primitive rigor of discipline and manners was utterly neglected and forgotten by the ecclesiastics of Rome. The most exorbitant luxury, with all the vices attending it, was introduced among them, and the most scandalous and unchristian arts of acquiring wealth universally practiced. They seemed to have rivaled in riotous living the greatest epicures of pagan Rome when luxury was there at the highest pitch. For Jerome, who was an eye-witness of what he writ, reproaches the Roman clergy with the same excesses which the poet Juvenal so severely censured in the Roman nobility under the reign of Domitian.—Bower. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.7
Everything was determined by auguries and auspices; the wild orgies of the Bacchanalians, with all their obscene songs and revelry, were not wanting.—Merivale. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.8
And now the criminal and frivolous pleasures of a decrepit civilization left no thought for the absorbing duties of the day nor the fearful trials of the morrow. Unbridled lust and unblushing indecency admitted no sanctity in the marriage tie. The rich and powerful established harems, in the recesses of which their wives lingered, forgotten, neglected, and despised. The banquet, theater, and the circus exhausted what little strength and energy were left by domestic excesses. The poor aped the vices of the rich, and hideous depravity reigned supreme, and invited the vengeance of heaven.—Lea. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.9
The pagan superstitions, the pagan delusions, and the pagan vices, which had been brought into the church by the apostasy, and clothed with a form of godliness, had wrought such corruption that the society of which it was a part could no longer exist. From it no more good could possibly come, and it must be swept away. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.10
The uncontrollable progress of avarice, prodigality, voluptuousness, theater-going, intemperance, lewdness; in short, of all the heathen vices, which Christianity had come to eradicate, still carried the Roman Empire and people with rapid strides toward dissolution, and gave it at last into the hands of the rude, but simple and morally vigorous, barbarians.—Schaff. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.11
It is impossible that it should be otherwise. By apostasy that gospel had lost its purity and its power in the multitudes who professed it. It was now used only as a cloak to cover the same old pagan wickedness. This form of godliness, practiced not only without the power but in defiance of it, permeated the great masses of the people, and the empire had thereby become a festering mass of corruption. When thus the only means which it was possible for the Lord himself to employ to purify the people, had been taken and made only the cloak under which to increase unto more ungodliness, there was no other remedy; destruction must come. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.12
And it did come, by a host, wild and savage, it is true, but whose social habits were so far above those of the people which they destroyed, that, savage as they were, they were caused fairly to blush at the shameful corruptions which they found in this so-called Christian society of Rome. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.13
A writer who lived at the time of the barbarian invasions, and who wrote as a Christian, exclaims:— ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.14
“The church, which ought everywhere to propitiate God, what does she but provoke him to anger? How many may one meet, even in the church, who are not still drunkards, or debauchees, or adulterers, or fornicators, or robbers, or murderers, or the like, or all these at once, without end? It is even a sort of holiness among Christian people to be less vicious.” From the public worship of God, and almost during it, they pass to deeds of shame. Scarce a rich man but would commit murder and fornication. We have lost the whole power of Christianity, and offend God the more, that we sin as Christians. We are worse than the barbarians and heathen. If the Saxon is wild, the Frank faithless, the Goth inhuman, the Alanian drunken, the Hun licentious, they are, by reason of their ignorance, far less punishable than we, who, knowing the commandments of God, commit all these crimes.—Schaff. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.15
You, Roman, Christians, and Catholics, are defrauding your brethren, are grinding the faces of the poor, are frittering away your lives over the impure and heathenish spectacles of the amphitheater. You are wallowing in licentiousness and inebriety. The barbarians, meanwhile, heathen or heretics though they may be, and however fierce toward us, are just and fair in their dealings with one another. The men of the same clan, and following the same king, love one another with true affection. The impurities of the theater are unknown amongst them. Many of their tribes are free from the taint of drunkenness, and among all, except the Alans and the Huns, chastity is the rule. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.16
Not one of these tribes is altogether vicious. If they have their vices, they have also their virtues, clear, sharp, and well defined. Whereas you, my beloved fellow provincials, I regret to say, with the exception of a few holy men among you, are altogether bad. Your lives from the cradle to the grave are a tissue of rottenness and corruption, and all this notwithstanding that you have the sacred Scriptures in your hands. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.17
In what other race of men would you find such evils as these which are practiced among the Romans? Where else is there such injustice as ours? The Franks know nothing of this villainy. The Huns are clear of crimes like these. None of these exactions are practiced among the Vandals, none among the Goths. So far are the barbarian Goths from tolerating frauds like these, that not even the Romans who live under the Gothic rule are called upon to endure them, and hence the one wish of all the Romans in those parts is that it may never be necessary for them to pass under the Roman jurisdiction. With one consenting voice the lower orders of Romans put up the prayer that they may be permitted to spend their life, such as it is, alongside of the barbarians. And then we marvel that our arms should not triumph over the arms of the Goths, when our own countrymen would rather be with them than with us.—Salvian. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.18
These events of the Seven Trumpets are important in another sense also; that is, that the peoples by whom was wrought “the divine judgment of destruction upon this nominally Christian, but essentially heathen, world,” are, in their descent, the great nations of to-day; and are to-day the living subjects of the prophecies relating to our times. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.19
In the destruction of the Western Empire there were planted, in its place, the ten kingdoms of the seventh chapter of Daniel, of which the seven that remain after the rooting up of the three before the papacy, are the kingdoms in whose “days,” according to Daniel 2:44, “shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.20
The first four trumpets are not, however, an account of the planting of the ten kingdoms. These are prophetic pictures of the most terrible of the mighty invasions by which Western Rome was ruined, and through which the ten kingdoms were planted. There were more than ten nations engaged in the invasion and ruin of the Roman Empire. Indeed, there were more than fifteen of those nations; and, out of this number, ten kingdoms, no more, and no less, divided among themselves the territory of Western Rome. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 520.21
“BEHOLD, I Paul say unto you, that if ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing. For I testify again to every man that is circumcised, that he is a debtor to do the whole law. Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law; ye are fallen from grace.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.1
Through unbelief and distrust of the promise of God in his covenant with Abraham, the eyes of Sarah and Abraham were hidden from the truth and blessings of the Abrahamic covenant, God’s everlasting covenant. Therefore, the real truth and spirit of that covenant they must be taught. Through the disappointing experience of Sarai’s scheme in bringing in Hagar and her son Ishmael, Sarah and Abraham were brought to sincerely trust in the promise of God by which they received the child of promise; and by which Abraham was enabled to see the day of Christ, and, in seeing it, to rejoice and be glad. John 8:56. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.2
Through the darkness of Egypt, which was upon their minds and hearts,—the darkness of unbelief and self-righteousness,—Israel at Sinai could not discern the truth and blessings of the Abrahamic covenant. “All this they must be taught.” By their experience in the covenant at Sinai, they were brought to the knowledge of themselves, of “their need of the Saviour revealed in the Abrahamic covenant and shadowed forth in the sacrificial offerings,” and “were prepared to appreciate the blessings of the new covenant.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.3
Through the darkness of Egypt, which was upon their minds and hearts,—the darkness of unbelief and self-righteousness,—Israel before Calvary, and at Calvary, and “the Pharisees which believed” after Calvary, could not discern the Saviour revealed in the Abrahamic covenant and shadowed forth in the sacrificial offerings—the blessings of the new covenant. All this they must be taught. And by Stephen, and especially by Paul; and by the church in council at Jerusalem, and especially by inspiration in the epistle to the Galatians, they were taught that there was not to be put upon the necks of Christians the yoke which neither their fathers nor themselves were able to bear; but that Christians are to stand fast in the freedom of the Abrahamic covenant,—God’s everlasting covenant,—“the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.4
Therefore it is written: “Behold, I Paul say unto you, that if ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.5
It is the truth that Timothy was circumcised, and it is also the truth that Christ did profit Timothy unto the very fullness of the salvation of God. How, then, can it be true that “if ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing,” and yet Timothy be both circumcised and profited by Christ? ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.6
The key to this problem lies in the purpose for which circumcision was employed. The Pharisees which believed, who had confused the Galatians, and were making this contention against Paul, “taught the brethren, and said, Except ye be circumcised after the manner of Moses, ye can not be saved.” Acts 15:1. With them, then, circumcision was the means of salvation; and to be saved was the object in the circumcision. And how entirely salvation was made to depend upon circumcision is shown in the fact that this was said to persons who were already saved by the faith of Jesus Christ. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.7
The Galatians had heard the gospel in its purity, preached by Paul. They had believed the gospel; and in that they had believed on the Lord Jesus, and had received him as their Saviour. Thus, they were already saved by faith in Christ; for by that they received the gospel, which is “the power of God unto salvation [working salvation] to every one that believeth.” And it was to these Christians who were already saved by Christ, through the faith of Christ,—to these it was that “the Pharisees which believed” had said, “Except ye be circumcised...ye can not be saved.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.8
This was, therefore, nothing else than to put circumcision above Jesus Christ as the way of salvation. It was to set Christ aside as the Saviour, and to put circumcision in his place as the savior. Therefore it is perfectly plain, in itself, that whosoever was circumcised under that scheme and for that purpose, Christ would profit him nothing; because, in the very process, he set Christ aside for circumcision; he repudiated Christ as the Saviour, and took circumcision as his savior. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.9
And while that controversy was going on, as yet unsettled, Paul would not give countenance for a moment to any suggestion to circumcise Titus, or anybody else. But when the controversy had been settled by the Holy Spirit, and the decree had been published by the Holy Spirit from the council at Jerusalem, that people are saved by Christ, without circumcision, and where there was no question of salvation in the circumcision that was performed,—then Paul circumcised Timothy, so that a wider door should be open to both Paul and Timothy in the preaching of the gospel without circumcision. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.10
Now, with those “Pharisees which believed” circumcision was the badge, the seal, the very pinnacle of works, of self-righteousness, and of salvation by works of self-righteousness. And these works included the law,—all law, moral and ceremonial, which the Lord had given,—and the ceremonies which the Pharisees had heaped upon all that the Lord had given. So that the scheme meant justification, salvation, by “law” and works of law, by ceremonialism, not by Christ and the faith of Christ. Therefore exactly as he wrote of circumcision, so now he writes of law: “Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by law; ye are fallen from grace.” The Greek is nomo law, in general: not ho nomou, the law, in particular. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.11
In this controversy the question was not whether it is right or wrong to keep the law of God. The question is whether or not men are justified, saved, by works of law, whatever law it may be. These people were already saved by Christ, and by faith in him; and now, to those who were saved by Christ, and by faith alone in him, these “Pharisees which believed” insisted that these must be circumcised, and keep the law, in order to be saved. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.12
This was putting the law, the keeping of the law, above Christ. It was, in fact, the setting aside of Christ as Saviour, and putting in his place as the Saviour their own works of law. And therefore, plainly enough, in the very fact of so doing they were “fallen from grace.” For, for any one to turn from Christ, for any purpose whatever,—and, above all, for the purpose of being saved,—is most definitely to fall from grace. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.13
And all this is true forever. Men are never saved by any of their own works in the keeping of any law. They are saved alone by Christ, and the faith of Christ: saved to the uttermost. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.14
IN considering the system of education of the present day, we have found, upon the highest authority on the question, that, from the common school to the university and the theological seminary, it is a system in which doubt is the beginning, the process, and the end. This at once marks it as exactly the Greek system of education reproduced. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.1
That this may be plainly seen, we present a statement of the Greek system as originated by Socrates and perpetuated by Plato. Here it is, as defined by the Encyclopedia Britannica, article on Socrates:— ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.2
Socrates was not a “philosopher,” nor yet a “teacher,” but rather an “educator,” having for his function “to rouse, persuade, and rebuke.”—Plato, Apology, 30 E. Hence, in examining his life’s work, it is proper to ask, not, What was his philosophy? but, What was his theory, and what was his practice, of education? He was brought to his theory of education by the study of previous philosophies, and his practice led to the Platonic revival. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.3
Socrates’ theory of education had for its basis a profound and consistent SKEPTICISM. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.4
Taking his departure from some apparently remote principle or proposition to which the respondent yielded a ready assent, Socrates would draw from it an unexpected but undeniable consequence, which was plainly inconsistent with the opinion impugned. In this way he brought his interlocutor to pass judgment upon himself, and reduced him to a state of “doubt,” or “perplexity.” “Before I ever met you,” says Meno in the dialogue which Plato called by his name, “I was told that you spent your time in doubting and leading others to doubt; and it is a fact that your witcheries and spells have brought me to that condition. You are like the torpedo: as it benumbs any one who approaches and touches it, so do you.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.5
In the application of the “dislectical” or “maieutic” method, two processes are distinguishable,—the destructive process, by which the worse opinion was eradicated; and the constructive process, by which the better opinion was induced.... Of the two processes, the destructive process attracted the more attention, both in consequence of its novelty and because many of those who willingly or unwillingly submitted to it stopped short at the stage of “perplexity” [or doubt]. But to Socrates and his intimates the constructive process was the proper and necessary sequel. It is true that in the dialogues of Plato the destructive is not always OR EVEN OFTEN followed by construction. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.6
Let any one take up the RVIEW of May 22 and read the statement of the Outlook, under its own heading of “A Needed Education Reform;” then take up the REVIEW of June 26, and read the statements of Professor Hoffman, as originally made in the North American Review, on “The Scientific Method in Theology;” then take up the REVIEW of July 3, and read the statements of the Hon. W. T. Harris, United States Commissioner of Education; and he can readily see that the system of education of the present day and that of Greece, as stated in the foregoing quotation, are, in principle and in method, identical. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.7
The result of such an education among the Greeks has been defined by Inspiration. And, knowing that, we can know for certain what the result of the identical thing must be to-day. Of the result of this system of education among the Greeks, the word of God says that by it the world was caused to know not God. 1 Corinthians 1:21. This, however, is plain enough on its face; because when the process is altogether enough on its face; because when the process is altogether one of doubt, how is it possible to know God? ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.8
The word of God not only defines the results of that sort of education, but tells what is the remedy. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.9
And, so, it is written: “For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.” 1 Corinthians 1:21. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.10
And what is it that is preached?—“We preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling-block, and unto the Greeks foolishness; but unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.” Verses 23, 24. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.11
Thus, against that Greek system of education, God sets the preaching of the cross of Christ,—the power of God. And against the Greek method, which is doubt, God sets the divine method, which is faith. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.12
Thus there is set before us, by the word of God, the gospel as the true principle and method of education; for the gospel is “the power of God” to every one that believeth, because in it “is the righteousness of God revealed, from faith to faith.” Romans 1:17, 18. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.13
Since, then, there is confessedly a sorely needed educational reform, and since true education is that alone of which the gospel is the source and substance, it follows that there must be presented to the world now a system of education, of which the gospel shall be the source and substance. And exactly to meet this demand, there is now due to the world that message from God,—“the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.14
As the worldly method is one only of doubt, and as against this God sets the true method, which is only of faith, so there is just now due to the world that mighty Third Angel’s Message, preaching the everlasting gospel to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, calling upon them to “keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.” “Here is the patience and the faith of the saints.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.15
And just now there is a people in the world who profess to be the people to whom is committed this great threefold message of the everlasting gospel, which calls all people to “the faith of Jesus.” ARSH August 14, 1900, page 521.16
It is, therefore, as certain as the word of God, and as plain as A B C, that to the people to whom is committed the Third Angel’s Message, in that, there is committed this sorely needed reform in education, for which so many in the world are calling, and which the world must have if it shall ever be saved from the fate of knowing not God. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 522.1
This reform in education—this establishing of thoroughly Christian education—this education of faith, in faith, by faith,—this education is the Third Angel’s Message. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 522.2
Now is the time, and in this work of Christian education it is, when the promise of God is to be fulfilled: “I will stir up thy sons, O Zion, against thy sons, O Greece, and will make thee as the sword of a mighty man.” Zechariah 9:13, R.V. And this “in the time of the latter rain.” Zechariah 10:1. ARSH August 14, 1900, page 522.3