MANY people have been longing and longing for a clean heart. They say: “I believe in the forgiveness of sin and all that, and I would take it all, if I was sure that I could hold out; but there is so much evil in my heart, and so many things to overcome, that I do not have any confidence.” But there stands the word, “Create in me a clean heart.” A clean heart comes by creation, and by no other means; and that creation is wrought by the word of God. For he says, “A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you.” Are you a creationist now, or are you an evolutionist? Will you go out of this house with an evil heart, or with a new heart, created by the word of God, which has in it creative energy to produce a new heart? It speaks to you a new heart. To every one it speaks just that way; and if you allow a moment to pass between the speaking of the word and the new heart, you are an evolutionist. When you allow any time to pass between the word spoken and the fulfilment of that thing in your experience, then you are an evolutionist.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 146.1

There are those in this house who have said: Yes, I want it, I am going to have it, I believe the word will accomplish it; but they have lengthened out the time until the next meeting, and on and on, passing over years; and so they are just this much evolutionists. “While so many are hovering about the mystery of faith and godliness, they could have solved the matter by proclaiming [speaking abroad, telling it out], ‘I know that Jesus Christ is my portion forever.’” The power to produce this is in the word of God; and when this is accepted, the creative energy is there producing the thing that is spoken. So you can settle the whole matter of the mystery of faith and godliness by proclaiming that you know that Christ is your portion forever.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.1

There is a mystery in how God can be manifest in such sinful flesh as yours. But, mind you, the question is not now about the mystery: the question is, Is there such a thing as creation? is there such a thing as a Creator, who can create in you a clean heart? Just now, and among Seventh-day Adventists, the question from this day until the end of the world must be, D you believe in the Creator? And when you believe in the Creator, how is it that he creates?—Of course you say, It is by the word of God. Very good. Now, does he create things for you by his word? Are you a creationist for the other evolutionists, and then an evolutionist for the other creationists? How is it?ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.2

Another thing. The word says, “Be ye clean.” He said, back yonder, “Let there be light; and there was light.” He said to the leper, “Be thou clean;” and “immediately” he was clean. He says now to you, “be ye clean,” and what now? Every one of you—what do you say? [Voice: “It is so.”] Then for your soul’s sake put yourself upon that creative word. Recognize the creative energy in the word of God which comes to you in the Bible; for this word of God in the Bible is the same here to you to-day that it was when it spoke into space the worlds on high, and brought light out of darkness, and cleansing to the leper. That word spoken to you to-day, if received, creates you new in Christ Jesus, that word, spoken into the dark waste and void space of your heart, if received, produces there the light of God; that word spoken to-day to you, afflicted with the leprosy of sin, if received, immediately cleanses you. Let it. Let it.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.3

How shall I be clean?—By the creative energy of that word, “Be ye clean.” Therefore it is written, “Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.” John 15:3. Are you? Will you from this moment be a creationist? or will you go on being an evolutionist?ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.4

See what a blessed thing this is. When you read the word, receive the word, and think upon the word, what is it to you all the time? O, it is creation! The creative energy is in you producing the things which the word speaks; and you are living in the very presence of the power of creation. Creation is going on in your life. God is creating, in you, righteousness, holiness, truth, faithfulness,—every good and gracious thing.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.5

And when this is so, your Sabbath-keeping will amount to something, because the Sabbath is a memorial of creation,—the sign that he who observes it knows the Creator, and is acquainted with the process of creation. But as certainly as you are an evolutionist, your Sabbath-keeping is a fraud.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.6

Unless you recognize the word of God day by day as a creative energy in your life, your Sabbath-keeping is a fraud; because the Sabbath is a memorial of creation. It is “a sign between me and you, that [by which] ye may know that I am the Lord your God,” the Creator of all things.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.7

In the second chapter of Ephesians, eighth to tenth verses, we read: “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God; not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.”ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.8

You need not expect to get any good works out of yourself. You have been trying. The evolutionist tries, and is always trying, without accomplishing it. Why go about trying to do good works, when you know you fail? Listen: there will never be any good thing in you, of any kind whatever, from now till the world’s end, except it is created there by the Creator himself, by his word, which has in it the creative energy. Do no forget that. Do you want to walk in good works when you go out of this house? It can be done only by being created in Jesus Christ unto those good works. Stop trying. Look to the Creator, and receive his creative word. “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly;” then those good works will appear; you will be a Christian. Then, because you live with the Creator, and are in the presence of the creative energy, you will have that pleasant, quiet peace, and genuine strength and building up, that belong to a Christian.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.9

When he tells you that “we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath ordained that we should walk in them,” then recognize the Creator,—recognize only the good works that are created in you, paying no attention whatever to any work that is not created there, because there is nothing good but what is created by the Lord.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.10

Now you are created new in Christ Jesus. He says so. Thank him that it is so. What! will you be an evolutionist on that verse? That is the present tense, “We are his workmanship,” we are created in Christ Jesus unto good works. Are you? The word is spoken. It is the creative word. How much time are you going to allow between that word of God, and your being created new? Of the creation in the beginning, you said that any man who allows even a minute to pass between the word and the thing, is an evolutionist. What are now as to this word of God, which creates men in Christ Jesus unto good works? Are you an evolutionist here? Come, let us all be creationists.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.11

Do you not see that in this way it will not require a long, tedious, wearing process to be made ready to meet the Lord in glory? So many people are looking at themselves. They know that, in the nature of things, it must take them an exceedingly long time to get fully ready to meet him. If it is done by evolution, it will never be done. But when it is done by creation, it will be both surely and quickly done. That word I have before referred to it the word every one here may take to himself: “While so many are hovering about the mystery of faith and godliness, they could solve the matter by proclaiming abroad [by telling it out], ‘Jesus Christ is my portion forever.’”ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.12

Do you see how much we have been evolutionists? Shall we quite? Come now, let us be creationists, and be done with it. Let us be Sabbath-keepers truly. Let us believe the Lord. He speaks forgiveness. He speaks a clean heart. He speaks holiness, he creates it. Let him create it in you. Stop being an evolutionist, and let that creative word work for you, let that creative energy work in you, that which the word pronounces; and before you leave this house, God can get you ready to meet him. Indeed, in that very thing you do meet him. And when you have thus met him, and do thus meet him every day, are you not then ready to meet him? Do you believe that? You believe he made the worlds when he spoke, that light came by his word when he spoke, and that the leper was “immediately” cleansed when he spoke; but with yourself you think considerable time must elapse between the time when the word is spoken and the fact is accomplished. O, why will you be an evolutionist? Creation, creation,—that is the thing.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.13

You and I are to call people to the supper; we are to say to all people, “Come; for all things are now ready.” How can I call to a man that all things are now ready, when I myself am not ready? It is a falsehood to start with. My words will not reach him: they are but an empty sound. But O, when there is in that call the creative energy of the word that has made us ready, that has cleansed us from sin, that has created us unto good works, that holds us as the sun is held in the course which God has marked out—then when we go forth, and say to the world lying in wickedness, “Come; for all things are now ready,” they will hear. They will hear in the call the tones of the voice of the Good Shepherd, and will be cheered to come to him for creative energy for themselves, to make them new creatures, and prepare them for the supper to which they have been called.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.14

This is where we are in this world’s history. God’s mark is being set upon the people. But remember, he will never set his mark upon one who is not cleansed from every defilement. God will not set his seal to something that is not true, that is not good. Would you ask him to set his seal to righteousness that is altogether unrighteousness?—You would not have the face to do that. You know that he is too righteous to do such a thing. Then he must cleanse you, so that he can put his seal to his own work. He can not put his seal to your work. His seal belongs only to a document which he himself has approved. Let him write his character upon your heart, and then he can set his seal there; he can write his seal of approval upon your heart, only when his creative word has accomplished its purpose in your heart.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.15

You can see in what a Presence we are; you can see in a measure how long it would take half to exhaust such a subject as this. But, brethren, when we do stop, let us stop in the presence of creation. Let us be no more evolutionists. Let not a moment pass between the word spoken to you, and the accomplishment of the thing in you. Thus, living in the presence of creation, walking with the Creator, upheld by creative power, inspired by the creative energy—why, with a people such as that, God can move the world in a little while.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.16

If at the beginning you thought this was a queer subject for such an occasion as to-day [it was the closing service of the week of prayer], you can now see that it is a strictly present truth. There are only the two ways. There is no half-way ground. Every man and woman in the world is either a creationist or an evolutionist. Evolution is infidelity, it is death. Creation is Christianity, it is life. Choose Creation, Christianity, and Life, that you may live. Let us be creationists only, and creationists forever. And let all the people say, Amen.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 148.17

“Editorial” The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald 76, 10, p. 152.

“THE just shall live by faith.”ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.1

Who are the just?—They are only those who are of faith; because men are justified only by faith.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.2

For though we all “have sinned, and come short of the glory of God,” yet we are “justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.”ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.3

For “to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.4

“Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Those who are of faith, and those alone, are the just in the earth.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.5

Now faith is entire dependence on the word of God, that that word shall accomplish what that word says. “It shall accomplish that which I please.” Isaiah 55:11.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.6

To be justified by faith, then, is to be justified by entire dependence upon the word of God. The just are those who are of the word of God. This is how men become just.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.7

Men must not only become just by faith,—by dependence upon the word of God,—but being just, we must live by faith. The just man lives in precisely the same way, and by precisely the same thing, that he becomes just.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.8

We become just by faith; faith is entire dependence on the word of God. We, being just, must live by precisely the same thing by which we become just; that is, by entire dependence upon the word of God.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.9

And this is exactly what Jesus said: Man shall live “by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.” When Jesus said that, it is perfectly plain that he simply said, in other words, Man shall live by faith.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.10

There is no other way truly to live than by faith, which is simply living by the word of God. Without faith, without the word of God, men only die.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.11

Indeed, without the word of God everything only dies; for in the beginning everything came by the word of God. The word of God is the origin and life of everything; for, “He spake, and it was.”ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.12

All things animate and inanimate,—sun, moon, and stars, animals and men,—all are entirely dependent upon the word of God for existence. Only in the case of men, God has bestowed upon them the wondrous gift of choice as to whether they will do so or not. This gift opens the door of faith. And when a man does choose to live by the word of God, which is the only means of life, faith—entire dependence upon the word of God—is the means by which he lays hold on the means of life.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.13

Thus “the just shall live by faith,” and thus “whatsoever is not of faith is sin;” which is simply to say, The just must live by the word of God; and whatsoever is not of the word of God is sin.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.14

“We can not have a healthy Christian experience, we can not obey the gospel unto salvation, until the science of faith is better understood; and until more faith is exercised.”ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.15

“Hast thou faith?” Have the faith of God. Here are they that keep “the faith of Jesus.”ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.16

“Editorial Note” The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald 76, 10, p. 152.

THE following respecting the Holy Spirit, from one of Elder W. W. Prescott’s speeches in the General Conference, is worth repeating to all people:—ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.1

“In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” Now this word “moved” here is just the same word that you find in Deuteronomy 32:11: “As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young,” hovereth over her young, trembles over them. This was the beginning, this was the origin, and this is the present power, of all force and of all motion. It was when the Spirit of God hovered—fluttered—over the earth, that the earth itself was filled with the properties of the Spirit of God. That is where the earth, by the word spoken, received all its power to bring forth; because the earth was without form, and void, and empty, and had no power to bring forth. This is the source and the manifestation of all the power of the universe.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.2

“Let us make some very simple illustrations. Suppose you hold something up. It is held there by some power, and when it is no longer held by that power, it falls; and where it falls, there it lies until some power moves it. Now there is a force acting upon it, and we have been taught that that is the force of gravitation. But what is gravitation?—Gravity is simply a name applied to the force working in that way; but when the support that gives motion to this book [holding a book up] is removed, the same force moves upon it that moved upon the deep in the first place; and it is a drawing power.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.3

Now the truth that is behind all the teaching of the books about gravitation, is the drawing power of the Spirit of God. Now when that is taught in the day-schools in just so many words,—not simply talked about,—religion will cease to be a matter of theory and a matter of creed, and will become a reality, and will be taught as a reality.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.4

If man had always been content to remain under the movings of God’s Spirit, there never would have been any sin in the world, because God’s Spirit moves in an orderly way. “For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace.” In our version the words “the author” are supplied; otherwise it would read, Our God is not confusion’s God, but peace’s God. God is not of confusion. It is because the tongue runs contrary to the mind of God, and the hand moves wrong, that confusion comes in. That is sin. It was because Satan was not willing to be moved upon, but determined to be a mover, that he fell. No created being in this universe can successfully be a mover in the universe. God himself, the author of the universe, God’s Spirit, the beginning and the power of all motion and of all movement, is the only one who can successfully run the movements in this universe, including man. That is true of man’s brain. God says, “I know the thoughts of man that they are empty, vain.” No man can move his brain to evolve anything. It is nothingness, emptiness. Only when the Spirit of God moves man’s brain, and controls his tongue, can he speak the truth. When holy men of God spoke of old, they simply spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost; and if we spoke in the same way, we should speak as the oracles of God.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.5

Why, then, should not we speak so? Does not the Lord command, “If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God”? Why shall we not obey? But without the Holy Spirit we can not obey.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.6

Therefore, “Ask, and it shall be given you.” “Every one that asketh receiveth.” “Receive ye the Holy Ghost.” “Be filled with” “the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.”ARSH March 7, 1899, page 152.7

“Editorial Note” The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald 76, 10, p. 154.

WHEN the holy women would anoint the Saviour after his death, the question that arose was, “Who shall roll us away the stone from the door of the sepulcher?” They knew that it was “exceeding great;” that is was beyond their power to remove it; that it was placed there by order of the king, with the instruction to “make it as sure as ye can.” More than all this, a guard was set over against it, to prevent any possible intrusion, “lest his disciples come by night, and steal him away.” Yet in the face of this apparently insurmountable obstacle, very early in the morning, “when it was yet dark,” they started for the tomb to perform their loving service; and when they reached it, “they saw that the stone was rolled away.”ARSH March 7, 1899, page 154.1

So to-day, obstacles like this sealed and guarded tomb may appear to lie before the people who would do the work of the Lord; but if their work is one of love for the Lord, then as surely as the women found the stone already rolled away, so sorely will they find the obstacles removed that seem to comfort them. Have faith, brethren. Believe the Lord.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 154.2

“Back Page” The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald 76, 10, p. 160.

IN Brother Waggoner’s testimony in meeting, as published last week in the REVIEW, he was made to say with reference to his experience on the sea, that he “never had a more joyful feeling.” It should read that he “never had a more joyful meeting.” That is what he said, meaning a joyful meeting with the Lord there.ARSH March 7, 1899, page 160.1

February 28, 1899

March 14, 1899