July 29, 1897

“Not a Creed” The Signs of the Times, 23, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

Justification by faith, and that means salvation by the Lord Jesus Christ, is not a theory. It can never be put into a creed, a form of words. Every professor of religion who has certain points of doctrine which he holds, and who is satisfied with them just as he was put them into a form of statement, has as iron-bound a creed as any ever imposed by a council.SITI July 29, 1897, page 450.1

But the truth of God is ever growing, ever enlarging. “The path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day” (Proverbs 4:18), and we can not put that light into writing, and say, “This is the sum of the doctrine.” We may speak what we know, and write what we know, but this simply calls attention to the truth; there is more and more. There are oceans of light and truth, wonderful revelations that the Lord will make to every soul, beyond what he has ever seen, in the treasures of the grace of Christ, if he will but give up to the Lord continually, for him to live his own marvelous life in him. Continually should the prayer be made, “open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law.” Every wonderful thing that we see is but the forerunner of a still more wonderful thing to be revealed, if we will but be open to receive it.SITI July 29, 1897, page 450.2

But the man not content with God’s words, who will not rest until he has defined doctrine by his own words and put God into a formula, shuts himself away from learning of God. E. J. W.SITI July 29, 1897, page 450.3