The Gospel Messenger--1899

In 2 Corinthians, and eleventh chapter the apostle expressed a fear lest the minds of the brethren at Cor­inth “should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.”

Simplicity in Christ is godly sincerity, unmixed with anything like deception, dissimulation, or dishonesty. It is plainness of manner and speech with no display of fleshly wisdom. It seeks not to confuse the minds of men by complicated questions, but like the apostle, it “utters by the tongue words easy to be understood, that the church of God may be edified thereby.

It was a source of rejoicing among the primitive min­isters in the days of the apostles that “In simplicity, and godly sincerity, and not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, they had their conversation in the world, and more abundantly” towards the church of God. 2 Cor. i. 12.

Gospel simplicity and godly sincerity is opposed to much outward show and demonstration in religious ser­vices. It consists more in the inward principle than in the outward ceremonies. It is like the Divine Lord, meek and lowly in heart, and those who have it “find rest to their souls.”   W. M. M.

It is certainly best for English speakers and writers to use short, plain, simple Anglo-Saxon words when such words will express their meaning, for thus they can best he understood by all classes of hearers and read­ers; but sometimes it takes one or more lines of short Anglo-Saxon words to express an idea that may be ex­pressed by one longer word derived from another lan­guage, and then the latter is really shorter, more precise, and more convenient. More than half of the words in the English language are derived from the Latin lan­guage, and many of these words of Latin origin, of four, five, and even six syllables, are found in the King James Version of the Bible, and are constantly used by perhaps all Primitive Baptist ministers, and their mean­ing is pretty well understood by the most of their hear­ers. When a longer and more appropriate and forcible word is used and its meaning is clearly explained, it would seem unreasonable for any hearer or reader to object to its use. In 1 Cor. i. and ii., the Apostle Paul tells this naturally proud and conceited Greek church that he did not, in his preaching among them, degrade and obscure the pure, bright truth of the gospel of Christ with the worthless embellishments of Greek oratory or Greek philosophy, but he declared unto them the testimony of God in words taught by the Holy Ghost, and in demonstration of the Spirit and in the power of God.

In 1 Cor. xiv., he tells them that, while he spake with tongues more than all of them, and wished that they all spake with tongues, he would rather that he and they should prophesy, unless the tongues were inter­preted, that the church might receive edifying; and he declares that he would rather speak, in the church, five understood and edifying words than ten thousand words not understood and not edifying, because he wished, not to glorify himself, but to benefit others. I believe that such is the feeling of every true minister of Christ. Still in the writings of Paul, as well as in the other Scriptures, are some things “hard to be under­stood” (2 Pet. iii. 15, 16), and differently understood by not only others of the people of God, but even by true gospel ministers.

In 2 Cor. ii. 12, the word rendered “simplicity” is not found in the oldest manuscripts, but in its place is the word rendered “holiness” in Heb. xii. 10, and therefore in the Revised Version and the Latest Baptist Version the word “simplicity’ is omitted and the word “holiness” put in its place in their translations of 2 Cor. i. 12. Whether the right word is “simplicity” or “holiness, “it is no doubt the opposite of that duplicity or double-mindedness which says one thing and means another—the opposite of that “fleshly wisdom” or carnal policy, which, while pretending to seek the glory of God and the good of man, really seeks its own advantage.

In 2 Cor. xi. 3., the word rendered “simplicity” literally means “singleness,” and it is used by the Apostle Paul in that verse as the opposite of “subtlety’ or crafty wickedness, and, as appears from the verse itself and the whole context, it means singleness of faith. trust, love, and devotion to Christ, from which virginal purity Judaizing teachers, disguised as ministers of righteousness, but really filled with the spirit and cunning of Satan, and making the gospel a new law, strove to seduce the minds of the church, the bride of Christ. The pure and simple doctrine of the prophets and apos­tles, the doctrine of God our Saviour, the doctrine of a free and full and holy and divine salvation by the grace of Christ alone from beginning to end, is the perfect detestation of the Devil and all his emissaries, and should be the perfect delight of all the dear children of God, and the latter should never allow this pure doctrine of eternal truth to be in the slightest degree contaminated in their minds by any kind of false  doctrine, false wor­ship, or false practice.  

S. H.