ZION'S ADVOCATE - January, 1880

This question has given us much concern, and we have searched diligently for a Scriptural answer to it. That there are divisions among professors of religion, and have been in all past ages and generations, and they also exist now, is lamentably true; but, so far as they are among believers in Christ, or Christians, were they caused by the Gospel of Christ, either preached or written? That Word, which Paul exhorted or commanded Timothy to preach, which is Christ, produces divisions between Christ and anti-Christ, between believers and unbelievers, and separates between the precious and the vile, for, for this purpose Christ came and was manifested. [See Luke xii., 51, 52, 53; Matt. x., 34, 35.] And so it is written: "So there was a division among the people because of him." [John vii., 43.] This is easily understood, but it does not answer the question whether preaching or writing "the truth as in Jesus," the Gospel of Christ, ever has or ever will cause divisions and offenses among God's spiritual family, the children of God, by faith in Christ ? Let us attend a little to what God says in the Word of his grace upon the subject. The apostle Paul in his epistle to the church at Rome wrote thus :--

"Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offenses, contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them." [xvi., I7.] The divisions referred to by the apostle had been produced by doctrine contrary to what they had learned, that is, contrary to the doctrine of Christ, or the Gospel. The apostle never commanded the saints to mark and avoid those who preach the Gospel of Christ .

In his first epistle to the Church at Corinth, he chided them for divisions and contentions among them, and charges them with being carnal in their strife and contention about their ministers. It was not a question of doctrine, or of the Gospel of Christ that they were contending about, but about their preachers. God spake by Isaiah the prophet as follows: "And all thy children shall be taught of the Lord; and great shall be the peace of thy children." [liv. 13.] Our Lord Jesus Christ quoted this in his public ministry, and gave the interpretation of the teaching, that it was to hear and learn of the Father. [John vi., 45] This hearing and learning is also explained, as it is written: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life. Verily, verily, I say unto you, the hour is coming and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live. [John v., 24, 25.] The teacher in this school is infallible, is wisdom in perfection, and consequently teaches his people substantially the same things.

Under the quickening power and influence of the Holy Ghost, the Word preached comes to God's people in power, by which they live, hear, and believe with the heart unto righteousness. Now ,when the Gospel is preached they know it. It is the voice of their Shepherd, the great Shepherd and Bishop of souls. The reception of this Word, Christ, by faith is thus described by the apostles: First, saying it is not; to say, who will go up and bring Christ down from above, or who will bring him up from the dead, that he may be seen and handled. It is not that kind of evidence that faith receives and rests upon. What then is it? Let the apostle answer: "But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart; that is, the word of faith, which we preach. For with the heart, man believeth unto righteousness and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation." [Rom. x., 6, 8, 10]

The saints in this can see, because they have felt it--have the witness within them of the truth of the Gospel, because the word is in them, as they have been taught of God. When therefore the Gospel is preached, the sincere milk of the word, they receive it, know it, because God has given them the witness within of its truth. The word of faith when preached is in their hearts, and hence they receive it as the engrafted word of truth.

The apostle's testimony concerning the gifts which Christ has given to his church, in his chosen ministers, are all for edification, for building up Zion; and whether they are apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, or teachers, they are all "for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ." Which, instead of strife and division, produces the following result: "Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." [Eph. iv., 12, 13.]

Mark these words of the Holy Ghost: They come to the knowledge of the Sons of God. Hence those who have been called of God to preach, and blessed with gifts from Christ for the ministry, are not found preaching that the Son of God is a creature, "the first production of divine power." Nor are they found preaching anything which the Holy Ghost has not revealed in the hearts of his people, in the work of grace in them. The Holy Ghost never revealed Christ in the hearts of God's redeemed, and taught them the way of salvation by Christ, and taught them to know Christ as God manifest in the flesh,' and then sent preachers to preach to them something else diverse from that. When a preacher, therefore, preaches a doctrine that is not in the Christian's experience, he preaches what is not written in the Bible, not given by inspiration of God, what is not the Gospel of Christ, but another gospel, but, which is not another, as the apostle said, [Gal. i.] but a perversion of the Gospel. Preachers, you who are preaching and writing doctrines which the saints of God cannot receive, and thus causing divisions and offenses among them, stop! Stop and think before you further go. Eld. R. C. Leachman once preached in his day, and said ministers were watchmen upon the walls of Zion, and if he saw from his position on the wall, what another did not see, who occupied another place on the wall, or if he had received superior light that another had not received, or had read and found out more than others, he ought not to be censured or blamed for it.

He is no longer on earth, but we have seen what rapid strides have been made by some on that principle. Every adventurer and leader of a new theory comes with the same pretensions of superior knowledge,, brighter light, &c., than the rest of mankind; not knowing that the light that is in them is darkness, and how great is that darkness. The saints shall judge angels, and they judge preachers, for the apostle instructs, that if any come and bring not the doctrine of Christ, they are not to receive them, and of course the judgment seat is with them. Search the Scriptures and see whether these things are so.—JOHN CLARK