The Watchtower, October 1, 1922

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Upon hie c.Tth distress of nations with perplexityj the sea and the wines (the letucss. discontented) roaring; men's hearts fulling them for fc.»r and for look’ng to the things car*”” i:pcn l!.c earth (society} | for the power? of the heavens (cccicblasticlsni) shall be shaken . . When vc see these things begin to eunn. u> pass, then know unit the K.ng.lotti ut God is at hand. Look up, lift up jour beads, icjoice, for your redemption draweth nigh.—Matt. 24:33; Mar’. 13:20; Luke 21.25-3L

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Vol. NLIII

Semi-Monthly

No.

Anno Mundi 6051 — October 1, 1S22

CON TENTS

Views from tite Watcit Tower ..........

.291

Labor-Saving Machinery .........................

Strikes Brought on bv Big Business .. A Military Dictatorship ......„............

The Churches Called On ....................

The Church's New Day ...................

Honest Ministers in Revolt ..............

Churches Repudiated ..........................

A Brighter Side .................................

Stepping into More Light ..................

Tnc Ministry of John the Baptist ... Jesus Tempted .....................................—

World-wide Prohibition ................

Interesting letters ..............................

Questions for Tower Btrean Study ..

“I will stand upon my watch and mill set my foot upon the Tomei, and will icatch to see what He will say unto tnc, and what answer 1 t>hall make to them that oppose me.”—llabak! uk. 2'1

©WTB6TS

THIS JOURNAL AND ITS SACRED MISSION

THIS journal is one of the prime factors or instruments in the system of Bible instruction, or “Seminary Extension”, now being presented in all parts of the civilized world by the Watch Tower Bible & Tract Society, chartered A. D. 1884, “For the Promotion of Christian Knowledge”. It not only serves as a class room where Bible students may meet in the study of the divine Word but also as a channel of communication through which they may be reached with announcements of the Society’s coDventions and of the coming of its traveling representatives, styled “Pilgrims”, and refreshed with reports of its conventions.

Our “Berean Lessons” are topical rehearsals or reviews of our Society’s published Studies most entertainingly arranged, and very helpful to all who would merit the only honorary degree which the Society accords, viz., Vetbi Dei Minister (V. D. M.), which translated into English is Minister of God’s Word. Our treatment of the International Sunday School Lessons is specially for the older Bible students and teachers. By some this feature is considered indispensable.

This journal stands firmly for the defense of the only true foundation of the Christian's hope now being so generally repudiated —ledeinption through the precious blood of “the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a [a corresponding price, a substitute] for

all”. (I Peter 1: JO; 1 Timothy 2:0 Building up on this sure foundation the gold, silver and precious stones (I Corinthians 3: 1115; 2 Peter 1 : 5-11) of the Word of God, its further mission is to “make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery which. . .has been hid in God, ... to the intent that now might be made known by the1 church the manifold wisdom of God”—“which in other ages was uot made known unto the sons of men as it is now revealed”.—Ephesians 3: 5-9,10.

It stands free from all parties, sects and creeds of men, while it seeks more and more to bring its every utterance into fullest subjection to the will of God in Christ, as expressed in the holy Scriptures. It is thus free to declare boldly whatsoever the Lord hath spoken—according to the divine wisdom granted unto us to understand his utterances. Its attitude is not dogmatic, but confident; for we know whereof we affirm, treading with implicit faith upon the sure promises of God. It is held as a trust, to be used only in bis service; hence our decisions relative to what may and what may not appear in its columns must be according to our judgment of big good pleasure, the teaching of his Word, for the upbuilding of his people in grace and knowledge. And we not only invite but urge our readers to prove all its utterances by the infallible Word to which reference is constantly made to facilitate such testing.

TO US THE SCRIPTURES CLEARLY TEACH

That the church is “the temple of the living God”, peculiarly “his workmanship” ; that its construction has been in progress throughout the gospel age—ever since Christ became the world's Redeemer and the Chief Corner Stone of his temple, through which, when finished, God's blessing shall come “to all people”, and they find access to him.—1 Corinthians 3 : 1G, 17; Ephesians 2:20-22; Genesis 28:34; Galatians 3:29.

That meantime the chiseling, shaping, and polishing of consecrated believers in Christ’s atonement for sin, progresses; and when the last of thovc “living stones”, “elect and precious,” shall have been made ready, the gieat Master Workman will bring all together in the first resurrection, and the temple shall be filled with his glory, and be the meeting place between God and men throughout the Millennium.—Revelation 15:5-8.

Ifliat the basis of hope, for the church and the world, lies in the fact that “Jesus Christ, by the grace of God, tasted death for every man,” “a ransom for all,” and will be “the true light which lighteth every man that comcth into the world”, “in due time”.— Hebrews 2:9; John 1 : 9 ; 1 Timothy 2:5, G.

That the hope of the church is that she may be like her Lord, “see him as he is,” be “partakers of the divine nature’,* and share his glory as bis joint-heir.—1 John 3:2; John li:24; Romans 8:37; 2 Peter 1:4.

ll’hat the present mission of the church is the perfecting of the saints for the future work of service: to develop in herself every grace; to he God’s witness to the world; and to prepare to be kings aud priests in the next age.—Ephesians 4:12; Matthew 24: 14: Revelation 1: G; 20:6.

That the hope for the world lies in the blessings of knowledge and opportunity to be brought to all by Christ's Millennial kingdom, the restitution of all that was lost in Adam, to all the willing and obedient, at the bands ot their Redeemer and his glorified church, when all the wilfully wicked will be destroyed.—Acts 3:19-23; Isaiah 35.

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AND HERALD OF CHRISTS PRESENCE

Vol. NL11I October 1, 1922 No. 19

VIEWS FROM THE WATCH TOWER

PRIME Minister Lloyd George of England is one of the statesmen who realize the ominous fact that in the endeavor to reconstruct the old world both the politicians and the financiers have failed. Now sounds the clarion call from Mr. George to the apostate churches come to the rescue:

And Russia. No way out of the pit, and sinking deeper into it witli every convulsive eil'ort. Germany clinging desperately to the rotten branch of debased currency; and when that gives way, God help Germany.

It is the business of the church of Chiist to keep that before the eyes of the people.

The church was once pure and true and separate from the politicians and the business men. Then it was debauched by politicians, and enslaved by the world, the flesh and the devil. It has been a parrot for the state and an office boy for the financiers. Without principle, without the assistance of the Head, without the approval of God, without the holy spirit, the churches have blundered and have floundered in the mire. Once the church persecuted was a power; but the church prostituted is a worthless reed, where a strong staff is required. It is this church that the desperate politicians commanded to clean up the filthy mess which it and the politicians have made. Listen to Mr. George’s ominous admonition:

There is a growing assumption that a conflict is coining again sooner or later. That is the business of the churches.

What do I mean by that? Nations are building up armaments.... Nations that have been submerged, buried, are building up new armaments. You have national animosities, national fears, suspicions, dislikes, ambitions, fostered and exaggerated. . . .

Keep your eye on what is happening. They are constructing more terrible machines than even the late war ever saw. What for? Not for peace. What are they for? They are not even to disperse armies. They are to attack cities unarmed, where you have defenseless populations, to kill, to maim, to poison, to mutilate, to burn helpless women and children.

If the churches of Christ throughout Europe and America allow that to fructify, they had better close their doors. The next war . . . will be a war on civilization itself....

Everything depends on the temper, the spirit which is created throughout the world, and it would be a sad thing, a sad danger, to the people, if the world came to the conclusion that Christianity, despite all Its principles, in spite of all its ideals, was perfectly impotent to prevent mischief of that kind. . . .

The League of Nations is an essential part of the machinery of civilization. If it succeeds, civilization is safe. If it tails, civilization is doomed

Conflict comes very suddenly. ... It comes with a suddenness which is appalling, perfectly appalling.... It is too lute then to work any elaborate machine. The war germ is just like any other germ. You really do not know that It has got you until you are stricken down. It is no use arguing with an epileptic when the fit is on him. . . . There is ... explosive material scattered all over Europe. When the match has been dropped into the explosives it is no good brandishing the Covenant of the League of Nations in the face of the explosion.

LABOR-SAVING MACHINERY

The Committee or Manufactures and Merchants on Federal Taxation, of Chicago, in connection with a study of taxation, has published in its Bulletin an article by Emil 0. Jorgensen, which includes a table of the extent to which labor-saving machinery multiplies the product of hand-work-. We give the table, the data for which Mr. Jorgensen dug up from the Thirteenth Annual Report of the Commissioner of Labor, Washington, 1898, Volume 1. The table presents the number of times that machinery multiplies the production of the same article done by efficient hand-workers:

. Brussels carpet

32 ..

.. Plows

9 ..

.. Men’s shoes

58 ..

.. Pine boards

13 ..

.. Women’s shoes

66 ..

. Woolen mittens

15 ..

.. Pitchforks

74 ..

. . Cotton thread

16 ..

. . Bolts

76 ..

.. Woolen skirts

17 .

. . Lead paint

106 . .

Cotton sheeting

IS ..

.. Iron pipe

119 .

. Hemp twine

20 . .

.. Laundry soap

129 . .

. Nails

27 ..

. . Hammers

279 . .

. Cotton hose

29 .

.. Butchers’ knives

539 . .

.. Marble slabs

31 .

.. Milk cans

4098 . .

. Iron screw posts

The average multiplication of production, omitting the last item, is eighty times, including the last 252.

Two important results have flowed from this. One is a great increase in the material well-being of the people as a whole and individually. The average person now enjoys the benefits of a flood of articles contributing to his well-being, and is better ofl: many times than the same person would have been before the advent of the era of machinery. The other result is that, because the machinery is in the possession of a very few individuals, who are in a position to retain a profit— often a minute one per article—and who have used the machinery for the benefit of themselves, the rich have grown enormously wealthy, beyond past drcams of avarice. With wealth has come unprecedented power over the people, particularly since the World War taught the well-to-do the power of uncontrolled and deceitful propaganda through ownership of the press, which more than government itself controls the thoughts and actions of the populace.

The invention of machinery is a direct outcome of the increase of knowledge predicted by the prophet Daniel (Daniel 12:4); for the labor-saving machinery has been invented by technically educated working people who, under laws favoring employers and disfavoring inventors, have become accustomed to seeing the fruit of their finely-trained minds appropriated by the wealthy. Thus labor itself constantly contributes to the power of a small group of men, who by means of the ownership of machinery are in a position at will to assert ownership of the workers themselves, under some camouflage in terms.

The hundred years or so of the development of machinery were not divinely designed to multiply the power of big business over the common people, but to make preparation for the kingdom of God. (Nahum 2: 3) Unwittingly and for a brief time under the sway of the devil and his demons the rich have heaped treasure together (dames 5: 3) not to keep, but to give up, at the behest of the King of kings when he visibly establishes his dominion. They have pursued a course of self-seeking such as fully to have demonstrated their unfitness to participate in the reign of Christ; and they will see possessions and power taken from them by the Lord, operating through natural agencies, and will see themselves superseded by good, just and fully consecrated men who, under the kingdom,will administer the affairs of the world.

Then the machinery already prepared will be treated as a stewardship from God, and will be operated for the benefit of all the people—its former owners included. Partly from the labor of these metal slaves will come to mankind the blessings promised by prophets of old, for example, by Al alachi, who as moved by the holy spirit predicted, “I will open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it.”—Malachi 3:10.

STRIKES BROUGHT ON BY BIG BUSINESS

The time was, centuries ago, when practically all workmen were slaves, owned by rich masters who exercised the legal right of life and death, but who were somewhat restrained in cruelty and destructiveness by the money value of slave property. Then came political freedom for the slaves, and as put by Pastor Russell:

Many of the wealthy are disposed to think and feel toward the poorer classes thus: Well, finally the masses have got the ballot and independence. Much good may it do them I They will find, however, that brains are an important factor in all of life's affairs, and Hie brains are chiefly with the aristocracy. Our only concern is that they use their liberty moderately and lawfully; we are relieved thereby from much responsibility. Formerly, when the masses were serfs, every lord, noble and duke felt some responsibility for those under his care; but now we are free to look out for our own pleasures and fortunes. Their independence is all the better for us ... . They are now our equals legally, and hence our competitors instead of our proteges; but they will learn by and by that political equality does not make men physically or intellectually equal: the result will be aristocracy of brains and wealth instead of the former aristocracy of heredity.

Some of the so-called “under-crust” of society thoughtlessly answer: We accept the situation; we are independ; nt and abundantly able to take care of ourselves. Take he <1 lest we outwit you. Life is a war for wealth and we ha\e numbers on our side; we will organize strikes and boycotts, and will have our way. —“Armageddon,” page 309.

This was written in 1897, a,nd today wc live amid the alarms of strikes and reprisals against strikes. Pastor Russell also predicted that when organized labor came into conflict with organized wealth,labor would find itself inadequately prepared and would lose in a conflict which would eventuate in the destruction or nullification of the power of labor unions, by well-prepared, wily and powerful big business, assisted by big politicians.

Now we behold the battle between these giant organizations. Great strikes are staged; and hundreds of thousands or millions for the most part remain quietly at home, abstaining from work and awaiting the issue. Not all of them, h’awever, know that the inveigling of workmen to strike is part of the strategy of their economic competition. Earlier in the year information was current that big business had chosen this year for the destruction of the power of the unions. It -was upon the hidden prompting of the packers that the packing unions struck—and came out with their powers much weakened. Now in the United States Senate the charge is openly made by Senator W. E. Borah, of Idaho, that the great unions are marked for their end:

Desi ruction of union labor, deliberately planned by capital upon termination of the world war, was declared by Senator W. E. Borah, chairman of the Senate Labor Committee, to be the fundamental cause of the coal and railroad situation. ... “I am of the opinion,” he declared, “that the present strike could have been avoided if the Government had stepped in at the outset and compelled the operators to live up to their contract with the miners Io consider the wage question within thirty days of the expiration of the former scale.”

Borah recalled that he had charged when he fought the Army Appropriation Bill, that the real danger of a big military establishment was that capital hoped to employ it against union labor.

“Recent developments certainly seem to justify the view I took of a large army then and which I still hold,” Borah declared. “One reason certain big interests supported the presidential aspiration of Gen. Leonard Wood in 1920 was that they were confident if he were elected he would place a battalion of soldiers at the doorway of union labor where-ever and whenever those interests deemed the use of armed force necssary.”

BIG POLITICIANS ASSIST BIG BUSINESS

President Harding, by virtue of his office the leading politician of the country, urged the coal operators to reopen their mines, and wired the governors of twentyeight states to protect the operators. The NaUon comments as follows:

We wish we could believe that President Harding had the wisdom o£ Canute, and that his invitation to the coal operators to reopen their mines regardless o£ the strike was intended as a wise and gentle lesson to the shrill advisers who assured him that the way to end strikes was to call out the troops and start mining. . . . Mr. Harding must, have known that his appeal to the operators to reopen their mines was an appeal to reopen on their own terms, without agreement with the miners, and that his elaborate invitation to the Slate governors to protect them in such a resumption was an invitation to the States to take side in the dispute. He richly deserved Ilie rebuke given him by Governor Ritchie of Maryland:

“1 feel that at this time I should not subscribe to (he assumption that all things else have failed and that the various States must give assurances which might lead them to take up arms against their own people.... The presence of troops is often not the assurance of security but the provocation of serious trouble. . . I venture to urge with the greatest respect that you renew your ellorls to adjust in a proper and peaceful way both the railroad strike and the coal st rike.”

The suggestion of Hooding the coal-producing regions with troops was not only an attempt to prejudge the dispute ; it was not only a dangerous provocation, as Governor Ritchie suggested; it was utterly futile. When men are unorganized and uncertain of their rights, they can be cowed by the use of iorce: but men like the miners, organized, determined, skilled workmen, who cannot lie replaced by the oiTseourings of the ports or by Negro hands imported from the South, can only be exasperated by such bullying partizmiship. They yielded to brute force once, three years ago; they will not do so again.

A MILITARY DICTATORSHIP

Perhaps the people of America are not aware that in 1920 the Congress of the United States passed a law which, in time of peace on the will of the President approved by Ccogress, transforms the government into a military dictatorship. This is part of the legal machinery determined upon by big business immediately after the close of the World War and created for use in the struggle to destroy the organizations of working men. Whenever a “national emergency” is declared to exist, the President is automatically given powers which in effect make him a military dictator. In pursuance of such a move, an item in the Des Moines Hei/i.ster is of interest:

An army sizable enough to guard every coal mine and every important railway terminal could be placed in the Held on short notice by the United States government, General Pershing disclosed in a statement issued today, telling what could be done if the United States were invaded.

In ordernot i.> arouse the suspicions of the populace, the persons behind the scheme camouflage their intent by prating about foreign invasion, in order to conceal Iho intention of keeping organized labor in subjection:

Eighteen war-strength infantry divisions of reserves, about 600,000 men, an expanded national guard about 500,000 strong, and regular army units expanded by volunteers to about 175,000 men, could be made quickly available, it was indicated.

United States Senator Pepper, of Pennsylvania, intimates that prior to the execution of such a plan, the press would be utilized for propaganda to excite the people and get them into a state of mind ready to acquiesce in anything:

That the President has considered issuance of a call for volunteers was indicated by Senator Pepper of Pennsylvania, who after a conference with the chief executive recently pointed out that ?>// t/etting public opinion back. of him Harding believed Hint filling up the skeletonized regular army and national guard and recruiting to war strength the “paper army,'’ or organized reserve, with volunteers, would be comparatively simple. . . .

“The national defence act of 1020.” the statement declared, “prescribes that the organized peace establishment, including the regular army, the national guard, and the organized reserves, shall include all of those divisions and other military necessary to form the basis for a complete and immediate mobilization for the national defense in the event of a national emergency declared by Congress.”

“Before the World War such a definite and comprehensive plan was impossible,” Pershing said. “Our military resources were too limited, and there n:as no legal sanation for development of such a system. Since the World War, with more adequate sources of military equipment and material and iiilh settled legal sanction for development and training of our traditional citizen army in time of peace, we are able to prepare definite plans.”

THE CHURCHES CALLED ON

Now come the churches. Ostensibly they are deeply interested in the welfare of the “public/’ and more or less ignore the life-and-death struggle for existence that has been forced upon the miners and public by the coal operators—alias big business—by low wages, and oppressive and intolerable working conditions. The Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America, jointly with the Roman Catholic National Welfare Council and the Social Justice Commission of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, step in, in effect, to the rescue of the operators, who would like above all else to have things fixed for the miners so as to stop all economic protests'against oppression:

We believe flint the majority of the people of this country are unwilling to have its vitally important industries subject to economic combat as a means of settling disputes

The New York press owned and controlled by Wall Street has consistently avoided giving its readers the real viewpoint of the men on strike, or any adequate conception of what they have had to endure at the hands of the rich; but its attitude has been fully satisfactory to its owners. In praise of the newspapers, the united churches—the third partner with big business and big politics—chime in:

We have ... been gratified to note that the press has made an unusually successful effort to record the facts of this conflict.

The ecclesiastics who prepared a paper on bringing the strikes to an early end and who sent it to the President are the ones who rely upon the wealthy profiteers among their membership to supply the funds for little church charities which keep kindly-disposed members busy and afford jobs for professional charity workers. Never is a profiteer, and seldom is a professedly “Christian” crook, reproved by a church; for the money from such wolves helps the ecclesiastics to keep the thing going and enables them to affect a pious posture of liberality to the oppressed poor and to the destitute, who unfortunately have been stripped of earnings and savings by the church members in the world banicing systems that precipitated the hard times. In commenting upon the united message from the religious errand-boys of big business to the President, the Chicago Daily News unctuously declares:

THE CHURCH’S NEW DAY

Many changes that profoundly affect the well-being of mankind come silently. One such change, of vast significance because of the far-reaching potential benefits that it foreshadows, is the new emphasis given to its message by the church at large. It is not stressing the future life the less, but the present life the more.

This is shown, for example, by the recent joint appeal of Catholics, Protestants and Jews, through their national official agencies to President Harding to make an effort to settle the coal strike. . . .

The church collectively and churches individually are proving themselves mindful of those golden admonitions, “Hear ye one another’s burdens,” and “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” Whether it be in efforts to better the condition of children in city slums through providing gymnasiums and club rooms [from funds contributed by religious profiteers], extending playgrounds and carrying on vacation schools, or to make social centers of rural churches while working for good roads and improved methods of agriculture, the church is showing itself increasingly faithful to its task of bettering conditions here on earth, a task as necessary as that of preparing people for the great adventure that lies beyond this life.

There never was seen a time equal to the middle ages for the doing of “uplift” work by the monks and priests of the Roman Catholic Church for the good of the serfs and slaves of Europe; but this work played into the hands of the robber lords and kings in whose courts bishops and cardinals showed their actual colors as friends of the oppressors of the people. History repeats itself.

HONEST MINISTERS IN REVOLT

No wonder that honest ministers in some of the church pulpits are in revolt. At Ocean Grove, New Jersey, the truth was told about these nests of hypoc-crisy by one of the Reverends, as reported in the New York Daily News, under the headline, “Church Earns But Contempt, Pastor Asserts”:

Asserting that the church has become an object of contempt and has been preaching little less than dressed-up “heathen morality,’’the Rev. Dr. Paul Lindemann, St. Paul, Minn., editor of the “American Lutheran Magazine,” addressed a large audience in the Ocean Grove Auditorium.

“What is to be done?” asked the Rev. Dr. Lindemann. “The church has been appealed to; but in a world that is all awry, there is something the matter with the church. It has, to a great extent, lost its life and vigor and lost its influence and is no longer functioning along lines for which it was instituted.

“It has become an object of contempt, and rightly so. The heart has been taken out of the gospel. Preachers are presenting things that tickle the palate of the flesh, and are by their flatteries and moralizings training a generation of self-satisfied pharisees.

“Having abolished its real object as a soul-saving agency, it has constituted itself a watchdog over and regulator of public morals, and has presumed to become a dictator of legislation.

“The pulpit has degenerated into a lecture forum. The cross is gone, the spirit of God has departed. As a natural result, the church has lost its influence.”

Consequently it is with a spirit of bored impatience that newspaper readers scan such a pronouncement as the following by the “Right Reverend” Bishop James DeWolf Perry reported in the New York Times, who would institute a prolonged research into the textile strike, during which the workers might incidentally be driven by starvation into submission to the Bishop’s mill-owning associates:

The chief opportunity and responsibility of the church in the situation here is a careful and sympathetic study of the entire problem. The right is not all on either .side.

For the church the duty is to sit down with the representatives of both sides and get the facts; io learn from the manufactures why they take the stand they have taken, and then to sit down with the intelligent leaders of the unions, and learn from them the living conditions they face.

Then it will be possible to try to intelligently interpret one to the other with truth and sincerity. Then may we hope to bring- about a restoration of peace upon the principles for which the church stands.

Truly the so-called Churches of Christ seeking to sit in judgment on anything and everything, have departed far from Christ, who queried, “Man, who made me a judge or a divider over you?”—Luke 12:14.

CHURCHES REPUDIATED

The common people are coming to see more dearly the alliance between big church and big business, and are repudiating the churches and their hypocritical pretensions of friendship for working people. This is going on most rapidly in regions where big business has openly showed its hand, as it has in the West Virginia coal fields. There, according to press despatches like the following from the New York Call the workers are turning their faces away from ecclesiasticism. The report is of an interview with Lawrence Dwyer, member of the international executive board of the United Mine Workers:

“In the unorganized fields the miners don’t pay much attention to the regular preachers because they are paid by the operators,” Dwyer asserted. “Then the operators make the ministers preach against unionism. In the Senate investigation the operators testified under oath that they paid the preachers and told them what to preach, and discharged them if they didn’t preach according to instructions.”

For this reason the church, the authentic established church, has fallen into disrepute among the miners, according to Dwyer. But in its place there has arisen the miner' preacher, who works in the mines all day with the other men and at night preaches to little groups of the mine people in some miner’s home. Sometimes not more than a dozen people gather for these simple services under the harsh light of oil lamps.

And these services are different from those held in the churches in more ways than one. For, while the employer-paid ministers preach the open shop along with the gospel, the miner-preachers do not preach the doctrine of unionism. There is no propaganda in these services.

“They are just sincere in their religion,” is the explanation which Mr. Dwyer gives to this fact.

Another reason which has caused the miners to regard the regular church with suspicion is that the ministers not only preach the open shop, but try to help put it into practice. He declared that in their visits to the homes of the miners the ordained ministers urge the women to influence their husbands against the union.

The miner-preachers are not ordained ministers, and they receive no salary. Not only that, but they are the victims of an unscrupulous and far-reaching discrimination on the part of the operators. Miner-preachers are given the worst places in the mine in which to work; and Mr. Dwyer told, in addition, how a Negro preacher in Mingo whose sermons were drawing attention was taken out into the woods one night not long ago and severely beaten by “a couple of deputy sheriffs.”

Most of these preachers claim connection with one or another of the church systems. This is a class which is just beginning to appear to view, but which is destined to become quite numerous as ecclesiasticism hastens to its fall from power, and thereafter. It was concerning them that “The Finished Mystery” said: Ezekiel 33:23,24. . . . While the revolution overthrowing ecclesiasticism will make quite a clean sweep, there will still remain some of the more lowly adherents of ecclesiastical systems, who will imagine that they and their ideals are to prosper and spread even to the control of the revolutionary order of things.

33:25,2G. . . . But God knows their hearts, and is against them, for their continuance in the evil ways of ecclesiasticism.

33: 27. . . . A sad awakening awaits them. As Jehovah lives, those tares then surviving the ravages of revolution shall be slain by the sword of anarchy, and shall have taken away all pretense of being Christians. Those that have the spirit of earthly ambition shall be given to be destroyed by the savagery of anarchy.—I’ages 530, 531.

A BRIGHTER SIDE

Of course, while the ecclesiastical system itself has been cast off from God and manifests many plain evidences of final disfavor, there are many good men and women still enmeshed in its web, including thousands of the clergy who arc ministers of Christ, woefully deceived. Commenting on the foregoing utterances of Bev. Paul Lindemann, the editor of Ijrooldyn Life says:

This is pretty much what we have been thinking for a long time, though of course the implications are too sweeping; for there are many pulpits that have not degenerated into lecture platforms and thousands of churches that are sticking by the teachings of Jesus Christ.

Only, unfortunately, the preachers who have assumed the role of watchdogs over public morals and dictators of legislation attract far more attention than those who preach Christ crucified, and by their utterances and political activities get into the newspapers, from which the man on the street generally derives ins impressions of the church as a whole.

The great apostasy in which even the best ministers of the churches are involved, and to which most honest men are still blind,.was prophesied by St. Paul as due to come before the rise of the Papacy: “That day [Christ’s day] shall not come, except there come a falling away [apostasy] first, and that man of sin [Papacy] be revealed, the son of perdition.” (2 Thessalonians 2:3) This apostasy took definite form in 325 A.D., in the time of Constantine the Great, who destroyed the faithful primitive church and forced the faithless ecclesiastics, who assumed the places of the former ministers of God, to submit to him and to transform the church into the religious department of the government, subject to it and to big business, where the churches have remained ever since.

Not a few of the ministers sense the fact that something is the matter with the system with which they are conned rd. One pastor says: “There is something radically wrong with our church.” The New York World publishes an item under the headline, “Dr. Walsh urges Moral Standards of Early Church,” illustrating the vague desire of some to get back to “the simplicity that is in Christ” (2 Corinthians 11: 3) :

PLEA FOR CHARACTER

Isaiah told the people that ceremonies and incense and “solemn meetings” and “lain oblations” were an abomination to the Lord. He made a plea for the kind of religion that aims at the building up of moral character.

The early morality was not a merely personal and private tiling. It is astonishing how they engaged in what we call social service, helping strangers and prisoners and the sick. Pliny Ilie Younger [G2-1J0 A.D.], investigating Christianity for the Emperor Trajan, reported that the Christians assembled and sang hymns and then hound themselves by an oath not to steal, cheat, lie, Inti, commit adultery, or defraud any one. This was part of their religion.

Suppose that part of our religions service today were the taking of an oath to do whatever the highest moral standard would demand. The emplojer would take oath to pay the highest salaries lie possibly could. The employes would swear to give a full, honest and hearty day’s work.

HUSBAND AND WIFE

The wife, the husband. I he young man and the young woman, knowing what temptations and dangers men and women faced in the days of the early Christians, would ask themselves: “Can I take my stand against the ties, the conventions and the customs of the world in this, my day, as they did in theirs?” Eacli of us would look at his o«n life and ask, “What oatli ought I to take?”

If all the churches, with their numbers and their organization and wealth, were to get together in a programme something like this and make an cllorl to raise again the old moral standard, knowing that it saved the world once, and knowing how necessary it is to save the world today, what might wc not accomplish?

Many “mourners in Zion,” like Rev. Dr. Wal<h, earnestly desire to live the true Christian life, but fail to see th.it the very things they consider strength effectually hinder them—“numbers, organization and wealth.” The day is not more than a very few years in the future when the members of the great company must take the stand they now say they wish to take; for they will have to choose between that and the second death. It is of this host, now in the churches, that the Revelator said:

“After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and tongues, stoods before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands. . . . These are they which came up out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white iii the blood of the Lamb.” (Revelation 7 : 9,14) A mighty time of trouble shortly awaits this great company, when the church systems now dividing them will be gone, and in which they will gloriously overcome as did those that died for the ideals of the early church.

Incidentally it should be no small encouragement to the true church today to know that the Vow unto the Lord which they have taken is but another bit of evidence that the church of the twentieth century is walking in the footsteps of the oathbound church of the first century.

STEPPING INTO MORE LIGHT

Scarcely a week passes that news does not come of clergymen stepping more and more into the light, and preaching much the same, if not the identical message of the true church. A special despatch in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, appearing at greater length in other papers, depicts ionic truth about the earthly phase of the kingdom of God. The headlines are close to present truth: “.Evangelist Paints Millennium Picture. Earth Won’t Disappear”; “Straton Foresees Heaven on Earth. Norristown Baptists Are Told Earth Will Not Be Wiped Out.” Dr. Straton is a well known vice-fighter, and one of the more prominent of New York city clergymen of the Baptist denomination. We quote, in part:

God's original plan was a perfect world dowered with happiness and blessed with peace. . . . The final restitution of the human race and its perpetuation in a purified and perfected world is necessary, therefore, if God is really ro win completely in the age-long contest between himself ami the devil. Unless the earth is to be restored and God’s Ed<;n plan is finally to be victorious, then he has only partly succeeded in his wise and loving efforts toward redemption.

Scripture teaches clearly that in the fulness of God’s time, the devil, the author of all evil, is to be completely defeated and cast out. And with this elimination of the devil from the affairs of earth, all the sin and suffering and sorrow which lie caused will disappear. Every plague spot of sin and infamy will be blotted out; all the marshes and bogs of crime, all the gambling dens and drinking hells, and haunts of shame, all the loathsome pest holes of hideous disease done away forever.

All the depraved cabinets and the vain-glorious courts, and the self-seeking legislatures of the world adjourned. All rotten rulers and corrupt public olhciais, who use their offices for private gain through public plunder and to serve the advancement of their own political fortunes, banished in utter disgrace from before the children of men. All the cannon melted into church bells, and the swords beaten into reaping hooks. All the emptiness and vanity which now characterizes social life exploded, and true brotherhood and human sympathy smiling in their stead. Every impure picture and every line of lust on every printed page, and every lecherous playhouse and every lie of yellow journalism cast out forever.

All the selfish and infamous cliques, and combinations and rings—political rings, and whiskey rings, and vice rings, and society rings, and railroad rings, and mercantile rings, and bankers’ rings, and labor rings, and building-contractor rings, and walking-delegate rings, and dancing-master rings, and Bolshevistic rings—yes, and preachers’ rings and a thousand other rings—broken up, and in their place fraternity, love, and a sweet fellowship established.

Every jail emptied, every penitentiary in the hands of a receiver, every judge given a permanent vacation, all the forces that have to drive and restrain and coerce the sons of men, and all those who work iniquity in any form, putting through rotten laws, crippling honest industry, corrupting the press, exploiting the poor—whatsoever maketh iniquity or vvorketh a lie—ended by the power of the Almighty, and a clean, honest, healthy, pure-minded, straight-limbed, red-blooded, home-loving, woman-honoring, God-fearing race of men walking in the midst of a redeemed creation, lighted with beauty and blessed by the smile of an approving God !

Yes. soon will come that glorious day which this man in eloquent words proclaims. Dr. Straton is not far from the kingdom of God. He is one of the forerunners of an army of honest. God-fearing ministers, who are destined soon to take up the song of the kingdom of God at hand—when the divine prophecy of two millenniums ago finds its mate: “The Lord gave the word: great was the company of those that published it. Kings [political, financial, ecclesiastical] and their armies did flee apace: and she [the true church] that tarried at home divided the spoil.”—Psalm 68:11,12.

In patient expectation the church awaits the nearing hour when all of the spirit-begotten shall be one in heart and one in voice.

SOME ONE

‘Some one a crown of life will have By and by ;

Some one the glorious King will see, From toils and pains of earth be free, And evermore with Christ will be;

Shall you, shall I?

“Some one will shout the victory By and by;

Some one will join the heavenly baud, Some one be found at God’s right hand. Some one with overcomers stand;

Shall you, shall 11”

THE MINISTRY OF JOHN THE BAPTIST

— October 35-Luke 3.

AN UNUSUAL PREACHER—UNDER GOD’S PROVIDENCES—BAl’TISM-OF REPENTANCE—PROPHET AND PRIEST—GREAT BUT TRULY HUMBLE

—TIMES OF JUDGMENT—FAITHFUL WITNESS.

“Repent ye; for the kingdom of

EIGHTEEN years after the time of Jesus’ first visit to the Temple, mentioned in the last lesson, its religious leaders and the common people were stirred by the report of one who was preaching in the wilderness of Judea. The preacher was an altogether unusual man ; his message also was altogether unusual, and was in no sense a development out of the then present circumstances. He spoke with much boldness, declaring that he was fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah, being “the voice of the one crying in the wilderness,” and that he was preparing the way of the one who should come after him. (Luke 40:3,4; John 1:23) The whole country-side was stirred, and crowds went out into the wilderness to see and hear the preacher. (Matthew 3:5) He was John, son of Zacharias and Elizabeth, born to be forerunner of Jesus. Of his childhood, youth, and manhood until he was thirty years of age, the Scripture is silent, save that it records “lie was in the deserts till the day of his showing unto Israel.” (Luke 1:80) Probably his parents, who were old when he was born, did not live very long after his boyhood.

TRAINING FOR HIS WORK

We may take it for certain that John, who was very specially under the providences of God, had the peculiar circumstances of his birth related to him: both his father and his mother would tell him of the angel’s visit, and, of that which he had said concerning him. He trained himself accordingly; for no man could have taken the bold stand he took, and have been so clear on the realities of true worship, unless he had arrived at his conclusions by much meditation and communion with God. Also he would know of his cousin Jesus. We do not know that these two met either as bo.\s or young men, though it is probable that they did: and it can easily be imagined that each would be a help to the other when talking over the Scriptures upon which their hearts would love to dwell.

At thirty years of age, probably on time to a day (Luke 1:80) in the spring of A.D. 29. Jolm began his ministry. He lifted up his voice in the wilderness. In this lie showed his faith, as well ns that he had a clear understanding; for the natural inference would be that if he were to do a preparatory work amongst the people, a wilderness would not. be a good place wherein to reach them, however good it had been for study. But he knew his work and his place, and he had faith to believe that the issues remained with God. It was in the wilderness the “voice” of Isaiidi’s prophecy was to be heard; so in the wilderness he began to preach.

This strange tiling was noised abroad : the people were attracted. As the crowds came to him he boldly proclaimed a course of repentance unto remission of sin, and he practised baptism to symbolize its removal. He made the people realize that they were out of harmony with God, and he had no hesitation in speaking very plainly to those who came to hear him. To mere professors he was exceedingly outspoken: a “generation of vipers” he called them. (Matthew 3:7) To the common people he gave definite counsel. He told who he was, saying that lie was the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy; a forerunner for one much mightier than he, and who was about to come; that his work was preparatory. The one immediately following would baptize in holy spirit and fire; would come with a fan in hand to cleanse his threshing floor; would gather the wheat into the garner and burn up the chaff with unquench

heaven is at hand."—Mattheic 3. 2.

able fire; and that he, John, was not worthy to loose the shoe latchet of this Coming One. “And many other things in his exhortation preached he unto the people.”—Luke 3: IS.

THE GATHERING DISCIPLES

Amongst the many who listened to John were a few honest hearts who lingered, willing to be taught of him, and who became disciples to him. Foremost amongst these were some fishermen from Galilee—John,and James, Peter, and Andrew. For a season they appeared to have left their fishing that they might learn ol Jehovah’s purpose, and God rewarded them; they surely would be a great encouragement to John in his work. Soon he found himself with a little band of disciples who entered into his ministry with him, and who became the nucleus of that people “prepared for the Lord,” spoken of to his father Zacharias by the angel. (Luke I : 17) To the Jordan John took his hearers, and in that stream of “judgment” some entered into a closer union with God, while some brought further condemnation upon themselves through rejecting the heaven-sent witness.

John was, of course, of the priesthood ; indeed, both his father and his mother were of the house of Aaron. He thus combined the offices of prophet and priest. Th is is not an unknown combination; for it is found in the cases of Jeremiah and Ezekiel. But it is somewhat remarkable in John’s case because of the singularity of his disposition: lie corresponds more with the Elijah type of prophet Ilian with the Jeremiah or Ezekiel type, and therefore wo are apt to forget his descent from Aaron. The question might be raised as to why the forerunner of Jesus came from the priestly order; and the answer to the query may be that Jehovah desired to have both the witness of the prophets and the priests converge in the pointed message of the prophet-priest John the Baptist. There is no record of John doing any priestly service as did his father before him : indeed the Scriptures say that he was in the desert until the day of his showing to Israel.—Luke 1:80.

THE LAMB OF JEHOVAH

Rut though John never sacrificed a lamb at the Temple altar, he had something to do with the sacrificing of the Lamb of God. It was lie who first called attention to Jesus as God’s sacrifice. “Behold,” lie said, pointing to Jesus, “the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world.” (John 1:20) And it may very well be that John’s faithful ministry, telling of the one who should come and who was so much greater than he, might have much to do with the ultimate death of Jesus, so unexpected and apparently so unlikely to happen. God thus crowned the priesthood of Israel, and the prophetic office in this otherwise obscure member of the priestly order. As a whole the priesthood had sought the office and its glamour rather than the true service of God. The prophet and priest combined in John, and pointed to the king.

John was one of the world’s greatest men. Very few could have taken as he the high honor and position as the announcer of the coming king. His faith was great and of a high order. None but one who was absolutely sure of his mission and of his God would have dared to tell that the Coming One was present amongst them The same courage and faith are again necessary and the witness is being given! Neither meanness nor ambition had any part in John’s disposition.

It is when caught unawares that the true disposition discloses itself before profession has time to get its cloak on; and that John was truly humble is shown by the sudden revelation of humility as Jesus appeared before him for baptism. ‘Nay,’ said Jolin on Jesus' request, ‘it is more fitting that you should baptize me than 1 baptize you.’ He rose above the ordinary standard of the prophet, though that indeed were high; for Jesus said of him that lie was a prophet and more than a prophet. (Matthew UI: 9) But lie proved he was a member of the fallen family: for his faitli failed somewhat as his expectations concerning the Messiah were not fulfilled. When llie due time came for his ministry to cease, and for Jesus to come into prominence, God permitted John io be thrown into prison. His public ministry was ended: though he was allowed to have some of his disciples about him. Evidently he expected Jesus to begin to do something to establish a kingdom; but instead of doing as he expected, Jesus took up John's own message, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 4:17) and continued to do the same kind of work as John, with this difference, that he wrought miracles in his work; and also, unlike John, he moved from place to place. Nor did Jesus make any mention of anything relating to the early establishment of the kingdom ; on the contrary, as if he had only a spiritual kingdom in mind, he was a teacher and preacher.

It was a good work that Jesus was doing, but John evidently was puzzled and asked himself what relation all this had to the kingdom which he had proclaimed, and which he expected to be set up. He wondered whether he had been mistaken in pointing out Jesus as the one for whom lie was forerunner; and voicing his doubt to some of his disciples, he sent them to ask Jesus whether he was the one who should come, or, “should we look for another?” Jesus received the messengers, and that same hour wrought many miracles, sufficient to show the disciples of John that the Scripture was being fulfilled, and thus to open Jolin’s eyes to the fact that there was to be a ministry of the Messiah before the kingdom could be established. (Isaiah 61:1-3) Without doubt Jolin was assured, and without doubt lie died in faith, and to the glory of God. This ministry of the anointed has continued during the age, resulting in preparing a people for the Lord, and giving opportunities for those sufferings which the prophets had so plainly declared ns belonging to the Christ.

JOHN WAS THE ELIJAH

Jesus said that to those able to receive it John was the Elijah of Malachi’s prophecy (Malachi 4:5) ; for Jesus came for judgment as well as to bless those of Israel whose hearts were waiting for God. It was in favor to Israel that Jolin was sent. God would have his people fully warned before they entered into judgment; and have those who wanted to be rigid prepai-ed for that fuller blaze of light which should come with Jesus. But it is evident that Malachi’s prophecy looks forward to a greater fulfillment than that accomplished by John's ministry. Malachi saw that event which we call the second coming of our Lord, the coming of Messiah to judge, bless, and restore Israel, and his messenger Elijah proceeding him before lie should “come to his temple”.

That great ex ent is now upon us. To our understanding the Scriptures and corroborative facts show that the Lord came to his temple for judgment in the spring of 1918. If this be so it follows that Pastor Russell’s message announcing the coming of the kingdom for judgment corresponds with the message of John the Baptist announcing the judgment then coming with Jesus. This thought does not in mix xxnj nullif.x those tilings which have so surely been believed amongst us. The judgment of nominal Christendom began in 1878 and was sharpened in 1S81; but it is clear that God used Pastor Russell to head a work of calling Christendom to repentance by telling it of the error of its ways. It was not until after the World War, when the nominal church finally threw its lot in with the world, and thus separated itself from God, that God finally cast it off. This corresponds with the rejection of Jesus by the Jews, and the rejection of them by God. As Paul said, “wrath is come upon them to the uttermost.”—1 Thessalonians 2:16.

The Lord gave a warning to the Israel of tiiose days by his servant John sucli as in these days he gave to Christendom by his servant Pastor Russell. John tore away the garment of shams and forms and got down to realities. The Jews boasted that they had Abraham as their father. Jolin says: ‘Your claim is nothing worth.’ “God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham.” (Matthew 3:9) So to the churches in these days Pastor Russell said to those who claim to have the Apostolic Succession. ‘Your claim is nothing worth: indeed your “ordination” is fraudulent.’ Both urged all to whom they could appeal to amend their ways, to accept the “present truth” at the hands of the present Lord. In both cases the messengers of God were ill-used of the world, and in both cases the majority of tiiose to whom they spoke passed on to destruction.

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