By REV. JAMES MACLEOD, Greenock.
MOSES, the man of God, was a faithful witness, meek, and a man of great natural parts as well as a most gracious servant of the Lord. What he learned at the back of the wilderness for forty years stood for him when his great experience was put to the test as the leader of God’s people in guiding them out of Egypt. Leaders among God’s people must have certain graces, qualifications, and peculiar experiences which are not given to all the servants of God. Everyone is not fitted, either by gifts, graces, or experience, to be “he-goats” to go before the flock of God. Far from it. Many a poor man thought himself not only qualified to be one of the “great men of the earth,” who not only floundered himself, but brought those that followed him into “deep waters.” It is a great mercy if one knows his limitations, and seeks grace to walk humbly before God! Men of small parts, gifts, and graces are often envious of those who are superior to themselves, and when the supposed opportunity offers itself to them they will not hesitate to shew their vindictiveness.
“Wrath is cruel, and anger is outrageous; but who is able to stand before envy?” (Prov. xxvii, 4). Envy, therefore, is the very essence of wickedness. “They envied Moses also in the camp, and Aaron the saint of the Lord” (Ps. cvi, 16). It is truly the spirit of the devil which finds expression in the lives of the wicked against the Lord’s witnesses! Satan is completely permeated with the spirit of envy against God, and man. When envy is clothed with a garment of light (as an angel of light) who then is able to stand against envy? Moses, Aaron, and the saints of God in all ages had to encounter this vile spirit in those who were supposed to be serving the Lord! It was this evil spirit that envied the saints during the ten persecutions: and again, when the Papists slaughtered millions of the Lord’s people for centuries before the Reformation, and after to this time, as in Spain and in South America. “Who can stand before envy?”
“But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth” (Acts i, 8). In Greek the name witness means martyr, or one that gives testimony to the truth at the expense of his life. Jesus Christ is the faithful witness, as it is said in Rev. i, 5. He was the faithful witness to us of the truth, and revealed what was hid from us, by His glorious testimony, and doctrines, explaining even to babes what was the will and purpose of God towards us. He is also a swift witness against false swearers, who perjure themselves professing to be on His side while they do the work of the devil. He will deal with such wicked men. The atheist and modernist cannot call His witness in question at the bar of eternal judgment! The Apostles, and all who in truth believe in Jesus Christ are witnesses on His side. A witness, therefore, is one who is prepared to seal his testimony with his life if need be. Truth was never popular in this world, from the fall of Adam. Those who witness for the truth were not popular either. Abel was the first martyr to the truth which he professed, and ever since the devil has been busy to blot out truth from the minds of men. His aim is to have the lie fixed in the mind, so that truth cannot enter in!
Britain was highly honoured with men who sealed their testimony with blood, and godly women were not behind in their humble and faithful witness on the side of the Lord, who paid the price of their redemption. Truth is most precious, and must be defended at all costs against all who oppose this precious gift of God to poor sinners. It is not by learning Greek, Latin and Hebrew that men are counted faithful witnesses on the side of the Lord. No! By grace, sinners are saved, and not by reading various languages, and clatter in what Paul calls, “Vain babblings, and oppositions, of science falsely so called.” We admire learning when subject to, and used for the advancement of the Kingdom of God in the world. When silly men look upon themselves as superior beings if they are called “masters” and scholars at the expense of others, that is clear evidence of pride and ignorance. “The Lord will cut off the man that doeth this, the master and the scholar, out of the tabernacles of Jacob, and him that offereth an offering to the Lord of hosts” (Mal. ii, 12). When men try to offer to the Lord their own attainments as an offering, they will be cut off. God is no respecter of the persons, of masters, scholars, scientists, or raw modernists. Many a poor “scholar” will be in a lost eternity out of this miserable generation! It won’t save a man if he be adorned by his fellows with “D.D.” or “Master of Arts,” if he is not “born again”—at death he is lost for ever! Men will glory in their supposed gifts in the face of the clearest denunciation from heaven against such sinful tendency. “That, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord” (I Cor. i, 31). That sinful man should glory in his gifts, mental attainments, in the Arts, Sciences, Philosophy, Theology, in his morality, is a clear indication that he knows nothing; as Paul, writing to Timothy, says, “He is proud knowing nothing, but dotting about questions and strifes of words, whereof cometh envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings, perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, and destitute of the truth, supposing that gain is godliness: from such withdraw thyself” (Tim. vi, 4). Timothy was to withdraw himself and have nothing to do with them but to ignore, and shun the “Master and the Scholar” who should abuse their gifts and talents, “seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put Him to an open shame,” as the “Modernists” do in this land to-day.
Our people (at least some) may be wishing to understand what is meant by the men we call “Modernists.” They are professed ministers of religion in the Protestant Churches, Professors in Colleges, teaching young students who cannot accept, or believe, that the Bible is a revelation of the will and purpose of God to lost sinners. The Modernist believes that Christ was but a mere man, like other men, born into this life like other ordinary mortals, and died like other men, and never rose from the dead. The most of them give Him credit that He was a “good man,” but some of them go so far as to say that He was not scholarly, educated, or intelligent enough to be a teacher to instruct men of far superior intellect than He ever revealed while teaching crude and ignorant fishermen! Are many of them in the Churches? The late Rev. Dr. Cox, of Aberdeen, declared shortly before he died that he knew that the vast majority of the ministers of the Church of Scotland were of the same mind as himself, and that he never believed in the Virgin birth, or resurrection of Christ (according to press reports). I trust it is sufficiently clear to our readers who are the men we, for brevity’s sake, call “Modernists.” You will
all understand that they are the outcrop of the Declaratory Act, German Rationalism, and not a whit better than Atheists, Infidels, Communists, Papists, and Pagans. That is very true if they do not believe that Christ was the Son of God, the Saviour of lost, hell-deserving sinners!
There are some who hold to the opinion, and act on it, that we should be silent on such public questions, and never refer to other Churches or men who, in pulpit, by pen, and on public platforms, denounce the Bible, Christ, and all the doctrines of Revelation! They say, “Preach the Gospel and never mind what they say or do.” That policy suits the carnal mind, and the ungodly peace of such men, but what does the Word of God say about such trimmers? “His watchmen are blind; they are all ignorant, they are all dumb dogs, they cannot bark; sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber” (Isa. lvi). That is the character the Holy Spirit gives to the trimmers! The servants of God dare not be silent when they see the enemy coming in like a flood. The testimony of our Church demands that the ministers of the Church be not silent, or ignore the condition of the cause of Christ in this nation to-day. The missionaries of the Church, elders, and members dare not be silent to the young who are rising up about them, and have to face the flood of atheism that ungodly men pour forth from pulpit and press to blot out the glorious witness of the Holy Spirit raised in the hearts and lives of the martyrs, Covenants, Reformers—men and women of undoubted piety, true godliness, that in many cases sealed their testimony with the blood of their veins. In our beloved Scotland, we have been compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses that it would be to our everlasting shame to ignore the issues that confront us and our children. “I have set watchmen upon thy walls, O Jerusalem, which shall never hold their peace day or night: ye that make mention of the Lord, keep not silence” (Isa. lxii). O no, this is not time to be silent whatever supine “Scholars” may say in their unhallowed wisdom, who seek to be at peace with the enemies of Christ and in great fear that they might utter a word that should disturb the devil in case he might turn on them—”And the evil spirit answered and said, Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are ye?” (Acts xix).
We have been left a glorious witness to uphold, acknowledge, and defend with all our heart, at all times, in all places where our lot may be cast in divine providence. We have noticed for more than forty years, when men in our own Church were back-sliding from the witness raised in defence of the Word of God in May, 1893, that they did not like to hear one word said about it, or defend it, as they had ceased to bear witness, and in heart were ready to compromise, or separate from that blessed testimony! Let our people take note of that—silence means a departure in heart, and when the heart departs, we may be sure that the feet and head will follow in due course. Oh! how often that has happened for the last fifty-seven years, and all had their various excuses, cause, reason, and many Scriptures to enable them to slide down into the slough of despond! A few did return, and such should be encouraged. And we must not be unmindful of that Scripture which saith: “Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall” (I Cor. x, 12).
The Reformed Church was wonderfully blessed with men of eminent learning, and Scotland had her large share of such men. That was for the benefit of the Church of God in their own time, and to this present
time, and we should be truly thankful to God for what they left behind for our instruction in righteousness: Dr. John Owen on the Persons of the God-head, on justification, and sanctification, etc.; Thomas Boston on the fall of mankind in Adam, and his need of redemption through the blood of the Lamb of God; Witsius on the Covenants, etc. Many others could be mentioned, but space won’t allow it. What a galaxy of them that adorned the Church of God in Germany, Netherlands, France, England, Scotland, and New England, from the dawn of the Reformation to recent times. When the “modern Scholars” rose up in the Church, they began to introduce innovations, theories, Darwinianism, infidelity, atheism, blasphemy, so that the “learned and critical minds” wrenched the Word of God from the people, divided Churches, communities, families and nations. If Protestant Britain and Protestant Germany had kept together it is reasonable to think that the peace of Europe had remained unbroken to this day! What blood, what tears, poverty, confusion and debauchery “the learned critical minds” were (in awful judgment) the means of bringing on the poor German nation and the hundreds of thousands of homes in the British Isles! “But who is able to stand before envy?” Now the German nation is handed over to the Roman Catholics—the very thing the Jesuits were after ever since the days of Luther. They got it at last! The Protestants of Germany are crushed between Russian Communism, poverty, disease, and Roman Catholics on the west! Oh! what awful judgments on that once bulwark of Protestantism in Europe! Who brought Germany to ruins? Her own sons. May we take warning, and learn our lesson from what happened in Germany. The Bible, the Son of God, the Gospel, heaven, and hereafter were explained away as Jewish myth. God gave her mythology to drink in His righteous wrath! We have evil men in Britain, who would have us believe that the Word of God is a myth (fable), Christ a mere man, the Lord’s Day is for sport and carnal pleasure. But let us take courage that we have a good number in Parliament who are able to defend the absolute necessity of a day of rest—the Lord’s Day. One clergyman among them, during the last debate on the question of opening the Amusement Section of the Festival of Britain on the Lord’s Day, was very witty and amusing, and voted with those who would have the Amusement Section open on Sabbath as on other days of the week. He will be among the “learned and critical minds”! “Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things?” Nicodemus was a teaching Rabbi, “A scholar, master of his art,” and as blind spiritually as a pagan of the way he could be reconciled to God. But the man was a “Scholar” and what about it? The Lord soon shewed him that his “scholarship” was gross ignorance, blindness, pomp, emptiness, that his “learned, critical mind” could not save him from eternal death. Take note of the wisdom of this Master in Israel, “Can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” Who then is silly enough, stupid, and blind to think that one’s knowledge of University text-books is all that is needed to know and understand the Gospel? We do not for a moment disparage learning: we do acknowledge abilities, gifts, and mental attainments, when used to the glory of God and the good of others. “Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in words and in deeds” (Acts vii, 22). Few, if any, made more and better use of learning than Moses, as faithful in all his house as a servant, as all servants should be.