Britain Fails to Enter Common Market
The negotiations on Britain’s application to join the Common Market came to an end on the 29th January, 1963, at Brussels, no agreement having been reached. The other nations concerned and Britain also laid the responsibility for the failure upon France and General de Gaulle in particular. Never in modern times has our Government shown such determination about any political objective as in their desire to enter the European Common Market. Yet one man has blocked the way. But over all this, God has in His Providence and all-wise government revealed that the ways and thoughts of our Government are not His ways and thoughts. The desire and prayer of many in our nation since the above negotiations began was that the Most High would prevent our being ultimately linked up with the Roman Catholic Nations of Europe. Strangely enough, although the Vatican expressed delight at the whole idea of the Common Market, De Gaulle, an ardent Romanist, was instrumental in keeping Britain out. Was there after all a fear that British influence, with its Protestant and democratic freedom and background, would have an adverse effect upon Romanist institutions and mode of thinking and operating? We do not know. Presumably we consider the outcome of these negotiations to be a deliverance and a relief. What a good day it shall be when our Statesmen shall let it be known that they consider God’s guidance an essential in all such matters.
People No Longer Believe the Gospel
Rev. Dr. John Kellas, Glencorse, as retiring Moderator of the Church of Scotland Synod of Edinburgh, said some time ago that his Church had problems because people no longer believed in the Gospel. He said: “Ministers must face the fact that people no longer believe what we say. What, for example, do Heaven and Hell mean to our generation? They are getting on quite well without reference to them or at least they think they are.” The Rev. Dr. was also reported as saying that he did not think the ministry nor the laity could be blamed for this state of affairs. But we are not of this opinion as far as the Church of Scotland is concerned. How many of her ministers fail utterly to teach that only those who are believers in Christ as regenerated by the Holy Spirit have the promise of heaven? How many of her ministers deliberately ignore in their teaching that all unconverted, unbelieving sinners shall go to hell, who die thus without a saving faith in Christ Jesus? Our view is that there are many such ministers; and that for many years now the most of the people of Scotland have been hearing a gospel which condemns and troubles no one and which has but flattered them into thinking that it shall be well with them after death. This gospel saves no sinner and has left the people of Scotland completely indifferent to what the Christian Church has to say now. The poor laity have been encouraged and deceived into thinking that “joining” the Church makes a man a Christian. Conversion and the saving work of the Holy Spirit as essential to bringing a sinner to be a living, true Christian has, to a large extent, not been taught nor insisted on. The professing Christian in most cases (that is the laity) is in all things like the out and out irreligious worldling except that he has in addition a Church connection as a member, deacon or elder. The Rev. Dr. stated that: “We need somehow to bring men and women throughout the land back to a belief in God.” Therefore, we say, let the Churches in Scotland teach the Bible, all the doctrines of the Word according to the Word of God, and preach the full gospel of Christ and salvation to men as sinful, lost and hell-devouring, in dependence upon the Holy Spirit.
Ministers Meet R.C. Priests
Fifteen ministers of the Church of Scotland and fifteen Roman Catholic priests met last January at the Scottish Churches’ House, Dunblane, Scotland, in connection with what is called the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. Two talks were given, one by the Rev. Dr. Craig, who visited the Pope as Church of Scotland Moderator of Assembly, and the other by the Abbot of Nunraw. Our only comment upon the above is, that by this time the Church of Scotland ministers and people should know, as we do, that all this means to the Roman Catholic Church, the need for others to come back to the fold of Rome and her dogmas and darkness. But the blind cannot see.
Russia and the Pope
It is reported that the Vatican has been receiving inquiries from Mr Kruschev, through the Soviet Embassy, about the health of the Pope. In a recent message to Dr. Adenauer, Mr Kruschev went out of his way to praise the Pope’s constant pleas for peace. It is said that Mr Kruschev hopes for a meeting with the Pope sometime in the future. This is an aspect of Russian diplomacy difficult to disentangle. Of course the Pope must know that Italy is largely Communistic, and yet all and sundry are being asked to join with the R.C. Church as the supposed bulwark against Communism. The nations, the churches, the political parties need one thing, the principles and influence of the Gospel of Christ.
Prime Minister Visits Pope.
On Saturday, the 2nd February Mr MacMillan, our Prime Minister and Mr Heath, who carried on the unsuccessful Common Market negotiations, visited the Pope for half an hour, while in Rome on political business with the Italian government. This and such like visits panders to the arrogant claims of the Pope that he is the supreme ruler of the world in a civil capacity as well as in a spiritual sense. How deplorable that the Queen and Prime Minister of professedly Protestant Britain, the land of godly, eminent Reformers and Covenanters, should from time to time think so little of our Reformed and Protestant heritage and our deliverance from the bondage of Rome’s heresies, superstitions and anti-Christian practices. Rome aims at Britain’s return to the oppression of the Romish priesthood but the earnest prayer of the Lord’s people must be: “Turn us again, O Lord God of hosts, cause Thy face to shine; and we shall be saved.” (Ps. 80:19.)
New Jewish Version of Five Books of Moses
A report from Philadelphia, U.S.A., states that a new Jewish version of parts of the Old Testament, makes changes in the sense of some passages in this translation into English. It is recorded that Moses did not lead the Children of Israel through the Red Sea, but through a marshy area near the present Suez Canal. The Third Commandment of the Moral Law is altered from condemning profanity of God’s name to the condemnation of perjury. And this report states that the translation virtually eliminates the word “soul.” From this report we gather that the present Jewish translators are of a modernistic character even by orthodox Jewish standards. Their work relative to the Red Sea salvation of their ancient forefathers by God is deplorable in the extreme as it inevitably wipes out from their point of view a large and detailed part of the Word of God regarding that wonderful deliverance. Are these translators Jewish Rationalist?