Mysteries of Godliness

Preface

The main matter of this volume, and indeed all of it except these few sentences of Preface, was submitted to the notice of a life-long friend in the merest condition of lead-pencil scrawling, presenting the thoughts of an unpretentious layman upon subjects interesting to every one of us, and which intrude daily upon tens of thousands of his neighbors and acquaintances, who have not time nor the facilities to consider them duly, and yet whose interpretation and application form a grave portion of the needs of the hour.

The obvious intention of the work appeals to our hearty respect. He recounts the " mysteries" which have beset him, and reports his solution of them, or at least his mitigation of their worst disturbance. With his own wounds healed, he acts the part of the good Samaritan, not only upon recreant passers-by but on all who will look and listen.

This modest way of " doing good" wears true

PREFACE.

philanthropy's rare stamp, which finds its just return collateral with its labor; it goes home "justified" by the time of sunset, and wakes to new labors of love on the morrOw.

This small volume will hardly find its way immediately to our hosts of readers in America; but its circulation once begun will spread, and occupy for the hour space not likely to be better filled. It has a pleasant familiarity which assumes to meet our dogma of equality at least half-way, either journeying or at work, and to be the voice of that model wayfaring man to whom long ago was vouchsafed the power to understand the Scriptures. Let us make his hearty faith contagious, and thus spread the exceeding peace which comes of true believing.

H. C. O.

Contents

PAGE.

Introduction 7

Eternity 14

God's Sovereignty and Man's Free Agency ... 82 Resurrection of the Dead ...... 102

Christ's Resurrected Body . ... . . .120

Introduction

Every observant and intelligent mind must have noticed " in the signs of the times" for the last two decades an extraordinary spirit of inquiry after truth. This is seen in the whole realm of thought, whether among scholars or laymen. Men's minds have been turned in a most remarkable manner to the pursuit of truth. Especially is this the case in the domain of religious thought.

The geologist has gone forth with hammer in hand, breaking the flinty rock that it may give up its secrets which have been hidden for ages; and he comes back with the wonderful discovery that this earth is some fifty or sixty millions of years old, which so alarmed some good old-fashioned people that they betook themselves to their Bibles, and exclaimed, " Not so, for the Bible says the world was made in six days, and was created only six thousand years ago ;" and it seemed at the time that the geologist's hammer was likely to knock the props from under the former belief in the Bible account of the creation.

But after recovering their equanimity and reading again more carefully they discovered that the Bible does not say that the earth is only six thousand years old, but that " In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." When that beginning was is not stated. But it does say God made the world in six days, " And He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had made."

Here, again, was another seeming difficulty to reconcile with the obtrusive and positive geologist. But by reading again it is seen that the Bible does not say that the world was made in six consecutive days of twenty-four hours each, but the " evening and the morning were the first day," etc., which may mean periods or ages of time of millions of years each ; and so the fears of timid Christian people were quieted, and the good old book remains unharmed.

We would just here remark that while the Bible mentions six distinct days or periods of time in the formation of the earth, and marks each day by the expression " the evening and the morning were the

INTRODUCTION. g sixth day," etc., " He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had made," there is no mention made of the evening and the morning being the seventh day; therefore it is plain that the seventh day began when He had finished the work of creation, and we are living in the seventh day.

Again, the scientist has found out that all matter is changeable or transmutable ; that the earth brings forth grass, which the ox eats, and the grass becomes beef, which man eats, and it becomes other flesh ; then man dies, and the earth gets its own again; and so on, in an endless, ever-changing round, this transmutation of matter proceeds ad infinitum.

So the believer in the resurrection of the body is perplexed again, and does not know what to say. But some careful readers of the Scriptures fail to find any definite statement that the material body will rise again; but it is positively stated that the "spiritual" body will be raised. This subject is treated of at length under the caption of the " Resurrection."

The doctrine of election and reprobation, held by some of the adherents of Calvin, has been a

IO MYSTERIES OF GODLINESS.

stumbling-block for centuries in the way of some for not believing in the teachings of the Bible. They say, " Can God be partial ? and if so, it makes no difference what I do. If I am to be saved I will be saved, and if I am to be lost I will be lost, without any agency of mine in the matter."

To all such casuists the author has endeavored to reconcile this difficulty, and trusts all who will read dispassionately the dissertation on " God's Sovereignty and Man's Free Agency" will accord his assent to the conclusions arrived at, viz., that man is a free agent, and therefore responsible for his acts, and that his salvation depends upon his choice and actions.

There are others who see that there are incongruities in what is called the " Athanasian Creed," — of the Trinity of the Godhead, — which affirms that there are three distinct persons in the Godhead, and yet these three are one.

To most minds who are accustomed to think closely there is an apparent incongruity in this statement of the creed. The Bible nowhere says that there are three separate persons in the Godhead, but one God with three hypostatic manifestations.

INTR OD UCTION. 1 1

This subject is treated under the caption of the " Trinity of the Deity/' to which the reader is referred, in the hope that he may have his objections appeased by a somewhat different presentation of the mystery of the Godhead ; for we hold that there is no mystery revealed to us in the Bible which, by a proper study and with the illumination by God's Spirit, cannot be made plain to our comprehension. The Bible is God's Word ; God is truth itself; therefore it must be consistent with itself, as all truth is so.

Then, again, the modern materialist has revived the old hypothesis of the Hindoos and the Greeks that matter is eternal, and therefore there is no creator or first cause; that matter is the aggregation of atoms brought together by chance, which by an inherent principle in themselves formed the worlds and established laws without a law-giver, and that there is no hereafter, that the soul dies with the body, and therefore death ends all.

All those who hold such views are referred to the argument for the " Immortality of the Soul."

But there is a still more subtle form of infidelity called " Agnosticism," which apparently admits the teachings of the Bible with mental reservation, and its followers may be called honest doubters, who would believe if they had the demonstration. It is to this class of persons particularly that the author of this little book earnestly hopes to render some service, by the blessing of God upon his feeble efforts in removing their honest doubts.

There are some credulous minds that can believe almost anything upon plausible testimony ; to such Christ said, "Blessed are they who believe;" but there are some doubting Thomases whose minds are so constituted that they cannot believe without seeing for themselves. And this is not to be wondered at in regard to spiritual truths, for the reason that some of the dogmas of the church are hard to reconcile with reason; and we hold that unless theology can be made to harmonize with reason, and science, and Scripture it is not truth, and the minds of thinking men will ever antagonize against a religion that is not consistent with reason ; it will not do any longer for theologians to demand faith inconsistent with reason. Faith soars above reason, but God does not require in us faith contrary to reason.

The author has for years been impressed with

INTRODUCTION.

the belief that there is a want existing of a handbook setting forth in a concise though homely way the mooted doctrines held by the church, such as a layman can read in a short time and understand without having to spend years of severe and tedious reading of lengthy volumes, elaborately written by schoolmen, on the various themes of theology, for which few active business men have the inclination or the time. It is to supply this want, and with an earnest desire to induce this class of persons to consider these great questions for themselves, which are so intimately connected with their eternal destiny, that has induced the author to issue this little volume on the " Mysteries of Godliness," for which he bespeaks a candid and dispassionate reading.

It is possible this book may fall into the hands of some theologian, who may find some views set forth therein which he will object to; but as the author is a layman writing to laymen, he indulges the hope he will not be judged too harshly, especially when the critic is advised that it was written in such moments of time as he could seize from an active business life.

MYSTERIES OF GODLINESS.

ETERNITY.

Eternity ! stupendous thought ! There is no word or thought, except Eternal God, that can be compared with* it in expanse of meaning or reach of thought. The finite mind, unaided by revelation, cannot comprehend it. The nearest approach ever made by human reason to it was by the ancient philosophers, who represented Eternity by a circle ; but this comes far short of conveying a correct idea of Eternity, for the least departure from the centre would be an equal advance towards the circumference. An infinite circle, with a centre everywhere and circumference nowhere, would better express it.

The human mind alone, unaided by revelation, has never conceived the true idea of Eternity. Placed as man is on the earth, with its periodic revolutions marking time, it is exceedingly difficult for him to disassociate himself from its surroundings. If there were no earth, sun, moon, or heavenly bodies, there would be no measurement of time,

ETERNITY. 15 no past, no future, no years, no days, no moments of passing time, just as it was before the creation of the heavenly bodies, whose revolutions began the measurement of time. Beyond that the most remote period to the infinite mind might be considered as the present moment. There is no time with God but the ever-present now: "A day with Him is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day."

When Moses was commissioned by God to go into Egypt and deliver the Israelites from bondage, he demanded of God that He should tell him what name he should give as his authority to act as their deliverer; then God out of the burning bush announced to Moses His incommunicable name, "/ Am that I Am" (Ex. iii. 14), which implies His Self and Eternal existence. If there were no other evidence of the Divine origin of the Bible, this unique expression of His name would be sufficient. Again, in John vii. 58, we read that Jesus, in answering the cavils of the Jews concerning His oneness with the Father, uses like words in speaking of Himself: "Before Abraham was I Am!' Mark, He does not say before Abraham was I was, but " before Abraham was / Am!' And it is a noticeable fact that l6 MYSTERIES OF GODLINESS.

Christ when speaking of Himself almost invariably uses the present tense. Keeping this in view, it will enable us to interpret many passages of Scripture which otherwise would be inexplicable. The Prophets also frequently use the present tense in predicting events which were to occur hundreds of years in the future, as already being accomplished ; for instance, Isa. ix. 6, " For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given ;" and many others might be adduced.

In view of what we have said, we come to the conclusion that Eternity is an ever-present Now, and will not admit of a past or future, or else we are driven to the only alternative, that there was a Beginning and an End, for there could be no past without a future, no beginning without an end, and no end without a beginning. So, we repeat, the idea of an Infinite Now could only originate with an Infinite mind, and is beyond and above the conception of finite mind, and proves conclusively the Divine origin of the Bible. Let the skeptic cavil at it as much as he will, let him show in the annals of the human race where any people or race, unaided by Revelation, even conceived the true idea

ETERNITY. iy

of Eternity. They have always associated in their minds a past and future. Such an idea as a present, without a past or a future, never entered into the mind of man, and never would have been but for the Revelation of God to man, as- in the announced name, " I Am that I Am." If, then, Eternity is an Infinite Now, as we think we have shown in the foregoing remarks, should it not finally put to rest the controversies of the present day about the endless punishment of the wicked? Because, if Eternity is an ever-present Now, it of course follows, a priori, there can be no End. Consequently, if the wicked are punished at all, it must be endlessly.

How should the thought of an Eternal, unchanging Holy God, "the same yesterday, to-day, and forever," who cannot look upon sin with any degree of allowance, fill our souls with a profound sense of the majesty of His greatness and the perfection of His being, — the Supreme Ruler of the universe, who from His throne, surrounded with light inaccessible and full of glory, beholding all the dwellers upon earth, supplying by His providential care all their needs, God over all, blessed forever ! As the profound Pascal has truly said, " God is the

MYSTERIES OF GODLINESS.

centre of all, and to Him everything points, and he who knows Him not, knows nothing of the economy of this world and of himself. In Him is treasured up all our happiness, our virtue, our every life and light and hope; and out of Him there is nothing for us but sin, misery, darkness, and despair."

The foregoing thoughts are beautifully expressed by the Poet :

" O Thou Eternal One ! whose presence bright

Thou only God ! There is no God beside ! Being above all beings ! Mighty One !

Whom none can comprehend and none explore ; Who fill'st existence with Thyself alone :

Being whom we call God — and know no more ! . . . What am I, then ?

Naught ! Yet the effluence of Thy light divine,

Pervading worlds, hath reached my bosom too ; Yes, in my spirit doth Thy Spirit shine,

As shines the sunbeam in a drop of dew. Naught ! but I live, and on hope's pinions fly

Eager toward Thy presence ; for in Thee I live, and breathe, and dwell, aspiring high,

Even to the throne of Thy divinity.

I am, O God ! and surely Thou must be !"

TRINITY OF THE DEITY.

TRINITY OF THE DEITY.

The doctrine of the Trinity of the Deity is a profound Mystery, and is inexplicable to the finite mind, and must ever remain so, for the reason that the finite cannot comprehend the infinite. Men have convened in council and formulated what is called the "Athanasian Creed," and as the result of their deliberations have given to the world the following utterances, viz. : " There is one person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost.

"The Father is God and Lord, the Son is God and Lord, and the Holy Ghost is God and Lord ; but yet there are not three Gods and Lords, but one God and Lord ; because, as we are compelled by Christian verity to confess each person singly God and Lord, so we are forbidden by the Catholic religion to say three Gods or three Lords."

Now it is evident from the apparent incongruities contained in this creed that its authors did not fully understand the subject, for they tell us there are three separate, distinct personalities in the Godhead, and yet these three are one, — a manifest incongruity, if not an absurdity. The Word of God does not teach that there are three distinct, separate personalities in the Godhead, but One, the I Am (Jehovah) (Eph. iv. 4-6). " There is one body, and one Spirit, one Lord, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all." That is, oneness with three essentials of nature, or with three Hypostatic manifestations, viz., Father, Son, and Holy Spirit ; that is, three subsistences, not three Metaphysical existences ; for if there be three personal, metaphysical existences there must be three Gods, which is contrary to the plain teaching of the Scriptures. The passage in 1 John v. 7, " There are three that bear record in heaven, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost," is conceded by the best Biblical scholars to be an interpolation (which in the revised version is omitted), and does not affect what we have said. Christ, when in the flesh, although having a dual nature, viz., the human and divine, was God manifested in the flesh (1 Tim. iii. 16), and we are told in Col. ii. 9, " In Him dwelt

TRINITY OF THE DEITY. 2 l

all the fulness of the Godhead Bodily." Christ, in speaking of His divinity to His disciples, tells them that " I and my Father are one" (John x. 30). John xiv. 8, 9: "Philip said unto him, Show us the Father and it sufficeth us." He replies, " Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? He that hath seen me hath seen the Father."

These are words too plain to admit of any doubt as to His divinity. But some will say, Did not He use the term My Father, and your Father, My God, and your God, when speaking of Himself to His disciples ? Yes ; but it was His human speaking to His divine, as instanced in His prayers in Gethsemane, and in the agonies of the cross, when He broke forth in the exclamation, " My God, why hast thou forsaken me;" and after having accomplished His mediatorial work, Glorified His human (John xvii. 5; xiii. 31, 32), and ascended to His throne of Glory, which He had with the Father before the foundation of the world.

Now, although we may not be able fully to comprehend the mystery of the Godhead, yet we may by the analogies in nature get a faint glimpse of

God in His works ; for there is running through all the creation of God in nature an analogy with the spiritual, as St. Paul tells us in Rom. i. 20 : " For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead!'

Now if we interpret invisible things to mean spiritual things, and things that are made material things, we see clearly that we can understand spiritual things by material things, and we shall see, if we examine into the nature of material things, a close analogy to spiritual things.

Thus a few examples will show us that every perfect thing in nature which God has made is constituted of three elementary principles or laws, whether animate or inanimate.

Beginning at the lowest order, that which is called inanimate matter, we have Solids, Fluids, Gas ; rising one step higher to what is called animate nature, — the tree or fauna of the earth, — the trunk, sap, flower or fruit; ascending one step higher into the animal kingdom (man, for instance), Body, Soul, and Spirit ; then in the do-

TRINITY OF THE DEITY.

main of Metaphysics (mental faculties), feeling, thought, and will. In sound there are three concordant chords, viz., fundamental, the third, and fifth, by the transposition of which all harmony is made. In color we find three primary colors, viz., Red, Yellow, and Blue, by the intermixture of which all colors are made.

The atmosphere we breathe has a triplicity of elements, viz., Oxygen, Hydrogen, • and Nitrogen ; Electricity, Positive, Negative, and the Electric Spark. The whole universe is controlled by three forces, viz., Centripetal, Centrifugal, and Equilibrium, or Attraction, Repulsion, and Equilibrium.

Thus we might go on multiplying analogies through all created things, showing there is a trinity in every thing in nature up to Nature's God. We submit, do not the foregoing thoughts aid us in some measure to comprehend the Trinity of the Godhead ?

Would it not be strange if God were not reflected in His works, and does not the Scripture we have quoted from — Rom. i. 20 — clearly teach us that we can understand the spiritual by material things, even somewhat of the mystery of the Trinity of the Godhead, — Father, Son, and Holy Spirit ?

MYSTERIES OF GODLINESS.

We repeat, there is in the Trinity of the Godhead oneness, with three essentials of nature, or a trinity of Hypostatic Subsistences, corresponding to the constitution of man, viz., Body, Soul, and Spirit, which without either essential would not be man. Man cannot perform any act without the concurrent function of the three essential elements of his nature. If we consider man in his spiritual nature we still have three essentials, viz., feeling, thought, and will ; without the concurrence of these three no action or result would follow and he would be a nonentity.

Christ's method of imparting spiritual instruction to His disciples was by parables drawn from nature (Matt. xiii. 10, n): "And the disciples came, and said unto him, Why speakest thou unto them in parables? He answered and said unto them, Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given." And we hold that it is the privilege of every disciple of Christ to know the mysteries of Godliness if he applies himself to earnest and prayerful study of God's Word. " For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance ; but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken awayeven that he hath."

Prof. T. Christleib, of Bonn Theological University (to whom we are under obligation for some of the thoughts in the foregoing article), has given an excellent summary of the Trinitarian doctrine of Scripture in his work on " Modern Doubt," which in closing this dissertation we copy verbatim :

"The Trinitarian doctrine of Scripture is briefly this : The Father is simply God, the God, the divine Subject, the Source and well-spring of the Godhead, of both Son and Holy Spirit ; the Son is God, true God, in Hypostatic distinction, though derived from the Father; and the Spirit is also truly God, in a form which is predicated of the whole divine nature, for God is a Spirit (John iv. 24), and the Lord is the Spirit (2 Cor. iii. 17), but also in Hypostatic distinction from the Father and the Son, by whom He is sent and from whom He proceeds. There is, therefore, at once the most essential unity and a threefold Hypostatic distinction. The divine nature remains undivided; the whole Godhead is in the Son, and in the Holy Spirit, — in the Son {Logos) as God's own self, utterance, and in the Spirit as the divine self-consciousness. And as the Son is the uttered thought of the Father concerning Himself, so it is again His office to speak out into the world the Father's thoughts of creation and redemption, and thus to stand to the creatures generally, and especially to mankind, in an original archetypal relation (John i. 4). And finally, as the Son is thus the archetypal and ideal principle of mediation between God and the world, of creation and of redemption, so the Holy Spirit is the real or efficient principle, affecting and individualizing all the creative and redemptive energies of the Father and the Son, applying, for instance, to each individual believer the Justification ideally (i.e., in the idea or thought of God) accomplished by the Son, and so effecting a real sanctifkation and regeneration (Eph. ii. 18; I Cor. xii. 3), in which process He takes, indeed, everything from the Son, the real and actual having always the ideal and transcendant for its ultimate eround and condition."

IMMORTALITY OF THE SOUL.

2/

IMMORTALITY OF THE SOUL.

Every thoughtful and observant mind must have noticed everywhere in nature a most marvellous, persistent struggle for life. We see this exemplified from the lowest form of life in nature to the highest. How tenaciously the lichen clings to the barren rock, or the sponge to the bottom of the sea. Ascending to the seed-germ, how careful has the Author of all life provided against the destruction of the life-germ by encasing the seed in a cyst or shell, as is seen in a grain of wheat, th,e acorn, or the chestnut. So securely is the life-germ protected that a grain of wheat enwrapped in the cerements of the mummy for three thousand years, when planted in the ground, has germinated and reproduced its kind as well as if it were only a year old. In the animal kingdom we see the same instinctive and persistent struggle for life. We notice, furthermore, that the lower animals are happy and satisfied in their condition of life. They have all their instinctive cravings gratified, and are as happy and contented as it is possible to be in their sphere of life.

Not so with man ; he is peculiar to himself, discontented and dissatisfied in this life, and if there be no life beyond, he is of all God's creatures most miserable.

There is a universal aspiration in the breast of man for immortal life, whether Christian or pagan, as we see exemplified in the various races of man. The ancient Egyptians, believing in a future existence of the soul after the death of the body, built Pyramids, and embalmed the body with great care, so that it might endure for ages, agreeably to their belief that the soul would after thousands of years return to the body. There is no doubt the Pharaohs built the Pyramids to serve as secure places of sepulture for the bodies of the kings. The sacrifices of the pagans to propitiate their idol gods prove their belief in the future existence. The untutored savage has his belief in his future hunting-grounds. So we say there is an innate belief in a future state of existence which is universal to man, and we have Scripture for this assertion, as we read in Eccl. iii. 2, u God has set the world [i.e., Eternity] in our hearts,"

and, we repeat, if death ends all, man of all God's creatures is the most miserable, and his life is a failure, and of all the rest of God's creatures comes short of his expectations in not fulfilling his innate and instinctive aspirations, which would be a libel on his maker. For if all the other creatures of God are fulfilling their destiny to complete and perfect satisfaction, can it be possible that man, made in the image of his maker, should be the only exception in God's creation who should come short? Impossible ! It would be a libel on God's goodness and wisdom to suppose such an anomaly. Can it be possible that God has set in our hearts the idea of immortal life for the purpose of deceiving us ? The very thought of such a thing is blasphemy against God.

It has been said that the sacred Scriptures do not give us any reliable information or positive proof of the immortality of the soul. This we hold to be a mistake. The Bible all through, from Genesis to Revelation, recognizes and treats of the spiritual world as an accepted reality, and, in fact, the only real reality is spirit life. " God (Spirit) created the Heavens and the Earth," as we have endeavored to

3*

MYSTERIES OF GODLINESS.

show at length in our article on " Christ's Resurrected Body,'* which the reader is referred to in this connection. But let us see if we cannot adduce some specific texts which will throw light more especially on this subject. First, we make mention of that memorable occasion when Christ took with Him three of His disciples, Peter, James, and John, as witnesses up the mountain where He was transfigured, and there appeared Moses and Elijah, who conversed with Him concerning His decease, which He was to accomplish at Jerusalem. Now, is this not a positive proof of the immortality of the soul ? Moses and Elijah had been dead many centuries before this appearance on the Mount of Transfiguration, and yet we are told by three reliable witnesses that they conversed with Christ, and were recognized as the veritable Moses and Elijah, — Moses as the representative of the Law, Elijah the representative of the Prophets, and Christ the fulfilment of the Law and the Prophets ; all three in consultation concerning the great work of salvation being wrought out through Jesus Christ. Here we have a remarkable instance of the natural and the spiritual worlds in conjunction. Will any one say this was a myth ?