Real Trust in Christ

There are many persons who seek the pardon of their sins who do not find that great blessing. There are various reasons; but the chief one lies in the fact that the unsuccessful seekers do not really trust in Jesus Christ. They are told to trust, and they try, and they think that they do, but they are mistaken. The truth is, that saving faith is possible only in a certain state of mind. There is a divinely prescribed and irreversible order of duties: first, repent; and secondly, believe. When a sinner feels that he is lost, and loathes his sins, he is more than half saved. Trust in Christ for forgiveness is possible only to one who realizes his utter helplessness.

— Mile-Stone Papers, Part 1, Chapter 10.

Christian Perfection is Not Adamic Perfection

QUESTION: Is Christian Perfection, as set forth by Wesley, Adamic?

ANSWER; No. It does not make us as perfect as Adam was before he sinned and impaired his own nature and that of all his descendants. Such diminished capacities and crippled powers as we have we are to consecrate fully to God, trusting in Jesus Christ. This gift of ourselves God accepts as a perfect offering and fills us with his love. Our perfect love responsive to his great love he accepts as the fulfillment of his law, through the merit of the atonement made by his adorable Son.

— from Steele's Answers pp. 96, 97.

Are We Responsible for Original Sin?

QUESTION: Are we not responsible for inbred sin?

ANSWER: I cannot he responsible for any inborn quality. But when I find that there is a perfect cure in the blood of Christ and I prefer the disease to the cure, I become responsible for the continued existence of the inherited evil tendency. The whole Christian world from before the days of Jerome down to Wesley inclusive believed in the guilt of the original sin, that we all sinned in Adam and deserve punishment for Adam's sin and that we cannot plead an alibi, i.e., that we were elsewhere. This doctrine which has perplexed Christians and clouded the character of God 1,500 years, came from a mistranslation of Rom. 3:12, "in whom all have sinned," instead of "in that we all sin" (sooner or later), all except the Son of man. This mistake is, in the earliest Latin Version, and was copied by Jerome in the Vulgate, guilt of "original sin" became fixed in the theology of the church from which it descended into some reformed churches, especially those of the Calvinian type.

— from Steele's Answers pp 94, 95.

Anger

QUESTION: Explain Eph. 4:26, "Be ye angry, and sin not; let not the sun go down upon your wrath."

ANSWER: In the presence of wrongdoing, if we are Godlike, we must feel such displeasure as he feels (Rom. 1:18). Hence there is a sinless anger, an adverse emotion in view of any injustice or falsehood demanding the punishment of the wrongdoer in the interest of good order and righteousness, not of personal ill will. This feeling, though consistent with uninterrupted perfect love, has its perils, if it becomes chronic and settles into a grudge. The being angry without sin presupposes that the heart is not embittered, but remains appeasable. To secure this feeling let not the anger be carried over into the following day. Have a faith that leaves the matter with God, as Paul exhorts us in Rom. 12:19, for the first time correctly translated in the American Version, "Avenge not yourselves, beloved, but give place unto the wrath of God, for it is written, Vengeance belongeth unto me." The truth is that anger in human hearts is like a razor in the hands of a baby. The sooner it is handed over to the child's father the better for it. A negro woman complained to her pastor of the ill treatment she was suffering by her husband. When asked whether she had applied the Scriptural cure of heaping coals of fire on his head (Rom. 12:20), she replied, "No, but I have tried pouring hot water on him, but it made him all the worse." There is much good sense in Wesley's note: "If ye are angry, take heed ye sin not. Anger at sin is not evil; but we should feel only pity to the sinner. If we are angry at the person, as well as the fault, we sin. And how hardly do we avoid it!"

— from Steele's Answers pp. 95, 96.

Saved Without Baptism?

\QUESTION: How can the Friends or Quakers be saved when they do not believe in baptism?

ANSWER: It is not a saving ordinance, but a willful neglect of it indicates a spirit of disobedience which is a bar to salvation. But the Friends have no such disobedient spirit. Their difficulty is not in their hearts but in their heads. They believe in baptism, not water baptism, but that of the Holy Spirit, the reality of which water baptism is only a symbol. They say, "Why should I be concerned about the shadow while I have the substance?" Let us be charitable toward the mistake of the Christians.

— from Steele's Answers p. 94.

The Mountain-top Saints

The faith which is the required condition of being lifted into the higher regions of Christian experience is possible only to a soul whose obedience has reached the point of entire surrender to the will of God, where there is a willingness to walk to Calvary with the fainting Christ, and to be crucified with Him. Then, and then only, will the Christ-life take the place of the old self-life, enabling the believer to adopt St. Paul's words: "I have been crucified with Christ; alive no longer am I, but alive is Christ within me." [Meyer]

Faith Includes Obedience

The fact that genuine faith always includes obedience is a sufficient answer to the sceptic's objection that salvation is made to hinge upon a bare intellectual act, without reference to the character of the agent. It is just the opposite. It is an act of submission to the highest authority in the universe — an act which tends to conserve its moral order, by enthroning the moral law in universal supremacy. A singular confirmation of the truth of these remarks is found in the Greek Testament, where ἀπείθεια, unbelief, is frequently used to signify disobedience and obstinacy. The unbelief for which men are to be everlastingly condemned lies in the rebellious attitude of the will toward Jesus Christ, and not in any supposed innocent intellectual inability to believe the truth of God's word.

— from Mile-Stone Papers, Chapter 9.

On Galatians 5:17

QUESTION: Explain Galatians 5:17, "For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit and the Spirit (strives) against the flesh; for these are contrary one to the other; that ye may not do the things that ye would."

ANSWER: Flesh is used in a bad sense for evil inclinations. Hence the Holy Spirit after regeneration resists such evil tendencies which still cling to the newborn soul. This produces an inward conflict, the Spirit trying to keep the man from doing wrong and the flesh striving to hinder those Christian acts to which the Spirit prompts. The Revision eliminates the "cannot" which has no place in the Greek, for God's grace superabounds where sin has abounded. 

— Steele's Answers p. 93. 

The First Throb of Spiritual Life

QUESTION: In Revelation 2:4, what is signified by first-love?

ANSWER: The love of God shed abroad in the heart when he first savingly trusts in Jesus. Christ, awakening responsive love which is the first throb of spiritual life, Strange indeed is the fact that backsliders generally deny and decry this experience as a mere spasm of excited sensibilities.

— Steele's Answers p. 93. 

Does God Foreknow Who Will Be Saved?

QUESTION: Does God foreknow who will be saved and who will be lost?

ANSWER: There are two answers, [1.] yes, but this foreknowledge in no way causes this ultimate fact. There is nothing causative in knowledge of things present, past or future. These divisions of time are an eternal now with God. The second answer is [2.] no; God knows only what is knowable. The non-existent is not knowable. The future free moral choices of men in probation are non-existent. This is the doctrine of the late Professor McCabe, who published a book on the Divine Nescience. Bishop Taylor and some others had the same opinion. It seems difficult to reconcile it with the prediction of future events which are decided by free agents. Moreover it greatly circumscribes omniscience and seemingly detracts from God's infinitude. For these reasons most theologians reject it, preferring the first answer.

— Steele's Answers pp. 92, 93. 

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EDITOR'S NOTE: The more things change the more they stay the same. Astute readers will recognize the first of these answers as Molinism, and the second answer as Open Theism — still the alternatives in Arminian Christian theology to this day — though Open Theism has gained increasing support. It is interesting to me that Steele can cite, even in his day, supporters of the Open Theist view.