The Golden Rule in Business Dealings

QUESTION: A has a mortgage on B's farm, which he forecloses, and C bids it in at the public sheriff's sale and pays the debt, principal and, interest, getting the farm a little less than its value. Should C pay this little less to B?

ANSWER: The Golden Rule would seem to require it, especially if B's failure to pay arose from providential circumstances, such as sickness, or losses by fire or flood, or an unusual scarcity of money at the time of the auction, diminishing the number of bidders and perhaps excluding competition. Many considerations are to be regarded in such a case.

— Steele's Answers pp. 167, 168.

Leaving a Seeker at the Altar?

QUESTION: Is it proper for a Christian to lead a seeker to the altar and leave him there without trying to help him find salvation?

ANSWER: It is supposed that the preacher or evangelist is more competent to give the required instruction. It is sometimes true that the seeker is confused by advices from several persons. If the seeker is mature, self­possessed, and well acquainted, with the Gospel, it may be better to leave him alone with nothing to divert his attention from the Saviour whom he is seeking. If the seeker is young and timid, the person who has led him should kneel near him to pray for him audibly or silently, as the case may require. Many persons have been hindered more than helped by misleading advice at the altar, such as "believe that you are saved, in order to be saved," or believe this or that Scripture and you are saved, instead of "Submit to God and receive his Son as both Saviour and Lord," and keep at it till "the Spirit cries in the heart Abba, Father."

— Steele's Answers pp. 166, 167.

The Personal Devil

QUESTION: I cannot harmonize the existence of the personal devil with the goodness and omnipotence of God. Can you help me?

ANSWER: Your difficulty arises from several erroneous conceptions: (1) That the moral government of God is an appropriate sphere for the exercise of physical omnipotence. Free agency excludes it, having no more relation to it than the eye has to a symphony and the ear has to a rainbow, and an earthquake has to the shaping of a geometrical demonstration. A free agent is the first cause of his own moral acts. God can prevent the evil choice of a free agent only by uncreating him. (2) The devil is one personality. The scriptures teach that there is a multitude of evil spirits. (3) That the evil one, or the combination of fallen spirits, is omnipotent is a great mistake. (4) That Satan is omnipresent, because temptation to sin is going on everywhere at the same moment. For aught that we know the tempters may outnumber the tempted, a legion (6,000) besieging one soul (Mark 5:1, 15), the name Satan or devil being conceptually applied to the whole number, because our minds in this way more easily and vividly wield the total of bad spirits. Davenport, the ablest theologian of all the New England Fathers, in his catechism thus answers the question, "What is the devil?"

The multitude of apostate angels which, by pride, and blasphemy against God, and malice against man, became liars and murderers, by tempting him to that sin.

Eliminating from your mind these errors there is no more difficulty in believing that evil spirits exist in the spiritual realm than that they exist in the physical realm. It is true that a man may be drawn away by his own lust; but this does not explain the temptations of Christ. He talked with wicked spirits, not with something impersonal.

— Steele's Answers pp. 165, 166.

Reading the Bible Systematically

QUESTION: I have been reading my Bible in a haphazard. way without getting as much good as I ought. Tell me how I can read it in a better way.

ANSWER: Get the American Standard Revised Bible, with maps and index to them. Locate every place you find in your reading. This will give you a sense of reality. When you begin a book get a synopsis of its contents by reading the headlines at the top of the pages. Then rapidly read the book through, and afterwards review such portions as most interest you, studying the various marginal readings and turning to the references. There is no easy way to a thorough knowledge of God's Word. If you do not find sufficient nutriment to your spiritual life in Ecclesiastes, alternate that book with John's Gospel, which is to be read in the same way. Read in both the Old Testament and the New daily. Have a Bible dictionary at hand to answer many questions respecting persons, places and doctrines which will arise in your mind. Don't be discouraged because of your slow advancement.

— Steele's Answers pp. 164, 165.

Is Perfect Love Real?

QUESTION: When I quoted to my pastor I John 2:5 and 4:18 he said "There is no such a thing as perfect love." What shall I say to him?

ANSWER: Tell him for me that he assumes that he is wiser than John and that a light so much brighter than the beloved apostle ought not to be kept under a bushel but on the world's candlestick. For John did not know any better, after leaning on the bosom of Jesus, than to teach that there is such a glorious reality as perfect, i.e., pure, love shed abroad by the Holy Spirit in the heart of him who exercises an all-surrendering faith in Jesus Christ as both Savior and Lord. If this is a chimera, those Christians who are chasing it ought to know it, but as it is a blessed verity, let it be proclaimed from the house-top in trumpet tones by every herald of the Gospel.

— Steele's Answers p. 164.

How to Treat False Teachers (2 John 10)

QUESTION: How can we apply in practice II John 10, "If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him Godspeed"?

ANSWER: Have no fellowship with those teachers, who deny the very fundamentals of Christianity, such as the reality of Christ's body, making it a phantom, a sham, as in verse 7; for such a religious leader "is a deceiver and an antichrist." Both the first and second epistles of John are aimed directly at this gnostic error called docetism. Its teachers were not only false in faith, but corrupt in morals, not fit to be entertained by any Christian family. To sympathize with such leprous leaders is to become "a partaker in their evil works." The idea of leadership is in verse 9 correctly translated, "whosoever goeth onward" (R. V.) as a teacher, or leads others, etc.

— Steele's Answers p. 163, 164.

In What Sense Did John Remain Until Jesus' Coming?

QUESTION: Explain John 21:22, "Jesus saith unto him (Peter), 'If I will that he (John) tarry till I come, what is that to thee?'"

ANSWER: The passage is designedly obscure. It may mean it is none of Peter's business if Christ should let John live on the earth till Christ should come to judge the world and wind up its history. This erroneous interpretation, "went forth among the brethren." I prefer to understand the words, "till I come," to mean the coming of Christ in the destruction of Jerusalem in A. D. 70, at least twenty years before John's death (Matt. 24:80-34; 16:28; 10:28). But some writers think this "coming of Christ" was his special manifestation of himself to John in Rev. 1:12-20.

— Steele's Answers p. 163.

Punctuation in Matthew 19:28

QUESTION: How can we follow Christ "in the regeneration," as stated in Matt. 19:28, since he was never regenerated?

"And Jesus said unto them, 'Verily I say unto you, That ye which have followed me, in the regeneration when the Son of man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.'" (KJV)

ANSWER: The querist has failed to note the punctuation marks. When the commas are properly noted, it will be found that our Lord Jesus assures his disciples that "In the regeneration (the evangelized world) when he shall sit, etc., then they who had followed him should also sit," etc. This predicts the great honor and authority of the twelve apostles when the gospel shall have reconstructed the human society. The earlier edition of the American Bible Society had no comma after "me," but all the later editions are correct.

— Steele's Answers p. 162.

Holiness Sects

QUESTION: Some one enumerates thirty-two sects or sorts of holiness people. How is this to be accounted for?

ANSWER: Sects are liable to be formed wherever there is perfect religious liberty, and even where such liberty is very much restricted, or is non-existent, as in the Papal Church, where the various orders antagonize one another, the Jesuits exterminating the Jansenists. When professors of holiness come out from the various denominations, they find it easy to come out of the new organization for some trifling cause, much to the detriment of the glorious doctrine of Christian perfection.

— Steele's Answers p. 162.

Will We Know People in Heaven?

QUESTION: Have we any Bible proof that we shall know father and mother as such in heaven?

ANSWER: No. It has not pleased the Holy Spirit in the Revelation of spiritual truth to give us any light on this subject. But we have good ground for the inference that we shall recognize our earthly friends. Our heavenly Father, we are quite sure, will not deny us any lawful felicity. We cannot think that death will destroy our natural sensibilities, our capacity to enjoy sweet Christian fellowship. In Col. 1:28, Paul's ambition to present every hearer "perfect in Christ" implies his expectation that he will know them in the world to come. We do not believe in the heathen idea borrowed by Milton from Greek mythology:

"Lethe, the river of oblivion rolls
Her wat'ry labyrinth, which whoso drinks
Forgets both joy and grief."

— Steele's Answers pp. 161, 162.