Christ Dwelling in the Heart

"...and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith...." (Ephesians 3: 17 NRSV)

It is instructive to note that Christ dwells only in the vital center of our being, not in the tongue, which would produce only a mouth religion, not in the hand, which would make a lifeless routine of works, but in the heart, which rules the tongue, the hands, and the feet, making them the instruments of a glad and willing service. He never takes up his abode in the brain alone; but it is his purpose, after taking possession of the heart, to extend his conquest to the head. To reverse this order would reduce Christianity to a theory instead of a joyful experience. Alas, too many have proved the truth of this declaration. A Christ flitting through the intellect now and then, gives no such repose of soul as the Christ who becomes a permanent resident of the heart, year after year, and decade after decade. The beauty of this is that he who carries him through life will have his presence in death. A good lady in a love-feast once said, "I mean to carry heaven with me through life, then I shall be sure of it at the end of my journey."

The door through which Christ comes in and takes up his abode in the heart is faith. Faith widens the soul so that more and more can be grasped. It has been said that "more depends upon taking in faith than upon giving and doing in love. For the more we take of the fullness of God, the more we can live." Faith is the inner man's vision, his reason, and his light. Such faith is possible when the heart is purified of sin. Then the eye is purged of film. The pure in heart see God. Only they have a spiritual perception which makes him real.

— Half-Hours with St. Paul and Other Bible Readings Chapter 4.

"What Shall I Do, Lord?"

Paul's first recorded prayer, Acts 22:10, "What shall I do, Lord?" is the keynote of his whole Christian life-activity and not a selfish quietism. It indicates that he did not have that conception of the new birth in which the sinner is passive or rather, passive in fulfilling its conditions. That form of piety in which the Christian devotes himself exclusively to coddling himself, to constant morbid introspections of frames and feelings, will not be found in the writings of St. Paul. We are not so much inclined to this error as were many medieval Christians, who were taught that a soul which desires supreme good must remove, not only all sensual pleasures, but also all material things, silence every impulse of its mind and will, and be concentrated and absorbed in God; and that the monastery was most favorable for this result. Self-surrender to God is requisite to the stature of the fullness of Christ; but it must always be accompanied by perfect self-sacrifice for the salvation of our fellow-men. Love must be made perfect in both its Godward and manward aspects. It is a good omen when people are converted with the idea that salvation means vigorous, ceaseless work for others, and joining the church is enlisting in an army in front of an appalling rebellion.

— Half-Hours with St. Paul and Other Bible Readings Chapter 3.

Five Thousand Converts?

QUESTION: Explain Acts 4:4, "And the number of the men was about 5,000."

ANSWER: The Am. Revision has, "came to be about 5,000." This has been understood as the sum total of adult male believers up to that date, for the Greek word for men excludes women and children. The 20th Century version reads thus: "The number of men alone mounted up to some five thousand." But there are very eminent scholars  who  say that there was on that day a fresh accession of 5,000 men exclusively. This view is held by such as Chrysostom, Jerome, and. Augustine. The Greek verb, "came to be," instead of "was," seems to be against this interpretation.

—  Steele's Answers p. 140, 141.

Church Fairs and Auctions

QUESTION: Is it right to support the church of Christ by fairs, entertainments and auction sales?

ANSWER: No. It is derogatory to the Gospel by making the impression on the world that it is not of itself alone worth supporting. The lack of money requisite to the maintenance of Christian worship arises from three causes: (1) Little or no love of Christ. (2) Pride prompting the building of edifices too costly for the people to pay for and to maintain. (3) Selfishness requiring the entire services of a preacher and unwilling to be part of a circuit as in olden times in America and as in England now. (4) Often questionable devices are used in fairs to get money. The Scotch preacher intimates this in his pulpit notice: "We very much need more 'siller' (silver) and have tried hard to get it honestly and have failed; so we have decided to hold a fair."

— Steele's Answers p. 140.

Should People Be Compelled to Do Right?

QUESTION: Is  it in accord with a sanctified life to compel people in a public place to do right, when they are not willing to do right otherwise?

ANSWER: True virtue must be free; it cannot be compelled. But decent behavior in a public meeting may be righteously required by calling on the police in the last resort, and both the preacher and the police who collars the disturber may be entirely sanctified.

— Steele's Answers p. 139, 140.

Sin as a State or Condition

QUESTION: Give Scripture references where sin is used to designate a state or condition and not an act.

ANSWER: Rom. 3:9, "they are all under sin," as explained in verses 10-18. Verses 10-13 inclusive denote a state, as also verse 18. Rom. 6:1, "continue in sin." Here the verb implies a state. The next verse, "we who died to sin, how can we any longer live therein?" The words "live therein" must relate to a state of sin rather than an act. Sin is sometimes used to denote the source whence the evil acts proceed; hence II Thess. 2:3, "man of sin," a man in such a condition that he seems unable to live without sin; also Rom. 5:21, 6:12, "Sin reigned." Here Paul is thinking of sin as a state which he personifies, as he does in Rom. 7:23 and 8:2, "law of sin." The same is true of Rom. 6:6, "in bondage to sin." Christ conceives of sin as a condition in John 8:34, "the bond servant (Greek, slave) of sin."

— Steele's Answers p. 139.

Is Baptism Necessary to Salvation?

QUESTION: Does this verse teach that water baptism is necessary to salvation, "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved"?

ANSWER: The rest of the verse (Mark 16:16), "but he that disbelieveth shall be condemned," makes unbelief the sole cause of condemnation. Water baptism is not saving, but contempt of it is damning. An involuntary absence of it, as in the case of the thief converted on the cross, cannot be the ground of condemnation.

— Steele's Answers pp 138, 139.

Why Do Pastors Stand to Pray?

QUESTION: Why is it that so many preachers stand when they pray?

ANSWER: Some are of "the standing order," having been educated to pray in that posture, as were the ancient Jews and the modern Calvinists. It is said that the Puritans caught cold on Plymouth Rock and it settled in their knees. But this does not account for the stiff-kneed Methodist preachers. Some of them stand because, like Zaccheus, they are too short to be seen by the people, if they kneel behind the pulpit; others are embarrassed by having to stoop down to adjust the kneeling stool, and others think the pos­ture of the body is indifferent so long as they tell God that they come to him on the bended knees of their souls, "as though souls have knees!"

— Steele's Answers p. 138.

Should a Preacher Wear a Ring?

QUESTION: Is it right for a minister of the Gospel to wear a ring on his finger?

ANSWER: It is certainly not in good taste, nor does it seem to be Pauline for a man if it is forbidden to a woman. If it is a superfluity for a lady it is a super-superfluity for a gentleman, especially while pleading for money to feed the starving or to evangelize the heathen. It would not be right for me to be flourishing rings in the pulpit. The Lord has not "appointed me to be judge of my brother's conscience in this matter.

— Steele's Answers p. 138.

A Sorry Set of Christians

QUESTION: Explain I Cor. 14:40, "Let all things be done decently and in order."

ANSWER: "I should loth to minister to such a sorry set of Christians as were the Corinthians. Wrangling about Paul, Apollos and Cephas, full of envying and strife, running after false teachers, harboring an incestuous person without discipline, degrading the Lord's supper into a drunken banquet, giving to Paul constant sorrow, these Corinthians needed miracles to give them respectable title to the Christian name; and they so abused miraculous gifts by jealousy and contention that they turned their Sabbath assemblies into cabals of men and women, shouting, singing, praying, prophesying, pell-mell, without decency or order." These words of Dr. Joseph P. Thompson show why Paul gave this precept about becoming behavior in public worship.

— Steele's Answers p 137.

Fit for Heaven?

QUESTION: If inbred sin is merely a hereditary tendency to sin, is the soul that is regenerated but without the experience of entire sanctification fit for heaven?

ANSWER; The new birth entitles to the adoption of sons and to life everlasting. "If children, then heirs of God," etc. Heirship gives the title, but does not give the complete fitness. This must be sought by the believer. If while seeking completed holiness he sud­denly dies, he is saved by virtue of the new covenant in which God promises to save all who perseveringly trust in him. The truth is, everyone who loves God in the first degree desires what John calls perfect love initiated by entire sanctification, and that this state of grace is the heritage of every infant cut off in infancy and of every soul born of God and called to Christ. This is an inference from all the promises made by a covenant-keeping God, and not a special revelation found in the Holy Scriptures which would almost certainly have been abused.

— Steele's Answers pp. 136,137.

Sancification and Regeneration in 1 John 1:9

QUESTION: Would not I John 1:9 alone, "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness," naturally teach entire sanctification when regenerated, to one who is free from all preconceptions?

ANSWER: Perhaps it would, if he had failed to note the prayers for the entire cleansing of those who are already children of God and the exhortations to Christians to go on unto perfection. But an observant Greek reader would understand from the two verbs of different meaning in the aorist tense that two distinct and decisive works are to be done. Even Alford, who is not friendly to the doctrine of Christian perfection as taught by his brother churchman, John Wesley, admits that "to cleanse from all unrighteousness is plainly distinguished from to forgive us our sins; distinguished as a further process; as, in a word, sanctification distinct from justification. The two verbs are aorists, because the purpose and faithfulness and justice of God are to do each as one great complex act — to justify and to sanctify wholly and entirely." He says, "to do each," not both together, as one great act. In 1737 the Wesleys discovered "that men are justified before they are sanctified."

— Steele's Answers p. 135, 136.

Entire Sanctification and Pentecost

QUESTION: Does not Acts 2:39 teach that the three thousand were entirely sanctified at Pentecost?

ANSWER: Acts 15:9 is an undoubted proof text of this experience in the case of the Apostles and other disciples. The fulness of the Spirit is sometimes emotional rather than sanctifying. This is often the case when the Spirit descends upon a multitude, filling them with joy, entirely sanctifying those who are aspiring after this grace and regenerating penitent seekers of pardon and convicting sinners. The spirit of adoption crying in the heart, "Abba, Father," fills the convert with a feeling of fullness. For these reasons, Wesley did not employ this phrase, "Fullness of the Spirit," to denote entire sanctification, although he used at least a score of synonymous terms to denote this experience.

— Steele's Answers p. 134, 135.

Job's Afflictions

QUESTION: How long did Job's afflictions last?

ANSWER: Our only means of knowing is to infer from the intensity of Job's sufferings that they continued only a few days or weeks at the most.

— Steele's Answers p. 134.

Infirmity and Weakness

QUESTION: What is the meaning of "infirmity" in (1) Rom. 8:26, "The spirit also helpeth our infirmity," and (2) II Cor. 12:9, 10, "Gladly will I glory in my weakness"?

ANSWER: (1) A lack of strength to endure the temptations and trouble of this life; (2) a consciousness of weakness which caused Paul to ally himself with Christ so that he could say "when I am weak then am I strong." "An infirmity," says Fletcher, "is consistent with pure love to God and man; but a sin is inconsistent with love. An infirmity is free from guilt, and has its root in our animal frame; but a sin is attended with guilt and in our moral frame, springing either from the habitual corruption of our hearts, or from the momentary perversion of our tempers. An infirmity has its foundation in an involuntary want of power; and a sin is a willful use of the present light and power we have."

— Steele's Answers p. 134.

The High Calling of the Preacher

The humblest pulpit is higher than the dome of any state house in our country, yea, higher than the Federal Capitol itself. "He that winneth souls is wise. They that are wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness, as stars for ever and ever."

Robert Hall once said that if two angels were sent down from heaven, one to sweep the streets of London and the other to be its lord mayor, they would not debate on the way the question, Which is the greater honor? All men are to be equally honored who equally fulfill their duty, whether to rock a cradle or to command the army at Gettysburg.

But to do as the God-man did when he preached up and down Galilee and Judea seems to be the most exalted occupation to which mortals can aspire. "I paint for immortality" was the reply of an artist who was asked why he lingered so long over one picture. The preacher who sways souls from sin to holiness preaches for eternity. His theme is the cross of Christ, the central point of human history. Scientific men may sneer at such a preacher as narrow because he confines himself to one theme, Christ crucified, not considering that this theme touches all human interests. It gives the amplest scope to mental, moral and spiritual development. The preacher may apply elevating and transforming truth to every state of society and to every subject of human thought. In God's ancient temple the layman could enter no farther than the court of the Jews, but the high priest could enter every apartment. The preacher is God's high priest in the temple of Christian truth to apply truth to all human transactions from the king on the throne to the beggar on the dunghill.

— Jesus Exultant Chapter 5.

What Language Did Jesus Use?

QUESTION: What language did Jesus use?

ANSWER: The Aramaic. The ancient name of Syria was Aram, the language of which was the northern branch of the Semitic, the tongue of the descendants of Shem. After the return from Babylon it was the dialect in which the Jews conversed and Jesus preached. The only remains of its literature in the Gospels are a few words in the New Testament: Talithacumi, ephphatha, Bethesda, Aceldama, Boanerges, and Bar-jonah. The Syriac and the Peshito versions very much resemble the Aramaic, as does the palimpsest of the Gospels recently discovered by two very learned and enterprising twin sisters, Mrs. Gibson and Mrs. Lewis, widows of Oxford professors.

— Steele's Answers pp. 133, 134.

The Biblical Proofs of Inbred Sin

QUESTION: What are the Biblical proofs of inbred sin or birth sin?

ANSWER: They are chiefly found in the Old Testament, such as Ps 51:5, "Behold I was brought forth in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me;" 58:3, "The wicked are estranged from the womb: they go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies." Job 15:14, "What is man, that he should be clean? And he that is born of woman, that he should be righteous?" Rom. 5:12-21 contains proofs that the effect of Adam's sin was universal. Eph. 2:3, "by nature children of wrath," has been considered a strong proof of original or inbred sin, but from the context we learn that Paul is describing adult, actual, responsible sinners, whom he deems worthy of punishment, expressed in the Hebrew idiom as "children of wrath." Richard Watson thought that John 3:6, "That which is born of the flesh is flesh," is the strongest proof of inbred sin to be found in the Bible. But scholars now study the meaning of words as used by different writers, and they agree that nowhere in John, and probably nowhere in the Gospels, is "flesh" used in a bad sense to denote depravity. "The flesh," says President Timothy Dwight, "is to be understood here in the physical, not in the moral, sense." "Flesh and spirit," says Westcott, "are not related to one another as evil and good; but as two spheres of being with which man is connected by the spirit of heaven, by the flesh to the earth."

— Steele's Answers pp. 132, 133.

John's Conception of Sin

QUESTION: Does the word "sin" in I John I:7, "cleanseth us from all sin," refer to an act or a state?

ANSWER: According to John's definition of sin, "sin is lawlessness," it may refer to either. Here it is quite evident that it refers to a state. In the next verse the phrase, "have sin," is peculiar to John, and it always implies an act entailing guilt. See John 9:41; 15:22, 24; 19:11. Another peculiarity of John is that he does not trace sin along the line of heredity up to Adam, as Paul does, but he ascribes it to the devil. "He that committeth sin is of the devil." In this particular John imitates Christ, who emphasizes not so much the source of sin as its guilt and its cure; not the origin of the conflagration, but how to put it out. John does not contradict Paul; he only traces sin one step further back to the first sinner in the universe.

— Steele's Answers p. 132.have

Every Christian Should Consider the Call to the Ministry

Our contention is that every disciple of Christ, male or female, should covet the Christian ministry and in this attitude of mind sit down to examine the question of a personal call. Thus Christian parents in prayer and consecration should offer their sons and daughters to the Head of the church for the best possible service in the establishment of his universal kingdom. Should one in every Christian family be accepted the world would not be overstocked with ministers of various kinds, pastors, evangelists, teachers and deaconesses proclaiming saving truth to all nations, peoples and tribes. Such is the present disproportion between the harvest and the laborers. Timothy was well prepared to be the successor to St. Paul in the care of the churches, because his mother Eunice and his grandmother Lois had diligently instructed him in Christian truth and dedicated him to the ministry of the gospel. Thousands have been trained in the theological seminary of a pious home. Bishop Simpson says that when an eminent preacher is needed the Lord first calls some praying mother, some Hannah to train her Samuel for the service of his holy temple. Others who have toiled all their lives in small churches in obscure places, unknown to fame, and others who have become world-renowned preachers, have come into the Christian ministry through the gateway of a mother's faith in God and careful spiritual training of her offspring.

It may not be an unpardonable infraction of the canons of sacred rhetoric for the writer of these lines to give this public expression of his gratitude to God for leading him into this sacred vocation through such a portal. In many instances the stars which are supposed to belong to the minister's crown rightfully belong to his faithful mother, some Monica wrestling with God for the conversion of her wayward Augustine, or some Susannah Wesley closeted weekly with each of her children in prayer and spiritual counsel. It is no wonder that from the nest which she builded and brooded in the humble Epworth manse there flew upward two eaglets till they were seen first by all England, then by all the world; the one "the greatest ecclesiastical organizer of a thousand years," and the other the writer of hymns for all the coming generations. If there were more of this offering children to God in the closet instead of sacrificing to the Moloch of fashion or of mammon, there would be fewer downfalls in the slippery paths of youth, and no scarcity of reapers in the ever-widening harvest field of the church of Christ.

— edited from Jesus Exultant (1899) Chapter 5.

All Christians are Called to Spread the Gospel

There is a sense in which every Christian, whether old or young, male or female, is called to preach the gospel. The first impulse of every regenerated soul is to run and tell the good news to others in the same family or neighborhood, shop or school. Andrew findeth Peter, and Philip, Nathaniel. On such informal but effective preaching, as on the wings of love and gladness, is the gospel of Christ to spread through all the world. Woe to that church which from month to month hears not the voice of the young convert in its assemblies. Its lease of life is short. God has no use for a sterile gospel. All may not be called to expound God's word or to define doctrines; but all are called to preach by example and testimony. Even the mutes are not excluded from this privilege and duty, for they can communicate with the slate and pencil, or with the dumb alphabet, and can all be persuasive by holy living.

The relation of experience is the most convincing preaching. A little girl of eight years came from her chamber to her mother, radiant with joy, and said, "Mother, God has pardoned my sins and given me a new heart; may I run across the street and tell the old cobbler?" "It will do no good, my child, for he is a confirmed and outspoken infidel," said the mother. "But it will do me good to tell him, and it may do him good, too; may I not go?" "Yes, if your heart is so much set on it." She went and told in artless simplicity of her sense of sin and guilt, of her repentant tears and prayers, of her trust in Jesus Christ who died to become her Saviour, of the light and joy which sprang up in her heart, of the feeling of love towards God, and of a voice sounding within saying, "Father, Father;" and whenever she thought of God he seemed no more like a policeman to arrest her, but a person more loving and tender than her mother. Before she finished her account of her joyful conversion her solitary hearer was in tears, which did not cease to flow until they were wiped away by the hand of divine mercy writing forgiveness on his believing heart.

When Paul rose to the summit of his eloquence, whether as a prisoner before Felix or Festus, or addressing the riotous Hebrews in their temple, he presented no elaborate chain of reasoning, but narrated in unadorned style his own experience of the transforming power which arrested him and, when he was obedient to the heavenly vision, made a new man of him when he had still in his pocket a commission to arrest and handcuff and drag to Jerusalem all the Hebrew disciples of Jesus found in Damascus.

Testifying of personal conscious salvation through faith is a kind of effective preaching to which all believers are called.

— edited from Jesus Exultant (1899) Chapter 5.

The Holy Spirit Never Denigrates Christ

The Holy Spirit never utters a word or prompts to an act derogatory to Christ. Since it is His office to glorify Christ, the Comforter will never degrade Him by denying or detracting from one of His claims. He professed to be an infallible Teacher, to be absolutely sinless, to set a faultless example, to have a right to universal obedience, to work miracles, to fulfill the prophecies, to be the Messiah of the Jews, the Light of the world, the Savior of men, the Son of God, in a sense so unique that He was the only-begotten; He declared that He would raise the dead, and judge the world; and, lastly, that He was one with the Father, having all power in heaven and on earth. The Paraclete is a mirror, wherein is reflected the image of the risen and invisible Jesus, as He truly is, without distortion. "The Spirit of truth which proceedeth from the Father, HE SHALL TESTIFY OF ME. . . He shall GLORIFY ME, for He shall receive of Mine and show (tell, Greek) it unto you." He never mars the symmetry of the God-man. "Wherefore I give you to understand that no man speaking by the Spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed" (I Cor. xii. 3). 

Hence it is an incontestable fact of Church history that every lapse from orthodoxy has been preceded by spiritual decay. The Holy Ghost leaves the Church before she can deny the lordship of Jesus her great Head. For proof of this, study the religious history of New England. "Every spirit that confesseth not Jesus Christ come in the flesh, is not of God." This is Dean Alford's version, who asserts that the PERSON of Christ, and not some fact pertaining to Him, is the object of the confession. Whatever that spirit is that denies one claim of Christ, or obscures one feature of His glorious likeness, as it beams upon us in the Gospels, we may be well assured that this spirit is not the Divine Limner who portrayed that likeness with the pen of the four evangelists. When Jesus is ranked with Buddha, Confucius, Zoroaster, and Mohammed, in the style of our modern free-religionists, we may feel certain that the Spirit of truth does not suggest this degrading classification.

— Mile-Stone Papers  (1878) Part 1, Chapter 22.

The Spirit's Guidance Agrees with Scripture

The Spirit's inward utterances are never contrary to His declarations in the Holy Scriptures. This is too obvious to require proof. If any so-called spiritual guidance is repugnant to the plain teachings of God's Word as interpreted by that universal agreement styled the analogy of faith, this professed guidance must be erroneous. We have no just grounds for the expectation that the Paraclete will open to the believer, independently of his acquaintance with the original tongues, commentaries, lexicons, and other critical aids, the treasures contained in the Bible, and pour them into his mind without danger of error. Nevertheless, a perfectly candid enquirer, putting his intellect under the guidance of the Spirit in unwavering trust, though he may make many mistakes in non-essentials, will infallibly be led to Christ, the sum and substance of all saving truth.

— Mile-Stone Papers (1878) Part 1, Chapter 22.

What are Evil Qualities?

QUESTION: Why do you teach that entire sanctification removes all evil qualities, as anger, envy, etc.?

ANSWER: We do teach that in Christ provision is made for the removal of all tendencies to sin per se. Anger is not a sin per se, for God is angry with the wicked, and there is such a paradox as "the wrath of the Lamb." In the interest of justice, every good citizen ought to be angry enough with criminals, burglars, highway robbers, murderers to thrust them out, to assist to secure their arrest, trial and punishment. Entire sanctification delivers from things sinful in themselves, such as pride, envy, jealousy, avarice, ingratitude, impurity, etc. There are tendencies toward sin in the natural appetites, hunger, thirst, sleep, marriage, which require watchfulness and restraint to keep them from sinful excess, "lest," in the language of Paul, "I should become a castaway."

— Steele's Answers p. 131.

Sanctification and Pentecost

The following letter, together with the printed article to which it refers, has been sent to the Question Box, with the suggestion that it be answered in a separate article:

---

"In the Evangelical Messenger, the organ of the Evangelical Association, of Oct. 5, the editor states that a minister says he recently heard a young preacher of said church in a sermon declare that the disciples did not receive the blessing of sanctification on the day of Pentecost, but simply the enduement of power for their great work. And that another young minister said we did not know when and where the disciples were sanctified. The editor in his article says the brother wishes to know whether this is correct teaching according to the Word of God and the standard of the church. In answering the question, he says the two young brothers were correct, and that he would like to see the Scripture proof to the contrary. He states that the Scripture did not definitely state anywhere, when and where any one of the twelve was entirely sanctified. He further says, many teach that this occurred on the day of Pentecost, that what the disciples received on that day was the blessing of entire sanctification. But he says: The Pentecostal blessing and the blessing of entire sancti6cation are entirely different; and that the teaching which makes the Pentecostal enduement identical with entire sanctification is slipshod, careless, lacks in preciseness and discrimination, and leads to much confusion. It, lowers the standard of entire sanctification, slurs over the great central principle of holiness, and switches the whole doctrine of sanctification into a groove where it does not fit.

"Now, I would like to know, through your paper, whether that is correct teaching.

"1. Is it a fact that the disciples were not entireh sanctified on the day of Pentecost ?

"2. If we don't know when and where they were sanctified, how do we know they were sanctified ?

"3. Is it correct that the Pentecostal blessing was simply an enduement of power, and not entire sancti- fication ?

"4. Is it true that the two blessings are entirely dis- tinct and different!

"I enjoy Bible holiness in my heart, and preach it wherever I go, and I would like to have these things explained for my benefit and the benefit of thousands of the readers."

---

We commend the spirit of both the letter and the article which has called it forth. Both writers are manifestly seeking to know the truth. A preliminary word should be said respecting the manner of Christian experience. We learn from books and from the lectures of some theological professors that both regeneration and entire sanctification are states of grace sharply defined, entered upon instantaneously after certain very definite steps, and followed by certain very marked results. But the young preacher soon learns that there are eminently spiritual members of his church whose experiences have not been in accordance with this regulation manner. They have passed through no marked and memorable crises. Hence they have no spiritual anniversaries. The young pastor is puzzled by these anomalies. At last, if he is wise, he will conclude that the books describe normal experiences to which the Holy Spirit does not limit itself, and that an abnormal method of gaining a spiritual change or elevation is by no means to be discounted.

1. In this question the article has been misapprehended. The writer's real doubt is that "the disciples were all sanctified wholly, at one and the same time," while the conditions are "almost wholly subjective and personal." It should be borne in mind that the ten days of waiting, prayer, and religious conference graphically described in Arthur's "Tongue of Fire" strongly tended to assimilate their different characteristics and peculiarities. The fact that the hearts of some of them were cleansed by faith — enough to be said, "The first shall be last, and the last shall be first." He will recognize many as having fulfilled his commandment, "Be ye perfect," who have not dared to use that great word, imagining that it excludes all errors, infirmities, and ignorances. Some such I have intimately known. When asked, "Are you enjoying perfected holiness?" they would say, "I am not sure." But when asked, "What would be your feeling if you should see the Son of God, the final Judge, descending on his great white throne?" they instantly reply, "I would fly to meet him half way, if possible." This absence of "all fear that has torment" is a proof positive of perfect love. It is the only adequate cause of such an effect. In estimating the number of the entirely sanctified in the Apostolic age, and in every other age since, we are not to be limited to those who have passed through an instantaneous experience, a memorable transition and uplift, though this is, as Wesley says, "infinitely desirable," while admitting that "this great work may be gradually wrought in some." Fletcher, the able expounder and eminent defender of this Wesleyan doctrine, says that "to deny that imperfect believers may and do gradually grow in grace, and of course that the remains of their sins may, and do, gradually decay, is as absurd as to deny that God waters the earth by the daily dews, as well as by thunder showers; it is as ridiculous as to assert that nobody is carried off by lingering disorders, but that all men die suddenly or a few hours after they are taken ill." Hence there was in John S. Inskip more than a spice of humor, there was a good sense and wise philosophy in his invitation to gradualists to come to the altar as seekers of perfected holiness, "Come, ye brethren and sisters who expect to attain this grace by degrees, come to the altar and get along a good bit to-day." Sometimes this "good bit" was the step that reached the prize.

Wesley studied a great variety of terms and phrases expressive of this experience, a good example for all its teachers. I have counted up twenty-six, but "the baptism of (or with) the Spirit," and "the fullness of the Spirit," are phrases not used by him, probably because there is an emotional fullness of a temporary nature, not going down to the very roots of the moral nature. Nor did he use "receiving the Holy Ghost," because "in a sense of entire sanctification" the phrase is not scriptural and not quite proper; for they all received the Holy Ghost when they were justified. Wesley did not, probably for the same reason, use "Pentecostal blessing" though Charles Wesley did in a letter to John, saying, "Your day of Pentecost is not fully come; but I doubt not it will; and you will then hear of persons sanctified as frequently as you do now of persons justified." Were John Wesley now living, I think he would express a deep sympathy with the closing sentences of the article under criticism and quoted at the end of the letter. I think that the best way to restore this doctrine to the evangelical pulpits is to begin by preaching on the offices of the Holy Spirit in convicting of sin and in the new birth and the witness of the Spirit direct and indirect, topics on which many Christian people are in lamentable ignorance. When any one has received the Regenerating Spirit, then is the time to instruct him respecting the Sanctifying Spirit and to urge that he be received by faith. We must be wise as serpents, studying the best way of presenting truths distasteful to prejudiced minds.

— Steele's Answers pp. 126-131.

Undoubted Knowledge of Spiritual Realities

We are promised a knowledge of salvation by the remission of sins. Paul speaks in emphatic condemnation of those who are never able to come to a knowledge of the truth. He is speaking not of an intellectual grasp of the truth, but of its spiritual realization. The English reader of the Pauline Epistles fails to discover the fullness and certainty of the knowledge of spiritual realities on which the apostle insists.

In his struggle of mind and strain of style to express the Christian's privilege of full and undoubted knowledge of spiritual realities he accumulates epithets which burden his sentences as in Col. ii. 2: "That their hearts might be comforted being knit together in love, and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the acknowledgment of the mystery of God and of the Father, and of Christ."

He employs the compound word ἐπίγνωσις (epignosis), full knowledge, when he wishes to be emphatic, instead of γνῶσις (gnosis), knowledge. Bishop Ellicott and Dean Alford authorize this strengthened translation in the following passages: Eph. i.17, "That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the full knowledge of Him;" Eph. iv. 13, "till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the (full) knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ;" "perfect knowledge of the Son of God;" Col. iii. 10, "renewed unto perfect knowledge after the image of Him that created him;" 1 Tim. ii. 4, "who willeth all men to be saved and come to the certain knowledge of the truth;" 2 Tim. iii. 7, "ever learning, and never yet able to come to the full knowledge of the truth." Peter uses the strengthened form in his Second. Epistle i. 8, "toward the perfect knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ."

— Mile-Stone Papers (1878) Part 1, Chapter 22.

The Inward Revelation of the Spirit

Christian experience, especially in its higher phases, abundantly testifies to the certitude of the inward revelations of the Comforter. The burden of this testimony, all along the Christian ages, is not that dogmatic truth is inwardly revealed, but that the facts of personal justification and entire sanctification, fundamental to complete Christian character, are disclosed to all who perfectly trust in Him who is able to save to the uttermost.

Nor will the attestation of these souls, who with Moses have trodden the Mount of God, and conversed with Him face to face in spiritual communion, be invalidated in the estimation of the wise, by the fact that they have been stigmatized as fanatics, Pietists, Lollards, Mystics, Waldenses, Quakers, and Methodists. For in this series of opprobrious nicknames we find the real apostolical succession, and not in an unbroken chain of prelatical ordinations. The martyr fires, which illumined the dark ages, conserved our spiritual Christianity against councils and inquisitions. What was the heresy of Tauler, Suso, Eckhart, Madame Guyon, Luther, and Wesley, but the manifestation of Christ to the believer, through the Holy Spirit, certifying forgiveness, renewing and sanctifying the soul.

Church Entertainments

QUESTION: Is it wrong for a person entirely sanctified to attend. church entertainments; if so, why?

ANSWER: The phrase "church entertainment" is a solecism, an impropriety of speech, a contradiction in terms — suggesting the idea of a conglomerate of the church and the theater, or the ball-room, or the card party. A pure heart desires a holy place for worship dissociated from fun and frolic. He wants to take his children on the Lord's day to a temple consecrated to God., where the very place will inspire reverence. This cannot be in the edifice where the children and youth often assemble for amusement. There seems to be an incongruity between purity of heart and the frivolities of the so-called church entertainments. Many of the public readings in them are so low as to awaken disgust in a person of refined taste, to say nothing of a holy heart. For these reasons the writer gives them a tremendous letting alone. They lead downward. and not upward. Right-down Christian earnestness eschews them. They prevent the coming of a revival and they kill the revival that has holcome.

— Steele's Answers pp. 125, 126.

Esau's Failed Repentance?

QUESTION: Explain Heb. 12:17: "For he (Esau) found no place of repentance, though he sought carefully with tears.

ANSWER: If the questioner had read this text in a Bible which is up to date, the American Revision, he would not have wasted his postage stamp and his time by sending to the Christian Witness for light, for that version sets an electric light in it, thus: "For he found no place for a change of mind in his father, though he sought it diligently with tears." Esau could not by his whimpering persuade the old gentleman to recall the decision which favored Jacob by giving him the birthright, the lawful inheritance of Esau. The Twentieth Century version is: "Indeed, he never found an opportunity for repairing his error, though he begged. for the blessing with tears."

— Steele's Answers p. 125.

Does John 6:48-58 refer to Holy Communion?

QUESTION: Does John 6:48-58 have reference to the Lord's Sup­per, especially these words, "except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood ye have not life in yourselves"?

ANSWER: To say that it does would make that rite absolutely necessary as a saving ordinance. In the formal institution of the holy eucharist a year afterwards, no such idea is suggested. The idea is that as the body contains the blood and the blood contains the life we must appropriate Christ's entire humanity in order to receive and maintain spiritual life. We obtain this life, not by eating the symbols, but by eating or appropriating Christ himself. This view is that of Origen, Basil the Great, Augustine, Calvin, Luther most emphatically, and. Wesley with less emphasis, saying, "It refers remotely, if at all, to the Lord's Supper," and such modern exegetes as Adam Clarke, Moses Stuart, Alford and Meyer. On the other side of this question are all the ritualistic sacramentarians, both Roman and Anglican. We regret to say that American Methodism is committed to the ritualistic and not the spiritual interpretation by this prayer in the communion service: "Grant us. . . so to eat the flesh of thy Son Jesus Christ and drink his blood that we may live and grow thereby." If American Methodism ever backslides so far as to become ritualistic, it will be through this unfortunate connection of these words with the Lord's Supper, which is not the source of life, but a means of grace, as everything is which brings Christ into our minds as our atoning Savior.

— Steele's Answers p. 123, 124.

Purgatory?

QUESTION: What do you think of the following: "If a man will not let the Holy Spirit burn his selfishness out of him in this life, it will have to be done in the next"?

ANSWER: This is the doctrine of the Roman Catholics, who have borrowed from Grecian paganism purgatorial fires for curable sinful souls. It is also the teaching of modern Universalism that all the souls unfit for heaven when they leave the body will be purified by a limited punishment and will then be admitted to the life everlasting. The Scriptural basis for this doctrine is lack­ing. There is not the remotest hint that the work of the Holy Spirit in the sanctification of believers can be done after death, nor is there anywhere in the Bible any intimation that saving faith in Christ, followed by the new birth, is possible after the spirit becomes disem­bodied. There is positive proof that the sentences on the day of judgment are final and irreversible. It is equally certain that repentance and regeneration do not take place between death and the resurrection, for Christ says, "they that have done evil shall come forth unto the resurrection of damnation." The idea that good men will arise from bad men's graves implies the possibility that wicked men may arise from graves in which righteous men were buried! This is preposterous. The extension of probation till the day of judgment might solve some theological difficulties, but it would greatly weaken, if not destroy, the motive to repentance in the present life. Nothing that we have here said con­tradicts the possibility of a believer aspiring after perfect purity finding on his death-bed. All persevering believers belong to the new covenant which insures not only heaven but a fitness for heaven as the gift of God in probation.

— Steele's Answers pp. 122, 123.

Are the Sacraments Life-Giving?

QUESTION: I have recently heard a preacher describe the sacraments as "life-giving." Is this correct?

ANSWER: They are not the source of life, but rather the means of grace through which, when used with faith in Christ, the Holy Spirit may impart and sustain life. Baptism is the outward sign of the Spirit's inward work The Lord's Supper is a memorial of Christ's great love manifested in voluntarily dying for us. Whatever brings this event vividly to the mind of the believer is a means of grace. We should beware of resting in the symbol instead of the thing signified. Thousands of ceremonialists are trusting for salvation in symbols instead of the Savior — in the shadow instead of the substance. The sacraments alone, though administered by priests who claim to be ordained by bishops in succession back to the apostles, are not saving. Only Christ saves.

— Steele's Answers p. 122.

Would the Incarnation Have Happened Apart From Human Sin?

QUESTION: If sin had not come into our world, would the Son of God have been incarnate? 

ANSWER: All along down the Christian ages there have been some theologians who have given an affirmative answer. They say that the incarnation was not con­tingent upon man's sin, but that it was the original pur­pose of God for the exaltation of the human race, pro­moting their highest spirituality and felicity. They, moreover, dislike the doctrine expressed by the "felix culpa" ("blessed be the sin") which brought God into man and man into God. To the writer the idea is very distasteful and repugnant, that sin has been beneficial to our race. Those interested in this question should read Bishop Westcott's essay, "The Gospel of Creation," in his commentary on the Epistles of St. John; 87 pages.

— Steele's Answers pp. 121, 122.

Unbelief and Doubt

QUESTION: My presiding elder teaches that all men have doubts at times, and that it is not a sin to doubt at times even the divinity of Christ and the existence of God. Is this so?

ANSWER: He probably told you that there is a great difference between unbelief and doubt. Unbelief, involving as it does a permanent wrong attitude of the will inconsistent with spiritual life, is always sinful; and doubt, not implying any fixed and wilful repugnance to saving truth, but rather a temporary suspense of the mind while investigating a theological proposition with a willingness to receive the truth, is not a sin. A man may doubt and yet live on the right side of his doubts. Bunyan tells us that Christian fell into the slough of despond and got out on the right side of his doubts, the side towards the celestial city; and that for a while he was in Doubting Castle, locked up in a cage. Neither of these experiences were destructive of his spiritual life, yet both have their perils. Your preacher should have told you that there is a perfect salvation from doubts on fundamentals. But perhaps he has not got so far in his personal experience as the full assurance of faith, the sure cure of doubt. This is a distinctively Christian privilege unknown to John the Baptist in Herod's dark prison, and to Elijah, his antitype, under the juniper tree. They were the greatest Old Testament saints. The weakest one in the kingdom of heaven opened on the earth on the Day of Pentecost is greater in privilege and experience. He may be entirely delivered from doubt on the fundamentals, and march with firm steps to the fires of martyrdom.

— Steele's Answers pp. 120, 121.

Looking Unto Jesus

The gospel scheme of keeping men from sinning is so peculiar that it never was conceived or dreamed of by mere human reformers. It is to commit the keeping of your soul wholly to another, even Christ. The attitude of the watchful soul is to be that of Peter's eyes when he first stepped from the ship upon the waters of the sea — LOOKING UNTO JESUS.

Philosophy says, "Eye well your deadly foes;" the Gospel says, "Eye Jesus only." Philosophy says , "Dispose of your enemies first, and look to Jesus afterward;" the Gospel says, "Look to Jesus first and last, and He will dispose of your foes."

Weakness, not strength, comes from a constant survey of the hosts in battle array against you. Power comes into the palsied arm when the eye turns wholly toward the Angel of Jehovah, who encampeth around about the believer. Philosophy says, "Grow strong by a downright grapple with the threatening foeman;" but the Gospel of the Old Testament, as well as that of the New, says, "THEY THAT WAIT UPON THE LORD SHALL RENEW THEIR STRENGTH."

The Rate of Divorce

QUESTION: One of the special contributors to the Christian Witness of Sept. 20 says: "As to the divorce evil, where one couple separate, there are five hundred that keep together." Is this true?

ANSWER: It may have been true when the contributor was a little boy, but it is far from the present ratio of divorces to marriages. In some of our States, every tenth marriage ends in a divorce, and in the whole United States the average is more than one in twenty. The very foundations of church and state and civilized society are being overturned. "If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?" says the Psalmist. It is reform or ruin. God help the nation to make wise choice and ministers of the Gospel to refuse to marry persons unscripturally divorced.

— Steele's Answers pp. 119, 120.

But, Don't Infants Need the New Birth?

QUESTION: If the necessity for regeneration is found in our fallen nature, do not infants need the new birth?

ANSWER: Certainly. But if cut off from life before becoming accountable, they are unconditionally saved by the second Adam from the wrong tendency entailed by the first Adam. If allowed to attain intellectual and moral development, the new birth is left to their free choice.

— Steele's Answers p. 119.

"Unrighteousness" in 1 John 5:17

QUESTION: Does the word unrighteousness in I John 5:17, "All unrighteousness is sin," refer to conduct or to a condition of heart?

ANSWER: It may include both, but it probably refers to some deed violating law and justice, or some marked failure to fulfill our duty one to another. Bishop Westcott thinks that it also includes sins which flow from human imperfection and infirmity in regard to which there is a wide scope for Christian sympathy and intercession.

— Steele's Answers p. 119.

Sin as a Condition of Heart

QUESTION: Is the word sin ever used in the Bible to denote a state or condition of heart?

ANSWER: Yes. When a man sins he takes on a sinful character. "Not only does sin have its seat in the will; it is a state of the will. it is not merely a series of voluntary acts; it consists rather in the fixed moral preferences; it is character, a moral perversity, a false direction." (Prof. Stevens, Methodist Review, September, 1904.)

— Steele's Answers pp. 118, 119

The Salvation of a Dying Infant

QUESTION: On what grounds is the dying infant freed from Adamic depravity?

ANSWER; On the ground of the atonement made for the fallen race by Jesus Christ. Cut off from development and sanctification, by which he could have been delivered through faith in Christ from the effects of an evil heredity, he is unconditionally cleansed by the second Adam from the defilement of Adam. The plaster is as large as the wound. "Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound." This is as true of the infant incapable of faith as it is of the believer in Christ.

— Steele's Answers p. 118.

Books Opposing Universalism

QUESTION: What book is the best antidote for universalism?

ANSWER: The Bible. The next best is a book by Rev. N. D. George, entitled "Universalism Not of the Bible." It is published by the Methodist Book Concern, New York. It may be out of print.

— Steele's Answers p. 118.

The Elect

QUESTION: Who are "the elect" in the New Testament?

ANSWER: All persevering believers in Jesus Christ, in contrast with "the called" who have been invited and by their refusal or indifference show themselves unfltted to partake of the marriage supper spread by Christ. This term is also applied to those angels whom God has chosen out from other created beings to be peculiarly associated with him in the government of the universe. Sometimes it signifies dear, choice, select, as in II John, verses 1 and 9.

— Steele's Answers pp. 117, 118.

If It is Impossible to Keep the Law of God Why Should Anyone Be Held Guilty?

QUESTION: If it is impossible to keep the law of God, why should we be condemned for not keeping it? (2) Do we need pardon for unconscious violations of a perfect law?

ANSWER: Law has several meanings in the Scriptures. The Adamic or Paradisaical law, the Levitical or Ceremonial law, and the Moral law. Only the latter are we bound to obey. It is possible for every one who is born of God to keep this law, because he loves Christ the Lawgiver, who makes the moral law to be "the law of liberty," not liberty to sin, but emancipation from the dominion of evil. Hence it is possible for every one to keep the royal law, the king of all laws, the law of love which carries the moral law in its bosom, for it is possible for every man, through penitent faith in Christ, to be born into the kingdom of love. (2) The law of love cannot be unconsciously violated, for if love turns to hatred, or indifference, consciousness must note the change. An act put forth in love may inadvertently harm my neighbor, but this is not sin. Do I not sin if I fail to keep the Adam law? The only expressed law given in Paradise was a prohibition. The implied Adamic law was love up to the full measure of his capacity, undiminished by sin. I am not required to serve God with Adam's powers, but with my present abilities crippled by sin. "Where little is given, little is required." Under the atonement everybody who knows the distinction between right and wrong has, through faith in Christ, the gracious ability to abstain from sinning — posse non peccare. The Lord Jesus be praised! This is the next best thing to the heavenly state — non posse peccare — the inability to sin. The first state leads to the second. Glory to God! The declaration that God's law cannot be kept reflects on both his justice and his goodness.

— Steele's Answers 116, 117.

"Sins" and "Sin" — Singular and Plural

QUESTION: Is  it not a fact that all Scriptural texts speaking of sin in the singular number have reference to inbred sin and never refer to actual sins (plural)? Is not this true?

ANSWER: It is not true. In the singular "sin" is found in the Synoptic Gospels (Matt., Mark and Luke) but once, "Every sin and blasphemy," etc. (Matt. 12:81). Stephen prayed, "Lord lay not this sin to their charge" (Acts 7:60), "If any man see his brother sinning a sin not unto death," etc. "There is a sin unto death" (I John 5:16), and "If we say we have no sin" (1:8), in all these texts some act of sin is meant. The phrase "to have sin" is found elsewhere only in John 9:41, "If ye were blind, ye would have no sin;" 15:22, 24, "If I had not * * *  spoken * * * they had not sin." Also, "He that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin" (19:11). This phrase "to have sin" the experts say is the strongest possible expression for an act entailing guilt. The poet Euripides uses it of one who has committed murder. John uses the term "sin" in only one signification, "the transgression of the law." Paul rhetorically personifies sin, i.e., sinning, as an imperial personage ruling sinners who become his slaves, and John personifies sin as a slave holder (8:34). "The slave of sin is bondage to sinning." Sow a thought, and you reap an act, sow an act, and you reap a habit; sow a habit and you reap a character; sow a character and you reap a destiny. The consequences of Adam's transgression have damaged me, but the guilt he did not bequeath to me, because it is non-transferable. Yet Wesley in the second of the Articles of Religion speaks of Christ as "a sacrifice not only for original guilt, but also for the actual sins of man." Substitute Adam's for "original," and I will accept it.

— Steele's Answers pp. 117, 116.

Is Atonement Taught in the New Testament?

QUESTION: A friend of mine says (1) that Jesus said nothing about the atonement, and (2) that the word is not in the New Testament. Is this so?

ANSWER: We should bear in mind that the four Gospels contain all the truths of Christianity in seed form. The atonement is thus taught in Matt. 20:28, "The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give his life a ransom for many." If Christ had said more than this before his death and resurrection demonstrating that he is both God and man, and that for this reason he only was capable of making an atonement, he would have bewildered and confounded his disciples by teaching a doctrine which they could not then have received. But after his blood had been shed and he had arisen, ascended, and poured out the Pentecostal gift in proof that he had reached the throne of his Father and was glorified, the doctrine of the atonement could now be clearly unfolded and its relation to salvation be revealed by the Paraclete as Jesus had promised with respect to the many things he had to say which they could not then bear. (2) While it is true that the term atonement is not found in the Revised New Testament, the thing itself is found everywhere in other terms, such as redemption, propitiation, blood of sprinkling and sacrifice of himself. The absence of the words Trinity and sacrament is no valid argument against the fundamental doctrines, which are abundantly taught in other terms.

— Steele's Answers p. 114, 115.