Cheap!—When evangelists resort to sensational stunts and dramatic claptrap, discerning people are disgusted. They think "cheap"—and so it is. It constitutes but religious burlesque. It is incongruous to the whole spirit of the gospel. It does violence to the entire program of this message. It is an offense to the spiritual members of the church, and is a deterrent to the earnest strangers we are seeking to reach. "What have the priests of God to do with common fire?
Voices!—Conflicting voices are calling today—voices of true and of false shepherds. Some are leading to the fold of safety, green pastures, and unrolled waters. Others are "stranger" voices seeking to simulate the tone and the words of the true Shepherd, calling the sheep after them out of the fold to promised fields of -green that prove to be naught but dry stubble and whose waters are brackish and bitter. So we hear them—scattering calls and unifying calls. The counterfeits are conflicting, contending, seductive, bewildering calls. Beware the false, and give heed to the true. Whoso hath ears to hear, let him hear—and understand.
Details!—There is a basic difference between a declaration of the Bible or the Spirit of prophecy, and some one's interpretation of it. One person may hold that the seven heads of Revelation 12 and 13 are seven forms of the Roman government; another may sincerely believe that they represent successive world-power systems. The prophecy is true and will be fulfilled, irrespective of men's differing interpretations. Therefore no man is authorized to become dogmatic on such a secondary point, for both culminate in Rome. All are united in understanding the main feature of the prophecy. Let no man's orthodoxy be gauged by such details of interpretation. Prominent pioneers differed on similar points, but they formed one harmonious movement. Small wonder that their schools of interpretation persist among their spiritual posterity. Let nothing break the unity of the remnant band. We must stand together on fundamentals.
Diverted!—The evil one is incessantly seeking to throw us out of balance. If he can keep vita) godliness out of our experience and our preaching, holding us to the skeleton of bare doctrine or prophecy as mere dogma, he scores. Equally sinister is his purpose to lead one who has passed from cold intellectualism into the wondrous joys of living fellowship with Christ, into neglect of basic prophetic foundations and doctrinal beliefs of the message. These must not be neglected, lest we lose our bearings and our distinctiveness in this remnant of time. Ours is a movement of time prophecy. It arose at a designated hour, emphasizing specified truths. These must remain prominent to the end, else we fail to meet the requirements of the prophecy and of God. But it is not to be divorced from the everlasting gospel, else it will be but a message without a gospel.
L. E. F.
