the Spirit, but manifested in all their native character, no longer able to deceive those who do not wish to be deceived by them? By no means! faith can look upwards, and though with sorrow and in tears can still lift up her eyes trustfully towards heaven, and say, “Father I thank thee,” for that is still revealed to the babes, which the wise and prudent ever have and ever will fail to see. The Lord amidst the candlesticks has been walking and speaking, and he who was in Ephesus, in Smyrna, in Pergamos, has been in Plymouth, in Bristol, in London, and the messages he has been sending to those whom they may concern, are not less plain. The approving word that says “thou art rich,” and the word of reproof that says “repent or I will fight against thee,” have alike been heard, and are still heard amongst us, but there are whispers of God that the wise can hear and the chastened soul understand, and there are voices in thunder that the unwise often read backwards to their own confusion.
When avowed principles of evil come in, the Lord’s hand is seen in scattering, that all may not be defiled, thereby enabling the scattered ones the better to keep their garments so that they may walk with him in white. In the present instance that foreseeing God, who knew full well whereunto these unholy principles of exclusiveness in the holy name of Jesus would tend, by the divisions made by Satan has graciously shielded thousands from their influence, who otherwise might have been led away, and by the very opposition those principles met from the brethren in Bethesda, have the eyes of multitudes been opened to see the magnitude of the evil, in which they might have been involved.
These events happen not in the church of God for the individual instruction of the few, but for the saints at large; not that any should boast but that all should fear, that all may find matter for self-judgment in what arises, wherein God triumphs over man’s weakness and wilfulness. God acts not in such a way but that those who wish not to see the signs of the times, will fail to see his working; God forces not conviction even on his children; if they know not the time of their visitation, as they are ever responsible for doing, they will reap the bitter consequences in broken projects here and lost blessing hereafter.
Many need to be cautioned against casting away truth because truth is troublesome, as it ever will be as long as we are in the body, for the truth has to bear upon the natural depravity of the natural heart. We know that “where no ox is the crib is clean, but much strength is in the labor of the ox.” Truth has to be looked at in the light of the Word, and not viewed through the weakness of the creature, so that no
