(271-275) only my church but loved ones also and flee into the wilderness for the truth’s sake. I am anxious to withdraw from the church, and would also like some tracts suitable for Methodist people. Your sister in Christ, Sagan E. Case,—Illinois. My Dear BrorHer Pastor RUSSELL: — I am writing to you to express my deeply-felt gratitude to God and to you his servant, that through reading your books and studying the Word of God in connection with what you have written I have been brought into the clearer sunshine of his blessed revelation, and rejoice to see it from what I firmly believe is God’s standpoint. God has indeed been good to me in guiding me into the present truth. I was very much prejudiced at first, as I had wrong notions concerning your teaching. The idea of the millennium starting from the year 1874 was a stumbling block to me until it was explained, and I tore up the tracts which had been handed to me and refused to read them. I had never heard of MILLENNIAL Dawn until about nine months ago, when my attention was called to the Watcu Tower by a dear saint, a patient slowly dying of cancer, and my first idea about it was a glorification of socalled Christendom, because it placed the dawn of the millennium at the present time. Thinking it could easily be refuted by the Word of God, and with a desire to help others to ward off error, I promised to read one of the tracts, “The Hope of Immortality.” I was simply amazed with the reasonableness, the wisdom, of it. It never occurred to me before that the all-wise God would certainly not have committed the silly blunder of making man an imperishable being, an “immortal soul,” knowing beforehand how he would fall. I read through the tract, praying to God to guard me against being influenced by error. When I finished it I tore off on VoL. XXV ZION’S WATCH TOWER ALLEGHENY, PA., SEPTEMBER 15, 1904 ALLEGHENY, Pa my bicycle at once to get “The Plan of the Ages” and “What Say the Scriptures About Hell?” I was so impatient that I did not like waiting a moment and eagerly devoured the books when I got them. I have now read carefully and thoughtfully all the Dawn volumes several times, and each time I learn more. Soon after beginning to read them we had a month’s mission in Liverpool held by Messrs. Torrey and Alexander. Dr. Torrey was very much opposed to the Dawns and warned the people against them. He advised the people to “take the tracts; by all means take them, and take them home and burn them.” This seemed to me like the R. C. priests who say, “By all means take the Bible given to you and then burn it.” His sermon on “Hell” was simply awful for its bitterness and nightmare misery, and he defined eternal punishment as “every second suffering infinite agonies throughout unending billions of years.” One poor woman who knew I was reading the Dawns said to me after one of the meetings, “Oh, Dr. Hughes, do burn those books!” and I was told that I would be done for if I read “those awful books!” So you see that it has been in the teeth of prejudice all along, and if it had not been that God had given me ‘Truth hunger” I should have neglected this glorious opportunity and lost the great blessing. At a mission Sunday School in connection with the Presbyterian church I joined some years ago I have a Bible class for working men on Sunday afternoon for the last four months, I have been giving them MittennraL Dawn teaching, and one or two of the young men have spoken about bringing the matter of my teaching before the minister. Some of them listen very attentively and seem to be greatly blessed. Believe me to be, dear brother, yours very lovingly in our glorious and risen Savior. E. Lucas Huenes,—England. No. 18 VIEWS FROM THE WATCH TOWER ARGUING FOR DENOMINATIONAL UNION At a imecting held in Washington City not long since, to favor the union of Methodist Protestants, Congregationalists and United Brethren, one of the speakers said:— “Lutherans are divided into 16 different bodies, Baptists into 13, Presbyterians into 20 and Methodists into 17. Who is wise enough to show us how and to what extent the Kingdom of God is being profited by all these divisions? Does Presbyterianism have 20 and Methodism 17 different messages to the world? How ridiculous the thought of having 16 varieties of Lutherans and 16 Baptists in the same town or mission field. The fact is we are over-organized, Our machinery is too ponderous and complex. It requires so much energy and money to keep it going that we have but little to use beyond the machinery itself. Just think of the missionary and church extension organizations, of the publishing plants, colleges, theological seminarics and the great number and variety of other benevolent institutions which are fairly piled upon each other! No wonder there is friction and great waste. Nor need we be surprised that level-headed laymen are getting tired of seeing their money wasted and are beginning to seek a remedy. “Away with the delusion that the God of all wisdom and grace has planned for the continued existence of these ecclesjastical divisions and gub-divisions, with 100 more that might be named, whose presence cannot be explained on any rational grounds or in harmony with the spirit of the gospel. “Mere federation will not accomplish what we want. We must go further. The call of God at this hour to husband our resources and to unify our forces, to the end that we may conquer and win, is loud and clear. “How humiliating the thought that very much of the money raised in this country ostensibly to save the heathen is spent in keeping up ecclesiastical distinctions and consequently the most shameful rivalries, Why should a town of only a few hundred people be burdened with a half dozen churches, when two at most would answer every purpose? Yet we have scores and hundreds of such over-churched towns. Christian work, so-called, degenerates into a mere scramble for existence. “In concentration we will find a solution of many of the problems which confront and annoy us; and this centralization is impossible where a multiplicity of similar organizations exist. It is a sin to waste God’s money in duplicating agencies, and yet this is being done all the time.” * * * It seems remarkable that some of the most earnest and intelligent Christian people in all denominations are so misled by the present erv of denominational union. The majority seem to be entircly blind to the real issues: they are all carried off their feet mentally with enthusiasm for a united church. They fail to see that such a union must be disadvantageous along the lines proposed, namely, the ignoring of doctrine, the ignoring of conscience, the ignoring of truth. In the union of Christendom which prevailed for over a thousand years before the Reformation, the basis of union was false doctrine supported by tyranny and force, persecution and fire. The Reformation movement was a breaking up of those evil influences, and practically every denomination inte which Christendom split represented further endeavor to get to the truths taught in the Lord’s Word. The union or federation of all denominations now proposed is to be one in which not only false doctrines will be considerably ignored, but also the true doctrines of the Lord’s Word. Among those to be retained as fundamental will be some of the gross errors that dominated Papacy during the dark ages, and much of the Reformation blessing will be entirely lost. The union of the true church is amply provided for in the Scriptures without any outside patent fastenings, bolts, riveta, cords, etc. The Scriptural proposition is that the Lord’s people, instead of being united to him by sects and parties called “branches,” should be united to him individually—as individual branches. As he declares in his Word, “I am the true vine, ye [individually] are the branches.” As the Reformation led to the splitting off from Papacy and its errors various large composite branches or denominations, so we need still further reformation that will split every sect up into individual units, so that each individual Christian will have his own individual faith and his own personal relationship to the Lord as a “branch.” Union of denominations, instead of favoring this proper condition which the Lord designed for his people, will be in opposition to it. But the true people of God will gradually be guided of him and separated from the Babylonian bundies, leaving therein only the tares. Thus the separation of this harvest time is progressing. The tare element in the nominal church sees matters only from the worldly natural standpoint and hence, influenced by pride, ete., favors size and bulk rather than truth. The Lord is taking advantage of their worldly spirit and favoring their organization, that the gulf between the tares and wheat may daily, monthly, yearly become more marked. Meantime through the Truth and its various mouthpieces and ministers the Lord is calling the attention of the true saints to the bright shining of his glorious plan, now visible as never before; and as they perceive it and compare it with their surroundings in Babylon, it hecomes to them the voice of God saving to them, “Come out [3426]
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