(95-99) (2) He gave the place a name, calling it Beth-el, the house of God, in commemoration of the blessing. But this was not enough: he said to himself, Although I have been a follower of the Lord, and am even now here because of my faith in the divine promise to Abraham, yet now that God has personally favored me with these assurances of his presence with me, and his assistance along the journey of life and his ultimate fulfilment in me of all these promises, what should I render unto the Lord for all his benefits? He resolved that he would (3) make a vow, a covenant of fidelity to the Lord. It was this: Since God will be with me and will keep me in this way which I go, and provide me bread to eat and raiment to wear, so that I shall return hither again in peace, and in view of this promise he shall be my Lord, my God, which signifies that I shall be his servant, his creature. The stone set up as a monument served as a corroboration, a witness to the vow, and additionally Jacob vowed that of all that God gave him he would surely give a tenth ;art to the d.vine service. We consider such a consecration of himself and of his income as the reasonable proper course on Jacob’s part. The man or woman who receives blessings from the Lord or from anyone without thought, desire and wish to make returns according to his ability, shows thereby his degradation, because surely every noble-minded person would be prompted to consecration by a realization of the Lord’s favors and privileges. So the Apostle declares respecting the spiritual Israelite, that we have received of the Lord exceedingly great and precious promises. Having come to this place where we are at the foot of the ladder and in touch therewith, and recipients of the blessings from heaven and the privilege of this association, we should consider it, he tells us, a reasonable service to present our bodies living sacrifices to him.—Rom. 12:1. ‘We should estcem it a great joy, a great privilege, to be the Lord’s servants, We do not become his servants in order to get his blessings, but his blessings have been conferred upon us conditionally: we are pleased to present our bodies living sacrifices to his service. Jacob vowed one-tenth of his income to the Lord’s service, and this proportion seems to have been in general recognized at that time and probably previously, as we know it was subsequently incorporated in the Mosiac Law. Abraham gave a tithe, one-tenth, of the spoils to Melchisedec, and the king of Sodom made a similar offering to Abraham, which the latter rejected, preferring to receive gifts from the Lord only. ZION’S WATCH TOWER ALLEGHENY, Pa. Theoretically the Christian gives his all to the Lord, and theoretically the Lord accepts our all of time, talent, influence, money, all. But actually, when we consider the time necessary for rest and for the reasonable care of our earthly interests, we are fortunate indeed if we are able to give directly to the Lord one-tenth of our time. Similarly with all of our gifts, privileges and opportunities—so many of them are necessary to ourselves, our reasonable well being, the providing of things honest in the sight of all men, it is doubtful if very many, therefore, give to the Lord much more than onetenth of all their substance. And surely if this was a command to natural men, we, as new creatures, would feel ashamed to proffer the Lord less. We certainly should set apart at least one-tenth for the Lord, and then add thereto as much as possible according to the Lord’s blessing and the possibilities of the case. We, too, should set up pillars or memorials as marking this special blessing received of the Lord. A provision has been made for us along this line by our Lord. Has he not provided the Memorial season, in which annually we are privileged to celebrate our Bethel?—that we are the house of God because with us is the Son of man, the ladder, the connecting way between earth and heaven, between us and the heavenly Father. How earnest we should be to perpetuate this Memorial, and how we should appreciate the fact that its recurring lessons are amongst the most helpful that could possibly be our experience. And did not our Lord provide for us another Memorial, and set us the example in the use of it, too, when he symbolized his consecration to death by baptism into water? How glad we are that we can set up this Memorial also, that it is our privilege to be symbolically buried and symbolically raised as a manifestation and expression of our faith and our hope and our joy. Whoever neglects the vow of consecration, and whoever neglects to set up this Memorial, is thereby to this extent evidencing a carelessness and a deficiency in the spirit that is pleasing to the Lord; and in the same degree he fails to have the witness that he pleases the Lord and is making his calling and election sure. Let us, then, like Jacob, arise early. We may set up these memorials and make these vows of consecration. Those who have done these things early in their Christian experience—early after coming to the foot of the cross, the foot of the ladder—have received proportionately the greater blessing as they have gone on in life’s pathway. Vou. XXVIII ALLEGHENY, PA., APRIL 1, 1907 No. 7 VIEWS FROM THE WATCH TOWER WILL BAPTISTS AND CHRISTIANS UNITE? With a proposition before it looking towards the merger of two great religious denominations, the ninth annual congress of the Disciples of Christ, which will meet at the Central Christian Church in Cincinnati the first week of April, will be of national importance and of great significance in the religious world. At the 1906 congress, held in Indianapolis, a committee of ten was appointed to make overtures and formulate a plan for ‘‘closer relations between the Baptists and the Disciples of Christ.’? This committee will report at the conclusion of the three-days’ session of the congress in Cincinnati. Its report will advocate the merger of the two churches, and it is probable that an agreement will follow, which, within the next few years, will bring about consolidation.—Cincinnati TimesStar. * * * These two great denominations claim to have ‘‘no creed but the Bible.’’ They, however, advocate very different views of baptism, which is one of the cardinal doctrinal tests of both. Nevertheless, if the preachers can unite, undoubtedly their flocks will follow them, for they generally do not comprehend the doctrinal difference. The people of both would be quite ready for the clearer Bible teachings presented in ZION’s WatcH TowrR were it not for the power of their preachers, exercised to suppress thought and Bible study and liberty. SOCIAL SYSTEM DOOMED UNLESS IT IS REFORMED Dr. Jacob Gould Schurman, president of Cornell University, in an address delivered recently in Old Trinity Church, New York, attacked the present industrial system and declared that, unless something was done for the wage-earner by the big capitalists, the end would be social revolution. Dr, Schurman’s remarks created a sensation. He said in part: ‘¢Steam, electricity and consolidated capital are in our own days eliminating the small producer and the small trader. The chance of young men becoming independent producers and traders, when business is conducted on the scale of millions, instead of thousands or hundreds of dollars, is vastly less than it was in the time of our fathers. ‘(The wage-earner, feeling himself and his children doomed to poverty, rises in rebellion against the economic system which makes such things possible. He protests that capital gets too large a share of the product which laboring men create. His remedy, when he has a remedy, is confiscation of private capital in the public interests and the establishment of a socialistic State, in which all such workers shall receive compensation in proportion to their deserts. ‘*Somehow—I know not how, but somehow—the organizers and financiers and managers of our modern establishments of production and transportation must devise a method whereby the men whose labor builds them up shall become shareholders in the enterprises. The present discontent and rankling sense of injustice must be got rid of, if our economic and industrial system is to survive, ’’ Thus we note from time to time that some see what is eoming, even though they follow not with us and are ignorant of the Bible’s teaching on this subject. They ‘‘fear for looking after those things coming upon the earth.’’ Our Lord says that his followers, better instructed, may lift up their heads and rejoice, knowing that their redemption draweth nigh. 8 INSANITY IN CHICAGO A newspapér_ dispatch from Chicago says:—‘‘The State Board of Charities, in an official report to the Governor, declares one in every ninety Chicagoans is insane and needs watching, and that 58,000 persons in the State are unfit to be at large.’’ * * * Insanity is greatly on the inerease, proving that this is not the ‘‘brain age,’’ in a good sense of the term. New [3966]
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