صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

danger that he will? It is because you are not to be trusted, that you should trust him who is able to keep that which is committed to him. If you trust him for strength, you are as sure of being supplied as of being pardoned, if you trust him for that. Why should not you remember Christ? He remembers you—yes, practically remembers you; nor one thing merely does in remembrance of you, but many. What if he should make excuses for not remembering you?

But perhaps you will cut short the interview by saying, "I am now quite unprepared for this act; hereafter I mean to attend to it." Be it known to you, then, that there are greater things for which you are unprepared, and they are things which you cannot evade or defer, as you can this; and as to that hereafter on which you count, who art thou that boastest of to-morrow?

8. I don't like Professions.

This is the reason which many give for not acknowledging Christ. They say, when urged upon the point, that they "don't like professions." A strange reason this for not obeying the express command of the Divine Savior! What if they do not like pro

fessions, do they equally dislike obeying commands? If so, they had better say, "I don't like obedience to the commands of God." But they profess to be well disposed to obey: it is only to professing that they object. Well, then, let them obey all the precepts which they find in the Bible, and we will not trouble them about a profession. Why should we? In that case they will obey the precept which enjoins a profession; they will do the thing appointed in remembrance of Christ.

[ocr errors]

But I don't like professions." And who does. like mere professions? Who ever contended in favor of a man's professing to have what he has not? Professions are very different from mere professions. Suppose a person has what he professes to have, what then? What is the objection to a profession in that case? I see none. If a man loves the Lord Jesus, I can see no harm in his professing or declaring his attachment to him. It is very natural to declare it. We profess attachment to others—to relatives, friends, benefactors, pastors, civil rulers. Why not to Christ? How does his being the subject of the profession constitute such an objection to it? Is he the only being to whom we may not profess attachment?

"Don't like professions?" Why yes, they do. Professions of friendship, of patriotism, and of loyalty they like. Why not of religion? Why should not religion be professed as well as other things? Are attachment to the Gospel, love to Christ, regard

[blocks in formation]

for the authority of Jehovah, and adherence to his government, the only things never to be professed?

66

I do not see any objection to professions, but I see propriety and utility in them, even if it were optional with us to make them or not. If it were left to our choice, it strikes me, we ought to choose to profess love and obedience to Christ. But suppose it is required, does not that alter the case? Will these persons say they do not like what God requires? And does he not require a profession? His inspired apostle twice exhorts Christians to hold fast their profession. Does not that imply that it is made, and ought to be made? How is a person to hold on to that of which he has never taken hold? Is not the public confession of Christ required when it is made a condition of salvation? Rom. 10: 9, If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved." Does not divine authority require it, when to the doing of it is made one of the most precious promises in the whole Bible? "Whosoever therefore shall confess me be fore men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven." Is not that duty, against the omission of which such a threatening lies as this, But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven ?” Matt. 10: 32, 33. It is very plain that God requires professions, though some men do not like them.

[ocr errors]

"You don't like professions!" Then Joshua, a man that followed the Lord fully, falls under your censure, for he professed the service of God. "As

66

for me and my house," said he, we will serve the Lord." Are we to think the worse of him for this? Some ask what is the use of a profession. If they will observe what followed Joshua's profession, they will see the use of it. They will see that it brought out all Israel. "We will also serve the Lord,” said they, and they entered that day into a covenant to serve him. Nor did their practice belie their profession, for it is recorded that “ Israel served the Lord all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the Elders that overlived Joshua." So much for a profession. It is agreed on all hands that that professing generation, in piety and devotion to God, surpassed any other during the national existence of Israel.

[ocr errors]

We read in 1 Tim. 2: 10, of certain things which are said to become women professing godliness." It would seem from this to be the duty of women to profess godliness. And if of women, of men also, 1 suppose. What case of real subjection to the Gospel of Christ do we read of, which was not also a case of "professed subjection" to it? Paul, in 2 Cor. 9: 13, speaks of some who glorified God for the " professed subjection" of others unto the Gospel of Christ. It appears then that God is glorified by these professions. And I should presume, from certain passages in the Bible, that he is not glorified when a

profession is withheld. There were in primitive times some who did not like professions. It is no new thing not to like professions. In John, 12: 42, 43, we read that “ among the chief rulers many believed on him, but" as they did not like professions, "because of the Pharisees they did not confess him-for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God." It is no honorable mention which is intended to be made of another, of whom it is said that he was 66 a disciple of Jesus, but secretly, for fear of the Jews." John, 19: 38. Fear made him decline a profession for a time; but at length he came out openly on the side of Christ, and besought Pilate for the body of Jesus.

If they who say they do not like professions, mean that they do not like false, or loud, or ostentatious, or barely verbal professions, let them say so, and we will agree with them; but let them not mean this, and say, without qualification, they "don't like professions."

It is truly strange, because some now, as in apostolic times, "profess that they know God, but in works deny him," that others will never profess to know him. Because men have professed friendship, and have proved no friends, therefore they will not only not profess friendship, but they will abstain from certain acts and expressions of friendship, because they involve a profession of it! It is a pity that men who are going to give an account of them selves to God, should reason and act thus.

« السابقةمتابعة »