Made Straight.
Among the many things that the Son of God did while on earth, perhaps none meet the approval of the general reader more than the one recorded in Luke 13: 10-13. This was a woman who had been bound by infirmities for eighteen years; but when Jesus put his hands upon her, she was made straight, and glorified God.
In my travels I find hundreds, yes, thousands, of people year after year who have been bound by infirmities of the flesh and the spirit, who need to go to the Son of God to be made straight. Many are not strong enough to walk alone upright. They totter, they waver, they tremble, and become weak under the burdens of life. Unable to stand alone, they should be made straight. I find many brethren crooked by the love of this world, who are covetous, continually trying to get and never give, who have turned a deaf ear to the cry of the orphan, the call of the widow, the mission of the gospel. These brethren are crooked, and should be made straight.
Again, I find others whose motives to do good are pure, yet they have drawn the wrong straightening line, and look with an evil eye and with suspicion upon all brethren, and especially preachers, who may differ from them; say they are bad men, and only working for worldly gain. While these brethren may desire to do good, frequently they require to be made straight.
Many of us note with sadness the departure of brethren who have been led off by the innovations that have come upon us in these latter days. Brethren who once stood firm for the gospel, and were perhaps paid better then than now for their work, are often charged with going off after the money in the work, when many of these brethren could get from two to three times as much following some secular business as to preach. I confess that I am not able to make such a charge, and think that all, before they do, should be sure that they, by the word of God, have been made straight.
Again, I find some congregations where members have perhaps had some misunderstanding; some hard words have been spoken; some things have been done that should not have been done; and on account of these things many go for years bowed down by stubbornness, by evil thinking, evil speaking, and evil doing, instead of going at once to the word of God to be made straight.
Often I find brethren who have been crooked by strong drink, by the use of tobacco, by the ballroom, by indifference, by going visiting on Lord’s day instead of going to the house of the Lord; who pay cash for their whisky and tobacco, yet get their clothes and religion on credit. This class can have no hope of heaven unless they are willing to come to God, and by him to be made straight. Then, dear brethren, are we not willing to examine ourselves and see in what particular we are crooked, and commence to-day to be made straight? Some are crooked in judgment, crooked in conversation, crooked in thought, crooked in practice, crooked by an improper zeal, it not being according to knowledge; and last, but not least, crooked in infidelity, in failing to recognize the hand of God in all that we do.
After learning in what particular we are crooked, the remaining question to settle is: “How can I be made straight?” To this only one answer can come, and this has been true in all ages of the past: Do all things commanded you of God. Here come up two serious questions: 1. What has God commanded? 2. How must the things commanded be done? Many mistakes of both these commands have often been made. Among our own brethren forty years ago they were like the early Christians for the first three hundred years. In those days all were measured by the same standard and made straight by the same rule. As long as these things continued, peace, love, and zeal characterized the early Christians wherever they went; but in the course of time the things that were revealed began to give way to experience; and then division, alienation, and strife became the ruling power of the day. So it was forty years ago. All churches were opened to all respectable preachers. Then all were welcomed wheresoever they went. All, by the power of God, were made straight, and then measured by the same rule; but in the course of time we began to let our preachers do our thinking for us. Many pulled far on minor points, and educated the brethren on one point to the neglect of others; and, as we failed to observe the divine instruction to “teach them to observe all things” (Matt. 28: 19), or make them straight in all things; as our papers, which were the creatures of our preachers, became the medium through which the things learned were carried to the people, many failed to observe the difference between the power or divine rule that makes us straight and the medium through which these principles reach the brethren. As a result, many of us forgot to go to the divine system to see if we had been made straight, and only consulted our preachers, and judged a man’s straightness or crookedness by the paper he read. As one paper began to teach the Bible on baptism, and show our inconsistencies on sect baptism, many of us reached out on that one point to the neglect of others, forgetting the principles of love; and instead of pleading with the brethren in love who differed from us, we claimed: “I and my paper are straight, and all who are not made straight by this paper are crooked.” Frequently brother called brother by hard, unkind names. About this time another paper started up to argue instrumental music, and had many hard things to say about brethren who believed it not right. They claimed: “Our paper is right. We are straight; and if you indorse this paper, you are straight; if not, you are crooked.” At another place some other paper started up to proclaim the missionary cause through organized effort, and many pulled so far as to forget that baptism is for the remission of sins, and even claimed that sprinkling will do; the pious unimmersed will be saved; that “our paper is straight, but those who don’t agree with us are not.”
Again, we find others being against all institutionalism; the church is the only divine society to do all things, and those only who circulate “our paper are straight, and all who differ from us are crooked; for we only are straight.”
Along this line, brethren, all would do well to stop and think a moment. “By what rule are we measuring to make people straight?” I frequently hear brethren, speaking of certain preachers, say: “I don’t think him sound in the faith, for I never see his name mentioned in our papers.”
I am well aware of the fact that too many of us have centered around some paper in particular, and go to it instead of the Bible for all our religious training. As almost all editors make some one principle the leading thought of every issue; as preachers have some sermon they make the leading thought of every meeting, many are carried away by the leading issue and the one sermon. Frequently when they hear a preacher or read a paper that does not hit on their favorite theme, they claim that the man or the paper is crooked, simply because they measured by the wrong rule.
Brethren, these things should not be. How long till we will learn that it may be possible for a man to be straight, and at the same time not be measured in all points by any of our papers?
But to the final question: How can all be made truly straight. How can all be of the same mind and speak the same thing? How can all, with love to our brethren and to the world, earnestly contend for the faith? To all these Peter answers in these words: “If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God.” (1 Pet. 4: 11.) To this end, brethren, let us think, work, and pray. J. D. TANT.
GOSPEL ADVOCATE Thursday, June 25 1896