Belington progressive. [volume] (Belington, W. Va.) 1912-1927, 1913-01-02

In our scheme of Lessons we return
to the Old Testament and confine our
study for the ensuing year to the first
six books of the Bible.
The word Genesis means begin
nings," and in the book of that name
we see recorded all the information
of the beginning Of things that our
, heavenly father deemed necessary in
the development of the scheme of re-
demption
After all the assaults of its enc
mics, and Of the skeptics, the first
verse of the book of Genesis contains
all the clear, concise, and positive
knowledge man possesses about the
origin of this Universe. God Gre
ated,' not, God is all and all is God"
Pantheism has no ground upon which
to stand. 'Tn the beginning God Gre
ated," therefore he Is above and was
before the heaven and the earth.
The beginning OF all right thinking
and true living, of every proper rela7
ton of life. is God and yet we are
withholding that knowledge from
young America upon the specioua
| plea that the bible Is sectarian.
Truth Of the Trinity. /
| Following this statement OF the Gre
! alton come the steps of rehabilitation,
for the words in verse two denote
waste, void, or confusion and one
| Hebrew scholar contends for the word
ruin" See also lisa. 1918 r. v. Thus
1t seems that upon this created earth
presumably upon some pre-Adamite
race and that what follows, verse two.
Is not the original creation but the
| steps whereby this earth was made
ready as habitation for man.
Lord Kelvin said, scientific thought
is compelled to accept the idea of Gre
alive power" There Is a wonderful
agreement between modern science
and the account in Genesis: ID The
biblical accounts by their wording
provide for both creation and the eyo.
lutionary development of created
| things; (2) Science has failed to pro-
duce matter life, or the soul of man;
and of these in each instance the
bible says God created while Of all
else 1t says he made.
The great truth of the trinity is re-
vealed In these first three verses a.
| God, v. 1; (2) Spirit, v. 2; and (3)
God said''-the word, see John III.
Verse five does not call the light
day meaning twelve hours, but rather
| n ~ i,,o 81 90
an Arctic day" which is six months.
Animal life cannot assimilate these
elements unless they are already fixed
in organic vegetable life. How and
where life originated no science has
discovered. Pasteur's dictum that.
''it is nothing but life which gener-
ates life" still stands mistaken. And
SO the constant and only satisfactory
answer to the questions, how, where
and why, of all these things of this
material universe is God. God Gre
ated, God made, he created, and then
set into being those forces and laws
whereby the earth, the sky, the sun
| and the moon have gone on with I'M
broken regularity. He made possible
ops, the oak grows, and animal and
vegetable life reproduce each after
its own kind
But creation was not yet complete.
Man, the last created, was the crown
ing glory of this earthly creation.
Verses $3.50 will be studied in con
nection with next weeks lesson and
are referred to here simply to give q.
complete account of creation. 1t
would be well, however, to refer to
the fact that the great God and Gre
ator made provision for the immortal
souls of mankind by arranging for his
| training in the knowledge and charac-
ter OF himself, the father, by the in
stitution of the Sabbath, as soon as
he had prepared a piece in which
man was to dwell
The dignity and majesty of the Lam
guage Of Genesis is sublime.
| Astrologers tell us that our sun and
solar system is only one OF perhaps a
million others. A recent writer tells
US that a ray of light which would
travel the equivalent Of nine times
| take nine years to travel across the
| great nebula in the constellation of
Orion And God made all of this.
1.-THE fool hath said in his heart there
is no God" and It is the man next
door to the fool who tries to stipu-
late what God ought or ought not to
| do.
What a beautiful story this Is to
| tell to children A mother drew her
three-year-old sons attention to the
| beauty Of field and mountain and
added God loves the beautiful and
loves little boys too" Neither spoke
| for moment Then the son asked
his mother II she were praying.
| YES" said the mother. "Then
want 60 say prayers too" said the
boy. 1t Is a tremendous responsible
ity to give to others their first idea
Of God. May God keep US all on this
II n