River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1914-04-02

He will do something Of love. This
He shows us in His dealings with
mankind. God was only just when He
condemned the race of Adam as unfit
for everlasting life; and He would still
have been just if He had never pro-
vided redemption or any other oppor-
tunity for the world whatever.
God is more than just, however, and
SO in due time He provided the Re
deemer. This was Grace, this was
Mercy. this was Love. And Love has
been working all through His great
Plan of the Ages, providing first the
Savior. then making provision for the
Church, that through His mercy we
might come from the ranks of sinners
up to the ranks of glory. To accom-
plish this, He has forgiven the sins of
the Church, has encouraged them by
assurances of His love and favor all
the way and has made all things work
together for their good
"Be We Perfect"
This, then. is the Love of God; and
the New Creatures in Christ must
have this Observation-Disclosures to God.
We must have love, sympathy, and not
merely justice. There is nothing of
grace in the giving of justice; any
thing less than justice is wrong But
the Lords people must be more than
just; they are to be kindly affectiOned
one to another, tender-hearted, fOrgiv-
ing one another, even as God fol
Christ's sake has forgiven them. Our
Heavenly Father wishes His children
to see that quality in His character
and to copy it. This is what Jesus
meant when He said, BE. We perfect.
even as your Father in Heaven is per
feet We cannot bring our mortal
body to that degree of perfection
where every act would be perfect, ev-
cry word perfect, but the mind must
be in full sympathy and accord with
God and His arrangements, and each
must strive to the best of his ability
to bring the body into harmony with
God.
AS the Bible teaches, the Church
class are in the School of Christ. being
taught of God-His workmanship. By
His providence and His Word He has
been working in us. by our experiences.
which He has shaped for us, and by
the opportunities which He gives us.
All these things are designed by the
Lord to bless us and to develop us in
His own Observation-Disclosures, so that, as
Jesus said, we may be like unto our
Father in Heaven, SO that we may be
holy, even as He is holy-that our in
tentions. aims, desires, may be of ex-
sctly the same kind as His own.
If. therefore, any one who processes
to be a New Creature in Christ has In
his heart a feeling of bitterness, envy
or strife. let him beware Such con-
dition of heart is dangerous; it is not
of the Holy Spirit at all. Those who
have such elements of character are
not holy as the Heavenly Father is
holy. On the contrary, as the Apostle
explains. these qualities of character
are works Of the flesh and of the Devil;
and to whatever extent one possesses
these, they are the result of the spirit
Of the flesh and of the Devil at work
in the heart.
But if, on the contrary, one has hol1-
ness and a fitness of desire to know
and to do Gods will as an increasing
power in his heart, then he is indeed
being sealed of the Holy Spirit of God.
The Observation-Disclosures of our Father
in Heaven is being impressed upon
him. He is more and more coming to
see things from Gods viewpOint-to
see as God sees. to sympathize with
the things with which God sympa-
thizes, to be opposed to the things to
which God is opposed
The Grand Climax of Character.
Of our Lord Jesus it was written:
Thou lowest righteousness, and latest
iniquity; therefore God, Thy God.
hath anointed Thee with the oil Of JOY
above Thy fellows psalm 45:0-
above the angels, above the Church,
making Him to be Head over all
things to the Church and decreeing
that all the angels shall worship Him.
(Hebrews 1862 In order to copy
Him we must see to what extent He
loved righteousness and hated iniquity.
He so hated wickedness that in every
way He avoided injustice, iniquity, un-
righteousness, sin; and He so loved
righteousness that He preferred to die
even the death of the cross rather than
to resist the will of God.
This, then, is the great test of char
acter going on with the Lords people.
and according to these lines God is
dealing with them. 1t is not merely
that they are fighting the good fight
and trying to accomplish something In
their flesh; for the New Creature will
never succeed in getting as good con-
troll of the flesh as he could wish. But
what God wishes to see in His people
is that their whole hearts are set for
righteousness, that they love the right
and hate the wrong, and that they are
striving to the best of their ability to
put down the wrong and to uphold the
right, especially in themselves-in their
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