Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1922-08-03

ney of approximately SIX months.
Their first work was to erect an
altar to Jehovah on top of the rock,
where the temple had formerly Stood
Recent studies have shown that in
the mosque of Omar, which stands
On Mt. MOriah, where SolOmon'S tenn
pie once stood, under the dome of
the rock, are evidences of steps lead
ing up to an altar built on the rock.
1t is supposed that these are the
remains of the altar. At any rate
the altar was at the very center
Of the life of the people.
They instituted at once the sacri-
fices which they had been accus-
toned to offer-the burnt offering,
the sin offering, the feast of taber-
nacles, etc. In other words they
did not attempt to establish any new
religion, but only the old one which
their fathers had forsaken and from
which they had turned away. They
put God first in their lives, and
learned anew the lesson that God
desires obedience to His revealed
will in the smallest particulars.
They had no materials out of
which to construct the temple, SC
they began it once, as their next
task, to gather materials for that
building. In the second year of their
return they were ready to begin
work in earnest, and laid the founda-
tons with the greatest rejoicing.
The hilarity that characterized this
act Of worship would have shocked
some people so severely that they
would scarcely have recovered. But
why should the worship Of God be
accompanied with the greatest re.
joicing? If any one has a right
to be happy, it is a Christian-not
the half-hearted professor Of re-
ligion who has too much religion to
enjoy the world, and not enough to
appreciate the riches of grace in
Christ Jesus; one thoroughly pities
such;-but a Christian, one who has
Christ! Oh! how happy such an
one is! But some covered the truth
with so much outward form and
ceremony that these which are in
tended only as aids to worship be-
come the whole thing, and the Christ
is lost in the ceremonial. OF course,
the hilarity that these Jews display
ed would have been shocking in the
extreme to such.
The shouting was mingled with
weeping, SO that one could not dis
tinguish the noise of rejoicing from
that Of the weeping. This latter
was done by some Of the older Jews
who had known the temple OF Solo,
mon before it was destroyed. They
were looking backward and hoWllng
because this one never could pc as
good as that one had been. They
had some ground for their sorrow
this one never had in it the ark or
the tables of the covenant, or the
Trim and Thummin, or the pot Oh
r-anna, or AarOn'S rod that budded.
Their sin was in looking backward
and mourning over what was gone
and which could not be rest bred, in
stead of looking forward to the fu-
ture with hope. The elixir OF lie
is the forward look. whenever q
man geS to the point Where ne Is
forever looking edward, ana mas
ceased to look forward with nope
and plans, that man is back num-
Der. He is an old man, Whethel ms
year. are 80 or 80. This is true IN
hi business, professional or social
life. Don't allow yourself to lock
backward except that you may dis
c. err your failures and make them
Don't let the time come when you
have no interest in learning some
thing new, and looking forward to
something better. That's the Sc
cret of perpetual youth, no matter
what your years may be.
Assistance Refused
AS soon as the work was well un-
der way, the people about them
came and offered their assistance,
saying, We seek your God, too, ever
since the day we came into this
land; let us help you build his tenn
pie. Zerubbabel, however, fatty re
fused their offer. Was he wise?
Was he right? They Immediately
took the matter up with the king
they put ever obstacle in the way
that they could, and succeeded in
stopping the work for fourteen
years.
Suppose you were building a
church, and the bootleggersI @ould
offer their assistance, or to put 1t
more mildly, suppose the Motion Pic
ture association or the Cooperative
Theater- Perpetrators league should Of
fer you their assistance in large
gifts of money, would you refuse?
Of course, the gifts of Cyrus were
somewhat different-they were IN
the nature of indemnity; he was
simply paying TO- the damage the
armies of his predecessor had done.
If the Liquor Dealers association
boz bed you chu; CHI and destroyed
it, they ought to pay for restoring
it. But their money otherwise has
no place in a building dedicated to
God.
Zerubbabel was right in refusing
their offer. He was building a tenn
pie for the worship of God. Suppose
t. he had cepted their aid, and
they had wanted to worship in it
- after their own way, how could
he have refused them then? His
eXclusiveness was not snobbishness,
b. peculiarly sensitive apprecia-
ton Of the holiness of God.
Would God that he had more
of - today, and then the church
would not be compromised so often
with the devil and the world; and
God would be honored by His enc
mics rather than made a beggar in
their eyes by His people appealing
to them for their unholy money for
His work, in the shape of tickets to
barbecues, church suppers and the
like. God is not a beggar nor is He
hard up for money. He owns the
earth, and can still afford to carry
on every enterprise that is for His
glory without assistance from His
| adversaries.
The Prophets and Their Work
Discouraged and disheartened
zerubbabel and Joshua stopped the