The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald, vol. 79
July 1, 1902
“The Gospel of the Kingdom” The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald 79, 26.
E. J. Waggoner
Christ himself is the embodiment, the personification, of the kingdom of God. The Gospel or good news of the kingdom is the demonstration of all the power of God in human flesh. Men are to be taught that the Spirit is stronger than the flesh, and can rule it; and that the flesh of weak, sinful man, even in what are supposed to be the most debased, savage races of the earth, can be used to show forth the mighty works of God. And this will be the case with every one who completely recognizes the fact that he has but one debt, namely, that he owes himself to God, and thus to the world, since God lives for the benefit of His creation. ARSH July 1, 1902, page 9.1
The debt that we owe to the world is love, and “God is love.” Therefore we owe it to the world-to all our fellow-men-to allow God to reveal Himself to them in us. We owe it to everyone to cease holding down the truth in unrighteousness, so that all that may be known of God may be manifest in us. There is altogether too low a conception in the world of what a man ought to be. The standard of manhood is too low. The possibilities that are wrapped up in the human body are not grasped; but there are men now in the world who will allow God to use them to demonstrate that with Him nothing is impossible. Who will be one of them? ARSH July 1, 1902, page 9.2
The men who will compose this glorious band will not be making excuses for not obeying God’s law either in letter or in spirit. The righteousness of the law-every commandment to the full-will be fulfilled in them; for love, the manifestation of God, is the fulfilling of the law. “Love worketh no ill to his neighbor;” but love must be at work; therefore love does good to his neighbor. Even so Christ “went about doing good.” ARSH July 1, 1902, page 9.3
In the kingdom of God the Spirit rules: but “where the Spirit of God is there is liberty” (2 Corinthians 3:17); therefore the absolute reign of the Spirit means the complete freedom of the body from all “fleshly lusts that war against the soul.” The desires of the flesh will be present in the flesh; but only the mind of the Spirit will be fulfilled. What a glorious thing it is that this Gospel comes to us, and that all this freedom-the freedom of the universe-is for us if we are willing to pay the price, namely, the absolute, constant and eternal surrender of ourselves to God. ARSH July 1, 1902, page 9.4
“Fulfilling the Law” The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald 79, 26.
E. J. Waggoner
A complete answer to anyone who is so perverse that, in the face of the plain statement of Christ that He did not come to destroy the law, he will say that Christ fulfills the law by abolishing it, is found in the words of the text: “He will magnify the law, and make it honorable.” What honor can anyone give to Christ, and in what sort of esteem does he hold His work, who says that Christ destroys that which is honorable, and holy, and just and good? ARSH July 1, 1902, page 10.1
“But He fulfilled the law,” says one. That is exactly what He did. What then? “Oh, then we do not need to do it; since He fulfilled it, we can have nothing to do with it.” Indeed, that sounds very strange from the lips of one who professes to love the Lord Jesus. It is very easy to understand how one who says, “We will not have this Man to reign over us,” can say, “We do not wish to have anything to do with anything that He is connected with.” But why should a Christian desire to be separated from that which finds its fullness in Christ? ARSH July 1, 1902, page 10.2
“But we are not under the law.” No indeed, thank the Lord for that. And why are we not under it? Because we walk in it. Have you forgotten that the message of comfort prepares the way of the Lord? and that the undefiled in the way are those who walk in the law of the Lord? Psalm 119:1-3. We are delivered from the law, which condemned us to death for our transgression, that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter. Romans 7:4-6. And this is done by the body of Christ, in whom the law finds its perfect fulfillment. When we are joined to Christ in perfection, then the same fullness of the law will be found in us. The curse of the law is not to them that do it, but upon them that do not continue in all things that are written in it. Galatians 3:10-13. Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law; that is, He has redeemed us from disobedience, unto perfect obedience. -Present Truth. ARSH July 1, 1902, page 10.3