What is a Church?

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Byrne Foreshew

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Sunday School Lesson

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Priscilla Van Der Hart

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Jesus Tomb

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Gary Sharp

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“By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain. . . God testifying of his gifts, and by it he being dead yet speaketh.”Hebrews11:4" TARGET="_blank">Hebrews11:4

Why were Abel and his offering accepted, and Cain and his offering rejected? Does the expression “more excellent” imply that there was something excellent in that of Cain?

The word translated, “more excellent,” is literally “more, “or’ ‘greater,” and is used either of quantity or quality, here clearly of the latter. It does not imply any excellence in Cain’s offering, otherwise we should not read, “but unto Cain and to his offering God had not respect.” Also later God said to him, “If thou doest well (i.e., come like Abel with the slain victim, implying that Cain had not done well in offering his fruit of the earth), but if thou doest not well (i.e., persist in thy refusal of that offering;) sin’ lieth at the door; i.e., croucheth like a wild beast ready to spring. There can be no reasonable doubt that God had revealed to His fallen creatures how they must approach to Him—even by the minhab or approach offering—a lamb of the flock. Clearly this was to be slain, as the expression—”of the fat thereof” shows. Had there been no such revelation, how could Abel have had “faith” to draw near in this way?

I remember years ago seeing a blind Kabyle reading in Braille type by the wayside in North Africa, what I learned to be this fourth chapter of Genesis. When we asked him why God accepted Abel’s offering, he replied, “There was something in it which spoke of the Messiah.” This is true; no doubt that sacrifice was a type of the Lamb of God slain at Calvary, and foreshadowed the bruising of the Kinsman’s heel. Abel confessed himself worthy of death and appropriated the death of the victim in his stead. Cain’s offering was of the same vegetable kingdom as the fig-leaves of the aprons of Adam and Eve, and as the host of flour and water, which the Romanist and Ritualist offer on their “altars,” all of which are bloodless offerings and powerless to remit
sin.

W.H.

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Highfield Road Gospel Hall Toronto has been in the news for a video that was posted online from a conflict between a group of neighbors and a group of people from the church.

Incorrect Assumptions

The street preaching was interpreted by some neighbors as "an attack", "a protest" or a "method to drive out gays from their neighborhood".  "Messages of hate" and "homophobic" as other descriptions appeared on blogs across the internet. Predictably comments from Christians and gays alike condemned the group for its perceived attacks.

Corrections

To the credit of journalists Daniel Dale and Jesse McLean, from The Star, interviews were conducted with people from both sides of the street to try to shed some light on what the two groups were saying. In the article Viral video in Leslieville is not what it seems , the reports show that the church was not, and never has used its sermons, singing or prayers as weapons in the culture war.  

 ----- quote from article -------------

“I don’t like how the whole issue is being distorted,” said Blair Chiasson, a civil servant who lives with his partner, Paul Collins. “Nothing happened. Nothing happened.”

Christine Oddy was on her porch when she heard a sermon which featured, she said, “something about blood running down the street, souls going to purgatory.” She approached the parishioners. “You are hateful people, that’s what you are,” she can be heard saying on the video.

Online, hundreds of others joined her in condemnation. Prominent U.S. sex writer Dan Savage, who is gay, called the parishioners “Christofascists.” Another gay blogger called them “Christian terrorists.”

To Chiasson, however, they are the unthreatening “church people” — and they did not do anything wrong.

Chiasson, 45, said he believes Highfield parishioners only choose to read the Bible from a spot near their house because a fire hydrant prevents cars from parking there.

He said the parishioners preached on the street long before he and Collins, 47, arrived 13 years ago. Moreover, he said, he and Collins have never felt personally targeted by the parishioners, have never heard them say anything homophobic, and have not even been present for three years on the summer Sundays when the infrequent sermons occur.

He said the parishioners are “a part of the neighbourhood” with the right to speak freely. The neighbours who confronted them, he said, “overreacted.”

“We don’t even know the people that started this,” he said. “So the people who are apparently our defenders, we don’t even know who they are.”

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Some churches try to target gays with provocative statements that are meant to enrange and belittle their opponents.  Churches like Westboro Baptist are well known for proudly display signs saying hurtful and provocative things.  However, the churches that meet in Gospel Hall buildings are careful to refrain from political involvement or name calling.

The debate now has turned to whether or not preaching on the street is a right or an annoyance.  In a follow-up article, reporter Jessica McLean asks the question - A righteous disturbance or a democratic right?

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Matthew 24:5-8" TARGET="_blank">Matthew 24:5-8 many will come in my name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and they will lead many astray.  (6)  And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars.  (7)  For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places.  (8)  All these are but the beginning of the birth pains.  

Matthew 24:21-22" TARGET="_blank">Matthew 24:21-22  For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be.  (22)  And if those days had not been cut short, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short.

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What is the difference in Isaiah 9:6." TARGET="_blank">Isaiah 9:6. between the expressions the “child born” and the “Son given”?

There is an important difference, I believe, and one which the exponents of what they term “the New Light,” as to the Eternal Sonship of our Lord, would do well to consider. Why is the “child” said to be “born,” but the “Son” not born, but “given”? We read in Isaiah 7:14" TARGET="_blank">Isaiah 7:14 that God had been pleased to offer to king Ahaz a sign to confirm his doubting soul, that the line of David would not be superseded by the son of Tabeal, according to the Satanic design of Rezin and Pekah, which would have set aside the purpose of God regarding His future King, who must be of the seed of David according to the flesh. Ahaz had liberty of choice; he might ask for any sign in the depth, that is commensurate with the drying up of the Red Sea, or in the height commensurate with the standing still of the sun in answer to Joshua’s prayer. The king who was continually tempting God by his disobedience, refused this offer: He would not tempt the Lord, he said. Very well, then, the Lord will give a sign greater than any other known so far in the history of the world—the Virgin Birth of Him who was God: “Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call His name Immanuel” (v. 14). A great effort of unbelief has been made to show that the word,” ‘almãh,” translated “virgin,” should be rather rendered “young married woman.” Such an objection hardly shows unusual scholarship, so much as a lack of common sense; for the fact of a young married woman having a son would be no sign at all. In this verse, in the phrase “a virgin shall. . . bear a son,” the same verb is used as in chap. 9. 6, “a child is born.” Here the Son is viewed as the Son of Mary in the sense of Matthew 1:25" TARGET="_blank">Matthew 1:25: “She brought forth her first-born Son.” Why then is the “Son” said to be “given” in Isa. 9." TARGET="_blank">Isa. 9. 6? The reason is that there the One born is viewed as the One who had already been Son from all eternity. He could not become that by human birth. The child was born, but God gave His Eternal Son. W.H.

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Had the Lord Jesus Christ, a spirit, a soul, and a body, as a perfect Man, together with, yet different from, His being God?

This is no unnecessary matter for consideration, for not only is the Deity of Christ attacked to-day, but also His true Humanity, and that in circles where one might hope for better things. This arises partly from ignoring the labours of God’s servants in the past, especially in the first centuries of the Christian era, which we cannot afford to do. God overruled the early attacks on the Person of His beloved Son to consolidate and define the truths of His Deity and Humanity, and we owe a debt of gratitude to those whom He raised up to “contend earnestly for the faith.”

One truth which emerged as Scriptural from these conflicts was what is known as the “Hypostatical Union,” that is the union in the Lord Jesus Christ of two whole and perfect natures, the Divine and the Human, in equal relation with One Divine Person, the Eternal Son of God, of one substance with the Father. We cannot penetrate this mystery for “No man knoweth the Son but the Father;” we believe what is written. However, even the Arian heresy of the 4th century turned to the furtherance of the truth. The Arians taught the quasi-Godhead and quasi-Manhood of Christ. For them He was neither perfect God, nor true man, but something less than the former and more than the latter; and the spiritual element in His manhood (i.e., the spirit and soul) was replaced by His imperfect Godhead. The Arian controversy was a matter of life and death. Anus was a popular soft-spoken man and exercised a notable influence, as such men do to-day. However, the truth prevailed, and the Godhead of Christ, of the same substance as the Father, was established on a firm Scriptural basis, but His Manhood remained undefined.

It was the heresy of Apollinarius of Laodica (in Syria), an earnest opponent of Anus, that led to this. He taught that in the manhood of Christ the rational soul was lacking, and was replaced by the Godhead. This is virtually the error taught in some circles to-day. It was proved to be entirely unsatisfactory and unscriptural. If Christ were truly man, He must have been in possession of all that constitutes complete humanity—spirit, soul, body, will, etc. Indeed, His own words testify to this: “This is My body”; “My soui is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death”; “Father . . . not as I will, but as Thou wilt”; “Father, into Thy hands I commend My Spirit.” (Matthew 26:26, 38, 39;" TARGET="_blank">Matthew 26:26, 38, 39; Luke 23:46)." TARGET="_blank">Luke 23:46). Thus the words, “The Word became flesh”, imply something much more than that a Divine Person took a body, which might have meant little more than a Theophany of the Old Testament, but rather that He entered into manhood, that He became incarnate as truly “born of a woman,” a virgin, with all that perfect unfallen humanity implies. He was not less man, because sinless; not less experienced in human joys, sorrows, affections, weariness, hunger, pain, because truly God; not less capable of death, because not liable to death.

He was, moreover, not a dual Personality, as Nestorius of Constantinople taught (430 A.D.), but one Divine Person, in equal relation with His dual natures. As man, He is able in all points to sympathise with His people’s infirmities; as God, He is able to succour them.

W.H.

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SEPARATION
Is sectarianism sin? I am In an assembly of so called “open brethren” who invite “Reverend” gentlemen from the sects, also a sister, to address them. Is this right?.

Sectarianism wherever found, is a work of the flesh (Galatians 5:20)." TARGET="_blank">Galatians 5:20). To whom but God Himself should confession be made? The beginnings of it were seen at Corinth—”I am of Paul, and I of Apollos and I of Cephas; and I of Christ” (1 Corinthians  1:12).

In the first three cases men were attaching themselves to human leaders, instead of to Christ alone; in the last case, while attaching themselves to Christ, they were detaching from Him true members of His Body and pretending to belong to Him in some peculiar sense, in which others did not. This is also sectarianism against which we must watch. The whole idea of dividing up the Body of Christ is condemned by the Holy Spirit (see 1 Corinthians 3:3-4" TARGET="_blank">1 Corinthians 3:3-4 ). It is condoned to-day and we are told that the different sects are only regiments in God’s army, as though regiments recruited from one another and were sometimes found fighting against one another. The only true Christian position is to know no other centre than Christ, and to recognise all believers as equally belonging to Him, though lamenting the broken-up condition of things around.

No doubt there are men truly gifted of Christ, who occupy sectarian positions, but that does not make those positions right, and to invite such to teach the Saints a complete anomaly and certainly not calculated to “build these up on their most holy faith,” but rather to break down the land-marks between truth and error and lead the Lord’s people back on to sectarian ground. This is especially dangerous when the invited brethren are men who were once in the simple assemblies themselves, but have become popular preachers or even “Reverends,” wearing all the insignia of their declension. They are often strongly opposed to the truth they once professed. It is not for us to judge their conscience, nor should we put a salve to their conscience by inviting them to teach or preach, thus approving of their position, or be present, when they officiate, as is apparently the case in some places. As for inviting a sister to teach the gathered saints, it is so clearly contrary to our Lord’s express prohibition, through His apostle: “I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority* over the man, but to be in silence” (1 Timothy 2:12;" TARGET="_blank">1 Timothy 2:12; see also 1 Corinthians 14:34-35)," TARGET="_blank">1 Corinthians 14:34-35), that comment is needless.

W.H.

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