Herald of Gospel Liberty 1904

 Your observations welcome:

Herald of Gospel Liberty – December 15, 1904, page 790. 

Private Interpretation.

By Rev. S. B. Bloomfield. 

There appeared in the HERALD an account of a division, into two parties, of a certain church in Indiana, over the teachings of two certain ministers, one of the Christians, the other a Holiness minister. Setting forth in the decision of the judge is the fact (if it be a fact), that every member of the church has the right to interpret the Bible for himself and to believe, teach and practice the doctrine, taught in the Scripture, according to his own belief of their meaning; Christian character being the test of Christian fellowship, Christ, the only recognized head and master of said church. Brethren, do you or do you not stand by these principles. Has a brother the right to teach and preach the Bible, and to expound the same as he may understand it? Say Yes, and No. Yes, if he is being led by the Holy Spirit into all truth, he has; and No, if he has not been so led. But did not the brethren of Paul's time find some that had not even heard that there was a Holy Spirit, and they were taken and taught more perfectly? And is not that the proper way? God’s people are one, and the one spirit holy; and it should teach them not that which we conceive to be proper, but try them by the word and the Spirit in the spirit of a sound mind. We must first believe, understand, that the Jehovah, the creator of the universe, whose only son, (begotten son) was Jesus Christ, and we by him, and by whom all things were made, and "without him was not anything made,” this same personage is the author of our Bible, that it is his word. Second, that salvation, deliverance, is from that which was lost (all was lost in Adam) and that it is by grace, favor that we are granted life on any plane,) but by the favor of Jehovah through Christ. Says the apostle. We have grace upon grace; called to have shares with Jesus; immortality, hence, we are to seek immortality. That death is destruction, and not life in torment; "God is a God of love." Paul in first Cor. says, "If we in this life only have hope, we are of all men most miserable." Why? Because Satan is the prince of this world, and has the power of death, but Christ will destroy him, and open the grave in the resurrection. The great atonement sacrifice is Christ , head and body ; we are his body, and bring up that of the suffering of Christ, for the sins of the world, in this our day, atonement day, which is from Christ's first advent in the flesh till his second as a quickening spirit, the first fruits of the spirit.  

We are now in the harvest of this age of this age Christ is chief reaper, and is present as such though invisible, and his kingdom is now in process of organization, which will in a very short time overturn all the nations of earth, destroy evil, bind Satan and rule the earth, as its rightful Prince, fill the earth with life, beauty and glory, for God says "I will give you beauty for ashes." These brethren, are some of my conclusions, drawn from that old Bible, having been a minister of the word for fifty years, and first a member of the Miami Christian Conference, ordained in said conference, when I. N. Walter was its president, at Carysville, Ohio, yet I have been in the state for years, and have not so much as been asked by any of its ministers to give an address or preach a sermon.

 Maybe the reason lies in the fact, that I am a student of C. F. Russell. [sic] His works, the Millennial Dawn series of helps to Bible study, which help to the understanding of the Word, I consider superior to any other. And so with the tracts; I consider Russell, Hastings, Miles Grant, Couch on the Prophets, the deep thinkers of our day; not but what there are others, but that these stand out in bold relief as minds led by the spirit of God; if this be true, brethren, remember that the church stands for the principles first named; then why your treatment of brethren who may see different? 

Eaton, Ohio.