Covenanter Witness Vol. 54 - Rparchives.org

obligations"
ourselves"
works."
views."
and in a very real sense it is. It is a very long and
far-reaching interruption. How many plans are up
set by death ! How much seemingly good and neces
sary work is interrupted by the angel of death ! The
interruption caused by death is one that we will all
experience some day. When the angel of death calls
we must obey the summons. Everything must be
laid aside at once. We can't bribe the angel of death
or keep him away.
And yet, looked at aright, death is not really
an interruption. If we trust and love the Lord Jesus
Christ, if we are living daily in union and fellowship
with Him and in obedience to His will, then death is
not really an interruption but a promotion to higher
service. One of the things we are told about heaven
is that there "His servants shall serve Him." That
heavenly service will be the continuation and consum
mation of the service begun here on earth.
Let us then make sure that we are Christ's
that we have chosen Him as Saviour and are con
secrated to His service. Then the so-called interrup
tions of life we shall be able to regard as His ap
pointment, and when the last interruption of all
comes and death calls, it will seem to us the voice
of Christ inviting us to higher service.
The Reformed Presbyterian Witness
OUR OBLIGATIONS . . . Cont'd from page 37
recognition of need, in "accepting the Covenant of
Grace."
We acknowledge that we sin and fall short
of the glory of God. That we are frail creatures and
that any hope of acceptance rests in the provisions
of God's grace offered to us in Christ Jesus our Lord.
2. We "undertake
promising to seek
to conform our lives to the teaching and example of
Our Lord Jesus Christ in the testimony of a consist
ant, godly life. In this we promise to "endeavor to
forsake all that is sinful and that would compromise
our witness."
3. To this end "we promise to avail
of the means of grace and the opportunities of stew
ardship of the whole life, in service as well as in
monetary giving.
4. We do solemnly purpose to "seek first the
righteousness"
Kingdom of God and His
with all of
its implications in opposing evil in high places and
furthering that which is right and good in Church
and State.
should be given that
Now a concluding warning
our chief purpose in renewing our Covenant should
not be the blessing which we may anticipate, but,
instead, that God's name may be glorified in the act
of renewal and in the continuing life of obedience
which should flow from the Covenant renewal. Then
the grand purpose should one day be attained that,
"All ends of earth, remembering Him,
Shall turn repenting, to the Lord ;
The kindreds of the nations then
To Him their homage shall accord;
Because the Lord the kingdom owns
And rules above all earthly thrones."
GLIMPSES- Continued from page 38
"The worst kind of religion is no religion at all, and those
men who live in ease and luxury, indulging themselves in the
amusement of going without religion, may be thankful that
Tither's Corner
KANSAS SPEAKS AGAIN
Rev. Sam Boyle's article of December first on a
new minister for Japan stated that if the 2000 adult
members, supposed to be furnishing the bulk of the
church's giving, would increase their gifts by $58.00
each, the over-all asked for budget woud be sub
scribed.
Mr. Boyle's home congregation decided to do
something about it. So a pledge-card was distributed
on Sabbath, December 26, which reads as follows :
"I PLEDGE IN EXCESS OF REGULAR
GIVING SO THAT SYNOD'S BUDGET WILL
BE RAISED AND A MISSIONARY SENT TO
JAPAN. SOME OF PLEDGE TO BE PAID DE
CEMBER 26 AND THE BALANCE BY
1955."
MARCH 1,
This would seem an inopportune time to present
a card like that. First, because an offering was to be
taken for the building fund for their new church.
Then there was the regular fund that comes Sabbath
by Sabbath. Besides all that, it was the day set for
the offering for National Reform. A pledge-card on
top of all that on the same day
So What I copy from their church bulletin of
January 2, 1955.
Treasurer's Report on Collections
for December 26:
National Reform Association $106.04
Building Fund 515.00
Synod's Budget 608.00
General Fund 183.95
Total $1412.99
Pledged to Synod's Budget (Pledge Card) 1036.00
(of which $608.00 was paid that day)
Well, there it is folks and from a congregation
which now has no church building and is without a
pastor to lead them! Knowing Topeka as we do we
are not too greatly surprised.
Be it known that Topeka congregation has not
asked or authorized us to publish these facts but
we take it that church bulletins are public property.
Besides we deem it a good way to "consider one an
other to provoke unto love, and to good
D. H. Elliott
they live in lands where the gospel they neglect has tamed the
beastliness and ferocity of the men who, but for Christianity,
might long ago have eaten their bodies like the South Sea
Islanders, or cut off their heads and tanned their hides like
the monsters of the French Revolution.
"When the microscopic search of skepticism,
which has
hunted the heavens and sounded the seas to disprove the ex
istence of a Creator, had turned its attention to human society,
and has found a place on this planet ten miles square where
a decent man can live in decency, comfort and security, sup
porting and educating his children unspoiled and unpolluted;
a place where age is reverenced, infancy respected, manhood
esteemed, womanhood honored, and human life held in due
regard
when skeptics can find a place ten miles square on
this globe where the gospel of Christ has not gone and cleared
the way and laid the foundations, and made decency and se
curity possible, it will then be in order for the skeptical liter
ati to move thither, and there ventilate their
January 19, 1955
41