Covenanter Witness Vol. 53 - Rparchives.org

again."out"again."men."earth."nation."price."lives at Quebec died willingly. But the Lord JesusChrist gave His life as a willing sacrifice. "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay downmy life, that I might take it again. No man takethit from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have powerto lay it down and I have power to take it(John 10:17, 18)The Quebec bridge is striking for its beauty.Symmetrical in every detail, it has over each stonepier a net work of steel girders supported both fromabove and below. These huge structures are joined bysmaller section in the middle. The Lord Jesus Christis also noted for His beauty. This has been the universal conception of the artists. Isaiah wrote, "Thineeyes shall see the king in his beauty." (33:17) Inthe Song of Solomon he is described as "the one whois altogether lovely" (5:16), and as "the chiefestamong ten thousand" (5:10). John in John 1:14writes, "We beheld his glory, the glory as of theOnly Begotten of the Father."One day after we had returned from our tripI recounted to our family some of the things I hadbeen reading about the bridge. Our daughter Louise,who is 10, said, "Well Daddy, If I had known that ithad fallen twice when it was being built I would havebeen afraid to go across it for fear that it mightfall We assured her that there was littleto fear for the bridge has stood up under heavytraffic for many years, and is even used by railwaytrains.How many people there are unwilling to trustJesus Christ as their spiritual bridge! Some willsay, "What assurance do we have that Christ is ableto cleanse us from all unrighteousness ?" It appearsthat there are many who would rather trust in theirown ability to swim through the dangerous currentsin the river which no man can cross, than to committhemselves to the loving care of Christ.Years ago when the old trestle bridge was standing at Niagara Falls, trains in crossing it would justbarely creep along, as it was so shaky. People sat perfectly quiet with their hearts in their mouths withfear lest it should fall. There used to be an old coloredman come aboard just as they started across thebridge, distributing tracts, and in a clear voice cryout in the stillness, "If your trust is in the LordJesus Christ you have nothing to fear." We have theassurance of this truth from the Sacred writers andfrom the Lord himself: "All that the Father givethme shall come to me, and him that cometh to me Iwill in no wise cast (John 6 :37).Usually we have to pay toll when we cross alarge bridge, so we were surprised to find no tollcollector at the Quebec bridge. Perhaps in an indirectway we were helping to maintain the bridge when wepaid a gasoline tax, but in the usual sense of theword the bridge is free. We might have felt an obligation in crossing the bridge, reasoning that thebridge was constructed at great expense and that weshould therefore pay our share. But there was noone to whom we could have paid a toll had we so desired.When Clara Barton was engaged in Red Crosswork in Cuba during the Spanish American war,Colonel Roosevelt came to her desiring to buy somedelicacies for the sick and wounded men under hiscommand. His request was refused. Roosevelt wastroubled; he loved his men, and was ready to payfor the supplies out of his own pocket. "How can Iget these things?" he said; "I must have proper foodfor my sick "Just ask for them, Colonel," saidthe surgeon in charge of the Red Cross headquarters."Oh,"said Roosevelt, his face breaking into a smile,"Then I do ask for them." And he got them at once.But he got them through grace and not throughpurchase. The Scripture makes it clear that God'sgrace is free. "Come ye, buy, and eat; yea come,buy wine and milk without money and without(Isa. 55:1) Also in The Revelation we have the invitation of the Lord himself, "Whosoever will, let himcome and take the water of life freely" (Rev. 22:17).The next time you cross a large bridge, thinkwhat the bridge means to you and your fellow citizens. Consider the convenience of it, and of what itmust have cost to build it. But will you not also consider this bridge of which we have been writing ? Areyou ready to put your trust in the bridge which wasplanned in the counsels of eternity, the bridge whichcrosses the dark chasm of sin and which no man isable to cross in his own strength ? Commit your waynow to this bridge that you may never be caught inthe dark and swirling waters which carry men toeternal destruction.GLIMPSES Cont'd from page 242monsense or spirituality swallow their interpretations hook,line and sinker. That is the pathos of the thing. Who can tellhow many followers of this false cult might have been savedfrom its snare had the ministers of the Gospel in our variouschurches been faithful in their exposition of the Word?"The one thing about the Witnesses that one must admireand commend is their zeal. One sees them on every busystreet corner in Toronto, and we presume it is the same elsewhere selling their 'Kingdom' wares unabashed by rebuffs andunperturbed byrebuttals of their false philosophies. This isone respect at least in which the children of darkness arewiser than the children of Light. If the evangelical churchwould take a leaf from their book and go forth with theglad tidings of the evangelical faith and proclaim the Wordof God up and down the land, false cults and false faithswould soon disappear from theProtest the Queen's ActionThe Queen of Great Britain recently gave a donation toaid with the rebuilding of a Roman Catholic Cathedral inEngland. The Commission of the Assembly of the Free Churchin Scotland has protested this royal action in the followinglanguage : "This, in our opinion, raises a constitutional issue ofvital importance to our Protestant nation. In the Coronationthe Queen solemnly undertook to pledge herself to uphold theProtestant faith of the nation and it is, in our opinion, quiteinconsistent with these vows that she should also uphold afaith that is antagonistic to the Protestant religion and thatis in these days putting forth all its might to undermine andoverthrow our national Protestantism." Their resolution alsostated that this act is "without precedent in this realm sincethe Reformation."Commenting on this, the Canadian editor, J. H. Hunter,says: "The Protestant church there (in Britain) has largelyforgotten the pit from whence it was dug, and the eighteenthousand men, and women and children who laid down theirlives during the 'killing times' in Scotland that Popery andPrelacy might be then exterminated. Popery is coming backwith a vengeance in the old land and this action of the royalfamily cannot help but encourage it in its endeavor to gaincontrol in Britain and set a popish king or queen on thethrone. God made Britain great when she got rid of Romanism, and her decline and fall is being written with the riseand spread of that evil system throughout theOctober 20, 1954245