Northwestern Bible School - Scroll Yearbook (Minneapolis, MN)

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The Preacher’s Promissory Note (Continued from Page TO) Word of God has been the instrument ol the Holy Ghost, sometimes a hammer to break the heart; sometimes a sharp two-edged sword to cleave from one the evil habits that had long enthralled him; sometimes a magni¬ fying glass, compelling him to see his sins and all other features of horror that God beholds in the unregenerate heart. Truly it is a discemer of the thoughts and intents of the heart (Heb. 4:12) and on that account is used by the Spirit to reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment, (John 16:8.) Finney gives us a page out of his life to the effect that he came one after¬ noon to a neighborhood where they had never had any religious meetings. Calling the people to the school-house he found them moved by curiosity to look on his face and by hatred against what he should have to say. When he asked them to sing, the discords were such that he put his hands over his own ears, and when he prayed they sat bolt upright and scowled. What text to employ he knew not, But suddenly there came to him the Scripture: Up, get you out of this place; for the lord will destroy this city. (Gen, 19:15.) Standing before them for a few minutes, he declared their state tike that of Sodom, and in spite of their threatening countenances from which he (eared they might even strike him, he went on to tell them that their judgment would be the same. Suddenly a solemnity settled over them and imme¬ diately there seemed to fall upon the congregation a sort of shock. The Word had cut like a sword! Finney later learned that the wickedness of the town had given it the nick¬ name of SODOM, and the one man who had invited him there was nick¬ named LOT. But even there many converts were made, for the Word was the power of God unto salvation. Little wonder, then, that Paul, advising his Junior Timothy, did it in the brief sentence: Preach the Word! White As Snow (Continued from Page 72) God declares that the scarlet wool shall be made as white as snow. This speaks of a great change that is beyond the power of man. The white wool does not teach the eradication of a sinful nature, but it is a figurative way of declaring the great change which takes place in man in salvation. With some of these changes we are familiar. Get away from that man, for the God he is cursing will split the earth and swallow him up and let him go down alive into hell for his awful blas¬ phemy 1 said a gypsy in old England, of John Bunyan, who afterward wrote The Pilgrims Progress, the book that ranks next to the Bible. Jerry Macaulay once made this statement: There were days in my past life when I would have murdered a man had I known he had five dollars on him. Yet he became the saint of the Bowery, the man v ho stands foremost among all the rescue mission workers America has ever had. This is v hat God means when He says, Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. ( 73 )

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transgress the holy law of God. He is the only Indiv idual that ever lived Who could throw out the challenge, Convict Me of sin! Dr. I. M. Haldeman once described Him in this unforgettable way. Jesus Christ is a White Rose in a bed of scarlet poppies. The Roman centurion who stood at the foot of the cross spoke the truth for eternity when he said, Truly, this is a Right¬ eous Man, He was the White One. The only way in which the scarlet man could ever be made while is through God ' s plan of salvation. In other words, the Scarlet may today be made White because nineteen hundred years ago the White One was made Scarlet. Jesus paid it all, All to Him I owe; Sin had left a crimson stain. He washed it white as snow. Scarlet has in it the meaning of sacrifice, for it is the color of blood. The Bible is a bloody Book. In the Old Testament, a continual stream of blood flows at the sacrificial altar. This blood is typical of the blood of the Lamb of God, shed on Calvary ' s tree. This blood our Lord declared to be for the remission of sins (Matt, 26:28). SALVATION Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow, Snow comes from heaven. So does true righteousness! A missionary in the Province of Natal, South Africa, was served tea every morning in his bed¬ room by his Zulu servant. One morning, after a snowfall, the servant burst into the room without knocking and without the tea. He cried, Oh, Missy, the sky has fallen in and we are all in heaven! It was his lirst sight of snow and as its white beauty excited his wonder, he could think only of heaven. He had read in I Cor. 1:30 that He is made unto us righteousness. Snow is a covering whiteness. How beautiful to look out upon the snow- covered earth. Whiteness everywhere! All the dingy dark places of earth covered. The same thing happens when a sinner is clad in the robe of God ' s righteousness. Dressed in His righteousness alone, Faultless I stand before the throne. We have a double imputation in Scripture. When Christ went to the cross, our sins were imputed to Him: when we come to Him, His righteousness is imputed to us. The following illustration may help to make clear what we mean. In the twenty-seventh chapter of Matthew, the Lord Jesus is delivered by Pilate into the hands of Roman soldiers. They took Him into the common hall and stripped Him of the white robe which He wore, and put upon Him a scarlet robe (Matt. 27:23). There He stood in their midst—the Sinless Man, scarlet clad. Just a s that scarlet robe was placed upon Him, even so God laid our sins upon Him. The same chapter in Matthew pictures the soldiers gambling for His garments at the foot of the cross (verse 35). Have you ever stopped to think that a sinner went away from the foot of the cross to wear the Lord ' s white garment? When we come as lost sinners to the cross, we are arrayed in God ' s garments of white. Our scarlet robe was upon Him; His white robe is upon us. But salvation goes beyond the mere imputation of righteousness. There is also an importation of righteousness in the Person of the Holy Spirit, Who dwells within the saint to make of him a temple of God. The crimson wool spoken of has reference to a woolen cloth placed in the pot of crimson dye and boiled and boiled until every thread is crimson. This takes us beyond the thought of sin as some superficial act of man. Sin is part of the very nature of man, and to deal with sin, we must get back to the very fiber of a man ' s being. (Continued on Page 73) ( 72 )

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SNOWFLAKES Out of the bosom of the air, Out of the cloud-folds of her garments shaken, Over the woodlands brown and bare, Over the harvest-fields forsaken, Silent, and soft, and slow Descends the snow. Even as our cloudy fancies take Suddenly shape in some divine expression, Even as the troubled heart doth make In the white countenance confession, The troubled sky reveals The grief it feels. This is the poem of the air, Slowly in silent syllables recorded; This is the secret of despair, Long in its cloudy bosom hoarded, Now whispered and revealed To the wood and field. —Longfellow ( 74 )