NO. 188: JUST MEN PERFECTED IN THEIR SPIRITS

No. 188

“But ye are come unto Mount Zion, and unto the city of the Living God, the heaven­ly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the first-born, which are written in Heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect.” (Heb. 12:22,23) While it is not our purpose to discuss all of this Scripture in detail, we shall quote it from the Diaglott: “You have approached to Zion, a mountain and city of the Living God – the heavenly Jerusalem (Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all—Gal. 4:26); and to myriads of angels – a full assembly; and to a congregation of first-borns, having been enrolled in the Heavens; and to a Judge Who Is God of all; and to spirits of the right­eous made perfect.” The last clause would be more literally translated: “Ye have ap­proached... God the judge of all, even of just men perfected in their spirits.”

Specifically addressed in this text are those living here in the end of the Age, portraying as it does the Time of Trouble, which we have not only “approached,” but are involved in the very midst of it – when everything that can be shaken will be shaken ­all will be shaken out except that which Is unbreakable. “Every man’s work will be made manifest, and the day (this present day) will declare it, because it will be re­vealed by fire” – by the destructive influences now in operation. Those who have built their “house upon the sand” will see it demolished by the rain, the floods and the winds (Matt. 7:27) – by the “fire” of this day. But of the fully faithful it is written, “Here is the patience of the saints – those who keep the commandments of God and the faith (faithfulness) of Jesus... From this time blessed are those dead who die in the Lord... they may rest from their labors; for their works follow after them.” Thus, there are only two unshakable things brought to view here: the Kingdom and the “fine linen” the unimpeachable characters – of the saints. Often we hear it stated, You can’t take it with you; but the Revelator tells us that the saints can, and do, take their works, their superb characters, with them.

St. Paul likens all this to the inauguration of the law Covenant at Sinai, when all the people heard the thunderings, and the noise of the trumpets, and saw the light­enings and the mountain smoking; when Moses “drew near unto the thick darkness where God was”; and Moses went up into the mountain. All of this was typical, of course, representing the inauguration of the New Covenant. And, as we have so often stressed, every antitype is greater than its type; and the things which the Jews saw, and at which they trembled, pictured in very small fashion the larger and grander things trans­piring now, and yet to come. If the people trembled then, how much more do we now see “men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking on these things.” (Luke 21:26)

Presently, we are approaching the General Assembly (the complete gathering) of the Church of the first-borns, included in which will be Christ, the Head, and all the faith­ful of this Age – all who have made “their calling and election sure,” and those who failed to do so, but who were saved so as by fire – all new creatures who attain the “first resurrection,” and those others – the Great Multitude – who publicly serve before the Throne. All of these must have finished their course before the “marriage of the Lamb” and the wedding supper can occur.

St. Paul also states we are approaching the place where “the spirits of just men” will be made perfect – just men perfected in their spirits, or disposition, characters. Self-evidently these are not a part of the church of the first-borns, or the Apostle would not have made separate mention of them. These are properly catalogued in Heb. 11:39, 40: “These all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise: God having provided some better thing for us (the fully faithful of this Gospel Age), that they without us (the fully faithful class – the saints) should not be made perfect” perfected in their bodies, minds and hearts. These all, the Ancient Worthies, are still waiting – “sleeping in the dust of the earth” – waiting for the marriage supper of the Lamb, after which they will appear in physical perfection as the first children of that marriage. But then they will only be men made perfect – human beings and not spirit be­ings. And this perfection will at first be only physical.

It should not require great intellect to recognize that Samson, for instance, who slew more in his death than he did in his life, would not come forth from the ruins of the Philistine temple with the love of God in his heart and mind for those whom he had just destroyed. Nor of Samuel, one of the grand “Old men” (Joel 2:28) of the Old Tes­tament, who “hewed Agag in pieces before the Lord.” (1 Sam. 15:33) St. Paul gives quite a list of these in the 11th Chapter of Hebrews, but says there are many more whom he does not specifically name. But of all of them, known or unknown to us, not one is said to have been a pacifist. They were counted “Just” because of their faith. It was left for Jesus to be the first of the fully faithful to preach the doctrine “love your enemies.” But the present-day Youthful Worthies (the young Men” of Joel 2:28) have been well in­structed in this matter; thus, from that standpoint they will enter the Kingdom superior to the stalwarts of Old Testament record. All of the “Old men” were of “the just,” will have a “better resurrection,” though none of them even closely approached the perfection of character attained by The Elect of this Age – the Little Flock. Thus, Jesus said that “the least” of these latter would be greater in the Kingdom than the greatest of those Ancients.

THE TABERNACLE

It has been properly stated that the Tabernacle in the wilderness reveals the entire Plan of God; and, as is true with so many types, that Tabernacle has a number of anti­types, chief of which is the Gospel-Age antitype. Let us keep well in mind that a place in that type invariably represents a condition in the antitype. Thus, the Camp in the type represents the rebellious nominal people of God in the Gospel-Age and in the Epi­phany antitypes. These people desire some association with God, but not enough for them to do His “good and acceptable, and perfect will” with “all the heart, mind, soul and strength.” If this conclusion be true, then we may reach a further conclusion – namely, so long as we have with us the rebellious nominal people of God, just that long shall we also have the assurance that the definition of the antitypical Camp must remain constant; it should not be changed in any particular.

And the Court of the type represents for the faith Age, the place where the “Just men” would have their standing – the tentatively justified. Of course, in the case of Abel, Noah, Abraham, etc., they lived long before the Tabernacle in the wilderness was constructed; but they were reckoned as having their standing there, God counting those things that are not as though they are. Those men believed God and it was counted, reck­oned, to them for righteousness. Because of their faith, they were “counted” (reckoned) just; counted as having their standing in the place where all the just of this faith Age have had their standing.

When JFR first coined his “Jonadabs,” he could not logically put them in the Court; there were then still too many good Bible Students who knew the truth on the subject from Brother Russell, and they would not swallow such an invention. This and other errors eventually forced him to drop the Tabernacle entirely as a type, so the Witnesses no longer study Tabernacle Shadows, or regard it as a part of their belief. Similar con­siderations forced him also to reject Elijah & Elisha as types; and his was an outstanding example of the truth that one error usually forces its proponent to accept other errors ­to patch up the ‘hole in the roof.’ And now that RGJ has rejected the true antitypical Camp, he likewise is forced to the same course – not to the same degree, however, but he is definitely headed in that same direction with his Campers Consecrated. He has now cor­rupted the proper interpretation of the antitypical Camp.

He has emphasized that his Campers perform in every particular just as do the Youth­ful Worthies – they are so much alike you can’t tell them apart unless you ask them what date they fully accepted God, so he says. But he also contends that they cannot be counted with the “just men” discussed aforegoing – their names have never been written in Heaven. And in this he directly contradicts the clear teachings of the Epiphany Messen­ger on this subject. Early in the Epiphany, when the status of the Youthful Worthies was being vehemently debated, this statement was given in E-4:330 to prove that the Youth­ful Worthies could, and do, receive similar recognition and treatment from God as did the Ancient Worthies:

“Both classes show the same spirit of faithfulness amid the same hard con­ditions under the handicap of there being no Ransom merit available for their use (which truth also applies to RGJ’s Consecrated Campers – if there is such a class, and they have the faith of Abraham as he contends—JJH). The unchangeableness of God’s holy character in view of His oath to the entire faith class (and RGJ contends they are a ‘faith class’—­JJH) guarantees a similar reward to those who were similarly faithful under similar diffi­cult conditions and who were subject to a similar handicap in a similar inavailability of the Ransom merit for their benefit.”

And further on p. 332:

“It is reasonable and Scriptural to expect for the Youthful Worthies, as well as for the Ancient Worthies, that they will receive ultimately a higher reward than they could have on this earth. As the Ancient, so the Youthful Worthies would be everlastingly degraded instead of being everlastingly rewarded for their Millen­nial service and suffering for the world, and their post-Millennial service for the faith­ful of the world, and for their post-Millennial suffering for righteousness at the hands of the Second Death class, if they would remain on the earth forever; for since all human beings found worthy of everlasting life will henceforth be equal (Matt. 25:34; Rev. 21: 24), it would follow that the Youthful, as well as the Ancient Worthies, from being the Millennial superiors would be degraded to being the eternal equals of the world of mankind, if as human beings they remained eternally on this earth. Thus God would not only not give them any reward for the Millennial and post-Millennial service and suffering, but post-­Millennially give them no more than He will give to those who would not serve Him, but did serve Satan, sin, error and death, during the period that these were in the ascendancy and domination among men. The Divine attributes do not reward such faithfulness by eternal deg­radation.”

If the above is the correct teaching for Youthful Worthies, it would also now apply with equal force toward his Campers Consecrated — if such a class is now being developed. To avoid the force of this logic by the Epiphany Messenger, RGJ is now falteringly at­tempting to stammer a certain “more honorable” position for his Campers Consecrated than will eventually be the reward of the “sheep” after the end of the Little Season; but his contention carries no conviction whatever, because he can find nothing in Bible logic any­where to support it — nor in the Parousia or Epiphany writings.

At the Chicago Convention he offered quite some detail on the Hill Ophel in Jerusa­lem as a type of his Campers Consecrated; but it will be recalled that when Brother John­son taught that the Hill Bezetha typed the Youthful Worthies, he also produced many con­vincing Scriptures to support his contention. This RGJ has not been able to do for his Campers Consecrated. If that Hill Ophel has any significance at all, it would typify the Jews, for we have the clear statement in Rom. 1:16 that “salvation is to the Jew first” ­not to Campers Consecrated, or to Jonadabs, or to Quasi-elect Consecrated first, but to the Jew first. And any one with even a smattering of Present Truth should be able to see the logic of this. Certainly those Jews in Jerusalem that survive Jacob’s Trouble would automatically be the first to be blessed under the new Kingdom, after which it will grad­ually extend to others.

So far as we know, there are only three groups in Little Babylon – or anywhere else, for that matter – who have invented non-existent classes in this Epiphany period. And the three that comprise this newly-developed ‘Trinity’ are the JW’s (Jehovah’s Witnesses), RGJ (Laymen’s Home Missionary Movement), and JWK (the self-styled Apoka­lypsis Messenger).

There is yet another crushing refutation to his error to be found in Epiphany Vol. 8, p. 10: “In the second typical feature the 12 tribes represent those people of the 12 denominations who do not consecrate, but who hold measurably to the Ransom and right­eousness, and who form the transitional camp, i.e., the Camp bridging the period between the Gospel and the Millennial Ages.”

This same teaching is given in slightly different wording in E-10:209. Certainly, we are not yet in the Millennial Age – from the Kingdom standpoint; in fact, the 12 denominations are still intact as such in the transitional Epiphany Camp. Thus, the Camp as outlined in the foregoing quotation must still be with us; and RGJ is now put­ting his Campers Consecrated right in the same position as the twelve denominations. He has not yet explained this to his Campers Consecrated. He is now telling us that the Epiphany Messenger did not understand this matter, so he himself will give us the Truth on it. If the Epiphany Messenger were wrong on his understanding of the Epiphany Camp, then it would logically follow that he was also wrong on the remainder of the Epi­phany Tabernacle. Let those accept such error who wish to do so; as for us, we shall continue in the things we have learned, and been assured of, knowing of whom we have learned them.”

Certainly no one with just ordinary understanding of Present Truth would believe that the twelve denominations are not still in the Epiphany Camp. Therefore, it follows that the “finished picture” has not yet begun to appear; yet RGJ has us in it with his Campers Consecrated. The finished picture will begin to appear after Armageddon, at which time the truly repentant and believing (the quasi-elect), but not consecrated, will constitute the Epiphany Camp, even as all others will be forced therefrom, and take their places with the Heathen. When that occurs, and antitypical Hophni and Phineas are no longer with us, many who are now rebellious nominal Christians will no longer be rebel­lious, but will become receptive to the Truth. We stress that the ‘signs of the times’ will make very clear to us when that time arrives; yet RGJ is now following in the foot­steps of That Evil Servant, who was ever running ahead of the Lord, and making one co­lossal blunder after another, so that now the Witnesses have the Kingdom already with us, and they are separating the sheep from the goats. Given time – if RGJ doesn’t turn from the “error of his way” – he will be forced into some such spiritual bedlam, as he also repeatedly attempts to run ahead of the Lord. Immediately after Brother Johnson’s death, he began his “foolish” course by presenting his Do-You-Knows – a full million of them were printed. It would be very interesting to know how many of them he has left, and just what results were secured by those that have been distributed. Indeed, we are witness to the truth of Brother Johnson’s statement: Bungling is the usual and natural activity of the Great Company!

Had 1914 come and gone, with nothing in the signs of the times to pinpoint that date, we may be certain Brother Johnson would not have taught that the Time of Trouble and the Epiphany were then with us. Yet, with just nothing in the signs of the times to establish 1954, RGJ now clings to that date as though the corroborating evidence were fully there.

One more point may well be mentioned here: In several places the Epiphany Messen­ger has warned us that any attempt by a crown-loser to bring forth a new doctrine would be “gazing,” would be offering “strange fire,” which would consequently be error with­out further ado. Therefore, we could – if we were inclined – automatically reject such teaching as error; but we offer Scriptural refutation of it to strengthen the faith of our readers, so they may know the real foundation truth on this subject. There are cer­tain principles laid down in the Bible, which we need to grasp and apply them to our daily lives that we may be “established in the Present Truth.” A primary foundation principle is justice, which must be recognized and practiced before we can build the principles of love, mercy, etc. We need to learn what justice means – as it is dis­cussed in some of the quotations herein. Then we shall be in a strong position “by rea­son of use to discern both good and evil” (Heb. 5:14) – to discern clearly between Truth and error on every important point – and to be courageous and uncompromising in declar­ing the Truth.

THE NOVEMBER-DECEMBER PRESENT TRUTH

On pages 87-91 of this paper the Chicago discourse on Ophel is further considered ­with the usual presumption that RGJ injected into it. Again he offers Rev. 22:10, 11 as ‘proof’ of his teaching, and refers his readers to E-10:114 for corroboration. We have used this very citation so repeatedly against him in crushing manner that only one fully in the clutches of Azazel would have the brazen effrontery to use it again. However, we now repeat it again in refutation: “Only when J expounds connectedly the entire book of Revelation will it be due to say, ‘Seal not the sayings of the prophecy of this book.” So we now inquire, Has J “expounded connectedly the entire book of Revelation?”

Then on p. 114:

“After 1954 no more persons will enter the tentatively-justified state,” But, since 1954 RGJ has been feverishly attempting to bring people into the tentatively-­justified state – clearly in contradiction of this statement, and this very statement he is now citing to ‘prove’ his present activities. As the Epiphany Messenger has observed about similar crown losers – Why is it that they offer citations that directly contra­dict their position? Is it not because they are in the clutches of Azazel, and cannot think clearly as long as they are in that condition?

And concerning this spiritual bedlam, RGJ says this on p. 90, col. 1, par. 4: “We know that it, like all other parts of the advancing Truth, will come under special at­tack by the Adversary. Satan has always opposed the ‘meat in due season,’ given by our Lord to supply the needs of His people.” To those of us familiar with the early Epi­phany, these words have a very familiar ring to them; they are almost an exact duplicate of the wails and whines of that Foolish Shepherd. He, too, had an ‘Adversary’ to oppose his ‘advancing Truth’ – it was the sword (sharp opposing real Truth) that was upon his arm and upon his right eye. (Zech. 11:17) It is indeed an old Jesuitical trick to hurl at others the very truths that apply to them – just as did that Foolish Shepherd. And, Hitler like, they also realized that if you make the lie big enough, and repeat, repeat, repeat, a certain element will believe it.

It is apparent on every hand that we are in the Epiphany period when “the Lord will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the heart” (1 Cor. 4:5); and time itself is one of the major factors in producing that mani­festation. Early in the Epiphany a great division occurred over the chronology, some con­tending there was a 19-year mistake in our understanding of it. That error was clearly and forcefully refuted in the Present Truth; but many who had accepted the error either did not read the Present Truth, or were overly persuaded by their leaders to ignore it. However, time itself made manifest the error. When 1933 came, not one thing occurred which would mark that date as the end of the Gentile Times; but in nineteen years it had been sufficiently glossed over and given the silent treatment, so there was no prominent mention of it. But it was there just the same!

Time Itself is also slowly, but surely, making manifest RGJ’s folly with respect to his 1954 date. Let us not forget that he obtained his initial impetus on Campers Conse­crated from J. W. Krewson, whom he now brands as a rank errorist. Nor has JWK made much effort since that time to defend the teaching – leaving that now to RGJ. But time is making it appear more foolish every year. And the same is true of his Attestatorial Ser­vice – a service which has produced as near to nothing as anything that Evil Servant foisted upon his gullible followers. And many of RGJ’s ardent followers, including some of his prominent leaders, have shown little or no enthusiam for the Service, with inter­est in it also diminishing as each year passes. Even RGJ himself is not nearly so loud and garrulous about it as he was ten years ago, because even a babe in the Truth can readily recognize that there is just no ‘parallel’ at all between the 1954 effort and the true Little Flock attestatorial service in 1914-1916. Of course, many of his new­comers know nothing about the 1914-1916 effort from their personal experience, and prob­ably many of them have not even read about it.

Then, concerning this latest ‘advancing Truth’ regarding the Hill Ophel, RGJ says Brother Johnson laid the foundation for this to come in due course. Those quotations we have offered aforegoing from E-10:113,114 certainly don’t reveal any such foundation; but it is well to keep in mind here, too, that this is also an old trick of Azazel. The Roman Catholic Church tells us that St. Peter laid the foundation for their present er­rors; and the Jehovah’s Witnesses state with equal vehemence that Brother Russell laid the foundation for their present efforts and errors. Even the most innocent tyros with RGJ have no difficulty In recognizing the falsity of the Witnesses’ claims, even as they are at the same time completely blinded to the grime on their own doorstep. And with such evidence before us, we may resign ourselves in the strong assurance that time itself will eventually “make manifest” the Truth and the error on such controversial questions; and we offer a few stanzas from the poet along this line:

Serene, I fold my hands and wait,

Nor care for wind nor tide nor sea;

I rave no more ‘gainst time or fate,

For lo! my own shall come to me.

The stars come nightly to the sky;

The tidal wave unto the sea;

Nor time, nor space, nor deep, nor high,

Can keep my own away from me.

Previously, we made mention of the “gazing” activities of crown-losers; and we now offer some quotations in corroboration: “Nor are the Levites to seek to discover ‘new light’ (note RGJ’s statement aforegoing concerning ‘advancing Truth – new light—JJH) and spread it before the Church, as this would be attempting to go into the Holy, from which they have been excluded, and would result in their offering strange fire, as the Society and other leaders have done in Vol. VII, the Tower, etc.” (E-7:138)

And all of us are witness to the tumult and mischief that have resulted from these efforts. We quote further from E-9:134: “It will be noted that while God has given the non-star-membered teachers of the General Church and the more prominent local elders vis­ions and dreams, He has never given them to see as a thing new a doctrine. This privi­lege is limited exclusively to our Lord acting in the star-members. Any attempt on the part of a non-star-membered teacher or of a non-teacher as the first one to work out a doctrine would be speculation, and would, therefore, not result in uncovering a new truth (as RGJ has been attempting to do with his Campers Consecrated—JJH), but would result in error.” We now quote from E-11:495: “None of these brothers (prominent Little Flock teachers—JJH) were the first to see new doctrines, which under Jesus is the exclusive privilege of star-members.”

And summing up, concerning those attempting to “gaze,” there is this in E-11:383: “God will put such an one into such controversial disadvantages that amid them to de­fend his errors he will be continually surrendering formerly held truths (such as the truth on the transitional Epiphany Camp, Justification only in the Court, etc.—JJH) that impinge against his new errors, as was done with all the six sets of harvest sif­ters. Thus does God punish such invasions, which are usurpations.”

To those who have their senses properly exercised (developed) to discern between truth and error, the above quotations are more than sufficient to enable them to recog­nize that any new doctrine proposed by a crown-loser is self-evidently “strange fire” (false doctrine). The Epiphany Messenger has presented this matter most unmistakably clear in this Epiphany (bright shining) period for our protection against such perver­sions as Campers Consecrated, Quasi-elect Consecrated and Jonadabs; and any who cast aside such important Truth that he gave us are indirectly denying that he was indeed the Epiphany Messenger, and the last Star Member to produce a new doctrine. And, once this matter is made clear, we may be sure that only those who persist in being misled by it will be those who never were “established in the present (Epiphany) truth.”

As respects the resurrection, we are definitely told that there will be a resurrec­tion of “the just” – as such; separate and distinct from all others of the human race. But there is no mention anywhere in the Scriptures of a resurrection of the Quasi-elect as such – whether they be consecrated or not. Thus, if any of his Consecrated Campers should die before the inauguration of the Mediatorial reign, they will have no prece­dence whatever over their fellows who will be raised at the same time they are – except, of course, any good they have developed into their characters now. However, the Jews in Jerusalem who survive Jacob’s Trouble, will certainly have precedence over others of the human family who will also survive Jacob’s Trouble. Just how many years it will be be­tween the resurrection of “the just” (faithful Abraham and his kind) and the initial awakening of the first unjust, we do not know; but we believe it is a reasonable conclu­sion that it will be more than one or two years, because the restoration of order in the earth will by no means be a simultaneous or instantaneous matter everywhere. Thus, when RGJ claims his Campers Consecrated “are blessed with faithful Abraham,” he is at least sadly lacking when he fails to explain just what he means by that. It is reasonably cer­tain the “just men” of Heb. 12:23 will all receive their resurrection when Abraham re­ceives his; therefore, they will of a surety be “blessed with faithful Abraham”; but such a conclusion cannot logically be made of any of the Quasi-elect, and RGJ’s state­ment becomes extremely strained and needs a lot of clarification. He that discerns clear­ly, teaches clearly. Would any one conclude that RGJ discerns clearly in this instance?

In keeping with the foregoing, we consider it timely to offer same more from Bro. Russell and not from us personally: “In thinking of the nature of the tribulation at the end of this Age, we are first of all to remember that it is a tribulation coming upon the world and the hypocrites. The Lord tells us that if we are faithful, we shall not come into the condemnation coming upon the world. The intimation is that those who are not faithful enough to get Into the Little Flock will come into this condemnation, with the world. So the Lord tells us of some who will get their portion with the hypocrites. Matt. 24:51” (Reprints 5256) These are described in Matt. 25:30 as “the unprofitable servant,” the Great Company (see Berean Comment), who are cast “into outer darkness” (er­ror), which is so much in evidence among the leaders and the mis-leaders of God’s people at this time.

BROTHER RUSSELL’S ARTICLE

On pp. 82-84 of this same Present Truth is an article by Brother Russell. As we should expect, the article is an excellent one, and would embellish any paper which car­ries it – whether that paper be Roman Catholic or RGJ’s Present Truth; so he is to be commended for reproducing it. But he would merit even more commendation if he himself would take the teachings of that article to heart, and practice them himself – particu­larly those parts of it that treat “whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are just. “

“I will hear what God the Lord will speak: for he will speak peace unto his people, and to his saints: but let them not turn again to folly. Surely his salvation is nigh them that fear him; that glory may dwell in our land...... Righteousness shall go before him; and shall set us in the way of his steps.” (Psa. 85:8,9 & 13)

Sincerely you brother,

John J. Hoefle Pilgrim

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LETTERS OF GENERAL INTEREST

Dear Brother Hoefle: Fond Christian love to you and all with you!

I noted what you said about Brother Brown, and I agree with you. He was not one to swallow a doctrine without proving it to be reasonable and Scriptural – nor was he easily influenced by those who told him not to read another’s writings.

The service we had for the Messengers was a praise, prayer and testimony meeting, and Brother ------- from Kingston gave a lengthy testimony. He also mentioned that Bro. Brown was a good friend from Parousia times, even before he embraced the Truth for himself. He thought Brother Brown was an example of a good profession of the believ­ers. After the service he told us Brother Brown’s son said he was 97, but that he was sure that Brother Brown was around 104.....

Warm Christian love for all. God Bless you!

Sister ------- (JAMAICA)

NOTE: Yes, Brother Brown had many rich experiences in the “narrow way” under both Brother Russell and Brother Johnson, and he gave us many of the details of these experiences in the lengthy correspondence we have had with him since we first met him personally at Kingston in 1957. He was warm and gracious to us at that Con­vention despite all the vicious diatribe hurled at us by RGJ then – and continued warm and friendly to us until his death. He told us at that Convention that he praised the Lord for the privilege of living to meet and greet us. In one of his letters he wrote: “May it please the Lord to make you a blessing to yourself and all who will hear. ‘Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.’ (John 14:27) Love and good will to you and Sis­ter Hoefle. I am, As ever your Brother Brown.”

Be was very definite about his refusal to accept the Campers Consecrated doctrine. He said: “I don’t teach Consecrated Epiphany Campers, as the Camp represents the world of mankind in sin and needing atonement, and desiring it. I see now the world of mankind must wait their due time – must wait till the reign of Christ begins....... Again I say, he who distinguishes clearly teaches right.” And in his last letter to us: “Must close with love, and the Lord Bless you! I give you Poem 124 and Heb. 13:20-21. Pray for me as I do for you both.” This was received a short time before he died in 1970. We do indeed, with others who knew him well, treasure his memory as a warm, lov­ing and zealous brother.

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Dear Brethren:

Thank you for sending me Epiphany truth. I find it very helpful and enjoy read­ing the truth. I am 79 years old........ Please notice my new address. I am a widow, and please accept my small help.

I am your sister in Christ ------- (WISCONSIN)

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My dear Brother Hoefle: Grace and peace Divine be yours!

We are indeed glad to receive your papers. They are refreshing – especially in the struggle of our present day. I greatly enjoyed your paper, “Jesus The Christ.”

With Christian love in Jesus’ dear name, Your brother ------- (JAMAICA)

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ANNOUNCEMENT

The Memorial this year may be celebrated any time after 6 p.m., Thursday, April 8. The moon comes new at the 30th Meridian East, Jerusalem time, at 9:24 p.m. March 26, thus establishing 6 p.m. March 26 as Nisan 1, Bible reckoning. Counting to Nisan 14, we reach 6 p. m. April 8; and any hour after 6 p.m. that evening would be correct for the service.

NO. 187: RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT

No. 187

Another year gone – with great advancement in scientific achievements in various capacities, and great retrogression in human relations and decor. This is as should be expected when we remember the prophecy, “The morning cometh, and also the night.” (Isa. 21:12) One professor of agriculture in a prominent university has recently pre­dicted that we shall be growing 400 bushels of corn to the acre in the near future, and 200 bushels of wheat. When we were a boy on the farm in Ohio, fifty bushels of corn per acre became the talk of the whole county. And 18-20 bushels of wheat was considered an exceptionally good crop. The first hybrid corn appeared in 1930, which has already increased the yield to about four times what it was previously.

Also, a seedless cucumber is soon to appear on the market, which will not only much improve the quality, but also increase the yield by 50% or more. And a mechani­cal cherry picker is now in use, eliminating manual picking entirely. This Machine merely shakes the entire tree, causing it to drop its fruit into an apron underneath. It is said the tree is completely relieved of all fruit by this mechanism. In addition, an acid has been developed which causes the fruit to ripen eight to fourteen days soon­er than would naturally be the case, thus easing the burden of the canneries by extend­ing the period of harvest. Furthermore, it is requiring considerably less labor today to produce and harvest these large crops than it did ten or twenty years ago, when much less was grown. And the quality of the food was never better. In 1960 the average farmer in America fed 25 people; now he feeds 45 people.

The increase in speed of travel is likewise keeping pace. It is now predicted that the distance from San Francisco to Tokyo will be accomplished in little more than a half hour in the next ten years. Recently we flew from Detroit to Chicago, leaving Detroit at 11:20 a.m., and arriving in Chicago at 11:18 a.m. This is due to the change from eastern to central time, of course, but it shows we were traveling faster than the sun. At that rate we could travel around the world completely in the daytime. Indeed, “Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.” (Dan. 12:4) It is a fair appraisal that even the unlearned are very much better informed on all social, politi­cal and world issues today than ever before. Sir Isaac Newton had predicted that man would some day travel at the rate of fifty miles per hour; and the ridicule he received for such a prediction now bounces back vigorously at his critics.

It is reported that a computer has now been invented for supermarkets, which will register the customer’s purchase by name, and give price, total amount and amount of tax, then state the remaining inventory on the shelf.

Truly, we are in the “day of preparation” – the “morning”; but the “night” pro­ceeds emphatically along with it. Crime in the larger cities of the United States is becoming increasingly violent and abundant, causing great numbers to move to the su­burbs, or to entirely new locales. Most large cities lost population in the last ten years. “They shall flee away, none shall look back.... the heart melteth, and the knees smite together, and the faces of them all gather blackness.” (Nah. 2:8-10) Last Spring in Detroit a father followed his 17-year-old daughter to an apartment, found her cohabiting with a Jew, a Negro and a Gentile boy; then shot them all to death. This just after he had bought his daughter a new auto to make her happy. Another instance: Several young men entered a bar at 1:30 a.m., ordered various mixed drinks, then in­sisted they be allowed to taste them before making payment. The ensuing argument re­sulted in one of them being shot to death, which in turn brought on a riot of some 2,000 in the street before the bar. The tension was extreme for several days thereafter. All about a $2.30 bar bill. “The earth (the present social structure) is moved exceeding­ly. The earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall be removed like a cot­tage... it shall fall, and not rise again.” (Isa. 24:20)

IN FINANCE

The financial structure continues to deteriorate in keeping with the moral fiber. Earlier the President had hoped for a budget surplus of possibly two billion dollars; now it is estimated that there will be a deficit of anywhere from ten to twenty billions. And with it all the cost of living continues upward. Apples are now 20 to 30¢ per lb. in the big city markets – against 20 to 30¢ per bushel (60 lbs.) forty years ago. It is a sage observation in investment circles that constant vigilance is the price of safety; and only the well-informed and the vigilant are surviving the ravages of deteriorating paper money, much of which is simply a “promise to pay” nothing. One skilled writer recently took note of this, saying that the real menace to the United States is not from without, but from within. Here is a small quotation from his booklet:

“Today local and Federal taxes take one-third of all our earnings – and the Federal Government takes, and controls, and spends 70 per cent of it. Statistics show that prior to 1913 the Federal Government took and spent $7 per year per capita. In 1960 it took and spent $450 per every man, woman and child in our country. Thus the Federal Govern­ment takes and spends today about 65 times as much, per person, as it did 50 years ago.”

Of course, this is not due to the Government being in the money business; it is due to the money men being In the Government business. And to accomplish their purposes they must also control primarily the news agencies – to prevent them from informing the people of what goes on behind the scenes. Says the writer quoted above:

“The Masterminds realized that as long as the Press – or any other mass communica­tions media – remained free to tell what they were trying to do, the enraged people would not only smash their plans, but they might well find themselves hanging from the nearest trees and telegraph poles. They decided that there must be no “free press.” And in the two decades that followed they achieved that objective. They bought outright some of the most important newspapers in the nation – they subsidized ‘stooges’ to buy other news­papers, magazines, etc. They evolved a perfect formula for controlling the ‘Wire Ser­vices,’ such as Associated Press, UPI, etc. They achieved that control by infiltrating such of their affiliates into the Chairmanships and other key posts on the governing Directorates.... Bear in mind that newspapers and magazines depend upon their advertising revenues for their existence. Hence, any individual, or organization, who has the power to place – or to withhold – the bulk advertising of both Department Stores and Advertis­ing Agencies can walk into the office of any newspaper and ‘write his own ticket.’ He can force the newspaper to give ‘the silent treatment’ – or even to smear – any indivi­dual who has incurred his displeasure.... he can force the newspaper to back any type of legislation he desires – or to denounce legislation he opposes – he can absolutely DICTATE the editorial policies of the newspaper.”

It is said that the financiers described aforegoing contributed twenty million dol­lars in gold during World War I to finance the Lenin-Trotsky group to overthrow the Rus­sian Government, and to work from there to perpetrate similar procedure in other en­lightened countries that had become overburdened with debt as a result of the great con­flict. And they have been continuing their plan in quiet, but intensive, zeal throughout the years following 1918; and they eventually masterminded the great depression of 1929-1932.

Some years back one of these money men made a statement something like this: If I can control the money of a nation, I care not who makes the laws. It is self-evident that a capitalistic system operates with money; and, under the evil conditions that have prevailed over the centuries of the curse, the capitalistic system seems best suited to existing conditions. There is no question but that competition among men has resulted in much injustice, brutality and deep-laid plans of evil in many respects; but things would have been even worse under any other system. In the early Church the Apostles thought to establish a communistic arrangement among the brethren (“they had all things common”—Acts 4:32), but it failed almost before it began, resulting in St. Peter exe­cuting the death penalty upon Ananias and Sapphira. (Acts 5:1-11) Shortly after America was discovered some Europeans thought to escape the demands of capitalism; they would come to America, bask in the sun, with no money worries, and no effort at producing anything. This forced Captain John Smith, founder of the Virginia colony, to issue the edict, “He who will not work shall not eat.”

Knowing that the capitalistic system operates with money, certain men – motivated by theory of Fabian Socialism – determined that the best way to destroy the capitalistic system would be with capital itself. Thus, they have adopted a set policy of corrupting the currencies of all civilized countries, which has resulted in all of them devaluing their currencies as occasion made it expedient. Some have done this more than others. For instance, the French franc that was valued at about 19 cts in 1914 is now worth about 1/4 of a cent, so that a franc today will buy little more than a match or a toothpick. In the United States devaluation has occurred only once – in 1933; but the deterioration of its money has more than kept pace with other leading countries. It is estimated that the overall debt in this country now – federal, state, local and private – is about 1½ trillion dollars – with the end nowhere in sight. The annual interest on the federal debt alone is about 20 billion dollars; whereas, the entire national debt in 1914 was about one billion dollars, and the ruling party was very diligent that it should go no higher. This tremendous erosion has tragically undermined life insurance, annuities, and the like, where people have paid in ‘hard’ dollars, but will now receive the eroded dollar in eventual payment. Already about 1945, when the national debt was about 45 bil­lions, one prominent Washington commentator offered the appraisal that nobody with any intelligence in Washington thinks this debt will ever be paid off. And that debt is now about eight times that amount.

When the final accounting arrives for this financial mess, it will be a fearful day of reckoning. “Behold, the day cometh that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble; and the day that cometh shall burn them up... that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.” (Mal. 4:1) Companion to this is Heb. 1:10-12: “Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth (the present social order); and the heavens (the present religious order) are the works of thine hands: They shall perish (in the turmoil of this evil day)... they shall all wax old as doth a garment; and as a vesture shalt thou fold them up.” This is all typically foretold in Gen. 15:8-17. After God had made certain promises to Abraham, the latter then asked: “Lord, whereby shall I know that I shall Inherit it (the land)?... And it came to pass, that, when the sun went down, and it was dark, behold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp that passed between those pieces.” The “smoking furnace” undoubtedly foretold the “burning oven” of this our day; and the “lamp” that passed be­tween is a “more sure word of prophecy, whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a Light (the ‘lamp’) that shineth in a dark place.” (2 Pet. 1:19) From such ‘prophecy’ the Lord’s people shall receive their clear understanding of present conditions; and it is well that we all set our houses in order that that “day shall not overtake us as a thief.”

IN POLITICS

Another political campaign has just ended in the United States – with the usual promises and recriminations sharply in evidence. Anent the glowing promises, a teacher gave the question, When is Jesus coming back to earth? To which a little girl promptly answered, Election day! One pundit offered the definition, A politician is one who shakes your hand on election day, and your confidence afterward. We, however, would not make this allegation all-inclusive. Some leaders in government are undoubtedly try­ing honestly and laboriously to improve the general environment; but they are hampered by at least three things: Colossal debt, poor material with which to work, and impa­tience on the part of the citizens. With the confusion and faulty organization every­where apparent, any substantial panacea requires much time to make it work; and the peoples of earth have had their tolerance worn thin; they are in no mood for reform that requires much time, but the complications of the times mist self-evidently need lots of time if they are to be cured. Of course, we have “the sure word of prophecy” that they will not be cured by puny men. Only will they be cured when “the Sun of Righteousness shall rise with healing in His wings ... tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I shall do this, saith the Lord of Hosts.” (Mal. 4:2,3)

The governmental upheavals of the day have become accepted as regular ‘diet’; but a little reflection will quickly remind us that such was not the case before 1914, when revolution and extreme political reverse were definitely uncommon. In this respect, let us consider Italy. From 1870 on the House of Savoy ruled that country with a mini­mum of uproar; but we offer now some comments from one magazine, the article being en­titled “ITALY BENT FOR CHAOS.” Here are same of the statements:

“For the 27th time since World War 11 Italy is without a government (Aug. 10, 1970). The center-left coalition of Premier Mariano Rumor collapsed abruptly on July 6, and nearly three weeks later, Rumor’s fellow Christian Democrat, Giulio Andreotti, gave up his attempts to revive it. Last week, another Christian Democrat, Treasury Minister Emilio Colombo, was trying – without much luck – to patch together a new center-left Cab­inet. But despite the gravity of the crisis, it hardly seemed to matter to most Ital­ians whether Colombo succeeded or failed. For democratic government in Italy has worked so poorly during the postwar years that in one recent poll, two-thirds of those ques­tioned said they would prefer to temporarily surrender authority to a good strong man. What ails Italy: From Rome last week, Senior Editor Arnaud de Borchgrave cabled this report: ‘As a tourist, I came to Rome not only to see the mountains,’ an angry Ameri­can visitor recently wrote to Rome’s daily American, ‘but to swim and get a little sun­shine without going too far from the city. On Sunday, my wife and I took a train to one of the nearer beaches. I have never witnessed such squalor anywhere in the world. The water, the facilities, the air were all filthy. To cap it all, we had to pay $3 to get into a beach whose sleaziness is indescribable – and swim in a sewer.... Almost every feature of life in the big city has been a cruel disappointment to the migrants, many of whom wind up living in abandoned cars or shantytowns. In Rome, whose population has doubled since World War II, some 60,000 squatters live in wooden shacks. The cities them­selves are fast becoming unlivable.

“Successive Italian Governments have been almost powerless to deal with this social decay. Some 4,000 bills are pending in the clogged Parliament; university reform has been stalled for five years, urban planning for seven. Public transportation is break­ing down, and the schools, short one million desks, have been forced to adopt a two shift system. The country’s hospitals have 40,000 fewer beds than they need. Appellate courts are struggling with a ten-year backlog of cases, and frequent amnesties for minor criminals are all that stand between the prison system and complete chaos.

“In the face of these problems, Italy’s bureaucracy has grown bigger – but no better. The ranks of the civil service swell by ten per cent every four years, the payroll by 40 per cent. Bureaucrats (politicians) cost the country seven billion a year, nearly half the national budget. In Sicily, which has 600 different Government offices, some $860 million has been spent on local administration in the last five years; by contrast, only $530 million has been spent during the same period on public works and other social investment. In an effort to decentralize the bureaucracy, Italy recently created fif­teen new regional administrations. This set off-bloody riots in the southern seaport of Reggio de Calabria when the rival city of Catanzaro was chosen as capital of the region. More important, the new system will add $3 billion to the cost of the civil service – and yet another layer to the bureaucracy. The elected branch of government has been no more effective than the civil service. Designed chiefly as an antidote to Fascism, Italy’s multiparty political system has disintegrated into a proliferation of factions and personal rivalries. The Christian Democrats (the Roman Catholics), the country’s largest party with about 38% of the vote, are split into nine identifiable sub-species. The once-powerful Socialists are now three parties (Socialists, Proletarians and Social Democrats), while the Communists are also badly divided. Some, while perhaps critical of Soviet policy, remain loyal to Moscow as the mecca of International Communism. Others want to make a clean break with Russia and cooperate with democratic parties in reform­ing Italy.”

There is much more to this article, but the foregoing will suffice to inform our readers of the political situation in Italy. It is much the same in other countries, with some perhaps being even worse. The politician’s first objective is to take care of himself. Once he is on the payroll, it is almost impossible to dislodge him; and the most of them have unlimited gall in their operations. England’s labor Government was badly beaten in the last year’s elections; whereas, they considered themselves sure­ly entrenched. But it should be recalled that almost the first thing they did when they came into power several years back was to double their salaries – and at the same time telling the working people, who had elected them, that they should tighten their belts for an austerity program. The average politician has had little or no business experi­ence; consequently any enterprise conducted by the Government makes miserable compar­ison with private enterprise. One wag recently made the quip, Crime wouldn’t pay if the Government ran it. In the United States, where two parties predominate, the question was asked, Just what’s the difference between the Republicans and Democrats anyway? To which came the answer, All the difference in the world; they’re in, we’re out!

IN RELIGION

In religion much the same deterioration appears as is going on in the financial and political realms. In almost every Christian system the spirit of the real reformers is almost if not completely dead. Having come to the end of the Age, this should not sur­prise us, because the same condition prevailed at the end of the Jewish Age, when Jesus was on earth. And of them He said, “Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess.” (Matt. 23:25) We gave more than ordinary detail aforegoing about Italy because the Roman Catholic Church is located there; and the sharpest con­trast is shown there between the general populace and the Church. It is variously esti­mated that the Vatican Empire is worth about five billion dollars, and is thus the wealthiest institution on earth, excepting a few Industrial empires in the United States and elsewhere. Surely, the prophecy is fulfilled in them, “Thou sayest, I am rich and Increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked.” (Rev. 3:17)

Companion to the foregoing is the comment of one radio broadcaster that there are now 10,000 letters before the Pope by priests from various countries, asking that they be relieved of the vows of celibacy. Perhaps this is the prelude to fulfillment of the prophecy in 2 Kgs. 9:30-33: “When Jehu was come to Jezreel, Jezebel (type of the Roman Church in her union with the various Gentile Governments) heard of it.... and looked out at a window... And Jehu lifted up his face to the window, and said, Who is on my side? Who? And there looked out to him two or three eunuchs. And he said, Throw her down. So they threw her down... and he trod her under foot.”

At the Episcopal Convention this Fall in Texas, that Church also was faced with considerable crisis – both in money and antipathy and discord among both the lay and the clerics. Just one small quotation will give the general idea:

“The program and budget committee regards anticipated diocesan (quota) income as $2 million less than the budget proposed by those swashbuckling spenders who comprise a ma­jority of the denomination’s executive council..... The financial desperation at Episco­pal headquarters is evidenced by Bishop John E. Hines having embarked quietly on a series of special fund-raising dinners in various dioceses. But only a few days before the general convention, in Massachusetts, this effort bombed. For among the 140,000 church members who comprise this, one of the denomination’s largest and most liberal dioceses, Bishop John Burgess was able to muster a total attendance of 23 people.”

Among the various Truth groups in Little Babylon the general trend is in much the same direction as in Big Babylon – though not nearly so extreme, of course. All during the Philadelphia period the more zealous and representative Christians were usually found in that group nearest the last reformer – in the sect that developed from his ef­forts. Thus, we should logically look for more advanced and devoted assemblies among those who arose from the last reformer. Inasmuch as there are those still living who were intimately acquainted with That Servant, and who diligently worked with him, we should expect to find the better Christian characters among those brethren, even though their particular group may not in general maintain the same high standards he advocated. And the same would be true of those associated more intimately with Brother Johnson. He also was an excellent “example of the believers”; and those honestly close to him would certainly have some of that ‘rub off’ onto them. However, crown-losers all during the Age were remiss in what they absorbed from their star-member leaders; and it should not surprise us to see the same situation still in vogue.

The leader of the laymen’s Home Missionary Movement, as example, has made various attempts to change the technique and to alter the teachings left in his trust, with such efforts always resulting in a downgrading of what was done during Brother Johnson’s life. Perhaps the latest departure from established practice before 1950 (when he became Trus­tee) is his practice now of collecting questions the day before the Question Meeting, to be sure no questions are presented that might prove embarrassing to him. thus, he is now running “scared”; and let us not forget that this is the same person who repeatedly vaunts his ‘courage’ from the platform at Conventions – where he is sure he is safe.

And, of course, the brethren he has accepted as his cohorts are those whose minds operate the same as does his, so that many of his speakers are of the weaker variety of “the unstable and the unlearned.” In our December paper we mentioned rather briefly the discourse of one of them at Chicago, his subject being “For Defense.” Then he proceeded to go into quite some detail about any one meeting a wolf in the wilderness, and being unarmed, would beat a hasty retreat. And he gave that as a pattern of our treatment of wolves among the Lord’s people. As Brother Russell once commented, Some of the pilgrims do paint some awful pictures; and this summation we would now repeat in the present in­stance. St. Paul emphatically instructed the elders at Ephesus (Acts 20:28) to “Take heed unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over whom the Holy Spirit hath made you over­seers.” Even the veriest novice should recognize from this that St. Paul was in nowise hinting that the elders should “take heed to the flock” by running away if a wolf appeared. Nor did the Parousia or Epiphany Messengers themselves ever shrink from battle at any time with errorists – either in Babylon, or among our own selves. Nor did Jesus, or the Apos­tles. Note the Berean Comment on John 18:37: “It was this ‘Good confession (of the Truth—­JJH) before Pilate’ that cost our Lord His life.” And when Jesus said, “The good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep,” He certainly did not mean he would ‘give his life’ by run­ning away if a wolf appeared. Certainly, the example we have just detailed is a far, far step from the performance and teaching of the last reformers. May God bless their memory!

ANOTHER FRAUD

During the past year the Roman Catholic Church has added another fraud to its long list of “great swelling words.” We offer now a magazine comment on this item:

“Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church. So said Jesus to a Galilean fisherman named Simon who became ‘Prince of Apostles’ and the first Pope. Roman Catholic historians record that Peter traveled to Rome and was crucified – head down – by the Emperor Nero in A. D. 64 or 67. He is then said to have been buried in a common cemetery on the site where Emperor Constantine built the first Basilica of Saint Peter in the fourth century. Constantine’s structure was razed during the sixteenth century, and the present basilica erected in its place.

“Last week, Pope Paul VI announced that bones uncovered beneath the basilica were indeed those of Saint Peter. Speaking to several thousand pilgrims at his weekly audi­ence, the Pontiff emphasized that intensive investigation of the bones would continue. But he added: ‘For our part, we believe it our duty – in the present state of archeol­ogical and scientific conclusions – to give you and the church this happy announcement, bound as we are to honor sacred relics, backed by reliable proof of their authenticity.’”

On the foregoing we would say there is not the slightest evidence to prove that the Apostle Peter ever visited Rome at any time during his life. And, had he done so, the Apostle Paul would certainly have made some slight comment about it in his writings from that city. Furthermore, it is definitely unscientific and illogical to believe that bones would still be intact and identifiable after 1900 years in the tomb. Some of us may re­call that, when the Communists took over the Russian Government in 1917, they immediate­ly went into the Catholic cathedrals there, took from the glass enclosures those sup­posed bodies of the saints that had never decayed, took them onto the front steps of those churches, picked them apart before the public, and revealed that they were nothing but cotton mummies – rank fraud in every respect.

This recalls the incident of a young priest who was being commissioned to a remote church as his first assignment. Just before his departure, his bishop called him aside and confidentially gave him a jawbone of the ass on which Jesus had ridden into Jerusa­lem the week of His death. It would be an inspiration and encouragement to him in the trials ahead, the bishop told him. But, after he had become settled in his charge, and had become acquainted with other priests in neighboring localities, he found seven other priests who also had been given a jawbone of that same ass.

GENERAL

In closing, we would offer parts of an editorial in the Los Angeles Times, entitled “In Its Own Quiet Way, The ‘70 Summer Was Terrible”:

“In truth, the absence of any Watts style mass riot has masked the fact that this has been the terrible summer of ‘7O. Instead of headline-producing rioting, the pattern of black militancy has changed to ever-better-organized urban guerrilla warfare deeply in­fluenced by Black Panther philosophy. Law enforcement experts believe that this year has moved the United States far down the road toward white counter-guerrilla action and vir­tual civil war. Black Panther propaganda glorifying the killing of police abounds in Negro ghettos... Earlier this year Detroit police uncovered plans for recurrent ambush assassinations of police intended to trigger race riots... Law enforcement officers in Mi­ami, about the same time, found similarly elaborate planning by the Black Afro Militant Movement... The epidemic is worsening. Unlike the centrally-directed Communist Party underground, black guerrillas are decentralized and difficult to infiltrate... The terrible summer of 1970 may be followed by escalated black guerrilla war year-round with frightful consequences that nobody today can dare guess.”

All this is in keeping with our Lord’s prophecy in Luke 21:25-28: “Upon the earth distress of nations... Men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth (the present social order)... When these things be­gin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.” Thus, our counsel to our readers is that they in nowise become involved in the present turmoil, but remain as far removed from it as possible. Understanding the prophecies as we do, this is but the elementary workings of “the spirit of a sound mind.” Let us consider the axiom: He who does a good deed is instantly ennobled; he who does an evil deed is instantly degraded!

To all our readers we extend cordial good wishes for the year 1971; and we grate­fully reciprocate also the many expressions of good will that have come to us over the Holidays. “Thanks be unto God, who always causes us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savior of His knowledge by us in every place.... For we are not as many, which corrupt the word of God; but as of sincerity, but as of God, in the sight of God speak we in Christ.”—2 Cor. 2:14-17

Sincerely Your brother,

John J. Hoefle, Pilgrim

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QUESTION OF GENERAL INTEREST

QUESTION: – Should we salute the flag?

ANSWER: – The above question was answered by the Epiphany Messenger at one time, and we don’t believe we can now give a better answer than he gave us in the November l, 1940 Present Truth: “J.F.R. has raised this question, altogether erroneously, we believe. He claims that the flag is a graven image; therefore people are by the Second Commandment forbidden to salute it, which he claims is worshipping it. This position we deny; because it is not a graven image. It is not an image of a god, nor even of the United States, which, of course, is not a god. It is the standard of the United States. The Israelites had, by Divine order, standards and ensigns about their camp, as we read in Num. 2:2,3, 10,l7, 18, 25, 34. If they were given graven images, God would never have had or sanctioned Israel’s having standards and ensigns-­flags; for He forbade graven images and their worship.

“Our country deserves respect and honor, both as a Divine ordinance and as doing us good; and we should regard the saluting of the flag, when required by law or cus­tom, as a thing that the Lord’s people may properly do as a mark of respect for a Di­vine ordinance and for the good conferred by the United States upon us. We would not consider it a religious service at all, anymore than if we were to tip our hats to a lady would we consider that a religious service; or, if we were privates in the army, if we would salute our officers, or if we were officers and would salute our fellow officers or privates. If the flag were a religious symbol, and if that symbol would represent a false religion, it would be wrong to salute it. But neither of these things are true; hence the second commandment does not forbid saluting the flag. J.F.R. in this matter, as in many others, has brought much evil and discredit upon the Lord’s Truth and people. We should pity his poor dupes for the suffering that they bring upon themselves through his pertinent fanaticism. Thereby they are not suffering for right­eousness, but for an error that is deservedly unpopular. We rather think that the rioting spirit that their fanaticism has aroused will overflow from them to the priests for their work of rebuking the evil of state and church cooperation in this country.”

And we might add for the further benefit of the questioner, that when we stand in respect when our anthem is played or sung, we are not worshipping a graven image. We have heard of no specific case where the Jehovah’s Witnesses have made themselves con­spicuous by such disregard, and received the disapproval of their fellows – nor do we know they refuse to do this. But we don’t see any difference in this gesture of respect and saluting the flag. Their shibboleth is this: We are not interested in supporting any of the religious systems, social systems, or Governments, since they are all parts of the Devil’s Organization; we are interested in liberating the individuals of those systems, and have them join with us now before Armageddon, so they will be saved, even as all other Individuals together with the systems, will be completely annihilated then.

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If any of our readers have not read our No. 11 on this subject, it will be our pleasure to send it free upon request.

NO. 186: IN MEMORIAM

No. 186

My dear Brethren: Grace and peace through our Beloved Master!

Activities of Pastor Russell. That Servant. His Memory still fragrant. Will His work endure? God Bless His Memory! The Epiphany proves him That Servant.

The Anniversary of our Pastor’s passing beyond the veil, October 31, will always be a date of special sacredness to God’s saints. Eight years ago (written in 1924) the whole Church was shocked by the news of his departure. Loath were we to believe it true, until the evidence became unanswerable; and then we realized our great loss, but his great gain. His memory is fragrant and blest to us. He will ever occupy in our hearts the large place that his holy character, unselfish service and faithful suf­ferings have won for him. That his memory may still continue fragrant and blest to us, let us together briefly review the activities, the achievements and attainments of this eminent saint of God. He certainly was a SCHOLAR in the true sense of that term. Those who require a university diploma as indispensable evidence of learning will deny him the merit of scholarship. However, there are not a few cases of scholars that were self-made, gaining their knowledge apart from the schools of the learned world. Among such our Pastor won a high place. Apart from English, he was not a linguist, though he learned how to use well for his Biblical work the gains of the best scholar­ship in Greek and Hebrew. He was deeply versed in history, as his writings attest. His writings show that he was at home in the perplexing questions of industry, econo­mics, sociology, capital and labor.

The realms of philosophy were deeply explored by him, and he was an expert in theoretical and practical psychology and phrenology. Few have understood the work­ings of the human intellect and heart so well as he. Human knowledge of these scien­ces, combined with that of medicine, made him a physician; and though he had no medi­cal diploma, he attained better results in the healing art than the average physician. However, his real eminence in learning was in the domain of theology, in which he was without peer since the days of the Apostles. His knowledge of the Bible was phenome­nal; and when other theologians will have been discarded, he will be recognized as a standing authority in this the greatest of all sciences.

Naturally such a scholar would be a writer. Very few human beings have written more than he. His correspondence alone was sufficient for the life work of an indus­trious and talented man. When it is remembered that some years over 300,000 letters and postals were written to him, and that he supervised the answers to this huge mail, and attended to no small share of it himself, we can realize something of the amount of his correspondence and the time and labor involved. As an author he produced Six unrivaled books on the Bible whose combined circulation during his life aggregated 10,000,000 copies. As a bookleteer he published a number of booklets of great value, one of which, on Hell, has been circulated more widely than any other booklet ever written. He produced over 200 tracts, some of which attained a circulation of over 50,000,000 copies. His sermons, appearing regularly every week for thirteen years, were published part of that time simultaneously in over 2,000 newspapers, having a combined circulation of over 15,000,000 copies. He edited a semi-monthly religious magazine with a circulation of about 45,000 copies. His Scenario of the “Photo-Drama of Creation” has had a wide circulation, as is also the case with his Angelo­phone record lectures. His articles on the International Sunday School Lessons have reached many Sunday School teachers in a special publication, as well as in his semi-­monthly magazine and in hundreds of newspapers. He was a regular contributor to sev­eral magazines, and, apart from his regular weekly sermon, was a frequent contribu­tor of special articles to newspapers, some of which also carried reports of his fre­quent lectures.

Nor was his work as a lecturer on a small scale. Most well-known lecturers have only a few lectures that they use year in and year out. Not so with him. He lectured on hundreds of subjects which were of compelling interest, as well as of recognized difficulty. His lectures were direct, clear, simple, logical and convincing. His powers of exposition and proof were of the first order, and were so well in hand as to appeal to the learned and unlearned alike, an unequaled proof of genius. Wherever he was announced to speak, the largest and best auditoriums were crowded, and frequently thousands and usually hundreds were turned away, unable to gain entrance. He did not depend on the tricks of oratory to win his hearers. He appealed to their heads and hearts in that simple and direct manner which wins the hearer without oratorical fire­works. He was the most cosmopolitan lecturer that ever lived, having addressed audi­ences in this capacity in almost every country on earth, traveling between 1,000,000 and 2,000,000 miles to meet his appointments.

As a preacher he was even more widely known than as a lecturer. Wherever he worked as a lecturer he addressed more private audiences as a preacher. This acquired for him the title, “The Ubiquitous Preacher.” It can be more correctly said of him than of any other preacher that the World was his parish. His spoken sermons were pub­lished in the newspapers, reaching millions of readers weekly. These sermons appeared in many languages; and before he died his pen products had been published in some forty languages. As a preacher he appealed to the hearts of his hearers through their heads; and his ability to strike home to the hearts and heads of his hearers through suitable Bible verse or illustration the thoughts that he was seeking to impress was marvelous. His genuine and unaffected love for God and man gave a power to his utter­ances that drove them home, where mere eloquence and oratory would have been effect­less. His sermons, therefore, always elevated head and heart.

He was the most notable of pastors. His clearness of insight into the problems of his day, his knowledge of human nature, his intuition of the condition and needs of the individual, his single-hearted consecration to God and devotion to the inter­ests of His people, his large sympathy, benevolence and hope as respects others, his grip on the purpose of his ministry, and his knowledge of the spiritual dangers of his times and of the safeguards needed by those in danger, made him a real pastor, a gen­uine shepherd of God’s sheep. As many as 1200 different churches at one time claimed him as their pastor. He had “the care of all the churches.” As a pastoral advisor he was expert; as a pastoral comforter he was inspiring; as a pastoral corrector he was tactful and fruitful; and as a pastoral leader he was unobtrusive, yet all-per­suasive and effective. These qualities made him a part of the very life of those whose pastor he was, and bound him to them by ties that death itself has not severed. This is why the tens of thousands that chose him as their pastor have, up to the pres­ent, eight years (54 years in 1970—JJH) after his death, chosen no successor to him.

No review of him would be complete without treating of his activities as a reform­er. He was every inch a reformer and stood in the front rank of the reformers of all Ages. Error never had an antagonist more to be dreaded than he, who with thoroughness of disproof of error’s claims combined tact, sympathy, gentleness and charity that left no personal sting after his onslaughts. If he hated error greatly, he loved the error­ist more greatly, and always sought to help him, while overthrowing his wrong theories. The superstitions connected with the penalty of sin and the state of the dead were the especial objects of his attacks; and he never let an opportunity of attacking them pass by unused. The superstitious and the infidel alike felt the logic of his attacks; and the devout student of the Word found in him a champion who knew how to vindicate the truthfulness of the Bible and to refute the errors of the superstitious and the unbeliefs of the infidel. His insistence on a faith harmonious with Scripture, Reason and Fact was an inspiration to the Bible believer and a terror to the creedist and infidel. His forty-five years of continued attacks on the strongholds of error and superstitions largely undermined them for real students of the Word. But his work as a reformer was more than destructive of error and superstition. It left not his hearers victims of unbelief. On the contrary, he unfolded a harmonious reasonable and Scriptural view of the Bible that evidences the inspiration of the Scriptures. Thus he gave others a sound and reasonable basis for their faith in “The Impregnable Rock of Holy Scripture,” while destroying caricatures of ‘Scriptural teachings handed down by the superstition of the Dark Ages. Consequently those who looked to him as their leader in reform were not left with stately ruins as the sum total of his and their labors. Rather, beside and instead of the ruins of the Temple of Error he erected the Sanctuary of the Truth as a refuge against all the storms of doubt, superstition and unbelief. And in this fact his real worth as a reformer is recognizable.

He was great as an executive. A phrenologist once seeing his picture, but not knowing whose it was, remarked that he was either a merchant prince of the president of a Theological Seminary! Already in his teens his executive abilities made him the owner and director of a large business which was soon increased until it occupied four large stores in various cities. As a business man he acquired experiences that fitted him for his future work. His executive abilities were such as enabled him to grasp the details as well as the generalities of his many enterprises. He was profitably interested in dozens of enterprises aside from his great religious work, to which he gladly devoted the profits of his secular business. Aside from his purely secular business interests, his religious activities required high and varied executive ability. He not only produced the vast literature of his movement, but he directed its publication and distribution. Hence he saw to the publication and circulation of his books, booklets, tracts, sermons, lectures, scenarios, Sunday School lessons, magazines, lecture records and magazine articles, assisted, of course, by an able staff of co-laborers. He organized and directed seven branch offices in foreign countries. He supervised a Biblical correspondence school. At least two hours daily he gave to directing a Theological School in the Bethel home. For twenty-two years he controlled a Lecture Bureau that for several years had a staff of over 300 lecturers. He managed for thirty years a propaganda work that at times had 1000 colporteurs in its service. He directed for twenty-five years a tractarian movement in which at times nearly 10,000 individuals took part. For three years he directed the preparation and for two and a half years managed the exhibition of the “Photo-Drama of Creation:” in hundreds of cities, and in many countries, before over 15,000,000 people. He was the guiding spirit in over 1500 churches, and at the headquarters of his work daily presided as the head of the family over his co-laborers who, for many years averaged 175 members, lived together as a family. In this capacity he took cognizance of all sorts of details in storehouse, kitchen, laundry, dining room, living room, hospital, library, study, drawing room and parlor.

Had he been eminent in any one of the seven capacities in which we have viewed him (and we could profitably view him from others, so many-sided was this remarkable man), he would properly be considered a great man. But to have been eminent in all of them, and have been in some of them without a peer, prove him to have been a genius of the first order.

History will yet give him a place among the very greatest of men. While dealing with him it is necessary in doing him justice to use superlatives. If we were to reduce his qualities to two, we know of no others to use more truly and fittingly to characterize him than those used of him by Him whose steward he was: “Faithful and Wise.” His life was a great success to himself and a great blessing to others; his death was a great loss to others and a great gain to him; and his memory has been and is a benediction and an inspiration to the Church, and in due time will be to the world “God bless his memory!”

It is fitting that we who prize his ministry as especially Divinely arranged and directed should consider him as “that Servant,” according to Matt. 24:45-47 and Luke 12:42-46. There is even at this late date more or less confusion among some of the Truth people as to who or what is meant by the expression, “that Servant.” According to several views the expression “That Servant,” refers to a class. Some claim that, understood as a class, the expression, “that Servant,” means the teachers in the Church; others claim that it means the Little Flock; and more latterly still, others – the Tower editors and their disciples – claim that it means the Society, by which we must understand either the Society’s directors, organized with their agents, or the shareholders, or both combined. This latter thought we have refuted in detail in Vol. Six. In Z 196, 47, and in D 613, 614, our dear Pastor modestly gave the proofs that the expression, “that Servant,” refers to an individual, i. e., to himself. With this view all well instructed Truth people agreed, until lately the Society leaders, to make their usurped powers more secure, spread the opinion that the Society, a business corporation, is “that Servant.” Accordingly, the Tower editors and their followers must be reckoned among those who teach that “that Servant” is not an individual, but is a class.

The Scriptures (Matt. 24:45-47; Luke 12:42-46) clearly refute such claims, teach­ing that the expression “that Servant” means an individual. In both passages “that Servant” is clearly distinguished from the Church, because he is spoken of as being made “ruler over His (the Lord’s) household”; hence he cannot be the household, the Church. Again, the fact that he is spoken of as giving them “meat in due season” dis­tinguishes him from the “household,” the Church. Furthermore, his being called the “steward” proves that all of the servants of the household cannot be meant, for the steward is the special representative of the householder, having in charge all the latter’s goods during his time of office, and as such has also all the other servants in his charge. (In our Lord’s day individuals, not classes, were stewards). More­over, he is expressly distinguished in Luke 12:45 from all the other servants, in that he is forbidden “to beat the menservants and maidens,” i.e., all the other ser­vants of the Church. Hence the expression “that Servant” cannot mean the servants of the Church as a class, because in this passage he is clearly distinguished from them. Therefore, in view of the fact that these two Scriptures distinguish him from the Church as a whole and from all of the other servants of the Truth, we should con­clude that he must be an individual.

Furthermore, the facts of the harvest history prove that an individual, our sainted Pastor, is meant by that expression. For the Harvest, understood as the reaping and gleaning period, is passed. During that time not a class, i.e., neither the Church, nor all servants of the Truth, nor the Society, had the entire Storehouse in their charge, nor gave the meat in due season, nor ruled the harvest work; but “that Servant” alone did these things. Hence he alone fulfilled the prophecy. Nor could it have been reasonably done otherwise. How could the entire Church have had the entire Storehouse in its charge? or have given itself the meat in due season? or have ruled the work? How could all of the servants of the Truth have had these privi­leges? And have not the divisions in the Church, caused by various power-grasping leaders, proven the unreasonableness of the attempt to rule the Church by all the leaders? Moreover, how could a “dummy corporation” with dummy directors” have ruled the household, given the meat in due season and had charge of all the goods?

From these considerations we see the Absurdity of the teaching of those who claim that the expression, “that Servant,” means a class. Truly, during the reaping and gleaning time our Pastor had charge of all the goods, and gave the meat in due season. Practically every feature of the harvest message was first seen by him, and was then first taught by him to the Church. This he did in his teaching and preaching, through his books, booklets, tracts, magazines and other publications. So, too, every branch of the harvest work was in its general aspects under his charge. Thus he directed the pilgrim, colporteur, volunteer, newspaper, extension, pastoral, photo-drama, publicity, Tabernacle and Bethel work. Only those who are ignorant of the facts, or who “to draw away disciples after themselves” or for some other reprehensible reason misrepresent the fact, would deny the facts stated in this paragraph. And these facts unanswerably prove that the privileges and work outlined in Matt. 24:45-47 and Luke 12:42-44 were fulfilled in our Pastor alone. He alone was “that Servant.”

And, true to these passages, he was appointed to this office after our Lord’s Re­turn, as a reward for his being found faithfully administering the food to the house­hold when the Lord came, which was before the Society existed, and which proves that the Society cannot be “that Servant.” So, too, in his office work he was both faithful and wise; and therefore he was blessed by the Lord according to these Scriptures with a continuance in his office. In calling him faithful our Lord prophesied that he would be loyal to the end. So responsible and trialsome was his office that the Lord deemed it wise to give him, as a special caution, the words of Luke 12:45,46 – not to deny His Second Presence, not to mistreat the servants who were put into his charge, nor selfish­ly to feed himself to the neglect of the household, nor to imbibe error. If he should fail to heed these warnings, God said that he would be cut off from the Little Flock, as well as lose his stewardship as an unfaithful servant. Nor were these merely idle warn­ings; for so responsible was his office that, if he should have proven untrue, he could have committed untold evil, even as “that evil servant” by his unfaithfulness has wrought unutterable evil in the Church. But “that faithful and wise servant” heeded the Lord’s admonitions, and proved true in the exercise of his office to the end; and through his faithfulness he was privileged to fulfill official obligations and privileges that gave him a wider and more fruitful field of service than any other servant of God ever had on this earth, our Lord alone excepted. Therefore, well may we thank God for every re­membrance of Him, and pray daily, God bless his memory!

Our beloved Pastor’s ministry in life toward us was one of the rich blessings that the Lord has bestowed upon us, and in death his writings and the memory of his holy character, unselfish ministry and faithful sufferings on behalf of the Lord, the Truth and the brethren continue to bless us. Surely, if we were bereaved of what he was and still is to us, much of great value now and hereafter would be lost to us. Very few persons who have lived have left so rich a legacy to others as “that faithful and wise Servant” left to the Church; and the sweet incense of his offering abides with us as a sacred memory, a good example and a strong Inspiration. Surely we have abund­ant reason to praise and thank God for every memory of him, and well may we daily pray, “God bless his memory!” We are sure that all Epiphany-enlightened ecclesias will be glad to hold memorial services for him on the anniversaries of his passing beyond the veil, and that on those days isolated Epiphany-enlightened saints will spend some time in private memorial services for him.

But while he means much to the faithful, it is indeed sad to note how some who make loud professions of loyalty to his teachings and memory, and who, because the use of his name brings them advantage, employ it as a charm with which to bewitch others, vie with one another in the work of casting off various of his teachings. The P. B. I., for a while lauding him as “that Servant,” at the same time endorsed a chro­nology which he as “that Servant” after mature study very properly rejected; and they dignify that chronology (rejected by him, ninety-seven years ago proven false, and dur­ing the 1908-11 sifting used by the sifters against our Scriptural chronology) as ad­vancing light on the path of the just not due in his day to be understood, but since “discovered” as “new Truth” by them! The Society, for years claiming to have been his successor as “that Servant,” has been casting aside many features of his Charter, Will, arrangements and teachings. Every Levitical movement praises him in one breath, and undergoes nausea at some of his teachings and arrangements in the next breath. The Olsonites, rejecting all of his prophetic teachings, have vitiated fundamental doctrines taught by him.       One of the Swedish pilgrims in his periodical teaches that our Pastor lost his crown. Another Swedish pilgrim in still another periodical denies that he was “that Servant,” claiming that the title “that Servant” means a class – the teaching brethren in the Church from Pentecost to our Lord’s Return. This pilgrim’s arguments we will briefly review at this time, believing that we have previously refuted every other form of teaching that denies to our Pastor the exclusive privilege of being “that Ser­vant,” and have proved above that the expression “that Servant” means an individual, and not a class.

The first argument that this brother presents is that the Diaglott translation proves that the office of “that Servant” was exercised before our Lord’s Return: Happy that servant whom his Master at His arrival shall find so employed,” i.e., giving the meat in due season (Matt. 24:46). Had the brother who makes this criticism an accur­ate knowledge of Greek, or, having it, had he used it in studying the Greek text of this verse, he would not have based his argument upon the italicized phrase above. The Ao­rist participle, elthon, which expresses non-continued past action, should not have been rendered “at his arrival”; rather it should have been translated “after coming.” The verse in question should therefore be rendered as follows: “Blessed that servant whom his Lord, after coming, shall find so doing.” As the Aorist participle elthon denotes a non-repeated past action, so the present participle, poiounta, denotes a present con­tinued action in the time of the activity of the verb on which it is dependent. Hence the passage shows that after, not at, our Lord’s arrival He would find a certain ser­vant continuing to give the meat as due.

The following facts will elucidate this. About Sept. 12, 1874, our Lord returned. About Sept. 21, 1874, our Pastor came to understand, and then immediately afterwards be­gan to teach, the invisibility of the Second Advent as the first feature of the harvest Truth (C 88, par. 4; Z ‘16, 171, pars. 2,3). From then on he continued faithfully to teach the Truth as due, including the fact of the Lord’s Return (Z ‘16, 171, pars. 10-13), the awakening of the sleeping saints (Z ‘16, 172, pars. 5-8), etc., until in 1879 the Lord made him “that Servant,” at the time that He gave him the light on the Tabernacle. Thus the facts are in harmony with the literal translation of the passage: (1) our Lord came, (2) our Pastor for nearly four years continued faithfully to give the meat (the Lord found him “so doing” during those years), and then (3) the Lord promoted him to be “that Servant.” Thus, instead of this verse teaching that the office of “that Servant” would be exercised before our Lord’s Return, it teaches the reverse – that only after the Lord’s Return and after the faithful servant’s continuance in giving the meat for some time was he promoted to be “that Servant.”

The brother’s second argument is that after our Lord’s Return, “that Servant” was rewarded for his faithfulness manifested before the Lord’s Return, with being put over all the Master’s goods. Hence he argues that he represents the faithful servants from Pentecost onward. This argument is false, because it is based upon the false premise of the first argument, i.e., that “that Servant” was exercising this office before our Lord’s arrival. having above shown that its basis – his first argument – is false, this argument falls with his first argument to the ground.

The brother’s third point is that “that Servant” was warned not to say in his heart, “My Lord delays to come.” From this the brother argues that this warning could be applicable only before the Lord’s Return, and, therefore, he argues, this proves that “that Servant’s” office was exercised before our Lord’s Return. Our answer to this argument is the following: Not before, but only after our Lord’s Second Advent could one be blamed for saying, “My Lord delays to come,” i.e., be blamed for denying that the Second Advent had set in. Before our Lord’s Return it would have been proper to deny that His Second Advent had set in. But if one should once have known that the Lord’s Second Advent had set in, and then later have given up that belief, then he would have said a condemnable thing, if he asserted that the Lord was delaying His Second Advent, i.e., that it had not yet set in, but that it was a future event. The Lord knew that all sorts of arguments would be brought against the chronology to disprove the thought that the Second Advent had set in. Knowing that such a view would lead to giving up the harvest work, He cautioned “that Servant” not to give way to these argu­ments, and as a result give up faith in the Second Advent as having set in; for if he should deny this point of his faith, it would imply that his heart (“shall say in his heart”) had become wrong; and it would surely move him to give up the harvest work, and thus would make him unfaithful to his office. The caution not to deny the Lord’s Return as having set in not only does not prove that the office of “that Servant” was exercised before our Lord’s Return, but positively disproves such a thought, by prov­ing that such a condemnable denial on the part of the incumbent of that Servant’s of­fice could come only after the Lord’s Return had set in.

The brother’s fourth argument is that that Servant’s unfaithfulness could only have preceded the Lord’s Return, because the Lord threatens that if “that Servant” should prove unfaithful, his Lord would in an unexpected day and at an unknown hour come and cut him off. It will be noticed that the brother uses the expression, “will come” (Luke 12:46), as signifying the setting in of the Lord’s Second Advent. By the expression, “will come,” in this sentence our Lord did not mean His Second Advent as setting in, any more than He meant His Second Advent as setting in when He said to the Ephesus and Pergamos phases of the Church, which passed away hundreds of years before our Lord’s Return: “Repent,....or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick.” “Repent, or else I will come upon thee quickly, and will fight against thee with the sword of My mouth” (Rev. 2:5,16). In Other occurrences of such a use of the word “come” as applied to acts of our Lord other than His Second Advent set­ting in are found in Rev. 3:3; 16:15, etc. In such connections the word “come” im­plies that one in a hostile manner enters into an activity against another. It does not mean what the word “come” ordinarily means, i.e., to arrive at a place, or in the presence of a person, after a journey. Accordingly, we interpret the words of Luke 12: 46 to mean that unknown and unexpected by “that Servant” the Lord would enter into a hostile activity against him, if he should prove unfaithful, and by that hostile activ­ity would deprive him of his office as well as of his membership in the Lord’s Body, i.e., after the Lord’s coming and subsequent to the time when He would appoint the faithful and wise servant to the office of “that Servant.”

How shallow are the four arguments that this brother offers to us for his theory whereby he seeks to deprive our dear Pastor of the honor that the Lord gave him, and that the Bible (Num. 25:6-13; Matt. 20:5; 1 Cor. 10:8; P ‘19, 142, par. 3--143, par. 3) shows would be made known as his at the exact time that it was made known as his! Why do some brethren, either by their teachings or by their acts, continually seek to take from dear Bro. Russell the honors that the Lord has given him? Is it not that they might by undermining him in the estimation of some of the brethren all the more enhance themselves in the estimation of those same brethren, and thus gain them as their followers? This the Lord assures us is the motive of errorists among the Lord’s people, which experience frequently confirms (Acts 20:30).

All of us recall how our Society brethren claimed that our Pastor was, from beyond the veil, functioning in his office as “that Servant,” using the Society as the channel of his office work. Our Pastor, himself, on the contrary, has told us that the func­tions of that office were to be used by its incumbent in this life only, and that if “that Servant” should prove faithful until death, the office of “that Servant” would cease to exist at the time of his death (Z ‘04, 126, par. 1). Doubtless there is method in the Adversary’s attacks on our Pastor as “that Servant.” Those who by ex­press profession deny that he was “that Servant,” and those who by repudiation of ex­press teachings of his by their course deny that he was “that Servant,” are alike guilty of undermining his influence in order “to draw away disciples after them.” The most Sa­tanic of all uses made of his position as “that Servant” was that of the Society leaders, whose claim that from beyond the veil our Pastor, as “that Servant,” was directing their work, makes him responsible for all their false teachings and unbiblical practices. What an unholy use of his dearly-bought influence in the Church to further their de­ceptive schemes! For “all deceivableness of iniquity” it can be equaled by only one other claim made – that claim of the papacy that St. Peter from heaven directs the official acts and teachings of the popes, his pretended successors. Indeed, the pa­pacy’s teaching on this point is in the Great Papacy the counterpart of the Society leaders’ teaching in Little Papacy on the point that is here under discussion. See­ing the Adversary’s purpose in these attacks, let us in God and Christ all the more appreciate and hold to our Pastor as “that Servant.”

The foregoing is quoted from Vol. E-9, Chapter 5; and it is our hope that all who read it may be refreshed and strengthened by this excellent treatise. We consider it especially timely now because so many who still offer lip service to “That Servant,” are busy in “revising” or totally denying many of the fundamental truths he taught. If he was “That Servant” – and we believe he was – then he could not be so wrong on so many vital truths.

Of course, such technique is an old ruse of the Adversary. The Papacy makes loud and loquacious claims of loyalty to St. Peter, even as they vitiate every important truth he taught. The Society (now Jehovah’s Witnesses) did the same with Pastor Rus­sell and his teachings – so much so that their very errors eventually forced them to deny he was That Servant. It should be emphasized that Tabernacle Shadows was basic for producing the six volumes of Scripture Studies, and was fundamental for the entire Harvest program. It made crystal clear “the song of Moses and the Lamb;” and its re­jection tends to void most of the basic truths that came to us during the years of That Servant’s life.

Similar comparison may be made with the Laymen’s Home Missionary Movement. These brethren also stress their great respect for That Servant and for the Epiphany Messenger, as they also pervert much of the Truth they taught. Let us keep in mind that in the Tabernacle picture a place types a condition in the antitype. Thus, the Camp, the Court, the Holy, the Most Holy and “without the Camp,” were all given logical setting in Tabernacle Shadows; and no one place could type two different conditions in the antitype. But the LHMM brethren have now invented a way to do this, so they are now teaching Justification in the Camp and in the Court. We say they have “invented” this, because it cannot be found in any of the writings of That Servant or of the Epiphany Messenger; and all who desire to give respect to these two prominent servants of the Lord will do well to reflect seriously upon this situation, as we especially pay homage to their memory at this season of the year. And we trust that all our faithful breth­ren have not only honored them by Memorial services, but also by Special Effort in antitypical Gideon’s Second Battle, with the literature the Epiphany Messenger espec­ially designated for this good work.

Of course aberrations such as mentioned above should not surprise us; we should, in fact, expect them – in keeping with St. Paul’s conclusion: “They admitted not the love of the Truth (pointedly true of sifters and crown-losers).... and on this account God will send to them an energy of delusion” – such as Justification being typed by two places in the Tabernacle, applying the Parable of the Sheep and Goats now, etc.

“Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world. (1 John 4:1) “As for God, his way is perfect; the word of the Lord is tried: he is a buckler to all those that trust in him.” (Psalms 18:30)

Sincerely your brother,

John J. Hoefle,  Pilgrim

See Addenda -Sept.-Oct. Present Truth and Tract No. 11 – Jehovah’s Witnesses and Cameroon Persecutions enclosed.

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Addenda to Dec. 1, 1970 No. 186 Article

REVIEW OF SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER PRESENT TRUTH

In the 1970 Sept.-October Present Truth, pp. 73-79, is an article on “Christ’s Millennial Reign – Its Beginning and End,” in which the writer attempts to expose some errors of other groups in Little Babylon, which is as extreme in its illogical and shal­low reasoning as anything ever to come from the pen of RGJ. At first we had determined to pass it by, but others have encouraged us to offer some comment on it.

RGJ’s heart “bleeds” for reconciliation of the differences of the brethren; he yearns for “loving consideration of what God’s Word really teaches.” So we ask, Is this now the same R. G. Jolly that was on the platform at Jamaica in 1957, or has he in fact cleansed himself to the extent that we may now accept his statement for what it says ­or is he acting the part of a rank hypocrite? If this is now an honest statement from him, we do indeed rejoice over the improvement, and recovery, of this member of antityp­ical Jambres.

To make clear to our readers: Sister Hoefle and this writer made special journey to Jamaica in 1957 for the very purpose of “loving consideration,” but which was sadly con­spicuous by its very opposite in RGJ. He manipulated the Chair at the Crofts Hill meet­ing into the hands of one of his rabid sectarian supporters, who then unctuously permit­ted RGJ’s continuous use of the rostrum from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. – not even allowing a brief recess during that four hours. And all during that time his “profusion of words” was in full sway, even as he stoutly refused to entertain a single question from either of us. His “loving consideration” was a spectacle to behold! At the end of the four hours all present were decidedly weary; and the Chairman would have closed the meeting without a word from us – although we had traveled the distance for the express purpose – by invitation from Sister Condell and others – of being there for “loving consideration.” However, she and others would not be silenced by such tactics – insisted upon a vote being taken, at which about 80% of those present voted a hearing from us.

Knowing the severe strain already experienced by the brethren, we promised brevity. Our remarks were over in about 15 minutes; but during that short time we again asked RGJ if we could now ask him questions on our time, which he refused. Then we graciously asked if he had any questions to present to us, at which he emphatically shouted, “I don’t want to talk to you at all!” And this same RGJ is now pleading for “loving considera­tion”! But his plea for “loving consideration” now is in direct keeping with the plea of the Roman Church for tolerance, even as they practice gross intolerance toward others in those localities where their power permits them to do so. And let us not forget that some of the Dawn brethren also remember his “bad conscience” from Parousia days!

But 15 minutes was sufficient time for us to devastate his four hours of harangue. To Illustrate: He contended his position and acts as Executive Trustee of the LHMM were fully justified because he had the endorsement of a Star Member. To this we replied that J. F. Rutherford had had the endorsement of two Star Members, Brother Russell and Brother Johnson; and Judas for a time had had the endorsement of Jesus Himself. This and other comments by us so infuriated him that he spent one entire discourse at the Kingston Con­vention, and large parts of other sessions in the days following, in a vicious diatribe against us, which persuaded some of the “unstable and the unlearned” to refuse even to speak to us. But it also persuaded some more “established in the Present Truth” – such as Sister Condell and others – to refuse to partake of the Love Feast with him, or to have anything more to do with him thereafter.

However, regardless of his present condition – and we trust it has changed since 1957 and subsequently – it is thoroughly illogical to expect RGJ to receive much of a hearing from the leaders of other groups when he himself presents so much error – error that they themselves can recognize as error. He accuses them of being “antitypical Jam­bres – the Great Company sifting leaders,” while he himself is a part of the “antitypical Jambres” by his own admission. If he were the cleansed Levite that he claims to be, then those of the other groups would be persuaded to come to him, rather than separating them­selves – as he has admitted – into private groups of their own. We believe he would be having a much more successful ministry if he were cleansed, and the lord would bless his efforts toward the uncleansed, as the Epiphany Messenger has taught. But what do we see not many, if any, of the individuals in other groups come to him at all, and none whole­heartedly. It is simply one uncleansed Great Company leader attempting refutation of the errors of other Great Company leaders – just as it has been with the crown-lost leaders all during the Gospel Age – many of them vehemently attempted to refute errors of others with errors of their own. It is for this reason that his Attestatorial Service has been such a marked failure – not even a remote “parallel” to the Little Flock Attestatorial Service of 1914-16. Note that not even he now describes his failures as “Brother Russell’s Parallels.”

One predominant reason for RGJ’s failure toward his “kinsmen” – a reason not readily apparent on the surface – is this: When Brother Johnson was still with us, he generously conceded there were saints in most of the Truth groups. But, even with that forceful ap­peal, he could not persuade many of them toward the Epiphany Movement. Now comes RGJ with the flat assertion that not a single one of them is a saint; and he is “foolish” enough to consider that some of them may accept that from him. Also, quite a few of the Dawn brethren have been reading our papers, so they are in no mood at all to embrace his errors.

It is also something to contemplate when he quotes the following from Brother Russell on p. 76, col. 2 of his Sept.-Oct. Present Truth:

“Our thought is that whoever under such conditions as these will make a full conse­cration to the Lord, to leave all to follow in his ways, and will live up faithfully, loyally, to that consecration, may be privileged to be counted as a similar class (italics by RGJ) to those who preceded the Gospel age. We know of no reason why the Lord would re­fuse to receive those who make a consecration after the close of the Gospel age and before the full opening of the Millennium.” (italics ours)

The Dawns and his readers must now conclude that RGJ is presently teaching that Youthful Worthiship is still available, which is the Truth, and is commendable, if that is now his intention. Our readers will quickly recognize that we have repeatedly used this quotation to refute his false doctrine (“strange fire”) of Epiphany Campers Conse­crated. If this is just another sample of his “doublemindedness” (Jas. 1:8), and he has not forsaken the “error of his way,” then his own readers will quickly recognize the con­fusion into which he has led himself, if he has not repudiated his false teaching. Cer­tainly to present to the Dawns and others that there is still an elective salvation of­fered to those who consecrate between the Ages, while sin and evil are yet in the ascendancy, is in harmony with all Scriptural teaching of both Messengers. If he has forsaken his sins of practice and teaching, then he will surely receive encouragement and favor from all his brethren who are “of the Truth.”

CONFUSION ON THE THOUSAND-YEAR REIGN

On p. 78, col. 2, RGJ injects his confusion on the thousand-year reign, in which he says, “every member of the Church did not have to be present at Pentecost, when the Church as a class came under the anointing.” And he draws from this the conclusion that the reign began in 1874 when Jesus returned, and that He then represented not only Himself but His Body Members also in reigning. If he wants even a semblance of analogy here, he should contend that the Church received its anointing at Jordan in the person of Jesus, because Jordan is the parallel date for 1874. But he won’t find confirmation for his position here in either the Parousia or Epiphany writings; it is simply another of his own inventions.

He attempts to offer some proof from Parousia Vol. 2, pp. 217-222; but the date 1874 is not mentioned once in the prose of those pages. It is, however, found in the chart opposite page 218, but then only incidental to proving the main theme of Brother Russell’s discussion, which is the rise and fall of Israel, the main stress being on 1878. Note particularly the statement on p. 222: “the dates 33 and 1878 mark when the work of the respective new ages began.”

Rev. 20:4, Dia., states – “They lived and reigned with the Anointed One the thousand years.” It reveals a very desperate position here to contend that “they” and “the Anointed One” may be pooled as one expression. Clearly enough, for even “the unstable and the unlearned” to understand, “they” are the Body Members of “the Anointed One.” But not a single one of the “they” were living in the First Resurrection at 1874. And if RGJ wants to contend they were living representatively in the individual Christ, then let him go back and start his date with Jesus’ resurrection, as He was then “living” in the full sense of the First Resurrection.

If the Dawn leaders had modified their statements by including the word “mediatorial,” they would be in much less difficulty, because that reign has not yet begun, and will not begin until Satan is fully bound at some future date not yet known to us.

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THE FALL CONVENTIONS

It was our privilege to attend the Labor Day Pottstown Convention and the one near Chicago at October’s end. As on previous occasions, our experiences were a commingling of joy in the fellowship of the few who still retain the “spirit of the Truth,” and a deep sadness at the deplorable condition of the majority. It gave us acute reminder of the experiences of all the reformers, particularly of Brother Russell and Brother Johnson, at the hands of the measurably faithful as they attempted to heal their “fleshly minds.” But this latter provides us with ample explanation as to why they have gone from error to error since Brother Johnson died twenty years ago. There was no special service for either the Parousia or Epiphany Messengers this year, which demonstrates the degree of esteem in which they are still held, and it enables us to discern more readily how the Gospel-Age Church sank into the error it did after the Apostles departed. It gives us real pleasure, however, to make mention of the warm tribute given the Messengers by the Brother at Chicago who gave the opening welcome address.

And we should expect from such people a loose and slipshod handling of various Scrip­tures, and interpretations that suit their present purposes. During the Interim the Pa­pacy dwelt loud and long upon Scriptures pertaining to renegades, pointing the accusing finger at the faithful, all the while those very Scriptures pertained specifically to them. Thus did also Big Babylon toward Brother Russell; then Little Babylon, and speci­fically the Little Pope, did likewise with Brother Johnson, describing him and his asso­ciates as That Evil Servant class. These observations should teach us something; and it brings vividly to mind the words of the Prophet: “Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord.” (Jer. 17:5)

In this connection one speaker at Chicago used the subject, “The Defense”; based upon Phil. 1:17. He then offered quite some detail about avoiding ‘the wolves,’ in which he used the ‘avoid them’ policy of That Evil Servant, et al. “If you met a wolf in the woods, you’d get away as quickly as possible,” he said; but he completely over­looked the fact that St. Paul not only warned against ‘wolves,’ but he also said he was “set” for the defense of the Truth. Nor is there the slightest hint in any of the rec­ord that the courageous Apostle ever ran like a whipped pup or attempted to avoid con­frontation with the gainsayers. But the speaker on this occasion advised just the re­verse: get away from the ‘wolf’ as quickly as possible; so we have here a clear-cut picture of the ‘good soldier’ in St. Paul, and the good runner in the present instance. Of course, if we don’t have a weapon to defend ourselves against the ‘wolf,’ our best course is to run. But the fully faithful – those “who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil” – are well prepared for defense and attack against the gainsayers and wolves: “For I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which your adversaries shall not be able to gainsay nor resist.” (Luke 21:15)

THE QUESTION MEETING

At both meetings RGJ adopted the technique of his “kinsmen” in other groups – some­thing he himself ridiculed in times past – by demanding all questions the evening before. This is a two-edged sword, of course, because it allows plenty of previous thought on some questions, and enables him to avoid entirely those questions that might prove trouble­some. All of us acquainted with the past know that Brother Johnson never pursued such a “scared” course. We ourselves “walk in the trodden paths,” gathering the questions at meetings’ start. Not only so, we usually allow verbal follow-ups in case we have not made ourselves clear.

With plenty of time for research and premeditation, RGJ gave very commendable answers to some questions, as he also offered monotonous “profusion of words” on others – to be sure he would not have time to answer all questions submitted. But even with all this “sleight-of-hand,” he offered outright error in some of his answers. As instance, he em­phatically declared the Memorial is presently for the entire Household of Faith; where­as, Brother Johnson clearly stated it is only for the consecrated. Considering the things implied in partaking of the bread (broken with Him) and the wine (drinking His cup), it would seem a mere novice should see the force of Brother Johnson’s teaching that it is only for the consecrated. (See E-11, pp. 206-209)

Also, RGJ was just as emphatic in another of his errors, as he declared the only embargo on Jesus’ merit at this time is on behalf of new creatures. All who “continue in” the truths taught in Tabernacle Shadows know the merit in the Court is on embargo for those in the Court – which, in the “finished picture” will contain only the conse­crated. The Tentatively Justified who have failed to consecrate will be ejected from the Court into the Camp, and will no longer be a part of the “Household of Faith.” “The latter during the Epiphany cease altogether to be of the Household of Faith, having used the grace of God in vain; while the former (the consecrated – the Youthful Worthies—­JJH), consecrating and proving faithful, retain their Tentative Justification, and are thus of the Gospel-Age Household of Faith who persist into and during the Epiphany.” (E-4 p. 406) Then in E-12, p. 315: “After the three elect classes of the present will have left this world, and thus will no longer need the imputation of Christ’s ransom-merit, then it will be free to be used for the actual purchase of Adam and his race of the unbe­lief class.”

We have often pointed out these basic Truths, and it would seem RGJ should have been so well informed on this item that he could recite it in his sleep. But, then, we shouldn’t be surprised if we see him teaching “strong delusion” (2 Thes. 2:10,11), and his character brothers accepting it. And since only the consecrated are to partake of the Lord’s Supper, and only the three elect classes are pictured as of the Household of Faith in the “finished picture,” then we know that only the firstborns, the new creatures and the Youthful Worthies (the latter being the tentative firstborns) are now privileged to partake of the Lord’s Supper. (Also see E-4, pp. 322-323)

There were other questions where he wobbled considerably, so that we could not be certain whether he did not understand his subject, or whether his customary “profusion of words” garbled his answer so that it was simply “off center.”

“Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding.” (Prov. 4:7)

NO. 185: THE JULY-AUGUST PRESENT TRUTH

No. 185

My dear Brethren: Grace and peace through our Beloved Master!

On pages 55-61 are a number of Questions and Answers by RGJ attempting to support his various errors, to which we now offer pertinent refutations.

No. 1 – He presents the Question: Was the message of Rev. 22:11 first due to be proclaimed in its entirety in the Fall of 1954, or must it wait until after the Time of Trouble is over, as some claim?

In his answer he states, “One of Satan’s devices.... to deceive the Epiphany-­enlightened brethren into believing that.... Rev. 22:11 does not fully apply until after the Time of Trouble is over.” If he is referring to us – and we assume he is, even though he never has the character manifested by the Parousia and Epiphany Messengers, who never juggled any of their refutations of the gainsayers – then his statement here is a deception. We have never made such a contention. He quotes from E-10:114 – “1954 is the date that the last member of the Great Company will get his first enlightenment that will bring him into the Truth by Passover 1956.” To evade our previous annihila­tive refutation of his use of Rev. 22:11 at the Fall of 1954, he now offers the sophis­tical twist: “not necessarily into the Parousia or Epiphany Truth.... but sufficient Truth to enable them to make sure their final standing in the Great Company.” Brother Johnson says they would get “sufficient” enlightenment to bring them into the Truth by Passover, 1956. Why doesn’t he tell us what that “sufficient truth” was? Can he give one infinitesimal item of Truth they received then? And did they all come “into the Truth by Passover, 1956,” as was true of the parallel in 1916?

Then, further: “Passover, 1956, parallels Passover, 1916.” By Passover 1916 the last member of the Little Flock had come into Parousia Truth – into Present Truth ­into THE Truth. Certainly, all even moderately acquainted with Present Truth know that when we speak of any coming into “the Truth,” we mean into the Parousia or Epi­phany Truth. We don’t speak of those who gain some knowledge of the Truth as having come into the Truth, if they remain in Babylon. And this same RGJ is the very same person who often accuses us of sophistry! If he wanted to offer a fair and unsophisti­cal teaching to his readers, why did he not also quote from E Vol. 10, p. 607, which we now do:

“The production of the Great Company as a class is an Epiphany work; for by the time the Epiphany ends in its lapping, 1956 (RGJ contends this “lapping” is still go­ing on—JJH), all Great Company members will have been brought into the Truth.... These promises and their appliers, beginning in their second phase, Oct. 1954, to come to an end, will cease entirely to operate some time after 1956.” Let RGJ explain to us how “all Great Company members” were brought into the Truth by 1956 – if he can.

Furthermore, why did he not start his explanation by using p. 113 of E-10, instead of starting with p. 114? Here’s what we have on p. 113: “The third shorter forecast in the form of a prophecy on the Epiphany Messenger is found in Rev. 22:10,11. Here he speaks again... That the Epiphany Messenger is represented by the ‘he’ of v. 10 is evi­dent from the nature of what he said. Only when he expounds connectedly the entire book of Revelation will it be due to say, ‘Seal not the sayings of the prophecy of this book’; for Bro. Russell refused to expound the book as a whole, and after the early eighties of the last century refused to answer almost all questions asked him thereon. J. has hitherto followed, and for some years yet will continue to follow, the same course, which he will change toward the end of the Epiphany, when he will begin to ex­pound the book in its entirety connectedly.”

Did Brother Johnson “expound connectedly the entire book of Revelation” by 1954? Was he here to declare the message of Rev. 22:10,11 then? As Brother Johnson has so well asked, Why is it that these Levites offer citations and Scriptures that directly contradict their position? Is it not because they are so befuddled by Azazel that they cannot think clearly on the subjects involved? And Brother Johnson tells us, too, that RGJ is especially skilled in Azazelian trickery. (See E-10:646)

Then he tells us that he is “building up the Epiphany Camp – after the Epiphany period begins to lap into the Basileia” – with his “Consecrated Epiphany Campers.” Why does he not also use in this connection what is found in E-10:209? “The Epiphany Camp in the finished picture is the condition of truly repentant and believing, but not consecrated Jews and Gentiles,”

No. 2 – In E Vol. 10, p. 672, Bro. Johnson states that “non-Truth Great Company and Youthful Worthy brethren, and new ones not yet consecrated, are to be won for the Truth, some of whom will be won before Babylon is destroyed and others of them afterward.” Does he in this statement militate against the teaching that a class in the antitypical Tabernacle Camp has been consecrating since 1954?

RGJ quotes our comments on this statement, and styles it “shallow reasoning.” He makes this statement about us because we accept literally what Brother Johnson taught on p. 672 of E-10; whereas, RGJ is now trying to tell us what he meant. Well, we still accept what he said! This is on par with his kinsmen of the past when they ‘in­terpreted’ the Scriptures –told them what to believe the Scriptures meant. Although RGJ’s attempt here is even more ridiculous, because he is now telling us Brother Johnson said something, but meant something else!

He then mentions a “large work” to be done by the Great Company after 1954. Why doesn’t he tell us what that “large work” has been since 1954? He has repeatedly re­ferred to his “attestatorial service” since 1954, in which none of the Levite groups have joined; in fact, we believe it is a statement without prejudice –and nothing but the truth –that he has fewer Great Company members with him now than he had in 1954. On p. 56, col. 2, par. 1, he says this “attestatorial service” is “just as the Little Flock attestatorial service began promptly 40 years previously, in 1914.” Why doesn’t he tell us what that Little Flock attestatorial service accomplished in 1914-1916; then compare it with his own in 1954-1956, if he accepts the parallel? As we have previously pointed out, he could show less in 1956 than he did in 1954. Yet, he is crass enough to offer such Azazelian trickery to his sleepy readers. All of us know of an outstanding event that occurred in 1914 –to begin the Little Flock Attestatorial Service; and we know, too, of an outstanding event that ended it in November 1916. Let RGJ name any events at all to parallel these things in 1954-1956.

Also, he repeatedly refers to 1954 as the end of the Epiphany in a “restricted sense.” Nowhere in the Epiphany writings does he find such a statement. It is purely an invention by RGJ. The Epiphany and the Time of Trouble are identical –is a teach­ing all Epiphany-enlightened brethren learned under the Epiphany Messenger, and still retain if they “continue in” the Epiphany Truth. In this same connection, at no place in his writings did Brother Johnson ever hint at justification in the Camp during this Age, nor did he ever present the expression “Consecrated Campers” for this Age. That, too, is pure invention by RGJ (or should we say by J. W. Krewson?).

In the January 1950 Present Truth Brother Johnson said he expected to complete the writing of the rest of the 21 volumes of the Epiphany Studies – the last two would be on Revelation – practically every part of which was then clear to him. What has be­come of those notes? Why have they been withheld? Our opinion is that those notes, if published, would completely annihilate RGJ’s teachings on no more saints on earth, etc. In fact, we know – of our own knowledge – that some of his very close partners in per­version, right in the Bible House, have grossly falsified respecting some of those truths that Brother Johnson produced.

His No. 3 Question: – Did Bro. Johnson in his later years revise his teachings, so that he no longer taught (1) that the Epiphany, or Apocalypse, period would end in its narrow or restricted sense in the Fall of 1954, (2) that the Basileia would begin in its first lapping beginning in the Fall of 1954, and (3) that after the Fall of 1954 no more Youthful Worthies would be won?

RGJ’s comments on this question are in keeping with what he has said in the prev­ious questions – and with the same kind of “logic”(?). He says on p. 57, col. 2, par. 3, that this “teacher of sophistry” (meaning JJH, we assume), is comparable to J. F. Rutherford in 1920 in his denial of a “modern (Youthful) Worthy class.” We rest in the assurance of the fact that most of our readers are well aware that we have spent much time and effort to reassert the faithful doctrine of Youthful Worthiship as taught by both Messengers – a Class of faithful consecrators “from 1881 until Restitution sets in, for whom there are no crowns available, and hence no Spirit-begetting... who will be the Millennial Associates of the Ancient Worthies in reward and service” (E-4:342) ­or so long as Tentative Justification is available for such consecrators. Those of us informed in the matter know that Brother Russell clearly taught – and Brother Johnson confirmed with many Scriptures – that there would be such a class in the end of the Age. But we also know that neither Brother Russell nor Brother Johnson ever gave the slightest hint of a Consecrated Campers class in the end of the Age. It took a J. F. Rutherford and RGJ to produce such classes!

As stated previously, this latter class is pure invention by RGJ – a new doctrine, which Brother Johnson taught is “gazing” by such as RGJ and JFR. Thus, his comparison of JFR to us is simply some more of his Azazelian tactics, much the same as he used against the Epiphany Messenger: “Not a few in the ecclesia sympathized with them (RGJ, et al—JJH); and had not J. been present and vigorously opposed their resolution, so Azazelianly constructed as, if possible, to have deceived the very Elect, it would doubt­less have passed.” (E-10:646) It would seem that he is more adept now than he was then. He now doesn’t have the restraining hand of “J. present” with him to thwart his sins of teaching and practice. There is in fact no basis for his comparison of JFR with us, but there is every evidence to prove the comparison fits him! It is simply some more of his loose irresponsible “profusion of words to no purpose.” As Brother Johnson has faithfully recorded: “both the three bad Levite groups and the good levites, the crown-­losers in the Epiphany movement, darken the Truth by their teachings without proper know­ledge.” (E-10:594)

His Question No. 4: – Is it wrong to hold forth the hope of attaining Youthful Worthiship to those who have consecrated since the Fall of 1954 and those consecrating now?

In his answer to this question, RGJ says we are not to hold forth false hopes to anyone – and with this we are in full agreement. He then proceeds to tell us, “after the door of entrance into the High Calling closed in the Fall of 1914, so since the Fall of 1954 the Youthful Worthy call ended.” In proof of this he offers his “parallel”; and from this it is clear he does not understand the meaning of the word ‘parallel.’ Those informed in the matter know that 1914 brought “the night wherein no man can work.” As the war enveloped the various countries, it put an end to the reaping work. Now let RGJ point to any infinitesimal action of any kind in 1954 that put an end to gathering Youth­ful Worthies. Only one badly befuddled by Azazel would attempt to prove a “parallel” there. The facts emphatically contradict his contention. And the same may be said for his “Parallel” of October 1956.

Then he refers to Leviticus 12, “which Scripture the opposers carefully avoid fac­ing squarely in this connection.” Of course, this statement is simply another of his falsehoods, reveals once more his “bad conscience” (See E-10:585), and that he’s still the same “false-accusing Epiphany crown-loser” with whom Brother Johnson had abundant vexation. On various occasions we have declared that Leviticus 12 has no application whatever to the Youthful Worthy call ending – nor did Brother Johnson at any place in his writings attempt such an application. The Scripture refers to the cleansing of the Little Flock and Great Company developing truths. If those truths were properly under­stood by RGJ, he would not be talking the nonsense he now does. This nonsense is clear­ly evident when he attempts to “parallel” Brother Johnson’s activity toward Youthful Worthies with his own activity now toward Campers Consecrated. Brother Johnson had the teaching of That Servant to build upon – but RGJ has nothing of the sort for his newly-­invented non-existent Class of Campers Consecrated from either the Parousia or Epiphany Messengers.

Let us not forget that Brother Johnson energetically and sincerely pursued his ac­tivity toward winning Little Flock members for some four years after 1914. It was not until 1918 that he himself awoke to the fact that that call was completed in the Fall of 1914. Note now RGJ’s statement on p. 58, col. 1, par. 2 of the above question: “Soon after the Fall of 1914 Brother Johnson began teaching... the High Calling closed.” It seems to us he is putting quite a strain on the word “soon,” when he describes four years in that manner. If he were a reliable teacher – with a “good conscience” instead of a “bad” one – he would give the time as we have. Or, can it be possible he doesn’t even know this fact?

Further, he declares, “If God were to keep the call to Youthful Worthiship open until restitution begins, the last ones called would have no time to make their calling and election sure before the Highway of Holiness is opened.” Here are the exact words Brother Johnson used on the subject: “Those faithful consecrators from 1881 until Resti­tution sets in, for whom there are no crowns available... will be the Millennial associ­ates of the Ancient Worthies in reward and service.” (E-4:342) And we might offer this question here: It is now 16 years since his “lapping” parallel began. Is he telling us that 16 years would be insufficient for Youthful Worthies to make their calling and elec­tion sure?

Also That Wise and Faithful Servant has this to say in the Sept. 1, 1915 Watch Tower, Reprint 5761, col. 2, top: “It is our thought that with the closing of the ‘door’ of this Gospel Age there will be no more begetting of the Holy Spirit to the spirit nature. Any afterward coming to God through consecration, before the inauguration of the restitu­tion work, will be accepted by Him, not to the-spirit plane of being, but to the earthly plane. Such would come in under the same conditions as the Ancient Worthies who were accepted of God.... Our thought is that whoever under such conditions as these will make a full consecration to the Lord, to leave all to follow in His ways, and will live up faithfully, loyally, to that consecration, may be privileged to be counted as a similar class to those who preceded this Gospel Age. We know of no reason why the Lord would re­fuse to receive those who make a consecration after the close of the Gospel Age High Call­ing and before the full opening of the Millennium.”

Here we have both Parousia and Epiphany Messengers teaching us that such consecra­tors would come in under the same conditions as the Ancient Worthies – all who consecrate and are faithful thereto – UNTIL THE FULL OPENING OF THE MILLENNIUM or UNTIL RESTITU­TION SETS IN, with RGJ ridiculing such a teaching as an impossibility! He also criti­cizes and ridicules us for “continuing in” that Truth, and presenting it against his errors. As we have said in previous papers, the true parallel to 1914 will arrive when the Time of Trouble becomes severe enough to produce “the night wherein no man can work.” And, when that time does come, it will make crystal clear to all who are “of the Truth” that Rev. 22:10,11 is having its fulfillment – when it will be “useless to exhort the tentatively justified to consecrate,” as Brother Johnson has stated in E-10:114.

His Question No. 5: – Is it true that in the Epiphany Tabernacle setting, there can be no justification outside the linen certain?

On p. 59, col. 1, par. 1, there is this statement: “Eventually the Epiphany Camp will consist only of ‘those who will persist in believing in Jesus as Savior and King.’” Then in par. 2, col. 1 he rails “the tactics of a shyster lawyer” at us for our handling of Brother Johnson’s writings. It will be noted earlier in this refutation that we quoted from E-10:209 on this very subject; but we also included all that Brother Johnson said there – that such members of the Epiphany Camp will be “not consecrated Jews and Gentiles.” So, here again, RGJ reveals he is still the same “false-accusing Epiphany crown-loser” that hurled “unfair and unkind criticisms” at Brother Johnson ­even as he continues his “unfair and unkind criticisms” of both Brother Johnson and Brother Russell in their teaching of Youthful Worthies – “until Restitution begins” ­and now includes JJH in such criticisms.

His Question No. 6: – In teaching that the Basileia period began in 1954 and that those who have consecrated since then will have an eventual reward as a part of the restitution class, are you not thereby teaching that the restitution salvation has be­gun and that the Millennial-Age Tabernacle is in operation?

In answering this question, RGJ offers copious quotations from Brother Johnson, especially from E-Vol. 12, with which we are in full agreement. But we are definitely in disagreement with RGJ’s conclusions about that book, and with his ‘fractured’ Epi­phany Tabernacle. He is now telling us there are two Epiphany Tabernacles – one up to 1954, and another from that date onward to the end of the Epiphany – although he doesn’t mention the “finished picture” that the Epiphany Messenger gave us. Let him give us any Scriptural precedent for such bedlam. And let him give us anything from the Epi­phany writings to support it. Or, is this just another of his own inventions?

As all of us know, the Gospel Age Tabernacle continued to the Fall of 1914; but, when 1881 arrived, and some consecrators began to appear in the Court who were not new creatures, the Gospel Age Tabernacle itself did not change – justification was still found only in the Court. The condition pictured by the Court did not change; the con­dition pictured by the Camp did not change. But RGJ is telling us we may, since 1954, find justification in the Court and also in the Camp! We are still in the Gospel Age – ­the last special period, as taught by the Epiphany Messenger; and the linen curtain, during the faith dispensation, has always been a distinct wall of partition between the faithful justified and those not so. The Court is a type of Justification, even as RGJ himself taught during the lifetime of the two Messengers. The only difference in the Court “in the finished picture,” as taught by the Epiphany Messenger, is that all the tentatively justified who had not sealed their justification by consecration, would have their Tentative Justification lapse and be remanded to the Camp. Now, if that is the case, they were still in character the same as they were when they were in the Court: they were remanded because of their failure to comply in consecration with all require­ments and opportunities of the Tentatively Justified. Does RGJ teach that all those who were remanded to the Camp, having their Tentative Justification to lapse as they leave the Court, will have it renewed as they enter the Camp? In character such people will be exactly the same in the Camp as they were in the Court.

He also teaches that it is possible for Campers to consecrate now, which would in­clude all believers, of course – and would imply a Millennial condition. But from the other side of his mouth he tells us that the Millennial Salvation is not yet available not opened up! This is a Gospel-Age Restitution Salvation! And his Campers are now inscribing their names in the Book of Life, even though their Book of Life is not opened up until the New Covenant is inaugurated!

That curtain in the type made clear distinction between the Priests and Levites, and those in the Camp. And in that Camp there were many of the quasi-elect; but in no place does Brother Russell or Brother Johnson tell us those people had a faith-­justification such as the Ancient Worthies. But RGJ is now telling us that his Camp­ers Consecrated and Youthful Worthies (whose standing is exactly the same as the An­cient Worthies) have the same faith justification. As he said once from a Convention platform, we couldn’t tell one from the other of these consecrated Camp people and the Youthful Worthies, since their consecrations were the same – “unto death” – in both cases. Clearly enough, this is purely invention on his part – the same as was the Jonadabs, ‘great multitude,’ etc., a pure invention on JFR’s part – a new doctrine never before in this Age, or in previous Ages, taught by any one else. And, since Brother Johnson properly taught that such invention by such as RGJ and JFR is “gazing,” we still accept his teaching as correct, and must therefore label RGJ as a full-fledged “gazer,” who is offering “strange fire” (false doctrine) before the Lord. And let us keep in mind that it was JFR who first invented such a Class of consecrated people in the Camp – the only difference being in the name he gave them; so RGJ is indeed treading in real good footsteps when he accepts such an idea from him! Thus, in this he is imitating JFR by perverting the true Tabernacle picture, and by tampering with Tenta­tive Justification.

Once more he tells us “the half tribe of Manasseh west of Jordan types such a Class. Brother Johnson has properly taught that type and antitype must correspond in every detail. This is an elementary consideration – a “must” in proper interpretation of any type. RGJ had not learned this during Brother Russell’s lifetime (see his letter in the Nov. 15, 1910 Watch Tower); and it is evident he did not learn it during Brother Johnson’s lifetime, otherwise he would not now be offering his present confu­sion. In the type, the half tribe of Manasseh west of Jordan received not one iota of advantage in land or position above the other nine tribes west of Jordan. Therefore, any advantage RGJ now promises his Campers Consecrated on the basis of that type is simply effervescent nonsense. Of course, Brother Johnson has told us that when these people fall into the clutches of Azazel, they talk all sorts of nonsense; and here is another sample of it. “When for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again which be the first principles of the oracles of God.” (Heb. 5:12) And a “first principle” here is that type and antitype must correspond in every detail; and, if it does not, we may know, without further research, that there is something badly wrong with it.

His Question No. 7: – In the March-April PT, pages 29 and 30, you show that ac­cording to the Scriptures, many of which you cite, Bro. Russell was correct in teaching in Tabernacle Shadows (pp. 105-112) that while the antitypical water of separation “will specially apply to the world of mankind during the Millennial Age,” it applies also to God’s people during the Gospel Age, for the sufferings of the red heifer class “have to do with the cleansing or purification of the people of God, including those who shall yet become His people during the Millennial Age.” But you mention also another state­ment he made in Z 1897, col. 2, par. (7), i.e., in the Nov. 15, 1895 Zion’s Watch Tower: “Had the red heifer and its ashes been connected with the Gospel Age cleansings, the Apostle surely would have shown the fact here (i.e., in Heb, 9:13).” Since this state­ment does not agree with what he Wrote in Tabernacle Shadows, and was written some time afterward, should we not accept it and reject his teaching in Tabernacle Shadows on this matter, as one of the sifters now advocates?

In his answer to this RGJ uses his habitual “Satan” charges against us; and this clearly is nothing more than a smoke-screen to conceal his own condition: He is self-­admittedly a part of the “goat for Azazel” – Satan – (Lev. 16:8, margin). Thus, his yelling “Satan” here is simply a take-off of the old Jesuitical trick that has been in use by them for hundreds of years – to divert attention from their own miserable actions. Let us note well that Brother Russell in 1895 offered a clear Scriptural correction for his statement in Tabernacle Shadows.

In a previous answer to a Question in this same Present Truth RGJ again quotes Brother Russell as teaching “a tentative justification” during the Millennium. Here he is offering a direct contradiction to what Brother Johnson taught in E-11:170: “no faith justification in the Millennial Age”; and in E-15:216: “no tentative or vital­ized justification in the Millennium.” And it is also a direct contradiction to what Brother Russell himself said on page 312 of the Question book: “At the close of this Age there will no longer be a tentative justification.” And to these statements also: “Faith-justification ceases with the Gospel Age” (E-6:717) And we believe that his own followers who receive this article will be persuaded by the Truths quoted here from both Messengers.

When Brother Johnson was stating in E-4 that Tentative Justification would prevail “until Restitution begins,” he was simply using this in a secondary sense: His main purpose in making that statement was to prove that Youthful Worthiship would be avail­able so long as Tentative Justification was available; but the Youthful Worthy Class and Tentative Justification will pass away simultaneously when this Age ends. And all who still hold to Parousia and Epiphany Truth can readily see this when they read Epi­phany Volume 4, and note Brother Johnson’s refutations of JFR’s errors on Tentative Justification and Youthful Worthies.

Regarding the ashes of the Red Heifer, we stated in our previous paper on the sub­ject that those memories certainly are helpful to all of us now – all those memories recorded in the Bible – and have been helpful all during this Age to God’s people. But we continue to agree with Brother Russell’s statement in Nov. 1895 Tower that it is not a specific type for this Age. As stated above, Let us note well that Brother Russell in 1895 offered a clear Scriptural correction for his statement in Tabernacle Shadows. Of course, he didn’t revise Tabernacle Shadows on this point, just as he didn’t revise it on the teaching that the Gospel Age only was the Day of Atonement. When the Ancient Worthies are with us, then all the “ashes” of those faithful people will inure to the cleansing of the world – about some of whom we now know absolutely nothing. (See Heb. 11:32) At the top of p. 61, col. 1, RGJ says “the red heifer represents both the An­cient Worthies and the Youthful Worthies.” If he now wants to be at all consistent, then he must be teaching that the Youthful Worthies are also a type applicable to the Gospel Age for the cleansing of God’s people. Will he make himself clear on this point?

A number of times in this Present Truth RGJ refers to us as the “errorist who has been teaching what Brother Johnson termed ‘sophistry’ on the saints’ reign.” Our teach­ing on this subject is identical to our teaching on “the end” of 1 Cor. 15:24; but it will be noted RGJ is careful to omit any reference to this text. He probably knows our analysis of this text, and our refutations of his contentions, have been well received by our readers – and some from his own group have so expressed themselves. We are told that others don’t go along with RGJ’s contentions after reading our analysis.

“If one observes one faithful in his ministry of the Lord, the Truth, the brethren and all others with whom he has to do, let him recognize that such an one has had great favor of the Parousia and Epiphany Messengers, and not that of power-grasping and lord­ing Levite leaders.” (E-11:654, top) “Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith: so do. Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned. From which some having swerved have turned aside unto vain jangling. Desiring to be teachers of the law; understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm.” (I Tim. 1:4,7)

Sincerely your brother, John J. Hoefle, Pilgrim

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LETTERS OF GENERAL INTEREST

Dear Brother Hoefle: Christian greetings!

Your letter informing us that you sent a part of the books has been received, but the books have not arrived yet. We would like to join with you in the Special Effort of October to November 15. Kindly send us an assorted number of tracts for the occa­sion. The friends specially mentioned Permission of Evil and Where are the Dead.

It is good to know that you and all there are in reasonably good health. We here are in good spirits. All join in sending Christian love to you, Sister Hoefle and the friends.

Your sister by His Grace ------- (TRINIDAD)

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Dear Sirs:

I have been given an issue of your publication “THE HERALD OF THE EPIPHANY” and I am interested in receiving it if it is still published.

I understand your organization was once part of the Jehovah’s Witnesses. Is this true? If so, I’d be interested to know why the break came and when and how you now differ from that organization.

In Jesus’ Name ------- Church of Christ (CALIFORNIA)

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Gentlemen:

Thank you for your two papers, which I have read with great interest. May I ask that you send me – without obligation on my part – your No. 2 folder, “What is the soul?”

Thank you ------- (NEW JERSEY)

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Dear Brother Hoefle:

Thank you for the literature which I am reading carefully. Enclosed is which I am freely donating to your work. Please use it as Christ directs.

Yours in Christ ------- (NEW JERSEY)

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Dear Brother Hoefle: – May Grace and peace abound!

Trusting you, your entire household and friends are all in as good health as is permissible under the present circumstances.

I now hasten to express gratitude on behalf of Sister ------- for the kind gift. Everything was received intact.

On behalf of all here, Sister joins me in sending warm Christian greetings to Sister Hoefle, you and the friends on your side. May the Lord’s countenance continue to ever shine on thee.

Your brother by His Grace -------- (TRINIDAD)

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SISTER AUGUSTA HENZ

It was our privilege to conduct the funeral of this beloved Sister on August 17. In a few months (Nov. 29) she would have reacted her 96th year. If we consider the history of the United States as beginning with the War of the Revolution in 1775, then she lived over almost one-half of the entire history of this country; saw it progress from the ox cart to the jet airplane, and to men on the moon. She embraced the Truth very early in this century, and was personally known to us for more than fifty years. It is our belief that she was a “good soldier,” a faithful co-laborer and a trustworthy sister. Thus, we say of her “she hath done what she could.” It is our hope – and belief – that we may repeat for her the words of St. Paul: “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.”

SISTER EMILY PICKERING

Another beloved Sister finished her course this Spring; would have been 101 years old in September. We believe she also “fought a good fight, kept the faith” ­yet without sectarianism, and without succumbing to the third “slaughter-weapon man” of Combinationism. “When the Son of Man cometh, shall He find the faith in the earth?” Such faith is indeed precious, and sadly missed, when one of its recipients is taken from our midst.

NO. 184: A BOOK REVIEW

No. 184

“Of making many books there is no end”—Ecc. 12:12. It seems that the Wise Man had become vexed and wearied with so much reading matter, because he then concludes, “Much reading is a weariness of the flesh.... God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.” Here is a terse warning that every book – especially on Biblical subjects – would be subjected to a critical eye by those in agreement and by those of contrary views. And if this were true three thousand years ago, how much more would it be so today. Thus, those of us who resort to the printing press should logically – and agreeably – expect close anal­ysis of the things written.

On this premise we now review the latest book by the Jehovah’s Witnesses – “Then Is Finished The Mystery Of God,” copyrighted in 1969, first edition two million copies. Writers are motivated by various standards – some from pride or pelf, some from real altruism, duty, and a “love of the truth.” We shall not attempt to catalog the Wit­nesses in their writing of many books; we shall record their methods, then allow our readers to form their own conclusions. If we are properly informed by the Witnesses themselves, Headquarters simply sends them a number of copies of each new issue, tell­ing them the price, and “PLEASE REMIT.” Considering that their “dedicated” help at headquarters is substantially slave labor (board, room and slight expense allowance), no union interference, and all participants very willing cooperators, we may readily conclude that the cost of such productions as the one we now consider would be a small percentage of a like production that must comply with the competitive rules of the fi­nancial world. The system of the Witnesses thus approaches the ideal: A quick sale without any cost of advertising, with pressure placed upon the “faithful” in the field to dispose of their supply with no undue delay.

In 1917 this same organization – then the International Bible Students Assn –produced The Finished Mystery, an attempted interpretation of the books of Revelation and Ezekiel. This present “Mystery” deals only with Revelation; and is often in sharp disagreement with the book they published in 1917. Many of those former state­ments are now reversed, or completely set aside. When the 1917 volume appeared, it caused a great revolt among the members, with headquarters insisting that it be accep­ted with blank credulity; critical questions were anathema. Many who disagreed there­upon severed their association with the organization, were disfellowshiped, and casti­gated with such names as “That Evil Servant” class, second-deathers, causers of divi­sions among the faithful, etc. But it was only a matter of a very few years that Headquarters itself recognized many of the blatant blunders of The Finished Mystery, and not only no longer insisted upon its acceptance, but actually threatened disfellow­ship of those who would dare to read it. Its printing was discontinued.. But no sense of shame was manifested over the unchristian treatment that had been meted out to their erstwhile brethren who dared question it in 1917. Indeed, Man’s inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn!

Coming now to this 1969 “Mystery,” it seems to us to have as many – or more –errors, ridiculous charges, false interpretations, etc., as did the one in 1917. And it is to some of these that we now direct our attention: On page 67 there is quite some elaboration on Rev. 6:11 – “White robes were given to every one of them.” Their interpretation states this took place in 1918, when the sleeping saints were raised. They say, “It would hardly be fitting for those slaughtered souls to receive these white robes while still remaining under the altar.... How could long flowing robes be kept white down there?” The shallow thinking here will become readily appar­ent when we consider Rev. 19:8; “The fine linen is the righteousness of saints” ­the righteousness that every one of them earned through perfecting himself in a Christ like character. Their condition “under the altar” was exactly the same as was the con­dition of Jesus, when He exclaimed, “Into Thy hands do I commend my spirit.” When our Lord was in the death state, after His crucifixion, His righteousness did not die; it was simply deposited into the hands of the Father until His resurrection. And the same with the sleeping saints – the mere fact that Jesus was dead only parts of three days would not alter in any way the condition of those who may have been dead – under exactly the same conditions – for a number of years. And let us not forget here that the Witnesses’ so-called “Founder” – Brother Russell – showed very clearly from the parallel dispensations that the first sleeping saints were raised in 1878, and not in 1918, as now claimed by the organization.

ERRORS ON THE CHRONOLOGY

On page 94 the book says “the creation of man almost six thousand years ago.” Here again they have cast away the clear calculations of their founder, who gave log­ical proof from the Scriptures that the six thousand years of Adam’s creation had ex­pired in 1872. We take a step forward in the book here to page 137, where it is stated, “When the manna was put into the Ark of the Covenant by Moses to King Solomon’s dedica­tion of the completed temple was 485 years.” How they could arrive at this erroneous conclusion we do not know, as it is clearly disputed by clear Bible statements. In Acts 13:20 St. Paul says that God “gave them (the children of Israel) judges about the space of four hundred and fifty years, until Samuel the Prophet.” It is recorded that the Jews wandered in the Wilderness of Sin, after leaving Egypt, for forty years; then it took them six years to divide the land by lot after they crossed Jordan into Canaan, making then 496 years. Saul, the first King after Samuel, reigned as King for forty years, as did also David who followed Saul on “the throne of the Lord in Israel.” Then came Solomon, who “began to build the House of the Lord” in the fourth year of his reign. Adding all these figures, we have exactly 580 years from Sinai to the time Solomon began to build the Temple.

In 1 Kgs. 6:1 it is stated “it came to pass in the four hundred and eightieth year after the children of Israel were come out of the land of Egypt” Solomon began to build the Temple. The discrepancy of 100 years in these two statements is well explained in the footnote of the Diaglott:

“A difficulty occurs here which has very much puzzled Bibli­cal chronologists. The date given here is at variance with the statement in 1 Kings 6:1. There have been many solutions offered, but only one which seems entirely satisfactory, i.e., that the text in 1 Kings 6:1 has been corrupted, by substituting the Hebrew character daleth (4) for hay (5), which is very similar in form. This would make 580 years (instead of 480) from the exode to the building of the Temple, and exactly agree with Paul’s chronology.”

This is the explanation that was approved and accepted by Pastor Russell; and for a few years after his death the Witnesses themselves approved of his conclusion, and vigorously defended it against the attempts of some other errorists to set his chronology aside (although the errorists attempted only a 19-year change in his figures –against approximately 100 years which the Witnesses now try to inject into them). But, even if we accept their present figure of 1 Kgs. 6:1, they are still six years off, because 1 Kings 6:38 tells us, “In the eleventh year, in the month Bul, which is the eighth month, was the house finished throughout all the parts thereof... So he was seven years in building it” – or ten years and eight months after he began his reign, mak­ing at least 491 years from Sinai – if we accept the faulty statement of 1 Kings 6:1 as correct. However, let us note that they say “almost” or “about” when stating dates now, so it would seem they are not at all certain of their own figures. And this should not surprise us when we consider the confusion of many of their statements.

THAT SERVANT

When the Witnesses produced The Finished Mystery in 1917, they were emphatic that Pastor Russell was “that servant” of Matt. 24:45-47; and they falsely insisted that the book was his posthumous work. Indeed, they did include copious quotations from his writings, which statements contained the Truth; and it was the “seventh vial” of Rev. 16:17, although the errors the writers intermingled with the truths of Pastor Russell gave that “vial” a vile appearance in many parts of it. But attacks made upon so many of their errors were so incisive that they were shortly forced to reverse themselves, sub­sequently claiming that “that servant” was a class of people, and not an individual ­the ‘class’ being themselves, of course. And in the book now under discussion they follow the same line with the “seven angels” of the seven churches described in Reve­lation chapters two and three. These “seven angels” they now also describe as a class, again including themselves in that class.

There are a number of reasons why their twist in both instances is fundamentally wrong, because the Scripture itself—Matt. 24:45-47, and its companion text Luke 12: 42-46, clearly refutes their claim. “That Servant” is clearly distinguished from the church in general because he is spoken of as being made “ruler over His (the Lord’s) household; hence he cannot be the household – or we are faced with the ridiculous statement that he is made ruler over himself – an unsound statement on its very face. Also, he is said to “give them (the Church) meat in due season,” a statement which clearly sets him apart from the general Church. And, when he is called the “steward” here is clear proof that all the household cannot be meant, for a steward is the spec­ial representative of the householder, having in charge the owner’s goods during his employment, as well as the supervision of all the other servants in that particular house. In our Lord’s day individuals, not classes, were stewards. Moreover, he is expressly distinguished in Luke 12:45 from all the other servants, in that he is for­bidden “to beat the menservants and maidens,” i.e., all the other servants of the Church. Would there be any sense whatever in warning the steward not to beat himself? Hence, the expression “That Servant” cannot mean the servants of the Church as a class, because in this passage he is clearly distinguished from them. Therefore, in view of the fact that these two Scriptures distinguish him from the Church as a whole and from all the other servants of the Truth, we should conclude that he must be an individual.

Furthermore, the facts of the harvest history (all of which is now seemingly de­nied by the Witnesses in their juggled chronology) prove that an individual, Brother Russell, is meant by that expression. For the Harvest, understood as the reaping and gleaning period, is past – that is, for those of us who still retain the true chronol­ogy and apply the parallel dispensations. During that Harvest time not a class, i.e., neither the Church, nor all servants of the Truth however we may classify them, had the entire storehouse in their charge, nor gave the meat in due season, nor ruled the Harvest work; but “That Servant” alone did these things. Hence he alone fulfilled the prophecy. Those of us conversant with the situation know he was “monarch of all he surveyed – his right there was none to dispute.” He appointed and dismissed pilgrims at his will; he determined what should go into the Watch Tower; supervised the vol­unteer work and indirectly the colporteurs; decided who should be employed at Bethel, and what particular position each one there should occupy. We are told that he him­self realized the absolute position he occupied; did not want any of his survivors to have the great power that was his; thus arranged in his will that the work in general, and the writing of the Watch Tower in particular, should be done by a group of brethren – rather than by any one of them. He was thus the antitypical Eleazar of the Gospel Age Harvest, having complete charge of the antitypical Tabernacle – in exact duplication of the plenipotentiary powers conferred by the Lord upon the Twelve Apostles, excepting only he did not speak by inspiration, nor was he infallible.

And because of the very nature of the work to be done, could it reasonably have been otherwise? How could the entire Church have had the entire Storehouse in its charge? Or have given itself the meat in due season? Or have ruled the work? That would have been a duplication of some brethren during the Philadelphia period who decided that each one of their number “spoke as he was moved by the Holy Spirit,” to determine what was right and what was wrong, which often resulted in about as many dif­ferent opinions on any one subject as there were members in the congregation, with the result being a spiritual bedlam. Thus we recognize the absurdity in the claim that “That Servant” was just another name for the entire Church. In fact, we inquire, Why should the Lord offer such a confusion in the use of an uncalled-for name? Why did He not offer the simple statement that the Church would do the things specified – if that was His intention?

And the results confirm this. It was Brother Russell who saw most of the advanc­ing Truth during his stay with us. And what others did see, they first had to submit it to him for approval and for presentation to the general Church. Certainly all familiar with the facts know this to be the truth. And this being the truth, it log­ically follows that “That Servant” had to be an individual. It is stated of him that he was “faithful and wise.” While it is properly stated that the general Church is blessed with “the wisdom from above,” it is also properly stated that many of them did very unwise and downright foolish things. Not only so, but many of them eventually proved to be unfaithful – either as crown-losers, or as second-death sifters during the Parousia. This also is common knowledge.

But, having concluded That Servant to be a class, they are logically forced to further error: They must determine that all “the angels to the seven churches” must also be the entire Church. It would be quite illogical to single out one individual during the entire Gospel Age for any particular time, then say that all the others were a group – the general Church. Note now Rev. 1:20, Dia.: “The seven stars are messen­gers (angels) of the seven congregations, and the seven Lampstands are seven congrega­tions.” Here is a very clear and indisputable line of demarcation between the “angels” and the congregations themselves. No, That Servant cannot be defined as the general Church, if we apply “the spirit of a sound mind.”

Further, if we consider the “angel” to the Church at Ephesus, we find that the twelve Apostles (angels, messengers, ones sent forth) were decidedly superior to the general Church: “If the sins of any one you may forgive, they are forgiven them; if those of any you may retain, they have been retained.” (John 20:13, Dia.) There is certainly no difficulty here in separating the “angel to the Church at Ephesus” from the Church itself.

FORCED INTERPRETATIONS

As may logically be expected from such minds as now control the Witnesses, all their thinking will manifest a similar bent; so they now attempt to place literal interpretation upon parts of The Revelation. When The Finished Mystery was first published in 1917, it placed great stress upon the first verse of Revelation: “Jesus Christ .... sent and signified it by His angel unto His servant John.” ‘Signified’ means the Lord told it by signs – sign-i-fied it. One of the keys to a proper under­standing of The Revelation is that practically all the nouns – except the proper names such as God, Jesus Christ, John, etc. – are symbolic (they mean something different than the surface would indicate), while all the numerals are literal.

On page 146 – and pages following of the book under discussion – the attempt is made to give a literal meaning to “that woman Jezebel,” although Brother Russell properly applied the meaning to the apostate church of Rome, and her illicit union with the empires of earth. He came to this proper conclusion from the type in first and second Kings, where she, as Queen in Israel, was joined with King Ahab in a God-forbidden union with the kingdoms of this world, a thing the Church had been specially warned not to do.

SECTARIANISM

From pages 107 and onward much stress is placed by the Witnesses on their resolve not to be recognized as a “sect”; and one of the methods they have chosen to avoid this is to give themselves a name. True, a different name than any other sect in Chris­tendom, but a name just the same. On July 26, 1931 at Columbus, Ohio, they chose “to be identified and distinguished from Christendom” by adopting the name Jehovah’s Witnes­ses. It seems they reason that just a name in itself is sufficient to eradicate the evil of sectarianism from the character of those who accept it. But, as we have said on previous occasion concerning the Lord’s people, it is not the building that sancti­fies them; rather, it is they who sanctify the building in which they gather. And the same with sectarianism: It is not the name that frees any one from this evil; it is rather the person who must free himself from it. During Pastor Russell’s lifetime his movement became designated ‘Russellites’; but that in itself did not make a sectarian of any one who associated with him. The advice he gave operated to free his adherents from this evil. Repeatedly he insisted, Don’t accept anything just because I say it; PROVE IT FOR YOURSELF! In this he was but following the course of St. Peter (1 Peter 3:15): “Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you.” To this end he always counseled his followers not to distribute anything he wrote without first reading it themselves, and convincing them­selves that it was the truth.

Consider now the Witnesses: We have met quite a few of their former supporters who were disfellowshiped by them simply because they insisted upon asking questions on statements in their Watch Tower that seemed to carry a view contrary to the one printed there. That surely is sectarianism in the extreme degree; it is just the opposite of St. Paul’s counsel: “Prove all things, and hold fast that which is good.” To para­phrase the statement of another uninspired writer: Sectarianism is a great sin; for it does not act from devotion to the Truth (as advised by Peter, Paul and Pastor Russell) but from devotion to partisanship. The Truth, its arrangements and its spirit are by it neglected or antagonized whenever this is in the interests of the sect. Their actual, though perhaps not verbal motto is: My party, my religious organization – I stand for it, right or wrong. Thus, such people support their sect and their leaders regardless of how wrong they are. And the Witnesses, being the little twin of the Roman Church in Little Babylon, have been excellent mimics of their ‘Big Brother’ in heaping anathema upon any who dare question their teachings. Over the centuries the shibboleth of the Roman Church has been: Reading (literature other than ours) is doubt; doubt is here­sy; and heresy is Hell!

Such a spirit finds no company with St. Paul’s words: “Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage.” (Gal. 5:1) The opposite of this is SECTARIANISM, which not only depraves him who succumbs to It, but it also encourages power-grasping leaders to wax worse and worse. This is in keeping with St. Paul’s prediction: “In the last days perilous times shall come (we are now in those days).... evil men, and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived.” (2 Tim. 3:1, 13) And the very people who have fanned the sectarian spirit to fever pitch over the past fifty years now have the colossal gall to offer this statement on page 112 of their book:

“The tendency toward the formation of a sect (back In 1917) among his faithful fol­lowers was displeasing to the one ‘who holds the seven stars in his right hand.’ Under his guidance this tendency toward the founding of a religious sect like the sects of Christendom out of which they had come was fought against by those who hate unchristian sectarianism. Those who chose to follow a dead man (Pastor Russell) left the ranks. Those who believed that the light of Bible Truth did not stop advancing with the death of the first president of the Watch Tower Bible & Tract Society held to God’s visible organization and continued searching the Holy Scriptures in the advancing light.”

In former years it was taught, and inculcated in their members, to be faithful to their sect in Big Babylon – whether Baptist, Methodist, Lutheran, etc. Today the gen­eral advice and teaching of Big Babylon is to “join the church of your choice” whatever that may be. But the Jehovah’s Witnesses are more adamant than any of these sects in Big Babylon in their pronounced teaching that they must be faithful to their organiza­tion – God’s channel for the Truth. It doesn’t matter who runs the organization, it is God’s ‘earthly’ visible channel.

The “advancing light” which came from those who seized control of the Society after Brother Russell’s death set aside almost all of the advancing light he had brought forth from the storehouse during his lifetime; and we have here an exact duplicate of the action of the Roman Church after the death of the Apostles, who proceeded to counterfeit, or set aside completely, every important teaching that the Apostles gave when they were yet alive. Clearly enough, Brother Russell and the leaders of the Society since 1917 cannot both be right; one or the other must be a colossal fraud – just as either the Apostles or the Roman Church must be a colossal fraud. And St. Paul warns that as pun­ishment for such fraud “God will send to them an energy of delusion” (2 Thes. 2:11, Dia.) – such as Millions Now Living Will Never Die, the Kingdom to be established by 1925, etc. It is a sound appraisal that he who successfully fools others must first fool himself. It is decidedly an unjust twist by the writers of this Mystery of God book when they declare that those back in 1917 who opposed the management then were at­tempting to “follow a dead man.” While the dissenters had great respect for that “dead man,” it was the Harvest and general truths given by the Lord through him that they were adamant in retaining and defending. To these present writers we would offer the Scrip­ture, “What doth the Lord require of thee but to do justly.”

In this connection, let us recall that J. F. Rutherford in 1918 placed great stress upon Eph. 4:13, insisting that it was at that date that “all attained the unity of the Faith” – the “all” in this text being his dedicated sectarian supporters, of course. But “the unity of the faith” that the Witnesses attained in 1918 has now been so changed that it is no longer recognizable; so they must now self-evidently be in jumbled dis unity of the faith. In fact, within ten years after 1918 the Vice-president of the So­ciety, C. A. Wise, said from the platform during one of their Conventions that he no longer knew himself anymore – that what he believed last year he didn’t believe this year, and probably wouldn’t be believing next year what he did that year. Thus, the Witnes­ses’ “unity of the faith” has been clear as mud for the past fifty years!

THE DAILY HEAVENLY MANNA

On pages 145, 146 is offered some detailed comment about the Manna book, saying it “was published by a Christian woman.” If that be true, all of us know full well that the comments themselves are by Brother Russell; and the citation is given in the perti­nent Watch Tower for every day’s item. Then why bring a woman into the discussion? The lame excuse is presented that the woman wanted to bring the book up to date in 1926, which “offer was refused in the light of 1 Tim. 2:12.” We know not the details surrounding that decision, but we observe that it furnished another excuse to the lead­ers to replace the Manna with a book of their own – The Year Book – with “Daily Texts and Comments” – to be published every year. Truly, “Of making many books there is no end!”

However, the hypocrisy of this move is also clearly revealed when we consider that just a few years after Pastor Russell’s death the various Ecclesias were advised to form “Sunday Schools,” in which the children of the members could be instructed by women teachers. It seems they had then temporarily forgotten 1 Tim. 2:12. But many of the members had not forgotten it; and the reaction was a positive NO by many of the sisters, causing some to leave the organization completely. In this also the objectors were following a “dead man” – in fact, “dead men” when we include the Apostle Paul – be­cause Pastor Russell himself was quite definitely opposed to such performance. Here’s what he said about it in Vol. 6, pp. 544-46:

“If it be considered in the light of a children’s social club, which draws them together once a week and directs their minds out of the ordinary work-day channels and in a general social and religious direction, it might be esteemed that the Sunday School has accomplished considerable in the world – especially for the lower classes of society. As for the effect of Sunday Schools upon the children of believers, we regard it as in­jurious.”

Then he offers some considerable detail for his reasons in thus stating, to which we refer our readers at their leisure. However, in this matter also the leaders in 1917 were determined not to follow a “dead man,” regardless of how sound and Scriptural his conclusions may have been.

FALSE PERSECUTIONS?

On page 119, and pages following, there is recited the experiences of many of the Witnesses in durance vile for their supposed adherence to Christian principles. Among these is listed the seven leaders of the organization, who were prosecuted by the United States Government for obstructing the conduct of the War in 1918 because of cer­tain statements made in The Finished Mystery; and they relate this:

“All seven having been sentenced on June 21, 1918, on false charges of political sedition, and obstruction of the American Military draft.... were denied the right to bail and were finally committed to the Federal penitentiary in Atlanta, Georgia.”

Just for the record, and the information of our readers, we offer now a quotation from that 1917 book:

“The three fundamental truths of history are man’s Fall, Redemp­tion, and Restoration. Stated in other language, these three truths are the mortal nature of man, the Christ of God and His Millennial Kingdom. Standing opposite to these Satan has placed three great untruths, human immortality, the Antichrist and a certain delusion which is best described by the word Patriotism, but which is in reality murder, the spirit of the very Devil. It is this last and crowning feature of Satan’s work that is mentioned first. The other two errors are the direct cause of this one. The wars of the Old Testament were all intended to illus­trate the battlings of the new creature against the weaknesses of the flesh, and are not in any sense of the word justification for the human butchery which has turned the earth into a slaughter house. Nowhere in the New Testament is Patriotism (a narrow-minded hatred of other peoples) encouraged. Everywhere and always murder in its every form is forbidden; and yet, under the guise of Patriotism the civil governments of earth demand of peace-loving men the sacrifice of themselves and their loved ones and the butchery of their fellows, and hail it as a duty demanded by the laws of heaven.”

There are some four or five pages more of the same, but we believe the above will be sufficient for our readers to determine for themselves whether these statements would indeed “obstruct the conduct of the war and the American Military draft.” And our readers may also determine for themselves whether such statements on the part of “peace-loving” Christians would come from “the spirit of a sound mind” when all ele­ments of Society in the United States were aroused to a consuming frenzy over prose­cution of the war.

THE “GREAT CROWD”

On page 194, and following, there is given some considerable detail concerning the ‘great multitude’ of Rev. 7:9-17. Brother Russell went into some great elabora­tion in defining and describing this class: they are the “many” who are called, but not “chosen.” He presented many Scriptures, and explained numerous types concerning this class, whom he said would eventually have a spiritual birth – a part of “the church of the firstborn, which are written in Heaven.” A summary of such Scriptures is to be found on page 315 of the 1907 Watch Tower; and much was written and spoken concerning this class during the final years of Brother Russell’s life – by himself and by many other brethren. So far as we know, all the present leaders of the Witnesses, includ­ing J. F. Rutherford (now deceased), who were in the Movement prior to 1916, were in wholehearted agreement with the interpretation given at that time.

But, Behold! Here is just one more piece of what was “advancing Truth” ­“unity of the faith” - prior to 1918 that became disdainful error when J. F. Ruther­ford “discovered” early in 1935 that this class was not spiritual at all; it would be an earthly, flesh-and-blood class - one time styled Jonadabs, but now the “great crowd” of this Revelation Scripture. It was this same J. F. Rutherford who also “discovered” almost all the other errors that replaced the accepted truths of the Har­vest period prior to 1916; so any unbiased mind is now forced to admit that either Brother Russell or J. F. Rutherford must repose in the history books as a rank error­ist; in fact, a gross fraud. And notice that it took almost twenty years to “discov­er” this very important truth here in the end of the Age. But with It all, it would be very interesting to learn what the Witnesses now do with those Scriptures listed in the 1907 Tower, and how they explain the “unprofitable servant” of Matt. 25:30. It will be noted that it is written of this servant that “there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Then compare the statement concerning this ‘great crowd’ in Rev. 7:17: “God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.”

Some of us recall that it was Brother Russell’s prediction that the majority of those in his organization toward the end of his life would be of this ‘weeping’ class; so we ponder the question, Can it be that the present leaders have concluded that the best way to free themselves from membership in this class is simply to deny in toto that there is such a class? In “due time” the truth on this matter will prevail – especially after Armageddon. For some years now the leaders have been telling this ‘great crowd’ that they will go right through Armageddon and live forever, if faithful to that organization. But so many of their number have already died that it has shaken the faith of quite a few others; and we offer the prediction now that when Armageddon fails completely to confirm present predictions, the great majority of those remaining will indeed experience “weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

Perhaps we shall have more to say about this book in a future paper, but for now we would offer the counsel of St. Paul (2 Tim. 3:14,15--Dia.): “But do thou continue in the things which thou didst learn, and wast convinced of (from 1874 to 1916), know­ing by whom thou hast been instructed.... those holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise for salvation, through that faith which is in Jesus Christ.”

Sincerely your brother,

John J. Hoefle, Pilgrim

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ANNOUNCEMENT OF GENERAL INTEREST

In harmony with the arrangements the Epiphany Messenger made for the Epiphany, we suggest Sunday, October 18 through Sunday, November 15, for our Fall Special Effort in antitypical Gideon’s Second Battle in the “good fight” against the two King Errors, ­Eternal Torment and Consciousness of the Dead, antitypical Zebah and Zalmunna. Please see Epiphany Vol. 5, pp. 236-245. Our tracts Where Are The Dead? What Is The Soul? and The Resurrection of The Dead are especially adapted for this service. Also the books, The Divine Plan of the Ages and Life-Death-Hereafter may be used for this work. All who wish to join with us in this service, please order the pertinent literature in time. Our tracts are free, postage paid.

As we seek to “bear witness” to these timely Truths, we honor the Lord, as we also honor those whom He honors (1 Sam. 2:30), His faithful Mouthpieces who faith­fully pursued antitypical Zebah and Zalmunna all during their ministry; therefore, we invite all of like mind to join with us in this Special Effort – and also to join with us in the prayer, God bless their memory! (1 Tim. 5:17)