W. B. Godbey - Enter His Rest
W. B. Godbey - Enter His Rest
W. B. Godbey - Enter His Rest
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fortifying Jerusalem by impregnable walls.<br />
The Methodist preachers had yielded to intimidation and given up the altar, contenting themselves to take in<br />
members as seekers and risk getting them converted afterwards. This state of things was fast secularizing the<br />
Church, as the old ones who had been saved were going to Heaven and leaving the Church in the hands of their<br />
successors who knew not the Lord experimentally. I could not preach Bible Holy Ghost religion clearly,<br />
forcefully, efficiently and successfully, without constantly exposing the silly, superficial sophistries of<br />
Campbellism, which the people had heard so long that many of them believed, and really the popular mind had<br />
suffered an awful deterioration appertaining to the orthodox truth of the Bible, which is the actual new creation<br />
wrought in the heart by the Holy Ghost, through faith subsequently to a radical and genuine repentance.<br />
Campbell's translation of the New Testament was circulated and read, which gives “reformation” for<br />
“repentance,” and “immersion” for “baptism,” thus really eliminating spirituality out of the Bible. The Greek<br />
word for repentance is metamoria, which literally means a change of mind. The Campbellite interpretation is<br />
simply metaphysical, construing it into a mere change of purpose and consequent reformation. The error lurks<br />
deep down on the bottom of Bible theology. The Bible is not a book on mental philosophy, but salvation and<br />
serves as its own expositor. The precious book plainly reveals what the change of mind is; not simply a change<br />
of thought and purpose, but the actual removal of the carnal mind, which is hereditary from fallen Adam, and its<br />
substitution by the mind of Christ, which is created in the heart by the Holy Ghost in regeneration. In the first<br />
great work of grace wrought by the Holy Ghost in justification and regeneration, which constitutes conversion,<br />
the old man of sin,<br />
I. e., the carnal mind, is conquered and grace given to hold him in subordination so that he does not break<br />
out and commit actual transgressions; yet we still have him on hand in the deep interior of the heart and ready to<br />
rise in the form of pride, vanity, ambition, lust, passion, temper, envy, jealousy, revenge, ritualism, prejudice,<br />
bigotry, egotism, sectarianism, self-will and a diversity of insidious metamorphisms. Consequently every true<br />
Christian has the inward conflict till these indwelling enemies, which are the elements of the carnal mind, are all<br />
washed away by the cleansing blood in entire sanctification, which is the completion of repentance.<br />
The vast multitudes who came from all the surrounding country to attend those debates had never heard much<br />
true, straight, orthodox preaching, as four-fifths of the crowd were either members of the Campbellites or under<br />
their influence. My opportunities to preach the Gospel to the people who had really never heard it were almost<br />
as if one were in India. Some places where I preached, the people said that they had never heard the Gospel<br />
before. Let the Campbellites get the complete monopoly of a country and give the people nothing but their water<br />
doctrines, and at the same time abuse and ridicule Holy Ghost religion and tell the people that there is no such<br />
thing, and that the people who profess it are fanatics, deceived and deceiving others; in a generation or two the<br />
Gospel will go out of that country, and the people become practically heathenized. The doctrine constantly<br />
preached by these people, which I heard incessantly during the first twenty years of my life, is literal idolatry. In<br />
the house of Noah, whence all the people in the world emanated, they all had a knowledge of the true God; but<br />
how quickly they trended away into idolatry. Baal, the sun-god, and Ashteroth, the moon-goddess, led the way<br />
in the monopoly of the human heart, as they are the most conspicuous to the eye.<br />
Well has man been denominated by philosophers the “religious animal.” Therefore a nation without a religion<br />
has never been found. The most simple form of religion which has been found among all nations is spiritism, I.<br />
e., the recognition of a spirit at every place, at a fountain, at a river, or a mountain, or a plain. They think that<br />
there is a spirit there somewhere having charge of it, and if they do not respect its rights and show it reverence<br />
by offering it sacrifice, it will punish them in some way. From this comes fetishism, the religion of charms, I. e.,<br />
the wearing of something on one's person, like a ring on the finger, to keep away diseases, and fortify you<br />
against evils.<br />
You see how exceedingly difficult it was to keep Israel out of idolatry. They would engage in the worship of<br />
Jehovah, whom they could not see, but they wanted to see the object of their worship.<br />
Baal, the sun-god, was so conspicuous as he rolled his fiery chariot over the skies, flooding the world with his<br />
light, that they felt awed into reverence before him and constrained to recognize his majesty by offering him a<br />
sacrifice. Thy believed that he was the god that made them. The American Indians have always worshipped the