W. B. Godbey - Enter His Rest

encroachment of hydrolatry.
God, in His good providence, gave me a classical education. I became a good reader when I was six years old,
and never took time to sow wild oats, or run after the devil. I have been a student all of my life. For the glory of
God I have ransacked the vocabulary of all ages and nations for light and information on this controversy which
divides the Lord's people. God has permitted me three times to travel in the Holy Land – in 1895, 1899, 1905.
With the honesty of a Judgment bound pilgrim I have examined everything calculated to throw light on this
subject, and thus corroborate the precious Word. Therefore I give you the benefit of my life-long study and
extensive travel; asking God in His condescending mercy to make me the humble instrument in helping you to
study His wonderful revelation. If you are not saved from all prejudice, you had better get down before God and
stay on your knees till He gives you a clean heart, as the slightest prejudice will blind your eyes to the truth and
may do you incalculable damage. I do believe without a doubt that you will receive my testimony as a candid
and truthful witness to what I have seen, and you may go and see for yourself.
As to the Word of the Lord, I shall not give you an opinion. When I was preaching in Philadelphia, a brother
came to me and said he wanted my Commentaries on the Scriptures and proceeded to observe that he supposed
that they were my opinions, and gave that as a reason why he wanted them, because he desired to know my
opinion about the Bible. I said, “Brother, if that is what you want, you need not get them, because they do not
contain my opinions, but the Word of the Lord; Scripture explaining Scripture. The Bible is God's dictionary and
explains itself.” I notify you now that I have neither time nor space in my biography for my opinions, creed,
theology, Church rites, etc. Therefore on the mode of baptism, watch me closely and see that I give you the
Word of the Lord.
I have used for the last thirty years nothing but the Greek, which our Savior and His apostles spoke and wrote,
and which was the learned language of the world during those days. Constrained by the Lord's dear people, you
know I have translated it so you can see it for yourself, free from the errors which had inadvertently crept in
during the ages of transcription which preceded the art of printing. As this is my last will and testimony, of
course I am overly anxious to sacrifice everything for the truth, desiring nothing else.
When God sanctified me, the Holy Ghost fell on the people everywhere I preached, the altar was crowded with
seekers and the power was there gloriously manifest in conviction, conversions, and sanctification; of course I
had to expose the silly sophistries of baptismal regeneration, in order to convict the people so that they would
seek the Lord and get saved. For more than a generation the Campbellites had rolled their belligerent tide over
that country, claiming to be the only true Christian people and anathematizing all others and consigning them to
Hell if they were not immersed for the remission of their sins; meanwhile it seemed that they would take
everybody into their Church. The Methodist preachers had to yield to that perpetual war with constant
challenges, so that they had generally given up the altar, and merely took in members as seekers and made no
public effort to get them saved. Consequently I found the great majority of Methodists only in the attitude of
seekers, never having been converted. When the Lord filled me with the Holy Ghost, making me a cyclone of
fire, my preaching stirred everything, raising the multitudes on tiptoe, and filling all houses till standing room
was at a premium, and of course stirring Diabolus with his myrmidons till they raced from the bottomless pit to
hold their people, whom the Lord, through my humble instrumentality, was taking out of the way. Multitudes of
Campbellites were stricken down with conviction and crowded the altars; old and young, great and small,
leading members rank and file, and all sorts got gloriously converted. The Lord, as a normal consequence of the
blessed work He had done for them, invariably led them out of that Church into the Methodist or the Baptist.
Eternity alone will reveal the good that was done in that ten years' war, the very length of time the Greeks
besieged old Troy before she fell a prey into their hands. I was not alone as a contestant with them during those
stormy times. Doctors Ditzler, Miller, Hiner and Fitch heroically met them on the gory field, and the results
were exceedingly fruitful in the kingdom of God.
During the war we had a glorious opportunity to preach the Gospel to thousands who had never heard anything
but that pseudo-water theology which had not a scintilla of salvation in it, and never did bring anybody within a
million miles of salvation. An eight day's debate invariably wound up with a great spiritual awakening and
revival of Scriptural regeneration and sanctification. As the days rolled by the Spirit would rest on the people in