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