1912 Watch Tower - A2Z.org

lotted out, we find, as the Scriptures state, that "everycreature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and suchas are in the sea" will be heard saying, "Blessing andhonor and glory and power be unto Him that sitteth uponthe throne, and unto the Lamb forever and ever." (Rev. 5:13.)Thus the Lord will gather together all the faithful,both in heaven and in earth, under the headship ofChrist, whose Head is Jehovah.--Eph. 1:10.====================R5056 : page 215"CONTEND FOR THE FAITH""Ye should earnestly contend for the faith whichwas once delivered unto the saints."--Jude 3.THE CONTENTION which the Scriptures reprobateis that of selfishness--contendingfor place, for power, for our friends againstsome one else's friends, for our ideas againstthose of others. And the implication isgiven that those who are thus contentiouswill never enter into the Kingdom; for thiscontentious spirit indicates a wrong attitudeor condition.It is one thing, however, to be inveigledinto something or to be overtaken in a fault, and quiteanother thing to contend along selfish lines. Amongst theLord's people, even in the Apostles' day, there was atendency at times to fight each other rather than to fightthe Devil and the spirit of the world and the weaknesseswithin themselves. The organs of destructiveness andcombativeness, which would serve a Christian soldier ingood stead if directed against his own weaknesses andblemishes, are sadly out of place when, ignoring his ownweaknesses, he merely becomes contentious with thebrethren--often over nothing or over questions whose importancehe exaggerates, because of his contentious spirit.Such should remember the Scriptural statement that "hethat ruleth his spirit is greater than he that taketh a city."--Prov. 16:32.The Apostle Paul reprehends that misdirection ofChristian energy which "bites and devours" one anotherand warns against it as tending to the destruction of allthat is spiritual amongst the Lord's people. Not that theApostle favored slackness as respects the important principlesof Divine Revelation, for he showed always hisdetermination to contend for righteousness; as one instanceof this we recall his own words regarding his rebukeof one of the other Apostles, older in the Christianfaith than himself--"I withstood him to the face, becausehe was to be blamed."COMMENDABLE CONTENTION