The faith of our fathers - Carmel Apologetics

THE CHURCH AND THE BIBLE. 109no fewer than eighty different meanings to thesefour simple words ;and since their time the numberof interpretations has increased to over a hundred.No one will deny that in our days there exists avast multitude of sects, which are daily multiplying.No one will deny lthat this multiplying of creeds is acrying scandal, and a great stumbling-block in theway of the conversion of heathen nations. No onecan deny that these divisions in the Christian familyare traceable to the assumption of the right of private judgment. Every new-fledged divine, with asuperficial education, imagines that he has receiveda call from heaven to inaugurate a new religion, andhe iz ambitious of handing down his fame to posterity by stamping his name on a new sect. Andevery one of these champions of modern creedsappeals to the unchanging Bible in support of hisever-changing doctrines.Thus, one body of Christians will prove from theBible that there is but one Person in God; whilethe rest will prove from the same source that aTrinity of Persons is a clear article of divine Revelation. One will prove from the Holy Book that JesusChrist is not God. Others will appeal to the sametext to attest His divinity. One denomination willassert on the authority of Scripture that infantbaptism is not necessary for salvation ; while otherswill hold that it is. Some Christians, with Bible1Except, perhaps, Rev. H. W. Beecher, who thinks thataod is glorified by the variety of sects.10