Preserving Parousia and Epiphany Truth: Further Light

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Further Light

"(29) In the Parousia reaping period (1874-1914), in the Epiphany, or Apocalypse, period in its restricted, 40-year sense (1914-1954) and ever since 1954 in its wider sense, in the lapping beginning of the Basileia (Kingdom) period, many have blessed others with the Parousia Truth, the Parousia and Epiphany Truth or whatever measure of Truth they have inside or outside of Babylon, at least sufficient to enable them to bring others into tentative justification. In these periods, these servants of God have, by the measure of such Truth as they possessed, figuratively fathered many who by repentance and faith in Jesus as Savior have become tentatively justified, and who make full consecrations in the post-Sept. 16, 1954 Epiphany period and so become Consecrated Epiphany Campers. By causing others through the Word to become tentatively justified, these servants have figuratively fathered such into partial consecrations, consecrations to righteousness (comp. F 124, 125). These consecrations are not to be confused with full consecrations, which in the Gospel-Age proper made full consecrators into Spirit-begotten new creatures and which since 1881 additionally have made many others into Spirit-enlightened, non-Spirit-begotten fully consecrated ones." PT. 1977 Pages. 90-91

Sifters—Who Are The Sifters

Question (1968)—Bro. Russell called Messrs. Barbour, Paton, Williamson, Henninges, McPhail and other similar disseminators of error sifters, and they in turn called him a sifter; Bro. Johnson called J.F.R. and others like him sifters, and they in turn called him the same; and now you speak of certain ones as sifters and they accuse you of being like J.F.R., who “accused Bro. Johnson of being a sifter.” It is rather confusing. Who are the sifters anyway?

Answer.—It should not be confusing if we hold carefully to the Truth as unfolded for us from the Word of God and look for His holy Spirit. In all cases Satan is really the sifter—the one who originates, initiates and carries on persistently a sifting (Luke 22: 31; 1 Pet. 5: 8). Through pride, ostentation, self-exaltation, envy, jealousy, deceit, misrepresentations, falsehoods, slander, favoritism, unfaithfulness to the Truth, malice and other works of the flesh he appeals to God’s people and uses those who respond to Him as his agents to oppose the Truth and to spread error, which of course sifts out the unfaithful ones. We are not to forget that God’s approval or disapproval is manifested through testings and siftings (1 Cor. 11: 18, 19; see also P. ’53, pp. 50, 51). Nations are sifted “with the sieve of vanity,” but “through the voice of the Lord shall the Assyrian be beaten down” (Isa. 30: 28-31). The Assyrian here, as in Micah 5: 5, 6, represents “those who make spoil of God’s people by devastating the Truth and its Spirit” (E. 10, p. 115).

Satan’s emissaries “call evil good, and good evil” and “put darkness for light and light for darkness” (Isa. 5: 20). Many leaders who once had the truth, given by the Lord through Bro. Russell, on Jesus’ Second Advent, His invisible presence, the Bible chronology and the forty years’ Harvest reaping, now claim . . . that the Bible chronology as given by Bro. Russell is wrong,. . . The Lord’s true sheep will heed only the voice of the Good Shepherd; they will study to show themselves approved unto God, rightly dividing the word of truth (2 Tim. 2: 15). They will keep themselves in the love of God and in the most holy faith. The Truth and its Spirit will be the touchstones that will determine for them which is true and which is false. Teachings that do not agree with (1) themselves (2) all other Scriptures, (3) all other Scripture doctrines, (4) with the Ransom, (5) with reason, (6) with facts, and (7) with the purposes of Godliness, should be rejected as erroneous. ’68-46