Gospel Tents
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Official Journal of the Ministerial Association of Seventh-day Adventists VOLUME XXXV JANUARY, 1962 No. 1 Editor IN THIS ISSUE ROY ALLAN ANDERSON EDITORIAL A Preacher©s New Year Resolve ____ R. A. Anderson 3 Associate Editor . Into the New Year ____________ A. C. Fearing 6 ANDREW C. FEARING ARTICLES Principles of Biblical Interpretation (Part 1) Managing Editor R. F. Cottrell 9 HARRY W. LOWE The Days of Our Years ....______.......... L. C. Kleuser 11 Great Words of the Bible No. 6 The Kingdom Assistant Editors R. E. Loasby 13 Biblical Languages Are They Necessary? _. N. Germanis 16 E. EARL CLEVELAND The Incarnation and Nature of Christ _ A. V. Olson 18 WALTER SCHUBERT How God Prepares a Minister ______ J. L. Shuler 27 Copy Editor REGULAR FEATURES EVANGELISM: Large Baptism in Menado, North J. INA WHITE Celebes, Indonesia ___________ P. Sitompul 22 A Parable on Evangelism ......___..___ E. K. Walter 23 Consulting Editors Report of the Los Angeles Campaign and Field REUBEN R. FIGUHR, WALTER R. BEACH, School _____._._... _......_.__.__ E. E. Cleveland 24 EDWARD HEPPENSTALL, LOUISE C. RESEARCH: The Cleansing of the Sanctuary G. D. Keough 30 KLEUSER, W. B. OCHS, R. HAMMILL HEALTH EVANGELISM: Sabbathkeeping in Our Medical Institutions . .... .... .........__ H. C. Ray 33 Art Editor LITERATURE EVANGELISM: "What You Dare to T. K. MARTIN Dream, Dare to Do" ....._ .......... .... H. W. Petersen 36 SHEPHERDESS: Candles in the Night No. 5 Circulation Manager L. C. Kleuser 38 BOOKS FOR YOUR LIBRARY ______________ 42 WALTER SCHUBERT NEWS ___...... _...-___.__............. .... _ 44 E. EARL CLEVELAND, Assistant PULPIT POINTERS FOR PREACHERS _______ 48 Overseas Contributors POETRY Light for the New Year _________ J. F. Hilliard 8 GEORGE BURNSIDE Australia A New Year©s Prayer _______.____ M. E. Brooks 26 ERWIN BERNER Central Europe J. R. SPANGLER Far East H. J. WESTPHAL Inter-America Our Cover WAYNE E. OLSON Middle East Northern Europe This reflection in Spirit Lake has been seen by multitudes. ODD JORDAL It suggests reflections of another kind. ENOCH OLIVEIRA South America Thomas a Kempis once remarked that the reflections on a S. G. MAXWELL Southern Africa day well spent furnish us with joys more pleasing than a J. F. ASHLOCK Southern Asia thousand triumphs. Southern Europe Richard Sheridan, Irish man of letters, said, "They only G. CUPERTINO babble who practice not reflection. I shall think; and thought is silence." The poet-philosopher Samuel Taylor Coleridge declared that every man should master the art of reflection, and he Editorial Office: 6840 Eastern Avenue, NW. proceeded to set high standards in this challenging ques Washington, D.C. tion: "If you are not a thinking man, to what purpose are Printed and published monthly for the Min you a man at all?" isterial Association of Seventh-day Adventists On what shall we reflect? "All that is true, all that is noble, all that is just and pure, all that is lovable and gra by the Review and Herald Publishing Associa cious, whatever is excellent and admirable fill your thoughts tion, Washington, B.C., U.S.A. $4.00 a with these things" (Phil. 4:8, N.E.B.).* year; 40c a copy. Add 25c for yearly subscrip tions to countries requiring extra postage. * The New English Bible. The Delegates of the Oxford University Second-class postage paid at Washington, D.C. Press and the Syndics of the Cambridge University Press 1961. THE MINISTRY Gt ^Preachers /lew L/efear Lriesotve R. A. ANDERSON H©I EW YEAR is a time for re Source of all wisdom, how can they have flection and re-evaluation; any real wisdom? To know truth we must a time when it seems easier to come as little children, in humility. take inventory of ourselves Bishop Fulton Sheen has wisely said: "It and our service. At this season is only by being little that we ever discover a wise minister maps out his anything big." We cannot always be child work for the ensuing months. like physically, but spiritual growth de And every assignment has but pends upon our being childlike in humil one purpose the advancement of the king ity. Only the humble can see the greatness dom of God. Bringing from the Scriptures of our God. It is not childishness, but child- new revelations of our Lord will do more likeness we need. Jesus said, "Except ye be to inspire unselfish service and holy living converted, and become as little children, than anything else. ye shall not enter into the kingdom of Man©s penetration of outer space has heaven" (Matt. 18:3). certainly challenged the thinking of our When the God of eternity came from the generation. But more, it has inflated hu courts of glory to become an outcast on man ego. Where will be the stopping place one of the meanest of the planets, angels in this new adventure? More and more, people are losing their sense of a personal God. With many, the more they know about the universe the less they know about God. The Creator is be ing lost in the cosmos. A certain type of scientist says with a sneer that our telescopes and microscopes Ministerial have given not even the slightest trace of anything like a "Friend behind the phe nomena," or a "God who cares." Of course association not, for God cannot be discovered by re search; we can know Him only by revela jerg Header tion. He has revealed Himself in three ways: in the book of nature, where the de vout scientist can trace His hand; in the 004©* Book of truth, where the student can read His purpose; and finally in Jesus Christ, who is the way, the truth, and the life. Hichest JBteings Our generation has witnessed an abun dance of research, yet we have so little in knowledge of real truth; "so many wise men, yet so little wisdom." Why? Because "the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." If men turn willfully from the JANUARY, 1962 announced His birth. The heavenly choir comes from a stable in Bethlehem, not burst forth in praise for this unspeakable from the hide-out of a Homo sapien; His Gift. The story of His coming to earth is as name, not Pithecanthropus, but Jesus significant as it is beautiful. And it is sig Christ. And the light in His eyes is the light nificant that only two types came to visit of God shining amid the darkness of a lost the holy family the shepherds and the race, not the dawn of reason illumining the wise men; the simple and the learned. It mind of an evolving beast. will ever remain a mystery that the Eternal The New Testament declares that "when God could be born among common peo the fulness of the time was come, God sent ple in a common stable in the tiny town of forth his Son, made of a woman, made Bethlehem. But He came to make His under the law" (Gal. 4:4). He came as a home with men, to take upon Himself the member of the Godhead. That was the most sins of men, so He might share the common momentous event in all human history. lot of men. "Simple souls such as shepherds find God because they know they know Man Individually Responsible to God nothing; learned souls like the wise men The concept of man©s individual re find God because they know they do not sponsibility to a personal God is becoming know everything." less and less popular. Restraint is not a popular word these days. Little wonder The Missing Link we find ourselves unable to solve our prob For more than a hundred years men have lems. The study of social science gives little been searching diligently for the missing encouragement to hope that the nations link. Convinced that the human species is can find their way out of our present di a development through successive stages lemma, for a backward glance over the mil from mud and slime, up through fish and lenniums of the past reveals a sad but con reptiles, to animals and men, certain stant struggle man fighting with his fel schools of philosophy continue to main lows for place and power. This has given tain that civilization as we know it today rise to the thought that man at heart is only is the outgrowth of brute force and con a beast; that civilization has developed quest. In fact, they declared that the long- by the gradual ascent of this beast instinct, hoped-for Utopia would be ushered in by and that whatever we are has been at the process of evolution. True, there was a tained by our own effort. missing link, but men were sure it would Darwin declared that "man is developed soon be found. The embarrassing thing from an ovule about 1/125th of an inch in about it all, however, is that despite the diameter, which differs in no respect from diligence of the searchers, the missing link the ovules of other animals." His philos is still missing. ophy, though now much discredited, Strange that men should be so concerned gripped his generation and has influenced about a link that binds man to beast, and every generation since. While recognizing yet so unconcerned about the link that his place in the scientific world, no authen binds them to God; seek the iron chain that tic scientist today, Christian or non-Chris tethers them to the dust, and yet be so tian, agrees with Darwin in all of his con apathetic about the golden chain that con clusions on comparative anatomy.