STUDY IV

The Christ to be thus sacrificed afresh is first "created" from wheat-bread and wine by the officiating priest. They are ordinary bread and wine until laid upon the altar, when certain words of consecration, it is claimed, change the bread and wine into the actual flesh and blood of Christ. Then they are bread and wine no longer, though they still have such an appearance. This change is called transubstantiation --change of substance. The five magical Latin words which, it is claimed, effect this change of bread and wine into actual flesh and blood, are, "Hoc est autem corpus meum." It is claimed that any priest can thus create Christ in the flesh, afresh, to be sacrificed afresh. And having thus created Christ, a bell is sounded, and priests and people fall down and worship and adore the bread and wine, which now they recognize as the very Christ. This done, the bread (the real flesh of Christ, veiled from the senses, they say) is broken. Christ is thus slain or sacrificed afresh, repeatedly, for the special sins sought by this means to be canceled.

*Dens, Tract. de Euchar., No. 20, p. 314.

"Ques. What is the holy eucharist?

Ans. It is a sacrament which contains the BODY and BLOOD, the SOUL and DIVINITY, of Jesus Christ, under the forms and appearances of bread and wine.

Q. Is it not bread and wine which is first put upon the altar for the celebration of the Mass?

A. Yes, it is always bread and wine till the priest pronounces the words of consecration during the Mass.

Q. What happens by these words?

A. The bread is changed into the BODY of Jesus Christ, and the wine into his BLOOD.

Q. What is this change called?

A. It is called transubstantiation, that is to say, a change of one substance into another.

Q. What is the Mass?

A. The Mass is the perpetual ["daily" or "continual"] sacrifice of the new law, in which Christ our Lord offers himself by the hands of the priest, in an unbloody manner, under the appearances of bread and wine, to his Heavenly Father, as he once offered himself on the cross in a bloody manner.

Q. What is the difference between the sacrifice of the Mass and the sacrifice of the Cross?

A. The sacrifice of the Mass is essentially the same [kind or sort of] sacrifice as that of the Cross; the only difference is in the manner of offering.

Q. What effects has the Mass as a sacrifice of propitiation [satisfaction]?

A. By it we obtain from the divine mercy, first, Graces of contrition and repentance for the forgiveness of sins; and second, Remission of temporal punishments deserved for sins.

Q. To whom are the fruits [benefits] of the Mass applied?

A. The general fruits are applied to the whole Church, both the living and the dead; the special fruits are applied, first, Chiefly to the priest who celebrates the Mass; next, To those for whom in particular he offers it up; and, thirdly, To those who assist at it with devotion [i.e., those who attend Mass as worshipers]."

The same authority says: "He who sacrifices is a priest; the sensible thing which is sacrificed is called the victim; the place where it is sacrificed is called the altar. These four-- priest, victim, altar and sacrifice--are inseparable: each one of them calls for the others."

Again, explaining the ceremony, it says of the priest:

"Then he pronounces the mysterious words of Consecration, adores, making a genuflection, and elevates the Sacred Body and the Sacred Blood above his head. At the ringing of the bell the people adore on their knees, and strike their breasts in token of repentance for their sins. The priest begs of God graciously to ACCEPT THE SACRIFICE."

We close the testimony on this subject by a brief quotation from the Canons of the Council of Trent* as follows:

*Concil. Trid., Sess. 22. De Sacrificio Missae.

Thus we see clearly that Papacy has substituted a false or sham sacrifice, in the place of the one everlasting, complete and never-to-be-repeated sacrifice of Calvary, made once for all time. Thus it was that Papacy took away from Christ's work the merit of being rightly esteemed the Continual Sacrifice, by substituting in its stead a fraud, made by its own priests. It is needless here to detail the reason why Papacy denies and sets aside the true Continual Sacrifice, and substitutes the "abomination," the Mass, in its stead; for most of our readers know that this doctrine, that the priest makes in the Mass a sacrifice for sins, without which they cannot be canceled, or their penalties escaped, is at the very foundation of all the various schemes of the Church of Rome for wringing money from the people, for all her extravagancies and luxuries. "Absolutions," "indulgences," and all the various presumed benefits, favors, privileges and immunities, for either the present or the future life, for either the living or the dead, are based upon this blasphemous doctrine of the Mass, the fundamental doctrine of the apostasy. It is by virtue of the power and authority which the sacrifice of the Mass imposes upon the priests, that their other blasphemous claims, to have and exercise the various prerogatives which belong to Christ only, are countenanced by the people.

Of course, Romanists claim that the Mass was instituted by Christ and the apostles; but the earliest mention of it we have been able to find was at the Council of Constantinople, A.D. 381. However, the date of the introduction of this defiling error is not particularly referred to in the prophecy, except that by reason of this fundamental error Papacy became the "Abomination of Desolation," before it was, as such, "set up" in power, which, we have seen, was in A.D. 539.

The very foundation of the true Christian faith being thus cast aside, is it any wonder that the great apostasy fell into such depths of iniquity as it did? One error led to another, until only outward forms of truth and godliness remained; and the desolating abomination seated itself in the temple of God, defiling both the Sanctuary and the host, and exalting its head as Christ's vicar or representative.

"Until Two Thousand Three Hundred Days,
Then Shall the Sanctuary be Cleansed"

In the examination of this period of time the student is at once struck with the fact that literal days cannot be meant; because 2300 literal days would be less than eight years, and yet the prophecy evidently covers all the long period of the defiling of the Sanctuary and the treading down of the truth. Again, we note that it is foretold that these 2300 days will terminate sometime in the period called the "Time of the End"; for Gabriel said, "Mark well, O son of man! because for the Time of the End is the vision"; and again, "Behold, I will make known unto thee what is to come to pass to the end of these evil predictions; for it [the fulfilment] pertaineth to the appointed Time of the End."

In his explanation, Gabriel traverses the entire vision, explaining in part the various symbols, and finishes with the assurance that the 2300 days is the correct measure of it all.

The death of Messiah, as shown, was in the spring of A.D. 33;* and this was the midst or middle of the last week of the seventy, the full end of which was therefore a half week, or three and a half years later--in the autumn of A.D. 36. Therefore, 1810 years from the autumn of A.D. 36, viz., the autumn of 1846, marks the end of the vision of the 2300 days, and the date when the Sanctuary was due to be cleansed.

*See Vol. II, page 68.

This prophecy being fulfilled, we should expect, in this as in other cases of fulfilled prophecy, to find the facts proving its fulfilment clearly set forth on the pages of history; for, though historians are often unbelievers in the Bible and the God of the Bible, yet, unknown to them, God has overruled their work, so that wherever a prophecy has been fulfilled, the facts have unmistakably passed into history, and always on good and reliable authority. And so it has been in this case of the cleansing of the Sanctuary.

This was the right place for reformation to begin: at the foundation--justification [cleansing] by faith in "the continual." Yet, notice, the prophecy does not indicate a cleansing of the host at this time, but of the Sanctuary class only. Nor was the host cleansed. They still retained the error, and do to this day; but the consecrated class, the Sanctuary, renounced the error and suffered for the truth's sake, many of them even unto death.

But this was only the beginning of the cleansing process; for this class, now awakened, soon discovered that the defiling errors had been multiplied while Papacy had practiced and prospered. Luther, the leading spirit of the reformation, did not stop with one error, but attempted to throw out many others, and nailed upon the church door at Wittenberg, Oct. 31st, 1517, ninety-five theses, all of which were objections to the doctrines of Papacy, the twenty-seventh being a denial of the claimed inherent immortality of man. These propositions having been denounced as heresy by Pope Leo X, Luther in his response (A.D. 1520) denounced in unmeasured terms the doctrines of transubstantiation, human immortality, and the claim of the pope to be "Emperor of the world, king of heaven, and God upon earth," and referred to them as "MONSTROUS OPINIONS TO BE FOUND IN THE ROMAN DUNGHILL OF DECRETALS."

Of Sweden--"A great political revolution occurred, which involved also a religious revolution."

Of Germany--"The threats against the Protestant princes induced them to form the League of Smalcald, for mutual defense. It was found impracticable to carry out the measures of repression against the Lutherans." "At the Diet of Augsburg in 1555, the Religious Peace was concluded. Every prince was to be allowed to choose between the Catholic religion and the Augsburg Confession [of the Reformers]; and the religion of the prince was to be that of the land over which he reigned: that is, each government was to choose the creed for its subjects."

In fact, the political circumstances of the time, combined with the fact that even the leaders of the reform were only beginning to get awake to some of the moral and a few of the doctrinal errors of Papacy, lead us to wonder at the rapid strides taken toward the right, rather than to harshly condemn them for not making the cleansing more thorough. But when the Protestant churches united with the state, progress and reform came to a standstill. Soon creeds were formed which were almost as unyielding and opposed to growth in knowledge as the decrees of Rome, though nearer to the truth than Rome's--bondages of greater latitude.

The Wesleys and their colaborers, oppressed by the prevalent coldness and formality of their day, endeavored to cast out some of the cold formalism naturally resulting from the union of church and state, and to show the necessity of individual holiness through personal faith in and union with Christ--teaching that the fact of being born under a so-called Christian government, and reckoned from birth a member of such state-church organization, is not Christianity. This was excellent so far, and a necessary part of the "cleansing" work; but, instead of going on toward perfection in the simplicity of the early church, Wesley, too, soon concluded that the cleansing and reforming work was completed, and proceeded with others to organize Methodism, and so to hedge it about with the creed, formulas and standards of Methodism as to effectually hinder further progress and cleansing. Unitarianism and Universalism, though likewise embodying errors, have also been attempts to cast out defiling errors, which perhaps have been proportionately as successful and as unsuccessful as others.

Those called Baptists represent another effort at cleansing the Sanctuary, by casting out another error introduced by Papacy with reference to baptism, and denying that the sprinkling of an unbelieving infant is the baptism of a believer, or that sprinkling in any manner even symbolizes any doctrine of Christ. Yet, beyond the teaching of a correct outward form or symbol, Baptists have made little progress, and now are often found standing with others as objectors to, and hinderers of, any further cleansing.

A later reform is known by the name of "The Christian Church" or "The Disciples." This sect was organized in 1827 by Alexander Campbell. The reforms they specially advocated at their organization were, Apostolic simplicity in church government; the Bible only for a creed; the equality of all members of Christ under Him as the head of all; and, consequently, the abrogation of ecclesiastical titles, such as Reverend, Doctor of Divinity, etc., as Romish, and contrary to the spirit of Christ and pure Christianity, which says: "All ye are brethren, and one is your master, even Christ." The design, and the cleansing so far as it went, were good, and have borne fruit in the minds and liberties of some in all denominations. But this denomination, like the others, has ceased to attempt further reform, and the spirit of its reform is already dead; for, while claiming the Bible as the only creed, it has stopped in the rut, and there it revolves without making progress in the truth. Claiming liberty from the creeds and shackles of human tradition, it fails to use the liberty, hence is really bound in spirit, and consequently fails to grow in grace and knowledge. Though bound by no written creed, yet by its respect for the traditions and the honor of men, as well as by self-complacency, it soon became fixed, and asleep to the work of the further cleansing of the Sanctuary, and is even retrograding from its former position.

While we have mentioned but a few of the reformers and reform movements, we must not be understood as rejecting or ignoring others. Far from it: the reform has been general, and all true, earnest Christians have had some share in the work of cleansing. The great difficulty lies in the fact that, prejudiced by early training and awed by the loud and boastful claims of error, few can see the great amount of error, and the consequent necessity for going forward with the cleansing. And these, his advantages, our great adversary, Satan, has not been slow to use in binding the saints and hindering the cleansing work.

Another reform, and in some respects the most thorough of all, had its start shortly after the last mentioned, as referred to briefly in the preceding chapter. Mr. William Miller, of Massachusetts, connected with the Baptist denomination, who was the instrument used to start this reform, brought to the attention of the Church the fact that the Bible reveals something of the time, as well as the order, of God's plan. He saw periods recorded by the prophets, accompanied by the statement that at the due time the truly wise should understand them, and he sought to be of the class described. He searched, and found some things of great interest, long lost sight of under the traditions of Rome, among others that the second coming of our Lord was for the bestowment of God's blessing of life, to believers, as the first coming was for the purchase of the world; in fact, that ransom and recovery are two parts of the one redemptive plan.

Thus, finally, the great system and network of defiling error, which began with the taking away of the continual sacrifice, was removed; and, the Sanctuary being relieved or cleansed of it, the value of the "continual sacrifice" of Jesus was seen in renewed freshness and beauty and power.

When we say that the Sanctuary was cleansed of this defilement, we must remember that in Scripture a part of the Church not infrequently stands for the whole. A company, a few, had been relieved from the defiling error; and to these few, God has been adding daily of those who are fully under his leading and taught of him.

In his calculation of what would occur, Mr. Miller was far from correct--supposing that the cleansing of the Sanctuary meant a cleansing of the earth from evil, by literal fire in which the earth would be burned up. The failure of his predictions, which ensued, was a sore trial to those who under his teachings had learned to expect the Lord from heaven and the fulfilment of the prayer, "Thy kingdom come." But, though disappointed by the Bridegroom's tarrying, they were greatly blest. Their experience in searching the Scripture was valuable, and they had learned to place the Word of God above the traditions of men. They had measurably gotten free from servility to the honor and respect of men in the various denominations from which they had been cut loose, for they had been separated from their company by reason of obedience to their convictions relative to the subject of the Lord's coming. Honesty to conviction always brings some blessing: even as Paul going to Damascus, we meet the Lord on the way.

Consequently, we find that among these were some who took a more advanced stand in the cleansing or reformation work than any who preceded them. Thus A.D. 1846, the end of the 2300 days, as above shown, found an unorganized nucleus of Christians, who not only agreed with the "Disciples" regarding simplicity of church government, the discarding of all creeds but the Bible, and the abolition of all titles by its ministers, but with the "Baptists" relative to the outward form of baptism, and with Luther in regarding the Papal system as the Man of Sin, and the degenerate church the mother of harlots and abominations. These, standing aloof from any compromise or affinity with the world, taught vital piety, simple trust in the omnipotent God, and faith in his unchangeable decrees; and, in addition, while recognizing Christ as Lord of all, and now partaker of the divine nature, they were guarded against the unscriptural* as well as the unreasonable theory that Jehovah is his own Son and our Lord Jesus is his own Father; and they began to see that eternal life and immortality are not present possessions, but are to be expected only as gifts of God through Christ in the resurrection.

*These subjects are fully discussed in Volume V of this SCRIPTURE STUDIES series, and all the scriptures bearing upon them are there fully examined and found to be in absolute harmony.

But though many of those who at first represented the cleansed Sanctuary thus became again entangled with the yoke of bondage, those who still kept free and followed on to know the Lord still represented his cleansed Sanctuary, and have since been owned and greatly blessed by his leading.

If the rubbish and defiling abominations were entirely removed in 1846, the time since should be a season for the setting in order of the things which remain, and for the unfolding and developing of God's glorious plan--which truths should reoccupy the places vacated by the errors removed.