In The Master's Service

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THE OLD BAPTIST TEST

Elder John M. Watson From the book "The Old Baptist Test"

How important, brethren, that we should teach our servants the truths of the Gospel, and let them have all the benefits of evangelical preaching, believing, as we do, that the great design of this providence about which I have been treating, is to bring in God's elect among them, as I have before stated. This I confess has reconciled me more to African slavery heretofore, than any other considerations whatever; otherwise I should have felt very different about it. And after they are brought in, through a sanctification of the spirit, unto a belief of the truth, let us treat them as brethren in our churches; and out of them-I mean in our outward relations to them - according to the plain exhortation of the Apostle: "Masters, give unto your servants that which is just and equal, knowing that ye also have a Master in heaven." After all, we must confess that servants suffer occasionally under Christian masters. But this is only in particular cases, for we can say that no minister or member of our church can treat his servants much amiss without a loss of his Christian character. Positive cruelties and reprehensible privations should not be tolerated by the churches. Who can have full fellowship for his brother who treats his slaves cruelly? I cannot. Our ministers would do well to give an exposition of these duties more frequently. There are many masters as well as servants, who might profit by faithful preaching of this kind.

To return: I find that my remarks have involved the profoundly mysterious subject of an All-wise Providence, in its connection with the evils of this world. Therefore, I will discuss this part of my subject more fully hereafter. It is necessary to pursue the subject of Divine Providence some further, lest it may be inferred from my general remarks on the subject of the bringing in of the "other sheep" from among the Africans, that the slave trade was right in se, and should be continued for that subserviency. All this admits of an easy explanation, according to similar examples recorded in the Bible. The conduct of Joseph's brethren was overruled in like manner. The crucifixion of Christ is a most remarkable example, for it is plainly revealed that that occurred according to the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. Hence, may we not infer that all the mal-treatment, such as imprisonments, stripes, persecutions, and martyrdoms of the followers of Christ, which have followed that great event were also according to the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God! And that all such things will take the same way as long as the world stands. There are, I admit, two things which,although true, are hard to reconcile, as has been before said by a good writer:

1. That God is not the author of sin.
2. That God permits sin.

One is no less true than the other. He does not tempt to sin, nor does he prevent. Were it His pleasure He could have hindered it, but He permitted Adam to sin, and yet He could have restrained him as He did Abimelech. Ge 20:6. He permits it in His providence. Acts 14:16.

God is holy, and nothing but what is good and holy can proceed directly from him. Yet He permits both nations and individuals to sin, and their sins are overruled in His providence, often in a visible manner in the production of our greatest good. This overruling of sinful deeds may be regarded as the direct work of the Lord, while the acts themselves are simply permitted by Him, and pertain to His permissive providence. Acts 2:23. It was as fully determined in the counsel and foreknowledge of God that there should be a traitor Judas as an evangelist John; a wicked Simon as an holy Paul; false as well as true teachers; opposers as well as lovers of truth; and anti-Christian powers as well as Christian ones!

Thus we see that neither good nor evil take the ways, as some suppose, of chance in this world, but those of a complex providence which no man can comprehend; for God's providence, like Himself, is incomprehensible. But we must learn to make a broad distinction between the sinful act of the creature and the permissions of it by the Lord. His permission evidently relates to good, but the creature's act is in relation to sin.

The mysterious subserviency of evil deeds in producing good in the providence of God is as apparent as the result of good deeds! The greatest blessings which any have realized came through the "hands of wicked men!" The greatest temporal blessings which Jacob ever received were obtained through the sinful conduct of Joseph's brethren! And the greatest dispensation of Gospel truth which the world has ever had was the result of cruel and wicked persecutions! So that truth's greatest triumphs have been at the martyr's stake, and faith's greatest strength has been developed amidst fiery trials! Well may we say that He who gives strength of faith also permits fiery trials. Further, that these fiery trials came to the Christian according to the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, and must therefore come indirectly in a way of mercy-trials which God in His merciful providence will overrule for the good of all true believers.

But the reader must not conclude that we believe that we should do evil that good may come. The Lord forbid that we should. Therefore, we will not justify the kidnapping and enslaving of Africans, because the Lord has in His gracious providence made it subserve his purposes of mercy, grace and salvation to thousands of them, any more than we would justify them who took Paul a chained prisoner to Rome, or those who persecuted the early disciples, and thereby caused them to go forth and preach the Gospel everywhere.

The spiritual way of the Gospel on earth, in the ingathering of the "other sheep," let them be of whatever people they may, is the way of Christ in the affair. "Them also I must bring," says the Lord. And this bringing of them involves many strange and incomprehensible providences; for the hand of the Lord is more decidedly in this work than Arminians ever conceived of. How deep, how dark the unsolved problem of this permissive Providence! None have brought it within the ken of finite mind. The Apostle anticipated human perversions, of his teachings on this subject, and anticipated the sayings of his opposers, as follows: Why doth he yet find fault? Who hath resisted His will? Shall we do evil that good may come? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? But he says, "God forforbid." And may I not ask, shall deceive our fathers as Jacob did? Shall we act as did Joseph's brethren? Shall we crucify the Lord afresh? Shall we persecute His disciples? Shall we engage in the sins and cruelties of the slave trade? To all of which we reply, "God forbid." Some, in our day, by perverting or misunderstanding what I have written, may ask these latter questions just as Paul's opposers did those of him.

If we cannot explain and reconcile all these things, we can learn our plain duty in regard to them. To abstain from all evil, to avoid sinning as far as possible, and to be zealous of good works.

The Colossians were, the Apostle says, some of the elect, some of the "other sheep" then brought in by the Lord, and he exhorts them to perform good works; and he exhorts them as the elect, intimating thereby, that as such they were qualified for doing works of practical godliness. Like the Colossians, we have fellowship for servants as brethren in the Lord, and many of our churches, like theirs, abound with members of this kind. And in view of God's Providence in regard to them, their relations to us as servants, and our obligations to them as brethren, we should not neglect them, but afford them, as well as unconverted ones, every reasonable opportunity of hearing the Gospel, and of practicing its precepts.