Birth of a Reformation; Or, The Life and Labors of Daniel S. Warner

by A. L. Byers

Such must be the honest verdict of every intelligent, God-fearing man. It is no pleasant thing, we know, to look upon and admit this monster evil, this fell destroyer of the purity, love, and power of the Lord's Zion. Says Wm. Starr, "My heart has groaned as, pen in hand, I have looked at this subject, arranged my thoughts to present them to you." But for the love of truth I am constrained to differ with the position that sects are a present necessity. They originated from sin in the church; and shall we admit that the fruit of sin is a necessity under any circumstances? "Shall we do evil that good may come? God forbid." Where the cause—sin in the church—is removed by full salvation, should not its effects also disappear? But it is thought that "because of differences sects can not yet be abolished." We might say, with equal propriety, because of sects differences can not be removed. They coexist and mutually support each other. These divergent views, and party shibboleths, may have had their root in carnality, but they are stereotyped and perpetuated by sectarian parties and their man-made creeds. Therefore we have no more right to palliate the sin of sects because of differences, than to excuse the latter because of the former. One of the great evils of sectarian divisions is, they prevent the return of the church to the "faith once delivered to the saints"; and shall we let the baneful tree stand until it ceases to bear its legitimate fruit?

Again, it is thought that "sects are a necessity until holiness more generally prevails." "Thorough and wide-spread holiness would soon destroy denominations." Sects and holiness are antagonistic to each other. This truth is clearly implied in the above remarks. The fire of true holiness burns up all the fences that Satan has placed between the saints. And shall we defeat this its real mission, by not lifting up the sword of the Lord against sects, and attempt to abolish the evil, until holiness prevails more extensively? That is the same as saying that we should make no attack on unholiness until holiness gains a certain degree of ascendancy. Yea, it provides that we should give place to the devil in the church to destroy holiness, until the church becomes more holy. These are no trifling words. It is a solemn fact that adherence in different denominations is the devil's wedge, whereby the unity of the Spirit, so perfectly procured in the grace of prefect love, is again destroyed. Party names, party creeds, and party spirits almost of necessity go together; and the natural return of this spirit, because of membership in a fragmentary church, takes more souls off of God's altar than do everything else together.

Let sects alone until holiness prevails! What a device of the enemy! How can we expect to bring forth permanent fruits into holiness, if we allow the plowshare of God's truth to slip over this fallow ground of sin? Sects are the devil's "high places" in the land, the groves of his own planting, and gods that he has set up to corrupt Israel, and "provoke God." How many of the kings Jehovah complains of because they did not, like Josiah, "purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places and the groves" (2 Chron. 34:3)! Beware that we partake not of their sins. Of Azariah it is said that "he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord ... save that the high places were not removed.... And the Lord smote the king [Azariah] so that he was a leper unto the day of his death" (2 Kings 15:3-5).

Says W. H. Starr (a conscientious Presbyterian minister) after quoting 1 Cor. 1:10-13 in his Discourses on Sectarianism: "It would seem as if no man could read these words of the great apostle without vividly seeing that party divisions among the people of Christ were, in his view, a most astounding evil. 'Is Christ divided,' he says, that ye who are all his, and who have been 'baptized by one Spirit' should be sundered one from the other by party names?

"And he adjures them in the most solemn manner, he beseeches them by an appeal the most sacred that words could utter, even by the name of Christ, as it were for his sake, and for his bleeding cause, to forsake these pernicious ways, and to be perfectly joined together in the same mind."

Hear what this author thinks of promoting holiness over these "high places," or sect walls.

"The divisions of the Christian church, as they now exist, are a prominent cause of the low state of piety among believers; the greatest single obstacle which now exists to the spread and triumph of our religion in the world." "The moment you separate the church of Christ into distinct divisions, you set up the idol of party. Success or adversity will no longer affect the mind simply as they touch the cause of Christ, but they will be felt, also, as affecting 'our side' or 'our church.' It is not Christ and his cause to which their whole thoughts and desires are now turned; the idol of party has now been set up, and it claims, and receives, part of their regard. The man, I think, is almost more than human that can wholly avoid this influence, at least after he has been long identified with any branch of the church. It is an influence which is all the time at work. The idol has been set up to divide the heart from the blessed Savior and his holy service; and its influence is as ceaseless as the existence of the cause. And this party feeling is, as we have seen, the essence of all sin, so that sinful desire is blended continually in the heart with its love to Christ, and pollutes the worship which it offers him."

This is an honest and faithful description of this monster evil. The party feeling is very sin. Yea, says this God-fearing man, "It casts a millstone round the neck of those who are struggling upwards to the image of their Redeemer. It mingles poison with the streams of salvation that flow to the soul through the church, and casts a blight upon its budding fruit."

Again, "Sectarianism is the greatest foe to the exhibition of love which God has ever suffered Satan to beget. It hinders brotherly love among Christians, and regard for the souls of men. It is vain for brethren in Christ to talk about the duty of loving one another, and to try to feel love for one another, while they refuse to act as love dictates [by separating into parties]. Their actions will control their hearts, as men's acts always do in the end. The fences which they set up between them in fact will become fences in feeling. And that is now even so, every Christian knows.... The divisions of Christ's people beget and stimulate continually that opposite spirit of rivalry and contention, which is the spirit of the world.... Yes, I charge all this mischief, the existence of which you all know, upon the sectarian divisions of the people of Christ; and let him deny it who can. It is in fact their legitimate fruit."