[11] See [Chapter XV] for further mention of this.
[XV]
THE CRISIS[12]
True to prophetic fulfilment, the time was at hand for the restoration of the church to her normal state of unity and holiness. The scattered condition of God's people in the various sectarian denominations was not always to continue, for such could not be the ideal state of the church; it could not be her final state in which Christ could expect to receive her as his bride. For her there was a better day at hand. From Romish night to the light of justification by faith, possessed among Protestant sects generally since the sixteenth century reformation, had been a great step upward. Also the Wesleyan reformation, bringing in the light of perfect holiness as a Christian attainment subsequent to regeneration, marked an advance for the truth in its progress by stages unto the end of time. There needed to be yet another step, another reformation, which should bring the church to her fulness of glory, and visualize her unity and solidarity.
It would seem that the holiness movement that arose in the sixties and seventies should have accomplished this, but it served only as an approach to it. True holiness indeed destroys the elements of sectarianism, and forbids a continued state of division among Christians. But the holiness movement, as such, came to have holiness only nominally for its object. It undertook no antagonism to sectarian divisions, though it deplored them. It stood for nothing more than holiness as a subject to be taught and experienced, and satisfied itself as best it could to remain within the denominations. It drew back when the real issue came, and in consequence it has long been dissipated in the sects, having for forty years accomplished little or nothing toward bringing God's people into unity.
Christian unity can never be brought about within the sects nor in connection with any recognition of allegiance to them. It absolutely can be effected only out of and away from the sects, by obedience to God and a severance of sectarian ties. Since true Christian unity is incompatible with sects, and since coming out of sects is opposed by the sect spirit and invites persecution by the sects, the only course for the people of God to take who have received the light on the true church is to cut loose from human institutions and abide in Christ alone, even though it places them in a relation hostile to the so-called churches. For those first leaving the sects there was no body of saints already called out to which they could be added. What could it mean to them but a crisis? And what would it constitute in the progress of events but a reformation? But the Spirit of the Lord was thus leading. Since sects are hostile to the movement out of sects, the Spirit of the Lord becomes necessarily hostile to them; for he indeed leads his people out of sects. But the time had come. God's spiritual ones were looking and longing for some development or other by which they would cease to be divided in sectarian bodies. No one had put it into their minds; their anticipation of it was prompted by the Spirit of God, which was in them. There needed some one to sound the trumpet of the Lord, some one to take the lead and make a positive declaration against the sin of division, some one through whom God could voice the call, "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues" (Rev. 18:4).
God had in Brother Warner prepared just such an instrument. His was the spirit of a reformer. He shunned not to declare God's judgments. His ministry had a definite message, and represented the burden of God for the purity and unity of his church. Looking back upon Brother Warner's career it would seem, as the writer has already intimated, that his connection with the Church of God (Winebrennerian), which assumed to have no creed but the Bible and to be indeed the true church of God, had doubtless served to emphasize to him the true church ideal and to shape his course along right lines. And his rejection by the Ohio Eldership for the preaching of holiness awakened him to see that that body was not what it claimed to be, but was, after all, only a humanly ruled institution, only one sect among the many. The light he already had on the church was sufficient to forbid his reuniting with them. Thus the so-called Church of God had contributed to him the right idea of the church, and the holiness movement had brought to his understanding the line on which God would bring out a pure church, namely, the line of holiness; and thus was the divine Hand leading him and fitting him for the work to which he was called.
We can only imagine what it meant to step out on God alone and preach the divine judgments against the apostate religions of the day, to decry the evils of denominationalism, and to undertake on that same line the publication of a paper. That his work was despised and that Satan undertook to crush it in its very beginning can not be wondered at. Its humbleness and apparent insignificance looked uninviting to the worldly-minded; but the deep spirituality and divine manifestations that characterized it were a sufficient vindication to those who were capable of spiritually discerning the truth. There was something that said, "This work is of God." There was a sense of spiritual freedom and of love and Christian fellowship that bore convincing testimony to those who would but listen to the dictation of the Spirit that this is indeed the truth.
But Brother Warner was not alone. God had reserved his thousands who no longer were bowing the knee to Baal. From them he received encouragement and support, though for a few years it seemed his work had to go through the crucible of trial. Accordingly we trace his difficulties and sorrows, as well as his victories, until the cause becomes fully established in the earth.