Life and Labors of Elder John Kline, the Martyr Missionary / Collated from his Diary by Benjamin Funk

by John Kline

After dinner we all go to Isaac Shobe's, where we have night meeting and stay all night.

Sunday, October 19. We have meeting at Brother Jacob High's. Acts 3 is read. Also night meeting at Parks's where we stay.

Monday, October 20. Meeting at Solomon Michael's, where we stay all night.

Tuesday, October 21. Meeting at Joseph Arnold's, on Patterson's Creek, in Hampshire County, Virginia. I spoke to-day on 2 Timothy 1:13. Text: "Hold fast the form of sound words."

This passage of Scripture is a part of the fatherly instruction Paul gave his spiritual son Timothy. God's works and man's works in the conversion and regeneration of man are so blended, so connected and identified one with the other that Paul sometimes speaks of doing what none but God himself can do. Thus to the Corinthians he said: "For I have begotten you through the gospel." And to Philemon he said: "I beseech thee for my son Onesimus, whom I have begotten in my bonds." These passages show how clearly the true child of God stands connected with the Holy Spirit, in his blessed work of regenerating man and qualifying him for heaven. The conjunction of effort may be compared with what we see and know to exist in husband and wife. When the twain are really one flesh, one heart, one mind, what is done by the one is regarded as done by the other. It must be in a sense somewhat like this that Paul calls Timothy his son. The aged John also says: "I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth." He here means spiritual children. He calls them his children from the love he has for them, and the fatherly care he has over them, and the fatherly instruction he gives them. They are near to him, as children are to their own parents, and when he sees or hears that they receive the truth and walk in it, it gives him joy.

When Paul addressed the words of my text to Timothy, most of the New Testament had been written. It is to the New Testament Scriptures that he calls Timothy's special attention, where he says: "It is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works." Here, in these Scriptures, is to be found the form of sound words which Timothy is admonished to hold fast. This instruction harmonizes with what was said to the angel of the church in Thyatira: "But that which ye have, hold fast till I come." And in the last of the book of Revelation there are awful warnings given against adding to or taking from what God has spoken. The temptation to skip over, misquote, and misinterpret the Scriptures must be very great, as it is to these three sources that nearly or quite all the denominational differences among professing Christians can be traced.

Brethren, it becomes us to be very careful here, "lest Satan should get an advantage of us; for we are not ignorant of his devices." I believe a departure from the form of sound words mainly accounts for the many errors in doctrine and practice which exist among professing Christians to-day. A departure from the form of our Lord's great commission has not only perverted the ordinance of baptism by applying it to infants; but it has destroyed the ordinance itself by setting aside trine immersion, which it so plainly teaches.

And what shall we say of the ordinance of feet-washing! When a parent or teacher wishes to impart to his child or pupil a clear understanding of some duty or obligation, he usually feels relieved of all further responsibility when he has given the necessary instruction to his child or pupil in words which he knows can be understood. But in the institution of the ordinance of feet-washing our Lord did not depend upon oral instruction to impart a clear knowledge of his will; but he went through the performance himself, and at the close he said: "I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you." Are not these sound words? What are sound words, and what is their form? I answer that sound words are words which have no doubtful meaning; and the form of sound words is such a use of them as clearly expresses and conveys to the mind of the reader or hearer just what the writer or speaker wants him to know. But do the so-called churches hold fast these words? No, they do not. They let them go as things out of date, or unnecessary at the present advanced stage of enlightened thought. But "if the light that is in them be darkness, how great is that darkness!"

I can say of the Lord's Supper, which Jude calls a feast of charity, or love feast, which is the same, and which the Lord instituted in connection with feet-washing, just what I have said of this ordinance. It is let go. These, with many other omissions and errors, have crept into the so-called Christian faith and practice, by letting go the form of sound words. Still more. The injunctions to nonconformity to the world in dress and other things are all let go instead of being held fast, and loose reins are given to all manner of worldly forms and fashions. Professing Christians even defraud one another through covetousness, which is idolatry, going to law one with another. They also do not hesitate to bear arms in war, which is the greatest of all earthly evils.

Brethren and friends, I do not speak in this way from any feeling of ill-will toward any, but from the depth of love in my heart; for there is no joy that could be compared with the joy that I would feel could I see the whole Christian world bowing, meekly bowing under the weight and power of God's revealed Truth. Our way, Brethren, is to hold fast "the form of sound words." As we expect to have a love feast here on to-morrow evening, let each one examine himself to see whether in his faith or in his works he may have departed from the form of sound words of warning, of encouragement, of instruction, of exhortation, of doctrine. And it most assuredly becomes us to inquire whether we have done our duty in the way of searching the Scriptures, giving ourselves to reading, to meditation, to prayer. We are too apt to seek for what pleases the taste of the natural mind, to the neglect of what is necessary to refresh the spiritual mind and keep that healthy and strong.