It is of infinite importance for us to know how he saves us, what we are expected to do, how we are to work with him and to what extent. I will try to give some light on this from the Word itself. Jesus said to his disciples: "If any man walk in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light of this world. But if a man walk in the night, he stumbleth, because there is no light in him." This beautiful and striking parable, showing the benefit of knowledge and the disadvantage of ignorance, lights the sinner's way for his first step toward the Lord. Knowledge, which is light from the Lord through his Word, is the very first thing every one must receive. The sinner first receives the clay and the spittle applied to his blind eyes. He does not get his sight from this application. When he hears the Gospel with something of a desire to have his eyes opened he is receiving this anointing of his eyes. He must go to the pool of Siloam and wash before he can have sight. This washing in the pool is the first step in that humble spirit of obedience by which the understanding is cleared up and prepared to know the Lord. When any sinner gets this far the Lord is sure to find him and whisper in his heart: "Dost thou believe on the Son of God?" Every true penitent sinner, with his eyes open, will answer in heart: "Who is he, Lord, that I might believe on him?" Then the joyful response will be whispered again: "Thou hast both seen him, and it is he that talketh with thee." The Lord meets the returning sinner in his blessed Word, and there he shows himself to him, and there he talks with him.
Water, in many places in the Old as well as the New Testament, is the emblem or symbol of Divine Truth. I need not say that without water man cannot live. His body is largely composed of water. It is consequently essential as a beverage; and as an ablution, indispensable to cleanliness. Reading and hearing the Word of Divine Truth from a real thirst or desire to know the truth, is what is spiritually symbolized by drinking water. This may be proved by what the Lord said to the Samaritan woman: "He that drinketh of the water that I shall give him, shall never thirst; for it shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life." By the expression, "never thirst," Jesus does not mean that there will never be any further inclination to drink the water of life, but he means that there will in that soul never be any more perishing, dying thirst, for the water of life will be like a spring in the heart that will flow on forever from the Lord. It will be the rock in the wilderness that supplied the camp of Israel with water, and that Rock is Christ.
But again. The sinner's whole inner man is defiled with sin. This may be illustrated by the spots and scales and raw blotches on the skin, caused by the disease called leprosy. This disease affected every part of the body; but, like smallpox and some other kindred affections, it made itself mostly visible upon the surface of the body. It gave the victim a horrible appearance, so much so that no one was willing but such as were similarly afflicted, to go near a leper. But the water of Divine Truth will effectually and forever wash away all this filth and loathsomeness from the redeemed sinner's soul and prepare his spiritual body for that bright array of fine linen, clean and white, in which the saints shall be clothed as a fit emblem of their righteousness. Paul calls all this the washing of regeneration. In that great change, without which no man can see the kingdom of heaven, called regeneration, or the new birth, wrought by God only, the water of truth is the means employed. This is so evident that water is specifically named in connection with it in these words: "Except a man be born of water, and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven."
Ananias did not forget this when instructing the penitent Saul of Tarsus; for at the close of all the words the Lord had authorized him to say to Saul, we find these: "And now, why tarriest thou? Arise, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling upon the name of the Lord. And Saul arose and was baptized." Saul's sins were not washed away by the water in which his body was baptized, but that water symbolized the truth, the Lord's truth, that does wash away sins. And his being immersed in it in each of the three names, according to the great commission which the Lord had given some time before, signified his faith in the Word of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Peter says: "Baptism is not the washing away of the filth of the flesh," but I feel authorized to say that it is the outward sign or emblem of the power of divine truth to wash away the filth of the soul. The change in Saul, wrought by this act as the crown of obedience, was so great that from this time on he was a new man, and had a new name, for he was called Paul ever after.
But we must not forget that salvation is all of God. Of ourselves we can do nothing. Jesus is the way, the truth and the life. All that man can do is to take the Lord's hand and be led in the way; to open his eyes to the light, and his ears to the truth, and his heart to the life, in faith receiving, and in life living the precepts that make him wise unto salvation.
Thursday, April 26. The two brethren preached the funeral of Isaac Shobe's mother. She had passed away shortly before, at the high age of ninety-four years. They spoke from First Corinthians 15. From here they went to James Parks's and had night meeting. The next day they had meeting at William Parks's; and on
Saturday, April 28, they had meeting at Enoch Hyre's in forenoon, and at Elijah Judy's at night. They anointed Sister Elijah Judy with oil in the name of the Lord.
Sunday, April 29. They had meeting at Sister Chlora Judy's in the forenoon, and then crossed the Fork mountain to Nimrod Judy's, where they had night meeting and stayed all night.
Monday, April 30. They got home. Quoting from the Diary Brother Kline says: "I love to go among the mountains. The people there seem to pay better attention to what is said, and manifest better behavior at our meetings than they do in the thickly-settled and more fashionable sections of our State. It is true that ignorance and poverty abound in some places; but are the souls of the poor less dear to the Lord than the souls of the rich? On one occasion our Lord referred to the fact that the Gospel was preached to the poor as a proof of its heavenly origin. But there are intelligent people living among those mountains. And in the way of hospitality and genuine kindness, meeting you with a smile and a hearty welcome, they are probably unsurpassed as a people, rich and poor alike."
The high regard in which Brother Kline held the people of the western part of the old State of Virginia, and the reciprocation of that regard by their high appreciation of him and his mission, accounts for the many visits he made among them, and his devotion to their spiritual welfare. Nor was his work evanescent. The seal of his influence was so deeply impressed upon their affections and memories that to-day, after the lapse of fifty years, its stamp is almost as fresh as when first made. Nor is this a matter of wonder or surprise. The sermons I have set in order were substantially preached by him and other ministers, mostly led into that section by him; and the power of such discourses, together with the worship and instructions held and given in families wherever he stayed, had an influence that will never be forgotten. The writer's own personal acquaintance with the people living in sections of his vast district of labor gives him to know that the name of John Kline is still as a household word with many of them. Nor is this all. The indoctrination of these people into the beliefs and practices of Revealed Truth as held by the Brethren was so profound, so clear, so convincing, that they to-day stand abreast of others in defense of these doctrines as at first received, in the face of all the isms and religious innovations of the times.