THROUGH THE SILENCE
By William E. Videto
ARS HEN you consult a spirit medium
for information. you suppose the informa-
tion is furnished by some loved and trusted
friend or relative from whom you have
been parted by death. But the Bible tells
us that we cannot converse with the dead;
for of the dead it is said: “His sons come
to honor, and he knoweth it not; and they
are brought low; but he perceiveth it not of
them.” Job 14:21. Also, “The living
know that they shall die: but the dead
know not any thing.” Ecclesiastes 9: 5.
If 1t is not, cannot be, our dead friends
who respond to the call of the medium and
bring us messages, who is it that the dev-
otees of spiritism meet at the seance?
To this also the Bible has an answer.
When nearing the border of the Promised
Land, ancient Israel was seduced into
grievous sin by her neighbor Midian. The
psalmist says: ‘They joined themselves
also unto Baal-peor, and ate the sacrifices
of the dead.” Psalm 106:28. Moffatt
translates: “They joined the Baal of Peor,
and ate food offered to the dead.” The
explanation as found in verse thirty-seven
of the same psalm reads: “Yea, they
sacrificed their sons and their daughters
unto devils.” They thought they were in
cantact with the dead, but really they
were communing with devils masquerading
as their dead friends. Moffatt thus trans-
lates Isaiah 8:19, 20:
“When they tell you to consult mediums
and ghosts that cheep and gibber in low
murmurs, ask them if a nation should not
rather consult its God. Say, ‘Why con-
sult the dead on behalf of the living? Con-
sult the Message and the Counsel of God!’
But that will only be their ery when there
1s no dawn of hope for them any more.”
Paul tells us: “We wrestle not against
flesh and blood, but against . . . spiritual
wickedness [wicked spirits, margin] in high
- places.” Ephesians 6:12. The Apostle
John speaks of “unclean spirits” going
forth to the kings of the earth to incite
them to war, and then plainly calls them
‘spirits of devils.” See Revelation 16:
13, 14.
While spiritism is an ancient cult, it had
1ts rebirth in recent times in the experience
of the Fox sisters, Margaret and Kate, at,
Hydesville, New York, about a hundred
years ago. Very appropriately one of the
sisters named her familiar spirit “Old
Splitfoot.”
Spiritism has grown and spread, and its
devotees have multiplied rapidly. We
must judge it by its teachings as well as by
its fruits. The Scripture says: “To the
law and to the testimony: if they speak not
aceording to this word, it is because there
JANUARY, 1942
1s no light in them.” Isaiah 8:20. Spirit-
ism has shown a marked hostility to the
law of God, asserting that man needs no
law, and is not fettered by any restraint.
A near relative of the writer was in the
habit of attending seances. She said she
once conversed with the spirit of an Irish-
man who told her of his disappointment
and rage when, for seven years after
death, he vainly searched the universe to
find Jesus Christ. Such are the subtle
ways by which spiritism has sought to
destroy faith in the Saviour and in the
Bible.
Sometimes, the covering that screens the
real god of spiritism gets thin, as shown
in this prayer to Lucifer, (Satan) ap-
pearing in the Banner of Light, leading
spiritist paper, some years ago: “O Lucifer,
thou son of the morning, who fell from
thy high estate, and whom mortals are
prone to call the embodiment of evil, we
lift our voices to thee.” In the same paper,
at another time, appeared the following
dialogue: “Question: Do you know any
such spirit as a person we call the devil?
Answer: We certainly do. And yet this
same spirit 1s our god, our father.”
®
Shall we dismiss spiritism as mere fraud
and trickery because there has been fraud
in connection with it? If it is all deception,
1t has at least deceived some of the great-
est and keenest minds of modern times,
such as Sir Oliver Lodge, Sir William
Crookes, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
Lady Conan Doyle, writing after the
death of her husband, relates the following:
“I have seen all the sights of Pentecost
In our upper room on a Sunday,—a rush-
ing wind, the tongues of fire, a great voice
from above, prophesying something to my
husband which 1t was impossible for any-
one in the world to know would happen,
and which did happen within twenty-four
hours of the seance.” ‘The night before
the last Japanese earthquake (1923) we
were told of it in our own home seance, no
outside medium being present.”—Lady
Jean Conan Doyle.
An old frontiersman, whose truthfulness
no one who knew him would question, told
me he once attended a seance at which a
spirit, supposedly that of an Indian, ap-
peared. He stated that the instant the
Indian was seen he ‘‘smelled Indian.”
Such a thing, for which human ingenuity
could searcely provide, would not tax the
resources of the Prince of Darkness.
Spiritism is dangerous because 1t is an
open channel through which the hosts of
darkness can contaminate the human race,
through which they can pour out their
hatred and venom and spite upon a dis-
traught world. A prominent newspaper-
man visited a United States Senator in
Washington. The Senator referred to “my
favorite medium” as though, as a matter
of course, he would have such contacts.
Mediums abound in Washington, and
their influence »® certain to be felt in na-
tional legislation.
The Prince of Darkness compassed the
ruin and death of Saul, ancient king of
Israel. He knows just as well how to lure
the curious schoolboy who consults the
planchette board, as the mature men
and women who eagerly pay their
money to consult a clairvoyant or a
medium. The road to En-dor has been
made easy but it has not been made safe.
As Kipling has written:
“Oh, the road to En-dor is the oldest road
And the craziest road of all,
Straight it runs to the witch’s abode,
As it did in the days of Saul.
And nothing has changed of the sorrow
in store
For such as go down on the road to
En-dor.”
Why Will Christ Return?
(Continued from page 7)
10:26, 27.) So the purpose of Christ's
second coming is to ‘render . eternal
life” (Romans 2:6, 7) to those who have
been faithful unto the end, who have now
eternal life by faith and are in “hope of
eternal life.” Titus 3:7.
Jesus came the first time, died and rose
again, that He might bestow immortality
upon those who believe on Him so that
they should die no more. (Luke 20:36.)
The purpose of His coming is to change
the righteous from mortality to immor-
tality. This great change will take place
at the second coming of Christ: “Behold,
I show you a mystery; We shall not all
sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a
moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the
last trump: for the trumpet shall sound,
and the dead shall be raised incorruptible,
and we shall be changed. For this cor-
ruptible must put on incorruption, and
this mortal must put on immortality. So
when this corruptible shall have put on in-
corruption, and this mortal shall have put
on immortality, then shall be brought to
pass the saying that is written, Death is
swallowed up in victory.” 1 Corinthians
15: 51-54.
He arose from Joseph's tomb a conqueror
of death and the grave so that those who,
believing on Him, die before He comes
again may have a resurrection unto im-
mortality and eternal life. (John 5:28.)
This resurrection brings realization of
eternal life in its fullest sense. Christ
sald, “And this is the Father’s will which
hath sent Me, that of all which He hath
given Me I should lose nothing, but should
raise 1t up again at the last day. And this
(Continued on page 18)
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