-
167 Gnostics
GNOSTICS (from knowing,) ancient heretics, famous from the first rise of Christianity, principally in the east. It appears from several passages of Scripture, particularly 1 John 2:18; 1 Tim. 6:20; Col. 2:8; that many persons were infected with the Gnostic heresy in the first century; though the sect did not render itself conspicuous, either for numbers or reputation, before the…
-
2 Thessalonians: Chapter 3, Verse 15
“Yet count him not as an enemy, &c.” As an enemy of Christ, and the Christian religion, as the Jews and Pagans were; or as an enemy of all righteousness, as Elymas the sorcerer was; as one that has an implacable hatred to good men, and a persecutor of them, and has an utter aversion to them and their principles;…
-
March 18—Morning Devotion
"And Israel strenghened himself, and sat up on the bed."—Genesis 48:2 This was an interesting moment in the life, or rather the death, of the patriarch, and may serve, my soul, to shew what ought to be the conduct of the believer in his last expiring hours. The imagination can hardly conceive any situation equally momentous, in every point of…
-
166 Atheist
ATHEIST One who denies the existence of God:--this is called speculative atheism. Professing to believe in God, and yet acting contrary to this belief, is called practical atheism. Absurd and irrational as atheism is, it has had its votaries and martyrs. In the seventeenth century, Spinosa, a foreigner, was its noted defender. Lucilio Vanini, a native of Naples, also publicly…
-
2 Thessalonians: Chapter 3, Verse 14
“And if any man obey not our word, &c.” Of command, to work quietly, and eat his own bread, now signified “by this epistle”, particularly in (2 Thessalonians 3:12), “note that man;” Some read this clause in connection with the preceding phrase, “by this epistle”, or by an epistle; and so the Ethiopic version, “show”, or “signify him by an…
-
March 17—Morning Devotion
"Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations."—I Peter 1:6 My soul! it is too difficult a task to flesh and blood, but it is among the most blessed triumphs of grace, to glory in tribulation, that the power of Jesus may rest upon the soul. Pause over the…
