EXCLUSIVENESS
EXCLUSIVENESS
In a day of difficulty what can we be but exclusive? What has preserved the great truths which you and I lately enjoyed so much together but exclusiveness? If we are true to the body of Christ as God’s purpose now, we must separate from all the looseness which self-will argues for. Feebleness or ignorance is no ground for exclusion. The principle for exclusion is not only that a person holds the wrong doctrine, but that he gives any acknowledgment to one who does. Saying “fare-well” marks, we find in 2 John 10,11, the character of the indifference. It is from this indifference that we [p. 97] desire to separate, and this indifference we charge on Bethesda....
Indifference is not of the Holy Ghost, who baptises us into one body; on the contrary, the unity of the Spirit is exclusiveness, and I rejoice before my Lord in acknowledgment of His mercy to me in that He allows me, so conscious of my personal nothingness, to be exclusive for Him in this loose, indifferent day. I want nothing from ———— but to renounce his indifference ... he seemed to desire to know the truth of God, but I must admit he seemed more afraid of it than eager to adopt whatever it would inculcate. I see every day that when the leaven of indifference creeps in the Lord ceases to instruct and to unfold His mind. I challenge you to point out to me one who is in His thoughts about the church now who is involved in this leaven of indifference. I think brethren, like ————, are the more responsible, because they know more, and are not acting up to their knowledge, and therefore should be treated accordingly.
No doubt many are feeble and ignorant. These I should receive, if not self-willed in the maintenance of indifference. If you were faithful to ———— perhaps the Lord would use you to arouse him as to his true place for Christ in this world. For myself I must seek to maintain the truth for you, though, if it must be so — separated from you.
Christian fellowship without discipline just suits the mass. When will the true-hearted be content to have an exclusive path for Christ on earth?