Church of Christ Studies

Bible History

Ladies and gentlemen, brethren, and friends, I am very seriously impressed by the wonderful rapidity with which the weeks and the months of time roll by. To me it is but a short space since together here we met under circumstances so much akin to this, to study those things in which all seemed intensely interested; yet I recognize we are one year nearer our eternal destiny.

 

Far more than I can express it do I appreciate the very kindly invitation to return to your capital city and to engage in this meeting. I could but congratulate myself, indeed, upon the confidence which those who have this meeting directly at heart have in me personally, and upon the splendid gathering of you, friends, who by your very presence lend encouragement to the services thus begun. I had hoped and really would have been delighted to have had with us to-day Brother Pullias as a fellow laborer in directing the part he had last year; but I rejoice to know that he will soon, if not already, be engaged in a series of meetings somewhat akin to this, and, therefore, perhaps wield a greater influence than he might here. In his absence, as has been stated, we are glad to have Brother John T. Smith, one of Israel's sweetest singers, with whom, I am sure, you will be glad to join in hymning praises to "Him from whom all blessings flow."

 

I must acknowledge personally my genuine appreciation to the newspapers of the city of Nashville for their kindness in giving publicity to this meeting and publishing the sermons, and I do hope and trust that as the months and years go by there may be nothing done by your humble servant or those with whom he labors that will cause them ever to regret the extension of this splendid courtesy in helping to bear the messages that shall be announced to numbers and numbers of yearning hearts who cannot be present in body during this series of meetings. Political, social, and economic questions and issues are forever changing, but the things with which we shall have to do are perpetual and eternal.

 

I have not come to you brethren to preach myself; for, in the language of Paul, "we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord; and ourselves your servants for Jesus' sake." Neither have I come to please men other than as an earnest, honest effort to present the truth as best I can may meet their approval, for I recognize that if I seek to please men I cannot be the servant of God. I have not come, therefore, simply as a matter of entertainment. I have not come to play upon your fancies or your emotional nature in any way, for I recognize full well that though I preach the gospel, I have nothing to glory of; "for necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe it, unto me, if I preach not the gospel" of the Son of God. I come to you "not with excellency of speech, or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God. For I am determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and him' crucified." "I am debtor both to the Greeks, and to the Barbarians; both to the wise, and to the unwise. So, as much as in me is, I am ready to preach the gospel to you" who are of Nashville, and who will from time to time, I hope, be glad to favor me with your presence, your prayers, and your interest in every way.

 

There are two great books for the human family to study and by which to be governed and guided according to their respective needs along the pathway of life. I refer to the book of nature and the book of revelation. I think it safe to say that the object of the first has to do purely and solely with the things that are temporal and transient in their nature. My material success in life and relationship with reference to time and timely things are dependent upon my ability to harmonize with nature and nature's law. In that special held alone I do not need the Bible. But there is another—a higher and a nobler-characteristic of humanity which we call the "spiritual," that which differentiates man from the other animals of earth and links him to divinity. With reference to that part of our nature, God's book, the Bible, gives us a message from high heaven indicative of God's will and of heaven's desire that the human family may be happy in its journey from the cradle to the grave, from time to eternity, and ultimately blessed in that home of the soul across which the shadows never come.

 

Since this meeting is going to continue for twenty and two days, representing as it shall forty-three sermons, I think it is not at all amiss for us to begin as if it were a great school with the Bible our text, at the close of which we expect to be better acquainted therewith and have a more thorough grasp of that wonderful book which has, indeed, been the anvil on which numbers and numbers of hammers of opposition have been worn out, a book which has withstood the ravages of time and stands to-day the most prominent book in all the history of the world.

 

I think it necessary for us to have a general grasp of the entire field of Bible story and of Bible history, that it may be both chronologically and logically fixed concretely and definitely in mind, that we may be able to see the general trend of God's revelation to man from start to finish.

 

I know the difficulty and the disadvantage of learning an abstract fact here and another there and a third somewhere else, these having no relation either logically or in point of time one with the other. All knowledge of any sort whatsoever, if it be practical and helpful, must be correlated in some kind of a definite and tangible manner. In the study, for instance, of the history of this, the greatest country under heaven, it is absolutely necessary, in order that it be remembered and appreciated, that it be divided into periods and the events connected therewith properly classified so that they may be grasped and related the one to the other. In this study there are five great periods. First, the aboriginal, which embraces that period in which three prominent characters appear—viz., the Norsemen, the mound-builders, and the Indians; second, the period of discovery, in which we learn of the different activities of the five leading nations that were sending out explorers and discoverers to gain information regarding the world that lay to their west; third, the period of settlement and development; fourth, the period of the Revolution, when the yoke of bondage was laid aside and a new nation was born upon the earth and assumed its rightful place among the sister nations of the world; last of all, from the inauguration of Washington down to the present, we have what we call the "national period."

 

Now, to understand the history of this country, I need to know the facts and the particular period to which they belong; also, I must know the relation of each event to the others.

 

The history of the Bible covers a period of forty-one hundred years—from 4004 B.C. to 96 A.D., according to Arch-bishop Usher's chronology. The dates found at the top of all our Bibles are generally accepted, and perhaps are as nearly correct as any one can determine. In these forty- one hundred years the history of God's dealings with humanity has been written in one volume complete. But it likewise is divided into periods. I want you, therefore, carefully and thoughtfully to be able to get a glance, a bird's- eye view, of all Bible story from first to last, a general outline, and in the remainder of this meeting to All in such things as may be discussed. According to others who have thus classified events better than I could have done, there are Ave great periods of Bible history. First, the period of early races, covering a stretch of time from 4004 B.C. to 1921 B.C.-two thousand and eighty-three years; second, the call of the chosen family, from 1921 B.C. on down four hundred and thirty years to 1491 B.C.; third, the Israelite people, from 1491 to 1095 B.C.;fourth, the Israelite kingdom, from 1095 B.C. to 587 B.C.; fifth and last, Jewish provinces, from 587 B.C. down to 70 A.D., the destruction of the temple of Jerusalem.

 

I trust that you may be able to follow now and to appreciate the details that shall be mentioned therein.

 

Referring to the first period, the early races of mankind, are embraced the first eleven chapters of the book of Genesis. That period has but one topic that subdivides it First of all, the races of mankind were united upon the earth. They were all of one accord, spoke the same language, were of one tongue, one tribe, one dialect, and one in every respect. But finally there was an incident that marred the continuation of that state of affairs, known as the building of the tower of Babel, 2234 B.C., from which time unity no longer prevailed ; but the people were dispersed and scattered abroad upon the face of the earth, and thus were in a state of division when that period closed, and God saw fit to lead out a family and offer promises through the blood line of the same. The events characteristic of the first period are very simple, and a Bible student needs only to recall what therein happened.

 

Under that period comes the story of creation outlined in the first chapter of Genesis—the creation, fall, and expulsion of man, and the first sons born upon the earth, with their endeavor to worship God.

 

After that we have an account of the ten generations from Adam to Noah. These are: Adam, Seth, Enos, Cainan, Mahalaleel, Jared, Enoch, Methuselah, Lamech, and Noah.

 

After that we have a development of wickedness as it begins to evidence itself upon the earth, brought about, seemingly at least, by marriage relationships of the sons of God with the daughters of men. The record tells us that when these sons of God looked upon the daughters of men they saw they were fair to behold. Attracted, enamored, and allured thereby, they took unto themselves wives; and the next statement that follows is that wickedness multiplied upon the face of the earth more and more, until finally "God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually." it appears that the world reached a state when almost total depravity was the condition of humanity. But such a condition was not allowed to continue, and immediately God issued a decree that there should come a great flood upon the earth and that everything in whose nostrils was the breath of life should be wiped out of existence. The command was given to Noah to make ready for the wonderful scene that was soon to transpire, and hence the direction and the instruction for the building of an ark. Noah began the preaching of righteousness to the world. Just how long he continued thus to proclaim, I do not know—perhaps one hundred and twenty years. This encouragement he gives to every man—viz., that while he absolutely failed to impress his neighbors and to convert the world to the truth, he succeeded in saving his own family; and if you and I and every other man could be equally successful, the angels would look out over the battlements of heaven and rejoice with joy unspeakable even this afternoon.

 

I am not, therefore, friends, discouraged when on any occasion people refuse to accept what I conceive to be the truth or fail to acquiesce in the things proclaimed; but there is a solemn obligation resting upon every man and upon every soul, and that is, God expects of us a rendition of service and of duty according to the requirements and demands under which we live. At last the windows of heaven were opened, the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the rains descended, and for one hundred and fifty days the waters prevailed upon the face of the earth. Noah took his wife, his three sons and their wives, entered the ark, and launched out upon the bosom of an ocean without a shore, guided by the great Captain of that wonderful vessel, until by and by, in Jehovah's providence, having ridden the waves of the mighty flood, it rested upon the summit of Mount Ararat. At the voice of God, Noah and his family emerged into a new world, cleansed and purified and made ready for the beginning of a race of people of which he was the second representative Soon after that event the posterity of Noah drifted southward, attracted, perhaps, by the rich alluvial soil along the lower course of the Euphrates; and, as is characteristic of humanity, they became forgetful and unmindful of God's providence and grew conceited to the extent that they said: "We will build us a tower and make us a name, that no matter where we wander or where we go, we will never get outside the view of this splendid monument." According to profane history, they laid the foundation well—a square two hundred and seventy-two feet, then up, pyramid like, until at last one hundred and fifty-three feet of height was reached. Perhaps they fancied that by their own physical force and power they could build a tower that would pierce the vaulted canopy of the heavens and permit them to look in upon the throne of Jehovah. Then God saw fit to stop the vainglory of man and to demonstrate the futility of any efforts of his prompted purely by physical power. He visited their city, confounded their language, and scattered the people that had hitherto been one over the face of the earth. And this was the beginning of the division of the language of the people, which division has continued until a thousand tongues, dialects, and languages are found in the earth today.

 

Next, the genealogy of Adam is traced on down to Abraham through Noah's sons: Shem, Arphaxad, Salah, Eber, Peleg, Reu, Serug, Nahor, Terah, and Abraham—twenty generations, covering a period of two thousand years. The world was steeped again in sin. Idolatry was in the land. God saw fit to visit one special family, which dwelt down on the lower course of the Euphrates River, in the land of Shinar, and said to Abram: "Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will show thee: and I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: and I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed." These promises mark the close of the first and the beginning of the second great period in Bible history, covering a space of time from 1921 to 1491 B.C.

 

This period of the Bible is characterized by the study of three personages—namely, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. At God's call Abraham left Ur of Chaldea, together with Sarah, his wife; Lot, his nephew; and Terah, his father. Up the valley they marched for a distance of possibly five hundred and fifty miles, until they came to old Haran, in the country of Mesopotamia. There they tarried, for how long I do not know, but sufficiently long for Abraham to secure a number of souls and to enrich his already increasing physical effects. There his father died at the age of two hundred and five years and was buried in a strange land.

 

After Abraham, with the rest of his people, marched around the northern part of the Arabian Desert, he came into the land that was afterwards to be the land that flowed with milk and honey. When they reached Bethel, ten miles north of the city of Jerusalem, Abraham stopped, built an altar, and called upon the name of the Lord. Prompted by a famine in the land of Canaan, he moved on southward into the land of Egypt, and there trouble arose because of the beauty of his wife. Abraham, thinking that the exigencies of the hour demanded that a falsehood be perpetrated, almost brought destruction upon an innocent people and their king by deceiving them in the half-true statement concerning Sarah's being his "sister," when she was only a half sister and his legal wife. Let me stop to offer this suggestion: The very fact that the Bible account reveals this weakness on the part of Abraham carries with it a genuine conviction that a hand higher than that of man must have penned the story. it is characteristic of humanity to record the good things about our heroes and heroines and to leave the bad in the background and to the unknown. But in the Bible, without exception, God tells of the weakness of man as well as his superior traits of character. By the intervention of Jehovah, Abraham escaped out of the land of Egypt and came into the land of promise. Here trouble arose between his herdsmen and those of Lot. Knowing that they were in a strange land and that the enemy was on every hand, he said to Lot: "Let there be no strife between me and thee; for we be brethren." The whole land was before them, and Abraham made a generous offer relative to their separation. Lot's character of selfishness and greed is revealed in that he selected the best section and pitched his tent toward Sodom. This decision meant his ultimate ruin. Abraham turned to the left and made his home at old Hebron. He next pursues the Elamites and rescues Lot. On his return he meets Melchizedek and to him pays tithes. Soon Ishmael is born, and the cities of the plain are overthrown. He next moves to Beer-sheba; and Isaac having been born, he goes to the land of Moriah to offer him as a burnt offering unto God. Sarah died at the age of one hundred and twenty-seven and was buried in the cave of Machpelah. Abraham continues on until his career closes at the age of one hundred and seventy-five, when his remains were placed beside the body of Sarah.

 

The life of Isaac, though longer than the lives of Abraham and Jacob, was spent in a small range of territory and with but few events. After his marriage to Rebekah at the age of forty, his home was at (1) Beer-la-hai-roi, (2) Gerar, (3) Rehoboth, and (4) Beer-sheba, where he died at the age of one hundred and eighty years and was buried in the family sepulcher.

 

The story of Jacob is related with more of detail than any other person in the Old Testament. His career is varied and presents many phases of life. After having gained the birthright over Esau and having secured the blessing from his deceived father, he left the old home, where he had spent about sixty years, and hastened to Haran, where he remained for the next forty years. Here he married Leah, then Rachel, and unto him eleven sons and a daughter were born. Being a fine trader, he soon grew rich in cattle, flocks, and herds. The time came for him to leave, and, with his possessions, he started back to the land of Canaan. At Mizpah he made a treaty with his father-in-law; at Peniel he wrestled with the angel and was reconciled to Esau; and at Shalem he rested once again in the land of Canaan. At Bethlehem, Benjamin was born and his beloved wife, Rachel, died.

 

Joseph is sold into Egypt; a famine waxes sore in the land; and finally Jacob and his family, now numbering about seventy souls, come into Egypt to remain for about two hundred and fifteen years. At the age of one hundred and forty-seven Jacob died, and his body, being embalmed, was carried back to Hebron and laid to rest in the ancestral sepulcher. The Israelites fared well until a king rose up which knew not Joseph, and then their bondage became so severe that God heard their groanings and cries and sent Moses to deliver them. But Pharaoh refused to let them leave his control, and a series of plagues finally convinced him that God's hand was with them. Under the leadership of Moses, they crossed the Red Sea and sang the song of glad deliverance on the farther shore.

 

Thus ended the second period in 1491, and introduced to us the next, known as the period of the Israelite people, lasting from 1491 to 1095. Having become free from Egypt, these people march along the eastern shore of the Red Sea and finally come to Mount Sinai, where they remain for one year.

 

During this stay four important events came to pass— (1) the making and worship of the golden calf; (2) the giving of the Decalogue, the constitution of their great law, to be written by Moses and to last for the next fifteen hundred years; (3) the building of the tabernacle, God's golden house, upon a foundation of silver; (4) the numbering and organization of the people preparatory to their onward journey.

 

From Mount Sinai they marched on, and at the end of the second year they came to old Kadesh-barnea, at which time Moses thought best to send out the spies to view the land, and thus one from each tribe was selected. They went into the land of promise, viewed it over, and brought back evidences of the richness and of the fertility thereof. They were all agreed on a number of points respecting the same. They said with one accord that it is a fine land and a goodly country; it has its fruitage galore; and its wonderful harvests are, indeed, attractive to the eyes of men. They further agreed that there were giants dwelling in that land. Ten of the spies opposed the efforts to take the land and proposed to make them another captain and return to Egypt, but Caleb and Joshua rent their clothes and insisted that under the banner of Jehovah they could drive out the enemy and come into their own promised possessions. Because of the report made by the ten, God issued a decree that none of that generation above twenty years old, except Caleb and Joshua, should come into that goodly land, but that they should wander in the wilderness a year for every day spent in searching the country. Thus for forty years they roamed up and down the wady beds of a barren region until all had died. During all these years Moses bore their grievances and suffered their frequent condemnations, until at last they came to the plains of Moab, just east of the Dead Sea. Here occurred (1) the episode of Balaam's prophecy, his efforts to curse God's people being turned into a blessing; (2) the iniquity of Israel with the women of Moab, and the plague upon them as a result; (3) the numbering of Israel once more; (4) the campaign against the Moabites and the Midianites; (5) the allotment of the land east of the Jordan to Reuben, Gad, and half of Manasseh; (6) the repetition of the law as found in the book of Deuteronomy; and (7) the ascent of Moses to the height of Nebo, his splendid view of the promised land, and his lonely death.

 

I have tried, my friends, to think of Moses as thus he stood at the close of the most eventful career that any man had hitherto had—a man who had stood as the very confidant of God himself, who had been privileged to receive and give to the world that basis of law that has been the model and the standard for all nations of civilized peoples since that time, the man that led the greatest army the world has ever seen and directed them to victory. He stands, if you please, one hundred and twenty years young, with his physical force unabated, with the same eagle eye that gazed into the eye of old Pharaoh forty years before. Looking out to the right, Moses could view the entire land that glided away toward the great Arabian desert. Northward there was old Mount Hermon, veiled in misty clouds, towering above the surrounding country. Then as he cast a wishful eye beyond Jordan's stormy banks, he saw the rich fields of Canaan, the silvery streams, and the smiling valleys. When he thus beheld the sublimest sight ever viewed by mortal man, God laid his hand upon his heart, and, without a pain, an agony, or a sigh, Moses fell asleep. God buried him in some lonely spot, unmarked, unknown, that his tomb might never be desecrated, that his body might sleep in solemn silence until the trump of God shall sound and all the ransomed be gathered home.

 

Upon the death of Moses, Joshua took the lead and conducted the people across the river Jordan, whose waters were parted as were those of the Red Sea. Then he remembered that a reproach had rested upon Israel for forty years, due to the fact that they had failed to circumcise their children, and hence were under the disfavor and disapproval of God. When the male children were circumcised, they called the place of their headquarters "Gilgal," which means their reproach had been taken away.

 

Joshua then planned three campaigns to drive out the seven nations that occupied the western part. Each of these was a success, and then the land was allotted to the remaining nine and one-half tribes. Thus was the promise made by God to Abraham with reference to physical affairs literally fulfilled.

 

Things went well for a time; but, as the further history will show, they soon became unmindful, forgot the part God had had in their delivery and that he had guided them thus far. To reprove them and bring them to the recognition of their sins, God allowed a series of oppressions to come upon them, seven in number, until by and by the people were humbled, dependent, and recognized their relationship to God. Judges were ordered to rule over them, according to the demands of the hour; and hence the period of the chosen family and of the Israelite people closes with the reign of the fifteen judges.

 

At the close of Samuel's career the people demanded that a change of affairs be brought about; and hence a system was inaugurated unlike that which God had ordained, which did not meet with his approval, and that stands out an exceedingly prominent period in the subsequent history of God's dealings with humanity. But enough for this time.

 

From this talk, ladies and gentlemen, I am perfectly aware that nobody could learn what to do to be saved. I am certain that from it you could not understand what God's will is to you personally and individually; but from your previous study of the Scriptures and from the preaching hitherto to which you have listened, if there should be those in this audience who understand what the will of the Lord Is and have a disposition to render obedience to him now, I am always glad, and shall evermore be, I hope, to extend to you the gospel call.

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