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Populist Saints - B.T. and Ellen Roberts "It has taken the world a log while to understand the Gospel of Jesus Christ; and even now it is but imperfectly understood. ... I do not know but we are too much taken up with our own personal salvation and fail in taking as deep an interest as we should in the affairs of the day. ... Pure religion does not consist in withdrawing from the world, but in keeping one's self unspotted from the world. ... We should take God's part in the great moral warfare being carried on in the world. We should array ourselves on God's side in every controversy that is carried on between righteousness and iniquity. (708, 744) "In a country where laws are made and administered, often according to popular clamor, men of one class, if united, may exert a much more powerful influence than men of a much larger class, if acting in their individual character. Seeing this, all the great interests of the State, except the farming interest, have become thoroughly organized. As a result there is manifest a strong tendency, by our legislature, to enact laws operating unjustly against farmers. Several such laws are not in force, and others still more unfair are proposed. ... The monopolists should, for their own safety, lift the hand of oppression from the farmers, which is now crushing them into the earth. (744, 786) "The greater the proportion of men who work for others, the greater danger there is of riotous disturbances. It is as advantageous to the city, as it is to the country, to have the property and the business divided up among a large number of owners. ... In the old Jewish republic, the greatest possible precautions were taken that each family should possess a competence. The land was divided among them. Every one had a farm, a homestead, in the country. If one was compelled to sell his inheritance, he could alienate it from his family for only fifty years at the longest. At the year of jubilee debts were cancelled and inheritances restored. (720-1) "Our laws should make provision for the breaking up of great estates upon the death of the owners. The steady aim of our Government should be to afford to all, every just and proper facility for unfavorable to the acquisition of a vast amount of property by any one person, and to the handing of it down unbroken from generation to generation. (722) "The Gospel gives to woman the same religious rights that it does to man. It allows of no distinction on account of sex or social condition. This, Paul plainly asserts. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for you are all one in Christ Jesus. - Gal. 3:28. The Gospel witholds not a single privilege from any person, because he is a Gentile, or because he is a bondman, or because she is a woman. One is your Master even Christ: and all ye are brethren. (723) "No other institution that has appeared among men produces such radical changes in society as the religion of Christ. It is revolutionary in its character. Wherever the Gospel plow breaks up the soil, school houses and churches, and colleges and asylums for the insane, the blind and the dumb, spring up in its furrows as if by magic ... unsettling every false foundation of the social edifice. (740) "We must awake to the importance of promoting righteousness. Conversions amounts to nothing unless those converted turn fully to the right in every thing. Wrong principles and wrong practices must be fully and forever forsaken by every one who would become a disciple of Christ. A revival without a reformation is one of Satan's devices to perpetuate his kingdom. (741) "Political reform is greatly needed. Our Legislatures are utterly corrupt, our administrators of justice are bought and sold far more shamefully, and almost as openly, as the negroes were in the days of slavery. ... But if a reform is effected, a few impracticable radicals, who consult only the right, must take the lead, and when the cause becomes popular so that their help is not needed, the co-operation of the leading ministers and churches of the day (and, presumably, citizens generally) may be expected. (788) Populist Saints: B. T. and Ellen Roberts and the First Free Methodists by Howard A. Snyder, Eerdmans, 2006. "There
is no class of society in such imminent danger of eternal damnation
as the rich. If any among them are saved, it will be like Lot coming
out of Sodom - the exception not the rule. ... It is not merely
trust in riches, that renders it so difficult to enter the kingdom
of God, but their possession. ... 'The people should see to it that their representatives in Congress pass laws in their interest, and not in favor of the moneyed class and rich corporations in the injury of community generally. ... (money) controls legislation until it becomes so oppressive that the people rise up against its control. (16-17) "Aspects of Early Free Methodist History" by Howard A. Snyder (United Seminary, Dayton, Ohio, 1994) Return to Homepage |
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