The Door of the Sheep

THERE are certain figurative ideas presented to us in the Scriptures, which to the Eastern mind are perfectly natural, while to us of another race and habit of life they offer difficulties. Amongst these may be placed the well-known words of the Lord, "I am the Door of the Sheep.”
The fold in Palestine is a strong erection, having high walls of stone, or of prickly shrubs, and it affords a safe abode for the flock during the night. The walls are designed to keep out both wolves and robbers. The entrance to the fold is a little doorway in the wall, just about the height of a man, and wide enough to admit one sheep at a time. When the hour has come for folding the flock, the shepherd stands at the doorway; and having his rod—really a formidable club—in his hand, he calls the sheep to enter in. He is their protector; his club is to preserve them from both wolf and robber. When the flock has passed in under his club, or rod—that is, really under his protecting care—the shepherd stands in the doorway, and thus he becomes literally the door. "I am the Door," says our Lord. He keeps the flock, and none can enter in save at His will. Robbers come to the fold to kill and to destroy; He in His might is the Living Door to save and to preserve.
He is the "Door of the Sheep." Suppose a stranger stood in the doorway of the fold: do we suppose the Eastern flock would approach and enter in? They would flee from the stranger. His club, his rod, would terrify them; his voice would repel them—they would not know the voice of the stranger. The sheep are wise in the knowledge of their shepherd, if in other matters they may be foolish. The Lord speaks of this wisdom: "I know My sheep, and am known of Mine.”
Let us picture to ourselves the Living Door, and apply the figure to our Lord. He stands in His strength. His right hand of power holds the extended rod. He stands in His love. His heart is towards His sheep. He is the Door for them. What vigor does this picture give to our Lord's gracious words: "I am the Door: by Me, if any man enter in...." By Me, the Living Door, the Person full of strength and power! What a sweetness it casts over the entry of the flock to perfect security. The eye is just fixed upon Jesus, and upon Him all hopes rest. Indeed, there is no question whatever on the Door; He is there, and all questions are answered by His strength and His love.
“By Me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved." The door to the Jewish nation was an ordinance; the door to the fold is Jesus. The ordinance did not save—Jesus saves. The ordinance was not instituted to save; by it man entered the nation and came under the law. Jesus came to save, and by Him not only are we saved, but we "enter in" the fold of security; we "go in and out" as He may lead and guide, and we "find pasture"—we are supplied out of His fullness.
Bible Class Outline
WHAT CHRIST'S SHEEP HAVE:—
Eternal life
Perfect security
Absolute safety
Salvation
Liberty
Food
Eternal life in its abundance
Intimate knowledge of the Lord|
John 10:28, 29, 30

Ver. 9

Ver. 10
Ver. 14, 15|

(Refer to the Revised Version for verses 14 and 15. There is a most lovely unfolding of grace to be found in that rendering of our Lord's words, which is not in our Old Book.)
WHAT THE SHEPHERD IS FOR THE SHEEP:—
Their leader... John 10:3, 4.
Their door... ver. 7.
Their lover to death. ver. 11.
Him Who speaks to them,
Who knows them (ver. 27); Who gives His life for them (ver. 15), and Who gives them eternal life (ver. 28) Who seeks for them and finds them, each one, and carries each one home rejoicing (Luke 15:4, 5, 6).
The Entrance of Christianity Into Britain
IN considering the subject of the introduction of The Christian Faith into Britain, it is necessary not only to picture the condition of the country in the first three centuries of our era, but also to have in view the religious condition of the Romans, and the state of the Church at that period.
Britain was peopled by various tribes, some of which were little better than savages, while others were moderately civilized. Within the tribes was the circle of the druids, who had their three orders, and whose priests were subject to one head. The druids possessed considerable knowledge of astronomy and mechanics, which was utilized for religious purposes. They had also the knowledge of writing, but as they encouraged memory to a wonderful extent, they did not favor the pen. They held great festivals in different parts of the country at set seasons, and their temples were very vast in area. In the innermost part the altar was placed. Here the sacrifice was offered up by the white-robed priest. "They hold," said Caesar, "that the wrath of the immortal gods can only be appeased and man's life redeemed by offering up human sacrifice, and it is part of their national institutions to hold fixed solemnities for this purpose.”
Cesar further tells us that the druids held the immortality of the soul, and that because of this, virtue was inculcated. Their doctrines, he adds, also treated of the power and the attributes of the immortal gods. We know that the ancient nations of the East, long before the time of Moses, believed these things; and we may say, therefore, that these druidic faiths, overlaid though they were with horrible and cruel superstition, evidence a great antiquity.
In the year 59 the power of the druids was broken. The tribes had joined together to cast off the Roman yoke, and were defeated in their stronghold in Wales. The sacred groves were felled and the authority of the druids was destroyed. By this great victory the druid spell, which was a terrible hindrance to the entrance of The Faith amongst the un-subdued tribes, was removed from over the Britons.
Let us now glance at Rome and its religion. Temples abounded in the imperial city and numerous gods were adored; but, strangely enough, at least in the first century, there was a disrespectful feeling in regard to some of these deities, while the habit of the people and the craving of the time led to the importation of new gods and the erection of fresh temples. Processions, gorgeously robed priests, the glamour of sacred personages, and sacred shows, upon which all the art of Rome was lavished, were to be found without stint in the imperial city; but such as would know what its paganism really was should read the latter verses of the first chapter of St Paul's epistle to the Romans.
A very remarkable event occurred in the year 70. Jerusalem fell, and Rome regarded her god, Jupiter, as the victor of the God of the Jews, Jehovah I His temple was burned to the ground, and the city of His people razed. The defiant Jews were either dead in the Holy Land, or were being slaughtered in the pagan arenas to amuse the populace. The few sacred vessels from the temple that escaped the flames had been carried as divine spoils in triumph through Rome, and had been presented before Rome's gods in the temples, even the Book of the Law being thus treated. Paganism seemed triumphant.
We glance over the world of the first century, and we inquire, What should speak to man in his moral darkness and lift him up out from his baseness— whether barbarian or civilized—and set him upon his feet before God?
The Jew, with Jerusalem fallen and the temple destroyed, was religiously set aside, and he could offer nothing to man. What could the Church offer at the close of the first century?
A general insight into the condition of the Church in those times is necessary in order to satisfactorily answer this question.
All the apostles had died, or had suffered martyrdom, in the first century, the aged apostle John falling asleep about the year 100. With the apostles gone, the Church had lost her miraculous powers, and, still more, her divinely inspired directors and guides, and her mighty missioners, who, when preaching Christ to the heathen, received from on high the witness of signs and wonders. The Church without the apostles was as is the Church amongst the heathen, and under heathen government, today. But not only was the Church thus bereft: wave after wave of persecution was rolling over her—the confessors of Christ were mutilated, destroyed, and thrown to wild beasts. There was no Government to fight her battles; she had God alone in Whom to hope. Yet day by day the Church grew in numbers—day by day the heathen, whether barbarian or civilized, were attracted from their idols, their sensuality, and their selfishness, to purity, and love, and peace!
Notwithstanding that the apostles were gone, and miraculous powers had ceased, the Church grew! How could this be? This is the reason for the marvel—the Church had the Truth. The apostles and the men inspired of God had left the written Word of Truth with the Church, and by The Word of God, the Sword of the Spirit, the marvelous victory was wrought. Born of that Word, the lives of the confessors of Christ of all ranks, ages, and peoples, proclaimed purity, love, and immortality, and the pagans were astonished. That Word proclaimed salvation from sin and from the power of self; alike in Caesar's household and in the shepherd's hut, alike in the sun-worshipping East and in the islands of the West.
The Faith, with its love and holiness, was illegal in the Roman Empire, and its confessors were therefore liable to death at the hands of the State. Conquered nations were permitted by Rome to maintain their own religions; but the Church was not a nation—it was a family composed of members of all classes from all nations, bound together by bonds of love and common faith. The Christians refused the idols of every nation, rejected the philosophy of the day, and refrained from the sins in which the people delighted. Thus they were looked upon as a huge secret society.
They were said to be subversive of law and order, to their charge all kinds of abominations were laid, and over and over again they were tortured, in order that their secret might be discovered.
At the beginning of the second century, Pliny thus wrote of the Christians in Bithynia—some of whom he had caused to be tortured in order to discover their practices—to Trajan, the Emperor: "The whole of these people's fault or error," he said, "is that they are accustomed, on an appointed day, to meet before dawn, to sing an ode to Christ as God, and to bind themselves by an oath—not to the commission of any enormity—but only, not to be guilty of any theft, or robbery, or adultery, and not to break their word, or withhold a pledge when re-demanded"; that when this was over they used to go away, and come together again to take food, but it was of a common kind, and harmless.
Intervals of peace came to the Church, but only to be succeeded by fresh persecutions. Sometimes these broke out in different parts of the world—in Asia Minor, Africa, and Europe; at others, the whole empire rose up against the Christians. In Lyons, in 177, the populace of that city rioted against the Church there, and one Christian after another was tortured, but only to obtain this confession: "I am a Christian; we commit no crimes.”
The third century tells the same tale of suffering. We read of the martyrs of Carthage, and of those of Egypt at its beginning, and of awful and widespread persecutions in the heart of the century. Again and again throughout the century the Christians were hunted out, tortured, and slain; and yet when its end arrived the number of those who professed The Faith was greater than when the century began.
The Church was outwardly prosperous at the commencement of the fourth century, and there were Christians at the Emperor's court who held high offices in the State. But in the army located in the West there was very severe persecution, and a whole legion composed of Christians was slaughtered. Britain, too, gave up her martyrs at this period—that is to say, to the Roman power.
A fierce effort was made to root out The Faith in 303. The Emperor Diocletian issued an edict, commanding the destruction of all churches and sacred writings, the degradation of all Christians, and the death of all who maintained The Faith. Some books were surrendered, but generally there was constant faith under the most ingenious cruelties. The rage against the Christians increased, and at length idolatry was so intimately connected with every duty and necessity of life that no one could escape sacrificing to, or in some way associating himself with idols. Even infants were fed with food which had been offered to idols, and everyone who refused idolatry was slain. The empire ran with blood.
But times of peace were about to dawn.
In 312 Maxentius and Constantine strove for the imperial crown. Maxentius persecuted the Church; Constantine favored the Christian religion. Maxentius was defeated, and the next year Constantine issued edicts favorable to the profession of Christianity. From this date, excepting during a short period of relapse, the Christian religion took its place amongst the accepted religions of the world, It is necessary to keep these broad facts before the mind in considering the entrance of Christianity into Britain. Under the Roman occupation The Faith had no rights in the island and no protection. Neither is there much ground for believing that Christians from imperial Rome were largely instrumental in spreading it in Britain, as we shall point out later. There are remains in England which mark the devotion of Roman soldiers of different nations to their gods, but monumental remains indicating The Faith of Christ are very rare.
We fall back upon the little that the writers of the early Church have to tell us on the matter, and very interesting it is to hear of The Faith prospering in the island outside the limits of the Roman sway. Tertullian, in or about the year 208, wrote in favor of The Christian Faith with the view of seeking to quiet pagan hostility and injustice towards its confessors; and, referring to its world-wide conquests, he speaks of " districts of Britain inaccessible to the Romans, but subdued to Christ... “and how "the kingdom and name of Christ are venerated" there. He wrote in a similar manner, we should judge, to that which in our day might be adopted as to parts of China where Christian missionaries are at work. He did not imply that Britain had become Christianized, but that many true Christians were the fruit of missionary labor in Britain. It is wise to keep this in view in reference to the position of the Church in Britain in later years. In 239 Origen says, "The power of the Savior is felt even among those who are divided from our world in Britain," and he adds, that very many in that country had not heard of Christ. Tertullian was of Africa, and Origen of Asia Minor, but evidently they were each in some way in touch with missionary work in Britain. This fact certainly points to the belief that to the East and its early apostolic energy Britain was indebted for "The Word of the Truth of the Gospel.”
And here we would add that as the origin of the more ancient of the Britons was the East, and as the druid religion had in it, doctrines as ancient as those held in Egypt before the time of Moses, there was a sort of affinity between the islands of the West and the Africa of Tertullian's days. Christianity shone the fairest in the early centuries of our era in the East, and the East rejoiced over the salvation of the children of the West. In some ways the religion of Britain offered ideas which the missionary could use in teaching the Truth of the Gospel. Certainly the religion of the druids was not so debased as that of imperial Rome, for it contained, in spite of all its horrors, the conception of a deity requiring from the guilty a sacrifice of the most important nature the human race could offer, and of the deity overseeing man's actions and motives, and of a coming day when man should be judged by him. And when the priestly power of the druids was broken, as it was midway in the first century, it is not so difficult to follow the missionary from the Far East, proclaiming to the oppressed Britons the Truth by which men are made free forever, as it is to follow him in his labors amongst the luxury and debasement of the worshippers of the gods of Rome.
From the Mission Field
THE STATES OF CENTRAL AMERICA.
A FEW words on the open doors to mission work in the States of Central America, and also in the State of Ecuador, South America, will interest our readers. The present day is chiefly remarkable in its mission work for the doors which are constantly being opened in different countries for the entrance of the Word of Salvation. Lands closed for centuries against the Scriptures are now open to their circulation, and nowhere is this more apparent than in Roman Catholic countries. In some of the States of Central and South America the Romish Church has for generations held the people in utter ignorance of the Word of God; but now, though the State religion be Roman Catholic, the respective Governments afford liberty to distribute the Scriptures and to teach their truths. A very small band of Christian workers is now struggling to introduce the Scriptures in the Central States of America.
Writing from
HONDURAS,
one of these missionaries says:—
“I doubt if any new work among the heathen in these last centuries has had greater evidence of God's unmixed grace and favor, in spite of missionary flesh,' than has had the work in Honduras.
“As to evangelizing Honduras, it is most probable that today no other land in all heathendom is so open to the preaching of the Gospel, for the following reasons:—Because of the small number of priests here, there being about forty in all Honduras, for they will not stay where poverty and hardships abound. Because a goodly number of the people have lost faith in Rome. And also because of the poverty of the people.
“Perfect religious liberty is guaranteed by the Constitution, but this, of course, does not mean that the people will not persecute.
"Contrary to the laws of Honduras, the officials of San Augustine have been trying to compel the converts to Christ in that city, under threat of imprisonment, to do work on the church building; and to collect alms for the processions of idolatry, and to do personal service for the priest. With loyalty to Jesus they have said, 'We can go to jail, but we cannot do these inconsistent things.'
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“The people here seem to persecute the native converts much more than they do any of us. The alcalde (mayor of San Augustine) attempted to make Justa Rodrigus (a convert) gather up alms for the priest, threatening her with imprisonment for her refusal. We therefore called on the commander of the department of Copan, who lives in Santa Rosa, and laid the matter before him. He said the alcalde had no authority to support his action, that religious liberty was guaranteed, and that they could not compel anyone to serve the priest in any way. He said he would write the alcalde of San Augustine, so we trust the annoyance along this line will stop; but we expect persecution to deepen in many ways as the truth is sounded out.
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“Here, in San Rosa, the house of Nina Fransito, where we held meetings for a week, has been stoned, and plans were prepared to poison us...
“We are right in the midst of Lent, and every Friday a procession marches from the temple to an elevation outside the town called Calvary. They bear a life-size image of Christ carrying upon its back a monstrous cross. For the purpose of more fully deceiving the people, the priest petitioned the authorities for police protection, saying that we were planning to molest the procession last Friday. The police were granted, with instruction to arrest us should we attempt to molest them. At the same time—these things being unknown to us—we held four meetings on the street in advance of the procession, and when it passed we were standing on the porch of Nina Fransito's house, which the same procession had stoned the previous week.
“A few days later the alcalde (mayor) sent for us, and said that he had been told that the, people were planning to molest us, and that he believed the priest, whom he said was a very wicked man, was at the bottom of it.
He further said that he would give the police special instructions to protect us, and that he would be glad for us to assist him in keeping good order by reporting any disturbance. He also said that he would, see that the officials in San Augustine, over whom he has superior authority, did not further annoy the believers. Thus our God has wrought for us in these matters without our asking the authorities for help.
“Formerly I had a great dread of working in Roman Catholic lands, but now I would rather work among them than any class of heathen in the world. One does not have to prove to them the inspiration of the Bible. They do not question this anything like the people do in Protestant lands. Again, any good Bible student can show that every doctrine, without exception, of the Roman Catholic Church is not of God. The idolatry of Rome is more dreadful than you can imagine. The deceit and licentiousness of the priests beyond description.”
BIBLE DISTRIBUTION IN GUATEMALA.
Another missionary writes: “We left with a cargo of books for Esquipulas, Guatemala, where a great Catholic feast was being held from January 1st to 15th. We passed through many towns and villages, and in each left some testimony for Jesus. The last days of our trip we met a great many persons returning from the feast. We thought it a good time to spread the Word of God far and wide, so offered our Bibles for sale, and from our mules sold Gospels and Testaments so fast that we could not keep track of the number.
“After being located at Esquipulas we started out with our arms loaded with Bibles, and going down the main street, which was crowded with thousands of people, we commenced to cry out Santa Biblia de venta ' ('Holy Bible for sale'). In less than a day and a half we had sold the last book of our cargo! It is said that people attend the feast from each of the five republics of Central America, and also from Mexico and South America.
“Esquipulas is not a large place, but it has one of the largest and finest churches in Central America. The annual January feast is called the feast of the Black Saint.' The image, life size, is suspended on a cross in a large glass case at the far end of a spacious temple, the whole being hid from the view of the audience chamber by a curtain. The people pass through a side door, ascend a large platform, and then pass through the glass case on their knees, dropping their gift of money into a slot that conveys it under the platform, and then, kissing the feet of the Black Saint,' pass on and out. The poor, deluded people are told that the image is a petrified body, a saint from the time of Christ, which was found in the mountains near Esquipulas. When the people are sick or in trouble they pray to this saint, and vow to make it a visit and pay it so much money if they are delivered. In this way many who get out of their difficulties, or recover from sickness, make long journeys, some occupying months, on foot, and the treasury of the church and the pockets of deceiving priests are enriched.
“A colored man from the States, now living here, told us that he painted the image two years ago, and that it was made of wood, and that there were two or three discarded images of the ' Black Saint ' in the church garret. Perhaps fifty thousand or more pilgrims attend this feast every year. Drunkenness, gambling, and robbery abound on every hand. Every man, with scarce an exception, carries a gun or a sword. Before starting we were repeatedly warned against robbers, but the Black Saint' is by far the biggest robber of them all.”
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Let us now turn to
ECUADOR.
The "New York Herald" of May last announced that the President of Ecuador had issued an order for the expulsion of the priests because of their activity in the revolution in the State. "From almost the very first the uprisings in Ecuador have been among religious fanatics, who, led by the priests, and receiving their support from that quarter, have harassed the Government persistently." The President declares "that he is determined to rid Ecuador of the priestly thralldom which has existed there for the last thirty years.”
A month previously to the issuing of this order an American missionary, who visited Guayaquil, Ecuador, with Gospel books and literature, had to suffer considerably for the Gospel's sake; and such being the case, the action of the President will be accepted by Christians as another instance of God's way of opening the doors for the entrance of His Word.
Let us hear Mr. Strain's story.
After some heavy traveling the missionary reached Guaranda.
“In the morning it seemed laid on me," he says, "to distribute some tracts on the crowded market plaza, so, selecting several which seemed free from offensive references to Catholicism, I took perhaps two or three hundred, and as soon as my actions were discovered I could hardly give them out fast enough. In a little while the conductor of the mail under whose care I was traveling came to me saying the people were greatly excited, claiming that the tracts were against the Catholic religion, and that if I would go on to San Jose de Chimbo, some fifteen or twenty miles distant, he would provide a horse at once, and would join me there that night. I had no time to think over the matter; the horse was brought, and as it was being saddled, boys and young men crowded into the hotel court, looked up towards my room, and cried, Que baje no mas,' a free translation of which would be, Let him come down—we will do the rest.'
“The landlady closed the big front gates to the hotel as the mob was crowding in, but as they were opened I rode out, turned my horse toward Chimbo, dug the spurs into his sides, and flew down the street, the crowd after me. I saw a crowd waiting ahead, so turned into another street, when I noticed a horseman following, who, coming within hailing distance, told me it was the order of the commander of the troops that I should return.
“He caught my bridle-rein, and, with the help of a man on foot who came up, commenced to lead me back. We had not gone far before we met the mob. I was made to dismount, and fully expected they were going to kill me, but they were after the tracts. They broke into a package behind my saddle, and into my medicine case, tearing into bits what they found, but not securing all I had. They even pulled my little Spanish Testament out of my hip pocket, and that was the last I saw of it.
“About this time some young men arrived who tried to take my part, but they were an exceedingly small minority. The ringleader, after shouting at me, responded to the demand for my death by saying they would first take me to the commander, but there seemed a slim chance that I would ever get there.
“Just then a rather big man came running to meet us; he drew a revolver, struck the man who was leading my horse with his fist, and said he would shoot anyone who touched me. He then made himself known to me as the commander himself, and told me he would guarantee my safety, and took me into the barracks. As we went in, the crowd made a rush, but the young men inside ran here and there gathering guns, and putting in cartridges; the sharp click of the hammers was heard again and again, and the result was the mob remained outside. As I sat down and thought of the awful exhibition of hatred on the part of the Catholic Church of Guaranda, as well as the wonderful workings of our God, I wept.
“Some man, whose heart God had touched, sent me as good a breakfast as the place afforded, but you can imagine I could not eat very much. The commander sent quite a lengthy telegram to President Alfaro, and inquired as to what was missing, and was quite anxious I should understand this was the work of the enemies of the Government. The soldiers kept coming to me for papers, and I soon gave away my stock of calendars.
“About 3 p.m. the commander sent me out of the city under an escort of soldiers, and eventually reached Guayaquil safely.”
Another dispatch from Ecuador mentions the arrest of Father Rivadene Cialik, of Guaranda, on the charge of conspiracy to assassinate Captain Saltos, commander-in-chief of the Government battalion in Guaranda. This captain is probably the man who was used by God to save Mr. Strain's life.
Thus the secular power ranges itself against the spiritual power, and aids the distribution of God's Word. We need have no doubt that when the brave missionary revisits the places where his life was so nearly taken from him he will find people anxious to obtain his tracts and books. We say this, for such is the case elsewhere in similar circumstances. Where the Lord opens the door no man can shut it.
A FEW WORDS FROM CHINA.
Dr. Parrott writes us as follows. He was leaving China at the date of his letter.
“I found it very hard to break away from my native children in Lao-he-Kori. Their love and tears were too much for me. Some of them put their arms around me and wept, urging me to return to them quickly. One rough old man cried for half an hour, and told the others that he could not understand what ailed him. He had not cried since he was a boy, when his father used to beat him. Now the hard skin of his old eyes had broken and the tears began to flow.' This was his expressive way of putting it.
“The old nurse was beside herself with grief at the thought of losing the children she had learned to love.
“Let no one say that the Gospel of Christ has no power to change the hard hearts of these naturally stolid and unsympathetic people after such exhibitions of affection as I have seen.
“How truly it may be said that the Gospel produces the same kind of fruit in every believer, no matter what the social condition may be! I mean that our admiration of the Lord Jesus begets in us something of His own Spirit. What wisdom of God so to order it! By what other means could it be possible for men of every tribe and nation to become of one heart and of one mind? Men try to be one in doctrine, and in opinion, and in codes of morality; but how sadly all such unions fail! One in Christ—the Center—the Heir of Creation.”