The Church's Message

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXXVI, Issue 14572, 16 January 1948, Page 4

The Church's Message

FROM MAGNITUDE TO MINUTENESS

(Jesse Forest Silver.)

Atom and atomic are words now on the tip of every tongue and pen. The starry heavens, which declare the glory of God, are aggregations of atoms. Light travels 186,000 miles a second. In a year, at that rate, it travels six trillion miles; that distance is called a light-year. A big star in Auriga is 3,500 lightyears away; and there are stars still more remote. The boundaries of the universe have never been reached; the magnitude is past finding out. What is a man, here on earth, that God is mindful of him?

From near infinity of magnitude, let us descend to near infinity of minuteness. In the dust that we shake from the soles of our feet, there are myriads of universes inconceivably small. The atom is the tiniest particle of matter that exists. Its creation is a solar system in miniature. It declares the glory of God. Like the heavens, the atoms seem to utter speech and say, "The hand that made us is divine." How small is an' atom? The average atom is so small that 125 million in a row is only an inch long. And yet a single one of those atoms is such a marvel of perfection in mechanism and behaviour that in its study we almost fall at God's feet as dead. Each atom has, so to speak, a central nucleus or sun with electrons as planets whirling around in their orbits. The uranium atom has 92 electrons. There must be, we shall find, billions of circuits of ions in an atom in one second. Atomic power is material for another chapter. We deal now with speed. What does a Christian Bible student care about atoms? He cares something, does he not, about getting to heaven? And the words of Christ and the Emstle of Paul are of interest to him. Let us look into the matter. Atoms Calling a Halt A star led wise men to find Christ. Atoms are today sobering the minds of unbelieving men. Paul writes about atomic quickness. "Behold, I show you a mystery; we shall not ail sleep, but we shall all be changed, in an atom" (1 Cor. 15: 51-52). Look, and ponder the mystery. But Paul wrote "moment," and not "atom." What Paul wrote was in Greek. He wrote en atomo (dat.; final o is omega). Science has been 1900 years in grasping what Paul wrote. The velocity of electrons is amazing, in some cases equal to that of light. In x-ray work, b-ray electrons are ejected with the speed of light. "The number of surplus electrons which in every second pass through a section of thin wire in an ordinary 25 candle incandescent light, at 220 volts, amount to about one trillion in .000,000,001 of a second" (Hoist, Bohr Theory, p. 74). Electronic speed and behaviour is incomprehensible. The sum of what Paul wrote —what God said—is that souls purified by fire off heaven's alter will be translated from earth to heaven in the fraction of a millionth of a second! "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." When Christ expired, nature shook. The sun covered his face, earth trembed, rocks broke down; only man was unmoved. Heavens tell, and atoms cry; is man too mad to listen? Shall stones by their utterances put us to shame? Let the deaf hear; the blind see.

Waiting- Time Not Long

How long will it take saints from India to join us for ascension to the magnet in heaven? The velocity of light, we have seen, makes a semicircle of the earth in one fifteenth of a second. The waiting time for them to arrive will not be long; the speed will be electronic—in an atom. When God's camera snaps, it is too late to pose, too late to think; no signal to get ready. The bridegroom catches up those who are ready (Matt. 25: 10). As lightning flasheth, Christ returns; as electrons, as electricity, we go. One instant you are here, but in another you will not be, for you will be gone. Enoch was "not, for God took him" (Gen. 5:24).

Watch and pray that ye be accounted worthy to escape. Say not the Lord may come next year, or next Friday, or tomorrow, or next hour or minute. Before you can think anything about it, you may be gone. It will be in no time. Therefore be ready. In the fraction of the millionth of a second—they are gone.

How are we to spend our time in watching for the coming of the Lord? We should be seeking and saving the lost; now, and not a little later. Spend and be spent for souls. Go out in the highways and hedges, and constrain men to come to Christ. No matter how blistered your hands, how wet your brow, how soiled your clothing in honest toil in factory, field or mine, have your, soul washed in the blood of the "He which fpstifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus" (Rev. 22: 20).