Inconsistency

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     From my good friend and brother, Dan Thurston, Cincinnati, Ohio, comes this: "In the March issue, under 'Paragould Debate' you said, 'No one can be inconsistent and be right.' What did you mean?"

     A man can be consistently wrong. But he cannot be inconsistent and be right. When the term "inconsistent" is applied to a person, it refers to one who is "incoherent or illogical in thought or actions." When applied to abstract matters, it is used of "propositions, ideas, beliefs, etc., so related that both (or all) cannot be true." Consult the dictionary.

     If a man condemns the missionary society because it is a human organization created to preach the word of God, and yet commends a Bible college, which is an educational society created to teach the word of God, he is inconsistent at one end or the other. To be consistent in his position, he must accept both, reject both, or prove that God will authorize a human organization to convey his word by teaching, while forbidding one to convey his word by preaching.

     But so long as a man predicates his opposition to an organization on the premise that it is sinful to create a human organization to do a work entrusted to the divine organization, he must oppose every such human organization, if he would be consistent. If he attempts to carry water on both shoulders, we should either knock one bucket off or make him spill them both!