The Spirit of Adoption

W. Carl Ketcherside

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     "For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live" (Romans 8:13).

     I know a man who is on "Skid Row." He is unkempt, unshaven and filthy. The cast-off clothes which he wears hang loosely upon his gaunt frame. His sockless feet can be seen through the holes in his worn shoes. He is a "wino," a human derelict cast up like a piece of driftwood on the littered beach which is a city street. Each evening at dusk he shuffles into Lighthouse Mission and sits stolidly through a religious service so that he will be entitled to the bowl of steaming stew and the mug of hot coffee. If he has the thirty-five cents, panhandled from passersby earlier in the day, he pays it for a place to "flop" and sleeps in a stupor, oblivious to the groans and snores and sodden curses of the roomful of men who often snarl at one another like so many caged beasts.

     The man was not always thus. I knew him in better times. In fact I baptized him many years ago. He was one of a number of people whom I led out into a clear Ozark stream one Sunday afternoon for the purpose of immersing them into Christ. It was at a spot of such natural beauty that the angels must have smiled upon it. I heard of him again when I got a letter from his anguished parents telling me he had run away from home in a violent rage when they had tried to thwart some of his wild tendencies. They wanted me to find him and talk with him. I did so. He seemed to respect me--in a detached sort of way, but he told me he was going to have his fling and he did not want anyone standing in his path.

     I went to see him later when he was in jail. He was ashamed and he could not understand why I would come. He told me he was not in my class and that I should not waste my time on people like himself. I pointed out that we were two sinners talking together and that both of us were in need of God's mercy, and neither of us had anything to brag about. I asked him if I could pray with him, and although it embarrassed him, he replied, "I guess so." But before I prayed he said, "It won't do any good. I've tried and I haven't got what it takes. I'm too weak. You might as well forget me and let me go to hell!"

     It was by sheer accident I saw him again.I parked close to a liquor store downtown and I saw him coming out. I hardly recognized him. He was bleary-eyed and had a raw inflamed cut on his face where he had fallen and struck his cheekbone on a rock. He had a bottle of the cheapest wine and he was fumbling with it trying to open it. I stepped in front of him and he shuffled to a halt. I said, "Do you remember me?" He shook his head in negation. I said softly, "Do

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you recall when I baptized you in the creek down home one Sunday afternoon?" For a moment it appeared that he would strike me or shove me out of his way. Then he turned and walked away. He did not look back and he said no word.

     I have often wondered if it could have been different. When I baptized him I knew little about the Holy Spirit. I was concerned about getting people into "the right church" and having them go where the correct slant of doctrine was taught. I wanted them to be sheltered under an umbrella where the issues which seemed of such tremendous importance to us were emphasized always. I think now, although the thought is abhorrent to me, that baptism may have been an end, instead of a means. I am persuaded that all too often converts were so many "scalps" to dangle from the poles of our factional tepees. We were interested in getting people into the water. We may have thought that mere performance of an act automatically brought them into a vital relationship with Christ Jesus.

     I am not sure that we talked a great deal about mercy, lovingkindness and grace. To us grace had but one office to perform, the writing and imposition of another legal code, the least infraction of which would damn us. Certainly, as I look back on the meetings which I conducted, I have little recollection of delivering messages about the empowering of the Holy Spirit from within. So those who "came forward during the invitation hymn" were left to go it alone in an unfriendly world, still beset by the same desires, drives, urgings and fleshly compulsions as before.

     We gave them a sense of forgiveness for their past transgressions and they often wept in the knowledge that the old things had passed away. But it was not true that all things had become new. Some things became new. They had a new set of duties. They had to "attend church" three times per week. They had to give money into the treasury on Sunday so the church could "get the glory." They had new people to whom they had to be hostile, friends and neighbors who went where they had instrumental music or opposed Sunday Schools. Before they became identified with "the loyal church" they could attend meetings with any of these, but now that they had been made free by the blood of Christ they must show their "loyalty to the church" by spurning invitations which others mailed to them.

     We created conformists but they were void of life. They were puppets who acted when we pulled the strings. They responded automatically, like a congregational machine. If one objected to our procedure, or questioned our right to prescribe life like a factory schedule, we circulated word around that he would have to be watched. He was a potential troublemaker. If he insisted on thinking for himself we charged him with "rebelling against the elders," some of whom never had an original thought in their lives. Then we withdrew from him. This made it scriptural to ignore him and insult him, to treat him like "a heathen man and a publican."

     We left people empty. There was an inner void, a vacuum, a secret chamber created for the Spirit of God to occupy, to fill with divine love, to flood with power. Unoccupied, it became a dark dungeon of futility and despair. The black bats of doubt flew in and out. Dusty cobwebs of moral weakness, woven by poisonous spiders of suggestion, hung from the rafters of the soul, filtering out the gentle sunlight of divine concern. And a spirit of languor and lassitude made the muscles of the inner man flabby. He became unable to resist the whispering of the demons, the burning desires, the flaming darts of the wicked one. The shield of faith lay rusting on the floor of life's closet, buried beneath the soiled clothing flung off in moments of remorse created by times of indulgence in gray yesterdays which were all alike, times of battles halfheartedly fought and always lost.

     "I've tried and I haven't got what it takes. I'm too weak. You might as well forget me and let me go to hell!" He was staring at me through bars when he said this. His face was puffed and bloated. He

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was not at all the same fresh-faced country lad who took his turn and waded out to where I was braced in the swirling waters of a stream so clear that I could see the darting minnows as I gently laid him back and buried him in the liquid sepulcher. That day he was not thinking of going to hell. He was starting on the road to heaven. He was strong in determination and resolute in his promise to God.

     But I knew little to tell him about the Spirit who would come in and help in time of need when the adversary was pressing hard and the going was rough. Even when I visited him in jail I was still trying to encourage him to reform on his own, to lead a better life, and to behave differently. So I wonder what might have happened if I would have told him at the beginning how we can become more than conquerors through that inner power which is a blessed gift from above. It might not have made any difference, but I wish I had known.

     If you live a certain life you will die. If you die a certain death you will live. That is what Paul is saying. If you live on the lower plane of your natural life, down on the ground level, the end is death. Sometimes it is a living death, agonizing and drawn out like that of the one whom I have described. It is possible to walk around dead. The world is a living charnel house, a place of ghosts and corpses, masquerading as men. But they are dead--dead in trespasses and sins.

     The road to life lies in the mortification of the deeds of the body, that is, the flesh. We sometimes use the word mortify as a symbol of embarrassment or shame. We say that a person was mortified by his mistakes. But Paul is not talking about that. The word means to kill, to visit death upon. To mortify is to put to death, and one can kill the deeds of the flesh only through the assistance of the indwelling Spirit. The New English Version has "base pursuits" for "deeds of the body." That seems like a good translation. In any event, we cannot maintain the works of the flesh. The spirit of carnality must die if Christ rules!

     The original for led is ago, and there are two things that may be said of its usage in the new covenant scriptures. First, it generally applies to persons, and has to do with their motivation to go in a certain direction or to accomplish a certain thing. Second, it implies willingness and cooperation on the part of those who are led. The leading is not by force. It is not against the will.

nbsp;    To be led by the Spirit is to surrender to the influence and guidance of the Spirit, that is, to walk after the Spirit, as previously indicated. This is a proof of divine sonship. Only sons of God will be led by the Spirit, and thus, when one is so led it is indicative of his personal relationship with God. This is quite different than the measuring-rods employed by men.

     Jesus placed the term "son of God" on a higher moral plane than a mere tie of relationship with the Father. There are certain characteristics stated as conditions. For example, only peacemakers can be truly regarded as children of God (Matthew 5:9). If one belongs to a religious organization and has a good knowledge of scripture, yet is guilty of sowing discord among brethren, or of refusing to labor for peace, he cannot be called a child of God. True children of God wage peace as actively as others wage war.

     Again, Jesus postulates love, even for those who despitefully use you and are enemies, as the criterion of sonship. He says, "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father which is in heaven." It is our contention that this love is a fruit of the Spirit. It is shed abroad in our hearts by the Spirit. It is at once obvious that sons of God must be led, directed, motivated by, and filled with the Spirit of God.

     It is difficult to understand the spiritual implications of a term if one is not familiar with its natural relationships. In our culture, "the spirit of slavery" may be passed over lightly by a modern reader. We have never experienced the agony of physical slavery and cannot fully appreciate "the spirit of slavery" as applied to sin. On the contrary, we may regard the life of sin as a pleasant time of indulgence which we are called upon to give up or "sacrifice" for Jesus Christ. Thus, the life in Christ is actually regarded as a bondage to which we surrender ourselves, more or less reluctantly, in order to secure a reward.

     This was not the case with the citizens of Rome. One writer of note says, "The epoch which witnessed the early growth of Christianity was an epoch of which the horror and degradation have rarely been equalled, and perhaps never exceeded, in the annals of mankind." Of the state of things in Rome at this time. Canon Farrar writes, "At the lowest extreme of the social scale were millions of slaves without family, without religion, without possessions, who had no recognized rights, and towards whom none had any recognized duties, passing normally from a childhood of degradation to a manhood of hardship, and an old age of unpitied neglect."

     The French historian Du Page declares that it can be fairly well authenticated that there were sixty-million slaves in the Roman Empire when the gospel was first proclaimed. We are indebted to Cornelius Tacitus, the Roman historian who was born the year Paul began his third preaching tour, for the information that the slaves were so numerous that they were divided and registered according to their nationalities. And Seneca, the philosopher, who was the brother of Gallic before whom Paul was brought (Acts 18:12), writes that every slave was under a constant cloud of suspicion as a potential enemy.

     To illustrate the fear which was associated with slavery I need mention only one incident recorded by Tacitus. The Roman Senate was debating the murder of Pedanius Secundus by one of his slaves. C. Cassius Longinus arose and gravely argued for enforcement of the Silanian law, which made it mandatory to kill all of the slaves owned by a master who was murdered. One after another of the senators came to the rostrum and cast their votes for this sanguinary law. When it is remembered that such masters often owned hundreds of slaves and that these were in constant jeopardy by the act of one hot-head or brutal criminal, it can be seen how cheaply life was regarded by the patricians or ruling classes.

     The citizens of Rome could make an immediate application of Paul's statement to the fear of slavery and degradation of sin. The fact is that his letter to the Romans was written just the year before the meeting of the Senate described by Tacitus. There was nothing glamorous about slavery. Slaves were sustained only by the faint hope of some day being free, or by the certain hope of death. And while we are a long way from the conditions which then obtained we can still offer a few suggestions about "the spirit of slavery" to sin from which we have been set free by the grace of God. Praise His holy name!

     1. Slavery to sin destroys human dig-

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nity, reducing one to the animal level and making him a victim of passion and inordinate desire. Peter writes, "But these men, with no more sense than the unreasoning brute beasts which are born to be caught and killed, scoff at things outside their own experience, and will most certainly be destroyed in their own corruption."

     2. Slavery to sin demands all of our powers and resources and places every faculty under tribute. When sin reigns in our mortal bodies it exacts obedience to the body's desires. It forces us to put all of our parts at its disposal as instruments for wrong doing (Romans 6: 12, 13).

     3. Slavery to sin reduces us to abject servitude and then pays off with death. "When you were slaves of sin you were free from the control of righteousness; and what was the gain? Nothing but what now makes you ashamed, for the end of that is death" (Romans 6:20, 21).

     4. Slavery to sin brings only misery and despair. "We know that the law is spiritual, but I am not; I am unspiritual, the purchased slave of sin...Miserable creature that I am, who is there to rescue me out of this body doomed to death?" (Romans 7:14,24).

     5. Slavery to sin forces its captives to breathe the polluted and poisonous atmosphere of fear. They are all of their lifetime subject to bondage through fear of death (Hebrews 2: 15), and fear brings with it the fear of judgment (1 John 4:18).

     Against the frightful state conjured up in the mind at mention of "the spirit of slavery" is brought to bear another term "the spirit of adoption." No more significant expression could be used to indicate a complete transformation in the Roman mind. From slavery to adoption would be like a Horatio Alger book "From Rags to Riches." Only if we understand the legal adoptive process can we ever grasp what the apostle is really saying.

     Fortunately, there has been preserved in Roman annals and laws a great mass of material related to the adoption process which was a very serious business in Rome. I trust that you will forgive me if I present to you the fruit of my own research and study for which I am indebted to many sources.

     Notice my use of the expression "very serious business" with reference to Roman adoptive procedures. It was made especially serious because of the law called patria potestas. This was the law which gave a father absolute authority over his offspring so long as they lived. It conferred upon the father the right to punish a son regardless of the age of that son. He could kill his son and no one could lift a finger against him. Gains, a respected interpreter of Roman jurisprudence said, "The right of dominion which we have over our children is peculiar to the citizens of Rome, nor is there any race of men who have a dominion over their children similar to ours."

     In 450 B. C., there was a revolt of the plebs, or common people, against the patricians. It was alleged that the latter abused the unwritten law and took advantage of the former, denying them their civil rights. The magistrates, in order to avoid a revolution, were commissioned to draw up a code, which they did, inscribing it upon ten tablets which were accepted by the popular assembly. Later two more tablets were added to make the great body of laws known as Lex Duodecim Tabularium, the law of the twelve tablets. The laws were enshrined in the forum and became the supreme law of the land.

     The patria potestas stemmed from the second stipulation of the fourth tablet which provided for "the control of the father over his children, the right existing during their whole life to imprison, scourge, keep to rustic labor in chains, to sell or slay, even though they may be in enjoyment of high state offices." A son could not own a foot of land in his own name while his father lived.

     I do not want to bore you with details, but we must try and catch the atmosphere in Rome when Paul wrote to the Romans of slavery and adoption. In order to do this I want to insert a quotation from Dionysius of Halicarnassus. His

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testimony is especially valuable because he was a Greek historian living in Rome at the very time when Augustus issued his decree for the whole Roman Empire to enroll in the census for taxation purposes. Dionysius wrote Roman Antiquities, a history of his adopted city from its inception to the year 264 B. C., in twenty volumes. Nine of these have been preserved in their entirety, and in one of them is this description of the patria potestas.

     "The law-giver of the Romans gave virtually full power to the father over his son, whether he thought proper to imprison him, to scourge him, to put him in chains, and keep him at work in the fields, or to put him to death; and this even though the son were already engaged in public affairs, though he were numbered among the highest magistrates, and though he were celebrated for his zeal for the commonwealth. Indeed in virtue of this law men of distinction while delivering speeches from the rostra, hostile to the senate and pleasing to the people, and enjoying great popularity on that account, have been dragged down from thence, and carried away by their fathers, to undergo such punishment as these thought fit; and while they were being led away through the forum, none present, neither consul, tribune, nor the very populace which was flattering them, and thought all power inferior to its own, could rescue them."

     Adoption involved the transfer of a person from the absolute control of his whole life by one man to the absolute control of his life by another. There had to be a complete surrender of the power of life and death by one and a complete assumption of that power by another. So drastic was this change that the one who was transferred to another patria potestas, was looked upon as a wholly new creature. He was said to be born again, or born anew. A whole new existence for him began on the day that the transfer of allegiance was ratified. Never again would he be subject in any sense to his former relationship. It was as if he had literally died to his past.

     The prospective father said, "This day I purchase your son for my own." He then placed a coin in one pan of the balance. The father placed the son's hand in the other pan, but before the sale could be completed he removed the boy's hand, and the other removed his coin. This identical procedure was again enacted. But the third time the father did not remove the hand of the son. The scales were struck with the brass rod as a sign that the sale was completed. The coin was given to the boy as a sign that he would inherit from the new father. It was a seal of his relationship. Even to this day we say, "The third time is the charm."

     There remained one more step called vindicatio. In Roman law this meant to affirm and assert one's legal right to a thing. The new father took the adopted son to a magistrate and had his new name properly inscribed in the census tables and the right of patria potestas, of life and death, passed into his hands. All of this is most interesting to me, but it is secondary to the purpose of the apostle. His primary desire is to impress upon the Romans the great blessings which accrue to us in Christ.

     Let us point out then the privileges that were bestowed by adoption in Rome. (1) The one adopted was ushered into a whole new family relationship, with a new father and new brothers and sisters, and this was the direct result of the

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father's choice. He was a chosen one, an elected person. The very word "adoption" means to choose, as our word option indicates. (2) The one adopted was given a new name clearly indicative of a new relationship. (3) He was permitted to eat at the father's table, a privilege never accorded slaves. In the Greek world such eating together was an expression of koinonia, fellowship, the sharing of the common life of the father and family. (4) He became heir of the estate of the father. If there was an elder brother, he became a joint-heir with him. He shared in both the vicissitudes and rewards which were the lot of the family, for this was part of "the common life," the fellowship.

     (5) When one was adopted by Roman law his past life was literally blotted out. It was removed from the roster of citizenship. All debts were cancelled, all obligations deleted. The adopted person began a new life with the slate wiped clean. Even his education began anew, and Cicero said its aim was to produce "self-control, combined with dutiful affection to parents, and kindliness to kindred."

     Paul speaks of the Spirit in connection with the cry "Abba, Father." There are two passages in which this expression occurs. In Romans 8:15 the Spirit enables us to say these words. In Galatians 4:6 it is the Spirit which does the crying out. In both cases our divine sonship is under consideration. We are adopted, that is given the place of a son. Adoption is from huiothesis, to place as a son. Because we are inducted into the glorious family we are able to cry "Abba, Father." That is, we are able, through the Spirit, to recognize our real relationship to Christ.

     There is more to it than this. The word abba could not have been translated "father." It is an Aramaic word, and was the first expression of a little child in the East. In our country little children say "Da-da" or "Pa-pa" and we must transliterate with "Daddy" and "Papa" to indicate that these are the simple, unaffected, and spontaneous expressions of love in early life. It would not capture this meaning to translate by supplying the word "father."

     Paul well knew that the Jews had a strict law forbidding a slave to use the word "abba" in addressing a master or the head of a household. So when he wants to show that we are sons, not slaves, he makes it clear that the indwelling Spirit identifies us as children of God and makes it possible for us to speak to the Father in a fashion that slaves were not allowed to use. And so close is the union between the Holy Spirit and my own spirit that it cannot be distinguished from the cry which one is calling out to the Father.

     We are told that "the Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ." What does this tremendous statement mean? Remember that Paul is contrasting the servile state of slavery with the superb experience of sonship. We described for you the public ceremony of adoption. The sale of a slave had many of the same aspects. It also was in the presence of witnesses and involved a pair of balances and a deposit of money in one of the pans of the balance.

     Suppose that the father of an adopted child died and the natural sons hated the one who was adopted and wanted to debar him from his inheritance. They could claim that he was never adopted at all but simply purchased as a slave. The adopted son would have to bring a wit-

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ness to corroborate his own testimony. If he could find the librepens, the scales-bearer, that one could say, "I know he is a son because I was the one who struck the brass ingot and sealed the transaction."

     The Holy Spirit is in me for that very purpose. He is a seal of my redemption. "And if you and we belong to Christ, guaranteed as his and anointed, it is all God's doing; it is God also who hath set his seal upon us, and as a pledge of what is to come has given the Spirit to dwell in our hearts" (2 Cor. 1:22).

     The indwelling Spirit is God's guarantee that I am going to inherit every provision of grace. I am not a slave. I am a son. My spirit testifies of this. The Holy Spirit testifies the same. I am even a joint heir with Christ. This establishes the quality of our sonship. Whatever is the lot of Jesus is to be my lot. We are "sharers together" with all that sonship involves. This is the thing to which the Spirit witnesses. I hope that you will forgive me for a lengthy quote which I am going to insert here. I want to share it with all of you. It is found in The Local Colour of the Bible, by Charles W. Budden and Edward Hastings (Vol. 3, pages 275-277).

     "St. Paul is the only one of the New Testament writers to use the term 'adoption.' This is not surprising, because adoption was not a custom among the Jews, and, in a legal sense, was absolutely unknown. On the other hand, the custom was a common one among the Greeks and Romans, and as a Roman citizen Paul was familiar with it and with the legal ceremonies which belonged to it.
     Under Roman law an entire stranger by blood might be adopted into a family and become a member of that family, holding the same position in it as a son born in marriage. According to Dr. Ball, he even became a member of the family in a higher sense than some who had the family blood in their veins, than emancipated sons or descendants through females. He assumed the family name, and took part in its mystic sacrificial rites. He could not any more marry in the family of his adoption within the prohibited degrees than those related by blood. He severed his connections completely with his former family, and in the eyes of the law he became so entirely a new personality that even his debts were cancelled.
     Let us look at the process. In the presence of five witnesses and the libripens (one who held the balances, as if to weight out money, at nominal sales), the son about to be adopted was sold three times by his father. According to the law of the Twelve Tables, if a father sold his son thrice he lost his paternal rights over him (patria potestas). A fictitious law-suit then followed, by which the person to be adopted was surrendered to the adopter, and the act was ratified in a set form of words.
     As the form of adoption and that of sale into slavery were very similar, the presence of witnesses was essential to testify to the real nature of the ceremony. That is why the Apostle says, 'Ye received not the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye received the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, 'Abba, Father.' Suppose that the adopter has died and that the adopted son lays claim to the inheritance. His claim is refused; his status as a son is denied; it is declared that he was sold as a slave and that he has no legal right to the inheritance. So the son seeks the aid of the law-court. 'No,' he pleads, 'the ceremony was that of adoption, the deceased claimed me by the name of son. He took me to his home. I called him father and he allowed it...I sat at his table where the slaves never sat. He told me the inheritance was mine.' But the law requires corroborative evidence. One of the witnesses is called. 'I was present,' he says, 'at the ceremony. It was I who held the scales and struck them with the ingot of brass. The transaction was not a sale into slavery. It was an adoption. I heard the words of vindication, and I say this person was claimed by the deceased not as a slave, but as a son.'
     And who is the witness to that spiritual

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adoption which makes us sons of God? It is the Third Person of the Trinity. 'The Spirit himself beareth witness (along) with our spirit, that we are children of God.' " (End of quotation).

     Rawlins White was a fisherman at Cardiff for twenty years. During the reign of Henry the Eighth he was an ardent partaker of the superstition and idolatry of Catholicism, but when the accession of Edward the Sixth made possible the proclamation of the gospel again, he "began partly to mislike that which before he had embraced, and to have good opinion of that which before, by the iniquity of the time, had been concealed from him." Dane writes, "He began to be a diligent hearer, and a great searcher-out of the truth."

     However, White was ignorant and unlearned. He had to have help, so he took his little son and started him to school to learn to read English. "Now after the little boy could read indifferently well, his father every night after supper, summer and winter, would have the boy read a piece of the holy Scripture, and now and then, of some other good book; in which kind of virtuous exercise the old man had such a delight and pleasure." Dane further says, "Within a few years, through the help of his little son, and through much conference besides, he profited and went forward in such sort, that he was able not only to resolve himself touching his own former blindness and ignorance, but was also able to admonish and instruct others, and therefore, when occasion served, he would go from one place to another, visiting such as he had best hope in."

     I like this statement which follows. "And to this his great industry and endeavor in the Holy Scripture, God did also add to him a singular gift of memory, so that by the benefit thereof he would and could do that, in vouching and rehearsing of the text, which men of riper and more profound knowledge, by their notes and other helps of memory, could very hardly accomplish; insomuch that he, upon alleging of Scripture very often would cite the book, the leaf, yea and the very sentence; such was the working of God in this simple and unlearned man."

     After traveling five years with his son, White learned that King Edward had died. Mary succeeded to the throne, motivated by a passion to ruthlessly stamp out all opposition to Catholicism. White testified even more diligently of the grace of God and converted many. His friends sought to have him desist, but he refused saying, "I will, by his favourable grace, confess and bear witness of him before men, that I may find in him everlasting life. I must suffer with him here if I would be in his glory."

     Finally he was arrested and charged with heresy before the bishop of Llandaff. He was committed to the castle of Cardiff for a year, during which John Dane often visited him, taking him money and food prepared by his (Dane's) mother. At the end of the year he was summoned for trial before the bishop, who accused him in a diatribe about his "obstinate and wilful opinions" for several hours. After listening quietly to the end. White replied, "My lord, I thank God I am a Christian man, and I hold no opinions contrary to the word of God: and if I do, I desire to be reformed out of the word of God, as a Christian man ought to be."

     Dane quotes, "From thence he was, by the bishop's commandment, carried again to Cardiff, there to be put into the prison of the town, called Cockmarel; a very dark, loathsome and most vile prison. Rawlins in the meantime passed away his time in prayer, and chiefly in singing of psalms, which kind of godly

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exercise he always used, both at Cardiff castle and in all other places." While in prison, his writ of execution on the charge of heresy, was read to him. It was to be "speedily carried out."

     On the day before he was to die he sent a messenger to his wife requesting her to send him a long white shirt which he called his "wedding garment." Attired in it, he was taken from prison the next morning. Dane records, "So he came to a place in his way, where his poor wife and children stood weeping and making great lamentation; the sudden sight of whom so pierced his heart that the very tears trickled down his face." When he saw the stake and the wood piled near, he fell down upon his knees, and kissed the ground, saying, "Earth unto earth, and dust unto dust: thou art my mother, and unto thee I shall return."

     Arising, he went boldly to the stake, and a blacksmith fastened a huge chain of iron about his body. As the officers began to lay the wood mixed with straw and reeds about him, he reached out as far as he could and gathered the straw and reeds and tucked them in closer about his body. He was forced to listen to a harangue on the authority of Rome given by a priest. He gave such good attention that all were astonished at his composure. When the fire was kindled he held his hands in the intense flame and watched the sinews shrink and the fat drop away. He continued to cry out, "O Lord, receive my spirit!" until his mouth would no longer open.

     The recorder ends his account with these words, "Thus died this godly man for the testimony of God's truth, being now rewarded, no doubt, with the crown of everlasting life." Fifty-six years later the version of the scriptures authorized by King James was first printed and given to the world. Really, this is not quite all. I want to add that I expect to meet Rawlins White. I would like to tell this simple man what an influence his life and death have had on me.

     The apostle writes that we are joint-heirs with Christ "if so be that we suffer with him that we may be glorified together." He personally rejoiced in his sufferings for the saints and longed to fill up that which was behind in the afflictions of Christ in his own flesh. I do not expect ever to be called upon to suffer as did Rawlins White, who was just my age when he met Jesus in the burning bush of his own body. But whatever it is my lot to share with Jesus, I want to be strong enough to "go forth unto him without the gate, bearing his reproach."

     I want that power of the Spirit which will flood my soul with such unquenchable love for my enemies that I can pray for them in spite of taunts and false accusations. When reviled I want to bless and not revile again. I want that fierce courage which can make me smile and thank God when I am accused and branded as a heretic or an apostate by those who cannot read my heart but would play God with my life.

     May the blessed Spirit grant to me that same patience which sustained others in dark dungeons and vile prisons and made it possible for their tongues to form the words and sounds of hymns of praise. God help me to overcome the temptation to feel self-pity when it seems that I am deserted and must stumble along lonely in the darkness.

     May I have that greater love for Christ which will impel me on to my destiny with him, though I see my wife, my children and my grandchildren, weeping and lamenting at the crossroads. And although I taste the brine of my own tears, and see dimly through the misty curtain of my own sorrow, let me not turn back from following the Galilean carpenter, to cling even to those who are the very substance of my earthly dreams.

     May I be able to walk boldly to whatever my stake may be. There are many kinds of stakes. There are many kinds of fires. Sometimes the literal stake is easier to embrace than the mental. There are chains which cannot be formed on an anvil by a blacksmith with clang of hammer-- fetters of hate and hostility which bind you while others burn you. I want to be bold enough not to shrink

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from either heated metal or white-hot words of wrath which sear the soul.

     I want to be forgiven for the time wasted in trivialities, debating those senseless and foolish issues which cannot matter in eternity. I want to purge my very consciousness of those molehills elevated into mountains by the partisan and factional spirit. I want to scale the far-off peaks and not wallow forever on the low ground where men wade through the miasmatic swamps of their own stagnant minds and fever-ridden hearts. How weak I am! How unworthy to be an heir of God! How unworthy to be a joint-heir with Christ, my redeemer! But what triumphant reassurance I find in the blessed words, "My grace is all you need; power comes to its full strength in weakness." I want to be able to say, "I shall therefore prefer to find my joy and pride in the very things that are my weakness; and then the power of Christ will come and rest upon me" (2 Corinthinans 12:9).

     "The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, my brothers. Amen" (Galatians 6:18).