Dr. Thomas: —I attempt to address a few lines to you, for the purpose of eliciting truth concerning the faith of the gospel of the kingdom promised to Abraham and his seed. I have had the opportunity of reading but a small portion of your writings, but the little I have read has set me to thinking somewhat seriously. I was immersed some eight or nine years ago, with (as I supposed) the one faith requisite to precede baptism; but since reading your publication, viz.: the Herald, I have become alarmed, as to my standing justified before God. I will state some of the particulars of my faith, and ask, if you will be so kind (if you can spare a place in your paper) as to give me your views, according to the light which you have gained from the inspired volume, whether I had the faith that would be accounted to me for righteousness; for we read, "without faith it is impossible to please God." If I did not, I am willing, yea, anxious to obey my Lord in all things. I believed that Jesus was the Christ, and that it was through him that I should gain immortality at his second coming, when the dead in Christ should rise, and, with the living saints, be caught up to meet the Lord in the air; while this earth and heavens were burned up, or made new, the wicked of all nations exterminated therefrom, in a moment, as it were; and when this is done they would reign on the new earth a thousand years, at the end of which he would deliver up the kingdom, &c. I did not know any thing about the restoration of Israel and Judah, or the land covenanted to Abraham, and therefore had no faith in them. I supposed the home of the father of the faithful was the new earth. Now, if you can give me any light, please do, and the Lord reward you; and that you may be preserved blameless unto his kingdom is my prayer.

ELIZA S. COFFIN.

Adrian, Lenawee co., Mich., July 12, 1854.

REMARKS.

In the second number of the second volume of the Herald, I have written at length on the subject of the letter before us. I would, however, observe in the case presented, that the immersion was not in obedience to the "one faith" preached of Paul, and therefore not the "one baptism." No subject of the one faith in Paul’s day was ignorant of the restoration of Israel and Judah, and without faith in the things promised of the land covenanted to Abraham. No faith defective of these elements is worth any thing in the matter of justification; for the gospel is the glad tidings covenanted to Abraham and his Seed. Our correspondent was evidently immersed on the belief of a theory whose traditions made void the little truth it contained. The Bible nowhere proclaims the extermination of all nations from the earth when Christ comes; on the contrary, it teaches their subjugation to Jesus, and blessedness in him for a thousand years. A "kingdom" in which Christ and the Saints are "reigning" without subjects is no kingdom at all; and there can be no subjects if the "wicked of all nations,"—which is equivalent to "all nations," for they are all wicked—be exterminated. The saints are not subjects, but heirs and rulers, civil and ecclesiastical, over subjects, or Jews and Gentiles, in the flesh. Men are invited to become immortal rulers over the nations when the power of their mortal rulers shall be broken as a potter’s vessel, and swept away. This is the invitation of the gospel. He that accepts it is commanded to be immersed into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, that he may be purified by the blood of the Abrahamic covenant, and obtain a right to the things covenanted through the SEED.

EDITOR.

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