American First-Fruits

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Excerpt from American First-Fruits: Being a Brief Record of Eight Months', Divine Healing Missions in the State of California, Conducted by the Rev. John Alex, Dowie and Mrs. Dowie, Form Melbourne, Australia, With an Appendix Containing Two Address on Divine Healing, Delivered Before the Co With joyous songs and grateful hearts, the people of God in ancient days obeyed His command, "Thou shalt not delay to offer the first of thy ripe fruits, . the First-Fruits of thy labors which thou hast sown in the field." (Exodus 21 : 29, 23: 16.) We, therefore, giving all the praise to our God and- Father, who has, by the Holy Spirit, so gloriously blessed our first eight months work for His dear Son in this land, send forth these First-Fruits of our labors in America in the cause of Christ our Lord, especially in the ministry of Divine Healing. We do this on the eve of going forth again for a second and longer period of service to our Lord on this Pacific Coast. We begin, on Lords Day, April 28th, a mission in the city of Los Angeles, Southern California, and, God willing, we shall visit other cities in that portion of this State, and proceed from thence to Oregon, Washington and British Columbia, where we intend to conduct missions until the Fall, in which labors we ask the prayers and sympathies of all our Christian readers. The following pages are, for the most part, simply extracts from our shorthand writers reports of the words of testimony uttered by those who have been healed through faith in Jesus, as given by themselves before a multitude of witnesses in the Praise and Testimony Meetings which have been held at the close of each of our missions, ten of which have been conducted by us in this State. Concerning the genuineness of these statements there can be no righteous dispute, but we deeply regret (although we cannot be surprised) that we have been under the necessity of defending the truthfulness of these witnesses against the false and malicious attacks, not of the world, but of some who profess to be ministers within the Church of God. "No strange thing has happened to us" in our being compelled to discharge this painful duty, but it is hone the less to be regretted, although we trust such conduct will never be repeated. One good result is that it has given us an opportunity, and laid upon us the necessity, of again and again bringing forward these witnesses, who, before hundreds and even thousands of persons, have reaffirmed their testimony without challenge. In this matter, remembering the words of the great apostle, we say to our Christian friends, Pray for us, that the word of the Lord may have free course and be glorified, and that we may be delivered from unreasonable margin, Gr. absurd and wicked men, for all men have not faith. 2 Thessalonians 3 :2. In only two, or possibly three, cases do we know of any of the witnesses whose testimonies arc herein reported having gone back to former conditions, and the cause of their declension in every case is to be found in a return to sin, largely through evil and ungodly surroundings which the persons concerned have yielded to instead of overcoming through the grace of God In this connection, we desire to remind all who read, that what is received through faith in Jesus may be lost through unbelief and other sins. Our Lords warning in John 5 : 14 sufficiently proves this assertion. He said to one whom he had healed, Behold, thou art made whole. Sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee. We have added to this new and enlarged edition of First-Fruits two addresses which we delivered before the Congregational Ministers Club of San Francisco. These contain brief, and necessarily incomplete, outlines of our doctrinal teaching, which forms by far the greatest portion of our ministry, but we think it well to add these pages, since there is a widespread desire th