G. H. Pember Quotes
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And so the powerful appeals of Enoch, his loud calls to repentance and threatenings of judgment to come, since they were slighted by the world, must have mightily hardened the hearts of men, and caused the Spirit of God to cease striving with them. Very probably many were at first impressed and alarmed: but after a while, when they saw day following day without any sign of the predicted vengeance, they lost their fear: they went back to their favourite sins, as the dog to his vomit: they could no longer be roused as before: they began to be scoffers, and mocked at the most solemn warnings: the demon, who had been for a brief space expelled, returned with seven others more wicked than himself: so that their last state was worse than the first.
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Through a misapprehension of the Septuagint, which we will presently explain, the English version renders Nephilim by “giants.” But the form of the Hebrew word indicates a verbal adjective or noun, of passive or neuter signification, from Naphal, to fall: hence it must mean “the fallen ones,” that is, probably, the fallen angels. Afterwards, however, the term seems to have been transferred to their offspring, as we may gather from the only other passage in which it occurs. In the evil report which the ten spies give of the land of Canaan, we find them saying;—“All the people which we saw in it were men of great stature. And there we saw the Nephilim, the sons of Anak, descended from the Nephilim: and we seemed to ourselves as grass- hoppers, and so we did to them.
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First; he throws her off her guard by his assumed ignorance. Secondly; he stirs up vanity from the depths of her self-consciousness by giving her an opportunity to correct and instruct him. Thirdly; he uses the term Elohim, and not the covenant name Jehovah, to represent the Creator as far distant, and as having but little concern with His creatures. Fourthly; he puts in a doubt as to whether God had uttered the prohibition, and hints at the possibility of a mistake. And lastly; he insinuates the blasphemous thought that harshness and caprice on God’s part are not inconceivable, but may sometimes be expected.
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Woful was the proof that man, if unrestrained, if left to his own devices, is not merely incapable of recovering his innocence, but will rush madly down the steep of sensuousness and impious self-will until he finds himself engulphed in the abyss of perdition. The trial of freedom had failed: the second of the ages was ended.
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The occultist is brought into intelligent communication with the spirits of the air, and can receive any knowledge which they possess, or any false impression they choose to impart...the demons seem permitted to do various wonders at their request.
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But throughout the whole Bible there is no instance of a spirit influencing men for good save the Spirit of God alone.
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The custom of bowing to the earth, and the feeling which prompted the casting of dust on the head, in time of bitter affliction, as a sign of broken pride and humble acknowledgment of the truth of the Creator’s words.
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But Paul knew something of it: for he was caught up alive into the Third Heaven, and into Paradise.[463] Yet instead of satisfying our curiosity, he tells us that it would be impossible to do so, for that he heard unspeakable words which it is not lawful for a num to utter. We are thus positively forbidden to pry into the matter: but we are at least permitted to infer that what Paul saw was transcendently beautiful, full of such ravishing joy as we cannot now conceive. For, when he returned to earth, he was so elated by what he had experienced, so thoroughly unstrung for this lower life by his short taste of that which is to come, that he would have been incapacitated for further service in this world had not God brought him down to his former level by a painful affliction, a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan sent to buffet him. It was, therefore, no Purgatory which Paul saw—he would not have needed a thorn in the flesh to keep him from elation after such a sight as that—but a Paradise of beauty and joy far beyond the comprehension of man.
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He could not endow men with great power and wisdom; He could not make them excellent in majesty and glorious in might, swift as the winds or the lightning to do His will, until they had passed the danger of abusing His gifts, and so falling as the sinful angels had done before them.
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Christians who take the trouble to reconnoitre in the darkening twilight are well aware that hostile forces are converging from various quarters, but with unmistakable concert, upon their camp; while that camp itself is, alas! becoming thinned by the almost daily desertions of those who cease to believe in the Bible as the only revelation from God, and in the Lord Jesus as the One Christ and Saviour, Who bare our sins in His own body on the tree, and gave His life a ransom for many.