34, Woodside,
Wimbledon.
London, S. W. 21 Apr. 1909
Beloved Brother,
It is always a delight to hear from you.
How often I wish we were nearer, so that
we might confer instead of writing! While
I think of it, have you received your
18 clean copies of letters Li to Lvii, all
right? We are getting short, & I should
not like you to be missing any number.
I always try to keep a few till I hear you
are served _
Do you know a brother named M'Miller
at Stanley, Wisconsin? Is he with us? And
the brother named R Page (I think) who
has corresponded with George Phayre & has
I understand with drawn from the gathering
he was connected with, partly in consequence
of what G.P. wrote to him. Our much be-
loved & valued G P. is under the weight of
matters & has much difficulty in rising
up tp God. We always damage others when
we get under the power of evil. Our hope
is in God. "What hath God wrought?" was
the summing up of Israel's history at the end
of the wilderness, & What is God doing? is
the word for us today, & would keep us
very quiet.
One more sorrow. Three brothers have
written me a joint letter purporting[?] that
they have separated from the gathering
at Kingston, Jamaica, taking, themselves,
the highest ground of being or representing
"the assembly of God" in the place. I have
written shortly, endeavouring to point out
their mistake, & that they, in so doing, commit
the very sin for which they complain of
John Lawrence. Their names are
J. A. Foster, G. S. Hyatt, F. R. Barker.
Foster would seem to be in a solicitor's
office at 3 Duke St.
Certainly it is a lawless day, but God will
bring good out of evil, I am persuaded,
to all concerned.
Now for your letter, which reached me in
Belgium among the coal miners, where we had
an interesting reading on Ephesians, greatly
blessed to us all, I trust. They have been &
are having pretty sharp conflict with the
loose or Bethesda brethren in those parts,
in which I got my share of abuse, as you
will see if you cast your eye over enclosed
two tracts. But God is working to exercise
the younger generation. We shall have to answer
the "Refutations", to explore its subtlety. These
loose brethren are I suspect supplied with
funds, which are not lacking with the O.B.'s,
as any one may see from their fortnightly
missionary report, "Echoes of Service" I think.
Now as to your questions. The reports are
so far from the truth, that I am continually
reminded of my dear mother's advice, "Believe
nothing of what you hear & only half of what
you see!" Our Streatham meeting, last
October, was a very happy one, - no element
of looseness about it. Dr. Evans of Dublin,
for long inclined that way, was specially
invited by myself in the fervent hope that
a little kindness & godly intercourse would
keep him from finally severing his connection
from the gathering in Dublin. In that hope
we are for the present disappointed, but I
cannot say I am sorry for our having done
our best to talk to him, & set quietly before
him his want of faith in God, in giving up
Truth, which never changes in spite of all
our failure. Bedsides that, my own brother
John was there, in as far as shattered health
would allow. He is a sort of free lance &
has lost ground spiritually, but is full of
Christ & the Lord's coming. Was that wrong?
Everyone who cares, knows the intense grief
of heart his position causes me, & none,
I suppose, more than himself.
What these "private & educational meetings
held in different parts" are, - I know not.
I have not heard of anything of the kind
amongst us. They probably refer to sections[?]
of the Ravenites & others who have gone
out from us.
Another little 3 day reading meeting we had at Brighton
February last, has also been harshly criticized.
Why I cannot tell, except that the devil is
jealous because four from outside have
lately come into fellowship at Brighton,
two from the Kelly fellowship, the other
two, Dr Molson & his wife, floating about,
both of them most interesting, & desirous
to learn. We also had Dr Bergmann who
was only too thankful to set aside his own
meetings in order to be present at the
readings, & was most useful to us. He
has laboured for years amongst the Jews
with marked blessing, & has translated
the Bible into two different dialects of
so called Yiddish or the Jew's Jargon.
I felt it quite an honour from the Lord
to have such a man with us. The
meetings were wholly in our hands,
without any effort or jar of any kind,
& acknowledged to be most profitable.
You yourself would have most heartily
joined in; but if we are never to seek
to serve & help those who are not with
us, what are we coming to? The truth
of Ephes. iv is given up. And that is what
I feel so grieving to the Holy Spirit of
God, in this ultra-ecclesiasticism which
is being pressed by some, & is practically
little else that beating the men-servants
& maid servants (end of Matt xxiv).
Alfred Burton has protested against this;
I quite admit that his statements in C.
Library need qualifying often, & rounding
off as J.N.D. used to do. But in heart,
he is right, and not loose. Few men
have been more blessed of God. I
heard him say, (not to me), "If the
brethren were to receive the Kelly people
in a block today, he should leave
fellowship tomorrow."
We need patience with one another,
& to hold fast the truth in communion
with God, more firmly than ever.
This I seek to do, while profiting by
all complaints made, so as not to
offend needlessly, but never, God helping
me, give up the care of souls whoever
& wherever they may be, if it be possible
to help them in His fear.
God is working every where, but very
little amongst us in England, where
a pharisaical spirit has, alas, engendered
much blight. Still He works, & for
that I am thankful.
Very much love in the Lord, I
have the hymn book by my side, but
am so overwhelmed with work,
I get on but very slowly.
Yours, very affectly in the Lord
W.J.Lowe
Notice one thing beloved brother, which
I believe is a test - Has the unfolding
of the Father's name (the truth of John's Gospel
& Epistle) its proper place with those who
are on rigid ecclesiastical lines?
The “Dr Bergmann” of page 5 is מרדכי שמואל בערגמאנן (Mordekai Shmuel Bergmann). After conversion he altered his name to Marcus Samuel Bergmann. He lived from 1846 to 1922. See his biography here: https://books.google.com/books?id=Q9rYwAEACAAJ (readers from Europe have to use an US-proxy-server to download this).
Bergmann’s conversion was printed in Gospel Gleanings 11 (1911), pages 50 - 53.
Bergmann’s famous Yiddish translation is here (1904): https://archive.org/details/sefertorahneviim00berg and here (1912): https://archive.org/details/theoldtestamenti00berg/page/1250/mode/2up also the New Testament (1912): https://archive.org/details/haberithahadasha00berg
Martin