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Preface

No Christadelphian would deny that we are living in "the last days". The "signs of the times", so anxiously awaited by past generations, are evident on every side and "the coming of the Lord draweth nigh". The apostle Paul forewarned that these "last days" would be "Perilous". Nineteen centuries ago he wrote, by inspiration, an exact description of conditions now prevailing in this twentieth century:

"For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, inhuman, implacable, slanderers, profligates, fierce, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasures rather than lovers of God." (2 Tim. 3:2-5 R.S.V.)

These remarkable words have been fulfilled in stark detail. There has been a moral collapse. Standards have rapidly declined in all stratas of society - whether political, religious, social, or relating to the family. If the Lord tarries and the rate of decline of recent years continues, the future of mankind will be grim. The Lord declared that men would "faint with fear and with foreboding of what is coming on the world; for the powers of the heavens will be shaken" (Luke 21:26 R.S.V.).

In the midst of such a world, we must continue our walk towards the Kingdom. Concerning his disciples, Jesus said, "I pray not that Thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that Thou shouldest keep them from the evil" (John 17:15). We must therefore hold fast the standards set by Christ and his apostles - standards faithfully upheld by past generations of Christadelphians.

In this short publication, attention is drawn to a number of matters in which an evident decline has taken place in the Body of Christ and wherein peril lurks for the future of the ecclesia. The sole motive behind its production is that, when the Lord returns, he may find us as a group of believers who have kept themselves "unspotted from the world" (James 1:27).

The Inter-ecclesial Advisory Committee, on behalf of the following South Australian ecclesias:

Blackwood
Salisbury
Brighton
Tea Tree Gully
Cumberland
Woodville
Enfield

(Further copies of this booklet are obtainable from The Secretary, The Christadelphian Scripture Study Service, 85 Suffolk Road, Hawthorndene, South Australia 5051.)

LET US EXAMINE OURSELVES