{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_40482/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_40482","id":"gutenberg_40482","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/40482","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Religion/Spirituality","Devotional exercises","Faith"],"text":"Transcriber's Note:\n\nItalics are indicated by _underscores_. Daily quotations from\npublished prayers, which are italicised here and in the original, have\nbeen indented.\n\nBolding is indicated by =equal signs=. Daily quotations from\nScripture, which are bolded here and in the original, have also been\nindented.\n\nSmall capitals have been rendered in upper case.\n\nInconsistencies in spelling (e.g. \"Savior\" and \"Saviour\") and in\nhyphenation have been retained.\n\nIn the two chemical formulae in Chapter 4 \"^\" is followed by a\nsuperscript and \"_\" by a subscript.\n\nMinor changes have been made to the format of biblical references; and\ncorrections made to apparent punctuation errors elsewhere in the text.\n\n\n\n\nThe Meaning of Faith\n\n\n HARRY EMERSON FOSDICK\n AUTHOR OF \"THE MANHOOD OF THE MASTER,\" \"THE MEANING OF PRAYER,\"\n \"THE CHALLENGE OF THE PRESENT CRISIS,\" ETC.\n\n ASSOCIATION PRESS\n NEW YORK: 347 MADISON AVENUE\n 1922\n\n\n COPYRIGHT, 1917, BY\n THE INTERNATIONAL COMMITTEE OF\n YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATIONS\n\nPrinted in the United States of America\n\nThe Bible Text used in this volume is taken from the American Standard\nEdition of the Revised Bible, copyright 1901, by Thomas Nelson & Sons,\nand is used by permission.\n\n\n TO\n MY MOTHER\n IN MEMORIAM\n\n\n  \"_'Tis human fortune's happiest height to be\n  A spirit melodious, lucid, poised, and whole;\n  Second in order of felicity\n  To walk with such a soul._\"\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\n\nA book on faith has been for years my hope and intention. And now it\ncomes to final form during the most terrific war men ever waged, when\nfaith is sorely tried and deeply needed. Direct discussion of the war\nhas been purposely avoided; the issues here presented are not confined\nto those which the war suggests; but many streams of thought within\nthe book flow in channels that the war has worn. Since the conflict\nhad to come, I am glad for this book's sake that it was not written\nuntil it had Europe's holocaust for a background.\n\nAgainst one misunderstanding the reader should be guarded. If anyone\napproaches these studies, expecting to find detailed and special views\nof Christian doctrine, he will be disappointed. The perplexities of\nmind and life and the affirmations of religious faith, with which\nthese studies deal, lie far beneath sectarian doctrinal controversy. I\nhave tried to make clear a foundation on which faith might build its\nthoughts of Christian truth. And while I have spoken freely of God and\nChrist and the Spirit, of the Cross and life eternal, I have not\nintended or endeavored a complete theology. I have had in mind that\nelemental matter of which Carlyle was thinking when he wrote: \"The\nthing a man does practically lay to heart, and know for certain\nconcerning his vital relations to the mysterious Universe, and his\nduty and destiny there, _that_ is in all cases the primary thing\nfor him, and creatively determines all the rest. _That_ is his\nreligion.\"\n\nAs in \"The Meaning of Prayer,\" the Scripture has been used for the\nbasis and interpretation of the daily thought. The Bible is our\nsupreme record of man's experience with faith; it recounts in terms of\nlife faith's sources and results, its successes and failures, its\nservants and its foes. And because faith is not a _tour de force_\nof intellect alone, but is an act of life, prayers have been used for\nthe expression of aroused desire and resolution.\n\nMy indebtedness to many helpers is very great. But to my friend and\ncolleague, Professor George Albert Coe, my gratitude is so definitely\ndue for his careful reading of the manuscript, that the book should\nnot go out lacking an acknowledgment.\n\n H. E. F.\n December 15, 1917.\n\n\n\n\nACKNOWLEDGMENTS\n\n\nSpecial acknowledgment is gladly made to the following: to E. P.\nDutton & Company for permission to use prayers from \"A Chain of Prayer\nAcross the Ages\" and from \"The Temple,\" by W. E. Orchard, D.D.; to the\nRev. Samuel McComb and the publishers for permission to quote from \"A\nBook of Prayers,\" Copyright, 1912, Dodd, Mead & Company; to the\nAmerican Unitarian Association for permission to draw upon \"Prayers,\"\nby Theodore Parker; to the Pilgrim Press and the author for permission\nto use selections from \"Prayers of the Social Awakening,\" by Dr.\nRauschenbusch; to the Missionary Education Movement for permission to\nmake quotations from \"Thy Kingdom Come,\" by Ralph E. Diffendorfer; to\nFleming H. Revell Co., for permission to make use of \"A Book of Public\nPrayer,\" by Henry Ward Beecher; and to the publishers of James\nMartineau's \"Prayers in the Congregation and in College,\" Longmans,\nGreen & Co.\n\nNone of the above material should be reprinted without securing\npermission.\n\n\n\n\n CONTENTS\n\n\n CHAPTER                                                          PAGE\n\n       PREFACE                                                     vii\n\n    I. FAITH AND LIFE'S ADVENTURE                                    1\n\n   II. FAITH A ROAD TO TRUTH                                        26\n\n  III. FAITH IN THE PERSONAL GOD                                    51\n\n   IV. BELIEF AND TRUST                                             77\n\n    V. FAITH'S INTELLECTUAL DIFFICULTIES                           103\n\n   VI. FAITH'S GREATEST OBSTACLE                                   129\n\n  VII. FAITH AND SCIENCE                                           158\n\n VIII. FAITH AND MOODS                                             184\n\n   IX. FAITH IN THE EARNEST GOD                                    210\n\n    X. FAITH IN CHRIST THE SAVIOR: FORGIVENESS                     237\n\n   XI. FAITH IN CHRIST THE SAVIOR: POWER                           263\n\n  XII. THE FELLOWSHIP OF FAITH                                     289\n\n       SCRIPTURE PASSAGES USED IN THE DAILY READINGS               316\n\n       SOURCES OF PRAYERS USED IN THE DAILY READINGS               317\n\n\n\n\nPUBLISHERS' NOTE\n\n\nThe complex subject of Faith has required an extended treatment, which\nhas made the present volume much longer than the author's previous\nworks. Every item of expense connected with publishing has greatly\nincreased even within the past few months, and, to the regret, alike\nof publisher and author, it has been found necessary to charge more\nfor this volume than for \"The Meaning of Prayer\" and \"The Manhood of\nthe Master.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nFaith and Life's Adventure\n\n\nDAILY READINGS\n\nDiscussion about faith generally starts with faith's _reasonableness_;\nlet us begin with faith's _inevitableness_. If it were possible\nsomehow to live without faith, the whole subject might be treated\nmerely as an affair of curious interest. But if faith is an\nunescapable necessity in every human life, then we must come to terms\nwith it, understand it, and use it as intelligently as we can. _There\nare certain basic elements in man which make it impossible to live\nwithout faith._ Let us consider these, as they are suggested in the\nEpistle to the Hebrews, which, better than any other book in the\nBible, presents faith as an unavoidable human attitude.\n\n\nFirst Week, First Day\n\n =Now faith is assurance of things hoped for, a conviction of things\n not seen.--Heb. 11:1.=\n\nAs Moffatt translates: \"Now faith means we are confident of what we\nhope for, convinced of what we do not see.\" When faith is described in\nsuch general terms, its necessity in human life is evident. Man cannot\nlive without faith, because he deals not only with a past which he may\nknow and with a present which he can see, but with a _future in whose\npossibilities he must believe_. A man can no more avoid looking ahead\nwhen he lives his life than he can when he sails his boat, and in one\ncase as in the other, his direction is determined by his thought about\nwhat lies before him, his \"assurance of things hoped for.\" Now, this\nfuture into which continually we press our way can never be a matter\nof demonstrable knowledge. We know only when we arrive, but meanwhile\nwe believe; and our knowledge of what is and has been is not more\nnecessary to our quest than our faith concerning what is yet to come.\nAs Tennyson sings of faith in \"The Ancient Sage\":\n\n  \"She sees the Best that glimmers thro' the Worst,\n  She feels the sun is hid but for a night,\n  She spies the summer thro' the winter bud,\n  She tastes the fruit before the blossom falls,\n  She hears the lark within the songless egg,\n  She finds the fountain where they wail'd 'Mirage'!\"\n\nHowever much a man may plan, therefore, to live without faith, he\ncannot do it. When one strips himself of all convictions about the\nfuture he stops living altogether, and active, eager, vigorous manhood\nis always proportionate to the scope and power of reasonable faith.\nThe great spirits of the race have had the aspiring, progressive\nquality which the Scripture celebrates:\n\n =These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but\n having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having confessed\n that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For they that say\n such things make it manifest that they are seeking after a country of\n their own. And if indeed they had been mindful of that country from\n which they went out, they would have had opportunity to return. But\n now they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly: wherefore God\n is not ashamed of them, to be called their God; for he hath prepared\n for them a city.--Heb. 11:13-16.=\n\n _Almighty God, let Thy Spirit breathe upon us to quicken in us all\n humility, all holy desire, all living faith in Thee. When we meditate\n on the Eternal, we dare not think any manner of similitude; yet Thou\n art most real to us in the worship of the heart. When in the strife\n against sin we receive grace to help us in our time of need, then art\n Thou the Eternal Rock of our salvation. When amid our perplexities\n and searchings, the way of duty is made clear, then art Thou our\n Everlasting Light. When amid the storms of life we find peace and\n rest through submission, then art Thou the assured Refuge of our\n souls. So do Thou manifest Thyself unto us, O God!_\n\n _Our Heavenly Father, we give Thee humble and hearty thanks for all\n the sacred traditions which have come down to us from the past--for\n the glorious memories of ancient days, concerning that Divine light\n in which men have been conscious of Thy presence and assured of Thy\n grace. But we would not content ourselves with memories. O Thou who\n art not the God of the dead, but the God of the living, manifest\n Thyself unto us in a present communion. Reveal Thyself unto us in the\n tokens of this passing time. Give us for ourselves to feel the\n authority of Thy law: give us for ourselves to realize the exceeding\n sinfulness of sin: give us for ourselves to understand the way of\n salvation through sacrifice. Teach us, by the Spirit of Christ, the\n sacredness of common duties, the holiness of the ties that bind us to\n our kind, the divinity of the still small voice within that doth ever\n urge us in the way of righteousness. So shall our hearts be renewed\n by faith; so shall we ever live in God. Amen._--John Hunter.\n\n\nFirst Week, Second Day\n\n =By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed to go out unto a place\n which he was to receive for an inheritance; and he went out, not\n knowing whither he went. By faith he became a sojourner in the land\n of promise, as in a land not his own, dwelling in tents, with Isaac\n and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise: for he looked for\n the city which hath the foundations, whose builder and maker is\n God.--Heb. 11:8-10.=\n\n =By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son\n of Pharaoh's daughter; choosing rather to share ill treatment with\n the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season;\n accounting the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures\n of Egypt: for he looked unto the recompense of reward. By faith he\n forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king: for he endured, as\n seeing him who is invisible.--Heb. 11:24-27.=\n\nMan cannot live without faith because his relationship with the future\nis an affair not alone of thought but also of action; _life is a\ncontinuous adventure into the unknown_. Abraham and Moses pushing out\ninto experiences whose issue they could not foresee are typical of all\ngreat lives that have adventured for God. \"By faith\" is the first word\nnecessary in every life like Luther's and Wesley's and Carey's. By\nfaith John Bright, when his reforms were hard bestead, said: \"If we\ncan't win as fast as we wish, we know that our opponents can't in the\nlong run win at all.\" By faith Gladstone, when the Liberal cause was\ndefeated, rose undaunted in Parliament, and said, \"I appeal to time!\"\nand by faith every one of us must undertake each plain day's work, if\nwe are to do it well. Robert Louis Stevenson said that life is \"an\naffair of cavalry,\" \"a thing to be dashingly used and cheerfully\nhazarded.\" But so to deal with life demands faith. The more one sees\nwhat venturesome risks he takes every day, what labor and sacrifice he\ninvests in hope of a worthy outcome, with what great causes he falls\nin love until at his best he is willing for their sakes to hazard\nfortune and happiness and life itself, the more he sees that the soul\nof robust and serviceable character is faith.\n\n _O God, who hast encompassed us with so much that is dark and\n perplexing, and yet hast set within us light enough to walk by;\n enable us to trust what Thou hast given as sufficient for us, and\n steadfastly refuse to follow aught else; lest the light that is in us\n become as darkness and we wander from the way. May we be loyal to all\n the truth we know, and seek to discharge those duties which lay their\n commission on our conscience; so that we may come at length to\n perfect light in Thee, and find our wills in harmony with Thine._\n\n _Since Thou hast planted our feet in a world so full of chance and\n change that we know not what a day may bring forth, and hast\n curtained every day with night and rounded our little lives with\n sleep; grant that we may use with diligence our appointed span of\n time, working while it is called today, since the night cometh when\n no man can work; having our loins girt and our lamps alight, lest the\n cry at midnight find us sleeping and the door fast shut._\n\n _Since we are so feeble, faint, and foolish, leave us not to our own\n devices, not even when we pray Thee to; nor suffer us for any care to\n Thee or for any pain to us to walk our own unheeding way. Plant\n thorns about our feet, touch our hearts with fear, give us no rest\n apart from Thee, lest we lose our way and miss the happy gate.\n Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nFirst Week, Third Day\n\nMan cannot live without faith because the prime requisite in life's\nadventure is _courage_, and the sustenance of courage is faith.\n\n =And what shall I more say? for the time will fail me if I tell of\n Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah; of David and Samuel and the\n prophets: who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness,\n obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the power of\n fire, escaped the edge of the sword, from weakness were made strong,\n waxed mighty in war, turned to flight armies of aliens. Women\n received their dead by a resurrection: and others were tortured, not\n accepting their deliverance; that they might obtain a better\n resurrection: and others had trial of mockings and scourgings, yea,\n moreover of bonds and imprisonment: they were stoned, they were sawn\n asunder, they were tempted, they were slain with the sword: they went\n about in sheep-skins, in goat-skins; being destitute, afflicted,\n ill-treated (of whom the world was not worthy), wandering in deserts\n and mountains and caves, and the holes of the earth. And these all,\n having had witness borne to them through their faith, received not\n the promise, God having provided some better thing concerning us,\n that apart from us they should not be made perfect.--Heb. 11:32-40.=\n\nWhen in comparison with men and women of such admirable spirit, one\nthinks of weak personalities, that ravel out at the first strain, he\nsees that the difference lies in courage. _When a man loses heart he\nloses everything._ Now to keep one's heart in the midst of life's\nstress and to maintain an undiscourageable front in the face of its\ndifficulties is not an achievement which springs from anything that a\nlaboratory can demonstrate or that logic can confirm. It is an\nachievement of faith,\n\n  \"The virtue to exist by faith\n  As soldiers live by courage.\"\n\nConsider this account of Havelock, the great English general: \"As he\nsat at dinner with his son on the evening of the 17th, his mind\nappeared for the first and last time to be affected with gloomy\nforebodings, as it dwelt on the probable annihilation of his brave men\nin a fruitless attempt to accomplish what was beyond their strength.\nAfter musing long in deep thought, his strong sense of duty and his\nconfidence in the justice of his cause restored the buoyancy of his\nspirit; and he exclaimed, 'If the worst comes to the worst, we can but\ndie with our swords in our hands!'\" No man altogether escapes the\nneed for such a spirit, and, as with Havelock and the Hebrew heroes,\nconfidence in someone, faith in something, is that spirit's source.\n\n _O God, who hast sent us to school in this strange life of ours, and\n hast set us tasks which test all our courage, trust, and fidelity;\n may we not spend our days complaining at circumstance or fretting at\n discipline, but give ourselves to learn of life and to profit by\n every experience. Make us strong to endure._\n\n _We pray that when trials come upon us we may not shirk the issue or\n lose our faith in Thy goodness, but committing our souls unto Thee\n who knowest the way that we take, come forth as gold tried in the\n fire._\n\n _Grant by Thy grace that we may not be found wanting in the hour of\n crisis. When the battle is set, may we know on which side we ought to\n be, and when the day goes hard, cowards steal from the field, and\n heroes fall around the standard, may our place be found where the\n fight is fiercest. If we faint, may we not be faithless; if we fall,\n may it be while facing the foe. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nFirst Week, Fourth Day\n\nMan cannot live without faith, because the adventure of life demands\nnot only courage to achieve but _patience to endure and wait_,\nand all untroubled patience is founded on faith. When the writer to\nthe Hebrews speaks of those who \"through faith and patience inherit\nthe promises\" (Heb. 6:12), he joins two things that in experience no\nman successfully can separate. By as much as we need patience, we need\nfaith.\n\n =But call to remembrance the former days, in which, after ye were\n enlightened, ye endured a great conflict of sufferings; partly, being\n made a gazingstock both by reproaches and afflictions; and partly,\n becoming partakers with them that were so used. For ye both had\n compassion on them that were in bonds, and took joyfully the spoiling\n of your possessions, knowing that ye have for yourselves a better\n possession and an abiding one. Cast not away therefore your boldness,\n which hath great recompense of reward. For ye have need of patience,\n that, having done the will of God, ye may receive the promise.--Heb.\n 10:32-36.=\n\nThe most difficult business in the world is _waiting_. There are\ntimes in every life when action, however laborious and sacrificial,\nwould be an unspeakable relief; but to sit still because necessity\nconstrains us, endeavoring to live out the admonition of the psalmist,\n\"Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for him,\" is prodigiously\ndifficult. _No one can do it without some kind of faith._ \"In\nyour patience,\" said Jesus, \"ye shall win your souls\" (Luke 21:19),\nbut such an achievement is no affair of logic or scientific\ndemonstration; it is a venture of triumphant faith. The great\nbelievers have been the unwearied waiters; faith meant to them not\ncontroversial opinion, but sustaining power. As another has phrased\nit, \"Our faculties of belief were not primarily given to us to make\northodoxies and heresies withal; they were given us to _live_ by.\"\n\n _We beseech of Thee, O Lord our God, that Thou wilt grant to every\n one of us in Thy presence, this morning, the special mercies which he\n needs--strength where weakness prevails, and patience where courage\n has failed. Grant, we pray Thee, that those who need long-suffering\n may find themselves strangely upborne and sustained. Grant that those\n who wander in doubt and darkness may feel distilling upon their soul\n the sweet influence of faith. Grant that those who are heart-weary,\n and sick from hope deferred, may find the God of all salvation.\n Confirm goodness in those that are seeking it. Restore, we pray Thee,\n those who have wandered from the path of rectitude. Give every one\n honesty. May all transgressors of Thy law return to the Shepherd and\n Bishop of their souls with confession of sin, and earnest and sincere\n repentance. Amen._--Henry Ward Beecher.\n\n\nFirst Week, Fifth Day\n\nMan cannot live without faith because he exists in a universe, the\ncomplete explanation of which is forever beyond his grasp, so that\n_whatever he thinks about the total meaning of creation is\nfundamentally faith_.\n\n =By faith we understand that the worlds have been framed by the word\n of God, so that what is seen hath not been made out of things which\n appear.--Heb. 11:3.=\n\nNot only is this true, but if we think that there is _no_ God,\nthat also is faith; and if we hold that the basic reality is physical\natoms, that is faith; and whatever anybody believes about the origin\nand destiny of life is faith. When Haeckel says that the creator is\n\"Cosmic Ether,\" and when John says that \"God is love,\" they both are\nmaking a leap of faith. This does not mean that faith can dispense\nwith reason. In these studies we shall set ourselves to marshal the\nample arguments that support man's faith in God. But when the utmost\nthat argument can do has been achieved, the finite mind, dealing with\nthe infinite reality, is forced to a sally of faith, a venture of\nconfidence in Goodness at the heart of the world, not opposed to\nreason but surpassing reason. _Faith always sees more with her eye\nthan logic can reach with her hand._ And especially when men come\nto the highest thought of life's meaning and believe in the Christian\nGod, they face the fact which the writer to the Hebrews presents:\n\n =And without faith it is impossible to be well-pleasing unto him; for\n he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a\n rewarder of them that seek after him.--Heb. 11:6.=\n\nIndeed, in all stout conviction about the meaning of life there is a\ncertain defiant note, refusing to surrender to small objections. Cried\nStevenson, \"I believe in an ultimate decency of things; ay, and if I\nwoke in hell, should still believe it!\"\n\n _O Thou Infinite Spirit, who needest no words for man to hold his\n converse with Thee, we would enter into Thy presence, we would\n reverence Thy power, we would worship Thy wisdom, we would adore Thy\n justice, we would be gladdened by Thy love, and blessed by our\n communion with Thee. We know that Thou needest no sacrifice at our\n hands, nor any offering at our lips; yet we live in Thy world, we\n taste Thy bounty, we breathe Thine air, and Thy power sustains us,\n Thy justice guides, Thy goodness preserves, and Thy love blesses us\n forever and ever. O Lord, we cannot fail to praise Thee, though we\n cannot praise Thee as we would. We bow our faces down before Thee\n with humble hearts, and in Thy presence would warm our spirits for a\n while, that the better we may be prepared for the duties of life, to\n endure its trials, to bear its crosses, and to triumph in its lasting\n joys...._\n\n _In times of darkness, when men fail before Thee, in days when men of\n high degree are a lie, and those of low degree are a vanity, teach\n us, O Lord, to be true before Thee, not a vanity, but soberness and\n manliness; and may we keep still our faith shining in the midst of\n darkness, the beacon-light to guide us over stormy seas to a home and\n haven at last. Father, give us strength for our daily duty, patience\n for our constant or unaccustomed cross, and in every time of trial\n give us the hope that sustains, the faith that wins the victory and\n obtains satisfaction and fulness of joy. Amen._--Theodore Parker.\n\n\nFirst Week, Sixth Day\n\nMan cannot live, lacking faith, because _without it life's richest\nexperiences go unappropriated_. Opportunities for friendship lie\nall about us, but only by trustful self-giving can they be enjoyed;\nchances to serve good causes continually beckon us, but one must have\nfaith to try; superior minds offer us their treasures, but to avail\noneself of instruction from another involves teachable humility. A man\nwithout capacity to let himself go out to other men in friendly trust\nor to welcome new illumination on his thought with grateful faith\nwould be shut out from the priceless treasures of humanity. A certain\ntrustful openheartedness, a willingness to venture in personal\nrelationship and in attempts at service is essential to a rich and\nfruitful life. And what is true of man's relationship with man is true\nof man's relationship with God. So Prof. William James, of Harvard,\nstates the case: \"Just as a man who in a company of gentlemen made no\nadvances, asked a warrant for every concession, and believed no one's\nword without proof, would cut himself off by such churlishness from\nall the social rewards that a more trusting spirit would earn--so\nhere, one who should shut himself up in snarling logicality and try to\nmake the gods extort his recognition willy-nilly, or not get it at\nall, might cut himself off forever from his only opportunity of making\nthe gods' acquaintance.\" _Wherever in life great spiritual values\nawait man's appropriation, only faith can appropriate them._\n\n =Let us fear therefore, lest haply, a promise being left of entering\n into his rest, any one of you should seem to have come short of it.\n For indeed we have had good tidings preached unto us, even as also\n they: but the word of hearing did not profit them, because it was not\n united by faith with them that heard!--Heb. 4:1, 2.=\n\n _O Infinite Source of life and health and joy! the very thought of\n Thee is so wonderful that in this thought we would rest and be still.\n Thou art Beauty and Grace and Truth and Power. Thou art the light of\n every heart that sees Thee, the life of every soul that loves Thee,\n the strength of every mind that seeks Thee. From our narrow and\n bounded world we would pass into Thy greater world. From our petty\n and miserable selves we would escape to Thee, to find in Thee the\n power and the freedom of a larger life.... We recognize Thee in all\n the deeper experiences of the soul. When the conscience utters its\n warning voice, when the heart is tender and we forgive those who have\n wronged us in word or deed, when we feel ourselves upborne above time\n and place, and know ourselves citizens of Thy everlasting Kingdom, we\n realize, O Lord, that these things, while they are in us, are not of\n us. They are Thine, the work of Thy Spirit brooding upon our souls._\n\n _Spirit of Holiness and Peace! Search all our motives; try the secret\n places of our souls; set in the light any evil that may lurk within,\n and lead us in the way everlasting. Amen._--Samuel McComb.\n\n\nFirst Week, Seventh Day\n\nMan cannot live without faith, because in life's adventure the central\nproblem is _building character_. Now, character is not a product of\nlogic, but of faith in ideals and of sacrificial devotion to them.\nWhat is becomes only the starting point of a campaign for what _ought\nto be_, and in the prosecution of that campaign what ought to be must\nbe believed in with passionate intensity. Faith of some sort,\ntherefore, is necessarily the dynamic of character; only limp and\nragged living is possible without faith; and the greatest characters\nare girded by the most ample faith in God and goodness. The writer to\nthe Hebrews saw this intimate relationship between quality of faith\nand quality of life, and challenged his readers to judge the\nChristian faith by its consequence in character.\n\n =Remember them that had the rule over you, men that spake unto you\n the word of God; and considering the issue of their life, imitate\n their faith.--Heb. 13:7.=\n\nSuch are the basic elements in human experience that make faith\nnecessary: we deal with a future, about which we must think, with\nreference to which we must act, and adventuring into which we need\ncourage and patience; this venture of life takes place in a world the\nmeaning of which can be grasped only by a leap of faith; and in this\nventure the best treasures of the spirit are obtainable only through\nopenheartedness, and character is possible only to men of resolute\nconviction. Plainly the subject to whose study we are setting\nourselves is no affair of theoretical interest alone; it affects the\ndeepest issues of life. No words could better summarize this vital\nidea of faith which the Epistle to the Hebrews presents than Hartley\nColeridge's:\n\n  \"Think not the faith by which the just shall live\n  Is a dead creed, a map correct of heaven,\n  Far less a feeling, fond and fugitive,\n  A thoughtless gift, withdrawn as soon as given.\n  It is an affirmation and an act\n  That bids eternal truth be present fact.\"\n\n _How great are the mercies, O Lord our God, which Thou hast prepared\n for all that put their trust in Thee!... Thou hast comfort for those\n that are in affliction; Thou hast strength for those that are weak;\n ... Thou hast all blessings that are needed, and standest ready to be\n all things to all, and in all. And yet, with bread enough and to\n spare, with raiment abundant, and with all medicine, how many are\n there that go hungry, and naked, and sick, and destitute of all\n things! We desire, O Lord, that Thou wilt, to all Thine other\n mercies, add that gift by which we shall trust in Thee--faith that\n works by love; faith that abides with us; faith that transforms\n material things, and gives them to us in their spiritual meanings;\n faith that illumines the world by a light that never sets, that\n shines brighter than the day, and that clears the night quite out of\n our experience. This is the portion that Thou hast provided for thy\n people. We beseech of Thee, grant us this faith, that shall give us\n victory over the world and over ourselves; that shall make us valiant\n in all temptation and bring us off conquerors and more than\n conquerors through Him that loved us. Amen._--Henry Ward Beecher.\n\n\nCOMMENT FOR THE WEEK\n\nI\n\nWhen Donald Hankey, who died in the trenches in the Great War, said\nthat \"True religion is betting one's life that there is a God,\" he not\nonly gave expression to his own virile Christianity, but he gave a\ngood description of all effective faith whatsoever. Faith is holding\nreasonable convictions, in realms beyond the reach of final\ndemonstration, and, as well, it is thrusting out one's life upon those\nconvictions as though they were surely true. _Faith is vision plus\nvalor._\n\nOur study may well begin by recognizing that, as it is exercised in\nthe religious life, such faith is the supreme use of an attitude which\nwe are employing in every other realm. No man can live without vision\nto see as true what as yet he cannot prove, or without valor to act on\nthe basis of his insight. Our vocabulary in ordinary relationships,\nquite as much as in religion, is full of words involving faith. I\nbelieve, I feel sure, I am confident, I venture--such phrases express\nour common attitudes in work and thought. Each day we act on\nreasonable probabilities, hold convictions not yet verified, take\nrisks whose outcome we cannot know, and trust people whom we have\nbarely met. We may pride ourselves that our twentieth century's life\nis being built on scientifically demonstrable knowledge, but a swift\nreview of any day's experience shows how indispensable is another\nattitude, without which our verifiable knowledge would be an unused\ninstrument. In order to _live_ we must have insight and daring.\nIt is not alone the just who live by faith; lacking it, there is no\nreal life anywhere.\n\nTo be sure, we may not leap from this general necessity of faith to\nthe conclusion that therefore our religious beliefs are justified.\nMany men use faith in business and in social life who cannot find\ntheir way to convictions about God. But our desire to understand\nfaith's meaning is quickened when we see how indispensable a place it\nholds, how tremendous an influence it wields, whether it be\nreligiously applied or not. All sorts of human enterprise bear witness\nto its unescapable necessity. Haeckel, the biologist, describing\nscience's method, says: \"Scientific faith fills the gaps in our\nknowledge of natural laws with temporary hypotheses.\" Lincoln, the\nstatesman, entreating the people, cries: \"Let us have faith that right\nmakes might and in that faith let us to the end dare to do our duty.\"\nStevenson, the invalid, trying with fortitude to bear his trial,\nwrites: \"Whether on the first of January or the thirty-first of\nDecember, faith is a good word to end on.\" And the Master states the\nsubstance of religion in a single phrase: \"Have faith in God\" (Mark\n11:22). Scientific procedure, social welfare, personal quality,\nreligion--the applications of our subject are as wide as life. Vision\nand valor are the dynamic forces in all achievement, intellectual as\nwell as moral, and as for man's spiritual values and satisfactions,\n\"It is faith in something,\" as Oliver Wendell Holmes put it, \"which\nmakes life worth living.\"\n\n\nII\n\nOne major reason for this necessary place of faith in our experience\nis clear. _Life is an adventure and adventure always demands insight\nand daring._ That \"Chinese\" Gordon, on his hazardous expedition into\nthe Soudan, should be thrown back on undiscourageable faith in\nhimself, in the justice of his cause, in the bravery of his men, and\nin God; that he should even speak of praying his boats up the Nile,\nseems to us natural; for some kind of faith is obviously necessary to\nany great adventure. But men often forget that all ordinary living is\nessentially adventurous and that by this fact the need of faith is\nwoven into the texture of every human life. It is an amazing adventure\nto be born upon this wandering island in the sky and it is an\nadventure to leave it when death calls. To go to school, to make\nfriends, to marry, to rear children, to face through life the swift\nchanges of circumstance that no man can certainly predict an hour\nahead, these are all adventures. Each new day is an hitherto unvisited\ncountry, which we enter, like Abraham leaving Ur for a strange land,\n\"not knowing whither he went\" (Heb. 11:8), and every New Year we begin\na tour of exploration into a twelvemonth where no man's foot has ever\nwalked before. If we all love tales of pioneers, it is because from\nthe time we are weaned to the time we die, life is pioneering. Of\ncourse we cannot live by verifiable knowledge only. Imagine men,\nequipped with nothing but powers of logical demonstration, starting on\nsuch an enterprise as the title of Sebastian Cabot's joint stock\ncompany suggests: \"Merchants Adventurers of England for the discovery\nof lands, territories, isles and seignories, unknown.\"\n\nIndeed no knowledge of the sort that our scientific inductions can\nachieve ever will take from life this adventurous element. Scientific\nknowledge in these latter decades has grown incalculably; yet for all\nthat, every child's life is a hazardous experiment, every boy choosing\na calling takes his chances, every friendship is a risky exploration\nin the province of personality, and all devotion to moral causes is\njust as much a venturesome staking of life on insight and hope as it\nwas when Garrison attacked slavery or Livingstone landed in Africa. To\none who had acquired not only all extant but all possible knowledge,\nas truly as to any man who ever lived, life would be full of hazard\nstill. He could not certainly know in advance the outcome of a single\nimportant decision of his life. He could not at any moment tell in\nwhat new, strange, challenging, or terrific situation the next hour\nmight find him. With all his science, he must face each day, as Paul\nfaced his journey to Rome, \"not knowing the things that shall befall\nme there\" (Acts 20:22).\n\nThe reason for this is obvious. Our systematized knowledge is the\narrangement under laws of the experiences which we have already had.\nIt furnishes invaluable aid in guiding the experiments and\nexplorations which life continuously forces on us. In every\nenterprise, however, we must use not only legs to stand on, but\ntentacles as well with which to feel our way forward--intuitions,\ninsights, hopes, unverified convictions, faith. We project our life\nforward as we build a cantilever bridge. Part of the structure is\nsolidly bolted and thoroughly articulated in a system; but ever beyond\nthis established portion we audaciously thrust out new beginnings in\neager expectation that from the other side something will come to meet\nthem. Without this no progress ever would be possible.\n\nEvery province of life illustrates this necessity of adventure. In\n_science_, the established body of facts and laws is only the\ncivilized community of knowledge from whose frontiers new guesses and\nintuitions start. Says Sir Oliver Lodge about the great Newton: \"He\nhad an extraordinary faculty for guessing correctly, sometimes with no\napparent data--as for instance, his intuition that the mean density of\nthe earth was probably between five and six times that of water, while\nwe now know it is really about five and one half.\" In _personal\ncharacter_, our habits are basic, but our ideals in which, despite\nourselves, we must believe, are pioneers that push out into new\nterritory and call our habits after them to conquer the promised land.\nIn _social advance_, some Edmund Burke, statesman of the first\nmagnitude, basing his judgment on the established experience of the\nrace, can call slavery an incurable evil and say that there is not the\nslightest hope that trade in slaves can be stopped; and yet within\neighty-two years the race can feel its way forward to Lincoln's\nEmancipation Proclamation. As for _daily business_, adventurous daring\nis there the very nerve of enterprise. Says a modern newspaper man:\n\"There are plenty of people to do the possible; you can hire them at\nforty dollars a month. The prizes are for those who perform the\nimpossible. If a thing can be done, experience and skill can do it; if\na thing cannot be done, only faith can do it.\" Great in human life is\nthis adventurous element, and, therefore, great in human life is the\nnecessity of faith. To chasten and discipline, to make reasonable and\nstable the faiths by which we live is a problem unsurpassed in\nimportance for every man.\n\n\nIII\n\nOne result of special interest follows from this truth. It is commonly\nsuspected that as mankind advances, the function of faith proportionately\nshrinks. It is even supposed that the place of faith in human life has\nsensibly diminished with our growing knowledge, and that Matthew\nArnold told the truth:\n\n  \"The sea of faith\n  Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore\n  Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furl'd.\n  But now I only hear\n  Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,\n  Retreating, to the breath\n  Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear\n  And naked shingles of the world.\"\n\nAccordingly by custom we call the medi\u00e6val centuries the \"Age of\nFaith.\" But even a cursory comparison between the medi\u00e6val people and\nourselves reveals that among the many differences that distinguish us\nfrom them, none is more marked than the diversity and range of our\nfaiths. One considers in surprise the things which they did not\nbelieve. That the world would ever grow much better, that social\nabuses like political tyranny and slavery could be radically changed,\nthat man could ever master nature by his inventions until her mighty\nforces were his servants, that the whole race could be reached for\nChrist, that war could be abolished and human brotherhood in some fair\ndegree established, that common men could be trusted with responsibility\nfor their own government or with freedom to worship God according to\nthe dictates of their own consciences--none of these things did the\nmedi\u00e6val folk believe. One of the most distinguishing characteristics\nof the so-called \"Age of Faith\" was its lack of faith. It lived in a\nstatic world; it was poor in possibilities except in heaven; it\npitiably lacked those most certain signs of vital faith, the open mind\neager for new truth and the ardent, vigorous life seeking new\nconquests. In comparison with such an age our generation's faiths are\nrich and manifold. To call our time an \"Age of Doubt\" because of its\nfree spirit of critical inquiry, is seriously to misunderstand its\nmajor drift. Bunyan's Pilgrim found Doubting Castle kept by Giant\nDespair and his wife Diffidence and in any Doubting Castle these two\nalways dwell. But who, considering our generation's life as a whole,\nwould call it diffident or desperate? It is rather robust and\nconfident; its social faiths, at least, are unprecedented in their\nsweep and certainty. Even the Great War is the occasion of such\norganized faith in a federated and fraternal world as mankind has\nnever entertained before.\n\nThe truth is that with the progress of the race the adventure of life\nis elevated and enlarged, and in consequence faith grows not less but\nmore necessary. _The faiths of a savage are meager compared with a\nmodern man's._ The Australian bushman never dreams of laboring for\nsocial ideals even a few years ahead. What can he know of those superb\nfaiths in economic justice and international brotherhood, which even\nin the face of overwhelming difficulty, master the best of modern men?\nThe primitive mind was not curious enough to wonder whether the sun\nthat rises in the morning was the same that set the night before. What\ncould such a mind understand of modern science's faith in the\nuniversal regularity of law? Put a Moro head hunter beside Mr. Edison,\nand see how incalculable the difference between them, not simply in\ntheir knowledge, but in their faith as to what it is possible for\nhumanity to do with nature! Or put a fetish worshipper from Africa\nbeside Phillips Brooks and compare the faith of the one in his idol\nwith the faith of the other in God. Faith does not dwindle as wisdom\ngrows; vision and valor are not less important. _The difference\nbetween the twentieth century man and the savage is quite as much in\nthe scope and quality of their faith as in the range and certainty of\ntheir knowledge._\n\nFaith, therefore is not a transient element in human life, to be\nevicted by growing science. For whatever life may _know_, life\n_is_ adventure; and as the adventure widens its horizons, the\ndemand for faith is correspondingly increased. If one tries to imagine\nthe world with all faith gone--knowledge supposedly having usurped its\nplace--he must conceive a world where no conscious life and effort\nremain at all. Take trust in testimony away from courts of law, and\nunsure experiments from the physician's practice; refuse the teacher\nhis confidence in growing minds and the business man his right to\nventures that involve uncertainty; abstract from civic reforms all\nfaith in a better future, from science all unproved postulates, from\nsociety all mutual trust and from religion all belief in the Unseen,\nand life would become an \"inane sand heap.\" A man who tries to live\nwithout faith will die of inertia. A society that makes the attempt\nwill be paralyzed within an hour. The question is not whether or no we\nshall live by faith. The question is rather--By what faiths shall we\nlive? What range and depth and quality shall they have? How reasonable\nand how assured shall they be?\n\n\nIV\n\nAmong all the faiths which mankind has cherished and by which it has\nbeen helped in life's adventure, none have been more universally and\nmore passionately held than those associated with religion. In the\ndaring experiment of living, men naturally have sought by faith\ninterpretation not only of life's details but of life itself--its\norigin, its meaning, and its destiny. Australian bushmen, unable to\ncount above four on their fingers, have been heard discussing in their\nhuts at night whence they came, whither they go, and who the gods are\nanyway. And when one turns to modern manhood in its finest exhibitions\nof intelligence and character, he sees that Professor Ladd, of Yale,\nspeaks truly: \"The call of the world of men today, which is most\ninsistent and most intense, if not most loud and clamorous, is the\ncall for a rehabilitation of religious faith.\"\n\nFor it does make a prodigious difference to the spirit of our\nadventure in this world, whether we think that God is good or on the\nother hand see the universe as Carlyle's terrific figure pictures\nit--\"one huge, dead, immeasurable Steam-engine, rolling on, in its\ndead indifference, to grind me limb from limb.\" It does make a\ndifference of quite incalculable magnitude whether we think that our\nminds and characters are an evanescent product of finely wrought\nmatter which alone is real and permanent, or on the contrary with John\nbelieve that \"Now are we children of God and it is not yet made\nmanifest what we shall be\" (I John 3:2).\n\nHow great a difference in life's adventure religious faith does make\nis better set forth by concrete example than by abstract argument. On\nthe one side, how radiant the spirit of the venture as the New\nTestament depicts it! The stern, appealing love of God behind life,\nhis good purpose through it, his victory ahead of it, and man a fellow\nworker, called into an unfinished world to bear a hand with God in its\ncompletion--here is a game that indeed is worth the candle. On the\nother side is Bertrand Russell's candid disclosure of the consequences\nof his own scepticism: \"Brief and powerless is man's life; on him and\nall his race the slow sure doom falls pitiless and dark. Blind to good\nand evil, reckless of destruction, omnipotent matter rolls on its\nrelentless way; for Man condemned today to lose his dearest, tomorrow\nhimself to pass through the gate of darkness, it remains only to\ncherish, ere yet the blow falls, the lofty thoughts that ennoble his\nlittle day--proudly defiant of the irresistible forces that tolerate\nfor a moment his knowledge and his condemnation, to sustain alone, a\nweary but unyielding Atlas, the world that his own ideals have\nfashioned despite the trampling march of unconscious power.\"\n\nMan's life, interpreted and motived by religious faith, is glorious,\nbut shorn of faith's interpretations life loses its highest meaning\nand its noblest hopes. Let us make this statement's truth convincing\nin detail.\n\n_When faith in God goes, man the thinker loses his greatest\nthought._ Man's mind has ranged the universe, has woven atoms and\nstars into a texture of law; his conquering thoughts ride out into\nevery unknown province of which they hear. But among all the ideas on\nwhich the mind of man has taken hold, incomparably the greatest is the\nidea of God. In sheer weight and range no other thought of man\ncompares with that. Amid the crash of stars, the reign of law, the\nvicissitudes of human history, and the griefs that drive their\nploughshares into human hearts, to gather up all existence into\nspiritual unity and to believe in God, is the sublimest venture of the\nhuman mind.\n\n_When faith in God goes, man the worker loses his greatest\nmotive._ Man masters nature until the forces that used to scare him\nnow obey; in society he labors tirelessly that his children may have a\nbetter world. Wars come, destroying the achievements of ages; yet when\nwar is over, man rebuilds his cities, recreates his commerce, dreams\nagain his human brotherhoods, and toils on. Many motives, deep and\nshallow, fine and coarse, have sustained him in this tireless work,\nbut when one seeks the fountain of profoundest hope in mankind's toil\nhe finds it in religious faith. To believe that we do not stand alone,\nhopelessly pitted against the dead apathy of cosmic forces which in\nthe end will crush us in some solar wreck and bring our work to\nnaught; to believe that we are fellow-laborers with God, our human\npurposes comprehended in a Purpose, God behind us, within us, ahead of\nus--this incomparably has been the master-faith in man's greatest work.\n\n_When faith in God goes, man the sinner loses his strongest help._ For\nman is a sinner. He tears his spiritual heritage to shreds in\nlicentiousness and drink. He wallows in vice, wins by cruelty,\nviolates love, is treacherous to trust. His sins clothe the world in\nlamentation. Yet in him is a protest that he cannot stifle. He is the\nonly creature whom we know whose nature is divided against itself. He\nhates his sin even while he commits it. He repents, tries again,\nfalls, rises, stumbles on--and in all his best hours cries out for\nsaviorhood. No message short of religion has ever met man's need in\nthis estate. That God himself is pledged to the victory of\nrighteousness in men and in the world, that he cares, forgives, enters\ninto man's struggle with transforming power, and crowns the long\nendeavor with triumphant character--such faith alone has been great\nenough to meet the needs of man the sinner.\n\n_When faith in God goes, man the sufferer loses his securest\nrefuge._ One who has walked with families through long illnesses\nwhere desperate prayers rise like a fountain day and night, who has\nseen strong men break down in health or lose the fortune of a\nlifetime, who has stood at children's graves and heard mothers cry,\n\"How empty are my arms!\" does not need long explication of life's\ntragic suffering. The staggering blows shatter the hopes of good and\nbad alike. Whether one's house be built on rock or sand, on both, as\nJesus said, the rains descend and the floods come and the winds blow.\nIn this experience of crushing trouble nothing but religious faith has\nbeen able to save men from despair or from stoical endurance of their\nfate. To face the loom of life and hopefully to lay oneself upon it,\nas though the dark threads were as necessary in the pattern as the\nlight ones are, we must believe that there is a purpose running\nthrough the stern, forbidding process. What men have needed most of\nall in suffering, is not to know the explanation, but _to know that\nthere is an explanation_. And religious faith alone gives confidence\nthat human tragedy is not the meaningless sport of physical forces,\nmaking our life what Voltaire called it, \"a bad joke,\" but is rather a\nschool of discipline, the explanation of whose mysteries is in the\nheart of God. No one who has lived deeply can ever call such faith a\n\"matter of words and names.\" To multitudes it is a matter of life and\ndeath.\n\n_When faith in God goes, man the lover loses his fairest vision._ When\nwe say our worst about mankind, this redeeming truth remains, that\neach of us has some one for whose sake he willingly would die. The\nvery love lyrics of the race are proof of this human quality, from\nhomely folk songs like \"John Anderson, My Jo, John\" to great poetry\nlike Mrs. Browning's sonnets. We call them secular, but they are\nineffably sacred. And when one seeks the faith that has made these\nloves of men radiant with an illumination which man alone cannot\ncreate, he finds it in religion. Love is not a transient fragrance\nfrom matter finely organized--so men have dared believe; love is of\nkin with the Eternal, has there its source and ground and destiny;\nlove is the very substance of reality. \"God is love, and he that\nabideth in love, abideth in God, and God abideth in him\" (I John\n4:16). Man the lover is bereft of his finest insight and love's inner\nglory has departed, when that faith has gone.\n\n_When faith in God goes, man the mortal loses his only hope._\nMan's nature, like a lighthouse, combines two elements. At the\nfoundation of the beacon all is stone; as one lifts his eyes, all is\nstone still; but at the top is something new and wonderful. It is the\nthing for which the rock was piled. Its laws are not the laws of stone\nnor are its ways the same. For while the stolid rock stands fast, this\nmiracle of light with speed incredible hurls itself out across the\nsea. Two worlds are here, the one cold and stationary, the other full\nof the marvel and mystery of fire. So man has in him a miracle which\nhe cannot explain; he \"feels that he is greater than he knows\"; and he\nnever has been able to believe that the mystery of spirit was given\nhim in vain, had no reality from which it came, and no future beyond\ndeath. The finest thing ever said of Columbus is a remark of his own\ncountryman, \"The instinct of an unknown continent burned in him.\" That\nis the secret of Columbus' greatness. All the arguments by which he\nattempted to convince the doubters were but afterthoughts of this; all\nthe labors by which he endeavored to make good his hopes were but its\nconsequence. And if we ask of man why so universally he has believed\nin life to come, the answer leaps not superficially from the mind, but\nout of the basic intuitions of man's life. We know that something is\nnow ours which ought not to die; the instinct of an unknown continent\nburns in us. But all the hopes, the motives, the horizons that\nimmortality has given man must go, if faith in God departs. In a\ngodless world man dies forever.\n\nOne, therefore, who is facing loss of faith may not regard it as a\nlight affair. To be sure, some denials of religion, even a Christian\nmust respect. Huxley, for example, at the death of his little boy,\nwanting to believe in immortality as only a father can whose son lies\ndead, yet, for all that, disbelieving, wrote to Charles Kingsley, \"I\nhave searched over the grounds of my belief, and if wife and child and\nname and fame were all to be lost to me one after another as the\npenalty, still I will not lie.\" One respects _that_. When George John\nRomanes turned his back for a while on the Christian faith, he wrote\nout of his agnosticism, \"When at times I think, as think at times I\nmust, of the appalling contrast between the hallowed glory of that\ncreed which once was mine, and the lonely mystery of existence as now\nI find it--at such times I shall ever feel it impossible to avoid the\nsharpest pang of which my nature is susceptible.\" One respects _that_.\nBut some discard religion from their life's adventure with no such\nserious understanding of the import of their denial. They are pert\ndisbelievers. They toss faith facilely aside in a light mood. Such\nfrivolous sceptics indict their own intelligence. Whoever discards\nreligious faith should appoint a day of mourning for his soul, and put\non sackcloth and ashes. He must take from his life the greatest\nthought that man the thinker ever had, the finest faith that man the\nworker ever leaned upon, the surest help that man the sinner ever\nfound, the strongest reliance that man the sufferer ever trusted in,\nthe loftiest vision that man the lover ever saw, and the only hope\nthat man the mortal ever had. So he must deny his faith in God. Before\none thus leaves himself bereft of the faith that makes life's\nadventure most worth while he well may do what Carlyle, under the\nfigure of Teufelsdr\u00f6ckh, says that he did in his time of doubt: \"In\nthe silent night-watches, still darker in his heart than over sky and\nearth, he has cast himself before the All-seeing, and with audible\nprayers cried vehemently for Light.\"\n\n\nV\n\nIf minimizing the importance of religious faith is unintelligent, so\nis avoiding some sort of decision about religious faith impossible.\nMost of those into whose hands these studies fall will grant readily\nfaith's incalculable importance. Some, however, will be not helped but\nplunged into deeper trouble by their consent. For they feel themselves\nunable to decide about a matter which they acknowledge to be the most\nimportant in the world. Asked whether they believe in God, they would\nreply with one of Victor Hugo's characters, \"Yes--No--Sometimes.\" They\ngrant that to be steadily assured of God would be an invaluable boon,\nbut for themselves, how can they balance the opposing arguments and\nfind their way to confidence? All our studies are intended for the\nhelp of such, but at the beginning one urgent truth may well be\nplainly put. However undecided they may appear, men cannot altogether\navoid decision on the main matters of religion. Life will not let\nthem. For while the mind may hold itself suspended between\nalternatives, the adventure of life goes on, and men inevitably tend\nto live either as though the Christian God were real or as though he\nwere not.\n\nSome questions allow a complete postponement of decision. As to which\nof several theories about the Northern Lights may be true, a man can\nhold his judgment in entire suspense. Life does not require from him\nany action that depends on what he thinks of the Aurora Borealis; and\nwhether a man think one thing or another, no conceivable change would\nbe the consequence in anything he said or did. But there is another\nkind of question, where, however much the mind may waver between\nopinions and may resolve on indecision, life itself compels decision.\nA man cannot really be agnostic and neutral on a question like the\nmoral law of sexual purity, for, by an irrevocable necessity, he has\nto act one way or another. He may stop thinking, but he cannot stop\nliving. With tremendous urgency the adventure of life insistently goes\non, and it never pauses for any man to make up his mind on any\nquestion. Therefore while a man may theoretically suspend his judgment\nas to the requirements of the moral law, his life will be a loud,\nconvincing advertisement to all who know him that he has vitally\ndecided. _A man can avoid making up his mind, but he cannot avoid\nmaking up his life._\n\nQuite as truly, though, it may be, not quite as obviously, religious\nquestions belong to this second class. Not all questions that are\ncalled religious belong there. With fatal pettiness religious men have\nreduced the great faiths to technicalities and some beliefs called\nreligious a man may hold or not, with utter indifference to anything\nhe is or does. But on the basic attitudes of religion such as we have\njust rehearsed, a man cannot be completely neutral, no matter how he\ntries. Bernard Shaw's remark, \"What a man believes may be ascertained\nnot from his creed, but from the assumptions on which he habitually\nacts,\" should be taken to heart by any one trying to remain\nreligiously neutral. For one cannot by any possibility avoid\n\"assumptions on which he habitually acts.\" He tends to undertake\nsocial service either as confident cooperation with God's purpose or\nas an endeavor to make one corner of an unpurposed world as decent as\npossible. He tends to follow his ideals, either as the voice of God\ncalling him upward, or as the work of natural selection, adjusting him\nto a temporary environment. He tends to face suffering either\nhopefully as a school of moral discipline, in a world presided over by\na Father, or grimly as a hardship in which there is no meaning. He\ntends to face death either as the supreme adventure, full of boundless\nhope, or as a final exit that leads nowhere. He may never consciously\nformulate his ideas on any of these matters, he may maintain an\nintellectual agnosticism, genuine and complete, but his living subtly\ninvolves the confession of some faith. \"A man's action,\" said Emerson,\n\"is only the picture-book of his creed.\" And the more thoughtful he\nis, the more he will be aware of that unescapable tendency to confess\nin his living an inward faith about life.\n\nOne practical result of this urgent truth is too frequently seen to be\ndoubtful. _Those who in religion do not decide, thereby decide\nagainst religion._ Religious faith is a positive achievement, and\nhe who does not deliberately choose it, loses it. A man who, rowing\ndown Niagara River, debates within himself whether or not he will stop\nat Buffalo, and who cannot decide, thereby has decided. His\nirresolution has not for a moment interfered with the steady flow of\nthe river, and if he but debate long enough concerning his stop at\nBuffalo, he will awake to discover that he has finally decided not to\nstop there. As much beyond the control of man's volition is the steady\nflow of life. It pauses for no man's indecision, and if one is\nirresolute about any positive, aspiring faith in any realm, his\nindecisiveness is decision of a most final sort.\n\nThis, then, is the summary of the matter. Life is a great adventure in\nwhich faith is indispensable; in this adventure faith in God presents\nthe issues of transcendent import; and on these issues life itself\ncontinuously compels decision. Our obligation is obvious--since\nwilly-nilly the decision must be made--to make it consciously, to\nreach it by reason, not by chance, by thinking, not by drifting. If a\nman is to be irreligious, let him at least know why, and not slip into\nthis estate, as most irreligious men do, by careless living and\nfrivolous thought. If a man is to be religious, let him have reason\nfor his choice; let his faith be founded not on credulity and chance,\nbut on real experience and reasonable thought. So his faith shall be\ngood not only for domestic consumption, but for export too--clear in\nhis own mind and convincing to his friends. The forms of thought shift\nwith the centuries and old situations cannot be repeated in detail,\nbut one crisis in its essential meaning is perennial: \"Elijah came\nnear unto all the people, and said, How long go ye limping between the\ntwo sides? if Jehovah be God follow him; but if Baal then follow him\"\n(I Kings 18:21).\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nFaith a Road to Truth\n\n\nDAILY READINGS\n\nMany minds are prevented from even a fair consideration of religious\nfaith by prejudices which spring, not from reasoned argument, but from\npractical experience. They are biased before argument has begun; they\n_feel_ that faith means credulity, and that religious faith in\nparticular is a surrender of reason. Before we positively present\nfaith as an indispensable means of dealing with reality in any realm,\nlet us, in the daily readings, consider some of the practical\nexperiences and attitudes that thus prejudice men against religion.\n\n\nSecond Week, First Day\n\nMany men are biased in advance by the _unwise treatment to which in\ntheir childhood they were subjected_. Paul pictures the home life of\nTimothy as ideal:\n\n =I thank God, whom I serve from my forefathers in a pure conscience,\n how unceasing is my remembrance of thee in my supplications, night\n and day longing to see thee, remembering thy tears, that I may be\n filled with joy; having been reminded of the unfeigned faith that is\n in thee; which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother\n Eunice; and, I am persuaded, in thee also.--II Tim. 1:3-5.=\n\n\"Unfeigned faith\" is often thus a family heritage, handed down by\nvital contagion. But in many homes religion is not thus beautifully\npresented to the children; it is a hard and rigorous affair of dogma\nand restraint. \"Oh, why,\" said a young professional man, whom\nProfessor Coe quotes, \"why did my parents try to equip me with a\ndoctrinal system in childhood? I supposed that the whole system must\nbe believed on pain of losing my religion altogether. And so, when I\nbegan to doubt some points, I felt obliged to throw all overboard. I\nhave found my way back to positive religion, but by what a long and\nbitter struggle!\" If, however, one has been so unfortunate as to be\nhardened in youth by unwise training, is it reasonable on that account\nforever to shut himself out from the most glorious experience of man?\nThis complaint about mistreatment in youth is often an excuse, not a\nreason for irreligion. Says Phillips Brooks: \"I have grown familiar to\nweariness with the self-excuse of men who say, 'Oh, if I had not had\nthe terrors of the law so preached to me when I was a boy, if I had\nnot been so confronted with the woes of hell and the awfulness of the\njudgment day, I should have been religious long ago.' My friends, I\nthink I never hear a meaner or a falser speech than that. Men may\nbelieve it when they say it--I suppose they do--but it is not true. It\nis unmanly, I think. It is throwing on their teaching and their\nteachers, or their fathers and their mothers, the fault which belongs\nto their own neglect, because they have never taken up the earnest\nfight with sin and sought through every obstacle for truth and God. It\nhas the essential vice of dogmatism about it, for it claims that a\ndifferent _view_ of God would have done for them that which no view of\nGod can do, that which must be done, _under any system, any teaching_,\nby humility and penitence and struggle and self-sacrifice. Without\nthese no teaching saves the soul. With these, under any teaching, the\nsoul must find its Father.\"\n\n _O Thou, who didst lay the foundations of the earth amid the singing\n of the morning stars and the joyful shouts of the sons of God, lift\n up our little life into Thy gladness. Out of Thee, as out of an\n overflowing fountain of Love, wells forth eternally a stream of\n blessing upon every creature Thou hast made. If we have thought that\n Thou didst call into being this universe in order to win praise and\n honor for Thyself, rebuke the vain fancies of our foolish minds and\n show us that Thy glory is the joy of giving. We can give Thee nothing\n of our own. All that we have is Thine. Oh, then, help us to glorify\n Thee by striving to be like Thee. Make us just and pure and good as\n Thou art. May we be partakers of the Divine Nature, so that all that\n is truly human in us may be deepened, purified, and strengthened.\n And so may we be witnesses for Thee, lights of the world, reflecting\n Thy light._\n\n _Help us to make religion a thing so beautiful that all men may be\n won to surrender to its power. Let us manifest in our lives its\n sweetness and excellency, its free and ennobling spirit. Forbid that\n we should go up and down the world with melancholy looks and dejected\n visage, lest we should repel men from entering Thy Kingdom. Rather,\n may we walk in the freedom and joy of faith, and with Thy new song in\n our mouths, so that men looking on us may learn to trust and to love\n Thee. Amen._--Samuel McComb.\n\n\nSecond Week, Second Day\n\nMany men are prejudiced against religion during their youthful\n_period of revolt against authority_. Listen to an ancient father\ntalking with his sons:\n\n =Hear, my sons, the instruction of a father,\n And attend to know understanding:\n For I give you good doctrine;\n Forsake ye not my law.\n For I was a son unto my father,\n Tender and only beloved in the sight of my mother.\n And he taught me, and said unto me:\n Let thy heart retain my words;\n Keep my commandments, and live;\n Get wisdom, get understanding;\n Forget not, neither decline from the words of my mouth;\n Forsake her not, and she will preserve thee;\n Love her, and she will keep thee.\n Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom;\n Yea, with all thy getting get understanding.\n Exalt her, and she will promote thee;\n She will bring thee to honor, when thou dost embrace her.\n She will give to thy head a chaplet of grace;\n A crown of beauty will she deliver to thee.=\n\n =--Prov. 4:1-9.=\n\nNo father can read this urgent, anxious plea without understanding the\nreason for its solicitude. Every boy comes to the time when he breaks\naway from parental authority and begins to take his life into his own\nhands. It is one of youth's great crises, and the spirit of it is\nsometimes harsh and rebellious. So Carlyle describes his own\nexperience: \"Such transitions are ever full of pain: thus the Eagle\nwhen he moults is sickly; and, to attain his new beak, must harshly\ndash-off the old one upon rocks.\" For religious faith this period of\nlife is always critical. Stevenson in his revolt, when he called\nrespectability \"the deadliest gag and wet-blanket that can be laid on\nman,\" also became, as he said, \"a youthful atheist.\" How many have\ntraveled that road and stopped in the negation! Stevenson did not\nstop, and years afterward wrote of his progress: \"Because I have\nreached Paris, I am not ashamed of having passed through Newhaven and\nDieppe.\" Surely if anyone has been \"a youthful atheist,\" it was an\nexperience to be \"passed through.\"\n\n _O God, we turn to Thee in the faith that Thou dost understand and\n art very merciful. Some of us are not sure concerning Thee; not sure\n what Thou art; not sure that Thou art at all. Yet there is something\n at work behind our minds, in times of stillness we hear it, like a\n distant song; there is something in the sky at evening-time;\n something in the face of man. We feel that round our incompleteness\n flows Thy greatness, round our restlessness Thy rest. Yet this is not\n enough._\n\n _We want a heart to speak to, a heart that understands; a friend to\n whom we can turn, a breast on which we may lean. O that we could find\n Thee! Yet could we ever think these things unless Thou hadst inspired\n us, could we ever want these things unless Thou Thyself wert very\n near?_\n\n _Some of us know full well; but we are sore afraid. We dare not yield\n ourselves to Thee, for we fear what that might mean. Our foolish\n freedom, our feeble pleasures, our fatal self-indulgence suffice to\n hold us back from Thee, though Thou art our very life, and we so sick\n and needing Thee. Our freedom has proved false, our pleasures have\n long since lost their zest, our sins, oh how we hate them!_\n\n _Come and deliver us, for we have lost all hope in ourselves.\n Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nSecond Week, Third Day\n\nSome men--often the precocious, clever ones--are biased against\nreligion because _in youth they accepted an immature philosophy of\nlife and have never changed it_. The crust forms too soon on some\nminds, and if it forms during the period of youthful revolt, they are\ndefinitely prejudiced against religious truth. The difference between\nsuch folk and the great believers is not that the believers had no\ndoubts, but that they did not fix their final thought of life until\nmore mature experience had come. They fulfilled the admonition of a\nwise father to keep up a tireless search for truth:\n\n =My son, if thou wilt receive my words,\n And lay up my commandments with thee;\n So as to incline thine ear unto wisdom,\n And apply thy heart to understanding;\n Yea, if thou cry after discernment,\n And lift up thy voice for understanding;\n If thou seek her as silver,\n And search for her as for hid treasures:\n Then shalt thou understand the fear of Jehovah,\n And find the knowledge of God.=\n\n =--Prov. 2:1-5.=\n\nMrs. Charles Kingsley, for example, says of her husband that at twenty\n\"He was full of religious doubts; and his face, with its unsatisfied,\nhungering, and at times defiant look, bore witness to the state of his\nmind.\" At twenty-one Kingsley himself wrote: \"You believe that you\nhave a sustaining Hand to guide you along that path, an Invisible\nProtection and an unerring Guide. I, alas! have no stay for my weary\nsteps, but that same abused and stupefied reason which has stumbled\nand wandered, and betrayed me a thousand times ere now, and is every\nmoment ready to faint and to give up the unequal struggle.\" If\nKingsley had framed his final philosophy then, what a loss to the\nworld of an inspiring life transfigured by Christian faith! He cried\nafter discernment, lifted up his voice for understanding, and he found\nthe knowledge of God. Many a man ought to revise in the light of\nmature experience and thought a hasty irreligious guess at life's\nmeaning which he made in youth.\n\n _O Father, we turn to Thee because we are sore vexed with our own\n thoughts. Our minds plague us with questionings we cannot answer; we\n are driven to voyage on strange seas of thought alone. Dost Thou\n disturb our minds with endless questioning, yet keep the answers\n hidden in Thy heart, so that away from Thee we should always be\n perplexed, and by thoughts derived from Thee be ever drawn to Thee?\n Surely, our God, it must be so._\n\n _But still more bitter and humbling, O Father, is our experience of\n failure, so frequent, tragic, and unpardonable. We have struggled on\n in vain, resolves are broken ere they pass our lips; we can see no\n hope of better things, we can never forgive ourselves; and after all\n our prayers our need remains and our sense of coming short but\n deepens. Yet, at least we know that we have failed, and how, if\n something higher than ourselves were not at work within?_\n\n _Our desperate desires have driven us at last to Thee, conscious now,\n after all vain effort, that it is Thyself alone can satisfy, and now\n at peace to know that Thou it is who art desired, because Thou it is\n who dost desire within us. Beyond our need reveal Thyself, its cause\n and cure; in all desire teach us to discern Thy drawing near.\n Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nSecond Week, Fourth Day\n\nMen are often prejudiced against religion because _the churches\nwhich they happened to attend in youth urged on them an irrational\nfaith_. Some men never recover from the idea that all religion\neverywhere must always be the same kind of religion against which in\nyouth their good sense rose in revolt; they are in perpetual rebellion\nagainst religion as it was when they broke with it a generation ago.\nBut if one thing more than another grows, expands, becomes in the\nintelligent and pure increasingly pure and intelligent, it is religion.\n\nConsider an early Hebrew idea of God:\n\n =And it came to pass on the way at the lodging-place, that Jehovah\n met him, and sought to kill him. Then Zipporah took a flint, and cut\n off the foreskin of her son, and cast it at his feet; and she said,\n Surely a bridegroom of blood art thou to me. So he let him alone.\n Then she said, A bridegroom of blood art thou, because of the\n circumcision.--Exodus 4:24-26.=\n\nOver against so abhorrent a picture of a deity who would have\ncommitted murder, had not a mother swiftly circumcised her son,\nconsider a later thought of God:\n\n =How think ye? if any man have a hundred sheep, and one of them be\n gone astray, doth he not leave the ninety and nine, and go unto the\n mountains, and seek that which goeth astray? And if so be that he\n find it, verily I say unto you, he rejoiceth over it more than over\n the ninety and nine which have not gone astray. Even so it is not the\n will of your Father who is in heaven, that one of these little ones\n should perish.--Matt. 18:12-14.=\n\nSo religion grows with man's capacity to receive higher, finer\nrevelations of the divine. And in no age of the world has so great a\nchange passed over the intellectual framework of faith as in the\ngeneration just gone. To live in protest against forms of belief a\ngeneration old is fighting men of straw; the vanguard of religious\nthought and life has pushed ahead many a mile beyond the point of such\nattack. Men who threw away the living water of the Gospel because they\ndisliked the water-buckets in which their boyhood churches presented\nit, are living spiritually thirsty lives when there is no reasonable\nneed of their doing so. There is many an unbeliever with a \"God-shaped\nblank\" in his heart, who could be a confident and joyful believer if\nhe only knew what religion means to men of faith today.\n\n _O God, who hast formed all hearts to love Thee, made all ways to\n lead to Thy face, created all desire to be unsatisfied save in Thee;\n with great compassion look upon us gathered here. Our presence is our\n prayer, our need the only plea we dare to claim, Thy purposes the one\n assurance we possess._\n\n _Some of us are very confused; we do not know why we were ever born,\n for what end we should live, which way we should take. But we are\n willing to be guided. Take our trembling hands in Thine, and lead us\n on._\n\n _Some of us are sore within. We long for love and friendship, but we\n care for no one and we feel that no one cares for us. We are\n misunderstood, we are lonely, we have been disappointed, we have lost\n our faith in man and our faith in life. Wilt Thou not let us love\n Thee who first loved us?_\n\n _Some of us are vexed with passions that affright us; to yield to\n them would mean disaster, to restrain them is beyond our power, and\n nothing earth contains exhausts their vehemence or satisfies their\n fierce desire._\n\n _And so because there is no answer, no end or satisfaction in\n ourselves; and because we are what we are, and yet long to be so\n different; we believe Thou art, and that Thou dost understand us. By\n faith we feel after Thee, through love we find the way, in hope we\n bring ourselves to Thee. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nSecond Week, Fifth Day\n\nMany minds are prejudiced against religion because, having gone so far\nas to feel the credulity of religious belief, they have never gone\nfurther and _seen the credulity of religious unbelief_. Irreligion\nimplies a creed just as surely as religion does; and many a man's\nreturn to faith has begun when his faculties of doubt, which hitherto\nhad been used only against belief in God, became active against belief\nin no-God. Mr. Gilbert Chesterton, with his characteristic vividness\nand exaggeration, narrates such an experience: \"I never read a line of\nChristian apologetics. I read as little as I can of them now. It was\nHuxley and Herbert Spencer and Bradlaugh who brought me back to\northodox theology. They sowed in my mind my first wild doubts of\ndoubt. Our grandmothers were quite right when they said that Tom Paine\nand the free-thinkers unsettled the mind. They do. They unsettled mine\nhorribly. The rationalist made me question whether reason was of any\nuse whatever; and when I had finished Herbert Spencer I had got as far\nas doubting (for the first time) whether evolution had occurred at\nall. As I laid down the last of Colonel Ingersoll's atheistic lectures\nthe dreadful thought broke across my mind, 'Almost thou persuadest me\nto be a Christian.' I was in a desperate way.\" Lest Mr. Chesterton's\nwhimsicality may hide the seriousness of such an experience, we may\nadd that Robert Louis Stevenson's first break with his \"youthful\natheism\" came when, under the influence of Professor Fleeming Jenkin,\nhe too began to have his \"first wild doubts of doubt.\" He began\nthinking, as he says, that \"certainly the church was not right, but\ncertainly not the anti-church either.\" Many a man has played unfairly\nwith his doubts; he has used them against religion, but not against\nirreligion. When he is thorough with his doubts he may join the many\nwho understand what the apostle meant when he wrote to Timothy:\n\n =O Timothy, guard that which is committed unto thee, turning away\n from the profane babblings and oppositions of the knowledge which is\n falsely so called; which some professing have erred concerning the\n faith.=\n\n =Grace be with you.--1 Tim. 6:20, 21.=\n\n _O God, too near to be found, too simple to be conceived, too good to\n be believed; help us to trust, not in our knowledge of Thee, but in\n Thy knowledge of us; to be certain of Thee, not because we feel our\n thoughts of Thee are true, but because we know how far Thou dost\n transcend them. May we not be anxious to discern Thy will, but\n content only with desire to do it; may we not strain our minds to\n understand Thy nature, but yield ourselves and live our lives only to\n express Thee._\n\n _Shew us how foolish it is to doubt Thee, since Thou Thyself dost set\n the questions which disturb us; reveal our unbelief to be faith\n fretting at its outworn form. Be gracious when we are tempted to\n cease from moral strife: reveal what it is that struggles in us.\n Before we tire of mental search enable us to see that it was not\n ourselves but Thy call which stirred our souls._\n\n _Turn us back from our voyages of thought to that which sent us\n forth. Teach us to trust not to cleverness or learning, but to that\n inward faith which can never be denied. Lead us out of confusion to\n simplicity. Call us back from wandering without to find Thee at home\n within. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nSecond Week, Sixth Day\n\nMany men are biased in favor of their habitual doubt because they do\nnot see that _positive faith is the only normal estate of man_.\nWe live not by the things of which we are uncertain, but by the things\nwhich we verily believe. Columbus doubted many of the old views in\ngeography, but these negations did not make him great; his greatness\nsprang from the positive beliefs which he confidently held and on\nwhich he launched his splendid adventure. Goethe is right when he\nmakes Mephistopheles, his devil, say, \"I am the spirit of negation,\"\nfor negation, save as it paves the way for positive conviction, always\nbedevils life. The psalmist reveals the ideal experience for every\ndoubter.\n\nFirst, _uncertainty_:\n\n =But as for me, my feet were almost gone;\n My steps had well nigh slipped.\n For I was envious at the arrogant,\n When I saw the prosperity of the wicked.=\n\n =--Psalm 73:2, 3.=\n\nThen _vision_:\n\n =When I thought how I might know this,\n It was too painful for me;\n Until I went into the sanctuary of God,\n And considered their latter end.=\n\n =--Psalm 73:16, 17.=\n\nThen, _positive assurance_:\n\n =Thou wilt guide me with thy counsel,\n And afterward receive me to glory.\n Whom have I in heaven but thee?\n And there is none upon earth that I desire besides thee.\n My flesh and my heart faileth;\n But God is the strength of my heart and my portion for ever.=\n\n =--Psalm 73:24-26.=\n\nDoubt, therefore, does have real value in life; it clears away rubbish\nand stimulates search for truth; but it has no value unless it is\nfinally swallowed up in positive assurance. So Tennyson pictures the\nexperience of his friend, Arthur Hallam:\n\n              \"One indeed I knew\n    In many a subtle question versed,\n    Who touch'd a jarring lyre at first,\n  But ever strove to make it true:\n\n  Perplext in faith, but pure in deeds,\n    At last he beat his music out.\n    There lives more faith in honest doubt,\n  Believe me, than in half the creeds.\n\n  He fought his doubts and gather'd strength,\n    He would not make his judgment blind,\n    He faced the spectres of the mind\n  And laid them: thus he came at length\n\n  To find a stronger faith his own.\"\n\n _O Most Merciful, whose love to us is mighty, long-suffering, and\n infinitely tender; lead us beyond all idols and imaginations of our\n minds to contact with Thee the real and abiding; past all barriers of\n fear and beyond all paralysis of failure to that furnace of flaming\n purity where falsehood, sin, and cowardice are all consumed away. It\n may be that we know not what we ask; yet we dare not ask for less._\n\n _Our aspirations are hindered because we do not know ourselves. We\n have tried to slake our burning thirst at broken cisterns, to comfort\n the crying of our spirits with baubles and trinkets, to assuage the\n pain of our deep unrest by drugging an accusing conscience, believing\n a lie, and veiling the naked flame that burns within. But now we know\n Thou makest us never to be content with aught save Thyself, in earth,\n or heaven, or hell._\n\n _Sometimes we have sought Thee in agony and tears, scanned the clouds\n and watched the ways of men, considered the stars and studied the\n moral law; and returned from all our search no surer and no nearer.\n Yet now we know that the impulse to seek Thee came from Thyself\n alone, and what we sought for was the image Thou hadst first planted\n in our hearts._\n\n _We may not yet hold Thee fast or feel Thee near, but we know Thou\n holdest us. All is well. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nSecond Week, Seventh Day\n\nMen are often prejudiced against religion or any serious consideration\nof it, because they _never have felt any vital need of God_. To study\nwireless telegraphy in the safe seclusion of a college laboratory is\none thing; to hear the wireless apparatus on a floundering ship send\nout its call for help across a stormy sea is quite a different matter.\nMany folk have never thought of faith in God save with a mild,\nintellectual curiosity; they do not know those deep experiences of\nserious souls with sin and sorrow and anxiety, with burden for\ngreat causes and desire for triumphant righteousness in men and\nnations--experiences that throw men back on God as their only\nsufficient refuge and hope. _Men never really find God until they need\nhim_; and some men never feel the need of him until life plunges them\ninto a shattering experience. Even in scientific research new\ndiscoveries are made because men _want_ them, and Mayer, lighting on a\ntheory that proved to be of great value, says, \"Engaged during a sea\nvoyage almost exclusively with the study of physiology, I discovered\nthe new theory, for the sufficient reason that I _vividly felt the\nneed of it_.\" How much more must the vital discovery of God depend on\nlife's conscious demand for him! And how certainly a shallow,\nfrivolous nature, unstirred by the deep concerns of life, is biased\nagainst any serious interest in religious faith! Great believers have\nfirst of all _thirsted_ for God.\n\n =Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that\n hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk\n without money and without price. Wherefore do ye spend money for that\n which is not bread? and your labor for that which satisfieth not?\n hearken diligently unto me, and eat ye that which is good, and let\n your soul delight itself in fatness. Incline your ear, and come unto\n me; hear, and your soul shall live: and I will make an everlasting\n covenant with you, even the sure mercies of David.... Seek ye Jehovah\n while he may be found; call ye upon him while he is near: let the\n wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let\n him return unto Jehovah, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our\n God, for he will abundantly pardon.--Isa. 55:1-3, 6, 7.=\n\n _Grant unto us, we pray Thee, the lost hunger and thirst after\n righteousness--the longing for God. Grant unto us that drawing power\n by which everything that is in us shall call out for Thee. Become\n necessary unto us. With the morning and evening light, at noon and at\n midnight, may we feel the need of Thy companionship.... Though Thou\n dost not speak as man speaks, yet Thou canst call out to us; and the\n soul shall know Thy presence, and shall understand by its own self\n what Thou meanest. Grant unto us this witness of the Spirit, this\n communion of the soul with Thee--and not only once or twice: may we\n abide in the light._\n\n _Thou hast come unto Thine own; and even as of old, Thine own know\n Thee not, and believe Thee not. How many are there that have learned\n Thy name upon their mother's knee, but have forgotten it! How many\n are there that grew up into the happiness of a childhood in which\n piety presided, but have gone away, and have not come back again to\n their first love and to their early faith! How many are there\n marching on now in the Sahara of indifference and in the wilderness\n of unbelief!... Lord, look upon them; have merciful thoughts toward\n them, and issue those gracious influences of power by which what is\n best in them shall lift itself up and bear witness against that which\n is worst. Amen._--Henry Ward Beecher.\n\n\nCOMMENT FOR THE WEEK\n\nI\n\nWe are to deal in this chapter with one of the most common experiences\nof doubt and are to attempt the statement of a truth useful in meeting\nit. Many minds are undone at the first symptoms of religious\nuncertainty, because they suppose that their doubt is philosophical,\nand they feel a paralyzing inability to deal with philosophy at all.\nAs men have been known to take to their beds at hearing the scientific\nnames of illnesses which hitherto they had patiently endured, so minds\nare sometimes overwhelmed by an unsettlement of faith that takes the\nname of philosophic doubt. It is well, then, early in our study, to\nnote the homely, familiar experience, which in most cases underlies\nand helps to explain the problem of theological unrest.\n\nWe all began, as children, with an unlimited ability to believe what\nwe were told. We were credulous long before we became critical. God\nand Santa Claus, fairy stories and life after death--in what\nbeautiful, unquestioning confusion we received them all! Our thinking\nwas altogether imitative, as our talking was. From the existence of\nKamchatka to the opinion that it was wrong to lie, we had no\nindependent knowledge of our own. Reliance on authority was our only\nroad to truth. One prescription was adequate for every need of\ninformation: ask our parents and be told.\n\nThis situation was the occasion of our first unsettlement of faith: we\ndiscovered the fallibility of our parents. They failed to tell us what\nwe asked, or we found to be untrue what they had said, or they\nthemselves confessed how much they did not know. To some this was a\nshock, the memory of which has never been forgotten. Edmund Gosse, the\nliterary critic, tells us that up to his sixth year he thought that\nhis father knew everything. Then came the fateful crisis when his\nfather wrongly reported an incident which Edmund himself had\nwitnessed. \"Nothing could possibly have been more trifling to my\nparents,\" he writes, \"but to me it meant an epoch. Here was the\nappalling discovery never suspected before that my father was not as\nGod and did not know everything. The shock was not caused by any\nsuspicion that he was not telling the truth, as it appeared to him,\nbut by the awful proof that he was not, as I had supposed,\nomniscient.\" By most of us, however, the transfer of our faith from\nour parents' authority to some other basis of belief was easily\naccomplished. We found ourselves resting back on the priest or the\nchurch or the creed or the Bible. Still our convictions were not\nindependently our own; we had never fought for them or thought them\nthrough; they were founded on the say-so of authority. What we wished\nto know we asked another, and what was told us we implicitly believed.\n\nThe time inevitably comes, however, to a normally developing mind,\nwhen such an attitude of unquestioning credulity becomes impossible.\nThe curious \"Why?\" of the growing child, that began in early years to\nbesiege all statements of fact, now ranges out to call in question the\npropositions of religious faith. For long-accepted truths, from the\nrotundity of the earth to the existence of God, the enlarging\nintellect wants reasons rather than dogmas. So normal is this period\nof interrogation that it is regularly slated on the timetables of\npsychological development. Starbuck fixes the average age of the doubt\nperiod at about eighteen years for boys and about fifteen for girls.\n\nAt whatever time and in whatever special form this period of doubt\narises, the characteristic quality of its outcome is easily described.\nIn the end the fully awakened mind is ill content to accept any\nauthoritative statements that he dare not question or deny. He resents\nhaving a quotation from any source waved like a revolver in his face\nwith the demand that he throw up his intellectual hands. No more in\nreligion than in politics does he incline to stand before infallibility,\nlike the French peasants before Louis XI, saying, \"Sire, what are our\nopinions?\" He claims his right to question everything, to make every\ntruth advance and give the countersign of reasonableness, to weigh all\npropositions in the scales of his own thinking, and if he is to love\nthe Lord his God at all, to do it, not with all his credulity, but, as\nJesus said, with all his mind.\n\nBiography reveals how many of the great believers have passed through\nthis youthful period of rebellion against accepted tradition and have\nsuffered serious religious unsettlement in the process. Robert\nBrowning tells us that as a boy he was \"passionately religious.\" When\nhis period of questioning and revolt arrived, however, it carried him\nso far that he was publicly rebuked in church for intentional\nmisbehavior, and in his sixteenth year, under the influence of\nShelley's \"Queen Mab,\" he declared himself an atheist. But in his\n\"Pauline,\" written when he was twenty-one, the direction in which his\nquest was leading him was plain:\n\n    \"I have always had one lode-star; now\n  As I look back, I see that I have halted\n  Or hastened as I looked towards that star--\n  A need, a trust, a yearning after God.\"\n\nAnd when he grew to his maturity, had left his early credulousness\nwith the revolt that followed it far behind and had used his\nindependent thinking to productive purpose, from what a height of\nsplendid faith did he look back upon that youthful period of storm and\nstress which he called \"the passionate, impatient struggles of a boy\ntoward truth and love\"!\n\nHenry Ward Beecher's intellectual revolution was postponed until he\nhad entered the theological seminary. \"I was then twenty years old,\"\nhe writes, \"and there came a great revulsion in me from all this\ninchoate, unregulated, undirected experience. My mind took one\ntremendous spring over into scepticism, and I said: 'I have been a\nfool long enough--I will not stir one step further than I can see my\nway, and I will not stand a moment where I cannot see the truth. I\nwill have something that is sure and steadfast.' Having taken that\nground, I was in that state of mind for the larger part of two years.\"\nA wholesome restraint upon the wild perversions, the anarchic denials,\nthe abysmal despairs of this period of life is the clear recognition\nthat in some form it is one of the commonest experiences of man.\n\n\nII\n\nThe treatment accorded to a youth who is passing through this\ndifficult adjustment often determines, in a fine or lamentable way,\nhis subsequent attitude towards religion. _Negative repression of real\nquestions is of all methods the most fatal, whether it be practiced on\nthe youth by others or by the youth upon himself._ \"I have not been in\nchurch for twenty years,\" said a college graduate. \"Why?\" was the\ninquiry. \"Because in college I learned from geology through how many\nages this earth was slowly being built. Troubled by the conflict\nbetween this new knowledge and my early training, I went to my\nminister. He said that the Bible told us the earth was made in six\ndays and that I must accept that on faith. That's why.\" Thousands of\nmen are religious wrecks today because, when the issue was raised in\ntheir thinking between their desire for a reason and their traditional\nbeliefs, they were told that to ask a reason is sin. George Eliot's\nexperience unhappily is not unique. Just when in girlhood her mind was\nwaking to independent thought, a book now long unread, Hennell's\n\"Inquiry Concerning the Origin of Christianity,\" convinced her\nimmature judgment that her early credulity had been blind. No one was\nat hand to state the faith in a reasonable way or to meet, not by\ndenying but by using her right to think, the attacks of Hennell, which\nnow are forgotten in their futility. She never came through her\nyouthful unsettlement. Years after, F. W. H. Myers wrote: \"I remember\nhow at Cambridge I walked with her once in the Fellows' Garden of\nTrinity, on an evening of rainy May, and she, stirred somewhat beyond\nher wont, and taking as her text the three words which have been used\nso often as the inspiring trumpet calls of men--the words God,\nImmortality, Duty--pronounced with terrible earnestness, how\ninconceivable was the first, how unbelievable was the second, and how\nperemptory and absolute the third. Never, perhaps, had sterner accents\naffirmed the sovereignty of impersonal and unrecompensing law. I\nlistened and night fell; her grave, majestic countenance turned toward\nme like a Sibyl's in the gloom; it was as though she withdrew from my\ngrasp one by one the two scrolls of promise, and left me the third\nscroll only, awful with inevitable fate.\"\n\nIn this period of readjustment, whether one is the youth in the midst\nof the struggle or the solicitous friend endeavoring to help, one most\nneeds a clear perception of the ideal outcome of such intellectual\nunrest. Let us attempt a picture of that ideal. The youth who long has\ntaken on his parents' say-so the most important convictions that the\nsoul can hold, or who, with no care to think or question for himself,\nhas looked to Book or Church for all that he believed about God, now\nfeels within him that intellectual awakening that cannot be quieted by\nmere authority. He long has taken his truth preserved by others'\nhands; now he desires to pick it for himself, fresh from the living\ntree of knowledge. His declaration of independence from subjection to\nhis parents or his Church is not at first irreverent desire to\ndisbelieve; it is rather desire to enter into the Samaritans'\nexperience when they said to the woman who first had told them about\nJesus: \"Now we believe, not because of _thy_ speaking; for we have\n_heard for ourselves_, and know that this is indeed the Saviour of the\nworld\" (John 4:41). The youth turns from second-hand rehearsal of the\ntruth to seek a first-hand, original acquaintance with it. As he began\nin utter financial dependence on his father, then made a bit of\nspending money of his own, and at last moved out to make his living,\nashamed to be a pensioner and parasite when he should be carrying\nhimself, so from his old, intellectual dependence the youth passes to\na fine responsibility for his own thinking and belief. He knows that\nsuch transitions, whether financial or intellectual, generally mean\nstress and perplexity, but if he is to be a man the youth must\nventure.\n\nIn this transition beliefs will certainly be modified. Not only do\nforms of religious thinking shift and change with the passing\ngenerations, but individuals differ in their powers to see and\nunderstand. Religious faith, like water, takes shape from the\nreceptacles into whose unique nooks and crannies it is poured. If the\ntruth which the youth possesses is to be indeed his own, it will\nsurely differ from the truth which once he learned, by as much as his\nmind and his experience differ from his father's. Even in the New\nTestament one can easily distinguish James' thought from Paul's and\nJohn's from Peter's. But change of form need not mean loss of value.\nTo pass by fine gradations from unquestioning credulity to thoughtful\nfaith is not impossible. Thus a boy learns to swim with his father's\nhands beneath him and passes so gradually from reliance upon another\nto independent power to swim alone that he cannot tell when first the\nold support was quietly withdrawn.\n\nThus ideally pictured, this transition is nothing to be feared; it is\none of life's steps to spiritual power. This period of questioning and\nventure we have called the passage from credulity to independence, but\nits significance is deeper than those words imply. _It is the passage\nfrom hearsay to reality._ Of all inward intimate experiences, religion\nreaches deepest and is least transferable. It is as incommunicable as\nfriendship. A father may commend a comrade to his son and lay bare his\nown deep friendship with the man, but if the son himself does not see\nthe value there nor for himself in loyalty and love make self\nsurrender, the father can do nothing more. Friendship cannot be\ncarried on by proxy. One can as easily breathe for another as in\nanother's place be loyal to a friend or trust in God.\n\nWhen, therefore, the youth moves out from mere dependence on his\nfather, his Bible, or his Church to see and know God in his own right,\nhe is fulfilling the end of all religion. _For this his father\ntaught him, for this the Book was written and the Church was\nfounded._ As George Macdonald put it, \"Each generation must do its\nown seeking and finding. The father's having found is only the warrant\nfor the children's search.\" Said Goethe: \"What you have inherited from\nyour fathers you must earn for yourself before you can call it yours.\"\nThis individual experience makes religion real, and the \"awkward age\"\nof the spirit when the old security of credulous belief has gone and\nthe new assurance of personal conviction has not yet fully come, is a\nsmall price to pay for the sense of reality that enters into religion\nwhen a man for himself knows God. Such is the ideal transition from\ncredulity to independence, from hearsay to reality.\n\n\nIII\n\nOne fallacy which disastrously affects many endeavors after this ideal\ntransition is the prejudice that, since faith has hitherto in the\nyouth's experience meant credulous acceptance of another's say-so,\nfaith always must mean that. Faith and credulity appear to him\nidentical. In \"Alice through the Looking Glass\" the Queen asserts that\nshe is a hundred and one years, five months, and one day old. \"I can't\nbelieve that,\" said Alice. \"Can't you?\" said the Queen. \"Try again,\ndraw a long breath and shut your eyes.\" So blind, irrational, and\nwilful does faith seem to many! So far from being an essential part\nof all real knowledge, therefore, faith seems to stand in direct\ncontrast with knowledge, and this impression is deepened by our common\nphraseology. Tennyson, for example, sings:\n\n  \"We have but faith: we cannot know;\n    For knowledge is of things we see.\"\n\nBefore there can be any profitable discussion of religious belief,\ntherefore, we need to see that faith is one of the chief ways in which\ncontinually we deal with reality; it is a road to truth, without which\nsome truth never can be reached at all. The reason for its\ninevitableness in life is not our lack of knowledge, but rather that\nfaith is as indispensable as logical demonstration in any real knowing\nof the world. Behind all other words to be said about our subject lies\nthis fundamental matter: _faith is not a substitute for truth, but a\npathway to truth; there are realities which without it never can be\nknown_.\n\nFor one thing, no one can know _persons_ without faith. The world\nof people, without whom if a man could live, he would be, as Aristotle\nsaid, either a brute or a god, is closed in its inner meaning to a\nfaithless mind. Entrance into another life with insight and\nunderstanding is always a venture of trust. We cry vainly like Cassim\nbefore the magic cave, \"Open, Barley,\" if we try to penetrate the\nsecrets of a human personality without sympathy, loyalty, faith. These\nalone cry \"Open, Sesame.\"\n\nSurely this knowledge of persons, impossible without faith, is as\nimportant as any which we possess. While the physical universe\nfurnishes the general background of our existence, the immediate world\nin which we really live is personal, made up of people whom we fear or\nlove, by whom we are cheered, admonished, hurt, and comforted. \"The\nworld is so waste and empty,\" cried Goethe, \"when we figure but towns\nand hills and rivers in it, but to know that someone is living on it\nwith us, even in silence--this makes our earthly ball a peopled\ngarden.\" A solitary Robinson Crusoe would give up any other knowledge,\nif in return he could know even a benighted savage like Friday. But\neven a savage cannot be known by logical demonstration. Crusoe could\nso have learned some things, but when he wanted to know Friday, he\ncame by way of adventures in confidence, personal trust and\nself-commitment, growing reliance and appreciative insight, assured\nloyalty and faith. He _knew_ whom he had _believed_.\n\nMoreover, such knowledge of persons is as solid as it is important.\nThat two plus two make four cannot be gainsaid, and doubtless no other\nkinds of information can be quite so absolute as mathematical\ntheorems. But when one thinks of a comrade, long loved and trusted\nuntil he is known through and through, for practical purposes one can\nthink of nothing more stable than his knowledge of his friend. The\nplain fact is that we _do_ know people, know them well, and that\nthis knowledge never has been or can be a matter of logical\ndemonstration. By taking Arthur Hallam to pieces and analyzing him,\nthe inductive mind might work out all the laws that are involved in\nArthur Hallam's constitution; but that mind with all its knowledge\nwould not know Arthur Hallam. Tennyson's \"In Memoriam,\" however, makes\nclear that knowledge of a friend is not interdicted because scientific\ndemonstration cannot supply it. Tennyson knew Hallam well, and this\nknowledge, far more solid and significant than most other information\nhe possessed, was not achieved by grinding laws out of facts; it came,\nas all such knowledge comes, by faith.\n\nAs one considers what this understanding of the personal world, seen\nwith the open eyes of trust and loyalty, means to us, how assured it\nis, how it enriches and deepens life, he perceives that here at least\nfaith is something far more than a stop-gap for ignorance, a dream, a\nfantasy. It is positively a pathway to truth.\n\nThere is another realm where faith is our only way of dealing with\nreality; by it alone can we know _the possibilities of individuals and\nof society_. We are well assured now in the United States that the\nnation can be economically prosperous without slavery. But sixty years\nago plenty of people were assured of the contrary, were convinced that\nif the abolitionists succeeded we could not economically endure. How\ndid we come by this significant knowledge that the immoral system was\ndispensable? Not by logical demonstration. The economists of most of\nour universities logically demonstrated that slavery was essential.\n_Faith was the pathway to the truth._ Faith that a new order minus\nslavery was possible gained adherents, grew in certainty with access\nof new believers, fed its followers on hopes unrealized but\npassionately believed in, until _faith became experiment, and\nexperiment became experience, and experience brought forth\nknowledge_. The nation trusted and tried. This is the only way to\ntruth in the realm of moral possibilities. If the world were finished,\nits _i's_ all dotted and its _t's_ all crossed, we might exist on that\nsort of descriptive science that finds the facts and plots their laws.\nBut the world is in the making; what is _actual_ is not quite so\nimportant to us as what is _possible_; we live, as Wordsworth sings,\nin\n\n  \"Hope that can never die,\n  Effort and expectation and desire,\n  And something evermore about to be.\"\n\nTo endeavor to satisfy man, therefore, with descriptions of the actual\nis preposterous. The innermost meaning of personal and social life\nlies in the contrast between what we are and what we may become.\nBeyond the achieved present and the demonstrable future, stands the\nideal, whose possibility we can never know as a truth without faith\nenough to try.\n\nWhen, therefore, one hears disparagement of faith as a poor makeshift\nfor knowledge, he may be pardoned a sharp rejoinder. When has man ever\nfound solid knowledge in this most important realm of human\npossibilities, without faith as the pioneer? We do not know first and\nthen supply by belief what knowledge lacks. _We believe first, as\nColumbus did, and then find new continents because what faith first\nsuggested a great venture has confirmed._ When Stephenson proposed to\nrun a steam car forty miles an hour, a host of wise-acres proved the\nfeat impossible on the ground that no one could move through the air\nso rapidly and still survive. If now we know that one easily survives\na speed of over a hundred miles an hour in an aeroplane, it is because\na faith that _saw_ and _dared_ introduced us to the information. We\nknow now that democracy is not a futile dream, nor the conquest of the\nair by wireless and of the land by electricity a madman's frenzy; we\nknow truths of highest import and certainty from the usefulness of\nradium to the wisdom of religious liberty, and all this knowledge\nexisted as belief in possibility before it became truth in fact. Faith\nwas \"assurance of things hoped for, a conviction of things not seen\"\n(Hebrews 11:1). Faith is no makeshift. Its power is nowhere felt more\neffectively than in the achievement of knowledge.\n\n\nIV\n\nSo far is faith, then, from being blind credulity, that it alone\ndeserves to be called the Great Discoverer. Everywhere faith goes\nbefore as a pioneer and the more prosaic faculties of the mind come\nafter to civilize the newly opened territory. In the evolution of the\nsenses touch developed first. All the knowledge that any creature had,\nconcerned the tangible. But in time other senses came. Dimly and\nuncertainly creatures discerned by hearing and seeing the existence of\ndistant objects. They became aware of presences which as yet they\ncould not touch; they were furnished with clues, in following which\nthey found as real what at first had been intangible. Such a relation\nfaith bears to knowledge. Faith, said Clement of Alexandria, is the\n\"ear of the soul.\" Said Ruskin, faith is \"veracity of insight.\" By it\nwe hear what as yet we cannot touch and see what the arms of our logic\nare not long enough to reach.\n\nAll the elemental, primary facts of life are faith's discoveries; we\nhave no other means of finding them. By faith we discover our\n_selves_. We do not hold back from living until we can prove that\nwe exist. We never can strictly prove that we exist. The very self\nthat we are trying to demonstrate would have to be used in the\ndemonstration. We have no other way of getting at ourselves except to\ntake ourselves for granted--accepting\n\n  \"This main miracle that you are you,\n  With power on your own act and on the world.\"\n\nAs Mr. Chesterton remarked, \"You cannot call up any wilder vision than\na city in which men ask themselves if they have any selves.\" By faith\nall men go out to live as though their selves were real.\n\nBy faith we accept the existence of the _outer world_. We do not\nrestrain ourselves from acting as though the physical world were\nreally there, until we can prove it. We never can strictly prove it;\nperhaps it is not there at all. When through a microscope an Indian\nwas shown germs in the Ganges' water, to convince him of the peril of\nits use, he broke the instrument with his cane, as though when the\nmicroscope was gone, the facts had vanished too. In his philosophy all\nthat we see is illusion. Perhaps this is true--the world a phantasm\nand our minds fooling us. But none of us believes it. And we do not\nbelieve it because we live by faith--the elemental faith on which all\ncommon sense and science rest and without which man's thought and work\nwould halt--that our senses and our minds tell us the truth. \"It is\nidle to talk always of the alternative of reason and faith. _Reason\nitself is a matter of faith._ It is an act of faith to assert that\none's thoughts have any relation to reality at all.\"\n\nBy faith we even discover the _universe_. We cannot think of the\nworld as a multiverse; we always think of it as having unity, and we\ndo so whether as scientists we talk about the uniformity of nature, or\nas Christians we speak of one Creator. Not only, however, can no one\ndemonstrate that this is a universe; _it positively does not look as\nthough it were_. Opposing powers snarl at each other and clash in a\ndisorder that gives to the casual observer not the slightest\nintimation that any unity is there. Thunder storms and little babies,\nvolcanoes and Easter lilies, immeasurable nebul\u00e6 in the heavens and\npeople getting married on the earth--what indescribable contrasts and\nconfusions! Still we insist on thinking unity into this seeming\nanomaly, and out of it we wrest scientific doctrines about the\nuniformity of law. As Professor James, of Harvard, put it, \"The\nprinciple of uniformity in nature has to be _sought_ under and in\nspite of the most rebellious appearances; and our conviction of its\ntruth is far more like religious faith than like assent to a\ndemonstration.\"\n\nOne might suppose that beliefs so assumed and so incapable of adequate\ndemonstration would make the knowledge based upon them insecure. _But\nthe fact is that all our surest knowledge is thus based on assumptions\nthat we cannot prove._ \"As for the strong conviction,\" Huxley says,\n\"that the cosmic order is rational, and the faith that throughout all\nduration, unbroken order has reigned in the universe, I not only\naccept it, but I am disposed to think it the most important of all\ntruths.\" Faith then, in Huxley's thought, is not a makeshift when\nknowledge fails. Rather by faith we continually are getting at the\nmost important realities with which we deal. As Prof. Ladd, of Yale,\nimpatiently exclaims: \"The rankest agnostic is shot through and\nthrough with all the same fundamental intellectual beliefs, all the\nsame unescapable rational faiths, about the reality of the self and\nabout the validity of its knowledge. You cannot save science and\ndestroy all faith. You cannot sit on the limb of the tree while you\ntear it up by the roots.\"\n\n\nV\n\nIf faith is thus the pioneer that leads us to knowledge of persons and\nof moral possibilities; if by faith we discover our selves, the outer\nworld's existence and its unity, why should we be surprised that faith\nis our road to God? Superficial deniers of religion not infrequently\nseek the discredit of a Christian's trust by saying that God is only a\nmatter of faith. To which the Christian confidently may answer: Of\ncourse God is a matter of faith. Faith is always the Great Discoverer.\n\nA man finds God as he finds an earthly friend. He does not go apart in\nacademic solitude to consider the logical rationality of friendship,\nuntil, intellectually convinced, he coolly arms himself with a Q. E.\nD. and goes out to hunt a comrade. Friendship is never an adventure of\nlogic; it is an adventure of life. It is arrived at by what Emerson\ncalled the \"untaught sallies of the spirit.\" We fall in love, it may\nbe with precipitant emotion; our instincts and our wills are first\nengaged; the whole personality rises up in hunger to claim the\naffection that it needs and without which life seems unsupportable;\nfaith, hope, and love engage in a glorious venture, where logic plays\na minor part. But to make friendship rational, to give it poise, to\ntrace its origins and laws, to clarify, chasten, and direct--this is\nthe necessary work of thought. Faith discovers and reveals; reason\nfurnishes criticism, confirmation, and discipline.\n\nSo men find God. They are hungry for him not in intellect alone, but\nwith all their powers. They feel with Tolstoi: \"I remembered that I\nonly _lived_ at those times when I believed in God.\" They need him to\nput sense and worth and hope into life. As with the reality of\npersons, the validity of knowledge, the unity of the world, so in\nreligion the whole man rises up to claim the truth without which life\nis barren, meaningless. His best convictions at the first are all of\nthem insights of the spirit, affirmations of the _man_. But behind,\naround and through them all play clarifying thoughts, and reasons come\nto discipline and to confirm. But the reasons by themselves could not\nhave found God. Faith is the Great Discoverer.\n\n  \"Oh! world, thou choosest not the better part,\n  It is not wisdom to be only wise,\n  And on the inward vision close the eyes;\n  But it is wisdom to believe the heart.\n  Columbus found a world and had no chart\n  Save one that Faith deciphered in the skies;\n  To trust the soul's invincible surmise\n  Was all his science and his only art.\n  Our knowledge is a torch of smoky pine\n  That lights the pathway but one step ahead\n  Across the void of mystery and dread.\n  Bid then the tender light of Faith to shine\n  By which alone the mortal heart is led\n  Into the thinking of the thought Divine.\"[1]\n\n[1] Professor Santayana, of Harvard.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nFaith in the Personal God\n\n\nDAILY READINGS\n\nWe are to consider this week the Christian faith that God is personal.\nBefore, however, we deal with the arguments which may confirm our\nconfidence in such a faith, or even with the explanations that may\nclarify our conception of its meaning, let us, in the daily readings,\nconsider _some of the familiar attitudes in every normal human life,\nthat require God's personality for their fulfilment_. Men have\nbelieved in a personal God because their own nature demanded it.\n\n\nThird Week, First Day\n\nMen have believed in a personal God because of a _deep desire to think\nof creation as friendly_. F. W. Myers, when asked what question he\nwould put to the Sphinx, if he were given only one chance, replied\nthat he would ask, \"Is the universe friendly?\" Some have tried to\nthink of creation as an enemy which we must fight, as though in\nGreenland we strove to make verdure grow, although the soil and\nclimate were antagonistic. Some have tried to think creation neutral,\nan impersonal system of laws and forces, which we must impose our will\nupon as best we can, although in the end the system is sure to outlast\nall our efforts and to bring our gains to naught. But at the heart of\nman is an irresistible desire to think creation a friend, with whose\ngood purposes our wills can be aligned, and whose power can carry our\nefforts to victorious ends. Says Gilbert Murray, of Oxford University,\n\"As I see philosophy after philosophy falling into this unproven\nbelief in the Friend behind phenomena, as I find that I myself cannot,\nexcept for a moment and by an effort, refrain from making the same\nassumption, it seems to me that perhaps here too we are under the\nspell of a very old ineradicable instinct.\" _But friends are always\npersons, and if creation is friendly then God is in some sense\npersonal._ This faith is the radiant center of the Gospel.\n\n =But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thine inner chamber, and\n having shut thy door, pray to thy Father who is in secret, and thy\n Father who seeth in secret shall recompense thee. And in praying use\n not vain repetitions, as the Gentiles do: for they think that they\n shall be heard for their much speaking. Be not therefore like unto\n them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye\n ask him. After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father who art in\n heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as\n in heaven, so on earth. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive\n us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And bring us not\n into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For if ye forgive\n men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive\n you.--Matt. 6:6-14.=\n\n _O Lord, we would rest in Thee, for in Thee alone is true rest to be\n found. We would forget our disappointed hopes, our fruitless efforts,\n our trivial aims, and lean on Thee, our Comfort and our Strength.\n When the order of this world bears cruelly upon us; when Nature seems\n to us an awful machine, grinding out life and death, without a reason\n or a purpose; when our hopes perish in the grave where we lay to rest\n our loved dead: O what can we do but turn to Thee, whose law\n underlieth all, and whose love, we trust, is the end of all? Thou\n fillest all things with Thy presence, and dost press close to our\n souls. Still every passion, rebuke every doubt, strengthen every\n element of good within us, that nothing may hinder the outflow of Thy\n life and power. In Thee, let the weak be full of might, and let the\n strong renew their strength. In Thee, let the tempted find succor,\n the sorrowing consolation, and the lonely and the neglected their\n Supreme Friend, their faithful Companion._\n\n _O Lord, we are weary of our old, barren selves. Separate us from our\n spiritual past, and quicken within us the seeds of a new future.\n Transform us by the breath of Thy regenerating power, that life may\n seem supremely beautiful and duty our highest privilege, and the only\n real evil a guilty conscience. Let us be no longer sad, or downcast,\n or miserable, or despairing, vexed by remorse, or depressed by our\n failures. Take from us the old self. Give us a new self, beautiful,\n vigorous, and joyous. Let old things pass away and let all things\n become new. Kindle within us a flame of heavenly devotion, so that to\n us work for Thee shall become a happiness, and rest in Thee shall\n become an energy, unchecked by fears within and foes without. Give us\n love, and then we shall have more than all we need, for Thou art\n Love, Thyself the Giver and the Gift. Amen._--Samuel McComb.\n\n\nThird Week, Second Day\n\n =Bless Jehovah, O my soul;\n And all that is within me, bless his holy name.\n Bless Jehovah, O my soul,\n And forget not all his benefits:\n Who forgiveth all thine iniquities;\n Who healeth all thy diseases;\n Who redeemeth thy life from destruction;\n Who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies;\n Who satisfieth thy desire with good things,\n So that thy youth is renewed like the eagle.=\n\n =--Psalm 103:1-5.=\n\nSuch an attitude of thankfulness as this psalm represents is native to\nman's heart. When he is glad he feels grateful: he has an irrepressible\nimpulse to thank somebody. As between a boastful Nebuchadnezzar--\"This\ngreat Babylon which I have built ... by the might of my power and for\nthe glory of my majesty\" (Dan. 4:30)--and the Master, grateful for the\ndawning success of his cause--\"I thank Thee, O Father, Lord of heaven\nand earth\" (Matt. 11:25)--we can have no doubt which is the nobler\nattitude. Man at his best always looks upon his blessings as gifts,\nhis powers as entrustments, his service as a debt which he owes, and\nhis success as an occasion of gratitude rather than pride. _But we\ncannot be really thankful to impersonal power._ Little children blame\nchairs for their falls and thank apple trees for their apples, but\nmaturity outgrows the folly of accusing or blessing impersonal things.\nThankfulness, in any worthy interpretation of the term, can never be\nfelt except toward friendly persons who _intended the blessing_ for\nwhich we are glad. A thoughtful man, therefore, cannot be grateful to\na godless world-machine, even though it has treated him well, for the\nworld-machine never purposed to treat him well and his happiness is a\nlucky accident, with no good will to thank for it. Haeckel says that\nthere is no God--only \"mobile, cosmic ether.\" Imagine a congregation\nof people, under Haeckel's leadership, rising to pray, \"O Mobile\nCosmic Ether, blessed be thy name!\" It is absurd. _Unless God is\npersonal, the deepest meanings of gratitude in human hearts for life\nand its benedictions have no proper place in the universe._\n\n _O God above all, yet in all; holy beyond all imagination, yet friend\n of sinners; who inhabitest the realms of unfading light, yet leadest\n us through the shadows of mortal life; how solemn and uplifting it is\n even to think upon Thee! Like sight of sea to wearied eyes, like a\n walled-in garden to the troubled mind, like home to wanderer, like a\n strong tower to a soul pursued; so to us is the sound of Thy name._\n\n _But greater still to feel Thee in our heart; like a river glorious,\n cleansing, healing, bringing life; like a song victorious, comforting\n our sadness, banishing our care; like a voice calling us to battle,\n urging us beyond ourselves._\n\n _But greater far to know Thee as our Father, as dear as Thou art\n near; and ourselves begotten of Thy love, made in Thy image, cared\n for through all our days, never beyond Thy sight, never out of Thy\n thought._\n\n _To think of Thee is rest; to know Thee is eternal life; to see Thee\n is the end of all desire; to serve Thee is perfect freedom and\n everlasting joy. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nThird Week, Third Day\n\n =Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness:\n According to the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my\n   transgressions.\n Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity,\n And cleanse me from my sin.\n For I know my transgressions;\n And my sin is ever before me.\n Against thee, thee only, have I sinned,\n And done that which is evil in thy sight.=\n\n =--Psalm 51:1-4.=\n\nPenitence is one of the profoundest impulses in man's heart. And man\nat his deepest always feels about his sin as the Psalmist did: he has\nwronged not only this individual or that, but he has sinned against\nthe whole structure of life, against whatever Power and Purpose may be\nbehind life, and his penitence is not complete until he cries to the\nHighest, \"Against Thee, Thee only, have I sinned.\" While men,\ntherefore, have always asked each other for forgiveness, they have as\nwell asked God for it. _But such an attitude is utterly irrational if\nGod is not personal._ Persons alone care what we do, have purposes\nthat our sins thwart, have love that our evil grieves, have compassion\nto forgive the penitent; and to confess sin to a world-machine--careless,\npurposeless, loveless, and without compassion--is folly. Yesterday we\nsaw how impossible it was really to feel grateful to a materialist's\ngod; today imagine congregations of people addressing to the Cosmic\nEther any such penitent confessions as Christians by multitudes\ncontinually address to their Father: \"We have erred and strayed from\nThy ways like lost sheep.\" _Plainly in a world where creative power is\nimpersonal the deepest meanings of penitence have no place._ Read over\nthe prayer that follows, considering the futility of addressing such a\npenitent aspiration to anything impersonal; and then really pray it to\nthe God whom Christ revealed:\n\n _We beseech Thee, Lord, to behold us with favor, folk of many\n families and nations gathered together in the peace of this roof,\n weak men and women subsisting under the covert of thy patience. Be\n patient still; suffer us yet awhile longer--with our broken purposes\n of good, with our idle endeavors against evil, suffer us awhile\n longer to endure and (if it may be) help us to do better. Bless to us\n our extraordinary mercies; if the day come when these must be taken,\n brace us to play the man under affliction. Be with our friends, be\n with ourselves. Go with each of us to rest; if any awake, temper to\n them the dark hours of watching; and when the day returns, return to\n us, our sun and comforter, and call us up with morning faces and with\n morning hearts--eager to labor--eager to be happy, if happiness shall\n be our portion--and if the day be marked for sorrow, strong to endure\n it._\n\n _We thank Thee and praise Thee; and in the words of him to whom this\n day is sacred, close our oblation. Amen._--Robert Louis Stevenson.[2]\n\n\nThird Week, Fourth Day\n\n =Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing,\n that ye may abound in hope, in the power of the Holy Spirit.--Rom.\n 15:13.=\n\n =For in hope were we saved: but hope that is seen is not hope: for\n who hopeth for that which he seeth? But if we hope for that which we\n see not, then do we with patience wait for it.--Rom. 8:24, 25.=\n\nHope is no fringe on the garment of human life; it is part of the\nsolid texture of our experience; without it men may exist, but they\ncannot live. Now some minds live by hope about tomorrow, or at the\nmost, the day after tomorrow, and do not take long looks ahead. But as\nmen grow mature in thoughtfulness, such small horizons no longer can\ncontent their minds; they seek a basis for hope about the far issue of\nman's struggle and aspiration. They cannot bear to think that creation\nlacks a \"far-off divine event\"; they cannot tolerate a universe that\nin the end turns out to be\n\n  \"An eddy of purposeless dust,\n  Effort unmeaning and vain.\"\n\n_But it is obvious that if God is not in control of creation, with\npersonal purpose of good will, directing its course, there is no solid\nbasis for hope._ If the universe is in the hands of physical\nforces, then a long look ahead reveals a world collapsing about a cold\nsun, and humanity annihilated in the wreck. Some such finale is the\ninevitable end of a godless world. As another pictures it, mankind,\nlike a polar bear on an ice floe that is drifting into warmer zones,\nwill watch in growling impotence the steady dwindling of his home,\nuntil he sinks in the abyss. All optimistic philosophies of life have\nbeen founded on faith in a personal God, who purposes good to his\nchildren, and without such faith no hope, with large horizons, is\nreasonable. Paul is fair to the facts when he says, \"Having no hope\nand without God in the world\" (Eph. 2:12). When one asks why men have\nbelieved in a personal God, this clearly is part of the answer: only a\npersonal God can be \"the God of hope.\"\n\n _O God of heaven above and earth beneath! Thou art the constant hope\n of every age--the reliance of them that seek Thee with\n thoughtfulness and love. We own Thee as the guardian of our\n pilgrimage; and when our steps are weary we turn to Thee, the mystic\n companion of our way, whose mercy will uphold us lest we fall. Thou\n layest on us the burden of labor throughout our days; but in this\n sacred hour Thou dost lift off our load, and make us partakers of Thy\n rest. Thou ever faithful God, our guide by cloud and fire! without\n this blest repose our life were but a desert path; here we abide by\n the refreshing spring, and pitch our tents with joy around Thy holy\n hill. Yet when we seek to draw nigh to Thee, Thou art still above us,\n like the heavens. O Thou that remainest in the height, and coverest\n Thyself with the cloud thereof! behold, we stand around the mountain\n where Thou art; and if Thou wilt commune with us, the thunder from\n Thy voice of love shall not make us afraid. Call up a spirit from our\n midst to serve Thy will; and take away the veil from all our hearts,\n that with the eye of purity we may look on the bright and holy\n countenance of life. And when we go hence to resume our way, may it\n be with nobler spirits, with more faithful courage, and more generous\n will. For life and death we trust ourselves to Thee as disciples of\n Jesus Christ. Amen._--James Martineau.\n\n\nThird Week, Fifth Day\n\n =Jehovah is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup:\n Thou maintainest my lot.\n The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places;\n Yea, I have a goodly heritage.\n I will bless Jehovah, who hath given me counsel;\n Yea, my heart instructeth me in the night seasons.\n I have set Jehovah always before me:\n Because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.\n Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoiceth:\n My flesh also shall dwell in safety.\n For thou wilt not leave my soul to Sheol;\n Neither wilt thou suffer thy holy one to see corruption.\n Thou wilt show me the path of life:\n In thy presence is fulness of joy;\n In thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore.=\n\n =--Psalm 16:5-11.=\n\nMany things in human life bring joy. From the sense of a healthy body\nand the exhilaration of a sunshiny day to the deep satisfactions of\nhome and friends--there are numberless sources of happiness. But man\nhas always been athirst to find joy in thinking about the total\nmeaning of life. Lacking that, the details of life lose radiance, for,\nin spite of himself, man\n\n              \"Hath among least things\n  An undersense of greatest; sees the parts\n  As parts, but with a feeling of the whole.\"\n\nIf when he thinks about God, he can, like this psalmist, rejoice in\nthe love behind life, the good purpose through it, the glorious future\nahead of it, then all his other blessings are illumined. Not only are\nthere happy things _in life_, but _life itself_ is fundamentally\nblessed. But if when he raises his thought to the Eternal, he has no\njoyful thoughts about it, sees no love or purpose there, then a pall\nfalls on even his ordinary happiness. Alas for that man who does not\nlike to think about life's origin and destiny and meaning, because he\nhas no joyful faith about God! Some men have what Epictetus called\n\"paralysis of the soul\" every time they think of creation, for to them\nit is a huge physical machine crashing on without reason or good will.\nBut some men have such a joyful faith in the divine that their\ngladness about the whole of life redeems their sorrow about its\ndetails. So Samuel Rutherford in prison said, \"Jesus Christ came into\nmy room last night and every stone flashed like a ruby.\" For the\nthought of God in terms of friendly personality is the most joyful\nidea of him that man has ever had. Man's thirst for joy is one of the\nsources of his faith in a personal God. He has wanted what Paul called\n\"joy and peace in believing\" (Rom. 15:13).\n\n _We rejoice, O Lord our God, not in ourselves nor in the firm earth\n on which we tread, nor in the household, nor in the church, nor in\n all the procession of things where mankind moves with power and\n glory. We rejoice in the Lord. We rejoice in Thy strength. A strange\n joy it is. Day by day we find ourselves breaking out into gladness\n through the ministration of the senses, and by the play of inward\n thought; but Thou art never beheld by us.... Thou never speakest to\n us, nor do we feel Thy hand, nor do we discern Thy face of love and\n glory and power. We break away from all other experiences, and look\n up into the emptiness, as it seems to us, which yet is full of life;\n into that which seems cold and void, but wherein moves eternal power;\n into the voiceless and inscrutable realm where Thou dwellest, God\n over all, blessed forever.... O Lord our God, how near Thou art to\n us! and we do not know it. How near is the other life! and we do not\n feel it. It clothes us as with a garment. It feeds us. It shines down\n upon us. It rejoices over us.... Thither, out of narrow and\n anguishful ways, out of sorrows, out of regrets, out of bereavements,\n we look; and already we are rested before we reach it._\n\n _Grant unto us, today, we beseech Thee, this beatific vision.\n Amen._--Henry Ward Beecher.\n\n\nThird Week, Sixth Day\n\n =For when one saith, I am of Paul; and another, I am of Apollos; are\n ye not men? What then is Apollos? and what is Paul? Ministers through\n whom ye believed; and each as the Lord gave to him. I planted,\n Apollos watered; but God gave the increase. So then neither is he\n that planteth anything, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth\n the increase. Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one: but\n each shall receive his own reward according to his own labor. For we\n are God's fellow-workers: ye are God's husbandry, God's building.--I\n Cor. 3:4-9.=\n\nOne of the profoundest motives that can grip man's heart is the\nconviction that he is a fellow-worker with the Divine. To feel that\nthere is a great Cause, on behalf of which God himself is concerned,\nand in the furtherance of which we can be God's instruments and\nconfederates, is the most exhilarating outlook on life conceivable.\nEven people who deny God try to get this motive for themselves. One\nsuch man hopes for the success of his favorite causes in \"the tendency\nof the universe\"; another talks about \"the nature of things taking\nsides.\" _But nothing save personality has moral tendencies, and only\npersons take sides in moral issues._ If the guidance of the world is\npersonal, then, and then only, can we rejoice with confidence in a\ngreat Ally, who has moral purposes and who has committed to us part of\nhis work. This was the Master's motive when he said, \"My Father\nworketh even until now, and I work\" (John 5:17). But one clearly sees\nthat such an inspiring consciousness of cooperation with the Eternal\ndepended on the certainty with which the Master called the Eternal by\na personal name--Father. When men like Livingstone have gone out in\nsacrificial adventure for the saving of men they have not banked on\nthe \"tendency of the universe,\" nor trusted in any abstract \"nature of\nthings taking sides\"; they have been servants of a personal God, under\norders from him, and they have counted on personal guidance in the\nservice of a cause whose issue was safe in God's hands.\n\n _O God, we pray Thee for those who come after us, for our children,\n and the children of our friends, and for all the young lives that are\n marching up from the gates of birth, pure and eager, with the morning\n sunshine on their faces. We remember with a pang that these will live\n in the world we are making for them. We are wasting the resources of\n the earth in our headlong greed, and they will suffer want. We are\n building sunless houses and joyless cities for our profit, and they\n must dwell therein. We are making the burden heavy and the pace of\n work pitiless, and they will fall wan and sobbing by the wayside. We\n are poisoning the air of our land by our lies and our uncleanness,\n and they will breathe it._\n\n _O God, Thou knowest how we have cried out in agony when the sins of\n our fathers have been visited upon us, and how we have struggled\n vainly against the inexorable fate that coursed in our blood or bound\n us in a prison-house of life. Save us from maiming the innocent ones\n who come after us by the added cruelty of our sins. Help us to break\n the ancient force of evil by a holy and steadfast will and to endow\n our children with purer blood and nobler thoughts. Grant us grace to\n leave the earth fairer than we found it; to build upon it cities of\n God in which the cry of needless pain shall cease; and to put the\n yoke of Christ upon our business life that it may serve and not\n destroy. Lift the veil of the future and show us the generation to\n come as it will be if blighted by our guilt, that our lust may be\n cooled and we may walk in the fear of the Eternal. Grant us a vision\n of the far-off years as they may be if redeemed by the sons of God,\n that we may take heart and do battle for Thy children and ours.\n Amen._--Walter Rauschenbusch.\n\n\nThird Week, Seventh Day\n\n =I will extol thee, my God, O King;\n And I will bless thy name for ever and ever.\n Every day will I bless thee;\n And I will praise thy name for ever and ever.\n Great is Jehovah, and greatly to be praised;\n And his greatness is unsearchable.\n One generation shall laud thy works to another,\n And shall declare thy mighty acts.\n Of the glorious majesty of thine honor,\n And of thy wondrous works, will I meditate.\n And men shall speak of the might of thy terrible acts;\n And I will declare thy greatness.\n They shall utter the memory of thy great goodness,\n And shall sing of thy righteousness.\n Jehovah is gracious, and merciful;\n Slow to anger, and of great lovingkindness.\n Jehovah is good to all;\n And his tender mercies are over all his works.\n All thy works shall give thanks unto thee, O Jehovah;\n And thy saints shall bless thee.=\n\n =--Psalm 145:1-10.=\n\nAdoration springs from the deeps of man's spirit. We never can be\ncontent with looking down on things beneath us, nor with looking out\non things that find our level. We always must look up to things above\nus. As a medi\u00e6val saint said, \"_The soul can never rest in things\nthat are beneath itself._\" Worship, therefore, is an undeniable\nimpulse in man's heart. Poets worship Beauty; scientists worship\nTruth; every man of honor worships Right. That is, the good, true, and\nbeautiful stand above us calling out our adoration, and all the best\nin us springs from our worshipful response to their appeal. But this\nimpulse to adore is never fulfilled until we gather up all life into\nspiritual unity and bow down in awe and joy before God. That is\nadoration glorified, worship crowned and consummated. And the only God\nwhom man can adore with awe and joy is personal. No impersonal thing\nis worshipful; however great a _thing_ may be it still lies beneath\nour soul. No abstract Idea is worshipful; we still are greater than\nany _idea_ that we can hold. Only God, thought of in personal terms\nbut known to be greater than any terms which human life can use, is\nadorable. _Men have believed in Him because worship is man's holiest\nimpulse._\n\nSuch are the experiences of man, with which faith in a personal God is\ninseparably interwoven. Our demand for a friendly creation, our\ndeepest impulses to thanksgiving, penitence, hope, joy, cooperation\nwith the Eternal, and adoration of the highest--all require\npersonality in God. As Professor William James said, \"The universe is\nno longer a mere _It_ to us, but a _Thou_ if we are religious.\"\n\n _O Lord our God, Thy greatness is unsearchable, and the glory of Thy\n presence has overwhelmed us. Thou art hidden in excess of light; and\n if we were to behold Thee in the great sphere in which Thou art\n living, none of us would dare to draw near to Thee. Our\n imperfections, our transgressions, our secret thoughts, our wild\n impulses, that at times come surging in upon us, are such that we\n should be ashamed to stand before the All-searching Eye. Our lives\n are before Thee, open as a book, and Thou readest every word and\n every letter thereof. Blessed be Thy name, Thou hast taught us to\n come to Thee through the Lord Jesus Christ as through a friend, and\n thou hast taught us to draw near to Thee in person through the\n familiar way of Fatherhood; from our childhood we have said, Our\n Father, and in this way we are not afraid; in this way we come\n familiarly and boldly: not irreverently, but with the familiarity\n which love gives. Thou hast poured the light of Thy love upon the\n path which we tread, and Thou hast taught us to come rejoicing before\n Thee.... Open Thy hand and Thy heart, and say to every one of us,\n Peace be unto you! Amen._--Henry Ward Beecher.\n\n\nCOMMENT FOR THE WEEK\n\nI\n\nWe have been using freely the most momentous word in human speech as\nthough we clearly understood its meaning. We have been speaking of God\nas though the import of the term were plain. But most of us, asked to\nstate precisely what we mean by \"God,\" would welcome such a refuge\nfrom our confusion as Joubert sought. \"It is not hard to know God,\"\nsaid he, \"provided one will not force oneself to define him.\" Many\npeople who stoutly claim to believe in God live in perpetual\nvacillation as to what they mean by him. Writes one: \"God to my mind\nis an impersonal being, but whether for convenience or through sheer\nimpotence I pray to him as a personal being.... I know I talk on both\nsides of the fence, but that is just where I am.\"\n\nAt times, indeed, some question whether there is any need to think or\nsay what \"God\" may signify. They call him by vague names--the All, the\nInfinite. In moods of exalted feeling, impatient of definition, they\nwish to be left alone with their experience of the Eternal; they\nresent the intrusion of theology, as a poet, lost in wonder at a\nlandscape, might resent the coming of surveyors with their clanking\nchains. So Walt Whitman wanted to see the stars rather than hear the\nastronomer, and after listening to the learned lecture, with its\ncharts and diagrams, he says,\n\n  \"I became tired and sick,\n  Till rising and gliding out I wandered off by myself,\n  In the mystical moist night air, and from time to time\n  Looked up in perfect silence at the stars.\"\n\nBut, for all that, we well may be thankful for astronomers. At times\nthe \"mystical, moist night air\" is absent; we do not wish to \"look up\nin perfect silence at the stars\"; and, even though we know in advance\nthat they are bound to be inadequate, we do want as clear and worthy\nideas as possible about the universe. Moreover, when such ideas are\nours, looking up in perfect silence at the stars is more impressive\nthan it ever was before. No more can men content themselves with a\nvague consciousness of God. Spirits like Wordsworth have raptures of\nwhich they sing,\n\n  \"In such access of mind, in such high hour\n  Of visitation from the living God,\n  Thought was not--in enjoyment it expired.\"\n\nIn communion with nature, in love for family, in fellowship with God,\nsuch hours may come, but nature, family, and God must also be the\nobjects of understanding thought. Days of vital need, if not of mental\ndoubt, inevitably come when it is impossible any longer to use a term\nlike \"God\" without knowing what we mean.\n\nThe special urgency of this is felt by most of us because as children\nwe were taught to picture the Divine in terms of personality. The God\nof the Bible is personal. Little that persons do, save sinning, is\nomitted from the catalogue of God's activities as he is pictured for\nus in the Scripture. He knows, loves, purposes, warns, rebukes,\nallures, rewards, and punishes, as only persons can. And all our\nrelationships with him are clearly personal. When we pray we say \"Our\nFather\"; when we seek our duty we ask, \"What wilt thou have me to do?\"\nGod is _He_ and _Thou_, not _It_, and friendship is the ideal relation\nof all souls with him.\n\nMoreover, in our maturity we are not likely to be interested in a God\nwho is not personal. Whoever curiously asks why he believes in God,\nwill find not simply _reasons_ but _causes_ for his faith,\nand will perceive that the causes of faith lie back of the reasons for\nit. Vital need always precedes the arguments by which we justify its\nsatisfaction. A man eats one thing and shuns another on principles of\ndietetics that can be defended before his intelligence; but behind all\nsuch sophisticated reasons stands the vital cause of eating--hunger.\nSo back of intellectual arguments for belief in God lies the initial\ncause of faith: _men are hungry_. Men believe in God because they\nhunger for a world that is not chance and chaos, but that is guided by\na Purpose. They believe in God, because in their struggles after\nrighteousness they hunger for a Divine Ally in whom righteousness has\nits origin, its ground and destiny. They believe in God because they\nhunger for confidence that Someone cares about our race in its\nconflicts and defeats and because in their individual experience they\nwant a friend. Without such faith man feels himself to be, in Goethe's\nphrase, \"a troubled wanderer upon a darkened earth.\" Plainly this\nelemental human hunger for purpose, righteousness, and friendship\ncalls for something akin to personality in God. _Only persons have\npurpose, character, and friendliness._ The vital motives which lead\nmen to seek God's comfort, forgiveness, guidance, and cooperation\nplainly imply his personality. Things do not forgive us, love us, nor\npurpose good concerning us, nor can any thing be imagined so subtle\nand so powerful as to satisfy the needs on account of which men come\nto God. If God is not personal, he can feel no concern for human life\nand a God of no concern is of no consequence.\n\nThe philosophers of India, with a well-reasoned pantheistic system and\ncenturies to make their philosophy effective, have failed to quell\nthis deathless thirst for a God who counts. Every wayside shrine of\nHinduism incarnates the old faith in gods conceived as friends, not\nthings; and Buddha, who taught impersonal deity, is now himself adored\nas the Personal Lord of Love and Blessedness. Wherever one finds vital\nreligion one finds that God is no dry impersonal abstraction, but\nman's friend. Boscamen, speaking of the Egyptian Book of the Dead and\nof the Chaldean Tablets, says: \"Six thousand years ago in Egypt and\nChaldea--it is not dread, but the grateful love of a child to his\nfather, of friend to friend, that meets us in the oldest books of the\nworld.\" And when one turns from the oldest to the newest books this\ninner demand of man's religious life has not ceased; it has been\nrefined and confirmed. \"The All would not be the All unless it\ncontained a Personality,\" said Victor Hugo. \"That Personality is God.\"\n\nBiography is lavish in illustrations of this need in man's religious\nlife. The biographer of Theodore Parker, the freelance preacher of\nBoston, remarks: \"In his _theology_ God was neither personal nor\nimpersonal, but a reality transcending these distinctions. In his\n_devotions_ God was as personal as his own father or mother, and he\nprayed to him as such, daringly indifferent to the anthropomorphisms\nof his unfettered speech.\" When one passes from speculation to\nreligion, he always comes into a realm where only a personal God will\ndo. On this point even confessed unbelievers furnish confirmation. One\nwho calls himself an agnostic writes: \"At times in the silence of the\nnight and in rare lonely moments, I experience a sort of communion of\nmyself with Something Great that is not myself. Then the Universal\nScheme of things has on me the effect of a sympathetic Person, and my\ncommunion therewith takes on a quality of fearless worship. These\nmoments happen, and they are to me the supreme fact in my religious\nlife.\" Always for the purposes of vital religion, God must have on us\nthe \"effect of a sympathetic Person.\"\n\n\nII\n\nWhen one, however, subjects this need of his religious life to\nsearching thought, what difficulty he encounters! Multitudes, if they\nwere candid, would confess what a college senior wrote: \"When I am\njust thinking about God in a speculative or philosophical way, I\ngenerally think of him as impersonal, but for practical purposes I\nthink of him as personal.\" Many folks feel thus distraught; at the\nheart of their religious life is the paralyzing doubt, that in a\nuniverse like this to think of God as personal is absurd. If a train\nmoving a mile a minute should leave the earth, it must travel\n40,000,000 years before it would reach the nearest star. The Creator\nof such a world is not readily reduced to the similitude of human\nlife. Once men lived on a flat earth, small in compass and cosily\ntucked beneath the sky's coverlet, but now the world's vastness\nbeggars imagination. As an astronomer remarked, coming from a session\nwith his telescope, \"This does away with a six-foot god; you cannot\nshake hands with the Creator of _this_.\" Men used to suppose that\nArcturus was a single star, but now new telescopes reveal Arcturus as\na galaxy of stars, thousands in number, with interstellar spaces so\nimmense that thought breaks down in spanning them and imagination even\ncannot make the leap. Is the God of such a universe to be conceived in\nterms of a magnified man?\n\nSo to picture deity seems at first sight a survival of mere\nchildishness. Professor John Fiske, of Harvard, has told us that when\nhe was a boy God always conjured up in his imagination the figure of a\nvenerable bookkeeper, with white flowing beard, standing behind a high\ndesk and writing down the bad deeds of John Fiske. How many of us can\nrecall such early crude and childish thoughts of God! A mother asked\nher young daughter what she was drawing. \"A picture of God,\" was the\nanswer. \"But no one knows what God looks like,\" the mother said. \"They\nwill,\" came the rejoinder, \"when I get through.\" We all began with\nsome such primitive idea of deity. Indeed, these early conceptions\nlong persist in many minds, as the following statements, written by\ncollege students, indicate: \"I think of God as real, actual skin and\nblood and bones, something we shall see with our eyes some day, no\nmatter what lives we lead on earth.\" \"It may be a remnant of youth,\nbut anyhow, every time I think of God there appears a vague image of a\nman, with all members of the body, just enormously large.\" \"I have\nalways pictured him according to a description in _Paradise Lost_ as\nseated upon a throne, while around are angels playing on harps and\nsinging hymns.\" \"I think of God as having bodily form and being much\nlarger than the average man. He has a radiant countenance beaming\nwith love and compassion. He is erect and upright, fearless and\nbrave.\"[3]\n\nNo one of us may be contemptuous of such crude ideas; we all possessed\nthem once. Indeed the loss of them, with their picture of deity, clear\nin feature and distinct in outline, has been to some a shock from\nwhich faith has not recovered. When increasing knowledge discredited\nour immature theology, and our world immeasurably widened, the very\nhuman God of our first imaginations was lost among the stars. We\nlearned that this is a universe where the light that falls upon our\neyes tonight left the far heavens when Abraham was shepherding on\nSyrian hills. The Christian Gospel of the personal Father which once\nwas good news became a serious problem. We still may cling to the old\nmeanings of our religious faith; still we may pray in hours of need as\nthough our childhood's God were really there; but at times we suspect\nthat we are clinging to the beauty of an early memory while\nreluctantly we lose conviction of its truth. Many modern men and women\ncan understand the plight of the famous Dr. Jowett of Oxford, who, so\nruns the tradition, inserted \"used to\" in a muffled voice, when he\nrecited the creed: \"I _used to_ believe in God the Father Almighty.\"\n\nWith such misgivings, whether as habitual disturbers of our faith or\nas occasional moods of unbelief that come and go, most of us must be\nfamiliar. What Charles Darwin is reported to have said about himself,\nmany if they spoke frankly would say too: \"Sometimes I feel a warm\nsense of a personal God, and then\"--with a shake of his head--\"it goes\naway.\"\n\n\nIII\n\nWhatever may be our theology, the fact is plain that the denial of a\npersonal God solves no problem. For if we may not think of God in\nterms of personality, the query still remains, which was there\nbefore--_in what terms shall we conceive of the Eternal_? In a\ndiscussion on the nature of the sky, one boy, denying the idea of a\nsolid canopy, exclaimed, \"There ain't any sky.\" Said the other, seeing\nhow little this negation solved the problem, \"Well, what _is_ it that\nain't?\" Some such inquiry one must put to his doubts about God's\npersonality. Though we may deny a personal God, nevertheless in the\nplace where he once stood, creator and sustainer of all existence, is\nSomething that we do think of somehow. We may have but little of\nCarlyle's sublime imagination; may not easily transport ourselves to\nstand with him on the far northern cliff, \"behind him all Europe and\nAfrica fast asleep, except the watchmen, and before him the silent\nImmensity and Palace of the Eternal, whereof our sun is but the\nporch-lamp.\" Yet who of us, regarding the illimitable universe, on the\nfar outskirts of which our little earth is whirling, so minute that\nthrough the strongest telescope from the nearest star its conflagration\nwould be quite invisible, has escaped the sense of a Universal Power?\nAnd the human mind cannot so keep itself at home in little tasks and\npleasures as to evade the question: How shall we think of the Power\nthat made the universe? In what terms? By what analogies? Hours of\nrevelation come in every serious life when no desire compares in\nurgency with the desire to know the character of the Eternal. It does\nmake a prodigious difference what hands hold the leash of the\nuniverse.\n\nThis second fact is also clear, that if we are to think of the Eternal\nat all, we must think in terms of something drawn from our experience.\nWhen we sing of Paradise we speak of golden streets and gates of\npearl, and Thoreau remarks that, arriving in heaven, he expects to\nfind pine trees there. Such words we do not take literally, but such\nwords we cannot utterly avoid, for if we are to speak at all of the\nunknown glory, we must use pictures from the known. So we think of God\nin human symbols. We cannot catch him in an abstract definition as\nthough a boy with a butterfly net should capture the sun at noon. Our\nminds are not fitted for such enterprise. Of necessity we take\nsomething homely, familiar, close at hand, and lifting it up as far as\nwe can reach, say _God is most like that_. No one who thinks at\nall of the Eternal escapes this necessity.\n\nBy this method the _materialist_ reaches his philosophy. Haeckel\nlaughs to scorn the opening clause of the \"Apostles' Creed.\" \"I\nbelieve in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth\"--for\nsuch faith no words are contemptuous enough. This denial does not mean\nhowever that Haeckel has no faith; he deliberately offers a creedal\nsubstitute which runs in part: I believe in a \"chemical substance of a\nviscous character, having albuminous matter and water as its chief\nconstituents.\" In such terms does Haeckel think of the Eternal. A\nprofessor of medicine has remarked that such a theory reduces all\nreality to \"phosphorus and glue.\" When some Psalmist cries, \"Bless the\nLord, O my soul,\" nothing substantial is speaking or is being spoken\nto save phosphorus and glue! When an Italian patriot cries, \"The time\nfor dying comes to all, but the time for dishonoring oneself ought\nnever to come,\" nothing is real and causal save phosphorus and glue!\nAnd every gracious and redeeming deed in history from the love of\nmothers to the cross of Christ has been a complicated working out of\nphosphorus and glue! In whatever labored phrases he may state his\ncase, the materialist's method there is obvious; he has taken physical\nenergy, of whose presence in his own body he is first assured, and\nwhose reality he has then read out into the world, and this homely and\nfamiliar experience he has lifted up as far as he can reach to say,\nthe Eternal is most like that.\n\nSo far as method is concerned, the _theist_ of necessity travels\nthe same road; only he insists on a nobler symbol than physical energy\nin terms of which to think of God. He takes _mind_. He says in\neffect: There may be wide stretches of the universe where our\nintellects meet no answer and find no meaning. But in much of the\nuniverse we do see meaning; and how can intelligence find sense where\nintelligence has not put sense? A few scratches on a cliff's face in\nAssyria, after centuries of neglect, rendered up their meaning to the\nmind of Rawlinson. They were themselves the work of intelligence, and\nintelligence could read them. So, the theist continues, the universe\nis in part at least intelligible. Our minds fit into it and are\nanswered by it. We can trace its laws and predict its movements. Man\nfirst worked out the nature of the ellipse in theoretical geometry,\nand then telescopes later showed the gigantic ellipses of planetary\norbits in the heavens. Can it be that this intelligible world,\nreadable by mind, is itself essentially mindless? As easily believe\nthat the notes of Wagner's operas were accidentally blown together by\na whirlwind and yet are playable by man! Therefore the theist believes\nthe universe to be rational; he takes mind as he has known it in\nhimself, and lifting it as high as he can reach, cries, God is most\nlike that.\n\nSo far as the general method of approach is concerned, the Christian\ntravels the same road to his idea of God. Only he cannot believe that\nthe best he knows is too good or too great to be a symbol in terms of\nwhich to think of the Eternal. Therefore he will not take a byproduct\nof experience such as physical energy, nor a section of personality\nsuch as mind; he takes the full orb of personality, _self-conscious\nbeing that knows and purposes and loves_, and he affirms that God is\nmost like this. Such in its simplest form is the Christian assertion\nof God's personality.\n\nIn one of his noblest passages Martineau has put into classic form\nthis necessity, which we have been discussing, of thinking about God\nin terms of human experience: \"God, being infinite, can never be fully\ncomprehended by our minds; whatever thought of him be there, his real\nnature must still transcend: there will yet be deep after deep beyond,\nwithin that light ineffable; and what we see, compared with what we do\nnot see, will be as the raindrop to the firmament. Our conception of\nhim can never _correspond with the reality_, so as to be without\nomission, disproportion, or aberration; but can only _represent the\nreality_, and _stand for God_ within our souls, till nobler\nthoughts arise and reveal themselves as his interpreters. And this is\nprecisely what we mean by a symbolical idea. The devotee who\nprostrates himself before a black stone,--the Egyptian who in his\nprayers was haunted by the ideal form of the graceful ibis or the\nmonstrous sphinx--the Theist who bends beneath the starry porch that\nmidnight opens to the temple of the universe--the Christian who sees\nin heaven a spirit akin to that which divinely lived in Galilee, and\nwith glorious pity died on Calvary--all alike assume a representation\nof him whose immeasurable nature they can neither compass nor escape.\nAnd the only question is, whether the conception they portray upon the\nwall of their ideal temple is an abominable idol, or a true and\nsanctifying mediatorial thought.\"\n\n\nIV\n\nIn their endeavor thus to think of God in terms of personality, some\nare perplexed because in their imagination a person is inseparable\nfrom flesh. \"I think of God as a personal being,\" writes a college\nstudent. \"A personal being would have a form that you could see or\ntouch.\" But this would be true only if the grossest materialism were\naccepted, and the spiritual life declared to be the product of brain\nas digestive fluids are of salivary glands. On any other basis,\npersonality is not indissolubly bound to body nor by it necessarily\ndelimited. A man cannot hear without his ear, but he is not his ear;\nhe cannot hear without the auditory nerve, but he is not the auditory\nnerve; he cannot hear without the temporal lobe of the brain, but he\nis not the brain nor any portion of it. These may be the instruments\nwhich he uses; he is free when they are well, hampered when they are\nbroken, and at last he is separable from them all. John Quincy Adams\nat the age of eighty met a friend upon a Boston street. \"Good\nmorning,\" said the friend, \"and how is John Quincy Adams today?\"\n\"Thank you,\" was the ex-president's reply, \"John Quincy Adams himself\nis well, quite well, I thank you. But the house in which he lives at\npresent is becoming dilapidated. It is tottering upon its foundation.\nTime and the seasons have nearly destroyed it. Its roof is pretty well\nworn out. Its walls are much shattered and it trembles with every\nwind. The old tenement is becoming almost uninhabitable and I think\nJohn Quincy Adams will have to move out of it soon. But he himself is\nquite well, quite well.\" Such a conception of man as _being_ a\npermanent personality and _having_ a temporary body is essential to\nany worthy meaning when we use personal terms about God.\n\nWith such an elevated thought, however, of what personality does mean,\nit soon is evident that no other reality with which we deal is so\nworthy to be the symbol of an Eternal Spirit. Is one perplexed that\nGod, who is invisible, should be pictured in the similitude of human\npersons? But _we_ are invisible. The outward husks and fleshly\ngarment of our friends we indeed have seen, but upon the friend\nhimself--consciousness, love, purpose, ideal, and character--no eye\nhas looked. No mirror ever has been strong enough to show us to\nourselves. In every homely conversation this ineffable miracle is\nwrought: out of the unseen where I dwell, I signal by word and gesture\nto you back in the unseen where you dwell. We are inhabitants now of\nthe intangible and unseen world; we are as invisible as God.\n\nIndeed, personality is essentially the most unlimited reality with\nwhich we deal; in comparison a solar system is a little thing.\nConsider _memory_, by which we can retrace our youthful days, build\nour shanties once again at brooksides, replay our games, and\nrecapitulate the struggles and the joys of the first days at school.\nNothing in all the universe can remember except persons. Were we not\nso familiar with this element in human greatness, we would more often\npause to exclaim, as did Augustine, fifteen centuries ago, \"Great is\nthe power of memory. Amazement overcomes me when I think of it. And\nyet men go abroad to gaze upon the mountains, the broad rivers, the\nwide ocean, the courses of the stars, and pass themselves, the\ncrowning wonder, by!\" Consider _imagination_, by which, sitting still\nin body we can project ourselves around the world, can walk down\nPrinces Street in Edinburgh, or stand in mingled awe and condemnation\nbefore the tomb of Napoleon in Paris, or rise uncovered before the\nmajesty of the Matterhorn. Nothing in all the universe can do that\nexcept persons. Were full power to act wherever we can _think_ added\nto our gifts, we should come so near to incipient omnipresence as to\nbe in dread of our responsibility. Consider _love_, by which we live\nnot so much where our bodies are as where our friends and family may\nbe. Love expands the individual until his real life is independent of\ngeography. Says one lover to another:\n\n                  \"The widest land\n  Doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart in mine\n  With pulses that beat double.\"\n\nMany a mother in America has _lived_ in the trenches of France;\nmany a man has found that what might happen to him where his body was\ncould not be compared with what might happen to him where his\nfriendships were; and as we grow in love and loyalty we find ourselves\nscattered all over creation. How far such an expansion of life may go\nour Lord revealed when he said, \"Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of\nthese, my brethren, even these least, ye did it unto me.\" (Matt.\n25:40.) Nothing in heaven above or on the earth beneath can so extend\nitself in love save persons.\n\nFinally, consider _creative power_ by which human beings project\nthemselves into the future, and, with masterful ideals in mind, lay\nhold on circumstance and bend it to their will. As if he shared\ncreative power with the Eternal, an engineer summons nature's forces\nto his bidding and lays his will upon them, until where nothing was a\nstructure stands that mankind may use for centuries. Nothing in all\nthe universe can so create except persons. In that essentially\ncreative act where deathless ideas and harmonies are given being by\npoets and musicians, so that something out of nothing is brought to\npass by personality, man faces a mystery as abysmal as God's making of\nthe world. \"Paradise Lost\" is wonderful; but not half as wonderful as\nthe creative personality itself who years before projected it. \"An\ninward prompting,\" Milton says, \"which now grew daily upon me, that by\nlabor and intense study, joined with the strong propensity of nature,\nI might perhaps leave something so written to after times as they\nshould not willingly let it die.\" Nothing can so create save\npersonality.\n\nPersonality is not so limited that we should be ashamed to think of\nGod in terms of it. Rather, of all realities with which we deal,\npersonality alone, invisible, reaching back in memory, reaching out in\nimagination, expanding itself in love, and laying hold upon the future\nwith creative power, is a worthy symbol of the Eternal Spirit.\n\nEven when the meaning of personality has been so enlarged and\nelevated, we should not leave our statement of belief in God as though\nour experience of personality were a mould into which our thought of\nhim is poured and so delimited. We are not presumptuous Lilliputians,\nrunning out with verbal stakes and threads, to pin down the tall,\nmajestic Gulliver of the Eternal and dance in theological exultation\nround our capture. We know better than that. We understand how\ninsufficient is every human name for God. We know that when we have\nsaid our best--\"How unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past\ntracing out!\" (Rom. 11:33).\n\nNothing more has marred the Christian message and discredited the\nChristian faith than the unwise presumption that has forced its\ndefinitions into the secrets of the Infinite. \"It is enough to say,\"\nexclaims Leslie Stephen, \"that they defined the nature of God Almighty\nwith an accuracy from which modest naturalists would shrink in\ndescribing the genesis of a black beetle.\" The antidote to such vain\npride of theology is found in the wholesome modesty of the Bible.\nThere man enquires, \"Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst thou\nfind out the Almighty unto perfection? It is high as heaven; what\ncanst thou do? Deeper than Sheol; what canst thou know?\" (Job 11:7).\nThere God replies: \"As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are\nmy ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts\"\n(Isa. 55:9). Scripture bears abundant testimony to the symbolic nature\nof our human terms for God. \"Like as a father pitieth his children, so\nJehovah pitieth them that fear him\" (Psalm 103:13). \"As one whom his\nmother comforteth, so will I comfort you\" (Isa. 66:13). \"I will\nbetroth thee unto me\" (Hos. 2:20). \"Return, ... saith Jehovah, for I\nam a husband unto you\" (Jer. 3:14). \"The Lord spake unto Moses ... as\na man speaketh unto his friend\" (Ex. 33:11). Father, Mother,\nBridegroom, Husband, Friend--these are symbols of God. Men,\nendeavoring to frame some worthy thought of the Eternal, lift up their\nbest in phrases such as these, and in them enshrine their noblest\nconcepts of the divine. They have no better, truer thing to say of\nGod, no wiser way in which to say it. But when they think of the\nEternal as he must be, and of their human words, infinitesimal in\ncomparison, they know that all their best names for God are like small\nmeasures of water dipped from an immeasurable sea. For all that, so\nmuch of God as they can grasp and understand is the most important\ntruth that mankind knows. Let even a tea-cup of water be taken to a\nlaboratory and it will tell the truth about the sea; _that one tea-cup\nwill reveal the quality of the whole ocean_. Yet it will not reveal\nall the truth about the ocean. When one considers the reach of the sea\nover the rim of the world; thinks of the depths that no eye can\npierce, the distances that no mind can imagine; remembers the currents\nthat sweep through the sea, the tides that rise there, and the storms\nthat beat it to its nether wells, he dare not try to put _these_ into\na tea-cup. So God sweeps out beyond the reach of human symbols. At\nonce so true and so inadequate are all our words for him.\n\nSo we might speak to one who incredulously looks upon our faith, but\nfor one who whole-heartedly approaches God as Christianity suggests,\nno negative and cautionary word is adequate. The Christian method of\nconceiving God brings the most exhilarating thought of him that man\nhas ever had. It says in brief: Take your _best_ and think of God as\nmost truly symbolized in that. As to what our best is, not even the\nagnostics doubt. The physical universe belittles us on one side only;\nit makes a pigmy of the body. In our spirits we still tower above the\nphysical; we are greater than the world we know. Our supreme good, the\ndivinest reality with which we deal, is personality. Then lift that\nup, says Christianity; it is your best, and you dare not think of God\nin terms of less; you have Christ's example in arguing from the human\nbest to the divine: \"If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts\nunto your children, _how much more_ ... your Father.\" (Matt. 7:11.)\n\nThe Christian faith asserts that when a man thus thinks of God in\nterms of the best he knows he is on the road toward truth. How many\nbillion spiritual miles he may have to travel to the end, no man can\ntell. Only he will never need to stop, retrace his steps, and start\nupon a lower path than personality, a road that lies beneath\nrighteousness and love. The road leads on and up beyond our\nimagination, but it is the same road and not another. _God is\npersonality plus, or else he alone is completely personal and we are\nbut in embryo._\n\nIf God so is personal, then all the deep meanings of religious life\nand faith that the saints, our spiritual sires, have known are open to\nus modern men and women. Forms of thought indeed have changed, but if\nGod is thus our Father and our Friend, the essentials of Christian\nexperience are waiting for us all. Life then is not purposeless; all\ncreation is bound into spiritual unity by personal Will; and in\nsacrificial labor we are serving one who is able to guard that which\nwe \"have committed unto him against that day\" (II Tim. 1:12). Old\nhymns of confidence in time of trial, we too can sing:\n\n  \"Still will we trust, though earth seem dark and dreary,\n    And the heart faint beneath His chastening rod;\n  Though steep and hard our pathway, worn and weary,\n    Still will we trust in God.\"\n\nAnd we can pray, not indeed with clamorous beggary as though the grace\nof God were a wayside stall where every greedy hand can pluck what\npassing whim may wish, but we can commune with God as the real saints\nhave always prayed with humility and gratitude and confident desire\nfor good. Most of all, that priceless privilege is open to us which is\nthe center and sun of Christian thought and life. For if among all\nrealities in our experience, we have dared take the best, personality,\nas a symbol in terms of which to think of God, how should we not,\namong all personalities, take the best we know as the highroad of\napproach to him. Therefore our real symbol of God shall be no man\namong us, frail and sinful, but our Lord himself \"fairest among ten\nthousand\"--\"the one altogether beautiful.\" We shall think of God in\nterms of him. We shall see \"the light of the knowledge of the glory of\nGod in the face of Jesus Christ\" (II Cor. 4:6.)\n\n[2] Copyright, 1914, Charles Scribner's Sons. Used by permission.\n\n[3] From a questionnaire, \"Belief in God and Immortality,\" by Prof.\nJames H. Leuba.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nBelief and Trust\n\n\nDAILY READINGS\n\nWe have tried to explain our faith in the personal God, and to see the\ntransfiguring influence of that faith on life. But is belief in God\nalways such a blessing as we have pictured? Rather faith, like every\nother experience of man, has its caricatures and burlesques. Many men\nare prevented from appreciation of faith in God, with its inestimable\nblessings, because they have so continually seen faith's perversions.\nThe fact is that belief in God may be an utterly negligible matter in\na man's experience or may even become a positively pernicious\ninfluence. Let us, in the daily readings, consider some of the\n_familiar travesties on faith_.\n\n\nFourth Week, First Day\n\n =Praise ye Jehovah.\n Praise Jehovah, O my soul.\n While I live will I praise Jehovah:\n I will sing praises unto my God while I have any being,\n Put not your trust in princes,\n Nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help.\n His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth;\n In that very day his thoughts perish.\n Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help,\n Whose hope is in Jehovah his God.=\n\n =--Psalm 146:1-5.=\n\nNo one can mistake the note of reality in this psalmist's experience\nof God. But every one of us knows people who, if asked whether they\nbelieved in God, would readily assent, yet to whom faith makes no such\ndifference in life as this psalm expresses. Their faith is nothing but\nan opinion about God, lightly held, a formal consent that what church\nor family tradition says must be correct. They have what Luther used\nto call \"the charcoal burner's faith.\" A man of that occupation, when\nasked what he believed, said, \"What Holy Church believes\"; but,\nquestioned further, he could not tell what it was that Holy Church did\nbelieve. So formal, vitally unpossessed, and practically unreal is\nmuch of our religious opinion that passes for faith. Dean Swift was a\nchurchman of high rank, and yet his biographer is compelled to say of\nhim: \"He clung to the doctrines of his church, not because he could\ngive abstract reasons for his belief, but simply because the church\nhappened to be his.\" Vital religious faith is a very different thing\nfrom such dry conventionality. A man may assent to the contents of a\ncollege catalogue and yet never have experience of college life; he\nmay agree that a menu is dietetically correct and yet never grow\nstrong from the food; and he may believe in every creed in Christendom\nand not know what faith in God really means. Opinions about God are a\nroadway to God, but the end of the journey is a personal fellowship\nthat transfigures life; and to seize opinions as though they were the\nobject of faith is, to use Tagore's figure, \"like a man who tries to\nreach his destination by firmly clutching the dust of the road.\"\n\n _O Thou great Father of us all, we rejoice that at last we know Thee.\n All our soul within us is glad because we need no longer cringe\n before Thee as slaves of holy fear, seeking to appease Thine anger by\n sacrifice and self-inflicted pain, but may come like little children,\n trustful and happy, to the God of love. Thou art the only true\n Father, and all the tender beauty of our human loves is the reflected\n radiance of Thy loving kindness, like the moonlight from the\n sunlight, and testifies to the eternal passion that kindled it._\n\n _Grant us growth of spiritual vision, that with the passing years we\n may enter into the fulness of this our faith. Since Thou art our\n Father, may we not hide our sins from Thee, but overcome them by the\n stern comfort of Thy presence. By this knowledge uphold us in our\n sorrows and make us patient even amid the unsolved mysteries of the\n years. Reveal to us the larger goodness and love that speak through\n the unbending laws of Thy world. Through this faith make us the\n willing equals of all Thy other children._\n\n _As Thou art ever pouring out Thy life in sacrificial father-love,\n may we accept the eternal law of the cross and give ourselves to\n Thee and to all men. We praise Thee for Jesus Christ, whose life has\n revealed to us this faith and law, and we rejoice that he has become\n the first-born among many brethren. Grant that in us, too, the faith\n in Thy fatherhood may shine through all our life with such persuasive\n beauty that some who still creep in the dusk of fear may stand erect\n as free sons of God, and that others who now through unbelief are\n living as orphans in an empty world may stretch out their hands to\n the great Father of their spirits and find Thee near. Amen._--Walter\n Rauschenbusch.\n\n\nFourth Week, Second Day\n\nFaith is travestied in many lives not so much by the substitution of\nopinion for experience, as by making religion consist in certain\ndevout practices, such as church-going. Ceremonialism, instead of\nbeing an aid in making God real, takes the place of fellowship with\nGod. How scathing were the attacks of the prophets on this distortion\nof religion!\n\n =Hear the word of Jehovah, ye rulers of Sodom; give ear unto the law\n of our God, ye people of Gomorrah. What unto me is the multitude of\n your sacrifices? saith Jehovah: I have had enough of the\n burnt-offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not\n in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he-goats. When ye come\n to appear before me, who hath required this at your hand, to trample\n my courts? Bring no more vain oblations; incense is an abomination\n unto me; new moon and sabbath, the calling of assemblies--I cannot\n away with iniquity and the solemn meeting. Your new moons and your\n appointed feasts my soul hateth; they are a trouble unto me; I am\n weary of bearing them. And when ye spread forth your hands, I will\n hide mine eyes from you; yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not\n hear: your hands are full of blood. Wash you, make you clean; put\n away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil;\n learn to do well; seek justice, relieve the oppressed, judge the\n fatherless, plead for the widow.--Isa. 1:10-17.=\n\nMany young people, watching conventional observances in religious\nworship and perceiving no real life active there, come to the\nconclusion that religious faith is a decent and negligible formality.\nSo William Scott Palmer, tracing his progress from agnosticism to\nChristianity, describes the religion of his boyhood: \"Religion as a\npersonal matter, religion as a life, did not exist for me or for my\nfamily. The border-land of my native village went to church at eleven\no'clock on fine Sundays, and I went in and with it. There were unlucky\nSundays when the Litany was said, and the service prolonged by its\nunmeaning length; the lucky Sundays were wet ones that cleared up\nlater.... I did not know that there was any vital meaning in\nreligion.\" And even Sir Wilfred Grenfell, whose work in Labrador is\none of this generation's outstanding triumphs of Christian faith, says\nof his young manhood: \"The ordinary exponents of the Christian faith\nhad never succeeded in interesting me in any way, or even in making me\nbelieve that they were more than professionally concerned themselves.\nReligion appeared to be a profession, exceedingly conventional, and\nmost unattractive in my estimation--the very last I should have\nthought of selecting.\" No travesty on faith is more deadly in its\neffects than this substitution of conventional observance for life.\n\n _O Jesus, we thy ministers bow before Thee to confess the common sins\n of our calling. Thou knowest all things; Thou knowest that we love\n Thee and that our hearts' desire is to serve Thee in faithfulness;\n and yet, like Peter, we have so often failed Thee in the hour of Thy\n need. If ever we have loved our own leadership and power when we\n sought to lead our people to Thee, we pray Thee to forgive. If we\n have been engrossed in narrow duties and little questions, when the\n vast needs of humanity called aloud for prophetic vision and\n apostolic sympathy, we pray Thee to forgive. If in our loyalty to the\n Church of the past we have distrusted Thy living voice and have\n suffered Thee to pass from our door unheard, we pray Thee to forgive.\n If ever we have been more concerned for the strong and the rich than\n for the shepherdless throngs of the people for whom Thy soul grieved,\n we pray Thee to forgive._\n\n _O Master, amidst our failures we cast ourselves upon Thee in\n humility and contrition. We need new light and a new message. We need\n the ancient spirit of prophecy and the leaping fire and joy of a new\n conviction, and Thou alone canst give it. Inspire the ministry of Thy\n Church with dauntless courage to face the vast needs of the future.\n Free us from all entanglements that have hushed our voice and bound\n our action. Grant us grace to look upon the veiled sins of the rich\n and the coarse vices of the poor through Thine eyes. Give us Thine\n inflexible sternness against sin, and Thine inexhaustible compassion\n for the frailty and tragedy of those who do the sin. Make us faithful\n shepherds of Thy flock, true seers of God, and true followers of\n Jesus. Amen._--Walter Rauschenbusch.\n\n\nFourth Week, Third Day\n\n =And he spake also this parable unto certain who trusted in\n themselves that they were righteous, and set all others at nought:\n Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee, and the\n other a publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself,\n God, I thank thee, that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners,\n unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the\n week; I give tithes of all that I get. But the publican, standing\n afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but\n smote his breast, saying, God, be thou merciful to me a sinner. I say\n unto you, This man went down to his house justified rather than the\n other: for every one that exalteth himself shall be humbled; but he\n that humbleth himself shall be exalted.--Luke 18:9-14.=\n\nThe men against whom the Master directed this parable were bigots.\nSelf-opinionated, self-conceited, dogmatic, and contemptuous--they\nwore all the attributes of bigotry. _And bigotry is a very familiar\nperversion of faith._ Vital fellowship with God ought to make men\ngracious, magnanimous, generous; it ought to make life with God seem\nso incomparably important that when anyone has that, his opinions\nabout God will be tolerantly regarded, however mistaken they may\nappear to be. Dr. Pritchett, when President of the Massachusetts\nInstitute of Technology, passed through a classroom where a young\ninstructor was conducting a chemical experiment. \"The reaction\nitself,\" says Dr. Pritchett, \"was going on in a retort on the table,\nwhile on a blackboard was written the conventional formula, which in\nthe science of chemistry is used to describe the reaction. It so\nhappened that the instructor had made a mistake in writing the\nformula; instead of CO^2 he had written CO_3. But this made not the\nslightest difference in the reaction which was going on in the flask.\"\nSo, a man may live his life with an admirably Christian spirit,\nalthough he describes it with a mistaken formula. His error is\ntheoretical, not vital. But a bigot is so sure that he alone knows the\ntrue formula, that a man without that formula is altogether wrong, and\nthat he must either set him right or condemn him utterly, that he\ngrows bitter, hard, unlovely. His opinions may be right, but his\nspirit is wrong. The faith that should make his life radiant is\nperverted to make it narrow, harsh, contemptuous. He renders hateful\nthe very faith he seeks to commend and ruins the reputation of the God\nwhom he is zealous to exalt. So the Pharisee of the parable missed all\nthe beauty of the Publican's life because he thought the Publican's\nformula was wrong. No one can estimate the irreparable damage which\nzealous bigots have done to true faith.\n\n _O Thou who art of purer eyes than to behold iniquity, canst Thou\n bear to look on us conscious of our great transgression? Yet hide not\n Thy face from us, for in Thy light alone shall we see light._\n\n _Forgive us for the sins which crowd into the mind as we realise Thy\n presence; our ungovernable tempers, our shuffling insincerities, the\n craven fear of our hearts, the pettiness of our spirits, the foul\n lusts and fatal leanings of our souls. Not for pardon only, but for\n cleansing, Lord, we pray._\n\n _Forgive us, we beseech Thee, our unconscious sins; things which must\n be awful to Thy sight, of which we yet know nothing. Forgive by\n giving us in fuller measure the awakening of Thy presence, that we\n may know ourselves, and lose all love of sin in the knowledge of what\n Thou art._\n\n _Forgive us for the things for which we can never forgive ourselves;\n those sad turned pages of our life which some chance wind of memory\n blows back again with shame; for the moment of cruel passion, the\n hour beyond recall, the word that went forth to poison and defame,\n the carelessness that lost our opportunity, the unheeded fading of\n bright ideals._\n\n _Forgive us for the things that others can never forgive; the idle\n tale, the cruel wrong, the uncharitable condemnation, the unfair\n judgment, the careless criticism, the irresponsible conduct._\n\n _Forgive us for the sins of our holy things; that we have turned the\n sacred page without a sigh, read the confessions of holy men and\n women and never joined therein, lived in Thy light and never prayed\n to be forgiven or rendered Thee thanksgiving; professed to believe in\n Thee and love Thee, yet dared to injure and hate._\n\n _Naught save being born again, nothing but a miracle of grace, can\n ever be to us forgiveness. Cleanse our hearts, renew our minds, and\n take not Thy Holy Spirit from us. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nFourth Week, Fourth Day\n\nOf all perversions of faith none is more fatal than the substitution\nof opinions about God for integrity of character and usefulness of\nlife. With what scathing vehemence does James, as Dr. Moffatt renders\nhim, attack this travesty on faith.\n\n =\"My brothers, what is the use of anyone declaring he has faith, if\n he has no deeds to show? Can his faith save him? Suppose some brother\n or sister is ill-clad and short of daily food; if any of you says to\n them, 'Depart in peace! Get warm, get food,' without supplying their\n bodily needs, what use is that? So faith, unless it has deeds, is\n dead in itself. Someone will object, 'And you claim to have faith!'\n Yes, and I claim to have deeds as well; you show me your faith\n without any deeds, and I will show you by my deeds what faith is! You\n believe in one God? Well and good. So do the devils, and they\n shudder. But will you understand, you senseless fellow, that faith\n without deeds is dead? When our father Abraham offered his son Isaac\n on the altar, was he not justified by what he did?\"--James 2:14-21.=\n\nAn American business man not long dead, who hated any word from the\npulpit about social righteousness, used to complain: \"Preachers are\ntalking so everlastingly about this earth. I've done my best to get\nthem to stick to the Gospel, and not allow 'worldliness' to get into\nthe teachings of the Church; but the good old preachers have gone to\nglory.\" Yet this pious zealot helped wreck the finances of a great\nrailroad system, and with part of the proceeds built a theological\nseminary. _There was no vital, intelligent connection between his\nfaith in God and his ideals of character and service._ One verse\nshould be made to flame in Christian pulpits: \"If any provideth not\nfor his own, and specially his own household, he hath denied the faith\nand is worse than an unbeliever\" (I Tim. 5:8). Domestic fidelity is\nhere only typical of all basic moral obligations. What this verse says\nin principle is clear: theoretical unbelief is not the worst sin in\nGod's sight; any man who fails in the fundamental duties of rectitude\nand service has thereby denied the faith and is worse than an atheist.\n\n _O thou holy One and just! if alone the pure in heart can see thee,\n truly we must stand afar off, and not so much as lift up our eyes\n unto heaven. Were it not that thou hast help and pity for the\n contrite spirit, we could only cry, \"Depart from us, we are sinful\n men, O Lord!\" For idle words, for proud thoughts and unloving deeds;\n for wasted moments and reluctant duties, and too eager rest; for the\n wandering desire, the vain fancy, the scornful doubt, the untrustful\n care; for impatient murmurs, and unruly passions, and the hardness of\n a worldly heart; thou, Lord, canst call us unto judgment, and we have\n naught to answer thee. But, O thou Judge of men, thou art witness\n that we do not love our guilty ways; make our conscience true and\n tender that we may duly hate them, and refuse them any peace as\n enemies to thee. Stir up within us a great and effectual repentance\n that we may redeem the time which we have lost, and in the hours that\n remain may do the work of many days. Thou knowest all our secret\n snares; drive from us every root of bitterness: with thy severity\n pluck out, O Lord, the thorns of sin from our entangled souls, and\n bind them as a crown of contrition around our bleeding brows; and\n having made our peace with thee may we henceforth watch and pray that\n we enter not again into temptation, but bear our cross with patience\n to the close. Amen._--James Martineau.\n\n\nFourth Week, Fifth Day\n\nSome of the most lamentable perversions of religious faith arise from\ninadequate ideas of God. Consider, for example, the way Manasseh\nthought that the Divine ought to be worshiped.\n\n =For he built again the high places which Hezekiah his father had\n destroyed; and he reared up altars for Baal, and made an Asherah, as\n did Ahab king of Israel, and worshipped all the host of heaven, and\n served them. And he built altars in the house of Jehovah, whereof\n Jehovah said, In Jerusalem will I put my name. And he built altars\n for all the host of heaven in the two courts of the house of Jehovah.\n And he made his son to pass through the fire, and practised augury,\n and used enchantments, and dealt with them that had familiar spirits,\n and with wizards: he wrought much evil in the sight of Jehovah, to\n provoke him to anger.--II Kings 21:3-6.=\n\nThen compare the thought of the Master on the same subject.\n\n =But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall\n worship the Father in spirit and truth: for such doth the Father seek\n to be his worshippers. God is a Spirit: and they that worship him\n must worship in spirit and truth.--John 4:23, 24.=\n\nThere is no reason to suppose that Manasseh was insincere; he is one\nof an innumerable company in whom the religious motive has been\nharnessed to warped and ignorant ideas of God. Religious faith, like\nany other tremendous power, is terrific in evil consequences when it\ngoes wrong. Men, under its subtle and prevailing influence, have waged\nbloody wars, worshiped with licentious rituals, carried on pitiless\npersecutions, and in bigotry, cruelty, and deceit have grown worse\nthan they would have been with no religion whatsoever. And men, in its\ninspiring light, have launched missionary movements, founded great\nphilanthropies, built schools, hospitals, orphanages, and in\nsacrifice, courageous service, and hope of human brotherhood have made\nman's history glorious. Religion needs intelligence to save it from\nbecoming a ruinous curse; like all power of the first magnitude it is\na disaster if ignorantly used. Since religious faith will always be a\nmajor human motive, under what obligations are we to save it from\nperversion and to keep it clean and right!\n\n _Almighty God, our heavenly Father, we are most unworthy to be called\n Thy children; for when light and darkness have been set before us, we\n have often chosen darkness rather than light. Conscious that within\n us are the elements of a nobler and a meaner life, we have yet given\n way to the meaner appetites, and have not obeyed the inspiration Thou\n hast kindled within us. We entreat Thee now of Thy grace to call us\n back from the ways of temptation and sin into that higher life which\n Thou dost breathe upon us, and which is manifested in Jesus Christ\n our Lord. Give us the self-knowledge, the humility, the repentance,\n the aspiration which draw us to the Cross of Christ, that worshiping\n there in lowliness, we may see the weakness of falsehood and the\n strength of truth, the exceeding sinfulness of selfishness, and the\n beauty of love and sacrifice._\n\n _O Thou whose secret is with them that fear Thee, inspire us with\n that loyalty of soul, that willingness to do Thy will to which all\n things are clear. Darkness, we know, cometh upon the proud and\n disobedient; confusion is ever attendant upon self-will; while to the\n humble, the earnest, and the pure-minded, the way of duty and\n spiritual health is made clear. O Spirit of the Eternal, subdue\n within us all pride, all vainglory, all self-seeking, and bring every\n thought and every desire into obedience to the law of Christ our\n Lord._\n\n _Almighty Father, to Thee would we consecrate these earthly days from\n infancy to age. Thee would we remember in childhood and youth. Thee\n would we serve in all the relations and activities of middle age.\n Thee would we teach our children to love and serve. Be Thou our stay\n and hope when health and strength shall fail. And when we are\n summoned hence, do Thou, O Life of our life, illumine the mystery of\n the invisible world with Thy presence and love. We ask these\n blessings in the spirit of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen._--John Hunter.\n\n\nFourth Week, Sixth Day\n\nThe perversions of religious faith, working pitiable instead of\nbenevolent consequences, are often seen on mission fields. Consider\nPaul's address in Athens:\n\n =And Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus, and said,=\n\n =Ye men of Athens, in all things I perceive that ye are very\n religious. For as I passed along, and observed the objects of your\n worship, I found also an altar with this inscription, TO AN UNKNOWN\n GOD. What therefore ye worship in ignorance, this I set forth unto\n you. The God that made the world and all things therein, he, being\n Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands;\n neither is he served by men's hands, as though he needed anything,\n seeing he himself giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; and\n he made of one every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the\n earth, having determined their appointed seasons, and the bounds of\n their habitation; that they should seek God, if haply they might feel\n after him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us: for\n in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain even of your\n own poets have said,=\n\n =For we are also his offspring.=\n\n =--Acts 17:22-28.=\n\nPaul did not need to plead for religion with the Athenians; they were\nalready \"very religious.\" Only religion was not doing for them what it\nought; it was a power used \"in ignorance\"; and Paul, valuing all that\nwas good there, quoting their own poets with appreciation,\nnevertheless longed to take their strong religious motives and so\nclarify and direct them that faith might mean unqualified benediction.\nIs not this always the right missionary method? The people of India\nare intensely religious; no tribe in Africa lacks its gods; and\neverywhere the faith-motive is immensely powerful. But often it makes\nmothers drown their babies in sacred rivers, it consecrates caste\nsystems as holy things, it centers man's adoration around unworthy\nobjects, its powers, gone wrong, are a curse and not a blessing. If in\nJesus Christ religious faith has come to us, through no merit of our\nown, as an unspeakable benediction, ought we not, humbly, without\ndogmatism or intolerance, and yet with passionate earnestness, to\nshare our best with all the world? Religious faith may either depress\nor lift a people's life; it is forever doing one or the other in every\nnation under heaven; and _there is no hope for the world until this\nmaster-motive is lifting everywhere_.\n\n _Almighty God, our Father in heaven, who hast so greatly loved the\n world that Thou hast given Thine only-begotten Son, the Redeemer,\n communicate Thy love to the hearts of all believers, and revive Thy\n Church to preach the Gospel to every creature._\n\n _O Thou who rulest by Thy providence over land and sea, defend and\n guide and bless the messengers of Christ; in danger be their shield,\n in darkness be their hope; enrich their word and work with wisdom,\n joy, and power, and let them gather souls for Thee in far fields\n white unto the harvest._\n\n _O Thou who by Thy Holy Spirit workest wonders in secret, open the\n eyes that dimly look for light to see the day-star in Christ; open\n the minds that seek the unknown God to know their Heavenly Father in\n Christ; open the hearts that hunger for righteousness to find eternal\n peace in Christ. Deliver the poor prisoners of ignorance and captives\n of idolatry, break down the bars of error, and dispel the shadows of\n the ancient night; lift up the gates, and let the King of glory and\n the Prince of Peace come in._\n\n _Thy kingdom, O Christ, is an everlasting kingdom! Strengthen Thy\n servants to pray and labor and wait for its appearing; forgive our\n little faith and the weakness of our endeavor; hasten the day when\n all nations shall be at peace in Thee, and every land and every heart\n throughout the world shall bless the name of the Lord Jesus, to the\n glory of God the Father. Amen._--Henry van Dyke.\n\n\nFourth Week, Seventh Day\n\nThe sad perversions of religious faith are not a matter for foreign\nmissions only. At home, too, we find people who seem to be rather\nworse than better because they are religious. Just as power in any\nother form may be abused, so may religious faith. Some in the name of\nreligion become censorious and intolerant, some superstitious, some\nslaves to morbid fears; and ignorance, self-conceit, pride, and\nworldly ambition when driven and enforced by a religious motive are\ninfinitely worse than they would have been without it. Toward this\nfact two attitudes are possible. One is to throw over religion on\naccount of its abuses; which is as reasonable as to deny all the\nblessings of electricity because in ignorant hands it is a dangerous\npower. The other is to take religious faith more seriously than ever,\nto see how great a force for weal or woe it always is in human life,\nand to strive in ourselves and in others for a high, intelligent, and\nworthy understanding and use of it. For religion can mean what Amiel\nsaid of it: \"There is but one thing needful--to possess God. Religion\nis not a method: it is a life--a higher and supernatural life,\nmystical in its root and practical in its fruits; a communion with\nGod, a calm and deep enthusiasm, a love which radiates, a force which\nacts, a happiness which overflows.\" From our study of the perversions\nand travesties of faith, we turn therefore in the weekly comment to\nconsider faith's vital meanings. So Paul, writing to the Galatians,\nrejoices in religion as a gloriously transforming power in life.\n\n =But I say, Walk by the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of\n the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit\n against the flesh; for these are contrary the one to the other; that\n ye may not do the things that ye would. But if ye are led by the\n Spirit, ye are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are\n manifest, which are these: fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,\n idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousies, wraths, factions,\n divisions, parties, envyings, drunkenness, revellings, and such like;\n of which I forewarn you even as I did forewarn you, that they who\n practise such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. But the\n fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness,\n goodness, faithfulness, meekness, self-control; against such there is\n no law. And they that are of Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh\n with the passions and the lusts thereof.--Gal. 5:16-23.=\n\n _Thou, O God, hast exalted us so that no longer we walk with prone\n head among the animals that perish. Thou hast ordained us as Thine\n own children, and hast planted within us that spiritual life which\n ever seeks, as the flame, to rise upward and mingle with Thee. Every\n exaltation, every pure sentiment, all urgency of true affection, and\n all yearning after things higher and nobler, are testimonies of the\n divinity that is in us. These are the threads by which Thou art\n drawing us away from sense, away from the earth, away from things\n coarse and unspiritual, and toward the ineffable. We rejoice that we\n have in us the witness of the Spirit, the indwelling of God. For,\n although we are temples defiled, though we are unworthy of such a\n Guest, and though we perpetually grieve Thee, and drive Thee from us,\n so that Thou canst not do the mighty work that Thou wouldst within\n us, yet we rejoice to believe that Thou dost linger near us. Even\n upon the outside, Thou standest knocking at the door until Thy locks\n are wet with the night dews, and dost persuade us with the\n everlasting importunity of love, and draw us upward, whether with or\n without our own knowledge. Thou art evermore striving to imbue us\n with Thyself, and to give us that divine nature which shall triumph\n over time and sense and matter; and we pray that we may have an\n enlightened understanding of this Thy work in us and upon us, and\n work together with Thee. Amen._--Henry Ward Beecher.\n\n\nCOMMENT FOR THE WEEK\n\nOne might be tempted by the last chapter to suppose that, if he could\naccept the proposition that God is personal, he would be well upon his\nway toward Christianity. But in theory at least Plato accepted this\nproposition four hundred years before Christ, when he said: \"God is\nnever in any way unrighteous--He is perfect righteousness; and he of\nus who is most righteous is most like Him.\" He, too, used personality\nas a symbol of God. When, however, one compares Plato with Jesus, how\nincalculably greater is the religious meaning of our Lord! There is\nsomething more in the Master's experience and thought than the belief\nthat God is personal. Evidently our quest must be followed further\nthan the last chapter carried us.\n\nIn Scripture two kinds of faith in the personal God are clearly\nindicated. On the one side stand verses such as this: \"Thou believest\nthat God is one; thou doest well; the demons also believe and shudder\"\n(James 2:19). On the other, one finds through both the Testaments\nwitness and appeal for a kind of faith that plainly differs from the\nfirst: \"O my God, in thee have I trusted\" (Psalm 25:2). It is not\ndifficult to guess the terms in which many would describe this\ndifference. In the first, so the familiar explanation runs, we are\ndealing with the _mind's_ faith in God; the man's intellect\nassents to the belief that God is and that He is one. In the second we\nare dealing with the _heart's_ faith in God; the whole man is\nhere involved in an adoring trust that finds in reliance upon God\nlife's stimulus and joy.\n\nThis distinction between the faith of the intellect and of the heart\nis valid, but it does not go to the pith of the truth. When a\nprofessor in the class-room, discussing conflicting theories of life's\norigin, concludes that theism is the reasonable interpretation of the\nuniverse, the listener understands that the lecturer believes in God's\nexistence. But if the professor could be followed home and overheard\nin a private prayer, like F\u00e9nelon's: \"Lord, I know not what I ought to\nask of Thee; Thou only knowest what I need; Thou lovest me better than\nI know how to love myself. O Father! give to Thy child that which he\nhimself knows not how to ask,\" something incalculably more than the\nclassroom talk disclosed would be revealed about the meaning of the\nteacher's faith. And as the classroom lecture and the private prayer\nstand so contrasted, the gist of the difference is plain. In the one,\nfaith was directed toward a _theory_; in the other faith laid hold\nupon a _Person_. That the intellect was more involved in the first and\nthe emotions in the second is incidental to the main matter, that _two\ndiffering objects were in view_. Toward these two objects we\ncontinually are exercising faith--_ideas and people, propositions and\npersons_.\n\nNow faith in a proposition we conveniently may call belief; and faith\nin a person, trust. We believe that gravitation and the conservation\nof energy universally apply, that democracy will prove better than\nabsolutism, and that prison systems can be radically reformed; these\nand innumerable other propositions that cannot be demonstrated we\nconfidently believe. But in quite another way we daily are exercising\nfaith; _we have faith in our friends_. How profound a change\ncomes over the quality and value of faith when it thus finds its\nobjective in a person! Our beliefs in propositions are of basic import\nand without them we could not well exist, but it is by trust in\npersons that we live indeed. Belief in monogamy, for all its\nimportance, is a cold abstraction, and few could be found to die for\nit. Men do not lay down their lives for abstract theories, any more\nthan they would suffer martyrdom, as Chesterton remarked, for the\nMeridian of Greenwich. But when monogamy is translated from theory\ninto personal experience, when belief in the idea becomes trust in a\nlife-long comrade of whom one may sing:\n\n                  \"What I do\n  And what I dream include thee, as the wine\n  Must taste of its own grapes,\"\n\nfaith has taken a form for which men do live and die in glad\nsurrender. Although the same word, faith, be applied to both, trust in\npersons reaches deeper than belief in propositions and supplies a\nwarmth and power that belief cannot attain.\n\nIn religion these two aspects of faith continually are found and both\nare indispensable. Trust in a person, for example, presupposes belief\nin his existence and fidelity. \"He that cometh to God must believe\nthat he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that seek after him\"\n(Heb. 11:6). Trust cannot exist without belief, but when one seeks the\ninner glory of the religious life that has overflowed in prayer and\nhymn, supplied motive for service and power for character, he finds it\nnot in belief, but in the vital relationships involved in trusting a\nPerson. Men often have discussed their particular beliefs with cool\ndeliberation, have stated them in formal creeds, have changed them\nwith access of new knowledge and experience. But _trust_, the\ninner reliance of the soul on God and glad self-surrender to his will,\nhas persisted through many changes, clothing itself with beliefs like\ngarments and casting them aside when old. Trust has made rituals and\nchurches and unmade them when they were ineffectual, it has been the\nlife behind the theory, the experience behind the explanation; and its\nproper voice has been not creed and controversy, but psalm and song\nand sacrifice. Men have felt in describing this inward friendship that\ntheir best words were but the \"vocal gestures of the dumb,\" able to\nindicate but unable to express their thoughts. _For while belief is\ntheology, trust is religion._\n\n\nII\n\nThis central position of trust in the Christian life is evident when\none considers that in its presence or absence lies the chief point of\ndifference between a religious and an irreligious man. The peculiarity\nof religion is not that it has beliefs; everybody has them. As we have\nseen, Huxley, who called himself an agnostic, said that he thoroughly\nbelieved the universe to be rational, than which only a few greater\nventures of faith can be imagined. A man may not want to have beliefs.\nHe may say that knowledge is wool, warm to clothe oneself withal, that\nbelief is cotton, and that he will not mingle them. But for all that\nhe still does have beliefs and he cannot help it.\n\nWhen, therefore, a Christian and an atheist converse they can match\nbelief with belief. \"I believe,\" says one, \"in God the Father\"; and \"I\nbelieve,\" says the other, \"in the eternal physical universe, without\nspiritual origin or moral purpose.\" Says the Christian, \"I believe in\nthe immortality of persons,\" and the atheist replies, \"I believe that\nthe spirit dies with the body as sound ceases when the bell's swinging\niron grows still.\" Says the Christian, \"I believe in the ultimate\ntriumph of righteousness\"; and the atheist replies, \"I believe that\nall man's aspiration after good is but the endless sailing of a ship\nthat never shall arrive.\" So the two may play battledore and\nshuttlecock, but if, so having paired beliefs, they part with no more\nsaid, they have missed the real point of their difference. The\nirreligious man can match the Christian's belief with his own, but one\nthing he cannot match--the Christian's trust. _He has nothing that\nremotely corresponds with that._\n\nThe Christian always has this case to plead with an unbelieving man:\nDo not suppose that the difference between us is exhausted in a\nconflict of contrasting propositions. Great indeed is the divergence\nthere! But the issue of all such difference lies in another realm.\nWhen you face life's abysmal mysteries that your eyes can no more\npierce than mine, you have no one to trust. When misfortunes fall that\nsend men to their graves, as Sydney Smith said, with souls scarred\nlike a soldier's body, you have no one to trust. When you face the\nlast mystery of all and whether going say farewell to those who stay,\nor staying bid farewell to those who go, you have no one to trust. You\ncan match my belief with your belief, but for one thing you have no\ncounterpart. \"Jehovah is my shepherd, I shall not want\" (Psalm 23:1).\nYou cannot match that! \"My heart hath trusted in him, and I am helped\"\n(Psalm 28:7). You cannot match that! \"Shall not the Judge of all the\nearth do right?\" (Gen. 18:25); \"We have our hope set on the living\nGod\" (I Tim. 4:10); \"Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit\" (Luke\n23:46). That trust you cannot match!\n\n\nIII\n\nIn the light of this distinction between belief and trust some\nmistaken types of faith can be easily described. There, for example,\nis the _faith of formal creedalism_. We cannot have trust without\nsome belief, but we may unhappily have belief without any trust. Now a\nman who believes the doctrines that underly the Christian life but who\ndoes not vitally trust the Person whom those doctrines present, has\nmissed the heart out of faith's meaning. He is like one who cherishes\na letter of introduction to a great personality, but has never used\nit; he has the formal credentials, but not the transforming\nexperience. It follows that we cannot estimate a man merely by knowing\nhis beliefs. I believe in all the Christian truths, says one; and the\ncurious question rises, how did these beliefs of his come into his\npossession? They may have been handed to him by his forbears like a\nset of family jewels, a static and external heritage, which now he\nkeeps in some ecclesiastical safe-deposit vault and on state days, at\nChristmas or at Easter, goes to see. Still he may claim that they are\nhis beliefs; he may even quarrel about their genuineness, not because\nhe ever uses them but because they are his. He may repeat the creed\nwith the same unquestioning assent that he gives to the conventional\ncut of his clothes. His beliefs are not the natural utterance and\nexplanation of his inner life with God and man, but are put on as they\nwere handed to him, like the fashions of his coats. So easy is it to\nbe formally orthodox!\n\nOver against such conventional believers one thinks of other folk whom\nhe has known. They have no such stereotyped, clear-cut beliefs. They\nare very puzzled about life. It seems to them abysmally mysterious.\nAnd when they speak they talk with a modesty the formal creedalist has\nnever felt: My beliefs are most uncertain. Confused by many voices\nshouting conflicting opinions about truths which I once accepted\nwithout thinking, I cannot easily define my thoughts. But I do trust\nGod. That assent of the mind which I cannot give to propositions, I\ncan give to him. Life is full of mystery, but I do not really think\nthat the mystery is darkness at its heart. My faith has yet its\nstanding ground in this, that the world's activities are not like the\nconvulsions of an epileptic, unconscious and purposeless. There is a\nMind behind the universe, and a good purpose in it.\n\n  \"Yet in the maddening maze of things,\n  And tossed by storm and flood,\n  To one fixed trust my spirit clings;\n  I know that God is good.\"\n\nSay as one may that such an attitude is far from adequate, yet as\ncompared with the merely formal acceptance of inherited opinions how\nincomparably superior its religious value is!\n\nThe people of placid, stiff beliefs are not the successors of the real\nsaints. When one reads George Matheson's books of devotion, for\nexample, or sings his hymn \"O Love, that wilt not let me go,\" or\nlearns of his great work in his church in Edinburgh, one might suppose\nthat he never had a doubt. Yet listen to his own confession: \"At one\ntime with a great thrill of horror, I found myself an absolute\natheist. After being ordained at Innellan, I believed nothing; neither\nGod nor immortality. I tendered my resignation to the Presbytery, but\nto their honor they would not accept it, even though an Highland\nPresbytery. They said I was a young man and would change. I have\nchanged.\" One need only read such books of his as \"Can the Old Faith\nLive with the New?\" to see through what a searching discipline of\nstrenuous thought he passed in the regaining of his faith. But if one\nwould know what held his religious life secure while he was working\nout his beliefs from confusion to clarity, one must turn to Matheson's\npoem:\n\n  \"Couldst thou love _Me_\n  When creeds are breaking--\n  Old landmarks shaking\n  With wind and sea?\n  Couldst thou refrain the earth from quaking\n  And rest thy heart on _Me_?\"\n\nMany a man has been held fast by his trust in God while in perplexity\nhe thought out his beliefs about God.\n\nIndeed, within the Scripture, whatever word is used to describe the\nattitude of faith, this vital personal alliance with God is everywhere\nintended. For convenience we have called faith in propositions belief,\nbut that does not mean that when the Scriptures use \"believe\" they are\nurging the acceptance of propositions. Not often in the Bible are we\ninvited merely to agree with an opinion; we are everywhere called to\ntrust a Person. \"Trust in the Lord\" in the Old Testament, \"Believe in\nthe Lord Jesus Christ\" in the New, are neither of them the\nproclamation of a theory, but the exaltation of a personality.\nWherever in Scripture doctrines are insisted on--the unity of God,\nthe deathlessness of the spirit, the divinity of Christ--they are\nnever doctrines for their own sakes; _they are either commendatory\ntruths about a Friend, that we may not fail to trust him, or they are\nideas about life that have come to men because they did trust him_.\n_Trust in a Person is either the source or the goal of every Christian\ndoctrine._ The Gospel at its center is not a series of propositions,\nbut a concrete, personal relationship opened between the soul and the\nDivine, out of which new powers, joys, possibilities flow gloriously\ninto human life. When out of this experience of divine fellowship\nPaul, for example, speaks of faith he means by it the alliance that\nbinds him to his friend. He fairly sings of the peace that comes from\nsuch believing (Rom. 15:13), of the love that is its motive power and\nchief expression (Gal. 5:6), and of \"the sacrifice and service\" which\nare its issue (Phil. 2:17). He enthusiastically commends to everyone\nthis divine alliance through which moral defeat is changed to victory\nin the \"righteousness which is of God by faith\" (Phil. 3:9); and his\nprose slips over into poetry when he describes his new transfigured\nlife as \"access by faith into that grace wherein we stand\" (Rom. 5:2).\nPlainly he is not talking here about a set of propositions; he is\nrejoicing in a transforming personal relationship. Some faith is\nnothing but an inherited set of opinions and it gives a cold light\nlike an incandescent bulb; some faith, like sunshine, is brighter for\nseeing than any incandescence can ever be, but warm too, so that under\nits persuasive touch new worlds of life spring into being. The faith\nof the New Testament and of the real saints is not the cold brilliance\nof a creed in whose presence one can freeze even while he sees; it is\nthe warm, life-giving sunshine of a trust in God that makes all\ngracious things grow, and puts peace and joy, hope and love into life.\nBelief in propositions is there, but the crown and glory of it are\ntrust in a Person.\n\n\nIV\n\nIn the light of this distinction between belief and trust, the\ninadequacy of another type of faith can easily be understood. Many\nwould protest that they have not accepted their beliefs as an external\nheritage from the past, but rather have thought them through, and hold\nthem now as _reasonable theories to explain the facts of the spiritual\nlife_. They would say that as a geologist observes the rocks and\nconstructs an hypothesis to account for their origin and nature, so\nthe mind, observing man's contacts with invisible powers, constructs\nreligious beliefs as explanations of experience. They would insist\nthat their theology is not merely traditional, but in large degree is\nindependently appropriated and original. They hold it as an hypothesis\nto make intelligible man's experiences of the spiritual world.\n\nThere is significant truth in this view of faith. Man's ideals, his\nloves, hopes, aspirations, his unescapable sense of moral obligation,\nhis consciousness of Someone other than himself, are facts, as solidly\npresent in experience as stars and mountains. To explain these facts\nby theology is as rational as to explain the stars by astronomy. Every\nbeliever in religious truth should welcome this confirming word from\nDr. Pritchett, written when he was President of the Massachusetts\nInstitute of Technology: \"Science is grounded in faith just as is\nreligion, and scientific truth, like religious truth, consists of\nhypotheses, never wholly verified, that fit the facts more or less\nclosely.\"\n\nBut when one turns from such a statement to inquire what faith has\nactually meant to religious men, he does not find that their\nexperience could easily be defined as belief in an hypothesis. The\nprophets, standing their ground through national disaster,\nundiscourageable in their conviction of God's good purpose for His\npeople, would have been surprised to hear their faith so described.\nWhen the Sons of Thunder were swept out into a new life by the\ninfluence of Jesus, or the seer of Patmos was ravished with visions of\neternal victory, or Paul was made conqueror in a fight for character\nthat had been his despair, they would hardly have spoken of their\nexperiences as belief in an hypothesis. Real religion has always meant\nsomething more vital than holding a theory about life. When Robert\nLouis Stevenson says of his transformation of character, \"I came about\nlike a well-handled ship. There stood at the wheel that unknown\nsteersman whom we call God\"; when Tolstoi cries: \"To know God and to\nlive are one and the same thing\"; when Professor William James, of\nHarvard, writes of his consciousness of God, \"It is most indefinite to\nbe sure and rather faint, and yet I know that if it should cease,\nthere would be a great hush, a great void in my life\"; one sees what\nconversion of character, what increase of life's value, what\nspiritual reenforcement religion has meant even to such unconventional\nbelievers. When they speak of it, they are evidently thinking of a\nvital power and not a theory.\n\nThe most obscure Christian to whom religion has become a necessity in\nliving, knows how far short the plummet of hypothetical belief comes\nfrom reaching bottom. In sin, burdened by a sense of guilt that he\ncould not shake off and unable to forgive himself, he has cried to be\nforgiven, and the Gospel that has been his hope was no injunction to\nhold hard by his hypothesis! In sorrow, when the blows have fallen\nthat either hallow or embitter life, he has sought for necessary\nfortitude, and the Gospel which established him certainly was not,\nCast thy care on thine hypothesis! And when, more than conqueror, he\nfaces death, his confidence and hope will rest on no such prayer as\nthis, O Hypothesis, guide me! The word of religion is of another sort,\n\"Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear\nno evil, for _Thou_ art with me.\" Not belief in propositions, but\ntrust in a Person has been the heart of the Gospel, and to make any\nhypothesis, however true, do duty as religion is to give the soul a\nstone when it asks for bread.\n\nThe futility of seeking contentment in faith as an hypothesis alone is\nespecially manifest in our time. This is an age of swiftly changing\nideas in every realm. As in science, so in religion, today one theory\nholds the field to be displaced tomorrow by another. A man in\ntheology, as much as in politics or psychology, goes to bed supposing\nhe has settled his opinions, and wakes up to find a new array of\nevidence that disturbs his confidence. When, therefore, religious\nfaith has meant no more to its possessor than theory, there is no\nsecurity or rest. Each day the winds of opinion shift and veer, and\nminds at the beginning obstinate in their beliefs, at last, dismayed\nby the reiterated uncertainties of thought, give up their faith.\n\nWhere, then, have the men of faith found the immovable center of their\nconfidence? Paul revealed the secret. On the side of his particular\nopinions he frankly confessed his limited and uncertain knowledge.\n\"Now we know in fragments,\" he wrote, \"now we see through a glass\ndarkly.\" \"How unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past tracing\nout!\" But on the side of his trust he is adamant: \"I know _him_ whom\nI have believed.\" The certainty of his life was his relationship with\na person, and his beliefs were the best he yet had thought in the\nexplication and establishment of that trust.\n\nThe great believers of the Church continually have exhibited this dual\naspect of their faith. Even St. Augustine, facing the profound\nmysteries involved in his trinitarian belief, complains that human\nspeech is pitiably futile in trying to explain what \"Three persons\"\nmeans, and that if he uses the familiar phrase, he does so not because\nhe likes it, but because he may not be silent and knows no better\nthing to say. But when Augustine prays to the God whose nature is so\nunfathomable that no man can see it fully or express it adequately, he\nreveals no such uncertain thought: \"Grant me, even me, my dearest\nLord, to know Thee and love Thee and rejoice in Thee.... Let the love\nof Thee grow every day more and more here, that it may be perfect\nhereafter; that my joy may be great in itself and full in Thee. I\nknow, O God, that thou art a God of truth; O make good Thy gracious\npromises to me!\" So children do not fully understand an earthly father\nand often hold conceptions grotesquely insufficient to do justice to\nhis life and work. But they may have for him well-founded trust. Even\nin the years of infancy an ennobling personal relationship begins,\ndespite the inadequacy of their beliefs, and that trust yearly deepens\nwhile mental concepts shift and change with access of new knowledge.\n_The abiding core of a child's life with his father is not belief\nbut trust._\n\nSuch has always been the secret of faith's stability in men who have\nentered into personal fellowship with God. Even of the first disciples\nit has been said--\"They would have had difficulty sometimes to tell\nyou _what_ they believed, but they could always have told you in\n_whom_ they believed.\"\n\n\nV\n\nThe truth of which we have been speaking has pertinent bearing on the\nmain object of our studies. We shall be considering the difficulties\nwhich Christians have with their beliefs, and the arguments which may\nclarify and establish our minds' confidence in God. But many problems\nin the realm of intellectual belief cannot be solved by any arguments\nwhich the mind devises. The trouble often lies not in our theories\nabout the religious life, but in our religious life itself. _The\ndeeper difficulty is not that our thinking is unreasonable, but that\nour experience is unreal._\n\nTo a man who never had seen the stars or felt the wonder of their\ndistances, astronomy would be a lifeless topic and his endeavors to\nthink about it a blundering and futile operation. Our theories about\nanything depend for their interest and worth upon the vividness with\nwhich we experience the thing itself and care to understand its\nmeaning. This is true about matters like the stars; how much more true\nabout the intimate affairs of man's own life! Democracy vs. autocracy\nis a crucial problem. But plenty of men are so careless about human\nweal, think so little of their country and the world as objects of\nsolicitude and devotion, that to discuss in their presence democratic\nand autocratic theories of state is a waste of time. The trouble is\nnot with their minds; they may be very clever and acute. The trouble\nis with their lives. They need to experience patriotism as a vital\nmotive; they need to care immensely what happens to mankind. Only then\nwill the problems of government grow vivid, and the need of a solution\nbecome so critical that thinking will be urgent and productive. We\nnever think well about anything for which we do not care.\n\nPlenty of people today discuss theology as an academic pastime. It is\na speculative game at which they play, as they do at golf, for its fun\nand lure. They do not really care about God; they feel no crucial need\nof him. Of little use is all their ingenuity in argument, clever and\nastute though it may be. Blind men might so discuss the color scheme\nof an Italian landscape and deaf men debate the harmonies of Handel's\noratorios. What is lacking is experience. For our theories are only\nthe explanations of experience, and an emptier game cannot be played\nthan debating explanations of experiences which we have not had.\n\nEveryone in difficulty with his faith should give due weight to this\nimportant truth. Our intellectual troubles are not all caused by the\nbankruptcy of our spiritual lives, but many of them are. Men live with\ndrained and unreplenished spirits, from which communion with God and\nservice of high causes have been crowded out. God grows unreal. The\nself-evidencing experiences that maintain vital confidence in the\nspiritual life grow dim and unimperative. Men pass years without\nhabitually thinking as though God really were, without making any\ngreat decisions as though God's will were King, without engaging in\nany sacrificial work that makes the thought of God a need and a\ndelight, without the companionship of great ideas or the sustenance of\nprayer. Then, when experience is denuded of any sense of God's\nreality, some intellectual doubt is suggested by books or friends, or\nfearful trouble shatters happiness. What recourse is there in such a\ncase? The arguments of faith have no experience to get their grip\nupon; they can appeal to no solid and sustained fact of living.\nReligious confidence goes to pieces and men tell their friends that\nmodern philosophy has been too much for faith. But the underlying\ndifficulty was not philosophical; it was vital. The insolvency of\n\"belief\" was due to the bankruptcy of \"trust.\" Personal fellowship\nwith God failed first; the theory about him lapsed afterward.\n\nThroughout our endeavor to deal with intellectual perplexity, this\nfundamental truth should not be forgotten. _The peril of religion is\nthat vital experience shall be resolved into a formula of explanation,\nand that men, grasping the formula, shall suppose themselves thereby\nto possess the experience._ If one inquires what air is, the answer\nwill probably be a formula stating that oxygen and nitrogen mixed in\nproportions of twenty-one to seventy-nine make air. But air in\nexperience is not a formula. Air is the elixir we breathe and live\nthereby. Air is the magician who takes the words that our lips frame\nand bears them from friend to friend in daily converse. Air is the\nmessenger who carries music to our ears and fragrance to our nostrils;\nit is the whisperer among the trees in June, and in March the wild\ndancer who shakes the bare branches for his castanets. Air is the\ngiant who piles the surf against the rocky shore, and the nurse who\nfans the faces of the sick. One cannot put that into a formula. No\nmore can God be put into a theology, however true. They who define him\nbest may understand him least. God is the Unseen Friend, the Spiritual\nPresence, who calls us in ideals, warns us in remorse, renews us with\nhis pardon, and comforts us with power. God is the Spirit of\nRighteousness in human life, whose victories we see in every moral\ngain, and allied with whom we have solid hopes of moral victory. God\nis the One who holds indeed the far stars in his hand, and yet in\nfellowship with whom each humblest son of man may find strength to do\nand to endure with constancy and fortitude and deathless hope. And\nwhen one lives close to him, so that the inner doors swing easily on\nquiet hinges to let him in, he is the One who illumines life with a\nradiance that human wills alone cannot attain. That is God--\"Blessed\nis the man that taketh refuge in him\" (Psalm 34:8).\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nFaith's Intellectual Difficulties\n\n\nDAILY READINGS\n\nMost people will readily grant that such a sense of personal\nfellowship with God as the last week's study presented is obviously\ndesirable. Every one who has experienced such filial life with God\nwill bear witness to its incomparable blessing. Said Tennyson, \"I\nshould be sorely afraid to live my life without God's presence, but to\nfeel he is by my side just now as much as you are, that is the very\njoy of my heart.\" But many who would admit the desirability of the\nexperience are troubled about the reasonableness of the beliefs that\nunderly it. They want intellectual assurance about their faith. Let us\nin the daily readings present certain considerations which a mind so\nperplexed should take into account.\n\n\nFifth Week, First Day\n\nWe should let no one deny our right to bring religious belief to the\ntest of reasonableness. Glanvill was right when in the seventeenth\ncentury he said, \"There is not anything I know which hath done more\nmischief to Religion than the disparaging of Reason.\" In the New\nTestament Paul says:\n\n =Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.--I Thess. 5:21.=\n\nPeter says:\n\n =Yea, and for this very cause adding on your part all diligence, in\n your faith supply virtue; and in your virtue knowledge.--II Pet. 1:5.=\n\nThis might be paraphrased to read, Faith should be _worked out_ into\ncharacter and _thought through_ into knowledge. As for Jesus:\n\n =One of the scribes came, and heard them questioning together, and\n knowing that he had answered them well, asked him, What commandment\n is the first of all? Jesus answered, The first is, Hear, O Israel;\n The Lord our God, the Lord is one: and thou shalt love the Lord thy\n God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind,\n and with all thy strength.--Mark 12:28-30.=\n\nIn many a life which has neglected these admonitions Lowell's words\nhave proved true: \"Nothing that keeps thought out is safe from\nthought.\" In our resolute endeavor to think through the mystery of\nlife, however, and to find a reasonable basis for faith, we need to\nremember that _the very desire to know is an indication of the\nreality which we seek_. The dim intuition that the world with all\nits diverse powers was in some sense a unity, preceded by ages the\nstatement of nature's uniformity which modern science knows; and man's\ntireless desire to reach a reasonable statement of the unity was an\nintimation in advance that unity was there. So men do not believe in\nGod because they have proved him; they rather strive endlessly to\nprove him because they cannot help being sure that he must be there.\nThis in itself is an intimation about reality which no thoughtful man\nwill lightly set aside. Tennyson rightly describes the reason for\nman's quest after proof about God:\n\n  \"If e'er when faith had fall'n asleep,\n    I heard a voice 'believe no more'\n    And heard an ever-breaking shore\n  That tumbled in the Godless deep;\n\n  A warmth within the breast would melt\n    The freezing reason's colder part,\n    And like a man in wrath the heart\n  Stood up and answer'd 'I have felt.'\"\n\n _Eternal Father, Quest of ages, long sought, oft doubted or forsook;\n can it be that Thou art known to us, the Law within our minds, the\n Life of every breath we draw, the Love that yearneth in our hearts?\n Art Thou the Spirit who oft hast striven with us, and whom we greatly\n feared, lest yielding to His strong embrace we should become more\n than we dared to be?_\n\n _An impulse toward forgiveness has sometimes stirred within us, we\n have felt moved to show mercy, the sacrificial life has touched our\n aspiration; but we were unprepared to pay the price. Was this\n Thyself, and have we turned from Thee? Something like this we must\n have done, so barren, joyless and so dead has life become. Canst Thou\n not visit us again?_\n\n _We hush our thoughts to silence, we school our spirits in sincerity,\n and here we wait. O may we not feel once more the light upon our\n straining eyes, the tides of life rise again within our waiting\n hearts?_\n\n _We never looked to meet Thee in the stress of thought, the toil of\n life, or in the call of duty; we only knew that somehow life had lost\n for us all meaning, dignity, and beauty. How then shall we turn back\n again and see with eyes that fear has filmed? How can we be born\n again, now grown so old in fatal habit?_\n\n _If we could see this life of ours lived out in Thee, its common days\n exalted, its circumstances made a throne, its bitterness,\n disappointment, and failure all redeemed, then our hearts might stir\n again, and these trembling hands lay hold on life for evermore.\n Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nFifth Week, Second Day\n\nNot only is man's tireless quest for assurance about God an intimation\nthat God must be here to be sought after; but _the spiritual nature of\nman which insists on the quest is itself a revelation that God\nactually is here_. Some men say that our spiritual life is the result\nof evolution, and they suppose that by this magic word they have\nexplained it. But what comes out of a process of growth was somehow\nlatent in the Original Beginning from which the growth started.\nPalm-trees do not grow from acorns; only oaks evolve from acorns and\nfor the sufficient reason that oaks are somehow _involved in acorns_\nto start with. So a universe with spiritual life in it naturally\npresupposes an Original with spiritual life in It. Whatever evolves\nmust first of all have been involved. The very fact that the seeker\nafter God has a spiritual life, which is restless and unsatisfied\nwithout faith in the Eternal Spirit, is one of the clearest\nindications that, whatever else may be said about the source of life,\nit must be spiritual. The Nile for ages was a mystery; it flowed\nthrough Egypt--a blessed necessity to the land, enriching the soil,\nand sustaining the people--but nobody knew its source. Long before\nVictoria Nyanza was discovered, however, thinkers were sure that a\ngreat lake must be the explanation of the stream; and when at last\nthey found the sources of the Nile, the lake was even greater than\nanyone had dreamed. So is man's spirit a revelation of a spiritual\norigin even before that origin is clearly known. As the Bible puts it:\n\n =Now he that wrought us for this very thing is God, who gave unto us\n the earnest of the Spirit.--II Cor. 5:5.=\n\n _O God! mysterious and Infinite, Thou art the first and Thou the\n last: as our weeks pass away and our age rises or declines, we still\n return to Thee who ever art the same. We seek Thee as the sole\n abiding light amid the shadows of perishable things. O Thou most\n ancient God! to whom the heavens are but of yesterday, and the life\n of worlds but as the shooting star, there is no number of Thy days\n and mercies; and what can we do, O Lord, but throw ourselves on Thee\n who failest not, and from whom our pathway is not hid? With solemn\n and open heart we would meet Thee here. Cover not Thyself with a\n cloud, most High, but may our prayer pass through._\n\n _O Thou our constant Witness and our awful Judge! When we remember\n our thoughtless lives, our low desires, our impatient temper, our\n ungoverned wills, we know that Thou hast left us without excuse. For\n Thou hast not made us blind, O Lord, as the creatures that have no\n sin; nor hast Thou spared the light of holy guidance. Thy still small\n voice of warning whispers through our deepest conscience; and Thine\n open Word hath dwelt among us, full of grace and truth, and called us\n to the feet of Christ to choose the better part. We are not our own,\n and are ashamed to have lived unto ourselves. Thou hast formed us for\n Thy service, and we must hide our face that we have shrunk from the\n glorious hardships of our task, and slumbered on our holy watch. Our\n daily work has not been wrought as in Thy sight; and we have not made\n the outgoings of the morning and the evening to praise Thee. The\n trials of our patience we have received as earthly pains of nature,\n not as the heavenly discipline of faith; and the fulness of Thy\n bounties has come to us as dead comfort, not as the quickening touch\n of Thy everlasting love. O our true and only God! we have lived in a\n bondage of the world that bringeth no content; and the passions we\n serve are as strange idols that cannot deliver. Awake, awake, O Arm\n of the Lord! and burst our bonds in sunder; and help the spirit that\n struggles within us to turn unto Thee with a pure heart, and serve\n Thee in newness of spirit. Amen._--James Martineau.\n\n\nFifth Week, Third Day\n\nMany stumble at the very beginning of their quest for God, because\nthey are sure that finite mind can never know the Infinite. The Bible\nitself asserts that God is in one sense unknowable.\n\n =Touching the Almighty, we cannot find him out.--Job 37:23.=\n\n =Man cannot find out the work that God hath done from the beginning\n even to the end.--Eccl. 3:11.=\n\n =O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge of\n God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past tracing\n out! For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his\n counsellor?--Rom. 11:33, 34.=\n\nBut in the same sense in which God is unknowable, all the most\nimportant realities with which we deal are also beyond our\ncomprehension. We do not know what electricity is, what matter is,\nwhat life is. Ether is utterly beyond the reach of our definitions,\nand an English scientist calls it \"unknown, impalpable, the necessary\ncondition of scientific thought.\" As for the constituent elements of\nthe material world, we are told that atoms are so infinitesimally\nminute as to be indivisible, and yet that an \"electron ranges about in\nthe atom as a mouse might in a cathedral.\" The plain fact is that in\nany realm, human knowledge soon runs off into an unknown region where\nit deals with invisible realities, which it cannot define, but on\nwhich life is based. While therefore we do not know what electricity,\nether, electrons, and life itself are, we do know them well _in\ntheir relationship with our needs_. So we may know God. Deep beyond\ndeep in him will be past our fathoming, but what God means in his\nrelationships with our lives we may know gloriously.\n\n _O Thou who transcendest all thought of Thee as the heavens are\n higher than the earth; we acknowledge that we cannot search Thee out\n to perfection, but we thank Thee that Thou, the Invisible, comest to\n us in the things that are seen; that Thy exceeding glory is shadowed\n in the flower that blooms for a day, in the light that fades; that\n Thine infinite love has been incarnate in lowly human life; and that\n Thy presence surrounds all our ignorance, Thy holiness our sin, Thy\n peace our unrest._\n\n _Give us that lowly heart which is the only temple that can contain\n the infinite. Save us from the presumption that prides itself on a\n knowledge which is not ours, and from the hypocrisy and carelessness\n which professes an ignorance which Thy manifestation has made for\n ever impossible. Save us from calling ourselves by a name that Thou\n alone canst wear, and from despising the image of Thyself Thou hast\n formed us to bear, and grant that knowledge of Thee revealed in Jesus\n Christ which is our eternal life. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nFifth Week, Fourth Day\n\nThe assurance of God may come in part from looking outward at his\ncreation. This universe seems superficially to be material, but really\nit is _saturated with the presence of mind_. So a city's streets,\nbuildings, bridges, subways, and railroads might appear to careless\nthought grossly material; but the fact is that in their origin they\nall are _mental_. They are not simply iron and steel and stone; they\nare thought, plan, purpose materialized and made visible. The basic\nfact about them is that mind shaped them and permeates every use to\nwhich they are put. The most important and decisive force in their\norigination was not anything that can be seen, but the invisible\nthought that dreamed them and moulded them. So when one looks at\ncreation he finds something more than matter; he finds order, law,\nuniformity; his mind is at home in tracing regularities, discovering\nlaws, and perceiving purposes. Creation is not grossly material; it is\nsaturated with the evidence of mind. Lord Kelvin, the chemist, walking\nin the country with Liebig, his fellow-scientist, asked his companion\nif he believed that the grass and flowers grew by mere chemical\nforces; and Liebig answered, \"No, no more than I could believe that\nthe books of botany describing them could grow by mere chemical\nforces.\"\n\n =Lift up your eyes on high, and see who hath created these, that\n bringeth out their host by number; he calleth them all by name; by\n the greatness of his might, and for that he is strong in power, not\n one is lacking.=\n\n =Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and speakest, O Israel, My way is hid from\n Jehovah, and the justice due to me is passed away from my God? Hast\n thou not known? hast thou not heard? The everlasting God, Jehovah,\n the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary;\n there is no searching of his understanding. He giveth power to the\n faint; and to him that hath no might he increaseth strength. Even the\n youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly\n fall: but they that wait for Jehovah shall renew their strength; they\n shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be\n weary; they shall walk, and not faint.--Isa. 40:26-31.=\n\n _O Thou Infinite Perfection, who art the soul of all things that are\n ... we thank Thee for the world of matter whereon we live, wherewith\n our hands are occupied, and whereby our bodies are builded up and\n filled with food and furnished with all things needful to enjoy. We\n thank Thee for the calmness of Night, which folds Thy children in her\n arms, and rockest them into peaceful sleep, and when we wake we thank\n Thee that we are still with Thee. We bless Thee for the heavens over\n our head, arched with loveliness, and starred with beauty, speaking\n in the poetry of nature the psalm of life which the spheres chant\n before Thee to every listening soul._\n\n _We thank Thee for this greater and nobler world of spirit wherein we\n live, whereof we are, whereby we are strengthened, upheld, and\n blessed. We thank Thee for the wondrous powers which Thou hast given\n to man, that Thou hast created him for so great an estate, that thou\n hast enriched him with such noble faculties of mind and conscience\n and heart and soul, capable of such continual increase of growth and\n income of inspiration from Thyself. We thank Thee for the wise mind,\n for the just conscience, for the loving heart, and the soul which\n knows Thee as Thou art, and enters into communion with Thy spirit,\n rejoicing in its blessing from day to day. Amen._--Theodore Parker.\n\n\nFifth Week, Fifth Day\n\nThe vital assurance of faith always comes, not so much from observing\nthe outer world, as from appreciating the meaning of man's inner life.\nMan knows that he is something more than a physical machine. Theorists\nmay say that our minds are only a series of molecular changes in the\nbrain; but man turns to ask: _Who is it that is watching these\nmolecular changes? The very fact that we can discuss them, is proof\nthat we are something more than they are and of another order._\nLeslie Stephen was an agnostic, but at the thought of man as merely a\nphysical machine he grew impatient. \"I knock down a man and an image,\"\nhe said, \"and both fall down because both are material. But when the\nman gets up and knocks me down, the result is not explicable by any\nmerely mechanical action.\" Man denies his own inward consciousness of\nself when he refuses to acknowledge the mental and spiritual part of\nhim as the thing he really is. Man may have a body, but he surely is a\nsoul. And when man lets this highest part of him speak its own\ncharacteristic word, he always hears a message like this: I am spirit;\nto grow into great character is the one worthy end of my existence;\nbut how came I to be spirit with spiritual purpose unless my Creator\nis of like quality? and how can I believe that my existence and my\npurpose are not a cruel joke unless I am begotten by a Spiritual Life\nthat will sustain my strength and crown my effort? To believe that\nman's soul is a foundling, laid on the doorstep of a merely physical\nuniverse, crying in vain for any father who begot him or any mother\nwho conceived him, is to make our highest life a liar. Therefore man\nat his best has always believed in God.\n\n =For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of\n God. For ye received not the spirit of bondage again unto fear; but\n ye received the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The\n Spirit himself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are children\n of God.--Rom. 8:14-16.=\n\n _O Thou whom no name can tell, whom all our thoughts cannot fully\n comprehend, we rejoice in all Thy goodness.... We thank Thee for our\n body, this handful of dust so curiously and wonderfully framed\n together. We bless Thee for this sparkle of Thy fire that we call our\n soul, which enchants the dust into thoughtful human life, and blesses\n us with so rich a gift. We thank Thee for the varied powers Thou hast\n given us here on earth. We bless Thee for the far-reaching mind,\n which puts all things underneath our feet, rides on the winds and the\n waters, and tames the lightning into useful service.... We thank Thee\n for this conscience, whereby face to face we commune with Thine\n everlasting justice. We thank Thee for the strength of will which can\n overpower the weakness of mortal flesh, face danger and endure\n hardship, and in all things acquit us like men...._\n\n _We thank Thee for this religious sense, whereby we know Thee, and,\n amid a world of things that perish, lay fast hold on Thyself, who\n alone art steadfast, without beginning of days or end of years,\n forever and forever still the same. We thank Thee that amid all the\n darkness of time, amid joys that deceive us and pleasures that cheat,\n amid the transgressions we commit, we can still lift up our hands to\n Thee, and draw near Thee with our heart, and Thou blessest us still\n with more than a father's or a mother's never-ending love.\n Amen._--Theodore Parker.\n\n\nFifth Week, Sixth Day\n\nOne ground of assurance concerning faith is the way a sincere\nfellowship with God affects life. In a delicious passage of his\nautobiography, Benjamin Franklin says, \"I was scarce fifteen, when,\nafter doubting by turns of several points, as I found them disputed in\nthe different books I read, I began to doubt of Revelation itself.\nSome books against Deism fell into my hands; they were said to be the\nsubstance of sermons preached at Boyle's Lectures. It happened that\nthey wrought an effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by\nthem; for the arguments of the Deists which were quoted to be refuted,\nappeared to me much stronger than the refutations; in short I soon\nbecame a thorough Deist. My arguments perverted some others,\nparticularly Collins and Ralph; but, each of them having afterwards\nwrong'd me greatly without the least compunction, and recollecting\nKeith's conduct towards me (who was another free thinker), and my own\ntowards Vernon and Miss Read, which at times gave me great trouble, I\nbegan to suspect that this doctrine, tho' it might be true, was not\nvery useful.\" Many men, not yet able to see clearly the issue of\nconflicting arguments, are practically convinced in favor of faith by\nthe relative effects on life of faith and unbelief. When one carries\nthis thought out until he imagines a world where no one any more\nbelieves in God, he feels even more emphatically the negative results\nof unbelief. As Sir James Stephen said, \"We cannot judge of the\neffects of Atheism from the conduct of persons who have been educated\nas believers in God, and in the midst of a nation which believes in\nGod. If we should ever see a generation of men to whom the word God\nhas no meaning at all, we should get a light on the subject which\nmight be lurid enough.\" A practical working conviction is often gained\nin religion, as in every other realm, not by argument, but by acting\non a principle until it verifies itself by its results, or, as in\nBenjamin Franklin's case, by trying a negation until one is driven\nfrom it by its consequences.\n\n =Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but\n inwardly are ravening wolves. By their fruits ye shall know them. Do\n men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good\n tree bringeth forth good fruit; but the corrupt tree bringeth forth\n evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a\n corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not\n forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Therefore by\n their fruits ye shall know them.--Matt. 7:15-20.=\n\n _O God, who remainest the same though all else fades, who changest\n not with our changing moods, who leavest us not when we leave Thee;\n we thank Thee that when we lose faith in Thee, soon or late we come\n to faith in something that leads us back again with firmer trust and\n more sincerity. Even if we wander into the far country we take\n ourselves with us; ourselves who are set towards Thee as rivers to\n the sea. If we turn to foolishness, our hearts grow faint and weary,\n our path is set with thorns, the night overtakes us, and we find we\n have strayed from light and life._\n\n _Grant to us clearer vision of the light which knows no shade of\n turning, that we stray not in folly away; incline our hearts to love\n the truth alone, so that we miss Thee not at last; give us to realise\n of what spirit we are, so that we cleave ever to Thee, who alone can\n give us rest and joy. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nFifth Week, Seventh Day\n\nWhen all is said and done in the matter of intellectual assurance,\nmany are confused by the seeming lack of finality in the result. After\nall these ages of debate, they say, see all the innumerable opinions\nof jarring sects about religious truth! Evidently there is no\nsatisfying conclusion obtainable at all! But look at the innumerable\nschools of medicine--shall one on their account decide that health is\na fruitless study? Consider the infinite variety of taste in\nfood--shall we say that therefore hunger and its satisfaction is a\nfutile question to discuss? Rather, the very variety of the answers in\nman's quest reveals the importance of the quest itself. Of course\nproof of God lacks the finality of a scientific demonstration, and\nthis is true _because it moves in a realm so much more important than\nanything that science touches_. Exactness and finality are possible\nonly in the least important realms. One can measure and analyze and\ndescribe to a minute nicety a table which a carpenter has made, but\nwhen one turns to the carpenter himself and endeavors to analyze his\nmotives, weigh his thoughts, estimate his quality, and prove his\npurposes, one drops minute nicety at once. The carpenter is not to be\nput into a column of figures and added with mathematical precision as\nhis table is. The farther up one moves in the scale the less precise\nand undeniable do his conclusions become. So science is exact just\nbecause it deals with measurable things; but religion, by as much as\nits realm is more important, can less easily pack its conclusions into\nneat parcels finally tied up and sealed. A man who will not believe\nanything which is not precisely demonstrable must eliminate from his\nlife everything except what yardsticks can measure and scales can\nweigh. Let no man ever give up the fight for faith because he does not\nseem at once to be reaching an answer which he can neatly formulate.\nLet him remember Tolstoi, writing on his birthday: \"I am twenty-four,\nand I have not done a thing yet. But I feel that not in vain have I\nbeen struggling for nearly eight years against doubt and temptation.\nFor what am I destined? This only the future will disclose.\"\n\n =Hear, O Jehovah, when I cry with my voice:\n Have mercy also upon me, and answer me.\n When thou saidst, Seek ye my face; my heart said unto thee,\n Thy face, Jehovah, will I seek.\n Hide not thy face from me;\n Put not thy servant away in anger:\n Thou hast been my help;\n Cast me not off, neither forsake me, O God of my salvation.\n When my father and my mother forsake me,\n Then Jehovah will take me up.\n Teach me thy way, O Jehovah;\n And lead me in a plain path,\n Because of mine enemies.\n Deliver me not over unto the will of mine adversaries:\n For false witnesses are risen up against me,\n And such as breathe out cruelty.\n I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of Jehovah\n In the land of the living.\n Wait for Jehovah:\n Be strong, and let thy heart take courage;\n Yea, wait thou for Jehovah.=\n\n =--Psalm 27:7-14.=\n\n _Deliver us, our Father, from all those mists which do arise from the\n low places where we dwell, which rise up and hide the sun, and the\n stars even, and Thee. Deliver us from the narrowness and the poverty\n of our conceptions. Deliver us from the despotism of our senses. And\n grant unto us this morning, the effusion of Thy Spirit, which shall\n bring us into the realm of spiritual things, so that we may, by the\n use of all that which is divine in us, rise into the sphere of Thy\n thought, into the realm where Thou dwellest, and whither have trooped\n from the ages the spirits of just men now made perfect. Grant, we\n pray Thee, that we may not look with time-eyes upon eternal things,\n measuring and dwarfing with our imperfectness the fitness and beauty\n of things heavenly. So teach us to come into Thy presence and to rise\n by sympathy into Thy way of thinking and feeling, that so much as we\n can discern of the invisible may come to us aright. Amen._--Henry\n Ward Beecher.\n\n\nCOMMENT FOR THE WEEK\n\nI\n\nWhile it is true that in many cases the apparent unreasonableness of\nChristian faith springs from the underlying unreality of Christian\nlife, this is not always a sufficient diagnosis of doubt. Horace G.\nHutchinson, the English golfer, who spent much of his life in\nagnosticism and has now come over into Christian faith, thus\ninterprets the spirit of his long unbelief: \"All the while I had the\nkeenest consciousness of the comfort that one would gain could he but\nbelieve in the truth of the Christian promises. Surely that must\nalways be the agnostic's mood.... It is not that they wilfully reject\nthe appeal to the heart; their will is eager to respond to it. But man\nhas his gift of reason; it cannot be that he is not intended to use\nit. Least of all can it be part of the great design that he should\nsuspend its use in regard to the most important subject to which his\nthought can be directed.\"\n\nSuch sincere intellectual difficulties with faith must be met with\nintellectual arguments and not with moral accusations. Plenty of folk\nof elevated character and admirable lives grant, sometimes\nimpatiently, that the Christian faith is beautiful--but is it\n_so_? Is not its solacing power a deceptive sleight of hand, by\nwhich our pleasing fancies and desires are made to look like truth? So\na mirage is beautiful to weary travelers, but their temporary comfort\nrests on fallacy. McTaggart summed up one of the most wide-spread and\nmasterful desires of this generation when he said, \"What people want\nis a religion they can believe to be true.\"\n\nAs one sets himself to meet faith's intellectual difficulties, the\nattitude in which he is to approach the problem is all-important.\nSamuel M. Crothers tells us that a young man once left with him a\nmanuscript for criticism, and remarked in passing, \"It is only a\nlittle bit of my work, and it will not take you long to look it over.\nIn fact it is only the first chapter in which I explain the Universe.\"\nWhen one outgrows this cocksure presumption of youth and gains a\ngraver and more seasoned mind, he leaves behind the attempt to pierce\nto creation's last secret. He sees that we can no more neatly and\nfinally demonstrate God than we can demonstrate any of life's\nimportant faiths.\n\nMoreover proof of God, as a theorem in philosophy, is not a deep human\nneed. Men often have supposed that they had such demonstration, but\nhuman experience was little affected by the fact. The exhaustless\nsource of mankind's desire for assurance about God is not theoretical\ncuriosity but vital need, and until a man feels the need, sees how\nurgently man's highest life reaches out toward God, he never will make\nmuch of any arguments. Browning's bishop asks his friend:\n\n  \"Like you this Christianity or not?\n  It may be false, but will you wish it true?\n  Has it your vote to be so if it can?\"\n\nUntil a man gives an affirmative answer to that inquiry, until he\npossesses a life that itself suggests God and wants him, he is not\nlikely to arrive anywhere by argument alone.\n\nThis is not the case with Christianity only. We cannot prove with\ntheoretical finality that monogamy is the form of family life to which\nthe universe is best adapted. But mankind, trying many experiments\nwith family life, has found in the monogamous family values unique and\nindispensable. It is because men feel the value of such a love-bond,\nthat they begin to argue for it. And their argument, when one sees\ndeeply into it, is framed after this fashion: We know the _worth_\nof this family-life of faithful lovers. We want monogamy and we\npropose to have it. We do not pretend that our faith in monogamy, as\nthe form of marriage best fitted to this universe, is capable of exact\ndemonstration; but we do see arguments of great weight in favor of it\nand we do not see any convincing arguments against it. We are\npersuaded that our faith has reasonable right of way; and we propose\nto go on believing in monogamy and practicing it and combating its\nenemies, until we prove our case in the only way such cases ever can\nbe finally proved, by the issue of the matter in the end.\n\nSo men come into the sort of personal and social life that Jesus\nrepresents. Apart from any theories, they value the life itself--its\nideals of character, friendship, service, trust. If honesty allows,\nthey propose to live that life. When a man has gone far enough in\nChristian experience, so that he comes up to his intellectual\ndifficulties by such a road, he is likely to profit by a consideration\nof the reasons in favor of faith. He is in the attitude of saying: I\nhave found great living in Christ. No argument for the Christian\nexperience can be quite so convincing as the Christian experience\nitself. I am bound to have that life if I honestly can, and I will\nsearch to see whether there is any insuperable intellectual difficulty\nin the way of it.\n\n\nII\n\nOne of the initial perplexities of faith concerns the sort of\nintellectual assurance which we have a right to expect. In a\nlaboratory of physics, the investigator gathers facts, makes\ninductions as to their laws, and then verifies his findings. He uses a\nsimplicity of procedure and gains a finality of result that makes all\nother knowledge seem relatively insecure. To be sure, the scientist\nmay seek long for his truth and make many ineffectual guesses that\nprove false, but, in the end, he reaches a conclusion so demonstrable\nthat every man of wit enough to investigate the subject must agree\nthat it is so. How the Christian wishes for such certainty concerning\nGod!\n\nBefore, however, any one surrenders confidence in God, because\nconfessedly the affirmations of religious faith cannot be established\nby such methods as a physicist employs, there is ample reason for\ndelay. We are certain that heat expands and cold contracts, and we can\nprove the fact and state its laws. But are we not also sure that it is\nwrong to lie and right to tell the truth? This conviction about\ntruthfulness at least equals in theoretical certainty and in practical\nright to determine conduct, our confidence in heat's expanding power.\nThis conviction about truthfulness does actually sway life more than\ndoes any single scientific truth that one can name. Let us then set\nourselves to prove our moral confidence by such methods as the\nphysical laboratory can supply--with yard sticks, and Troy weight\nscales, and test tubes, and meters! At once it is evident that if we\nare to hold only such truth as is amenable to the demonstration of a\nlaboratory, we must bid farewell to every _moral conviction_ that\nhitherto has influenced our lives. God, banished because the physicist\ncannot prove him, will have good company in exile!\n\nMoreover, all our _esthetic convictions_ will have to share that\nbanishment. We know that some things are beautiful. The consensus of\nthe race's judgment has not so much agreed to accept the new astronomy\nas it has agreed to think sunrise glorious and snow-capped mountains\nwonderful. Take from our lives our judgments on beauty, so that we may\ncall no music marvelous, no poetry inspiring, no scenery sublime, and\nsome of the most intimate and assured convictions we possess will have\nto go. A man who has seen the Matterhorn at dawn, when the first shaft\nof light reaches its rocky pinnacle and streams down in glory over the\nglaciers that cape its shoulders, will not disbelieve the splendor of\nthe scene, though all the world beside unanimously should cry that it\nis not beautiful. But prove it by the methods of a laboratory? When\nthe geologist has analyzed all the mountain's rocks, the chemist all\nits minerals; when the astronomer has traced the earth's orbit that\nbrings on the dawn, and the physicist has counted and tabulated the\nrays of light that make the colors, our conviction of the scene's\nbeauty will be as little explained or proved as is our confidence in\nGod. It becomes clear that some convictions which we both do and must\nhold are not amenable to the sort of proof which a scientific\nlaboratory furnishes.\n\nMoreover, if we will have no truth beyond the reach of a physicist's\ndemonstration, all our _convictions in the realm of personal\nrelationship_ will have to go. We _know_ that friendship-love is the\ncrown of every human fellowship. Father and son, mother and daughter,\nbrother and sister, wife and husband--these relationships are in\nthemselves bare branches wanting the foliage and fruit of friendship.\nOf no truth is man at his best more sure than he is that \"Life is just\nour chance o' the price of learning love.\" But no laboratory ever can\ndeal with such a truth, much less establish it. For this is the\nneglected insight, for the want of which our religious confidence is\nneedlessly unstable: _Every realm of reality has its own appropriate\nkind of proof, and a method of proof available in one realm is seldom,\nif ever, usable in another._ That truthfulness is right is in a way\nprovable, but methods proper to the moral realm must be allowed; that\nthe Matterhorn is sublime is in a sense provable, but by methods which\nthe esthetic realm permits; that love is the crown of life can be\nsoundly established, but one must employ a method appropriate to\npersonal relationships. If, obsessed by the procedure of a laboratory\nas the solitary path to knowledge, one will have no convictions which\ncannot meet its tests, then in good logic there must be a great\nemigration from his soul. All his convictions about morals and\nbeauty, all his convictions about personal friendships and about God\nmust leave together. He will have a depopulated spirit. No man could\nlive on such terms for a single hour. The most essential and valuable\nequipment of our souls is in convictions which the demonstrations of a\nphysicist can as little reach as an inch worm, clambering up the\nHimalayas, can measure the distance to the sun.\n\n\nIII\n\nA man to whom the Christian life has come to be preeminently valuable,\nand who is asking whether it is intellectually justifiable, is set\nfree, by such considerations as we just have noted, to seek assurance\nwhere religious assurance may properly be found. For one thing, he may\nfind help by _trying out the creed of no-God_. Many a man is a\nwavering believer, makes little excursions into doubt and returns\nhesitant and unhappy, because he never has dared to see his doubts\nthrough to their logical conclusion and to face the world with God\neliminated.\n\nOne may sense the general atmosphere of the world, under the no-God\nhypothesis, by saying, _In all this universe there is no mind\nessentially greater than mine._ The import of such a statement\ngrows weightier the more one ponders it. All human minds are\ninfinitesimal in knowledge; endless realities must lie beyond our\nreach; \"our science is a drop, our ignorance a sea.\" Yet human\nknowledge is all that anywhere exists, if the no-God hypothesis is\ntrue. There is no knower who knows more, and the infinite reality\nbeyond our grasp is not known by any mind at all. No one ever thought\nit or will think it through eternity. Then, let a man add, _In all\nthis universe there is no goodness essentially greater than mine._\nHuman goodness is pitiably partial; it is but prophecy of what\ngoodness ought to mean; \"Man is a dwarf of himself,\" as Emerson said.\nBut human goodness is all that anywhere exists, if the no-God\nhypothesis is true. There never will be any better goodness anywhere,\nand when the earth comes to its end in a solar catastrophe, there will\nbe no goodness left at all. Certainly the hypothesis of no-God raises\nmore questions than it easily can quell.\n\nIndeed the Christian, long accused by unbelieving friends of gross\ncredulity because he holds his creed, may well leave his defense and\n\"go over the top\" in an offensive charge. If it is a question of\nholding creeds, unbelief is a creed as certainly as belief is; it\nsays, I believe that there is no God or that God cannot be known. If\nit is a question of credulity, the Christian suspects that of all the\ndifferent kinds of credulousness which the world has seen, nothing\never has surpassed the capacity of modern sceptics to accept\nimpossible beliefs. He who says, I believe that there is no God, nor\nanything which that name might reasonably connote, is saying, I\nbelieve that the fundamental reality everywhere is physical. Long ages\nago atoms, electrons, \"mobile cosmic ethers\" began their mysterious\norganization, whose present issue is planetary orbits, rocks, organic\nlife, and, highest point of all, the brain of man. Man's mind is but\nthe moving shadow cast by the activity of brain. Man's character is\nthe subtle fragrance of his nerves. Everywhere, if the no-God\nhypothesis be true, spirit is a _result_, physical energy the _cause_.\n\nSome startling corollaries follow such a view. _No man can be blamed\nfor anything._ Molecular action in the brain is responsible alike\nfor saints and sinners, and we are as powerless to change our quality\nof character or action as a planet is to change its course. Judas and\nJesus, Festus and Paul, the Belgian lads and the Prussian officers who\nmutilated them, the raper and the raped--why blame the one or praise\nthe other when all characters alike are ground from a physical\nmachine, whose action is predetermined by the push of universal energy\nbehind? One man even says that to condemn an immoral deed is like\nXerxes whipping the Hellespont--punishment visited on physical\nnecessity which is not to blame.\n\nThe second corollary is not less startling: _every man thinks as he\ndoes because of molecular action in the brain_. A Christian believes\nin God because his molecules maneuver so, and his opponent is an\natheist because his molecules maneuver otherwise, and all convictions\nof truth, however well debated and reasoned out, are fundamentally the\nwork of atoms, not of mind. What we call intellect as little causes\nanything as steam from a kettle causes the boiling out of which it\ncomes. Some brains boil Socialism, some do not; some brains boil\nEpiscopalianism and some Christian Science. A determinist and a\nbeliever in freewill differ as do oaks and elm trees, for physical\nreasons only, and folk are Catholic in southern Europe--so we are\ninformed--because their skulls are narrow, and in northern Europe\nProtestants because their skulls are broad. Truth is a nickname for a\nneurosis. The standing marvel is that on some matters like the\nmultiplication table our brains boil so unanimously.\n\nA third corollary still remains: _we have no creative power of mind\nand will_. All that is and is to be was wound up in primeval\nmatter, and now in our thoughts and actions is ticking like a clock.\n\"All of our philosophy,\" says Huxley, \"all our poetry, all our\nscience, and all our art--Plato, Shakespeare, Newton, and Raphael--are\npotential in the fires of the sun.\" That is to say, Plato had nothing\nto do with _creating_ his philosophy, nor Shakespeare with\nwriting plays--they were empty megaphones and the real voice is the\nphysical machine from which all things come. Professor Bowne of Boston\nUniversity, after the publication of his \"Metaphysics,\" received from\na physicist a protest against his emphasis on the reality of mind. The\nprofessor of physics insisted that the only fundamental reality was\nphysical and that mind is always a result of brain's activity and\nnever a cause of anything. To this Professor Bowne replied that\naccording to the writer's own theory, as he understood it, the letter\nof protest was the result of certain physical forces issuing in\nnervous excitations that made scratches on paper, and that the\nwriter's mind had nothing effectual to do with its composition. This,\nsaid Professor Bowne, might be a plausible explanation of the letter,\nbut he was unwilling to apply it to the universe. What wonder that the\nphysicist acknowledged to a friend that the retort nettled him, for he\ndid not see just how to answer it?\n\n\nIV\n\nOne's discontent with this reduction of our lives to physical\ncausation is increased when he studies the _mental process by which\nmen reach it_. It is as if a man should perceive in the works of\nShakespeare insight and beauty, pathos and laughter, despair and hope,\nand should set himself to explain all these as the function of the\ntype. How plausibly he could do it! If one takes Shakespeare's\nsentences full of spiritual meaning he can readily resolve them into\ntwenty-six constituent letters of the alphabet, and these into certain\nhooks and dashes, and these into arithmetical points diffused in\nspace. Starting with such abstract points, let one suppose that some\nfortunate day they arranged themselves into hooks and dashes, and\nthese into letters of the alphabet, and these by fortuitous concourse\ncame together into sentences. Reading them we think we see deep\nspiritual meaning, but they are all the work of type; the fundamental\nreality is arithmetical points diffused in space. Such is the process\nby which a man reduces the mental and moral life of man back to its\nphysical basis; then breaks up the physical basis into atoms; then,\nstarting with these abstractions, builds up again the whole world\nwhich he just has analyzed, and thinks he has explained the infinitely\nsignificant spiritual life of man. Not for a long time will we accept\nsuch a method of explaining the works of Shakespeare! Nor can man\ncontentedly be made to follow so inconsequential a process of thought\nas that by which the mind and character of Jesus are reduced to a\nmaneuver of molecules.\n\nThe attractiveness of this explanation of the universe as a huge\nphysical machine is easily understood. It presents a simple picture,\nreadily grasped. It packs the whole explanation of the world into a\nneat parcel, portable by any mind. In the days of monarchy the\ngovernment of the universe was pictured in terms of an absolute\nsovereign; in feudal times the divine economy was pictured as a\ngigantic feudalism; we always use a dominant factor in the life of man\nto help us picture the eternal. So in the age whose builder and maker\nis machinery we easily portray the universe as a huge machine. The\nprocess is simple and natural, but to suppose that it is adequate is\npreposterous. Lord Kelvin, the chemist, knew thoroughly the\nmechanistic idea of the world. He felt the fascination of it, for he\nsaid at Johns Hopkins University, \"I never satisfy myself until I make\na mechanical model of a thing. If I can make a mechanical model I can\nunderstand it. As long as I cannot make a mechanical model all the way\nthrough, I cannot understand.\" But Lord Kelvin knew better than to\nsuppose that this figure comprehended all of reality. \"The atheistic\nidea,\" said he, \"is so nonsensical, that I do not know how to put it\ninto words.\"\n\nThe rejection of the no-God hypothesis does not necessarily imply that\na man becomes fully Christian in his thought of deity. There are\nway-stations between no-God and Jesus' Father. _But it does mean that\nto him reality must be fundamentally spiritual, not physical._ What\nother hypothesis possibly can fit the facts? For consider the view of\na growing universe which we see from the outlook that modern science\nfurnishes. Out of a primeval chaos where physical forces snarled at\neach other in unrelieved antagonism, where no man had yet arisen to\nlove truth and serve righteousness, something has brought us to a\ntime, when for all our evil, there are mothers and music and the\nlaughter of children at play, men who love honor and for service' sake\nlay down their lives, and homes in every obscure street where\nfortitude and sacrifice are splendidly exhibited. Out of a chaos,\nwhere a contemporary observer, could there have been one, would have\nseen no slightest promise of spirit, something has brought us to the\nTen Commandments, and the Sermon on the Mount, to great character and\ngrowing achievements in social righteousness, to lofty thoughts of the\nDivine and hopes of life eternal. _Something has been at work here\nbesides matter. No explanation of all this will do, without God._\n\n\nV\n\nAnother source of confirmation for the man who, valuing Christian\nexperience, seeks assurance that it is intellectually justifiable, is\nto be found in the effect of Christian faith on life itself. The\nnautical tables can be proved by an astronomer in his observatory; but\nif they are given to a sailor and he beats about the seas with them in\nsafety, finding that they make adventurous voyages practicable, that\nalso would be important witness to their truth. So the Christian ideas\nof life have not been kept by studious recluses to ponder over and\nweave philosophies about; they have been down in the market place, men\nhave been practically trying them for generations, and _they make\ngreat living_.\n\nThe ultimate ground of practical assurance about anything is that we\nhave tried it and that it works. A man may have experience that other\npersons exist, may draw the inference that friendly relations with\nthem are not impossible, but only when he launches out and verifies\nhis thought in an adventure will he really be convinced of\nfriendship's glory. In no other way has final assurance about God come\nhome to man. They who have lived as though God _were_ have been\nconvinced that he _is_; they who have willed to do his will have\nknown.\n\nThat religious faith does justify itself in life is a fact to which\nmankind's experience amply testifies. Men have come to God, not as\nchemists to bread curious to analyze it; they have come as hungry men,\nneeding to eat if they would live. And they have found life glorified\nby faith in him. The difference between religion and irreligion here\nis plain. _How seldom one finds enthusiastic unbelievers!_ When all\nthat is fine spirited and resolute in agnostic literature is duly\nweighed and credited, the pessimistic undertone is always heard.\nLeslie Stephen thus summarizes life--\"There is a deep sadness in the\nworld. Turn and twist the thought as you may there is no escape.\nOptimism would be soothing if it were possible; in fact, it is\nimpossible, and therefore a constant mockery.\" No gospel burns in the\nunbeliever's mind, urgent for utterance; he has no inspiring outlooks\nto offer, no glad tidings to declare. The more intelligent he is the\nmore plainly he sees this. With Clifford he laments that \"the spring\nsun shines out of an empty heaven to light up a soulless earth\" and\nfeels \"with utter loneliness that the Great Companion is dead\"; with\nRomanes he frankly states, \"So far as the ruination of individual\nhappiness is concerned, no one can have a more lively conception than\nmyself of the possibly disastrous tendency of my work.\" An unbeliever\nwhose admirable life raised the question as to the philosophy by which\nhe guided it, gave this summary of his creed, \"I am making the best of\na bad mess.\" Unbelievers do not spontaneously utter in song the glory\nof a creed like this, and when they do write poetry, it is of a sort\nthat music will not fit--\n\n  \"The world rolls round forever like a mill,\n  It grinds out death and life and good and ill,\n  It has no purpose, heart, or mind or will.\"\n\nWhen from poetry one turns to philosophy, he can see good reasons why\nhymnals and unbelief should be uncongenial. There is little to make\nlife worth while in a creed which holds as Haeckel does that morality\nin man, like the tail of a monkey or the shell of a tortoise, is\npurely a physiological effect, and that man himself is \"an affair of\nchance; the froth and fume at the wave-top of a sterile ocean of\nmatter.\" Shall the practical unserviceableness of such an idea for the\npurpose of life, awaken no suspicion as to its truth?\n\nUpon the other hand, suppose that by some strange chance the\nprinciples of Jesus should over night take possession of mankind. Even\nas it is, when one starts his thought with the Stone Age, the progress\nof mankind has obviously been immense. From universal cannibalism\nafter a battle, to massacre without cannibalism marked one great\nadvance; from massacre of all prisoners taken in war to enslavement of\nthem marked another; and when slavery ceased being a philanthropic\nimprovement, as it was at first, and became a sin and shame, humanity\ntook another long step forward. With all our present barbarity, a far\nlook backwards shows a clear ascent. As for the influence of Jesus,\nLecky, the historian, tells us that \"The simple record of three short\nyears of Christ's active life has done more to regenerate and soften\nmankind than all the disquisitions of philosophers and all the\nexhortations of moralists.\" What if this process were brought to its\nfulfilment between sunset and dawn, and the new day came with every\none sure of God's fatherhood and life eternal, of the law of love and\nthe supremacy of character and with everyone living as though these\nwere true? Whatever intellectual perplexities of belief a man may\nhave, he knows that such a world would be divinely great. No war, no\nevil lust, no covetous selfishness, no drunkenness! Mankind, relieved\nof ancient burdens which have ruined character and crushed endeavor,\nconfident of faiths that give life infinite horizons and deathless\nhopes, in cooperative international fraternity would be making the\nearth a decent home for God to rear his children in. One finds it hard\nto believe that ideas which, incarnate in life, would so redeem the\nworld are false.\n\nAs to the effect of the Christian affirmations on individual\ncharacter, we do not need to picture an imagined future. A Character\nhas been here who has lived them out. A jury of philosophers might\nanalyze the wood-work and the metals of an organ, and guess from form\nand material what it is, but we still should need for our assurance a\nmusician. When he sweeps the keys in harmony we _know_ that it is an\norgan. So when the philosophers have debated the pros and cons of\nargument concerning faith, Jesus _plays_ the Gospel. His life is the\nChristian affirmations done into character. When religious faith, at\nits best, is incarnate in a Man, this is the consequence. And\nmultitudes of folk, living out the implications of the faith, have\nfound the likeness of the Master growing in them. Weighty confirmation\nof the Gospel's _truth_ arrives when its meaning is translated into\nlife; the world will not soon reject the New Testament in this\nedition--bound in a Man.\n\nTo one in perplexity about belief, this proper question therefore\nrises: What do we think about the Christlike character? Is it not life\nat its sublimest elevation? But to acknowledge that and yet to deny\nthe central faiths by which such life is lived is to say that those\nideas which, incarnate, make living great are false, and those ideas\nwhich leave life meager of motive and bereft of hope are true. No one\nlives on such a basis in any other realm. We always mistrust the\nvalidity of any idea which works poorly or not at all. And so far from\nbeing a practical makeshift, this \"negative pragmatism\" is a true\nprinciple of knowledge. Says Professor Hocking, of Harvard, \"If a\ntheory has no consequences, or bad ones; if it makes no difference to\nmen, or else undesirable differences; if it lowers the capacity of men\nto meet the stress of existence, or diminishes the worth to them of\nwhat existence they have; such a theory is somehow false, and we have\nno peace until it is remedied.\" The last word against irreligion is\nthat it makes life unlivable; the last word for faith is that it makes\nlife glorious.\n\n\nVI\n\nOne who is facing intellectual difficulties in the way of faith may\nwell consider that the very Christian life for whose possession he is\nseeking justification is itself an argument of the first importance.\nThis life grew up in the universe; it is one expression of the\nuniverse; and it is hard to think that it does not reveal a nature\nkindred to itself in the source from which it came.\n\nMankind has always experienced a relationship with the Unseen which\nhas seemed like communion of soul with Soul. When a psychologist like\nProfessor James, of Harvard, reduces to its most general terms this\nreligious Fact which has been practically universal in the race, he\nputs it thus: \"Man becomes conscious that this higher part (his\nspiritual life) is coterminous and continuous with a MORE of the same\nquality, which is operative in the universe outside of him, and which\nhe can keep in working touch with, and in a fashion get on board of\nand save himself when all his lower being has gone to pieces in the\nwreck.\" No experience of man is more common in occurrence, more\ntremendous in result than this. From the mystics whose vivid sense of\nGod canceled their consciousness that anything else was real, to plain\nfolk who in the strength of the divine alliance have lived ordinary\nlives with extraordinary spirit, mankind as a whole has known that the\nbest in man is in contact with a MORE.\n\nOne does not need to be of a mystical temperament, given to raptures,\nto know what this means. Let him consider his own experience of love\nand duty, how he is bound by them to his ideals and woven into a\ncommunity of personal life not only with his friends but with all\nhumanity, until this spiritual life of his becomes the most august and\ncommanding power he knows. When in our bodies we so discern a physical\nnature, whose laws and necessities we did not create, and whose power\nbinds us into a community of need and labor with our fellows, our\nconclusion is confident. This experience is the basis of our assurance\nthat a _physical universe is really here_. When, likewise in our\ninner selves we find a spiritual life, which man did not create, in\nobedience to which alone is safety, and peace, and power, what shall\nwe conclude? That there is a _spiritual universe_ as plainly\nevidenced in man's soul as the physical universe is in the body! And\nwhen we note the attributes of this Spiritual Order, how it demands\nrighteousness, rebukes sin, welcomes obedience and holds out ideals of\nendless possibility, it is plain that we are talking about something\nclose of kin to God. As in summer we beat out through some familiar\nbay, naming the headlands as we sail, until if we go far enough, we\ncannot prevent our eyes from looking out across the unbounded sea, so\nif a man moves out through his own familiar spiritual life far enough,\nhe comes to the Spiritual Order which is God. Man has not drifted into\nhis religion by accident or fallen on it merely as superstition; he\nhas moved out from his inner life to affirm a Spiritual Order as\ninevitably as he has moved out from his bodily experiences to affirm a\nphysical universe.\n\nWhen from this general experience we turn to the specific experiences\nof religion, which prayer and worship represent, the testimony of the\nrace is confident. Men have not all these ages been lifting up their\nsouls to an unreality from which no response has come. The artesian\nwell of transforming influence in human souls has not flowed from\nNowhere. Some, indeed, hearing confidence in God founded on the\nindividual experiences of man, derisively cry \"Nonsense!\" But if one\nwere to prove that the Sistine Madonna is beautiful, he would have to\noffer his experience in evidence. \"I went to Dresden,\" he might say,\n\"up into the room where the Madonna hangs ... and it _is_ beautiful. I\nsaw it.\" Met with derision by a doubter, as though his experience were\nno proof at all, how shall he proceed? \"I am not the only one,\" he\nmight continue, \"who has perceived its beauty. All these centuries the\nfolk best qualified to judge have gone up into that room and have come\ndown again, sure that Raphael's work is beautiful.\" Is anyone in a\nposition to deride that? So through all ages men and women, from\nlowest savages to the race's spiritual kings and queens, have gone up\nto the Divine, and, at their best, from experiences of prayer,\nworship, forgiven sins, transfigured lives, have come down sure that\nReality is there. _One may not call nonsense the most universal and\ninfluential experience of the human race!_\n\nThe force of this fact is more clearly seen when one considers that\nman has grown up in this universe, gradually developing his powers and\nfunctions as responses to his environment. If he has eyes, so the\nbiologists assure us, it is because the light waves played upon the\nskin and eyes came out in answer; if he has ears it is because the air\nwaves were there first and ears came out to hear. Man never yet,\naccording to the evolutionist, has developed any power save as a\nreality called it into being. There would be no fins if there were no\nwater, no wings if there were no air, no legs if there were no land.\nAlways the developing organism has been trying to \"catch up with its\nenvironment.\" Yet some would tell us that man's noblest power of all\nhas developed in a vacuum. They would say that his capacity to deal\nwith a Spiritual World, to believe in God, and in prayer to experience\nfellowship with him, has all grown up with no Reality to call it into\nbeing. If so, it stands alone in man's experience, the only function\nof his life that grew without an originating Fact to call it forth. It\ndoes not seem reasonable to think that. The evidence of man's\nexperience is overwhelmingly in favor of a Reality to which his spirit\nhas been trying to answer. Said Max M\u00fcller, \"To the philosopher the\nexistence of God may seem to rest on a syllogism; in the eyes of the\nhistorian it rests on the whole evolution of human thought.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nFaith's Greatest Obstacle\n\n\nDAILY READINGS\n\nThe speculative doubts leave many minds untouched, but one universal\nhuman experience sooner or later faces every serious life with\nquestions about God's goodness. We all meet trouble, in ourselves or\nothers, and oftentimes the wonder why in God's world such calamities\nshould fall, such wretchedness should continually exist, plunges faith\ninto perplexity. Few folk of mature years can fail to understand Edwin\nBooth when he wrote to a friend, \"Life is a great big spelling book,\nand on every page we turn the words grow harder to understand the\nmeaning of.\" Now, the basis of any intelligent explanation of faith's\nproblem must rest in a _right practical attitude toward trouble_.\nTo the consideration of that we turn in the daily readings.\n\n\nSixth Week, First Day\n\n =Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial among you,\n which cometh upon you to prove you, as though a strange thing\n happened unto you: but insomuch as ye are partakers of Christ's\n sufferings, rejoice; that at the revelation of his glory also ye may\n rejoice with exceeding joy. If ye are reproached for the name of\n Christ, blessed are ye; because the Spirit of glory and the Spirit of\n God resteth upon you. For let none of you suffer as a murderer, or a\n thief, or an evil-doer, or as a meddler in other men's matters: but\n if a man suffer as a Christian, let him not be ashamed; but let him\n glorify God in this name.... Wherefore let them also that suffer\n according to the will of God commit their souls in well-doing unto a\n faithful Creator.--I Pet. 4:12-16, 19.=\n\nSuch an attitude toward trouble as Peter here recommends is the most\nwholesome and hopeful possible to man. And it is reasonable too, if\nonly on the ground that trouble _develops in men the essential\nqualities of strong character_. Our highest admiration is always\nreserved for men who master difficult crises. If the story of Joseph,\nbegun beside Bedouin camp fires centuries ago, can easily be\nnaturalized beside modern radiators; if Robinson Crusoe, translated\ninto every tongue is understood by all, the reason lies in the depth\nof man's heart, where to make the most out of untoward situations is a\ndaily problem. Not every one can grasp the argument or perceive the\nbeauty of \"Paradise Lost\" and \"Paradise Regained,\" but one thing about\nthem every man appreciates--the blind Milton, sitting down to write\nthem:\n\n                  \"I argue not\n  Against Heaven's hand or will, nor bate a jot\n  Of heart or hope; but still bear up and steer\n  Right onward.\"\n\nThe full understanding of Ole Bull's playing on the violin was\nnecessarily restricted to the musical, but no restriction bounds the\nadmiration of men, learned or simple, when in a Munich concert, his A\nstring snaps and he finishes the composition on three strings. That is\nthe human problem in epitome. Getting music out of life's remainders\nafter the break has come; winning the battle with what is left from a\ndefeat; going blind, like Milton, and writing sublimest poetry, or\ndeaf, like Beethoven, and composing superb sonatas; being reared in an\nalmshouse and buried from Westminster Abbey, like Henry M. Stanley;\nor, like Kernahan, born without arms or legs and yet sitting at last\nin the British Parliament--all such hardihood and undiscourageable\npluck reach back in a man's bosom beyond the strings that ease and\nluxury can touch, and strike there an iron, reverberating chord.\nNothing in human life is so impressive as pluck, \"fighting with the\nscabbard after the sword is gone.\" And no one who deeply considers\nlife can fail to see that our best character comes when, as Peter\nsays, we \"suffer as a Christian.\"\n\n _O Lord our God, let our devout approach to Thee be that of the\n heart, not of the lips. Let it be in obedience to Thy spiritual law,\n not to any outward ritual. Thou desirest not temples nor offerings,\n but the sacrifice of a lowly and grateful heart Thou will not\n despise. Merciful Father, to all Thy dispensations we would submit\n ourselves, not grudgingly, not merely of necessity, but because we\n believe in Thy wisdom, Thy universal rule, and Thy goodness. In\n bereavement and in sorrow, in death as in life, in joys and in\n happiness, we would see Thy Hand. Teach us to see it; increase our\n faith where we cannot see; teach us also to love justice, and to do\n mercy, and to walk humbly with Thee our God. Make us at peace with\n all mankind, gentle to those who offend us, faithful in all duties,\n and sincere in sorrow when we fail in duty. Make us loving to one\n another, patient in distress, and ever thankful to Thy Divine power,\n which keeps, and guides, and blesses us every day. Lord, accept our\n humble prayer, accomplish in us Thy holy will. Let Thy peace reign in\n our hearts, and enable us to walk with Thee in love; through Jesus\n Christ our Lord. Amen._--Francis W. Newman, 1805.\n\n\nSixth Week, Second Day\n\n =Even unto this present hour we both hunger, and thirst, and are\n naked, and are buffeted, and have no certain dwelling-place; and we\n toil, working with our own hands: being reviled, we bless; being\n persecuted, we endure; being defamed, we entreat: we are made as the\n filth of the world, the offscouring of all things, even until now.--I\n Cor. 4:11-13.=\n\nIf Paul could be questioned about the experience of trouble which\nthese verses vividly express, would he not say that there had been\nqualities of character in him and resources in his relationship with\nGod which he never would have known about had it not been for the test\nof adversity? Trouble not only develops but also _reveals_ character;\nwe do not know ourselves until we have been tried out in calamity. The\nsimplest demand of adversity on every man is that he be \"game.\" Henry\nNewbolt is not indulging in rhetoric when he tells of a Soudan battle\nwhere a British square made up of Clifton graduates is hard beset by a\ncharge of fierce enemies, and, in that crisis, makes the cry of a\nClifton football captain, \"Play up, boys, play the game!\" rally the\nmen and save the day. At school or in the Soudan the problem is the\nsame; the sling with which David plays in his youth is his chief\nreliance when Goliath comes; a \"game\" spirit is essential to character\nfrom birth to death. We turn from the story of Nelson at Aboukir,\nnailing six flags to his mast so that if even five were shot away no\none would dream that he had surrendered, to find that the spirit there\nexemplified is applicable to our most common day. The quality which\nmade Nelson an Admiral of England, in spite of his lost arm, his lost\neye, his small stature, and his feeble health is one of our elemental\nneeds. And to a supreme degree this quality was in great Christians\nlike Paul. Read his letter to the Philippians and see! Adversity\nbrought his spirit to light, and made it an asset of the cause. In a\nreal sense, trouble, however forbidding, was one of Paul's best\nfriends, and there was a good reason why he should \"rejoice in\ntribulations.\"\n\n _O Father of spirits! Thou lovest whom Thou chastenest! Correct us in\n our weakness as the children of men, that we may love Thee in our\n strength as the sons of God. May the same mind be in us which was\n also in Jesus Christ, that we may never shrink, when our hour comes,\n from drinking of the cup that he drank of. Wake in us a soul to obey\n Thee, not with the weariness of servile spirits, but with the\n alacrity of the holy angels. Fill us with a contempt of evil\n pleasures and unfaithful ease; sustain us in the strictness of a\n devout life. Daily may we crucify every selfish affection, and\n delight to bear one another's burdens, to uphold each other's faith\n and charity, being tender-hearted and forgiving as we hope to be\n forgiven. Hold us to the true humility of the soul that has not yet\n attained; and may we be modest in our desire, diligent in our trust,\n and content with the disposals of Thy Providence. O Lord of life and\n death! Thy counsels are secret; Thy wisdom is infinite: we know not\n what a day may bring forth. When our hour arrives, and the veil\n between the worlds begins to be lifted before us, may we freely trust\n ourselves to Thee, and say, \"Father, into Thy hands I commend my\n spirit.\" Amen._--James Martineau.\n\n\nSixth Week, Third Day\n\nIf adversity, rightly used, so develops and reveals character, we may\nexpect to find trouble as a background to the most admirable men of\nthe race. We read the luminous histories of Francis Parkman and do not\nperceive, behind the printed page, the original manuscript, covered\nwith a screen of parallel wires, along which the blind author ran his\npencil that he might write legibly. We think of James Watt as a genius\nat invention, and perhaps recall that Wordsworth said of him, \"I look\nupon him, considering both the magnitude and the universality of his\ngenius, as perhaps the most extraordinary man that this country ever\nproduced.\" But Watt himself we forget--sickly of body, starving on\neight shillings a week, and saying, \"Of all things in life there is\nnothing more foolish than inventing.\" Kant's philosophy was a turning\npoint in human thought, but lauding Kant, how few recall his struggle\nwith a broken body! Said he, speaking of his incurable illness, \"I\nhave become master of its influence in my thoughts and actions by\nturning my attention away from this feeling altogether, just as if it\ndid not at all concern me.\" Wilberforce, the liberator of British\nslaves, we know, and beside his grave in Westminster Abbey we recall\nthe superb title that he earned, \"the attorney general of the\nunprotected and of the friendless,\" but the Wilberforce who for twenty\nyears was compelled to use opium to keep himself alive, and had the\nresolution never to increase the dose--who knows of him? One of the\nchief rewards of reading biography is this introduction that it gives\nto handicapped men; the knowledge it imparts of the world's great\nsaints and scripture makers, conquerors and reformers, who, in the\nwords of Thucydides, \"dared beyond their strength, hazarded against\ntheir judgment, and in extremities were of excellent hope.\" And when\none turns to the supreme Character, could the dark background be\neliminated and still leave Him?\n\n =But now we see not yet all things subjected to him. But we behold\n him who hath been made a little lower than the angels, even Jesus,\n because of the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that\n by the grace of God he should taste of death for every man. For it\n became him, for whom are all things, and through whom are all things,\n in bringing many sons unto glory to make the author of their\n salvation perfect through sufferings.--Heb. 2:8-10.=\n\n _O God, who art unsearchable in Thy judgments, and in Thy ways past\n finding out, we bow before the mystery of Thy Being, and confess that\n we know nothing, and can say nothing worthy of Thee. We cannot\n understand Thy dealings with us. We have faith, not sight; when we\n cannot see, we may only believe. Sometimes Thou seemest to have no\n mercy upon us. Thou dost pierce us through our most tender\n affections, quenching the light of our eyes in dreadful darkness.\n Death tears from us all that we love, and Thou art seemingly deaf to\n all our cries. Our earthly circumstances are reversed and bitter\n poverty is appointed us, yet Thou takest no heed, and bringest no\n comfort to the sorrow and the barrenness of our life. Still would we\n trust in Thee and cling to that deepest of our instincts which tells\n us that we come from Thee and return to Thee. Be with us, Father of\n Mercies, in love and pity and tenderness unspeakable. Lift our souls\n into Thy perfect calm, where all our wills are in harmony with Thine.\n Amen._--Samuel McComb.\n\n\nSixth Week, Fourth Day\n\nTo one perplexed and disheartened by adversity, a theoretical\nexplanation is generally not half as valuable as concrete instances of\ncourage and fortitude, founded on faith. Whether we be theologians or\nscientists or as ignorant of both as Caliban, there is an immediate,\npersonal call to arms in the brave fight of George Matheson, one of\nScotland's great preachers for all his blindness, or in Louis\nPasteur's indomitable will, making his discoveries despite the\nparalytic stroke that in his forty-sixth year crippled his strength.\nThe qualities which we admire in them are a sort of apotheosis of the\nqualities which we need in ourselves. For we all are handicapped, some\nby ill-starred heredity, by unhappy environment, or by the\nconsequences of our own neglect and sin; some by poverty, some by\nbroken bodies, or by dissevered family ties--and all of us by\nunfortunate dispositions. It does us good then to know that Phillips\nBrooks failed as a teacher. His biographer tells us that so did his\nfirst ambition to be an educator cling to him, that in the prime of\nlife, when he was the prince of preachers, he came from President\nEliot's office, pale and trembling, because he had refused a\nprofessorship at Harvard. So Robertson, of Brighton, whose sermons\nbegan a new epoch in British Christianity, was prevented from being a\nsoldier only by the feebleness of his body, and Sir Walter Scott, who\nwanted to be a poet, turned to novel writing, anonymously and\ntentatively trying a new role, because, as he frankly put it, \"Because\nByron beat me.\" He is an excellent cook who knows how to make a good\ndinner out of the left-overs, and hardly a more invigorating truth is\ntaught by history than that most of the finest banquets spread for the\ndelectation of the race have been prepared by men who made them out of\nthe leavings of disappointed hopes.\n\n =Therefore let us also, seeing we are compassed about with so great a\n cloud of witnesses, lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so\n easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set\n before us, looking unto Jesus the author and perfecter of our faith,\n who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising\n shame, and hath sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For\n consider him that hath endured such gainsaying of sinners against\n himself, that ye wax not weary, fainting in your souls.--Heb. 12:1-3.=\n\n _Our Father, we thank Thee that while we are sure of Thy protecting\n care, Thy causal providence, which foresees all things, we can bear\n the sorrows of this world, and do its duties, and endure its manifold\n and heavy cross. We thank Thee that when distress comes upon us, and\n our mortal schemes vanish into thin air, we know there is something\n solid which we can lay hold of, and not be frustrate in our hopes.\n Yea, we thank Thee that when death breaks asunder the slender thread\n of life whereon our family jewels are strung, and the precious stones\n of our affection fall from our arms or neck, we know Thou takest them\n and elsewhere givest them a heavenly setting, wherein they shine\n before the light of Thy presence as morning stars, brightening and\n brightening to more perfect glory, as they are transfigured by Thine\n own almighty power._\n\n _We thank Thee for all the truth which the stream of time has brought\n to us from many a land and every age. We thank Thee for the noble\n examples of human nature which Thou hast raised up, that in times of\n darkness there are wise men, in times of doubt there are firm men,\n and in every peril there stand up heroes of the soul to teach us\n feebler men our duty, and to lead all of Thy children to trust in\n Thee. Father, we thank Thee that the seed of righteousness is never\n lost, but through many a deluge is carried safe, to make the\n wilderness to bloom and blossom with beauty ever fragrant and ever\n new, and the desert bear corn for men and sustain the souls of the\n feeble when they faint. Amen._--Theodore Parker.\n\n\nSixth Week, Fifth Day\n\nOne distinguishing mark of the men who have won their victories with\nthe remnants of their defeat is that they refuse to describe their\nunideal conditions in negative terms. If they cannot live in southern\nCalifornia where they would choose to live, but must abide in New\nEngland instead, they do not describe New England in terms of its\ndeficiencies--no orange groves, no acres of calla lilies, no palm\ntrees. There are compensations even in New England, if one will\ncarefully take account of stock and see what positively is there! Or\nif a man would choose to live in Boston and must live in Labrador, the\ncase of Grenfell suggests that a positive attitude toward his\nnecessity will discover worth, and material for splendid triumphs even\non that inhospitable coast. The mark of the handicapped men who have\nmade the race's history glorious has always been their patriotism for\nthe country where they had to live. They do not stop long to pity\nthemselves, or to envy another's opportunity, or to blame circumstances\nfor their defeat, or to dream of what might have been, or to bewail\ntheir disappointed hopes. If the soil of their condition will not grow\none crop, they discover what it will grow. They have insight, as did\nMoses, to see holy ground where an ordinary man would have seen only\nsand and sagebrush and sheep.\n\n =Now Moses was keeping the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the\n priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the back of the wilderness,\n and came to the mountain of God, unto Horeb. And the angel of Jehovah\n appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and\n he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was\n not consumed. And Moses said, I will turn aside now, and see this\n great sight, why the bush is not burnt. And when Jehovah saw that he\n turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the\n bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I. And he said,\n Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the\n place whereon thou standest is holy ground.--Exodus 3:1-5.=\n\n _Father of life, and God of the living, Fountain of our being and\n Light of all our day; we thank Thee for that knowledge of Thyself\n which lights our life with eternal splendor, for that giving of\n Thyself which has made us partakers of Thy divine nature. We bless\n Thee for everything around us which ministers Thee to our minds; for\n the greatness and glory of nature, for the history of our race, and\n the lives of noble men; for the thoughts of Thee expressed in human\n words, in the art of painters and musicians, in the work of builders\n and craftsmen. We bless Thee for the constant memories of what we are\n that rise within ourselves; for the pressure of duty, the hush of\n solemn thoughts, for moments of insight when the veil on the face of\n all things falls away, for hours of high resolve when life is\n quickened within, for seasons of communion when, earth and sense\n forgotten, heaven holds our silent spirits raptured and aflame._\n\n _We have learned to praise Thee for the darker days when we had to\n walk by faith, for weary hours that strengthened patience and\n endeavor, for moments of gloom and times of depression which taught\n us to trust, not to changing tides of feeling, but to Thee who\n changest not. And now since Christ has won His throne by His cross of\n shame, risen from His tomb to reign forever in the hearts of men, we\n know that nothing can ever separate us from Thee; that in all\n conflicts we may be more than conquerors; that all dark and hostile\n things shall be transformed and work for good to those who know the\n secret of Thy love._\n\n _Glory be to Thee, O Lord. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nSixth Week, Sixth Day\n\nWhen folk have seen into human life deeply enough so that they\nperceive how adversity can be used to high issues, faith in God\nbecomes not so much a speculative problem as a practical need. They\nwant to deal with trouble nobly. They see that faith in God gives the\noutlook on life which makes the hopeful facing of adverse situations\nreasonable and which supplies power to make it possible. The result is\nthat the _great sufferers have been the great believers_. The idea\nthat fortunate circumstances make vital faith in God probable is\nutterly unsupported by history. Hardly an outstanding champion of\nfaith who has left an indelible impress on man's spiritual life can\nanywhere be found, who has not won his faith and confirmed it in the\nface of trouble. What is true of individuals is true of generations.\nThe days of Israel's triumphant faith did not come in Solomon's reign,\nwhen wealth was plentiful and national ambitions ran high. The great\nprophets and the great psalms stand out against the dark background of\nthe Exile and its consequences.\n\n =Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of Jehovah; awake, as in the\n days of old, the generations of ancient times. Is it not thou that\n didst cut Rahab in pieces, that didst pierce the monster? Is it not\n thou that driedst up the sea, the waters of the great deep; that\n madest the depths of the sea a way for the redeemed to pass over? And\n the ransomed of Jehovah shall return, and come with singing unto\n Zion; and everlasting joy shall be upon their heads: they shall\n obtain gladness and joy; and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.=\n\n =I, even I, am he that comforteth you: who art thou, that thou art\n afraid of man that shall die, and of the son of man that shall be\n made as grass; and hast forgotten Jehovah thy Maker, that stretched\n forth the heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth; and fearest\n continually all the day because of the fury of the oppressor, when he\n maketh ready to destroy? and where is the fury of the oppressor? The\n captive exile shall speedily be loosed; and he shall not die and go\n down into the pit, neither shall his bread fail. For I am Jehovah thy\n God, who stirreth up the sea, so that the waves thereof roar: Jehovah\n of hosts is his name. And I have put my words in thy mouth, and have\n covered thee in the shadow of my hand, that I may plant the heavens,\n and lay the foundations of the earth, and say unto Zion, Thou art my\n people.--Isa. 51:9-16.=\n\nThat is a voice out of the Exile. Such great believers, whose faith\nshone brightest when the night was darkest, have not pretended to know\nthe explanation of suffering in God's world. But they have had insight\nto see a little and trust for the rest. Stevenson has expressed their\nfaith: \"If I from my spy-hole, looking with purblind eyes upon a least\npart of a fraction of the universe, yet perceive in my own destiny\nsome broken evidences of a plan, and some signals of an overruling\ngoodness; shall I then be so mad as to complain that all cannot be\ndeciphered? Shall I not rather wonder, with infinite and grateful\nsurprise, that in so vast a scheme I seem to have been able to read,\nhowever little, and that little was encouraging to faith?\"\n\n _We thank Thee, O God, that Thou dost ride upon the cloud, and govern\n the storm. All that to us is dark is light to Thee. The night shineth\n as the day. All that which seems to us irregular and ungoverned, is\n held in Thine hand, even as the steed by the rein. From age to age\n Thou dost control the long procession of events, discerning the end\n from the beginning; and all the wild mixture, all the confusion, all\n the sorrow and the suffering, is discerned of Thee. As is the palette\n to the color, as is violence to development in strength, as is the\n crushing of the grape to the wine, so in Thy sight all things are\n beneficent that to us are most confusing and seemingly conflicting\n and threatening. Sorrow and pain and disaster are woven in the loom\n of God; and in the end we, too, shall be permitted to discern the\n fair pattern, and understand how that which brought tears here shall\n bring righteousness there._\n\n _O, how good it is to trust Thee, and to believe that Thou art wise,\n and that Thou art full of compassion, as Thou carriest on Thy great\n work of love and benevolence, sympathizing with all that suffer on\n the way, and gathering them at last with an exceeding great\n salvation! We trust Thee, not because we understand Thee, but because\n in many things Thou hast taught us where we should have been afraid\n to trust. We have crossed many a gulf and many a roaring stream upon\n the bridge of faith, and have exulted to find ourselves safe landed,\n and have learned to trust Thee, as a child a parent, as a passenger\n the master of a ship, not because we know, but because Thou knowest.\n Amen._--Henry Ward Beecher.\n\n\nSixth Week, Seventh Day\n\n =Every one therefore that heareth these words of mine, and doeth\n them, shall be likened unto a wise man, who built his house upon the\n rock: and the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds\n blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded\n upon the rock. And every one that heareth these words of mine, and\n doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, who built his\n house upon the sand: and the rain descended, and the floods came, and\n the winds blew, and smote upon that house; and it fell: and great was\n the fall thereof.--Matt. 7:24-27.=\n\nAn important fact is here asserted by the Master, which is commonly\nobscured in the commentaries. He says that no matter whether a man's\nlife be built on sand or on rock, he yet will experience the blasts of\nadversity; on both houses alike \"the rain descended, and the floods\ncame, and the winds blew.\" The Master repeatedly affirmed that trouble\ncomes without necessary reference to character, that while we may\nalways argue that sin causes suffering, we never can confidently argue\nthat suffering comes from sin (Luke 13:4; John 9:1-3). Folks\nneedlessly and unscripturally harass their souls when they suppose\nthat some special trouble must have befallen them because of some\nspecial sin. The book of Job was written to disprove that, and as for\nthe Master, he distinctly says that the man of faith with his house on\na rock faces the same storm that wrecks the faithless man. _The\ndifference is not in the adversity, but in the adversity's effect._\nNo more important question faces any soul than this: seeing that\ntrouble is an unevadable portion of every life, good or bad, what am I\nto do with it? Says Oliver Wendell Holmes, \"Did you ever happen to see\nthat most soft-spoken and velvet-handed steam-engine at the Mint? The\nsmooth piston slides backward and forward as a lady might slip her\ndelicate finger in and out of a ring. The engine lays one of its\nfingers calmly, but firmly, upon a bit of metal; it is a coin now, and\nwill remember that touch, and tell a new race about it, when the date\nupon it is crusted over with twenty centuries. So it is that a great\nsilent-moving misery puts a new stamp on us in an hour or a moment--as\nsharp an impression as if it had taken half a lifetime to engrave it.\"\nThe only flaw in that simile is that the coin cannot decide what\nimpression shall be made. But we can. Rebellion, despair, bitterness,\nor triumphant faith--we can say which impression adversity shall leave\nupon us.\n\n _O God of our life, whom we dimly apprehend and never can comprehend,\n to whom nevertheless we justly ascribe all goodness as well as all\n greatness; as a father teaches his children, so teach us, Lord, truer\n thoughts of Thee. Teach us to aspire, so far as man may lawfully\n aspire, to a knowledge of Thee. Thou art not only a God to be honored\n in times of rest and ease, Thou art also the Refuge of the\n distressed, the Comforter of the afflicted, the Healer of the\n contrite, and the Support of the unstable. As we sympathize with\n those who are sore smitten by calamity, wounded by sudden accident,\n wrecked in the midst of security, so must we believe that Thy mighty\n all-embracing heart sympathizes. Pitier of the orphan, God of the\n widow, cause us to share Thy pity and become Thy messengers of\n tenderness in our small measure. Be Thou the Stay of all in life and\n death. Teach all to know and trust Thee, give us a portion here and\n everywhere with Thy saints; through Jesus Christ our Lord.\n Amen._--Francis W. Newman, 1805.\n\n\nCOMMENT FOR THE WEEK\n\nI\n\nFew who have sincerely tried to believe in God's goodness and who have\nlived long enough to face the harrowing facts of human wretchedness\nwill doubt what obstacle most hampers faith. The major difficulty\nwhich perplexes many Christians, when they try to reconcile God's love\nwith their experience, is not belief's irrationality but life's\ninjustice. According to the Psalmist, \"The fool hath said in his\nheart, 'There is no God'\" (Psalm 14:1). But the fool is not the only\none who has said that. He said it, jeering; he announced it in\nderision; he did not want God, and contemptuous denial was a joy. It\nwas the temper of his negation that made him a fool. But many hearts,\nin tones far different from his, have said, \"There is no God.\" Parents\ncry it brokenheartedly beside the graves of children; the diseased cry\nit, suffering from keener agony than they can bear; fathers cry it\nwhen their battle against poverty has failed and their children plead\nin vain for bread; and men who care about their kind say it as they\nwatch the anguish with which war, drunkenness, lust, disease, and\npoverty afflict the race. No man of moral insight will call such folk\nfools. The wretchedness and squalor, the misery and sin which rest\nupon so much of humankind are a notorious difficulty in the way of\nfaith.\n\nIn dealing with this problem two short cuts are often tried, and by\nthem some minds endeavor to evade the issue which faith ought to meet.\nSome _minimize the suffering_ which creation cost and which man\nand animals are now enduring. We must grant that when we read the\nexperience of animals in terms of man's own life, we always exaggerate\ntheir pain. Animals never suffer as we do; their misery is not\ncompounded by our mental agonies of regret and fear; and even their\nphysical wretchedness is as much lower in intensity as their nerves\nare less exquisitely tuned. Darwin, who surely did not underestimate\nthe struggle for existence, said in a letter, \"According to my\njudgment, happiness decidedly prevails. All sentient beings have been\nformed so as to enjoy, as a general rule, happiness.\" We must grant\nalso that man's practical attitude toward life gives the lie to\npessimism. Only the suicides are the logical pessimists, and all the\nrest of men, most with good heart and multitudes with jubilant\nenthusiasm, do actually cling to life. Indeed, all normal men\ndiscover, that, within limits, their very hardships are a condition of\ntheir happiness and do not so much abate their love of life is they\nadd zest and tang. We must grant further that suffering should be\nmeasured not by quantity, but by intensity. One sensitive man enduring\nbereavement, poverty, or disease represents _all_ the suffering\nthat ever has been or ever can be felt. To speak of limitless\nsuffering, therefore, is false. There is no more wretchedness anywhere\nnor in all the world together, than each one can know in his own\nperson.\n\nWhen all this, however, has been granted, the facts of the world's\nmisery are staggering. Modern science has given terrific sweep and\nharrowing detail to Paul's assertion, \"The whole creation groaneth and\ntravaileth in pain together until now\" (Rom. 8:22). Let one whose\ninsight into misery's meanings is quickened by even a little\nimagination, try to sum up the agony of drunkards' homes, of bereaved\nfamilies, of hospitals, insane asylums, jails, and prisons, of war\nwith its unmentionable horrors--its blinded, deafened, maddened,\nraped--and no small palliatives can solve his problem. Rather he\nunderstands the picture which James Russell Lowell said he saw years\nago in Belgium: an angel holding back the Creator and saying, \"If\nabout to make such a world, stay thine hand.\"\n\nAnother short cut by which some endeavor to simplify the problem and\ncontent their thought is _to lift responsibility for life's\nwretchedness from God's shoulders and to put it upon man's_. Were\nman's sin no factor in the world, some say, life's miseries would\ncease; all the anguish of our earthly lot stands not to God's\nresponsibility but to man's shame. But the sufferings of God's\ncreatures did not begin with man's arrival, and the pain of creation\nbefore man sinned is a longer story than earth's misery since. Let\nRomanes picture the scene: \"Some hundred of millions of years ago,\nsome millions of millions of animals must be supposed to have become\nsentient. Since that time till the present, there must have been\nmillions and millions of generations of millions and millions of\nindividuals. And throughout all this period of incalculable duration,\nthis inconceivable host of sentient organizations have been in a state\nof unceasing battle, dread, ravin, pain. Looking to the outcome, we\nfind that more than one-half of the species which have survived the\nceaseless struggle are parasitic in their habits, lower and insentient\nforms of life, feasting on higher and sentient forms, we find teeth\nand talons whetted for slaughter, hooks and suckers molded for\ntorture--everywhere a reign of terror, hunger, sickness, with oozing\nblood and quivering limbs, with gasping breath and eyes of innocence\nthat dimly close in deaths of cruel torture.\" Is man responsible for\nthat? For cold that freezes God's living creatures, for lightning that\nkills them, for volcanoes that burn them, for typhoons that crush\nthem--is man responsible? By no such easy evasion may we escape the\nproblem which faith must meet. \"In sober truth,\" as John Stuart Mill\nexclaimed, \"nearly all the things which men are hanged or imprisoned\nfor doing to one another, are Nature's everyday performances.\" Who can\navoid seeing the patent contrast between the Father of Jesus and the\nCreator of such a world? \"The power that launches earthquakes and arms\ncuttlefish,\" said one perplexed believer, \"has but a meager\nrelationship to the power that blesses infants and forgives enemies.\"\n\n\nII\n\nCould we hold this problem at arm's length, discussing it in\nspeculative moods when we grow curious about the makeup of the\nuniverse, our case would be more simple. But of all life's problems,\nthis most certainly--sometimes creeping, sometimes crashing--invades\nour private lives. Every man has a date with adversity which he must\nkeep and which adversity does not forget. One notes the evidence of\nthis in every normally maturing life. As children we wanted happiness\nand were impatient, lacking it. Our cups of pleasure easily brimmed\nand overflowed. A Christmas tree or a birthday party--and our hearts\nwere like sun-parlors on cloudless days with all the windows open to\nthe light! But the time comes to all when happiness like this is not\nour problem; we recognize that it is gone; our Edens are behind us\nwith flaming angels at the gate. We have had friends and lost them and\nsomething has gone from our hearts that does not return; we have won\nsuccesses which we do not estimate as highly in possession as we did\nin dreams, and it may be have lost what little we achieved; we have\nsinned, and though forgiven, the scars are still upon us; we have been\nweathered by the rains and floods and winds. Happiness in the old\nfashion we no longer seek. We want peace, the power to possess our\nsouls in patience and to do our work. We want joy, which is a profound\nand spiritually begotten grace as happiness is not. This maturity\nwhich so has faced the tragic aspects of our human life is not less\ndesirable than childhood; it may be richer, fuller, steadier. We may\nthink of it as Wordsworth did about the English landscape--that not\nfor all the sunny skies of Italy would he give up the mists that\nspiritualize the English hills. But when trouble comes, life faces a\nnew set of problems that childhood little knew. We have joined the\nhuman procession that moves out into the inevitable need of comfort\nand fortitude.\n\nThe decisive crisis in many lives concerns the attitude which this\nexperience evokes. Some are led by it more deeply into the meanings of\nreligion. The Bible grows in their apprehension with the enlarging of\ntheir life; new passages become radiant as, in a great landscape,\nhills and valleys lately unillumined catch the rays of the rising sun.\nAt first the human friendliness of Jesus is most real, and the Bible's\nstories of adventure for God's cause; then knightly calls to character\nand service become luminous; but soon or late another kind of passage\ngrows meaningful: \"Now our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God, our\nFather who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through\ngrace, comfort your hearts and establish them\" (II Thess. 2:16).\nOthers, so far from being led by adversity into the deeper meanings\nof faith, renounce faith altogether, and fling themselves into open\nrebellion against life and any God who may be responsible for its\ntragedy. They may not dare to say what James Thomson did, but they\nthink it--\n\n  \"Who is most wretched in this dolorous place?\n    I think myself; yet I would rather be\n    My miserable self than He, than He\n  Who formed such creatures to his own disgrace.\n\n  The vilest thing must be less vile than Thou\n    From whom it had its being, God and Lord!\n    Creator of all woe and sin! abhorred,\n  Malignant and implacable! I vow\n\n  That not for all Thy power furled and unfurled,\n    For all the temples to Thy glory built,\n    Would I assume the ignominious guilt\n  Of having made such men in such a world!\"\n\nMany, however, are not by adversity made more sure of God, nor are\nthey driven into rebellion against him. They are perplexed. It had\nbeen so much easier, in the sheltered and innocent idealism of their\nyouth, to believe in God than it is now. As children they looked on\nlife as they might have listened to Mozart's music, ravished with\nunqualified delight; but now they know that Mozart died in abject\npoverty, that the coffin which his wife could not buy was donated by\ncharity, that as the hearse went to the grave the driver loudly damned\nthe dead because no drink money had been given him, and that to this\nday no one knows where Mozart's body lies. Maturity has to deal with\nso much more tragic facts than youth can ever know. With all the\nphilosophy that man's wit can supply, the wisest find themselves\nsaying what Emerson did, two years after his son's death: \"I have had\nno experience, no progress to put me into better intelligence with my\ncalamity than when it was new.\" And in this inevitable wrestling with\nadversity, the cry of men is not simply for more courage. They might\neasily steady their hearts to endure and overcome, were only one\nquestion's answer clear--is there any _sense_ in life's suffering? The\none unsupportable thought is that all life's pain and hardship is\nmeaningless and futile, that it has no worthy origin, serves no high\npurpose, that in misery we are the sport of forces that have no\nconsciousness of what they do, no meaning in it and no care. Such folk\nwant to believe in God, but--can they?\n\n\nIII\n\nTwo preliminary facts about Christianity's relationship with our\nproblem may help to clarify our thought. The doubt sometimes obtrudes\nitself on minds perplexed about life's tragedies that the Christian's\nfaith in a God of love is an idealistic dream. Such faiths as the\nFatherhood of God have come to men, they think, in happy hours when\ncalamity was absent or forgotten; they are the fruition of man's\nfortunate days. And born thus of a view of life from which the\nmiseries of men had been shut out, this happy, ideal faith comes back\nto painful realities with a shock which it cannot sustain. But is\nChristian faith thus the child of man's happy days? Rather the very\nsymbol of Christianity is the Cross. Our faith took its rise in one of\nhistory's most appalling tragedies, and the Gospel of a loving God, so\nfar from being an ideal dream, conceived apart from life's forbidding\nfacts, has all these centuries been intertwined with the public\nbrutality of a crucifixion. Every emphasis of the Christian's faith\nhas the mark of the Cross upon it. Jesus had said in words that God\nwas love, but it was at Calvary that the words took fire: \"God so\nloved the world that he gave his only begotten son\" (John 3:16). Jesus\nhad preached the divine forgiveness, but on Golgotha the message grew\nimperative: \"God commendeth his own love toward us, in that, while we\nwere yet sinners, Christ died for us\" (Rom. 5:8). Jesus had put into\nparables the individual care of the Father for every child, but it was\nthe Cross that drove the great faith home: Christ tasted \"death for\nevery man\" (Heb. 2:9). Nothing in Christian faith has escaped the\nformative influence of the Tragedy. The last thing to be said about\nthe Gospel is that it is a beautiful child-like dream which has not\nfaced the facts of suffering. In the New Testament are all the\nmiseries on which those who deny God's love count for support. We are\nat home there with suffering men: \"they were stoned, they were sawn\nasunder, they were tempted, they were slain with the sword: they went\nabout in sheepskins, in goatskins; being destitute, afflicted,\nill-treated (of whom the world was not worthy), wandering in deserts\nand mountains and caves and the holes of the earth\" (Heb. 11:37, 38).\nThe men with whom Christianity began were not strangers to such\ntrouble, so that some modern need remind their innocent and dreaming\nfaith that life is filled with mysterious adversity. _Christianity was\nsuckled on adversity; it was cradled in pain. At the heart of its Book\nand its Gospel is a Good Man crowned with thorns, nailed to a cross,\nwith a spear wound in his side._\n\nNor have the great affirmations of faith in God's fatherhood ever been\nassociated with men of ease in fortunate circumstance. The voice that\ncried \"Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit\" spoke in agonizing\npain. And through history one finds those words best spoken with a\ncross for a background. Thomas \u00e1 Becket said them, martyred in his own\ncathedral; John Huss said them, going to the stake at Constance;\nGeorge Wishart said them, roasted at the foot of the sea-tower of St.\nAndrews. Christian faith is not a dream that came in hours when human\ntrouble had been forgotten; it has furnished from the beginning an\ninterpretation of human trouble and an attitude in meeting it that has\nmade men \"more than conquerors.\"\n\nThe second preliminary fact is this: _Christianity has never pretended\nto supply a theoretical explanation of why suffering had to be_. This\nseeming lack has excellent reason, for such an explanation, if it be\ncomplete, is essentially beyond the reach of any finite mind. The most\ncomprehensive question ever asked, some philosopher has said, was put\nby a child. \"Why was there ever anything at all?\" No finite mind can\nanswer that. And next in comprehensiveness, and in penetration to the\nvery pith of creation's meaning, is this query, \"Why, if something had\nto be, was it made as it is?\" One must be God himself fully to answer\nthat, or to comprehend the answer, could it be written down. To expect\ntherefore, from Christianity or from any other source a theoretical\nexplanation that will plumb the depths of the mystery of suffering is\nto cry for the essentially impossible. So Carlyle says with typical\nvividness: \"To the minnow every cranny and pebble, and quality and\naccident of its little native creek may have become familiar; but does\nthe minnow understand the Ocean Tides and periodic Currents, the\nTrade-winds, and Monsoons, and Moon's Eclipses; by all which the\ncondition of its little Creek is regulated, and may, from time to time\n(_un_-miraculously enough), be quite overset and reversed? Such a\nminnow is Man; his Creek this Planet Earth; his Ocean the immeasurable\nAll; his Monsoons and periodic Currents the mysterious Course of\nProvidence through Aeons of Aeons.\"\n\nSo little is this inability of ours to know all that we wish about the\nworld a cause for regret, that it ought to be an occasion of positive\nrejoicing. If _we_ could understand the universe through and\nthrough, how small and meager the universe would have to be! The fact\nis that we cannot understand anything through and through. If one is\ndisheartened because he cannot pierce to the heart of Providence and\nknow all its secrets, let him try his hand upon a pebble and see how\nmuch better he will fare. What is a pebble? If one define it roughly\nas granite he must ask what granite is; if that be defined in terms of\nchemical properties, he must ask what they are; if they be defined as\nultimate forms of matter, he must inquire what matter is; and then he\nwill be told that matter is a \"mode of motion,\" or will be assured by\na more candid scientist, like Professor Tait, that \"we do not know and\nare probably incapable of discovering what matter _is_.\" No one\never solves the innermost problems of a stone, but what can be done\nwith stones our engineering feats are evidence.\n\nIf, therefore, we recognize at the beginning that the question why\nsuffering had to be is an ultimate problem, essentially insoluble by\nfinite minds, we need not be dismayed. Two opposing mysteries are in the\nworld--goodness and evil. If we _deny_ God, then _goodness_ is a\nmystery, for no one has ever yet suggested how spiritual life could\nrise out of an unspiritual source, how souls could come from dust. If\nwe _affirm_ God, then _evil_ is a mystery, for why, we ask, should\nlove create a world with so much pain and sin? Our task is not to\nsolve insoluble problems; it is to balance these alternatives--no God\nand the mystery of man's spiritual life, against God and the mystery\nof evil. Such a comparison is not altogether beyond our powers, nor\nare weighty considerations lacking to affect our choice.\n\n\nIV\n\nFor one thing, we may well inquire, when we complain of this world's\nmisery, what sort of world we are seeking in its place. Are we asking\nfor a perfectly happy world? But happiness, at its deepest and its\nbest, is not the portion of a cushioned life which never struggled,\noverpassed obstacles, bore hardship, or adventured in sacrifice for\ncostly aims. A heart of joy is never found in luxuriously coddled\nlives, but in men and women who achieve and dare, who have tried their\npowers against antagonisms, who have met even sickness and bereavement\nand have tempered their souls in fire. Joy is begotten not chiefly\nfrom the impression of happy circumstance, but from the expression of\novercoming power. Were we set upon making a happy world, therefore, we\ncould not leave struggle out nor make adversity impossible. The\nunhappiest world conceivable by man would be a world with nothing hard\nto do, no conflicts to wage for ends worth while; a world where\ncourage was not needed and sacrifice was a superfluity. Beside such an\ninane lotos-land of tranquil ease this present world with all its\nsuffering is a paradise. Men in fact find joy where in philosophy we\nmight not look for it. Said MacMillan, after a terrific twelve-month\nwith Peary on the Arctic continent: \"This has been the greatest year\nof my life.\"\n\nThe impossibility of imagining a worth-while world from which\nadversity had all been banished is even more evident when one grows\nill-content to think of happiness as the goal of life. That we should\nbe merely happy is not an adequate end of the creative purpose for us,\nor of our purpose for ourselves. In our best hours we acknowledge this\nin the way we handle trouble. _However much in doubt a man may be\nabout the theory of suffering, he knows infallibly how suffering\npractically should be met._ To be rebellious, cursing fate and\nhating life; to pity oneself, nursing one's hurts in morbid\nself-commiseration--the ignobility of such dealing with calamity we\nindubitably know. Even where we fall feebly short of the ideal, we\nhave no question what the ideal is. When in biography or among our\nfriends we see folk face crushing trouble, not embittered by it, made\ncynical, or thrust into despair, but hallowed, sweetened, illumined,\nand empowered, we are aware that noble characters do not alone _bear_\ntrouble; they _use_ it. As men at first faced electricity in dread,\nconceiving toward it no attitude beyond building lightning-rods to\nward away its stroke, but now with greater understanding harness it to\ndo their will, so men, as they grow wise and strong, deal with their\nsuffering. They make it the minister of character; they set it to\nbuild in them what nothing save adversity can ever build--patience,\ncourage, sympathy, and power. They even choose it in vicarious\nsacrifice for the good of others, and by it save the world from evils\nthat nothing save some one's suffering could cure. They act as though\n_character_, not happiness, were the end of life. And when they are at\ntheir best they do this not with stoic intrepidity, as though\ntrouble's usefulness were but their fancy, but joyfully, as though a\ngood purpose in the world included trouble, even though not intending\nit. So Robert Louis Stevenson, facing death, writes to a friend about\nan old woman whose ventriloquism had frightened the natives of\nVailima, \"All the old women in the world might talk with their mouths\nshut and not frighten you or me, but there are plenty of other things\nthat frighten us badly. And if we only knew about them, perhaps we\nshould find them no more worthy to be feared than an old woman talking\nwith her mouth shut. And the names of some of these things are Death\nand Pain and Sorrow.\"\n\nWhatever, then, may be our theoretical difficulty about suffering,\nthis truth is clear: when we are at our best we practically deal with\nsuffering as though moral quality were the goal of life. We _use_\nadversity, as though discipline were its purpose and good its end. It\nis worth noting that the only theory which fully fits this noblest\nattitude toward trouble is Christianity. Men may think God a devil, as\nJames Thomson sang, and yet may be practically brave and cheerful, but\ntheir theory does not fit their life. Men may believe in no God and no\npurpose in the world, and yet may face adversity with courage and\nhope, but their spirit belies their philosophy. When men are at their\nbest in hardship _they act as though the Christian faith in God were\ntrue, as though moral quality were the purpose of creation_.\n\nIf now, we really want a world in which character is the end and\naim--and no other world is worth God's making--we obviously may not\ndemand the abolition of adversity. If one imagines a life from its\nbeginning lapped in ease and utterly ignorant what words like\nhardship, sorrow, and calamity imply, he must imagine a life lacking\nevery virtue that makes human nature admirable. Character grows on\nstruggle; without the overcoming of obstacles great quality in\ncharacter is unthinkable. Whoever has handled well any calamitous\nevent possesses resources, insights, wise attitudes, qualities of\nsympathy and power that by no other road could have come to him. For\nall our complaints against life's misery, therefore, and for all our\ninability to understand it in detail, who would not hesitate,\nforeseeing the consequence, to take adversity away from men? He who\nbanishes hardship banishes hardihood; and out of the same door with\nCalamity walk Courage, Fortitude, Triumphant Faith, and Sacrificial\nLove. If we abolish the cross in the world, we make impossible the\nChrist in man. It becomes more clear the more one ponders it, that\nwhile this is often a hard world in which to be happy, to men of\ninsight and faith it may be a great world in which to build character.\n\n\nV\n\nBefore too confidently, however, we accept this conclusion, there is\none objection to be heard. So far is the world from being absolved\nfrom cruelty, on the plea of moral purpose, one may say, that _its\ninjustice is the very crux of its offense_. See how negligent of\njustice the process of creation is! Its volcanoes and typhoons slay\ngood and bad alike, its plagues are utterly indifferent to character;\nand in the human world which it embosoms some drunken Caesar sits upon\nthe throne while Christ hangs on the cross. Who for a single day can\nwatch the gross inequities of life, where good men so often suffer and\nbad men go free, and still think that the world has moral purpose in\nit? The Bible itself is burdened with complaint against the seeming\nsenselessness and injustice of God. Moses cries: \"Lord, wherefore hast\nthou dealt ill with this people? Neither hast thou delivered thy\npeople at all\" (Exodus 5:22, 23); Elijah laments, \"O Jehovah, my God,\nhast Thou also brought evil upon the widow, with whom I sojourn, by\nslaying her son?\" (I Kings 17:20); Habakkuk complains, \"Wherefore\nlookest thou upon them that deal treacherously, and holdest thy peace,\nwhen the wicked swalloweth up the man that is more righteous than he?\"\n(Hab. 1:13); and Job protests, \"Although thou knowest that I am not\nwicked, ... yet thou dost destroy me\" (Job 10:7, 8). Man's loss of\nfaith springs often from this utter disparity between desert and\nfortune. The time comes to almost every man when he looks on,\nindignant, desperate, at some gross horror uninterrupted, some\ninnocent victim entreated cruelly. He understands Carlyle's impatient\ncry, \"God sits in heaven and does nothing!\"\n\nNatural as is this attitude, and unjust as many of life's tragic\ntroubles are, we should at least see this: _man must not demand that\ngoodness straightway receive its pay and wrong its punishment_. He\nmay not ask that every virtuous deed be at once rewarded by\nproportionate happiness and every sin be immediately punished by\nproportionate pain. That, some might suppose, would put justice into\nlife. But whatever it might put into life, such an arrangement\nobviously would take out _character_. The men whose moral quality\nwe most highly honor were not paid for their goodness on Saturday\nnight and did not expect to be. They chose their course _for\nrighteousness' sake alone_, although they knew what crowns of\nthorns, what scornful crowds about their cross might end the journey.\nThey did not drive close bargains with their fate, demanding insurance\nagainst trouble as the price of goodness. They chose the honorable\ndeed for honor's sake; they chose it the more scrupulously, the more\npleasure was offered for dishonor; their tone in the face of\nthreatened suffering was like Milne's, Scotland's last martyr: \"I will\nnot recant the truth, for I am corn and no chaff; and I will not be\nblown away with the wind nor burst with the flail, but I will abide\nboth.\"\n\nEvery man is instinctively aware and by his admiration makes it known,\nthat the kind of character which chooses right, willing to suffer for\nit, is man's noblest quality. The words in which such character has\nfound utterance are man's spiritual battle cries. Esther, going before\nthe King, saying, \"If I perish, I perish\" (Esther 4:16); the three\nHebrews, facing the fiery furnace saying, \"Our God whom we serve is\nable to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace; and he will deliver\nus out of thy hand, O king. But if _not_, be it known unto thee, O\nking, that we will not serve thy gods\" (Dan. 3:17, 18); Peter and the\napostles, facing the angry Council, saying, \"We must obey God rather\nthan men\" (Acts 5:29); Anaxarchus, the martyr, crying, \"Beat on at the\ncase of Anaxarchus; Anaxarchus himself you cannot touch\"; Luther,\ndefying the Emperor, \"Here stand I; I can do no other\"--most words of\nmen are easily dispensable, but no words like these can man afford to\nspare. They are his best. _And this sort of goodness has been\npossible, because God had not made the world as our complaints\nsometimes would have it._ For such character, a system where goodness\ncosts is absolutely necessary. A world where goodness was paid cash in\npleasant circumstance would have no such character to show. Right and\nwrong for their own sakes would be impossible; only prudence and\nimprudence for happiness' sake could there exist. Out of the same door\nwith the seeming injustice of life goes the possibility of man's\nnoblest quality--his goodness \"in scorn of consequence.\" Many special\ncalamities no one on earth can hope to understand. But when one has\ngranted that fitness to grow character is the only worthy test of\ncreation, it evidently is not so simple as at first it seemed to\nimprove the fundamental structure of the world.\n\n\nVI\n\nIndeed, when one in imagination assumes the task of omnipotence and\nendeavors to construct a universe that shall be fitted for the growth\nof character, he cannot long hesitate concerning certain elements\nwhich must be there. _A system of regular law_ would have to be the\nbasis of that world, for only in a law-abiding universe could\nobedience be taught. If the stars and planets behaved \"like swarms of\nflies\" and nothing could be relied upon to act twice in the same way,\ncharacter and intelligence alike would be impossible. In this new\nworld, remolded, \"nearer to our heart's desire,\" _progress_ also would\nbe a necessity. A stagnant world cannot grow character. There must be\nreal work to do, aims to achieve; there must be imperfections to\noverpass and wrongs to right. Only in a system where the present\nsituation is a point of departure and a better situation is a\npossibility, where ideal and hope, courage and sacrifice are\nindispensable can character grow. In this improved world of our\ndreams, _free-will_ in some measure must be granted man. If character\nis to be real, man must not in his choice between right and wrong be\nas Spinoza pictured him, a stone hurled through the air, which thinks\nthat it is flying; he must have some control of conduct, some genuine,\nthough limited, power of choice. And in this universe which we are\nplanning for character's sake, individuals could not stand separate\nand unrelated; _they must be woven into a community_. Love which is\nthe crown of character, lacking this, would be impossible. What\nhappens to one must happen to all; good and ill alike must be\ncontagious in a society where we are \"members one of another.\"\n\nNo one of these four elements could be omitted from a world whose test\nwas its adaptability for character. Men with genuine power of choice,\nfused into a fellowship of social life, living in a law-abiding and\nprogressive world--on no other terms imaginable to man could character\nbe possible. _Yet these four things contain all the sources of our\nmisery._ Physical law--what tragic issues its stern, unbending\ncourse brings with terrific incidence on man! Progress--how obviously\nit implies conditions imperfect, wrong, through which we have to\nstruggle toward the best! Free-will--what a nightmare of horror man's\nmisuse of it has caused since sin began! Social fellowship--how surely\nthe innocent must suffer with the guilty, how impossible for any man\nto bear the consequence of his own sin alone! We may not see why these\ngeneral conditions should involve the particular calamities which we\nbewail, but even our finite minds can see thus far into the mystery of\nsuffering: _all our trouble springs from four basic factors in the\nuniverse, without any one of which, great character would be\nimpossible_.\n\nWhile, therefore, if one _deny_ God, the mystery of goodness lacks\nboth sense and solution; one may _affirm_ God and find the mystery of\nevil, mysterious still but suffused with light. God is working out a\nspiritual purpose here by means without which no spiritual purpose is\nconceivable. Fundamentally creation is good. We misuse it, we fail to\nunderstand its meaning and to appropriate its discipline, and\nimpatient because the eternal purpose is not timed by our small\nclocks, we have to confess with Theodore Parker, \"The trouble seems to\nbe that God is not in a hurry and I am.\" In hours of insight, however,\nwe perceive how little our complaints will stand the test of\ndispassionate thought. Our miseries are not God's inflictions on us as\nindividuals, so that we may judge his character and his thought of us\nby this special favor or by that particular calamity. The most\ncareless thinker feels the poor philosophy of Lord Londonderry's\npetulant entry in his journal: \"Here I learned that Almighty God, for\nreasons best known to himself, had been pleased to burn down my house\nin the county of Durham.\" One must escape such narrow egoism if he is\nto understand the purposes of God; one must rise to look on a\ncreation, with character at all costs for its aim, and countless \u00e6ons\nfor its settling. In the making of this world God has _limited\nhimself_; he cannot lightly do what he will. He has limited himself in\ncreating a law-abiding system where his children must learn obedience\nwithout special exemptions; in ordaining a progressive system where\nwhat _is_ is the frontier from which men seek what _ought to be_; in\ngiving men the power to choose right, with its inevitable corollary,\nthe power to choose wrong; in weaving men into a communal fellowship\nwhere none can escape the contagious life of all. What Martineau said\nof the first of these is true in spirit of them all: \"The universality\nof law is God's eternal act of self limitation or abstinence from the\nmovements of free affection, for the sake of a constancy that shall\nnever falter or deceive.\"\n\nWhen once a man has risen to the vision of so splendid a purpose in so\ngreat a world, he rejoices in the outlook. Granted that now he sees in\na mirror darkly, that many a cruel event in human life perplexes\nstill--he has seen enough to give solid standing to his faith. What if\nan insect, someone has suggested, were born just after a thunderstorm\nbegan and died just before it stopped--how dark would be its picture\nof creation! But we who span a longer period of time, are not so\nobsessed by thunderstorms, although we may not like them. They have\ntheir place and serve their purpose; we see them in a broader\nperspective than an insect knows and on sultry days we even crave\ntheir coming. A broken doll is to a child a cruel tragedy, but to the\nfather watching the child's struggle to accept the accident, to make\nthe best of it and to come off conqueror, the event is not utterly\nundesirable. He is not glad at the child's suffering, but with his\nhorizons he sees in it factors which she does not see. So God's\nhorizons infinitely overpass our narrow outlooks. There is something\nmore than whimsy in the theologian's saying, which President King\nreports, that an insect crawling up a column of the Parthenon, with\ndifficulty and pain negotiating passage about a pore in the stone, is\nas well qualified to judge of the architecture of the Parthenon, as we\nof the infinitude of God's plans. Seeing as much as we have seen of\nsense and purpose in the structure of creation, we have seen all that\nour finite minds with small horizons could have hoped. We have gained\nample justification for the attitude toward suffering which Dolly\nWinthrop in Silas Marner has immortalized: \"Eh, there's trouble i'\nthis world, and there's things as we can niver make out the rights on.\nAnd all as we've got to do is to trusten, Master Marner--to do the\nright thing as far as we know and to trusten. For if us, as knows so\nlittle, can see a bit o' good and rights, we may be sure as there's a\ngood and a rights bigger nor what we can know--I feel it i' my own\ninside as it must be so.\"\n\n\nVII\n\nWe may not truthfully leave our subject in such a case that faith's\nconcern with human misery will seem to lie merely in giving adversity\nan explanation. Faith is concerned not alone to _explain_ misery\nbut to _heal_ it. For while it is impossible without hardship to\ndevelop character, there are woeful calamities on earth that do not\nhelp man's moral quality; they crush and mutilate it; they are\nbarbarous intruders on the plan of God and they have no business in\nhis world. Some ills are such that no theory can reconcile them with\nthe love of God and no man ought to desire such reconciliation; in the\nlove of God they ought to be abolished. Slavery must be a possibility\nin a world where man is free; but God's goodness was not chiefly\nvindicated by such a theory of explanation. It was chiefly vindicated\nby slavery's abolishment. The liquor traffic and war, needless poverty\nin a world so rich, avoidable diseases that science can overcome--how\nlong a list of woes there is that faith should not so much explain as\nbanish! When some ills like drunkenness and war and economic injustice\nare thrust against our faith, and men ask that the goodness of God be\nreconciled with these, faith's first answer should be not speculation\nbut action. Such woes, so far from being capable of reconciliation\nwith God's goodness, are irreconcilable with a decent world. God does\nnot want to be reconciled with them; he hates them \"with a perfect\nhatred.\" We may not make ourselves patient with them by any theory of\ntheir necessity. They are not necessary; they are perversions of man's\nlife; and _the best defense of faith is their annihilation_.\n\nIndeed, a man who, rebellious in complaint, has clamorously asked an\nexplanation of life's ills as the price of faith in God, may well in\nshame consider God's real saints. When things were at their worst,\nwhen wrong was conqueror and evils that seemed blatantly to deny the\nlove of God were in the saddle, these spiritual soldiers went out to\nfight. The winds of ill that blow out our flickering faith made their\nreligion blaze--a pillar of fire in the night. The more evil they\nfaced, the more religion they produced to answer it. They were the\nreal believers, who \"through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought\nrighteousness, obtained promises.\" In comparison with such, it is\nobviously paltry business to drive a bargain with God that if all goes\nwell we will believe in him, but if things look dark, then faith must\ngo.\n\nMany a man, therefore, who is no philosopher can be a great defender\nof the faith. He may not weave arguments to prove that such a world as\nthis in its fundamental structure is fitted to a moral purpose. But he\ncan join the battle to banish from the world those ills that have no\nbusiness here and that God hates. He can help produce that final\ndefense of the Christian faith--a world where it is easier to believe\nin God.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nFaith and Science\n\n\nDAILY READINGS\n\nThe intellectual difficulties which trouble many folk involve the\nrelations of faith with science, but often they do not so much concern\nthe abstract theories of science as they do the particular attitudes\nof scientists. We are continually faced with quotations from\nscientific specialists, in which religion is denied or doubted or\ntreated contemptuously, and even while the merits of the case may be\nbeyond the ordinary man's power of argument, he nevertheless is shaken\nby the general opinion that what ministers say in the pulpit on Sunday\nis denied by what scientists say all the rest of the week. In the\ndaily readings, therefore, we shall deal with the scientists\nthemselves, as a problem which faith must meet.\n\n\nSeventh Week, First Day\n\nNo one can hope to deal fairly with the scientists, in their\nrelationship with faith, unless he begins with a warm appreciation of\nthe splendid integrity and self-denial which the scientific search for\ntruth has revealed.\n\n =Canst thou bind the cluster of the Pleiades,\n Or loose the bands of Orion?\n Canst thou lead forth the Mazzaroth in their season?\n Or canst thou guide the Bear with her train?\n Knowest thou the ordinances of the heavens?\n Canst thou establish the dominion thereof in the earth?\n Canst thou lift up thy voice to the clouds,\n That abundance of waters may cover thee?\n Canst thou send forth lightnings, that they may go,\n And say unto thee, Here we are?\n Who hath put wisdom in the inward parts?\n Or who hath given understanding to the mind?\n Who can number the clouds by wisdom?\n Or who can pour out the bottles of heaven,\n When the dust runneth into a mass,\n And the clods cleave fast together?=\n\n =--Job 38:31-38.=\n\nSuch is man's ancient wonder before the physical universe; and in the\nendeavor to discover the truth about it science has developed saints\nand martyrs whose selfless and sacrificial spirit is unsurpassed even\nin the annals of the Church. Men have spent lives of obscure and\nunrewarded toil to get at a few new facts; they have suffered\npersecution, and, even after torture, have reaffirmed the truth of\ntheir discoveries, as did Galileo, when he insisted, \"The earth does\nmove.\" They have surrendered place and wealth, friends and life itself\nin their passion for the sheer truth, and when human service was at\nstake have inoculated themselves with deadly diseases that they might\nbe the means of discovering the cure, or have sacrificed everything\nthat men hold most dear to destroy an ancient, popular, and hurtful\nfallacy. The phrase \"pride of science\" is often used in depreciation\nof the scientists. There is some excuse for the phrase, but in\ngeneral, when one finds pride, dogmatism, intolerance, they are the\nwork of ignorance and not of science. The scientific spirit has been\ncharacteristically humble. Says Huxley: \"Science seems to me to teach\nin the highest and strongest manner the great truth which is embodied\nin the Christian conception of entire surrender to the will of God.\nSit down before the fact as a little child, be prepared to give up\nevery preconceived notion, follow humbly wherever and to whatever end\nnature leads, or you shall learn nothing.... I have only begun to\nlearn content and peace of mind since I have resolved at all risks to\ndo this.\" The Christian, above all others, is bound to approach the\nstudy of the controversy between science and theology with a high\nestimate of the integrity and disinterested unselfishness of the\nscientists.\n\n _O God, we thank Thee for the world in which Thou hast placed us, for\n the universe whose vastness is revealed in the blue depths of the\n sky, whose immensities are lit by shining stars beyond the strength\n of mind to follow. We thank Thee for every sacrament of beauty; for\n the sweetness of flowers, the solemnity of the stars, the sound of\n streams and swelling seas; for far-stretching lands and mighty\n mountains which rest and satisfy the soul, the purity of dawn which\n calls to holy dedication, the peace of evening which speaks of\n everlasting rest. May we not fear to make this world for a little\n while our home, since it is Thy creation and we ourselves are part of\n it. Help us humbly to learn its laws and trust its mighty powers._\n\n _We thank Thee for the world within, deeper than we dare to look,\n higher than we care to climb; for the great kingdom of the mind and\n the silent spaces of the soul. Help us not to be afraid of ourselves,\n since we were made in Thy image, loved by Thee before the worlds\n began, and fashioned for Thy eternal habitation. May we be brave\n enough to bear the truth, strong enough to live in the light, glad to\n yield ourselves to Thee._\n\n _We thank Thee for that world brighter and better than all, opened\n for us in the broken heart of the Saviour; for the universe of love\n and purity in Him, for the golden sunshine of His smile, the tender\n grace of His forgiveness, the red renewing rain and crimson flood of\n His great sacrifice. May we not shrink from its searching and\n surpassing glory, nor, when this world fades away, fear to commit\n ourselves to that world which shall be our everlasting home.\n Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nSeventh Week, Second Day\n\nThe Christian's appreciation of scientists should not stop short of\nprofound gratitude for their service to religion. If one reads Burns's\n\"Tam o' Shanter,\" with its \"ghaists,\" \"warlocks and witches,\" and\n\"auld Nick,\" and remembers that these demonic powers were veritable\nfacts of terror once, he will see in what a world of superstitious\nfear mankind has lived. Bells were first put into church steeples, not\nto call folk to worship, but to scare the devils out of thunder-clouds,\nand the old cathedral bells of Europe are inscribed with declarations\nof that purpose. The ancients hardly believed in God so vividly as\nthey believed in malicious demons everywhere. Now the Gospel removed\nthe _fear_ of these from the first Christians; it made men aware of a\nconquering alliance with God, so that believers no longer shared the\npopular dread of unknown demons. But so long as thunderstorms,\npestilences, droughts, and every sort of evil were supposed to be the\nwork of devils, even the Gospel could not dispel the general dread.\nOnly new knowledge could do that. While Christianity therefore at its\nbest has removed the _fear_ of evil spirits, science has removed the\n_fact_ of them as an oppressive weight on life. Today we not only do\nnot dread them, but we do not think of them at all, and we have\nscience to thank for our freedom. By its clear facing of facts and\ntracing of laws, science has lifted from man's soul an intolerable\nburden of misbeliefs and has cleansed religion of an oppressive mass\nof credulity. _True religion never had a deadlier foe than\nsuperstition and superstition has no deadlier foe than science._\nLittle children, brought up in our homes to trust the love of the\nFather, with no dark background of malignant devils to harass and\nfrighten them, owe their liberty to the Gospel of Jesus indeed, but as\nwell to the illumination of science that has banished the ancient\ndreads.\n\n =These things have I spoken unto you, while yet abiding with you. But\n the Comforter, even the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my\n name, he shall teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance\n all that I said unto you. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give\n unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your\n heart be troubled, neither let it be fearful.--John 14:25-27.=\n\n _To God the Father, God the Son, God the Spirit, we pour forth most\n humble and hearty supplications, that He, remembering the calamities\n of mankind, and the pilgrimage of this our life in which we spend our\n days, would please to open to us new consolations out of the fountain\n of His goodness for the alleviating of our miseries. We humbly and\n earnestly ask that human things may not prejudice such as are Divine,\n so that from the opening of the gates of sense, and the kindling of a\n greater natural light, nothing of incredulity ... may arise in our\n minds towards Divine mysteries; but rather, O Lord, that our minds\n being thoroughly cleansed and purged from fancy, and yet subject to\n the Divine will, there may be given unto faith the things that are\n faith's, that so we may continually attain to a deeper knowledge and\n love of Thee, Who art the Fountain of Light, and dwellest in the\n Light which no man can approach unto; through Jesus Christ our Lord.\n Amen._--Francis Bacon, 1561.\n\n\nSeventh Week, Third Day\n\nIf one approach the scientists, as we have suggested, with\nappreciation of their devoted spirit and of their beneficent service,\nhe is likely to be fair and Christian in his judgment. For one thing,\nhe will readily understand why some of them are not religious men. The\nlaws of psychology are not suspended when religion is concerned; there\nas elsewhere persistent attention is the price of a vivid sense of\nreality. When, therefore, a man habitually thinks intensely of nothing\nbut biological tissue, or chemical reactions, or the diseases of a\nspecial organ, the results are not difficult to forecast. Darwin's\nfamous confession that in his exacting concentration on biology he\nutterly lost his power to appreciate music or poetry is a case in\npoint. Said Darwin, \"My mind seems to have become a kind of machine\nfor grinding general laws out of a large collection of facts.\" It is\nneedless to say that such a mind is not likely to be more vividly\naware of God than it is to feel music's beauty or poetry's truth. The\nplain fact is that if any man should persistently restrict himself to\na physical science, should never hear a symphony or an oratorio,\nshould shut out from his experience any dealing with music or\nenjoyment of it, he would in the end lose all musical capacity, and\nwould become a man whose appreciation of music was nil and whose\nopinion on music was worthless. _Just such an atrophy of life is\ncharacteristic of intense specialists._ When one understands this\nhe becomes capable of intelligent sympathy with scientists, even when\nhe does not at all agree with their religious opinions. Jude gives us\na remarkable injunction, plainly applicable here. \"On some have mercy\nwho are in doubt.\"\n\n =But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith,\n praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God,\n looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. And\n on some have mercy, who are in doubt; and some save, snatching them\n out of the fire; and on some have mercy with fear; hating even the\n garment spotted by the flesh.=\n\n =Now unto him that is able to guard you from stumbling, and to set\n you before the presence of his glory without blemish in exceeding\n joy, to the only God our Saviour, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be\n glory, majesty, dominion and power, before all time, and now, and for\n evermore. Amen.--Jude 20-25.=\n\n _O God, who so fillest all things that they only thinly veil Thy\n presence; we adore Thee in the beauty of the world, in the goodness\n of human hearts and in Thy thought within the mind. We praise Thee\n for the channels through which Thy grace can come to us; sickness and\n health, joy and pain, freedom and necessity, sunshine and rain, life\n and death._\n\n _We thank Thee for all the gentle and healing ministries of life; the\n gladness of the morning, the freedom of the wind, the music of the\n rain, the joy of the sunshine, and the deep calm of the night; for\n trees, and flowers, the clouds, and skies; for the tender ministries\n of human love, the unselfishness of parents, the love that binds man\n and woman, the confidence of little children; for the patience of\n teachers and the encouragement of friends._\n\n _We bless Thee for the stirring ministry of the past, for the story\n of noble deeds, the memory of holy men, the printed book, the\n painter's art, the poet's craft; most of all for the ministry of the\n Son of Man, who taught us the eternal beauty of earthly things, who\n by His life set us free from fear, and by His death won us from our\n sins to Thee; for His cradle, His cross, and His crown._\n\n _May His Spirit live within us, conquer all the selfishness of man,\n and take away the sin of the world. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nSeventh Week, Fourth Day\n\nThe tendency of scientific specialization to shut out the appreciation\nof life's other values has one notable result: the opinions of\nscientific specialists in the physical realm on matters of religion\nare generally not of major importance. There is a popular fallacy that\nan expert in one realm must be listened to with reverence on all\nsubjects. But the fact is that a great physicist is not by his\nscientific eminence thereby qualified to talk wisely on politics or\nliterature or religion; rather, so far as _a priori_ considerations\nare concerned, he is thereby disqualified. Mr. Edison cannot say\nanything on electricity that is insignificant; but when he gave an\ninterview on immortality he revealed to everyone who knew the history\nof thought on that subject and the issues involved in it, that on\nmatters outside his specialty he could say things very insignificant.\nThe more one personally knows great specialists, the more he sees how\nhuman they are, how interest in one thing shuts out interest in\nothers, how the subject on which the mind centers grows real and all\nelse unreal, how very valuable their judgment is on their specialties,\nand how much less valuable even than ordinary men's is their judgment\non anything beside. This truth does not concern religion only; it\nconcerns any subject which calls into play appreciative faculties that\ntheir science does not use. For a man, therefore, to surrender\nreligious faith because a specialist in another realm disowns it is\nabsurd. If one wishes, outside of those whose vital interest in\nreligion makes them specialists there, to get confirmation from\nanother class of men, let him look not to physicists but to judges.\nThey are accustomed to weigh evidence covering the general field of\nhuman life; and among the great judicial minds of this generation, as\nof all others, one finds an overwhelming preponderance of religious\nmen.\n\n =But unto us God revealed them through the Spirit: for the Spirit\n searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. For who among men\n knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of the man, which is in\n him? even so the things of God none knoweth, save the Spirit of God.\n But we received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is\n from God; that we might know the things that were freely given to us\n of God. Which things also we speak, not in words which man's wisdom\n teacheth, but which the Spirit teacheth; combining spiritual things\n with spiritual words. Now the natural man receiveth not the things of\n the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot\n know them, because they are spiritually judged.--I Cor. 2:10-14.=\n\n _O Eternal and glorious Lord God, since Thy glory and honor is the\n great end of all Thy works, we desire that it may be the beginning\n and end of all our prayers and services. Let Thy great Name be\n glorious, and glorified, and sanctified throughout the world. Let the\n knowledge of Thee fill all the earth as the waters cover the sea. Let\n that be done in the world that may most advance Thy glory. Let all\n Thy works praise Thee. Let Thy wisdom, power, justice, goodness,\n mercy, and truth be evident unto all mankind, that they may observe,\n acknowledge, and admire it, and magnify the Name of Thee, the Eternal\n God. In all the dispensation of Thy Providence, enable us to see\n Thee, and to sanctify Thy Name in our hearts with thankfulness, in\n our lips with thanksgiving, in our lives with dutifulness and\n obedience. Enable us to live to the honor of that great Name of Thine\n by which we are called, and that, as we profess ourselves to be Thy\n children, so we may study and sincerely endeavor to be like Thee in\n all goodness and righteousness, that we may thereby bring glory to\n Thee our Father which art in heaven; that we and all mankind may have\n high and honorable thoughts concerning Thee, in some measure suitable\n to Thy glory, majesty, goodness, wisdom, bounty, and purity, and may\n in all our words and actions manifest these inward thoughts touching\n Thee with suitable and becoming words and actions; through Jesus\n Christ our Lord. Amen._--Lord Chief Justice Sir Matthew Hale, 1609.\n\n\nSeventh Week, Fifth Day\n\nSo far in our thought we have tacitly consented to the popular\nsupposition, that the scientists are at odds with religion. Many of\nthem unquestionably are. But in view of the obsessing nature of\nscientific specialties, the wonder is not that some scientists are\nnon-religious; the wonder is that so many are profoundly men of faith\nin God. The idea that scientists as a whole are irreligious is untrue.\nLists of testimonials from eminent specialists in favor of religion\nare not particularly useful, for, as we have said, the judgment of\nspecialists outside their chosen realm is, at the most, no more\nvaluable than that of ordinary men. But if anyone tries to rest his\ncase against religion on the adverse opinions of great scientists, he\neasily can be driven from his position. Sir William Crookes, one of\nthe world's greatest chemists, writes: \"I cannot imagine the\npossibility of anyone with ordinary intelligence entertaining the\nleast doubt as to the existence of a God--a Law-Giver and a\nLife-Giver.\" Lord Kelvin, called the \"Napoleon of Science,\" said that\nhe could think of nothing so absurd as atheism; Sir Oliver Lodge,\nperhaps the greatest living physicist and certainly an earnest\nbeliever, writes, \"The tendency of science, whatever it is, is not in\nan irreligious direction at the present time\"; Sir George Stokes, the\ngreat physicist (died 1903), affirmed his belief that disbelievers\namong men of science \"form a very small minority\"; and Sir James\nGeikie, Dean of the Faculty of Science at Edinburgh University,\nimpatiently writes, \"It is simply an impertinence to say that 'the\nleading scientists are irreligious or anti-Christian.' Such a\nstatement could only be made by some scatter-brained chatterbox or\nzealous fanatic.\" The fact is that, in spite of the tendency of high\nspecialization to crowd out religious interest and insight, our great\nscientists have never thrown the mass of their influence against\nreligion, and today, in the opinion of one of their chief leaders, are\ngrowing to be increasingly men of religious spirit. Whatever argument\nis to be based on the testimony of the scientists is rather for\nreligion than against it.\n\n =For this cause I also, having heard of the faith in the Lord Jesus\n which is among you, and the love which ye show toward all the saints,\n cease not to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my\n prayers; that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory,\n may give unto you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge\n of him; having the eyes of your heart enlightened, that ye may know\n what is the hope of his calling, what the riches of the glory of his\n inheritance in the saints, and what the exceeding greatness of his\n power to us-ward who believe.--Eph. 1:15-19.=\n\n _O Lord, who by Thy holy Apostle hast taught us to do all things in\n the Name of the Lord Jesus and to Thy glory; give Thy blessing, we\n pray Thee, to this our work, that we may do it in faith, and\n heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men. All our powers of body\n and mind are Thine, and we would fain devote them to Thy service.\n Sanctify them and the work in which we are engaged; let us not be\n slothful, but fervent in spirit, and do Thou, O Lord, so bless our\n efforts that they may bring forth in us the fruit of true wisdom.\n Strengthen the faculties of our minds, and dispose us to exert them\n for Thy glory and for the furtherance of Thy Kingdom. Save us from\n all pride and vanity and reliance upon our own power or wisdom. Teach\n us to seek after truth, and enable us to gain it; while we know\n earthly things, may we know Thee, and be known by Thee through and\n in Thy Son Jesus Christ, that we may be Thine in body and spirit, in\n all our work and undertakings; through Jesus Christ. Amen._--Thomas\n Arnold, 1795.\n\n\nSeventh Week, Sixth Day\n\nFar more important than the opinions of individual scientists for\nreligion or against it, is the fact that scientists are coming\nincreasingly to recognize the limitations of their field. The field of\nscience _is_ limited; its domain is the system of facts and their\nlaws, which make the immediate environment of man's life; but with the\nOrigin of all life, with the character of the Power that sustains us\nand with the Destiny that lies ahead of us science does not, cannot\ndeal. The most superficial observance shows how little any great soul\nlives within the confines of science's discoveries. Carlyle, after his\ngreat bereavement, writes to his friend Erskine:\n\n\"'Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name, Thy will be\ndone'--what else can we say? The other night in my sleepless tossings\nabout, which were growing more and more miserable, these words, that\nbrief and grand Prayer, came strangely to my mind, with an altogether\nnew emphasis; as if written and shining for me in mild pure splendor,\non the black bosom of the Night there; when I, as it were, read them\nword by word--with a sudden check to my imperfect wanderings, with a\nsudden softness of composure which was much unexpected. Not for\nperhaps thirty or forty years had I once formally repeated that\nprayer--nay, I never felt before how intensely the voice of man's soul\nit is; the inmost aspiration of all that is high and pious in poor\nhuman nature.\" But supposing that the facts of science were all of\nreality and the laws of science all of truth, what sort of prayer\ncould Carlyle have offered? Another has suggested the form which the\nLord's Prayer would take in a world that lacked religious faith: \"Our\nbrethren who are upon the earth, hallowed be our name; our Kingdom\ncome; our will be done on earth; for there is no heaven. We must get\nus this day our daily bread; we know we cannot be forgiven, for Law\nknows no forgiveness; we fear not temptation, for we deliver ourselves\nfrom evil; for ours is the Kingdom and ours is the power, and there is\nno glory and no forever. Amen.\" In such a barren prayer _the whole of\nman's life is not represented_.\n\n =Let no man deceive himself. If any man thinketh that he is wise\n among you in this world, let him become a fool, that he may become\n wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is\n written, He that taketh the wise in their craftiness: and again, The\n Lord knoweth the reasonings of the wise, that they are vain.\n Wherefore let no one glory in men. For all things are yours; whether\n Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or\n things present, or things to come; all are yours; and ye are\n Christ's; and Christ is God's.--I Cor. 3:18-23.=\n\n _O Thou Infinite Spirit, who occupiest all space, who guidest all\n motion, thyself unchanged, and art the life of all that lives, we\n flee unto thee, in whom we also live and move and have our being, and\n would reverence Thee with what is highest and holiest in our soul. We\n know that Thou art not to be worshiped as though Thou needest aught,\n or askedst the psalm of praise from our lips, or our heart's poor\n prayer. O Lord, the ground under our feet, and the seas which whelm\n it round, the air which holds them both, and the heavens sparkling\n with many a fire--these are a whisper of the psalm of praise which\n creation sends forth to Thee, and we know that Thou askest no homage\n of bended knee, nor heart bowed down, nor heart uplifted unto Thee.\n But in our feebleness and our darkness, dependent on Thee for all\n things, we lift up our eyes unto Thee; as a little child to the\n father and mother who guide him by their hands, so do our eyes look\n up to Thy countenance, O Thou who art our Father and our Mother too,\n and bless Thee for all Thy gifts. We look to the infinity of Thy\n perfection with awe-touched heart, and we adore the sublimity which\n we cannot comprehend. We bow down before Thee, and would renew our\n sense of gratitude and quicken still more our certainty of trust,\n till we feel Thee a presence close to our heart, and are so strong in\n the heavenly confidence that nothing earthly can disturb us or make\n us fear. Amen._--Theodore Parker.\n\n\nSeventh Week, Seventh Day\n\nThe difficulty which many Christians feel concerning science centers\naround their loyalty to the Bible. They still are under the\ndomination of the thought that the Christian idea of the Bible is the\nsame as the Mohammedan idea of the Koran or the Mormon idea of Joseph\nSmith's sacred plates. The Koran was all written in heaven, word for\nword, say orthodox Mohammedans, before ever it came to earth. As for\nthe Mormon Bible, God buried the plates on which he wrote, said Smith,\nand then disclosed their hiding place, and his prophet translated them\nverbatim, so that the Mormon book is literally inerrant. But this is\nnot the Christian idea of the Bible. Inspiration is never represented\nin Scripture as verbal dictation where human powers and limitations\nare suspended, so that like a phonographic plate the result is a\nmechanical reproduction of the words of God. Rather God spoke to men\nthrough their experience as they were able to understand him, and as a\nresult the great Christian Book, like a true Christian man, represents\nalike the inbreathing of the Divine and the limitation of the human.\nSo the Epistle to the Hebrews clearly states that God did what he\ncould in revealing partially to partial men what they could\nunderstand:\n\n =God, having of old time spoken unto the fathers in the prophets by\n divers portions and in divers manners, hath at the end of these days\n spoken unto us in his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things,\n through whom also he made the worlds.--Heb. 1:1, 2.=\n\nOf all limitations that are entirely obvious in the ancient\nHebrew-Christian world, the current view of the physical universe is\nthe most unescapable. To suppose that God never can reveal to men\nanything about the world, transcending what the ancient Hebrews could\nunderstand, is to deny the principle which Jesus applied even to the\nmore important realm of spiritual truth: \"I have yet many things to\nsay unto you, but ye cannot bear them now\" (John 16:12).\n\n _O Thou who hast visited us with the Dayspring from on high, who hast\n made light to shine in the darkness, we praise Thy holy name and\n proclaim Thy wonderful goodness._\n\n _We bless Thee for the dawning of the light in far-off ages as soon\n as human eyes could bear its rays. We remember those who bore aloft\n the torch of truth when all was false and full of shame; those\n far-sighted souls who from the mountain tops of vision heralded the\n coming day; those who labored in the darkened valleys to lift men's\n eyes to the hills._\n\n _We thank Thee that in the fulness of the times Thou didst gather Thy\n light into life, so that even simple folk could see; for Jesus the\n Star of the morning and the Light of the world._\n\n _We commemorate His holy nativity, His lowly toil, His lonely way;\n the gracious words of His lips, the deep compassion of His heart, His\n friendship for the fallen, His love for the outcast; the crown of\n thorns, the cruel cross, the open shame. And we rejoice to know as He\n was here on earth, so Thou art eternally. Thou dost not abhor our\n flesh, nor shrink from our earthly toil. Thou rememberest our\n frailty, bearest with our sin, and tastest even our bitter cup of\n death._\n\n _And now we rejoice for the light that shines about our daily path\n from the cradle to the grave, and for the light that illumines its\n circuit beyond these spheres from our conception in Thy mind to the\n day when we wake in Thy image; for the breathing of Thy spirit into\n ours till we see Thee face to face: in God, from God; to God at last.\n Hallelujah. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nCOMMENT FOR THE WEEK\n\nI\n\nThe innermost questions which some minds raise about religion cannot\nbe answered without candid discussion of the obvious contrasts between\nfaith and science. The conflict between science and theology is one of\nthe saddest stories ever written. It is a record of mutual\nmisunderstanding, of bitterness, bigotry, and persecution, and to this\nday one is likely to find the devotees of religion suspicious of\nscience and scientists impatient with the Church.\n\nIf we are to understand the reason for this controversy between\nscience and theology, we must take a far look back into man's history.\nStephen Leacock remarks that whenever a professor discusses anything,\nhe has to retreat at least 2,000 years to get a running start. Our\nretreat must be farther than that; it carries us to the earliest stage\nin which we are able to describe the thoughts of men. _At the\nbeginning men attributed to superhuman spirits all activities in the\nworld which they themselves did not perform._ If the wind blew, a\nspirit did it; if the sun rose, a spirit moved it; if a storm came, a\nspirit drove it. Natural law was non-existent to the primitive man;\nevery movement in nature was the direct result of somebody's active\nwill. From the mysterious whispering of a wind-swept field to the\ncrashing thunder, what man did not cause the gods did.\n\nIf, therefore, a primitive man were asked the cause of rain, he had\nbut one answer: a god made it rain. That was his _scientific_\nanswer, for no other explanation of rain could he conceive. That was\nhis _religious_ answer, for he worshiped the spirit on whom he\nmust depend for showers. This significant fact, therefore, stands\nclear: _To primitive man a religious answer and a scientific answer\nwere identical._ Sunrise was explained, not by planetary movements\nwhich were unknown, but by the direct activity of a god, and the Dawn\nthen was worshipped in the same terms in which it was explained. The\nhistoric reason for the confusion between science and religion at once\ngrows evident. _At the beginning they were fused and braided into\none; the story of their relationship is the record of their gradual\nand difficult disentangling._\n\nWherever peace has come between science and religion, one finds a\nrealm where the boundaries between the two are acknowledged and\nrespected. Ask _now_ the question, What makes it rain? There is a\nscientific answer in terms of natural laws concerning atmospheric\npressure and condensation. There is also a religious answer, since\nbehind all laws and through them runs the will of God. These two\nreplies are distinct, they move in different realms, and are held\ntogether without inconsistency. As Sabatier put it, \"Since God is the\nfinal cause of all things, he is not the scientific explanation of any\none thing.\" In how many realms where once confusion reigned between\nthe believers in the gods and the seekers after natural laws, is peace\nnow established! Rain and sunrise, the tides and the eclipses, the\ncoming of the seasons and the growing of the crops--for all such\nevents we have our scientific explanations, and at the same time\nthrough them all the man of religion feels the creative power of God.\nPeace reigns in these realms because here _no longer do we force\nreligious answers on scientific questions or scientific answers on\nreligious questions_. Evidently the old Deuteronomic law is the\nsolution of the conflict between science and religion: \"Cursed be he\nthat removeth his neighbor's landmark\" (Deut. 27:17).\n\n\nII\n\nLeft thus in the negative, however, this might seem to mean that we\nare to divide our minds into air-tight compartments, and allow no\ninfluences from one to penetrate another. But science and religion do\ntremendously affect each other, and no honest dealing ever can\nendeavor to prevent their mutual reaction. Our position is not thus\nnegative; it affirms a positive and most important truth. Life has\nmany aspects; science, art, religion, approach it from different\nangles, with different interests and purposes; and while they do\n_influence_ each other, they are not _identical_ and each has solid\nstanding in its own right. When science has grown domineering, as\nthough her approach to reality were the only one and her conclusions\nall of truth, the poets have had as much distaste for her as have the\ntheologians. Shelley, who called himself an atheist, had no interest\nin religion's conflict with the extreme claims of science; yet listen\nto his aroused and flaming language as he pleads the case for poetry\nagainst her: \"Poetry is something divine.... It is the perfect and\nconsummate surface and bloom of all things; it is as the odor and\ncolor of the rose to the texture of the elements which compose it, and\nthe form and splendor of unfaded beauty to the secrets of anatomy and\ncorruption. What were virtue, love, patriotism, friendship--what were\nthe scenery of this beautiful universe which we inhabit; what were our\nconsolations on this side of the grave--and what were our aspirations\nbeyond it, if poetry did not ascend to bring light and fire from those\neternal regions where the owl-winged faculty of calculation dare not\neven soar?\" This involves no denial of science's absolute right to her\nown field--the \"texture of the elements which compose\" the rose, and\nthe \"secrets of anatomy.\" But it is a justified assertion that this\nfield of science is not all of reality, and that what the \"owl-winged\nfaculty of calculation\" can reach is not all of truth.\n\nWhat is a sunset? Science sets forth the answer in tables where the\nlight waves that compose the colors are counted and the planetary\nmovements that bring on the dusk are all explained. Poetry answers in\na way how different!\n\n  \"I've dreamed of sunsets when the sun, supine,\n  Lay rocking on the ocean like a god,\n  And threw his weary arms far up the sky,\n  And with vermilion-tinted fingers,\n  Toyed with the long tresses of the evening star.\"[4]\n\nIs one of these answers more true than the other? Rather it is absurd\nto compare their truth; they are not contradictory; they approach the\nsame fact with diverse interests, and seek in it different aspects of\nreality. Each has its rights in its own field. And so far is it from\nbeing true that science has a clear case in favor of its own superior\nimportance, that H\u00f6ffding, the philosopher, remarks, \"It well may be\nthat poetry gives more perfect expression to the highest Reality than\nany scientific concept can ever do.\"\n\nAny great fact is too manifold in its meanings to be exhausted by a\nsingle method of approach. If one would know the Bible thoroughly, he\nmust understand the rules of grammar. Were one to make grammar his\nexclusive specialty, the Bible to him, so far as he held strictly to\nhis science, would be nouns and verbs, adverbs, adjectives, and\nprepositions, and the law-abiding relationships between them. This\nmere grammarian would know by such a method one aspect of the Bible,\nbut how little of the Book would that aspect be! No rules of grammar\ncan interpret the thirteenth chapter of First Corinthians or explain\nthe story of the Cross. The facts and laws of the Book's language a\ngrammarian could know, but the beauty and the soul of it, the\ninnermost transforming truth of it, would be unperceived.\n\nSo life is too rich and various to be exhausted by any one approach.\nScience seeks facts and arranges them in systems of cause and effect.\nPoetry sees these bare facts adorned with beauty, she suffuses them\nwith her preferences and her appreciations. Religion sees the whole\ngathered up into spiritual unity, filled with moral purpose and good\nwill, and in this faith finds peace and power. There need be no\nconflict between these various approaches; they are complementary, not\nantagonistic; and no man sees all the truth by any one of them alone.\nSo a chemist might come to a spring to analyze it; a painter to\nrejoice in its beauties and reproduce them on his canvas; and a man\nathirst might come to drink and live. Shall they quarrel because they\ndo not all come alike? Let them rather see how partial is the\nexperience of each without the others!\n\n\nIII\n\nIn the mutual trespassing which has caused our problem, religion has\nhad her guilty share, and the reason is not difficult to find. God did\nnot have to give a modern scientific education to his ancient Hebrew\nsaints before he could begin to reveal to them something of his will\nand character. And they, writing their experience and thought of him,\ncould not avoid--as no generation's writers can avoid--indicating the\nview of the physical world which they and their contemporaries held.\nIt is easy, therefore, from scores of Scripture passages to\nreconstruct the early Hebrew world. Their earth was flat and was\nfounded on an underlying sea. (Psalm 136:6; Psalm 24:1, 2; Gen. 7:11);\nit was stationary (Psalm 93:1; Psalm 104:5); the heavens, like an\nupturned bowl, \"strong as a molten mirror\" (Job 37:18; Gen. 1:6-8;\nIsa. 40:22; Psalm 104:2), rested on the earth beneath (Amos 9:6; Job\n26:11); the sun, moon, and stars moved within this firmament, of\nspecial purpose to illumine man (Gen. 1:14-19); there was a sea above\nthe sky, \"the waters which were above the firmament\" (Gen. 1:7; Psalm\n148:4), and through the \"windows of heaven\" the rain came down (Gen.\n7:11; Psalm 78:23); beneath the earth was mysterious Sheol where dwelt\nthe shadowy dead (Isa. 14:9-11); and all this had been made in six\ndays, a short and measurable time before (Gen. 1). This was the world\nof the Hebrews.\n\nBecause when the Hebrews wrote the Bible their thoughts of God, their\ndeep experience of him, were interwoven with their early science,\nChristians, through the centuries, have thought that faith in God\nstood or fell with early Hebrew science and that the Hebrew view of\nthe physical universe must last forever. In the seventeenth century,\nDr. John Lightfoot, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge,\nsaid: \"Heaven and earth, center and circumference, were created all\ntogether, in the same instant, and clouds full of water.... This work\ntook place and man was created by the Trinity on October 23, 4004 B. C.,\nat nine o'clock in the morning.\" Of what tragedy has this identification\nof science with religion been the cause!\n\nWhen _astronomy_ began to revolutionize man's idea of the solar\nuniverse, when for the first time in man's imagination the flat earth\ngrew round and the stable earth began moving through space\nseventy-five times faster than a cannon-ball, Pope Paul V solemnly\nrendered a decree, that \"the doctrine of the double motion of the\nearth about its axis and about the sun is false and entirely contrary\nto Holy Scripture.\" When _geology_ began to show from the rocks'\nunimpeachable testimony the long leisureliness of God, laying the\nfoundations of the world, a Christian leader declared geology \"not a\nsubject of lawful inquiry,\" \"a dark art,\" \"dangerous and disreputable,\"\n\"a forbidden province,\" \"an awful evasion of the testimony of\nrevelation.\" This tragic record of theology's vain conflict with\nscience is the most pitiable part of the Church's story. How needless\nit was! For now when we face our universe of magnificent distances and\nregal laws has religion really suffered? Has a flat and stationary\nearth proved essential to Christianity, as Protestants and Catholics\nalike declared? Rather the Psalmist could not guess the sweep of our\nmeaning when now we say, \"The heavens declare the glory of God and the\nfirmament showeth his handiwork\" (Psalm 19:1).\n\nIn the last generation the idea of _evolution_ was the occasion of a\nstruggle like that which attended the introduction of the new\nastronomy. How was the world made? asked the ancient Hebrew, and he\nanswered, By the word of God at a stroke. That was his scientific\nanswer, and his religious answer too. When, therefore, the evolving\nuniverse was disclosed by modern science, when men read in fossil and\nin living biological structure the undeniable evidence of a long\nhistory of gradually changing forms of life, until the world was seen\n_not made like a box but growing like a tree_, many men of religion\nthought the faith destroyed. They identified the Christian Gospel with\nearly Hebrew science! Today, however, when the general idea of\nevolution is taken for granted as gravitation is, how false this\nidentification obviously appears! Says Professor Bowne, \"An Eastern\nking was seated in a garden, and one of his counselors was speaking\nof the wonderful works of God. 'Show me a sign,' said the king, 'and I\nwill believe.' 'Here are four acorns,' said the counselor; 'will your\nMajesty plant them in the ground, and then stoop down and look into\nthis clear pool of water?' The king did so. 'Now,' said the other,\n'Look up.' The king looked up and saw four oak trees where he had\nplanted the acorns. 'Wonderful!' he exclaimed; 'this is indeed the\nwork of God.' 'How long were you looking into the water?' asked the\ncounselor. 'Only a second,' said the king. 'Eighty years have passed\nas a second,' said the other. The king looked at his garments; they\nwere threadbare. He looked at his reflection in the water; he had\nbecome an old man. 'There is no miracle here, then,' he said angrily.\n'Yes,' said the other; 'it is God's work whether he do it in one\nsecond or in eighty years.'\"\n\nSuch an attitude as this is now a commonplace with Christian folk. A\nvast and growing universe through which sweep the purposes of God is\nby far the most magnificent outlook for faith that man has ever had.\nThe Gospel and Hebrew science are _not_ identical; the Gospel is\nnot indissolubly bound to any science ancient or modern; for science\nand religion have separable domains.\n\n  \"A fire-mist and a planet,\n    A crystal and a cell,\n  A jelly-fish and a saurian,\n    And caves where cave men dwell.\n  Then a sense of Love and Duty\n    And a face turned from the clod,\n  Some call it Evolution\n    And others--call it God.\"\n\nThe same story of needless antagonism is now being written about\nreligion and _natural law_. When science began plotting nature's laws,\nthe control of the world seemed to be snatched from the hands of deity\nand given over to a system of impersonal rules. God, whose action had\nbeen defined in terms of miracle, was forced from one realm after\nanother by the discovery of laws, until at last even comets were found\nto be not whimsical but as regular in their law-abiding courses as the\nplanets, and God seemed to be escorted to the edge of the universe and\nbowed out. When Newton first formulated the law of gravitation, the\nartillery of many an earnest pulpit was let loose against him. One\nsaid that Newton took \"from God that direct action on his works so\nconstantly ascribed to him in Scripture and transferred it to material\nmechanism\" and that he \"substituted gravitation for Providence.\" But\nnow, when science has so plainly won her case, in her own proper\nfield; when we know to our glory and profit so many laws by which the\nworld is governed, and use our knowledge as the most splendid engine\nof personal purpose and freedom which man ever had, we see how great\nour gain has been. _Nor is it more a practical than a religious gain._\nGod once was thought of chiefly in terms of miraculous action; he came\ninto his world now and again, like the _deus-ex-machina_ of a Greek\ntragedy, to solve a critical dilemma in the plot. Now all the laws we\nknow and many more are his regular ways of action, and through them\nall continuously his purpose is being wrought. As Henry Drummond\nexclaimed, \"If God appears periodically, he disappears periodically.\nIf he comes upon the scene at special crises, he is absent from the\nscene in the intervals. Whether is all-God or occasional God the\nnobler theory?\"\n\nNothing, therefore, can be more pathetic than the self-styled\n\"defenders of the faith\" who withstand the purpose of reverent\nstudents to give scientific answers to scientific questions. Such men\nare not really defending the faith. They are doing exactly what Father\nInchofer did when he said, \"The opinion that the earth moves is of all\nheresies the most abominable\"; what Mr. Gosse did when he maintained,\nin explanation of geology's discoveries, that God by the use of\nstratified rock and fossils deliberately gave the earth the\n_appearance_ of development through long ages, while really he made it\nin six days; what Mr. Southall did when, in the face of established\nanthropology, he claimed that the \"Egyptians had no Stone age and were\nborn civilized\"; what the Dean of Chichester did when he preached that\n\"those who refuse to accept the history of the creation of our first\nparents according to its obvious literal intention, and are for\nsubstituting the modern dream of evolution in its place, cause the\nentire scheme of man's salvation to collapse.\" These were not\ndefending the faith; they were making it ridiculous in the eyes of\nintelligent men and were embroiling religion in controversies where\nshe did not belong and where, out of her proper realm, she was\nforedoomed to defeat. _For scientific problems are not a matter for\nfaith; they are a matter for investigation._ No one can settle by\nfaith the movements of the planets, the method of the earth's\nformation, the age of mankind, the explanation of comets. These lie in\nscience's realm, not in religion's, and religious faith demeans\nherself when she tries to settle them. Let science be the grammarian\nof the world to observe its parts of speech and their relations!\nReligion deals with the soul of the world, its deepest source, its\nspiritual meaning, its divine purpose.\n\n\nIV\n\nScience, however, has not always been content with the grammarian's\ntask. When we have frankly confessed religion's sins in trespassing on\nscientific territory, we must note that _science has her guilty\nshare in the needless conflict_. Today one suspects that the\nChurch's vain endeavor by ecclesiastical authority to force religious\nsolutions on scientific problems is almost over. But the attempt of\nmany scientists to claim the whole field of reality as theirs and to\nforce their solutions on every sort of problem is not yet finished.\nThis, too, is a vain endeavor. To suppose that the process of\nscientific observation and inference can exhaust the truth of life is\nlike supposing that there is no more meaning in Westminster Abbey than\nis expressed in Baedeker.\n\nScientists, for example, sometimes claim domains which are not theirs\nby _spelling abstract nouns with capitals, by positing Law or\nEvolution as the makers and builders of the world_. But law never\ndid anything; law is only man's statement of the way, according to his\nobservation, in which things are done. To explain the universe as the\ncreation of Law is on a par with explaining homes as the creation of\nMatrimony. Abstract nouns do not create anything and the capitalizing\nof a process never can explain it. So, too, Evolution does nothing to\nthe world; it is the way in which whoever makes the world is making\nit. As well explain the difference between an acorn and an oak by\nsaying that Growth did it, as to explain the progress of creation from\nstardust to civilization by changing e to E. Science may describe the\nprocess as evolutionary, but its source, its moving power, and its\ndestiny are utterly beyond her ken.\n\nFor another thing, scientists often invade realms which are not\ntheirs, _by stretching the working theories of some special science to\nthe proportions of a complete philosophy of life_. A generation ago,\nwhen geology and biology were in their \"green and salad days,\" the\nenthusiasm inspired by the splendid results of their hypotheses went\nto strange lengths. One professor of geology seriously explained the\npyramids of Egypt to be the remains of volcanic eruption which had\nforced its way upwards by slow and stately motion. The hieroglyphs\nwere crystalline formations and the shaft of the great pyramid was the\nairhole of a volcano. Scientists are human like all men; their\nspecialties loom large; the ideas that work in their limited areas\nseem omnipotent. So a student of the influence of sunlight on life\nthinks reactions to the sun explain everything. \"Heliotropism,\" he\nsays, \"doubtless wrote Hamlet.\" A specialist on the influence of\ngeography on human nature interprets everything as the reaction of man\nto seas, mountains, plains, and deserts, and Lombroso even thinks the\nrevolutionary temperament especially native to men who live on\nlimestone formations! Specialists in economic history are sure that\nman is little more than an animated nucleus of hunger and that all\nlife is explicable as a search for food. And psychologists, charmed by\nthe neatness of description which causal connections introduce into\nour inner life, leap to the conclusion, which lies outside their\nrealm, that personality is an illusion, freedom a myth and our mental\nlife the rattling of a causal chain forged and set in motion when the\nuniverse began. _All this is not science; it is making hypotheses from\na limited field of facts masquerade as a total philosophy of life._\n\nThe underlying reason why science, when she regards her province as\ncovering everything, inevitably clashes with the interests of\nreligion, is that _she starts her view of the world from the\nsub-human side_. The typical sciences are physics, chemistry,\nastronomy, geology, biology, and the view of the universe which they\npresent is the basis on which all other sciences proceed. But this\nfoundation is sub-human; the master ideas involved in it are all\nobtained with the life of man left out of account. Such an approach\npresents a world-machine, immense and regular, and when, later,\npsychology and sociology arise, how easy it is to call the human life\nwhich they study a by-product of the sub-human world, an exudation\narising from the activities of matter.\n\nReligion, on the contrary, _starts with human life_. Fall down in\nawe, Science cries, before this vast sub-human world! And the\nreligious man answers: What world is this I am to bow before? Is it\nnot the universe which my mind knows and whose laws my intellect has\ngrasped? This universe, so far as it exists at all for me, is\napprehended by my vision, penetrated by my thought, encompassed by my\ninterpretations. _What is really great and wonderful here, is not\nthe world which I understand, but the mind that understands it--not\nthe sub-human but the human._ Man himself is the supreme Fact, and\nall the world that man could bow before, man's mind must first of all\ncontain. The master truth is not that my mind exists within a physical\nuniverse, but that the physical universe is encompassed by my mind.\nTherefore, when I interpret life, I will start with man, and not with\nwhat lies below him.\n\nRomanes, the English scientist, illustrates in his experience the\ndifference which these two approaches make. When, returning from\nagnosticism to Christianity, he explained his lapse, he said, \"I did\nnot sufficiently appreciate the immense importance of _human_\nnature, as distinguished from physical nature, in any inquiry touching\ntheism.... Human nature is the most important part of nature as a\nwhole whereby to investigate the theory of theism. This I ought to\nhave anticipated on merely _a priori_ grounds, had I not been too\nmuch immersed in merely physical research.\" Of how many now does this\nsame explanation hold! They segregate man from the rest of the\nuniverse, and endeavor an interpretation of the unhuman remainder.\nThey forget that man is part and parcel of the universe, bone of its\nbone, as imperative an expression of its substantial nature as are\nrocks and stars, and that _any philosophy which interprets the world\nminus man has not interpreted the world_.\n\nHere is the difference between a Haeckel and a Phillips Brooks. All\nthe dominant ideas of the one are drawn from existence minus man; all\nthe controlling convictions of the other are drawn from the heights\nand depths of man's own life. The first approach inevitably leads to\nirreligion, for Spirit cannot reveal itself except in spirit and until\none has found God in man he will not find him in nature. The second as\ncertainly leads to religion, for, as Augustine said, \"If you dig deep\nenough in every man you find divinity.\" Over against the testimony of\nthe sub-human that there is a mechanistic aspect to the world, stands\nthe unalterable testimony of the human that there is as well an ideal,\npurposive, and spiritual aspect to the world. Surely the latter brings\nus nearer to the heart of truth. _We never understand anything except\nin terms of its highest expression and man is the summit of nature._\n\nCould religion find a voice, therefore, she would wish to speak not in\nterms of apology but of challenge, when science, assuming all of\nreality for its field, grows arrogant. Describe the aspect of the\nworld that belongs to you, she would say. I have learned my lesson;\nyour field is yours, and no interference at my hands shall trouble you\nagain. But remember the limitations of your domain--to observe and\ndescribe phenomena and to plot their laws. That is an immense task and\ninexpressibly useful. But when you have completed it, the total result\nwill be as unlike the real world as a medical manikin with his wire\nnerves and painted muscles is unlike a real man. The manikin is\nsufficiently correct; everything is truly pictured there--_except\nlife_. So things are as science sees them, but things are more than\nscience sees. Plot then the mechanistic aspect of the world, but do\nnot suppose that you have caught all of truth in that wide-meshed net!\nWhen you have said your last word on facts observed and laws induced,\nman rises up to ask imperious questions with which you cannot deal, to\npresent urgent problems for which no solution ever has been found save\nAugustine's, \"I seek for God in order that my soul may _live_.\"\n\n\nV\n\nOur thought so ended, however, would leave science and religion\njealously guarding their boundaries, not cooperating as allies. _Such\nsuspicious recognition of each other's realms does not exhaust the\npossibilities._ When once the separate functions each by the other\nhave been granted, we are free to turn our thought to the inestimable\nservice which each is rendering. Consider the usefulness of science to\nthe ideal causes of which religion is the chief! Science has given us\nthe _new universe_, not more marvelous in its vastness than in its\nunity. For the spectroscope has shown that everywhere through\nimmeasurable space the same chemical properties and laws obtain; the\ntelescope has revealed with what mathematical precision the orbits in\nthe heavens are traced and how unwaveringly here or among the stars\ngravitation maintains its hold. Man never had so immense and various\nand yet so single and unified a world before. Polytheism once was\npossible, but science has banished it forever. Whatever may be the\nsource of the universe, it is _one_ Source, and whoever the creator,\nhe is more glorious in man's imagination than he could ever have been\nbefore. Science also has put at the disposal of the ideal causes _such\ninstruments as by themselves they would never have possessed_. We are\nhoping for a new world-brotherhood, and we pray for it in Christian\nchurches as the Father's will. But the instruments by which the\ninter-racial fellowship must be maintained and without which it would\nbe unthinkable are science's gift. Railroads, steamships, telegraphs,\ntelephones, wireless--these are the shuttles by which the ideal faiths\nin man's fraternity may be woven into fact. When Christian physicians\nheal the sick or stamp out plagues that for ages have been man's curse\nand his despair, when social maladjustments are corrected by Christian\nphilanthropy, and saner, happier ways of living are made possible;\nwhen comforts that once were luxuries are brought within the reach of\nall, and man's life is relieved of crushing handicaps; when old\nsuperstitions that had filled man's life with dread for ages are\ndriven like fogs before science's illumination, and religious faith is\nfreed of their incumbrance; when great causes of relief have at their\ndisposal the unimaginable wealth which our modern economic system has\ncreated--can anyone do sufficient justice to man's debt to science?\nAnd once more science has done religion an inestimable service in\nestablishing as a point of honor the ambition _to see straight and to\nreport exactly_. The tireless patience, the inexorable honesty, the\nsacrificial heroism of scientists, pursuing truth, is a gift of\nincalculable magnitude. Huxley is typical of science at its best when\nhe writes in his journal his ideal--\"To smite all humbugs however big;\nto give a nobler tone to science; to set an example of abstinence from\npetty personal controversies and of toleration for everything but\nlying; to be indifferent as to whether the work is recognized as mine\nor not, so long as it is done.\" Countless obscurantisms and bigotries,\nshams and sophistries have been driven from the churches by this\nscientific spirit and more are yet to go. Science has shown\nintellectual dishonesty to be a sin of the first rank. Christianity\nnever can be thankful enough for science; on our knees we should be\ngrateful for her as one of God's most indispensable gifts. Nor should\nthe fact that many a scientist whose contributions we rejoice in was\nnot certain about God defer our gratitude. Cyrus, the Persian, is not\nthe only one to whom the Eternal has said, \"I will gird thee, though\nthou hast not known me\" (Isa. 45:5).\n\nWhen, however, science has done her necessary work, she needs her\ngreat ally, religion. Without the insight and hope which faith alone\ncan bring, we learn a little about the world, our minds enclosed in\nboundaries beyond which is dark, unfathomable mystery. We rejoice in\nnature's beauty and in friendship, suffer much with broken bodies and\nmore with broken family ties, until we die as we were born--the spawn\nof mindless, soulless powers that never purposed us and never cared.\nAnd the whole universe is purposeless, engaged with blind hands, that\nhave no mind behind them, on tasks that mean nothing and are never\ndone. Science and religion should not be antagonists; they are\nmutually indispensable allies in the understanding and mastery of life.\n\n[4] J. G. Holland.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nFaith and Moods\n\n\nDAILY READINGS\n\nThe relationship of faith to feeling, rather than faith's relationship\nto mind, is with many people the more vital interest. The emotional\nresults of faith are rightfully of intense concern to everyone, for\nour feelings put the sense of value into life. To see a sunset without\nbeing stirred by its beauty is to miss seeing the sunset; to have\nfriends without feeling love for them is not to have friends; and to\npossess life without feeling it to be gloriously worth while is to\nmiss living. Now, in this regard, the attitude of faith stands sharply\nopposed to its direct contrary--the attitude of fear. Faith and fear\nare the two emotional climates, in one or the other of which everyone\ntends habitually to live. To the comparison of these we set ourselves\nin the daily readings.\n\n\nEighth Week, First Day\n\n =Give ear to my prayer, O God;\n And hide not thyself from my supplication.\n Attend unto me, and answer me:\n I am restless in my complaint, and moan,\n Because of the voice of the enemy,\n Because of the oppression of the wicked;\n For they cast iniquity upon me,\n And in anger they persecute me.\n My heart is sore pained within me:\n And the terrors of death are fallen upon me.\n Fearfulness and trembling are come upon me,\n And horror hath overwhelmed me.\n And I said, Oh that I had wings like a dove!\n Then would I fly away, and be at rest.\n Lo, then would I wander far off,\n I would lodge in the wilderness.=\n\n =--Psalm 55:1-7.=\n\nHow many people are slaves to the mood from which this psalmist\nsuffered! \"Fearfulness and trembling\" are their habitual attitude\ntoward life. They fear to die and just as much they fear to live;\nbefore every vexatious problem, before every opposing obstacle, even\nbefore the common tasks and responsibilities of daily living, they\nstand in dread; and every piece of work is done by them at least three\ntimes--in previous worry, in anxious performance, and in regretful\nretrospect. Such fear _imprisons_ the soul. No two men really\nlive in the same world; for while the outward geography may be\nidentical, the real environment of each soul is created by our moods,\ntempers, and habits of thought. Fear builds a prison about the man,\nand bars him in with dreads, anxieties, and timid doubts. And the man\nwill live forever in that prison unless faith sets him free. _Faith\nis the great liberator._ The psalmist who found himself a prisoner\nof \"fearfulness and trembling\" obtained his liberty and became a \"soul\nin peace\" (v. 18); and the secret of his freedom he revealed in the\nclosing words of his psalm--\"But I will trust in Thee.\" Faith of some\nsort is the only power that ever sets men free from the bondage of\ntheir timidities and dreads. If a man is the slave of fearfulness,\nthere is no substance in his claim to be a man of faith; a man who has\nvital faith is not habitually fearful. And as Emerson said, \"He has\nnot learned the lesson of life who does not every day surmount a fear.\"\n\n _O God, we remember with sadness our want of faith in Thee. What\n might have been a garden we have turned into a desert by our sin and\n wilfulness. This beautiful life which Thou hast given us we have\n wasted in futile worries and vain regrets and empty fears. Instead of\n opening our eyes to the joy of life, the joy that shines in the leaf,\n the flower, the face of an innocent child, and rejoicing in it as in\n a sacrament, we have sunk back into the complainings of our narrow\n and blinded souls. O deliver us from the bondage of unchastened\n desires and unwholesome thoughts. Help us to conquer hopeless\n brooding and faithless reflection, and the impatience of irritable\n weakness. To this end, increase our faith, O Lord. Fill us with a\n completer trust in Thee, and the desire for a more whole-hearted\n surrender to Thy will. Then every sorrow will become a joy. Then\n shall we say to the mountains that lie heavy on our souls, \"Remove\n and be cast hence\" and they shall remove, and nothing shall be\n impossible unto us. Then shall we renew our strength, and mount up\n with wings as eagles; we shall run and not be weary; we shall walk\n and not faint. We offer this prayer in the name of Jesus Christ our\n Lord. Amen._--Samuel McComb.\n\n\nEighth Week, Second Day\n\nNot only is it true that fear imprisons while faith liberates; fear\n_paralyzes_ and faith _empowers_. The only attitude in which\na man has command of his faculties and is at his best, is the attitude\nof faith; while fear bewilders the mind and paralyzes the will. The\nphysical effects of fear are deadly; it positively inhibits any useful\nthinking; and in the spiritual life its results are utterly\ndemoralizing. Fear is the panic of a soul. Consider such an estate as\nthe author of Deuteronomy presents:\n\n =And among these nations shalt thou find no ease, and there shall be\n no rest for the sole of thy foot: but Jehovah will give thee there a\n trembling heart, and failing of eyes, and pining of soul; and thy\n life shall hang in doubt before thee; and thou shalt fear night and\n day, and shalt have no assurance of thy life. In the morning thou\n shalt say, Would it were even! and at even thou shalt say, Would it\n were morning! for the fear of thy heart which thou shalt fear, and\n for the sight of thine eyes which thou shalt see.--Deut. 28:65-67.=\n\nSuch a situation oppresses every vital power, and the conquest of such\na situation must always be inward before it can be outward; _the man\nmust pass from fear to faith_. Let even a little faith arise in\nhim, and power begins to return. Men fear that they cannot overcome\nevil habits, that they cannot successfully meet difficult situations,\nthat they cannot hold out in the Christian life, and that great causes\ncannot be fought through to victory--and the weakness which appalls\nthem is the creation of their own misgiving.\n\n              \"Our doubts are traitors,\n  And make us lose the good we oft might win,\n  By fearing to attempt.\"\n\nBut faith is tonic; the results which follow a change of heart from\nfear to faith are miraculous; spiritual dwarfs grow to giants and\nachieve successes that before would have been unbelievable. No verse\nin Scripture has behind it a greater mass of verifiable experience\nthan: \"This is the victory that hath overcome the world, even our\nfaith\" (I John 5:4).\n\n _Gracious Father, Thou hast invited us, unworthy as we are, to pray\n for all sorts and conditions of men.... We pray for all who are in\n bondage to fear, unable to face the tasks of life or bear the thought\n of death with peace and dignity. Free them from the tyranny of these\n dark dreads. Let the inspiration of a great faith or hope seize their\n souls, and lift them above their fruitless worry and idle torments,\n into a region of joy and peace and blessedness. We pray for the\n victims of evil habits, the slaves of alcohol or morphine, or any\n other pretended redeemer of the soul from weariness and pain. Great\n is the power of these degrading temptations; but greater still is the\n saving energy of Thy Spirit. So let Thy Spirit enter the hearts of\n these unhappy children of Thine, that their will may be made strong\n to resist, and that the burning heat of high thoughts may consume the\n grosser desires of the flesh. We pray for souls bound beneath\n self-imposed burdens, vexed by miseries of their own making; for the\n children of melancholy, who have lost their way and grope without a\n light; for those who do their work with no enthusiasm, and, when\n night falls, can find no sleep though they search for it as for\n hidden treasure. Let Thy light pierce through their gloom and shine\n upon their path...._\n\n _Unite us to Jesus Christ, Thy perfect Son, in the bonds of a living\n trust, so that sustained by His example, and sanctified by His\n Spirit, we may grow more and more into the image of His likeness.\n These, and all other blessings, we ask in His name and for His sake.\n Amen._--Samuel McComb.\n\n\nEighth Week, Third Day\n\nThere are many situations in life which naturally throw the pall of\ndread over man's soul. Life is seldom easy, it is often overwhelmingly\ndifficult, and if a man has worry in his temperament, circumstances\nsupply plenty of occasions on which to exercise it. The difference\nbetween men lies here: those in whom the fear-attitude is master hold\nthe oppressive trouble so close to the eye that it hides everything\nelse; those whom the faith-attitude dominates hold trouble off and see\nit in wide perspectives. A copper cent can hide the sun if we hold it\nclose enough to the eye, and a transient difficulty can shut out from\na fearful soul all life's large blessings and all the horizons of\ndivine good will. Fear _disheartens_ men by concentrating their\nattention on the unhappy aspects of life; _but faith is the great\nencourager_. Whittier lived in a generation full of turmoil and\ntrouble, and his own life is a story of prolonged struggle against\nillness, disappointments, and poverty. But, listen:\n\n  \"Yet sometimes glimpses on my sight\n  Through present wrong, the eternal right;\n  And, step by step, since time began\n  I see the steady gain of man.\"\n\nThat is the attitude of faith; it does not deny the evil, but it sees\naround it, refuses to be obsessed or scared by it, and takes heart\nfrom a large view when a small view would be appalling. And history\nalways confirms the large view. Fear may be right for the moment, but\nin the long run it is a liar; only faith tells the truth.\n\n =Be merciful unto me, O God; for man would swallow me up:\n All the day long he fighting oppresseth me.\n Mine enemies would swallow me up all the day long;\n For they are many that fight proudly against me.\n What time I am afraid,\n I will put my trust in thee.=\n\n =--Psalm 56:1-3.=\n\n _Almighty and ever-living God, we draw near unto Thee, believing that\n Thou art, and that Thou wilt reward all those who diligently seek\n Thee. We are weak, mortal men, immersed in this world's affairs,\n buffeted by its sorrows, flung to and fro by its conflicts of right\n and wrong. We cry for some abiding stay, for some sure and steadfast\n anchorage. Reveal Thyself to us as the eternal God, as the\n unfathomable Love that encompasses every spirit Thou hast made, and\n bears it on, through the light and the darkness alike, to the goal of\n Thine own perfection. And yet, when Thou speakest to us, we are\n covered with confusion, for now we remember all the sadness and evil\n disorder of our lives. Thou hast visited our hearts with ideals fair\n and beautiful, but alas! we have grown weary in aspiration, and have\n declined into the sordid aims of our baser selves. Thou hast given us\n the love of parent and of friend, that we might thereby learn\n something of Thine own love; yet too often have we despised Thy gift\n and shut our hearts to all the wonder and the glory. We make\n confession before Thee of our sin and folly and ignorance. Again and\n again we have vowed ourselves to Thy service; again and again our\n languid wills have failed to do Thy Will. We have been seduced by the\n sweet poison of sin, and even against light and knowledge we have\n done that which Thou dost abhor, and which in our secret hearts we\n loathe. And now we almost fear to repent, lest Thou shouldst call us\n into judgment for a repentance that must needs be repented of. O\n mighty Saviour of men! be patient with us a little longer. Take us\n back to Thyself. Without Thee, we are undone; with Thee, we will take\n fresh heart of hope, and bind ourselves with a more effectual vow,\n and laying aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset\n us, we will follow Thee whithersoever Thou leadest. Amen._--Samuel\n McComb.\n\n\nEighth Week, Fourth Day\n\nFear depresses vitality and is a fruitful cause of nervous disorders,\nwith all their disastrous reactions on man's health. Modern\ninvestigation has shown beyond any reasonable doubt that while illness\ncomes often by way of the body, it comes also by way of the mind; our\nmoods and tempers have a physical echo, and of all fatal mental states\nnone is so ruinous as fear. It is not strange, therefore, that some\npeople never are well. As Dr. McComb puts it, \"Many play at\nliving--they do not really live. They fear the responsibilities, the\nstruggles, the adventures, not without risk, which life offers them.\nThey fear illness. They fear poverty. They fear unhappiness. They fear\ndanger. They fear the passion of sacrifice. They fear even the\nexaltation of a pure and noble love, until the settlements in money\nand social prestige have been duly certified. They fear to take a\nplunge into life's depths. They fear this world, and they fear still\nmore the world beyond the grave.\" In such a mood no man can possibly\nbe well. Faith, therefore, which drives out fear, has always been a\nminister of health. The Master's healings, which to the rationalism of\na previous generation seemed incredible, in the light of the present\nknowledge seem inevitable. He had faith and he demanded faith, and\nwherever the faith-attitude can be set in motion against the\nfear-attitude and all its morbid brood, the consequences will be\nphysical as well as moral. An outgrown custom of the early Church does\nnot now seem so strange as it did a generation ago:\n\n =Is any among you suffering? let him pray. Is any cheerful? let him\n sing praise. Is any among you sick? let him call for the elders of\n the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the\n name of the Lord: and the prayer of faith shall save him that is\n sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins,\n it shall be forgiven him. Confess therefore your sins one to another,\n and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The supplication of\n a righteous man availeth much in its working.--James 5:13-16.=\n\n _Eternal God, who art above all change and darkness, whose will begat\n us, and whose all present love doth enfold and continually redeem us,\n Holy Guest who indwellest, and dost comfort us; we have gathered to\n worship Thee, and in communion with Thee to find ourselves raised to\n the light of our life, and the Heaven of our desires._\n\n _Pour upon our consciousness the sense of Thy wonderful nearness to\n us. Reveal to our weakness and distress the power and the grace that\n are more than sufficient for us. May we see what we are, Thy\n Spirit-born children linked by nature, love, and choice to Thy mighty\n being; and may the vision make all fears to fade, and a Divine\n strength to pulse within._\n\n _Enable us to carry out from this place the peace and strength that\n here we gain, to take into our homes a kinder spirit, a new\n thoughtfulness; that we may brighten sadness, heal the sick, and make\n happiness to abound. May we take into our daily tasks and life of\n labor, a sense of righteousness that shall be as salt to every evil\n and corrupting influence._\n\n _Because we have walked here awhile with Thee, may we be able to walk\n more patiently with man. Send us forth with love to the fallen, hope\n for the despairing, strength to impart to the weak and wayward; and\n carry on through us the work Thou didst commence in Thy Son our\n Brother Man and Saviour God. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nEighth Week, Fifth Day\n\nFear makes impossible any satisfying joy in life. A man of faith may\nbe deeply joyful even in disastrous circumstances, but a man of fear\nwould be unhappy in heaven. Stevenson sings in \"the saddest and the\nbravest song he ever wrote\":\n\n  \"God, if this were faith?...\n  To go on for ever and fail and go on again,\n  And be mauled to the earth and arise,\n  And contend for the shade of a word and a thing not seen\n    with the eyes:\n  With half of a broken hope for a pillow at night\n  That somehow the right is the right,\n  And the smooth shall bloom from the rough:\n  Lord, if that were enough?\"\n\nSad this song may be, but at the heart of it is yet a fierce joy\nbecause faith is there. But put a man of fear in luxury and remove\nfrom him every visible cause of disquiet and he will still be\nmiserable. The more a man considers these two determinant moods in\nlife, the more he sees that somehow the faith-attitude must be his, if\nlife is to be worth living. Without it life dries up into a Sahara;\nwith it, he comes into a company of the world's glad spirits, who one\nway or another have felt what the Psalmist sings:\n\n =Jehovah is my light and my salvation;\n Whom shall I fear?\n Jehovah is the strength of my life;\n Of whom shall I be afraid?\n When evil-doers came upon me to eat up my flesh,\n Even mine adversaries and my foes, they stumbled and fell.\n Though a host should encamp against me,\n My heart shall not fear:\n Though war should rise against me,\n Even then will I be confident.\n One thing have I asked of Jehovah, that will I seek after:\n That I may dwell in the house of Jehovah all the days of my life,\n To behold the beauty of Jehovah,\n And to inquire in his temple.\n For in the day of trouble he will keep me secretly in his pavilion:\n In the covert of his tabernacle will he hide me;\n He will lift me up upon a rock.\n And now shall my head be lifted up above mine enemies round about me;\n And I will offer in his tabernacle sacrifices of joy;\n I will sing, yea, I will sing praises unto Jehovah.=\n\n =--Psalm 27:1-6.=\n\n _Gracious Father! We confess the painful riddle of our being, that,\n while claiming kinship with Thee, we feel far from Thee. O, what\n means this strange bewilderment, this never-ending war between our\n worse and better thoughts? We are Thine by right, yet we have not\n given ourselves wholly to Thy care. Our hearts know no rest, save in\n Thee, yet they have sought it in this world's vainglory, which\n passeth away. We seek to quench our thirst at the cisterns of this\n earth, but they are broken cisterns, that can hold no water. Lead us\n to Thy well of life that springeth up eternally. Give us to drink of\n that spiritual water, of which, if any man drink, he shall never\n thirst again. We lament our want and poverty before Thee. Open Thou\n our eyes to behold the unsearchable riches of Thy grace, and increase\n our faith that we may make them ours. Unite us to Thee in the bonds\n of will and love and purpose. Out of Thy fulness, which is in Christ,\n give to each one of us according to his need. Make us wise with His\n Wisdom; pure with His purity; strong with His strength; that we may\n rise into the power and glory of the life that is life indeed. Hear\n our hearts' weak and wandering cries, and when Thou hearest, forgive\n and bless, for His sake. Amen._--Samuel McComb.\n\n\nEighth Week, Sixth Day\n\n =No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and\n love the other; or else he will hold to one, and despise the other.\n Ye cannot serve God and mammon. Therefore I say unto you, Be not\n anxious for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink;\n nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more\n than the food, and the body than the raiment? Behold the birds of the\n heaven, that they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into\n barns; and your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are not ye of much more\n value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add one cubit\n unto the measure of his life? And why are ye anxious concerning\n raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil\n not, neither do they spin: yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in\n all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.=\n\n =But if God doth so clothe the grass of the field, which to-day is,\n and to-morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe\n you, O ye of little faith? Be not therefore anxious, saying, What\n shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be\n clothed? For after all these things do the Gentiles seek; for your\n heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But\n seek ye first his kingdom, and his righteousness; and all these\n things shall be added unto you.--Matt. 6:24-33.=\n\nThe meaning of this passage hinges on the first \"therefore.\" You\ncannot serve God and selfish gain at the same time, says Jesus; you\nshould choose decisively to serve God; and _therefore_ you must not be\nanxious about yourself. For _anxious fear so concentrates a man's\nthought on himself that he can serve no one else_. That this is the\nmeaning of this familiar passage is clear also from its conclusion.\nThe real reason for conquering anxious fear is that a man may give\nhimself wholeheartedly to the service of the Kingdom. That fear does\nspoil usefulness is obvious; a man cannot be fearful for himself and\nconsiderate of his fellows. As Stevenson puts it in \"Aes Triplex,\"\n\"The man who has least fear for his own carcass has most time to\nconsider others. That eminent chemist who took his walks abroad in tin\nshoes and subsisted wholly upon tepid milk had all his work cut out\nfor him in considerate dealings with his own digestion. So soon as\nprudence has begun to grow up in the brain, like a dismal fungus, it\nfinds its first expression in a paralysis of generous acts.\" The shame\nof our fearful living is that it circles about self, is narrowed down\nto mean solicitudes about our own comfort, and is utterly incapable of\nserving God or seeking first his Kingdom. Only faith puts folk at\nleisure from their small anxieties so that they can be servants of a\nworthy cause. Jesus, therefore, in this passage is not giving us the\nimpossible injunction not to think about tomorrow; he is stating a\ntruth of experience, that anxious fear for oneself which so draws in\nthe thought that God's great causes are forgotten is a deadly peril in\nman's life. By faith thrust out the mean and timid solicitudes, is his\ninjunction, that life may be free to put first things first.\n\n _We come to Thee, our Father, that we may more deeply enter into Thy\n joy. Thou turnest darkness into day, and mourning into praise. Thou\n art our Fortress in temptation, our Shield in remorse, our Covert in\n calamity, our Star of Hope in every sorrow. O Lord, we would know Thy\n peace, deep, abiding, inexhaustible. When we seek Thy peace, our\n weariness is gone, the sense of our imperfection ceases to discourage\n us, and our tired souls forget their pain. When, strengthened and\n refreshed by Thy goodness, we return to the task of life, send us\n forth as servants of Jesus Christ in the service and redemption of\n the world. Send us to the hearts without love, to men and women\n burdened with heavy cares, to the miserable, the sad, the\n broken-hearted. Send us to the children whose heritage has been a\n curse, to the poor who doubt Thy Providence, to the sick who crave\n for healing and cannot find it, to the fallen for whom no man cares.\n May we be ministers of Thy mercy, messengers of Thy helpful pity, to\n all who need Thee. By our sympathy, our prayers, our kindness, our\n gifts, may we make a way for the inflow of Thy love into needy and\n loveless lives. And so may we have that love which alone is the\n fulfilling of Thy law. Hasten the time when all men shall love Thee\n and one another in Thee, when all the barriers that divide us shall\n be broken down, and every heart shall be filled with joy and every\n tongue with melody. These gracious gifts we ask, in Jesus' name.\n Amen._--Samuel McComb.\n\n\nEighth Week, Seventh Day\n\nFear does not reveal its disastrous consequences to the full until it\ncolors one's thoughts about the source and destiny of life. Folk work\njoyfully at a picture-puzzle so long as they believe that the puzzle\ncan be put together, that it was meant, completed, to compose a\npicture, and that their labor is an effort made in reasonable hope.\nBut if they begin to fear that they are being fooled, that the puzzle\nis a hoax and never can be pieced together anywhere by anyone, how\nswiftly that suspicion will benumb their work! So joyful living\ndepends on man's conviction that this life is not a hapless accident,\nthat a good purpose binds it all together, and that our labor for\nrighteousness is not expended on a futile task without a worthy\noutcome. But fear blights all such hope; it whispers what one\npessimist said aloud: \"Life is not a tragedy but a farcical melodrama,\nwhich is the worst kind of play.\" That fear benumbs worthy living,\nkills hope, makes cynical disgust with life a reasonable attitude, and\nwith its frost withers all man's finest aspirations. _Only faith in\nGod can save men from such fear._ Fear or faith--there is no dilemma\nso full of consequence. Fear imprisons, faith liberates; fear\nparalyzes, faith empowers; fear disheartens, faith encourages; fear\nsickens, faith heals; fear makes useless, faith makes serviceable--and,\nmost of all, fear puts hopelessness at the heart of life, while faith\nrejoices in its God.\n\n =Oh give thanks unto Jehovah; for he is good;\n For his lovingkindness endureth for ever.\n Let Israel now say,\n That his lovingkindness endureth for ever.\n Let the house of Aaron now say,\n That his lovingkindness endureth for ever.\n Let them now that fear Jehovah say,\n That his lovingkindness endureth for ever.\n Out of my distress I called upon Jehovah:\n Jehovah answered me and set me in a large place.\n Jehovah is on my side; I will not fear:\n What can man do unto me?=\n\n =--Psalm 118:1-6.=\n\n _O God, we invoke Thy blessing upon all who need Thee, and who are\n groping after Thee, if haply they may find Thee. Be gracious to those\n who bear the sins of others, who are vexed by the wrongdoing and\n selfishness of those near and dear to them, and reveal to them the\n glory of their fellowship with the sufferings of Christ. Brood in\n tenderness over the hearts of the anxious, the miserable, the victims\n of phantasmal fear and morbid imaginings. Redeem from slavery the\n men and women who have yielded to degrading habits. Put Thy Spirit\n within them, that they may rise up in shame and sorrow and make\n confession to Thee, \"So brutish was I, and ignorant: I was as a beast\n before Thee.\" And then let them have the glad assurance that Thou art\n with them, the secret of all good, the promise and potency of better\n things. Console with Thy large consolation those who mourn for their\n loved dead, who count the empty places and long for the sound of a\n voice that is still. Inspire them with the firm conviction that the\n dead are safe in Thy keeping, nay, that they are not dead, but live\n unto Thee. Give to all sorrowing ones a garland for ashes, the oil of\n joy for mourning, and the garment of praise for the spirit of\n heaviness. Remember for good all who are perplexed with the mysteries\n of existence, and who grieve because the world is so sad and\n unintelligible. Teach them that Thy hand is on the helm of affairs,\n that Thou dost guide Thine own world, and canst change every dark\n cloud into bright sunshine. In this faith let them rest, and by this\n faith let them live. These blessings we ask in the name of our Lord\n and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen._--Samuel McComb.\n\n\nCOMMENT FOR THE WEEK\n\nI\n\nMany people do not find their most perplexing difficulty either in the\nrealm of trust or of belief, but in a problem which includes both.\nThey are confused because neither their experience of God nor their\nintellectual conviction of the reasonableness of faith is dependable\nand steady. Faith comes and goes in them with fluctuating moods that\nbring an appalling sense of insecurity. Their religious life is not\nstable and consistent; it runs through variant degrees of confidence\nand doubt, and its whimsical ups and downs continually baffle them. To\nclassify some folk as men of faith and some as men of doubt does not,\nin the light of this experience, quite tally with the facts. There are\nmoods of faith and moods of doubt in all of us and rarely does either\nkind secure unanimous consent. Were we to decide for irreligion, a\nminority protest would be vigorously urged in the interests of faith,\nand when most assuredly we choose religion, the prayer, \"Lord, I\nbelieve, help thou mine unbelief\" (Mark 9:24) is still appropriate. We\noften seem to be exchanging, as Browning's bishop says:\n\n  \"A life of doubt diversified by faith,\n  For one of faith diversified by doubt.\"\n\nSome hope arises when we observe that this experience which so\nperplexes us is fully acknowledged in the Bible. The popular\nsupposition is that when one opens the Scripture he finds himself in a\nworld of constant and triumphant faith. No low moods and doubts can\nhere obscure the trust of men; here God is always real, saints sing in\nprison or dying see their Lord enthroned in heaven. When one, however,\nreally knows the Bible, it obviously is no serene record of untroubled\nfaith. It is turbulent with moods and doubt.\n\nHere, to be sure, is the fifteenth chapter of First Corinthians, on\nImmortality, but here too is another cry, burdened with all the doubt\nman ever felt about eternal life, \"That which befalleth the sons of\nmen befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them: as the one dieth,\nso dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath; and man hath no\npreeminence above the beasts\" (Eccl. 3:19). The Scripture has many\nexultant passages on divine faithfulness, but Jeremiah's bitter prayer\nis not excluded: \"Why is my pain perpetual, and my wound incurable,\nwhich refuseth to be healed? Wilt thou indeed be unto me as a\ndeceitful brook, as waters that fail?\" (Jer. 15:18). The confident\ntexts on prayer are often quoted, but there are cries of another sort:\nJob's complaint, \"Behold, I go forward, but he is not there; and\nbackward, but I cannot perceive him\" (Job 23:8); Habakkuk's\nbitterness, \"O Jehovah, how long shall I cry, and thou wilt not hear?\nI cry unto thee of violence and thou wilt not save\" (Hab. 1:2). The\nBible is no book of tranquil faith. From the time when Gideon, in a\nmood like that of multitudes today, cried, \"Oh, my Lord, if Jehovah is\nwith us, why then is all this befallen us?\" (Judges 6:13) to the\ncomplaint of the slain saints in the Apocalypse, \"How long, O Master,\nthe holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood\" (Rev.\n6:10), the Bible is acquainted with doubt. It knows the searching,\nperplexing, terrifying questions that in all ages vex men's souls. If\nthe Psalmist, in an exultant mood, sang, \"Jehovah is my shepherd,\" he\nalso cried, \"Jehovah, why casteth thou off my soul? Why hidest thou\nthy face from me?\" (Psalm 88:14).\n\nNo aspect of the Scripture could bring it more warmly into touch with\nman's experience than this confession of fluctuating moods. At least\nin this the Bible is our book. Great heights are there, that we know\nsomething of. Psalmists sing in adoration, prophets are sure of God\nand of his coming victory; apostles pledge in sacrifice the certainty\nof their belief, and the Master on Transfiguration Mountain prays\nuntil his countenance is radiant. And depths are there, that modern\nmen know well. Saints cry out against unanswered prayer and cannot\nunderstand how such an evil, wretched world is ruled by a good God; in\ntheir bitter griefs they complain that God has cast them off, and\nutterly forgotten and, dismayed, doubt even that a man's death differs\nfrom a dog's. This is our book. For the faith of many of us, however\nwe insist that we are Christians, is not tranquil, steady, and serene.\nIt is moody, occasional, spasmodic, with hours of great assurance, and\nother hours when confidence sags and trust is insecure.\n\n\nII\n\nFaith so generally is discussed as though it were a creed, accepted\nonce for all and thereafter statically held, that the influence of our\nmoods on faith is not often reckoned with. But the moods of faith are\nthe very pith and marrow of our actual experience. When a Christian\ncongregation recite together their creedal affirmation, \"I believe in\nGod,\" it _sounds_ as though they all maintained a solid, constant\nfaith. But when in imagination, one breaks up the congregation and\ninterprets from his knowledge of men's lives what the faith of the\nindividuals actually means, he sees that they believe in God not\nevenly and constantly, but more or less, sometimes very much,\nsometimes not confidently at all. Our faith in God is not a static\nmatter such as the recitation of a creed suggests. Some things we do\nbelieve in steadily. That two plus two make four, that the summed\nangles of a triangle make two right angles--of such things we are\nunwaveringly sure. No moods can shake our confidence; no griefs\nconfuse us, no moral failures quench our certainty. Though the heavens\nfall, two and two make four! But our faith in God belongs in another\nrealm. It is a vital experience. It involves the whole man, with his\nchameleon moods, his glowing insights, his exalted hours, and his\ndejected days when life flows sluggishly and no great thing seems\nreal.\n\nThis experience of variable moods in faith does not belong especially\nto feeble folk, whose ups and downs in their life with God would\nillustrate their whole irresolute and flimsy living. The great\nbelievers sometimes know best this tidal rise and fall of confidence.\nElijah one day, with absolute belief in God, defied the hosts of Baal\nand the next, in desolate reaction, wanted to die. Luther put it with\nhis rugged candor, \"Sometimes I believe and sometimes I doubt.\" John\nKnox, at liberty to preach, \"dings the pulpit into blads\" in his\nconfident utterance; but the same Knox recalled that, in the galleys,\nhis soul knew \"anger, wrath, and indignation which it conceived\nagainst God, calling all his promises in doubt.\" The Master himself\nwas not a stranger to this experience. He believed in God with\nunwavering assurance, as one believes in the shining of the sun. But\nthe fact that the sun perpetually shines did not imply that every day\nwas a sunshiny day for him. The clouds came pouring up out of his dark\nhorizons and hid the sun. \"Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I\nsay?\" (John 12:27). And once the fog drove in, so dense and dark that\none would think there never had been any sun at all. \"My God, my God,\nwhy hast thou forsaken me?\" (Matt. 27:46).\n\nThis experience of fluctuating moods is too familiar to be denied, too\ninfluential to be neglected. There can be no use in hiding it from\ncandid thought behind the recitation of a creedal formula. There may\nbe great use in searching out its meaning. For there are ways in which\nthis common experience, at first vexatious and disquieting, may supply\nsolid ground for Christian confidence.\n\n\nIII\n\nIn dealing with these variant moods of faith we are not left without\nan instrument. We have _the sense of value_. We discern not only the\n_existence_ of things, but their _worth_ as well. When, therefore, a\nman has recognized his moods as facts, he has not said all that he can\nsay about them. Upon no objects of experience can the sense of value\nbe used with so much certainty as upon our moods. _We know our best\nhours when they come._ The lapidary, with unerring skill, learns to\ndistinguish a real diamond from a false, but his knowledge is external\nand contingent, compared with the inward and authoritative certainty\nwith which we know our best hours from our worst. Our great moods\ncarry with them the authentic marks of their superiority.\n\nExperience readily confirms this truth. We all have, for example,\n_cynical and sordid moods_. At such times, only the appetites of\nphysical life seem much to matter; only the things that minister to\ncommon comfort greatly count. When Sydney Smith, the English cleric,\nwrites, \"I feel an ungovernable interest in my horses, my pigs, and my\nplants. But I am forced and always was forced to task myself up to an\ninterest in any higher objects,\" most of us can understand his mood.\nWe grow obtuse at times to all that in our better moods had thrilled\nus most. Nature suffers in our eyes; great books seem dull; causes\nthat once we served with zest lose interest, and personal relationships\ngrow pale and tame, From such mere dullness we easily drift down to\ncynicism. Music once had stirred the depths, but now our spirits tally\nwith the scoffer's jest, \"What are you crying about with your Wagner\nand your Brahms? It is only horsehair scraping on catgut.\" Man's most\nholy things may lose their grandeur and become a butt of ridicule.\nWhen the mood of Aristophanes is on, we too may hoist serious Socrates\namong the clouds, and set him talking moonshine while the cynical look\non and laugh. The spirit that \"sits in the seat of the scornful\" is an\nancient malady.\n\nBut every man is thoroughly aware that these are not his best moods.\nFrom such depleted attitudes we come to worthier hours; _real\nlife_ arrives again. Nature and art become imperatively beautiful;\nmoral causes seem worth sacrifice, and before man's highest life,\nrevealed in character, ideal, and faith, we stand in reverence. These\nare our great hours, when spiritual values take the throne, when all\nelse dons livery to serve them, and we find it easy to believe in God.\n\nAgain, we have _crushed and rebellious moods_. We may have been\nChristians for many years; yet when disaster, long delayed, at last\ndescends, and our dreams are wrecked, we _do_ rebel. Complaint rises\nhot within us. Joseph Parker, preacher at the City Temple, London, at\nthe age of sixty-eight could write that he had never had a doubt.\nNeither the goodness of God nor the divinity of Christ, nor anything\nessential to his Christian faith had he ever questioned. But within a\nyear an experience had fallen of which he wrote: \"In that dark hour I\nbecame almost an atheist. For God had set his foot upon my prayers and\ntreated my petitions with contempt. If I had seen a dog in such agony\nas mine, I would have pitied and helped the dumb beast; yet God spat\nupon me and cast me out as an offense--out into the waste wilderness\nand the night black and starless.\" No new philosophy had so shaken the\nfaith of this long unquestioning believer. But his wife had died and\nhe was in a heartbroken mood that all his arguments, so often used on\nothers, could not penetrate. He believed in God as one believes in the\nsun when he has lived six months in the polar night and has not seen\nit.\n\nThese heartbroken moods, however, are not our best. Out of rebellious\ngrief we lift our eyes in time to see how other men have borne their\nsorrows off and built them into character. We see great lives shine\nout from suffering, like Rembrandt's radiant faces from dark\nbackgrounds. We see that all the virtues which we most admire--constancy,\npatience, fortitude--are impossible without stern settings, and that\nin time of trouble they find their aptest opportunity, their noblest\nchance. We rise into a new mood, grow resolute not to be crushed, but,\nas though there were moral purpose in man's trials, to be hallowed,\ndeepened, purified. The meaning of Samuel Rutherford's old saying\ndawns upon us, \"When I am in the cellar of affliction, I reach out my\nhand for the king's wine.\" And folk, seeing us, it may be, take heart\nand are assured that God is real, since he can make a man bear off his\ntrial like that and grow the finer for it. These are our great hours\ntoo, when the rains descend, and the winds blow, and the floods come,\nand beat upon our house, and it is founded on a rock!\n\nOnce more, we have hours of _discouragement about the world_. The more\nwe have cared for moral causes and invested life in their advancement,\nthe more we are desolate when they seem to fail. Some rising tide in\nwhich we trusted turns to ebb again, injustice wins its victories, the\npeople listen to demagogues and not to statesmen, social causes\nessential to human weal are balked, wars come and undo the hopes of\ncenturies. Who does not sometimes fall into the Slough of Despond?\nCavour, disheartened about Italy, went to his room to kill himself.\nJohn Knox, dismayed about Scotland, in a pathetic prayer entitled,\n\"John Knox with deliberate mind to his God,\" wrote, \"Now, Lord put an\nend to my misery.\" We generally think of Luther in that intrepid hour\nwhen he faced Charles V at Worms; but he had times as well when he was\nsick with disappointment. \"Old, decrepit, lazy, worn out, cold, and\nnow one-eyed,\" so runs a letter, \"I write, my Jacob, I who hoped there\nmight at length be granted to me, already dead, a well-earned rest.\"\nDuring the Great War, this mood of discouragement has grown familiar.\nMany can understand what Robert Louis Stevenson meant when he wrote,\nof the Franco-Prussian war, \"In that year, cannon were roaring for\ndays together on French battlefields, and I would sit in my isle (I\ncall it mine after the use of lovers) and think upon the war, and the\npain of men's wounds, and the weariness of their marching.... It was\nsomething so distressing, so instant, that I lay in the heather on the\ntop of the island, with my face hid, kicking my heels for agony.\"\n\nBut these dismayed hours are not our best. As Bunyan put it, even\nGiant Despair has fainting fits on sunshiny days. In moods of clearer\ninsight we perceive out of how many Egypts, through how many\nround-about wilderness journeys, God has led his people to how many\nPromised Lands. The Exodus was not a failure, although the Hebrews,\ndisheartened, thought it was and even Moses had his dubious hours; the\nmission of Israel did not come to an ignoble end in the Exile,\nalthough multitudes gave up their faith because of it and only\nprophets dared believe the hopeful truth. The crucifixion did not mean\nthe Gospel's end, as the disciples thought, nor did Paul, imprisoned,\nlose his ministry. _Nothing in history is more assured than this,\nthat only men of faith have known the truth._ And in hours of\nvision when this fact shines clear we rise to be our better selves\nagain. What a clear ascent the race has made when wide horizons are\ntaken into view! What endless possibilities must lie ahead! What ample\nreasons we possess to thrust despair aside, and to go out to play our\npart in the forward movement of the plan of God!\n\n  \"Dreamer of dreams? we take the taunt with gladness,\n    Knowing that God beyond the years you see,\n  Has wrought the dreams that count with you for madness\n    Into the texture of the world to be.\"\n\nThese are our better hours.\n\n\nIV\n\nSuch sordid, cynical, crushed, rebellious, and discouraged moods we\nsuffer, but we have hours of insight, too, when we are at our best.\nAnd as we face this ebb and flow of confidence, which at the first\nvexatiously perplexed our faith, an arresting truth is clear. The\ncreed of irreligion, to which men are tempted to resign their minds,\nis simply the _intellectual formulation of what is implied in our\nless noble hours_. Take what man's cynical, sordid, crushed,\nrebellious, and discouraged moods imply, and set it in a formal\nstatement of life's meaning, and the result is the creed of\nirreligion. But take man's best hours, when the highest seems the\nrealest, when even sorrows cannot crush his soul, and when the world\nis still the battlefield of God for men, and formulate what these\nhours imply, and the result is the central affirmations of religious\nfaith. Even Renan is sure that \"man is most religious in his best\nmoments.\" Of this high interpretation our variant moods are\nsusceptible, that _we know our best hours when they come, and the\nfaith implied in them is essential Christianity_. As Browning sings\nit:\n\n              \"Faith is my waking life:\n  One sleeps, indeed, and dreams at intervals,\n  We know, but waking's the main point with us.\"\n\nThis fact which we so have come upon is a powerful consideration in\nfavor of religion's truth. _Are we to trust for our guidance the\ntestimony of our worse or better hours?_ We have low moods; so, too,\nwe have cellars in our houses. But we do not _live_ there; we live\nupstairs! It is not unnatural to have irreligious moods. There may be\nhours when the eternal Energy from which this universe has come seems\nto be playing solitaire for fun. It shuffles the stars and planets to\nsee what may chance from their combinations, and careless of the\nconsequence, from everlasting to everlasting it shuffles and plays,\nand shuffles and plays again. But these are not our best hours. We may\nhave moods when the universe seems to us, as Carlyle's figure pictures\nit, \"as if the heavens and the earth were but boundless jaws of a\ndevouring monster, wherein, I, palpitating, lay waiting to be\ndevoured,\" but we are inwardly ashamed of times like that. Man comes\nto this brutal universe of irreligion by way of his ignoble moods.\nWhen he lifts up his soul in his great hours of love, of insight, and\nof devotion, life never looks to him as irreligion pictures it; it\nnever has so looked to him and it never will!\n\nIn his best hours man always suspects that the Eternal must be akin to\nwhat is best in us, that our ideals are born from above, have there\ntheir source and destiny, that the Eternal Purpose reigns and yet\nshall justify the struggle of the ages, and that in anyone who is the\nbest we know, we see most clearly what the Eternal is and means. That\ngoodness is deeper than evil, that spirit is more than flesh, that\nlife is lord of death, that love is the source of all--such\nconvictions come naturally to us when we are at our best. When one\nexamines such affirmations, he perceives that Christianity in its\nessential faiths is the expression of our finest hours. This is the\nsource whence Christianity has come; it is man's best become\narticulate. Some used to say that Christian faith had been foisted on\nmankind by priests. Christian faith has no more artificially been\nfoisted upon human life than the full blown rose is foisted on the\nbud. Christianity springs up out of man's best life; it is the\nutterance of his transcendent moods; _it is man believing in the\nvalidity of his own noblest days_.\n\nChristianity, therefore, at its heart can never fail. Its theologies\nmay come and go, its institutions rise and fall, its rituals have\ntheir dawn, their zenith, and their decline, but one persistent force\ngoes on and will go on. _The Gospel is saying to man what man at his\nbest is saying to himself._ Christ has a tremendous ally in human\nlife--our noblest hours. They are all upon his side. What _he_\nsays, _they_ rise to cry \"Amen\" to. When we are most truly\nourselves we are nearest to him. Antagonistic philosophies, therefore,\nmay spring up to assail the Gospel's influence, and seem to triumph,\nand fall at last and be forgotten. Still Christ will go on speaking.\nNothing can tear him from his spiritual influence over men. _In\nevery generation he has man's noblest hours for his ally._\n\n\nV\n\nIn the fact to which our study of man's variant moods has brought us\nwe have not only a confirming consideration in favor of religion's\ntruth, but an _explanation of some people's unbelief_. They live\nhabitually in their low moods; they inhabit spiritual cellars. We are\naccustomed to say that some friend would be saved from his ignoble\nattitudes by a vital religious faith; but it is also true that his\npersistent clinging to ignoble attitudes may be the factor that makes\nreligious faith impossible. According to Dickens's \"Tale of Two\nCities\" a prisoner in the Bastille, who had lived in a cell and\ncobbled shoes for many years, became so enamored of the narrow walls,\nthe darkness, the task's monotony, that, when liberated, he built a\ncell at the center of his English home, and on days when the skies\nwere clear and birds were singing, the tap of his cobbler's hammer in\nthe dark could still be heard. So men, by an habitual residence in\nimprisoning moods, render themselves incapable of loving the wide\nhorizons, the great faiths and hopes of religion. They do not merely\nmake excursions of transient emotion into morose hours and, like men\nthat find that the road is running into malarial swamps, turn swiftly\nto the hills. They dwell in their moroseness; they _choose_ it, and\noften obstinately resist deliverance.\n\nThe common moods that thus incapacitate the soul for faith are easily\nseen in any man's experience. There are _sullen_ tempers when we are\nchurlish and want so to be. There are _stupid_ tempers, when our soul\nis too negligent to care, too dull to ask for what only aspiring minds\ncan crave or find. There are _bored_ moods when we feel about all life\nwhat Malachi's people felt about worship, \"Behold, what a weariness is\nit!\" (Mal. 1:13); _rebellious_ moods when, like Jonah, deprived of a\ncomfort he desired, we cry, \"I do well to be angry, even unto death\"\n(Jonah 4:9); _suspicious_ moods, when we mistrust everyone, and even\nof some righteous Job hear Satan's insinuating sneer, \"Does Job fear\nGod for nought?\" (Job 1:9). No man is altogether strange to\n_frivolous_ hours, when those thoughts are lost which must be handled\nseriously if at all, and _wilful_ hours, when some private desire\nassumes the center of the stage and angrily resents another voice than\nhis. To say that one who habitually harbors such moods cannot know God\nis only a portion of the truth; such a man cannot know anything worth\nknowing. He can know neither fine friends nor great books; he cannot\nappreciate beautiful music or sublime scenery; he is lost to the\ndeepest loves of family and to every noble enthusiasm for human help.\nAthwart the knowledge of these most gracious and necessary things\nstand our obtuse, ignoble moods. The sullen, stupid, bored,\nrebellious, suspicious, frivolous, or wilful tempers, made into a\nspiritual residence, are the most deadly prison of the soul. Of course\none who dwells there has no confidence in God. Lord Shaftesbury, the\nEnglish philanthropist, made too sweeping a statement about this, but\none can see the basis for his judgment: \"Nothing beside ill-humor,\neither natural or forced, can bring a man to think seriously that the\nworld is governed by any devilish or malicious power. I very much\nquestion whether anything beside ill-humor can be the cause of\natheism.\" At least one may be sure that where ill-humor habitually\nreigns, vital faith in God is made impossible.\n\nAfter full acknowledgment, therefore, of the momentous intellectual\nproblems of belief, we must add that there is a _moral qualification\nfor faith in God_. So great a matter is not achieved by any sort of\nperson, with any kind of habitual moods and tempers. There are views\nwhich cellar windows do not afford; one must have balconies to see\nthem. When Jesus said that the pure in heart are blessed because they\nsee God, he was not thinking merely, perhaps not chiefly, of sexual\nimpurity as hindering vision. He was pleading for a heart cleansed of\nall such perverse, morose, and wayward moods as shut the blinds on the\nsoul's windows. He knew that men could not easily escape the sense of\nGod's reality if they kept their vision clear. On elevated days we\nnaturally think of Spirit as real, and see ourselves as expressions of\nspiritual purpose, our lives as servants of a spiritual cause. When\none habitually dwells in these finer moods, he cannot tolerate a world\nwhere his Best is a transient accident. _He must have God, for faith\nin God is the supreme assertion of the reality and eternity of man's\nBest._ Any man who habitually lives in his finest moods will not\neasily escape the penetrating sense of God's reality.\n\n\nVI\n\nThe certainty with which we tend to be most deeply religious in our\nbest hours is clear when we consider that a man does practically\nbelieve in the things which he counts of highest worth. Lotze, the\nphilosopher, even says that \"Faith _is_ the feeling that is\nappreciative of value.\" It is conceivable that one might be so\nconstituted that without any sense of value he could study facts, as\na deaf man might observe a symphony. The sound-waves such a man could\nmechanically measure; he could analyze the motions of the players and\nnote the reactions of the crowd, but he would hear no music. He would\nnot suffuse the whole performance with his musical appreciations; he\nwould neither like it nor condemn. Man might be so constituted as to\nface facts without feeling, but he is not. Facts never stand in our\nexperience thus barren and unappreciated--mere neutral _things_ that\nmean nothing and have no value. The botanist in us may analyze the\nflowers, but the poet in us estimates them. The penologist in us may\ntake the Bertillon measurements of a boy, but the father in us best\ncan tell how much, in spite of all his sin, that boy is worth. This\npower to estimate life's _values_ is the fountain from which spring\nour music, painting, and literature, our ideals and loves and\npurposes, our morals and religion. Without it no man can live in the\nreal world at all.\n\nIf we would know, therefore, in what, at our highest altitudes, we\ntend to believe, we should ask _what it is that we value most, when\nwe rise toward our best_. In our lowest hours what sordid,\nmercenary, beastly things men may prize each heart knows well. But\never as we approach our best the things that are worth most to us\nbecome elevated and refined. Our better moods open our eyes to a world\nwhere character is of more worth than all the rest beside, and through\nwhich moral purpose runs, to be served with sacrifice. We become aware\nof spiritual values in behalf of which at need physical existence must\nbe willingly laid down; and words like honor, love, fidelity, and\nservice in our hours of insight have halos over them that poorer moods\ncannot discern. Man at his best, that is to say, _believes in_ an\ninvisible world of spiritual values, and he furnishes the final proof\nof his faith's reality by sacrificing to it all lesser things. The\ngood, the true, the beautiful command him in his finer hours, and at\ntheir beck and call he lays down wealth and ease and earthly hopes to\nbe their servant. Men really _do believe_ in the things for which\nthey sacrifice and die.\n\nIn no more searching way can a man's faith be described than _in terms\nof the objects which thus he values most_. Wherever men find some\nconsuming aim that is for them so supreme in worth that they sacrifice\nall else to win it, we speak of their attitude as a religion. The\n\"religion of science\" describes the absolute devotion of investigators\nto scientific research as the highest good; the \"religion of art\"\ndescribes the consuming passion with which some value beauty. When we\nsay of one that \"money is his God\" we mean that he estimates it as\nlife's highest treasure, and when with Paul we speak of others, \"whose\ngod is the belly\" (Phil. 3:19), we mean men whose sensual life is to\nthem the thing worth most. _What men believe in, therefore, is most\ndeeply seen not by any opinions which they profess, but by the things\nthey prize._ Faith, as Ruskin said, is \"that by which men act while\nthey live; not that which they talk of when they die.\" Many a man uses\npious affirmations of Christian faith, but it is easy to observe from\nhis life that what he really believes in is money. Where a man's\ntreasure is, as Jesus said, his heart is, and there his faith is, too.\n\nIs there any doubt, then, what we most believe in when we are at our\nbest? While in our lower altitudes it may be easy to believe that the\nphysical is the ultimately real, in our upper altitudes we so value\nthe spiritual world, that we tend with undeniable conviction to feel\nsure that it must be causal and eternal. Materialism is man's\n\"night-view\" of his life; but the \"day-view\" is religion. Tyndall the\nscientist was regarded by the Christians of his generation as the\nenemy of almost everything that they held dear. Let him, then, be\nwitness for the truth which we have stated. \"I have noticed,\" he said,\nspeaking of materialism, \"during years of self-observation, that it is\nnot in hours of clearness and vigor that this doctrine commends itself\nto my mind.\"\n\nThe challenge, therefore, presented to every one of us by Christian\nfaith is ultimately this: _Shall I believe the testimony of my better\nhours or of my worse?_ Many who deny the central affirmations of the\nGospel put the object of their denial far away from them as though it\nwere an external thing; they say that they deny the creed or the Bible\nor the doctrine about God. Such a description of a man's rejection of\nreligious faith is utterly inadequate--the real object of his denial\nis inward. One may, indeed, discredit forms of doctrine and either be\nunsure about or altogether disbelieve many things that Christians\nhold, but when one makes a clean sweep of religion and banishes the\ncentral faiths of Christianity _he is denying the testimony of his own\nfinest days_. From such rejection of faith one need not appeal to\ncreed nor Bible, nor to anything that anybody ever said. Let the\nchallenge strike inward to the man's own heart. From his denial of\nreligious faith we may appeal to the hours that he has known and yet\nwill know again, when the road rose under his feet and from a height\nhe looked on wide horizons and knew that he was at his best. To those\nhours of clear insight, of keen thought, of love and great devotion,\nwhen he knew that the spiritual is the real and the eternal, we may\nappeal. They were his best. He _knows_ that they were his best. And as\nlong as humanity lives upon the earth this conviction must underlie\ngreat living--that _we will not deny the validity of our own best\nhours_.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nFaith in the Earnest God\n\n\nDAILY READINGS\n\nThroughout our studies we have been thinking of the effect of faith on\nthe one who exercises it. As an introduction to this week's thought on\nthe earnestness of God, let us approach the effect of faith from\nanother angle. Faith has enormous influence on the one in whom it is\nreposed; not only the believer but the one in whom he believes is\naffected by his faith.\n\n\nNinth Week, First Day\n\n =I commend unto you Phoebe our sister, who is a servant of the church\n that is at Cenchre\u00e6: that ye receive her in the Lord, worthily of the\n saints, and that ye assist her in whatsoever matter she may have need\n of you: for she herself also hath been a helper of many, and of mine\n own self.=\n\n =Salute Prisca and Aquila my fellow-workers in Christ Jesus, who for\n my life laid down their own necks; unto whom not only I give thanks,\n but also all the churches of the Gentiles: and salute the church that\n is in their house. Salute Ep\u00e6netus my beloved, who is the\n first-fruits of Asia unto Christ. Salute Mary, who bestowed much\n labor on you. Salute Andronicus and Junias, my kinsmen, and my\n fellow-prisoners, who are of note among the apostles, who also have\n been in Christ before me. Salute Ampliatus my beloved in the\n Lord.--Rom. 16:1-8.=\n\nThis series of personal commendations is only the beginning of the\nlast chapter of Paul's letter to the Romans. All the way through one\nhears the individual names of Paul's friends and fellow-laborers, with\nhis discriminating and hearty praise of each. It is clear that he has\nfaith in these men and women; he believes in them and relies on them.\nConsider the effect on them that Paul's confidence in their Christian\nfidelity would naturally have. There is no motive much more stirring\nthan the consciousness that somebody believes in us, is trusting and\ncounting on us. Whatever is fine and noble in human life responds to\nthat appeal. Soldiers who feel that their country is relying upon\ntheir fidelity, children who are conscious that their parents believe\nin them, friends who are heartened by the assurance that some folk\ncompletely trust them--how much of the best in all of us has come\nbecause we have been the objects of somebody's faith! A Connecticut\nvolunteer in the American Revolution has written that George\nWashington once paused for a moment in front of his company and said\nsimply, \"I am counting on you men from Connecticut.\" And the recruit\nclasped his musket in his arms and wept with the devotion which\nWashington's confidence evoked. Would not the sixteenth chapter of\nRomans have a similar effect on those who read it?\n\n _O Thou loving and tender Father in heaven, we confess before Thee,\n in sorrow, how hard and unsympathetic are our hearts; how often we\n have sinned against our neighbors by want of compassion and\n tenderness; how often we have felt no true pity for their trials and\n sorrows, and have neglected to comfort, help, and visit them. O\n Father, forgive this our sin, and lay it not to our charge. Give us\n grace ever to alleviate the crosses and difficulties of those around\n us, and never to add to them; teach us to be consolers in sorrow, to\n take thought for the stranger, the widow, and the orphan; let our\n charity show itself not in words only, but in deed and truth. Teach\n us to judge as Thou dost, with forbearance, with much pity and\n indulgence; and help us to avoid all unloving judgment of others; for\n the sake of Jesus Christ Thy Son, who loved us and gave Himself for\n us. Amen._--Johann Arndt, 1555.\n\n\nNinth Week, Second Day\n\n =And it came to pass in these days, that he went out into the\n mountain to pray; and he continued all night in prayer to God. And\n when it was day, he called his disciples; and he chose from them\n twelve, whom also he named apostles: Simon, whom he also named\n Peter, and Andrew his brother, and James and John, and Philip and\n Bartholomew, and Matthew and Thomas, and James the son of Alph\u00e6us,\n and Simon who was called the Zealot, and Judas the son of James, and\n Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor.--Luke 6:12-16.=\n\nThe power that comes to men when someone believes in them must have\ncome to these disciples whom Jesus trusted with his work. We often\nnote the power that was theirs through their faith in Christ; consider\ntoday the inspiration that came from Christ's faith in them. He picked\nthem out, commissioned them, relied on them, and believed in their\nability with God's help to carry his work to a successful issue. All\nthat is most distinctive and memorable in their character came from\ntheir response to that divine trust. How they must have encouraged\nthemselves in times of failure and disheartenment by saying: He\nbelieves in us; even though we are ignorant and sinful, he believes in\nus; he has trusted his work to us, and for all our inability he has\nfaith that we can carry it to triumph! Their faith in themselves and\nwhat they could do with God's help must have been almost altogether a\nreflex of his faith in them. Our contention, therefore, that faith is\nthe dynamic of life has now a new confirmation: _the faith that\nlifts and motives life is not simply our faith in the Divine, but the\nfaith of the Divine in us_. One of the most glorious results of\nbelieving in God is that a man can press on to the further confidence\nthat God believes in us. If he did not, he would never have made us.\nThe very fact that we are here means that he does believe in us, in\nour possibilities of growth, in our capacities of service, in what he\ncan do in and for and through us before he is done. Man's faith in God\nand God's faith in man together make an unequalled motive for great\nliving. Yet there is always a sad appendix to every list of trusted\nmen, with somebody's blighted name: \"Judas Iscariot, who became a\ntraitor.\"\n\n _Loving Father, our hearts are moved to gratitude and trust when we\n look up to Thee. We rejoice that through our fleeting days there runs\n Thy gracious purpose. We praise Thee that we are not the creatures of\n chance, nor the victims of iron fate, but that out from Thee we have\n come and into Thy bosom we shall return. We would not, even if we\n could, escape Thee. Thou alone art good, and to escape from Thee is\n to fall into infinite evil. Thy hand is upon us moving us on to some\n far-off spiritual event, where the meaning and the mystery of life\n shall be made plain and Thy glory shall be revealed. Look in pity\n upon our ignorance and childishness. Forgive us our small\n understanding of Thy purpose of good concerning us. Be not angry with\n us, but draw us from the things of this world which cannot satisfy\n our foolish hearts. Fill us with Thyself, that we may no longer be a\n burden to ourselves. So glorify the face of goodness that evil shall\n have no more dominion over us. Amen._--Samuel McComb.\n\n\nNinth Week, Third Day\n\nThe fact that God has faith in us is not alone a source of comfort; it\npresents a stirring challenge. It means that he is in earnest about\nachieving his great purposes in human life and that he is counting\nupon us to help. He has set his heart on aims, about which he cares,\nand to whose achievement he is calling us; he is confident that with\nhim we can work out, if we will, loftier character and a better world.\nLet us consider some of the purposes which God is counting on us, in\nfellowship with him, to achieve. The prophet Micah, in a brief but\nperfect drama, gives one clue. First the Lord summons his people to a\ntrial, with the eternal mountains for judges:\n\n =Hear ye now what Jehovah saith: Arise, contend thou before the\n mountains, and let the hills hear thy voice. Hear, O ye mountains,\n Jehovah's controversy, and ye enduring foundations of the earth; for\n Jehovah hath a controversy with his people, and he will contend with\n Israel.--Micah 6:1, 2.=\n\nThen, the Lord presents his case:\n\n =O my people, what have I done unto thee? and wherein have I wearied\n thee? testify against me. For I brought thee up out of the land of\n Egypt, and redeemed thee out of the house of bondage; and I sent\n before thee Moses, Aaron, and Miriam. O my people, remember now what\n Balak king of Moab devised, and what Balaam the son of Beor answered\n him; remember from Shittim unto Gilgal, that ye may know the\n righteous acts of Jehovah.--Micah 6:3-5.=\n\nThen the people put in their hesitant, questioning plea.\n\n =Wherewith shall I come before Jehovah, and bow myself before the\n high God? shall I come before him with burnt-offerings, with calves a\n year old? will Jehovah be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten\n thousands of rivers of oil? shall I give my first-born for my\n transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?--Micah\n 6:6, 7.=\n\nThen the mountains pronounce judgment:\n\n =He hath showed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth Jehovah\n require of thee, but to do justly, and to love kindness, and to walk\n humbly with thy God?--Micah 6:8.=\n\nGod, then, is in earnest about _just_, _kind_, _and humble\ncharacter_. He believes in it as a possibility; he sees the making\nof it now in human hearts; he is pledged to further and establish it\nwith all his power; and he is counting on us for loyal cooperation\nwith all our powers of choice. Vital faith means a transforming\npartnership with a God who is in earnest about character.\n\n _O Thou who art the Father of that Son which hast awakened us and yet\n urgeth us out of the sleep of our sins, and exhorteth us that we\n become Thine, to Thee, Lord, we pray, who art the supreme Truth, for\n all truth that is, is from Thee. Thee we implore, O Lord, who art the\n highest Wisdom, through Thee are wise, all those that are so. Thou\n art the supreme Joy, and from Thee all have become happy that are so.\n Thou art the highest Good and from Thee all beauty springs. Thou art\n the intellectual Light, and from Thee man derives his understanding.\n To Thee, O God, we call and speak. Hear us, O Lord, for Thou art our\n God and our Lord, our Father and our Creator, our Ruler and our Hope,\n our Wealth and our Honor, our Home, our Country, our Salvation, and\n our Life; hear, hear us, O Lord. Few of Thy servants comprehend Thee,\n but at least we love Thee--yea, love Thee above all other things. We\n seek Thee, we follow Thee, we are ready to serve Thee; under Thy\n power we desire to abide, for Thou art the Sovereign of all. We pray\n Thee to command us as Thou wilt; through Jesus Christ Thy Son our\n Lord. Amen._--King Alfred, 849.\n\n\nNinth Week, Fourth Day\n\nGod also is in earnest about _social righteousness_.\n\n =I hate, I despise your feasts, and I will take no delight in your\n solemn assemblies. Yea, though ye offer me your burnt-offerings and\n meal-offerings, I will not accept them; neither will I regard the\n peace-offerings of your fat beasts. Take thou away from me the noise\n of thy songs; for I will not hear the melody of thy viols. But let\n justice roll down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty\n stream.--Amos 5:21-24.=\n\nAnyone who cares about character must care about social conditions,\nfor every unfair economic situation, every social evil left to run its\ncourse means ruin to character. And the God of the Bible, because he\ncares supremely for personal life at its best, is zealously in earnest\nabout social justice; his prophets blazed with indignation at all\ninequity, and his Son made the coming Kingdom, when God's will would\nbe done on earth, the center of his message. To fellowship with this\nearnest purpose of God we all are summoned; God believes in the\nglorious possibilities of life on earth; he is counting on us to put\naway the sins that hold the Kingdom back and to fight the abuses that\ncrush character in men. To believe in God, therefore--the God who is\nfighting his way with his children up through ignorance, brutality,\nand selfishness to \"new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth\nrighteousness\"--is no weakly comfortable blessing. It means joining a\nmoral war; it means devotion, sacrifice; its spirit is the Cross and\nits motive an undiscourageable faith. And our underlying assurance\nthat this war for a better world can be won is not simply our belief\nthat it can be done, but _our faith that God is, and that he\nbelieves that it can be done_. When we pray we say, \"Thy Kingdom\ncome,\" and we are full of hope about the long, sacrificial struggle,\nfor the purpose behind and through it all is first of all God's. Our\nearnestness is but an echo of his.\n\n _O Thou Eternal One, we adore Thee who in all ages hast been the\n great companion and teacher of mankind; for Thou hast lifted our race\n from the depths, and hast made us to share in Thy conscious\n intelligence and Thy will that makes for righteousness and love.\n Thou alone art our Redeemer, for Thy lifting arms were about us and\n Thy persistent voice was in our hearts as we slowly climbed up from\n savage darkness and cruelty. Thou knowest how often we have resisted\n Thee and loved the easy ways of sin rather than the toilsome gain of\n self-control and the divine irritation of Thy truth...._\n\n _We pray Thee for those who amid all the knowledge of our day are\n still without knowledge; for those who hear not the sighs of the\n children that toil, nor the sobs of such as are wounded because\n others have made haste to be rich; for those who have never felt the\n hot tears of the mothers of the poor that struggle vainly against\n poverty and vice. Arouse them, we beseech Thee, from their selfish\n comfort and grant them the grace of social repentance. Smite us all\n with the conviction that for us ignorance is sin, and that we are\n indeed our brother's keeper if our own hand has helped to lay him\n low. Though increase of knowledge bring increase of sorrow, may we\n turn without flinching to the light and offer ourselves as\n instruments of Thy spirit in bringing order and beauty out of\n disorder and darkness. Amen._--Walter Rauschenbusch.\n\n\nNinth Week, Fifth Day\n\nThe thought which we have been pursuing leads us to a truth of major\nimportance: if God is thus in earnest, believing in man's possibilities\nand laboring for them, then he cannot be known by anyone who does not\nshare his purpose and his labor. _Action is a road to knowledge and\nsome things never can be known without it._ If one would know the\nbusiness world, he must be an active business man; no amount of\nabstract study and speculation can take the place of vital\nparticipation in business struggle. The way to understand any movement\nor enterprise is to go into it, share its enthusiasms and hopes, labor\nsacrificially for its success, bear its defeats as though they were\nour own, and rejoice in its achievements as though nothing so much\nmattered to our happiness. Such knowledge is thorough and vital; when\none who so has learned what war is, or the missionary enterprise, or\nthe fight against the liquor traffic, stands up to speak, a merely\ntheoretical student of these movements sounds unreal and tame. If\ntherefore God is earnest Purpose, with aims in which he calls us to\nshare, no one can thoroughly know him merely by _thinking_; he must\nknow him by _acting_.\n\n =But he that doeth the truth cometh to the light, that his works may\n be made manifest, that they have been wrought in God.--John 3:21.=\n\n =Jesus therefore answered them, and said, My teaching is not mine,\n but his that sent me. If any man willeth to do his will, he shall\n know of the teaching, whether it is of God, or whether I speak from\n myself.--John 7:16, 17.=\n\nMany people endeavor to reach a satisfactory knowledge of God by\nclarifying their thought and working out a rational philosophy. But,\nby such intellectual means alone, they could not gain satisfactory\nknowledge of so familiar a thing as home life. To know home life one\nelemental act is essential: get into a home and share its problems,\nits satisfactions, and its hopes. So the most adequate philosophy by\nitself can bring no satisfactory knowledge of God; only by working\nwith God, sharing his purposes for the world, sacrificially laboring\nfor the aims he has at heart can men know him.\n\n _Eternal God, who hast formed us, and designed us for companionship\n with Thee; who hast called us to walk with Thee and be not afraid;\n forgive us, we pray Thee, if craven fear, unworthy thought, or hidden\n sin has prompted us to hide from Thee. Remove the suspicion which\n regards Thy service as an intrusion on our time and an interference\n with our daily task. Shew to us the life that serves Thee in the\n quiet discharge of each day's duty, that ennobles all our toil by\n doing it as unto Thee. We ask for no far-off vision which shall set\n us dreaming while opportunities around slip by; for no enchantment\n which shall make our hands to slack and our spirits to sleep, but for\n the vision of Thyself in common things for every day; that we may\n find a Divine calling in the claims of life, and see a heavenly\n reward in work well done. We ask Thee not to lift us out of life, but\n to prove Thy power within it; not for tasks more suited to our\n strength, but for strength more suited to our tasks. Give to us the\n vision that moves, the strength that endures, the grace of Jesus\n Christ, who wore our flesh like a monarch's robe and walked our\n earthly life like a conqueror in triumph. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nNinth Week, Sixth Day\n\nBecause action with God is essential to any satisfying knowledge of\nhim, action is one of the great resolvers of doubt. Many minds,\nendeavoring to think through the mystifying problems of God's\nprovidence, find themselves in a clueless labyrinth. The more they\nthink the more entangled and confused their minds become. Their\nthoughts strike a fatal circle, like wanderers lost in the woods, and\nreturn upon their course, baffled and disheartened. To such perplexed\nminds the best advice often is: Cease your futile thinking and go to\nwork. Let action take the place of speculation. Break the fatal round\nof circular thought that never will arrive, and go out to act on the\nbasis of what little you do believe. Your mind like a dammed stream is\ngrowing stagnant; set it running to some useful purpose, if only to\nturn mill-wheels, and trust that activity will bring it cleansing in\ndue time. Horace Bushnell, the great preacher, while a skeptical tutor\nat Yale, was disturbed because so many students were unsettled by his\ndisbelief. In the midst of a revival he said that like a great snag he\ncaught and stopped the newly launched boats as fast as they came down.\nUnable to think his way out of his intellectual perplexity, he faced\none night this arresting question: \"What is the use of my trying to\nget further knowledge, so long as I do not cheerfully yield to what I\nalready know?\" And kneeling he prayed after this fashion: \"O God, I\nbelieve there is an eternal difference between right and wrong, and I\nhereby give myself up to do the right and to refrain from the wrong. I\nbelieve that Thou dost exist, and if Thou canst hear my cry and wilt\nreveal Thyself to me, I pledge myself to do Thy will, and I make this\npledge fully, freely, and forever.\" What wonder that in time the light\nbroke and that Bushnell became a great prophet of the faith!\n\nEven Paul, finishing his laborious discussion of God's providence\ntoward Israel, acknowledges his baffled thought:\n\n =O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge of\n God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past tracing\n out! For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his\n counsellor? or who hath first given to him, and it shall be\n recompensed unto him again? For of him, and through him, and unto\n him, are all things. To him be the glory for ever. Amen.--Rom.\n 11:33-36=.\n\nAnd then, as if he turned from philosophy to action with gratitude, he\nbegins the twelfth chapter:\n\n =I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present\n your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is\n your spiritual service. And be not fashioned according to this world:\n but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove\n what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God.--Rom. 12:1, 2.=\n\n _O God, we thank Thee for the sweet refreshment of sleep and for the\n glory and vigor of the new day. As we set our faces once more toward\n our daily work, we pray Thee for the strength sufficient for our\n tasks. May Christ's spirit of duty and service ennoble all we do.\n Uphold us by the consciousness that our work is useful work and a\n blessing to all. If there has been anything in our work harmful to\n others and dishonorable to ourselves, reveal it to our inner eye with\n such clearness that we shall hate it and put it away, though it be at\n a loss to ourselves. When we work with others, help us to regard\n them, not as servants to our will, but as brothers equal to us in\n human dignity, and equally worthy of their full reward. May there be\n nothing in this day's work of which we shall be ashamed when the sun\n has set, nor in the eventide of our life when our task is done and we\n go to our long home to meet Thy face. Amen._--Walter Rauschenbusch.\n\n\nNinth Week, Seventh Day\n\n =Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye\n blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the\n foundation of the world: for I was hungry, and ye gave me to eat; I\n was thirsty, and ye gave me drink; I was a stranger, and ye took me\n in; naked, and ye clothed me; I was sick, and ye visited me; I was in\n prison, and ye came unto me. Then shall the righteous answer him,\n saying, Lord, when saw we thee hungry, and fed thee? or athirst, and\n gave thee drink? And when saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in?\n or naked, and clothed thee? And when saw we thee sick, or in prison,\n and came unto thee? And the King shall answer and say unto them,\n Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of these my\n brethren, even these least, ye did it unto me.--Matt. 25:34-40.=\n\nThe earnestness of God is not about any diffuse generality; it is\nabout persons. His purposes concern them, and he believes in them and\nin their capacities for fellowship with him, for growing character and\nfor glorious destiny. If, therefore, one wishes the sense of God's\nreality which comes from active co-partnership, let him serve persons,\nbelieve in them, and be in earnest about them. A woman, troubled by\ninvincible doubts, was given by a wise minister the Gospel of John and\na calling-list of needy families, and was told to use them both. She\ncame through into a luminous faith, and which helped her more, her\nreading or her service, she could never tell. When the Master said\nthat the good we did to the least of his brethren, we did to him, he\nindicated a road to vital knowledge of him; he said in effect that we\ncan always find him in the lives of people to whom we give love and\nhelp. Many will never find him at all unless they find him there. The\ngreat believers have been the great servants; and the reason for this\nis not simply that faith produced service, but also that _service\nproduced faith_. The life of Sir Wilfred Grenfell, for example,\nmakes convincingly plain that his faith sent him to Labrador for\nservice, and that then he drew out of service a compound interest on\nhis original investment of faith.\n\n _O God, the Father of the forsaken, the Help of the weak, the\n Supplier of the needy, who hast diffused and proportioned Thy gifts\n to body and soul, in such sort that all may acknowledge and perform\n the joyous duty of mutual service; Who teachest us that love towards\n the race of men is the bond of perfectness, and the imitation of Thy\n blessed Self; open our eyes and touch our hearts, that we may see and\n do, both for this world and for that which is to come, the things\n which belong to our peace. Strengthen us in the work we have\n undertaken; give us counsel and wisdom, perseverance, faith, and\n zeal, and in Thine own good time, and according to Thy pleasure,\n prosper the issue. Pour into us a spirit of humility; let nothing be\n done but in devout obedience to Thy will, thankfulness for Thine\n unspeakable mercies, and love to Thine adorable Son Christ Jesus....\n Amen._--Earl of Shaftesbury, 1801.\n\n\nCOMMENT FOR THE WEEK\n\nI\n\nThroughout our studies we have been asserting that faith in God\ninvolves confidence that creation has a purpose. But we shall not see\nthe breadth and depth of the affirmation, or its significant meaning\nfor our lives, unless more carefully we face a question, which, as\nkeenly as any other, pierces to the marrow of religion: _Is God in\nearnest?_\n\nThat the God of the Bible is in earnest is plain. If we open the Book\nat the Exodus, we hear him saying, \"I have surely seen the affliction\nof my people, ... and have heard their cry, ... and I am come down to\ndeliver them\" (Exodus 3:7, 8). If we turn to the prophets, we find\nHosea, interpreting the beating of God's heart: \"How am I to give thee\nup, O Ephraim? How am I to let thee go, O Israel? How am I to give\nthee up? My heart is turned upon me, my compassions begin to boil\"[5]\n(Hos. 11:8). Everywhere in the Old Testament, God is in earnest: about\npersonal character--\"What doth Jehovah require of thee, but to do\njustly, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with thy God?\" (Micah\n6:8); about social righteousness--\"Let justice roll down as waters,\nand righteousness as a mighty stream\" (Amos 5:24); about the salvation\nof the world--\"It is too light a thing that thou shouldest be my\nservant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved\nof Israel: I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that\nthou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth\" (Isa. 49:6).\nWhen from the Old Testament one turns to the New, he faces an\nassertion of God's earnestness that cannot be surpassed: \"God so loved\nthe world that he gave his only begotten Son.\" God in the New\nTestament is as much in earnest as that, and all the major\naffirmations of the Book cluster about the magnetism of this central\nfaith. God is even like a shepherd with a hundred sheep, who having\nlost one, leaves the ninety and nine and goes after that which is\nlost, until he finds it (Luke 15:4). From the earliest Hebrew seer\ndimly perceiving him, to the last apostle of the New Covenant, the God\nof the Bible is tremendously in earnest.\n\nHow profoundly the acceptance of this faith deepens the meaning and\nvalue of life is evident. For a moment some might think that the major\nquestion is not whether _God_ is in earnest but whether _we_\nare; but when a man considers the hidden fountains from which the\nstreams of his human earnestness must flow, he sees how necessary is\nat least the hope that at the heart of it creation is in earnest too.\nVon Hartmann, the pessimist, makes one of his characters say, \"The\nactivities of the busy world are only the shudderings of a fever.\" How\nshall a man be seriously in earnest about great causes in a world like\nthat? The men whose devoted lives have made history great have seen in\ncreation's busyness more than aimless shuddering. Moses was in\nearnest, but behind his consecration was his vision of the Eternal,\nsaying to Pharaoh, \"Let my people go!\" The Master was in earnest, but\nwith a motive that took into its account the purposefulness of God,\n\"My Father worketh hitherto, and I work\" (John 5:17).\n\nIndeed, no satisfying meaning, no real unity are conceivable in a\npurposeless universe. The plain fact is that _within_ the universe\nnobody explains anything without the statement of its purpose. A chair\nis something to sit down on; a watch is something to tell time by; a\nlamp is something to give illumination in the dark--and lacking this\npurposive description, the story of the precedent history of none of\nthese things, from their original materials to their present shape,\nwould in the least tell what they really are. One who knows all else\nabout a telephone, practically knows nothing, unless he is aware of\nwhat it is _for_. Nor is the necessity of such explanation lessened\nwhen scientists endeavor descriptions in their special realms. Huxley,\nnarrating the growth of a salamander's egg, writes, \"Let a moderate\nsupply of warmth reach its watery cradle, and the plastic matter\nundergoes changes so rapid, and yet so steady and so purposelike in\ntheir succession, that one can only compare them to those operated by\na skilled modeler upon a formless lump of clay. As with an invisible\ntrowel, the mass is divided and subdivided into smaller and smaller\nportions, until it is reduced to an aggregation of granules not too\nlarge to build withal the finest fabrics of the nascent organism.\nAnd, then, it is as if a delicate finger traced out the line to be\noccupied by the spinal column and moulded the contour of the body;\npinching up the head at one end, the tail at the other, and fashioning\nflank and limb into the due salamandrine proportions, in so artistic a\nway, that, after watching the process hour by hour, one is almost\ninvoluntarily possessed by the notion that some more subtle aid to\nvision than an achromatic, would show the hidden artist, with his plan\nbefore him, striving with skilful manipulation to perfect his work.\"\nThe obvious fact is that salamanders' eggs act as though they were\nseriously intent on making salamanders; and lion's cells as though\nthey were tremendously in earnest about making lions. As Herbert\nSpencer said of a begonia leaf, \"We have therefore no alternative but\nto say, that the living particles composing one of these fragments,\nhave an innate tendency to arrange themselves into the shape of the\norganism to which they belong.\" _But if this is so, purpose is\nessential in the description of every living thing._ All about us is a\nworld of life with something strikingly like purposeful action rampant\neverywhere, so that in describing an elm tree it will not do to say\nonly that forces from behind pushed it into being; one must say, too,\nthat from our first observation of its cells they acted as though they\nwere intent on making nothing else but elm. They went about their\nbusiness as though they had a purpose. The tree's cause is not alone\nthe forces from behind; it is as well the aim that in the cells'\naction lay ahead.\n\nMen can describe nothing in heaven above or on the earth beneath\nwithout the use of purposive terminology. How shall they try otherwise\nto describe the universe? _A world in which the minutest particles\nand cells all act as though they were eagerly intent on achieving\naims, can only with difficulty be thought of as an aimless whole._\nMan's conviction is insistent and imperious that creation, so\nsurcharged with purposes, must have Purpose. The greatest scientists\nthemselves are often our best witnesses here. Charles Darwin and\nAlfred Russel Wallace are the twin discoverers of evolution. Said the\nformer: \"If we consider the whole universe the mind refuses to look at\nit as the outcome of chance.\" Said the latter: the world is \"a\nmanifestation of creative power, directive mind, and ultimate purpose.\"\n\nWhat such men have coldly said, the men of devout religion have set\non fire with passionate faith. They have been sure that this world is\nnot\n\n                                  \"A tale\n  Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,\n  Signifying nothing.\"\n\nIn every cause that makes for man's salvation they have seen the\nmanifest unveiling of divine intent. _God is in earnest_--this\nconviction has possessed them utterly, and to live and die for those\nthings on behalf of which the Eternal is tremendously concerned has\nbeen the aim, the motive, and the glory of their lives.\n\n\nII\n\nOne need only watch with casual observance the multitudes who say that\nthey believe in God, to see how few of them believe in this God who is\nin earnest. When they confess their faith in deity they have something\nelse in mind beside the God of the Bible, compassionately purposeful\nabout his world and calling men to be his fellow-workers. Let us\ntherefore consider some of the fallacies that enable men to believe in\na God who is _not_ in earnest.\n\nFor one thing, some _put God far away_. Missionaries in Africa's\ninterior find tribes worshiping stocks, stones, demons, ghosts, but\nthis does not mean that no idea of a great original god is theirs.\nOften they are not strangers to that thought, but, as an old\nAfricander woman said, \"He never concerned himself with me; why should\nI concern myself with him?\" To such folk a great god exists, but he\ndoes not care; he dwells apart, an indifferent deity, who has left\nthis world in the hands of lesser gods that really count. The task of\nthe missionary, therefore, is not to prove the existence of a\ncreator--\"No rain, no mushrooms,\" said an African chief; \"no God, no\nworld\"--but it is to persuade men that the God who seems so far away\nis near at hand, that he really cares, and over each soul and all his\nworld is sacrificially in earnest.\n\nSuch missionary work is not yet needless among Christian people. Said\na Copenhagen preacher in a funeral discourse, \"God cannot help us in\nour great sorrow, because he is so infinitely far away; we must\ntherefore look to Jesus.\" One feels this Siberian exile of God from\nall vital meaning for our humanity, when he is called the \"Absolute,\"\nthe \"Great First Cause,\" the \"Energy from which all things proceed.\"\nLike the man, examined by the Civil Service, who, asked the distance\nfrom sun to earth, answered, \"I do not know how far the sun is from\nthe earth; but it is far enough so that it will not interfere with the\nproper performance of my duties at the Customs Office,\" so men with\nphrases like \"the Great First Cause\" put God an immeasurable distance\noff. No man has dealings with a \"Great First Cause,\" no \"Great First\nCause\" ever had vital, personal, constraining meanings for a man.\nRather across infinite distance and time unthinkable, we vaguely\npicture a dim Figure, who gave this toboggan of a universe its primal\nshove and has not thought seriously of it since. So a wanderer down\nthe street might put a child upon her sled and giving her a start\ndown-hill, go on his way. She may have a pleasant slide, but he will\nnot know; she may fall off, but he will not care; there may be a\ntragic accident, but that will not be his concern--he has gone away\noff down the street. Multitudes of nominal believers have a god like\nthat.\n\nIn comparison with such, one thinks of men like Livingstone. His God\nwas compassionately concerned for Africa, spoke about black folk as\nHosea heard him speak concerning Israel, \"How can I give thee up? How\ncan I let thee go?\" until the fire of the divine earnestness lit a\ncorresponding ardor in Livingstone's heart and he went out to be God's\nman in the dark continent. Such men have smitten the listless world as\nwinds fill flapping sails, crying \"Move!\" And the God of such has been\ntremendously in earnest.\n\n\nIII\n\nSome gain a God lacking serious purpose, not by putting him afar off,\nbut by endeavoring to bring him so near that they _diffuse him\neverywhere_. Writers tell us that God is in every rustling leaf and in\nevery wave that breaks upon the beach; we are assured that God is in\nevery gorgeous flower and in every flaming sunset. And the poetry of\nthis is so alluring that we cannot bear to have God specially\nanywhere, because we are so anxious to keep him everywhere. Preachers\ndelight to illustrate their thought of God with figures drawn from\nnature's invisible energies--\n\n  \"Who has seen the wind?\n    Neither I nor you:\n  But when the leaves hang trembling\n    The wind is passing through.\n\n  Who has seen the wind?\n    Neither you nor I:\n  But when the trees bow down their heads\n    The wind is passing by.\"\n\nBy such comparisons are we taught to see that God invisibly is\neverywhere.\n\nFor all the valuable truth that such speech contains, its practical\nissue, in many minds today, is to strip God of the last shred of\npersonality, and with that loss to end the possibility of his being in\nearnest about anything. He has become refined Vapor thinly diffused\nthrough space. Folk say they love to meditate on him, and well they\nmay! For such a god asks nothing of anybody except meditation; he has\nno purposes that call for earnestness in them. When little children\nare ruined in a city's tenements, when the liquor traffic brutalizes\nmen, when economic inequity makes many poor that a few may be made\nrich, when war clothes the world with unutterable sorrow, such a god\ndoes not care. He is not in earnest about anything. For the only thing\nin the universe that can be consciously in earnest is personality, and\nwhen one depersonalizes God, the remainder is a deity who has no love,\nno care, no purpose. Thousands do obeisance to such a gaseous idol.\n\nFrom this fallacy spring such familiar confessions of faith as this,\n\"God is not a person; he is spirit.\" If by this negation one intends\nto say that God is not a limited individual, that is obviously true;\nbut _the contrast between personality and spirit is impossible_. One\nmay as well speak of dry water as of impersonal spirit. Rays of radium\nare unimaginably minute and swift, but they are not spirit. Nothing in\nthe impersonal realm can be conceived so subtle and refined that it is\nspirit. Spirit begins only where love and intelligence and purpose\nare, and these all are activities of personality. No one can _really_\nbelieve what Jesus said, \"God is a Spirit,\" without being ready to\npray as Jesus prayed, \"Our Father.\"\n\nBetween an impersonal, diffused, and gaseous god, and the God of the\nBible, how great the difference! God's pervading omnipresence is\nindeed affirmed in Scripture. There, as much as in any modern thought,\nthe heavens declare his glory, the flowers of the field are\nillustrations of his care, and the influences of his spirit are like\nthe breeze across the hills. To the ancient Hebrew, heaven and sheol\nwere the highest and the lowest, but of each the Psalmist says to God,\n\"Thou art there,\" and as for the uttermost parts of the sea, \"even\nthere shall thy hand lead me\" (Psalm 139:7-10). Cries Jeremiah from\nthe Old Testament, \"Am I a God at hand, saith Jehovah, and not a God\nafar off? Can any hide himself in secret places so that I shall not\nsee him? saith Jehovah. Do not I fill heaven and earth?\" (Jer. 23:23,\n24). And Paul answers from the New Testament, \"Not far from every one\nof us: for in him we live, and move, and have our being\" (Acts 17:27,\n28). But the God of the Bible who so pervades and sustains all\nexistence never degenerates into a Vapor. When Egyptian taskmasters\ncrack their whips over Hebrew slaves, he cares. When exiles try in\nvain to sing the songs of Zion in a strange land, he cares. When evil\nmen build Jerusalem with blood, and rapacious men pant after the dust\non the head of the poor, he cares. He is prodigiously in earnest, and\nthose who best represent him, from the great prophets to the\nsacrificial Son, are like him in this, that they are mastered by\nconsuming purpose. The God of the Bible is sadly needed by his people.\nFor lack of him religion grows often listless and churches become\nsocial clubs.\n\n\nIV\n\nBy another road men travel to believe in a God who is not in earnest:\n_they think of him as an historic being_. It was said of Carlyle,\nshrewdly if unjustly, that his God lived until the death of Oliver\nCromwell. Whatever may be the truth about Carlyle, it is easy to find\nfolk whose God to all intents and purposes is dead. Long since he\nclosed his work, spoke his last word, and settled down to inactivity\nand silence. He made the world, created man, thundered from Sinai,\nestablished David's kingdom, brought back the exiles, inspired the\nprophets and sent his Son. He _once_ was earnest; the record of his\nancient acts is long and glorious, and men find comfort in reading\nwhat he used to do. They would not explicitly confess it, but in fact\nthey habitually think of God in the past tense. They cannot conceive\nthe universe as happening by chance, and they posit God as making it;\nthey cannot believe that the transcendent characters of olden times\nwere uninspired, so God becomes the explanation of their power. When\nsuch believers wish to assure themselves of God they go to the stern\nof humanity's ship and watch the wake far to the rear; but they never\nstand on the ship's bridge, and feel it sway and turn at the touch of\na present Captain in control. They have not risen to the meaning of\nthe Bible's reiterated phrase, \"_the living God_.\"\n\nH\u00f6ffding tells us that in a Danish Protestant church, well on into the\nnineteenth century, worshipers maintained the custom of bowing, when\nthey passed a certain spot upon the wall. The reason, which no one\nknew, was discovered when removal of the whitewash revealed a Roman\nCatholic Madonna. Folk had bowed for three centuries before the place\nwhere the Madonna _used to be_. So some folk worship deity; he is\nnot a present reality but a tradition; their faith is directed not\ntoward the living God himself, but toward what some one else has\nwritten about a God who used to be alive. They do not feel now God's\nplans afoot, his purposes as certainly in progress now as ever in\nman's history. They stand rather like unconverted Gideon, facing\nbackwards and lamenting, \"Where are all his wondrous works which our\nfathers told us of?\" (Judges 6:13).\n\nNot by what we say, but by our practical attitudes we most reveal how\nlittle we believe in an earnest, living God whose voice calls _us_,\nwhose plans need _us_, as much as ever Moses or David or Paul was\nsummoned and required. If we say that we do believe in this living God\nwe are belied by our discouragements, deserving as we often do the\nrebuke which Luther's wife administered to the Reformer. \"From what\nyou have said,\" she remarked, standing before him clothed in deep,\nmourning black, \"and from the way you feel and act I supposed that God\nwas dead.\" If we say that we believe in a living, earnest God, we are\nbelied by our reluctance to expect and welcome new revelations of\nGod's truth and enlarging visions of his plan. Willing to believe what\nthe astronomers say, that light from a new star reaches the earth\neach year, we act as though God's spiritual universe were smaller than\nhis physical, and do not eagerly await the new light perpetually\nbreaking from his heavens. But most of all the little influence which\nour faith in God has upon our practical service is a scathing\nindictment of its vitality and power. No one who really believes in an\nearnest, living God can have an undedicated life. He may not think of\nthe Divine in the past tense chiefly; the present and the future even\nmore belong to God; and through each generation runs the earnest\npurpose of the Eternal, who has never said his last word on any\nsubject, nor put the final hammer blow on any task. A faith like this,\ndeeply received and apprehended, is a masterful experience. It changes\nthe inner quality of life; it makes the place whereon we stand holy\nground; it urgently impresses us into the service of those causes that\nwe plainly see have in them the purpose of God. No outlook upon life\ncompares with this in grandeur; no motive for life is at once so\nweighty and so fine.\n\n\nV\n\nOne of the subtlest fallacies by which we miss believing in an earnest\nGod is not describable as an opinion. Men fall into it, who neither\nreduce God to a Great First Cause, nor diffuse him into a vapor, nor\nregard him as an historic being. _They rather allow their superstitious\nsentiments to take the place of worthy faith._ Plenty of people who\nwarmly would insist on their religion, reveal in their practical\nattitudes how utterly bereft of serious moral purpose their God is.\nThey think their fortune will be better if they do not sit thirteen at\na table or occupy room thirteen at a hotel; on occasion they throw\nsalt or look at the moon over their right shoulders and rap on wood to\nassure their safety or their luck; and to be quite certain of divine\nfavor they hang fetishes, like rabbits' feet, about their necks. Their\nattitude toward such surviving pagan superstitions is like\nFontenelli's toward ghosts. \"I do not believe in them,\" he said, \"but\nI am afraid of them.\" That this is a law-abiding universe with moral\npurpose in it, such folk obviously do not believe. Their God is not in\nearnest. He spends his time watching for dinner parties of thirteen or\nlistening for folk who forget to rap on wood when they boast that\nthey have not been ill all winter. The utter poverty to which great\nwords may be reduced by meager minds is evident when such folk say\nthat they believe in God.\n\nEven when these grosser forms of superstition are not present, others\nhardly more respectable may take their place. God is pictured as a\nKing, surrounded with court ritual, in the complete and proper\nobservance of which he takes delight, and any rupture in whose\nregularity awakes his anger. To go to church, to say our prayers, to\nread our Bibles, to be circumspect on Sunday, to help pay the\npreacher's salary and to contribute to the missionary cause--such\nthings as these comprise the court ritual of God. These Christian acts\nare not presented as gracious privileges, opportunities, like fresh\nair and sunshine and friendship, to make life rich and serviceable;\nthey are presented as works of merit, by which we gain standing in\nGod's favor and assure ourselves of his benignity. For with those who\nso conform to his ordinances and respect his taboos, he is represented\nas well-pleased, and he blesses them with special favors. But any\ninfraction of these rituals is sure to bring terrific punishment. God\nwatches those who do not sing his praises or who fail in praying, and\nhe marks them for his vengeance! Dr. Jowett tells us that in the\nSunday school room of the English chapel where as a child he\nworshiped, a picture hung that to his fascinated and frightened\nimagination represented the character of God: a huge eye filled the\ncenter of the heavens, and from it rays of vision fell on every sort\nof minute happening and small misdeed on earth. As such a monstrous\nDetective, jealous of his rights and perquisites, God is how often\npictured to the children! So H. G. Wells indignantly interprets his\nexperience: \"I, who write, was so set against God, thus rendered. He\nand his Hell were the nightmare of my childhood; I hated him while I\nstill believed in him, and who could help but hate? I thought of him\nas a fantastic monster, perpetually spying, perpetually listening,\nperpetually waiting to condemn and to strike me dead; his flames as\nready as a grill-room fire. He was over me and about my feebleness and\nsilliness and forgetfulness as the sky and sea would be about a child\ndrowning in mid-Atlantic. When I was still only a child of thirteen,\nby the grace of the true God in me, I flung this lie out of my mind,\nand for many years, until I came to see that God himself had done\nthis thing for me, the name of God meant nothing to me but the hideous\nsear in my heart where a fearful demon had been.\"\n\nThis \"bogey God\" is in earnest about nothing except the observance of\nhis little rituals; he is unworthy of a good man's worship, he has no\npurpose that can capture the consent and inspire the loyalty of\nserious folk. How many so-called unbelievers are in revolt against\nthis perversion of the idea of God, taught them in childhood! The\ndeity whom they refuse to credit is not the Father, with \"the eternal\npurpose which he purposed in Christ\" (Eph. 3:11); often they have not\nheard of him. Their denial is directed against another sort of God. \"I\nwish I could recall clearly,\" writes one, \"the conception of God which\nI gained as a boy in Sunday school. He was as old as grandfather, I\nknow, but not so kind. We were told to fear him.\" Surely the real God\nmust sympathize with those who hate his caricature. A vindictive\nBogey, querulous about the mint, anise, and cummin of his ritual, in\nearnest about nothing save to reward obsequious servants and to have\nhis vengeance out on the careless and disobedient, is poles asunder\nfrom the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ with his majestic\npurpose for the world's salvation.\n\n\nVI\n\nOf all the sentiments, however, by which a worthy faith is made\nimpossible, none is so common, in these recent years, _as the\nascription to God of a weak and flaccid affectionateness_. God's love\nis interpreted by love's meaning in hours when we are gentle with our\nchildren or tender with our friends. The soft and cosy aspects of\nlove, its comforts, its pities, its affections, are made central in\nour thought of God. We are taught, as children, that he loves us as\nour mothers do; and as from them we look for coddling when we cry for\nit, so are our expectations about God. Our religion becomes a selfish\nseeking for divine protection from life's ills, a recipe for ease, an\nexpectant trust, that as we believe in God he in return will nurse us,\nunharmed and happy, through our lives. No one intimately acquainted\nwith the religious life of men and women can be unaware of this\nwidespread, ingrained belief in a soft, affectionate, grandmotherly\nGod. What wonder that life brings fearful disillusionment! What\nwonder that in a world where all that is valuable has been\n\n  \"Battered with the shocks of doom\n  To shape and use,\"\n\nthe God of coddling love seems utterly impossible!\n\nThe lack in this fallacious faith is central; there is no place in it\nfor the movement of God's moral purpose. _To ascribe love to God\nwithout making it a quality of his unalterable purpose, which must\nsweep on through costs in suffering however great, is to misread the\nGospel._ Many kinds of love are known in our experience, from a\nnursing mother with her babe to a military leader with his men. In\nDonald Hankey's picture of \"the Beloved Captain\" we see affection and\ntenderness, as beautiful as they are strong: \"It was a wonderful\nthing, that smile of his. It was something worth living for, and worth\nworking for.... It seemed to make one look at things from a different\npoint of view, a finer point of view, his point of view. There was\nnothing feeble or weak about it.... It meant something. It meant that\nwe were his men and that he was proud of us.... When we failed him,\nwhen he was disappointed in us, he did not smile. He did not rage or\ncurse. He just looked disappointed, and that made us feel far more\nsavage with ourselves than any amount of swearing would have done....\nThe fact was that he had won his way into our affections. We loved\nhim. And there isn't anything stronger than love, when all's said and\ndone.\"\n\nYet, this Captain, loving and beloved, will lead his men in desperate\ncharges, where death falls in showers, but where the purpose which\ntheir hearts have chosen forces them to go. The love of God must be\nlike that; it surely is if Jesus' love is its embodiment. His\naffection for his followers, his solicitude and tenderness have been\nin Christian eyes, how beautiful! They shine in words like John's\nseventeenth chapter where love finds transcendent utterance. Yet this\nsame Master said: \"Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of\nwolves\" (Matt. 10:16); \"Blessed are ye when men shall reproach you,\nand persecute you, and say all manner of evil against you falsely for\nmy sake\" (Matt. 5:11); \"Then shall they deliver you up unto\ntribulation, and shall kill you; and ye shall be hated of all the\nnations for my name's sake\" (Matt. 24:9); \"They shall put you out of\nthe synagogues; yea, the hour cometh, that whosoever killeth you shall\nthink that he offereth service unto God\" (John 16:2); \"If any man\ncometh unto me, and hateth not his own father, and mother, and wife,\nand children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also,\nhe cannot be my disciple\" (Luke 14:26). The love of Jesus was no\ncoddling affection; it had for its center a moral purpose that balked\nat no sacrifice. He took crucifixion for himself, and to his beloved\nhe cried, \"If any man would come after me, let him deny himself, and\ntake up his cross, and follow me\" (Matt. 16:24). Such love is God's;\nand _preachers who advertise his Fatherhood as a gentle nurse that\nshelters us from suffering have sapped the Gospel of its moral power_.\nGod's love is austere as well as bountiful; he is, as Emerson said,\nthe \"terrific benefactor.\"\n\nIndeed, faith in a God of coddling love may be one of the most\npernicious influences in human life. Our trust, so misinterpreted,\nbecomes a cushion on which to lie, a sedative by which to sleep. When\nills afflict the world that men could cure, such misbelievers merely\ntrust in God; when tasks await man's strength, they quietly retreat\nupon their faith that God is good and will solve all, until religion\nbecomes a by-word and a hissing on the lips of earnest men. Such\nmisbelievers have not dimly seen the Scripture's meaning, where faith\nis not a pillow but a shield, from behind which plays a sword (Eph.\n6:16) and where men do not sleep by faith, but \"fight the good fight\nof faith\" instead (I Tim. 6:12). Or if such misbelievers do rouse\nthemselves to lay hold on their Divinity, it is to demand God's love\nfor them and not to offer their lives to God. As Sydney Smith\nexclaimed about some people's patriotism, \"God save the King! in these\ntimes too often means, God save my pension and my place, God give my\nsisters an allowance out of the Privy Purse, let me live upon the\nfruits of other men's industry and fatten upon the plunder of the\npublic.\"\n\nFaith in God never is elevated and ennobling until we overpass \"_God\nfor our lives!_\" to cry \"_Our lives for God!_\" Then at the luminous\ncenter of our faith shines the divine purpose, costly but wonderful,\nthat binds the ages together in spiritual unity. To that we dedicate\nour lives; in that we exceedingly rejoice. No longer do we test God's\ngoodness by our happiness or our ill-fortune; we are _his_ through\nfair weather and through foul. No longer do we merely hold beliefs, we\nare held by them, captured now and not simply consoled by faith. Only\nso are we learning discipleship to Christ and are beginning really to\nbelieve in the Christian God.\n\n\nVII\n\nFrom all these common fallacies of thought and sentiment one turns to\nthe New Testament to find the God of the Gospel. The very crux of the\nGood Tidings is that God is so much in earnest that he is the eternal\nSufferer. The ancient Greeks had a god of perfect bliss; he floated on\nfrom age to age in undisturbed tranquillity; no cry of man ever\nreached his empyrean calm; his life was an endless stream of liquid\nhappiness. How different this Greek deity is from ours may be\nperceived if one tries to say of him those things which the Scripture\nhabitually says of God. \"In all their affliction he was afflicted\"\n(Isa. 63:9); \"Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should\nnot have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, these may forget, yet\nwill not I forget thee\" (Isa. 49:15); \"God, being rich in mercy, for\nhis great love wherewith he loved us even when we were dead through\nour trespasses\" (Eph 2:4, 5); \"God so loved the world that he gave his\nonly begotten Son\" (John 3:16). None of these things that Christians\nsay about their God can be said of a deity who dwells in tranquil\nbliss.\n\nIndeed let one stand over against a war-torn, unhappy world and try to\nthink that God does not suffer in man's agony, and he will see how\nuseless and incredible such a God would be. God looks on Belgium and\nhe does not care; he looks on Armenia desolate and Poland devastated,\nand he does not care; he sits in heaven and sees his children wounded\nand alone in No-man's land, watches the deaths, the heart-breaks, the\npoverty of war, its ruined childhood and its shattered families, and\nhe does not care--how impossible it is to believe in such a God! A God\nwho does not care does not count.\n\nChristians, therefore, have the God who really meets the needs of men.\nHe cares indeed, and, with all the modesty that words of human\nemotion must put on when they are applied to him, he suffers in the\nsuffering of men and is crucified in his children's agonies. God\nlimited himself in making such a world as this; in it he cannot\nlightly do what he will; he has a struggle on his heart; he makes his\nway upward against obstacles that man's imagination cannot measure.\nThere is a cross forever at the heart of God. He climbs his\neverlasting Calvary toward the triumph that must come, and he is\ntremendously in earnest.\n\nOne important consequence follows such faith as this. Confidence in\nsuch an earnest, sacrificial God makes inevitable the Christian faith\nin immortality. Our solar system is no permanent theater for God's\neternal purposes; it is doomed to dissolution as certainly as any\nhuman body is doomed to die. In the Lick observatory one reads this\nnotice under a picture of the sun: \"The blue stars are considered to\nbe in early life, the yellow stars in middle life, the red stars in\nold age.... From the quality of its spectrum the sun is classified as\na star in middle age.\" Those, therefore, who, denying their own\nimmortality, comfort themselves with prophesying endless progress for\nthe race upon the earth, have no basis for their hopes. \"We must\ntherefore renounce those brilliant fancies,\" says Faye the scientist,\n\"by which we try to deceive ourselves in order to endow man with\nunlimited posterity, and to regard the universe as the immense theater\non which is to be developed a spontaneous progress without end. On the\ncontrary, life must disappear, and the grandest material works of the\nhuman race will have to be effaced by degrees under the action of a\nfew physical forces which will survive man for a time. Nothing will\nremain--'Even the ruins will perish.'\"\n\nIf one believes, therefore, in the God who is in earnest, he cannot\ncontent himself with such a universe--lacking any permanent element,\nany abiding reality in which the moral gains of man's long struggle\nare conserved. God's purpose cannot be so narrow in horizon that it is\nsatisfied with a few million years of painful experiment, costly\nbeyond imagination, yet with no issue to crown its sacrifice. In such\na universe as Faye pictures, lacking immortality, generation after\ngeneration of men suffer, aspire, labor, and die, and this shall be\nthe history of all creation, until at last Shakespeare's prophecy\nshall be fulfilled,\n\n  \"The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces,\n  The solemn temples, the great globe itself,\n  Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve\n  And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,\n  Leave not a rack behind.\"\n\nIf such is to be the story of creation, there is no purpose in it and\nthe Christian faith in an earnest God is vain.\n\nOnly one truth is adequate to crown our confidence in a purposeful\nuniverse and to make it reasonable: _personality must persist_.\nWe believe in immortality, not because we meanly want rewards ahead,\nbut because in no other way can life, viewed as a whole, find sense\nand reason. If personality persists, this transient theater of action\nand discipline may serve its purpose in God's time, and disappear. He\nis in earnest, but not for rocks and suns and stars, he is in earnest\nabout persons--the sheep of his pasture are men. They are not mortal;\nthey carry over into the eternal world the spiritual gains of earth;\nand all life's struggle--its vicarious sacrifice, its fearful\npunishments, its labor for better circumstance and worthier life--is\njustified in its everlasting influence on personality. When we say\nthat God cares, we mean no vague, diffusive attitude toward a system\nthat lasts for limited millenniums and then comes to an uneventful end\nin a cold sun and a ruined earth. We mean that he cares for\npersonality which is his child, that he suffers in the travail of his\nchildren's character, and that this divine solicitude has everlasting\nissues when the heavens \"wax old like a garment.\" Still Paul's\nstatement stands, one of the most worthy summaries of God's\nearnestness that ever has been written: \"The creation waits with eager\nlonging for the sons of God to be revealed\" (Rom. 8:19).[6]\n\n[5] George Adam Smith's Translation.\n\n[6] Moffatt's Translation.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nFaith in Christ the Savior: Forgiveness\n\n\nDAILY READINGS\n\nDuring the next two weeks we are to consider some of the distinctive\nmeanings which faith in Christ has had for his disciples. They have\nfound in that faith unspeakable blessing and have uttered their\ngratitude in radiant language. But, just because of this, many folk\nfind themselves in difficulty. Their expectations concerning the\nChristian life have been lifted very high, and in their experience of\nit they have been disappointed. Their problem is not theoretical\ndoubt, but practical disillusionment. Their difficulty lies in their\nexperience that the Christian life, while it may be theoretically\ntrue, is not practically what it is advertised to be. At this common\nproblem let us look in the daily readings.\n\n\nTenth Week, First Day\n\nMany expect in the Christian experience an emotional life of joy and\nquietude which they have not found. They are led to expect this by\nmany passages of Scripture about \"peace in believing,\" by many hymns\nof exultation where a mood of unqualified spiritual triumph finds\nvoice, and by testimonies of men who speak of living years without any\ndepressed hours or flagging spirits. Such a wonderful life of elevated\nemotion many crave for themselves; they came into the Christian\nfellowship expecting it; and they neither have it, nor are likely to\nachieve it. Now the beauty of a clear, high emotional life no one can\ndoubt, _but we must not demand it as a condition of our keeping\nfaith_. We ought not to seek God simply for the sake of sensational\nexperiences, no matter how desirable they may be. In all the ages\nbefore Christ, the outstanding example of deep personal religion,\nexpressing itself in over forty years of splendidly courageous\nprophetic ministry, is Jeremiah, and his temperament was never marked\nby quietude and joy. His emotional life was profoundly affected by his\nfaith: _courage was substituted for fear_. But if he had demanded the\nmood of the 103rd psalm as a price for continued faith, he would have\nlost his faith. He was not temperamentally constructed like the\npsalmist--and he was a far greater personality. We must not be too\nmuch concerned about our spiritual sensations. Consider the Master's\nparable about the two sons: one had amiable feelings, but his will was\nwrong, the other lacked satisfactory emotions, but he did the work.\n\n =But what think ye? A man had two sons; and he came to the first, and\n said, Son, go work to-day in the vineyard. And he answered and said,\n I will not: but afterward he repented himself, and went. And he came\n to the second, and said likewise. And he answered and said, I go,\n sir: and went not. Which of the two did the will of his father? They\n say, The first.--Matt. 21:28-31.=\n\n _Ah, Lord, unto whom all hearts are open; Thou canst govern the\n vessel of our souls far better than we can. Arise, O Lord, and\n command the stormy wind and the troubled sea of our hearts to be\n still, and at peace in Thee, that we may look up to Thee undisturbed,\n and abide in union with Thee, our Lord. Let us not be carried hither\n and thither by wandering thoughts, but, forgetting all else, let us\n see and hear Thee. Renew our spirits; kindle in us Thy light, that it\n may shine within us, and our hearts may burn in love and adoration\n towards Thee. Let Thy Holy Spirit dwell in us continually, and make\n us Thy temples and sanctuary, and fill us with Divine love and light\n and life, with devout and heavenly thoughts, with comfort and\n strength, with joy and peace. Amen._--Johann Arndt, 1555.\n\n\nTenth Week, Second Day\n\nMany came into the Christian life because they needed conquering power\nin their struggle against sin. They were told that absolute victory\ncould be theirs through Christ, and they set their hearts on that in\nardent hope and expectation. But they are disappointed. That they have\nbeen helped they would not deny, but they find that the battle with\nbesetting sin is a running fight; it has not been concluded by a final\nand resounding victory. This seems to them a denial of what Christian\npreachers and Christian hymns have promised, and perhaps it is. Hymns\nand preachers are not infallible. Christian experience, however, is\nplainly aligned against their disappointment. Some men under the power\nof Christ are immediately transformed so that an old sin becomes\nthenceforth utterly distasteful; even the desire for it is banished\naltogether. But a great preacher, only recently deceased, no less\nreally under the power of Christ, had all his life to fight a taste\nfor drink which once had mastered him. His battle never ceased. His\nvictory consisted not in the elimination of his appetite, but in\nabiding power to keep up the struggle, to refuse subjugation to it,\nand at last gloriously to fall on sleep, admired and loved by his\npeople who had seen in him steadfast, unconquerable will, sustained by\nfaith. To have done with a sinful appetite in one conclusive victory\nis glorious; but we must not demand it as a price of keeping faith.\nPerhaps our victory must come through the kind of patient persistence\nwhich James the Apostle evidently knew.\n\n =Count it all joy, my brethren, when ye fall into manifold\n temptations; knowing that the proving of your faith worketh patience.\n And let patience have its perfect work, that ye may be perfect and\n entire, lacking in nothing.=\n\n =But if any of you lacketh wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to\n all liberally and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let\n him ask in faith, nothing doubting: for he that doubteth is like the\n surge of the sea driven by the wind and tossed. For let not that man\n think that he shall receive anything of the Lord; a double-minded\n man, unstable in all his ways.--James 1:2-8.=\n\n _O Lord God Almighty, who givest power to the faint, and increasest\n strength to them that have no might; without Thee we can do nothing,\n but by Thy gracious assistance we are enabled for the performance of\n every duty laid upon us. Lord of power and love, we come, trusting in\n Thine almighty strength, and Thine infinite goodness, to ask from\n Thee what is wanting in ourselves; even that grace which shall help\n us such to be, and such to do, as Thou wouldst have us. O our God,\n let Thy grace be sufficient for us, and ever present with us, that\n we may do all things as we ought. We will trust in Thee, in whom is\n everlasting strength. Be Thou our Helper, to carry us on beyond our\n own strength, and to make all that we think, and speak, and do,\n acceptable in Thy sight; through Jesus Christ. Amen._--Benjamin\n Jenks, 1646.\n\n\nTenth Week, Third Day\n\n =Jehovah is my shepherd; I shall not want.\n He maketh me to lie down in green pastures;\n He leadeth me beside still waters.\n He restoreth my soul:\n He guideth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.\n Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,\n I will fear no evil; for thou art with me;\n Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me.=\n\n =--Psalm 23:1-4.=\n\nWhat expectations are awakened by such a passage! Many have come into\nthe Christian life because in experience they have found that \"it is\nnot in man that walketh to direct his steps.\" They wanted a Guide in\nthe mysterious pilgrimage of life, and in the words of hymns like, \"He\nleadeth me, O blessed thought!\" they saw the promise of a God-conducted\nexperience. But they are disappointed. They have the same old puzzles\nto face about what they ought to do; they have no divine illumination\nthat clears up in advance their uncertainty as to the wisdom of their\nchoices; they are not vividly aware of any guidance from above to save\nthem from the perplexities which their companions face about conduct\nand career. Of course part of their difficulty is due to false\nexpectation. Not even Paul or John was given mechanical guidance,\ninfallible and unmistakable; they never had a syllabus of all possible\nemergencies with clear directions as to what should be done in every\ncase; they were guided through their normal faculties made sensitive\nto divine suggestion, and doubtless they never could clearly\ndistinguish between their thought and their inspirations. Divine\nguidance, did not save them from puzzling perplexities and unsure\ndecisions. But it did give them certainty that they were in God's\nhands; that he had hold of the reins behind their human grasp; that\nwhen they did wisely and prayerfully the best they knew, he would use\nit somehow to his service. And so far as the vivid consciousness of\nbeing guided is concerned, that probably came _in retrospect_; when\nthey saw how the road came out, they agreed that God's hand must have\nbeen in the journey. Such an experience it is reasonable to expect and\npossible to have.\n\n _O God our Lord, the stay of all them that put their trust in Thee,\n wherever Thou leadest we would go, for Thy ways are perfect wisdom\n and love. Even when we walk through the dark valley, Thy light can\n shine into our hearts and guide us safely through the night of\n sorrow. Be Thou our Friend, and we need ask no more in heaven or\n earth, for Thou art the Comfort of all who trust in Thee, the Help\n and Defence of all who hope in Thee. O Lord, we would be Thine; let\n us never fall away from Thee. We would accept all things without\n murmuring from Thy hand, for whatever Thou dost is right. Blend our\n wills with Thine, and then we need fear no evil nor death itself, for\n all things must work together for our good. Lord, keep us in Thy love\n and truth, comfort us with Thy light, and guide us by Thy Holy\n Spirit; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen._--S. Weiss, 1738.\n\n\nTenth Week, Fourth Day\n\nMany folk grow up into the Christian life, and so interpret the love\nof God that they expect from him affectionate mothering; they look to\nhim to keep them from trouble. In childhood, sheltered from life's\ntragic incidents, this expectation was more or less realized; but now\nin maturity they are disappointed. God has not saved them from\ntrouble; he has not dealt with them in maternal tenderness. Rather\nJob's complaint to God is on their lips:\n\n =I cry unto thee, and thou dost not answer me:\n I stand up, and thou gazest at me.\n Thou art turned to be cruel to me;\n With the might of thy hand thou persecutest me....=\n\n =Did not I weep for him that was in trouble?\n Was not my soul grieved for the needy?\n When I looked for good, then evil came;\n And when I waited for light, there came darkness.\n My heart is troubled, and resteth not;\n Days of affliction are come upon me.=\n\n =--Job 30:20, 21; 25-27.=\n\nOne such disappointed spirit says that in youth, even if she hurt her\nfinger, she was told to pray to God and he would take away the bruise;\nbut now life does not seem to be directed by that kind of a God at\nall. It isn't! A pregnant source of lost faith is to be found in this\nunscriptural presentation of God's love. In Scripture God's love for\nhis people and their tragic suffering are put side by side, and the\nCross where the well-beloved Son is crucified is typical of the whole\nBook's assertion that God does not keep his children from trouble.\nSometimes he leads them into it; and always he lets the operation of\nhis essential laws sweep on, so that disease and accident and death\nare no respecters of character. When Ananias was sent with God's\nmessage to the newly converted Paul, that greeting into the Christian\nlife concerned \"how many things he must suffer\" (Acts 9:16). Whatever\nelse our faith must take into account, this is an unescapable fact: we\nare seeking the impossible when we ask that our lives be arranged on\nthe basis that we shall not face trouble. Faith means a conquering\nconfidence that good will, a purpose of eternal love, runs through the\nwhole process. It says, not apart from suffering, but in the face of\nit:\n\n              \"I'm apt to think the man\n  That could surround the sum of things, and spy\n  The heart of God and secrets of his empire,\n  Would speak but love--with him the bright result\n  Would change the hue of intermediate scenes,\n  And make one thing of all Theology.\"\n\n _Almighty God to whom all things belong, whose is light and darkness,\n whose is good and evil, Master of all things, Lord of all; who hast\n so ordered it, that life from the beginning shall be a struggle\n throughout the course, and even to the end; so guide and order that\n struggle within us, that at last what is good in us may conquer, and\n all evil be overcome, that all things may be brought into harmony,\n and God may be all in all. So do Thou guide and govern us, that\n every day whatsoever betide us, some gain to better things, some\n more blessed joy in higher things may be ours, that so we, though but\n weaklings, may yet, God-guided, go from strength to strength, until\n at last, delivered from that burden of the flesh, through which comes\n so much struggling, we may enter into the land of harmony and of\n eternal peace. Hear us, of Thy mercy; through Jesus Christ our Lord.\n Amen._--George Dawson, 1877.\n\n\nTenth Week, Fifth Day\n\n =Till we all attain unto the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge\n of the Son of God, unto a fullgrown man, unto the measure of the\n stature of the fulness of Christ: that we may be no longer children,\n tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by\n the sleight of men, in craftiness, after the wiles of error; but\n speaking truth in love, may grow up in all things into him, who is\n the head, even Christ.--Eph. 4:13-15.=\n\nMany came into the Christian life familiar with such an idea of\ngrowth. They expected the new life to be an enlarging experience, with\nnew vistas, deepening satisfactions, increasing certitude. If at the\nbeginning the Christian way did not content them, they blamed their\nimmaturity for the unsatisfactory experience; they appealed to the\ndays ahead for fuller light. But they are disappointed. They have not\ngrown. The most they can claim is that they are stationary; the\nhaunting suspicion cannot altogether be avoided that their faith is\ndwindling and their fervor burning down. This difficulty is not\nstrange--with many folk it is inevitable; for they have never grasped\nthe fact that the Christian life, like all life whatsoever, is\nlaw-abiding, and that to expect effects without cause is vain. That a\nChristian experience has begun with promise does not mean that it will\nmagically continue; that the spirit will naturally drift into an\nenlarging life. An emotional conversion, like a flaming meteor, may\nplunge into a man's heart, and soon cool off, leaving a dead, encysted\nstone. But to have a real life in God, that begins like a small but\nvital acorn and grows like an aspiring oak, one must obey the laws\nthat make such increasing experience possible. To keep fellowship with\nGod unimpeded by sin, uninterrupted by neglect; to think habitually as\nthough God were, instead of casually believing that he is; to\npractice love continually until love grows real; and to arrange life's\nprogram conscientiously as though the doing of God's will were life's\nfirst business--such things alone make spiritual growth a possibility.\n\n _We desire to confess, O Lord, that we have not lived according to\n our promises, nor according to the thoughts and intents of our\n hearts. We have felt the gravitation of things that drew us downward\n from things high and holy. We have followed right things how feebly!\n Weak are we to resist the attraction of evils that lurk about the way\n of goodness; and we are conscious that we walk in a vain show. We\n behold and approve Thy law, but find it hard to obey; and our\n obedience is of the outside, and not of the soul and of the spirit,\n with heartiness and full of certainty. We rejoice that Thou art a\n Teacher patient with Thy scholars, and that Thou art a Father patient\n with Thy children. Thou art a God of long-suffering goodness, and of\n tender mercies, and therefore we are not consumed._\n\n _And now we beseech of Thee, O Thou unwearied One, that Thou wilt\n inspire us with a heavenly virtue. Lift before us the picture of what\n we should be and what we should do, and maintain it in the light,\n that we may not rub it out in forgetfulness; that we may be able to\n keep before ourselves our high calling in Christ Jesus. And may we\n press forward, not as they that have attained or apprehended; may we\n press toward the mark, for the prize of our high calling in Christ\n Jesus, with new alacrity, with growing confidence, and with more and\n more blessedness of joy and peace in the soul. Amen._--Henry Ward\n Beecher.\n\n\nTenth Week, Sixth Day\n\nThe Christian experience which disappoints its possessor by lack of\ngrowth is common, because so many leave the idea of growth vague and\nundefined. They expect in general to grow, but in what direction, to\nwhat describable results, they never stop to think. If we ran our\nother business as thoughtlessly, with as little determinate planning\nand discipline, as we manage our Christian living, any progress would\nbe impossible. What wonder that as Christians we often resemble the\nchild who fell from bed at night, and explained the accident by\nsaying, \"I must have gone to sleep too near the place where I got in\"!\n\nGrowth is always in definite directions, and folk will do well at\ntimes, without morbid self-examination, to forecast their desired\ncourses. Becoming Christians from motives of fear, as many do, we\nshould press on to a fellowship with God in which fear vanishes in\ndivine friendship and cooperation. Choosing the Christian life for\nself-centered reasons, because it can do great things for us, we\nshould press on to glory in it as a Cause on which the welfare of the\nrace depends and for which we willingly make sacrifice. Beginning with\nnarrow ideas of service to our friends and neighborhood, we should\npress on to genuine interest in the world-field, in international\nfraternity, and in Christ's victory over all mankind. Such definite\nlines of progress we well may set before us. And a life that does\ngrow, so that each new stage of maturing experience finds deeper\nlevels and greater heights, is never disappointing; it is life become\nendlessly interesting and worth while.\n\n =Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect: but I\n press on, if so be that I may lay hold on that for which also I was\n laid hold on by Christ Jesus. Brethren, I count not myself yet to\n have laid hold: but one thing I do, forgetting the things which are\n behind, and stretching forward to the things which are before, I\n press on toward the goal unto the prize of the high calling of God in\n Christ Jesus. Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, be thus\n minded: and if in anything ye are otherwise minded, this also shall\n God reveal unto you: only, whereunto we have attained, by that same\n rule let us walk.--Phil. 3:12-16.=\n\n _Our Father, we pray Thee that we may use the blessings Thou hast\n given us, and never once abuse them. We would keep our bodies\n enchanted still with handsome life, wisely would we cultivate the\n intellect which Thou hast throned therein, and we would so live with\n conscience active and will so strong that we shall fix our eye on the\n right, and, amid all the distress and trouble, the good report and\n the evil, of our mortal life, steer straightway there, and bate no\n jot of human heart or hope. We pray Thee that we may cultivate still\n more these kindly hearts of ours, and faithfully perform our duty to\n friend and acquaintance, to lover and beloved, to wife and child, to\n neighbor and nation, and to all mankind. May we feel our brotherhood\n to the whole human race, remembering that nought human is strange to\n our flesh but is kindred to our soul. Our Father, we pray that we may\n grow continually in true piety, bringing down everything which would\n unduly exalt itself, and lifting up what is lowly within us, till,\n though our outward man perish, yet our inward man shall be renewed\n day by day, and within us all shall be fair and beautiful to Thee,\n and without us our daily lives useful, our whole consciousness\n blameless in Thy sight. Amen._--Theodore Parker.\n\n\nTenth Week, Seventh Day\n\nWhile some, for reasons such as we have suggested, have made at least\na partial failure of the Christian life, and are tempted to feel that\ntheir experience is an argument against it, we may turn with\nconfidence to the multitude who have found life with Christ an\nineffable blessing.\n\n =There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ\n Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus made me free\n from the law of sin and of death. For what the law could not do, in\n that it was weak through the flesh, God, sending his own Son in the\n likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh:\n that the ordinance of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not\n after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For they that are after the\n flesh mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the\n Spirit the things of the Spirit. For the mind of the flesh is death;\n but the mind of the Spirit is life and peace.--Rom. 8:1-6.=\n\nInnumerable disciples of Jesus can subscribe to this Pauline\ntestimony, and the center of their gratitude, as of his, is the\nvictory over sin which faith in Christ has given them. The farther\nthey go with him the more wonderful becomes the meaning of his Gospel.\nWhat Thomas Fuller, in the seventeenth century, wrote about the Bible,\nthey feel about their whole relationship with Christ: \"Lord, this\nmorning I read a chapter in the Bible, and therein observed a\nmemorable passage, whereof I never took notice before. Why now, and no\nsooner, did I see it? Formerly my eyes were as open, and the letters\nas legible. Is there not a thin veil laid over Thy Word, which is\nmore rarified by reading, and at last wholly worn away? I see the oil\nof Thy Word will never leave increasing whilst any bring an empty\nbarrel.\" As for the consciousness of filial alliance with the God and\nFather of Jesus, that has been a deepening benediction. How many can\ntake over the dual inscription on an ancient Egyptian temple, as an\nexpression of their own experience! A priest had written, in the name\nof the Deity, \"I am He who was and is and ever shall be, and my veil\nhath no man lifted.\" But near at hand, some man of growing life and\ndeepening faith has added: \"Veil after veil have we lifted, and ever\nthe Face is more wonderful.\"\n\n _Eternal and Gracious Father, whose presence comforteth like sunshine\n after rain; we thank Thee for Thyself and for all Thy revelation to\n us. Our hearts are burdened with thanksgiving at the thought of all\n Thy mercies; for all the blessings of this mortal life, for health,\n for reason, for learning, and for love; but far beyond all thought\n and thankfulness, for Thy great redemption. It was no painless\n travail that brought us to the birth, it has been no common patience\n that has borne with us all this while; long-suffering love, and the\n breaking of the eternal heart alone could reconcile us to the life to\n which Thou hast ordained us. We have seen the Son of Man sharing our\n sickness and shrinking not from our shame, we have beheld the Lamb of\n God bearing the sins of the world, we have mourned at the mysterious\n passion and stood astonished at the cross of Jesus Christ; and behind\n all we have had the vision of an altar-throne and one thereon slain\n from the foundation of the world; heard a voice calling us that was\n full of tears; seen beyond the veil that was rent, the agony of God._\n\n _O for a thousand tongues to sing the love that has redeemed us. O\n for a thousand lives that we might yield them all to Thee. Amen._--W.\n E. Orchard.\n\n\nCOMMENT FOR THE WEEK\n\nI\n\nHitherto in our studies we have thought of God as the object of our\nfaith. From the beginning, to be sure, we have been using the Master\nas the Way. The God who is in earnest about immortal personalities is\nsupremely revealed in Jesus Christ. But through Christ's mediation we\nhave been trying to pierce to the Eternal character and purpose; we\nhave been taking Jesus at his word, \"He that believeth on me,\nbelieveth not on me but on him that sent me\" (John 12:44).\n\nThe meaning of faith for the Christian, however, cannot be left as\nthough Christ were an instrument which God used for his revealing and\nthen thrust aside, a symbol in terms of whom we may poetically picture\nGod. Christ has been for his people more than a transparent pane,\nitself almost forgettable, through which the divine light shone. His\npersonality has been central and dominant, and when his disciples have\nmost vividly expressed the meaning of their faith they have said that\nthey believed in him. The first Christians whose experience is\nenshrined in the New Testament did not deal with faith in God alone.\nThey adored Jesus; they were illimitably thankful to him; they\nrejoiced to call themselves his bondservants and to suffer for him;\nthey claimed him as a brother, but they acknowledged him their Lord as\nwell; and they bowed before him with inexpressible devotion. \"They all\nset him in the same incomparable place. They all acknowledged to him\nthe same immeasurable debt.\"\n\nOne need not read far in the New Testament to see why these first\ndisciples so adored their Lord. He was their Savior. They called him\nby many other names--Messiah, _Logos_, Son of Man, and Son of God--in\ntheir endeavor to do justice to his work and character, but one name\nshines among all the rest and swings them about it like planets round\na sun. He is the Savior. From the annunciation to Joseph, \"Thou shalt\ncall his name Jesus; for it is he that shall save his people from\ntheir sins\" (Matt. 1:21), to the New Song of the Apocalypse (Rev.\n5:5-13), the New Testament is written around the central theme of\nsaviorhood. These first disciples were vividly aware of an abysmal\nneed, which had been met in Christ, a great peril from which through\nhim they had escaped; and throughout the New Testament one never loses\nthe accent of astonished gratitude, from folk who were once slaves and\nnow are free, who from victims have been turned to victors. When\nWilberforce's long campaign for the freeing of British slaves was at\nits climax, the population of Jamaica lined the shore for days\nawaiting the ship that should bring news of Parliament's decision. And\nwhen from a boat's prow the messenger cried \"Freedom,\" the island\nrang with the thanksgiving of the liberated. Such rejoicing one hears\nin the New Testament. The disciples speak of the freedom wherewith\nChrist has set them free (Gal. 5:1); they say that they were dead and\nnow are made alive (Rom. 6:11-13); once overwhelmed by sin, they now\ncry, \"More than conquerors\" (Rom. 8:37). Nor have they any doubt who\nis the agent or what is the agency of their salvation: Christ is the\nSavior and faith the means. \"This is the victory that hath overcome\nthe world,\" they cry, \"even our faith\" (I John 5:4).\n\nIf we are to understand this attitude of the first disciples toward\nChrist the Savior, _we must appreciate as they did the peril from\nwhich he rescued them_. One cannot understand the meaning of any\ncharacter who, like Moses, delivered a people from their bondage,\nunless he deeply feels the importance of the problem to whose solution\nthe man contributed. Moses shines out against the background of a\nnation's trouble like a star against the midnight sky. When the\nblackness of the night is gone, the star has vanished, too. The race's\ndeliverers never can retain their brightness in our gratitude unless\nwe keep alive in our remembrance the evil against which they fought.\nIf we would know Moses, we must know Pharaoh; if we would know\nWellington, we must know Napoleon. If we are to value truly the great\neducators, we must estimate aright the blight that ignorance lays on\nhuman life. John Howard will be nothing to us, if we do not know the\nancient prison system in comparison with which even our modern jails\nare paradise; and Florence Nightingale will be an empty name, if we\ncannot imagine the terrors of war without a nurse. Always we must see\nthe stars against the night.\n\nNor is there any other way in which a Christian can keep alive a vital\nunderstanding of his Lord. Many modern Christians seem to have lost\nvision of the problem that Jesus came to solve, of the human peril to\nwhose conquest he made the supreme contribution. They think that the\nChurch has adored Jesus because of a metaphysical theory about him,\nbut all theories concerning Christ have arisen from a previous\ndevotion to him. Or they think that Jesus is adored because he was so\nuniquely beautiful in character. But while without this his people\nnever would have called him Lord, not on this account chiefly have\nthey looked on him with inexpressible devotion. No one can understand\nthe Christian attitude toward Jesus except in terms of the bondage\nfrom which he came to rescue us. There is a human cry that makes his\nadvent meaningful; it is like the night behind the star of Bethlehem.\nLong ago a Psalmist heard that cry and every age and land and soul has\nechoed it, \"My sins are mightier than I\" (Psalm 65:3).[7]\n\n\nII\n\nThe peril of sin as the innermost problem of human life is in these\ndays obscure to many minds. For one thing, sin has been so\ncontinuously preached about, that it seems to some an ecclesiastical\nquestion, fit for discussion, it may be, in a church on Sunday, but\notherwise not often emerging in ordinary thought. But sin is no\nspecialty of preaching. If a man, forgetting churches and sermons,\nseriously ponders human life as he knows it actually to be, if he\ngathers up in his imagination the deepest heartaches of the race, its\nworst diseases, its most hopeless miseries, its ruined childhood, its\ndissevered families, its fallen states, its devastated continents, he\nsoon will see that the major cause of all this can be spelled with\nthree letters--sin. To make vivid this peril as the very crux of\nhumanity's problem on the earth, one needs at times to leave behind\nthe customary thoughts and phrases of religion and to seek testimony\nfrom sources that the Church frequently forgets. When governments try\nto build social states where equity and happiness shall reign, their\nprison systems, their criminal codes, their courts of law loudly\nadvertise that their problem lies in sin. When jurists plan leagues of\nnations and sign covenants to make the world a more fraternal place,\nonly to find greed, hate, and cruelty demolishing their well-laid\nschemes, their failure uncovers the crucial problem of man's sin. When\nphilanthropists try to lift from man's bent back the burdens that\noppress him, it becomes plain how infinitely their task would be\nlightened, if it were not for sin. As for literature--where the seers,\nregardless of religious prejudice, have tried to see into the human\nheart and truly to report their insights--its witness is overwhelming\nas to what man's problem is. No great book of creative literature was\never written without sin at the center. Macbeth, Hamlet, Othello,\nFaust, Les Mis\u00e9rables, Romola, The Scarlet Letter--let the list be\nextended in any direction and to any length! Always the insight of the\ncreative seers reports one inner peril of the race. Sin is no bogey\nerected by the theologians, no ghost imagined by minds grown morbid\nwith the fear of God. Sin to every seeing eye is the one most real and\npractical problem of mankind.\n\nFor another reason this crucial problem is dimly seen by many minds:\nwe do not often use the word about ourselves. The hardest thing that\nany man can ever say is \"I have sinned.\" We make mistakes, we have\nfoibles of character and conduct, we even fall into error--but we do\nnot often sin. By such devices we avoid the painful consciousness of\nour inward malady and even the name of our disease is banished from\ndecorous speech. But sin does not go into exile with its name. Sin has\nmany aliases and can swiftly shift its guise to gain a welcome into\nany company.\n\nSin in the slums is gross and terrible. It staggers down the streets,\nblasphemes with oaths that can be heard, wallows in vice unmentionable\nby modest lips. Then some day prosperity may visit it. It moves to a\nfiner residence, seeks the suburbs, or finds domicile on a college\ncampus. It changes all its clothes. No longer is it indecent and\nobscene. Its speech is mild, its civility is irreproachable. It gathers\na company of friends who minister to pleasure and respectability,\nand the cry of the world's need dies unheard at its peaceful door. It\npresses its face continually through the pickets of social allowance,\nlike a bad boy who wishes to trespass on forbidden ground but fears\nthe consequence. Its goodness is superficial seeming; at heart it is\nas bad as it dares to be. It has completely changed its garments, but\nit is the same sin--indulgent, selfish, and unclean. Sin, as anyone\ncan easily observe, takes a very high polish.\n\nNeither by calling sin an ecclesiastical concern nor by covering its\npresence in ourselves with pleasant euphemisms can we hide its deadly\nbane in human life. The truth and import of this negative statement\nbecome clear and convincing when its positive counterpart is faced.\nThe world needs _goodness_. The one thing in which mankind is poor and\nfor the lack of which great causes lag and noble hopes go unfulfilled\nis character. With each access of that humanity leaps forward; with\nthe sag of that all else is failure. And the one name for every loss\nand lack and ruin of character is sin. That is our enemy. Upon the\ndefeat of that all our dearest hopes depend, and in its victory every\ndream of good that the race has cherished comes to an end.\n\n\nIII\n\nThe urgency of this truth is manifest when we note the consequence of\nsin in our own lives. No statement from antiquity has accumulated more\nconfirming evidence in the course of the centuries than the Psalmist's\ncry, \"My sins are mightier than I.\" Let us consider its truth in the\nlight of our experience.\n\nOur sins are stronger than we are _in their power to fasten on us a\nsense of guilt that we cannot shake off_. Sinful pleasures lure us\nonly in _anticipation_, dancing before us like Salome before her\nuncle, quite irresistible in fascination. Happiness seems altogether\nto depend upon an evil deed. But on the day that deed, long held in\nalluring expectation, is actually done--how swift and terrible the\nalteration in its aspect! It passes from anticipation, through\ncommittal, into memory, and it never will be beautiful again. We lock\nit in remembrance, as in the bloody room of Bluebeard's palace, where\nthe dead things hung; at the thought of it we shrink and yet to it our\nreminiscence continually is drawn. Something happens in us as\nautomatic as the dropping of a loosened apple from a tree; all the\nlaws of the moral universe conspire to further it and we have no power\nto prevent: sin becomes guilt. When on a lonely ocean the floating\nbell-buoys toll, no human hands cause them to ring; the waste of an\nunpeopled ocean surrounds them everyway. The sea by its own\nrestlessness is ringing its own bells. So tolls remorse in a man's\nheart and no man can stop it.\n\nOur sins are stronger than we are _in their power to become habitual_.\nIf one who steps from an upper window had only the single act to\nconsider, his problem would be simple. He could step or not as he\nchose. But when one steps from an upper window he finds himself\ndealing with a power over which his will has no control. Master of his\nsingle act, he is not master of the _gravitation_ that succeeds it.\nMany a youth blithely plays with sin, supposing that separate\ndeeds--which he may do or refrain from as he will--make up the\nproblem. Soon or late he finds that he is dealing with moral laws,\nbuilt into the structure of the universe as gravitation is--laws\nwhich he did not create and whose operation he cannot control. By them\nwith terrific certainty thoughts grow to deeds, deeds to habits,\nhabits to character, character to destiny.\n\nAt the beginning sin always comes disguised as liberty. Its lure is\nthe seductive freedom which it promises from the trammels of\nconscience and the authority of law. But every man who ever yet\naccepted sin's offer of a free, unfettered life, discovered the cheat.\nFree to do the evil thing, to indulge the baser moods--so men begin,\nbut they end _not free to stop_, bound as slaves to the thing\nthat they were free to do. They have been at liberty to play with a\ncuttle-fish, and now that the first long arm with its suckers grasps\nthem, and the second arm is waving near, they are not at liberty to\nget away.\n\nOur sins are mightier than we are _in their power to make us tempt our\nfellows_. When we picture our sinfulness, even to ourselves, we\nnaturally represent our lives assailed by the allurements of evil and\npassively surrendering. We are the tempted; we pity ourselves because\nthe outward pressure was too strong for the inward braces. We forget\nthat in sin we are not simply the passive subjects of temptation; sin\nalways makes us active tempters of our fellows. No drug fiend ever is\ncontent until he wins a comrade in his vice; a thief would have his\nfriends steal, too; a gossip is not satisfied until other lips are\ntearing reputations into shreds; and vindictiveness is happiest when\nother hearts as well are lighted with lurid tempers. Sin always is\ncontagious as disease is; the tempted becomes tempter on the instant\nthat he falls. Peter weak, lures Jesus to his weakness, and the Master\nrecognizes the active quality of his disciple's sin; \"Get thee behind\nme, Satan!\" (Matt. 16:23). Sin satanizes men and sends them out to\nseduce their fellows. When, therefore, a sensitive man repents of his\nevil, he abhors himself--not mildly as a victim, but profoundly as a\nvictimizer. He repents of the way he has played Satan to others,\nsometimes deliberately, sometimes by the unconscious influence of an\nunworthy spirit. He remembers the times when his words have poisoned\nthe atmosphere which others breathed, when his tempers have conjured\nup evil spirits in other hearts, when his attitude has made wrongdoing\neasy for his friends and family, and well-doing hard. And his\ndesperate helplessness in the face of sin is made most evident when he\nrecalls the irrecoverable injury which lives have suffered and are\nsuffering, hurt, perhaps ruined, by his evil.\n\n_Our sins are mightier than we are in their power to bring their\nnatural consequences upon other lives._ The landlord, of whom\nPresident Hyde has told, who without disinfection rented to a new\nfamily an apartment where a perilous disease had been, is typical of\nevery evil-doer. When the only child of the incoming family fell sick\nof the disease and died, and the landlord was faced with his guilt, he\npleaded his unwillingness to spend the money which the disinfection\nwould have cost. He denied his Lord for ten dollars. Let the law\npunish him as it can, the crux of his moral problem lies in the fact\nthat however much he may be sorry now, he never can bear all the\nconsequences of his sin. Somewhere there is a childless home bearing\npart of the result of his iniquity. One who had done a deed like that\nmight well crave death and oblivion. But everyone who ever sinned is\nin that estate. No man ever succeeded in building around his evil a\nwall high and thick enough to contain all evil's consequences. They\nalways flow over and seep through; they fall in cruel disaster on\nthose who love us best. One never estimates his sin aright until he\nsees that no man ever bears all the results of his own evil. Always\nour sins nail somebody else to a cross; they even \"crucify ... the Son\nof God afresh\" (Heb. 6:6).\n\nSuch is the meaning of the peril against whose background the New\nTestament believers saw the luminous figure of the Savior. Sin brings\nmen into the debt of a great guilt which they cannot pay and into the\nbondage of tyrannous habits which they cannot break; it makes men\ntempting satans to their fellows, and it hurls its results like\nvitriol across the faces of their family and friends. And when one\nlooks on the lamentable evils of the world at large, its sad\ninequities, its furious wars, he sees no need to deal delicately with\nsin or to speak of it in apologetic tones. Sin is, as the New\nTestament saw it, the central problem of mankind. If anyone has ever\ncome with the supreme contribution to its conquest, the face of the\nworld may well be turned toward him today. In the Christian's faith,\nsuch a Savior has come. For if the visitor from Mars who so often has\nbeen imagined coming to earth, should come again, and amazed at the\nchurches built, the anthems sung, the service wrought in Jesus' name,\nshould curiously inquire what this character had done to awaken such\nresponse, we should have to answer: Jesus of Nazareth made no direct\ncontribution to science or art or government or law--with none of\nthese important realms did he concern himself. Only one thing he did:\n_he made the indispensable contribution to man's fight for great\ncharacter against sin_. And because that is man's crucial problem, all\nscience, art, government, and law are under an unpayable indebtedness\nto him. Because that is man's innermost need, his birthday has become\nthe hinge of history, until one cannot write a letter to his friend\nwithout dating his familiar act from the advent of him who came to\nsave us in our struggle for godliness against evil.\n\n\nIV\n\nFaith in Christ has a double relationship with the problem of man's\nsin; it concerns _the basis on which we are to be judged and the\nstrength by which we are to conquer_. Christ has brought to men a\ngospel of forgiveness and power. With regard to the first--and with\nthe first alone this chapter is concerned--the opinion of many modern\nmen is swift and summary: folk are to be judged by what they do; the\noutput of a man, as of a machine, is the test of him. Until this\npopular method of judgment is convicted of inadequacy, there is no\nhope of understanding what Christians have meant by being \"saved\nthrough faith\" (Eph. 2:8). We must see that men are worth more than\nthey _do_.\n\nA man's deeds alone are an insufficient basis for judgment, because\n_motives for the same act may be low or high_. No one can be\nunaware of the Master's meaning when he speaks of those who do their\nalms before men to be seen of them (Matt. 6:1ff), or of Paul's when he\nsays, \"If I bestow all my goods to feed the poor ... but have not\nlove\" (I Cor. 13:3). Some men habitually shine to good advantage by\nsuch means; they have the facile gift of putting their best foot\nforward. Like a store at Christmas time, its finest goods in the\nwindow and inferior stock for sale upon the counters, they are\ninfinitely skilful in gaining more credit than their worth deserves.\nOne who has dealt with such folk becomes aware that to estimate an\nisolated deed is superficial; one must know the motive. A cup of cold\nwater or a widow's penny may awake the Master's spirited approval, and\nmillions rung into the temple treasury by showy Pharisees meet only\nscorn.\n\nDeeds alone are an insufficient basis for judgment because, while we\nare more than body, _our bodies are the instruments of all that\nvisibly we do_. Many a man in spirit is like a swift mill race,\neager for service, but the flesh, a battered mill wheel, ill sustains\nthe spirit's vehemence; it breaks before the shock. One must shut the\ngates and patch up the wheel, before the spirit, impatient for\nutterance, may have its way again; and some mill-wheels never can be\nmended. Says one of Robert Louis Stevenson's biographers: \"When a\ntemporary illness lays him on his back, he writes in bed one of his\nmost careful and thoughtful papers, the discourse on 'The Technical\nElements in Style.' When ophthalmia confines him to a darkened room,\nhe writes by the diminished light. When after hemorrhage, his right\nhand has to be held in a sling, he writes some of his 'Child's Garden'\nwith his left hand. When the hemorrhage has been so bad that he dare\nnot speak, he dictates a novel in the deaf and dumb alphabet.\" When\none has lived with handicapped folk, discerning behind the small\namount of work the infinite willingness for more, and in the work done\na quality that makes quantity seem negligible, he perceives that deeds\nare no sufficient measure of spiritual value. Only an eye that pierces\nbehind the unwrought work to the _man_, willing while the flesh\nwas weak, can ever estimate how much some spirits are worth.\n\nDeeds alone are an insufficient basis for judgment because _men face\nunequal opportunities_. Some start with one talent, some with ten.\nThe cherished son of a Christian family ought to live a decent life;\nhow favorable his chance! But if a vagrant wharf-rat by some\nmysterious vision of decency and determination of character makes a\nman of himself, how much more his credit! The worth of goodness cannot\nbe estimated without knowledge of the struggle which it cost. When one\nconsiders the smug, conventional respectability of some, possessing\nevery favorable help to goodness, and the rough but genuine integrity\nof others who have fought a great fight against crippling handicaps to\ncharacter, he sees why, in any righteous judgment, the last will be\nfirst, as Jesus said, and the first last. Only God, with power to\nunderstand what heredity and circumstance some men have faced, what\nenticements they have met, what a fight they have really waged even\nwhen they may have seemed to fail, can tell how much they are worth.\n\n  \"What's done we partly may compute,\n  But know not what's resisted.\"\n\nJudgment based on deeds alone can never truly estimate a man, because\nin every important decision of our lives an _\"unpublished self\"\nfinds no expression in our outward act_. Duty is not always clear;\nat times it seems a labyrinth without a clue. Perplexed, we balance in\nlong deliberation the opposing reasons for this act or that, until,\nforced to choose, we obtain only a majority vote for the decision. Yet\nthat uncertain majority alone is published in our deed; man's eyes\nnever see the unexpressed protestant minority behind. And when the\nchoice proves wrong, and friends are grieved and enemies condemn and\nwhat we did is hateful to ourselves, only one who knows how much we\nwanted to do right, and who accounts not only the published but the\nunpublished self can truly estimate our worth. Peter, who denied his\nLord, it may be because he wanted the privilege of being near him at\nthe trial, is not the only one who has appealed from the outward\naspect of his deed to the inner intention of his heart: \"Lord, thou\nknowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee\" (John 21:17).\n\nMoreover, even when we choose aright, _no deed can ever gather into\nutterance all that is best and deepest in us_. A mother's love is\nas much greater than any word she speaks or act she does, as the\nsunshine is greater than the focused point where in a burning glass we\ngather a ray of it. We are infinitely more than words can utter or\ndeeds express. No adequate judgment, therefore, can rest on deeds\nalone. A machine may be estimated by its output, but a man is too\nsubtle and profound, his motives and purposes too inexpressible, his\ntemptations and inward struggles too intimate and unrevealed, his\npossibilities too great to be roughly estimated by his acts alone.\n\n      \"Not on the vulgar mass\n      Called 'work' must sentence pass,\n  Things done, that took the eye and had the price;\n      O'er which, from level stand,\n      The low world laid its hand,\n  Found straightway to its mind, could value in a trice:\n\n      But all, the world's coarse thumb\n      And finger failed to plumb,\n  So passed in making up the main account;\n      All instincts immature,\n      All purposes unsure,\n  That weighed not as his work, yet swelled the man's amount:\n\n      Thoughts hardly to be packed\n      Into a narrow act,\n  Fancies that broke through language and escaped;\n      All I could never be,\n      All, men ignored in me,\n  This, I was worth to God, whose wheel the pitcher shaped.\"\n\n\nV\n\nIf, however, we are to understand the Christian's meaning when he\nspeaks of being saved by faith (Rom. 3:28; 5:1; Gal. 3:24), we need to\nsee not only that men are worth more than they _do_, but as well that\nthey are worth more than they _are_. Some things always start large\nand grow small; some things always start small and grow large; but a\nman may do either, and his value is determined not so much by the\nposition he is in, as it is by the direction in which he is moving.\nEven of stocks upon the market in their rise and fall this truth is\nclear. The figure at which a stock is quoted is important, but the\nmeaning of that figure cannot be understood unless one knows whether\nit was reached on the way up or the way down. How much more is any\nstatic judgment of a man impossible! One starts at the summit, with\nendowments and opportunities that elevate him far above his fellows,\nand frittering away his chance, drifts down. Another, beginning at the\nbottom, by dint of resolute endeavor climbs upward, achieving\ncharacter in the face of odds before which ordinary men succumb.\nSomewhere these two men will pass, and, statically judged, will be of\nequal worth. But one is drifting down; one climbing up. The innermost\nsecret of their spiritual value lies in that hidden fact. _When,\ntherefore, one would judge a man, he must pierce behind the deeds that\nhe can see, behind the present quality that he can estimate, back to\nthe thing the man has set his heart upon, to the direction of his\nlife, to the ideal which masters him--that is, to his faith._ There\nlies the potential future of the man, his ultimate worth, the seed of\nhis coming fruit. If one has eyes to see what that faith is, he knows\nthe man and what the man is bound to be.\n\nWhen, therefore, men set their hearts on Christ, lay hold on him by\nfaith as life's Master and its goal, that faith opens the door to\nGod's forgiveness. In Augustine's luminous phrase, \"The Christian\nalready has in Christ what he hopes for in himself.\" He is Christ's\nbrother in the filial life with God, young, immature, undeveloped--but\nthe issue of that life is the measure of the stature of Christ's\nfulness. God does not demand the end when only the beginning is\npossible, does not scorn the dawn because it is not noon. He welcomes\nthe first movement of man's spirit toward him, not for the fruit which\nyet is unmatured, but for the seed which still is in the germ; he\ntakes the will for the deed, because the will is earnest; he sees the\njourney's end in Christlike character, when at the road's beginning\nthe pilgrim takes the first step by faith. There is no fiction here;\nGod ought to forgive and welcome such a man. All good parents act so\ntoward their children. This divine grace corresponds with truth, for a\nman is _worth_ the central, dominant faith, that determines\nlife's direction and decides its goal. And the Gospel that God so\ndeals with man, announced in the words of Jesus, illustrated in his\nlife, sealed in his death, has been a boon to the race that puts all\nmen under an immeasurable debt to Christ.\n\n\nVI\n\nThis method of judgment which all good men use with their friends and\nfamilies has been often disbelieved, in its Christian formulations,\nbecause it has been misrepresented and misunderstood. But human life,\nfar outside religious boundaries, continually illustrates the wisdom\nand righteousness of so judging men by faith. Roswell McIntyre\ndeserted during the Civil War; he was caught, court-martialled, and\ncondemned to death. He stood with no defense for his deed, no just\ncomplaint against the penalty, and with nothing to plead save shame\nfor his act, and faith that, with another chance, he could play the\nman. On that, the last recourse of the condemned, President Lincoln\npardoned him.\n\n \"EXECUTIVE MANSION,\n Oct. 4, 1864.\n\n Upon condition that Roswell McIntyre of Co. E, 6th Reg't of New York\n Cavalry, returns to his Regiment and faithfully serves out his term,\n making up for lost time, or until otherwise discharged, he is fully\n pardoned for any supposed desertion heretofore committed, and this\n paper is his pass to go to his regiment.\n\n ABRAHAM LINCOLN.\"\n\nWas such clemency an occasion for lax character? The answer is written\nacross the face of Mr. Lincoln's letter in the archives: \"Taken from\nthe body of R. McIntyre at the Battle of Five Forks, Va., 1865.\" Five\nForks was the last cavalry action of the war; McIntyre went through to\nthe finish.\n\nAny one who knows the experience of being forgiven understands the\nmotives that so remake a pardoned deserter. The relief from the old\ncrushing condemnation, the joy of being trusted again beyond desert,\nthe gratitude that makes men rather die than be untrue a second time,\nthe unpayable indebtedness from which ambition springs, \"whether at\nhome or absent, to be well-pleasing unto him\" (II Cor. 5:9)--this is\nthe moral consequence of being pardoned. Goodness so begotten reaches\ndeep and high, has in it conscious joy and hope, feels vividly the\nvalue of its moral victories, possesses great motives for sacrificial\nservice in the world. The Apocalypse is right. There is a song in\nheaven that angels cannot sing. Only men like McIntyre will know how\nto sing it.\n\nThe vital and transforming faith that saves is always better presented\nin a story than in an argument, and in the Scripture the best\ndescription of it is Jesus' parable of the Prodigal. As the Master\ndrew that portrait of life in the far country, all the watching\nPharisees thought that such a boy was lost. The Prodigal himself must\nhave guessed that his case was hopeless. His friends, his character,\nhis reputation, his will were gone, and in the inner court-room of his\nsoul with maddening iteration he heard sentence passed, Guilty. Only\none hope remained. If he was unspoiled enough by the far country's\npitiless brutality to think that at home they might bear no grudge,\nmight find forgiveness possible, might offer him another chance as a\nhired servant, if he could think that perhaps his father even _wanted_\nhim to come home, then there was hope. With such slender faith the boy\nturned back from the far country. He had the same lack of character,\nthe same weakened will, the same evil habits. Only one difference had\nas yet been wrought. Before, he had been facing toward swine, now he\nwas facing toward home. The _direction_ of his life was changed by\nfaith. And when the father saw him, homeward bound, \"_while he was yet\nafar off,_\" forgiveness welcomed him. No pardon could unload from the\nlad's life all the fearful consequences of his sin. As long as he\nlived, the scars on health, repute, and usefulness were there. But\nforgiveness could take the sin away _as a barrier to personal\nfriendship with the father_; the old relationships of mutual\nconfidence, helpfulness, and love could be restored; the glorious\nchance could be bestowed of fighting through the battle for character,\nnot hopelessly in the far country, but victoriously at home.\n\nOne of the chief glories of the Gospel is that it has so reclaimed the\nwaste of humanity, made sons of Prodigals and patriots of McIntyres.\nIts Pauls were persecutors, its Augustines the slaves of lust, and its\nrank and file men and women to whom Christ's message has meant\nforgiveness, reinstatement, a new chance, and boundless hope.\nScientific business conserves its waste and makes invaluable\nby-products from what once was slag; but Christ has been the conserver\nof mankind. The lost and sick have been returned to sanity and\nwholesomeness and service; humanity has been enriched beyond\ncomputation, with Bunyans and Goughs and Jerry McAuleys. Tolstoi's\nsimple confession in \"My Religion\" is typical of multitudes: \"Five\nyears ago I came to believe in Christ's teaching, and my life suddenly\nbecame changed: I ceased desiring what I had wished before, and began\nto desire what I had not wished before. What formerly had seemed good\nto me appeared bad, and what had seemed bad appeared good.... The\ndirection of my life, my desires became different: what was good and\nbad changed places.\" Tolstoi had indulged, as he acknowledges, in\nevery form of unmentionable vice practiced in Russia; and yet\nforgiven, reinstated, transformed, he was carried to his burial by\ninnumerable Russian peasants with banners flying. Where Christ's\ninfluence has vitally come, the loss and wreck and flotsam of the\nmoral world have been so reclaimed to character and power.\n\nAt the beginning of the Christian era, a few desolate sand lagoons lay\noff the Paduan coast of Italy. There the wild fowl made their nests;\nthe lonely skiffs of fishermen threaded the reedy channels; the storms\nwashed the shifting and uncertain sands. And possibly to this day the\nlagoons would have been thus barren and deserted, had not the Huns\nswept down on Italy. The Huns made the building of Venice necessary.\nThey did not intend so fair a consequence of their terrific\nonslaughts. Their thoughts were on death and pillage. But because they\ncame, the Italians fled to the lagoons, built there, behind the\nbarricade of restless waters, their gleaming city, developed there the\ncommerce that combed the world, built the Doge's palace as the abode\nof justice, and raised St. Mark's in praise of God. Venice was the\ncity of Salvation; it rose resplendent because the Huns had come. So\nChrist turns the ruin of sin to victory, and builds in human life\ncharacter, recovered and triumphant. If his Gospel can have its way, a\nspiritual Venice will arise to make the onslaught of the moral Huns an\nevil with a glorious issue. What wonder that inexpressible devotion\nhas been felt for him by all his people?\n\n[7] \"Iniquities prevail against me.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\nFaith in Christ the Savior: Power\n\n\nDAILY READINGS\n\nAs we saw in the last week's study, Christian faith has always\ncentered around the person of Jesus himself. This week let us consider\nsome testimonies from the New Testament as to the meaning and effect\nof this definitely Christian faith.\n\n\nEleventh Week, First Day\n\nIt must be clear to any observing mind that the world does not suffer\nfrom lack of faith. There is faith in plenty; everybody is exercising\nit on some object. In the Bible we read of folk who \"trust in vanity\"\n(Isa. 59:4), who \"trust in lying words\" (Jer. 7:4), or \"in the\nabundance of riches\" (Psalm 52:7); and the Master exclaims over the\ndifficulty which those who \"trust in riches\" have when they try to\nenter the Kingdom of God (Mark 10:24). Faith, then, is a necessary\nfaculty of the soul: the power by which we commit ourselves to any\nobject that wins our devotion and commands our allegiance. No man\navoids its use, and men differ only in the objects toward which their\nfaith is directed. Of all the tragedies caused by the misuse of human\npowers, none is more frequent and disastrous than the ruin that\nfollows the misuse of faith. With this necessary and powerful faculty\nin our possession, capable of use on things high or low, to what\ndetermination can a man more reasonably set himself than this?--_since\nI must and do use faith on something, I will choose the highest_. It\nis with such a rational and worthy choice that the Christian turns to\nJesus. He is the best we know; we will direct our faith toward him.\nThis does not mean that in the end our faith does not rest on God; it\ndoes, for Jesus is the Way, the Door, as he said, and faith in him\nmoves up through him to the One who sent him. As Paul put it, \"Such\nconfidence have we through Christ to God-ward\" (II Cor. 3:4). But\nfaith in Jesus is the most vivid, true, and compelling way we have of\ncommitting ourselves to the highest and best we know. In the light of\nthis truth, we can understand why John calls such faith the supreme\n\"work\" which God demands of us.\n\n =Work not for the food which perisheth, but for the food which\n abideth unto eternal life, which the Son of man shall give unto you:\n for him the Father, even God, hath sealed. They said therefore unto\n him, What must we do, that we may work the works of God? Jesus\n answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe\n on him whom he hath sent.--John 6:27-29.=\n\n _Gracious Father! Thou hast revealed Thyself gloriously in Jesus\n Christ, the Son of Thy love. In Him we have found Thee, or rather,\n are found of Thee. By His life, by His words and deeds, by His trials\n and sufferings, we are cleansed from sin and rise into holiness. For\n in Him Thou hast made disclosure of Thine inmost being and art\n drawing us into fellowship with Thy life. As we stand beneath His\n Cross, or pass with Him into the Garden of His Agony, it is Thy heart\n that we see unveiled, it is the passion of Thy love yearning over the\n sinful, the wandering, seeking that it may save them. No man hath\n seen Thee at any time, but out from the unknown has come the Son of\n Man to declare Thee. And now we know Thy name. When we call Thee\n Father, the mysteries of existence are not so terrible, our burdens\n weigh less heavily upon us, our sorrows are touched with joy. Thy Son\n has brought the comfort that we need, the comfort of knowing that in\n all our afflictions Thou art afflicted, that in Thy grief our lesser\n griefs are all contained. Let the light which shines in His face,\n shine into our hearts, to give us the knowledge of Thy glory, to\n scatter the darkness of fear, of wrong, of remorse, of foreboding,\n and to constrain our lives to finer issues of peace and power and\n spiritual service. And this prayer we offer in Christ's name.\n Amen._--Samuel McComb.\n\n\nEleventh Week, Second Day\n\nThe New Testament clearly reveals the experience that _forgiveness_\ncomes in answer to such self-committing faith in Christ as we spoke of\nyesterday.\n\n =And he said unto her, Thy sins are forgiven. And they that sat at\n meat with him began to say within themselves, Who is this that even\n forgiveth sins? And he said unto the woman, Thy faith hath saved\n thee; go in peace.--Luke 7:48-50.=\n\nIn popular thought forgiveness is often shallowly conceived. It is\nthought to be an easy agreement to forget offense, a good-natured\nwaving aside of injuries committed as though the evil done were of no\nconsequence. But forgiveness is really a most profound and searching\nexperience; and it takes two persons, each sacrificially desirous of\nachieving it, before it can be perfected. In the pardoner, the passion\nfor saviorhood must submerge all disgust at the sin in love for the\nsinner; and in the pardoned, desire for a new life must create\nsacrificial willingness to hate and forsake the evil and humbly accept\na new chance. It follows, therefore, that no one can forgive another,\nno matter how willing he may be to do so, unless the recipient fulfils\nthe conditions that make pardon possible. Forgiveness is a mutual\noperation; no forgetting or good will on the part of one person is\nforgiveness at all; and the attitude in the forgiven man that makes\nthe reception of pardon possible is negatively penitence and\npositively faith. Any experience of human forgiveness reveals that the\noffender must detest his sin and turn from it in trust and\nself-commitment to claim the mercy and choose the ideals of the one\nwhom he has wronged. That God in Christ is willing to forgive is the\nChristian Gospel; and if we go unforgiven it is for lack of faith.\nThat is the hand which grasps the proffered pardon.\n\n _Almighty God, whose salvation is ever nigh to them that seek Thee,\n we think of our little lives, of their wayward ways, and we remember\n Thee and are troubled. Our days pass from us and we are heated with\n strifes, and troubled and restless, with mean temptations and\n fugitive desires. We spend our years in much carelessness, and too\n seldom do we think of the greatness of our trust and the wonder and\n mystery of our being. We are vexed with vain dreams and trivial\n desires. We live our days immersed in petty passions. We strain after\n poor uncertainties. We pursue the shadows of this passing life and\n continually are we visited by our own self-contempt and bitterness.\n We have known the better and have chosen the worse. We have felt the\n glory and power of a higher life and yet have surrendered to ignoble\n temptations and to satisfactions that end with the hour._\n\n _Almighty Father, of Thy goodness do Thou save our lives, so smitten\n with passion, from the failure and misery that else must come to us.\n Be with us in our hours of self-communion, and inspire us with good\n purpose and service to Thee. Be with us when heart and flesh faint,\n and there seems no help or safety near us. Be with us when we are\n carried into the dry and lonely places, seeking a rest that is not in\n them. Sustain us, we beseech Thee, under the burden of our many\n errors and failures. From the confused aims and purposes of our lives\n may there be brought forth, by the aid of Thy Spirit, and the\n teaching and discipline of life, lives constant and assured in\n service and obedience to Thee. Amen._--John Hunter.\n\n\nEleventh Week, Third Day\n\nIt is clear in the New Testament that all the _free movements of\ndivine help_ depend on the presence of man's faith. Words like these\nare continually on the lips of Jesus: \"Be of good cheer; thy faith\nhath made thee whole\" (Matt. 9:22); \"According to your faith be it\ndone unto you\" (Matt. 9:29); \"Great is thy faith: be it done unto thee\neven as thou wilt\" (Matt. 15:28). Human life as a whole confirms the\ntruth which such words suggest: _Man's faith is always the limit of\nhis blessing; he never obtains more than he believes in._ Men live in\na world of unappropriated truth and unused power; and the blessings of\ntruth and power can be reached only by ventures of faith. Even\nelectricity withholds its service from a man who, like Abdul Hamid,\nhas not faith enough to try. In personal relationships this fact\nbecomes even more clear. Whatever gifts of good will may be waiting in\nthe heart of any man, we are shut out from them forever, unless we\nhave the grace of faith in the man and open-hearted self-commitment to\nhim. As the Christian Gospel sees man's case, the central tragedy lies\nhere: that God in Christ is willing to do so much more in and for and\nthrough us than we have faith enough to let him do. Our unbelief is\nnot a matter of theoretical concern alone; it practically disables\nGod, it handicaps his operation in the world, it is an \"evil heart of\nunbelief, in falling away from the living God\" (Heb. 3:12). The\ndivine will is forced to wait upon the lagging faith of man. How often\nthe Master exclaimed, \"O ye of little faith!\" (Matt. 6:30; 8:26). And\nthe reason for his lament was eminently practical.\n\n =And coming into his own country he taught them in their synagogue,\n insomuch that they were astonished, and said, Whence hath this man\n this wisdom, and these mighty works? Is not this the carpenter's son?\n is not his mother called Mary? and his brethren, James, and Joseph,\n and Simon, and Judas? And his sisters, are they not all with us?\n Whence then hath this man all these things? And they were offended in\n him. But Jesus said unto them, A prophet is not without honor, save\n in his own country, and in his own house. And he did not many mighty\n works there because of their unbelief.--Matt. 13:54-58.=\n\n _Almighty God, our Heavenly Father, we desire to come to Thee in all\n humility and sincerity. We are sinful; pardon Thou us. We are\n ignorant; enlighten Thou our darkness. We are weak; inspire us with\n strength. In these times of doubt, uncertainty, and trial, may we\n ever feel conscious of Thine everlasting light. Soul of our soul!\n Inmost Light of truth! Manifest Thyself unto us amid all shadows.\n Guide us in faith, hope, and love, until the perfect day shall dawn,\n and we shall know as we are known._\n\n _Almighty God, teach us, we pray Thee, by blessed experience, to\n apprehend what was meant of old when Jesus Christ was called the\n power of God unto salvation, for we stand in need of salvation from\n sin, from doubt, from weakness, from craven fear; we cannot save\n ourselves; we are creatures of a day, short-sighted, and too often\n driven about by every wind of passion and opinion. We need to be\n stayed upon a higher strength. We need to lay hold of Thee. Manifest\n Thyself unto us, our Father, as the Saviour of our souls, and deliver\n us from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the\n children of God. Amen._--John Hunter.\n\n\nEleventh Week, Fourth Day\n\nNot only is man's power to appropriate the divine blessing dependent\non faith; in the experience of the New Testament man's power of\nachievement has the same source.\n\n =Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, Why could not we\n cast it out? And he saith unto them, Because of your little faith:\n for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard\n seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place;\n and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you.--Matt.\n 17:19, 20.=\n\nMountains are symbols of difficulty, and the Master's affirmation here\nthat faith alone can remove them is clearly confirmed in human\nexperience. It may seem at times as though faith, compared with the\nobstacles, were like a minute mustard seed before the ranges of\nLebanon, but faith can overcome even that disproportion in size. Great\nleaders always must have such confidence. Listen to Mazzini: \"The\npeople lack faith ... the faith that arouses the multitudes, faith in\ntheir own destiny, in their own mission, and in the mission of the\nepoch; the faith that combats and prays; the faith that enlightens and\nbids men advance fearlessly in the ways of God and humanity, with the\nsword of the people in their hand, the religion of the people in their\nheart, and the future of the people in their soul.\" In any great\nmovement for human good, the ultimate and deciding question always is:\nHow many people can be found who have faith enough to believe in the\ncause and its triumph? When enough folk have faith, any campaign for\nhuman welfare can be won. Without faith men \"collapse into a yielding\nmass of plaintiveness and fear\"; with faith they move mountains. And\nwhen men have faith in Christ as God's Revealor--faith, not formal and\nabstract, but real and vital--they begin to feel about the word\n\"impossible\" as Mirabeau did, \"Never mention to me again that\nblockhead of a word!\"\n\n _O God, our Father, our souls are made sick by the sight of hunger\n and want and nakedness; of little children bearing on their bent\n backs the burden of the world's work; of motherhood drawn under the\n grinding wheels of modern industry; and of overburdened manhood, with\n empty hands, stumbling and falling._\n\n _Help us to understand that it is not Thy purpose to do away with\n life's struggle, but that Thou desirest us to make the conditions of\n that struggle just and its results fair._\n\n _Enable us to know that we may bring this to pass only through love\n and sympathy and understanding; only as we realize that all are alike\n Thy children--the rich and the poor, the strong and the weak, the\n fortunate and the unfortunate. And so, our Father, give us an\n ever-truer sense of human sisterhood; that with patience and\n steadfastness we may do our part in ending the injustice that is in\n the land, so that all may rejoice in the fruits of their toil and be\n glad in Thy sunshine._\n\n _Keep us in hope and courage even amid the vastness of the\n undertaking and the slowness of the progress, and sustain us with the\n knowledge that our times are in Thy hand. Amen._--Helen Ring Robinson.\n\n\nEleventh Week, Fifth Day\n\nFaith in Christ has always been consummated, in the experience to\nwhich the New Testament introduces us, in an inward transformation of\nlife.\n\n =I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I that live,\n but Christ liveth in me: and that life which I now live in the flesh\n I live in faith, the faith which is in the Son of God, who loved me,\n and gave himself up for me.--Gal. 2:20.=\n\nSuch conversion of life is the normal result of a vital fellowship\nwhose bond is faith. For one thing, a man at once begins to care a\ngreat deal more about his own quality when he believes in Christ and\nin Christ's love. \"What a King stoops to pick up from the mire cannot\nbe a brass farthing, but must be a pearl of great price.\" To be loved\nby anyone is to enter into a new estimate of one's possible value; to\nbe loved by God in Christ is to come into an experience where our\npossible value makes us alike ashamed of what we are and jubilant over\nwhat we may become. We begin saying with Iren\u00e6us, \"Jesus Christ became\nwhat we are that he might make us what he is.\" And then, faith,\nripening into fellowship, opening the life sensitively to the\ninfluence of the friend, issues in a character infused by the friend's\ncharacter. He lives in us. Such transformation of life does not happen\nin a moment; it requires more than instantaneous exposure to take the\nLord's picture on a human heart; but time-exposure will do it, and\n\"Christ in us\" be alike our hope of glory and our secret of influence.\n\n _O Father Eternal, we thank Thee for the new and living way into Thy\n presence made for us in Christ; the way of trust, sincerity, and\n sacrifice. Beneath His cross we would take our stand, in communion\n with His Spirit would we pray, in fellowship with the whole Church of\n Christ we would seek to know Thy mind and will._\n\n _We desire to know all the fulness of Christ, to appropriate His\n unsearchable riches, to feed on His humanity whereby Thou hast become\n to us the bread of our inmost souls and the wine of life, to become\n partakers of Thy nature, share Thy glory, and become one with Thee\n through Him._\n\n _Give unto us fellowship with His sufferings and insight into the\n mystery of His cross, so that we may be indeed crucified with Him, be\n raised to newness of life, and be hidden with Christ in Thee._\n\n _We desire to make thankful offering of ourselves as members of the\n body of Christ; in union with all the members may we obey our unseen\n Head, so that the Body may be undivided, and Thy love, and healing\n power, and very Self may be incarnate on the earth in one Holy\n Universal Church. Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nEleventh Week, Sixth Day\n\nWith faith in Christ so seen as the secret of divine forgiveness and\nassistance, of achieving power and inward transformation, there can be\nlittle surprise at the solicitude which the New Testament shows\nconcerning the disciples' faith. We find this urgent interest in Paul:\n\n =Wherefore when we could no longer forbear, we thought it good to be\n left behind at Athens alone; and sent Timothy, our brother and God's\n minister in the gospel of Christ, to establish you, and to comfort\n you concerning your faith; ... night and day praying exceedingly that\n we may see your face, and may perfect that which is lacking in your\n faith.--I Thess. 3:1, 2, 10.=\n\n =We are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren, even as\n it is meet, for that your faith groweth exceedingly, and the love of\n each one of you all toward one another aboundeth.--II Thess. 1:3.=\n\nAnd one of the most appealing revelations of Jesus' habit in prayer\nconcerns his supplication for Peter's faith.\n\n =Simon, Simon, behold, Satan asked to have you, that he might sift\n you as wheat: but I made supplication for thee, that thy faith fail\n not; and do thou, when once thou hast turned again, establish thy\n brethren.--Luke 22:31, 32.=\n\nIn all such passages one feels at once that faith is used as Paul uses\nit in the thirteenth chapter of First Corinthians--a comrade and ally\nof hope and love. It is not a matter of dogma and does not move in the\nrealm of opinion, although ideas of the first magnitude may be\ninvolved in it. It is primarily a bond of divine fellowship, which at\nonce keeps the life receptive to all that God would do for the man and\nmoves the man to do all that he should for God. If that fails, even\nPeter would fall in ruins, and the expression is none too strong, when\nin I Timothy the failure of such vital faith is described as a\n\"shipwreck\" (I Tim. 1:19). But when by faith the consciousness of God\nhas grown clear, and alliance with him is so real that we stop arguing\nabout it and begin counting on it in daily living, the increment of\npower and confidence and stability which a man may win is quite\nincalculable.\n\n _O Thou plenteous Source of every good and perfect gift, shed abroad\n the cheering light of Thy seven-fold grace over our hearts. Yea,\n Spirit of love and gentleness, we most humbly implore Thy assistance.\n Thou knowest our faults, our failings, our necessities, the dulness\n of our understanding, the waywardness of our affections, the\n perverseness of our will. When, therefore, we neglect to practice\n what we know, visit us, we beseech Thee, with Thy grace, enlighten\n our minds, rectify our desires, correct our wanderings, and pardon\n our omissions, so that by Thy guidance we may be preserved from\n making shipwreck of faith, and keep a good conscience, and may at\n length be landed safe in the haven of eternal rest; through Jesus\n Christ our Lord. Amen._--Anselm, 1033.\n\n\nEleventh Week, Seventh Day\n\nSome who gladly acknowledge the surprising results which faith can\nwork in life, do not see any great importance in the object to which\nfaith attaches itself. They say that faith is merely a psychological\nattitude, and that faith in one thing does as well as faith in\nanother. Folk are healed, they point out, by all kinds of faith,\nwhether directed toward fetishes, or saints' relics, or metaphysical\ntheories, or God himself. It is the faith, they say, and not the\nobject, which does the work. There is a modicum of truth in this.\nFaith, by its very power to organize man's faculties and give them\ndefinite set and drive, is itself a master force, and if a man has no\ninterest beyond the achievement of some immediate end, like conquering\nnervous qualms or getting strength for a special task, he may achieve\nthat end by believing in almost anything, provided he believes hard\nenough. _But to believe in some things may debauch the intelligence\nand lower the moral standards, even while it achieves a practical\nend._ To win power for a business task by believing in a palm-reader's\npredictions is entirely possible, but it is a poor bargain; a man\nsells out his intelligence for cash. The object in which a man\nbelieves does make an immense difference in the effect of his faith on\nhis _mind_ and _character_. An African savage may gain courage for an\nordeal by believing in his fetish--but how immeasurable is the abyss\nbetween the meaning of that faith for the whole of life and the\nmeaning of a Christian's faith in God! We have no business, for the\nsake of immediate gain, to allow our faith to rest in anything lower\nthan the highest.\n\n =Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who\n according to his great mercy begat us again unto a living hope by the\n resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, unto an inheritance\n incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in\n heaven for you, who by the power of God are guarded through faith\n unto a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. Wherein ye\n greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, ye have\n been put to grief in manifold trials, that the proof of your faith,\n being more precious than gold that perisheth though it is proved by\n fire, may be found unto praise and glory and honor at the revelation\n of Jesus Christ: whom not having seen ye love; on whom, though now ye\n see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice greatly with joy unspeakable\n and full of glory: receiving the end of your faith, even the\n salvation of your souls.--I Peter 1:3-9.=\n\n _Gracious Father of our spirits, in the stillness of this worship may\n we grow more sure of Thee, who art often closest to us when we feel\n Thou hast forsaken us. The toil and thought of daily life leave us\n little time to think of Thee; but may the silence of this holy place\n make us aware that though we may forget Thee, Thou dost never forget\n us. Perhaps we have grown careless in contact with common things,\n duty has lost its high solemnities, the altar fires have gone\n untended, Thy light within our minds has been distrusted or ignored.\n As we withdraw awhile from all without, may we find Thee anew within,\n until thought grows reverent again, all work is hallowed, and faith\n reconsecrates all common things as sacraments of love._\n\n _If pride of thought and careless speculation have made us doubtful\n of Thee, recover for us the simplicity that understands Thou art\n never surer than when we doubt Thee, that through all failures of\n faith Thou becomest clearer, and so makest the light that once we\n walked by seem but darkness. Help us then to rest our faith on the\n knowledge of our imperfection, our consciousness of ignorance, our\n sense of sin, and see in them shadows cast by the light of Thy\n drawing near._\n\n _If Thy purposes have crossed our own and Thy will has broken ours,\n enable us to trust the wisdom of Thy perfect love and find Thy will\n to be our peace._\n\n _So lead us back to meet Thee where we may have missed Thee.\n Amen._--W. E. Orchard.\n\n\nCOMMENT FOR THE WEEK\n\nI\n\nThe forgiveness which the Gospel offers--reinstating a man in the\npersonal relationships against which he sinned, and giving him another\nchance--opens opportunity, but by itself it does not furnish power.\nThe saviorhood of Christ, however, so far from failing at this crucial\npoint, makes here its chief claim to preeminence. However one may\nexplain it, the normal quality of a genuine Christian life is moral\nenergy. The Gospel not alone to Paul, but to all generations of\nChrist's disciples, had been \"God's saving power for everyone who has\nfaith\" (Rom. 1:16).[8]\n\nFaith always supplies moral dynamic. Emerson's challenge, \"They can\nconquer who believe they can,\" is easily verified in daily life. In\npractical business, in social reform, in personal character, no more\ncommon or fatal barrier to success exists than disbelief in\npossibilities. While some who think they can when they cannot, prove\nthe rule by its exception, we are sure in advance that one who\nbelieves he cannot, has lost his battle before it has begun. Granted a\ntask worth doing, sufficient strength for its accomplishment, and\nmotives in plenty to make success desirable, and one insinuating enemy\ncan spoil the enterprise. Let the subtle fear that the task is\nimpossible obsess the thought, paralyze the nerve, and no hope is\nleft. Like chlorine gas, such fear defeats us before we have begun to\nfight and fills our trenches with asphyxiated powers.\n\nAnyone who is to be a savior to mankind, therefore, must be able to\nmake men say, \"I can.\" That Christ has had that influence on men is\nthe commonplace of Christian biography from the beginning until now.\n\"In him who strengthens me I am able for anything\" (Phil. 4:13)[9] is\na word of Paul's which the best Christian experience confirms. It does\nnot mean that men can do what they will, overriding all obstacles to\nchosen goals; it means that they are aware of resources in reserve, of\npower around them and in them, so that they are not afraid of anything\nwhich they may face. If a duty ought to be done, they are confident\nthat they can do it; if a trouble must be borne, they are assured that\nthey can bear it.\n\nThis buoyant faith is more than a grace of temperament. In Paul's\ncase, for example, it was not due to rugged health, for that he\nlacked; it was not the easy optimism of some happiness cult, for he\nwas a persecuted man, bearing in his body \"the marks of the Lord\nJesus\"; and such a note of assured resource as we just have quoted did\nnot come from the hopefulness of fortunate circumstance, but from a\nprison where he wore a chain. Paul himself is certain that his sense\nof power springs from discipleship to Jesus. And when one turns to the\ngospels, he sees that whenever the Master had opportunity to exert to\nthe full his influence on men, some such result as here appears in\nPaul is evident. A contagious personality always enlarges the sense of\npossibilities and powers in other men. A man, leaving Trinity Church,\nwhere he had heard Phillips Brooks, exclaimed, \"He always makes me\nfeel so strong.\" It was said that one could not stand for a moment\nwith Edmund Burke under an archway, to let a shower pass by, without\nemerging a greater man. Each one of us knows folk who so impress him.\nWe go into their presence, weak, self-pitiful; when we come out, the\nhorizons are broader, the possibilities have enlarged, there is more\nin us than we had suspected, we are convinced that we _can_.\n\nTo a degree that escapes our estimation Jesus exerted that influence\non men. Napoleon said that he made his generals out of mud. Out of\nwhat, then, did the Master make his apostles? At the beginning, Peter,\nfor example, is protesting, \"Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O\nLord,\" and Jesus is bending over him, saying: Come after me, and I\nwill make you a fisher of men; if you will, you can. After months of\ninfluence, Peter, still shamed and weak, is pleading his love against\nhis deed, and Jesus is saying: Feed my sheep; feed my lambs; if you\nwill, you can. In Jesus' relationship with his disciple, a great\npersonality stands over a lesser one, by life and word insistently\nsaying, _You can_, until power is vitally transmitted, and in the\nvacillating, vehement Simon there emerges rock-like, stable Peter.\n\nThroughout the Christian centuries nothing has been more typical than\nthis of the Master's influence on men. He has come to innumerable\nsodden lives, held slaves to tyrannous sin, saying in the hopelessness\nof bondage, \"I cannot,\" and he has touched them with his contagious\nconfidence, until they rose into freedom, saying, \"By the help of God,\nI can!\" He has come into social situations, where ancient evils, long\nentrenched and seemingly invincible, withstood the assault of\nreformation, and he has put inexhaustible resource into his people,\nuntil they said with an old reformer, \"Impossible? If that is all that\nis the matter, let us go ahead!\" He has come to his Church, reluctant\nto undertake a world-wide mission, staggered by the task's magnitude,\nand he has made men pray with _life_ and not alone with lip, \"Thy\nKingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.\" Wherever\nthe influence of Christ vitally has come, the horizons of possibility\nhave widened and the sense of power grown inexhaustible.\n\n_Such influence is of the very essence of saviorhood and the attitude\nthat appropriates it is saving faith._ When John B. Gough, desperately\nenmeshed in habit, faces the Christian Gospel of release one easily\nmay trace his changing response. Dubious at first, he wants to\nbelieve it but he does not dare. He wishes it were true, but the whole\nlogic of his situation, his long habit, his spoiled reputation, his\nweakened will, argue against the possibility. As Augustine said about\nhis lust, \"The worse that I knew so well had more power over me than\nthe better that I knew not.\" Still, a note of authority in the Gospel,\nas though spoken by one whose power to perform is equal to the thing\nhe promises, arrests Gough's mind, captures his imagination, awakens\nhis spirit's deep desire, until at last the Master's call, \"You can,\"\nis answered by the human cry, \"I will,\" and the man moves out into new\npossibilities, new powers, and increasing liberty. That _is_\nsalvation. It is no formal status decreed by legal enactment, as\nthough a judge technically acquitted a prisoner. It is new life,\ninward liberation from old habits, apprehensions, anxieties, and\nfears. It lifts horizons, consumes impossibilities, and at the center\nof life sets the stirring conviction that what ought to be done can be\ndone.\n\nChristians who are accustomed lightly to assert that they are saved\nneed specially to take this truth to heart. Some speak as though\nsalvation were a technicality and they sing about it,\n\n  \"'Tis done, the great transaction's done.\"\n\nTo many such, were candor courteous, one would wish to say: Saved?\nSaved from what? You are habitually anxious. Your life is continually\nvexed with little fears and apprehensions. When trouble comes, you are\nsure that you cannot stand it; when tasks present themselves, you are\ncertain that you cannot perform them. You have pet self-indulgences,\nfrom major sins to little meannesses; you know that they are wrong;\nbut when suggestion comes that you surrender them, you are sure that\nyou have not the strength. When causes, plainly Christian, on whose\nsuccessful issue man's weal depends, appeal to you for help, you\nweaken every enterprise by your disheartenment. Saved from _what_? Not\nfrom fear, timidity, selfishness, and stagnation! And if you say,\nSaved from Hell--what is Hell but the final subjugation of the soul to\nsuch sins as you now are cherishing? The words of Jesus are promises\nof saviorhood from real and present evils: \"Be not _anxious_\" (Matt.\n6:34); \"Go, _sin_ no more\" (John 8:11); \"_Fear_ not, little flock\"\n(Luke 12:32). When one, by faith, turns his face homeward from such\ndestroyers of life, he begins to be saved; but only as he lives by\nfaith in fellowship with the Divine and so achieves progressive\nvictory, does he keep on being saved. _The heart of salvation is\nvictorious power._\n\n\nII\n\nNot all men feel the need of the power which comes from discipleship\nto Christ. They live content without such increment of strength as\nChristians find in faith. Their power is equal to their tasks because\ntheir tasks are levelled to their power. One cannot understand,\ntherefore, what the Saviorhood of Christ has meant to men, unless he\nsees how Christ has created the need of the very power he furnishes.\nHe has done this, in part, _by awakening the desire for an ascending\nlife_. Men do not naturally want to believe in possibilities too\ngreat and taxing; it always is easier to leave undisturbed the\n_status quo_. Even changing one's residence is difficult. Though\none may move to a better house, yet to decide to move, to break old\nrelationships, to tear up and refit the furnishings, and to adjust\noneself to new associations mean stress and strain. So men come to be\nat home with habits; they are comfortably accustomed to timidity and\nself-indulgence. Release into a new life does not lure as privilege;\nit repels as hardship. Some sins, indeed, are followed by remorse, but\nothers, grown habitual, bring a sense of well-being and content. We\nlike ourselves; we do not want a better life; we are unwilling to pay\nits cost. Our sins are no bed of nettles, but a lotus land of decent\nease. Were we candidly to speak to them, we should say, O Sin, you are\na comfortable friend! When most we want forbidden fruit you suggest\nexcuses. You side happily with our inclinations and save us from the\nstruggle that high duty costs and the sacrifice of striving for the\nbest. Among the blessings of our lives, we count you not the least, O\ndecent, comfortable, self-indulgent Sin!\n\nIdlers thus drift listlessly and refuse a voyage with a purpose and a\ngoal; youths living by low standards, look on Christlike character as\nbeyond their interest and possibility; undedicated men find excuse for\nholding back devotion to great causes in the world--we shelter\nourselves from aspiration and enterprise behind our faithlessness.\nInto such a situation Christ repeatedly has come, bringing a vision of\nwhat life ought to be, too imperative to be neglected, too\nchallenging to be denied. Men have been shaken out of their content;\nthe true color of their lives has been revealed against his white\nbackground, the meanness of their plans against the wide ranges of his\npurpose. From seeing him they have gone back to be content in their\nold habits, but in vain. Can one who has seen a home be happy in a\nhovel? Ranke, the historian, says, \"More guiltless and more powerful,\nmore exalted and more holy, has naught ever been on earth than his\nconduct, his life, and his death. The human race knows nothing that\ncould be brought even afar off into comparison with it.\" So he has\nbeen the disturber of man's ignoble self-content, and to say that we\nbelieve in him means that, no longer able to endure the thing we are,\nwe go on pilgrimage toward the thing he is. Faith means that we decide\nto _move_. This first essential work of saviorhood Christ has wrought,\nand when men start to follow him, they feel the need of power.\n\nFor another thing, Christ has created a thirst for the power he\nfurnishes by _revealing the quality of character in the possession\nof which salvation ultimately consists_. At the beginning of the\nethical development whether of the individual or of the race, goodness\nis defined in terms of prohibitions. There are many things which men\nought _not_ to do; they walk embarrassed in the presence of their\nduty like courtiers before an exacting prince. How negative and\nrepelling such goodness is! As another exclaims: \"They do not break\nthe Sabbath themselves, but no one who has to spend it with them likes\nto see the dreadful day come round. They do not swear themselves, but\nthey make all who know them want to. They are just as good as trying\nnot to be bad can make them.\"\n\nDiscerning spirits, therefore, turn to goodness positively conceived.\n\"Thou shalt not\" becomes \"Thou shalt\"; duty consists of rules to be\nkept, precepts to be observed, principles to be applied, and we go out\nto do good deeds to men. But whoever seriously tries to do deeds\nreally good, faces a need of moral elevation, as much beyond the\noutward act of good as that surpasses the observance of prohibitions.\n_Good deeds are not a matter of will alone, but of spiritual quality._\nLet the wind blow to fan the faces of the sick, but if it discover\nthat it is laden with disease, what shall it do? To blow this way or\nthat may be within volition's power, but not to _cleanse_ oneself. The\ntask of character reaches inward, beyond the things we do or refrain\nfrom doing to the man we are. Goodness is something more than girding\nup the loins, blowing upon the hands, and setting to the work of being\ndutiful. It springs from the spirit's depths; it is tinctured with the\nspirit's quality; and deeds are never really better than the soul\nwhose utterances they are. From \"Thou shalt not do\" to \"Thou shalt do\"\nand from \"Thou shalt do\" to \"Thou shalt be,\" man's flying goal of\ngoodness moves. And this ideal in Christ has been incarnate, visible,\nimperative. He _was_ right in the inner quality and flavor of his\nlife; and to be like him involves a pure and powerful personality.\nWhoever sets that task ahead knows that he cannot strut proudly into\nit. Like Alice entering Wonderland he must grow very small before he\ncan grow large. The Christ who has power to give has revealed the need\nof it.\n\nNot only by the intensifying of the ideal, but by its extension, has\nChrist created thirst for divine help. In youth the problem of\ncharacter concerns personal habits. Our untamed strength must be\nbroken to the harness, and the snaffle bit be used upon our wayward\npowers. We justly fear our sins and in their triumph we see the wreck\nof individual prospects and the ruin of our families' hopes. Our\nconcern centers about ourselves, and its crux is self-mastery. But\nwhen in maturity, somewhat \"at leisure from ourselves\" in settled\nhabits, we no longer fear our own ruin nor think it probable, goodness\nextends its meaning. To play our part in man's advancement, to live,\nwork, sacrifice, and if need be die for causes on which our children's\nhopes depend, becomes our ideal. As boys in spring-time when the ice\nis melting see from a hill-top the swirling flood that overflows the\nplain, and know that somewhere underneath the unfamiliar and\ntumultuous rapids the main channel runs, from which the floods have\nbroken, to which in time they must return, so in a generation when\nman's life has broken its banks in fury we still believe that the main\ncourse of the divine purpose is not forever lost. To believe that, and\nin the strength of it to toil for the ends God seeks, becomes to\nawakened spirits the essential soul of goodness.\n\nWhen such meanings enter into his ideal, a man runs straight upon the\nneed of God. For we may make our contribution to the cause of man's\ngood upon the earth and our children may make theirs, but if this\nworld is a spiritual Sahara, never meant for character and social\nweal, and against the dead set of the desert's power we are building\noases here with our unaided fingers, then the issue of our work stands\nin no doubt. The Sahara will pile its burning sands about us and hurl\nits blistering winds across us, and we and our works together come to\nnaught. By as much, then, as a man really cares about democracy and\nliberty and social equity, about human brotherhood and Christian\ncivilization, by so much he needs God, who gathers up the scattered\ncontributions of his children and builds them into victory. A man\nalone may keep the decalogue, but alone he cannot save the world. Who\ndreams of that wants power. And Christ has made men dream of that,\nbelieve in that with passionate certainty, until \"Thy Kingdom come\" is\nthe daily prayer of multitudes. To no human strength can such prayer\nbe offered; we are not adequate to an eternal, universal task. Again\nChrist has brought us to the need of power, and his people call him\nSavior, because the need which he creates he also satisfies.\n\nIn one of the tidal rivers near New York, the building of a bridge was\ninterrupted by a derelict sunk in the river's bottom. Divers put\nchains about the obstacle and all day long the engineer directed the\nmaneuvering of tugs as they puffed and pulled in vain endeavor to\ndislodge the hulk. Then a young student, fresh from the technical\nschool, asked for the privilege of trying, and from the vexed,\nimpatient chief obtained his wish. \"What will _you_ do it with?\"\nthe engineer enquired. \"The flat-boats in which we brought the granite\nfrom Vermont,\" the young man answered. So when the tide was out, the\nflat boats were fastened to the derelict. The Atlantic began to come\nin; its mighty shoulders underneath the boats lifted--lifted until the\nderelict had to come. The youth had harnessed infinite energy to his\ntask. To the consciousness of such resource in the spiritual world\nChrist has introduced his people. They have meant not formula but\nfact, not technicality but experience, when they have called him\nSavior.\n\n\nIII\n\nThis consciousness of power has come in part from Christ's revelation\nof God the Father. Whoever has sinned against his friend or unkindly\nwronged a child knows what sin does to personal relationships. How\nswift a change comes over a son's thought of his father when the son\nhas sinned! The wrong may have been done secretly so that his sire\ndoes not know, and the boy alone on earth is conscious of it. But for\nall that the filial relationship has lost its glory. Before the sin,\nthe son was happy with his father near; they were companions,\nconfidants, and to the boy fatherhood was very beautiful. Now, he is\nmost unhappy with his father near; the father's eyes like a\ndetective's pierce him through, the face like a judge's waits sternly\nto condemn. He is looking at his father through the dark glasses of\nhis sin, and they distort his vision. When one considers the gods whom\nmen have worshiped, approaching them by bloody altar-stairs, offering\ntheir first-born to assuage wrath or win from apathy to favor, he\nsees, extended to a racial scale, our boyhood's tragedy. _Mankind has\nbeen looking at the Father through its ignorance and sin and it has\nseen him beclouded and awry._ Christ changed all that. By what he\ntaught, by what he was, by what he suffered he has said to man, so\nthat man increasingly has believed it--You are wrong about God. He\ndoes not stand aloof--careless or vindictive; he is not as he looks to\nyou through the twisted lenses of your evil. He loves you. He _cares_\nbeyond your power to understand, and all my compassion but reveals in\ntime what is eternally in him. He is pledged to the victory of\ngoodness in you and in the world, and you have not used all your power\nuntil you have used his, for that, too, is yours.\n\nFrom that day the fight against sin has been a new thing, and men have\ngone into it with battle-cries they never used before--\"_God_ was\nin Christ, reconciling the world unto himself\" (II Cor. 5:19);\n\"_God_ commendeth his own love toward us, in that, while we were\nyet sinners, Christ died for us\" (Rom. 5:8); \"If _God_ is for us,\nwho is against us?\" (Rom. 8:31).\n\nThis access of power has come in part from Christ's revelation of\n_man_. When a jewel is taken from darkness into sunlight, there is a\ntwo-fold revealing. The sunlight is disclosed in new glory, for it\nnever seemed so beautiful before as it appears breaking in splendor\nthrough the jewel's heart. And there is a revelation of the jewel.\nDull and unillumined in the dark, it is lustrous when the sun\nenlightens it. So Christ brought us an unveiling of the Father; the\nDivine never had seemed so wonderful as when it poured in glory\nthrough his purity and love. And he brought as well a new revelation\nof man. Our human nature, bedimmed by sin and lusterless, he in his\nown person took up into the light, and lifting it where all mankind\ncould see he cried--This _is_ human nature--man as God intended him to\nbe--no slave of fate and dupe of sin, but a free man and a victor. And\nfrom that day the war on sin has had new spirit in it, and battle\ncries that presage triumph have grown familiar on the fighters' lips:\n\"Now are we children of God, and it is not yet made manifest what we\nshall be\" (I John 3:2); \"Till we all attain unto the unity of the\nfaith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a full-grown man,\nunto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ\" (Eph. 4:13);\n\"His precious and exceeding great promises; that through these ye may\nbecome partakers of the divine nature\" (II Pet. 1:4).\n\n\nIV\n\nChrist's double revelation of God and man, however, has had its vital\nimpact of power on life in what Christians have always called _the\nexperience of the Spirit_. When the New Testament speaks its\ncharacteristic word about the Spirit, it means the conscious presence\nof the living God in the hearts of men, and that is the very essence\nof religion. The first Christians did not know God in one way only;\nthey knew him in three ways. So one man might know Beethoven the\ncomposer and be an authority upon his works; another might know\nBeethoven the performer and delight in his playing; and another might\nknow Beethoven the man and rejoice in his friendship--but no one could\nknow the whole of Beethoven until he knew him all three ways. The New\nTestament Christians came thus to God. He was the Father, Creator of\nall; he was the Character, revealed in Jesus; but as well he was the\nSpiritual Presence in their lives, their sustenance and power. \"The\ngrace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion\nof the Holy Spirit\" (II Cor. 13:14)--such was their experience of the\nDivine. It was not dogma; it was _life_. God was Creator, Character,\nand Comforter.\n\nChristian experience is in continual danger of drifting from this\nvital center. In our age especially, we are prone to find God at the\nend of an argument and to leave him there. We have been compelled by\nmilitant agnosticism to put our apologetic armies on the defensive.\nFinding it impossible to hold the respect of men's intelligence\nwithout reasonable arguments in the faith's behalf, we have had to\ndraw such inferences from the nature of the material universe, from\nthe necessities of human thought, the demands of human conscience, and\nthe progress of moral evolution in history, that materialism should be\nmade, what indeed it is, a discredited affair. But God so arrived at,\nby way of reason, is an external matter. He is an hypothesis to\nexplain the universe. \"He sitteth upon the circle of the earth and the\ninhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers before him.\" Granted the\nincalculable value in such faith, putting unity into history and\npurpose into life--it is not religion and it never can be. _Religion\nbegins when the God outwardly argued is inwardly experienced._\nReligion begins when we cease using the tricky and unstable aeroplane\nof speculation to seek Him among the clouds, and retreat into the\nfertile places of our own spirits where the living water rises, as\nJesus said. God outside of us is a theory; God inside of us becomes a\nfact. God outside of us is an hypothesis; God inside of us is an\nexperience. God the Father is the possibility of salvation; God the\nSpirit is actuality of life, joy, peace, and saving power. God the\ntranscendent may do for philosophy, but he is not enough for religion.\n\nWithout this completion of the Gospel, Christ's saviorhood does not\nreach inward to our need. For lacking it, we stand before the Master\nwith the same admiration that a man who is no painter feels when he\nsees a Raphael. He knows the work is sublime, but he is not proposing\nto reproduce it. He is conquered by its beauty, but he knows no\npossibility of its imitation. If, however, there were a spirit of\nRaphael that could lay hold upon a man's life and transform him to the\nmaster's skill and power, then his admiration would become inwardly\neffective. _It takes the spirit of Raphael to do Raphael's work._ If\nthis gospel of an indwelling dynamic is not coupled with our\nadmiration for Jesus, we are like a student practicing the fingering\nof the Hallelujah Chorus on an organ from which the power has been\nshut off. With what accuracy his fingers travel the keys, who can\ntell? Once Handel's soul, on fire with the passion of harmony, burned\nitself into that composition. He wrote it upon his knees. But with\nwhatever agility the student's fingers follow the notes, no Hallelujah\nChorus comes from his organ to praise God and move men. So the record\nof this matchless character handed to us in the gospels, like notes of\nmusic meant to be played again, is but our despair, if we must attempt\nits reproduction on a powerless organ. Our admiration for it is\nexternal and ineffectual. We fall thereby into a static religion of\ncreed; we have no dynamic religion of progress and hope. This then is\nthe glorious message, where the Christian Gospel reaches its climax,\nand which alone puts fullest meaning into Jesus' perfect life: _the\nSpirit of God in Jesus made his quality; that same Spirit is\nunderground in our lives, striving to well up in characters like his,\nuntil we live, yet not we, but Christ lives in us_.\n\nAny spring day may serve to illustrate this faith. Where does the\nrestlessness in nature have its source? Every tree, in discontent,\nhastens to make buds into leaves, and every blade of grass is\ntremulous with impatient life. No tree, however, is a sufficient\nexplanation of its own haste and dissatisfaction; no flower has in\nitself the secrets of its eager growth. The spirit of life is abroad,\nand crowding itself everywhere on old, dead forms, is making them\nbloom again. Explain then, the moral restlessness of our hearts in\nother wise! We do ill, and are distraught with remorse until we repent\nand make reparation. We attain money or talents, and are chased day\nand night by the urgent call to their spiritual dedication. We conform\nourselves to decency and still hear a call for goodness beyond all\nearthly need. We succeed as the world calls it, and we know that it is\nfailure; we fail as the world sees it, and our hearts sing for joy\nbecause we know that we have succeeded. Everywhere we are confronted\nwith a pulsing life that longs to get itself expressed in us. We\ncannot get away from God. He is not far, he is here. This Spirit, for\nwhom there is no better name than the Spirit of Jesus, is our\ncontinual companion. We are locked in an enforced fellowship with him.\nThere is no friend with whom we deal more directly and continually\nthan with him. Every time we open an inspiring book and devoutly study\nit, this Spirit is pleading for entrance. Every time we pray he stands\nat the door and knocks. Every time some child in need, or some great\ncause demanding sacrifice, lays claim on us, this Spirit is crying to\nbe let in. Men's hunger for food, their love for family and friends,\nare not more direct, concrete, immediate experiences than our dealings\nwith this Spirit of the Lord. He is not only God the Father; he is\nGod the Spirit, striving to dwell in us and work through us.\n\nInto a vital use of this relationship with the Divine, Christ opened\nthe way and multitudes have followed. He has taught men to find that\nsame resourcefulness in the spiritual world which science finds in the\nphysical. Every successful invention of a man like Edison involves a\ntwofold faith: that there is inexhaustible power in the universe and\nthat, with persistent patience and cooperation, there is no telling\nwhat marvels yet may come from the employment of it. Faith is\nscience's flying column. It runs out into engineering, agriculture,\nmedicine, and refuses to limit the possibilities. Science is a\ntremendous believer; it lives by faith that almost anything may yet be\ndone. Such a relationship Paul sustained with the Spirit. He was\nconfident of resources there, \"exceeding abundantly above all that we\nask or think\" (Eph. 3:20). He was a spiritual Edison, a believer in\nthe divine reality and power and their availability by faith in human\nlife.\n\nOnly such a Gospel is adequate to man's deepest need. Sin, whether its\nforms be decent or obscene, cripples men's wills with the appalling\ncertainty that they are slaves. As a hypnotist draws imaginary circles\naround his victims, across which they cannot step, so Sin, that\nSvengali of the soul, whether in personal or social life, paralyzes\nits dupes with disbelief in possibilities. To innumerable folk,\nemprisoned by their fears and sins, Christ has been the Savior. He has\nawakened that faith which, as he said, is the greatest mountain-mover\nknown to men. They have been \"strengthened with power through his\nSpirit in the inward man\" (Eph. 3:16).\n\n\nV\n\nWhen one considers, as we have in these two chapters, what Christ has\nmeant in the experience of his people, little wonder can remain that\nthey have called him by such high names as have aroused man's\nincredulity. For this Gospel of power has never been separable from\nhim, as though he were its historic fountain and could easily be\nforgotten by those who far down-stream enjoyed the water. His\npersonality itself has been the inspiration of his people. At Marston\nMoor, when the Puritans and Cavaliers were aligned for battle and all\nwas in readiness for conflict to begin, Oliver Cromwell came riding\nacross the plain. And the chronicler says that at the sight of him the\nPuritans sent up a great victorious shout, as though their battle\nalready had been won. Some such effect our Lord has had on his\ndisciples. To explain that effect one would have to speak not so much\nof his teaching as of himself--his character and purpose; nor so much\nof them as of the Cross where all he taught and was came to a point of\nflame that has set the world on fire. Christ was the\n\n                  \"nerve o'er which do creep\n  The else unfelt oppressions of the earth.\"\n\nHe suffered with man and for man, he uniquely embodied in his own\nexperience the universal law that the consequences of sin fall in part\non the one who loves the sinner and tries to save him; and in that\nsacrifice his work for man was consummated, and his influence over man\nconfirmed. When his people have bowed before him in unutterable\ndevotion they have been thinking not only of what he has done for\nthem, but of what it cost him to do it.\n\nWhy, therefore, should we wonder that his disciples at their best have\ncalled Jesus divine? His first followers began with no abstract ideas\nof deity; they began with \"the man, Christ Jesus\" (I Tim. 2:5). They\nhad no idea at the first that he was more. His bodily and mental life\nhad obeyed the laws of normal human development, advancing \"in wisdom\nand stature, and in favor with God and men\" (Luke 2:52). He hungered\nafter his temptation, thirsted on the Cross, slept from weariness\nwhile the boat tossed in a storm, and exhausted, sat beside the well.\nLike other men he had elevated hours of great rejoicing; times when\ncompassion moved him to tears, as when he saw a multitude unshepherded\nor, swinging round the brow of Olivet, beheld Jerusalem; and hours of\nhot indignation, too, as when he found his Father's house a den of\nthieves or spoke out his heart against the Pharisees. He asked\nquestions, and was astonished, now at the people's lack of faith,\nagain at the centurion's excess of it. His fellowship with God was\nnourished by secret prayer, his power replenished by retreat to quiet\nplaces for communion, and all his life was lived, his temptations\nfaced, his troubles borne, and his work done in a spirit of humble,\nfilial dependence on his Father.\n\nThus real and human, a sharer in their limitations, their sorrows, and\ntheir moral trials, the first disciples saw the Master. But ever as\nthey lived with him, whether in physical presence or in spiritual\nfellowship, he wrought in them a Savior's work. He became to them\nmanhood indeed, but manhood plus. He grew in their apprehension, as\nthough a boy had thought an ocean's inlet were a lake enclosed, and\nnow discovers that it is the sea itself, and all its tides the pulse\nof the great deep. How should they name this greatness in their Lord?\nThey were not utterly without a clue, for he himself had introduced\nthem to the life divine. They had learned through him to say about\nthemselves that they were temples in which God dwelt (II Cor. 6:16),\nthat God abode in them (I John 4:12), that he stood ever waiting to\ncome in (Rev. 3:20), and that the possession of the divine nature was\nthe Gospel's promise (II Pet. 1:4). By what other element in their\nexperience could they interpret the greatness of their Lord? It might\nbe inadequate, but it was the best they had. They rose to understand\nthe divine life in him from the experience of the divine life in\nthemselves. \"God was in Christ,\" they said. They never dreamed of\nclaiming equality with him. Like pools beside the sea, they understood\nthe ocean's quality from their own. There are not two kinds of\nsea-water; nor, with one God, can there be two kinds of divine life.\nBut so understanding the sea, shall the pool claim equality with it?\nRather, the sea has deeps, tides, currents, and relationships with the\nworld's life that no pool can ever know. So Christ was at once their\nbrother and their Lord. He was real, because they interpreted his life\ndivine from the foregleams of God's presence in themselves. He was\nadorable, because he was an ocean to their landlocked pools, and they\nwaited for his tides.\n\nOnly by some such road as these first disciples trod can men come to a\nvital understanding of the Lord. Nothing but _experience_ can give us\na living estimate of anything; without that theory is vain. Let a man\nlive with the Master's manhood until it grows luminous and through it\nhe sees the character of God; let a man avail himself of the Master's\nsaviorhood until forgiven and empowered he finds the \"life that is\nlife indeed\"; let a man grow in the experience of God's presence until\nhe knows not only the God without but the God within; and then if he\nrises to estimate his Lord, he will not hesitate to see in Jesus the\nincarnate presence of the living God. After that, theology may help or\nhinder him, according as it is wise and vital or cold and formal; but\nwith theology or not, he knows the heart of the New Testament's\nattitude toward Jesus. He understands why the first Christians summed\nup their faith as \"believing in the Lord Jesus Christ.\"\n\n[8] Moffatt's translation.\n\n[9] Moffatt's translation.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\nThe Fellowship of Faith\n\n\nDAILY READINGS\n\nOur thought turns, in our closing week of study, from believers taken\none by one, to believers gathered in fellowship. This community of\nfaith has wider boundaries than the organized churches; in a real\nsense it includes all servants of man's ideal aims; yet in the Church\nwe naturally seek the chief meanings of fellowship for faith. Why men\ndo not go to church, is often asked. But why men do go, so that in\nspite of countless failures in the churches, attendance on public\nworship and loyalty to organized religion are among mankind's most\nusual habits, is an inquiry far more important. To that inquiry let us\nin the daily readings turn our thought.\n\n\nTwelfth Week, First Day\n\n =But woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye shut\n the kingdom of heaven against men: for ye enter not in yourselves,\n neither suffer ye them that are entering in to enter.=\n\n =Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea\n and land to make one proselyte; and when he is become so, ye make him\n twofold more a son of hell than yourselves....=\n\n =Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye tithe mint\n and anise and cummin, and have left undone the weightier matters of\n the law, justice, and mercy, and faith: but these ye ought to have\n done, and not to have left the other undone. Ye blind guides, that\n strain out the gnat, and swallow the camel!--Matt. 23:13-15; 23, 24.=\n\nJesus' indictment of the Jewish Church is terrific, and yet no one who\nknows the story of the Christian churches can doubt that they often\nhave deserved the same condemnation. They have at times committed all\nthe sins that can be laid at any institution's door; they have been\nselfish, formal, worldly, cruel. A wonder-story from the Arctic says\nthat once the candle-flames froze and the explorers broke them off and\nwore them for watch charms; the flames of the great fire congealed and\nwere wound like golden ornaments around men's necks. So repeatedly the\nburning words of Scripture, the blazing affirmations of old creeds, on\nfire at first with the passion of souls possessed by God, have been\nfrozen in the churches' Arctic climate, and handed to men like\ntalismans and amulets, with no saving warmth or light. Creeds,\nrituals, organizations--how often these frozen forms of life have\ntaken the place of inward spiritual power! Dr. Washington Gladden\nwould not be alone in saying: \"While therefore I had as large an\nexperience of church-going in my boyhood as most boys can recall, I\ncannot lay my hand on my heart and say that the church-going helped me\nto solve my religious problems. In fact, it made those problems more\nand more tangled and troublesome.\" And yet the Church goes on.\nVoltaire prophesied its collapse in fifty years, and in fifty years\nthe house where he made the prophecy was a depot for the circulation\nof the Scriptures. The Church's persistence, continual adaptation to\nnew conditions, and apparently endless power of revival must have some\ndeep reason. It may be because prayer like this which follows has\nnever utterly died out in the sanctuary.\n\n _O Thou that dwellest not in temples made with hands! We ever stand\n within the courts of Thy glorious presence, only we open now the\n gates of our poor praise. Thou hast enriched this day of rest, O\n Lord, with Thy choicest gifts of peace; and lo! Thou unforgetting\n God, its record is before Thee, for ages past, moistened with\n penitential tears, and illumined with glad hopes, and hallowed by the\n innumerable prayers of faithful and saintly men. In this our day may\n the churches of Thy Holy One seek Thee still in spirit and truth; may\n we also enter in and find our rest, being of one heart and mind, and\n serving Thee with a wakeful and humble joy. Teach us now how we may\n converse with Thee, for we cannot order our speech by reason of\n darkness. We are naked and without disguise before Thee; oh! hide not\n Thyself from us behind our ignorance and sin. May we at least in\n this Thine hour shake off the sluggish clouds of sense and self that\n cling around our souls; and strenuously open our whole nature to the\n breath of Thy free spirit, and the healthful sunshine of Thy grace.\n Let the divine image of the Son of God visit us with power; driving\n out, with the chastisement of penitence, all obtruding passions that\n profane the temple of our hearts, and turn into a place of traffic\n that native house of prayer. O God of glory, God of grace! let not\n the things which are spiritually discerned be foolishness unto us\n through the blindness of our conscience: Thou knowest the thoughts of\n our wisdom that they are vain; take them from us, and bid them vanish\n away, lost in that wisdom from above which is revealed only to the\n pure in heart. Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thee be\n every thought of praise! Amen._--James Martineau.\n\n\nTwelfth Week, Second Day\n\nSome men doubtless go to church from traditional habit only, but such\na motive obviously is not adequate to explain why the recurrent tides\nof humanity, even after an ebb in interest, sweep back to the Church\nagain. In the eighteenth century, for example, Butler reports the\ncommon opinion that all that remained for Christianity was decent\nobsequies. But in a few years the Wesleys began a movement that\nchanged the spiritual complexion of the English-speaking world, and\nswept multitudes into Christian fellowship. One reason for this\nrepeated fact is clear. Mankind cannot and will not consent to live\nwithout faith in God, and faith in God in its genesis and its\nsustenance is largely a matter of contagion. We are not so much taught\nit; we catch it. It is vitally imparted in the family circle, and\nwherever kindred and believing spirits gather. No man is so\nindependent as to escape the vital fact that his noblest emotions,\nattitudes, ideals, and faiths are socially engendered and socially\nsustained; he never would have had them in a solitary life and a\nsolitary life would soon spoil those which he has now. A man may\nbelieve in his country and love her; but let him join in a patriotic\nmovement or even attend a high-spirited patriotic meeting, and he will\nbelieve in her and love her more ardently. Man's religious life is not\nlawless; it is regulated by the same necessities of fellowship. The\nChurch has made many mistakes, but on her altar the fire has never\nutterly gone out, and in her fellowship the faith of multitudes has\nbeen kindled.\n\n =Let us hold fast the confession of our hope that it waver not; for\n he is faithful that promised: and let us consider one another to\n provoke unto love and good works; not forsaking our own assembling\n together, as the custom of some is, but exhorting one another; and so\n much the more, as ye see the day drawing nigh.--Heb. 10:23-25.=\n\n _Great is Thy name, O God, and greatly to be praised. In Thee all our\n discordant notes rise into perfect harmony. It is good for us to\n think of the wonder of Thy being. Thou art silent, yet most strong;\n unchangeable, yet ever changing; ever working, yet ever at rest,\n supporting, nourishing, maturing all things. O Thou Eternal Spirit,\n who hast set our noisy years in the heart of Thy eternity, lift us\n above the power and evils of the passing time, that under the shadow\n of Thy wings we may take courage and be glad. So great art Thou,\n beyond our utmost imagining, that we could not speak to Thee didst\n Thou not first draw near to us and say, \"Seek ye my face.\" Unto Thee\n our hearts would make reply, \"Thy face, Lord, will we seek.\"... We\n thank Thee for our birth into a Christian community, for the Church\n and the Sacraments of Thy grace, for the healing day of rest, when we\n enter with Thy people into Thy House and there make holy-day; for the\n refreshment of soul, the joys of communion, the spiritual discipline,\n the inspiration of prayer and hymn and sermon.... We praise Thee for\n the myriad influences of good, conscious and unconscious, that have\n been about us, deeply penetrating our inner life, shaping and fitting\n us for Thy Kingdom. Thou hast indeed forgiven all our iniquities, and\n healed all our diseases, and redeemed our life from destruction, and\n crowned us with loving-kindness. Therefore would we call upon our\n souls, and all that is within us, to bless Thy holy Name.\n Amen._--Samuel McComb.\n\n\nTwelfth Week, Third Day\n\n =For ye, brethren, were called for freedom; only use not your freedom\n for an occasion to the flesh, but through love be servants one to\n another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word, even in this:\n Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. But if ye bite and devour\n one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another.--Gal.\n 5:13-15.=\n\nOne fundamental reason for the endless revival of the Church is that\nfaith never is satisfied until it issues in work. It insists on our\nbeing \"servants one to another.\" We have spoken of God's merciful\nacceptance of a man when out of sin he turns his life by faith toward\nChrist; but to interpret this as meaning the adequacy of faith without\neffective service is to misread Scripture and to demoralize life.\nFaith that does not lead to service is no real faith at all. But\nwhenever men endeavor to express in work any faith which they may hold\nthey must come together. Service involves cooperation. A hermit may\nhave faith, but his faith does not concern any ideal hopes on earth;\nit has no outlooks save upon his own soul's condition in the world to\ncome; it is a narrow, selfish, inoperative thing. As soon as men are\ngrasped by some moving faith about what ought to be done for God's\nservice and man's welfare here and now, a hermit's solitude or any\nsort of unaffiliated life becomes impossible. They must combine in a\nfellowship of faith and of labor to seek common ends. They begin to\nsay with Edward Rowland Sill, \"For my part I long to 'fall in' with\nsomebody. This picket duty is monotonous. I hanker after a shoulder on\nthis side and the other.\" And to fall in with others to serve\nChristian ends means some kind of church. Let us pray today for a\nchurch more fit to express this passion to serve.\n\n _God, we pray for Thy Church, which is set today amid the\n perplexities of a changing order, and face to face with a great new\n task. We remember with love the nurture she gave to our spiritual\n life in its infancy, the tasks she set for our growing strength, the\n influence of the devoted hearts she gathers, the steadfast power for\n good she has exerted. When we compare her with all other human\n institutions, we rejoice, for there is none like her. But when we\n judge her by the mind of her Master, we bow in pity and contrition.\n Oh, baptize her afresh in the life-giving spirit of Jesus! Grant her\n a new birth, though it be with the travail of repentance and\n humiliation. Bestow upon her a more imperious responsiveness to duty,\n a swifter compassion with suffering, and an utter loyalty to the\n will of God. Put upon her lips the ancient Gospel of her Lord. Help\n her to proclaim boldly the coming of the Kingdom of God and the doom\n of all that resist it. Fill her with the prophet's scorn of tyranny,\n and with a Christ-like tenderness for the heavy-laden and\n down-trodden. Give her faith to espouse the cause of the people, and\n in their hands that grope after freedom and light to recognize the\n bleeding hands of the Christ. Bid her cease from seeking her own\n life, lest she lose it. Make her valiant to give up her life to\n humanity, that like her crucified Lord she may mount by the path of\n the cross to a higher glory. Amen._--Walter Rauschenbusch.\n\n\nTwelfth Week, Fourth Day\n\n =For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be put\n to shame. For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek: for the\n same Lord is Lord of all, and is rich unto all that call upon him:\n for, Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.\n How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and\n how shall they believe in him whom they have not heard? and how shall\n they hear without a preacher? and how shall they preach, except they\n be sent? even as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them\n that bring glad tidings of good things!--Rom. 10:11-15.=\n\nThe necessity of affiliation for effective faith is clear when one\nconsiders the missionary enterprise. One of the noblest qualities in\nhuman life is our natural desire to share our blessings. Every normal\nchild is happier when some other child is joining in the play; every\nlover of music is gladdened by sharing with a friend enjoyment of a\nfavorite symphony; save in singularly churlish folk the love of having\nothers partake our joys is spontaneous and hearty. To those whom\nChristian faith, has blessed with hope and power, the undeniable\nimpulse comes to share these finest benedictions with all other men.\nThe missionary enterprise does not rest upon a text; it wells up from\none of the worthiest impulses in man's life. One may be fairly sure,\nthat save as some perverted theology inhibits a spirit of love, a\nman's missionary interest will be proportionate to the reality and\nvalue of his own experience. If he himself has something well worth\nsharing, he will want to share it. But the missionary enterprise is\nmore than any individual can compass; it demands organization,\ncooperation, and massed resources; it cannot be prosecuted without a\nchurch. The further our thought proceeds the more clear it becomes\nthat the question is not, shall we have churches? but rather, since\nchurches are inevitable, of what sort shall they be?\n\n _O Thou who hast made all nations of men to seek Thee and to find\n Thee; bless, we beseech Thee, Thy sons and daughters who have gone\n forth, into distant lands, bearing in their hands Thy Word of Life.\n We rejoice that, touched with the enthusiasm of Christ, so many have\n consecrated their lives to proclaiming the message of Thy love to\n those other sheep of Thine who are not of our fold, that they may be\n united with us and that there may be one flock and one Shepherd. Help\n Thy ministering servants to recognize the fragments of truth and\n goodness that are ever found where men are sincere and to claim these\n glimpses of Thyself as the prophecies of a fuller revelation. When\n discouraged by the hardness of their task, and the meager fruit of\n all their labor, give them faith to see the far-off whitening\n harvest. Inspire them with Thy gracious promise that though the sower\n may go forth weeping, bearing precious seed, he will come again with\n joy, bringing his sheaves with him. Comfort them in their exile and\n loneliness with a sense of Thy companionship and with the prayers and\n sympathy of their brethren at home. Through them let Thy Word have\n free course and be glorified. And so let Thy Kingdom come, and Thy\n Will be done on earth as in Heaven, for Jesus Christ's sake.\n Amen._--Samuel McComb.\n\n\nTwelfth Week, Fifth Day\n\n =After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father who art in heaven,\n Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in\n heaven, so on earth. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us\n our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And bring us not\n into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For if ye forgive\n men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But\n if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father\n forgive your trespasses.--Matt. 6:9-15.=\n\nThe central ideal of Christian effort is set for us in the first\npetition of the Master's prayer. But a Kingdom on earth, with God's\nwill done here in heavenly fashion, is a social idea. It means not\nonly right personal quality; it means right family life, and economic,\npolitical, and international relationships Christianized. No amount of\nfine individual character, necessary as it is, will of itself rectify\nthe social maladjustments and inequities. Were everyone as good as\npossible, we still should need organized action. All parts of an\nengine may be correct, and yet they may be wrongly fitted together. As\nit is, social relations obviously demand concerted action; we must\njoin together to combat immoral industrial conditions, to throttle the\nliquor traffic, to make human fraternity a fact and not a dream. The\nopposition to all such reforms is organized, and no haphazard attack\nwill succeed. Now, many organizations may arise to serve special ends\nand may do excellent service to the cause, but what has proved true in\nthe conflict with the liquor traffic, is true also of enterprises for\nindustrial justice and international cooperation--_only when the\nchurches see the moral issue and put their power in, is there any hope\nof victory_. A Christian whose faith involves the Kingdom sees\nplainly that he cannot go on without the Church.\n\n _O Lord, we praise Thy holy name, for Thou hast made bare Thine arm\n in the sight of all nations and done wonders. But still we cry to\n Thee in the weary struggle of our people against the power of drink.\n Remember, Lord, the strong men who were led astray and blighted in\n the flower of their youth. Remember the aged who have brought their\n gray hairs to a dishonored grave. Remember the homes that have been\n made desolate of joy, the wifely love that has been outraged in its\n sanctuary, the little children who have learned to despise where once\n they loved. Remember, O Thou great avenger of sin, and make this\n nation to remember._\n\n _May those who now entrap the feet of the weak and make their living\n by the degradation of men, thrust away their shameful gains and stand\n clear. But if their conscience is silenced by profit, do Thou grant\n Thy people the indomitable strength of faith to make an end of it.\n May all the great churches of our land shake off those who seek the\n shelter of religion for that which damns, and stand with level front\n against their common foe. May all who still soothe their souls with\n half-truths, saying \"Peace, peace,\" where there can be no peace,\n learn to see through Thy stem eyes and come to the help of Jehovah\n against the mighty. Help us to cast down the men in high places who\n use the people's powers to beat back the people's hands from the\n wrong they fain would crush._\n\n _O God, bring nigh the day when all our men shall face their daily\n task with minds undrugged and with tempered passions; when the\n unseemly mirth of drink shall seem a shame to all who hear and see;\n when the trade that debauches men shall be loathed like the trade\n that debauches women; and when all this black remnant of savagery\n shall haunt the memory of a new generation but as an evil dream of\n the night. For this accept our vows, O Lord, and grant Thine aid.\n Amen._--Walter Rauschenbusch.\n\n\nTwelfth Week, Sixth Day\n\n =Neither for these only do I pray, but for them also that believe on\n me through their word; that they may all be one; even as thou,\n Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be in us: that\n the world may believe that thou didst send me. And the glory which\n thou hast given me I have given unto them; that they may be one, even\n as we are one; I in them, and thou in me, that they may be perfected\n into one; that the world may know that thou didst send me, and\n lovedst them, even as thou lovedst me.--John 17:20-23.=\n\nTo the Christian the Church is a problem, just because she is a\nnecessity. He caught his faith from the contagion of her fellowship\nand he sees that if he is to serve effectively the ideals of Christ\nand the coming of the Kingdom he must work through some church. But\nbecause the Church is necessary, he is not thereby made content with\nher. She is at once helping and hindering the spread of the faith; she\nis the source of immeasurable good and yet she is not \"one, that the\nworld may believe.\" A traveler across the American plains in\nspringtime sees fences, tiresomely prominent, staring at him from the\nlandscape; but in summer when he returns the fences are invisible. The\nwheat and corn are growing, the earth is bearing fruit, and while the\nold divisions may be there, they all are hidden. One suspects that if\nChristians everywhere set themselves with hearty zeal to bear the\nfruit of service for the common weal, if they gave themselves to\nachieve the aims of Christ for men with ardor and thoroughness, the\nsectarian divisions would grow unimperative and disappear. We may not\nbe able to think the disagreements through, but we may be able to work\nthem out; even where we cannot recite a common creed, we can share a\ncommon purpose. The War, where Jewish rabbis have held crucifixes\nbefore the eyes of dying soldiers, and where Catholic priests have met\ndeath, as one did at Gallipoli, following a Wesleyan chaplain--\"my\nProtestant comrade\"--into danger, has revealed how deeply underneath\nour sharp divisions our spiritual loyalties seek unity when crisis\ncomes. For all the unity that can come without compromise to\nconscience, surely the Christian people are bound to pray and work.\n\n _O God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, our only Saviour, the\n Prince of Peace; give us grace seriously to lay to heart the great\n dangers we are in by our unhappy divisions. Take away all hatred and\n prejudice, and whatsoever else may hinder us from godly union and\n concord; that as there is but one body and one Spirit, and one hope\n of our calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father\n of us all, so we may be all of one heart and of one soul, united in\n one holy bond of truth and peace, of faith and charity, and may with\n one mind and one mouth glorify Thee, through Jesus Christ our Lord.\n Amen._--\"The Book of Common Prayer.\"\n\n\nTwelfth Week, Seventh Day\n\n =For I am already being offered, and the time of my departure is\n come. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I\n have kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of\n righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give to me\n at that day; and not to me only, but also to all them that have loved\n his appearing.--II Tim. 4:6-8.=\n\nThe fellowship of faith is not bounded by the earth. Paul's\nexpectation took into its account a communion that far overreached\nthe confines of temporal experience. The New Testament believers not\nonly held but vividly apprehended that the \"whole family\" to which\nthey belonged in Christian communion was \"in heaven and on earth.\"\nTheir outlook Wordsworth has expressed in modern words:\n\n                          \"There is\n  One great society alone on earth:\n  The noble Living and the noble Dead.\"\n\nTo that society of the world's prophets and martyrs, seers and\nservants, it may well be a man's ambition to belong. And that ideal is\nnot impossible to anyone, for the mark and seal of their fellowship is\nthat they have \"kept the faith.\" When others despaired, lost heart,\nand deserted causes on which man's welfare hung, they kept the faith.\nWhen mysteries perplexed their minds and discouragement, to human\nvision, was more rational than hope, they turned from sight to insight\nand they kept the faith. When new knowledge, half-understood,\ndisturbed old forms of thought and multitudes were confused in\nuncertainty and disbelief, they kept the faith. And they often came to\ntheir end, like Paul, having \"suffered the loss of all things\"--yet\nnot all, for they had kept the faith.\n\n  \"For all the saints, who from their labors rest,\n  Who Thee by faith before the world confessed,\n  Thy name, O Jesus, be forever blest,\n            Alleluia!\n\n  O may Thy soldiers, faithful, true, and bold,\n  Fight as the saints who nobly fought of old,\n  And win with them the victor's crown of gold,\n            Alleluia!\n\n  O blest communion, fellowship Divine!\n  We feebly struggle; they in glory shine;\n  Yet all are one in Thee, for all are Thine.\n              Alleluia!\"\n\n _O God, Thou only Refuge of Thy children! who remainest true though\n all else should fail, and livest though all things die; cover us now\n when we fly to Thee. Thy shelter was around our fathers. Thy voice\n called them away, and bids us seek Thee here till we depart to be\n with them. In Thy memory are the lives of all men from of old. Before\n Thy sight are the secret hearts of all the living. We stand in awe of\n Thy justice which, since the ages began, hath never changed: and we\n cling to Thy mercy that passeth not away._\n\n _Almighty Father, Thou art a God afar off as well as nigh at hand.\n Thou who in times past didst pity the prayers of our forerunners, and\n especially of that suffering servant of Thine whom Thou hast made our\n Leader unto Thee! be pleased to strengthen us now, O Lord, to bear\n our lighter cross and surrender ourselves for duty and for trial unto\n Thee. Show us something of the blessed peace with which they now look\n back on their days of strong crying and tears, and teach us that it\n is far better to die in Thy service than to live for our own. Rebuke\n within us all immoderate desires, all unquiet temper, all\n presumptuous expectations, all ignoble self-indulgence, and feeling\n on us the embrace of Thy Fatherly hand, may we meekly and with\n courage go into the darkest ways of our pilgrimage, anxious not to\n change Thy perfect will, but only to do and bear it worthily. May we\n spend all our days in Thy presence, and meet our death in the\n strength of Thy grace, and pass thence into the nearer light of Thy\n knowledge and love. Amen._--John Hunter.\n\n\nCOMMENT FOR THE WEEK\n\nI\n\nSo far in our studies we have been dealing with the individual\nbeliever in his search for a reasonable faith. But we must face at\nlast what from the beginning has been true, that there is no such\nthing as an individual believer. _All faiths are social._ However\nlittle we may be aware of each other's influence, however intangible\nthe social forces which shape the convictions by which we live, no man\nbuilds or keeps his faiths alone. We may pride ourselves on our\nindependent thought, but the fact remains as Prof. William James has\nstated it: \"Our faith is faith in some one else's faith, and in the\ngreatest matters this is most the case.\"\n\nThe realm of religious conviction is not the only place where we hold\nwith a strong sense of personal possession what has been given us by\nothers, and often forget to acknowledge our indebtedness. We believe\nin democracy and popular education, not because by some gift of\nindividual genius we are wiser than our unbelieving sires, but\nbecause, in the advance of the race, that faith has been wrought out\nby many minds, and, with minute addition of our own thought, we share\nthe general conviction. As a man considers how rich and varied are the\nfaiths he holds, how few of them he ever has thought through or ever\ncan, and how helpless he would be, if he were set from the beginning\nto create any one of them, he gains new insight into Paul's words,\n\"What hast thou that thou didst not receive? but if thou didst receive\nit, why dost thou glory as if thou hadst not received it?\" (I Cor.\n4:7).\n\nIndeed, this same truth holds in every relationship. Nothing is more\nimpossible than a \"self-made man.\" In no realm can that common phrase\nbe intelligently applied to anyone. If in business one has risen from\npoverty to wealth, he has used railroads that he did not invent and\ntelephones that he does not even understand; he has built his business\non a credit system for which he did not labor and whose moral basis\nhas been laid in the ethical struggles of unnumbered generations. For\nthe clothes he wears, the food he eats, the education he receives, he\nis debtor to a social life that taps the ends of the earth and that\nhas cost blood not his and money which he never can repay. If granting\nthis, a man still say, \"My power and the might of my hand hath gotten\nme this wealth\" (Deut. 8:17), he may well consider whence his power\nhas come. His distant ancestors stalked through primeval forests,\ntheir brows sloped back, their hairy hides barren of clothes, and in\ntheir hands stone hatchets, by the aid of which they sought their\nfood. What has this Twentieth Century boaster done to change the\nhabits of the Stone Age to the civilization on which his wealth is\nbased or to elevate man's intellect to the grasp and foresight of the\nmodern business world? All the power by which he wins his way is\nclearly a social gift, and any contribution which he may add is\ninfinitesimal compared with his receipts.\n\nBy this truth all declarations of individual independence need to be\nchastened and controlled and all boasting cancelled utterly. Normal\nminds have their times of self-assertion in religion, when they grow\nimpatient of believing anything simply because they have been told. As\na college Junior put it: \"I must clear the universe of God, and then\nstart in at the beginning to see what I can find.\" But to assert a\nreasonable independence ought not to mean that one cut himself off\nfrom the support of history, the accumulated experience of the race,\nthe insight of the seers, and in unassisted isolation walk, like\nKipling's cat, \"by his wild lone.\" No man can do that anywhere and\nstill succeed. Imagine a man, in politics, dubious of his old\naffiliations and disturbed by the conflicting opinions of his day. If,\nso perplexed, he should throw over all that ever had been thought or\ndone in civic life, and in an unaided individual adventure attempt out\nof his own mind to constitute a state, in what utter confusion would\nhe land! No mind can begin work as though it were the first mind that\never acted, or were the only mind in action now. All effective\nthinking is social; contributions from innumerable heads pour in to\nmake a wise man's knowledge. And to suppose that any man can climb the\nsteep ascent of heaven all alone and lay his hands comprehensively on\nthe Eternal is preposterous. No one ever apprehended a science so,\nmuch less God! Even Jesus fed his soul on the prophets of his race.\n\n\nII\n\nIndeed, Jesus' attitude toward the fellowship of faith is most\nrevealing, seen against the background of his nation's history. In the\nbeginning, there was in Israel no such thing as individual religion.\nIn the earliest strata of the Bible's revelation, we find no\nindication of a faith that brought God and each of his people into\nintimate relationships. Jehovah was the God of the nation as a whole\nand not of the people one by one. When he spoke, he spoke to the\ncommunity through a leader; \"Speak thou with us and we will hear,\" the\npeople cried to Moses, \"but let not God speak with us lest we die\"\n(Exodus 20:19). It was at the time of the Exile, when the nation fell\nin ruins, and the hearts of faithful Jews were thrown back one by one\non God that individual trust, peace, joy, and confidence found\nutterance. It was Jeremiah (Chap. 31) and Ezekiel (Chap. 18) who saw\nmen individually responsible to God, and who opened the way for loyal\nJews to be his people even when the nation was no more. And what they\nbegan Jesus completed. He lifted up the individual and made each man\nthe object of the Father's care. \"It is not the will of your Father\n... that _one_ of these little ones should perish\" (Matt 18:14). \"What\nman of you, having a hundred sheep, and having lost _one_ of them ...\"\n(Luke 15:4). \"The very hairs of your head are all numbered\" (Matt.\n10:30). As for religion's inner meaning, it became in Jesus' Gospel\nnot a national ritual but a private faith: \"But thou, when thou\nprayest, enter into thine inner chamber, and having shut thy door,\npray to thy Father who is in secret\" (Matt. 6:6).\n\nWhile Jesus, however, so emphasized the inward, individual aspects of\nreligion, he did not leave it there, as though persons could ever be\nlike jugs in the rain, separate receptacles that share neither their\nemptiness nor their abundance. He bound his disciples into a\nfellowship. He joined their channels until, like interflowing streams,\none contributed to all and the spirit of all was expressed in each. He\nbraided them into friendship with himself and with each other, so\nclose that the community did what no isolated believer ever could have\ndone--it survived the shock of the crucifixion, the agony of sustained\npersecution, the frailties of its members, and the discouragements of\nits campaign. On that _group_ the Master counted for his work: \"The\ngates of Hades shall not prevail against it\" (Matt. 16:18). And when\nthe New Testament Church emerged, the fellowship which Christ himself\nhad breathed into it was clear and strong. Men who became Christians,\nin the New Testament, came into a new relationship with God indeed,\nbut into a new human fraternity as well. They were \"builded together\nfor a habitation of God through the Spirit\" (Eph. 2:22), and even when\ndeath came that fellowship was not destroyed. They were still \"the\nwhole family in heaven and on earth\" (Eph. 3:15). John Wesley was\nright: \"The Bible knows nothing of a solitary religion.\" In the Old\nTestament religion was predominantly national; in the New Testament,\nindividuals rejoicing in the \"Beloved Community\" could not describe\ntheir life without the reiteration of \"one another.\" They were to\n\"pray one for another\" and \"confess sins one to another\" (James 5:16);\nthey were to \"love one another\" (I Pet 1:22), \"exhort one another\"\n(Heb. 3:13), \"comfort one another\" (I Thess. 4:18); they were to \"bear\none another's burdens\" (Gal. 6:2) and in communal worship \"admonish\none another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs\" (Col. 3:16).\n\nSo when they thought of their faith, they never held it in solitary\nconfidence; they were \"strong to apprehend _with all the saints_\nwhat is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the\nlove of Christ which passeth knowledge\" (Eph. 3:18).\n\n\nIII\n\nWhen a modern believer endeavors to interpret this spirit in the New\nTestament in terms of his own wants, he sees at once that he needs\nfellowship for the _enriching_ of his faith. Cooperation for\nachievement is a modern commonplace, but when Paul prayed, as we have\nquoted him, that the Ephesians might be \"strong to _apprehend_\nwith all the saints,\" he was stating the more uncommon proposition\nthat men must cooperate for knowledge. He saw the divine love in its\nlength, breadth, depth, and height on one side, and on the other a\nsolitary man endeavoring to understand it. Impossible! said Paul; the\ndivine love in its fulness cannot be known in solitude, it must be\napprehended in fellowship.\n\nAt first nothing seems more strictly individual than knowledge. To\nknow is an intimate, personal affair; it cannot be carried on by\nproxy. But even casual thought at once makes clear that in solitude we\ncannot know even the physical universe. No man can go apart and\nthrough the narrow aperture of his own mind see the full round of\ntruth. For astronomers study the stars, geologists the rocks, chemists\nknow their special field and physicists know theirs; each scientist\nunderstands in part, and if one is to know the breadth and length and\nheight and depth of the physical world he must be strong to apprehend\nwith all the scientists.\n\nIn religion this necessity of cooperation in knowing God may not at\nfirst seem evident. In the secret session behind closed doors, as\nJesus said, one finds his clearest thought of God, and in the\nindividual heart the divine illumination comes. So some insist; and\nthe answer does not deny, but surpasses the truth in the insistence.\n_Is yours the only heart where God is to be found? Does the sea of his\ngrace exhaust itself in what it can reveal in your bay?_ Rather, in\nhow many different ways men come to God, how various their\nexperiences of him, and how much each needs the rest for breadth and\ncatholicity of view!\n\nOne man comes to God by way of intellectual perplexity and he knows\nchiefly faith's illumination of life's puzzling problems; another\ncomes through the experience of sin and he responds to such a phrase\nas \"God our Saviour\" (I Tim. 1:1); another comes to God through\ntrouble and has found in faith \"eternal comfort and good hope through\ngrace\" (II Thess. 2:16); and another by way of a happy life has found\nin God the object of devoted gratitude. One, a mystic, finds God in\nsolitary prayer; another, a worker, knows him chiefly as the Divine\nAlly. Some are very young and have a child's religion; some are at the\nsummit of their years and have a strong man's achieving faith; and\nsome are old and are familiar with the face of death and the thought\nof the eternal. How multiform is man's experience of God! Some\ncompositions cannot be interpreted by a solo. Let the first violinist\nplay with what skill he can, he alone is not adequate to the endeavor.\nThere must be an orchestra; the oboes and viols, the drums and\ntrumpets, the violins and cellos must all be there. So faith in God is\ntoo rich and manifold to be interpreted by individuals alone; a\nfellowship is necessary. Even Paul, in one of his most gloriously\nmixed-up and yet revealing sentences, prays for fellowship that his\nfaith may be enriched: \"I long to see you, that I may impart unto you\nsome spiritual gift, to the end ye may be established; that is, that I\nwith you may be comforted in you, each of us by the other's faith,\nboth yours and mine\" (Rom. 1:11, 12).\n\nPoverty of faith, therefore, is not due only to individual lapses of\ncharacter and perplexities of mind; _it is due to neglect of Christian\nfellowship_. One who with difficulty has clung to his slender\nexperience of God, goes up to the church on Sunday. Even though it be\na humble place of prayer, if the worship is genuine, the hymns, the\nprayers, the Scriptures gather up the testimony of centuries to the\nreality of God. Here David speaks again and Isaiah answers; here Paul\nreaffirms his faith and John is confident that God is love. Here the\nsaints before Christ cry, \"Jehovah is my rock, and my fortress, and my\ndeliverer\" (Psalm 18:2), and the sixteenth century answers, \"A mighty\nfortress is our God\"; and the nineteenth century replies, \"How firm a\nfoundation, ye saints of the Lord!\" We go up to the church finding it\nhard to sing, \"_My_ Jesus, _I_ love thee, _I_ know thou art _mine_\";\nwe go down with a _Te Deum_ in our hearts:\n\n  \"The glorious company of the apostles praise thee;\n  The goodly fellowship of the prophets praise thee;\n  The noble army of martyrs praise thee;\n  The holy Church throughout all the world doth acknowledge thee.\"\n\nIn the rich and varied faiths of the Church we find a far more\nfruitful relationship with God than by ourselves we ever could have\ngained. Without such an enriching experience men can only with\ndifficulty keep faith alive. Twigs that snap out of the camp-fire lose\ntheir flame and fall, charred sticks; but put them back and they will\nburn again, for fire springs from fellowship. Amiel, after an evening\nof solitude with a favorite book on philosophy, wrote what is many a\nChristian's prayer: \"Still I miss something--common worship, a\npositive religion, shared with other people. Ah! when will the church\nto which I belong in heart rise into being? I cannot, like Scherer,\ncontent myself with being in the right all alone. I must have a less\nsolitary Christianity.\"\n\n\nIV\n\nMen need fellowship, not only for the enrichment of their faith, but\nfor its _stability_. No man can successfully believe anything all\nalone. Let an opinion in any realm be denied, despised, neglected by\ncommon consent of men, and not easily do we hold an unshaken\nconviction of its truth. But let it be agreed with, supported and\nendorsed by many, especially by men of insight, and with each\nadditional testimony to its truth our faith grows confident. A\nfundamental experience of man is that his faiths are socially\nconfirmed.\n\nAuthority of some sort, therefore, never is outgrown in any province\nof knowledge, and strugglers after faith have solid right to the\nsustenance which it can give. For one thing the authority of the\n_expert_ is acknowledged everywhere. When a great astronomer speaks\nabout the stars, most of us put our hands upon our mouths and humble\nourselves to listen. If in science, expert knowledge has this\nauthority--not artificial, infallible, and externally enforced, but\nvital, serviceable, and real--how much more in realms where insight\nand spiritual quality are indispensable! Such authority comes in the\nspirit of Paul: \"Not that we have lordship over your faith, but are\nhelpers of your joy\" (II Cor. 1:24).\n\nAn amateur stands before a picture like Turner's \"The Building of\nCarthage\" and either does not notice the details, or noticing sees no\nspecial meaning there. But when Ruskin, Turner's seer, begins to\nspeak--how wonderful the children in the foreground sailing toy boats\nin a pool, prophecy of Carthage's future greatness on the sea!--one by\none the details take fire and glow with meaning as our eyes are\nopened. Such is the service of a real authority. It does not, as\nWeigel says, put out a person's eye and then try to persuade him to\nsee with some one else's. It rather cures our blindness and enables us\nto see what by ourselves we were incapable of seeing. Christ\nsupremely, when allowed to be himself, has helped men thus. He has not\noppressed the mind with burdensome authority, denying us our right to\nthink. He has come appealing to our little insight with his own clear\nvision, \"Why even of yourselves judge ye not what is right?\" (Luke\n12:57). Things which we see dimly he has clarified; things which we\ndid not see at all, he has made manifest. He has been what he called\nhimself, the Light, and his people have said of him what the man in\nJohn's ninth chapter said, \"He opened mine eyes\" (John 9:30). A\nstruggler after faith may well count among his assets the insight of\nthe seers and of the Seer. As another states it: \"Our weak faith may\nat times be permitted to look through the eyes of some strong soul,\nand may thereby gain a sense of the certainty of spiritual things\nwhich before we had not.\"\n\nBeside the authority of the seers, there is _the authority of racial\nexperience_, to which indeed no mind ought slavishly to subject\nitself, but from which all minds ought to gain insight and confidence.\nTradition has done us much disservice. Oppressions that might long\nbefore have been outgrown have been counted holy because they were\nhoary. There must be something to commend an opinion or a custom\nbeside its age, and all progress depends upon recognizing that\n\n  \"Time makes ancient good uncouth.\"\n\nBut if out of the past have come evils to be overthrown, out of the\npast also have come the best possessions of the race. \"Traditional\"\nhas grown to be an adjective of ill repute; it signifies in common\nparlance the inheritance of oppressive ideals and institutions that\nhold the \"dead hand\" over hopes of progress. But our best music also,\nour poetry, and our art are traditional; the discoveries of our\nscientists on the long road from alchemy to chemistry, from magic to\nphysics are traditional; all that each new generation begins with,\nfitted out like the well-favored child of a provident father, is\ntraditional. No one can describe the utter barrenness of life, if we\ncould not build on the accumulations of our sires, using the result of\ntheir toil as the basis of our work, their hardly won wisdom as our\nguide. To discount anything because it is traditional is to discount\neverything, except that comparatively minute addition which each new\ngeneration makes to the slowly accumulating wisdom and wealth of the\nrace. As Mr. Chesterton has put it: \"Tradition may be defined as the\nextension of the franchise. Tradition means giving votes to the most\nobscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the\ndead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy\nof those who merely happen to be walking about. All democrats object\nto men being disqualified by the accident of birth; tradition objects\nto their being disqualified by the accident of death. Democracy tells\nus not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is our groom;\ntradition asks us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is\nour father.\"\n\nNow racial experience is dubious at many points and at very few does\nit approach finality. But on one matter it speaks with a unanimity\nthat is nothing short of absolute. _Man cannot live without\nreligion_--like the earth beneath the mountain peaks this universal\nexperience of the race underlies the special insights of the seers.\nWhen during the mid-Victorian discomfiture of faith at the first\ndisclosures of the new science, Tennyson's \"In Memoriam\" appeared,\nProf. Sidgwick wrote of it, \"What 'In Memoriam' did for us, for me at\nleast in this struggle, was to impress on us the ineffable and\nirradicable conviction that _humanity_ will not and cannot acquiesce\nin a godless world.\" That conviction is confirmed by the whole\nexperience of the race. To be sure religion, like love, exists in all\ndegrees. From degraded lust to the relationship of Robert Browning and\nElizabeth Barrett, love is infinite in variety; it takes its quality\nfrom the character of those whom it affects; yet through all its\nchanges it is itself so built into the structure of mankind, that\nthough there be loveless individuals, life as a whole is unimaginable\nwithout it. So religion runs the gamut of human quality. In a Hindu\nidolater it performs disgusting rites to placate an angry god, and in\nRabindranath Tagore it cries: \"If thou speakest not I will fill my\nheart with thy silence and endure it. I will keep still and wait like\nthe night with starry vigil and its head bent low with patience. The\nmorning will surely come, the darkness will vanish, and thy voice pour\ndown in golden streams, breaking through the sky.\" In Torquemada it is\ncruel; in Father Damien it becomes a passion for saviorhood. Religion\nhelped Sennacherib to his campaigns and Isaiah to his prophecies; it\npreached the Sermon on the Mount and it dragged Jesus before Pilate.\nCan the same spring send forth sweet water and bitter? But religion\ndoes it, for religion is life motived by visions of God; it is\ntremendous in strength, but with man's unequal power to understand the\nDivine, it is ambiguous in quality. Like electricity, it is\nmagnificent in blessing or terrible in curse. Yet through all its\ndegrees man's relationship with the Invisible is so essentially a part\nof his humanity that lacking it he has never yet been discovered, and\nwithout it he cannot be conceived. It was this impressive witness of\nracial experience that made John Fiske, of Harvard, say, \"Of all the\nimplications of the doctrine of evolution with regard to man, I\nbelieve the very deepest and strongest to be that which asserts the\nEverlasting Reality of Religion.\"\n\nThis testimony of the spiritual seers and this cumulative experience\nof the race have a right to play a weighty part in any consideration\nof religious faith. Even a rebellious youth might pause before he\nscoffs at a mature and thoughtful mind, letting his Church, his\nScripture, and his Christ speak impressively to him about the reality\nof God. What we all do in every other realm, when we are wise, this\nmind is doing in religion. His individual grasp on truth he sets in\nthe perspective of history. He does not feel himself upon a lonely\nquest when he seeks God; rather he feels behind him and around him the\nrace of which he is a part and which never yet has ceased to believe\nin the Divine, and he sees his own insights illumined by those supreme\nspirits who have talked with God \"as a man talketh with his friend.\"\nHe knows as well as any youth that authority has been stereotyped in\ntheories of artificial infallibility, to which no mature mind for a\nmoment can weakly surrender its right to think, but he refuses to give\nup a real authority because some have held a false one. The authority\nof the dictionary is one thing--literal and external. But the\nauthority of a good mother moves on a different plane. It is not\nartificial and oppressive. It is vital and inspiring. She has lived\nlonger, experienced more than her children; she is wiser, better, more\ndiscerning than they. A man who has had experience of great motherhood\ncomes to feel that if his mother thinks something very strongly and\nvery persistently, he would better consider that thing well, for the\nchances are overwhelming that there is truth in it. How much more\nshall he feel so about the age-long experience of the saints with God!\nIn this respect at least there still is truth in Cyprian's words, \"He\nthat hath God for his Father, hath the Church for his Mother.\"\n\n\nV\n\nFaith needs fellowship not alone for enrichment and stability, but for\n_expression_. For faith, as from the beginning we have maintained, is\nnot an effortless acceptance of ideas or personal relationships; it is\nan active appropriation of convictions that drive life, and Christian\nfaith especially has always involved a campaign whose object is the\nsaving of the world. Such an expression of religious life involves\ncooperation; men cannot effectively support the \"work of faith\" (I\nThess. 1:3) apart from fellowship.\n\nThe necessity for this cooperative expression of religion is clear\nwhen we consider the _one in whom we believe_. How anyone can expect\nin solitude to believe in Christ is a mystery. For Christ, with\noverflowing love to those who shared his filial fellowship with God,\nsaid, \"No longer do I call you servants ... I have called you friends\"\n(John 15:15); his care encompassed folk who never heard of him and\nwhom he never saw, \"Other sheep I have, which are not of this fold:\nthem also I must bring ... and they shall become one flock, one\nshepherd\" (John 10:16); and beyond his generation's life his love\nreached out to followers yet unborn, \"Them also that believe on me\nthrough their word\" (John 17:20). Whatever other quality a movement\nsprung from such a source may possess, it must be social. Moreover,\nJesus' faith was active; the meaning of it he himself disclosed, \"All\nthings are possible to him that believeth\" (Mark 9:23). In such a\nspirit, both by himself and through his followers, he sought the lost,\nhealed the sick, preached the Gospel, and expectantly proclaimed an\nearth transformed to heaven. Such a character cannot be known in\ncontemplation under the trees in June or through the pages of an\ninteresting book. If Garibaldi, leading his men to the liberation of\nItaly, had found a devotee who said, I believe in you; I love to read\nyour deeds, and often in my solitary, meditative hours I am cheered by\nthe thought of you--one can easily imagine the swift and penetrating\nanswer! That you believe in me is false; no one believes in me who\ndoes not share my purpose; the army is afoot, great business is ahead,\nthe cause is calling, he who believes follows. Such a spirit was\nChrist's. The hermits, whether of old time in their cells, or of\nmodern time with their unaffiliated lives, are wrong. _The final test\nof faith in Christ is fellowship in work._\n\nThe Church itself has been to blame for much undedicated faith.\nCorrectness of opinion has been substituted, as a test, for fidelity\nof life. \"Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved,\"\nhas been interpreted to mean: accept a theory about Christ's person\nand all is well. But one need only go back in imagination to the time\nwhen first that formula was used to see how vital was its import. To\nbelieve in Christ then meant to accept a despised religion, to break\nties that men value more than life, to face the certainty of contempt\nand the risk of violence. To believe in Christ then meant coming out\nfrom old relationships and going to a sect where one was pilloried\nwith derision, that one might work for the things which Christ\nrepresents. No one did that as a theory; it required a tremendous\nthrust of the will, a decision that reached to the roots of life. All\nthis was involved in believing on Christ, and our decent holding of a\ntheory about him, in a time when all lips praise him, is a poor\nsubstitute for such vital faith. John tells us that once a multitude\nof Jews professed belief in Jesus, but the Master, hearing their\naffirmations, saw the superficial meaning there. \"Many believed on his\nname,\" says John--\"but Jesus did not trust himself unto them\" (John\n2:23, 24). How many believe in Christ in such a way that he cannot\nbelieve in them! They forget that while the test of a man is his\nfaith, the test of faith is faithfulness. An apostolic injunction\nneeds modern enforcement, \"that they who have believed God may be\ncareful to maintain good works\" (Titus 3:8).\n\nThe necessity for a cooperative expression of religion is evident\nagain in the _truth which we believe_. Take in its simplest form\nthe Gospel which Christianity presents, that God is in earnest about\npersonality, and what urgency is there for associated work! For\npersonality is being ruined in this world. False ideas of life,\nidolatry whether to fetishes in Africa or to money here, irreligion in\nall its manifold and blighting forms, are destroying personality from\nwithin, and from without sweatshops, tenements, war, the liquor\ntraffic, industrial inequity, are engaged in the same task of ruin.\nThe common contrast between individual and social Christianity is\nsuperficial. The one thing for which the Christian cares is personal\nlife, and in its culture and salvation he sees the aim of God and\nGodlike men. Whatever, therefore, affects _that_ is his concern,\nand what is there that does not affect it? What men believe about\nlife's meaning and its destiny strikes to the core of personal life,\nand the houses in which men live, the conditions under which they\nwork, the wages that they are paid, and the environments which\nsurround their plastic childhood--these, too, mould for good or ill\nthe fortunes of personality.\n\nThe Christian, therefore, who intelligently holds the faith that he\nprofesses cannot be negligent either of evangelism, education, and\nmissionary enterprise upon the one side, or of social reformation on\nthe other. These are two ends of the tunnel by which the Gospel seeks\nto open out a way for personality to find its freedom. A man who says\nthat he believes in Jesus Christ, and yet is complacent about child\nlabor and commercialized vice, poor housing conditions and unjust\nwages, the trade in liquor and the butchery of men in war, stands in\nperil of hearing the twenty-third chapter of Matthew's gospel brought\nup to date for his especial benefit by the same lips that spoke it\nfirst. The indignation of the Master falls on priests and Levites who,\nspeeding to the temple service, \"pass by on the other side\" the\nvictims of social injury.\n\nIsolated Christians, however, cannot further this campaign for\npersonality redeemed from inward ills and outward handicaps. _Evil is\norganized, and goodness must be, too._ As wisely would a single\npatriot shoulder a rifle and set out for France as would an\nunaffiliated Christian set his solitary strength against the massed\nevil of the world. Men increase effectiveness by a large per cent\nthrough fellowship, as ancient Hebrews saw: \"Five of you shall chase a\nhundred, and a hundred of you shall chase ten thousand\" (Lev. 26:8).\n\n\nVI\n\nMany secondary fellowships offer to a Christian opportunity for\nassociated service; no cooperative endeavor to make this a better\nworld for God to rear his children in should lack Christian sympathy\nand support. But the primary fellowship of Christians is the Church.\nSome indeed would have no church; they would have man's spiritual life\na disembodied wraith, without \"a local habitation and a name.\" But no\nother one of all man's finer interests has survived without organized\nexpression. Justice is a great ideal; any endeavor to incarnate it in\nhuman institutions sullies its purity. One who dwelt only on the lofty\nnature of justice, who thought of it uncontaminated and ideal, might\nprotest against its embodiment in the tawdry ritual and demeaning\nsquabbles of a law court. Between the poetry of justice and the\nrecriminations of lawyers, the perjury of witnesses, the fumbling\nuncertainty of evidence, the miscarriages of equity, how bitterly a\nscornful mind could point the contrast! But a reverent mind, sorry as\nit may be at the misrepresentation of the ideal in the human\ninstitution, is ill content with scorn. He who with insight reads the\nhistory of jurisprudence, perceives how the courts of law, with all\ntheir faults, have conserved the gains in social equity, have\npropagated the ideal for which they stand, have made progress\nsometimes slowly, sometimes with a rush like soldiers storming a\nredoubt, and in times of stress have been a bulwark against the\ninvasion of the people's rights. The poetry of justice would have been\nan idle dream without equity's laborious embodiment in codes and\ncourts.\n\nSome minds dwell with joy upon the spiritual Church. Its names are\nwritten on no earthly roster, but in the Book of Life; its worship is\noffered in no earthly temple, but in the trysting places where soul\nmeets Over-soul in trustful fellowship; its baptism is not with water\nbut with spirit, its eucharist not with bread but with the shared\nlife of the Lord. Or, ranging out to think of the Church as an ideal\nhuman brotherhood men dream as Manson did in \"The Servant in the\nHouse\":\n\n \"If you have eyes, you will presently see the church itself--a\n looming mystery of many shapes and shadows, leaping sheer from floor\n to dome. The work of no ordinary builder!... The pillars of it go up\n like the brawny trunks of heroes: the sweet human flesh of men and\n women is moulded about its bulwarks, strong, impregnable: the faces\n of little children laugh out from every corner-stone: the terrible\n spans and arches of it are the joined hands of comrades; and up in\n the heights and spaces there are inscribed the numberless musings of\n all the dreamers of the world. It is yet building--building and built\n upon. Sometimes the work goes forward in deep darkness: sometimes in\n blinding light: now beneath the burden of unutterable anguish: now to\n the tune of a great laughter and heroic shoutings like the cry of\n thunder. Sometimes, in the silence of the night-time, one may hear\n the tiny hammerings of the comrades at work up in the dome--the\n comrades that have climbed ahead.\"\n\nAll such ideals, like pillars of fire and cloud, lead the march toward\na promised land. They are to the actual Church what the poetry of\njustice is to the actual courts. But in one case as in the other, such\nideals are dreams if, with labor and struggle, through many mistakes,\nagainst the disheartenment of man's frailty and sin, we do not work\nout an institution that shall embody and express man's spiritual life.\nEven now a discerning spirit whose own faith has been nourished at the\naltar regards the Church with boundless gratitude. She has indeed been\nto the Gospel what courts are to justice, indispensable and yet\nburdensome, an institution that the ideal cannot live without and yet\noften cannot easily live with. No one feels her faults so acutely as\none who devotedly values the Gospel and longs for its adequate\nexpression on the earth. Yet the Church conserves the race's spiritual\ngains, fits out our youth with the treasure of man's accumulated\nfaith, is a power house of endless moral energy for good causes in the\nworld, exalts the ideal aims of life amid the crushing pressure of\nmaterial pursuits, holds out a gospel of hope to men whom all others\nhave forsaken, and to the ends of the earth proclaims the good pews of\nGod and the Kingdom. No other fellowship offers to men of faith so\ngreat an opportunity to make distinctive contribution to the race's\nspiritual life. In the presence of the Church's service and the\nChurch's need an unaffiliated believer in Jesus Christ is an anomaly.\nFor enrichment, stability, and expression, faith must have fellowship.\n\n _\"Oh magnify Jehovah with me, and let us exalt His name\n together\"_ (Psalm 34:3).\n\n\n\n\nSCRIPTURE PASSAGES USED IN THE DAILY READINGS\n\n\n EXODUS 3:1-5 (VI-5);\n   4:24-26 (II-4).\n\n DEUTERONOMY 28:65-67 (VIII-2).\n\n II KINGS 21:3-6 (IV-5).\n\n JOB 30:20, 21, 25-27 (X-4);\n   37:23 (V-3);\n   38:31-38 (VII-1).\n\n PSALMS 16:5-11 (III-5);\n   23:1-4 (X-3);\n   27:1-6 (VIII-5);\n   27:7-14 (V-7);\n   51:1-4 (III-3);\n   55:1-7 (VIII-1);\n   56:1-3 (VIII-3);\n   73:2, 3, 16, 17, 24-26 (II-6);\n   103:1-5 (III-2);\n   118:1-6 (VIII-7);\n   145:1-10 (III-7);\n   146:1-5 (IV-1).\n\n PROVERBS 2:1-5 (II-3);\n   4:1-9 (II-2).\n\n ECCLESIASTES 3:11 (V-3).\n\n ISAIAH 1:10-17 (IV-2);\n   40:26-31 (V-4);\n   51:9-16 (VI-6);\n   55:1-3 (II-7).\n\n AMOS 5:21-24 (IX-4).\n\n MICAH 6:1-8 (IX-3).\n\n MATTHEW 6:6-14 (III-1);\n   6:9-15 (XII-5);\n   6:24-33 (VI-6);\n   7:15-20 (V-6);\n   7:24-27 (VI-7);\n   13:54-58 (XI-3);\n   17:19-20 (XI-4);\n   18:12-14 (II-4);\n   21:28-31 (X-1);\n   23:13-15, 23, 24 (XII-1);\n   25:34-40 (IX-7).\n\n MARK 12:28-30 (V-1).\n\n LUKE 6:12-16 (IX-2);\n   7:48-50 (XI-2);\n   18:9-14 (IV-3);\n   22:31, 32 (XI-6).\n\n JOHN 3:21 (IX-5);\n   4:23, 24 (IV-5);\n   6:16, 17 (IX-5);\n   6:27-29 (XI-1);\n   7:16, 17 (IX-5);\n   14:25-27 (VII-2);\n   17:20-23 (XII-6).\n\n ACTS 17:22-28 (IV-6).\n\n ROMANS 8:1-6 (X-7);\n   8:14-16 (V-5);\n   8:24, 25 (III-4);\n   10:11-15 (XII-4);\n   11:33, 34 (V-3);\n   11:33-12:2 (IX-6);\n   15:13 (III-4);\n   16:1-8 (IX-1).\n\n I CORINTHIANS 2:10-14 (VII-4);\n   3:4-9 (III-6);\n   3:18-23 (VII-6);\n   4:11-13 (VI-2).\n\n II CORINTHIANS 5:5 (V-2).\n\n GALATIANS 2:20 (XI-5);\n   5:13-15 (XII-3);\n   5:16-23 (IV-7).\n\n EPHESIANS 1:15-19 (VII-5);\n   4:13-15 (X-5).\n\n PHILIPPIANS 3:12-16 (X-6).\n\n I THESSALONIANS 3:1, 2, 10 (XI-6);\n   5:21 (V-1).\n\n II THESSALONIANS 1:3 (XI-6).\n\n I TIMOTHY 6:20, 21 (II-5).\n\n II TIMOTHY 1:3-5 (II-1);\n   4:6-8 (XII-7).\n\n HEBREWS 1:1, 2 (VII-7);\n   2:8-10 (VI-3);\n   4:1, 2, (I-6);\n   10:23-25 (XII-2);\n   10:32-36 (I-4);\n   11:1 (I-1);\n   11:3, 6 (I-5);\n   11:8-10 (I-2);\n   11:13-16 (I-1);\n   11:24-27 (I-2);\n   11:32-40 (I-3);\n   12:1-3 (VI-4);\n   13:7 (I-7).\n\n JAMES 1:2-8 (X-2);\n   2:14-21 (IV-4);\n   5:13-16 (VIII-4).\n\n I PETER 1:3-9 (XI-7);\n   4:12-16, 19 (VI-1).\n\n II PETER 1:5 (V-1).\n\n JUDE 20-25 (VII-3).\n\n\n\n\nSOURCES OF PRAYERS USED IN THE DAILY READINGS\n\n\n ALFRED, KING--IX-3, \"A Chain of Prayer Across the Ages,\" by S. F. Fox.\n\n ANSELM, ST.--XI-6. \"A Chain of Prayer Across the Ages,\" by S. F. Fox.\n\n ARNDT, JOHANN--IX-1; X-1. \"A Chain of Prayer Across the Ages,\" by\n   S. F. Fox.\n\n ARNOLD, THOMAS--VII-5. \"A Chain of Prayer Across the Ages,\" by\n   S. F. Fox.\n\n BACON, FRANCIS--VII-2. \"A Chain of Prayer Across the Ages,\" by\n   S. F. Fox.\n\n BEECHER, HENRY WARD--I-4; I-7; II-7; III-5; III-7; IV-7; V-7; VI-6;\n   X-5. \"A Book of Public Prayer.\"\n\n BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER--XII-6.\n\n DAWSON, GEORGE--X-4. \"A Chain of Prayer Across the Ages,\" by\n   S. F. Fox.\n\n HALE, SIR MATTHEW--VII-4. \"A Chain of Prayer Across the Ages,\" by\n   S. F. Fox.\n\n HUNTER, JOHN--I-1; IV-5; XI-2; XI-3; XII-7. \"Devotional Services for\n   Public Worship.\"\n\n JENKS, BENJAMIN--X-2. \"A Chain of Prayer Across the Ages,\" by\n   S. F. Fox.\n\n MCCOMB, SAMUEL--I-6; II-1; III-1; VI-3; VIII-1; VIII-2; VIII-3;\n   VIII-5; VIII-6; VIII-7; IX-2; XI-1; XII-2; XII-4. \"A Book of\n   Prayers for Public and Personal Use.\"\n\n MARTINEAU, JAMES--III-4; IV-4; V-2; VI-2; XII-1. \"Prayers in the\n   Congregation and in College.\"\n\n NEWMAN, FRANCIS W.--VI-1; VI-7. \"A Chain of Prayer Across the Ages,\"\n   by S. F. Fox.\n\n ORCHARD, W. E.--I-2; I-3; II-2; II-3; II-4; II-5; II-6; III-2; IV-3;\n   IV-6; V-1; V-3; V-6; VI-5; VII-1; VII-3; VII-7; VIII-4; IX-5; X-7;\n   XI-5; XI-7. \"The Temple.\"\n\n PARKER, THEODORE--I-5; V-4; V-5; VI-4; VII-6; X-6. \"Prayers.\"\n\n RAUSCHENBUSCH, WALTER--III-6; IV-1; IV-2; IX-4; IX-6; XII-3; XII-5.\n   \"Prayers of the Social Awakening.\"\n\n ROBINSON, HELEN RING--XI-4. \"Thy Kingdom Come,\" by Ralph E.\n   Diffendorfer.\n\n SHAFTESBURY, EARL OF--IX-7. \"A Chain of Prayer Across the Ages,\" by\n   S. F. Fox.\n\n STEVENSON, ROBERT LOUIS--III-3. \"Prayers Written at Vailima.\"\n\n VAN DYKE, HENRY--IV-6. \"Thy Kingdom Come,\" by Ralph E. Diffendorfer.\n\n WEISS, S.--X-3. \"A Chain of Prayer Across the Ages,\" by S. F. Fox.","title":"The Meaning of Faith","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":124618}