A SPIRITUAL PARADOX.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 4, Issue 20, 12 March 1915, Page 4 (Supplement)

A SPIRITUAL PARADOX.

By The REV. It. J. CAMPBELL, 31.A

(Preached in the City Temple on Thursday December iOth.)

''Who is he that saith, anS it cometh to pass, when the Lord commandeth it not?:'— (Lamentations iii, 37.)

In my address to you last Thursday morning you may remember that X brieflv referred to a paradox resident in tho very heart of the Christian gospel, and which might be stated thus: We are bidden to do all we can for the lessening of human suffering, and yet arc assured that salvation can only lie won through suffering. Further, we are urged to work with all our might tor the betterment of this world, and yet are warned against believing that tin.world can ever be made a satisfactory dwelling place for the children of the living God. I wish to dwell upon that paradox for a further few moments this morning, and perhaps extend its rang* a little under the guidance <>l this in. pressive text. These words form part of a moving elegy pronounced over a comparatively small and weak country which had been overrun and devastated by the mightiest military empire in the world in the sixth century B.C. While it L- not trie that history ever does exactly repeat itself, it is remarkable neverihelo« how often the same kind of situation tends to recur in international rotations; for all this might have been written about SUFFERING BELGIUM TO-DAY. Here once again we have the mighty neighbour rushing upon a people who had given him no alienee and wl.osc numbers and resources .vere i ttorly unequal to the task of resisting 1 im. although heroically exerted. Jfi.-n? again, too. we see a prosperous industrial and trading community ruined and -hiittcred, its cities pillaged and destroyed, its inhabitants massacred, terrorised, and enslaved, its homesteads the prey ot a lustful and brutal soldiery and given up systematically to fire and sword. The parallel is very exact; militarism docs not seem to have changed much in cnaracter in two thousand five .'hundred years. But the religious poet who thus sings' his sad song of lamentation ovei the sorrow of his native land says a strange thing about it which must be equally applicable to the conditions of the present day. Look closely into it; it will repay scrutiny. After specifying a number of dreadful tilings which he had witnessed, Mich as the cruel treatment of prisoners by the invader, the daily perversion of justice, and the vast amount of private tyranny that was going_ on, he adds, " Who is he that saith, and it cometh to pass, when the Lord commandeth it not?" In other words—and surely it is' a very daring thing to say —none of all this could have happened except by the specific ordinance of God. The enemy was behaving wickedly and savagely, but God's holy and wise purpose was being served thereby. Am 1 not right in calling that a strange conclusion to draw from the text under observation? At first sight it is almost shocking to the mora sense. To say that the torrent ot evil passion, of terror, destruction, and bitter anguish, thus let loose upon a defenceless population, could have anything to do with God except to excite his righteous reprobation and bring down his stern judgments upon those guilty of causing it, is repugnant to the natural instincts. Yes, says this writer in effect, such may be true—undoubtedly is true—and God will punish the people who do these things; but they could not do them if he did not let them, and he lets them for other and higher reasons than those who afflict and suffer are fullv aware of. Who can bid anything come to pass except as the event is by the Lord's command. The same doctrine runs right through the New Testament as well as the Old, the supreme instance of its' operation being the atoning death of our Lord Jesus Christ himself, "turn, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain." By wicked hancb—by tho determinate counsel and foreknowledge ot God' Yes, it is indeed so; but let us keep our minds clear: it is not the wickedness' that is of God, but the pain that results from it. What men do with one motive GOD PERMITS with another. Sin works its own undoing; by its very nature it always results in suffering somewhere, and God uses that very suffering to awaken tho soul to spiritual things. When civilisation has become gross, secularised, absorbed in purely utilitarian objects, unmindful of the"eternal, unconscious of its blunder and recalled to the contemplation of essential and imperishable verities. This' is what is going on today, and iii the holy wisdom and mercy of God the chosen instrument to this end is tho very thing civilisation has most carefully and painstakingly elaborated, the thin"' in which it has trusted most implicitly for its preservation, namely, material force. What the world is sut fering from to-day is die legitimate and inevitable outcome of the ideals to which it has given its allegiance and the spirit in which it has been living. It is a terrible awakening; but it had to come: it is God's law. Jn one souse we have deserved what we are enduring and in another it has come for cur deliverance. The wickedness and unscnnMiloiisncsv of the German war policy with its awful results, will lead ultimately—indeed has already led—to a re-birth of the spiritual consciousness in the nations of Europe. Such is tho wonderful working of the providence ol 'Vatch that pjrndoxj it has n great deal to teach us. One might have expected that this' horrible war would destroy religion: it has clone the very opposite. Religion is beingjiorn again iii millions' of hearts on battlefields and m mourning, desolated homes. it w not the horrors of war, but the false securities and base contentments ot peace tint are fatal to the religious taith. Great sorrows do not drive men from God they bring them to him, especially if sorrows and sublimities are minified. Then all goes except the soul and the soul's claims upon the universal, mean and despicable motives and objects drop awav out of ..i«ht, horizons widen, vaster and nobler destinies loom into view than those which are bounded by flesh and sense. Our soldiers- many of tl.em-tell us that they arc conscious of strange supernatuiil forces everywhere about them <murt scenes of danger and death; they themselves are not normal; they do not feel He same ps before, nor will they ''•>'• <-' el *'" same again. Everything has changed. No man, no woman, no nation wi I come out of this titanic struggle exactly the same as they went in. FATHOMLESS DEEP 9 have been stirred in us all; we are new heincs; our toils, our dreams, our von v.-orries of yesterday are almost for.™ - t on in this day of larger .s, uos that . h. s broken upon us. A patriotism that IS far more of heaven than of earth has suddenly sprung into lite; the soldiers who w dvinji for their country are country nearer, sweeter, dearer, and more blessed-than we ever knew be

fore. Those who mourn the dead —and, oh, what multitudes of them there arc : —are feeling the visible growing dun and shadowy under the pressure of li.t invisible. Frivolity is all but gone, hardness of heart, class prejudioa, cruel Kelt-indulgence have disappeared as :r a flash, swallowed up in the great lolling wave of human sympathy that is passing over the world. Stramjp piuducts those of the devil's' agents and the rage of hell! There is more of the lov> of Christ in the world to-day than then; was on the day before the Kaiser launched his ultimatum to Russia, and the power of the Saviour's redeeming secrilice is better understood. Not many days ago a recruiting effort was being made outside a Loudon railway station, and an old man —probably a vt-ti ran soldier himself—was vainly < trving to persuade a young roan to join tlio <oi ours. He /as just turning away, when a line of wounded men wa> carried from the train to the waiting anil.u'nii'-e conveyances —a moving aul heartrending sight. The ol'd soldier said not another word, but, looking the younger man in the eyes, he turned and pointed to the procession of sufferers. It was l enough; with thc.'ume silence the young fellow thus mutely addressed went instantly and lined up with the newly enlisted squad and ma relied away. I was told last night by a Belgian refugee, a professor from the university of Louvain, that the crucifix has come back into the French Army, whence it was banished not so very long ago. The soldiers want to see it now; they understand better what it means. Priests are lighting in the ranks, and it is no uncommon sight to see mass celebrated on the battlefield by one of these soldier priests in military dress with marks of battle upon him, or ti, nee the sacrament of absolution administered by a dying man to dying men. One reads of a Protestant English nurse in a field hospital lifting up the shatter ed arm of a mortally stricken Catholic, who had managed to whisper to her almost with his last breath that he was a priest', although only a private in the French forces, and that he wanted to make THE SIGN OF THE CROSS over his moaning comrades for theii comfort and peace. Before that hand of blessing had lowered its owner had passed beyond the roar of battle to the presence 'of the High Priest himself. Ah, fiends may shriek in triumph over the appalling horrors of war and the black depravity that accompanies us course, but God is still reigning, and it is the worst and not the best in hu,man heart and life that is being overthrown. If I could say one word this morning to comfort and relieve any present who have come here in gloom and sadness, I thin kit would be this: In your grief try to realise who it is who has the keys of' hell and of death and without whom neither joy nor pain can reach us in this world. It K One in whose hands is still the print of the nails and on whose brows the crown of thorns has left a mark which can never bo effaced. " All power is committed unto me in heaven and on earth."

God's in his heaven, All's right with the world

I trust I have never taken lightly any of earth's tragedies or ever tried to minister an unreal and inadequate remedy to any broken heart; 1 am far from the thought of attempting to do so this morning. And yet 1 know what some people say when they hear such a gospel as 1 have just uttered. They say-, How utterly useless! It does not touch my needs; no preacher's word ever will; when the stark dreadfulness of lire in its most sinister aspects comes home to any man it turns him dumb; if he can prattle any longer about the goodness of God. it 'is because he does not understand what he is saying; all religious consolation breaks down, fails utterly when any real disaster overwhelms the soul; perhaps this preacher is only sayins what he thinks he ought to say arid not what he really feels. Well, put the preacher out of sight, and let us get direct to the crucified. 1 tell you, and 1 tell you again, and yet again, you with the "pale lips and the heart torn and bruised, that there is everything you need. Oh, mighty paradox! If there had never been a cross ot La I vary i might have nothing to say; if the Son of God had never agonised thereon, one might not feel that the soul-cleansing sacrament of pain had any efficacy at all. But now I know it. He went through the fire; he cried out in the darkness before tne gates of light opened to let him in. And therefore it is as one who knows that he comes to you in the closest of all fellowships, the fellowship of a love that has sounded the depth,' of sorrow, and says to you: Be at peace; in the world you have tribulation: but ba of good cheer, I have overcome the world. lake him at -is word: be still, I conjure you; let tin Great Physician have his way v.itu you, and have' it all; and ere long, perhaj s to vour own utter surprise, you will hue. an'unearthly calm descend upon your spirit, and vou will be made to realise that in the Master's keeping henceforth and for ever, sale and unharmed, exalted and glorified, is all tho treasure of your soul.