ST. ANDREW’S MISSION.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXVI, Issue 8, 14 May 1913, Page 2

ST. ANDREW’S MISSION.

THE OPENING SERVICE. (Contributed.) The special services in connection with the Stratford Presbyterian Chinch commenced in St. Andrew’s Hall last evening. The hall was carefully arranged for the meeting, and looked very comfortable. A huge fire crackled in the fir© place and vanned’ up the building. A carpet, kindly lent by Messrs Brocklebank, covered the platform, and gave the whom quite a .home-like- appearance, There wqa a very fair attendance, and the uieetipg was hearty and enjoyable. The hevt" Alexander hymns were to some of the audience a bit strange ai first, but the choir kept them going until the audience got a grip of them. The hymns “He' Will Hold Me/’ and' ’“Joy Bells Ringing in My Soul” were specially enjoyed. “IS CHRISTIANITY DECADENT?” Was a question asked at last night’s mission meeting, by the Rev. J. Pattison. Some people, imagine, said the speaker, that the, Church, has had its day, and that Christianity is declining. They suppose that the ‘old story’ of the Gospel is played out, and that we may look for deliverance from evil, and hope for the golden age through legislation, social reconstruction, or applied science. In opposition to this, we hold, that, the solution of all our problems, industrial, social, and political, lies in the teachings of the Man of Nazareth. What the world needs to-day, as truly as in ages past, is the Gospel of the New Birth and the New Heart. Without this radical spiritual change wrought by the Divine Spirit in the depths, of our being, no humanitarian scheme, no legislation, no social system will purify men’s spirits and cleanse their hearts, any more than whitewashing a pump Will cleanse the impure water within. The leaven of Christianity was nevei more active than it is to day, Thr world is getting better. Our golden age is in the future. The present is better than the past. And the future will be brighter than the present. Despite the untoward things that confront the Church to-day, we believe ia ! an optimistic outlook. In 1736 Butler,the distinguished author of the analogy which bears his name, wrote: “It has come, I know not how, to be taken for granted that Christianity is not so much a subject for en quiry, ns, that it is not discovered to be fictitious.” In 1695 Horace Walpole wrote; “Ha could not put his hand on a single man of eminence who was net an atheist.”

Anyone knows that atheism is dead or dying;. One <"a n hardly find a man of distinction who affirms that “there is no God.” The atheists in New Zealand are a mere handful. The old cress materialism has gone. Scien tific investigation leads us more and more to see that what we call matter is but a form of force,that ihe universe has a spiritual basis. Christianity was never more widely spread and aggressive than at this hour. Look ai somo of the facts. The Christian Endeavour movement composed of young people who have solemnity pledged themselves to serve Christ and work for His Church, number now over four million members, living in many lands, and consisting nl the voty cream of our young life. But this is only one of many kindred organisations, like the Epworth League of the Methodist Church and the Bro therhood of St. Andrew, of the Episco pal Church. One of the most hopeful and promising movements of the present is the Student Christian Union This movement i? comparatively

young, but in a few years it lias developed until there are now over 1 50,000 students in the Union. These students are found not only in tho Universities of America, England and Australia, but in those of the Continent, and in the new Universities of the Orient, a powerful Christian leaven at work in tho higher educational life of tho world. Needless to say that when, these men pass out of the Universities and take up their work in the various professions—law, medicine, and divinity; when they enter into commercial, industrial or political life, they will exercise as leaders a powerful influence for righteousness and the advancement of Christ’s Kingdom.

Take another movement of recent origin,' and one scarcely less significant and hopeful than the Students’ Union, the Laymen’s Missionary Movement, organised to disseminate missionary intelligence, promote missionary enthusiasm, and extend Christ’s Kingdom both at home and abroad. One reads of four thousand picked: men, doctors, lawyers, commercial men, professors in the Universities meeting together for days in Chicago, to discuss ways and means for spreading the Gospel of Christ. A short time age most of the Protestant Churches in the United States made a united systematic effort to reach and win the men and boys for Christ and the Church, and within a fortnight no less than seven million were brought into the movement. No! Christianity is not dead! Its leaven is powerfully at work in all lands. The awakening millions of China, the most populous country in the world, are turning their thoughts not only toward the arts and sciences, and civilisation, hut also toward the Christian religions of the West. The progress of Christianity is not always even and uninterrupted. It resembles a zig-zag course, rather than a straight line. But its progress is sure. The leaven will work until the whole is leavened, until all flesh shall see the Divine glory and grace, and “the kingdoms of this world become the kingdom of our Lord.”