SUNDAY READING

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVI, Issue 12, 14 June 1913, Page 10

SUNDAY READING

CHARACTERISTIC THOUGHT MOVEMENTS OF TO-DAY. An Address by the REV. FRANK HALES A great change has taken place in ->c religious thinking of to-day as compared with twenty or thirty years ago. Earnest men in the Church, and out of it, men of all creeds and no creeds, are asking what is the next step for them to take under conditions now prevailing in theology, in the Church, in the sciences, and in society at large. How are we going to bring the simplicity of the home to men whose minds are confused by definitions and doctrines? What are we going to say to Christians whose minds are filled with alarm at the decline of certain form* of evangelism? What are we going to say to the man who cannot believe mat piayer affects the weather? What about the churciies in which the consciousness of sin is suffering a kind of decay? All these things are being turned over in the minds of men and women who think to-day. We are face to face with these and other characteristic thought movements of our age. It is not my purpose to undertake a defence of them in thn address. But this much, I must be admitted, that however much remains to be done with respect to their logical grounds, boundaries and affinities, their essential justice may be said to be already established, 'i refer more particularly to the following group of ideas and tendencies. BELIEF IN THE IMMANENCE OF GOD IN NATURE AND IN MAN.

Most men are coming to see that what is needev. to-day is not an infusion of something that ever was totally outside of us, but a complete development of what is already within us. We of God at present in the soul from birth, and* throughout all its growth, and as being the source and inspiration 01 all good impulses. For many minds there is a lot o. truth in the statement, "One cannot be irreligious until one is converted from God to Satan." And it is also being recognised that, whoever sincerely approves anything that is worthy of approval, whoever is touched by tne true, the beautiful of the good, has written him a germ of the worship of God. What God demands of such is a repentance of all that is mean, half-hearted and fragmentary as will let that germ grow toward its source as the tree grows toward the sun. *vo must permit the religious function of our nature to receive God in all His fulness and rest in Him. .. we neeu, and what we are coming to find, is the God within the commonplace—the ordinary. If we lock God up in the Church He becomes the priest's God, the devotee's God. In Gort every man, everything, lives, moves and has its being:

"From Horeb's bush the Presence spoke To earlier faiths and simpler folk; But now each bush that sweeps our Flames with the Awful Immanence. EMPLOYMENT OF LITERARY AND HISTORICAL METHODS IN STUDY OF THE SCRIPTURE. When an undeveloped historic sense permitted men to place upon the same plane of spiritual authority the words of patriarch, Levitical law-giver, psalm-1 ist, prophet and the Christ, modes of life were acceptable as Christian that cannot now find toleration. The new conception of a developing revelation has so focussed' spiritual authority in Jesus Christ that men no longer find it easy to wrest the Scripture to the service of the arbitrary desires and practices. Thu3 the higher Biblical learning and a higher standard of life have come to us hand in hand, each one doubtless promoting the other. This, to my mind, exalts the Bible, and makes it much more intelligible than the view that put every word of it on the same level. ' SOCIAL INTERPRETATION OF THE TEACHING OF JESUS CHRIST.

The socialisation of our ideals seems at 1 first sight lu<e turning our backs on salvation and heaven, but in reality it ( merely reproduces the life of Him who ] thought that even being in the form of ; God was not something to be grasped r after, but made Himself of no reputa- ] tion, and took upon Him the form of a ] savant. In our day, as never before - since the sacred feet of Jesus trod the earth, the Church is emphasising service of fellow men as the true test and measure of piety. Active consecration rather than passive submission has come to be the mark of sanctity, and consecration has come to vastly more than any private interchange of soul relationships between self and God. In fs order the world is to be made over into the kingdom of the Christ, not by the easy way of begging God to do it, but by the much harder way of doing it ourselves. 1 believe that to-day of religion in the form of service we have more and more. Christianity is not decaying; it is developing. Christianity is teaching men that if they want to get a vision of God they can get it, not by snutting themselves up like a monk in a ee]J, but by doing some service to a fellow man. The fact that we have to deal wu.i to-day is not the daeay but the development of Christianity. This is most strikingly shown by the history of the three most recent revival movements of wide extent—the Young Men's Christian Association movement, the Salvation Army movement, and the revival movement led by Mr. Moody. When the Salvation Army came to this Dominion, many thought tnat this was the revival force for which they had been waiting. But to-day the Salvation Army evangelistic service is as trite as any service in an evangelical church. But the leaders 01 this wonderful movement were wise enough to see that mere revivalism only touches the problem of \ the city on its outer edge. And so we get to-day the Salvation Army being kept alive by its social service, which is as much Christian, and perhaps more so, as the mere preaching of the Gospel. The Young .Men's Christian Association has seen many changes since George Williams, its founder, interested himself in direct .spiritual work for the unchurched young man in certain London business houses. To-day no Young Men's Christian Association is complete without social privileges. Institutional activities in connection with many churches in England and America and Australia arc coining to be justified for what they are in themselves as a needed social service. "In the larger sense in which converting the world consists in assimilating men in body, mind and morals to the Christian ideal these new forms of service are helping to convert the world." Take Die greatest of recent revival movements which had for its leader the late Dwjght L. Moody. That movement appealed less to fear, and more to the ethical motives. Moody was wise enough to see that something more than public meetings was necessary to regenerate the world, so he devoted a good deal of his life to certain educational features of the work of winning the world for Christ. This did not mean any surrender of evangelistic ide.'.lr, but greati".' comprehensiveness of vision on Moody's part. INCREASING EMPHASIS OF LOVE AS THE SUPREME QAULITY IN THE DTVINE CHARACTER. We are coming to feel in these days that there is a God Whom we can lovi

/because Jesus Christ revealed' the loving kindness of God. In a world in which love is the law for men then.- must. 1)0 a loving God. Fancy Jesus without faith in the love and fatherhood of God! , Jesus Cluist's idea of Hod is the best interpreter of life we have as yet discovered. J prefer Mis conception of God to the theologian's bygone days. God does not go about like a Hon seeking whom lie may devour. God goes about like a mother seeking the lost child. It is being said to-day that too much emphasis is being laid on the love of God. Personally, I prefer to lay the -emphasis where I think Jesus Christ laid it.

THE RECOGNITION OF LIKENESS TO JESUS, IRRESPECTIVE OF DOGMATIC AFFINITIES AS THE ADEQUATE AND ONLY TEST OF CHRISTIAN DISGIPLESHIP.

Christianity as a Religion, not as a set of doctrines, is what the world is, asking for to-day, and think God in .many places the world is getting it. The mode of approach to Jesus to-day is the practical, not the theoretical. The dogmatic method of hanging the issues of life upon theoretical .considerations is dead. The Christ of experience has taken the place of the Christ of dogma. Christ has given something to live for, not to quarrel about. The Church ought to realise, and she is beginning to do so, her natural affinity for all souls who aspire toward the Christ life irrespective of their theories. "The Christianity of Christ is much steadier than creeds and ecclesiastical institutions." There is a great deal of unofficial Christianity in the world to-day. The Christ-figure calls aloud over twenty centuries of time, calls for service to the needy, help to the weak, encouragement to the fallen, and tenderness to the sinful. When Nicodemus came seeking to debate with Christ His relation to God, he was told to become obedient to the life that is from above. When John the Baptist sent his disciples to ask whether Jesus was the Messiah, the reply pointed out. the good works that were being wrought. | And so men who profesß to be Christ's I are being judged to-day by their works, I not by their dress or their profession. These are, I think, characteristic thought movements of to-day. And because of these movements, or developments, three things are happening—the Christian' life is being simplified, its ideals are being socialised, and its motives are being intensified.