HEREAFTER OF THE SLAIN.

Taranaki Daily News, 4 September 1915, Page 6

HEREAFTER OF THE SLAIN.

| THE EVANGELICAL VIEWPOINT. j AN INTERESTING STATEMENT. At the Christchurdh Baptist Ohuroh recently the Rev. J. J. North made a short statement on the controversy whioh, lias arisen through the utterance of a young Baptist minister in Gisborije, who has since resigned 'his Chureh, regarding the thereafter of the slam. Mr. North (jaid that the minister in question had made a very crude statemeat of the position of the Eyangelical Oh wanes, and had placed as a substitute a sort of Protestant Purgatory, in which those who die without Christ may be prepared for final blessedness. "Anglican Catholics may have ideas concerning a modified IPugatory," said the preadier, "but these have never been expressed in their creeds, and are of the nature of religious speculations. They labor as speculations with the enormous difficulty that they have no scrap of Scripture quotable in-thcir favor. They labor, further, with the fact that they slacken the fires of evangelism and tend toward a preaching emptied of the urgent call for repentance; which is the note of the New Testament.

"The position of our Church, which Bishop Julius characterises as narrow, seems to me to have much more width, and comfort, and force in it. We take the position that to make affirmations concerning the hereafter which go beyond the express words or tendencies of Schripture is unsafe. The words of Jesus carry authority. The words of the Apostles carry authority. Subsequent speculations carry none. The words of Jesus make it plain that for the outgoing soul faith implicit, or explicit, in Him is necessary. Scripture makes this life to be the supreme opportunity of the human soul. If there are opportunities of repentance hereafter, they are not revealed. We, therefore, have no right to assert them. We leave them in the reticence in which Scripture leaves them. , "We are taught with great emphasis that -the Day of God will be a day of the reversal of human judgment, when the first shall he last and the last first. Wo are forbidden to judge each other. We have no right to pronounce hopeless judgment on any. Wo are assured by Christ's pitiful lips that many who make no profession of Him, who are finconscious of Hiifi as the object of faith, shall because of their works hear Him say, 'Come, ye blessed of my Father.' We are also assured that the soul of a man may find the Eternal Mercy at the very gates of death, as did the thief on the cros3. No man, be he bishop, or priest, o? commoner, can say what passes between the outgoing soul and the Saviour. We can all of iw hope, wc can all of us wait, confident that'the Judgment of God will be full of pity and mercy and righteousness. In all this -we find a width and a depth in which it. is easy to work, and in wfluch it is inspirng to work, in which also it is hard--to despair. Our positon has advantages wlush the vague ideas of Catholic churchmen »aimnt pretend t.>. Wc ha\c lie neath us the words of Ohrist. on which the weight of the world can rest. We are not affirming when He is silent. We are waiting, content that the Judge of all the Earths will do right. Me a nwhile we try to keep the emphasis where Scripture keeps it, in this life. We urge men everywhere that they should repent."