SUNDAY READING

Taranaki Daily News, 19 August 1916, Page 10

SUNDAY READING

"THE lUY." SKIii.MON il'liiO.-U IIEI) liV IiEV. A. li. CoLYILK, M.A.. AT ST. .MAUY'S Cllil'KCH, NEW I'LYMOI'TII, "And it shall Ik l ~aid in tliut day, 'Lo, this is our Cod; we have waited for Him, we will lie glad and rejoice in His salvation.' "—lsaiah "2.5, !). "In that da.v"-we heard a great deal from our enemies at the beginning of the war about "the day." It was the day when the nations of Europe in general, and England in particular, were to lie crushed beneath the iron heel of Germany, and "Deuchland über alios" was to be a grim and terrible reality. \\ e will think now of another day. the day of which the prophet spoke which, please t,!od, shall be our day, too, and shall mean something greater and liner lor us and for the world than the triumph of militarism and the satisfaction of the lust for power. "Lo, this is our God." Of all the splendid and bcautilul language to be found ill tile utterances of the prophet Isaiah there is none that appeals to us more compell;"glv than .such passages as these which describe the looking forward with undying hope to a day of home-coming. The people of Israel after their exile were to come home, and to them home meant Jerusalem, and Jerusalem meant the Temple and the Temple meant God. it was this home-hunger that would not leave the people in the days of exile, of nerve-trial, ol fear and depression; it was this home-hunger that was in reality their salvation. True, it increased the pain of banishment and the hardship of that time of trial, but it kept them steadfast through it and deepened their power of prayer; for, my friends, the prayers that come from a homehunger are always unmatched in pathos and intensity, and as a matter of .solid experience, the intensity of longing for what satisfies the heart exceeds every other longing, exceeds immeasurably the longing for what satisfies the body. An Arctic explorer was once asked whether, during eight months of slow starvation which he and his comrades sull'ered, they had not found the torture of hunger ami cold almost insupportable. "Did you not long terribly for a good meal and warm lire?" Well." he answered, "that was not the worst; we almost forgot that in the longing for the sight of our fellow-countrymen and our homes. The hardest thing to bear was the feeling that our countrymen might have forgotten us and were not coming to our rescue. - ' The heart-hunger for the sight of human faces and the touch of human sympathy made them forgot all other needs. So it was with the people of Israel in their exile; they forgot all other needs in their one great need for i!od, and their "day" was

THE DAY OF HOME-COMING to .Jerusalem, to the Temple, to God. My friends, we have just been keeping the second anniversary of the declaration of war. and we are all hoping that there will not be a third. The "day" to which we all look forward is the day of the proclamation of peace. We 4" not let that "looking forward" share our determination to persevere, nor weaken our 'resolution to bear bravely whatever saeriliees may yet V demanded of us. lint without, a day to look forward to, there could be little spirit in our efforts, and we .should fall.into an attitude oFiiieehanical endurance. "We are saved by hope." says St. Paul, and we all know it to be true. In every dark experience, ill shame and sorrow and sickness, even in the darkest of all. the departure of one long and deeply loved to a life beyond our -ight, we, are saved by hope—the looking forward to "a day.'' The Church gives us that great hope in the treed. "I look for"—the word is "cxpecto." which implies. "1 look with confidence for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come." It is the satisfaction of the hunger of the heart for which we long, and every true pang of heart hunger is really hunger for Hi n in Whom all creatures on earth live and move and have their being, in Whom all spirits live; and looking forward we cry with 'the prophet. "It shall lie-said in that, day, "Lo, this is our God; we have Waited for lliin: we will be glad and rejoice in His salvation." We look forward then to the DAY OF J'EACH

as the satisfaction of more than our bodily ntcds. The day, please God, will •have something better for us than the triumph oyer our enemies, the relief from burdens, the freedom from the necessity for sacrifice, and will mean something more than u smoother life and more, ease and comfort—these are bodily needs. We know that many hearts are hungry to-day, hungry for the return of friends, for the joyful meeting, the clasp of hands, the gathering together of the family, the reconstruction (if the home. We pray earnestly for that day. May it mean for us all as w<- realise the desire of our hearts, a closer union with Cod. May we feel that as He has given us this time of trial and separation, and been with us through it all. so He must be to us in that day our strength and our salvation, and as we have learned that there is none other on whom we can depend in the day of trial, so there can be none other closer to us or more necessary to us in the day of victory, in the day of peace and safety. Now as we set our faces unflinchingly for the great struggle remaining (and the end is not yet) let us remember that the glory of that day depends on how we bear oil I .selves in this our time of trial. Every great day demands great preparation before it dawns in all its fullness and glory, and this time of preparation is ours. God has given it into our hands. We shall reach the day of peace when by the way of the Cross we have won right through it, and not before, and we must beware of false dawns and premature rejoicings. "Expecto"—yes:

WE LOOK WITH COXKIDKNCIO FOR Tllli DAY, but as we look we work', and as we work we pray. Tliut is the only way we can stop the war. IVople ask .sometimes, "Why does not Cod stop the war?" They have proposed what in logic would be called a dilemma, something in this form: "'lf <iod can stop the war and will not, lie is not a Cod to be loved; if He would like to stop the war and cannot, He is a God to be pitied." Hut suppose by some overwhelming intervention He did stop the war, then what? Why, we might stop the war to-morrow by giving in; do you suppose that thus we should be doing (Sod's will? And if God intervened and stopped the war tomorrow, it would solve 110 problem; it would settle no dispute. No ambition would be changed, no hatred softened,

no rivalry removed. The roots of war would not be touched; still fast in the soil of national life, they would lie and bear bitter fruit in the years to come, Let us remember that if ever we arc tempted in the coming months to cry peace when there is no peace, let us stay no prayer, and shrink from no sacrifice and grudge no trouble that will take us through to the real day of glory which chilli ii!-o be the clay of the Lord.

And remember (hat the people of Israel looked lorward to their day as u hoine-coming to their Temple, to their (loil. So must it be with us. There must be also the deep preparation of our own hearts for the day if we would feel its full glory in our lives. What keeps men outside the Church? What makes them turn away from the Tabic of the Lord? indifference, sloth, shallowness, lack of faith, lias not this time, of war taught us how deadly these very things are to the life of the nation? Shall we not le-rn, too, how deadly they are to the life of the soul, and let "the day" mean for us a HEAL HKTIT.N TO Ul":K CIl.l'ROIl and our Communion? What exiles men and woiu'en from Coil'.' Sin and, the wages of sin that plunge the soul into a lethargy which passes slowly on into death. Shall not our preparation for the day of glory mean a real personal repentance; a strong light against whatever is injuring our souls and keeping us exiles from the heart of Ood. a sustained ell'ort to live cleaner, truer, larger lives—that as,the day of glory dawns upon the world it may flood our own souls with light, and we find the full satisfaction of the hunger of our hearts in the cry, "Lo this is our Hod, we have waited for Him: we will be glad anil rejoice in ilis salvation .'