SUNDAY READING

Taranaki Daily News, 9 April 1921, Page 9

SUNDAY READING

THE SPIRIT GOD. “God is Spirit.”—Saint John IV. 24. (By Rev. A. 11. Collins, New Plymouth.) Our Lord was speaking to the soiled Magdalene of Samaria. The conversation opened on low levels and commonplace things—wells and water, thirst, and the of slaking it. But ic soon passed out of that region to things deeper. Physical thirst became symbolic of spiritual desire, the cool dark well of Sycar symbolised “the ay ells of salvation”; Jacob’s munificence suggested the greater gift of God; the low embrasure of the wayside well became a pulpit of Christendom; and the weary wayfarer who sat thereon was seen to be the Prophet of the Highest, whose pointed words searched a sinner’s heart, like- shafts of all-revealing light. It may be the woman’s question about the right place to worship was raised ■to blunt the edge of inconvenient appeal. The Jew in his blindness made the All Father a local and tribal deity. His throne was in Zion, and His altar the Temple. Outside Jerusalem there was no way into t‘he Divine Presence. Every other altar was an unhallowed shrine. All other forms of worship were vain superstition. This woman knew, that Ebal and Gerizem were so regarded. She and her people were anat’haniatised and •excommun'iicated by the men who monopolised God. But the quick eye of the Samaritan recognised in this Mysterious Stranger One who was superior to His race, and she wanted to know whether He too believed in a localised God and a Church; whether He also said that Jerusalem in the place, and the only place, where men ought to worship. This is Christ’s answer: God cannot be localised and monopolised. “God is Spirit,” all pervading, omnipresent, boundless, eternal. Wherever humble hearts turn to Him they find Him near; wherever sincere souls pray “in spirit and in truth,” they enter the audience chamber of the King immortal and invisible.

It was a. wonderful reply. It meant a complete revolution of religious ideas pud worship. It simplified, broadened, deepened, and spiritualised men’s thoughts of God and worship. Like a fresh mountain wind, it swept away the niitit that obscured the divine Face. Like the touch of new life in spring it burst the fettering husfc that cramped the seed of truth, and gave it room to grow. “God is Spirit.” That meant that henceforth He was not to be conceived as local, tribal racial, but universal, catholic, impartial, free. It meant, too,that worship was no longer external, ceremonial, ritualistic, but inward, pure, spiritual. “God is Spirit.” He is not bound by the limits of time and space. He cannot be imprisoned in the stone church, or frozen into a phrase : He tents within the lowly heart, And shepherds every thought; We find Him not by seeking long, We lose Him not unsought. “GOD IS SPIRIT.” I say it is a profound, a revolutionary word. That it was spoken to an audience of one, and that one the despised sex o ; a despised people, is proof emphatic that Jesus Christ was not afraid of speaking over the heads of the people. Pythagoras taught, and practised, the maxim that you should “never wear the types of gods on your rings” meaning “Do». not publish your highest and most sacred truths to the ignorant and uninitiated.” Jesus Christ acted on another principle. He taught His most sublime doctrine of God to a -dark and sinful woman. Preachers are urged to “preach the simple gospel.” but the phrase “simple gospel” may be very misleading. We cannot be simpler than Christ and the Apostles. But, say, are the four Gospels and the Epistles easy reading? A Greek temple is rounded, symmetrical, orderly and beautiful. It represented the Greek idea of the graceful and the finite, and so, however pleasing to the eye, a Greek temple never subdued the soul. A Gothic church is different, and produces a different effect. It is not so precise and measurable as the Greek temple, but it means more; it suggests the infinite and immeasurable . The spire, like the. stony finger of a prophet, points upward, away, beyond. It is the difference 1 between logic and poetry. Now the modern sermon is too often like Greek temples—orderly, symmterical, finished it may be. But the discources of Jesus are Gothic, every nave beaing the impress of infinitude, every transept filled with shadows of Christ’s words wake wonthought, subdue the soul to worship, hush the heart to a great and solemn awe. These are impressions we need recover in the religious life of today.

“God is Spirit.” Think what this means in relation to God Himself. We believe in God, vast as Eternity, with heights and depths and immeasurable expanse. The universe is filled with His glorious presence. He is everywhere. He is in all. and over all. He knows all, and ruieth over all. But “no man hath seen God at any time.” None! Never! Not Moses, for he was hidden in God’s hand. Not Elijah, for “th' Lord was not in the earthquake_aD(’ he storm.” Not the favored three on the mountain top, for the glory dazzled them with its unearthly sheen. Not the exile on Patmos, for he saw only the halo as of the jasper and sandonix. “I am an old man now, but I have never seen God,” said a Red Indian to Sir John Franklin. We might all say the same for “God is Spirit.” But the human heart nines for God. like a child that has missed its mother. Man gropes for the eternal and cries “Oh! that I knew where I might find Him.”

Oh! tell me, Mighty Mind, where art thou ? Shall I d : ve into the deep, call to the sun. And ask the roaring sea for the Creator Shall f question loud the thunder, If in that the Almighty dwells? Or holds He furious storms in tightened reins, And bids fierce whirlwinds wheel His rapid car?

And the answer comes: “Lo! these are the outskirts of His ways, and how small a whisper do we hear of Him.’ Battled in Nature, we turn to Providence, to the history of nations, the great sweeping movements of the world, and the march of the ages, only to confess “Thou art a God that hidest Thyself.” Thy spirit is around Stirring the restless mass that sweeps a’ong, And the eternal sound: Voices and footfalls of the numberless throng. Like the resounding sea, And like the rainy tempest speak of Thee. I'he history, of mau is the history, of

man’s search after God, and in many ways it is a sad and tragic story of base and degrading superstition, yet it has its pathetic side. But here stands one with highest qualification to speak on this great theme. He is Son of God, homed in the bosom of the Father. He is the. Son of Alan who shares our nature, struggles, tears, and He said “God is Spirit.” You cannot see God, you cannot comprehend God, you cannot analyse God. He is invisible, impalpable, incomprehensible, holy, but He is near, available, almighty, good. We live in Him. He lives in us.

No man has seen electricity. None! Never! No man knows just what it is. We cannot see, touch, taste, weigh it; but we can use it, we can apply it to light, and warm our dwellings, and we can yoke it to our daily task. “No man hath seen God at any time, for “God is Spirit,” but I can live in Him, I can walk in His presence, I can rest in His love. “Spe'ak to Him than, for He hears, And spirit with spirit can meet, Closer is He than breathing, And nearer than hands and feet. I cannot see God, but I can call upon Him, and I think He hears and answers me. I have t'he consciousness that some ansiwer is given to my heart’s cry. I feel myself to be en rapport with the spirit that “breathes in the air and shines in the light,” and I cry “O Thou Infinite Spirit! Thou who art the Father of my spirit! Thou life of my life! Thou perpetual presence, living, and moving, in earth and air and sea, flaming in the great and solemn splendors that deck the firmamental night, and looking from wayside grasses, and the flowers that star the meadows. Thou Redeemer of all worlds, help me to live to Thy praise, help me to worship Thee in spirit and in truth.” Oh! come Thou spirit infinite And make Thy creature blest. Thus the truth whidh deepens, heightens, and cleanses our thoughts of God, does the same thing for our worship. It is a pitiful fact that Christians are still divided on the question how and where men ought to worship, as if it ever could be a question of place and pose, of liturgy or no liturgy. The form of worship is largely the result of education, temperament, taste, climate, and these things are accidents, not essentials. Worship is worthship, and the only thing that really matters is that it be true to life. If you can best realise God through a red jersey and a brass band, let it be so; if a Geneva gown and a Book of Common Prayer helps you more, let it be a Geneva gown and a Prayer Book. But neither of these is an essential. Worship is not a matter of posture or gesture, the keeping or not keeping of days, psalm singing or recital of a creed. Worship is the song of t'he songful, the prayer of the devout, the reverential, adoring, worshipful soul which makes the mountain side an alter, and the desert place a holy shrine. Reverence, rapture, reality—these are the permanent elements of worship, and such, fellowship sends us back to our task, calmed and cleansed, for to touch God is to touch life and reality. “God is Spirit.” ? ; -