SUNDAY READING.

Taranaki Daily News, 1 October 1921, Page 9

SUNDAY READING.

“KNOWLEDGE THROUGHSERVICE” c 'But the servants who drew the water knew.”—Saint John, 11. 9. (By Rev. A. 11. Collins, New Plymouth.) Four miles to the north-west of Nazareth. lies the deserted village of Kefr Kenna, which markn the traditional sight of Cana of Galilee, a few limestone cottages, roofed in with reeds and rushes, and made picturesque by poverty and time, is all that remains. “The unspeakable Turk” has cast his blight on this once fair spot. The haunt of Jesus has become the leopard’s lair, and the streets, once vocal with marriage music, are made hideous with the screech of the jackal and the hoot of the night owl. But, though ruined and deserted, the glory has not departed. Hallowed .memories gather about the spot, and the ■ story of Cana will outlast and outshine the magnificence .of many modern cities, for it was here that the sun of righteousness began to shine in mild and radiant splendor. “This beginning of signs did Jesus in Cana of Galilee and manifested His glory.” Hitherto the life of John the Baptist had been the ideal, and John was an ascetic. He lived a life of solitary and penitental austerity. He drank no wine, ate no pleasant foods, married no wife, and shared none of the sweet and tender ministries of home. It i was the law of this stern prophet to ' mortify the flesh as diseased and sinful, in order that he might cultivate an intense spirituality. It was a life grand and impressive in its way, but it was

unnatural and gravely faulty. FALSE ESTIMATE. OF LIFE. It was to correct this false estimate of life Lliat Jesus began to manifest Hit divine glory at a marriage feast. By it Jesus Christ consecrated the marriage vow, proclaimed the sacredness of emotions which had been judged carnal, and stamped with His approval our social joys. He proclaimed these to be not only lawful, but sacramental. fit I taught the world that the life divine is not the life ascetic, that religion is ' not an affair of the cloister and tht desert, that innocence and isolation arc not the same thing, and that virtue flour ishes in the companionship of the home and the city.

But that is not quite the aspecl of the story I want to develop just now. There is a suggestion in the narrative which has the appearance of being accidental. Our text is a parenthesis, and a parenthesis is that part of a sentence which may be omitted .without injury to the sense of the passage. But with God a parenthesis is a paradox. He wastes no words, and if the evangelist thought these words worth recording, you may be sure the apparently casual clause has meaning and use. Saint John had a keen eye for spiritual suggestion.

You know the story. The Master and his disciples were guests at a rustic wedding; perhaps the plighted pair were relatives of Mary. The provisions ran short, and the mother of Jesus, with true womanly solicitude, thought of the embarrassment and possible chagrin of the happy couple. She was dimly conscious of her Great Son’s resourcefulness. and in whispered aside remarked

“They have no wine,” and He, in a stage whisper, issued the order, “Fill the water-pots.” This done, he gave a second command in the same unhurried strain:

“Draw out now and bear to the ruler of the feast,” and “the water, owning the presence of the Creator, blushed.” All confessed the quality of the new supply, but none save “the servants who drew the water” knew the secret, whence and how the crisis had been met. .“But the servants who had drawn the knew.” Isn’t that very significant? It is always the servants who know. If you would know any one or anything, yju must serve. So long as you sit at the banquet of life and simply enjoy the good things others provide, you cannot know, you cannot, see to the heart, of things; but. begin to serve, and the shy secret will steal out to greet you. Who knows music like her willing slaves ? Who knows the heart of a child like its mother? Who knows the value of the church like its devoted servants? ' The armchair critic, who stays'at home and does nothing, may question the worthiness of fqroig.i missions, but th? men and women who serve in India know. So with truth itself. .Speculation has its place, though it is a subordinate' place, but verification is granted to those who serve. “What, is truth?” “Study.” says the doctrinaire, and “so shall you know.” What is truth? “Serve.” says Jesus Christ, “and you shall know.” And the two answers are separated by the whole diameter of the moral universe. The one answer makes critics, the other makes saints. Knowledge through service is Christ’s Way, and there is none other. THREE VOICES. Now there are three voices which assail the ear of those who seek knowledge of divine things. There is the voice of external authority, which is the tVay of the dogmatist; there is the voice of reason, which is the way of the rationist; there is the voice of loyal service, which is the secret of Jesus. Listen to these for a minute or two. How am I to gain knowledge of divine things How can I be sure of God and His Son Jesus Christ? How can I find the way of life and peace and salvation? External authority comes in the guise of a priest, Protestant or Roman, for there are both, and even Baptists are not free of the priest, with the keys of human destiny jangling at his girdle. He is a scholastic pedant. He is an expert in ecclesiastical orthodoxy, in garb and phrase. He is a student of church councils, and church courts, and church creeds, and all such paltry detail. He says, “would you know the way, the truth, the life? Would you know how much or how little to believe? Would you know what to do, and when, and why? Harken to the church, obey her commands, keep her ordinances, and trust her ministers.

The lay mind is incompetent to interpret the Bible. As you trust your health to an expert in medicine, and your property to an expert in law, so you should trust your immortal soul to spiritual experts. Here is a system of doctrine, a code of morals, arranged to the last nicety; accept this and you are safe; reject this and you are lost. The solemn foolery of it. Truth is. bigger than any church., and all the churches. Truth is a thing that lives ahd grows, truth is a not a crystal, and to attempt to confine it in any church, or creed, is vain as an effort to trap a sunbeam, or force the ocean into a quart pot. Jesus .Christ never taught on external authority. He Taught, “not as the scribes.” who dogmatised because “it was written.” and stickled for maxiroa, and sacrificed uruiclplca- Me bade

men believe, not because He said it. but because it was eternally true. VALUE OF TRUTH. How am I to know what is true ? How am I to escape the meshes of error? The j intellectualLst fays, ’ reason, sift, discuss. Truth is the final result of synthesis. Sin is ah error of judgment and not the result of -a revolting will. Teach the people. Show them that sin is a mistake, -and it will disappear. Political economy will teach men public virtue; a knowledge of human anatomy will arrest indulgence in sins of the llet,h. Let the drunkard see the inflampd tissue of the brain, and it will sober him by fear and reason. Priests prate about God; there is do God. Parsons vapour about the soul; there is no soul. Dogmatists babble of heaven and hell; there is neither.; I am a scientist, exploring earth, and sky. and sea. and find no trace of God I am a surgeon, and. after dissecting body and brain. I find no trace of soul. I am an astronomer, and have swept the wide heavens; I know the stars and planets, and in none of them do I find Paradise or Perdition. “These are the stuff whereof our dreams are made.” Thus it happens that supersittion and rationalism strike hands. The man who denounces dogmatism becomes dogmatist. The man who sneers at religion as “old wives’ fables” bows the knee to an ugly little god called reason. The man who rejects the claim of infaJlability beside the Tiber, sets up the claim of infalla-

biHty for himself in Taranaki! But Jesus never said t’hat a trained mind would issue in a clean heart; He said the reverse of that. “DO RIGHTLY.” How can I know the things of God : How can I enter the kingdom of heaven? Over against external authority and irrational rationalism, I set the voice of obedience and service. Do rightly and you will see clearly. Obey t'he (ruth as far as you know it. and the horizon will brighten and expand. Serve the cause of truth, and you will learn that it is truth. Knowledge, through service, is a principle that does not apply to religion alone; it applies all round. The mere theorist and doctrinaire is never the fully equipped man. Theory pnust submit to the test of practice. The child only learns to play the piano by playing. The painter Iftarns to paint by painting with the great masters before him. The mechanic must serve at the bench, or hits text books will not help him much. Christianity must be an firplied science. You doubt the value of prayer? Test it by praying. You are doubtful about the inspiration of the

Bible? Read it with diligence. You question Christ’s power to save you? Put it to the touch of the actual. Follow His leadership, if only a<s an experiment. Oh! There are great and solemn hour?, when the mystery of life liee 'heavily on the heart, times when we feel the meanness and confusion of it all. seasons when we seem to be drifting on a wide and moaning sea, “stars all lost, and compass gone.”

Then it is that outward authority fails, and cold reason finds no help. W2 doubt God, we distrust men, we lose faith in ourselves. The future becomes an “if,” a «'perhaps,” a “peradventure.” What can we do? Cease to speculate, and begin to act. Be gentle, merciful, true. Follow the gleam. Compel yourself to abound in little acts of service. Be faithful to conscience and to duty. That must be right. So shall you have fuller light end your flickering faith will “Rise large and slow. From out the fluctuations of the mind. As from the dim and tumbling sea, Starts the completed moon.” “If any man will do His will he shall know of the doctrine whether it be of God ”