The Church's Message

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXXII, Issue 13265, 1 October 1943, Page 2

The Church's Message

VERSE FOR TO-DAY flOililHH^ It is a good land which the Lord our God doth give us.— Deut. 1:25. IMlllMlilO^ FRONT-PAGE NEWS (By the Right Hon. Ernest Brown, M.P., Minister of Health—British Government.) Text. Rom. 1:16. I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ. We go back in thought to what is sometimes called "the old Gospel," as though it belonged to the ancient as "the modern Gospel,' 'the Gospel world. Occasionally it is described for this age, as though it had never applied to any other age. The fact is, the Gospel is timeless; it applies to any age, anywhere.

When the shepherds watched their flocks by night on the first Christmas eve, they heard the angelic message, "Fear not; for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people." The good news, the front-

page news, was that there was born "a Saviour, Christ the Lord."

Is it not tragic that the good news, so thrilling and arresting, has been made prosaic and dull until it is supremely necessary for the Church to re-capture the spirit of news in the Evangel? Trained men search the ends of the earth for news. Those who are in public life can hardly move without being confronted by a Press man out for news. All the world wants news —good news. Any bit of real news has a commercial value; it is in demand; there is a market for it. How many people will be listening in to the news over the Wireless to-night? and what will they hear? Some listeners turn the Radio off when it •comes to the news bulletin; they have given up listening to "third news; copyright reserved by the Press Agency, Reuter and 8.8. C."; they have had enough of it. So much of it is bad new,s, terrible news, that stole sleep from tired eyes and left the brain working through the night. Our time has plenty of ill news. It is not needful for the good news to be - told over again that we may catch something of its power and unspeakable joy - ?

The Christian news is more than a sensation. Whenever I see on the placard of an evening paper the familiar sentence "Another Sensation," I do not buy the paper, because I am quite sure that the expert teller of news, if he has a sensation to relate, would put it into words less vague and hackneyed. What would happen if, when we turned on the radio and listened in to-night, we heard the broadcast "Good news; copyright unreserved; good news to all the world. - ' News which, if acted upon, would change the politics of every country and bring peace on earth; would revolutionise the economic system, and break down the barriers dividing nations. Not only news, but good news: there is "a Saviour, Christ the Lord."

The glad tidings of the Gospel, taken into the heart, revolutionise the life. The drunkard is not only reformed but regenerated. The harlot becomes as in the days of her youth, and the deeper sins of the spirit, those devils incarnate in the flesh, are cast out. The world does not need more politics, more knowledge, nor more economics, but more good news. A revival of the religion of the New Testament would transform the world; and yet the story is told week by Aveek in thousands of pulpits in the country, and so little happens.

People get excited over % almost anything except their religion. It is rather bad form to be enthusiastic about one's religion. I have been a: a football match when thousands' of people seemed to go mad, myself among the number, when a surprising goal was scored. I have read in the "Financial News," "pig iron excited." The market got really thrilled by the sudden rise of prices. We need more genuine excitement about the things that are eternal. The news of the Gospel is glad tidings to all people. Our Lord Jesus Christ —and we should give Him His full title —deals with men and women as individual souls. He discovered the priceless value of personality. Race and nationality counted nothing with the Son of God. He was a Jew according to the flesh, but He was much more: He was "The, Man," every man's man. He.

was humanity. He might have been black, white or yellow; Hindoo, Chinese or German. We do not think of Him in geographical terms, but in the universality of His love and power. He was "God manifest in the flesh."

Our Lord proclaimed the one Gospel, but it is adapted to the needs of each individual. If we read through the Gospels we shall see that Jesus dealt with individuals in very different ways'. He saw in the publican the evangelist, and in the woman who shamelessly talked with Him by the well a bearer of glad tidings to her friends. _

Sometimes we sing the familiar lines "A ruler once came to Jesus by night, seeking the way of salvation and light." I am not so sure about that. Perhaps the ruler simply came for further information about the miracles. without any thought of salvation, and he received more than he asked for. It is still the same. What good news it would be to you if you heard the voice of Jesus say "This day has salvation come to your house." And you might hear just that, and that bit of news might change everything in time and eternity.