VOICE OF THE CHURCHES

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 104, 27 January 1930, Page 12

VOICE OF THE CHURCHES

SERMONS FROM WELLINGTON PULPITS

PURPOSE OF THE GOSPEL Speaking yesterday morning at St. Andrew’! Presbyterian Church from the text Jno 20:30-31, “And many other signa truly did Jesus in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book: But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name,” the Bev. Herbert W. Hitchcock said: "We have all at some time or another seen pictures of the twelve disciples, that inner circle of our Lord’s followers. And those pictures frequently represent them as old men, bent and broken, worn by long years, and separated by a gulf from the vigour and enthusiasms of youth. While they may be true so far as the later life of the disciples is concerned, they tend to give a very wrong impression of those men as they appeared at the time of their association with Christ. For they then enjoyed the full vigour of early manhood, probably not one ot them being more than twenty-five years of age. , . “John, whose words we have here in our text and of whose gospel I wish to speak this morning, was one of that little band. And so it was his privilege to live in closest contact with Christ, hearing His teaching, watching His acts of service, noting the strong manly qualities 1 of His character, and altogether witnessing such a life as has never been paralleled before or since. Only one conclusion can John reach/ namely that Christ is none other than the Son of God, God Himself in human flesh. It is only natural, therefore, to expect that John will have a great story to tell. And so it proves. Time after time he relates it to the men who gather around him to hear the stirring message; and then, conscious that his days were swiftly drawing to a close, he decides to write down what he has seen and heard, that it may be passed on to future generations. So it comes to pass that he puts pen to paper and gives us this magnificent book, which we call the gospel according to St. John. “We are not given all the details concerning our Lord’s life, and there are many things we would that we knew. Nevertheless, the incidents recorded give us a -clear picture of Christ’s character and indicate the nature of His mission. John’s Purpose. < “Now, John’s purpose in writing the book was ‘that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing ye might have life. Man has an instinct for God which needs God for its satisfaction. Just as a swan could never be a truly contented bird away from the rippling lake or the cooling streams, so there is that in a man which cries out for the spiritual, and which only the spiritual, can satisfy John, being no hermit or recluse, but a man among men, realises that; and because of that, John writes his gospel in order that men may see Christ, accept Him, and find in Him the satisfaction of the deepest instinct of the human heart. “That was John’s purpose—to bring man to belief in Christ. What does it mean to believe, or, to use an equivalent term, to have faith? In all belief there are two elements —an element of knowledge and an element of personal trust. As regards belief in Christ, there is the element of knowledge when we read such an account as John gives us. But before there can be real belief it is necessary that a man act upon that knowledge. There must also be the element of personal trust. He must take Christ at His word, consecrate his life to Him, accept His teaching as though it were true, and prove it true by practising it. It is here that many draw back, afraid of what others may think or say of them. What Christ Offers. ■ “What Christ offers is life —real life, life in its fulness, life which satisfies. When Tennyson' was once asked by a friend what he thought of Jesus Christ, he pointed to a beautiful flower and said: ‘What the sun is to that flower Jesus Christ is to my soul.’ So. rich was Wesley’s experience that he went throughout the length and breadth of England proclaiming the glad news of the gospel. Livingstone ploughed his way through the very heart of Africa that others might share his experience of Christ. And the one''aim of Grenfell’s life was to carry Christ to the fishermen of Labrador. These men found life in Christ, a life which meant more to them than anything else in the wide, wide world. And all who are prepared to commit themselves to Christ may have that life.” The preacher then appealed for a fuller consecration and the address was concluded with three short sentences: —

“The message of John is Christ. The gift of Christ is Life. The experience of life may be yours.” BELIEF IN CHRIST “Thou shalt call His name Jesus, for It is He that shall save His people from their sins. This was the text selected by Mr. C. B. Boggis for his last message at the Island Bay Baptist Church yesterday. at the conclusion of his three months as a student pastor. “ ‘Does it matter what a man believes' is. often asked,” said Mr. Boggis. “Of course it matters very considerably. Belief lies beneath all our actions and is inescapable. It is determination. If our neighbours believed that it was right to rob us or attack- us or that there, was no sanctity attaching to human life, it would be a" calamitous situation. Right thought determines right conduct. When we vehemently believe we act accordingly. This holds in the matter of religion just as in other realms of life. Where is the authority of Christ’s words to be found, if He is understood as simply a man and His is rejected. Jesus said, ‘Believe me, and He hungers for the full trust and confidence of men. He feels that men ought so to know His character as to credit all His claims as Saviour. And again He said, ‘He that believeth not, is condemned already.’ There are a'few plain facts which everybody ought to believe with earnestness.' The basic things in Christianity are not ‘above’ people but can be grasped by all. “We accept first of all the fact of our own personality. The strange and mysterious self, different from all other persons, is a fact of unceasing . impressiveness. Secondly we are conscious of God. Man is aware of the creator and that awareness is innate* It is our deep conviction that there is ‘one God who is over all and through all,’ and we are found saying ‘every common bush is aflame with Him.’ But this further belief is basic, that man is not right with his God. Thye has been a rupturing of the relationship. We are away from our God and the breach which separates has been caused by our sin and rebellion. “This situation is met by the great fact which the text is affirming. Christ comes to set matters right. He grapples with the intractable subject and problem of sin. He began His earthly life with a very common name, Jesus, and has lifted it so high and made it an unsneakably holy name. • All He took an 1 touched He glorified. ‘Jesus is the Greek form of the Hebrew name Joshua. The famous soldier and leader, Joshua, of the Old Testament, was a saviour of Israel, but in a very different, sense from that in which Jesus Christ is the men. Jesus takes up the very thing that caused the downfall of Joshua s Kingdom, namely, sin. Sin has undermined the foundations of all the kingdoms and empires, and of individual lives. . Christ alone can handle adequately this terrine thing, and He makes the handling of it His great work. “He first, convinces us of our sin. It is when man sees and hears Christ that he makes the confesison ‘God be merciful to me a sinner.’ We are disturbed by the .man of Nazareth and His truth and Holiness. Then Christ forgives our sin. His forgiveness is of course conditioned upon our repentance. Sin can be forgiven, but only nt awful cost. Never let It be thought that pardon is nn easy or a cheap thing. We are surely broken down before such wondrous Jove and so

great a sacrifice as confront *us when we look at Calvary. “Furthermore Jesus gives to us His friendship which means newer. He enables us to live a life of victory. It is not enough to have the past forgiven. We want to be ‘saved from our sin’ in the life we are now called to live. Christ imparts strength so that we can enjoy triumph. He saves us not simply from future penalty but to something to a life of'grandeur, nobility, and usefulness. It is His longing to stive each individual completely and entirely, to save our whole manhood, body, intellect, influence, powers. The salvation which Christ effects is the greatest possible blessing which can come to our lives. It is a radical thing. He saves us from selfishness to largeness and nobility, from littleness to greatness, from defeat to tnumpli. He can only be our Saviour from our sins as we let Him There must be personal acceptance of and trust in Jesus and the call to this receiving of the Saviour is an urgent one, for now is the day of salvation.

THE INEQUALITIES OF LIFE Tho Rev. E. D. Patchett, preaching in the Thorndon Methodist Church last evening, took as his text, I Peter iv: 10: “You must serve one anothex, each with the talent he has received, as efficient stewards of God’s varied grace” (Moffat). “There are two ways of regarding life,” said the preacher. . “The first "is to ask the world what it has to give to you; what rights and privileges it has to bestow. The second is to ask yourself what you have to give to the world, what duties and obligations you owe to it. The latter was the way of Christ. It is the way therefore of His true followers. ‘Freely ye have received, freely give.’ “The phrase, ‘each received,” suggests to us the puzzling inequalities of life. Some have ten talents and some only one. Some have great possessions and others have none. Has the Gospel of Christ a message relating to the inequalities of life? We believe it has. It is a message of service and brotherhood. Jesus did not teaeh the equality of all, but He did teach the brotherhood of all. For Him there was no gulf of inequality which love and service could not bridge. The talents and possessions of life are not to be held for selfish ends; they are to be held by us as stewards of God for the service of one another. “God’s stewards! What a fine conception of life that is 1 Life is a gift of God. But we aye not absolute owners of the gift. We hold it in trust. The law of stewardship reminds us that life must be used for God who gives it and for the ends He appoints. “So the strong must help the weak, the rich the poor, the learned the ignorant, the employed the linemployed. This is how the teaching of Jesus may be . applied to the baffling inequalities of life. Not by reducing all to a common level, but by regarding the needs of all in the light of a love that delights to serve. “Jesus never suggests that life should be reduced to a drab and dull ©Quality. Rather does He lay upon the individual the responsibility of so using his gifts that they will lead to a more startling inequality, so that the man who has ten talents will gain other ten. But He does stress the fact that where much is given much will be required. This then is the shining ideal, ‘Let each one serve with the talent he has received, as an efficient steward of , God's grace.’ ”

THE CHURCH OF CHRIST ITS PLACE IN THE WORLD. Evangelist W. M. Garner, of the Lower Hutt Church of Christ, preached yesterday on the text, “I will build My church” (Matt. 16:18). “These words,” he said, “are among the most remarkable of all the words spoken by Jesus. Remarkable when we consider that they were spoken in an obscure corner of the world by one who was known merely as a Galilean Teacher identified with a despised race. He had but a mere handful of followers and while it was true that the ‘common people heard Him gladly,’ yet the political powers of Rome were against Him, and the ecclesiastical leaders of His own people, the Jews, were against Him. People have a habit of judging a person’s success by the measure of popularity they enjoy—and judging by these standards who would have thought of attaching a meaning to these words that would span 20 centuries, that would scale the highest heights of human aspiration and plumb the lowest depths of human need? The church has spread until every continent and island is covered, and people of every land and language are being nourished by its fruit. Wherever the church has been true to Jesus Christ, its Divine Head, it has been the greatest of all institutions. This being so, is it not sane and logical that we recognise the church and give.it that place in our thinking and in our lives that is due to it. I extended an invitation to a schoolmaster to attend a gospel service. He refused on the grounds that he could worship God as well out of the fields as he could in the services of the Church. It is well for that man that New Zealand does not reason along similar lines, else he would be compelled to seek work other than teaching. We could well reason that knowledge may exist apart from schools, therefore do away with the school. Truth may survive apart from books, therefore relegate all literature to the scrap-heap. Justice may. continue without the Courts, therefore dismiss the Judge and the Magistrate. Yes —these things may be so, but we are not so foolish as to advicate that we ignore or cease our loyalty to these institutions. The Work of the Church. An open-air preacher was once faced by an infidel, who said that he would like to see every, church wiped out, beginning with Spurgeon’s. The preacher promptly replied, “If Spurgeon’s church was wiped out, who would undertake the responsibility of Spurgeon’s orphanages?” The infidel was silenced. The fact is that we dare not, even if we could, do away with the Church —she is filling too large a place in the world. If we stand for anything, anything real and big in life, if we stand for character, the Church will be given a big place in our scheme of things.” x

What must we do to be numbered among that redeemed host? The answer to the question was given 1900 years ago when the Church was first organised. God had looked down on men through the years. He had noted rebellion and pride. He could see that man, left to himself, was rushing to moral and spiritual ruin, and to save the world from disaster He sent forth His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish but have everlasting life. Justice demanded that sin should pay the penalty, and on the Cross Jesus paid the price. That is what Jesus did for us. What are we going to do for Him? But what can we do? Is anything required of us in order that we might become a Christian? Let the Apostles answer. Their authority cannot be questioned. Their audience on the Day of Pentecost was compelled to believe that in murdering Jesus of Nazareth they had killed the very Son of God/ the Messiah for whom they had waited for so long. And as the awful conviction came upon them they cried out in fear, “Men and brethren, what shall we do?” Here were men anxious to get away from their sin—to as far as possible right a great wrong. The answer given them is of vital importance to us now. This is what we want to do—we, too, have sinned against God ; we, too, need to do something to undo the past. Listen to the answer given by the Apostles: “Repent, and be baptised every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.”