THE RESPONSIBILITIES OF RELIGIOUS DEMOCRACY.

Evening Star, Issue 7449, 18 February 1888, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE RESPONSIBILITIES OF RELIGIOUS DEMOCRACY.

An address from the Chair of the Congregational Union of N v Zealand by Rev. H, Lewis, of Auckland My Dear Brethren,—Allow me take this opportunity of thanking you for the unexpected honor you have done me in electing me thus early to the presidency of your Council. Hitherto I have regarded the chairmanship as a prize awarded by the Union to those who “cleave to her and worship her by years of noble deeds until they win her.” Henceforth I shall regard it as one of the gifts which are “of grace, not of works, lest any man should boast.” The sight of the faces assembled iu onr (’ouueil to-day naturally reminds us of the number of changes in the pastorates of our churches which have taken place during the past year. These changes have been most numerous in the far North. As we come South we find them fewer and fewer, till at last in the Otago district, owing doubtless to the increased stability of character imparted by the predominance of the Scotch element, we find them fewest of all. A less conspicuous but still more trying feature of our Church life during the past year has been the number of removals of members of our churches to other parts of the world, occasioned by the severe and protracted depression of trade. These removals have caused gaps in our churches far harder to fill than even the vacancies in onr pastorates. Many of them have been unavoidable, but I cannot help thinking that some of them have been at least a little precipitate. I may bo wrong, but I have a strong conviction that in the long rim the members as well as the ministers of our churches would find it as much for their own interests as for that of the churches to show a little more faith in the old proverb: “A rolling stone gathers no moss ”—a little more reluctance to tear themselves away from the splendid opportunities of usefulness in this lovely land, and to be a little more on their guard against that spirit of unrest which is one of the unhealthy characteristics of colonial life. As our thoughts revert by a natural rebound to the old home, we recall with great pleasure the fact that the event of last year —the Royal Jubilee—was celebrated with as much enthusiasm in New Zealand as in England. No one who witnessed our Jubilee rejoicings could doubt that our hearts are as loyal to the old Queen as to the old laud. A scarcely less important event of last year—at least in the eyes of English Radicals —was tho attainment of his seventy-eighth birthday by the greatest and purest statesman of Europe—W. E. We could not afford the expense of sending Mr Gladstone a cablegram of congratulation, but we rejoice in the grcencss of his old age, we admire his independence of judgment, we honor his incorruptible integrity of character and magnificent moral heroism as intensely as the crowds in Great Britain, who turn his every railway journey into a triumphal march. We cannot help remembering the gloom cast over the close of last year by the death of one of the greatest, if not the greatest, preacher of the century —Henry Ward Beecher. We do not know which to be more proud of, that our Congregationalism should have made a Beecher over whose grave two great nations bowed in reverent grief, or that it should have produced a Berry who has had sufficient moral strength to decline the honor of becoming Beecher’s successor. The most startling event of last year was the secession of Mr C. IT. Spurgeon from the Baptist denomination. It would be almost as impertinent for us to criticise the motives which prompted him to take this step as it would be superfluous for us to express our gratitude for the splendid work he has done and our appreciation of the noble character he has borne so long. All that goes without saying. But our respect for Air Spurgeon would be degenerating into pusillanimity if it restrained us from raising our protest against his insinuation of our lack of loyalty to the Gospel of Christ as equally ungenerous and unjust. We claim the right to discriminate between the grain of Gospel truth and the husk of theological tradition ; wc claim the right to study every theological theory in the light of its history, of the circumstances which determined its form aud shape, of its approximation to, or divergence from, the revelation of the character of God contained in the precepts and person of our Lord Jesus Christ ; wc claim the right to analyse and dissect every theological theory, to sift the Gospel gold from the Calvinistic and Augustinian ore ; to scrape the mould of ecclesiastical aud sacerdotal superstition off the inscription of the truth in Christ Jesus ; to readjust, reconstruct, if necessary, to reject every theological theory proved by experience to distort the truth it was intended to reveal—not because we love the grand old truths of the incarnation and atonement less than Mr Spurgeon, but because wc love them so much that wc want to show them to the world as_ they are, because we believe that if we can take men behind Calvin and Augustine to Christ we shall inspire such faith as we have never succeeded in inspiring yet. In fact, it is just because no theological theory is large enough to hold the whole of such transcendent truths as the incarnation and atonement that all theological theories require periodical restatement and readjustment, All life is expansive ; all seeds at some time or other burst their husks; all living creatures cast their skin either gradually or suddenly. And there is no surer sign that a seed is alive than its beginning to hurst its husk ; that au animal is_ growing than its changing its skin. It is, doubtless, a trying ordeal in the history of a crayfish when it tries to cast its shell. Sometimes it perishes in the attempt; but if it succeeds, it comes out of the ordeal filled with a new life, sheathed in a new armor, moving with a more majestic march than ever. So we trust that the truths now casting the shells of medieval theology they have worn so long and so patiently will not perish nor wander about like disembodied ghosts, but be clothed upon with new and nobler forms, which will give them a firmer grip of the intellect, conscience, and heart of the rising generation than they have had of generations gone by. But, if this is to be, we must give those truths as deep and earnest a study as was given them by tho men who made the theology of former ages, so that wc may make the existence of God as real, tho sovereignty of God as august, to men of our day as Calviu and Augustine did to the men of theirs ; while at the same time we show them such visions of His love and mercy as they could not, because they would not, see them. This brings me to the special subject to which I venture to ask attention to-night—-the responsibilities of religious democracies, We have deliberately accepted the democratic form of church life, not only as a sacred tradition inherited from our forefathers, but the still more sacred conclusion arrived at by our judgments. We have weighed other forma of church government in the balance and found them wanting. We have over and over again demonstrated the superiority of the democratic form of church government to any other with an amount of argument so overwhelming as ought long since to have silenced scepticism and ground all opposition to powder. But this is a comparatively small thing. John Bright once said: “I will engage to produce any amount of medical testimony on any side of any subject ; ” and it would not be very difficult for any man fairly well read in history and fairly well versed in logic to find almost any amount of unanswerable arguments in favor of almost any form of church government. The difficulty would be to awaken any Interest in his learned lucubrations outside the circle of those who have accepted all his conclusions before listening to any of his Arguments* The only test of the worth of church systems about which the common people care is practical efficiency ; and, therefore, each church system must show the world the best it can do by [ratting forth that wherein its great strength ieth. The strength of the monarchical system lies in the confidence repoa*d in its head. The strength of the democratic Satem lies in the sense of personal respon)ility realised by its individual members. Where bondage ends responsibility begins. No man is fit to belong to a republic, least of all to a religious republic, who does not recognise his responsibility to serve it.

What, then, are the distinctive responsibilities which our democratic principles impose on us ? I reply— I. — The. responsibility resting upon onr minister* for the theology they tearh. The theology of the present day has not yet assumed its final form. Iu fact, it cannot be said to have assumed any form at all. It has cast off its old shell, but not yet put on its now one. Hitherto it has been mainly destructive. It has yet to be made constructive. That, brethren, is the work which has to bo done by us ministers. To build up a living, human constructive theology ; to clothe the old truths of the gospel in forms which the fiercest fires of modem criticism shall be unable to consume. If we do not do this work, no one else will or can. We have no right as Christian ministers to attorn;t to cast on other shoulders the responsibility which onr very calling to be ministers imposes upon ns. Wc are not called to preach a gospel of negations. We arc not called to prcacli a gospel of speculations. Wo are called to preach a gospel of strong convictions, of glorious certainties ; and to clothe these strong convictions—those glorious certainties —in forms which shall command the respect of the thoughtful minds, so many of which arc now drifting into doubt. Other denominations may relieve their ministers of this responsibility, or share it with them ; but our Congregationalism casts it entirely upon ourselves. Wc cannot lay an atom of responsibility for onr theological teaching on the imprimatur affixed by any church to a formal creed or confession of faith. The very fact of standing before onr people without any theological syllabus between us and them makes ns responsible to our churches, to our consciences, and to our Cod for the truth which our own eyes have scon and onr own hands have handled. No man who docs not realise the gravity of this responsibility is fit to stand in a Congregational pulpit ; and grave as this responsibility always was, it never was so grave as it is to - day. Whether the next generation is to bo a generation of believers or of atheists depends more on the sort of theology we preach than on anything else. Here then, brethren, is a responsibility which wc dare not evade, which, if we are worthy of our office, we shall never attempt to evade—the responsibility of trying to build up for the old truths of the Gospel new and more durable habitations than those which the thought of the present day is so ruthlessly destroying. This is a great work ; but it is work which wo may at least commence, even if its consummation has to be carried out by those who come after us. But, if wc are even to commence it, three conditions of our work are indispensable, Ist. Trainin'/. —The man who is to teach a theology which shall bo the living thought of a living mind must know at least two things—his Greek Testament and his Church History. By knowing his Greek Testament I do not mean merely possessing a sufficient acquaintance with it to help him, by the aid of a lexicon, to spell out with a decent approach to accuracy the exegesis of his Sunday morning text. He who knows Ids Greek Testament only as a repository of texts knows it only as the village girl who knows just whore it is safe to dip her pitcher knows the Amazon. By knowing his Greek Testament I mean possessing an intimate familiarity with the source and trend of the noble rivers of theological thought which roll through the sublime epistles of Romans, Kphesians, and Colossians. I mean such a knowledge as will enable a man to trace the streams of Pauline thought respecting the divinity, mediation, atonement, and sovereignty of the Lord Jesus Christ from the hilltop of inspiration on which they rose, and to follow them through their various windings till he watches them fall at last into the sea of practical Christian life. He who is to make and teach a true theology needs also to know at least enough of church history to see something of the number and nature of the side streams of philosophical, ccclctiastical, and political corruption which, from the second century onwards, began to flow into and mix themselves with these great rivers of apostolic thought. It is oidy as lie does this that lie can see whore Divine inspiration ends and the human perversion of it begins. The knowledge of these things requires long, systematic, and thorough training. I therefore venture to think that the training of our colonial ministry is one of the most important problems which will haveto occupy our attention before very long. We cannot afford to go on indefinitely relying for the lilling-up of the vacancies in our ministry upon the arrivals from the Old Countiy. The time is coming when wo shall see the necessity of having ministers colonial-bom and colonial-trained, who shall he able to declare to the people of this Colony in their own tongue the wonderful works of God. And I am not sure that it would not he wise for us to prepare for the coming of that time by taking counsel with representatives of other denominations to sec whether it would not he possible to start a strong Theological College, iu which young men showing promise of fitness for the ministry might be thoroughly drilled in the elements of “the common faith,” while left free to follow the dictates of conscientious conviction as to the particular branch of the church to which to devote their services. •2nd. 'Time.. —lf wc are to lie mere evangelical mountebanks, trottiug out rounds of stale platitudes, the monotony of which is relieved only by the occasional introduction of sensational anecdotes serving much the same purpose in the sermon as the dead Hies in the apothecaries’ ointment—if we are to be mere dealers in second-hand theological ware, retailing to our people on Sunday thoughts which we have stolen from the homilist or the Christian world pulpit on Saturday—three half hours a week in our studies will he amply sufficient to equip us for the discharge of our functions. But if we are to he thinkers and teachers, giving your intelligent and cultured sons such a grip of the realities of the gospel as shall save them from being carried away by the sophistries and casuistries of the Freethought hall and the Freethought magazine, wc must have leisure to keep up, as ministers, the habits of culture we commenced as students. And I confess I do not see how to reconcile the demands which the thought cf the day makes on our knowledge with the demands which society makes on our time. If a minister is to attend an average of three committee meetings a week, besides spouting at frequent tea - fights, and paying pastoral visits as the sand by the seashore innumerable, I can see how he is to become a good-natured, genial gossip, but I cannot see how he is to become a teacher worth listening to. 11. Truth.— If we arc to be free to learn the truth that we may teach it, wc must possess your confidence. If you cannot trust a man to teach you and your children the theology he has made for himself by patient, prayerful study of the New Testament, you never ought to have asked him to become your minister. If you want a man simply to repeat to you, with variations sufficiently numerous to make them interesting, the outlines of a theological syllabus you have already dictated to him, you may make a parrot of him, but a prophet you never will make of him, and never can, If you do not believe that we love the truth as much as you do, and understand it better than you have had an opportunity of being able to do, send us about our business. But if you give us credit for possessing that sincerity, that knowledge, and that ability without which no one has any right to be a minister, show that you give us credit for possessing them by trusting us in all our attempts to get beyond tradition to truth. Give us then these three things—thorough training, adequate time, and cordial trust—and with the blessing of God we will make it our life work to teach you a theology which, whatever its defects, shall at least be a transparent atmosphere through which you shall see such glowing visions of God in Christ as shall inspire you with ever - increasing assurance to cry “We have seen His glory, the glory of the Only Begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.” //.—Responsibility resting on the deacons of our churches for training the people to the exercise of the grace of Christian liberality. I am very glad that our churches, in this Colony have had the courage to adopt the voluntary system, pure and simple. I trust that no attempt to revive the practice of pew rents will ever be made amongst us. The voluntary system is a natural andneoessary

outcome of the Congregational ideal of the relationship in which every Christian stands to Christ. It says to everyone: We have no right to charge yon anything for your attendance at a place of worship, and towards the support of Christ’s Church, because you are directly responsible to Christ himself for the amount you contribute towards it. That is a matter which lies entirely between yourself and Christ. He knows how much you can afford to give towards the carrying on of His work. He has given His best to you, and He expects yon to give your best to Him. How much that may be is a question in the decision of which no one has any right to interfere between you and your Lord. Hut though the voluntary system is the finest financial system in the world, if this sublime ideal of it is realised, it becomes a very precarious and perilous system if that ideal is lost sight of. To say that the voluntary system casts the amount of everyone’s contribution on his own conscience is one thing ; to say that it leaves it to his caprice is quite another. Do the members of our churches and congregations as a whole realise the distinction between these two things ? Do they understand that though every one has a right to give just what he likes, no one who likes to give less than his best has yet fully caught the spirit of Christ who gave himself for us ? Does not the disproportion between the average number of coins in our plates and that of persons present at our services show that there must be in all our congregations a considerable sprinkling of dead-heads ? Is not the very fact that in hard times like these no one can afford to give much the strongest of reasons why everyone should give according to his ability ? If even now all the members of our congregations wore to give on the same scale as that on which they spend for amusements and dress, would not the financial embarrassments of our churches become smaller in degree and beautifully less? Does not the attempt honestly to answer questions 'ike these, shut us up to the conclusion that we make a great mistake in forgetting that the grace of liberality, like every other, requires long, patient, and careful training ? In fact, there is no other fruit of the Spirit which requires so much painstaking culture to bring to anything like maturity and mellowness as this. There is no place wiiero the old Adam clings so close and dies so hard as the breeches pocket. Here, then, we are confronted by the anomaly that the virtue which requires the most training is the one which gets least. It seems to bo an axiom that the minister must never say anything about money matters. If so, how are the people to be brought up to the realisation of the true Christian ideal of liberality—the realisation that giving is not a burden, not a tax, not merely a duty, but a grace, a privilege, and a joy? Nothing but training can over bring them up to it. And if wo ministers must not touch this training, it seems to me that it must be taken up by the deacons of the churches. It appears to me that one of the distinctive responsibilities of the diaconate is the education of our people up to the same high souse of honor in giving as the majority of them show in other matters ; to say to the people what a Christian apostle once said, but what a modern minister must not say for fear cf being thought mercenary: “As ye abound in everything—in faith, and utterance, and knowledge, and in earnestness, and in love to us—sec that ye abound in this grace also ” ; and to say it so wisely, so delicately, and yet so faithfully that there will never lie any need for the pastor to make any special allusion to it. Hut beyond these special responsibilities resting upon the office-bearers of our churches, there lies— Ilf. The ri s/ionsibUily resting on all the, members of (very Christian church for taking an act! re interest in ad. its business affair*. Dr Dale, in his 1 Manual of Congregational Principles,’ lays it down as the fourth of them : “ That every member of a Christian church is directly responsible to Christ for maintaining His authoiity in it,” That means, in plain words, that you arc directly responsible to Christ for the share you take in promoting or opposing the election of every oliiccr iu the church, from the .pastor to the chapel-keeper; for the vote you give for or against the admission of every candidate for church fellowship ; for your speech or your silence at every discussion on church business; for your presence at or absence from every church meeting. It means that indifference to church business is only another name tor lack of Christian patriotism, and that the cowardice which prompts a man to stop away from a church meeting because unpleasant business is to bo brought before it borders very bard on treason to Christ, It is the will of Christ that His authority in the church, as exercised iu the election of its ofliccrs, in the choice of worthy members, iu the expulsion or censure of unworthy ones, should be maintained, not by the pastor and deacons, not by any committee of management, but by the concurrent action of the whole church. The youngest, poorest, humblest member of a church is just as responsible for the share lie or she takes in any resolution passed or action done by the church as the senior deacon. The realisation of this responsibility by the private members of our churches would give them a power and an influence they have never known yet. One of the most important discussions at the last meeting of the Congregational Union of England and Wales was that which took place on tiie subject of “The Congregational Church Meeting,” Many valuable suggestions were made as to the ways in which to increase the interest in our church meetings. But after all, wo must come back to this, the real cure for indifference to church meetings is a deeper sense of our personal responsibility to Christ for the individual interest wo show in the welfare ami prosperity of that church which He bought with his own blood. IV, Responsibility resting on ns nil foilin’. share nr, contribute towards snsluhiinij the strength of the whole denomination. In one of Ids addresses, I think it was at Adelaide, Dr Dale said: “ It should be our policy to make the unit of Congregationism in cadi place as strong as possible.” Those wise words indicate a danger into which Congregational churches are peculiarly liable to drift—the danger of sacrificing our denominational strength and influence to a spurious idea of independency. Isolation is independency minus brains, minus enthusiasm, and minus influence. Multiplicity of weak isolated churches is simply fatal to that tspril do corps, that enthusiasm of the body without which no denomination can ever exert any influence on the world. By whatever number you multiply nothing, the answer will still remain nothing. That is just as true in ecclesiastical matters as in any others. However many churches you have in a town, whose individual influence is zero, their aggregate influence will only amount to zero. And, therefore, before starting a new church, it is a duty we owe not only to our Congregationalism but to our Christianity to ask : Will the setting up of this church concentrate or dissipate the forces of Congregationalism? Will it strengthen or weaken the cause of Christianity ? For remember that the two questions are one. We are a single regiment in the army of the Lord of Hosts. The only way to make the whole army strong is to make every regiment composing it a solid phalanx presenting a united front to the foe, and bringing a compact force into the field. To break a regiment up into bands of stragglers, each too small to be capable of either conquest or self-defence is to imperil the fate of the army. For a mere handful of persons which have neither earnestness enough to walk a mile to a place of worship of their own faith and order, nor charity enough to worship with fellow Christians of another denomination, to claim the right of forming themselves into a separate church is very frequently simply claiming the right to starve a minister, weaken a denomination, and caricature our Christianity. That is a wrong which is perhaps oftener done (for want of thought than for want of heart. But we are responsible to our conscience and to our God for thinking about such steps before we take them. We are just as responsible for persisting in pushing on a church whose separate existence would be likely to weaken the cause of Christianity

as we are for refusing to throvv our whole heart and soul into the planting of one which would be likely to strengthen it. I'. Responsibility resting on ns as a denomination for contributing our full share towards that Christianising oj human society which is the common work oj the whole church. Between us and other Christian denominations there ought to he no more thought of jealousy than between the infantry and the cavalry. We meet to-day to deliberate, not how we can steal a march upon our Presbyterian or Alethodist brethren, but how we can so supplement their efforts and stimulate their enthusiasm that there may be victory all along the line. Because we are free to adopt any measures that may bo calculated to strengthen the hands of our fellow Christians, wc are bound to adopt all the measures wc can. And the best way to support their work is to do our own distinctive work well. The more steady the infantry’s lire, the more sustained will he the effect of the cavalry’s charge. We shall, therefore, moat effectually co-operate witli other divisions in the army of Die Lord of Hosts, not by copying their tactics, nor by crowding into their ranks, nor by wearing their weapons, but by filling up our own place on the field, by fixing on onr own point of attack, by lighting with our own weapons. May such power from on High descend on us during these meetings that all who arc on the Lord’s side may catch the thrill of our enthusiasm and the contagion of our courage, so that through all the long, fierce campaign our banners may wave salutes to theirs; that tho roll of our drums by day, and _ the gleam of our camp fires by night, may remind them that the chariots of tho Lord are twenty thousand, even thousands of saints ; that the rattle of onr rilles may echo the roar of their cannon, till at last the many battle-cries are merged in the one cheer—“ Hallelujah ! for the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth ; the kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our God aud of His Christ.”