SUNDAY READINGS.

Gisborne Times, Volume LXVI, Issue 10456, 10 December 1927, Page 4

SUNDAY READINGS.

ONE OF RAUL’S EASY THINGS.

(By the Her. James Ait-ken. ALA.)

Why is it that so many people reading the Epistles of Raul, fasten their attention on the doctrinal portions and overlook the practical. Raul's way 'of describing bis religions experience is none too easy to interpret, and is often misunderstood: but Raul’s counsels: for the guidance of life and conduct arc very plain, and they arc, most of them, as applicable to the circumstances of our own time as they were to those of the early Christian world. To skip the earlier chapters of the epistles and to read slowly and carefully tiic exhortation and advice with which Raul closes his letters, is sometimes a salutary moral and spiritual tonic. To study tlio early . doctrinal chapters may lead us to cull Jesus 'Lord, Lord' : but wind is the good of that- if we do not the things that ho .sa-yst' The later chapters it- is which .set before us with startling dearness what He would have us do in the common thoroughfares of life. To fake an example. There is an interesting passage in the Epistle of the Galatians which begins, “Brethren, d a mail he overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual restore such an one.” There's. a task for a Christian! Your neighbor, your friend, a member of your family, some one you knew, has done something wrong. What are you going to do about itf Perhaps this- wrongdoing is a habit with him. He’s got a- weakness, as we say: or he lias a vile temper: or he is lazy and careless. Are you simply going to let him know what you think of him, and leave it at that-' Are you going to lot Itis sin sever your relations with him and have nothing more to do with him ‘t What he lias done lias brought trouble and shame on you: his habit is constant vexation to you. Are yen therefore going to cut him adrift and let him alone henceforward:' That is not the Christian way, Raul says. The Christian wav is to set yourself to help your friend by every means in. your power to recover his character, to euro liimseli of his fault. That will be a difficult and bothersome thing to do, perhaps a very painful tiling. You will be undertaking a great burden if you set yourself to do that. \es, but in undertaking that burden you are lidfilling the law of Christ: you are following His exajmple and keeping llis commandment of love. One of the difficulties in such a task is the difficulty of avoiding an attitude, or even a feeding, of superiority. That wo have not ourselves fallen into our neighbor s sin is apt to be an occasion ol pride and self-satisfaction: and such pride, liesides being itself wrong, will effectually .frustrate all our attempts to help our neighbor. So Raul bids us be on our guard against it. He bids u,s remember that wo have weaknesses of our own. though they may be different from our friends’s weaknesses; and wo deceive ourselves it we imagine that wo are very much better than lie. If we compare ourselves with other people the temptation to be satisfied with ourselves is sure to beset us. Let us examine our own conduct in all its aspects, and sCo what comes of it at times. It will be a wonder if we have nothing to reproach ourselves with. Even if it be "so, al lit calls for- oil our part is thank fulness, not pride. Certainly it does not justify lis posing before others as beings of superior virtue. -Our neighbor has had his duties, whether lie has discharged them or no. AYe have our duties, our obligations, our burdens of responsibility, to all of which we are called upon to be faithful. To all of which—if we remember that we shall, have, little tendency to liiill' and pride ourselves on our.attaintiri.ic. That is -what Paul says to us in ibis passage. Let us read it low :u ids own Words: “Brethren, if a. mail lie overtaken (found out) in a fault, ye which are spiritual (you Christian men) restore such an one in the spirit of meekness —-considering thyself, lest thou, also be tempted. Bear ye one another's' burdens, and so ‘fulfilthe .law of Christ. For if a man thinketh. himself to be something, wlieli lie is nothing, lie dcceivcth himself. But let every man prove Host, try) his own work, and then shall he" have rejoicing (good cause for thankfulness—if ho finds it altogether what it should be) in liimseli alone, and not in another (it is a purclv private and personal matter, not to lead to comparisons with other people and their tiiilurcs. I'or every man shall bear liis own burden (every man is responsible, for Itis own duty, and whether lie shows well in comparison with his- neighbor is an altogether irrelevant matter). :Iu another part of the New Testament it is said that Paul wrote in his epistles some things hard to understand. “which tlio ignorant- wrest into their own destruction.” Hewrote, however, many things which are- simple and easy, and it is worth our while to give diligent heed to these..