World of Religion

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23127, 27 August 1938, Page 7 (Supplement)

World of Religion

By PHILEMON

IT was the writer's privilege recently to form one of a circle which spent an hour in reviewing the New Testament teaching about the Grace of God. Its members were versed in the study of religion and accustomed to speak of it in public, but as so often happens the exchange of thought added a depth and charm to familiar truth and begot a resolve to declare it with new force and directness of appeal. A few weeks ago the Archbishop of Canterbury, speaking at St. Paul's, recalled an incident in his own experience. Ho was to address a crowded gathering of workmen in the north of England on social questions, and as he passed to his scat on the platform they were singing, "as only north countrymen can," the well-known hymn—"Toll me the old, old story . . . remember I'm the sinner whom Jesus came to save." It was difficult for me, said the Archbishop, not to scrap my address and answer that appeal. We may depend upon it that the people want to hear the message of saving grace, nor may we forget that the primary commission of the preacher is to proclaim it. "Soiled by Controversy" When these great words of Scripture are brought into the classroom and become part of the vocabulary of the theologian they soon begin to lose something of their original simplicity and may even be soiled by controversy. Unhappily tho word "grace" has not escaped this misfortune. There is no denial of the fact of grace as fundamental to the Gospel, but the schools are strongly divided as to the extent to which divine grace is free to all or as to how it is mediated to its beneficiaries. We may avoid these discussions at present, important though they *be, and keep close to the central idea, always remembering that there is truth in the saying—"The further we get from simplicity, the further wo get from God." The idea of grace implies that there is a divine initiative in religion. Everything starts from God's side. Wo seem to seek God if haply we may find Him, but in the end we discover that our very seeking is prompted by His Spirit. "The passion and the hunger for God," sa.vs Baron von Hugel, "are from Himself, and He answers them in Christ." Our penitence and our faith are alike a response to the divine approach. Both are in Scripture spoken of as the gift of God.

We work out our own salvation, or seem to do so, and in the midst of our effort we discover, as Dr. Moffatt translates, that it is God who in His goodwill enables us to will and achieve all that we accomplish. As we so often sing—"Every virtue we possess, and every conquest won, and every thought of holiness, are His alone." Sermon on Mount Here lay the facts of life which led the wondering mind of St. Paul to a conception of the divine grace which has constantly arrested the attention of the Church and powerfully affected its teaching. The apostle had but little to say about the general goodwill of God which, as we learn from the Sermon on . the Mount, bestows its material blessings impartially upon mankind. His thought ran to deeper levels. Beyond the physical wants of man there was a poverty of the soul

WHAT PEOPLE WANT TO HEAR

into which sin had brought him, and from the foundation of the world, the apostle believed, a purpose of good had been at work redeeming mankind from the causes of this spiritual demerit and impoverishment. Through all the preparatory ages the divine intention moved to its fulfilment, until at last the "mystery hidden from times eternal," God's secret lying deep at the heart of the world, stood revealed in Christ. It is a great, broad world-view, an interpretation of history with the grace of God at work in every age. Hut further, in the Apostle's view this general purpose of good was accompanied by a potent influence of grace in the individual heart. These shames and strivings that disturb the soul, these voices within that will not let us rest, these self-accusings and desires for a better life, these leadings that bring us to the Cross, are all of God. His purpose of good is for the individual as well as for the race and none is left without some ministry of grace. Love Divine Thus grace is the divine benevolence in action. It is lovo "so amazing, so divine" flowing down from God to man, love that seeks to bless when all right to blessing has long been forfeited, love taking voieo and speaking of forgiveness and a new life "hid with Christ in God." It is the boundless goodwill of the Father made known in Jesus, our hope and stay for time and for eternity. Many would say it is too good to be true. To men whose lives are daily immersed in a hard and bargaining world and who think of money a thousand times for every once they think of God it is all.a fair dream. But we do not go to such to learn the truths of the spiritual world. The experience of believing men is a surer guide, and those who formed tlie circle of study referred to did not seem to find faith difficult.

There were among them men accustomed to weigh reasons and to think acutely, men skilled in self-scrutiny who knew their psychology well, men unlikely to deceive themselves, and those bore testimony to an experience in life which found no adequate explanation save in the grace of God. To them, as to thousands, the apostolic doctrine was no fine theory into which the facts must be compelled as best they may. Majestic Urgency Something real was at work in St. Paul's life which led him to say, "By the grace of God 1 am what I am." St. Augustine was striving to get that same something expressed when he cried, "I sought Thee without me, and Thou wast within me." Francis Thompson actually heard tho "majestic urgency" of the Hound of Heaven and the beat of His pursuing feet. If these things be true a great assurance enters the human heart. Man has a place in the divine regard. He is not left orphaned and dismayed. "Thou art as much His care as if beside nor man nor angel lived in heaven or earth." God does not console Himself for the loss of the wrongdoer by the fellowship of the good. He is not, it has been aptly said, a sovereign who has no personal knowledge of His subjects, an employer of labour who can readily get another hand to fill an empty post. Rather would He restore the most abandoned sinner than create a new archangel to take his place. If any doubt let him turn to the parables of Jesus in the immortal fifteenth of St. Luke. There he will learn, as A. K. Whitham reminds us, that when a man abandons all his rights, even that of being called a child" of God, and is willing for his folly to be accounted but a hired servant, then it is that God's wondrous grace slips the ring upon his finger, casts the best robe about his shoulders, and the dance and music of jov begin, in his own heart, in the whole glad household to which he now belongs; ves, and if we take the word of our Lord Himself, among "the angels of God."