A SERVICE FOR SUNDAY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 17504, 21 December 1918, Page 11

A SERVICE FOR SUNDAY

ARRANGED BY TIIE COUNCIL OF CHURCHES. Invocation. This is the day which (Jio Lord hath made; wo will rejoice and be glad in it. . Our voices shalt Tliou hear in the morning, O God; in tho morning will wo direct our prayer unto Thee, and will look up. Give ear to our words, O Lord; consider our meditation; hearken unto the voice o£ our cry, O our King and our God. Hymn. "O Come Ail Yo Faithful" Sculpturn Heading, Isaiah Iv. Pkater. Gracious God and Father we bless and magnify 'l'heo lor the designs of Thy love, and the counsels of Thy wisdom, that Thou shouldest bo manifested in tho Hesii, to destroy tins works of tho devil, and that •thy beloved Son should be made tho Son of man, to make us tho children of God. Ihou hast laitl help upon ono thift is nughtly, and iound a ransom for us; help us entertain and welcome tho joyful nows. Ihou didst not withhold Thine only begotten Son, but for our sins didst send Him forth to tako our nature upon Him. We laud Thee, wo magnify Thee, wo exalt lhy name for ever and ever. Humbly wo entreat Thee that, though tho incarnate lifo and willing sacrifice of Jesus, we may be both cleansed from sin, and also bom again into the likoness of His purity. Wo pray that wo and all men may so learn of Thee who art meek and lowly in heart that we may follow after Thee. Grant, Lord Jesus, that as tho wise men of old were led to Thy cradle by a light from heaven, so our hearts may bo guided this day to contemplate and adore tho mysof Thino incarnation and the grace of Thy nativity. Wo would present unto Theo better gifts than gold or myrrh, even tho offering of a contrite heart and of an obedient will.

Grant, O Spirit of holiness that Ho who was made flesh and dwelt among us, full of graco and truth, may, through Thy mighty operation, be so formed within each of us as tho hope of glory, that wo also may be mad© tho children of God. Cause every ono of us to become as a little child. Pur go our hearts from all sin that we may bo fit as true disciples to follow Him who was bom at Bethlehem. O G-od, let there be peaco on earth with goodwill to all mankind. Hasten the time when lie who is " called tho Prince of Peace" shall stretch His golden 6ceptro over a ransomed, reconciled, regenerate, and rejoicing world. Hoar us, for tho sake of Jesus Christ: to whom, with Thee and tho Holy Ghost, be glory and praiso for ever. Amen. Hyhx. "As With Gladness Men of Old." Sebmon. John iii, 16. —" God so loved tho world, that Ho gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believed on Him should not parish, but have overlasting life." This statement holds a unique place in the mind and heart of Christendom. it is tho summing up of the Gospel. It expresses the whole substance of a man's faith. Tlio writer presents in ono majestic, sweeping, comprehensive sentence the essence of Christian belief. This text has been called "The charter of man's salvation." What the evangelist sets before us is the supreme fact of love; the supreme proof of lovo; the supremo goal of love. The supreme fact is that God loves the world of men and women and children. God loves each soul in tlie world. There is no limitation. Tho worst and tho most forgotten are clasped to His bosom. He called souls into being that His love might have objects on which to bestow itself. God's lovo of the world and for the human soul—that is the absolute religion. Bring it all dc>'vn into the ordinary lifo and see what a tremendous difference it makes. If all crur struggles, our failures, our hopes, our aspirations were nothing to God, wnat could .God be to us? If wo feel that His eye is upon us, that our individual lives mean something to Him, and that His intention is for our good, then that very fact lifts our lives out of insignificance, makes the struggle worth waging, and enables us to say in tho midst of seeming desolation, "I am not alone, for the Father is with me." To tho Christian soul it is always true that God's awful attributes

"Aro but the ministers of love And feed the sacred flame." Tho proof follows tho statement immediately. "Ho gave His only begotten Son." It is not merely that He sent His son. Ho gave His son. Ho delivered Him. up to the death for us all. That was the proof of the Divine Love. The love of the Father is the source of the atonement. Christ went to the Cross willingly. "I delight to do Thy will, 0 my God." But it may bo said, "Why do we not say that. God is Father and that all is to be well, and leave Christ out"? Why not read the text "God gave to everyone everlasting life"? If any one says that God is love, upon what facts is he to rest his arguments? You cannot find the love of God in the mass of misery and vice which is so manifest in the world. But belief in God and in the lovo of God has been maintained and propagated in the Cress, and only there. Apart from that, where is the proof that God is n. Father and not merely a force? In giving us Jesus Christ, God gave us Himself. In Jesus Christ wo have the way to God, the truth about God, and the life of God lived out among men. In Christ they saw God willing to seek and save, ready to suffer and agonise for their sakes, loving men even in their disobedience and wilfulness, and giving Himself for them. "God so loved tho world that Ho gavo Himself to us in His own dear Son."

Then we have the goal revealed. "Whosoever belioveth on Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." Tho whole aim of the gift of Christ is this, that we may have life, and have it abundantly. Belief in Christ is not to bo confounded with belief in this or that historical statement concerning Him. We believe in Him when wo follow Him, when wo accept tho ideals Ho sot before us, when we keep His commandments. If we believe that He knows tho w&y, and that lie can help us to surmount its difficulties, if we believe that the goal to which Ho desires to bring us is worth striving for and worth attaining, wo shall not only express our belief' in words, but ondoavour to walk in His steps. Unbelief is a deadly thing. Tho word "perish" is a dark word. The tendency of all life apart from the Divine connection and renewal is towards decay and death. There is no power to enable us to drown the reality of the wretchedness that is about us, maiming and marring existence. What is to keep tho fires alive, tho high ideal, the unworldliness, tho aspiration'; after truth and purity and goodness? Just this, "Whosoever belioveth on Him shall not perish," but—it goes on to say—"shall have everlasting lifo." Love is life and its denial is death. Jesus died for us and rase again. Tho moment wo believe we are mado children of the resurrection, and there is given to us that life which neither tho world nor grief can quonch Only the unreal comes_ to an end, just because it is unreal. "Passing away, saith the world, passing away." The real persists, and love is the great reality. "Death dies 0 lifo lives." It we are in Christ there is something within us that has livod. that lives, and that will live. For the experience of that Divine Lovo which shone _ at its fullest in Christ we should not wait until to-morrow, it is meant to be ours to-day. This word of God is gone forth to tho end of tho earth, and lias reached us. Why should we not! each ono of us, have and hold and cherish and keep that eternal lifo? I

HnrN. "I Hear Thy Welcome Voice." Benediction.

Now unto Him that loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His father; to Him bo glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.