THE SUNDAY CIRCLE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19258, 23 August 1924, Page 5

THE SUNDAY CIRCLE

RELIGIOUS READING FOB THE HOME. BE STILL AND KNOW. 1 By Clyde Edwin Tuck. ‘‘He still, and know that I am God” Tills is the way to perfect peace For those who, storm-tossed and oppressed, From ail their foes would find surcease, Trust Him, with faith, and have no fear; Know that your Help is always near. “Ho still, and know that 1 am God’’ Trust Him to guide your footsteps right; Although tho path is rough and loads Where dangers lurk, where starless night Conies down with cold and rush of rain— You will not wait on Him in vain. A PRAYER. O God, who dost reveal Thyself to none but the pm - e in heart, wo come to confess with shame before Thee that wo are not pure, and that wo have missed the heavenly vision of Thee. Liven when we have kept our outer lives and actions spotless, wo have carried about a heart that is stained within. Before Thee, who socst all that is in our heart with Thy pure, all-seeing eyes, wo are utterly ashamed. Thou hast given us a kingdom in which to reign, and wo have abdicated our royalty. Create in us a clean heart, 0 God, and renew a right spirit within us. Cleanse us, and wo shall be whiter than snow. Wash ns in the fountain opened for sin and uncleanness. For Jesus’ sake. Amen. A REMARKABLE RELIGIOUS MOVEMENT IN CONTINENTAL EUROPE. In Europe to-day there is a religious inovemeut afoot which, although not given great publicity, bids fair to be a powerful agent in tho moral progress of that great area. The story of this particular movement which is at work in all the countries of the Continent has been ably summarised by Dr J. H. Rushbrook. M.A., in a very readable book entitled ‘The Baptist Movement in tho Continent of Europe.” These are arduous days, and much that was venerated for ils antiquity and regarded as established forever by reason of its long usage, has now gone by tho board. Among the laggard nations of Europe especially there is to be found a state of flux and uncertainty. The day of reconstruction has set in, and every worth-while force must bo enlisted if the desired and is to bo reached. In any scheme for tho world’s progress and betterment religion has over boon a foremost factor, and it has still its supreme part to play. Within the last few years thrones have toppled over; monarchs have taken their departure; 'and to-day the slogans of democracy are louder than ever. But to rebuild shattered Europe wo need something more than tho inflamed speech of the Socialistic demagogue who lashes the capitalist and clamours for more money in his payenvelope. We must hark back to “the first things” . . . the moral principle of Jesus, the world’s sublimest Teacher, or we build on the sand. Tho primary task of tho' Church to-day is to elucidate and enforce the teaching of the Master. And tho Baptists are endeavouring to discharge their share in the great task. It is this fact which gives Dr Rushbrook’s story of the spread of the Baptists with their plain democratic type of Christianity peculiar interest. It is a romance of evangelism. It shows the rapid strides that are being made by just one ot the great spiritual forces operating in the world. In the year o r Waterloo there was not a. single Baptist church on the mainland of Europe. Today there are thousands, with a membership running into millions. People of this faith have always stood for the enfranchisement of all peoples, and surely the presence of so many of them in the “back-blocks” of Europe is not without significance. The old sage of Chelsea maintained that all history is to a large extent tho history of great men, and the movement in Europe which wo are considering centres largely in the personality of Johann Horbard Oncken, well called the Father of Continental Baptists. Early in. the nineteenth century a Scottish merchant visited Varel, in Germany, to collect payment for goods smuggled into the district during Napoleon’s blockade. While there he met young Oncken, and taking a fancy to him, invited hm to Scotland, where he went and was for nine years in his employ, Tho gift of a Bible from his Scottish patron turned hi* mind to religion, and returning to Germany, he was in tho thirty-fourth year of his age, baptised in the river Elbe. The next day tho first Baptist Church in Germany was constituted in Hamburg with Oncken as its minister. His aggressive evangelism soon brought him into conflict with tho “powers that be,” and as religious toleration was then practically unknown in Germany, what progress ivas registered was made in the teeth of bitter persecution. Time and again Oncken was incarcerated, but aiter 20 years he won the fight for freedom in Hamburg. Associated with Oncken, and thus forming a great triumvirate, wero Julius Kobner and Gottfried Wilhelm Lehmann. These “three mighty men” of the movement, and others with them, penetrated practically every country of Europe with tho Story which makes men free indeed. The wide field of operations to-day includes Poland, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Norway, Latvia, Lithuania, Esthonia, Rumania, Jugo-Slavin, Bulgaria, and also in Latin countries of Europe. * In Sweden, tho land of Gustavus Adolphus, the Movement has grown in strength and efficiency until to-day it has an enrolled membership much over 60,000. The Swedish Baptists have their colleges, various healthy denominational organisations, and a foreign missionary staff of over a hundred. The whole account of tho Movement read like a romance, but no part of it is more wonderful than tho story of the groat awakening in Russia. Tho tragic conditions obtaining" in this vast country for so long are about to bo bettered Russia had been fettered for long centuries by a dead orthodoxy, but that which magnificent architecture, the golden glory of Byzantine domes, tho splendour of bejewelled ikens and an elaborate priesthood could not do, the simple story of tiro Nazareno, as told by the Movement is bring to pass. To-day in all parts of Russia, from the Polish border to Eastern Siberia, from Archangel to tho frontier of Persia, the Baptist cause is growing apace. At present tho largest Baptist community in Europe is to be found in this unfortunate and suffering land. The storv of its growth and progress, as told by Dr Rushbrook, thrills one with its heroisms and staunchness of devotion to the great principles that make for man’s freedom. Nor is the Movement, as some hostile writers avow, restricted to tho commonality. I*, numbers among its adherents members of the nobility, men of influence, men of parts, and others who stood high in the society of Old Russia. Hearts “pregnant with celestial fire” boat under the peasant’s gaberdine no less than under the fur coat of tho aristocrat. A Russian statesman recently declared that in tho whole country there must be some three million and a-balf of the Baptist faith. A faith which enunciates the groat principles of civil and religious liberty, as tho Baptists have uniformly done, must play no small part in the progress of any country in which they gain a footing. Russia and other European countries have thrown away the “ past's blood-rusted key,” and will attempt to force the lock of the future unless they are shown a more excellent way and that tho Baptists are showing a. more excellent way is abundantly evident from Dr Rushbrook’s masterly survey of their activities throughout Europe.

NEWS ITEMS. Dr John R. Mott has returned to tho United States after his extended tour in the Near East. A street in Salon ica has been named John It. Mott street Jn appreciation of the work of tho V.M.G. A. Addressing a meeting at Hackney, Gipsy Smith mentioned tho fart that exactly 47 years ago he began to preach for General Booth. When ho first conducted a service in Hackney ho could not have read a chapter in the New Testament to save his life. With a Bible given him by an unknown friend, and a pocket edition of Webster, ho taught himself to read, and when conducting a service, if he came to a word ho did not know, he stopped, made some comment by way of exposition—and began again on the other side of the word. Today the Gipsy, looking back on nearly 50 years’ preaching, exclaimed that ho felt ready for another SO. According to long custom, at the opening of each day’s session of the Republican National Convention at. Cleveland, an invocation was delivered by some distinguished minister. On tho first day this prayer was offered by a Methodist bishop, on the second by a. Jewish rabbi, and on tho third by a Roman Catholic bishop. It was officially announced that, if tho meeting had lasted until a fourth day, the turn would have come for a Christian Science reader to discharge this function. In his prayer on the first day Bishop Anderson asked “that by Thy good guidance may our Republic find its way to definite and aggressive leadership in the interests of universal goodwill and world peace,’’ and that the nation might believe this to bo among God purposes as His crowning of America's ministry and 'mission to all mankind.

Dr C. E. Jefferson delivered the baccalaureate sermon this year at Yale University. “Wo are not rnon of the highest type,” ho said, “unless wo attempt the impossible. It is only men who attempt the impossible who got this world on. The impossible next thing to bo don© is to abolish war. War is not inevitable through any fiat of God, but only through human stupidity and wickedness. We are going to abolish it as soon as wo think like full-grown men.” War would be abolished, ho continued, by organising our international life. A federation of the world ought to bo, and could be, created. The inspiration in this great ■ campaign must come from, the Man of Galileo, who laid aside the sword and dared to fight in the armour of God. Dr Henry Sloano Coffin has commended the invitation given by the Presbyterian General Assembly to Dr Posdick to enter the ministry of that church. “A man,” he says, “who remains for an indefinite period as a. gaiest in the household ought to become a member of the family. Inasmuch as • the church must assume responsibility for him, it is only fair that he should assume responsibility for the church. This, according to our constitution, is done by taking the vows which all our ministers and office-bearers assume.” Dr Collin does not see how a more happy and orderly decision could have l>een reached, and he hopes that, now that, the Liberties of the church have been fully asserted, and have been safeguarded by careful judicial decisions, controversy will cease and everyone will devote himself to the task of proclaiming Christ in Ilia fulness Dr IT. Emerson Fordick’.s sarmon at Marylebono Presbyterian Church on a recent Sunday morning illustrated the sound evangelicalism of this ‘'Modernist” preacher. Mis insistence on the reality of sin and the need of the Gross was as emphatic as any Fundamentalist could desire. 'The point about, sin, he said, was (hat it was so hard to forgive. Much human “forgiveness” was more light-hearted condonation. Jesus found it hard to forgive. “Is not that what Christianity has always meant when it associated forgiveness with the Cross? 1 do not know what your theory of the Atonement is, but I am sure of this, that behind all (lie theories of (he Atonement that in the course of human history have risen and bad their day and faded out again, the (Toss has a!nays been saying one thing, that it is iiQt easy for God to forgive sin. That it, crisis tremendously. It. costs love putting itself in our place and taking on its innocence the burden of our guilt. For whether a mother forgives a son, or God forgives us, there is always a cross at the centre, and it is not easy.”