THE CHRISTIAN AT WAR

Opotiki News, Volume II, Issue 230, 6 September 1939, Page 1

THE CHRISTIAN AT WAR

a'' (Ccnitri bated.) In order to understand the position of those who serve Christ, the Prince of Peace, during a time of war, we must first of all study what our Cliiisiinn Rible toadies us about Man. In the first chapter of the Bible the name given to the first man is Adam. a word which in the ancient Hebrew tongue means precisely the same thing as we .mean fallen we say Man, meaning the whole Mankind. ‘The Rible constantly regaVjjijs Man as one united whole. It uses SjL different word when speaking of a single individual, a word which, means literally “an intellectual llame”. AVc men and women are all parts of that one whole which the Rible calls Adam. When we adopt this attitude to our iellowmen, namley, that they are all .parts of one great whole called Adam', i then our position as.’ Christians in a time of war becomes a great deal easier for "us to umllerstand. For war then appears to us as a conflict with which we are all familiar, namely a conflict within ourselves between tire forces of good and evil. AN ar becomes to’us its St. James saw it; it is the outcome off “lusts which war” in our own members. It is the violent stirring of some sinful emotion in Map. The ancient Hebrews, as«.is well known, regarded themselves as God’s

chosen people, or in other words as what we might call the “Conscience” k .; of that united whole wliicli they recognised as “Adacl”. The Hebrew therefore _ believed that this whole -Man, or Adam, must, allow himself to be ruled. In hi s Conscience, or the Hebrew race. He also saw other races of men as other “lusts,” “desires”, “emotions”, “sentiments”, etc., within Man. Hence it was that Samuel; was -ready to tell Saul and slaughter the Amelekitos, man, woman, and child. He saw the Amafekites as an evil “lust” within Adam, which must lie stamped out. it was his way of “mortifying the evil desires of the flesh” ill Adam. When Christ came He modified this idea tot some extent, hut He in no way contradicted any of it's fundamentals. He was the “New Adam,” and a “new birth” of the old Adam. He was the “Seedl” of the New Man sown, and destined to grow up -within . the heart of the Old Adam. And the, Church' of God to-day is that Ney Mhn growing up within the Old Adam. And let us remember . Christ’s own words-, “if thy hand.ofl'end thee jeut it off”. War. is tmJ'result of Man’s hand offending him, and! we must cut that hand off. In this particular case, Sve of the British race believe that the is Herr Hitler, and have started out to. “cut it off”. It is all a normal part of that “mortifying of the sinful desire's of the..flesh” which has been, the practice of -hi 1 great Christian men of all ages, to practice in their own lives by prayer, fasting, and all manner of ascetic practices. Jt| is Man's method of cleansing the Temple of his body, and we may remember that Christ cleansed the Temple with violence, making a scourge and driving out t-be offenders. But, on the other hand, we must not lose sight of the fact that “no man liveth or d'ieth unto himself,” and that we “are all members one of another”. The Christian man can never enter into war for the glory of it. He enters into it with shame and sorrow. It is a cruel infliction upon the members; of his own body. He feels that he has his share of the guilt to hear, and also his share of the pain. And lie knows that Cfirist is also suffering horribly. The Church to-day, “scattered throughout all nations', and yet one in Christ Jesus”, is the Israel of" to-day, and the Conscience' of the Human Race. War conies because Man has not allowed his conscience to dictate his .actions. He has, in other words, neglected his Chinch. With these thoughts in view, we see at once-that-cur duty is not only to “mortify” those members which offend, but also to turn hack to Godl, and give ourselves wholly to the obeying of the Christ-conseionce in Man.”