SUNDAY READING

Taranaki Daily News, 13 October 1928, Page 17

SUNDAY READING

By

REV. A. H. COLLINS

STUDIES IN THE PEARL OF PARABLES. No. I.—THE LOST ARE MISSED. "What man of you having a hundred sheep and having lost one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness and go after that which is lost until he find it.” —Saint Luke XV. 4. Each of the four gospels has its own special features. The earliest is St. Mark, the story of an eye-witness, written under the influence of St. Peter, and represents the activity of Jesus Christ. St. Matthew wrote for the Jews to prove to them that Christ was the Messiah. St. John’s gospel came much later, and was written for a generation which had never known Christ in the flesh, and it stresses the Eternal Sonship of Christ. St. Luke’s is the most universal and beautiful picture, and was written by a gentile, for the whole gentile world. Luke is supposed to have been the brother of Titus, a doctor by profession, and his story is the most perfect in literary form, for in addition to being “the beloved physician” St. Luke is credited with being an artist. His pages abound in vivid descriptions and fascinating character sketches. But the crowning glory of his gospel is this parable of the lost sheep, the lost coin, and the lost son. It is “the pearl of parables.” It supplies “way-marks for wonderers,” light in the lattice which leads prodigals home. When Adonaram Judson first returned from his missionary labours in Burmah the popular imagination was greatly stirred. Crowds flocked to hear him tell some thrilling story of missionary adventure, and instead of this he preached a simple gospel sermon, and made no reference to himself. One of his Athenian hearers went away saying, “He told us nothing new.” The remark reached Dr. Judson, and his only comment was, “Thank God they bad it to say; I told them nothing new.” In attempting a series of addresses on this parable, my message will be open to the same criticism. I can tell you nothing new, but if I can speak so simply and persuasively that the truth which has lain on the surface of life becomes rooted convictions of your soul, how thankful I shall be. Great truths are always great, Not once but evermore, There is an everlasting youth A spring time' evrmore. FOUR SALIENT FACTS. There are four facts suggested in the text, and they can be stated this way. The loved are the lost. The lost, though lost, are loved. The loved and lost are missed. The loved and lost are missed and are sought. * What a number of things are lost! Lost days, lost opportunities, lost faculties and lost friendships! But a lost soul! I read in a shop window a card bearing this sentence: "Lost, somewhere between sunset and sunrise, two golden hours, each set with sixty diamond minutes. No reward is offered as they are lost forever.” Simple but tragic! A companion picture might be suggested: “Lost somewhere between the cradle and the coffin, a man gifted with fine abilities and imperial powers. The finder will be liberally rewarded.” But lost does not mean hopelessly lost; lost means “not yet found.” The saying, “Search how we will o’er our land and main, lost chance never conies again,” is not true. We have not only a second chance, but a good many other chances, else what means the gospel? HOW MEN MAY BE LOST. Further, the parable suggests three different ways in which men may be lost. The first of these is heedlessness. The lost sheep had no quarrel with the shepherd or the. flock; no sense of being bored or ill-.' :'d. It made no wild dash for freedom, it lost its way through thoughtlessness. It gave no heed, but just went on cropping the sweet grasses with no thought of what lay ahead. It was having a good time in a dull animal sort of way, and when it saw another mouthful of lush grass it went after it. The lost sheep just nibbled its way into the wilderness. Its outlook on life was sheepish. “All we like sheep have gone astray.” We have no serious quarrel with the world or its Maker. Wo do not deliberately throw off moral restraints and go wrong. We simply act on blind impulse rather than reason. We do not reflect. “My people do not consider.”

The story of the lost coin is quite different. The piece of silver was an inert and lifeless thing, with no power of resistance. It was the plaything of chance. So long as the woman held it on the string it was safe, but once the string snapped, gravitation laid hold of the coin and whirled it away, or' left it stranded on the ground. Some men go wrong that way. They seem to have no power of resistance, no self-direction. We say of one man, that he is a decent fellow but has no will of his own. Anyone can get at him, he is squeezable, with “the backbone of a cream puff!” If only one could put pith and core into his will he would be safe, but his nature is soft as putty. Heedlessness has slain its thousands and weakness it tens of thousands. “Ephraim is as a silly dove.” THE PRODIGAL SON.

But heedlessness and weakness arc not the end of the story, and if the parable stopped there it would be incomplete. The case of the prodigal goes deeper, for he was more than weak; he was depraved; he was not only foolish, he was wicked. We may try to think the best of hint, and yet, when all is said and done, he plain truth is that he was a bad son and a poor brother. He was irreverent, unfilial and selfish. He chafed under the restraints of home, and wanted to get hold of his share of the property, and have his fling in the big free world, and make a dash for Bohemia with no regard for the effect On others. And this is true to life, for however we may apologise for men, and make allowance for bad training and evil environment, the fact remains that sin is often downright badness. Sin is not only weakness or ignorance, it is rebellion .'gainst divine authority, and ic involves actual, selfish disregard of injury done to our fellows. Drink and gambling, violent temper and greed, in' volve cruelty, for they wreck homes, and hurt wives and children and neighbours, yet some men take the wrong ways with their eyes wide open and in scorn of consequences. It is this that makes sin so black, so heartless, so cruel

LOVE DIVINE AND HUMAN DERELICTS. How docs Love Divine regard these human derelicts? We know how some men regard them. The vast pagan world had no use for them. The Temple men of Christ’s day said of them “as for this multitude it is accursed.” For centuries modern civilisation regarded the toilers as so much waste human stuff to be exploited for the advantages of a few superior specimens! The church has sometimes cared very little for the lost and strayed. When William Carey - pleaded the cause of Indian missions, one of tho fathers of the church cried: “Sit down, young man. If God wants to save the world, He will do it without you.” Let us search our own hearts, and

say what place lost men have in our scheme of life. How much do we care for the conversion of relatives and shopmates? Are there not times when wa take low views of human nature? We read the records of the police courts and there rises in our hearts feelings i of contempt and despair. When you turn to the New Testament you breathe another atmosphere, the atmosphere of hope and mercy and charity. Christ looked on men with other and kinder eyes. There is no hiding of ugly facts, no glossing over with a thin veneer of vapid sentimentalism; there is a compassionateness and hopefulness that is entirely new. Jesus Christ regarded each individual soul as

possessing infinite value. He said all Heaven is stirred with joy at “one sinner that repenteth.” Those whom men despised and shunned He loved and sought to win, and that is His attitude still. The convict in chains, the victim of drink and profligacy; the shrunken, bleary-cycd opium smoking Chinaman; the caste-ridden Bengalee, and every living soul in this and every other world is dear to God. The folk we call “the dangerous classes,” the multitude who perish by accidents, are slain in battle, and the sunken in the sin and slime of great cities—there is not one outside God’s Fatherly love, not one beyond His power to save, not one who is not missed. Every lost sheep in His flock, every piece of silver in the dust, and every prodigal in tin far country. The only man God cannot help is Hie smug, self-righteous man who imagines that he needs no repentance. You may seem of no value in your own eyes; you may think that nobody knows or cares about you, and that if you dropped out. of the ranks to-morrow you would not be missed, and the hard, cruel world would go on just the same, as the tossing sea rolls on when the foam bell drops in the passing wave. LOST BUT SOUGHT. ißut this parable was spoken to deny all that. You are lost, but you are missed, you are loved, and you arc being sought. Come home, come home, You are weary at' heart, For the way has been long And so lonely and wild, O prodigal child, come home. Dr. MacLaren has a sermon on the phrase “Until He find it,” and the sermon is called “The Persistence of Love.” It is not wise to build a theory on a single text, but that phrase opens a wide door of hope, and it does not stand alone. The salvation is as wide as the sin. Love will outcast sin. The Eternal Father will never be satisfied until He finds all His wandering sons and even 'beyond the bounds of time He will seek until He find the lost. The soul is too precious to be “cast as rubbish to tlie void.” When we say, “I believe in the forgiveness of sin,” if we mean what we say we pronounce our disbelief in the final loss of a single human soul. The persistence of hatred and sin would mean the defeat of God, and the triumph of the devil. God has eternity in which to seek and to save. Somehow Good will be the final goal of ill, To pangs of Nature, sins of will, Defects of doubt and taints of blood. That nothing walks with aimless feet, That not one life shall be destroyed: Or cast like rubbish to the void, When God shall make the pile complete.

WITH the sermon published to-day Mr. Collins completes the eighth year of contributions to the Daily News. In that period the supply of his weekly message has been unbroken, and it is no exaggeration to say that the force an<f vitality of his interpretation of truths that are old and yet ever new have been equally unbroken. There is ample evidence also of the interest created by his sermons. Comments in regard to them have come from all ever the Dominion, from Australia and from the Old Country. It is a far-flung “parish” that Mr. Collins is now serving so well, and it will doubtless be a stimulus to his work to know how far and wide its influence is spread. The News congratulates Mr, Collins on the completion of another year’s valued contributions and' trusts it will be but the precursor of many more.