SUNDAY READING

Taranaki Daily News, 11 March 1933, Page 12 (Supplement)

SUNDAY READING

the late REV,

A, H. COLLINS

■ religion’s reveille. H; "Awake,- awake, put on thy strength, ■ ; ' O Zion: put on thy beautiful gar■v. ments,,o Jerusalem.” * ■j, . - —lsa.- LB. I. ■J; A CALL TO WAKEFULNESS. I The second Isaiah was the Prophet of ■ the Exiles. ’ His mission was to console I and hearten the exiles in Babylon, to ■ . ’help them to keep their hearts stout and ■ ,?. brave through the 70 years’ captivity. ■ And now the night of weeping was passI ing away. Day dawn was at hand, and | - Isaiah bids them “greet the future with I ■ a cheer.” The best was yet to be. But I .Babylon had left its mark on the HeI .brews. They were like invalids who I had been such a long time sick that they lx - .'had lost their desire to be up and out in I- -the sunshine. Slaves have been known I 'to hug their chains and shrink from reI sponsibility of freedom. Part of the I curse of slavery is that its saps the spirit of independence, and leads men to cringe and cower to their taskmasters. There was a time when the ancestors of these •-exiles sighed for the “fleshpots of Egypt,” rather than wrestle with the ■ ’ .< >-perils of the wilderness, and press on to Canaan, and it is evident from the Pro- \ phet’s words that the exiles were in like ease. They were stupefied. Sorrow had .acted I’ke a narcotic. They were drug- ■. ; ,ged and spiritless. Hence the challengT' ; ing clarion call: “Awake! Awake!” As much as he had said: “Don’t accept bondage as inevitable. Resist the drive and down drag of hostile things. Call .up your moral reserves. Rally the sinking V forces of the soul. Think! Act! Dare! V , The phrase that follows suggests a further effect of their bondage: it had drainf • ed their inner powers and left them limp and soft like pithy reeds that bend to the blast, rather than like oaks , that ' shake defiance at the storm‘ and strike their roots deeper. They needed to pull . .. themselves together, to stiffen their will, to fix their purpose and cleanse their vision. They needed to recall the men and'.the days of old, and to forecast the 7 gqlden age that , had yet to be. Hence these words: “Put on thy strength.” Look • ‘.. bold and be bold. Gird your soul with might. But in the slave fields of Babylon their dress had grown grimy and stained, and because they were slaves, they dressed like slaves. Their temple garments were hidden away; they had lost sight of their holiday, attire. Isaiah bids them unpack and get ready for freedom. “Put- on thy beautiful garments.” They are to dress like free men who Happened for the moment to be in - bonds. “Awake! Awake! Put on thy strength, O Zion; put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem.” So that, done down into simple Saxon, the text was a rail to wakefulness, vigor and comeliness, and these are the abiding qualities of any religion that is sane and strong and attractive. The emancipated soul is the soul that has experienced a great arousal, a mighty reinforcement, and a beautiful adorning, and any church composed of such will be alert, virile and winsome, and in so far as it is not so it is Unfaithful to the New Testament pattern. John Bunyan, in his picture'of • J “the Palace Beautiful/’ has drawn with rare skill the ideal church. The palace where the pilgrim rested was situated on the hill top. “Watchful” was the porter at the gate. “Prudence,” “Patience” and “Charity” provided entertainment. They showed “Christian” through the armoury and he slept in the chamber called “Peace,” with windows looking towards the sunrise! When he woke he sarig: “Where am I now? Is this the love and care Of Jesus for ‘ the men . that pilgrims are? Thus to provide! That I should be forgiven, And dwell already the next door to Heaven?” RELIGION, THE SOUL’S REVEILLE. “Awake! Awake!” It is the soul's reveille. All life is really an awakening. We are, at different stages, like people coming out of a deep sleep, and first one faculty, then another, is roused into activity. The new bom child is scarcely conscious of anything more than bodily sensations, and these only dimly. Youth slowly wakens to the world of < thought, and ideas begin to bud and shoot. Then comes a world of new sensations, the stirring of friendship, the mystical blending of two lives, when self is lost and found again in another. So from stage to stage we pass tlirough life, hearing the voice, of Authority, the voice, of Friendship, the voice of Love, crying: “Awake! Awake!” And Eternity itself will be a great awakening. The Bible is full of the idea that religion is the soul’s reveille, the soul becoming conscious of new thoughts, desires, purposes, aims and plans on the Godward side. Thus you read: “Awake thou that deepest and arise, and Christ shall give thee life.” And this: “You hath He quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins.” King Saul was asleep until Samuel anointed him, and set his life tingling with new ideas. Saul of Tarsus was asleep until Christ met . him on the Damascus Road, and “smote his blind train with the torch of glory.” Thousands of men and women are aiive in limb and brain, yet on their soul side are in- a state of spiritual torpor, and for such the call of this passage is a call to wake up and claim the freedom that is theirs in Jesus. Christ. A MEANS TO AN END. But the soul’s arousal is not an end; it is a means to an end. An oyster is alive; so is the aphis on a rose. Hence the Prophet’s “Awake! Awake!” is followed by other words: “Put on thy strength.” Emancipated Israel was faced by the task of rebuilding the waste places, restoring the lapsed ordinances, and re-establishing national order.' The slave- must become the statesman, the drudge in Babylon must become the stalwart in Zion, and the modem equivalent of this is that we need not only more religion, but stronger religion, religion that is open-eyed, intelligent, forceful, strong. What we call “conversion” is only the beginning of a life that . is ever advancing in knowledge and sovereignty and power. “They go from strength to strength,” says the Psalmist. “Add to your faith virtue,” says Saint Paul; and virtue in that connection means strength. “Quit you like men, be strong,” cried the veteran Apostle to '• his young brother Timothy, and that is the characteristic note of the New Testament from end to end. Religion ought to be alert, progressive, fearless. Religious men should be the most capable workmen in any trade, the most intelligent members of any society, and the most courageous in any emergency. They should know more, do more, and be more than any others. “Bound in cloth limp” is a poor definition of Christian. “Wears not here to dream, to drift, We have hard work to do, and loads to lift; Be strong.” DRESS IS AN INDEX TO CHARACTER. Then there is this third thing: “Put on thy beautiful garments,” Dress is

often an index to character. To say that “the tailor maketh the man” is an exaggeration, but it is an exaggeration of a truth, for when a man looks shabby he is apt to feel shabby, too. He loses self-respect. The same principle has higher, application. There is a beauty of I mind, a gracefulness of character, a comeliness of spirit' Mark Twain struck a deep, true note when he said: “Weaf a shabby coat if you must, but keep a tidy soul.” Tidy soul! I like that phrase. The thought is Apostolic, for the New Testament is constantly saying the same thing. Spiritual, qualities are described as the raiment of the soul, and we are bidden be “arrayed in purity,” “clad in zeal,” “clothed with humility,” and "vested with power.” Zachariah saw the High Priest clad in filthy garments, and the Voice said: “Take away the filthy garments from him. Behold, I caused thine iniquity to pass away and I Will clothe thee with a change of raiment.” I am afraid the meaning of all this is often obscured by what is miscalled “spiritualising”! But the plain truth is that “Put on thy beautiful garments” means that the quickened and reinforced soul should be the adorned soul. Religion should be attractive religion. It is not enough to be sound in the faith, and sour in spirit, bitter in temper, and uncouth in manners. The true Christian is “God Almighty’s Gentleman.” The fretful porcupine is not a strict moralist. There should be no honour so fine, no courtesy so finished and perfect, no truthfulness so absolute, and no charity so wide, as that of the man who calls himself a Christian. Wakefulness, forcefulness, winsomeness, these are the graces of the .Christian soul. CRITICISM OF THE CHURCH. . But this great word was not so much addressed to the individual as to the elect nation which constituted what Dean Stanley, called “the-Jewish church,” arid I shall do no. violence to the Prophet’s words if I say they are a clarion call to the modem Church; It is required of any and every church assembly that it shall exhibit the qualities of alertness, vigor and attraction. But he would be. a bold man who claimed these are the evident marks of organised Christianity, The Church has always had its critics,. and in some cases the critics steep their words iri vitriol. The Church is -blamed for what.it does, and what it ' fails to accomplish. On the principle that the onlooker, sees most of the game, those who stand aloof from the Church and its activities are freest in telling us what we ought to do!. I would not.be over squeamish. I would rather be criticised than ignored, and, indirectly, the criticism of the Church is a compliment. Carlyle, in his grim way, says: “You want a horse that won’t kick? Get a dead horse.. No horse in all the stable for not kicking like a dead one.” No, I cannot join the ranks of the croakers who say that Christianity has failed, and the Church is moribund. The fact is, Christianity has never been fairly tried. No nation has ever arisen that has been frankly and fearlessly Christian. Modem Christianity is largely a compromise. Much of our commerce is nakedly and unashamedly pagan. Many of our social habits and customs make no pretence of being patterned on the will of God. Governments are often an insolent defiance of the law of Jesus Christ. Christianity has not failed, but it has been found difficult and so not applied. The medicine is all right, but the patient lias not taken it! The same is tree of the Church; in so far as it has failed, the failure is due to compromise, and< the compromise is due to fear. “Give me,” said Wesley, “ten men who hate nothing but sin and fear none save God, and I will turn the world upside down.” Only be it remembered that Christianity has not yet said its last word. “The last 2000 years are no long period, when you remind yourself that God spent millions of years in moulding a bit of old red sandstone,” says Dean Inge. WHERE THE CHURCH FAILS. So I, the very imperfect minister of a very imperfect Church, come to you today ’ with this challenging message: “Awake! Awake!” We are not sufficiently alive to the needs and the opportunities of the hour. We are too conservative in our thinking and our methods. We need “a gentleman with a Duster.” We are living in the 20th century, and, without the sacrifice of anything vital, we need to recast our thought-moulds and modernise our speech and our machinery. We need to think in the terms of our own age and speak in the language of our own age. Theology is the Queen of the Sciences, and like every other science, it must be progressive. I care nothing for “the' old theology” or “the new theology”; what I am concerned about is that it be true, true to the life of to-day, true to, the needs of to-day, because true to the living Spirit of God. “Put on thy strength” are also the words we need to hear. “Faint heart never won a fair lady,” or anything else that is worth the having. The Church has been far too timid and far too apologetic. She hasn’t dared enough. Wicked things, which every good man knows are wicked, still continue, because the Church has failed to boldly challenge and resolutely attack. But I will frankly confess that our most conspicuous failure is the failure to attract. You cannot scold men into goodness. You cannot bludgeon men into the Kingdom of God. You will catch more flies with honey than vinegar. We have a beautiful message and it deserves a'.beautiful setting. The Church of God'should be the home of everything that' is beautiful in form and colour and tone. Its premises ought to be as well: kept as the smartest business premises in the town, and its appointments as tasteful .as every good housewife makes her home. It will be when we love the House of God. as the Jewish people loved the Temple. Above all, the Church should ;be the home of refined and gracious and courteous men and' women, who are the followers of Him who was the most perfect gentleman who ever lived. W. T. Stead used a remarkable and arresting sentence when he said that “we should achieve more for the Kingdom of God if each of us strove to be a Christ rather than a Christian.” The phrase is clear enough, though it is startling. There is nothing more beautiful than applied Christianity, and nothing more winning. But on the other hand there is nothing more repellant than Christianity divorced from life and reality. A sour, bitter, narrow, ill-mannered Christian is a contradiction in terms and a stumbling block to the Church. “Awake! Awake! Put on thy strength; O Zion; put on thy beautiful garments.” Alertness, efficiency, winsomeness, these three, and the greatest of these is winsomeness.