Facing the facts.

Waiapu Church Gazette, Volume VIII, Issue 11, 1 May 1918, Page 83

Facing the facts.

It is just as well that we should! face facts .and possibilities with regard to our national future. The present danger may pass, or it may not. - One often hears perfectly ! untenable arguments used by even, very : good'; people. We hear it said that: " : Gbd must save us."! Why? Is pur virtue' so great? Do even a majority pf our people lead lives that can be fairly described, as Christian? Do they pray '- and worship? Do they abstain from fornication arid all unclCanness? Do. they not worship money. and value it above all things ? Are they not passionately giveri to pleasure and ex-! citement? : Are. not bitterness arid hatred, malice 1 and uricharitablehess rampant among us? Can we without rank hypocrisy claim that we are so good, so* Christian, that God, must spare us the discipline of suffering and disaster? Only a very blind partisan would dare to say\so. It is not a : questiori for the' mbraent Whether we are less guilty than others. The sole question is dare we say that God must protect our nation because of its goodness. 1 Orily utter selfrighteousness would have to answer i Yes!' " '■.'■' -■ : : ' : ' :,; ' " '•"■ ■' :; : But even if we were better! tbali 1 '' 1 wo arc an affirmative answer 'is still impossible.. People say, "God lyill never let the guilty triumph !;' ':. B,ut the" facts are 1 surely that He often ' doe's let -hiiri triumph for a time. To - deny it is to fall into :the German heresy of . /.confounding . right, with might, and that the, fact of .victory ,

proves --the ] rig|the|s"} ] ;t>f j the^eause. Is not Good Friday a proof that God does allow the wicked to triumph for ; the time V';' If God ought ever to have interfered' He ought, one would think, to have^ interfered to save Christ. But He did not. , Bearing these things m mind it is well, while being always hopeful arid always refusing for accept defeat until no hope is deft,'; to remerriber that it is possible that disaster of the gravest kind may come upon "lis m spite of the : heroic efforts- df the best part of the nation to avoid it^'7 7 ••; What then? ' What is left?' We would answer : : Much! To 7 the' realChristian >no imaginable disaster eari, be overwhelming' or irrevocable ? Iri 5 the first place he knows that however, great,, widspread, unexpected;, or- inealuculable his disaster may be, whatever his trouble, God is m it with him; and the iriore with him the 'deeper the- waters may. be. He knows that the sympathy and love of God are far beyond all his imagination,, and- that it is 'the. lost sheep, not the safe and prosperous one,, for which Christ. especially- cares. "Those that- be wlible need no -physician, but those, that are, sick." /' Secondly, he.kribws. this, that there is no sin, "rip sorrow, no disaster from which man or nation, may' riot arise m and through . the resurrection! power of Christ. There is no such thing as finality m human affairs. The Christian, even m the midst of disaster, looks on beyond .it,-' whether! for himself or' his nation. He' recognises how weakrie.ss h assprung from sin arid from ' pride,; and he resolves that, by God's help h.e'.V will", arise by : thati. resurrection' power of Christ which is. His greatest gift to the World. The future is not'--; yet mortgaged: He is stronger already because humbler, safer because! rebuilt upon God. In the meantime, while/w e face . possibilities without despair, we have the full right . to hope, to "hope with all the passion of .our knowledge of God 's goodness,that we may be spared from what we know to be possible, and may, learn wisdom without punishmerit. — "Church Standard:'" .'■./■"/■" ,7'-