WANDERING IN A WONDERLAND
A lice in W onderland ’ s L ewis C arroll wrote another kbook, Alice Through the Looking-glass. I like to read it when I was a boy. Everything was backwards in Looking-glass Land. When I survey the present-day evangelical situation I get the same impression that I used to have reading Alice’s adventures on the other side of the mirror. Pity any old-fashioned Christian who tries to put the puzzle together. He may end up like the Dutchman who said, “Vot is all dis fussing about? I sure vould like to get into a good old Jesus meeting.” Satan seems to have executed a master stroke by enveloping us in general confusion. He is an artist in deception and “while men slept” he has sowed a crop of tares that only a few can distinguish from wheat. He would deceive, if it were possible, the very elect and never did the saints need so much grace for dis cernment to try the spirits whether they be of God. Out of all this, two extremes have developed: some spend all their time with a microscope looking for error and lose the joy of their salvation; others trying to be gracious end up being gullible, like the Hollywood actress who explained her interest in astrology by say ing, “ I believe in everything a little bit.” Looking-glass Land is tame compared to the reli gious menagerie today. All sorts of strange causes are championed. For a little publicity, men who ought to know better break into print with the wildest of state ments. We are supposed to be in a religious renaissance much of which may be a cheap substitute for the real thing. Sunday morning crowds at church would not deceive Isaiah or Amos, and Paul forewarned us about a facade of godliness without power. All the pitiful fleshly tricks to drum up interest by contests and prizes are but a parody on the apostolic church. We are about to blow a fuse trying to sound as intellectual as the modernists. And when a scientist says a good word for the Bible we go into raptures as though that settled it.
TIM E FOR A NEW LOOK? Among the other wonders of this new Looking-glass
THE KING'S BUSINESS
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