the after-life men were neither married nor given in marriage but were as the angels in heaven. Mohammedanism cannot stand the severe test of Christ’s teaching, “ Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.” The religious zeal and love of conquest in the hearts of the prophet’s followers engender the most stubborn pride and self-complacency. Anyone who has lived among the Arabs will say that they are a proud and haughty people; even when Christ is presented to them and they are led to see their need of Him, very few of them yield. The number of those who have been made Christians by missionary effort is negligible. Spiritually-minded folk see that the Mohammedan claim of divine and final revelation is preposterous! Life's Misery Buddhism is a religion of a different sort which was founded about fifth century B.C. by Gautama, a man pro foundly in earnest, whose chief purpose was to escape the contaminations of the world.and the sense of sin and evil that was in him. He had a great longing for peace; therefore he endeavofed to find a way out of life’s mise’ry into some sort of an existence which would bring deliverance. His was the first escapist religion, for to him all life was misery and the best way to destroy misery was to extinguish all desire. Nirvana, or nothingness, is the final objective of this faith. To achieve this completely passive state, the individual personal ity must be absorbed by the universal soul so that no in dividual desire exists and thereby it suffers no separate pain or misery of any kind. As someone has put it, “ The highest hope of man in Buddhism is the hope of extinction!” Compare with this expectation the high purpose and dignity which the Lord Jesus Christ put into life. Buddha’s phi losophy would extinguish desire; Christ’s philosophy is to satisfy desire. Of course, that desire must first be made legiti mate through regeneration and a redirection of all impulses. Christ dared to say, “ I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” Sin, after all, is often a wild desire for life; but, tragically, sin ends in death. Only Jesus can give the life that satisfies. He says, “ He that cometh to me shall never hunger; and -he that be- lieveth on me shall never thirst.” Christ’s gospel is the anti thesis to the negativeness of Buddhism. When Christianity’s view of life and its relationship to eternity is compared to the beliefs of Buddhism, we find that the chasm between the two widens. Christianity looks at this present life as a training ground for eternity, and tells us of a continuation of personality after death. It has no nebulous philosophy concerning the individual’s being swallow ed up in universal spirit, but encourages and inspires us with the realization that death is but a passageway into another life, that personality continues on another plane. No Buddhist can sing as does the Christian, I know not where His islands lift Their fronded palms in air; I only know I cannot drift Beyond His love' and care. Buddhism is without God, without redemption, without hope, and without love! The world has had many teachers but only one Jesus! All other religious leaders fade before the matchless Christ. 7. Christianity is true because it is a dignified and trustworthy revelation of God and His nature. William James in his great essay, The Will to Believe, said, “ Launch out into the dark if you will and act upon belief that God exists, and experience will vindicate your faith.” This is true in a measure; there are times when we must “ step out into the seeming void and find the rock be neath.” But Christianity doesn’t begin that way. Jesus defi nitely declared that there were tangible evidences for the existence of God and His revealed purposes. You cannot in all of revelation find a clearer statement than that of Jesus in John 5. In the midst of a controversy with the leaders of Israel, Jesus said that there was a fourfold witness to His deity, His Messiahship, and the validity of the philosophy which He brought to the world. O C T O B E R , I 9 4 8
Home of John Knox on the Royal Mile, Edinborough, Scotland
First, there was the witness of John the Baptist (vv. 33-35). “John. . .bare witness unto the truth,” said Jesus. Then, there was the witness of the mighty works of the Son of God (v. 36). Jesus said that these works which the Father had given Him to do witnessed to His deity, and to the fact that the Heavenly Father had sent Him into the world. The Final Authority There was also the witness of the Father Himself (vv. 37- 39). “ Ye have neither heard his voice at any time, nor seen his shape,” said our Lord to the Pharisees. He reminded them that at the baptism and at other times the Father had spoken and approved of the Son. The final witness is that of the Scriptures. Jesus admonish ed them to “ Search, the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.” All through the Bible, Old Testament and New, there is a dignified and trustworthy revelation of God and His nature which coincides in every part. “ God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in times past unto the fathers by the prophets, Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son.” While pantheism in religion, and evolution in science, re present deity as blind force, impersonal power or hideous gods, Christianity presents God as a person, humanly revealed in Christ. Our Lord could truthfully say, “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.” The human mind demands this revelation and so does the human heart. A child does not want an abstract principle, but a father! The cry of the ancient Job “ Oh that I knew where I might find him!” is the cry of all. How essential to peace of mind and heart is this humanity of Christ. A missionary in Africa talking to a native convert who was having difficulties received this reply from him, “ The trail is hard and tangled but there is a Man ahead of us.” Jesus always goes before. He is ever in front and answers human needs. He has traveled the pathway before us and slain every beast of the way and lighted even the valley shadow in order that we might pass through in safety and without fear! II. Christianity is true because it takes true cognizance of man—his nature and his need. What other faith squarely faces man’s nature? Most other religions are creeds of advice. Christianity is a religion of redemption. The human race is in a pit. Confucianism, Mo hammedanism and Buddhism either condemn or condone man; only Christianity lifts him out of the pit and gives him a nature which is able to keep him from falling into the pit again. Human pride does not like to accept this philosophy of Christianity, because the prerequisite to its reception is an admission of our lost condition and of our need of a Saviour. Page Seven
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