July 1925
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TH E K I N G ’S B U S I N E S S
297
uTh ey Have Taken A*wa}) Lord’’ Abstract of address delivered by William Jennings Bryan at Bethany Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia, March 17, 1925. Mr. Bryan is the outstanding layman of the United States as a defender of the faith once for all delivered. Every loyal layman in this land ought to write Mr. Bryan commending his position and assuring him of their fellowship and cooperation in the fight which he is making for the faith of our fathers.
I pause for a moment to say that I use the word “mod ernist” in the only sense in which it can properly be used, namely, as describing those who, having denied that the Bible is the Word of God, so divinely inspired as to be free from error and an infallible.authority as to what God said and did, consider their own judgment as more reliable than the writers of the Bible in determining the truth or falsity of every fact set forth in the Book of Books. We cannot single out any one modernist or group of modernists as representatives of all because modernists differ widely, each one being a law unto himself. Measured by their belief and their unbelief, they are scattered along the entire path that leads from so-called liberal conservatism to avowed atheism as represented by Neitzsche. Whether moving slowly or
T e x t * “ T h e y h a ve ta k e n aw ay m y X o r d , an d I kn ow no t w h er e th ey h a ve laid h im . ” (Jo hn 2 0 : 1 3 ) .
may seem like “carrying coals to Newcastle” to |om e to Philadelphia to defend orthodox Chris tianity. The spirit of that great Christian, Hon. John Wanamaker, still broods over Bethany, and your pastor, Dr. MacLennan, is one of the most able and courageous of the champions of “the faith once for all delivered unto the saints.” , This is also the home of Dr. Clarence Edward Macartney, our revered Moderator, who was the first head of our church in a generation to be elected on a distinct issue a s .the representative of con servative Presbyterianism. But communion together is the more enjoyable because we are in agreement on the fun
rapidly, they are all headed in the same direction, with no logical stopping place between the “hallowed faith” w h i c h Romanes held in youth and “the lonely mystery of exis tence” as he found it when he wrote his book “practically negativing t h e existence of God." A Virgin Born Christ Let us now consider the Christ whom the modernists have taken away. First, He is (for He has not changed) the only begotten Son of God. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” The Heavenly Father so loved
damentals, and I can be happy with you even if you do not need to h a v e y o u r faith strengthened. If it were proper for a lay man to take a text, I would choose the 13th verse of the 20th chapter of John; I will build my address upon it. Mary Magdalene, going to the tomb early on the first day of the week, found it empty. She notified the disciples, two of whom hastened to the tomb on hearing her startling story of the resurrection. . After they had gone away to their own homes, Mary remained, weep ing. When the two angels s p e a k i n g from the tomb,
“One of the tests of sanity is to put the patient in a tank into which a stream of water is running; he is then instructed to dip all the water out. If he does not have sense enough to shut off the inflow, he is adjudged insane. What shall we say of Christians who complain of the ravages of atheism and agnosticism among adults, and yet continue to allow our colleges— and even our high schools—to he made nurseries of agnosticism and atheism by modernist teachers who, by endorsing unproven guesses, undermine confidence in the Bible as a Divine authority?”
the world that He sent His Son to the earth, God-incarnate, that He might suffer in man’s stead and by His blood redeem man from sin. It is not strange that such a one should be conceived of the Holy Ghost and born of a virgin. If God can create life and bring man into the world daily, as He does, could He not bring Jesus into the world by a different, but not more mysterious, method? The modernists reject the virgin birth because they reject the supernatural Christ. They do not argue that Christ was just a man because they believe Him to have been the son of a human father; they insist that He must have been the son of a human father because they believe him to have been merely a man. If they will take Christ out of the man class and put Him in the God class, they will have' no dif ficulty in believing all that the Bible says of Him. Atonement Through the Blood Second: The Modernists reject the theory of the Atone ment— some of them denounce it as a “bloody gospel,” while others simply say, as one of the leading modernists did, “The blood upon the cross is too old to be of any aid to me.” Here too, their attitude is logical. They deny the fall of man— “How then,” they ask, “can man need a Sav iour to restore Him?” (Continued on page 324)
inquired the cause of her grief, she answered, “They have taken away my Lord and I know not where they have laid Him.” That is the indictment that we bring today against the modernists— “They have taken away our Lord,” and we are as disconsolate as was Mary, and no such glad surprise awaits us as awaited her. She found to her joy that her Lord had risen; He reappeared, glorified and triumphant over the grave, and honored her affection and loyalty by speaking to her His first recorded words after He had broken the bonds of the tomb. Mary’s Christ made of death a narrow star-lit strip between the companionship of yesterday and the reunion of tomorrow; but the modernists have stricken out the stars and deepened the gloom that enshrouds the grave. They have robbed our Saviour of the glory of a virgin birth, of the majesty of His deity,_ and of the triumph of His resurrection. We charge that they have taken away the supernatural Christ— the ONLY Christ of whom the Bible tells— and are attempting to put in His place a spur ious personage, unknown to the Scriptures, and as impotent to satisfy the affections of Christians as a painted doll would be to assuage the sorrow of a mother mourning for her firstborn.
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