16
THE KING’S BUSINESS
God is absolutely holy and righteous. Therefore the goal of life is right eousness. God is seeking a right life. That is the greatest and deepest fact that we know concerning God. Men have emphasized the Fatherhood of God in such a. way as to make it seem that he is all father love and therefore indifferent to our morals. “ It does not make much difference what we do all will be well when we meet Him. He is all love and will overlook our faults and weaknesses.” This kind of sentiment has had a most fatal in fluence upon our ethical life. It has wholly failed to move men towards the ideal. We were told that if we would only preach this conception of God men would flock to our banners. Now we realize that they have not so flocked and we are becoming weary and restless. Prof. Eucken says, “ A weariness o f the world and a deep dislike to its limitations are becoming more and more general. We feel that life must forfeit all meaning and value if man ma.y not strive towards some lofty goal in dependence on a power that is higher than man, and as he reaches forward realize himself more fully than he could ever do under the conditions of sense-experience. Cut off from, the larger life of the universe, and shut up in a sphere o f his own, he is condemned to an unbearable nar row and paltry existence, and the deeps of his own nature are locked away from him. Thus today we hear a great deal of the superhuman and the superman, but, for all the genuine longing that such a movement may embody, it cannot but degenerate into mere idle words if this superhuman be sought within the world of sense- experience within the sphere of our immediate existence. He must either break with the realistic culture or re nounce all hope of inwardly raising humanity and realizing the meaning: of life.”
This is the word of one of our greatest philosophers and not the word of an evangelist. But, where are we going to find this outside help that is so essential to the redemption of our life from this fatal narrowness and paltry existence of which he speaks? So far as I know human thought and human history there is but one thing that can meet this tremendous chal lenge of the best thought of: our day. Our help cometh from Jehovah who was revealed by Christ as Our Father who is in heaven. This revelation alone can meet the deepest need of our life. It not only stands the test of our best thinking, but is found to be essen tial to the realization of life as under stood by the greatest thinkers of our day. But this revelation of Fatherhood is a challenge to holiness of life. If we are the Sons of God we must have the life of God in us. “ We must purify ourselves even as He is pure.” This is the logic o f the New Testament Fatherhood, and is the thing that meets the need of our time. Eucken is absolutely right when he says that we are hopeless if the ideal is to be sought within ourselves. We are de pendent upon a higher power and that power is made available in JesuS Christ. The hope o f the world is in. meeting God in Jesus Christ and be ing reconciled to Him. At this point the life of God comes into our lives- and lifts us from the narrowness arid bondage of sin into the freedom of sons of God. This' is a philosophy of life which has always worked and works today when put to the test. It is the truest and most comprehensive philosophy of life that I know any thing about. It does hot flatter the flesh, but it saves us from our sins, and that after all is the supreme thing. It makes men holy and that is the chief end o f life.
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