December 1927
801
T h e
K i n g ' s
B u s i n e s s
Jesus robbed people of 2,000 hogs (Mk. 5:13). Matthew and Luke give two different genealogies of Jesus. Pontius hasn’t heard that one is Joseph’s and one is Mary’s. Paul admits that he robbed churches (2 Cor. 11:8). : Christ taught in parables in order to deceive (Mk. 4: 11 - 12 ) . There is not a verse in the Bible that intimates that a woman can go to heaven. Christians take a chunk of bread and a cup of wine and try to make the world believe they are eating the body arid drinking the blood of Jesus. Mr. Pontius surely didn’t find that-in the Bible. If this is the Bible “in a nutshell” let us hope that most of the boys and girls who read this leaflet will not be the kind of nuts Mr. Pontius and the A.A.A.A. evidently sus pect them of being. ii? Anonymous Atheists T HE mails are flooded these days with atheistic lit erature. New converts of the American Atheistic Association are imitating the Gospel tract idea and rushing into print to give vent to their hatred of Christ and Chris tianity. The majority of these tracts that have come to the writer are anonymous. The writers do not intend to take any chances of having the weak points in their reas oning pointed out to them. The senders make a specialty of sending their stuff to invalids whose only comfort in the world is the Bible. It seems to be a stock argument of all of these writers that Christianity teaches that the salvation of one’s soul for the next world is of more importance than character. Either these authors are totally unaware of what the Bible does teach, or they have no thought of being fair in their statements. It is certainly not amiss for us to point out frequently that heaven is not to be won by any fair professions, nor will one who is going there be without a character. “Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord?” asked the Psalmist. There came the answer, “He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart . . . . who hath not sworn deceitfully.” Hands, heart and tongue—the organs of action, feeling and speech—compose character. H ands , H earts and L ips Clean hands stand for outward practical holiness and service. The Christian is supposed to be a man whose outward life points as true as a compass to the highest ideals of manhood and womanhood. His hands are not stained with unjust gain. His hands refuse to set an unjust balance. His hands will not sign a mean letter or execute a crooked contract. His hands will not practice uncleanness nor do violence. If there has been a real work of divine grace in the core of the heart it will show itself in the palm of the hand. But observe that these clean hands are connected to a pure heart. Christianity answers likewise: “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” Christians are those who have an inner spiritual life. No mere outward morality will do. It is not mere talk about a religious experience and about future glory that makes a Chris tian. Stately walls, beautiful spires and organs, artistic anthems—may have their place, but of themselves they count nothing for Christ. What gives Christianity power to go forward century after century is that there have been and are today thousands of men and women whose lives are pure, whose hearts have been made glad with the light of Christ and whose hands are loaded with mercy.
Lips that do not swear deceitfully are also a mark of a genuine Christian. Lying is hateful to God. Jesus made the devil the father of them. A man whose word is not as good as his bond, has no right to call himself a Christian: Hypocrites galore there may be in the church, arid some there may be who think more j jf , saving their souls than of developing a character, but the Atheist who de sires to pass himself off as intelligent will avoid the argu ment that the Bible countenances such notions. The Bethlehem of the Heart T HE writer of the book of Galatians speaks of the time for which he longed, when Christ shall be “ formed in you.” As Jesus came to Bethlehem, the Bethlehem of Judea, so. He comes to the human heart, the radiant Son of God, to live with us as our guest. And this is the meaning of Christmas. If He has not come into the Beth lehem of our hearts, it is a dull season for spiritual pur poses. We may have all the joy and gladness of the car nal spirit. We may spend the day in riotous living, but if He has not come to the Bethlehem of our hearts, there will be a meaning of the day we cannot get from these other things. He came to that ancient Bethlehem that He might reveal God to the sons of men, that they might see God in Him and give themselves to the service of God, So does He come to the. Bethlehem of our hearts that He may give Himself to u s.as our Savior, as our friend, as our Lord and Master. For He will not reveal Himself to us until our hearts shall rejoice with the shepherds of the fields and with the wise-men of the East, because Christ is being formed within us into the beautiful character of a spotless life. But in the Bethlehem of our hearts the Christ will soon form Himself in us so that we shall become Christlike. He will take every motive and desire and passion and thought and ambition and form them into Christlikeness. As He came to Bethlehem to form the world into the beauty of His character and into the sweetness of His holy doctrine, so he comes into our hearts that He may fashion us after His own glory that we may be like Him. He came into that Bethlehem of ancient days that He might let the world hear the angels sing. That He might interpret the music of heaven into the hearts of men. That they might see the shining of the glory of God. And so He comes into the Bethlehem of our hearts and with Him still comes the angel song, the music of the heavenly life, the glory of the fadeless and eternal. . He came into the Bethlehem of old that He might sanc tify all life and make it holy, and from- the cradle to the cross and from the Cross to the sepulchre, and out of the sepulchre to the highest heavens, Jesus, the Living One, came to- Bethlehem to sanctify every moment of human life from its first breath to its eternal habitation. —Methodist Protestant . a£» Jig The Unrenewed Mind “The first function of the Holy Spirit is to; convict: a man of his sin, not to compliment him upon his superior intelligence,” says The Bible Call. “It is also imperative to recognize that man’s thinking apparatus has shared in the ruin and disorder which has affected the whole cre ation, and that the unrenewed mind -is- just as incapable of obedience to God’s truth, as the depraved heart is of loving God.” . *
Made with FlippingBook Annual report