1106
THE KING’S BUSINESS
light of Olivet: Are we living the risen, ascended, victorious life in Christ? Are we earnestly seeking the things that are above? Are we being delivered from the power and dominion of sin as we have from its guilt? Are we earnestly looking for the day when His feet shall stand upon the Motint of Olives? Are we commemo rating His death “till He come?” To partake of the Lord’s Supper without having thus examined ourselves is to do with the spiritual body of Christ what the Jews did with His physical body (xi. 29). (c) The Chastisements for Abuses in Connection with the Lord’s Supper (xi. 30 - 34 ) - Failure to judge one’s sins brings the discipline of God upon that life. Sickness, while not always a direct punishment for sin (cf. John ix. 1-3), ofttimes is such a messenger of God (xi. 30-32; cf. v. S; John TT would not be amiss to try to analyze the reasons for Pope Benedict’s peace note to belligerents, at the present time, asking the Governments on both sides for a “reciprocal condonation” for the wrongs done and return of conquered territories; in other words, to come as near to “statu quo ante” as it is possible to come. The note is especially wanting because of its —if anything—purposeful omission of mentioning Serbia; also Bohemia and the Southern Slavs, whose freedom and inde pendence have been promised in no uncer tain terms by the allied powers in their reply to Mr. Wilson’s peace note of last December. Permit me to state here, that it is not the purpose of this article to question the humanitarian reasons that may have prompted the pope’s peace note. That may be the only reason; manlike however, we
v. 14; James v. 13-16; Hebrews xii. 6-13). One must make his choice between self judgment and divine discipline as mani fested in mild affliction (“weak”), severer punishment ( “sickly”), or even death ( “sleep”),. Here is a reason for the illness, affliction, and death of some of God’s peo ple. We are sometimes wrong in failing to see this great truth in God’s dealings with’ the believer. God would not have his children condemned with the world; yet sin cannot go unpunished. For this reason the judgment of God against the believer’s sin is meted out to him in this life. Happy is the child of God who sees the purpose of such affliction and repents, confesses, and forsakes his sin; and so the prayer of faith saves the sick (James v. IS). Have we any hidden, unconfessed, unforsaken sin in our lives? Look out; there’s grave danger ahead. O look for other more material reasons as well, and our reasoning in this article must be construed entirely from the point of wanting to get to the; bottom, and we hope not to be accused of any personal grudge toward the Pope or the Roman Catholic Church. It seems that, as far as the belligerents are concerned, the time of Mr. Wilson’s peace note was much more appropriate for peace then than now. The allies have been weakened by their unsuccessful drives, while the central powers still had an organized enemy on the eastern front to reckon with. Nevertheless, both belligerents believed in final success and therefore neither would give up. Since that time many things have changed; Russia, for the time being is out of the fight, which gives hope to the cent ral powers, and on the other hand the United States entered the war which gives
ANALYSIS OF Pope Benedict’s Peace Note By P. M.
Made with FlippingBook Online newsletter