Continued from 36 ing sessions, an honest young man was heard to comment upon the message, “ brutal but necessary.” Such is the message of the Cross. One can be as orthodox as Job, as eloquent as Demosthenes, as fundamental as a Pharisee, and as sublime as Mil- ton, but what is all this except a false glorying in one’s own fleshly elegance? How easy to talk about holding the Cross high and about lifting up the Cross in order to make it attractive! Fellow-Chris- tians, instead of elevating the Cross, come down and die on it. Forget the elegance and the attrac tion, and preach the Cross! Christ will take care o f the attraction. “ I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me.” Our fundamental and orthodox world has yet to learn that “ if any man will be wise, let him be come a fool in this world.” Only then will we begin to appreciate Paul’s argument to the Corinthians: “God chose the foolish things of the world, that He might put to shame them that are wise; and God chose the weak things of the world, that He might put to shame the things that are strong; and the base things of the world, and the things that are despised, did God choose, yea and the things that are not, that He might bring to nought the things that are: that no flesh should glory before God” (I Cor. 1 :27-29, R. V .). Charles Fox has called this array “God’s five- ranked army o f decreasing human weakness.” In stead o f the wise and mighty and noble, God delib erately selects those of ever-decreasing mortal weakness in order that all boasting shall be shut out. It is interesting that, whether foolish or weak or base or despised or are-nots, all God’s soldiers Paul calls “ things.” So insignificant are God’s weapons that they are “ scarcely worth calling per sons, so that once possessed by the Holy Ghost, like the Christian warrior, at the battle call they become “ . . . happy as a lover, and attired in sudden brightness, like a thing inspired.” —Charles Fox. In the first rank of God’s army we find the fools —fools for Christ’s sake, “ such fools that they are not ashamed to be in the front rank.” Next to the fools come the weak things. Do you complain that you are too weak? Then fall in behind the front- rank fools. You are weak in influence? weak in ability? weak in body? a bit weak in mind? Take heart, little worm, God conceals His power in weak lings and simpletons; in such He can safely set off His dynamite. In God’s economy, the lamb slays the lion and “ the dove outwits the serpent.” Let God’s indomitable army pass in review: FOOLS—without talents — the are nots in sense. WEAK—weak in seven ways — the are nots in strength. NOVEMBER, 1969
BASE— “ poor whites”—the are nots of low birth. DESPISED—without standing—the are nots in rank. NOTHING—nobodies too insignificant even for contempt — the are nots of unsus pected existence, “ scarce seen, scarce heard, unreckoned.” These nothings and nobodies are yet “ the forlorn hope of the Church, which bursting from their long ambush o f obscurity, are ordered up to charge and break the enemy’s line” (Fox). Is the reader bent on bringing many sons unto glory, bent on being usable, bent on God’s anoint ing at any cost? Then despite not your lack in any line. Listen to Martin Luther, the man of abject and poverty-stricken spirit: “Next to my just cause it was my mean reputation and mean aspect which gave the Pope his deadly blow; for the Pope thought— ’Tis but one poor friar; what can he do against me?’ ” Luther embodied the hidden power of God. How foolish it would have been for him to despise his handicaps! He sank himself into the likeness of his Master’s death, embraced his “mean reputation” and “mean aspect,” and thereby dealt the Pope a deadly blow. In his nothingness was lodged God’s concealed omnipotence. “When I am weak,” cries the Apostle, “ then am I strong.” Seek then, dear servant of Christ, to be weak with Him. “ I thank Thee, 0 Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that Thou didst hide these things from the wise and understanding, and didst reveal them unto babes: yea, Father; for so it was well-pleasing in Thy sight” (Luke 10:21, R. V.). Dr. A. J. Gordon refers to an address delivered by a man of God before the London Missionary Society. By prayerful study this man had sought to reproduce a true picture of the apostolic mission ary. This address created a great tumult when it was delivered, because of the startling contrast it suggested “between the ancient and modern policy of methods and missionary labour.” Dr. Gordon says, “He was addressing a society that a little before had greeted with applause the declaration of a speaker who had said, ‘If I were asked what is the first qualification for a missionary, I would say prudence, and the second, prudence; and the third, prudence.’ ” Little wonder that, when this man of God reproduced the apostolic missionary as a man self-abandoned and of sublimely dominant faith, his fleshly brethren were greatly annoyed and aroused to no small commotion. Here is a portion of that eloquent pen-picture o f God’s Apostolic Missionary: “ Therefore I say, let this type o f mission ary stand, that he is a man without the care of making friends or keeping friends, without the hope or desire of worldly good, without the apprehension of worldly loss,
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