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not as the scribes.” The words that passed His lips were the words of God, and His every utterance bespeaks One who knew that His words were unchangeable truth. Dr. Josiah Strong says: “Without the broadening of reading; travel, educated companionship, He presents a character, a spirit, a sympathy, a doctrine as broad as man kind and as profound as human need.” . Those who have seen in Christ “the Word made flesh”, (Jn. 1 :14) seek the truth in Him because He is the, truth (Jn. 14:6). His word is their final authority because they have learned that Christ Himself is greater than any statement He made. Hams “Love thinketh no evil, rejoiceth not in iniquity * * * beareth all things" (1 Cor. 13:5-6). S OME of us are geniuses at attributing the worst of motives to another person. We rarely attribute good motives if we can find room for bad ones. We seem to know exactly why others stand up and sit down; why they make this move and tha t; and usually it is for some sub tle purpose. But the love of Christ in the heart keeps one from dwelling upon evil in others. It never makes one feel good over the downfall of another. “Love beareth all things * * * endureth all things.” In English the words “bear” and “endure” are synonym ous. The Greek word translated “beareth” means to “over-roof.” A form of the same word is used in Mk. 2 :4 —“they uncovered the roof.” What does a roof do ? It keeps those' inside sheltered from the storm outside. It catches the storm and turns it aside. “Hatred stirreth up strifes: but love covereth all sins” (Prov. 10:12). Shem and Japheth covered Noah’s sin. Ham went and published it. Are you a Ham? Do you love to hear scandal and roll it as a sweet morsel under your tongue? One may know the Bible “frontwards and backwards,” and be able to repeat the catechism, and still be a Ham. The Christian in whose heart the love of Christ is shed abroad by the Spirit is ever eager to believe the best; hopeth for the best; does not live to unroof the faults of others when, he himself has a beam in either eye. There are some Christians to whom we would never think of going with our tales of scandal. There are plenty who will sit long and let us pour it into their ears. To which class do you belong? Now for th e Confessional T HE most remarkable thing about Dr. Fosdick’s recent proposal to the Protestant Church to put in the Con fessional is the amount of free publicity it has brought him in the secular press. If he means simply that the minister should be a wise and sympathetic adviser to sick, sinful
The In fa llib le Christ AYS a popular exponent of Modernistic views: “Christ’s authority cannot be invoked to invali date the findings of modern Biblical criticism, neither do we explain His language as an ac commodation to the ignorance of His contem poraries. We must maintain the limitations of the knowledge of Jesus in the interests of intellectual lib erty.”j The failure to acknowledge the final authority of Jesus on every question on which He has spoken is of course due to a refusal to own Him as “God manifest in the flesh.” Take away His claim to deity (in which case there is no alternative but to call Him an impostor), and He has no more authority than any other man. Admit His claim, and there need be no trouble about anything He said. It is therefore of greater importance to know who He was than to know what He said. Dr. R. B. Jones correctly says: “The man Christ Jesus, even though He were not God, brands Modernism as a farce and a lie. His testimony still riddles the Modernist’s position.” Benjamin Carpenter saw the same point when he wrote: “That Jesus, surrounded as He was, could have promulgated a system of morals embodying all that is most valuable in the prior life of the world, and to which nineteen centuries of civilization have not been able to add a thought or impart an ornament, is a fact not to be explained by any ridicule.” To the same point Dr. Newell Dwight Hillis once said: “In view of Christ’s influence upon law, literature, letters and life, it seems hard not to believe in His supremacy in the realm of intellect. For some reason, men have dis cussed His ideas but said little as to the marvelous skill with which He formulated thoughts so melodious that, though they have been translated twice, they still breathe the sound of ethereal music.” There are few of the critics who do not see in Jesus the perfect man. It is claimed that Christ was a real man, therefore did not have perfect knowledge in all things, and that on some points we know better than He. By admitting Him as a perfect man, however, the critic spoils his argument that Jesus was fallible. In his shallow way, the Modernist is thinking in terms of fallen human ity, whereas Christ was God-man, and it was this alone that made Him a perfect man. Though Christ has not spoken on many topics of modern interest, this by no means implies that we know more about those subjects than He knew. “He whom God sent speaketh the words of God” (Jn. 3:34). Whatever Jesus said, it is true and final because of what He was. When He says anything, it is as if God said if. He never dropped a hint that any utterance of His might need revision, and no one has yet discovered the word which He ought not to have said. Not once did He say, like our guessing thinkers of today, “We may well suppose—it may be—possibly.” He never argued any question. He never took back anything. “He spake with authority and
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