May 1927
282
T h e
K i n g ’ s
B u s i n e s s
He is not only the key to the plan of the ages, but He is also the sustaining power in all the activities of nature and history. 4. He “made purification of sins.” He answered the greatest and deepest moral question of human life and his tory. 5. Therefore, He is exalted “to the right hand of the Majesty on high” and He who is and has done all of this is “the effulgence of the divine glory and the very image of God’s substance.” This gives Him not only the place of superiority but also the place of finality. The book is written to show that He is superior to all and, therefore, must be the final fact in divine revelation. D eep P hilosophy H ere This outline of this wonderful paragraph contains a most comprehensive philosophy and we shall now face it and try to bring it to the test of the highest and the best that we know. In order to do this we must begin with the thing that we know. All conclusions reached from the point of view of reason must be conclusions that are inferred from what is known. No living person from actual experience knows how things were made or developed. Therefore, there is no experiential evidence. Any theory we put forward regarding the origin of the world must be either a revelation or an inference. Here we have a statement that claims to be a revelation. The author says, in another part of the Epistle, “By faith we understand the worlds were framed by the word of God.” As a matter of fact it is by faith we understand whatever explanation may be given of the origin of things. The explanation given by Science is just as much an explana tion that has to be accepted by faith as the explanation here given by revelation. We have no evidence from any one who was there when things were first made, only as we have it through revelation from God. If we have a revelation from God we accept it by faith. Any other explanation that is given must be the explanation of one who has inferred it and that, of course, means we have to accept it by faith. We do not know—we simply believe in the light of what we do know that it may or may not be a true explanation. Therefore, whether we accept this explanation or some other explanation, we have to bring it to the test of things we know and we will naturally accept the one which seems the most probable in the light of the facts. This explanation begins with a declaration concerning God. Therefore, it is important that we get a clear idea of what this word stands for. Everything that we accept in our Christian thinking is determined by our idea of God. If this idea can not stand the test of modern science then our whole fabric falls to pieces. This statement says that God is like Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is “the outshining of His glory and the very image of His sub stance.” He can not be less than Jesus because Jesus is in volved in the experienced world that we know. Therefore, the God here spoken of is personal, loving, good, just, active in the creation and sustaining of the world and his tory. He is also active in a process of revelation that is con summated by Jesus Christ. So we start with the philoso phy that makes a personal God the origin and sustainer of our world and also a declaration concerning the fact that He may be known. Is such a conception of God con sistent with the highest and deepest and most compre hensive insights that we have into our world ? We shall endeavor to answer this question in our next article.
all of the questions of life-—questions of the mind and of the heart and of the conscience. It is the truth that Robert Browning, after many mental struggles, expressed in his immortal lines, “I say, the acknowledgment of God in Christ This He does because He is “the effulgence of God’s glory .and the very image of His substance.” Therefore, accord ing to this writer He is superior to all who have under taken to answer these great questions; superiof to angels because at most they are ministers, while He is God on the throne;, superior to Moses for at most he was servant in God’s house, but Christ is the Son who built the house. He is superior to Joshua; for Joshua, though a great leader, failed to lead the people into rest, while Christ is able to give rest to all who come to Him. He is also super ior to the whole Hebrew priestly order because they could not take away sin or bring peace to the conscience, while He has settled that question for ever and opened up a new and a living way into the presence of God. He has made God available and, therefore, a reality in human experience and in this He has made the heavenly order possible. The whole point of the Epistle’s teaching is that Jesus Christ, in making atonement for sin and ascend ing into the presence of God, has established a new order in which all the questions of the mind, heart and con science are finally answered. O utline of T he T hought This whole argument is introduced by one of the most beautiful and comprehensive paragraphs in all of the Bible, a paragraph which in itself contains a comprehen sive philosophy of our world. Let me briefly outline the thought in this paragraph in order that we may have it before us as we take up the questions involved in it for detailed consideration. First: It begins with God. That is where all philoso phy must begin and our relation with that word with which the Epistle opens in the English translation deter mines our interpretation of our world. It is safe to say that all philosophies are finally determined by their atti tude to the origin of things and that word suggests an origin that involves a whole philosophy. Second: It declares that God has revealed Himself, having, spoken. Th ird : It declares something regarding the method by which God revealed Himself. 1. He spoke in and through human experience—“In the Prophets.” 2. This experience of God in the Prophets was in divers portions and in divers manners, that is, it was little by little and in different ways. 3. It was consummated by a revelation in the Son— “In the end of these days he hath spoken unto us in his Son.” Fourth: He declares certain things regarding this Son. 1. He is “appointed heir of all things.” That is, in Him all,things are summed up. He lifts all interests into Himself and into His activities and makes them His. 2 .. He is the framer and designer of all the ages, the origin of the outlines of history. 3. Not only is He the maker and designer of the ages, but in Him all things are sustained, or, as Paul says in another Epistle, “all things are held together in Him.” Accepted by thy reason, solves for thee : All questions in the earth and out of it.”
Made with FlippingBook flipbook maker