Thomas_Strongho_1915-WM.pdf

@1---@1---@1 THE STRONGHOLD OF TRUTH By W. H. Griffith Thomas, D. D. @]___@]___@]

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STRONGHOLD OF TRUTH

BY W. H. Griffith Thomas, D. D. of Wycliffe College, Toronto, Canada FIVE LECTURES DELIVERED AT MONTROSE BIBLE CONFERENCE IN THE SUMMER OF 1915

The Bible as a Revelation

~1'1°~ EVERAL years ago an enterprising press . man wrote to a hundred men representing 0 various positions and classes in England peers of the realm, members of the House of

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~ Commons, professional men, merchants, and others-with this inquiry: "Suppose you were con demned to three years' solitary imprisonment, and could take with you only three books, which three would you select? Please state them in the order of your prefer ence." Ninety-eight out of the hundred put the Bible first of the three; and this is all the more remarkable because quite a number of these men were not only not Christians or even church-goers, but some had actually worked against the ·ouistian religion. Nevertheless, as they thought of the possibility of three years' solitary confinement, the Bible in that large num ber of instances was put first of the three books that they desired to have with them. It is a fine testimony to that Book which enters into everything in Christianity. The Bible touches the Christian life at all points, and for this reason it is essential for us to be clear as to what the Bible is, and in what respects it affects our thought and action. This is a day of communication, from the crudest form up to wireless telegraphy and aeroplanes; but the supreme question is whether it is possible to have communication with and from God. No one can read the Old Testa ment or the New without seeing indications that the writers at any rate believed that they could and did receive communications from God.

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In Gen. 15 :1, we first have the statement which is frequently found afterwards: "The word of the Lord came." In the prophets again and again we find what is found in Ezek. 6 :1: "The word of the Lord came unto me." In the Book of Leviticus, something like thirty times we read: "The Lord spake unto Moses." In the New Testament, John the Baptist, the last and greatest of the prophets, has the same prophetic exper ience-Luke 3 :2 : "The word of God came unto John." When we tum to the Epistles we find this in 1 Cor. 14 :37: "Let a man acknowledge that the things which I write are the commandments of the Lord;" and in 1 Thess. 4 :15: "This we say unto you by the word of the Lord." A modem writer has well said that the prophets were absolutely convinced of receiving commun ications from God. Now there are two tests given in the Old Testament in regard to this matter. There were two ways in which the Israelites were to examine the credentials of every man who claimed to be a prophet of the Lord. In Deut. 18 :21, 22, they were to know by the fulfillment; and with this can be compared Jer. 28 :9-if the .thing came to pass it was regarded as accredited. But then there was another and complementary test. They were to know by the genuineness of the thing whether it came from the Lord (Deut. 13 :1-5). It might come to pass and yet not be genuine. Just as there are spiritualistic media today, sometimes genuine communications I doubt not, but not, therefore, necessarily from God. I remember asking Dr. Zwemer some years ago how he accounted for the spread of Islam. He said that people make a great mistake in thinking that Islam is a natural religion. He said it is a supernatural religion, but supernatural from below. So that the two tests in the Old Testament were these: Is it accurate? Is it true? Divine Revelation In accordance with this, God is spoken of as the God of truth. The Lord Jesus Christ is described as "the

STRONGHOLD OF TRUTH s Truth." The Holy Spirit has as one of His titles-"the Spirit of Truth." And we are told that every one that is of the truth heareth Christ's voice (John 18 :37). Now let us proceed step by step in regard to this question of Divine revelation. I. I think I shall carry you all with me when I say that Revelation is possible. If we believe that God exists and is Almighty, then of course He can communicate Himself to us. No one will deny the possibility of a revelation, unless he is prepared to deny the existence of God. The Bible pre-supposes, takes. for granted, the existence of God, and never attempts to prove it. "In the beginning God!" vVe must learn to do the same. Revelation is possible, because God is, and is Almighty. II. Revelation is probable.-We ought to agree with this, for the reason that self-revelation is natural to us. We cannot help communicating ourselves to others. Interest and love prompt the communication of self. Since, then, God is love, the fact that He is love implies that He will-I was going to say that He must-com municate Himself, because it is the essence of love to reveal itself. Love would not be love unless it communi cated itself to others. Therefore the fact that God is love suggests at least the probability of revelation. III. Reve/a.tion is necessary.-There are two things essential for life-Knowledge and Power: what :Mat thew Arnold once called "light and leading." And surely no one can say these things are unnecessary, for we are faced with that which the Bible calls sin. Sin has brought uncertainty, and this demands knowledge. Sin has brought weakness, and this necessitates power. I need not spend any more time in proving that revelation is necessary. In ·nr. Orr's little book, Revelation and Inspiration, it is said that there is probably no proposition on which the higher religious philosophy of the past century is more agreed than this, that all religion originates in revela tion. The only questions are, What is this revelation? and how does it come?

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IV. Revelation is available.-Let us notice how far we have traveled.-Revelation is possible, and necessary. And now we must see that it is available. Heb. 1 :1-2: "God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son." We believe that revelation is available in the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ. A person communicates himself either by acts or by words, or by both. For the first disciples, for the earliest Christian Church before our Lord's resurrec tion-that is to say, for the community of His immediate followers-His Presence was a revelation, His Person was sufficient; but we today have His words, since. we have not His Presence in the sense in which they had. So we find in St. John 20 :30-31 this: "Many other signs truly did Jesus . . . . which are not written in this book, but these are written, that ye might believe . and that believing ye might have life." For us today, the words of the Lord Jesus Christ take the place of His personal presence, and are the media of His reve lation. St. Paul has the same idea in 2 Tim. 3 :16-17. And so our position is just this-God has revealed Him self in nature ; He has revealed Himself in providence and history ; but pre-eminently He has revealed Himself in Christ for spiritual realities. A Bad Mirror Natural religion has never been found sufficient for human life, because of sin. Man's nature has never been an adequate mirror of Divine revelation. If we would know the highest and best, as well as the deepest and worst, of which human nature is capable, we should read Romans, Chap. 1, where we shall find, as Sir William Ramsay says, "St. Paul's philosophy of history." When we look there, and see what men had, and yet did not retain God in their knowledge, we see the futility and the fatality of a merely natural religion. Of this revelation in Christ, we believe that the New Testament is the purest, fullest, and clearest expression.

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We are not concerned for the moment whether the reve lation came in this way or in that way. All that is essen tial is that this-whatever it is and however it has come is a revelation of God in Christ. It is at least significant to note that all the great religions have their sacred books. It would seem as though the litera scripta ( writ ten words) were a foundation, a necessary condition of all Divine revelation. We take it that the New Testa ment is the clearest, fullest, and most reliable embodi ment of the Divine revelation in Christ. V. Revelation is assztrcd.-This brings us to the heart of our present subject: Why do we believe the New Testament to be a Divine revelation? I do not refer to the Old Testament in detail, because if we can prove the New Testament, I think this carries the Old Testament with it. At any rate, we are on the ground that is most convenient for us, if we concentrate on the New Testament, and look upon that as the embodiment of a Divine revelation. There are just three steps in this argument. First, the New Testament is genuine; that is, it is the word of those for whom it is claimed-the associates of Jesus Christ. This genuineness of the New Testament may be proved in a variety of ways, and if this were merely an address on Christian evidence it would be necessary to elaborate. But I want to state as briefly as possible for the sake of those who are concerned with these subjects in their parishes and in their homes and colleges, some of the general reasons why we believe the New Testa ment to be genuine. (a) There is the testimony of the Church through the centuries. For this we can still refer to that familiar book, Paley's Evidc11ccs of Christianity. Although the second and third parts of Paley may be ignored, the first part is practically as valuable today as it ever was. If we take Paley's eleven points, written in that clear, pel lucid English of which he was a master, we shall see what I mean by the testimony of the church through the cen turies to the genuineness of these books.

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( b) There is the direct testimony of the books them selves. If we examine them we see clear evidence that they did come from the Apostles' time. If any one gave me a book purporting to be of the 18th century, and if I read in it the word "boycott." I should say, of course, that it was not from that century. The word marks it as modern and Victorian. And again, if I read about aeroplanes, I should know that the book was not of the 18th century, but of the 20th. That is the test, like the watermark of a bank note. In that little point, as you will see, is an evidence of genuineness. Hairs in the Bill A gentleman once showed me an American dollar bill, and said: "This is one thing by which you can be sure of its genuineness" ; and he pointed out on the back of it some different colored hairs in the paper. He said: "That is a secret; no one knows how they are put in, and they are the evidence of the genuineness of the bill." Since then I almost always look for these hairs, for naturally I want to see whether a bill is genuine. The New Testament has similar evidence of genuine ness. Its allusions to Jewish, Roman and Greek history and customs prove its early date. Such allusions would in many cases have been impossible later. Yott can test this for yourselves, and, like Sir William Ramsay, you will be fully compensated for doing so. You remember he said he went out a few years ago to Asia Minor, believing that the Acts of the Apostles was not a gen uine, first-century work, but he returned convinced that it dates back to the first century, and that it was the work of St. Luke, the companion of St. Paul. ( c) There is the testimony of adversaries. Every opposition to Christianity from the first century has been directed towards the New Testament. vVhy did men like Celsus, Porphyry, Julian and Rousseau oppose it? If they did not think anything of this book, why did they trouble about it? Why did they not leave it alone? And why do not men today leave it alone? Because the Bible does not leave them alone. What is still more important

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in the minds of a great many, is that the best scholarship of our time is bringing the New Testament books back to the first century. Speaking generally, Harnack and quite a number of English and German scholars are pushing back the books of the New Testament to that time at which they have always been held by the Church of Christ to have origin ated. Secondly, the New Testament is credible; that is, it is worthy to be believed. There are many things that are genuine, but not credible. Many works of fiction are gen uine, but not credible. The Shepherd of H ermas, which is the work of the John Bunyan of the second century, is perfectly genuine, but not credible. So the New Testa ment is not only genuine, but is worthy of our belief. Why? First, because of the unblemished character of the witnesses. If we examine them, we shall find their char acters stand all the tests we can apply. Next, because of the agreement of the facts of the New Testament with the facts of Christianity in the world. Here is Christian ity today, with its ordinances of Baptism, the Lord's Day, and the Lord's Supper, all independent of the New Testament, and in existence at least thirty years before the New Testament was written; and yet when the New Testament and they are compared, there is an entire agreement between these facts of Christianity in the world and the truths recorded in this Book. Then, third, the contents of the New Testament do nothing but good. This is another proof of their credi bility. And I would say to those critics of the Bible who accuse it of mendacity, that they should drink of its springs, and they will find in its beneficent draughts of grace and truth that which will assure them of its cred ibility. Truth Unearthed Again, the explorations of Palestine, Egypt, and Baby lon go to confirm the truth of the Bible, Old and New Testaments. During the last sixty years there have been many archrealogical researches, . and not one has gone

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against the Bible, or proved it untrue. This has been shown by the work of men like Sir William Ramsay, to mention only one out of many. Now, if we have followed the argument so far in sup port of the genuineness and credibility of the New Testa ment, we shall be prepared to take the third step. It is a leap, but I believe it is an inevitable leap. The New First: Supernatural creation. There is that in the Bible which is supernatural in connection with creation. Neither in the ancient world nor in the modern do we Testament is Divine, Supernatural. What are the reasons for this? ever get behind the truth of Gen. 1 :2. There is not one of the accounts of creation in the old world that goes further back than chaos. They start with chaos, but the Bible starts with God. The same thing is true of modern science. Science cannot reach further back than the nebular hypothesis. But that has to assume two things: the existence of nebulre, and the power to rotate; but who created the nebulre, and who gave them the power to rotate? The Bible goes further back and starts from God. Second: Supernatural revelation. There is a revela tion of religion in the Old Testament, whether of the Jewish ecclesiastical system or of the prophets. It is immaterial whether you take one or the other, or both, but no one can doubt that there is a supernatural revela tion. ·A speaker is said to have uttered words, and these words were declared to others and were put down; and whether we have prophets in the later part or the earlier part, there is supernatural revelation. Third: A supernatural nation, the Jews. There is the well-known story of Frederick the Great asking his chaplain for the evidence of Christianity in a word. The man said: "Sire, the Jew!" Here is a little country not larger than Wales, in which a nation is found absolutely unique. A modern German writer ( \Vellhauscn) has said that he could not understand why Chemosh, the god of the Moabites, never developed into the universal god of

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the Jews. Of course he cannot understand it, because he looks at it from the naturalistic point of view; but if we believe that the God of the Jews was Jehovah, the Lord of heaven and earth, we can readily understand why this nation is supernatural. Fourth: Supernatural expectation. There is that in the Old Testa·ment which is always pointing forward to the future, especially to the coming of the Messiah. Some will remember that in Canon Liddon's Bampton Lectures he says there were 333 references to the Messiah in the Old Testament, and Dr. Pierson argued that, based upon mathematical grounds, the concentration of all these 333 references on an individual, in face of the probabilities against it, is simply marvellous. Each time you add a reference, you reduce the probability of the allusions cen tring on one person ; and when we get to 333, and all these concentrate on one Man, the l\fan from the nation of the Jews, from the tribe of Judah, from the family of David, from the place mentioned in Micah (Bethlehem), we see at once the force of this extraordinary expecta tion. And I do not believe that there is any scholarship worthy of the name, which will deny that in the Old Tes tament there is expectation, always looking forward to some one who is to come. A Perfect Character Fifth: Supernatural Incarnation. Here we come face to face with the New Testament and the Person of our Lord Jesus Christ. This by itself is more than sufficient for a whole course of studies, but I only ask you to notice the portrait of Jesus Christ, the combination and balance of qualities in Him, and the perfection of His character. I wonder whether we are all aware that not a single great master in literature has ever tried to depict a perfect character. From Homer down to the present day, we cannot find one literary genius who has attempted to depict a perfect man or woman. Who is the most per fect character in Shakespeare? Some people think Ham let. But he is admittedly not very perfect. Yet here is

12 STRONGHOLD OF TRUTH a picture, drawn by four ordinary men, who, nevertheless, depict a perfect Character which has been the admiration of the ages! How can we account for that? I entirely agree with the statement that if these men invented Jesus, then we are in the presence of a stupendous miracle, one that is more wonderful than any we find in the Gospels. Rousseau well said that it takes a Jesus to invent a Jesus. To think that these ordinary men should put into literary form a perfect character, is to introduce us to the super- natural. · Sixth: Supernatural Manifestation. By this I mean the existence of the Christian Church. We fail to realize how supernatural the Church is ; and by the Church it is to be understood what the New Testament teaches "the blessed company of all faithful people," those who belong to the Lord Jesus Christ. That Church was super natural in its beginning, and supernatural in its course, and is supernatural in its persistence to the present day. No compulsion led to membership in this Church, for every worldly advantage was against it, and yet the Church commenced and continued, and lasts to the pres ent day. No wonder Tertullian said that "the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church;" no wonder that all the opposition to the Christian Church has never ser iously touched it. It is here today stronger than ever. There was a man in Ireland who built a wall three feet high and four feet thick. When he was asked why he did so, he said: "If the wall falls over it will be higher than ever!" And so it is with the Church; men can per secute it and devastate it; but they cannot destroy it. This supernatural manifestation is one of the greatest evi dences of Christianity. Without compulsion, with every thing against it, here are those who are united to the Lord Jesus Christ, and belong to Him-that is, the Chris tian Church; the society of saved sinners. Paul's Testimony Seventh: Supernatural Attestation. (a) The attes tation of Paul the Apostle. He himself is one of the

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greatest evidences of Christianity; his conversion and his life. If his life was real, his conversion was true; and if his conversion was true, Jesus Christ rose from the dead and you have the supernatural. Dr. Parker once com mented in his own inimitable way: "Paul's conversion is said to be due to epilepsy. Yes, before his epilepsy Paul was a blasphemer, after his conversion he became a saint, a missionary, a hero. Fly abroad, thou mighty epilepsy l" Baur fifty years ago, and men since his day, have admit ted that the conversion of Paul is a psychological mystery. Of course it is; and it must always be a mystery to those who deny its supernatural cause. ( b) Bible morality is another attestation. How simple yet how sufficient is the morality of the Bible, because it deals with principles, not with rules. I remember seeing a book called Enquire Within upon Everything. The Bible is not a book of this sort, in the sense of giving rules for everything, but it gives principles. It does not say whether you are to go to the theatre, or to dance, to drink, to smoke, and the rest of it, but "Whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." That is a principle which men must apply for themselves, and in the application is found our manhood and our Christianity. This morality is Jewish and yet universal. There arc ten commandments, and the proper division of them is not one to four and five to ten, but one to five and six to ten. The first five have the phrase "The Lord thy God" in them, linking them together. Parents are never our neighbors, never our equals, but the representatives of God; therefore the fifth commandment should come with the first table. Now notice these facts. Commandments one and two refer to thoughts. Commandment three, to words. Commandments four and five, to actio11s. Com mandments six, seven, eight, to actio11s. Commandment nine, to words. Commandment ten, to thoughts. That is, thoughts, words, actions towards Gad, and acts, words, thoughts towards man. So that these Jewish command ments given for a number of slaves just come out of Egypt, are equally applicable to us today I

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Then there has been no new morality in the world since Jesus Christ came to this earth. Is not that a won derful thing? Here are we nineteen hundred years since Jesus Christ came, and yet not a new ethical principle has ever been discovered or expressed since His time. We have had great philosophers, great poets, and great writers of prose, and yet not one of them has given an ethical idea that we cannot find in this Book. Then, too, we notice, as Professor Romanes has said, that the world out-grows the teaching of other men, but it has not out grown the teaching of Jesus Christ. One of the most striking things is that we have not outgrown the teaching of the Man who lived and died in one of the narrowest countries-that of the Jews. All this is an attestation. ( c) Here is the third of these proofs or attestations, namely, the results of Christianity. Observe the effects of Christianity on life-the Father revealing, the Son saving, and the Spirit equipping. Life is the problem, and Christ is the solution; life is the question, and Christ is the answer. If you want to see the results of Chris tianity, test it by other religions. If we would know what Confucianism has done, let us look at China; if we would know what Buddhism has done, let us look at India; if we would know what Islam has done, let us look at Tur key and Persia. Some years ago when I was in Damas cus, looking over that magnificent mosque which used to be a Christian church, I noticed that the Turkey carpets on the ground were all fastened together roughly with thread, and I said to the dragoman: "Why are all these carpets fastened like this?" He said: "To keep those who come to pray from stealing them!" This is what Islam means in the matter of ethics-it has no idea of the connection between cause and effect, between principle and practice. Broken Lights Of course, we do not despise any of these religions to which I have referred. Everything that is good in them comes from God. They are what Tennyson calls

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"broken lights." They are lights, but they are broken. But there is one great difference between them and Christianity: in each of these, man is seeking God; in Christianity, God is .seeking man. These religions are aspirations; Christianity is a revelation. And so, we conclude that God has spoken, and this message is in the Bible or nowhere else. It calls for a personal test from every one of us. In the present day a great deal is said, and rightly, about the argument from experience. In 2 Peter 1 :16-21, we see three things-( 1) Christ, (2) prophecy, and (3) experience-Christ as revealed to the Apostles on the Mount of Transfigura tion ; then the word of prophecy; and then the word of prophecy made more sure by the light shining, until the day dawn and the day star arises in our hearts. These are the three things-Prophecy in the Old Testament, Christ in the New, and both together verified by personal experience-"in your hearts." If we will put them to the test, we shall have a verification in our own souls, and then will come the strongest possible proof that the Bible comes from God. There is no other Book in the world that will so verify itself to human experience, because it contains and embod ies a Divine revelation. And thus we have the matter entirely in our own hands. Whatever may be said about history and philosophy and morality, the crowning point is: What is the Bible to me? And when the Bible is really and truly in my own heart and life, I cannot pos sibly doubt that it comes from God. "Father of mercies, in Thy word What endless glory shines; For ever by Thy Name adored For these celestial lines!"

The Bible as An Authority

~- F GOD has spoken, then obviously His word ·• · must be authoritative. "Where the word of .. ~ a king is," there is authority and power. i~ Th;, subject natucaliy leads ;nto fields of ~ ·_.· difficulty, and, unfortunately, of controversy. 'Ne want, as far as possible, to avoid anything purely controversial, and yet at the same time to show where we stand in regard to the Bible as an authority in connection with our spiritual life. \Ne must not hesitate to face modern difficulties, controversies, and problems; because they necessarily come before us at all times, in every part of the way, and in almost every aspect of Christian life and experience. It will never do for any Christian man or woman to ignore difficulties. It would be easy to do so. It is sometimes called the ostrich policy of burying the head in the sand, but it does not work well. The question of authority is vital, and touches us at every point. The fundamental question is : ·what is the ultimate and final authority in religion? ·what is truth? 'Where can it be found? \-\That and where is the last and supreme word concerning God, life, and eternity? I. The Need of Authority.-The necessity of author ity is seen in every walk of life-the authority of the parent over his boys and girls, the authority of the school master over the child, the authority of the college over the student; authority in professional, in artistic, in scientific life. Authority is recognized as vital and essential every where. It is also essenti_al in connection with religion. Authority has been rightly described as the existence of an ethical standard.

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Ma.n Needs & Guide :Man, even as man, needs a guide. 'vVe were never intended to be independent. Our very nature is limited, and requires guidance and authority. But still more, man as a sinner needs authority. Amidst all the sins and sorrows of life, its difficulties, its problems, its perplexi ties, man needs an authoritative guide concerning things spiritual and eternal. Two things are necessary for every life-truth, and the eye to see it. 2. The Source of Authority.-Where is this need to be satisfied? The answer, of course, is that God is the Source of all authority. He is the Source of truth, of righteousness, and of all guidance; and authority is expressed by revelation. God's own revelation must of necessity be our authority; and for our present purpose it will suffice to say that Christ, as representing and revealing God, is our ultimate authority. The Source of all authority is the Lord Jesus Christ. So far, I do not suppose there will be any real diffi culty. But at once the question arises: God is invisible. Christ is no longer here. Where, then, can this Divine authority be found? Where is it embodied? How can I be sure of God as the Source of all authority? How can I be sure of Christ as the expression of the mind and will of God? 3. The Seat of Attthority.-'vVe have to face this question as to where the revelation of God is to be found. I suppose there are only three usual, perhaps only three possible, answers. It is in connection with these three answers that controversy to some extent seems inevitable. There are those who say that the seat of authority is in human reason. I am using the word reason to represent what is sometimes spoken of as human life, including rea son and conscience; but reason will suffice. Some say that the consent of the mind is the condition and foundation of all certitude. Let us be very clear on this point. Reason is valuable and necessary. "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy mind." The mind is essential as part of human nature, and is required

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to test the claims of any professed revelation, and then to receive the revelation thus tested. Long ago Butler said .that reason is the only faculty for judging anything, even revelation, and there can be no authority that destroys human reason; there can be no authority that subverts and stultifies the mind that God has given us. The right of every man to verify is in alienable; it is a prerogative that is essential. "Prove all things," said the Apostle, as well as "hold fast that which is good." Indeed, it is only possible to hold fast that which is good, when we have proved it; and again and again St. Paul speaks of discernment. vVe are first to prove, then to approve. But this is very different from claiming that reason is the seat of authority. After all, reason is only one of several faculties, and all these have been affected by sin. Besides, there is such a thing as reality, independent of reason. vVhat is truth? Truth is not what / trow, though that definition, so etymologic ally suggestive, has often been given. No, truth is fact. Truth is not dependent upon the changing opinions of men. Truth is true whether I accept it or not. A thing .must be true before I can accept it as truth. So that rea son is not originative, not creative, it is only a channel. It is not a source, but a medium. Rea.son Not Creative Our reason never creates anything; it only weighs data, and settles things as the result of weighing them. Auth -0rity, therefore, is not against reason, but in accordance with reason; and so we conclude that reason is not the .seat of authority. Others say the Church is the seat of authority. vVell, .of course, we ask: \,Yhat Church? vVhere is that Church to be found? The Church in the fullest sense of the word is best described as "the blessed company of all faithful people;" and as such it is the product of Divine revelation. The Church came into existence on the day .of Pentecost by accepting Divine revelation. If we go Jurther back, the Jewish Church came into existence as

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a believer, as a result of this revelation. "The word of the Lord came to Abraham" (Gen. 15 :1). Indeed, we can go back to Adam, and find that everything presup poses a Divine revelation, which is the foundation of all the religion, whether individual or corporate, that the world has ever seen. Divine revelation, it is difficult to see how it can be the seat of authority. The Church can not embody, certainly cannot create its Creator. So we come back to this, that the seat of authority is the Bible. And if God has spoken pre-eminently through the Bible, then the Bible is pre-eminently our authority. 'vVe believe the Bible to be our authority, the seat of authority, because it preserves the revelation of Christ in its purest and clearest form. Christianity is an historic religion. We are a long way from the commencement of Christianity. It started centuries ago, and has been ever since an historic religion. Now what we need today, in this twentieth century, is the very best form of that his toric religion which we can find. It does not at all matter where it is, or what it is, or how it has come, so Jong as we can make sure that we have the best available form of God's revelation in Christ. It might come through a man, or it might come through an institution, or through a book; but we need not mind in the least about the vehicle, so long as we can make sure that we have got the genuine revelation. Greatest Book Now Christianity is at once life and literature. The life seems to require the literature for its nourishment. As already noticed, it is at least significant that all the great religions of the world have their books. It has seemed as though a book were really necessary for the ~aintenance and continuation of all religion. Literature 1~ the nearest possible approach to reliability. Truth in literary form has four qualities which are pre-eminently ~ecessary. for a world-wide religion : (a) Durability; litera scnpta manet; the Written Word abides. There is a durability about any written form of communication

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which stands the test of time. (b) Catholicity. There is a universal element in a written form which appeals and applies to the whole world. The Bible, by way of illustration, is the easiest book to translate into universal language today. I wonder what China or Uganda would make of one of Shakespeare's plays? Every one knows how impossible it is to translate Heine's ballads into Eng lish. There are French poems of exquisite thought and expression that cannot possibly be put into our language. But the Bible is a Book of universal-shall I use the word ?-interpretability. And it is this catholicity of the ·written ·word that makes the Bible so valuable. (c) Fixity. There is a permanence about the Written Word that makes it essentially valuable and important for human life. (d) Purity. We can have purity in con nection with writing, in a way that we cannot possibly have by any other method. . We cannot be sure of these four qualities in reason, because that is unsafe and variable. We cannot be sure of them in any institution, for it is always uncertain. This written form of revelation is therefore the best available form. It is guaranteed to us by the fact that the New Testament has come from uniquely qualified men. I remember once when in conversation with a friend, asking him this question : "What is the ultimate reason why you accept the New Testament? Deep down below everything else, what is it that causes you to accept it, and reject other books?" My friend said he did not know that he had ever really faced it in that way. So I went on : "Do you accept it because it is old? There are older books. Do you accept it because it contains truth? Well, there are other books that contain truth. No; beneath its age,· beneath its helpfulness, beneath its truthfulness is the bedrock-this book came from men who were uni quely qualified to convey God's will to men; and the bed rock of our acceptance of the New Testament is what is called in technical language Apostolicity; because the books came, either from Apostolic authors or through Apostolic sanction."

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Apostolic Writers I am not now concerned with authorship, but with sanction. These books came from Apostolic men. Out of the eight writers of the New Testament, five were Apostles, and the other three were immediate associates of the Apostles. Some one says: "Is not this what is called 'Bibliola try ?'" No, it is not. You do not interpose the Bible between yourselves and Christ. You use the Bible as a medium by which you come to Christ. If I go out tonight and desire to see the stars with the telescope, will that be an interposition? It will be a medium. It will not be a hindrance, but a help. ·when a boy receives a letter from his mother, his school fellows may say: "Oh, how perfectly absurd for you to trouble about a bit of paper like that!" "Ah," says the boy, "it is not the paper, it is what is on it. That paper represents my mother's in terest, my mother's love; and so far from being a hind rance, it represents and expresses my mother's love to me when I ·cannot be in her presence." The Scriptures do two things: They provide truth for our acceptance and material for our experience. That brings us face to face with the Lord Jesus Christ. So we conclude that it is not reason, not the Church, but the Bible which is the seat of authority. 4. The Natu1·e of this Authority.-lt is a spirit11al authority. \iVords familiar at least to some of us are these: " Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation." It is a book of salvation, it is a guide to spiritual safety. It reveals the Lord Jesus Christ as our Teacher, our Redeemer, and our ]\faster; our Prophet, Priest, and King. . Spiritual Authority Authority always declares itself by its moral and spiri tual proofs. -At one time in our Lord's life His authority was definitely questioned. "By what authority doest Thou these things? Who gave Thee this authority?" And our Lord replied: "The baptism of John, was it

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from Heaven or of men?" They saw at once what the reply to that would involve, and said: "vVe cannot tell." Quite so. The moral proofs of John's authority were such, that if they had answered truly they would have committed and condemned themselves. The authority of the Bible, therefore, is spiritual, because it reveals Christ as the Saviour, and produces spiritual results. Then this authority is supreme. The Bible is supreme over reason. Reason is human. The Bible, though pos sessing human elements, is guaranteed by what we believe to be Divine inspiration. The Bible is our guide as the light of reason and of human thought. Revelation, because it comes from God, cannot possibly dishonor reason, which also comes from God. Reason is the judge of our need of revelation. Reason examines the claims of reve lation; but once those claims are accepted, reason takes a subordinate place, and revelation is supreme. An illustration I read years ago on this point may help us to understand it: One morning in one of the prisons a warrant comes to the governor ordering that a certain criminal,. who has been condemned, should be executed. What is the governor to do? He has to examine the warrant. He has to look at its seal; he has to be sure of its signature; he has to take every possible precaution to see that it is genuine, that it is not a fraud, but that it actually does come from those in authority. When he has thus made sure of that warrant, he has to obey it. He cannot alter the elate of the execution; he cannot alter the form of the execution; he cannof do anything but submit himself to that warrant, of whose authenticity he has become convinced. That shows the place reason has in religion. Reason examines, tests, sifts, inquires, but the moment reason has become convinceel that this or that comes from Goel, then, like Joshua of old, it says: "What saith my Lorel unto His servant?" So though revela tion is supreme over reason, reason examines the creden tials of revelation and then submits to them. You have this illustrated in a well-known passage. Even an Apos tle was not accepted without his message being tested.

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At Berea, though St. Paul was heard with respect, yet the people searched the Scriptures daily whether these things were so ( Acts xvii. 11). And when they were convinced that the Apostle's word and the Scriptures agreed, they bowed and accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as their Saviour. So that Christ is our Authority, and when we are assured that the Bible is the form in which His word reaches us, we submit to it, and it becomes supreme over our reason and life. Bible Is Supreme Again, the Bible is supreme over the Church. But some one says: "How can this be? Surely it is impos sible; the Church was in existence at least twenty years before the New Testament was written." The Church was certainly before the New Testament, but does it fol low that the Church is above it? That is where a fallacy may creep in. But first, was the Church without a Bible? For those twenty years had the Church no Bible? One of our greatest scholars, C. H . Turner, in the Jour_11al of Theolo gical Studies, has pointed out that while there is a truth in the statement that the Church is before the Bible, yet that if we had said it to any early Christian he would have stared at us with amazement. He would have said: "'vVe have got a Bible, the Old Testament, and it speaks to us of Christ." The Apostle Paul says concerning the Old Testament that, with the simple addition of faith in Christ Jesus, it "is able to make wise unto salvation." This is what St. Paul thought of the Old Testament. It is, however, perfectly true that the Church had no part of the New Testament for at least twenty years. If we would like to add another twenty years we may do so. There was no complete New Testament for a long time after they had the truth; but we ought to notice this: while they had not the written \,Vord they had the spoken Word from the day of Pentecost onwards. The Church came into existence by believing the spoken Word; and as long as the Apostles were at hand, the spoken Word was sufficient. But by and by, when they went from

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place to place, and afterwards died, it was essential to embody in another form the spoken revelation; and thus came the written form. We see at once that it does not very much matter whether it is spoken or written, so long as we can be sure it is a revelation from God. I am per fectly certain that if the Apostle Paul were here, we should listen to him just as carefully as we should read one of his writings. The precise way in which the revela tion comes does not matter so long as we can be certain that it comes from God. So that it is perfectly true that the written \Vord of the New Testament came after the Church, but the spoken vVord came before the Church. A Spoken Gospel By way of illustration let us remember that there was a Church in Uganda before Mackay and Pilkington put the Gospel into writing. The missionaries preached the vVord; it was accepted by some; and a Church existed before anything could be put into writing. And so there was a Church on the day of Pentecost from the Word spoken by the Apostles, long before there was a written \Vord. This is where the fallacy comes in. The Church, therefore, is "a witness and a keeper," but not a maker of Holy Scripture. One of·the hymns we sing is: "The church from her dear :Master, received the gift divine." Did the Church at Rome write the Epistle to the Romans? \Vas the Church at Rome the maker of that Epistle? Did the Church of the Ephesians make the Epistle to the Ephesians? No; it was the Apostle who wrote that Epistle to the Church of Rome, and it was Scripture to that Church from the moment they accepted it from his hand. John the Apostle says: "I wrote unto the Church, but Diotrephes, who loveth to have the pre eminence, receiveth us not." It was not the Church, but the Apostles representing Christ, who gave first the spoken and then the written Word of God. And so those familiar words in the Article of the Church of England, "The Church is a witness and a keeper," are literally true. The Church is a witness of what is Scripture. The Church has kept the Scripture.

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But though the Church is a "witness and keeper," it is not the author or mailer of Scripture, and the reasoning employed in support of the latter contention is fallacious. It seems to be as follows: "The Apostles were the authors of Holy Scripture." "But all Apostles are members of the Church of Christ." "Therefore, the Church of Christ is the author of Scripture." This has been well compared by the late Dr. Waller, of Highbury, to the following: · "Mr. Balfour wrote a book on The Fou11datio11s of Belief." "Mr. Balfour is a member of the Privy Council." "Therefore, the Privy Council is the author of the book called The Fom1da-tio11s of Belief." The fallacy, of course, lies in attributing to a body in its collective capacity certain acts of individual members of the body. The Church is not, and never was, the author of Scripture. The Scriptures are the law of God for the Church, delivered to it by the Apostles and Pro phets. So we say again that the Lord Jesus Christ is the supreme Authority, and we accept the Bible because it enshrines and embodies that authority. Take away Christ from the Bible, and there is no Bible left worth having. We do not bow down to the Book because it is a book; we do not repudiate reason because it is reason; we do not set aside the Church because it is the Church. We say that what we want is the best available form of Christ's revelation, and we believe we get this in the Bible and not in any other way. The Whole Church The Word of God is therefore that which gives us a fixed and objective embodiment of the revelation of God in.Christ; and as such it is, of course, supreme for every th_mg connected with the Church. Let us not make any mistake. The witness of the whole Church is very im-

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portant. \,Vhen the whole Church bears testimony to the Deity of Jesus Christ, we are rash if we individually reject that doctrine; but still, when we have said every thing for the moral authority of the Church, it is the work of a witness, not of a creator. Let me quote the words of the Bishop of Oxford, Dr. Gore, on this point: "The v-,r ord of God in the Bible is the final testing ground of doctrine." Church belief, what we call Church tradition, tends to deteriorate in the course of time. It never abides fixed. Tradition is so variable that we cannot depend upon it. There is modification and subtraction; there is often a positive inserted here and a superlative there if we depend upon tradition. We find this in Jewish history. Mark vii. 13: "l\faking the word of God of none effect through your tradition." The Bishop of Oxford said some years ago concerning the Jewish Church, and the Medireval Church, that they had merged Scripture in a miscellane ous mass of authorities. But we do not believe in merg ing it that way. We insist on keeping it separate and supreme. Here again an illustration will help us. When we have a telegram, we require reason to read the message. The wire that brought the message may represent the Church that brought the Bible to our door; but the message is the real thing. And so we have reason, the Church, and the Bible, but the message is the essential matter. It Is Final That brings me to this: The Bible is our final auth ority. Spiritual, supreme, and final. The Old Testament could not claim finality for itself, because it was a grad ual growth; and for the same reason the New Testament could not claim finality for itself; but the. whole tone of the Bible involves and implies finality. Fathers are not always saying to their boys: "I am your father; I am supreme here." They do not need to say that again and again. The boys know from their whole bearing and tone who are the masters. The attitude of the father

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and mother is sufficient; and the attitude of Scripture shows that it is final. Isa. viii. 20: "To the law and to the testimony, if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them," or "there is no morni11g for them." Matt. xxiv. 25: "Behold I have told you." 2 Cor. iv. 2: "Adulterating the Word of God." Eph. vi. 17: "The Sword of the Spirit, which is the vVord of God." 1 Thess. ii. 13: "Ye received the Word of God." 2 Tim. iii. 16: "All Scripture God-breathed is profitable for doctrine, for correction, for instruction in righteousness." However you take this last text, it refers to the authority of the Old Testament. 1 Peter i. 23: "The seed . . . the Word of God." Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself in His life on earth bore testimony again and again to His own submission to that authority: "The Scripture cannot be broken." (See l\fatt. v. 18 and John x. 35). So we believe that the substance of Scripture bears testimony to its finality; and the general tenor of the early Church is in the same direc tion. If we read the Fathers of the first three centuries,. we shall find witness after witness to the supremacy and finality of the vVord of God. And at the Council of Chalcedon the Gospels were placed in the center, as the final court of appeal. Then, too, every heresy opposed to orthodoxy was alleged to be based on Scripture; ancient liturgies are simply saturated with the Scriptures, and the most severe attacks of opponents have always been on Scripture. Christ and the Bible Experience tells the same story. It is clear from Church history that the Lord Jesus Christ has never fully revealed Himself apart from the Bible. Where the Bible has been neglected, Christ has been neglected, and the light of Christianity has burned low. The oldest and truest view we have in ecclesiastical history is the supremacy of the. Bible, the finality of the Bible in rela tion to the revelation of God in Christ. V. The Power of this Authority-the power of the

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