380 THE KING’S BUSINESS he saw that the difference between them was as wide as the difference between heaven and earth. The same thing is true of the difference between the sayings and actions attributed to our Lord in the Canonical Gospels and those attributed to Him in the Apocryphal gospels. Any one who has any discernment who reads the Canonical Gospels and then reads the Apocryphal gospels will readily understand why the former were admitted into the Bible and why the latter were excluded from the Bible. He does not need to find out what Church councils decided the matter or by how large a vote pro or con. It is something the same with the Freer manuscripts. If they turn out after thorough and unbiased study to be as old as is claimed, it will only prove again what scholars already know that the value of a manuscript cannot be decided solely by its' relative antiquity. What Would Jesus Do ? M ANY have taken in hand of late to say what Jesus would do if He “came to Chicago,” Los Angeles, the Gentile world today; how He would war on social evils ; hygienize marriage ; sterilize foods and atmospheres; lengthen wages and shorten hours; run campaigns and vote. With the end these good men seek, we believe the Lord is in sympathy, and so are we, but not altogether with their associations, their methods, and their confidence in the flesh. Men went far astray who planned His program once, and when He came were all at sea in their pilotage. Some advised, “There is no man that doeth anything in secret, and he himself seeketh to be known openly. Show thyself to the world.” Others hindered saying, “This shall not be to thee,” which, well meant as it was, “savoured” of Satan. They had not that wisdonj “which none of the princes of this world knew ; for had they known it. they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.” He might be equally offensive to men’s politics today. It depends on one’s viewpoint of Jesus. Is He reformer, or redeemer ? Would He work from without, or from within? Would He make the fruit good, or, first, the tree? One thing in T he O racles is overlooked : The All-wise has a plan, a dispensation®! purpose. What a Jewish Messiah under Gentile regimen would do, and in the twentieth century, who can say? We know what He did do under a Jewish regimen, and that He did not do what they thought He would do and ought to do. It is enough for us to know what He would that we should do in Chicago, Los Angeles, and to the uttermost parts of the earth. We have not been put in trust with the sword of execution, nor with the besom of renovation, but with the Gospel. His will for His Church is definite. “Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel; live soberly,, righteously and godly; keep yourselves unspotted from the world; and wait for His Son from heaven.” Let us ask God’s blessing on every good word and work and lend a hand, as we have opportunity, but never losing sight of the main and real duty; never flattering ourselves, or the world, that anything less, or other, than the blood of Christ amd the regenerating Spirit, can cleanse, or reform human society; that ought but the manifest advent of the King can realize the Kingdom of righteousness; or that Jesus should He come would do or will do anything else than condemn and destroy the whole Christ- rejecting system.
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