Years ago the country was flooded with nostrums which were advertised as "cures for tuberculosis." The advertising of these drugs emphasized the dread consequences and awful dangers of consumption. Finally this advertising became a nuisance, so much so that about the worst thing you could say of a medicine was that it could cure consumption.
Yet we never did go so far as to say tuberculosis is a good thing. We never did cease to desire to find a way to cure it. And as a matter of fact we have found a way which does cure the larger part of such sufferers if taken in time. However, that means of cure is not some patent medicine, some secret method taught only in certain copyrighted books; it is mostly a natural method of rest, food, and common sense, administered with skill.
Every lover of the truth ought to be glad for every true word spoken about Christian unity by Roman Catholic, Episcopalian, or by zealots of small sects. This discussion does good and encourages the desire for unity in the community of Christian believers. But when the day breaks which shall see the organic unity of the whole Christian community it is my belief that it will be seen to have come like the cure for tuberculosis-not by some narrow sectarian scheme of aggrandizing one or the other human corporations, however big or little, but by the skillful practice of great principles known to all Christians.
Some Christians object to Christian unity on the ground that if the church were one it would make for an intolerance which would hamper the creative intellectual life of the country and thus thwart its moral and religious development and paralyze its spirit of exploration and discovery.
If Christian unity should do such a thing it would doubtless be unfortunate and would halt the progress of the human race. Christians need to learn anew the spirit of adventure and divine questing which was so characteristic of the church of the apostolic age. Undoubtedly the greatest saints of the past have possessed only the faintest outlines of knowledge concerning the possibilities of the grace of Cod both socially and individually. It would be the tragedy of history for the church to become crystallized in the primary grades of the divine science of the spiritual life.
We cannot deny that the church of the Middle Ages did develop an attitude of opposition to discovery, both intellectual and spiritual, and did practice intolerance toward new and strange ideas.
It is doubtless true that an highly organized human corporation ruled by men holding office in political fashion would be very much inclined to such a tendency. But while we are not pleading for the type of unity which the bishops of Rome imposed upon the Medieval Church, yet we think that the intolerance of that age did not altogether grow out of the system but out of the social and cultural background of the age. The Church of England in the nineteenth century had a system remarkably similar to the religio-political entity called the Medieval Church; yet with all its faults the Church of England was not markedly intolerant in the period referred to, nor is it in the present century. As a matter of fact the Church of England has given place to a wide variety of opinion, and has given stimulus and encouragement to profound scholars and thinkers with original and creative minds.
This is not said as a defense of the episcopal political type of unity-for I think that the unity toward which Christ leads his flock is a far different thing-but merely to show that the crudest type of Christian unity imaginable would very probably not produce the abuses to-day, in our age, that it did in a rude, barbarous age of poverty and ignorance.
It takes more than religious strife to generate tolerance in the minds of men. India would be a good illustration of this fact. India has nine religions, all hostile to each other, but the principal religions are Hindu and Moslem. The religious division between Hindus of various sects and castes, and Mohammedans, also of various sects, runs down into the smallest villages. If there is something in religious difference which tends to create a spirit of tolerance and open-mindedness toward the other fellow India ought to be the most tolerant country in the world, for there the Hindu and Moslem have faced each other and have been in intimate contact for many weary ages-much longer than the Protestant sects have argued over their differences. The first Mohammedan invasion of India occurred in 664. That is nearly thirteen hundred years which they have had in which to discuss their differences and learn tolerance through differences in religious point of view. But they have not done so. On the contrary the age-long religious controversy, instead of benefiting the country in any way, is probably the one big hindrance to prevent their wresting their independence from the British at the present time, just as the intolerance among Protestants in the sixteenth century probably weakened their political defenses and laid the way open for the horrors of the Thirty Years War.
Just because Protestants in this country have practically ceased to fight over their religious differences and have decided to live peaceably with each other in a Christian way without strife, we come to the conclusion that the tolerance in this country is the direct result of the religious differences and the multitude of denominations. May it not be largely due to the presence of that which India with its religious controversy lacks, namely, the spread of education among us?
I have traveled in France. There everywhere one finds only one type of religion-the Roman Catholic Church. There are only a few Protestants in France. However, there are multitudes of people in France who are tolerant to an exceptional degree. This is not because they have lived all their lives among different kinds of warring religions, for they have not. It is because they are educated people. I believe that whenever the church attains her unity in our land it will be a type of unity which shall stimulate the spirit of man to unheard of advances in literature, art, and philosophy-and especially in the art and science of the spiritual life.
It is not alone education and culture which has softened the asperity of theological dispute and breathed the Christlike spirit of Christian tolerance into the hosts of ('hristians divided by denominational walls. This change is due to a better understanding of the spirit of Christ. We treat each other with more courtesy not merely because we have gone to school longer than our ancestors did, but because, however much we may fall below them in other respects, in this, at least, we are better Christians than they. Doubtless we have lost some religious values they had, but at least we are richer in this particular.
And we shall be still richer in Christlike courtesy and forbearance; there will be a deeper, more spiritual form of tolerance in us; we shall have a finer culture of mind and spirit whenever we learn to get along together in one visible church as our Lord prayed that we should.
The objection is sometimes made against unity that the different denominations each develop a special type of religious culture; and the contribution of these different kinds of religious character to the community tends to enricher society in a way impossible if the church be in unity.
I think this is a matter worthy of serious thought by every Christian in the world. Meditation on this thought will serve to enhance our good opinion of other Christians and make us more friendly toward the idea of living with these kinds of people. Think of the value to the world of such a man as Luther- stalwart and vigorous saint of God. The world would be immeasurably poorer if bereft of the characters of the great saints of the Lutheran communion. The Reformed churches and Presbyterianism have contributed a type of serious and high-minded men and women, great scholars and great saints, that have lifted humanity to its loftiest heights. How I wish we could teach our young people the stories of their heroic lives. And what shall we say of Roman Catholic saints such as the Christlike Francis of Assisi, and of those other-worldly mystics trained by the Quakers ? yes, and of the saintly women preachers produced among them like the mother of Herbert Hoover ? The Methodists have their mystics, too; but they were of a different type from the Quakers-not better, perhaps, nor worse-just different. And what mighty men and women of God they were ! How the wilderness echoed to the shout of their triumphant and godly ministry! Were the Baptists better than the Methodists ? Of course not-nor were they worse; but different. They too wrought mightily in conquering the wilderness and laying the foundation of our great nation.
It is impossible to go on and name them all. Congregationalists, C h r i s t i a n s, Disciples, United Brethren, Nazarenes, and a host of others have trained disciples of Jesus so fine and so noble that the tears rush to the eyes to think of the crystal beauty of their souls. Every time I get hold of a denominational year book I always turn and read the biographies of the workers that have died in the past year-often stories of humble lives unknown to fame. And I do not care what denomination it is these stories go to the depths of my heart and make me walk on the stars and want to be a more devoted follower of our Lord Jesus.
One cannot deny that the different communions have all along tended to develop a somewhat different type of religious character. However, as culture increases and different groups tend to know and understand one another more this tendency to produce unique values in each communion is constantly lessening. A Presbyterian Christian and a Methodist Christian, or a Baptist Christian and a Quaker Christian are very much more alike to-day than they were a hundred years ago.
It reminds one of the advance of science. Long ago there was a German science, and a French science, and an English science. Particularly does one remember the days when French science and English science were very distinct. Doubtless it would be possible to argue that each of these types of science was contributing unique and precious values to mankind.
Be that as it may, the fact remains that the advance of science wiped out the national and sectarian schools of science and gave us one school of science- not English, or French or German, or Japanese; not pow-wowism, or wizardry, or alchemy, but merely science. To-day there is not a German or Japanese doctrine of electricity, but simply a scientific doctrine of electricity. Is this a loss or a gain?
Moreover, the different denominations do not so much pride themselves in producing Christians of a peculiar type, different from their other brethren. Years ago a Quaker community took satisfaction in producing a type of Christian who wore a certain garb and addressed people with a " thee " and a "thou. " Quite generally this man, dressing and taIking quaintly, was a stalwart saint of God; but he would be a bold man who should assert that the modern Quaker is not as good a Christian without these peculiarities.
Every light has its shadow; and the truth is these differences between Christians of different communions sometimes arose out of their aloofness toward each other, growing out of their mutual ignorance and intolerance of each other. It is in tacit recognition of this fact that different denominations no longer take pride in producing queer Christians who are different from all the others.
If this tendency toward the assimilation of the types of Christian character which is now perfectly apparent is a good thing and is a result of the increase of general and Christian culture, then who can deny it the right to develop to the point where all denominational distinctions are done away ?
At the same time there is a true sense in which the church ought to strive to cultivate unique and gifted personalities, strong in some certain gift and quality of character; and it is my contention that the church in unity will be more effective in doing that than any denominational system that has ever existed. The very fact that different denominational systems tend to develop certain types of character is indubitable proof that they tend to thwart the development of other types. In the past when each denomination was supposed to produce a certain type of man there is no doubt that many gifted souls were either driven away from the Christian life altogether or dwarfed and twisted into something much less and different than their God-given possibilities.
The church in unity will give liberty and scope of development for every type of Christian character that has ever existed in history-and may even be expected to produce some new kinds. In that glorious field of God will grow side by side rare mystics like Thomas a Kempis, and practical men like Oliver Cromwell. Stern Puritans like Cotton Mather will dwell cheek-by-jowl with cheerful saints who enjoy their meals like Martin Luther and old Dr. Johnson.
If anybody doubts this let him read again the his-tory of the apostolic church, and there he will learn that men of different temperament do not have to organize separate denominations in order to get along together. Take the three apostles who companied closest to the Lord in every critical time-Peter, James, and John. These men represent the three dominant types of Christian character that have lent dignity, glory, and strength to the Christian church from the first.
Peter was the dynamic type, the doer. His followers have wrought the visible marvels of Christian history. They built the cathedrals, the hospitals, the children's homes, and the schools. They preached on the streets and in the slums, and laid down their bones among the heathen as missionaries in the faraway corners of the earth.
It would be possible to eulogize them to the point where we should say they were the only servants of Christ worth while until we get to thinking of their faults and of the virtues of the other kinds.
John was the type of the mystic of the church. A long line of the rarest and finest spirits of history have followed in his steps. Counted as cranks and fools by the world, they have nevertheless contributed the spiritual values to the church which have made it seem worth while for weary humanity to keep plodding on the long road. These have contributed to life, vision-its highest and finest gift.
James may be regarded as of the judicial type. He was the kind needed to mediate between the wild zeal of the men of action and the wild dreams of the men of contemplation. In their moments of weakness doubtless each of these types seemed utterly unchristian to the other. Doubtless the men of zeal often wondered how the men of vision could spend time in prayer and meditation when children were hungry and men were going to hell. They also wondered how the men of poise could be so calm when conditions were so desperate that fighting was in order. The mystics wondered how the zealots could be Christians at all when they were so impetuous and spent so little time in prayer. They also wondered if the men of the James type were not really backslidden compromisers. But the men of judicial temperament were tempted to give up the whole thing because they could not sympathize with the heat of the zealots on the one side and the dreamy impracticability of the mystics on the other.
Such were the stresses within the apostolic company before our Lord had even ascended to heaven. Already men of many minds were finding a welcome haven in the fellowship of the Lord of universal humanity.
After our Lord went away the personnel of the church became more complex than ever. Jewish workingmen and Greek philosophers mingled with Roman soldiers-to mention only a few of the different types-within the glorious fellowship of the apostolic church.
The early church developed men of every type and kind. Within her communion were brought to fruition many different varieties of religious genius. The universal character of her membership appealed to the universal need of human nature; and exemplified in multitudinous ways the infinite resources of the grace of Glod.
What has been can be again. What a glorious day it will be when the denominational walls are broken down and those brave days of the ancient church are restored again; when God's children long divided by what they imagined to be insuperable differences shall flow together like the kindred waters of the boundless sea. Then shall they contribute each to the other the priceless treasures they have accumulated during their age-long separation; and cheerfully shall they throw away the dross of ancient prejudice and intolerance.
When all Christians shall realize their blessed unity there will be a mutual helpfulness which will stimulate the spirit of man to unheard-of achievements. In the mellow warmth of an universal Christian brotherhood the soul of humanity, once disorganized by division and scorched by the heats of discord will spring to new life under the divine blessing like Aaron's rod, and put forth at once the 'cowers of genius and the precious fruits of a sublime art and a splendid life.
Perhaps even more than they fear a rigid, dogmatic church, reactionary and non-progressive, do some opponents of Christian unity fear that the Christian church in unity would be a great, sprawling, helpless giant, too weak to erect and maintain the essential standards of the Christian faith. Such a church, they fear, would be a yielding, compromising thing, utterly unable to repel heresy.
Some dear souls are always for building a fence around every precious thing and guarding such things by always standing on their defense. Such people are always fighting to defend the church, to defend the character of Luther and Wesley, and of Peter and John. They struggle hard in defense of the Bible; and even God is in their debt by their reckoning; for they fight hard to defend him. They keep their children in leading-strings as long as possible, boys as well as girls, for they want to defend these young people against that contact with life which they themselves weathered in their own youth. Their ideal seems to be a static and a changeless world, well defended on all sides.
They have never learned that there are some things so big that even if they needed defense one could never defend them. The sea is a soft and yielding thing. One can punch his finger into it anywhere- except where it is frozen. And yet the sea needs no defense against the land-nor ought else. Perhaps in some places the land may be encroaching slightly on the sea; but none of our stalwart defenders ever need to raise money or make speeches in defense of the sea. Never fear, old ocean will hold his own; but even if he could not, then the case would be hopeless; for the defense would be beyond any man's power.
Some scientists claim that the sun may explode sometime. If that be true something ought to be done about it to protect this earth from such great danger; but cannot the feeblest intellect perceive that there is no possible defense humanity can make against such a possibility? It all rests on the knees of God.
The sun is too big to defend. The sea is too big to defend. The Bible is too big for us to defend. God is too big for us to defend. And the majestic destiny of the Christian church is also too great for us to defend by the feeble safeguards of our human defenses of organization and creed.
Although the sea is a soft and yielding thing, yet it grinds away the mighty granite rocks and holds its place against the land and the arts of man unflinchingly through the ages of time. Just so the Christian church in unity can be expected to be gentle enough to avoid crushing the most sensitive souls that cast themselves on its bosom; and yet so invincibly strong will it be that the migrations of peoples and the arts of man and the storms of the ages shall not move it from its place.
The record of the past induces to the conclusion that written creeds and denominational organizations are very poor instrumentalities for perpetuating the moods and ideas of one age onward forever into the future. The Roman Catholic Church is perhaps the strongest advocate of this method of retaining the mental attitudes of a given age throughout immemorial time; but scholars know that her claim to be unchanging, while perhaps made in good faith, is yet inaccurate.
Always the written creeds read the same, but forever men interpret them differently. Perhaps they cannot change the words, but they can and do put new meanings into them; and not only new meanings, but new emphases. The writings of the fathers of the Christian church are skillfully and ably translated into English. Anyone who can read at all is free to read them when he will. But as a matter of fact not many people read them except scholars. Scarcely anyone else really can read them; for while they are translated into good English they refer to a world of thought which has vanished away and can only be reconstructed by the scholar.
Just so we build our little harbors of creed into which the treasures of Christian thought must come; but the mouths of our harbors fill up with the silt of antiquity and our harbors stand vacant far inland from the sea. But still the mighty tides of God yet ebb and flow through the heart of the church, and on her mighty bosom the precious freight of human hope and aspiration sails on to new harbors that we wot not of.
When we turn to the creeds of Protestantism we find scarcely one denomination which believes as it did one hundred years ago. The old-time Methodists believed in sanctification as a second work of grace subsequent to regeneration; and so they wrote it in their creeds. So it stands yet in the creeds but it is not believed nor held that way generally in the church to-day.
The clergy of the Presbyterian Church allow much more liberty in the interpretation of predestination than the Westminster Confession ever contemplated. Many Baptist churches have had a Calvinistic creed quite as rigid as the Westminster Confession; but that has not prevented the growth of quite contrary opinions within their fold.
In fact there is no Protestant denomination that has a written creed which does not have more or less of modernists within its fold who hold doctrines contradictory to or subversive of the tenets of their creed.
Some of the famous schools of the East that have long been leaders in Liberalism and Modernism were founded by men who were the sternest of Fundamentalists. These founders defended the future orthodoxy of their schools by writing Fundamentalist creeds of the strongest description and requiring the teachers to conform to them. And yet in spite of these invincible creeds those schools became hot-beds of the most radical forms of Modernism.
The creeds were there, good and strong-and for the most part just such creeds as I would write, if I wrote any-but of what avail have they been' If the future safety of the church depends upon the skillful construction of denominational creeds, then is our case hopeless indeed.
There is an illustration in history of a creedless communion casting off heresy. The Congregational churches of New England were comparatively creedless; and yet in the latter part of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth they took a decided stand against the S o c i n i a n i s m of the Unitarians and finally separated completely from the latter. This seems to be an indication of what would happen in case of fundamental heresy in the Christian church in unity.
Doubtless a further illustration of this principle is found in the fact that the apostolic church had no written creed, as such-if we except the Holy Scriptures-and yet that church vigorously sloughed off heresy, and successfully transmitted to us the Christian faith which we have to-day. This is the very faith which we quarrel about two thousand years later, and vainly seek for creeds and formulas which shall transmit it to posterity pure as we hold it, never even faintly suspecting that the scholars and saints which are to follow us might conceivably understand that faith as well as ourselves without consulting our denominational creeds. But it is as certain as that the sun shines and water runs, if they get rid of denominationalism and sectarianism they will prove by that fact alone that they do understand the Christian faith better than we do who have not escaped from these dreadful snares so contrary to the essence of Christianity.
If the coming generation do understand the Christian faith better than we, how presumptuous of us it would be to insist upon writing creeds for them which shall guard and defend a faith which will be nearer the original than our own! The simple fact is that there never was any age except the apostolic age that could dare to write a creed for the Christian church without becoming guilty of audacious presumption. The apostolic age -which knew Christianity best, and therefore had the most right to do so-refrained from writing a creed at a time when all Christian history was before it. Why cannot we refrain from this form of challenging our brethren at a time when possibly the sands of the world's history are nearly run?
Really, however, the apostolic age did write a creed -or had one written for it by the Holy Spirit-that creed was the New Testament. We will give all assent to that; but more we will not either yield or exact.
Perhaps it is an act of faith to launch out into the sea of Christian unity, leaving the protecting shore walls of creeds and denominational barriers; but it is an act that will bring a larger freedom, a richer return for our labor, and an even more secure protection for all the treasures of the faith.
Chapter 5
DO WE NEED CHRISTIAN UNITY?
Unfortunately we often want a good many things that we do not need; and doubtless it would not be too difficult to prove that we need, at times, things which we do not want. I have tried to show that Christian unity is a desirable thing, or at the least that it is not an undesirable thing; let us now attempt to determine if it is merely that alone, or something more. Is it a spiritual luxury about which we may day-dream and indulge wish-fancies, or is it one of the imperative necessities of the times?
And let us not forget that there are some necessities which we can possibly get along without. To be free of slavery would be counted a necessity of the utmost importance by the most materialistic intellectual in America to-day-that is, if it referred to himself personally; otherwise it might be a mere academic question; although freedom is not a material thing which can be weighed and measured-it is a thing of the spirit. But the Negro race got along in America without freedom for over two hundred years. However, just because they managed to exist without freedom is no reason why we should deny that freedom is a real necessity.
Just so, Christians have got along in a divided Christendom for a long time-so long that many regard the idea of unity as a mere chimera of the imagination. But the fact that they have sustained existence without unity is no argument to prove that unity is not a real necessity of the Christian church, and never more so than now. May we now examine some of the reasons why unity is a necessity.
For convenience in looking over our subject let us take the least important one first-although doubtless many persons would count it the most important. I refer to the economic argument against denominational division.
And just at this point let me say that it is in no spirit of niggardly haggling over pennies that I would study the question of waste in the Lord's vineyard. The writer of this is one who gives regularly a tithe of his income to the Lord; and he constantly urges upon all Christians to do the same. I do not deplore the waste in Christian resources either to save one penny more for myself or for others. If I had my way we would save millions more by rigid economy of operation and give millions more by the practice of giving the tenth to God. This is our bounder duty as persons charged by our Lord with the tremendous responsibilities of going into all the world with his gospel.
Let us not then as grasping misers, but as Christian statesmen, survey the field of Christian activities and regard every cent squandered therein or uselessly spent as a form of treason against the great Head of the church.
During the World War many of us remember reading of how the Russian army of the old regime was honeycombed with graft and hobbled with inefficiency. I remember one story of how crates of soldiers' uniforms were shipped to the front; when the crates were opened the uniforms were found to have sleeves not over four inches long. This was an indication that cloth had been spared in order to save money for the contractors, who had doubtless given part of their cruel gains as graft to higher officers to insure the placing of the proper inspection stamp.
The loss to the nation which one or two such frauds involved was doubtless adjudged a trivial thing by the higher-ups benefiting by the transaction; but how they suffered for such wastefulness-both they and the whole nation that winked at it-is now a matter of history.
I do not accuse the denominational officials of graft or dishonest administration of funds entrusted to their care. I believe that so far as common honesty is concerned church business is the most honestly and efficiently managed business in America to-day, bar none. The church is getting finer talent for less money than any other business. And the loss of a church dollar through dishonesty is a thing that almost never happens.
I am not thinking for one moment about money lost through dishonest or inefficient administration; but I am thinking of the money lost through senseless duplication of effort. I am thinking of a host of little denominational colleges where there ought to be one large one with the strength and prestige to challenge the materialism of the State university. I am thinking of the four or five churches in the little crossroads town, fighting each other and disgusting the public, when there ought to be only one commanding the respect of the countryside for miles around. I am thinking-but one's head grows dizzy thinking such thoughts, especially if he has not the mathematician's or the statistician's head for figures. But while I am no statistician I cannot help but wonder what is the amount of the loss involved to the cause of Christ by the duplication of church-houses, parsonages, automobiles, connectional officers, and all the necessary equipment for the maintenance of religious ministry in America to-day.
Whatever it is I feel sure that it would be enough to go a long way-if not all the way-toward discharging America's duty in the fulfillment of Christ's command to go into all the world to preach the gospel to every creature.
If this be true-if our failure to reach the heathen world with the gospel is due to the duplication and waste of our factionalism and our denominationalism-then is this waste seen to be a very serious thing in the eyes of the head of the church.
Doubtless someone will say that if the church were in unity there would be no place for all the preachers in America to-day. It is quite possible that there are some preachers who are following the ministry merely as a profession, as a career. Now, of all the pitiable persons in the world it is the minister who is not in the ministry because God has called him but because he had supposed that was a good way to make a living. I used to condemn such persons very severely: now I merely pity them. For I feel that there are probably a number of good men who are following the ministry without a divine calling because they have not known or felt that such a calling is necessary. They are doing the best they can-and probably often doing good as sincere Christian men. But they are in the hardest business in the world for an insufficient reason. Whenever by some accident such a man gets free of the ministry he experiences such a relief that he generally has no more desire to return.
If the church were able to release all such persons from the pulpit to other forms of Christian service, such as Sunday school and other church work, instead of having a grievance these men would be glad to get free; and the pastor who was left would have sufficient support to maintain his family in decent comfort, so that his children would not grow up hating the church for robbing their innocent childhood by ecclesiastical serfdom and poverty.
Some who really had a divine call would find sufficient funds released to support them as missionaries on the foreign field. This is a career which, in spite of its hardships, seems more desirable to the average minister than any other-a career from which the most of them are kept through sheer inability to go, for, make no mistake about it, the average minister loves the cause of Christ with a true devotion.
We need Christian unity in order to exert the proper Christian influence upon the social order of our time. In saying this I am perfectly well aware that the question of the "social gospel" is still a subject of the keenest controversy between devout and earnest Christians. Therefore I have used the expression-" to exert the proper Christian influence upon the social order"-instead of saying "to Christianize the social order," as the zealous advocate of the "social gospel" would say; for I desire to avoid all controversy upon this point.
Conservatives have often been repulsed from the "social gospel" because it seemed to be another gospel; and to stress political means and ends more than the salvation of the soul through the blood of Christ. Again, there is a difference of opinion among Christians as to what degree it is possible to influence the social order. Many Christians, nowadays, believe it is possible and feasible to Christianize the social order quite completely; others regard that as impossible and nothing less than a denial of God's plan of dealing with the human race.
My contention is that it is not necessary to resolve this conflict in order to maintain our thesis; for even if it be impossible to Christianize the social order completely, surely it is not wrong for us as citizens to make as powerful an impact as possible upon the society of our time-to do all the good we can, in all the ways we can, to as many people as we can. Indeed I think it is possible to prove this assertion to conservative, orthodox Christians by direct appeal to the authority of Holy Scripture; for the Word of God says, "He that giveth, let him do it with simplicity; he that ruleth, with diligence" (Rom. 12: 8). In this country every citizen is legally empowered with the responsibility of rule through the ballot box. To the extent of his opportunity, therefore, it is his Christian duty diligently to rule the government so as to benefit society as much as possible. This he is obligated to do whatever may be his doctrine as to the limit of possible extension of the principles of Christ in modern society.
Probably a majority of all Christians can agree with me that it is our duty as citizens, if possible, to remove the temptations and dangers of alcoholic liquor-and especially the commercial trade therein- from their fellow citizens. Intelligent and thoughtful Christians everywhere are distressed at the spectacle of millions of prospect tive American citizens growing up in educational institutions from which all references to Christianity or even to any religion are carefully excluded. From the kindergarten to the university some of our Christian teachers are as straitly forbidden to name Christ's name to their charges or to enforce his precepts as if they were in a Hindu or Mohammedan land. In fact it is said that Gandhi-who is not a Christian, but a Hindu-gave a course in New Testament history to one of his classes in India. But many a Christian teacher could not do that in a public school in America. He would be liable to prosecution for doing so. It would be against the law-at least in very very many places.
Be sure this barring God and the Bible from our schools is having its effect. It is not without cause that our country has the highest homicide rate in the world, with the fewest convictions. Mechanistic philosophy runs rampant, honeycombing all society and eating into the vitals of the church itself. It is not wild sensationalism to assert calmly and soberly that the root and spring of all this trouble is the fact that children in America are brought up under a form of secularistic teaching that leads many of them to believe that religion is an unimportant, if not a fraudulent thing. As the child sees it, it is clearly not a plain, matter-of-fact truth such as arithmetic or geography. Subconsciously he reasons that it is left out of the school curricula because it is not a certain truth but merely a form of ancient folk-lore, such as fairy tales and other fanciful legends.
In reality, however, religion is not left out of our schools because the best minds of the world regard it as of doubtful truth. Plainly, it must be said that the division among Christian people is the reason why religious training is denied to the vast majority of future American citizens in the public schools of the land. In fear lest they might get the teaching of some sect other than our own, we deny them the privilege of having any religious teaching at all.
And dearly are we paying for our mutual intolerance in this regard. Already the Protestant churches have come to the most discouraging epoch, possibly, in their whole history. Secularism and indifference are eating the heart out of thousands of congregations everywhere to-day. Some blame the automobile, others the radio; but back of it all is the mutual jealousy and distrust of the sects which dooms millions of helpless little ones to grow up under secularistic teaching which sometimes ranges openly into atheism.
If the Christian church were in unity in our land we could put Christian education into our public schools and within a generation we would produce such a change as should stem the fierce, dark tide of crime and atheism and improve the moral complexion of society in America. But this unity might involve our eating the Lord's Supper with Christians who doubt or ignore some ancient creed written before any of us were born.
Let us suppose that the door-bell rings and we go to the door. Perhaps it is a bitter cold day; and there stands a man before us with all the tragedy of the ages, its shame and its pain, graven on his face. Haltingly he tells us that he has a wife and four children at home who are starving. He has been out of work for months, meanwhile haunting the employment offices with that pathetically troubled face. What are we going to do? It avails nothing to say the man may be a faker. Maybe he is, but millions of them are real-their stories are true. I am not a Socialist; but while I was in England a few years ago I saw good Christian brethren who were out of work and were being supported by the government. That struck me as the Christian thing to do under the circumstances; for here is not a theory but a condition. Millions of these people are driven out of work through what is euphemistically called technological employment, which means that machines have displaced them. Here is a condition which grips millions of men, like the iron hand of Fate. Even if all the factories ran full blast there would not be work for all workers, owing to the advance of invention in producing machines which displace men.
What are we as Christians to do about it? Shall we idly wash our hands of the matter because it is not the work of preaching the gospel? Jesus Christ fed the hungry multitudes; and every Christian as a director in the great corporation of America is duty bound to bestir himself to see that while science and industry are making the necessary adjustments -which may take many long years-these people do not starve in the meantime.
Likewise, it is our duty to make provision for the care of the sick and the aged. It is not right to leave this merely to charity, for two reasons: First, an old person who has worked all his life deserves something better than mere charity. Second, in charity only those give who feel generous, and it is rarely sufficient, and often accompanied by humiliating restrictions. It is our duty as directors of the national corporation to levy on the national wealth which these have helped create to care for them in sickness and old age.
A church in unity is needed to make such a system effective in our land. Split into hundreds of sects and at cross purposes with each other, our hope of accomplishing this needed reform is at least not as promising as it ought to be.
Foreign missions is not a mere whim born of some idle brain. The many millions poured out by the Christians of America to this work are not given merely because America is so rich she has to have some outlet for her money, even if she has to give it away. As a matter of fact perhaps the greater part of the money given for foreign missions among us is given by poor people to whom the gift represents a real sacrifice. Foreign missions is the answer of redeemed humanity to a Redeemer who has commanded us to "go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature."
It is only recently that the average Christian of the homeland has become dimly aware that there is something like a crisis developing in the work of foreign missions. The work seems to falter at home and abroad. If the facts were only understood it would be realized that the division among Christians is at the root of the troubles of the missionary work.
When the old-time missionaries went out in most cases they found a people so ignorant and childlike in their lack of knowledge of the world that the state of Christendom at home did not appear upon the horizon of their thought. If the missionary was the representative of a given denomination these people were unaware that there was any different denomination in the world. They looked up to the missionary like children to their father and took what he said with the utmost naivete.
But that day has passed in nearly every mission station of the world. And to check the sneer of the cynic let me say that it was the work of the missionary himself that caused it to pass. Working in the spirit of John the Baptist, who said, "He must increase, but I must decrease, " they educated their charges until they developed into persons of culture with a wide knowledge of the world. In this way it has come to pass that some of the most cultured people and keenest thinkers in the world to-day are on the mission fields.
In addition, spurred by the example of the missionaries, the governments of the mission lands have themselves instituted schools; and in these schools they have given an education sometimes hostile to Christianity.
The net result has been that Christianity never has been anywhere nor at any time so keenly analyzed and dissected as in those very mission fields where the Protestant churches are trying to win converts from the ancient ethnic faiths. It would do any self-satisfied and egotistic American Christian good to know how these non-Christian peoples search out our weakness with unerring precision. They have censured the unemployment brutally ignored by us. Our bootlegging and crime are noted by them, as well as our prostitution and graft. The grave eyes of Oriental philosophers gaze critically into inhuman prison conditions about which we never take the trouble to inquire at all. They wonder why people who profess to love and serve a Lord who taught that visiting those sick and in prison was a part of his service-they wonder why such people can be so oblivious of the fate of the prisoner. In short, Oriental critics of Christianity know our social and religious shortcomings much better than we do ourselves.
They might forgive us some things, however, but they cannot overlook the fact that we are split into hundreds of divisions which used to be called "warring sects," but which have lately come upon a more or less well-observed truce.
And thus it is that while the old-time missionary taught a people who were unaware of our divisions, the modern missionary attempts to teach a people who understand the matter too well by far for the prestige and influence of his message.
We have not let the matter stay at home where only the upper classes could come and find out about it. We have exported our sectarianism so that the peasant in the rice fields of China and the savage in the wilds of Africa is called upon to decide between the doctrines of Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, Wesley, and hundreds of others; and sometimes he must also decide whether he wants his religion marked North or South, which of course means north or south of the Ohio River in America sixty-five years ago.
The politicians have cured the breach between North and South in the nation long ago, and now have no North nor South, but one united nation; but the ecclesiastics cannot forgive so easily, but ask heathen and savages to decide anew the old questions which were decided for us as a nation at the time of the Civil War. When I was a boy a familiar gibe among the rustic wits was to say that a person did not know that the War was over yet-meaning the Civil War of 1861-65. Some of our ecclesiastics seem also not to have learned that historic fact.
It has now come to the pass where denominational divisions are a stumblingblock to the efficacy of the gospel among the heathen. There are three hundred and eighty different missionary societies in the world, operating on the mission fields. In some cases one denomination may have and does have more than one society, and they all work in harmony; but in a very real sense this large array represents very graphically the sad division of the forces of Protestant Christianity. Take China, for instance: there are one hundred and thirty-eight different missionary societies in China alone. Even little Japan has fifty-three separate missionary societies.
And then think of the little country of Palestine- the cradle of ancient Christianity. This is a district about ninety-five miles long and the same in width. In this little district about the size of two average counties in America there are seventeen separate and distinct Protestant missionary societies, besides the missions of the Greek Catholic and the Roman Catholic Churches. In addition to these there are also several Oriental churches.
Does it take much imagination to wonder if the eyes of the Son of Man grow clouded with sorrow at this exhibition of disunity among his followers in the very land where he prayed that "they all may be one " 7
Protestantism does not have to go beyond the seas to meet its critics. It can find them right here at home-and within its own fold. For it the time has come when a man's foes shall be they of his own household. Much of this criticism is unreasoning and unreasonable. It springs from depraved hearts who do not wish to subject themselves to the moral discipline which Protestantism imposes. Others have a financial interest in the perpetuation of evils and abuses which Protestantism opposes. Thus for one reason or another much of this criticism may be discounted entirely.
But Protestantism cannot discount the fact that some of its best friends, and some of the soberest and sincerest thinkers of the time, are saying that its divisions are a grievous hindrance to the spread of the gospel in our home land.
These thinkers say-and rightly I think-that a divided church is at a decided disadvantage in meeting the present widespread unbelief and the appalling lowering of morals that has resulted therefrom. Not bootlegging alone, but all forms of criminal activity abound as never before. Our cities are honey-combed with graft and the foulest corruption. It no longer occasions surprise to hear that even a judge on the bench is leagued with gangs of murderers and criminals of the vilest type.
Lying, dishonesty, and sexual immorality abound widely. Many people hoot at such statements and point out the complaints of contemporaries to the morals of every age in turn, averring that all have been about alike. However a retrospective view of history shows that this is not the case. Clearly some ages have been much worse than others; and the verdict of history will undoubtedly be that this is one of the most corrupt and godless of all time.
Even Mr. H. G. Wells is a witness. Referring to the rise of the doctrine of evolution and the consequent strife, he says: "The immediate effect of this great dispute upon the ideas and methods of people in the prosperous and influential classes throughout the Westernized world was very detrimental indeed" (the Outline of History, vol. II, p. 422). He then goes on to argue that what he calls a misunderstanding of Darwinism created a state of mind which lowered the moral tone of modern society. He is convinced that the spread of these ideas has engendered a general state of doubt concerning the fundamentals of religion to the extent that there was a much higher percentage of people among the well to-do in the seventeenth century who tried to do the right thing than there was at the beginning of the Twentieth Century. This is a reasonable conclusion. And one might add that the progress of the present century has only served to scatter these godless ideas and doctrines and their consequent moral behavior among the whole mass of the common people more widely than ever before.
There is no reasonable doubt but that if our present widespread education was also accompanied by a seventeenth century belief in Cod that social legislation-and social morality-would have lifted the lot of the workingman to a place far above what it is to-day.
We have not drifted from our subject. Our thesis is that this crisis in beliefs and in morals is a stern challenge to the church to rid itself of the smothering incubus of denominational division and to rise with all its might to meet the most dangerous situation it has ever seen in all history. Men are saying everywhere that Protestantism is dying; and it is open to the friends of evangelical Christianity to meet the questions of sincere thinkers with the utmost frankness. And when these tell us that division is one of the greatest hindrances which modern Christianity is forced to labor under, let us bravely admit it, instead of questioning their motives or evading the issue.
But more compelling reasons may be found-if more compelling reasons were needed-in the very nature of the Christian religion itself. The apostle of old has asked a question which rebukes our division. "Is Christ divided?" he enquired of the sectaries of ancient Corinth. If he were in America would he not ask the same of us to-day?
Christ is one; and it is the universal belief of Christendom that every saved soul is a member of his mystical body-is, in fact, a member of the living Christ. It is one of the scandals of Christendom that we have interpreted the doctrine of the spiritual unity of the church in a way to justify organic division; whereas it must be apparent to the meanest intelligence that the spiritual unity of the church is one of the strongest arguments why there should be an organic, visible unity to demonstrate that spiritual unity to the unbelieving world.
The Bible teaches a spiritual unity between husband and wife, similar in nature, in fact, to that which subsists between Christ and his church (Eph. 5: 2532). Does this spiritual unity between husband and wife justify them in separating on the theory that they are in unity anyhow? Every thinking person knows that the spiritual unity of husband and wife is the tie and bond which makes their visible unity possible and necessary. Does a couple demonstrate their spiritual unity by quarreling, separating, and living apart? Everybody knows that they demonstrate the existence of spiritual unity by manifesting a love which enables them to get along together in visible unity.
The visible unity of all true Christians would set up such mighty tides of spiritual power that the strongest saint in Christendom would become a more devout and spiritual person; and the laggards and near-backsliders would be quickened by a thrill of enthusiasm which would hearten every weary and discouraged Christian in the world. Every interest of the church would spring forward like an old- fashioned carriage which was dragged out of the deep mud onto a concrete pavement.
No thoughtful reader of the New Testament needs to be told that that foundation document of the Christian doctrine is replete with exhortations and commands to Christians to maintain a visible unity among themselves. Over and over the theme is stressed.
"Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there he no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment" (I Cor. 1: 10).
It was Paul's desire " that there should be no schism in the body; but that the members should have the same care one for another" (Ch. 12: 25). This means that all Christians (the members) of Christ should have the same care one for another. Let us try to understand it, as we doubtless shall at the judgment seat of Christ. That means that a Lutheran should have the same care for a Methodist or Presbyterian as he has for a brother Lutheran and vice versa. If he does not he sins against the commandment of St. Paul. If he does he will probably find that the denominational organizations are a hindrance rather than a help to him in carrying out the apostolic injunction.
Paul condemned divisions more strongly than scarce any modern responsible writer would be able to condemn. He wrote: "And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ . . . For ye are yet carnal for whereas there is among you envying, and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men ? " (I Cor. 3 :1-3).
[ Continued...See Link Below... ]