The Hawaiian gazette., 1872-03-06
A Remarkable Sermon by a Uni
tartan Minister.

tartan Minister.
REV George epworth pastor the Church Of the Mes
ah in this city, one Of the most popular preachers in tn,
Unitarian His church always crowded and
largely by young men, who attracted by his ezuesuess
and eloquence On Christmas day he preached sermon
which has excited good attention. in it he
to approach orthodox views Of the person Of Christ
than is common among Unarians 1t iswOth quoting from
as sign the times We take the condensed report pub
Iished in the Herald Of tuesday,
Mr. Hepworth's text was taken from John /. is
-"The only begotten Son, which is in the bosom
Of the Father" He said Dear friends, want to
talk to you very plainly and very frankly this morn
ing, and npon a subject OF the greatest importance
do not care at this time interesting aud instructive
as it might be- to talk of the evidences OF Christian
ty take il for granted that all admit what the
socalled evidences assert-namely, that the Scrip
lures are an inspired revelation from God. Neither
care 20 into the question OF the various read
iugs, agreeable as that will be on another occasion;
but / shah presume upon your acceptance OF the
general text OF the New Testament it stands only
promising that the words shall quote are regarded
by the scholars as valid parts of the Scriptures
One cannot read the accounts of the Evaugeliss
without being struck with the constant use by Christ
Of the pronouns / and Ne IfGuy one else should
use them frequently we should call it arrogance
or conceit; but in Him We think It natural result
/ Of true royalty We should not tolerate it for an
instant in Luther Calvin, 10 not even in Moses or
Paul, but It is as becoming to Christ as crown is
TO king. First / want TO speak of Christ as a
Theological Dogma. l know very little about the
science of theology and less for it. 1t was al
ways very dry study to me, but this dogma is the
basic element of my system, and therefore l speak
of it. cannot resist the feclingit has grown part
ly out of the way in which read the Bible and
partly out OF my own religious consciousness-that
Chrsts life an Gods life are netricably interviewer
and interlaced. l am bound to believe in Christ's
divinity or else tear certain texts up by the roots
which am wholly unwilling TO do. When Jesus, in
prayer, says, Father glorify Ne with Thine
own self, with the glory which had with Thee be-
fore the world was ~ cannot evade the conviction
that the words, plainly as any words can, in
tended to assert precxistence. If they do not dis
tincy say that Christ is coeya with God, then Ifa
to comprehend the meaning of the passage Now,
you may honestly deny the fact by openly doubsng
the correctness of the text. But, admitting the
text, the deduction Is plain. Again, when He says
" If man love Ne, my Father will love him, aud
We will come unto him and take up Our abode with !
him. think he clearly intimates power coord |
nate with that of God. 1 don't see how the conclu
sion can be avoided, provided you admit the cor
rectness of the text do believe this. You ask |
me- Did the Jews have any hint of this 1 think
they did. On one occasion they took up stones to
stone Him on the charge of blasphemy, saying that
BE made Himself equal with God.
Second, having placed myself right on the dogma, /
come 10 speak of its historical value. I believe |
that the dogma, as have stated it, has saved the
world and done more than anything else to mould |
modern society. IfChrist had been mere man, |
great reformer, the changes he introduced would |
have died out and His voice though it spoke in ca-
rion ones would have died into 4 very dim and dis
tant echo long before this. The Church was built
on the divinity OF Christ: it would not have sur
vived iii had not been, and the Church saved the
seeds of the civilization from among the ruins
of the old Luther and Calvin the martyrs, and all
the giants of those carly times, were but the bench
men Of Christ. They were His servants, and He
made them, and in His promise TO be with them,
just God is with men, and in the full power OF God
to help, they were born into heroes and martyrs
In the third place, I want TO speak of the value of
this dogma in personal religion. Dear friends, TO
whom we invited to go for help in troubles?
To whom do We naturally go for consolation? God
is very vague; We have, We can have, no distinct
conception of Him. But Jesus-that is, that mani
festation of God which came upon the earth and
went through the whole round of our troubles-He
is our friend and He tells us to come TO Him Shall
we do it? He says he is the Shepherd. Can you
get beyond the Shepherd, do you want to? He
says He is the Door You tell me, yes but the
Door is not the Temple. True: but is it not part
of the Templeg aud so important part of the Tenn
pie that without the Door the Temple itsefis worth
nothing. He says, Come uGto Me- &c. Again,
q II We shall ask anything in My name Twill do it,
! might quote indefinitely, but this is enough.
come lastly to speak of the institutional value of
the dogma. 1t is the only possible basis of orgaui
cation. 1t gives two works to Accomplished
ourselves and then to save the rest Of the world
Atheism can't organize. 1t never has done so; it
never will Radicalsm can't organize. One must
have faith to organize. Radicalism is cold; it al
ways seems to me like hen brooding on stone eggs
1t may warm them with the heat of its own body,
but after ALL the eggs stone, and can never bring
forth life. What may not this dogma be to you?
If you are week-and who is not-you go to
Christ aud get strong: il you siufu-and who is
not-you can 20 to Christ and be forgiven. i'm
ricitly believe all this and OF it would found this
church heartily believe it, and by means Of it I
would save my own soul and yours.