Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1875-11-24
SERMON.

SERMON.
Preached at Plymeuth Church. N1ii-
vaukee. by Rev. y. h. Dudley, sam
day June 23d. 1s72.
(Reported by Roby & Burke.)
Galations Fourth Eighth and Eleventh
Verses, inclusive:
Glow be it then " hen We knew not God,
We did service unto them which By nature
are Gods; but now after thatye have known
God. or rather are known of God how turn
YOU again to the weak and teggarly ele-
ments wherenpon you desire to be in bond
ace. Not observing DAYS aud mons hs and
time; and vet. am afraid of you lest |
have bestowed upon you labor in vain.
One Of the hardest things men ever IN
dertake to do is to wean themselves from
the traditions of an elder 'aith. 1t is cx-
ceedingly difficult to persuade them thai the
ritual, or the symbol local and transitory
is rot also universal and ornament. It is
scade men. first 10 seek and ascertain the
spirit OF the law; aud then interpret the
letter IL the light eff that spirit. The
proneneSs and lreposterodsness OF faith
works the grain the other WAY.
We have standard illustration of this in
the early fortunes OF Christianity. For
when Christ came into the world. instead
of taking Him as the spirit and inserpresa-
ton of the old ritual, and letter, they stuck
to that to the death, and rejected The live
out-coming, and inspired Interpretation.
Born at home as Christianity was. in the
household of the ancient faitE, there was
nobody present TO give welcome. They
were the Jews then. Instead of taxing the
spirit of the ancient dispensation. born in
the falness of time, how difficult it was for
men to wean themselves from the old-the
bygone-and the Obsolete. Those of
Christ's own household conspired with the
Gentites, as the record would seem to teach
In even putting Him to death--clipging to
the dead instead of the new born. We
know very well that the entire life Of Paul
was welded aud persistent argument on
this very point
The Epistle to the Galations is fnll of
logic whereby the great postle Is attempt
ing to disentangle the Christian converts
from the Jewish ritual, and tradition The
con slant tendency was to fall back to those
beggarly elements, out Of which the new
birth had come-a clinging to.the past-aa
unweaned tenacity for the life that once
2ourished it, and fse and thirty centuries
have already rolled away to find The moo
their old traditions, leaving il the ancient
wardrobes the vesture OF Moses forever
They are doing it nnder your very eyes
They are putting some of US protested Chris
tians to shame in, that we cling to the
mere forms OF ancient belief. whereas they
are shaking of the forms, and striking for
for what was then permanent in them, and
asserting it in the forms of the hour. Our
creeds, our stated preaching abound in the
diction of the Mosaic altar.
We pin our faith greatly upon Offices,
upon usages, and to greatextent Christen-
dom constructs the form of the church It.
self upon the three-fold type of that old
dspensation, gone out of tie world by
nearly forty centuries. It's cultus we
hold onto. We instil it into the minds of
children Their earliest associations of re-
ligion are colored with a usage that was
right and proper in the raw infancy OF the
world, but no more adapted to our life than
Ptolemy was to Copermieus.
The Orient rules the Occident IL religion.
The lisping childhood; the prattling, play
ing infancy of our faith, gives law and
binding authority to the manhood Of the
hour. The p ovidence of God today mas
less sway over what you and I believe,
think and feel, than the Hebrew coastitu-
tion-the Mosaic eultuS Instituted long cen
turtles age.
But having sail this, of course we are
not done. Beneath all that against which
Paul.waraed the early disciples, there aow-
ed an under-ehannel of meaning, which w
destined to crop oat here and there all alone
the way Of time; giving nurture and sus-
tenance, and bringing to life ereat diver
stir in human thought and character. The
under current is what we want that which
was the same to-day, yesterday and fer
ever. What is Levisicus to US? Are you
governed by Lesiticus? What is your idea
of creation? The account OF it given in