The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1888-07-14

the organic things around US, of the
God that made them all, nor stopped
with the lifeless and the speechless, but
in the end made mani Question, and
always come away with the feeling
that the answer does not entirely sat-
isfy, mind and heart reaching out for
an answer that shall cut the difficulties,
or rather so weld them that we see
they are but links in one great chain.
Nay, no more of this, for the Great
Mediator makes all things plain
The grave is felt now to be only the
dark room into which we tenderly lay
by the garments which the spirit has
worn during its earthly sojourn,-a
place which has really nothing to do
with our real selves, any more than has
the cedar chest into which in the spring
time we put our heavy and no longer
needed winter garments. We do not
think of the grave now, when our
friends die, but of the heaven to which
they have gone,-their new home, of
which this was only the vestibule.
We do not think of the grace now,
when aue are dying, but of the heaven
to which we are going, going to meet
those who started earlier in time.
Christ Jesus, the Great Mediator, has
revealed to us the fact that there is no
death, -"what seems so is transition"
and thus there has come to us through
him divine strength, a boundless
capacity of trust; and our broken affec-
tions instead of bringing us a ceaseless
sorrow, bring ceaseless joy, for it is a
| joy unspeakable and full of glory to
know that those who have gone from
us have gone directly to angelic care,
to the mansions Of the blessed, to the
personal presence Of the Son and the
Father. o, if this Mediator had done
nothing else but reveal the life immor-
tai, the life that shall make all holy
and happy, our gratitude should be un-
creasing, yelling up from the hearts
deepest fountains.
But Christ Jesus, the Mediator, did
even more than this for us. He revealed
the sublime doctrine of the atonement,
or the reconciliation. Coming down
from heaven himself, that is, coming
to us with such an abundance of the
Fathers spirit in him that he carried
his heaven with him always and wher-
ever he went, he mediated between the
law of God which makes for purity and
peace, and the law of the flesh which
makes for grossness and battle,-he
mediated between righteousness and
sin, bringing US out of the lower into
the higher human life, into union with
the Father, or as the beautiful old
word has it, into an at one ment with the
Father, into one mind with them, or
one tone with him. In one mind with
the Father our ways are his ways,
except for the mighty difference
between the finite and the infinite, but
according to our measure Of reception,
and our ability for execution, our ways
are Gods ways. In one tone with the
Father our lives might be sung to the
same music we sing the glories of the
Father, save only for that same differ
ence, the infinite SO far above US, but
in quality the music of our lives will
be the same as his, full of love towarde
every living being, having tender feel
ing even for the flowers that watt their
perfume to US, and for the birds that
make the morning and the evening vocal
with native and vesper hymns, and
loving our neighbor as ourselves, and
realizing too that our neighbor is not
simply he or she who lives next door to
us, but the one who needs our help,
whether he or she live under our roof
or thousand miles away.
To lead us to live the life of the
reconciled, or the life of those who are
of the same mind as God, or in tone
with him, that is the second great work
of the Great Mediator, the complement
of the first. Immortal life for the
spirit when it puts off the flesh, eternal
life for the spirit while it wears the
flesh, to reveal these two lives came
the great Redeemer, and thus looming
down from heaven" he brought the
days of heaven with him, and it is our
own fault if we do not find and keep
these days, these days which glorify
earth and make angels of us even here.
CAROLINE A. SoULE.