Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-06-19
THE APOSTLES CREED,
Hodern Progress Is Making Wider
the Gate Into the Church.
THERE ARE BUT FEW ESSENTIALS.
The Central Figure of It all Is Him Who
Died Upon the Cross
Room FOR HONEST DIFFERENCES
rwxrrrs FOR THE D1srArcs.,

rwRrrTEN FOR THE DIsPATcHt
Some day, when we are all wiser and
better than we are st present. We will be
satisfied to take the Apostles Creed Al the
sufficient statement Of our faith. Not of
our individual faith. perhaps-we may be-
lieye great deal more than that-but of
our common faith. We will be content If
our brethren believe rs much as that We
will account Is orthodox all who can recite
the brief creed of the apostles
We will not tear up all the old confess
sions, nor abrogate the articles, nor annul
the DEGREES We will keep these venerable
documents upon our bookshelves for refe
ence, for guidance, for the sake of the i'm
portant part which they have played IN
ecclesiastical history. and, in great measure,
for their intrinsic value For all these old
dogmatic statements have q good deal Of
truth in them; let us not deny that. There
will be no objection, ,even in the millennium,
to complete acceptance of the entire West
minister theology by anybody who will. But
we will not insist that everybody else must
also accept the conclusions of the West
minister diyines.
All Can't Believe Alike.
That is the great mistake Of the creed
makers, that they want to make all people
believe exactly alike to the remotest par
ticular And that is against human nature.
God did not make US that way. God never
meant that the creed should be monotoned
by any Christian congregation; that is, that
all believers should recite it in one tone of
voice. He meant that it should be psalm
of praise, sung with the harmony Of all the
parts, hundred different voices joining IN
it together. making it musical.
1t is we'll that we should agree in certain
essentials But the probability is that we
will make these essentials fewer and fewer,
agreeing in thousand other things to dis
agree, until we get to the Apostles Creed
Then we may desire to attain to still
greater height OF simplicity. And we may
come at last to the brief creed ofSt. Peter. the
only creed which has received the direct
commendation of the Lord Jesus Christ
'sThou art the Christ the Soh Of the living
God" We may some time be satisfied to
admit into the Christian Church all who
can say that. But we are as yet long way
of from that blessed simplicity. We in
sist that our brethren must believe hun
dred times az much as that The apostles
themselves would, no doubt, find dificulty
in getting into some Of our religious de-
nominations.
A Wide Gate Into the Church.
It seems as If the great desire of ssme
Christians is to keep out of the church as
many people as they can. Whereas the
voice Of the church, when Christ and the
apostles uttered it, was the voice of invita-
tion. We ought to want to make the gate
into the church a. wide as we oen. And
the Apostles Greed makes q good wide gate
The doctrine of the church ought to be
contained within the limits Of the creed.
The doctrine of the individual may have
no limit at all. But let Us agree In this.
The heart of the creed is Christ The mid
die part of the creed tells US who Christ is
and what he did. The first part and the
last tell us what Christ taught
Even the Apostles Creed, however, is
not so plain and definite but that 1t offers q
choice of meanings. The truth with which
it is concerned is so vast that there must of
necessity be room for various points of
view, Even the creed is not written in the
language of mathematics. What want to
do to-day is to make . brief journey
through the Apostles Greed, commenting
upon certain parts Of 1t which offer an op-
portunity of mistake, or which need expla-
nation. Then I purpose to say something
about the reason for our acceptance of the
statements of the creed.
Where There's Room for Dinersncs.
"He descended into hell" There are two
words in the original Languages of the Bible
which in our authorized English version are
translated 'thelL" One is "gehenna,"
which means the place Of punishment The
other is "hades," which means the place of
departed spirits. The word in the creed has
the second of these meanings The article
death of Christ He was buried, his body
was put into the grave; and he descended
into hell-his soul went into the place of
departed spirits. Associated also with this
article, is the belief, which is suggested by
various passages Of Holy Scripture, that
heaven does not follow Immediately after
the death even of the faithful, but that all
souls wait in paradise till the kingdom of
God shall come.
'.The Communion of Saints" is another
article in which it is possible to read the
same suggestion as to the life which follows
death. Death does not separate the soul
here and they who have gone before Join
in prayer and alteration in the presence of
the same God.
'The forgiveness of sins" does not mean
a change in the sinners condition as re-.
CARDS his sin; there is no interruption be-
tween cause and consequence; there is no
denial of the text which tells us that 'what-
soever a man soweth, that shall he also
reap" The change is in the relation be-
tween the sinner and the heavenly Father
The sinner turns away from God. He sets
a separation between himself and God But
the love of God is uncessing. And when
ever any sinner turns back, and Is sorry,
and loves God again, the Father in heaven
has in instant welcome for him. He is not
the same as if he had not sinnej. He may
indeed, be the better for the fall and the
lesson it has taught him. But he is for
given. There is mutual love again be-
tween God and the sinner.
Differences rs to the Resurrection.
As for the resurrection of the body" we
NAV interpret that according to the sense of
Holv Scripture. St. Paul says that the
BODY with which We will be clothed in the
resurrection is not the body which is put
into the grave, God will give US another
body, aspiritual body. And yet in identity
the same body, as plant and the seed out
of which it grows are esentially the same.
And capable of recognition, even as Christ,
after his resurrection, having . body posses
sing new and marvellous properties, was yet
LnSu,p nv those WIN loved him.