The Caucasian. (Clinton, N.C.) 188?-1913, 1893-06-29

and he - afraid not 20 take IT. A minis
, trv az power il q ministry OF freeion.
ministry that thinks for itself and acts
a. ls.l by the spirit Of God The minis
.rr who survives and i Of the church
, triumphant viii therefore De prophet
no. a priest: a leader. not an echo. ne
will be led by the splrii u TOD. not os
the traditions Of men. The keynote Il
his creed viii be freedom q: thought and
r~y,rress in k1scwlesige. by their fruits
go small know them 4 ministry that
has no fruit is dead ministry. IL may
be IS orthodox as the recent general as
seinLly Of the Presbyterian church. but
il il bear no fruit it nigh; lie as heter-
odox as the devil for all that il amounts
10 in the history Of humanity. The or
thoiox church Is the church that saves
men The orthodox ministry Is the min
istry of power unto salvation, and this Is
lie rlinistry Of faith which is the true
successor of st Peer IF old.
Seoond-It Is "a certainty that this
church triumphant will be a saving pow
or. IL will be known as church simply
because il saves the world. There are
two conceptions of church current to-
day. One is the election idea: the other
is the commission idea. The one is an
aggregation of saints met together for
self eSlifcauon and self enjoyment, gath
cred apart and ont of the world. not
even in it. The other is Z community
army. sent forth in the world. to live in
it, to die in it and for it. The one means
/ isolation, the other conduct. The one
means tradition. the other life. The one
! that will survive is the one that saves.
| The church that has no saving quality is
good for nothing but to be cast out and
| trodden under foot of men. I'VE are the
| salt of the earth" The work of the
church is the salvation Of this world,
here and now-this whole world, man in
his entire relations. And the church
which lives in this crowded center of
modern life must be church that
touches with saving power every ramifi-
cation of life. Man is spiritual being
He is moral being He is physical
being. The church must save him
spirit, soul and body. If the church of
Jesus Christ does not thus touch man, it
must die and other powers take its place.
TRADITIONAL ToMBS.
Its first work must of necessity be q
spiritual one. 1t must stand for and
emphasize the eternal, spiritual verities
and their triumph over matter. 1t must
bear witness to the truth thus-it must
present to thoughtless world the great
problem ever fresh. What shall it
profit a man if he gain the whole world
and forfeit his life" II must teach with
renewed emphasis from day to day that
mans life does not consist in the
abundance of the things that he NAV
possess There are plenty of dead
churches in our great cities, that are
dead because they have preached no such
thing, and they died because they did
not preach it, and wealth and pride and
vanity have taken possession and eaten
them up, and the spirit of God has de-
parted. The church that lives and sur
wives will be one that leads back to the
Fatherthe wandering child, the orphan
world. 1t must be full of zeal for man.
1t must be full of faith in man as it has
faith in God. The life of Jesus shows
boundless faith in man. The infidelity
that refuses to believe in the possibility
of saving men is as mean and as bias
phemous as the infidelity that refuses as.
sent to the postulate of the Godhead. |
The worship of God is the service of |
man. if Jesus is to be believed.
The Protestant church if it must tri- |
umph must go back to Catholicism and |
learn again the lesson which it has for. |
gotten, and it is that mans spiritual ma
ture is bound up whether he will or not |
with his body. We must relearn the
TACT that there Is gospel of the body; |
that the body Is an organ of the soul;
that there is physical basis even of sal
Walton; that Jesus healed the sick and
fed the hungry; that he came with heal
ing In his touch; that he recognized the
tremendous power of this work over the
soul The church must have its gospel
OF healing. 1t must build its hospitals
rather than its dismal, traditional tombs
with stained glass windows and solemn
churches. 1t needs corps of evangelist
- consecrated doctors -who |
preach the gospel of Jesus as they heal
the bodies of men.
The church that saves man TODAY must
touch the intellectual part of man.
man s reason Is an organ of the soul
turned toward God, not toward matter.
1t is here that we apprehend the Bible.
1t Is here that we reach the full sweep of
The deep truths of religion. It ia the
WORK OF the church to apply here the
simple gospel to every human deed and
every human relation. The church must
solve some of the mightiest problems of
human philosophy and of social science
the church prove the cure all for bu-
nan LIS In our great modern city. 1t is
hard work to do and do tboroughlv
t Is hard to tell the truth and make tSe
'aStlc application at all times to men
md to society. If the salt have saving
power, 1t must be rubbed in. A disserta.
ION ABOUT salt will never accomplish the
Work. An exposition of the theory of a
mustard plaster will not cure anv man
must be put On him. So the cbnrcb B
nat trlulnphs must be the church that a
'reaches-that applies practical gosnel b
II saiVatlon TO men as men are TODAY. TO
oclety as 1t Is today, to the city as it lies g
all IT'S darkness, in all its suualor and c
'retchedness and sin and crime. a
sENsATIoNALIsM.
inlrd-Sucn church triumphant will r
e church that returns to aposto1ic Y
ympathy IN method. By this I do not T
leal that we are to wear sandals, as the :!
posties did. do not mean that we ara q
copy all their ceremonies or all their a
orms. But do mean that we are to q
oI INTO practice in the nineteenth cen.
lry the apostolic spirit with the amos
5nc IDEAL before we can hope for a a. q
horcn triumphant. The idea of Panl CT
ne greatest Of all the apostles. was
implicitly itself. He took the che fror, Of
IS masters lips, I'VE shall know them Ii
y thelr fruits" The method of Panl CT
as the method of success. and If ia - q
a arr, contrast with some modern
leais. Inc secret of his success is found
TINS simple statement of his methods.