The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1895-02-02

nlmSelI 10 De anu TIC WHO, III mummy, III
selfforgetfulness, in joyful trust, is most
perfectly child of the Father is the great
est of all in the Kingdom of heaven.
2. The Crime of WrOnging the
Helpless,-vs. SO.
Jesus then drew the moral of the mo-
mentous fact he had now stated. He had
taught that men are to value themselves
because they are children of God; now he
declares, as the logical outcome of this
truth, that all souls are to be valued as
Gods children.
Whose shall yecei5e one such Hftle child
in my name, yecei0eth me. The disciples
had asked of him what they could do to
gain his favor and receive his highest hon
ors; he tells them that to become the serv-
ant of a child, any child of God, any needy
soul, is to serve him. Do good to the
child to the weak one; that is to serve me,
the Son of Man.
And conversely, from the same pre-
misses: Whose shall cause one Of these
little ones 7Vjzich 6elie0e on me to to stun
BILE, it as brgfta6le fov him that a great
milestone aOeye Hanged about his neck, and
that he should be SINK in the depth Of the
sea. Love here shows its stern righteous
ness. Precisely because it is SO sublime
thing, because it is such direct service of
the Christ, to do service to a helpless
little soul, it is CORRESPONDENCE an awful
thing to do harm to helpless little soul,
to cause it to sin. Better for you says the
Teacher, that you have fastened about
your neck one of the great millstones,-so
great that an ass and not woman must
turn it,-and that with this weight upon
you you be plunged into the sea, than that
you cause one of these helpless little souls
who are striving to do right to stumble in
the righteous way and fall down into the
sinful way.
Jesus enlarges his moral. He could not
thoughtfully look at the little innocent up
on his knees,-no one could, without this
thought coming to his mind: The purity
of this white soul must in future years,
alas, be furnished in this evil world. With
reference to this sad fact the Master
speaks: Woe unto tie zv0yld because of
occasions Of stum6ltneI for it must needs
be that tie occasions conn; bit zoe TO that
man Dyo1gh qOhom the occasion comefhI
Inevitable, it may be, that the innocen.
shall be tempted and that many innocent
ones shall fall; but nevertheless woe to
you if you tempt the innocent; the sinful
ness of humanity will be no palliation of
your personal sin, when you do wrong to
one of Gods little ones.
And still Jesus enlarges the moral. He
tells his disciples that their chief ambition
and integrity of childhood to God. With
the imagery of the Orient he says: If thy
hand or thy foot canSeth thee to stumble,
that is if any act your hands are habitu-
ally doing or any path your foot is habitu-
ally treading, is causing you to fail of real
lied childhood to God,-cwtt off and cast
it from Mee,-that is, abjure the wrong
act, turn back from the wrong path. as
good for thee to enter into life manned or
har, rather than havine tqVo hands or
fz00 feet TO be cast into eternal tire. In
other phrasing: Do not attempt to live
double life. 1t is impossible to secure at
the same time both the qualification of lust
and the true life of the soul. To continue
the wrong deeds and pursue the wrong
path will make necessary the painful
atontan fire that must purify dross from
all sinful souls
And again Jesus says If thine eye-here
sgnifying vision, or the thing the heart
ovets,-canSeth thee to stumble, Pluek it
ont and cast 1t from thee His disciples,
or some of them, had seen in reckoning
vision the places of visible honor in the
Messiahs kingdom; on these and such
things they had fixed their desiring gaze.
Jesus now tells them to drive this vision
out of their breasts. II is good, he says,
for thee to enter into life qOitA enc eye
that is, with the false vision banished,-
rather than havtng t70O eyes to be cast into
tie hell 0ffre,--that is, to be cast as offal
into the cleansing fires of the Valley of
Hinnom. The shell of fire." or Gehenna,
was literally the valley where the garbage
of Jerusalem was burned. The necessary
inference is that there are spiritual fires, or
pains and agonies, that will serve a cor
responding purifying process for sinful
souls.
Jesus warns his disciples, and through
them he warns US, that it is only by purity
of act, by choice of the right path, by over
coming all false ambitions, that Gods chill
dren can escape Gods purifying fires.
3. In Childhood is a Prophecy
of Heaven 1914.
Jesus then returned from these impress
sive cancellations to the more immediate
suggestions of the little child on his knees.
1t is of the worth of child he now speaks:
See that .ye deSpise not one Of these kitfke
ones, tor I say into y0n that in heaOen
their angels do aIzOayS 6ehOld tie face Of
my Father 7Vhich is in heaven.
Whether Jesus intended by this language
an endorsement of the doctrine of guardian
angels prevalent in his day among the
Jews, is an open question Many scholars
believe that he gave the common doctrine
approval. Such, We remember, was DR..
Fishers opinion at Canton years ago; he
believed it to be the Great Teachers teach
ing, as it was his own conviction, that souls
in the earth have special guardians or
attendants in the Invisible realm.
But the main affirmation Of tie Master