The enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 188?-1899, 1895-03-06

NOuAd ROOIs 4hC OhdAOA Va
God has bestowed its chief care on one
acre, and has raised splendid men and
women in that small enclosure, but the
field is the world. That means North
and South America, Europe, Asia and
Africa, and all the islands of the sea-
1t is as though after great battle
there were left 5000 wounded and dy-
ing on the field, and three surgeons
gave all their time to three patients
under their charge. The major general
comes in and says to the doctors:
Come out here and look at the nearly
$4,000 dying for lack of surgical attend
ance." NO" say the three doctors,
standing there and tanning their pa
tients, 1--WE have three important cases
here and we are attending them, and
when we are not positively busy with
their wounds, it takes all our time to
keep the flies off. +" In this awful bat
tie of sin and sorrow, where millions
have fallen on millions, do not let us
spend all our time in taking care of
few people, and when the command
comes: 60 into the world" say prac-
tically: mo. cannot go; have here
a few choice cases, and am busy
keeping off the fies."
There are multitudes to-day who
have never had any Christian worker
look them in the eye, and with earnest
ness in the accentuation say: Gomez
or they would long ago have been in
the kingdom. My friends, religion is
either sham or a tremendous real
ity. lf it be a sham, let us cease to
have anything to do with Christian as
sociation. If it be a reality, then
great populations are on their way to
the bar of God untitled for the ordeal,
and what are we doing?
In order to reach the multitude of
outsiders we must drop all TECHNICAL.
ties out Of our religion. When we talk
to people about the hypostatic union
and French ncyclopedianism, and
Erastinianism, and Complutensianism
we are as impolitic and little under
stood as if a physician should talk to
an ordinary patient about the pericard-
ium, and inter costal muscle and scor-
butte symptoms. Many of us come out
of the theological seminaries so loaded
up that we take the first ten years to
show our people how much we know,
and the next ten years get our people
to know as much as we know, and at
the end find that neither of us know
anything that we ought to know.
Here are hundreds of thousands OF sim
ming, struggling, and dying people who
need to realize just one thing-that
Jesus Christ came to save them, and
will save them now. But we go into
a profound and elaborate de1init ton of
what justification is, and after all the
work there are not, outside of the
learned professions, five thousand peo-
pie in the United States who can tell
what justification is. will read you
the definition:
classification is purely forensic
act, the act of judge sitting in the
forum, in which the Supreme Ruler and
Judge, who is accountable to none,
and Who alone knows the manner in
which The ends of II unir,rse GOV.
ernment can best be attain reckons
that which was done by the sub stitute,
and not on account Of anything done
by them, but purely upon account of
this gracious method of reckoning,
grants them the full remission of their
SINS"
Now, what is justification? / will
tell you what justification is-when a
sinner believes, God let's him off. One
summer in Connecticut | went to
large factory, and saw over the door
written the words: "No admittance."
] entered and saw over the nos Aoor:
mo admittance." Of course entered.
got inside. anu found IL pin IactOry,
and they were making pins, very serv.
iceable, fine and useful pins. So the
spirit of exclusiveness has practically
written over the outside door of many
n church: 'No admittance. And if
the stranger enters he fin DIS practically
written over the second door: mo adj
mittance," and if he goes in over all
the pew doors seems writ en-: mo ad-
mittance," while the minist err stands in
the pulpit, hammering out his little
niceties of belief, pounding out the
technicalities of religion, making pins.
In the most practical, common sense
way, and laying aside the pon-essen-
tials and the hard definitions of re-
ligion, go out on the G od-given mis-
sion, telling the peopl what they need
and when and how they cen get it.
Comparatively little effort as yet has
been made to save that large class of
persons in our midst called skeptics,
and he who goes to work here will not
be building upon another mans founda-
tion. There is great multitude of
them. They are afraid of us and our
churches, for the reason we do not
know how to treat them. One of this
class met Christ, and hear with what
tenderness, and pathos and beauty,
and success Christ dealt with him:
Thou shalt love the Lord thy God
with all thy heart and with all thy
soul, and with all thy mind, and with
all thy strength. This is the first COM
mandment, and the second is like this:
namely, thou shalt love thy neighbor
as thyself. Theve is no other command
ment greater than this" And the scribe
said to him; "Well, Master, Thou has
said the truth, for there is one God, and
to love Him with all the heart, and the
understanding, and all. the soul, and
all the strength 10 more than whole
burnt offerings and sacrifices" And
when Jesus saw that he answered dis
creetly, he said unto him: "rhou art
not far from the lSinrdom of God" So