The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-03-29
MOTIVES TO CHRISTIANITY.
Love of God and Not the Fear of an
Imaginative He'll Should Prevail.

Love of God and Not the Fear of an
Imaginative He'll Should Prevail.
Rev. Charles H. Strong preached one of
his usually interesting sermons last night,
his subject being THE Love of God and
Fear of He'll as Motives"
His text was taken from the 18th and
14th verses of the 5th chapter of the sec
ond epistle of Paul to the Ephesians, in
which the evangelist is quoted as making
statements which appear to be rather
diverse in their nature. in the one speak,
ing of the fear of everlasting punishment,
and in the other of the love of Christ that
restraineth us.
Rev. Mr.. Strong spoke of the proofs of
the fact that the world and the universe
were created by the highest order of intel
ligence. and then of the life of Christ and
it's influence upon the world Of to-day He
wondered how men could confuse the
meaning of the love of God with the mean
ing for the fear of he'll. Whoever dares
violate the laws of God. he said. must
| suffer for it. But he does not stand in
the fear of some terrible. impossible, i'm
aginary hell, he said, but in the fear of a
violated conscience. The Old conceptions
of hell, he said, are impossible to modern
thought He spoke of the fanciful picture
| Of fire and birthstone that were put on
some of the walls of the old time churches.
In referring to the punishment of con-
| science he spoke of Irvng's famous play.
! The Bells" in which is shown the horri-
| BILE punishment in the conscience of the
murderer.
But to tell us that such a fate as that.
-
untold ages without mitigation, he SAID.
| is absolutely impossible to any thought
| that calls itself Christian. This, he held.
| was not inconsistent with the greatest re-
spect for divine law and it's teachings.
| With many men he said that the fear
of after punishment was motive and a
| cogent motive. But life has something
more in it than the initial moment when
a man repents and joins the church. The
question is what is to be done for the de-
/ Velopment and growth of the lives of men
! in Christianity and morality. The fear of
/ hell, he argued. could do no more than
make man abstain from evil, while the
| love of God has not only that power but
makes him grow and develop from day to
day in Christian character. AS an exam
| pie. he spoke of the mob that Assem- bled
| in Savannah on the night of the Slattery
| riot, and the prompt suppression of VIC
| lence by the appearance of the militia.
| The appearance or the militia, he said
! stopped further violence, but it did not
| make good citizens of those who engaged
in the disturbance. So it is also with jail-
| birds, who attempt to- escape. They NAV
| be driven back by the fear of the weapon
| in the hands of the guard, but that does
not make good citizens of them.
| The element of fear only deters from
evil The great misfortune with society
Is that the penalty is often not enforced.
| When a man violates the law he should
be punished, but the penal laws, he said,
do not develop morality. There is a no.
bier motive than any dread of conse-
quences. The great damage done to Chris
tan charity in the past has been through
| the propagation of this motive of fear.
The motive should be the love of God,
which would not only restrain men from
evil, but develop them also in Christian
| life. Wherever human nature grows bet
| ter and better it Is not because men think
| of an impossible hell, but because the di-
vine spirit of the master percolates our
| lives and Is developing us more and more.
| The hardest thing in the world, he said,
he had found was to teach men and chill
! dren not to prepare to escape hell, but to
| prepare themselves to be ready for God s
| kingdom which they should attain
! through righteousness born of His love.
The love Of God should always be the mo-
! tive for doing good. and living a righteous
life, and not the fear of an imaginative
hell.