The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-03-27


rejected by the Pharisees. lie was sus-
pected in the Christians. He had hoped for
auditors even among the pagans. and they
the poorer and the lower classes. You see,
ne said, not many rich, not many wise, not
many noble, are called. Remember that ne
was, as Ccleridge has said, one of the finest
gentlemen of whom history gives any rec
ord; man of culture; not without some
means; of fine education, who had added
to education that culture which travel
brings and yet his constituency were the
poor, the outcast, the ignorant, the de-
spised, the freedman and the slave. There
from whom he could draw l:fe; in his own
churches, too, those who mad grown up I'M
DER his ministry. He was abandoned. He
had seen again and again the planting of
his own hands diverted misled or cor
rupted. He had been received by she Gala
tianS with enthusiasm, and III IN he had
ing askance upon him, Suspecting lis mo-
tives and abandoning his ministry and 60
ing back into Judaism He had been well
coined by those who had received the Cos
pei from him IN Corinth, and he had seen
them dividing up into parties and
sects. and he had seen missionaries
ity, and he had seen his motives ques-
toned, and he had seen them looking at
him with suspicion, and he had been so
aroused with Indignation that, he says, he
started to go back to Greece by his own
personal presence to do battle to those who
had misrepresented and unsupported, and
then held back because he did not quite
dare to trust his temper under the circum
stances. He had seen corruption enter into
the churches of EpheSus and Colosse; he
had seen them turning away from the sim
picity which was in the Lord Jesus Christ
by the Orientalism which had been inn
ported from Alexandria,; he had seen
mongrel religion growing up-polytheistic,
pantheistic, Oriental-lacking even the sim
plicity of the Hebrew faith. And these were
the churches he had himself established.
Sometimes the question must have come
upon him whether anything he had done
was going to stand after he had left. The
care of the churches which comes upon me
daily, he puts as the climax and the Gull
mination of all the burdens that he bore.
SPIRITUAL DISAPPOINTMENT.
"And yet there was a still heavier bur-
den Disappointed in his own people, dis
appointed in the Christian Church, disap-
pointed in the instability OF the pagans, dis
appointed in the recreancy and the apos-
tasy of the churches which he had himself
established, he was disappointed in his own
spiritual hopes. He had fully believed that
Jesus Christ would come in very little
while. He had looked for his return from
month to month, from day to day. He had
entered ON his mission with a full, strong
Iaith that the Lord was going to establish
by power and by. might the kingdom of God
on the earth, and he had thought that the
resurrection of Jesus Christ was the attes-
tatlon and evidence that He would so come
and would soon establish this kingdom and
overthrow the imperial Romanism and eS-
taDlish another in its place. But the days
mad heightened into months and the months
into years, and the years into more than
two score years, and still there was no sign
OF his coming. And hope deferred might
well nave made the heart SICK and he no
longer looked for the coming of the Lord
and the establishment of the kingdom in
His OWL ~rff
. but his hope had taken a ntw turn. He
had power now that Rome, imperial Rome
would become a Christian power. Four CEN
turtles later it did; but four centuries is a
long while osWait. Paul had hoped to live
to see the day when Rome would become a
Christian empire. And now it was begin
ming to be questioned whether he should
even be permitted to give the message of
this Christ in the Roman empire. The
clouds Of approaching persecution were be-
ginning to gather upon the horizon, the
mutterlngs or the coming storm We're to be
distinctly heard, and he stands alone in
Rome; stands for the liberty which up TO
that time never had been denied but now
was hotly questioned. even the liberty to
say that Christ had come to redeem the
world from sin and pain. And he was
alone; prisoner; part of the time chained
to soldier companion. forsaken by others,
his own companions AT one time scattered
Alone. Uncertain as to the issue of the
trial: wondering whether it should end in
death, not only to him. but TO the liberty
of the Individual: wondering whether II
should end in that or in his emancipation
and in larger life and in larger liberty.
What is better calculated to take the life
out of man than this perpleXity and UNI
certainty? And on that energetic man, full
of fire. full of power, long1ns TO go, bound
hand and foot, waiting while the days and
months and years passed by in enforced
inaction. And already his prophetic vision
forecast the future. He saw-he could not
have failed to see-and this epistle to the
Philippians gives us hints that he saw
how that Judaistic faction which had fol-
lowed him all his life was going to triumph
over him. 1t would enthronc itself in Rome
If Rome did become converted. If imperial
Rome becanle5 Christian Rome, Christian
al "a orr oil
the Christianity which would center itself
there would not be "a gospel of liberty and
of individual freedom; it would be a law
proceeding from human head enforced by
pains and penalties. Sometimes the shadow
of this fear crossed his path and embittered
him.
HIS RELIGION IN LIFE.
This was his history. This was the Paul
whose letter we are to read. Disappointed in
his own people, suspected in his own Chris
ton church; more than once deserted by the
church which he had founded; disappointed
in his own earlier faith of speedy victory;
beginning to question whether he would not
be disappointed in his second expectation of
the conversion of the Roman empire; alone,
imprisoned; forbidden the liberty of action
in which such soul as his finds relief, and
already beginning to fCreshadoW defeat in
that which was vital to hin-the liberty
wherewith Christ makes free-he writes this
letter to the Philippians. 1t would not have
been strange if such a man in such circum-
stances should have written q letter like
Psalms xiii and xiii. 1t would not be strange
if in this letter you found the refrain run
ming all the way through it. Hope thou i'll
God and then the answer % God, my soul
is cast down within mel Open: what do
We find? For in this letter we Rre to find
Pauls religion under trial bef%re he has
given us explanation. Now we Behold it i'll
life. He has theorized; that is easy; now
his philosophy is being tested; that is diff
cult.
I thank my God upon every remembrance of
you,
Always in every prayer of mine for you all
making request with joy
This is the opening: Joy-thanks And
this, the note and motif of this symphony,
runs through it an:
joy
For your fellowship in the gospel from the first
Being confident of this very thing, that he which
hath begun a good work in you will perform it
until the day of Jesus Christ
Even as it is meet for to think this of you
all, because have you in my heart; inasmuch as
both in my bonds, and in the defense and confr-
grace.
For God is my record how greatly L long after
you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ.
And this l pray, that your love may abound yet
more and more in knowledge and in all Judgment !;
That We may approve things that are excellent:
that We may be sincere and without offense till
the day OF Christ; ~
Being filled with the fruits of righteousness
which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and
praise of God.
Joy, joy, joy-this is the song that sings
through this letter from beginning to end