The Worcester spy. [volume] (Worcester, Mass.) 1898-1904, 1899-11-27
WORK OF TIE CHURCH.
Question Interestingly Discussed by
Rev. Moses H. Harris.

Rev. Moses H. Harris spoke yester
day morning at All Souls church,
on one question, what is our church
set to do in the world?" He said in
part:
I'VE are to help men to a better life.
That is, as we believe the highest work
of Christianity is to make men good,
so by our ideas, by our own methods,
we are pledged to this great work of
saving souls, by helping them to over
come their evils and to grow in holiness
That at which Christianity aims is not
better place, neither does it make its
chief business or it's business at all, to
reserve souls from a penal calamity.
1t comes to help souls to be, to be-
come stronger, wiser and Durer So
we feel that the best product is the
soul itself, enriched, elevated, enlarged,
refined by all the means which the COS
pei provides. And if we do not help
in this work, if we do not make it our
chief aim, we are faAse to our ideas and
to the great body of principles for
which our church stands. We are COM
missioned to deal not with what is rep
resentative or dramatic, but with what
is substantive and real in the soul. We
work at what is central; we aim at the
heart of things and seek to overcome
wrong there and to lead out all that is
good there.
AS a church, we stand for character
as the final resort in education and re-
ligion, and as the final product of all
religious discipline and training. There
is not that difference which once ex-
listed between the man of books and
the man of business. Both get wisdom
and discipline of the faculties; one in
the retreats of study, the other in con-
tact with the commerce which is the
life of the globe. Work, all work in
these days, has such relations, such
roots that even the most ordinary SER
vice educates. 1t is thinking that col
ors our commodities and sends our ven
lures across the seas, and where
thought is so stimulated, it does not
stop in the sphere of its birth. 1t goes
out in the quest of new Objects and it
is not content with meagre results 1t
is forever in search of the best. We
are living in time when nothing is
taken for granted. Men everywhere
are asking what things stand on, and
what they are. 1t is true that the
thought today is generous and hospi-
table. as it is intense and critical There
is such ntercommunication among men
that they are forced to the front, new
things to meet new persons and take
the measures of new products The
must be open, recipient, more eager to
take all things within its sphere.
THAT upon which all lines converge
is the human soul. What it is what
are it's relations to God? The answers
Of yesterday do not satisfy. To us the
question is not where, but what, and
the supreme object is not to gain some
thing, but to be somebody. Sin is per-
sonal and near the judgment is pro-
vided for within us. Heaven is pres
ent, for it is a soul in the love of God,
and hell is present, for it is the being in
sin and liking it. The good here or
there in this world or the next is a
! soul that is right in itself, and here or
there in this or any other world, the con-
demnation is a soul that is not right
in itself We say there is a supreme
good for each child of God. We appeal
to the best in men, believing that in
due time and the best time, the right
response will break forth. We believe
in the love of God, as the strongest
force in the universe. To us, that love
is not weak, allowing men to do as they
please and never restraining them 1t
pursues them not only with invitation
and promise but with discipline, with
severe correction and hard, long scour-
aging upon their impenitence. The OBJ