The Camden chronicle. (Camden, Tenn.) 1890-current, 1903-05-22
A SERMON FOR SUNDAY
AN ELOQUENT DISCOURSE ENTITLED
"lNcREAsE OF FAITH" q
The Rov. Quincy Ewing shows now This
becomes the Prayer Of Our Souls
when tho Worid's Perploxlties Bear
Down Upon Us.

Wheh inc WofAua EefpleAtAeh neM
Down Upon Us.
NEW YoRK CITY. o. The Rev. Quincy
| Ewing, Of St. James Episcopal Church,
/ Greenvile Miss, who was at one time un-
| der consideration for one Of the important
pulplts Of Brooklyn, recently preached 4
| thoughtful sermon on Increase Of Faith.
Mr.. Ewing took his text from Luke xvii:
| D: Lord, increase our faith" In the
/ course of the sermon he said:
We do not know why precisely the discl-
| pies should have made this request at this
| particular time. Jesus had Just said 20
them III thy brother trespass against thee
rebhke him, and il he repent, forgive him.
and If he trespass against thee seven times
/ in day, and seven times in day turn TO
/ thee, saying, i repent thou shalt forgive
/ him" Then very abruptly comes from
| them the request, Increase our faith"
/ Possibly there was some tone Of impotence
/ in their voices as they spoke. They may
| have recalled that in the old book Of Le-
| vlticus was 10 be found practically the
| same commandment that He was giving
| them; that in the book of Leviticus they
| were taught not to hate their brethren,
/ nor to bear grudge against the children Of
/ their people, but to love their neighbor as
\ themselves; and they may have felt that
/ there was no need for them 10 bear this
/ the Master; that He was but wasting
time in telling them what they already
/ knew so well.
! So their request. Increase our faith may
have meant, "Tell us something that we do
not already know-something hid from the
/ prophets and wise men of old times; tell
] US something, show us something, do some
! thing which will make us surer that you
/ are indeed the Messiah we and our fathers
/ have looked for; that our hope in You is
| not misplaced; that You are truly the
/ promised Deliverer. Make us more certain
] that we were justified in breaking away
/ from the authority of the Scrbes and
! Pharisees, in fOrsaking all to follow You.
Do not be simply repeating to us what we
may read ourselves in an ancient book;
say something, do something reveal some
thing which will certify our faith in You
As the Messiah"
Or the request may have had a profound
er import and been uttered in a tone OF
sef-distrust, of unfeigned humility and
duplication. Suddenly while Jesus was
speaking there may have awakened in the
souls Of His hearers the accusing conscious
ness that, though they had known for so
long the divine law of duty toward their
neighbors, yet never had they or their
/ fathers been able to live up to 1t, to real
ize in their human life the divine ideal, and
accompanying the consciousness Of past
failure may have been the reflection that
never should they be able to realize that
divine ideal, to eXpel from their human
hearts all hatreds, all resentnents, all con-
tempts, all unforgivingness and look upon
their fellow-men with the steady Christ
vision Of redemptive charity.
And so their request may have meant,
"Open wider our spiritual eyes, that we
nv coo with WCys laod ne dravv nc ~, 4O
Your spiritual height; let us share with
You Your vision Of God and man; let US
drink from the invisible fountain of Your
vast strength and goodness; let us know
the secret of Your Christliness, that we
may rise to full sympathy with Your di-
vine purpose and build with You the king
dom of God among men as You would
have it builded" But whatever may have
been the character of the disciples re.
quest, whether of impatient criticism or
humble speculation in the words that came
from their lips, Increase our faith, we
may all utter the deepest and devoutest
prayer of the most needful moments of
our human life, Increase our faith" How
inevitably that becomes the prayer of our
souls at times when the infinite problems
and perplexities of this problematical, per-
picking world bear down upon us and
threaten to weigh US down; when we are
!
the long and cruel and, apparently, unend.
ing suffering of good and evil; the suffering
of unnumbered millions; the vast failures
Of justice and triumphs of injustice; the
tragic defeat of right and victories of
wrong; the bitter battles of uplifting truth
for recognition by the mind and heart of
humanity; the painful, questionable pro-
gress of indubitable good everywhere upon
earth; and so rejecting, are tempted to
cry out in loud despair, or in danger OF
being mastered by that deep hopelessness
which utters no sound and shows itself in
no outward sign; hopelessness, that a
deathless heart of good does, indeed, throb
on to victory in things evil; hopelessness,
that the to-morrows of humanity will be
gladder and nobler than its yesterdays;
hopelessness, that the wrongs we know will
be done away, and the good we dream en-
body itselI in fact; hopelessness, that our
individual efforts, all that we can say, all
that we can do, are not mere vain, tran
sient strivings against eternal fate, power.
less as the wings of insects fluttering in
the storm, to effect any betterment of
things that are! How much that prayer
Of the apostles, Increase our faith, may
mean, then, to our individual souls! A 81.
lent, unsyllabled cry for rescue to the In
visible Power that made us and the world;
pleading with that Power Invisible
whose name we cannot then utter. whose
attributes we hesitate then to declare, that
again we may be privileged to pray, Our
Father" that again we may feel ourselves
His children; that real enough may be
come His presence in our lives, to Danish
from lis all doubt that the world intelligi
NJ s! 'lV5g 10 YIBp 'eIq!S!Uelu!un 10 'oIq
His keeping; all suspicion. that any good
dies, that any right fails, that any throned
and crowned power Of iniquity can swing
this earth outside the circle Of His Faith
er's purpose and His Fathers love.
But it is not only in times Of sorrow, sad
APOSTLES should be our PRAYER. for that re-
quest of theirs points to an eternal anC
| 1lniua1aal rnand nf thn human anul thh nee