Orange County observer. [volume] (Hillsborough, N.C.) 1880-1918, 1903-06-11
THIS THE SECRET
OUR REGULAR SUNDAY SERMON.
Not Elegant Windows, Fine rlusic
and Eloquent Preaching, But Gem
ulne Religion.


New YORK C1TY.-At the Church of the
Pilgrims, Brooklyn, DIR. Lyman Abbott
preached Sunday morning on "The Secret
OF Christianity" He took for his text
Luke II: IL: Unto you is born, this Cay,
Christ the Lord" and said:
-, In the Anglo-Saxon version Of the New
Testament the word Saviour is rem
dered for the Anglo-Saxon word sshelper''
You know also that the word Christ is
not a proper name, but title equivalent
to 'sThe Messiah''-the Lord
Every great movement has at the heart
OF it some secret, which if we can discover
it, will disclose to us the secret Of that
great movement. What is the secret at
the heart of Christianity, which has made
it the great power that it is? In asking
you to consider this question you will un-
derstand, of course, that / am not under
question; [ am only going to try in that
half hour to indicate the essence of Chris
tianity-the secret of its vitality. The
Jewish people were in more than one sense
ga peculiar people" Among other things
in this: That their faces were turned to-
ward the future All other nations look
backward for their golden age. but these
peculiar people" looked forward for theirs.
They believed that a time was coming
when there would be peace instead Of war
and for themselves prosperity instead of
universal poverty. They believed that this
great time would come through their own
nation and that Jerusalem would become
the holy city and the mistress Of the world.
And their prophets even pointed forward
to this divine consolation. and they indi-
Gated that it would come through some de-
liverer. Sometimes they regarded the ma
tion itself as that de1iverer; sometimes
succession of prophets; sometimes single
prophet; sometimes single man, as king
or prince, as teacher, as a priest, as a
"Man Of Sorrows, and acquainted with
grief" However different OF incongruous
or inconsistent those prophesies might be,
they. pointed the minds of the people for
ward to great delivery and delivered. So
the shepherds perfectly well understood
the angels when they said: 'The deliyerer
has come; the helper is here. You will find
Him Graded in the manger." When Jesus
began His ministry His first sermon of
which we have a record, was preached in
the synagogue at Nazareth. He went into
the synagogue, roll was open before Him
and He read one Of the prophecies Of the
great deiverer who was coming and then
said: This day is this Scripture fulfilled in
your ears. have come: 1 am that delivv-
erer." Having begun His ministry in this
way He went out to be helper and fed
the hungry, taught the ignorant and healed
the sick and dispensed the gospel of hope.
Once John the Baptist, perplexed to know
if this was the Messiah, for things went on
much the same and no great thing seemed
to be accomplished, sent Him a message
saying: cart Thou the Messiah?" and
Christ said to the messengers, "Wait here,
see what you will see, and then go and tell
your master" The waited and saw, and
then Christ told them: eco your way and
tell John what things We have seen and
heard; how that the blind see the lame
walk the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear.
the dead are raised to the poor the gospel
is preached
No man can undertake to help his fellow
men really sincerely on q large scale, with
out coming in contact with men who do
not want the help, those who are making
something out of the misfortunes Of their
fellow men. Christ came in contact with
such. and they leagued themselves together
to destroy Him. He was arrested and
| brought before the Jewish tribunal and
! asked, care You the Messiah?" And un-
der solemn oath He said, II am" Plate
said, Are You king?" He said, ri am. "
70 both the Jewish tribunal and the Ro-
man He said, II am" and for that He was
condemned to die and for it He died.
dissipated. They said, eve thought He
was to be the great deliverer, but evidently
He was not" Rumors of His ascension be-
| gan to circulate, and, little by little they
became convinced. and then they said
"Ah, He is the dehverer, after all" If you
will turn to the Book of Acts and read one
! of the sermons there you will see that was
the burden of all the apostolic ministry
No new theology, ethic or law. Their mes
sages were all the same: s'The deliverer is
come. He is here; the deliverance has be-
gum"
In the first century rule was by absolute
despotism. Gradually government has been
transformed, until now it is completely es
| tab]ished, and there is no government in
Europe west Of Russia that does not al
least recognize the fact that government il
not for the government, but for the gov
erned. All industry was servile. Half the
Roman population were slaves, and the
other half were on the edge of famine anc
only kept alive by the largess of others
Wherever Christianity has gone the chair
has dropped from the slave and labor ha:
been emancipated There were no schools
in Rome and none among the Jews, except
those connected with the synagogue, but
wherever Christianity has gone it has es
tablished schools and wealth has been diff
fused among the people. This is called al
! age of concentrated wealth. That is not so
| There never was an age, and that is espe
cially true Of America, when wealth wa
more distributed There are charities
everywhere. The church has also changed
the conception of punishment, so that pun
| ishment has become reformatory. The oh
iect of the old pagan religion was not tt
help man; it was to appease the wrath O
God or to purchase the favor OF corrupt
| bic God Christianity has altered all tha
with various degrees of success. The churcl
of Christ is engaged in the work of liftin,
the burdens of men, in inspiring them will
courage and nobler purposes. Christiarit,
is not mere sum of doctrines. new
method of worship or new law of morals
It is great historical movement
Flowing down through the centuries will
ever widening and deepening current, bless
ing every land it has touched and carryin,
with it some measure of helpfulness, Chris
tianity has done, through the centuries
what Christ did in those four short years
it has helped the helpless, fed the hungry
taught the ignorant, given courage to tn
despairiug and brought glad tidings to th
DOOR The secret of Christianity, then, i
belpfulness. This it is that distinguishe
the theology of the Christian religion from
the theology of all other religions 1t is
new doctrine respecting God-not absolute
ly SO. but still new contrasted with th'
teachings of other religions. Everywfer,
on the globe men believe in the aid O
God and in the power of God The dis
tinction between the Jewish religion ant
Paganism was not that one called Coo
| Jehovah and the other Baal. It was tha