The Penn's Grove record., 1904-02-05

be absolute independence of God. Surely.
this is not Gods idea.
The true way Of looking upon our reIa-
ton 70 Christ is that His presence within
our. heart by faith gives us energy to
achieve, not by enslaving, but by enfran-
chising the will, invigorating it, energizing
It, yitallziDg It, until with Augustine We
can say: I'VE will, but God works the
willing; we work, but God works the
working"
Philippians, 2: u, Is, has often been mis-
undo stood. 1t says: Work out your own
salvation with fear and trembling. For iE
is God which worketh in you both, to viii
and do of His good pleasure" To work
out" does not mean to work INTO outward
expression what God puts within MS, but
as it literally means, to achieve" for sal
Walton IS an achievement as well as being
at the same time a gift. Nor does it mean
that we are to work IN PauPs absence.
The possibility of working out our So, "a
ton rests upon the fact that God is with
In, so that we can will and do OF His good
pleasure. Thus, viii is not an Instrument
which we can turn from side to side, and
which when necessary God can use; it 10
ourselves acting. That which God does 10
not our act unless God works through car
wills.
The possibilities of such an empowered
life are divine. We need not be perfec-
tlonlsts and still believe as we ought that
Chrlsts grace IS sufficient for US. Many
pretend to believe it, and do not live it.
They worry, they fret, they give up. The
most of US seem to think that the normal
Christian life Is to rise and fall like the
tides.A Yet Paul says: There hath no
temptation befallen you but such as is COM
mon to man; but God is faithful. who will
not suffer you to be tempted above that
We are able; but viii with the temptation
also make a way of escape, that ye may
be able to bear it"
Christ within also makes al living sa-
cred. We have made sad divisions among
objects. We have divided space into holy
and unho.y, and declared that God could
be found only in certain places, which had
been consecrated. We have divided time
into holy and secular. declaring that we
would serve GOD on the Sabbath and con-
duct our business and amrsements as we
pleased the rest of the week. We have di-
vlded money into two parts. We have said
that the giving of the one-tenth. OF one
twentieth to God, justified US in the claim
of unlimited freedom in the disposition
of the rest. We have divided up persons,
and put a certain class of people called
priests, ministers. missionaries. upon ped
e~stals, declaring that the standard of con-
duct for them differed from the standard
for others, and that their work was espe-
cially religious.
All wrong. All space is holy, and the
green grass may be the chancel carpet and
the trees the massive pillars aud the sky
the dome, if below there is a heart pray
ing in spirit and truth. All time IS sacred.
The Monday should be as much devoted to
Gods service as Sunday, and the Office and
the store should be as muc1 shrines Of
devotion as the closet. All money is sa-
cred, and the money spent upon the nee
~essaries of life, upon business and pleasure
should be spent with equal consciousness
as upon the church. An Christians have
to obJectify His life. There is nothing we
need to-day quite as much as the Chris
tianization of the secular life.
Then at last, the Christ within Is the
source of final holiness. Christ at last
is to present us holy and ~unbiamable, and
irreprovable in His sight.
Sin does two things for us, separates
US from God and d. ,Tts our Lature. When
we are forgiven we are restored to the d.
vine fellowship. But what about the ct
feets of sin upon our nature See the
scars UT IN the tree .-1d what the life OF
| the tree does for it. Listen to what Paul
says: Il am perplexed until Christ be
formed within you" as Christ had his
BethI,hem, His Nazareth, His 0livet, 80
does He again in His reinearnatlon have
His Bethlehem, His Nazareth, His Uhvet-
Who knows why one plant grows into the
| geranium, and the other into the rose! The
\ type is something more than the ideal pre-
sented for the imitation of the plant. Is
is an informing life.
I think it was the last thing that DR..
A. S. Gumbert wrote for the Examiner:
Among the Dutch the rose was sometimes
cultivated by planting an inferior rose
close to a rose of superior variety The
rose of inferior quality WIS carefully
watched and anthers removed to avoid
INSTRUMENTATION: the object being that
it should be poIlenized by The superior
rose. Gradually the rose thus treated took
upon itself the characteristics of the supe-
| rior life of its companion" So, our lives
are pollenized as it were by His righteous
ness.
Thus Christ within becomes to us the
source of divine eompanionship, of power
for achievement, of the exaltation OF con-
duct. of final holiness. He who wishes
to plant hope within his own heart Of sueh
prospects, should begin and never cease
| exercising faith in Him who loved Us and
gave Himself to die for us.