The daily morning journal and courier., 1904-05-09
A QUESTION OF THE TIMES.
'HAVE THE PREACHERS LOST
 THE MESSAGE.v
Interesting Treatment of the Subject by Rev. pr. Watson L. Phillips at United Church Yesterday Forenoon.

by Rev. Dr. Watson l.. Phillips at
 United Church Yesterday Forenoon.
 I. Corinthians, i., r, For Christ sent me, not to baptize, but to preach the gospel; not in wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made void."
 St. Paul is rebuking those divisive and schismatil elements in the church which are allowing their preferences for individual teachers and teachings to lead them into partisan boasting and antagonisms, and defending himself against any possible charge of being the leader of a party. In doing this he incidentally makes clear his own con- ception of the functions of the minis try.
 The minister, preacher apostle, what ever be the name you give him, is one sent, a messenger. representative; he is a man with message and a life. But he is not sent to baptize, to busy himself with forms and ceremonies or the paraphernalia of religion, least of all to build a party whose members could use his name and notions as a shibboleth. Elsewhere certain other apostles affirm that they were not com cissioned to serve tables or to adminis- ter funds for the poor, position to which, one may be sure, St. Paul gave hearty assent
 The minister is sent to preach the gospel, the make a proclamation, to call the worlds attention ta line of principles and facts which the world very much needs to hear about. That is the apostles conception; the minis ter is one sent, to preach the gospel
 But what is the gospel? The good tidings. answer the etymologists. But that definition hardly makes the mean ing more clear till we inquire and as certain in what the good tidings con- ,sist. Speaking in the broadest way, l think one may say the gospel is the good tidings of the revelation of God in the terms of human life, the sim pie setting forth of the life and charac- ter of that Jesus in whom God was in such unique and unprecedented fashion that He could say, He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father,
 It is at this point that present-day conservatism, looking askant at the modern pulpit, has had it's fears arous- ed and it's questions wakened. Chief among these questions has been this, Have the preachers lost the message2" which has not always been ques- ton, but often the bald affirmation, They have lost 1t, or are perversely distorting it in the interests of so- called critical scholarship"
 It is worth our while, then, to ask. Has the modern pulpit a gospel, and Is it preaching that gospel with clearness and authority? Tn this presence one might safely answer that question with a categorical affirmative. but even here it will not be unproftable to inquire, and to attempt the partial expression of, what we mean by our affirmative. First of all it must be admitted that we have lost much of the old terminol- ogy especially the terminology of defi- milton, and denunciation, and pessimism regarding the future by means of which the earlies theologies were wont to shroud themselves in mystery. But
 this change is not the result of any purpose to deny the faith or any lust for the speech of Ashdod, but of an honest desire to avoid those forms
 which express more or less, or utterly 1 fail to express, the full content of mod ern thought and feeling, and to put old truths into living forms. We are em- ploying the words with whose meaning and use men are familiar; we are not i saying either more or less than we mean in the interests of an hereditary nomenclature; and there is a calm,
 clear, courageous utterance of the an- cient messages with al, with the accent
 of the street rather than of the cloister,
 and with the breath of our free modern life pulslng in every syllable. But our gospel is a larger gospel because of a
 truer appreciation of the revelation of
 God in the human life of Jesus and a
 better conception of the meaning of in- carnation, and sonship, and Father
 hood. We have larger Christ. We
 are not busy with speculations about Him-we are busy with Him. There
 has been much agitation and discussion
 and some display of unsanctified tenn per; men have failed to understand
 each others spirit and motives, and to
 interpret correctly each others words.
 But the mists are clearing, and out of them q larger Christ is emerging and a better message is taking shape.
 | And we are learning to say that Christianity is life, in its inner mean 1 ing the life of God in the soul of man, 1 in it's external manifestation relivine of the Christ life. We are shifting the
 accent from dogma to character, from i faith to life, and we are insisting upon
 the cultivation of the whole content of mans nature and upon freer and more natural expression of the Chris tian spirit within the lines of personal | ity.
 1 This conception of Christianity, as life has modified the message, or chang ed it altogether, at many points which we have come to feel are unessential, and greatly broadened and strengthens
 ed it at all those points which devout l thinking perceives to be essential to the | spiritual development of the race. It has immeasurably widened the boun- | daries of the Kingdom of God, and brought into it's citizenship all men, of whatever name or sign, who are seek | ing the ultimate truths of life and who | struggle to incarnate the spirit of | Christ, to obey the rule of Christ and to live the life of Christ
 ! It conceives of the church as the ser