The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1904-10-26
SERMON FOR SUNDAY
A STRONG DISCOURSE ENTITLED,
.coMFoRTINc cERTAINTIEs."
The Rev. DIR. Robert Bruce Hull% Talk
on the Words Addressed to Nicodemus
The Person That the Verlties OF Our
Precious Faith Cluster About.

-
BROOKLYN, N. Y.-Sunday morning the
Rev. DR.. Robert Bruce Hull, pastor Of
Greenwood Baptist Church, preached on
comforting Certainties." The text was
from John iii:ll: "We speak that we do
know" DR.. Hull said in the course or MS
sermon:
These words were addressed to Nicode.
mus. He was an earnest, honest, yet timid
INQUIRER after truth. He had come to
Jesus under cover of the darkness. As an
official of the Jewish Sanhedrim, he did
not dare to be seen talking with the Naza-
rene Teacher. Yet he is convinced in his
own mind that Jesus is a prophet and
that, too, a prophet sent of God: This
much he confesses to the Christ. Then be-
gins the wonderfully instructive interview
from which the text is taken. This inter
view is evidently only an outline, but the
outline is marvelously suggestive. Nico-
demus was q good man. He was a religious
man. He conformed to all the religious
forms and ceremonies of his nation. His
outward department was blameless and
his standing in the community was honor
able. But he was not a spiritual man. de
was not what we would call to-day a con-
verted man. To him Jesus thrice used the
solemn double "Amen, amen, l say unto
thee"
NlCOQemuS COulQ HOC uuueISlduQ WudG
Jesus meant by being born again. He was
unable to see what that new spiritual life
was of which he himself was lacking. Then
it is that the third double amen Of Jesus
| introduces the words of the text: "Verily,
verify, I say unto thee, we speak that we
do know and testify that we have SEEM.
In this utterance Jesus uses the word
eve" not simply as the plural of majesty,
but connecting Himself with all His. disci:
Piles, so that it is perfectly proper and
right for us to-day to use His words and
say: "We speak that we do know" Chris
tians are competent witnesses to the GER
tainties of religion. While in a sense 1t
may be said that "the Bible and the Bible
the fuller sense our religion is a life:
Christ is Christianity. His life in Himself
and in His disciples is the spirit and the
power of true religion. We have something
more than opinion; something better than
creeds; we have as one of the eternal yerl-
ties Jesus Christ as the manifestation of
God. It has been well said that Christ
either deceived mankind by conscious
fraud or He was Himself deluded and de-
ceived, or He was divine. There is no get
ting out Of this trilemma. 1t Is lnexor-
able" He stood before the men who knew
Him best and said: "He that hath seen Me
hath seen the Father" and again declared
to them: "I and My Father are one" This
was tremendous assumption and awful
blasphemy if it was not the truth. That
it is the truth the course of time and the
course of Christianity both abundantly de-
clare.
The verities of our precious faith cluster
about a person. This person was God,
turtles since Bethlehem the noblest, wisest
and hottest have bowed before Him, reyer:
emily exclaiming, my Lord and my God!"
1t matters not from what point we view
Him, Jesus stands before the world as
more than man. 1t is said of a safe and
perfect arch that it must meet two require
ments. Its feet must not slip and its mid
die must not bend. Jesus Christ is the arch
connecting humanity and divinity. The
weight of the centuries Of Christianity rest
on that arch and they rest there safely, for
"Jesus is God; there never was a time
when He was not;
Boundless. eternal, merciful, the word,
the Sire begot;
Backward our thoughts through ages
stretch, onward through realms Of
! bliss,
For there are two eternities and both
alike are His"
Another of the certainties is that the
Christian life is a divine life. This was a
new thought to Nicodemus. It is a new
figure of speech, but a plain statement of
fact, when Jesus insisted that it was neces-
sary to be born again in order to enter
heaven. Those of Nicodemus' time would
have said it was necessary to reform, to
deal honestly, to behave kindly, to live up.
rightly. So many say to-day, and if by. all
this they mean uprightness in its perfect
form they are right. But no man has ever
lived who uas been thus upright. "All
have sinned and come short Of the glory Of
God" The history Of mankind shows that
we must not seek holiness in order to God,
but God in order to holiness. Christ must
come into the soul of man with His divine
life, and then, and not till then, are we In
harmony with the divine holiness.
When that life comes in then there is
manifested the ~"expulsive power of a new
affection" better still, the expulsive power
of a new life. Nothing less than life can
account for the change in men,. Nothing
but life can exert the power which the CEN
turtles of Christianity have manifested. In
physics we affirm confidently that every. eff
feet must have an adequate cause. This
also is true in the realm Of spirituality. II
prosecutors are changed into preachers, if
those once thoroughly depraved have been
nodded into recognized saints, If the dregs
of society have been transformed into IN
paralleled martyrs for the truth, If common
people have been fashioned into those of
whom the world was not worthy-we ask
what cause or what power is adequate for
such marvellous alterations. We know
these changes. It is folly to say we do not
know the power.
Twice each day our city is washed by a
mighty ebb and flow of tides that sweep in
,,9 o,t' do,D;ta oil Tho winds fbot hlow
Your child recognizes the fact, but he is
puzzled to think that the pale, silent moon.
serene amid the clouds, is the cause of
those resistless floods. The child is puz-
zled, but when your philosopher explains
to you that the moon does this by attrac-
ton of gravitation, and you ask him to ex-
plain to you this attraction of gravitation,
then he. too, is puzzled. Yet he knows the
power, knows it so we'll he can measure it
and use it. So, too, with Christianity, and
its power. We can recognize its force and
use it.. but its secret is the secret of life.
Like all force, in its origin it is a mystery.
Tennyson says:
eve have but faith we cannot know.
For knowledge is Of things we see."
This is not quite true. knowledge is of
Many things we know that We cannot see.
We never saw a pain, but we should. call
him a fool who should say we never felt or
knew a pain. We know the power of the
Christ life in the believer, because we have
felt it, and sometimes when this Christ life
in US has it's perfect freedom We are able
to say with Paul: 81 can do all things in
Christ who strengthened me-"
This certainty concerning the power of
the Christ life can be attained by all who
will fulfill the conditions. There must be
q surrender to Christ and a trust in Christ.
You cannot have the sunbeam without the
without the Christ Himself. The apostle
cars. MChriSS IL in rol, the hnnn Of nloruO