Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-04-02

name? Yes. BY current, superhclai reputa-
ton? Yes. BY appearance and manner
when under observation and on his guard?
Yes. BY actual character and In deepest
reality? No. For this you must live with
him; twenty-four hours day, seven Gays
{, week. fifty-two weeks in year. Only
within the walls of a home, within the
limits of the family, can you reach SUCH an
acquaintance with one as to be able to say,
in the fullest sense, Il know him. y
Now, just this sort of opportunity these
men had had with Jesus. He and they had
been living apart and by themselves. Ihey
had constituted a very real family To-
eether they had Travelled the roads of Judea
and Gallee; lodged al Bethany and Caper-
naum; endured the privations of poverty,
toll, popular distrust and sometimes aver
sion. They had seen at closest range His
dealings not only with them, but with all
sorts and conditions of men. Under their
eyes His patience had been often tried, His
kindness tested, His disposition laid bare.
BY this time they knew Him. Not His
deity in any full way. He did not at this
period ask of them faith in this. But Him
self. His personality, just, kind, good
man; pure, true. ingenious; tender, SYM
pathetic, helpful: frank, candid, trust
worthy. And something more. Wise and
powerful beyond human scope. Speaking
as never man spake. Healing as no physi-
clan ever healed. More majestic than
Abraham Moses, Elijah, Isaiah; more mys-
FERROUS, yet more transparent; elcitinS
equally their reverence and their love. So
Jesus the Nazarene. Surely He had the
right to ask, Have ye not yet faith?"
Now this. we may be sure, is the ques-
ton that He is asking of us today; and in
the same tone of surprise, disappointment
and gentle reproach And with the same
emphasis. Have We not yet faith For
surely He must think that it is tim for us
10 have faith" Not perhaps CO nplete,
comprehensive faith. free from all questions
and scruples; but such practical. working
faith as would make Us His loyal f.. ,wers.
For this, our opportunities have II eX-
ceeded those of the first disciples. instead
of their limited observation of q few months
of His personal ministry, we have before us
all that ministry eliminating in Hls death
and resurrection. For every 81 en- - love
and power that they knew, J ..ow Il
score For every gracious word that they
had heard, we have hundred. II cad of
the sketch, very real but very par,..I, that
was before them, we have full 3Jrtrait,
with every lineamcnt accurately letned.
And in addition to this full kno",sdge of
the Christ. have Christianity, II whose
faintest shadow they could never have
dreamed. Over against small part of a
little interior province that His influence had
then reached have the world pervaded
by His power. with all its best civilization
shaped by his precept and example We
have seen Jesus; whom they knew as a
quiet villager, saying and doing some Won
derful things, but always cautioning them
to reserve and secrecy: obliged often to flee
for His life from relentless foes; we have
seen Him grown within a few years to be
master of Rome; creating a literature be-
side which that of Greece is mcager and
local; inspiring the best art, music, archi-
lecture; humaniZing governments, elevat-
ing morals Softening manners; become, in
short, the dominating force in the thought
and conduct of all the progressive people of
the world. In the name of Jesus, avowedly
or potentially, all ministry of human kind
ness is performed in home and hospital; on
sAsa and land; to dumb animals and to little
children; to the sick, the aged the imbecile,
the insane. In that name statesmen gather
to devise liberty for the enslaved, to substi-
hte arbitration for war, to tighten the
burdens of the toilers, to compel justice
for the oppressed. Before that name, as
before the rising, unclouded sun, all the
haunting shadows and miasmatic mists of
humanitys long night are vanishing away.
We have seen this. We know it to be
the salient, unifying fact of history. We
live in the light and warmth of it. 1t
mOlds, as IL has created our domestic,
educational. political social, ethical, re-
ligious conditions. 1t precedes our birth,
of death. We awake to it every morning;
meet it at every turn each hour of the day;
fall asleep at night in the comfort and Sc
curity of ii. 1t is new discovery today,
or yesterday we read it in our mothers
eyes. learned 1t or our fathers knee, lSped
1t in our first speech, We're taught it in
school and college, encountered it in BUSH
ness and profession, have lived with it al
ways-this great fact of the dominance of
Jesus in the affairs of the world. Have
we not yet faith?''
TEUNIS S. HAMLIN,
The Church of the Covenant.