The Penn's Grove record., 1909-04-09
THE PULPIT.
A SCHOLARLY SUNDAY SERMON BY
DEAN HODGES.
Theme: Defense of the Faith.

cIeu d lectufe On the early enurch.
The subject vas "The Defense Of the
Faith" Dean Hodges said:
The frat antagonist Of the faith
was prejudice, crowned in ignorance,
growing up into contempt and Their
into hatred, and resulting III preju-
disc whereby the Christians were &C.
cused OF atheism and .sedition, and of
immortality. OF atheism, because
they had no images in their sanctu-
aries and because they worshiped in
a fashion unknown among the relig-
lou of their time; of sedition be-
cause they refused to acknowledge
the divinity of the Roman Empire;
and of immortality because they held
secret meetings, and not knowing
what took place at these meetings,
everybody might guess what he chose
and the mind of man is SO censti-
tuted that under such circumstances
some people will guess very unpleas-
ant things. So, by virtue of ignor-
ance, In almost entire absence OF
facts, there grew up around the
Christians a thick atmosphere of pref
udice. 1t fs astonishing, remember
Ing all that afterward happened, that
Christianity should have existed for
n or two centuries almost unno-
ticed, and then only with derision and
~antagonism. There vas Lucian the
satirist, who makes one of his char
acters, Perigrinus Proteus, profess
to be a Christian, and when he is put
in prison is visited by prominent
Christians, who reverence him be-
u he is in danger of martyrdom,
and then says Of thems rThese mis-
guided creatures have SO persuaded
themselves that they are going to live
forever that they have lost all fear
OF DEATH" and he says, again, that
they have been taught by their
Master that they are all brothers, and
they love one another in an amazing
manner" ]. is a friendly comment,
but mingled with contempt. There
was CELSIUS, the critic, who wrote a
lcng and substantial book against
the Christian religion, in which he
decried it first on the ground of his
tory. He says it is not historical be-
cause it is filled with accounts Of mir
acles, and miracles cannot happen;
and SO he begins with the virgin
birth and the resurrection, and dis
credits miracles, which he says
Christ was able to do by meals of
tricks He learned in Egypt. And,
second, of philosophy. He says the
incarnation is impossible because
God. Is intangible, and unnecessary
BECAUSE God is good. 1t Is absurd, he
says, to think that God cares for any
little company of people and services
on this planet, and he praises the
Greeks, who put their trust in reason
over against the Christians, who put
their trust in faith.
There was Marcus Aurelius, en-
peror, philosopher, moralist, the one
MAJ in the pagan world whom we
would have said beforehand would
have appreciated the Christian relig-
ion and would have gone out to meet
1t. He views them with a far-off
contempt and refers with some de-
rision to the alacrity with which
Christians go to martyrdom. This
religion. which within a few centur-
les was to take possession of the
Roman world, which was to be the
most notable fact in the history of
the race. began in o~bscurity, an OBJ
security amazing to us. When Chris
tianitJ came to be a little known
there came in its defense against its
antagonists the A%pologists, chief of
whom was Justin Martyr. Born at
Sychar. in Palestine, of pagan par
entage, at an early age Justin devoted
himself to philosophy. In his desire
to learn the relation between God
and the world, he in turn sought this
knowledge from the Stoics, the peri
ratetics and the Pythagorians, and
finally turned to Christianity and died
martyr at Rome. From some writ
lngs of his we learn that in the mid
die of the second century the Chris
Trans had no creed and no recitation
of the creed, and no formulation of
the truths of their religion. Justin
made some differences from the Bible
In the direction of faith. He laid
great stress upon the argument from
prophecy, and had much to say about
lewis, with whom he Identifies the
gods of the Pagan world, and he be-
lieved in a literal millennium. There
vas a lack or order and formality in
The church, but they took collections,
he says, and describes a service at
which there was a reading of the
Bible, a long prayer. a hymn and a
sacramental feast of bread and wine.
The second antagonist of the
Christian faith was Heresy. The time
came when men of education and
learning began to be attracted toward
The Christian religion, and there was
ainatural desire on the part of Chris
tian teachers to prove the Christian
religion to those persons, to make it
reasonable to their cultivated minds.
and the result was sometimes heresy.
Heresy, l suppose, is almost always
the result of that kind of
These heretics were the Gnostics.
whose aim it was to make some kind
of a combination between Christian
truth and the other kinds of truths
floating about in the minds of men.
Gnostics found two great difficulties
in religion: One, the difficulty of re-
conciling the New Testament with the
Old Testament, partly on the ground
of morality, which is taught from 50
much higher a plane in the New
Testament than in the Old Testament.
the difficulty emphasized by the
teaching of st. Paul, wherein he
seemed to set a new system of grace
over against the old system of works.
How to reconcile these discrepancies
between the Old and New Testaments
perplexed them. And the other ner-
plexity was, how to reconcile the bad
world with the good and mighty God.
These they met with a series of prom
,sitions.
They said there are two antagon-
1stic facts. There is matter which
is essentially evil, and there is a spir-
it which is essentially divine" They
also said, There are two worlds.
the lower world, In which we live.
clothed in matter. and thereby hav.
ing our spirit hindered by this enyir-
onment of evil; and a higher world
where God dwells. remotely distant
and having between Him and us a
long series of spiritual being. ema-
nations from Him, called aeons. and
at the end of this long line of aeons
reaching down is }he Demiurge, =
pretty poor kind of aeon" The Dem
urge was the maker OF the world,
evil matter, and the Demiurge was
the God Of the Old Testament. Every,