The Montgomery advertiser., 1909-05-31

freeoom and power. The rignt hano or God is the one that governs this uni- verse and Christ is seated there, not standing. but seated. The things He
 lived out among men are the forces that are running this old world. His
 principles are enthroned forever. And to seek those principles is to find the things that put us on the winning side. The difference between the pray CT of the Christian and the Pagan Is that the Pagan performs rites and cer- emonies to get his god to do his will. while the Christian asks to be brought into subjectton to the Divine will. The ascended life Is the surrendered life. IL seeks only the things that are in line with Gods will and government of the world. This means that we have the backing of that government. The universe Is made for the true. the beautiful and the good. Nothing elSe has a chance Every law and evefy force is pledged alike to the ultimate destruction of the wrong, and the final enthronement of the right. We come o-the common tasks of the day with the backing of Almighty Love.
 T watched pile driver the other day as 1t speedily drove down timbers twenty feet long for the foundations of a sky-scraper: A derrick . nun. dred feet high lifted a great block Of iron and dropped 1t on the end of the timbers and they went down like splinters before a sledge hammer. The block of iron fell with the momentum of the higher level. I went away say ing to myself, So does the ascending life drop upon the everyday duties and problems with the momentum of the Christly level
 working With God.
 This is working with God rather than against Him. I saw small boy manipulating a crane at the St. Louis fair that would lift sixty tons. He waz sitting comfortably reading newspaper while by touching spring the great machine responded to his win. He, too, was working with God by adding his little knowledge and skill to the forces of nature. Had he touched the electric wires that con- veyed the current all would have been over with him. He who works against God cannot succeed; he who works with God cannot fail.
 "Elisha's servant dismayed at the hosts of the invading Syrians had but to have his eyes opened to see the mountain filled with horses and char lots of fire round about his master. So | invisible armies that are thvincible | surround every loyal heart and put us | beyond the reach of the combined pow CTS of the devil. and we can work with the leisure of eternity in our bones.
 And the consciousness of limitless power brings freedom.
 T heard a story the other day of two travellers in Europe who found an | eagle chained to a post and said that would never do. They asked the own | CT what the bird was worth and when | ss was named as the price they paid 1t and loosed tite chain But the eagle. 30 long confined to the post, refused to leave it and circled round and round | as he had done so long. They tried to push him off but still he would not go. they took him between them and. lifting him as high as they could. threw him up in the air. Feeling his freedom and power. he flew away to make his home among the mountain .raRs. Poor, oppressed humanity has been so long chained to the post bv lear and superstition and ignorance that we refuse to be liberated.
 Religion came to give us not 'hackles but wings, to make us un- lfraid.
 The vast sweet visage of space md teach us to
 Fly in the greatness of God. as the
 marsh hen flies | Tn the freedom that fills all the space
 twixt the marsh and the skies
 And the secret of this freedom lies Tn the gospel of non-resistance. Jesus was giving not a code of action but a ieep philosophy of life when He said. whosoever smiteth thee on thy right ,heelx. turn to him the other aIso.' He ,arries us into the atmosphere of the courts and exhorts from the stand point of the injured individual rathey han social justice. He is telling us low that man can make the most of lis life.
 Spiritual friction is the cause of most of our unhappiness. The combined forces of nature and society may assail us, put can disturb as only when we be- gin to fight them. He is pleading for things, on the offensive rather than the defensive. for us to fight for the right rather than against the wrong, live by what we love rather than what we hate, by what we assert rather than what we deny. work for the end In view rather than against possible failure.
 "Make you demand for wages zero and you have the world at your feet
 "Seek what we can do for others | rather than what others can do for us overcome sine not by dwelling upon | its hideousness. but by turning to God and righteousness.
 Facts of Life.
 But what shall we do with the facts of life that are against us. facts that are stern, awful. overwhelming? There are those who can deny even pain and get free from 1t. Blessed are those who can by juggling with facts get rid | of them. We can defy them. We can use them, and their noblest use is to cultivate dexterity in the art of liv- ing by bringing us nto closer touch with reality and into fuller harmony with the laws of eternal life. And where there is harmony there is free doom. so, still within this life.. Tho lifted o'er its strife the ascended soul grasps more and more of the exhaustless riches that are and that satisfy its deep- est longiugs. for the ascended life is the ascending life.
 "This ascended life which begins in a resurrection and Is committed to the kAa Fnr- al na