Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1911-09-12
A PRAYERLESS AND FAITHLESS
MORALITY IS IMPOSSIBLE
ar BISHOP W. A. CANDLES.

In Christ's doctrine of providence, as
set forth in the Sermon on the Mount.
trust in God is related Immediately to
man can serve two masters; for either
he will hate the one and love the other,
or he will hold to the one and despise
the other. Ye can not serve God and
mammon. Therefore / say unto you,
Take no thought for your life, what We
shall eat or what We shall drink; nor
yet for your body what we shall put on.
Is not the life more than meat and the
body than raiment'. The point of the
passage is in the word therefore, and
its meaning Is that anxious care for ma
terial things arising from distrust OF
Gods providence alieniates us from God
and makes US servants of mamrnon.
In the ordinary preachments about
providence this is not the phase of the
subject which Is brought to view. Men
are exhorted to trust God in order that
they may feel more comfortable and
cheerful. But Jesus urges reliance upon
Gods providential care in order that men
may be virtuous, and that they may not
be lost in the service of mammon. 1t is
well enough for men to be comfortable,
but 1t Is indispensable that they be
virtuous; and virtuous they will not be
in default of faith in God.
Occasions are constantly arising in the
course of daily living in which II appears
that right living is not feasible. The way
of wrong seems the only safe path to
take. The pathway of right principle APP
pears to be perilous. If not utterly OBJ
structed. and the way OF worldly expedi-
ency seems to be the only way open to
US. In such situations, when right and
interest n ho IN FRO aCf Ia Ia
opposition. when conscience and con-
venience constrain to opposite courses of
conduct, the soul its crucial hours
and testing times. II in such a moment
a man has no firm trust in the righteous
God, who loveth and helpeth righteous
ness, he will say to himself, ~ wish I
could do right, but 1 can not afford it.
In this situation the right is not practical
BILE" But IL God is real to him, If he
trusts the divine hand as being both
able and willing to take care of that
which is right. he will say Whatever
may befall me 1 can not afford to do
wrong AS the Lord my God liveth 1
will not sin against HIM.
The essence of heroic and incorruptible
virtue is faith in God and the source of
all cowardly compromises with evil is
found in doubt. The case OF the Hebrew
children in Babylon, when they were
threatened with the fiery furnace to COM
pei them to commit the sin of idolatry,
illustrates this great and practical truth.
To the threat of the king they answered.
We are not careful to answer thee in
this matter If it be so, OUR GOD
WHOM WE SERVE rs ABLE TO DE-
LIVER US FROM THE BURNING
FIERY FURNACE, AND HE WILL RE-
LIVER Us. OUT OF THINE HAND.
But II not be It known unto thee, o
king, that we will not serve thy gods.
nor worship the golden image which thou
hast set up. To men who can answer
thus there is nothing in all thef uni
verse more real. or more worthy OF
trust, than God. The favour of God IS
to such men the greatest good and His
frown the worst possible i'll They en-
dure as seeing Him who is invisible
OF course to doubting minds men of
such heroic faith appear as unreasoning
fanatics. 1t must be so for man Of
faith and "a man of the
world reason from entirely differ
ent premises. and they must reach in
evitably. opposite eofriusions. The di-
vorgence of their v iewssgdoesg not come
from the fact that one OF them rea-
sons and the other does not reason:
they differ because the premises upon
Which they reason are divergent. Tbs
slons from the facts of Gods charac-
ter and the laws of the divine cavern
ment; but to the man of the world,
who is without faith in Ga, these
things of God are foolishne@s, because
they are spiritually discerned" Il Co
rinthians ii:14). The, man Of faith and
the man of doubt move in worlds as
different as If one lived on the earth
and the other on Mars. They can not
possibly agree in convictions, charac-
ter or conduct.
Unfortunately the men of our times
vainly imagine that they can retain the
morals of the Sermon on the Mount
after they have renowned the faith
which it requires. The men of the
commercial world are especially con-
cerned that the two virtues of truth
and honesty. without which the CONNER
cial world suffers sorely. must be saved
from the general wreck OF faith. But
they, and all other classes, may as well
understand that neither truth nor hon.
esty nor any other virtues can be saved
when all faith in God Is lost
If men cease to trust God and His
providence they will undertake to care