Arizona republican. [volume] (Phoenix, Ariz.) 1890-1930, 1912-01-29
THE GOSPEL
AND THE WORLD
Sunday Morning Sermon of
Rt. Rev. j. w. Atwood,
Bishop of Arizona on the
Relation of Christ to HUI
man Society.

The Son of Man came eating ana
drinking. and they say Behold man
siuttonous and wine-bibber' a
friend Of publicans and sinners. st.
Matthew N. 10"
Nv subject is asceticism, true and
false Perhaps we might better call
il the relation of the Gospel to the
world. or Christ's attitude towards
human society In these days we
find men studying more and more
the life of Jesus Christ We find
men discovering new things concern
ing him We find. moreover. false
conceptions of His life and teachings
overthrown. We find that the per-
sOnality of Jesus is grander and rich
CT and more vital than any definition
of Christianity. Yes. we discover that
crude definitions have been given
that have made Jesus Christ unreal
and remote from the world into
which He came nineteen hundred
years ago. and from which he has
never gone away. though men have
failed To see Him in their blindness
If we could explain the marvellous
power and Illuminating influence Of
Phillips Brooks over the men and
women of his generation. an influ-
cnce which i'm no way is diminishing
today. because, wrought into the very
fibre Of their spiritual life. and con
tipucd through the revelation of his
public sermons and biographies. We
Will find il To consist largely in the
fact that he was prrsistently de-
claring all through his life the per
feet humanity OF Jesus, that He was
MAN. He brought the life of
Christ To- the Interpretation of our
own. He was always endeavoring To
show how that great life touched
upon our varied human life today at
every point. He made real To I'M
numbered thousands the title which
Jesus 50 constantly gave To Himself,
the Son Of Man. He showed that
this was not antaGoniStic To the sec
ord title. tn" son of God. He was
the Son Of God. because He was the
Son of Man. The TWO were not sep
arate. but they were blended togeth-
CT in perfect union The divinity and
humanity made up the perfect man.
This is the way Jesus Christ is pre-
scented i'm the Gospels. ,Thc human
and the divine are not inconsistent
with each other. and God pity the
men who have nothing Of the divine
Of His own spirit in them. who are
not His children but belong to this
earth alone. But somehow or other.
there grew up later a different idea
Of Christ's person and character
This conception partook more o..
the spirit of John the Baptist than
Of Christ. We read the Gospels and
we cannot overlook the fact that
Jesus was ever preaching and fight
irg against worldliness. but we also
find that His wish and prayer were
that His disciples might not be re-
moved from the world, but that they
might be kent unspotted from the
evil. The church was intended To-
leaven the whole lump. The full and
complete triumph Of Christianity will
not come until the whole world be-
comes the Kingdom of God. Now.
John the Baptist was. first and fore
most and all the time, an ascetic
He lived remote from men. he gave
up al human ties and relationships
his dress was lions skin. and his
food consisted of locusts and wild
honey His real home was in the
wilderness. from which he emerged
POW and then to preach the gospel
of repentance and To announce the
coming Judgment of the world In
his eyes. the whole world and every
thing connected with it were evil
He did not distinguish between the
world itself and the spirit of world
illness, which is SelfishneSs. mater
ialism. as opposed To the life of the
Spirit. which are love and service
Now. it is true that we can find i'm
Christ's own words many expressions
which. taken by themselves, would
life held by John. But we must loci,
AT Christ's life in its broad outline.
We must judge His life as a whole
We must look at His example as WEI
as His words There is nothing more
than trying to build a
doctrine or theory Of life upon 4
single isolated text. We have seen
this illustrated again and again. Men
have gone to the Scriptures with |
strange views of life and there they |
have found support for them in iso-
lated texts. Strange and inconsistent |
doctrines. antagOnistic tn each otner. |
have been defended by an appeal Il |
h, authority Of the Bible. This is !,