Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-12-29
YEAR OF WONDERS
SEEN In REVIEW
Ellis Shows Lessons of 1916 as
Seen in History of Early
Church
(By William II. Ellis.) }

III hAStoty lOHB Cdlenuat soiilS
years are printed in red. Red fol
emphasis and red for blood marks the
year 1916. AS the annalists compile
the records of the twelve months now
passing they will crowd their col
ums with a diversity of unique and
significant events, from the inven'
ton OF new engines of death on the
battlefield to the overthrow of ancient
nations. Time for ages to come Will
date back to the period of which this
year is a critical part.
Unheeded by all the general chron'
iclers. a factor of deep import in the
year that is gone is the twelve
months of the Sunday school spent
by more than score of millions OF
persons. here and abroad, in q week
by-week study of the history of the
Apostolic Christian Church.
Absurd" cries some critic, who
boasts that he will not believe any,
thing he cannot see, even though
that stupid creed would deny the ex,
istence of his own soul; "the idea OF
counting a Sunday School lessor
among the achievements of thi:
epochal year! That is nothing bu
arrant provincialism and sheer non
sense"
Not so fast, my skeptical friend
All the world has learned afresh tha
LAS a man thinketh in his Heart, 81
is he" The ideals of people are to-
day the determining force in his
tory. No real statesman or scholar
would consider as negligible any in
fluence that has been operating fun
damentally upon the lives of twenty
million intelligent persons-especial
ly when that force strikes directl!
at the deepest springs of action
which are religious.
Leaving its implications and con
sequences to the readers tmagina
ton, the simple fact is to be stateC
that this year of study of the ris,
and growth of the Christian Church
with it's sweep over the then entire
known world, has peculiarly pre-
pared the minds of a host Of per
sons to consider the large movement
of history in our own time. The his
torical sense has been immeasurabl,
quickened by the year which tn
Sunday schools of the world hav
spent in the Book of the Acts.
Great Events That Changed The
World
This gift of seeing things in tn
large is not common, although 1t i
the first quality of the historian
Whoever las it always reckons witt
ence in great events. So we ma
fairly compare the achievements o
early Christianity, which has bee
the theme of Sunday school stud
during 1916, with certain other his
torical events of first magnitude il
human history.
| There were, for example, the con
quests of Alexander, which unifie
most of the known world, and car
ried Grecian culture from the Allan
tic to the Indian Ocean, and to tn
banks of the Indus.
| Long afterward came the rise O
| Mohamm edanism and it's irruptio
! into Europe, with TRANSFORMING con
sequences that endure to the presen
day.
The Crusaders, in turn, carrie
social change in the world tina
was greater than their militar
achievements.
Then came q group of nonmilt
tary triumphs, the invention c
printing, the discovery of America
and the Reformation, which wrough
more nightly than the conquests c
Alexander.
OF the present war, as a world
revolutionizing agency, it is too earl
yet to speak with any degree of final
ity. We know already, though, tina
in many respects it is more far
reaching than any of the epochs
events named.
Overtopping all of these era-mak
ing factors, however, is the effect @
the rise of the Christian Church
! fuh haNra c,fttdiaH
The Gospel of Christ has won might
Ter victories than the sword of Alex
ander; has acquired a larger domin
ion than Islam ever attempted; ha
made a spiritual reality of what tn
Crusaders attempted by tempors
| power; and has more profoundly in
| fiuenced life than the invention O
printing, the discovery of Americ
and the Reformation, all of whic