Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1918-07-26
By WILLIAM T. ELLIS.

"slackers" and social and political as
well as commercial profiteers. but it
will also set men and women afire
with eagerness to realize in their
own lives the will of God
The swede's Telephone
AS countless of our boys have
found themselves" in the discipline
of army life, so lives beyond number
have learned that perfect freedom
comes by allegiance to the clear will
of God. Obedience else is right
felicity. Everything elst is right
when We are right with God. An
orego nSwede is said to have given
this quaint testimony:
II have all my lifetime been an in
fidel. and the Lord had a hard job
to save a poor old Swede man, but
He did save me, and put little tele-
phone in my heart and the other ind
in hiven. Sometimes He say to me,
Hello, Larsen" and 1 say, Hillo;'
and den He speak to me so sehveet,
and den must be careful dat l don't
cut up no prank to break dat little
wire what brung de message. for
find we can have a good deal of fun
wild God If we behave ourself."
Doing the will is more important
than confessing the creed, by Jesus
own declaration. AS an old writer
says, the Lords sheep are marked on
the ears and the feet; they hear His
voice and they follow Him. Christ
rebuked stingingly those who called
Hin Lord, Lord" but did not the
things He commanded them.
The Hungry Junk Heap
War is throwing on to the scrap
heap a great many institutions and
usages. We who are. Jealous for the
Church do not realize how much that
we have deemed sacred is to go the
way of old junk. Denominational
peculiarities, churchly practices,
minor organizations-the countless
wheels within wheels, to keep which
turning engrosses so much of the
power of religious institutions that
there is little left for the real output
of changed lives-these are destined
to pass. Thet Church after the war
will be a simpler organization, with
far les machinery, ferew salaried
officers. a lower maintenance cost,
less unholy competition, and only a
small degree of self-complacency. 1t
will be body of humbled and chas-
tened disciples of Jesus, bent upon
doing the will of God in the welfare
of man. The Christians of tomorrow
will have a new zeal for the honor
of the Lord. and for the fulfllment
of His ministry.
Two quotations from an army
chaplain, Rev. Godfrey Gordon, ap-
propriately close this Lesson: IF the
will of God Is merely a matter of
opinion, no single individual can
have great confidence that his own
prayers are more worth while than
the prayers of some one else who is
Offering them with a precisely con-
trary intent. But for those who be-
lieve in Christianity, the will of God
is no longer a matter of mere guess
work, and it is in no way dependent
upon our imaginings. The nature
and chtracter of God has been spread
out before use. In Christ, God is re-
vealed as a person with a will of His
own. "a will that is ascertainable-
will that is like Christ's will. 1t
does not matter that hostile nations
use to Him the same words and apply
to Him the same titles. Prayer, how
ever worded; however addressed, is
not prayer in the name of Christ un-
les 1t is a laying of our Wills in line
with Gods will, as that will has been
revealed to us in Christ. Believing
in the justice of the cause in which
we fight, convinced that it's triumph
is in accordance with His will, the
fact that others pray to Him for its
defeat will disturb us not at all. Our
task it is to keep ourselves in line
with what we believe to be His pur-
pose and His will. and herewith to
be content.
The Christian is free and royal,
yet before all things he is man un-
der authority. He is bought with a
price'-the slave of his Lord. st.
James, who is content at the open
ing of his Epistle to describe himself
as the bond-servant of Jesus Christ,
speaks more than once of a royal
law, a law of liberty. The Christian
is a servant. yet free and royal, be-
cause his service is voluntary and
offered in the spirit of the Royal
Son of Man, who himself came not to
be ministered unto but to minister.
He is under authority, but 1t is the
authority of Him in whose service
is perfect freedom. The Christian
law is law, binding and authoritative,