The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1920-01-02
Intern rtional
SundaySchoolLesson
BY WILLIAM +. ELLIS.

| Pentecost. Acts 2:14. 22:24. 32:42.
An Old Message for the New Year.
Religiously. there is something new
on the horizon for Nineteen Twenty.
Practically all of the denominations of
the United States and Canada have
united in concerted enterprise, more
comprehensive and radical than any
thing they have heretofore under
taken, called the Interchurch World
Movement. 1t enters the new year
with an auoactouS program, huge
Organization and practically unlimited
money. All Christians should wish it
well; some even dare hope that it may
be the solution for the present prob
lem of social crisis and religious deca-
dence.
At the beginning of a momentous
year. as we take up a course of, Sun
| day school studies that face the fun
damentals of faith. it is well to deal
frankly with ourselves and with con-
ditions. Let US admit freely the
temptation to do spiritual work by
material methods. And, to prevent
| later disillusionment let US, also. in
perfect candor remind ourselves that
the church is not going to meet sue
! cessfully the present emergency in the
world by means of money or machin-
| cry or methods of modernity.
| The church, may take on all the
| business resourcefulness of the Stand
| ard Oil company; all the publicity de-
vices of the circus; all the many-sided
adaptability OF a political party; and
all the propaganda ingenuity of the
| German government, and still leave
| her great-task fairly untouched. Scien-
| tific efficiency on the part of the
church is not enough to save our dis
| traught times. However useful a sub
ordinate place all these modern appli-
ances may fill, the truth needs to be
driven straight home that they are
merely incidental. Nothing that
worldly wisdom can devise is able to
deliver our enmeshed and imperilledf
world.
Back To Peters Way.
A message proclaimed is more po-
| tent than Organizations constituted or
| institutions erected. One Fisherman,
afire with the eloquence of the eye
witness. proved mightier than the Ro-
man senate and than Caesar and his
legions. We cannot improve upon
| Peter at Pentecost. The first and last
obligation of Christianity to the world
is a Word Of witness. Preaching, ae-
cording to apostolic specifications, is
going to save humanity. The Good
News is the only hope of bad times.
Accept no substitutes" A motion
picture can never supplant the mes
sage of a man who has had personal
traffic with God. An Open Forum is
poor makeshift for an Open Book;
| II
| lier to make Bolsheviks than Chris
tians The Peter fashion at Pentecost
set the gait that the church meant to
| follow; she has strayed from it only
at her own peril and at mankind's
| loss.
AS a layman, and as a prepayment of
| Christian publicity, and as a forward
looking progressive, I nevertheless de-
clare it as a deep conviction, born OF
experience, observation and study OF
1 m GI,4[ Il re
| great need today is for more God
aflame preachers of the gospel of a
Crucified and Risen Christ. Lack of
| these is the worst weakness of the
1 church. Prophets in Peters mould,
men with clear, unmistakable
message about God and the way out
for the world-men who search the
| hearts of their fellows, and set them.
| to crying in contrition-these are
more to be desired today than any
new movements or organizations or
| campaigns. The many-tongued world
| will cleanse as by fire the corruptions
of our time, only when it hears the
witnesses to the power of the Re
deemer.
In a PoIygIot World
Within five years we have moved
| into a new great world, embracing
all races and countless strange
tongues. We know ourselves cosmop-
olites, and responsible for the set
| thing of questions undreamed of
short time ago. At no previous study
of the Pentecost story have We so
| clearly understood the reality of the
catalogue of nationalities who heard
Peters sermon; he might almost have
been preaching at the Paris peace
conference, or on the East Side of
New York. AS we think of it all now,
we understand anew that its mean
| ing must apply not only to Luke's list.
ranging from Parthians to Arabians.
| but also to vast groups of mankind
unknown in Peters time.s The Mes
sage of Pentecost today has a wider
scope than the New Testament world.
One of our modern poets. Richard
/ Burton. has voiced the universally of
| the call of Christ:
T"It is said the Bedouins cry, on the Syrian
hills, clear
| Loud summons to war, and the tribes far
distant hearken and hear,
So wondrous rare Is the air, SO crystal the
atmosphere.
Their call is to arms; but One. in the cen
spake there for Peace. In tones that were
marvellous sweet aud low,
And the ages they hear Him yet and His
voice do the nations know"
As Pentecost pictured, the Word is
to all the world. Since the armistice.
| many American have sunk into a
new sense of selfish provincialism and
| isolation. They are a sort, of western
! Sim Feiners, for themselves alone''
| But it cannot be done. Even if the
commingled blood shed in France did
! not cement US indissolubly to the
whole world, the blood shed on Cal
vary would do so. We cannot accept
the ties Christ without being tied to
all his other friends. The Modes and
Mesopotamians Cat present, afresh,
| peoples in a crisis) have the same
need for the Penteeost tidings as the
Canadians and Americans
A Great Sermon. l
| Better than a theological seminary
was it for Peter. the fisherman, to
have been keeping company with
Jesus. the carpenter. There are signs
that the churches are revising their
sense OF values in training for the
\ ministry; many an anointed young
man is removed far from his fellows.
and emascuiated and devitalized, by
modern theological curricula Reek-