The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1920-06-04

| CdHluSi
The Bleating of the Sheep.
| Listen to the bleating of the sheepi
| It sounds from nations all around the
| horizon to condemn the governm ents
met at Paris; it sounds from uneX
peeted corner lots of individual lives,
to betray our disobedience. Our high
professions con scarcely be heard be-
| cause of the noise made by the b1eat-
| ing of the sheep. We confess our
! selves in fellowship with Saul, the
self-righteous failure as king of Israel.
/ We are COMPOUNDED by the bleating of
| the sheep which we have preserved
for our own pride and indulgence,
when obedience would have slain ev-
| cry one of them.
! There is a picture for individual
lives and for nations in this dramatic
! episode from the history of early
Israel. It brings us face to face with.
| innermost reality. There is in it a
| clear portrayal of the way out for our
troubled times and our troubled lives
| We have failed just as Saul failed. The
| Divine word for him is equally the Di-
| vine word for us.
| Saul had become so Advanced that
/ he no longer resembled the .bashful
and modest man who had hidden him
self in the baggage when the people
had elected him king. Gone now was
! all his self-distrust. He had become
an enthusiastic convert to the divine
right of kings. He believed tremen-
/ dously in Saul. In fact. he held him
self as above the moral law.
He had yielded to the temptation
that is making shipwreck of myriads
of persons today the temptation to
| believe that laws might be necessary
for the rabble of common folk, but
! that they did not apply to him. He
was above the law. Religious teach
| ings might be all right in the abstract,
| but he personally was exempt from
their application.
| That is the specious notion that is
devastating in high places, making
| profiteers out of good" men, wreck
| ing the happy homes of men who have
suddenly come TO wealth or distinc-
ton, and melting young men and
! women to apply some vague higher
| law" than the Ten Commandments to
! their own conduct.
| A Kings Higher Law"
| The wife of a clergyman tried to
persuade me recently when the pri-
| vate life of a certain representative of
royalty was under discussion. that a
| king is not bound by the same prin-
| ciples ordinary mortals! In other
words. the Decalogue takes a vacation
whenever it meets up with a title
This dear little woman was bound to
keep her faith in royalty, even if she
| had to bend her faith to the Bible.
/ Not all of us are so naive as she. But
| our reasoning gets us to the same con-
| clusion when we wink at political cor
ruption, or condone double dealing in
international diplomacy. What one of
us would refuse to admit a censor to
our tables because he is a professional
liar, albeit employed for government
purposes2
King Saul had been told to extir-
pate the heather sAmalekites for their
| treatment of the Children of Israel.
| The awfulness of this command
seemed not to trouble his moral con-
| seriousness at all. But his vanity and
eupidity baked at the direction to de-
stroy the flocks and other booty,
which he and his army could use. And
as far executing King Agag, it minis
| tered far more to SauFs vanity to re-
tain him as a prisoner to decorate his
! triumph. The explicit command of
| the Lord came into collision with the
royal desires and pleasure and the di-
! vine will was ruthlessly run over.
| Whereat we pause and name over to
ourselves many modern parallels.
| Back of the Worlds Middle.
Staring out at us from the midst of
every days newspaper, as the most OBJ
vious application of this present Les
son, is the experience of the Great
| Powers in formulating the peace
! treaty. The war was fought avewed-
| ly to end imperialism and oppression
of weak peoples. and to stop the ex.
tension of the unscrupu1ous designs OF
a nation which put it's own claims
above all moral consideration. No in
dictment was oftener. or more justly,
| laid at the door of the kaiser than his
usurpation, by impious phrase, OF oil
/ vine right to do evil deeds.
| Now what4do we see today? The
world in a terrible tangle, and amidst
real war over large areas. because the
powers have been apportioning out the
earth selfishIy among themselves as
the booty of victory, in forgetfulness
of the noble idealism for which our
boys died. The clash of selfish ambi-
lions between the victorious nations,
1.-THE overpowering reerudescence of
se1fishness amidst us all. has put this
old world into such mess as causes
| many persons to declare that the peace
is becoming worse than the war We
fought VOL against Agag and the
Aim elekites, but we are not equal to
the high responsibility of destroying
his works, and of abstaining from fol-
lowing his example.
We are, as nations, let us confess
with shame and contrition, squarely
paralleling the case of King Saul of
old. In our day of humiliation, we
bowed low at the feet and will of God
In the hour of our victory, we forget
God and His Word, and seek the spoil
of the Amalekite for our own pride
and profit. From the high spiritual
enthusiasm and idealism that marked
us during the war there has been a
recession that makes US fear for the
same fate as that of Israefs recreant
king. This is an hour for Christian
nations to cdy from the dust a new
'Recessional." Instead, we hear only
J the bleating of sheep
The Story Itself.
The familiar incident which is the
lesson text carries its own MESA ge
and 1 quote it here:
And Samuel came to Saul; and
Saul said unto him, Blessed be thou
| of Jehovah; l have performed the
commandment of Jehovah. And
| 4 !.