Perth Amboy evening news., 1921-08-13

readers, war on q large SCALE, WITH
armies of hundreds of thousands of
men arrayed against each other.
still RACES in Bible Lands. Greeks
and Turks are doing the actual
fighting, but the interests of all the
leading nations are involved. The
outcome may ultimately be of even
more far-reaching Importance than
the decision on the western front.
AS the newspaper often turns
readers to the Bible, so in the pres
ent instance the Scripture Lessons
which are being studied by thirty
million members of the Sunday
schools throughout the world may
turn many minds TO the days cable
grams. Asia Minor, where the lar
gest-scale fighting now to be seen
on earth is under way is the iden-
teal scene of the new campaign of
Christianity's greater soldier, the
Apostle Paul. The best map from
which to study the days dispatches
are those printed in the backs of
modern Bibles. This coincidence of
modern news with ancient history is
only one of the ways wherein the
Sunday school begets large-minded-
ness, and makes for world citizen
ship. 1t is incumbent upon Chris
tians to think and live spaciously.
The Greatest Work in the World
We are brought squarely up
against u big idea by this Lesson.
For here begins. in the Acts his
tory, that campaign of world con-
quest which burst the Judean and
Syrian boundaries of Christianity,
and carried the Tidings quickly to
the centers of Roman power, and
even to the borders of Europe and
which continue today to bear the
same banner across the borders of
lTribet, into the center of the CEN
ter of Africa" as n missionary
letter 1 have received is dated; into
the far islands of the sea, and to
every people under heaven. We
have to do with a movement which
has changed maps, moulded nations
and altered the course of history.
1t is a fat lesson that crowds us
today, sc there is no room to recall
how the known world, then center
irg about the Great Sea-" which is
afresh the scene of the deepest per-
plexities that confront modern
statecraft, was prepared for this
swift extension of the Good News of
a Saviour for all mankind. Greece
| lldu llllpOScu d COllllllOli idiiS udSC VI
culture upon all peoples, so that the
everywhere. Rome had latd a net
work of good roads and legal pro-
lection over the known world.
Judea had provided the religious
background for the new Message.
So it was as the Man of the Hour
Gods W hour-that Paul set
forth.
Gods clocks all chime in time. AS
thoughtful persons perceive the ex-
treme present need of a new spirit
ual motive to restore, restrain and
reign over human life, they see also
how one hundred years of Chris
ian missions have occupied most of
the strategic places of earth. At
least a skeletonized preparation of
the entire world field has been made
for the new campaign of Christian
ization for which the distraught
lace waits. The making ready of
the ancient world for Paurs mis-
sionary tour was no more ProVi-
dental or dramatic than that which
today lies before our eyes. Ours is
a unified humanity with unprece-
denied communications and identity
Of interests ana needs. The field is
| DTeDdTeu, the MSSSd6t 10 ltddy dlit
adequate; the need is surprising:
all that lacks is the statesman
soldier-saint to follow in Pauls
steps.
Little Men in Big Places
In no ~censorious spirit, l hope,
am bound to record the great and
growing conviction that organized
Christian work needs a better type
of leadership. The smallness of the
men in high official positions of re-
ligious responsibility is both dis
couraging and eXasperating. Few
of them can see farther than their
own jobs. They are often only
clerkly-minded occupants of salaried
positions, whose supreme concern is
the safety and success of their own
organizations. Their complacency
is as remarkable as their incompe-
tence. Most of them think them
selves leaders," whereas they are
| often found in opposition to real ad-
vancement and to large kingdom
projects. The pioneering spirit oil
Barnabas and Saul is utterly lack
ing in them.
One sometimes wishes that il
might be possible for all salaried
workers in organized Christianity
excepting possibly the active minis
ters of the Gospel, to spend a period
of, say, five years in self-supportine
secular pursuits. Then there would
ensue a wholesome testing of the
reality of all the professional beliefs
and activities; and also, it is to be
hoped, a mighty accession of Chris
tian activity into the ordinary walks
of life. We have gone a long way
from the self-supporting missionary
,.,a-Ir &c a.. piannarc n1nHt nrhn,I
we are now studying.
If it is true that strange limita-
tons. intellectual, spiritual and So
cial, seem to encompass the official
leadership of religious organizations
it is even more true-and somewhat
a corrective of this condition-that
the ordinary company of Christians
are strangely ready nowadays tC
rise to the largest conceptions and
presentations of religious opportuni-
ty and duty. No statement of the
church's present mission can be toe
bold or sweeping for the average re-
ligious congregation or convention
The time-spirit of crisis has moVed
powerfully upon the popular mind
Christians generally believe that
Christ is calling His people to mex
ampled service; and they really
clamor for brave, big leadership
The Church is impatient of all at
tempts to compress the Gospel OF
Christ into a mere formula of petty
prescriptions and prescriptions: she
wants to go with Saul into the diff
cult places and to attempt the auda'
cious tasks. One reason why there
is today an alarming shortage OF
candidates for the ministry is that
perfunctory and professional eccle-
siasticism does not appeal to high