The Wolf Point herald. (Wolf Point, Mont.) 1913-1940, 1924-04-24

RA6B of men are turned to dwell
upon a fact which no nat
uralistic critic Of the Gospels has ever
succeeded in explaining away.
Faith may differ over whether the
reported resurrection experiences OF
the followers of Jesus were objective
or subjective, but history records be-
yond effective contradiction the COM
polling and Transforming result upon
life and character of those experiences.
Whatever doubt may be held as to
whether the men and women who testi-
fed to seeing the risen Christ, looked
with the eyes of the body upon an ac-
tual physical manifestation of their
Master, there can be no doubt as to
the certainty of their conviction that
He whom they had seen taken from
the cross, whose body had been laid
In Joseph's tomb, survived as a real
and living presence in their midst.
This faith brought together the fright
ened and detected group of disciples
in the spirit of confident rejoicing; 1t
carried them through arduCus labor
and bitter persecution it won to them
increasing adherents; 1t triumphed
over every difficulty, over all opposi-
ton. 1t became the power Of he life
eternal, giving new significance to all
life, new meaning to all the lessons
they learned from the Masters lips.
We may build this faith upon the
empty tomb, but, in fact, it had deeper
foundation than that. 1t went back
behind the tomb and the cross to the
living Christ as they had known Him.
Everything that they had seen of Him
and heard Of Him made it reasonable,
made it logical, made it, in a sense, in
evitable. He had lived in the power of
the life eternal. 1t was inconceivable
that the beauty, the goodness and the
truth which found embodiment in Him
could perish. that the personality which
they expressed could be less than for
ever enduring. The existence of these
values-inseparable from personality
was essential tc the understanding
of life as anything more than a pur-
poseless tragedy, a futile breath in a
chaotic and meaningless world.
To have known Jesus was to have
kuONn I1dI IllClG IL IL SDlllLudA LOdAlbJ
which transcends the material and the
temporal. This consciousness had been
quickened in the souls of His follow
ers. The jealous hatred CT His foes,
the brutal cross of Roman power, the
sealed tomb-these were the eva
nescent, the illusory means whereby it
was stupidity sought to destroy the
eternal reality of His love, His wis
dom, His soaring faith in God. And
the effort had failed. How could it be
otherwise? How can it ever be ether
wiser
And the meaning of His life was
just this-that the reality in the life
of all men is the possibility of becom-
ing like Him, of expressing beauty and
goodness and truth, of living now and
always in the power of the life eternal.
To him who has seen this possibility,
faith in the continuity of life, in the
persistence Of personality, comes nat
urally and will not permit of contra
dictica; to him death is merely an
incident-not even an interruption-it
is a step in the process, an escape from
the shadows of illusion into the full
light of reality. 1t is robbed of fears
and robed in the glory OF hope.
The effect of such a faith and such
a hope is seen in the story of the
early church, a story marked by sud-
denly intensified interest in the SUI
preme Importance of human values by
the flaming of a splendid spiritual
idealism against the background of a
world given ever to the flesh, by the
immediate broadening of sympathies in
a rae of narrow prejudices to over
whelm and submerge the ingrained
prejudices of tradition and former re-
ligious training, by the emphasis upon
justice and brotherhood in human rela-
lions, upon character and unselfsh
services. Men and women began to
live the life eternal, personality was
appraised in terms of the enduring,
and the things of time and change fell
back into their proper subordinate
places.
1t is a revival of that resurrection
faith which the world needs today, a
faith in the reality of the continuing
life and the things which belong to
lt. NOInlng else can save US from the
perverted sense of values which curses
humanity, from the circling pursuit
of illusion, from the vain struggle
for that which cannot satisfy.
The vital message of this Easter
season is the call to every man to live
in the light and power of the life
eternal, and the assurance that to ev-
1sa-s f. Ii Ta-,,
it supremacy. Those who dare
to follow where He leads may know
it's joy, and, when the world accepts
His leadership it will find both right
eousness and ~peace-these treasures 1T
can never find while it gropes amid
the shadows of its passing pride and
pomp.
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