The Republican., 1925-10-15
SUNDAY SCHOOL LESSON
Prepared Especially For The Repub.
lican's Readers by Rev. U. S.
Wright, DID.
SUNDAY, OCTOBER 18, 1925.
PAUL WRITES TO THE COR
INTHIANS.

in IhIANS.
| Cor. 12:1-13:13. Read both Letters.
Now abideth faith hope, love, these three:
and the greatest of these is love- Cor
1913.
TEACHER AND TEXT.
Paul was the first president of the
greatest correspondence school in his
tory. In personality, passion, atti-
tude, method and purpose the Apostle
was a teacher and it was we'll that
such was his characteristic, for the
necessity of teaching was thrust upon
him by the conditions under which he
worked. Reading rapidly thru any of
his letters or thru Luke's accounts of
his activities, one finds always the
sympathetic understanding of others
and the attempt to help them solve
their problems. His letters are cor
respondence sheets giving solutions
to something unsolved by the pupil
that had grown out of his previous
teaching. Take this letter to the Cor
liI'li40ilS' much VI IL - d reply 10
pupils letter of inquiry of which he
says: "NOw concerning the things
whereof We wrote" and proceeds to
discuss marriage, meats, customs,
communion, value of spiritual gifts,
the resurrection and the collection. To
study the letter is to discover the
things that were being talked about
among those Christians, raw from
heathenism, who in that first century
became the Church of Christ.
The particular problem of the les
son runs thru three chapters, begin
ming with the 18th Factions had aris-
en- in which some boasted the author
ity of Cephas and derided Paul's. The
Appolonians exalted oratory,the Paul
inists defended their leader and those
"of Christ exalted their piety above
the rest. Another question ran thru
these groups that grew out of vary
ing expressions of their spiritual ex-
perience in which teaching was set
over against healing, evangelism
against speaking with tongues, and
the group having this particular form
of expression believed themselves pos
sessing the supreme evidence of spir-
itual living. 1t is an expression that
has been illustrated across the years
by some who speak in tongues" un-
Ineligible usually to the speaker
himself. Who were the holiest? What
is its mark? 1t is a question as old as
the race and as persistent and the e
ply is an equally ageless response to
the query raised and goes beyond all
eXternals to the foundation upon
which the life of God rests equally
with that Of His children.
THE INDISPENSABLE GRACE.
Eloquence, Learning, Faith, Chari-
ty and Self-sacrifce march into ones
presence Ike great, white angels, fit
to serve the life of the highest. And
where we see them walk we bow in
mute reverence, for more battles have
been won with words than with bull
lets. Learning opens the doors TO the
mysteries of past, commands the
present, and to some degree can chart
the future and he whose mind is disci-
plined may achieve things undreamed.
Faith is the substance out of which
society is builded, for without it all
institutions and enterprises crumble
Charity, benevolence, has never made
gifts comparable with those Of today
and the place it occupies in eStimat-
ing a mans worth was never so in
tluential as now. Self-giving is seen
laying down even life for the ad-
vancement of the race and the men
in kahki who volunteered for inocu-
lation with new serum for trench
fever, r.sking death for their COM
rades' good did a service as daring
as any that won a Congressional med
al. To find life that homes virtue,
like these is to discover mans capac-
ity for God-likeness, and vet Paul de-
clares that unless these are saturated
with love they leave the posSessor
utterly bankrupt in character, bra
zen clattar and a mere cipher in the
measure Of real values. Here is an in
escapable challenge in the demand as
terrific as that of Jesus for His fol
lowers to love "as | have loved YOU
For we would think ourselves might
lily advanced if we could compass
these qualities in our own living The
world would call Us Christians indeed,
but Paul declares we would be moth
ing but paupers in Grace and to the
men actually struggling in Corinth
over what is most worth setting as
Christians goal and failing in loving
thereby, babies was his eye-opening
word To fail in love is TO fail to have
God in the life, for He is love
TIL EINENHACSTABLE GRACE.
In the Morse mythology Thor is