To be near unto God - pagina 349

master of these present-day out-and-out people of the world. They still strive for higher things. They are lovers of art. They are zealous in works of philanthropy. They labor for general culture as they understand it. At times they dote with ideals that awaken the poetic talent in them. But far from being led thereby to worship, this higher, more ideal Hfe is the ground from which they explain the superfluity of religion. Religion may do for the lower classes of society. They have outgrown it. To live without God in the world they consider a means by which to secure high places of honor in the life of this world. Love alone can save the world from these conditions. At Ephesus there were people who at one time lived without God in the world, but who by hundreds were turned to God, not by reproaches and uncharitable criticisms, but by the love wherewith the apostles approached them. In this apostolic love the reality of life in the world with God was luminous. This thawed out hearts and captured them. This reality is not devoid of creed. There is no greater witness for the truth and the facts of the Gospel than St. Paul. This reality of life with God is not without forms. Preaching, Baptism and Holy Communion stand ever in the foreground. But the power behind the creed and the service of forms was the work of the Holy Ghost, his indwelling in the heart, and life in constant fellowship with God. If then the church of God would raise a barrier in the way of increasing atheism of our times, let her hold fast to her confession, and honor the sacred services of the sanctuary. But above all things else, let her guard the essence that is behind these forms, and itself

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