It is, fourth, a program of finance. It is a great thing to-day to walk about Zion, tell her towers, and consider her bulwarks. Back of all of it is the money given by faithful servants of the kingdom. What many people need for blessing of their own lives as well as for the growth of the kingdom is an adequate financial standard and program. Newer Conceptions of Religion (1922) We can never have a new set of principles of truth, but we can have new discoveries of old ones and new attitudes toward them. We can never change the constitution of life and nature, but we can learn more about it and better adapt ourselves to it. We cannot alter the divine plan of life and redemption, but we can make progress in our understanding and use of it. Not to do so would be an inexpressible pity. We do not have a new religion, but we do have newer and more adequate conceptions of the old faith. The older type of religious thinking was largely derived from the speculations of the cloister. That of the present is taken directly from the facts of life. The Bible was the basis of the old, and is the basis of the new; but in the one case it was viewed from the quiet shadows of the cell, while in the other it is seen from the viewpoint of the dusty road, the busy market place, and the domestic hearthstone. In so far as the older religious thinking did take its conclusions from life, it tended to place the stamp of divinity only on the unusual phases and outstanding experiences. It saw God in the violence of the thunder and lightning, but it did not always sense him in the gentle sunshine of the ordinary day. It recognized him in the ecstasy of the mountaintop, but it did not always find him in the duty of the valley. It connected him with the exceptional moments, but not with quiet hours, prosaic tasks, and drab days. The older religious thinking tended to glorify every tense except the present. It had its good old days on which it looked back with loving tenderness, and its Golden Age, toward which it looked forward with longing hope. The newer thinking recognizes the value of the past and the importance of the future, but lays its supreme emphasis upon the present. It glorifies only one tense, and that is the Golden Now. The International Religion (1923) The Book of Revelation is full of significant pictures, but none is more so than that presented in the Ninth Chapter. It is drawn in climaxes. The first part might seem disturbing if considered alone. As to whether God proposes to save the many or the few, it would seem to favor the first answer. John says that he heard the number of them that were sealed, and there were only twelve thousand from each of the tribes of Israel.