The same is true of houses and lands, of business and trade. There is no necessary rivalry here. Religion does not rob us of earthly interests, it does not strip us of the good things of this world. It only corrects our perspective and enables us to see the true scale of values. The trivial and fragmentary things of the world no longer absorb us. We refuse now to allow them to own us and drive us, or drag us. We see things steadily and we see them whole. We discover through our higher contacts and inspirations how to flood light back upon our occupations and upon the things we own, and how to make these subordinate things minister to the higher functions and attitudes of life. We get not some other world, but this world here and now transmuted and raised a little nearer to the ideal and perfect world of our hopes and dreams. We get it back item for item increased a hundredfold, raised to a higher spiritual level. The wise owner of property and the intelligent man of affairs will not beg off when the great invitation comes to him. He will say: “I have just come into possession of a piece of land, I have bought five yoke of oxen, and therefore I want to come to thy divine feast so that I may learn how to turn all I possess into the channels of real service and to make these things which thou hast given me help me find the way to the highest joy and blessedness of life.” CHAPTER VI AGENCIES OF CONSTRUCTION I THE CHURCH OF THE LIVING GOD We have all been asking, “What is the matter with the Church? Why is it so weak and ineffective? Why does it exercise such a feeble influence in the world to-day? Why do men care so little for its message and its mission?” There are no doubt many answers to these questions, but one answer concerns us here. It is this: We who compose the Church do not sufficiently realize that God is a living God and that the Church is intended to be the living body through which he works in the world and through which he reveals himself. We think of him as far away in space and remote in time, a God who created once and who worked wonders in ancient times long past, but we do not, as we should, vividly think of him as a living reality, as near to us as the air is to the flying bird or the water to the swimming fish. We suppose that the Church is made up of just people, and is a human convenience for getting things done in the world. We do not see as we should that it is meant to be both divine and human and that it never is properly a Church unless God lives in it, reveals himself by means of it and works his spiritual work in the world through it.