Studies in the Life of the Christian: His Faith and His Service — John Shaqi
Studies in the Life of the Christian: His Faith and His ServiceSell, Henry T. (Henry Thorne)
Religion
Studies in the Life of the Christian: His Faith and His Service
Sell, Henry T. (Henry Thorne)
Religious education
God's Attitude to the Universe.--The Scriptures are consistent in the
statement, many times made, that God is the source of all things. He
brings all things into being and sustains all by the word of His
power. His is a work of perpetual administration. But God is not
wholly occupied in conducting the affairs of the universe, neither
does it exhaust His possibilities (Psalm 8:1; 148:13). He is greater
than the universe. God, says Dr. Clarke, in his "Outline of Christian
Theology," is like the spirit of a man in his body, which is greater
than his body, able to direct his body, and capable of activities that
far transcend the physical realm. God is a free spirit, personal,
self-directing, unexhausted by His present activities. This statement
affirms both the immanence and the transcendence of God. By the
immanence of God is meant that He is everywhere and always present in
the universe, nowhere absent from it, never separated from its
life. By His transcendence is meant--not as is sometimes
represented--that He is outside and views the universe from beyond and
above, but that He is not shut up in it or limited by it, not required
in His totality to maintain and order it. By both together is meant
that He is a free spirit inhabiting the universe, but surpassing it,
immanent as always in the universe, and transcendent, as always
independent of its limitations and able to act upon it.
God's Attitude to Man.--God has not only placed man at the head of the
animal world, but has endowed him with qualities which make him its
lord and master. God is more than the Creator of man. He is his
Father, Saviour and Friend.
God comes to man in the attitude, of The Supreme Spiritual Being,
approaching a spiritual being who is of priceless value. Jesus Christ
makes this truth very plain. He everywhere teaches the great worth of
the life of a man and that God is seeking to come directly into touch
with this life which is so precious in His sight (John 3:16; Matthew
10:30,31). This life is not the physical but the spiritual which is
the real life of a man. "Not what one has, but what one is, gives the
true measure of a man." He said, "For what shall it profit a man, if
he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul? Or what shall a
man give in exchange for his soul?" (Mark 8:36,37). "Is not the life
more than meat and the body than raiment?" (Matthew 6:25). "In
harmony with this view of the worth of life," Professor Stevens in
"The Theology of the New Testament," says, "Jesus taught that the most
humble and insignificant person, on whom men set no value, is precious
in the sight of God. These little ones, be they children or humble
believers, are not the despised (Matthew 18:10). The least important
person who goes astray from goodness excites the pity and solicitude
of God, and He seeks him and brings him back as the shepherd, leaving
his ninety-nine sheep, goes into the mountains in eager search after
the one that has wandered away" (Luke 15:14).
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