It will be observed that I take as historic records the statements of
the Bible. This I do in face of the efforts of many of the clergy in a
number of the churches to make me see in the Old Testament chiefly a
collection of myths, and in the New a series of compilations by
irresponsible hands, of doubtful date and authority, leaving, in the
case of our Lord, only a substratum which can be relied on as
biographical.
As an instance of what I mean I quote the following: A few weeks ago I
happened to mention to the distinguished head of one of the most
important theological schools of one of the largest denominations in the
country, our Lord's turning the water into wine. "I've no idea that He
ever did anything of the kind," were the words with which he dismissed
the subject, which I did not take up again. I am not arguing here
against his point of view. I merely state that I do not share it, and
for these two main reasons:
First, because the so-called Higher Criticism on which it is based is a
purely evanescent phase of man's learning, likely to be rejected
to-morrow by those who accept it to-day, as has been the case with other
such phases;
Secondly, because I feel sure that, with the mastery of matter to which
we have already attained, the future development of our race will
justify these seeming "miracles," and make them as natural and
commonplace as telegraphy and telephony.
I speak only for myself when I say that the more I can feel round me the
atmosphere of omnipotence the less I am aware of fear. It is a matter of
course that the one should exclude the other. The sense of being myself,
in a measure, the inheritor of omnipotence, as an heir of God and a
co-heir with Christ, becomes, therefore, one to cultivate. This I can do
only in proportion as I see that my Standard and Example cultivated it
before me. In my capacity as a son of God I take as applying to myself
the words reported by St. John: "In most solemn truth I tell you that
the Son can do nothing of Himself--He can only do what He sees the
Father doing; for whatever He does, that the Son does in like manner."
While sayings like these, of which there are many in the New Testament,
apply doubtless, in the first place, to Him who best exemplifies the
Sonship of God, they must apply, in the second place, I suppose, to all
who exemplify that Sonship to any degree whatever. Man is the Son of
God; and it is worth noting that He who is specially termed the Son of
God is also specially termed the Son of Man. "Dear friends," St. John
writes, elsewhere, "we are now God's children, but what we are to be in
the future has not been fully revealed to us." I take it, therefore, as
no presumption on my part to emphasise in my daily thought my place as a
co-heir with Christ, feeling that not only is God's almightiness
exercised on my behalf, but that as much of it as I know how to use is
placed in my hands.
X
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