To begin a confused situation is to flash on it the light of an elemental truth. Unless we begin with facts which are incontrovertible we cannot prosper in our efforts to solve the problems of life. with forms is a constant temptation. It is the surface things which catch the eye and arrest the mind. It is easier to deal with measures than with truths, to frame programs than to mould dispositions, to devise machinery than to create a new heart. Measures and programs and machinery are indispensable. Without them we cannot go on. They deserve not a little of our time and our thought. But our machinery and schedules and policies are all the time disappointing us, because we have neglected the things which lie deeper. We get into morasses because we start at the wrong point. The house falls because we do not go down to the rock. In this Cathedral, dedicated to God, in Whom we live and move and have our being, to Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord, and to the Holy Ghost, our Advocate and Guide, it is fitting that before we enter on the work that lies before us we should think together of some things which are fundamental and all controlling. "If a man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his." Too often we begin and end with the words of Jesus. His words are wonderful. They lie before us in the New Testament. They are often on our lips. It is easy to repeat them and to conjure with them. Does the Church pos Does the Church sess the words of Jesus? Yes. possess the Spirit of Christ? That is an embarrassing question. But if the Church have not the Spirit of Christ it is none of His, no matter how diligent it is in repeating His words. say to me Lord, Lord.” "Many will Sometimes we do not begin with Christ at all; we begin with the Church, its forms of worship, its sacraments, its orders, its government, its creedal statements, its traditions. But the first great Christian preacher did not begin in his thinking with the Church; he began always with Christ. To him Christ is all. If we have the Spirit of Christ we have everything. If we have not His Spirit we have nothing. That was Paul's conviction. See what this means. A man may be baptized with water, but if he is not baptized into the Spirit of Christ he is none of His. A man may come to the sacrament of the Lord's Supper all through his life, but if he have not the Spirit of Christ he has no part with Him. A man may repeat the most orthodox of the creeds, but if he have not the Spirit of Christ he is not a believer. Paul had a genius for seeing through shams. He always cut to the core, he grasped the essence, he made his way into the marrow. He did not allow his eye to wander from the main point. He saw that if a man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of His. This is not a dictum to be recited or quibbled over, but a truth to be pondered over and accepted and built on. Let us reckon with it today. “If a man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his." Paul liked to say this. He says it now in one way and now in another. Like all great teachers, he varies his language in order that the truth may have a better chance to capture the mind. To the Romans he says it in prose. To the Corinthians he says it in poetry. To the man on the Tiber he is as curt and matter of fact and peremptory as Pontius Pilate with his "What is written is written." To the Greeks he is as picturesque and opulent as Plato. "Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels and have not love-in other words, if I have not the Spirit of Christ I am nothing but noise "-I am not creating music that can be caught up and woven into the everlasting harmonies. The Corinthians, like certain moderns, put primary emphasis upon rhetoric and knowledge.. Paul asserts, "Though I know all the mysteries and all knowledge and have not the Spirit of Christ I am nothing." There were some in Corinth, as there are some now, who talked much about faith. They had caught up the word of Jesus and were making a fetish of it. Paul declares, "Though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not the Spirit of Christ I am nothing." There were Corinthians who made good works the be-all and end-all of religion, and their descendants have gone abroad through all the earth. Their religion consisted in feeding poor people. Paul proclaims, "Though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor and have not the Spirit of Christ it profits me nothing." Philanthropy is not religion. It is possible to scatter large benefactions and have a heart at enmity with God. Even martyrdom does not always possess ethical value. Men can become martyrs through superstition or fanaticism, or through sheer stubbornness, and Paul lays it down, Though I give my body to be burned and have not the Spirit of Christ it does not help me at all.” Here is a truth which the Apostle is determined to drive home. Everything, so he thinks, depends on this being understood. The future of the Church and of religion and of civilization itself all hangs on this. If men fail to see that being a Christian means possessing the Spirit of Christ, then all the future course of the world's life will be bound in shallows and miseries. 66 What is the Spirit of Christ? Fortunately we are not left in the dark. There is much twilight in the New Testament, but not at this point. Many things which we want to know about Jesus the New Testament refuses to disclose. One thing it makes gloriously luminous-the Spirit of Christ. His soul stands out before us radiant, full-statured, clear-cut as a star. We are uncertain sometimes as to His words; we are never in doubt concerning the sort of man He was. We are always absolutely sure of His attitude, His disposition, His spirit. First of all, He was brotherly. His spirit was warmly fraternal. His heart was big and friendly. He was a brother to everybody. The crowd at once saw that. His brotherliness was amazing, unprecedented, even scandalous. He carried it too far, so thought the Scribes. He shocked the prudent by being too brotherly. He was the friend of publicans and sinners. That was the first indictment brought in against Him. To Jesus brotherliness is of the essence of true religion. Fellowship is cardinal and indispensable. In religion worship does not come first; brotherliness comes first. It is far easier to worship than to be brotherly. "If thou bring thy gift to the altar and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar and go thy way-first be reconciled to thy brother and then come and offer thy gift." This is what He was always saying. His disciples could never forget it. One of them, when he was an old man, wrote: "He that loveth not his brother, whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?" Brotherliness expresses itself in intercourse, communion, coöperation. The Christian who is zealous in worship and indifferent to fellowship does not know the A B C of Christianity. What foolery to make a great to-do about forms of worship and crucify the spirit of brotherliness! Church bigots and snobs, ecclesiastical autocrats |