Part 7 (1/2)

VI

The superiority of Theism to Deism simply consists in its being more Christian. With the ideas of G.o.d which 'Theists' hold, we can, as Christians, most cordially sympathise. We can sincerely say, 'Hold to them firmly, they are your life: let no man rob you of {165} them by any vain deceit.' But we cannot help also asking, 'Whence have you drawn those lofty ideas? where have you obtained so exalted a conception of the Divine Being in His mingled Majesty and lowliness, in His inconceivable greatness, and His equally inconceivable compa.s.sion?

We turn from the picture of G.o.d which, with so much labour, so much skill, so much moral earnestness, you have exhibited, and we behold the Original in Christ and His Teaching. However unconsciously, it is His Truth, it is His Features, that you have reproduced. You have been brought up in the Church of Christ, or you have been brought into contact with its influences, and you have imbibed its teachings, perhaps more deeply than some who would not dare to question its smallest precepts. Still, Christ's teaching you have not outgrown, from Christ Himself you have not escaped. You cannot go from His presence or flee from His Spirit. Those {166} views which you hold so strongly, which are to you the most enn.o.bling that have ever been given of G.o.d and of religion, where is it that alone they are to be found?

In places where Christianity has gone before.

No doubt, belief in G.o.d is not confined to Christian countries: wors.h.i.+p of the Maker of heaven and earth exists where the name of Christ has never been heard, but not such belief, _such_ wors.h.i.+p, as that for which those persons contend. The G.o.d Whom they adore will not be found anywhere save where Christianity has penetrated. In this country it is the desperate clinging to one portion of the Christian Faith when all else has been abandoned: in other lands, in India, for example, where representatives of this way of thinking are not uncommon, it is the rapturous welcome of one of the sublime truths of Christianity before which the idolatries of their forefathers are pa.s.sing away. It is safe to call it a transition stage: {167} it will either part with the fragment of Christianity which it retains and become merged in doubt and speculation and unbelief; or it will include yet more of the Christianity of which it has grasped a part: its belief in G.o.d will be crowned and confirmed by its belief in Christ.

For, speaking to those who cherish faith in the All-Righteous and All-Loving G.o.d as the only hope for the regeneration of mankind, we cannot shut our eyes to the fact that where faith in Christ fades, faith in G.o.d has a tendency to become vague and dim. He ceases to be thought of as a Friend and Help at hand: He is resolved into a Creator infinitely distant or into a Law, immovable, inexorable, a blind, unconscious Fate. It is Christ Who gives life to the thought of G.o.d.

It is the Word made Flesh that makes the Eternal Word more real. The attempt of the Deists to purify religion by the preaching of a G.o.d who had not {168} revealed Himself, and could not reveal Himself, in a Son, came to nothing. Voltaire's chapel at Ferney still stands, but n.o.body wors.h.i.+ps in it. Religion seemed to slumber: belief in G.o.d seemed to be decaying, when the preaching of the name and the work of Christ again aroused it into life. And so it is now. Whatever the ability, whatever the sincerity of the advocates of belief in G.o.d without reference to Christ, it lacks motive-power, it lacks the missionary spirit. If we may judge by the past, Theism without Christ is a faith which will not spread, which will not lay hold on the labouring and the heavy laden: which may be maintained as a theory, but which will not be as a fire in the souls of men diffusing itself by kindling other souls.

It is from Christ alone, from Christ the manifestation of what G.o.d is in Heart and Mind, from Christ the manifestation of what man ought to be, from Christ Who said, 'In My Father's house are many {169} mansions: he that hath seen Me hath seen the Father,' that there comes with an authority to which, in face of the difficulties besetting the present and the future, the human soul will bow, with a soothing power to which the human spirit will gladly yield--it is from Christ alone that there comes the Divine injunction, 'Let not your heart be troubled, ye believe in G.o.d, believe also in Me.' It is as He is clearly seen and truly known that the clouds of error and superst.i.tion vanish from the Face of G.o.d, and men are drawn to wors.h.i.+p and to trust.

[1] Longfellow, _Song of Hiawatha_.

[2] Keble, _Christian Year_.

[3] Bishop Gore, _The Christian Creed_.

[4] Appendix XX.

[5] _Phases of Faith_.

[6] _The Soul: its Sorrows and Aspirations_.

[7] _The Soul: its Sorrows and Aspirations_.

[8] _The Soul_.

[9] _Alone to the Alone_.

[10] _Alone to the Alone_.

[11] _Alone to the Alone_.

[12] Appendix XXI.

[13] _The Religions of Authority and the Religion of the Spirit_.

[14] J. Warschauer, _Coming of Christ_.

[15] Whittier, _Our Master_.

[16] R. B. Bartlett, _The Letter and the Spirit_: Bampton Lecture.

[17] Appendix XXII.