reveal the really important things. This one-sided knowledge is what
Paul was speaking of in I Cor. 1:21 when he said that "the world
through its wisdom knew not God." The true wisdom takes account of
the "foolishness" of God's message, and finds that that foolishness
is wiser than men. The true wisdom of the gospel is revealed only
through the Holy Spirit; only the Spirit of God can reveal the
things of God. Without the Spirit, the human mind becomes hopeless
in dismal error; it is the Spirit of truth who sheds the true light
over our path.

    "O grant us light, that we may know
      The wisdom Thou alone canst give;
     That truth may guide where'er we go,
      And virtue bless where'er we live."

IN THE LIBRARY.--Patton, "A Summary of Christian Doctrine." Greene,
"Christian Doctrine." A. A. Hodge, "Outlines of Theology" and
"Popular Lectures on Theological Themes."

LESSON LI

THE CHRISTIAN HOPE AND THE PRESENT POSSESSION

A type of religious effort has become prevalent to-day which is
directed chiefly to the present life; the improvement of worldly
conditions is often regarded as the chief end of man. All such
tendencies are strikingly at variance with apostolic Christianity.
The apostolic Church was intensely other-worldly. The chief gift
that the apostles offered was not a better and more comfortable life
in this world, but an entrance into heaven.

1. THE END OF THE WORLD

Only the great outlines of the events connected with the end
of the world are revealed in the New Testament. Minute details
cannot be discovered except by an excessively literal method of
interpretation, which is not really in accord with the meaning of
the apostolic writers. Some have supposed, for example, that there
are to be two resurrections, first a resurrection of the Christian
dead and long afterwards a resurrection of other men; expectation
of a thousand-year reign of Christ upon earth has been widely
prevalent. Such beliefs are not to be lightly rejected, since they
are based upon an interpretation of certain New Testament passages
which is not altogether devoid of plausibility; but on the whole
they are at least doubtful in view of other passages, and especially
in view of the true nature of prophecy. God has revealed, not
details to satisfy our curiosity, but certain basal facts which
should determine our lives.

Those basal facts, connected with the end of the world, are a second
coming of Christ, a resurrection of the dead, a final judgment, an
eternity of punishment for the wicked and of blessing for those who
have trusted in Christ. It is not maintained that these facts stand
absolutely alone; certainly they are fully explained, at least in
their spiritual significance; but the devout Bible-reader should be
cautious about his interpretation of details.

2. FEAR AND JOY

The practical effect of the apostolic teaching about the end of
the world should be a combination of earnestness with joy. A man
who lives under the expectation of meeting Christ as Judge will
desert the worldly standard of values for a higher standard. He
will rate happiness and worldly splendor lower, in order to place
the supreme emphasis upon goodness. The difference between evil and
good, between sin and holiness, is not a trifle, not a thing of
merely relative importance, as many men regard it; it enters deep
into the constitution of the universe, it is the question of really
eternal moment. Again and again, in the New Testament, the thought
of Christ's coming and of the judgment which he will hold is made
the supreme motive to a pure and holy life. The apostolic example
may well be borne in mind. When we are tempted to commit a mean or
dishonest or unclean act, when unholy thoughts crowd in upon us like
a noisome flood, we cannot do better than think of the day when we
shall stand in the presence of the pure and holy Judge.

On the other hand, the thought of Christ's coming is to the believer
the source of inexpressible joy. Christ has saved us from a terrible
abyss. Our joy in salvation is in proportion to our dread of the
destruction from which we have been saved. To the truly penitent
man, the thought of the righteous God is full of terror. God
is holy; we would sometimes endeavor vainly to shrink from his
presence. Yet such a God has stretched out his hand to save--there
is the wonder of the gospel--and if we trust in the Saviour the last
great day need cause no fear. We are lost in sin, but God looks
not upon us but upon him who died to save us. "Salvation" to the
apostolic Church meant "rescue," rescue from the just and awful
judgment of God.

3. THE INTERMEDIATE STATE

The time of that judgment has not been revealed, but so far as any
offer of repentance is concerned the time comes to every man at
death. One question of detail cannot altogether be ignored. What did
the apostles teach about the condition of the believer between death
and the final resurrection? Upon this subject, the New Testament
says very little, but it becomes clear at least that the believer,
even when absent from the body, is to be present with the Lord,
II Cor. 5:8, and that to die is to be with Christ. Phil. 1:23. On
the whole, no better statement of the apostolic teaching about the
"intermediate state" can be formulated than that which is contained
in the Shorter Catechism: "The souls of believers are at their death
made perfect in holiness, and do immediately pass into glory; and
their bodies, being still united to Christ, do rest in their graves,
till the resurrection." The hope of an immediate entrance into bliss
at the time of death should not be allowed, however, to obscure the
importance of the resurrection. The resurrection of the body will be
necessary to "the full enjoying of God to all eternity."

4. THE FINAL BLESSEDNESS

That enjoying of God is no mere selfish pleasure; it means first
of all a triumph of holiness. Every last vestige of evil will
be removed. No taint of sin will separate the redeemed creature
from his God. Service will be free and joyous. The consummation,
moreover, will concern not merely individuals, but the race; no mere
expectation of the personal immortality of individuals begins to do
justice to the apostolic teaching. The ultimate end, indeed, is not
our own enjoyment, but the glory of God. Some carnal, materialistic
conceptions of the future age would really remove God from his own
heaven, but such is not the teaching of the New Testament. God will
be all and in all; only in his glory is to be found the true glory
of a redeemed race. The power of loving God is the highest joy that
heaven contains.

5. THE DISPENSATION OF THE SPIRIT

The present age, according to the New Testament, is a time of
waiting and striving; it is related to the future glory as a
battle is related to the subsequent victory. Satisfaction with the
present life, even as it is led by the best of Christians, would
to the apostles have been abhorrent; the Christian is still far
from perfect. A prime condition of progress is a divine discontent.
Jesus pronounced a blessing upon them that "hunger and thirst
after righteousness." Eternal things to us are unseen; they can be
discovered only by the eye of faith; we long for a time when hope
will be supplanted by sight. Nevertheless, there is no room for
despondency; the blessed time is surely coming.

Its coming is rendered certain by the presence, here and now, of the
Holy Spirit. The Spirit may be relied upon to prepare us, both in
soul and in body, for the glory of heaven.

=(1) The Spirit in the Old Testament and in the Life of Jesus.=--The
Spirit of God was mentioned even in the Old Testament. At the
beginning he "moved upon the face of the waters," Gen. 1:2; he
was the source of the mighty deeds of heroes and of the prophets'
inspired words. In the life and teaching of Jesus, however, the
Spirit was far more fully revealed than he had ever been revealed
before. He was the source of Jesus' human nature, Matt. 1:18, 20;
Luke 1:35; he descended upon the newly proclaimed Messiah, Matt.
3:16, and was operative in all the earthly ministry of the Lord.

=(2) The Spirit in the Church.=--For the disciples, however, the
full glory of the Spirit's presence was manifested only after
Jesus himself had been taken up into heaven; the present age,
from Pentecost to the second coming of the Lord, is peculiarly
the dispensation of the Holy Spirit. Discontent with the Church's
imperfections and dismay at her many adversaries should never cause
us to lose confidence in the work that is being done by the Spirit
of God. It was expedient that Jesus should go away; through the
other "Comforter" whom he has sent, he manifests himself even more
gloriously than he did to the disciples in Galilee.

=(3) The Nature of the Spirit.=--The apostles never discuss the
nature of the Holy Spirit in any thoroughly systematic way. But two
great facts are really presupposed in the whole New Testament. In
the first place, the Holy Spirit is God, and in the second place he
is a person distinct from the Father and from the Son. The divinity
of the Spirit appears, for example, in I Cor. 2:11. The point of
that verse is that the Spirit is as closely related to God as the
human spirit is to a man. "For who among men knoweth the things of
a man, save the spirit of the man, which is in him? even so the
things of God none knoweth, save the Spirit of God." The distinct
personality of the Spirit appears with special clearness in Rom.
8:26, 27. There the Spirit is represented as making intercession
with him "that searcheth the hearts"; the one who intercedes is
personally distinct from him before whom he makes intercession.
Even more convincing, perhaps, is the great promise of Christ in
John 14:16, 17, 26; 15:26; 16:7-15, where the other "Comforter" is
spoken of in clearly personal terms and is distinguished both from
the Father and from the Son. Personal distinctness, however, is
not inconsistent with a perfect unity of nature. What the Spirit
does the Son and the Father do; when the other Comforter comes to
the Church, Christ himself comes. The doctrine of the "Trinity" is
a profound mystery, but its mysteriousness is no obstacle to the
acceptance of its truth. Mystery in the depths of God's nature is
surely to be expected. This mystery, taught by the pen of inspired
writers, has brought salvation and peace into the lives of men.
Distinctly Trinitarian passages, such as Matt. 28:19; II Cor. 13:14,
are merely the summation of the New Testament teaching about God,
and that teaching has worked itself out in unspeakable blessing in
the life of the Church.

=(4) The Work of the Spirit.=--A complete summary of the belief of
the apostolic Church about the work of the Holy Spirit would be
impossible in one brief lesson. The Christian life is begun by the
Spirit, and continued by his beneficent power. Conversion, according
to Jesus and his apostles, is only the manward aspect of a profound
change in the depths of the soul. That change is "regeneration," a
new birth. Christian experience is no mere improvement of existing
conditions, but the entrance of something entirely new. Man is not
merely sick in trespasses and sins, but "dead"; only a new birth
will bring life. That new birth is a mysterious, creative act of the
Spirit of God. John 3:3-8.

But the Spirit does not leave those whom he has regenerated to
walk alone; he dwells in them and enables them to overcome sin.
The motive of his work is love. He is no blind force, but a loving
Person; the Christian can enjoy a real communion with him as with
the Father and the Son. In the presence of the Spirit we have
communion with God; the Persons of the Godhead are united in a
manner far beyond all human analogies. There is no imperfect medium
separating us from the divine presence; by the gracious work of the
Holy Spirit we come into vital contact with the living God.

The Spirit is the ground and cause of Christian freedom. "Where the
Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." II Cor. 3:17. "For as
many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. For ye
received not the spirit of bondage again unto fear; but ye received
the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father." Rom. 8:14,
15. This liberty that the Spirit brings is, however, not a liberty
to sin; it is liberation from sin. The body of the Christian is a
temple of the Holy Spirit; in that temple only purity is in place.
The inward power of the Holy Spirit in the heart is more powerful
than the law; if a man yields to that power he will overcome the
flesh; the law of God is fulfilled by those "who walk not after the
flesh, but after the Spirit."

IN THE LIBRARY.--Vos, "The Teaching of Jesus Concerning the Kingdom
of God and the Church." Crane, "The Teaching of Jesus Concerning the
Holy Spirit." Swete, "The Holy Spirit in the New Testament." Thomas,
"The Holy Spirit of God."

LESSON LII

RETROSPECT: THE FIRST CHRISTIAN CENTURY

The apostolic example can be applied intelligently to the problems
of our time only if there be some understanding of the intervening
centuries. We are connected with the apostolic Church by an unbroken
succession. A study of Church history would help us to apply the New
Testament teaching to our own age.

The Christian writings which have been preserved from the early
part of the second century show a marked decline from the spiritual
level of the apostles. Evidently the special inspiration which had
made the New Testament a guide for all ages had been withdrawn. Yet
the Spirit of God continued to lead the Church. Even in the darkest
periods of Church history God did not forget his people.

Only scanty Christian writings have been preserved from the first
three-quarters of the second century; the extant works of the
so-called "Apostolic Fathers" and of the "Apologists" are of limited
extent. About the close of the century, however, the record becomes
more complete. Clement of Alexandria, Irenæus of Asia Minor and
Gaul, and Tertullian of North Africa, give a varied picture of
the Christian life of the time. The Church had gained rapidly in
influence since the conclusion of the apostolic age; persecutions
had not succeeded in checking her advance. Finally, under
Constantine, in the first part of the fourth century, Christianity
became the favored religion of the Roman Empire.

About the same time, in A.D. 325, the first ecumenical council, at
Nicæa, undertook the work of formulating the belief of the Church.
The creeds which were adopted at the great ancient councils are
accepted to-day in all parts of Christendom. During the same general
period, the power of the bishop of Rome was gradually increased
until it culminated in the papacy.

After the conquest of the western part of the Roman Empire in
the fifth century, Christianity was accepted by the barbarian
conquerors, and during the dark ages that followed the Church
preserved the light of learning and piety until a better day should
dawn. During the middle ages, though there was for the most part
little originality in Christian thinking, great scholars and
theologians formed striking exceptions to the general condition.
The political power of the papacy became enormous, but was hindered
by the personal weakness and immorality of many of the popes.
The degraded moral and spiritual condition of the Church was
counteracted here and there by the establishment of monastic orders,
whose purpose at the beginning was good, by the writings of certain
mystics, and by the work of the three "pre-reformers," Wyclif in
England, Huss in Bohemia and Savonarola in Italy.

A genuine advance, however, did not come until the Reformation
of the fifteenth century, when Luther in Germany and Zwingli in
Switzerland, almost at the same time and at first independently,
became the leaders in a mighty protest. A little later Calvin
carried out the principles of the Reformation in a comprehensive
theological system, and by the power of his intellect and the
fervency of his piety exerted an enormous influence throughout the
world. The Reformation was distinctly a religious movement, though
it had been prepared for by that revival of learning which is called
the Renaissance. The work of Luther was a rediscovery of Paul. Not
the performance of a set of external acts prescribed by the Church,
but, as Paul taught, the grace of God received by faith alone, is,
according to Luther, the means of salvation.

The Reformation brought about a counter-reformation in the Roman
Catholic Church, and the western European world was finally divided
between the two great branches of Christendom. After a period of
controversy and wars between Protestants and Catholics, the Church
was called upon to fight a great battle against unbelief. That
battle, begun in its modern form about the middle of the eighteenth
century, continues unabated until the present day. We are living in
a time of intellectual changes. To maintain the truth of the gospel
at such a time and to present it faithfully and intelligently to
the modern world is the supreme task of the Church. The task to
some extent has been accomplished; and the missionary movement of
the nineteenth and twentieth centuries attests the vitality of the
ancient faith. God has not deserted his Church. There are enemies
without and within, compromise will surely bring disaster; but the
gospel of Christ has not lost its power. This is not the first time
of discouragement in the history of the Church. The darkest hour has
always been followed by the dawn. Who can tell what God has now in
store?

Transcriber's note:

Minor typographical errors have been corrected without note.

Irregularities and inconsistencies in the text have been retained
as printed.