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BX 9070 .S3 1894 Scottish Church Society.
Conference 1893 : Scottish Church Society
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SCOTTISH CHURCH SOCIETY CONFERENCES
SCOTTISH CHURCH SOCIETY PUBLICATIONS.
I.
In Demy Svo (28 pp-)- Price 6d.
'^ht Scottish Church ^orictg.
SOME ACCOUNT OF ITS AIMS.
By Professor Milligan, D.D., President of the Society.
With Appendix containing the Constitution of the Society, &'c.
II.
In Demy %vo (32 pp.). Price 6d.
(Dur ^elp is in the #amc of the |Corb.
A CALL TO PRAYER : WITH FORMS OF INTERCESSION. By John Macleod, D.D., Minister of Govan Parish.
Will Shortly be Publislud. III.
glag ^rifsthoob in the Chvistmn CChurck.
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A. W. Williamson, M.A., Minister of St Cuthbert's Parish, Edinburgh ; G. W. Sprott, D.D., Minister of the Parish of North Berwick ; John Macleou, D.D., Minister of Govan Parish.
SCOTTISH CHURCH SOCIETY
CONFERENCES
jfirst Seriee .,
^^ Ask for the Old Paths, . . . and walk therein^
iBDinburgb
J. GARDNER HITT, 37 GEORGE STREET
GLASGOW: JOHN SMITH & SON, 19 RENFIELD STREET
LONDON : EDWARD STANFORD, 26 & 27 COCKSPUR STREET, S.W,
1894
PREFACE.
The Scottish Church Society was founded in 1892, by members of the Church of Scotland, for the general purpose of defending and advancing Catholic Doctrine as set forth in the Ancient Creeds, and embodied in the Standards of the Church of Scotland ; and of asserting Scriptural prin- ciples in all matters relating to Church Order and Policy, Christian Work, and Spiritual Life throughout Scotland.
A full statement of its Aims and Constitution will be found in the Appendix to this volume.
The First Conference of the Society was held in Glasgow, opening on the 25th November 1893, and closing on the 29 th November,
This volume contains the papers read at that Con- ference.
To the longer papers, twenty minutes' time was allowed for delivery ; to the shorter, ten. This limitation — in some cases, however, exceeded — explains the brevity with which the subjects are treated.
It had been originally the intention of the Society to publish also in this volume the pre-arranged Addresses delivered at the Conference, together with some account of the Discussions which followed, but it has been found impracticable on account of the extent of the discussions to carry out this design.
Although this volume is issued with the sanction of the Society, each writer is alone responsible for his own contribution.
6 Preface.
The Opening Address was to have been delivered by Professor Milligan, but he was unable through illness to be present. His death, which occurred almost immediately after the Conference, was an inexpressible loss to the Society and to the Church.
Edinburgh, Ma-]) 1894.
PAPERS
AND
CONTRIBUTORS.
Lettek from the President —
The Very Eev. Professor William Milligan, D.D.,
University of Aberdeen .... 9
Opening Address —
Rev. Thomas Leishman, D.D., Minister of Linton
Parish ....■• H
Devotional Life -. CoMxMUNion with God and Communion in God —
Rev. A. Wallace Williamson, M.A., Minister of
St Cuthbert's Parish, Edinburgh ... 19
Rev. H. J. WoTHERSPOON, M.A., Minister of Burnbank
Parish, Hamilton ..... 25
National Religion : Its Principles and Possible Embodiments —
The Very Rev. George Hutchison, D.D., Minister
of Banchory- Ternan Parish ... 31
Rev. R. S. Kirkpatrick, B.D., Minister of Dalbeattie
Parish ...... 41
The Present Call to Witness for the Funda- mental Truths of the Gospel —
Rev. James Cooper, D.D., Minister of the East Parish,
Aberdeen ...... 47
Rev. George Campbell, Minister of Eastwood Parish 59
The Church's Call to Study Social Questions —
Rev. Professor Robert Flint, D.D., LL.D., University
of Edinburgh ..... 66
8 Contents.
PAOB
The Divine Order of Church Finance and other
Systems —
Rev. Thomas Leishman, D.D., Minister of Lintou Parish 73 Eev. M. P. Johnstone, B.D., Minister of Fraserburgh
Parish ...... 81
The Observance in its Main Features of the Christian Year —
Rev. E. L. Thompson, D.D., Minister of Hamilton
Pari-sh (2nd charge) .... 85
Rev. W. H. MACLEOD, B.D., Minister of Buchanan
Parish ...... 97
The Training of the Clergy —
Rev. Professor John Dobie, B.D., University of Edin- burgh ...... 105
The Celebration of the Holy Communion and THE Daily Service —
Rev. John Macleod, B.A., D.D., Minister of Govan
Parish, Glasgow . . , . .113
Rev. A W. Wotherspoon, M.A., Minister of Oatlands
Parish, Glasgow . . . . .143
The Church and the Education of the Young —
Rev. J. Howard Crawford, M.A., Minister of
Abercorn Parish . . . . .149
The Historical Continuity of the Church of Scotland —
Rer. G. W. Sprott, D.D., Minister of North Bermck
Parish ...... 161
Rev. Thomas Leishman, D.D., Minister of Linton Parish 173
Evangelistic Work and its Proper Basis —
Rev. H. J. Wotherspoon, M.A., Minister of Burnbank
Parish ...... 179
Rev. J. Cromarty Smith, B.D., Minister of Alexandria
Parish ...... 189
Appendix — Programme of the Conference . . . 195
Constitution of the Scottish Church Society . 198
LETTER FROM THE VERY REV. PROFESSOR MILLIGAN.
The Very Rev. Dr Milligan, President of the Society, was unable to be present through illness, and sent the following letter to Dr Macleod, Convener of the Business Com- mittee : —
" 39 Royal Terrace, " Edinburgh, I3tk November 1893.
"My Dear Dr Macleod, — It is with the deepest regret, and even pain, that, as I receive the completed Programme of the Scottish Church Society's Conference to be held at Glasgow on the closing days of this month, I find myself in the providence of God, absolutely precluded from taking part in the proceedings. Confined closely to bed, there is no hope that I shall be able to join those who are there to stand forth in vindication of some of the greatest truths of our Christian faith, or to take my part in speaking to any of the subjects set down for discussion, and so closely con- nected with the highest privileges and labours of the Church of Christ.
" It would have been to me not more a duty than a delight to have been associated with my brethren in their defence of the truth in the great capital of the West, and among a people so deeply interested in Christian revelation and religious life as are its citizens. In no place has a greater effort been made than there to discredit the aims and exertions of our Society. In no place, when the real facts of the case have had time to be considered, and the inevitable reaction has set in, shall we experience a deeper, a warmer, or a more generous sympathy. It will be seen that the charges brought against us are utterly unfounded.
I o Dr Milliga7is Letter.
that the suspicions entertained of us have had no solid ground to rest on, and that our whole conduct is deter- mined by two great beliefs, — that the Church of Christ has a Divine and Living Lord for her Guardian and Head, and that He by His Spirit is ready to work as powerfully as He has ever done in her and through her, for the accom- plishment of her great mission in the world,
" These truths are not so vividly realised either by the Church of Christ as a whole, or by our own particular branch of that Church, as they ought to be. We feel that the solemn duty is imposed on us of re-stating and re-enforc- ing them.
" The very last thought that we entertain would be that of forming the ministry into an independent caste to come between individual Christians and their Father in heaven. For my own part, I should prefer to designate the ministers of Christ less as priests than as, in what appears to me to be their trne Scripture character, the servants of the priesthood.
" We feel deeply how much has to be done to make the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ the power for good in the world she was designed by her great Head to be. In seek- ing to attain this we would elevate the tone and character of the ministry, and would lead it into paths of self-denying labour and suffering, in which alone it can truly follow in the footsteps of Him who came ' not to be ministered unto but to minister and to give His life a ransom for many.'
" I dare not upon this occasion venture to say more, and shall therefore conclude with only the earnest prayer that the great Head of the Church may be present with you in all your meetings, and may make them a blessing alike to our Church and to our native land. — I am, dear Hr Macleod, very truly yours,
"Wm. Milligan."
ADDRESS AT OPENING OF CONFERENCE.
Rev. Thomas Leishman, D.D.
The first words of our Conference ought to have come from the eminent divine who is our president, and whose ripened wisdom has led him to hold so firmly the prin- ciples on which our Society rests. Since it is ordered so, we must meet without his guidance. His seat may be occupied, but his place cannot be supplied. Let us each strive, while we take counsel together, to attain that spirit of sincerity and devoutness which his presence would have infused into our deliberations.
Before the discussion of separate subjects begins, you may expect some reference to the ends which the Scottish Church Society has in view. They were stated with suf- ficient minuteness and publicity at the time when it was being formed. Some hard judgments found expression then. Though discussion seems to have softened these, there are still lingering misapprehensions as to our objects. It is said that we are possessed by a spirit of sacerdotalism. The word is one of somewhat vague import. Along the whole range of Christian opinion it may be heard applied to any one who holds somewhat loftier views than the speaker of the offices and ordinances which bind together the Christian brotherhood. A Quaker may be supposed to use it in describing the distinctive tenets of the Baptist. Outside of Christianity, it, or its exact Saxon equivalent, priestcraft, is affixed to any form of the faith. But when we analyse this word of opprobrium, we find that it means the opinion of one who claims to be a sacerdos, a hpvjg, a sacrificer. I have yet to make the acquaintance of any minister of the
12 Address at Opening of Confei'ence.
Church of Scotland who so understands the functions of his ministry. We know of the Great High-priesthood of Clirist, The truth of the priesthood of the laity holds a prominent place in the terms of this Society's constitution. There are those of our clergy who differ from others in holding more defined opinions, higher opinions, if you will, of their office, of the message which they have to deliver, and the ordinances of which they are the instruments. But they believe that they have learned these things from their Church's own Standards, to say nothing of the teaching of the Church Universal, nothing of a purer fountain of wisdom than either.
Another charge is that we have a fuller sympathy with the Church of England than is consistent with loyalty to our own. Certainly we have no wish to be out of sympathy with a Church which is so much at one with us in her beliefs, in her duties, and in her dangers. In essence, their doctrinal articles are the same as ours. Their presbyters have been admitted to the ministry, as we were, by the hands of a plurality of presbyters. They witness, as we do, to the duty and the blessing of national Catholicity, and thereby earn the enmity of the same foes. There are points on which we differ, but in some of these they are coming nearer to us. A series of councils, from Convocation downwards, have been revived or created, without statutory powers certainly, but powerful for good, through the moral influence which they exercise. Their laity are being taken more largely into confidence. Their worship has unquestionably be- come less monotonous and cumbersome by the separation of services, the amended lectionary and extended rights of modification in the use of tlie prayer book. In this matter some assimilation between two peoples who are becoming in all other respects more closely one is inevitable. If this is possible from their side without their disowning what they hold to be distinctive principles, we surely can do the same. I can say with confidence that many among us who are credited with a readiness to make abject submission to Anglicanism are those who most clearly understand what
Address at Opening of Conference. \ 3
the important points of difference between the two systems are, and are most keenly on the watch to see that they are not effaced. It is not to England alone, nor to England mainly, that they have looked for light in their endeavours to make our service more fruitful of grace. Indeed, in many of the changes which have been lately made, there has been as much desire to reject as to adopt English usage. Various unseemly features in worship which are vanishing fast were memorials of English domination, introduced among: ns to displace better things. Many things then lost are being restored. They were characteristic of our Church at a time when the peoples of this island, now happily united, were to each other foreigners, and the phrases, our auld enemies of England, our ancient allies of France, were household words in every Scottish home. Our Reformed worship, like our formulated theology, came to us from the French-speaking lands, and was our cherished heritage till English influences deformed it. If its usages, when revived, are found to correspond with existing customs in the Church of England, that surely is no reason for effacing them a second time, when the old national enmities have in great part dis- appeared. It is not often that we have found anything to learn from the indigenous customs of England. We have looked as much to the Reformed group of Continental Churches with which she was once proud to associate herself, or to remoter ages when both we and England were sitting in darkness. The same teachers would have had the same lessons for us, though the Berwickshire bank of the Tweed had been the northern shore of the British Channel. While most men, thinking calmly, will own that the points of con- trast between the two National Churches might be reduced in number, there is a possible danger of hasty and ill- instructed approximation on our part. Some check to this will always be found in the force of public opinion, and there are those who unintentionally do their best to keep it sensitive and watchful. Extreme Anglicans will press upon us the privilege of being annexed to them, and so
14 Address at O petting of Conference.
becoming sharers of a Catholicity which consists in un- churching one half of Christendom, and being unchurched by the other. They will insist on recalling to the recollec- tion of Scotsmen two periods, after the union of the crowns, but not of the peoples or their parliaments, when the English Church saw in the Scottish only a derelict bark which it was their duty to take in charge. When the mariners recovered from their surprise, it fared badly with the prize-crew, and the story of the recapture is not forgotten yet.
One great end contemplated by the Society is the strengthening of belief Here she has nothing to disown. She inscribes on the very front of her constitution that her " general purpose is to defend and advance Catholic doctrine as set forth in the ancient Creeds and embodied in the Standards of the Church of Scotland." She conjoins the ancient Creeds with our own, because Christianity is not a local religion, but a faith for a lost world, and we cannot cling too closely to anything that makes for unity among the mere section of our race which has as yet received it. The Apostles' Creed has been always accepted by us. It was our baptismal creed till the Long Parliament procured its suppression. It still forms part of our Catechism, wher- ever that is printed without mutilation. As to the two others, those who look with suspicion on them and on us wall perhaps reverence the authority of Samuel Rutherford, when he defines a confession S.e jure to be " what everyone ought to believe, as the Nicene Creed, the Creed of Atha- nasius " ("Due Right of Presbyteries," p. 131).
Of late a conviction has been deepening in many minds, that as to doctrine, the Scottish Church had missed her way. The divergence had not its origin within her own bounds. A generation or more since, the young mind of the Church, weary of the attempts made to quicken Christian life by reviving the ecclesiastical politicalism of two hundred years before, was averting its thoughts from the past. Its atten- tion was caught by a movement abroad, which seemed to
Address at Opening of Conference. 1 5
promise that men's understanding of Christianity would be in the ratio of their distance from its source. The bonds of creeds were strained or broken. The supernatural was minimised or slighted. Holy Scripture was treated as a challengeable record of the doings and speculations of men of old. We heard more of thinkers than of believers, and to think was to look within rather than above, to guess at the future rather than sit at the feet of the past. It seems as if of late this movement, so far as we felt it, has been losing its dynamical impulse. The opinions have become so common that the fascination of fresh adventure is gone. Possibly some minds unconsciously cherished them all the more because they kept them more apart from the Church's keenest foes. But these are now following, nay, passing, them in the race. While men here and there were beginning to reconsider their theological position, a political question arose which helped to turn their minds in the direction of the past. There was a threat of assailing the Church for the purpose of severing her alliance with the State. In preparing themselves for her defence, they looked to her foundations, and found that these did not rest only on modern acts of legislation and ancient assignments of property. Following her history back to the days when the Son of God was on earth, they seemed to discern all along its course the ascended Lord working through His own consecrated agencies to guard those inmost verities of His faith which His earlier servants embodied in their creeds. This Society has proved to be a rallying point for men not a few, who, apart from and unknown to each other, had been dwelling on these matters in the spirit of the divine precept which she has taken for motto, " Ask for the old paths . . . and walk therein."
Let me speak of but one other topic. This Society believes in Christian unity, and by consequence must protest against schism. In doing so, it is prepared to find itself at variance with much of current opinion. One of the commonplaces of the time is to say that the essence
1 6 Address at Opening of Conference.
of schism lies not so much in visible separation, as in bitter partizanship, which has often existed where unity was unbroken. But experience shows that every open breach has had such partizanship for its preparative, and depends on it for its continuance. The choice is not between two evils, but between one of them singly and both in combina- tion. The partizanship that causes no breach is likely to disappear. The combatants die, or they live to discover that they had misunderstood each other, or that the subject of dispute was less vital than it seemed. But let a new sect be organized in commemoration of it, and the evil is perpetuated. Schism makes provision against the healing virtue of time and charity. The fervid zeal which, be it always remembered, had been generated within the forsaken centre of brotherhood, cools down, but the unchristian antipathy abides. The initial principles of the body are belittled, then disowned, then forgotten. Other principles are proclaimed. Denominational traditions and professional interests grow up. Rights of property are created. Let Scripture and reason testify as they may to the blessedness of unity, and the hatefulness and harm of severance, the personal identity of the sect must at all costs be saved. And a little curbing of temper or vanity might have prevented it all !
Another popular form of speech is, " Our differences are not about essentials." Does that lessen the particular fault of schism or increase it ? Nothing short of a conviction that they are contending for something essential gives logical j ustification to those who create or prolong a state of things forbidding brother Christians to be one in breaking of bread and in prayer. Another and comparatively a modern plea is that the antagonism of rival communions is wholesome, and stimulates the zeal of all. So says the world. But the Word saith, " Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory." It is for the time a prevalent opinion that in secular politics the community is best served by the unceasing contention and alternate victory of parties.
Address at Opening of Conference. i 7
Possibly ages hence men may be saying that tliis was not the last word of wisdom in that field. However this is to be, dare we apply the principle to the kingdom that is not of this world ? It were profanity to associate it with that kingdom's heavenly centre and home. But as regards the present frame of things, how does it accord with almost the last words spoken by the Master before He went forth to the betrayal and the cross? " I pray for them that shall believe on Me through their word, that they all may be one, as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe- that Thou hast sent Me." The world has not believed, and seems to suspend its belief till we are one after the likeness of that heavenly Unity.
And what is the ordinance chosen to be the safeguard of this unheavenly disunion ? The Holy Communion itself. All the conditions of alienation may be relaxed save this. There may be occasional association in other acts of worship. There may be co-operation in works of charity. But the blessed Supper is reserved to be the test, the life of denomi- nationalism. Surely all this ought to be reversed. Sacra- mental unity and common worship ought to be conserved to the last ; and within the limits of the great Creeds, some scheme of doctrinal comprehension might be devised allow- ing scope for the variations of opinion which will arise among men. Then we should hear the last of some well- worn platitudes. One hears it said, " We are all going the same road." We are going to the same destination, let us hope, but assuredly by different roads, because we cannot walk together in unity. " We are all regiments of the same army, with different uniforms but under one Captain." Are they so, if in the presence of the enemy they are firing into each other's ranks, and if some have been embodied expressly to drive neighbouring bands from the positions on which their leader had posted them. Men who can understand the craft and the danger of an earthly tyrant's maxim, divide et imijcra, are unwittingly fellow- workers
B
1 8 Address at Opening of Conference.
with the great enemy of souls, acting on it with such fearful success for the disintegration of the kingdom of Christ. May God make use of us, and of all everywhere who see and would abate these evils, that some at least of the wounds of the body, the Church, may be healed.
DEVOTIONAL LIFE: COMMUNION WITH GOD AND COMMUNION IN GOD*
Rev. a. Wallace Williamson, M.A.
There is a special need in our time to emphasise the devotional life ; and it is therefore fitting that we should deal with this subject at the very beginning of our con- ference. Indeed, it may be said, unless this subject be the dominant note in our discussions we shall miss much, and we shall fail to carry away with us, as we hope and desire to do, a deeper sense of our consecration to the service of God and of His Church.
It is a constant danger, but the circumstances of our time make it more grave with us, — the danger of for- getting that personal Communion with God is the one thing needful in our Christian life. Whatever clouds and obscures this closeness of fellowship is a hindrance not merely to progress in the graces of the soul, but also to the outward activities by which we are called to manifest the reality of our inner life. It is not merely that we lose in character, we lose in power. We may seem to do more, there may be a greater number of apparent results, but it is certain they will not be permanent, because they lack that element which alone can keep them fresh. It is true of every individual life that which is true of the Church, as also in Nature. We cannot rise beyond our source. If we are content with the water which we find down in the low grounds, we must be content also to lose
* Notes of a paper which the writer was prevented through iUness from preparing and reading at the Conference.
10
20 Devotional Life :
the clearness, the vigour, the freshness of the mountain height.
We must continually renew the spirit of our mind. This is really the end and aim of the devotional life — to keep in constant touch with God, to keep fresh and real that union with Christ which has been assured to us as members of His Body, and of which our whole life here (and hereafter) can only be the gradual unfolding — the branch, so to speak, ever more and more identifying itself with the vine. In the spiritual life there must be as constant, as close, as vital a fellowship as there is in physical life between the head and its members. Of course the analogy is difficult to carry out in detail, but it is for practical purposes quite simple and intelligible. To relax the devotional spirit is to wither and to be in danger of dying altogether. As our Lord has said, " If a man abide not in Me he is cast forth as a branch and withered."
Now, I think it will be admitted that if we have suffered in Scotland on any side of our religious life it has been undoubtedly on the devotional side that our loss has been greatest. I do not say that we cannot point in our history to many bright examples which may be mentioned with the noblest saints of God in any land. But it will hardly be contended that this has been characteristic of our religi- ous life during the latest period of our history. A great many satisfactory reasons for the fact may be given, but the fact remains. Our religion has been aggressive and argumentative. It has also too often been censorious. And though it has been marked by great strength and persistent advocacy of righteousness, it has very often lacked that sweet persuasive force which is stronger than any arsfument, that indescribable charm of the soul which comes from habitual dwelling with God, habitual walking in what St Paul calls the heavenly places. We have fed the intel- lect and starved the heart.
On this matter it is needless to dwell. It is a patent fact, and it applies not merely to the Christian people, but
Commtmion with God and Com^mmion in God. 2 1
in the first place to the Christian ministry. There are few of us who have not felt how much has been lost in power and spiritual influence by the one-sided training which we receive, and by the want of definite devotional habit engrained as a part of our daily life, so as to make it a constant walk with God. Looking at the whole matter from this point of view, as it bears upon the ministry we have surely much need to reproach ourselves, and to strive to stir up each other to greater earnestness and greater regularity, as well as to greater directness and reality in the practice of devotion, in daily access to God through our Lord Jesus Christ, who has not only called us in common with all His people to manifest His life and power, but has also commissioned us as His servants to cherish His flock, to lead them and feed them with the word of truth. Here, as in all matters, our Lord Him- self, in His earthly life and by His presence, must be our example and our guide. What was real to Him in His divine life was real to him in His Human life also : " I am in the Father, and the Father in Me,"
There is thus a very important distinction involved in the twofold title of this paper which it is well to consider. " Communion with God " is one thing', " Communion in God " is another thing, but the one phrase without the other is an imperfect expression of the full idea of Christian Devotion. Each by itself is liable to misunderstanding. When " Communion with God " is spoken of, it is apt to suggest to many minds a vague meditative tendency, often going no further than an indefinite longing which is easily satisfied, and which rather relaxes than invigorates the spiritual powers. On the other hand, the phrase " Com- munion in God " may seem to indicate an idea of personal absorption in the Being of the Eternal which is alien to the teaching of the Church, and which cuts at the root of true devotion. As our Confession says : — " This Communion which the saints have with Christ doth not make them in any wise partakers of the substance of His Godhead." In
22 Devotional Life :
fact there can be no consistent grasp of the one conception without the other. To attain Communion with God in the Christian sense we must realise our Communion in God. Our life is, as the Apostle describes it, " hid with Christ in God."
The importance of the distinction will be seen at once, when we consider its bearing upon the Scriptural view of the Church and of the life of the individual. The devotional life of the Church is a constant realisa- tion of this twofold Communion. The tendency of the first to pass into vagueness, and to become mere religious dreaming, is corrected by the second, which specialises the relation of the soul to God and to our brethren as a definite personal fellowship. Into this fellowship we have entered, and the seal of our Sonship has been set upon us, in virtue of our calling and standing in the Church. Our whole progress in the Christian life must be an unfolding of what is implied in this sacred fellowship. Communion in God must express itself through Communion with God, and the richer our Communion with Him, the closer and warmer and deeper will be our Communion in Him.
I can conceive no graver loss to the definiteness of our devotional life than the falling away which is so prevalent among us from clear views as to the relation in which we stand through our Baptism, and by conscious faith, to our Lord Jesus Christ, and in Him to God the Father. Apart altogether from any special view as to the value and purpose of that Holy Sacrament, it has this great power to the soul, that it assures us by a visible token of our giving up " unto God through Jesus Christ to walk in newness of life." Devotion on the part of the^Christian is thus the expression of his union to God, and that not merely in prayer but in all the acts of his life. It is the unfolding in one very important aspect of what is involved in his ingrafting into Christ. For this is the special dis- tinction of our faith, that it offers Communion with God through Communion in God. Communion with God is the
Coinnmiiion ivitk God a7id Cominunion in God. 23
aim of every I'orm of religion. Communiou in God is the special gift of Christ to His people. "All saints that are united to Jesus Christ their head by His Spirit, and by faith, have fellowship with Him in His graces, sufferings, death, resurrection, and glory" (Confession of Faith, Cap. 26). The Incarnation of our Lord, with all which it in- volves, is the great fact which solves for us the mystery of our fellowship with God, for it brings us into living touch with God through our own nature, which He has taken to Himself
And if we in this Society have any message to ourselves and to our brethren it must begin here. It must simply take us back to the Incarnate Lord, through whom we are lifted again into the life of God. It must not declare that there is no Communion with God vouchsafed to the human soul beyond the ordinances of the Church, forgetting that the influences of the Eternal Spirit come to us in many secret w^ays. But it must affirm that we have no right to expect the guidance and comfort of God's Spirit in our devotional life if we neglect the means that are open. When we hear of that "still communion which transcends the imperfect offices of praise and prayer," we seem to enter a region where the wayfaring man cannot follow. To the vast majority of human souls such communion is as a sealed book. As Christians we know that " prayers and praises are the mode of our intercourse with the next world," and that God grants to us through such communion His divine grace. But we know also, that He has called us into His Church, and has incorporated us into the Body of Christ, and has assured to us by word and sacrament spiritual nourishment and growth in Him. And so our full message as to the secret of the devotional life, is not merely Com- munion with God, or Communion in God, but Communion with God through Communion in God ; " our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ,"
I am sure that this subject must be felt by all of us to be a proper beginning for the work which is to occupy us
2 4 Devotional L ifc.
at this Conference. Whatever direction our thoughts may take, Avhatever practical effect we may seek to give them, these are hut the stream of which true devotion to God is the fountainhead. From this everything real in our life must flow, and to this everything real must return. To breathe this ampler air is to grow in the divine life. But there is a special reason why this subject of the devotional life should take with us the first place. It is the Apostolic order. In the Epistle to the Ephesians, the Epistle in which, above all, the full conception of the Cliurch is set forth, a stream of devotion flows through the whole argu- ment. It is, so to speak, steeped in the spirit of prayer. The Apostle begins with an ardent burst of praise and then passes into an earnest supplication from which he never seems to break off, though somehow he Las carried his readers on to consider all the great truths of the faith, culminating and combining in the truth which is the key- note of all his teachinof, — Christ " the Head over all thins's to the Church, which is His Body, the fulness of Him that filleth all in all." Now, if there be one aim of our present Conference, it is surely this, to emphasise the same great truth, to bring out and to make more clear the divine basis and supernatural life of the Church, to show its bear- ing upon the various departments of individual and social life, to endeavour to stir up in ourselves and in our brethren a more living sense of the spiritual power which the Church possesses, in virtue of its relation to its Ascended Lord, to deal with every problem which humanity can present. This is exactly the aim of the Apostle in the great Epistle of the Church. And we do well to approach it in his spirit — the spirit of individual con.secration to God, and of fellowship in the Body of Christ — the spirit expressed in the words which wo would here take as our own, " For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named."
DEVOTIONAL LIFE: COMMUNION WITH GOD AND COMMUNION IN GOD.
Rev. H. J. WoTHERSPOON, M.A.
1. The whole Christian Hfe is of course a life of devotion; but I take the expression " devotional life " in its restricted sense, as meaning that life which is the link between the inner life, lived in the deep thoughts of the soul, and the ex- ternal Christian life, lived before men, whether in the fellow- ship of ordinance, in good works, or in the daily occupation and conflict of the world. It is a life of action, embodied in things done, exercises performed, acts fulfilled — but personal, private, individual, and as between the man and God. It is not the inner life, which can be seen of none but God ; the devotional life is a life which might be seen, but is not suffered to be seen, being for God only, and of the man himself only — his personal exercise of himself, for the realisa- tion and proof and discipline of his inward faith and resolution, in order that he may fulfil them strongly and unswerv- ingly in the Church and before the world ; but also, and still more, it is his effort to be his own offering to God ; it is the cultivation of his own delight in God, as he sets out, for no other eyes than his own and those of God, that secret of the Lord, which is with them that fear Him.*
It is the life for which Christ has given direction, when He said, " When thou doest alms . . . When thou prayest . . . When ye fast." t He has Himself taught us what is the nature of the devotional life, what its parts, what its
* Ps. XXV. 14. t St Matt. vi. 2, 5, 7, 16.
26 Devotional Life :
necessity, its order, and its reserve. Its nature is that of sacrifice offered to God : consecration in act to Him of what is most personal to ourselves, our possessions, our bodies, our spirits. It is so needful, that it is taken for granted, as essential to His Disciple : Christ does not say "If ye do these things," but "When ye do tliem." It is so needful, that He Himself thus dwelt with God, and thus too was offered to Him. Our blessed Lord fasted ; He spent nights in prayer ; of His poverty some- thing was secretly " given to the poor." * He indicates, too, the essential character of devotional life, as lived under rule. Not under law — for it is an offering, a chosen communion ; not enforced by commandment or governed by precept; yet evidently deliberate, done with forethought and purpose, prepared and resolved ; in nothing left to occasional impulse or uncertain humour. Finally, He emphasises its secrecy, as for God only ; for love of Him, and out of desire for Him ; for His knowledge who " seeth in secret." ^
2. The devotional life has its point of contact with the active life, inasmuch as it is a search for power — the power which is drawn from God in communion of life with Him ; as our Lord Himself sought and found it by fasting and prayer and watching before each crisis of His ministry, t These are the hidden roots of the soul's life, by which it has vigour to bear its fruits in the open sunlight. By prayer without ceasing, by self- denials and acts of love, kept for God's sole knowledge, its thoughts and habits and affections are knit into sub- stantive fellowship with its Lord. It is trained to abide in Him, disciplined from wandering, practised in the use of grace, moulded into conformity to His mind. In this the soul furnishes itself to the Holy Spirit, as a prepared channel for His activity, by yielding, not itself only, but
* St John xiii. 29. t St Matt. vi. 4, 6 18.
X St Matt. iv. 1, 2 ; St Luke vi. 12, 13 ; St Matt. xiv. 23 ; St Jolinvi. 15 ; St Matt. xxvi. 36-44, &c.
Coimnunion zuith God and Communion in God. I'j
the members with it, to be the instruments of God's righteousness unto holiness ; * offering the body, and the bodily, the concrete life, in living sacrifice.*!-
The heart is assured before God through the devotional life that its love is not in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth ; | we are aware of God, with Whom for ourselves we have to do, to Whom for ourselves we are offered and minister, trimming the lights that burn only for His eyes ; presenting the incense, and laying out the shewbread, in the veiled holy jjlace, which is empty except for His presence and our ministry. We are con- scious of Christ when, alone with Him, we have sat at His feet and heard His word, §
Thus the devotional is the nourishment of faith — the faith to which all things are possible. It is the source of confidence ; we are able to believe, able to witness for God and to act for Christ, as we go from actual communion with God in Christ, ourselves with God, to work the works of God, and to name the name of Christ. These things are then real, true ; not con- ventions or officialities : we know it, when our own private and hidden life is filled with God and active in Christ. " If tliou canst believe," Christ has said, " all thing's are possible to him that believeth." || But it is difficult to believe in mere belief of our own, which receives no concrete expression in act of devotion or sacrifice ; and as difficult to believe in what is only public and agreed between man and man, and has nothing corresponding to it in the individual activity. It is in the devotional, active and embodied, yet secret and personal, that faith becomes conscious of itself, and grows to the confidence of power.
The devotional is the source of power in a higher way — as consecrating, protecting against evil, sanctifying. IT Not by itself; not unless growing out of the heart's deep con-
*Rom. vi. 19. t Rom. xii, 1. +1 John iii. 19.
§ St Luke X. 39. f| St Mark ix. 23. IT St John xvii. 19.
2 8 Devotional Life :
viction and the inward obedience of faitli ; not without the supernatural nourishment which is found only in the sacramental life of the corporate Church ; and not without the diligence of evangelical fervour to do the will of God and bear the cross and fight the good fight in the world. But central among all these things, where the soul dwells in the secret place of the Most High and abides under the shadow of the Almighty ; * from which it goes, guarded and armed to pass safely through temptation ; fervent in the spirit to take its place in the Church's life of w^orship and work ; patient, and filled with courage to stand in the day of trial ; strong to do the work of God, wiiatever be allotted.
3, If to-day we accuse ourselves of powerlessness and uncertainty — powerlessness to accomplish tasks which more and more we recognise as our charge, and our charge unfulfilled — uncertainty before problems, which more and more we feel are those for which we, and no others, should give the answer ; if too often we find ourselves perplexed and silent in face of the world which we are called to heal and comfort — is not our neglect of the province of the de- votional life at least one cause which we may well regard ?
" Lord, why could not we cast him out ? " " This kind goeth not out but by jirayer and fasting. "t Is not that our case ? Might not Christ's answer be the same to us, confounded before our statistics of non-Churchgoing or intemperance, as it was to those Disciples ? We have looked in every direction for sources of power rather than to those which Christ has indicated — these, if we have not despised, we have ignored. Where are they in the programme of our Church to-day for her need ? We have looked to the attractive, not to the devotional — not to fasting and prayer, but to elocution and feasting, eloquence of discourse, "improvement of worship," and endless catering for popular amusement ; as if by such means the demons of indifference and Godlessness are to be exorcised. We ♦ Ps, xci. 1. t St Matt. .wii. 19, 21.
Covin nmion with God and Comimmion in God. 29
have trusted to the outward— to what we may do, rather than to what we might be. We have forgotten the per- fecting of the instrument ; or if we have thought of it, it has been to seek the perfecting in multiplied agencies, elaborated machinery, skilfully devised novelties of organisa- tion, rather than in a deeper holiness or a nearer life of communion Avith God. We have forgotten the ancient conviction of the Church that saintliness is the source of power in God.
4. If we are to return to any cultivation of the devotional life, we must regard it, not only as a life of communion with God, but of communion with one another in God. The life by which we live is so essentially corporate and not individual, that even the individual devotion, the secret and private devotion, requires the support of con- scious fellowship. Though this be a path which each must tread alone, it should be to us a beaten path in which we tread confidently, because it is marked by the tread of the redeemed of all the Christian ages. As sheep we have gone astray, and as sheep we return and are folded and find pasture.* That is the nature of the flock of God, and we cannot change it. I do not say that it is impossible to work out a devotional rule of life for oneself, or impossible to adhere to it — many a one has been forced to discover the principles which I have tried to express, and to formu- late them, each for himself, in some shape, better or worse, and to try at least to practise them : but I do say that it is difficult to do so. Is there any function more proper to the Church than to say to her children, of this as of public devotion, " This is the way, walk ye in it " ? The devotional life is essentially a life of rule — a life ordered and seeking a right order to which to conform ; a life strengthened by the sense that the rule followed in secret is yet a bond in Christ to those who are also exercising themselves in the same warfare and to the same ends. After these ages is there no experience of the saints of God ? * 1 Pet. ii. 25; St John x. 9.
30 Devotional L ife.
Has the Church proved no method \ Is there no counsel, no gathered store of discipline and custom, wise way and tried practice and consecrated formula ? Our Lord has left warrant and canon : " When ye pray, say, ' Our Father.' " Have we nothing of counselled petition self- examination or intercession to build on that foundation ? Must each be left, not only to be his own teacher in these things, not only unhelped to persevere ; but actually un- advised of the need of any devotional life ?
There are those here who have received the current Christian education, and besides it the usual preparation for the work of the ministry — who at least, if any, might have been subjects of care to the Churcli in this matter ; each will know for himself how much (either beforehand, or in the years of registered study for license to preach the Gospel of God, or subsequently during probation, or since in their inexperienced efforts to find for themselves a way of bearing the burden of charge laid upon him) was spoken to himself of any devotional life — of rule, method, or practice therein — what word concerning ''alms, fasting, or prayer," the three great provinces in which that personal discipline must lie. Our experience of a training for the ministry is not perhaps always such as to lead one to expect any very diligent care for the devotional life of the flock in general.
God grant that this, among many undone things, may return upon the conscience of our beloved Church. It cannot be laid to her charge that she has said, " I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing."* She has sought, and is daily finding, a fuller realisation of the holy calling and blessed responsibility which are upon her. In this also may she own and fulfil her motherhood to us. Any strong and general devotional life must be a life aided and guided — one in which we are aware of sanction, order, and a bond to others — so that, alone with God, we may still " have fellowship one with another ; "f and when we pray, say " Oxiv Father."
* Kev. iii. 17, t 1 John i. 7.
NATIONAL RELIGION ; ITS PRINCIPLES AND POSSIBLE EMBODIMENTS.
The Very Rev. George Hutchison, D.D.
Let me explain, first of all, what we are to understand by- National Religion. It means the profession of religion on the part of a community bound together as a state or nation. This implies two things — a doing honour to God, and a making use of His truth and laws for the good of the people. And what we are to maintain is that National Religion, in this sense of it, is a right and a good thing, and therefore an obligatory thing so far as the circumstances of a nation allow of it.
The man who believes in God and in certain things as made known by Him, will feel bound to confess Him, and also to avail himself of the benefits implied in such a belief If he is the head of a family, he will show his religion in that character, both as towards God and as towards those who are subject to his authority and in- lluence. If he is an employer of labour, with a number of people under him in whom he feels an interest, and who are, in certain respects, accountable to him, he cannot surely be blamed, he cannot be said to be going out of his way, he cannot be thought of as acting any other than a good and praiseworthy part, if he puts himself to some trouble and expense, as far as circumstances admit, to enable them to turn religion to practical account in a larger measure than they would be able to do if left entirely to their own re- sources. It is no abrupt, unnatural, illogical step we take when we pass from this to any wider community, such as a
32 National Religion : its Principles
state or nation. We have the same fundamental principles on this much larger scale — interest, power, influence, on the part of those who rule in regard to those who are under them.
We are thus far assuming that the great mass of the people are believers in God, and in the more outstanding of the doctrines which we connect with His name. In tliis case, would it not be thought inconsistent, unnatural, un- accountable to a degree, if on so great an occasion, for example, as the ascension of a sovereign to the throne, there should be no express recognition of God, the Fountain of Power by whom kings reign, and the source of all good for nations as such, not less than for the individuals and the families of which nations are composed ? Are we not entitled to expect that he should be held bound by oath to God to be faithful to so high a trust, and that he should be commended to God by prayer — such prayer as would prove continuous both in private and in public throughout the land ; and this on the simple ground of the reasonableness of the case, and even had we no such sanction as we find in the words of the apostle who exhorts us in a special manner to " make supplications, and prayers, and intercessions for kings and for all that are in authority." Now, that is National Religion even were thei-e nothing more ; and those who object to the principle of National Religion are bound to object to what we have just been saying, and to maintain that on occasion of such an event as we have singled out there ought to be nothing higher than a mere secular demonstration. Thus, as the making and the executing of law, as well as the whole of the administration of government, are virtually bound up in the supreme authority, and are the practical exercise and application of it, it follows that religion may reason- ably penetrate through every branch and pore of public life.
Thus far I am assuming that the mass of the people receive religion as true, and substantially the same religion. But now I may be asked what about the minority, perhaps
and Possible Eiiibodimeiits. 'i,'^
a very considerable one, who do not agree with them ? Are they to be compelled to acquiesce in all this ? Can this be done without coercing conscience ? I have no desire to impugn the conscience of the infidel, much less the con- science of the voluntary religionist, both of whom occupy the same ground in relation to the principle in hand. We have no wish to impugn conscience in the case of either of these parties. But may we be allowed to suggest, with all deference, that conscience is not the monopoly of any person or of any party. Neither is it confined to questions of religion strictly so called. There is surely such a thing as righteousness in secular affairs ; and is not this a thing with which conscience has to do ? It is a principle which is constantly coming up in legislation. Such and such a proposal is right and just in the estimation of one set of men and the reverse in the estimation of others. What is to be done in a case of that kind ? Either there must be a standstill, or the will of the majority must have its way ! It is only on this latter principle that society is possible ; the majority must prevail. The life of a nation is not to come to a stand because this or that minority may be over sensitive — so very conscientious as to fancy that there is no conscience anywhere but among themselves and in their own party.
The advocates of National Religion profess to be very strong on certain questions to which conscience is fairly applicable, if applicable anywhere. Let us take an example. All will admit that, as regards crime, prevention is in every sense better than cure. And there are very few who will deny that there is a light and a strength in religion which go a long way in favour of law and order, and that those who are left without them are the most liable to fall into disorder and crime. If this be so, is it the part of a government of any pretensions to wisdom, or justice, or humanity to say, " We have nothing to do with what is called religion, or with any light or strength which it may be capable of supplying : if these poor people want anything
C
34 National Religion : its Principles
of that kind, let them find it for themselves, or let the philanthropists find it for them : it is no business of ours. We have only to tell these people that if they break our ]aws — religion or no religion — thev shall smart for it; that is all." AVhat are we to say to this ? To withhold from a number of poor struggling people well known and well tried means of preventing crime, and means allowed to be of great power in securing the right discharge of the duties of citizenship, and then to punish them for their offences as unmercifully as if those means had been put within their reach — is that fair ? is it just ? is it a thing to commend itself to the conscience of any one whose conscience is worthy of the name ? In a case of that kind, who is the chief offender in the sight of the Highest ? Is it the poor waif ? or is it those who leave him to his fate ? The con- science of the National Religionist protests against any theory of which that is the outcome. We are to leave all this to the philanthropist — are we ? And who is he ? The evangelist, no doubt, who tells the State that he will have nothing to do with it, and that it has no standing in such matters. And yet this same evangelist, as is well known, turns his back upon the people as soon as they become too poor to make him comfortable, and betakes himself to more pleasant places where he is not required. And not only so, but he wants the State to do as he has done — to retire from the field and leave the people in utter destitution. That is the cry which was never louder than at this day, namely, that the very slender means in the form of a provision for religious worship and teaching in connection with the old parish churches shall be withdrawn, even in the most destitute localities, and that the poor people shall be left as helpless by the country as they are by the impotence of voluntaryism.
This suggests the question of Endowments as one of the common adjuncts of National Religion. We need not say that religious endowments, founded in our own time, are recognised and protected by law just as much as any other
and Possible Embodiments. 35
kind of property. No one will deny that religion has as good a right to its property as any other interest in the country. If we go back to the early days of the Church in Scotland we find more or less of Church property existing, whether as the increment of the rude soil on which ecclesi- astics had expended labour, or as the benefactions of pious members of the Church, or as gifts from the proprietors of land for the support of those who ministered in matters of religion to themselves and their dependents. The property which thus became attached to religion in those early days was quite as fairly acquired as any of thg possessions in the hands of those secular or lay owners of property in the midst of whom it exercised its functions. There has been a continuation of this, in one form or other, with many changes and modifications down to the present time, Eeligion has never been without property. In this respect it has all along been on a level with the other great interests of the country. It is on a level with them at this day. And the question I put is this : Is there any reason in justice — anything that can commend itself to any fair and intelligent mind — why religion should be stripped of its property any more than that other proprietors, whether private or public, should be stripped of theirs ? Perhaps I shall be told that religion is very much changed from what it was in the days when its property was acquired either under the Celtic Church or under the Church of Rome. In answer to that, I say that it is religion still — a thing which has to do with God and immortality, a power which ministers to the higher part of our being, and that not only without interfering with our interests in the present world, but also tending to the furtherance of those interests both in the case of the individual and of society ; so that in this view its right to its property cannot be fairly challenged on the ground of any change that has taken place in certain of its doctrines and practices. Let me give an illustration of this. Take the case of a chair of astronomy, founded in the old days of that science when many errors were mixed up with it. As
36 National Religion : its Principles
time went on, those errors (many of them at least) were cleared aAvay, and the teaching that came to be given from the chair was very different from the old teaching. Would any reasonable man say that such a change as that would justify the confiscation of the original endowment of the chair, and its application to some other purpose for which it was never intended ? And so as to religion. And it is of this, observe, that I am speaking — not of this or that particular branch of the Church, but of religion — and what I say is that religion in one form or other has as good a right, as valid and indefeasible a right to its property as the owner of any field, or farm, or territory in the country has to his. To take it away would be an act of injustice as clear and undeniable as it would be to take away the possessions of those secular proprietors. To spoil the one and to leave the others in possession would be nothing less than robbery.
Will a man rob God ? Can he do so with impunity ? The State, in the eye of voluntaryism, has nothing to do with the Bible ; yet the Bible, for all that, may have some- thing to do with the State. And even in these days, now near the close of this nineteenth century, there are multi- tudes in this land to whom the words of an Old Testament prophet are not a dead letter, but in very truth a voice from the living God. And it is for the Church of Scotland to proclaim it far and near, as with the sound of a trumpet, that religion — I do not say this or that Church, or this or that denomination — has as clear and undoubted a right to its property as any other interest in the country, any art or science, any institution, any agency whose services are still required. Defend your Church as you may ; but let us not forget that there is much more at stake than that. The defence of religion — the vindication of its ancient rights as one of the oldest and most outstanding interests in the land — that is the battle, more than all, to which you are summoned. " Will a man rob God ? " Will he do so in any case ? Least of all, surely, in a case like this, where it
and Possible Embodiments. 2>7
would throw burdens upou the poor from which they have been always free, and when the spoil, to the extent at least of £40,000 a year, in the name of Church buildings, would be thrown into the hands of those who do not ask it, and who do not need it, sharing as they do the broad acres of Scotland among them. Will a man thus so rob God as to make the rich richer and the poor poorer ? Will a man, will a State thus rob God, and with impunity ? No ; never. Will a man rob God ? Let that be your watchword.
You are met with a cry on the other side ; and what is that ? Religious Equality. Do those wlio use the phrase understand what it means ? If religious equity, or equity in matters of religion, is what they mean^ we have that already in the toleration which is given to religious pro- fession, and teaching, and worship of whatever kind, so long as it does not interfere with the good order of society. The only other meaning it can have is equality among all in matters of religion; and in that sense it brings the Christian down to the level of the infidel, so that the nation in its national character, in its national institutions, in its national acts, must ignore religion altogether, or, in other words, treat it as a mere nonentity not worth minding. That is the plain English of it if the words have any meaning at all. It is of immense importance that this should be made clear ; and therefore I would represent it in some such way as this : —
Religious equality, let us suppose, is a sovereign lady sitting on a throne, her face full of good-nature, but not without a dash of weakness. There comes into her presence, first of all, a band of Nonconformist Presbyterians, and they are there to claim it as their right to have the National Church brought down from her high position and put on a level with themselves. All right, she says ; and down goes the Church to be as they are. They with- draw full of joy, and they have gone but a short way when they meet with another company going up on a similar errand — Unitarians, and Jews, and others of various names ; and
38 National Religion : its Principles
what these ask of lier gracious majesty is that all those Presbyterians, old and new, young and old together, shall be brought down from the place they occupy, so orthodox, so unimpeachable, and ranged side by side with them ; one of the effects of which would be that the Jewish Sabbath would have to be recognised and protected by law just as much as the Christian Sabbath, or that the Christian Sabbath should cease to have any legal recognition at all ; so that either we should have two Sabbaths in the week, which would be one too many, or no Sabbath at all, which would be one too few. But leaving that to lie over, the request is granted, and the petitioners retire. The good news spread, and by-and-bye a third party appears, composed of infidels or atheists, or whatever you may choose to call them ; and the claim of right presented by them is just as valid in the eyes of the gracious lady as either of the two claims she has just disposed of ; and their demand, which is nothing less than to have all those various sections of religionists brought down to the blank level of no religion, or a denial of all religion, which is the lowest level of all, is at once complied with. The religion of the nation as a nation — what we call National Religion — is thus effaced by means of two or three movements of the sceptre of this imperial lady, with the high-sounding name of Eeligious Equality. Yes ; religion must come to have no place in any of the institutions of the country — such as the throne, the legislature, the courts of justice, army and navy, school and college, jail and penitentiary, and so on — and all this, why ? Lest it should offend the infidel. The property of religion — its ancient pati'imony — must be secularised, and why ? In order that it may be shared with the infidel. In this view, we can understand how, at the annual meeting of one of the voluntary denominations in the month of May 1S82, two of its leading men were not ashamed to beckon to the infidels all over the land, to come forward and help them in their attacks on the Church of Scotland.
To hear some people talk, one would think it is a grand
and Possible Embodiments. 39
thing to be an infidel now-a-days. But is he quite sure that those new friends of his are as sincere as they are loud in their professions ? They are no doubt quite sincere in the cry of Religious Equality, so far as it brings those who are above them down to their own level ; but are they indeed consumed with the desire of going down to the level of those who are below them ? In the case of the unthinking: multitude the cry is a delusion — a cry and nothing more ; in the case of those who know better, it is an imposition and a sham. The man who trusts those people is to be pitied indeed. Poor man ! As soon as they have made their own use of him, he will be cast aside and left lamentinsf. How did they treat the secularist in the school controversy ? Secularism was everything with those Religious-Equality men ; but as soon as a Bill was so far forward as to be safe, they grasped at the old " use and wont " of religious education, and left the secularist in the mire. And how is it to be with the secularism of the same men in the question of Church endowments ? What if, on a Bill gettinsf so far on as to seem safe, they turn round and say, " Never mind the disposal of the funds at present ; that can easily be taken up afterwards ; there is a good time coming." Alas for the poor secularist ! Has he taken the bribe for nothing ? He is thinking of his cottage and his plot of ground on the old parish glebe, with ample room for any number, and lo ! it is but a dream.
NATIONAL RELIGION: ITS PRINCIPLES AND POSSIBLE EMBODIMENTS.
Rev. Roger S. Kirkpatrick, B.D,
The time at my disposal is so brief, that t shall content myself with simply stating three propositions and adding a few words under each.
I. The principle for which we contend is that the State, as the organ of a Christian nation, must recognise the sovereignty of God in Christ, and must interpret its duties and responsibilities in the light of the Christian Revelation.
In order to avoid ambiguity, I use the word State. Confusion is often introduced by the use of the word nation, which is understood sometimes as a synonym for State, sometimes as a synonym for people. When, for instance, we are met with the objection that national religion does not consist in coronation services, public ceremonials, an Established Church, that national religion must rather be sought for in the hearts and lives of the masses of the people, the two senses of the word nation are confounded, and the distinction between national and personal religion is ignored. Of course a nation is not truly religious unless the masses of its people are religious. That everyone admits. It is simply an assertion of the universal obligation of personal religion. But a nation is not merely a multitude of people. It is an organized body. It lives a corporate life. And our contention is that, both as representing and as directing that corporate life, the State itself must be ruled by considerations of
42 National Religion : Its Principles
religion, must cast its crown at the feet of the King Invisible, and employ its sceptre in obedience to His sway. This principle is founded on the truth that there is no power but of God, and that God has exalted His Son to be Prince of the kings of the earth. Now national sccalarism is the one practical alternative to this principle. And between national religion and national secularism the choice virtually lies. That a nation, hostile or indifferent to religion, should choose the latter principle, would indeed cause us no surprise. But that a nation, by origin, tradition and profession Christian, should ever dream of renouncing the former principle in order to adopt the latter is simply monstrous. Its choice might perhaps to some extent be justified if the responsibilities of the State were really so light and inconsiderable as certain doctrines of political economy once represented them to be. But both in theory and in practice such doctrines of laisser faire have been discredited. And, under the pressure of advancing Socialism, larger con- ceptions of the responsibilities of the State prevail. Because the State is " the supreme society," because the welfare of the people is its care, because by its laws and institu- tions it influences, and cannot fail to influence, the character and destiny of millions, its manifold activity, strictly political though that activity be, must proceed upon assumptions that transcend the sphere of politics, upon assumptions that immediately relate to the importance and solemn end of human life. Now what in the case of a Christian State should these assumptions be ? Not surely the secularist assumption that temporal interests are all-engrossing. Not merely the ethical assumption that moral interests are of higher rank. But this impera- tive assumption, that every individual man (and therefore society at large) has eternal interests to be cared for, interests that must on no account be prejudiced, interests so infinitely precious that for them the Son of God laid down His life. This, then, is our assertion : — A power
and Possible Ejubodiments. 43
so vast aud influential as that wielded by the State, a power which touches, at so many thousand points, the highest interests of the masses of the people, dare not on any Christian theory safely venture to ignore religion, cannot on any Christian theory be left ungoverned and unhallowed Vjy it.
" A King we need, one who at least shall see That city's towers, where dwells true Righteousness."
TI. The principle for which we contend may certainly find partial embodiments without any institution of an Established Church ; but the main arguments at present urged in favour of Disestablishment are equally valid against all embodiments of the principle.
All possible embodiments of national religion may be ranged under the two heads of homage to Almighty God and service in God's name to men, which constitute the sum and substance of personal religion also. Under each of these two heads a nation might conceivably declare its Christian char- acter without any Established Church. Under the first head, for instance, without any Established Church, the Christian Creed might still be solemnly affirmed ; each successive sovereign might still be crowned in the name of the Holy Trinity ; the royal title might still involve deliberate re- cognition of the King of kings; Parliament, High Courts of Justice, and all ceremonies and institutions of national im- portance might still be consecrated with worship ; and days of national thanksgiving and national humiliation might be still observed. Under the second head, again, without any Established Church, the responsibilities of the nation might still be viewed and dealt with in the light of Christian duty ; law might still be based on Christian ethics, and still be administered in the spirit of the faith ; such special Christian legislation as relates to marriage and the day of rest might be still maintained ; religion might still be taught in public schools, theology still hold its place in Universities ; chap- lains might still be provided for the Army and the Navy,
44 National Religion : Its Principles
for prisons and for poorhouses ; and religious effort might still be privileged in various ways. It is extravagance to pretend that no nation can be Christian that has no Established Church. By conniving at many practical inconsistencies, a nation, as in the actual instance of the United States, may, without any Established Church, con- tinue through some or all of these forms to bear a feeble and intermittent witness to the faith. And, if there were any real prospect of restoration of unity to the Church by means of Disestablishment, and if the advocates of Dis- establishment showed any honest, earnest disposition to safeguard and maintain the principle of national religion, these facts would deserve to be considered. But the present attitude and methods of " Liberationists " give no such promise. They make for further division not for peace. They use their weapons recklessly. Their much vaunted arguments — Eeligious Equality and the secular character of the State — strike impartially at every possible embodiment of the principle in question — strike therefore at the very principle itself And the one logical outcome of their reasoning and of their policy is — national establishment of secularism ivith 'mere toleration for religion.
III. The principle for which we contend can never be adequately embodied but in some such arrangement as is described by the term Established Church ; and, though such arrangements may be very various in character, it is essential that they should always keep in view the py^omotion and not the control of religion.
Plainly the embodiments already indicated are extremely partial embodiments ; phantoms rather than incorporations of a living principle. They do not exhaust the religious duty of the State. Until, not only in prisons and poor- houses, but throughout the length and breadth of its dominions, it promotes the worship of God, and makes provision for the ordinances of Christian instruction, the State cannot be said adequately to fulfil its religious duty. But this is what the State by direct interposition is
and Possible Einbodiruents. 45
essentially ill-qualitied to do. The State bears the sword. It is the embodiment of force. And, by means of force, religion, the Christian religion above all, cannot be promoted. The State may indeed attempt to avail itself of the methods of teaching and persuasion. But in its hands even these methods will be over-clouded by the shadow of the force behind. Hence, then, the necessity for some concordat between Church and State : — the Church, independent within her proper sphere, fulfilling as her Divine vocation a duty which the State alone could not sufficiently perform ; the State, in recognition of its own responsibility in the matter, proving helpful to the Church in every fitting way. The measures by which this concordat is expressed we call establishment — a word of no constant meaning, denoting different arrangements in different realms and centuries. At the present day in all the States of Europe some arrangements exist for the recognition and furtherance of the Church, or of various branches of the Church concurrently ; and these arrangements are not mere relics of the past, but have been adjusted within recent times to meet the require- ments of the age. In some of them, indeed, the control of religion rather than its promotion is too evidently contem- plated ; and, in so far as such control is contemplated, these arrangements do not embody the principle of national religion, but quite another and repugnant principle. From the injury of State control the Church of Scotland is singularly exempt. I think that it may boldly be asserted that there is not another country in the world in which the due relations between Church and State are so perfectly realized as they are in Scotland. Still we do not maintain that the present arrangements are the only possible arrangements. And if some alternative plan were suggested which, while in no way releasing the State from the adequate fulfilment of its religious duty, would bring healing to the deplorable divisions that exist, as Christians and as patriots we should be bound to weigh it carefully. As little of course in national as in personal religion can we hope in this world
46 National Religion.
to reach the absolute ideal. But as little in national as in personal religion does that failure of the absolute ideal warrant our abandoning the embodiments that already exist. Clearly our constant aim should be, not to destroy what of necessity is to some extent imperfect, but step by step to achieve for the ideal the best possible realization in existing circumstances. Until we are shown the better, let us hold fast the good.
THE PRESENT CALL TO WITNESS FOR THE FUNDAMENTAL TRUTHS OF THE GOSPEL.
Rev. James Cooper, D.D.
The Present Call ! It is always the Church's call. To witness for the Fundamental Truths of the Gospel, and for all the Truths committed to her keeping, was one main function for which the Church was constituted. It is part and parcel of her work : so bound up with her very being, that unless she is performing it, she can do nothing as she ought.
It will not be denied that the Church in times past has recognized the obligation. Yet it may be well at the out- set to point out how plainly it is laid upon her in the pages of the Four Gospels. As Christ Himself was anointed, He says, to preach the glad tidings to the poor (St Luke iv. 18), so by Him were the Twelve sent forth, the Seventy, the Church. The Twelve were to preach,, saying. The kingdom of heaven is at hand ; it was for the Name of its King, Jesus, they would have to witness and to suffer ; and they would not have gone over the cities of Israel till the Son of Man had come (St Matt. x. 22, 23). The Seventy were sent two and two before Jesus' face into every city and place where He Himself would come (St Luke x. 1-22). The Church also is to preach the Gospel to every creature — a Gospel which must be believed as well as practised (St Mark xvi. 15, 16); she is to make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them into the Threefold Name, and teaching them to observe all things whatsoever Jesus hath commanded (St Matt, xxviii. 19, 20). As, to this end
47.
48 The Present Call to Witness foi' the
our Lord was born and for this end came He into the world, that He should bear witness unto the truth (St John xviii. 37), so the Holy Ghost and the Apostles together were to bear witness of Him (St John xv. 26, 27). He opened their understandings, says the Third Evangelist, that they might understand the Scriptures, and said unto them, " Thus it is written, and thus it behoved the Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day : and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. And ye are witnesses of these things. And, behold, I send the promise of My Father upon you" (St Luke xxiv. 45-49).
This, let us notice, is a creed — precisely the creed which St Paul, in the 15th chapter of 1 Corinthians, declares to be his Gospel ; it is substantially, and almost in point of form, the Apostles' Creed.
In the face of all this it is not too much to say that the contrast which has once more been drawn by Dr Hatch, in the opening of his Hibbert Lectures, between " the Church of the fourth century, with its Nicene Creed, and the Church as it came from Christ, with the Sermon on the Mount," is doubly unhistorical. It is unjust alike to the Creeds and to the Gospels. (1) To the Creeds. Take the most dogmatic of the three — the Athanasian. Is it true that it sub- stitutes the holding of correct beliefs for a righteous life ? It is not true. The Athanasian Creed, when it comes to speak of the judgment on which all shall turn, makes no mention any more of doctrine, but of life only. " All men shall . . . give account for their own works. And they that have done good shall go into life everlasting ; and they that have done evil into everlasting fire."
(2) The contrast is as unjust to the Gospels as it is to the Creeds ; yea, to that part of the Gospels which, by Dr Hatch and others, is taken for the whole. The Sermon on the Mount is full of doctrine — of "High" doctrine — about a particular Providence (St Matt. vi. 32); about God our Father (v. 45 ; vi. 9); about almsgiving, prayer, and fasting
Fundamental Truths of the Gospel. 49
(vi. 1-18) ; about despising this world and laying up treasure in heaven (vi. 19-21) ; about marriage and divorce (v. 32) ; about the broad way and the narrow (vii. 13, 14). It re- spects, indeed, the former dispensation, the Law and the Prophets, but it subjects them to the. higher authority of Jesus, to obey whose sayings is to be secure, and to disobey them to be lost. He, in that day, will be the Sovereign Judge (vii. 22-29). We have, moreover, in the Sermon on the Mount the mission of the Church — a twofold missiou : in the first place, ethical — " Ye are the salt of the earth " fv. 13), your function to purify the life of humanity ; but in the next verse it is doctrinal — " Ye are the light of the world " (v. 1 4), to dispel by your illumination from above its spiritual night. The Church was only projected in the Sermon on the Mount : its real birthday was the day of Pentecost ; but, even as projected in the Sermon on the JMount, it is a teaching body. Part and parcel of its mis- sion is to bear witness unto the truth.
Nor can it be successfully maintained that this truth, as it was delivered in the Gospels, is in point of fact aught else than the doctrine asserted in the Three Creeds.
As we study the Gospels, we observe how, to the re- velation of the Father which our Saviour made in the Sermon on the Mount and in the Lord's Prayer, — which, indeed, He was always making, — He straightway added the revelation of His own Sonship and Divinity. Step by step, deliberately, systematically. He " trained His disciples to trust Him with that sort of trust which can be legitimately given to God only." * " Ye believe in God," He said, " be- lieve also in Me" (St John xiv. 1), Nor was He content with a simple trust. He pressed for an intellectual recog- nition, an overt confession, of the fact on which alone such a trust could be justified. " What think ye of the Christ ?" He asks, " Whose Son is He ? " (St Matt. xxii. 42). " Whom say ye that I am ? " (St Matt, xvi, 13). Who can forget the warm approbation with which He received the confession
* Gore, "Bampton Lectures," p. 13. D
50 The Present Call to Witness for the
of St Peter, making it the very rock on which He would build His Church? (St Matt. xvi. 17, 18). The almost coldness, on the other hand, with which, after He is risen, He takes the even greater confession of St Thomas : " My Lord and my God " (St John xx. 28), is not less note- worthy : "Thomas, because thou hast seen Me, thou hast believed "... You know it now, but you ought to have apprehended it before.
Christ declared the Father ; He revealed His own Divinity. He taught also precisely what the Creeds teach about the Holy Ghost (John xiv.-xvi). Finally, He summed up His doctrine in that Name into which He requires every single member of His Church to be baptized, "The Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost" (St Matt, xxviii. 19).
That Name is the kernel of the Creeds. Men may dis- believe it. They may deny that Christ gave it to His Church. But they cannot believe it as a truth without accepting the doctrine of the Creeds ; they cannot believe that Christ gave it to His Church without acknowledging the doctrine of the Creeds to be the doctrine of the Lord Him- self. And therefore, as a matter of historical fact, dogmatic theology finds itself at home in the Four Gospels. " Increased care for the [Four] Gospels and study of them, compared with other parts of Scripture, was one of the things," says Dean Church, " characteristic of the [Oxford] Movement." *
XL
The Trinity ; the Eternal Father ; the Deity, Incarna- tion, Death, Resurrection, Ascension, and Second Coming of our Lord ; the Deity and Presence with us of the Holy Ghost ; His inspiring of the Scriptures ; His real work- ing in the Church and Sacraments ; the Communion of Saints, the tremendous realities of heaven and of hell — these, I take it, are the Fundamental Truths which we
* " Oxford Movement," p. 167.
Fiindaniental Truths of the Gospel. 5 1
hold it is the duty of the Church to witness to in the present day, as in past times. Our duty and our wisdom both.
Our duty, all the more because many are everywhere denying their truth or their utility. Our wisdom, because we are persuaded that they supply the essential foundation alike of Christian ideas, of Christian sanctity, and of (Christian worship.
What is the general condition of university and pulpit teaching in Scotland at this moment ? Must we not say that our teachers, as a rule, from the greatest of them even to the least of them, are either contradicting or ignoring the Catholic dogmatic ?
(1) Take some of the teachings addressed in the name of philosophy, or of science, or of history, to the highest intellect of the present day. I remember that when either the Burnett Bequest was remodelled or the Gifford Lectures were established (I think it was the latter occa- sion). Professor Bain made the remark, " that, in order to a fair administration of the Trust, it would be needful now and then to appoint a Hume." Why, sir, we have had three Humes already.* I do not say that Mr Tylor, Professor Caird, or Mr Max Muller have the philosophical ability of Hume ; but that qualification to which I suppose Professor Bain referred they certainly possess — the utter incompatibility of their respective systems with all the facts of the Gospel history, and with all that the Church in all ages has regarded as the fundamental truths of Christianity, Of course their language towards what they call Christ- ianity is polite ; it is sometimes flattering. But their com- plete antagonism to all that constitutes the Faith of the Gospel they scarcely care to veil. It were not charity — it were the very idiocy of optimism for the Church to ignore it.
* "We have a fourth in Professor Pfleiderer, whose Lectures are being delivered amid "applause" at Edinburgh while these papers are passing through the press. No doubt the systems propoxmded are mutually destruc- tive ; but each successive assault undermines the faith of some.
52 The Present Call to Witness for the
To Mr Tylor, religion in every form is literally " the baseless fabric of a vision." It has its origin in dreams.
To Mr Max Muller, the Christianity of the Creeds is altogether "legendary"; their Christ is "mythological." Great theologians, whom we in our blindness canonized as saints and hailed as doctors of the Church, really believed, it appears, what Mr Max Muller informs us is the " funda- mental doctrine of Christianity " — not, as we had supposed, that the Eternal Son of God was made man, but " the divine sonship of man " — of man as man ; Christ being called the " Logos " or Word of God only because He was the perfect exemplification of all that God desired man to be. There is no Trinity. There has been no Incarna- tion. And "few only" it seems "will now deny that Christians can be Christians without what was called a belief in miracles ; nay, few will deny that they are better Christians without than with that belief."
It is painful, indeed, to have to bracket Professor Caird with such as these. But amid all that is noble, grave, and reverent in the " Evolution of Religion," with all his real, however inconsistent, belief in God, with all his admiration for Christ, it is all too clear that to him the mere notion of a supernatural revelation is impossible. His system is in- compatible not only with the Incarnation, but even wdth our Lord's teaching in the Sermon on the Mount of God's Fatherly care over us. He quotes our Saviour's saying, " Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone : but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit " (St John xii. 24), as giving us the essence of the Gospel ; but he denies the Resurrection which in the Gospel justifies the words. To him, " Christ is no more God than Socrates " ; and, as if to emphasize this rejection of the Faith, he adapts Mr Morley's device of printing " God " with a small " g," and prints the pronouns which refer to the Redeemer with a small " h."
These are our Gifford Lecturers, the chosen exponents of " Natural Religion " ! Nor does the selection seem to
Fundamental TriUhs of the Gospel. 53
strike any one as strange. They are received everywhere. No word of warning is raised against their Christ-dishonour- ing, soul-destroying errors. Their disbelief in Christianity rather helps than hinders their advancement. Professor Caird has just been appointed, without protest, to be Master of a great Oxford College, where hundreds of young souls will be under his charge.
(2) The pulpit is for the great body of the people the chief agent of Christian instruction.
And what, in respect of Christian doctrine, is the present condition of the Scottish pulpit ?
Were our preachers systematically trained at College in the doctrine of the Creeds ? Were they duly exercised in its correlative devotions ? Do they know anything about it ? Do they preach it ? What is it that is too commonly preached in Glasgow churches ? Is it the fundamental truths of the Gospel, awful, soul-subduing in their power, holiness, and love, which bend men to their knees in the worship of a present God (1 Cor. xiv. 25), who is recon- ciling in Christ Jesus a sinful world unto Himself (2 Cor. v. 19)? Or do you, for a large part, rejoice in " a pretty ser- vice," followed by a smart essay on some " topic of the day," while the solemn facts which the Creed commemorates are either ignored or dismissed as " dogmas," dry, unspiritual, antiquated ? *
The state of the Free Church can never but be a matter of profound concern for all who care for the religion of our country. The Free Church is not a pleasant spectacle just now. Its leader brushing aside its own claim that Christ in His Church should have the homage of the nation, and otfering the " patrimony of the Kirk " as a bribe to the electors. Its professors minimizing one day, and the next day unctuously repeating the Evangelical shibboleths ; en- gaged themselves in importing the latest rationalism of
* Two eminent ministers in the West end of Glasgow assure me that this is an exaggeration ; but I fear there is only too large a measure of truth in it. -J. C.
54 The Present Call to Witness for the
Germany or Holland, yet trying to rouse a pseudo-patriotism against whatever is not, in their narrow interpretation, Scotch. As if Sir Walter was not Scotch !
" Facilis descensus Averui."
The English Nonconformists of 1660 were largely Unitarian in 1690. A Free Churchman, who has come under the influence predominant at present in Free Church theology, told me not long since, " I must say I have not the same horror of Unitarianism that I used to have."
Yet have we any reason to be better pleased with the condition of our own Church ? We have less theological activity : have we more orthodoxy ? We have less fierce- ness (it is easy to us) ; but have we not more of easy self- complacency ? We were called to humiliation lately : many of our men stood up in their pulpits and declared, " We have nothing for which to humble ourselves." And they spoke not merely as against the Disestablishers, but in view of our responsibilities as the Church of Jesus com- missioned to this people !
Evangelicalism used to have some robustness. If it was afraid of preaching good works, it had at least a serious sense of sin. It made a real protest against the world. It had one positive institution to be sacredly observed — " the Sabbath." Now it has given up even the Sabbath. It relies on amusements, and sensations, and " Pleasant Sunday Afternoons " — while ordinances, order, precepts are thrown into a common melting-pot. Evangelicalism never believed the reality of ordinances. It valued preaching, no doubt as the instrument of conversions. But it valued nothing else. Its prayers and hymns became simply sermons, addressed not so much to God as to " the sinner " in the congregation. The Sacraments it included among " forms." The pulpit, accordingly, usurped the place of the Lord's Table. While in regard to the Sacrament of Baptism, the result of the long Evangelical ascendancy has been to create the impres- sion that it is rather superstitious to attach any importance
Fundamental Truths of the GospeL 55
to it whatever, A prayer at a child's funeral is necessary — but baptism on any pretext may be put off !
III.
Such are some of the prevalent teachings amid which we are called to bear witness to the ancient Fundamental Truths.
We obey the call, first of all, because it is the call of God. " Woe is unto us if we preach not the Gospel " (1 Cor. ix. 16).
But we obey it also because we know the power and value of these Truths.
Jesus Christ to His people is no mere name. He is our Lord, our Head, the Priest for ever who stands, and feeds His fiock in the majesty of the Name of the Lord His God. We know whom we worship ; for we live in Him, we receive out of His fulness. " He is to-day," as Dr Milligan has expressed it, " not less than He ever was, the life of His people." From Him all the body has its nourishment ministered, and is knit together. The relation to Jesus Christ of His members is a fact of ex- perience. It implies as its foundation all the truths which we preach concerning Him.
We recognize these Truths historically as inseparable and essential parts of the Christianity of Christ and His Apostles ; theologically, as supplying the intellectual foun- dation of the most characteristic thoughts of Christendom ; ethically, as yielding alike the suggestions and the motives of Christian sanctity ; devotionally, as the root from which naturally springs, in all its varying expressions of awe, tenderness, and sublimity, the characteristic worship of the Church. As we bow before our Divine Redeemer the Creed becomes an Anthem to His praise.
Let me particularize a little here, and I have done.
(1) What are the thoughts, the ideas, about God and man that have moulded most decisively the mind of Christendom ? Are they not such as these — the justice,
56 The Present Call to Witness for the
the holiness, the love of God, the dignity of woman, the value of every human soul, the heinousness of sin, the tremendous issues of the present life, the blessedness of the .saints in heaven ? These ideas are the inheritance of all the Christian nations. They belong to them exclusively. Where did they get them ? In their common Creed, that " God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son " ; that the Eternal Son was born of the Virgin Mary ; that for the weakest brother He died upon the Cross ; that sin is an injury and insult offered to the personal love He bears each one of us ; that we must all appear before His judgment seat ; that His faithful servants shall live with Him for ever.
Or again, take Christian sanctity. Think of its various features — unworldliness, heavenly-mlndedness, humility, charity, purity, munificence ? What are the motives which lead Christians to exercise themselves in these things ? The " generous love " of Christ, who, " though He was rich, yet for our sakes became poor " ; the humility of Christ, who, "being in the form of God . . . emptied Himself of His glory, and took on Him the form of a servant " (Philip, ii. 5); the Cross of Christ, b}' which "the world is crucified imto us, and we unto the world " (Gal. vi. 14) ; the Ascen- sion of Christ, whereby He has lifted our heart and treasure into heaven, where He " sitteth at the right hand of God " (Col. iii. 2).
It was to these truths, applied to the heart by the Holy Ghost, that Jesus looked as the means for the sanctifica- tion of His people : " Sanctify them through Thy truth : Thy word is truth " (St John xvii. 17). It was in these truths that St Paul found the motive of his life of sacrifice : " The life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the Faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me" (Gal. ii. 20). And when the Church had been established in the world, St John not only ascribes to these truths her victory ; he challenges any other motive to produce them : " Who is he that overcometh the world,
Fundamental Truths of the Gospel. 57
but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God ? " (1 John V. 5).
The Faith, in short, of our Lord's Deity and Sonship, as it is the rock on which He built His Church, so is it also the spring whence flow those streams of Christian holiness which refresh the world.
It was His own promise : " He that believeth on Me . . . out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water " (St John vii. 38).
Thou hast given us, O Lord, a dry land : give us, we beseech Thee, these springs of water.
THE PRESENT CALL TO WITNESS FOR THE FUNDAMENTAL TRUTHS OF THE GOSPEL.
Rev. George Campbell.
The vital character of those spiritual verities which lie at the foundation of our Divine religion forbids the idea of their ever being regarded as matters of inferior importance, — as of even at all equal importance with man's sj'stems and theories regarding them. The Lord Jesus habitually in- sisted on the Divine authority of tlte Truth, and described Eternal Life as subsisting in the knowledge of the only true God and of Him whom He hath sent. He represents His Church as founded upon the rock of His Divine Licar- nation, received by the faith and confessed by the lips of those to whom it is revealed by His Father in heaven. The proclamation of this truth through word and sacrament, in its naked simplicity, as the message of omnipotent mercy to mankind, must likewise rank above all human ratiocina- tion upon the subject ; and the acceptance of it, and of Christ Himself its substance, by faith and obedience, — that the baptized may be built up in the oneness of His body, — must be regarded as God's requirement at the hand of each soul of man.
The history of the Church is the record of the progress of the entering of the Lord Jesus Christ in His Divine Life into the families and hearts of men : and it is one which exhibits numberless alternations of advance and decline, according to the circumstances and the preparation of the various races addressed. There are of necessity times when it is specially needful to bring back to remembrance the
59
6o The Present Call to Witness for the
great purposes and functions for which the Church is insti- tuted ; and to awake a slumbering world, — shall I say a backsliding Church ? — to a consciousness of the divine end and method according to which, amid all our human im- perfection and shortcoming, the Most High is ever working.
Without adopting any pessimistic view of the present aspect of society as unfavourable to these high purposes, or dwelling upon the state of division and confusion into which the Church herself has fallen, — the sadly low and life- less condition of which we all lament, — it cannot be denied that there is need in these days to recall both the one and the other to the first principles of the Gospel ; to remember that from which we have " fallen, to repent, and to do the first works " ; need to emphasize the apostolic exhortations to "hold fast the form of sound words" and to "contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints."
There has come to be prevalent among us an inveterate prejudice against dogmatic teaching, amounting even to a horror of pressing doctrinal truth upon the young ; as if there were no dogmatism, no sectarianism in science, in philosophy, in politics, in socialism, in rationalism ; no dog- matism on the part of those who would proscribe dogmatism altogether, or who, allowino: it in the reiiion of the material world, would forbid it in the spiritual, in which alone we have an infallible guide ; as if the spirit of the age and the periodical press, with its crude conclusions on every sub- ject, condemning all dogmatism but its own, were not the loudest of dogmatists. It is an age of latitude of opinion, of dislike to tests and restraints, and all that favours fixedness of view and settledness of principle.
Accordingly, it is not beyond the truth to sa}^ that, in some of these last-named spheres, a man may profess one thing to-day, and almost the very opposite to-morrow. No one is shocked, because every one understands that the utterance both of the one and the other is unreal, both alike insincerely assumed for party or time-serving purposes, or for the very pleasure of startling the unthinking. Un-
Fundamental Truths of the Gospel. 6i
fortunately the demoralizing effect of this swimming with the current reacts in a region where faith and loyalty to the truth should reign supreme, unaftected by every passing breeze or current.
Now, while the soul cannot live, and society cannot sub- sist on negations, it is equally true that error can never either sanctify or save. Where there is no anchorage for the storm-tossed spirit, it can have no rest within itself. Yet, in forgetfulness of this, we allow any amount of pro- fession, but not of conviction ; and zeal, the fire of the soul, is cant, bad form. We tolerate everything but what is earnest, and we expend our encomiums on the affecta- tion, not the reality, of sincerity, for we are sincere neither to others nor to ourselves. No doubt there is the enthusi- asm of youth, but we get over it early, and fall into the common error of accepting what looks well, rather than wears well, and which we can put off when we tire of it. In the humbler classes, and among a certain order of re- ligionists, enthusiasm enough is also sometimes to be found ; but where there is zeal without knowledge, and based upon no abiding principle, there is no guarantee for stability, and it is impossible to predict into what vagaries of sentiment and action these sectaries may not be led.
In our dread of false appearances of goodness we have assuredly run into the opposite extreme, and have put on a pretence of coldness and cynicism, lest the falsit}'" of our semblance of piety be exposed. It is hard to say how much this, how much indifference, contribute each their part as parents to that form of unbelief, which, with a profession of modesty in sacred things, yet claims to be a very science, a religion, under the seductive name of Agnosticism. It is only Materialism under a more specious guise, a rejection of tliat loving Father Who has been pleased to reveal Himself in and to the child which He has formed in His own likeness ; and it is, therefore, the supreme step to the degradation of our nature.
The Church of every age will always, so far, reflect the
62 The Present Call to Witness for the
reigning spirit of its time. Its recognised teachers come of the people ; are, more or less, in sympathy with the exist- ing tone of the schools through which they pass ; and while they, of course, greatly regulate and shape the faith of their flocks, it is not less true, on the other hand, that, like as the character of any period, such like is the man whom the Church puts forth and accepts as its instructor and guide. As a rule, then, the clergy and people of any age and country will be found to think the same thoughts, cherish the same beliefs, and equally fall into prevailing errors.
Thus, if we find in many of tlie hearers of the present day an impatience of sound doctrine ; a revolt from the perhaps over-minute subtleties of a Puritanic theology ; a spurious liberality, and a toleration of everything but the truth ; the same features will be sure to characterize the teaching of the pulpit. If we find, on the part of the one, that articles of faith which were dear to their fathers are now in a measure set light b}' ; that a critical, sceptical spirit is early developed among the more highly educated ; that secularism is fast forcing its way alike into our elementary and our secondary schools, and insisting on the exclusion of the science of revealed religion from the very universities which were expressly founded for its study ; that the same spirit has infected the Church, where the teaching of Christian truth is pronounced dull and dry, and sermons unpalatable which are not spiced with modern ideas, and served up with hashed bits of science, and art, and socialism, and decked with all the art of the sensa- tionalist, to stimulate the cloyed appetite ; it cannot be denied that some among the clergy not only minister to, but are themselves not a little responsible for, such a per- verted taste and craving.
Among other tendencies of modern times is a strongly- marked hostility to the supernatural in every form. Such appeared generations ago in the departure from the strongly- expressed views of the Fathers of the Reformation on the subject of the Church, the Christian ministry, and, above
Fundamental Truths of the Gospel. 63
all, the Holy Sacraments. To the emphatic witness to Scriptural truth on these momentous topics contained in our Standards, the Church in Scotland, as a whole, has never again returned. A fatal example of the same pernicious tendency has once again appeared in a looseness of view not only as respects Revelation and Miracle, but very specially on the crucial subject of the Divinity of our blessed Lord. I make no specific charge against any of my brethren of unfaithfulness to this distinctive mark of a living Church ; but traces of it may certainly be found in the writings of accredited teachers in various bodies through the country ; and on the part of others, a sailing as close to the wind as they safely may. This has, naturally, greatly shocked and grieved those in the ministry, and the devout, but simple- minded, among the laity who value such a doctrine as they do the breath of life, with whom the older types of belief fondly linger. It has in many cases seriously unhinged the faith of some who were disposed to plead for new forms in which to express the primitive and Catholic faith, and has encouraged a vagueness only too attractive to persons of unexact habits of thought and belief, by its air of breadth and liberality, at the cost of all that is most precious in our Christian hope and heritage. And, apart from the per- nicious effects of such unfaithfulness, how can we charac- terize the conduct of those who profess their adherence to the Church's Standards — who fill her offices as watchmen, and eat her bread, yet in their teaching depart from and undermine that faith, if they do not indeed sneer at some of its articles ; or of another class who will contend for instruction in the Shorter Catechism in our schools, and make adherence to its doctrine an obligation which they impose upon parents in their Baptismal service, without having themselves apprehended its profound truth ; for, indeed, in how few of our pulpits is the entirely Scriptural teaching of that Catechism on the subject of this very Sacrament and of the Holy Eucharist fully recognised and expounded !
64 Fundamental Truths of the Gospel.
In conclusion, considering the manifold sources and quar- ters from which these dangers spring, as well as their diversified forms and temptations, it well becomes those who are set for the defence of the truth, — for the love of it, of their Lord, and their brethren, — and certainly in no vain- glorious and self-satisfied spirit, to bear an undivided and undeviating testimony to the great verities of the faith. To utter upon these an uncertain sound would be on the part of the Church in this our day an unpardonable treachery. For they are doctrines which do not grow old with the years, nor does the world, with all its enlighten- ment, stand less in need of them than ever before. They are spiritual facts, not matters of opinion, nor passing phases or phenomena in the development of our common humanity ; but the abiding, deep-laid principles of an order, and of a faith which are both alike — for the Church is " the Pillar and Ground of the Truth " — in very deed built upon the Foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, and Jesus Christ Himself the chief corner stone.
THE CHURCH'S CALL TO STUDY SOCIAL QUESTIONS.
Rev. Professor Flint, D.D.
The call of the Church to study social questions is not a new one, except so far in form. In substance it is as old as the Church itself. The teaching of Christ and of the Apostles was the setting forth of a Gospel intimately related to the society in which it appeared, and vitally affecting the whole future of the society which was to be. The Church may find in the study of the New Testament the same sort of guidance for its social activity as an individual minister may find in it for the right performance of his pulpit or pastoral duty.
Just as in the New Testament there are the all-compre- hensive and inexhaustibly fruitful germs of a perfect doctrine of the ministry of the word, and of the pastoral care, so are there of a perfect doctrine of the social mission of the Church. Indeed, the Sermon on the Mount alone contains far more of light fitted to dispel social darkness, and far more of the saving virtue which society needs, than any individual mind can ever fully apprehend, or than the Church universal has yet apprehended.
If the call of which I have to speak were not thus old as well as new ; if it were not a call inherent in the very nature of the Gospel, and implied in the very end of the existence of a Church on earth ; if it summoned the min- isters of the Word away from the work which Christ had assigned to them ; if it required them to discard their divinely-inspired text-book, it could hardly be a true one,
E 65
66 The ChiircJis Call to Study Social Qttesiions.
and ministers might well doubt if it could be incumbent on them to listen to it. But it is no such call. For, althoush it be one which summons us to reflect on what is required of us in the circumstances of the present hour, — one which is repeated to us by God's providence daily in events happening around us and pressing themselves on our attention, — it is also one which comes down to us through the ages from Him who lived and suffered and died in Palestine centuries ago, in order that, as God was in Him, and He in God, all men might be one in Him.
The call is so distinct that the Church has never been entirely deaf to it. Originating as it did in the love of Christ to mankind, it necessarily brought with it into the world a new ideal of social duty ; and it has never ceased to endeavour, more or less faithfully, to relieve the misery and to redress the wrongs under which it found society suffering. In the early Christian centuries, in the time of the fall of the Roman Empire and the formation of the mediaeval world, in the so-called "ages of faith," and the epoch of the foundation of modern states, and in all periods since, the Church has had a social mission varying with the characteristics and wants of each time, and may fairly claim to have largely contributed to the solutions which the social problems of the times received. And a zeal guided by prudence, a wise activity in the social sphere, has never done the Church anything but good. When the Church has kept itself to itself, when it has shut itself up in its own theolo- gical schools, divided itself into sects mainly interested in opposing one another, and confined its work within congre- gational and parochial limits ; in a word, when it has culti- vated an exclusive and narrow spirit, then it has been proportionately unfaithful, disputatious, and barren ; its theology has been lifeless and unprogressive, its ministry of the word sapless and ineffective, and the types of piety and of character which it has produced poor and unattractive. In the measure in which the Church is a power for good on earth will it prove a power which draws men to heaven.
The call of the Church to study social questions has its
The Churclis Call to Study Social Questions. 67
chief ground or reason in this, that the influence of the Church, if brought rightly and fully to bear on society must be incalculably beneficial to it. There is no power in the world which can do so much for society as the Church, if pure, united and zealous, if animated with the mind of Christ, and endowed with the graces of the Spirit.
The State can, of course, do for society what the Church cannot do, and has no right even to try to do ; but it cannot do for society more than, or even as much as, the Church may do, and should do. The power of the State, just because the more external and superficial, may seem the greater, but is really the lesser. Spiritual force is mightier than material force. Rule over the affections of the heart is far more decisive and wide-reachinfj than rule over the actions of the body.
The Church, if it does not destroy its own influence by unreasonableness, selfishness, contentiousness, departure from the truth as it is in Christ, and conformity to the world, will naturally, and in the long run inevitably, rule society and rule the State ; and that for the simple reason that it ought to rule them, — ought to bring them into subjection to those principles of religion and of morality on which their life and welfare are dependent.
Of course, if the Church be untrue to itself, unfaithful to its Lord, it will do harm in society just in proportion to the good which it might and ought to do. The corruption of the best is the worst.
In the truths which it was instituted to inculcate, the Church has inexhaustible resources for the benefiting of society, which ought to be wisely and devotedly used.
Was it not instituted, for example, to spread through society the conviction that the supreme ruler of society is God over all ; that the Prince of the kings of the earth is the Lord Christ Jesus ; that the perfect law of God as revealed in Christ ought to underlie all the laws which monarchs and parliaments make ; and that whatever law contradicts His law is one to be got rid of as soon as pos- sible, and brought into consistency with His eternal statutes,
68 The CJmrcJis Call to Study Social Questions.
Well, what other real security has society for its freedom than just that conviction ? What other sure defence against the tyranny of kings or parliaments, of majorities or mobs ? I know of none. The only way for a people to be free is to have a firm faith in God's sovereignty, in Christ's Headship, over the nations ; a firm faith that in all things it is right to obey God rather than man ; that the true and supreme law of a people cannot be the will of a man, or of a body of men, or of the majority of men, or of those who ha,ppen for the time to have physical force on their side, but only the will of God, the law at once of righteousness and of liberty.
The God in whom the Christian Church believes, more- over, is not only God over all, but God the Father of all ; God who loves all with an equal and impartial love, and whose love, in seeking the love of all men and the good of all men, seeks also that they should love one another and promote each other's good. The Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of men are truths which the Church is bound to endeavour fully to impress on the mind and heart of society ; and obviously the welfare of society depends on the success with which this is effected.
Further, the Church has been instituted to commend to the consciences of mankind the claims of a moral law, com- prehensive and perfect so far as its principles are concerned ; a law which does justice to the rights and requirements both of the individual and of society, and therefore is free from the faults alike of individualism and of socialism ; one which lays the foundations of a rightly constituted family life and of just and beneficent government ; and which overlooks not even the least of those virtues on which the economic wel- fare of a community and of its members so much depends. And to give life and force to the injunctions of this law, so that they may be no mere verbal precepts, but full of divine fire and efficacy, they are connected witli the greatest and most impressive facts, — the mercies of God, the work and example of Christ, and the aid and indwelling of the Holy Spirit.
The CluLrcJts Call to Study Social Questions. 69
Does the Church commend this law in all its breadth, and by all the motives which enforce it, as wisely, earnestly, and effectively as it might ? I fear not altogether; and yet there is great need that it should ; for, if not, there is no other body, no other society, that will. Take even those humble yet most essential virtues, to which I have just referred under the name of economic — those personal quali- ties which make a man's labour more valuable both to himself and others than it would otherwise be, and which further en- sure that whatever his wages may be they will not be foolishly or unworthily spent. Are they not apt to be overlooked in our teaching, although they were certainly not overlooked in that of the Apostles ? Yet who Avill do them justice if ministers of the Gospel do not ? Do you suppose it will be Socialist orators like those in Hyde Park or Glasgow Green, or gentlemen in quest of workmen's votes to help them into Parliament, or otherwise to raise them to promi- nence and power ? I trow not ; they will willingly leave that task to you ; and I think you had better do it, and as lovingly yet as faithfully as you can. Political economists, indeed, may show, and have abundantly shown, the econo- mic importance of the virtues referred to both as regards individuals and societies ; but that, although all that political economists can relevantly do, is not enough ; while Christian ministers can bring to the enforcement even of these virtues far higher and more effective considerations.
I hasten to add that the Church of Christ has been set up to show forth to mankind a kingdom of God which is both in heaven and in earth. Among multitudes of Socialists there is a quite special hatred against faith in a heavenly kingdom. It is the opium, they say, by which the peoples have been cast into sleep, and prevented from asserting and taking possession of their rights. Exclaims one of them — " When a heaven hereafter is recognised as a big lie, men will attempt to establish heaven here." Thousands of them have uttered the same thought in other words. O strange and sad delusion. If a heaven hereafter be a big lie, what
JO The ClmrcJis Call to Study Social Questions.
reason can we have to expect that there will ever be a heaven here. A merely earthly paradise can only be a fool's paradise. Earth is all covered with darkness when not seen in the light of a heaven above it. The preachers of past days, perhaps, erred by laying almost exclusive stress on the kingdom of God in heaven. The pi'eachers of the pre- sent day may err by laying too exclusive stress on the coming of the kingdom of God on earth, and so leading some to believe that the secularist Socialists may be right, and that there may be no other heaven than one which men can make for themselves here.
The great and continuous call of the Church to study social questions arises from her having been entrusted with such powers to act on society, to regenerate and reform, to quicken and elevate society, as I have now indicated. The right application of them is essential to the w^elfare of society ; but such application of them supposes the most patient and careful and prayerful study, the most intimate and living acquaintance with the Gospel on the one hand, and the most thorough insight into the requirements of .society on the other, and, in a high degree, the knowledge and the prudence which inform a man when and what to j^peak, how to say just enough and to refrain from adding what will weaken or wholly destroy its effect. Bishop Westcott's " Social Aspects of Christianity," and Dr Donald Macleod's " Christ and Society," are greatly more valuable than they would have been if their authors had shown a less exquisite sense of knowing always where to stop ; and such a sense, only attainable in due measure by assiduous thoughtfulness, is probably even more necessary in addressing congregations composed of the poor and labouring classes than those which meet in Westminster Abbey or the Park Church.
While there has always been a call on the Church to study social questions, there is likewise, however, a special call on the Church of the present day to do so. For, indu- bitably,'all over Christendom there is a vast amount of L
The Chttrch's Call to Study Social Qtiestions. 7 1
social unrest and discontent. The conflict between labour and capital is one of chronic war, of violent and passionate struggles, which too often produce widespread waste and misery. And closely connected with it is a vast irreligious and revolutionary movement, which sees in Christianity its bitterest foe, and aims at destroying it along with social order and private property. This irreligious and revolu- tionary movement is to a considerable extent the effect of the conflict between labour and capital, but it is to an even greater extent its cause ; and, if I had time, I think I could show that the deepest question still agitating Europe in the nineteenth century is not the labour question but the religious question : the question, How do men think and feel towards God ?
The matter standing thus, there is a most urgent call on the Church to study how to bring all the powers of the Gospel to bear against whatever is wrong in society, and on the stimulation and strengthening of all that is good in it. There can be no doubt that the Church should do more than she is doing for the solution of social and labour questions than at present, in the sense that she ought to do her duty better, present the Gospel with greater fulness and power, push on her Home Mission work with increased zeal, strive more earnestly to diffuse among all classes the spirit of Christian love and brotherhood, of righteousness and peace, and exemplify in herself more perfectly the beauty of that spirit.
Whether or not the Church ought directly to intervene more than she does in attempting to solve labour and other social questions is itself a question not to be lightly answered. I do not say that she ought not, but certainly she ought not to do so in any such way or to any such extent as will take her out of her own sphere, that of her Divine strength. Nor ought either a Church, or even a minister of the Church, ever interfere in social or labour disputes in a partisan spirit or manner, for all reasonable hope of their doing good must be lost if their impartiality be not perfectly visible.
72 The Church's Call to Shidy Social Questions.
There has been at least one great strike in Scotland where the intervention of clergymeo was little to edification and wholly without effect. It should serve as a warning.
Before a minister interferes in such cases, he ought, I think, to examine himself as to whether or not he has these three qualifications : first, a correct and full knowledge of the facts on which the dispute turns, and not merely a partial and inaccurate conception of them founded on hear- say and untested ix parte statements ; second, a sufficient acquaintance -with economic science to enable him to interpret aright these economic facts ; and third, reason to believe that he knows enough about the disputing parties, and is held in such esteem by them, as not to be in danger of doing more harm than good by attempting to mediate between them. But, perhaps, if he really possess these qualifications both parties may ask his aid, in which case he will be in a much better position than if he had offered it.
I do not think that any of our Churches are uninterested in the social questions at present disputed among us. They are all, I have no doubt, anxious to see those questions so settled that there may be more comfort and contentment throughout the land, and to aid towards the attainment of that end so far as they can. The Church of Scotland has in many ways shown her solicitude for the welfare of the poor, the peasantry, the labourers of Scotland. The Presbytery of Glasgow has been honourably conspicuous by the anxiety which it has shown for the improvement of the conditions in which so many live in this city.
Thoughtfulness need not lessen or counteract zeal ; it should accompany, enlighten, and assist zeal. If there be an urgent and strong call that the Church in present circumstances should endeavour to act, with all the power with which God has endowed her, for the purification and salvation of society, there must be a correspondingly urgent and strong call for her to studi/ how she may most Jitllf/ and effectively do so.
THE DIVINE ORDER OF CHURCH FINANCE AND OTHER SYSTEMS.
Rev. Thomas Leishman, D.D.
The New Testament teaches us very little about making provision for the ordinances of the Church. There is no more than our Lord's words when He is sending forth His disciples with empty purses to preach the coming of the kingdom, and a very few sayings of St Paul, such as : " If we have sown unto you spiritual things, is it a great thing if we shall reap your carnal things ? " (1 Cor. ix. 11). And even he, though asserting the principle, waives his own claim under it, preferring to support himself by the handi- craft which he had learned in youth. Why is it that the Scripture, while assuming that this duty rests on the followers of Christ, says so little to enforce it ? Because the first believers had lived from youth in the full know- ledge of it. They were children of the pre-in carnation Church. The new faith was to the old as the flower is to the bud. Higher truths were unfolded. But there was no reversal of the old morality, nor even at first of the old ordinances. The prolonged disputes about circumcision show how unready they were to part with divine usages till they saw clear reason. Now the principle of tithe-giving was one so bound up with the system of their religion, so familiar to their experience, that the lesson of providing for holy ordinances was one in which they needed no instruction. There is, however, one passage in which St Paul deduces the Christian duty from the Hebrew institution. " Do ye not know that they which minister about holy things live
74 The Divine Order of CImrch Finauee
of the things of the temple I And they which wait at the altar are partakers with the altar ? Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach the Gospel should live of the Gospel" (1 Cor. ix. ll). In speaking of the measure and end of the ordinance of tithe, we must remember that the analogy covers more than the present subject of con- ference. Tithe included not only the Levite's tenth, but at least as much more to be devoted to the festivals and to the poor. In the first Christian centuries, there could not be the same regulated provision of tithe as in the Holy Land, v/here the chosen people were identical with the community. In the great heathen world the Christians were lost to sight, or noticed only to be evil entreated and cast out. But when the empire became Christian, and the faith was once more a prevalent and hereditary belief, the twofold obligation for which tithe had been instituted was acknow- leged by the new servants of the God of Israel. The Church took under her care both the bodies and souls of men, relieving the needy, ministering the Gospel to the lost. Amid all the darkness and corruption of the Middle Ages, she faithfully remembered the poor as those of whom Jesus said, " Inasmuch as ye did it to one of the least of these my brethren, ye did it unto Me" (St Matt. xxv. 40). The Church Reformed never forgot the duty, though grievously crippled in the performance of it by the greed of mercenary allies. Under increasing difficulties, no Church strove more faithfully to be helpful to the poor than our own. There are those still with us who can remember how in this city Dr Chalmers sought to repair the old framework of charity. But selfishness in the individual, and schism in the Church, were too strong for him, and he lived to see it displaced by a Parliamentary tax, grudgingly paid, thanklessly received, blessing neither him who gives nor him who takes. Fan- tastic theories, that are shaking the fabric of society, owe perhaps not a little of their popularity to the disuse of alms- giving which was Christian in its source as well as national in its operation.
But the subject on which we have to confer to-day is the
and other Systems. 75
duty of giving to the church in its corporate capacity. We are familiar with two forms in which provision is made for the ministration of holy ordinances. There are the yearly fruits of what in former generations was devoted to the perpetual service of God. There are the free offerings dedicated by His people from day to day for His present service. There is another source of revenue, but it is hardly worthy of being classed with these. I mean the hiring by private bargain, and for fixed periods, seats for the personal comfort of the worshipper while he is engaged in his religious duties. Obviously this is primarily an offering to self not to God, and at best, the ultimate destination of the funds so accruing does not extend beyond the building from which they are derived. The duty of providing Christ's ordinances in a world which He came to save has to do with far more than the income of an individual minister from whatever source it comes. When we take this broad view of the duty, two questions suggest themselves. What ought to be the measure of our giving, and, that being deter- mined, how should it be apportioned ?
As to the measure of our gifts, it seems to be thought by many that we are left absolutely to our own discretion ; in other words, that the minimum is anything above nothing. But in the light of Scripture can we assume that the Chris- tian least may fall below the Jewish ? It may be pleaded that part of the liberty wherewith Christ hath made His people free is that tliey are delivered from the rigid exacti- tude of Judaism. In another branch of duty we have been content to adopt precisely the Jewish measure of sacrifice. We consecrate to God a seventh of our time ; is it too much to devote to him a smaller proportion of our means ? It can be said of tithe, as indeed of the other, that it is an ordinance older than the Levitical law. Jacob at Bethel said, " Of all that Thou shalt give me, I will surely give the tenth unto Thee," and Abraham gave tithes of all to Mel- chizedek, " priest of the most high God." This is not a case in which we can argue that the spirit of a law is more than the letter, for the result would be to make the spirit
"j^ The Divine Order of Church Finance
narrower and more selfish, instead of loftier and more free. If a difference is to be made, the beneficence of a Christian ought to rise to a higher level than that of the Jew. Our religion is more pervaded than theirs with the spirit of self- denial and love. Its mission is wider. It has not only to maintain the truth in one narrow land, but to spread it throughout the earth. And if, nineteen centuries after the Incarnation, it has not possessed the world for Christ, is not this one chief cause, tiiat the Church has not taken note of the apostolic warning, " he which soweth sparingly, shall reap also sparingly." If Jesus Himself said little on this very duty, we have at least His Avords regarding the kindred obligation of giving to the poor. No rebuke, but a word of blessing, came to the publican who urged, " the half of my goods I give unto the poor." And when He applied the law at its strictest to test the weak point of a soul that He loved. He said, " sell all that thou hast, and distribute unto the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven, and come, follow Me." As regards the other duty, the rule which the Christian prescribes to himself ought at least to equal in its measure of self-sacrifice the lowest rate accepted by the Jewish law. And yet many a Christian who insists on being a law to himself thinks that he hiis come to the limit of reasonable liberality as soon as he begins to feel the pinch of self-denial. If he passes those confines, it is not for His sake, " Who became poor that Ave through His poverty might be rich," but that he may rid himself of some im- portunate pleader, or not appear to have less to give than some rival in the battle of life. It may be said with justice, that there cannot be one rule, one measure for all. There may be taken into account most fairly such considera- tions as the number of a man's dependants, the unavoidable demands of his position, habits of early life which to one person have become a second nature, while they would be a burden on another to whom unaccustomed prosperity has come. There is abundant room for such reckonin^js amonjj the nine-tenths that remain after one has been set apart for
and othey Systems. 77
God. One man's tenth is as much from him as another's fifth. But we must think not only of those who have abundant means, but of the poor. Can we expect them to regulate their givings by this half-forgotten Jewish scale ? Sometimes their defence against such claims is undertaken by those who have not habitually much regard for the poor, and who, it is to be feared, take up their case as the strongest point against a general principle which they do not wish to have pressed on themselves. But whoever pats it, the question is one that must not be evaded. Christ is no hard master to any. He who knew not wliere to lay His head well knows the case of tlie poor, and has a dispensa- tion ready for those who have enough for existence, but nothing to spare. " If there be first a Avilling mind, it is accepted according to that a man hath and not according to that he hath not." But as to the poor, never is their Master's pleasure in them greater, or His blessing on them fuller, than when " their deep poverty aboundetli unto the riches of their liberality." Remember the two widows
whose memory is embalmed in the pages of Holy Writ her
of Zarephath, ready to share her last meal with a stranger, and her of Jerusalem, giving her last farthing for the worship of God. For warning, there is the case of him who, because he hid his single talent, as too mean a trust to be used for his Lord, heard the words, " from him that hath not, even that he hath shall be taken away from him." But in truth the poor are not the class who most need to be reminded of this duty. All who are familiar with their ways know that their generosity constantly puts to shame those who have a wider margin for self-denial. No doubt their ready sympathy is often abused, and their hard-won earnings made the prey of the unworthy. Then on the one part at least the blessing does not fail, of which Jesus spoke when He said, "It is more blessed to give than to receive." But there are among them not a few who spend so lavishly on things that bring no blessing, that they cannot claim exemption from the duty of giving to God.
78 The Divine Order of C/unr/i Finance
There are those of one sex who waste on drink, of the other on dress, a proportion of their gains far in excess of the Hebrew tenth. Out of wliat is thus cast away, what pro- vision might be made for the necessities of later life, or for seizing any opportunity that offered of rising in the world, while yet they were living day by day in the spirit of the Saviour's counsel, " Take no thought, saying, what shall we eat ? or what shall we drink ? or wherewithal shall we be clothed ? . . . But seek ye first the kingdom of God." When persons who have been accustomed to give without system in response to appeals from acquaintances or irre- gular impulses of their own, are led to set aside a defined sum for the service of God, they usually make the discovery that they had been giving much less than they supposed. In thinking of the many claims upon them, they had not been accustomed to separate the claims disallowed from those that were met. Finding now a larger surplus on their hands than they had expected, they search out for themselves objects to which it may be applied. As the habit of enquiring and sifting grows, their giving becomes more judicious, their own hearts more generous, more tolerant of weakness, more pitiful of sin ; iu a word, more like to Him whose almoners they are. 1 have been assum- inof that the Christian ought to devote at least as much as the Jew with a narrower mission and less precious privileges offered for the direct service of God. We do not realize how far we fall short of our elder brethren in the faith. Some years ago our highest statistical authority estimated the national income at twelve hundred millions. If we assign a tenth part of that to Scotland, her tithe would be twelve millions. Reckoning one half of this as the tribute due by the National Church, it appears that she is not giving a tithe of her tithe. Her Christian Liberality, as she fondly calls it, if repeated thirteen times, would not come up to Jewish liberality, calculated on the lowest scale allowed by God.
The Christian having ilctermined what he ought to offer
and other Systems. 79
for the upholding and extension of his Master's Kingdom, has to solve a further question : how it is to be allocated. With many the supreme authority on this point is a pro- verb believed by them to be Scriptural, if we judge from the unction with which it is quoted. " Charity," they say, " begins at home." Whoever the author was, it was not Solomon. It were better to recall other words, and think from whose lips they came, " If ye love them that love you, what thank have ye ? " Charity in the popular sense of beneficence has no work within the home. Outside it, the adage ought to run, "The nearer the home, the less the charity." The home has its special and rightful claims upon us as has the neighbourhood, the fatherland, the Christian brotherhood. Of these widening circles, self is the common centre. As our sympathies stretch forth into each successively, personal interest wanes, but charity waxes. Outside all lies the great family of humanity, the common fall its heritage, the common redemption its hope. All these claims must be acknowledged in just proportion, if we would be like Him whose almost latest word on the cross was of His mother, who wept when, for the last time, He came in sight of the doomed city of His people, and yet, devoted son and true patriot as He was, gave Himself to die for all. Earlier in His life, one asked of Him, " who is my neighbour," expecting perhaps an ansAver in the spirit of that favourite proverb of the selfish, and had for answer the parable of the Good Samaritan. Think what might have been our state had missionaries, leaving the Mediterranean shores for the savage regions of North-Western Europe, heard and acted on some Latin version of "charity begins at home." So far as means allow and opportunity offers, we ought to do what we can alike for those who are near and for those who are afar off. That stock character of the satirist, the person who neglects home duties in the interest of the distant savage, is infinitely less common in real life than the opposite type of one-sided zeal, whose sympathies are confined to his own consregation. In such minds the
So /Vie Divine Order of CIntrch Finance.
boundaries of generosity and selfishness become strangely confused. Some seem to suppose that so much is being withheld from sessional funds when large and frequent oft'erings are made in God's house for strangers and foreigners that they may become fellow-citizens with the saints. Gatherings for local objects and for remote, act and react upon each other for good or for evil as they are stimulated or neglected. " There is that scattereth, and yet increase th ; and there is that withholdeth more than is meet, but it tendeth to poverty." A flock, protected by its office-bearers from contributions whose destination is too distant to promise any reflex benefit to the donors, is not unlikely to improve upon the lesson, and grow sparing at home. Much, too, of what is given for congregational jDurposes has self-gratification for the motive power quite as much as self-sacrifice. Not that the graces of architecture or the melody of sweet sounds need be undervalued as aids to the worship of God. That the purpose in consecrating them may be lofty, and the tribute acceptable, no one will question who thinks of the alabaster box of spikenard. But considering the danger that lurks in the relation of these things to self, it were well that they should not have the first place on the roll of a Christian's gifts. In disciplin- ing ourselves in this duty, nothing is more helpful for the elevation of motive than to give largely for the use of that vast section of the human family who have not heard of the divine Brother and the heavenly home, and who will never see in the flesh the distant kindred whose prayers and alms for them have come up as a memorial before God.
THE DIVINE ORDER OF CHURCH FINANCE AND OTHER SYSTEMS.
Rev. M. p. Johnstone, B.D.
Church finance must be governed by the same principles- as any other outcome of the Divine life. That life must be homogeneous and uniform, or its condition cannot be one of perfect health. It must express itself naturally, proportionately and harmoniously. For excess in one direction necessitates, with a finite being, defect in another.
This principle is contradicted by the practice of a Church which strains the open-handed, and fails with the niggardly elements of which it is composed. Consciousness of re- sponsibility is not only not diffused throughout the whole community, but is violated at either end of the scale of liberality. The unwilling gift is as distasteful to God as the gift withheld. There is an evident absence of that cohesiveness and solidarity which belongs to real unity — a unity, that is to say, which necessarily brings with it an esprit die corps. The present-day condition of most Churches testifies — so far as so chaotic a state of things can be articulate — to the absence of Church-Self-Con- sciousness.
This presents a problem less easy to deal with than the condition of a Church which makes a uniform and harmonious reply to the responsibilities of its existence. "I would thou wert either cold or hot," was the address of our Lord to lukewarm Laodicea. A sham spiritual tepidity is often more hopeless than devotional frost.
If this principle be a true one, it is the bed-rock on which every system of almsgiving must be built. All
F ''
82 The Divine Order of Church Finance
Church hfe must be ruled by it, if it be true at all ; every department of Church activity, no matter how different each may be from the rest. A sense of responsibility must be present in every individual of whom the body is composed. " Neither much nor little " is the apostolic dictum, but each man according to his ability. His Church giving must be proportioned to his Church strength. Individuals, and sometimes even communions, may run themselves out of breath, so to speak, in this phase of Church work, to the detriment of symmetry as a whole. The body is compacted not by that which a single, but every joint supplieth according to the effectual working in the measure of every part.
The same lesson is enforced by the non-acceptability before God of a reluctant gift, that is, beyond the Church strength of the giver. The gift must have the same relation, our Lord says, to the giver, as the fruit has to the tree. This is a life relationship, and it is impossible to make the fruit good by any other process than by making the tree good. This is merely another way of saying that Church beneficence must be in the highest sense instinctive and natural.
Church authorities, generally, do not regard this. The widow's mite has only a conventional, formal, unreal value. Absolute magnitude in the size of gifts overshadows every other feature in almsgiving. As much money as possible, no matter how unwillingly. The idea of a lurking grudge created in the reluctant giver's mind, and the consequent <listaste engendered for Church work, never occurs. The lopsided character which, well able to contribute, acquires a facility for compounding thereby for spiritual felony is contemplated with easy and good-humoured tolerance. And who shall say how many of our Missionary catastrophes have resulted from the adulteration of the stream of free- will offerings by the large admixture of liberality which has no real relation to the Christian stature of character behind it.
a7id other Systems. 83
It cannot, therefore, be by a forcing hot-house process that true Church finance can be fostered and regulated, nor by any system of organization which does a fraction more than remove artificial and superficial obstructions. There can be no spiritual increase from Church liberality, isolated and disconnected from a corresponding Church vitality. The first movement of animal life is, by a system of reticu- lated arteries and veins, to organize itself Vitalizing is more important than organizing. Too complicated a machinery may prove an oppressive load to a feeble life, and organization may actually extinguish and stifle a flickering vitality, just as a savage community often receives a curse instead of a blessing from civilization, because it has power to assimilate only its baser elements. Church financiers must recognize facts and forbear to legislate for a state of things beyond the Church's present spiritual strength. Another course indeed may be followed by commercial or even a lower ecclesiastical success. But it is utterly inconceivable that money as such can have any spiritual offspring. It is the good man who is rich toward God. It would be monstrous, unnatural, and appalling if we were ever to see the world converted by a wealthy, worldly Church. Like produces like. Mere money, with no devotion behind it as its impelling motive power, accomplishes no result on the plane of celestial things. " That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit."
If our Lord is to do mighty w^orks on the supernatural level of His unworldly Kingdom either by a Church or by a saint, it cannot be merely by a complicated mechanism or a perfected system as a system. The bitter, desert waters of ecclesiastical activity must be sweetened by the branch of spiritual consecration before they can quench the thirst of a people elect, beloved ; before the waning life of a holy nation can be so replenished that the arduous pilgrimage becomes a triumphal progress. Neither men nor Churches are mere machines. And the spasmodic liberality evoked
84 The Divine Order of Church Finance.
by the galvanic battery of schedule, card, and special effort will not be replaced by the steady, natural and spontaneous offering until the clattering activity of Martha ceases to register the highest Avater-mark on the shore of the Church's work. That offering which perfumes the whole house with the odour of its ointment emerges from the life of con- templative devotion, and the more excellent way of working begins, continues, ends by sitting at the feet of Jesus to hear His Word, It must be by an increase of spiritual temperature throughout the whole body pneumatical that the Divine order of Church finance will be realized. This is the heavenly inheritance and the jvus divinum of the household of faith. Primarily, this function is in higher than human hands, " Not by might nor by power but by My Spirit." Secondarily, it belongs to human piety to study how to increase the receptiveness of the Divine gift both corporately and individually. The apostle of Church finance is perhaps more apt than the minister of other modes and departments of the Divine vigour to suffer the eye of trustfulness to wander from the Incarnate Vision among the waves of commercial anxiety and the breakers of " low thoughted care." When this happens to man or Church, the law of spiritual gravitation, neutralized and suspended by the energy of a higher life, ever begins to re- assert itself. First principles must be re-discovered, and salvation recoojnized as beloncrins: to the Lord.
THE OBSERVANCE, IN ITS MAIN FEATURES, OF THE CHRISTIAN YEAR.
Rev. E. L. Thompson, D.J).
You will not expect me (with the limited time at my disposal) to enter into the Jewish origin of the Christian year. For just as the great Apostolic Liturgy had its Jewish origin and its early foreshadowings in the Christianised prayers of the Temple Ritual, of the Service of the Synagogue, and of the Domestic Rites related to the sacrifice of the Paschal Lamb, so we might trace the origin of a yearly celebration of Festivals in the Christian Church to those of the Jewish year. The fact of the earlier observance would influence the new worship, and the growth out of the particular institutions of the ancient Church of some very important ones of the early Church is obvious. The Lord's Day, the Day of the Resurrection, did not spring out of the weekly Sabbath of the Jew. There is not one word in the New Testament which shows even indirectly the substitution of the one for the other, or which bases the observance and worship of the first day of the week on the Jewish observance and worship of the Sabbath. The Jewish converts observed both days. The Gentile converts observed only the Lord's Day. In all our studies in the history of the sub-apostolic church, and later to the Council of Nicea, we see how with one voice the Fathers and Early Councils declare against the observance of the Jewish Sabbath, i.e., against the Judaizing influence that would insist on the Christian observance of it as binding on the Church. You know of the ultimate supersession of it by the Lord's Day when the latter held its ground as the first Day of the Creation, the Day of Christ's Resurrection, and
85
86 The Observance, in its Main Features,
of the Descent of the Holy Ghost, though the valuable moral and Divine feature of periodical Rest from work indicated in Paradise and in the Decalogue was amply considered and recognised, and passed rightly into the Christian Institution. But certainly Good Friday sprang from the Day of the Passover, certainly Whitsunday sprang from the Day of Pentecost. One might not unprofitably trace the development of the Memorial Principle in worship with its roots in Divine authority, Apostolic appointment or sanction, and even in human nature. What about national days and local days of ancient Burghs, and days of festival for great heroes, great patriots, and great poets ? Why, then, such shrieks against the days of the Ecclesiastical Year ? Human nature is on our side, and that in the long run will help us to establish our position.
But the Early Church, and the Mediaeval Church even more so, proceeded to work out the development of this Memorial Principle, and broadly, it may be stated, she went too far. Tlio Christian Year r)iay be a great burden or a great Blessing. For making it a great and almost unbear- able burden, or for converting it into a system that was in danger of becoming, and did often become, a mechanical form and calculation of Hours, Days, and groups of Days, with an infinite series of Piites, vestments. Offices, scraps of Scripture Lessons, and Ptemembrance of Saints in an over-loaded Calen- dar, the Church lost, — ivell, what we have lost. She lost for Scotland the blessing we are now seeking to recover — " the observance in its main features of the Christian Year." I cannot easily forgive the Roman Church for pushing her Ritual to such an excess as to make it so burdensome even to the ministrant that there came from him the pathetic wail for relief which we find expressed in the Preface of the English Prayer-Book and in the Homilies. Look at the burden of the Breviary. Listen to the cry that went to Rome, and learn how the interesting effort, at first success- ful, of Cardinal Quignon for a new Scriptural and really delightful Breviary came to grief For " Rome," like the
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Bourbons, will not learn anything, nor change, even when she cannot deny that the change is right and necessary. Look at the Saram Missal, in pretty general use before the Reformation, and observe the intricacies of the Ritual for the year, the elaborate rules, the multitude of rubrics, the memorials of Apostles, and Saints historical, national, and local, the clashing of the interests of these and how to harmonise the observance of them, the obvious need of immense study of these rubrics and of the adjustment of the Days and Daily Services, requiring an arithmetical faculty, a power of method, a love of (Retail, and a minute attention to form which could hardly escape producing a mechanician in the Public Duties of Religion. Often, very often, there arose and arises an absolute weariness and even detestation of the burden. Who that has watched carefully in Italy, France, and in Spain, the Services in the choir, and scrutinized the Priests, Deacons, acolytes, and choristers engaged, must have sometimes seen obvious and not very pleasant — often very disgusting — signs of the burden. And we need not go on to consider what the effect was and is upon the people of this excessive elabora- tion of the features and associated rites of the Christian Year, and of a Church Calendar crowded as you see it. We simply indicate the dangers of externalism and of a mechanical piety and worship.
I cannot understand how all this could have come about, checked as a good and healthy Memorial Principle ought to have been, by (1) the study of the Prophets of the Old Testament. This study should have showed the value, the delightsomeness, and yet the danger of the Ritual services and Festivals of the old Covenant. The Prophets never cease to point out the superior obligation of righteousness, and to show that mercy, humanity, and obedience are better than any sacrifices. Here, for us and for all time, is an obvious " other side of the question " of Ritual, which every devout man will carefully consider as an element in the balancing
88 The Observance^ in its Main Features^
of the truth as to the observance of Days, Years, Festivals, positive institutions in religion, and their related Ritual. There is a moderation here right wise and beautiful. Really the Roman Church has not shown this moderation, and people naturally say she has given to worship all the burdensome character of the ancient Law ; she has gone back to the rudiments, the " beggarly elements," the childhood of religion. For example, Christ gave a simple prayer to His disciples for the very purpose of devout brevity in approach- ing the awful, yet loving Presence of God. Rome would not have it so. If the prayer be short, then let it be repeated to abolish, as it were, the very brevity our Lord desiderated. Repeated over and over again in the Services or by itself, as a kind of charm, the Paternoster became a mere form, the repetition emptied the Prayer of its interest and reality, and converted it into a burden, so that our forefathers came, alas ! to recoil from it, and gave it up altogether in worship. See what followed ! The removal of this Pillar of the Liturgy from the Services of the Sanctuary has been the cliief instrument in the destruction of our Liturgical worship. The restoration of it is really the restoration of that type of worship. The use of it is the admission that Forms of Prayer are allowable on the highest authority, that of our Lord Himself
(2) I shall not dwell on what may be learned from the Gospels as to the " Limits of Ritual." But observe, our Lord fulfilled all righteousness by submission to the Rites of the Law, by honouring the Festivals of the Church, by His worship in the Temple and Synagogue, yet His silence on these things is significant, and His insistence on spirituality of Avorship — worship in sincerity, and reality, worship in the light of the grand truth of God's Fatherhood — as the essential features of acceptable and universal worship — are on the side of the subordination of Ritual as a means to an end.
(3) A check to the undue developments of the Christian Year might have been obtained from the study of St Paul's position in regard to the Jewish rites and ordinances. His
of the Christian Year. 89
reproach of the Church of Galatia for observing " days and months and times and years " in deference to the Judaizing party, and his demand that the Colossians were not to be compelled to keep the yearly Jewish Festivals are suggestive. He took the broad ground that the Mosaic Ordinances had been adjusted to the future of the Gospel, and that their fulfilment in Christ abrogated the compulsory observance of them. Such a position will justify any fair-minded man in maintainino^, not that Ritual and Ordinances are abro- gated in the Christian Church, but that there are limita- tions to these. They are always to be viewed as a means and never as an end. There is to be a spiritual and devo- tional freedom as well as a fixed form. There is we admit a danger of being driven into a ritualistic bondage from which the Church has escaped through Christ — " a bondage greater than the fathers were able to bear." It was shame- ful of St Cyprian to initiate this driving process and for the Mediaeval Church to increase the bondage.
On the other hand, there is nothing in St Paul's position or in the Epistle to the Hebrews to invalidate the propriety and the value of a due observance of certain memorials and memorial seasons related to Christ. Even the ceremonies of the Law were permissible if still desired by the Jewish convert, and were placed in subservience to the Christian conscience and Christian liberty. " Circumcision Avas no- thing." No, and " uncircumcision was nothing " either. The Sabbath might be observed or not observed if the keeping or non-keeping were done conscientiously as unto the Lord. The Apostle himself kept the Feast of Pentecost after it had been Christianised by the descent of the Holy Ghost. Moreover, the old observances were " works of law," the new memorials were works of faith and love and spiritual teaching and discipline "until He come." The Jewish Ritual was a type, a shadow, but the substance the body was Christ, and Christ having come, the observance of Days and Ordinances related to Him supplanted the need and the obligatory character of the ancient ones, and stood
90 The Observance, in its Main Featnres,
ou grounds specially its own. Broadl}-, these grounds are : (a) The honour due to our Head in Heaven. (6) The edification resulting from every means that brings an his- torical Christ and His Truth before us, and that strengthens the consciousness of our identity with Him in His Body. (c) The fruits of the Spirit produced by the high, holy, orderly and sustained communion with Christ in the presence and power of the Holy Ghost, and this not of the individual simply, but of the whole organism of the Church in its united adoration, thanksgiving, and surrender of the will and the life to our Lord in worship and in service. id) The safe historical preservation of the Apostolic deposit, "the Faith once delivered to the Saints." So much in general, but consider the grounds for the observance of the Christian Year in expansion and detail.
(1) The undoubted institution and observance of the Lord's Day, the weekly Easter, solely at the beginning on the ground of our Lord's Resurrection, and with no reference or relation at first to the Jewish Sabbath, is the cru.K of the whole question. It was done in pure holy honour of Jesus, a weekly memorial of Him, and the observance of the Friday previous in fasting and in sorrow as the Great Day of the Sacrifice, and of other days of the week under the one in- clusive word, " the Pascha," and the keen contest of the first Paschal controversy, with the Palestinian claim to adhere to the days of the lunar month on the one hand, contrasted with the Asiatic usage of keeping to the actual days of the week, all indicate a principle, viz. : our religion is an historical one. It is a religion of historical facts. A Birth, a Life, a Death, a Rising again, an Ascension to Heaven, a Descent of a promised Comforter. Our Religion is not a mere Philosophy, i.e., it is not to be described as one of the best, say the very best, of those systems which great minds have devised to explain the universe — to account for being and law and conscience and duty — nor is it a mere Scheme of Morals taught and exemplified by a Great and Good Pro- phet, nor is it a beautiful, pious devotional Literature — nor
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is it an " Evolution of Religion " explained by perfectly natural causes, but an Original and Divine Revelation given by a Person in the " fulness of time," through Words and Deeds, by sinless character, by perfect self-renunciation, by Atoning Sacrifice, and by His triumph over sin and death.
Hence the expansion of the weekly Memorial of Christ by other Days relating to the great events of His life and work. We have Epiphany because of the positive wondering delight of the best hearts of the early Church in the thought of God's Salvation being for the whole world, of Christ being a Light for the Gentiles, and of the proof in the gift of the Holy Ghost, without distinction, to all believers, that the Church was to be Catholic. Then arose Christmas out of and severed from Epiphany, to celebrate the Birth. Then Advent was instituted, for just as the ancient Church was kept in a spirit of expectation, desire, and hope, ever ripen- ing until the aged Simeon and the venerable Anna received the Holy Child Jesus in the Temple, so, as it were, before our celebration of the Birth of Jesus, we are to prepare for another and more glorious Coming — we are to be as sure of this Second Advent as of the First. We have a pledge of its certainty which the ancient Church did not have, a pledge in the fact of the Incarnation. The keej^ing of Advent opens the Christian Year.
And because the Prophecies and Psalms and devout longings of the holy men of the olden time indicate that they saw in the promised Messiah not only a gift to Israel and a redemption for God's ancient people, but a Universal King and Redeemer, we sing in Advent these Psalms, we read the Lessons from these Prophets, and from the life of the last and greatest of them, the immediate fore-runner and Proclaimer of the Christ. All Christians acknowledge the Lord's Day, and, likewise, I do not suppose that from that first Ascension Day there ever ceased the joyous remembrance of it, or that the New Pentecost, the White- Sunday once baptized with the descent of the Holy Ghost was ever omitted from the Christian Year, shaping itself, as
92 The Observance, in its Main Features,
it did, apart from the civil year and the Jewish calendar. Other observances will suggest themselves in this relation.
(2) Our religion is not only an historical one, i.e., of facts related to a Person, but in relation to this Person and these facts there is a Body of Doctrine — vital, fundamental, Catholic. The Christian Year secures not only the remem- brance of the Person of Christ and the facts of His Religion, but the instruction of the Church in the Doctrine or Teach- ing of our Lord and His Apostles, in relation to the Person and the focts. The Law, the Prophets, the Psalms, the Epistle, the Gospel are all ordered in this relation, are all read and explained, so as to convey to the faithful the moral and spiritual meaning and the lively power of the Historical, yet Living Christ. There is security in such a system that the people will hear not only of the Great Events, and see not only the Central Figure of the Person of Christ, but will get the explanation and the application of these to their soul and conscience.
There are other securities, such as that of a living ortho- doxy as to the broad Christian facts of the Creed, and the great doctrines bound up with them ; yet liberty as to mere theory and devout speculation and theological opinions which the Puritan Theology make fundamental. Moreover, you have a greater security for common honesty in the Ministry, for how can a man deny the Incarnation and observe Christmas as appointed by the Church, or the Resurrection of Christ and ours through His, and observe Easter aright ?
There is the security also that the Truths of our Religion shall not be presented in the office of Preaching in the mere abstract, theological, Catechism form, thus — "What is God?" as if God were a " What ; " but. Who is God ? " Our Father which art in Heaven ; " God, a Person revealed in a Person, His Divine Son our Human Brother. Sermons will be, not a reply to the question — what is Atonement, xvhat is Adoption, Justification, Sanctification ? The circle
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of the Christian Year will present these Blessed Truths to the conscience by another " plan of Salvation." Here is the Atoning One. Here is God the Justifier. Here is the Holy Ghost, the Sanctifier. Here is the Trinity, not as mere discussion about a dogma, nor mere belief in a dogma, but the presentation to faith and to the conscience of a Father, of a Son, and of a Holy Ghost. It is no answer to this, that the ordinary random method of the selection of texts can be made so as to secure that these Truths shall be brought before our people, and this living, real, historical form of their j)resentation. As a matter of fact, it does not do so. A congregation may be left the entire year without hearing a sermon on the Incarnation or Resurrection of Christ. Then suddenly one may hear a discourse to prove the Resurrection of Christ, as if the people were a body of philosophers or an audience of doubters and inquirers, or of Divinity students 3'et uncertain as to the basis of our Religion. The Catholic Church does not argue as a practice in her worship as to the facts and doctrines of the Christian Faith. She may at certain times, and in certain places, require to state afresh the grounds of her Creed, but she always remembers that the Church meets, not as a school of philosophy, but as a fellowship of believers for communion, spiritual sacrifice, worship, and edification.
I must emphasise, then, what I believe to be one ad- mirable feature of the Christian Year, for example, as we have it, in the first Prayer Book of Edward I. It is this, the security for the essentials of our faith as great, supernatural, yet Historical Facts related to an Historical Person ever liv- ing and teaching us still by His Word, His Holy Spirit, His Church, and His Light of Pure Reason, the meaning and the value of Revelation, combined with a large liberty as to mere views or opinions or theories on Inspiration, Atonement, Predestination, and the like, and on certain unimportant Church ordinances.
It is melancholy to think that these theories or views
94 T^h^ Observance, in its Main Features,
and opinions have actually been made the ground of rup- ture and schism in the Church — views on which, and on the " great " man who propounded them, people have actually founded " churches " or sects, and called them after his name. I love this strictness and yet this breadth and freedom which you get in the Universal Church in her system of worship reformed and purged, in her Creed, enshrined in the Christian Year, in her devotional life nourished by the orderly regular Distribution of the Bread of Life and Food of Immortality ; and in the moral practice, so severe yet so humane, and so related to the Lord we honour, and remember that we walk at liberty' because we love His Commandments. I claim that our National Church is a Branch of this Catholic Church and enables us to realise in our experience this ideal in some measure at least. Let us labour for the perfect realisation.
(3) I might refer to the vahie of the Christian Year as a powerful and exquisite means of creating, deepening, and expressing the whole range of the emotion of the Christian life. " Sorrowful, yet always rejoicing," might be its motto; our hopes, desires, and watchfulness in Advent; our peace with all men of goodwill to God and man at Christmas, our yearning for the conversion of the heathen and the triumph of Christ, our intercession and our sacrifices at Epiphany, our descent in Holy Week into the valley of suffering and mysterious, awful depths of Passion and Sacri- fice, and our journey along the Via Dolorosa with the ''Man of Sorrows," our observance with Him of the sad way to the Cross, our remembrance of His Death on Good Friday, our silence, our dejection even almost to despair on the Saturday of the Burial, our woe yet our (piiet restful sub- mission in that awful interval supported as we are by our remembrance of His Promise to rise the third day. Then Easter Joy — all the gi-eater because of the sorrow before it — I need only name it. Our upward glance and elevation of spirit on Ascension Day, our sense of power
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in the renewed reception of the gifts of the Holy Ghost on Whitsunday, Let some one more capable than I am develop this advantage of the Christian Year, the Church recoo-nis- ing it in the provision of Psalms and Special Prayers and Anthems and Hymns — the poet of the Church revival having given us a manual of sweetest song for the devout, sober, yet rich and full cultivation and expression of the joy and the sorrow, the poverty and the wealth, the penitence and the pardon, the despair and the hope, the dying and the living, of our life in Christ and in the Body of Christ.
Once again, the Christian Year, with its ordered relation to Christian Worship, is in a noble sense an Art. It is an Art as to its form, as to the expression of its spirit ; an Art recognising the power and the freedom of the spiritual life of our human nature, yet the glory of the forms which that life can take, and their capacity when expressed in the Holy Sacrament, and in the oblation, of prayer, and praise, and all the accessories of spiritual worship, to kindle the souls of men, to touch the tenderest feelings of our nature, to stir pure and lofty emotion, to lift us above sense and earthly passion, to join us with what is beautiful and true and good, to place us in the fellowship of those who either in the Church triumphant, or still in the House of God on earth, worship the Father in spirit and in truth. The Christian Year, as enshrined in the Liturgy of the Church, is an effort of the Church to express her Faith as a knowledge or Scientia for the intellect or reason, and as a Revelation to the conscience and the heart with all the spiritual and moral force which the Revealed Truth can exercise upon our motives, our will, and our conduct. It is also a Work of Art reverently and gradually con- structed. Its object, in conjunction tuith the Liturgy {never rightly separated from the rational freedom of Free Prayer) and the other Services of the Church, with which it is in living relation, is to reveal the nature and the object, the spirit also, and the very tone of Christian Worship. It
96 The Observance of the Christian Year.
aims at placing that Worship on its true Divine principles as on a foundation, a corner stone, sure, elect, and precious. It seeks to pourtray in faint outline the exquisite form, and in sober reverent colour the sublime character and glory of the Ideal Worship of God as realised in Heaven. It desires to give shape and embodiment to our Worship here in its union with that Worship before the Throne. It surrounds us, therefore, even now, with the pure atmosphere, the clear light, the warmth, the freshness, and the vigour of the Heavenly Life. It lifts us to the Heavenly places where Christ is at the Eight Hand of God. It fascinates us with the suggestion of many thoughts, and deep ones, as to God's Kingdom and God's Church and God's Truth and Love, and especially of the infinite preciousness of that Kingdom as the chief good of the soul. It indicates the harmony of bounden duty and holy inclination in this Worship, and it supplies us with all the inspiration and helpfulness by which we may be able to offer the sacrifice that God desires, both in His House and in His World, with the purity of heart which obtains the vision of His Face. Here there is power and beauty, here there is strength and wisdom, here, in brief, in the Christian Year, is a good thing that has ever been devised for the pro- motion of our spiritual welfare, a wise instrument in the household of the Faith for the edification and delight of God's people — the chief thing among ten thousand good things in the Church of Christ, and altogether lovely.
THE OBSERVANCE, IN ITS MAIN FEATURES, OF THE CHRISTIAN YEAR.
Rev. W. H. Macleod, B.A., B.D.
" The time has perhaps coine," said Dr Robert Lee some thirty years ago, " when it may be proper seriously to inquire whether there may be any good reason why we should not celebrate such festivals as Christmas, Good Friday, Easter, Ascension and Whitsunday with all or nearly all our Christian brethren over the whole world." But we have now advanced beyond the stage of mere in- quiry, for there must be few that have studied the subject with any degree of care who are not now convinced that the observance, in their due ordei', of the outstanding facts in the life of our Blessed Lord is not only a powerful means of deepening- the spiritual life of the Church, but also a duty which we owe to that same risen and ascended Saviour. We have frequently to be reminded that the Church of Christ is called to be a city set upon a hill, ever bathed in the bright beams of her sun, a caudle set upon a candlestick, ever sending forth light in the midst of dark- ness ; and that she dare not recede from this position without being guilty of unfaithfulness to her Head. She has a twofold office to fulfil ; in union with her Lord she is called to otfer intelligent worship to God the Father, spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christy and also to exhibit before the world those great acts of re- demption upon which her faith is founded, " so that by looking upon what she does," in the words of the judicious Hooker, " the world may in a manner read what she believes." But let us glance at some of the arouments
G 97
98 The Observance, in its Main Features^
which may be brought forward in support of the observance, in their due order throughout the year, of those mighty acts whereby our salvation has been brought to light. When we contemplate the relation in which we stand to the rest of Christendom, ought not the fact that, with but few exceptions, the different branches of the Christian Church, however much they may differ from each other in other points, are practically at one in keeping the Christian year be of great weight in urging us to stand aloof no longer in these matters? For we are unnecessarily and unreasonably accentuating the divisions which mar the unity of the Body of Christ by thus separating ourselves not merely from the Eastern and Western Communions but also from our brethren of the Reformed Churches. As the Church of Christ gathers round the manger cradle at Bethlehem, and gazes, as it were, upon Him who for our sakes became poor and had not where to la}^ His head, and as she gives thanks for that first great Christmas Day when the heavens rang with the Angel Chorus and tlie countless multitudes around the throne were filled with wonder and rejoicing as they contemplated the mystery of the condescension of the Eternal Son ; when also beyond the veil light was given to those who sat in darkness and in the shadow of death, and peace and goodwill were proclaimed upon the earth, are we alone to remain silent ? As the saintly George Herbert expresses it, " The shepherds sing, and shall I silent be. My God, no hymne for Thee ?" So also at the commemoration of the other great facts of the Redemption. Catching, as it were, at Christmastide from the Angel Chorus the spirit of her worship, the Church goes on to perfect her Te Deum, which each festival in its turn helps to swell, until the harmony is complete, and the Church on earth rejoices with the Church at rest, when upon Trinity Sunday she offers up her full-voiced thanksgiving before the throne of the Triune God. Is that Te Deum to be forever marred of its completeness by our refusing to definitely remember, in union with the Universal Church, those majestic events ?
of the Christian Year. 99
If not a step towards the realisation of that unity for which every earnest heart must be praying, it would at least be an indication that we were desirous of drav/ing closer the bonds which unite the scattered members of the Body of Christ were we to unite at such seasons in bringing glory to our common Lord. But we pass from this aspect of the subject. The Teaching of Scripture furnishes us with another powerful reason for such observances. The Church is called to preach the Gospel, What, then, is this Gospel, and how best can it be set forth ? If we study the teaching of the New Testament, we shall find that* " the word Gospel is exclusively applied to the announcement of certain events occurring at a particular time in the history of the world." And these events are, the Incarnation, Life, Passion, Death, Resurrection and Ascension of our blessed Lord. And they are presented in due order. No one event anticipates the other, but each follows each in historical sequence. In the Gospels we have brought before us the great facts of our Lord's life ; in the Acts of the Apostles we have the record of the founding of the Church and of the early teaching of the Apostles. From the epitome of the two sermons which it contains, delivered by St Peter and St Paul respectively, and from other parts of the book, we gain the main feature of their teaching, and it was this, viz., the proclamation of the good news of the love of God the Father as manifested in the Death and Resurrection of His Divine Son. It is the same when we turn to the Epistles, for there again we find " that the Gospel is still represented as consisting in the record of the same outward facts, and not," as it has been pointed out, " as so much inward experience or abstract declarations of the love of God, or of the all sufficiency of the work of Christ." By far the greater part, then, of the New Testament is occupied with the history or life of Jesus of Nazareth commencing wdth His Incarnation and ending with His Ascension. " For it is the desire of God," to quote again from the same authority, " that our minds
* " Cliurcli Doctrine. " M. F. Sadler.
lOO The Observance, in its Main Features,
should be saturated with the account of the Biith, Life, Death and Resurrection of His dear Son." This, then, is the Gospel of the early Church, and thus is it set forth, in due order, in those Scriptures which have been written for our learning. The Church is called to preach this Gospel. She has to set it before her children. How, then, can she better or more powerfully bring home that Gospel to her people's heart than by dwelling upon those great events, in their due order, throughout the course of the year ? " For to reproduce in grand outline the simple story of the Son of God, is not this of all methods the most natural to faith and love, the most impressive on feel- ing and memory ? " And as we dwell upon the great facts of the Redemption, "the year in its silent course preaches the very Gospel of Scripture," and we spell out and ponder over every article of our Creed.
But again, in addition to such commemorations being strictly in accordance with the teaching of Scripture, we can hardly overestimate their high educational value. For we are thus brought face to face with facts, and we are made to act over again and celebrate the history of our Lord. Christmas has its message of peace and good- will, its deeper message of the infinite love of God to man. Yet it cannot stand alone. We cannot rest there, any more than He could remain in that manger cradle. Christmas leads us to Calvary, for we must follow Him in all the way He had to go. And who can exhaust the teaching of those days which immediately precede Easter, that Holy Week which should be commemorated every week ? How full they are of instruction, as we follow Him during those last days upon earth, or witness that triumphant joy which was His, when, on the night in which He was betrayed. He instituted that Supper of His love, and projecting Himself in Spirit across the dark hours of the agony and death, and anticipating the time when, risen and ascended to the Father's right hand, He should enter upon His Eternal Priesthood, He
of the Christian Year. loi
uttered that great intercessory prayer which makes audible upon earth that intercession which He ever liveth to make ! Who that has not commemorated that night can fully understand the calling wherewith he is called ? Or Good Friday, with the buffetings and the cruel stripes, the crown of thorns, the dereliction, the death, the victory, when, like a king laying aside his sceptre. He dismissed His Spirit to the Father. Who can have his sin, his own exceeding sin, brought more vividly before him than by thus standing at the foot of the cross ? And when Easter dawns, if we have not waited at the tomb, if we have not passed in spirit from the cross, and marked the place where the Lord was laid, the quiet garden, the new tomb, the costly spices, the ministry of loving hands, after the Passion had spent itself, how can we rejoice as those who have been raised from the dead ? Yet here we cannot rest, as He could not rest. " I am ascending," said He to Mary. We cannot yet possess Him for ever. He is on His way to receive a kingdom, but He will return to be with us for ever. Easter holds within it the promise of Whitsunday. And during the forty days which separate Easter from the Ascension, we learn to live as ever . in His sight, for He is the same yet not the same, able to appear though the doors be locked, able to walk with His Disciples as the shadows lengthen over the land. And as we learn that lesson, so shall we understand something of that joy which filled the Disciples' hearts when a cloud received Him from their sight. But as Ascensiontide passes, we are but led further into the presence of our God. For during those ten days which separate the Ascension from Whitsunday, our hearts are drawn from earth to heaven, our spiritual imagination is quickened as we try to realise those majestic preparations in heavenly places for the homecoming of the Son of God, in the truth of our humanity, and we catch an echo of the celestial chorus which celebrated the enthronisation of the Eternal Son. Whitsunday is the fulfilment upon
I02 The Obsei'vancc, in its Main Features,
earth of that sublime event, when the Holy Spirit with whom our Head was anointed flowed down to the very skirts of His garment, binding the Church on earth to the highest heaven, and the Disciples knew that that same Jesus who had been crucified had been made both Lord and Christ. Will any but a systematic presentation suffice ; for will any irregular exposition, say, of the descent of the Holy Spirit convey to the heart of man the full significance of that event, as will its presentation, in its own place, in the plan of salvation ?
If we keep the seasons, we shall be better able to keep the faith. As it is, we do not attain any vivid realisation of the life and death of our blessed Saviour, and hence we fail to gain that intensity of interest we otherwise would. To the devout heart, then, such commemorations must be of inexpressible comfort and strength.
Yet it is for the Church, which is His Body, to keep the seasons. It is to her that His gifts have been given, and it is for that time when He may present her, without spot and blameless, unto the Father with exceeding joy, that the Lord waits. He desires to see that she is still true to Him ; that though centuries have rolled away since He passed from her midst, she still reverences His memory, telling out again and yet again the old, old story of His love, and feeding His people upon bread and not upon stones. But we must not suffer the presentation of a marred Gospel by keeping Christmas and not the other festivals. They are all one, they must be treated as a whole, and there is no more truly evangelical way of obeying that command which He has addressed to us through St Peter, when He said, " Follow Me, follow thou Me."
" Ye who the Name of Jeaua bear, His sacred steps pursue, And let tti;»t luiud which w.is in Him Be also found m you."
We need the restatement of the Gospel message. We
of the Christian Year. 103
can do very well without hair-splitting arguments, but we cannot do without more whole-hearted surrender to the Lord. In the midst of the many anniversaries we keep, let us find room for those anniversaries of Him. Let us cease to give glory to vnen, and give unto Him the glory that is His due. Then the Holy Spirit, who has been the unconquerable strength of all His saints, will again make glorious the place of His feet, leading us ever onward into the truth, till we all come, in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.
THE TRAINING OF THE CLEEGY.
Rev. Professor Dobie, B.D.
The subject set down for discussion this afternoon is the "Training of the Clergy." In treating of this subject I shall assume that the training of our future clergy, while under study in the Faculty of Arts, does not come under our cognisance, although it must be manifest that the mode of treatment of certain departments of study in this Faculty has a very important bearing upon the student's theo- logical views, and that therefore it is by no means unim- portant that, say, the direction of his philosophical studies should be guided in a strictly impartial and unbiassed manner.
I shall take for granted, then, that the student has already entered upon his purely professional curriculum with a view to the ministry of the Church. Now what strikes one as most conspicuous in the Scottish University Theological Halls is the total ignoring of the necessity for special direction and guidance in pastoral and parochial training, the complete want of fellowship in work, and the entire absence of anything approaching the principles of a common social and devotional life. I am aware that it is expected by Presbyteries that every student of the Church of Scotland shall engage in some sort of practical work, such as parochial visiting and Sunday School teaching. But I would ask, is it prudent or fitting that the Church should treat so important a factor in clerical efficiency in so loose and desultory a fashion ? In the University itself there exists as yet no chair of practical training. As my esteemed and distinguished colleague, Dr Flint, says :
io6 The Training of the Clergy,
" There is no provision whatever made to guide students for the ministry, as to the composition of sermons, the conduct of public worship, the discharge of parochial duty, taking part in the government of the Church. You may," he goes on to say, "you may, of course, call, in a loose sense, anything that in any way helps to prepare you for your profession professional training, but in that sense all your classes in the Faculty of Arts have been just as much parts of your professional training as those in the Faculty of Theology can reasonably be expected to be. In that sense, the Chairs of Engineering, of Agriculture, of Con- veyancing in the Faculty of Law, may be purely pro- fessional. Not infrequently our theological Faculties are represented as exclusively places of training and preparation for the ministry of the Church of Scotland. In reality, the most striking defect in these Faculties is, that there is no provision made in them for purely professional training."
Now it is evident that such a state of things must be a source of great weakness to the Church, and of want of effi- ciency in her ministry. Think how the case would stand were the system applied and carried out in the study of Medicine. I am aware that when a licentiate is appointed to a parochial assistantship, he is under the direction and guidance of the minister of the parish. But I greatly fear, save in very exceptional cases, that the licentiate is left to discover for himself the principles and methods of parochial organisation, and so long as things are as at present, so long as the licentiate must remain unordained until he is appointed to a living, he must be debarred from that intimate relationship with the parishioners which is essential to the full realisation of the nature and responsibility of parochial duty.
I make no doubt whatever that many of our clergy, even after an extended period of probationary service, have felt obliged to acknowledge that they were quite inadequately equipped when they entered upon the
The Training of the Clergy. 107
manifold duties of parochial life. Dr Flint suggests, and his suggestion is a very admirable one, and well worthy of the Church's acceptation, that while the State should provide for what is general and scientific in, theological education, the Church should supplement what she does by providing for what may be purely pro- fessional or properly denominational thereiu. "In my opinion," he says, "what the Church of Scotland should do, if she wishes effectively to do her duty towards herself and towards her students, is to follow the example set by the Dutch Reformed Church, and appoint, through her General Assembly, two Professors to supplement the teaching given in the Divinity Faculties by instruction in practical and pastoral theology, and on the history, doctrine, and law and government of the Church of Scotland, as well as by the practical superintendence and guidance of her students in missionary and other evangelical work." This is admirable counsel, and the Church of Scotland will be foolish if she does not adopt it and put it into practice.
But it is not enough. I am strongly of opinion that it will not be fully effective until our students can be united together and worked upon in one compact body, regulated and governed by the principles of a Common Life. I was more than delighted to hear the suggestion of a Church House emanate from my esteemed friend, the Convener of the Home Mission Committee, on the floor of the last General Assembly. I believe that through the medium of such an institution the practical efficiency of the ministry of the Church of Scotland would be very materially increased.
It has often been a mystery to me why our Church has failed so long to utilise fully the services of those of her licen- tiates who have not yet obtained parochial appointments. We talk of the lapsed masses and the non-churchgoing and the inadequacy of the parochial staff, while all the time there are dozens of unemployed licentiates eager to be enlisted in the Church's service. Now, I may be in error,
io8 The Training of the Clergy.
but it is my impression that many of these would gladly avail themselves of opportunities of furthering their ac- quaintance with the practical duties of their profession, without pecuniary remuneration, were they domiciled to- gether and were their labours duly regulated and directed. I may be over-estimating the measure of self-sacrifice which the unemployed licentiate is prepared to undergo for the sake of the Church and our people, but I hope not. There are no signs that the spirit of devotion to the National Church is waning among her younger clergy, and there are more ways in which the young licentiate can display his Churchmanship than in struggling to get a place upon a parish leet. That enthusiasm can display itself even in subordination and self-sacrifice — and here it is certainly not less lovely and not less attractive, — and I am fully persuaded that the institution of a Clergy House in each of the four University centres, presided over by an accredited superior, trusted by the Church, would be an inestimable privilege as a practical training school until a wider and more responsible field should open up to the junior clergy. Such Sunday services as might be required in the country could be supplied, in a regular and methodical manner, from this centre, and throughout the week days the residents would engage in parochial duty in such destitute parts of the city as might from time to time be selected in conjunction with, and with the consent and approval of, the parish minister.
And in such an institution, and in such Church work, theological students might also with great advantage be conjoined. It would be no new thing for them, at least, to carry on successfully important Mission work without any material remuneration. The fruits of their unsalaried labour are enjoyed by more than one parish in Glasgow, Edinburgh and elsewhere to-day, and what has already been done by free and voluntary effort on the part of University students only shows what could be done by more united effort on a larger and more highly organised
The Training of the Clergy. 109
scale. These home-mission efforts should be directed and controlled by one who has no professorial duties to dis- charsre, and who can wive his undivided care and attention to the task. I am bound to believe that with the blessing of God the benefits of such an institution as this, with its common life, its common labour, its fellowship in work, its opportunities for cultivating the devotional life, its oppor- tunities for private study and mutual iutercourse ; would be speedily and abundantly felt alike by probationers and students of the Church. I am not without a well-founded hope that ere long we shall see at least the beginning of such an institution in Edinburgh.
And there are so many collateral subjects of study of great and growing importance to the future clergyman, most of which are entirely neglected in these days. We have no study of Practical or Pastoral Theology or any of its branches, no homiletics, no liturgies, no catechetics, no study of the science and art of education, no study of Church music and its history, all of which are of great importance. It is a great reproach to us that it should have been left to others to revive the good old Scottish institution, the parochial " Sang Schule " ; but as things are at present, so scattered are our students, so multifarious are the claims upon their time, it were a matter of the utmost difficulty to start with success a scheme for instruc- tion in choral music, and yet I am fully persuaded that this is quite as important as many of the non-academic pursuits which engage the theological student's thoughts.
Furthermore, it must be patent, even to the most casual observer, that there is a clamant need for the extension of the Scottish Theological Schools. How is this to be effected ? One greatly desires that the University Com- missioners had had courage and patriotism enough to seize the present opportunity, which may not again soon recur, of remedying our national deficiency in this direction. In the absence of help from this quarter, why cannot the Church take the extension of the professoriate, as well as the pastorate
iio The Training of the Clei'gy.
of her parishes, upon her own shoulders ? Why should party and sectarianism so largely rule the future development of Scottish University theological learning ? What has been done by the denominations in Scotland is surely not beyond the power of the National Church. That the Universities stand sorely in need of some large measure of extension, both in the length of the curriculum and in the number of chairs, has been abundantly proved. There can be no doubt that, had medical teaching in Scotland been left solely to the University faculties, we should have had something very different from the large and flourishing schools which are to-day our pride and glory. W^hy cannot the same thing, or something like the same thing, with a little effort, a little initial self-sacrifice and energy, be done for theology? The new University scheme for graduation in Arts, the principle of which may, I hope, sooner or later be extended in the direction of an Honour School of Theology, points the way to at least the institution of lectureships in connec- tion with the Faculty of Theology. I trust this scheme may speedily be seen in full working order. It would greatly tend to recover for Scotland some, at least, of that educa- tional prestige which she was once proud to possess, but which, I greatly fear, she has temporarily relinquished.
One only needs to compare the professorial staff in any German University with that of any of our Scottish Univer- sities, to see how lamentably we are behind the age. In Berlin there are eight ordinary professors, four extraordinary professors, three privat-docents and one honorary professor. There is scarcely any German University with less than eight theological chairs now, while in each of our four Universities there are four chairs — manifestly a staff, how- ever efficient, utterly inadequate to furnish a fully-equipped theological professoriate. As matters stand at present, the most that we can hope to accomplish is to give a foundation to study and some impulse to its prosecution, but further it is impossible to go.
And here I would strongly emphasise the necessity
The Training of the Clergy. 1 1 1
for greater attention to post-graduate studies amongst our students. I am strongly of the opinion that the institu- tion of a Clergy House in each of the University centres would be a stepping-stone to the formation of schools of private study, as well as of guilds of parochial vjovh, even on the part of those who enter straight from our halls into the service of the Church. But one of the essential conditions of the revival of Scottish theological learning lies in closer fellowship in work, in deepening the bonds of common aspiration after learning, in more intimate and sympathetic union of students and probationers and such scholars as do not take upon themselves the parochial Avork of the Church, but devote themselves, with the Church's help, to the post-graduate instruction of her future clergy. And I am supported in my belief by the success which has attended the efforts of Dr Fairbairn and his efficient staff of coadjutors at Mansfield College, Oxford. I would, therefore, very strongly recommend that every student at the close of his theological curriculum should take up some special subject, some special line of study and work, and pursue it assiduously until he has mastered it and made it his own. There is far too much diffuseness and far too little concentration of effort along particular lines. Select a subject likely to be of use — say Church History, Liturgies, or Church Law or Church Music. I select those because great personal pleasure and relaxation, as well as public profit, will often arise from such studies as these, even when pursued in the midst of heavy parochial responsibilities. What I would particularly desire to see is a wiser diffusion of more earnest and more accurate scholarship among the future clergy of the Church. It is marvellous what has been accomplished by the persistent study of a congenial and appropriate field of study, even when there appeared but little leisure for its prosecution.
I am aware that the present is a period of such politico- ecclesiastical disquiet and unrest, that it is very hard for the claims of higher scholarship to make themselves heard above
112 The Training of the Clergy.
the din of party strife and confusion. It is hard that the Church of Scotland should not be allowed to pursue her Divine Work of ministering in the Word and Sacraments, so that her clergy might have leisure to respond more fully to the claims of higher scholarship. Such a state of things has long been sapping the springs of true learning and devotion in the country. God grant that the time may speedily come when the Church will cease to be wearied with trouble from without, and will be at rest and at peace to discharge to the full extent of her desire and ability the work of building up God's kingdom in the world.
THE CELEBRATION OF THE HOLY COMMUNION AND THE DAILY SERVICE.
Rev. John Macleod, B.A., D.D.
The object of this paper is to assert," and enforce, so far as that can be done within the time at my disposal, the position which ought to be authoritatively claimed for the Holy Communion as the distinctive and Divinely-appointed Lord's Day Service of the Christian Church. I am, of course, aware that we are justified in pleading for even more than a weekly celebration. The practical object of this paper will, however, best be served by limiting the discussion of the subject to the position claimed for the Sacramental Celebration as at least the appointed Lord's Bay Service.
I propose, first, to define the place which belongs to the celebration of the Holy Communion in relation to the worship of the Church.
I propose, secondly, to indicate some of the principal doctrinal points which need to be emphasised in order to create or revive among our people a true discernment of the place which belongs to the Holy Communion.
I propose, thirdly, to indicate certain alterations or developments in the Service of Celebration (as usually fulfilled) which have to be brought about before its true place can be regained, or the Sacred Office can be adequately rendered.
And I propose, lastly, to indicate some of the reasons which call for our raising, and encourage us in raising, an urgent and emphatic testimony to the need of a return to the Divine order in this great matter.
1 14 The Celebration of the Holy Covniuniion
Section I.
I. The apprehension of the place of the Holy Eucharist as the appointed service of Christian Worship and supreme means of spiritual nourishment depends upon our appre- hension of certain antecedent facts.
The truth of this will have been verified by every minister who has ever addressed himself intelligently to the work of instructing catechumens in preparation for their first Communion.
It seems to me a great, though not uncommon, mistake to begin such instructions by speaking immediately of the Eucharist in itself. What has first to be done is to instruct catechumens in regard to the meaning of the antecedent steps which have already been taken with them in the fact that they (1) have been brought to receive the Gospel, and (2) have been baptised into Christ, and so, through faith, have been made members of His Church.* The " Know ye not " line of argument so often followed by St Paul — " Know ye not that so many of us as were baptised into Jesus Christ were baptised into His death ? " t " Know ye not that ye are the Temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you V'l " Know ye not that ... ye are not your own ? for ye are bought with a price ? " § — or, in other words, the line of argument by which it is sought to prepare them for the further step which God asks them to take by the intelligent survey of the steps which He has already taken with them, is that which leads most rapidly to the issue that is sought.
II. What are some of the principal elements of such instruction as must precede a due apprehension of the Divinely ordered place and purpose of the Holy Eucharist ?
I name five in their order.
* Gal. iii. 26, 27- t Romans vi. 3.
X 1 Cor. iii. 16. § 1 Cor. vi. 19, 20.
and the Daily Service. 1 1 5
1. We have, first, to lead our people to discern both the scope and the perfection of the work which has been effected for all men, and not for the Church, only through the Incarnation, Passion, Resurrection, and Ascension of our Lord. That work implies the reconcilia- tion of God and man, effected once in historical com- pleteness and for all, but falling to be realised in human history in successive stages, and severally by each in- dividual soul. " God so loved the world." * " God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself."! He "gave Himself a ransom for all."+ He "is the Saviour of all." §
2. We have, next, to lead our people to perceive the scope of our Lord's work, not now in relation to all, but in its more limited aspect in relation to the Church — or in other words, in its special relation to those whom the Father hath given to the Son Incarnate as an election out of the world in order to the further fulfilment through them, as His Body, of the purposes of God.
God has done one work equally for all men in common. But He does another and special w^ork for some whom He takes or elects from the rest of mankind and whom He constitutes, by the Gift to them of the Holy Ghost, as the Spirit of Jesus Risen and Glorified, to be the Body of His Son. II IT
* John iii. 16. t 2 Cor. v. 19. X 1 Tim. ii. 6.
§ 1 Tim. iv. 10. II Acts xv. 14, 18.
IT The idea, it may be remarked in passing, which supplies the key to much of the phraseology of the Epistles, and which alone harmonises the teaching of the Apostles as to the range of future development awaiting the purpose of God (1 Cor. xv. 24 ; Col. i. 19, 20 ; Eph i. 9, 10) with their hope of the immediate return of the Lord, is that the Chiirch is now only in process of being gathered out of the world, but will, when perfected after the example of her Head, by resurrection or translation, be afterwards used as an instrument of blessing to the whole Creation of God in modes and for ends as yet but partially revealed (Eph. v. 25-27 ; Col. i. 28, 29). This idea is strikingly brought out in Acts xv. 13-19. The Second Advent is always presented as an event in human history, and not, as so often nowa- days, as the end of it. There is the closest connection between the mis- apprehension of the character of the Church as implying an election to privilege for the sake of others whom she is to serve, and the general forgetfulness of the blessed hope of the Second Appearing of the Lord unto Salvation (Hebrews ix. 28).
1 1 6 The Celebration of the Holy Communion
3. We have at this stage, then, to instruct our people as to what the Church is, aud to urge them to pray that, the eyes of their understanding being opened,* they may attain to some true apprehension of this great mystery which has its parallel only, as we are taught in the Holy Scripture, in the m3'stery of the Incarnation, or of the Unity of the Three in One.t The Church is an election taken out from among mankind and constituted by the operation and inhabitation of the Holy Spirit, as the Spirit of the Son of God Incarnate, now raised from the dead and glorified,J to be that mystical Body by which He, our Divine Human Head, fulfils now, and will fulfil for ever, all the functions proper to Him as the Christ of God, precisely as an individual man executes his purposes in and by the various members and organs of that body which God has given him.
4. It is to be assumed that the enquirer is at this stage led, fourthly, to realise the place which has been given him as a member of the Church thus described. §
5. This necessitates, fifthly, the opening up of the subject of Baptism.
Instruction as to what the Church is should invari- ably precede instruction on Baptism, and many difficulties which often hinder the apprehension of what the Sacra- ment of Baptism effects would be removed or lessened, if it was more emphatically presented as the Sacrament
* See Eph. i. 15-23.
t John xvii. 11, 20, 21.
X What is distinctive (it should be here pointed out) in the temporal mission of the Holy Ghost since the Day of Pentecost, as compared with all His previous operations, seems to be best perceived, according as we first endeavour to apprehend the glory into which our Lord, when raised from the dead, entered by His Ascension. The office of the Spirit, as the Spirit of Jesus Glorified, is to incorporate us, in organic unity, with our Lord as glorified ; and thus to make us partakers of His risen life, of His ascended jwwcr, of His present heavenly Priesthood, and of His future Kingdom (Acts ii.).
§ 1 Cor. xii., and specially verse 27.
and the Daily Service. 117
of our incorporation into the Church,* and if our people were led to weigh the statements of Holy Scripture, and of the Confessions based thereupon, which undoubtedly imply that Baptism confers a distinctive responsibility. When it is seen as the Sacrament of Responsibility, it is easy to apprehend it also as a channel of Grace.
In Holy Baptism we are, through faith, made members of the Body of Christ.! Baptism is the Divinely appointed seal and sign of the place of membership in the Body of Christ, thus given to us by the free gift of the grace of God. If the enquirer is rightly instructed as to the mean- ing of Church Membership and of his baptism in relation thereto, he will realise then that he is not his own,J and is not at his own disposal ; that, on the contrary, he already belongs to, and is at the disposal of the Lord ; that he is already a member of His Body ; that he is so because of God's good pleasure and appointment, and antecedently to his own choice ; that he can neither add to the responsi- bility thus resting upon him, nor escape from it ; and that therefore the Lord has a claim upon him for the accom- plishment of such purposes as He seeks to effect in and
* See John Knox's Book of Common Order (or Jolin Knox's Liturgy), Post-Baptismal Prayer : — " That Thou wilt take this infant into Thy tuition and defence, whom we offer a7id present unto Thee ; and never suffer him to fall into such tmkindness ivherehy he may lose the force of Baptism;" Confession of Faith, chap, xxviii., sec. 1 ; Larger Catechism, Questions 165, 167 ; Directory on Baptism ; Address before Baptism : — " That children, by Baptism, are solemnly received into the bosom of the visible church, distinguished from the world and them that are -nithout, and united with believers ; and that all who are baptised in the Name of Christ, do renounce, and by their Baptism are bound to fight against the devil, the world, and thefiesh." See also Prayer after Baptism: — "That the Lord would still continue and daily confirm more and more this His unspeakable favour ; that He would receive the infant noiv baptised, and solemnly entered into the household of faith, into His Fatherly tuition aiul defence."
The Act of Assembly xi. (1706), emphatically requires ministers to in- struct catechumens particularly as to the Covenant of Grace, and "to charge upon their consciences the obligations they lie under from their baptismal Covenant. "
+ Rom. vi. 3, 4 ; 1 Cor. xii. 13, 27 ; Col. ii. 12 ; Gal. iii. 26, 27 ; iv. 4, 5.
± 1 Cor. vi. 19.
ii8 The Celebration of the Holy Covnnunion
by the members of His Church, precisely as a man has a claim on his own hands or feet, or any of the organs of his body for the execution of any work that he seeks to do.*
III. When we have instructed our people in these five points — here enumerated as representing the minimum of knowledge which is needful for every one who is a candidate for the position of a communicant — they will naturally ask, will they not ? — What, then, is the use to which the Lord would put us, if we be indeed " members " of that Body wliich God has given to Him to be the instrument of His work ?
It is important to point out, in now proceeding to answer this question, that the work of our Lord, whether viewed as set forth in the record of His earthly life, or viewed in con- nection with His present and post- Ascension life in Heaven, has always a two-fold aspect.!
He is the Priest and the Apostle of our confession. :|:
He fulfils (1) a work of worship towards the Father, and (2) a work of ministry towards the Church, and through it, towards the world.
His work in both these aspects draws its distinctive character and also its efficiency from the constitution of His person as the God-Man, the Eternal Son made Man. As God the Son made one with us — as Jesus raised from the dead, and made in His Ascension Lord
* Every minister knows how almost universally in Scotland the idea of mcmhcrshi}) of the Church is connected not with the Divine Act in the Sacra- ment of Baptism (as it ought to be), but with our admission through our own choice to the Sacrament of the Lord's Supjter. Being uninstructed as to their existing responsibilities as baptised, many defer Communion in the belief that they are thus escaping from contracting any responsibility whatever.
t The Gosjiels, it need scarcely be pointed out, abound with illustrations of this two-fold aspect of our Lord's earthly life as ministering (I) to the Father and (2) from the Father. We see the germ of the future vocation of the Church — as called to worship in heavenly places before the Altar of God, and as called also to go forth to all the world — in the record of the Apostolate, "Zfc ordained twelve that they should be with Him, and that He might send tlicm forth to incach " (Mark iii. 14).
X Hebrews iii. L
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and Christ,* He mediates for man with God, and also effects God's purposes in His ministry to man. Accordingly the ivork of the Church, the Christ Mystical, exactly corresponds ivith these two aspects of the personal ivorJc of Jesus Christ her Head. To put it still more accurately, He fulfils these tiuofold operations, not only personally, hut also instrumentcdly, in and through His Church.
The Church is, on the one hand, (1) a Holy Priesthood set apart to fulfil, as the Body of Christ, a perpetual service of worship before the Father : and on the other hand she has (2) an Apostolic commission to go out and fulfil her vocation as the channel of the Divine Grace in the world.!
IV. If the Church, then, is called as the Body of Christ to be united with her Lord in presenting before the Father a common service of worship and intercession, it is in- evitable— is it not ? — to ask. How is this service to be fulfilled ? Where are the materials ? Where is the order ? Is there such a Divinely ordered service of Worship ? and if so, Where is its institution to be found 1
The answer to these questions brings us at once to the glorious Ordinance of the Holy Communion.
The celebration of the Holy Communion is the distinctive Lord^s Day Service, by Christ's appointvient, of the Christian Church. This is the worship which He instituted.! The fulfilment of this Service it is which constitutes that worship of the Father "in Spirit and in Truth," which the Father " seeks," and which the Son was sent to enable us to give.§
* Acts ii. 32, 36.
t The remainder of this paper is occupied exclusively with the connection between the Service of the Holy Communion and the first of these two functions ; but it is obvious that our conceptions as to the distinctive character of the work of the Church in fulfilling her ministry in the world must equally depend upon the measure and scope of our antecedent instruc- tion as to what the Church is, according to the Divine Purpose, as the Body of Christ Glorified.
X 1 Cor. xi. 23, 24, 25.
§ John iv. 23, 24 ; xvi. 23, 24. What is supremely distinctive of Christian "Worship is not so much that it implies the worship of Christ, as rather that it is our worship with or in Christ of the Father. (See Eph. ii. 18 ; John xvi. 23-28 ; Heb. xiii. 15.)
I20 The Celebration of the Holy Coimminio7i
This, and none other, was the Service which He appointed to be fulfilled for a Memorial of Him in whom the Father is " well pleased." Whatever else we do when we meet together in the congregations of the faithful, we fail to do that which He appointed to be done by us as now united with Himself, — that which He appointed as the highest and most distinctive action of worship, if we refrain from cele- brating this Holy Ordinance.
Many acts of so-called worship, such as the confession of sin, prayers for pardon, the declaration of peace, the reading and preaching of the Word, are but introductory to this service. Other acts of still higher range, such as the offering of our alms, of our thanksgiving, or of intercession, are but parts of it. All other acts, such as the daily service, &c., are dependent upon it.
The Sacramental commemoration on the part of the Church in unity with her Lord, and before the Throne of the Father, her intercessions based on that commemoration, and her subsequent reception sacramentally of the food of her spiritual nourishment in the Body and Blood of Christ, tlie^e constitute her Divine Service.
No Lord's Day should ever pass without this service being rendered.
It should be the principal service of each Lord's Day.
The Communicants should be trained to regard their presence at, and their efficient assistance in, the fulfilment of that Service as the principal object for which they come up to the House of God, and the highest form in which they can fulfil their common Royal Priesthood.*
The Service should be always fulfilled because of what it is in all its parts, and especially because of the Presence of the Lord there sacramentally assured to us, with " full assurance of faith," " and with exceeding joy." "f*
V. The position of the Eucharist as the distinctive rite
* 1 Peter ii. 5, 9 ; Hebrews xiii. 10-16. t Psalm xliii. 3, 4, 5.
and the Daily Service. 1 2 1
of Christian worship has been universally recognised by the spiritual instinct of the Church, and throughout all history, except, indeed, in quite recent times, and within com- paratively narrow sections. The truth of this remark is not invalidated by a reference to the history of even Presbyterian churches since the Reformation. It must be sorrowfully admitted that in these churches the Supreme aspect of the institution — that which we may call its Godward aspect — as a service of worship wrought in sacramental unity with the Lord and before the Father, has been almost wholly obscured. This notwith- standing however, our Confession speaks of the Holy Communion as a part " of ordinary worship." Our
Directory again appears to contemplate as reasonable and fit a frequency of celebration which can scarcely be less than weekly.! The Fathers of the Reformation repeatedly affirmed, as is well known, the propriety of the celebration being made every Lord's Day. I Going back further to
* Confession, chap. xxi. see. 5.
+ Directory : " Of the Celebration of the Communion," paragraph III.
X As, for example, Calvin :— " That such was the practice of the Apostolic Church we are informed by St Luke in the Acts, where he says that ' they continued steadfastly in the Apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread and in prayers ' (Acts ii. 42). Thus we ought always to provide that no meeting of the Church is held without the Word, prayer, the dispensation of the Supper, and alms. We may gather from St Paul that this was the order observed by the Corinthians, and it is certain that this was the practice many ages after. . . . Most assuredly the custom which prescribes Communion once a year is an invention of the devil, by what instrumentality soever it may have been introduced. The consequence is, that almost all, when they have once communicated, as if they were discharged as to all the rest of the year, sleep on secure. It ought to have been far otherwise. Each week, at least, the Table of the Lord ought to have been spread for the company of Christians, and the promises declared on which we might then spiritually feed. No one indeed ought to be forced, but all ought to be exhorted and stimulated. The torpor of the sluggish, also, ought to be rebuked, that all, like persons hungering, should come to the feast." (Calvin's "Institutes," Book iv. chap. xvii. sees. 46, 47). Many Acts of Assembly (1701, 1711, 1712, &c.) have been passed, endeavouring to secure increased frequency of celebra- tion. These Acts have heretofore been attended with but little result, owing, no doubt, to the lack of realisation on the part of the Church of the true place of the Holy Communion, and of her own vocation. "Everything " (says
122 The Celebration of the Holy Commnnion
pre-Reformation times, and to the earliest centuries, we may certainly affirm that if in anything universality of conviction may be taken as indicating Divine guidance, it is in this. For fifteen hundred years it never occurred to the Christian Church that her pnncipal Lord's Day Service should be other than a celebration of the Holy Eucharist.
The facts that all the extant Liturgies, carrying us back almost to the Apostolic Age, are wholly services for the cele- bration of the Holy Communion, and that the very word " Liturgy " signifies the Order of Celebration, are in them- selves a conclusive indication of what the mind of the Church throughout all its earlier history has been.
The earliest notices of Christian worship, such as those familiar to every reader in the writings of Justin Martyr,* and in the letter of Pliny to Trajan,-f- show that the cele- bration of the Communion on the Lord's Day was the distinctive service of the period immediately subsequent to the Apostolic Age.
It is unnecessary, however, to dwell on this. What we have to get our i^eople to realise is the fact that, during the time in ivhich the Church was guided by the Apostles, to whovfi the Lord had committed the Holy Institution, and who most surely knew luliat the mind of the Lord iuas,t the observance of this rite constituted the Church's worship, and ivas the supreme end for which the faithful came together every Lord's Day. The power of this fact is seldom realised, but the fact itself does not admit of dispute,
Dr Leishnian in his valuable essay on " The Ritual of the Church ") "tends to show that the prevailing custom of the laity at the time of the Reformation was to communicate only once a year, except in the case of the very devout, or at the approach of death. To this Popish practice the people of Scotland adhere with remarkable steadfastness,"
* Apol. i, 67. t "Stato die," Ep. lib. x. 97. X 1 Cor. xi. 23.
and the Daily Service. 123
Section II.
I now proceed to the second section, viz., to enumerate some of the doctrinal points which have to be pressed on the attention of our people in order to their gaining a fuller discernment of the place above assigned to the Holy Communion. Here I notice six points.
1, First, it is of the highest importance to perceive that the institution of the Holy Communion does not rest only on the words of Jesus as spoken previous to His passion, but is, in point of fact, eaually an institution of the Risen and Ascended Lord. Few words demand more earnest consideration than those in which St Paul announces that he had received immediately from the Glorified Lord in Heaven that revelation of the Eucharist, and of the manner of its celebration, which he proceeded to give to the Church.*
The record of the Eucharist, as given to us in the Epistle of St Paul to the Corinthians many years before the Gospels were written, is thus, it is most interesting to notice, the earliest fragment of Gospel history which has come down to us.
The only command which it has pleased the Lord to reiterate, as from the Throne of His Glory, is that which concerns the perpetual obligation of His Church to fulfil this rite and to celebrate a sacramental worship.
Pondering the words of St Paul, and receiving, as it were, along with him, the sacred institution from the hands of our Risen and Ascended Lord, we are not merely helped to realise its transcendent importance as a means of effect- ing the ends for which the Church exists, but also to approach it from a right point of view. In other words, we are helped to regard it as not merely an ordinance resting, as it is so often put, on the " dying command " of Jesus, and to be observed in commemoration of what He was and did, but also, and still more, as an institution of the Risen and Living Lord who seeks to take vis into * 1 Cor. xi. 23.
124 ^/^^ Celeb7'ation of the Holy Communion
unity with Himself both in the work of now celebrating, in sacramental union with Him, one Glorious Worship before the Father, and in the work of perpetuating as His Body the revelation of the Glory of the Father in the Church and in the world.
2. A second point of great importance is, that we should realise the distinctive mental attitude set forth in Holy Scripture, in which our Lord on the Thursday night before the Passion instituted the Holy Supper, as compared with that of the Friday on which He suffered.
The Thursday evening on which He first celebrated the Holy Supper Avas an evening of surpassing Peace. The Joy of Communion with the Father, the Joy of Self- Oblation, the Joy of His anticipated triumph, the Joy in which He now presents Himself before the Father and pleads in full assurance of hope for the fulfilment of the Father's will — this Joy on that evening was anticipated, and filled to overflowing the Sacred Heart.*
The boundary lines of the Passion history, beginning with the moment when, as He entered the Garden of Gethsemane, He exclaimed, " My soul is exceeding sorrowful," and terminating with the moment when, on the Cross, He said, " Father, into Thy Hands I commend My Spirit," are not more clearly defined than are the boundary lines of that Thursday night of Peace in which He instituted the Holy Eucharist — beginning with the moment when, " KNOWING THAT He was come from God and went to God," and that
God " HAD GIVEN ALL THINGS INTO HiS HANDS," He rose
from Supper, " laid aside His garments, and took a TOWEL and girded Himself," and closing with the moment in which, when they " HAD SUNG AN Hymn " (the Hallel of Praise), " they went out into the Mount of Olives."
The importance of realising the distinctive Peace and Joy and Elation and Glory that belonged to the night of the first celebration lies in this — that it is the mind of the Lord, as then exhibited, when He was looking forward not only
* See John xiii.-xvii., and siiecially xiv. '27-xv. 11 ; xvi. 33.
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to His death, but also, and with infinite desire, to the Resurrection, and to the relation in which He was to stand thereafter, and stands now, to the Father, into which relation He was also to uplift the Church, is that which is to be perpetuated by the Church in the celebration of the Supper. The Eucharist should not be merely like a Good Friday service. It is a Eucharist of Joy*
3. Thirdly, the Holy Communion is to be regarded as being not so much the commemoration of the Death or Passion of our Lord as rather the memorial of Himself, and of Himself in what He is as well as in what He luas, in what He does as truly as in what He did. This is the Divinely ordained rite wherein the Holy Ghost, who takes of the things of Christ, seeks to draw the Church up into the fellowship of the mind of the Lord, into the fellowship not merely of what He did nineteen centuries ago, but also of what He is doing now ; exhibiting thus before the Father the perpetuated expression of one mind, of the mind that was and is in Christ Jesus, and is now reproduced in us to the Glory of God our Father.
That filial glory which was exhibited in the consecration of the first Eucharist, is reflected and perpetuated in every subsequent Eucharist of the Church. The prejudice which exists in many minds against the advocacy of the restoration of the Holy Communion to its place as the Lord's Day service of the Church on the ground that it implies mere ritualism, would surely be removed if it were but perceived that what constitutes the acceptableness and glory of the service is the spiritual manifestation therein before the Father, not only of the obedience and sacrifice of the Son, in whom He is ever well pleased, but also of the like mind in us, who are now, in Him, made sons of God — a manifest- ation dependent upon, and effected by the Holy Spirit,
* There is surely no feature of our congregational worship, as commonly rendered, more noticeable than its joylessness and lack of that abounding and overflowing thankfulness which we trace in the record of Apostolic worship (Eph, V. 19, 20). ^^ There is a crying for wine in the streets: all joy is darkened: the mirth of the land is gone " (Isaiah xxiv. 11).
126 The Cclebi^ation of the Holy Coinumnion
whose office it is to take of the things which are Christ's, who therefore uses the Sacramental Ordinance which Christ instituted for this very end.*
It is impossible within our present limits to dwell on this point, but its importance cannot be exaggerated. The Church very early in her history began to fall from her realisation of her unity with the Lord in His Resurrection Glory, and of her call to share and to exhibit her fellowship in the joy in which He now " liveth unto God."-|-
This may be one reason why, even in the early liturgies, we see a tendency to make the Eucharist too exclusively a memorial of the Passion rather than of the Person of the Lord. The true safeguard against this tendency is to be found in meditating on the emphatic words of the institution " This do in remembrance of ME."
It is true indeed that St Paul says, " As often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup ye do show the Lord's death till He come," and that these words appear to fix our attention exclusively or especially on the death. A deeper study of that passage will be found, however, greatly to confirm the truth on which I am now insisting — viz., that in the due celebration of the Eucharist we are led forward, in sacramental unity with our Risen Lord, to offer a common worship to the Father, of which the most accept- able element, as pointed out above, lies in the fact that it is a perpetuated expression of that mind which is in Him, who liveth and was dead, but is alive for evermore. \
In the sense in which St Paul uses the phrase, " Ye do proclaim the Lord's death till He come," the words must be understood to stand for the ivhole course of our Saviour's passage (not only through death, but also through the resurrection) into the presence of the Father. It was by the resurrection following upon His death that He passed " through the veil, that is to say. His flesh," into the Holiest of all ; and we also exhibit or " show forth " the
* John xvi. 13-lG. t Romans vi. 10.
X Revelation i. 18.
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reality of that access into the Holiest which He has opened for us, when, in unity with Him, not only looking back to Him as having died, but looking up to Him as having risen, and realising His presence with us, we draw near, and, eating of His flesh and drinking of His blood, pass on into the Holiest, and celebrate in the mind of the Eternal Son our one worship of our Father.*
4, The fourth point on which it seems to me of the highest importance to insist is, that the words of institu- tion, " Do this for a memorial of Me," are to be regarded as applying, so far as the ritual sequence of the various parts of the service is concerned, not merely, as seems so commonly supposed, to the act of reception, but to the entire series of actions which the Lord fulfilled.
The extent to which this point is overlooked must be obvious to all. It is no exaggeration to say, that, according to prevailing ideas of the Communion Service, stress is almost exclusively laid upon what is called "Coming to the Table," and there receiving the Sacra- mental symbols.
In contradistinction to this impression it is to be pointed out that the actions in the institution of the Ordinance were six in number, including — (1) the Separation of the elements for their holy use ; (2) the Thanksgiving to the Father ; (3) the Consecration of the elements ; (4) the Fraction in sacrificial spirit or intention of the bread pronounced to be His Body, and the Uplifting of the Cup, in the attitude of adoration ; (5) the Com- munication of the Sacrament in both forms ; and (6) the Reception, on the part of the Communicants, of the Holy Sacrament which had thus been presented before God. In a rightly ordered celebration of the Holy Service these acts, in their number and their order, determine the proper sequence of its parts. They fall to be wrought
* See Professor Milligan on the " Resurrection of our Lord," Lecture iv. and specially note 56 appended thereto, which constitutes one of the most valuable parts of this book.
128 The Celebration of the Holy Comrnunion
out accompanied by the prayers of blessing, oblation, and intercession, which express their meaning. In the measure in which the Church is drawn up, through the power of the Holy Spirit, into unity with the " mind which was in Christ Jesus " when He first, anticipating the joy on which He has now entered, fulfilled these sacred actions — in that measure the Church is exhibiting that Memorial of Him which is for ever glorious in the Father's eyes, and forms the most effective exhibition of His eternal mediation to the world.
(a) The Separation of the Holy Elements and their presentation before God, expressed, when fulfilled by the Lord Himself, the perfection of His Self-Consecration for the fulfilment of the Father's will. That action is now perpetuated by the Church, with accompanying prayers of oblation (including our offering of the elements, of our substance, and of ourselves), as an expression of the mind which was in Him and is now in us.
(6) The Thanksgiving uttered by the Lord as He " lifted up His eyes to Heaven " on that night of the first celebration was a supreme confession of the glory of the Father who had sent Him. The great Thanksgiving of the Christian Church, which " it is very meet, right, and our bounden duty " to renew on the occasion of every Eucharist, ought, in the same way, to be an expression of the filial joy of the Church, united with the Son Incarnate, in the Father, whose household she is.
(c) The Blessing or Consecration of the sacred elements when accomplished personally by the Lord, was effective in making the Sacramental actions that followed a true exhibition, before the Father, of His prevailing Passion and Mediation, and an effectual means of exhibitinsr His presence and communicating His life, in His Body and Blood, to His Church. The consecration now accom- plished in the Church through the invocation of the Holy Ghost, the benediction of the Sacramental elements,
and the Daily Service. 129
and the recital of the words of institution, must then be regarded as effectual for precisely the same ends.*
(cZ) The fraction of the holy bread, broken in the hands of Jesus as He stood before His disciples at that first cele- bration and " lifted up His eyes to Heaven " + as He broke it, and the uplifting of the Cup, which in like manner He raised, pronouncing it to be the New Testament in His Blood shed for the remission of sins — these acts (fulfilled, it is to be observed, before He proceeded to give the Sacra- ment into the hands of His disciples) were a true exhibition, following ui^on the consecration, of His mediation, in its tiuo successive parts as including both (1) the sacrifice in death which was offered on the Cross, and (2) the perpetual mediation which, in the consecration of the life reached through resurrection. He now accomplishes for evermore. This Sacramental commemoration and oblation falls, there-
* Compare Westminster Directory, ' ' Of tlie Celebration of the Com- munion." Referring to this section, the author (Rev. C. G. M'Crie of Ayr) ■of the "Cunningham Lectures" (1892) on "Tlie Public Worship of Presby- terian Scotland," remarks: — "The section of the Westminster Directory devoted to the ' Celebration of the Communion, or Sacrament of the Lord's Supper,' has interest both for the divine and the historian. For the systematic theologian the importance arises from the evidence furnished therein that the Westminster divines favoured what would now be regarded as High in opposition to Low Church views on the subject of the Sacraments generally, and, in particular, when they sought to express the spiritual and real presence of the Body and Blood of the Lord in the ordinance. This appears in 'the Prayer, Thanksgiving, or Blessing of the Bread and Wine,' through wliich, along with the 'Words of Listitution,' the Elements are 'sanctified,' and at a certain stage of which the minister is directed ' earnestly to pray to God, the Father of all mercies, and God of all consola- tion, to vouchsafe His gracious presence, and the effectual working of His Spirit in us, and so to sanctify these Elements, botli of Bread and Wine, and to bless His own ordinance, tJiat we may receive by Faith the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ crucified for us, and so to feed upon Him, that He may be one with us and we with Him ' " (page 441).
t Compare Matt. xiv. 19 ; John xvii. 1 ; also all ancient Liturgies : — ' ' Taking Bread in His lioly, spotless, and pure and immortal hands, and looking up to heaven, and showing it unto Thee, His God and Father, He gave thanks. . . . Likewise also the cup after supper, having taken . . . and havitig looked np to Jtcaveii, and displayed it unto His God and Father," &c. (Liturgy ■of St James).
I
130 The Celebration of the Holy Coinmunion
fore, to be renewed with like significance, and with actions, prayers, and intercessions expressive of that significance, so often as this fourth and supreme action of the Holy cele- bration is repeated.
(e) The communication and (/) reception of the Holy- Sacrament, which form the two concludins acts, receive an immeasurably augmented fulness of meaning and blessed- ness * just in proportion as we apprehend the reahty of the Sacramental actions which had preceded them, and that in very truth, the Lord being mystically present with us, we have been united with Him in one act of worship towards the Father, He being exhibited sacra mentally, as appearing in the presence of God for us, and accomplishing, not only personally, but also mystically, through us, as the members of His Body, His eternal intercession before the Throne.
Pondering these great matters, we begin to gain a glimpse of the glorious significance of the Holy Eucharist li'hen rightly rendered, as the 'perfect sacramental expres- sion of the mind of Jesus perpetuated in the Church and constituting the one spiritual offering of filial joy and devotion and "all possible praise," ivhich is for ever acceptable to the heart of His Father and. our Father, and His God cmd our God.f
5. From what has just been said, the importance will be seen of concentrating attention, fifthly, upon the fact that the Service of the Holy Communion is, in its first aspect, one of ivorship, one in Avhich tve seek first the glory of the Father rather than direct blessing and benefit for ourselves, its distinctive privilege being this, that in it, as in no other service, the Lord is sacramentally present ivith His people, and ive knoiu ourselves, in the sacra- mental exhibition, to be then and there, really and indeedy united with Him in the fidfilment of one glorious office before God..
* See Confession of Faitli, chap. xxix. sec. vii. ; Larger Catecliisni, Q. 170. t Confession of Faith, chap. xxix. sec. i., ii.
and the Daily Service. 131
Next to the necessity of duly instructing communicants as to the effective force of the consecration as thereafter making sure to us, by sacramental signs, the Presence of the Lord with us in order to the fulfilment of the service appointed, there is no other point of greater importance than that of leading them to apprehend what we may call this Godward aspect of the office, as one of sacramental worship offered by the Lord, holding the Church in unity with Himself, before the Father.
The apprehension of this point has been almost totally lost "in Scotland.
6. Sixthly and lastly, it will be obvious that it follows from the above that the privilege and duty of receiving the Sacrament should be always presented to our people not, as is too commonly done, as a necessity on the ground of obedience to a precept, but on the ground of its inclis- liensahleness as a means to the maintenance and groiuth of that life xuhich has been supernaturally communicated to us in OUT regeneration — a life which in its character is one of perfect Sonship and perfect Brotherhood, and in its range includes the Body as well as the Spirit, and will find its consummation in the resurrection. We should in- sist upon the simple, absolute, and immutable truth of the words : " Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man
AND DRINK HiS BlOOD YE HAVE NO LIFE IN YOU," and
"Whoso eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood hath eternal life, and i will raise him up at the
LAST DAY." *
Section III.
Ill the third section of my paper, at which I have arrived, I propose very rapidly to state some of the more important alterations in our modes of celebrating the Service which are necessary as steps to the due fulfilment of the rite.
* All the Reformed Confessions teach that the Lord's Supper is an effectual means of grace and salvation.
132 The Celebration of the Holy Coimmmion
Of these I name five : —
1. It is obvious that a 'proper and progressive sequence in the parts of the sacred service ought to he ohserved. The confession of sin, for example, ought to be fulfilled at the outset as the first of the acts which are merely introductory to the service proper, and not mingled, as is sometimes done, with the intercession and other prayers following the consecration.*
2. Secondly, the preaching of the Word at the service of the Eucharist must be kept strictly in subordination to the main actions of the Service as one of worship and interces- sion, and should, in fact, be treated also as introductory.
This point is of the highest practical importance.
It is utterly impossible to realise in practice the true conception of a Eucharist Service so long as the sermon is made the principal feature in it. Sermons of instruction, of argument, and the like, should be preached at other times, and separated from services of worshij) when the protracted exposition of Divine truth, often called for, has to be given. What should be preached to believ- ing worshippers before celebration ought to be but a brief homily or devotional meditation, uttered in an adorational spirit and with the definite object of quicken- ing the faith of the communicants in their standing as " accepted in the beloved," and as free to pass on " in the full assurance of faith," f to present their worship in the
* Note the prohibitions in Exodus xxx. 1, 8.
t Heb. X. 22.
I In what is said above I do not wish to appear as if disparaging the Divine Ordinance of Preaching. God forbid. There is probably as much need for a higlier apprehension of the end of that ordinance as there is for a truer conception of the jilace assigned in the Divine order of worship to the Holy Comnnmion. We need, for one thing, to distinguish between the differ- ent ends and modes of preaching — between (1) Sermons (such as are referred to above) brief and devotional in si)irit, aiming cliiefly at deepening in com- municants an "assurance of faith" as to their standing; and (2) sermons on Christian ethics ; or (3) sermons expository of Christian doctrine ; or (4) sermons of an apologetic or controversial character, vindicating the Chris- tian Faith ; or (5) Evangelistic or Mission Sermons addressed to the careless
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1 cannot dwell at present on these points, but I may say- in passing, that the power of them is most marvellously illustrated by a study of the structure and rites of the Tabernacle which was, as we know, framed according to Divine direction, as an earthly shadow of those heavenly
or impenitent. Sermons of the second or third of these classes may without doubt be fitly preached at Communion celebrations. They are, however, per- haps more appropriate at other services, of which preaching is intended to be the principal feature. In Churches where the Holy Communion is the principal Forenoon Service, they might be preached in the afternoon, or either precede or form part of the closing service (if at a convenient hour) of Evening Prayer. Evangelistic sermons should lie preached not only in the Church (at proper times), but also much more fre(|uently than is attempted, at the street corners, and wherever hearers can be found. We ought to utilise certain seasons, such as Advent, the Holy Week, Pentecost, &c., for apologetic sermons in defence of the Faith, and for " Mission " sermons. Instead of attempting, as we almost invariably do, to combine protracted ser- mons and worship, we should sometimes convene the people avowedly only to hear the AVord, the sermon being on such occasions prefaced only with a brief prayer for illumination, and being as elaborate and persuasive as the preacher, by the Grace of God, can make it. AVe have, in short, lost much from a want of variety of type in our services and methods. We neither pro- vide sermons mighty, in the Holy Ghost, to arouse and convert and persuade, nor supply services that (apart from the sermon) may uplift and soothe and bless. The ideal arrangements on the Lord's Day (where circumstances per- mitted) might embrace Morning Prayer (without sermon) at 7 a.m. or 8 a.m. or 10 A.M. ; the Celebration of the Holy Communion (with sermon of suit- able character) at 11 a.m. ; Afternoon Service, with sermon for children, or catechetical instruction, at 3 p.m. ; Sermon at 4.15 p.m., followed by Evening Prayer at 5 p.m.; or, Sermon at 5.15 p.m., followed by Evening Prayer at 6 p.m.; or. Evening Service, with sermon, at 6.30 p.m.; and Evangelistic Sermon in church or elsewhere (at certain seasons) at 8 p.m. I suggest these arrangements only by way of illustration. In this as in all things else changes in the customs of the people must be introduced only in the degree in which the grounds of them are understood and command their sympa- thetic assent. The subject is one of great importance, and I hope to have the privilege of devoting a paper to it at some future Conference. Meanwhile, it is clear that a profound and growing weariness of the routine sermon twice a Sunday, and of services in which sucli a sermon (too often a mere essay or a poor attempt at a rhetorical oration) is always the principal feature, exists in all circles. It is clear also that we realise too little that the preaching of the AVord, in the sense in which the phrase is used in the New Testament, embraces a personal pastoral ministry to individual souls of a totally different character from the public rhetorizing with which it is now almost exclusively associated. The time consumed in the perpetual manu- facture of our so-called sermons is wholly disproportionate to what remains
134 '^^^^ Celebration of the Holy Communion
realities Avhich ought now to be realised in the Church of God.* The study of that earthly model, prefiguring the worship we ought now to render, shows us, by means of (1) the Golden Altar, (2) the Table of the Shewbread, and (3) the Golden Candlestick which was set in the Holy Place, that the distinctive worship of the Church is to consist of (1) intercession, (2) offered in Sacramental form, and (3) in unity with the whole Body of Christ, the Lord Himself being, as it were, the true Mercy Seat t in unity with whom we now abide in the heavenly places before the Shechinah Glory of the Father.
In like manner the brazen Altar which was set at the door I of the outer court shows the true position of con- fession, and the mirror-laver,§ set between the brazen altar of the outer court and the entrance to the Holy Place, at which the priests washed and received assurance that they were cleansed, illustrates to us, in the most wonderful way, the office of the Word as preached prior to our passing forward to the service of worship — which office consists in reflecting to us, not what Ave were but what, by Divine Grace, we are, in quickening in us the sense of our being a holy and accepted priesthood in the Lord, called in full assurance of faith to draio near as felloiv- worshippers ivith Him, our Great High Priest, into the Holy Place.
8. Thirdly, in order to bring out, in accordance with the Divine order, what I have called the Godward aspect of the Holy Communion as a service of worship, and an oblation before God, it is essential (a) that in particular the prayers of consecration shoidd he fulfilled luith the
for the careful pastoral guidance and instruction of individual souls and the seeking out of tlie erring and the lost. Competitive preaddng and jmnjing, it may be added, is a form of profanity which it has been reserved, it is be- lieved, for this generation to invent, and which must be regarded by all who think of what it means as a practice which must indeed go far towards filling up the measure of our iniquity.
* Heb. iii. 5, 6 ; viii. 5. f Exodus xxv. 21, 22.
I Ih. xl. 6. § lb. xl. 7 ; xxxviii. 8.
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utmost definiteness of intention and solemnity of form ; * and (h) that the 'prayers of commemoration and intercession should follov) the consecration and 'precede the Corainun- ion 'proper, and indeed he separated hy a distinct interval frotn the communion part of the service, regarded as em- bracing only the reception of the Sacrament.
It is in connection with these points, I may say in passing, that the defects of the Anglican service are most obvious. The absence of a direct invocation of the Holy Spirit in the consecration, the absence, also, of any true oblation as following upon the consecration, the introduc- tion of the intercession for the whole Church militant previously to the consecration, the absence of any true commemoration of the Holy Departed (a point of so much importance in the light of the fact that the intercession of the Church, as fulfilled in that service, should be com- mensurate with the intercession of the Lord, which, we know, embraces the whole Church, whether living or departed, and is in point of fact a mode or form of that intercession) t — all these constitute defects so great as to make it impossible to accept the Anglican service in its present form otherwise than as the example of a meagre, disordered, and defective Eucharistic order,
4. Fourthly, it is of the greatest importance that the offerings of the Com'niunicants should he hrought into connection 'with the Service at the loroper place, as an act in which we present our substance and our offerings and ourselves before God.
This point is important as one remedy for much of the
* Among the Presbyterian exceptions against the Book of Common Prayer presented at the Savoy Conference (a.d. 1661), the following occurs with reference to the Prayer of Consecration : " We conceive that the manner of the consecrating of the elements is not here explicit and distinct enough, and the minister's breaking of the bread is not so much as mentioned."
t This subject is specially referred to in a sermon which I lately published — '■'^ Judge nothing before the time " — referring to the work of the late Professor Milligan, and incidentally to current criticism of the Scottish Church Society, with a note on the Remembrance in Prayer of the Faithful Departed (published by Hitt, Edinburgh).
136 The Celebration of the Holy Comimmion
disorder which characterises the methods now in vogue in regard to the gathering of the offerings from faithful people for the service of God and His Church.
5. Fifthly, the utmost effort should be used to develop in our congregations a sense of their common vocation as partakers, through their hajjtism, of a priestly life* the supreme opportunity of fulfilling Avhich towards God is presented to them Avhen they are invited to take their part in the sacred service. It is impossible here to
* I here venture to reproduce a note appended to the sermon above refeiTed to. "All men are equally free to come to God through Christ that they may ask mercy. This, hoAvevcr, does not make all men, as is sometimes loosely said, equally priests, or in any sense 'jjriests unto God.' Triest- hood, in that sense in which it is affirmed in tlie New Testament of all Christians, implies (1) a call through Divine Grace to a place of membership in the Body of Christ (1 Pet. i. 2 ; ii. 9) ; (2) admission through Holy Baptism to that place (1 Cor. xii. 12, 13, and 27) ; (3) the response of Faith on the part of the baptised person (Gal. iii. 26, 27) ; (4) a distinctive vocation arising thence to be exercised in Christ, unto God, and in behalf of others (1 Pet. ii. 5 ; Heb. xiii. 2-16 ; Rev. i. 6) ; and (5) endowment with the measure of grace needed for the exercise of that vocation (Ei)h. i. 13, 14 ; iv. 7 ; Rom. xii. 4-6). Obviously, therefore, christened people (I use the phrase— too often meaningless to us — in the full sense of Galatians iii. 26, 27, as meaning as many as have been laptiscd into Christ a^td have sa PUT ON Christ and are the Sons of God, through faith in Christ Jesus) — and they only— have in reality, whether realising it or not, a priestly rank and calling. Others, for example, are free to ask mercy for themselves ; they only who are thus in Christ have the call laid upon them, and the right to intercede for others. So also as regards all other priestly }irivileges and duties. Nothing is more needed than the restoration of a due perception of the distinctive priestliness of all Christians on its positive side, as based (to use the phrase of the Larger Catechism) on 'the Grace of Baptism and OUR engagements therein.' It is vitally connected with the restoration in the mind of the laity of a sense of the call laid upon them to maintain, and more actively to fulfil, their part in the worship of God (not forsaking the assembling of themselves together, as the manner of matnj in these days is), and of their commission to spread abroad the knowledge of the Gospel throughout the earth, to be ' witnesses for the Lord' wherever they stand, and to devote themselves, in Christ, to voluntarily accepted sacrifice for the service of man. The (question as to the relation between the universal priesthood of all Christians, and the position and functions reserved to the Evangelical Ministry, is one too largo to enter upon here. I would only add, that the first re(|uisite for the understanding of either part of the subject is the realisation of the heavenly Priesthood, as now in exercise, of our Ascended Lord, ' IN Whom are ave to the glory of God the Father.' "
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enumerate the various ways in which this should be done, but among others, and the more obvious, we may mention these : —
"We must try to make them realise their unity with the ministry in all the acts. St Paul unites the Church with himself when he thus speaks : " For as often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup ye 60 show the Lord's death till He come." * " The bread which ive break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ ? " -f* " The cup of blessing which lue bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ ? "
We must lead them to unite aloud in the singing of the " Ter Sanctus," to say audibly the great "Amen," referred to by St Paul in the Epistle to the Corinthians, at the close of the Eucharistic celebration, I and to unite together aloud and with one voice in the Lord's Prayer, which, let me say very emphatically, is in truth the entire Service of the Eucharist, in its order, compressed into one Divine form. In other words, the Lord's Prayer is (as we should expect) the Eucharist office or the appointed Lord's Day service in germ. §
* 1 Cor. xi. 26. + 1 Cor. x. 16. J 1 Cor. xiv. 16.
§ The Lord's Prayer was the earliest, and probably remained for a consider- able period the one fixed liturgical formula. It was not merely closely associated with the Prayer of Consecration, but constituted an invariable part of it. " The change of the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ is by the v:ord of Prayer which comes from Him " (Justin, " Apoll." 66). "We pray for our liread because Christ is the bread of us who belong to His body" (St Cyprian in Orat. 13). For the duo iUustration of this paper it would be necessary to append an example of a Form of Service embodying the liturgical principles set forth. Meanwhile, however, it may suffice, by way of indicating the correspondence between the progressive order of topics in the Lord's Prayer, and the sequence of the various sections or parts of a celebration of the Holy Conmiunion rightly ordered, to note the following points : — (1) The opening invocation in the service of the Holy Com- munion— in whatever form that invocation may be fulfilled — corresponds to the First Petition of the Lord's Prayer. (2) The Section embracing the Prayers for Pardon and of Peace, and the Prayer of Access, and for grace wherewith to draw near and "worthily to magnify His glorious Name," corresponds to the Second Petition. (3) The Section embracing the Lessons, the Prophetic Lesson, the Epistles, and the "Gospel of the Kingdom," the
138 The Celebration of the Holy Communion
We must encourage them to present tlicir private offering and intercession to be united with the interces- sion of the Lord, as that is accomplislied in this special Service.
All these are but examples, which might be multiplied indefinitely, of the ways in which we may develop in our communicants the almost lost sense of their common participation of a Holy Priesthood.
6. Sixthly, we need to restore the Service of the Holy Communion to its place as the Divine Service of every Lord's Day. In no oilier way is it possible to bring about the realisation of its true character. For more than a century in Scotland the Holy Communion, although described in our Confession as a rite of " ordinary worship," was put on the same footing as fastings and other acts of humiliation of an extraordinary character. Within the last few years the Fast Days, which were as frequent as the Communion Sundays, have been dissevered from the Communion, and in fact abolished, but almost no progress has been made in the restoration of the Holy Communion to its proper place.
7. Seventhly and lastly, we must aim not merely at restoring the Holy Communion to its place as the Divine Service of every Lord's Day, but with equal zeal endeavour to lead communicants to see that it is the service at which they should all seek to assist.
It appears to me that we have to be on our guard
preaching of that Gospel, the Creed, and the dedication of our alms, of the elements, and of ourselves, corresponds to the Third Petition. (4) The celebration proper, which ought to exhibit on earth "the very imacjc " of the things fulfilled in heaven, embracing the great Thanksgiving, the Con- secration, the sacramental Memorial actions, and the prayers of oblation and intercession, corresponds to the Fourth, and central Petition. (5) The subse(pient Sections, including the Communion proper, the administration of the Sacrament, our recei)tion, and our Communion therein with our Lord and with one another, as one body in Him, correspond to the Fifth and Si.dh Petitions. (6) The Post-Comnuinion prayers for grace, guiilance, and hnal deliverance, correspond to the ,S'evcnlh Petition. (7) Lastly, the concluding act of Praise corresponds to the liturgical addition to the Lord's Prayer which is found in the Do.vology,
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against the multiplication, such as we see in England, of frequent services of Communion, beginning at an early hour of the clay, at which comparatively few are present, and to aim steadily, whatever else is done, at the realisa- tion of the Divine purpose that the Holy Communion should be, as it were, the congregational Service of the Day. The accomplishment of this must, at best, be a very gradual work, demanding much prayer, patience, and prudent effort. It is, of course, dependent, in the first instance, on the revival of the truth of the Gospel as to the Church and Sacraments. It must be a work carried forward in the spirit of unity, and with tender considera- tion of the abounding difficulties and prejudices. Indeed it is perhaps undesirable that in such a movement one congregation should, in too marked a degree, outstrip others. The beginning of the return to the Divine Order is, hoivevcr, effected luhcn that order is once asserted, and luhen the return to it is made an avowed aim.
Section IV.
I promised in the fourth section of this paper to indicate the reasons which so emphatically call at present for our testimony to the truth of what has been above set forth, and the encouragements which we possess in presenting that testimony. This I can do only in a word.
1. One reason, and the only one which I here mention, is found in the neglect of Divine worship, alleged on all sides to be increasing. That neglect largely arises from the fact that the Divine worship, at which our congregations should assist, has never really been offered.
The people are in many places forsaking their atten- dance on sermons. But they can scarcely be said to be forsaking Divine worship, for in the highest sense of the term the Divine worship is not provided for them.*
* In the disappearance of the Communion Table from some of our modern churches, and in tlie overshadowing prominence of the Pulpit, the sym- bolism is complete which sets forth the prevalent idea that the House of God, which should be a place of Prayer for all people, is but a Lecture Hall.
140 The Celebration of the Holy Commimion
When the heaving of sermons, which too often take merely the form of useless and unedifying rhetorical dis- plays, is made the supreme object of going to church, it is not a matter for surprise that, in an age like ours, many people should come to act upon the instinct which tells them that the good which they are supposed to get in church, they may equally get at home. The ultimate remedy is to be found in leading them to see that the supreme blessing to be found in the Sanctuary is connected by Divine ordinance with a sacramental worship at which they are called to assist every Lord's Day, and wliicli^ tliereforc, as a matter of fact, cannot he found except where the divinely appointed memorial is ^presented.
Sooner or later this truth, which is of momentous im- portance, will come to be set forth and seen to be, as it is, vital and fundamental to all reform, otherwise I see no hope of permanently arresting the disintegration of con- gregational and Church life now in progress.
2. The encouragements to persevering in fearless testi- mony on these matters lie principally in three considera- tions : —
(1) First we know that we are witnessing for Divine truth. In this we have the most assured confidence. God is on our side. We seek to bring about a restora- tion of obedience to the will of the Lord as determining: in regard to what the worship of His Church should be, and to the means whereby His people should be blessed. We can therefore rely on the presence with us of the Holy Ghost who takes of the things that are Christ's and reveals them to His people as we go forth to bear our Avitness.
(2) Secondly, the nobler and most active instincts of our time are in harmony with the truth which we are called to affirm. Many who would remain indifferent so long as the attendance on a ritual form is impressed upon them as a mere necessity of precept, may be brought to look at the matter in another light if they
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once see the Evangelical and Spiritual Glory of the filial and brotherly life as exhibited and replenished in its higiiest form in the rightly rendered worship of the Father in the Eucharist. Communicants who are lax in communicating (notwithstanding their being reminded of its necessity as a duty, or as a means of making a profession once a year, or once in three years, in order to their retaining their places as "members" of the Christian Church) may be found to be more easily moved when they are taught that every time the Church Bell rings on the Lord's Day morning, the Lord's announcement is that He is about to appear sacramentally in the presence of the Father and to present His intercession ; and that He asks them to come up out of their own houses into the House of God, and to unite with Him and, as it were, to sustain in Him and with Him one mystical and ineffably glorious celebration.
(3) The last encouragement which I shall mention is found in the reflection that, whether our testimony is accepted by many or otherwise, the Hol}'^ Eucharist, so far as we may see it restored to its proper place, will be effective in its intercessional aspect even for the help of those who reject our testimon^^, just because it is a form, though exhibited on the earth, of the prevailing mediation of the Lord in Heaven, which is the ground of all our hope, and of which the final fruit, whatever hindrances may for a season interpose, will be found in the revelation of the Kingdom and in the advent of that Day of days when the implicit promise of this word will be fulfilled — "/ say unto you, I ivill not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine,
■until THAT DAY WHEN I DRINK IT NEW WITH YOU IN My
Father's Kingdom." *
* Matthew xxvi. 29.
THE CELEBRATION OF THE HOLY COMMUNION AND THE DAILY SERVICE.
Rev. Arthur W. Wotherspoon, M.A.
The devotional life of the individual — q, service of God that is reasoned, ordered, diligently cultivated, yet that is God- ward wholly, a personal and secret thing — has its parallel in the Church's life of Avorship. As the individual, so the corporate Church maintains a service of God personal to herself as the Bride of Christ, private aS offered in separa- tion from the world, Godward wholly in the secret of His tabernacle. And whatever is true of the individual devo- tional life is true also of that cultivated by the Church. Her service too must be " ordered in all things and sure," regular as breathing, " sure," constant as life.
And this at once calls for Daily Service. The day with its evening and its morning is God's unit of time. More may not be required of us than that each day be duly hallowed. But service less than daily can claim nothing of continuit3\
To pray night and morning is the least that we require of ourselves as individuals, and the Church should show exami^le of no less. Morning and evening in the House of God she should gather up the private prayers of all her children, and present them through her Lord with in- tercession. " The Prayers "* should link day to day, and each week begin with " the Breaking of Bread " — a silver chain with a golden clasp : that so life might be sealed with the communion of Christ's Body and Blood, and might abide in the communion of His Spirit. " The fire" it is written, " shall he ever burrnng on the altar : it shall never
* Acts ii. 42.
144 ^-^^^ Celebi^ation of the Holy Commtinion
go out ; " but we do not begin to fulfil that word until, under the New Testament as under the Old, each day has its daily sacrifice.
And if this be the calling of the Church as God's servant, it is her calling, also, in the adoption, as one with Christ and the incarnation of His Spirit. Her union with her Lord involves the sharing of His office, endues her with His sacerdotal robe. If the member, much more the body must "abide in Christ": and to dwell in the fellowship of Him who is a priest for ever is to dwell in " prayer without ceasing." " As He is, so are we in the vjorld ; " as He in heaven appears for us, so the Church in earth must appear in God's presence for the outside world. It is for the Church supremely to say, "for me to live is Christ," and Christ " ever liveth to make intercession." The Church is not (as it is her vocation to be) Christ to the world, either as manifesting the true Christ, Priest of humanity, or as fulfilling in the earth the ministry of Christ for men, — so long as her prayers are spasmodic, interrupted, not " rising like a fountain day and night," both for herself and for the outside world.
Again, the Church's life and her work, although these are not identical as some appear to think, are allied most intimately. Church-workers are born not manufactured : in earth as in heaven it is the ministering (worshipping, lit. liturgic) spirit that is sent forth to do service for the sake of others (Heb. i. 14, R.V.). As the fruit of the in- dividual disciple is in holy dispositions — love, joy, peace and goodness — so the fruit of the Church is in her saints. Her ripe grapes are holy lives, matured and perfected : and she cannot bring forth, cannot ripen, a single cluster except as with a constant indwelling she herself abide in Christ. May it not be for lack of that constancy that we of this present age have many converts but few saints ? and that our work among the heathen is crippled as it is by the need of mission work at home ?
The Cliurch to her shame has need to convert her own
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children : she has it not in her to bring them up in the nurture of the Lord. God looks that she should bring forth grapes, but she brings forth wild grapes.
(/3) If these considerations move us, they will move our people also ; and in further commending Daily Service and weekly Eucharist, we can appeal to our Lord and call upon them to consider His legacy : — that Christ left for our Church life three things alone : a sacrament that signifies and seals our adoption and membership, a prayer that is the prayer of God's Church and family, and finally a sacrament that is worship before it is a means of grace, and is indeed the one Divine service.
Our Lord left but these three, and a unique importance on this account attaches to them. And since one is for birth, only two remain for life. The Lord's Prayer and the Holy Eucharist are Christ's sole institutions for Church worship.
Now if we consider the Lord's Prayer as instructing us in this matter, as " teaching us to pray," as making known " the mind of Christ " regarding prayer, — COMMON prayer is taught us by the words, "Our Father . . . give us . . . deliver us " ; and daily common prayer by the word " daily " in the fourth petition. The Lord's Prayer is " the daily" (Dan. viii. 11) of the New Testament, of which our prayers, supplications, and intercessions day by day are but the expansion.
But (what is as remarkable as it is instructive) thanks- giving has no place in the Lord's Prayer ; which I take to be because it is incomplete without the Eucharist. The Lord's Prayer is the norm of the week-day prayer, and over each such day there is a shadow in the Christian week. Monday remembers Christ's rejection as the Priest-King, when man turned on him for cleansing His own temple ; and Tuesday remembers that even as a Prophet we would none of Him ; Wednesday remembers His betrayal ; Thurs- day His agony in the garden ; Friday the crucifixion ; and Saturday His grave. Lower and lower our shame sinks us,
K
146 The Celebration of the Holy Communion
even as the Lord's Prayer sinks also through its preface and seven petitions — with a strange correspondence (strange if no more than a coincidence) between each of these eight and the days of the Christian octave. And even so the week- day life that we live in the world should be ever peniten- tial, " bearing His reproach," lived in the fellowship of Christ's sufferings, that in the world we may " know Him " as that world used Him, and be made conformable to His death and so press forward. Su2^plications, 'prayers, and intercessions are the note of the Daily Service.
But yet thanksgiving is enjoined in the same word with these (1 Tim. ii. 1). It comes in its own place, even as after the sufferings came the glory that should follow. The Lord's Day is the day of thanksgiving, and the thanks- giving is the Eucharist.* " What shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits ? " For benefits of such cost, the purchase of His pain, what can we render ? What but the " pure offering " t that He Himself gives into our hands '( Holy things to the Holy. Of His own let us give Him. " I will take the cup of salvation ... I will offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving." Date et dabitur vohis : Christ grants us so to pass from the fellowship of His sufferings to " know the POWER of His Resurrection." There is " an Easter day in every week " for those who thus " keep the feast " (1 Cor. v. 8) having duly hallowed the week-days.
(7) Something, I am aware, is to be said for a daily cele- bration of the Eucharist. But as the day is God's unit of time for our earthly life, so the week is His sacred unit : in the work of creation, and in the work of redemption, our new creation. So that to begin each week with Eucharistic service may be sufficient for continuity.
Less than weekly cannot be ; and without a continuous presentation, it is as though the light were out in the Holy
* As will be known to most readers, the Greek word for thanksgiving is eueharistia : as, e.g., in 1 Tim. ii. 1, St Paul exhorts to make " supplications, lirayers, intercessions, eucharists."
t Mai. i. ii.
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Place and the shewbread table bare. And this is to sin against Christ. We think too exclusively of the Church, in Eucharistic worship, as presenting Christ's memorial before God. In another aspect, not less true, the Lord Jesus Christ Himself is the one and only celebrant in every communion service. It is He who takes bread, and showing it to the Father, utters the words. This is My Body : He breaks it. He offers it. And this is Christ, the Priest-King, presenting His Body the Church a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, — a sacrifice and holy in union with His death, — a living sacrifice as presented with the Cup of salvation, "the New Covenant in His Blood." We hinder our Lord's exercise of the office of His priest- hood so long as we disuse the weekly Eucharist ; because, in the end. He is the celebrant, and what are we but a vestment for His wear.
(6) We should remind our people (finally) that so long as the Lord's Table is not spread each Sunday, they forego their distinctive privilege under the Gospel. For what is that Gospel privilege if not (as Christ taught the Samaritan woman) that all men always in every 'place may now worship God, as formerly one man only (the High Priest) in one place (the Temple at Jerusalem), and he but once a year, might worship God. The High Priest entered through the Veil into the Holy of Holies, to the Ark of the Covenant and the Mercy Seat and the Glory of the Presence. No man anywhere may ever so worship God as that High Priest, except as entering by the new and living way which Christ hath consecrated for us, — entering into the Holiest throuo-h Christ s Flesh and by His Blood.
THE CHURCH AND THE EDUCATION OF THE YOUNG.
Rev. John Howard Crawford, M.A.
There is no question brought under the consideration of this Conference of greater importance than that of the Church's duty with reference to Education. In all times the Christian Church has held it as one of her most pressing duties to educate her children, and that in all branches of useful learning. We are too apt to think that the interest in education began with the Reformation, and thouo^h undoubtedly the Reformers gave an impulse to educa- tion such as had not before been felt, yet the Church, prior to their day, had not entirely forgotten her duty. Every monastery and cathedral had its school, taught often by the most learned men. Principal Lee asks very justly, " Who taught the Reformers themselves ? Who instituted the schools in which Buchanan and Knox, Fergusson and Row, Wynram and Willock, Arbuthnot and Douglas and Spotswood were so well instructed as to be adequately prepared for entering on the higher studies pursued at the universities ? One at least of the number appears to have been taught in one of the schools of the canons regular, and another in a mouastery of the Mliite Friars. The others we know were educated at grammar schools."*
The Church, indeed, was the mother of arts and learning for many centuries ; and what education there was, came through her as its source. There was then no question as to the relation of religion to culture ; there was then no thought of separating the knowledge of God from the
* Inaugural Address, University of Edinburgh, 1846.
M9
150 The Church and the Education of the Yoiing.
faculties by which we serve man ; it was reserved for our modem sophists to invent a scheme by which religion and secular knowledge should be divided as if in watertight compartments.
But no one can shut his eye to the imminent danger which seems to lie before us of a growing desire to secu- larise education. It is almost incredible that in a Christian country such a possibility should be contemplated. We all believe that religion is the central science which gives value to all other knowledge. We all admit that education is the duty of the State, and that if the State is to secure any benefit from education, it must be such as will tend to make upright citizens, who fear God and obey His commandments.* We know that great numbers of children have no religious nurture except what they receive in the day-schools. And yet, admitting all these facts, there are many men among us of undoubted piety who would banish religion from our schools entirely. The battle was fought out some years ago in America with but varying success, and still wages in our colonies. It may be hoped that it will never have to be fought in these realms.
Still we must beware that we are dwelling in no fool's paradise in this matter. We must carefully consider our own case ; which though not presenting the extreme positions which other countries show, has yet enough to excite our anxious inquiry.
The common schools of Scotland can boast a good lineage.
Children as they are of the Reformation, they have ever
had a religious character. Knox, like Luther and Calvin,
based his best hopes on the sound culture of the rising
generation ; knowing that young hearts
" Do deeply take and strongly keep The jirint of Heaven."
The changes of time have, however, severed the close
* " It is of great importance to a State that every citizen should be of a religion that may inspire him with a regard for his duty." — Rousseau, "Contrat Social," v. 8.
The ChiLrch and the Education of the Youiig. 1 5 i
connection of the parish schools with the Church, which lasted so long and worked so well. The severance was not a violent one, and the Board schools differ little in outward appearance from their predecessors. There are few restric- tions placed on the teaching of Christian doctrine in the school hours ; and where the Board does not permit any distinc- tively theological instruction through a catechism, as in Aberdeen, we are told that an excellent grounding in the contents of Holy Scripture is given.
Our teachers, moreover, are men of the highest character, and many of them are really interested in the true Christian upbringing of their pupils. I do not think any profession is less affected by the negative spirit of our times than our elementary teachers. Both in England and Scotland they are the most valuable helpers the clergyman has. In present circumstances, where almost the whole character of the religious teaching depends on the individual master, this is a fact to be deeply grateful for.
But is all as fair as it looks ? Is there not a tendency to lightly consider the religious teaching among the parents ; a tendency perhaps favoured by the School Boards ? My impression is that this has grown during the last twenty years. Parents are growing more indifferent to regular and punctual attendance at the hour of religious teaching, and the school rarely musters its full number at that time.
Still, even granting that the attendance is regular, may we not ask if the compulsory limitation of all religious teaching to a stated hour is not in itself an evil. If the limi- tation is understood to imply the exclusion of all religious references or a religious spirit from the secular teaching, it is surely to be regretted. Is it possible so to separate the secular from the religious ? Can history and literature be taught without the light which Christianity gives ? It is always dangerous to think of religion and life as apart from each other ; but such a mode of thought is specially injur- ious to the plastic mind of childhood. Dean Stanley tells
152 The Church and the Education of the Young.
us that a religious character more or less pervaded all Dr Arnold's teaching, whether of history or classics or any other subject. We should aim at no lower ideal than the surrounding the child with a religious atmosphere in which all his work should be done. To quote the beautiful words of Plato,* " We must secure that the young, dwelling, as it were, in a healthful land, may drink in good from all around them, and airs borne from every noble work and sight and sound may bring them, step by step, from earliest childhood into the likeness and love of, and harmony with, the beauty of truth."
Suffer me to add here a practical conclusion. We have seen how much the religious nurture of the young depends on the teachers, and the need of the teachers themselves being soundly trained does not require to be urged.! In England this is most earnestly cared for, and clergymen of distinction are placed at the head of training colleges.^ In our colleges, there does not seem to be any special provision for religious teaching, as all the officials are laymen. Should not our Church appoint a chaplain to each college, who should have charge of the religious teaching ; and would not such an appointment infuse a more religious spirit into the institution ?
We cannot, however, leave this subject of elementary schools without a glance at the struggle in England to maintain some due measure of Christian teachiug in con- nection with School Boards. We cannot withhold our sympathy from those who desire to secure to the poorest and most neglected child some knowledge of our holy religion. When we read such awful facts as are told us about the ignorance of some Board-school children, we cannot refrain from asking: if instruction is not valueless which leaves out
* "Republic," iii. 401.
t In Switzerland, every teacher must have a certificate from a clergyman, that the teaclier is fitted to conduct religious instruction.
X In this respect the work of Derwent Coleridge at St Mark's College, Chelsea, deserves to be commemorated ; and has no parallel that I know in Scotland, though the labours of David Stow should not be forgotten.
The Church and the Education of the Yonng. 153
the best things in life. A teacher asked a class of such children who was the mother of our Saviour, and received for a reply, " The Queen." A district visitor spoke of Jesus to a poor family, and after he was gone, the children asked who was the man he was speaking of. A thousand such facts might be given, we are assured.
It is not easy to understand the opposition of Noncon- formists to the teaching of true Christianity in the Board schools. There is no proposal to teach anything they do not believe, as may be seen in the suggestions made by Mr Athelstan Riley at the London Board-; and the mere lust of controversy need not drive them into antagonism to Christianity itself. May an outsider not add that it gives a strange impression of the Church of England that so powerful an organisation cannot secure what we have gained so easily in Scotland ; and moreover, causes sad reflections as to what may happen to her in the day of trial ?
It is vain to say that the Sunday school may be a sub- stitute for religion in the day-school. In Birmingham it was found some few years since that there were 26,000 elementary school children who went to no Sunday school. The Secretary of the British and Foreign School Society tells us that Sunday-school influence is not coexten- sive with the needs of the neediest children, and those who need moral and spiritual instruction most are most likely to go to no Sunday school. In America it is said that five- sixths of the children have no Sunday teaching ; and from that country as from our own comes the too general assur- ance that our Sunday schools are a practical failure.
I trust we are yet far off from the condition of France, where all the religion taught is the existence of God, " in accordance," as the officials say, " with that spiritual philo- sophy which is the glory of Descartes and of France." The municipality of Paris goes even farther, and will not permit the name of God in a school book ; nay, has even sanctioned a text-book openly hostile to all religion. The result is, of course, that one-third of the children of Paris are educated
154 ^''^^ CJmrcli and the Education of the Yotmg.
by the religious orders, a proportion which exactly corre- sponds with that of voluntary schools in London, but is only about one-half of the voluntary figures for the rest of England.
The desire for the secularisation of the schools on the Continent may be due to well-founded distrust of the Jesuits ; but it must be surely the mere fanaticism of free thought which overturned a system of which Guizot, Thiers, and Cousin approved.* Sectarian strife puts us in strange positions, and it is an unhappy country which sees patriots like Jules Simon and the late Bishop Dupanloup t waging war to the knife over the education of the young. But doubtless the question of religious education in Roman Catholic countries is complicated with considerations I must not dwell upon. It is doubtful whether the Roman Church is really favourable to popular education. The lay-school can only exist by a struggle, and since the clergy wish to destroy it by excommunication and other religious weapons, it becomes anti-religious. It must be remembered, too, that it was the Roman Catholics who brought about the secularising the schools of New York,J and bitterly opposed all reading of the Bible in them. We are not called on to pronounce an opinion on the peculiar case of France or Belgium, for their special circumstances do not exist in England.
* See " L'Ecole," by Simon and Dupanloup respectively.
t Bishop Dupanloup said to the teachers of secondary schools when Jules Simon's circular to them was issued, a circular which he thought would be the ruin of the humanities, and tlie definite overturn of high intellectual education in France: "Cling to the basis, the form, and the methods of teaching which gave to France and the Church Bossuet, Fenelon, Bourda- loue, Massillon, and the seventeenth century." (Note that he omits to name Pascal, Arnauld, Racine, and the greater names of that period.)
X Contrast, however, with Archbishop Hughes' views, the words of Cardinal Manning: "England is a Christian people, and its national character is Christian because it lias been hitherto formed and perpetuated by Christian schools. How can this English and Christian character be perpetuated or formed when the schools liave ceased to be Christian ? If any one shall say it will still be formed in the homes of the people, such an answer is either from ignorance of what the homes of our millions really are, or from a levity of mind." — Nineteenth Century, Dec. 1882.
The Church and the Education of the Young. 155
The demand for Christian teaching in England takes two forms — the one asking some definite doctrinal instruc- tion in Board schools, and the other desiring a part of the rates to be given to voluntary schools, or that the subscribers to such schools should be exempt from the rates.* The first demand seems a just one in a Christian country. Only Deists can be content with a Deistic religion, which is really the true name for undenominational teaching. The Church cannot be content with such instruc- tion, and must put but one interpretation on religious teaching. M. Renan said he wished to be called a Christian ; but a view of Christianity which satisfied M. Renan will not satisfy the Church. t The Italian system, which permits religious teaching in school hours by the priest of the parish, is a wise plan. It is, indeed, recom- mended by the First Book of Discipline that the reader should teach in the schools, and it would still give useful employment to our licentiates to fulfil such duties. It was the suggestion of Julius MuUer that this should be done in Germany; and it may be remembered that Oberlin, the philanthropic pastor, always reserved for himself the re- ligious instruction in the schools which he founded. I beheve the time will come, both in England and Scotland, when the clergy will visit their schools almost daily, and
* It may be noted that the conscience clause in Guizot's Scheme of 1833 provided that if parents exempted their children from religious instruction, they must show that they i^rovided elsewhere for the religious education of their children. See Kay-Shuttleworth, " Education of People."
t The Abbe Martin says with some truth :— " Religion is unquestionably the one foundation stone essential to the educational fabric ; and the religion of which we speak must be a dogmatic religion, having clear and well-defined articles of faith, easily taught and readily remembered. The vague generalities which pass under the name of natural religion may possibly exercise sufficient moral restraint over the best-disposed members of the highly educated and prosperous classes, to preserve them from any serious losses from propriety, but they will never keep the mass of children or of working men from sin."
In Holland, the regulation is as follows :— "Measures shall be taken that the scholars be not left without instruction in the doctrinal creed of the religious communion to which they belong."
156 The Church and the Education of the Yoimg.
teach the children the true Christian faith ; and for my part, I think it their duty to do so.*
One word on the financial aspect of the question, which may come to have its bearings in our own country. There seems no reason why the Church demands should not be yielded. Dr Hodge, of America, professed his willingness to exempt Roman Catholics from school rates, since their religion asked schools of their own, and most Presbyterians agreed with him.t But I cannot discuss the practical difficulties ; and would leave this part of the subject with the words of Dean Hook written fifty years ago : "If the Church of England claims a right to the exclusive education of the people, it becomes her duty to seek to supply the funds required, by appropriating her funds to this purpose. Our bishops are bound, upon this principle, to go down to the House of Lords and seek power from the legislature to sell their estates." Which words we beg leave to commend to our friends in the South.
The religious instruction in elementary schools in our country is, as we have seen, such as to inspire us with a measure of satisfaction. The teaching is regularly given on a sound basis and is in some cases examined with good results. The remarkable decrease of crime since the passing of the Education Act is a testimony to the value of the
* The admirable laboms of the Freres des Ecoles Chretiennes are an example of what may be done by pious zeal. Nor should it be forgotten that the National Assembly in 1790 exempted this brotherhood from its decree which suppressed other orders.
t I am of opinion, therefore, on the same grounds as are urged above that the Roman Catholic and Episcopalian and other denominational schools should receive assistance from the rates in Scotland. The amount given should be at the pleasure of the School Board, and should only be given to schools which are under Government inspection, and must therefore have been recognised by the Education Department as necessary in the special circumstances of the district. The object of the Education Act is to secure a good education for all, Avhich in the United Kingdom means a Christian education ; and no mere official pedantry should interfere with any wise way of carrying this out. It must be remembered, as stated above, that no denominational school can be originated without satisfying the Department that it is required.
The Church and the Education of the Young. 1 5 7
common schools in England. The number of offences which steadily rose till 1868, when it reached 247,000, had fallen to 198,000 in 1890, and most rapidly since 1882, by which time the education given had begun to tell. The number of habitual criminals fell in the same period from 87,688 to 52,1 83. There is a corresponding decrease in pauperism, notwithstanding our periods of bad trade, from 1,000,000 in 1870 to 775,000 in 1891. These figures give us courage even in presence of difficulties which are looming in the future.
So much for primary education : suffer a word or two on secondary schools. From all I can learn, there is a growing neglect of religion in our middle-class day schools in Scot- land ; and Lord Norton says the same thing is happening in England. The almost entirely secular character of our Scottish Universities, the scientific tendency of the age, and the keen passion for success which has invaded our middle- class schools, has tended to eliminate religious instruction, which can give no results that immediately pay. The ethical and spiritual side of life is forgotten ; the boys and girls seem too busy to have any time for religion, aod their whole aim is success in examinations. But, as Mark Pattison said : " Education has for its object to qualify for life. Life is not the profession or the shop ; these are live- lihood not life." I might give many facts to prove my statements, but your own knowledge will confirm what I say as to the materialistic and mechanical view of education taken in our Scottish higher schools. May we not ask, is all this not a throwing away of life for mere outward gain ; is it not 'propter vitawj vivendi perdere causas ?
I believe that in private schools, religious teaching is generally well given ; but I fear the governing bodies of our secondary schools are inclined to overlook the matter altogether. Can the Church be indifferent or silent on the education of those who must by-and-bye take positions of importance in public life ?
In days gone by, it was different. The grammar schools
158 The Church and the Education of the Yonng.
of England and Scotland were founded by piety, for true Christian teaching ; and the Jesuit schools were so admirable that Lord Bacon says he knows none better.
In the German gymnasia the law enjoins religious instruction at least twice a week.* The lower classes are taught the Scripture history, the Creed, and hymns ; the middle classes learn the life of Christ and Church History ; while the upper classes read the Greek Testament and receive lessons in Introduction and Dogmatics. The teach- ing is good and interesting, and the scholars discuss theological problems with eagerness. But the system depends on the teacher, who may be a sceptic or rationalist : and good men have felt their anxieties about it. The Church has had its doubts about the value of instruction which such teachers might give ; and accordingly a distinctly Christian gymnasium was instituted in 1851 at Gtitersloh. Here, as at Bugby under Arnold, the Christian faith was to be the basis of the whole school life.
A quarter of a century before, the same idea had inspired Dr Muhlenberg of America. That lover of mankind saw that the Church should accept as a cardinal part of its duty the providing of a distinctly Christian education for youth. He realised his ideal in the well- known Flushing Institution and St Paul's College, over which he presided for twenty years. The example of Dr Muhlenberg was followed in England by Canon Woodard, who founded the schools called by his name, the best known
* In the elementary schools of Germany the religious teaching has tlie foremost place in the school work, six hours per week being given to it. The inspector who examines the school is bound to take special heed of the religious instruction, which in the case of most of the children is based on the Scriptures, the Lutheran catechism and hymn book. The minority — Catholics or Jews — are entitled to a teacher of their own sect. Mr Matthew Arnold says : ' ' The religious instruction in the jiopular schools of Germany seems to me one of tiie best and most effective parts of the school work." Yet, notwithstanding all the excellent teaching, the spread of irreligion among the working classes of Germany is remarked on by their own clergy. There is probably exaggeration in their statements, and the steadfast character of the German nation is in itself a proof of the value of their religious education.
The Church and the Education of the Young. 159
of which is Lancing College ; and later on, by the Church Schuols Company, which had twenty-eight schools under its management last year.
And what is the Church of Scotland doing in this important question ? We have suffered our parish schools to be taken from us ; we have seen endowments, bound up with the Church and consecrated by pious wishes, given over to secular hands ; * is there no limit to this madness of indifference ? Are our clergy heedless of all change except such as affects their emoluments or the numbers of their communicants ?
Is it not possible for us to have schools for the middle classes directly under Church control, where our boys and girls can receive a really Christian education ? Such a school, where the whole spirit would be religious, would be a great boon to our rising generations. Do not misunder- stand me when I speak of religious schools. Some seem to imagine that a system like that of the Jesuits of the past would be pursued ; where the soul would be stifled with the tedium of perpetual religious exercises, where the result would be, to quote the words of Erasmus, virtutem simul odisse et nosse. The English public school system at its best, or the admirable training of Port Royal, is nearer the ideal school. In Scotland, we cling to the day- school, and doubtless we are wise in so doing. Professor Sewell said, " It has been the mistake of the English Church to think more of individuals than of families. It has broken up the family relationship by transplanting the children into large schools, and superseding the parental authority." In our country, it is due to the fact that parental care is still given to the children while they are at school that the great evils of an almost secular system are lessened. But I am convinced that these evils are apparent in the lessening interest in religion among our young
* Tlie Church, through the General Assembly, submitted to the secularising of the funds of the S.P.C.K. with, I think, only one dissentient voice, that of Dr Sprott.
i6o The Church and the Education of the Young.
men ; and no amount of guild work, which, after all, is an artificial method, repulsive to many of our best young men, can make up for the loss of earlier opportunities of laying the foundation of the religious life. The Church, at all events, is bound to impress on parents the pressing need of giving their boys and girls the best religious teaching they can, and bringing them early to the Communion. I am inclined to think that heretical views as to the Church, an ignorance as to her mission of nourishing and bringing up those who are her members by baptism, and an anabaptist view as to conversion are at the root of most of our indifference. But whether that be so or not, it is certain that the Church does not even fulfil all her duty when she enjoins parents to do theirs. Her clergy must take on themselves their voluntary burden of assisting in the daily education of the young. They should offer their services free of reward as the priests in other lands do ; and I am convinced we should reap a rich harvest not only in this world but also in that which is to come.
Note. — This paper treats only of the question of Day- School education : it was intended that others should take up the work of the Church in Sunday Schools, Classes, Guilds, and Services for the Young.
THE HISTORICAL CONTINUITY OF THE CHURCH OF SCOTLAND.
Rev. George W. Sprott, D.D.
As it will be necessary to speak at some length on the succession of the ministry at and since the Reformation, I shall only have time to allude briefly to other important aspects of the question before us.
The Church before the Reformation.
The Celtic Church was marked by peculiarities of much greater significance than those which referred to the clerical tonsure and the proper date of Easter, but it need not de- tain us, as centuries before the Reformation it was assimi- lated to the rest of Western Christendom.
The Reformation.
In 1558 and 1559 the Reforming party petitioned that the Church should be reformed in accordance with the pre- cepts of the New Testament, the writings of the ancient Fathers, and the godly rules of the Emperor Justinian, and that the face of the primitive Church might be restored. They asked, among other things, that the Sacraments should be administered in the vulgar tongue, and the Lord's Supper in both kinds ; that the immorality of the clergy should be suppressed, and that bishops should be appointed with consent of the gentry of the diocese, and parish ministers with consent of the parishioners. The refusal of this petition was followed by a religious war, in which the Reforming party gained the upper hand, and in 1560 Par-
L ^6'
i62 The Historical Continuity of the
liament threw off the yoke of the Papacy, and ratified the Confession of Faith drawn up by the Reforming clergy. We learn from Ninian Wingate that in the spring of 1559, large numbers of the clergy joined the ranks of the Reformed, and there is no reason to doubt that the Reformation was effected with " the consent of the greater part both of pastors and people," It was not a secession but a movement en onasse, and from that time till 1784 the Romish Church had no existence in the country as an organised body. In 1562 it was ordained that as many ministers as had been accepted of their kirks should remain as lawful ministers, unless they had been found corrupt in life or doctrine. Of the 5 superintendents, 289 ministers, and 715 readers officiating in 1567, the great majority must have been old priests. A few years later, in St Andrews, where before the Reformation there had been about 160 ecclesiastics, the whole com- munity had joined the Reformed Church, except three who were suspected of Popery and two confirmed Papists, one of whom was a priest. In 1567 Parliament declared the Reformed Church to be the only true Church of Christ in the realm, and to be entitled to the teinds as its proper patrimony, or inheritance. Since then it has had constant national recognition ; in the eye of the law it has always been the same Church, it has embraced the great body of the people, it has always reflected the national character, and has in turn influenced and moulded it.
But these things are not suflficient to justify its claim to be the national branch of the Church Catholic, unless it can be shown that it has " continued steadfast in the Apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread and in prayers." We proceed to prove that, while it has under- gone many superficial changes, the sacred bonds which bind it to the Church formed at Pentecost have never been broken.
I. Doctrine.
The old Scottish Confession of 1560 kept its place as the authorised doctrinal Standard of the Church till 1647, wheu
C/mrch of Scotland. 165
the Westminster Confession was adopted as in nothing con- trary to that previously received. This last lost its civil sanction in 1661, but (as we learn from Bishop Burnet) it continued to be used by the bishops and clergy during the second episcopacy. In 1690 it was ratified anew by Par- liament as the public and avowed Confession of the Church, and it has ever since had the sanction both of Church and State. The Apostles' Creed was also used both in public worship and in baptism from the Reformation as before till 1690. There were interruptions in the later covenanting period, but after the adoption of the West- minster Standards, Presbyteries disciplined those who objected to its use in the baptismal service. After 1690, it was continued only as an appendix to the Catechism, but its use in the administration of the Sacraments and in public worship has again been widely restored. We have thus every right to claim that our Church at the Reformation cast off Romish corruptions of doctrine and has maintained the Faith in apostolic purity ever since.
II. The Apostles Fellowship.
Under this head I shall speak chiefly of the lineal descent of our clergy from those ordained by the Apostles. As the Westminster divines said, we have " a lineal succession from Christ and His Apostles as well as a doctrinal succession." Ordination is the bond which makes us participators of the Apostolic ministry, and that "which mainly holds the Church together" through successive generations. Bishop Lightfoot expressed the verdict of the most learned divines of all ages when he said, " the Episcopate " was " developed out of the Presbytery." In the Old Testament Church there were the High Priest, the ordinary priests, and the Levites, and the obvious counterpart and fulfilment of these orders is only to be found in Christ our great High Priest and Head, and in the presbyters and deacons who serve under Him in His Church.
164 The Historical Continuity of the
Nature itself teaches us, as Calvin says, that every council must have its official head, and the extent of his powers is a question of expediency not of principle. But the presi- dent is merely first among equals, and hence Episcopacy is nothing more than a phase of Presbytery. Scripture gives us examples of presidentship in the first councils of pres- byters, but neither in Scripture nor in primitive times is there any trace of persons receiving a second ordination or consecration on their elevation to the chair. It follows from this that there never has been and never can be anything but ordination by presbyters in the Christian Church, even if it be granted that Episcopacy dates from the Apostolic age. It would have been easy for our Reformers to have continued what is now-a-days called the historic Episcopate, as bishops duly consecrated became reformed ministers and acted as superintendents in their former dioceses. But it seems never to have entered their minds that the Episcopate was anything more than an ecclesiastical arrangement. It was the conviction of the greatest divines of the Middle Ages, that presbyter and bishop formed but one order in the ministry. In 1537 the Convocation of the English Church had declared that in the New Testament there was BO mention made of any degrees or distinctions in the ministry, except the two orders of presbyter and deacon. Scottish historians, like Fordun and Major, had accepted the common if erroneous tradition, that at first the Scottish Church was governed by presbyters without bishops, and that in the Celtic Church this had prevailed for centuries ; and Boman ecclesiastics though they were, they never thought of this as making any breach of historical continuity.
From 1560 till 1571 the Church was governed by Assem- blies, Synods and Kirk Sessions. The Synods were presided over by superintendents, who formed the executive of the Church and who did very much the work of bishops. The appointment of clergymen during this period consisted chiefly in the admission of old priests to be ministers or readers. Any new ordinations that took place were conducted by the
Church of Scotland. 165
superintendents, some of whom were bishops, assisted by other presbyters.
We are told by some that the chain was broken at this point, because, in the case of a few laymen then admitted to the ministry, the laying on of hands by ordination was omitted. This is founded on a statement of the First Book of Discipline, that it was not necessary. But that book was never law, civil or ecclesiastical, and there is no act of the General Assembly authorising such an omission. Calvin's Institutes, first published in 1536 and in English in 1561, contain such statements as the following : " Seeing that in the sacred Assemblies all things ought to be done decently and in order, there is nothing in which this ought to be more carefully observed than in settling (Church) govern- ment, irregularity in any respect being nowhere more perilous." " It (the laying on of hands) was uniformly observed by the Apostles, and ought to be regarded by us in the light of a precept." " The laying on of hands ... I admit to be a sacrament in true and legitimate ordination." " In it there is a ceremony which ... is declared by Paul to be not empty or superfluous, but ... a faithful symbol of spiritual grace." In the face of such declarations from the great master at whose feet our Reformers sat, it would require clear proof that they laid aside this ceremony at all. The records of the Church at that period are imperfect, but I think it not unlikely that John Erskine of Dun, the only one of the superintendents whose regular ordination is doubtful, received that imposition of hands which he himself refers to in letters written in 1571 as an apostolic institution, and as then used at the admission of ministers.
1571—1592.
In 1571 titular Episcopacy was introduced by a con- cordat between Church and State, and it continued to have the sanction of law till 1592 ; but in 1580 the Assembly condemned that kind of Episcopacy as unlawful, and there-
1 66 The Historical Continuity of the
after Presbyteries were set up. The two systems were com- bined, or rather "jumbled confusedly together," till 1592, when Presbytery was ratified by the State. Under the titular arrangement, Douglas, who had been ordained before the Reformation, was made Archbishop of St Andrews in Feb. 1571, and the imposition of hands was used at his admission to that office. In the preface to an ordinal drawn up under Episcopal sanction at a later period, it is stated that " Our Church hath in diverse Assemblies and specially in the Assembly which was kept at Edr. the 5th of March 1570 appointed their admittance {i.e., pastors) to be by a public and solemn form of ordination," and the order then adopted is spoken of as "good and commendable." John Morrison appears in a list of clergy as Minister of Baro in East Lothian in 1574. Some years later he was received into the Church of England by Archbishop Grindal, who in licensing him " to celebrate divine offices and minister the Sacraments throughout the whole Province of Canterbury," places on record the fact that " he was admitted and ordained to sacred orders and the holy ministry by the im- position of hands, according to the laudable form and order of the Reformed Church of Scotland," and that he "ratifies and approves the form of his ordination." In the Second Book of Discipline drawn up by authority of the Church in 1577, it is said that " the ceremonies of ordination are fasting, earnest prayer and the laying on of hands." It is thus evident that if the imposition of hands was ever omitted, it could only have been in a few cases during a short period, and that it was restored while most of the clergy had pre-Reformation orders.
1592— 1G38.
After 1592, the Church was under Presbyterial govern- ment as at present for some years, but King James was anxious to restore Episcopacy, and he induced the Assembly of 1610 to assent to it. The new bishops by the king's orders, but without warrant from the Church, were conse-
Church of Scotland. 167
crated by English prelates, who recognised the validity of their previous ordination as presbyters. The historic Epis- copate was thus reintroduced into the Church, and was combined with Presbyterian Church Government. Reordi- nation of the clergy was never dreamt of, but in the case of new ordinations, bishops and presbyters laid on their hands. In the ordinal drawn up during this period, the bishop, with the ministers present, is directed to lay hands on the head of the candidate, and to say : " In the name of God, and by the authority committed to us by the Lord Jesus Christ, we give unto thee power and authority to preach the Word of God, to minister His Holy Sacraments, and exercise dis- cipline in such sort as is committed unto ministers by the order of our Church," which certainly covers both the power of ordination and jurisdiction.
1638—1661.
The Assemblies of 1638 and 1639 abolished Episcopacy, claiming a constitutional right to do so, inasmuch as by law the bishops -were subject to the General Assembly. Bat this involved no breach of continuity, and there was no formation of a separate Episcopal Church. Three-fourths of the clergy were then in Episcopal orders, and they were in a majority in every Presbytery. The records of the time show what care was taken to guard against any irregularity in ordination. Take, e.g., the Presbytery Record of Kirk- caldy, under date of April 26, 1638, " The Presbytery having the power of ordination j\ire diuino, being also after the Reformation invested therewith jicre nosti^o parliamcntario, and never again deprived of the same by any posterior act, either of Parliament or General Assembly, hath admitted and ordained . . . Mr George Gillespie into the ministry at Weems, ... by taking his oath of allegiance, and giving to him imposition of hands with full power to preach the word, minister the sacraments, exercise Kirk discipline, and do all the offices of a complete minister." There had been
1 68 The Historical Cotitinuity of the
no restrictions in the exercise of the office of presbyter im- posed in either Episcopal or Presbyterian times. The power of jurisdiction and ordination had always been conferred, and it is worthy of note that after 1638 several of the bishops became parish ministers, and one of them at least took part in ordinations where all the powers of the Epis- copate were conferred.
It was during this period that the first schism took place in the Eeformed Church. In 1651 a small number of ministers rejected the authority of the General Assembly, and formed themselves into a party called the Protesters. The disruption was not complete, because Cromwell did not allow the General Assembly to meet after 1652, and his officers interfered with Synods and Presbyteries in the exercise of discipline. The Protesters, who were in close alliance with the usurper, were thus kept in their parishes.
1661—1680.
We now come to the most deplorable period in the history of our Church. Charles II., whose restoration was mainly effected by Presbyterians, in violation of his solemn oath and royal word restored Episcopacy in 1661, without a shadow of warrant from the Church. The whole legislation of the previous twenty-three years was annulled by the Act Rescissory. Synods and Presbyteries were not allowed to meet till authorised anew by the bishops. In October 1662 it was enacted that all ministers who had been appointed since 1649 should receive presentations from the patrons and induction from the bishops. About two hundred refused to do so, and were deprived. The clergy ordained before 1649 were not directly touched by this Act, but about one hun- dred and fifty of them were deprived for not attending Synods and Presbyteries when revived by the bishops. Douglas, the leader of the Church after Henderson, tells us that he dealt with the statesmen to allow Presbyteries to stand without interruption, as when Episcopacy was Intro-
Church of Scotland. 169
duced in 1610, and suggested that in that case fewer minis- ters would object to attend them. Some who refused had powerful friends and were allowed to remain. Of the clergy who conformed, many remained Presbyterian by conviction, and some of the best of the bishops, such as Leighton and Scougal, were but half Episcopal in their judgment. Of the outed ministers, about one hundred, including the most eminent, were in 1669 and 1672 allowed again to officiate as parish ministers without sub- mitting to Episcopacy. In 1681 about eighty of the parish clergy resigned rather than take the ' oaths required by Government. People were compelled to attend their parish churches, and the outed ministers were forbidden to preach or baptise under the heaviest penalties. During these twenty-eight years of persecution the doctrine and worship of the Church underwent almost no change, and Synods and Presbyteries met and conducted business much as in pre- vious periods. At the reintroduction of Episcopacy in 1660, two of the four bishops who received consecration in England were obliged to submit to reordination as presby- ters, on account of the English Act of Uniformity passed after the Restoration, but they submitted unwillingly, and there was no repetition of this insult to the Reformed Churches in the case of other Scottish presbyters raised to the Episcopate, nor was there any attempt to reordain the parish clergy, most of whom were in Presbyterian orders. The late Dr Grub informed me that he knew of only one case of the kind, and he presumed that it had been done privately. New ordinations were conducted by bishops, assisted by presbyters, as during the first Episcopacy.
FroDi 1688 till the 'present liDie.
The Revolution of 1688 brought this bloody page in the history of our Church to a close. The Scottish Parliament then abolished Prelacy, ratified anew the Westminster Confession, restored Presbyterian Church Government as
1 70 The Historical Continuity of the
settled in 1592, vested the ecclesiastical Government in the survivors of those ministers who had been deprived and in those whom they should receive into communion, and called a meeting of the General Assembly, after an interruption of thirty-eight years. The Act Rescissory was left unrepealed, so that none of the ecclesiastical legislation of the covenanting: period is now binding, except such Acts as have been revived by the General Assembly since 1690.
Most of the Episcopal clergy who were willing to take the oath of allegiance to William and Mary were desirous to continue in the Church as thus restored, and hundreds were received ; but an Act of Parliament, allowing those Avho preferred to remain and officiate in their parishes without taking part in the Courts of the Church, was passed, and was taken advantage of by many. Those who refused to take the oath of allegiance to Government, and others who were considered corrupt in life and doctrine, were deprived. At the beginning of the Revolution in the south and west, where the persecution had been hottest, many ministers who had abbetted it were rabbled out of their parishes, and the worst Act of the Government was the les^alisinoj of these evictions. The change in the Church at that time was mainly in the way of restoration, and as it was approved or acquiesced in by the largest section both of the clergy and people, there was no breach of continuity. Since then she has enjoyed a large measure of peace and prosperity, and to her influence is greatly due the high character for which our countrymen have since been distinguished. After 1688, ordination by Presbyteries was resumed, many of the ordainers being then in Episcopal orders, and it has since then been conducted with strict regularity. The Moderates and Evangelicals of past generations were of one mind as to the necessity of a valid ordination and of an unbroken succession in the ministry. Priucipal Hill, the leader of the Church in his day, and one of our greatest divines, laid down principles on these subjects which leave nothing to be desired. He says : " The right of preaching the
Church of Scotland. 171
word, dispensing the sacraments and exercising ecclesiastical jurisdiction . . . was conveyed by the Apostles to all whom they ordained. . . . And every one who is ordained (Presbyter) is as much a successor of the Apostles as any Christian Teacher can be. . . . We contend that we are successors of the Apostles invested with all the power which of right belongs to any Minister of the Church of Christ."
" The idea of a right in the whole congregation to . . . ordain their own Ministers ... is inconsistent with the principles of Presbyterian government, and has often been disclaimed by the Church of Scotland both in ancient and modern times." In the ordinations of our Church the candi- date is invested " with the full character of a minister of the Gospel," and there is conveyed to him " by prayer and the imposition of the hands of the Presbytery all the powers implied in that character." The Edinburgh Christian Instructor, under the editorship of Dr Andrew Thomson, the leader of the Evangelical party, contained as able and as strong articles as are anywhere to be met with on the necessity of an unbroken ministerial succession from the days of the Apostles, and on the Scottish Church possessing it. During last century, if any Congregational minister applied for admission into our Church he was ordained. As an example, I may refer to the case of Dr Jones, the minister of Lady Glenorchy's Church, Edinburgh.
It was reserved for the Assembly of 1882 to break through this apostolic rule, and to admit men to the status of ministers without a valid ordination. No wonder that such words as the following were then heard in the General Assembly : " This is a bad day for the Kirk." "We shall have to become Episcopalians to save Presbytery." " Certainly there is no Presbytery here." " We are no longer a Church." Many protested against the decision as incompetent, and as overturning the Constitution of the Church. A committee was appointed to answer the reasons given, but no answers were forthcoming, and protestation was offered at next Assembly that such was the case. The Church has since
172 Historical Continuity of Church of Scotland.
returned to its previous practice, and if any like departure from its fundamental principles were again attempted, this Society would have something to say on the subject.
III. The Breaking of Bread and of Prayers.
The third essential of the continuity of the Church is its maintenance of the worship instituted by our Lord and His Apostles. Amid many corruptions in pre-Reformation times, and many defects since, that worship has never ceased to be offered.
But time forbids me to enlarge, and I shall conclude with a brief reference to other claimants to the honour of representing the historic Church of our land. The record of the Scottish Episcopal Church dates only from 3 661, according to its own showing, while, as we think, it began with the section that separated from the National Church after the Revolution. Anglicans speak of the Romish Church in this country as ''the Italian Mission"; and the Episcopal Church in Scotlaud has, with at least equal propriety, been described as " the English Mission." With regard to the Presbyterian secessions, they did not take place under the authority of the Church, nor with the consent of the greater part of its pastors and people. Still less can they claim identity of principle with the Scottish Church in past centuries, for, not to speak of other things, it has always condemned schism, and has always regarded the secularisation of property devoted to God as sacrilege. Their true predecessors are the protesters of 1G51. If the Ancient Church of Scotland is not, and has not all along been represented by our Reformed Church, it ceased to exist more than three centuries aero.
The subject of re-union does not fall within the scope of this paper, but, I may add, that it will be a great step towards it when the Anglican bishops recognise the validity of the orders of other Reformed Churches, as their prede- cessors did for more than a century after the Reformation.
THE HISTORICAL CONTINUITY OF THE CHURCH OF SCOTLAND.
Rev. Thomas Leishman, D.D.
The continuity of our Church, through the transmission of the ministerial office from generation to generation, can hardly be questioned as a tact. But the insisting on it as a requisite is looked on with suspicion by many. In the Church of a neighbouring kingdom some have rested the principle on a narrow basis, and supported it in a narrow spirit. Many among us, accepting too readily the assump- tion that apostolical and episcopal succession are equivalent tei'ms, have, in the recoil of resentment, fallen back almost to the confines of Independency, which sees in each Christian association a separate and complete organism, developing from within itself the ministries of grace. Wide as is the difference between this system and that of Rome, there is here a certain analogy between them. In each case he who professes to proclaim the mind of Christ receives his visible mission from below, one from the congregation, the other from the sacred College. For there can be no apostolic succession to the Papacy. No earlier holder conveys the office to his successor. From the death of one to the election of the other, it is extinct on earth. Can there be a connection between this fact and another, that Rome has never made so much of episcopal succession as High Anglicans do ? The extreme views held on this point by some in South Britain are only another illustration of the law that Christian bodies are apt to magnify unduly the point of difference which distinguishes them most
174 The Historical Continuity of the
sharply from local opponents. We refuse to accept their voice as the voice of their Church, so long as we can point to her Canons of 1604, authorised both by King and Convocation, enjoining prayer to be made regularly for the Churches of England, Scotland, and Ireland, while in Scotland there was not at that moment a single successional bishop, nor certainty that there ever would be. On this, however, and on various other matters, the Church of England, lying so near to us as she does, and filling so much of the field of vision, may employ too many of our thoughts. These ought to range over something wider in space than this moderately-sized island. What we hold is that the radical order of the Christian ministry is the presbyterate, and that, in the often quoted words of Bishop Lightfoot, " the episcopate was formed not out of the apostolic order by localisation, but out of the presbyterial by elevation," * Even in one of the earlier Oxford Tracts, believed to be by Newman, the writer, before going on to press very strongly the authority of the episcopate, says, " the more clear and simple principle for a Churchman to hold is that of a ministerial succession, which is undeniable as a fact, while it is most reasonable as a doctrine, and sufficiently countenanced in Scrij)ture for its practical recep- tion. Of this Episcopacy, i.e., superintendence, is but an accident ; though for the sake of conciseness, it is often spoken of as synonymous with it " (Tract vii. 1). Let us search in Scripture for the functions which Christ assigned to His apostles, be they presbyters or be they bishops. Apart from the temporary one of witnessing to the fact of His resurrection, they were these, to teach, to bind and loose, to baptize, to celebrate the Supper, with promises to be with them till the end of all things. Every one of these has from the first, by common consent and practice, been an office of the presbyter. What is left to the apostle in his episcopal character, by direct commission from the Lord ? I know of nothing, unless, with the Church of
* No one denies tliat since tlie time of the apostles, the presbyter has becu the usual channel of word and sacrament.
Church of Scotland. 175
Rome, we give an individual reference to the words, " upon this rock I will build My Church," which excludes eleven of the number. We need not follow the well-beaten track of controversy through the period covered by the history of the Acts and the teaching of the Epistles. Before we have gone far in the line of later history, we find two offices existing apart, dividing between them two titles, those of bishop and presbyter, which few now deny to have been at the very first convertible terms. The point at issue is whether the bearers of these titles were two orders of men, or a single order in two degrees of dignity. On the answer depends largely the decision of the question, whether the continuity of the Church rests on the body of presbyters or on the bishop as such. From very early times there seems to have been a virtual acknowledgment by the prelate that a commission given by him alone would be incomplete. For he has had it strengthened not only by the presence, not only by the assent, of presbyters, but by their performing the very manual act of ordination simultaneously with him- self. At the present day, when the kindred question is discussed of the necessity of bishops receiving their own mission from brother-bishops, appeal is constantly made to passages in the Fathers where a succession of bishops in certain sees is taken to be a guarantee for the transmission of pure doctrine. But what is plainly meant is a sequence of tradition, not of consecration. For the last would be an impossibility. A new bishop could not be consecrated by the dead man who had left the place vacant for him. His commission must come from outside, from the bishops of other sees, and the familiar quotations lose all force as vouchers for vertical prelatical succession. The local continuity referred to by Tertullian and others could be perpetuated only through the body of presbyters testifying to the truth that had been handed down to them. Their bishop's name would serve for chronological record, as acts of Parliament are ranged under the names of reigning monarchs. Our contention, that bishop and presbyter continued to be in effect one order after the partition of
176 The Historical Continuity of the
the names, is supported by much early evidence, particularly by the full and distinct statements of St Jerome. Rome, so far from identifying herself with these extreme insular views which among us have excited so much prejudice ao-ainst the very word succession, has always shown con- siderable toleration for the opinion that the two offices are essentially one. It had the support of many of the school- men, among the rest of Peter Lombard and Thomas Aquinas. Some canonists have held that the Pope may delegate to a sino-le presbyter the right of ordaining. A case is recorded in which one of the Popes, Pelagius I., was himself conse- crated to the holy see by two bishops having a presbyter associated with them. At the Council of Trent, no question was more fiercely debated than the demand for a canon resting the authority of the episcopate on Christ's institu- tion, but under the influence of Rome it was finally with- held. For the bishop she finds no place among the seven orders of the ministry. The priest stands first. Coming nearer home, we find, in the eighteenth century, cases among Scottish Roman Catholics in which presbyters took part in the consecration of bishops. In two of these, one so recent as in 1791, the ceremony was performed by one bishop only, supported by two presbyters. What had those presbyters to confer ? Not the ordinary functions of their own office. With these the bishops-elect were already invested. There remained those only which are by usage episcopal duties. The concurring presbyters, therefore, helped to convey the right of creating other presbyters. It is interesting in these later times to come on a trace, if a faint one, of an opinion so emphatically borne witness to by the most leai-ned of the Fathers of the Latin Church, the author of her Vulgate. Let me add that a belief in minis- terial succession is not the novelty among presbyters of the Reformed Church in this country that some suppose it to be. A passage is sometimes quoted from the old Scottish Con- fession which is supposed to contradict it. It declares that, among other things, lineal descence is no note of the true
Church of Scotland. 177
Church. But it is remarkable that in the Latin version of that Confession, prepared by desire of the Kirk in 1572, the phrase is Umited to prelatical succession. The words are " a successione perpetua episcoporum." And the doctrine is very plainly set forth in the Jus Divinum Ministerii Evangelici, that too much neglected book in which the ministers of London under Cromwell embodied their views, when they had escaped from the atmosphere of compromise which Presbyterians had to breathe in the Westminster Assembly among Independents and Erastians. They say, " The receiving of our ordination from Christ and His apostles and the primitive Churches, and so all along through the apostate Church of Rome, is so far from nullifying our ministry, or disparaging of it, that it is a great strengthen- ing of it, when it shall appear to all the world that our ministry is derived to us from Christ and His apostles by succession of a ministry contained in the Church for 1600 years, and that we have : (1) A lineal succession from Christ and His apostles. (2) Not only a lineal succession, but that which is more, and without which the lineal is of no benefit, we have a doctrinal succession also " (Part ii. p. 45).
M
EVANGELISTIC WORK AND ITS PROPER BASIS.
Rev. H. J. WoTHERSPOON, M.A.
It is easiest, perhaps, to approach the consideration of evangelistic work and its proper basis by considering the evangelism prevalent around us. I do not mean Evan- gelicalism— by the nature of the case we of this Society are all evangelical, — a sound faith must at the least include every detail of the theology which is popularly characterised by the term. Nor do I intend the older evangelism * of the earlier revival — but recent extremes and typical develop- ments, which at present hold the field.
We are bound, in speaking of such work, to acknowledge two things — the enormous amoiont of such work that is being done, earnestly and diligently, and the 7ieed of it.
It is impossible to be satisfied with the current evangelism, either for its methods or its results ; but we must thankfully recognise its evidence of profound and widespread interest in religion, much personal devotion, real spiritual energy, and multitudinous instances of individual perception of Christ. We may criticise both method and result, and yet feel what a witness there is
* " What is belief? What does it demand ? Does it demand conviction of sin, confession of sin, repentance, faith ? All these things, except faith, are dropped nowadays, and people are led to believe that to accept Christ as a Saviour, and to wish for His Salvation, is the sum and substance of a heart turned to God. It requires no self-abasement, no confession of the justice of the Divine \vrath, no acknowledgment of inherited corruption ; and, dis- guise it as the preacher may, no sense of demerit, no sense of deserved condemnation. It is in fact reduced to an easy, agi'eeable acceptance of a pleasant invitation, to be had at any time that is convenient to you. Herein lies the seed of an incipient Antinomianism." — Lord Shaftesbury's
Life, iii. 23.
1 79
i8o Evangelistic Work and its proper Basis.
to the power of the Holy Name of Christ, when our ways are ringing with His praises, however rudely sung, and His Gospel is preached from every street corner, often crudely and imperfectly enough, and yet with a fervour and courage and forgetfuluess of self which may put our decorousness to shame. We have, please God, in- finitely more in common with these evangelists of the halls and streets than with routine religion, or luxurious worldliness, or intellectual negativism, though they were to be found in our own parishes and pulpits. And there is wholesome and sharp rebuke for us in much of that undisciplined evangelism ; if by its means converts are made (as they are made), while we have to comfort our- selves by talking of seed growing secretly, and results never to be seen in this world. We have something, too, to learn from them — it is not for nothing that our own converts tend (as they do) to drift from us to that evangelism and its circles, looking for what they call (and they mean something real) " life " — an atmosphere of fervent and active fellowship.
We are bound, too, to acknowledge that it has gi'own up because of the field for it, and because that field was unoccupied. It sprang up because the Church had not adequately recognised facts — the facts of the soul, which does not always grow to conscious knowledge of the truth in the process of normal Christian education, which, under ordinary influences, developes often indifference and often prodigalism ; and the facts of the tmie — that a vast mass of our people has been drifting from all touch with ordinance, and developing absolute atrophy of the spiritual organism. We had too much forgotten the kindling of the lamp and the sweeping of the house — the precious pieces of silver lay lost in the very dust among our feet. The continual mission work of the Church to her own children was neglected — its organ Avas lacking in the Church's order ; we must not forget that the very life of the Spirit in the Christian body would necessarily compel some such
Evangelistic Work and its proper Basis. 181
efforts to express and give effect to the Spirit's travailing as those which now we see to be, by the very circumstances of their existence, at fault in their basis, and defective in proceeding; in some respects even positively hurtful in parts of outcome.
Still farther, we should not forget what we owe to these self-originated efforts at evangelism, even when they seem to cross our lines and confuse our work. They are a constant witness to the inner vitality of the Christian faith, of itself, and for its own truth and power. This is not an official religion ; not a conventional Gospel ; not dependent on professional advocacy (as that of the clergy will always seem to the world). Those who are hostile to every clergy and antagonistic to all ecclesiastical communions are possessed by the same truths as ourselves, and are devoted to the same Lord we preach. In the absence of that witness of mutual love and unity, which our Lord has rather chosen, we may thank God for this, which has helped to keep alive among the indifferent the conviction that Christianity at least is true.
We must remember, too, that this evangelism has a distinct faith in the present supernatural — although it regards that only as in the individual ; that therein lies its force, and that so far it is infinitely higher and more Christian than much which passes for part of the Church's normal constituent.
On the other hand, the current evangelism fails by its individualism ; by its defective theology ; and by the externality of its relation to the Church. That it does good is evident ; but its good is essentially sporadic — it is in cases. And I believe that its good is in a sense limited to cases — that if its effect is regarded as in the large, and as extended in result over any considerable period of time, that will be found not wholly good. I fear that it has confused the religious sense of the com- munity by concentrating emphasis upon one or two doctrines, to the practical ignoring of the rest ; that it has shaken the
1 82 Evangelistic Work and its proper Basis.
whole traditional value attached by our people to religious training, by insisting on critical experience, as the one effective process of salvation ; that it has had the effect of substituting conversion for Christ as the object of faith — a past experience for a daily life in Christ. It has obscured the whole field of Christian morality to the con- science by its treatment of the consciously converted as the " saved," and implicitly of all others, whatever they be as humble believers in Christ and quiet followers of Him, as the " unsaved." It has in part weakened spiritual modesty by its habit of publicly unveiling experience for the purpose of testimony. It has terribly weakened the sense of parental responsibility for children, who are not to be reared as Christian, but are expected to be prodigal, as a necessary preliminary to return. It has depleted the Church of much of its best material — those earnest and living souls who are its very vigour — setting them out of sympathy with its broader aims and fuller recognition of truth, drawing them away to outside organisations, and creating in them an attitude of criticism and disapproval while they remain with us. It has unfitted our people to endure the weariness of welldoing and the monotony of the spiritual life ; under its influence, they have grown incapable of savouring any- thing except the exciting presentation of immediate salvation or eternal perdition. Yet it has wearied them with itself Its preaching is an endless repetition. Its teaching is limited to a few doctrines and a handful of texts. Therefore it too frequently fails to hold what it gains. It continually tends to pass on its subjects to one or other of two distinct classes — those who have been impressed and have declared their conversion, and afterwards have lapsed, and are now unimpressible ; and those who go farther to seek con- clusions, and leave simple evangelism for some form of extreme sectarianism, such as are found among the endless variety of Anabaptists and "Brethren." And it has produced an extensive spiritual barrenness — a spiritual desolation — among those whom it has attempted and has failed
Evangelistic Work and its proper Basis. 183
effectively to influence. These have become " gospel- hardened." They have been besieged with the ultimate appeal of life and death, forced upon them under every condition of unpreparedness for it ; and they are prac- tised to refuse it, and to adjudge themselves as those who refuse. In this way an extraordinary inaccessibility of soul has been evolved — a concluded avoidance of the subject of religion— which has grown to be a barrier against aggressive Church work of a curiously baffling kind. Finally, this Evangelism has taught the people to regard itself as " Christianity." Those who adopt its formulas are " Christians " — others are not. And this view has largely passed into popular acceptance — so that nothing except on these lines obtains recognition as distinctively religious, or entitled to be regarded as real and in earnest. Thus it has produced a strange sect within all the sects — an undenomi- national denomination, held together by its own freemasonry, having its fashions and shibboleths and enterprises — practically its own organisation for worship and work — along- side of and apart from those of the Church. This " un- denominationalism " is rapidly growing to be a very important factor in the religious life of our time. It would be useless to ignore its vigour — in the form to which I refer it is of very recent growth — and it has practically conquered the field of popular religious activity. And its power as a dis- integrating force within the Church is always more and more painfully felt, disintegrating, superseding, depleting, on every hand.
It is all very well to point to the good it has done for countless individuals — let the praise of that be to the truths which it embodies and proclaims — but the individual passes, the Church lives on to be God's steward and instrument from age to age. If the Church is weakened, her life con- fused, her traditions broken, her grasp on the flock of God slackened, the ultimate result for harm, even as regards the numbers of souls to be impressed, will balance heavily against sporadic and personal impressions, which end with the life of the persons impressed.
1 84 Evangelistic Work and its p7'oper Basis.
It is not waste of time to dwell on this, because our minds are possessed by this powerful and aggressive evan- gelism— we too are ready enough to accept it as holding the field for its proper end ; to think of it as something to be used as far as possible, something with which we ought to be able to sympathise ; it is difficult for us to know how to separate its truth and its good from its error and its peril — to realise that its error, which is rather its defect, is to be opposed and openly corrected — or to see that the work it aims to do is essential, while its methods may be erron- eous ; and that we must evangelise, and can evangelise, on a truer basis, with a fuller doctrine, and, please God, to a surer result.
The current evangelism fails because it is apart from the Church. The Church is God's agency for the salvation of the world, both to gain and to keep what is His for Him. There can be no substitute for its failure to do this work. The remedy is, not that the Church's work be done by others, or done for the Church and in her interest, but that she herself awake and fulfil her charge.
An evangelism which is only evangelistic must fail. It brings men within the wicket gate, and leaves them un- guided on the narrow way and to its countless dangers. It sows the good seed, and leaves it to spring and be choked. It must be one-sided and partial, attempting always to lay again foundations, dwelling always on alpha- betic things. By the nature of the case, it must exalt these to be all in all. To have believed is, with it, not to have found the way of salvation — it is to be saved. And since no man can desire more than salvation, all the rest, character, holiness, knowledge, growth, is by the way — treated as natural inference, and left to come of itself in the course of events. Evangelism has no pastorate, no direction, no protection, no tending and pruning of the vine branch, no nourishment. What is born of it, helpless as the new-born, is left to wayside mercies. It speaks the word that quickens, and forgets " He commanded to give
Evangelistic Work and its proper Basis. 185
her meat." And it is nothing to the purpose that much at least of the current evangelism professes to work for the Church and to feed the Church witli its converts. That is not the way of God, and it does not succeed in its professed intent. The Divine method is to adopt into a family, to re- store the strayed to the flock, to engraft into the vine, to build the fresh stone into the age-long walls of the City of God. The process cannot be broken up between the Divine agency and various human agencies, however earnest and diligent, without perilous results. What does not gather wiili Christ scatters abroad.
It must fail, too, by the partiality of its interest in the Gospel itself. Its theology ends at the cross. The Resurrection, the Ascension, Pentecost are unnecessary to it. It is concerned with Christ's ivorh, and with a part of His work, rather than with Christ. His part is played for it, in that He has suffered once for sins.
And because it omits appeal to the deepest and highest motives of action. It speaks of security instead of holiness, pardon instead of purity, of what we shall have, and not of what we shall lose. It tells men what Christ offers, but little of what Christ asks. Whereas men are drawn and held to Christ by His demand as Avell as by His gift, and for His sanctity and the hope of attaining to its fellowship as well as by the hope of future unearthly felicity.
And again, because it has no account to give of a great province of revelation — Church and ministry and Sacrament. In its latest developments, it dispenses with these, and at the same time invents substitutes for them. It has no realisation of the normal and continuous operations of the Holy Spirit, but is aware only of the extraordinary and critical.
Lastly, to form an adequate estimate of it, we must see not only whence it comes, but whither it goes — that practi- cally, when pushed to logical inferences, it has tended to emerge in the various heresies of Brethrenism.
A right evangelism must be that of the Church, in the
1 86 Evangelistic Work and its proper Basis.
care of her order, in the fulness of her doctrine, and leading to edification in her life. I do not mean that it must be by the presbyterate only — as manifold as are the graces of the Holy Spirit, and as widely as His gifts are bestowed, so manifold should be their use in the Church and so diligent her care that no gift be given in vain to any member of Christ. But that evangelisation be done as her work, studied and fostered and directed by her with such care as the most difficult and crucial of all her tasks require.
Its basis must be her basis — from Sacrament to Sacra- ment— in the truths of which Baptism and the Lord's Supper are the Sacraments.
Those whom here she has to evangelise are her own children, who have wandered blindly, or have departed recklessly, or are neglected by fault of hers ; but still her own. She must speak to them, not as to strangers and foreigners, but as to those on whom God has a lien — whom God has called ; who have already a tie to God, and God to them ; to whom God owns a care, and who owe duty to God. She must teach their responsibility, and she must teach the complementary ability to respond. Under the influence of current teaching, men are waiting for conver- sion, instead of turning to God and striving to enter into life. Conversion is popularly regarded as the act of God, in which man is passive. I need not say to you that the word is never used passively in the New Testament* — it is translated passively in the Authorised Version, and a whole theology of error has grown round the mistranslation. We have to call upon men, as redeemed, as those upon whom God's election rests, as men in peril of the second death, to convert and yield to God. And we must speak to them as men who liave power from God to obey God, Who commands them to believe. We
* Compare the renderings of the R.V. with those of tlie A.V. in Matt, xiii. 15 ; xviii. 3 ; Mark iv. 12 ; Luke xxii. 32 ; John xii. 40 ; Acts iii. 19 ; xxviii. 27.
Evangelistic Work and its proper Basis. 187
must speak to them as in an atmosphere of grace sufficient for them. And we must take this ground with assurance of its truth, perceiving it. Our Lord has taught us the nature of tUis evangelism which is committed to us. It is that of the shepherd, who goes to seek for his own sheep — of the woman who searches for the precious coin out of her own store, lost by her in her own house, — it tells of the Father forsaken by His child, yet bound to Him, even in the far country, by a link of nature which cannot cease to exist.
We must preach of conversion as a great reality — having place in some form, consciously or not, in all living Christian experience — yet not salvation by conversion — not conversion as the object of faith or ground of hope ; not conversion tested by power to date and place it, or to describe its experience. We must preach Christ ; and grace, mercy, and peace upon all who love Him in sincerity and truth.
And we must preach it as a beginning, not an end — not salvation, but entrance to " seek for glory and honour and immortality " by patient continuance in welldoing.
We must show it as conformity to the grace of Baptism, which, being once for all for entrance into Christ, leads to a life continually nourished by the ordinances of God, especially by the often repeated Sacrament of the Lord's Body and Blood — nourished, and at the same time con- secrated and offered.
And as we say, we must do. Our evangelising must be so wrought in with our pastorate, whether exercised in the same individual or not, that our fruit of evangelism shall be our continual and tenderest care. What we quarry, we must build up and carve to the adornment of the House of God. What we engraft, we must tend. What we gather to the fold, we must lead in and out, and see that it finds pasture, and is kept and guided in the peace of God.
Finally, the Church's evangelism must be in power and
1 88 Evangelistic Work and its proper Basis.
much assurance and in the Holy Ghost — with confidence in herself, as ordained of God, that He is with her, and that she has the grace of God, His help. His prepared life to offer to those who come at her call to Christ's arms.
And we must know the vast difficulty of recalling evan- gelism to wiser and fuller lines.
EVANGELISTIC WORK AND ITS PROPER BASIS.
Rev. J. Cromarty Smith, B.D.
Evangelistic work is the work of bringing the Gospel to bear upon the hearts, and in consequence upon the livesj of those who are living without God and without hope in the world. Now the Church, and the Church only, can declare the Gospel in its fulness ; for the Church only holds the faith of the Gospel, and she alone has been commissioned to declare it. We do not undervalue the work done by those various religious societies which exist ostensibly for the preaching of the Gospel, and which need not have existed in such numbers if the Church had been more alive to her duty, but the Gospel so preached is at best but a fragmentary Gospel, and cannot raise those whose knowledge and belief are confined to it to the stature of the perfect man in Christ Jesus.
And what is the Gospel ? St Paul tells us : " Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the Gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand ; by which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain. For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures ; and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day, according to the Scriptures ; and that He was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve " (1 Cor. xv. 1-5). That Christ died, that He was buried, and that He rose again : these are the central facts of Christ's work. All the rest of the faith leads up to and follows from these. The Incarnation, the Ascension, and the Heavenly Priest-
1 90 Evangelistic V/ork and its propei^ Basis.
hood of the Lord are impHed in these facts which St Paul terms the "first of all." We remember that the Gospel is not a mere proclamation of what Christ did for us when He died, which is too often regarded as being the whole Gospel, nor even of what He did during His earthly life by way of teaching, and healing, and blessing : it is not a mere proclamation of what Christ did, but of what He is doing now in His ascended and glorified state. He came down from heaven for us men, and for our salvation, but He that descended is the same that ascended far above all heavens that He might fill all things, and for ever until the ages close He lives in all the power of His glorified humanity, to save from sin and from death those who come to Him.
And further, the Church alone can do evangelistic work, for she alone possesses the power of conveying from Christ to His people those means by which the spiritual life can be nourished and maintained. Christ communicates to us the benefits of redemption, as our own branch of the Church truly teaches, by His " Word, Sacraments, and Prayer, all which are made effectual to the elect for salvation."
In what remains we will say a little about the methods by which the Church is to carry on her evangelistic work. But first of all let it be said that there are, as we all know, two departments of that work, or rather two fields for its exercise. The Church has to evangelise the world that lieth in darkness, and that world consists of our home, as well as our foreign heathen, but she has, alas ! also to evangelise those who are nominally within her pale, those who attend more or less regularly on her ordinances, and whose outward life is more or less respectable ; those who cannot be classed, to use the familiar phrase, among the " non-Churchgoing," There are those without to be brought within, and there are those within to be built up in their most holy faith.
And this being so, there are of necessity diflferent methods to be used. Of course there are certain methods,
Evangelistic Work and its proper Basis. 1 9 r
or rather certain aspects, of teaching necessary for both classes — as, for instance, that all who are baptized are under an obligation to serve God. But it stands to reason, that the truth must be presented in one aspect to your regular Church-goer, who knows, intellectually at least, the way of salvation, and in another, to the man who is in total ignorance of things divine.
First a very few words about evangelistic work among our Church-going people. It is a truism that there are many in the Church but not of the Church, many who have not personally made that conscious yielding of them- selves to God, call it conversion, call it realisation of their Baptism, or whatever else you like. And it is to those that perhaps our first duty lies, and this for two reasons : (1) Our own household has the first claim upon us ; and (2) our hope of converting the outside world must be small unless those who are in the Church are living consecrated lives. Our duty, therefore, is to them in the first place, both because they are nearest to us and because this is our best policy, if we may use the word, in our attitude to those who make no profession. And in this department there is scope for our best and most zealous efforts. It is no easy task to awaken the slumbering conscience, to convict of sin those who are persuaded that they are not so bad as others, and to enlist in the service of God those whose whole interest has been centered, it may be for years past, around themselves. Yet this is our task, and yet not ours, for it can only be accomplished by the moving of the Spirit of God. We in our work must allow ourselves to be guided by that Spirit, and trust to His influence operating upon those for whose souls' welfare we are striving. And surely, as regards the methods of this work, we need not concern ourselves to find out new inventions. As there is no other name given under heaven among men whereby we must be saved than Jesus Christ, so there are no other methods, or at any rate no methods so good, for bringing men to
192 Evangelistic Work arid its proper Basis.
God than those which have the sanction of that Church to which He entrusted His work. We must awaken men to the realisation of their covenant with God in Holy Baptism whereby He made them His, setting His mark and seal upon them, and lead them to see how unworthily they have lived of their privilege as sons of God. We must exhort them to diligent preparation, not only for first Communion but, what is too often forgotten, for all Communions, showing them how unfailingly necessary is that patient, prayerful self-examination on which St Paul lays so much stress : we must assure them of the Forgive- ness taught in the Holy Supper by Christ in that cup which is for the '' Remission of Sins," and we must teach them to be very careful after Communion, to cherish the grace imparted to them and to rest upon the strength of the food received. About our preaching in this con- nection so much might be said that it is best perhaps to say nothing. I would only say, that we must remember what powerful machinery the Church furnishes us with in her continually revolving year of Advent, Christmas, Lent, Passion-tide, Easter, Ascension, and Pentecost. There we have it all : awakening, penitence, pardon, newness of life, and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. By following the year's course we are bound to dwell upon all these things, and so to declare to our people the whole counsel of God. Such preaching, if onl}' we are guided in it by the Holy Spirit as we must be, and prayerfully depend upon His promised power, always bears, as experience, the best teacher, has proved to many of us, abundant fruit of the right kind.
And now about our work among those who are without the Church. Here again I am persuaded that our methods need not of necessity be new. Not that any of us would be so foolish as to refuse to adopt any method because it is new : and the wisest man is the man who is always most willing to learn from others, even if those others be those from whom he differs in some things ; but there
Evangelistic Work and its proper Basis. 193
is a tendency upon the part of many to abandon the old methods and say that those methods have failed when, as a matter of fact, they have not had even a fair trial. Patient, systematic visitation of the people in their homes, dealing with them as far as possible personally and privately, simple preaching of the Cross of Christ, with none of that tinsel and tawdriness and self-conceit so deplorably common even in our own branch of the Church ; these methods are old, but where honestly tried have not failed, and cannot fail.
About preaching: it is well we should be on our guard against going from one extreme to the other. It is true that preaching has too much usurped the place of the one only Divine Service among us, and we all long for that time when the Holy Communion will be restored to its right place as the united act of worship of the faithful every Lord's day ; but because we have been putting preaching in the wrong place we need not banish it from its right place. On the contrary, we must pay more attention to preaching than we have been doing of late. Not only the people but the clergy must attend thereto with diligence, preparation, and prayer. Whether it be in the Church or at the street corner (and I am keenly alive to the benefit in certain places of open-air preaching of the right sort), the preaching of the Cross is to them that believe the power of God.
About special preaching — missions, for instance — I should have liked to say something, but time forbids me. Missions have their place and their undoubted benefits, but they have also their dangers. It is folly, for example, for a man to imagine that if his parish be in a spiritually un- satisfactory state he can get all put right by bringing in a special preacher for a week or ten days. He should always ask himself first whether or not he has done his utmost in all ways and by all means at his disposal. But very often a mission does do good, and perhaps the parish to benefit most by it is the parish whose minister is most
N
194 Evatjgelistic Work aftd its proper Basis.
faithful in his own ordinary work. Still, in all cases if the mission is to do good, it must be long looked forward to and carefully prepared for, and the mission preacher or preachers wisely selected.
I must conclude, and I do so with a sense of leavinir very much unsaid. There is specially the wide field of doctrine as it relates to evangelistic work. Let this, and this above all, be said, that we who are commissioned and empowered to do evangelistic work must be in our own hearts and our own experience persuaded of the truth. We believe and therefore we speak : we testify what we know, and we know and believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God, and that only through Him can the world receive life.
Let those of us who are called to the ministry lay to heart the words of \\\e Apostle who has said " Give attend- ance to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine. Neglect not the gift that is in thee, which was given thee by prophecy, with the laying on of the hands of the presbytery. Meditate upon these things ; and give thyself wholly unto them ; that thy profiting may appear unto all. Take heed unto thyself, and unto the doctrine ; continue in them : for in doing this thou shalt both save thyself, and them that hear thee" (1 Tim. iv. 13-lG).
APPENDIX.
PROGRAMME OF CONFERENCE.
Saturday, 25th November. Evening Service, Govan Parish Church, 5 p.m.
II.
Sunday, 2Qth November .
I. — Celebration of the Holy Communion, Govan
Parish Church, 11 a.m.
-Other Services in connection with, the Conference, as follows :—
Chdkches.
IIOtJKS.
Hillhead,
Blackfriars, Bluevale,
Cathedral,
Cowlairs,
Dean Park,
Macleod Memorial,
Maxwell, Oatlands,
St James',
Belmont,
Cowlairs,
Govan,
Maxwell,
11 a.m.,
2 p.m., 2 p.m.,
2 p.m.,
2 p.m.,
2 p.m.,
2 p.m., 2 p.m., 2 p.m.,
2 p.m.,
6.30 p.m.,
6.30 p.m.
6.30 p.m.
7 p.m..
Pkeachers.
( Rev. Professor Dobie, ) \ B.D., Edinburgh, ) Rev. H. J. Wother-'j spoon, M.A., Burn- V bank Parish, j
( Rev. John Parker, St ( ( James' Parish, j
( Rev. W. W. Tulloch, ) ) D. D. , Maxwell Parish, ) (Rev. T. N. Adamson ■{ St Margaret's, Barn ( hiU, Rev. M. P. Johnstone, \ B.D., Fraserburgh V Parish, j
I^^Rev. A. W. Wother- N spoon, M.A., Oat- (. lands Parish, j Rev. H. M. Hamilton, i D. D. , Hamilton Pai-ish, ( Rev. J. Cromarty Smith, •n B.D., Alexandria ( Parish,
( Rev. James Cooper, \ D.D., East Parish, ( Aberdeen, [Rev. M. P. Johnstone, S -V B. D. , Fraserburgh V t Parish, j
Rev. H. J. Wother- spoon, M.A., Burn- bank Parish, ) Rev. Professor Dobie, 1 1 B.D., f
( Rev, James Cooper, <J D.D., East Parish ( Aberdeen,
'}
Subjects.
The Power of the Incar- nation.
The Nature of Christian Worship.
The Church Witnessing to the Atonement.
The Church in its Rela- tion TO Society.
Dally Service.
The Mission ok the Comforter.
The Christian Year.
Holy Communion.
The Vocation of the Christian Ministry.
The Christian Salvation and Church Order.
The Supernatural in Modern Christian Life.
The Bread of Life.
The Sacramental Life OF the Church.
Almsgiving, Prayer, and Fasting.
195
196
Appendix.
III. — Special Evening Sermon on the Objects ok the
Scottish Church Society —
" Then contended I with the rulers, and said, Why is the House of
God forsaken ?" Nehemiah xiii. 11.
City Hall (Albion Street), 7 p.m. — Preacher, Rev. John
MACLEOD, D.D., GoVAN PARISH.
Monday, Tlth November. I. — Morning Prayer, Govan Parish Church, 10 a.m.
II. — Conference, Berkeley Hall (St Andrew's Halls), 11 a.m. — The Very Eev. Professor Milligan, D.D., President of the Society, presiding* : —
|
Time. |
Sdbject. |
ReAD£R.S. |
Speakeks. |
|
11 a.m. 11.30a.m, to 1 p.m. 1 p.m. to 2.30 p.m. |
The President's Address. Devotional Life : Com- munion iritlb God, and Communion in God. National Religion : the Principle and Possible Embodiments thereof. |
Rev. A. Wallace Williamson, M.A.* Rev. 1-1. J. Wother- spoon, M.A. TheVery Re V.George Hutchison, D.D. Rev. Roger S. Kirk- patrick, B.D. |
Rev. Henry M. Hamilton, D.D. Rev. John Parker. Rev. M. P. John- stone, B.D. J. H. Miller, Esq., Advocate. |
III. — Evening Prayer, Govan Parish Church, 5 p.m.
IV. — Conference, Berkeley Hall, 7 p.m. — The Very Rev. A. K. H. Boyd, D.D., LL.D., presiding* ;—
7 p.m.
to
8.30 p.m.
8.30 p.m.
to 10 p.m.
The I'rosent Call to Witness for the Funda- mental Truths of the Gospel.
The Church's Call to Study Social Questions.
Rev. James Cooper,
D.D. Rev. GeorgeCampbell.
RcT. I'rofessor Flint,
D.D., LL.D. Rev. W. W. Tulloch,
D.D.*
Rev. C. J. M.
Middlcton, M.A. Rev. J. Laudreth,
M.A.
Shcriflf Birnie. Sheriff Guthrie,
LL.D.* William Jolly, Esq.,
LL.D., F.G.S.,
F.R.S.E.*
• Unable tu be at the Couferunco.
Appendix.
197
Tuesday, 28</i November. I. — Morning Prayer, Govan Parish Church, 10 a.m.
II. — Conference, Berkeley Hall, 11 a.m. — Rev. George W. Sprott, D.D., presiding : —
|
11 a.m. to 12.30p.m. |
The Divine Order of Church Finance and other Systems. |
Rev. Thomas Leish- man, D.D. Rev. M. P. John- stone, B.D. |
Rev. John Macleod, D.D. Patrick Cooper, Esq. |
|
12.30 p.m. to 2 p.m. |
The Observance, in its Main Features, of the Christian Year. |
Rev. E. L. Thomp- son, D.D. Rev. William H. Macleod, B.D. |
The Very Rev. A. K.H.Boyd, D.D. , LL.D.* The Right Hon. Sir James Fergus- son, Bart.,M.P.* |
III. — Students' Reception, Berkeley Hall, 3 p.m. — Paper to be read by the Rev. Professor Dobie, B.D., on "The Training of the Clergy."
IV. —Evening Prayer, Govan Parish Church, 5 p.m.
V. — Conference, Berkeley Ha.ll, 7 p.m.— Rev. Thomas Leishman, D.D., presiding : —
|
Time. |
Subject. |
Readers. |
Sfeakbbs. |
|
7 p.m. to 8.30_p.m. 8.30 p.m. to 10 p.m. |
The Celebration of the Holy Communion and the Daily Service. The Church and the Education of the Young. |
Rev. John ]\Iacleod, D.D. Rev. J. Parker. Rev. John H. Craw- ford, M.A. Rev. J. C. Carrick, B.D. |
Rev. A. W. Wother- spoon, M.A. Rev. James M. Campbell. Rev. John A. Clark, B.D. llev. William Taylor, M.A. |
Unable to be .at the Conference.
198
Appendix.
Wednesday, 29«A November. I. — Morning Prayer, Govan Parish Church, 10 a.m.
II. — Private Conference, Berkeley Hall, 11 a.m. — Rev. John MACLEOD, D.D., presiding : —
|
11 a.m. to 12.30p.m. r2.30p.m. to 2 p. m. |
Historical Continuity of the Church of Scot- land. Evangelistic Work and its proper Babis. |
Rev. George W. Sprott, D.D. Rev, Thomas Leish- man, D.D. Rev. H. J. Wother- spoon, M.A. Rev. J. Cromarty Smith, B.D. |
Rev. James Cooper, D.D, Rev. T. Newbigging Adamson. Rev. D. H. Paterson. Rev. John Charle- son, a.D. |
III. — Evening Prayer, Govan Parish Church, 5 p.m.
CONSTITUTION OF THE SCOTTISH CHURCH SOCIETY.
I. The name of the Society shall be "The Scottish Church Society."
II. The MoLto ol" the Society shall be : '' Ask for the Old Paths, . . . and iculk therein."
III. The general purpose of the Society .shall be to defend and advance Catholic doctrine as set forth in the Ancient Creeds, and embodied in the Standards of the Church of Scotland ; and generally to assert Scriptural pruiciples in all matters relating to Church Order and Pulicy, Christian Work, and Spiritual Life, throughout Scotland.
IV. Among the special objects to be aimed at shall be the following : —
1, The consistent atfirmation of the. divine basis, supernatural life,
and heavenly calling of the Church.
2. The fostering of a due sense of the historic continuity of the
Church i^rom the first,
3. The maintaining of the necessity of a valid Ordination to the
Holy Ministry, and the celebration in a betitting manner of the rite of Ordination.
4, The assertion of the efficacy of the Sacraments.
Appendix. 1 99
5. The promotion of the religious education and pastoi\al care of
the young, on the basis of Holy Baptism.
6. The restoration of the Holy Commimion to its right place in
relation to the worship of the Church, and to the spiritual life of the liaptised.
7. The revival of Daily Service wherever practicable.
8. The observance in its main featiires of the Cliristian year.
9. The encouragement, wliere practicable, of free and open
churches.
10. The advancement of a higher spiritual life among the clergy.
11. The restoration of more careful jiastoral discipline of clergy
and laity.
12. The deepening in the laity of a due sense of their priesthood,
and the encouraging them to fulfil their calling in the worship and work of the Church.
13. The 2:)romotion of right methods for the pastoral training of
candidates for the Holy Ministr3\
14. The promotion of Evangelistic work on Church lines.
15. The placing on a right basis of the financial support of the
Church through systematic giving, and the restoration of the Weekly Offering to its proper place in thought and worship.
16. The better fulfilment by the Church of her duties in regard to
Education ; and to the care of the poor.
17. The consideration of Social Problems with a view to their
adjustment on a basis of Christian justice and In-otherhood. ] 8. The maintenance of the law of the Church in regard to ]\larriage.
19. The maintenance of the Scriptural view (as held by the
Reformers and early Assemblies) as to the heinousness of the sin of sacrilege.
20. The reverent care and seemly ordering of churches and church-
yards ; and the preservation of ancient ecclesiastical monuments.
21. The deepening of a penitential sense of the sin and peril
of schism.
22. The furtherance of Catholic uuity in every way consistent with
true loj'alty to the Church of Scotland.
V. Among the methods to be adopted for the promotion of these objects, shall l^e : —
1. Private and United Prayer.
2. Meetings for Conference as circumstauces may require.
3. A public Church Society Congress, to be held annually in one
of the larger towns in Scotland : a full Report of the Pro- ceedings of each Congress to be afterwards published and circulated.
?oo Appendix.
4. The preparation and publication from time to time of such
Occasional Papers, Forms of Service, Sermons, Class-books, Parochial or other Leaflets, and Devotional Literature as shall be approved by the Society.
5, The delivery of special Sermons or Lectures in connection with
the Society. G. The provision of aids to the spiritual life of the clergy. 7. The organisation of Parochial Missions.
TUR>-BDLL AND SPEAK3, PRISTKKS, KDINBCKQH.
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