The Social Principles of Jesus Part 22

3. Why has religion been more effective in the field of private life than of public life?

4. If you had full control of the churches in a given country or village community, on what aims would you concentrate their forces?

PART IV. CONQUEST BY CONFLICT

Chapter X. The Conflict With Evil

_The Kingdom of G.o.d Will Have to Fight for Its Advance_

The great objective is the Kingdom of G.o.d. In realizing the Reign of G.o.d on earth three recalcitrant forces have to be brought into obedience to G.o.d's law: the desire for power, the love of property, and unsocial religion. We have studied Christ's thought concerning these in the foregoing chapters. The advance of the Kingdom of G.o.d is not simply a process of social education, but a conflict with hostile forces which resist, neutralize, and defy whatever works toward the true social order.

The strategy of the Kingdom of G.o.d, therefore, involves a study of the social problem of evil.

DAILY READINGS

First Day: The Consciousness of Sin in the Lord's Prayer

And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.

And bring us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.-Matt. 6:12, 13.

The Lord's Prayer expresses the very mind and spirit of the Master. It begins with the Kingdom of G.o.d; it ends with the problem of sin. As we stand before G.o.d, we realize that we have loaded up our life with debts we can never pay. We have wasted our time, and the powers of body and soul.

We have left black marks of contagion on some whose path we have crossed.

We have hurt even those who loved us by our ill-temper, thoughtlessness, and selfishness.

We can only ask G.o.d to forgive and give us another chance: "Forgive us our debts." Looking forward we see the possibility of fatal temptations. We know how fragile our power of resistance is. "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil." Thus the consciousness of sin is written across this greatest of all prayers.

Is a sense of unworthiness an indication of moral strength or of weakness?

_Where do we draw the line between a normal and abnormal sense of sin?_

Second Day: Evil Embodied in Character

Either make the tree good, and its fruit good; or make the tree corrupt, and its fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by its fruit. Ye offspring of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.

The good man out of his good treasure bringeth forth good things: and the evil man out of his evil treasure bringeth forth evil things. And I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.-Matt. 12:33-37.

Character is formed by action, but after it is formed, it determines action. What a man says and does, he becomes; and what he has become, he says and does. An honest and clean-minded man instinctively does what is kind and honorable. But when a man for years has gone for profit and selfish power, you can trust him as a general thing to do what is underhanded and mean. Since selfish ability elbows its way to controlling positions in business, politics, and society, the character reactions of such men are a force with which the Kingdom of G.o.d must reckon. They are the personal equipment of the kingdom of evil, and the more respectable, well-dressed, and clever they are, the worse it is.

What man or woman of our acquaintance would we single out as the clearest case of an evil character?

Why do we so judge him?

Third Day: The Social Pressure of Evil

And he said unto his disciples, It is impossible but that occasions of stumbling should come; but woe unto him, through whom they come! It were well for him if a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he were thrown into the sea, rather than that he should cause one of these little ones to stumble.-Luke 17:1, 2.

A s.e.x story lodging in a young mind, an invitation to companions.h.i.+p and a drink, a sneer at religion which makes faith look silly-such things trip us up. They are stumbling-blocks, like wires stretched across a path in the dark. Just because we are social and easily influenced by friends.h.i.+p, admiration, or persuasion, one man's suggestion or example draws the other man on. Jesus knew that social solicitation and pressure toward sin was inevitable. It is the price we pay for our social nature. But, all the same, it is a terrible thing to contaminate a soul or steer a life toward its ruin. This saying about the millstone is one of the sternest words ever uttered.

"Three men went out one summer night, No care they had or aim, And dined and drank. "Ere we go home We'll have," they said, "a game."

Three girls began that summer night A life of endless shame, And went through drink, disease, and death, As swift as racing flame.

Lawless and homeless, foul they died; Rich, loved, and praised the men; But when they all shall meet with G.o.d, And justice speaks-what then?"

Let us enumerate to our own minds cases where others drew us into wrong, and cases where we were a cause of evil for others. About which do we feel sorest now? Why?

Fourth Day: Moral Laziness

No man having drunk old wine desireth new; for he saith, The old is good.-Luke 5:39.

This is a chance remark, but a keen observation. In wine-raising countries an expert tongue and nice discrimination between the fifty-seven varieties is one of the most coveted talents. A man who would prefer some recent stuff to the celebrated vintage of 18-, would commit intellectual _hari-kari_. It is said that in some of the celebrated vaults of France they breed spiders to cover the bottles with webs and dust to convey the delicious suggestion of antiquity. Jesus uses the preference for old vintage to characterize the conservative instinct in human nature. This is one of the stickiest impediments to progress, one of the most respectable forms of evil-mindedness. "The hereditary tiger is in us all, also the hereditary oyster and clam. Indifference is the largest factor, though not the ugliest form, in the production of evil" (President Hyde). Men are morally lazy; they have to be pushed into what is good for them, and the "pushee" is almost sure to resent the pus.h.i.+ng. The idea that men ardently desire what is rational and n.o.ble is pernicious fiction. They want to be let alone. This is part of original sin.

Was the above written in haste, or will it stand?

Fifth Day: Satanic Frustration of Good

Another parable set he before them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man that sowed good seed in his field: but while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares also among the wheat, and went away. But when the blade sprang up and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also. And the servants of the householder came and said unto him, Sir, didst thou not sow good seed in thy field? whence then hath it tares? And he said unto them, An enemy hath done this. And the servants say unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? But he saith, Nay; lest haply while ye gather up the tares, ye root up the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather up first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them; but gather the wheat into my barn.-Matt. 13:24-30.

Here we encounter the devil. There is more in sin than our own frailty and stupidity, and the bad influence of other individuals. There is a permanent force of organized evil which vitiates every higher movement and sows tares among the grain over night. You work hard on some law to reform the ballot or the primary in order to protect the freedom and rights of the people, and after three years your device has become a favorite tool of the interests. You found a benevolent inst.i.tution, and after you are dead it becomes a nest of graft. Even the Church of Jesus was for centuries so corrupt that all good men felt its reform in head and members to be the greatest desideratum in Christendom. Evil is more durable and versatile than youth and optimism imagine. The belief in a satanic power of evil expresses the conviction of the permanent power of evil. In early Christianity the belief in the devil was closely connected with the Christian opposition to the idolatrous and wicked social order of heathenism. In the Apocalypse the dragon who stands for Satan, and the beasts who stand for the despotic Roman Empire, are in close alliance.

What are the satanic social forces today?