Theology and the Social Consciousness Part 9

II. DEEPENING THE SENSE OF SIN

And this conviction, in the second place, not only deepens our sense of the real unity of the race, it deepens also the sense of sin. And we can hardly separate here the influence of the third element of the social consciousness--the sense of the value and sacredness of the person. As against a rather wide-spread and often expressed contrary feeling, this deepening sense of sin may yet, it is believed, be truthfully maintained, _so far as the social consciousness is really making itself felt_. There are some disintegrating tendencies here, no doubt, like the tendency under some applications of evolution and evolutionary philosophy to turn all sin into a necessary stage in the evolution. But had not Drummond reason to say: "There is one theological word which has found its way lately into nearly all the newer and finer literature of our country. It is not only _one_ of the words of the literary world at present, it is perhaps _the_ word. Its reality, its certain influence, its universality, have at last been recognized, and in spite of its theological name have forced it into a place which nothing but its felt relation to the wider theology of human life could ever have earned for a religious word. That word, it need scarcely be said, is sin."[80]

Contrast this modern sense of sin with the almost total lack of it among even so gifted a people of the ancient world as the Greeks, and feel the significance of the phenomenon. But it is particularly to be noted that this sense of sin in literature is largely due to a keener social conscience. In fact, if the social consciousness is not a thoroughly fraudulent phenomenon, it could hardly be otherwise; for the social consciousness, in its very essence, is a sense of what is due a person; and sin is always ultimately against a person, failure to be what one ought to be in some personal relation, including finally all the relations of the kingdom of G.o.d. We simply cannot deepen the sense of the meaning and value of personal relations, and not deepen, at the same time, the sense of sin. The meaning of the Golden Rule, and so the sense of sin under it, deepens inevitably with every step into the meaning of the person. If the one great commandment is love, then the sin of which men need most of all to be convicted is lack of love.

The self-tormenting and fanciful sins of some of our devotional books very likely are less felt. But the very existence of the social consciousness seems to be proof that there never was so much good, honest, wholesome sense of real sin as to-day--such sin as Christ himself recognizes in his own judgment test.

It may be that, in temporary absorption in the human relations, the relation of all this to the All-Father may seem forgotten; even so, we may well remember Christ's "Ye did it unto me." But, in fact, we must go much farther and say, The social consciousness can only be true to itself finally, as it goes on to see its acts in the light, most of all, of that single, personal relation which underlies all others. We have already seen that the social consciousness requires for its own justification its grounding in the manifest trend of the living will of G.o.d. With this felt identification of the will of G.o.d with love for men, men can still less shake off easily the conviction of sin.

Probably, most religious men argue a diminis.h.i.+ng sense of sin, because they feel that less is made of those consequences of sin which have been usually connected with the future life. There may be real danger here from shallow thinking; but here, too, the social consciousness has only to be true to itself to be saved from any shallow estimate of the consequences of sin here or hereafter. As the sin itself is always, finally, in personal relations, so the most terrible results of sin, in this life and in all lives, are in personal relations. What it costs the man himself in cutting him off from the relations in which all largeness of life consists, what it costs those who love him, what it costs G.o.d,--this alone is the true measure of sin. So judged, sin itself is feared as never before. Surely, Princ.i.p.al Fairbairn is right in saying: "And so even within Christendom, sin is never so little feared as when h.e.l.l most dominates the imagination; it needs to be looked at as it affects G.o.d, to be understood and feared."[81] But it is the inevitable result of the social consciousness to bring us to the deepest conviction of all these personal relations, and so to the deepest conviction of sin.

Another consideration deserves attention. We have a growing conviction that our social ideal is personally realized only in Christ, and we have given unequaled attention to that life and have such knowledge of it, in its detailed applications, as no preceding generation has ever had. This simply means that we have both such a sense of our moral calling, and are face to face with such a living standard, as must steadily deepen in us a genuine sense of real sin, in our falling so far short of the spirit of Christ.

Theology needs, further, to make unmistakably clear, and to use the fact, that _this mutual influence of men holds for good_ as well as for evil; that few greater lies have ever been told, than the insinuation that only evil is contagious, the good not. And this conviction of the contagion of the good, of mutual influence for good, concerns theology particularly in three ways, all of which may be regarded simply as ill.u.s.trations or aspects of the one kingdom of G.o.d.

We are members one of another (1) in attainment of character, (2) in personal relation to G.o.d, and (3) in confession of faith. And each of these forms of mutual influence will need careful attention.

In considering separately here attainment of character and relation to G.o.d, it is not meant for a moment to admit that separation of ethics and religion which has been already denied, but only to single out for distinct treatment the one most important and fundamental relation of life--relation to G.o.d. We are certainly never to forget that the indispensable condition of right relations to G.o.d, is that a man should have been won into willingness to share G.o.d's own righteous purpose concerning men.

III. MUTUAL INFLUENCE FOR GOOD IN THE ATTAINMENT OF CHARACTER

We know no deeper law in the building of character, than that righteous character comes through that a.s.sociation with the best in which there is mutual self-giving. The problem of character implies not only a bare recognition of a man's moral freedom, but a sacred respect at every point for his personality. If a man is ever to have character at all, it must be absolutely his own; he must be won freely into it. In this free winning to character, no a.s.sociation counts for its most that is not mutual. I become in character most certainly and rapidly like that man with whom I constantly am, to whose influence I most fully surrender, and who gives himself most completely to me.

We may a.n.a.lyze the phenomenon psychologically, as, indeed, we have already done in showing that a true personal relation to Christ necessarily carries with it a true ethical life. And that which held true for religion cannot be false for theology, we may be sure. But, in any case, we always come back finally to the fact, that character is truly and inevitably contagious in an a.s.sociation in which there is mutual surrender. Character is caught, not taught. The inner strength of another life to which we surrender is, as Phillips Brooks somewhere says, "directly transmissible." I suspect that the ultimate psychological principle at work here is that of the impulsiveness of consciousness. But, whether that be true or not, the witness to this contagion is wide-spread among students of men. "The greatest gift the hero leaves his race," one of our great novelists says, "is to have been a hero." In almost identical language, a great ethical and philosophical writer adds: "The n.o.blest workers of our world bequeath us nothing so great as the image of themselves. Their task, be it ever so glorious, is historical and transient, the majesty of their spirit is essential and eternal."

But one might still think, here, only of an example. The other life, however, must be more to me than mere example. For the highest attainment in character I need the a.s.sociation of some highest one, who will give himself to me unreservedly. Redemption to real righteousness of life cannot be without cost to the redeemer. And it is a psychologist, facing the ultimate problem of will-strengthening, who urges in words that might seem almost to look to Christ: "The prophet has drunk more deeply than any one of the cup of bitterness; but his countenance is so unshaken, and he speaks such mighty words of cheer, that his will becomes our will, and our life is kindled at his own."[82] It _is_ the one great certain road to character--as it is to appreciation of every value--to stay in the presence of the best, in self-surrender to it. No wonder Christ said, "I am the Way."

1. _The Application to the Problem of Redemption._--It is hardly possible to ignore this one great known law of character-making, which the social consciousness so presses upon us, in any thinking that is for a moment worth while concerning our redemption by Christ. And whatever our point of view, this consideration ought to have weight with us. Nay, must we not make it necessarily the very center of all our thought here? For all the realities in this problem of redeeming a man from sin to righteousness are intensely personal, ethical, spiritual. Now, are we to reach a deeper view of redemption, by turning away from the deepest ethical fact to the unethical? Do we so ground our view the more securely? Is there something holier than the holy ethical will seen realized in Christ's life and death? For, if it is the will in his death by which we are sanctified,[83] there can be no sharp separation of the life and death. Must we not rather expect that the clearest light, on the holiest in G.o.d and our personal relation to him, will be thrown by the holiest we know in life, in our human personal relations?

Is not the precise method of redemption, then, to no small degree, cleared for us right here, in this conviction of the social consciousness of the contagion of the good in a self-surrendering a.s.sociation--the only solidarity of which we can be certain? Christ saves us, in the only certain way we know that any man is ever saved to better living, through direct contagion of character, through his immediate influence upon us. The power of the influence of a redeeming person must depend upon two facts: the richness of the self that is given, and the depth of the giving. The supremely redeeming power must be the giving of the richest self, unto the uttermost. G.o.d has not yet done his best for men, until he gives himself in the fullest manifestation which can be made through man to men, and gives to the uttermost, with no drawing back from any cost. Is it not because, after all, back of all theories and even in spite of theories, men have seen in the life and death of Christ just this eternal giving of G.o.d himself, that they have been caught up into some sharing of the same spirit, and so felt working directly and immediately upon them the supremest redeeming power the world knows? The cross of Christ has been G.o.d's not only _saying_, "I will help that child to conquer himself, whatever it costs me," but G.o.d doing it, and perpetually doing it. Not less than that must be the cost of a man's redemption.

Character is directly transmissible in an a.s.sociation in which there is mutual self-giving. It is most easily so transmissible, only at its highest, in its most perfect manifestation, in its completest self-giving at any cost.

The self-giving on the part of one trying to win another into character must precede the self-giving of the sinner; for the sinner's own willingness to yield himself to the influence of the character of the other must first of all be won. This initial winning of the cooperative will of the other is the heart of the whole battle. And here the power relied on is not only the unconscious contagion and imitation of character that enlists a man's interest almost by surprise, but also the mightiest influence men know in breaking down the resisting will and winning men consciously and with final abandon--the influence of a patient, long-suffering, persistent, self-sacrificing love that cannot give the sinning one up.

Most certainly, then, redemption cannot be without cost to the redeemer of men--not only that cost to the hero of the superior showing of superior character in a superior task, but that other cost, indissolubly linked indeed with this, of reverently, patiently, to the bitter end, helping another to conquer himself--the inevitable suffering of all redemptive endeavor for those whom one loves. This involves (1) suffering in contact with sin, (2) suffering in the rejection by those sinning, and most of all, (3) suffering in the sin itself of those one loves because one loves them--suffering which is the more intense, the more one loves.

2. _The Consequent Ethical and Spiritual Meaning of Subst.i.tution and Propitiation._--Can we go yet a step farther here? It may be fairly taken for granted that where the church has strongly and persistently stood for certain modes of putting a doctrine--though the precise putting may be unfortunate--that in all probability there is there some real and important truth after which the consciousness of the church is dimly feeling. Starting, now, from this same great law of the contagion of character and the inevitable influence of an a.s.sociation in which there is mutual self-giving, is it not possible to show that there is a strict ethical and spiritual sense that we can understand, in which Christ's suffering may be truly called vicarious, and himself a subst.i.tute for us, and a propitiation?

It is, of course, not for a moment forgotten that, in Dr. Clarke's language, "a G.o.d who will himself provide a propitiation has no need of one in the sense which the word has ordinarily borne. Some richer and n.o.bler meaning must be present if the word is appropriate to the case."[84] But it is not likely that a purely ethical and spiritual view of the atonement, which sees the problem as a strictly personal one--and this seems to the writer the only true position--can ever succeed in the hearts of the great body of the members.h.i.+p of the churches, if it cannot show, at the same time, that it is able in some real way to take up into itself these thoughts of subst.i.tution and propitiation. The writer finds much of the old language about the atonement as offensive to his moral sense as any man well can. But that there is an absolutely universal human need for something like that to which the old language of subst.i.tution and propitiation looked, he cannot doubt. It seems to show itself in this, that no man with real moral sense, probably, cares to put himself at the end of his life, say, in the att.i.tude of the Pharisee rather than in that of the Publican. If one sets aside all spectacular elements in the judgment, and even denies altogether any great single final a.s.size for all men, still he cannot avoid the thought of some judgment upon his life. As Dr. Clarke says again: "We are not our own masters in going out of this world; we go we know not whither. Yet our going is not without its just and holy method. Our place and lot in the life that is beyond must be determined righteously, in accordance with the life that we have lived thus far, that the next stage in our existence may be what it ought to be."[85]

However, now, that judgment of G.o.d may be expressed, no man can hope to face the test proposed by Christ in the twenty-fifth of Matthew, still less the test implied in Christ's own life, and feel that he has _already_ attained. He knows himself to be at best only a faulty growing child, with some real spirit of obedience in his heart. And it is particularly to be noted, that exactly that man must stand most definitely for the reality of some genuinely ethical judgment, who has most insisted upon the necessarily ethical character of the religious life. Moreover, the normal experience of the deepening Christian life is an increasing sense of sin. Upon this point, too, the social consciousness is witness.

What, now, makes it possible for a man to expect, in any sense, a favorable judgment of G.o.d upon his life? If G.o.d makes any separation of men in the world to come, he certainly cannot divide them into perfect and imperfect men. Judged by any complete standard, all are imperfect. Or if, without separation, G.o.d in any sense, in the most inner way, pa.s.ses judgment, how does approval fall upon any? And upon whom does it fall? Must not every man who wishes to be clear and honest with himself fairly face these questions?

And Christ's own thought of G.o.d as Father must be our key here. And the matter may well be counted worth a more careful a.n.a.lysis than it often gets. How does a father distinguish between what he calls an obedient and a disobedient child? Both are faulty. How in any fair sense may one be called obedient? To the earthly father, that child is called an obedient child, not who is deliberately setting his will against his father's with no intention to cooperate with the father's purpose for him, but whose loyal intention is to do the father's will, really to cooperate with the father in the father's own purpose for the child's life. When, now, this child is carried away by some gust of temptation and disobeys, and then returns in penitence to the father, evidently viewing the sin, so far as his experience allows, as the father views it, and heartily putting it away, the father, _either with or without penalty_, restores the child to full personal relation to himself; and that is the vital point. And, though he neither judges the past life as without failure, nor expects the future to be without failure, he approves the child, as in a true sense obedient. He is an approved child.

What is it that satisfies the father in such a case? Upon what does he rely in his hope for matured character in the child? What, in biblical language, "covers" for the father the actual disobediences of the past and the certain disobediences of the future, and enables him in a sense to ignore both in his approval of the child? Certainly, the present purpose of the child, the child's honest intention to cooperate with the father in the father's purpose for him. Yes; but as certainly, it seems to the writer, _not that alone_. The father's hope for his child's steady growth in righteousness depends not only on the child's present intention, but much more upon the father's own intention never to give up in his attempt at any cost to help that child to conquer himself.[86] The father may be said here in a true sense to propitiate himself; and his own fixed purpose has become a partial subst.i.tute for the wavering purpose of the child.

And the child's full righteousness is seen, not merely in an att.i.tude of immediate present obedience, but especially in his loyal acceptance of his filial relation--in his honest surrender to his father's influence. And the father can now say, Because my child accepts heartily his relation to me, and honestly throws himself open to it to let it be to him all it can and work its own work in him, I may approve him; for this relation to me which he so takes has only to go on, to work out its complete results in a matured character. In the hearty acceptance of this filial relation to me, there is contained the promise of the end.

Just this att.i.tude exactly, and no other, it seems to the writer, G.o.d takes toward men in his revelation in Christ. Christ is G.o.d's own showing forth of himself. "G.o.d was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself."[87] "Propitiation," Beysclag truly says, "is blotting out, making amends for sin in G.o.d's eyes. Now what can cover the sin of the world in G.o.d's eyes? Only a personality and a deed which contain the power of actually delivering the world from its sin."[88]

We have seen, it may be hoped, just how G.o.d's self-revealing in Christ does have this actual power, and becomes, thus, a true propitiation in the highest moral sense, in the only sense in which G.o.d can wish a propitiation, and in the only sense in which we can ever need a propitiation. Our final hope for that true salvation, which is the sharing of the life of G.o.d and the involved likeness of character with G.o.d, is in G.o.d's own long-suffering, redeeming activity. Only as _that_ may be remembered, in connection with our surrender to it, may we hope to stand approved before the judgment of G.o.d. We are not judged alone before the judgment of G.o.d. In a very real sense the judge himself stands with us. Not what G.o.d is able to believe about this man thought of as standing alone, but what he may believe about this man standing in a living, surrendering a.s.sociation with himself, is the ground of judgment. We may not separate here the work of G.o.d and the work of Christ, as the New Testament does not separate them.

In constant reliance upon the constant redeeming activity of the Father here and hereafter, we children go hopefully on our way.

Put into the language of the blood covenant, where the blood has all its significance as life--the giving of life, the sharing of life, the closest and most indissoluble union of lives--this is to say, there is no atonement, no reconciliation, no remission of sins, no forgiveness--and these are all essentially identical terms--without shedding of blood, that is, without complete giving of life on both sides, Christ giving himself not only _for_ us in seeking us out, but _to_ us in complete reconciliation and renewal of life. It means that only G.o.d, the very life of G.o.d, sharing G.o.d's life, can really save one from his sins. G.o.d must pour his life into one, and he does, in Christ.

This seems to be the heart of the whole matter; but certain considerations may be still added, as indicating how far a purely ethical and spiritual view of the atonement may go, in meeting the human need expressed in these older terms of subst.i.tution and propitiation.

There must be a wrath of G.o.d against wilful sin, a complete disapproval of it, and all the more because G.o.d loves the sinner. G.o.d is a consuming fire for sin in us, because he loves us. That wrath cannot be propitiated, that disapproval cannot be satisfied, in any effective way, so long as the sin continues. The punishment of the sin in its inevitable consequences, will go on in the very fidelity of G.o.d. But for any real satisfaction of G.o.d, the sin itself must cease, and there must be a.s.surance of righteousness to come. The sinner must come to share G.o.d's hatred of the sin and G.o.d's positive purpose of love. Hence the expiation of the sin, the propitiation of the wrath of G.o.d, the satisfaction of G.o.d--so far as these terms still have meaning, and so far as they express Christ's work--consist (1) in winning men to repentance, to sharing G.o.d's hatred of their sin, (2) in helping men to a real power against sin, and (3) in the a.s.surance of perfecting righteousness which is contained in the relation to G.o.d honestly accepted by men. When, now, the unfilial spirit is thus changed into a completely filial spirit--through the fullest acceptance by the child of the father's purpose for him, and through the child's throwing himself completely open to the influence of the father--the personal relation _is_ thereby inevitably changed, personal reconciliation is achieved. It is impossible to think it otherwise. And so the chief pain in the previous relation is done away both for G.o.d and man; though the punishment, in the consequences of sin in other respects, is not thereby set aside.

But, further, so far now as the power of this new personal relation to G.o.d in Christ begins actively to counteract the consequences of sin in us, as it will a.s.suredly do, G.o.d's work in Christ becomes a direct subst.i.tute for that punishment of us that would else inevitably follow. And yet the process is wholly ethical; for the results of righteousness can actually occur in us, only in so far as we come into harmony with Christ's purpose for us.

Even so far, we may believe, does the social consciousness, in its emphasis upon the mutual influence of persons go, in leading us into the secret of the attainment of character--into the heart of G.o.d's redemption of men.

IV. MUTUAL INFLUENCE FOR GOOD IN OUR PERSONAL RELATION TO G.o.d

What, now, in the second place, does the mutual influence of men for good mean for theology in the individual relation to G.o.d? Here it may be said at once, that faith is as directly contagious as character.

1. _In Coming into the Kingdom._--We are introduced through others into all spheres of value, including friends.h.i.+p even with G.o.d. In the atmosphere of those who already feel the value, our interest is aroused; we find it possible at least to take those initial steps of a dawning attention, which give the value opportunity to make its own impression upon us, and bring us to an appreciation, to a faith of our own. Only so is that most difficult of all tasks in the redemption of a man--that first stirring of a new appet.i.te, a new desire, a new aspiration, a new ideal--accomplished.

We are members one of another here to an extent that deserves ever fresh emphasis. We cannot too often say to ourselves, Had it not been that there were those who actually entered into the meaning of the revelation of G.o.d in Christ--who, in John's language, "beheld his glory"--the record of that revelation never could have come down to us. Christianity must have perished at its birth. "Hence," in the vital language of Herrmann, "the picture of his inner life could be preserved in his church or 'fellows.h.i.+p' alone. But, further, this picture so preserved can be understood only when we meet with men on whom it has wrought its effect. We need communion with Christians in order that, from the picture of Jesus which his Brotherhood has preserved, there may s.h.i.+ne forth that inner life which is the real heart of it. It is only when we see its effects, that our eyes are opened to its reality so that we may thereby experience the same effect. Thus we never apprehend the most important element in the historical appearance of Jesus until his people make us feel it. The testimony of the New Testament concerning Jesus is the work of his church, and its exposition is the work of the church, through the life which that church develops and gains for itself out of this treasure which it possesses."[89]

The Christian is no Melchizedek, then, without father or mother; he comes into life in a community of life, and usually, moreover, through the personal touch of some other individual life. It is the one primal law, of life through life.

2. _In Fellows.h.i.+p within the Kingdom._--And not only in coming into the kingdom, but also within the religious fellows.h.i.+p of the kingdom, we are emphatically members one of another. In bringing us into that love which is G.o.d's own life, G.o.d evidently has no intention of allowing us to cut ourselves off from our brethren, to climb up to heaven by some little individual ladder of our own. That humility or open-mindedness, which const.i.tutes the first beat.i.tude and the initial step into the kingdom, and that self-sacrificing love, which const.i.tutes the last beat.i.tude and the crown of the Christian life, are both possible and cultivable only in personal relations to others.

No man ever got them alone. And, for this very reason, in the discussion of the religious life, we found the New Testament guarding most carefully against all over-estimation of marvelous experiences as such. For these tended to make a man feel that he had such an individual ladder of his own to heaven, and had no need, consequently, of his brethren; and so led him into the very reverse of the fundamental Christian qualities--into unteachableness instead of humility and open-mindedness, and into censoriousness instead of love.

That objective att.i.tude which is essential in all character and work and happiness, cannot be unimportant in our specifically religious life.

Even in this most individual relation to G.o.d, then, men's outlook is varied and but partial. We need to share, and can share, one another's visions. The meaning of the many-sidedness of even a great human personality gets home to us only so--through the various impressions gained by different men. Much more can G.o.d be revealed to us, even approximately, only so. The great and surpa.s.sing value of the New Testament lies exactly herein, that it gives the varied impressions upon the first Christian generation of G.o.d's supreme revelation--the most important individual reflections of Christ. The New Testament comes to stand, thus, in no merely external and mechanically authoritative relation to the life and faith of the church, but in the most interior and vital relation. And Bible study gets a new significance for us, as we see it, as at one and the same time our chief way to our own vision of G.o.d's actual, concrete self-revelation, and our deliverance from our merely subjective dreaming. We come to share in some living way the vision of these others who have seen most directly and most largely.

3. _In Intercessory Prayer._--One particular application to our religious life, of this conviction of the social consciousness of our mutual influence, seems worthy of mention--its bearing upon intercessory prayer. Few other things in religion, one may suspect, seem less real to modern men. Can we ground the matter a little more deeply for ourselves, and give it reality, by showing its close connection with this deep-rooted conviction of the social consciousness?

We have already seen,[90] if character and love are to be realities to us, if the world is to be a real training-ground for moral character, and not a mere play-world--a nursery continually set to rights from without, that we must all be most closely knit together; that our choices must have effects in the lives of others; that we must be bound up in one bundle of life. And we do affect one another's lives in a thousand ways. In manifold directions we condition the happiness and temptations of one another. The unspoken mood of another, an expression of countenance, a tone, an emphasis, may affect our whole day.

Now, if the spiritual world is real at all, it is to be counted upon.

Apparently, there is such a thing, for example, as a spiritual atmosphere in an audience--not, it may well be supposed, a magical matter, but really determined by the tone of the minds composing the audience. The actual mood of the hearers and of the speaker makes a difference. Results, great and important, are so changed often quite unconsciously. It may well be that G.o.d is the medium in all this. The att.i.tude of the auditors is like unconscious, silent praying to G.o.d--the praying of their life, of their spirit.

But, whether one cares to look at this special case in such a way or not, we are, in any event, in our spiritual lives in the deepest way members one of another. Our spiritual condition inevitably affects others. We cannot sow to the flesh and reap life anywhere, in ourselves or in others. This is particularly true, of course, of those to whom we are bound in the closest life relations. That this is absolutely true in normal personal relations, when we are in the presence of our friends, all of us fully believe. The question simply is, May this law of mutual influence hold of those bound up with our lives even when they are distant from us or estranged? In giving the privilege of intercessory prayer, it may well be believed, G.o.d simply allows us to be, even then, what we are always so fully under other circ.u.mstances--an influence upon them, a condition of the good and growth of others. _He simply allows the regular law of the spiritual and moral world to hold without exception._ We are still, though distant or estranged, members one of another. It would be a very human, defective, faulty G.o.d, who could not put us thus in touch with our loved ones everywhere. But this is possible through _him_, and therefore in prayer, and under strictly ethical and spiritual conditions, and not as a matter of mere whimsical and wilful will on our part, and it opens no door to magical superst.i.tion. Is not the recognition of the place and value of intercessory prayer, then, an only just extension of the prime conviction of the social consciousness?

V. MUTUAL INFLUENCE FOR GOOD IN CONFESSIONS OF FAITH

Theology has, once more, in the third place, to recognize the importance of mutual influence for good in confession of faith, in creeds. When, to-day, we seek the common grounds of belief for Christian thinkers, so far as the social consciousness really moves us, we approach the problem in a way somewhat different from that of previous generations. We do not now seek to elaborate a second, modern Westminster confession; nor do we seek a mere average of Christian ideas that in reality expresses no one's whole living thought. Still less is there sought the barest minimum of Christian belief. Rather, in harmony with the social consciousness, we seek a unity that is organic. Our age, therefore, must recognize that, in the confession of its faith as in all else, we are genuinely members one of another. The unity sought not only tolerates differences, but welcomes and justifies them, as themselves helps to a deeper unity. It believes in equality, but not in ident.i.ty.

It is true that Christianity looks everywhere to life; and we may be sure that any statement of Christian doctrine that does not obviously bear on living is still inadequate and incorrect. It is true that we do well to emphasize the strictly religious and practical purpose of the Bible; that the Bible is interested in both nature and history so far and only so far as either reveals G.o.d and inspires to G.o.dly living. It is true that in all Christian thinking Christ is our ultimate appeal.