USA > Ohio > Miami County > West Milton > Centennial anniversary of West Branch Monthly Meeting of Friends, 1807-1907 > Part 11
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A review of the changes which have come about in the century's development since our fathers founded this church shows us that life has become increasingly social. Our fathers lived largely alone. Their rela- tions were far more to material facts and forces than to human individuals. Life tended to become self- centered, and each individual family had largely to supply its own needs, and to settle its own problems. The great increase in the means of communication and in the population of our cities has brought about a condition in which no man lives to himself, and each is dependent, not only in the realm of thought and gov- ernment, but also in the small details of daily living upon his fellows and his neighbors. It follows from this that religion must more and more concern itself with social morality, that less and less can the religious message be merely one of individual salvation, but must be more and more a statement of social duties and an ideal of co-operation and brotherhood. Its regal words to this generation must be character and service.
Changes such as those I have sketched show that the gospel, if it is to take hold upon the world of the future, must be stated in modern terms. This means not merely that we must use English instead of medi- aeval Latin, not merely that we must use Twentieth
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Century American English instead of the English of Shakespeare and King James, but that we must ex- press the essence of the gospel in modern thought forms.
In order to do this effectively we must drop from our speculative theology all conceptions which are non- essential to the religion of experience, and which are contradicted by the modern view of the world. Every system of theology has within it two elements, the experimental and the speculative. The experimental consists of those parts which may be put to the test of personal experience. Such in our gospel, is the teachings of the sense of sin, and the peace of forgive- ness through faith in Christ, of becoming a new char- acter with Christ-like love for one's fellowmen through the work of the Spirit of Christ, and of the immediate and personal communion with the Spirit of God. On the other hand, the speculative elements are those which attempt to explain the matters of every- day experience in terms of some system of thought which has to do with the past or the future or with that transcendental region which lies beyond the range of our present life. The experimental elements of religion are those which are constant and unchanging, while the speculative change with men's conceptions of the forces that work in the world and of the prob- abilities of the past or future. My contention is that speculative elements in religion that are out of har- mony with the views of thinking men are apt to be- come barriers to religious faith and should never be pushed to the point of being regarded as essential to the gospel.
The point that I insist on is this, any speculative theology that is uncongenial to the thought of the present age will become a handicap to the work of winning the world. Men will be repelled by the dog- matic assertion of speculative ideas that are incredible to them and consequently will not exercise that faith in Christ that would bring them to an experimental knowledge of the gospel. A man may use the electric cars who believes that electricity is a fluid just as well as one who believes it to be a mode of motion. But it would be extremely bad policy for a corporation, anx- ious to secure patronage for its line, to insist that no one could ride upon its cars who did not hold to the outgrown view that electricity is a fluid. Some of the outgrown conceptions which it seems to me we should
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drop from the presentation of Quakerism in the future are as follows: First, we must make the world under- stand that we have not to deal with a new God since Jesus Christ. We often get the impression from our religious teaching that God before the time of Christ was for all practical purposes a Being different from the one whom Jesus has taught us to call Father ; that He displayed a different character, acted from different motives, laid down different laws of conduct and required a different sort of worship from the "God of Our Lord Jesus Christ." Let us make plain that the explanation of his different representation in the Old Testament is to be found in the fact that men only imperfectly understood him, that because of the hard- ness of their hearts and the blindness of their eyes they did not see and know perfectly our God, whose will and character are the same "yesterday, to-day and for- ever." Let us have the courage to confess with prophet and apostle that the blood of bulls and goats never did and never could take away sins ; that then as now, it was the spirit of the offerer that availed in any sacri- fice ; that the only acceptable sacrifices were those of the humble and contrite heart. Secondly, we need to make the world realize that God did not dwell in the Temple at Jerusalem any more than at any other place in the world where reverent and earnest hearts turned to- wards Him; that no special sanctity attached to either the Temple in Gerizim or in Jerusalem, but that God is, and has always been, truly worshipped wherever men turn to Him, with the true spirit of worship. Thirdly, God speaks to men today, as always, not in the outward voice, but through all those spiritual ave- nues which He has made to afford Himself access to the human heart; that it is not in outward vision nor in abnormal states like trances and dreams that we see and know God best. It is purity of heart that gives us vision of God. We find religious truth at its highest in the normal states of our consciousness. Men today have the same opportunity to commune with God and to work with Him that were afforded the saints of old. Fourthly, in the effort to present a purely spiritual gospel, not limited to any outward forms and geo- graphical locations, we must make clear to the world that the essential things in heaven and hell are spiritual
states rather than places. The impression that men often get is that Heaven is a place which confers eternal bliss upon men by the mere fact of their being
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in it. It tempts men to waste their lives in sin under the delusion that if by some means they can elude St. Peter at the gate, and get inside the heavenly city, eternal bliss will be their portion. The world must be helped to understand that man's moral choices bring bliss or woe by the inevitable action of God's spiritual laws, that in no place can one be happy whose life is alien to God, full of the unrest of selfishness, the pain of evil conscience and the spiritual gangrene of sensu- ality. Fifthly, the Quakerism of the future must teach a purer monotheism. We must not only say, as others do, "I believe in God, the Father Almighty," but we must make men feel that God is the only source of au- thority with whom we have to deal in the universe. Consequently, angels or demons or a devil cannot be spiritual agencies to be reckoned with in our practical life. If such exist, it must be like the "winds and the flames of fire," merely as God's instruments, acting only at His bidding or by His permission.
Monotheism means that God alone is the responsible author of all the circumstances of our outward life, that all the forces both of the material and the spiritual world are under His control, and that for our own choices and acts we alone are responsible.
The Quakerism of the future must, in the way indi- cated by these modifications, present a purely spiritual gospel, which makes religion a matter of the soul's relation to God and man, finding its power in faith working through love, and which shall insist that sal- vation is primarily a matter of character, reaching its realization when the believer is transformed into the image of Christ and filled with His Spirit.
For the presentation of such a purely spiritual gospel, our own best ideals and practices give us a great advantage. Under the influence of modern con- ditions, the world is coming around to our spiritual conceptions of worship and life. This is the testimony of Professor James, of Harvard. In speaking of George Fox, he says, "The Quaker religion which he founded is one which it is impossible to over-praise. In a day of shams it was a religion of veracity rooted in spiritual inwardness, and a return to something more like the original gospel truth than men had ever known in England. So far as our Christian sects to- day are evolving into liberality, they are simply re- verting in essence to the position which Fox and the early Quakers so long ago assumed," That Professor
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James is correct as to the drift of modern religious thinking, a study of the leading religious writings of the present time will abundantly prove. I desire to exhibit the evidence of this with some detail. I shall assume that the original Quaker position is familiar to you. The first point that is distinctive of Friends' presentation of the gospel is that the final test of truth must be sought in the inward spiritual experience. The early Friends used the Bible as a guide to spiritual experience, but not as an outward substitute for it. That such is the position to which the modern religious writers are coming the following quotations will show : "The habit of calling the Canon of Sacred Scripture the Word of God, a term so significant and so unique, a term employed so specifically in more than one place to describe the Saviour Himself, is likely to give rise, and has often given rise to serious misconceptions. There is no authority for the usage in the Bible itself." (Horton, The Word of God, p. 109.) "The Bible as a whole may be spoken of as the Word of God, because it contains words and messages of God to the human soul ; but it is not in its whole extent and throughout, identical with the Word of God."- -"Christ alone is the Word of God."-"The formal identification of the Bible in its whole contents with the very Word of and is in God is neither ancient nor catholic
fact an error of yesterday."- "The Bible is amply sufficient for our instruction in all those truths which are necessary to salvation In everything which is requisite for man's salvation, the lessons con- tained in Scripture, with the co-ordinate help of the Spirit, by whom its writers were moved, to aid us in our discrimination are an infallible guide to us in things necessary." (Farrar. Bible : Meaning and Su- premacy, pp. 142, 146-7, 150.)
"Under the new assumption, the Bible is just what its contents are found to be by the scrutiny thereof in the light of literary and historical science and of our experience of spiritual things. Its authority is that of a body of ascertained facts. Any statement becomes credible, not through a belief that it must be true be- cause it is in the Bible, but either because its origin and setting make it trustworthy or because the substance of what it asserts can be tested by us in our daily living." (Coe, Religion of a Mature Mind, p. 93.) "Modern historical study of the Bible, therefore, offers the Bible as the record of God's development among
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men of a religious life, and therefore as the best stim- ulus for exciting individuals a corresponding religious life; as the standard to which the impulses of all re- ligious life may be brought for testing, to inquire whether they are on the line of real progress ; and as the guide to which we may turn whenever we are op- pressed by the arrogance or tyranny of human think- ing, to escape into the free places of the soul's liberty in the presence of the Most High." (Rhees, Religious Educational Association, 1903, pp. 86, 87.) "The teach- ing of the book may be summarized as follows. There is in every man light sufficient to disclose all the truth that is needed for the purposes of life; that light is from God, who dwells in humanity as He is immanent in the universe; therefore the source of authority is to be found within the soul and not in external author- ity of church or creed or book; that light, being divine, must be continuous ; it will never fail; it will lead into all truth and show things to come; and it may be implicitly trusted."- -"For many years and for many centuries, men have been taught to look for the ultimate authority in their thinking and living to some one or to some writings or to some institution outside of themselves. The supremacy and sanctity of the State or the Church, of some sacred book or of some holy man or of some doctrinal standards, has been emphasized, while but few have caught glimpses of the clearer light which shines within the human soul and still fewer have dared to think of it as evi- dence of the divine indwelling, or even as the medium of divine revelation. Almost alone, the Society of Friends has ventured to assert this truth, and to teach it as an article of religious faith. It has remained for the Twentieth Century to give to the Inward Light the attention it deserves. Formerly it was left to mys- tics of various schools, and even recently it has been suspected of being "new theology," and has been re- garded as a. source of various inoffensive heresies, when it has not been denounced as an enemy of the Christian Church." (Bradford, "Inward Light," p. vii, Preface, and p. 3.)
In regard to the question of the source of authority in Christian belief. there are three consistent positions offered to the modern world. The Catholics. Disciples of Christ and the Quakers occupy these three posi- tions with logical consistency. The Catholic finds the fountain of religious truth in the not-to-be-questioned
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dogmas that the church has received from its past. The Disciples of Christ find the sole authority for Christian faith and practice in the Bible itself, espec- ially the letter of the New Testament. The Quakers find the ultimate basis for religious belief in the lead- ing of the Spirit of God in the individual and the church. In Protestantism, the real issue, when plainly seen, is between the position of the Disciples of Christ and that of the Quakers, is between the bare acceptance of the statement of Scripture and the in- ward test and realization of all religious truth. Ex- ceptions to these statements may be found among the leaders and often among the membership of these var- ious denominations, but these two occupy logically consistent positions and on this point ought logically to divide the Protestant world between them. The quotations given above show that in this effort the Quakers have a tremendous advantage and that the trend of modern religious thinking is towards their position, as Professor James asserted. Another posi- tion of the original Friends was that outward forms are non-essential to religion, but that the true religion is a vital, personal relationship to God that expresses itself in the consistent character and daily acts of men and women. This position of theirs is being more and more approved by modern thinkers. The position of Friends in opposition to war and oaths is more gener- al today than ever before. This is the testimony of Professor Schmidt, of Cornell University: "Jesus . . . expresses ideas of such far reaching importance, lays down principles so startling and revolutionary. that, if they should in the main commend themselves to men and find embodiment in their social life, a transforma- tion of human society would be the result.
It was his conviction that men should love their enemies, do good to those who use them ill, ab- stain from all retaliation and overcome evil with good. The adoption of this principle would abolish war, do away with armies and navies that are a constant men- ace to the world. send millions of men back to produc- tive and profitable work and give millions of capital to useful industry and needed improvements, to educa- tion, art and science. As yet no denomination except the little body of Quakers accepts the view of Jesus in its literal and unqualified statement, but outside the church there is a growing disposition to regard His at- titude as both wise and practicable." -- "Jesus
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said, 'Swear not at all.' The nominally Christian state has never recognized the wisdom of his counsel, and the church, for its convenience, has furnished a wholly improbable interpretation, by which Jesus did not have in mind any oath that really meant anything, but only the senseless curse words with which the or- dinary conversation of some men is too redolent. The early Christians, the Baptists of the Sixteenth Century and the Quakers understood him." (Schmidt, "Proph- et of Nazareth," pp. 364, 368.) The position of Friends denying any special value to creeds and out- ward ordinances and set forms of worship finds abun- dant supporters today. "The vitality of Christian dog- ma is due to its relation to the unquenchable life of the spirit. It outlives its own defective logic because it does not live by that kind of bread alone. It is an out- ward sign of an inward experience. Generation after generation, a mighty power has gripped men, and the system of doctrine is a stammering effort to testify to it." (Coe, "Religion of a Mature mind," p. 102).
It is not absolutely certain that Jesus Him- self actually instituted such a supper and directed His disciples to eat and drink in remembrance of Him." (McGiffert, "Apostolic Age," pp. 68-9). "The atti- tude of Jesus to the popular religious customs and in- stitutions of His time, to sacred persons, places, days and acts, to public prayers, almsgiving and fasts, is calculated to increase the confidence of modern men in His leadership. He claimed for all men the rights accorded to a priestly class. He seems to have cared nothing for the continuation of sacrifices, would make the temple a house of prayer for all nations and feared no evil for the cause of religion from its destruction. The evangelist who put upon his lips the statement that the time would come when men would worship neither in Jerusalem nor on Gerizim, but would wor- ship in spirit and truth, understood the mind of the Master. He maintained that man has a right to deter- mine what to do on the Sabbath, since the Sabbath was instituted for man's benefit. He neglected and criticized sacred ablutions. He never ordained either baptism or eucharist. He was opposed to taxation for the maintenance of the religious cult, and to the use
of force in the interest of religion. He ap-
pealed directly to the judgment. of men. There is nothing about him that savors of the priest. It is im- possible to conceive . of him as smearing the horns of
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the altar with sacred blood, or swinging a golden cen- ser, or chanting a litany or elevating the host." (Schmidt, "Prophet of Nazareth," p. 378). "The teaching of Paul in the Epistle to the Galatians, may be summed up in the sentence. Nothing external to man is of the essence of religion : no order of ministry, no form of church service, no rite or ceremony, no day of observance. It is indeed true that the religious spirit must always embody itself in some form.
But no particular order of teachers, form of service, method of rite, or time of observance is of the es- sence of religion. Faith, hope and love alone are eter- nal. The language which they use, the method and instruments which they employ, may be changed from time to time, that they may be adapted to new con- ditions of life." To sum all up in a single sentence. In Christ there is neither priest nor sacri- fice. The priest is a mediator between man and God. In Christ the way of access to God is open to the hum- blest, the poorest and the most sinful. The veil of the Temple is rent. Every man may enter the Holy of Holies. But there are still prophets, who, knowing God, interpret Him to his children. Whoever knows the Father may do this work of interpretation.
There is no special symbol of consecration which is essential to divine sonship. Neither is immersion any- thing nor sprinkling anything, but a new creation. Life is itself the test of all instruments of life. There are Pedo-Baptists as consecrated to Christ as Baptists : and there are Friends, who have received no water baptism of any kind, as consecrated as either. No day is of the essence of religion. The church has done wisely to make of Christ's resurrection day a festal occasion. But the obligation of the Lord's Day lies not in an ancient code, given by Moses to an ancient people, but in this : that the observance of such a dav helps to conserve and promote the fruits of the Spirit .- love, joy, peace, long suffering, serviceable- ness, goodness. faith, meekness, self-control." (Ah- bott, "Life and Letters of Paul," pp. 204-5. 209.) "The most disconcerting fact to the thoughtful min- ister is not the indifference of the multitude; it is the increasing neglect of the ordinances of the church by men of intelligence and character as doctors, lawyers, artists, writers, scholars, experts in science." -- "Among thinking men there is a remarkable return both toward faith in the unseen and toward rever-
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ence for Jesus Christ. But this goes with a growing indifference to religious ordinances." (Adeney, "The Ordinances of the Church," Biblical World, Novem- ber, 1906.)
A large number of works that are recognized as ex- ponents of the latest religious thinking, give modern statements of what is essentially the Quaker view. Such are, "Christian Belief Interpreted by Christian Experience," by President Hall of Union Theological Seminary; "The Direct and Fundamental Proofs of the Christian Religion," by Professor Knox. "The Religions of Authority and the Religion of the Spirit," by Sabatier, of the University of Paris. All these books ought to have been written by Quakers and might have been if we had been as ready to express our conceptions of Christianity in the thought of this age as was Barclay in that of his time. Whether we be- lieve that these men are right or not, whether we think that the world ought to share their views or not, I feel confident that the preachers and religious teach- ers and editors of the coming century are going to accept their views, because these men whom I have quoted and the men who share them are practically all of them teachers and editors, and their pupils and read- ers will follow them in the main, and are bound to become the leaders of the religious life and thoughit of the future. These works are evidence sufficient, though plenty more could be given, if there were time or need for it, to show the drift of this present age away from the forms of worship and thinking of past generations. We have our opportunity, if we will adjust the forms of our religion to the needs of the times, to spread the influence of Quakerism far be- yond anything that has ever been realized before. We may be. sure, however, that these men are not going to turn to Quakerism, even though they may sym- pathize with its essential positions, if .it is to be identi- fied with ancient peculiarities or outgrown systems of thought or crude methods of worship. The men of the modern world who have come to believe that there is no virtue in ritual at all, are not going to abandon an elaborate one, beautified and sanctified by age, and custom, for a Quaker ritual, however simple it be, if it is to be regarded as essential. We shall not get men trained to modern parliamentary usage to transact church business according to our way. But we do have an opportunity to gather them into meetings to
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worship and work according to our principles, and to embody and express these principles in organizations and forms of worship that seem to their minds best suited to their needs, that seem to them to be the lead- ing of God for their present tasks.
Such seem to me the opportunity and the problem that face the Quakerism of the Twentieth Century. Let us go forward to meet the responsibilities of the future with the scrupulous conscientiousness and the moral heroism with which our fathers faced the wild- erness. We should consecrate our best talents and use them to the fullest capacity in the effort to make Quakerisin once more a vital and dominant force in . the world. In my previous address, I sketched the reaction which, in the closing decade of the Nineteenth Century, checked the tendency to abandon altogether our essential Quaker positions and to adopt a mediocre type of evangelical Protestantism. That reaction is practically over. We have resisted the tendency to turn back again to bondage to the "rudiments of the world," to practise ordinances, and to surrender our freedom of thought and worship for a hard and fast creed and a ruling clergy ; and now, having passed through the period of reconstruction and criticism, as the second Five Years' Meeting approaches, we find ourselves face-forward, girded up for the task of gripping the modern city, if we feel it worth while. The problem of greatest moment before the Five Years' Meeting that is just to assemble is the problem of constructive and statesman-like effort to plant Christianity as we Quakers understand it, where Paul planted Christianity in the First Century, in the great centers of population ; and to enlist in behalf of the gospel of the Spirit, those men of today whom the old forms of thought and worship no longer satisfy. We have to give to this age a gospel of God's grace, of Christ's salvation, and of man's worth and welfare which is still needed by modern society. The close contact of our modern life and the interdependence of one upon the other for all the needs of life, will render the state of society intolerable if the spirit of Christian brotherhood shall not permeate all and rule all. We need to teach this age, proud of its material achievement, of its great cities, big battleships, and vast manufacturies, that it is better to build great char- acters than to build tall buildings; that it is better to acquire Christian virtues than to accumulate stocks
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