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THE WAY BACK
Religion is the tie that binds us back to
God. It is doubtful if we ever lose, in this
life, something of the binding force of religion.
Man is hopelessly religious, though his religion
may lead him far afield.
There is only one door to the Father's House.
That door is Jesus Christ. lie said more than
once, "I am the Door." The trouble with the
world is, not that they do not desire good
nor even God, but they are trying to get back
in some other way.
Jesus pictures two types of men in what is
known as the Parable of the Prodigal Son.
The latter part about the elder brother is a
part of that parable. And it is not merely
the foil of it, to show off in higher light, the
merciful provision of the Father's love and
excellence of the Father's grace. Some men
come to God by going away from Him. They
must needs adventure into t lie far country.
Faith is the investment in the future. It is
only by going away from the light, that we
are finally coming back to it. The grain of
corn must die and in dying thrust its roots
down into the dark earth away from the life
giving sun, in order to reach up at last and
receive the blessing of fruit. This young man
would never have known his father, if lie had
not known the emptiness of the world with
out him. The path back home was the same
path away from home. The way back has
the same sign-boards. He went away and
alienated himself from father and home. He
found in that the absence of a great necessity.
God is needed by us all. He consumed his
real self in a kind of living that had no sal
vation in it, for this is the root meaning of
the word, "riotous living." lie found nothing
really satisfying to his soul in the consumption
of the real and substantial of life. The shadow
of waste hung over his head all the time. The
relationships of earth failed to provide for
the vacancy of his soul. Friends cannot take
the place of God. Citizens are cold-hearted
when we want the warmth of home. The end
was only a blind alley and a hard wall against
which this type of man could only bruise his
body and wear out his soul. So the way away
was the way back. Only it was facing God.
We wonder, if there are not many that are
near that place. They need a kindly direc
tion. The adventure has failed because it did
not carry God along. Life has become empty,
because the best has been left out. Is not this
the trouble with thousands today? They have
sought satisfaction in going to the far coun
try. They are coming back.
The second type of men is the one who
stays close by, yet does not understand the
deeps of the Father's heart, nor the worth of
feeling human need, lie is the elder brother.
Now waste is his ? carefully all has bean kept
? no excess, which is sin, has he been guilty of,
yet he is as far away as the other, from realiz
ing the deeps of divine compassion, the glory
of helping back. He is away from God as
truly as the far-flung prodigal.
Perhaps this type of man is as common
in the Church, as the other is out of it. He
needs to come back to God. The way back is
the way he went out. He followed the road
of decent and safe staying by. He must needs
get away from that, for God's salvation does
not centre in safety, but in lowly and com
passionate and joyous service. It is strange, he
cannot save himself, without saving his brot+ier.
He cannot sit down at the feast, without a
sense of God's love. Feasting upon kids with
decent friends has no joy in it, unless it has
a place for the prodigal brother and a recogni
tion of the Father's far-reaching compassion,
and overwhelming joy over the recovery of the
lost.
So the way back is the way he went out,
only it faces God, and not self. It looks on
another and not our own.
So sings the poet ?
"Why fret the heavens with your futile cry,
The while in want a brother fasteth by?
Your true religion is but half of creed,
The other, greater, is in human need.
"In ehanceled aisles and altars wrought with
gold,
Where surpliced priests chant litanies of old,
While white-robed choirs in golden accents
cheer,
If love of man is not, God doth not hear.
"For King and slave, his ancient sacrifice;
To give thyself will not suffice;
Lip-love will never lift a brother's load;
For black and white he paved a road.
"No high, nor low, except in humble state,
We live our faith; true service makes men
great.
Religion is not all in stately creed,
But love of God and man, the utmost need."
?A. A. L.
Contributed
WHY DID JESUS SUFFER?
By Rev. D. J. Currie.
No one ever yet answered successfully the
question, Why were sin and suffering per
mitted to come into the world? The sooner
a man shelves that question as one of the
unsolvable problems of life the better for him.
Though we wince under suffering and natural
ly seek to escape it, we can believe, without
understanding it all, that sufferings are over
ruled for man's good, especially for- the good
of God's children.
But the very fact that Jesus suffered ? suf
fered, perhaps, as no one ever suffered ? for
ever does away with the ancient view, that
great sin is the one explanation for great suf
fering. His sufferings were great, indeed, and
yet He was "holy, harmless, and undefiled."
We do not understand fully, and yet we under
stand in part why our Lord had to suffer.
His sufferings were in fulfillment of prophe
cy. The thought of a suffering Saviour was
one of the most common and one of the most
important elements in prophecy. The scarlet
thread of atoning blood stretches all the way
from Eden to Calvary. Both major prophet
and minor prophet told of a Sufferer that
would save.
Again Christ's sufferings were necessary in
order that He might meet the imperative de
mands of inviolable justice. Since God is just,
all sin must be punished, either in the person
of the offender or in the person of one who
will pay the penalty for the offender. If
Christ had not taken the sinner's place and
suffered in his stead, salvation to the sinner
had been impossible.
Also it was necessary that Christ suffer in
order that He might meet the three-fold obli
gation assumed by Him in the covenant of re
demption. In that great and gracious covenant
Jesus agreed to take the place of the sinner
and pay the penalty of the sinner's sins that
the sinner might be saved. Thus there were
three parties to whom Jesus was obligated in
that covenant, lie was under obligations to
the Father with whom He made the covenant
and to whom He gave the promise to save all
those whom the Father had given Him. He
was under obligation to those whom He had
promised the Father to save from sin. These
whom the Father had given Him and whom
lie was to save were utterly unworthy of sal
vation, and yet once Jesus intervened in their
behalf, He was under obligation to tuuKe His
gracious promise good. His was a voluntary
service in their behalf, but having once as
sumed to save them, 11c was under obligation
to do what He undertook to do. Further,
Jesus was under obligation to Himself to car
ry out the provisions of the covenant. The
whole covenant was voluntary on llis part, but
having once become a party to that covenant,
He was henceforth under obligation to Him
self, as well as to the Father and those given
Him by the Father, to carry out the provi
sions of the covenant. And all this demanded
suffering on His part if He should save those
.whom He undertook to save.
Yet again, it was necessary that Jesus suf
fer in order that He might enter into glory.
He said to the two disciples on the way to
Emmaus, "Ought not Christ to have suffered
these things, and to enter into His glory?"
De Funiak Springs, Fla.
I KNOW.
By Margaret II. Bacuett.
The planet Uranus is the seventh of our sys
tem in point of distance from the sun. When
astronomers were studying this planet, whi^h
was then the newest of the planets, certain ir
regularities were noticed in its movements,
which could only be accounted for by the at
traction of some heavenly body in the vicinity,
as "vicinity" is used in space. But there was
no such body then known to astronomers.
Reasoning that the disturbance must be due
to some planet, as yet undiscovered, two as
tronomers, one in France and the other in
England, independently calculated the prob
able position in the sky which such a planet
would occupy. When that part of the heavens
was searched with the telescope the planet
which was afterwards named Neptune, was dis
covered. Its distance from the sun is 2,792,
000,000 miles, and one revolution around the
sun requires 1G5 of our years. From the Revo
lutionary War to the present time, Neptune
has not completed one revolution around the
sun.
The astronomer Ilalley studied the comet
which bears his name and calculated that it
would be visible again, to dwellers on this
earth, in about seventy-five years. He did not
live to see his calculations verified, but other
astronomers did. Imagine, if you can, that
long, mysterious journey through space, which
brought it back, after seventy-five years, to a
point where those on this earth could see it.
But these heavenly bodies, the planet and
the comet, belong to our solar system. As
tonomer8 tell us that the nearest of the fixed
stars is about twenty trillions of miles distant,
and that there are other of these stars, prob
ably themselves suns, which are so distant that
their distance cannot be estimated.
Colonel Robert G. Ingcrsoll, in an address
which set forth his views, said, "I do not say
that there is no God; I simply say I do not
know. I do not say there is no life beyond;
I simply say I do not know."
Colonel Ingersoll could contemplate the ra
diant, star-lit skies, brilliant with unnumbered
blazing suns, and say, "I do not know whether
there is a God or not." He could look up at