Essay No. 22
The Two Gospels
BY
The Right Rev. the Bishop of London, D.D.
I SUPPOSE that it would be very difficult to discover a greater contrast than exists to-day between the ideal of many in the world and the ideal of the New Testament.
The popular gospel to-day is a gospel of comfort. According to it, the great evil to be avoided at all costs is Pain ; the least misfortune, and still more, of course, a series of misfortunes, is held to prove at once either that there is no God or that God hates us.
If maternal duties involve discomfort and loss of society, they must be escaped at all costs. If a child cries and makes itself unpleasant, it must be given what it asks for at once, as crying is so bad for children, and future character is considered un¬important compared to present comfort. Further, compulsory military training is looked upon almost as an insult to a proud, freedom-loving people. "If a man will not work, neither shall he eat " is thought a barbarous saying fit for a barbarous and uncivilised
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age. Schools must be more and more comfortable, and boys' holidays carefully provided with treats and entertainments, or there will be great dissatisfaction in a very important part of the household.
Now turn to the New Testament and mark the contrast.
Pain and trouble are to be expected, and are to be borne cheerfully as part of the discipline of a soldier on service. "We must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God."
Undeserved suffering a proof that God does not love us ! Listen to the verdict of God upon the most unjustly persecuted Being that ever lived : "This is My beloved Son, in Whom I am well pleased." In¬stead of the idea that the child or the boy is to tyran¬nise over his parents, we hear the blunt command : " Children, obey your parents, for this is right." Instead of the idea that life is to be tested by what can be got out of it, we hear : "What shall it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul ? " "He that saveth his life shall lose it." Instead of the idea that the Christian is to expect everything to be smooth and easy, it is said : "Thou therefore endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ."
The whole idea of the Church is that of a band of soldiers on a hard campaign under a blood-stained banner and a leader wounded again and again—a band always in training, always alert, always loyal
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to one another, always ready to strike a blow for the right.
The two pictures are in absolute contrast, and we are bound to make up our minds which is to be our own ideal.
Am I in the least exaggerating when I paint these two pictures ? Look around and see for yourselves. Many of the shrewdest observers note a marked tendency to decay in our national character. We have won our great possessions in the world by gallant exploits on land and sea, by a self-discipline and sobriety of character which has been the admiration of the world. "You were a very great nation," acknowledged a foreigner the other day.
Am I exaggerating about the children, the boys, or the young men, so many of whom are content with vicarious exercise ? Is it not true also about the women ? Are the men as ready to become public leaders, or to take part in public work, as they were when England grew so great ? Is the Drink Bill of £161,000,000 defensible from any point of view ? Is the moral evil really abolished, or only driven under the surface ? Are we soldiers on a campaign, looking for a fight here and our reward hereafter, or are we idlers, crying, like the decadent Romans, for "bread and games " ?
Let us look, then, at the New Testament picture of the soldier we were all meant to be. Notice the following points about him.
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(I) He is disciplined.
That is where the whole question of the moral and spiritual training of our youth comes in. It is the most cruel kindness to spoil children, or to let them have their way in youth. No one is a greater curse to himself and to the world than the undisciplined young man, or the hysterical or neurotic woman; and in many cases this arises from defects in early train¬ing.
You are a soldier on service. Is your temper under control ? Is your time strictly husbanded ? Are your own inclinations subordinated to the calls of duty ?
If you have got the idea that the universe exists for you, that the home was formed to give you com¬fort, that parents are there to save you worry, then, instead of being an efficient soldier and a help to the working force of a great Empire like this, you are an encumbrance, carried along to the great danger and discredit of the whole force.
(2) But a soldier is not only disciplined—he must expect danger, and trouble, and wounds.
All arguments against the goodness of God, based upon the theory that, if, good, He will never allow pain or loss to fall upon you, are defeated by the fact that His own Son endured the most deadly wounds and death, and, as it were, fell at the head of His troops.
If you are a soldier you must be, on the contrary,
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almost surprised if you have nothing to bear. It is quite clear that this earth is "the star of suffering." * Other worlds may have other work in store, but only in this world may we suffer for God. And even if we are spared crushing sorrows—which may or may not come—we must be always "enduring hardness," and "not entangling ourselves in the affairs of this world, that we may please Him Who has called us to be soldiers." We must mortify then the flesh with the affections and lusts, so that the flesh may readily obey the spirit.
But more than that.
(3) Good soldiers fight.
Make no mistake about it. Public opinion on the moral question is nearly as slack as ever, and although in the temperance question it is greatly altered for the better, it still needs a combined effort to push home the advantage; and this is the motive for the C.E.T.S. Forward Movement which we have started this autumn. Do let us fight the public opinion which still condones so much mis-chievous and unnecessary drinking, and the still more damnable opinion that certain sins are necessary to human nature.
(4) Good soldiers fight together.
The growing loyalty in the Church and the readi¬ness to combine for work can only be increased by
* See "The Lessons in the Hospital," by Mrs. Hamilton King.
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resolute men on both sides who refuse to be brought into conflict on non-essentials.
(5) Good soldiers fight in loving loyalty to their leader on earth, because he is their leader, and in vital dependence upon their Leader in Heaven, because on Him alone they depend for daily wisdom, strength, and courage.
Let all good citizens, then, combine to fight shoulder to shoulder to enforce the New Testament Gospel as opposed to the gospel of the world, and it will not be too late to bring back the nation to such duty and discipline as may bring down upon it again the blessing of the duty-loving God.
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