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TOPIC: Gordon, Samuel Dickey - Quiet Talks on Personal Problems (Other Topics in this Collection)
SUBJECT: 63. Fellowship and Service.
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Fellowship and Service.
Man was made for fellowship and service. He was made male and female for mutual help in the maturing of his life, and so greater efficiency in service. Here in the original plan for man lies the plan of the Church. It is a divine institution for the mutual maturing of the life of its members, and for a great service—bearing witness to Jesus Christ before all men. Its birthday was that marvelous 'day in Jerusalem when the crucified and enthroned Jesus sent down the Holy Spirit upon His waiting disciples. Its beginnings were wholly Jewish, at the Jewish capital, with Jewish members, and in a Jewish atmosphere.
Its mission was a striking resemblance to that of the old Hebrew nation. That nation's great mission was to preserve the revelation it had received of the true God, and to give it to all the world. The Hebrews were God's preachers to the world of Himself. The Church's mission is to tell all the world of Jesus Christ, His life and death and new life beyond death. The Church is Jesus Christ's preacher to all nations.
The principle of organization of the two is radically different. In the nation there was a birthright membership, in the Church a membership by personal choice; there others could come in by choosing to, and fulfilling the requirements; here all come in by choice. In the nation the magnet was Jehovah, and His worship. In the Church the magnet is Jesus Christ, and His sacrifice of love. The Church is the lineal descendant of the Hebrew nation. The nation failed at the greatest crisis of its history, the coming of its King—failed through rejecting Him. The highest revelation entrusted to it was refused. The Church was brought to its birth that that rejected King, accepted as Saviour, might be taken to all men.
There are a good many family traits of the nation in its descendant. That nation was not always true to its mission. Its leaders were frequently weak and false. It had to be severely chastened. Its light shone very dimly and unsteadily at times. Yet up to the time of the great crisis its mission had been largely fulfilled; everywhere in the civilized world was a knowledge of the true God, and a people worshipping Him, in the midst of idolatry. Always in its darkest days and saddest plight the true light was kept shining clear and bright by a faithful company. There was the nation within the nation; the inner group true to the national mission while the nation itself was losing sight of its high ideal.
The Church has not always been true to its mission. Yet always there have been those who have kept the fires alive, though sometimes the live coals seemed very few. But always there has been a vitality in the Church, a peculiar quality of real life that has thrown off the bad, broken through the false-work, risen up out of the dead elements, and swung it true to its great mission. They were all sons of the Church who led in the great protesting movement which was as a second birth to it, and to the whole world's life.
The counter Reformation within the mother Church was another evidence of its great vitality. The more recent movements among young men, and young women, and students, and for a renewed missionary campaigning by students and young people and laymen, have all grown up within the circle of its membership; they have drawn their strength from its heart; they are simply new evidences of its vast fertility and resource, equal to any emergency.
It is intensely interesting to note that all the creative factors that enter into our present complex, intense civilization found their birth within the Church. The mental awakening of the world's life so marked and marvelous in every sphere of life in our day has dated practically from the great Reformation movement. There has been no such mental activity in the nations outside the sphere of the Church's influence. It has been most apparent where the Church's influence has been greatest. The whole modern system of education found a birthplace in its vitality, and is distinctively its child. Here in America peculiarly, in the beginning, the Church built the colleges.
The spirit of robust, aggressive vigor so dominant to-day in all the world was breathed into life by the life of the Church. Church history is the backbone of all history. Other lines break and recede. The Church supplies the one continuous warp into which is woven all the rest. The whole network of benevolent institutions to help the distressed, the hospitals and the asylums of all sorts for caring for the physically and mentally needy, grew up out of its warm heart.
Great Church-names Sign-posts of Man's Growth* The fact that there are great divisions of the Church has been the subject of much criticism. It is not uncommon to hear the Church spoken of as being "all split up." But these great divisions have, in the main, come about in a very natural way. They have been a natural development historically of man's progress in liberty, and in the development of his mental powers. They are a great expression of his strength of thought, as well as of his individual temperament, brought into conflict with the autocratic principle of government in both Church and State from which men have so largely broken away.
The first great division was by a geographical line into east and west, Greek and Roman. Underneath that line was a radical difference of temperament between the peoples of the West centering at Rome, and those of the East centering about Constantinople. They had been bound into one empire through the power of the sword. Now they are free to give expression to their individuality. It has been commonly said that that division came about through the dispute over two little Latin words in the creed. But that only revealed the different modes of thought of peoples diverse in temperament, and now free to give expression to their thoughts.
The next division, the great Protestant movement, was an evidence of the new life, both mental and spiritual, of the peoples of Europe. The whole body of Protestant churches to-day tells out the vigor and vitality both of man's life and of the Church. It spells out large the greatest movement of man towards a new intellectual life. The race was catching fire afresh. It was having a new birth.
The varying names within the Protestant Church grew up naturally in different nations. In Germany the personality of the great leader in their midst gave the name Lutheran. Under the leadership of that very different personality, Calvin, the churches in the Rhine countries from Holland to Switzerland used the name Reformed. In Scotland, always marked peculiarly for its independence and individuality, the name Presbyterian grew up, indicating a form of government radically different from that of the mother Church from which they had broken away. In England the Reformation movement took on national proportions, the King leading in the break, and so a national name was used, the Church of England.
The Methodist Church was a later movement. It is a child of the Church of England, born in its heart. It grew up out of the great awakening among the common people of England under the leadership of John Wesley. Its name is a constant reminder of the power of the Church to reach out to the masses, and, too, of the marvelous power inherent in man to develop new life. The stream of life always cuts new channels.
Others have grown up through adherence to some truth or principle that was not being recognized and emphasized as some men felt that it should be. So the great Baptist Church came into being and was peculiarly strengthened by the various persecutions endured. Many of the smaller church bodies are evidence that the unity of the Church is greater than the differences; for they are made of remnants who have refused to come into a union being effected by the larger number. Their existence reveals the fact that the unity of the Church has been dominant, though not all inclusive.
The last hundred years and more have witnessed an unparalleled spreading out of the race over the whole earth, subduing, developing, and organizing, even as the command was given in Eden. The pouring of the hordes of northern barbarians into southern Europe has been spoken of as one of the greatest movements of the race. But it is clear overshadowed, both in the numbers and in the vast changes involved, by the present-day emigration movements. And as the people have gone they have carried with them the church forms and names to which they were accustomed in the home land. So it comes to pass that on American soil can be found about every form of church worship, and management, and name. These differences viewed thus historically do not reveal the weakness of the Church but its strength. They mark a certain stage in its progress. They tell the story of man's vigorous life, and of his devotion to the Church.