2/3/52

Scripture: Psalm 91

Some periods in history seem marked by a reasonable amount of agreement on matters pertaining to the common life. Other times seem electric with disagreement; with clashing ideologies, and violent differences. Our time is such a period in history. So- called "peace" conferences are filled with suspicion and barbed with invective. Ideas are so far apart that even a limited compromise leaves wide gaps which bar the road to harmony. In a time like this, it is increasingly difficult for one to live in any positive fashion without the enmity of someone or some group. It a rare person who has no enemies in the camp of firm opposition.

Up in the state of Vermont, they tell the story of a man who had reached the experienced old age of 95, and who claimed that he had no enemies. He reported the assertion among neighbors and at town meetings, until one day when, in open meeting, there was time enough so that the presiding officer could ask a curiosity question. Looking down from the platform to the old man sitting by the aisle, the presiding man said to the old-timer, "We’ve heard you remark, now and then, that you are a man without enemies. For anybody to be able to say that is remarkable. In fact it’s amazing that anyone could live for 95 years and have no enemies. How do you do it?" The old fellow got deliberately to his feet and replied, "‘Tain’t so amazin’. I just outlived the scoundrels, that’s all!"

Well, I suppose it might be a hope of more than one participant in a conflict of opinion and purpose the outlive his opponent, if unable to convince him. But life isn’t always that long!

To be an American citizen today is a coveted privilege and a cause for some just pride. There are those who would give anything they possess to secure such a privilege if it were available to them. In the United States of America, the citizen may still take part in molding the affairs of this nation, devoted to the cause of liberty.

Of course the freedom we have carries with it a real duty, a heavy responsibility, not only to defend and maintain our essential principles, but then exemplify them in our lives. We sometimes say that we are a Christian nation - and so we should be. But any reasonably honest observer will find much to cast doubt on the assumption that we are a religious people in any accurate sense. For many pay little attention, except occasional lip service, to real motivating religion, or its application in American life, and live a stunted, circumscribed kind of life, quite dwarfed beside its possibilities.

If you have ever ridden the subway in New York City, you know how confusing it can be to be riding along that noisy train in an underground tube. When going over a new route to an unfamiliar part of the city, one is apt to want to ask questions of someone else who knows just where the train goes over that route. A man who was a comparative stranger to the City was riding one night on the subway and asked a man next to him, "What is the nearest station to 181st Street?" The answer was, "I don’t know." "Oh," said the first man, "Don’t you ride this line regularly?" "Yes, I ride it every night." "And don’t you know the station nearest to 181st Street?" "No, I never go beyond 168th Street." He explained that his daily world was from 168th street to 34th street. If such a person is not careful, he may get the "34th street to l68th street" mind after a while. One can live in the greatest city in the world and become awfully little by allowing horizons to shrink and visions of the world to shrivel. We can live in this nation we consider greatest in the world -- at least greatest for us and for freedom-living folk -- and yet stand in danger of beating our own little paths without a comprehensive view of what our citizenship means.

A superficial examination of our life in this country shows us that people have achieved longer life and better health, more gadgets and luxuries, freedom from much of the kind of toil that was the price of existence for the pioneers. For millions abroad, and even for some within this nation, many of these achievements are only a hope; better living is a long way off for them.

And even here, men must struggle to keep the machine and the factory the servants rather than the task-masters of themselves. People herd together in great cities; work and live to the monotony of the clock; find mass production unbalancing emotions and the power of choice. We find class and race hatreds, aggravated by frayed nerves. Things are in abundance, and yet not available to all. In an amazing age of scientific achievement and technology, we yet have a jungle legacy of selfishness, lust for satisfaction or power, and human passions that change little through the centuries.

1) Our time is characterized by a materialistic philosophy, that is altogether inadequate for happiness or well-being. Leisure increases, but moral stature declines. Transportation and communication are swift, but suspicion between people is rife. Man should be the lord of earthly creation, but is mastered by matter. Knowledge outruns spirit.

Materialistic philosophy has been adopted not only by an occasional tough mind here and there, but by whole blocks of men. Communism has endorsed it completely, and denies any official room for the concept of a good God. But materialism is the working way of a host of men and women of our own nation, who, whether or not they give lip service to God, act on the basis of materialistic claims and live an essentially pagan existence.

2) Our time is further characterized by intensive specialization of interest and skill. The wide acquaintance and varied ability of the skilled craftsman is narrowed to the required skill and craft of the worker who does a single repetitive task in some industrial process or some office responsibility. The world has expanded in knowledge, but the individual’s world has often become more narrow and circumscribed. And many suffer from a sort of intellectual scurvy, caused by restriction of intellectual diet. But it is not as easily cured as the physical disease. It takes more than pills or onions to change the habits of thought and intellectual outlook.

It is even possible for the scientist to proceed down this path. He may be the most disciplined and careful individual possible in his laboratory; but outside the laboratory unable to enter into the concerns and hopes of people who are humbly dependent on some of his findings. There have been circumstances wherein the scientific mind has avoided responsibility for interpreting his discoveries in terms of effect on human life. Perhaps one who has seen trivial discoveries grow into potent influences in the common life hesitate to make predictions, preferring scientific freedom to pursue the matters that interest him. But scientists can no more dodge responsibility than can anyone else. The findings of science can just as readily be turned to destroy the good as to create a benefit. And it takes not the technical discovery, but the moral judgment, to discover which shall be the effect.

What is true of the scientist is true as well of people in all other walks of life. If they are disappointed with the ineffectiveness of much of their specialized work, they must seek broader interests than the daily routine, for interpreting the meaning of life.

3) A third characteristic of much contemporary American life is widespread disillusionment and lack of faith; a kind of spiritual atrophy. The intellectual, physical and spiritual aspects of a man’s life must move and grow together, else he is imperfectly developed. Even after thousands of years of training and education and religious heritage, we see far too many of our fellow humans living the life of animals - motivated mostly by the physical and sensual, their minds and souls being but the primitive part of what they could attain.

There are a few religious fanatics who are creatures of instinct and emotion with no guidance from reason. There are some who appear to worship reason, without a spiritual standard for their intellectual life. These things fall into proper perspective when we remember that Jesus taught: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment." [Mark 12: 30].

The old adage that "knowledge is power" is proved by experience to be only a partial truth. It is possible for knowledge to be debased to the service of selfish ends. The knowledge of explosives has powered much of the machinery of peace-time progress. It has fired the guns of national defense. But it is also used for great destruction. And the same knowledge that loads the guns of defense, loads the guns of the gangster.

The faith that man’s good sense will pretty well guarantee the good use of knowledge is falsely placed. The only guarantee for good use of knowledge lies in the moral character of those who possess the knowledge. And the sole origin of good moral character lies in religious devotion. Now that is a broad statement. But I believe it to be true. Even the man who boasts that he applies the golden rule as well as any Christian, although not himself connected with a Christian church, is acting on religious precepts passed on to him by parents, teachers, or religious neighbors. He doesn’t develop what moral sense he has in a vacuum.

Science places a high premium on objective truth and intellectual honesty. It recognizes no arbitrary authority. The law of gravitation is not a truth because Newton said so, but because it is a fact that can be demonstrated as a part of anyone’s experience!

In the area of human emotions which determine the direction we take more than the factual material we have at hand, it is moral perception rather than factual knowledge which must govern us and our course.

Our life today demands a vital religious faith. First, because such a faith gives us the only fully dependable power over every conceivable situation.

"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for thou are with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me." [Psalm 23: 4].

"Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night, nor by the arrow that flieth by day; nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday." [Psalm 91: 5-6].

"O my Father, if this cup may not pass away from me, except I drink it, thy will be done." [Matthew 26: 39].

Whether illness of self or loved ones, loss of business or personal possessions, or some great tragedy of spirit or life -- whatever calamity or good fortune comes your way, faith can guide your course.

Our complicated world shifts about in some confusion. How to know and do the proper thing? the wise action? You want keenness of brain; you want strength of character; you want personal courage to make decisions and carry them through. The source of that ability is in obedience to God, whose kingdom is within you. You do not need to hunt around outside for it; it is within you; just release it! You shall receive power!

An excellently built electric motor is powerless without electric current. So are you and I without some spiritual contact. We have been educated, we have some ability and skill, we work hard. But we are worried, anxious, frustrated until we establish contact by faith. An increasing number of thoughtful people realize the necessity of religious faith to make life count today. For one’s contact with God is the source of moral power for our time.

After all, the thing that prophets and preachers have been talking about for ages is the thing that brings power into our lives. It is conversion from our dependence on material, sensual, self concern to dependence on the guiding spirit of God for a good life.

Not only will religious faith give us confidence over the direction of our souls, and mastery over our lives, but it leads us to the practice of brotherly love with our fellowman that is so surely needed in all society today. The sharing, the bearing of one another’s burdens, voluntarily, is the great lubricant that can turn the wheels of human relationship without heat or friction.

And each generation has to learn this in its own right. What a pity that we can’t just draw on the faith of our fathers, stored up for us from the experience of Moses, of David, of Jesus of Nazareth, or of those who have loved and served him since. But few do! Most of us have to lay hold upon it ourselves -- to repent of our errors; to consecrate ourselves to God; to become ourselves disciplined to His will and His ways.

Moral accomplishment is personal and perishable. It is a matter of continual attention and effort. Unusual and neglected talents are lost. But one is accountable in the measure of the gifts of talents he possesses for the morally right use of them.

Our American life needs more and more folk who will give not only of their labor, skill and interests, but of their heart and soul to the cause of ministering to the needs of people’s lives. Our American life needs many more devoted people of faith to ease the burden of the world and advance its spiritual level.

A religious faith is essential to our American life to restore our perspective on values and to enable us to lay hold on the things that are eternally right and permanent.

Our materialistic philosophy results from improper assessment of values in material things. Television is not a fraction as important as family love and confidence. An automobile is secondary to a household’s serene faith. The programs that tumble from the radio are not comparable to the tested truth that illuminates the pages of the Bible. We must build anew, for ourselves and our time, the faith that puts things in their proper place.

To the age-old inquiry: "O that I knew where I might find him," [Job 23: 3] let us hear and heed and follow the admonition: "Seek ye the Lord while he may be found; call ye upon Him while he is near." [Isaiah 55: 6].

We must earn our heritage anew in our time.

Religion must count so heavily in your life and mine that perchance others may say, because they have seen Christ somewhere within us, that there is no better way of life than to follow Him right into the thick of life’s battle.

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Delivered in Wisconsin Rapids, February 3, 1952.