THE LETTER :HAVE WE LOST FAITH?
To the Editor of the Evening Sun :
When I follow in your paper the daily toll of the war, the thousands of lives sacrificed to the greed or vainglory of nations, unoffending women and children thrown out into the world penniless, homeless, and robbed of husbands and sons, I wonder how it can be that an all-powerful Being allows such a state of things to keep up. For what is all our effort at progress and our striving toward usefulness and achievement if we are to be torn to pieces and thrown into the ditches ? Of what use all our millions a year and the sacrifices of good men and women to convert the heathen to our way of thinking when we in turn imitate the wild beasts in our ferocity toward our fellow-man, and turn the strength of our arms and the ingenuity of our brains toward annihilating one another?
Our day of prayer for peace was unavailing, and our peace parades came to nothing. Is it because we asked without faith ? Have we really lost faith, or are we being punished for having attained wings like the bird, for chaining the lightning and blotting out the sun with the smoke of battle?
Our President has asked us to be neutral. I think we are neutral in the way he meant; that is, the cumulative horror of the thing seems to have strangled such expressions as "I hope Germany will win ; " or, "I have no doubt the Allies will win." The big question is :How much longer, O Lord, is the door of this vast slaughterhouse of the great and brave of all nations to be kept open ? We are not worrying any longer about how it started, or what nation is in the lead; we are concerned only about when it shall stop ! We know that the conflict has passed beyond the bounds of human intervention. Only the Father may stretch out His hand and stay the destruction, and He has apparently turned His face away.
I am groping in doubt and dismay. What do you think ? That day when ve all prayed for peace-do you think we asked without faith?
Have we lost faith ? A MOTHER.
THE ANSWER:
The "sacrifices" of which this letter speaks have characterized the course of this world ever since man fell away from God-ever since the blood of righteous Abel was shed by Cain. Man is reaping the bitter fruits of his sin and departure from God. Tried under mere conscience, then under government, then under the law, surrounded with the glorious witness of creation, man has shown himself under those trials to be the wilful rejector of God, filling his cup of iniquity by crucifying the Prince of Peace.
But is the world of to-day chargeable with the crime of long ago? Yes; for its spirit, principle of action and moral attitude are antagonistic to Christ, the same as when He was here in the world. Its history is the witness that the world to-day would crucify afresh the Son of God and put Him to open shame. Can a world thus blood-guilty, content to forget God in its years of "progress" and "achievement," ever advancing in infidelity and refusing the testimony of Christ, expect in the hour of its extremity that the Almighty, God of .heaven and earth, will immediately stretch out His hand to do its bidding ?
God is holy, as well as love; His requirement, therefore, is repentance-with confession of sin, of having feet swift to shed blood, of utter unrighteousness if measured by the standard of Divine holiness. But the world does not own this to be the truth as to itself. In its pride and God-forgetfulness it boasts of its "progress," of its "advancement " far beyond prior ages. Yet it has plunged into this abyss of conflict-of slaughter, for which it has gathered its utmost strength and exercises its greatest ingenuity.
The world is morally the same as when it crucified Christ. In exceeding grace God has proclaimed His great amnesty, granting forgiveness of sin to every repentant soul who submits to, and puts his faith in, the sacrifice of the Cross. But men have taken this time of amnesty as an opportunity to further unfurl their banner of infidelity in God's face, refusing to confess the truth about their evil condition, and accept in simple faith the one only Saviour whom God has provided-for "there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved" (Acts 4 :12). And then they expect their Peace Parades and sudden recourse to prayer to bring down in their own way an immediate answer from heaven's Throne-for are they not "Christian nations" which are involved in this titanic struggle ?
But nations are not converted by water-baptism and then calling themselves "Christians." It is a work in individual souls, producing repentance toward God and faith in Christ; for true Christianity is not a mere set of so-called dogmas, but a living power in the soul which has embraced divine truth. It enters into every department of life and orders the activity of the whole man. But, as already stated, the initial step is repentance toward God, and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. Apart from this there are no true Christians. They may be moral and good in the eyes of their fellows, but God does not look through men's eyes. He must have a radical change, beginning with the inmost part of man's moral being:" Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God" (Jno. 3:3).
To this simple and elementary truth the mass of so-called Christians have never bowed; therefore, though taking that name, Christians they are not. While professing allegiance to Christ, they persist in their own way, not God's. They think God should answer their prayer, though at heart they reject the Christ He offers to them as Lord and Saviour. Such prayer is without faith, and "without faith it is impossible to please God" (Heb. ii:6).
Furthermore, men are praying for peace, that they may continue their previous course of boasted progress and forgetfulness of God-a peace which, being unable to establish it of themselves, they hope to get by God's intervention, or they would never dream of asking Him to intervene. "Ye ask, and ^receive not, because ye ask amiss (1:e., with unholy intent), that ye may consume it upon your lusts" (Jas. 4:3).
The searching question for each one is:"Have I faith ? " not " Have I lost if? " Am I listening to God who speaks in His Word ? Am I allowing it to speak to me ? Do I believe its message ? If so, I have faith. Then I can pray, not for the. doing of mine own will to be done in my way, but for God's will to be accomplished in His time and way. Thus making our requests in prayer to God who is revealed in Christ in perfect wisdom and love, in holy government yet infinite compassion, there is no reason for " doubt and dismay," but "the peace of God, which passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus" (Phil. 4:7). God, who gave His own Son to die for us, has not "turned His face away" from this "vast slaughter-house of the great and brave of all nations." Men are reaping what their evil hearts and wicked hands have sown, yet God is able to make the wrath of man to praise Him, and the remainder He will restrain (Ps. 76:10). Whether smitten by sorrow or only staggered by the terror of the present awful events, every soul that turns to God, in submission and simple faith, shall reap the peace of God.
A little before the Lord Jesus sealed with His blood His mission of reconciling love to this world, He prophetically said:" Ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars:see that ye be not troubled:for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom:and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes in divers places. All these are the beginning of sorrows " (Matt. 24 :6-8). To-day this is being fulfilled as never before in the world's history since it crucified our Lord. Yet in the midst of it all, His word still is:"Come unto Me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest" (Matt, 11:28).
The question now is:" Have I faith in him ?" John Bloore