THEORY is ever tested by practice. If it does not stand this test, however attractively it may be presented, it is bound to be rejected. How does it work? is the ultimate test.
So tested, higher criticism and new theology utterly fail. They stand discredited as miserable failures. When sitting in one’s study, in, comfortable health and pleasant surroundings, theories may attract and convince the unregenerate mind, or even allure and seduce the unestablished believer.
But what comfort do they give in trial, in poverty, in bereavement, in sorrow? What consolation do they give on a death-bed? These are the tests. Above all,
HOW DO THEY AFFECT ETERNAL ISSUES?
Higher criticism is the thin end of the wedge, of which the thick end is open rank infidelity. Many a nominal believer has begun with higher criticism, and ended in the refusal of even higher criticism, and pursued it to its ultimate goal― infidelity and socialism. Lawlessness and godlessness lend themselves to national suicide and individual disaster.
New Theology― old as the vagaries of man’s mind―cannot be classed as Christian in the remotest sense of the word. It has a genius for pulling down, but not for building up. It loosens every corner stone of morality and truth, and involves in a cataclysm of ruin those who seek shelter where there is none. Its title is dishonest, and it is neither new nor theology.
The following well illustrates my meaning. It is related by Dr J. H. Jowett of New York, formerly of Birmingham, as told him by his friend, the late Rev. Charles H. Berry, D.D., and is copied from the Homiletic Review.
Dr Berry was a modern theologian when the following incident took place. I believe he received at a very early age the highest honors that the denomination to which he belonged was able to confer. His fame as a preacher was as wide as the English-speaking world. He says: ―
“One night there came to me a Lancashire girl, with her shawl over her head, and with clogs on her feet.” Are you the minister?’ she said.
“ ‘Yes.’
“ ‘Then I want you to come, and get my mother in.’
“Thinking it was some drunken brawl, I said, ‘You must get a policeman.’
“Oh, no,’ said the girl, my mother is dying, and I want you to get her into salvation.’
“Where do you live?’
“‘I live so and so, a mile and a half from here.’
“ ‘Well,’ said I, ‘is there no minister nearer than I?’
“ ‘Oh, yes, but I want you, and you have got to come.’
“I was in my slippers, and I soliloquized and wondered what the people of the church would think if they saw their pastor walking late at night with a girl with a shawl over her head. I did all I could to get out of it, but it was no use. That girl was determined, and I had to dress and go.
“I found the house was a house of ill-fame. In the lower rooms they were drinking, and telling lewd stories, and upstairs I found the poor woman dying.
“I sat down, and talked about Jesus as the beautiful Example, and extolled Him as a Leader and Teacher, and she looked at me out of her eyes of death, and said: Mister, that’s no good for the likes of me. I don’t want an example.
‘I’M A SINNER.’
“‘Jowett, there I was face to face with a poor soul dying, and had nothing to tell her. I had no gospel, and I thought of what my mother had taught me, and I told her the old story of God’s love in Christ’s dying for sinful men, whether I believed it or not.’
“Now you are getting at it,’ said the woman. ‘That’s what I want. ‘That’s the story for me.’ “‘And so I got her in, and I got myself in. From that night,’ added Dr Berry, ‘I have always had a full gospel of salvation for lost sinners.’”
What a testimony to the old-fashioned gospel―the old, old story preached by the Apostle Paul, Wycliffe, Luther, Wesley, Whitfield, Spurgeon, and multitudes of sainted men of God, ―the old, old story for which Huss, Jerome of Prague, Ridley, Latimer, Cranmer, and thousands besides have died, rather than surrender its blessing.
Higher criticism and new theology are emphatically not for the slums, for the sick, for the poor, for the dying. The old, old story is for all-blessed be God’s name-reaching the Sovereign on the throne, and carrying its glad message to the denizens of the slums and the solitary inmate of the condemned cell.
It is still doing its happy work, spite of the flood of evil cast out by the dragon’s mouth―it is still winning its peaceful conquests―nothing can stop it.
How striking is Dr Berry’s testimony! Not only was the poor dying Lancashire sinner saved, but finding the powerlessness of his message to others when tested, he wisely came to the conclusion to receive
GOD’S MESSAGE OF POWER
for himself. Preacher and listener saved by the same address! How delightful!
No wonder the Apostle Paul exclaimed in the beginning of his masterly analytical Epistle to the Romans: “I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ; for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth” (Rom. 1:1616For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. (Romans 1:16)). It had saved him. It could save others. But mark it is to “every one that believeth.” There must be personal faith.
For three short years Dr. Berry preached, as he styled it himself, “a full gospel of salvation for lost sinners.” God used His message mightily, and then he was called home. One Sunday night as he was about to begin his sermon he was called home—from the pulpit to the glory―from serving to resting. Happy transition! He was ready!
Reader, are you deceived by a beautiful theory with
No MORE TRUE COMFORT IN IT
than prismatic colors lighting up an icicle are able to warm the starving traveler in Arctic regions, or have you proved and tested the power of the gospel of God? God grant you may apply the test. Remember, the test will come. Death is coming. Eternity is coming. Are you ready?
Why not put the gospel to the test? I remember hearing of a skeptical Russian nobleman who decided to put the gospel to the test. He prayed earnestly night after night, “O God, if there is a God, reveal Thyself.” His prayer was answered. He was converted, and for many a long year he was an earnest and successful preacher of the gospel, whose power he had experienced.
Not one, who has believed, but has found the gospel “God’s power unto salvation.” This is the universal testimony of all believers. Why not put it to the test in your own case?
A. J. P.