FEW things can be more important, or distressing in a certain sense, than the widely accepted proposal of the world's reformation by means of the mental and moral cultivation of mankind, as opposed to God's redemption by the blood of His Son.
It is nothing short of this (as an object) which is being attempted through existing institutions, whether established by voluntary efforts, as formerly, or as now, by legislative enactments, and governmental patronage, for they alike contemplate man as a member of this creation.
In addition to these establishments may be discovered, upon a higher level, the religious organizations, and co-operative societies of the day, which embrace other objects, it is true, but- still recognize man as a citizen of the world.
Even Christian associations, so called, which rise upon this graduated. scale and leave their own mark, stop entirely short of "a new creature in Christ," and- " I, crucified to the world." By -all such combinations of state-policy and social enterprise, it is hoped and confidently stated by the world's leaders, that the political and natural rights of men will soon be recognized; and that the suffrage may be universally extended, when its populations have been fitted by these educational schemes for its exercise, and all be then led forward, in one encouraging effort of getting good and doing good to the world, where they are.
As a fair consequence, the governments of Europe and the States, may, in their turn, as well expect by some gigantic effort to rise up out of their iron and clay formations and develop. themselves in brass or silver, and, by thus working backward, endeavor to reach " the head of gold."
The melancholy interest which one naturally feels about these movements and expectations is deepened, because they are seen to be unscriptural and futile when judged in the light of the word of God., On this account it is that feelings of another kind lay hold on those who remember they were-once upon this treadmill for themselves; and thus, the one great absorbing desire now is, the deliverance of such as are ru still hard at work in the Egyptian house of bondage.
Another fact weighs heavily upon the spirit of the emancipated ones, namely,, that these combined efforts, in all their gigantic forces, are proof of alienation of mind from God, and to the way by which He invites and beseeches men to be reconciled unto Himself, by the death of His Son. There is a fellowship which God has thus formed with believers in Christ, and into which in grace He calls; but this is not our present subject.
A confederacy of continental nations, in this our own century, sought to reach a " Holy alliance " for themselves (many will remember it) as a ground of universal peace, and this was vauntingly declared to lave been formed, but no sooner celebrated by the nations comprised in that alliance, then unholy violated. It has long since passed away from its expected longevity, into the pages of disappointed history. This failure gave place to a further and last attempt to reach a commonwealth of peace and prosperity by " the balance of power " amongst "the ten toes " of Daniel's prophetic image;. but this was a rope of sand, and, following upon "The holy alliance," only threw, each of the great powers into warlike attitude for aggression or self-defense. Nothing else could follow these last abortive efforts to form an international brotherhood but the existing armaments, with their ironclads and turret-ships, in a proud defiance of one nation against another, in connection with all the innumerable rifles and chassepots of the ever-training armies which they embrace, in view of a coming and extended war. But to proceed. It is not intended in this paper to say anything more upon true Christian fellowship, " which is with the Father and the Son, in the light where God dwells," as it is not its object. The fact has been already stated; we have now to examine its counterfeits.
Enough has been said of associations, unions, and mutual alliance societies, in their multiplications and varieties, to prove that fellowship in itself is the common want of the world.
An instructed Christian, judging by the light of God's word, must sooner or later admit that the need and call for these formations among men is but the honest, though accidental, avowal of " the fall," by which mankind has shut itself up to its own inventions, and in willfulness and wickedness broken loose from God. These are but their own sorry productions, alas, and the fruit of their poor resources, when left to themselves like Cain, who went out from the presence of God, to take his place as " a fugitive and vagabond in the earth." He had reduced himself to himself, and to make terms of agreement with his neighbor, if haply he could, where the old dragon and Satan held his power and seat:-I only refer so far back as this to show, that the primary and common drift, or, to speak morally, the fact of the fall and of original sin, was likewise a falling away from God; and threw man upon his fellow in guilt for sympathy, and in a common confession of departure, if not too far sunk, or else, in sinful confederation, to war against the righteous judgment of God which he could not escape.
But leaving this original ground, and its demands and supplies, we may look into other varieties of modern times, and the forms and fashions, religious or otherwise, with which we are unavoidably familiar.
Still God acted on behalf of men; He had not forsaken the world, and, by the introduction of Judaism as a grand system of legislation and of external worship, established with them on the earth, He founded a theocracy which was intended as the center of outward peace and prosperity for Israel and the surrounding nations. This enabled the Jehovah of that favored people to lead them into the land of Canaan, and dwell with thaw according to His promises. The patterns and forms which He gave out in grace (when the true knowledge of God was lost by mankind at large) and by which He opened a way between' Himself and Israel for conditional blessing, had been finished and set up in the tabernacle of Moses, and again, with further developments and aids, in the temple and throne of Solomon.
It is very needful and precious to us to bear in mind the facts we are now tracing-that God would neither leave Himself without witness, as to communion and intercourse with His people on earth, nor suffer mankind unrebuked to perish in their alienation of mind and confederacy of will against Him by the formation of their own fellowships as they attempted at Babel. Nevertheless, it is sad to remember, that whatever God in love gave for the true knowledge of Himself in communion with patriarchs or the nation, must most surely turn against them governmentally if not used for His glory in their midst, and become a new measure for their correction in righteous judgment.
Nor is this all; for Satan, the enemy of God and man, catches up anything and everything which has once had the sanction of divine authority; but has been forfeited and spoiled by transgression and abuse. Nothing will suit Satan so well as that which no longer suits God. Whatever is thus thrown away, as unholy and unfit for " the sanctuary of God," becomes the choicest material for the devil's mint and coinage; else, how could he get the whole world at last to worship the beast and his image, and to Say, "Who is like unto the beast?" These corruptions of what once came from God, and their forfeiture on the part of those to whose hands they were committed, added to the awful fact that Satan delights to turn them into capital and make these forfeits his new material of currency, bring us on to the consideration of-the ecclesiastical and religious, fellowships in our own day.
These take their character necessarily from Christianity, and likewise from Christ and the church, mingled it is true with the previous forms and ritualism of Judaistic observances: Let us bear in mind that the devil has lastly corrupted Christianity too, and added this to the ill-gotten stores, with which he is trading largely throughout Christendom and the world. As regards Christianity and the professing church likewise (this last, and which should have been the highest, witness of truth on the earth), the Son of man has said, when walking in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks, " I will spue thee out of my mouth;" and so the Apocalypse reveals " the woman as sitting upon a scarlet colored beast." The thing which Christ rejects is, in Satan's hands, become the mother of harlots, and abominations of the earth. The heavens, so to speak, have thus emptied on the earth all they had to give in the way of recovering grace, if the hands were competent to retain, or appreciate and use, the means; but alas, all that was bestowed on the ground of man's responsibility to God has dropped out and been forfeited, only to put increasing power into the grasp of Satan. The huge confederacy he has in this way formed against God and Christ, and the alliance he has thus made between mankind and himself, and their fellow-,lips and agreements one with another, is " the mystery of iniquity " in the Revelation, by which the failure of all inward and public testimony closes in judgment upon the world.
Historically and prophetically we may thus look at the origin of these human fellowships and their final character and form, under the energetic and guiding enmity of Satan, " the god of this world, and the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience."
When this system- of confederated greatness and pride has reached its height, then it is that God refuses and judges it, "for in one hour is she made desolate. Rejoice over her, thou heaven, and ye holy apostles and prophets; for God hath avenged you on her."
Inside, however, and in a measure distinct from the world's fellowships, are those ecclesiastical and religious ones, which are accepted mainly by consciences exercised upon " the good and evil," but not knowing, or refusing, the Christ of God, and Him who has called His people " " unto the fellowship of His Son."
It is obvious that all external and governmental systems, constituted by regal authority and conducted by parliamentary legislation, would not meet the uneasiness of such consciences upon another and the far deeper question of sin and holiness in the presence of God, much less settle it. Nor was the best thing at Rome which Christendom presented, or its Eastern and Western churches more satisfactory on account of their contradictory creeds and dogmas. The dissatisfaction therefore which arose from a semi-political system, such as Popery on the one hand, with its indulgences and penances, and the uncertainty which national churches produced on the other, reduced the keeping of one's conscience (where there was any) to one's self, and what became individual, or else left an opening as to means and appliances for anything and every change which in time might appear more promising.
Two great systems, however, sprang out of this general dissatisfaction, and have become established- one is the Conventual, system-and both offer, in their respective ways, to restore man to this broken fellowship with God. Merely social and political unions and their nationalities were declined, on the weighty discovery that God was in question, rather than man and his neighbor.
The Conventual system embraced a religious life within walls to meet this emergency, and separated its votaries from the world by being enclosed out of its sight. The Sacramental system connected itself with a contemplative life, fastings and prayers, hours spent in church, on high days and festivals, but not the confessional and oratory, as with the Conventual.
In either, the body must be all but ignored by fasting or penance; when required to bring it under, that the soul might be kept free from all worldly thought, or affection and desire. Under these restrictions and impositions upon the body, it is supposed the soul would rise into such a state of ecstasy, and perhaps beatitude, as to reach the full manifestation of Christian perfection.
Besides these Conventual and Sacramental systems of to-day, there is yet the Evangelistic movement, and the adoption of the Mosaic law, as " a rule of life," by which the body and its members are sought to be controlled and brought into subjection, in order to possess a fellowship of uncertain character, indeed not beyond the seventh of Romans as to experience, and forced to accept " O wretched man that I am! " as the proper state and condition of this so-called Christian. There are off-shoots of this Evangelistic system which claim from its. advocates a self- surrender to God, and a putting the will on His side, accompanied by such a consecration of all the powers and faculties of nature, and the body, as would lead to a " higher Christian life " &c., instead of a present union with Christ in life and maintained in us by the indwelling Spirit. It is remarkable, that in all these ecclesiastica and evangelistic movements the human body seems to be viewed and dealt with as the one thing in the way, and the main hindrance to the recovery of a lost fellowship with God; and on this account Conventualism, with its severer measures' of penance and privation, or Sacramentalism, 'with its ritualistic observances, offers to carry the soul beyond the contaminations of the body.
The Monastic system, with its Continental pilgrimages and new order of "the Sacred Heart" might have been added to these; but these so-called pilgrimages are become properly speaking " excursions' by railways " and connected with hotel accommodations and refreshments; under which the body escapes the impositions and privations formerly practiced for its mortification. It is merely passed through the genuflexions and continuous adorations due to the Virgin, alternated by the counting of beads, and the daily lessons and hourly duties of " sisters of mercy," by which it is sought to bring the body back to its original virtues in " holy communion."
Still it is the human body, and a fallen nature, that occupies each and all of these systems, however they may vary in the choice of means for its subjugation, or its voluntary surrender to God, or its fuller consecration to His service.
One of the last of these pilgrimages was to Parai-le-Monial, and " the Sacred Heart,"
and this (as may be remembered) was arranged for from London, through France, with a well-known excursionist company by return tickets, under the sanction of Rome, and the blessing of the Pope.
In the great outside confederations of the world, and the alliances between man and man, led on by the wiles of the devil, it is quite otherwise, for the body is at a high premium. As might be supposed, man and all his physical energies are taxed to the utmost, in order to their development and display, for Satan knows " that his time is short."
Fire and water, which in an earlier age were viewed chiefly as destructive elements, have now become allied, and by their generative power, are the necessary and hourly appliances for transit and gain. The millions who are thus whirled along in express trains over the globe, still needed a rapidity better suited for the transmission of their overtaxed thoughts and words, and these are flashed along the wires to the world's end, upon poles which support them in the air, or else by sub-marine cables across the channels and the seas. Man has become a cosmopolite, and is a wonder to himself by his inventions and appliances. Or else a fancied, but necessary, brotherhood in misfortune has sprung up, by which he becomes co-operative and international in his largest ideas and undertakings-but without God, and without Christ!
And now, what is the result of all these and other fellowships in the church and in the world? Rationalistic, and infidel theories, in opposition to the word of God, abound, and are the palpable but plain answer, as given by philosophers and men of science, who rule the day, and are themselves ruled by " the spirit of the age." Indifferentism and immorality would number up the rest of the outsiders-such as take things as they come, till their " soul is required " of them, or the impending judgment overtakes them, when "the Lord is revealed from heaven in flaming fire, taking vengeance," &c.
In conclusion, it is obvious that all these systems, religious or otherwise, have still got man in hand as a moral being, and are seeking how to educate him in his generation, so as to develop what is good, or else by confession, and penance, or sacraments and prayers, to curb and overcome what is bad; for it is the devil's interest to keep up this deceit. It is only at the cross that such matters can be made plain for those who are simple enough to see the end of the first man in the death of Christ. As regards men and the world, the cross witnesses to the rupture of the last tie. "God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself," but the rejection and crucifixion of the on of His love was the open refusal either to accept His mediation or to suffer His presence in their midst on such a footing. What fellowship can there be with God, in the face of that cross, which is the standing proof of the outburst of the world's enmity against Him and His love, when they nailed Jesus thereon? " And they cried out all at once, saying, Away with this man, and release unto us Barabbas." So Pilate " released unto them him that for sedition and murder was cast into prison, whom they had desired; but he delivered Jesus to their will."
The words of our Lord may fitly close this bird's-eye view of existing alliances and ripening confederations: "I am come in my Father's name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive." Barabbas instead of Jesus; the dragon instead of God; the antichrist instead. of Christ; the false prophet instead of the true one; the beast instead of the Lamb slain; are become the authorities and names' by which the devil is suffered to wind up this world's history, and by which he fatally plunges those who are "led captive by him at his will " into the last scenes of the apocalyptic judgments of God. The earth clears itself, by such means, of those who have corrupted it, whether by Satanic or human energies; yet only that hell may open its mouth to receive them. The earth thus cleanses itself from its pollutions by destroying them that destroyed it, and the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night forever and ever."
What an unspeakable comfort for our souls, and what a mercy, that we can turn away from the consideration of such fellowships as these, and their issues (and invite others to do so), to speak of another which God has formed for all who are Christ's, and into which He leads us by the Holy Ghost.
J.E.B.