What and Where is God? Part 11

Instead of finding a church, or some specialist, that could teach him, unfortunately and untruthfully the sceptic usually decides that it is impossible for him to be a Christian. So he resolves to be what he regards as an upright man and lets it go at that. But he does not find the great realities, except in a most vague and attenuated form.

d. The provincialism of sceptics

The most hopeless situation of all is where sceptics consort almost wholly with sceptics. They can soon kill the last remnant of religion that lingers in their hearts. The provincialism of doubt may be even greater than the provincialism of a bigoted faith. In their hearts, sceptics often try and condemn intelligent Christians with but slight knowledge of what the Christians believe and with even less knowledge of why they believe it. Many doubting minds take it for granted that all Christians conceive of religion as they themselves did when they were children in Sunday school, or boys and girls in a Junior Endeavor society. They think that a little scientific knowledge of the material universe makes anything more than agnosticism impossible. If their knowledge of religion and their philosophical knowledge of the universe were all that is known, they would be right. By learning a little more of religion, and by acquiring a better philosophical as well as scientific knowledge of the material universe many have regained their grasp on G.o.d. For such as have come to see G.o.d as the center and Soul of all things, natural science, instead of being a hindrance to, has become one illuminating phase of theology. As a Christian believer, I find myself continually going to expert scientists to ascertain their latest findings. And I can truthfully say that, from a religious point of view, their verifiable report is always interesting. It is good news. It lifts me to higher levels of thought, to n.o.bler planes of social conduct, and to loftier heights of fellows.h.i.+p with G.o.d and men. G.o.d's blessings on any man that discovers anything new in G.o.d's world and reports it correctly!

A friend once said to me:

"I do not know whether there is a G.o.d or not, and I am not going to bother my head about it; I am just going to wait and see."

If, however, he finds himself alive after the death of his body, I venture to a.s.sert that the old problem of finding G.o.d will still confront him. We may rest a.s.sured that there is no ghost-G.o.d to be seen after death. This man has utterly misconceived of G.o.d and of the method of finding Him. Death will not be a subst.i.tute for spiritual development. If ever he finds G.o.d it will be as a Loving Intelligent Will, and not as a glorious ghost on which his physical eyes may look.

"G.o.d is a spirit, and they that wors.h.i.+p Him must wors.h.i.+p Him in spirit and in truth." If we would know G.o.d we must seek Him as He is, and not as something which He is not.

Let the sceptic consider well this statement: So far as we can _see_, everything would necessarily appear just as it does if there were a G.o.d.

I have never interrogated any one who could suggest anything to the contrary. If G.o.d actually exists, we shall never know Him as we know man with local form and articulate speech, unless we come to recognize Him in man. I dare say we shall _never_ become acquainted with G.o.d save as we learn to know Him in our own souls, in other people, and in nature. So if we ever expect to know Him we would as well put forth the effort to know Him now. If it could be proved that there is a G.o.d we should still need to find Him. But if we find him we have no need of further proof. Our problem then is not one of proving, but of finding.

2. Equal striving for spiritual and material things is necessary

All normal people have senses which give them physical objects. Without these, we could not commence to live a rational life. But we must acquire some sense to make our senses of value. Most of our seeing, in the physical as well as in the spiritual, is with our sense and not alone with our senses. To achieve insight in any line requires effort.

The man who has senses only, lacks the insight of the man who has both sense and senses. Therefore we must earn not only our bread by the sweat of our brow, but everything else which has priceless worth.

How covetous we all are for the material side of things! That we may truthfully know and really possess the material side of the universe, we put forth prolonged and painful effort. Our striving, however, to know and to possess the _Soul_ of the universe is pitifully meager. If we strove no harder for the former than we do for the latter we should be ignorant and poor beyond recognition. Having long neglected the Soul of the universe we look up, occasionally, and demand proof that the world has a Soul. However, it is not _proof_ that we need, but religious insight. If I ask proof that cla.s.sical music is beautiful, I must either take other people's word for it or else acquire musical sense by living with cla.s.sical music and cla.s.sical musicians. The senses of the average man p.r.o.nounce cla.s.sical music very ugly. Mathematical or business ability will not suffice; it will more likely hinder, because as a rule it has been acquired at the expense of musical development. There are those who actually make fun of cla.s.sical music without any realization of their personal defect which they are advertising. Charles Darwin was probably never surpa.s.sed in the amount of data gathered for scientific observations. And yet, there are persons in every civilized village in the world who are better judges of music; and Paul, to say nothing of Jesus, was so far ahead of him in religious insight that the contrast is painful. In every realm of knowledge known to man, so-called proof is but seeing and understanding and appreciating. Logic does not prove anything. If for our major premise we say all normal men are rational, we rest our belief on observation. If for our minor premise we affirm that here is a normal man, we do so on the ground of observation. If both observations are correct, then we need no proof that the man of the minor premise is rational because it is self-evident. Logic is often a convenient method of seeing, but it is never a proof. Even in mathematics we do not prove, we see. Not a single proposition in mathematics is proved; its truth is only perceived. The so-called proof is but a method of separating the elements of a condensed proposition so that these elements, one by one, may be recognized. The certainty began with one or more axioms, and proceeded with rules built upon observation, and the certainty at every step to the finish rested on something self-evident. A prominent man a.s.sured me that he could prove that two and two were four. However, the first thing I learned in Geometry was that an axiom was too self-evident to be capable of proof.

The highly complex methods which we have devised for reducing intricate mathematical statements of their axiomatic verities we call proof, but the term proof can only be used in this accommodated sense, for fundamentally we have proved nothing; we have simply increased our intelligence by using a speedy and ingenious method of looking. When it is said that one does not know how to prove a proposition, it only means that he does not know how to separate and arrange the elements in such a manner that the mind can see them. Fundamentally, _nothing in the world is proved_. When we clearly see, doubt flees and certainty comes. If in anything a person insists that he can not see, all we can do is to ask him to look again; or perhaps we may try holding the truth at different angles, or we may present its elements in some new order. If, however, nothing enables him to see, then in respect to that particular thing he is d.a.m.ned. I had a very intelligent friend who was dismissed from an important position because he was color-blind.

While some have much stronger religious intuitions than others, yet I think there is no normal person who may not, if he goes about it in the right way, achieve religious insight. It takes a great deal of maneuvering to get some people to see mathematics. And the average sceptic has not put forth the effort to see religious truth that the average pupil has to see mathematical truth. But I know sceptics who _have_ put forth such effort, and they have succeeded. When a sceptic wins a faith, in the nature of the case it is vital. Saving faith in religion, as in everything else, is the feeling of certainty that follows clear insight. And clear insight into any subject depends upon intelligent study and faithful practice. While there are many things that we positively know, and many more that we may come to know, yet it is through rational experience, and not so-called proof, that we come to know them.

As hungry cannibals feed upon the body of a civilized man with never a thought that his trained mind would be worth more to them than his body, so mult.i.tudes feed upon the body of the universe with no thought of what its animating Will might be to them. To all who sustain such an att.i.tude toward the universe, its body looms large while its Soul fades. As the cannibal missed the wealth and civilization which the larger mind of his victim could have brought, so the mere world-consumers miss that which the Soul of the universe could abundantly give. If it were divinely conceived of and divinely used, the physical universe and the social relations therein would be infinitely enriched. But when the Soul of the universe is lost, and the body of the universe is narrowed down to the temporal uses of the materialistic mind, we have lost the best part of reality.

But if we know what G.o.d and the world are to-day, we have a solid basis for knowing what they will be to-morrow. The future is not a new life and a new universe and a new G.o.d, but the present life and the present universe and the present G.o.d to-morrow. The remedy for a hazy future is a luminous present. Since G.o.d carries all men, good and bad, in His bosom, what a pity it is that we allow sloth and selfishness to deprive us of His acquaintance and fellows.h.i.+p. A little play-fellow once refused to speak to me in the presence of his newly arrived cousin. Finally he said to his cousin with a sneer, "d.i.c.k spoke to me three times, and I never let on that I heard him." This cut me deeply. But I now confess with sorrow and shame that the G.o.d who carries me in His own life has spoken a thousand times to me when I never let on that I heard Him. I have often tried to forget Him that I might enjoy pleasures of which He could not approve. All souls are in touch with G.o.d, and in that sense know Him, even when they do not recognize who or what it is that touches them; they are like the fishes that know the water but can not find the sea.

At last it has come to this: I have simply learned to see the universe that enfolds me, as the present energy of an intelligent Will. I see that Will coming to human expression in me, in my Christian friends, and in a social kingdom of infinite possibilities. That which I see _works_, and _coordinates_ with all that I know, making me more glad and more strong as the years go by. G.o.d seems to live in me and about me and through me. That in which I live and from which I cannot escape for a single moment of my existence, I do not try to prove. My task is to see it more intelligently and to adjust myself to it more perfectly. I can testify that the more I learn and _the better I live_ the more clearly do I see that that in which I live has sense as well as chemical energies; and that its deeper meaning and purpose may get to the surface through my life. I no longer live in a dirt world, but in a mind world.

I believe neither in a muck world, nor in a ghost-G.o.d who is somewhere in hiding. My universe has come to be a Will in action, a Will that enfolds me with its energies and does not let me go. When the universe is otherwise conceived I do not like it. My intellect and instincts rebel against a universe materially conceived and materially explained.

It is too twisted and dwarfed for all the facts. I am rationally convinced that I see a larger and better world.

To me, wors.h.i.+p is the deeper penetration into that Will in whose enfolding energies I live and move and have my being. My world has become an oratorio with both peaceful and dramatic pa.s.sages. I get nerve thrills from its music; and more, since its text is written in plain English, and not in an unknown tongue, I see the majestic pageant of a well-ordered creation. I understand what the music is about, and experience a joy infinitely beyond what I should if the music were without words. And though I meet some severe hards.h.i.+ps, yet I am convinced that this is the best conceivable world in which to _begin_ a life that is to live forever. History helps me, science helps me; and I feel myself borne along by a union of forces toward a glorious goal. G.o.d becomes more and more articulate in me and in all men and in all nature as we learn to will His will and to use nature's forces as the instruments of our enlightened and purified spirits. I also find that this vision will not leave me unless I live beneath my best. If, therefore, my best life and best vision go together, it would be folly to do anything that would break the harmony.

Some may say, "this is nothing but the way _you_ see things, why not give us something more?" No one has anything to give beyond what he sees, unless he gives what some one else has seen; and that is entirely uncalled for if he can not tell it better than the other man has done.

The only justification for the appearance of another book is that the author thinks his vision is sufficiently like what others see, and at the same time enough different to make it useful. "But I can't see it your way," some reader may retort. Well, I am sorry. Obviously, if we are sincere, it is for us to go on living and preaching the gospel with the hope that some day he may come to see. The Master Himself was shut up within the same circ.u.mscribed method. However, my contention is that if we have "pure hearts," and are not unnecessarily confused in thought, or possessed of erroneous thoughts, we know G.o.d here and now.

This is the luminous present that clarifies the hazy future. Not all men know G.o.d, but in my opinion all may know Him if they go about it in the right way. Every human being, consciously or unconsciously, must submit to having his life moulded by a world with a G.o.d or by a world without a G.o.d, and the finished life will be as different as the two worlds.

3. The final step in the effort to know G.o.d

To know G.o.d and to win the hope of immortality one must do more than formulate a set of correct ideas. Correct ideas will greatly aid, yet alone they are utterly inadequate. When the scientist gets his idea, he proceeds to experiment with it. If he does not at first get the hoped-for results, when the idea is clear and impelling, he performs his experiments over and over again in the most painstaking manner. In religion, however, many will never go beyond the idea. They wish to have the idea fully established without experiment or application. The reason for this difference is that, in religion, the experiment can not be made on carbon and zinc, but it must be made on the man's own soul. The experiment cuts right into his moral, emotional, and sentimental nature.

How often a man will admit, "I can see no flaw in your idea, but I am not convinced that you are right." When the scientist gets his idea, whether it is true or not, he acts as if it were true until he has tried his experiments, and does not always abandon the idea when his tests fail; he realizes that the fault may have been in the experiment.

Many of the greatest facts in science have long been baffled by faulty experiments. Like consequences occur in religion. If instead of going on to the experiment and application one keeps repeating forever the question, "I wonder if the idea is true," he will never get anywhere except into a deeper state of doubt. A wise person while putting his best idea to the test will say, "I am hopeful that it will turn out favorably because it is such an attractive, promising idea." Religious ideas must be planted in the soul as seeds are put into the ground, and allowed to remain undisturbed long enough to germinate. It is most fortunate when children, through experimental knowledge, have been taught to love good types of religion and music; and this while they are receptive, and before they are ensnared by a thousand other influences.

Yet no one, at any age, dare neglect his religious duties and privileges if he wishes religion to be an impelling power in his soul. In my youth, mathematics was a great inspiration to me, but through neglect my mathematical lamp burns low. To keep mathematics interesting and alive one must work problems applied to constructive business.

For an example of a man who attained unto great religious certainty, take Paul. He experienced a radical revision of his religious ideas, but his improved ideas were not enough. To test their validity he hurled himself upon the Christian verities with all the force of his being; and in consequence, found a life of intimate friends.h.i.+p with G.o.d.

Thenceforward Paul had great things to tell and magnificent things to achieve. "I can do all things in Him that strengthened me." He felt that nothing could break this new bond. "For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor princ.i.p.alities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of G.o.d, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." His friends.h.i.+p with G.o.d gave him a new conception of, as well as a new interest in, society. "So we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and severally members one of another." G.o.d the Father "Is over all, and through all, and in all." Paul's insight broke all former bounds; it elevated him to a boundless and timeless world; his insight gave him a deep sense of G.o.d and became the evidence of many things not yet achieved. Here was personal a.s.surance of G.o.d and immortality deep, strong, and jubilant. Whence came it? Such a.s.surance is inherent in a life spiritually nourished and divinely employed. Hope simply comes to such a soul, like color to the ripening apple.

This generation, though engaged in many n.o.ble charities, shows marked signs of under-nourishment; its mind is active in the acquisition of material knowledge, and its body is overworked in the effort to acc.u.mulate wealth, yet its soul languishes. And there is a near likeness between a starved soul and a starved body.

Without hope or courage, a little girl sits staring out of great innocent eyes because she is under-nourished. This poor fading flower is in striking contrast with the little apple-cheeked girl in bloomers who believeth all things and hopeth all things and (as her brother knows) can do pretty much all things. This startling difference requires no lengthy explanation; nourishment and exercise tell the whole story.

So in our day many languid souls ask, "Where is thy G.o.d, and who knows whether there is a life beyond?"

For an instructive contrast, place beside such a life the life of Jesus.

Living in the bosom of the Father, doing the Father's will day by day, seeing life in the light of divine love, and witnessing the effect upon those whom he won to a life of love and service, made it impossible for Jesus to lose faith in immortality. While enduring the pain of the cross He could say to the malefactor, "To-day shalt thou be with me in Paradise."

The abundant, buoyant life nourished in the life of G.o.d and exercised in the service of G.o.d and man, is the source of hope for the life that is yet to be.

4. Conscious of the existence of G.o.d, we become certain of immortality

It is clear as daylight that G.o.d Himself will be defeated if He _loses His family_. Attention has already been called to the fact that, with the loss of His family, G.o.d would be reduced to a child-G.o.d playing with a toy world; and that without the cooperation of other wills He could not finish His toy. He would be in the position of having a world full of raw material, material capable of infinite, spiritual and social uses, only He would be dest.i.tute of any such help as would enable Him to turn the universe to any account whatsoever. If He were left solitary in the world, all G.o.d's labors in creation would lead directly to shameful defeat. Without other inhabitants than Himself, the universe would become one colossal piece of junk. Yes, it would be worse than that; even junk has value where there are people. Without intelligent souls to inhabit the universe, an appalling night would settle over all creation.

Love, truth, wisdom, righteousness, and the last semblance of a kingdom would be gone; and G.o.d Himself would as well die with His children; He would be dest.i.tute of character, and incapable of completing that which He began on such a magnificent scale. Having a universe like the present on His hands, with no one to use it, nor to inhabit it, G.o.d would be an object worthy of ridicule. The idea that G.o.d could murder His children, or carelessly allow them to perish, and then spend an eternity in an unfinished and depopulated world shatters reason itself; such a thought is too appalling and abhorrent to be entertained for a moment. Just as sure as there is a G.o.d, we shall continue to live. Anyone who believes in G.o.d and does not believe in immortality surely never gave two consecutive logical thoughts to the subject. (1) _Ultimately G.o.d will have no children at all_, (2) _or He will have an endless succession of short-lived children_, (3) _or He will have children that survive all changes_.

The first obnoxious idea we regard as impossible and unthinkable. A being that could live in perpetual and absolute solitude, with no more reason and character than such a position would warrant, is not a person that we should call G.o.d anyway.

The second thought of G.o.d having an endless succession of short-lived children is in some respects worse.

In the autumn of nineteen hundred and fourteen, a friend said to me:

"What _is_ there, I should like to know, in Christianity? Here we've had the Christian religion for more than nineteen hundred years--and now this war. Oh, there is nothing in it!"

"No," I answered, "we have had Christianity about thirty-three years; that is, a few people have had it."

When asked what I meant by such a statement, I told her that the earth was inhabited only by children; that the average age of all living people was only about thirty-three years; and that they would scarcely get beyond the spanking period until their places would be taken by another set of babies; and that these new babies would scratch and bite, and be tempted to lie and steal just as all the babies before them had done; and that these in turn would soon give way to another set of babies. I told her that all the knowledge and character on earth would, in a few days, need to be transferred to the minds of babies not yet born, or it would entirely disappear from the earth. "Moreover," I said, "how do you know what Christianity has accomplished? You have never been where the Christians have gone? What do you suppose the Apostles and all the Christians who are nineteen hundred years old have been doing; and the mult.i.tudes who are eighteen hundred years old, and so on down through all the centuries? You have seen only a succession of kindergarten cla.s.ses."

Though progress on earth rests exclusively upon successive groups of children, yet we gladly recognize the social achievements that have been made during human history. We keenly realize also the sin we all share in not having produced better social conditions than now exist.

Nevertheless, I am absolutely certain that no succession of infants will ever be able to put this universe to its highest possible uses. G.o.d will never get far with His great cosmic enterprise if He employs only ignorant little children; and that is clearly what He is doing if death ends all. What a pity and shame it would be to throw away such a universe; a universe of infinite intellectual, spiritual, and social possibilities. And what a crime it would be to destroy the intelligent beings who could turn the universe to full account if only they were allowed ample time. That G.o.d will not do anything so foolish and wicked we may safely rest a.s.sured.

At the close of one of my services a man came forward and spoke to me, saying:

"If everybody were good, your job would be done."

"Now I must sc.r.a.p with you," I said. "If all were good, I should have a larger and a better job. The good people, and not the bad people, have the greatest desire for Church. Why is the engine put on the track at all unless it is to go somewhere? For what purpose does anyone become a Christian, except to learn more about G.o.d and His plans in order that he may embody them in a kingdom of love and righteousness? I am too young and ignorant to preach you a very good sermon now, but if you will come around where I am a thousand years from now, I will preach you a sermon that will make you sit up and take notice." Something must be left out of the mental structure of one who can make such a statement as this man made to me. In the face of such conceptions of life one wonders that religion commands the respect that it does.

There is no doubt concerning the unlimited possibilities of the universe, nor of the limitless possibilities of the human spirit if it is given a chance. Standing as many of us do on the threshold of these greater possibilities, who but a devil could shut the door in our faces?

If G.o.d wanted us when we were ignorant and sinful, He wants us even more now that we are a little wiser and a little better. If He intended to crush us before we were fairly started why did He ever raise us to such hope by allowing us to see the infinite possibilities?

As to our ability to survive the shock of physical death, if G.o.d made us live in the first place, He can make us live on through all changes.

If, however, G.o.d alone survives He will be quite worse off than His dead children; they will simply be extinct, while He will go to the gloomiest sort of h.e.l.l. Who could wish to be a mad G.o.d living alone through eternity in a graveyard? With everybody dead, and all kingdoms gone, and all work at an end, the universe would be one vast--desolate--h.e.l.l; such as a bad G.o.d would deserve. How _can_ any one believe in G.o.d and not believe in immortality?