A LIGHT-FILLED RELIGION.
By Edison Driver
Like a lighthouse on a dangerous shore, religion, to be of value, must shine out clear and bold, declaring itself for what it professes to be. Christ said: “Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill can not be hid. Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house.” Matt. 5:14-16. That was His standard for religion. It must be a light, burning in vivid contrast to the darkness around it. When I come out of darkness into a room where a candle is burning, the very first thing that attracts my eyes is the light. My eyes see it, my brain recognizes it, and I need no logic or deep reasoning to persuade myself that it is light. Christ has seen fit to compare His Gospel to just such a light as that. By Isaiah He calls to His people, “Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. … His glory shall be seen upon thee. And the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising.” Isa. 60:1-3. Moreover, His own life was a living light; for “in Him was life, and the life was the light of men.” There was only one thing that could make Christ a light, and that was life. The shadow of death hung heavy, and in that shadow only life could shine, for life was opposed to death, as light is opposed to darkness. Therefore Jesus “came that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” And it was in that more abundant life—in the life He gave the sorrowful, the sick, the maimed, the weak, the blind, and the dead—that men saw the light of God’s love; “for God so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” Thus the very essence and center of the Gospel is restoration to life, and life more abundant! That is the only kind of light that has power in it to shine! Such was the light that shone forth from Christ. Yet it was not His life; for He declared: “Of Mine own self I can do nothing.” “The Father that dwelleth in Me, He doeth the works.” It was actually God who thought and spoke and acted, and it was actually God’s thoughts and words and actions that men saw in Christ, and Christ could say, “He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father!” But without that Father living and working in Him, He could have done nothing. No more can we, except He live in us, and manifest Himself. That is just what Christ made possible by His great at-one-ment. He said, “I and My Father are one,” and for His disciples He prayed, “That they all may be one; as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be one in Us; that the world may believe that Thou hast sent Me. And the glory which Thou gavest Me I have given them; that they may be one, even as We are one; I in them, and Thou in Me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that Thou hast sent Me, and hast loved them as Thou hast loved Me.” John 17:21-23. Thus has He opened the way for us to have Him living in us as the Father lived in Him, so that it is possible for us to say with Paul, “I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God.” Through Christ’s life and presence in us, we are to give to the world the same light that He gave, and in the same way. Our mission to our fellows is not to show them what poor weak flesh can do when filled with a theory of religion; but rather to show them that Christ’s life working in us will conquer death and sin, and all their evil fruits, as light dispels darkness. Such a religion will have the same effect that it had when it was preached by the apostles. It is just because we are so far from this true center of the Gospel that so little real light is seen among religions. God’s message of love is the gift of Christ’s life—nothing less, and “the just shall live by faith” is but another statement of the same great truth. Looking backward for a moment, we see that God’s purpose for Israel was a missionary purpose. He set that nation in Palestine, in the very arms of three great continents, and He said, “I will not rest until her righteousness go forth as brightness, and her salvation as a lamp that burneth. And the nations shall see thy righteousness, and all kings thy glory.” Isa. 62:1, 2. “For I, saith the Lord, will be unto her a wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the midst of her.” Zech. 2:5.6 Thus the light of God’s life would shine out from His very presence in His people. But, after many backslidings, troubles, and defeats, brought about by their unbelief, Israel added to their evil another evil. They said, “We will have a king over us; that we also may be like all the nations.” 1 Sam. 8:19, 20. They lost sight of the great central truth of their religion, that they were to live by a faith that would bring God’s life right into them, and make them different from the other nations. O, how sadly we read of their defeats and distresses as they put their trust in princes and in the sons of men, in whom there is no help. How far short they fell of the standard God had set! The light of the world grew dim, and only a few stars (Hebrews 11) shone through the gloom, to light earth’s weary pilgrims on their way. Still the land was filled with scribes and Pharisees, whose “deep religious piety” has been a by-word for powerless religion ever since. Then came “this dark world’s Light,” and He brought us back to the central idea again, showing us, both in His own life and in His teachings, that “the just shall live by faith.” Following Him were the disciples and apostles, who could all say with Paul, “Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me.” Gal. 2:20. Thus their lives were manifestations of God’s life in its fullest sense, and while they held to this principle, “living by faith,” the Gospel was a drawing and growing power. But deceivers came in, who taught “not that Christ is come in the flesh” (2 John 7), and men drifted away from the truth “Christ liveth in me.” That was light; and when it was gone, there came on that dark night of error that history calls the Dark Ages. With the sixteenth century came the Reformation, and lo, God gave Luther the old message again. “As he was in his cell, reading over the epistle to the Romans, he came to the word, ‘The just shall live by faith.’ He stopped, and from that time that simple text, says the historian, became the inspiration and the power of the Reformation.” But sad to say, men came in again who misunderstood the truth, feared to take it for its wonderful worth, “interpreted it and explained it” each as he himself saw it—anything to leave the actual power of Christ’s life out of it—till weakness, confusion, and uncertainty filled the world, and that is where we are to-day. We are weak when we ought to be strong, dark when we ought to be light, lukewarm when we ought to be burning with the sin-consuming fire of our God. But our Father is the same yesterday, to-day, and forever. His love for men has not grown cold with the march of the centuries. His Gospel has not yet done its work in the earth. The message of infinite love is still life—Christ’s complete and perfect life. O, may God give us grace to receive that divine message in His fulness, through His Spirit, that His own life, which is the only light, may be seen in the earth now as it was seen nineteen hundred years ago. EDISON DRIVER.