CHRISTIANITY VERSUS POLITICS.
By G.
CHRIST is the Christian's example. He left the world's politics to the world; therefore that is the wise thing for the Christian to do. When Christ was on earth, the world's politics was very much in need of purifying, and He would have gladly seen a betterment of civic conditions. Did He endeavor to ameliorate the corrupt civic conditions?—He certainly did, but not by any political method. He never taught, either by precept or example, that wading in a muddy pool would tend to clarify it. The only remedial agency He ever offered to the world was the Gospel. The apostle Paul gives us this lesson: "Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life; that he may please Him who hath chosen him to be a soldier." And God's soldier is provided with an armor of which the only weapon is the Word of God, "the sword of the Spirit." As "we wrestle not against flesh and blood," but against "spiritual wickedness" (margin, "wicked spirits"), therefore the human weapons used in the political conflicts of the world—being in the main inspired by the Christian's adversary—are but hindrances in the Christian's legitimate controversy. Our Commander says, "Preach the Word." It is sin and its instigator that we have to contend with, and, in whatever form we have to contend with these, our tactics is simply to "preach the Word," and do good to all men. The controversy in which the Christian is engaged is against the root and author of sin, and not against the poor, unfortunate victims. Our aim is to rescue them, not to fight them. It is not the Christian's business to execute the law; but to call sinners to repentance. G.