Archives: Book Chapters

Of ourselves we know only that all things die! What our eyes see and experience daily is that there is nothing perfect. When we look about on this great universe, we shudder. In the midst of infinite space, with its millions of suns that arise and grow old in millions upon millions of years, what does this little earth-history mean? In the midst of the history of man, where races stream forth as from an inexhaustible spring into visible life and then disappear again after a few short centuries of stardom -- what is the meaning of your insignificant life with its seventy, or "by reason of strength" eighty years? Is there any meaning to it at all? No, says the universe to us. Yes, says the Word of God, the Creator of all these suns and races is thy Creator. The tremendous starry world that frightens you is not the real world. This racial life with its waxing and waning is not real life, this is all only on the surface. Beyond it is another life, that longs to break forth. It has broken forth once in Jesus Christ, the Risen Lord, and it will break forth for us all in the Resurrection. This other life is Eternal life. Eternal life is not an unending continuance of this life -- that would perhaps be Hell -- but Eternal life is a quite different life, divine, not mundane, perfect, not earthly, true life, not corrupt half-life.

We cannot form a conception of eternal life. What we imagine is ever simply of the earth, temporal, worldly. Nor could we know anything about our eternal life if it had not appeared in Jesus Christ. In him we realize that we were created for the eternal life. If we ask what is this eternal life? What sense is there in thinking about it if we can have no conception of it? the answer is, "It is life with God, in God, from God; life in perfect fellowship." Therefore it is a life in love, it is love itself. It is a life without the nature of death and of sin, hence without sorrow, pain, anxiety, care, misery.

To know this suffices to make one rejoice in eternal life. If there were no eternal life, this life of time would be without meaning, goal, or purpose, without significance, without seriousness and without joy. It would be nothing, for what ends in nothing, is itself nothing. That our life does not end in nothing, but that eternal life awaits us is the glad message of Jesus Christ. He came to give us this promise as a light in this dark world. A Christian is a man who has become certain of eternal life through Jesus Christ.

What is the meaning of life? There are many answers to this question. It means power, possessions, honor, progress, culture, etc. That is not the true answer. If that is all life means then our answer is no answer at all, because surely all these things end in nothing. The true answer is that the meaning of this life is eternal life. Such is its seriousness. The stakes are high, the loss or gain of eternal life. The dice are cast for a great prize -- how have your dice fallen? Do you win eternal life, or do you lose it? How does one win eternal life? "Master, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" That question was answered, "Keep the commandments!" "What must I do to be saved?" That question was answered, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ!" Which answer is correct? Both mean the same thing -- become a child of God! How a man can become a child of God has been the theme of this whole book. A child of God is, as the Scripture says, an heir of eternal life.

Death ends all life on this earth. We shall all die some day. Tomorrow? Next year? It makes no difference. Some day! Even the whole race will one day die. Without faith that means all is over. But faith says: the end is eternal life. Is it certain that faith is right? Can one know that so certainly? In the last analysis is it not a supposition? When this question arises -- and why should it not arise? -- we find out whether we can really believe. Faith is the assurance that God has truly revealed His will to us in Jesus Christ, and this will is eternal life. How he will realize his will we do not know, the "how" is unimportant for us. Our business is to live in this faith, to be joyful, and to live even now in this love which is the inner meaning of eternal life. Eternal life begins by faith in Christ, and when it has begun death can have no more dominion over us.

"The history of the world is the judgment of the world," says Schiller. The Bible not only does not con- test this statement, but repeatedly confirms it. That the judgment of God prevails in history, as well as in the life of the individual, is the meaning of the stories of the Flood and the tower of Babel, in which God judges in catastrophe the blasphemous deeds of men. They relate how God steps into history with His storms and upheavals to shatter those moments of human madness in which self-drunken men raise their towers to heaven. The Bible teaches us to observe how "he that soweth to the flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption." It shows us how "righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people," and that this is true of great and small, of the life of the Nations as of individuals. These are indeed judgments, but they are not "The Judgment." These judgments have been or are being completed in history, they are but preludes to "The Judgment," which has not yet come. These judgments give us a preview, as it were of the Last Judgment.

"We must all appear before the Judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad." "God will render to every man according to his deeds: to them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, eternal life: but unto them that are contentious, and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, indignation and wrath." It is no Jewish moralist who tells us that, but the Apostle through whom God has most power- fully proclaimed the message of His forgiving love.

One scarcely hears a sermon any more about The Judgment. Perhaps in former times there was too much and too rash preaching on this subject, motivated by a desire to drive men into the Kingdom of Heaven by fear. No one enters into the Kingdom of Heaven by fear, and the man who tries to do God's will out of fear simply does not do God's will. He alone can do God's will who loves God with all his heart, and trusts Him and relies wholly upon His mercy, but just because we must constantly take refuge in God's mercy, and not go our independent way, we need the message of the Judgment. We need it, just because we learn from it to "bring forth fruits meet for repentance." Every man, believer or unbeliever ought to know that at last comes

the Judgment when the Shepherd of Nations will sepa- rate the sheep from the goats. "Then shall the King say unto them on His right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world." "Then shall He say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels." These words are not an opinion, they are the Lord's words (Matt. 25). So God speaks to each one of us, and whether or not we want to hear Him is not a matter of choice or speculation. The message of the Judgment informs us that God is to be taken seriously, that God will not be mocked. It tells us that God is not only the loving Father, but also the righteous Lord, who desires that His commandments find obedience.

"We must all," says Paul, "appear before the Judgment seat of Christ and must testify." "Who then can be saved?" the troubled disciples asked their Lord. "With men it is impossible, but with God all things are possible," he gave answer.

Therefore the message of the Cross of Christ is given us, that it might show us the mercy of God with whom all things are possible. This message, however, does not mean, as it has often been interpreted, that the Judgment no longer means anything to him who believes in Christ, but rather that he alone survives the Judgment who has become a new man through faith in Christ, who has "passed from death to life" and hence belongs among those who "by patient continuance in well-doing seek for eternal life." God alone knows which are the good trees, that bear good fruit. We men can deceive ourselves. We know this much for certain, however, that no one is a "good tree" that rests upon his own righteousness.

We understand what the Bible tells us about forgive- ness only when we take seriously what it says about the Judgment. Only then do we really know what the Scriptures mean by "repent and be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus," for it is this name alone that sustains us on that day. But the Lord Jesus can help us then only when he knows us to be his own, and does not have to say, "I know ye not." "For not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, will enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven." This word, too, we must "let remain." It belongs to the word of Judgment, not to make us afraid, but to drive us to repentance, that we might really become those who "are His" by faith, hope, and love.

What is coming? We are not prophets. Even for our own little lives we cannot, with any degree of certainty, prognosticate one day ahead. It is probable that so and so will occur tomorrow, but all may turn out quite differently. On one matter only are we real prophets, we can predict with utter certainty that death is coming. And yet, in spite of our certain knowledge that we must die, the thought plays a very small role in our life. We avoid this thought, it is painful, indeed, fearful to us. For death means all is over; if there is nothing more, then every column in this life adds up to the same result -- zero. Death means that everything we create, the purposes for which we struggle, the ends after which we strive, for which we make sacrifices -- all are at last nothing. Death finally destroys all; all that is, is fit for destruction. Do not say that all high purposes and noble ends will continue to live in those who follow. Say rather that all will ultimately die with those dying men who follow us. All paths lead into -- the grave. That is the fearful geography of this life. It is no wonder that we avoid this thought.

To evade is not finally to escape, for this thought is swifter and stronger than our evasion. The fear of death accompanies us secretly in everything we do or leave undone, everything we think or say. It is the quiet undertone that penetrates all life. What Christ says is true of every one -- the courageous and the un- concerned, the cowardly and the careful, "In the world ye shall have tribulation." To each one it comes in a different form. We live like business men, who foresee certain bankruptcy but do not dare think of it, do not any longer balance books, make no attempt to save themselves. Fate must ultimately overtake us; so let us make shift of our days well as we can! Afterward comes the end!

Is death really the end? Is life then really senseless? Death, nothingness, is the most senseless thing we can imagine. And this is indeed the final result. But we know that in a religious, assuredly in a Christian book, we must expect to read a denial of the total destructive power of death, and that there is indeed an eternal life. But do we really believe it? And is it so sure? Can one know something certain about the matter? Death is that "undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveller returns." So, then, what we have are not certainties but only beautiful comforting auto-suggestions that may be true, that may be quite false. Isn't this the way we naturally think? That we do so think is because we doubt. And many have the idea that doubt belongs to life and cannot be helped, that it belongs even to the Christian life.

But the truth is that so long as we are in bondage to this doubt we are not yet Christians. For to doubt eternal life is to dismiss the promises of God, to be dis- obedient to the Word of God, to put our trust in our own understanding and senses. God's Word is not sufficient guarantee, we want something more certain. But this desire for something more certain than God's Word is doubt, crass, naked doubt; crass, naked paganism; crass, naked Godlessness.

The Word of God is the message of eternal life. Jesus Christ came to show us eternal life and to bestow it upon us. "I am the resurrection and the Life. He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die." That is Christ's message. Whosoever is not sure of this in his faith should not think that he is a Christian.

Can one "believe" such a thing? One can, of course, say the words, but the mere words give no help. Doubt continues to live under the same roof with this "faith"; this "faith" has no power, for it does not overcome our terror of death. Hence the Lord says, "He that believeth in me, hath eternal life." So believing in Christ, then, is not merely "believing" but life itself! Eternal life! Eternal life begins where fellowship with Christ begins, and when this begins, doubt disappears. Because Christ comes into a man's life, doubt must disappear. Christ and doubt cannot exist together. Christ alone can overcome doubt, Christ alone can really free us from the fear of death. And by doing that he makes us joyful men. "In the world ye shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer, for I have overcome the world." It is as though he said to you, "If you are alone you are afraid. But I have overcome your fear by standing beside you." Upon some mountain peaks there is only one solitary path -- and he who will not climb through this narrow place cannot reach the summit and must fall to his death. So, too, there is only one way to eternal life -- Christ. He who passes him by misses the goal and falls into the abyss. But he who finds this way is saved, from doubt, from tribulation and from death itself.

The Christian faith is distinguished from all other faiths in that it knows that God is coming. That God shall come to His people is the great theme of the Old Testament; and the first word of the New Testament hails Him, "Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand." The whole long record closes with the beautiful prayer, "Even so, Come, Lord Jesus!" The proclamation of the coming reign of God is the Gospel, and the assurance of future salvation and eternal completion is the Christian faith.

The great human sorrow is hopelessness, and hopelessness reigns wherever men do not know that God is coming, for hopelessness muses, the world cannot be helped and I cannot be helped. To be sure people do hope, but they hope only for the "improvement" which comes with development. One hopes in the "healthy kernel" the "good forces operative in us" and the like. Such hope is no real hope. If we must rely solely upon our own potencies, on the powers latent in the world, we are lost. Development of our own strength or release of the energies of the universe cannot redeem us from the corruption that death and sin signify. If we are to rely solely upon ourselves, what is in us and in the world, then everything still ends in one great bankruptcy.

The Bible tells us we are not thrown upon our own resources. The world is not "closed" but open to God. You are not isolated, but open in God's direction; or rather, God relieves your isolation. God breaks into the world. He breaks open the dungeon to release the languishing prisoners and bring them to the light of day. He comes to His corrupt creation to restore its original goodness and to perfect it. God comes to you to save you! When we hear that proclamation two questions arise, How does this happen, and how does one know it is so? Both questions have one answer, Jesus Christ. Because we know Jesus Christ, we know what is meant by the coming of God, the new redemption. And because we know Jesus Christ we know that this redemption is really true. We are not speaking of theories or of heartening thoughts, but of something that has occurred. "The life was manifested and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us."

God has already come. "The Word became flesh and we beheld His glory." Jesus Christ has become real history, and in him the great new thing has come, a thing that the world does not have, and that you do not possess -- life from God, love, the love of God that forgives us our sin and heals our diseases.

With Jesus came the Kingdom of God. Something new is now in the world that was not previously here, fellowship with God by faith, the peace of God that passes all understanding, life in communion with God and man, a life in the Holy Spirit. There is now a Church of Christ in which he himself is the head and men are the members, head and members united with one another, a "communion of saints" -- men not holy in themselves and by themselves, but made holy by fellowship him. The Kingdom of God actually exists wherever living faith and living love grows out of communion with God.

This new life in God is something infinitely great and precious, this new joy, certainly of God, this new power, new will, new fellowship with one another. "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature, old things are passed away; behold all things are become new."

This new life does not obliterate, but must abide in the old life. Hence it is a hidden new life, just as the glory of God and the reign of God in Jesus Christ were concealed under the humiliation of a Cross and the form of a servant. The new is in process of becoming, it struggles out of the old. As a clear strong shaft of light is broken and diffused in passing through a dark glass, so the new Christ-life, itself so clear and strong, must yet shine through "the old Adam." "It doth not yet appear what we shall be." We all are, and indeed remain sinners, those who have fellowship with God. We sigh under the burden of our own imperfection, we are shamed again and again by the corruption the old Adam ever holds between us and the new life. We long for perfection, but we know that we must die, and know also that death is simply the judgment upon the old Adam, the old nature we ever carry about with us. The Kingdom of God has not yet come in its fullness. We therefore look into the future, God's future. What we already have is just the pledge of what is to come. But what will come is not "something" but He Himself. Without the prospect of the future there remains only illusion or despair. Illusions that delude us about the frailty of our present possessions, despair that shuts out the hope for the future. Faith is not merely an uncertain longing, an indefinite expectation, but the soul's open window to the future, the glad assurance of that which is promised us in Christ. Such is the true Christian nature which is born of God; it "waits upon God."

Concerning nothing in the Christian Church has there been more dispute than over the Lord's Supper, which was surely intended solely as a means of fellowship. Concerning few things have so abstruse theological dogmas been formulated as there have been concerning the Lord's Supper, which was surely intended solely as a divine help in understanding the message of reconciliation, a perceptual picture of the heart of the Gospel, the superb gift with which God longs to draw us to Himself.

The Lord's Supper -- and this must be said first of all ùis not magic but, so to speak, an "illustrated word of God," given in order that we might not merely hear the message of divine grace, but also see it and perceive it the more clearly. This is all that happens; but of course this "all" is the inexhaustible miracle of divine reconciliation.

Bread and wine are distributed in the Lord's Supper. We are to eat and drink, which means that we are to receive that by which we live. But this bread and this wine are signs, symbols. The spiritual bread of life and the spiritual drink of life is -- Christ himself. "I am the Bread of Life. He that believeth on me shall never thirst." This "he that believeth" in the utterance of Jesus is a great mystery; it is likewise the great mystery of the Lord's act in giving us the Sacrament of his Supper. This holy act is a means which God employs to give us His Word, Jesus Christ; to strengthen and nourish that faith with which alone we receive Christ. God then, not simply the pastor and the deacons, does something in the Lord's Supper. Not simply bread and wine but Christ himself is present in the Sacrament. Indeed, Christ the Bread of Life, and not simply natural bread, is to be eaten. It is a miracle that God should speak His Word to us, and that we should receive and eat it in faith. As surely as simple natural bread is eaten, and this natural bread is and remains bread, so surely something else is also eaten -- the Word of God, Christ, the Bread of Life. Both really eaten, the one physically, the other spiritually. The soul is just as real as the body and must, with equal reality, be nourished. But as the soul is invisible, it must be nourished with invisible bread. Christ is the Bread of the soul, just as wheat bread is the nourishment of the body.

It is no mere chance that we use bread and wine in the Sacrament. Jesus instituted the Lord's Supper the night before his crucifixion. He broke the bread as a symbol for his body which was to be broken on the following morning. So, too, the wine to signify his blood. The Lord's Supper "proclaims" the "Lord's death." It is a narrative, but more than that, for it transmits at the same time the significance of this death. When a man dies, the significance of his death for him and for his loved ones is that he is no longer present. Jesus' death is, however, no such human death. The death of Jesus is something that God does to help the whole world. The death of Jesus is the atoning act of God. It is this death which the Lord's Supper proclaims, this perishing whereby we receive eternal life. In the Lord's Supper God would say to us that this death is your life, if you in faith partake of him. By faith you are united with the crucified and risen Christ; by faith you, the sinner, come to the Cross and this eternal life comes to you. By faith you receive what is Christ's and he takes upon himself what is yours. This inconceivable exchange -- is the grace of God in Jesus Christ.

You receive this grace through God's Word, be it through the word the preacher proclaims from the pulpit, or by what the Lord's Supper says to you of God's grace. It wants to tell you that! So to tell it that you can also see it, better understand it, and more certainly believe it.

One thing more. It is just by this act of the Lord's Supper that we are told clearly that we can have God's salvation only in fellowship; not each one for himself alone. The Lord's Supper is an act of fellowship. We are not only to be united with Christ, but also with our fellow men. "One body whose head is Christ." When there is one body, each member thinks and suffers for the other.

Whoever goes away from the Lord's Supper without the love of the brethren being awakened in him, has received nothing; he was present in vain, for it is by our love to the brethren that we prove we have fellowship with Christ.

Few of the readers of this book are not baptized, but there are not very many who know what it means to be baptized. "Well, a person has to have a name," and that is what one gets in baptism! Aren't warships "christened" when they get their names? No. You received a name when a county official entered you in the Birth Register; no baptism was necessary for such a purpose.

In former times slaves were branded on the back with their master's name. In your baptism God laid hold upon you, called you by your name and stamped you as ever after -- His own. Through the word and act of man in your baptism, the brand, "property of God" was stamped upon you. The words "God's own" were spoken over you by the Church, the Church of Jesus Christ; God has laid claim upon you through the act of the Church.

Do we not belong to God without Baptism, by virtue of being His creatures? To be sure. We should not know this if God had not said so in His Word; without God's Word we know neither Him nor ourselves. With- out God's Word we do not know we are His property and all that this ownership means for our lives. In His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, God has shown us what it means to be His property and how He is disposed toward us. God does not make us His property in Jesus Christ to show that He can do with us what He wills, as the slaveholder stamps His name upon His slaves. He can to be sure, do with us what He wills; He is the Creator and we are His creatures. He does not want us to have to be afraid of Him as slaves before their master, but rather to love Him as the one who first loved us. "God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." That is the Gospel, in this way God claims us, in this way He means to proclaim to us by the Church the words, "Thou art mine."

Baptism is the prevenient love of God antecedent to any human effort. What did we know when our sponsors held us, crying infants, up to the Pastor for Baptism! He "received us in love before we ever thought of Him." He gave us a name that is written in no Civil Register -- child of God! He has been before-hand with His gift; He loved us even before we were as yet conscious of our identity.

Are we then children of God by virtue of Baptism? Is it so simple and so cheap? Yes -- if you believe. "Whosoever believeth in Him...." Indeed faith is not so simple and cheap. Baptism wants to point out just that. Baptize comes from "baptize" to dip. Children formerly were not simply sprinkled with water, but immersed, and so, too, were the first Christian adults baptized. Why was this done? As a sign that we must die really to belong to God. We are baptized into the death of our Lord. We must share in his death if we desire to share in his life. We are by nature men who do not at all desire to belong to God, but to them- selves. The "Lord" of our life says first, I am the Lord my God! This self-willed, self-seeking, self-glorifying I must be drowned. And that is not so "cheap and easy." It costs much. It cost the Lord Jesus his life. "To believe" that we belong to God, means no less than to be crucified with Jesus Christ, knowing that he had to die for us, trusting that he really died for us -- really for you -- and therewith setting aside all that separates us from God. "The old Adam in us should, by daily sorrow and repentance be drowned and die," says Luther. Every day we must be immersed anew in the divine forgiveness, and repent, put off what separates us from God. Baptism itself happens just once. But we must believe constantly anew, for only through faith does Baptism save us. "That whosoever believeth in Him. ...." Hence we are not baptized merely in the name of the Father and of the Son, but also of the Holy Ghost. "Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His."

Even most good Christians do not know what to make of the Sacraments: Baptism and the Lord's Supper. They are venerable customs which have always been performed by the Church, in which one takes part out of respect, or because they are here and are observed -- or perhaps simply out of habit, or "because it makes things better." In the cities, the neglect of the Lord's Supper is quite general. Often no more than a fourth of the many who throng the church on high festivals remain for the Lord's Supper. Are the Sacraments dying branches on the tree of the Church -- like so much that once was customary, but is now sacrificed to the times?

The Lord surely knew what he was doing when, on that last night, he said to his Disciples, "This do in remembrance of me." Without the Sacraments the Church would long ago have disappeared, and with the passing of the Church would have gone also Christian faith and the Bible. The Sacraments are the divinely given flying buttresses which save the Church from collapse. In how many of the Churches of today do we not find the Sacraments almost the sole biblical footing -- the only biblical element that has been able to withstand the caprices of the gifted minister who lives by his own wisdom rather than from the Scriptures. Even the most audacious minister has not dared to lay hands on the Sacraments. And they are what they are! One may so interpret the words of Scripture that the words speak the opposite of their intent; but the Sacraments, thank God, speak a language independent of the language of the Pastor. They are a part of the message of the Church least affected by theological or other tendencies; and that is their especial blessing.

Yes, the Sacraments have a message for us. God wants to speak to us in them. For once, however, He addresses us through the eye, instead of through the ear as in preaching, through an action instead of through speech. Thus we cannot have the excuse that since the concrete appeals to us more than the abstract we cannot understand the message of the Church.

The Sacraments are God's message for the eye, for the whole body. One eats and drinks, the whole man partakes of the Sacrament. It is, however, not eating and drinking alone, but surely solely and simply permitting God to say what He wants to impart to us, which is just nothing but the Gospel, laid hold upon at its heart in the message of the Cross. To receive and embrace God's Word in the Sacrament, this alone matters. God acts upon us in the Lord's Supper. As the Pastor distributes the bread and wine to you, God distributes His grace. He is present in this action -- whether the Pastor is a believer or not -- God is present therein in such a way as to be able to touch your heart, humbling and exalting you, bringing you to repentance and faith.

Why is it necessary to have this special way of speaking God's Word, if it still says nothing more than the sermon? Because in the Sacrament the Word seeks us in a different mode, and through a different channel, not with many words, but in an intelligible act. Above all, the consideration is important that you can have the spoken Word of God at home, not only in the Bible, since even the sermon is now being "delivered to your own home" as is everything else, by radio. This convenience may have many advantages. But one inherent evil develops almost of necessity; people do not come together to hear God's Word and to thank God for it in prayer and song. One becomes a private Christian, one does not know any more the meaning of Church, or the fellowship of faith. The fellowship of faith is, how- ever, an integral part of faith. It is possible to enjoy a work of art, a concert or a lecture, and be edified by it without the presence of any other person. Enjoyment and edification in these spheres do not require the presence of others. One cannot have faith alone. Indeed the aim of the Word of God is to conquer this solitude by leading us out of our isolation into fellowship with one another. God's Word and fellowship are inseparable. Therefore our Lord instituted the Sacraments that we might not make a private concern of His Word, but come together actually, not simply "in spirit."

The Sacraments bind us to the Church. They are acts requiring the presence of several; acts in which it be- comes clear that one receives God's salvation, yes, truly receives it through the mediation of a man. God wants to give us the highest gifts through men, that we in coming to Him, might also come to men. He wants to draw us out of our isolation and self-satisfaction. He wants to lead us to others in such a way that we perceive our need of them. Christians are men who have felt their need of others. So often it is just the "good" and "able" people who fail to see this. "I can get along by myself." It is just that which is sin, pride, and lovelessness. God did not create us to be able to get along by ourselves, but that we "should bear one another's burdens." The Sacraments are the buttresses which keep the Church from falling asunder because they do not permit a man to receive the salvation of God alone. Only in the congregation, only in confessing "I need the other man" shall you receive God's salvation. Otherwise you remain self-contained -- and unsaved.

"I believe one holy Catholic and Apostolic Church" -- so reads the common Christian confession of faith. Almost every word of the sentence is incomprehensible for the present-day man, and even for the average Christian. Luther called the word Church a "blank" and would have preferred the term "the Christian folk." "Church" means for most people the great building with the tower and chimes where every Sunday services of worship are conducted. All of that, to be sure, is used by the Church and reminds us that the matter of greatest significance in the Church is the proclamation of the Gospel. But the misunderstanding is just as great. As if the modest chapel near by were not just as truly a Church! As though there were Church only where there is a clergyman. What is meant in the New Testament by the word we translate "Church"? What is the Church of which the creed speaks?

Church, in Greek is called "ekklesia," which means, -- the chosen band. Just as the herald in former times read the royal proclamations in the market-place, and men poured forth from the houses into the square in obedience to his voice and listened to his message; or as the recruiting officer came into a village and with attractive speech won the young men into the army of some great lord, -- in similar manner there sounds forth among us God's call to salvation, the "come unto me all ye!" of the world's Saviour. The Company of them that hear and heed this call

constitute the "army" of God. The army he has won, "bought with a price," is the Church. Every one who heeds the call of Christ belongs to it, be he Catholic, Quaker, Methodist, or Reformed. One thing only is decisive: have you really heard, and really heeded the call, or have you made but an exterior gesture of joining this or that? And because this decisive matter can never be seen, judged, or evaluated from the outside, because unlike the military forces of a great king, no one can see or enumerate those who have become part of the "church army" of God, because this hearing and heeding of God's call is a hidden matter, known only to God Himself, we speak also of the invisible Church.

To be sure Christ desires no invisible army. He wants a host of such a kind that even the children of this world, who know nothing of faith nor want to know, will be able to note that there is something mightily at work within these "called-soldiers"; that they obey a mighty Other and no longer their own wills. And Christ now recruits this band through his "recruiting officers" his "heralds." The first heralds were the Apostles and for that reason the Church is called Apostolic. The Church rests on them; that is to say, upon the message which they proclaimed, upon the message of Jesus the Son of God, crucified and arisen, the message of the Kingdom and the Reign of God. One belongs to the Church when one is recruited by this message for Christ the King and Lord; and that means belonging to the Kingdom of God, now hidden, until it shall one day be revealed at the time of the end of all things.

This Church is not only "Apostolic," meaning "founded by the Apostles" but it is also universal. Formerly it was called "Catholic," but every man understands by that the Roman Catholic Church, which is something quite different. Universal means spread over the whole world. One army -- whether in Switzerland or in America or in Japan, wherever men "call upon the name of the Lord Jesus" at all times and in all places. Universal, too, in the sense that it cuts across all state churches, confessions, and sects. Christ does not have all his people in one body; they are not only scattered about through all lands, but are among all church organizations. The Roman Catholics rightly lament this latter fact. There should be but one Church. How much more driving power it would have, how much greater its impact on the world! And conversely: how the name of Jesus is blasphemed because there are so many churches, sects, and confessions! Why is it so? Because people did not remain in the truth, that is to say, the truth the Apostles proclaimed. And also be- cause pride, contentiousness, and pomposity supposed something additional was necessary, something beyond the hearing and the heeding of God's call. Sects have been formed for all sorts of insignificant reasons; for the most part, to be sure, because some established "church" had gone spiritually to sleep or had languished. There should be only one Church, but this unity can come only from a powerful renewal of faith, a new Reformation created out of the depths of the Gospel.

The most important and difficult word is the Holy Church. Holy doesn't mean what one usually under- stands it to signify, but means "belonging to God." That is definitive not only for the Church, but for eternal life also. He who does not belong to God and who has not really been enlisted, cannot be saved and must be lost. A man belongs to God and becomes holy by accepting the divine promise of forgiveness in repentance and faith. When that occurs another person is received into the Church, a new member grows upon the body "whose head is Christ." How does one get into the Church? Solely and simply by a hearty trust in and obedience to the Word of God. To establish "obedience to the faith among all nations" was the purpose of Paul in setting forth, and it was in this way that he enlisted the Church, the Army of God. Obedience to the faith is the touchstone of true Church membership.

Many do not know either their own loneliness or the loneliness of others. I do not mean simply that some people are alone. One can be alone and still not be lonely. One can be in a teeming crowd of people and yet be quite lonely. Loneliness is solitude of soul. There are even quite garrulous people who -- as it is said -- have their hearts on their tongues, and who nevertheless live quite alone. Every person whose life is self-centered has an isolated soul. Such a person is like a castle. There is a gate through which one sallies forth to take booty. There are embrasures through which one shoots poisoned arrows; there are battlements, to be sure, from which one looks down upon those below. But the whole castle is isolated, and over the gate stands "mine" in large letters. The possessor of this castle is called "I." And everything is operated according to the will of this "I," and the laws are my laws. There is a kind of social life between this feudal lord, the self, and others; there is intercourse, but the spirit of the castle regulates everything. Things must go as I want them to, and as they suit me. Such a life is isolated, lonesome, even in the midst of the greatest activity. For all people who go in and out are present simply for my sake. No one ever enters who is called thou.

The castles of mediaeval times were sometimes captured by another lord, so -- perhaps it may happen to your castle. There is only one who is strong enough to capture it, banish this tyrant named I, and revoke my law. This one, the only conqueror, conquers not by power or might, blow for blow, by the opposition of his will to the will of the individual. He would accomplish nothing in that way. The Ego has made sufficient pro- vision for assault of this sort. The sole conqueror breaks into the citadel by quite different means. He vanquishes the self through love, by blasting the great gate with forgiveness, by overthrowing the self from the throne by sacrificing, yes even by giving his life for it. This conqueror is called Jesus Christ. And this con- quest comes about when the self surrenders like a conquered fort-commander and says, "Enter, thou art now the Lord of my life." This abdication is called faith. Through this event -- or rather through Jesus Christ, man is "opened"; the law "for me" is abrogated, and another law introduced -- "for you." Solitude ceases the moment the law "for you" takes the place of the other law. Solitude is replaced by fellowship. Fellowship means that the self really discloses itself to another, so that "I" and "thou" really come together. Fellowship is the same as love. And this love comes by faith alone, or, what is the same, from Christ alone.

Love thy neighbor as thyself! It is that which Christ fulfilled, he alone. But by fulfilling it for us, we can now be overcome by him, we too can begin its fulfillment. "Faith working by love."

Only in this way can solitude be overcome. Such a new life begins in every man whom Jesus has overcome. Fellowship now displaces loneliness, life is directed toward a thou and not toward the self.

It is not, however, only faith that produces fellowship. The reverse is also true. Faith grows out of fellowship. We need others to be able to believe. One cannot be a Christian by himself. All sorts of things can be done alone; but one cannot be a Christian alone. My own weak faith must constantly be awakened, renewed, strengthened, purified by the faith of others. We must come together really to believe. "Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them." We must learn that again. Everything today has become a matter of private property and private affairs, even faith. But faith must perish when it is alone. It can thrive only in fellowship.

Our Church is only a remnant of such fellowship. What the Church offers today in the way of fellowship cannot satisfy. It is not enough that the Word of God is proclaimed to you on Sunday, if you are left alone for the remainder of the week. We all need that our faith and prayer should grow strong with the faith of others; and that our own faith and love be increased by and with the faith and love of others. The first Christians remained daily with one another in prayer and breaking of bread. Something of that must come again into our Church. For otherwise all preaching is in vain. If what has been sown on Sunday is not tended in fellowship it is soon lost. The individual is too negligent and weak. "One may fall, but two can stand together." We must open ourselves mutually, otherwise self re- mains lord, and "for me" the law of life. When we do not share our faith with one another we remain isolated, selfish people. Let us seek the fellowship of faith, according as Christ has opened our hearts.

There is nothing more daring or more humiliating than prayer. It is daring because in prayer I dare to speak with Him whom all the heavens cannot contain. The man who prays trusts that his speaking with God is not in vain, that something happens when he prays that otherwise would not occur. "The fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much." The brain almost reels when it imagines this possibility, surely it is foolish presumption, or simply a remnant of primitive superstition. Are we to believe that the Lord of the world really considers the petitions brought before him by a mere man? The Bible answers yes to all of these questions, and the whole of Biblical revelation creates and nurtures faith in God's hearing of prayer. God is our Father -- that means precisely that He hears. He stands in a reciprocal relationship with us, there is communication between us and Him. God awaits our prayer, and because He longs to extend His kingdom not only over men but through men and with men, God accomplishes some things only when they are asked for; God earnestly awaits our prayer. We dare believe that our prayers make possible for us some action of God not otherwise possible. To believe this, and actually to pray in such trust is surely the most daring thing a man can do.

To pray is also most humbling. Every other act, no matter how small or humble, is nevertheless our act, we are responsible, it is our work, and we have, for all its insignificance, a certain pride in what we have done. But when we pray we fold our hands in silent gesture that we now do nothing more, we now are at the end of our efforts -- that we now leave all things. Father, to Thee! Prayer is a declaration of impotency, it is to say, "I surrender the helm of my life; take it, I can do no more."

Hence prayer is really nothing but faith. So much prayer -- so much faith. So little prayer -- so little faith. In prayer it appears whether a man is daring enough to believe that God is really our Father. That is trust in God. And in prayer it also appears whether a man is humble enough to surrender all to God and to look for all things from Him. To me it always seems that if we could pray aright great things would have to happen. Christianity is so poverty-stricken because so few

really know the meaning of prayer and only he knows who is able to pray. Perhaps none of us yet know rightly. We are still too lacking in trust, and not humble enough in resignation. We do not yet reckon sufficiently on the reality of God. Wherever men today take God with real seriousness miracles happen as they did 2000 years ago. The man who does not believe in such miracles, cannot pray. We fail to take the promises of God seriously enough.

We have to learn how to pray again. It is learned only in quiet and composure. Prayer means first of all the assurance of the presence of God, or as those of old well said "coming before God," "standing before His face." That is not so simple. It requires an effort of the will, -- and more than that. "I will arise and go to my Father." That resolution requires the courage to let God tell you the truth, the humiliating knowledge that you can no longer help yourself. Only he really seeks God, for whom all other doors are bolted. God Himself meets us only when we are at the end of our knowledge and power.

Hence prayer is so much harder than work, more exhausting. For a hundred men who are not afraid of the exertion of labor, there are only a few who take upon themselves the strain of prayer. Most .flee from it, are afraid of it, for who would not be afraid to be alone with God? To babble little prayers is not to pray. The Publican who did not dare to lift up his eyes, and who could only sigh "God be merciful to me, a sinner" -- prayed. But the Pharisee who used the machinery of prayer so fluently did not pray; he was too full of himself for that.

Prayer, as all worth-while deeds, requires time. He who takes no time for the practice will either fail to learn how to pray, or, if he once knew will soon forget. Only he who takes much time for prayer can then understand what the Apostle means by the word "pray without ceasing." And prayer does not mean saying many words, it means seeking God and letting God seek us. When the Psalmist says that he is still before God, rejoices in God, he indicates the content and the mood of prayer. Prayer proceeds from petition to praise, from praise to thanks; and from praise and thanks onward to enlarged petition. But all real prayer, I think, will begin with the petition of the disciples, "Lord, teach us to pray!"