Doubt is transient. fused and darkened spirit,-a redeeming love that bridges the gulf of separation and leads the guilty conscience back into peace and harmony with God. An age of doubt is a transient phase of a sinful world. There is always some doubt in the world, just as there is always some moisture in the air. At certain times and in certain places this moisture is increased and rolls together in gray mist and clinging fog. There are certain stages and conditions of human thought in which the difficulties of believing in a spiritual world are multiplied and grow more dense and impenetrable. The soul of man seems to be shut in by a narrower horizon. Things that are near loom larger in the mist. Things that are far are lost to view. The atmosphere in which the spirit moves is heavy and bewildering. Men are confused, hesitating, questioning, despondent, in regard to all that lies beyond the reach of the senses. Doubt, always present though diffused, becomes so thick and pressing, that it overshadows the age. Through such an age I think we have been passing, in this latter half of the nineteenth century. Of the intellectual causes which have led to this increase of doubt; of the qualities which characterize it, — qualities for the most part sympathetic and hopeful, its reverence for the questioned faith, its deep unrest and sorrow, its loyalty to ethical ideals; and of the gospel which it needs, the gospel of the personal Christ clearly revealing the reality and fatherhood of God, the liberty and responsibility of man, and the immortality of the soul, — of these things I have written in a former book. But such a presentation of the gospel, from the point of view of a particular age, and with the purpose of meeting certain intellectual needs, certain urgent questionings of the human spirit, could not be (and indeed it was not intended to be) complete and sufficient. Man has other needs than those of the intellect. After the question of the reality of God is answered, then remains the question of our personal relation to Him. The age of doubt will pass, is already pass- The dissolving, and we are entering, if the signs of the ing of doubt. times fail not, upon a new era of faith. There is a renaissance of religion. Spiritual instincts and cravings assert themselves and demand their rights. The loftier aspirations, the larger hopes of mankind, are leading the When doubt dissolves, sin is made clear. new generation forward into the twentieth century as men who advance to a noble conflict and a glorious triumph, under the captaincy of the Christ that was and is to be. The educated youth of to-day are turning with a mighty, world-wide movement toward the banner of a militant, expectant, imperial Christianity. The discoveries of science, once deemed hostile and threatening to religion, are in process of swift transformation into the materials of a new defence of the faith. The achievements of commerce and social organization have made new and broad highways around the world for the onward march of the believing host. Already we can discern the brightness of another great age of faith. But an age of faith, when the mist of doubt is dissolved and driven away, is always the time when the gulf of sin is most clearly visible. The souls that are most sure of the reality of God and the future life are always those that feel most deeply their separation from Him and their guilty uncleanness in His sight. The evil that is in their own hearts presses upon them more heavily, the more vividly they realize the actual existence of the spiritual realm and its eternal significance. The evil that is in the world does not disappear nor change, through gospel. all the coming and going, the darkening and Sin also dissolving of human doubts in regard to its needs a origin, nature, and meaning. It remains an unalterable fact in human experience. The interpretation which religious faith gives to it intensifies the necessity of a divine salvation from it. Those who have accepted the gospel for an age of doubt are those who feel most keenly the need of the gospel for a world of sin. There cannot be two gospels. I do not believe that there is any essential difference or contradiction between the message which Christianity has for one age and that which it has for another. It is always the glad tidings of the personal Christ, the revealer of God and the Saviour of men. The application of this message is as wide and various as human need and longing, hope and fear, sorrow and sin. To those who are doubtful and confused, to those who have lost the sense of spiritual things, the divine voice says, "This is my beloved Son; hear him."1 To those who are sinful and sorrowful, upon whom the sense of evil rests like an intolerable burden, the voice says, "Behold the Lamb 1 Luke ix. 35. The unity of all gospel in Christ. Christ the Revealer is Companion volumes. of God, which taketh away the sin of the world."1 These two elements of the gospel are interwoven and inseparable. Christ could not take away the sin of the world unless He were the Son of God. Christ would not be the divine Saviour unless He took away the sin of the world. In trying to set forth the personal Christ as God's answer to the doubts and questionings of this age, I could not help speaking of Him as the deliverer from sin.2 Nor will it be possible to present His sacrifice on the cross as the world's redemption without confessing a constant faith in Him as God manifest in the flesh. Indeed, this second book is written chiefly because I feel the need of a fuller utterance to complete the message of the former book. I would have the two books stand together and interpret each other. They are but windows looking toward Christ from two different points of view. The message of the first book was this: Christ saves us from doubt, because He is the revelation of God. The message of the second book is this: 1 John i. 29. 2 The Gospel for an Age of Doubt, pp. 75 ff., 162 ff. |