Jesus is more than a message. He is a living power in a man"s life. This is the great need of men"s hearts,--the message of Jesus" purity and of Jesus" power embodied in live men, living side by side, in the thick of things, with their brothers of the great world.
The Great Unknown Lack.
The greatness of men"s need stands out most pathetically in this, that men don"t know their need. They have gotten so used to the night that they don"t care for the sunlight. They have been hungry so long that the sense of hunger and the call of appet.i.te have wholly gone.
There is a simple, striking story told of two famous Scandinavians, Ole Bull, the great violinist, and John Ericsson, the great inventor, who taught the world to use the screw in steam navigation. The one was a Norwegian, the other a Swede. They had been friends in early life, but drifted apart and did not meet again until each had become famous. The old friendship was renewed on one of Ole Bull"s tours to this country.
As Bull was leaving his friend, after a delightful visit, he gave him a cordial invitation to attend his concert that evening. But the matter-of-fact, prosaic Ericsson declined, pleading pressure of work, and saying that he had no time to waste on music.
Bull renewed his invitation, time and again, finally saying, "If you won"t come, I"ll bring my violin down here to your shop, and play." "If you do,"
replied the famous engineer laughingly, "I"ll smash the thing to pieces."
The violinist, knowing the marvellous, almost supernatural, power of his instrument to touch and awaken the human heart into new life, felt curious to know what effect it would have on this scientific man steeped in his prosaic physics. So he planned a bit of diplomacy.
Taking the violin with him, he called upon Ericsson at his workshop one day. He removed the strings and screws and ap.r.o.n, and called Ericsson"s attention to certain defects, asking about the scientific and acoustic principles involved, and discussing the differing effect of the different grain of certain woods. From this he went on to a discussion of sound waves. Finally, to ill.u.s.trate his meaning and his questions, he replaced the parts, and, bringing the bow softly down upon the tense strings, drew out a few marvellously sweet, rich tones.
At once the workmen in the shop dropped their tools, and listened with wide-eyed wonder. Ole Bull played on and on, with his simple great skill, making the workshop a place of worship. When finally he paused, Ericsson lifted his bowed head, and showed eyes that were wet. Then he said softly, with the touch of reverent awe in his voice, "Play on! Don"t stop. Play on. I never knew before what it was that was lacking in my life."
That is what men everywhere say when they come to know Jesus. They fight against knowing Him because of their ignorance of Him. At home, prejudice against theology of this sort and that; against some preaching, or church service, or some Christian people they have unpleasant memories of perhaps, bar the way. Abroad, prejudice against their treatment at the hands of Christian nations, or against anything new, shuts the door with a slam and a sharp push of the bolt.
It takes great diplomacy, love"s diplomacy, the combination of serpent and dove, subtlety and harmlessness, to get an entrance. But when the door is pried open, or coaxed open enough for some sound or sight of Jesus to get in, they pa.s.sionately cry out, "This is what I need. This Jesus is the lacking thing in my life!"
The Present Opportunity
Somebody"s Knocking at the Door.
They"re Standing in the Dark.
Who"s There?
The Coming Leaders.
What They"re After.
Returning Our Call.
"Inasmuch."
The Present Opportunity
Somebody"s Knocking at the Door.
There"s a soft, tender pa.s.sion in the heart of G.o.d. Its flame burns steadily. It never flags nor dims. It"s a pa.s.sion for His child-man. And that very pa.s.sion itself draws man to Himself with a drawing power that is irresistible. They can"t resist being drawn, even though they may refuse to yield to it.
There is an answering pa.s.sion in man"s heart for G.o.d. It is often a sort of dumb longing, not clearly defined nor well understood. It is a mute yearning of his heart for G.o.d, though often he doesn"t think of it that way. But it is there; for these two, man and G.o.d, belong together. They were together until sin drove its ugly wedge in between. They are a part of each other. Neither one is complete nor happy without the other.
The heart of G.o.d can be satisfied only as man comes back home to Him. And man"s heart never rests until it finds rest in comradeship with G.o.d. These two are always drawing toward each other. G.o.d is always drawing man by the great master-pa.s.sion of His heart. And man is always responding to that tender, strong pull in the underneath, mute yearning of his heart.
By and by the thing that keeps them apart will be gotten rid of. Sin will be shipped overboard, to fall by its own dead weight to the bottom of the sea. Then there will be glad reunion of G.o.d and man, their hearts in full glad accord again. To-night we want to talk together a bit about this answering pa.s.sion of man"s heart for G.o.d.
The heathen world is knocking to-day at the door of the Christian Church.
It has found out who has the fullest and truest information about G.o.d. And it is knocking loudly and earnestly at that door. And it keeps on knocking, though the door seems to be barely open yet; and a good many--most?--inside don"t seem to have heard the knocking.
The most remarkable thing about the present time from the Church point of view is that the heathen peoples are asking for what the Master has told us to give them. The centre of Church attraction and of Christian action to-day is on the swing toward heathen lands.
When the Church began again, a hundred years ago, to enter the great heathen world, it had to use pick and axe, jimmy and chisel. It seemed like using burglar"s tools. Certainly it was working in the dark, with only the burglar"s dark-lantern to show the way. But now the heathen door is wide open. Instead of our knocking at their door, the heathen world is knocking at our door.
Our billion brothers stand in the night-time of their darkness blindly feeling for our door, and knocking, now timidly, now earnestly and loudly, ay, imperiously, for the light that we have. It has been a cold night for them, and a long night, too. But the darkest hour of it is already throbbing with the flood of coming light. They have found the door and are using it. The whole foreign non-Christian world is knocking with incessant, insistent clamor at our church door.
They"re Standing in the Dark.
I do not mean that actually every country in the world is open to the Gospel. For there are a few countries with comparatively scanty populations that are not open; except, indeed, on the edges, to the man prying earnestly around for a way to get in.
I don"t mean that every man in these open countries is actually asking us to send him some word of Jesus. For vast numbers of them have never heard either about us or about Him. They don"t know there is a Jesus to ask about; or, judging by others, they would be asking.
Neither do I mean that these mult.i.tudes who are asking are, in every case, asking for the Gospel itself. For many times that is not so. They ask for that which appeals to them strongly as something that they want. They want our Western science and learning. They want to get from us the secret of harnessing nature up to their wagon to pull their heavy loads.
In many cases, without doubt, they don"t want our Christianity at all.
They regard it simply as something that goes along inseparably with the thing they do want. They are willing to put up with some of it for a while, if only they can get the thing they are after. Their eyes have been caught by the bright light of our Christian civilization. They don"t understand how it came to us. They haven"t wakened up enough, most of them, to think into that.
They want the light we have, as we might want something that we could order a shipment of. They haven"t learned enough yet to want to get the light-generating plant installed in their midst. The great fact that all our civilization has come to us through the partial presence of the Light of the world hasn"t dawned upon their minds yet.
But, however selfish motives and a crude understanding or misunderstanding may enter in, the great strange unprecedented fact still remains true that the world of heathenism is knocking at the door of Christendom as never before in the world"s history.
And then, too, everywhere some of them are asking plainly and piteously for the real thing. Great numbers in all the foreign-mission lands are asking that Christian teachers be sent to them with Bibles and other books to teach them the way back home to G.o.d. Wherever they find out that there is a knowledge of G.o.d to be gotten, from there comes the insistent knocking that it be brought to them.
I remember Bishop Bashford, of the Methodist Episcopal Church, stationed in China, telling of one of his thrilling experiences out there. He had gone inland quite a bit into China on one of his tours. One day he was preaching the story of Jesus to a crowd of Chinese gathered in the open air. As his interpreter turned his words into Chinese the crowds listened with great respect and keenest interest.
As he finished he asked them if they had ever heard the Gospel before. No; none of them had. He was turning up absolutely fresh soil. And they pressed in about him, earnestly asking that men be sent to tell them. And this experience of Bishop Bashford"s is being repeated, over and over again, throughout the foreign-mission world.
Who"s There?
But there is yet more than this. Everywhere among these peoples, as one comes into close enough touch to find their hearts, there can be found underneath the inarticulate, inexpressible yearning for something they haven"t. And they don"t know enough to know what it is they long for. But they are conscious of the constant, weary, yearning tug within. The great heart of the non-Christian world to-day is asking dumbly, but earnestly, as only the heart can ask, for the light we have. Its knocking at our front door is growing louder in its insistent earnestness.
Since Commodore Perry steamed into the harbor of Yokohama, fifty years ago, with open Bible and American flag, and knocked at the front door of the Orient, the whole situation has completely changed. Then we knocked for admission to these shut-in lands. Now they are knocking at our door, for the knowledge and light that we have in Christian lands because we have Jesus.