THE National Laymen’s Missionary Movement, whose office is in London, has issued not long since a unique manifesto signed by six Prime Ministers, namely, those of Great Britain, Canada, Australia, South Africa, Newfoundland, and New Zealand. The document is of a religious character, and is addressed to the citizens of the British Empire. Its message, so far as it goes, is good, but the doctrine proclaimed is so vague and indefinite that we do not expect much benefit to result from it. To begin with, the manifesto declares that “the War, in shaking the very foundations of ordered civilization, has driven all thoughtful men to examine the bases of national and international life,” and then it proceeds to state that “it has become clear to-day . . . that neither education, science, diplomacy, nor commercial prosperity, when allied with a belief in material force as the ultimate Power, are real foundations for the ordered development of the world’s life.” To put this in simple language, it means that neither education nor any of the other things mentioned, joined with pure Materialism, provide any proper foundation for the moral and spiritual welfare and progress of society. None of these merely natural forces can ensure peace and prosperity of the best kind. And the Prime Ministers go a step further, and affirm that even the League of Nations, upon which many are placing undue confidence, will be insufficient of itself to maintain peace. Its success is “dependent on something deeper,” the existence of the spirit of goodwill among “the consenting peoples”; and then they add that “the spirit of goodwill among men rests on spiritual forces. The hope of a ‘brotherhood of humanity’ reposes on the deeper spiritual fact of the ‘Fatherhood of God.'” The sum of the concluding portion of the message is that the one hope for the reconstruction of the life of the world, and for a permanent world-peace, is the recognition and acceptance of these “spiritual principles,” a recognition which “cannot be imposed by Government,” and “can only come as an act of free consent on the part of individual men everywhere.”
We daresay we ought to be thankful for small mercies in these degenerate times, and be glad that the Prime Ministers of these countries should give any message that would insist upon the necessity of Christianity for the life and peace of the world, though they should not express themselves in the most accurate or satisfactory terms from a theological point of view. But for all this, we see no reason to exult over the manifesto and extol it as of a noble character, as some writers do. The Prime Ministers exhibit a very deficient knowledge of fallen human nature, and they do not appear to perceive that apart from the work of the Holy Spirit in the regeneration of human hearts, there will be no “spirit of good-will” worthy of the name, and no acceptance of any spiritual principles whatsoever. Man’s natural free-will will never save the race from hatred, violence, and corruption. Nothing other than the preaching of the gospel concerning Jesus Christ as the only Saviour from sin in heart and life, and that preaching attended by the Spirit’s power, will produce men animated by a spirit of genuine love to their fellows, and will weld together the nations in real bonds of unity and brotherhood. A mere superficial belief in the Divine Fatherhood will effect no radical change in the inward disposition or the outward life. There was never a period in which there was more delusive talk from pulpits about God’s universal Fatherhood and man’s power of will to do good, than the present, and yet the world has never seen more hatred, violence, or general wickedness. Truly, the leaders in Church and State require illumination from above, so as to discern the deep-seated root of all the disorder that exists in the heart which is “deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked,” and to perceive that apart from “the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost” through Jesus Christ, the Divine Mediator, there can be no transformation of the lives of sinful men, and no ushering in of a glorious time of purity, harmony, and peace. God has promised in His word to send such a day, but it will not come along the weak lines laid down by our Prime Ministers. They must awake to deeper and higher views of the Christian message, before they will work any abiding deliverance in the earth. At the same time, we are glad to see that they acknowledge the impotency of merely natural causes to effect the desired improvement upon the world at large, and the necessity for “spiritual forces” to operate. The testimony so far has some value and power of appeal, coming from such intelligent and responsible quarters. May the Lord send forth His light and truth to Prime Ministers and peoples, and hasten the time when all kings and nations shall serve Him in truth!
THE Lord Jesus, though He was a man of sorrows, yet He was not a man of sin; He had correction, but not corruption; He that was a way to others never went out of the way Himself.—
Dyer.