2. What control of municipal affairs by large commercial and industrial enterprises can be discovered? 3. Has the community received adequate returns from franchises? How are public utilities handled? What special concessions are made to certain groups? 4. Are the taxes high or low? Why? Are the poorer sections of the city discriminated against in public improvements? 5. What is the character of public officers? To what extent are they bound by pre-election pledges? To what extent are they acting as public servants? 6. What is our appraisal of the character and efficiency of our local government? II. Recent Progress in Local Government I. What have been the outstanding items of progress in local government in the last four years? Discuss together how they were accomplished. What lessons do they bring for the future? 2. Is there a municipal league? Are there direct primaries? Is there municipal ownership of public utilities? What have been the most effective ways of fighting graft? III. Advance Steps in the Local Government I. What is the most outstanding present need? 2. To what extent does the local government hold itself responsible for the community as a whole in some such way as the family does for its members? Is there a department of recreation? Is the health department really preventing disease? How? How far have the newer ideals of education been adopted? What special measures have been undertaken for safeguarding and developing the lives of children? 3. What improvements in the city "housekeeping" most urgently demand the support of college graduates? IV. Government Progress in Other Lands 1. What hope is there of securing permanent democratic government in China? in India? in the Near East? CHAPTER X OVERTHROWING THE COMMON ENEMIES To tackle one social evil in any community anywhere is to encounter the opposition of those who make profit out of it, and finally of all whom they can bribe, silence, or otherwise control. If any college man scorns Christianity because it seems to him to lack fight, let him come in on this affair and he will find out whether his Christianity has any punch in it. Any venturesome spirits in the college world who find the ordinary paths of life dull and prosaic will get all the excitement they want the first day they strike the trail that leads to the Commonwealth of God. DAILY MEDITATIONS FIRST DAY: Real Fighters Needed Who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, from weakness were made strong, waxed mighty in war, turned to flight armies of aliens. -Heb. II: 33, 34. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith.-II Tim. 4: 7. Paul's word to Timothy was not a mere figure of speech. He was a battle-scarred veteran in deed and truth, and he is no exception. The powers of darkness are organized to overthrow the Commonwealth of God. The head of every man who stands up to battle for it is a target for them. There were martyrs in China in 1900; in Armenia in 1916. God's country is invaded by the hosts of evil, but the warfare of Christianity is not merely defensive. It is aggressive, with the purpose of transforming the kingdoms of this world into the Kingdom of Christ. The war must be carried into the enemies' country. Jesus calls for no soft-handed, weak-kneed, spineless followers, but for big two-handed fighting men. The struggle calls as well for the fighting qualities of womanhood—their tenacity, their enduring courage-forces of untold value in. reckoning the battle rank of Christianity. Whether the fight is here in America or on the forefront in Asia, none can qualify save those who are clad in the whole armor of God. SECOND DAY: Defending the Common Rights From that time began Jesus to show unto his disciples, that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and the third day be raised up. And Peter took him, and began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from thee, Lord: this shall never be unto thee. But he turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art a stumbling-block unto me: for thou mindest not the things of God, but the things of men. Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man would come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever would save his life shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose his life for my sake shall find it.—Matt. 16: 21- 25. Peter was a first-class fighting man. The trouble was not with his courage. He had the fiery spirit of the Galilean. The trouble was that he did not understand Jesus' manner of warfare nor his motive in fighting. He could not understand him who would not allow a sword to be drawn in his behalf but would die gladly for the people; who would raise no hand for himself, but did raise his hand in the temple for the rights of the people. Peter was still engrossed in personal ends. They bulked too large in his scheme of things. Jesus was seeking nothing personal, but with single mind the salvation of the world. Here is the peril of all those who fight, even in the warfare for justice. They are likely to become so absorbed in the struggle that their own ends take the place of the community good. As in local issues the test is always the seeking of the highest good for the whole community, so in national issues the touch-stone is the common rights of humanity. Are these too big and vague and far away for us to follow even now? How far are we actually following just the desires of our own hearts in the things we fight for? THIRD DAY: Jesus the Fighting Pacifist But I say unto you, Resist not him that is evil: but whosoever smiteth thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.-Matt. 5. 39. There is an attempt today to discount the teaching of Jesus to treat the Sermon on the Mount as a mere scrap of paper, because he is believed to teach non-resistance. "This is not practical," we are told, "evil must be overcome, or it will overcome the world; therefore it must be fought against.” But is this a true interpretation of Jesus' teaching? Was he a passive resister? Did he fold his hands in the presence of evil and let it pursue its deadly way unchecked and unopposed? Jesus proclaimed his intention of casting evil out of the world. He sees Satan falling from Heaven; he sees the leaven of his Kingdom transforming the whole world; his attitude is militant and aggressive, but his method is not the method of the militarist. He will not use the weapons of evil, for he sees clearly that to accept its methods is to give it triumph. He will destroy hate with love. Can evil be overcome merely by force? FOURTH DAY: Opposing the Enemies of Community Life Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! strain out the gnat, and swallow the camel! Woe unto To get the effect of these words, we must consider to whom they were addressed. It is as if today Jesus were speaking to church officials and judges. He is carrying the war straight into the enemy's country. Having once identified the real enemies of the people, having once become sure of his facts, he uses no soft words. It is considered improper today to criticize established authority in church or state. "We must exercise the spirit of Christian charity." To call to account the powers that be in religion, politics, or the labor world, is not pleasant business. Yet "spiritual wickedness in high places" must be faced and fearlessly opposed. Notice that Jesus denounces the scribes and Pharisees because they are community enemies. They have defrauded the people of religion; they have become usurers and extortioners. Think of the courage of it-remember who filed the charges before Pilate! How shall his disciples follow in his train? FIFTH DAY: Lonely Hours Assured to Christian Fighters A young minister who found vice was destroying his community was unable to secure the enforcement of law by the officials. He was compelled himself to do it. He got into the newspapers. He successfully proved his case against the administration and then the ministers of his denomination in meeting assembled censured him for securing undesirable notoriety and bade him stick to his pulpit. This was harder for him to bear than to fight the organized forces of evil. The most difficult thing Jesus had to endure was not the attacks of the scribes and the Pharisees but the subtle treachery of Judas. A man who fights for righteousness has to learn sometimes that his foes shall be "they of his own household." It is a lonesome business to stand out against one's friends- / |