CHAPTER CONTENTS I HOW THIS BOOK CAME TO BE WRITTEN II I GIVE UNTO THEM THE Keys of the KINGDOM III THE CHURCH'S ONE FOUNDATION IV I AM COME TO PREACH GLAD TIDINGS TO THE V I AM COME TO GIVE LIFE PROLOGUE THE Christianity of the Twentieth Century is not the same as the Christianity of Jesus Christ; and it ought not to be. For Christianity is a life, and after nineteen centuries of growth it can no more be the same that it was in the First Century than an oak is the same as an acorn, or America in 1920 is the same as America in 1787. Jesus told his disciples that the Kingdom of Heaven was like a seed planted, which from the least of seeds would grow to be a great tree. This is what has happened. The Roman Catholic Mass is quite different from the Last Supper as taken by Jesus and his friends in that upper chamber; the Westminster Confession of Faith is quite different from the Sermon on the Mount; the highly organized churches of the present day are quite different from the Church in the house as described in the Book of Acts. During these nineteen centuries philosophers have been trying to interpret Christian life and experience and so have developed a Christian theology; reformers have been trying to apply the principles inculcated by Jesus Christ to the varying and often complex conditions of society and so have developed a Christian social ethics; men and women have been trying to express their experiences in methods adapted to their various temperaments and so have developed Christian rituals; pagans coming into the Christian life have brought their paganism with them, so that while their paganism has been Christianized at the same time and by the same process Christianity has been paganized. To-day throughout Christendom we are submitting this modern Christianity to a sifting process. We are trying to find out what in it is Christian and what pagan, what natural growth and what artificial addition, what we shall accept and what reject. The Protestants are rejoiced to see this sifting process going on in the Roman Catholic communion, the Liberals welcome it in the conservative churches; personally I welcome it wherever it appears and whatever questions it asks. Unbelief is less dangerous than insincere beliefs. But in this book I do not take part in this sifting process. Without attempting to determine what of modern Chris |