Article September 4, 1909 Issue

THE CHURCH

ANNIE DINSMORE MC CLURE

The prophet Habakkuk declared: "The earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." He does not say that heaven shall be thus filled, but the earth.

In what may this "knowledge of the glory of the Lord" properly be said to consist? All presence and power and wisdom and goodness and love are universally admitted, by those who profess to be and call themselves Christians, to be the attributes of God and the expressions of His glory. Now if every person on earth belonged to some one of the denominations of those who are called Christians, would this mean that the time had come which was spoken of by the prophet?

Some one may answer, Yes, if they were all consistent and what is called "good" members of such a denomination. But is there any universal standard of consistency or goodness? and is there any power or influence by means of which the consistent and good can bring up to their ideal those who belong nominally to their class and who yet claim to judge for themselves what constitutes goodness and consistency? Unless there were some such standard and some such ability, the extension of a name over all the earth could not be equivalent to the extension of God's kingdom and glory, even assuming that the promulgators and the worthier members were themselves shining lights of righteousness and true reflectors of God's glory. There is no question that if every Christian should faithfully follow the grand heroes of religious history as they followed Christ, it would go far toward extending the kingdom of God. But how induce them to do this? They agree in venerating and canonizing such, but many seem to draw the line at following them—very far.

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