Article October 19, 1918 Issue

From the Press

with contributions from Edith Daley, Ernest A. Miller

[The Continent]

Men's lives are more important than their clothing, but they do not realize it until they have to choose between the two. Forms of worship, methods, ceremonies, definitions of faith, are not of first importance, no matter who says they are nor how much they seem to be so. But it requires such furnace times as these to make the fact clear. Out of this fire the church will come stripped of some things which it has accumulated as trimmings of its life and has mistakenly identified with its life.

But the furnace fire is not to destroy the church. There walks through the furnace with it as with the three Hebrews in the time of Daniel, one like unto the Son of God. The church is not merely a human agency. It has human elements, but it is the work and agency of God. Because it is made of faulty, failing men, it needs to be purified. Because it is the body of Christ, it is sure of preservation. Its fundamental verities will be revealed and emphasized anew in this furnace of fire. Most of the things it has been seeking to do for the world will still need doing. Most of the words it has been saying will need said. Out of the fire it will come purged and tested, better ready than before to do the will of Christ, its head.

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