2> Faith and Power : A Sermon preached in the Chapel of Magdalene College, Cambridge, BY THE REV. E. A. BURROUGHS, M.A., Fellow and Tutor of Hertford College, Oxford, and Examining Chaplain to the Lord Bishop of Liverpool. OXFORD : B. H. BLACKWELL, Broad Street. London Agents: Simpkin, Marshall SL Co., Ltd 1914. Reprinted from the Record Newspape FAITH AND POWER. " Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you." — Acts i. 8. " I have strength for all things in Him Who giveth me power." — Phil. iv. 13. When the last word has been said in the long controversy between Christian Theology and modern thought — that battle of which in these days we hear, and talk, probably far too much for our spiritual health, — when the last philosophical defence has been put forward by the Church, and either answered or ignored by the world, it will still be to the practical effects of Christ's religion in human lives that the Church will have to appeal, and still by those effects the world will judge it. The highest claim which Christianity makes is to put men in touch with unlimited power. The claim is made on the authority of our Lord's parting promise— "Ye shall receive power" — and it is substantiated by the word of the long line of witnesses in every age who " out of weakness have been made strong." And, some- how, these people have always accounted for the change in the words of one who illustrated it so startlingly in the first century, " I have strength for all things in Him Who giveth me power." Some such witnesses — -nay, many such, if we begin to look for them — there are still, thank God, to-day; but, apparently, not enough of them to convince the modern world that the claim still holds good. Such lives have always provided the most compelling form of " Christian evidence." Is it perhaps the deficiency of such evidence that is responsible for the prevailing attitude of " modern thought"? What percentage of modern Christians possess such evidential value? If there is anything in this suggestion, the first duty of Christians is obvious. We have to ask ourselves whether we still believe that original promise of "power"; whether otir lives show that it still holds good ; and, if we cannot honestly say so— if " I can do all things in Him Who giveth me power" is a phrase 4 that would be unreal on our lips — whether we really understand what the promise means, and what are the conditions for its fulfilment. So, to-day, I want to ask what we mean by Christian power. For if we see nv)re clearly how it works, so to speak, it may help us to claim and use it more really. And this means first looking at ourselves "as we are," as human nature "finds itself," quite apart from religion and the religious view of it. What is it to be just " human," to be " a man " ? "Human Nature." It means, brielly, to be a curious self-contradiction; to be, apparently, the highest order of being in the universe, and yet the one which, left to itself, is least likely to do what the Greeks called " possessing one's nature," that is, reaching one's full natural perfection, satisfying one's instincts, being perfect of one's kind. An animal on one of the lower rungs of the scale of creation, if left to itself and its environment, will normally be perfect of its kind and content with its existence. Man, standing at the top of the scale, is never comfortable there j he is torn between the instinct to rise yet higher, and the rival instinct to throw himself down. Two kingdoms claim him, and to find himself in the one involves in the same degree losing himself in the other. It is not as a theologian, but as an ordinary human creature, that St. Paul can say " The flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh ... so that ye may not do the things that ye would." The pagan poet says as much : "... Video meliora, proboque : Deteriora sequor." * Thus man, alone of the creatures, presents the spectacle of a house divided against itself— the proverbial symbol of weakness. And his weakness is actually due to his high place in the scale. It is his very powers— the number and complexity of them— that leave him distracted and weak. It is his right to choose between rival claims that makes him need the power to choose aright. God, our Complement. And so God comes in as the natural complement of human life-an essential element in human self-realisation. A-ain it is not theology, but human experience, that tells us so, that°forces us into our conception of God. Theology only claims to tell us more about the God in Whom our own natures bid us believe. And that wh!ch God contnbutes toward s^cmnqau^^ restoring the * '• I see the better, and approve ; " The woise I follow . . " 5 balance of human life is whit theology sums up as u the grace of God." "Grace" is simply a convenient term for "all the ways in which God comes in to the help of our lives." And over against it stands " Faith," which similarly covers " all the ways in which we appropriate the help of God." The terms are correlatives ; neither, strictly, can be conceived of without the other. What, then, are the chief ways in which God becomes the complement of human lives ? What are the needs that He comes in to meet? As we have already seen, the need to be met may be summed up as " weakness," and so the supply may be summed up as " power." But this power, of course, takes various forms. For instance, the very central element in our " weakness " is the strange fact we call sin. There is no more serious handicap to a man than a guilty conscience, and even those who do not themselves feel the burden of their past, yet know its weakening effects. To have chosen wrongly many times is almost tantamount to selling your free-will, and compelling yourself to choose the same way again. Thus, the grace of God appears, first and foremost, as forgiveness — that is the first way a man needs God's help in his life. He requires to be "justified by faith" in order that he may "have peace towards God." But then, when that is provided, and the handicap removed, there is still need of help for the course before him, and that need may be summed up as the need of power, the thing which we find we have not in ourselves. Powers and Power. Powers, of course, we have. But not only are they (as we have seen) the prime cause of our weakness, but often the more a man has the worse off in this matter he is. Is it only at Oxford, I wonder, that the words come to mind, as one watches the current of University life, " How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the Kingdom of God ! " " Have any of the rulers believed on Him"? How often has a man been prevented from finding and living by the power of God through possessing such " riches " and " powers " of his own as, say, social position, or personal charm, or artistic temperament, or quickness of brain, or distinction in games ? The greater our " powers," the greater our need of " power," if only because we are the more likely to be blind to our own weakness. And here Christianity stands apart from all other philosophies and religions, in that it not only recognises the need, and the fact that the supply is in God— that after all any " religion " takes for granted, — but tells man how God gives this supply, and how any one of us can get it. And this it does in the twin doctrines of the Holy Spirit and of the believer's union with Christ, which my pair of texts embodies. " Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you." " I can do all things in Christ." 6 God, Three in One. Clearly we cannot here go into the theology and philosophy of the subject. The two statements lead us right up to the central mystery of all, the ineffable nature of God, " Three in One." For us, if we are over-puzzled by the doctrine of the Trinity, I fancy the thing to remember is that the Three are one. St. Paul seems almost indifferent as to usage, now expressing our spiritual life in terms of the Second Person, now of the Third. Our Lord Himself spoke both of going away and of staying with His people " all the days." "I will send you another comforter" is followed by " I will not leave you comfortless, /will come to you." And He also said, " He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father." What matters is not the explanation of the triune nature of God, but the fact that, through that nature, God is able to meet the whole of man's need and raise him to the level he was meant for when " made in God's image." What matters is that the power is available, and we have been told ho7c>. " Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you." And then follows the testimony of one who has received, — " I can do all things in Christ, Who giveth me the power." Power in Nature. But, though we cannot explain to ourselves how the power comes out from God, we can, I think, find helpful analogies to suggest how it works in us. Has it ever struck you that, in the material universe, " power" is never originated by man, but always given to him ? Man has to find the power and to apply it, but it is there quite apart from him. An electrical "power-station" is not a place where power is created, but a place where power already found in one form is converted into another and applied to certain uses afterwards. And then look at the machinery to which it is applied. It has "powers"— it is designed to do certain things, and can do them. But when ? Only while it uses, or rather is used by, the power laid on. Then you get your light, or motion, or heat. Your machine has " received power," and " in " that power it can " do all things " which it was made to do. But if the power be cut off, the engine stops, and the light goes out ; in spite of its " powers " the machine stands " powerless." Then, again, take another illustration, which will carry us a step further. A small boat is on the bay and wants to cross to the other side. The power which is to help it across is all there in the wind ; but when is that power effectual ? Only when those on board give it the means of communicating itself to the boat, by hoisting a sail. True, the sails are powerless without the wind, but so is the wind useless till a sail is held up for it to fill and drive. 7 Need I work out the spiritual parallel ? Spiritual power also is not generated within a man, but "given" to him. When given, it proceeds rather to use him than to be used by him. But it only can be given in so far as he himself provides it with means of self- communication— in so far as he puts and keeps himself " in touch." Power in Personality. And these thoughts will, I think, throw light on our two texts and how they are related. The second comes in to correct a false impression which the first might leave. The Holy Spirit is not to be thought of as a "force," like electricity, " laid on" to a life, but as a person laying hold of it. The thought of the Holy Spirit •' given to us " is balanced by that of our being "in Christ." So the machinery we are speaking of in one sense " possesses the power " ; in another sense, and more truly, it is " possessed by it." The power is greater than the machine it controls, and a higher thing in the scale of nature. What then, if what answers to the machine in our analogy is itself a human being, a " personality," which, as we saw at the outset, represents the very highest stage of all in the order of created things ? What must be the nature of the Power which is to possess and control and utilise a person ? Surely, it must be not only a Person, but something mot e as well, — ■ a Being still higher in the scale than man himself. In other words, God, Whose nature we have been taught to try and express in terms of what is highest in ourselves as " Three Persons in One God." For the doctrine of the Trinity is, among other things, our way of saying that we cannot possibly comprehend what God is, but that we know He is all that we, as persons, have it in us to become, and much more besides ; so that even the best of human beings stand to Him somewhat as the higher animals stand to us in the scale of nature. So the " power," which we have seen to be the crucial need of us personal beings, must come to us in the form of a Personal Being, Who, at the same time, is more than personal, and is therefore able not only to help, as human persons may, but to possess us. And the only possible attitude for us is that of the sail to the wind, the machine to the electric current, the attitude of of inferior to superior, the attitude of faith, dependence, surrender. The power is there, centred in and emanating from an Infinite Personality, Who is more than able to direct, control, and utilise all the human hearts and wills in His universe, even as the wind is more than able to fill all the sails that can possibly be hoisted to it over the whole area of the " multitudinous seas." But this power can only communicate itself when we supply the means, when we, as it were, hoist the sail. We do so thinking, as the phrase is, " to catch the wind," to make use of the power thus "received"; but lo, instead, we find ourselves caught and grasped and used, because where we expected a " force," we find a Person, Who is also 8 something more, even God, "in Whom we live, and move and have our being." That is what it means to be "in Christ, and that is why " I can do all things in Christ, Who giveth me the power. Human or Christian ? What, then, is the conclusion of the whole matter? To be a man as we have seen, is to be a being weak through his very powers, and especially in need of power because of the highest of his powers, the power of moral choice. But, stdl, to be a man is to be free to accept, if he will, the power available for him in God, and by that power to find himself completed. To be a Christian is to have exercised the choice, to have accepted the power, and so to find oneself grasped by the Person in Whom the power resides ; so that the natural expression of" a man's consciousness under the new conditions is, in St. Paul's words, " I live no longer as ' I,' but Christ liveth in me, and the life that I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God." And, if this sounds terrifying, we have only to remember Who is the Person Whom we are to let possess us. It is a human instinct to want to be " possessed " by someone, to. have someone to whom we can "give ourselves away." There is nothing we more dread than being " left to ourselves," " left on our own hands." Our difficulty is to find the right person — one whose wisdom will be as reliable as his love is complete. And what we seek in vain in human friends we find in Him, Who is at once the Ideal Man and the Perfect Friend— " the Son of God, Who loved me and gave Himself for me." To be a Christian is to be possessed by Him, and " in Him to have strength for all things." How, then, is the choice exercised, and the power obtained? The answer of the Christian Gospel is simply " by faith," — by trust in God, by such a belief in His reality and His character as will drive a man to act accordingly. Faith is the continual readiness to count upon the presence and to claim the help of a God Who is such as we see Him in Christ. It is the stretching out of the hand, the hoisting of the sail. And, because God is there, faith succeeds ; and, succeeding, confirms itself. The experiment passes into an experience : an attitude results from the act. Not, however, the attitude of mere passive adherence, but the active dependence of friend upon Friend, the faith which is not only made active, but kept in activity through love."*-* It is just this experience and this attitude which distinguish the Christian from the natural man ; and the key to both is the venture of faith. If we would consent to become Christians in this, the one true sense of the word, we should be doing more perhaps than any theologian can for " the defence and confirmation of the Gosnel " at a critical time. ' : Ai' aydtr-ns (ytpyov/xevr). Hall the Printer Ltd., 3a Queen Street, Ox/01 d.