We have a church which claims to
have extracted from the life of Jesus a whole code of laws for life and
conduct; is not this enough?" But what if the teachers themselves have
never found the true secret of Jesus? What if they have but repeated
the error of the Pharisees in elaborating a code of laws in which the
vital spirit of the truth they would impart is lost? And does not the
whole history of man's mind teach us that one simple truth known at
first-hand is worth more to us, and is of greater influence on our
conduct, than all the second-hand instruction we may receive from the
most competent of teachers? It is just this first-hand thought which
we most need. We need to see for ourselves what Jesus was, and not
through the eyes of another, whatever his authority.
Suppose that we should read the Gospels in this spirit, with an
entirely unbiassed and receptive mind, capable of first-hand
impressions, what would be the probable character of these impressions?
The clearest and deepest of all, I think, would be that the Jesus
therein depicted lived His life on principles so novel that we are able
to discover no life entirely like His in the best lives round about us.
We should probably be struck first of all by certain outward
dissimilarities. Thus He was not only poor, but He did not resent
poverty--He beatified it.
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