FAITH MADE EASY.

Part I.

WHAT TO BELIEVE ABOUT CHRISTIANITY.

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CHRISTIANITY SECURELY FOUNDED.

HRISTIANITY rests upon a sure foundation. It is deeply planted in the soil of truth, underneath which is Christ the living Rock. As the name implies, it is a religion which proceeds from a person, and which is, as a whole, a personal product. Its Founder dwelt on earth. History proves that he lived in Palestine. The existence of Christians can be traced to within a few years of the date of his death. This is fact. It is not supposition, or guess-work, or tradition, or mere belief; it is fact. This ground has been traversed a thousand times. The ablest scholars of every century have gone carefully over it. Every page of history, profane and sacred; every hint and scrap of information in the dead and living languages, likely to have any bearing on the truth, pro or con, has been studied, weighed, and balanced by the profoundest intellects of the past nineteen centuries; and the result is something definite, fixed, and sure. In early times no one demanded proofs of this truth, far less sought to prove it an untruth. It was an accepted verity, so clear, so plain, that even its enemies regarded it as unquestionable. When determined opposition at length arose, plenty of able men stood by the records, and were faithful to their own confirming experience. Others who candidly inquired into Christianity, like Justin Martyr, who was born at the close of the apostolic age, that is, the beginning of the second century, and who had often heard the Platonists calumniate the Christians, were unable to resist. They renounced all for Christ. They rejected all other philosophy for the truths of redemption. Their own consciences became so saturated with the truth that they could not and would not deny it even in the face of death. So powerful were the evidences

for the Christian doctrine when it came fresh into the world that men were fairly compelled to believe, when believing they boldly testified, and when this involved them in danger and death, they resolutely, calmly, conscientiously sealed their testimony with their blood. Moreover, when it became evident to the early Christians that written statements of the truths of Christianity would be necessary in the long and bloody contest with heathenism, they set about this task with assurance and fortitude. Many of these early writings are lost, but the fragments of them which are preserved show the clearness with which these primitive fathers set forth the facts of our Lord's life and work. Thus Quadratus, Bishop of Athens in the early part of the second century, and probably the first to present to the heathen a written defense of Christianity, a passage of whose writings is preserved by Eusebius (Vol. I, p. 230), says: "The works of our Savior were always conspicuous, for they were real; both they which were healed and they which were raised from the dead; who were seen not only when they were healed or raised, but for a long time afterwards; not only while he dwelt on this earth, but also after his departure, and for a good while after it; insomuch that some of them have reached to our times." (Rawlinson's Historical Evidences, p. 213.)

It has been truthfully observed that from the writings of Justin Martyr, to whom we have just referred, and whose "Apology" was presented to Marcus Aurelius and the Roman Senate, there "might be collected a tolerably complete account of Christ's life, in all points agreeing with that which is delivered in our Scriptures." (Paley, Evidences, Part I, ch. vii.) Dr. H. B. Hackett, an accurate and bright American scholar, who edited Professor Rawlinson's "Historical Illustrations of the Old Testament," concurs with the learned author of that work in the following statement as the mature result of the most rigid, impartial, scholarly, and critical examination of the Biblical records:

"The religion of the Bible, unlike almost all other religions, has its roots in the region of fact. Other religious systems are, in the main, ideal, being the speculations of individual minds, or the gradual growth of a nation's fanciful thought during years or centuries. The religion of the Bible, though embracing much that is in the highest sense ideal, grounds itself upon accounts, which claim to be historical, of occurrences that are declared to have actually taken place upon the earth. That Jesus Christ was born under Herod the Great, at Bethlehem; that he came forward as a teacher of religion; that he preached and taught and performed many 'mighty works' in Galilee, Samaria, and Judea during the space of some years; that he was

crucified by Pontius Pilate; that he died and was buried; that he rose again from the dead, and ascended before the eyes of his disciples into heaven-these are the most essential points, the very gist and marrow of the New Testament. And these are all matters of simple fact. And, as with the New Testament, so, or still more strikingly, with the Old. Creation, the paradisaical state, the fall, the flood, the dispersion of nations, the call of Abraham, the deliverance out of Egypt, the giving of the law on Sinai, the conquest of Palestine, the establishment of David's kingdom, the dispersion of Israel, the captivity of Judah, the return under Ezra and Nehemiahall these are of the nature of actual events, objective facts occurring at definite times and at definite places, conditioned, like other facts perceptible to the sense, and fitted to be the subject of historic record."

"It is absolutely certain," says Dr. George B. Cheever, "if any thing in this world can be, that God has given us the means of ascertaining all the truths necessary for our immortal well-being, and of detecting and exposing the falsehoods that put us in danger of eternal evil." He does not require from man a blind and unreasoning faith. He has providentially secured to believers in every age the evidences necessary to the certain arrival at fundamental truth. Candid consideration of these evidences will inspire faith; and faith its own experimental confirmation.

Thus says Bishop F. D. Huntington: "Seeing from abundant signs that I myself and the universe I live in must have had a personal Maker, and instructed by my own soul that he must be a Father, I find it to be antecedently probable, if not a moral necessity, that he should speak to his children, disclosing to them his character and his will. Christianity declares of itself, explicitly, repeatedly, and in terms and a tone befitting the majesty and tenderness of the message, that it is such a revelation; and nothing has been said or done in the world since it appeared, to negative that august claim, or to weaken its force. The undeniable effects of Christianity on national, domestic, and individual progress, wrought through the organization, ministries, and missions of the Christian Church, in knowledge, virtue, order, freedom and mercy, testify not only that the God of truth revealed it, but that the God of history is with it and within it. Christendom is accounted for only by Christianity, and Christianity broke too suddenly into the world to be of the world."

President W. F. Warren, of Boston University, being asked why he believed Christianity, replied: "I do not know that I can furnish a more truthful answer than this: I believe Christianity to be a rev

elation, because it has made me incapable of any contrary belief. Whenever I undertake to think my way into the one system or the other, or into any of the non-Christian religions of the past or present, I find that Christianity has so broadened my outlook that no philosophy of being, or of history, or of destiny, can satisfy me but Christ's. It has so illuminated and quickened my conscience that no moral ideals can satisfy me but Christ's. It has so renovated and intensified my emotional nature that I can rest in no love short of that which is evoked and nourished and strengthened by living communion with Christ."

In response to the same question, Rev. A. P. Peabody, D. D., formerly preacher to Howard University, gave this reply: "I believe Christianity to be divine: Because I am conscious of its adaptation to my nature, of its having made me whatever I am morally and spiritually, and of capacities and needs infinitely beyond my present attainments, for which it has ample resources; because in the history of the world it is the only cause of all that has been best and noblest in humanity since the advent of Christ; because I can trace under its influence a constant and unintermitted progress, of which there is no other assignable cause; because the phenomena connected with the earliest stages of the existence of Christianity are such as could not have been, had there not appeared on the earth a being specially endowed, inspired, and empowered by God, and had not this being actually arisen from the dead."

The late Chancellor E. O. Haven once expressed his views of Christianity in these graceful sentences: "The strongest evidence of the divinity of the religion of Christ is its own character, its subjective power over the human soul. It is precisely adjusted to man. It generates the holiest, noblest ambition. It develops humanity most harmoniously, most perfectly. It is adapted to all circumstances, to all ages, to all conditions. It ennobles man; it adds to the beauty

and influence of woman. It individualizes men. It shows every human being how to make his own general life sublimer than the most splendid epic poem. The grandest conception of the most gifted poet, embodied in his greatest hero or heroine, is not equal to what every human being may become under the light and guidance of Christian truth and the Holy Spirit. This is what the world needs; it is all it needs: Power for every one-whatever his condition-to fill out the measure of his own noblest aspiration. A young woman full of promise and earnest hope qualifies herself for usefulness, and just as her promise is about to ripen, disease seizes upon her and

says

announces the dreadful doom that soon death will hurry her away. What Science? Her life is a failure. There has been a violation of some law of nature. She must die. All must die. Why mourn for her? What says Religion? 'Her life need not be a failure. Christ is her Savior. Let her trust in him, and you shall see in her short remaining years, or months, or weeks, such serenity, such hope, such love, as will show you what that spirit will ripen into in heaven.' O, that I could communicate to all what I know of the power of Christ and the Holy Spirit to supply all the wants of human nature and human life!"

Professor Miner Raymond, D. D., LL. D., one of the most distinguished of American theologians, in the Spring of 1885, closed one of his profound discourses with this childlike statement of his Christian faith:

"A word or two why I am a Christian. I have this Testament, these Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, and especially the Epistles (the Epistle to the Romans, the Epistle to the Hebrews, the Epistle to the Corinthians, etc.); and the fact that these are here is historical and positive proof that within twenty-five years after the death of Christ there were established Christian Churches in all the main cities of the Mediterranean, and substantially of the then known Roman empire. These Churches had been planted and established by the preaching of the apostles, most of which consisted in affirming that Jesus Christ was the Son of God and the Savior of man. They went preaching this in the midst of persecution and self-sacrifice, and for no worldly gain, and they sealed their testimony by their blood. People by hundreds and thousands believed this, and Churches, to whom these epistles were directed, were established within twenty-five years after the death of Christ. Now, it is impossible for me to think that these historical events could occur, that these apostles preached, with such results under such circumstances, such a doctrine, unless they possessed indubitable evidence that it was true. The apostles believed that Jesus Christ rose from the dead; and I say it is impossible for me to come to the conclusion that the facts occurring in history could occur unless Jesus Christ did rise from the dead. It is just as preposterous to doubt whether Julius Cæsar was emperor of Rome as to doubt whether Christ rose from the dead. If he did rise from the dead, then he is what he professed to be-the Son of God, the Savior of man. This is the record of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and the Gospels are a true record of his life of what he said, did, and required. In the time of Christ and his apostles the Old