From the MLJ Archive

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Most of you will remember that we are dealing at the moment with the first seven verses in the 13th chapter of Paul's Epistle to the Romans, beginning with the great statement: "Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation," or judgment or punishment.

And on the Apostle goes to elaborate that statement. We have been considering this for a number of weeks because it is such a crucial and important statement. It is perhaps the most illuminating statement in the whole of the Bible on this whole question of the relationship of the Christian to the state and the governing powers of the country to which he belongs. This has been a cause of great perplexity throughout the centuries. It was obviously a difficulty in the early church, and it has continued to be a difficulty throughout the centuries.

At the moment, we are dealing with the whole question of the relationship between the church and the state. We have considered the individual Christian, and now we are considering the church in general in relationship to the state. We have taken an historical view and made a review of the history of this subject throughout the centuries. Having done that, we tried last Friday evening in a measure to evaluate all that history in the light of the teaching of the scripture.

We had to come to the conclusion that the position of those who believe either in the unity of the church and the state or a close alliance between the two is something that is based mainly, if not almost entirely exclusively, on the Old Testament scriptures, indeed at the expense of the new. That seems to me to stand out very clearly. At this point, I think it might be advantageous before we come to deal with any particular problems or questions that confront the individual Christian and the church at the present time, to try to sum up the things we have been considering together.

I would suggest the following conclusions. One: that the church and state in New Testament teaching are entirely distinct, and that there is no warrant from the New Testament teaching whatsoever for either controlling the other. There is no warrant for the church controlling the state, as the Roman Catholic Church has done and would always like to do; but equally there is no warrant for the state controlling the church, as happens under Erastianism and every state church.

Secondly, we surely must have seen together something of the danger of trying to put the new wine of the gospel in the new dispensation into the old bottles of the Old Testament and Old Testament teaching. We fail to see the uniqueness of the position of the children of Israel. For there, the state and church consisted of the same people. But we were trying to show last week that that was something that was unique and special and which no longer obtains.

Thirdly, I trust it has been clear that what happened at the time of Constantine was not only a departure from the New Testament teaching but also a departure from the practice of the early church. That is a most crucial point. It has been the failure to realize that which has accounted for so much of the history that we have been considering. My fourth general conclusion is that it is quite clear historically that the Roman Catholic Church perpetuated that which began in the time of Constantine.

As its power increased and Rome continued to decline and fall until ultimately she was conquered by the barbarians, Rome then succeeded in reversing the position and began to dominate the life of the state. But as regards the principle of the unity of the two, that remained constant. The Roman Catholic Church perpetuated that. It is also clear that the Protestant reformers likewise perpetuated this precise error. They really did not face it; they just took it over and assumed it without examining it as they should have done.

This was true not only of the Protestant reformers but of their descendants, even including the Puritans in this country. It took what happened in 1662 at the time of the great ejection to awaken people truly to this whole matter. I remember many months ago recommending a book called *The Reformers and Their Stepchildren*. It is very helpful and illuminating on this very subject, so I would recommend that book once more. It is a study of this particular point, showing how the reformers went astray through taking over the notion of the state-church association.

It appeared at that time mainly in their opposition to the people who were called Anabaptists. The Anabaptists were guilty of many excesses; no one would defend them for that. But on this particular principle, they stood for something which it took well over a century for people in this country to see with any clarity. Well, that book then does help us to understand that matter. There are the general conclusions.

But what I am really concerned about is this: somebody may say to me, "What has all this got to do with us?" I am trying again to show that this has everything to do with us. You and I are once more put into a position where all these things that we have been considering are of the most urgent importance. Whether we like it or not, we are in that position. We happen to be living in an age which is one of the great turning points of history, not only in the world in general, but also in the history of the Christian church.

Great decisions have been taken, are being taken, and in the next few years will be taken with increasing rapidity. We are all involved in this. These things are going to happen. If you do nothing, the decisions will be taken for you, and you will find yourself facing a *fait accompli*. That is something which we should all denounce. It is the business of Christian people to know what they are doing. We are made severally members of the body of Christ.

We are given a position in the body of Christ, and it behooves us all to acquaint ourselves not only with the scriptural teaching but also with the facts of what is happening around us, so that as we are called upon to make decisions, we shall know what we are doing. Therefore, there are certain lessons that come to us plainly from the history of the church in this matter, especially as we have looked at it in the light of the teaching of the scripture itself.

What are these lessons? I would say the first is the terrible danger of traditionalism. Traditionalism. You notice I am not saying the danger of tradition. I am saying the danger of traditionalism. What is the difference between tradition and traditionalism? Tradition in and of itself is something that is good. A man who dismisses the whole of the past is behaving in a very foolish manner. There are many people who are doing that today; indeed, it is perhaps one of the most foolish and ridiculous aspects of modern life.

People are tending to assume that all that has happened in the past is quite irrelevant and unimportant and that nobody knew anything until this present generation came. People who dismiss the past are just displaying ignorance and a lack of intelligence. Let's put it quite plainly; it is nothing but that. Any man who thinks at all and who has any experience of life soon begins to realize that life is very big and difficult, and he is grateful for any light or help or instruction that he can receive from the past and from those who have gone before us.

As Christians, we start with this basic assumption: that the world doesn't change. The world thinks it does. It is a part of our very belief to believe and to say that the world does not change. Ever since the fall of man, the world has not changed. It changes on the surface in its dress, its appearance, and in some of its customs and habits. But basically, man in sin does not change at all. He commits the same sins, he falls into the same errors, and he repeats the same heresies.

Starting from that assumption, what can be more important for us than to learn from the past? We do so by considering the traditions which we have inherited. We should thank God for every tradition, and we should make full use of it. We should familiarize ourselves with it and learn lessons from it. To me, one of the most extraordinary things—particularly in evangelical circles at this point—is the way in which people are innocent and ignorant of the great evangelical story of the centuries.

In sheer ignorance, many seem to think that evangelicalism began in this country with the arrival of D.L. Moody in 1873. That is sheer ignorance. Many of our troubles and our failures in the realm of the church have arisen directly from that ignorance. Let's acquaint ourselves with the past and learn everything we can from it. That is the right use of tradition. But traditionalism is something very different, very dangerous, and something that is condemned in the Bible itself.

What do I mean by traditionalism? It is the tendency to exalt a teaching into something absolute which becomes a legalism and eventually paralyzes our thinking. I could illustrate the difference between tradition and traditionalism by pointing out the exact parallel between a legitimate pride of nation and nationality on the one hand and nationalism on the other hand. Nationalism is something really bad. But to take pride in one's nation is not only legitimate; it is something which is good.

The moment it becomes an 'ism', it becomes the greatest possible source of error and of trouble. So many of the problems we have had to face and so many of the tragedies we have had to face in this present century have been entirely due to nationalism. It may very well be the greatest source of trouble for the remainder of this century. That is the kind of illustration of the difference between tradition and traditionalism.

But let me put it to you in the form in which we find it in the scripture. Take the 15th chapter of the Gospel according to St. Matthew. What you have there is our Lord's denunciation of the traditionalism of the Pharisees and the scribes. What he charges them with is that they have made the word of God of none effect through their traditions. This is a most important matter. Remember, the Pharisees were religious people and teachers. They were very serious people. This was their life.

They believed of all men that they were honoring God and living to His glory. As Paul says of them, they have a zeal for God. It is a very great mistake to think of the Pharisee as a dishonest man. I know the literary writers have tended to give us that impression of the Pharisee, but it is quite wrong. The trouble with the Pharisee was that he fooled himself. The Pharisee is not a man who deliberately sets out to fool others; the whole tragedy is that he fools himself and doesn't realize what he's doing. It is a very insidious and a very subtle process.

These men studied the scriptures and they made comments on them. So a body of doctrine and of teaching came into being. They had no intention of going wrong whatsoever. Their intention was absolutely right and good. They were there to explain and to expound the scriptures. But in doing that and in accumulating this teaching, a tradition developed. Our Lord says that they had reached a point when the teaching of the word of God was being entirely obscured and they were spending all their time with their tradition.

That is the charge that he brings against them. He said, "You claim to be teachers, but you are not teachers of the word. You are hiding the word. You are standing between the people and the word. Your traditions, the traditions of the elders—you are always saying 'It has been said' and you are quoting your authorities." That is what they did, so that the people were not brought face-to-face with the law of God and the teaching of the scriptures.

These clever, expert men were comparing this view and that, putting up the rival schools amongst the Pharisees, and spending all of their time in this abstruse intellectualism. The common people were not being instructed or taught. That was why when our Lord came and taught the people plainly and directly, the common people heard him gladly. They couldn't follow these others; it was all intellectualism and the word of God was being concealed. But our Lord was revealing and bringing out the word of God to them.

That is our Lord's way of dealing with this very thing to which I'm calling your attention. The tradition had become traditionalism, and it had become so important that it was concealing the truth. This is a most terrible thing. We are all subject to this, and this is the great lesson that we should be prepared to learn. Because if we don't, we are not only going to miss a great opportunity, but we are going to make grievous mistakes and we are going to hinder the propagation of the gospel.

What happens with traditionalism always is that this body of teaching which has come into being becomes fixed, set, hardened, and ossified. It becomes quite rigid. The people who are influenced and dominated by it are people who generally refuse to consider anything else. That was exactly why the Pharisees wouldn't listen to our Lord. He didn't fit into their scheme of things, their teaching, their outlook, or their tradition; therefore they objected to him, denounced him, and eventually they encompassed his death.

This is something that always happens to the victims of traditionalism. Their minds are shut; they won't even listen to anything else at all. In many cases it is entirely due to a spirit of fear. They are afraid. They have got a set, fixed system, a square, as it were, of doctrine and of truth. They are terrified that if they open that at all, they may lose everything. So in a spirit of fear, they defend the lot and they won't listen to anything.

I remember a man long since gone to glory who used to attend here very regularly. I remember when I was giving some lectures on biblical doctrines and dealing with the doctrine of the last things, he came and listened. It was quite obvious that as he listened to the exposition and the arguments, he was beginning to see that the position he had occupied for 50 years was not as tenable as he thought it was. He told me rather jocularly on one occasion, "You know, I'm too old to change now."

He felt that having had this system and having taught it for so many years, even though what I was saying may be right and true, he was too old to change now. Thank God our salvation doesn't depend upon our understanding! But you see the pathetic position we can get into. Because of some spirit of fear, I have even known people stay away from meetings when they know that a point of view that doesn't tally with what they have always believed is being put forward. They just are afraid to listen to it.

Can't you see how reprehensible this is? It's very easy for us to denounce Roman Catholics. We say those people are just traditionalists; instead of going to the scriptures, they say, "What does the church teach?" They put the tradition of the church before the teaching of the scripture. That is the Protestant charge against Roman Catholics: that they are not given the truth, but they are given all this church teaching about Mary and the saints and works of supererogation and all the things they have accumulated throughout the centuries.

It is very true, of course. And all their talk about the saints. There are many innocent, ignorant Roman Catholic people who know much more about particular saints than they know about the scriptures. They can be woefully ignorant of the teaching of the scriptures, but they know all this that the church has taught them. It is so simple for us to denounce that and to see the error of it. But how difficult for us to see that we are often guilty of doing exactly the same thing. We have the same kind of shut and closed mind.

This is always typical of traditionalism. It is quite as wrong for us to adopt the position "my denomination, right or wrong" as it is to say "my country, right or wrong." You don't think much of a man who says that. My country can never make a mistake; that is what breeds war. That is where wars come from: when people are foolish and unintelligent enough to say "my country can never be wrong." Now, to say that is foolish.

But the world is full of people who are saying the same thing in the religious realm. "The denomination I have been brought up in, I'll fight for it to my last breath." Why? Well, because it is *my* denomination. It is exactly the same spirit. This also shows itself in another way: there is always the danger of regarding the fathers as divinely inspired and infallible. As Protestants, we object to the doctrine of papal infallibility. We don't believe in an infallible church or an infallible Pope.

But I have known many Protestant people who unconsciously and unintentionally have turned John Calvin into a Pope. You must not criticize John Calvin, not even on a detail. This comes out in reviews. I read two reviews of *The Reformers and Their Stepchildren*. Neither of them gave any account of the contents of the book, but what they took up were criticisms of Calvin in that book and they fixed on this: Calvin can never be wrong. You mustn't breathe any suspicion of a criticism of John Calvin. My dear friends, that is to turn John Calvin into a Pope and that is to be guilty of traditionalism.

It applies not only to men, but it applies also to books and to documents. There are people who obviously regarded the notes in what is called the Scofield Bible as being as inspired and as infallible as the text of the scripture. They have argued on this basis: "This can't be wrong; it's in the Bible." The notes are as infallible as the text of the scripture itself. I have also known people obviously regard the Westminster Confession as being divinely inspired and infallible and that it must never be criticized.

On all sides, whatever view you may happen to take, there is always this danger of falling under the tyranny of traditionalism, of being entirely governed by the teaching of one man or one book or one system. These are but ways in which this spirit of traditionalism manifests itself. You can see the importance and relevance of all this to the present position. We are living at a time when the ecumenical movement is calling upon people to merge into one great world church.

It's calling upon people, therefore, not to hold rigidly to that which they have been brought up in, but to think again. What are we to say about this? The tragedy is that so many people facing that kind of position, instead of evaluating it all in the light of the scripture and seeing the evangelical position and coming together to stand for that, are much more concerned to defend the position they are already in.

"I've always been brought up in it; fathers and grandfathers all my family always belonged to this particular denomination." So they are not open to the truth; their minds are shut. They are not prepared to change. They are not prepared to admit that perhaps their fathers were wrong and that they themselves have been wrong. All I am asking for is this: that surely in the light of our consideration of the history of this matter of church and state, we should have arrived at this general principle—that it is possible for any of us and all of us to go astray and be in error at certain points.

We must not regard anything that the church has ever done as being infallible. We must rather examine all things in the light of the teaching of the scripture, whatever the consequences, and be ready to act upon what we find. In exalting that, I am actually doing the very same thing that the reformers did themselves. This was the gigantic thing that was done by Martin Luther. Here is a man who, having seen the truth of the scriptures, is prepared to stand up against 15 centuries of tradition.

That is the very thing I am advocating. But of course, we know that since then Luther himself has been turned into a Pope by many sections of the Lutheran Church. Luther and Calvin and these other reformers were not bound by everything that was decided in the early ecumenical councils of the church. They were critical of these councils and they didn't hesitate to say so. In the same way, they were ready to criticize the fathers.

It was one of the great bones of contention between them and the Roman Catholic Church. The Roman church was quoting the councils and the fathers. But the reformers said, "Look here, but what does the scripture say?" Even the early fathers of the church not only *could* go astray but patently *did* go astray. We therefore must not slavishly accept everything that tradition brings down to us. We must examine it; it's helpful. But let's examine it in the light of the scripture, and then let us decide what we must do.

There is nothing which is more regrettable than that people should just be defending the position they are in. They refuse to consider; they are afraid to keep their minds open. The Christian should have an open mind in this sense: that he is not bound by tradition. He is open only to the scripture, and he evaluates all else in the light of that and his understanding of it. I trust that as we have been examining this matter of the relationship between the church and the state and have seen how our great forefathers took over a tradition instead of evaluating it in the light of the scriptures, we must beware of that error.

If we don't realize this, and if we are all going to adhere simply to the denomination in which we were brought up and hold on to this at all costs, what most of you will find is you will end sooner than you think in the Church of Rome. Or else you will be divided into such little fragments that you will neither count in the church nor amongst those who are outside the church. At a time like this, when everything is in the melting pot, let us take advantage of it. Let's learn from the scriptures, let's learn from the past, and let us come to decisions in the light of the scripture and adhere to it resolutely and be ready if necessary to suffer for it.

But above all, be determined to put it into practice together. I feel that this matter has a very great lesson for us to learn just at this present time. There are our general lessons which I trust we are all prepared to consider very seriously and prayerfully. Then having done that, I ask: what then is the position? What is the position with regard to this whole question of the relationship of the church and the state?

It seems to me that it all boils down to one question: what is the function of the state? In a sense, we considered that before Christmas, but we have to come back and look at it again in the light of this problem of this particular relationship. There are two questions which arise as you face that. The fundamental question is: what is the function of the church? There are two subsidiary questions which will help to throw light on that.

Here is the first: is the function of the state anything more than negative? Is the state to have any positive function at all or is it entirely negative? If you consult this particular paragraph that we are looking at, I think you will have to come to the conclusion that it is entirely negative. Read the First Epistle to Timothy, chapter 2. There you remember what the Apostle teaches us: "I exhort therefore, that first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men; for kings, and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty."

That's the function of the state: that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty. If you take the passage in the First Epistle of Peter, chapter 2, I think you will find that it is exactly the same thing. Peter says that the business of the governors, kings, or the state is the punishment of evildoers and the praise of them that do well. The three New Testament passages that deal with this seem to leave it at that.

But that raises the second subsidiary question. There are those who say, "But surely you haven't considered this whole doctrine of common grace. When man fell and all men became sinful, God dealt with some by His special grace, His peculiar grace, His saving grace. But He hasn't ceased to have any dealings with the others. He deals with the others by means of what is called common grace. The world is still God's world; God hasn't abandoned the world. And God through the Holy Spirit is doing something even to the unregenerate world."

They say the Lord Jesus Christ is the Lord of the universe. He said himself, "All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth." We are told that all things were created for Him, by Him, and for Him, and that by Him all things consist, and that He is over all, far above all principality and power and might and dominion and every name that can be named, not only in this world but in the world to come. What about the lordship of Christ over the whole of life?

These people say that this combined teaching of common grace and of the lordship of the Lord Jesus Christ means that this is to show itself even in the life of unregenerate people, and that it is a part of the business and the duty of the state to do this. These second people assert that it is the business of the church to remind the state of this and it is the business of the state to bring into being the lordship of Christ over the whole of life. They say that therefore there is a sense in which it is the business of the state to Christianize society, to bring to bear the Christian teaching upon every realm and aspect of life and all the affairs of men.

They say it is wrong for the church to withdraw and abandon all this. Because the powers that be are ordained of God, it is their business to assert the lordship of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ over the whole of life. The state is to introduce these Christian ideas into the thinking of people. So they talk about winning the world for Christ, winning culture for Christ, winning everything for Christ. They would say that this is to be a gradual process, that the Christian teaching is to act as a leaven in society, and that as it does permeate the life of the world, aspects of the life of the world will be captured from the devil and the lordship of God and of His Christ will become more evident in the various parts of life.

This was a teaching that was extremely popular, especially towards the end of the last century and the early part of this present century. There were certain well-known teachers who taught this in this country. There was an Anglican teacher of the name of F.D. Maurice; he taught it. Canon Scott Holland taught it towards the end of the last century in St. Paul's Cathedral. The famous Bishop Gore and afterwards Archbishop William Temple were the people who presented this point of view in this country.

But it hasn't been confined to them and to Anglicans. You have had people in other countries teaching much the same thing. There was a great man in Holland of the name of Abraham Kuyper, whom many of you know about from his famous lectures on Calvinism. He was brought up in the Dutch Reformed Church, began to see that that state church had been going astray in certain respects, and with others began a new denomination. He was an ordained minister, but eventually he gave that up and entered into politics and he actually became the Prime Minister of Holland.

This was his essential teaching: that you should bring the lordship of God and of Christ to bear upon the whole of life. He started a Christian university in Amsterdam, known as the Free University of Amsterdam. He and others started a political party to propagate these things, and they believe in Christian schools and in bringing the influence of the Christian teaching to bear upon the whole of life. Which of these two views do you take? That first view which says that the function of the state is almost entirely negative, or this other one which makes the function of the state very positive and that indeed you can even use such terms as the 'Christianizing' of life and of society?

I would say that it is always wrong to talk about Christianizing anything. I would describe that as heresy. There is no such thing as Christianizing anything. In other words, you are either a Christian or you are not a Christian. It is only the Christian who can live the Christian life. It is only the Christian who can understand the Christian teaching. So whatever you may do to unregenerate men and to society, though you may change its mode of living, you must not use the term 'Christianize'.

That you persuade people to live in a certain way is a good thing, but you mustn't say that they are living as Christians because they cannot do so. To say that a man can live the Christian life in any shape or form without being born again, without becoming a Christian, I would have thought is the very essence of the Pelagian heresy. Secondly, it is surely quite wrong in the light of the teaching of the scripture to talk of Christ's lordship and His kingdom as coming gradually.

There are those who would use our Lord's parable of the leaven. You remember one of His parables of the kingdom was that it is like unto a woman who takes some leaven and puts it into the meal and it gradually leavens it until the whole was leavened. That's been used tremendously as an argument in the last 100 years to say that that's how Christianity works in society until eventually the whole has become Christian. But I'm here to contend that there is a serious misunderstanding of the parable of the leaven because it brings it into actual contradiction with other plain statements of our Lord Himself.

Take, for instance, the 17th chapter of Luke's Gospel, beginning at verse 20. When He was demanded of the Pharisees when the kingdom of God should come, He answered them and said, "The kingdom of God cometh not with observation. Neither shall they say, 'Lo here' or 'lo there,' for behold the kingdom of God is within you." And He said unto His disciples, "The days will come when ye shall desire to see one of the days of the Son of Man and ye shall not see it. And they shall say to you, 'See here' or 'see there.' Go not after them nor follow them. For as the lightning that lighteneth out of the one part under heaven shineth unto the other part under heaven, so shall also the Son of Man be in His day. But first He must suffer many things and be rejected of this generation. And as it was in the days of Noah, even so shall it be in the days of the Son of Man. They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage until the day that Noah entered into the ark and the flood came and destroyed them all."

"Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded. But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed." Surely these things are perfectly plain and clear. Don't you remember that famous question that our Lord put: "When the Son of Man is come, shall He find faith on the earth?"

It is a staggering question. Our Lord's picture of the end time immediately before His reappearing is that things will be so bad even in the church that you can ask that question. And if it is to be like that with the church, what will the condition of the world be? Our Lord has told us. The condition of the world will be similar to that in which it was before the flood or before the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. So far from this teaching gradually permeating and Christianizing the life of society, our Lord's own teaching is that it is the exact opposite.

When you read the Book of Revelation, you get exactly the same impression. You see terrible conditions, great suffering, and the world giving itself to evil. Read again chapters 17 and 18 of the Book of Revelation. It is the exact opposite of this idea that Christianity is going to permeate society. It's very interesting to notice that this teaching was very popular towards the end of the last century. I think that is what misled these good men. There had been peace more or less since the Napoleonic Wars. There had been the Crimean War, but it was a kind of incident.

There had been that great era of peace, knowledge was advancing, education coming, and science developing, so they were all optimistic. They could see the missionary societies active and the whole world was going to be won for Christ. Men prominent in the student movement had a great slogan: "The Christianizing of the world in our generation." It looked as if it was going to happen. But of course, it only looked like that to people who were being misled by appearances rather than by the teaching of the scripture.

They believed it was all going to happen, that it was working like leaven, and eventually the whole of society was going to be Christianized. But the teaching of the scripture is that the end will come suddenly and unexpectedly. It will be crisis, judgment, and apocalypse. The teaching of the scripture is that these two kingdoms are eternally different: the kingdom of God and the kingdom of the devil. It is a conflict between them, and there is nothing that is going to bring it to an end except the second coming and the glorious appearing of our great Lord and Savior.

That teaching of the scripture is abundantly confirmed by history itself. What do you find in history? Has the teaching of Christian men who have been in politics acted as a leaven? Have these principles become more and more evident in the life even of the unregenerate world? There is only one answer to give historically: far from your having a gradual development and improvement, what you actually have is a rise and a fall. Whenever you get a spiritual revival, you will always find that the whole country derives benefit from it.

Every time there has been a great religious awakening in this country, there have always been moral and ethical improvements. Education has had a stimulus; hospitals, good deeds, and the abolition of slavery came directly as a consequence of the evangelical awakening. There is no question about these things. The trade union movement came directly out of that same evangelical awakening.

The Victorian period is to be explained primarily in the light of the great evangelical awakening of the 18th century. The same was true in the Puritan era. In other words, when there has been a great revival, there has been a general influence of Christian teaching upon the whole of society, even those who are not regenerate. It hasn't Christianized them, but it has modified their conduct and behavior. That has lasted for a while, but it has never been permanent.

It has only been a temporary improvement. Take the Puritan period leading to the Commonwealth of Cromwell and these various acts of Parliament about the Sabbath and so on that are still on the statute book. All that got onto the statute book as the result of that religious awakening. But you remember that it was very soon followed by one of the most dissolute and evil periods in the whole of the history of this country—everything that the names 'Restoration' and 'Charles the Second' stand for.

But we needn't go back into history. Look at the condition of this country morally, socially, artistically, and in every other respect at the present time. It all looked so different sixty and seventy years ago; everything seemed to be going upwards. So these men were optimistic. But look at it today! I wonder what they would say if they could return now. Whatever benefits accrue to the world outside Christ, they are always only temporary. You have these brighter periods followed by periods of degradation, degeneration, and often even vileness.

There is no greater fallacy than thinking that you can permeate the whole life of society by Christian teaching. It is not only opposed to the teaching of our Lord Himself and the apostles, particularly the Book of Revelation; it is something that is negated entirely by the long history of man and of civilization. We must leave it at that for this evening. We've just a few more general points and principles to lay down again and then we can apply all this to some of the particular questions that are agitating people's minds at the present time.

Let us pray. O Lord our God, we come unto Thee once more. We are more amazed than ever, O Lord, that Thou hast committed these things unto us, that Thou hast made Thy people guardians and custodians of the faith. And yet we know Thy ways are perfect, and we thank Thee that Thou dost overrule us, our errors, our mistakes, and our fallacies. We rejoice in the certain knowledge that whatever may be happening at this present time, Thine ultimate purpose is sure and safe and certain.

O Lord, receive our prayers and continue, we humbly beseech Thee, to deal with us by Thy Spirit and to give us enlightenment and understanding. Above all, we humbly pray Thee, open our eyes to the present position and to the present possibilities for Thy people. O God, deliver us from traditionalism and keep us true and steadfast and loyal only to Thy word. Hear us, O Lord, have mercy upon us in our weakness and our many frailties, and keep us from the various pitfalls into which so many have fallen in ages past. Lord, have mercy upon us and ever keep us to that simplicity that is in Christ Jesus. Hear us, O Lord, in this our prayer. And now may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship and the communion of the Holy Spirit abide and continue with us, now this night, throughout the remainder of this our short and certain earthly pilgrimage, and evermore. Amen.