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Show Tragedy oM ChallengeW At Easter we face the challenge f 'JS'V" $ of the Cross. j', T"ere is no fact lD aU tlie Clirls- prtiv.'.V.5a tlan story which Pi4? is at tUe sarae Skt?Jiw'H tlme 80 lllsiirlns aud 80 disiuieting KMSM! as the fact of kjHsmW$ Calvary. We can-v'iSi; can-v'iSi; not come within OHm M vision of the little rS'i''s' hi1 tliat lay be ESSJi yond the wall of l Jerusalem and fall to feel our hearts urougly uplifted aud profoundly disturbed. dis-turbed. It Is the scene of supreme love fur humanity, of unfaltering loy-ulty loy-ulty to God. In the former aspect It brings to us hope and consolation ; in the latter It challenges us to examine the nature of our faith and the manner man-ner of Its exercise. I-ooklng at the universe from the nandpolnt of the Cross we discover I he tremendous truth that back of all phenomena Is love. No matter how tuui'h of surface contradiction there may he; no matter how many thins appear In the history of the race. In I he facts displayed by science. In the experience of the Individual, which run eouuter to love, Calvary. If It has Miy meaning at all. means that the ultimate, controlling fact Is love. God Is love that Is what the Cross menus. And If tha ultimate significance signifi-cance of life and the universe Is God. then love Is tlw supreme motive and ivwer. which. In the end. must explain ex-plain all, ninst reconcile all, must restore re-store everywhere and In all life the hanuonv niid happiness which our failure fail-ure to understand and to believe this truth have lost to us for a time. Faith's Foundation. When faith lays hold upon this fact It gets solid ground beneath Its feet. Nor can It be easily confounded by appearances. ap-pearances. It has learned that the contradictions of appearance are due to the incompleteness of vision when life I regarded from any other standpoint stand-point than llmt of Calvary. Only at ,1,.. foot of the Cross, on the summit of the little hill, can we see thins Ui tt.clr completeness. We must keep coming back to It for a renewed realization real-ization of the truth that when life Is viewed steadily and as a whole, from this focal point of God's purpose, love Is seen to be the heart of It, But when faith finds the comfort of this fact It faces, also, the challenge which lies In It. The practical significance of the fact rests In the response which faith makes to It The fact must be acted upon. We derive no benefit from the universal uni-versal atmosphere if we do not breathe it into our lungs. A man with nostrils stopped and mouth closed, dying of suffocation, does not disprove the existence ex-istence of air. He proves only his own folly in falling to appropriate the essential es-sential element abundantly provided for his life. If the room becomes stifling sti-fling and respiration difficult we throw open the window, acting upon our faith that God's supply of air is ample. God's Love All Powerful. Calvary Is a challenge to faith to act upon Its belief that love Is the supreme su-preme force in the rniverse to dare all things and to suffer all things In unhesitating reliance upon the certainly cer-tainly and sufficiency of God's love to conquer where every other power falls. Jesus, as lie turned His steps toward Jerusalem, faced the apparent collapse col-lapse of His mission. If men were to Judge by the surface Indications, by the part picture which was visible to them the picture of Jesus standing alone in the grip of His enemies; Jesus with the organized prejudice of hierarchical Judaism against Him; Jesus with the might of Imperial Rome against Him; Jesus without a human friend who had the courage to stand by IJIm men could only say that this was catastrophe and defeat. So Judging. Jesus Himself could not have felt otherwise. The failure of religion to conquer the world In the name of Jesus Is chlelly due to the fact that, too often. It Is thus that Its exponents have Judged. They wunted Immediate, visible visi-ble results. They have shrank from apparent fRllure, with all that It entailed en-tailed of material loss and physical suffering; they have compromised and resorted to other sources of seeming strength. They have bullded up au apparent success, measured In terms of wealth, or prestige, or numbers. Put they have sacrificed the only thin:: worth while the spiritual regeneration regenera-tion of humanity through the power of love. Savior Chose Victory. ' Jesus saw all the gloomy appear- J a noes of defeat long before they over- i whelmed His disciples and sent them scurrying to cover; but n saw that the only rci:l defeat possible lay In His surrender to appearances, in His losing faith In the love-purrose of God. Had He said. "By a Utile concession to the Temple authorities, by a small yielding to Annas and Pilate, I can prolong My life and My service to My people; I can continue for another ten I or twenty years to teach and to heal and to help ; I can gather a large following fol-lowing and lay a stronger foundation for the work that must go when 1 am no longer able to direct it," that would have been tragic, that would have meant utter failure, hopeless defeat And yet how wise and common-seuslcal common-seuslcal it all sounds, and how often men who couut themselves His followers follow-ers have shaped their service of Him by Just such considerations as these. Jesus went to the cross because He believed that love was mightier than organized prejudice aud hatred, mightier than the armies of Rome, mightier than death, and that the way of God's triumph ran like a path of glory through all the midnight darkness which men termed catastrophe. catas-trophe. Call to Christians. ADd when we turn back to Calvary, and salute with grateful and worshiping worship-ing hearts the Man who did not flinch from It we acknowledge that Jesus Judged truly. When will Christians answer the challenge of the Cross, and declare that they are willing to risk everything, every-thing, to lose everything, In order to demonstrate anew the truth that love Is the only redemptive power for life, that love is the only answer to lis problems, that love Is the only solvent for Its Ills? When will Christians courageously and wlib the heroism of their Master, build all their plans, rest all their hopes, chance everything upon the faith that the significance of life Is love, that the controlling Impulse of the universe is love' When that day comes the Cross will return, not as a symbol, but as an experience. ex-perience. There may be another such appear.-'.nce of failure and defeat as made midnight for the timid at Calvary; Cal-vary; but beyond It will lie the dawn of which Jesus spoke when He said. "And I. If I be lUlcd up, will draw all men unto met" |