Now this social need was distinctly provided for in the very beginning of the gospel. We can hardly conceive of a stronger emphasis on the social element in religion than that which Jesus gave. He declared himself present, though unseen, with his true disciples in any congregation of them on earth-"where two or three are gathered together" in his name. And just as when he promises to make his abode with the man who keeps his word,' it is shown that he wills that men shall keep his word, and just as when he promises to be with those who teach and preach his gospel, "alway, even unto the end of the world," it is shown that he wills that his messengers shall teach and preach, so likewise when he promises to be in the congregations of his disciples, it is shown that he wills that they shall meet together in congregations.

But it is not only in verbal teaching that Jesus sets forth the sociality of religion. He shows it also and chiefly in his life. No recluse, no separatist, but the holy Friend of even the most despised, and a seeker of friends-such was he who uniformly spoke of himself as the Son of Man.

To Jesus, indeed, the will of the Father was the all of life; but a very large part of that will was brotherhood: "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." He made a household of the Twelve and lived among them. Their lack of insight and sympathy grieved him to the heart: "What, could ye not watch with me one hour?" Yet he loved them unto the end; while for the eternal future it was his prayer, "I will that where I am, they also may be with me," and his word of assurance: "That where I am, there ye may be also." Having gone away, he came again in the glory of the resurrection, and was made known to them, as a foretoken of the heavenly life, in the breaking of bread, and in other social acts. When he spoke of the kingdom of God, whether present or future, he would sometimes use the old-time social figure of a table at which the redeemed were to sit down together, partaking of a common meal.*

It was in the spirit of the Master, therefore, that those whom he sent forth from immediate companionship with himself became seekers and promoters of fellowship. They would share with others the new life which they themselves had received, "the eternal life, which was with the Father and was manifested" in his Son Jesus Christ. "That which we have seen and heard," says one of them, "declare we unto you also, that ye also may have fellowship with us.'

Accordingly the response of those upon whom such an appeal has power will be to enter into this fellowship of the new life. "This Jesus whom," said Paul to the people of Thessalonica, "I proclaim unto you is the Christ. And some of them were persuaded, and consorted with [πpoσekλnpwlŋσav, cast in their lots with, were Divinely allotted to] Paul and Silas." It will always be so. To win believers in Jesus is to make them brethren. They will cast in their lots with their fellow-Christians.

It might be remarked, parenthetically, that even the meetingplaces of the early Christians were distinctly promotive of fellowship. In our own day, the most sociable of all the meetings of a church are likely to be those that are held in the homes of fellow church members; and such of necessity were congregational meetings for more than a hundred years of Christianity. There were no church edifices, and it was in the homes of their friends and brethren that those who had cast in their lots with one another as followers of Jesus habitually met together.

But a far stronger figure is used. One of these same two apostles with whom the Thessalonian converts consorted made use of it in an epistle to Gentile Christians. Let us recall it: "That he might create in himself of twain one new man." Of what twain? Of two peoples that had long been at enmity, not indifferent nor simply alienated, but bitterly antagonistic. Think how the Jew had regarded the Gentile and the Gentile the Jew through ages and generations. But now the soul of the Jew and the soul of the Gentile were reconciled, brought into

oneness of spirit and aim, in being both reconciled to God in Jesus Christ. It was even this twain that became one new man. At the cross the insurmountable barrier had been broken down. And such, in its crowning example, was the genesis of the Christian Church.

Unquestionably, then, the power of Christ was creative of a new individual. First of all, a new individual. But it was also creative of a new fellowship. Christians were not simply so many separate persons; they at once became a people, a race, a nation, a priesthood. So declares the first of Jesus's confessing disciples: "Ye are an elect race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession."1

2. SOCIAL DEPENDENCE IN WORSHIP AND IN WORK.

In two things that might be particularly noted does this Christian social dependence appear: in worship and in the extension of Christ's kingdom.

First, in worship. Now it is true that the soul must come to God alone. Otherwise it can hardly be said to know him at all. As truly as if there were no other being in the universe except the Creator and myself must I listen to his voice and speak to him in whose hand my life is. Nevertheless, all answers to prayer are not received by the solitary worshiper. Some are specifically promised to the worshiping assemblage. It may be a very small assemblage; but any real Christian communion will open the heart to receive a greater blessing from on high: “If two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father who is in heaven." And no petition that is either unbelieving or unloving may hope to be heard." "But tarry ye in the city," was the Master's word, "until ye be clothed with power from on high;" and it was when "they were all together in one place" that the garment of power descended upon them.

The Lord's Supper also, the sacrament which the ever-living "Mark xi. 24, 25. "Luke xxiv. 49.

'1 Pet. ii. 9. "Matt. xviii. 19.

Saviour has given us of trust and love toward himself, calls most truly and tenderly for trust and love toward each other. "Seeing that we, who are many, are one bread, one body; for we all partake of the one bread."

Secondly. As in the case of spiritual receptivity in worship, so in that of effectiveness in extending Christ's kingdom brotherhood is needed. Are Christians to be good soldiers of Jesus Christ? The peculiar power of an army, as compared with any equal number of brave men, is in systematic coöperation. Are Christians coworkers with Christ for the redemption of the world? Good feeling, harmony, a common aim, the division of labor, will multiply the efficiency of the individual laborer many fold. "I beseech thee also, true yokefellow, help those women, for they labored with me in the gospel, with Clement also, and the rest of my fellow-workers." "And he called unto him the Twelve, and began to send them forth by two and two."

There may be solitary workers, each doing what he can in his own line without contact with others. There may be competitive workers, each endeavoring to surpass others, oftentimes to their disadvantage. But the great body of the world's work is done by associated workers, each depending on others and depended on by them, each assisting others and assisted by them.

Need we be reminded that in Christianity this coöperative method, which has been illustrated from the beginning, must continue unto the end? Coöperation is the method of the kingdom of God-here and we may believe hereafter. For let us consider: Is solitariness the law of the universe? Is competition? And what, on the other hand, shall be said of coöperation?

3. THE CHURCH IDEA IN THE ACTS AND THE Epistles. Social dependence, as illustrated thus in worship and in work, will help to explain the prominence of the Church idea in the books of the New Testament that follow the Gospels. For this idea is very prominent in these books. The very literary form

which most of them have taken is suggestive of it; they are not treatises, but letters written to be read aloud in congregations.

Except as a social institution, Christianity could not have made an effective start or gathered its forces for subsequent progress and achievement. Therefore even in the apostolic period it must embody itself not only in persons but also in societies—“a city set on a hill."

Of course it is not simply that Christ's people should be congregated or made to live side by side in the same group by some external authority; for in such a case proximity might not prove to be helpfulness. The uniting pressure must come from within, like the informing and uniting life force of any organism. It must be a spirit of truth and love. The plants of a garden bed or the trees of the forest grow side by side, but instead of helping they hinder one another. A congregation of Jesus Christ must be organically-which is to say, vitally-interrelated; not like the collective plants in a garden bed, but like the several organs of the individual plant, which are each for all and all for each. The man that has found his Father in heaven instinctively seeks his brother on earth; and the two brothers are to become one, mutually serviceable, in Christ.

Many, it is true, are the sinful interferences, the misunderstandings, strifes, and envyings, that hinder and oftentimes destroy this unity of the Spirit. But the idea persists, and, in proportion as the Christianity professed is real, clothes itself in everyday fact. It is the ethical idea of "mutualism" glorified. “Bear ye one another's burdens," says Paul to his Galatian converts, and immediately illumines the precept with an interpretation of the teaching of Jesus, "and so fulfill the law of Christ." Even between the chief of the apostles and the humblest Christian brother, it is a reciprocal service that is due: "I long to see you, that I with you may be comforted in you, each of us by the other's faith, both yours and mine." Alike in the first age and in all after ages, the Church, so far as it has kept true to its heavenly

1Rom. i. II, 12.