through the necessities of its own urgent outreaching life, became an organization. In fact, it became an organization very soon-almost from the beginning. And such will be the way of Christianity always and everywhere. A Christian church. takes form not as a mere brotherhood, and still less as a mere organization. It appears as a brotherhood organized.

I. CHRIST AS THE UNIFYING TRUTH.

This brotherhood as organized is our subject of study. Let us begin with an inquiry as to the unifying truth, the creative idea, the formative force-all these being different names for the same thing-that brings people together into a church and organizes that church for growth and usefulness in the world. For some such unifying truth there must be. Just as a tree of the forest grows up and lives its life about a certain divine idea, enshrining a divine purpose, so is it with human society, and so very manifestly with the Church of God. The tree of course does all this unconsciously-the consciousness being solely in Him who is making the tree. But in the case of social organization, this idea and purpose is to be shared by the society itself, and to be consciously its bond of union. Men, in their freedom, are thus to become workers together with God for the achievement of his purpose. What, therefore, in the case of the Church, may we recognize as this conscious bond of union?

The answer is Jesus Christ. It is the divine idea and purpose that men should be made Christlike, or, what is the same thing, that they should become in spirit and character sons of God. For this, accordingly, God sent redemption into the world, that all who would might be "conformed to the image of his Son." How? Through the knowledge of him, through faith in him, through communion with him, through obedience to him, who is himself the image of the invisible God. In a word, through Christianity.

And, moreover, as men, believing in Christ, become responsive

"The Idea of the Church," pp. 51, 52; 95 ff.

to his transforming power, they come into spiritual unity with one another. For they become sharers of the one mind that was in him, and take up their several interrelated tasks in the doing of the one work which he has commanded. Christ who is "all" is also "in all." Such is the origin of the Church; and such, nothing less and nothing other, is the unity of the Church.

Now the extraordinary influence of the personality of Christ upon the men and women who first became his disciples is unquestionable. It woke such a response as human hearts had nowhere made before. It was a compelling and a cumulative power. Cumulative not only as long as he was visibly with them; for after his going away he came to them again, in closer relationship, even in the Spirit, and gained the completer mastery of their lives.

What, then, was the vision of the Divine One-for surely we shall find it to be nothing less-which, when these persons saw it in Jesus, made them not only his individual followers but also, and very manifestly, his congregation? It is altogether unlikely that they attempted, after any theological manner, to analyze his character or number his "offices" or reason out to a satisfactory conclusion the truth of his nature. That came some generations later. Do we occupy our minds with a systematic attempt to analyze the nature and endowments of the man who is making himself our friend? We only know and feel the new personality that enters with a certain peaceful constraining power into our lives. Much more may we believe this to have been true of the first disciples and friends of the Lord Jesus. He was to them more and more a presence, a personality, known by its effects in their innermost being, as if it were life itself. Indeed, he was the Life, and was continually giving himself, giving them of his own-"that they might have it very abundantly."

Yet it is no less than the duty of thoughtful Christian love to make answer to the Master's own question: "Who say ye that I am?" What was it in Jesus of Nazareth that, in the New Testament time, drew men to him as his disciples and congregations?

As a matter of fact, all men were not drawn to him. Many

were not. Some utterly rejected the claim that he put forth, and had him condemned to the death of the cross. Even after the Resurrection and Pentecost, some, so far from acknowledging the Master, persecuted his disciples unto prison and unto death. Very many more seem to have passed him by in a spirit of indifference. As it is in the twentieth century, so was it in the first: "My sheep hear my voice." What then was the attractive power which won those who did yield allegiance to Jesus and form a Christian brotherhood about him?

That attraction was the awakening of the sense of spiritual needs and possibilities, and the satisfaction that such a hunger of the spirit received from him. It was said of the poet-philosopher Coleridge by one of his friends: "He wanted better bread than can be made of wheat." So does every man; but especially so does the man in whom hunger of the spirit, which is his deepest self, is awakened. But nowhere else does this cry of want find the answer which it has found in Jesus, the very Bread of God. Those upon whom that offer had power, in the beginning of the gospel, came to him, gave him their hearts, obeyed his words.

For one thing, they beheld in him, as it had never appeared to them before, the revelation of spiritual truth. “Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God; for no man can do these signs that thou doest, except God be with him."1 But for stronger reasons also than the marvelous physical signs that thus impressed Nicodemus, Jesus was recognized as "a teacher come from God." That is to say, the teaching itself was a greater "sign." It stirred the deepest intuitions of the religious nature, broke the slumber of the soul, searched the conscience, opened up the realm of spiritual reality, as this had not been done by the wisest and best who had gone before. They, indeed, as prophets of Jehovah, received messages from on high for Israel; but he dwelt perpetually in the light of God's eternal love, without a cloud between, and out of the revelations of

'John iii. 2.

that Presence taught the people. "The words that I say unto you I speak not from myself, but the Father abiding in me doeth his works"-the words of Jesus, which were the works of the Father. And a still greater sign-though one that should be much "spoken against"-was the prophet-teacher himself. He not only revealed the truth-peerless and priceless as were his utterances: he himself was the revelation. For that which he spoke he was. By continual self-expression, in word and look and deed, he showed himself to be the very Truth and Wisdom of God. It was not as if a torchbearer came uplifting a torch; the light shone from within, from the Man, "as the sun shineth in his strength." "The WORD became flesh." Is it any wonder that those who were "of the truth" should be attracted to him and consent to group themselves about him as a company of learners? "One is your teacher, and all ye are brethren.""

But to say that Jesus was the highest truth incarnate is only another way of confessing his perfect rightness of nature. Men who had eyes to see did see in him the Divine holiness. It was not simply that he could challenge opponents to break the force of his teaching or of his personal claim by pointing out any moral obliquity in his life: "Which of you convicteth me of sin?" That were a comparatively little thing. The great fact is that the self-consciousness of Jesus, as expressed in the whole course of his recorded history, was the consciousness of entire oneness with the Father. A petition for the forgiveness of trespasses, such as he taught the disciples to offer when they prayed, would not only be unthinkable on his lips now by those who believe upon him, but it must have been so then.

Simon Peter often spoke in a truly representative character, but never more so, we may believe, than when he cried: "Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord." It was personal unworthiness bearing witness to the Worthy One, the sense of sin becoming intolerable in the presence of the visualized holiness of God.

Not only so. Men of faith found in Jesus the mastership of the spirit. For holiness is power. It is the moral law personalized. The sinner, even though resisting its claim, stands in awe of it, acknowledging its sovereign right to obedience. It is a celestial vision that must speak in imperatives. And the human soul needs such an imperative. It needs to say "Lord," and instinctively feels after some one greater than itself whom it may reverence, trust, honor, follow, obey. So the disciples of Jesus, finding the very sovereignty of the spirit in him, called him not only teacher but Lord. It was his to command, theirs to obey. Gentle, sympathetic, considerate, ministrant, declaring on the night of his betrayal, "No longer do I call you servants, but I have called you friends," yet the sovereign of the soul, whose word was law. "Ye are my friends, if ye do the things which I command you." "Ye call me Master [Teacher] and Lord; and ye say well, for so I am." To them, therefore, as to those who learned his name afterwards through the gospel and the interpreting Spirit, Jesus was the Lord Jesus Christ. And well might the willing servants of the one Master, uniting to keep his commandments, form a household about him.

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Moreover, such a Master, exemplifying in daily life all grace and truth, would become their spiritual Ideal. Did he not distinctly offer himself as an example to be followed by them all? "Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto but to minister." "For I have given you an example, that ye also should do as I have done to you.' To become Christlike, changed into the spiritual splendor of his image, was unquestionably the Christian ideal. The uttermost self-sacrifice must be accepted by the disciples of him who went in unspeakable suffering, but with undeviating footstep, to the death of the cross. "Hereby know we love, because he laid down his life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren." Nor can they picture to themselves any happier immortality than to be

'John xv. 15. John xiii. 13. Matt. xx. 28. John xiii. 15. 1 John iii. 16.