PRACTICAL RELIGION.

BUT be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deluding your own selves. For if any one is a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a mirror: for he beholdeth himself, and goeth away, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. My brethren, hold not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with respect of persons. What doth it profit, my brethren, if a man say he hath faith, but have not works? can that faith save him? If a brother or sister be naked, and in lack of daily food, and one of you say unto them, Go in peace, be ye warmed and filled; and yet ye give them not the things needful to the body; what doth it profit? Even so faith, if it have not works, is dead in itself. Yea, a man will say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith apart from thy works, and I by my works will shew thee my faith. Thou believest that God is one; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and shudder. But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith apart from works is barren.

JAMES, chapters one and two.

PRACTICAL RELIGION.

I. The Apparent Contradiction between James and Paul. Luther, following Paul, as he thought, made the chief doctrine of religion that of justification by faith. As a result, he called this Epistle of James an "epistle of straw," and wondered that it was ever permitted to take its place in the Bible. The contradiction between Paul and the writer of this letter is, on the surface at least, very marked. Paul says, "We are justified by faith," and "By the works of the law shall no flesh living be justified." James says the very devils have faith and that faith without works is dead and useless.

But when we remember that this letter was written to counteract not Paul's teaching, but the later doctrine that a man was justified in the sight of God by accepting a belief, the contradiction disappears. Paul said that a man may conform to all kinds of religious observances and modes of conduct, and still be a bad man at heart. James said that a man might believe all the statements of the great Christian teacher and yet not be half so good a man as an unbeliever whose life was unselfish and helpful. The moment we state it in this way, we see that each is equally true.

II. Faith as Paul meant it is not Mere Acceptance of Beliefs.

When James says (James ii. 19), "The devil is a believer; nay, more, he believes truly enough to be afraid," Paul would have agreed with him. It is obvious that the more ignorant a man is, the more readily he is able to accept beliefs of almost any character. But his readiness to accept them has nothing to do with the man's goodness. It witnesses only to the fact that he is uneducated, or thoughtless, or a fool. It is obvious that a man who denies all the articles of a creed may be a better man than one who accepts them all. Creed or belief or faith, in this sense, is utterly indifferent in matters of religion. As the writer of this letter says, you may be correct enough in your belief, and yet be a devil.

But faith, as Paul meant it, is something very different

from this. It is an enthusiastic conviction that your real life is like the life of Jesus, and that the supreme thing for you is to come to find that out for yourself. It means that you are confidently setting yourself to allow this which is your real nature to become the power of your life. The example, the counsel, the power of your enthusiastic loyalty to Jesus, gradually help you to become your true self, as one of the children of God.

Religion is not a set of habits or observances imposed on you from without through fear or from any other cause. It is the rising within of the sense of the beauty of the better life of kindness and truth.

III. Works do not mean Outer Conformity.

In the same way the external conduct in which the inner spirit expresses itself is an inevitable result of faith in this sense. You cannot be really in love with kindness without acting kindly. You cannot believe in Jesus as Paul did, save in so far as the spirit which is his spirit is alive within you. You cannot be a man really of this unselfish temper without inevitably acting unselfishly.

On the other hand, you may do things which bear the mark of unselfishness from all sorts of motives. It may be from love of praise or from love of advantage in business or to advertise yourself. Paul would call this a case of works without faith, and decide, truly enough, that that is no evidence of the real quality of life.

It is the same with religious observances. To be of real value, they ought to be the natural outcome of the inner life in its need of help and inspiration. A man may go to church and keep the Sabbath, and avoid theatres and dancing, not in any sense because he is a good man, but because the people around him make conduct like this the mark of respectability. This sort of thing is of no value, Paul says. A man is saved by faith alone; that is, by the inner temper and spirit which is the real power of his life.

IV. Religion from Within.

This brings us to the point where the new religious impulse which created Christianity broke loose from Judaism. Judaism was the religion of external conformity to commands. It produced a correct life, and left men often without inspiration or vitality or real goodness. They did what was legally right, and were satisfied. That is not goodness. Jesus struck

a higher note. It is what a man is that matters. His very goodness may often lead him to break outer standards. Το follow the kindly helpfulness of your own heart is more than to keep the Sabbath. To obey the love of your fellow and to help the man by the roadside makes you a better man, even though you are a heathen, than to think of your own religious contamination, and pass by on the other side with the priest and the Levite.

Paul follows this up.

not religion.

Conformity to external standards is

Religion is the awakening within of the higher nature. Then you learn to love goodness and to act rightly, because it is the thing you love most of all. This is faith. You believe in the life which you see in really good men. You come to obey it in yourself, and to feel it grow up in you as your real life. Your actions are its natural result and expression. Even where you fail because the inner life is not yet strong, you are in a more really good relation to God than if you were acting out of mere conformity or fear.

V. Practical Religion.

Faith in this sense is the most practical thing in the world. External rules of conduct can never meet all cases. What is right in one case (as in giving money to mendicants) is wrong in another. But, if you learn to love goodness and truth and the chance of really helping your fellows, then you have an inner rule which makes the necessary distinctions. You can never make a people righteous by acts of parliament. You cannot make a man righteous by constraining him to do what are considered righteous acts. You can do both by awakening the best nature in men, and letting them find out that the finest satisfaction comes only through obedience to their own best. Faith which is not the power of his best over a man's life is not faith. Real faith is the awakening of the noblest nature in us as the power which all conduct comes to express. Religion is then real. It is simply high, natural, spontaneous life.

THE GROWTH OF CHARACTER.

GRACE to you and peace be multiplied in the

knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; seeing that his divine power hath granted unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that called us by his own glory and virtue; whereby he hath granted unto us his precious and exceeding great promises; that through these ye may become partakers of the divine nature. Yea, and for this very cause adding on your part all diligence, in your faith supply virtue; and in your virtue knowledge; and in your knowledge self-control; and in your self-control patience; and in your patience godliness; and in your godliness love of the brethren; and in your love of the brethren love. For if these things are yours and abound, they make you to be not idle nor unfruitful unto the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he that lacketh these things is blind, seeing only what is near, having forgotten the cleansing from his old sins. Wherefore, brethren, give the more diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never stumble: for thus shall be richly supplied unto you the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

II. PETER, chapter one.