The True Broad-Church

“He ghall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers.’”’ — Mat. iv. 6.

BY first interpretation of this passage was, “When the Messiah comes, He will consecrate the relations of family life.” But on reflection I remembered that family ae was consecrated before Christ’s coming — specially consecrated by the Jew. I have changed my view, therefore, of the meaning of these words. Is not this their real significance — When the Messiah’s work is inaugurated, there will be established a sympathy between the generation going out and the generation coming in — between the old faith and the new.” In the natural heart it is very difficult to get a sympathy between the views of the fathers and the views of the children. The fathers think the children too broad; the children think the

fathers too narrow. There is only one way of reconciling them, and that is the Christian rule of putting one’s self in the place of another. If the child could live in the father’s experience, it would see that the old doctrine is the only thing fitted to the father; if the father could live in the child’s experience, he would see that the new doctrine is the only thing fitted to the child. Each would perceive that both faiths are “beautiful in their time.” But to get that, you must have Christ. To put myself in your place is a most unselfish act. To see a thing, not as it is, but as you see it, to live in your thought, to feel with your heart, to struggle, in fancy, with the sense of your limitations, to make allowance for the changes of the years and the shifting of the scenes — that requires the spirit of Him who put Himself in the place of sinners.

Teach us, O Lord, the spirit of charity for views not our own! We preach charity towards human wants. We preach charity towards human deeds. But we neither preach nor practise charity towards human opinions. We speak of the Broad-Church and the Narrow; but in truth we are all narrow — alike the old and the new. Teach us that whatever excludes the mental need of another is narrow! Tell the fathers that they are narrow when they refuse to let the children extend the old field! Tell the children that they are narrow when they refuse to include in the new field the ground trod by their fathers! Let the old men throw themselves forward; let the young men throw themselves back! I used to think that youth was the time for hope, and age the time for memory. But in the light of Thy truth I seem to learn otherwise; it is age that needs hope, and youth that needs memory. Give hope to age, O Lord — power to look forward to the possibilities of to-morrow! Give memory to youth, O Lord — power to look backward to the limits of yesterday! Give the fathers the wing of anticipation; give the children the wing of retrospect! Say to the one, “Arise and depart, for this is not your rest”; say to the other, “Son, remember”! Breathe upon the fathers the spirit of the world to come; breathe upon the children the spirit of the world that is past! Reveal to the old that their life is but in its morning; reveal to the young that they cannot forget yesterday’s afternoon! Point the autumn to the rising, the spring to the setting, sun! Then shall the heart of the fathers and the heart of the children meet together, and the old and the new shall be joined in one wedding ring.