Religion and Life                                                                   11/1/42

 

Scripture: John 10: 1-10

 

Text: John 10: 10       “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.”

 

There has been at times among our forefathers in religion, a tendency to think of religion as being primarily connected with death.  A man’s religion has been supposed to prepare him for death and the next life, and whatever effect it had on his present life was only by way of preparing him for what is to come.

 

People have become impatient with the emphasis on that idea.  Some have decided that that kind of religion is useless and have not cared to have anything more to do with religion.  Others have been merely confused.  Others have felt that there really must be something more to religion than that and have reinterpreted religion and Christian teachings to themselves with considerable profit.

 

Instead of thinking of religion and death, why not think of religion and life?  Of course most people, probably both in and out of the church, want some kind of religious service at marriage, at the baptism or consecration of their little children, and at death.  But real religion is more important and far-reaching than that.  It is something that permeates the whole of our life and work and vitally affects our attitude toward everything.

 

Consider our attitude toward daily work.  Basil King has expressed our mistaken and irreligious attitude toward most of our work in these words:  “We think that God is more concerned with some of our occupations than he is with others, and that for some of them he gives us extra help, while he leaves others to take care of themselves.  In this way we speak of a poet as inspired to write a song, but not of a carpenter to build a house.  We speak of a bishop as inspired to preach a sermon but not of a banker to extend a loan.  We speak of the church as inspired to teach the truth, but not of the government to put it into action.  It is easy enough to think of the Holy Ghost being present when the book of Ruth was composed, or the Gospel according to Saint Mark, but not when Edison invented electric light or Madame Curie discovered radium.  God, for perhaps most of us, is interested in churches, in services, in philanthropies, and all compositions to which we may append the word sacred, but not in business or science, or railroads, or coal mining or any but the most idealistic forms of art.  From the part of our life with which we are most anxiously preoccupied we shut this inspiration out.”

 

In this statement of King’s lies a principle which has a great deal to do with our restlessness and discontent.  We try to shut religion out of our daily, so-called secular life when, if it is real religion, it can’t be shut out of any of our life.  Real religion is that which permeates all of a man’s life.

 

Look again at Jesus.  Of all men who ever lived his religion was the finest.  The wonderful thing about his life is that he seemed to get more joy out of life than anyone else.  As a matter of fact, he had very little to say about death.  When you reexamine the New Testament you discover that it is all about life.  The very word “life” was a favorite, and frequently used, word with Jesus.  On various occasions, he remarked, “A man’s life does not consist in the things he possesses.”  [Luke 12 15].  “Ye will not come to me that ye might have life.”  [John 5: 40].  “I am the way, the truth, and the life.”  [John 14: 6].  “I am come that they might have life, and have it more abundantly.”  [John 10: 10].  It is clear that Jesus meant that religion should apply to the whole of life.

 

His Sermon on the Mount is the longest discourse by Jesus that we have recorded.  What is it about?  Why, it is about life and how to live happily here.

 

Jesus saw that multitudes of people had been misled as to the main source of happiness.  They thought, as many do today, that happiness came from the material things with which one is surrounded.  Jesus kept pointing out to them, in many ways, that happiness springs from within rather than from possessions or outward circumstances.  It is not what we have or that with which we are surrounded but what we are and do that makes us happy or unhappy.  Jesus observed that many people were worried.  Now a man can not be happy if he is worried.  Worry saps the life out of a person.  It ages people prematurely.

 

And, of course, it is not always the poor who are most worried.  Sometimes the people with the best stocked cupboards and wardrobes and the best furnished homes worry just as do those who fear starvation.  People worry saying, “What shall we eat, and what shall we drink, and what shall we wear?”  Jesus said, “Don’t worry.  Take no thought for the morrow.  Your heavenly Father knoweth that you have need of all these things.  Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all other things will be added unto you.”  [Matthew 6: 31-33].  In all this Jesus was not making light of what absorbs most of our time and energy - the earning of food and clothing and necessary comforts.  What he seems to have meant was that if you are going to worry over these things, you will have this cause for worry every day and every week and every month and every year of your life.  And where will be room for the joy which refreshes and invigorates you?  Let your religion cast worry out of your life.

 

Consider another passage from the Sermon on the Mount.  Jesus said, “Enter ye in by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many are they that enter in thereby.  For narrow is the gate and straightened the way that leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.”  [Matthew 7: 13-14].  That passage has frequently been taken as a text for a sermon on heaven and hell.  It is supposed to refer to the next life - many on the broad road going to perdition and few on the straight road leading to heaven.  But is that what it means?  Jesus was pointing out a universal law of life.  It was an observation of present fact.

 

Jesus wanted men to have an abundant life, rich and fruitful spiritual experience, and he saw that not many were finding it.  There are two ways to live this earthly existence; one is lawless, undisciplined, uncontrolled, traveling a broad way, following undependable impulses and temporary passions.  That road looks easy and many are traveling on it.  But it does not lead to life.  “Narrow is the gate and straightened the way to life.”

 

If you want to lead the life of an athlete, you can’t lead a whimsical hither-thither-and-yon existence.  You have to put yourself under a strict regime of training, denying yourself the things that others may feel free to indulge in.  He who wants to live a life of physical superiority can do so only through the narrow gate of training and self-denial and self-discipline.

 

The musician who is talented and clever enough to make us feel the throb of a march or the quiet of the fields or the fury of a storm in his music isn’t just a genius.  If he is, his genius is the usual variety that is one-tenth native ability and nine-tenths perspiration.  It is only through the narrow gate of years of self-denying practice that one can enter the life of musical technique and harmony. 

 

Most young folk hate the word “discipline.”  It has an unpleasant sound.  But there is one kind of discipline that should be for every person.  That is self-discipline.  Without self-discipline it seems to me impossible to really live.  If, then, your religion can help you to overcome worry and to discipline yourself, it is vital to your life.

 

It is vital to all of your living, all of the time!  We are accustomed to thinking of religion as associated with Sunday church, hymn-singing, Bible reading, and preaching, pastoral prayer, and private devotions.  To many, it is more difficult, but fully as vital, to think of religion as associated with building, banking, commerce or trade.  Let religion be consciously connected with the work of home, office, store, factory or agriculture.  The writer of the book of Psalms once said, wisely, “I have set the Lord always before me.”

 

Jesus’ living was religious on Sunday - and not conventionally religious, either.  But he was also a religious man on Monday and Tuesday and every other day of the week.

 

If a minister can not drown personal ambitions in the joy of his work, he is a sorry success.  If a laborer finds no joy in his work aside from the shortest possible hours and highest possible wages, he is to be pitied.  If an owner really seeks joy in larger barns and bigger dividends, he is already slated for disappointment.

 

A certain man of wealth - a man who was a leader in a church and a liberal giver to religious and educational institutions - passed away several years ago.  In his will or farewell letter, he penned these words:

 

            “I earnestly entreat my wife and my children and descendants that they steadfastly decline to sign any bonds or obligations of any kind as surety, for any other person or persons; that they refuse to make any loans except on the basis of first-class, well-known securities, and that they invariably decline to invest in any untried or doubtful securities or property or enterprise or business.”  This man was eulogized as one of the great men of his generation.

 

During the same month another man, who would commonly be considered ignorant, was executed as a public menace.  He wrote this as a farewell to  his son:

 

            “My son, do not cry.  Be strong to comfort your mother.  Take her for walks in the quiet country, gathering wild flowers, resting beneath shady trees, and visiting the streams and the gentle tranquillity of the Mother Nature.

 

            Do not seek happiness just for yourself.  Help the persecuted, because they are your better friends.  They are your comrades who fight and fall, as your father fought and fell, to conquer joy and freedom for all the poor.”

 

What has happened to our public sense of values?  Can’t we see that the man who was lauded lived in fear that the fortune that he had built up would be dissolved by his descendants?  Can’t we see that the man who was executed had an abiding sense of values even in the face of execution?  His words sound something like words found in the Gospels.  I don’t know who he was or for what he was executed.  I have only seen these written words of his.  But even though he may have been engaged in a mistaken cause, or otherwise been guilty of some grave offense, he had apparently found satisfaction in sticking to what he thought was the right course for him and for the permanent benefit of his friends.

 

There is a story called “Shoes and Sermons” in a book called “Hiram Golf’s Religion.”  In this story, a new minister comes to call on Hiram Golf, the shoemaker.  Noticing the quality of Hiram’s work and the evident pride and satisfaction he took in it, the minister remarked that he was glad to see a man who could use the “humblest vocation” for the Glory of God as Hiram was doing.

 

The condescending note of the minister got a quick rebuttal, for Hiram fired back with, “There ain’t no sech thing in the universe, parson, there ain’t no sech thing in the wide world as a humble vocation ------ Now you are a minister by the grace of God ---- Well, I’m a shoemaker by the grace of God.  If I make good shoes I shall get just as much credit for it as you will for being a faithful pastor.  All work is noble and honorable, and it’ll take a good deal of argyment to show me that all work isn’t equally important.”

 

The parson interrupted long enough to ask him if he thought heaven discriminated as to the class of work done.  “Only the discrimination between good work and bad work, not between brain work and hand work.”

 

Hiram continued, “Jest look at that, parson,” and he took from the pile of shoes on the floor the battered shoe of a child; “that belongs to William Runkle’s youngest, a little fellow of six, not over hardy.  That boy’s body ought to be kept healthy, oughtn’t it?  Well, I am going to do my part.  If he should catch a cold some muddy day and get pneumonia, his father, who only earns $12 a week, would have a heavy doctor’s bill to pay, and even then he might lose the child.  That would almost break his heart, I do believe.  Now, then, I propose to mend them shoes as though my salvation depended on it.  I can’t afford, as a child of God, to put poor work into that job.  Too much depends on it.  Yes, parson, too much depends on it.

 

            “Do you think a vocation is a humble one when it deals with the health and lives of our fellow creatures?  I reckon not.”

 

I take it that that is a healthy attitude toward one’s work, whether it is fixing shoes, or preaching, or driving locomotives, or teaching, or building roads or any other occupation necessary to the welfare of humankind.  It is just the spirit that our Lord sought to bring into the world, as he demanded that men everywhere bring the whole of life under the gracious influence of high religion.

 

“Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father which is in heaven.”  [Matthew

5: 16].

 

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dates and places delivered:

 

            Kahului Union Church, September 27, 1931

            Wananalua Church, Hana, October 4, 1931

            Puunene Japanese Church, October 11, 1931

            Paia Japanese Church, October 11, 1931

            Puunene Hawaiian Church, October 18, 1931

            Wailuku Union Church, November 29, 1931

            Kahului Union Church, February 4, 1934

            Pilgrim Church, Honolulu, November 1, 1936  PM

            Wisconsin Rapids, November 1, 1942