elieved that God had forsaken him; and yet he held fast to
his trust, to his truth, to his faithfulness, even when swooning away
into the unconsciousness of death.
There is faith, and there is faithfulness; and he shares this with
thousands of others. There are thousands of men who have suffered more
than Jesus did dying for his own truth; thousands of martyrs who, with
his name on their lips, have gone through greater torture than he did.
All these, whoever has been faithful, whoever has suffered for the
right, whoever has been true, has helped to work out the atonement, the
reconciliation, of the world with God, showing the beauty of truth and
bringing men into that admiration of it that helps them to come into
accord with the divine life.
Then one more point. Instead of the wail of the damned that is never,
through all eternity, for one moment hushed in silence, we place the
song of the redeemed, an eternal hope for every child born of the race.
We do not believe it is possible for a human soul ultimately to be
lost. Why? Because we believe in God. God either can save all souls or
he cannot. If he can and will not, then he is not God. If he would and
cannot, then he is not God. Let us reverently say it: he is under an
infinite obligation to his own self, to his own righteousness, to his
own truth, his own power, his own love, his own character, to see to it
that all souls, some time, are reconciled to him.
This does not mean a poor, cheap, an easy salvation. It means that
every broken law must have its consequences so long as it remains
broken. It means that in this world and through all worlds the law-
breaker is to be followed by the natural and necessary results of his
thoughts, of his words, of his deeds; but it means that in this
punishment the pain is a part of the divine love. For the love of God
makes it absolutely necessary that the object of that love shall be
delivered from sin and wrong, and brought into reconciliation with
himself; and the pain, the necessary results of wrongdoing, are a part
of the divine tenderness, a part of the divine faithfulness, a part of
the divine love. So we believe that through darkness or through light,
through joy or through sorrow, some time, somewhere, every child of God
shall be brought into his presence, ready to sing the song of peace and
joy and reconciled love.
Now, friends, I have gone over all the main points of the theology of
our question. I have told you
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