he Word expressed through our own
Personality. This is why St. Paul speaks of our growing to "the measure
of the stature of the fulness of Christ," (Eph. iv, 13) and why we find
the symbol of "Measurement" so frequently employed in the Bible.

Therefore, if a great scale of measurement for our Word is to be
exhibited, it can only be by its presentation in human form.

Then if the purpose be to establish such a standard of measurement, the
scale must be expressed in units of the same denomination as that of our
own nature--you cannot divide miles by amperes--and it is because the
scale of our potential being is laid out in the same denomination as
that of the Spirit of Life itself that we can avail ourselves of the
standard of "the Word made Flesh."

When this is clearly seen it removes those intellectual difficulties
which so many feel with regard to the doctrine of the Atonement. If we
want to avail ourselves of the Bible Promises on the basis of the Bible
teaching, we cannot throw the teaching overboard. As I have said before,
if a doctrine is to be rightly interpreted, it must be interpreted as a
whole, and in one form or another the doctrine of the Atonement is the
pivot point of the whole Bible. To omit it is like trying to play
"Hamlet" with Hamlet left out, and you may put your Bible out on the
rubbish-heap. How, then, does the Atonement come in?

Here are the usual intellectual difficulties. To whom is the sacrifice
offered? To God or to the Devil? If it be to the Devil, then the Devil
is a greater power than God. If it be to God, then how can a God who
demands a sacrifice of blood be Love? And in either case how can guilt
be transferred from one person to the other?

Now as a matter of fact none of these questions arise. They are beside
the real point at issue, which is: How can we so combine the Personal
action of the Word with the Impersonal action of the Law, as to make the
Law become to us the Law of Life instead of the Law of Death (Rom. viii,
2)?

Let us recur to the principles which we have worked out. The Law flows
from the Word and not _vice versa_--it acts for good or ill according to
the Quality of the Word which calls it into action. Therefore to get the
Law of Life we must speak the Word of Life. Then, on the principle of
"Omne vivum ex vivo," the Word of Fundamental Basic Life, which is not
subject to conditions because it is antecedent to all conditions, can
only be spoken through conscious