The Christ Ideal

Every quality that makes the old deity repugnant was swept away. Every evidence is given that if we repent, that is, come to judgment and change our mode of thought and life so that we do the Father’s will, we shall enjoy the forgiveness, the remission of sins which is a natural consequence of righteousness.

How sublime the prospect, yet how stringent the law! Though a man accept a theological creed, make great protestations, and pray in a loud voice, it matters not. Jesus unsparingly condemned many customs which have obtained for ages in the Church. Here, as elsewhere, his statements are unqualified. For ever is it true that no man can serve two masters. No compromise is possible. A man must reap as he has sown, just as the number of units in a problem in arithmetic produces a given sum, and can produce no other sum unless more units be added.

But by the same law, the moment a man begins to sow righteously he shall reap righteousness. No man can sow for him, any more than a man may think for him. For, let it be repeated, it was not the death of Jesus which saved mankind; it was the life he lived, the Christ, the ideals to which he was faithful even when men came to slay him. “I am come that ye might have life, and that ye might have it more abundantly.”

We cannot even save ourselves by repeating the words which Jesus uttered. Each must retire to his sanctuary and learn there how to be the Christ. For each must be a new Christ. And even greater works are promised when many shall attain the Christ attitude and lead the Christ life.

Jesus saved mankind, therefore, by revealing the true way. Before his time no one had been faithful in all respects to the divine will,—so far as history records,—though many had been faithful in certain details. But after his time no one could say that the way was not clear. Since then men have known not only the truth, but the way and the life.

Yet how far from Jesus’s meaning is that doctrine which lays chief emphasis upon salvation! The salvation theory is akin to the theosophical doctrine of “Karma.” The Theosophist labours to rid himself of the burdens of “Karma,” or the accumulated misdeeds of previous existences; he is ever seeking to avoid another incarnation. Thus all is primarily for self. Aud so the Christian has sought escape from the torments of hell. But imagine Jesus healing the sick, not because of compassion for them, but because he “needed” to in order to be saved, or to avoid re-embodiment!

In the doctrine of Jesus all lesser ends are fulfilled by the attainment of the highest. The true Christ man simply says, Come what may, death, crucifixion, another life, it will find me ready. “Not my will, but thine be done.” “He that loseth his life shall find it.”

Thus does Jesus trace all results back to the individual. It is not the storm which sweeps upon the house built on the sand that is to be condemned; the blame rests with him who chose the uncertain foundation. Every tree is known by its fruits, and the tree must be pure before it can produce pure fruit. There is no other way. Jesus does not resort to theoretical arguments, nor is he a believer in miracles, that is, infringements of law.

The universe was for Jesus a realm of law, and no compromise was possible. Therefore he always spoke unqualifiedly. Unless a man be willing to do the entire will of the Father, he cannot attain the Christ. Only through the sonship, only through the Christ can such things come as people have sought in their pursuit of the Messianic ideal.

Thus Jesus is the Saviour because be points out the way of escape from sin, from the consequences of misdirected life; Salvation can come only through this channel because man can only direct his energies aright when he is living the Christ life. It must come through conduct, for individual conduct is alone responsible for the results suffered.

Another may bear our burdens for us for a time. There is much vicarious suffering in the world. But sooner or later all men must face the great alternatives and decide for themselves. For no one can be unselfish for another. Each must settle this problem of problems in the solitude of his own heart: either self or the Christ. By the consecrated life which follows, the world shall know how the struggle ended. Not by protestations of belief do men prove themselves saved; not by publishing abroad the works of their right hands. Always it is the life, and the life is determined by the individual soul.

But if by the divine grace is meant the new birth from above, the coming of the Holy Spirit to the receptive soul, the unexpected welling up of the divine life, we shall have the full sympathy of Jesus. This is not a providential interposition. It is the regular activity of God, the constant effort of the divine Father to recall the wayward son. At all times and in all places the Father thus seeks recognition. Nothing is more in accord with law than this.

The suddenness is unquestionably due to some change on man’s part, either to subconscious receptivity, or to self-disgust on account of a long career of sin. For in order to be a true conversion it must be a permanent change in consciousness, a recognition of the Christ ideal as contrasted with the life of sin. There must be preparation for it, a gradual working up to the point where, when the divine alternative was presented, it was at once accepted; for there are no sudden leaps in God’s cosmos, no changes contrary to the law of evolution.

No, Jesus does not teach this. He bids men take up the cross and follow him. If man must atone for his sinful life by following the Christ, by patiently working day by day to wear off the burdens of his earlier years, this process surely cannot be stopped by mentally casting the burden on someone else. That would imply that Jesus knew not what he said when he based the entire plan of salvation on the law of individual action and reaction.

No, there is no escape from this conclusion. In so far as a man repents and seeks the Kingdom of God, he wins freedom and peace. God is always faithful; Jesus has done his utmost to reveal the Christ law to all. But upon man, individual man, rests the responsibility.

In the end, therefore, we can give no wiser counsel than the advice of Jesus, “Seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness,” for with each step in the seeking we set that power in motion which in due course will free us from our sins. And when the unexpected happens, we may know that it is not because the Father has made special effort to save us, but that in deepest truth he is perpetually seeking to make himself known to all men.

The new birth is thus the supreme work of creation; the coming down from above of that supernal peace which soothes the troubled soul after its long travail; the union of the creative spirit with the noblest product of the life which has evolved from below. In that moment the son at last recognises the Father. In that moment the true atonement is made. For all barriers have fallen away. The law of life is seen. The mission of Jesus is appreciated. And the love of the Christ begins its perfect work.

To become a Christian therefore means to pray without ceasing, to live hour by hour and moment by moment as Jesus would have men live. It is as impossible to settle the matter once for all by standing up and confessing one’s self a Christian, as it is to do all our praying for the week in a half- hour on Sunday. It is the little causes that are effective, the little thoughts of righteousness and the little deeds of love. And so the new birth extends through the Christian’s lifetime. He must die daily and every day be resurrected until, finally, only righteousness shall triumph, only love shall prevail.