is needed
For righteousness; we are so truly made,
If only to our making we were true."

In the days before we began to question the generally accepted
standards, a judge always stood for the epitome of wisdom, and it is
worth noting that the recognized function of a judge is to consider all
questions in the light of the precedents of the past. That fact
sufficiently explains the difference in receptivity to a new and
liberating truth on the part of the wise and prudent as compared with
babes unhampered by a judicial attitude or a collection of time-honored
shibboleths.

Is it possible for us sufficiently to divest ourselves of our inherited
and acquired prejudices, our theology, our thought-forms and the
accepted standards of conduct, to enter into an appreciation of the
experience of those to whom the words and presence of Jesus came as a
new experience? It is doubtful whether we can very thoroughly, and yet I
would ask you to make that attempt, that we may together examine anew
the revealing simplicity of the message which Jesus brought to His
generation nineteen hundred years ago, a message which is still valid in
spite of all the checks and distortions which we have placed upon it.

What were the salient features of Jesus' message and ministry which
found such a welcome acceptance in the hearts of plain, ordinary men and
women? What were those truths so simple that the ignorant and uncultured
could understand them, yet so potent that once they began to ferment
their possessors became known as men who had turned the world upside
down? I think we can put them down under two heads which will include
the heart of the matter.

The first is simply that this is God's world in which we are living.
That sounds like the barest sort of platitude, but have patience. There
is more in it than appears at first glance.

Certainly it is the basis of Jesus' message. From His references to the
lilies on the Galilean hillsides and the sparrows on the housetops to
His discussion of the whole range of human affairs, Jesus was at pains
to point out that there was no detail which was outside of God's care
and concern. The assurance of St. Paul that all things work together for
good to them that love God is the emphasis on such a characterization of
the world as finds its culmination in Jesus' confident assertion, "Ye
therefore shall be perfect as your father in heaven is perfect." It is a
world in which men can live up to th