salvation with a certainty that far transcends the lower
knowledge which he possesses of external things, or of mere historical
happenings.[7]

This Word of God is eternal, and is the source of all spiritual light and
truth that have come to the race in all ages. Through it the patriarchs
discovered how to live well, even in a world of sin, and through this
same Word the prophets saw the line of march for their people, and by the
power and inspiration of this Word the written word was given as a
temporary guidance, as a pedagogical help, as a lantern on men's paths,
until the morning Star, Jesus Christ, the living Word, should rise and
shine in men's hearts. The living Word is, thus, vastly different from
the written word. One is essence, the other only image or shadow; one is
eternal, the other is temporal; one is uncreated, the other is made; one
is the Light itself, the other is the lantern through which the {109}
Light shines; one is Life itself, the other is only the witness of this
Life--the finger which points toward it.[8]

True religion is distinguished from all false or lower forms of religion
in this, that true religion is always inward and spiritual, is directly
initiated within the soul, is independent of form and letter, is
concerned solely with the eternal and invisible, and verifies itself by
producing within man a nature like that of God as He is seen in Christ.
The "law" of true religion is a new and divinely formed disposition
toward goodness--a law written in the heart; its temple is not of stone
or wood, but is a living and spiritual temple, its worship consists
entirely of spiritual activities, _i.e._ the offering of genuine praise
from appreciative hearts, the sacrifice of the self to God, and the
partaking of divine food and drink through living communion with Christ
the Life. Religion, of this true and saving sort, never comes through
hearsay knowledge, or along the channels of tradition, or by a head
knowledge of texts of the written word. It comes only with inward
experience of the Word of God, and it grows and deepens as the will of
man lives by the Will of God, and as the kingdom of God comes, not in
some far-away Jerusalem, or in some remote realm above the sky, but _in a
man's own heart_.

This true and saving religion is begun, and completed, within the soul by
a process which Coornhert names by the great historic word, _faith_.
Faith is the soul's free assent to the living Word o