Of whom the world was not worthy." That is a faith worth having, and
it is as sound philosophy as it is scripture.
"These all died in faith, not having received the promises." Did
they receive nothing? Moses and Elijah, Gideon and Barak gained
power and heroism greater than we can conceive of. Surely that was
enough. But they did not get the whole of the promise, or even the
best of it. And the simple reason was that God cannot make a promise
small enough to be completely fulfilled to a man in his earthly
life. He gets enough to make him a king, but this does not begin to
exhaust the promise. It is inexhaustible. This is the experience of
anyone who will faithfully try it. And this experience is the
grandest argument for immortality.
Therefore, "giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue ([Greek:
arete], strength), and to virtue knowledge, and to knowledge
temperance ([Greek: enkrateia], self-control), and to temperance
patience ([Greek: hypomene], endurance), and to patience godliness,
and to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness
charity" (love).
And what of prayer? How can it be answered in a universe of law? We
certainly could have no confidence that our prayers could or would
be answered if ours were not a universe of law. God's laws are, as
we have seen, his modes of working out his great plan.
Pages:
309
310
311
312
313
314
315
316
317
318
319
320
321
322
323
324
325
326
327
328
329
330
331
332
333