Joy in Service; Forgetting, and Pressing Onward; Until the Day Dawn | Page 8

and the way in which we
should forget them. Like him, we are not required to blot out the
remembrance of the past. There could be no improvement if we did not
remember past mistakes and profit by them. It is often our sweetest joy
and highest pride to think of the days that are no more, of the wondrous
history of mankind, of our own journey as Providence has led us on,
and above all things, of him whom we are to hold in everlasting

remembrance. But we must keep life's balance true. Some people are
always living among the gravestones, regretting what is now inevitable,
mourning over losses that cannot be repaired, thinking the days of old
better than those which are to be--and wasting their energies in
sorrowful reminiscences and wistful longings for a perished past,
instead of using their energies in the accomplishment of what may be
done for the winning of better crowns. It is against this practice that the
apostle's experience warns. This practice makes progress impossible. It
is a source of misery. It fetters the Christian mind. It does not know that
the resurrection has taken place. It makes life a threnody instead of a
hosanna. We are to turn from the past that we may obtain the better
future. Let me give you an example of the way in which we are to
forget the things which are behind, and reach forth unto those things
that are before.
I. It is worth our while to forget old doubts and questionings, through
absorption in the practical application of the truth brought us by Jesus
Christ. Most of the doubts and questionings which men have on the
subject of religion are very old. Their hair is gray with the anxious
thought of many centuries. They may be represented by old men, with
wrinkled foreheads and feeble knees, pretending by dress and manner
to be young. But you would be surprised to find how old they are, these
questions that disturb your religious faith and hinder you from the
performance of your whole duty.
There, for instance, is that weary question about the reason why God
allowed sin and misery to enter into his world--a question which men
are still pondering, under which they are still restless and sometimes
unhappy. But lo! it is as old as human history. The ancient Brahmins
wrestled with it. We find it echoed in the hymns of Chaldea that date
from the days of Abraham, in the songs of Greece, and in the literature
of the age of Solomon; and neither philosophy nor science, neither
discovery nor accident, has to this day been able to frame a satisfactory
answer.
In like manner the question how to harmonize in thought the absolute
sovereignty of God, who ruleth over all and designed the end from the

beginning, with the freedom and responsibility of man, is an ancient
problem which no answer has been found able to finally solve. Hindoo
philosophy settled it by fatalism, making man nothing and deities all.
Greek thought vibrated between the two extremes; and from the
beginning of Christian history the problem has vexed the ingenuity and
taxed the patience of the Church. It is not peculiar to Calvinism. It is a
problem which has ever risen up before inquiring minds and baffled the
wisdom of the greatest who have grappled with it.
And so, too, most of the specific doubts about and objections to
Christian doctrine have descended to us from remote generations.
Modern philosophy turns out to be only a careful repetition of
speculations which were indulged in by the earliest thinkers. Most of
the really important objections to the Bible were raised by the shrewd
and cultured antagonists whom ancient paganism put forward as its
champions. There can scarcely be a new theory devised, for the human
mind has long since gone over the whole ground with plowshare and
rake. Nothing is more instructive and entertaining to the student of
Christianity than to recognize in ancient times the faces with which he
is familiar in our day, although they may be dressed in different clothes
and speak another tongue. He will hail them as well-known families,
and will return with the conviction that, so far as the religious doubts
and questionings of the human mind are concerned, there was some
truth in the declaration of Solomon, that there is nothing new under the
sun.
I do not mean to say that progress is not being made in religious
thought as well as elsewhere. I think there is. God's truth is being better
understood. God's Word is being read more intelligently. Light is
falling from many a source and on many a fact. Neither do I mean to
say that these old problems should not be considered,