Him; in envy we crucify Him. Our lukewarmness is forgetfulness of Him. No one is condemned because he is bad, but because he does not believe in Christ. No one is justified because he is good, but because he believes in Christ. The heart of Christianity is Christ, and religion is a personal relationship to Him. It is an experience of the soul. For His sake, whose love takes us captive, we do mightily. It is His love that stirs our love, and we are launched on the mighty enthusiasm that is the tide of religion.

Who is friend of Christ has constraining power. Poise of mind and soul, warmth of love, spirit to dare and undertake, and charm of person are all his. These beget in turn in others, interest, devotion, willingness to be commanded, and a sense of God which is authority. Now the ministry as friends of Christ are wrapped round with those ideals, and the Spirit, which issue from Him; they know Him, and here, in what begets devotion

or passion, have also the equipment for leadership. They dwell in His fellowship; they have felt the power of His constraining; they have entered into His mind; they have answered His call to service. It may be that for years they have walked with Him, and the divine face has shed upon them its radiance. This is great privilege and constraining. Other men live in associations not the best; these men are ever in the face of vision.

Here too we need a frank acceptance of the approvals and admirations of the heart as the very program of life, and fearlessly and enthusiastically to commit ourselves to Christ. There is solid ground beneath our feet at every step. Our ideals simply cannot be gainsaid; they represent the self-evident and undeniable; the compelling. The moral beauty and glory of Christ lay upon us inescapable charm. The incarnation of the good tremendously constrains us. Daily we

are brought into judgment by Him, and pronounce our own doom: we are miserable cowards and cravens we see and approve the better though we follow the worse. But looking upon Christ, the noblest and best are stirred within us we, too, go to the

cross.

We know by every feeling and to a certainty that no one can pin to truth and fail; that if we do good the heavens will not fall; that our condemnations of folly are in spite of all effort to excuse; that we loathe ourselves for our divided life; that Christ is our true self. Here, too, the machinery for heroic living is perfect and within the keeping of established religion. This is not to deny that it may become outworn, that it has many times stood idle, that few understood it, that it has not yielded a commensurate or living product. But it is in our keeping, and the day has come when again it must be chosen whether the output shall be worthier,

or whether current religion shall be discredited by other and more vital ideals or faiths. To save religion and make it a power, the ministry must lead. And the ministry can lead only by fearlessly and joyously accepting its own logic and ideals, and living a masterful life. To believe in God is to be devoted to the God we believe in is to commit ourselves to His will and His mind. Religion is partnership with God in the work and glory of life.

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The equipment of the minister for leadership by virtue of his immersion in the contemplation of the facts of the creed and the ideals and the heroes of the faith, and by personal fellowship with Christ, is wholly adequate. It is the official equipment of religion. Attention - do the psychologists ever tire telling us? commands the will. "What one thinks today he will do tomorrow," is the law. Positive conviction and full persuasion are not born out of strange and

uncertain thoughts. Can it be otherwise than that a busy, flitting life be without mighty convictions and strong religious, passions. Once men prepared for great careers by retirement into deserts: they came forth from their thinking and fasting and watching and praying and communing burning with faith. Moses and St. Paul, the great religious leaders, are examples. Meditation is a human necessity, not an oriental fashion. Men do not attend to the problems of life and destiny, do not think, do not conclude, do not have fellowship with Christ, and so are without strength of mastering conviction. Here, on the positive side, is the explanation of enthusiasms such as patriotism and religious feeling. The continued attention of men is arrested and held. Keep any cause intently and constantly before the attention of men, and they are subdued to the environment. This is true of even bad causes, as history proves.