The whole of Christianity is comprised in three things—to believe, to love, and to obey Jesus. These are things, however, which we must be learning all our life.
Christianity may produce agitation, anger, tumult as at Ephesus; but the diffusion of the pure gospel of Christ, and the establishment of the institutions of honesty and virtue, at whatever cost, is a blessing to mankind.
Christianity depends finally on consciousness and experience. From other departments of the mind she may retire at times or seem to, but never from this. Sitting here, if allowed to, on the throne of the soul, she occasionally walks into the other rooms and sets them in order; and accustomed to her presence, sooner or later the soul finds every department flooded with her light.
Christian faith is a grand cathedral, with divinely pictured windows. Standing without you see no glory, nor can possibly imagine any. Nothing is visible but the merest outline of dusky shapes. Standing within all is clear and denned; every ray of light reveals an army of unspeakable splendors.
Christianity is perfect, men are imperfect. Now a perfect consequence cannot spring from an imperfect principle. Christianity, therefore, is not the work of man. If Christianity is not the work of man, it can have come from none but God. If it came from God, men cannot have acquired a knowledge of it except by revelation. Therefore, Christianity is a revealed religion.
