We are seeing how every human
problem when pressed to its ultimate issue becomes theological. Here
is where the fertile field for contemporary preaching lies. It
is found, not in remaining with those elements in the religious
consciousness which it shares in common with naturalism and humanism,
but in passing over to those which are distinctive to itself alone. It
has always been true, but it is especially true at this moment, that
effective preaching has to do chiefly with transcendent values.
Our task is to assert, first, then, the "otherness" of man, his
difference from Nature, to point out the illusoriness of her phenomena
for him, the derived reality and secondary value of her facts.
These are things that need religious elucidation. The phrase
"other-worldliness" has come, not without reason, to have an evil
connotation among us, but there is nevertheless a genuine disdain
of this world, a sense of high superiority to it and profound
indifference toward it, which is of the essence of the religious
attitude. He who knows that here he is a stranger, sojourning in
tabernacles; that he belongs by his nature, not to this world, but
that he seeks a better, that is to say, a heavenly country, will for
the joy that is set before him, endure a cross and will despise
the shame. He will have a conscious superiority to hostile facts of
whatever sort or magnitude, for he knows that they deceive in so
far as they pretend to finality.
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