Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 274, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 November 1916 — “INTO THE HEART" [ARTICLE]

“INTO THE HEART"

Righteousness Which Alone Can Satisfy God Must Be Perfect in Its Purity. “Except yonr righjeemsness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribe* and Phariseesr'ye shall 111 no wlm enter into.ifie Kingdom of Heaven."— Matt. 5:20. A strange doctrine this must have been to those who looked upon scribes and Pharisees as foremost ih religion. The scribes were the mostnoted teachers of the law, the Pharisees the most noted professors of It. It had been said among the Jews, ft but two people were to enter heaven, one would be a Pharisee, the other a scribe. What a surprise, then, to hear from the lips of the great Prophet of Nazareth that “except your rlghteonsnsaa shall exceed”—go beyond, be better than —“the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall In no case enter Into the kingdom of heaven.” Wherein did the righteousness of the Pharisees and the scribes fall short? What was lacking? It did not go far enough. They were extremely careful to observe some of the laws or parts of the law, while they fell short In others. And It did not go deep enough. That was the chief lack. It did not penetrate beneath the shell of the outward life. Holiness Above All Things. But the law of God, properly understood, reaches deep Into the heart with all Its desires, njotives, and thoughts. The law of God demands holiness in the inner sanctuary ns well as in the outer courts. To drive this home the Savior adduces, by way of Illustration, several commandments of the decalogue. “Ye have heard It said” —The traditional Interpretation confined the , application of these commands to the actual crimes. Our Lord shows that It extends deeper—lnto the heart. In the sight of him who searches the Inner fountain of life, the evil thought, the wicked wish, and the unclean de* sire are as guilty as the deeds. And so the only rightoou.<ness that can please God Is the one that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees; that conforms to the law not merely In oatward deed and aetlon, but also In the Inner recesses of the heart with its desires, motives, and thoughts. And this conformity to the law must be complete, without any violation whatsoever. Accordingly the Lord closes this section of his sermon on the Mount with the words recorded at the end of this chapter : “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is In heaven is perfect.” Perfection, a 100 per cent holiness. Is the only righteousness that can please the Lord. But Is this doctrine not sufficient to drive a man to despair? For where on this terrestrial globe Is the man who has ever succeeded in working out for himself and of himself a perfect rightness? “There Is not a Just man upon earth, that doeth good and slnneth not” (Eccl. 7:20), says the Preacher Inspired by the Omniscient Spirit of God. If God’s message t» humanity were confined to the law no one might hope to stand before the Omniscient One and receive the reward of eternal life by virtue of his own self-made, fllthy-rag ’righteousness. The sinner must wander to his grave condemned —lost. * Savior’s Gracious Promise. But. thank God, we have from the lips of Jesus, the prophets, and the apostles also the sweet Gospel message, which proclaims to unrighteousness, condemned, lost mankind the Joyful tidings, “Unto you Is bom a Savior, which is Christ the Lord.” And so what man could not do the Savior, which Is Christ the Lord, did. “Think not,” says he, “that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill.’* The Savior here assures ns that the purpose of his coming was to fulfill the law —that is, fill It full. The law with all Its demands and penalties may be considered as a vessel. Man had been trying to fill It full by his own efforts, but unsuccessfully. All have come far short of the mark. Hence we are all under the condemnation of God and his broken-law—last. But behold! “The Son of Man is come to seek and to sa|ve that which Is lost” And how did he save them? “I am come ... to fulfill” the law. He came, and with his atoning life and death filled it full to the brim; full, so that not one .word of the law remained unfilled, and not one penalty unsatisfied. He worked out a perfect righteousness.—Rev. H. P. Eckhardt