GIFT or 
 
OUR 
 IDENING 
 THOUGHT 
 OF GOD 
 
OUR WIDENING 
 THOUGHT o/GOD 
 
 1 
 
 " YET I DOUBT NOT THROUGH 
 THE AGES ONE INCREASING 
 PURPOSE RUNS <* AND THE 
 THOUGHTS OF MEN ARE WI- 
 DENED WITH THE PROCESS 
 OF THE SUNS." Tennyson. 
 
 
 By CHARLES SUMMER 
 NASH, President of the 
 Pacific Theological 
 Seminary 
 
 PAUL ELDER AND 
 COMPANY-PUBLISHERS 
 SAN FRANCISCO 
 
 
Copyright, 1914 
 By Paul Elder and Company- 
 San Francisco 
 
 
 
 
 
 
TO MY STUDENTS 
 

By Way of Introduction 
 
 The address which follows was pre- 
 pared for a special purpose and de- 
 livered in San Francisco, March 19, 
 1914. The occasion was planned in 
 the interest of expanding views of 
 certain main Christian truths, con- 
 cerning which differences of opinion 
 had disturbed the public mind. No 
 less than fourteen hundred persons 
 testified by their presence their alert 
 interest in the themes presented. This 
 address was one of three, the other 
 topics being "The Changed View of 
 the Bible" and "Christ from the Mod- 
 ern Point of View." The addresses 
 were received most sympathetically 
 and evoked many expressions of ap- 
 preciation and gratitude. They were 
 printed in response to an urgent call 
 and circulated widely. 
 
 This address is now published in 
 the hope that it may reach a still 
 larger number of thoughtful readers 
 who may be helped through confusiqn 
 into clearness or cheered and sustained 
 in their religious convictions. The 
 author assumes to speak for no one 
 but himself. There are, however, large 
 and enlarging numbers within and 
 without the churches who hold the 
 interpretations here offered and find 
 life deepened and enriched. These 
 are not final conceptions. Spiritual 
 experience will be granted yet wider 
 horizons and profounder realities in 
 the knowledge of God. Life is infinite 
 and "the rapture of the forward view" 
 is endless. 
 
 308343 
 
OUR WIDENING 
 THOUGHT o/GOD 
 
 W 
 
 E ARE here tonight in 
 no spirit of controversy 
 or conceit. We would 
 say no word that would 
 sting or hurt those who 
 may differ with us. We 
 would not disparage the past. We are 
 children of our fathers. They have 
 lifted us to our high estate. If we 
 stand upon their shoulders, it is what 
 they desired and trained us to do. We 
 should be sadly false to them if we 
 had failed to make the advance for 
 which they prepared and charged us. 
 We are, moreover, the children of 
 those who counted religion the su- 
 preme interest and duty of life. If 
 they expected the new day to be fuller 
 of light and they certainly did ex- 
 pect it it was the light of God upon 
 the human spirit that they meant. It 
 is our duty to them as well as to God, 
 in grateful memory of all they knew 
 and taught us, to live and learn be- 
 yond them. We have reverenced and 
 obeyed them by going forward. In 
 this generation mankind has made be- 
 wildering strides and is still marching 
 on in seven-league boots. No depart- 
 ment of human thought and life is at 
 a standstill. And in the universal pro- 
 cess, wheresoever religion has igno- 
 rantly or timidly or stubbornly halted 
 in its tracks, there it has lost its op- 
 portunity and declined its duty. As 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 i 
 
 a general truth, it has not halted nor 
 held back. Religion is a conserving 
 and steadying force in human life. 
 In these marvelous new days, when 
 men are so intoxicated with the wine 
 of life, religion should not lose its 
 poise. Advance it must make, afraid 
 of nothing, appropriating and inter- 
 preting all truth, adapting itself to all 
 conditions, maintaining its control of 
 human thought and action. It must 
 think and speak in the language of the 
 day, or men will cease to understand 
 and then will cease to listen. And 
 these days in which we live are so 
 rapid that religion finds it hard to 
 keep its eternal values intelligible to 
 swiftly changing thought and applied 
 to human need. But its effort to ad- 
 vance without loss and hurt is far 
 more valiant and successful than 
 many suppose. Religious truth is 
 roomy and spacious; there are cozy 
 corners for those who are content 
 with what they have, and far horizons 
 for those who are off and away, eager 
 and not content. Long advance in 
 religious thought and experience has 
 been made in the last seventy-five 
 years. It should not be counted 
 strange. The greatest changes that 
 have ever occurred in human thought 
 and knowledge and in their applica- 
 tion to living conditions have come 
 since 1850. And the men who have 
 been thinking out religious truth and 
 applying it to life are the same men 
 who have lived through the wondrous 
 changes in science and philosophy 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 and education and economics and 
 morals and social service. And men 
 must unify their thinking; not long 
 can they keep religion in a separate 
 compartment. All truth is one, and 
 religion must be at home everywhere. 
 
 I. 
 
 God is the final reality; beyond 
 Him human thought can not go; short 
 of Him it can not rest. Thought about 
 God is thought in its farthest reach. 
 Experience of God is the deepest need 
 and desire of man; consciousness of 
 it his joy and strength, his transform- 
 ing power. It follows that a change 
 in our conception of God can be noth- 
 ing less than a most profound and 
 vital change. Such a change has 
 passed and is passing over our Chris- 
 tian thought, surpassing all the more 
 superficial, yet astounding changes of 
 our time. This change may be char- 
 acterized as follows: 
 
 In method it is an exchange of 
 the intellectual for the experimental, 
 of elaborate interpretation for simple 
 statement of fact and reality. Greek 
 philosophy "took a simple faith and 
 left an elaborate system of belief. It 
 added to the bulk of doctrine, but not 
 to its vitality or working vigor."* 
 Metaphysical inquiry and discussion 
 took the place of tne experience of 
 the heart. The way unto God and the 
 life in God became too largely intel- 
 lectual assent to manifold doctrine. 
 
 1. Clarke What Shall We Think of Christianity?" p. 71. 
 
 a 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 I I 
 
 Elaborate interpretations were sub- 
 stituted for the heart of the truth. 
 Then these elaborations were fixed 
 in formal and authoritative creeds. 
 "The Church went on to build the 
 doctrine into a scholastic system. The 
 system has grown, until the head of 
 tne organization stands as the infal- 
 lible teacher."! 
 
 Christian truth has come down to 
 us thus elaborated and formalized. 
 But men have always been thinking 
 for themselves and no official creed 
 has been final. The cry of the heart 
 for truth and power could not be 
 stifled, and the search has been con- 
 tinuous for the real and simple truth 
 beneath the burdensome and power- 
 less forms. The real truth has re- 
 mained, however overlaid. Today 
 more than ever men insist upon find- 
 ing it and rejoicing in it as the es- 
 sential thing. It has recently been 
 said, "The permanent element in the 
 doctrine (any doctrine) consists in 
 the declaration of the great experi- 
 mental truths; the changing and pass- 
 ing element consists in the various in- 
 terpretations of those truths, made 
 from time to time in human thought. 
 We need to be called back to the 
 realities, where the power dwells." 2 
 As fast, brethren, as we recognize this 
 difference between the central reality 
 and the various interpretations, be- 
 tween essentials and non-essentials, 
 we shall cease to strive over interpre- 
 
 1. Clarke- "What Shall We Think of Chri.tianity?" p. 72. 73. 
 
 2. CUrke" What Shall We Think of Christianity?" p. 92. 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 tations and shall welcome one another 
 "back to the realities, where the power 
 dwells." 
 
 . It is true at this moment that men 
 are tired of insistent discussions of 
 non-essentials and are seeking a vital 
 experience of the simple heart of 
 truth. They are seeking God less by 
 the hard labor of the mind than 
 through moral sympathy, through the 
 trust and love of the heart. We are 
 incniiring after God, not of philosophy, 
 but of Jesus Christ, His Son, our 
 Brother. We are listening to His 
 words, "Blessed are the pure in heart 
 for they shall see God;" and, "He that 
 hath seen Me hath seen the Father." 
 
 II. 
 
 Beholding God in and through 
 Jesus Christ, we are surer than ever 
 that we have found Him to be a Per- 
 son. In the Man of Nazareth was a 
 fulness of life whose measure we can 
 not take. Before His clear and guile- 
 less consciousness of communion with 
 the personal God we stand in awe. 
 The religion which He taught is noth- 
 ing else than such communion. The 
 life into which He restores men is 
 the same experience of personal com- 
 munion with God. For nearly two 
 millenniums Christians have been 
 repeating the mysterious experience 
 of divine fellowship, of exchanging 
 thought and feeling with an infinite 
 Friend. We have not lost His person- 
 ality in His infinity. In Him all the 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 elements of true personality are raised 
 to perfection. Lacking all incomplete- 
 ness and limitation, He is the self- 
 existent, self-conscious and self-direct- 
 ing Person. We may or may not think 
 Him out in philosophical terms, or 
 present Him in a creed. The vital 
 thing is that we find and recognize 
 Him and share the fulness of His life. 
 Though we never can compass 
 His being, we have a wealth of vital 
 experience too wonderful to be sup- 
 pressed. Hence the historic doctrine 
 of the Trinity. This was not an effort 
 of sheer metaphysics; it was an earn- 
 est attempt to formulate an experience 
 of the personal God too complex for 
 simple definition. The doctrine of the 
 Trinity has persisted and will persist. 
 The' permanent element in it is "the 
 declaration of the great experimental 
 truths;" the voluminous, labored in- 
 terpretations are good for those who 
 find them helpful. Believing souls 
 recognized in Jesus "the fulness of 
 the Godhead bodily," God incarnate, 
 G9d manifest in humanity. Through 
 Him they apprehended God Himself, 
 whom Jesus called Father, the final 
 Reality, the self-existent One, who so 
 loved as to reveal Himself to redeem 
 His children. Through Christ, again, 
 they became aware of God dwelling in 
 their hearts in a ministry of power, 
 and they called him the Holy Spirit. 
 These three seemed all so real and so 
 divine as often to be held separate and 
 equal while yet they blended into the 
 single conception of the infinite God. 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 It has been difficult to keep the unity 
 of God. There are three persons in 
 one God, said the ancient thinkers. 
 Popular faith and W9rship have often 
 had three gods, losing the unity in 
 showing full reverence to each. Mod- 
 ern thought is now clearing and es- 
 tablishing the unity. The three are 
 persons only in an ancient sense, not 
 in the modern meaning of separate 
 personalities. The one God holds all 
 the relations there are with His cre- 
 ated universe. In every experience it 
 is God Himself we meet, not S9me rep- 
 resentative of God. "The universe is 
 one," says the thinker quoted above, 
 "and God is one. One God, one mind, 
 one will this is the only form in 
 which any belief in God whatever is 
 possible in the world as we know it 
 now. God Himself is the 
 
 Father, God Himself is the divine in 
 Jesus Christ, and God Himself is the 
 Holy Spirit." The writer may well 
 add, and we adopt his words, 'There 
 is not less divine indwelling than the 
 ancient doctrine affirmed, but more, 
 but it is the indwelling of God. 'I 
 will dwell in them' (2 Cor. 6:16) is 
 a true word without diminution."! We 
 shall keep the terms and figures of 
 the ancient doctrine of the Trinity. 
 Our interpretations will differ, but 
 that is not essential. Some will 
 reduce the terms to mere modes of 
 three-fold manifestation of the one 
 God. Others will hold the doctrine in 
 a different sphere, as the worthiest 
 
 1. Clarke-" Christian Doctrine of God." p. 237, 246. 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 effort to express the limitless wealth 
 of our experience of the infinite God. 
 Beneath all varieties of interpretation 
 we dwell together as brethren in the 
 one God, our Father. 
 
 III. 
 
 Another change which has passed 
 over our religious thinking is a change 
 from legal, formal and institutional to 
 personal conceptions. We used to 
 think of God as monarch, wielding the 
 sceptre and jealous for His throne. 
 We thought of Him as King over a 
 kingdom of sheer power, triumphing 
 over enemies, reducing all creatures 
 to subjection, ruling in majesty and 
 might. We thought of Him as Judge 
 dispensing severe justice over crea- 
 tures of wrath, condemning and pun- 
 ishing, inflicting endless and hopeless 
 penalties, as the only way to sustain 
 His omnipotent government. * We are 
 learning at last, really learning and 
 understanding, that God is our Father, 
 and that we are not subjugated ene- 
 mies nor condemned culprits, but 
 children beloved and cherished. Our 
 Father is indeed Lord of all, clothed 
 with infinite majesty. To His lord- 
 ship we must forever answer. But as 
 we find God in Christ, the greatest 
 truth regained most true of Him and 
 us, supreme over all other truths, de- 
 termining all His relations with us 
 is His Fatherhood and our sonship. 
 This truth is now radiant and surpass- 
 ing. The filial relation is chief of all. 
 
 8 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 "Our Father" is the address to be for- 
 ever on our lips. By that must all 
 truth and duty be tested and ex- 
 plained. Our days should be those of 
 growing children, responsive to our 
 Father's love, unfolding in His light, 
 approaching His moral perfection, 
 working with Him and with one an- 
 other. The extent and significance of 
 this change from the institutional to 
 the personal we may be slow to ap- 
 preciate; but no sooner do we catch 
 its first meanings than we know our- 
 selves delivered into the "liberty of 
 the glory of the children of God." 
 
 What is the character of God? 
 is the deepest question of the ages. 
 Our reply now is this: God is what 
 Jesus of Nazareth said He was, what 
 Jesus Himself was. He is like Christ. 
 There is nothing higher to be said. 
 Our thought can not reach beyond 
 the perfect character and divine 
 consciousness of Jesus. Seeing the 
 Father in Him "sufliceth us." How 
 profound and complete it is, yet how 
 simple! It is not metaphysical analy- 
 sis, it is spiritual vision. It finds the 
 inmost truth about the divine nature, 
 because it finds God Himself. God is 
 in Christ, and he who accepts Christ 
 by faith receives God and knows Him 
 by the kinship of moral life and the 
 answer of love. Much remains to 
 learn of God, but there is no different 
 God to replace Him whom we have 
 found in and through Jesus. We have 
 begun to live in the Living One. Thus 
 have Christians always found God 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 through Christ the Way, but have been 
 confused and burdened by the elabo- 
 rate creeds enforced by faulty leaders 
 who could not believe that it was 
 enough to see God in Christ. The re- 
 turn to this simplicity of faith and 
 vision is a modern renewal of life at 
 its very source. 
 
 Learning of Jesus Christ, our 
 modern emphasis is now resting upon 
 God's moral perfection and His love. 
 God is a holy being, and God is love, 
 we are chiefly saying. Those are the 
 truths we most need to know of Him. 
 Those are the most radiant and mighty 
 qualities in Jesus. Those are the truths 
 bearing most commandingly upon our 
 duty and most blessedly upon our 
 welfare. His truth, His wisdom, His 
 justice, His power, all His attributes 
 we revere. "But the central element 
 in the doctrine of God is the moral 
 and religious. Not the divine power, 
 but the divine character is at the 
 front. Not the philosophy of His na- 
 ture, but the love and righteousness of 
 God is the primary fact in the doc- 
 trine."! There is an extraordinarv 
 moral reaction abroad at the present 
 time. Men feel the call to rectitude 
 and perfection. Salvation is seen to 
 be a moral process, however miracu- 
 lously it may begin in renewal and 
 conversion. It is deeply felt that 
 God will have nothing less from men 
 than the pursuit and attainment of 
 holy character. Christian living is not 
 so much church membership or cere- 
 
 1. CUrke-T.hriitian Doctrine of Cod." p. 53. 
 
 10 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 monial worship as it is likeness to 
 Christ in character and service. The 
 sincere soul acknowledges that all 
 his actions must be clean and right, 
 out of a character whose spirit and 
 substance are holy as God is holy. 
 Never an age so complex and con- 
 fused; nor ever an age when men of 
 sincere and intelligent purpose bowed 
 so surely to the moral imperative. We 
 must work out our own salvation till 
 we are perfect as pur heavenly Father 
 is perfect. The victory of holy char- 
 acter must be won. 
 
 It can be won, for love is su- 
 
 ?reme. Not alone by resident human 
 orces must our salvation be worked 
 out, for God worketh His own will in 
 us. The truest and greatest word 
 about the nature of God is that He is 
 love. Whatever else our Father is, 
 love is His inmost being, His all-per- 
 vading quality. However He may ap- 
 pear to act toward His children at anv 
 time, His love is always perfect and 
 supreme. Else were He not our Fa- 
 ther. Love is not mere good nature, 
 that men should do all manner of evil 
 with impunity. But the Father's love 
 is mightier than the waywardness, the 
 resistance, the weakness and the guilt 
 of His wilful children. He will help 
 them through, by whatever devious 
 and painful ways, unto perfection and 
 filial love, if they are willing; nay 
 more, will not His love prevail to 
 make them willing and bring them 
 home? Shall sovereign and exhaust- 
 less love fail? 
 
 11 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 So stands men's hope today, be- 
 lieving that infinite love will make the 
 victory of holy character complete 
 and universal, and that "good shall 
 fall at last, far off, at last to all." 
 
 IV. 
 
 Another far-reaching change in 
 our conception has been that which is 
 represented in the modern doctrine 
 of the immanence of God. His trans- 
 cendence has always been a great ar- 
 ticle of our faith. It means that God 
 is greater than all that He has created 
 and independent of it. It was often 
 held to mean that God was absent 
 from the world an "absentee God." 
 He kept the world running by resi- 
 dent forces. Its regular processes 
 went on without His immediate action. 
 Occasionally He broke in by what is 
 called a miracle, but for the most part 
 He remained aloof, He governed from 
 without. 
 
 We have always had, it is true, 
 the precious truth of the divine omni- 
 presence. We have believed God pres- 
 ent everywhere. He could act in- 
 stantly at any point or at all points. 
 Men could reach Him with their praise 
 and prayer, and were the objects of 
 His unfailing care. Thus have we 
 brought near the infinite and trans- 
 cendent God. We have rejoiced in 
 the rich Scriptures which set forth 
 His presence with men, His provi- 
 dence, His spiritual indwelling, His 
 
 12 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 immediate transforming influence in 
 a word, His communion with His chil- 
 dren. 
 
 In this truth of the divine pres- 
 ence we have reality and complete 
 vital values. We might use the term 
 omnipresence for the recent great ex- 
 
 Eansion of our thought and faith. We 
 ave, however, taken the term imma- 
 nence instead. We have made a new 
 discovery of God's vital relation to 
 His universe. We have caught new 
 meanings in the old truth that the 
 transcendent God, who surpasses all, 
 dwells in all. We have discerned that 
 His real presence everywhere is a con- 
 tinuously creative presence. The pro- 
 cesses of life do really work by resi- 
 dent forces, but those forces are not 
 merely set in motion by the Creator, 
 they are the continual action of the 
 indwelling Spirit. He creates and sus- 
 tains and governs, not from without, 
 but from within. Modern philosophic 
 thought has reached this revelation, 
 and Christian thought finds its Scrip- 
 tures rising to the height of the great 
 argument. The late Professor Bowne 
 has put it in this way: "In the new 
 conception the supernatural is nothing 
 foreign to nature and making occa- 
 sional raids into nature in order to re- 
 veal itself; but, so far as nature is 
 concerned the supernatural is the ever 
 present ground and administrator of 
 nature; and nature is simply the form 
 under which the Supreme Reason and 
 Will manifest themselves. This is the 
 doctrine of the divine immanence to 
 
 13 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 which philosophy is coming in its 
 search after the cosmic causality. We 
 come down to a Living Will which 
 worketh hitherto and worketh ever- 
 more. The commonest event, 
 say the fall of a leaf, is as supernatural 
 in its causation as any miracle would 
 be; for in both alike God would be 
 equally implicated." 1 "The instructed 
 theist, then," he adds, "sets aside the 
 self-running nature and the absentee 
 God. For him God is the 
 ever present agent in the ongoing of 
 the world, and nature is but the form 
 and product of His ceaseless activ- 
 ity." 1 The same writer says again: 
 "The presence of God in nature does 
 not mean that God is here and there 
 in the world performing miracles, but 
 that the whole cosmic movement de- 
 pends constantly upon the divine will 
 and is an expression of the divine 
 purpose. In like manner the presence 
 of God in history does not mean ex- 
 clusively, or mainly, that God is work- 
 ing signs and wonders upon occasion, 
 but rather that God is carrying on 
 the great historical movement and 
 working His will therein."2 
 
 This is the Christian view of the 
 relations of God to His universe. "Of 
 Him and through Him and unto Him 
 are all things." In the divine Son "all 
 things hold together." "Whither shall 
 I go from Thy Spirit? Or whither 
 shall I flee from Thy presence?" "He 
 that dwelleth in the secret place of 
 
 1. Bowne-"Immanence of God." p. 17, 24. 
 
 2. Bowne "Immanence of God." p. 43. 
 
 14 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 the Most High shall abide under the 
 shadow of the Almighty." "Thus saith 
 the high and lofty One that inhabiteth 
 eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell 
 in the high and holy place, with him 
 also that is of a contrite and humble 
 spirit." Not a sparrow "shall fall on 
 the ground without your Father," and 
 "the very hairs of your head are all 
 numbered." "The God that made the 
 world, and all things therein, giveth 
 to all life and breath and all things; 
 He is not far from each one of us; 
 for in Him we live, and move, and 
 have our being." The deepest spirit 
 and drift of the Scriptures carries this 
 truth of the most intimate indwelling 
 and creative contact of God in nature 
 and in man. It can not be overstated. 
 God is forever uttering and imparting 
 Himself. His love is incessantly out- 
 poured. His children may be "filled 
 unto all the fulness of God." 
 
 In this truth of the immanent God 
 an immense change has passed over 
 our religious thinking and our Chris- 
 tian living. Two or three implications 
 call for special mention. In the first 
 place, the orderly processes of nature 
 and human nature have taken the evi- 
 dential place formerly held by mir- 
 acles. We need not disbelieve in 
 miracles. God is still omnipotent, able 
 to operate in startling ways if need 
 be, to bring in a higher law to check 
 the operation of a lower for that is 
 what miracles are now seen to mean. 
 But the "isolated wonder" is no longer 
 necessary to manifest God's presence 
 
 15 
 

 Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 and display His power. Every living 
 blade of grass is proof of His inwork- 
 ing energy; so is "each glad, obedient 
 planet" that "sings through the web 
 that time is weaving;" so is the mar- 
 velous pageant of the seasons, the 
 birth of children, the love of mothers, 
 the awakening of Helen Keller through 
 the infinite ministry of love; so is 
 every open eye and ~vocal tongue and 
 every vital breath. Evolution is still 
 a fearsome word to many devout 
 souls, but it has revolutionized our 
 thinking. Its truth does not banish 
 God, but intensifies the light and 
 power of His presence. It is but a 
 study in the method of God's opera- 
 tion in nature and man. 
 
 "A fire-mist and a planet, 
 
 A crystal and a cell, 
 A jelly-fish and a saurian, 
 
 And caves where the cave men 
 
 dwell; 
 Then a sense of law and beauty, 
 
 And a face turned from the clod; 
 Some call it evolution, 
 
 And others call it God." 
 
 It is evolution, and it is God. The 
 whole ageless process is the creative 
 work of the Eternal, who, moment by 
 moment, everywhere, worketh hither- 
 to and forevermore. 
 
 Then the words "natural" and 
 "supernatural" may be cleared of con- 
 fusion. You can not draw a distinct 
 line through God's creation and call 
 the lower part natural and the higher 
 
 16 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 part supernatural. The only place to 
 draw the line is between the whole 
 created universe on the one hand and 
 God on the other. The created uni- 
 verse is the natural, and God is the 
 supernatural. Nor are these anywhere 
 separate, the one from the other. They 
 dwell together, each in the other, in 
 an intimacy deep beyond our compre- 
 hension. 
 
 "Earth's crammed with heaven, 
 And every common bush afire with 
 God." 
 
 Nor do the words "sacred" and 
 "profane" or "secular" express valid 
 distinctions. Nothing in the natural 
 order is unhallowed, for all is filled 
 with God and is the expression of His 
 life. Doubtless we erring children 
 profane the sacred works of our 
 Father, debasing even our own spirits 
 which are the highest of God's crea- 
 tions. Doubtless, too, it is necessary 
 for us to set apart some things to 
 moral and religious uses days of 
 rest and worship, a Lenten season, 
 churches, cathedrals, abbeys, rituals, 
 a peace palace, homes, hospitals, God's 
 acre. But we need to hold all things 
 as of God and sacred, save as touched 
 by moral evil. 
 
 There are certain special work- 
 ings of these changed emphases and 
 modern conceptions which marvel- 
 ously enrich our religious experience. 
 We are becoming familiar with the 
 divine order of life and serenely con- 
 
 17 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 fident of our secure place therein. 
 "Not chiefly in flashes of God, but in 
 a steady world, is the divine reality 
 revealed." We learn to rest with set- 
 tled confidence in the steady world 
 filled with the faithful God. There 
 grows within us the sensitive realiza- 
 tion of that inner Presence. Every 
 blossom is opened by His hand. 
 Every tree stands in His strength. 
 Every bird sings in the Father's joy. 
 On tne hills or by the sea, we walk 
 in His mystic presence, where "In 
 His temple everything saith 'Glory'!' 
 
 V. 
 
 We rise, then, to the higher levels 
 of the truth. Chiefly does God dwell 
 in the spiritual order of which all in- 
 telligent beings are a part. In Him 
 we have our being. In higher and 
 richer volume than in a tree does God, 
 who* is a spirit, dwell in His children. 
 Our being is of the same kind as God's 
 being, since we are His offspring. We 
 used to believe just ^yesterday that 
 human nature and divine nature were 
 essentially unlike and could not inter- 
 penetrate save in the one Person, 
 Christ Jesus, in some miraculous 
 union. We are now convinced that 
 the Father and His children are alike. 
 There are not two diverse kinds of 
 spirit. The human is capable of re- 
 ceiving and expressing the divine. In 
 the one matchless Person the expres- 
 sion was unhindered and perfect. But 
 all communion with God is an incar- 
 
 18 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 nation, and all true living is, so far as 
 it goes, a manifestation of the incar- 
 nate God. The intimacy of an obe- 
 dient and visional soul with the in- 
 dwelling Spirit of God is too profound 
 and pervasive to be understood per- 
 fectly. We strain our speech to ut- 
 ter it. 
 
 "Closer is He than breathing, 
 And nearer than hands and feet." 
 
 "He is not so far away as even to 
 be near." Jesus prayed, "Even as 
 Thou, Father, art in me, and I in 
 Thee, that they also may be in us." 
 In this mystery shall we riot somewhat 
 amend the language of our spiritual 
 experience? God does not come; He 
 is with us. He does not withdraw, 
 else we should instantly die. We do 
 not go here or there to find Him. We 
 do not leave Him when we depart. 
 Prayer should not be an agony of 
 pleading to move a reluctant God; 
 rather, the trustful inquiry of a child 
 after the Father's will, and a serene 
 infilling with the Father's power. Do- 
 ing the will of God is no grudging 
 obedience to arbitrary commands, no 
 mere fulfillment of written orders. 
 The will of God is His infinite energy 
 working in perfect love toward His 
 perfect ends. And doing His will 
 is accepting our Father's purposes 
 and throwing all our kindled force 
 into the onward sweep of His power. 
 Living thus in Him and He in us. 
 why not with a sound mind in a 
 sound body, with abounding energy 
 
 19 
 
Our Widening Thought of God 
 
 and contagious love? Surely so, in 
 so far as we can take the vital cur- 
 rents of the indwelling God. Such 
 living is "under the aspect of eter- 
 nity." It makes "our noisy years seem 
 moments in the being of the eternal 
 silence." It believes that sovereign 
 love can not be defeated. The holv 
 city of God can be brought down out 
 of lieaven and built, all glorious with 
 redeemed humanity, here on earth. 
 The materials for it are here, in the 
 divine nature of God's children per- 
 vaded with the Father's redeeming 
 presence, in the awakening of the chil- 
 dren to their heavenly inheritance and 
 the victorious power within and 
 among them. Here, too, is founded 
 our hope of personal and social im- 
 mortality. When Christ, who is our 
 life, shall appear, then shall we appear 
 with Him in glory. Children created 
 in the image of God, redeemed by His 
 incarnate love, sustained by His in- 
 flowing and abiding presence, have 
 no other destiny than their Father's 
 home. The world today believes, as 
 it never knew enough to believe be- 
 fore, the Father's word through Jesus, 
 "I go to prepare a place for you, 
 * and will receive you unto 
 Myself." 
 
 The widening thought of God has 
 brought a fulness of life unknown to 
 any preceding age. "The tabernacle 
 of God is with men * and God 
 
 Himself is with them. * * * And 
 He that sitteth on the throne saith, Be- 
 hold, I make all things new." 
 
 20 
 
HERE ENDS OUR WIDENING THOUGHT OF 
 GOD, BEING AN ADDRESS DELIVERED BY 
 CHARLES SUMNER NASH. PUBLISHED IN 
 BOOK FORM BY PAUL ELDER & COMPANY, 
 AND SEEN THROUGH THEIR TOMOYE PRESS 
 BY JOHN SWART IN THE CITY OF SAN FRAN- 
 CISCO, DURING THE MONTH OF NOVEMBER, 
 NINETEEN HUNDRED AND FOURTEEN. 
 
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 
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 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY