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HAT is the true place of a creed in a religion: of any creed in any religion? In particular, what is the place and part of the Christian creed in the Christian religion? In itself that is a question of great interest, well worth our careful thought. It is one of the burning questions of the day. It is also a question of vital and practical importance. I should like to take for granted that my readers want to be Christians, and want to be better Christians than they are. If so, this question of the creed will have a direct bearing on their personal religion, on their personal attachment to their Lord. I want them therefore to give this inquiry a personal, and individual note: to ask themselves, "What am I as a Christian to do or to think about the creed? Ought I to hold to it? Ought I to let it go? And if so, why? What is its real and rightful place in my religion?" So interrogating themselves, my readers may get out of this discussion, not only mental stimulus, but also, what is vastly more important, spiritual help and satisfaction: a growth in faith and grace.

I.

My purpose is to treat this question as simply and practically as I can, seeking to give a right direction to your thought, leaving details to be worked out by you at your leisure. At the start, a concrete

illustration may be of help. Think of a journey you have made from one place to another: say, from Washington to Baltimore. You can split up that journey, so to speak, into three parts or stages. Three things went to make it up. First, there was your desire to go. Nothing would have happened without that. For one reason or another, you wanted to go to Baltimore. That is where it all began. Next came the means of transportation which you used. You had to find some way of getting there. Desires, however strong, are not enough to carry anyone on any journey to any goal. To make a journey you must have a means of transit. So you took a motor or a train, and went upon your way. That was the second step. Lastly, came the arrival: the getting there: the reaching of your goal. your goal. That was the great point: that completed the whole thing: that meant the fulfillment of your original desire. your original desire. The journey was accomplished.

Now religion is like a journey: indeed it may be well thought of and defined as the journey of the soul to God. Like every journey, it has the same three parts or stages: a start, a transit, an arrival. Its start is in desire for God. That is where it all begins. "My soul is athirst for God: yea, even for the Living God. When shall I come to appear before the presence of God?" Until, and unless, some such "thirst of soul" comes to us, religion must remain a

secret hidden from us, an experience quite outside of our lives. So it So it starts in a desire. Next, it must find means of transportation: a way of access. Something, someone, is needed to point the way: to give directions: to communicate the needed spiritual motive power which will bring one where one wants to be, that is, into contact and fellowship with God. Lastly, to crown it and complete it, comes the arrival: some actual reality or experience of communion with the God of one's desire. And the arrival is the chief point, the great thing. My whole religious hope is set on it. My whole religious satisfaction depends on it.

With

out some confidence or faith that God is not a stranger: that I know Him for what He is: that I have really discovered what He approves and what He disapproves: what He would have me do and leave undone: until I have some definite assurance that my life is in touch with His life, my religious desire leads me nowhere, comes to nothing: has no practical meaning for me, no bearing on my

life.

meant to supply us with the means of transportation on our religious In the spiritual sphere journey.

they correspond to the trains or motor cars which we take to make our earthly journeys. Creeds, all creeds which have been set forth and believed, have as their real purpose, to give or show to men the way of access into the Presence and Fellowship of God. That may be a rather crude and superficial way of putting it, but it does put us on the track: it starts us thinking in the right way. Creeds are the means of access: they are nothing more and they are nothing less. They are secondary, not primary, in religion.

They are

the means, not the ends. But they are necessary. Without them there could be no arrival: no realized or practical religion. "O that I knew where I might find Him, that I might even come into His Presence." It is the office of the creed to tell us where and how.

II.

A creed, then, although not the chief part, is still a necessary part, of a religion. It is not the end itself, but it is a necessary means by which the end is gained. Hence it is that every religion is known by its creed. The instant you hear of Judaism, for instance, or of Buddhism, or Islam, or Spiritualism, or Mormonism, or Christian Science, you think at once of their respective creeds. Each one has its answer to the soul's question: "How and where may I find God?" It is through the answer which it gives to the religious question "How?" that each religion makes its claim on men's attention and allegiance. A religion gets its name and definition from its creed. (Continued on page 33)