And yet, and
yet, he says, and says plainly, that a man thinking differently from all
this or at least, quite unprepared to make this whole-hearted profession
of faith, is yet his brother in Christ, in whom the knowledge of Christ
that he has will work and work, the new leaven casting out the old
leaven until he, too, in the revelation of the Father, shall come to the
perfect stature of the fulness of Christ. Meantime, Paul, the Apostle,
must show due reverence to the halting and dull disciple. He must and
will make no demand upon him on the grounds of what he, Paul, believes.
He is where he is, and God is his teacher. To his own Master,--that is,
Paul's Master, and not Paul,--he stands. He leaves him to the company of
his Master. "Leaves him?" No: that he does not; that he will never do,
any more than God will leave him. Still and ever will he hold him and
help him. But how help him, if he is not to press upon him his own
larger and deeper and wiser insights? The answer is ready: he will
press, not his opinion, not even the man's opinion, but the man's own
faith upon him. "O brother, beloved of the Father, walk in the
light,--in the light, that is, which is thine, not which is mine; in the
light which is given to thee, not to me: thou canst not walk by my
light, I cannot walk by thine: how should either walk except by the
light which is in him? O brother, what thou seest, that do; and what
thou seest not, that thou shalt see: God himself, the Father of Lights,
will show it to you.
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