Starting from this point, the revelation of God as Father is the means of the enlargement of our personality in three ways, through (a) His forgive- ness of us, (b) our imitation of Him, (c) the com- munion between Him and us.
{a) God's forgiveness, gratefullj- received, is the first stage of man's moral freedom. It must always be a factor in our filial consciousness, but at first it may be said to Ije the only, or at least the chief one. Tims it was the message in which Christ first ex- pres.sed the meaning of the Fatherhood (^Ik 2''), and which He ever delighted to bring to the children who felt themselves farthest from home (Lk lo'*-^-). Their repentance made joy in heaven (15"), while the Divine forgiveness Avoke love in their hearts (7'''). For it is the spiritual release that goes to the root of our being, and .sets free the wholesome springs of goodness, long sealed and ignored (18" 19*^). But forgiveness was more than a ' word of grace' : it was a gain for the world at the cost of Calvary (Mt 26-*). And that cost was ultimately met out of the treasuries of the Fathers heart, ' who so loved the world that he gave his only- begotten Son ' ( Jn S"', cf. Ro S^). Forgiveness in the name of Christ is thus the measure of the
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estimate in which our personality is held in the sight of God.
(b) Our imitation of God. — Sonship, being ours potentially through forgiveness, becomes ours actu- ally through imitation. If one may venture to say so, without seeming to undervalue the continuity of grace, in forgiveness God pays our debts, in order that in imitation we may pay our way. We are ' made nigh ' (Eph 2^^), that we may grow like our Father who is in heaven. Having ' received the adojition of sons' (Ro 8^^, Gal 4^), we are to become ' imitators of God as dear children ' (Eph 5'). ' Even as God (or the Lord) forgave you, so also do ye ' (Col 3^^). For the standard of our new nature is nothing less than Kara deov (Eph 4^'*). This connexion of thought is as clear in John as in Paul. ' Herein is love . . . that God loved us, and sent his Son. . . . Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought to love one another . . . because as he is, even .so are we in this world' (1 Jn 41"- n- ") These words point to their original in the teaching of Christ, who bade us give ' mind, heart, will, and strength ' to this holy task (Mt 22^^). To ' be perfect, as our Father in heaven is perfect ' (5^^), to forgive as He forgives (gi2 1835^^ iq make peace and love our enemies that we may prove ourselves His sons (5^- *^), is the Christian standard of conduct, and the final chal- lenge to our personality.
(c) Comviunion bettveen God and man. — If per- sonality finds its release in the forgiveness, its scope in the imitation, of God, it finds its fulfil- ment in communion with Him. ' Religion is nothing if it is not the vital act by which the whole spirit seeks to save itself by attaching itself to its principle. This act is prayer' (Sabatier, Philosophy of Religion, p. 28). But prayer, to be real and eti'ectual, must rest on faith in the Father revealed by Jesus Christ. ' He wlio makes prayer simply a way to reach God " invents a god for him- .self, and one that does not hear." . . . There can be no true Avorship unless we come through Christ into the relation of children towards God ' (Luther, quoted by Herrmann, Communionwith God, p. 244). This is the prayer that is surely answered by God (Lk IP"^*, Jn 15^), the worship that is in spirit and in truth, which He Himself both inspires and seeks after (Jn A^*- '\ Ro S'^^^- ^7). This is praying after the manner of the Lord's Prayer, when ' the storm of desire dies away into stillness before God.' Yet ' whatever really so burdens the soul as to threaten its peace is to be brought before God in prayer, with the confidence that the Father's love under- stands even our anxious clinging to earthly things ' (Herrmann, p. 247). There is no higher employ- ment of the powers of personality than real (Mt 6'- 6), believing (Mk IP^), consecrs.teil (Jn 14^^), persistent (Lk 18^ prayer, from a forgiving heart (Mk IP^), when it throws itself without reserve upon the loving will of the Father (Mt 26*«-4-). Such prayer is far more than an act : it invests all the outgoings and incomings of life with the sacred sense that the Father is ' over all, through all, and in all ' (Eph 4^). Thus prayer has ' a natural eftect in spiritualizing and elevating the soul. A man is no longer what he was before. Gradually — imper- ceptibly to himself — he has imbibed a new set of ideas, and become imbued M'ith fresh principles. He is as one coming from kings' courts, with a grace, a delicacy, a dignity, a propriety, a justness of thought and taste, a clearness and firnmess of principle, all his own' (J. H. Newman). Resting on life eternal as a principle, a man cannot sink into being the mere plaything of events, a puppet in his environment. Christ has invited him to ascend a higher storey of his being, whence he can see the hosts of God beyond the encircling enemy. 'Heaven lies about us in our infancy.' And the fulfilment of that truth is when the saint, with