The War and the Gospel: Sermons and Addresses During the Present War

by Henry Wace

The King’s Accession and Intercession.

CANTERBURY CATHEDRAL, 1915.

“I exhort, therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, thanksgivings, be made for all men: for kings, and for all that are in authority: that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.”—1 Tim. ii. 1.

It is in fulfilment of the duty prescribed in this text that we hold every year a Service of Thanksgiving and Intercession on the anniversary of our King’s accession to the throne, and I am sure we all know and appreciate the abundant reasons we have for offering such thanksgivings. We know that every public action of the King since he came to the throne has borne witness to his unreserved devotion to the welfare of his subjects in all parts of his Empire. His visit, for instance, to India was a very arduous and anxious undertaking, and was prompted by his own desire to assure the Indian people of his deep personal care for them, and also to strengthen the bonds between them and his subjects at home; and no doubt the generous service which Indian princes and soldiers are now rendering to the Empire on the plains of Flanders is in great measure due to the influence of that visit, in deepening the loyalty and devotion of his Indian subjects. We have had abundant evidence, moreover, in the last few months, of the King’s deep sympathy with his people in the sorrows and losses which this war is inflicting upon them. He has sent his son and heir to serve with his soldiers at the Front, and has himself visited them there to thank and cheer them, and he has lately set a very conspicuous example of personal self-denial in the ordinary habits of life. We see that the King and Queen live for the good of their subjects, and for the promotion of all that is good and true and gracious throughout their vast Empire, and that their example is one of the chief influences which are working among us for these noble ends. Knowing and appreciating all this, I need not say more to induce you to join with a full heart to-day in the words of our Service, and to “yield unfeigned thanks to God” that He was pleased, as on this day, to place His servant our Sovereign Lord King George upon the throne of this realm.

But I think it may be desirable and opportune to lay some special stress on those intercessions which we are bidden to offer “for kings and for all that are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.” Those words remind us, first of all, that the purpose of God, so far as this world is concerned, is that we may live a life of peace in all godliness and honour—a state of peace in which men may enjoy the happiness for which God intended them, in which they may “replenish the earth and subdue it,” and develop to the utmost the faculties and capacities with which God has endowed them. That is the main object to be kept in view for the purpose of the present life. The next fact of which the words remind us is that the maintenance of these peaceful conditions of life depends mainly upon Kings and all that are in authority. It does not depend merely upon Kings, but also upon those in authority, who are the Kings’ Ministers. In some parts of the world, as in this country, Kings no longer have the power by themselves, and of their own motion, to determine the course of public affairs, to keep the peace or to declare wars. Yet their position must always give them an immense influence in the government of a nation; and even now, in the two greatest countries of Europe—Germany and Russia, they have not merely the supreme control, but the supreme initiative, in affairs of State. The peace of the world, the possibility of our living a quiet and peaceable life, depends in Europe, in the main, on the rulers of Russia and Germany, upon those in authority in France, and upon the King of England and his Ministers.

It is a momentous fact, and a surprising one to realize. God has so constituted mankind that the welfare of the masses, of the millions of ordinary men and women, depends upon the actions of a few dozens of the leading men in the various countries of Europe. We are proud of being a constitutional country, and of the fact that by the election of members of Parliament—by selecting, that is, the members of the House of Commons—the vast majority of Englishmen have a voice in creating their own Government; and to a certain extent in that way we govern ourselves. But nevertheless, in the last resort, the fate of the country depends upon the dozen or two men who are placed in power by the House of Commons. It is a simple fact that the mass of the people in this country had no voice whatever in determining whether we should or should not enter upon this terrible war. It was determined for us in the course of a few hours by the King’s Ministers, and by the action they took in their relations with other countries. In the nature of the case it must be so. Whether they will or not, great masses of people and great nations cannot do without a Government; and when they have established one, that Government must necessarily act in many critical emergencies without waiting to consult the people whom it governs. A nation and its King, with his Ministers, constitute as much one body, to use St. Paul’s image, as the various elements and limbs of the human body and its brain. We become one single organism, under the control and management of the brain of that organism, which is the King and his Ministers. It is an awful responsibility for men to have entrusted to them, to be able to declare war and thus to launch many millions of men in their own country, and hundreds of millions of men in the Empire and in other countries, upon a gigantic struggle, of which all we know for certain at the outset is that it will involve a sacrifice of tens of thousands of lives, the devastation of fair countries, and the waste of enormous treasure. But so it is and ever must be. In the freest republics that ever existed the chief rulers have had similarly to act as the brain of the whole people; and it depends on their wisdom and faithfulness, not merely at critical moments, but in that daily administration of affairs out of which critical moments arise, whether the people shall live a quiet and peaceable life or not.

We must add to this the fact—which no one would be more ready to recognize than these leaders and rulers, Kings, Ministers, or Presidents, themselves—that the affairs with which they have to deal, the problems they have to solve, are too vast and mysterious to be fully grasped by any human brain, and that they are liable to the most grievous miscalculations. If you need evidence of this, look at the outbreak of the present war. Our rulers in this country had no idea at all, within a few days of the event, that such a war was about to break upon us; the rulers of all other nations have been loudly proclaiming, ever since it began, that they are not responsible for it, and that it would not have happened but for circumstances which they could not foresee or control. There seem, indeed, to have been wild and unscrupulous spirits in Germany who were eager for it, and who had long been intriguing for it; but none the less it burst upon Europe suddenly and unexpectedly, and it baffled the foresight of European statesmen in general. In the face of such imperfect competence for these problems of statesmanship, and of such enormous responsibility for them, are we not compelled to stretch out our hands towards Heaven, and implore God’s guidance for the rulers who are feeling their way amidst such dim lights—“for kings and for all in authority,” upon whose words and actions the fate of the world and its peace, the happiness and the very life of millions of men and women are dependent? If, indeed, we could not do so, we might well despair. We should behold before us a mass of nations rising against one another, blinded—as we see in Germany that nations can be blinded—by passion and pride, and fighting wildly, almost like men in the dark, and we might well feel helpless before such a chaos. But knowing, as it is the privilege of Christians to know, that “the Lord sitteth above the water-floods,” that “the Lord remaineth a King for ever,” knowing, as another Psalm says, that “the Lord is King, be the people never so impatient. He sitteth between the cherubim, be the earth never so unquiet,” we cry unto the Lord in our trouble, and implore Him to deliver us out of our distress.

There is another reason for our thus appealing to Him, which is, that we are assured by His Word that the whole history of the world has been under his control, and that He has been directing its course throughout, and determining the fate of nations for His own purposes. We have before us the most conclusive evidence of this in the history of the Jews. The course of their history and their position in the world at the present day were announced to Abraham and Moses thousands of years ago, and they have fulfilled, and are now fulfilling, the place and the function in the world which were then assigned to them. There is nothing, accordingly, on which the Bible insists more urgently and constantly than that the great issues of war and history are in the hands of God. It is not merely that He exercises a general controlling influence over them, but that He has His own purposes, which He is gradually fulfilling by means of “the unruly wills and affections of sinful men.” It teaches us that “except the Lord build the house they labour in vain that build it; except the Lord keep the city the watchman watcheth but in vain.” He does not merely interpose in the course of the building, but He is the Builder. He is building up, through the ages, some great design, and all nations will be made in the end to conform to it.

It is certain, for instance, that it was not by our design or forethought, or our skill, that the Empire which we are now called on to defend was built up. A hundred years ago—nay, fifty years ago—no statesman seems to have imagined that the British Empire would grow, or could grow, to the vast dimensions it now possesses. Not merely did they not imagine it—some of them actually deprecated its growth. It has not been by our will and design, but in great measure against them, that the British nations have been developed into one great body politic. It must be the hand of God which we see in all that development. We have, whether we will or no, a great work laid upon us all over the world—in India, in America, and in the Islands of the sea—and we recognize that it is by God’s will that this task and responsibility, which is at the same time a great privilege, has been laid upon us. We may well, therefore, implore continually His help and guidance in the discharge of it. Is it not, then, an imperative duty, is not St. Paul right in putting it in the very forefront of our duties, that we should offer up supplications, intercessions, urgent prayers for the King and for all in authority under him, that they may be guided to know God’s will in the vast problems which are set before them? that “God’s wisdom may be their guide and that His Arm may strengthen them,” and that He may direct their actions and endeavours to His own glory, to the accomplishment of His great designs, and to the welfare of our people?

Let us ask ourselves earnestly whether we have realized, as we ought, since this war began, that it is in God’s hands, and not in ours, to determine its issue. War is not merely an appeal to the sword—it is, in a far higher degree, an appeal, the final appeal, to God Himself. Lord Bacon observes that great soldiers and Commanders have always been conspicuous for their acknowledgment that the issues of their great battles and campaigns all depended upon some supernatural power. They knew better than others the infinite accidents and chances upon which the issue of war depends, and they realized that it was in God’s power to determine that issue as He pleased. I fear it must be owned that we have not, as yet, acknowledged this truth in the present war as much as we ought. If we had, would not the Services of Intercession in this Cathedral and elsewhere be more frequently and more earnestly attended? Let us be reminded then, by this Service of Prayer and Supplication, on the anniversary of the Accession of our King, how deeply he and his Ministers need that prayer and intercession, how wholly dependent they are, in bearing the momentous burdens laid upon them, upon “the good hand of our God upon them”; and let us henceforth “pray without ceasing” for God’s blessing upon our King, and particularly, at this time, for his victory over the bitter enemies by whom he has been forced into this dreadful struggle.