The Commission.
And so the commission to teach all nations[[3]] and the promise of the Spirit stand together—two things which God hath joined—the Witness and the Spirit.
In the power and fulness of that Spirit, the little company of weak and vacillating fishermen with their few companions went out fearlessly to win the world for Christ. They dared to believe what He had said—that 'greater works' remained for them to do because He had gone to the Father.
What mattered then the frowning mask of things, the deadness of the decadent old world, the hateful lust of Grecian cities, the murderous gladiatorial games, scourgings, imprisonments, death? They never doubted the final triumph. Let St. Paul speak out his mind—the secret of the final triumph:
Have this mind in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, counted it not a prize to be on an equality with God, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men; and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled Himself, becoming obedient even unto death, yea, the death of the cross. Wherefore also God highly exalted Him, and gave unto Him the name which is above every name; that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things on earth and things under the earth.
Hear St. Paul again, revealing the secret of his own life, 'I live: yet not I, but CHRIST LIVETH IN ME.'
We may answer the Moslem just in proportion as that is true of us—made true by the Holy Spirit.
What else was it in Raymund Lull that made him the one apostle of the Moslems of his day? Whence else came Henry Martyn's quiet, dauntless faith? What else was the source of Ion Keith-Falconer's heroic devotion? To the deadness of Islam, they brought the living Christ: 'The Life was the Light of men.'
The Moslem has blessed us by asking us the question, by forcing us to ask it of ourselves!