And as we make an effort to demonstrate that love to the world
may we also clear our minds of any lingering trace of unhappy
misunderstandings that might obscure our clear conception of the
exact purpose and methods of this new world order, so challenging
and complex, yet so consummate and wise. We are called upon by
our beloved Master in His Will and Testament not only to adopt it
unreservedly, but to unveil its merit to all the world. To attempt to
estimate its full value, and grasp its exact significance after so short
a time since its inception would be premature and presumptuous on
our part. We must trust to time, and the guidance of God’s Universal
House of Justice, to obtain a clearer and fuller understanding
of its provisions and implications. But one word of warning must
be uttered in this connection. Let us be on our guard lest we measure
too strictly the Divine Plan with the standard of men. I am not
prepared to state that it agrees in principle or in method with the
prevailing notions now uppermost in men’s minds, nor that it should
conform with those imperfect, precarious, and expedient measures
feverishly resorted to by agitated humanity. Are we to doubt that
the ways of God are not necessarily the ways of man? Is not faith
but another word for implicit obedience, whole-hearted allegiance,
uncompromising adherence to that which we believe is the revealed
63
and express will of God, however perplexing it might first appear,
however at variance with the shadowy views, the impotent doctrines,
the crude theories, the idle imaginings, the fashionable conceptions
of a transient and troublous age? If we are to falter or hesitate, if
our love for Him should fail to direct us and keep us within His
path, if we desert Divine and emphatic principles, what hope can we
any more cherish for healing the ills and sicknesses of this world?
