spirit than, alas! it ever has done.  Certainly it does seem to be not very obviously in accordance with Christ’s teachings that men-of-war should be launched with a religious service, or that Te Deums should be sung because thousands have been killed.  It certainly does seem to be something like a satire on European Christianity that one of the chief lessons we have taught the East is that we have instructed the Japanese how to use Western weapons to fight their enemies.  Surely, surely, if Christian churches laid to heart as they ought these plain words of the Master, they would bring their united influence to bear against that demon of war, and that pinchbeck, spurious glory which is connected with it.  ‘Blessed are the peacemakers’:  let us try to earn the benediction.

III.  Lastly, note the issue of this peacemaking.

‘They shall be called the sons of God.’  Called?  By whom?  Christ does not say, but it should not be difficult to ascertain.  It seems to me that to suppose that it is by men degrades this promise, instead of making it the climax of the whole series.  Besides, it is not true that if a Christian man lives as I have been trying to describe, protesting against certain evils, trying to diffuse an atmosphere of peace round about him; and, above all, seeking to make known the Name of the great Peacemaker, men will generally call him a ‘son of God.’  The next verse but one tells us what they will call him.  ’Blessed are ye when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and say all manner of evil against you falsely for My sake.’  They are a great deal more likely to have stones and rotten eggs flung at them than to be pelted with bouquets of scented roses of popular approval.  No! no! it is not man’s judgment that is meant here.  It matters very little what men call us.  It matters everything what God calls us.  It is He who will call them ‘sons of God.’  So the Apostle John thought that Christ meant, for he very beautifully and touchingly quotes this passage when he says, ’Beloved! behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God.’

God’s calling is a recognition of men for what they are.  God owns the man that lives in the fashion that we have been trying to outline—­God owns him for His child; manifestly a son, because he has the Father’s likeness.  ’Be ye therefore imitators of God as beloved children, and walk in love.’  God in Christ is the first Peacemaker, and they who go about the world proclaiming His peace and making peace, bear the image of the heavenly, and are owned by God as His sons.

What does that owning mean?  Well, it means a great deal which has yet to be disclosed, but it means this, too, that the whisper of the Voice which owns us for children will be heard by ourselves.  The Spirit which cries, ‘Abba, Father!’ will open our ears to hear Him say, ’Thou art My beloved Son.’  Or, to put it into plain English, there is no surer way by which we can come to the calm, happy, continual consciousness of being the children of God than by this living like Him, to spread the peace of God over all hearts.