PART I. THE MORAL BASIS OF THE CREATION

CHAPTER ONE
THE MYSTERY OF GOD

"Known unto God are all His works from the beginning", but only made known to His creatures as He chooses to reveal them (Eph. 3 v.3): as Isaiah said "Verily Thou art a God that hidest Thyself, O God of Israel, the Saviour". The word 'mystery' in the Scriptures has no thought in it of anything mysterious, uncanny, vague. On the contrary it was used to describe the inner religious teachings which the various pagan sects divulged to those of their members who desired to go on to perfection. The modern parallel would be the inner teaching of, for example, the Freemasons, or the spiritists. There is an inner as well as an outer circle of Christianity; all Christians are born again, but not all grow up into full stature. Some spend their lives drinking the milk of babyhood, others feast on the solid food of manhood.

From the opening pages of Scripture the Lord began to reveal Himself and as chapter was added to chapter, and later on book to book, so the revelation steadily grew for those who valued it. There was, however, a world of difference between the writer of Psalm 119 and the King of Judah who, like a modernist, cut the words of Jeremiah to pieces and burnt them. There were also passages of Scripture in the Old Testament which were sealed up and not intended to be understood till many years had passed (1 Peter 1:12; Daniel 12 v.9). Then for a long period from Malachi to