A Poem for our Times

Horatius Bonar wrote the following poem in light of departure that was taking place in his day from orthodox, Biblical Christianity. If it was true then how much more so now!

The creeds have gone, so speaks the Age,

The era of the sects is past,

Forward in spite of saints or sage,

True freedom has begun at last.

The Christ of God is now no more,

The Christ of men now sits supreme;

The Cross is part of mythic lore,

The Resurrection morn a dream.

The ages progress fears no God,

No righteous law, no judge's throne;

Man bounds along his new found road,

And calls this universe his own. 

Not faith in God, but faith in man,

Is Pilate now, and sail and oar;

The creeds are shrivelled, cold and wan,

True Christ has been is no more.

Old Truth which once struck deep in hearts,

Fights hard for life and fights in vain,

Old error into vigour starts

And feeble comes to life again.

Old misbelief becomes earth's creed,

The falsehood lives, the truth has died,

Man leans upon a broken reed,

And falls in helplessness of pride.

He spurns the hand that would have led,

The lips that would have spoken love,

The Book that would his would have fed,

And taught the Wisdom from above.

The Everstanding Cross, to him

Is but a Hebrew relic, vain,

The Virgin Birth at Bethlehem

A fiction of the wandering brain.

He wants no Saviour and no light,

No teacher but himself he needs;

He knows not of a human night

Save from the darkness of the creeds.

Eternal light hide not thy face,

Eternal Truth, direct our way;

Eternal love, shine forth in grace,

Reveal our darkness and Thy day!