--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Keyser, Peter collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 31 number: 6 published: 1928-04 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: "Peter Keyser, “The Call for Reverence,” *Improvement Era* 31, no. 6 (April 1928): 466–468." source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera3106unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera3106unse start_page: 466 end_page: 468 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1928-04) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera3106unse publication_year: 1928 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1928, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # The Call for Reverence The Call for Reverence By Peter Keyser, B. A., Provincial School of Agriculture. Raymond, Canada ONE of the notable impoverishments of our present age is the loss of reverence from the varied avenues of life. We are not a reverent people. This boldly inquisitive age, and our rushing, modern life are not conducive to that quietness of spirit which produces this virtue. There are many causes contributing to the decay of reverence in our day. Our age is too materialistic. We have lost sight of God and have little sense of his sovereignty and holiness. We are too blasphemously familiar with holy things. Our mode of living in many respects is too shallow; our reading too care- less, and our amusements too sensational, if not even sensual. There is nothing we need today more than a revival of the spirit of reverence. Reverence is one of the finer qualities of the soul. It is not something one can put on with Sunday garments and carry to church, to be laid aside on Monday. It is not a passing posture, but a permanent passion. Reverence is not easily defined. Like love, it evades analysis. It is an attitude of soul; it is the atmosphere in which the great virtues of life are nourished; it is the heart's recog- nition of the great and sublime in life, whether it be in the grandeur of the mountains, the vastness of the heavens, the majesty of the seas, or the sublimity of the eternal. As Dr. Charles Jefferson says: "Reverence is respect and esteem moving at high altitudes. It is one of the loftiest of all the emotions of the soul. * * * There is probably no expression which defines what we mean by reverence so well as the Old Testa- ment phrase, "the fear of the Lord." The wise men of Israel were convinced that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Their effort was to make men conscious of the existence of a God of infinite power and wisdom and goodness. There is nothing in the world fosters the spirit of reverence like a holy fear and love toward God. A deep, true sense of the presence of God will always produce reverence. One can hardly resort to blasphemy when the soul is moved by the majesty of a sun- set, or by a marvelous landscape, or one can hardly be vulgar in the presence of a refined, cultured person. Who, then, can be irreverent who has a holy fear and love toward the eternal God? There has never been another character so reverent or holy as Christ. Was there ever another person who so revered God, as Jesus revered THE CALL FOR REVERENCE 467 him? When he gave us the Lord's prayer, he said: "When ye pray say> Our Father * * * hallowed be thy name.' ' Men and wom- en of all ages who have been awed by the holiness and sovereignty of God, who in his presence have stooped to remove, as it were, their shoes from their feet, recognizing they were on holy ground, have become .like him in spirit, and their lives have been transformed by his presence. We know that faith and love toward God fosters reverence, and such reverence for God means that the sanctities of human life are respected. If, on the other hand, it be true that an irreverent at- titude toward God has a dehumanizing effect, and issues in the sanctities of life are trampled in the mud, what then will be the result of the wave of atheism which is rising among university stu- dents today, led on by the propaganda of "the American Association for the Advancement of Atheism"? Through the influence of this godless organization, student societies are rapidly formed, which go under such pernicious names as: "God's Black Sheep;" "The Devil's Angels;" "The Circle of the Godless;" "The Damned Souls," who laugh at the thought of God and who assert "religion is bunk;" who scoff at prayer and call Christ "the bewhiskered Jewish Je- hovah." In one American university where their propaganda is carried on, 100 out of 763 claimed there is no God, and, of the same studentbody, 548 had no faith in immortality. No reverence for God means no respect for human life, and no sense of the real values of life. Life is always cheap where God is sneered out. No wonder these students' societies scoff at marriage and slate it "an antiquated institution which should be abolished." Anarchy is bound to follow atheism, and the destruction of a nation is inevitable which becomes detached from God. Along with reverence toward God and our fellow-men, should be emphasized the matter of reverence in worship. Human values cannot estimate the worth of worship. Christ believed in it and exalted it. True, he decried formalism, and sham; he knew that those who worshiped God must "worship in spirit and in truth;" and that it is the spirit, not the place, that counts. At the same time he magnified the temple. He set an example of regular attend- ance at the synagogue, and spoke of the temple as "My Father's House." There is a deep need today of reverence in worship. A rever- ence born of consciousness of God's presence and power. It is pathetic today that so many, as one writer remarked, "treat the house of God as they treat a streetcar, entering it and leaving it when they please. Even habitual church attendants often surprise and shock one by their irreverent behavior in the house of prayer." Fortunate is the nation that possesses a people with the spirit 468 IMPROVEMENT ERA of reverence toward God, toward worship and toward their fellow- men. "He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength. Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall: but they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint." (Isaiah 40:29-31.) Reclaimed I fetter the hands of my Deity And I circumvent His cause — I take from His might and His majesty When I break my Maker's laws; Nor the interdict of His providence, Nor His love compassionate, Can rescue me from the consequence Of the law I desecrate. 'Tis as I grow and build and change To a higher, nobler mould, The very spheres take wider range And His godliness unfold; And the earth that swerved to its mortal march, When the primal edict was defamed, Shall swing again to the Super-arch, When man to godship is reclaimed. Mesa. Arizona. BERTHA A. KLEINMAN.