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diff --git a/13601-8.txt b/13601-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0ea21f9 --- /dev/null +++ b/13601-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,24327 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans +Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V), by Alexander Maclaren + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) + +Author: Alexander Maclaren + +Release Date: October 5, 2004 [EBook #13601] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK EXPOSITIONS OF HOLY SCRIPTURE *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Franks, John Hagerson, and the Project Gutenberg +Online Distributed Proofreading Team + + + + + +EXPOSITIONS OF HOLY SCRIPTURE + +ALEXANDER MACLAREN, D.D., Litt. D. + +ROMANS +CORINTHIANS _(To II Corinthians, Chap. V)_ + + + + +EXPOSITIONS OF HOLY SCRIPTURE + +ALEXANDER MACLAREN, D.D., Litt. D. + +ROMANS + + + +CONTENTS + +THE WITNESS OF THE RESURRECTION (Romans i. 4, R.V.) + +PRIVILEGE AND OBLIGATION (Romans i. 7) + +PAUL'S LONGING (Romans i. 11, 12) + +DEBTORS TO ALL MEN (Romans i. 14) + +THE GOSPEL THE POWER OF GOD (Romans i. 16) + +WORLD-WIDE SIN AND WORLD-WIDE REDEMPTION (Romans iii. 19-26) + +NO DIFFERENCE (Romans iii. 22) + +'LET US HAVE PEACE' (Romans v. 1, R.V.) + +ACCESS INTO GRACE (Romans v. 2) + +THE SOURCES OF HOPE (Romans v. 2-4) + +A THREEFOLD CORD (Romans v. 5) + +WHAT PROVES GOD'S LOVE (Romans v. 8) + +THE WARRING QUEENS (Romans v. 21) + +'THE FORM OF TEACHING' (Romans vi. 17) + +'THY FREE SPIRIT' (Romans viii. 2) + +CHRIST CONDEMNING SIN (Romans viii. 8) + +THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT (Romans viii. 16) + +SONS AND HEIRS (Romans viii. 17) + +SUFFERING WITH CHRIST, A CONDITION OF GLORY WITH CHRIST + (Romans viii. 17) + +THE REVELATION OF SONS (Romans viii. 19) + +THE REDEMPTION OF THE BODY (Romans viii. 23) + +THE INTERCEDING SPIRIT (Romans viii. 26) + +THE GIFT THAT BRINGS ALL GIFTS (Romans viii. 32) + +MORE THAN CONQUERORS (Romans viii. 37) + +LOVE'S TRIUMPH (Romans viii. 38, 39) + +THE SACRIFICE OF THE BODY (Romans xii. 1) + +TRANSFIGURATION (Romans xii. 2) + +SOBER THINKING (Romans xii. 3) + +MANY AND ONE (Romans xii. 4, 5) + +GRACE AND GRACES (Romans xii. 6-8) + +LOVE THAT CAN HATE (Romans xii. 9, 10, R.V.) + +A TRIPLET OF GRACES (Romans xii. 11) + +ANOTHER TRIPLET OF GRACES (Romans xii. 12) + +STILL ANOTHER TRIPLET (Romans xii. 13-15) + +STILL ANOTHER TRIPLET (Romans xii. 16, R.V.) + +STILL ANOTHER TRIPLET (Romans xii. 17, 18, R.V.) + +STILL ANOTHER TRIPLET (Romans xii. 19-21) + +LOVE AND THE DAY (Romans xiii. 8-14) + +SALVATION NEARER (Romans xiii. 11) + +THE SOLDIER'S MORNING-CALL (Romans xiii. 12) + +THE LIMITS OF LIBERTY (Romans xiv. 12-23) + +TWO FOUNTAINS, ONE STREAM (Romans xv. 4, 13) + +JOY AND PEACE IN BELIEVING (Romans xv. 13) + +PHOEBE (Romans xvi. 1, 2, R.V.) + +PRISCILLA AND AQUILA (Romans xvi. 3-5) + +TWO HOUSEHOLDS (Romans xvi. 10,11) + +TRYPHENA AND TRYPHOSA (Romans xvi. 12) + +PERSIS (Romans xvi. 12) + +A CRUSHED SNAKE (Romans xvi. 20) + +TERTIUS (Romans xvi. 22, R.V.) + +QUARTUS A BROTHER (Romans xvi. 23) + + + + +THE WITNESS OF THE RESURRECTION + + 'Declared to be the Son of God with power, ... by the + resurrection of the dead.'--ROMANS i. 4 (R.V.). + + +It is a great mistake to treat Paul's writings, and especially this +Epistle, as mere theology. They are the transcript of his life's +experience. As has been well said, the gospel of Paul is an +interpretation of the significance of the life and work of Jesus +based upon the revelation to him of Jesus as the risen Christ. He +believed that he had seen Jesus on the road to Damascus, and it was +that appearance which revolutionised his life, turned him from a +persecutor into a disciple, and united him with the Apostles as +ordained to be a witness with them of the Resurrection. To them all +the Resurrection of Jesus was first of all a historical fact +appreciated chiefly in its bearing on Him. By degrees they discerned +that so transcendent a fact bore in itself a revelation of what would +become the experience of all His followers beyond the grave, and a +symbol of the present life possible for them. All three of these +aspects are plainly declared in Paul's writings. In our text it is +chiefly the first which is made prominent. All that distinguishes +Christianity; and makes it worth believing, or mighty, is inseparably +connected with the Resurrection. + +I. The Resurrection of Christ declares His Sonship. + +Resurrection and Ascension are inseparably connected. Jesus does not +rise to share again in the ills and weariness of humanity. Risen, 'He +dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over Him.' 'He died unto +sin once'; and His risen humanity had nothing in it on which physical +death could lay hold. That He should from some secluded dimple on +Olivet ascend before the gazing disciples until the bright cloud, +which was the symbol of the Divine Presence, received Him out of +their sight, was but the end of the process which began unseen in +morning twilight. He laid aside the garments of the grave and passed +out of the sepulchre which was made sure by the great stone rolled +against its mouth. The grand avowal of faith in His Resurrection +loses meaning, unless it is completed as Paul completed his 'yea +rather that was raised from the dead,' with the triumphant 'who is at +the right hand of God.' Both are supernatural, and the Virgin Birth +corresponds at the beginning to the supernatural Resurrection and +Ascension at the close. Both such an entrance into the world and such +a departure from it, proclaim at once His true humanity, and that +'this is the Son of God.' + +Still further, the Resurrection is God's solemn 'Amen' to the +tremendous claims which Christ had made. The fact of His +Resurrection, indeed, would not declare His divinity; but the +Resurrection of One who had spoken such words does. If the Cross and +a nameless grave had been the end, what a _reductio ad absurdum_ +that would have been to the claims of Jesus to have ever been with +the Father and to be doing always the things that pleased Him. The +Resurrection is God's last and loudest proclamation, 'This is My +beloved Son: hear ye Him.' The Psalmist of old had learned to trust +that his sonship and consecration to the Father made it impossible +that that Father should leave his soul in Sheol, or suffer one who +was knit to Him by such sacred bonds to see corruption; and the +unique Sonship and perfect self-consecration of Jesus went down into +the grave in the assured confidence, as He Himself declared, that the +third day He would rise again. The old alternative seems to retain +all its sharp points: Either Christ rose again from the dead, or His +claims are a series of blasphemous arrogances and His character +irremediably stained. + +But we may also remember that Scripture not only represents Christ's +Resurrection as a divine act but also as the act of Christ's own +power. In His earthly life He asserted that His relation both to +physical death and to resurrection was an entirely unique one. 'I +have power,' said He, 'to lay down my life, and I have power to take +it again'; and yet, even in this tremendous instance of +self-assertion, He remains the obedient Son, for He goes on to say, +'This commandment have I received of My Father.' If these claims are +just, then it is vain to stumble at the miracles which Jesus did in +His earthly life. If He could strip it off and resume it, then +obviously it was not a life like other men's. The whole phenomenon is +supernatural, and we shall not be in the true position to understand +and appreciate it and Him until, like the doubting Thomas, we fall at +the feet of the risen Son, and breathe out loyalty and worship in +that rapturous exclamation, 'My Lord and my God.' + +II. The Resurrection interprets Christ's Death. + +There is no more striking contrast than that between the absolute +non-receptivity of the disciples in regard to all Christ's plain +teachings about His death and their clear perception after Pentecost +of the mighty power that lay in it. The very fact that they continued +disciples at all, and that there continued to be such a community as +the Church, demands their belief in the Resurrection as the only +cause which can account for it. If He did not rise from the dead, and +if His followers did not know that He did so by the plainest +teachings of common-sense, they ought to have scattered, and borne in +isolated hearts the bitter memories of disappointed hopes; for if He +lay in a nameless grave, and they were not sure that He was risen +from the dead, His death would have been a conclusive showing up of +the falsity of His claims. In it there would have been no atoning +power, no triumph over sin. If the death of Christ were not followed +by His Resurrection and Ascension, the whole fabric of Christianity +falls to pieces. As the Apostle puts it in his great chapter on +resurrection, 'Ye are yet in your sins.' The forgiveness which the +Gospel holds forth to men does not depend on the mercy of God or on +the mere penitence of man, but upon the offering of the one sacrifice +for sins in His death, which is justified by His Resurrection as +being accepted by God. If we cannot triumphantly proclaim 'Christ is +risen indeed,' we have nothing worth preaching. + +We are told now that the ethics of Christianity are its vital centre, +which will stand out more plainly when purified from these mystical +doctrines of a Death as the sin-offering for the world, and a +Resurrection as the great token that that offering avails. Paul did +not think so. To him the morality of the Gospel was all deduced from +the life of Christ the Son of God as our Example, and from His death +for us which touches men's hearts and makes obedience to Him our +joyful answer to what He has done for us. Christianity is a new thing +in the world, not as moral teaching, but as moral power to obey that +teaching, and that depends on the Cross interpreted by the +Resurrection. If we have only a dead Christ, we have not a living +Christianity. + +III. Resurrection points onwards to Christ's coming again. + +Paul at Athens declared in the hearing of supercilious Greek +philosophers, that the Jesus, whom he proclaimed to them, was 'the +Man whom God had ordained to judge the world in righteousness,' and +that 'He had given assurance thereof unto all men, in that He raised +Him from the dead.' The Resurrection was the beginning of the process +which, from the human point of view, culminated in the Ascension. +Beyond the Ascension stretches the supernatural life of the glorified +Son of God. Olivet cannot be the end, and the words of the two men in +white apparel who stood amongst the little group of the upward gazing +friends, remain as the hope of the Church: 'This same Jesus shall so +come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven.' That great +assurance implies a visible corporeal return locally defined, and +having for its purpose to complete the work which Incarnation, Death, +Resurrection, and Ascension, each advanced a stage. The Resurrection +is the corner-stone of the whole Christian faith. It seals the truths +that Jesus is the Son of God with power, that He died for us, that He +has ascended on high to prepare a place for us, that He will come +again and take us to Himself. If we, by faith in Him, take for ours +the women's greeting on that Easter morning, 'The Lord hath risen +indeed,' He will come to us with His own greeting, 'Peace be unto +you.' + + + + +PRIVILEGE AND OBLIGATION + + 'To all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be + saints.'--ROMANS i. 7. + + +This is the address of the Epistle. The first thing to be noticed +about it, by way of introduction, is the universality of this +designation of Christians. Paul had never been in Rome, and knew very +little about the religious stature of the converts there. But he has +no hesitation in declaring that they are all 'beloved of God' and +'saints.' There were plenty of imperfect Christians amongst them; +many things to rebuke; much deadness, coldness, inconsistency, and +yet none of these in the slightest degree interfered with the +application of these great designations to them. So, then, 'beloved +of God' and 'saints' are not distinctions of classes within the pale +of Christianity, but belong to the whole community, and to each +member of the body. + +The next thing to note, I think, is how these two great terms, +'beloved of God' and 'saints,' cover almost the whole ground of the +Christian life. They are connected with each other very closely, as I +shall have occasion to show presently, but in the meantime it may be +sufficient to mark how the one carries us deep into the heart of God +and the other extends over the whole ground of our relation to Him. +The one is a statement of a universal prerogative, the other an +enforcement of a universal obligation. Let us look, then, at these +two points, the universal privilege and the universal obligation of +the Christian life. + +I. The universal privilege of the Christian life. + +'Beloved of God.' Now we are so familiar with the juxtaposition of +the two ideas, 'love' and 'God,' that we cease to feel the +wonderfulness of their union. But until Jesus Christ had done His +work no man believed that the two thoughts could be brought together. + +Does God love any one? We think the question too plain to need to be +put, and the answer instinctive. But it is not by any means +instinctive, and the fact is that until Christ answered it for us, +the world stood dumb before the question that its own heart raised, +and when tortured spirits asked, 'Is there care in heaven, and is +there love?' there was 'no voice, nor answer, nor any that regarded.' +Think of the facts of life; think of the facts of nature. Think of +sorrows and miseries and pains, and sins, and wasted lives and +storms, and tempests, and diseases, and convulsions; and let us feel +how true the grim saying is, that + + 'Nature, red in tooth and claw, + With rapine, shrieks against the creed' + +that God is love. + +And think of what the world has worshipped, and of all the varieties +of monstrosity, not the less monstrous because sometimes beautiful, +before which men have bowed. Cruel, lustful, rapacious, capricious, +selfish, indifferent deities they have adored. And then, 'God hath +established,' proved, demonstrated 'His love to us in that while we +were yet sinners Christ died for us.' + +Oh, brethren, do not let us kick down the ladder by which we have +climbed; or, in the name of a loving God, put away the Christian +teaching which has begotten the conception in humanity of a God that +loves. There are men to-day who would never have come within sight +of that sunlight truth, even as a glimmering star, away down upon +the horizon, if it had not been for the Gospel; and who now turn +round upon that very Gospel which has given them the conception, +and accuse it of narrow and hard thoughts of the love of God. + +One of the Scripture truths against which the assailant often turns +his sharpest weapons is that which is involved in my text, the +Scripture answer to the other question, 'Does not God love all?' Yes! +yes! a thousand times, yes! But there is another question, Does the +love of God, to all, make His special designation of Christian men as +His beloved the least unlikely? Surely there is no kind of +contradiction between the broadest proclamation of the universality +of the love of God and Paul's decisive declaration that, in a very +deep and real manner, they who are in Christ are the beloved of God. +Surely special affection is not in its nature, inconsistent with +universal beneficence and benevolence. Surely it is no exaltation, +but rather a degradation of the conception of the divine love, if we +proclaim its utter indifference to men's characters. Surely you are +not honouring God when you say, 'It is all the same to Him whether a +man loves Him and serves Him, or lifts himself up in rebellion +against Him, and makes himself his own centre, and earth his aim and +his all.' Surely to imagine a God who not only makes His sun to shine +and His rains and dews to fall on the unthankful and the evil, that +He may draw them to love Him, but who also is conceived as taking the +sinful creature who yet cleaves to his sins to His heart, as He does +the penitent soul that longs for His image to be produced in it, is +to blaspheme, and not to honour the love, the universal love of God. + +God forbid that any words that ever drop from my lips should seem to +cast the smallest shadow of doubt on that great truth, 'God so loved +the world that He gave His Son!' But God forbid, equally, that any +words of mine should seem to favour the, to me, repellent idea that +the infinite love of God disregards the character of the man on whom +it falls. There are manifestations of that loving heart which any man +can receive; and each man gets as much of the love of God as it is +possible to pour upon him. But granite rock does not drink in the dew +as a flower does; and the nature of the man on whom God's love falls +determines how much, and what manner of its manifestations shall pass +into his true possession, and what shall remain without. + +So, on the whole, we have to answer the questions, 'Does God love +any? Does not God love all? Does God specially love some?' with the +one monosyllable, 'Yes.' + +And so, dear brethren, let us learn the path by which we can pass +into that blessed community of those on whom the fullness and +sweetness and tenderest tenderness of the Father's heart will fall. +'If a man love Me, he will keep My words; and My Father will love +him.' Myths tell us that the light which, at the beginning, had been +diffused through a nebulous mass, was next gathered into a sun. So +the universal love of God is concentrated in Jesus Christ; and if we +have Him we have it; and if we have faith we have Him, and can say, +'Neither life, nor death, nor things present, nor things to come, nor +height, nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate +us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.' + +II. Then, secondly, mark the universal obligation of the Christian +life. + +'Called to be saints,' says my text. Now you will observe that the +two little words 'to be' are inserted here as a supplement. They may +be correct enough, but they are open to the possibility of +misunderstanding, as if the saintship, to which all Christian people +are 'called' was something future, and not realised at the moment. +Now, in the context, the Apostle employs the same form of expression +with regard to himself in a clause which illuminates the meaning of +my text. 'Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ' says he, in the first +verse, 'called to be an Apostle' or, more correctly, 'a called +Apostle.' The apostleship coincided in time with the call, was +contemporaneous with that which was its cause. And if Paul was an +Apostle since he was called, saints are saints since _they_ are +called. 'The beloved of God' are 'the called saints.' + +I need only observe, further, that the word 'called' here does not +mean 'named' or 'designated' but 'summoned.' It describes not the +name by which Christian men are known, but the thing which they are +invited, summoned, 'called' by God to be. It is their vocation, not +their designation. Now, then, I need not, I suppose, remind you that +'saint' and 'holy' convey precisely the same idea: the one expressing +it in a word of Teutonic, and the other in one of classic derivation. + +We notice that the true idea of this universal holiness which, _ipso +facto_, belongs to all Christian people, is consecration to God. In +the old days temple, altars, sacrifices, sacrificial vessels, persons +such as priests, periods like Sabbaths and feasts, were called +'holy.' The common idea running through all these uses of the word is +_belonging to God_, and that is the root notion of the New Testament +'saint' a man who is God's. God has claimed us for Himself when He +gave us Jesus Christ. We respond to the claim when we accept Christ. +Henceforth we are not our own, but 'consecrated'--that is, 'saints.' + +Now the next step is purity, which is the ordinary idea of sanctity. +Purity will follow consecration, and would not be worth much without +it, even if it was possible to be attained. Now, look what a far +deeper and nobler idea of the service and conditions of moral +goodness this derivation of it from surrender to God gives, than does +a God-ignoring morality which talks and talks about acts and +dispositions, and never goes down to the root of the whole matter; +and how much nobler it is than a shallow religion which in like +manner is ever straining after acts of righteousness, and forgets +that in order to be right there must be prior surrender to God. Get a +man to yield himself up to God and no fear about the righteousness. +Virtue, goodness, purity, righteousness, all these synonyms express +very noble things; but deep down below them all lies the New +Testament idea of holiness, consecration of myself to God, which is +the parent of them all. + +And then the next thing to remind you of is that this consecration is +to be applied all through a man's nature. Yielding yourselves to God +is the talismanic secret of all righteousness, as I have said; and +every part of our complex, manifold being is capable of such +consecration. I hallow my heart if its love twines round His heart. I +hallow my thoughts if I take His truth for my guide, and ever seek to +be led thereby in practice and in belief. I hallow my will when it +bows and says, 'Speak, Lord! Thy servant heareth!' I hallow my senses +when I use them as from Him, with recognition of Him and for Him. In +fact, there are two ways of living in the world; and, narrow as it +sounds, I venture to say there are only two. Either God is my centre, +and that is holiness; or self is my centre, in more or less subtle +forms, and that is sin. + +Then the next step is that this consecration, which will issue in all +purity, and will cover the whole ground of a human life, is only +possible when we have drunk in the blessed thought 'beloved of God.' +My yielding of myself to Him can only be the echo of His giving of +Himself to me. He must be the first to love. You cannot argue a man +into loving God, any more than you can hammer a rosebud open. If you +do you spoil its petals. But He can love us into loving Him, and the +sunshine, falling on the closed flower, will expand it, and it will +grow by its reception of the light, and grow sunlike in its measure +and according to its nature. So a God who has only claims upon us +will never be a God to whom we yield ourselves. A God who has love +for us will be a God to whom it is blessed that we should be +consecrated, and so saints. + +Then, still further, this consecration, thus built upon the reception +of the divine love, and influencing our whole nature, and leading to +all purity, is a universal characteristic of Christians. There is no +faith which does not lead to surrender. There is no aristocracy in +the Christian Church which deserves to have the family name given +especially to it. 'Saint' this, and 'Saint' that, and 'Saint' the +other--these titles cannot be used without darkening the truth that +this honour and obligation of being saints belong equally to all that +love Jesus Christ. All the men whom thus God has drawn to Himself, by +His love in His Son, they are all, if I may so say, objectively holy; +they belong to God. But consecration may be cultivated, and must be +cultivated and increased. There is a solemn obligation laid upon +every one of us who call ourselves Christians, to be saints, in the +sense that we have consciously yielded up our whole lives to Him; and +are trying, body, soul, and spirit, 'to perfect holiness in the fear +of the Lord.' + +Paul's letter, addressed to the 'beloved in God,' the 'called saints' +that are in Rome, found its way to the people for whom it was meant. +If a letter so addressed were dropped in our streets, do you think +anybody would bring it to you, or to any Christian society as a +whole, recognising that we were the people for whom it was meant? The +world has taunted us often enough with the name of saints; and +laughed at the profession which they thought was included in the +word. Would that their taunts had been undeserved, and that it were +not true that 'saints' in the Church sometimes means less than 'good +men' out of the Church! 'Seeing that we have these promises, dearly +beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of flesh and +spirit; perfecting holiness in the fear of the Lord.' + + + + +PAUL'S LONGING[1] + + 'I long to see you, that I may impart unto you some + spiritual gift, to the end ye may be established; + 12. That is, that I may be comforted together with + you, by the mutual faith both of you and me.'--ROMANS i. 11, 12. + + +I am not wont to indulge in personal references in the pulpit, but I +cannot but yield to the impulse to make an exception now, and to let +our happy circumstances mould my remarks. I speak mainly to mine own +people, and I must trust that other friends who may hear or read my +words will forgive my doing so. + +In taking such a text as this, I desire to shelter myself behind +Paul, and in expounding his feelings to express my own, and to draw +such lessons as may be helpful and profitable to us all. And so there +are three things in this text that I desire to note: the manly +expression of Christian affection; the lofty consciousness of the +purpose of their meeting; and the lowly sense that there was much to +be received as well as much to be given. A word or two about each of +these things is all on which I can venture. + +I. First, then, notice the manly expression of Christian affection +which the Apostle allows himself here. + +Very few Christian teachers could or should venture to talk so much +about themselves as Paul did. The strong infusion of the personal +element in all his letters is so transparently simple, so obviously +sincere, so free from any jarring note of affectation or unctuous +sentiment that it attracts rather than repels. If I might venture +upon a paradox, his personal references are instances of +self-oblivion in the midst of self-consciousness. + +He had never been in Rome when he wrote these words; he had no +personal relations with the believers there; he had never looked them +in the face; there were no sympathy and confidence between them, as +the growth of years. But still his heart went out towards them, and +he was not ashamed to show it. 'I _long_ to see you,'--in the +original the word expresses a very intense amount of yearning blended +with something of regret that he had been so long kept from them. + +Now it is not a good thing for people to make many professions of +affection, and I think a public teacher has something better to do +than to parade such feelings before his audiences. But there are +exceptions to all rules, and I suppose I may venture to let my heart +speak, and to say how gladly I come back to the old place, dear to me +by so many sacred memories and associations, and how gladly I reknit +the bonds of an affection which has been unbroken, and deepening on +both sides through thirty long years. + +Dear friends! let us together thank God to-day if He has knit our +hearts together in mutual affection; and if you and I can look each +other, as I believe we can, in the eyes, with the assurance that I +see only the faces of friends, and that you see the face of one who +gladly resumes the old work and associations. + +But now, dear brethren, let us draw one lesson. Unless there be this +manly, honest, though oftenest silent, Christian affection, the +sooner you and I part the better. Unless it be in my heart I can do +you no good. No man ever touched another with the sweet constraining +forces that lie in Christ's Gospel unless the heart of the speaker +went out to grapple the hearts of the hearers. And no audience ever +listen with any profit to a man when they come in the spirit of +carping criticism, or of cold admiration, or of stolid indifference. +There must be for this simple relationship which alone binds a +Nonconformist preacher to his congregation, as a _sine qua non_ of +all higher things and of all spiritual good, a real, though oftenest +it be a concealed, mutual affection and regard. We have to thank God +for much of it; let us try to get more. That is all I want to say +about the first point here. + +II. Note the lofty consciousness of the purpose of their meeting. + +'I long to see you, that I may impart unto you some spiritual gift.' +Paul knew that he had something which he could give to these people, +and he calls it by a very comprehensive term, 'some spiritual +gift'--a gift of some sort which, coming from the Divine Spirit, was +to be received into the human spirit. + +Now that expression--a spiritual gift--in the New Testament has a +variety of applications. Sometimes it refers to what we call +miraculous endowments, sometimes it refers to what we may call +official capacity; but here it is evidently neither the one nor the +other of these more limited and special things, but the general idea +of a divine operation upon the human spirit which fills it with +Christian graces--knowledge, faith, love. Or, in simpler words, what +Paul wanted to give them was a firmer grasp and fuller possession of +Jesus Christ, His love and power, which would secure a deepening and +strengthening of their whole Christian life. He was quite sure he had +this to give, and that he could impart it, if they would listen to +what he would say to them. But whilst thus he rises into the lofty +conception of the purpose and possible result of his meeting the +Roman Christians, he is just as conscious of the limitations of his +power in the matter as he is of the greatness of his function. These +are indicated plainly. The word which he employs here, 'gift' is +never used in the New Testament for a thing that one man can give to +another, but is always employed for the concrete results of the grace +of God bestowed upon men. The very expression, then, shows that Paul +thought of himself, not as the original giver, but simply as a +channel through which was communicated what God had given. In the +same direction points the adjective which accompanies the noun--a +'_spiritual_ gift'--which probably describes the origin of the gift +as being the Spirit of God, rather than defines the seat of it when +received as being the spirit of the receiver. Notice, too, as bearing +on the limits of Paul's part in the gift, the propriety and delicacy +of the language in his statement of the ultimate purpose of the gift. +He does not say 'that I may strengthen you,' which might have sounded +too egotistical, and would have assumed too much to himself, but he +says 'that ye may be strengthened,' for the true strengthener is not +Paul, but the Spirit of God. + +So, on the one hand, the Christian teacher is bound to rise to the +height of the consciousness of his lofty vocation as having in +possession a gift that he can bestow; on the other hand, he is bound +ever to remember the limitations within which that is true--viz. that +the gift is not his, but God's, and that the Spirit of the Lord is +the true Giver of all the graces which may blossom when His word, +ministered by human agents, is received into human hearts. + +And, now, what are the lessons that I take from this? Two very simple +ones. First, no Christian teacher has any business to open his mouth, +unless he is sure that he has received something to impart to men as +a gift from the Divine Spirit. To preach our doubts, to preach our +own opinions, to preach poor platitudes, to talk about politics and +morals and taste and literature and the like in the pulpit, is +profanation and blasphemy. Let no man open his lips unless he can +say: 'The Lord hath showed me this; and this I bring to you as His +word.' Nor has a Christian organisation any right to exist, unless it +recognises the communication and reception and further spreading of +this spiritual gift as its great function. Churches which have lost +that consciousness, and, instead of a divine gift, have little more +to offer than formal worship, or music, or entertainments, or mere +intellectual discourse, whether orthodox or 'advanced,' have no right +to be; and by the law of the survival of the fittest will not long +be. The one thing that warrants such a relationship as subsists +between you and me is this, my consciousness that I have a message +from God, and your belief that you hear such from my lips. Unless +that be our bond the sooner these walls crumble, and this voice +ceases, and these pews are emptied, the better. 'I have,' says, Paul, +'a gift to impart; and I long to see you that I may impart it to +you.' Oh! for more, in all our pulpits, of that burdened +consciousness of a divine message which needs the relief of speech, +and longs with a longing caught from Christ to impart its richest +treasures. + +That is the one lesson. And the other one is this. Have you, dear +friends, received the gift that I have, under the limitations already +spoken of, to bestow? There are some of you who have listened to my +voice ever since you were children--some of you, though not many, +have heard it for well on to thirty years. Have you taken the thing +that all these years I have been--God knows how poorly, but God knows +how honestly--trying to bring to you? That is, have you taken Christ, +and have you faith in Him? And, as for those of you who say that +you are Christians, many blessings have passed between you and me +through all these years; but, dear friends, has the chief blessing +been attained? Are you being strengthened day by day for the burdens +and the annoyances and the sorrows of life by your coming here? Do I +do you any good in that way; are you better men than when we first +met together? Is Christ dearer, and more real and nearer to you; and +are your lives more transparently consecrated, more manifestly the +result of a hidden union with Him? Do you walk in the world like the +Master, because you are members of this congregation? If so, its +purpose has been accomplished. If not, it has miserably failed. + +I have said that I have to thank God for the unbroken affection that +has knit us together. But what is the use of such love if it does not +lead onwards to this? I have had enough, and more than enough, of +what you call popularity and appreciation, undeserved enough, but +rendered unstintedly by you. I do not care the snap of a finger for +it by comparison with this other thing. And oh, dear brethren! if all +that comes of our meeting here Sunday after Sunday is either praise +or criticism of my poor words and ways, our relationship is a curse, +and not a blessing, and we come together for the worse and not for +the better. The purpose of the Church, and the purpose of the +ministry, and the meaning of our assembling are, that spiritual gifts +may be imparted, not by me alone, but by you, too, and by me in my +place and measure, and if that purpose be not accomplished, all other +purposes, that are accomplished, are of no account, and worse than +nothing. + +III. And now, lastly, note the lowly consciousness that much was to +be received as well as much to be given. + +The Apostle corrects himself after he has said 'that I may impart +unto you some spiritual gift,' by adding, 'that is, that I may be +comforted (or rather, encouraged) together with you by the mutual +faith both of you and me.' If his language were not so transparently +sincere, and springing from deep interest in the relationship between +himself and these people, we should say that it was exquisite +courtesy and beautiful delicacy. But it moves in a region far more +real than the region of courtesy, and it speaks the inmost truth +about the conditions on which the Roman Christians should +receive--viz. that they should also give. There is only one Giver who +is only a Giver, and that is God. All other givers are also +receivers. Paul desired to see his Roman brethren that he might be +encouraged; and when he did see them, as he marched along the Appian +Way, a shipwrecked prisoner, the Acts of the Apostles tells us, 'He +thanked God and took courage.' The sight of them strengthened him and +prepared him for what lay before him. + +Paul's was a richly complicated nature--firm as a rock in its will, +tremulously sensitive in its sympathies; like some strongly-rooted +tree with its stable stem and a green cloud of fluttering foliage +that moves in the lightest air. So his spirit rose and fell according +to the reception that he met from his brethren, and the manifestation +of their faith quickened and strengthened his. + +And he is but one instance of a universal law. All teachers, the more +genuine they are, the more sympathetic they are, are the more +sensitive of their environment. The very oratorical temperament +places a man at the mercy of surroundings. All earnest work has ever +travelling with it as its shadow seasons of deep depression; and the +Christian teacher does not escape these. I am not going to speak +about myself, but this is unquestionably true, that every Elijah, +after the mightiest effort of prophecy, is apt to cover his head in +his mantle and to say, 'Take me away; I am not better than my +fathers.' And when a man for thirty years, amidst all the changes +incident to a great city congregation in that time, has to stand up +Sunday after Sunday before the same people, and mark how some of them +are stolidly indifferent, and note how others are dropping away +from their faithfulness, and see empty places where loving forms used +to sit--no wonder that the mood comes ever and anon, 'Then, said I, +surely I have laboured in vain and spent my strength for nought.' The +hearer reacts on the speaker quite as much as the speaker does on the +hearer. If you have ice in the pews, that brings down the temperature +up here. It is hard to be fervid amidst people that are all but dead. +It is difficult to keep a fire alight when it is kindled on the top +of an iceberg. And the unbelief and low-toned religion of a +congregation are always pulling down the faith and the fervour of +their minister, if he be better and holier, as they expect him to be, +than they are. + +'He did not many works because of their unbelief.' Christ knew the +hampering and the restrictions of His power which came from being +surrounded by a chill, unsympathetic environment. My strength and my +weakness are largely due to you. And if you want your minister to +preach better, and in all ways to do his work more joyfully and +faithfully, the means lie largely in your own hands. Icy +indifference, ill-natured interpretations, carping criticisms, swift +forgetfulness of one's words, all these things kill the fervour of +the pulpit. + +On the other hand, the true encouragement to give a man when he is +trying to do God's will, to preach Christ's Gospel, is not to pat him +on the back and say, 'What a remarkable sermon that was of yours! +what a genius! what an orator!' not to go about praising it, but to +come and say, 'Thy words have led me to Christ, and from thee I have +taken the gift of gifts.' + +Dear brethren, the encouragement of the minister is in the conversion +and the growth of the hearers. And I pray that in this new lease of +united fellowship which we have taken out, be it longer or +shorter--and advancing years tell me that at the longest it must be +comparatively short--I may come to you ever more and more with the +lofty and humbling consciousness that I have a message which Christ +has given to me, and that you may come more and more receptive--not +of _my_ words, God forbid--but of Christ's truth; and that so we +may be helpers one of another, and encourage each other in the +warfare and work to which we all are called and consecrated. + +[Footnote 1: Preached after long absence on account of illness.] + + + +DEBTORS TO ALL MEN + + 'I am a debtor both to the Greeks and to the Barbarians, + both to the wise and to the unwise.'--ROMANS i. 14. + + +No doubt Paul is here referring to the special obligation laid upon +him by his divine call to be the Apostle to the Gentiles. He was +entrusted with the Gospel as a steward, and was therefore bound to +carry it to all sorts and conditions of men. But the principle +underlying the statement applies to all Christians. The indebtedness +referred to is no peculiarity of the Apostolic order, but attaches to +every believer. Every servant of Jesus Christ, who has received the +truth for himself, has received it as a steward, and is, as such, +indebted to God, from whom he got the trust, and to the men for whom +he got it. The only limit to the obligation is, as Paul says in the +context, 'as much as in me is.' Capacity, determined by faculties, +opportunities, and circumstances, prescribes the kind and the degree +of the work to be done in discharge of the obligation; but the +obligation is universal. We are not at liberty to choose whether we +shall do our part in spreading the name of Jesus Christ. It is a debt +that we owe to God and to men. Is that the view of duty which the +average Christian man takes? I am afraid it is not. If it were, our +treasuries would be full, and great would be the multitude of them +that preached the Word. + +It is no very exalted degree of virtue to pay our debts. We do not +expect to be praised for that; and we do not consider that we are at +liberty to choose whether we shall do it or not. We are dishonest if +we do not. It is no merit in us to be honest. Would that all +Christian people applied that principle to their religion. The world +would be different, and the Church would be different, if they did. + +Let me try, then, to enforce this thought of indebtedness and of +common honesty in discharging the indebtedness, which underlies these +words. Paul thought that he went a long way to pay his debts to +humanity by carrying to everybody whom he could reach the 'Name that +is above every name.' + +I. Now, first, let me say that we Christians are debtors to all men +by our common manhood. + +It is not the least of the gifts which Christianity has brought to +the world, that it has introduced the new thought of the brotherhood +of mankind. The very word 'humanity' is a Christian coinage, and it +was coined to express the new thought that began to throb in men's +hearts, as soon as they accepted the message that Jesus Christ came +to give, the message of the Fatherhood of God. For it is on that +belief of God's Fatherhood that the belief of man's brotherhood +rests, and on it alone can it be secured and permanently based. + +Here is a Jew writing to Latins in the Greek language. The phenomenon +itself is a sign of a new order of things, of the rising of a flood +that had surged over, and in the course of ages would sap away and +dissolve, the barriers between men. The Apostle points to two of the +widest gulfs that separated men, in the words of my text. 'Greeks and +Barbarians' divides mankind, according to race and language. 'Wise +and unwise' divides them according to culture and intellectual +capacity. Both gulfs exist still, though they have been wonderfully +filled up by the influence, direct and indirect, of the Gospel of +Jesus Christ. The fiercest antagonisms of race which still subsist +are felt to belong to a decaying order, and to be sure, sooner or +later, to pass away. I suppose that the gulf made by the increased +culture of modern society between civilised and the savage peoples, +and, within the limits of our own land, the gulf made by education +between the higher and the lower layers of our community--I speak not +of higher and lower in regard to wealth or station, but in regard to +intellectual acquirement and capacity--are greater than, perhaps, +they ever were in the past. But yet over the gulf a bridge is thrown, +and the gulf itself is being filled up. High above all the +superficial distinctions which separate Jew and Gentile, Greek and +Barbarian, educated and illiterate, scientific and unscientific, wise +and unwise, there stretches the great rainbow of the truth that all +are one in Christ Jesus. Fraternity without Fatherhood is a ghastly +mockery that ended a hundred years ago in the guillotine, and to-day +will end in disappointment; and it is little more than cant. But when +Christianity comes and tells us that we have one Father and one +Redeemer, then the unity of the race is secured. + +And that oneness which makes us debtors to all men is shown to be +real by the fact that, beneath all superficial distinctions of +culture, race, age, or station, there are the primal necessities and +yearnings and possibilities that lie in every human soul. All men, +savage or cultivated, breathe the same air, see by the same light, +are fed by the same food and drink, have the same yearning hearts, +the same lofty aspirations that unfulfilled are torture; the same +experience of the same guilt, and, blessed be God! the same Saviour +and the same salvation. + +Because, then, we are all members of the one family, every man is +bound to regard all that he possesses, and is, and can do, as +committed to him in stewardship to be imparted to his fellows. We are +not sponges to absorb, but we are pipes placed in the spring, that we +may give forth the precious water of life. + +Cain is not a very good model, but his question is the world's +question, and it implies the expectation of a negative answer--'Am I +my brother's keeper?' Surely, the very language answers itself, and, +although Cain thinks that the only answer is 'No,' wisdom sees that +the only answer is 'Yes.' For if I am my brother's brother, then +surely I am my brother's keeper. We have a better example. There is +another Elder Brother who has come to give to His brethren all that +Himself possessed, and we but poorly follow our Master's pattern +unless we feel that the mystic tie which binds us in brotherhood to +every man makes us every man's debtor to the extent of our +possessions. That is the Christian truth that underlies the modern +Socialistic idea, and, whatever the form in which it is ultimately +brought into practice as the rule of mankind, the principle will +triumph one day; and we are bound, as Christian men, to hasten the +coming of its victory. We are debtors by reason of our common +humanity. + +II. We are debtors by our possession of the universal salvation. + +The principle which I have already been laying down applies all +round, to everything that we have, are, or can do. But its most +stringent obligation, and the noblest field for its operations, are +found in reference to the Christian man's possession of the Gospel +for the joy of his own heart, and to the duties that are therein +involved. Christ draws men to Himself for their own sakes, blessed be +His name! but not for their own sakes only. He draws them to Himself, +that they, in their turn, may draw others with whose hands theirs are +linked, and so may swell the numbers of the flock that gathers round +the one Shepherd. He puts the dew of His blessing into the chalice of +the tiniest flower, that it may 'share its dewdrop with another +near.' Just as every particle of inert dough as it is leavened +becomes in its turn leaven, and the medium for leavening the particle +contiguous to it, so every Christian is bound, or, to use the +metaphor of my text, is a debtor to God and man, to impart the Gospel +of Jesus Christ. 'Greek and Barbarian,' says Paul, 'wise or unwise'; +all distinctions vanish. If I can get at a man, no matter what +colour, his race, his language, his capacity, his acquirements, +he is my creditor, and I am defrauding him of what he has a right to +expect from me if I do not do my best to bring him to Jesus Christ. + +This obligation receives additional weight from the proved adaptation +of the Gospel to all sorts and conditions of men. Alone of all +religions has Christianity proved itself capable of dominating every +type of character, of influencing every stage of civilisation, of +assuming the speech of every tongue, and of wearing the garb of every +race. There are other religions which are evidently destined only to +a narrow field of operations, and are rigidly limited by geographical +conditions, or by stages of civilisation. There are wines that are +ruined by a sea voyage, and can only be drunk in the land where the +vintage was gathered; and that is the condition of all the ethnic +religions. Christianity alone passes through the whole earth, and +influences all men. The history of missions shows us that. There has +yet to be found the race that is incapable of receiving, or is beyond +the need of possessing, or cannot be elevated by the operation of, +the Gospel of Jesus Christ. + +So to all men we are bound, as much as in us is, to carry the Gospel. +The distinction that is drawn so often by the people who never move a +finger to help the heathen either at home or abroad, between the home +and the foreign field of work, vanishes altogether when we stand at +the true Christian standpoint. Here is a man who wants the Gospel; I +have it; I can give it to him. That constitutes a summons as +imperative as if we were called by name from Heaven, and bade to go, +and as much as in us is to preach the Gospel. Brethren! we do not +obey the command, 'Owe no man anything,' unless, to the extent of our +ability, or over the whole field which we can influence at home or +abroad, we seek to spread the name of Christ and the salvation that +is in Him. + +III. We are debtors by benefits received. + +I am speaking to men and women a very large proportion of whom get +their living, and some of whom amass their wealth, by trade with +lands that need the Gospel. It is not for nothing that England has +won the great empire that she possesses--won it, alas! far too often +by deeds that will not bear investigation in the light of Christian +principle, but won it. + +What do we owe to the lands that we call 'heathen'? The very speech +by which we communicate with one another; the beginning of our +civilisation; wide fields for expanding population and emigration; +treasures of wisdom of many kinds; an empire about which we are too +fond of crowing and too reluctant to recognise its +responsibilities--and Manchester its commerce and prosperity! Did God +put us where we are as a nation only in order that we might carry the +gifts of our literature, great as that is; of our science, great as +that is; of our law, blessed as that is; of our manufactures, to +those distant lands? The best thing that we can give is the thing +that all of us can help to give--the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 'Who +knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom for such a time as +this?' + +IV. Lastly, we are debtors by injuries inflicted. + +Many subject-races seem destined to fade away by contact with our +race; and if we think of the nameless cruelties, and the iliad of +woes which England's possession of this great Colonial Empire has had +accompanying it, we may feel that the harm in many aspects outweighs +the good, and that it had been better for these men to be left +suckled in creeds outworn, and ignorant of our civilisation, than to +receive from us the fatal gifts that they often have received. I do +not wish to exaggerate, but if you will take the facts of the case as +brought out by people that have no Christian prejudices to serve, I +think you will acknowledge that we as a nation owe a debt of +reparation to the barbarians and the unwise. + +What about killing African tribes by the thousand with the vile stuff +that we call rum, and send to them in exchange for their poor +commodities? What about introducing new diseases, the offspring of +vice, into the South Sea Islands, decimating and all but destroying +the population? Is it not true that, as the prophet wailed of old +about a degenerate Israel, we may wail about the beach-combers and +other loafers that go amongst savage lands from England--'Through you +the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles.' A Hindoo once said +to a missionary, 'Your Book is very good. If you were as good as your +Book you would conquer India in five years.' That may be true or it +may not, but it gives us the impression that is produced by godless +Englishmen on heathen peoples. We are taking away their religion from +them, necessarily, as the result of education and contact with +European thought. And if we do not substitute for it the one faith +that elevates and saves, the last state of that man will be worse +than the first. + +We can almost hear the rattle of the guns on the north-west frontier +of India to-day. There is another specimen of the injuries inflicted. +This is not the place to talk politics, but I feel that this is the +place to ask this question, 'Are Christian principles to have +anything to do in determining national actions?' Is it Christian to +impose our yoke on unwilling tribes who have as deep a love for +independence as the proudest Englishmen of us all, and as good a +right to it? Are punitive expeditions and Maxim guns instalments of +our debt to all men? I wonder what Jesus Christ, who died for Afridis +and Orakzais and all the rest of them, thinks about such conduct? + +Brethren, we are debtors to all men. Let us do our best to influence +national action in accordance with the brotherhood which has been +revealed to us by the Elder Brother of us all; and let us, at least +for our own parts, recognise, and, as much as in us is, discharge the +debt which, by our common humanity, and by our possession of the +universal Gospel we owe to all men, and which is made more weighty by +the benefits we receive from many, and by the injuries which England +has inflicted on not a few. Else shall we hear rise above all the +voices that palliate crime, on the plea of 'State necessity,' the +stern words of the Master, 'In thy skirts is found the blood of the +souls of poor innocents.' We are debtors; let us pay our debts. + + + + +THE GOSPEL THE POWER OF GOD[1] + + 'I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ: for it is + the power of God unto salvation to every one that + believeth.'--ROMANS i. 16. + + +To preach the Gospel in Rome had long been the goal of Paul's hopes. +He wished to do in the centre of power what he had done in Athens, +the home of wisdom; and with superb confidence, not in himself, but +in his message, to try conclusions with the strongest thing in the +world. He knew its power well, and was not appalled. The danger was +an attraction to his chivalrous spirit. He believed in flying at +the head when you are fighting with a serpent, and he knew that +influence exerted in Rome would thrill through the Empire. If we +would understand the magnificent audacity of these words of my text +we must try to listen to them with the ears of a Roman. Here was a +poor little insignificant Jew, like hundreds of his countrymen down +in the Ghetto, one who had his head full of some fantastic nonsense +about a young visionary whom the procurator of Syria had very wisely +put an end to a while ago in order to quiet down the turbulent +province; and he was going into Rome with the notion that his word +would shake the throne of the Cæsars. What proud contempt would have +curled their lips if they had been told that the travel-stained +prisoner, trudging wearily up the Appian Way, had the mightiest thing +in the world entrusted to his care! Romans did not believe much in +ideas. Their notion of power was sharp swords and iron yokes on the +necks of subject peoples. But the history of Christianity, whatever +else it has been, has been the history of the supremacy and the +revolutionary force of ideas. Thought is mightier than all visible +forces. Thought dissolves and reconstructs. Empires and institutions +melt before it like the carbon rods in an electric lamp; and the +little hillock of Calvary is higher than the Palatine with its regal +homes and the Capitoline with its temples: 'I am not ashamed of the +Gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation.' + +Now, dear friends, I have ventured to take these great words for my +text, though I know, better than any of you can tell me, how sure my +treatment of them is to enfeeble rather than enforce them, because I, +for my poor part, feel that there are few things which we, all of us, +people and ministers, need more than to catch some of the infection +of this courageous confidence, and to be fired with some spark of +Paul's enthusiasm for, and glorying in, the Gospel of Jesus Christ. + +I ask you, then, to consider three things: (1) what Paul thought was +the Gospel? (2) what Paul thought the Gospel was? and (3) what he +felt about the Gospel? + +I. What Paul thought was the Gospel? + +He has given to us in his own rapid way a summary statement, +abbreviated to the very bone, and reduced to the barest elements, of +what he meant by the Gospel. What was the irreducible minimum? The +facts of the Death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ, as you will find +written in the fifteenth chapter of the First Epistle to the +Corinthians. So, then, to begin with, the Gospel is not a statement +of principles, but a record of facts, things that have happened in +this world of ours. But the least part of a fact is the visible part +of it, and it is of no significance unless it has explanation, and so +Paul goes on to bind up with the facts an explanation of them. The +mere fact that Jesus, a young Nazarene, was executed is no more a +gospel than the other one, that two brigands were crucified beside +Him. But the fact that could be seen, plus the explanation which +underlies and interprets it, turns the chronicle into a gospel, and +the explanation begins with the name of the Sufferer; for if you want +to understand His death you must understand who it was that died. His +death is a thought pathetic in all aspects, and very precious in +many. But when we hear 'Christ died according to the Scriptures,' the +whole symbolism of the ancient ritual and all the glowing +anticipations of the prophets rise up before us, and that death +assumes an altogether different aspect. If we stop with 'Jesus died,' +then that death may be a beautiful example of heroism, a sweet, +pathetic instance of innocent suffering, a conspicuous example of the +world's wages to the world's teachers, but it is little more. If, +however, we take Paul's words upon our lips, 'Brethren, I declare +unto you the Gospel which I preached ... how that Christ died ... +according to the Scriptures,' the fact flashes up into solid beauty, +and becomes the Gospel of our salvation. And the explanation goes on, +'How that Christ died for our sins.' Now, I may be very blind, but I +venture to say that I, for my part, cannot see in what intelligible +sense the Death of Christ can be held to have been for, or on behalf +of, our sins--that is, that they may be swept away and we delivered +from them--unless you admit the atoning nature of His sacrifice for +sins. I cannot stop to enlarge, but I venture to say that any +narrower interpretation evacuates Paul's words of their deepest +significance. The explanation goes on, 'And that He was buried.' Why +that trivial detail? Partly because it guarantees the fact of His +Death, partly because of its bearing on the evidences of His +Resurrection. 'And that He rose from the dead according to the +Scriptures.' Great fact, without which Christ is a shattered prop, +and 'ye are yet in your sins.' + +But, further, notice that my text is also Paul's text for this +Epistle, and that it differs from the condensed summary of which I +have been speaking only as a bud with its petals closed differs from +one with them expanded in their beauty. And now, if you will take the +words of my text as being the keynote of this letter, and read over +its first eight chapters, what is the Apostle talking about when he +in them fulfils his purpose and preaches 'the Gospel' to them that +are at Rome also? Here is, in the briefest possible words, his +summary--the universality of sin, the awful burden of guilt, the +tremendous outlook of penalty, the impossibility of man rescuing +himself or living righteously, the Incarnation, and Life, and Death +of Jesus Christ as a sacrifice for the sins of the world, the hand of +faith grasping the offered blessing, the indwelling in believing +souls of the Divine Spirit, and the consequent admission of man into +a life of sonship, power, peace, victory, glory, the child's place in +the love of the Father from which nothing can separate. These are the +teachings which make the staple of this Epistle. These are the +explanations of the weighty phrases of my text. These are at least +the essential elements of the Gospel according to Paul. + +But he was not alone in this construction of his message. We hear a +great deal to-day about Pauline Christianity, with the implication, +and sometimes with the assertion, that he was the inventor of what, +for the sake of using a brief and easily intelligible term, I may +call Evangelical Christianity. Now, it is a very illuminating thought +for the reading of the New Testament that there are the three sets of +teaching, roughly, the Pauline, Petrine, and Johannine, and you +cannot find the distinctions between these three in any difference as +to the fundamental contents of the Gospel; for if Paul rings out, +'God commendeth His love toward us in that while we were yet sinners +Christ died for us,' Peter declares, 'Who His own self bare our sins +in His own body on the tree,' and John, from his island solitude, +sends across the waters the hymn of praise, 'Unto Him that loved us +and washed us from our sins in His own blood.' And so the proud +declaration of the Apostle, which he dared not have ventured upon in +the face of the acrid criticism he had to front unless he had known +he was perfectly sure of his ground, is natural and +warranted--'Therefore, whether it were I or they, so we preach.' + +We are told that we must go back to the Christ of the Gospels, the +historical Christ, and that He spoke nothing concerning all these +important points that I have mentioned as being Paul's conception of +the Gospel. Back to the Christ of the Gospels by all means, if you +will go to the Christ of all the Gospels and of the whole of each +Gospel. And if you do, you will go back to the Christ who said, 'The +Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to +give His life a ransom for many.' You will go back to the Christ who +said, 'And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men +unto Me.' You will go back to the Christ who said, 'The bread that I +will give is My flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.' +You will go back to the Christ who bade His followers hold in +everlasting memory, not the tranquil beauty of His life, not the +persuasive sweetness of His gracious words, not the might of His +miracles of blessing, but the mysterious agonies of His last hours, +by which He would have us learn that there lie the secret of His +power, the foundation of our hopes, the stimulus of our service. + +Now, brethren, I have ventured to dwell so long upon this matter, +because it is no use talking about the Gospel unless we understand +what we mean by it, and I, for my part, venture to say that that is +what Paul meant by it, and that is what I mean by it. I plead for no +narrow interpretation of the phrases of my text. I would not that +they should be used to check in the smallest degree the diversities +of representation which, according to the differences of individual +character, must ever prevail in the conceptions which we form and +which we preach of this Gospel of Jesus Christ. I want no parrot-like +repetition of a certain set of phrases embodied, however great may be +their meanings, in every sermon. And I would that the people to whom +those truths are true would make more allowance than they sometimes +do for the differences to which I have referred, and would show a +great deal more sympathy than they often do to those, especially +those young men, who, with their faces toward Christ, have not yet +grown to the full acceptance of all that is implied in those gracious +words. There is room for a whole world of thought in the Gospel of +Christ as Paul conceived it, with all the deep foundations of +implication and presupposition on which it rests, and with all the, +as yet, undiscovered range of conclusions to which it may lead. +Remember that the Cross of Christ is the key to the universe, and +sends its influence into every region of human thought. + +II. What Paul thought the Gospel was. + +'The power of God unto salvation.' There was in the background of the +Apostle's mind a kind of tacit reference to the antithetical power +that he was going up to meet, the power of Rome, and we may trace +that in the words of my text. Rome, as I have said, was the +embodiment of physical force, with no great faith in ideas. And over +against this carnal might Paul lifts the undissembled weakness of the +Cross, and declares that it is stronger than man, 'the power of God +unto salvation.' Rome is high in force; Athens is higher; the Cross +is highest of all, and it comes shrouded in weakness having a poor +Man hanging dying there. That is a strange embodiment of divine +power. Yes, and because so strange, it is so touching, and so +conquering. The power that is draped in weakness is power indeed. +Though Rome's power did make for righteousness sometimes, yet its +stream of tendency was on the whole a power to destruction and +grasped the nations of the earth as some rude hand might do rich +clusters of grapes and squeeze them into a formless mass. The tramp +of the legionary meant death, and it was true in many respects of +them what was afterwards said of later invaders of Europe, that where +their horses' hoofs had once stamped no grass ever grew. Over against +this terrific engine of destruction Paul lifts up the meek forces of +love which have for their sole object the salvation of man. + +Then we come to another of the keywords about which it is very +needful that people should have deeper and wider notions than they +often seem to cherish. What is salvation? Negatively, the removal and +sweeping away of all evil, physical and moral, as the schools speak. +Positively, the inclusion of all good for every part of the composite +nature of a man which the man can receive and which God can bestow. +And that is the task that the Gospel sets to itself. Now, I need not +remind you how, for the execution of such a purpose, it is plain that +something else than man's power is absolutely essential. It is only +God who can alter my relation to His government. It is only God who +can trammel up the inward consequences of my sins and prevent them +from scourging me. It is only God who can bestow upon my death a new +life, which shall grow up into righteousness and beauty, +caught of, and kindred to, His own. But if this be the aim of the +Gospel, then its diagnosis of man's sickness is a very much graver +one than that which finds favour amongst so many of us now. Salvation +is a bigger word than any of the little gospels that we hear +clamouring round about us are able to utter. It means something a +great deal more than either social or intellectual, or still more, +material or political betterment of man's condition. The disease lies +so deep, and so great are the destruction and loss partly +experienced, and still more awfully impending over every soul of us, +that something else than tinkering at the outsides, or dealing, as +self-culture does, with man's understanding or, as social gospels do, +with man's economical and civic condition, should be brought to bear. +Dear brethren, especially you Christian ministers, preach a social +Christianity by all means, an applied Christianity, for there does +lie in the Gospel of Jesus Christ a key to all the problems that +afflict our social condition. But be sure first that there is a +Christianity before you talk about applying it. And remember that the +process of salvation begins in the deep heart of the individual and +transforms him first and foremost. The power is 'to every one that +believeth.' It is power in its most universal sweep. Rome's Empire +was wellnigh ubiquitous, but, blessed be God, the dove of Christ +flies farther than the Roman eagle with beak and claw ready for +rapine, and wherever there are men here is a Gospel for them. The +limitation is no limitation of its universality. It is no limitation +of the claim of a medicine to be a panacea that it will only do good +to the man who swallows it. And that is the only limitation of which +the Gospel is susceptible, for we have all the same deep needs, the +same longings; we are fed by the same bread, we are nourished by the +same draughts of water, we breathe the same air, we have the same +sins, and, thanks be to God, we have the same Saviour. 'The power of +God unto salvation to every one that believeth.' + +Now before I pass from this part of my subject there is only one +thing more that I want to say, and that is, that you cannot apply +that glowing language about 'the power of God unto salvation' to +anything but the Gospel that Paul preached. Forms of Christianity +which have lost the significance of the Incarnation and Death of +Jesus Christ, and which have struck out or obscured the central facts +with which I have been dealing, are not, never were, and, I may +presumptuously venture to say, never will be, forces of large account +in this world. Here is a clock, beautiful, chased on the back, with a +very artistic dial-plate, and works modelled according to the most +approved fashion, but, somehow or other, the thing won't go. Perhaps +the mainspring is broken. And so it is only the Gospel, as Paul +expounds it and expands it in this Epistle, that is 'the power of God +unto salvation.' Dear brethren, in the course of a sermon like this, +of course, one must lay himself open to the charge of dogmatising. +That cannot be helped under the conditions of my space. But let me +say as my own solemn conviction--I know that that is not worth much +to you, but it is my justification for speaking in such a +fashion--let me say as my solemn conviction that you may as well take +the keystone out of an arch, with nothing to hold the other stones +together or keep them from toppling in hideous ruin on your +unfortunate head, as take the doctrine that Paul summed up in that +one word out of your conception of Christianity and expect it to +work. And be sure of this, that there is only one Name that lords it +over the demons of afflicted humanity, and that if a man goes and +tries to eject them with any less potent charm than Paul's Gospel, +they will turn upon him with 'Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who +are you?' + +III. What Paul felt about this Gospel. + +His restrained expression, 'I am not ashamed,' is the stronger for +its very moderation. It witnesses to the fixed purpose of his heart +and attitude of his mind, whilst it suggests that he was well aware +of all the temptations in Rome to being ashamed of it there. Think of +what was arrayed against him--venerable religion, systematised +philosophies, bitter hatred and prejudice, material power and wealth. +These were the brazen armour of Goliath, and this little David went +cheerily down into the valley with five pebble stones in a leathern +wallet, and was quite sure how it was going to end. And it ended as +he expected. His Gospel shook the kingdom of the Roman, and cast it +in another mould. + +And there are temptations, plenty of them, for us, dear friends, +to-day, to bate our confidence. The drift of what calls itself +influential opinion is anti-supernatural, and we all are conscious of +the presence of that element all round about us. It tells with +special force upon our younger men, but it affects us all. In this +day, when a large portion of the periodical press, which does the +thinking for most of us, looks askance at these truths, and when, on +the principle that in the kingdom of the blind the one-eyed man is +the king, popular novelists become our theological tutors, and when +every new publishing season brings out a new conclusive destruction +of Christianity, which supersedes last season's equally complete +destruction, it is hard for some of us to keep our flags flying. The +ice round about us will either bring down the temperature, or, if it +stimulates us to put more fuel on the fire, perhaps the fire may melt +it. And so the more we feel ourselves encompassed by these +temptations, the louder is the call to Christian men to cast +themselves back on the central verities, and to draw at first hand +from them the inspiration which shall be their safety. And how is +that to be done? Well, there are many ways by which thoughtful, and +cultivated, students may do it. But may I venture to deal here rather +with ways which all Christian people have open before them? And I am +bold to say that the way to be sure of 'the power of God unto +salvation' is to submit ourselves continually to its cleansing and +renewing influence. This certitude, brethren, may be contributed to +by books of apologetics, and by other sources of investigation and +study which I should be sorry indeed to be supposed in any degree to +depreciate. But the true way to get it is, by deep communion with the +living God, to realise the personality of Jesus Christ as present +with us, our Friend, our Saviour, our Sanctifier by His Holy Spirit. +Why, Paul's Gospel was, I was going to say, altogether--that would be +an exaggeration--but it was to a very large extent simply the +generalisation of his own experience. That is what all of us will +find to be the Gospel that we have to preach. 'We speak that we do +know and testify that we have seen.' And it was because this man +could say so assuredly--because the depths of his own conscience and +the witness within him bore testimony to it--'He loved me and gave +Himself for me,' that he could also say, 'The power of God unto +salvation to every one that believeth.' Go down into the depths, +brother and friend; cry to Him out of the depths. Then you will feel +His strong, gentle grip lifting you to the heights, and that will +give power that nothing else will, and you will be able to say, 'I +have heard Him myself, and I know that this is the Christ, the +Saviour of the world.' + +But there is yet another source of certitude open to us all, and that +is the history of the centuries. Our modern sceptics, attacking the +truth of Christianity mostly from the physical side, are strangely +blind to the worth of history. It is a limitation of faculty that +besets them in a good many directions, but it does not work anywhere +more fatally than it does in their attitude towards the Gospel. After +all, Jesus Christ spoke the ultimate word when He said, 'By their +fruits ye shall know them.' And it is so, because just as what is +morally wrong cannot be politically right, so what is intellectually +false cannot be morally good. Truth, goodness, beauty, they are but +three names for various aspects of one thing, and if it be that the +difference between B.C. and A.D. has come from a Gospel which is not +the truth of God, then all I can say is, that the richest vintage +that ever the world saw, and the noblest wine of which it ever drank, +did grow upon a thorn. I know that the Christian Church has sinfully +and tragically failed to present Christ adequately to the world. But +for all that, 'Ye are My witnesses, saith the Lord'; and nobler +manners and purer laws have come in the wake of this Gospel of Jesus +Christ. And as I look round about upon what Christianity has done in +the world, I venture to say, 'Show us any system of religion or of no +religion that has done that or anything the least like it, and then +we will discuss with you the other evidences of the Gospel.' + +In closing these words, may I venture relying on the melancholy +privilege of seniority, to drop for a minute or two into a tone of +advice? I would say, do not be frightened out of your confidence +either by the premature paean of victory from the opposite camp, or +by timid voices in our own ranks. And that you may not be so +frightened, be sure to keep clear in your mind the distinction +between the things that can be shaken and the kingdom that cannot be +moved. It is bad strategy to defend an elongated line. It is +cowardice to treat the capture of an outpost as involving the +evacuation of the key of the position. It is a mistake, to which many +good Christian people are sorely tempted in this day, to assert such +a connection between the eternal Gospel and our deductions from the +principles of that Gospel as that the refutation of the one must be +the overthrow of the other. And if it turns out to be so in any case, +a large part of the blame lies upon those good and mistaken people +who insist that everything must be held or all must be abandoned. The +burning questions of this day about the genuineness of the books of +Scripture, inspiration, inerrancy, and the like, are not so +associated with this word, 'God so loved the world ... that whosoever +believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life,' as +that the discovery of errors in the Second Book of Chronicles shakes +the foundations of the Christian certitude. In a day like this truth +must change its vesture. Who believes that the Dissenting Churches of +England are the highest, perfect embodiment of the Kingdom of God? +And who believes that any creed of man's making has in it all and has +in it only the everlasting Gospel? So do not be frightened, and do +not think that when the things that can be shaken are removed, the +things that cannot be shaken are at all less likely to remain. Depend +upon it, the Gospel, whose outline I have imperfectly tried to set +before you now, will last as long as men on earth know they are +sinners and need a Saviour. Did you ever see some mean buildings that +have by degrees been gathered round the sides of some majestic +cathedral, and do you suppose that the sweeping away of those +shanties would touch the solemn majesty of the mediæval glories of +the building that rises above them? Take them away if need be, and +it, in its proportion, beauty, strength, and heavenward aspiration, +will stand more glorious for the sweeping away. Preach positive +truth. Do not preach doubts. You remember Mr. Kingsley's book +_Yeast_. Its title was its condemnation. Yeast is not meant to be +drunk; it is meant to be kept in the dark till the process of +fermentation goes on and it works itself clear, and then you may +bring it out. Do not be always arguing with the enemy. It is a great +deal better to preach the truth. Remember what Jesus said: 'Let them +alone, they are blind leaders of the blind, they will fall into the +ditch.' It is not given to every one of us to conduct controversial +arguments in the pulpit. There are some much wiser and abler brethren +amongst us than you or I who can do it. Let us be contented with, not +the humbler but the more glorious, office of telling what we have +known, leaving it, as it will do, to prove itself. You remember what +the old woman, who had been favoured by her pastor with an elaborate +sermon to demonstrate the existence of God, said when he had +finished; 'Well, I believe there is a God, for all the gentleman +says.' + +As one who sees the lengthening shadows falling over the darkening +field, may I say one word to my junior brethren, with all whose +struggles and doubts and difficulties I, for one, do most tenderly +sympathise? I beseech them--though, alas! the advice condemns the +giver of it as he looks back over long years of his ministry--to be +faithful to the Gospel how that 'Jesus Christ died for our sins +according to the Scriptures.' Dear young friends, if you only go +where Paul went, and catch the inspiration that he caught there, your +path will be clear. It was in contact with Christ, whose passion for +soul-winning brought Him from heaven, that Paul learned his passion +for soul-winning. And if you and I are touched with the divine +enthusiasm, and have that aim clear before us, we shall soon find out +that there is only one power, one name given under heaven among men +whereby we can accomplish what we desire--the name of 'Jesus Christ +that died, yea, rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right +hand of God, and also maketh intercession for us.' If our aim is +clear before us it will prescribe our methods, and if the inspiration +of our ministry is, 'I determine not to know anything among you save +Jesus Christ and Him crucified,' then, whether men will hear or +whether they will forbear, they shall know that there hath been a +Prophet among them. + +[Footnote 1: Preached before Baptist Union.] + + +WORLD-WIDE SIN AND WORLD-WIDE REDEMPTION + + 'Now we know, that what things soever the law saith, it + saith to them who are under the law; that every mouth + may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty + before God. 20. Therefore by the deeds of the law there + shall no flesh be justified in His sight: for by the + law is the knowledge of sin. 21. But now the + righteousness of God without the law is manifested, + being witnessed by the law and the prophets; 22. Even + the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus + Christ unto all and upon all them that believe; for + there is no difference: 23. For all have sinned, and + come short of the glory of God: 24. Being justified + freely by His grace, through the redemption that is + in Christ Jesus; 25. Whom God hath set forth to be a + propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His + righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, + through the forbearance of God; 26. To declare, I say, + at this time His righteousness; that He might be just, + and the justifier of him which believeth in + Jesus.'--ROMANS iii. 19-26. + + +Let us note in general terms the large truths which this passage +contains. We may mass these under four heads: + +I. Paul's view of the purpose of the law. + +He has been quoting a mosaic of Old Testament passages from the +Psalms and Isaiah. He regards these as part of 'the law,' which term, +therefore, in his view, here includes the whole previous revelation, +considered as making known God's will as to man's conduct. Every word +of God, whether promise, or doctrine, or specific command, has in it +some element bearing on conduct. God reveals nothing only in order +that we may know, but all that, knowing, we may do and be what is +pleasing in His sight. All His words are law. + +But Paul sets forth another view of its purpose here; namely, to +drive home to men's consciences the conviction of sin. That is not +the only purpose, for God reveals duty primarily in order that men +may do it, and His law is meant to be obeyed. But, failing obedience, +this second purpose comes into action, and His law is a swift witness +against sin. The more clearly we know our duty, the more poignant +will be our consciousness of failure. The light which shines to show +the path of right, shines to show our deviations from it. And that +conviction of sin, which it was the very purpose of all the previous +Revelation to produce, is a merciful gift; for, as the Apostle +implies, it is the prerequisite to the faith which saves. + +As a matter of fact, there was a far profounder and more inward +conviction of sin among the Jews than in any heathen nation. Contrast +the wailings of many a psalm with the tone in Greek or Roman +literature. No doubt there is a law written on men's hearts which +evokes a lower measure of the same consciousness of sin. There are +prayers among the Assyrian and Babylonian tablets which might almost +stand beside the Fifty-first Psalm; but, on the whole, the deep sense +of sin was the product of the revealed law. The best use of our +consciousness of what we ought to be, is when it rouses conscience to +feel the discordance with it of what we are, and so drives us to +Christ. Law, whether in the Old Testament, or as written in our +hearts by their very make, is the slave whose task is to bring us to +Christ, who will give us power to keep God's commandments. + +Another purpose of the law is stated in verse 21, as being to bear +witness, in conjunction with the prophets, to a future more perfect +revelation of God's righteousness. Much of the law was symbolic and +prophetic. The ideal it set forth could not always remain +unfulfilled. The whole attitude of that system was one of +forward-looking expectancy. There is much danger lest, in modern +investigations as to the authorship, date, and genesis of the Old +Testament revelation, its central characteristic should be lost sight +of; namely, its pointing onwards to a more perfect revelation which +should supersede it. + +II. Paul's view of universal sinfulness. + +He states that twice in this passage (vs. 20 to 24), and it underlies +his view of the purpose of law. In verse 20 he asserts that 'by the +works of the law shall no flesh be justified,' and in verses 23 and +24 he advances from that negative statement to the positive assertion +that all have sinned. The impossibility of justification by the works +of the law may be shown from two considerations: one, that, as a +matter of fact, no flesh has ever done them all with absolute +completeness and purity; and, second, that, even if they had ever +been so done, they would not have availed to secure acquittal at a +tribunal where motive counts for more than deed. The former is the +main point with Paul. + +In verse 23 the same fact of universal experience is contemplated as +both positive sin and negative falling short of the 'glory' (which +here seems to mean, as in John v. 44, xii. 43, approbation from God). +'There is no distinction,' but all varieties of condition, character, +attainment, are alike in this, that the fatal taint is upon them all. +'We have, all of us, one human heart.' We are alike in physical +necessities, in primal instincts, and, most tragically of all, in the +common experience of sinfulness. + +Paul does not mean to bring all varieties of character down to one +dead level, but he does mean to assert that none is free from the +taint. A man need only be honest in self-examination to endorse the +statement, so far as he himself is concerned. The Gospel would be +better understood if the fact of universal sinfulness were more +deeply felt. Its superiority to all schemes for making everybody +happy by rearrangements of property, or increase of culture, would be +seen through; and the only cure for human misery would be discerned +to be what cures universal sinfulness. + +III. So we have next Paul's view of the remedy for man's sin. That is +stated in general terms in verses 21, 22. Into a world of sinful men +comes streaming the light of a 'righteousness of God.' That +expression is here used to mean a moral state of conformity with +God's will, imparted by God. The great, joyful message, which Paul +felt himself sent to proclaim, is that the true way to reach the +state of conformity which law requires, and which the +unsophisticated, universal conscience acknowledges not to have been +reached, is the way of faith. + +The message is so familiar to us that we may easily fail to realise +its essential greatness and wonderfulness when first proclaimed. That +God should give righteousness, that it should be 'of God,' not only +as coming from Him, but as, in some real way, being kindred with His +own perfection; that it should be brought to men by Jesus Christ, as +ancient legends told that a beneficent Titan brought from heaven, in +a hollow cane, the gift of fire; and that it should become ours by +the simple process of trusting in Jesus Christ, are truths which +custom has largely robbed of their wonderfulness. Let us meditate +more on them till they regain, by our own experience of their power, +some of the celestial light which belongs to them. + +Observe that in verse 22 the universality of the redemption which is +in Christ is deduced from the universality of sin. The remedy must +reach as far as the disease. If there is no difference in regard to +sin, there can be none in regard to the sweep of redemption. The +doleful universality of the covering spread over all nations, has +corresponding to it the blessed universality of the light which is +sent forth to flood them all. Sin's empire cannot stretch farther +than Christ's kingdom. + +IV. Paul's view of what makes the Gospel the remedy. + +In verses 21 and 22 it was stated generally that Christ was the +channel, and faith the condition, of righteousness. The personal +object of faith was declared, but not the special thing in Christ +which was to be trusted in. That is fully set forth in verses 24-26. +We cannot attempt to discuss the great words in these verses, each of +which would want a volume. But we may note that 'justified' here +means to be accounted or declared righteous, as a judicial act; and +that justification is traced in its ultimate source to God's +'grace,'--His own loving disposition--which bends to unworthy and +lowly creatures, and is regarded as having for the medium of its +bestowal the 'redemption' that is in Christ Jesus. That is the +channel through which grace comes from God. + +'Redemption' implies captivity, liberation, and a price paid. The +metaphor of slaves set free by ransom is exchanged in verse 25 for a +sacrificial reference. A propitiatory sacrifice averts punishment +from the offerer. The death of the victim procures the life of the +worshipper. So, a propitiatory or atoning sacrifice is offered by +Christ's blood, or death. That sacrifice is the ransom-price through +which our captivity is ended, and our liberty assured. As His +redemption is the channel 'through' which God's grace comes to men, +so faith is the condition 'through' which (ver. 25) we make that +grace ours. + +Note, then, that Paul does not merely point to Jesus Christ as +Saviour, but to His death as the saving power. We are to have faith +in Jesus Christ (ver. 22). But that is not a complete statement. It +must be faith in His propitiation, if it is to bring us into living +contact with His redemption. A gospel which says much of Christ, but +little of His Cross, or which dilates on the beauty of His life, but +stammers when it begins to speak of the sacrifice in His death, is +not Paul's Gospel, and it will have little power to deal with the +universal sickness of sin. + +The last verses of the passage set forth another purpose attained by +Christ's sacrifice; namely, the vindication of God's righteousness in +forbearing to inflict punishment on sins committed before the advent +of Jesus. That Cross rayed out its power in all directions--to the +heights of the heavens; to the depths of Hades (Col. i. 20); to the +ages that were to come, and to those that were past. The suspension +of punishment through all generations, from the beginning till that +day when the Cross was reared on Calvary, was due to that Cross +having been present to the divine mind from the beginning. 'The judge +is condemned when the guilty is acquitted,' or left unpunished. There +would be a blot on God's government, not because it was so severe, +but because it was so forbearing, unless His justice was vindicated, +and the fatal consequences of sin shown in the sacrifice of Christ. +God could not have shown Himself just, in view either of age-long +forbearance, or of now justifying the sinner, unless the Cross had +shown that He was not immorally indulgent toward sin. + + + + +NO DIFFERENCE + + 'There is no difference.'--ROMANS iii. 22. + +The things in which all men are alike are far more important than +those in which they differ. The diversities are superficial, the +identities are deep as life. Physical processes and wants are the +same for everybody. All men, be they kings or beggars, civilised or +savage, rich or poor, wise or foolish, cultured or illiterate, +breathe the same breath, hunger and thirst, eat and drink, sleep, are +smitten by the same diseases, and die at last the same death. We have +all of us one human heart. Tears and grief, gladness and smiles, move +us all. Hope, fear, love, play the same music upon all heart-strings. +The same great law of duty over-arches every man, and the same heaven +of God bends above him. + +Religion has to do with the deep-seated identities and not with the +superficial differences. And though there have been many aristocratic +religions in the world, it is the great glory of Christianity that it +goes straight to the central similarities, and brushes aside, as of +altogether secondary importance, all the subordinate diversities, +grappling with the great facts which are common to humanity, and with +the large hopes which all may inherit. + +Paul here, in his grand way, triumphs and rises above all these small +differences between man and man, more pure or less pure, Jew or +Gentile, wise or foolish, and avers that, in regard of the deepest +and most important things, 'there is no difference,' and so his +Gospel is a Gospel for the world, because it deals with all men on +the same level. Now I wish to work out this great glory and +characteristic of the Gospel system in a few remarks, and to point +out to you the more important of these things in which all men, be +they what or who they may, stand in one category and have identical +experiences and interests. + +I. First, there is no difference in the fact of sin. + +Now let us understand that the Gospel does not assert that there is +no difference in the degrees of sin. Christianity does not teach, +howsoever some of its apostles may seem to have taught, or +unconsciously lent themselves to representations which imply the view +that there was no difference between a man who 'did by nature the +things contained in the law,' as Paul says, and the man who set +himself to violate law. There is no such monstrous teaching in the +New Testament as that all blacks are the same shade, all sin of the +same gravity, no such teaching as that a man that tries according to +his light to do what is right stands on exactly the same level as the +man who flouts all such obligations, and has driven the chariots of +his lusts and passions through every law that may stand in his way. + +But even whilst we have to insist upon that, that the teaching of my +text is not of an absolute identity of criminality, but only an +universal participation in criminality, do not let us forget that, if +you take the two extremes, and suppose it possible that there were a +best man in all the world, and a worst man in all the world, the +difference between these two is not perhaps so great as at first +sight it looks. For we have to remember that motives make actions, +and that you cannot judge of these by considering those, that 'as a +man thinketh in his heart,' and not as a man does with his hands, 'so +is he.' We have to remember, also, that there may be lives, +sedulously and immaculately respectable and pure, which are white +rather with the unwholesome leprosy of disease than with the +wholesome purity of health. + +In Queen Elizabeth's time, the way in which they cleaned the hall of +a castle, the floor of which might be covered with remnants of food +and all manner of abominations, was to strew another layer of rushes +over the top of the filth, and then they thought themselves quite +neat and respectable. And that is what a great many of you do, cover +the filth well up with a sweet smelling layer of conventional +proprieties, and think yourselves clean, and the pinks of perfection. +God forbid that I should say one word that would seem to cast any +kind of slur upon the effort that any man makes to do what he knows +to be right, but this I proclaim, or rather my text proclaims for me, +that, giving full weight and value to all that, and admitting the +existence of variations in degree, the identity is deeper than the +diversity; and there is 'not a just man upon earth that doeth good +and sinneth not.' + +Oh, dear friends! it is not a question of degree, but of direction; +not how far the ship has gone on her voyage, but how she heads. Good +and evil are the same in essence, whatever be their intensity and +whatever be their magnitude. Arsenic is arsenic, whether you have a +ton of it or a grain; and a very small dose will be enough to poison. +The Gospel starts with the assertion that there is no difference in +the fact of sin. The assertion is abundantly confirmed. Does not +conscience assent? We all admit 'faults,' do we not? We all +acknowledge 'imperfections.' It is that little word 'sin' which seems +to bring in another order of considerations, and to command the +assent of conscience less readily. But sin is nothing except fault +considered in reference to God's law. Bring the notion of God into +the life, and 'faults' and 'slips' and 'weaknesses,' and all the +other names by which we try to smooth down the ugliness of the ugly +thing, start up at once into their tone, magnitude, and importance, +and stand avowed as _sins_. + +Well now, if there be, therefore, this universal consciousness of +imperfection, and if that consciousness of imperfection has only need +to be brought into contact with God, as it were, to flame thus, let +me remind you, too, that this fact of universal sinfulness puts us +all in one class, no matter what may be the superficial difference. +Shakespeare and the Australian savage, the biggest brain and the +smallest, the loftiest and the lowest of us, the purest and the +foulest of us, we all come into the same order. It is a question of +classification. 'The Scripture hath concluded all under sin,' that is +to say, has shut all men up as in a prison. You remember in the +French Revolution, all manner of people were huddled indiscriminately +into the same dungeon of the Paris prisons. You would find a princess +and some daughter of shame from the gutters; a boor from the country +and a landlord, a count, a marquis, a _savant_, a philosopher +and an illiterate workman, all together in the dungeons. They kept up +the distinctions of society and of class with a ghastly mockery, even +to the very moment when the tumbrils came for them. And so here are +we all, in some sense inclosed within the solemn cells of this great +prison-house, and whether we be wise or foolish, we are prisoners, +whether we have titles or not, we are prisoners. You may be a +student, but you are a sinner: you may be a rich Manchester merchant, +but you are a sinner; you may be a man of rank, but you are a sinner. +Naaman went to Elisha and was very much offended because Elisha +treated him as a leper who happened to be a nobleman. He wanted to be +treated as a nobleman who happened to be a leper. And that is the way +with a great many of us; we do not like to be driven into one class +with all the crowd of evildoers. But, my friend, 'there is no +difference.' 'All have sinned and come short of the glory of God.' + +II. Again, there is no difference in the fact of God's love to us. + +God does not love men because of what they are, therefore He does not +cease to love them because of what they are. His love to the sons of +men is not drawn out by their goodness, their morality, their +obedience, but it wells up from the depths of His own heart, because +'it is His nature and property,' and if I may so say, He cannot help +loving. You do not need to pump up that great affection by any +machinery of obedience and of merits; it rises like the water in an +Artesian well, of its own impulse, with ebullient power from the +central heat, and spreads its great streams everywhere. And +therefore, though our sin may awfully disturb our relations with God, +and may hurt and harm us in a hundred ways, there is one thing it +cannot do, it cannot stop Him from loving us. It cannot dam back His +great love, which flows out for ever towards all His creatures, and +laves them all in its gentle, strong flood, from which nothing can +draw them away. 'In Him we live, and move, and have our being,' and +to live in Him, whatever else it may mean--and it means a great deal +more--is most certainly to live in His love. A man can as soon pass +out of the atmosphere in which he breathes as he can pass out of the +love of God. We can no more travel beyond that great over-arching +firmament of everlasting love which spans all the universe than a +star set in the blue heavens can transcend the liquid arch and get +beyond its range. 'There is no difference' in the fact that all men, +unthankful and evil as they are, are grasped and held in the love of +God. + +But there _is_ a difference. Sin cannot dam God's love back, but sin +has a terrible power in reference to the love of God. Two things it +can do. It can make us incapable of receiving the highest blessings +of that love. There are many mercies which God pours 'upon the +unthankful and the evil.' These are His least gifts; His highest and +best cannot be given to the unthankful and the evil. They would if +they could, but they cannot, because they cannot be received by them. +You can shut the shutters against the light; you can close the vase +against the stream. You cannot prevent its shining, you cannot +prevent its flowing, but you can prevent yourself from receiving its +loftiest and best blessings. + +And another awful power that my sin has in reference to God's love +is, that it can modify the form which God's love takes in its +dealings with me. We may force Him to do 'His work,' 'His strange +work,' as Isaiah calls it, and to punish when He would fain only +succour and comfort and bless. Just as a fog in the sky does not +touch the sun, but turns it to our eyes into a fiery ball, red and +lurid, so the mist of my sin coming between me and God, may, to my +apprehension and to my capacity of reception, solemnly make different +that great love of His. But yet there is no difference in the fact of +God's love to us. + +III. Thirdly, there is no difference in the purpose and power of +Christ's Cross for us all. + +'He died for all.' The area over which the purpose and the power of +Christ's death extend is precisely conterminous with the area over +which the power of sin extends. It cannot be--blessed be God!--that +the raven Sin shall fly further than the dove with the olive branch +in its mouth. It cannot be that the disease shall go wider than the +cure. And so, dear friends, I have to come to you now with this +message. No matter what a man is, how far he has gone, how sinful he +has been, how long he has stayed away from the sweetness and grace of +that great sacrifice on the Cross, that death was for him. The power +of Christ's sacrifice makes possible the forgiveness of all the sins +of all the world, past, present, and to come. The worth of that +sacrifice, which was made by the willing surrender of the Incarnate +Son of God to the death of the Cross, is sufficient for the ransom +price of all the sins of all men. + +Nor is it only the power of the Cross which is all embracing, but its +purpose also. In the very hour of Christ's death, there stood, clear +and distinct, before His divine omniscience, each man, woman, and +child of the race. And for them all, grasping them all in the +tenderness of His sympathy and in the clearness of His knowledge, in +the design of His sufferings for them all, He died, so that every +human being may lay his hand on the head of the sacrifice, and _know_ +'his guilt was there,' and may say, with as triumphant and +appropriating faith as Paul did, 'He loved _me_,' and in that hour of +agony and love 'gave Himself for _me_.' + +To go back to a metaphor already employed, the prisoners are gathered +together in the prison, not that they may be slain, but 'God hath +included them all,' shut them all up, 'that He might have mercy upon +all.' And so, as it was in the days of Christ's life upon earth, so +is it now, and so will it be for ever. All the crowd may come to Him, +and whosoever comes 'is made whole of whatsoever disease he had.' +There are no incurables nor outcasts. 'There is no difference.' + +IV. Lastly, there is no difference in the way which we must take for +salvation. The only thing that unites men to Jesus Christ is faith. +You must trust Him, you must trust the power of His sacrifice, you +must trust the might of His living love. You must trust Him with a +trust which is self-distrust. You must trust Him out and out. The +people with whom Paul is fighting, in this chapter, were quite +willing to admit that faith was the thing that made Christians, but +they wanted to tack on something besides. They wanted to tack on the +rites of Judaism and obedience to the moral law. And ever since men +have been going on in that erroneous rut. Sometimes it has been that +people have sought to add a little of their own morality; sometimes +to add ceremonies and sacraments. Sometimes it has been one thing and +sometimes it has been another; but there are not two ways to the +Cross of Christ, and to the salvation which He gives. There is only +one road, and all sorts of men have to come by it. You cannot lean +half upon Christ and half upon yourselves, like the timid cripple +that is not quite sure of the support of the friendly arm. You cannot +eke out the robe with which He will clothe you with a little bit of +stuff of your own weaving. It is an insult to a host to offer to pay +for entertainment. The Gospel feast that Christ provides is not a +social meal to which every guest brings a dish. Our part is simple +reception, we have to bring empty hands if we would receive the +blessing. + +We must put away superficial differences. The Gospel is for the +world, therefore the act by which we receive it must be one which all +men can perform, not one which only some can do. Not wisdom, nor +righteousness, but faith joins us to Christ. And, therefore, people +who fancy themselves wise or righteous are offended that 'special +terms' are not made with them. They would prefer to have a private +portion for themselves. It grates against the pride of the +aristocratic class, whether it be aristocratic by culture--and that +is the most aristocratic of all--or by position, or anything else--it +grates against their pride to be told: 'You have to go in by that +same door that the beggar is going in at'; and 'there is no +difference.' Therefore, the very width of the doorway, that is wide +enough for all the world, gets to be thought narrowness, and becomes +a hindrance to our entering. As Naaman's servant put a common-sense +question to him, so may I to you. 'If the prophet had bid thee do +some great thing, wouldest thou not have done it?' Ay! that you +would! 'How much more when He says "Wash and be clean!"' There is +only one way of getting dirt off, and that is by water. There is only +one way of getting sin off, and that is by the blood of Jesus Christ. +There is only one way of having that blood applied to your heart, and +that is trusting Him. 'The common salvation' becomes ours when we +exercise 'the common faith.' 'There is no difference' in our sins. +Thank God! 'there is no difference' in the fact that He grasps us +with His love. There is no difference in the fact that Jesus Christ +has died for us all. Let there be no difference in our faith, or +there will be a difference, deep as the difference between Heaven and +Hell; the difference between them that believe and them that believe +not, which will darken and widen into the difference between them +that are saved and them that perish. + + + + +LET US HAVE PEACE + + 'Let us have peace with God through our Lord Jesus + Christ.'--ROMANS v. 1. (R.V.). + + +In the rendering of the Revised Version, 'Let us have peace with God +through our Lord Jesus Christ,' the alteration is very slight, being +that of one letter in one word, the substitution of a long 'o' for a +short one. The majority of manuscripts of authority read 'let us +have,' making the clause an exhortation and not a statement. I +suppose the reason why, in some inferior MSS., the statement takes +the place of the exhortation is because it was felt to be somewhat of +a difficulty to understand the Apostle's course of thought. But I +shall hope to show you that the true understanding of the context, as +well as of the words I have taken for my text, requires the +exhortation and not the affirmation. + +One more remark of an introductory character: is it not very +beautiful to see how the Apostle here identifies himself, in all +humility, with the Christians whom he is addressing, and feels that +he, Apostle as he is, has the same need for the same counsel and +stimulus that the weakest of those to whom he is writing have? It +would have been so easy for him to isolate himself, and say, 'Now you +have peace with God; see that you keep it.' But he puts himself into +the same class as those whom he is exhorting, and that is what all of +us have to do who would give advice that will be worth anything or of +any effect. He does not stand upon a little molehill of superiority, +and look down upon the Roman Christians, and imply that they have +needs that he has not, but he exhorts himself too, saying, 'Let all +of us who have obtained like precious faith, which is alike in an +Apostle and in the humblest believer, have peace with God.' + +Now a word, first, about the meaning of this somewhat singular +exhortation. + +There is a theory of man and his relation to God underlying it, which +is very unfashionable at present, but which corresponds to the +deepest things in human nature, and the deepest mysteries in human +history, and that is, that something has come in to produce the +totally unnatural and monstrous fact that between God and man there +is not amity or harmony. Men, on their side, are alienated, because +their wills are rebellious and their aims diverse from God's purpose +concerning them. And--although it is an awful thing to have to say, +and one from which the sentimentalism of much modern Christianity +weakly recoils--on God's side, too, the relation has been disturbed, +and 'we are by nature the children of wrath, even as others'; not of +a wrath which is unloving, not of a wrath which is impetuous and +passionate, not of a wrath which seeks the hurt of its objects, but +of a wrath which is the necessary antagonism and recoil of pure love +from such creatures as we have made ourselves to be. To speak as if +the New Testament taught that 'reconciliation' was lop-sided--which +would be a contradiction in terms, for reconciliation needs two to +make it--to talk as if the New Testament taught that reconciliation +was only man's putting away his false relation to God, is, as I +humbly think, to be blind to its plainest teaching. So, there being +this antagonism and separation between God and man, the Gospel comes +to deal with it, and proclaims that Jesus Christ has abolished the +enmity, and by His death on the Cross has become our peace; and that +we, by faith in that Christ, and grasping in faith His death, pass +from out of the condition of hostility into the condition of +reconciliation. + +With this by way of basis, let us come back to my text. It sounds +strange; 'Therefore, being justified by faith, let up have peace.' +'Well,' you will say, 'but is not all that you have been saying just +this, that to be justified by faith, to be declared righteous by +reason of faith in Him who makes us righteous, is to have peace with +God? Is not your exhortation an entirely superfluous one?' No doubt +that is what the old scribe thought who originated the reading which +has crept into our Authorised Version. The two things do seem to be +entirely parallel. To be justified by faith is a certain process, to +have peace with God is the inseparable and simultaneous result of +that process itself. But that is going rather too fast. 'Being +justified by faith let us have peace with God,' really is just +this--see that you abide where you are; keep what you have. The +exhortation is not to attain peace, but retain it. 'Hold fast that +thou hast; let no man take thy crown.' 'Being justified by faith' +cling to your treasure and let nothing rob you of it--'let us have +peace with God.' + +Now a word, in the next place, as to the necessity and importance of +this exhortation. + +There underlies it, this solemn thought, which Christian people, and +especially some types of Christian doctrine, do need to have hammered +into them over and over again, that we hold the blessed life itself, +and all its blessings, only on condition of our own cooperation in +keeping them; and that just as physical life dies, unless by +reception of food we nourish and continue it, so a man that is in +this condition of being justified by faith, and having peace with +God, needs, in order to the permanence of that condition, to give his +utmost effort and diligence. It will all go if he do not. All the old +state will come back again if we are slothful and negligent. We +cannot keep the treasure unless we guard it. And just because we have +it, we need to put all our mind, the earnestness of our will, and the +concentration of our efforts, into the specific work of retaining it. + +For, consider how manifold and strong are the forces which are always +working against our continual possession of this justification by +faith, and consequent peace with God. There are all the ordinary +cares and duties and avocations and fortunes of our daily life, +which, indeed, may be so hallowed in their motives and in their +activities, as that they may be turned into helps instead of +hindrances, but which require a great deal of diligence and effort in +order that they should not work like grains of dust that come between +the parts of some nicely-fitting engine, and so cause friction and +disaster. There are all the daily tasks that tempt us to forget the +things that we only know by faith, and to be absorbed in the things +that we can touch and taste and handle. If a man is upon an inclined +plane, unless he is straining his muscles to go upwards, gravitation +will make short work of him, and bring him down. And unless Christian +men grip hard and continually that sense of having fellowship and +peace with God, as sure as they are living they will lose the +clearness of that consciousness, and the calm that comes from it. For +we cannot go into the world and do the work that is laid upon us all +without there being possible hostility to the Christian life in +everything that we meet. Thank God there is possible help, too, and +whether our daily calling is an enemy or a friend to our religion +depends upon the earnestness and continuousness of our own efforts. +But there is a worse force than these external distractions working +to draw us away, one that we carry within, in our own vacillating +wills and wayward hearts and treacherous affections and passions that +usually lie dormant, but wake up sometimes at the most inopportune +periods. Unless we keep a very tight hand upon ourselves, certainly +these will rob us of this consciousness of being justified by faith +which brings with it peace with God that passes understanding. + +In the Isle of Wight massive cliffs rise hundreds of feet above the +sea, and seem as if they were as solid as the framework of the earth +itself. But they rest upon a sharply inclined plane of clay, and the +moisture trickles through the rifts in the majestic cliffs above, and +gets down to that slippery substance and makes it like the greased +ways down which they launch a ship; and away goes the cliff one day, +with its hundreds of feet of buttresses that have fronted the tempest +for centuries, and it lies toppled in hideous ruin on the beach +below. We have all a layer of 'blue slipper' in ourselves, and unless +we take care that no storm-water finds its way down through the +chinks in the rocks above they will slide into awful ruin. 'Being +justified, let us have peace with God,' and remember that the +exhortation is enforced not only by a consideration of the many +strong forces which tend to deprive us of this peace, but also by a +consideration of the hideous disaster that comes upon a man's whole +nature if he loses peace with God. For there is no peace with +ourselves, and there is no peace with man, and there is no peace in +face of the warfare of life and the calamities that are certainly +before us all, unless, in the deepest sanctuary of our being, there +is the peace of God because in our consciences there is peace with +God. If I desire to be at rest--and there is no blessedness but +rest--if I desire to know the sovereign joy of tranquillity, +undisturbed by my own stormy passions or by any human enmity, and to +have even the 'beasts of the field at peace with' me, and all things +my helpers and allies, there is but one way to realise the desire, +and that is the retention of peace with God that comes with being +justified by faith. + +Lastly, a word or two as to the ways by which this exhortation can be +carried into effect. + +I have tried to explain how the peace of which my text speaks comes +originally through Christ's work laid hold of by my faith, and now I +would say only three things. + +Retain the peace by the exercise of that same faith which at first +brought it. Next, retain it by union with that same Lord from whom +you at first received it. Very significantly, in the immediate +context, we have the Apostle drawing a broad distinction between the +benefits which we have received from Christ's death, and those which +we shall receive through His life. And that is the best commentary on +the words of my text. 'If when we were enemies, we were reconciled to +God by the death of His Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be +saved by His life.' So let our faith grasp firmly the great twin +facts of the Christ who died that He might abolish the enmity, and +bring us peace; and of the Christ who lives in order that He may pour +into our hearts more and more of His own life, and so make us more +and more in His own image. And the last word that I would say, in +addition to these two plain, practical precepts is, let your conduct +be such as will not disturb your peace with God. For if a man lets +his own will rise up in rebellion against God's, whether that divine +will command duty or impose suffering, away goes all his peace. There +is no possibility of the tranquil sense of union and communion with +my Father in heaven lasting when I am in rebellion against Him. The +smallest sin destroys, for the time being, our sense of forgiveness +and our peace with God. The blue surface of the lake, mirroring in +its unmoved tranquillity the sky and the bright sun, or the solemn +stars, loses all that reflected heaven in its heart when a cat's paw +of wind ruffles its surface. If we would keep our hearts as mirrors, +in their peace, of the peace in the heavens that shine down on them, +we must fence them from the winds of evil passions and rebellious +wills. 'Oh! that thou wouldest hearken unto Me, then had thy peace +been like a river.' + + + + +ACCESS INTO GRACE + + 'By whom also we have access by faith into this grace + wherein we stand.'--ROMANS v. 2. + + +I may be allowed to begin with a word or two of explanation of the +terms of this passage. Note then, especially, that _also_ which +sends us back to the previous clause, and tells us that our text adds +something to what was spoken of there. What was spoken of there? +'The peace of God' which comes to a man by Jesus Christ through faith, +the removal of enmity, and the declaration of righteousness. But that +peace with God, which is the beginning of everything in the Christian +view, is only the beginning, and there is much to follow. While, +then, there is a progress clearly marked in the words of our text, +and 'access into this grace wherein we stand' is something more than, +and after, the 'peace with God,' mark next the similarity of the text +and the preceding verse. The two great truths in the latter, Christ's +mediation or intervention, and our faith as the condition by which we +receive the blessings which are brought to us in and through Him, are +both repeated, with no unmeaning tautology, but with profound +significance in our text--'By whom also we have access'--as well +as--'the peace of God'--'access _by faith_ into this grace.' So then, +for the initial blessing, and for all the subsequent blessings of the +Christian life, the way is the same. The medium and channel is one, +and the act by which we avail ourselves of the blessings coming +through that one medium is the same. Now the language of my text, +with its talking about access, faith, and grace, sounds to a great +many of us, I am afraid, very hard and remote and technical. And +there are not wanting people who tell us that all that terminology in +the New Testament is like a dying brand in the fire, where the little +kernel of glowing heat is getting covered thicker and thicker with +grey ashes. Yes; but if you blow the ashes off, the fire is there all +the same. Let us try if we can blow the ashes off. + +This text seems to me in its archaic phraseology, only to need to be +pondered in order to flash up into wonderful beauty. It carries in it +a magnificent ideal of the Christian life, in three things: the +Christian place, 'access into grace'; the Christian attitude, +'wherein we stand'; and the Christian means of realising that ideal, +'through Christ' and 'by faith.' Now let us look at these three +points. + +I. The Christian Place. + +There is clearly a metaphor here, both in the word 'access' and in +that other one 'stand.' 'The grace' is supposed as some ample space +into which a man is led, and where he can continue, stand, and +expatiate. Or, we may say, it is regarded as a palace or +treasure-house into which we can enter. Now, if we take that great +New Testament word 'grace,' and ponder its meanings, we find that +they run something in this fashion. The central thought, grand and +marvellous, which is enshrined in it, and which often is buried for +careless ears, is that of the active love of God poured out upon +inferiors who deserve something very different. Then there follows a +second meaning, which covers a great part of the ground of the use of +the phrase in the New Testament, and that is the communication of +that love to men, the specific and individualised gifts which come +out of that great reservoir of patient, pardoning, condescending, and +bestowing love. Then there may be taken into view a meaning which is +less prominent in Scripture but not absent, namely, the resulting +beauty of character. A gracious soul ought to be, and is, a graceful +soul; a supreme loveliness is imparted to human nature by the +communication to it of the gifts which are the results of the +undeserved, free, and infinite love of God. + +Now if we take all these three thoughts as blended together in the +grand metaphor of the Apostle, of the ample space into which the +Christian man passes, we get such lessons as this. A Christian life +may, and therefore should, be suffused with a continual consciousness +of the love of God. That would change everything in it. Here is some +great sweep of rolling country, perhaps a Highland moor: the little +tarns on it are grey and cold, the vegetation is gloomy and dark, +dreariness is over all the scene, because there is a great pall of +cloud drawn beneath the blue. But the sun pierces with his lances +through the grey, and crumples up the mists, and sends them flying +beneath the horizon. Then what a change in the landscape! All the +tarns that looked black and wicked are now infantile in their +innocent blue and sunny gladness, and every dimple in the heights +shows, and all the heather burns with the sunshine that falls upon +it. So my lonely doleful life, if that light from God, the beam of +His love, shines down upon it, rises into nobility, and flashes into +beauty, and is calm and fair and great, as nothing else can make it. +You may dwell in love by dwelling in God, and then your lives will be +fair. You have access into the grace; see that you go there. They +tell us that nightingales sing by the wayside by preference, and we +may have in our lives, singing a quiet tune, the continual thought of +the love of God, even whilst life's highway is dusty and rough, and +our feet are often weary in treading it. A Christian life may be, and +therefore should be, suffused with the sense of the abiding love of +God. + +Take the other meaning of the word, the secondary and derived +meaning, the communication of that love to us, and that leads us to +say that a Christian life may, and therefore should, be enriched with +continual gifts from God's fullness. I said that the Apostle was +using a metaphor here, regarding the grace as being an ample +space into which a man was admitted, or we may say that he is +thinking of it as a great treasure-house. We have the right of +entrance there, where on every side, as it were, lie ingots of +uncoined gold, and masses of treasure, and we may have just as much +or as little as we choose. It is entirely in our own determination +how much of the wealth of God we shall possess. We have access to the +treasure-house; and this permit is put into our hands: 'Be it unto +thee even as thou wilt.' The size of the sack that the man brings, in +the old story, determined the amount of wealth that he carried away. +Some of you bring very tiny baskets and expect little and desire +little; you get no more than you desired and expected. + +That wealth, the fullness of God, takes the shape of, as well as is +determined in its measure by the magnitude of, the vessel into which +it is put. It is multiform, and we get whatever we desire, and +whatever either our characters or our circumstances require. The one +gift assumes all forms, just as water poured into a vase takes the +shape of the vase into which it is poured. The same gift unfolds +itself in an infinite variety of manners, according to the needs of +the man to whom it is given; just as the writer's pen, the +carpenter's hammer, the farmer's ploughshare, are all made out of the +same metal. So God's grace comes to you in a different shape from +that in which it comes to me, according to our different callings and +needs, as fixed by our circumstances, our duties, our sorrows, our +temptations. + +So, brethren, how shameful it is that, having the possibility of so +much, we should have the actuality of so little. There is an old +story about one of our generals in India long ago, who, when he came +home, was accused of rapacity because he had brought away so much +treasure from the Rajahs whom he had conquered, and his answer to the +charge was, 'I was surprised at my own moderation.' Ah! there are a +great many Christian people who ought to be ashamed of their +moderation. They have gone into the treasure-house; stacks of jewels, +jars of gold on all sides of them--and they have been content to come +away with some one poor little coin, when they might have been 'rich +beyond the dreams of avarice.' Brethren, you have 'access' to the +fullness of God. Whose fault is it if you are empty? + +Then, further, I said there was another meaning in these great words. +The love which may suffuse our lives, the gifts, the consequence of +that love, which may enrich our lives, should, and in the measure in +which they are received will, adorn and make beautiful our lives. For +'grace' means loveliness as well as goodness, and the God who is the +fountain of it all is the fountain of 'whatsoever things are fair,' +as well as of whatsoever things are good. That suggests two +considerations on which I have no time to dwell. One is that the +highest beauty is goodness, and unless the art of a nation learns +that, its art will become filthy and a minister of sin. They talk +about 'Art for Art's sake.' Would that all these poets and painters +who are trying to find beauty in corruption--and there is a +phosphorescent glimmer in rotting wood, and a prismatic colouring on +the scum of a stagnant pond--would that all those men who are seeking +to find beauty apart from goodness, and so are turning a divine +instinct into a servant of evil, would learn that the true +gracefulness comes from the grace which is the fullness of God given +unto men. + +But there is another lesson, and that is that Christian people who +say that they have their lives irradiated by the love of God, and who +profess to be receiving gifts from His full hand, are bound to take +care that their goodness is not 'harsh and crabbed,' as not only +'dull fools suppose' it to be, but as it sometimes is, but is musical +and fair. You are bound to make your goodness attractive, and to show +that the things that are 'of good report' are likewise the 'things +that are lovely.' + +II. And so, now, turn to the second point here, viz. the Christian +attitude. + +'The grace wherein ye _stand_'; that word is very emphatic here, +and does not merely mean 'continue,' but it suggests what I have put +into that phrase, the Christian attitude. + +Two things are implied. One is that a life thus suffused by the love, +and enriched by the gifts, and adorned by the loveliness that come +from God, will be stable and steadfast. Resistance and stability are +implied in the words. One very important item in determining a man's +power of resistance, and of standing firm against whatever assaults +may be hurled against him, is the sort of footing that he has. If you +stand on slippery mud, or on the ice of a glacier, you will find it +hard to stand firm; but if you plant your foot on the grace of God, +then you will be able to 'withstand in the evil day, and having done +all to stand.' And how does a man plant his foot on the grace of God? +simply by trusting in God, and not in himself. So that the secret of +all steadfastness of life, and of all successful resistance to the +whirling onrush of temptations and of difficulties, is to set your +foot upon that rock, and then your 'goings' will be established. + +Jesus Christ brings to us, in the gift of life in Him, stability +which will check the vacillations of our own hearts. We go up and +down, we yield when pressure is brought to bear against us, we are +carried off our feet often by the sudden swirl of the stream, and the +fitful blast of the wind. But His grace comes in, and will make us +able to stand against all assaults. Our poor natures, necessarily +changeable, and sinfully vacillating and weak, will be uniform, in +the measure in which the grace of God comes into our hearts. Just as +in these so-called petrifying wells, they take a bit of cloth, a +bird's nest, a billet of wood, and plunge it into the water, and the +mineral held in solution there infiltrates into the substance of the +thing plunged in, and makes it firm and inflexible: so let us plunge +our poor, changeful, vacillating resolutions, our wayward, wandering +hearts, our passions, so easily excited by temptation, into that +great fountain, and there will filter into our flexibility what will +make it firm, and into our changefulness what will give in us some +faint copy of the divine immutability, and we shall stand fast in the +Lord and in the power of His might. + +Further, in regard to this attitude, which is the result of the +possession of grace, we may say that it indicates not only stability +and steadfastness, but erectness, as in opposition to crouching or +bowing. A man's independence is guaranteed by his dependence upon, +and his possession of, that communicated grace of God. And so you +have the fact that the phase of the Christian teaching which has laid +most stress on the decrees and sovereign will of God, on divine grace +in fact, and too little upon the human side--the phase which is +roughly described as Calvinism--has underlain the liberties of +Europe, and has stiffened men into the rejection of all priestly and +civic domination. 'Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is +liberty,' and if a man has in his heart the grace of God, then he +stands erect as a man. 'Ye are bought with a price; be ye not the +servants of men.' The Christian democracy, the Christian rejection of +all sacerdotal and other domination, flows from the access of each +individual Christian to the fountain of all wisdom, the only source +of law and command, the inspirer of all strength, the giver of all +grace. By faith ye stand. 'Stand fast therefore in the liberty +wherewith Christ has made you free.' + +III. Lastly, and only a word; we have here the Christian way of +entrance into grace. + +I have already remarked on the emphasis with which, both in my text +and in the preceding clause, there are laid down the two conditions +of possessing this grace, or the peace which precedes it: 'By +Christ--through faith.' Notice, too, that Jesus Christ gives us +'access.' Now that expression is but an imperfect rendering of the +original. If it were not for its trivial associations, one might read +instead of 'access,' introduction, 'by whom we have introduction into +this grace wherein we stand.' The thought is that Jesus Christ +secures us entry into this ample space, this treasure-house, as some +court officer might take by the hand a poor rustic, standing on the +threshold of the palace, and lead him through all the glittering +series of unfamiliar splendour, and present him at last in the +central ring around the king. The reality that underlies the metaphor +is plain. We sinners can never pass into that central glory, nor ever +possess those gifts of grace, unless the barrier that stands between +us and God, between us and His highest gifts of love, is swept away. + +I recall an old legend where two knights are represented as seeking +to enter a palace, where there is a mysterious fire burning in the +middle of the portal. One of them tries to pass through, and recoils +scorched; but when the other essays an entrance the fierce fire +sinks, and the path is cleared. Jesus Christ has died, and I say it +with all reverence, as His blood touches the fire it flickers down +and the way is opened 'into the holiest of all, whither the +Forerunner is for us entered.' He both brings the grace and makes it +possible that we should go in where the grace is. + +But Jesus Christ's work is nothing to you unless your personal faith +comes in, and so that is pointed to in the second of the clauses +here: '_By faith_ we have access.' That is no arbitrary appointment. +It lies in the very nature of the gift and of the recipient. How can +God give access into that grace to a man who shrinks from being near +Him; who does not want 'access,' and who could not use the grace if +he had it? How can God bestow inward and spiritual gifts upon any man +who closes his heart against them, and will not have them? My faith +is the condition; Christ is the Giver. If I ally myself to Him by my +faith, He gives to me. If I do not, with all the will to do it, He +cannot bestow His best gifts any more than a man who stretches out +his hand to another sinking in the flood can lift him out, and set +him on the safe shore, if the drowning man's hand is not stretched +out to grasp the rescuer's outstretched hand. + +Brethren, God is infinitely willing to give the choicest gifts of His +love to us all, to gladden, to enrich, to adorn, to make stable and +erect. But He cannot give them unless you will trust Him. 'It pleased +the Father that in Him should all fullness dwell.' That alabaster box +is brought to earth. It was broken on the Cross that 'the house' +might be 'filled with the odour of the ointment.' Our faith is the +only condition; it is only the condition, but it is the indispensable +condition, of our being anointed with that fragrant anointing. He, +and He only, can give us the fullness of God. + + + + +THE SOURCES OF HOPE + + 'We rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3. And not only + so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that + tribulation worketh patience; 4. And patience, experience; + and experience, hope.'--ROMANS v. 2-4. + + +We have seen in a previous sermon that the Apostle in the foregoing +context is sketching a grand outline of the ideal Christian life, as +all rooted in 'being justified by faith,' and flowering into 'peace +with God,' 'access into grace,' and a firm stand against all +antagonists and would-be masters. In our text he advances to complete +the outline by sketching the true Christian attitude towards the +future. I have ventured to take so pregnant and large a text, because +there is a very striking and close connection throughout the verses, +which is lost unless we take them together. Note, then, 'we rejoice +in hope,' 'we glory in tribulation.' Now, it is one word in the +original which is diversely rendered in these two clauses by +'rejoice' and 'glory.' The latter is a better rendering than the +former, because the original expression designates not only the +emotion of joy, but the expression of it, especially in words. So it +is frequently rendered in the New Testament by the word 'boast,' +which, of course, has unpleasant associations, which scarcely fit it +for use here. So then you see Paul regards it as possible for, and +more than possibly characteristic of, a Christian, that the very same +emotion should he excited by that great bright future hope, and by +the blackness of present sorrow. That is strong meat; and so he goes +on to explain how he thinks it can and must be so, and points out +that trouble, through a series of results, arrives at last at this, +that if it is rightly borne, it flashes up into greater brightness +the hope which has grasped the glory of God. So then we have here, +not only a wonderful designation of the object around which Christian +hope twines its tendrils, but of the double source from which that +hope may come, and of the one emotion with which Christian people +should front the darkness of the present and the brightness of the +future. Ah! how different our lives would be if that ideal of a +steadfast hope and an untroubled joy were realised by each of us. It +may be. It should be. So I ask you to look at these three points +which I have suggested. + +I. That wonderful designation of the one object of Christian hope +which should fill, with an uncoruscating and unflickering light, all +that dark future. + +'We rejoice in hope of the glory of God.' Now, I suppose I need not +remind you that that phrase 'the glory of God' is, in the Old +Testament, used especially to mean the light that dwelt between the +cherubim above the mercy-seat; the symbol of the divine perfections +and the token of the Divine Presence. The reality of which it was a +symbol is the total splendour, so to speak, of that divine nature, as +it rays itself out into all the universe. And, says Paul, the true +hope of the Christian man is nothing less than that of that glory he +shall be, in some true sense, and in an eternally growing degree, the +real possessor. It is a tremendous claim, and one which leads us into +deep places that I dare not venture into now, as to the resemblance +between the human person and the Divine Person, notwithstanding all +the differences which of course exist, and which only a presumptuous +form of religion has ventured to treat as transitory or +insignificant. Let me use a technical word, and say that it is no +pantheistic absorption in an impersonal Light, no Nirvana of union +with a vague whole, which the Apostle holds out here, but it is the +closest possible union, personality being saved and individual +consciousness being intensified. It is the clothing of humanity with +so much of that glory as can be imparted to a finite creature. That +means perfect knowledge, perfect purity, perfect love, and that means +the dropping away of all weaknesses and the access of strange new +powers, and that means the end of the schism between 'will' and +'ought,' and of the other schism between 'will' and 'can.' It means +what this Apostle says: 'Whom He justified them He also glorified,' +and what He says again, 'We all, beholding as in a glass'--or rather, +perhaps, mirroring as a glass does--'the glory, are changed into the +same image.' + +The very heart of Christianity is that the Divine Light of which that +Shekinah was but a poor and transitory symbol has 'tabernacled' +amongst men in the Christ, and has from Him been communicated, and is +being communicated in such measure as earthly limitations and +conditions permit, and that these do point on assuredly to perfect +impartation hereafter, when 'we shall be like Him, for we shall see +Him as He is.' The Three could walk in the furnace of fire, because +there was One with them, 'like unto the Son of God.' 'Who among us +shall dwell with the everlasting fire,' the fire of that divine +perfection? They who have had introduction by Christ into the grace, +and who will be led by Him into the glory. + +Now, brethren, it seems to me to be of great importance that this, +the loftiest of conceptions of that future life, should be the main +aspect under which we think of it. It is well to speak of rest from +toil; it is well to speak of all the negations of present +unfavourable, afflictive conditions which that future presents to us. +And perhaps there is none of the aspects of it which appeals to +deeper feelings in ourselves, than those which say 'there shall be no +night there,' 'there shall be no tears there, neither sorrow nor +sighing'; 'there shall be no toil there.' But we must rise above all +that, for our heaven is to live in God, and to be possessors of His +glory. Do not let us dwell upon the symbols instead of the realities. +Do not let us dwell only on the oppositions and contradictions to +earth. Let us rather rise high above symbols, high above negations, +to the positive truth, and not contented with saying 'We shall be +full of blessedness; we shall be full of purity; we shall be full of +knowledge,' let us rather think of that which embraces them all--we +shall be full of God. + +So much, then, for the one object of Christian hope. We have here-- + +II. The double source of that hope. + +Observe that the first clause of my text comes as the last term in a +sequence. It began with 'being justified by faith.' The second round +of the ladder was, 'we have peace with God.' The third, 'we have +access into this grace.' The fourth, 'we stand,' and then comes, 'we +rejoice in hope of the glory of God.' That is to say, to put it into +general words, and, of course, presupposing the revelation in Jesus +Christ as the basis of all, without which there is no assured hope of +a future beyond the grave, then the facts of a Christian man's life +are for him the best brighteners of the hope beyond. Of course, that +is so. 'Justified by faith'--'peace with God'--'access into grace'; +what, in the name of common-sense, can death do with these things? +How can its blunted sword cut the bond that unites a soul that has +had such experiences as these with the source of them all? Nothing +can be more grotesque, nothing more incongruous, than to think that +that subordinate and accidental fact, whose region is the physical, +has anything whatever to do with this higher region of consciousness. + +And, further than that, it is absolutely unthinkable to a man in the +possession of these spiritual gifts, that they should ever come to a +close; and the fact that in the precise degree in which we realise as +our very own possession, here and now, these Christian emotions and +blessings, we instinctively rise to the belief that they are 'not for +an age, but for all time,' and not for all time, but for eternity, is +itself, if not a proof, yet a very strong presumption, if you believe +in God, that a man who thus 'feels he was not made to die' because he +has grasped the Eternal, is right in so feeling. If, too, we look at +the experiences themselves, they all have the stamp of +incompleteness, and suggest completeness by their own incompleteness. +The new moon with its ragged edge not more surely prophesies its +completed silver round, than do the experiences of the Christian life +here, in their greatness and in their smallness, declare that there +come a time and an order of things in which what was thwarted +tendency shall be accomplished result. The tender green spikelet, +pushing up through the brown clods, does not more surely prophesy the +waving yellow ear, nor the broad highway on which a man comes in the +wilderness more surely declare that there is a village at the end of +it, than do the facts of the Christian life, here and now, attest the +validity of the hope of the glory of God. + +And so, brethren, if you wish to brighten that great light that fills +the future, see to it that your present Christianity is fuller of +'peace with God,' 'access into grace,' and the firm, erect standing +which flows from these. When the springs in the mountains dry up, the +river in the valley shrinks; and when they are full, it glides along +level with the top of its banks. So when our Christian life in the +present is richest, our Christian hope of the future will be the +brighter. Look into yourselves. Is there anything there that +witnesses to that great future; anything there that is obviously +incipient, and destined to greater power; anything there which is +like a tropical plant up here in 45 degrees of north latitude, +managing to grow, but with dwarfed leaves and scanty flowers and half +shrivelled and sourish fruit, and that in the cold dreams of the warm +native land? Reflecting telescopes show the stars in a mirror, and +the observer looks down to see the heavens. Look into yourselves, and +see whether, on the polished plate within, there are any images of +the stars that move around the Throne of God. + +But let us turn for a moment to the second source to which the +Apostle traces the Christian hope here. I must not be tempted to more +than just a word of explanation, but perhaps you will tolerate that. +Paul says that trouble works patience, that is to say, not only +passive endurance, but brave persistence in a course, in spite of +antagonisms. That is what trouble does to a man when it is rightly +borne. Of course the Apostle is speaking here of its ideal operation, +and not of the reality which alas! often is seen when our +tribulations lash us into impatience, or paralyse our efforts. +Tribulation worketh patience, 'and patience _experience_.' That is a +difficult word to put into English. There underlies it the frequent +thought which is familiar in Scripture, of trouble of all kinds as +testing a man, whether as the refiner's fire or the winnower's fan. +It tests a man, and if he bears the trouble with patient persistence, +then he has passed the test and is approved. Patient perseverance +thus works approval, or proof of the man's Christianity, and, still +more, proof of the reality and power of the Christ whom his +Christianity grasps. And so from out of that approval or proof which +comes, through perseverance, from tribulation, there rises, of +course, in that heart that has been tested and has stood, a calm hope +that the future will be as the past, and that, having fought through +six troubles, by God's help the seventh will be vanquished also, till +at last troubles will end, and heaven be won. + +Brethren, there is the true point of view from which to look, not +only at tribulations, but at all the trials, for they too bring +trials, that lie in duty and in enjoyment, and in earthly things. +They are meant to work in us a conviction, by our experience of +having been able to meet them aright, of the reality of our grasp of +God, and of the reality and power of the God whom we grasp. If we +took that point of view in regard to all the changes of this +changeful life, we should not so often be bewildered and upset by the +darkest of our sorrows. The shining lancets and cruel cutting +instruments that the surgeon lays out on his table before he begins +the operation are very dreadful. But the way to think of them is that +they are there in order to remove from a man what it does him harm to +keep, and what, if it is not taken away, will kill him. So life, with +its troubles, great and small, is all meant for this, to make us +surer of, and bring us closer to, our God, and to brace and +strengthen us in our own personal character. And if it does that, +then blessed be everything that produces these results, and leads us +thereby to glorying in the troubles by which shines out on us a +brighter hope. + +So there are the two sources, you see: the one is the blessedness of +the Christian life, the other the sorrows of the outward life, and +both may converge upon the brightening of our Christian hope. Our +rainbow is the child of the marriage of the sun and the rain. The +Christian hope comes from being 'justified by faith, having peace +with God ... and access into grace,' and it comes from tribulation, +which 'worketh patience,' and patience which 'worketh approval.' The +one spark is struck from the hard flint by the cold steel, and the +other is kindled by the sun itself, but they are both fire. + +And so, lastly, we have here-- + +III. The one emotion with which the Christian should front all the +facts, inward and outward, of his earthly life. + +'We glory in the hope,' 'we glory in tribulation,' I need not dwell +upon the lesson which is taught us here by the fact that the Apostle +puts as one in a series of Christian characteristics this of a +steadfast and all-embracing joy. I do not believe that we Christian +people half enough realise how imperative a Christian duty, as well +as how great a Christian privilege, it is to be glad always. You have +no right to be anxious; you are wrong to be hypochondriac and +depressed, and weary and melancholy. True; there are a great many +occasions in our Christian life which minister sadness. True; the +Christian joy looks very gloomy to a worldly eye. But there are far +more occasions which, if we were right, would make joy instinctive, +and which, whether we are right or not, make it obligatory upon us. I +need not speak of how, if that hope were brighter than it commonly is +with us, and if it were more constantly present to our minds and +hearts, we should sing with gladness. I need not dwell upon that +great and wonderful paradox by which the co-existence of sorrow and +of joy is possible. The sorrows are on the surface; beneath there may +be rest. All the winds of heaven may rave across the breast of ocean, +and fret it into clouds of spume against a storm-swept sky. But deep +down there is stillness, and yet not stagnation, because there is the +great motion that brings life and freshness; and so, though there +will be wind-vexed surfaces on our too-often agitated spirits, there +ought to be deeper than these the calm setting of the whole ocean of +our nature towards God Himself. It is possible, as this Apostle has +it, to be 'sorrowful, yet always rejoicing.' It is possible, as his +brother Apostle has it, to 'rejoice greatly, though now for a season +we are in sorrow through manifold temptations.' Look back upon your +lives from the point of view that your tribulation is an instrument +to produce hope, and you will be able to thank God for all the way by +which He has led you. + +Now, brethren, the plain lesson of all this is just that we have +here, in these texts, a linked chain, one end of which is wrapped +around our sinful hearts, and the other is fastened to the Throne of +God. You cannot drop any of the links, and you must begin at the +beginning, if you are to be carried on to the end. If we are to have +a joy immovable, we must have a 'steadfast hope.' If we are to have a +'steadfast hope,' we must have a present 'grace.' If we are to have a +present 'grace,' and 'access' to the fullness of God, we must have +'peace with God.' If we are to have 'peace with God,' we must have +the condemnation and the guilt taken away. If we are to have the +condemnation and the guilt taken away, Jesus Christ must take them. +If Jesus Christ is to take them away, we must have faith in Him. Then +you can work it backward, and begin at your own end, and say, 'If I +have faith in Jesus Christ, then every link of the chain in due +succession will pass through my hand, and I shall have justifying, +peace, access, the grace, erectness, hope, and exultation, and at +last He will lead me by the hand into the glory for which I dare to +hope, the glory which the Father gave to Him before the foundation of +the world, and which He will give to me when the world has passed +away in fervent heat.' + + + + +A THREEFOLD CORD + + 'And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is + shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is + given unto us.'--ROMANS v. 5. + + +We have seen in former sermons that, in the previous context, the +Apostle traces Christian hope to two sources: one, the series of +experiences which follow 'being justified by faith' and the other, +those which follow on trouble rightly borne. Those two golden chains +together hold up the precious jewel of hope. But a chain that is to +bear a weight must have a staple, or it will fall to the ground. And +so Paul here turns to yet another thought, and, going behind both our +inward experiences and our outward discipline, falls back on that +which precedes all. After all is said and done, the love of God, +eternal, self-originated, the source of all Christian experiences +because of the work of Christ which originates them all, is the root +fact of the universe, and the guarantee that our highest +anticipations and desires are not unsubstantial visions, but morning +dreams, which are proverbially sure to be fulfilled. God is love; +therefore the man who trusts Him shall not be put to shame. + +But you will notice that here the Apostle not only adduces the love +of God as the staple, so to speak, from which these golden chains +hang, but that he traces the heart's being suffused with that love to +its source, and as, of course, is always the case in the order of +analysis, that which was last in time comes first in statement. We +begin at the surface, and go down and down and down from effect to +cause, and yet again to the cause of that cause which is itself +effect. We strip off, as it were, layer after layer, until we get to +the living centre--hope comes from the love, the love comes from the +Spirit in the heart. And so to get at the order of time and of +manifestation, we must reverse the order of analysis in my text, and +begin where it ends. So we have here three things--the Spirit given, +the love shed abroad by that Spirit, and the hope established by that +love. Now just look at them for a moment. + +I. The Spirit given. + +Now, the first point to notice here is that the Revised Version +presents the meaning of our text more accurately than the Authorised +Version, because, instead of reading 'is given,' it correctly reads +'was given.' And any of you that can consult the original will see +that the form of the language implies that the Apostle is thinking, +not so much of a continuous bestowment, as of a definite moment when +this great gift was bestowed upon the man to whom he is speaking. + +So the first question is, when was that Spirit given to these Roman +Christians? The Christian Church has been split in two by its answers +to that question. One influential part, which has taken a new lease +of life amongst us to-day, says 'in baptism,' and the other says 'at +the moment of faith.' I am not going to be tempted into controversial +paths now, for my purpose is a very different one, but I cannot help +just a word about the former of these two answers. 'Given in +baptism,' say our friends, and I venture to think that they thereby +degrade Christianity into a system of magic, bringing together two +entirely disparate things, an external physical act and a spiritual +change. I do not say anything about the disastrous effects that have +followed from such a conception of the medium by which this greatest +of all Christian gifts is effected upon men. Since the Spirit who is +given is life, the result of the gift of that Spirit is a new life, +and we all know what disastrous and debasing consequences have +followed from that dogma of regeneration by baptism. No doubt it is +perfectly true that normally, in the early Church, the Divine Spirit +was given at baptism; but for one thing, that general rule had +exceptions, as in the case of Cornelius, and, for another thing, +though it was given _at_ baptism, it was not given _in_ +baptism, but it was given through faith, of which in those days +baptism was the sequel and the sign. + +But I pass altogether from this, and fall back on the great words +which, to me at least, if there were no other, would determine the +whole answer to this question as to when the Spirit was given: 'This +spake He of the Holy Ghost, which they that _believe_ on Him +should receive'; and I would ask the modern upholders of the other +theory the indignant question which the Apostle Paul fired off out of +his heavy artillery at their ancient analogues, the circumcisers in +the Galatian Church: 'This only would I know of you: Received ye the +Holy Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?' + +The answer which the evangelical Christian gives to this ancient +question suggested by my text, 'When was that Divine Spirit +bestowed?' is congruous with the spirituality of the Christian faith, +and is eminently reasonable. For the condition required is the +opening of the whole nature in willing welcome to the entrance of the +Divine Spirit, and as surely as, wherever there is an indentation of +the land, and a concavity of a receptive bay, the ocean will pour +into it and fill it, so surely where a heart is open for God, God in +His Divine Spirit will enter into that heart, and there will shed His +blessed influences. + +So, dear brethren, and this is the main point to which I wish to +direct your attention, the Apostle here takes it for granted that all +these Roman Christians knew in themselves the truth of what he was +saying, and had an experience which confirmed his assertion that the +Divine Spirit of God was given to them when they believed. Ah! I +wonder if that is true about us professing Christians; if we are +aware in any measure of a higher life than our own having been +breathed into us; if we are aware in any measure of a Divine Spirit +dwelling in our spirits, moulding, lifting, enlightening, guiding, +constraining, and yet not coercing? We ought to be, 'Know ye not that +the Spirit dwelleth in you, except ye be rejected?' Brethren, it +seems to me to be of the very last importance, in this period of the +Church's history, that the proportion between the Church's teaching +as to the work of Christ on the Cross, and as to the consequent work +of the Spirit of Christ in our hearts and spirits, should be changed. +We must become more mystical if we are not to become less Christian. +And the fact that so many of us seem to imagine that the whole Gospel +lies in this, that 'He died for our sins according to the +Scriptures,' and have relegated the teaching that He, by His Spirit, +lives in us, if we are His disciples, to a less prominent place, has +done enormous harm, not only to the type of Christian life, but to +the conception of what Christianity is, both amongst those who +receive it, and amongst those who do not accept it, making it out to +be nothing more than a means of escape from the consequences of our +transgression, instead of recognising it for what it is, the +impartation of a new life which will flower into all beauty, and bear +fruit in all goodness. + +There was a question put once to a group of disciples, in +astonishment and incredulity, by this Apostle, when he said to the +twelve disciples in Ephesus, 'Did you receive the Holy Ghost when you +believed?' The question might well be put to a multitude of +professing Christians amongst us, and I am afraid a great many of +them, if they answered truly, would answer as those disciples did, +'We have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost.' + +And now for the second point in my text-- + +II. The love which is shed abroad by that Spirit. + +Now, I suppose I do not need to do more than point out that 'the love +of God' here means His to us, and not ours to Him, and that the +metaphor employed is but partially represented by that rendering +'shed abroad.' 'Poured out' would better convey Paul's image, which +is that of a flood sent coursing through the heart, or, perhaps, +rather lying there, as a calm deep lake on whose unruffled surface +the heavens, with all their stars, are reflected. Of course, if God's +love to us thus suffuses a heart, then there follows the +consciousness of that love; though it is not the consciousness of the +love that the Apostle is primarily speaking of, but that which lies +behind it, the actual flowing into the human heart of that sweet and +all-satisfying Love. This Divine Spirit that dwells in us, if we are +trusting in Christ, will pour it in full streams into our else empty +hearts. Surely there is nothing incongruous with the nature either of +God or of man, in believing that thus a real communication is +possible between them, and that by thoughts the occasions of which we +cannot trace, by moments of elevation, by swift, piercing +convictions, by sudden clear illuminations, God may speak, and will +speak, in our waiting hearts. + + 'Such rebounds the inmost ear + Catches often from afar. + Listen, prize them, hold them dear; + For of God, of God, they are.' + +But we must not forget, too, that, according to the whole strain of +New Testament thinking, the means by which that Divine Spirit does +pour out the flashing flood of the love of God into a man's heart is, +as Jesus Christ Himself has taught us, by taking the things of Christ +and showing them to us. + +Now, as I said about a former point of my sermon, +that the Apostle was taking for granted that this gift of the Spirit +belonged to all Christian people; so here again he takes for granted +that in every Christian heart there is, by a divine operation, the +presence of the love, and of the consciousness of the love, of God. +And, again, the question comes to some of us stunningly, to all of us +warningly, Is that a transcript of our experience? It is the ideal of +a Christian life; it is meant that it should be so, and should be so +continuously. The stream that is poured out is intended to run summer +and winter, not to be dried up in drought, nor made turbid and noisy +in flood, but with equable flow throughout. I fear me that the +experience of most good people is rather like one of those tropical +wadies, or nullahs in Eastern lands, where there alternate times of +spate and times of drought; and instead of a flashing stream, pouring +life everywhere, and full to the top of its banks, there is for long +periods a dismal stretch of white sun-baked stones, and a chaos of +tumbled rocks with not a drop of water in the channel. The Spirit +pours God's love into men's spirits, but there may be dams and +barriers, so that no drop of the water comes into the empty heart. + +Our Quaker friends have a great deal to say about 'waiting for the +springing of the life within us.' Never mind about the phraseology: +what is meant is profoundly true, that no Christian man will realise +this blessing unless he knows how to sit still and meditate, and let +the gracious influence soak into him. Thus being quiet, he may, he +will, find rising in his heart the consciousness of the love of God. +You will not, if you give only broken momentary sidelong glances; you +will not, if you do not lie still. If you hold up a cup in a shaking +hand beneath a fountain, and often twitch it aside, you will get +little water in it; and unless we 'wait on the Lord,' we shall not +'renew our strength.' You can build a dam as they do in Holland that +will keep out, not only the waters of a river, but the waters of an +ocean, and not a drop will come through the dike. Brethren, we must +keep ourselves in the love of God. + +Lastly, we have here-- + +III. The hope that is established by the love poured out. + +I need not dwell at any length upon this point, because, to a large +extent, it has been anticipated in former sermons, but just a word or +two may be permitted me. That love, you may be very sure, is not +going to lose its objects in the dust. The old Psalmist who knew so +much less than we do as to the love of God, and knew nothing of the +whispers of a Divine Spirit within his heart charged with the message +of the love as it was manifested in Jesus Christ, had risen to a +height of confidence, the beauty of the expression of which is often +lost sight of, because we insist upon dealing with it as merely being +a Messianic prophecy, which it is, but not merely: 'Thou wilt not +leave my soul in Sheol, neither wilt Thou suffer Thy beloved' (for +that is the real meaning of the word translated 'thy Holy +One')--'Thou wilt not suffer the child of Thy love to see +corruption.' Death's bony fingers can untie all true lover's knots +but one; and they fumble at that one in vain. God will not lose His +child in the grave. + +That love, we may be very sure, will not foster in us hopes that are +to be disappointed. Now, it is a fact that the more a man feels that +God loves him, the less is it possible for him to believe that that +love will ever terminate, or that he shall 'all die.' In the lock of +a canal, as the water pours in, the vessel rises. In our hearts, as +the flood of the full love of God pours in, our hopes are borne up +and up, nearer and nearer to the heavens. Since it is so, we must +find in the fact that the constant and necessary result of communion +with Him here on earth is a conviction of the immortality of that +communion, a very, very strong guarantee for ourselves that the hope +is not in vain. And if you say that that is all merely subjective, +yet I think that the universality of the experience is a fact to be +taken into account even by those who doubt the reality of the hope, +and for ourselves, at all events, is a sufficient ground on which to +rest. We have the historical fact of the Resurrection of Jesus +Christ. We have the fact that wherever there has been earthly +experience of true communion with God, there, and in the measure in +which it has been realised, the thermometer of our hopes of +immortality, so to speak, has risen. 'God is love,' and God will not +bring the man that trusts Him to confusion. + +And may we not venture to say that, contemplating the analogous +earthly love, we are permitted to believe that that divine Lover of +our souls desires to have His beloved with Him, and desires that +there be no separation between Him and them, either, if I might so +say, in place or in disposition? As certainly as husband and wife, +lover and friend, long to be together, and need it for perfection and +for rest, so surely will that divine love not be satisfied until it +has gathered all its children to its breast and made them partakers +of itself. + +There are many, many hopes that put the men who cherish them to +shame, partly because they are never fulfilled, partly because, +though fulfilled, they are disappointed, since the reality is so much +less than the anticipation. Who does not know that the spray of +blossom on the tree looks far more lovely hanging above our heads +than when it is grasped by us? Who does not know that the fish +struggling on the hook seems heavier than it turns out to be when +lying on the bank? We go to the rainbow's end, and we find, not a pot +of gold, but a huddle of cold, wet mist. There is one man that is +entitled to say: 'To-morrow shall be as this day, and much more +abundant.' Who is he? Only the man whose hope is in the Lord his God. +If we open our hearts by faith, then these three lines of sequence of +which we have been speaking will converge, and we shall have the hope +that is the shining apex of 'being justified by faith,' and the hope +that is the calm result of trouble and agitation, and the hope that, +travelling further and higher than anything in our inward experience +or our outward discipline, grasps the key-word of the universe, 'God +is love,' and triumphantly makes sure that 'neither death nor life, +nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor +things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall +be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus +our Lord.' + + + + +WHAT PROVES GOD'S LOVE + + 'God commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we + were yet sinners, Christ died for us.'--ROMANS v. 8. + + +We have seen in previous sermons on the preceding context that the +Apostle has been tracing various lines of sequence, all of which +converge upon Christian hope. The last of these pointed to the fact +that the love of God, poured into a heart like oil into a lamp, +brightened that flame; and having thus mentioned the great Christian +revelation of God as love, Paul at once passes to emphasise the +historical fact on which the conviction of that love rests, and goes +on to say that 'the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the +Holy Ghost which is given to us, _for_ when we were yet without +strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.' Then there rises +before him the thought of how transcendent and unparalleled a love is +that which pours its whole preciousness on unworthy and unresponsive +hearts. He thinks to himself--'We are all ungodly; without +strength--yet, He died for us. Would any man do that? No! for,' says +he, 'it will be a hard thing to find any one ready to die for a +righteous man--a man rigidly just and upright, and because rigidly +just, a trifle hard, and therefore not likely to touch a heart to +sacrifice; and even for a good man, in whom austere righteousness has +been softened and made attractive, and become graciousness and +beneficence, well! it is just within the limits of possibility that +somebody might be found even to die for a man that had laid such a +strong hand upon his affections. But God commendeth His love in that +while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.' Now, when Paul says +'commend,' he uses a very significant word which is employed in two +ways in the New Testament. It sometimes means to establish, or to +prove, or to make certain. But 'prove' is a cold word, and the +expression also means to recommend, to set forth in such a way as to +appeal to the heart, and God does both in that great act. He +establishes the fact, and He, as it were, sweeps it into a man's +heart, on the bosom of that full tide of self-sacrifice. + +So there are two or three points that arise from these words, on +which I desire to dwell now--to lay them upon our hearts, and not +only upon our understandings. For it is a poor thing to prove the +love of God, and we need that not only shall we be sure of it, but +that we shall be softened by it. So now let me ask you to look with +me, first, at this question-- + +I. What Paul thought Jesus Christ died for. + +'Died _for_ us.' Now that expression plainly implies two things: +first, that Christ died of His own accord, and being impelled by a +great motive, beneficence; and, second, that that voluntary death, +somehow or other, is for our behoof and advantage. The word in the +original, 'for,' does not define in what way that death ministers to +our advantage, but it does assert that for those Roman Christians who +had never seen Jesus Christ, and by consequence for you and me +nineteen centuries off the Cross, there is benefit in the fact of +that death. Now, suppose we quote an incident in the story of +missionary martyrdom. There was a young lady, whom some of us knew +and loved, in a Chinese mission station, who, with the rest of the +missionary band, was flying. Her life was safe. She looked back, and +saw a Chinese boy that her heart twined round, in danger. She +returned to save him; they laid hold of her and flung her into the +burning house, and her charred remains have never been found. That +was a death for another, but 'Jesus died for us' in a deeper sense +than that. Take another case. A man sets himself to some great cause, +not his own, and he sees that in order to bless humanity, either by +the proclamation of some truth, or by the origination of some great +movement, or in some other way, if he is to carry out his purpose, +he must give his life. He does so, and dies a martyr. What he aimed +at could only be done by the sacrifice of his life. The death was a +means to his end, and he died for his fellows. That is not the depth +of the sense in which Paul meant that Jesus Christ died for us. It +was not that He was true to His message, and, like many another +martyr, died. There is only one way, as it seems to me, in which any +beneficial relation can be established between the Death of Christ +and us, and it is that when He died He died for us, because 'He bare +our sins in His own body on the tree.' + +Dear brethren, I dare say some of you do not take that view, but I +know not how justice can be done to the plain words of Scripture +unless this is the point of view from which we look at the Cross of +Calvary--that there the Lamb of Sacrifice was bearing, and bearing +away, the sins of the whole world. I know that Christian men who +unite in the belief that Christ's death was a sacrifice and an +atonement diverge from one another in their interpretations of the +way in which that came to be a fact, and I believe, for my part, that +the divergent interpretations are like the divergent beams of light +that fall upon men who stand round the same great luminary, and that +all of them take their origin in, and are part of the manifestation +of, the one transcendent fact, which passes all understanding, and +gathers into itself all the diverse conceptions of it which are +formed by limited minds. He died for us because, in His death, our +sins are taken away and we are restored to the divine favour. + +I know that Jesus Christ is said to have made far less of that aspect +of His work in the Gospels than His disciples have done in the +Epistles, and that we are told that, if we go back to Jesus, we shall +not find the doctrine which for some of us is the first form in which +the Gospel finds its way into the hearts of men. I admit that the +fully-developed teaching followed the fact, as was necessarily the +case. I do not admit that Jesus Christ 'spake nothing concerning +Himself' as the sacrifice for the world's sins. For I hear from His +lips--not to dwell upon other sayings which I could quote--I hear +from His lips, 'The Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to +minister'--that is only half His purpose--'and to give His life a +ransom instead of the many.' You cannot strike the atoning aspect of +His death out of that expression by any fair handling of the words. + +And what does the Lord's Supper mean? Why did Jesus Christ select +that one point of His life as the point to be remembered? Why did He +institute the double memorial, the body parted from the blood being a +sign of a violent death? I know of no explanation that makes that +Lord's Supper an intelligible rite except the explanation which says +that He came, to live indeed, and in that life to be a sacrifice, but +to make the sacrifice complete by Himself bearing the consequences of +transgression, and making atonement for the sins of the world. + +Brethren, that is the only aspect of Christ's death which makes it of +any consequence to us. Strip it of that, and what does it matter to +me that He died, any more than it matters to me that any +philanthropist, any great teacher, any hero or martyr or saint, +should have died? As it seems to me, nothing. Christ's death is +surrounded by tenderly pathetic and beautiful accompaniments. As a +story it moves the hearts of men, and 'purges them, by pity and by +terror.' But the death of many a hero of tragedy does all that. +And if you want to have the Cross of Christ held upright in its place +as the Throne of Christ and the attractive power for the whole world, +you must not tamper with that great truth, but say, 'He died for our +sins, according to the Scriptures.' + +Now, there is a second question that I wish to ask, and that is-- + +II. How does Christ's death 'commend' God's love? + +That is a strange expression, if you will think about it, that +'_God_ commendeth His love towards us in that _Christ_ +died.' If you take the interpretation of Christ's death of which I +have already been speaking, one could have understood the Apostle if +he had said, 'Christ commendeth His love towards us in that Christ +died.' But where is the force of the fact of a _man's_ death to +prove _God's_ love? Do you not see that underlying that swift +sentence of the Apostle there is a presupposition, which he takes for +granted? It is so obvious that I do not need to dwell upon it to +vindicate his change of persons, viz. that 'God was in Christ,' in +such fashion as that whatsoever Christ did was the revelation of God. +You cannot suppose, at least I cannot see how you can, that there is +any force of proof in the words of my text, unless you come up to the +full belief, 'God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.' + +Suppose some great martyr who dies for his fellows. Well, all honour +to him, and the race will come to his tomb for a while, and bring +their wreaths and their sorrow. But what bearing has his death upon +our knowledge of God's love towards us? None whatever, or at most a +very indirect and shadowy one. We have to dig deeper down than that. +'God commends His love ... in that Christ died.' 'He that hath seen +Me hath seen the Father.' And we have the right and the obligation to +argue back from all that is manifest in the tender Christ to the +heart of God, and say, not only, 'God so loved the world that He' +sent His Son, but to see that the love that was in Christ is the +manifestation of the love of God Himself. + +So there stands the Cross, the revelation to us, not only of a +Brother's sacrifice, but of a Father's love; and that because Jesus +Christ is the revelation of God as being the 'eradiation of His +glory, and the express image of His person.' Friends! light does pour +out from that Cross, whatever view men take of it. But the omnipotent +beam, the all-illuminating radiance, the transforming light, the heat +that melts, are all dependent on our looking at it--I do not only +say, as Paul looked at it, nor do I even say as Christ looked at it, +but as the deep necessities of humanity require that the world should +look at it, as the altar whereon is laid the sacrifice for our sins, +the very Son of God Himself. To me the great truths of the +Incarnation and the Atonement of Jesus Christ are not points in a +mere speculative theology; they are the pulsating vital centre of +religion. And every man needs them in his own experience. + +I was going to have said a word or two here--but it is not +necessary--about the need that the love of God should be irrefragably +established, by some plain and undeniable and conspicuous fact. I +need not dwell upon the ambiguous oracles which-- + + 'Nature, red in tooth and claw, + With rapine' + +gives forth, nor on how the facts of human life, our own sorrows, and +the world's miseries, the tears that swathe the earth, as it rolls on +its orbit, like a misty atmosphere, war against the creed that God is +love. I need not remind you, either, of how deep, in our own hearts, +when the conscience begins to speak its _not_ ambiguous oracles, +there does rise the conviction that there is much in us which it is +impossible should be the object of God's love. Nor need I remind you +how all these difficulties in believing in a God who is love, based +on the contradictory aspects of nature, and the mysteries of +providence, and the whisperings of our own consciousness, are proved +to have been insuperable by the history of the world, where we find +mythologies and religions of all types and gods of every sort, but +nowhere in all the pantheon a God who is Love. + +Only let me press upon you that that conviction of the love of God, +which is found now far beyond the limits of Christian faith, and +amongst many of us who, in the name of that conviction itself, reject +Christianity, because of its sterner aspects, is historically the +child of the evangelical doctrine of the Incarnation and sacrifice of +Jesus Christ. And if it still subsists, as I know it does, especially +in this generation, amongst many men who reject what seems to me to +be the very kernel of Christianity--subsists like the stream cut off +from its source, but still running, that only shows that men hold +many convictions the origin of which they do not know. God is love. +You will not permanently sustain that belief against the pressure of +outward mysteries and inward sorrows, unless you grasp the other +conviction that Christ died for our sins. The two are inseparable. + +And now lastly-- + +III. What kind of love does Christ's death declare to us as existing +in God? + +A love that is turned away by no sin--that is the thing that strikes +the Apostle here, as I have already pointed out. The utmost reach of +human affection might be that a man would die for the good--he would +scarcely die for the righteous. But God sends His Son, and comes +Himself in His Son, and His Son died for the ungodly and the sinner. +That death reveals a love which is its own origin and motive. We love +because we discern, or fancy we do, something lovable in the object. +God loves under the impulse, so to speak, of His own welling-up +heart. + +And yet it is a love which, though not turned away by any sin, is +witnessed by that death to be rigidly righteous. It is no mere +flaccid, flabby laxity of a loose-girt affection, no mere foolish +indulgence like that whereby earthly parents spoil their children. +God's love is not lazy good-nature, as a great many of us think it to +be and so drag it in the mud, but it is rigidly righteous, and +therefore Christ died. That Death witnesses that it is a love which +shrinks from no sacrifices. This Isaac was not 'spared.' God gave up +His Son. Love has its very speech in surrender, and God's love speaks +as ours does. It is a love which, turned away by no sin, and yet +rigidly righteous and shrinking from no sacrifices, embraces all ages +and lands. 'God commendeth'--not 'commended.' The majestic present +tense suggests that time and space are nothing to the swift and +all-filling rays of that great Light. That love is 'towards us,' you +and me and all our fellows. The Death is an historical fact, +occurring in one short hour. The Cross is an eternal power, raying +out light and love over all humanity and through all ages. + +God lays siege to all hearts in that great sacrifice. Do you believe +that Jesus Christ died for _your_ sins 'according to the Scriptures'? +Do you see there the assurance of a love which will lift you up above +all the cross-currents of earthly life, and the mysteries of +providence, into the clear ether where the sunshine is unobscured? +And above all, do you fling back the reverberating ray from the +mirror of your own heart that directs again towards heaven +the beam of love which heaven has shot down upon you? 'Herein is +love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and gave His Son +to be the propitiation for our sins.' Is it true of us that we love +God because He first loved us? + + + + +THE WARRING QUEENS + + 'As sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace + reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus + Christ our Lord.'--ROMANS v. 21. + + +I am afraid this text will sound to some of you rather unpromising. +It is full of well-worn terms, 'sin,' 'death,' 'grace,' +'righteousness,' 'eternal life,' which suggest dry theology, if they +suggest anything. When they welled up from the Apostle's glowing +heart they were like a fiery lava-stream. But the stream has cooled, +and, to a good many of us, they seem as barren and sterile as the +long ago cast out coils of lava on the sides of a quiescent volcano. +They are so well-worn and familiar to our ears that they create but +vague conceptions in our minds, and they seem to many of us to be far +away from a bearing upon our daily lives. But you much mistake Paul +if you take him to be a mere theological writer. He is an earnest +evangelist, trying to draw men to love and trust in Jesus Christ. And +his writings, however old-fashioned and doctrinally hard they may +seem to you, are all throbbing with life--instinct with truths that +belong to all ages and places, and which fit close to every one of +us. + +I do not know if I can give any kind of freshness to these words, but +I wish to try. To begin with, I notice the highly-imaginative and +picturesque form into which the Apostle casts his thoughts here. He, +as it were, draws back a curtain, and lets us see two royal figures, +which are eternally opposed and dividing the dominion between them. +Then he shows us the issues to which these two rulers respectively +conduct their subjects; and the question that is trembling on his +lips is 'Under which of them do you stand?' Surely that is not fossil +theology, but truths that are of the highest importance, and ought to +be of the deepest interest, to every one of us. They are to you the +former, whether they are the latter or not. + +I. So, first, look at the two Queens who rule over human life. + +Sin and Grace are both personified; and they are both conceived of as +female figures, and both as exercising dominion. They stand face to +face, and each recognises as her enemy the other. The one has +established her dominion: 'Sin _hath_ reigned.' The other is +fighting to establish hers: 'That Grace _might_ reign.' And the +struggle is going on between them, not only on the wide field of the +world; but in the narrow lists of the heart of each of us. + +Sin reigns. The truths that underlie that solemn picture are plain +enough, however unwelcome they may be to some of us, and however +remote from the construction of the universe which many of us are +disposed to take. + +Now, let us understand our terms. Suppose a man commits a theft. You +may describe it from three different points of view. He has thereby +broken the law of the land; and when we are thinking about that we +call it crime. He has also broken the law of 'morality,' as we call +it; and when we are looking at his deed from that point of view, we +call it vice. Is that all? He has broken something else. He has +broken the law of God; and when we look at it from that point of view +we call it sin. Now, there are a great many things which are sins +that are not crimes; and, with due limitations, I might venture to +say that there are some things which are sins that are not to be +qualified as vices. Sin implies God. The Psalmist was quite right +when he said; 'Against Thee, Thee only have I sinned'; although he +was confessing a foul injury he had done to Bathsheba, and a glaring +crime that he had committed against Uriah. It was as to God, and in +reference to Him only, that his crime and his vice darkened and +solidified into sin. + +And what is it, in our actions or in ourselves considered in +reference to God, that makes our actions sins and ourselves sinners? +Remember the prodigal son. 'Father! Give me the portion of goods that +falleth to me.' There you have it all. He went away, and 'wasted his +substance in riotous living.' To claim myself for my own; to act +independently of, or contrary to, the will of God; to try to shake +myself clear of Him; to have nothing to do with Him, even though it +be by mere forgetfulness and negligence, and, in all my ways to +comport myself as if I had no relations of dependence on and +submission to him--that is sin. And there may be that oblivion or +rebellion, not only in the gross vulgar acts which the law calls +crimes, or in those which conscience declares to be vices, but also +in many things which, looked at from a lower point of view, may be +fair and pure and noble. If there is this assertion of self in them, +or oblivion of God and His will in them, I know not how we are to +escape the conclusion that even these fall under the class of sins. +For there can be no act or thought, truly worthy of a man, situated +and circumstanced as we are, which has not, for the very core and +animating motive of it, a reference to God. + +Now, when I come and say, as my Bible teaches me to say, that this is +the deepest view of the state of humanity that sin reigns, I do not +wish to fall into the exaggerations by which sometimes that statement +has been darkened and discredited; but I do want to press upon you, +dear brethren, this, as a matter of _personal_ experience, that +wherever there is a heart that loves, and leaves God out, and +wherever there is a will that resolves, determines, impels to action, +and does not bow itself before Him, and wherever there are hands that +labour, or feet that run, at tasks and in paths self-chosen and +unconsecrated by reference to our Father in heaven, no matter how +great and beautiful subsidiary lustres may light up their deeds, the +very heart of them all is transgression of the law of God. For this, +and nothing else or less, is His law: 'Thou shalt love the Lord thy +God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy +strength, and with all thy mind.' I do not charge you with crimes. +You know how far it would be right to charge you with vices. _I_ +do not charge you with anything; but I pray you to come with me and +confess: 'We all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.' + +I suppose I need not dwell upon the difficulty of getting a lodgment +for this conviction in men's hearts. There is no sadder, and no more +conclusive proof, of the tremendous power of sin over us, than that +it has lulled us into unconsciousness, hard to be broken, of its own +presence and existence. You remember the old stories--I suppose there +is no truth in them, but they will do for an illustration--about some +kind of a blood-sucking animal that perched upon a sleeping man, and +with its leathern wings fanned him into deeper drowsiness whilst it +drew from him his life-blood. That is what this hideous Queen does +for men. She robes herself in a dark cloud, and sends out her behests +from obscurity. And men fancy that they are free whilst all the while +they are her servants. Oh, dear brethren! you may call this theology, +but it is a simple statement of the facts of our condition. 'Sin hath +reigned.' + +And now turn to the other picture, 'Grace might reign.' Then there is +an antagonistic power that rises up to confront the widespread +dominion of this anarch of old. And this Queen comes with twenty +thousand to war against her that has but ten thousand on her side. + +Again I say, let us understand our terms. I suppose, there are few of +the keywords of the New Testament which have lost more of their +radiance, like quicksilver, by exposure in the air during the +centuries than that great word Grace, which is always on the lips of +this Apostle, and to him had music in its sound, and which to us is a +piece of dead doctrine, associated with certain high Calvinistic +theories which we enlightened people have long ago grown beyond, and +got rid of. Perhaps Paul was more right than we when his heart leaped +up within him at the very thought of all which he saw to lie +palpitating and throbbing with eager desire to bless men, in that +great word. What does he mean by it? Let me put it into the shortest +possible terms. This antagonist Queen is nothing but the love of God +raying out for ever to us inferior creatures, who, by reason of our +sinfulness, have deserved something widely different. Sin stands +there, a hideous hag, though a queen; Grace stands here, 'in all her +gestures dignity and love,' fair and self-communicative, though a +sovereign. The love of God in exercise to sinful men: that is what +the New Testament means by grace. And is it not a great thought? + +Notice, for further elucidation of the Apostle's conception, how he +sacrifices the verbal correctness of his antithesis in order to get +to the real opposition. What is the opposite of Sin? Righteousness. +Why does he not say, then, that 'as Sin hath reigned unto death, even +so might Righteousness reign unto life'? Why? Because it is not man, +or anything in man, that can be the true antagonist of, and victor +over, the regnant Sin of humanity; but God Himself comes into the +field, and only He is the foe that Sin dreads. That is to say, the +only hope for a sin-tyrannised world is in the out-throb of the love +of the great heart of God. For, notice the weapon with which He +fights man's transgression, if I may vary the figure for a moment. It +is only subordinately punishment, or law, or threatening, or the +revelation of the wickedness of the transgression. All these have +their places, but they are secondary places. The thing that will +conquer a world's wickedness is nothing else but the manifested love +of God. Only the patient shining down of the sun will ever melt the +icebergs that float in all our hearts. And wonderful and blessed it +is to think that, in whatsoever aspects man's sin may have been an +interruption and a contradiction of the divine purpose, out of the +evil has come a good; that the more obdurate and universal the +rebellion, the more has it evoked a deeper and more wondrous +tenderness. The blacker the thundercloud, the brighter glows the +rainbow that is flung across it. So these two front each other, the +one settled in her established throne-- + +'Fierce as ten furies, terrible as hell--' + +the other coming on her adventurous errand to conquer the world to +herself, and to banish the foul tyranny under which men groan. 'Sin +hath reigned.' Grace is on her way to her dominion. + +II. Notice the gifts of these two Queens to their subjects. + +'Sin hath reigned in death' (as the accurate translation has it); +'Grace reigns unto eternal life.' The one has established her +dominion, and its results are wrought out, her reign is, as it were, +a reign in a cemetery; and her subjects are dead. If you want a +modern instance to illustrate an ancient saw, think of Armenia. There +is a reign whose gifts to its subjects are death. Sin reigns, says +Paul, and for proof points to the fact that men die. + +Now, I am not going to enter into the question here, and now, whether +physical death passes over mankind because of the fact of +transgression. I do not suppose that this is so. But I ask you to +remember that when the Bible says that 'Death passed upon all men, +for all have sinned,' it does not merely mean the physical fact of +dissolution, but it means that fact along with the accompaniments of +it, and the forerunners of it, in men's consciences. 'The sting of +death is sin,' says Paul, in another place. By which he implies, +I presume, that, if it were not for the fact of alienation from God +and opposition to His holy will, men might lie down and die as +placidly as an animal does, and might strip themselves for it 'as for +a bed, that longing they'd been sick for.' No doubt, there was death +in the world long before there were men in it. No doubt, also, the +complex whole phenomenon gets its terror from the fact of men's sin. + +But it is not so much that physical fact with its accompaniments +which Paul is thinking about when he says that 'sin reigns in death,' +as it is that solemn truth which he is always reiterating, and which +I pray you, dear friends, to lay to heart, that, whatever activity +there may be in the life of a man who has rent himself away from +dependence upon God--however vigorous his brain, however active his +hand, however full charged with other interests his life, in the very +depth of it is a living death, and the right name for it is death. So +this is Sin's gift--that over our whole nature there come mortality +and decay, and that they who live as her subjects are dead whilst +they live. Dear brethren, that may be figurative, but it seems to me +that it is absurd for you to turn away from such thoughts, shrug your +shoulders, and say, 'Old-fashioned Calvinistic theology!' It is +simply putting into a vivid form the facts of your life and of your +condition in relation to God, if you are subjects of Sin. + +Then, on the other hand, the other queenly figure has her hands +filled with one great gift which, like the fatal bestowment which Sin +gives to her subjects, has two aspects, a present and a future one. +Life, which is given in our redemption from Death and Sin, and in +union with God; that is the present gift that the love of God holds +out to every one of us. That life, in its very incompleteness here, +carries in itself the prophecy of its own completion hereafter, in a +higher form and world, just as truly as the bud is the prophet of the +flower and of the fruit; just as truly as a half-reared building is +the prophecy of its own completion when the roof tree is put upon it. +The men that here have, as we all may have if we choose, the gift of +life eternal in the knowledge of God through Jesus Christ His Son, +must necessarily tend onwards and upwards to a region where Death is +beneath the horizon, and Life flows and flushes the whole heaven. +Brother! do you put out your whole hand to take the poisoned gift +from the claw-like hand of that hideous Queen; or do you turn and +take the gift of life eternal from the hands of the queenly Grace? + +III. How this queenly Grace gives her gifts. + +You observe that the Apostle, as is his wont--I was going to +say--gets himself entangled in a couple of almost parenthetical or, +at all events, subsidiary sentences. I suppose when he began to write +he meant to say, simply, 'as Sin hath reigned unto death, so Grace +might reign unto life.' But notice that he inserts two +qualifications: 'through righteousness,' 'through Jesus Christ our +Lord.' What does he mean by these? + +He means this, first, that even that great love of God, coming +throbbing straight from His heart, cannot give eternal life as a mere +matter of arbitrary will. God can make His sun to shine and His rain +to fall, 'on the unthankful and on the evil,' and if God could, God +would give eternal life to everybody, bad and good; but He cannot. +There must be righteousness if there is to be life. Just as sin's +fruit is death, the fruit of righteousness is life. + +He means, in the next place, that whilst there is no life without +righteousness, there is no righteousness without God's gift. You +cannot break away from the dominion of Sin, and, as it were, +establish yourselves in a little fortress of your own, repelling her +assaults by any power of yours. Dear brethren, we cannot undo the +past; we cannot strip off the poisoned garment that clings to our +limbs; we can mend ourselves in many respects, but we cannot of our +own volition and motion clothe ourselves with that righteousness of +which the wearers shall be worthy to 'pass through the gate into the +city.' There is no righteousness without God's gift. + +And the other subsidiary clause completes the thought: 'through +Christ.' In Him is all the grace, the manifest love, of God gathered +together. It is not diffused as the nebulous light in some chaotic +incipient system, but it is gathered into a sun that is set in the +centre, in order that it may pour down warmth and life upon its +circling planets. The grace of God is in Christ Jesus our Lord. In +Him is life eternal; therefore, if we desire to possess it we must +possess Him. In Him is righteousness; therefore, if we desire our own +foulness to be changed into the holiness which shall see God, we must +go to Jesus Christ. Grace reigns in life, but it is life through +righteousness, which is through Jesus Christ our Lord. + +So, then, brother, my message and my petition to each of you +are--knit yourself to Him by faith in Him. Then He who is 'full of +grace and truth' will come to you; and, coming, will bring in His +hands righteousness and life eternal. If only we rest ourselves on +Him, and keep ourselves close in touch with Him; then we shall be +delivered from the tyranny of the darkness, and translated into the +Kingdom of the Son of His love. + + + + +'THE FORM OF TEACHING' + + '... Ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine + which was delivered you.'--ROMANS vi. 17. + + +There is room for difference of opinion as to what Paul precisely +means by 'form' here. The word so rendered appears in English as +_type_, and has a similar variety of meaning. It signifies +originally a mark made by pressure or impact; and then, by natural +transitions, a _mould_, or more generally a _pattern_ or _example_, +and then the copy of such an example or pattern, or the cast from +such a mould. It has also the other meaning which its English +equivalent has taken on very extensively of late years, such as, for +instance, you find in expressions like 'An English type of face,' +meaning thereby the general outline which preserves the +distinguishing characteristics of a thing. Now we may choose between +these two meanings in our text. If the Apostle means type in the +latter sense of the word, then the rendering 'form' is adequate, and +he is thinking of the Christian teaching which had been given to the +Roman Christians as possessing certain well-defined characteristics +which distinguished it from other kinds of teaching--such, for +instance, as Jewish or heathen. + +But if we take the other meaning, then he is, in true Pauline +fashion, bringing in a vivid and picturesque metaphor to enforce his +thought, and is thinking of the teaching which the Roman Christians +had received as being a kind of mould into which they were thrown, a +pattern to which they were to be conformed. And that that is his +meaning seems to me to be made a little more probable by the fact +that the last words of my text would be more accurate if inverted, +and instead of reading, as the Authorised Version does, 'that form of +doctrine which was delivered you,' we were to read, as the Revised +Version does, 'that form whereunto ye were delivered.' + +If this be the general meaning of the words before us, there are +three thoughts arising from them to which I turn briefly. First, +Paul's Gospel was a definite body of teaching; secondly, that +teaching is a mould for conduct and character; lastly, that teaching +therefore demands obedience. Take, then, these three thoughts. + +I. First, Paul's Gospel was a definite body of teaching. + +Now the word 'doctrine,' which is employed in my text, has, in the +lapse of years since the Authorised Version was made, narrowed its +significance. At the date of our Authorised translation 'doctrine' +was probably equivalent to 'teaching,' of whatever sort it might be. +Since then it has become equivalent to a statement of abstract +principles, and that is not at all what Paul means. He does not mean +to say that his gospel was a form of doctrine in the sense of being a +theological system, but he means to say that it was a body of +teaching, the nature of the teaching not being defined at all by the +word. Therefore we have to notice that the great, blessed peculiarity +of the Gospel is that it is a teaching, not of abstract dry +principles, but of concrete historical facts. From these principles +in plenty may be gathered, but in its first form as it comes to men +fresh from God it is not a set of propositions, but a history of +deeds that were done upon earth. And, therefore, is it fitted to be +the food of every soul and the mould of every character. + +Jesus Christ did not come and talk to men about God, and say to them +what His Apostles afterwards said, 'God is love,' but He lived and +died, and that mainly was His teaching about God. He did not come to +men and lay down a theory of atonement or a doctrine of propitiation, +or theology about sin and its relations to God, but He went to the +Cross and gave Himself for us, and that was His teaching about +sacrifice. He did not say to men 'There is a future life, and it is +of such and such a sort,' but He came out of the grave and He said +'Touch Me, and handle Me. A spirit hath not flesh and bones,' and +_therefore_ He brought life and immortality to light, by no empty +words but by the solid realities of facts. He did not lecture upon +ethics, but He lived a perfect human life out of which all moral +principles that will guide human conduct may be gathered. And so, +instead of presenting us with a _hortus siccus_, with a botanic +collection of scientifically arranged and dead propositions, He led +us into the meadow where the flowers grow, living and fair. His life +and death, with all that they imply, are the teaching. + +Let us not forget, on the other hand, that the history of a fact is +not the mere statement of the outward thing that has happened. +Suppose four people, for instance, standing at the foot of Christ's +Cross; four other 'evangelists' than the four that we know. There is +a Roman soldier; there is a Pharisee; there is one of the weeping +crowd of poor women, not disciples; and there is a disciple. The +first man tells the fact as he saw it: 'A Jewish rebel was crucified +this morning.' The second man tells the fact: 'A blaspheming apostate +suffered what he deserved to-day.' The woman tells the fact: 'A poor, +gentle, fair soul was martyred to-day.' And the fourth one tells the +fact: 'Jesus Christ, the Son of God, died for our sins.' The three +tell the same fact; the fourth preaches the Gospel--that is to say, +Christian teaching is the facts plus their explanation; and it is +that which differentiates it from the mere record which is of no +avail to anybody. So Paul himself in one of his other letters puts +it. This is his gospel: Jesus of Nazareth 'died for _our_ sins +according to the Scriptures, and He was buried, and rose again the +third day, according to the Scriptures.' That is what turns the bald +story of the facts into teaching, which is the mould for life. + +So on the one hand, dear brethren, do not let us fall into the +superficial error of fancying that our religion is a religion of +emotion and morality only. It is a religion with a basis of divine +truth, which, being struck away, all the rest goes. There is a revolt +against dogma to-day, a revolt which in large measure is justified as +an essential of progress, and in large measure as an instance of +progress; but human nature is ever prone to extremes, and in the +revolt from man's dogma there is danger of casting away God's truth. +Christianity is not preserved when we hold by the bare facts of the +outward history, unless we take with these facts the interpretation +of them, which declares the divinity and the sacrifice of the Son of +God. + +And on the other hand, let us keep very clear in our minds the broad +and impassable gulf of separation between the Christian teaching as +embodied in the Scripture and the systems which Christianity has +evolved therefrom. Men's intellects must work upon the pabulum that +is provided for them, and a theology in a systematised form is a +necessity for the intellectual and reasonable life of the Christian +Church. But there is all the difference between man's inferences from +and systematising of the Christian truth and the truth that lies +here. The one is the golden roof that is cast over us; the other is +too often but the spiders' webs that are spun across and darken its +splendour. It is a sign of a wholesome change in the whole sentiment +and attitude of the modern Christian mind that the word 'doctrine,' +which has come to mean men's inferences from God's truth, should have +been substituted as it has been in our Revised Version of my text, by +the wholesome Christian word 'teaching.' The teaching is the facts +with the inspired commentary on them. + +II. Secondly, notice that this teaching is in Paul's judgment a mould +or pattern according to which men's lives are to be conformed. + +There can be no question but that, in that teaching as set forth in +Scripture, there does lie the mightiest formative power for shaping +our lives, and emancipating us from our evil. + +Christ is _the_ type, the mould into which men are to be cast. +The Gospel, as presented in Scripture, gives us three things. It +gives us the perfect mould; it gives us the perfect motive; it gives +us the perfect power. And in all three things appears its distinctive +glory, apart from and above all other systems that have ever tried to +affect the conduct or to mould the character of man. + +In Jesus Christ we have in due combination, in perfect proportion, +all the possible excellences of humanity. As in other cases of +perfect symmetry, the very precision of the balanced proportions +detracts from the apparent magnitude of the statue or of the fair +building, so to a superficial eye there is but little beauty there +that we should desire Him, but as we learn to know Him, and live +nearer to Him, and get more familiar with all His sweetness, and with +all His power, He towers before us in ever greater and yet never +repellent or exaggerated magnitude, and never loses the reality of +His brotherhood in the completeness of His perfection. We have in the +Christ the one type, the one mould and pattern for all striving, the +'glass of form,' the perfect Man. + +And that likeness is not reproduced in us by pressure or by a blow, +but by the slow and blessed process of gazing until we become like, +beholding the glory until we are changed into the glory. + +It is no use having a mould and metal unless you have a fire. It is +no use having a perfect Pattern unless you have a motive to copy it. +Men do not go to the devil for want of examples; and morality is not +at a low ebb by reason of ignorance of what the true type of life is. +But nowhere but in the full-orbed teaching of the New Testament will +you find a motive strong enough to melt down all the obstinate +hardness of the 'northern iron' of the human will, and to make it +plastic to His hand. If we can say, 'He loved me and gave Himself for +me' then the sum of all morality, the old commandment that 'ye love +one another' receives a new stringency, and a fresh motive as well as +a deepened interpretation, when His love is our pattern. The one +thing that will make men willing to be like Christ is their faith +that Christ is their Sacrifice and their Saviour. And sure I am of +this, that no form of mutilated Christianity, which leaves out or +falteringly proclaims the truth that Christ died on the Cross for the +sins of the world, will ever generate heat enough to mould men's +wills, or kindle motives powerful enough to lead to a life of growing +imitation of and resemblance to Him. The dial may be all right, the +hours most accurately marked in their proper places, every minute +registered on the circle, the hands may be all right, delicately +fashioned, truly poised, but if there is no main-spring inside, dial +and hands are of little use, and a Christianity which says, 'Christ +is the Teacher; do you obey Him?' is as impotent as the dial face +with the broken main-spring. What we need, and what, thank God, in +'the teaching' we have, is the pattern brought near to us, and the +motive for imitating the pattern, set in motion by the great thought, +'He loved me and gave Himself for me.' + +Still further, the teaching is a power to fashion life, inasmuch as +it brings with it a gift which secures the transformation of the +believer into the likeness of his Lord. Part of 'the teaching' is the +fact of Pentecost; part of the teaching is the fact of the Ascension; +and the consequence of the Ascension and the sure promise of the +Pentecost is that all who love Him, and wait upon Him, shall receive +into their hearts the 'Spirit of life in Christ Jesus' which shall +make them free from the law of sin and death. + +So, dear friends, on the one hand, let us remember that our religion +is meant to work, that we have nothing in our creed that should not +be in our character, that all our _credenda_ are to be our _agenda_; +everything _believed_ to be something _done_; and that if we content +ourselves with the simple acceptance of the teaching, and make no +effort to translate that teaching into life, we are hypocrites or +self-deceivers. + +And, on the other hand, do not let us forget that religion is the +soul of which morality is the body, and that it is impossible in the +nature of things that you shall ever get a true, lofty, moral life +which is not based upon religion. I do not say that men cannot be +sure of the outlines of their duty without Christianity, though I am +free to confess that I think it is a very maimed and shabby version +of human duty, which is supplied, minus the special revelation of +that duty which Christianity makes; but my point is, that the +knowledge will not work without the Gospel. + +The Christian type of character is a distinct and manifestly separate +thing from the pagan heroism or from the virtues and the +righteousnesses of other systems. Just as the musician's ear can +tell, by half a dozen bars, whether that strain was Beethoven's, or +Handel's, or Mendelssohn's, just as the trained eye can see +Raffaelle's magic in every touch of his pencil, so Christ, the +Teacher, has a style; and all the scholars of His school carry with +them a certain mark which tells where they got their education and +who is their Master, if they are scholars indeed. And that leads me +to the last word. + +III. This mould demands obedience. + +By the very necessity of things it is so. If the 'teaching' was but a +teaching of abstract truths it would be enough to assent to them. I +believe that the three angles of a triangle are equal to two right +angles, and I have done my duty by that proposition when I have said +'Yes! it is so.' But the 'teaching' which Jesus Christ gives and +_is_, needs a good deal more than that. By the very nature of the +teaching, assent drags after it submission. You can please yourself +whether you let Jesus Christ into your minds or not, but if you +do let Him in, He will be Master. There is no such thing as taking +Him in and not obeying. + +And so the requirement of the Gospel which we call faith has in it +quite as much of the element of obedience as of the element of trust. +And the presence of that element is just what makes the difference +between a sham and a real faith. 'Faith which has not works is dead, +being alone.' A faith which is all trust and no obedience is neither +trust nor obedience. + +And that is why so many of us do not care to yield ourselves to the +faith that is in Jesus Christ. If it simply came to us and said, 'If +you will trust Me you will get pardon,' I fancy there would be a good +many more of us honest Christians than are so. But Christ comes and +says, 'Trust Me, follow Me, and take Me for your Master; and be like +Me,' and one's will kicks, and one's passions recoil, and a thousand +of the devil's servants within us prick their ears up and stiffen +their backs in remonstrance and opposition. 'Submit' is Christ's +first word; submit by faith, submit in love. + +That heart obedience, which is the requirement of Christianity, means +freedom. The Apostle draws a wonderful contrast in the context +between the slavery to lust and sin, and the freedom which comes from +obedience to God and to righteousness. Obey the Truth, and the Truth, +in your obeying, shall make you free, for freedom is the willing +submission to the limitations which are best. 'I will walk at liberty +for I keep Thy precepts.' Take Christ for your Master, and, being His +servants, you are your own masters, and the world's to boot. For 'all +things are yours if ye are Christ's.' Refuse to bow your necks to +that yoke which is easy, and to take upon your shoulders that burden +which is light, and you do not buy liberty, though you buy +licentiousness, for you become the slaves and downtrodden vassals of +the world and the flesh and the devil, and while you promise +yourselves liberty, you become the bondsmen of corruption. Oh! then, +let us obey from the heart that mould of teaching to which we are +delivered, and so obeying, we shall be free indeed. + + + + +'THY FREE SPIRIT' + + 'The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made + me free from the law of sin and death.'--ROMANS viii. 2. + + +We have to distinguish two meanings of law. In the stricter sense, it +signifies the authoritative expressions of the will of a ruler +proposed for the obedience of man; in the wider, almost figurative +sense, it means nothing more than the generalised expression of +constant similar facts. For instance, objects attract one another in +certain circumstances with a force which in the same circumstances is +always the same. When that fact is stated generally, we get the law +of gravitation. Thus the word comes to mean little more than a +regular process. In our text the word is used in a sense much nearer +the latter than the former of these two. 'The law of sin and of +death' cannot mean a series of commandments; it certainly does not +mean the Mosaic law. It must either be entirely figurative, taking +sin and death as two great tyrants who domineer over men; or it must +mean the continuous action of these powers, the process by which they +work. These two come substantially to the same idea. The law of sin +and of death describes a certain constancy of operation, uniform and +fixed, under the dominion of which men are struggling. But there is +another constancy of operation, uniform and fixed too, a mighty +antagonistic power, which frees from the dominion of the former: it +is 'the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus.' + +I. The bondage. + +The Apostle is speaking about himself as he was, and we have our own +consciousness to verify his transcript of his own personal experience. +Paul had found that, by an inexorable iron sequence, sin +worked in himself the true death of the soul, in separation from God, +in the extinction of good and noble capacities, in the atrophying of +all that was best in himself, in the death of joy and peace. And this +iron sequence he, with an eloquent paradox, calls a 'law,' though its +very characteristic is that it is lawless transgression of the true +law of humanity. He so describes it, partly, because he would place +emphasis on its dominion over us. Sin rules with iron sway; men madly +obey it, and even when they think themselves free, are under a bitter +tyranny. Further, he desires to emphasise the fact that sin and death +are parts of one process which operates constantly and uniformly. +This dark anarchy and wild chaos of disobedience and transgression +has its laws. All happens there according to rule. Rigid and +inevitable as the courses of the stars, or the fall of the leaf from +the tree, is sin hurrying on to its natural goal in death. In this +fatal dance, sin leads in death; the one fair spoken and full of +dazzling promises, the other in the end throws off the mask, and +slays. It is true of all who listen to the tempting voice, and the +deluded victim 'knows not that the dead are there, and that her +guests are in the depth of hell.' + +II. The method of deliverance. + +The previous chapter sounded the depths of human impotence, and +showed the tragic impossibility of human efforts to strip off the +poisoned garment. Here the Apostle tells the wonderful story of how +he himself was delivered, in the full rejoicing confidence that what +availed for his emancipation would equally avail for every captived +soul. Because he himself has experienced a divine power which breaks +the dreadful sequence of sin and of death, he knows that every soul +may share in the experience. No mere outward means will be sufficient +to emancipate a spirit; no merely intellectual methods will avail to +set free the passions and desires which have been captured by sin. It +is vain to seek deliverance from a perverted will by any +republication, however emphatic, of a law of duty. Nothing can touch +the necessities of the case but a gift of power which becomes an +abiding influence in us, and develops a mightier energy to overcome +the evil tendencies of a sinful soul. + +That communicated power must impart life. Nothing short of a Spirit +of life, quick and powerful, with an immortal and intense energy, +will avail to meet the need. Such a Spirit must give the life which +it possesses, must quicken and bring into action dormant powers in +the spirit that it would free. It must implant new energies and +directions, new motives, desires, tastes, and tendencies. It must +bring into play mightier attractions to neutralise and deaden +existing ones; as when to some chemical compound a substance is added +which has a stronger affinity for one of the elements, a new thing is +made. + +Paul's experience, which he had a right to cast into general terms +and potentially to extend to all mankind, had taught him that such a +new life for such a spirit had come to him by union with Jesus +Christ. Such a union, deep and mystical as it is, is, thank God, an +experience universal in all true Christians, and constitutes the very +heart of the Gospel which Paul rejoiced to believe was entrusted to +his hands for the world. His great message of 'Christ in us' has been +wofully curtailed and mangled when his other message of 'Christ for +us' has been taken, as it too often has been, to be the whole of his +Gospel. They who take either of these inseparable elements to be the +whole, rend into two imperfect halves the perfect oneness of the +Gospel of Christ. + +We are often told that Paul was the true author of Christian +doctrine, and are bidden to go back from him to Jesus. If we do so, +we hear His grave sweet voice uttering in the upper-room the deep +words, 'I am the Vine, ye are the branches'; and, surely, Paul is but +repeating, without metaphor, what Christ, once for all, set forth in +that lovely emblem, when he says that 'the law of the Spirit of life +in Christ Jesus made me free from the law of sin and of death.' The +branches in their multitude make the Vine in its unity, and the sap +which rises from the deep root through the brown stem, passes to +every tremulous leaf, and brings bloom and savour into every cluster. +Jesus drew His emblem from the noblest form of vegetative life; Paul, +in other places, draws his from the highest form of bodily life, when +he points to the many members in one body, and the Head which governs +all, and says, 'So also is Christ.' In another place he points to the +noblest form of earthly love and unity. The blessed fellowship and +sacred oneness of husband and wife are an emblem sweet, though +inadequate, of the fellowship in love and unity of spirit between +Christ and His Church. + +And all this mysterious oneness of life has an intensely practical +side. In Jesus, and by union with Him, we receive a power that +delivers from sin and arrests the stealthy progress of sin's +follower, death. Love to Him, the result of fellowship with Him, and +the consequence of life received from Him, becomes the motive which +makes the redeemed heart delight to do His will, and takes all the +power out of every temptation. We are in Him, and He in us, on +condition, and by means, of our humble faith; and because my faith +thus knits me to Him it is 'the victory that overcomes the world' and +breaks the chains of many sins. So this communion with Jesus Christ +is the way by which we shall increase that triumphant spiritual life, +which is the only victorious antagonist of the else inevitable +consequence which declares that the 'soul that sinneth it shall die,' +and die even in sinning. + +III. The process of the deliverance. + +Following the R.V. we read 'made me free,' not 'hath made me.' The +reference is obviously, as the Greek more clearly shows, to a single +historical event, which some would take to be the Apostle's baptism, +but which is more properly supposed to be his conversion. His strong +bold language here does not mean that he claims to be sinless. The +emancipation is effected, although it is but begun. He holds that at +that moment when Jesus appeared to him on the road to Damascus, and +he yielded to Him as Lord, his deliverance was real, though not +complete. He was conscious of a real change of position in reference +to that law of sin and of death. Paul distinguishes between the true +self and the accumulation of selfish and sensual habits which make up +so much of ourselves. The deeper and purer self may be vitalised in +will and heart, and set free even while the emancipation is not +worked out in the life. The parable of the leaven applies in the +individual renewal; and there is no fanaticism, and no harm, in +Paul's point of view, if only it be remembered that sins by which +passion and externals overbear my better self are mine in +responsibility and in consequences. Thus guarded, we may be wholly +right in thinking of all the evils which still cleave to the +renewed Christian soul as not being part of it, but destined to drop +away. + +And this bold declaration is to be vindicated as a prophetic +confidence in the supremacy and ultimate dominion of the new power +which works even through much antagonism in an imperfect Christian. +Paul, too, calls 'things that are not as though they were.' If my +spirit of life is the 'Spirit of life in Christ,' it will go on to +perfection. It is Spirit, therefore it is informing and conquering +the material; it is a divine Spirit, therefore it is omnipotent; it +is the Spirit of life, leading in and imparting life like itself, +which is kindred with it and is its source; it is the Spirit of life +in Christ, therefore leading to life like His, bringing us to +conformity with Him because the same causes produce the same effects; +it is a life in Christ having a law and regular orderly course of +development. So, just as if we have the germ we may hope for fruit, +and can see the infantile oak in the tightly-shut acorn, or in the +egg the creature which shall afterwards grow there, we have in this +gift of the Spirit, the victory. If we have the cause, we have the +effects implicitly folded in it; and we have but to wait further +development. + +The Christian life is to be one long effort, partial, and gradual, to +unfold the freedom possessed. Paul knew full well that his +emancipation was not perfect. It was, probably, after this triumphant +expression of confidence that he wrote, 'Not as though I had already +attained, either were already perfect.' The first stage is the gift +of power, the appropriation and development of that power is the work +of a life; and it ought to pass through a well-marked series and +cycle of growing changes. The way to develop it is by constant +application to the source of all freedom, the life-giving Spirit, and +by constant effort to conquer sins and temptations. There is no such +thing in the Christian conflict as a painless development. We must +mortify the deeds of the body if we are to live in the Spirit. The +Christian progress has in it the nature of a crucifixion. It is to be +effort, steadily directed for the sake of Christ, and in the joy of +His Spirit, to destroy sin, and to win practical holiness. Homely +moralities are the outcome and the test of all pretensions to +spiritual communion. + +We are, further, to perfect holiness in the fear of the Lord, by +'waiting for the Redemption,' which is not merely passive waiting, +but active expectation, as of one who stretches out a welcoming hand +to an approaching friend. Nor must we forget that this accomplished +deliverance is but partial whilst upon earth. 'The body is dead +because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness.' But +there may be indefinite approximation to complete deliverance. The +metaphors in Scripture under which Christian progress is described, +whether drawn from a conflict or a race, or from a building, or from +the growth of a tree, all suggest the idea of constant advance +against hindrances, which yet, constant though it is, does not reach +the goal here. And this is our noblest earthly condition--not to be +pure, but to be tending towards it and conscious of impurity. Hence +our tempers should be those of humility, strenuous effort, firm hope. +We are as slaves who have escaped, but are still in the wilderness, +with the enemies' dogs baying at our feet; but we shall come to the +land of freedom, on whose sacred soil sin and death can never tread. + + + + +CHRIST CONDEMNING SIN + + 'For what the law could not do, in that it was weak + through the flesh, God sending His own Son in the + likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin + in the flesh.'--ROMANS viii. 3. + + +In the first verse of this chapter we read that 'There is no +condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus.' The reason of that +is, that they are set free from the terrible sequence of cause and +effect which constitutes 'the law of sin and death'; and the reason +why they are freed from that awful sequence by the power of Christ +is, because He has 'condemned sin in the flesh.' The occurrence of +the two words 'condemnation' (ver. 1) and 'condemned' (ver. 3) should +be noted. Sin is personified as dwelling in the flesh, which +expression here means, not merely the body, but unregenerate human +nature. He has made his fortress there, and rules over it all. The +strong man keeps his house and his goods are in peace. He laughs to +scorn the attempts of laws and moralities of all sorts to cast him +out. His dominion is death to the human nature over which he +tyrannises. Condemnation is inevitable to the men over whom he rules. +They or he must perish. If he escape they die. If he could be slain +they might live. Christ comes, condemns the tyrant, and casts him +out. So, he being condemned, we are acquitted; and he being slain +there is no death for us. Let us try to elucidate a little further +this great metaphor by just pondering the two points prominent in +it--Sin tyrannising over human nature and resisting all attempts to +overcome it, and Christ's condemnation and casting out of the tyrant. + +I. Sin tyrannising over human nature, and resisting all attempts to +overcome it. + +Paul is generalising his own experience when he speaks of the +condemnation of an intrusive alien force that holds unregenerate +human nature in bondage. He is writing a page of his own +autobiography, and he is sure that all the rest of us have like pages +in ours. Heart answereth unto heart as in a mirror. If each man is a +unity, the poison must run through all his veins and affect his whole +nature. Will, understanding, heart, must all be affected and each in +its own way by the intruder; and if men are a collective whole, each +man's experience is repeated in his brother's. + +The Apostle is equally transcribing his own experience when in the +text he sadly admits the futility of all efforts to shake the +dominion of sin. He has found in his own case that even the loftiest +revelation in the Mosaic law utterly fails in the attempt to condemn +sin. This is true not only in regard to the Mosaic law but in regard +to the law of conscience, and to moral teachings of any kind. It is +obvious that all such laws do condemn sin in the sense that they +solemnly declare God's judgment about it, and His sentence on it; but +in the sense of real condemnation, or casting out, and depriving sin +of its power, they all are impotent. The law may deter from overt +acts or lead to isolated acts of obedience; it may stir up antagonism +to sin's tyranny, but after that it has no more that it can do. It +cannot give the purity which it proclaims to be necessary, nor create +the obedience which it enjoins. Its thunders roll terrors, and no +fruitful rain follows them to soften the barren soil. There always +remains an unbridged gulf between the man and the law. + +And this is what Paul points to in saying that it 'was weak through +the flesh.' It is good in itself, but it has to work through the +sinful nature. The only powers to which it can appeal are those which +are already in rebellion. A discrowned king whose only forces to +conquer his rebellious subjects are the rebels themselves, is not +likely to regain his crown. Because law brings no new element into +our humanity, its appeal to our humanity has little more effect than +that of the wind whistling through an archway. It appeals to +conscience and reason by a plain declaration of what is right; to +will and understanding by an exhibition of authority; to fears and +prudence by plainly setting forth consequences. But what is to be +done with men who know what is right but have no wish to do it, who +believe that they ought but will not, who know the consequences but +'choose rather the pleasures of sin for a season,' and shuffle the +future out of their minds altogether? This is the essential weakness +of all law. The tyrant is not afraid so long as there is no one +threatening his reign, but the unarmed herald of a discrowned king. +His citadel will not surrender to the blast of the trumpet blown from +Sinai. + +II. Christ's condemnation and casting out of the tyrant. + +The Apostle points to a triple condemnation. + +'In the likeness of sinful flesh,' Jesus condemns sin by His own +perfect life. That phrase, 'the likeness of the flesh of sin,' +implies the real humanity of Jesus, and His perfect sinlessness; and +suggests the first way in which He condemns sin in the flesh. In His +life He repeats the law in a higher fashion. What the one spoke in +words the other realised in 'loveliness of perfect deeds'; and all men +own that example is the mightiest preacher of righteousness, and +that active goodness draws to itself reverence and sways men to +imitate. But that life lived in human nature gives a new hope of the +possibilities of that nature even in us. The dream of perfect beauty +'in the flesh' has been realised. What the Man Christ Jesus was, He +was that we may become. In the very flesh in which the tyrant rules, +Jesus shows the possibility and the loveliness of a holy life. + +But this, much as it is, is not all. There is another way in which +Christ condemns sin in the flesh, and that is by His perfect +sacrifice. To this also Paul points in the phrase, 'the flesh of +sin.' The example of which we have been speaking is much, but it is +weak for the very same reason for which law is weak--that it operates +only through our nature as it is; and that is not enough. Sin's hold +on man is twofold--one that it has perverted his relation to God, and +another that it has corrupted his nature. Hence there is in him +a sense of separation from God and a sense of guilt. Both of these not +only lead to misery, but positively tend to strengthen the dominion +of sin. The leader of the mutineers keeps them true to him by +reminding them that the mutiny laws decree death without mercy. Guilt +felt may drive to desperation and hopeless continuance in wrong. The +cry, 'I am so bad that it is useless to try to be better,' is often +heard. Guilt stifled leads to hardening of heart, and sometimes to +desire and riot. Guilt slurred over by some easy process of +absolution may lead to further sin. Similarly separation from God is +the root of all evil, and thoughts of Him as hard and an enemy, +always lead to sin. So if the power of sin in the past must be +cancelled, the sense of guilt must be removed, and the wall of +partition between man and God thrown down. What can law answer to +such a demand? It is silent; it can only say, 'What is written is +written.' It has no word to speak that promises 'the blotting out of +the handwriting that is against us'; and through its silence one can +hear the mocking laugh of the tyrant that keeps his castle. + +But Christ has come 'for sin'; that is to say His Incarnation and +Death had relation to, and had it for their object to remove, human +sin. He comes to blot out the evil, to bring God's pardon. The +recognition of His sacrifice supplies the adequate motive to copy His +example, and they who see in His death God's sacrifice for man's sin, +cannot but yield themselves to Him, and find in obedience a delight. +Love kindled at His love makes likeness and transmutes the outward +law into an inward 'spirit of life in Christ Jesus.' + +Still another way by which God 'condemns sin in the flesh' is pointed +to by the remaining phrase of our text, 'sending His own Son.' In the +beginning of this epistle Jesus is spoken of as 'being declared to be +the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness'; and +we must connect that saying with our text, and so think of Christ's +bestowal of His perfect gift to humanity of the Spirit which +sanctifies as being part of His condemnation of sin in the flesh. +Into the very region where the tyrant rules, the Son of God +communicates a new nature which constitutes a real new power. The +Spirit operates on all our faculties, and redeems them from the +bondage of corruption. All the springs in the land are poisoned; but +a new one, limpid and pure, is opened. By the entrance of the Spirit +of holiness into a human spirit, the usurper is driven from the +central fortress: and though he may linger in the outworks and keep +up a guerilla warfare, that is all that he can do. We never truly +apprehend Christ's gift to man until we recognise that He not merely +'died for our sins,' but lives to impart the principle of holiness in +the gift of His Spirit. The dominion of that imparted Spirit is +gradual and progressive. The Canaanite may still be in the land, but +a growing power, working in and through us, is warring against all in +us that still owns allegiance to that alien power, and there can be +no end to the victorious struggle until the whole body, soul, and +spirit, be wholly under the influence of the Spirit that dwelleth in +us, and nothing shall hurt or destroy in what shall then be all God's +holy mountain. + +Such is, in the most general terms, the statement of what Christ does +'for us'; and the question comes to be the all-important one for +each, Do I let Him do it for me? Remember the alternative. There must +either be condemnation for us, or for the sin that dwelleth in us. +There is no condemnation for them who are in Christ Jesus, because +there is condemnation for the sin that dwells in them. It must he +slain, or it will slay us. It must be cast out, or it will cast us +out from God. It must be separated from us, or it will separate us +from Him. We need not be condemned, but if it be not condemned, then +we shall be. + + + + +THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT + + 'The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, + that we are the children of God.'--ROMANS viii. 18. + + +The sin of the world is a false confidence, a careless, complacent +taking for granted that a man is a Christian when he is not. The +fault, and sorrow, and weakness of the Church is a false diffidence, +an anxious fear whether a man be a Christian when he is. There are +none so far away from false confidence as those who tremble lest they +be cherishing it. There are none so inextricably caught in its toils +as those who are all unconscious of _its_ existence and of _their_ +danger. The two things, the false confidence and the false +diffidence, are perhaps more akin to one another than they look at +first sight. Their opposites, at all events--the true confidence, +which is faith in Christ; and the true diffidence, which is utter +distrust of myself--are identical. But there may sometimes be, and +there often is, the combination of a real confidence and a false +diffidence, the presence of faith, and the doubt whether it be +present. Many Christians go through life with this as the prevailing +temper of their minds--a doubt sometimes arising almost to agony, and +sometimes dying down into passive patient acceptance of the condition +as inevitable--a doubt whether, after all, they be not, as they say, +'deceiving themselves'; and in the perverse ingenuity with which that +state of mind is constantly marked, they manage to distil for +themselves a bitter vinegar of self-accusation out of grand words in +the Bible, that were meant to afford them but the wine of gladness +and of consolation. + +Now this great text which I have ventured to take--not with the idea +that I can exalt it or say anything worthy of it, but simply in the +hope of clearing away some misapprehensions--is one that has often +and often tortured the mind of Christians. They say of themselves, 'I +know nothing of any such evidence: I am not conscious of any Spirit +bearing witness with my spirit.' Instead of looking to other sources +to answer the question whether they are Christians or not--and then, +having answered it, thinking thus, 'That text asserts that _all_ +Christians have this witness, therefore certainly I have it in some +shape or other,' they say to themselves, 'I do not feel anything that +corresponds with my idea of what such a grand, supernatural voice as +the witness of God's Spirit in my spirit must needs be; and therefore +I doubt whether I am a Christian at all.' I should be thankful if the +attempt I make now to set before you what seems to me to be the true +teaching of the passage, should be, with God's help, the means of +lifting some little part of the burden from some hearts that are +right, and that only long to know that they are, in order to be at +rest. + +'The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the +children of God.' The general course of thought which I wish to leave +with you may be summed up thus: Our cry 'Father' is the witness that +we are sons. That cry is not simply ours, but it is the voice of +God's Spirit. The divine Witness in our spirits is subject to the +ordinary influences which affect our spirits. + +Let us take these three thoughts, and dwell on them for a little +while. + +I. Our cry 'Father' is the witness that we are sons. + +Mark the terms of the passage: 'The Spirit itself beareth witness +_with_ our spirit--.' It is not so much a revelation made to my +spirit, considered as the recipient of the testimony, as a revelation +made in or with my spirit considered as co-operating in the +testimony. It is not that my spirit says one thing, bears witness +that I am a child of God; and that the Spirit of God comes in by a +distinguishable process, with a separate evidence, to say Amen to my +persuasion; but it is that there is one testimony which has a +conjoint origin--the origin from the Spirit of God as true source, +and the origin from my own soul as recipient and co-operant in that +testimony. From the teaching of this passage, or from any of the +language which Scripture uses with regard to the inner witness, it is +not to be inferred that there will rise up in a Christian's heart, +from some origin consciously beyond the sphere of his own nature, a +voice with which he has nothing to do; which at once, by its own +character, by something peculiar and distinguishable about it, by +something strange in its nature, or out of the ordinary course of +human thinking, shall certify itself to be not his voice at all, but +_God's_ voice. That is not the direction in which you are to +look for the witness of God's Spirit. It is evidence borne, indeed, +by the Spirit of God; but it is evidence borne not only to our +spirit, but through it, with it. The testimony is one, the testimony +of a man's own emotion, and own conviction, and own desire, the cry, +Abba, Father! So far, then, as the form of the evidence goes, you are +not to look for it in anything ecstatic, arbitrary, parted off +from your own experience by a broad line of demarcation; but you are +to look into the experience which at first sight you would claim most +exclusively for your own, and to try and find out whether +_there_ there be not working with your soul, working through it, +working beneath it, distinct from it but not distinguishable from it +by anything but its consequences and its fruitfulness--a deeper voice +than yours--a 'still small voice,'--no whirlwind, nor fire, nor +earthquake--but the voice of God speaking in secret, taking the voice +and tones of your own heart and your own consciousness, and saying to +you, 'Thou art my child, inasmuch as, operated by My grace, and Mine +inspiration alone, there rises, tremblingly but truly, in thine own +soul the cry, Abba, Father.' + +So much, then, for the form of this evidence--my own conviction. Then +with regard to the substance of it: conviction of what? The text +itself does not tell us what is the evidence which the Spirit bears, +and by reason of which we have a right to conclude that we are the +children of God. The previous verse tells us. I have partially +anticipated what I have to say on that point, but it will bear a +little further expansion. 'Ye have not received the spirit of bondage +again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby +we cry Abba, Father.' 'The Spirit itself,' by this means of our cry, +Abba, Father, 'beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the +children of God.' The substance, then, of the conviction which is +lodged in the human spirit by the testimony of the Spirit of God is +not primarily directed to our relation or feelings to God, but to a +far grander thing than that--to God's feelings and relation to us. +Now I want you to think for one moment, before I pass on, how +entirely different the whole aspect of this witness of the Spirit of +which Christian men speak so much, and sometimes with so little +understanding, becomes according as you regard it mistakenly as being +the direct testimony to you that you are a child of God, or rightly +as being the direct testimony to you that God is your Father. The two +things seem to be the same, but they are not. In the one case, the +false case, the mistaken interpretation, we are left to this, that a +man has no deeper certainty of his condition, no better foundation +for his hope, than what is to be drawn from the presence or absence +of certain emotions within his own heart. In the other case, we are +admitted into this 'wide place,' that all which is our own is second +and not first, and that the true basis of all our confidence lies not +in the thought of what we are and feel to God, but in the thought of +what God is and feels to us. And instead, therefore, of being left to +labour for ourselves, painfully to search amongst the dust and +rubbish of our own hearts, we are taught to sweep away all that +crumbled, rotten surface, and to go down to the living rock that lies +beneath it; we are taught to say, in the words of the book of Isaiah, +'Doubtless Thou art our Father--we are all an unclean thing; our +iniquities, like the wind, have carried us away'; there is nothing +stable in us; our own resolutions, they are swept away like the chaff +of the summer threshing-floor, by the first gust of temptation; but +what of that?--'in those is continuance, and we shall be saved!' Ah, +brethren! expand this thought of the conviction that God is my +Father, as being the basis of all my confidence that I am His child, +into its widest and grandest form, and it leads us up to the blessed +old conviction, I am nothing, my holiness is nothing, my resolutions +are nothing, my faith is nothing, my energies are nothing; I stand +stripped, and barren, and naked of everything, and I fling myself out +of myself into the merciful arms of my Father in heaven! There is all +the difference in the world between searching for evidence of my +sonship, and seeking to get the conviction of God's Fatherhood. The +one is an endless, profitless, self-tormenting task; the other is the +light and liberty, the glorious liberty, of the children of God. + +And so the _substance_ of the Spirit's evidence is the direct +conviction based on the revelation of God's infinite love and +fatherhood in Christ the Son, that God is my Father; from which +direct conviction I come to the conclusion, the inference, the second +thought, Then I may trust that I am His son. But why? Because of +anything in me? No: because of Him. The very emblem of fatherhood and +sonship might teach us that _that_ depends upon the Father's +will and the Father's heart. The Spirit's testimony has for form my +own conviction: and for substance my humble cry, 'Oh Thou, my Father +in heaven!' Brethren, is not that a far truer and nobler kind of +thing to preach than saying, Look into your own heart for strange, +extraordinary, distinguishable signs which shall mark you out as +God's child--and which are proved to be His Spirit's, because they +are separated from the ordinary human consciousness? Is it not far +more blessed for us, and more honouring to Him who works the sign, +when we say, that it is to be found in no out-of-rule, miraculous +evidence, but in the natural (which is in reality supernatural) +working of His Spirit in the heart which is its recipient, breeding +there the conviction that God is my Father? And oh, if I am speaking +to any to whom that text, with all its light and glory, has seemed to +lift them up into an atmosphere too rare and a height too lofty for +their heavy wings and unused feet, if I am speaking to any Christian +man to whom this word has been like the cherubim and flaming sword, +bright and beautiful, but threatening and repellent when it speaks of +a Spirit that bears witness with our spirit--I ask you simply to take +the passage for yourself, and carefully and patiently to examine it, +and see if it be not true what I have been saying, that your +trembling conviction--sister and akin as it is to your deepest +distrust and sharpest sense of sin and unworthiness--that your +trembling conviction of a love mightier than your own, everlasting +and all-faithful, is indeed the selectest sign that God can give you +that you _are_ His child. Oh, brethren and sisters! be +confident; for it is not false confidence: be confident if up from +the depths of that dark well of your own sinful heart there rises +sometimes, through all the bitter waters, unpolluted and separate, a +sweet conviction, forcing itself upward, that God hath love in His +heart, and that God is _my_ Father. Be confident; 'the Spirit +itself beareth witness with your spirit.' + +II. And now, secondly, That cry is not simply ours, but it is the +voice of God's Spirit. + +Our own convictions are ours because they are God's. Our own souls +possess these emotions of love and tender desire going out to +God--our own spirits possess them; but our own spirits did not +originate them. They are ours by property; they are His by source. +The spirit of a Christian man has no good thought in it, no true +thought, no perception of the grace of God's Gospel, no holy desire, +no pure resolution, which is not stamped with the sign of a higher +origin, and is not the witness of God's Spirit in his spirit. The +passage before us tells us that the sense of Fatherhood which is in +the Christian's heart, and becomes his cry, comes from God's Spirit. +This passage, and that in the Epistle to the Galatians which is +almost parallel, put this truth very forcibly, when taken in +connection. 'Ye have received,' says the text before us, 'the Spirit +of adoption, whereby _we_ cry, Abba, Father.' The variation in the +Epistle to the Galatians is this: 'Because ye are sons, God hath sent +forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, _crying_ (the Spirit +crying), Abba, Father.' So in the one text, the cry is regarded as +the voice of the believing heart; and in the other the same cry is +regarded as the voice of God's Spirit. And these two things are both +true; the one would want its foundation if it were not for the other; +the cry of the Spirit is nothing for me unless it be appropriated by +me. I do not need to plunge here into metaphysical speculation of any +sort, but simply to dwell upon the plain practical teaching of the +Bible--a teaching verified, I believe, by every Christian's +experience, if he will search into it--that everything in him which +makes the Christian life, is not his, but is God's by origin, and his +only by gift and inspiration. And the whole doctrine of my text is +built on this one thought--without the Spirit of God in your heart, +you never can recognise God as your Father. That in us which runs, +with love, and childlike faith, and reverence, to the place 'where +His honour dwelleth,' that in us which says 'Father,' is kindred with +God, and is not the simple, unhelped, unsanctified human nature. +There is no ascent of human desires above their source. And wherever +in a heart there springs up heavenward a thought, a wish, a prayer, a +trembling confidence, it is because that came down first from heaven, +and rises to seek its level again. All that is divine in man comes +from God. All that tends towards God in man is God's voice in the +human heart; and were it not for the possession and operation, the +sanctifying and quickening, of a living divine Spirit granted to us, +our souls would for ever cleave to the dust and dwell upon earth, nor +ever rise to God and live in the light of His presence. Every +Christian, then, may be sure of this, that howsoever feeble may be +the thought and conviction in his heart of God's Fatherhood, _he_ did +not work it, he received it only, cherished it, thought of it, +watched over it, was careful not to quench it; but in origin it was +God's, and it is now and ever the voice of the Divine Spirit in the +child's heart. + +But, my friends, if this principle be true, it does not apply only to +this one single attitude of the believing soul when it cries, Abba, +Father; it must be widened out to comprehend the whole of a +Christian's life, outward and inward, which is not sinful and +darkened with actual transgression. To all the rest of his being, to +everything in heart and life which is right and pure, the same truth +applies. 'The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit' in every +perception of God's word which is granted, in every revelation of His +counsel which dawns upon our darkness, in every aspiration after Him +which lifts us above the smoke and dust of this dim spot, in every +holy resolution, in every thrill and throb of love and desire. Each +of these is mine--inasmuch as in my heart it is experienced and +transacted; it is mine, inasmuch as I am not a mere dead piece of +matter, the passive recipient of a magical and supernatural grace; +but it is God's; and therefore, and therefore only, has it come to be +mine! + +And if it be objected, that this opens a wide door to all manner of +delusion, and that there is no more dangerous thing than for a man to +confound his own thoughts with the operations of God's Spirit, let me +just give you (following the context before us) the one guarantee and +test which the Apostle lays down. He says, 'There is a witness from +God in your spirits.' You may say, That witness, if it come in the +form of these convictions in my own heart, I may mistake and falsely +read. Well, then, here is an outward guarantee. 'As many as are led +by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God'; and so, on the +regions both of heart and of life the consecrating thought,--God's +work, and God's Spirit's work--is stamped. The heart with its love, +the head with its understanding, the conscience with its quick +response to the law of duty, the will with its resolutions,--these +are all, as sanctified by Him, the witness of His Spirit; and the +life with its strenuous obedience, with its struggles against sin and +temptation, with its patient persistence in the quiet path of +ordinary duty, as well as with the times when it rises into heroic +stature of resignation or allegiance, the martyrdom of death and the +martyrdom of life, this too is all (in so far as it is pure and +right) the work of that same Spirit. The test of the inward +conviction is the outward life; and they that have the witness of the +Spirit within them have the light of their life lit by the Spirit of +God, whereby they may read the handwriting on the heart, and be sure +that it is God's and not their own. + +III. And now, lastly, this divine Witness in our spirits is subject +to the ordinary influences which affect our spirits. + +The notion often prevails that if there be in the heart this divine +witness of God's Spirit, it must needs be perfect, clearly indicating +its origin by an exemption from all that besets ordinary human +feelings, that it must be a strong, uniform, never flickering, never +darkening, and perpetual light, a kind of vestal fire burning always +on the altar of the heart! The passage before us, and all others that +speak about the matter, give us the directly opposite notion. The +Divine Spirit, when it enters into the narrow room of the human +spirit, condescends to submit itself, not wholly, but to such an +extent as practically for our present purpose _is_ wholly to submit +itself to the ordinary laws and conditions and contingencies which +befall and regulate our own human nature. Christ came into the world +divine: He was 'found in fashion as a man,' in form a servant; the +humanity that He wore limited (if you like), regulated, modified, the +manifestation of the divinity that dwelt in it. And not otherwise is +the operation of God's Holy Spirit when it comes to dwell in a human +heart. There too, working through man, _it_ 'is found in fashion as a +man'; and though the origin of the conviction be of God, and though +the voice in my heart be not only my voice, but God's voice there, it +will obey those same laws which make human thoughts and emotions +vary, and fluctuate, flicker and flame up again, burn bright and burn +low, according to a thousand circumstances. The witness of the +Spirit, if it were yonder in heaven, would shine like a perpetual +star; the witness of the Spirit, here in the heart on earth, burns +like a flickering flame, never to be extinguished, but still not +always bright, wanting to be trimmed, and needing to be guarded from +rude blasts. Else, brother, what does an Apostle mean when he says to +you and me, 'Quench not the Spirit'? what does he mean when he says +to us, 'Grieve not the Spirit'? What does the whole teaching which +enjoins on us, 'Let your loins be girded about, and your lights +burning,' and 'What I say to you, I say to all, Watch!' mean, unless +it means this, that God-given as (God be thanked!) that conviction of +Fatherhood is, it is not given in such a way as that, irrespective of +our carefulness, irrespective of our watching, it shall burn on--the +same and unchangeable? The Spirit's witness comes from God, therefore +it is veracious, divine, omnipotent; but the Spirit's witness from +God is in man, therefore it may be wrongly read, it may be checked, +it may for a time be kept down, and prevented from showing itself to +be what it is. + +And the practical conclusion that comes from all this, is just the +simple advice to you all: Do not wonder, in the first place, if that +evidence of which we speak, vary and change in its clearness and +force in your own hearts. 'The flesh lusteth against the spirit, and +the spirit against the flesh.' Do not think that it cannot be +genuine, because it is changeful. There is a sun in the heavens, but +there are heavenly lights too that wax and wane; they _are_ lights, +they _are_ in the heavens though they change. You have no reason, +Christian man, to be discouraged, cast down, still less despondent, +because you find that the witness of the Spirit changes and varies in +your heart. Do not despond because it does; watch it, and guard it, +lest it do; live in the contemplation of the Person and the fact that +calls it forth, that it may not. You will never 'brighten your +evidences' by polishing at them. To polish the mirror ever so +assiduously does not secure the image of the sun on its surface. The +only way to do that is to carry the poor bit of glass out into the +sunshine. It will shine then, never fear. It is weary work to labour +at self-improvement with the hope of drawing from our own characters +evidences that we are the sons of God. To have the heart filled with +the light of Christ's love to us is the only way to have the whole +being full of light. If you would have clear and irrefragable, for a +perpetual joy, a glory and a defence, the unwavering confidence, 'I +am Thy child,' go to God's throne, and lie down at the foot of it, +and let the first thought be, 'My Father in heaven,' and _that_ +will brighten, that will stablish, that will make omnipotent in your +life the witness of the Spirit that you are the child of God. + + + + +SONS AND HEIRS + + 'If children, then heirs; heirs of God, and + joint-heirs with Christ.'--ROMANS viii. 17. + + +God Himself is His greatest gift. The loftiest blessing which we can +receive is that we should be heirs, possessors of God. There is a +sublime and wonderful mutual possession of which Scripture speaks +much wherein the Lord is the inheritance of Israel, and Israel is the +inheritance of the Lord. 'The Lord hath taken you to be to Him a +people of inheritance,' says Moses; 'Ye are a people for a +possession,' says Peter. And, on the other hand, 'The Lord is the +portion of my inheritance,' says David; 'Ye are heirs of God,' echoes +Paul. On earth and in heaven the heritage of the children of the Lord +is God Himself, inasmuch as He is with them for their delight, in +them to make them 'partakers of the divine nature,' and for them in +all His attributes and actions. + +This being clearly understood at the outset, we shall be prepared to +follow the Apostle's course of thought while he points out the +conditions upon which the possession of that inheritance depends. It +is children of God who are heirs of God. It is by union with Christ +Jesus, the Son, to whom the inheritance belongs, that they who +believe on His name receive power to become the sons of God, and with +that power the possession of the inheritance. Thus, then, in this +condensed utterance of the text there appear a series of thoughts +which may perhaps be more fully unfolded in some such manner as the +following, that there is no inheritance without sonship, that there +is no sonship without a spiritual birth, that there is no spiritual +birth without Christ, and that there is no Christ for us without +faith. + +I. First, then, the text tells us, no inheritance without sonship. + +In general terms, spiritual blessings can only be given to those who +are in a certain spiritual condition. Always and necessarily the +capacity or organ of reception precedes and determines the bestowment +of blessings. The light falls everywhere, but only the eye drinks it +in. The lower orders of creatures are shut out from all participation +in the gifts which belong to the higher forms of life, simply because +they are so made and organised as that these cannot find entrance +into their nature. They are, as it were, walled up all round; and the +only door they have to communicate with the outer world is the door +of sense. Man has higher gifts simply because he has higher +capacities. All creatures are plunged in the same boundless ocean of +divine beneficence and bestowment, and into each there flows just +that, and no more, which each, by the make and constitution that God +has given it, is capable of receiving. In the man there are more +windows and doors opened out than in the animal He is capable of +receiving intellectual impulses, spiritual emotions; he can think, +and feel, and desire, and will, and resolve: and so he stands on a +higher level than the beast below him. + +Not otherwise is it in regard to God's kingdom, 'which is +righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.' The gift and +blessing of salvation is primarily a spiritual gift, and only +involves outward consequences secondarily and subordinately. It +mainly consists in the heart being at peace with God, in the whole +soul being filled with divine affections, in the weight and bondage +of transgression being taken away, and substituted by the impulse and +the life of the new love. Therefore, neither God can give, nor man +can receive, that gift upon any other terms, than just this, that the +heart and nature be fitted and adapted for it. Spiritual blessings +require a spiritual capacity for the reception of them; or, as my +text says, you cannot have the inheritance unless you are sons. If +salvation consisted simply in a change of place; if it were merely +that by some expedient or arrangement, an outward penalty, which was +to fall or not to fall at the will of an arbitrary judge, were +prevented from coming down, why then, it would be open to Him who +held the power of letting the sword fall, to decide on what terms He +might choose to suspend its infliction. But inasmuch as God's +deliverance is not a deliverance from a mere arbitrary and outward +punishment: inasmuch as God's salvation, though it be deliverance +from the penalty as well as from the guilt of sin, is by no means +chiefly a deliverance from outward consequences, but mainly a +removal of the nature and disposition that makes these outward +consequences certain,--therefore a man cannot be saved, God's love +cannot save him, God's justice will not save him, God's power stands +back from saving him, upon any other condition than this that his +soul shall be adapted and prepared for the reception and enjoyment of +the blessing of a spiritual salvation. + +But the inheritance which my text speaks about is also that which a +Christian hopes to receive and enter upon in heaven. The same +principle precisely applies there. There is no inheritance of heaven +without sonship; because all the blessings of that future life are of +a spiritual character. The joy and the rapture and the glory of that +higher and better life have, of course, connected with them certain +changes of bodily form, certain changes of local dwelling, certain +changes which could perhaps be granted equally to a man, of whatever +sort he was. But, friends, it is not the golden harps, not the +pavement of 'glass mingled with fire,' not the cessation from work, +not the still composure, and changeless indwelling, not the society +even, that makes the heaven of heaven. All these are but the +embodiments and rendering visible of the inward facts, a soul at +peace with God in the depths of its being, an eye which gazes upon +the Father, and a heart which wraps itself in His arms. Heaven is no +heaven except in so far as it is the possession of God. That saying +of the Psalmist is not an exaggeration, nor even a forgetting of the +other elements of future blessedness, but it is a simple statement of +the literal fact of the case, 'I have none in heaven but Thee!' God +is the heritage of His people. To dwell in His love, and to be filled +with His light, and to walk for ever in the glory of His +sunlit face, to do His will, and to bear His character stamped upon +our foreheads--_that_ is the glory and the perfectness to which +we are aspiring. Do not then rest in the symbols that show us, darkly +and far off, what that future glory is. Do not forget that the +picture is a shadow. Get beneath all these figurative expressions, +and feel that whilst it may be true that for us in our present +earthly state, there can be no higher, no purer, no more spiritual +nor any truer representations of the blessedness which is to come, +than those which couch it in the forms of earthly experience, and +appeal to sense as the minister of delight--yet that all these things +are representations, and not adequate presentations. The inheritance +of the servants of the Lord is the Lord Himself, and they dwell in +Him, and _there_ is their joy. + +Well then, if that be even partially true--admitting all that you may +say about circumstances which go to make some portion of the +blessedness of that future life--if it be true that God is the true +blessing given by His Gospel upon earth, that He Himself is the +greatest gift that can be bestowed, and that He is the true Heaven of +heaven--what a flood of light does it cast upon that statement of my +text, 'If children, then heirs'; no inheritance without sonship! For +who can possess God but they who love Him? who can love, but they who +know His love? who can have Him working in their hearts a blessed and +sanctifying change, except the souls that lie thankfully quiet +beneath the forming touch of His invisible hand, and like flowers +drink in the light of His face in their still joy? How can God dwell +in any heart except a heart which has in it a love of purity? Where +can He make His temple except in the 'upright heart and pure'? How +can there be fellowship betwixt Him and any one except the man who is +a son because he hath received of the divine nature, and in whom that +divine nature is growing up into a divine likeness? 'What fellowship +hath Christ with Belial?' is not only applicable as a guide for our +practical life, but points to the principle on which God's +inheritance belongs to God's sons alone. 'Blessed are the pure in +heart, for they shall see God'; and those only who love, and are +children, to them alone does the Father come and does the Father +belong. + +So much, then, for the first principle: No inheritance without +sonship. + +II. Secondly, the text leads us to the principle that there is no +sonship without a spiritual birth. + +The Apostle John in that most wonderful preface to his Gospel, where +all deepest truths concerning the Eternal Being in itself and in the +solemn march of His progressive revelations to the world are set +forth in language simple like the words of a child and inexhaustible +like the voice of a god, draws a broad distinction between the +relation to the manifestations of God which every human soul by +virtue of his humanity sustains, and that into which some, by virtue +of their faith, enter. Every man is lighted by the true light because +he is a man. They who believe in His name receive from Him the +prerogative to become the sons of God. Whatever else may be taught in +John's words, surely they do teach us this, that the sonship of which +he speaks does not belong to man as man, is not a relation into which +we are born by natural birth, that we _become_ sons after we +_are_ men, that those who become sons do not include all those +who are lighted by the Light, but consist of so many of that greater +number as receive Him, and that such become sons by a divine act, the +communication of a spiritual life, whereby they are born of God. + +The same Apostle, in his Epistles, where the widest love is conjoined +with the most firmly drawn lines of moral demarcation between the +great opposites--life, light, love--death, darkness, hate--contrasts +in the most unmistakable antithesis the sons of God who are known for +such because they do righteousness, and the world which knew not +Christ, nor knows those who, dimly beholding, partially resemble Him. +Nay, he goes further, and says in strange contradiction to the +popular estimate of his character, but in true imitation of that +Incarnate love which hated iniquity, 'In this the children of God are +manifested and the children of the devil'--echoing thus the words of +Him whose pitying tenderness had sometimes to clothe itself in +sharpest words, even as His hand of powerful love had once to grasp +the scourge of small cords. 'If God were your Father, ye would love +Me: ye are of your father, the devil.' + +These are but specimens of a whole cycle of Scripture statements +which in every form of necessary implication, and of direct +statement, set forth the principle that he who is born again of the +Spirit, and he only, is a son of God. + +Nothing in all this contradicts the belief that all men are the +children of God, inasmuch as they are shaped by His divine hand and +He has breathed into their nostrils the breath of life. They who hold +that sonship is obtained on the condition which these passages seem +to assert, do also rejoice to believe and to preach that the Father's +love broods over every human heart as the dovelike Spirit over the +primeval chaos. They rejoice to proclaim that Christ has come that +all, that each, may receive the adoption of sons. They do not feel +that their message to, nor their hope for, the world is less blessed, +less wide, because while they call on all to come and take the things +that are freely given to them of God, they believe that those only +who do come and take possess the blessing. Every man may become a son +and heir of God by faith in Jesus Christ. + +But notwithstanding all the mercies that belong to us all, +notwithstanding the divine beneficence, which, like the air and the +light, pervades all nature, and underlies all our lives, +notwithstanding the universal adaptation and intention of Christ's +work, notwithstanding the wooing of His tender voice and the +unceasing beckoning of His love, it still remains true that there are +men in the world, created by God, loved and cared for by Him, for +whom Christ died, who might be, but are not, sons of God. + +Fatherhood! what does that word itself teach us? It speaks of the +communication of a life, and the reciprocity of love. It rests upon a +divine act, and it involves a human emotion. It involves that the +father and the child shall have kindred life--the father bestowing +and the child possessing a life which is derived; and because +derived, kindred; and because kindred, unfolding itself in likeness +to the father that gave it. And it requires that between the father's +heart and the child's heart there shall pass, in blessed interchange +and quick correspondence, answering love, flashing backwards and +forwards, like the lightning that touches the earth and rises from it +again. A simple appeal to your own consciousness will decide if that +be the condition of all men. Are you, my brother, conscious of +anything within you higher than the common life that belongs to you +because you are an immortal soul? Can you say, 'From God's hand I have +received the granting and implantation of a new and better life?' Is +your claim verified by this, that you are kindred with God in holy +affections, in like purposes, loving what He loves, hating what He +hates, doing what He wills, accepting what He sends, longing for +Himself, and blessed in His presence? Is your sonship proved by the +depth and sincerity, the simplicity and power, of your throbbing +heart of love to your Father in heaven? Or are all these emotions +empty words to you, things that are spoken in pulpits, but to which +you have nothing in your life corresponding? Oh then, my friend, what +am I to say to you? What but this? no sonship except by that +spiritual birth; and if not such sonship, then the spirit of bondage. +If not such sonship, why then, by all the tendencies of your nature, +and by all the affinities of your moral being, if you are not holding +of heaven, you are holding of hell; if you are not drawing your life, +your character, your emotions, your affections, from the sacred well +that lies up yonder, you are drawing them from the black one that +lies down there. There are heaven, hell, and the earth that lies +between, ever influenced either from above or from below. You are +sons because born again, or slaves and 'enemies by wicked works.' It +is a grim alternative, but it is a fact. + +III. Thirdly, no spiritual birth without Christ. + +We have seen that the sonship which gives power of possessing the +inheritance and which comes by spiritual birth, rests upon the giving +of life, spiritual life, from God; and unfolds itself in certain holy +characters, and affections, and desires, the throbbing of the whole +soul in full accord and harmony with the divine character and will. +Well then, it looks very clear that a man cannot make that new life +for himself, cannot do it because of the habit of sin, and cannot do +it because of the guilt and punishment of sin. If for sonship there +must be a birth again, why, surely, the very symbol might convince +you that such a process does not lie within our own power. There must +come down a divine leaven into the mass of human nature, before this +new being can be evolved in any one. There must be a gift of God. A +divine energy must be the source and fountain of all holy and of all +Godlike life. Christ comes, comes to make you and me live again as we +never lived before; live possessors of God's love; live tenanted and +ruled by a divine Spirit; live with affections in our hearts which +_we_ never could kindle there; live with purposes in our souls which +_we_ never could put there. + +And I want to urge this thought, that the centre point of the Gospel +is this regeneration; because if we understand, as we are too much +disposed to do, that the Gospel simply comes to make men live better, +to work out a moral reformation,--why, there is no need for a Gospel +at all. If the change were a simple change of habit and action on the +part of men, we could do without a Christ. If the change simply +involved a bracing ourselves up to behave better for the future, we +could manage somehow or other about as well as or better than we have +managed in the past. But if redemption be the giving of life from +God; and if redemption be the change of position in reference to +God's love and God's law as well, neither of these two changes can a +man effect for himself. You cannot gather up the spilt water; you +cannot any more gather up and re-issue the past life. The sin +remains, the guilt remains. The inevitable law of God will go +on its crashing way in spite of all penitence, in spite of all +reformation, in spite of all desires after newness of life. There is +but one Being who can make a change in our position in regard to God, +and there is but one Being who can make the change by which man shall +become a 'new creature.' The Creative Spirit that shaped the earth +must shape its new being in my soul; and the Father against whose law +I have offended, whose love I have slighted, from whom I have turned +away, must effect the alteration that I can never effect--the +alteration in my position to His judgments and justice, and to the +whole sweep of His government. No new birth without Christ; no escape +from the old standing-place, of being 'enemies to God by wicked +works,' by anything that we can do: no hope of the inheritance unless +the Lord and the Man, the 'second Adam from heaven,' have come! He +_has_ come, and He has 'dwelt with us,' and He has worn this +life of ours, and He has walked in the midst of this world, and He +knows all about our human condition, and He has effected an actual +change in the possible aspect of the divine justice and government to +us; and He has carried in the golden urn of His humanity a new spirit +and a new life which He has set down in the midst of the race; and +the urn was broken on the cross of Calvary, and the water flowed out, +and whithersoever that water comes there is life, and whithersoever +it comes not there is death! + +IV. Last of all, no Christ without faith. + +It is not enough, brethren, that we should go through all these +previous steps, if we then go utterly astray at the end, by +forgetting that there is only one way by which we become partakers of +any of the benefits and blessings that Christ has wrought out. It is +much to say that for inheritance there must be sonship. It is much to +say that for sonship there must be a divine regeneration. It is much +to say that the power of this regeneration is all gathered together +in Christ Jesus. But there are plenty of people that would agree to +all that, who go off at that point, and content themselves with +_this_ kind of thinking--that in some vague mysterious way, they +know not how, in a sort of half-magical manner, the benefit of +Christ's death and work comes to all in Christian lands, whether +there be an act of faith or not! Now I am not going to talk theology +at present, at this stage of my sermon; but what I want to leave upon +all your hearts is this profound conviction,--Unless we are wedded to +Jesus Christ by the simple act of trust in His mercy and His power, +Christ is nothing to us. Do not let us, my friends, blink that +deciding test of the whole matter. We may talk about Christ for ever; +we may set forth aspects of His work, great and glorious. He may be +to us much that is very precious; but the one question, the question +of questions, on which everything else depends, is, Am I trusting to +Him as my divine Redeemer? am I resting in Him as the Son of God? +Some of us here now have a sort of nominal connection with Christ, +who have a kind of imaginative connection with Him; traditional, +ceremonial, by habit of thought, by attendance on public worship, and +by I know not what other means. Ceremonies are nothing, notions +are nothing, beliefs are nothing, formal participation in worship is +nothing. Christ is everything to him that trusts Him. Christ is +nothing but a judge and a condemnation to him who trusts Him not. And +here is the turning-point, Am I resting upon that Lord for my +salvation? If so, you can begin upon that step, the low one on which +you can put your foot, the humble act of faith, and with the foot +there, can climb up. If faith, then new birth; if new birth, then +sonship; if sonship, then an heir of God, and a joint-heir with +Christ.' But if you have not got your foot upon the lowest round of +the ladder, you will never come within sight of the blessed face of +Him who stands at the top of it, and who looks down to you at this +moment, saying to you, 'My child, _wilt_ thou not cry unto Me "Abba, +Father?"' + + + + +SUFFERING WITH CHRIST, A CONDITION OF GLORY WITH CHRIST + + '...Joint heirs with Christ: if so be that we suffer with + Him, that we may be also glorified together.'--ROMANS viii. 17. + + +In the former part of this verse the Apostle tells us that in order +to be heirs of God, we must become sons through and joint-heirs with +Christ. He seems at first sight to add in these words of our text +another condition to those already specified, namely, that of +suffering with Christ. + +Now, of course, whatever may be the operation of suffering in fitting +for the possession of the Christian inheritance, either here or in +another world, the sonship and the sorrows do not stand on the same +level in regard to that possession. The one is the indispensable +condition of all; the other is but the means for the operation of the +condition. The one--being sons, 'joint-heirs with Christ,'--is the +root of the whole matter; the other--the 'suffering with Him,'--is +but the various process by which from the root there come 'the blade, +and the ear, and the full corn in the ear.' Given the sonship--if it +is to be worked out into power and beauty, there must be suffering +with Christ. But unless there be sonship, there is no possibility of +inheriting God; discipline and suffering will be of no use at all. + +The chief lesson which I wish to gather from this text now is that +all God's sons must suffer with Christ; and in addition to this +principle, we may complete our considerations by adding briefly, that +the inheritance must be won by suffering, and that if we suffer with +Him, we certainly shall receive the inheritance. + +I. First, then, sonship with Christ necessarily involves suffering +with Him. + +I think that we entirely misapprehend the force of this passage +before us, if we suppose it to refer principally or merely to the +outward calamities, what you call trials and afflictions, which +befall people, and see in it only the teaching, that the sorrows of +daily life may have in them a sign of our being children of God, and +some power to prepare us for the glory that is to come. There is a +great deal more in the thought than that, brethren. This is not +merely a text for people who are in affliction, but for all of us. It +does not merely contain a law for a certain part of life, but it +contains a law for the whole of life. It is not merely a promise that +in all our afflictions Christ will be afflicted, but it is a solemn +injunction that we seek to know 'the fellowship of His sufferings, +and be made conformable to the likeness of His death,' if we expect +to be 'found in the likeness of His Resurrection,' and to have any +share in the community of His glory. In other words, the foundation +of it is not that Christ shares in our sufferings; but that we, as +Christians, in a deep and real sense do necessarily share and +participate in Christ's. We 'suffer with Him'; _not_ He suffers +with us. + +Now, do not let us misunderstand each other, or the Apostle's +teaching. Do not suppose that I am forgetting, or wishing you to +account as of small importance, the awful sense in which Christ's +suffering stands as a thing by itself and unapproachable, a solitary +pillar rising up, above the waste of time, to which all men +everywhere are to turn with the one thought, 'I can do nothing like +that; I need to do nothing like it; it has been done once, and once +for all; and what I have to do is, simply to lie down before Him, and +let the power and the blessings of that death and those sufferings +flow into my heart.' The Divine Redeemer makes eternal redemption. +The sufferings of Christ--the sufferings of His life, and the +sufferings of His death--both because of the nature which bore them, +and of the aspect which they wore in regard to us, are in their +source, in their intensity, in their character, and consequences, +unapproachable, incapable of repetition, and needing no repetition +whilst the world shall stand. But then, do not let us forget that the +very books and writers in the New Testament that preach most broadly +Christ's sole, all-sufficient, eternal redemption for the world by +His sufferings and death, turn round and say to us too, '"Be planted +together in the likeness of His death"; you are "crucified to the +world" by the Cross of Christ; you are to "fill up that which is +behind of the sufferings of Christ."' He Himself speaks of our +drinking of the cup that He drank of, and being baptized with the +baptism that He was baptized with, if we desire to sit yonder on His +throne, and share with Him in His glory. + +Now what do the Apostles, and what does Christ Himself, in that +passage that I have quoted, mean, by such solemn words as these? Some +people shrink from them, and say that it is trenching upon the +central doctrine of the Gospel, when we speak about drinking of the +cup which Christ drank of. They ask, Can it be? Yes, it can be, if +you will think thus:--If a Christian has the Spirit and life of +Christ in him, his career will be moulded, imperfectly but really, by +the same Spirit that dwelt in his Lord; and similar causes will +produce corresponding effects. The life of Christ which--divine, +pure, incapable of copy and repetition--in one aspect has ended for +ever for men, remains to be lived, in another view of it, by every +Christian, who in like manner has to fight with the world; who in +like manner has to resist temptation; who in like manner has to +stand, by God's help, pure and sinless, in so far as the new nature +of him is concerned, in the midst of a world that is full of evil. +For were the sufferings of the Lord only the sufferings that were +wrought upon Calvary? Were the sufferings of the Lord only the +sufferings which came from the contradiction of sinners against +Himself? Were the sufferings of the Lord only the sufferings which +were connected with His bodily afflictions and pain, precious and +priceless as they were, and operative causes of our redemption as +they were? Oh no. Conceive of that perfect, sinless, really human +life, in the midst of a system of things that is all full of +corruption and of sin; coming ever and anon against misery, and +wrong-doing, and rebellion; and ask yourselves whether part of His +sufferings did not spring from the contact of the sinless Son of man +with a sinful world, and the apparently vain attempt to influence and +leaven that sinful world with care for itself and love for the +Father. If there had been nothing more than that, yet Christ's +sufferings as the Son of God in the midst of sinful men would have +been deep and real. 'O faithless generation, how long shall I be with +you? how long shall I suffer you?' was wrung from Him by the painful +sense of want of sympathy between His aims and theirs. 'Oh that I had +wings like a dove, for then I would fly away and be at rest,' must +often be the language of those who are like Him in spirit, and in +consequent sufferings. + +And then again, another branch of the 'sufferings of Christ' is to be +found in that deep and mysterious fact on which I durst not venture +to speak beyond what the actual words of Scripture put into my +lips--the fact that Christ wrought out His perfect obedience as a +man, through temptation and by suffering. There was no sin _within_ +Him, no tendency to sin, no yielding to the evil that assailed. 'The +Prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in Me.' But yet, when +that dark Power stood by His side, and said, 'If thou be the Son of +God, cast Thyself down,' it was a real temptation and not a sham one. +There was no wish to do it, no faltering for a moment, no hesitation. +There was no rising up in that calm will of even a moment's impulse +to do the thing that was presented;--but yet it was presented, and, +when Christ triumphed, and the tempter departed for a season, there +had been a temptation and there had been a conflict. And though +obedience be a joy, and the doing of His Father's will was His +delight, as it must needs be in pure and in purified hearts; yet +obedience which is sustained in the face of temptation, and which +never fails, though its path lead to bodily pains and the +'contradiction of sinners,' may well be called suffering. We cannot +speak of our Lord's obedience as the surrender of His own will to the +Father's, with the implication that these two wills ever did or could +move except in harmony. There was no place in Christ's obedience for +that casting out of sinful self which makes our submission a +surrender joined with suffering, but He knew temptation. Flesh, and +sense, and the world, and the prince of this world, presented it to +Him; and therefore His obedience too was suffering, even though to do +the will of His Father was His meat and His drink, His sustenance and +His refreshment. + +But then, let me remind you still further, that not only does the +life of Christ, as sinless in the midst of sinful men, and the life +of Christ, as sinless whilst yet there was temptation presented to +it--assume the aspect of being a life of suffering, and become, in +that respect, the model for us; but that also the Death of Christ, +besides its aspect as an atonement and sacrifice for sin, the power +by which transgression is put away and God's love flows out upon our +souls, has another power given to it in the teaching of the New +Testament. The Death of Christ is a type of the Christian's life, +which is to be one long, protracted, and daily dying to sin, to self, +to the world. The crucifixion of the old manhood is to be the life's +work of every Christian, through the power of faith in that Cross by +which 'the world is crucified unto Me, and I unto the world.' That +thought comes over and over again in all forms of earnest +presentation in the Apostle's teaching. Do not slur it over as if it +were a mere fanciful metaphor. It carries in its type a most solemn +reality. The truth is, that, if a Christian, you have a double life. +There is Christ, with His power, with His Spirit, giving you a nature +which is pure and sinless, incapable of transgression, like His +own. The new man, that which is born of God, sinneth not, cannot sin. +But side by side with it, working through it, working in it, +leavening it, indistinguishable from it to your consciousness, by +anything but this that the one works righteousness and the other +works transgression, there is the 'old man,' 'the flesh,' 'the old +Adam,' your own godless, independent, selfish, proud being. And the +one is to slay the other! Ah, let me tell you, these +words--crucifying, casting out the old man, plucking out the right +eye, maiming self of the right hand, mortifying the deeds of the +body--they are something very much deeper and more awful than +poetical symbols and metaphors. They teach us this, that there is no +growth without sore sorrow. Conflict, not progress, is the word that +defines man's path from darkness into light. No holiness is won by +any other means than this, that wickedness should be slain day by +day, and hour by hour. In long lingering agony often, with the blood +of the heart pouring out at every quivering vein, you are to cut +right through the life and being of that sinful self; to do what the +Word does, pierce to the dividing asunder of the thoughts and intents +of the heart, and get rid by crucifying and slaying--a long process, +a painful process--of your own sinful self. And not until you can +stand up and say, 'I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me,' have +you accomplished that to which you are consecrated and vowed by your +sonship--'being conformed unto the likeness of His death,' and +'knowing the fellowship of His sufferings.' + +It is this process, the inward strife and conflict in getting rid of +evil, which the Apostle designates here with the name of 'suffering +with Christ, that we may be also glorified together.' On this high +level, and not upon the lower one of the consideration that Christ +will help us to bear outward infirmities and afflictions, do we find +the true meaning of all that Scripture teaching which says indeed, +'Yes, our sufferings are _His_'; but lays the foundation of it in +this, 'His sufferings are _ours_.' It begins by telling us that +Christ has done a work and borne a sorrow that no second can ever do. +Then it tells us that Christ's life of obedience--which, because it +_was_ a life of obedience, was a life of suffering, and brought +Him into a condition of hostility to the men around Him--is to be +repeated in us. It sets before us the Cross of Calvary, and the +sorrows and pains that were felt there;--and it says to us, Christian +men and women, if you want the power for holy living, have fellowship +in that atoning death; and if you want the pattern of holy living, +look at that Cross and feel, 'I am crucified to the world by it; and +the life that I live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of +God.' + +Such considerations as these, however, do not necessarily exclude the +other one (which we may just mention and dwell on for a moment), +namely, that where there is this spiritual participation in the +sufferings of Christ, and where His death is reproduced and +perpetuated, as it were, in our daily mortifying ourselves in the +present evil world--there Christ is with us in our afflictions. God +forbid that I should try to strike away any word of consolation that +has come, as these words of my text have come, to so many sorrowing +hearts in all generations, like music in the night and like cold +waters to a thirsty soul. We need not hold that there is no reference +here to that comforting thought, 'In all our affliction He is +afflicted.' Brethren, you and I have, each of us--one in one way, +and one in another, all in some way, all in the right way, none in +too severe a way, none in too slight a way--to tread the path of +sorrow; and is it not a blessed thing, as we go along through that +dark valley of the shadow of death down into which the sunniest paths +go sometimes, to come, amidst the twilight and the gathering clouds, +upon tokens that Jesus has been on the road before us? They tell us +that in some trackless lands, when one friend passes through the +pathless forests, he breaks a twig ever and anon as he goes, that +those who come after may see the traces of his having been there, and +may know that they are not out of the road. Oh, when we are +journeying through the murky night, and the dark woods of affliction +and sorrow, it is something to find here and there a spray broken, or +a leafy stem bent down with the tread of His foot and the brush of +His hand as He passed, and to remember that the path He trod He has +hallowed, and thus to find lingering fragrances and hidden strengths +in the remembrance of Him as 'in all points tempted like as we are,' +bearing grief _for_ us, bearing grief _with_ us, bearing +grief _like_ us. + +Oh, do not, do not, my brethren, keep these sacred thoughts of +Christ's companionship in sorrow, for the larger trials of life. If +the mote in the eye be large enough to annoy you, it is large enough +to bring out His sympathy; and if the grief be too small for Him to +compassionate and share, it is too small for you to be troubled by +it. If you are ashamed to apply that divine thought, 'Christ bears +this grief with me,' to those petty molehills that you sometimes +magnify into mountains, think to yourselves that then it is a shame +for you to be stumbling over them. But on the other hand, never fear +to be irreverent or too familiar in the thought that Christ is +willing to bear, and help you to bear, the pettiest, the minutest, +and most insignificant of the daily annoyances that may come to +ruffle you. Whether it be a poison from one serpent sting, or whether +it be poison from a million of buzzing tiny mosquitoes, if there be a +smart, go to Him, and He will help you to endure it. He will do more, +He will bear it with you, for if so be that we suffer with Him, He +suffers with us, and our oneness with Christ brings about a community +of possessions whereby it becomes true of each trusting soul in its +relations to Him, that 'all mine (joys and sorrows alike) are thine, +and all thine are mine.' II. There remain some other considerations +which may be briefly stated, in order to complete the lessons of this +text. In the second place, this community of suffering is a necessary +preparation for the community of glory. + +I name this principally for the sake of putting in a caution. The +Apostle does not mean to tell us, of course, that if there were such +a case as that of a man becoming a son of God, and having no occasion +or opportunity afterwards, by brevity of life or other causes, for +passing through the discipline of sorrow, his inheritance would be +forfeited. We must always take such passages as this--which seem to +make the discipline of the world an essential part of the preparing +of us for glory--in conjunction with the other undeniable truth which +completes them, that when a man has the love of God in his heart, +however feebly, however newly, there and then he is fit for the +inheritance. I think that Christian people make vast mistakes +sometimes in talking about 'being made meet for the inheritance of +the saints in light,' about being 'ripe for glory,' and the like. One +thing at any rate is very certain, it is not the discipline that +fits. That which fits goes before the discipline, and the discipline +only develops the fitness. 'God hath made us meet for the inheritance +of the saints in light,' says the Apostle. That is a past act. The +preparedness for heaven comes at the moment--if it be a momentary +act--when a man turns to Christ. You may take the lowest and most +abandoned form of human character, and in one moment (it is possible, +and it is often the case) the entrance into that soul of the feeble +germ of that new affection shall at once change the whole moral +habitude of that man. Though it be true, then, that heaven is only +open to those who are capable--by holy aspirations and divine +desires--of entering into it, it is equally true that such +aspirations and desires may be the work of an instant, and may be +superinduced in a moment in a heart the most debased and the most +degraded. 'This day shalt thou be with Me in Paradise,'--_fit_ for +the inheritance! + +And, therefore, let us not misunderstand such words as this text, and +fancy that the necessary discipline, which we have to go through +before we are ready for heaven, is necessary in anything like the +same sense in which it is necessary that a man should have faith in +Christ in order to be saved. The one may be dispensed with, the other +cannot. A Christian at any period of his Christian experience, if it +please God to take him, is fit for the kingdom. The life _is_ life, +whether it be the budding beauty and feebleness of childhood, or the +strength of manhood, or the maturity and calm peace of old age. But +'add to your faith,' that 'an entrance may be ministered unto you +_abundantly_.' Remember that though the root of the matter, the seed +of the kingdom, may be in you; and that though, therefore, you have a +right to feel that, at any period of your Christian experience, if it +please God to take you out of this world, you are fit for heaven--yet +in His mercy He is leaving you here, training you, disciplining you, +cleansing you, making you to be polished shafts in His quiver; and +that all the glowing furnaces of fiery trial and all the cold waters +of affliction are but the preparation through which the rough iron is +to be passed before it becomes tempered steel, a shaft in the +Master's hand. + +And so learn to look upon all trial as being at once the seal of your +sonship, and the means by which God puts it within your power to win +a higher place, a loftier throne, a nobler crown, a closer fellowship +with Him 'who hath suffered, being tempted,' and who will receive +into His own blessedness and rest them that are tempted. 'The child, +though he be an heir, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be +lord of all; but is under tutors and governors.' God puts us in the +school of sorrow under that stern tutor and governor here, and gives +us the opportunity of 'suffering with Christ,' that by the daily +crucifixion of our old nature, by the lessons and blessings of +outward calamities and change, there may grow up in us a still nobler +and purer, and perfecter divine life; and that we may so be made +capable--more capable, and capable of more--of that inheritance for +which the only necessary thing is the death of Christ, and the only +fitness is faith in His name. + +III. Finally, that inheritance is the necessary result of the +suffering that has gone before. + +The suffering results from our union with Christ. That union must +needs culminate in glory. It is not only because the joy hereafter +seems required in order to vindicate God's love to His children, who +here reap sorrow from their sonship, that the discipline of life +cannot but end in blessedness. That ground of mere compensation is a +low one on which to rest the certainty of future bliss. But the +inheritance is sure to all who here suffer with Christ, because the +one cause--union with the Lord--produces both the present result of +fellowship in His sorrows, and the future result of joy in His joy, +of possession of His possessions. The inheritance is sure because +Christ possesses it now. The inheritance is sure because earth's +sorrows not merely require to be repaid by its peace, but because +they have an evident design to fit us for it, and it would be +destructive to all faith in God's wisdom, and God's knowledge of His +own purposes, not to believe that what He has wrought us for will be +given to us. Trials have no meaning, unless they are means to an end. +The end is the inheritance, and sorrows here, as well as the Spirit's +work here, are the earnest of the inheritance. Measure the greatness +of the glory by what has preceded it. God takes all these years of +life, and all the sore trials and afflictions that belong inevitably +to an earthly career, and works them in, into the blessedness that +_shall_ come. If a fair measure of the greatness of any result of +productive power be the length of time that was taken for getting it +ready, we can dimly conceive what that joy must be for which seventy +years of strife and pain and sorrow are but a momentary preparation; +and what must be the weight of that glory which is the counterpoise +and consequence to the afflictions of this lower world. The further +the pendulum swings on the one side, the further it goes up on the +other. The deeper God plunges the comet into the darkness out yonder, +the closer does it come to the sun at its nearest distance, and the +longer does it stand basking and glowing in the full blaze of the +glory from the central orb. So in _our_ revolution, the measure of +the distance from the farthest point of our darkest earthly sorrow, +_to_ the throne, may help us to the measure of the closeness of the +bright, perfect, perpetual glory above, when we are _on_ the throne: +for if so be that we are sons, we _must_ suffer with Him; if so be +that we suffer, we _must_ be glorified together! + + + + +THE REVELATION OF SONS + + 'For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for + the manifestation of the sons of God.'--ROMANS viii. 19. + + +The Apostle has been describing believers as 'sons' and 'heirs.' He +drops from these transcendent heights to contrast their present +apparent condition with their true character and their future glory. +The sad realities of suffering darken his lofty hopes, even although +these sad realities are to his faith tokens of joint-heirship with +Jesus, and pledges that if our inheritance is here manifested by +suffering with him, that very fact is a prophecy of common glory +hereafter. He describes that future as the revealing of a glory, to +which the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be +compared; and then, in our text he varies the application of that +thought of revealing and thinks of the subjects of it as being the +'sons of God.' They will be revealed when the glory which they have +as joint-heirs with Christ is revealed in them. They walk, as it +were, compassed with mist and cloud, but the splendour which will +fall on them will scatter the envious darkness, and 'when Christ who +is our life shall appear, then shall His co-heirs also appear with +Him in glory.' + +We may consider-- + +I. The present veil over the sons of God. + +There is always a difference between appearance and reality, between +the ideal and its embodiments. For all men it is true that the full +expression of oneself is impossible. Each man's deeds fall short of +disclosing the essential self in the man. Every will is hampered by +the fleshly screen of the body. 'I would that my tongue could utter +the thoughts that arise in me,' is the yearning of every heart that +is deeply moved. Contending principles successively sway every +personality and thwart each other's expression. For these, and many +other reasons, the sum-total of every life is but a shrouded +representation of the man who lives it; and we, all of us, after all +efforts at self-revelation, remain mysteries to our fellows and to +ourselves. All this is eminently true of the sons of God. They have a +life-germ hidden in their souls, which in its very nature is destined +to fill and expand their whole being, and to permeate with its +triumphant energy every corner of their nature. But it is weak and +often overborne by its opposite. The seed sown is to grow in spite of +bad weather and a poor soil and many weeds, and though it is destined +to overcome all these, it may to-day only be able to show on the +surface a little patch of pale and struggling growth. When we think +of the cost at which the life of Christ was imparted to men, and of +the divine source from which it comes, and of the sedulous and +protracted discipline through which it is being trained, we cannot +but conclude that nothing short of its universal dominion over all +the faculties of its imperfect possessors can be the goal of its +working. Hercules in his cradle is still Hercules, and strangles +snakes. Frost and sun may struggle in midwinter, and the cold may +seem to predominate, but the sun is steadily enlarging its course in +the sky, and increasing the fervour of its beams, and midsummer day +is as sure to dawn as the shortest day was. + +The sons of God, even more truly than other men, have contending +principles fighting within them. It was the same Apostle who with +oaths denied that he 'knew the man,' and in a passion of clinging +love and penitence fell at His feet; but for the mere onlooker it +would be hard to say which was the true man and which would conquer. +The sons of God, like other men, have to express themselves in words +which are never closely enough fitted to their thoughts and feelings. +David's penitence has to be contented with groans which are not deep +enough; and John's calm raptures on his Saviour's breast can only be +spoken by shut eyes and silence. The sons of God never fully +correspond to their character, but always fall somewhat beneath their +desire, and must always be somewhat less than their intention. The +artist never wholly embodies his conception. It is only God who +'rests from His works' because the works fully embody His creative +design and fully receive the benediction of His own satisfaction with +them. + +From all such thoughts there arises a piece of plain practical +wisdom, which warns Christian men not to despond or despair if they +do not find themselves living up to their ideal. The sons of God are +'veiled' because the world's estimate of them is untrue. The old +commonplace that the world knows nothing of its greatest men is +verified in the opinions which it holds about the sons of God. It is +not for their Christianity that they get any of the world's honours +and encomiums, if such fall to their share. They are _un_known and +yet _well_-known. They live for the most part veiled in obscurity. +'The light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth it +not.' They are God's hidden ones. If they are wise, they will look +for no recognition nor eulogy from the world, and will be content to +live, as unknown by the princes of this world as was the Lord of +glory, whom they slew because their dim eyes could not see the +flashing of the glory 'through the veil, that is to say, His flesh.' +But no consciousness of imperfection in our revelation of an +indwelling Christ must ever be allowed to diminish our efforts to +live out the life that is in us, and to shine as lights in the world; +nor must the consciousness that we walk as 'veiled,' lead us to add +to the thick folds the criminal one of voluntary silence and cowardly +hiding in dumb hearts the secret of our lives. + +II. The unveiling of the sons of God. + +That unveiling is in the text represented as coming along with the +glory which shall be revealed to usward, and as being contemporaneous +with the deliverance of the creation itself from the bondage of +corruption, and its passing into the liberty of the glory of the +children of God. It coincides with the vanishing of the pain in which +the whole creation now groans and travails, and with the +adoption--that is, the redemption of our body. Then hope will be seen +and will pass into still fruition. All this points to the time when +Jesus Christ is revealed, and His servants are revealed with Him in +glory. That revelation brings with it of necessity the manifestation +of the sons of God for what they are--the making visible in the life +of what God sees them to be. + +That revelation of the sons of God is the result of the entire +dominion and transforming supremacy of the Spirit of God in them. In +the whole sweep of their consciousness there will in that day be +nothing done from other motives; there will be no sidelights flashing +in and disturbing the perfect illumination from the candle of the +Lord set on high in their being; there will be no contradictions in +the life. It will be one and simple, and therefore perfectly +intelligible. Such is the destined issue of the most imperfect +Christian life. The Christian man who has in his experience to-day +the faintest and most interrupted operation of the spirit of life in +Christ Jesus has therein a pledge of immortality, because nothing +short of an endless life of progressive and growing purity will be +adequate to receive and exemplify the power which can never terminate +until it is made like Him and perfectly seeing Him as He is. + +But that unveiling further guarantees the possession of fully +adequate means of expression. The limitations and imperfections of +our present bodily life will all drop away in putting on 'the body of +glory' which shall be ours. The new tongue will perfectly utter the +new knowledge and rapture of the new life; new hands will perfectly +realise our ideals; and on every forehead will be stamped Christ's +new name. + +That unveiling will be further realised by a divine act indicating +the characters of the sons of God by their position. Earth's +judgments will be reversed by that divine voice, and the great +promise, which through weary ages has shone as a far-off star,--'I +will set him on high because he hath known my name'--will then be +known for the sun near at hand. Many names loudly blown through the +world's trumpet will fall silent then. Many stars will be quenched, +but 'they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the +firmament.' + +That revelation will be more surprising to no one than to those who +are its subjects, when they see themselves mirrored in that glass, +and so unlike what they are here. Their first impulse will be to +wonder at the form they see, and to ask, almost with incredulity, +'Lord, is it I?' Nor will the wonder be less when they recognise many +whom they knew not. The surprises when the family of God is gathered +together at last will be great. The Israel of Captivity lifts up her +wondering eyes as she sees the multitudes flocking to her side as the +doves to their windows, and, half-ashamed of her own narrow vision, +exclaims, 'I was left alone; these, where had they been?' Let us +rejoice that in the day when the sons of God are revealed, many +hidden ones from many dark corners will sit at the Father's table. +That revelation will be made to the whole universe; we know not how, +but we know that it shall be; and, as the text tells us, that +revelation of the sons of God is the hope for which 'the earnest +expectation of the creature waits' through the weary ages. + + + + +THE REDEMPTION OF THE BODY + + 'The adoption, to wit, the redemption of our + body.'--ROMANS viii. 23. + + +In a previous verse Paul has said that all true Christians have +received 'the Spirit of adoption.' They become sons of God through +Christ the Son. They receive a new spiritual and divine life from God +through Christ, and that life is like its source. In so far as that +new life vitalises and dominates their nature, believers have +received 'the Spirit of adoption,' and by it they cry 'Abba, Father.' +But the body still remains a source of weakness, the seat of sin. It +is sluggish and inapt for high purposes; it still remains subject to +'the law of sin and death'; and so is not like the Father who +breathed into it the breath of life. It remains in bondage, and has +not yet received the adoption. This text, in harmony with the +Apostle's whole teaching, looks forward to a change in the body and +in its relations to the renewed spirit, as the crown and climax of +the work of redemption, and declares that till that change is +effected, the condition of Christian men is imperfect, and is a +waiting, and often a groaning. + +In dealing with some of the thoughts that arise from this text, we +note-- + +I. That a future bodily life is needed in order to give definiteness +and solidity to the conception of immortality. + +Before the Gospel came men's belief in a future life was vague and +powerless, mainly because it had no Gospel of the Resurrection, and +so nothing tangible to lay hold on. The Gospel has made the belief in +a future state infinitely easier and more powerful, mainly because of +the emphasis with which it has proclaimed an actual resurrection and +a future bodily life. Its great proof of immortality is drawn, not +merely from ethical considerations of the manifest futility of +earthly life which has no sequel beyond the grave, nor from the +intuitions and longings of men's souls, but from the historical fact +of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, and of His Ascension in bodily +form into heaven. It proclaims these two facts as parts of His +experience, and asserts that when He rose from the dead and ascended +up on high, He did so as 'the first-born among many brethren,' their +forerunner and their pattern. It is this which gives the Gospel its +power, and thus transforms a vague and shadowy conception of +immortality into a solid faith, for which we have already an +historical guarantee. Stupendous mysteries still veil the nature of +the resurrection process, though these are exaggerated into +inconceivabilities by false notions of what constitutes personal +identity; but if the choice lies between accepting the Christian +doctrine of a resurrection and the conception of a finite spirit +disembodied and yet active, there can be no doubt as to which of +these two is the more reasonable and thinkable. Body, soul, and +spirit make the complete triune man. + +The thought of the future life as a bodily life satisfies the +longings of the heart. Much natural shrinking from death comes from +unwillingness to part company with an old companion and friend. As +Paul puts it in 2nd Corinthians, 'Not for that we would be unclothed, +but clothed upon.' All thoughts of the future which do not give +prominence to the idea of a bodily life open up but a ghastly and +uninviting mode of existence, which cannot but repel those who are +accustomed to the fellowship of their bodies, and they feel that they +cannot think of themselves as deprived of that which was their +servant and instrument, through all the years of their earthly +consciousness. + +II. 'The body that shall be' is an emancipated body. + +The varied gifts of the Spirit bestowed upon the Christian Church +served to quicken the hope of the yet greater gifts of that +indwelling Spirit which were yet to come. Chief amongst these our +text considers the transformation of the earthly into a spiritual +body. This transformation our text regards as being the participation +by the body in the redemption by which Christ has bought us with the +great price of His blood. We have to interpret the language here in +the light of the further teaching of Paul in the great Resurrection +chapter of 1st Corinthians, which distinctly lays stress, not on the +identity of the corporeal frame which is laid in the grave with 'the +body of glory,' but upon the entire contrast between the 'natural +body,' which is fit organ for the lower nature, and is informed by +it, and the 'spiritual body,' which is fit organ for the spirit. We +have to interpret 'the resurrection of the body' by the definite +apostolic declaration, 'Thou sowest not that body that shall be... +but God giveth it a body as it hath pleased Him'; and we have to give +full weight to the contrasts which the Apostle draws between the +characteristics of that which is 'sown' and of that which is +'raised.' The one is 'sown in corruption and raised in incorruption.' +Natural decay is contrasted with immortal youth. The one is 'sown in +dishonour,' the other is 'raised in glory.' That contrast is ethical, +and refers either to the subordinate position of the body here in +relation to the spirit, or to the natural sense of shame, or to the +ideas of degradation which are attached to the indulgence of the +appetites. The one is 'sown in weakness,' the other is 'raised in +power'; the one is 'sown a natural body,' the other is 'raised a +spiritual body.' Is not Paul in this whole series of contrasts +thinking primarily of the vision which he saw on the road to Damascus +when the risen Christ appeared before him? And had not the years +which had passed since then taught him to see in the ascended Christ +the prophecy and the pattern of what His servants should become? We +have further to keep in view Paul's other representation in 2nd +Corinthians v., where he strongly puts the contrast between the +corporeal environment of earth and 'the body of glory,' which belongs +to the future life, in his two images: 'the earthly house of this +tabernacle'--a clay hut which lasts but for a time,--and 'the +building of God, the house not made with hands and eternal.' The body +is an occasion of separation from the Lord. + +These considerations may well lead us to, at least, general outlines +on which a confident and peaceful hope may fix. For example, they +lead us to the thought that that redeemed body is no more subject to +decay and death, is no more weighed upon by weakness and weariness, +has no work beyond its strength, needs no sustenance by food, and no +refreshment of sleep. 'The Lamb which is in the midst of the throne +shall feed them,' suggests strength constantly communicated by a +direct divine gift. And from all these negative characteristics there +follows that there will be in that future bodily life no epochs of +age marked by bodily changes. The two young men who were seen sitting +in the sepulchre of Jesus had lived before Adam, and would seem as +young if we saw them to-day. + +Similarly the redeemed body will be a more perfect instrument for +communication with the external universe. We know that the present +body conditions our knowledge, and that our senses do not take +cognisance of all the qualities of material things. Microscopes and +telescopes have enlarged our field of vision, and have brought the +infinitely small and the infinitely distant within our range. Our ear +hears vibrations at a certain rate per second, and no doubt if it +were more delicately organised we could hear sounds where now is +silence. Sometimes the creatures whom we call 'inferior' seem to have +senses that apprehend much of which we are not aware. Balaam's ass +saw the obstructing angel before Balaam did. Nor is there any reason +to suppose that all the powers of the mind find tools to work with in +the body. It is possible that that body which is the fit instrument +of the spirit may become its means of knowing more deeply, thinking +more wisely, understanding more swiftly, comprehending more widely, +remembering more firmly and judging more soundly. It is possible that +the contrast between then and now may be like the contrast between +telegraph and slow messenger in regard to the rapidity, between +photograph and poor daub in regard to the truthfulness, between a +full-orbed circle and a fragmentary arc in regard to the completeness +of the messages which the body brings to the indwelling self. + +But, once more, the body unredeemed has appetites and desires which +may lead to their own satisfaction, which do lead to sordid cares and +weary toil. 'The flesh lusts against the spirit and the spirit +against the flesh.' The redeemed body will have in it nothing to +tempt and nothing to clog, but will be a helper to the spirit and a +source of strength. Glorious work of God as the body is, it has its +weaknesses, its limitations, and its tendencies to evil. We must not +be tempted into brooding over unanswered questions as to 'How do the +dead rise, and with what body do they come?' But we can lift our eyes +to the mountain-top where Jesus went up to pray. 'And as He prayed +the fashion of His countenance was altered, and His raiment became +white and dazzling'; and He was capable of entering into the Shekinah +cloud and holding fellowship therein with the Father, who attested +His Sonship and bade us listen to His voice. And we can look to +Olivet and follow the ascending Jesus as He lets His benediction drop +on the upturned faces of His friends, until He again passes into the +Shekinah cloud, and leaving the world, goes to the Father. And from +both His momentary transfiguration and His permanent Ascension we can +draw the certain assurance that 'He shall fashion anew the body of +our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the body of His glory, +according to the working whereby He is able even to subdue all things +unto Himself.' + +III. The redeemed body is a consequence of Christ's indwelling +Spirit. + +It is no natural result of death or resurrection, but is the outcome +of the process begun on earth, by which, 'through faith and the +righteousness of faith,' the spirit is life. The context distinctly +enforces this view by its double use of 'adoption,' which in one +aspect has already been received, and is manifested by the fact that +'now are we the sons of God,' and in another aspect is still 'waited' +for. The Christian man in his regenerated spirit has been born again; +the Christian man still waits for the completion of that sonship in a +time when the regenerated spirit will no longer dwell in the clay +cottage of 'this tabernacle,' but will inhabit a congruous dwelling +in 'the building of God not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.' + +Scripture is too healthy and comprehensive to be contented with a +merely spiritual regeneration, and is withal too spiritual to be +satisfied with a merely material heaven. It gives full place to both +elements, and yet decisively puts all belonging to the latter second. +It lays down the laws that for a complete humanity there must be body +as well as spirit; that there must be a correspondence between the +two, and as is the spirit so must the body be, and further, that the +process must begin at the centre and work outwards, so that the +spirit must first be transformed, and then the body must be +participant of the transformation. + +All that Scripture says about 'rising in glory' is said about +believers. It is represented as a spiritual process. They who have +the Spirit of God in their spirits because they have it receive the +glorified body which is like their Saviour's. It is not enough to die +in order to 'rise glorious.' 'If the Spirit of Him that raised up +Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He that raised up Christ from the +dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that +dwelleth in you.' The resurrection is promised for all mankind, but +it may be a resurrection in which there shall be endless living and +no glory, nor any beauty and no blessedness. But the body may be +'sown in weakness,' and in weakness raised; it may be 'sown in +dishonour' and in dishonour raised; it may be sown dead, and raised a +living death. 'Many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall +awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting +contempt.' Does that mean nothing? 'They that have done evil to the +resurrection of condemnation.' Does that mean nothing? There are dark +mysteries in these and similar words of Scripture which should make +us all pause and solemnly reflect. The sole way which leads to the +resurrection of glory is the way of faith in Jesus Christ. If we +yield ourselves to Him, He will plant His Spirit in our spirits, will +guide and growingly sanctify us through life, will deliver us by the +indwelling of the Spirit of life in Him from the law of sin and +death. Nor will His transforming power cease till it has pervaded our +whole being with its fiery energy, and we stand at the last men like +Christ, redeemed in body, soul, and spirit, 'according to the mighty +working whereby He is able to subdue all things unto Himself.' + + + + +THE INTERCEDING SPIRIT + + 'The Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with + groanings which cannot be uttered.'--ROMANS viii. 26. + + +Pentecost was a transitory sign of a perpetual gift. The tongues of +fire and the rushing mighty wind, which were at first the most +conspicuous results of the gifts of the Spirit, tongues, and +prophecies, and gifts of healing, which were to the early Church +itself and to onlookers palpable demonstrations of an indwelling +power, were little more lasting than the fire and the wind. Does +anything remain? This whole great chapter is Paul's triumphant answer +to such a question. The Spirit of God dwells in every believer as the +source of his true life, is for him 'the Spirit of adoption' and +witnesses with his spirit that he is a child of God, and a joint-heir +with Christ. Not only does that Spirit co-operate with the human +spirit in this witness-bearing, but the verse, of which our text is a +part, points to another form of co-operation: for the word rendered +in the earlier part of the verse 'helpeth' in the original suggests +more distinctly that the Spirit of God in His intercession for us +works in association with us. + +First, then-- + +I. The Spirit's intercession is not carried on apart from us. + +Much modern hymnology goes wrong in this point, that it represents +the Spirit's intercession as presented in heaven rather than as +taking place within the personal being of the believer. There is a +broad distinction carefully observed throughout Scripture between the +representations of the work of Christ and that of the Spirit of +Christ. The former in its character and revelation and attainment was +wrought upon earth, and in its character of intercession and +bestowment of blessings is discharged at the right hand of God in +heaven; the whole of the Spirit's work, on the other hand, is wrought +in human spirits here. The context speaks of intercession expressed +in 'groanings which cannot be uttered,' and which, unexpressed though +they are, are fully understood 'by Him who searches the heart.' +Plainly, therefore, these groanings come from human hearts, and as +plainly are the Divine Spirit's voicing them. + +II. The Spirit's intercession in our spirits consists in our own +divinely-inspired longings. + +The Apostle has just been speaking of another groaning within +ourselves, which is the expression of 'the earnest expectation' of +'the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body'; and he says that +that longing will be the more patient the more it is full of hope. +This, then, is Paul's conception of the normal attitude of a +Christian soul; but that attitude is hard to keep up in one's own +strength, because of the distractions of time and sense which are +ever tending to disturb the continuity and fixity of that onward +look, and to lead us rather to be satisfied with the gross, dull +present. That redemption of the body, with all which it implies and +includes, ought to be the supreme object to which each Christian +heart should ever be turning, and Christian prayers should be +directed. But our own daily experience makes us only too sure that +such elevation above, and remoteness from earthly thoughts, with all +their pettinesses and limitations, is impossible for us in our own +strength. As Paul puts it here, 'We know not what to pray for'; nor +can we fix and focus our desires, nor present them 'as we ought.' It +is to this weakness and incompleteness of our desires and prayers +that the help of the Spirit is directed. He strengthens our longings +by His own direct operation. The more vivid our anticipations and the +more steadfast our hopes, and the more our spirits reach out to that +future redemption, the more are we bound to discern something more +than human imaginings in them, and to be sure that such visions are +too good not to be true, too solid to be only the play of our own +fancy. The more we are conscious of these experiences as our own, the +more certain we shall be that in them it is not we that speak, but +'the Spirit of the Father that speaketh in us.' + +III. These divinely-inspired longings are incapable of full +expression. + +They are shallow feelings that can be spoken. Language breaks down in +the attempt to express our deepest emotions and our truest love. For +all the deepest things in man, inarticulate utterance is the most +self-revealing. Grief can say more in a sob and a tear than in many +weak words; love finds its tongue in the light of an eye and the +clasp of a hand. The groanings which rise from the depths of the +Christian soul cannot be forced into the narrow frame-work of human +language; and just because they are unutterable are to be recognised +as the voice of the Holy Spirit. + +But where amidst the Christian experience of to-day shall we find +anything in the least like these unutterable longings after the +redemption of the body which Paul here takes it for granted are +the experience of all Christians? There is no more startling +condemnation of the average Christianity of our times than the calm +certainty with which through all this epistle the Apostle takes it +for granted that the experience of the Roman Christians will +universally endorse his statements. Look for a moment at what these +statements are. Listen to the briefest summary of them: 'We cry, +Abba, Father'; 'We are children of God'; 'We suffer with Him that we +may be glorified with Him'; 'Glory shall be revealed to usward'; 'We +have the first-fruits of the Spirit'; 'We ourselves groan within +ourselves'; 'By hope were we saved'; 'We hope for that which we see +not'; 'Then do we with patience wait for it'; 'We know that to them +that love God all things work together for good'; 'In all these +things we are more than conquerors'; 'Neither death nor life... nor +any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of +God.' He believed that in these rapturous and triumphant words he was +gathering together the experience of every Roman Christian, and would +evoke from their lips a confident 'Amen.' Where are the communities +to-day in whose hearing these words could be reiterated with the like +assurance? How few among us there are who know anything of these +'groanings which cannot be uttered!' How few among us there are whose +spirits are stretching out eager desires towards the land of +perpetual summer, like migratory birds in northern latitudes when the +autumn days are shortening and the temperature is falling! + +But, however we must feel that our poor experience falls far short of +the ideal in our text, an ideal which was to some extent realised in +the early Christian Church, we must beware of taking the +imperfections of our experience as any evidence of the unreality of +our Christianity. They are a proof that we have limited and impeded +the operation of the Spirit within us. They teach us that He will not +intercede 'with groanings which cannot be uttered' unless we let Him +speak through our voices. Therefore, if we find that in our own +consciousness there is little to correspond to those unuttered +groanings, we should take the warning: 'Quench not the Spirit.' +'Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God in whom ye were sealed unto the +day of redemption.' + +IV. The unuttered longings are sure to be answered. + +He that searcheth the heart knows the meaning of the Spirit's +unspoken prayers; and looking into the depths of the human spirit +interprets its longings, discriminating between the mere human and +partial expression and the divinely-inspired desire which may be +unexpressed. If our prayers are weak, they are answered in the +measure in which they embody in them, though perhaps mistaken by us, +a divine longing. Apparent disappointment of our petitions may be +real answers to our real prayer. It was because Jesus loved Mary and +Martha and Lazarus that He abode still in the same place where He +was, to let Lazarus die that He might be raised again. That was the +true answer to the sisters' hope of His immediate coming. God's way +of giving to us is to breathe within us a desire, and then to answer +the desire inbreathed. So, longing is the prophecy of fulfilment when +it is longing according to the will of God. They who 'hunger and +thirst after righteousness' may ever be sure that their bread shall +be given them, and their water will be made sure. The true object of +our desires is often not clear to us, and so we err in translating it +into words. Let us be thankful that we pray to a God who can discern +the prayer within the prayer, and often gives the substance of our +petitions in the very act of refusing their form. + + + + +THE GIFT THAT BRINGS ALL GIFTS + + 'He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up + for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give + us all things?'--ROMANS viii. 32. + + +We have here an allusion to, if not a distinct quotation from, the +narrative in Genesis, of Abraham's offering up of Isaac. The same +word which is employed in the Septuagint version of the Old +Testament, to translate the Hebrew word rendered in our Bible as +'withheld,' is employed here by the Apostle. And there is evidently +floating before his mind the thought that, in some profound and real +sense, there is an analogy between that wondrous and faithful act of +giving up and the transcendent and stupendous gift to the world, from +God, of His Son. + +If we take that point of view, the language of my text rises into +singular force, and suggests many very deep thoughts, about which, +perhaps, silence is best. But led by that analogy, let us deal with +these words. + +I. Consider this mysterious act of divine surrender. + +The analogy seems to suggest to us, strange as it may be, and remote +from the cold and abstract ideas of the divine nature which it is +thought to be philosophical to cherish, that something corresponding +to the pain and loss that shadowed the patriarch's heart flitted +across the divine mind when the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour +of the world. Not merely to give, but to give up, is the highest +crown and glory of love, as we know it. And who shall venture to say +that we so fully apprehend the divine nature as to be warranted in +declaring that some analogy to that is impossible for Him? Our +language is, 'I will not offer unto God that which doth cost me +nothing.' Let us bow in silence before the dim intimation that seems +to flicker out of the words of my text, that so He says to us, 'I +will not offer unto you that which doth cost Me nothing.' 'He +_spared_ not His own Son'; withheld Him not from us. + +But passing from that which, I dare say, many of you may suppose to +be fanciful and unwarranted, let us come upon the surer ground of the +other words of my text. And notice how the reality of the surrender +is emphasised by the closeness of the bond which, in the mysterious +eternity, knits together the Father and the Son. As with Abraham, so +in this lofty example, of which Abraham and Isaac were but as dim, +wavering reflections in water, the Son is His own Son. It seems to me +impossible, upon any fair interpretation of the words before us, to +refrain from giving to that epithet here its very highest and most +mysterious sense. It cannot be any mere equivalent for Messiah, it +cannot merely mean a man who was like God in purity of nature and in +closeness of communion. For the force of the analogy and the emphasis +of that word which is even more emphatic in the Greek than in the +English 'His _own_ Son,' point to a community of nature, to a +uniqueness and singleness of relation, to a closeness of intimacy, to +which no other is a parallel. And so we have to estimate the measure +of the surrender by the tenderness and awfulness of the bond. 'Having +one Son, His well-beloved, He sent Him.' + +Notice, again, how the greatness of the surrender is made more +emphatic by the contemplation of it in its double negative and +positive aspect, in the two successive clauses. 'He spared not His +Son, but delivered Him up,' an absolute, positive giving of Him over +to the humiliation of the life and to the mystery of the death. + +And notice how the tenderness and the beneficence that were the sole +motive of the surrender are lifted into light in the last words, 'for +us all.' The single, sole reason that bowed, if I may so say, the +divine purpose, and determined the mysterious act, was a pure desire +for our blessing. No definition is given as to the manner in which +that surrender wrought for our good. The Apostle does not need to +dwell upon that. His purpose is to emphasise the entire +unselfishness, the utter simplicity of the motive which moved the +divine will. One great throb of love to the whole of humanity led to +that transcendent surrender, before which we can only bow and say, +'Thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift.' + +And now, notice how this mysterious act is grasped by the Apostle +here as what I may call the illuminating fact as to the whole divine +nature. From it, and from it alone, there falls a blaze of light on +the deepest things in God. We are accustomed to speak of Christ's +perfect life of unselfishness, and His death of pure beneficence, as +being the great manifestation to us all that in His heart there is an +infinite fountain of love to us. We are, further, accustomed to speak +of Christ's mission and death as being the revelation to us of the +love of God as well as of the Man Christ Jesus, because we believe +that 'God was in Christ reconciling the world,' and that He has so +manifested and revealed the very nature of divinity to us, in His +life and in His person, that, as He Himself says, 'He that hath seen +Me hath seen the Father.' And every conclusion that we draw as to the +love of Christ is, _ipso facto_, a conclusion as to the love of God. +But my text looks at the matter from rather a different point of view, +and bids us see, in Christ's mission and sacrifice, the great +demonstration of the love of God, not only because 'God was in +Christ,' but because the Father's will, conceived of as distinct +from, and yet harmonious with, the will of the Son, gives Him up for +us. And we have to say, not only that we see the love of God in the +love of Christ, but 'God so loved the world that He sent His only +begotten Son' that we might have life through Him. + +These various phases of the love of Christ as manifesting the divine +love, may not be capable of perfect harmonising in our thoughts, but +they do blend into one, and by reason of them all, 'God commendeth +His love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for +us.' We have to think not only of Abraham who gave up, but of the +unresisting, innocent Isaac, bearing on his shoulders the wood for +the burnt offering, as the Christ bore the Cross on His, and +suffering himself to be bound upon the pile, not only by the cords +that tied his limbs, but by the cords of obedience and submission, +and in both we have to bow before the Apocalypse of divine love. + +II. So, secondly, look at the power of this divine surrender to bring +with it all other gifts. + +'How shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?' The +Apostle's triumphant question requires for its affirmative answer +only the belief in the unchangeableness of the Divine heart, and the +uniformity of the Divine purpose. And if these be recognised, their +conclusion inevitably follows. 'With Him He will freely give us all +things.' + +It is so, because the greater gift implies the less. We do not expect +that a man who hands over a million of pounds to another, to help +him, will stick at a farthing afterwards. If you give a diamond you +may well give a box to keep it in. In God's gift the lesser will +follow the lead of the greater; and whatsoever a man can want, it is +a smaller thing for Him to bestow, than was the gift of His Son. + +There is a beautiful contrast between the manners of giving the two +sets of gifts implied in words of the original, perhaps scarcely +capable of being reproduced in any translation. The expression that +is rendered 'freely give,' implies that there is a grace and a +pleasantness in the act of bestowal. God gave in Christ, what we may +reverently say it was something like pain to give. Will He not give +the lesser, whatever they may be, which it is the joy of His heart to +communicate? The greater implies the less. + +Farther, this one great gift draws all other gifts after it, because +the purpose of the greater gift cannot be attained without the +bestowment of the lesser. He does not begin to build being unable to +finish; He does not miscalculate His resources, nor stultify Himself +by commencing upon a large scale, and having to stop short before the +purpose with which He began is accomplished. Men build great palaces, +and are bankrupt before the roof is put on. God lays His plans with +the knowledge of His powers, and having first of all bestowed this +large gift, is not going to have it bestowed in vain for want of some +smaller ones to follow it up. Christ puts the same argument to us, +beginning only at the other end of the process. Paul says, 'God has +laid the foundation in Christ.' Do you think He will stop before the +headstone is put on? Christ said, 'It is your Father's good pleasure +to give you the Kingdom.' Do you think He will not give you bread and +water on the road to it? Will He send out His soldiers half-equipped; +will it be found when they are on their march that they have been +started with a defective commissariat, and with insufficient +trenching tools? Shall the children of the King, on the road to their +thrones, be left to scramble along anyhow, in want of what they need +to get there? That is not God's way of doing. He that hath begun a +good work will also perfect the same, and when He gave to you and me +His Son, He bound Himself to give us every subsidiary and secondary +blessing which was needed to make that Son's work complete in each of +us. + +Again, this great blessing draws after it, by necessary consequence, +all other lesser and secondary gifts, inasmuch as, in every real +sense, everything is included and possessed in the Christ when we +receive Him. 'With Him,' says Paul, as if that gift once laid +in a man's heart actually enclosed within it, and had for its +indispensable accompaniment the possession of every smaller thing +that a man can need, Jesus Christ is, as it were, a great Cornucopia, +a horn of abundance, out of which will pour, with magic affluence, +all manner of supplies according as we require. This fountain flows +with milk, wine, and water, as men need. Everything is given us when +Christ is given to us, because Christ is the Heir of all things, and +we possess all things in Him; as some poor village maiden married to +a prince in disguise, who, on the morrow of her wedding finds that +she is lady of broad lands, and mistress of a kingdom. 'He that +spared not His own Son,' not only 'with Him will give,' but in Him +has 'given us all things.' + +And so, brethren, just as that great gift is the illuminating fact in +reference to the divine heart, so is it the interpreting fact in +reference to the divine dealings. Only when we keep firm hold of +Christ as the gift of God, and the Explainer of all that God does, +can we face the darkness, the perplexities, the torturing questions +that from the beginning have harassed men's minds as they looked upon +the mysteries of human misery. If we recognise that God has given us +His Son, then all things become, if not plain, at least lighted with +some gleam from that great gift; and we feel that the surrender of +Christ is the constraining fact which shapes after its own likeness, +and for its own purpose, all the rest of God's dealings with men. +That gift makes anything believable, reasonable, possible, rather +than that He should spare not His own Son, and then should +counterwork His own act by sending the world anything but good. + +III. And now, lastly, take one or two practical issues +from these thoughts, in reference to our own belief and conduct. + +First, I would say, Let us correct our estimates of the relative +importance of the two sets of gifts. On the one side stands the +solitary Christ; on the other side are massed all delights of sense, +all blessings of time, all the things that the vulgar estimation of +men unanimously recognises to be good. These are only makeweights. +They are all lumped together into an 'also.' They are but the golden +dust that may be filed off from the great ingot and solid block. They +are but the outward tokens of His far deeper and true preciousness. +They are secondary; He is the primary. What an inversion of our +notions of good! Do _you_ degrade all the world's wealth, +pleasantness, ease, prosperity, into an 'also?' Are you content to +put it in the secondary place, as a result, if it please Him, of +Christ? Do you live as if you did? Which do you hunger for most? +Which do you labour for hardest? 'Seek ye first the Kingdom and the +King, and all 'these things shall be added unto you.' + +Let these thoughts teach us that sorrow too is one of the gifts of +the Christ. The words of my text, at first sight, might seem to be +simply a promise of abundant earthly good. But look what lies close +beside them, and is even part of the same triumphant burst. 'Shall +tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or +peril, or sword?' These are some of the 'all things' which Paul +expected that God would give him and his brethren. And looking upon +all, he says, 'They all work together for good'; and in them all we +may be more than conquerors. It would be a poor, shabby issue of such +a great gift as that of which we have been speaking, if it were only +to be followed by the sweetnesses and prosperity and wealth of this +world. But here is the point that we have to keep hold of--inasmuch +as He gives us all things, let us take all the things that come to us +as being as distinctly the gifts of His love, as is the gift of +Christ Himself. A wise physician, to an ignorant onlooker, might seem +to be acting in contradictory fashions when in the one moment he +slashes into a limb, with a sharp, gleaming knife, and in the next +sedulously binds the wounds, and closes the arteries, but the purpose +of both acts is one. + +The diurnal revolution of the earth brings the joyful sunrise and the +pathetic sunset. The same annual revolution whirls us through the +balmy summer days and the biting winter ones. God's purpose is one. +His methods vary. The road goes straight to its goal; but it +sometimes runs in tunnels dank and dark and stifling, and sometimes +by sunny glades and through green pastures. God's purpose is always +love, brother. His withdrawals are gifts, and sorrow is not the least +of the benefits which come to us through the Man of Sorrows. + +So again, let these thoughts teach us to live by a very quiet and +peaceful faith. We find it a great deal easier to trust God for +Heaven than for earth--for the distant blessings than for the near +ones. Many a man will venture his soul into God's hands, who would +hesitate to venture to-morrow's food there. Why? Is it not because we +do not really trust Him for the greater that we find it so hard to +trust Him for the less? Is it not because we want the less more +really than we want the greater, that we can put ourselves off with +faith for the one, and want something more solid to grasp for the +other? Live in the calm confidence that God gives all things; and +gives us for to-morrow as for eternity; for earth as for heaven. + +And, last of all, make you quite sure that you have taken _the_ +great gift of God. He gives it to all the world, but they only have +it who accept it by faith. Have you, my brother? I look out upon the +lives of the mass of professing Christians; and this question weighs +on my heart, judging by conduct--have they really got Christ for +their own? 'Wherefore do ye spend your money for that which is not +bread, and your labour for that which satisfieth not?' Look how you +are all fighting and scrambling, and sweating and fretting, to get +hold of the goods of this present life, and here is a gift gleaming +before you all the while that you will not condescend to take. Like a +man standing in a market-place offering sovereigns for nothing, which +nobody accepts because they think the offer is too good to be true, +so God complains and wails: I have stretched out My hands all the +day, laden with gifts, and no man regarded. + + 'It is only heaven may be had for the asking; + It is only God that is given away.' + +He gives His Son. Take Him by humble faith in His sacrifice and +Spirit; take Him, and with Him He freely gives you all things. + + + + +MORE THAN CONQUERORS + + 'Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors + through Him that loved us.'--ROMANS viii. 37. + + +In order to understand and feel the full force of this triumphant +saying of the Apostle, we must observe that it is a negative answer +to the preceding questions, 'Who shall separate us from the love of +Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or +nakedness, or peril, or sword?' A heterogeneous mass the Apostle here +brigades together as an antagonistic army. They are alike in nothing +except that they are all evils. There is no attempt at an exhaustive +enumeration, or at classification. He clashes down, as it were, a +miscellaneous mass of evil things, and then triumphs over them, and +all the genus to which they belong, as being utterly impotent to drag +men away from Jesus Christ. To ask the question is to answer it, but +the form of the answer is worth notice. Instead of directly replying, +'No! no such powerless things as these can separate us from the love +of Christ,' he says, 'No! In all these things, whilst weltering +amongst them, whilst ringed round about by them, as by encircling +enemies, "we are more than conquerors."' Thereby, he suggests that +there is something needing to be done by us, in order that the foes +may not exercise their natural effect. And so, taking the words of my +text in connection with that to which they are an answer, we have +three things--the impotent enemies of love; the abundant victory of +love; 'We are more than conquerors'; and the love that makes us +victorious. Let us look then at these three things briefly. + +I. First of all, the impotent enemies of love. + +There is contempt in the careless massing together of the foes which +the Apostle enumerates. He begins with the widest word that covers +everything--'affliction.' Then he specifies various forms of +it--'distress,' _straitening_, as the word might be rendered, +then he comes to evils inflicted for Christ's sake by hostile +men--'persecution,' then he names purely physical evils, 'hunger' and +'nakedness,' then he harks back again to man's antagonism, 'peril,' +and 'sword.' And thus carelessly, and without an effort at logical +order, he throws together, as specimens of their class, these salient +points, as it were, and crests of the great sea, whose billows +threaten to roll over us; and he laughs at them all, as impotent and +nought, when compared with the love of Christ, which shields us from +them all. + +Now it must be noticed that here, in his triumphant question, the +Apostle means not our love to Christ but His to us; and not even our +sense of that love, but the fact itself. And his question is just +this:--Is there any evil in the world that can make Christ stop +loving a man that cleaves to Him? And, as I said, to ask the question +is to answer it. The two things belong to two different regions. They +have nothing in common. The one moves amongst the low levels of +earth; the other dwells up amidst the abysses of eternity, and to +suppose that anything that assails and afflicts us here has any +effect in making that great heart cease to love us is to fancy that +the mists can quench the sunlight, is to suppose that that which lies +down low in the earth can rise to poison and to darken the heavens. + +There is no need, in order to rise to the full height of the +Christian contempt for calamity, to deny any of its terrible power. +These things can separate us from much. They can separate us from +joy, from hope, from almost all that makes life desirable. They can +strip us to the very quick, but the quick they cannot touch. The +frost comes and kills the flowers, browns the leaves, cuts off the +stems, binds the sweet music of the flowing rivers in silent chains, +casts mists and darkness over the face of the solitary grey world, +but it does not touch the life that is in the root. + +And so all these outward sorrows that have power over the whole of +the outward life, and can slay joy and all but stifle hope, and can +ban men into irrevocable darkness and unalleviated solitude, they do +not touch in the smallest degree the secret bond that binds the heart +to Jesus, nor in any measure affect the flow of His love to us. +Therefore we may front them and smile at them and say: + + 'Do as thou wilt, devouring time, + With this wide world, and all its fading sweets'; + +'my flesh and my heart faileth, but God is the strength of my heart, +and my portion for ever.' + +You need not be very much afraid of anything being taken from you as +long as Christ is left you. You will not be altogether hopeless so +long as Christ, who is our hope, still speaks His faithful promises +to you, nor will the world be lonely and dark to them who feel that +they are lapt in the sweet and all-pervading consciousness of the +changeless love of the heart of Christ. 'Shall tribulation, or +distress, or persecution?'--in any of these things, 'we are more than +conquerors through Him that loved us.' Brethren, that is the +Christian way of looking at all externals, not only at the dark and +the sorrowful, but at the bright and the gladsome. If the withdrawal +of external blessings does not touch the central sanctities and +sweetness of a life in communion with Jesus, the bestowal of external +blessedness does not much brighten or gladden it. We can face the +withdrawal of them all, we need not covet the possession of them all, +for we have all in Christ; and the world without His love contributes +less to our blessedness and our peace than the absence of all its +joys with His love does. So let us feel that earth, in its givings +and in its withholdings, is equally impotent to touch the one thing +that we need, the conscious possession of the love of Christ. + +All these foes, as I have said, have no power over the fact of +Christ's love to us, but they have power, and a very terrible power, +over our consciousness of that love; and we may so kick against the +pricks as to lose, in the pain of our sorrows, the assurance of His +presence, or be so fascinated by the false and vulgar sweetnesses and +promises of the world as, in the eagerness of our chase after them, +to lose our sense of the all-sufficing certitude of His love. +Tribulation does not strip us of His love, but tribulation may so +darken our perceptions that we cannot see the sun. Joys need not rob +us of His heart, but joys may so fill ours, as that there shall be no +longing for His presence within us. Therefore let us not exaggerate +the impotence of these foes, but feel that there are real dangers, as +in the sorrows so in the blessings of our outward life, and that the +evil to be dreaded is that outward things, whether in their bright or +in their dark aspects, may come between us and the home of our +hearts, the love of the loving Christ. + +II. So then, note next, the abundant victory of love. + +Mark how the Apostle, in his lofty and enthusiastic way, is not +content here with simply saying that he and his fellows conquer. It +would be a poor thing, he seems to think, if the balance barely +inclined to our side, if the victory were but just won by a hair's +breadth and triumph were snatched, as it were, out of the very jaws +of defeat. There must be something more than that to correspond to +the power of the victorious Christ that is in us. And so, he says, we +very abundantly conquer; we not only hinder these things which he has +been enumerating from doing that which it is their aim apparently to +do, but we actually convert them into helpers or allies. The '_more_ +than conquerors' seems to mean, if there is any definite idea to be +attached to it, the conversion of the enemy conquered into a friend +and a helper. The American Indians had a superstition that every foe +tomahawked sent fresh strength into the warrior's arm. And so all +afflictions and trials rightly borne, and therefore overcome, make a +man stronger, and bring him nearer to Jesus Christ. + +Note then, further, that not only is this victory more than bare +victory, being the conversion of the enemy into allies, but that it +is a victory which is won even whilst we are in the midst of the +strife. It is not that we shall be conquerors in some far-off heaven, +when the noise of battle has ceased and they hang the trumpet in the +hall, but it is here now, in the hand-to-hand and foot-to-foot +death-grapple that we do overcome. No ultimate victory, in some +far-off and blessed heaven, will be ours unless moment by moment, +here, to-day,' we _are_ more than conquerors through Him that +loved us.' + +So, then, about this abundant victory there are these things to +say:--You conquer the world only, then, when you make it contribute +to your conscious possession of the love of Christ. That is the real +victory, the only real victory in life. Men talk about overcoming +here on earth, and they mean thereby the accomplishment of their +designs. A man has 'victory,' as it is phrased, in the world's +strife, when he secures for himself the world's goods at which he has +aimed, but that is not the Christian idea of the conquest of +calamity. Everything that makes me feel more thrillingly in my +inmost heart the verity and the sweetness of the love of Jesus Christ +as my very own, is conquered by me and compelled to subserve my +highest good, and everything which slips a film between me and Him, +which obscures the light of His face to me, which makes me less +desirous of, and less sure of, and less happy in, and less satisfied +with, His love, is an enemy that has conquered me. And all these +evils as the world calls them, and as our bleeding hearts have often +felt them to be, are converted into allies and friends when they +drive us to Christ, and keep us close to Him, in the conscious +possession of His sweet and changeless love. That is the victory, and +the only victory. Has the world helped me to lay hold of Christ? Then +I have conquered it. Has the world loosened my grasp upon Him? Then +it has conquered me. + +Note then, further, that this abundant victory depends on how we deal +with the changes of our outward lives, our sorrows or our joys. There +is nothing, _per se_, salutary in affliction, there is nothing, +_per se_, antagonistic to Christian faith in it either. No man +is made better by his sorrows, no man need be made worse by them. +That depends upon how we take the things which come storming against +us. The set of your sails, and the firmness of your grasp upon the +tiller, determine whether the wind shall carry you to the haven or +shall blow you out, a wandering waif, upon a shoreless and melancholy +sea. There are some of you that have been blown away from your +moorings by sorrow. There are some professing Christians who have +been hindered in their work, and had their peace and their faith +shattered all but irrevocably, because they have not accepted, in the +spirit in which they were sent, the trials that have come for their +good. The worst of all afflictions is a wasted affliction, and they +are all wasted unless they teach us more of the reality and the +blessedness of the love of Jesus Christ. + +III. Lastly, notice the love which makes us conquerors. + +The Apostle, with a wonderful instinctive sense of fitness, names +Christ here by a name congruous to the thoughts which occupy his +mind, when he speaks of Him that loved us. His question has been, Can +anything separate us from the love of Christ? And his answer is, So +far from that being the case, that very love, by occasion of sorrows +and afflictions, tightens its grasp upon us, and, by the +communication of itself to us, makes us more than conquerors. This +great love of Jesus Christ, from which nothing can separate us, will +use the very things that seem to threaten our separation as a means +of coming nearer to us in its depth and in its preciousness. + +The Apostle says 'Him that loved us,' and the words in the original +distinctly point to some one fact as being the great instance of +love. That is to say they point to His death. And so we may say +Christ's love helps us to conquer because in His death He interprets +for us all possible sorrows. If it be true that love to each of us +nailed Him there, then nothing that can come to us but must be a +love-token, and a fruit of that same love. The Cross is the key to +all tribulation, and shows it to be a token and an instrument of an +unchanging love. + +Further, that great love of Christ helps us to conquer, because in +His sufferings and death He becomes the Companion of all the weary. +The rough, dark, lonely road changes its look when we see His +footprints there, not without specks of blood in them, +where the thorns tore His feet. We conquer our afflictions if we +recognise that 'in all our afflictions He was afflicted,' and that +Himself has drunk to its bitterest dregs the cup which He commends to +our lips. He has left a kiss upon its margin, and we need not shrink +when He holds it out to us and says 'Drink ye all of it.' That one +thought of the companionship of the Christ in our sorrows makes us +more than conquerors. + +And lastly, this dying Lover of our souls communicates to us all, if +we will, the strength whereby we may coerce all outward things into +being helps to the fuller participation of His perfect love. Our +sorrows and all the other distracting externals do seek to drag us +away from Him. Is all that happens in counteraction to that pull of +the world, that we tighten our grasp upon Him, and will not let Him +go; as some poor wretch might the horns of the altar that did not +respond to his grasp? Nay what we lay hold of is no dead thing, but +a living hand, and it grasps us more tightly than we can ever grasp +it. So because He holds us, and not because we hold Him, we shall +not be dragged away, by anything outside of our own weak and wavering +souls, and all these embattled foes may come against us, they may +shear off everything else, they cannot sever Christ from us unless +we ourselves throw Him away. 'In this thou shalt conquer.' 'They +overcame by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of His testimony.' + + + + +LOVE'S TRIUMPH + + 'Neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, + nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor + height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able + to separate us from the love of God.'--ROMANS viii. 38, 39. + + +These rapturous words are the climax of the Apostle's long +demonstration that the Gospel is the revelation of 'the righteousness +of God from faith to faith,' and is thereby 'the power of God unto +salvation.' What a contrast there is between the beginning and the +end of his argument! It started with sombre, sad words about man's +sinfulness and aversion from the knowledge of God. It closes with +this sunny outburst of triumph; like some stream rising among black +and barren cliffs, or melancholy moorlands, and foaming through +narrow rifts in gloomy ravines, it reaches at last fertile lands, and +flows calm, the sunlight dancing on its broad surface, till it loses +itself at last in the unfathomable ocean of the love of God. + +We are told that the Biblical view of human nature is too dark. Well, +the important question is not whether it is dark, but whether it is +true. But, apart from that, the doctrine of Scripture about man's +moral condition is not dark, if you will take the whole of it +together. Certainly, a part of it is very dark. The picture, for +instance, of what men are, painted at the beginning of this Epistle, +is shadowed like a canvas of Rembrandt's. The Bible is 'Nature's +sternest painter but her best.' But to get the whole doctrine of +Scripture on the subject, we have to take its confidence as to what +men may become, as well as its portrait of what they are--and then +who will say that the anthropology of Scripture is gloomy? To me it +seems that the unrelieved blackness of the view which, because it +admits no fall, can imagine no rise, which sees in all man's sins and +sorrows no token of the dominion of an alien power, and has, +therefore, no reason to believe that they can be separated from +humanity, is the true 'Gospel of despair,' and that the system which +looks steadily at all the misery and all the wickedness, and calmly +proposes to cast it all out, is really the only doctrine of human +nature which throws any gleam of light on the darkness. Christianity +begins indeed with, 'There is none that doeth good, no, not one,' but +it ends with this victorious pæan of our text. + +And what a majestic close it is to the great words that have gone +before, fitly crowning even their lofty height! One might well shrink +from presuming to take such words as a text, with any idea of +exhausting or of enhancing them. My object is very much more humble. +I simply wish to bring out the remarkable order, in which Paul here +marshals, in his passionate, rhetorical amplification, all the +enemies that can be supposed to seek to wrench us away from the love +of God; and triumphs over them all. We shall best measure the +fullness of the words by simply taking these clauses as they stand in +the text. + +I. The love of God is unaffected by the extremest changes of our +condition. + +The Apostle begins his fervid catalogue of vanquished foes by a pair +of opposites which might seem to cover the whole ground--'neither +death nor life.' What more can be said? Surely, these two include +everything. From one point of view they do. But yet, as we shall see, +there is more to be said. And the special reason for beginning with +this pair of possible enemies is probably to be found by remembering +that they are a pair, that between them they do cover the whole +ground and represent the _extremes_ of change which can befall +us. The one stands at the one pole, the other at the other. If these +two stations, so far from each other, are equally near to God's love, +then no intermediate point can be far from it. If the most violent +change which we can experience does not in the least matter to the +grasp which the love of God has on us, or to the grasp which we may +have on it, then no less violent a change can be of any consequence. +It is the same thought in a somewhat modified form, as we find in +another word of Paul's, 'Whether we live, we live unto the Lord; and +whether we die, we die unto the Lord.' Our subordination to Him is +the same, and our consecration should be the same, in all varieties +of condition, even in that greatest of all variations. His love to us +makes no account of that mightiest of changes. How should it be +affected by slighter ones? + +The distance of a star is measured by the apparent change in its +position, as seen from different points of the earth's surface or +orbit. But this great Light stands steadfast in our heaven, nor moves +a hair's-breadth, nor pours a feebler ray on us, whether we look up +to it from the midsummer day of busy life, or from the midwinter of +death. These opposites are parted by a distance to which the millions +of miles of the world's path among the stars are but a point, and yet +the love of God streams down on them alike. + +Of course, the confidence in immortality is implied in this thought. +Death does not, in the slightest degree, affect the essential +vitality of the soul; so it does not, in the slightest degree, affect +the outflow of God's love to that soul. It is a change of condition +and circumstance, and no more. He does not lose us in the dust of +death. The withered leaves on the pathway are trampled into mud, and +indistinguishable to human eyes; but He sees them even as when they +hung green and sunlit on the mystic tree of life. + +How beautifully this thought contrasts with the saddest aspect of the +power of death in our human experience! He is Death the Separator, +who unclasps our hands from the closest, dearest grasp, and divides +asunder joints and marrow, and parts soul and body, and withdraws us +from all our habitude and associations and occupations, and loosens +every bond of society and concord, and hales us away into a lonely +land. But there is one bond which his 'abhorred shears' cannot cut. +Their edge is turned on _it_. One Hand holds us in a grasp which +the fleshless fingers of Death in vain strive to loosen. The +separator becomes the uniter; he rends us apart from the world that +He may 'bring us to God.' The love filtered by drops on us in life is +poured upon us in a flood in death; 'for I am persuaded, that neither +death nor life shall be able to separate us from the love of God.' + +II. The love of God is undiverted from us by any other order of +beings. + +'Nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers,' says Paul. Here we pass +from conditions affecting ourselves to living beings beyond +ourselves. Now, it is important for understanding the precise thought +of the Apostle to observe that this expression, when used without any +qualifying adjective, seems uniformly to mean good angels, the +hierarchy of blessed spirits before the throne. So that there is no +reference to 'spiritual wickedness in high places' striving to draw +men away from God. The supposition which the Apostle makes is, +indeed, an impossible one, that these ministering spirits, who are +sent forth to minister to them who shall be heirs of salvation, +should so forget their mission and contradict their nature as to seek +to bar us out from the love which it is their chiefest joy to bring +to us. He knows it to be an impossible supposition, and its very +impossibility gives energy to his conclusion, just as when in the +same fashion he makes the other equally impossible supposition about +an angel from heaven preaching another gospel than that which he had +preached to them. + +So we may turn the general thought of this second category of +impotent efforts in two different ways, and suggest, first, that it +implies the utter powerlessness of any third party in regard to the +relations between our souls and God. + +We alone have to do with Him alone. The awful fact of individuality, +that solemn mystery of our personal being, has its most blessed or +its most dread manifestation in our relation to God. There no other +Being has any power. Counsel and stimulus, suggestion or temptation, +instruction or lies, which may tend to lead us nearer to Him or away +from Him, they may indeed give us; but after they have done their +best or their worst, all depends on the personal act of our own +innermost being. Man or angel can affect that, but from without. The +old mystics called prayer 'the flight of the lonely soul to the only +God.' It is the name for all religion. These two, God and the soul, +have to 'transact,' as our Puritan forefathers used to say, as if +there were no other beings in the universe but only they two. Angels +and principalities and powers may stand beholding with sympathetic +joy; they may minister blessing and guardianship in many ways; but +the decisive act of union between God and the soul they can neither +effect nor prevent. + +And as for them, so for men around us; the limits of their power to +harm us are soon set. They may shut us out from human love by +calumnies, and dig deep gulfs of alienation between us and dear ones; +they may hurt and annoy us in a thousand ways with slanderous +tongues, and arrows dipped in poisonous hatred, but one thing they +cannot do. They may build a wall around us, and imprison us from many +a joy and many a fair prospect, but they cannot put a roof on it to +keep out the sweet influences from above, or hinder us from looking +up to the heavens. Nobody can come between us and God but ourselves. + +Or, we may turn this general thought in another direction, and say, +These blessed spirits around the throne do not absorb and intercept +His love. They gather about its steps in their 'solemn troops and +sweet societies'; but close as are their ranks, and innumerable as is +their multitude, they do not prevent that love from passing beyond +them to us on the outskirts of the crowd. The planet nearest the sun +is drenched and saturated with fiery brightness, but the rays from +the centre of life pass on to each of the sister spheres in its turn, +and travel away outwards to where the remotest of them all rolls in +its far-off orbit, unknown for millenniums to dwellers closer to the +sun, but through all the ages visited by warmth and light according +to its needs. Like that poor, sickly woman who could lay her wasted +fingers on the hem of Christ's garment, notwithstanding the thronging +multitude, we can reach our hands through all the crowd, or rather He +reaches His strong hand to us and heals and blesses us. All the +guests are fed full at that great table. One's gain is not another's +loss. The multitudes sit on the green grass, and the last man of +the last fifty gets as much as the first. 'They did all eat, and were +filled'; and more remains than fed them all. So all beings are +'nourished from the King's country,' and none jostle others out of +their share. This healing fountain is not exhausted of its curative +power by the early comers. 'I will give unto this last, even as unto +thee.' 'Nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, shall be able to +separate us from the love of God.' + +III. The love of God is raised above the power of time. + +'Nor things present, nor things to come,' is the Apostle's next class +of powers impotent to disunite us from the love of God. The +rhythmical arrangement of the text deserves to be noticed, as bearing +not only on its music and rhetorical flow, but as affecting its +force. We had first a pair of opposites, and then a triplet; 'death +and life: angels, principalities, and powers.' We have again a pair +of opposites; 'things present, things to come,' again followed by a +triplet, 'height nor depth, nor any other creature.' The effect of +this is to divide the whole into two, and to throw the first and +second classes more closely together, as also the third and fourth. +Time and Space, these two mysterious ideas, which work so fatally on +all human love, are powerless here. + +The great revelation of God, on which the whole of Judaism was built, +was that made to Moses of the name 'I Am that I Am.' And parallel to +the verbal revelation was the symbol of the Bush, burning and +unconsumed, which is so often misunderstood. It appears wholly +contrary to the usage of Scriptural visions, which are ever wont to +express in material form the same truth which accompanies them in +words, that the meaning of that vision should be, as it is frequently +taken as being, the continuance of Israel unharmed by the fiery +furnace of persecution. Not the continuance of Israel, but the +eternity of Israel's God is the teaching of that flaming wonder. The +burning Bush and the Name of the Lord proclaimed the same great truth +of self-derived, self-determined, timeless, undecaying Being. And +what better symbol than the bush burning, and yet not burning out, +could be found of that God in whose life there is no tendency to +death, whose work digs no pit of weariness into which it falls, who +gives and is none the poorer, who fears no exhaustion in His +spending, no extinction in His continual shining? + +And this eternity of Being is no mere metaphysical abstraction. It is +eternity of love, for God is love. That great stream, the pouring out +of His own very inmost Being, knows no pause, nor does the deep +fountain from which it flows ever sink one hair's-breadth in its pure +basin. + +We know of earthly loves which cannot die. They have entered so +deeply into the very fabric of the soul, that like some cloth dyed in +grain, as long as two threads hold together they will retain the +tint. We have to thank God for such instances of love stronger than +death, which make it easier for us to believe in the unchanging +duration of His. But we know, too, of love that can change, and we +know that all love must part. Few of us have reached middle life, who +do not, looking back, see our track strewed with the gaunt skeletons +of dead friendships, and dotted with 'oaks of weeping,' waving green +and mournful over graves, and saddened by footprints striking away +from the line of march, and leaving us the more solitary for their +departure. + +How blessed then to know of a love which cannot change or die! The +past, the present, and the future are all the same to Him, to whom 'a +thousand years,' that can corrode so much of earthly love, are in +their power to change 'as one day,' and 'one day,' which can hold so +few of the expressions of our love, may be 'as a thousand years' in +the multitude and richness of the gifts which it can be expanded to +contain. The whole of what He has been to any past, He is to us +to-day. 'The God of Jacob is our refuge.' All these old-world stories +of loving care and guidance may be repeated in our lives. + +So we may bring the blessedness of all the past into the present, and +calmly face the misty future, sure that it cannot rob us of His love. + +Whatever may drop out of our vainly-clasping hands, it matters not, +if only our hearts are stayed on His love, which neither things +present nor things to come can alter or remove. Looking on all the +flow of ceaseless change, the waste and fading, the alienation and +cooling, the decrepitude and decay of earthly affection, we can lift +up with gladness, heightened by the contrast, the triumphant song of +the ancient Church: 'Give thanks unto the Lord: for He is good: +because His mercy endureth for ever!' + +IV. The love of God is present everywhere. + +The Apostle ends his catalogue with a singular trio of antagonists; +'nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature,' as if he had got +impatient of the enumeration of impotencies, and having named the +outside boundaries in space of the created universe, flings, as it +were, with one rapid toss, into that large room the whole that it can +contain, and triumphs over it all. + +As the former clause proclaimed the powerlessness of Time, so this +proclaims the powerlessness of that other great mystery of creatural +life which we call Space, Height or depth, it matters not. That +diffusive love diffuses itself equally in all directions. Up or down, +it is all the same. The distance from the centre is the same to +Zenith or to Nadir. + +Here, we have the same process applied to that idea of Omnipresence +as was applied in the former clause to the idea of Eternity. That +thought, so hard to grasp with vividness, and not altogether a glad +one to a sinful soul, is all softened and glorified, as some solemn +Alpine cliff of bare rock is when the tender morning light glows on +it, when it is thought of as the Omnipresence of Love. 'Thou, God, +seest me,' may be a stern word, if the God who sees be but a mighty +Maker or a righteous Judge. As reasonably might we expect a prisoner +in his solitary cell to be glad when he thinks that the jailer's eye +is on him from some unseen spy-hole in the wall, as expect any +thought of God but one to make a man read that grand one hundred and +thirty-ninth Psalm with joy: 'If I ascend into heaven, Thou art +there; if I make my bed in Sheol, behold, Thou art there.' So may a +man say shudderingly to himself, and tremble as he asks in vain, +'Whither shall I flee from Thy Presence?' But how different it all is +when we can cast over the marble whiteness of that solemn thought the +warm hue of life, and change the form of our words into this of our +text: 'Nor height, nor depth, shall be able to separate us from the +love of God.' + +In that great ocean of the divine love we live and move and have our +being, floating in it like some sea flower which spreads its filmy +beauty and waves its long tresses in the depths of mid-ocean. The +sound of its waters is ever in our ears, and above, beneath, around +us, its mighty currents run evermore. We need not cower before the +fixed gaze of some stony god, looking on us unmoved like those +Egyptian deities that sit pitiless with idle hands on their laps, and +wide-open lidless eyes gazing out across the sands. We need not fear +the Omnipresence of Love, nor the Omniscience which knows us +altogether, and loves us even as it knows. Rather we shall be glad +that we are ever in His Presence, and desire, as the height of all +felicity and the power for all goodness, to walk all the day long in +the light of His countenance, till the day come when we shall receive +the crown of our perfecting in that we shall be 'ever with the Lord.' + +The recognition of this triumphant sovereignty of love over all these +real and supposed antagonists makes us, too, lords over them, and +delivers us from the temptations which some of them present us to +separate ourselves from the love of God. They all become our servants +and helpers, uniting us to that love. So we are set free from the +dread of death and from the distractions incident to life. So we are +delivered from superstitious dread of an unseen world, and from +craven fear of men. So we are emancipated from absorption in the +present and from careful thought for the future. So we are at home +everywhere, and every corner of the universe is to us one of the many +mansions of our Father's house. 'All things are yours, ... and ye are +Christ's; and Christ is God's.' + +I do not forget the closing words of this great text. I have not +ventured to include them in our present subject, because they would +have introduced another wide region of thought to be laid down on our +already too narrow canvas. + +But remember, I beseech you, that this love of God is explained by +our Apostle to be 'in Christ Jesus our Lord.' Love illimitable, +all-pervasive, eternal; yes, but a love which has a channel and a +course; love which has a method and a process by which it pours +itself over the world. It is not, as some representations would make +it, a vague, nebulous light diffused through space as in a chaotic +half-made universe, but all gathered in that great Light which rules +the day--even in Him who said: 'I am the Light of the world.' In +Christ the love of God is all centred and embodied, that it may be +imparted to all sinful and hungry hearts, even as burning coals are +gathered on a hearth that they may give warmth to all that are in the +house. 'God _so_ loved the world'--not merely _so much_, but in _such +a fashion_--'that'--that what? Many people would leap at once from +the first to the last clause of the verse, and regard eternal life +for all and sundry as the only adequate expression of the universal +love of God. Not so does Christ speak. Between that universal love +and its ultimate purpose and desire for every man He inserts two +conditions, one on God's part, one on man's. God's love reaches its +end, namely, the bestowal of eternal life, by means of a divine act +and a human response. 'God _so_ loved the world, that He _gave_ His +only begotten Son, that whosoever _believeth_ in Him should not +perish, but have everlasting life.' So all the universal love of God +for you and me and for all our brethren is 'in Christ Jesus our +Lord,' and faith in Him unites us to it by bonds which no foe can +break, no shock of change can snap, no time can rot, no distance can +stretch to breaking. 'For I am persuaded, that neither death nor +life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, +nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, +shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ +Jesus our Lord.' + + + + +THE SACRIFICE OF THE BODY + + 'I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of + God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, + holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable + service.'--ROMANS xii. 1. + + +In the former part of this letter the Apostle has been building up a +massive fabric of doctrine, which has stood the waste of centuries, +and the assaults of enemies, and has been the home of devout souls. +He now passes to speak of practice, and he binds the two halves of +his letter indissolubly together by that significant 'therefore,' +which does not only look back to the thing last said, but to the +whole of the preceding portion of the letter. 'What God hath joined +together let no man put asunder.' Christian living is inseparably +connected with Christian believing. Possibly the error of our +forefathers was in cutting faith too much loose from practice, and +supposing that an orthodox creed was sufficient, though I think the +extent to which they did suppose that has been very much exaggerated. +The temptation of this day is precisely the opposite. 'Conduct is +three-fourths of life,' says one of our teachers. Yes. But what about +the _fourth_ fourth which underlies conduct? Paul's way is the +right way. Lay broad and deep the foundations of God's facts revealed +to us, and then build upon that the fabric of a noble life. This +generation superficially tends to cut practice loose from faith, and +so to look for grapes from thorns and figs from thistles. Wrong +thinking will not lead to right doing. 'I beseech you, _therefore_, +brethren, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice.' + +The Apostle, in beginning his practical exhortations, lays as the +foundations of them all two companion precepts: one, with which we +have to deal, affecting mainly the outward life; its twin sister, +which follows in the next verse, affecting mainly the inward life. He +who has drunk in the spirit of Paul's doctrinal teaching will present +his body a living sacrifice, and be renewed in the spirit of his +mind; and thus, outwardly and inwardly, will be approximating to +God's ideal, and all specific virtues will be his in germ. Those two +precepts lay down the broad outline, and all that follow in the way +of specific commandments is but filling in its details. + +I. We observe that we have here, first, an all-inclusive directory +for the outward life. + +Now, it is to be noticed that the metaphor of sacrifice runs through +the whole of the phraseology of my text. The word rendered 'present' +is a technical expression for the sacerdotal action of offering. A +tacit contrast is drawn between the sacrificial ritual, which was +familiar to Romans as well as Jews, and the true Christian sacrifice +and service. In the former a large portion of the sacrifices +consisted of animals which were slain. Ours is to be 'a living +sacrifice.' In the former the offering was presented to the Deity, +and became His property. In the Christian service, the gift passes, +in like manner, from the possession of the worshipper, and is set +apart for the uses of God, for that is the proper meaning of the word +'holy.' The outward sacrifice gave an odour of a sweet smell, which, +by a strong metaphor, was declared to be fragrant in the nostrils of +Deity. In like manner, the Christian sacrifice is 'acceptable unto +God.' These other sacrifices were purely outward, and derived no +efficacy from the disposition of the worshipper. Our sacrifice, +though the material of the offering be corporeal, is the act of the +inner man, and so is called 'rational' rather than 'reasonable,' as +our Version has it, or as in other parts of Scripture, 'spiritual.' +And the last word of my text, 'service,' retains the sacerdotal +allusion, because it does not mean the service of a slave or +domestic, but that of a priest. + +And so the sum of the whole is that the master-word for the outward +life of a Christian is sacrifice. That, again, includes two +things--self-surrender and surrender to God. + +Now, Paul was not such a superficial moralist as to begin at the +wrong end, and talk about the surrender of the outward life, unless +as the result of the prior surrender of the inward, and that priority +of the consecration of the man to his offering of the body is +contained in the very metaphor. For a priest needs to be consecrated +before he can offer, and we in our innermost wills, in the depths of +our nature, must be surrendered and set apart to God ere any of our +outward activities can be laid upon His altar. The Apostle, then, +does not make the mistake of substituting external for +internal surrender, but he presupposes that the latter has preceded. +He puts the sequence more fully in the parallel passage in this very +letter: 'Yield yourselves unto God, and your bodies as instruments of +righteousness unto Him.' So, then, first of all, we must be priests +by our inward consecration, and then, since 'a priest must have +somewhat to offer,' we must bring the outward life and lay it upon +His altar. + +Now, of the two thoughts which I have said are involved in this great +keyword, the former is common to Christianity, with all noble systems +of morality, whether religious or irreligious. It is a commonplace, +on which I do not need to dwell, that every man who will live a man's +life, and not that of a beast, must sacrifice the flesh, and rigidly +keep it down. But that commonplace is lifted into an altogether new +region, assumes a new solemnity, and finds new power for its +fulfilment when we add to the moralist's duty of control of the +animal and outward nature the other thought, that the surrender must +be to God. + +There is no need for my dwelling at any length on the various +practical directions in which this great exhortation must be wrought +out. It is of more importance, by far, to have well fixed in our +minds and hearts the one dominant thought that sacrifice is the +keyword of the Christian life than to explain the directions in which +it applies. But still, just a word or two about these. There are +three ways in which we may look at the body, which the Apostle here +says is to be yielded up unto God. + +It is the recipient of impressions from without. _There_ is a field +for consecration. The eye that looks upon evil, and by the look has +rebellious, lustful, sensuous, foul desires excited in the heart, +breaks this solemn law. The eye that among the things seen dwells +with complacency on the pure, and turns from the impure as if a hot +iron had been thrust into its pupil; that in the things seen discerns +shimmering behind them, and manifested through them, the things +unseen and eternal, is the consecrated eye. 'Art for Art's sake,' to +quote the cant of the day, has too often meant art for the flesh's +sake. And there are pictures and books, and sights of various sorts, +flashed before the eyes of you young men and women which it is +pollution to dwell upon, and should be pain to remember. I beseech +you all to have guard over these gates of the heart, and to pray, +'Turn away mine eyes from viewing vanity.' And the other senses, in +like manner, have need to be closely connected with God if they are +not to rush us down to the devil. + +The body is not only the recipient of impressions. It is the +possessor of appetites and necessities. See to it that these are +indulged, with constant reference to God. It is no small attainment +of the Christian life 'to eat our meat with gladness and singleness +of heart, praising God.' In a hundred directions this characteristic +of our corporeal lives tends to lead us all away from supreme +consecration to Him. There is the senseless luxury of this +generation. There is the exaggerated care for physical strength and +completeness amongst the young; there is the intemperance in eating +and drinking, which is the curse and the shame of England. There is +the provision for the flesh, the absorbing care for the procuring of +material comforts, which drowns the spirit in miserable anxieties, +and makes men bond-slaves. There is the corruption which comes from +drunkenness and from lust. There is the indolence which checks lofty +aspirations and stops a man in the middle of noble work. And there +are many other forms of evil on which I need not dwell, all of which +are swept clean out of the way when we lay to heart this injunction: +'I beseech you present your bodies a living sacrifice,' and let +appetites and tastes and corporeal needs be kept in rigid +subordination and in conscious connection with Him. I remember a +quaint old saying of a German schoolmaster, who apostrophised his +body thus: 'I go with you three times a day to eat; you must come +with me three times a day to pray.' Subjugate the body, and let it be +the servant and companion of the devout spirit. + +It is also, besides being the recipient of impressions, and the +possessor of needs and appetites, our instrument for working in the +world. And so the exhortation of my text comes to include this, that +all our activities done by means of brain and eye and tongue and hand +and foot shall be consciously devoted to Him, and laid as a sacrifice +upon His altar. That pervasive, universally diffused reference to +God, in all the details of daily life, is the thing that Christian +men and women need most of all to try to cultivate. 'Pray without +ceasing,' says the Apostle. This exhortation can only be obeyed if +our work is indeed worship, being done by God's help, for God's sake, +in communion with God. + +So, dear friends, sacrifice is the keynote--meaning thereby +surrender, control, and stimulus of the corporeal frame, surrender to +God, in regard to the impressions which we allow to be made upon our +senses, to the indulgence which we grant to our appetites, and the +satisfaction which we seek for our needs, and to the activities which +we engage in by means of this wondrous instrument with which God has +trusted us. These are the plain principles involved in the +exhortation of my text. 'He that soweth to the flesh, shall of the +flesh reap corruption.' 'I keep under my body, and bring it into +subjection.' It is a good servant; it is a bad master. + +II. Note, secondly, the relation between this priestly service and +other kinds of worship. + +I need only say a word about that. Paul is not meaning to depreciate +the sacrificial ritual, from which he drew his emblem. But he is +meaning to assert that the devotion of a life, manifested through +bodily activity, is higher in its nature than the symbolical worship +of any altar and of any sacrifice. And that falls in with prevailing +tendencies in this day, which has laid such a firm hold on the +principle that daily conduct is better than formal worship, that it +has forgotten to ask the question whether the daily conduct is likely +to be satisfactory if the formal worship is altogether neglected. I +believe, as profoundly as any man can, that the true worship is +distinguishable from and higher than the more sensuous forms of the +Catholic or other sacramentarian churches, or the more simple of the +Puritan and Nonconformist, or the altogether formless of the Quaker. +I believe that the best worship is the manifold activities of daily +life laid upon God's altar, so that the division between things +secular and things sacred is to a large extent misleading and +irrelevant. But at the same time I believe that you have very little +chance of getting this diffused and all-pervasive reference of all a +man's doings to God unless there are, all through his life, recurring +with daily regularity, reservoirs of power, stations where he may +rest, kneeling-places where the attitude of service is exchanged for +the attitude of supplication; times of quiet communion with God which +shall feed the worshipper's activities as the white snowfields on the +high summits feed the brooks that sparkle by the way, and bring +fertility wherever they run. So, dear brethren, remember that whilst +life is the field of worship there must be the inward worship within +the shrine if there is to be the outward service. + +III. Lastly, note the equally comprehensive motive and ground of this +all-inclusive directory for conduct. + +'I beseech you, by the mercies of God.' That plural does not mean +that the Apostle is extending his view over the whole wide field of +the divine beneficence, but rather that he is contemplating the one +all-inclusive mercy about which the former part of his letter has +been eloquent--viz. the gift of Christ--and contemplating it in the +manifoldness of the blessings which flow from it. The mercies of God +which move a man to yield himself as a sacrifice are not the diffused +beneficences of His providence, but the concentrated love that lies +in the person and work of His Son. + +And there, as I believe, is the one motive to which we can appeal +with any prospect of its being powerful enough to give the needful +impetus all through a life. The sacrifice of Christ is the ground on +which our sacrifices can be offered and accepted, for it was the +sacrifice of a death propitiatory and cleansing, and on it, as the +ancient ritual taught us, may be reared the enthusiastic sacrifice of +a life--a thankoffering for it. + +Nor is it only the ground on which our sacrifice is accepted, but it +is the great motive by which our sacrifice is impelled. _There_ +is the difference between the Christian teaching, 'present your +bodies a sacrifice,' and the highest and noblest of similar teaching +elsewhere. One of the purest and loftiest of the ancient moralists +was a contemporary of Paul's. He would have re-echoed from his heart +the Apostle's directory, but he knew nothing of the Apostle's motive. +So his exhortations were powerless. He had no spell to work on men's +hearts, and his lofty teachings were as the voice of one crying in +the wilderness. Whilst Seneca taught, Rome was a cesspool of moral +putridity and Nero butchered. So it always is. There may be noble +teachings about self-control, purity, and the like, but an evil and +adulterous generation is slow to dance to such piping. + +Our poet has bid us-- + + 'Move upwards, casting out the beast, + And let the ape and tiger die.' + +But how is this heavy bulk of ours to 'move upwards'; how is the +beast to be 'cast out'; how are the 'ape and tiger' in us to be +slain? Paul has told us, 'By the mercies of God.' Christ's gift, +meditated on, accepted, introduced into will and heart, is the one +power that will melt our obstinacy, the one magnet that will draw us +after it. + +Nothing else, brethren, as your own experience has taught you, and as +the experience of the world confirms, nothing else will bind +Behemoth, and put a hook in his nose. Apart from the constraining +motive of the love of Christ, all the cords of prudence, conscience, +advantage, by which men try to bind their unruly passions and manacle +the insisting flesh, are like the chains on the demoniac's +wrists--'And he had oftentimes been bound by chains, and the chains +were snapped asunder.' But the silken leash with which the fair Una +in the poem leads the lion, the silken leash of love will bind the +strong man, and enable us to rule ourselves. If we will open our +hearts to the sacrifice of Christ, we shall be able to offer +ourselves as thankofferings. If we will let His love sway our wills +and consciences, He will give our wills and consciences power to +master and to offer up our flesh. And the great change, according to +which He will one day change the body of our humiliation into the +likeness of the body of His glory, will be begun in us, if we live +under the influence of the motive and the commandment which this +Apostle bound together in our text and in his other great words, 'Ye +are not your own; ye are bought with a price, therefore glorify God +in your body and spirit, which are His.' + + + + +TRANSFIGURATION + + 'Be not conformed to this world; but be ye transformed by + the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that + good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God.'--ROMANS xii. 2. + + +I had occasion to point out, in a sermon on the preceding verse, that +the Apostle is, in this context, making the transition from the +doctrinal to the practical part of his letter, and that he lays down +broad principles, of which all his subsequent injunctions and +exhortations are simply the filling up of the details. One master +word, for the whole Christian life, as we then saw, is sacrifice, +self-surrender, and that to God. In like manner, Paul here brackets, +with that great conception of the Christian life, another equally +dominant and equally comprehensive. In one aspect, it is +self-surrender; in another, it is growing transformation. And, just +as in the former verse we found that an inward surrender preceded the +outward sacrifice, and that the inner man, having been consecrated as +a priest, by this yielding of himself to God, was then called upon to +manifest inward consecration by outward sacrifice, so in this further +exhortation, an inward 'renewing of the mind' is regarded as the +necessary antecedent of transformation of outward life. + +So we have here another comprehensive view of what the Christian life +ought to be, and that not only grasped, as it were, in its very +centre and essence, but traced out in two directions--as to that +which must precede it within, and as to that which follows it as +consequence. An outline of the possibilities, and therefore the +duties, of the Christian, is set forth here, in these three thoughts +of my text, the renewed mind issuing in a transfigured life, crowned +and rewarded by a clearer and ever clearer insight into what we ought +to be and do. + +I. Note, then, that the foundation of all transformation of character +and conduct is laid deep in a renewed mind. + +Now it is a matter of world-wide experience, verified by each of us +in our own case, if we have ever been honest in the attempt, that the +power of self-improvement is limited by very narrow bounds. Any man +that has ever tried to cure himself of the most trivial habit which +he desires to get rid of, or to alter in the slightest degree the set +of some strong taste or current of his being, knows how little he can +do, even by the most determined effort. Something may be effected, +but, alas! as the proverbs of all nations and all lands have taught +us, it is very little indeed. 'You cannot expel nature with a fork,' +said the Roman. 'What's bred in the bone won't come out of the +flesh,' says the Englishman. 'Can the Ethiopian change his skin or +the leopard his spots?' says the Hebrew. And we all know what the +answer to that question is. The problem that is set before a man when +you tell him to effect self-improvement is something like that +which confronted that poor paralytic lying in the porch at the pool: +'If you can walk you will be able to get to the pool that will make +you able to walk. But you have got to be cured before you can do what +you need to do in order to be cured.' Only one knife can cut the +knot. The Gospel of Jesus Christ presents itself, not as a mere +republication of morality, not as merely a new stimulus and motive to +do what is right, but as an actual communication to men of a new +power to work in them, a strong hand laid upon our poor, feeble hand +with which we try to put on the brake or to apply the stimulus. It is +a new gift of a life which will unfold itself after its own nature, +as the bud into flower, and the flower into fruit; giving new +desires, tastes, directions, and renewing the whole nature. And so, +says Paul, the beginning of transformation of character is the +renovation in the very centre of the being, and the communication of +a new impulse and power to the inward self. + +Now, I suppose that in my text the word 'mind' is not so much +employed in the widest sense, including all the affections and will, +and the other faculties of our nature, as in the narrower sense of +the perceptive power, or that faculty in our nature by which we +recognise, and make our own, certain truths. 'The renewing of the +mind,' then, is only, in such an interpretation, a theological way of +putting the simpler English thought, a change of estimates, a new set +of views; or if that word be too shallow, as indeed it is, a new set +of convictions. It is profoundly true that 'As a man thinketh, so +is he.' Our characters are largely made by our estimates of what is +good or bad, desirable or undesirable. And what the Apostle is +thinking about here is, as I take it, principally how the body of +Christian truth, if it effects a lodgment in, not merely the brain of +a man, but his whole nature, will modify and alter it all. Why, we +all know how often a whole life has been revolutionised by the sudden +dawning or rising in its sky, of some starry new truth, formerly +hidden and undreamed of. And if we should translate the somewhat +archaic phraseology of our text into the plainest of modern English, +it just comes to this: If you want to change your characters, and God +knows they all need it, change the deep convictions of your mind; and +get hold, as living realities, of the great truths of Christ's +Gospel. If you and I really believed what we say we believe, that +Jesus Christ has died for us, and lives for us, and is ready to pour +out upon us the gift of His Divine Spirit, and wills that we should +be like Him, and holds out to us the great and wonderful hopes and +prospects of an absolutely eternal life of supreme and serene +blessedness at His right hand, should we be, could we be, the sort of +people that most of us are? It is not the much that you say you +believe that shapes your character; it is the little that you +habitually realise. Truth professed has no transforming power; truth +received and fed upon can revolutionise a man's whole character. + +So, dear brethren, remember that my text, though it is an analysis of +the methods of Christian progress, and though it is a wonderful +setting forth of the possibilities open to the poorest, dwarfed, +blinded, corrupted nature, is also all commandment. And if it is true +that the principles of the Gospel exercise transforming power upon +men's lives, and that in order for these principles to effect their +natural results there must be honest dealing with them, on our parts, +take this as the practical outcome of all this first part of my +sermon--let us all see to it that we keep ourselves in touch with the +truths which we say we believe; and that we thorough-goingly apply +these truths in all their searching, revealing, quickening, curbing +power, to every action of our daily lives. If for one day we could +bring everything that we do into touch with the creed that we +profess, we should be different men and women. Make of your every +thought an action; link every action with a thought. Or, to put it +more Christianlike, let there be nothing in your creed which is not +in your commandments; and let nothing be in your life which is not +moulded by these. The beginning of all transformation is the +revolutionised conviction of a mind that has accepted the truths of +the Gospel. + +II. Well then, secondly, note the transfigured life. + +The Apostle uses in his positive commandment, 'Be ye transformed,' +the same word which is employed by two of the Evangelists in their +account of our Lord's transfiguration. And although I suppose it +would be going too far to assert that there is a distinct reference +intended to that event, it may be permissible to look back to it as +being a lovely illustration of the possibilities that open to an +honest Christian life--the possibility of a change, coming from +within upwards, and shedding a strange radiance on the face, whilst +yet the identity remains. So by the rippling up from within of the +renewed mind will come into our lives a transformation not altogether +unlike that which passed on Him when His garments did shine 'so as no +fuller on earth could white them'; and His face was as the sun in his +strength. + +The life is to be transfigured, yet it remains the same, not only in +the consciousness of personal identity, but in the main trend and +drift of the character. There is nothing in the Gospel of Jesus +Christ which is meant to obliterate the lines of the strongly marked +individuality which each of us receives by nature. Rather the Gospel +is meant to heighten and deepen these, and to make each man more +intensely himself, more thoroughly individual and unlike anybody +else. The perfection of our nature is found in the pursuit, to the +furthest point, of the characteristics of our nature, and so, by +reason of diversity, there is the greater harmony, and, all taken +together, will reflect less inadequately the infinite glories of +which they are all partakers. But whilst the individuality remains, +and ought to be heightened by Christian consecration, yet a change +should pass over our lives, like the change that passes over the +winter landscape when the summer sun draws out the green leaves from +the hard black boughs, and flashes a fresh colour over all the brown +pastures. There should be such a change as when a drop or two of ruby +wine falls into a cup, and so diffuses a gradual warmth of tint over +all the whiteness of the water. Christ in us, if we are true to Him, +will make us more ourselves, and yet new creatures in Christ Jesus. + +And the transformation is to be into His likeness who is the pattern +of all perfection. We must be moulded after the same type. There are +two types possible for us: this world; Jesus Christ. We have to make +our choice which is to be the headline after which we are to try to +write. 'They that make them are like unto them.' Men resemble their +gods; men become more or less like their idols. What you conceive to +be desirable you will more and more assimilate yourselves to. Christ +is the Christian man's pattern; is He not better than the blind, +corrupt world? + +That transformation is no sudden thing, though the revolution which +underlies it may be instantaneous. The working _out_ of the new +motives, the working _in_ of the new power, is no mere work of a +moment. It is a lifelong task till the lump be leavened. Michael +Angelo, in his mystical way, used to say that sculpture effected its +aim by the removal of parts; as if the statue lay somehow hid in the +marble block. We have, day by day, to work at the task of removing +the superfluities that mask its outlines. Sometimes with a heavy +mallet, and a hard blow, and a broad chisel, we have to take away +huge masses; sometimes, with fine tools and delicate touches, to +remove a grain or two of powdered dust from the sparkling block, but +always to seek more and more, by slow, patient toil, to conform +ourselves to that serene type of all perfectness that we have learned +to love in Jesus Christ. + +And remember, brethren, this transformation is no magic change +effected whilst men sleep. It is a commandment which we have to brace +ourselves to perform, day by day to set ourselves to the task of more +completely assimilating ourselves to our Lord. It comes to be a +solemn question for each of us whether we can say, 'To-day I am liker +Jesus Christ than I was yesterday; to-day the truth which renews the +mind has a deeper hold upon me than it ever had before.' + +But this positive commandment is only one side of the transfiguration +that is to be effected. It is clear enough that if a new likeness is +being stamped upon a man, the process may be looked at from the other +side; and that in proportion as we become liker Jesus Christ, we +shall become more unlike the old type to which we were previously +conformed. And so, says Paul, 'Be not conformed to this world, but be +ye transformed.' He does not mean to say that the nonconformity +precedes the transformation. They are two sides of one process; both +arising from the renewing of the mind within. + +Now, I do not wish to do more than just touch most lightly upon the +thoughts that are here, but I dare not pass them by altogether. 'This +world' here, in my text, is more properly 'this age,' which means +substantially the same thing as John's favourite word 'world,' viz. +the sum total of godless men and things conceived of as separated +from God, only that by this expression the essentially fleeting +nature of that type is more distinctly set forth. Now the world is +the world to-day just as much as it was in Paul's time. No doubt the +Gospel has sweetened society; no doubt the average of godless life in +England is a better thing than the average of godless life in the +Roman Empire. No doubt there is a great deal of Christianity diffused +through the average opinion and ways of looking at things, that +prevail around us. But the World is the world still. There are maxims +and ways of living, and so on, characteristic of the Christian life, +which are in as complete antagonism to the ideas and maxims and +practices that prevail amongst men who are outside of the influences +of this Christian truth in their own hearts, as ever they were. + +And although it can only be a word, I want to put in here a very +earnest word which the tendencies of this generation do very +specially require. It seems to be thought, by a great many people, +who call themselves Christians nowadays, that the nearer they can +come in life, in ways of looking at things, in estimates of +literature, for instance, in customs of society, in politics, in +trade, and especially in amusements--the nearer they can come to the +un-Christian world, the more 'broad' (save the mark!) and 'superior +to prejudice' they are. 'Puritanism,' not only in theology, but in +life and conduct, has come to be at a discount in these days. And it +seems to be by a great many professing Christians thought to be a +great feat to walk as the mules on the Alps do, with one foot over +the path and the precipice down below. Keep away from the edge. You +are safer so. Although, of course, I am not talking about mere +conventional dissimilarities; and though I know and believe and feel +all that can be said about the insufficiency, and even insincerity, +of such, yet there is a broad gulf between the man who believes in +Jesus Christ and His Gospel and the man who does not, and the +resulting conducts cannot be the same unless the Christian man is +insincere. + +III. And now lastly, and only a word, note the great reward and crown +of this transfigured life. + +Paul puts it in words which, if I had time, would require some +commenting upon. The issue of such a life is, to put it into plain +English, an increased power of perceiving, instinctively and surely, +what it is God's will that we should do. And that is the reward. Just +as when you take away disturbing masses of metal from near a compass, +it trembles to its true point, so when, by the discipline of which I +have been speaking, there are swept away from either side of us the +things that would perturb our judgment, there comes, as blessing and +reward, a clear insight into that which it is our duty to do. + +There may be many difficulties left, many perplexities. There is no +promise here, nor is there anything in the tendencies of Christ-like +living, to lead us to anticipate that guidance in regard to matters +of prudence or expediency or temporal advantage will follow from such +a transfigured life. All such matters are still to be determined in +the proper fashion, by the exercise of our own best judgment and +common-sense. But in the higher region, the knowledge of good and +evil, surely it is a blessed reward, and one of the highest that can +be given to a man, that there shall be in him so complete a harmony +with God that, like God's Son, he 'does always the things that please +Him,' and that the Father will show him whatsoever things Himself +doeth; and that these also will the son do likewise. To know beyond +doubt what I ought to do, and knowing, to have no hesitation or +reluctance in doing it, seems to me to be heaven upon earth, and the +man that has it needs but little more. This, then, is the reward. +Each peak we climb opens wider and clearer prospects into the +untravelled land before us. + +And so, brethren, here is the way, the only way, by which we can +change ourselves, first let us have our minds renewed by contact with +the truth, then we shall be able to transform our lives into the +likeness of Jesus Christ, and our faces too will shine, and our lives +will be ennobled, by a serene beauty which men cannot but admire, +though it may rebuke them. And as the issue of all we shall have +clearer and deeper insight into that will, which to know is life, in +keeping of which there is great reward. And thus our apostle's +promise may be fulfilled for each of us. 'We all with unveiled faces +reflecting'--as a mirror does--'the glory of the Lord, are changed +... into the same image.' + + + + +SOBER THINKING + + 'For I say, through the grace that is given unto me, to + every man that is among you, not to think of himself more + highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, + according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of + faith.'--ROMANS xii. 3. + + +It is hard to give advice without seeming to assume superiority; it +is hard to take it, unless the giver identifies himself with the +receiver, and shows that his counsel to others is a law for himself. +Paul does so here, led by the delicate perception which comes from a +loving heart, compared with which deliberate 'tact' is cold and +clumsy. He wishes, as the first of the specific duties to which he +invites the Roman Christians, an estimate of themselves based upon +the recognition of God as the Giver of all capacities and graces, and +leading to a faithful use for the general good of the 'gifts +differing according to the grace given to us.' In the first words of +our text, he enforces his counsel by an appeal to his apostolic +authority; but he so presents it that, instead of separating himself +from the Roman Christians by it, he unites himself with them. He +speaks of 'the grace given to _me_,' and in verse 6 of 'the grace +given to _us_.' He was made an Apostle by the same giving God who has +bestowed varying gifts on each of _them_. He knows what is the grace +which he possesses as he would have them know; and in these counsels +he is assuming no superiority, but is simply using the special gift +bestowed on him for the good of all. With this delicate turn of what +might else have sounded harshly authoritative, putting prominently +forward the divine gift and letting the man Paul to whom it was given +fall into the background, he counsels as the first of the social +duties which Christian men owe to one another, a sober and just +estimate of themselves. This sober estimate is here regarded as being +important chiefly as an aid to right service. It is immediately +followed by counsels to the patient and faithful exercise of +differing gifts. For thus we may know what our gifts are; and the +acquisition of such knowledge is the aim of our text. + +I. What determines our gifts. + +Paul here gives a precise standard, or 'measure' as he calls it, +according to which we are to estimate ourselves. 'Faith' is the +measure of our gifts, and is itself a gift from God. The strength of +a Christian man's faith determines his whole Christian character. +Faith is trust, the attitude of receptivity. There are in it a +consciousness of need, a yearning desire and a confidence of +expectation. It is the open empty hand held up with the assurance +that it will be filled; it is the empty pitcher let down into the +well with the assurance that it will be drawn up filled. It is the +precise opposite of the self-dependent isolation which shuts us out +from God. The law of the Christian life is ever, 'according to your +faith be it unto you'; 'believe that ye receive and ye have them.' So +then the more faith a man exercises the more of God and Christ he +has. It is the measure of our capacity, hence there may be indefinite +increase in the gifts which God bestows on faithful souls. Each of us +will have as much as he desires and is capable of containing. The +walls of the heart are elastic, and desire expands them. + +The grace given by faith works in the line of its possessor's natural +faculties; but these are supernaturally reinforced and strengthened +while, at the same time, they are curbed and controlled, by the +divine gift, and the natural gifts thus dealt with become what Paul +calls _charisms_. The whole nature of a Christian should be ennobled, +elevated, made more delicate and intense, when the 'Spirit of life +that is in Christ Jesus' abides in and inspires it. Just as a sunless +landscape is smitten into sudden beauty by a burst of sunshine which +heightens the colouring of the flowers on the river's bank, and is +flashed back from every silvery ripple on the stream, so the faith +which brings the life of Christ into the life of the Christian makes +him more of a man than he was before. So, there will be infinite +variety in the resulting characters. It is the same force in various +forms that rolls in the thunder or gleams in the dewdrops, that +paints the butterfly's feathers or flashes in a star. All individual +idiosyncrasies should be developed in the Christian Church, and will +be when its members yield themselves fully to the indwelling Spirit, +and can truly declare that the lives which they live in the flesh +they live by the faith of the Son of God. + +But Paul here regards the measure of faith as itself 'dealt to every +man'; and however we may construe the grammar of this sentence there +is a deep sense in which our faith is God's gift to us. We have to +give equal emphasis to the two conceptions of faith as a human act +and as a divine bestowal, which have so often been pitted against +each other as contradictory when really they are complementary. The +apparent antagonism between them is but one instance of the great +antithesis to which we come to at last in reference to all human +thought on the relations of man to God. 'It is He that worketh in us +both to will and to do of His own good pleasure'; and all our +goodness is God-given goodness, and yet it is our goodness. Every +devout heart has a consciousness that the faith which knits it to God +is God's work in it, and that left to itself it would have remained +alienated and faithless. The consciousness that his faith was his own +act blended in full harmony with the twin consciousness that it was +Christ's gift, in the agonised father's prayer, 'Lord, I believe, +help Thou mine unbelief.' + +II. What is a just estimate of our gifts. + +The Apostle tells us, negatively, that we are not to think more +highly than we ought to think, and positively that we are to 'think +soberly.' + +To arrive at a just estimate of ourselves the estimate must ever be +accompanied with a distinct consciousness that all is God's gift. +That will keep us from anything in the nature of pride or +over-weening self-importance. It will lead to true humility, which is +not ignorance of what we can do, but recognition that we, the doers, +are of ourselves but poor creatures. We are less likely to fancy that +we are greater than we are when we feel that, whatever we are, God +made us so. 'What hast thou that thou didst not receive? Now, if thou +didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received +it?' + +Further, it is to be noted that the estimate of gifts which Paul +enjoins is an estimate with a view to service. Much +self-investigation is morbid, because it is self-absorbed; and much +is morbid because it is undertaken only for the purpose of +ascertaining one's 'spiritual condition.' Such self-examination is +good enough in its way, and may sometimes be very necessary; but a +testing of one's own capacities for the purpose of ascertaining what +we are fit for, and what therefore it is our duty to do, is far more +wholesome. Gifts are God's summons to work, and our first response to +the summons should be our scrutiny of our gifts with a distinct +purpose of using them for the great end for which we received them. +It is well to take stock of the loaves that we have, if the result be +that we bring our poor provisions to Him, and put them in His hands, +that He may give them back to us so multiplied as to be more than +adequate to the needs of the thousands. Such just estimate of our +gifts is to be attained mainly by noting ourselves at work. Patient +self-observation may be important, but is apt to be mistaken; and the +true test of what we can do is what we _do_ do. + +The just estimate of our gifts which Paul enjoins is needful in order +that we may ascertain what God has meant us to be and do, and may +neither waste our strength in trying to be some one else, nor hide +our talent in the napkin of ignorance or false humility. There is +quite as much harm done to Christian character and Christian service +by our failure to recognise what is in our power, as by ambitious or +ostentatious attempts at what is above our power. We have to be +ourselves as God has made us in our natural faculties, and as the new +life of Christ operating on these has made us new creatures in Him +not by changing but by enlarging our old natures. It matters nothing +what the special form of a Christian man's service may be; the +smallest and the greatest are alike to the Lord of all, and He +appoints His servants' work. Whether the servant be a cup-bearer or a +counsellor is of little moment. 'He that is faithful in that which is +least, is faithful also in much.' + +The positive aspect of this right estimate of one's gifts is, if we +fully render the Apostle's words, as the Revised Version does, 'so to +think as to think soberly.' There is to be self-knowledge in order to +'sobriety,' which includes not only what we mean by sober-mindedness, +but self-government; and this aspect of the apostolic exhortation +opens out into the thought that the gifts, which a just estimate of +ourselves pronounces us to possess, need to be kept bright by the +continual suppression of the mind of the flesh, by putting down +earthly desires, by guarding against a selfish use of them, by +preventing them by rigid control from becoming disproportioned and +our masters. All the gifts which Christ bestows upon His people He +bestows on condition that they bind them together by the golden chain +of self-control. + + + + +MANY AND ONE + + 'For we have many members in one body, and all members have + not the same office: 5. So we, being many, are one body in + Christ, and every one members one of another.'--ROMANS xii. 4, 5. + + +To Paul there was the closest and most vital connection between the +profoundest experiences of the Christian life and its plainest and +most superficial duties. Here he lays one of his most mystical +conceptions as the very foundation on which to rear the great +structure of Christian conduct, and links on to one of his +profoundest thoughts, the unity of all Christians in Christ, a +comprehensive series of practical exhortations. We are accustomed to +hear from many lips: 'I have no use for these dogmas that Paul +delights in. Give me his practical teaching. You may keep the Epistle +to the Romans, I hold by the thirteenth of First Corinthians.' But +such an unnatural severance between the doctrine and the ethics of +the Epistle cannot be effected without the destruction of both. The +very principle of this Epistle to the Romans is that the difference +between the law and the Gospel is, that the one preaches conduct +without a basis for it, and that the other says, First believe in +Christ, and in the strength of that belief, do the right and be like +Him. Here, then, in the very laying of the foundation for conduct in +these verses we have in concrete example the secret of the Christian +way of making good men. + +I. The first point to notice here is, the unity of the derived life. +Many are one, because they are each in Christ, and the individual +relationship and derivation of life from Him makes them one whilst +continuing to be many. That great metaphor, and nowadays much +forgotten and neglected truth, is to Paul's mind the fact which ought +to mould the whole life and conduct of individual Christians and to +be manifested therein. There are three most significant and +instructive symbols by which the unity of believers in Christ Jesus +is set forth in the New Testament. Our Lord Himself gives us the one +of the vine and its branches, and that symbol suggests the silent, +effortless process by which the life-giving sap rises and finds its +way from the deep root to the furthest tendril and the far-extended +growth. The same symbol loses indeed in one respect its value if we +transfer it to growths more congenial to our northern climate, and +instead of the vine with its rich clusters, think of some great elm, +deeply rooted, and with its firm bole and massive branches, through +all of which the mystery of a common life penetrates and makes every +leaf in the cloud of foliage through which we look up participant of +itself. But, profound and beautiful as our Lord's metaphor is, the +vegetative uniformity of parts and the absence of individual +characteristics make it, if taken alone, insufficient. In the tree +one leaf is like another; it 'grows green and broad and takes no +care.' Hence, to express the whole truth of the union between Christ +and us we must bring in other figures. Thus we find the Apostle +adducing the marriage tie, the highest earthly example of union, +founded on choice and affection. But even that sacred bond leaves a +gap between those who are knit together by it; and so we have the +conception of our text, the unity of the body as representing for us +the unity of believers with Jesus. This is a unity of life. He is not +only head as chief and sovereign, but He is soul or life, which has +its seat, not in this or that organ as old physics teach, but +pervades the whole and 'filleth all in all.' The mystery which +concerns the union of soul and body, and enshrouds the nature of +physical life, is part of the felicity of this symbol in its +Christian application. That commonest of all things, the mysterious +force which makes matter live and glow under spiritual emotion, and +changes the vibrations of a nerve, or the undulations of the grey +brain, into hope and love and faith, eludes the scalpel and the +microscope. Of man in his complex nature it is true that 'clouds and +darkness are round about him,' and we may expect an equally solemn +mystery to rest upon that which makes out of separate individuals one +living body, animated with the life and moved by the Spirit of the +indwelling Christ. We can get no further back, and dig no deeper +down, than His own words, 'I am ... the life.' + +But, though this unity is mysterious, it is most real. Every +Christian soul receives from Christ the life of Christ. There is a +real implantation of a higher nature which has nothing to do with sin +and is alien from death. There is a true regeneration which is +supernatural, and which makes all who possess it one, in the measure +of their possession, as truly as all the leaves on a tree are one +because fed by the same sap, or all the members in the natural body +are one, because nourished by the same blood. So the true bond of +Christian unity lies in the common participation of the one Lord, and +the real Christian unity is a unity of derived life. + +The misery and sin of the Christian Church have been, and are, that +it has sought to substitute other bonds of unity. The whole weary +history of the divisions and alienations between Christians has +surely sufficiently, and more than sufficiently, shown the failure of +the attempts to base Christian oneness upon uniformity of opinion, or +of ritual, or of purpose. The difference between the real unity, and +these spurious attempts after it, is the difference between bundles +of faggots, dead and held together by a cord, and a living tree +lifting its multitudinous foliage towards the heavens. The bundle of +faggots may be held together in some sort of imperfect union, but is +no exhibition of unity. If visible churches must be based on some +kind of agreement, they can never cover the same ground as that of +'the body of Christ.' + +That oneness is independent of our organisations, and even of our +will, since it comes from the common possession of a common life. Its +enemies are not divergent opinions or forms, but the evil tempers and +dispositions which impede, or prevent, the flow into each Christian +soul of the uniting 'Spirit of life in Christ Jesus' which makes the +many who may be gathered into separate folds one flock clustered +around the one Shepherd. And if that unity be thus a fundamental fact +in the Christian life and entirely apart from external organisation, +the true way to increase it in each individual is, plainly, the +drawing nearer to Him, and the opening of our spirits so as to +receive fuller, deeper, and more continuous inflows from His own +inexhaustible fullness. In the old Temple stood the seven-branched +candlestick, an emblem of a formal unity; in the new the seven +candlesticks are one, because Christ stands in the midst. He makes +the body one; without Him it is a carcase. + +II. The diversity. + +'We have many members in one body, but all members have not the same +office.' Life has different functions in different organs. It is +light in the eye, force in the arm, music on the tongue, swiftness in +the foot; so also is Christ. The higher a creature rises in the scale +of life, the more are the parts differentiated. The lowest is a mere +sac, which performs all the functions that the creature requires; the +highest is a man with a multitude of organs, each of which is +definitely limited to one office. In like manner the division of +labour in society measures its advance; and in like manner in the +Church there is to be the widest diversity. What the Apostle +designates as 'gifts' are natural characteristics heightened by the +Spirit of Christ; the effect of the common life in each ought to be +the intensifying and manifestation of individuality of character. In +the Christian ideal of humanity there is place for every variety of +gifts. The flora of the Mountain of God yields an endless +multiplicity of growths on its ascending slopes which pass through +every climate. There ought to be a richer diversity in the Church +than anywhere besides; that tree should 'bear twelve manner of +fruits, yielding its fruit every month for the healing of the +nations.' 'All flesh is not the same flesh.' 'Star differeth from +star in glory.' + +The average Christian life of to-day sorely fails in two things: in +being true to itself, and in tolerance of diversities. We are all so +afraid of being ticketed as 'eccentric,' 'odd,' that we oftentimes +stifle the genuine impulses of the Spirit of Christ leading us to the +development of unfamiliar types of goodness, and the undertaking of +unrecognised forms of service. If we trusted in Christ in ourselves +more, and took our laws from His whispers, we should often reach +heights of goodness which tower above us now, and discover in +ourselves capacities which slumber undiscerned. There is a dreary +monotony and uniformity amongst us which impoverishes us, and weakens +the testimony that we bear to the quickening influence of the Spirit +that is in Christ Jesus; and we all tend to look very suspiciously at +any man who 'puts all the others out' by being himself, and letting +the life that he draws from the Lord dictate its own manner of +expression. It would breathe a new life into all our Christian +communities if we allowed full scope to the diversities of operation, +and realised that in them all there was the one Spirit. The world +condemns originality: the Church should have learned to prize it. +'One after this fashion, and one after that,' is the only wholesome +law of the development of the manifold graces of the Christian life. + +III. The harmony. + +'We being many are one body in Christ, and every one members one of +another.' That expression is remarkable, for we might have expected +to read rather members _of the body_, than _of each other_; +but the bringing in of such an idea suggests most emphatically that +thought of the mutual relation of each part of the great whole, and +that each has offices to discharge for the benefit of each. In the +Christian community, as in an organised body, the active co-operation +of all the parts is the condition of health. All the rays into which +the spectrum breaks up the pure white light must be gathered together +again in order to produce it; just as every instrument in the great +orchestra contributes to the volume of sound. The Lancashire +hand-bell ringers may illustrate this point for us. Each man picks up +his own bell from the table and sounds his own note at the moment +prescribed by the score, and so the whole of the composer's idea is +reproduced. To suppress diversities results in monotony; to combine +them is the only sure way to secure harmony. Nor must we forget that +the indwelling life of the Church can only be manifested by the full +exhibition and freest possible play of all the forms which that life +assumes in individual character. It needs all, and more than all, the +types of mental characteristics that can be found in humanity to +mirror the infinite beauty of the indwelling Lord. 'There are +diversities of operations,' and all those diversities but partially +represent that same Lord 'who worketh all in all,' and Himself is +more than all, and, after all manifestation through human characters, +remains hinted at rather than declared, suggested but not revealed. + +Still further, only by the exercise of possible diversities is the +one body nourished, for each member, drawing life directly and +without the intervention of any other from Christ the Source, draws +also from his fellow-Christian some form of the common life that to +himself is unfamiliar, and needs human intervention in order to its +reception. Such dependence upon one's brethren is not inconsistent +with a primal dependence on Christ alone, and is a safeguard against +the cultivating of one's own idiosyncrasies till they become diseased +and disproportionate. The most slenderly endowed Christian soul has +the double charge of giving to, and receiving from, its brethren. We +have all something which we can contribute to the general stock. We +have all need to supplement our own peculiar gifts by brotherly +ministration. The prime condition of Christian vitality has been set +forth for ever by the gracious invitation, which is also an +imperative command, 'Abide in Me and I in you'; but they who by such +abiding are recipients of a communicated life are not thereby +isolated, but united to all who like them have received 'the +manifestation of the Spirit to do good with.' + + + + +GRACE AND GRACES + + 'Having then gifts, differing according to the grace that + is given to us, whether prophecy, let us prophesy according + to the proportion of faith; 7. Or ministry, let us wait on + our ministering; or he that teacheth, on teaching; 8. Or he + that exhorteth, on exhortation; he that giveth, let him do + it with simplicity; he that ruleth, with diligence; he that + showeth mercy, with cheerfulness.'--ROMANS xii. 6-8. + + +The Apostle here proceeds to build upon the great thought of the +unity of believers in the one body a series of practical +exhortations. In the first words of our text, he, with characteristic +delicacy, identifies himself with the Roman Christians as a +recipient, like them, of 'the grace that is given to us,' and as, +therefore, subject to the same precepts which he commends to them. He +does not stand isolated by the grace that is given to him; nor does +he look down as from the height of his apostleship on the multitude +below, saying to them,--Go. As one of themselves he stands amongst +them, and with brotherly exhortation says,--Come. If that had been +the spirit in which all Christian teachers had besought men, their +exhortations would less frequently have been breath spent in vain. +We may note + +I. The grace that gives the gifts. + +The connection between these two is more emphatically suggested by +the original Greek, in which the word for 'gifts' is a derivative of +that for 'grace.' The relation between these two can scarcely be +verbally reproduced in English; but it may be, though imperfectly, +suggested by reading 'graces' instead of 'gifts.' The gifts are +represented as being the direct product of, and cognate with, the +grace bestowed. As we have had already occasion to remark, they are +in Paul's language a designation of natural capacities strengthened +by the access of the life of the Spirit of Christ. As a candle +plunged in a vase of oxygen leaps up into more brilliant flame, so +all the faculties of the human soul are made a hundred times +themselves when the quickening power of the life of Christ enters +into them. + +It is to be observed that the Apostle here assumes that every +Christian possesses, in some form, that grace which gives graces. To +him a believing soul without Christ-given gifts is a monstrosity. No +one is without some graces, and therefore no one is without some +duties. No one who considers the multitude of professing Christians +who hamper all our churches to-day, and reflects on the modern need +to urge on the multitude of idlers forms of Christian activity, will +fail to recognise signs of terribly weakened vitality. The humility, +which in response to all invitations to work for Christ pleads +unfitness is, if true, more tragical than it at first seems, for it +is a confession that the man who alleges it has no real hold of the +Christ in whom he professes to trust. If a Christian man is fit for +no Christian work, it is time that he gravely ask himself whether he +has any Christian life. 'Having gifts' is the basis of all the +Apostle's exhortations. It is to him inconceivable that any Christian +should not possess, and be conscious of possessing, some endowment +from the life of Christ which will fit him for, and bind him to, a +course of active service. + +The universality of this possession is affirmed, if we note that, +according to the Greek, it was 'given' at a special time in the +experience of each of these Roman Christians. The rendering 'was +given' might be more accurately exchanged for 'has been given,' and +that expression is best taken as referring to a definite moment in +the history of each believer namely, his conversion. When we 'yield +ourselves to God,' as Paul exhorts us to do in the beginning of this +chapter, as the commencement of all true life of conformity to His +will, Christ yields Himself to us. The possession of these gifts of +grace is no prerogative of officials; and, indeed, in all the +exhortations which follow there is no reference to officials, though +of course such were in existence in the Roman Church. They had their +special functions and special qualifications for these. But what Paul +is dealing with now is the grace that is inseparable from individual +surrender to Christ, and has been bestowed upon all who are His. To +limit the gifts to officials, and to suppose that the universal gifts +in any degree militate against the recognition of officials in the +Church, are equally mistakes, and confound essentially different +subjects. + +II. The graces that flow from the grace. + +The Apostle's catalogue of these is not exhaustive, nor logically +arranged; but yet a certain loose order may be noted, which may be +profitable for us to trace. They are in number seven--the sacred +number; and are capable of being divided, as so many of the series of +sevens are, into two portions, one containing four and the other +three. The former include more public works, to each of which a man +might be specially devoted as his life work for and in the Church. +Three are more private, and may be conceived to have a wider relation +to the world. There are some difficulties of construction and +rendering in the list, which need not concern us here; and we may +substantially follow the Authorised Version. + +The first group of four seems to fall into two pairs, the first of +which, 'prophecy' and 'ministry,' seem to be bracketed together by +reason of the difference between them. Prophecy is a very high form +of special inspiration, and implies a direct reception of special +revelation, but not necessarily of future events. The prophet is +usually coupled in Paul's writings with the apostle, and was +obviously amongst those to whom was given one of the highest forms of +the gifts of Christ. It is very beautiful to note that by natural +contrast the Apostle at once passes to one of the forms of +service which a vulgar estimate would regard as remotest from the +special revelation of the prophet, and is confined to lowly service. +Side by side with the exalted gift of prophecy Paul puts the lowly +gift of ministry. Very significant is the juxtaposition of these two +extremes. It teaches us that the lowliest office is as truly allotted +by Jesus as the most sacred, and that His highest gifts find an +adequate field for manifestation in him who is servant of all. +Ministry to be rightly discharged needs spiritual character. The +original seven were men 'full of faith and of the Holy Ghost,' though +all they had to do was to hand their pittances to poor widows. It may +be difficult to decide for what reason other than the emphasising of +this contrast the Apostle links together ministry and prophecy, and +so breaks a natural sequence which would have connected the second +pair of graces with the first member of the first pair. We should +have expected that here, as elsewhere, 'prophet,' 'teacher,' +'exhorter,' would have been closely connected, and there seems no +reason why they should not have been so, except that which we have +suggested, namely, the wish to bring together the highest and +the lowest forms of service. + +The second pair seem to be linked together by likeness. The 'teacher' +probably had for his function, primarily, the narration of the facts +of the Gospel, and the setting forth in a form addressed chiefly to +the understanding the truths thereby revealed; whilst the 'exhorter' +rather addressed himself to the will, presenting the same truth, but +in forms more intended to influence the emotions. The word here +rendered 'exhort' is found in Paul's writings as bearing special +meanings, such as consoling, stimulating, encouraging, rebuking and +others. Of course these two forms of service would often be +associated, and each would be imperfect when alone; but it would +appear that in the early Church there were persons in whom the one or +the other of these two elements was so preponderant that their office +was thereby designated. Each received a special gift from the one +Source. The man who could only say to his brother, 'Be of good +cheer,' was as much the recipient of the Spirit as the man who could +connect and elaborate a systematic presentation of the truths of the +Gospel. + +These four graces are followed by a group of three, which may be +regarded as being more private, as not pointing to permanent offices +so much as to individual acts. They are 'giving,' 'ruling,' 'showing +pity,' concerning which we need only note that the second of these +can hardly be the ecclesiastical office, and that it stands between +two which are closely related, as if it were of the same kind. The +gifts of money, or of direction, or of pity, are one in kind. The +right use of wealth comes from the gift of God's grace; so does the +right use of any sway which any of us have over any of our brethren; +and so does the glow of compassion, the exercise of the natural human +sympathy which belongs to all, and is deepened and made tenderer and +intenser by the gift of the Spirit. It would be a very different +Church, and a very different world, if Christians, who were not +conscious of possessing gifts which made them fit to be either +prophets, or teachers, or exhorters, and were scarcely endowed even +for any special form of ministry, felt that a gift from their hands, +or a wave of pity from their hearts, was a true token of the movement +of God's Spirit on their spirits. The fruit of the Spirit is to be +found in the wide fields of everyday life, and the vine bears many +clusters for the thirsty lips of wearied men who may little know what +gives them their bloom and sweetness. It would be better for both +giver and receiver if Christian beneficence were more clearly +recognised as one of the manifestations of spiritual life. + +III. The exercise of the graces. + +There are some difficulties in reference to the grammatical +construction of the words of our text, into which it is not necessary +that we should enter here. We may substantially follow the Authorised +and Revised Versions in supplying verbs in the various clauses, so as +to make of the text a series of exhortations. The first of these is +to 'prophesy according to the proportion of faith'; a commandment +which is best explained by remembering that in the preceding verse +'the measure of faith' has been stated as being the measure of the +gifts. The prophet then is to exercise his gifts in proportion to his +faith. He is to speak his convictions fully and openly, and to let +his utterances be shaped by the indwelling life. This exhortation may +well sink into the heart of preachers in this day. It is but the echo +of Jeremiah's strong words: 'He that hath my word, let him speak my +word faithfully. What is the chaff to the wheat? saith the Lord. Is +not my word like as fire, saith the Lord, and like a hammer that +breaketh the rock in pieces?' The ancient prophet's woe falls with +double weight on those who use their words as a veil to obscure their +real beliefs, and who prophesy, not 'according to the proportion of +faith,' but according to the expectations of the hearers, whose faith +is as vague as theirs. + +In the original, the next three exhortations are alike in grammatical +construction, which is represented in the Authorised Version by the +supplement 'let us wait on,' and in the Revised Version by 'let us +give ourselves to'; we might with advantage substitute for either the +still more simple form 'be in,' after the example of Paul's +exhortation to Timothy 'be in these things'; that is, as our Version +has it, 'give thyself wholly to them.' The various gifts are each +represented as a sphere within which its possessor is to move, for +the opportunities for the exercise of which he is carefully to watch, +and within the limits of which he is humbly to keep. That general law +applies equally to ministry, and teaching and exhorting. We are to +seek to discern our spheres; we are to be occupied with, if not +absorbed in, them. At the least we are diligently to use the gift +which we discover ourselves to possess, and thus filling our several +spheres, we are to keep within them, recognising that each is sacred +as the manifestation of God's will for each of us. The divergence of +forms is unimportant, and it matters nothing whether 'the Giver of +all' grants less or more. The main thing is that each be faithful in +the administration of what he has received, and not seek to imitate +his brother who is diversely endowed, or to monopolise for himself +another's gifts. To insist that our brethren's gifts should be like +ours, and to try to make ours like theirs, are equally sins against +the great truth, of which the Church as a whole is the example, that +there are 'diversities of operations but the same Spirit.' + +The remaining three exhortations are in like manner thrown together +by a similarity of construction in which the personality of the doer +is put in the foreground, and the emphasis of the commandment is +rested on the manner in which the grace is exercised. The reason for +that may be that in these three especially the manner will show the +grace. 'Giving' is to be 'with simplicity.' There are to be no +sidelong looks to self-interest; no flinging of a gift from a height, +as a bone might be flung to a dog; no seeking for gratitude; no +ostentation in the gift. Any taint of such mixed motives as these +infuses poison into our gifts, and makes them taste bitter to the +receiver, and recoil in hurt upon ourselves. To 'give with +simplicity' is to give as God gives. + +'Diligence' is the characteristic prescribed for the man that rules. +We have already pointed out that this exhortation includes a much +wider area than that of any ecclesiastical officials. It points to +another kind of rule, and the natural gifts needed for any kind of +rule are diligence and zeal. Slackly-held reins make stumbling +steeds; and any man on whose shoulders is laid the weight of +government is bound to feel it as a weight. The history of many a +nation, and of many a family, teaches that where the rule is slothful +all evils grow apace; and it is that natural energy and earnestness, +deepened and hallowed by the Christian life, which here is enjoined +as the true Christian way of discharging the function of ruling, +which, in some form or another, devolves on almost all of us. + +'He that showeth mercy with cheerfulness.' The glow of natural human +sympathy is heightened so as to become a 'gift,' and the way in which +it is exercised is defined as being 'with cheerfulness.' That +injunction is but partially understood if it is taken to mean no more +than that sympathy is not to be rendered grudgingly, or as by +necessity. No sympathy is indeed possible on such terms; unless the +heart is in it, it is nought. And that it should thus flow forth +spontaneously wherever sorrow and desolation evoke it, there must be +a continual repression of self, and a heart disengaged from the +entanglements of its own circumstances, and at leisure to make a +brother's burden its very own. But the exhortation may, perhaps, +rather mean that the truest sympathy carries a bright face into +darkness, and comes like sunshine in a shady place. + + + + +LOVE THAT CAN HATE + + 'Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor that which is evil; + cleave to that which is good. 10. In love of the brethren + be tenderly affectioned one to another; in honour + preferring one another.'--ROMANS xii. 9-10 (R.V.). + + +Thus far the Apostle has been laying down very general precepts and +principles of Christian morals. Starting with the one +all-comprehensive thought of self-sacrifice as the very foundation of +all goodness, of transformation as its method, and of the clear +knowledge of our several powers and faithful stewardship of these, as +its conditions, he here proceeds to a series of more specific +exhortations, which at first sight seem to be very unconnected, but +through which there may be discerned a sequence of thought. + +The clauses of our text seem at first sight strangely disconnected. +The first and the last belong to the same subject, but the +intervening clause strikes a careless reader as out of place and +heterogeneous. I think that we shall see it is not so; but for the +present we but note that here are three sets of precepts which +enjoin, first, honest love; then, next, a healthy vehemence against +evil and for good; and finally, a brotherly affection and mutual +respect. + +I. Let love be honest. + +Love stands at the head, and is the fontal source of all separate +individualised duties. Here Paul is not so much prescribing love as +describing the kind of love which he recognises as genuine, and the +main point on which he insists is sincerity. The 'dissimulation' of +the Authorised Version only covers half the ground. It means, hiding +what one is; but there is simulation, or pretending to be what one is +not. There are words of love which are like the iridescent scum on +the surface veiling the black depths of a pool of hatred. A Psalmist +complains of having to meet men whose words were 'smoother than +butter' and whose true feelings were as 'drawn swords'; but, short of +such consciously lying love, we must all recognise as a real danger +besetting us all, and especially those of us who are naturally +inclined to kindly relations with our fellows, the tendency to use +language just a little in excess of our feelings. The glove is +slightly stretched, and the hand in it is not quite large enough to +fill it. There is such a thing, not altogether unknown in Christian +circles, as benevolence, which is largely cant, and words of +conventional love about individuals which do not represent any +corresponding emotion. Such effusive love pours itself in words, and +is most generally the token of intense selfishness. Any man who seeks +to make his words a true picture of his emotions must be aware that +few harder precepts have ever been given than this brief one of the +Apostle's, 'Let love be without hypocrisy.' + +But the place where this exhortation comes in the apostolic sequence +here may suggest to us the discipline through which obedience to it +is made possible. There is little to be done by the way of directly +increasing either the fervour of love or the honesty of its +expression. The true method of securing both is to be growingly +transformed by 'the renewing of our minds,' and growingly to bring +our whole old selves under the melting and softening influence of +'the mercies of God.' It is swollen self-love, 'thinking more highly +of ourselves than we ought to think,' which impedes the flow of love +to others, and it is in the measure in which we receive into our +minds 'the mind that was in Christ Jesus,' and look at men as He did, +that we shall come to love them all honestly and purely. When we are +delivered from the monstrous oppression and tyranny of self, we have +hearts capable of a Christlike and Christ-giving love to all men, and +only they who have cleansed their hearts by union with Him, and by +receiving into them the purging influence of His own Spirit, will be +able to love without hypocrisy. + +II. Let love abhor what is evil, and cleave to what is good. + +If we carefully consider this apparently irrelevant interruption in +the sequence of the apostolic exhortations, we shall, I think, see at +once that the irrelevance is only apparent, and that the healthy +vehemence against evil and resolute clinging to good is as essential +to the noblest forms of Christian love as is the sincerity enjoined +in the previous clause. To detest the one and hold fast by the other +are essential to the purity and depth of our love. Evil is to be +loathed, and good to be clung to in our own moral conduct, and +wherever we see them. These two precepts are not mere tautology, but +the second of them is the ground of the first. The force of our +recoil from the bad will be measured by the firmness of our grasp +of the good; and yet, though inseparably connected, the one is apt to +be easier to obey than is the other. There are types of Christian men +to whom it is more natural to abhor the evil than to cleave to the +good; and there are types of character of which the converse is true. +We often see men very earnest and entirely sincere in their +detestation of meanness and wickedness, but very tepid in their +appreciation of goodness. To hate is, unfortunately, more congenial +with ordinary characters than to love; and it is more facile to look +down on badness than to look up at goodness. + +But it needs ever to be insisted upon, and never more than in this +day of spurious charity and unprincipled toleration, that a healthy +hatred of moral evil and of sin, wherever found and however garbed, +ought to be the continual accompaniment of all vigorous and manly +cleaving to that which is good. Unless we shudderingly recoil from +contact with the bad in our own lives, and refuse to christen it with +deceptive euphemisms when we meet it in social and civil life, we +shall but feebly grasp, and slackly hold, that which is good. Such +energy of moral recoil from evil is perfectly consistent with honest +love, for it is things, not men, that we are to hate; and it is +needful as the completion and guardian of love itself. There is +always danger that love shall weaken the condemnation of wrong, and +modern liberality, both in the field of opinion and in regard to +practical life, has so far condoned evil as largely to have lost its +hold upon good. The criminal is pitied rather than blamed, and a +multitude of agencies are so occupied in elevating the wrong-doers +that they lose sight of the need of punishing. + +Nor is it only in reference to society that this tendency works harm. +The effect of it is abundantly manifest in the fashionable ideas of +God and His character. There are whole schools of opinion which +practically strike out of their ideal of the Divine Nature abhorrence +of evil, and, little as they think it, are thereby fatally +impoverishing their ideal of God, and making it impossible to +understand His government of the world. As always, so in this matter, +the authentic revelation of the Divine Nature, and the perfect +pattern for the human are to be found in Jesus Christ. We recall that +wonderful incident, when on His last approach to Jerusalem, rounding +the shoulder of the Mount of Olives, He beheld the city, gleaming in +the morning sunshine across the valley, and forgetting His own +sorrow, shed tears over its approaching desolation, which yet He +steadfastly pronounced. His loathing of evil was whole-souled and +absolute, and equally intense and complete was His cleaving to that +which is good. In both, and in the harmony between them, He makes God +known, and prescribes and holds forth the ideal of perfect humanity +to men. + +III. Let sincere and discriminating love be concentrated on Christian +men. + +In the final exhortation of our text 'the love of the brethren' takes +the place of the more diffused and general love enjoined in the first +clause. The expression 'kindly affectioned' is the rendering of a +very eloquent word in the original in which the instinctive love of a +mother to her child, or the strange mystical ties which unite members +of a family together, irrespective of their differences of character +and temperament, are taken as an example after which Christian men +are to mould their relations to one another. The love which is +without hypocrisy, and is to be diffused on all sides, is also to be +gathered together and concentrated with special energy on all who +'call upon Jesus Christ as Lord, both their Lord and ours.' The more +general precept and the more particular are in perfect harmony, +however our human weakness sometimes confuses them. It is obvious +that this final precept of our text will be the direct result of the +two preceding, for the love which has learned to be moral, hating +evil, and clinging to good as necessary, when directed to possessors +of like precious faith will thrill with the consciousness of a deep +mystical bond of union, and will effloresce in all brotherly love and +kindly affections. They who are like one another in the depths of +their moral life, who are touched by like aspirations after like holy +things, and who instinctively recoil with similar revulsion from like +abominations, will necessarily feel the drawing of a unity far deeper +and sacreder than any superficial likenesses of race, or +circumstance, or opinion. Two men who share, however imperfectly, in +Christ's Spirit are more akin in the realities of their nature, +however they may differ on the surface, than either of them is to +another, however like he may seem, who is not a partaker in the life +of Christ. + +This instinctive, Christian love, like all true and pure love, is to +manifest itself by 'preferring one another in honour'; or as the word +might possibly be rendered, 'anticipating one another.' We are not to +wait to have our place assigned before we give our brother his. There +will be no squabbling for the chief seat in the synagogue, or the +uppermost rooms at the feast, where brotherly love marshals the +guests. The one cure for petty jealousies and the miserable strife +for recognition, which we are all tempted to engage in, lies in a +heart filled with love of the brethren because of its love to the +Elder Brother of them all, and to the Father who is His Father as +well as ours. What a contrast is presented between the practice of +Christians and these precepts of Paul! We may well bow ourselves in +shame and contrition when we read these clear-drawn lines indicating +what we ought to be, and set by the side of them the blurred and +blotted pictures of what we are. It is a painful but profitable task +to measure ourselves against Paul's ideal of Christ's commandment; +but it will only be profitable if it brings us to remember that +Christ gives before He commands, and that conformity with His ideal +must begin, not with details of conduct, or with emotion, however +pure, but with yielding ourselves to the God who moves us by His +mercies, and being 'transformed by the renewing of our minds' and +'the indwelling of Christ in our hearts by faith.' + + + + +A TRIPLET OF GRACES + + 'Not slothful in business; fervent in spirit; + serving the Lord.'--ROMANS xii. 11. + + +Paul believed that Christian doctrine was meant to influence +Christian practice; and therefore, after the fundamental and profound +exhibition of the central truths of Christianity which occupies the +earlier portion of this great Epistle, he tacks on, with a +'therefore' to his theological exposition, a series of plain, +practical teachings. The place where conduct comes in the letter is +profoundly significant, and, if the significance of it had been +observed and the spirit of it carried into practice, there would have +been less of a barren orthodoxy, and fewer attempts at producing +righteous conduct without faith. + +But not only is the place where this series of exhortations occur +very significant, but the order in which they appear is also +instructive. The great principle which covers all conduct, and may be +broken up into all the minutenesses of practical directions is +self-surrender. Give yourselves up to God; that is the Alpha and the +Omega of all goodness, and wherever that foundation is really laid, +on it will rise the fair building of a life which is a temple, +adorned with whatever things are lovely and of good report. So after +Paul has laid deep and broad the foundation of all Christian virtue +in his exhortation to present ourselves as living sacrifices, he goes +on to point out the several virtues in which such self-surrender will +manifest itself. There runs through the most of these exhortations an +arrangement in triplets--three sister Graces linked together +hand-in-hand as it were--and my text presents an example of that +threefoldness in grouping. 'Not slothful in business; fervent in +spirit; serving the Lord.' + +I. We have, first, the prime grace of Christian diligence. + +'Not slothful in business' suggests, by reason of our modern +restriction of that word 'business' to a man's daily occupation, a +much more limited range to this exhortation than the Apostle meant to +give it. The idea which is generally drawn from these words by +English readers is that they are to do their ordinary work +diligently, and, all the while, notwithstanding the cooling or +distracting influences of their daily avocations, are to keep +themselves 'fervent in spirit.' That is a noble and needful +conception of the command, but it does not express what is in the +Apostle's mind. He does not mean by 'business' a trade or profession, +or daily occupation. But the word means 'zeal' or 'earnestness.' And +what Paul says is just this--'In regard to your earnestness in all +directions, see that you are not slothful.' + +The force and drift of the whole precept is just the exhortation to +exercise the very homely virtue of diligence, which is as much a +condition of growth and maturity in the Christian as it is in any +other life. The very homeliness and obviousness of the duty causes us +often to lose sight of its imperativeness and necessity. + +Many of us, if we would sit quietly down and think of how we go about +our 'business,' as we call it, and of how we go about our Christian +life, which ought to be our highest business, would have great cause +for being ashamed. We begin the one early in the morning, we keep +hard at it all day, our eyes are wide open to see any opening where +money is to be made; that is all right. We give our whole selves to +our work whilst we are at it; that is as it should be. But why are +there not the same concentration, the same wide-awakeness, the same +open-eyed eagerness to find out ways of advancement, the same +resolved and continuous and all-comprehending and dominating +enthusiasm about our Christianity as there is about our shop, or our +mill, or our success as students? Why are we all fire in the one case +and all ice in the other? Why do we think that it is enough to lift +the burden that Christ lays upon us with one languid finger, and to +put our whole hand, or rather, as the prophet says, 'both hands +earnestly,' to the task of lifting the load of daily work? 'In your +earnestness be not slothful.' + +Brethren, that is a very homely exhortation. I wonder how many of us +can say, 'Lord! I have heard, and I have obeyed Thy precept.' + +II. Diligence must be fed by a fervent spirit. + +The word translated 'fervent' is literally boiling. The metaphor is +very plain and intelligible. The spirit brought into contact with +Christian truth and with the fire of the Holy Spirit will naturally +have its temperature raised, and will be moved by the warm touch as +heat makes water in a pot hung above a fire boil. Such emotion, +produced by the touch of the fiery Spirit of God, is what Paul +desires for, and enjoins on, all Christians; for such emotion is the +only way by which the diligence, without which no Christian progress +will be made, can be kept up. + +No man will work long at a task that his heart is not in; or if he +does, because he is obliged, the work will be slavery. In order, +then, that diligence may neither languish and become slothfulness, +nor be felt to be a heavy weight and an unwelcome necessity, Paul +here bids us see to it that our hearts are moved because there is a +fire below which makes 'the soul's depths boil in earnest.' + +Now, of course, I know that, as a great teacher has told us, 'The +gods approve the depth and not the tumult of the soul,' and I know +that there is a great deal of emotional Christianity which is worth +nothing. But it is not that kind of fervour that the Apostle is +enjoining here. Whilst it is perfectly true that mere emotion often +does co-exist with, and very often leads to, entire negligence as to +possessing and manifesting practical excellence, the true relation +between these is just the opposite--viz. that this fervour of which I +speak, this wide-awakeness and enthusiasm of a spirit all quickened +into rapidity of action by the warmth which it has felt from God in +Christ, should drive the wheels of life. Boiling water makes steam, +does it not? And what is to be done with the steam that comes off the +'boiling' spirit? You may either let it go roaring through a +waste-pipe and do nothing but make a noise and be idly dissipated in +the air, or you may lead it into a cylinder and make it lift a +piston, and then you will get work out of it. That is what the +Apostle desires us to do with our emotion. The lightning goes +careering through the sky, but we have harnessed it to tram-cars +nowadays, and made it 'work for its living,' to carry our letters and +light our rooms. Fervour of a Christian spirit is all right when it +is yoked to Christian work, and made to draw what else is a heavy +chariot. It is not emotion, but it is indolent emotion, that is the +curse of much of our 'fervent' Christianity. + +There cannot be too much fervour. There may be too little outlet +provided for the fervour to work in. It may all go off in comfortable +feeling, in enthusiastic prayers and 'Amens!' and 'So be it, Lords!' +and the like, or it may come with us into our daily tasks, and make +us buckle to with more earnestness, and more continuity. Diligence +driven by earnestness, and fervour that works, are the true things. + +And surely, surely there cannot be any genuine +Christianity--certainly there cannot be any deep Christianity--which +is not fervent. + +We hear from certain quarters of the Church a great deal about the +virtue of moderation. But it seems to me that, if you take into +account what Christianity tells us, the 'sober' feeling is fervent +feeling, and tepid feeling is imperfect feeling. I cannot understand +any man believing as plain matter-of-fact the truths on which the +whole New Testament insists, and keeping himself 'cool,' or, as our +friends call it, 'moderate.' Brethren, enthusiasm--which properly +means the condition of being dwelt in by a god--is the wise, the +reasonable attitude of Christian men, if they believe their own +Christianity and are really serving Jesus Christ. They should be +'diligent in business, fervent'--boiling--in spirit. + +III. The diligence and the fervency are both to be animated by the +thought, 'Serving the Lord!' + +Some critics, as many of you know, no doubt, would prefer to read +this verse in its last clause 'serving the time.' But that seems to +me a very lame and incomplete climax for the Apostle's thought, and +it breaks entirely the sequence which, as I think, is discernible in +it. Much rather, he here, in the closing member of the triplet, +suggests a thought which will be stimulus to the diligence and fuel +to the fire that makes the spirit boil. + +In effect he says, 'Think, when your hands begin to droop, and when +your spirits begin to be cold and indifferent, and languor to steal +over you, and the paralysing influences of the commonplace and the +familiar, and the small begin to assert themselves--think that you +are serving the Lord.' Will that not freshen you up? Will that not +set you boiling again? Will it not be easy to be diligent when we +feel that we are 'ever in the great Taskmaster's eye'? There are many +reasons for diligence--the greatness of the work, for it is no small +matter for us to get the whole lump of our nature leavened with the +good leaven; the continual operation of antagonistic forces which are +all round us, and are working night-shifts as well as day ones, +whether we as Christians are on short time or not, the brevity of the +period during which we have to work, and the tremendous issues which +depend upon the completeness of our service here--all these things +are reasons for our diligence. But _the_ reason is: 'Thou Christ +hast died for me, and livest for me; truly I am Thy slave.' That is +the thought that will make a man bend his back to his work, whatever +it be, and bend his will to his work, too, however unwelcome it may +be; and that is the thought that will stir his whole spirit to +fervour and earnestness, and thus will deliver him from the +temptations to languid and perfunctory work that ever creep over us. + +You can carry that motive--as we all know, and as we all forget when +the pinch comes--into your shop, your study, your office, your mill, +your kitchen, or wherever you go. 'On the bells of the horses there +shall be written, Holiness to the Lord,' said the prophet, and 'every +bowl in Jerusalem' may be sacred as the vessels of the altar. All +life may flash into beauty, and tower into greatness, and be smoothed +out into easiness, and the crooked things may be made straight and +the rough places plain, and the familiar and the trite be invested +with freshness and wonder as of a dream, if only we write over them, +'For the sake of the Master.' Then, whatever we do or bear, be it +common, insignificant, or unpleasant, will change its aspect, and all +will be sweet. Here is the secret of diligence and of fervency, 'I +set the Lord always before me.' + + + + +ANOTHER TRIPLET OF GRACES + + 'Rejoicing in hope; patient in tribulation; continuing + instant in prayer.'--ROMANS xii. 12. + + +These three closely connected clauses occur, as you all know, in the +midst of that outline of the Christian life with which the Apostle +begins the practical part of this Epistle. Now, what he omits in this +sketch of Christian duty seems to me quite as significant as what he +inserts. It is very remarkable that in the twenty verses devoted to +this subject, this is the only one which refers to the inner secrets +of the Christian life. Paul's notion of 'deepening the spiritual +life' was 'Behave yourself better in your relation to other people.' +So all the rest of this chapter is devoted to inculcating our duties +to one another. Conduct is all-important. An orthodox creed is +valuable if it influences action, but not otherwise. Devout emotion +is valuable, if it drives the wheels of life, but not otherwise. +Christians should make efforts to attain to clear views and warm +feelings, but the outcome and final test of both is a daily life of +visible imitation of Jesus. The deepening of spiritual life should be +manifested by completer, practical righteousness in the market-place +and the street and the house, which non-Christians will acknowledge. + +But now, with regard to these three specific exhortations here, I +wish to try to bring out their connection as well as the force of +each of them. + +I. So I remark first, that the Christian life ought to be joyful +because it is hopeful. + +Now, I do not suppose that many of us habitually recognise it as a +Christian duty to be joyful. We think that it is a matter of +temperament and partly a matter of circumstance. We are glad when +things go well with us. If we have a sunny disposition, and are +naturally light-hearted, all the better; if we have a melancholy or +morose one, all the worse. But do we recognise this, that a Christian +who is not joyful is not living up to his duty; and that there is no +excuse, either in temperament or in circumstances, for our not being +so, and always being so? 'Rejoice in the Lord alway,' says Paul; and +then, as if he thought, 'Some of you will be thinking that that is a +very rash commandment, to aim at a condition quite impossible to make +constant,' he goes on--'and, to convince you that I do not say it +hastily, I will repeat it--"and again I say, rejoice."' Brethren, we +shall have to alter our conceptions of what true gladness is before +we can come to understand the full depth of the great thought that +joy is a Christian duty. The true joy is not the kind of joy that a +saying in the Old Testament compares to the 'crackling of thorns +under a pot,' but something very much calmer, with no crackle in it; +and very much deeper, and very much more in alliance with 'whatsoever +things are lovely and of good report,' than that foolish, +short-lived, and empty mirth that burns down so soon into black +ashes. + +To be glad is a Christian duty. Many of us have as much religion as +makes us sombre, and impels us often to look upon the more solemn and +awful aspects of Christian truth, but we have not enough to make us +glad. I do not need to dwell upon all the sources in Christian faith +and belief, of that lofty and imperatively obligatory gladness, but I +confine myself to the one in my text, 'Rejoicing in hope.' + +Now, we all know--from the boy that is expecting to go home for his +holidays in a week, up to the old man to whose eye the time-veil is +wearing thin--that hope, if it is certain, is a source of gladness. +How lightly one's bosom's lord sits upon its throne, when a great +hope comes to animate us! how everybody is pleasant, and all things +are easy, and the world looks different! Hope, if it is certain, will +gladden, and if our Christianity grasps, as it ought to do, the only +hope that is absolutely certain, and as sure as if it were in the +past and had been experienced, then our hearts, too, will sing for +joy. True joy is _not_ a matter of temperament, so much as a matter +of faith. It is _not_ a matter of circumstances. All the surface +drainage may be dry, but there is a well in the courtyard deep and +cool and full and exhaustless, and a Christian who rightly +understands and cherishes the Christian hope is lifted above +temperament, and is not dependent upon conditions for his joys. + +The Apostle, in an earlier part of this same letter, defines for us +what that hope is, which thus is the secret of perpetual gladness, +when he speaks about 'rejoicing in hope of the glory of God.' Yes, it +is that great, supreme, calm, far off, absolutely certain prospect of +being gathered into the divine glory, and walking there, like the +three in the fiery furnace, unconsumed and at ease; it is that hope +that will triumph over temperament, and over all occasions for +melancholy, and will breathe into our life a perpetual gladness. +Brethren, is it not strange and sad that with such a treasure by our +sides we should consent to live such poor lives as we do? + +But remember, although I cannot say to myself, 'Now I will be glad,' +and cannot attain to joy by a movement of the will or direct effort, +although it is of no use to say to a man--which is all that the world +can ever say to him--'Cheer up and be glad,' whilst you do not alter +the facts that make him sad, there is a way by which we can bring +about feelings of gladness or of gloom. It is just this--we can +choose what we will look at. If you prefer to occupy your mind with +the troubles, losses, disappointments, hard work, blighted hopes of +this poor sin-ridden world, of course sadness will come over you +often, and a general grey tone will be the usual tone of your lives, +as it is of the lives of many of us, broken only by occasional bursts +of foolish mirth and empty laughter. But if you choose to turn away +from all these, and instead of the dim, dismal, hard present, to sun +yourselves in the light of the yet unrisen sun, which you can do, +then, having rightly chosen the subjects to think about, the feeling +will come as a matter of course. You cannot make yourselves glad by, +as it were, laying hold of yourselves and lifting yourselves into +gladness, but you can rule the direction of your thoughts, and so can +bring around you summer in the midst of winter, by steadily +contemplating the facts--and they are present facts, though we talk +about them collectively as 'the future'--the facts on which all +Christian gladness ought to be based. We can carry our own atmosphere +with us; like the people in Italy, who in frosty weather will be seen +sitting in the market-place by their stalls with a dish of embers, +which they grasp in their hands, and so make themselves comfortably +warm on the bitterest day. You can bring a reasonable degree of +warmth into the coldest weather, if you will lay hold of the vessel +in which the fire is, and keep it in your hand and close to your +heart. Choose what you think about, and feelings will follow +thoughts. + +But it needs very distinct and continuous effort for a man to keep +this great source of Christian joy clear before him. We are like the +dwellers in some island of the sea, who, in some conditions of the +atmosphere, can catch sight of the gleaming mountain-tops on the +mainland across the stormy channel between. But thick days, with a +heavy atmosphere and much mist, are very frequent in our latitude, +and then all the distant hills are blotted out, and we see nothing +but the cold grey sea, breaking on the cold, grey stones. Still, you +can scatter the mist if you will. You can make the atmosphere bright; +and it is worth an effort to bring clear before us, and to keep high +above the mists that cling to the low levels, the great vision which +will make us glad. Brethren, I believe that one great source of the +weakness of average Christianity amongst us to-day is the dimness +into which so many of us have let the hope of the glory of God pass +in our hearts. So I beg you to lay to heart this first commandment, +and to rejoice in hope. + +II. Now, secondly, here is the thought that life, if full of joyful +hope, will be patient. + +I have been saying that the gladness of which my text speaks is +independent of circumstances, and may persist and be continuous even +when externals occasion sadness. It is possible--I do not say it is +easy, God knows it is hard--I do not say it is frequently attained, +but I do say it is possible--to realise that wonderful ideal of the +Apostle's 'As sorrowful, yet always rejoicing.' The surface of the +ocean may be tossed and fretted by the winds, and churned into foam, +but the great central depths 'hear not the loud winds when they +call,' and are still in the midst of tempest. And we, dear brethren, +ought to have an inner depth of spirit, down to the disturbance of +which no surface-trouble can ever reach. That is the height of +attainment of Christian faith, but it is a possible attainment for +every one of us. + +And if there be that burning of the light under the water, like +'Greek fire,' as it was called, which many waters could not +quench--if there be that persistence of gladness beneath the +surface-sorrow, as you find a running stream coming out below a +glacier, then the joy and the hope, which co-exist with the sorrow, +will make life patient. + +Now, the Apostle means by these great words, 'patient' and +'patience,' which are often upon his lips, something more than simple +endurance. That endurance is as much as many of us can often muster +up strength to exercise. It sometimes takes all our faith and all our +submission simply to say, 'I opened not my mouth, because thou didst +it; and I will bear what thine hand lays upon me.' But that is not +all that the idea of Christian 'patience' includes, for it also takes +in the thought of active work, and it is _perseverance_ as much +as _patience_. + +Now, if my heart is filled with a calm gladness because my eye is +fixed upon a celestial hope, then both the passive and active sides +of Christian 'patience' will be realised by me. If my hope burns +bright, and occupies a large space in my thoughts, then it will not +be hard to take the homely consolation of good John Newton's hymn and +say-- + + 'Though painful at present, + 'Twill cease before long; + And then, oh, how pleasant + The conqueror's song!' + +A man who is sailing to America, and knows that he will be in New +York in a week, does not mind, although his cabin is contracted, and +he has a great many discomforts, and though he has a bout of +sea-sickness. The disagreeables are only going to last for a day or +two. So our hope will make us bear trouble, and not make much of it. + +And our hope will strengthen us, if it is strong, for all the work +that is to be done. Persistence in the path of duty, though my heart +be beating like a smith's hammer on the anvil, is what Christian men +should aim at, and possess. If we have within our hearts that fire of +a certain hope, it will impel us to diligence in doing the humblest +duty, whether circumstances be for or against us; as some great +steamer is driven right on its course, through the ocean, whatever +storms may blow in the teeth of its progress, because, deep down in +it, there are furnaces and boilers which supply the steam that drives +the engines. So a life that is joyful because it is hopeful will be +full of calm endurance and strenuous work. 'Rejoicing in hope; +patient,' persevering in tribulation. + +III. Lastly, our lives will be joyful, hopeful, and patient, in +proportion as they are prayerful. + +'Continuing instant'--which, of course, just means steadfast--'in +prayer.' Paul uttered a paradox when he said, 'Rejoice in the Lord +alway,' as he said long before this verse, in the very first letter +that he ever wrote, or at least the first which has come down to us. +There he bracketed it along with two other equally paradoxical +sayings. 'Rejoice evermore; pray without ceasing; in everything give +thanks.' If you pray without ceasing you can rejoice without ceasing. + +But can I pray without ceasing? Not if by prayer you mean only words +of supplication and petition, but if by prayer you mean also a mental +attitude of devotion, and a kind of sub-conscious reference to God in +all that you do, such unceasing prayer is possible. Do not let us +blunt the edge of this commandment, and weaken our own consciousness +of having failed to obey it, by getting entangled in the cobwebs of +mere curious discussions as to whether the absolute ideal of +perfectly unbroken communion with God is possible in this life. At +all events it is possible to us to approximate to that ideal a great +deal more closely than our consciences tell us that we ever yet have +done. If we are trying to keep our hearts in the midst of daily duty +in contact with God, and if, ever and anon in the press of our work, +we cast a thought towards Him and a prayer, then joy and hope and +patience will come to us, in a degree that we do not know much about +yet, but might have known all about long, long ago. + +There is a verse in the Old Testament which we may well lay to heart: +'They cried unto God in the battle, and He was entreated of them.' +Well, what sort of a prayer do you think that would be? Suppose that +you were standing in the thick of battle with the sword of an enemy +at your throat, there would not be much time for many words of +prayer, would there? But the cry could go up, and the thought could +go up, and as they went up, down would come the strong buckler which +God puts between His servants and all evil. That is the sort of +prayer that you, in the battle of business, in your shops and +counting-houses and warehouses and mills, we students in our studies, +and you mothers in your families and your kitchens, can send up to +heaven. If thus we 'pray without ceasing,' then we shall 'rejoice +evermore,' and our souls will be kept in patience and filled with the +peace of God. + + + + +STILL ANOTHER TRIPLET + + 'Distributing to the necessity of saints; given to + hospitality. 14. Bless them which persecute you: bless, + and curse not. 15. Rejoice with them that do rejoice, + and weep with them that weep.'--ROMANS xii. 13-15. + + +In these verses we pass from the innermost region of communion with +God into the wide field of duties in relation to men. The solitary +secrecies of rejoicing hope, endurance, and prayer unbroken, are +exchanged for the publicities of benevolence and sympathy. In the +former verses the Christian soul is in 'the secret place of the Most +High'; in those of our text he comes forth with the light of God on +his face, and hands laden with blessings. The juxtaposition of the +two suggests the great principles to which the morality of the New +Testament is ever true--that devotion to God is the basis of all +practical helpfulness to man, and that practical helpfulness to man +is the expression and manifestation of devotion to God. + +The three sets of injunctions in our text, dissimilar though they +appear, have a common basis. They are varying forms of one +fundamental disposition--love; which varies in its forms according to +the necessities of its objects, bringing temporal help to the needy, +meeting hostility with blessing, and rendering sympathy to both the +glad and the sorrowful. There is, further, a noteworthy connection, +not in sense but in sound, between the first and second clauses of +our text, which is lost in our English Version. 'Given to +hospitality' is, as the Revised margin shows, literally, pursuing +hospitality. Now the Greek, like the English word, has the special +meaning of following with a hostile intent, and the use of it in the +one sense suggests its other meaning to Paul, whose habit of 'going +off at a word,' as it has been called, is a notable feature of his +style. Hence, this second injunction, of blessing the persecutors, +comes as a kind of play upon words, and is obviously occasioned by +the verbal association. It would come more appropriately at a later +part of the chapter, but its occurrence here is characteristic of +Paul's idiosyncrasy. We may represent the connection of these two +clauses by such a rendering as: Pursue hospitality, and as for those +who pursue you, bless, and curse not. + +We may look at these three flowers from the one root of love. + +I. Love that speaks in material help. + +We have here two special applications of that love which Paul regards +as 'the bond of perfectness,' knitting all Christians together. The +former of these two is love that expresses itself by tangible +material aid. The persons to be helped are 'saints,' and it is their +'needs' that are to be aided. There is no trace in the Pauline +Epistles of the community of goods which for a short time prevailed +in the Church of Jerusalem and which was one of the causes that led +to the need for the contribution for the poor saints in that city +which occupied so much of Paul's attention at Corinth and elsewhere. +But, whilst Christian love leaves the rights of property intact, it +charges them with the duty of supplying the needs of the brethren. +They are not absolute and unconditioned rights, but are subject to +the highest principles of stewardship for God, trusteeship for men, +and sacrifice for Christ. These three great thoughts condition and +limit the Christian man's possession of the wealth, which, in a +modified sense, it is allowable for him to call his own. His +brother's need constitutes a first charge on all that belongs to him, +and ought to precede the gratification of his own desires for +superfluities and luxuries. If we 'see our brother have need and shut +up our bowels of compassion against him' and use our possessions for +the gratification of our own whims and fancies, 'how dwelleth the +love of God in us?' There are few things in which Christian men of +this day have more need for the vigorous exercise of conscience, and +for enlightenment, than in their getting, and spending, and keeping +money. In that region lies the main sphere of usefulness for many of +us; and if we have not been 'faithful in that which is least,' our +unfaithfulness there makes it all but impossible that we should be +faithful in that which is greatest. The honest and rigid +contemplation of our own faults in the administration of our worldly +goods, might well invest with a terrible meaning the Lord's +tremendous question, 'If ye have not been faithful in that which is +another's, who shall give you that which is your own?' + +The hospitality which is here enjoined is another shape which +Christian love naturally took in the early days. When believers were +a body of aliens, dispersed through the world, and when, as they went +from one place to another, they could find homes only amongst their +own brethren, the special circumstances of the time necessarily +attached special importance to this duty; and as a matter of fact, we +find it recognised in all the Epistles of the New Testament as one of +the most imperative of Christian duties. 'It was the unity and +strength which this intercourse gave that formed one of the great +forces which supported Christianity.' But whilst hospitality was a +special duty for the early Christians, it still remains a duty for +us, and its habitual exercise would go far to break down the frowning +walls which diversities of social position and of culture have reared +between Christians. + +II. The love that meets hostility with blessing. + +There are perhaps few words in Scripture which have been more +fruitful of the highest graces than this commandment. What a train of +martyrs, from primitive times to the Chinese Christians in recent +years, have remembered these words, and left their legacy of blessing +as they laid their heads on the block or stood circled by fire at the +stake! For us, in our quieter generation, actual persecution is rare, +but hostility of ill-will more or less may well dog our steps, and +the great principle here commended to us is that we are to meet +enmity with its opposite, and to conquer by love. The diamond is cut +with sharp knives, and each stroke brings out flashing beauty. There +are kinds of wood which are fragrant when they burn; and there are +kinds which show their veining under the plane. It is a poor thing if +a Christian character only gives back like a mirror the expression of +the face that looks at it. To meet hate with hate, and scorn with +scorn, is not the way to turn hate into love and scorn into sympathy. +Indifferent equilibrium in the presence of active antagonism is not +possible for us. As long as we are sensitive we shall wince from a +blow, or a sarcasm, or a sneer. We must bless in order to keep +ourselves from cursing. The lesson is very hard, and the only way of +obeying it fully is to keep near Christ and drink in His spirit who +prayed 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.' + +III. Love that flows in wide sympathy. + +Of the two forms of sympathy which are here enjoined, the former is +the harder. To 'rejoice with them that do rejoice' makes a greater +demand on unselfish love than to 'weep with them that weep.' Those +who are glad feel less need of sympathy than do the sorrowful, and +envy is apt to creep in and mar the completeness of sympathetic joy. +But even the latter of the two injunctions is not altogether easy. +The cynic has said that there is 'something not wholly displeasing in +the misfortunes of our best friends'; and, though that is an utterly +worldly and unchristian remark, it must be confessed not to be +altogether wanting in truth. + +But for obedience to both of these injunctions, a heart at leisure +from itself is needed to sympathise; and not less needed is a +sedulous cultivation of the power of sympathy. No doubt temperament +has much to do with the degree of our obedience; but this whole +context goes on the assumption that the grace of God working on +temperament strengthens natural endowments by turning them into +'gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us.' Though +we live in that awful individuality of ours, and are each, as it +were, is landed in ourselves 'with echoing straits between us thrown,' +it is possible for us, as the result of close communion with Jesus +Christ, to bridge the chasms, and to enter into the joy of a +brother's joy. He who groaned in Himself as He drew near to the grave +of Lazarus, and was moved to weep with the weeping sisters, will help +us, in the measure in which we dwell in Him and He in us, that we too +may look 'not every man on his own things, but every man also on the +things of others.' + +On the whole, love to Jesus is the basis of love to man, and love to +man is the practical worship of Christianity. As in all things, so in +the exhortations which we have now been considering, Jesus is our +pattern and power. He Himself communicates with our necessities, and +opens His heart to give us hospitable welcome there. He Himself has +shown us how to meet and overcome hatred with love, and hurt with +blessing. He shares our griefs, and by sharing lessens them. He +shares our joys, and by sharing hallows them. The summing up of all +these specific injunctions is, 'Let that mind be in you which was +also in Christ Jesus.' + + + + +STILL ANOTHER TRIPLET + + 'Be of the same mind one toward another. Set not your + mind on high things, but condescend to things that are + lowly. Be not wise in your own conceits.'--Romans xii. 16 (R.V.). + + +We have here again the same triple arrangement which has prevailed +through a considerable portion of the context. These three +exhortations are linked together by a verbal resemblance which can +scarcely be preserved in translation. In the two former the same verb +is employed: and in the third the word for 'wise' is cognate with the +verb found in the other two clauses. If we are to seek for any closer +connection of thought we may find it first in this--that all the +three clauses deal with mental attitudes, whilst the preceding ones +dealt with the expression of such; and second in this--that the first +of the three is a general precept, and the second and third are +warnings against faults which are most likely to interfere with it. + +I. We note, the bond of peace. + +'Be of the same mind one toward another.' It is interesting to notice +how frequently the Apostle in many of his letters exhorts to mutual +harmonious relations. For instance, in this very Epistle he invokes +'the God of patience and of comfort' to grant to the Roman Christians +'to be of the same mind with one another according to Christ Jesus,' +and to the Corinthians, who had their full share of Greek +divisiveness, he writes, 'Be of the same mind, live in peace,' and +assures them that, if so, 'the God of love and peace will be with +them'; to his beloved Philippians he pours out his heart in +beseeching them by 'the consolation that is in Christ Jesus, and the +comfort of love, and the fellowship of the Spirit--' that they would +'fulfil his joy, that they be of the same mind, having the same love, +being of one accord, of one mind'; whilst to the two women in that +Church who were at variance with one another he sends the earnest +exhortation 'to be of the same mind in the Lord,' and prays one whom +we only know by his loving designation of 'a true yokefellow,' to +help them in what would apparently put a strain upon their Christian +principle. For communities and for individuals the cherishing of the +spirit of amity and concord is a condition without which there will +be little progress in the Christian life. + +But it is to be carefully noted that such a spirit may co-exist with +great differences about other matters. It is not opposed to wide +divergence of opinion, though in our imperfect sanctification it is +hard for us to differ and yet to be in concord. We all know the +hopelessness of attempting to make half a dozen good men think alike +on any of the greater themes of the Christian religion; and if we +could succeed in such a vain attempt, there would still be many an +unguarded door through which could come the spirit of discord, and +the half-dozen might have divergence of heart even whilst they +profess identity of opinion. The true hindrances to our having 'the +same mind one toward another' lie very much deeper in our nature than +the region in which we keep our creeds. The self-regard and +self-absorption, petulant dislike of fellow-Christians' +peculiarities, the indifference which comes from lack of imaginative +sympathy, and which ministers to the ignorance which causes it, and a +thousand other weaknesses in Christian character bring about the +deplorable alienation which but too plainly marks the relation of +Christian communities and of individual Christians to one another in +this day. When one thinks of the actual facts in every corner of +Christendom, and probes one's own feelings, the contrast between the +apostolic ideal and the Church's realisation of it presents a +contradiction so glaring that one wonders if Christian people at all +believe that it is their duty 'to be of the same mind one toward +another.' + +The attainment of this spirit of amity and concord ought to be a +distinct object of effort, and especially in times like ours, when +there is no hostile pressure driving Christian people together, but +when our great social differences are free to produce a certain +inevitable divergence and to check the flow of our sympathy, and when +there are deep clefts of opinion, growing deeper every day, and +seeming to part off Christians into camps which have little +understanding of, and less sympathy with, one another. Even the +strong individualism, which it is the glory of true Christian faith +to foster in character, and which some forms of Christian fellowship +do distinctly promote, works harm in this matter; and those who pride +themselves on belonging to 'Free churches,' and standing apart from +creed-bound and clergy-led communities, are specially called upon to +see to it that they keep this exhortation, and cultivate 'the unity +of the Spirit in the bond of peace.' + +It should not be necessary to insist that the closest mutual concord +amongst all believers is but an imperfect manifestation, as all +manifestations in life of the deepest principles must be, of the true +oneness which binds together in the most sacred unity, and should +bind together in closest friendship, all partakers of the one life. +And assuredly the more that one life flows into our spirits, the less +power will all the enemies of Christian concord have over us. It is +the Christ in us which makes us kindred with all others in whom He +is. It is self, in some form or other, that separates us from the +possessors of like precious faith. When the tide is out, the little +rock-pools on the shore lie separated by stretches of slimy weeds, +but the great sea, when it rushes up, buries the divisions, and +unites them all. Our Christian unity is unity in Christ, and the only +sure way 'to be of the same mind one toward another' is, that 'the +mind which was in Christ Jesus be in us also.' + +II. The divisive power of selfish ambition. + +'Set not your mind on high things, but condescend to things that are +lowly.' The contrast here drawn between the high and the lowly makes +it probable that the latter as well as the former is to be taken as +referring to 'things' rather than persons. The margin of the Revised +Version gives the literal rendering of the word translated +'condescend.' 'To be carried away with,' is metaphorically equivalent +to surrendering one's self to; and the two clauses present two sides +of one disposition, which seeks not for personal advancement or +conspicuous work which may minister to self-gratulation, but +contentedly fills the lowly sphere, and 'the humblest duties on +herself doth lay.' We need not pause to point out that such an ideal +is dead against the fashionable maxims of this generation. Personal +ambition is glorified as an element in progress, and to a world which +believes in such a proverb as 'devil take the hindmost,' these two +exhortations can only seem fanatical absurdity. And yet, perhaps, if +we fairly take into account how the seeking after personal +advancement and conspicuous work festers the soul, and how the flower +of heart's-ease grows, as Bunyan's shepherd-boy found out, in the +lowly valley, these exhortations to a quiet performance of lowly +duties and a contented filling of lowly spheres, may seem touched +with a higher wisdom than is to be found in the arenas where men +trample over each other in their pursuit of a fame 'which appeareth +for a little time, and then vanisheth away.' What a peaceful world it +would be, and what peaceful souls they would have, if Christian +people really adopted as their own these two simple maxims. They are +easy to understand, but how hard they are to follow. + +It needs scarcely be noted that the temper condemned here destroys +all the concord and amity which the Apostle has been urging in the +previous clause. Where every man is eagerly seeking to force himself +in front of his neighbour, any community will become a struggling +mob; and they who are trying to outrun one another and who grasp at +'high things,' will never be 'of the same mind one toward another.' +But, we may observe that the surest way to keep in check the natural +selfish tendency to desire conspicuous things for ourselves is +honestly, and with rigid self-control, to let ourselves be carried +away by enthusiasm for humble tasks. If we would not disturb our +lives and fret our hearts by ambitions that, even when gratified, +bring no satisfaction, we must yield ourselves to the impulse of the +continuous stream of lowly duties which runs through every life. + +But, plainly as this exhortation is needful, it is too +heavy a strain to be ever carried out except by the power of Christ +formed in the heart. It is in His earthly life that we find the great +example of the highest stooping to the lowest duties, and elevating +them by taking them upon Himself. He did not 'strive nor cry, nor +cause His voice to be heard in the streets.' Thirty years of that +perfect life were spent in a little village folded away in the +Galilean hills, with rude peasants for the only spectators, and the +narrow sphere of a carpenter's shop for its theatre. For the rest, +the publicity possible would have been obscurity to an ambitious +soul. To speak comforting words to a few weeping hearts; to lay His +hands on a few sick folk and heal them; to go about in a despised +land doing good, loved indeed by outcasts and sinners, unknown by +all the dispensers of renown, and consciously despised by all whom +the world honoured--that was the perfect life of the Incarnate God. +And that is an example which His followers seem with one consent to +set aside in their eager race after distinction and work that may +glorify their names. The difficulty of a faithful following of these +precepts, and the only means by which that difficulty can be +overcome, are touchingly taught us in another of Paul's Epistles by +the accumulation of motives which he brings to bear upon his +commandment, when he exhorts by the tender motives of 'comfort in +Christ, consolation of love, fellowship of the Spirit, and tender +mercies and compassions, that ye fulfil my joy, being of the same +mind, of one accord; doing nothing through faction or vainglory, but +in lowliness of mind each counting other better than himself.' As the +pattern for each of us in our narrow sphere, he holds forth the mind +that was in Christ Jesus, and the great self-emptying which he shrank +not from, 'but being in the form of God counted it not a prize to be +on an equality with God, but, being found in fashion as a man, He +humbled Himself, becoming obedient even unto death.' + +III. The divisive power of intellectual self-conceit. + +In this final clause the Apostle, in some sense, repeats the maxim +with which he began the series of special exhortations in this +chapter. He there enjoined 'every one among you not to think of +himself more highly than he ought to think'; here he deals with one +especial form of such too lofty thinking, viz. intellectual conceit. +He is possibly quoting the Book of Proverbs (iii. 7), where we read, +'Be not wise in thine own eyes,' which is preceded by, 'Lean not to +thine own understanding; in all thy ways acknowledge Him'; and is +followed by, 'Fear the Lord and depart from evil'; thus pointing to +the acknowledgment and fear of the Lord as the great antagonist of +such over-estimate of one's own wisdom as of all other faults of mind +and life. It needs not to point out how such a disposition breaks +Christian unity of spirit. There is something especially isolating in +that form of self-conceit. There are few greater curses in the Church +than little coteries of superior persons who cannot feed on ordinary +food, whose enlightened intelligence makes them too fastidious to +soil their dainty fingers with rough, vulgar work, and whose +supercilious criticism of the unenlightened souls that are content to +condescend to lowly Christian duties, is like an iceberg that brings +down the temperature wherever it floats. That temper indulged in, +breaks the unity, reduces to inactivity the work, and puts an end to +the progress, of any Christian community in which it is found; and +just as its predominance is harmful, so the obedience to the +exhortation against it is inseparable from the fulfilling of its +sister precepts. To know ourselves for the foolish creatures that we +are, is a mighty help to being 'of the same mind one toward another.' +Who thinks of himself soberly and according to the measure of faith +which God hath dealt to him will not hunger after high things, but +rather prefer the lowly ones that are on a level with his lowly self. + +The exhortations of our text were preceded with injunctions to +distribute material help, and to bestow helpful sympathy. The tempers +enjoined in our present text are the inward source and fountain of +such external bestowments. The rendering of material help and of +sympathetic emotion are right and valuable only as they are the +outcome of this unanimity and lowliness. It is possible to +'distribute to the necessity of saints' in such a way as that the +gift pains more than a blow; it is possible to proffer sympathy so +that the sensitive heart shrinks from it. It was 'when the multitude +of them that believed were of one heart and one soul' that it became +natural to have all things common. As in the aurora borealis, +quivering beams from different centres stream out and at each throb +approach each other till they touch and make an arch of light that +glorifies the winter's night, so, if Christian men were 'of the same +mind toward one another,' did not 'set their minds on high things, +but condescended to things that were lowly, and were not wise in +their own conceits,' the Church of Christ would shine forth in the +darkness of a selfish world and would witness to Him who came down +'from the highest throne in glory' to the lowliest place in this +lowly world, that He might lift us to His own height of glory +everlasting. + + + + +STILL ANOTHER TRIPLET + + 'Render to no man evil for evil. Take thought for + things honourable in the light of all men. 18. If it + be possible, as much as in you lieth, be at peace + with all men.'--ROMANS xii. 17, 18 (R.V.). + + +The closing words of this chapter have a certain unity in that they +deal principally with a Christian's duty in the face of hostility and +antagonism. A previous injunction touched on the same subject in the +exhortation to bless the persecutors; but with that exception, all +the preceding verses have dealt with duties owing to those with whom +we stand in friendly relations. Such exhortations take no cognisance +of the special circumstances of the primitive Christians as 'lambs in +the midst of wolves'; and a large tract of Christian duty would be +undealt with, if we had not such directions for feelings and actions +in the face of hate and hurt. The general precept in our text is +expanded in a more complete form in the verses which follow the text, +and we may postpone its consideration until we have to deal with +them. It is one form of the application of the 'love without +hypocrisy' which has been previously recommended. The second of these +three precepts seems quite heterogeneous, but it may be noticed that +the word for 'evil' in the former and that for 'honourable,' in these +closely resemble each other in sound, and the connection of the two +clauses may be partially owing to that verbal resemblance; whilst we +may also discern a real link between the thoughts in the +consideration that we owe even to our enemies the exhibition of a +life which a prejudiced hostility will be forced to recognise as +good. The third of these exhortations prescribes unmoved persistence +in friendly regard to all men. + +Dealing then, in this sermon only, with the second and third of these +precepts, and postponing the consideration of the first to the +following discourse, we have here the counsel that + +I. Hostility is to be met with a holy and beautiful life. + +The Authorised Version inadequately translates the significant word +in this exhortation by 'honest.' The Apostle is not simply enjoining +honesty in our modern, narrow sense of the word, which limits it to +the rendering to every man his own. It is a remarkable thing that +'honest,' like many other words expressing various types of goodness, +has steadily narrowed in signification, and it is very characteristic +of England that probity as to money and material goods should be its +main meaning. Here the word is used in the full breadth of its +ancient use, and is equivalent to that which is fair with the moral +beauty of goodness. + +A Christian man then is bound to live a life which all men will +acknowledge to be good. In that precept is implied the recognition of +even bad men's notions of morality as correct. The Gospel is not a +new system of ethics, though in some points it brings old virtues +into new prominence, and alters their perspective. It is further +implied that the world's standard of what Christians ought to be may +be roughly taken as a true one. Christian men would learn a great +deal about themselves, and might in many respects heighten their +ideal, if they would try to satisfy the expectations of the most +degraded among them as to what they ought to be. The worst of men has +a rude sense of duty which tops the attainments of the best. +Christian people ought to seek for the good opinion of those around +them. They are not to take that opinion as the motive for their +conduct, nor should they do good in order to be praised or admired +for it; but they are to 'adorn the doctrine,' and to let their light +shine that men seeing their good may be led to think more loftily of +its source, and so to 'glorify their Father which is in heaven.' That +is one way of preaching the Gospel. The world knows goodness when it +sees it, though it often hates it, and has no better ground for its +dislike of a man than that his purity and beauty of character make +the lives of others seem base indeed. Bats feel the light to be +light, though they flap against it, and the winnowing of their +leathery wings and their blundering flight are witnesses to that +against which they strike. Jesus had to say, 'The world hateth Me +because I testify of it that the deeds thereof are evil.' That +witness was the result of His being 'the Light of the world'; and if +His followers are illuminated from Him, they will have the same +effect, and must be prepared for the same response. But none the less +is it incumbent upon them to 'take thought for things honourable in +the sight of all men.' + +This duty involves the others of taking care that we have goodness to +show, and that we do not make our goodness repulsive by our additions +to it. There are good people who comfort themselves when men dislike +them, or scoff at them, by thinking that their religion is the cause, +when it is only their own roughness and harshness of character. It is +not enough that we present an austere and repellent virtue; the fair +food should be set on a fair platter. This duty is especially owing +to our enemies. They are our keenest critics. They watch for our +halting. The thought of their hostile scrutiny should ever stimulate +us, and the consciousness that Argus-eyes are watching us, with a +keenness sharpened by dislike, should lead us not only to vigilance +over our own steps, but also to the prayer, 'Lead me in a plain path, +because of those who watch me.' To 'provide things honest in the +sight of all men' is a possible way of disarming some hostility, +conciliating some prejudice, and commending to some hearts the Lord +whom we seek to imitate. + +II. Be sure that, if there is to be enmity, it is all on one side. + +'As much as in you lieth, be at peace with all.' These words are, I +think, unduly limited when they are supposed to imply that there are +circumstances in which a Christian has a right to be at strife. As if +they meant: Be peaceable as far as you can; but if it be impossible, +then quarrel. The real meaning goes far deeper than that. 'It takes +two to make a quarrel,' says the old proverb; it takes two to make +peace also, does it not? We cannot determine whether our relations +with men will be peaceful or no; we are only answerable for our part, +and for that we are answerable. 'As much as lieth in you' is the +explanation of 'if it be possible.' Your part is to be at peace; it +is not your part up to a certain point and no further, but always, +and in all circumstances, it is your part. It may not be possible to +be at peace with all men; there may be some who _will_ quarrel with +you. You are not to blame for that, but their part and yours are +separate, and your part is the same whatever they do. Be you at peace +with all men whether they are at peace with you or not. Don't you +quarrel with them even if they will quarrel with you. That seems to +me to be plainly the meaning of the words. It would be contrary to +the tenor of the context and the teaching of the New Testament to +suppose that here we had that favourite principle, 'There is a point +beyond which forbearance cannot go,' where it becomes right to +cherish hostile sentiments or to try to injure a man. If there be such +a point, it is very remarkable that there is no attempt made in the +New Testament to define it. The nearest approach to such definition +is 'till seventy times seven,' the two perfect numbers multiplied +into themselves. So I think that this injunction absolutely +prescribes persistent, patient peacefulness, and absolutely +proscribes our taking up the position of antagonism, and under no +circumstances meeting hate with hate. It does not follow that there +is never to be opposition. It may be necessary for the good of the +opponent himself, and for the good of society, that he should be +hindered in his actions of hostility, but there is never to be +bitterness; and we must take care that none of the devil's leaven +mingles with our zeal against evil. + +There is no need for enlarging on the enormous difficulty of carrying +out such a commandment in our daily lives. We all know too well how +hard it is; but we may reflect for a moment on the absolute necessity +of obeying this precept to the full. For their own souls' sakes +Christian men are to avoid all bitterness, strife, and malice. Let us +try to remember, and to bring to bear on our daily lives, the solemn +things which Jesus said about God's forgiveness being measured by our +forgiveness. The faithful, even though imperfect, following of this +exhortation would revolutionise our lives. Nothing that we can only +win by fighting with our fellows is worth fighting for. Men will +weary of antagonism which is met only by the imperturbable calm of a +heart at peace with God, and seeking peace with all men. The hot fire +of hatred dies down, like burning coals scattered on a glacier, when +laid against the crystal coldness of a patient, peaceful spirit. +Watch-dogs in farmhouses will bark half the night through because +they hear another barking a mile off. It takes two to make a quarrel; +let me be sure that I am never one of the two! + + + + +STILL ANOTHER TRIPLET + + 'Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give + place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; + I will repay, saith the Lord. 20. Therefore if thine + enemy hunger, feed him: if he thirst, give him drink; + for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his + head. 21. Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil + with good.'--ROMANS xii. 19-21. + + +The natural instinct is to answer enmity with enmity, and kindliness +with kindliness. There are many people of whom we think well and +like, for no other reason than because we believe that they think +well of and like us. Such a love is really selfishness. In the same +fashion, dislike, and alienation on the part of another naturally +reproduce themselves in our own minds. A dog will stretch its neck to +be patted, and snap at a stick raised to strike it. It requires a +strong effort to master this instinctive tendency, and that effort +the plainest principles of Christian morality require from us all. +The precepts in our text are in twofold form, negative and positive; +and they are closed with a general principle, which includes both +these forms, and much more besides. There are two pillars, and a +great lintel coping them, like the trilithons of Stonehenge. + +I. We deal with the negative precept. + +'Avenge not yourselves, beloved, but give place unto wrath.' Do not +take the law into your own hands, but leave God's way of retribution +to work itself out. By avenging, the Apostle means a passionate +redress of private wrongs at the bidding of personal resentment. We +must note how deep this precept goes. It prohibits not merely +external acts which, in civilised times are restrained by law, but, +as with Christian morality, it deals with thoughts and feelings, and +not only with deeds. It forbids such natural and common thoughts as +'I owe him an ill turn for that'; 'I should like to pay him off.' A +great deal of what is popularly called 'a proper spirit' becomes +extremely improper if tested by this precept. There is an eloquent +word in German which we can only clumsily reproduce, which christens +the ugly pleasure at seeing misfortune and calls it 'joy in others' +disasters.' We have not the word; would that we had not the thing! + +A solemn reason is added for the difficult precept, in that +frequently misunderstood saying, 'Give place unto wrath.' The +question is, Whose wrath? And, plainly, the subsequent words of the +section show that it is God's. That quotation comes from Deuteronomy +xxxii. 35. It is possibly unfortunate that 'vengeance' is ascribed to +God; for hasty readers lay hold of the idea of passionate resentment, +and transfer it to Him, whereas His retributive action has in it no +resentment and no passion. Nor are we to suppose that the thought +here is only the base one, _they are sure to be punished, so we +need not trouble_. The Apostle points to the solemn fact of +retribution as an element in the Divine government. It is not merely +automatically working laws which recompense evil by evil, +but it is the face of the Lord which is inexorably and inevitably set +'against them that do evil.' That recompense is not hidden away in +the future behind the curtain of death, but is realised in the +present, as every evil-doer too surely and bitterly experiences. + +'Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord.' God only has the +right to recompense the ungodly and the sinner as well as the +righteous. Dwelling in such a system as we do, how dares any one take +that work into his hands? It requires perfect knowledge of the true +evil of an action, which no one has who cannot read the heart; it +requires perfect freedom from passion; it requires perfect immunity +from evil desert on the part of the avenger; in a word, it belongs to +God, and to Him alone. We have nothing to do with apportioning +retribution to desert, either in private actions or in the treatment +of so-called criminals. In the latter our objects should be +reformation and the safety of society. If we add to these +retribution, we transcend our functions. + +II. Take the positive,--Follow God's way of meeting hostility with +beneficence. + +The hungry enemy is to be fed, the thirsty to be given drink; and the +reason is, that such beneficence will 'heap coals of fire upon his +head.' The negative is not enough. To abstain from vengeance will +leave the heart unaffected, and may simply issue in the cessation of +all intercourse. The reason assigned sounds at first strange. It is +clear that the 'coals of fire' which are to be heaped on the head are +meant to melt and soften the heart, and cause it to glow with love. +There may be also included the burning pangs of shame felt by a man +whose evil is answered by good. But these are secondary and auxiliary +to the true end of kindling the fire of love in his alienated heart. +The great object which every Christian man is bound to have in view +is to win over the enemy and melt away misconceptions and hostility. +It is not from any selfish regard to one's own personal ease that we +are so to act, but because of the sacred regard which Christ has +taught us to cherish for the blessing of peace amongst men, and in +order that we may deliver a brother from the snare, and make him +share in the joys of fellowship with God. The only way to burn up the +evil in his heart is by heaping coals of kindness and beneficence on +his head. And for such an end it becomes us to watch for +opportunities. We have to mark the right moment, and make sure that +we time our offer for food when he is hungry and of drink when he +thirsts; for often _mal-a-propos_ offers of kindness make things +worse. Such is God's way. His thunderbolts we cannot grasp, His love +we can copy. Of the two weapons mercy and judgment which He holds in +His hand, the latter is emphatically His own; the former should be +ours too. + +III. In all life meet and conquer evil with good. + +This last precept, 'Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with +good,' is cast into a form which covers not only relations to +enemies, but all contact with evil of every kind. It involves many +great thoughts which can here be only touched. It implies that in all +our lives we have to fight evil, and that it conquers, and we are +beaten when we are led to do it. It is only conquered by being +transformed into good. We overcome our foes when we win them to be +lovers. We overcome our temptations to doing wrong when we make them +occasions for developing virtues; we overcome the evil of sorrow when +we use it to bring us nearer to God; we overcome the men around us +when we are not seduced by their example to evil, but attract them to +goodness by ours. + +Evil is only thus transformed by the positive exercise of goodness on +our part. We have seen this in regard to enemies in the preceding +remarks. In regard to other forms of evil, it is often better not to +fight them directly, but to occupy the mind and heart with positive +truth and goodness, and the will and hands with active service. A +rusty knife shall not be cleaned so effectually by much scouring as +by strenuous use. Our lives are to be moulded after the great example +of Him, who at almost the last moment of His earthly course said, 'Be +of good cheer: I have overcome the world.' Jesus seeks to conquer +evil in us all, and counts that He has conquered it when He has +changed it into love. + + + + +LOVE AND THE DAY + + 'Owe no man anything, but to love one another: for he that + loveth another hath fulfilled the law. 9. For this, Thou + shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt + not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not + covet; and if there be any other commandment it is briefly + comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy + neighbour as thyself. 10. Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: + therefore love is the fulfilling of the law. 11. And that, + knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of + sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. + 12. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us + therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put + on the armour of light, 13. Let us walk honestly, as in + the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering + and wantonness, not in strife and envying: 14. But put ye + on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the + flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof.'--ROMANS xiii. 8-14. + + +The two paragraphs of this passage are but slightly connected. The +first inculcates the obligation of universal love; and the second +begins by suggesting, as a motive for the discharge of that duty, the +near approach of 'the day.' The light of that dawn draws Paul's eyes +and leads him to wider exhortations on Christian purity as befitting +the children of light. + +I. Verses 8-10 set forth the obligation of a love which embraces all +men, and comprehends all duties to them. The Apostle has just been +laying down the general exhortation, 'Pay every man his due' and +applying it especially to the Christian's relation to civic rulers. +He repeats it in a negative form, and bases on it the obligation of +loving every man. That love is further represented as the sum and +substance of the law. Thus Paul brings together two thoughts which +are often dealt with as mutually exclusive,--namely, love and law. He +does not talk sentimentalisms about the beauty of charity and the +like, but lays it down, as a 'hard and fast rule,' that we are bound +to love every man with whom we come in contact; or, as the Greek has +it, 'the other.' + +That is the first plain truth taught here. Love is not an emotion +which we may indulge or not, as we please. It is not to select its +objects according to our estimate of their lovableness or goodness. +But we are bound to love, and that all round, without distinction of +beautiful or ugly, good or bad. 'A hard saying; who can hear it?' +Every man is our creditor for that debt. He does not get his due from +us unless he gets love. Note, further, that the debt of love is never +discharged. After all payments it still remains owing. There is no +paying in full of all demands, and, as Bengel says, it is an undying +debt. We are apt to weary of expending love, especially on unworthy +recipients, and to think that we have wiped off all claims, and it +may often be true that our obligations to others compel us to cease +helping one; but if we laid Paul's words to heart, our patience would +be longer-breathed, and we should not be so soon ready to shut hearts +and purses against even unthankful suitors. + +Further, Paul here teaches us that this debt (_debitum_, 'duty') of +love includes all duties. It is the fulfilling of the law, inasmuch +as it will secure the conduct which the law prescribes. The Mosaic +law itself indicates this, since it recapitulates the various +commandments of the second table, in the one precept of love to our +neighbour (Lev. xix. 18). Law enjoins but has no power to get its +injunctions executed. Love enables and inclines to do all that law +prescribes, and to avoid all that it prohibits. The multiplicity of +duties is melted into unity; and that unity, when it comes into act, +unfolds into whatsoever things are lovely and of good report. Love is +the mother tincture which, variously diluted and manipulated, yields +all potent and fragrant draughts. It is the white light which the +prism of daily life resolves into its component colours. + +But Paul seems to limit the action of love here to negative doing no +ill. That is simply because the commandments are mostly negative, and +that they are is a sad token of the lovelessness natural to us all. +But do we love ourselves only negatively, or are we satisfied with +doing ourselves no harm? That stringent pattern of love to others not +only prescribes degree, but manner. It teaches that true love to men +is not weak indulgence, but must sometimes chastise, and thwart, and +always must seek their good, and not merely their gratification. + +Whoever will honestly seek to apply that negative precept of working +no ill to others, will find it positive enough. We harm men when we +fail to help them. If we can do them a kindness, and do it not, we do +them ill. Non-activity for good is activity for evil. Surely, nothing +can be plainer than the bearing of this teaching on the Christian +duty as to intoxicants. If by using these a Christian puts a +stumbling-block in the way of a weak will, then he is working ill to +his neighbour, and that argues absence of love, and that is +dishonest, shirking payment of a plain debt. + +II. The great stimulus to love and to all purity is set forth as +being the near approach--of the day (verses 11-14). 'The day,' in +Paul's writing, has usually the sense of the great day of the Lord's +return, and may have that meaning here; for, as Jesus has told us, +'it is not for' even inspired Apostles 'to know the times or the +seasons,' and it is no dishonour to apostolic inspiration to assign +to it the limits which the Lord has assigned. + +But, whether we take this as the meaning of the phrase, or regard it +simply as pointing to the time of death as the dawning of heaven's +day, the weight of the motive is unaffected. The language is vividly +picturesque. The darkness is thinning, and the blackness turning +grey. Light begins to stir and whisper. A band of soldiers lies +asleep, and, as the twilight begins to dawn, the bugle call summons +them to awake, to throw off their night-gear,--namely, the works +congenial to darkness,--and to brace on their armour of light. Light +may here be regarded as the material of which the glistering armour +is made; but, more probably, the expression means weapons appropriate +to the light. + +Such being the general picture, we note the fact which underlies the +whole representation; namely, that every life is a definite whole +which has a fixed end. Jesus said, 'We must work the works of Him +that sent Me, while it is day: the night cometh.' Paul uses the +opposite metaphors in these verses. But, though the two sayings are +opposite in form, they are identical in substance. In both, the +predominant thought is that of the rapidly diminishing space of +earthly life, and the complete unlikeness to it of the future. We +stand like men on a sandbank with an incoming tide, and every wash of +the waves eats away its edges, and presently it will yield below our +feet. We forget this for the most part, and perhaps it is not well +that it should be ever present; but that it should never be present +is madness and sore loss. + +Paul, in his intense moral earnestness, in verse 13, bids us regard +ourselves as already in 'the day,' and shape our conduct as if it +shone around us and all things were made manifest by its light. The +sins to be put off are very gross and palpable. They are for the most +part sins of flesh, such as even these Roman Christians had to be +warned against, and such as need to be manifested by the light even +now among many professing Christian communities. + +But Paul has one more word to say. If he stopped without it, he would +have said little to help men who are crying out, 'How am I to strip +off this clinging evil, which seems my skin rather than my clothing? +How am I to put on that flashing panoply?' There is but one way,--put +on the Lord Jesus Christ. If we commit ourselves to Him by faith, and +front our temptations in His strength, and thus, as it were, wrap +ourselves in Him, He will be to us dress and armour, strength and +righteousness. Our old self will fall away, and we shall take no +forethought for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof. + + + + +SALVATION NEARER + + '... Now is our salvation nearer than + when we believed.'--ROMANS xiii. 11. + + +There is no doubt, I suppose, that the Apostle, in common with the +whole of the early Church, entertained more or less consistently the +expectation of living to witness the second coming of Jesus Christ. +There are in Paul's letters passages which look both in the direction +of that anticipation, and in the other one of expecting to taste +death. 'We which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord,' +he says twice in one chapter. 'I am ready to be offered, and the hour +of my departure is at hand,' he says in his last letter. + +Now this contrariety of anticipation is but the natural result of +what our Lord Himself said, 'It is not for you to know the times and +the seasons,' and no one, who is content to form his doctrine of the +knowledge resulting from inspiration from the words of Jesus Christ +Himself, need stumble in the least degree in recognising the plain +fact that Paul and his brother Apostles did not know when the Master +was to come. Christ Himself had told them that there was a chamber +locked against their entrance, and therefore we do not need to think +that it militates against the authoritative inspiration of these +early teachers of the Church, if they, too, searched 'what manner of +time the Spirit which was in them did signify when it testified +beforehand ... the glory that should follow.' + +Now, my text is evidently the result of the former of these two +anticipations, viz. that Paul and his generation were probably to see +the coming of the Lord from heaven. And to him the thought that' the +night was far spent,' as the context says, 'and the day was at hand,' +underlay his most buoyant hope, and was the inspiration and +motive-spring of his most strenuous effort. + +Now, our relation to the closing moments of our own earthly lives, to +the fact of death, is precisely the same as that of the Apostle and +his brethren to the coming of the Lord. We, too, stand in that +position of partial ignorance, and for us practically the words of my +text, and all their parallel words, point to how we should think of, +and how we should be affected by, the end to which we are coming. And +this is the grand characteristic of the Christian view of that last +solemn moment. 'Now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.' +So I would note, first of all, what these words teach us should be +the Christian view of our own end; and, second, to what conduct that +view should lead us. + +I. The Christian view of death. + +'Now is our salvation nearer.' We have to think away by faith and +hope all the grim externals of death, and to get to the heart of the +thing. And then everything that is repulsive, everything that makes +flesh and blood shrink, disappears and is evaporated, and beneath the +folds of his black garment, there is revealed God's last, sweetest, +most triumphant angel-messenger to Christian souls, the great, +strong, silent Angel of Death, and he carries in his hand the gift of +a full salvation. That is what our Apostle rose to the rapture of +beholding, when he knew that the thought of his surviving till Christ +came again must be put away, and when close to the last moment of his +life, he said, 'The Lord shall deliver me, and save me into His +everlasting kingdom.' What was the deliverance and being saved that +he expected and expresses in these words? Immunity from punishment? +Escape from the headsman's axe? Being 'delivered from the mouth of +the lion,' the persecuting fangs of the bloody Nero? By no means. He +knew that death was at hand, and he said, 'He will save me'--not from +it, but through it--'into His everlasting kingdom.' And so in the +words of my text we may say--though Paul did not mean them so--as we +see the distance between us, and that certain close, dwindling, +dwindling, dwindling: 'Now,' as moment after moment ticks itself into +the past, 'now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.' +Children, when they are getting near their holidays, take strips of +paper, and tear off a piece as each day passes. And as we tear off +the days let us feel that we are drawing closer to our home, and that +the blessedness laid up for us in it is drawing nearer to us. 'Our +salvation,' not our destruction, our fuller life, not in any true +sense of the word our 'death,' is 'nearer than when we believed.' + +But some one may say, 'Is a man not saved till after he is dead?' Is +salvation future, not coming till after the grave? No, certainly not. +There are three aspects of that word in Scripture. Sometimes the New +Testament writers treat salvation as past, and represent a Christian +as being invested with the possession of it all at the very moment of +his first faith. That is true, that whatever is yet to be evolved +from what is given to the poorest and foulest sinner, in the moment +of his initial faith in Christ, there is nothing to be added to it. +The salvation which the penitent thief received on the cross is all +the salvation that he was ever to get. But out of it there came +welling and welling and welling, when he had passed into the region +'where beyond these voices there is peace'--there came welling out +from that inexhaustible fountain which was opened in him all the +fullnesses of an eternal progress in the heavens. And so it is with +us. Salvation is a past gift which we received when we believed. + +But in another aspect, which is also emphatically stated in +Scripture, it is a progressive process, and not merely a gift +bestowed once for all in the past. I do not dwell upon that thought, +but just remind you of a turn of expression which occurs in various +connections more than once. 'The Lord added to the Church daily such +as were being saved,' says Luke. Still more emphatically in the +Epistle to the Corinthians, the Apostle puts into antithesis the two +progressive processes, and speaks of the Gospel as being preached, +and being a savour of life unto life 'to them that are being saved,' +and a savour of destruction 'to them that are being lost.' No moral +or spiritual condition is stereotyped or stagnant. It is all +progressive. And so the salvation that is given once for all is ever +being unfolded, and the Christian life on earth is the unfolding of +it. + +But in another aspect still, such as is presented in my text, and in +other parallel passages, that salvation is regarded as lying on the +other side of the flood, because the manifestations of it there, the +evolving there of what is in it, and the great gifts that come then, +are so transcendently above all even of our selectest experiences +here, that they are, as it were, new, though still their roots are in +the old. The salvation which culminates in the absolute removal from +our whole being of all manner of evil, whether it be sorrow or sin, +and in the conclusive bestowal upon us of all manner of good, whether +it be righteousness or joy, and which has for its seal 'the adoption, +to wit, the redemption of the body,' so that body, soul, and spirit +'make one music as before, but vaster,' is so far beyond the germs of +itself which here we experience that my text and its like are amply +vindicated. And the man who is most fully persuaded and conscious +that he possesses the salvation of God, and most fully and blessedly +aware that that salvation is gradually gaining power in his life, is +the very man who will most feel that between its highest +manifestation on earth, and its lowest in the heavens there is such a +gulf as that the wine that he will drink there at the Father's table +is indeed new wine. And so 'is our salvation nearer,' though we +already possess it, 'than when we believed.' + +Dear brethren, if these things be true, and if to die is to be saved +into the kingdom, do not two thoughts result? The one is that that +blessed consummation should occupy more of our thoughts than I am +afraid it does. As life goes on, and the space dwindles between us +and it, we older people naturally fall into the way, unless we are +fools, of more seriously and frequently turning our thoughts to the +end. I suppose the last week of a voyage to Australia has far more +thoughts in it about the landing next week than the two or three +first days of beating down the English Channel had. I do not want to +put old heads on young shoulders in this or in any other respect. But +sure I am that it does belong very intimately to the strength of our +Christian characters that we should, as the Psalmist says, be 'wise' +to 'consider our latter end.' + +The other thought that follows is as plain, viz. that that +anticipation should always be buoyant, hopeful, joyous. We have +nothing to do with the sad aspects of parting from earth. They are +all but non-existent for the Christian consciousness, when it is as +vigorous and God-directed as it ought to be. They drop into the +background, and sometimes are lost to sight altogether. Remember how +this Apostle, when he does think about death, looks at it with--I was +going to quote words which may strike you as being inappropriate--'a +frolic welcome'; how, at all events, he is neither a bit afraid of +it, nor does he see in it anything from which to shrink. He speaks of +being with Christ, which is far better; 'absent from the body, +present with the Lord'; 'the dissolution of the earthly house of this +tabernacle'--the tumbling down of the old clay cottage in order that +a stately palace of marble and precious stones may be reared upon its +site; 'the hour of my departure is at hand; I have finished the +fight.' Peter, too, chimes in with his words: 'My exodus; my +departure,' and both of the two are looking, if not longingly, at all +events without a tremor of the eyelid, into the very eyeballs of the +messenger whom most men feel so hideous. Is it not a wonderful gift +to Christian souls that by faith in Jesus Christ, the realm in which +their hope can expatiate is more than doubled, and annexes the dim +lands beyond the frontier of death? Dear friends, if we are living in +Christ, the thought of the end and that here we are absent from home, +ought to be infinitely sweet, of whatever superficial terrors this +poor, shrinking flesh may still be conscious. And I am sure that the +nearer we get to our Saviour, and the more we realise the joyous +possession of salvation as already ours, and the more we are +conscious of the expanding of that gift in our hearts, the more we +shall be delivered from that fear of death which makes men all their +'lifetime subject to bondage.' So I beseech you to aim at this, that, +when you look forward, the furthest thing you see on the horizon of +earth may be that great Angel of Death coming to save you into the +everlasting kingdom. + +Now, just a word about + +II. The conduct to which such a hope should incite. + +The Apostle puts it very plainly in the context, and we need but +expand in a word or two what he teaches us there. 'And that knowing +the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep, for now is +our salvation nearer than when we believed.' To what does he refer by +'that'? The whole of the practical exhortations to a Christian life +which have been given before. Everything that is duty becomes tenfold +more stringent and imperative when we apprehend the true meaning of +that last moment. They tell us that it is unwholesome to be thinking +about death and the beyond, because to do so takes away interest from +much of our present occupations and weakens energy. If there is +anything from which a man is wrenched away because he steadily +contemplates the fact of being wrenched away altogether from +everything before long, it is something that he had better be +wrenched from. And if there be any occupations which dwindle into +nothingness, and into which a man cannot for the life of him fling +himself with any thoroughgoing enthusiasm or interest, if once the +thought of death stirs in him, depend upon it they are occupations +which are in themselves contemptible and unworthy. All good aims will +gain greater power over us; we shall have a saner estimate of what is +worth living for; we shall have a new standard of what is the +relative importance of things; and if some that looked very great +turn out to be very small when we let that searching light in upon +them, and others which seemed very insignificant spring suddenly up +into dominating magnitude--that new and truer perspective will be all +clear gain. The more we feel that our salvation is sweeping towards +us, as it were, from the throne of God through the blue abysses, the +more diligently we shall 'work while it is called day,' and the more +earnestly we shall seek, when the Saviour and His salvation come, to +be found with loins girt for all strenuous work, and lamps burning in +all the brightness of the light of a Christian character. + +Further, says Paul, this hopeful, cheerful contemplation of +approaching salvation should lead us to cast off the evil, and to put +on the good. You will remember the heart-stirring imagery which the +Apostle employs in the context, where he says, 'The day is at hand; +let us therefore fling off the works of darkness'--as men in the +morning, when the daylight comes through the window, and makes them +lift their eyelids, fling off their night-gear--'and let us put on +the armour of light.' We are soldiers, and must be clad in what will +be bullet-proof, and will turn a sword's edge. And where shall steel +of celestial temper be found that can resist the fiery darts shot at +the Christian soldier? His armour must be 'of light.' Clad in the +radiance of Christian character he will be invulnerable. And how can +we, who have robed ourselves in the works of darkness, either cast +them off or array ourselves in sparkling armour of light? Paul tells +us, 'Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the +flesh.' The picture is of a camp of sleeping soldiers; the night +wears thin, the streaks of saffron are coming in the dawning east. +One after another the sleepers awake; they cast aside their +night-gear, and they brace on the armour that sparkles in the beams +of the morning sun. So they are ready when the trumpet sounds the +reveille, and with the morning comes the Captain of the Lord's host, +and with the Captain comes the perfecting of the salvation which is +drawing nearer and nearer to us, as our moments glide through our +fingers like the beads of a rosary. Many men think of death and fear; +the Christian should think of death--and hope. + + + + +THE SOLDIER'S MORNING-CALL + + 'Let us put on the armour of light.'--ROMANS xiii. 12. + + +It is interesting to notice that the metaphor of the Christian armour +occurs in Paul's letters throughout his whole course. It first +appears, in a very rudimentary form, in the earliest of the Epistles, +that to the Thessalonians. It appears here in a letter which belongs +to the middle of his career, and it appears finally in the Epistle to +the Ephesians, in its fully developed and drawn-out shape, at almost +the end of his work. So we may fairly suppose that it was one of his +familiar thoughts. Here it has a very picturesque addition, for the +picture that is floating before his vivid imagination is that of a +company of soldiers, roused by the morning bugle, casting off their +night-gear because the day is beginning to dawn, and bracing on the +armour that sparkles in the light of the rising sun. 'That,' says +Paul, 'is what you Christian people ought to be. Can you not hear the +notes of the reveille? The night is far spent; the day is at hand; +therefore let us put off the works of darkness--the night-gear that +was fit for those hours of slumber. Toss it away, and put on the +armour that belongs to the day.' + +Now, I am not going to ask or try to answer the question of how far +this Apostolic exhortation is based upon the Apostle's expectation +that the world was drawing near its end. That does not matter at all +for us at present, for the fact which he expresses as the foundation +of this exhortation is true about us all, and about our position in +the midst of these fleeting shadows round us. We are hastening to the +dawning of the true day. And so let me try to emphasise the +exhortation here, old and threadbare and commonplace as it is, +because we all need it, at whatever point of life's journey we have +arrived. + +Now, the first thing that strikes me is that the garb for the man +expectant of the day is armour. + +We might have anticipated something very different in accordance with +the thoughts that Paul's imagery here suggests, about the difference +between the night which is so swiftly passing, and is full of enemies +and dangers, and the day which is going to dawn, and is full of light +and peace and joy. We might have expected that he would have said, +'Let us put on the festal robes.' But no! 'The night is far spent; +the day is at hand.' But the dress that befits the expectant of the +day is not yet the robe of the feast, but it is 'the armour' which, +put into plain words, means just this, that there is fighting, always +fighting, to be done. If you are ever to belong to the day, you have +to equip yourselves _now_ with armour and weapons. I do not need +to dwell upon that, but I do wish to insist upon this fact, that +after all that may be truly said about growth in grace, and the +peaceful approximation towards perfection in the Christian character, +we cannot dispense with the other element in progress, and that is +fighting. We have to struggle for every step. _Growth_ is not enough +to define completely the process by which men become conformed to the +image of the Father, and are 'made meet to be partakers of the +inheritance of the saints in light.' Growth does express part of it, +but only a part. Conflict is needed to come in, before you have the +whole aspect of Christian progress before your minds. For there will +always be antagonism without and traitors within. There will always +be recalcitrant horses that need to be whipped up, and jibbing horses +that need to be dragged forward, and shying ones that need to be +violently coerced and kept in the traces. Conflict is the law, +because of the enemies, and because of the conspiracy between the +weakness within and the things without that appeal to it. + +We hear a great deal to-day about being 'sanctified by faith.' I +believe that as much as any man, but the office of faith is to bring +us the power that cleanses, and the application of that power +requires our work, and it requires our fighting. So it is not enough +to say, 'Trust for your sanctifying as you have trusted for your +justifying and acceptance,' but you have to work out what you get by +your faith, and you will never work it out unless you fight against +your unworthy self, and the temptations of the world. The garb of the +candidate for the day is armour. + +And there is another side to that same thought, and that is, the more +vivid our expectations of that blessed dawn the more complete should +be our bracing on of the armour. The anticipation of that future, in +very many instances, in the Christian Church, has led to precisely +the opposite state of mind. It has induced people to drop into mere +fantastic sentiment, or to ignore this contemptible present, and +think that they have nothing to do with it, and are only 'waiting for +the coming of the Lord,' and the like. Paul says, 'Just because, on +your eastern horizon, you can see the pink flush that tells that the +night is gone, and the day is coming, therefore do not be a +sentimentalist, do not be idle, do not be negligent or contemptuous +of the daily tasks; but because you see it, put on the armour of +light, and whether the time between the rising of the whole orb of +the sun on the horizon be long or short, fill the hours with +triumphant conflict. Put on the whole armour of light.' + +Again, note here what the armour is. Of course that phrase, 'the +armour of light,' may be nothing more than a little bit of colour put +in by a picturesque imagination, and may suggest simply how the +burnished steel would shine and glitter when the sunbeams smote it, +and the glistening armour, like that of Spenser's Red Cross Knight, +would make a kind of light in the dark cave, into which he went. Or +it may mean 'the armour that befits the light'; as is perhaps +suggested by the antithesis 'the works of darkness,' which are to be +'put off.' These are works that match the darkness, and similarly the +armour is to be the armour that befits the light, and that can flash +back its beams. But I think there is more than that in the +expression. I would rather take the phrase to be parallel to another +of this Apostle's, who speaks in 2nd Corinthians of the 'armour of +righteousness on the right hand and on the left.' 'Light' makes the +armour, 'righteousness' makes the armour. The two phrases say the +same thing, the one in plain English, the other in figure, which +being brought down to daily life is just this, that the true armour +and weapon of a Christian man is Christian character. 'Whatsoever +things are true, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are +of good report,' these are the pieces of armour, and these are the +weapons which we are to wield. A Christian man fights against evil in +himself by putting on good. The true way to empty the heart of sin is +to fill the heart with righteousness. The lances of the light, +according to the significant old Greek myth, slew pythons. The armour +is 'righteousness on the right hand and on the left.' Stick to plain, +simple, homely duties, and you will find that they will defend your +heart against many a temptation. A flask that is full of rich wine +may be plunged into the saltest ocean, and not a drop will find its +way in. Fill your heart with righteousness; your lives--let them +glisten in the light, and the light will be your armour. God is +light, wherefore God cannot be tempted with evil. 'Walk in the light, +as He is in the light' ... and 'the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth +from all sin.' + +But there is another side to that thought, for if you will look, at +your leisure, to the closing words of the chapter, you will find the +Apostle's own exposition of what putting on the armour of light +means. 'Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ'--that is his explanation of +putting on 'the armour of light.' For 'once ye were darkness, but now +are ye light in the Lord,' and it is in the measure in which we are +united to Him, by the faith which binds us to Him, and by the love +which works obedience and conformity, that we wear the invulnerable +armour of light. Christ Himself is, and He supplies to all, the +separate graces which Christian men can wear. We may say that He is +'the panoply of God,' as Paul calls it in Ephesians, and when we wear +Him, and only in the measure in which we do wear Him, in that measure +are we clothed with it. And so the last thing that I would point out +here is that the obedience to these commands requires continual +effort. + +The Christians in Rome, to whom Paul was writing, were no novices in +the Christian life. Long ago many of them had been brought to Him. +But the oldest Christian amongst them needed the exhortation as much +as the rawest recruit in the ranks. Continual renewal day by day is +what we need, and it will not be secured without a great deal of +work. Seeing that there is a 'putting off' to go along with the +'putting on,' the process is a very long one. ''Tis a lifelong task +till the lump be leavened.' It is a lifelong task till we strip off +all the rags of this old self; and 'being clothed,' are not 'found +naked.' It takes a lifetime to fathom Jesus; it takes a lifetime to +appropriate Jesus, it takes a lifetime to be clothed with Jesus. And +the question comes to each of us, have we 'put off the old man with +his deeds'? Are we daily, as sure as we put on our clothes in the +morning, putting on Christ the Lord? + +For notice with what solemnity the Apostle gives the master His full, +official, formal title here, 'put ye on the _Lord Jesus Christ_.' Do +we put Him on as _Lord_; bowing our whole wills to Him, and accepting +Him, His commandments, promises, providences, with glad submission? +Do we put on _Jesus_, recognising in His manhood as our Brother not +only the pattern of our lives, but the pledge that the pattern, by +His help and love, is capable of reproduction in ourselves? Do we put +Him on as 'the Lord Jesus _Christ_,' who was anointed with the Divine +Spirit, that from the head it might flow, even to the skirts of the +garments, and every one of us might partake of that unction and be +made pure and clean thereby? 'Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ,' and +do it day by day, and then you have 'put on the whole armour of God.' + +And when the day that is dawning has risen to its full, then, not +till then, may we put off the armour and put on the white robe, lay +aside the helmet, and have our brows wreathed with the laurel, +sheathe the sword, and grasp the palm, being 'more than conquerors +through Him who loved us,' and fights in us, as well as for us. + + + + +THE LIMITS OF LIBERTY + + 'So then every one of us shall give account of himself + to God. 13. Let us not therefore judge one another any + more: but judge this rather, that no man put a + stumblingblock, or an occasion to fall, in his brother's + way. 14. I know, and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, + that there is nothing unclean of itself: but to him that + esteemeth anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean. + 15. But if thy brother be grieved with thy meat, now + walkest thou not charitably. Destroy not him with thy + meat, for whom Christ died. 16. Let not then your good + be evil spoken of: 17. For the kingdom of God is not + meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy + in the Holy Ghost. 18. For he that in these things + serveth Christ is acceptable to God, and approved of + men. 19. Let us therefore follow after the things which + make for peace, and things wherewith one may edify + another. 20. For meat destroy not the work of God. All + things indeed are pure; but it is evil for that man + who eateth with offence. 21. It is good neither to eat + flesh, nor to drink wine, nor any thing whereby thy + brother stumbleth, or is offended, or is made weak. + 22. Hast thou faith? have it to thyself before God. + Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that thing + which he alloweth. 23. And he that doubteth is damned + if he eat, because he eateth not of faith: for + whatsoever is not of faith is sin.'--ROMANS xiv. 12-23. + + +The special case in view, in the section of which this passage is +part, is the difference of opinion as to the lawfulness of eating +certain meats. It is of little consequence, so far as the principles +involved are concerned, whether these were the food which the Mosaic +ordinances made unclean, or, as in Corinth, meats offered to idols. +The latter is the more probable, and would be the more important in +Rome. The two opinions on the point represented two tendencies of +mind, which always exist; one more scrupulous, and one more liberal. +Paul has been giving the former class the lesson they needed in the +former part of this chapter; and he now turns to the 'stronger' +brethren, and lays down the law for their conduct. We may, perhaps, +best simply follow him, verse by verse. + +We note then, first, the great thought with which he starts, that of +the final judgment, in which each man shall give account of himself. +What has that to do with the question in hand? This, that it ought to +keep us from premature and censorious judging. We have something more +pressing to do than to criticise each other. Ourselves are enough to +keep our hands full, without taking a lift of our fellows' conduct. +And this, further, that, in view of the final judgment, we should +hold a preliminary investigation on our own principles of action, and +'decide' to adopt as the overruling law for ourselves, that we shall +do nothing which will make duty harder for our brethren. Paul +habitually settled small matters on large principles, and brought the +solemnities of the final account to bear on the marketplace and the +meal. + +In verse 13 he lays down the supreme principle for settling the case +in hand. No Christian is blameless if he voluntarily acts so as to +lay a stumbling-block or an occasion to fall in another's path. Are +these two things the same? Possibly, but a man may stumble, and not +fall, and that which makes him stumble may possibly indicate a +temptation to a less grave evil than that which makes him fall does. +It may be noticed that in the sequel we hear of a brother's being +'grieved' first, and then of his being 'overthrown.' In any case, +there is no mistake about the principle laid down and repeated in +verse 21. It is a hard saying for some of us. Is my liberty to be +restricted by the narrow scruples of 'strait-laced' Christians? Yes. +Does not that make them masters, and attach too much importance to +their narrowness? No. It recognises Christ as Master, and all His +servants as brethren. If the scrupulous ones go so far as to say to +the more liberal, 'You cannot be Christians if you do not do as we +do' then the limits of concession have been reached, and we are to do +as Paul did, when he flatly refused to yield one hair's-breadth to +the Judaisers. If a man says, You must adopt this, that, or the other +limitation in conduct, or else you shall be unchurched, the only +answer is, I will not. We are to be flexible as long as possible, and +let weak brethren's scruples restrain our action. But if they insist +on things indifferent as essential, a yet higher duty than that of +regard to their weak consciences comes in, and faithfulness to Christ +limits concession to His servants. + +But, short of that extreme case, Paul lays down the law of curbing +liberty in deference to 'narrowness.' In verse 14 he states with +equal breadth the extreme principle of the liberal party, that +nothing is unclean of itself. He has learned that 'in the Lord +Jesus.' Before he was 'in Him,' he had been entangled in cobwebs of +legal cleanness and uncleanness; but now he is free. But he adds an +exception, which must be kept in mind by the liberal-minded +section--namely, that a clean thing is unclean to a man who thinks it +is. Of course, these principles do not affect the eternal +distinctions of right and wrong. Paul is not playing fast and loose +with the solemn, divine law which makes sin and righteousness +independent of men's notions. He is speaking of things +indifferent--ceremonial observances and the like; and the modern +analogies of these are conventional pieces of conduct, in regard to +amusements and the like, which, in themselves, a Christian man can do +or abstain from without sin. + +Verse 15 is difficult to understand, if the 'for' at the beginning is +taken strictly. Some commentators would read instead of it a simple +'but' which smooths the flow of thought. But possibly the verse +assigns a reason for the law in verse 13, rather than for the +statements in verse 14. And surely there is no stronger reason for +tender consideration for even the narrowest scruples of Christians +than the obligation to walk in love. Our common brotherhood binds us +to do nothing that would even grieve one of the family. For instance, +Christian men have different views of the obligations of Sunday +observance. It is conceivable that a very 'broad' Christian might see +no harm in playing lawn-tennis in his garden on a Sunday; but if his +doing so scandalised, or, as Paul says, 'grieved' Christian people of +less advanced views, he would be sinning against the law of love if +he did it. + +There are many other applications of the principle readily suggested. +The principle is the thing to keep clearly in view. It has a wide +field for its exercise in our times, and when the Christian +brotherhood includes such diversities of culture and social +condition. And that is a solemn deepening of it, 'Destroy not with +thy meat him for whom Christ died.' Note the almost bitter emphasis +on 'thy,' which brings out not only the smallness of the +gratification for which the mischief is done, but the selfishness of +the man who will not yield up so small a thing to shield from evil +which may prove fatal, a brother for whom Christ did not shrink from +yielding up life. If He is our pattern, any sacrifice of tastes and +liberties for our brother's sake is plain duty, and cannot be +neglected without selfish sin. One great reason, then, for the +conduct enjoined, is set forth in verse 15. It is the clear dictate +of Christian love. + +Another reason is urged in verses 16 to 18. It displays the true +character of Christianity, and so reflects honour on the doer. 'Your +good' is an expression for the whole sum of the blessings obtained by +becoming Christians, and is closely connected with what is here meant +by the 'kingdom of God.' That latter phrase seems here to be +substantially equivalent to the inward condition in which they are +who have submitted to the dominion of the will of God. It is 'the +kingdom within us' which is 'righteousness, peace, and joy in the +Holy Ghost.' What have you won by your Christianity? the Apostle in +effect says, Do you think that its purpose is mainly to give you +greater licence in regard to these matters in question? If the most +obvious thing in your conduct is your 'eating and drinking,' your +whole Christian standing will be misconceived, and men will fancy +that your religion permits laxity of life. But if, on the other hand, +you show that you are Christ's servants by righteousness, peace, and +joy, you will be pleasing to God, and men will recognise that your +religion is from Him, and that you are consistent professors of it. + +Modern liberal-minded brethren can easily translate all this for +to-day's use. Take care that you do not give the impression that your +Christianity has its main operation in permitting you to do what your +weaker brethren have scruples about. If you do not yield to them, but +flaunt your liberty in their and the world's faces, your advanced +enlightenment will be taken by rough-and-ready observers as mainly +cherished because it procures you these immunities. Show by your life +that you have the true spiritual gifts. Think more about them than +about your 'breadth,' and superiority to 'narrow prejudices.' Realise +the purpose of the Gospel as concerns your own moral perfecting, and +the questions in hand will fall into their right place. + +In verses 19 and 20 two more reasons are given for restricting +liberty in deference to others' scruples. Such conduct contributes to +peace. If truth is imperilled, or Christ's name in danger of being +tarnished, counsels of peace are counsels of treachery; but there are +not many things worth buying at the price of Christian concord. Such +conduct tends to build up our own and others' Christian character. +Concessions to the 'weak' may help them to become strong, but flying +in the face of their scruples is sure to hurt them, in one way or +another. + +In verse 15, the case was supposed of a brother's being grieved by +what he felt to be laxity. That case corresponded to the +stumbling-block of verse 13. A worse result seems contemplated in +verse 20,--that of the weak brother, still believing that laxity was +wrong, and yet being tempted by the example of the stronger to +indulge in it. In that event, the responsibility of overthrowing what +God had built lies at the door of the tempter. The metaphor of +'overthrowing' is suggested by the previous one of 'edifying.' +Christian duty is mutual building up of character; inconsiderate +exercise of 'liberty' may lead to pulling down, by inducing to +imitation which conscience condemns. + +From this point onwards, the Apostle first reiterates in inverse +order his two broad principles, that clean things are unclean to the +man who thinks them so, and that Christian obligation requires +abstinence from permitted things if our indulgence tends to a +brother's hurt. The application of the latter principle to the +duty of total abstinence from intoxicants for the sake of others is +perfectly legitimate, but it is an application, not the direct +purpose of the Apostle's injunctions. + +In verses 22 and 23, the section is closed by two exhortations, in +which both parties, the strong and the weak, are addressed. The +former is spoken to in verse 22, the latter in verse 23. The strong +brother is bid to be content with having his wider views, or +'faith'--that is, certainty that his liberty is in accordance with +Christ's will. It is enough that he should enjoy that conviction, +only let him make sure that he can hold it as in God's sight, and do +not let him flourish it in the faces of brethren whom it would +grieve, or might lead to imitating his practice, without having risen +to his conviction. And let him be quite sure that his conscience is +entirely convinced, and not bribed by inclination; for many a man +condemns himself by letting wishes dictate to conscience. + +On the other hand, there is a danger that those who have scruples +should, by the example of those who have not, be tempted to do what +they are not quite sure is right. If you have any doubts, says Paul, +the safe course is to abstain from the conduct in question. Perhaps a +brother can go to the theatre without harm, if he believes it right +to do so; but if you have any hesitation as to the propriety of +going, you will be condemned as sinning if you do. You must not +measure your corn by another man's bushel. Your convictions, not his, +are to be your guides. 'Faith' is used here in a somewhat unusual +sense. It means certitude of judgment. The last words of verse 23 +have no such meaning as is sometimes extracted from them; namely, +that actions, however pure and good, done by unbelievers, are of the +nature of sin. They simply mean that whatever a Christian man does +without clear warrant of his judgment and conscience is sin to him, +whatever it is to others. + + + + +TWO FOUNTAINS, ONE STREAM + + 'That we, through patience and comfort of the + Scriptures, might have hope.... 13. The God of + hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, + that ye may abound in hope.'--ROMANS xv. 4, 13. + + +There is a river in Switzerland fed by two uniting streams, bearing +the same name, one of them called the 'white,' one of them the +'grey,' or dark. One comes down from the glaciers, and bears +half-melted snow in its white ripple; the other flows through a +lovely valley, and is discoloured by its earth. They unite in one +common current. So in these two verses we have two streams, a white +and a black, and they both blend together and flow out into a common +hope. In the former of them we have the dark stream--'through +patience and comfort,' which implies affliction and effort. The issue +and outcome of all difficulty, trial, sorrow, ought to be hope. And +in the other verse we have the other valley, down which the light +stream comes: 'The God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in +believing, that ye may abound in hope.' + +So both halves of the possible human experience are meant to end in +the same blessed result; and whether you go round on the one side of +the sphere of human life, or whether you take the other hemisphere, +you come to the same point, if you have travelled with God's hand in +yours, and with Him for your Guide. + +Let us look, then, at these two contrasted origins of the same +blessed gift, the Christian hope. + +I. We have, first of all, the hope that is the child of the night, +and born in the dark. + +'Whatsoever things,' says the Apostle, 'were written aforetime, were +written for our learning, that we, through patience,'--or rather +_the brave perseverance_--'and consolation'--or rather perhaps +_encouragement_--'of the Scriptures might have hope.' The written +word is conceived as the source of patient endurance which acts as +well as suffers. This grace Scripture works in us through the +encouragement which it ministers in manifold ways, and the result of +both is hope. + +So, you see, our sorrows and difficulties are not connected with, nor +do they issue in, bright hopefulness, except by reason of this +connecting link. There is nothing in a man's troubles to make him +hopeful. Sometimes, rather, they drive him into despair; but at all +events, they seldom drive him to hopefulness, except where this link +comes in. We cannot pass from the black frowning cliffs on one side +of the gorge to the sunny tablelands on the other without a +bridge--and the bridge for a poor soul from the blackness of sorrow, +and the sharp grim rocks of despair, to the smiling pastures of hope, +with all their half-open blossoms, is builded in that Book, which +tells us the meaning and purpose of them all; and is full of the +histories of those who have fought and overcome, have hoped and not +been ashamed. + +Scripture is given for this among other reasons, that it may +encourage us, and so may produce in us this great grace of active +patience, if we may call it so. + +The first thing to notice is, how Scripture gives encouragement--for +such rather than consolation is the meaning of the word. It is much +to dry tears, but it is more to stir the heart as with a trumpet +call. Consolation is precious, but we need more for well-being than +only to be comforted. And, surely, the whole tone of Scripture in its +dealing with the great mystery of pain and sorrow, has a loftier +scope than even to minister assuagement to grief, and to stay our +weeping. It seeks to make us strong and brave to face and to master +our sorrows, and to infuse into us a high-hearted courage, which +shall not merely be able to accept the biting blasts, but shall feel +that they bring a glow to the cheek and oxygen to the blood, while +wrestling with them builds up our strength, and trains us for higher +service. It would be a poor aim to comfort only; but to encourage--to +make strong in heart, resolved in will, and incapable of being +overborne or crushed in spirit by any sorrows--that is a purpose +worthy of the Book, and of the God who speaks through it. + +This purpose, we may say, is effected by Scripture in two ways. It +encourages us by its records, and by its revelation of principles. + +Who can tell how many struggling souls have taken heart again, as +they pondered over the sweet stories of sorrow subdued which stud its +pages, like stars in its firmament? The tears shed long ago which God +has put 'in His bottle,' and recorded in 'His book,' have truly been +turned into pearls. That long gallery of portraits of sufferers, who +have all trodden the same rough road, and been sustained by the same +hand, and reached the same home, speaks cheer to all who follow them. +Hearts wrung by cruel partings from those dearer to them than their +own souls, turn to the pages which tell how Abraham, with calm +sorrow, laid his Sarah in the cave at Macpelah; or how, when Jacob's +eyes were dim that he could not see, his memory still turned to the +hour of agony when Rachael died by him, and he sees clear in its +light her lonely grave, where so much of himself was laid; or to the +still more sacred page which records the struggle of grief and faith +in the hearts of the sisters of Bethany. All who are anyways +afflicted in mind, body, or estate find in the Psalms men speaking +their deepest experiences before them; and the grand majesty of +sorrow that marks 'the patience of Job,' and the flood of sunshine +that bathes him, revealing the 'end of the Lord,' have strengthened +countless sufferers to bear and to hold fast, and to hope. We are all +enough of children to be more affected by living examples than by +dissertations, however true, and so Scripture is mainly history, +revealing God by the record of His acts, and disclosing the secret of +human life by telling us the experiences of living men. + +But Scripture has another method of ministering encouragement to our +often fainting and faithless hearts. It cuts down through all the +complications of human affairs, and lays bare the innermost motive +power. It not only shows us in its narratives the working of sorrow, +and the power of faith, but it distinctly lays down the source and +the purpose, the whence and the whither of all suffering. No man need +quail or faint before the most torturing pains or most disastrous +strokes of evil, who holds firmly the plain teaching of Scripture on +these two points. They all come _from_ my Father, and they all +come _for_ my good. It is a short and simple creed, easily +apprehended. It pretends to no recondite wisdom. It is a homely +philosophy which common intellects can grasp, which children can +understand, and hearts half paralysed by sorrow can take in. So much +the better. Grief and pain are so common that their cure had need to +be easily obtained. Ignorant and stupid people have to writhe in +agony as well as wise and clever ones, and until grief is the portion +only of the cultivated classes, its healing must come from something +more universal than philosophy; or else the nettle would be more +plentiful than the dock; and many a poor heart would be stung to +death. Blessed be God! the Christian view of sorrow, while it leaves +much unexplained, focuses a steady light on these two points; its +origin and its end. 'He for our profit, that we may be partakers of +His holiness,' is enough to calm all agitation, and to make the +faintest heart take fresh courage. With that double certitude clear +before us, we can face anything. The slings and arrows which strike +are no more flung blindly by an 'outrageous fortune,' but each bears +an inscription, like the fabled bolts, which tells what hand drew the +bow, and they come with His love. + +Then, further, the courage thus born of the Scriptures produces +another grand thing--patience, or rather perseverance. By that word +is meant more than simply the passive endurance which is the main +element in patience, properly so called. Such passive endurance is a +large part of our duty in regard to difficulties and sorrows, but is +never the whole of it. It is something to endure and even while the +heart is breaking, to submit unmurmuring, but, transcendent as that +is, it is but half of the lesson which we have to learn and to put in +practice. For if all our sorrows have a disciplinary and educational +purpose, we shall not have received them aright, unless we have tried +to make that purpose effectual, by appropriating whatsoever moral and +spiritual teaching they each have for us. Nor does our duty stop +there. For while one high purpose of sorrow is to deaden our hearts +to earthly objects, and to lift us above earthly affections, no +sorrow can ever relax the bonds which oblige us to duty. The solemn +pressure of 'I ought,' is as heavy on the sorrowful as on the happy +heart. We have still to toil, to press forward, in the sweat of our +brow, to gain our bread, whether it be food for our bodies, or +sustenance for our hearts and minds. Our responsibilities to others +do not cease because our lives are darkened. Therefore, heavy or +light of heart, we have still to stick to our work, and though we may +never more be able to do it with the old buoyancy, still to do it +with our might. + +It is that dogged persistence in plain duty, that tenacious +continuance in our course, which is here set forth as the result of +the encouragement which Scripture gives. Many of us have all our +strength exhausted in mere endurance, and have let obvious duties +slip from our hands, as if we had done all that we could do when we +had forced ourselves to submit. Submission would come easier if you +took up some of those neglected duties, and you would be stronger for +patience, if you used more of your strength for service. You do well +if you do not sink under your burden, but you would do better if, +with it on your shoulders, you would plod steadily along the road; +and if you did, you would feel the weight less. It seems heaviest +when you stand still doing nothing. Do not cease to toil because you +suffer. You will feel your pain more if you do. Take the +encouragement which Scripture gives, that it may animate you to bate +no jot of heart or hope, but still bear up and steer right onward. + +And let the Scripture directly minister to you perseverance as well +as indirectly supply it through the encouragement which it gives. It +abounds with exhortations, patterns, and motives of such patient +continuance in well-doing. It teaches us a solemn scorn of ills. It, +angel-like, bears us up on soft, strong hands, lest we bruise +ourselves on, or stumble over, the rough places on our roads. It +summons us to diligence by the visions of the prize, and glimpses of +the dread fate of the slothful, by all that is blessed in hope, and +terrible in foreboding, by appeals to an enlightened self-regard, and +by authoritative commands to conscience, by the pattern of the +Master, and by the tender motives of love to Him to which He, +Himself, has given voice. All these call on us to be followers of +them who, through faith and perseverance, inherit the promises. + +But we have yet another step to take. These two, the encouragement +and perseverance produced by the right use of Scripture, will lead to +hope. + +It depends on how sorrow and trial are borne, whether they produce a +dreary hopelessness which sometimes darkens into despair, or a +brighter, firmer hope than more joyous days knew. We cannot say that +sorrow produces hope. It does not, unless we have this connecting +link--the experience in sorrow of a God-given courage which falters +not in the onward course, nor shrinks from any duty. But if, in the +very press and agony, I am able, by God's grace, to endure nor cease +to toil, I have, in myself, a living proof of His power, which +entitles me to look forward with the sure confidence that, through +all the uproar of the storm, He will bring me to my harbour of rest +where there is peace. The lion once slain houses a swarm of bees who +lay up honey in its carcase. The trial borne with brave persistence +yields a store of sweet hopes. If we can look back and say, 'Thou +hast been with me in six troubles,' it is good logic to look forward +and say, 'and in seven Thou wilt not forsake me.' When the first wave +breaks over the ship, as she clears the heads and heels over before +the full power of the open sea, inexperienced landsmen think they are +all going to the bottom, but they soon learn that there is a long way +between rolling and foundering, and get to watch the highest waves +towering above the bows in full confidence that these also will slip +quietly beneath the keel as the others have done, and be left +harmless astern. + +The Apostle, in this very same letter, has another word parallel to +this, in which he describes the issues of rightly-borne suffering +when he says, 'Tribulation worketh perseverance'--the same word that +is used here--'and perseverance worketh' the proof in our experience +of a sustaining God; and the proof in our experience of a sustaining +God works hope. We know that of ourselves we could not have met +tribulation, and therefore the fact that we have been able to meet +and overcome it is demonstration of a mightier power than our own, +working in us, which we know to be from God, and therefore +inexhaustible and ever ready to help. That is foundation firm enough +to build solid fabrics of hope upon, whose bases go down to the +centre of all things, the purpose of God, and whose summits, like the +upward shooting spire of some cathedral, aspire to, and seem almost +to touch, the heavens. + +So hope is born of sorrow, when these other things come between. The +darkness gives birth to the light, and every grief blazes up a +witness to a future glory. Each drop that hangs on the wet leaves +twinkles into rainbow light that proclaims the sun. The garish +splendours of the prosperous day hide the stars, and through the +night of our sorrow there shine, thickly sown and steadfast, the +constellations of eternal hopes. The darker the midnight, the surer, +and perhaps the nearer, the coming of the day. Sorrow has not had its +perfect work unless it has led us by the way of courage and +perseverance to a stable hope. Hope has not pierced to the rock, and +builds only 'things that can be shaken,' unless it rests on sorrows +borne by God's help. + +II. So much then for the genealogy of one form of the Christian hope. +But we have also a hope that is born of the day, the child of +sunshine and gladness; and that is set before us in the second of the +two verses which we are considering, 'The God of hope fill you with +all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope.' + +So then, 'the darkness and the light are both alike' to our hope, in +so far as each may become the occasion for its exercise. It is not +only to be the sweet juice expressed from our hearts by the winepress +of calamities, but that which flows of itself from hearts ripened and +mellowed under the sunshine of God-given blessedness. + +We have seen that the bridge by which sorrow led to hope, is +perseverance and courage; in this second analysis of the origin of +hope, joy and peace are the bridge by which Faith passes over into +it. Observe the difference: there is no direct connection between +affliction and hope, but there is between joy and hope. We have no +right to say, 'Because I suffer, I shall possess good in the future'; +but we have a right to say, 'Because I rejoice'--of course with a joy +in God--'I shall never cease to rejoice in Him.' Such joy is the +prophet of its own immortality and completion. And, on the other +hand, the joy and peace which are naturally the direct progenitors of +Christian hope, are the children of faith. So that we have here two +generations, as it were, of hope's ancestors;--Faith produces joy and +peace, and these again produce hope. + +Faith leads to joy and peace. Paul has found, and if we only put it +to the proof, we shall also find, that the simple exercise of simple +faith fills the soul with '_all_ joy and peace.' Gladness in all +its variety and in full measure, calm repose in every kind and +abundant in its still depth, will pour into my heart as water does +into a vessel, on condition of my taking away the barrier and opening +my heart through faith. Trust and thou shalt be glad. Trust, and thou +shalt be calm. In the measure of thy trust shall be the measure of +thy joy and peace. + +Notice, further, how indissolubly connected the present exercise of +faith is with the present experience of joy and peace. The exuberant +language of this text seems a world too wide for anything that many +professing Christians ever know even in the moments of highest +elevation, and certainly far beyond the ordinary tenor of their +lives. But it is no wonder that these should have so little joy, when +they have so little faith. It is only while we are looking to Jesus +that we can expect to have joy and peace. There is no flashing light +on the surface of the mirror, but when it is turned full to the sun. +Any interruption in the electric current is registered accurately by +an interruption in the continuous line perforated on the telegraph +ribbon; and so every diversion of heart and faith from Jesus Christ +is recorded by the fading of the sunshine out of the heart, and the +silencing of all the song-birds. Yesterday's faith will not bring joy +to-day; you cannot live upon past experience, nor feed your souls +with the memory of former exercises of Christian faith. It must be +like the manna, gathered fresh every day, else it will rot and smell +foul. A present faith, and a present faith only, produces a present +joy and peace. Is there, then, any wonder that so much of the +ordinary experience of ordinary Christians should present a sadly +broken line--a bright point here and there, separated by long +stretches of darkness? The gaps in the continuity of their joy are +the tell-tale indicators of the interruptions in their faith. If the +latter were continuous, the former would be unbroken. Always believe, +and you will always be glad and calm. + +It is easy to see that this is the natural result of faith. The very +act of confident reliance on another for all my safety and well-being +has a charm to make me restful, so long as my reliance is not put to +shame. There is no more blessed emotion than the tranquil happiness +which, in the measure of its trust, fills every trustful soul. Even +when its objects are poor, fallible, weak, ignorant dying men and +women, trust brings a breath of more than earthly peace into the +heart. But when it grasps the omnipotent, all-wise, immortal Christ, +there are no bounds but its own capacity to the blessedness which it +brings into the soul, because there is none to the all-sufficient +grace of which it lays hold. + +Observe again how accurately the Apostle defines for us the +conditions on which Christian experience will be joyful and tranquil. +It is 'in believing,' not in certain other exercises of mind, that +these blessings are to be realised. And the forgetfulness of that +plain fact leads to many good people's religion being very much more +gloomy and disturbed than God meant it to be. For a large part of it +consists in sadly testing their spiritual state, and gazing at their +failures and imperfections. There is nothing cheerful or +tranquillising in grubbing among the evils of your own heart, and it +is quite possible to do that too much and too exclusively. If your +favourite subject of contemplation in your religious thinking is +yourself, no wonder that you do not get much joy and peace out of +that. If you do, it will be of a false kind. If you are thinking more +about your own imperfections than about Christ's pardon, more about +the defects of your own love to Him than about the perfection of His +love to you, if instead of practising faith you are absorbed in +self-examination, and instead of saying to yourself, 'I know how foul +and unworthy I am, but I look away from myself to my Saviour,' you +are bewailing your sins and doubting whether you are a Christian, you +need not expect God's angels of joy and peace to nestle in your +heart. It is 'in believing,' and not in other forms of religious +contemplation, however needful these may in their places be, that +these fair twin sisters come to us and make their abode with us. + +Then, the second step in this tracing of the origin of the hope which +has the brighter source is the consideration that the joy and peace +which spring from faith, in their turn produce that confident +anticipation of future and progressive good. + +Herein lies the distinguishing blessedness of the Christian joy and +peace, in that they carry in themselves the pledge of their own +eternity. Here, and here only, the mad boast which is doomed to be so +miserably falsified when applied to earthly gladness is simple truth. +Here 'to-morrow _shall_ be as this day and much more abundant.' +Such joy has nothing in itself which betokens exhaustion, as all the +less pure joys of earth have. It is manifestly not born for death, as +are they. It is not fated, like all earthly emotions or passions, to +expire in the moment of its completeness, or even by sudden revulsion +to be succeeded by its opposite. Its sweetness has no after pang of +bitterness. It is not true of this gladness, that 'Hereof cometh in +the end despondency and madness,' but its destiny is to 'remain' as +long as the soul in which it unfolds shall exist, and 'to be full' as +long as the source from which it flows does not run dry. + +So that the more we experience the present blessedness, which faith +in Christ brings us, the more shall we be sure that nothing in the +future, either in or beyond time, can put an end to it; and hence a +hope that looks with confident eyes across the gorge of death, to the +'shining tablelands' on the other side, and is as calm as certitude, +shall be ours. To the Christian soul, rejoicing in the conscious +exercise of faith and the conscious possession of its blessed +results, the termination of a communion with Christ, so real and +spiritual, by such a trivial accident as death, seems wildly absurd +and therefore utterly impossible. Just as Christ's Resurrection seems +inevitable as soon as we grasp the truth of His divine nature, and it +becomes manifestly impossible that He, being such as He is--should +be holden of death,' being such as it is, so for His children, when +once they come to know the realities of fellowship with their Lord, +they feel the entire dissimilarity of these to anything in the realm +which is subjected to the power of death, and to know it to be as +impossible that these purely spiritual experiences should be reduced +to inactivity, or meddled with by it, as that a thought should be +bound with a cord or a feeling fastened with fetters. They, and +death, belong to two different regions. It can work its will on 'this +wide world, and all its fading sweets'--but is powerless in the still +place where the soul and Jesus hold converse, and all His joy passes +into His servant's heart. I saw, not long since, in a wood a mass of +blue wild hyacinths, that looked like a little bit of heaven dropped +down upon earth. You and I may have such a tiny bit of heaven itself +lying amidst all the tangle of our daily lives, if only we put our +trust in Christ, and so get into our hearts some little portion of +that joy that is unspeakable, and that peace that passeth +understanding. + +Thus, then, the sorrows of the earthly experience and the joys of the +Christian life will blend together to produce the one blessed result +of a hope that is full of certainty, and is the assurance of +immortality. There is no rainbow in the sky unless there be both a +black cloud and bright sunshine. So, on the blackest, thickest +thunder-mass of our sorrows, if smitten into moist light by the +sunshine of joy and peace drawn from Jesus Christ by faith, there may +be painted the rainbow of hope, the many-coloured, steadfast token of +the faithful covenant of the faithful God. + + + + +JOY AND PEACE IN BELIEVING + + 'The God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in + believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the + power of the Holy Ghost.'--ROMANS xv. 13. + + +With this comprehensive and lofty petition the Apostle closes his +exhortation to the factions in the Roman Church to be at unity. The +form of the prayer is moulded by the last words of a quotation which +he has just made, which says that in the coming Messiah 'shall the +Gentiles hope.' But the prayer itself is not an instance of being led +away by a word--in form, indeed, it is shaped by verbal resemblance; +in substance it points to the true remedy for religious controversy. +Fill the contending parties with a fuller spiritual life, and the +ground of their differences will begin to dwindle, and look very +contemptible. When the tide rises, the little pools on the rocks are +all merged into one. + +But we may pass beyond the immediate application of these words, and +see in them the wish, which is also a promise, and like the +exhibition of every ideal is a command. This is Paul's conception of +the Christian life as it might and should be, in one aspect. You +notice that there is not a word in it about conduct. It goes far +deeper than action. It deals with the springs of action in the +individual life. It is the depths of spiritual experience here set +forth which will result in actions that become a Christian. And in +these days, when all around us we see a shallow conception of +Christianity, as if it were concerned principally with conduct and +men's relations with one another, it is well to go down into the +depths, and to remember that whilst 'Do, do, do!' is very important, +'Be, be, be!' is the primary commandment. Conduct is a making visible +of personality, and the Scripture teaching which says first faith and +then works is profoundly philosophical as well as Christian. So we +turn away here from externals altogether, and regard the effect of +Christianity on the inward life. + +I. I wish to notice man's faith and God's filling as connected, and +as the foundation of everything. + +'The God of hope fill you ...'--let us leave out the intervening +words for a moment--'in believing.' Now, you notice that Paul does +not stay to tell us what or whom we are to believe in, or on. He +takes that for granted, and his thought is fastened, for the moment, +not on the object but on the act of faith. And he wishes to drive +home to us this, that the attitude of trust is the necessary +prerequisite condition of God's being able to fill a man's soul, and +that God's being able to fill a man's soul is the necessary +consequence of a man's trust. Ah, brethren, we cannot altogether shut +God out from our spirits. There are loving and gracious gifts that, +as our Lord tells us, He makes to 'fall on the unthankful and the +evil.' His rain is not like the summer showers that we sometimes see, +that fall in one spot and leave another dry; nor like the destructive +thunderstorms, that come down bringing ruin upon one cane-brake and +leave the plants in the next standing upright. But the best, the +highest, the truly divine gifts which He is yearning to give to us +all, cannot be given except there be consent, trust, and desire for +them. You can shut your hearts or you can open them. And just as the +wind will sigh round some hermetically closed chamber in vain search +for a cranny, and the man within may be asphyxiated though the +atmosphere is surging up its waves all round his closed domicile, so +by lack of our faith, which is at once trust, consent, and desire, we +shut out the gift with which God would fain fill our spirits. You can +take a porous pottery vessel, wrap it up in waxcloth, pitch it all +over, and then drop it into mid-Atlantic, and not a drop will find +its way in. And that is what we can do with ourselves, so that +although in Him 'we live and move and have our being,' and are like +the earthen vessel in the ocean, no drop of the blessed moisture will +ever find its way into the heart. There must be man's faith before +there can be God's filling. + +Further, this relation of the two things suggests to us that a +consequence of a Christian man's faith is the direct action of God +upon him. Notice how the Apostle puts that truth in a double form +here, in order that he may emphasise it, using one form of +expression, involving the divine, direct activity, at the beginning +of his prayer, and another at the end, and so enclosing, as it were, +within a great casket of the divine action, all the blessings, the +flashing jewels, which he desires his Roman friends to possess. 'The +God of hope fill you ... through the power of the Holy Ghost.' I wish +I could find words by which I could bear in upon the ordinary type of +the Evangelical Christianity of this generation anything like the +depth and earnestness of my own conviction that, for lack of a +proportionate development of that great truth, of the direct action +of the giving God on the believing heart, it is weakened and harmed +in many ways. Surely He that made my spirit can touch my spirit; +surely He who filleth all things according to their capacity can +Himself enter into and fill the spirit which is opened for Him by +simple faith. We do not need wires for the telegraphy between heaven +and the believing soul, but He comes directly to, and speaks in, and +moves upon, and moulds and blesses, the waiting heart. And until you +know, by your own experience rightly interpreted, that there is such +a direct communion between the giving God and the recipient believing +spirit, you have yet to learn the deepest depth, and the most blessed +blessedness, of Christian faith and experience. For lack of it a +hundred evils beset modern Christianity. For lack of it men fix their +faith so exclusively as that the faith is itself harmed thereby, on +the past act of Christ's death on the Cross. You will not suspect me +of minimising that, but I beseech you remember one climax of the +Apostle's which, though not bearing the same message as my text, is +in harmony with it, 'Christ that died, yea, rather, that is risen +again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh +intercession for us.' And remember that Christ Himself bestows the +gift of His Divine Spirit as the result of the humiliation and the +agony of His Cross. Faith brings the direct action of the giving God. + +And one more word about this first part of my text: the result of +that direct action is complete--'the God of hope fill you' with no +shrunken stream, no painful trickle out of a narrow rift in the rock, +but a great exuberance which will pass into a man's nature in the +measure of his capacity, which is the measure of his trust and +desire. There are two limits to God's gifts to men: the one is the +limitless limit of God's infinitude, the other is the working +limit--our capacity--and that capacity is precisely measured, as the +capacity of some built-in vessel might be measured by a little gauge +on the outside, by our faith. 'The God of hope' fills you in +'believing,' and 'according to thy faith shall it be unto thee.' + +II. Notice the joy and peace which come from the direct action of the +God of hope on the believer's soul. + +Now, it is not only towards God that we exercise trust, but wherever +it is exercised, to some extent, and in the measure in which the +object on which it rests is discovered by experience to be worthy, it +produces precisely these results. Whoever trusts is at peace, just as +much as he trusts. His confidence may be mistaken, and there will +come a tremendous awakening if it is, and the peace will be shattered +like some crystal vessel dashed upon an iron pavement, but so long as +a man's mind and heart are in the attitude of dependence upon +another, conceived to be dependable, one knows that there are few +phases of tranquillity and blessedness which are sweeter and deeper +than that. 'The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her'--that +is one illustration, and a hundred more might be given. And if you +will take that attitude of trust which, even when it twines round +some earthly prop, is upheld for a time, and bears bright flowers--if +you take it and twine it round the steadfast foundations of the +Throne of God, what can shake that sure repose? 'Joy and peace' will +come when the Christian heart closes with its trust, which is God in +Christ. + +He that believes has found the short, sure road to joy and peace, +because his relations are set right with God. For these relations are +the disturbing elements in all earthly tranquillity, and like the +skeleton at the feast in all earthly joy, and a man can never, down +to the roots of his being, be at rest until he is quite sure that +there is nothing wrong between him and God. And so believing, we come +to that root of all real gladness which is anything better than a +crackling of thorns under a pot, and to that beginning of all true +tranquillity. Joy in the Lord and peace with God are the parents of +all joy and peace that are worthy of the name. + +And that same faith will again bring these two bright-winged angels +into the most saddened and troubled lives, because that faith brings +right relations with ourselves. For our inward strifes stuff thorns +into the pillow of our repose, and mingle bitterness with the +sweetest, foaming draughts of our earthly joys. If a man's conscience +and inclinations pull him two different ways, he is torn asunder as +by wild horses. If a man has a hungry heart, for ever yearning after +unattained and impossible blessings, then there is no rest there. If +a man's little kingdom within him is all anarchical, and each passion +and appetite setting up for itself, then there is no tranquillity. +But if by faith we let the God of hope come in, then hungry hearts +are satisfied, and warring dispositions are harmonised, and the +conscience becomes quieted, and fair imaginations fill the chamber of +the spirit, and the man is at rest, because he himself is unified by +the faith and fear of God. + +And the same faith brings joy and peace because it sets right our +relations with other people, and with all externals. If I am living +in an atmosphere of trust, then sorrow will never be absolute, nor +have exclusive monopoly and possession of my spirit. But there will +be the paradox, and the blessedness, of Christian experience, 'as +sorrowful yet always rejoicing.' For the joy of the Christian life +has its source far away beyond the swamps from which the sour drops +of sorrow may trickle, and it is possible that, like the fabled fire +that burned under water, the joy of the Lord may be bright in my +heart, even when it is drenched in floods of calamity and distress. + +And so, brethren, the joy and peace that come from faith will fill +the heart which trusts. Only remember how emphatically the Apostle +here puts these two things together, 'joy and peace in believing.' As +long as, and not a moment longer than, you are exercising the +Christian act of trust, will you be experiencing the Christian +blessedness of 'joy and peace.' Unscrew the pipe, and in an instant +the water ceases to flow. Touch the button and switch off, and out +goes the light. Some Christian people fancy they can live upon past +faith. You will get no present joy and peace out of past faith. The +rain of this day twelve months will not moisten the parched ground of +to-day. Yesterday's religion was all used up yesterday. And if you +would have a continuous flow of joy and peace through your lives, +keep up a uniform habit and attitude of trust in God. You will get it +then; you will get it in no other way. + +III. Lastly, note the hope which springs from this experience of joy +and peace. + +'The God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that +ye may abound in hope.' Here, again, the Apostle does not trouble +himself to define the object of the hope. In this, as in the former +clause, his attention is fixed upon the emotion, not upon that +towards which it goes out. And just as there was no need to say in +whom it was that the Christian man was to believe, so there is no +room to define what it is that the Christian man has a right to hope +for. For his hope is intended to cover all the future, the next +moment, or to-morrow, or the dimmest distance where time has ceased +to be, and eternity stands unmoved. The attitude of the Christian +mind ought to be a cheery optimism, an unconquerable hope. 'The best +has yet to be' is the true Christian thought in contemplating the +future for myself, for my dear ones, for God's Church, and for God's +universe. + +And the truest basis on which that hope can rest is the experience +granted to us, on condition of our faith, of a present, abundant +possession of the joy and peace which God gives. The gladder you are +to-day, if the gladness comes from the right source, the surer you +may be that that gladness will never end. That is not what befalls +men who live by earthly joys. For the more poignant, precious, and, +as we faithlessly think, indispensable some of these are to us, the +more into their sweetest sweetness creeps the dread thought: 'This is +too good to last; this must pass.' We never need to think that about +the peace and joy that come to us through believing. For they, in +their sweetness, prophesy perpetuity. I need not dwell upon the +thought that the firmest, most personally precious convictions of an +eternity of future blessedness, rise and fall in a Christian +consciousness with the purity and the depth of its own experience of +the peace and joy of the Gospel. The more you have of Jesus Christ in +your lives and hearts to-day, the surer you will be that whatever +death may do, it cannot touch that, and the more ludicrously +impossible it will seem that anything that befalls this poor body can +touch the bond that knits us to Jesus Christ. Death can separate us +from a great deal. Its sharp scythe cuts through all other bonds, but +its edge is turned when it is tried against the golden chain that +binds the believing soul to the Christ in whom he has believed. + +So, brethren, there is the ladder--begin at the bottom step, with +faith in Jesus Christ. That will bring God's direct action into your +spirit, through His Holy Spirit, and that one gift will break up into +an endless multiplicity of blessings, just as a beam of light spilt +upon the surface of the ocean breaks into diamonds in every wave, and +that 'joy and peace' will kindle in your hearts a hope fed by the +great words of the Lord: 'Peace I leave with you, my peace I give +unto you,' 'My joy shall remain in you, and your joy shall be full,' +'He that liveth and believeth in Me shall never die.' + + + + +PHOEBE + + 'I commend unto you Phoebe our sister, who is a servant + of the Church that is at Cenchrea: 2. That ye receive her + in the Lord, worthily of the Saints, and that ye assist + her in whatsover matter she may have need of you: for she + herself hath been a succourer of many, and of mine own + self.'--ROMANS xvi. 1, 2 (R.V.). + + +This is an outline picture of an else wholly unknown person. She, +like most of the other names mentioned in the salutations in this +chapter, has had a singular fate. Every name, shadowy and unreal as +it is to us, belonged to a human life filled with hopes and fears, +plunged sometimes in the depths of sorrows, struggling with anxieties +and difficulties; and all the agitations have sunk into forgetfulness +and calm. There is left to the world an immortal remembrance, and +scarcely a single fact associated with the undying names. + +Note the person here disclosed. + +A little rent is made in the dark curtain through which we see as +with an incandescent light concentrated for a moment upon her, one of +the many good women who helped Paul, as their sisters had helped +Paul's Master, and who thereby have won, little as either Paul or she +thought it, an eternal commemoration. Her name is a purely idolatrous +one, and stamps her as a Greek, and by birth probably a worshipper of +Apollo. Her Christian associations were with the Church at Cenchrea, +the port of Corinth, of which little Christian community nothing +further is known. But if we take into account the hideous +immoralities of Corinth, we shall deem it probable that the port, +with its shifting maritime population, was, like most seaports, a +soil in which goodness was hard put to it to grow, and a church had +much against which to struggle. To be a Christian at Cenchrea can +have been no light task. Travellers in Egypt are told that Port Said +is the wickedest place on the face of the earth; and in Phoebe's home +there would be a like drift of disreputables of both sexes and of all +nationalities. It was fitting that one good woman should be recorded +as redeeming womanhood there. We learn of her that she was a +'servant,' or, as the margin preferably reads, a 'deaconess of the +Church which is at Cenchrea'; and in that capacity, by gentle +ministrations and the exhibition of purity and patient love, as well +as by the gracious administration of material help, had been a +'succourer of many.' There is a whole world of unmentioned kindnesses +and a life of self-devotion hidden away under these few words. +Possibly the succour which she administered was her own gift. She may +have been rich and influential, or perhaps she but distributed the +Church's bounty; but in any case the gift was sweetened by the +giver's hand, and the succour was the impartation of a woman's +sympathy more than the bestowment of a donor's gift. Sometime or +other, and somehow or other, she had had the honour and joy of +helping Paul, and no doubt that opportunity would be to her a crown +of service. She was now on the point of taking the long journey to +Rome on her own business, and the Apostle bespeaks for her help from +the Roman Church 'in whatsoever matter she may have need of you,' as +if she had some difficult affair on hand, and had no other friends in +the city. Possibly then she was a widow, and perhaps had had some +lawsuit or business with government authorities, with whom a word +from some of her brethren in Rome might stand her in good stead. +Apparently she was the bearer of this epistle, which would give her a +standing at once in the Roman Church, and she came among them with a +halo round her from the whole-hearted commendation of the Apostle. + +Mark the lessons from this little picture. + +We note first the remarkable illustration here given of the power of +the new bond of a common faith. The world was then broken up into +sections, which were sometimes bitterly antagonistic and at others +merely rigidly exclusive. The only bond of union was the iron fetter +of Rome, which crushed the people, but did not knit them together. +But here are Paul the Jew, Phoebe the Greek, and the Roman readers of +the epistle, all fused together by the power of the divine love that +melted their hearts, and the common faith that unified their lives. +The list of names in this chapter, comprising as it does men and +women of many nationalities, and some slaves as well as freemen, is +itself a wonderful testimony of the truth of Paul's triumphant +exclamation in another epistle, that in Christ there is 'neither Jew +nor Greek, bond nor free, male nor female.' + +The clefts have closed, and the very line of demarcation is +obliterated; and these clefts were deeper than any of which we +moderns have had experience. It remains something like a miracle that +the members of Paul's churches could ever be brought together, and +that their consciousness of oneness could ever overpower the +tremendous divisive forces. We sometimes wonder at their bickerings; +we ought rather to wonder at their unity, and be ashamed of the +importance which we attach to our infinitely slighter mutual +disagreements. The bond that was sufficient to make the early +Christians all one in Christ Jesus seems to have lost its binding +power to-day, and, like an used-up elastic band, to have no clasping +grip left in it. + +Another thought which we may connect with the name of Phoebe is the +characteristic place of women in Christianity. + +The place of woman amongst the Jews was indeed free and honourable as +compared with her position either in Greece or Rome, but in none of +them was she placed on the level of man, nor regarded mainly in the +aspect of an equal possessor of the same life of the Spirit. But a +religion which admits her to precisely the same position of a +supernatural life as is granted to man, necessarily relegates to a +subordinate position all differences of sex as it does all other +natural distinctions. The women who ministered to Jesus of their +substance, the two sisters of Bethany, the mourners at Calvary, the +three who went through the morning twilight to the tomb, were but the +foremost conspicuous figures in a great company through all the ages +who have owed to Jesus their redemption, not only from the slavery of +sin, but from the stigma of inferiority as man's drudge or toy. To +the world in which Paul lived it was a strange, new thought that +women could share with man in his loftiest emotions. Historically the +emancipation of one half of the human race is the direct result of +the Christian principle that all are one in Christ Jesus. In modern +life the emancipation has been too often divorced from its one sure +basis, and we have become familiar with the sight of the 'advanced' +women who have advanced so far as to have lost sight of the Christ to +whom they owe their freedom. The picture of Phoebe in our text might +well be commended to all such as setting forth the most womanlike +ideal. She was 'a succourer of many.' Her ministry was a ministry of +help; and surely such gentle ministry is that which most befits the +woman's heart and comes most graciously to the woman's fingers. + +Phoebe then may well represent to us the ministry of succour in this +world of woe and need. There is ever a cry, even in apparently +successful lives, for help and a helper. Man's clumsy hand is but too +apt to hurt where it strives to soothe, and nature itself seems to +devolve on the swifter sympathies and more delicate perceptions of +woman the joy of binding up wounded spirits. In the verses +immediately following our text we read of another woman to whom was +entrusted a more conspicuous and direct form of service. Priscilla +'taught Apollos the way of God more perfectly,' and is traditionally +represented as being united with her husband in evangelistic work. +But it is not merely prejudice which takes Phoebe rather than +Priscilla as the characteristic type of woman's special ministry. We +must remember our Lord's teaching, that the giver of 'a cup of cold +water in the name of a prophet' in some measure shares in the +prophet's work, and will surely share in the prophet's reward. She +who helped Paul must have entered into the spirit of Paul's labours; +and He to whom all service that is done from the same motive is one +in essence, makes no difference between him whose thirsty lips drink +and her whose loving hand presents the cup of cold water. 'Small +service is true service while it lasts.' Paul and Phoebe were one in +ministry and one in its recompense. + +We may further see in her a foreshadowing of the reward of lowly +service, though it be only the service of help. Little did Phoebe +dream that her name would have an eternal commemoration of her +unnoticed deeds of kindness and aid, standing forth to later +generations and peoples of whom she knew nothing, as worthy of +eternal remembrance. For those of us who have to serve unnoticed and +unknown, here is an instance and a prophecy which may stimulate and +encourage. 'Surely I will never forget any of their works' is a +gracious promise which the most obscure and humble of us may take to +heart, and sustained by which, we may patiently pursue a way on which +there are 'none to praise and very few to love.' It matters little +whether our work be noticed or recorded by men, so long as we know +that it is written in the Lamb's book of life and that He will one +day proclaim it 'before the Father in heaven and His angels.' + + + + +PRISCILLA AND AQUILA + + 'Greet Priscilla and Aquila my helpers in Christ Jesus; + 4. (Who have for my life laid down their own necks: + unto whom not only I give thanks, but so all the churches + of the Gentiles:) 5. Likewise greet the church that is + in their house.'--ROMANS xvi. 3-5. + + +It has struck me that this wedded couple present, even in the scanty +notices that we have of them, some interesting points which may be +worth while gathering together. + +Now, to begin with, we are told that Aquila was a Jew. We are not +told whether Priscilla was a Jewess or no. So far as her name is +concerned, she may have been, and very probably was, a Roman, and, if +so, we have in their case a 'mixed marriage' such as was not uncommon +then, and of which Timothy's parents give another example. She is +sometimes called Prisca, which was her proper name, and sometimes +Priscilla, an affectionate diminutive. The two had been living in +Rome, and had been banished under the decree of the Emperor, just as +Jews have been banished from England and from every country in Europe +again and again. They came from Rome to Corinth, and were, perhaps, +intending to go back to Aquila's native place, Pontus, when Paul met +them in the latter city, and changed their whole lives. His +association with them began in a purely commercial partnership. But +as they abode together and worked at their trade, there would be many +earnest talks about the Christ, and these ended in both husband and +wife becoming disciples. The bond thus knit was too close to be +easily severed, and so, when Paul sailed across the Ægean for +Ephesus, his two new friends kept with him, which they would be the +more ready to do, as they had no settled home. They remained with him +during his somewhat lengthened stay in the great Asiatic city; for we +find in the first Epistle to the Corinthians which was written from +Ephesus about that time, that the Apostle sends greetings from +'Priscilla and Aquila and the Church which is in their house.' But +when Paul left Ephesus they seem to have stayed behind, and +afterwards to have gone their own way. + +About a year after the first Epistle to the Corinthians was sent from +Ephesus, the Epistle to the Romans was written, and we find there the +salutation to Priscilla and Aquila which is my text. So this +wandering couple were back again in Rome by that time, and settled +down there for a while. They are then lost sight of for some time, +but probably they returned to Ephesus. Once more we catch a glimpse +of them in Paul's last letter, written some seven or eight years +after that to the Romans. The Apostle knows that death is near, and, +at that supreme moment, his heart goes out to these two faithful +companions, and he sends them a parting token of his undying love. +There are only two messages to friends in the second Epistle to +Timothy, and one of these is to Prisca and Aquila. At the mouth of +the valley of the shadow of death he remembered the old days in +Corinth, and the, to us, unknown instance of devotion which these two +had shown, when, for his life, they laid down their own necks. + +Such is all that we know of Priscilla and Aquila. Can we gather any +lessons from these scattered notices thus thrown together? + +I. Here is an object lesson as to the hallowing effect of +Christianity on domestic life and love. + +Did you ever notice that in the majority of the places where these +two are named, if we adopt the better readings, Priscilla's name +comes first? She seems to have been 'the better man of the two'; and +Aquila drops comparatively into the background. Now, such a couple, +and a couple in which the wife took the foremost place, was an +absolute impossibility in heathenism. They are a specimen of what +Christianity did in the primitive age, all over the Empire, and is +doing to-day, everywhere--lifting woman to her proper place. These +two, yoked together in 'all exercise of noble end,' and helping one +another in Christian work, and bracketed together by the Apostle, who +puts the wife first, as his fellow-helpers in Christ Jesus, stands +before us as a living picture of what our sweet and sacred family +life and earthly loves may be glorified into, if the light from +heaven shines down upon them, and is thankfully received into them. + +Such a house as the house of Prisca and Aquila is the product of +Christianity, and such ought to be the house of every professing +Christian. For we should all make our homes as 'tabernacles of the +righteous,' in which the voice of joy and rejoicing is ever heard. +Not only wedded love, but family love, and all earthly love, are then +most precious, when into them there flows the ennobling, the calming, +the transfiguring thought of Christ and His love to us. + +Again, notice that, even in these scanty references to our two +friends, there twice occurs that remarkable expression 'the church +that is in their house.' Now, I suppose that that gives us a little +glimpse into the rudimentary condition of public worship in the +primitive church. It was centuries after the time of Priscilla and +Aquila before circumstances permitted Christians to have buildings +devoted exclusively to public worship. Up to a very much later period +than that which is covered by the New Testament, they gathered +together wherever was most convenient. And, I suppose, that both in +Rome and Ephesus, this husband and wife had some room--perhaps the +workshop where they made their tents, spacious enough for some of the +Christians of the city to meet together in. One would like people who +talk so much about 'the Church,' and refuse the name to individual +societies of Christians, and even to an aggregate of these, unless it +has 'bishops,' to explain how the little gathering of twenty or +thirty people in the workshop attached to Aquila's house, is called +by the Apostle without hesitation 'the church which is in their +house.' It was a part of the Holy Catholic Church, but it was also 'a +Church,' complete in itself, though small in numbers. We have here +not only a glimpse into the manner of public worship in early times, +but we may learn something of far more consequence for us, and find +here a suggestion of what our homes ought to be. 'The Church that is +in thy house'--fathers and mothers that are responsible for your +homes and their religious atmosphere, ask yourselves if any one would +say that about your houses, and if they could not, why not? + +II. We may get here another object lesson as to the hallowing of +common life, trade, and travel. + +It does not appear that, after their stay in Ephesus, Aquila and his +wife were closely attached to Paul's person, and certainly they did +not take any part as members of what we may call his evangelistic +staff. They seem to have gone their own way, and as far as the scanty +notices carry us, they did not meet Paul again, after the time when +they parted in Ephesus. Their gipsy life was probably occasioned by +Aquila's going about--as was the custom in old days when there were +no trades-unions or organised centres of a special industry--to look +for work where he could find it. When he had made tents in Ephesus +for a while, he would go on somewhere else, and take temporary +lodgings there. Thus he wandered about as a working man. Yet Paul +calls him his 'fellow worker in Christ Jesus'; and he had, as we saw, +a Church in his house. A roving life of that sort is not generally +supposed to be conducive to depth of spiritual life. But their +wandering course did not hurt these two. They took their religion +with them. It did not depend on locality, as does that of a great +many people who are very religious in the town where they live, and, +when they go away for a holiday, seem to leave their religion, along +with their silver plate, at home. But no matter whether they were in +Corinth or Ephesus or Rome, Aquila and Priscilla took their Lord and +Master with them, and while working at their camel's-hair tents, they +were serving God. + +Dear brethren, what we want is not half so much preachers such as my +brethren and I, as Christian tradesmen and merchants and travellers, +like Aquila and Priscilla. + +III. Again, we may see here a suggestion of the unexpected issues of +our lives. + +Think of that complicated chain of circumstances, one end of which +was round Aquila and the other round the young Pharisee in Jerusalem. +It steadily drew them together until they met in that lodging at +Corinth. Claudius, in the fullness of his absolute power, said, 'Turn +all these wretched Jews out of my city. I will not have it polluted +with them any more. Get rid of them!' So these two were uprooted, and +drifted to Corinth. We do not know why they chose to go thither; +perhaps they themselves did not know why; but God knew. And while +they were coming thither from the west, Paul was coming thither from +the east and north. He was 'prevented by the Spirit from speaking in +Asia,' and driven across the sea against his intention to Neapolis, +and hounded out of Philippi and Thessalonica and Beræa; and turned +superciliously away from Athens; and so at last found himself in +Corinth, face to face with the tentmaker from Rome and his wife. Then +one of the two men said, 'Let us join partnership together, and set +up here as tent-makers for a time.' What came out of this unintended +and apparently chance meeting? + +The first thing was the conversion of Aquila and his wife; and the +effects of that are being realised by them in heaven at this moment, +and will go on to all eternity. + +So, in the infinite complexity of events, do not let us worry +ourselves by forecasting, but let us trust, and be sure that the Hand +which is pushing us is pushing us in the right direction, and that He +will bring us, by a right, though a roundabout way, to the City of +Habitation. It seems to me that we poor, blind creatures in this +world are somewhat like a man in a prison, groping with his hand in +the dark along the wall, and all unawares touching a spring which +moves a stone, disclosing an aperture that lets in a breath of purer +air, and opens the way to freedom. So we go on as if stumbling in the +dark, and presently, without our knowing what we do, by some trivial +act we originate a train of events which influences our whole future. + +Again, when Aquila and Priscilla reached Ephesus they formed another +chance acquaintance in the person of a brilliant young Alexandrian, +whose name was Apollos. They found that he had good intentions and a +good heart, but a head very scantily furnished with the knowledge of +the Gospel. So they took him in hand, just as Paul had taken them. If +I may use such a phrase, they did not know how large a fish they had +caught. They had no idea what a mighty power for Christ was lying +dormant in that young man from Alexandria who knew so much less than +they did. They instructed Apollos, and Apollos became second only to +Paul in the power of preaching the Gospel. So the circle widens and +widens. God's grace fructifies from one man to another, spreading +onward and outward. And all Apollos' converts, and _their_ +converts, and _theirs_ again, right away down the ages, we may +trace back to Priscilla and Aquila. + +So do not let us be anxious about the further end of our deeds--viz. +their results; but be careful about the nearer end of them--viz. +their motives; and God will look after the other end. Seeing that +'thou knowest not which shall prosper, whether this or that,' or how +much any of them will prosper, let us grasp _all_ opportunities +to do His will and glorify His name. + +IV. Further, here we have an instance of the heroic self-devotion +which love to Christ kindles. + +'For my sake they laid down their own necks.' We do not know to what +Paul is referring: perhaps to that tumult in Ephesus, where he +certainly was in danger. But the language seems rather more emphatic +than such danger would warrant. Probably it was at some perilous +juncture of which we know nothing (for we know very little, after +all, of the details of the Apostle's life), in which Aquila and +Priscilla had said, 'Take us and let him go. He can do a great deal +more for God than we can do. We will put our heads on the block, if +he may still live.' That magnanimous self-surrender was a wonderful +token of the passionate admiration and love which the Apostle +inspired, but its deepest motive was love to Christ and not to Paul +only. + +Faith in Christ and love to Him ought to turn cowards into heroes, to +destroy thoughts of self, and to make the utmost self-sacrifice +natural, blessed, and easy. We are not called upon to exercise +heroism like Priscilla's and Aquila's, but there is as much heroism +needed for persistently Christian life, in our prosaic daily +circumstances, as has carried many a martyr to the block, and many a +tremulous woman to the pyre. We can all be heroes; and if the love of +Christ is in us, as it should be, we shall all be ready to 'yield +ourselves living sacrifices, which is our reasonable service.' + +Long years after, the Apostle, on the further edge of life, looked +back over it all; and, whilst much had become dim, and some trusted +friends had dropped away, like Demas, he saw these two, and waved +them his last greeting before he turned to the executioner--'Salute +Prisca and Aquila.' Paul's Master is not less mindful of His friends' +love, or less eloquent in the praise of their faithfulness, or less +sure to reward them with the crown of glory. 'Whoso confesseth Me +before men, him will I also confess before the angels in heaven.' + + + + +TWO HOUSEHOLDS + + '... Salute them which are of Aristobulus' household. + 11. ... Greet them that be of the household of Narcissus, + which are in the Lord.'--ROMANS xvi. 10, 11. + + +There does not seem much to be got out of these two sets of +salutations to two households in Rome; but if we look at them with +eyes in our heads, and some sympathy in our hearts, I think we shall +get lessons worth the treasuring. + +In the first place, here are two sets of people, members of two +different households, and that means mainly, if not exclusively, +slaves. In the next place, in each case there was but a section of +the household which was Christian. In the third place, in neither +household is the master included in the greeting. So in neither case +was _he_ a Christian. + +We do not know anything about these two persons, men of position +evidently, who had large households. But the most learned of our +living English commentators of the New Testament has advanced a very +reasonable conjecture in regard to each of them. As to the first of +them, Aristobulus: that wicked old King Herod, in whose life Christ +was born, had a grandson of the name, who spent all his life in Rome, +and was in close relations with the Emperor of that day. He had died +some little time before the writing of this letter. As to the second +of them, there is a very notorious Narcissus, who plays a great part +in the history of Rome just a little while before Paul's period +there, and he, too, was dead. And it is more than probable that the +slaves and retainers of these two men were transferred in both cases +to the emperor's household and held together in it, being known as +Aristobulus' men and Narcissus' men. And so probably the Christians +among them are the brethren to whom these salutations are sent. + +Be that as it may, I think that if we look at the two groups, we +shall get out of them some lessons. + +I. The first of them is this: the penetrating power of Christian +truth. Think of the sort of man that the master of the first +household was, if the identification suggested be accepted. He is one +of that foul Herodian brood, in all of whom the bad Idumæan blood ran +corruptly. The grandson of the old Herod, the brother of Agrippa of +the Acts of the Apostles, the hanger-on of the Imperial Court, with +Roman vices veneered on his native wickedness, was not the man to +welcome the entrance of a revolutionary ferment into his household; +and yet through his barred doors had crept quietly, he knowing +nothing about it, that great message of a loving God, and a Master +whose service was freedom. And in thousands of like cases the Gospel +was finding its way underground, undreamed of by the great and wise, +but steadily pressing onwards, and undermining all the towering +grandeur that was so contemptuous of it. So Christ's truth spread at +first; and I believe that is the way it always spreads. Intellectual +revolutions begin at the top and filter down; religious revolutions +begin at the bottom and rise; and it is always the 'lower orders' +that are laid hold of first. 'Ye see your calling, brethren, how that +not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble +are called,' but a handful of slaves in Aristobulus' household, with +this living truth lodged in their hearts, were the bearers and the +witnesses and the organs of the power which was going to shatter all +that towered above it and despised it. And so it always is. + +Do not let us be ashamed of a Gospel that has not laid hold of the +upper and the educated classes, but let us feel sure of this, that +there is no greater sign of defective education and of superficial +culture and of inborn vulgarity than despising the day of small +things, and estimating truth by the position or the intellectual +attainments of the men that are its witnesses and its lovers. The +Gospel penetrated at first, and penetrates still, in the fashion that +is suggested here. + +II. Secondly, these two households teach us very touchingly and +beautifully the uniting power of Christian sympathy. + +A considerable proportion of the first of these two households would +probably be Jews--if Aristobulus were indeed Herod's grandson. The +probability that he was is increased by the greeting interposed +between those to the two households--'Salute Herodion.' The name +suggests some connection with Herod, and whether we suppose the +designation of 'my kinsman,' which Paul gives him, to mean 'blood +relation' or 'fellow countryman,' Herodion, at all events, was a Jew +by birth. As to the other members of these households, Paul may have +met some of them in his many travels, but he had never been in Rome, +and his greetings are more probably sent to them as conspicuous +sections, numerically, of the Roman Church, and as tokens of his +affection, though he had never seen them. The possession of a common +faith has bridged the gulf between him and them. Slaves in those days +were outside the pale of human sympathy, and almost outside the pale +of human rights. And here the foremost of Christian teachers, who was +a freeman born, separated from these poor people by a tremendous +chasm, stretches a brother's hand across it and grasps theirs. The +Gospel that came into the world to rend old associations and to split +up society, and to make a deep cleft between fathers and children and +husband and wife, came also to more than counterbalance its dividing +effects by its uniting power. And in that old world that was +separated into classes by gulfs deeper than any of which we have any +experience, it, and it alone, threw a bridge across the abysses and +bound men together. Think of what a revolution it must have been, +when a master and his slave could sit down together at the table of +the Lord and look each other in the face and say 'Brother' and for +the moment forget the difference of bond and free. Think of what a +revolution it must have been when Jew and Gentile could sit down +together at the table of the Lord, and forget circumcision and +uncircumcision, and feel that they were all one in Jesus Christ. And +as for the third of the great clefts--that, alas! which made so much +of the tragedy and the wickedness of ancient life--viz. the +separation between the sexes--think of what a revolution it was when +men and women, in all purity of the new bond of Christian affection, +could sit down together at the same table, and feel that they were +brethren and sisters in Jesus Christ. + +The uniting power of the common faith and the common love to the one +Lord marked Christianity as altogether supernatural and new, unique +in the world's experience, and obviously requiring something more +than a human force to produce it. Will anybody say that the +Christianity of this day has preserved and exhibits that primitive +demonstration of its superhuman source? Is there anything obviously +beyond the power of earthly motives in the unselfish, expansive love +of modern Christians? Alas! alas! to ask the question is to answer +it, and everybody knows the answer, and nobody sorrows over it. Is +any duty more pressingly laid upon Christian churches of this +generation than that, forgetting their doctrinal janglings for a +while, and putting away their sectarianisms and narrowness, they +should show the world that their faith has still the power to do what +it did in the old times, bridge over the gulf that separates class +from class, and bring all men together in the unity of the faith and +of the love of Jesus Christ? Depend upon it, unless the modern +organisations of Christianity which call themselves 'churches' show +themselves, in the next twenty years, a great deal more alive to the +necessity, and a great deal more able to cope with the problem, of +uniting the classes of our modern complex civilisation, the term of +life of these churches is comparatively brief. And the form of +Christianity which another century will see will be one which +reproduces the old miracle of the early days, and reaches across the +deepest clefts that separate modern society, and makes all one in +Jesus Christ. It is all very well for us to glorify the ancient love +of the early Christians, but there is a vast deal of false +sentimentality about our eulogistic talk of it. It were better to +praise it less and imitate it more. Translate it into present life, +and you will find that to-day it requires what it nineteen hundred +years ago was recognised as manifesting, the presence of something +more than human motive, and something more than man discovers of +truth. The cement must be divine that binds men thus together. + +Again, these two households suggest for us the tranquillising power +of Christian resignation. + +They were mostly slaves, and they continued to be slaves when they +were Christians. Paul recognised their continuance in the servile +position, and did not say a word to them to induce them to break +their bonds. The Epistle to the Corinthians treats the whole subject +of slavery in a very remarkable fashion. It says to the slave: 'If +you were a slave when you became a Christian, stop where you are. If +you have an opportunity of being free, avail yourself of it; if you +have not, never mind.' And then it adds this great principle: 'He +that is called in the Lord, being a slave, is Christ's freeman. +Likewise he that is called, being free, is Christ's slave.' The +Apostle applies the very same principle, in the adjoining verses, to +the distinction between circumcision and uncircumcision. From all +which there comes just the same lesson that is taught us by these two +households of slaves left intact by Christianity--viz. that where a +man is conscious of a direct, individual relation to Jesus Christ, +that makes all outward circumstances infinitely insignificant. Let us +get up to the height, and they all become very small. Of course, the +principles of Christianity killed slavery, but it took eighteen +hundred years to do it. Of course, there is no blinking the fact that +slavery was an essentially immoral and unchristian institution. But +it is one thing to lay down principles and leave them to be worked in +and then to be worked out, and it is another thing to go blindly +charging at existing institutions and throwing them down by violence, +before men have grown up to feel that they are wicked. And so the New +Testament takes the wise course, and leaves the foolish one to +foolish people. It makes the tree good, and then its fruit will be +good. + +But the main point that I want to insist upon is this: what was good +for these slaves in Rome is good for you and me. Let us get near to +Jesus Christ, and feel that we have got hold of His hand for our own +selves, and we shall not mind very much about the possible varieties +of human condition. Rich or poor, happy or sad, surrounded by +companions or treading a solitary path, failures or successes as the +world has it, strong or broken and weak and wearied--all these +varieties, important as they are, come to be very small when we can +say, 'We are the Lord's.' That amulet makes all things tolerable; and +the Christian submission which is the expression of our love to, and +confidence in, His infinite sweetness and unerring goodness, raises +us to a height from which the varieties of earthly condition seem to +blend and melt into one. When we are down amongst the low hills, it +seems a long way from the foot of one of them to the top of it; but +when we are on the top they all melt into one dead level, and you +cannot tell which is top and which is bottom. And so, if we only can +rise high enough up the hill, the possible diversities of our +condition will seem to be very small variations in the level. +III. Lastly, these two groups suggest to us the conquering power of +Christian faithfulness. + +The household of Herod's grandson was not a very likely place to find +Christian people in, was it? Such flowers do not often grow, or at +least do not easily grow, on such dunghills. And in both these cases +it was only a handful of the people, a portion of each household, +that was Christian. So they had beside them, closely identified with +them--working, perhaps, at the same tasks, I might almost say, +chained with the same chains--men who had no share in their faith or +in their love. It would not be easy to pray and love and trust God +and do His will, and keep clear of complicity with idolatry and +immorality and sin, in such a pigsty as that; would it? But these men +did it. And nobody need ever say, 'I am in such circumstances that I +cannot live a Christian life.' There are no such circumstances, at +least none of God's appointing. There are often such that we bring +upon ourselves, and then the best thing is to get out of them as soon +as we can. But as far as He is concerned, He never puts anybody +anywhere where he cannot live a holy life. + +There were no difficulties too great for these men to overcome; there +are no difficulties too great for us to overcome. And wherever you +and I may be, we cannot be in any place where it is so hard to live a +consistent life as these people were. Young men in warehouses, people +in business here in Manchester, some of us with unfortunate domestic +or relative associations, and so on--we may all feel as if it would +be so much easier for us if this, that, and the other thing were +changed. No, it would not be any easier; and perhaps the harder the +easier, because the more obviously the atmosphere is poisonous, the +more we shall put some cloth over our mouths to prevent it from +getting into our lungs. The dangerous place is the place where the +vapours that poison are scentless as well as invisible. But whatever +be the difficulties, there is strength waiting for us, and we may all +win the praise which the Apostle gives to another of these Roman +brethren, whom he salutes as 'Apelles, approved in Christ'--a man +that had been 'tried' and had stood his trial. So in our various +spheres of difficulty and of temptation we may feel that the greeting +from heaven, like Paul's message to the slaves in Rome, comes to us +with good cheer, and that the Master Himself sees us, sympathises +with us, salutes us, and stretches out His hand to help and to keep +us. + + + + +TRYPHENA AND TRYPHOSA + + 'Salute Tryphena and Tryphosa, who labour + in the Lord.'--ROMANS xvi. 12. + + +The number of salutations to members of the Roman Church is +remarkable when we take into account that Paul had never visited it. +The capital drew all sorts of people to it, and probably there had +been personal intercourse between most of the persons here mentioned +and the Apostle in some part of his wandering life. He not only +displays his intimate knowledge of the persons saluted, but his +beautiful delicacy and ingenuity in the varying epithets applied to +them shows how in his great heart and tenacious memory individuals +had a place. These shadowy saints live for ever by Paul's brief +characterisation of them, and stand out to us almost as clearly and +as sharply distinguished as they did to him. + +These two, Tryphena and Tryphosa, were probably sisters. That is +rendered likely by their being coupled together here, as well as by +the similarity of their names. These names mean luxurious, or +delicate, and no doubt expressed the ideal for their daughters which +the parents had had, and possibly indicate the kind of life from +which these two women had come. We can scarcely fail to note the +contrast between the meaning of their names and the Christian lives +they had lived. Two dainty women, probably belonging to a class in +which a delicate withdrawal from effort and toil was thought to be +the woman's distinctive mark, had fled from luxury, which often +tended to be voluptuous, and was always self-indulgent, and had +chosen the better part of 'labour in the Lord.' They had become +untrue to their names, because they must be true to their Master and +themselves. We may well take the lesson that lies here, and is +eminently needful to-day amidst the senseless, and often sinful, tide +of luxury which runs so strongly as to threaten the great and eternal +Christian principle of self-denial. + +The first thing that strikes us in looking at these salutations is +the illustration which it gives of the uniting power of a common +faith. Tryphena and Tryphosa were probably Roman ladies of some +social standing, and their names may indicate that they at least +inherited a tendency to exclusiveness; yet here they occur +immediately after the household of Narcissus and in close connection +with that of Aristobulus, both of which are groups of slaves. +Aristobulus was a grandson of Herod the Great, and Narcissus was a +well-known freedman, whose slaves at his death would probably become +the property of the Emperor. Other common slave names are those of +Ampliatus and Urbanus; and here in these lists they stand side by +side with persons of some distinction in the Roman world, and with +men and women of widely differing nationalities. The Church of Rome +would have seemed to any non-Christian observer a motley crowd in +which racial distinctions, sex, and social conditions had all been +swept away by the rising tide of a common fanaticism. In it was +exemplified in actual operation Paul's great principle that in Christ +Jesus 'there is neither Jew nor Greek, male nor female, bond nor +free, but in Him all are one.' Roman society in that day, as Juvenal +shows us, was familiar with the levelling and uniting power of common +vice and immorality, and the few sternly patriotic Romans who were +left lamented that 'the Orontes flowed into the Tiber'; but such +common wallowing in filth led to no real unity, whereas, in the +obscure corner of the great city where there were members of the +infant Church gathered together, there was the beginning of a common +life in the one Lord which lifted each participant of it out of the +dreary solitude of individuality, and imparted to each heart the +tingling consciousness of oneness with all who held the one faith in +the one Lord and had received the one baptism in the one Name. That +fair dawn has been shadowed by many clouds, and the churches of +to-day, however they may have developed doctrine, may look back with +reproach and shame to the example of Rome, where Tryphena and +Tryphosa, with all their inherited, fastidious delicacy, recognised +in the household of Aristobulus and the household of Narcissus +'brethren in the Lord,' and were as glad to welcome Jews, Asiatics, +Persians, and Greeks, as Romans of the bluest blood, into the family +of Christ. The Romish Church of our day has lost its early grace of +welcoming all who love the one Lord into its fellowship; and we of +the Protestant churches have been but too swift to learn the bad +lesson of forbidding all who follow not with us. + +Another thought which may be suggested by Tryphena and Tryphosa is +the blessed hallowing of natural family relations by common faith. +They were probably sisters, or, at all events, as their names +indicate, near relatives, and to them that faith must have been +doubly precious because they shared it with each other. None of the +trials to which the early Christians were exposed was more severe +than the necessity which their Christianity so often imposed upon +them of breaking the sacred family ties. It saddened even Christ's +heart to think that He had come to rend families in sunder, and to +make 'a man's foes them of his own household'; and we can little +imagine how bitter the pang must have been when family love had to be +cast aside at the bidding of allegiance to Him. + +But though the stress of that separation between those most nearly +related in blood by reason of unshared faith is alleviated in this +day, it still remains; and that is but a feeble Christian life which +does not feel that it is drawing a heart from closest human embraces +and constituting a barrier between it and the dearest of earth. There +is still need in these days of relaxed Christian sentiment for the +stern austerity of the law, 'He that loveth father or mother more +than Me is not worthy of Me'; and there are many Christian souls who +would be infinitely stronger and more mature, if they did not yield +to the seductions of family affections which are not rooted in Jesus +Christ. But still, though our faith ought to be far more than it +often is, the determining element in our affections and associations, +its noblest work is not to separate but to unite; and whilst it often +must divide, it is meant to draw more closely together hearts that +are already knit by earthly love. Its legitimate effect is to make +all earthly sweetnesses sweeter, all holy bonds more holy and more +binding, to infuse a new constraint and preciousness into all earthly +relationships, to make brothers tenfold more brotherly and sisters +more sisterly. The heart, in which the deepest devotion is yielded to +Jesus Christ, has its capacity for devotion infinitely increased, and +they who, looking into each other's faces, see reflected there +something of the Lord whom they both love, love each other all the +more because they love Him most, and in their love to Him, and His to +them, have found a new measure for all their affection. They who, +looking on their dear ones, can 'trust they live in God,' will there +find them 'worthier to be loved,' and will there find a power of +loving them. Tryphena and Tryphosa were more sisterly than ever when +they clung to their Elder Brother. 'There is no man that hath left +brethren, or sisters, or mother, or father, for My sake, but he shall +receive a hundredfold more in this time, brethren, and sisters, and +mothers, and in the world to come eternal life.' + +The contrast between the names of these two Roman ladies and the +characterisation of their 'labour in the Lord' may suggest to us the +most formidable foe of Christian earnestness. Their names, as we have +already noticed, point to a state of society in which the parents +ideal for their daughters was dainty luxuriousness and a withdrawal +from the rough and tumble of common life; but these two women, +magnetised by the love of Jesus, had turned their backs on the +parental ideal, and had cast themselves earnestly into a life of +toil. That ideal was never more formidably antagonistic to the vigour +of Christian life than it is to-day. Rome, in Paul's time, was not +more completely honeycombed with worldliness than England is to-day; +and the English churches are not far behind the English 'world' in +their paralysing love of luxury and self-indulgence. In all ages, +earnest Christians have had to take up the same vehement remonstrance +against the tendency of the average Christian to let his religious +life be weakened by the love of the world and the things of the +world. The protests against growing luxury have been a commonplace in +all ages of the Church; but, surely, there has never been a time when +it has reached a more senseless, sinful, and destroying height than +in our day. The rapid growth of wealth, with no capacity of using it +nobly, which modern commerce has brought, has immensely influenced +all our churches for evil. It is so hard for us, aggregated in great +cities, to live our own lives, and the example of our class has such +immense power over us that it is very hard to pursue the path of +'plain living and high thinking' in communities, all classes of which +are more and more yielding to the temptation to ostentation, +so-called comfort, and extravagant expenditure; and that this is a +danger--we are tempted to say _the_ danger--to the purity, loftiness, +and vigour of religious life among us, he must be blind who cannot +see, and he must be strangely ignorant of his own life who cannot +feel that it is the danger for him. I believe that for one professing +Christian whose earnestness is lost by reason of intellectual doubts, +or by some grave sin, there are a hundred from whom it simply oozes +away unnoticed, like wind out of a bladder, so that what was once +round and full becomes limp and flaccid. If Demas begins with loving +the present world, it will not be long before he finds a reason for +departing from Paul. + +We may take these two sisters, finally, as pointing for us the true +victory over this formidable enemy. They had turned resolutely away +from the heathen ideal enshrined in their names to a life of real +hard toil, as is distinctly implied by the word used by the Apostle. +What that toil consisted in we do not know, and need not inquire; but +the main point to be noted is that their 'labour' was 'in the Lord.' +That union with Christ makes labour for Him a necessity, and makes it +possible. 'The labour we delight in physics pain'; and if we are in +Him, we shall not only 'live in Him,' but all our work begun, +continued, and ended in Him, will in Him and by Him be accepted. +There is no victorious antagonist of worldly ease and self-indulgence +comparable to the living consciousness of union with Jesus and His +life in us. To dwell in the swamps at the bottom of the mountain is +to live in a region where effort is impossible and malaria weakens +vitality; to climb the heights brings bracing to the limbs and a +purer air into the expanding lungs, and makes work delightsome that +would have been labour down below. If we are 'in the Lord,' He is our +atmosphere, and we can draw from Him full draughts of a noble life in +which we shall not need the stimulus of self-interest or worldly +success to use it to the utmost in acts of service to Him. They who +live in the Lord will labour in the Lord, and they who labour in the +Lord will rest in the Lord. + + + + +PERSIS + + 'Salute the beloved Persis, who laboured much in + the Lord.'--ROMANS xvi. 12. + + +There are a great number of otherwise unknown Christians who pass for +a moment before our view in this chapter. Their characterisations are +like the slight outlines in the background of some great artist's +canvas: a touch of the brush is all that is spared for each, and yet, +if we like to look sympathetically, they live before us. Now, this +good woman, about whom we never hear again, and for whom these few +words are all her epitaph--was apparently, judging by her name, of +Persian descent, and possibly had been brought to Rome as a slave. At +all events, finding herself there, she had somehow or other become +connected with the Church in that city, and had there distinguished +herself by continuous and faithful Christian toil which had won the +affection of the Apostle, though he had never seen her, and knew no +more about her. That is all. She comes into the foreground for a +moment, and then she vanishes. What does she say to us? + +First of all, like the others named by Paul, she helps us to +understand, by her living example, that wonderful, new, uniting +process that was carried on by means of Christianity. The simple fact +of a Persian woman getting a loving message from a Jew, the woman +being in Rome and the Jew in Corinth, and the message being written +in Greek, brings before us a whole group of nationalities all fused +together. They had been hammered together, or, if you like it better, +chained together, by Roman power, but they were melted together by +Christ's Gospel. This Eastern woman and this Jewish man, and the many +others whose names and different nationalities pass in a flash before +us in this chapter, were all brought together in Jesus Christ. + +If we run our eye over these salutations, what strikes one, even at +the first sight, is the very small number of Jewish names; only one +certain, and another doubtful. Four or five names are Latin, and then +all the rest are Greek, but this woman seemingly came from further +east than any of them. There they all were, forgetting the hostile +nationalities to which they belonged, because they had found One who +had brought them into one great community. We talk about the uniting +influence of Christianity, but when we see the process going on +before us, in a case like this, we begin to understand it better. + +But another point may be noticed in regard to this uniting +process--how it brought into action the purest and truest love as a +bond that linked men. There are four or five of the people commended +in this chapter of whom the Apostle has nothing to say but that they +are beloved. This is the only woman to whom he applies that term. And +notice his instinctive delicacy: when he is speaking of men he says, +'_My_ beloved'; when he is greeting Persis he says, '_the_ beloved,' +that there may be no misunderstanding about the 'my'--'the beloved +Persis which laboured much in the Lord'--indicating, by one delicate +touch, the loftiness, the purity, and truly Christian character of +the bond that held them together. And that is no true Church, where +anything but that is the bond--the love that knits us to one another, +because we believe that each is knit to the dear Lord and fountain of +all love. + +What more does this good woman say to us? She is an example living +and breathing there before us, of what a woman may be in God's +Church. Paul had never been in Rome; no Apostle, so far as we know, +had had anything to do with the founding of the Church. The most +important Church in the Roman Empire, and the Church which afterwards +became the curse of Christendom, was founded by some anonymous +Christians, with no commission, with no supervision, with no +officials amongst them, but who just had the grace of God in their +hearts, and found themselves in Rome, and could not help speaking +about Jesus Christ. God helped them, and a little Church sprang into +being. And the great abundance of salutations here, and the +honourable titles which the Apostle gives to the Christians of whom +he speaks, and many of whom he signalises as having done great +service, are a kind of certificate on his part to the vigorous life +which, without any apostolic supervision or official direction, had +developed itself there in that Church. + +Now, it is to be noticed that this striking form of eulogium which is +attached to our Persis she shares in common with others in the group. +And it is to be further noticed that all those who are, as it were, +decorated with this medal--on whom Paul bestows this honour of saying +that they had 'laboured,' or 'laboured much in the Lord,' are women +that stand alone in the list. There are several other women in it, +but they are all coupled with men--husbands or brothers, or some kind +of relative. But there are three sets of women, I do not say single +women, but three sets of women, standing singly in the list, and it +is about them, and them only, that Paul says they 'laboured,' or +'laboured much.' There is a Mary who stands alone, and she 'bestowed +much labour on' Paul and others. Then there are, in the same verse as +my text, two sisters, Tryphena and Tryphosa, whose names mean 'the +luxurious.' And the Apostle seems to think, as he writes the two +names that spoke of self-indulgence: 'Perhaps these rightly described +these two women once, but they do not now. In the bad old days, +before they were Christians, they may have been rightly named +luxurious-living. But here is their name now, the luxurious is turned +into the self-sacrificing worker, and the two sisters "labour in the +Lord."' Then comes our friend Persis, who also stands alone, and she +shares in the honour that only these other two companies of women +share with her. She 'laboured much in the Lord.' In that little +community, without any direction from Apostles and authorised +teachers, the brethren and sisters had every one found their tasks; +and these solitary women, with nobody to say to them, 'Go and do this +or that,' had found out for themselves, or rather had been taught by +the Spirit of Jesus, what they had to do, and they worked at it with +a will. There are many things that Christian women can do a great +deal better than men, and we are not to forget that this modern talk +about the emancipation of women has its roots here in the New +Testament. We are not to forget either that prerogative means +obligation, and that the elevation of woman means the laying upon her +of solemn duties to perform. I wonder how many of the women members +of our Churches and congregations deserve such a designation as that? +We hear a great deal about 'women's rights' nowadays. I wish some of +my friends would lay a little more to heart than they do, 'women's +duties.' + +And now, lastly, the final lesson that I draw from this eulogium of an +otherwise altogether unknown woman is that she is a model of +Christian service. + +First, in regard to its measure. She 'laboured much in the Lord.' +Now, both these two words, 'laboured' and 'much,' are extremely +emphatic. The word rightly translated 'laboured' will appear in its +full force if I recall to you a couple of other places in which it is +employed in the New Testament. You remember that touching incident +about our Lord when, being '_wearied_ with His journey, He sat +thus on the well.' 'Wearied' is the same word as is here used. Then, +you remember how the Apostle, after he had been hauling empty nets +all night in the little, wet, dirty fishing-boat, said, perhaps with +a yawn, 'Master, we have _toiled_ all the night and caught +nothing.' He uses the same word as is employed here. Such is the sort +of work that these women had done--work carried to the point of +exhaustion, work up to the very edge of their powers, work unsparing +and continuous, and not done once in some flash of evanescent +enthusiasm, but all through a dreary night, in spite of apparent +failures. + +_There_ is the measure of service. Many of us seem to think that +if we say 'I am tired,' that is a reason for not doing anything. +Sometimes it is, no doubt; and no man has a right so to labour as to +impair his capacity for future labour, but subject to that condition +I do not know that the plea of fatigue is a sufficient reason for +idleness. And I am quite sure that the true example for us is the +example of Him who, when He was most wearied, sitting on the well, +was so invigorated and refreshed by the opportunity of winning +another soul that, when His disciples came back to Him, they looked +at His fresh strength with astonishment, and said to themselves, 'Has +any man brought Him anything to eat?' Ay, what He had to eat was work +that He finished for the Father, and some of us know that the truest +refreshment in toil is a change of toil. It is almost as good to +shift the load on to the other shoulder, or to take a stick into the +other hand, as it is to put away the load altogether. Oh, the careful +limits which Christian people nowadays set to their work for Jesus! +They are not afraid of being tired in their pursuit of business or +pleasure, but in regard to Christ's work they will let anything go to +wrack and ruin rather than that they should turn a hair, by +persevering efforts to prevent it. Work to the limit of power if you +live in the light of blessedness. + +She 'laboured much in the Lord,' or, as Jesus Christ said about the +other woman who was blamed by the people that did not love enough to +understand the blessedness of self-sacrifice, 'she had done what she +could.' It was an apology for the form of Mary's service, but it was +a stringent demand as to its amount. 'What she could'--not _half_ of +what she could; not what she _conveniently_ could. That is the +measure of acceptable service. + +Then, still further, may we not learn from Persis the spring of all +true Christian work? She 'laboured much in the Lord,' because she +_was_ 'in Him,' and in union with Him there came to her power +and desire to do things which, without that close fellowship, she +neither would have desired nor been able to do. It is vain to try to +whip up Christian people to forms of service by appealing to lower +motives. There is only one motive that will last, and bring out from +us all that is in us to do, and that is the appeal to our sense of +union and communion with Jesus Christ, and the exhortation to live in +Him, and then we shall work in Him. If you link the spindles in your +mill, or the looms in your weaving-shed, with the engine, they will +go. It is of no use to try to turn them by hand. You will only spoil +the machinery, and it will be poor work that you will get off them. + +So, dear brethren, be 'in the Lord.' That is the secret of service, +and the closer we come to Him, and the more continuously, moment by +moment, we realise our individual dependence upon Him, and our union +with Him, the more will our lives effloresce and blossom into all +manner of excellence and joyful service, and nothing else that +Christian people are whipped up to do, from lower and more vulgar +motives than that, will. It may be of a certain kind of +inferior value, but it is far beneath the highest beauty of Christian +service, nor will its issues reach the loftiest point of usefulness +to which even our poor service may attain. + +Persis seems to me to suggest, too, the safeguard of work. Ah, if she +had not 'laboured in the Lord,' and been 'in the Lord' whilst she was +labouring, she would very soon have stopped work. Our Christian work, +however pure its motive when we begin it, has in itself the tendency +to become mechanical, and to be done from lower motives than those +from which it was begun. That is true about a man in my position. It +is true about all of us, in our several ways of trying to serve our +dear Lord and Master. Unless we make a conscience of continually +renewing our communion with Him, and getting our feet once more +firmly upon the rock, we shall certainly in our Christian work, +having begun in the spirit, continue in the flesh, and before we know +where we are, we shall be doing work from habit, because we did it +yesterday at this hour, because people expect it of us, because A, B, +or C does it, or for a hundred other reasons, all of which are but +too familiar to us by experience. They are sure to slip in; they +change the whole character of the work, and they harm the workers. +The only way by which we can keep the garland fresh is by continually +dipping it in the fountain. The only way by which we can keep our +Christian work pure, useful, worthy of the Master, is by seeing to it +that our work itself does not draw us away from our fellowship with +Him. And the more we have to do, the more needful is it that we +should listen to Christ's voice when He says to us, 'Come ye +yourselves apart with Me into a solitary place, and there renew your +communion with Me.' + +The last lesson about our work which I draw from Persis is the +unexpected immortality of true Christian service. How Persis would +have opened her eyes if anybody had told her that nearly 1900 years +after she lived, people in a far-away barbarous island would be +sitting thinking about her, as you and I are doing now! How +astonished she would have been if it had been said to her, 'Now, +Persis, wheresoever in the whole world the Gospel is preached, your +name and your work and your epitaph will go with it, and as long +as men know about Jesus Christ, your and their Master, they will know +about you, His humble servant.' Well, we shall not have our names in +that fashion in men's memories, but Jesus will have your name and +mine, if we do His work as this woman did it, in _His_ memory. 'I +will never forget any of their works.' And if we--self-forgetful to +the limit of our power, and as the joyful result of our personal +union with that Saviour who has done everything for us--try to live +for His praise and glory in any fashion, then be sure of this, that +our poor deeds are as immortal as Him for whom they are done, and +that we may take to ourselves the great word which He has spoken, +when He has declared that at the last He will confess His confessors' +names before the angels in heaven. Blessed are the living that 'live +in the Lord'; blessed are the workers that work 'in the Lord,' for +when they come to be the dead that 'die in the Lord' and rest from +their labours, their works shall follow them. + + + + +A CRUSHED SNAKE + + 'The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your + feet shortly.'--ROMANS xvi. 20. + + +There are three other Scriptural sayings which may have been floating +in the Apostle's mind when he penned this triumphant assurance. 'Thou +shalt bruise his head'; the great first Evangel--we are to be endowed +with Christ's power; 'The lion and the adder thou shalt trample under +foot'--all the strength that was given to ancient saints is ours; +'Behold! I give you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and +over all the power of the enemy'--the charter of the seventy is the +perennial gift to the Church. Echoing all these great words, Paul +promises the Roman Christians that 'the God of peace shall bruise +Satan under your feet shortly.' Now, when any special characteristic +is thus ascribed to God, as when He is called 'the God of patience' +or 'the God of hope,' in the preceding chapter, the characteristic +selected has some bearing on the prayer or promise following. For +example, this same designation, 'the God of peace,' united with the +other, 'that brought again from the dead the Lord Jesus, that great +Shepherd of the sheep,' is laid as the foundation of the prayer for +the perfecting of the readers of the Epistle to the Hebrews in every +good work. It is, then, because of that great name that the Apostle +is sure, and would have his Roman brethren to be sure, that Satan +shall shortly be bruised under their feet. No doubt there may have +been some reference in Paul's mind to what he had just said about +those who caused divisions in the Church; but, if there is such +reference, it is of secondary importance. Paul is gazing on all the +great things in God which make Him the God of peace, and in them all +he sees ground for the confident hope that His power will be exerted +to crush all the sin that breaks His children's peace. + +Now the first thought suggested by these words is the solemn glimpse +given of the struggle that goes on in every Christian soul. + +Two antagonists are at hand-grips in every one of us. On the one +hand, the 'God of peace,' on the other, 'Satan.' If you believe in +the personality of the One, do not part with the belief in the +personality of the other. If you believe that a divine power and +Spirit is ready to help and strengthen you, do not think so lightly +of the enemies that are arrayed against you as to falter in the +belief that there _is_ a great personal Power, rooted in evil, +who is warring against each of us. Ah, brethren! we live far too much +on the surface, and we neither go down deep enough to the dark source +of the Evil, nor rise high enough to the radiant Fountain of the +Good. It is a shallow life that strikes that antagonism of God and +Satan out of itself. And though the belief in a personal tempter has +got to be very unfashionable nowadays, I am going to venture to say +that you may measure accurately the vitality and depth of a man's +religion by the emphasis with which he grasps the thought of that +great antagonism. There is a star of light, and there is a star of +darkness; and they revolve, as it were, round one centre. + +But whilst, on the one hand, our Christianity is made shallow in +proportion as we ignore this solemn reality, on the other hand, it is +sometimes paralysed and perverted by our misunderstanding of it. For, +notice, 'the God of peace shall bruise Satan _under your feet_.' +Yes, it is God that bruises, but He uses our feet to do it. It is God +from whom the power comes, but the power works through us, and we are +neither merely the field, nor merely the prize, of the conflict +between these two, but we ourselves have to put all our pith into the +task of keeping down the flat, speckled head that has the poison +gland in it. 'The God of peace'--blessed be His Name--'shall bruise +Satan under your feet,' but it will need the tension of your muscles, +and the downward force of your heel, if the wriggling reptile is to +be kept under. + +Turn, now, to the other thought that is here, the promise and pledge +of victory in the name, the God of peace. I have already referred to +two similar designations of God in the previous chapter, and if we +take them in union with this one in our text, what a wonderfully +beautiful and strengthening threefold view of that divine nature do +we get! 'The God of patience and consolation' is the first of the +linked three. It heads the list, and blessed is it that it does, +because, after all, sorrow makes up a very large proportion of the +experience of us all, and what most men seem to themselves to need +most is a God that will bear their sorrows with them and help them to +bear, and a God that will comfort them. But, supposing that He has +been made known thus as the source of endurance and the God of all +consolation, He becomes 'the God of hope,' for a dark background +flings up a light foreground, and a comforted sorrow patiently +endured is mighty to produce a radiant hope. The rising of the muddy +waters of the Nile makes the heavy crops of 'corn in Egypt.' So the +name 'the God of hope' fitly follows the name 'the God of patience +and consolation.' + +Then we come to the name in my text, built perhaps on the other two, +or at least reminiscent of them, and recalling them, 'the God of +peace,' who, through patience and consolation, through hope, and +through many another gift, breathes the benediction of His own great +tranquillity and unruffled calm over our agitated, distracted, sinful +hearts. In connection with one of those previous designations to +which I have referred, the Apostle has a prayer very different in +form from this, but identical in substance, when he says 'the God of +hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing.' Is not that +closely allied to the promise of my text, 'The God of peace shall +bruise Satan under your feet shortly'? Is there any surer way of +'bruising Satan' under a man's feet than filling him 'with joy and +peace in believing'? What can the Devil do to that man? If his soul +is saturated, and his capacities filled, with that pure honey of +divine joy, will he have any taste for the coarse dainties, the leeks +and the garlic, that the Devil offers him? Is there any surer way of +delivering a man from the temptations of his own baser nature, and +the solicitations of this busy intrusive world round about him, than +to make him satisfied with the goodness of the Lord, and conscious in +his daily experience of 'all joy and peace'? Fill the vessel with +wine, and there is no room for baser liquors or for poison. I suppose +that the way by which you and I, dear friends, will most effectually +conquer any temptations, is by falling back on the superior sweetness +of divine joys. When we live upon manna we do not crave onions. So He +'will bruise Satan under your feet' by giving that which will arm +your hearts against all his temptations and all his weapons. Blessed +be God for the way of conquest, which is the possession of a supremer +good! + +But then, notice how beautifully too this name, 'the God of peace,' +comes in to suggest that even in the strife there may be +tranquillity. I remember in an old church in Italy a painting of an +Archangel with his foot on the dragon's neck, and his sword thrust +through its scaly armour. It is perhaps the feebleness of the +artist's hand, but I think rather it is the clearness of his insight, +which has led him to represent the victorious angel, in the moment in +which he is slaying the dragon, as with a smile on his face, and not +the least trace of effort in the arm, which is so easily smiting the +fatal blow. Perhaps if the painter could have used his brush better +he would have put more expression into the attitude and the face, but +I think it is better as it is. We, too, may achieve a conquest over +the dragon which, although it requires effort, does not disturb +peace. There is a possibility of bruising that slippery head under my +foot, and yet not having to strain myself in the process. We may have +'peace subsisting at the heart of endless agitation.' Do you remember +how the Apostle, in another place, gives us the same +beautiful--though at first sight contradictory--combination when he +says, 'The peace of God shall garrison your heart'? + + 'My soul! there is a country + Far, far beyond the stars, + Where stands an armed sentry, + All skilful in the wars.' + +And her name is Peace, as the poet goes on to tell us. Ah, brethren! +if we lived nearer the Lord, we should find it more possible to +'fight the good fight of faith,' and yet to have 'our feet shod with +the preparedness of the gospel of peace.' + +'The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet'; and in +bruising He will give you His peace to do it, and His peace in doing +it, and in still greater measure after doing it. For every struggle +of the Christian soul adds something to the subsequent depth of +its tranquillity. And so the name of the God of peace is our pledge of +victory in, and of deepened peace after, our warfare with sin and +temptation. + +Lastly, note the swiftness with which Paul expects that this process +shall he accomplished. + +I dare say that he was thinking about the coming of the Lord, when +all the fighting and struggle would be over, and that when he said +'God shall bruise him under your feet shortly,' there lay in the back +of his mind the thought, 'the Lord is at hand.' But be that as it +may, there is another way of looking at the words. They are not in +the least like our experience, are they? 'Shortly!'--and here am I, a +Christian man for the last half century perhaps; and have I got much +further on in my course? Have I brought the sin that used to trouble +me much down, and is my character much more noble, Christ-like, than +it was long years ago? Would other people say that it is? Instead of +'shortly' we ought to put 'slowly' for the most of us. But, dear +friend, the ideal is swift conquest, and it is our fault and our +loss, if the reality is sadly different. + +There are a great many evils that, unless they are conquered +suddenly, have very small chance of ever being conquered at all. You +never heard of a man being cured of his love of intoxicating drink, +for instance, by a gradual process. The serpent's life is not crushed +out of it by gradual pressure, but by one vigorous stamp of a nervous +heel. + +But if my experience as a Christian man does not enable me to set to +my seal that this text is true, the text itself will tell me why. It +is 'the God of peace' that is going to 'bruise Satan.' Do you keep +yourself in touch with Him, dear friend? And do you let His powers +come uninterruptedly and continuously into your spirit and life? It +is sheer folly and self-delusion to wonder that the medicine does not +work as quickly as was promised, if you do not take the medicine. The +slow process by which, at the best, many Christian people 'bruise +Satan under their feet,' during which he hurts their heels more than +they hurt his head, is mainly due to their breaking the closeness and +the continuity of their communion with God in Jesus Christ. + +But, after all, it is Heaven's chronology that we have to do with +here. 'Shortly,' and it will be 'shortly,' if we reckon by heavenly +scales of duration. Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in +the morning. 'The Lord will help her, and that right early.' 'The +Lord is at hand.' When we get yonder, ah! how all the long years of +fighting will have dwindled down, and we shall say 'the Lord did help +me, and that right early,' and though there may have been more than +threescore years and ten of fighting, that, while we were in the +thick of it, did not seem to come to much, we shall then look back +and say: 'Yes, Lord, it was but for a moment, and it has brought me +to the undying day of Eternal Peace.' + + + + +TERTIUS + + 'I, Tertius, who write the epistle, salute you in the + Lord.'--ROMANS xvi. 22 (R.V.). + + +One sometimes sees in old religious pictures, in some obscure corner, +a tiny kneeling figure, the portrait of the artist. So Tertius here +gets leave to hold the pen for a moment on his own account, and from +Corinth sends his greeting to his unknown brethren in Rome. +Apparently he was a stranger to them, and needed to introduce +himself. He is never heard of before or since. For one brief moment +he is visible, like a star of a low magnitude, shining out for a +moment between two banks of darkness and then swallowed up. Judging +by his name, he was probably a Roman, and possibly had some +connection with Italy, but clearly was a stranger to the Church in +Rome. We do not know whether he was a resident in Corinth, where he +wrote this epistle, or one of Paul's travelling companions. Probably +he was the former, as his name never recurs in any of Paul's letters. +One can understand the impulse which led him for one moment to come +out of obscurity and to take up personal relations with those who had +so long enjoyed his pen. He would fain float across the deep gulf of +alienation a thread of love which looked like gossamer, but has +proved to be stronger than centuries and revolutions. + +This humble and modest greeting is an expression of a sentiment which +the world may smile at, but which, being 'in the Lord,' partakes of +immortality. No doubt the world's hate drove more closely together +all the disciples in primitive times; but the yearning of Tertius for +some little corner in the love of his Roman brethren might well +influence us to-day. There ought to be an effort of imagination going +out towards unknown brethren. Christian love is not meant to be kept +within the limits of sight and personal knowledge; it should overleap +the narrow bounds of the communities to which we belong, and +expatiate over the whole wide field. The great Shepherd has +prescribed for us the limits to the very edge of which our Christian +love should consciously go forth, and has rebuked the narrowness to +which we are prone, when He has said, 'Other sheep I have which are +not of this fold.' We are all too prone to let identities of opinion +and of polity, or even the accident of locality, set bounds to our +consciousness of brotherhood; and the example of this little gush of +affection, that reaches out a hand across the ocean and grasps the +hands of unknown partakers in the common life of the one Lord, may +well shame us out of our narrowness, and quicken us into a wide +perception and deepened feeling towards all who in every place call +up Jesus Christ as their Lord--'both their Lord and ours.' + +Another lesson which we may learn from Tertius' characterisation of +himself is the dignity of subordinate work towards a great end. His +office as amanuensis was very humble, but it was quite as necessary +as Paul's inspired fervour. It is to him that we owe our possession +of the Epistle; it is to him that Paul owed it that he was able to +record in imperishable words the thoughts that welled up in his mind, +and would have been lost if Tertius had not been at his side. The +power generated in the boilers does its work through machines of +which each little cog-wheel is as indispensable as the great shafts. +Members of the body which seem to be 'more feeble, are necessary.' +Every note in a great concerted piece of music, and every instrument, +down to the triangle and the little drum in the great orchestra, is +necessary. This lesson of the dignity of subordinate work needs to be +laid to heart both by those who think themselves to be capable of +more important service, and by those who have to recognise that the +less honourable tasks are all for which they are fit. To the former +it may preach humility, the latter it may encourage. We are all very +ignorant of what is great and what is small in the matter of our +Christian service, and we have sometimes to look very closely and to +clear away a great many vulgar misconceptions before we can +clearly discriminate between mites and talents. 'We know not which +may prosper, whether this or that'; and in our ignorance of what it +may please God to bring out of any service faithfully rendered to +Him, we had better not be too sure that true service is ever small, +or that the work that attracts attention and is christened by men +'great' is really so in His eyes. It is well to have the noble +ambition to 'desire earnestly the greater gifts,' but it is better to +'follow the more excellent way,' and to seek after the love which +knows nothing of great or small, and without which prophecy and the +knowledge of all mysteries, and all conspicuous and all the shining +qualities profit nothing. + +We can discern in Tertius' words a little touch of what we may call +pride in his work. No doubt he knew it to be subordinate, but he also +knew it to be needful; and no doubt he had put all his strength into +doing it well. No man will put his best into any task which he does +not undertake in such a spirit. It is a very plain piece of homely +wisdom that 'what is worth doing at all is worth doing well.' Without +a lavish expenditure of the utmost care and effort, our work will +tend to be slovenly and unpleasing to God, and man, and to ourselves. +We may be sure there were no blots and bits of careless writing in +Tertius' manuscript, and that he would not have claimed the friendly +feelings of his Roman brethren, if he had not felt that he had put +his best into the writing of this epistle. The great word of King +David has a very wide application. 'I will not take that which is +thine for the Lord, nor offer burnt offerings without cost.' + +Tertius' salutation may suggest to us the best thing by which to be +remembered. All his life before and after the hours spent at Paul's +side has sunk in oblivion. He wished to be known only as having +written the Epistle. Christian souls ought to desire to live chiefly +in the remembrance of those to whom they have been known as having +done some little bit of work for Jesus Christ. We may well ask +ourselves whether there is anything in our lives by which we should +thus wish to be remembered. All our many activities will sink into +silence; but if the stream of our life, which has borne along down +its course so much mud and sand, has brought some grains of gold in +the form of faithful and loving service to Christ and men--these will +not be lost in the ocean, but treasured by Him. What we do for Jesus +and to spread the knowledge of His name is the immortal part of our +mortal lives, and abides in His memory and in blessed results in our +own characters, when all the rest that made our busy and often stormy +days has passed into oblivion. All that we know of Tertius who wrote +this Epistle is that he wrote it. Well will it be for us if the +summary of our lives be something like that of his! + + + + +QUARTUS A BROTHER + + 'Quartus a brother.'--ROMANS xvi. 23. + + +I am afraid very few of us read often, or with much interest, those +long lists of names at the end of Paul's letters. And yet there are +plenty of lessons in them, if anybody will look at them lovingly and +carefully. There does not seem much in these three words; but I am +very much mistaken if they will not prove to be full of beauty and +pathos, and to open out into a wonderful revelation of what +Christianity is and does, as soon as we try to freshen them up into +some kind of human interest. + +It is easy for us to make a little picture of this brother Quartus. +He is evidently an entire stranger to the Church in Rome. They had +never heard his name before: none of them knew anything about him. +Further, he is evidently a man of no especial reputation or position +in the Church at Corinth, from which Paul writes. He contrasts +strikingly with the others who send salutations to Rome. 'Timotheus, +my work-fellow'--the companion and helper of the Apostle, whose name +was known everywhere among the Churches, heads the list. Then come +other prominent men of his more immediate circle. Then follows a +loving greeting from Paul's amanuensis, who, naturally, as the pen is +in his own hand, says: '_I_, Tertius, who wrote this epistle, +salute you in the Lord.' Then Paul begins again to dictate, and the +list runs on. Next comes a message from 'Gaius mine host, and of the +whole Church'--an influential man in the community, apparently rich, +and willing, as well as able, to extend to them large and loving +hospitality. Erastus, the chamberlain or treasurer of the city, +follows--a man of consequence in Corinth. And then, among all these +people of mark, comes the modest, quiet Quartus. He has no wealth +like Gaius, nor civic position like Erastus, nor wide reputation like +Timothy. He is only a good, simple, unknown Christian. He feels a +spring of love open in his heart to these brethren far across the +sea, whom he never met. He would like them to know that he thought +lovingly of them, and to be lovingly thought of by them. So he begs a +little corner in Paul's letter, and gets it; and there, in his little +niche, like some statue of a forgotten saint, scarce seen amidst the +glories of a great cathedral, 'Quartus a brother' stands to all time. + +The first thing that strikes me in connection with these words is, +how deep and real they show that new bond of Christian love to have +been. + +A little incident of this sort is more impressive than any amount of +mere talk about the uniting influence of the Gospel. Here we get a +glimpse of the power in actual operation in a man's heart, and if we +think of all that this simple greeting presupposes and implies, and +of all that had to be overcome before it could have been sent, we may +well see in it the sign of the greatest revolution that was ever +wrought in men's relations to one another, Quartus was an inhabitant +of Corinth, from which city this letter was written. His Roman name +may indicate Roman descent, but of that we cannot be sure. Just as +probably he may have been a Greek by birth, and so have had to +stretch his hand across a deep crevasse of national antipathy, in +order to clasp the hands of his brethren in the great city. There was +little love lost between Rome, the rough imperious conqueror, and +Corinth, prostrate and yet restive under her bonds, and nourishing +remembrances of a freedom which Rome had crushed, and of a culture +that Rome haltingly followed. + +And how many other deep gulfs of separation had to be bridged before +that Christian sense of oneness could be felt! It is impossible for +us to throw ourselves completely back to the condition of things +which the Gospel found. The world then was like some great field of +cooled lava on the slopes of a volcano, all broken up by a labyrinth +of clefts and cracks, at the bottom of which one can see the flicker +of sulphurous flames. Great gulfs of national hatred, of fierce +enmities of race, language, and religion; wide separations of social +condition, far profounder than anything of the sort which we know, +split mankind into fragments. On the one side was the freeman, on the +other, the slave; on the one side, the Gentile, on the other, the +Jew; on the one side, the insolence and hard-handedness of Roman +rule, on the other, the impotent, and therefore envenomed, hatred of +conquered peoples. + +And all this fabric, full of active repulsions and disintegrating +forces, was bound together into an artificial and unreal unity by the +iron clamp of Rome's power, holding up the bulging walls that were +ready to fall--the unity of the slave-gang manacled together for +easier driving. Into this hideous condition of things the Gospel +comes, and silently flings its clasping tendrils over the wide gaps, +and binds the crumbling structure of human society with a new bond, +real and living. We know well enough that that was so, but we are +helped to apprehend it by seeing, as it were, the very process going +on before our eyes, in this message from 'Quartus a brother.' + +It reminds us that the very notion of humanity, and of the +brotherhood of man, is purely Christian. A world-embracing society, +held together by love, was not dreamt of before the Gospel came; and +since the Gospel came it is more than a dream. If you wrench away the +idea from its foundation, as people do who talk about fraternity, and +seek to bring it to pass without Christ, it is a mere piece of +Utopian sentiment--a fine dream. But in Christianity it worked. It +works imperfectly enough, God knows. Still there is some reality in +it, and some power. The Gospel first of all produced the thing and +the practice, and then the theory came afterwards. The Church did not +talk much about the brotherhood of man, or the unity of the race; but +simply ignored all distinctions, and gathered into the fold the slave +and his master, the Roman and his subject, fair-haired Goths and +swarthy Arabians, the worshippers of Odin and of Zeus, the Jew and +the Gentile. That actual unity, utterly irrespective of all +distinctions, which came naturally in the train of the Gospel, was +the first attempt to realise the oneness of the race, and first +taught the world that all men were brethren. + +And before this simple word of greeting could have been sent, and the +unknown man in Corinth felt love to a company of unknown men in Rome, +some profound new impulse must have been given to the world; +something altogether unlike any of the forces hitherto in existence. +What was that? What should it be but the story of One who gave +Himself for the whole world, who binds men into a unity because of +His common relation to them all, and through whom the great +proclamation can be made: 'There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is +neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female, for ye are +all one in Christ Jesus.' Brother Quartus' message, like some tiny +flower above-ground which tells of a spreading root beneath, is a +modest witness to that mighty revolution, and presupposes the +preaching of a Saviour in whom he and his unseen friends in Rome are +one. + +So let us learn not to confine our sympathy and the play of our +Christian affection within the limits of our personal knowledge. We +must go further a-field than that. Like this man, let us sometimes +send our thoughts across mountains and seas. He knew nobody in the +Roman Church, and nobody knew him, but he wished to stretch out his +hand to them, and to feel, as it were, the pressure of their fingers +in his palm. That is a pattern for us. + +Let me suggest another thing. Quartus was a Corinthian. The +Corinthian Church was remarkable for its quarrellings and +dissensions. One said, 'I am of Paul, and another, I of Apollos, and +I of Cephas, and I of Christ.' I wonder if our friend Quartus +belonged to any of these parties? There is nothing more likely than +that he had a much warmer glow of Christian love to the brethren over +there in Rome than to those who sat on the same bench with him in the +upper room at Corinth. For you know that sometimes it is true about +people, as well as about scenery, that 'distance lends enchantment to +the view.' A great many of us have much keener sympathies with +'brethren' who are well out of our reach, and whose peculiarities do +not jar against ours, than with those who are nearest. I do not say +Quartus was one of these, but he may very well have been one of the +wranglers in Corinth who found it much easier to love his brother +whom he had not seen than his brother whom he had seen. So take the +hint, if you need it. Do not let your Christian love go wandering +away abroad only, but keep some for home consumption. + +Again, how simply, and with what unconscious beauty, the deep reason +for our Christian unity is given in that one word, a 'Brother.' As if +he had said, Never mind telling them anything about what I am, what +place I hold, or what I do. Tell them I am a brother, that will be +enough. It is the only name by which I care to be known; it is the +name which explains my love to them. + +We are brethren because we are sons of one Father. So that favourite +name, by which the early Christians knew each other, rested upon and +proclaimed the deep truth that they knew themselves to be all +partakers of a common life derived from one Parent. When they said +they were brethren, they implied, 'We have been born again by the +word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.' The great Christian +truth of regeneration, the communication of a divine life from God +the Father, through Christ the Son, by the Holy Spirit, is the +foundation of Christian brotherhood. So the name is no mere piece of +effusive sentiment, but expresses a profound fact. 'To as many as +received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God,' and +therein to become the brethren of all His sons. That is the true +ground of our unity, and of our obligation to love all who are +begotten of Him. You cannot safely put them on any other footing. All +else--identity of opinion, similarity of practice and ceremonial, +local or national ties, and the like--all else is insufficient. It +may be necessary for Christian communities to require in addition a +general identity of opinion, and even some uniformity in government +and form of worship; but if ever they come to fancy that such +subordinate conditions of visible oneness are the grounds of their +spiritual unity, and to enforce these as such, they are slipping off +the real foundation, and are perilling their character as Churches of +Christ. The true ground of the unity of all Christians is here: 'Have +we not all one Father?' We possess a kindred life derived from Him. +We are a family of brethren because we are sons. + +Another remark is, how strangely and unwittingly this good man has +got himself an immortality by that passing thought of his. One loving +message has won for him the prize for which men have joyfully given +life itself,--an eternal place in history. Wheresoever the Gospel is +preached there also shall this be told as a memorial of him. How much +surprised he would have been if, as he leaned forward to Tertius +hurrying to end his task and said, 'Send my love too,' anybody had +told him that that one act of his would last as long as the world, +and his name be known for ever! And how much ashamed some of the +other people in the New Testament would have been if they had known +that their passing faults--the quarrel of Euodia and Syntyche for +instance--were to be gibbeted for ever in the same fashion! How +careful they would have been, and we would be, of our behaviour if we +knew that it was to be pounced down upon and made immortal in that +style! Suppose you were to be told--Your thoughts and acts to-morrow +at twelve o'clock will be recorded for all the world to read--you +would be pretty careful how you behaved. When a speaker sees the +reporters in front of him, he weighs his words. + +Well, Quartus' little message is written down here, and the world +knows it. All our words and works are getting put down too, in +another Book up there, and it is going to be read out one day. It +does seem wonderful that you and I should live as we do, knowing that +all the while that God is recording it all. If we are not ashamed to +do things, and let Him note them on His tablets that they may be for +the time to come, for ever and ever, it is strange that we should be +more careful to attitudinise and pose ourselves before one another +than before Him. Let us then keep ever in mind 'those pure eyes and +perfect witness of the all-judging' God. The eternal record of this +little message is only a symbol of the eternal life and eternal +record of all our transient and trivial thoughts and deeds before +Him. Let us live so that each act, if recorded, would shine with some +modest ray of true light like brother Quartus' greeting, and let us +seek that, like him,--all else about us being forgotten, position, +talents, wealth, buried in the dust,--we may be remembered, if we are +remembered at all, by such a biography as is condensed into these +three words. Who would not wish to be embalmed, so to speak, in such +a record? Who would not wish to have such an epitaph as this? A sweet +fate to live for ever in the world's memory by three words which tell +his name, his Christianity, and his brotherly love! So far as we are +remembered at all, may the like be our life's history and our +epitaph! + + + + +EXPOSITIONS OF HOLY SCRIPTURE + +ALEXANDER MACLAREN, D.D., Litt.D. + +CORINTHIANS +(_To II Corinthians, Chap. V_) + + + +CONTENTS + +CALLING ON THE NAME (1 COR. i. 2) + +PERISHING OR BEING SAVED (1 COR. i. 18) + +THE APOSTLE'S THEME (1 COR. ii. 2) + +GOD'S FELLOW-WORKERS (1 COR. iii. 9) + +THE TESTING FIRE (1 COR. iii. 12, 13) + +TEMPLES OF GOD (1 COR. iii. 16) + +DEATH, THE FRIEND (1 COR. iii. 21, 22) + +SERVANTS AND LORDS (1 COR. iii. 21-23) + +THE THREE TRIBUNALS (1 COR. iv. 3, 4) + +THE FESTAL LIFE (1 COR. v. 8) + +FORMS _VERSUS_ CHARACTER + (1 COR. vii. 19, GAL. v. 6, GAL. vi. 15, R.V.) + +SLAVES AND FREE (1 COR. vii. 22) + +THE CHRISTIAN LIFE (1 COR. vii. 24) + +'LOVE BUILDETH UP' (1 COR. viii. 1-13) + +THE SIN OF SILENCE (1 COR. ix. 16, 17) + +A SERVANT OF MEN (1 COR. ix. 19-23) + +HOW THE VICTOR RUNS (1 COR. ix. 24) + +'CONCERNING THE CROWN' (1 COR. ix. 25) + +THE LIMITS OF LIBERTY (1 COR. x. 23-33) + +'IN REMEMBRANCE OF ME' (1 COR. xi. 24) + +THE UNIVERSAL GIFT (1 COR. xii. 7) + +WHAT LASTS (1 COR. xiii. 8, 13) + +THE POWER OF THE RESURRECTION (1 COR. xv. 3, 4) + +REMAINING AND FALLING ASLEEP (1 COR. xv. 6) + +PAUL'S ESTIMATE OF HIMSELF (1 COR. xv. 10) + +THE UNITY OF APOSTOLIC TEACHING (1 COR. xv. 11) + +THE CERTAINTY AND JOY OF THE RESURRECTION (1 COR. xv. 20) + +THE DEATH OF DEATH (1 COR. xv. 20, 21; 50-58) + +STRONG AND LOVING (1 COR. xvi. 13, 14) + +ANATHEMA AND GRACE (1 COR. xvi. 21-24) + +GOD'S YEA; MAN'S AMEN (2 COR. i. 20, R.V.) + +ANOINTED AND STABLISHED (2 COR. i. 21) + +SEAL AND EARNEST (2 COR. i. 22) + +THE TRIUMPHAL PROCESSION (2 COR. ii. 14, R.V.) + +TRANSFORMATION BY BEHOLDING (2 COR. iii. 18) + +LOOKING AT THE UNSEEN (2 COR. iv. 18) + +TENT AND BUILDING (2 COR. v. 1) + +THE PATIENT WORKMAN (2 COR. v. 5) + +THE OLD HOUSE AND THE NEW (2 COR. v. 8) + +PLEASING CHRIST (2 COR. v. 9) + +THE LOVE THAT CONSTRAINS (2 COR. v. 14) + +THE ENTREATIES OF GOD (2 COR. v. 20) + + + + +I. CORINTHIANS + + +CALLING ON THE NAME + + 'All that in every place call upon the name of Jesus + Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours.'--1 COR. i. 2. + + +There are some difficulties, with which I need not trouble you, about +both the translation and the connection of these words. One thing is +quite clear, that in them the Apostle associates the church at +Corinth with the whole mass of Christian believers in the world. The +question may arise whether he does so in the sense that he addresses +his letter both to the church at Corinth and to the whole of the +churches, and so makes it a catholic epistle. That is extremely +unlikely, considering how all but entirely this letter is taken up +with dealing with the especial conditions of the Corinthian church. +Rather I should suppose that he is simply intending to remind 'the +Church of God at Corinth ... sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be +saints,' that they are in real, living union with the whole body of +believers. Just as the water in a little land-locked bay, connected +with the sea by some narrow strait like that at Corinth, is yet part +of the whole ocean that rolls round the world, so that little +community of Christians had its living bond of union with all the +brethren in every place that called upon the name of Jesus Christ. + +Whichever view on that detail of interpretation be taken, this +phrase, as a designation of Christians, is worth considering. It is +one of many expressions found in the New Testament as names for them, +some of which have now dropped out of general use, while some are +still retained. It is singular that the name of 'Christian,' which +has all but superseded all others, was originally invented as a jeer +by sarcastic wits at Antioch, and never appears in the New Testament, +as a name by which believers called themselves. Important lessons are +taught by these names, such as disciples, believers, brethren, +saints, those of the way, and so on, each of which embodies some +characteristic of a follower of Jesus. So this appellation in the +text, 'those who call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,' may +yield not unimportant lessons if it be carefully weighed, and to some +of these I would ask your attention now. + +I. First, it gives us a glimpse into the worship of the primitive +Church. + +To 'call on the name of the Lord' is an expression that comes +straight out of the Old Testament. It means there distinctly +adoration and invocation, and it means precisely these things when it +is referred to Jesus Christ. + +We find in the Acts of the Apostles that the very first sermon that +was preached at Pentecost by Peter all turns upon this phrase. He +quotes the Old Testament saying, 'Whosoever shall call on the name of +the Lord shall be saved,' and then goes on to prove that 'the Lord,' +the 'calling on whose Name' is salvation, is Jesus Christ; and winds +up with 'Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that +God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and +Christ.' + +Again we find that Ananias of Damascus, when Jesus Christ appeared to +him and told him to go to Paul and lay his hands upon him, shrank +from the perilous task because Paul had been sent to 'bind them that +call upon the name of the Lord,' and to persecute them. We find the +same phrase recurring in other connections, so that, on the whole, we +may take the expression as a recognised designation of Christians. + +This was their characteristic, that they prayed to Jesus Christ. The +very first word, so far as we know, that Paul ever heard from a +Christian was, 'Lord Jesus! receive my spirit.' He heard that cry of +calm faith which, when he heard it, would sound to him as horrible +blasphemy from Stephen's dying lips. How little he dreamed that he +himself was soon to cry to the same Jesus, 'Lord, what wilt thou have +me to do?' and was in after-days to beseech Him thrice for +deliverance, and to be answered by sufficient grace. How little he +dreamed that, when his own martyrdom was near, he too would look to +Jesus as Lord and righteous Judge, from whose hands all who loved His +appearing should receive their crown! Nor only Paul directs desires +and adoration to Jesus as Lord; the last words of Scripture are a cry +to Him as Lord to come quickly, and an invocation of His 'grace' on +all believing souls. + +Prayer to Christ from the very beginning of the Christian Church was, +then, the characteristic of believers, and He to whom they prayed, +thus, from the beginning, was recognised by them as being a Divine +Person, God manifest in the flesh. + +The object of their worship, then, was known by the people among whom +they lived. Singing hymns to Christus as a god is nearly all that the +Roman proconsul in his well-known letter could find to tell his +master of their worship. They were the worshippers--not merely the +disciples--of one Christ. That was their peculiar distinction. Among +the worshippers of the false gods they stood erect; before Him, and +Him only, they bowed. In Corinth there was the polluted worship of +Aphrodite and of Zeus. These men called not on the name of these +lustful and stained deities, but on the name of the Lord Jesus +Christ. And everybody knew whom they worshipped, and understood whose +men they were. Is that true about us? Do we Christian men so +habitually cultivate the remembrance of Jesus Christ, and are we so +continually in the habit of invoking His aid, and of contemplating +His blessed perfections and sufficiency, that every one who knew us +would recognise us as meant by those who call on the name of the Lord +Jesus Christ? + +If this be the proper designation of Christian people, alas! alas! +for so many of the professing Christians of this day, whom neither +bystanders nor themselves would think of as included in such a name! + +Further, the connection here shows that the divine worship of Christ +was universal among the churches. There was no 'place' where it was +not practised, no community calling itself a church to whom He was +not the Lord to be invoked and adored. This witness to the early and +universal recognition in the Christian communities of the divinity of +our Lord is borne by an undisputedly genuine epistle of Paul's. It is +one of the four which the most thorough-going destructive criticism +accepts as genuine. It was written before the Gospels, and is a voice +from the earlier period of Paul's apostleship. Hence the importance +of its attestation to this fact that all Christians everywhere, both +Jewish, who had been trained in strict monotheism, and Gentile, who +had burned incense at many a foul shrine, were perfectly joined +together in this, that in all their need they called on the name of +Jesus Christ as Lord and brought to Him, as divine, adoration not to +be rendered to any creatures. From the day of Pentecost onwards, a +Christian was not merely a disciple, a follower, or an admirer, but a +worshipper of Christ, the Lord. + +II. We may see here an unfolding of the all-sufficiency of Jesus +Christ. + +Note that solemn accumulation, in the language of my text, of all the +designations by which He is called, sometimes separately and +sometimes unitedly, the name of 'our Lord Jesus Christ.' We never +find that full title given to Him in Scripture except when the +writer's mind is labouring to express the manifoldness and +completeness of our Lord's relations to men, and the largeness and +sufficiency of the blessings which He brings. In this context I find +in the first nine or ten verses of this chapter, so full is the +Apostle of the thoughts of the greatness and wonderfulness of his +dear Lord on whose name he calls, that six or seven times he employs +this solemn, full designation. + +Now, if we look at the various elements of this great name we shall +get various aspects of the way in which calling on Christ is the +strength of our souls. + +'Call on the name of--the Lord.' That is the Old Testament Jehovah. +There is no mistaking nor denying, if we candidly consider the +evidence of the New Testament writings, that, when we read of Jesus +Christ as 'Lord,' in the vast majority of cases, the title is not a +mere designation of human authority, but is an attribution to Him of +divine nature and dignity. We have, then, to ascribe to Him, and to +call on Him as possessing, all which that great and incommunicable +Name certified and sealed to the Jewish Church as their possession +in their God. The Jehovah of the Old Testament is our Lord of the +New. He whose being is eternal, underived, self-sufficing, +self-determining, knowing no variation, no diminution, no age, He +who is because He is and that He is, dwells in His fulness in our +Saviour. To worship Him is not to divert worship from the one God, +nor is it to have other gods besides Him. Christianity is as much +monotheistic as Judaism was, and the law of its worship is the old +law--Him only shalt thou serve. It is the divine will that all men +should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. + +But what is it to call on the name of Jesus? That name implies all +the sweetness of His manhood. He is our Brother. The name 'Jesus' is +one that many a Jewish boy bore in our Lord's own time and before it; +though, afterwards, of course, abhorrence on the part of the Jew and +reverence on the part of the Christian caused it almost entirely to +disappear. But at the time when He bore it it was as undistinguished +a name as Simeon, or Judas, or any other of His followers' names. To +call upon the name of Jesus means to realise and bring near to +ourselves, for our consolation and encouragement, for our strength +and peace, the blessed thought of His manhood, so really and closely +knit to ours; to grasp the blessedness of the thought that He knows +our frame because He Himself has worn it, and understands and pities +our weakness, being Himself a man. To Him whom we adore as Lord we +draw near in tenderer, but not less humble and prostrate, adoration +as our brother when we call on the name of the Lord Jesus, and thus +embrace as harmonious, and not contradictory, both the divinity of +the Lord and the humanity of Jesus. + +To call on the name of Christ is to embrace in our faith and to +beseech the exercise on our behalf of all which Jesus is as the +Messiah, anointed by God with the fulness of the Spirit. As such He +is the climax, and therefore the close of all revelation, who is the +long-expected fruition of the desire of weary hearts, the fulfilment, +and therefore the abolition, of sacrifice and temple and priesthood +and prophecy and all that witnessed for Him ere He came. We further +call on the name of Christ the Anointed, on whom the whole fulness of +the Divine Spirit dwelt in order that, calling upon Him, that fulness +may in its measure be granted to us. + +So the name of the Lord Jesus Christ brings to view the divine, the +human, the Messiah, the anointed Lord of the Spirit, and Giver of the +divine life. To call on His name is to be blessed, to be made pure +and strong, joyous and immortal. 'The name of the Lord is a strong +tower, the righteous runneth into it and is safe.' Call on His name +in the day of trouble and ye shall be heard and helped. + +III. Lastly, this text suggests what a Christian life should be. + +We have already remarked that to call on the name of Jesus was the +distinctive peculiarity of the early believers, which marked them off +as a people by themselves. Would it be a true designation of the bulk +of so-called Christians now? You do not object to profess yourself a +Christian, or, perhaps, even to say that you are a disciple of +Christ, or even to go the length of calling yourself a follower and +imitator. But are you a worshipper of Him? In your life have you +the habit of meditating on Him as Lord, as Jesus, as Christ, and of +refreshing and gladdening dusty days and fainting strength by the +living water, drawn from the one unfailing stream from these triple +fountains? Is the invocation of His aid habitual with you? + +There needs no long elaborate supplication to secure His aid. How +much has been done in the Church's history by short bursts of prayer, +as 'Lord, help me!' spoken or unspoken in the moment of extremity! +'They cried unto God in the battle.' They would not have time for +very lengthy petitions then, would they? They would not give much +heed to elegant arrangement of them or suiting them to the canons of +human eloquence. 'They cried unto God in the battle'; whilst the +enemy's swords were flashing and the arrows whistling about their +ears. These were circumstances to make a prayer a 'cry'; no composed +and stately utterance of an elegantly modulated voice, nor a languid +utterance without earnestness, but a short, sharp, loud call, such as +danger presses from panting lungs and parched throats. Therefore the +cry was answered, 'and He was entreated of them.' 'Lord, save us, we +perish!' was a very brief prayer, but it brought its answer. And so +we, in like manner, may go through our warfare and work, and day by +day as we encounter sudden bursts of temptation may meet them with +sudden jets of petition, and thus put out their fires. And the same +help avails for long-continuing as for sudden needs. Some of us may +have to carry lifelong burdens and to fight in a battle ever renewed. +It may seem as if our cry was not heard, since the enemy's assault is +not weakened, nor our power to beat it back perceptibly increased. +But the appeal is not in vain, and when the fight is over, if not +before, we shall know what reinforcements of strength to our weakness +were due to our poor cry entering into the ears of our Lord and +Brother. No other 'name' is permissible as our plea or as recipient +of our prayer. In and on the name of the Lord we must call, and if we +do, anything is possible rather than that the promise which was +claimed for the Church and referred to Jesus, in the very first +Christian preaching on Pentecost, should not be fulfilled--'Whosoever +shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved.' + +'In every place.' We may venture to subject the words of my text to a +little gentle pressure here. The Apostle only meant to express the +universal characteristics of Christians everywhere. But we may +venture to give a different turn to the words, and learn from them +the duty of devout communion with Christ as a duty for each of us +wherever we are. If a place is not fit to pray in it is not fit to be +in. We may carry praying hearts, remembrances of the Lord, sweet, +though they may be swift and short, contemplations of His grace, His +love, His power, His sufficiency, His nearness, His punctual help, +like a hidden light in our hearts, into all the dusty ways of life, +and in every place call on His name. There is no place so dismal but +that thoughts of Him will make sunshine in it; no work so hard, so +commonplace, so prosaic, so uninteresting, but that it will become +the opposite of all these if whatever we do is done in remembrance of +our Lord. Nothing will be too hard for us to do, and nothing too +bitter for us to swallow, and nothing too sad for us to bear, if only +over all that befalls us and all that we undertake and endeavour we +make the sign of the Cross and call upon the name of the Lord. If 'in +every place' we have Him as the object of our faith and desire, and +as the Hearer of our petition, in 'every place' we shall have Him for +our help, and all will be full of His bright presence; and though we +have to journey through the wilderness we shall ever drink of that +spiritual rock that will follow us, and that Rock is Christ. In every +place call upon His name, and every place will be a house of God, and +a gate of heaven to our waiting souls. + + + + +PERISHING OR BEING SAVED + + 'For the preaching of the Cross is to them that perish + foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power + of God.'--1 COR. i. 18. + + +The starting-point of my remarks is the observation that a slight +variation of rendering, which will be found in the Revised Version, +brings out the true meaning of these words. Instead of reading 'them +that perish' and 'us which are saved,' we ought to read 'them that +_are perishing_,' and 'us which _are being_ saved.' That is to say, +the Apostle represents the two contrasted conditions, not so much as +fixed states, either present or future, but rather as processes which +are going on, and are manifestly, in the present, incomplete. That +opens some very solemn and intensely practical considerations. + +Then I may further note that this antithesis includes the whole of +the persons to whom the Gospel is preached. In one or other of these +two classes they all stand. Further, we have to observe that the +consideration which determines the class to which men belong, is the +attitude which they respectively take to the preaching of the Cross. +If it be, and because it is, 'foolishness' to some, they belong to +the catalogue of the perishing. If it be, and because it is, 'the +power of God' to others, they belong to the class of those who are in +process of being saved. + +So, then, we have the ground cleared for two or three very simple, +but, as it seems to me, very important thoughts. + +I. I desire, first, to look at the two contrasted conditions, +'perishing' and 'being saved.' + +Now we shall best, I think, understand the force of the darker of +these two terms if we first ask what is the force of the brighter and +more radiant. If we understand what the Apostle means by 'saving' and +'salvation' we shall understand also what he means by 'perishing.' + +If, then, we turn for a moment to Scripture analogy and teaching, we +find that that threadbare word 'salvation,' which we all take it for +granted that we understand, and which, like a well-worn coin, has +been so passed from hand to hand that it scarcely remains +legible--that well-worn word 'salvation' starts from a double +metaphorical meaning. It means either--and is used for both--being +healed or being made safe. In the one sense it is often employed in +the Gospel narratives of our Lord's miracles, and it involves the +metaphor of a sick man and his cure; in the other it involves the +metaphor of a man in peril and his deliverance and security. The +negative side, then, of the Gospel idea of salvation is the making +whole from a disease, and the making safe from a danger. Negatively, +it is the removal from each of us of the one sickness, which is sin; +and the one danger, which is the reaping of the fruits and +consequences of sin, in their variety as guilt, remorse, habit, and +slavery under it, perverted relation to God, a fearful apprehension +of penal consequences here, and, if there be a hereafter, there, too. +The sickness of soul and the perils that threaten life, flow from the +central fact of sin, and salvation consists, negatively, in the +sweeping away of all of these, whether the sin itself, or the fatal +facility with which we yield to it, or the desolation and perversion +which it brings into all the faculties and susceptibilities, or the +perversion of relation to God, and the consequent evils, here and +hereafter, which throng around the evil-doer. The sick man is healed, +and the man in peril is set in safety. + +But, besides that, there is a great deal more. The cure is incomplete +till the full tide of health follows convalescence. When God saves, +He does not only bar up the iron gate through which the hosts of evil +rush out upon the defenceless soul, but He flings wide the golden +gate through which the glad troops of blessings and of graces flock +around the delivered spirit, and enrich it with all joys and with all +beauties. So the positive side of salvation is the investiture of the +saved man with throbbing health through all his veins, and the +strength that comes from a divine life. It is the bestowal upon the +delivered man of everything that he needs for blessedness and for +duty. All good conferred, and every evil banned back into its dark +den, such is the Christian conception of salvation. It is much that +the negative should be accomplished, but it is little in comparison +with the rich fulness of positive endowments, of happiness, and of +holiness which make an integral part of the salvation of God. + +This, then, being the one side, what about the other? If this be +salvation, its precise opposite is the Scriptural idea of +'perishing.' Utter ruin lies in the word, the entire failure to be +what God meant a man to be. That is in it, and no contortions of +arbitrary interpretation can knock that solemn significance out of +the dreadful expression. If salvation be the cure of the sickness, +perishing is the fatal end of the unchecked disease. If salvation be +the deliverance from the outstretched claws of the harpy evils that +crowd about the trembling soul, then perishing is the fixing of their +poisoned talons into their prey, and their rending of it into +fragments. + +Of course that is metaphor, but no metaphor can be half so dreadful +as the plain, prosaic fact that the exact opposite of the salvation, +which consists in the healing from sin and the deliverance from +danger, and in the endowment with all gifts good and beautiful, is +the Christian idea of the alternative 'perishing.' Then it means the +disease running its course. It means the dangers laying hold of the +man in peril. It means the withdrawal, or the non-bestowal, of all +which is good, whether it be good of holiness or good of happiness. +It does not mean, as it seems to me, the cessation of conscious +existence, any more than salvation means the bestowal of conscious +existence. But he who perishes knows that he has perished, even as he +knows the process while he is in the process of perishing. Therefore, +we have to think of the gradual fading away from consciousness, and +dying out of a life, of many things beautiful and sweet and gracious, +of the gradual increase of distance from Him, union with whom is the +condition of true life, of the gradual sinking into the pit of utter +ruin, of the gradual increase of that awful death in life and life in +death in which living consciousness +makes the conscious subject aware that he is lost; lost to God, lost +to himself. + +Brethren, it is no part of my business to enlarge upon such awful +thoughts, but the brighter the light of salvation, the darker the +eclipse of ruin which rings it round. This, then, is the first +contrast. + +II. Now note, secondly, the progressiveness of both members of the +alternative. + +All states of heart or mind tend to increase, by the very fact of +continuance. Life is a process, and every part of a spiritual being +is in living motion and continuous action in a given direction. So +the law for the world, and for every man in it, in all regions of his +life, quite as much as in the religious, is 'To him that hath shall +be given, and he shall have abundance.' + +Look, then, at this thought of the process by which these two +conditions become more and more confirmed, consolidated, and +complete. Salvation is a progressive fact. In the New Testament we +have that great idea looked at from three points of view. Sometimes +it is spoken of as having been accomplished in the past in the case +of every believing soul--'Ye have been saved' is said more than once. +Sometimes it is spoken of as being accomplished in the present--'Ye +are saved' is said more than once. And sometimes it is relegated to +the future--'Now is our salvation nearer than when we believed,' and +the like. But there are a number of New Testament passages which +coincide with this text in regarding salvation as, not the work of +any one moment, but as a continuous operation running through life, +not a point either in the past, present, or future, but a continued +life. As, for instance, 'The Lord added to the Church daily those +that were being saved.' By one offering He hath perfected for ever +them that are being sanctified. And in a passage in the Second +Epistle to the Corinthians, which, in some respects, is an exact +parallel to that of my text, we read of the preaching of the Gospel +as being a 'savour of Christ in them that are being saved, and in +them that are perishing.' + +So the process of being saved is going on as long as a Christian man +lives in this world; and every one who professes to be Christ's +follower ought, day by day, to be growing more and more saved, more +fully filled with that Divine Spirit, more entirely the conqueror of +his own lusts and passions and evil, more and more invested with all +the gifts of holiness and of blessedness which Jesus Christ is ready +to bestow upon him. + +Ah, brethren! that notion of a progressive salvation at work in all +true Christians has all but faded away out of the beliefs, as it has +all but disappeared from the experience, of hosts of you that call +yourselves Christ's followers, and are not a bit further on than you +were ten years ago; are no more healed of your corruptions (perhaps +less so, for relapses are dangerous) than you were then--have not +advanced any further into the depths of God than when you first got a +glimpse of Him as loving, and your Father, in Jesus Christ--are +contented to linger, like some weak band of invaders in a strange +land, on the borders and coasts, instead of pressing inwards and +making it all your own. Growing Christians--may I venture to +say?--are not the majority of professing Christians. And, on the +other side, as certainly, there are progressive deterioration and +approximation to disintegration and ruin. How many men there are +listening to me now who were far nearer being delivered from their +sins when they were lads than they have ever been since! How many in +whom the sensibility to the message of salvation has disappeared, in +whom the world has ossified their consciences and their hearts, in +whom there is a more entire and unstruggling submission to low things +and selfish things and worldly things and wicked things, than there +used to be! I am sure that there are not a few among us now who were +far better, and far happier, when they were poor and young, and could +still thrill with generous emotion and tremble at the Word of God, +than they are to-day. Why! there are some of you that could no more +bring back your former loftier impulses, and compunction of spirit +and throbs of desire towards Christ and His salvation, than you could +bring back the birds' nests or the snows of your youthful years. You +are perishing, in the very process of going down and down into the +dark. + +Now, notice, that the Apostle treats these two classes as covering +the whole ground of the hearers of the Word, and as alternatives. If +not in the one class we are in the other. Ah, brethren! life is no +level plane, but a steep incline, on which there is no standing +still, and if you try to stand still, down you go. Either up or down +must be the motion. If you are not more of a Christian than you were a +year ago, you are less. If you are not more saved--for there is a +degree of comparison--if you are not more saved, you are less saved. + +Now, do not let that go over your head as pulpit thunder, meaning +nothing. It means _you_, and, whether you feel or think it or +not, one or other of these two solemn developments is at this moment +going on in you. And that is not a thought to be put lightly on one +side. + +Further, note what a light such considerations as these, that +salvation and perishing are vital processes--'going on all the time,' +as the Americans say--throw upon the future. Clearly the two +processes are incomplete here. You get the direction of the line, but +not its natural termination. And thus a heaven and a hell are +demanded by the phenomena of growing goodness and of growing badness +which we see round about us. The arc of the circle is partially +swept. Are the compasses going to stop at the point where the grave +comes in? By no means. Round they will go, and will complete the +circle. But that is not all. The necessity for progress will persist +after death; and all through the duration of immortal being, +goodness, blessedness, holiness, Godlikeness, will, on the one hand, +grow in brighter lustre; and on the other, alienation from God, loss +of the noble elements of the nature, and all the other doleful +darknesses which attend that conception of a lost man, will increase +likewise. And so, two people, sitting side by side here now, may +start from the same level, and by the operation of the one principle +the one may rise, and rise, and rise, till he is lost in God, and so +finds himself, and the other sink, and sink, and sink, into the +obscurity of woe and evil that lies beneath every human life as a +possibility. + +III. And now, lastly, notice the determining attitude to the Cross +which settles the class to which we belong. + +Paul, in my text, is explaining his reason for not preaching the +Gospel with what he calls 'the words of man's wisdom,' and he says, +in effect, 'It would be of no use if I did, because what settles +whether the Cross shall look "foolishness" to a man or not is the +man's whole moral condition, and what settles whether a man shall +find it to be "the power of God" or not is whether he has passed into +the region of those that are being saved.' + +So there are two thoughts suggested which sound as if they were +illogically combined, but which yet are both true. It is true that +men perish, or are saved, because the Cross is to them respectively +'foolishness' or 'the power of God'; and the other thing is also +true, that the Cross is to them 'foolishness,' or 'the power of God' +because, respectively, they are perishing or being saved. That is not +putting the cart before the horse, but both aspects of the truth are +true. + +If you see nothing in Jesus Christ, and His death for us all, except +'foolishness,' something unfit to do you any good, and unnecessary to +be taken into account in your lives--oh, my friends! _that_ is the +condemnation of your eyes, and not of the thing you look at. If a +man, gazing on the sun at twelve o'clock on a June day, says to me, +'It is not bright,' the only thing I have to say to him is, 'Friend, +you had better go to an oculist.' And if to us the Cross is +'foolishness,' it is because already a process of 'perishing' has +gone so far that it has attacked our capacity of recognising the +wisdom and love of God when we see them. + +But, on the other hand, if we clasp that Cross in simple trust, we +find that it is the power which saves us out of all sins, sorrows, +and dangers, and 'shall save us' at last 'into His heavenly kingdom.' + +Dear friends, that message leaves no man exactly as it found him. My +words, I feel, in this sermon, have been very poor, set by the side +of the greatness of the theme; but, poor as they have been, you will +not be exactly the same man after them, if you have listened to them, +as you were before. The difference may be very imperceptible, but it +will be real. One more, almost invisible, film, over the eyeball; one +more thin layer of wax in the ear; one more fold of insensibility +round heart and conscience--or else some yielding to the love; some +finger put out to take the salvation; some lightening of the pressure +of the sickness; some removal of the peril and the danger. The same +sun hurts diseased eyes, and gladdens sound ones. The same fire melts +wax and hardens clay. 'This Child is set for the rise and fall of +many in Israel.' 'To the one He is the savour of life unto life; to +the other He is the savour of death unto death.' _Which_ is He, for +He _is_ one of them, to you? + + + + +THE APOSTLE'S THEME + + 'I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus + Christ, and Him crucified.'--1 COR. ii. 2. + + +Many of you are aware that to-day I close forty years of ministry in +this city--I cannot say to this congregation, for there are very, +very few that can go back with me in memory to the beginning of these +years. You will bear me witness that I seldom intrude personal +references into the pulpit, but perhaps it would be affectation not +to do so now. Looking back over these long years, many thoughts arise +which cannot be spoken in public. But one thing I may say, and that +is, that I am grateful to God and to you, dear friends, for the +unbroken harmony, confidence, affection, and forbearance which have +brightened and lightened my work. Of its worth I cannot judge; its +imperfections I know better than the most unfavourable critic; but I +can humbly take the words of this text as expressive, not, indeed, of +my attainments, but of my aims. One of my texts, on my first Sunday +in Manchester, was 'We preach Christ and Him crucified,' and I look +back, and venture to say that the noble words of this text have been, +however imperfectly followed, my guiding star. + +Now, I wish to say a word or two, less personal perhaps, and yet, as +you can well suppose, not without a personal reference in my own +consciousness. + +I. Note here first, then, the Apostolic theme--Jesus Christ and Him +crucified. + +Now, the Apostle, in this context, gives us a little autobiographical +glimpse which is singularly and interestingly confirmed by some +slight incidental notices in the Book of the Acts. He says, in the +context, that he was with the Corinthians 'in weakness and in fear +and in much trembling,' and, if we turn to the narrative, we find +that a singular period of silence, apparent abandonment of his work +and dejection, seems to have synchronised with his coming to the +great city of Corinth. The reasons were very plain. He had recently +come into Europe for the first time and had had to front a new +condition of things, very different from what he had found in +Palestine or in Asia Minor. His experience had not been encouraging. +He had been imprisoned in Philippi; he had been smuggled away by +night from Thessalonica; he had been hounded from Berea; he had all +but wholly failed to make any impression in Athens, and in his +solitude he came to Corinth, and lay quiet, and took stock of his +adversaries. He came to the conclusion which he records in my text; +he felt that it was not for him to argue with philosophers, or to +attempt to vie with Sophists and professional orators, but that his +only way to meet Greek civilisation, Greek philosophy, Greek +eloquence, Greek self-conceit, was to preach 'Christ and Him +crucified.' The determination was not come to in ignorance of the +conditions that were fronting him. He knew Corinth, its wealth, its +wickedness, its culture, and knowing these he said, 'I have made up +my mind that I will know nothing amongst you save Jesus Christ and +Him crucified.' + +So, then, this Apostle's conception of his theme was--the biography +of a Man, with especial emphasis laid on one act in His history--His +death. Christianity is Christ, and Christ is Christianity. His +relation to the truth that He proclaimed, and to the truths that may +be deducible from the story of His life and death, is altogether +different from the relation of any other founder of a religion to the +truths that he has proclaimed. For in these you can accept the +teaching, and ignore the teacher. But you cannot do that with +Christianity; 'I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life'; and in +that revealing biography, which is the preacher's theme, the +palpitating heart and centre is the death upon the Cross. So, +whatever else Christianity comes to be--and it comes to be a great +deal else--the principle of its growth, and the germ which must +vitalise the whole, lie in the personality and the death of Jesus +Christ. + +That is not all. The history of the life and the death want something +more to make them a gospel. The fact, I was going to say, is the +least part of the fact; as in some vegetable growths, there is far +more underground than above. For, unless along with, involved in, and +deducible from, but capable of being stated separately from, the +external facts, there is a certain commentary or explanation of them: +the history is a history, the biography is a biography, the story of +the Cross is a touching narrative, but it is no gospel. + +And what was Paul's commentary which lifted the bare facts up into +the loftier region? This--as for the person, Jesus Christ 'declared +to be the son of God with power'--as for the fact of the death, 'died +for our sins according to the Scriptures.' Let in these two +conceptions into the facts--and they are the necessary explanation +and presupposition of the facts--the Incarnation and the Sacrifice, +and then you get what Paul calls 'my gospel,' not because it was his +invention, but because it was the trust committed to him. That is the +Gospel which alone answers to the facts which he deals with; and that +is the Gospel which, God helping me, I have for forty years tried to +preach. + +We hear a great deal at present, or we did a few years ago, about +this generation having recovered Jesus Christ, and about the +necessity of going 'back to the Christ of the Gospels.' By all means, +I say, if in the process you do not lose the Christ of the Epistles, +who is the Christ of the Gospels, too. I am free to admit that a past +generation has wrapped theological cobwebs round the gracious figure +of Christ with disastrous results. For it is perfectly possible to +know the things that are said about Him, and not to know Him about +whom these things are said. But the mistake into which the present +generation is far more likely to fall than that of substituting +theology for Christ, is the converse one--that of substituting an +undefined Christ for the Christ of the Gospels and the Epistles, the +Incarnate Son of God, who died for our salvation. And that is a more +disastrous mistake than the other, for you can know nothing about Him +and He can be nothing to you, except as you grasp the Apostolic +explanation of the bare facts--seeing in Him the Word who became +flesh, the Son who died that we might receive the adoption of sons. + +I would further point out that a clear conception of what the theme +is, goes a long way to determine the method in which it shall be +proclaimed. The Apostle says, in the passage which is parallel to the +present one, in the previous chapter, 'We preach Christ crucified'; +with strong emphasis on the word 'preach.' 'The Jew required a sign'; +he wanted a man who would do something. The Greek sought after +wisdom; he wanted a man who would perorate and argue and dissertate. +Paul says, 'No!' 'We have nothing to _do_. We do not come to +philosophise and to argue. We come with a message of fact that has +occurred, of a Person that has lived.' And, as most of you know, the +word which he uses means in its full signification, 'to proclaim as a +herald does.' + +Of course, if my business were to establish a set of principles, +theological or otherwise, then argumentation would be my weapon, +proofs would be my means, and my success would be that I should win +your credence, your intellectual consent, and conviction. If I were +here to proclaim simply a morality, then the thing that I would aim +to secure would be obedience, and the method of securing it would be +to enforce the authority and reasonableness of the command. But, +seeing that my task is to proclaim a living Person and a historical +fact, then the way to do that is to do as the herald does when in the +market-place he stands, trumpet in one hand and the King's message in +the other--proclaim it loudly, confidently, not 'with bated breath +and whispering humbleness,' as if apologising, nor too much concerned +to buttress it up with argumentation out of his own head, but to say, +'Thus saith the Lord,' and to what the Lord saith conscience says, +'Amen.' Brethren, we need far more, in all our pulpits, of that +unhesitating confidence in the plain, simple proclamation, stripped, +as far as possible, of human additions and accretions, of the great +fact and the great Person on whom all our salvation depends. + +II. So let me ask you to notice the exclusiveness which this theme +demands. + +'Nothing but,' says Paul. I might venture to say--though perhaps the +tone of the personal allusions in this sermon may seem to contradict +it--that this exclusiveness is to be manifested in one very difficult +direction, and that that is, the herald shall efface himself. We have +to hold up the picture; and if I might take such a metaphor, like a +man in a gallery who is displaying some masterpiece to the eyes of +the beholders, we have to keep ourselves well behind it; and it will +be wise if not even a finger-tip is allowed to steal in front and +come into sight. One condition, I believe, of real power in the +ministration of the Gospel, is that people shall be convinced that +the preacher is thinking not at all about himself, but altogether +about his message. You remember that wonderfully pathetic utterance +from John the Baptist's stern lips, which derives much additional +pathos and tenderness from the character of the man from whom it +came, when they asked him, 'Who art thou?' and his answer was, 'I am +a Voice.' I am a Voice; that is all! Ah, that is the example! We +preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus as Lord. We must efface +ourselves if we would proclaim Christ. + +But I turn to another direction in which this theme demands +exclusiveness, and I revert to the previous chapter where in the +parallel portion to the words of my text, we find the Apostle very +clearly conscious of the two great streams of expectation and wish +which he deliberately thwarted and set at nought. 'The Jews require a +sign--but we preach Christ crucified. The Greeks seek after wisdom,' +but again, 'we preach Christ crucified.' Now, take these two. They +are representations, in a very emphatic way, of two sets of desires +and mental characteristics, which divide the world between them. + +On the one hand, there is the sensuous tendency that wants something +done for it, something to see, something that sense can grasp at; and +so, as it fancies, work itself upwards into a higher region. 'The Jew +requires a sign'--that is, not merely a miracle, but something to +look at. He wants a visible sacrifice; he wants a priest. He wants +religion to consist largely in the doing of certain acts which may be +supposed to bring, in some magical fashion, spiritual blessings. And +Paul opposes to that, 'We preach Christ crucified.' Brethren, the +tendency is strong to-day, not only in those parts of the Anglican +communion where sacramentarian theories are in favour, but amongst +all sections of the Christian Church, in which there is obvious a +drift towards more ornate ritual, and aesthetic services, as means of +attracting to church or chapel, and as more important than +proclaiming Christ. I am free to confess that possibly some of us, +with our Puritan upbringing and tendency, too much disregard that +side of human nature. Possibly it is so. But for all that I +profoundly believe that if religion is to be strong it must have a +very, very small infusion of these external aids to spiritual +worship, and that few things more weaken the power of the Gospel that +Paul preached than the lowering of the flag in conformity with +desires of men of sense, and substituting for the simple glory of the +preached Word the meretricious, and in time impotent, and always +corrupting, attractions of a sensuous worship. + +Further, 'The Greeks seek after wisdom.' They wanted demonstration, +abstract principles, systematised philosophies, and the like. Paul +comes again with his 'We preach Christ and Him crucified.' The wisdom +is there, as I shall have to say in a moment, but the form that it +takes is directly antagonistic to the wishes of these wisdom-seeking +Greeks. The same thing in modern guise besets us to-day. We are +called upon, on all sides, to bring into the pulpit what they call an +ethical gospel; putting it into plain English, to preach morality, +and to leave out Christ. We are called upon, on all sides, to preach +an applied Christianity, a social gospel--that is to say, largely to +turn the pulpit into a Sunday supplement to the daily newspaper. We +are asked to deal with the intellectual difficulties which spring +from the collision of science, true or false, with religion, and the +like. All that is right enough. But I believe from my heart that the +thing to do is to copy Paul's example, and to preach Christ and Him +crucified. You may think me right or you may think me wrong, but here +and now, at the end of forty years, I should like to say that I have +for the most part ignored that class of subjects deliberately, and of +set purpose, and with a profound conviction, be it erroneous or not, +that a ministry which listens much to the cry for 'wisdom' in its +modern forms, has departed from the true perspective of Christian +teaching, and will weaken the churches which depend upon it. Let who +will turn the pulpit into a professor's chair, or a lecturer's +platform, or a concert-room stage or a politician's rostrum, I for +one determine to know nothing among you save Jesus Christ and Him +crucified. + +III. Lastly, observe the all-sufficient comprehensiveness which this +theme secures. + +Paul says 'nothing but'; he might have said 'everything in.' For +'Jesus Christ and Him crucified' covers all the ground of men's +needs. No doubt many of you will have been saying to yourselves +whilst you have been listening, if you have been listening, to what I +have been saying, 'Ah! old-fashioned narrowness; quite out of date in +this generation.' Brethren, there are two ways of adapting one's +ministry to the times. One is falling in with the requirements of the +times, and the other is going dead against them, and both of these +methods have to be pursued by us. + +But the exclusiveness of which I have been speaking, is no narrow +exclusiveness. Paul felt that, if he was to give the Corinthians what +they needed, he must refuse to give them what they wanted, and that +whilst he crossed their wishes he was consulting their necessities. +That is true yet, for the preaching that bases itself upon the life +and death of Jesus Christ, conceived as Paul had learned from Jesus +Christ to conceive them, that Gospel, whilst it brushes aside men's +superficial wishes, goes straight to the heart of their deep-lying +universal necessities, for what the Jew needs most is not a sign, and +what the Greek needs most is not wisdom, but what they both need most +is deliverance from the guilt and power of sin. And we all, scholars +and fools, poets and common-place people, artists and ploughmen, all +of us, in all conditions of life, in all varieties of culture, in all +stages of intellectual development, in all diversities of occupation +and of mental bias, what we all have in common is that human heart in +which sin abides, and what we all need most to have is that evil drop +squeezed out of it, and our souls delivered from the burden and the +bondage. Therefore, any man that comes with a sign, and does not deal +with the sin of the human heart, and any man that comes with a +philosophical system of wisdom, and does not deal with sin, does not +bring a Gospel that will meet the necessities even of the people to +whose cravings he has been aiming to adapt his message. + +But, beyond that, in this message of Christ and Him crucified, there +lies in germ the satisfaction of all that is legitimate in these +desires that at first sight it seems to thwart. 'A sign?' Yes, and +where is there power like the power that dwells in Him who is the +Incarnate might of omnipotence? 'Wisdom?' Yes, and where is there +wisdom, except 'in Him in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom +and knowledge'? Let the Jew come to the Cross, and in the weak Man +hanging there, he will find a mightier revelation of the power of God +than anywhere else. Let the Greek come to the Cross, and there he +will find wisdom and righteousness, sanctification and redemption. +The bases of all social, economical, political reform and well-being, +lie in the understanding and the application to social and national +life, of the principles that are wrapped in, and are deduced from, +the Incarnation and the Sacrifice of Jesus Christ. We have not +learned them all yet. They have not all been applied to national and +individual life yet. I plead for no narrow exclusiveness, but for one +consistent with the widest application of Christian principles to all +life. Paul determined to know nothing but Jesus, and to know +everything in Jesus, and Jesus in everything. Do not begin your +building at the second-floor windows. Put in your foundations first, +and be sure that they are well laid. Let the Sacrifice of Christ, in +its application to the individual and his sins, be ever the basis of +all that you say. And then, when that foundation is laid, exhibit, to +your heart's content, the applications of Christianity and its social +aspects. But be sure that the beginning of them all is the work of +Christ for the individual sinful soul, and the acceptance of that +work by personal faith. + +Dear friends, ours has been a long and happy union but it is a very +solemn one. My responsibilities are great; yours are not small. Let +me beseech you to ask yourselves if, with all your kindness to the +messenger, you have given heed to the message. Have you passed beyond +the voice that speaks, to Him of whom it speaks? Have you taken the +truth--veiled and weakened as I know it has been by my words, but yet +in them--for what it is, the word of the living God? My occupancy of +this pulpit must in the nature of things, before long, come to a +close, but the message which I have brought to you will survive all +changes in the voice that speaks here. 'All flesh is grass ... the +Word of the Lord endureth for ever.' And, closing these forty years, +during a long part of which some of you have listened most lovingly +and most forbearingly, I leave with you this, which I venture to +quote, though it is my Master's word about Himself, 'I judge you not; +the word which I have spoken unto you, the same shall judge you in +the last day.' + + + + +GOD'S FELLOW-WORKERS + + 'Labourers together with God.'--1 COR. iii. 9. + + +The characteristic Greek tendency to factions was threatening to rend +the Corinthian Church, and each faction was swearing by a favourite +teacher. Paul and his companion, Apollos, had been taken as the +figureheads of two of these parties, and so he sets himself in the +context, first of all to show that neither of the two was of any real +importance in regard to the Church's life. They were like a couple of +gardeners, one of whom did the planting, and the other the watering; +but neither the man that put the little plant into the ground, nor +the man that came after him with a watering-pot, had anything to do +with originating the mystery of the life by which the plant grew. +That was God's work, and the pair that had planted and watered were +nothing. So what was the use of fighting which of two nothings was +the greater? + +But then he bethinks himself that that is not quite all. The man that +plants and the man that waters are something after all. They do not +communicate life, but they do provide for its nourishment. And more +than that, the two operations--that of the man with the dibble and +that of the man with the watering-pot--are one in issue; and so they +are partners, and in some respects may be regarded as one. Then what +is the sense of pitting them against each other? + +But even that is not quite all; though united in operation, they are +separate in responsibility and activity, and will be separate in +reward. And even that is not all; for, being nothing and yet +something, being united and yet separate, they are taken into +participation and co-operation with God; and as my text puts it, in +what is almost a presumptuous phrase, they are 'labourers together +with Him.' That partnership of co-operation is not merely a +partnership of the two, but it is a partnership of the three--God and +the two who, in some senses, are one. + +Now whilst this text is primarily spoken in regard to the apostolic +and evangelistic work of these early teachers, the principle which it +embodies is a very wide one, and it applies in all regions of life +and activity, intellectual, scholastic, philanthropic, social. +Where-ever men are thinking God's thoughts and trying to carry into +effect any phase or side of God's manifold purposes of good and +blessing to the world, there it is true. We claim no special or +exclusive prerogative for the Christian teacher. Every man that is +trying to make men understand God's thought, whether it is expressed +in creation, or whether it is written in history, or whether it is +carven in half-obliterated letters on the constitution of human +nature, every man who, in any region of society or life, is seeking +to effect the great designs of the universal loving Father--can take +to himself, in the measure and according to the manner of his special +activity, the great encouragement of my text, and feel that he, too, +in his little way, is a fellow-helper to the truth and a +fellow-worker with God. But then, of course, according to New +Testament teaching, and according to the realities of the case, the +highest form in which men thus can co-operate with God, and carry +into effect His purposes is that in which men devote themselves, +either directly or indirectly, to spreading throughout the whole +world the name and the power of the Saviour Jesus Christ, in whom all +God's will is gathered, and through whom all God's blessings are +communicated to mankind. So the thought of my text comes +appropriately when I have to bring before you the claims of our +missionary operations. + +Now, the first way in which I desire to look at this great idea +expressed in these words, is that we find in it + +I. A solemn thought. + +'Labourers together with God.' Cannot He do it all Himself? No. God +needs men to carry out His purposes. True, on the Cross, Jesus spoke +the triumphant word, 'It is finished!' He did not thereby simply mean +that He had completed all His suffering; but He meant that He had +then done all which the world needed to have done in order that it +should be a redeemed world. But for the distribution and application +of that finished work God depends on men. You all know, in your own +daily businesses, how there must be a middleman between the mill and +the consumer. The question of organising a distributing agency is +quite as important as any other part of the manufacturer's business. +The great reservoir is full, but there has to be a system of +irrigating-channels by which the water is carried into every corner +of the field that is to be watered. Christian men individually, and +the Church collectively, supply--may I call it the missing +link?--between a redeeming Saviour and the world which He has +redeemed in act, but which is not actually redeemed, until it has +received the message of the great Redemption that is wrought. The +supernatural is implanted in the very heart of the mass of leaven by +the Incarnation and Sacrifice of Jesus Christ; but the spreading of +that supernatural revelation is left in the hands of men who work +through natural processes, and who thus become labourers together +with God, and enable Christ to be to single souls, in blessed +reality, what He is potentially to the world, and has been ever +since. He died upon the Cross. 'It is finished.' Yes--because it is +finished, our work begins. + +Let me remind you of the profound symbolism in that incident where +our Lord for once appeared conspicuously, and almost ostentatiously, +before Israel as its true King. He had need--as He Himself said--of +the meek beast on which He rode. He cannot pass, in His coronation +procession, through the world unless He has us, by whom He may be +carried into every corner of the earth. So 'the Lord has need' of us, +and we are 'fellow-labourers with Him.' + +But this same thought suggests another point. We have here a solemn +call addressed to every Christian man and woman. + +Do not let us run away with the idea that, because here the Apostle +is speaking in regard to himself and Apollos, he is enunciating a +truth which applies only to Apostles and evangelists. It is true of +all Christians. My knowledge of and faith in Jesus Christ as my own +personal Saviour impose upon me the obligation, in so far as my +opportunities and capacities extend, thus to co-operate with Him in +spreading His great Name. Every Christian man, just because he is a +Christian, is invested with the power--and power to its last particle +is duty--and is, therefore, burdened with the honourable obligation +to work for God. There is such a thing as 'coming to the help of the +Lord,' though that phrase seems to reverse altogether the true +relation. It is the duty of every Christian, partly because of +loyalty to Jesus, and partly because of the responsibility which the +very constitution of society lays upon every one of us, to diffuse +what he possesses, and to be a distributing agent for the life that +he himself enjoys. Brethren! there is no possibility of Christian men +or women being fully faithful to the Saviour, unless they recognise +that the duty of being a fellow-labourer with God inevitably follows +on being a possessor of Christ's salvation; and that no Apostle, no +official, no minister, no missionary, has any more necessity laid +upon him to preach the Gospel, nor pulls down any heavier woe on +himself if he is unfaithful, than has and does each one of Christ's +servants. + +So 'we are fellow-labourers with God.' Alas! alas! how poorly the +average Christian realises--I do not say discharges, but +realises--that obligation! Brethren, I do not wish to find fault, but +I do beseech you to ask yourselves whether, if you are Christians, +you are doing anything the least like what my text contemplates as +the duty of all Christians. + +May I say a word or two with regard to another aspect of this solemn +call? Does not the thought of working along with God prescribe for us +the sort of work that we ought to do? We ought to work in God's +fashion, and if we wish to know what God's fashion is, we have but to +look at Jesus Christ. We ought to work in Jesus Christ's fashion. We +all know what that involved of self-sacrifice, of pain, of weariness, +of utter self-oblivious devotion, of gentleness, of tenderness, +of infinite pity, of love running over. 'The master's eye makes a good +servant.' The Master's hand working along with the servant ought to +make the servant work after the Master's fashion. 'As My Father hath +sent Me, so send I you.' If we felt that side by side with us, like +two sailors hauling on one rope, 'the Servant of the Lord' was +toiling, do you not think it would burn up all our selfishness, and +light up all our indifference, and make us spend ourselves in His +service? A fellow-labourer with God will surely never be lazy and +selfish. Thus my text has in it, to begin with, a solemn call. + +It suggests + +II. A signal honour. + +Suppose a great painter, a Raphael or a Turner, taking a little boy +that cleaned his brushes, and saying to him, 'Come into my studio, +and I will let you do a bit of work upon my picture.' Suppose an +aspirant, an apprentice in any walk of life, honoured by being +permitted to work along with some one who was recognised all over the +world as being at the very top of that special profession. Would it +not be a feather in the boy's cap all his life? And would he not +think it the greatest honour that ever had been done him that he was +allowed to co-operate, in however inferior a fashion, with such an +one? Jesus Christ says to us, 'Come and work here side by side with +Me,' But Christian men, plenty of them, answer, 'It is a perpetual +nuisance, this continual application for money! money! money! work! +work! work! It is never-ending, and it is a burden!' Yes, it is a +burden, just because it is an honour. Do you know that the Hebrew +word which means 'glory' literally means 'weight'? There is a great +truth in that. You cannot get true honours unless you are prepared to +carry them as burdens. And the highest honour that Jesus Christ gives +to men when He says to them, not only 'Go work to-day in My +vineyard,' but 'Come, work here side by side with Me,' is a heavy +weight which can only be lightened by a cheerful heart. + +Is it not the right way to look at all the various forms of Christian +activity which are made imperative upon Christian people, by their +possession of Christianity as being tokens of Christ's love to us? Do +you remember that this same Apostle said, 'Unto me who am less than +the least of all saints is this grace given, that I should preach the +unsearchable riches of Christ?' He could speak about burdens and +heavy tasks, and being 'persecuted but not forsaken,' almost crushed +down and yet not in despair, and about the weights that came upon him +daily, 'the care of all the churches,' but far beneath all the sense +of his heavy load lay the thrill of thankful wonder that to him, of +all men in the world, knowing as he did better than anybody else +could do his own imperfection and insufficiency, this distinguishing +honour had been bestowed, that he was made the Apostle to the +Gentiles. That is the way in which the true man will always look at +what the selfish man, and the half-and-half Christian, look at as +being a weight and a weariness, or a disagreeable duty, which is to +be done as perfunctorily as possible. One question that a great many +who call themselves Christians ask is, 'With how little service can I +pass muster?' Ah, it is because we have so little of the Spirit of +Christ in us that we feel burdened by His command, 'Go ye into all +the world,' as being so heavy; and that so many of us--I leave you to +judge if you are in the class--so many of us make it criminally light +if we do not ignore it altogether. I believe that, if it were +possible to conceive of the duty and privilege of spreading Christ's +name in the world being withdrawn from the Church, all His real +servants would soon be yearning to have it back again. It is a token +of His love; it is a source of infinite blessings to ourselves; 'if +the house be not worthy, your peace shall return to you again.' + +And now, lastly, we have suggested by this text + +III. A strong encouragement. + +'Fellow-labourers with God'--then, God is a Fellow-labourer with us. +The co-operation works both ways, and no man who is seeking to spread +that great salvation, to distribute that great wealth, to irrigate +some little corner of the field by some little channel that he has +dug, needs to feel that he is labouring alone. If I am working +with God, God is working with me. Do you remember that most striking +picture which is drawn in the verses appended to Mark's Gospel, which +tells how the universe seemed parted into two halves, and up above in +the serene the Lord 'sat on the right hand of God,' while below, in +the murky and obscure, 'they went everywhere preaching the Word.' The +separation seems complete, but the two halves are brought together by +the next word--'The Lord also,' sitting up yonder, 'working with +them' the wandering preachers down here, 'confirming the words with +signs following.' Ascended on high, entered into His rest, having +finished His work, He yet is working with us, if we are labourers +together with God. If we turn to the last book of Scripture, which +draws back the curtain from the invisible world which is all filled +with the glorified Christ, and shows its relations to the earthly +militant church, we read no longer of a Christ enthroned in apparent +ease, but of a Christ walking amidst the candlesticks, and of a Lamb +standing in the midst of the Throne, and opening the seals, launching +forth into the world the sequences of the world's history, and of the +Word of God charging His enemies on His white horse, and behind Him +the armies of God following. The workers who labour with God have the +ascended Christ labouring with them. + +But if God works with us, success is sure. Then comes the old +question that Gideon asked with bitterness of heart, when he was +threshing out his handful of wheat in a corner to avoid the +oppressors, 'If the Lord be with us, wherefore is all this come upon +us? Will any one say that the progress of the Gospel in the world has +been at the rate which its early believers expected, or at the rate +which its own powers warranted them to expect? Certainly not. And so +it comes to this, that whilst every true labourer has God working +with him, and therefore success is certain, the planter and the +waterer can delay the growth of the plant by their unfaithfulness, by +not expecting success, by not so working as to make it likely, or by +neutralising their evangelistic efforts by their worldly lives. When +Jesus Christ was on earth, it is recorded, 'He could there do no +mighty works because of their unbelief, save that He laid His hands +on a few sick folk and healed them.' A faithless Church, a worldly +Church, a lazy Church, an unspiritual Church, an un-Christlike +Church--which, to a large extent, is the designation of the so-called +Church of to day--can clog His chariot-wheels, can thwart the work, +can hamper the Divine Worker. If the Christians of Manchester were +revived, they could win Manchester for Jesus. If the Christians of +England lived their Christianity, they could make England what it +never has been but in name--a Christian country. If the Church +universal were revived, it could win the world. If the single +labourer, or the community of such, is labouring 'in the Lord,' their +labour will not be in vain; and if they thus plant and water, God +will give the increase. + + + +THE TESTING FIRE + + 'Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, + precious stones, wood, hay, stubble: 13. Every man's work + shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, + because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall + try every man's work of what sort it is.'--1 COR. iii. 12, 13. + + +Before I enter upon the ideas which the words suggest, my exegetical +conscience binds me to point out that the original application of the +text is not exactly that which I purpose to make of it now. The +context shows that the Apostle is thinking about the special subject +of Christian teachers and their work, and that the builders of whom +he speaks are the men in the Corinthian Church, some of them his +allies and some of them his rivals, who were superimposing upon the +foundation of the preaching of Jesus Christ other doctrines and +principles. The 'wood, hay, stubble' are the vapid and trivial +doctrines which the false teachers were introducing into the Church. +The 'gold, silver, and precious stones' are the solid and substantial +verities which Paul and his friends were proclaiming. And it is about +these, and not about the Christian life in the general, that the +tremendous metaphors of my text are uttered. + +But whilst that is true, the principles involved have a much wider +range than the one case to which the Apostle applies them. And, +though I may be slightly deflecting the text from its original +direction, I am not doing violence to it, if I take it as declaring +some very plain and solemn truths applicable to all Christian people, +in their task of building up a life and character on the foundation +of Jesus Christ; truths which are a great deal too much forgotten in +our modern popular Christianity, and which it concerns us all very +clearly to keep in view. There are three things here that I wish to +say a word about--the patchwork building, the testing fire, the fate +of the builders. + +I. First, the patchwork structure. + +'If any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, +wood, hay, stubble.' In the original application of the metaphor, +Paul is thinking of all these teachers in that church at Corinth as +being engaged in building the one structure--I venture to deflect +here, and to regard each of us as rearing our own structure of life +and character on the foundation of the preached and accepted Christ. + +Now, what the Apostle says is that these builders were, some of them, +laying valuable things like gold and silver and costly stones--by +which he does not mean jewels, but marbles, alabasters, polished +porphyry or granite, and the like; sumptuous building materials, +which were employed in great palaces or temples--and that some of +them were bringing timber, hay, stubble, reeds gathered from the +marshes or the like, and filling in with such trash as that. That is +a picture of what a great many Christian people are doing in their +own lives--the same man building one course of squared and solid and +precious stones, and topping them with rubbish. You will see in the +walls of Jerusalem, at the base, five or six courses of those massive +blocks which are the wonders of the world yet; well jointed, well +laid, well cemented, and then on the top of them a mass of poor +stuff, heaped together anyhow; scamped work--may I use a modern +vulgarism?--'jerry-building.' You may go to some modern village, on +an ancient historic site, and you will find built into the mud walls +of the hovels in which the people are living, a marble slab with fair +carving on it, or the drum of a great column of veined marble, and on +the top of that, timber and clay mixed together. + +That is the type of the sort of life that hosts of Christian people +are living. For, mark, all the builders are on the foundation. Paul +is not speaking about mere professed Christians who had no faith at +all in them, and no real union with Jesus Christ. These builders were +'on the foundation'; they were building on the foundation, there was +a principle deep down in their lives--which really lay at the bottom +of their lives--and yet had not come to such dominating power as to +mould and purify and make harmonious with itself the life that was +reared upon it. We all know that that is the condition of many men, +that they have what really are the fundamental bases of their lives, +in belief and aim and direction; and which yet are not strong enough +to master the whole of the life, and to manifest themselves through +it. Especially it is the condition of some Christian people. They +have a real faith, but it is of the feeblest and most rudimentary +kind. They are on the foundation, but their lives are interlaced with +the most heterogeneous mixty-maxty of good and evil, of lofty, high, +self-sacrificing thoughts and heavenward aspirations, of resolutions +never carried out into practice; and side by side with these there +shall be meannesses, selfishnesses, tempers, dispositions all +contradictory of the former impulses. One moment they are all fire +and love, the next moment ice and selfishness. One day they are all +for God, the next day all for the world, the flesh, and the devil. +Jacob sees the open heavens and the face of God and vows; to-morrow +he meets Laban and drops to shifty ways. Peter leaves all and follows +his Master, and in a little while the fervour has gone, and the fire +has died down into grey ashes, and a flippant servant-girl's tongue +leads him to say 'I know not the man.' 'Gold, silver, precious +stones,' and topping them, 'wood, hay, stubble!' + +The inconsistencies of the Christian life are what my text, in the +application that I am venturing to make of it, suggests to us. Ah, +dear friends! we do not need to go to Jacob and Peter; let us look at +our own hearts, and if we will honestly examine one day of our lives, +I think we shall understand how it is possible for a man, on the +foundation, yet to build upon it these worthless and combustible +things, 'wood, hay, stubble.' + +We are not to suppose that one man builds _only_ 'gold, silver, +precious stones.' There is none of us that does that. And we are not +to suppose that any man who _is_ on the foundations has so little +grasp of it, as that he builds _only_ 'wood, hay, stubble.' + +There is none of us who has not intermingled his building, and there +is none of us, if we are Christians at all, who has not sometimes +laid a course of 'precious stones.' If your faith is doing _nothing_ +for you except bringing to you a belief that you are not going to +hell when you die, then it is no faith at all. 'Faith without works +is dead.' So there is a mingling in the best, and--thank God!--there +is a mingling of good with evil, in the worst of real Christian +people. + +II. Note here, the testing fire. + +Paul points to two things, the day and the fire. + +'The day shall declare it,' that is the day on which Jesus Christ +comes to be the Judge; and it, that is 'the day,' 'shall be revealed +in fire; and the fire shall test every man's work.' Now, it is to be +noticed that here we are moving altogether in the region of lofty +symbolism, and that the metaphor of the testing fire is suggested by +the previous enumeration of building materials, gold and silver being +capable of being assayed by flame; and 'wood, hay, stubble' being +combustible, and sure to be destroyed thereby. The fire here is not +an emblem of punishment; it is not an emblem of cleansing. There is +no reference to anything in the nature of what Roman Catholics call +purgatorial fires. The allusion is simply to some stringent and +searching means of testing the quality of a man's work, and of +revealing that quality. + +So then, we come just to this, that for people 'on the foundation,' +there is a Day of revelation and testing of their life's work. It is +a great misfortune that so-called Evangelical Christianity does not +say as much as the New Testament says about the judgment that is to +be passed on 'the house of God.' People seem to think that the great +doctrine of salvation, 'not by works of righteousness which we have +done, but by His mercy,' is, somehow or other, interfered with when +we proclaim, as Paul proclaims, speaking to Christian people, 'We +must be manifested before the judgment seat of Christ,' and declares +that 'Every man will receive the things done in his body, according +to that he has done, whether it be good or bad.' Paul saw no +contradiction, and there is no contradiction. But a great many +professing Christians seem to think that the great blessing of their +salvation by faith is, that they are exempt from that future +revelation and testing and judgment of their acts. That is not the +New Testament teaching. But, on the contrary, 'Whatsoever a man +soweth that shall he also reap,' was originally said to a church of +Christian people. And here we come full front against that solemn +truth, that the Lord will 'gather together His saints, those that +have made a covenant with Him by sacrifice, that He may judge His +people.' Never mind about the drapery, the symbolism, the expression +in material forms with which that future judgment is arranged, in +order that we may the more easily grasp it. Remember that these +pictures in the New Testament of a future judgment are highly +symbolical, and not to be interpreted as if they were plain prose; +but also remember that the heart of them is this, that there comes +for Christian people as for all others, a time when the light will +shine down upon their past, and will flash its rays into the dark +chambers of memory, and when men will--to themselves if not to +others--be revealed 'in the day when the Lord shall judge the secrets +of men according to my Gospel.' + +We have all experience enough of how but a few years, a change of +circumstances, or a growth into another stage of development, give us +fresh eyes with which to estimate the moral quality of our past. Many +a thing, which we thought to be all right at the time when we did it, +looks to us now very questionable and a plain mistake. And when we +shift our stations to up yonder, and get rid of all this blinding +medium of flesh and sense, and have the issues of our acts in our +possession, and before our sight--ah! we shall think very differently +of a great many things from what we think of them now. Judgment will +begin at the house of God. + +And there is the other thought, that the fire which reveals and tests +has also in it a power of destruction. Gold and silver will lose no +atom of their weight, and will be brightened into greater lustre as +they flash back the beams. The timber and the stubble will go up in a +flare, and die down into black ashes. That is highly metaphorical, of +course. What does it mean? It means that some men's work will be +crumpled up and perish, and be as of none effect, leaving a great, +black sorrowful gap in the continuity of the structure, and that +other men's work will stand. Everything that we do is, in one sense, +immortal, because it is represented in our final character and +condition, just as a thin stratum of rock will represent forests of +ferns that grew for one summer millenniums ago, or clouds of insects +that danced for an hour in the sun. But whilst that is so, and +nothing human ever dies, on the other hand, deeds which have been in +accordance, as it were, with the great stream that sweeps the +universe on its bosom will float on that surface and never sink. Acts +which have gone against the rush of God's will through creation will +be like a child's go-cart that comes against the engine of an express +train--be reduced, first, to stillness, all the motion knocked out of +them, and then will be crushed to atoms. Deeds which stand the test +will abide in blessed issue for the doer, and deeds which do not will +pass away in smoke, and leave only ashes. Some of us, building on the +foundation, have built more rubbish than solid work, and that will be + + 'Cast as rubbish to the void + When God has made the pile complete.' + +III. So, lastly, we have here the fate of the two builders. + +The one man gets wages. That is not the bare notion of salvation, for +both builders are conceived of as on the foundation, and both are +saved. He gets wages. Yes, of course! The architect has to give his +certificate before the builder gets his cheque. The weaver, who has +been working his hand-loom at his own house, has to take his web to +the counting-house and have it overlooked before he gets his pay. And +the man who has built 'gold, silver, precious stones,' will +have--over and above the initial salvation--in himself the blessed +consequences, and unfold the large results, of his faithful service; +while the other man, inasmuch as he has not such work, cannot have +the consequences of it, and gets no wages; or at least his pay is +subject to heavy deductions for the spoiled bits in the cloth, and +for the gaps in the wall. + +The Apostle employs a tremendous metaphor here, which is masked in +our Authorised Version, but is restored in the Revised. 'He shall be +saved, yet so as' (not 'by' but) 'through fire'; the picture being +that of a man surrounded by a conflagration, and making a rush +through the flames to get to a place of safety. Paul says that he +will get through, because down _below_ all inconsistency and +worldliness, there was a little of that which ought to have been +_above_ all the inconsistency and the worldliness--a true faith +in Jesus Christ. But because it was so imperfect, so feeble, so +little operative in his life as that it could not keep him from +piling up inconsistencies into his wall, therefore his salvation is +so as through the fire. + +Brethren, I dare not enlarge upon that great metaphor. It is meant +for us professing Christians, real and imperfect Christians--it is +meant for us; and it just tells us that there are degrees in that +future blessedness proportioned to present faithfulness. We begin +there where we left off here. That future is not a dead level; and +they who have earnestly striven to work out their faith into their +lives shall 'summer high upon the hills of God.' One man, like Paul +in his shipwreck, shall lose ship and lading, though 'on broken +pieces of the ship' he may 'escape safe to land'; and another shall +make the harbour with full cargo of works of faith, to be turned into +gold when he lands. If we build, as we all may, 'on that foundation, +gold and silver and precious stones,' an entrance 'shall be +ministered unto us abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our +Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ'; whilst if we bring a preponderance of +'wood, hay, stubble,' we shall be 'saved, yet so as through the +fire.' + + + + +TEMPLES OF GOD + + 'Know ye not that ye are the temple of God?'--1 COR. iii. 16 + + +The great purpose of Christianity is to make men like Jesus Christ. +As He is the image of the invisible God we are to be the images of +the unseen Christ. The Scripture is very bold and emphatic in +attributing to Christ's followers likeness to Him, in nature, in +character, in relation to the world, in office, and in ultimate +destiny. Is He the anointed of God? We are anointed--Christs in Him. +Is He the Son of God? We in Him receive the adoption of sons. Is He +the Light of the world? We in Him are lights of the world too. Is He +a King? A Priest? He hath made us to be kings and priests. + +Here we have the Apostle making the same solemn assertion in regard +to Christian men, 'Know ye not that ye are'--as your Master, and +because your Master is--'that ye are the temple of God, and that the +Spirit of God dwelleth in you?' + +Of course the allusion in my text is to the whole aggregate of +believers--what we call the Catholic Church, as being collectively +the habitation of God. But God cannot dwell in an aggregate of men, +unless He dwells in the individuals that compose the aggregate. +And God has nothing to do with institutions except through the people +who make the institutions. And so, if the Church as a whole is a +Temple, it is only because all its members are temples of God. + +Therefore, without forgetting the great blessed lesson of the unity +of the Church which is taught in these words, I want rather to deal +with them in their individual application now; and to try and lay +upon your consciences, dear brethren, the solemn obligations and the +intense practical power which this Apostle associated with the +thought that each Christian man was, in very deed, a temple of God. + +It would be very easy to say eloquent things about this text, but +that is no part of my purpose. + +I. Let me deal, first of all, and only for a moment or two, with the +underlying thought that is here--that every Christian is a +dwelling-place of God. + +Now, do not run away with the idea that that is a metaphor. It was +the outward temple that was the metaphor. The reality is that which +you and I, if we are God's children in Jesus Christ, experience. +There was no real sense in which that Mighty One whom the Heaven of +Heavens cannot contain, dwelt in any house made with hands. But the +Temple, and all the outward worship, were but symbolical of the facts +of the Christian life, and the realities of our inward experience. +These are the truths whereof the other is the shadow. We use words to +which it is difficult for us to attach any meaning, when we talk +about God as being locally present in any material building; but we +do not use words to which it is so difficult to attach a meaning, +when we talk about the Infinite Spirit as being present and abiding +in a spirit shaped to hold Him, and made on purpose to touch Him and +be filled by Him. + +All creatures have God dwelling in them in the measure of their +capacity. The stone that you kick on the road would not be there if +there were not a present God. Nothing would happen if there were not +abiding in creatures the force, at any rate, which is God. But just +as in this great atmosphere in which we all live and move and have +our being, the eye discerns undulations which make light, and the ear +catches vibrations which make sound, and the nostrils are recipient +of motions which bring fragrance, and all these are in the one +atmosphere, and the sense that apprehends one is utterly unconscious +of the other, so God's creatures, each through some little narrow +slit, and in the measure of their capacity, get a straggling beam +from Him into their being, and therefore they are. + +But high above all other ways in which creatures can lie patent to +God, and open for the influx of a Divine Indweller, lies the way of +faith and love. Whosoever opens his heart in these divinely-taught +emotions, and fixes them upon the Christ in whom God dwells, receives +into the very roots of his being--as the water that trickles through +the soil to the rootlets of the tree--the very Godhead Himself. 'He +that is joined to the Lord is one spirit.' + +That God shall dwell in my heart is possible only from the fact that +He dwelt in all His fulness in Christ, through whom I touch Him. That +Temple consecrates all heart-shrines; and all worshippers that keep +near to Him, partake with Him of the Father that dwelt in Him. + +Only remember that in Christ God dwelt completely, all 'the fulness +of the Godhead bodily' was there, but in us it is but partially; that +in Christ, therefore, the divine indwelling was uniform and +invariable, but in us it fluctuates, and sometimes is more intimate +and blessed, and sometimes He leaves the habitation when we leave +Him; that in Christ, therefore, there was no progress in the divine +indwelling, but that in us, if there be any true inhabitation of our +souls by God, that abiding will become more and more, until every +corner of our being is hallowed and filled with the searching +effulgence of the all-pervasive Light. And let us remember that God +dwelt in Christ, but that in us it is God in Christ who dwells. So to +Him we owe it all, that our poor hearts are made the dwelling-place +of God; or, as this Apostle puts it, in other words conveying the +same idea, 'Ye are built upon the foundation of the Apostles and +prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief Corner-stone; in whom +all the building fitly framed together groweth ... for a habitation +of God through the Spirit.' + +II. Now then, turning from this underlying idea of the passage, let +us look, for a moment, at some of the many applications of which the +great thought is susceptible. I remark, then, in the second place, +that as temples all Christians are to be manifesters of God. + +The meaning of the Temple as of all temples was, that there the +indwelling Deity should reveal Himself; and if it be true that we +Christian men and women are, in this deep and blessed reality of +which I have been speaking, the abiding places and habitations of +God, then it follows that we shall stand in the world as the great +means by which God is manifested and made known, and that in a +two-fold way; _to ourselves_ and _to other people_. + +The real revelation of God to our hearts must be His abiding in our +hearts. We do not learn God until we possess God. He must fill our +souls before we know His sweetness. The answer that our Lord made to +one of His disciples is full of the deepest truth. 'How is it,' said +one of them in his blundering way, 'how is it that Thou wilt manifest +Thyself to us?' And the answer was, 'We will come and make Our abode +with him.' You do not know God until, if I might so say, He sits at +your fireside and talks with you in your hearts. Just as some wife +may have a husband whom the world knows as hero, or sage, or orator, +but she knows him as nobody else can; so the outside, and if I may so +say, the public character of God is but the surface of the revelation +that He makes to us, when in the deepest secrecy of our own hearts He +pours Himself into our waiting spirits. O brethren! it is within the +curtains of the Holiest of all that the Shekinah flashes; it is +within our own hearts, shrined and templed there, that God reveals +Himself to us, as He does not unto the world. + +And then, further, Christian men, as the temples and habitations of +God, are appointed to be the great means of making Him known to the +world around. The eye that cannot look at the sun can look at the +rosy clouds that lie on either side of it, and herald its rising; +their opalescent tints and pearly lights are beautiful to dim vision, +to which the sun itself is too bright to be looked upon. Men will +believe in a gentle Christ when they see you gentle. They will +believe in a righteous love when they see it manifesting itself in +you. You are 'the secretaries of God's praise,' as George Herbert has +it. He dwells in your hearts that out of your lives He may be +revealed. The pictures in a book of travels, or the diagrams in a +mathematical work, tell a great deal more in half a dozen lines than +can be put into as many pages of dry words. And it is not books of +theology nor eloquent sermons, but it is a Church glowing with the +glory of God, and manifestly all flushed with His light and majesty, +that will have power to draw men to believe in the God whom it +reveals. When explorers land upon some untravelled island and meet +the gentle inhabitants with armlets of rough gold upon their wrists, +they say there must be many a gold-bearing rock of quartz crystal in +the interior of the land. And if you present yourselves, Christian +men and women, to the world with the likeness of your Master plain +upon you, then people will believe in the Christianity that you +profess. You have to popularise the Gospel in the fashion in which +go-betweens and middlemen between students and the populace +popularise science. You have to make it possible for men to believe +in the Christ because they see Christ in you. 'Know ye not that ye +are the temples of the living God?' Let His light shine from you. + +III. I remark again that as temples all Christian lives should be +places of sacrifice. + +What is the use of a temple without worship? And what kind of worship +is that in which the centre point is not an altar? That is the sort +of temple that a great many professing Christians are. They have +forgotten the altar in their spiritual architecture. Have you got one +in your heart? It is but a poor, half-furnished sanctuary that has +not. Where is yours? The key and the secret of all noble life is to +yield up one's own will, to sacrifice oneself. There never was +anything done in this world worth doing, and there never will be till +the end of time, of which sacrifice is not the centre and +inspiration. And the difference between all other and lesser +nobilities of life, and the supreme beauty of a true Christian life +is that the sacrifice of the Christian is properly a +_sacrifice_--that is, an offering to _God_, done for the sake of the +great love wherewith He has loved us. As Christ is the one true +Temple, and we become so by partaking of Him, so He is the one +Sacrifice for sins for ever, and we become sacrifices only through +Him. If there be any lesson which comes out of this great truth of +Christians as temples, it is not a lesson of pluming ourselves on our +dignity, or losing ourselves in the mysticisms which lie near this +truth, but it is the hard lesson--If a temple, then an altar; if an +altar, then a sacrifice. 'Ye are built up a spiritual house, a holy +priesthood, that ye may offer spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to +God'--sacrifice, priest, temple, all in one; and all for the sake and +by the might of that dear Lord who has given Himself a bleeding +Sacrifice for the sins of the whole world, that we might offer a +Eucharistic sacrifice of thanks and praise and self-surrender unto +Him, and to His Father God. + +IV. And, lastly, this great truth of my text enforces the solemn +lesson of the necessary sanctity of the Christian life. + +'The temple of God,' says the context, 'the temple of God is holy, +which (holy persons) ye are.' The plain first idea of the temple is a +place set apart and consecrated to God. + +Hence, of course, follows the idea of purity, but the parent idea of +'holiness' is not purity, which is the consequence, but consecration +or separation to God, which is the root. + +And so in very various applications, on which I have not time to +dwell now, this idea of the necessary sanctity of the Temple is put +forth in these two letters to the Corinthian Church. Corinth was a +city honeycombed with the grossest immoralities; and hence, perhaps, +to some extent the great emphasis and earnestness and even severity +of the Apostle in dealing with some forms of evil. + +But without dwelling on the details, let me just point you to three +directions in which this general notion of sanctity is applied. There +is that of our context here 'Know ye not that ye are the temple of +God? If any man _destroy_ the temple of God, him shall God +destroy, for the temple of God is holy, and such ye are.' + +He is thinking here mainly, I suppose, about the devastation and +destruction of this temple of God, which was caused by schismatical +and heretical teaching, and by the habit of forming parties, 'one of +Paul, one of Apollos, one of Cephas, one of Christ,' which was +rending that Corinthian Church into pieces. But we may apply it more +widely than that, and say that anything which corrupts and defiles +the Christian life and the Christian character assumes a darker tint +of evil when we think that it is sacrilege--the profanation of the +temple, the pollution of that which ought to be pure as He who dwells +in it. + +Christian men and women, how that thought darkens the blackness of +all sin! How solemnly there peals out the warning, 'If any man +destroy or impair the temple,' by any form of pollution, 'him' with +retribution in kind, 'him shall God destroy.' Keep the temple clear; +keep it clean. Let Him come with His scourge of small cords and His +merciful rebuke. You Manchester men know what it is to let the +money-changers into the sanctuary. Beware lest, beginning with making +your hearts 'houses of merchandise,' you should end by making them +'dens of thieves.' + +And then, still further, there is another application of this same +principle, in the second of these Epistles. 'What agreement hath the +temple of God with idols?' 'Ye are the temple of the living God.' + +Christianity is intolerant. There is to be one image in the shrine. +One of the old Roman Stoic Emperors had a pantheon in his palace with +Jesus Christ upon one pedestal and Plato on the one beside Him. And +some of us are trying the same kind of thing. Christ there, and +somebody else here. Remember, Christ must be everything or nothing! +Stars may be sown by millions, but for the earth there is one sun. +And you and I are to shrine one dear Guest, and one only, in the +inmost recesses of our hearts. + +And there is another application of this metaphor also in our +letter.'Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost +which is in you?' Christianity despises 'the flesh'; Christianity +reverences the body; and would teach us all that, being robed in that +most wonderful work of God's hands, which becomes a shrine for God +Himself if He dwell in our hearts, all purity, all chastisement and +subjugation of animal passion is our duty. Drunkenness, and gluttony, +lusts of every kind, impurity of conduct, and impurity of word and +look and thought, all these assume a still darker tint when they are +thought of as not only crimes against the physical constitution and +the moral law of humanity, but insults flung in the face of the God +that would inhabit the shrine. + +And in regard to sins of this kind, which it is so difficult to speak +of in public, and which grow unchecked in secrecy, and are ruining +hundreds of young lives, the words of this context are grimly true, +'If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy.' I speak +now mainly in brotherly or fatherly warning to young men--did you +ever read this, 'His bones are full of the iniquities of his youth, +which shall lie down with him in the dust'? 'Know ye not that ye are +the temple of God?' + +And so, brethren, our text tells us what we may all be. There is no +heart without its deity. Alas! alas! for the many listening to me now +whose spirits are like some of those Egyptian temples, which had in +the inmost shrine a coiled-up serpent, the mummy of a monkey, or some +other form as animal and obscene. + +Oh! turn to Christ and cry, 'Arise, O Lord, into Thy rest, Thou and +the ark of Thy strength.' Open your hearts and let Christ come in. +And before Him, as of old, the bestial Dagon will be found, dejected +and truncated, lying on the sill there; and all the vain, cruel, +lustful gods that have held riot and carnival in your hearts will +flee away into the darkness, like some foul ghosts at cock-crow. 'If +any man hear My voice and open the door I will come in.' And the +glory of the Lord shall fill the house. + + + + +DEATH, THE FRIEND + + '... All things are yours ... death.'--1 COR. iii. 21, 22. + + +What Jesus Christ is to a man settles what everything else is to Him. +Our relation to Jesus determines our relation to the universe. If we +belong to Him, everything belongs to us. If we are His servants, all +things are our servants. The household of Jesus, which is the whole +Creation, is not divided against itself, and the fellow-servants do +not beat one another. Two bodies moving in the same direction, and +under the impulse of the same force, cannot come into collision, and +since 'all things work together,' according to the counsel of His +will, 'all things work together for good' to His lovers. The +triumphant words of my text are no piece of empty rhetoric, but the +plain result of two facts--Christ's rule and the Christian's +submission. 'All things are yours, and ye are Christ's,' so the stars +in their courses fight against those who fight against Him, and if we +are at peace with Him we shall 'make a league with the beasts of the +field, and the stones of the field,' which otherwise would be +hindrances and stumbling-blocks, 'shall be at peace with' us. + +The Apostle carries his confidence in the subservience of all things +to Christ's servants very far, and the words of my text, in which he +dares to suggest that 'the Shadow feared of man' is, after all, a +veiled friend, are hard to believe, when we are brought face to face +with death, either when we meditate on our own end, or when our +hearts are sore and our hands are empty. Then the question comes, and +often is asked with tears of blood, Is it true that this awful force, +which we cannot command, does indeed serve us? Did it serve those +whom it dragged from our sides; and in serving them, did it serve us? +Paul rings out his 'Yes'; and if we have as firm a hold of Paul's +Lord as Paul had, our answer will be the same. Let me, then, deal +with this great thought that lies here, of the conversion of the last +enemy into a friend, the assurance that we may all have that death is +ours, though not in the sense that we can command it, yet in the +sense that it ministers to our highest good. + +That thought may be true about ourselves when it comes to our turn to +die, and, thank God, has been true about all those who have departed +in His faith and fear. Some of you may have seen two very striking +engravings by a great, though somewhat unknown artist, representing +Death as the Destroyer, and Death as the Friend. In the one case he +comes into a scene of wild revelry, and there at his feet lie, stark +and stiff, corpses in their gay clothing and with garlands on their +brows, and feasters and musicians are flying in terror from the +cowled Skeleton. In the other he comes into a quiet church belfry, +where an aged saint sits with folded arms and closed eyes, and an +open Bible by his side, and endless peace upon the wearied face. The +window is flung wide to the sunrise, and on its sill perches a bird +that gives forth its morning song. The cowled figure has brought rest +to the weary, and the glad dawning of a new life to the aged, and is +a friend. The two pictures are better than all the poor words that I +can say. It depends on the people to whom he comes, whether he comes +as a destroyer or as a helper. Of course, for all of us the mere +physical facts remain the same, the pangs and the pain, the slow +torture of the loosing of the bond, or the sharp agony of its +instantaneous rending apart. But we have gone but a very little way +into life and its experiences, if we have not learnt that identity of +circumstances may cover profound difference of essentials, and that +the same experiences may have wholly different messages and meanings +to two people who are equally implicated in them. Thus, while the +physical fact remains the same for all, the whole bearing of it may +so differ that Death to one man will be a Destroyer, while to another +it is a Friend. + +For, if we come to analyse the thoughts of humanity about the last +act in human life on earth, what is it that makes the dread darkness +of death, which all men know, though they so seldom think of it? I +suppose, first of all, if we seek to question our feelings, that +which makes Death a foe to the ordinary experience is, that it is +like a step off the edge of a precipice in a fog; a step into a dim +condition of which the imagination can form no conception, because it +has no experience, and all imagination's pictures are painted with +pigments drawn from our past. Because it is impossible for a man to +have any clear vision of what it is that is coming to meet him, and +he cannot tell 'in that sleep what dreams may come,' he shrinks, as +we all shrink, from a step into the vast Inane, the dim Unknown. But +the Gospel comes and says, 'It _is_ a land of great darkness,' but +'To the people that sit in darkness a great light hath shined.' + + 'Our knowledge of that life is small, + The eye of faith is dim.' + +But faith has an eye, and there is light, and this we can see--One +face whose brightness scatters all the gloom, One Person who has not +ceased to be the Sun of Righteousness with healing in His beams, even +in the darkness of the grave. Therefore, one at least of the +repellent features which, to the timorous heart, makes Death a foe, +is gone, when we know that the known Christ fills the Unknown. + +Then, again, another of the elements, as I suppose, which constitute +the hostile aspect that Death assumes to most of us, is that it +apparently hales us away from all the wholesome activities and +occupations of life, and bans us into a state of apparent inaction. +The thought that death is rest does sometimes attract the weary or +harassed, or they fancy it does, but that is a morbid feeling, and +much more common in sentimental epitaphs than among the usual +thoughts of men. To most of us there is no joy, but a chill, in the +anticipation that all the forms of activity which have so occupied, +and often enriched, our lives here, are to be cut off at once. 'What +am I to do if I have no books?' says the student. 'What am I to do if +I have no mill?' says the spinner. 'What am I to do if I have no +nursery or kitchen?' say the women. What are you to do? There is only +one quieting answer to such questions. It tells us that what we are +doing here is learning our trade, and that we are to be moved into +another workshop there, to practise it. Nothing can bereave us of the +force we made our own, being here; and 'there is nobler work for us +to do' when the Master of all the servants stoops from His Throne and +says: 'Thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee +ruler over many things; have thou authority over ten cities.' Then +the faithfulness of the steward will be exchanged for the authority +of the ruler, and the toil of the servant for a share in the joy of +the Lord. + +So another of the elements which make Death an enemy is turned into +an element which makes it a friend, and instead of the separation +from this earthly body, the organ of our activity and the medium of +our connection with the external universe being the condemnation of +the naked spirit to inaction, it is the emancipation of the spirit +into greater activity. For nothing drops away at death that does not +make a man the richer for its loss, and when the dross is purged from +the silver, there remains 'a vessel unto honour, fit for the Master's +use.' This mightier activity is the contribution to our blessedness, +which Death makes to them who use their activities here in Christ's +service. + +Then, still further, another of the elements which is converted from +being a terror into a joy is that Death, the separator, becomes to +Christ's servants Death, the uniter. We all know how that function of +death is perhaps the one that makes us shrink from it the most, dread +it the most, and sometimes hate it the most. But it will be with us +as it was with those who were to be initiated into ancient religious +rites. Blindfolded, they were led by a hand that grasped theirs but +was not seen, through dark, narrow, devious passages, but they were +led into a great company in a mighty hall. Seen from this side, the +ministry of Death parts a man from dear ones, but, oh! if we could +see round the turn in the corridor, we should see that the solitude +is but for a moment, and that the true office of Death is not so much +to part from those beloved on earth as to carry to, and unite with, +Him that is best Beloved in the heavens, and in Him with all His +saints. They that are joined to Christ, as they who pass from earth +are joined, are thereby joined to all who, in like manner, are knit +to Him. Although other dear bonds are loosed by the bony fingers of +the Skeleton, his very loosing of them ties more closely the bond +that unites us to Jesus, and when the dull ear of the dying has +ceased to hear the voices of earth that used to thrill it in their +lowest whisper, I suppose it hears another Voice that says: 'When +thou passest through the fire I will be with thee, and through the +waters they shall not overflow thee.' Thus the Separator unites, +first to Jesus, and then to 'the general assembly and Church of the +first-born,' and leads into the city of the living God, the pilgrims +who long have lived, often isolated, in the desert. + +There is a last element in Death which is changed for the Christian, +and that is that to men generally, when they think about it, there is +an instinctive recoil from Death, because there is an instinctive +suspicion that after Death is the Judgment, and that, somehow or +other--never mind about the drapery in which the idea may be embodied +for our weakness--when a man dies he passes to a state where he will +reap the consequences of what he has sown here. But to Christ's +servant that last thought is robbed of its sting, and all the poison +sucked out of it, for he can say: 'He that died for me makes it +possible for me to die undreading, and to pass thither, knowing that +I shall meet as my Judge Him whom I have trusted as my Saviour, and +so may have boldness before Him in the Day of Judgment.' + +Knit these four contrasts together. Death as a step into a dim +unknown _versus_ Death as a step into a region lighted by Jesus; +Death as the cessation of activity _versus_ Death as the introduction +to nobler opportunities, and the endowment with nobler capacities of +service; Death as the separator and isolator _versus_ Death as +uniting to Jesus and all His lovers; Death as haling us to the +judgment-seat of the adversary _versus_ Death as bringing us to the +tribunal of the Christ; and I think we can understand how Christians +can venture to say, 'All things are ours, whether life or death' +which leads to a better life. + +And now let me add one word more. All this that I have been saying, +and all the blessed strength for ourselves and calming in our sorrows +which result therefrom, stand or fall with the Resurrection of Jesus +Christ. There is nothing else that makes these things certain. There +are, of course, instincts, peradventures, hopes, fears, doubts. But +in this region, and in regard to all this cycle of truths, the same +thing applies which applies round the whole horizon of Christian +Revelation--if you want not speculations but certainties, you have to +go to Jesus Christ for them. There were many men who thought that +there were islands of the sea beyond the setting sun that dyed the +western waves, but Columbus went and came back again, and brought +their products--and then the thought became a fact. Unless you +believe that Jesus Christ has come back from 'the bourne from which +no traveller returns,' and has come laden with the gifts of 'happy +isles of Eden' far beyond the sea, there is no certitude upon which a +dying man can lay his head, or by which a bleeding heart can be +staunched. But when He draws near, alive from the dead, and says to +us, as He did to the disciples on the evening of the day of +Resurrection, 'Peace be unto you,' and shows us His hands and His +side, then we do not only speculate or think a future life possible +or probable, or hesitate to deny it, or hope or fear, as the case may +be, but we _know_, and we can say: 'All things are ours ... death' +amongst others. The fact that Jesus Christ has died changes the whole +aspect of death to His servant, inasmuch as in that great solitude he +has a companion, and in the valley of the shadow of death sees +footsteps that tell him of One that went before. + +Nor need I do more than remind you how the manner of our Lord's death +shows that He is Lord not only of the dead but of the Death that +makes them dead. For His own tremendous assertion, 'I have power to +lay down My life, and I have power to take it again,' was confirmed +by His attitude and His words at the last, as is hinted at by the +very expressions with which the Evangelists record the fact of His +death: 'He yielded up His spirit,' 'He gave up the ghost,' 'He +breathed out His life.' It is confirmed to us by such words as those +remarkable ones of the Apocalypse, which speak of Him as 'the Living +One,' who, by His own will, 'became dead.' He died because He would, +and He would die because He loved you and me. And in dying, He showed +Himself to be, not the Victim, but the Conqueror, of the Death to +which He submitted. The Jewish king on the fatal field of Gilboa +called his sword-bearer, and the servant came, and Saul bade him +smite, and when his trembling hand shrank from such an act, the king +fell on his own sword. The Lord of life and death summoned His +servant Death, and He came obedient, but Jesus died not by Death's +stroke, but by His own act. So that Lord of Death, who died because +He would, is the Lord who has the keys of death and the grave. In +regard to one servant He says, 'I will that he tarry till I come,' +and that man lives through a century, and in regard to another He +says, 'Follow thou Me,' and that man dies on a cross. The dying Lord +is Lord of Death, and the living Lord is for us all the Prince of +Life. + +Brethren, we have to take His yoke upon us by the act of faith which +leads to a love that issues in an obedience which will become more +and more complete, as we become more fully Christ's. Then death will +be ours, for then we shall count that the highest good for us will be +fuller union with, a fuller possession of, and a completer conformity +to, Jesus Christ our King, and that whatever brings us these, even +though it brings also pain and sorrow and much from which we shrink, +is all on our side. It is possible--may it be so with each of +us!--that for us Death may be, not an enemy that bans us into +darkness and inactivity, or hales us to a judgment-seat, but the +Angel who wakes us, at whose touch the chains fall off, and who leads +us through 'the iron gate that opens of its own accord,' and brings +us into the City. + + + + +SERVANTS AND LORDS + + 'All things are yours; 22. Whether Paul, or Apollos, + or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things + present, or things to come; all are yours; 23. And ye + are Christ's.'--1 COR. iii. 21-23. + + +The Corinthian Christians seem to have carried into the Church some +of the worst vices of Greek--and English--political life. They were +split up into wrangling factions, each swearing by the name of some +person. Paul was the battle-cry of one set; Apollos of another. Paul +and Apollos were very good friends, their admirers bitter +foes--according to a very common experience. The springs lie close +together up in the hills, the rivers may be parted by half a +continent. + +These feuds were all the more detestable to the Apostle because his +name was dragged into them; and so he sets himself, in the first part +of this letter, with all his might, to shame and to argue the +Corinthian Christians out of their wrangling. This great text is one +of the considerations which he adduces with that purpose. In effect +he says, 'To pin your faith to any one teacher is a wilful narrowing +of the sources of your blessing and your wisdom. You say you are +Paul's men. Has Apollos got nothing that he could teach you? and may +you not get any good out of brave brother Cephas? Take them all; they +were all meant for your good. Let no man glory in individuals.' + +That is all that his argument required him to say. But in his +impetuous way he goes on into regions far beyond. His thought, like +some swiftly revolving wheel, catches fire of its own rapid motion; +and he blazes up into this triumphant enumeration of all the things +that serve the soul which serves Jesus Christ. 'You are lords of men, +of the world of time, of death, of eternity; but you are not lords of +yourselves. You belong to Jesus, and in the measure in which you +belong to Him do all things belong to you.' + +I. I think, then, that I shall best bring out the fulness of these +words by simply following them as they lie before us, and asking +you to consider, first, how Christ's servants are men's lords. + +'All things are yours, Paul, Apollos, Cephas.' These three teachers +were all lights kindled at the central Light, and therefore shining. +They were fragments of His wisdom, of Him that spoke; varying, but +yet harmonious, and mutually complementary aspects of the one +infinite Truth had been committed to them. Each was but a part of the +mighty whole, a little segment of the circle + + 'They are but broken lights of Thee, + And Thou, O Lord! art more than they.' + +And in the measure, therefore, in which men adhere to Christ, and +have taken Him for theirs; in that measure are they delivered from +all undue dependence on, still more from all slavish submission to, +any single individual teacher or aspect of truth. To have Christ for +ours, and to be His, which are only the opposite sides of the same +thing, mean, in brief, to take Jesus Christ for the source of all +knowledge of moral and religious truth. His Word is the Christian's +creed, His Person and the truths that lie in Him, are the fountains +of all our knowledge of God and man. To be Christ's is to take Him as +the master who has absolute authority over conduct and practice. His +commandment is the Christian's duty; His pattern the Christian's +all-sufficient example; His smile the Christian's reward. To be +Christ's is to take Him for the home of our hearts, in whose gracious +and sweet love we find all sufficiency and a rest for our seeking +affections. And so, if ye are His, Paul, Apollos, Cephas, all men are +yours; in the sense that you are delivered from all undue dependence +upon them; and in the sense that they subserve your highest good. + +So the true democracy of Christianity, which abjures swearing by the +words of any teacher, is simply the result of loyal adherence to the +teaching of Jesus Christ. And that proud independence which some of +you seek to cultivate, and on the strength of which you declare that +no man is your master upon earth, is an unwholesome and dangerous +independence, unless it be conjoined with the bowing down of the +whole nature, in loyal submission, to the absolute authority of the +only lips that ever spoke truth, truth only, and truth always. If +Christ be our Master, if we take our creed from Him, if we accept His +words and His revelation of the Father as our faith and our objective +religion, then all the slavery to favourite names, all the taking of +truth second-hand from the lips that we honour, all the partisanship +for one against another which has been the shame and the ruin of the +Christian Church, and is working untold mischiefs in it to-day, are +ended at once. 'One is your Master, even Christ.' 'Call no man Rabbi! +upon earth; but bow before Him, the Incarnate and the Personal +Truth.' + +And in like manner they who are Christ's are delivered from all +temptations to make men's maxims and practices and approbation the +law of their conduct. Society presses upon each of us; what we call +public opinion, which is generally the clatter of the half-dozen +people that happen to stand nearest us, rules us; and it needs to be +said very emphatically to all Christian men and women--Take your law +of conduct from His lips, and from nobody else's. + +'They say. What say they? Let them say.' If we take Christ's +commandment for our absolute law, and Christ's approbation for our +highest aim and all-sufficient reward, we shall then be able to brush +aside other maxims and other people's opinions of us, safely and +humbly, and to say, 'With me it is a very small matter to be judged +of you, or of man's judgment. He that judgeth me is the Lord.' + +The envoy of some foreign power cares very little what the +inhabitants of the land to which he is ambassador may think of him +and his doings; it is his sovereign's good opinion that he seeks to +secure. The soldier's reward is his commander's praise, the slave's +joy is the master's smile, and for us it ought to be the law of our +lives, and in the measure in which we really belong to Christ it will +be the law of our lives, that 'we labour that, whether present or +absent, we may be pleasing to Him.' + +So, brethren, as teachers, as patterns, as objects of love which is +only too apt to be exclusive and to master us, we can only take one +another in subordination to our supreme submission to Christ, and if +we are His, our duty, as our joy, is to count no man necessary to our +wellbeing, but to hang only on the one Man, whom it is safe and +blessed to believe utterly, to obey abjectly, and to love with all +our strength, because He is more than man, even God manifest in the +flesh. + +II. And now let us pass to the next idea here, secondly, Christ's +servants are the lords of 'the world.' + +That phrase is used here, no doubt, as meaning the external material +universe. These creatures around us, they belong to us, if we belong +to Jesus Christ. That man owns the world who despises it. There are +plenty of rich men in Manchester who say they possess so many +thousand pounds. Turn the sentence about and it would be a great deal +truer--the thousands of pounds possess them. They are the slaves of +their own possessions, and every man who counts any material thing as +indispensable to his wellbeing, and regards it as the chiefest good, +is the slave-servant of that thing. He owns the world who turns it to +the highest use of growing his soul by it. All material things are +given, and, I was going to say, were created, for the growth of men, +or at all events their highest purpose is that men should, by them, +grow. And therefore, as the scaffolding is swept away when the +building is finished, so God will sweep away this material universe +with all its wonders of beauty and of contrivance, when men have been +grown by means of it. The material is less than the soul, and he is +master of the world, and owns it, who has got thoughts out of it, +truth out of it, impulses out of it, visions of God out of it, who +has by it been led nearer to his divine Master. If I look out upon a +fair landscape, and the man who draws the rents of it is standing by +my side, and I suck more sweetness, and deeper impulses, and larger +and loftier thoughts out of it than he does, it belongs to me far +more than it does to him. The world is his who from it has learned to +despise it, to know himself and to know God. He owns the world who +uses it as the arena, or wrestling ground, on which, by labour, he +may gain strength, and in which he may do service. Antagonism helps +to develop muscle, and the best use of the outward frame of things is +that we shall take it as the field upon which we can serve God. + +And now all these three things--the contempt of earth, the use of +earth for growing souls, and the use of earth as the field of +service--all these things belong most truly to the man who belongs to +Christ. The world is His, and if we live near Him and cultivate +fellowship with Him, and see His face gleaming through all the +Material, and are led up nearer to Him by everything around us, then +we own the world and wring the sweetness to the last drop out of it, +though we may have but little of that outward relation to its goods +which short-sighted men call possessing them. We may solve the +paradox of those who, 'having nothing, yet have all,' if we belong to +Christ the Lord of all things, and so have co-possession with Him of +all His riches. + +III. Further, my text tells us, in the third place, that Christian +men, who belong to Jesus Christ, are the lords and masters of 'life +and death.' + +Both of these words are here used, as it seems to me, in their +simple, physical sense, natural life and natural death. You may say, +'Well, everybody is lord of life in that sense.' Yes, of course, in a +fashion we all possess it, seeing that we are all alive. But that +mysterious gift of personality, that awful gift of conscious +existence, only belongs, in the deepest sense, to the men who belong +to Jesus Christ. I do not call that man the owner of his own life who +is not the lord of his own spirit. I do not see in what, except in +the mere animal sense in which a fly, or a spider, or a toad may be +called the master of its life, that man owns himself who has not +given up himself to Jesus Christ. The only way to get a real hold of +yourselves is to yield yourselves to Him who gives you back Himself, +and yourself along with Him. The true ownership of life depends upon +self-control, and self-control depends upon letting Jesus Christ +govern us wholly. So the measure in which it is true of me that 'I +live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me,' is the measure in which +the lower life of sense really belongs to us, and ministers to our +highest good. + +And then turn to the other member of this wonderful antithesis, +'whether life or _death_.' Surely if there is anything over which no +man can become lord, except by sinfully taking his fate into his own +hands, it is death. And yet even death, in which we seem to be +abjectly passive, and by which so many of us are dragged away +reluctantly from everything that we care to possess, may become a +matter of consent and therefore a moral act. Animals expire; a +Christian man may yield his soul to his Saviour, who is the Lord both +of the dead and of the living. If thus we feel our dependence upon +Him, and yield up our lives to Him, and can say, 'Living or dying we +are the Lord's,' then we may be quite sure that death, too, will be +our servant, and that our wills will be concerned even in passing out +of life. + +Still more, if you and I, dear brethren, belong to Jesus Christ, then +death is our fellow-servant who comes to call us out of this +ill-lighted workshop into the presence of the King. And at His magic +cold touch, cares and toils and sorrows are stiffened into silence, +like noisy streams bound in white frost; and we are lifted clean up +out of all the hubbub and the toil into eternal calm. Death is ours +because it fulfils our deepest desires, and comes as a messenger to +paupers to tell them they have a great estate. Death is ours if we be +Christ's. + +IV. And lastly, Christ's servants are the lords of time and eternity, +'things present or things to come.' + +Our Apostle's division, in this catalogue of his, is rhetorical +rather than logical; and we need not seek to separate the first of +this final pair from others which we have already encountered in our +study of the words, but still we may draw a distinction. The whole +mass of 'things present,' including not only that material universe +which we call the world, but all the events and circumstances of our +lives, over these we may exercise supreme control. If we are bowing +in humble submission to Jesus Christ, they will all subserve our +highest good. Every weather will be right; night and day equally +desirable; the darkness will be good for eyes that have been tired of +brightness and that need repose, the light will be good. The howling +tempests of winter and its white snows, the sharp winds of spring and +its bursting sunshine; the calm steady heat of June and the mellowing +days of August, all serve to ripen the grain. And so all 'things +present,' the light and the dark, the hopes fulfilled and the hopes +disappointed, the gains and the losses, the prayers answered and the +prayers unanswered, they will all be recognised, if we have the +wisdom that comes from submission to Jesus Christ's will, as being +ours and ministering to our highest blessing. + +We shall be their lords too inasmuch as we shall be able to control +them. We need not be 'anvils but hammers.' We need not let outward +circumstances dominate and tyrannise over us. We need not be like the +mosses in the stream, that lie whichever way the current sets, nor +like some poor little sailing boat that is at the mercy of the winds +and the waves, but may carry an inward impulse like some great +ocean-going steamer, the throb of whose power shall drive us straight +forward on our course, whatever beats against us. That we may have +this inward power and mastery over things present, and not be shaped +and moulded and made by them, let us yield ourselves to Christ, and +He will help us to rule them. + +And then, all 'things to come,' the dim, vague future, shall be for +each of us like some sunlit ocean stretching shoreless to the +horizon; every little ripple flashing with its own bright sunshine, +and all bearing us onwards to the great Throne that stands on the sea +of glass mingled with fire. + +Then, my brother, ask yourselves what your future is if you have not +Christ for your Friend. + + 'I backward cast mine eye + On prospects drear; + And forward though I cannot see, + I guess and fear.' + +So I beseech you, yield yourselves to Jesus Christ, He died to win +us. He bears our sins that they may be all forgiven. If we give +ourselves to Him who has given Himself to us, then we shall be lords +of men, of the world, of life and death, of time and eternity. + +In the old days conquerors used to bestow upon their followers lands +and broad dominions on condition of their doing suit and service, and +bringing homage to them. Christ, the King of the universe, makes His +subjects kings, and will give us to share in His dominion, so that to +each of us may be fulfilled that boundless and almost unbelievable +promise: 'He that overcometh shall inherit all things.' 'All are +yours if ye are Christ's.' + + + + +THE THREE TRIBUNALS + + 'But with me it is a very small thing that I should be + judged of you, or of man's judgment: yea, I judge not + mine own self. 4. For I know nothing by myself; yet am + I not hereby justified; but he that judgeth me is the + Lord.'--1 COR. iv. 3, 4. + + +The Church at Corinth was honeycombed by the characteristic Greek +vice of party spirit. The three great teachers, Paul, Peter, Apollos, +were pitted against each other, and each was unduly exalted by those +who swore by him, and unduly depreciated by the other two factions. +But the men whose names were the war-cries of these sections were +themselves knit in closest friendship, and felt themselves to be +servants in common of one Master, and fellow-workers in one task. + +So Paul, in the immediate context, associating Peter and Apollos with +himself, bids the Corinthians think of '_us_' as being servants +of Christ, and not therefore responsible to men; and as stewards of +the mysteries of God, that is, dispensers of truths long hidden but +now revealed, and as therefore accountable for correct accounts and +faithful dispensation only to the Lord of the household. Being +responsible to Him, they heeded very little what others thought about +them. Being responsible to Him, they could not accept vindication +by their own consciences as being final. There was a judgment beyond +these. + +So here we have three tribunals--that of man's estimates, that of our +own consciences, that of Jesus Christ. An appeal lies from the first +to the second, and from the second to the third. It is base to depend +on men's judgments; it is well to attend to the decisions of +conscience, but it is not well to take it for granted that, if +conscience approve, we are absolved. The court of final appeal is +Jesus Christ, and what He thinks about each of us. So let us look +briefly at these three tribunals. + +I. First, the lowest--men's judgment. + +'With me it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you,' +enlightened Christians that you are, or by the outside world. Now, +Paul's letters give ample evidence that he was keenly alive to the +hostile and malevolent criticisms and slanders of his untiring +opponents. Many a flash of sarcasm out of the cloud like a lightning +bolt, many a burst of wounded affection like rain from summer skies, +tell us this. But I need not quote these. Such a character as his +could not but be quick to feel the surrounding atmosphere, whether it +was of love or of suspicion. So, he had to harden himself against +what naturally had a great effect upon him, the estimate which he +felt that people round him were making of him. There was nothing +brusque, rough, contemptuous in his brushing aside these popular +judgments. He gave them all due weight, and yet he felt, 'From all +that this lowest tribunal may decide, there are two appeals, one to +my own conscience, and one to my Master in heaven.' + +Now, I suppose I need not say a word about the power which that +terrible court which is always sitting, and which passes judgment +upon every one of us, though we do not always hear the sentences +read, has upon us all. There is a power which it is meant to have. It +is not good for a man to stand constantly in the attitude of defying +whatever anybody else chooses to say or to think about him. But the +danger to which we are all exposed, far more than that other extreme, +is of deferring too completely and slavishly to, and being far too +subtly influenced in all that we do by, the thought of what A, B, or +C, may have to say or to think about it. 'The last infirmity of noble +minds,' says Milton about the love of fame. It is an infirmity to +love it, and long for it, and live by it. It is a weakening of +humanity, even where men are spurred to great efforts by the thought +of the reverberation of these in the ear of the world, and of the +honour and glory that may come therefrom. + +But not only in these higher forms of seeking after reputation, but +in lower forms, this trembling before, and seeking to conciliate, the +tribunal of what we call 'general opinion,' which means the voices of +the half-dozen people that are beside us and know about us, besets us +all, and weakens us all in a thousand ways. How many men would lose +all the motive that they have for living reputable lives, if nobody +knew anything about it? How many of you, when you go to London, and +are strangers, frequent places that you would not be seen in in +Manchester? How many of us are hindered, in courses which we know +that we ought to pursue, because we are afraid of this or that man or +woman, and of what they may look or speak? There is a regard to man's +judgment, which is separated by the very thinnest partition from +hypocrisy. There is a very shadowy distinction between the man who, +consciously or unconsciously, does a thing with an eye to what people +may say about it, and the man who pretends to be what he is not for +the sake of the reputation that he may thereby win. + +Now, the direct tendency of Christian faith and principle is to +dwindle into wholesome insignificance the multitudinous voice of +men's judgments. For, if I understand at all what Christianity means, +it means centrally and essentially this, that I am brought into +loving personal relation with Jesus Christ, and draw from Him the +power of my life, and from Him the law of my life, and from Him the +stimulus of my life, and from Him the reward of my life. If there is +a direct communication between me and Him, and if I am deriving from +Him the life that He gives, which is 'free from the law of sin and +death,' I shall have little need or desire to heed the judgment that +men, who see only the surface, may pass upon me, and upon my doings, +and I shall refer myself to Him instead of to them. Those who can go +straight to Christ, whose lives are steeped in Him, who feel that +they draw all from Him, and that their actions and character are +moulded by His touch and His Spirit, are responsible to no other +tribunal. And the less they think about what men have to say of them +the stronger, the nobler, the more Christ-like they will be. + +There is no need for any contempt or roughness to blend with such a +putting aside of men's judgments. The velvet glove may be worn upon +the iron hand. All meekness and lowliness may go with this wholesome +independence, and must go with it unless that independence is false +and distorted. 'With me it is a very small thing to be judged of you, +or of man's judgment,' need not be said in such a tone as to mean 'I +do not care a rush what you think about me'; but it must be said in +such a tone as to mean 'I care supremely for one approbation, and if +I have that I can bear anything besides.' + +Let me appeal to you to cultivate more distinctly, as a plain +Christian duty, this wholesome independence of men's judgment. I +suppose there never was a day when it was more needed that men should +be themselves, seeing with their own eyes what God may reveal +to them and they are capable of receiving, and walking with their own +feet on the path that fits them, whatsoever other people may say +about it. For the multiplication of daily literature, the way in +which we are all living in glass houses nowadays--everybody knowing +everything about everybody else, and delighting in the gossip which +takes the place of literature in so many quarters--and the tendency +of society to a more democratic form give the many-headed monster and +its many tongues far more power than is wholesome, in the shaping of +the lives and character and conduct of most men. The evil of +democracy is that it levels down all to one plane, and that it tends +to turn out millions of people, as like each other as if they had +been made in a machine. And so we need, I believe, even more than our +fathers did, to lay to heart this lesson, that the direct result of a +deep and strong Christian faith is the production of intensely +individual character. And if there are plenty of angles in it, +perhaps so much the better. We are apt to be rounded by being rubbed +against each other, like the stones on the beach, till there is not a +sharp corner or a point that can prick anywhere. So society becomes +utterly monotonous, and is insipid and profitless because of that. +You Christian people, be yourselves, after your own pattern. And +whilst you accept all help from surrounding suggestions and hints, +make it 'a very small thing that you be judged of men.' And you, +young men, in warehouses and shops, and you, students, and you, boys +and girls, that are budding into life, never mind what other people +say. 'Let thine eyes look right onwards,' and let all the clatter on +either side of you go on as it will. The voices are very loud, but if +we go up high enough on the hill-top, to the secret place of the Most +High, we shall look down and see, but not hear, the bustle and the +buzz; and in the great silence Christ will whisper to us, 'Well done! +good and faithful servant.' That praise is worth getting, and one way +to get it is to put aside the hindrance of anxious seeking to +conciliate the good opinion of men. + +II. Note the higher court of conscience. + +Our Apostle is not to be taken here as contradicting what he says in +other places. 'I judge not mine own self,'--yet in one of these same +letters to the Corinthians he says, 'If we judged ourselves we should +not be judged.' So that he does not mean here that he is entirely +without any estimate of his own character or actions. That he did in +some sense judge himself is evident from the next clause, because he +goes on to say, 'I know nothing against myself.' If he acquitted +himself, he must previously have been judging himself. But his +acquittal of himself is not to be understood as if it covered the +whole ground of his life and character, but it is to be confined to +the subject in hand--viz. his faithfulness as a steward of the +mysteries of God. But though there is nothing in that region of his +life which he can charge against himself as unfaithfulness, he goes +on to say, 'Yet am I not hereby justified?' + +Our absolution by conscience is not infallible. I suppose that +conscience is more reliable when it condemns than when it acquits. It +is never safe for a man to neglect it when it says, 'You are wrong!' +It is just as unsafe for a man to accept it, without further +investigation, when it says, 'You are right!' For the only thing that +is infallible about what we call conscience is its sentence, 'It is +right to do right.' But when it proceeds to say 'This, that, and the +other thing is right; and therefore it is right for you to do it,' +there may be errors in the judgment, as everybody's own experience +tells them. The inward judge needs to be stimulated, to be +enlightened, to be corrected often. I suppose that the growth of +Christian character is very largely the discovery that things that we +thought innocent are not, for us, so innocent as we thought them. + +You only need to go back to history, or to go down into your own +histories, to see how, as light has increased, dark corners have been +revealed that were invisible in the less brilliant illumination. How +long it has taken the Christian Church to find out what Christ's +Gospel teaches about slavery, about the relations of sex, about +drunkenness, about war, about a hundred other things that you and I +do not yet know, but which our successors will wonder that we failed +to see! Inquisitor and martyr have equally said, 'We are serving +God.' Surely, too, nothing is more clearly witnessed by individual +experience, than that we may do a wrong thing, and think that it is +right. 'They that kill you will think that they do God service.' + +So, Christian people, accept the inward monition when it is stern and +prohibitive. Do not be too sure about it when it is placable and +permissive. 'Happy is he that condemneth not himself in the thing +which he alloweth.' There may be secret faults, lying all unseen +beneath the undergrowth in the forest, which yet do prick and sting. +The upper floors of the house where we receive company, and where we, +the tenants, generally live, may be luxurious, and sweet, and clean. +What about the cellars, where ugly things crawl and swarm, and breed, +and sting? + +Ah, dear brethren! when my conscience says to me, 'You may do it,' it +is always well to go to Jesus Christ, and say to Him 'May I?' 'Search +me, O God, and ... see if there be any wicked way in me,' and show it +to me, and help me to cast it out. 'I know nothing against myself; +yet am I not hereby justified.' + +III. Lastly, note the supreme court of final appeal. + +'He that judgeth me is the Lord.' Now it is obvious that 'the Lord' +here is Christ, both because of the preceding context and because of +the next verse, which speaks of His coming. And it is equally +obvious, though it is often unnoticed, that the judgment of which the +Apostle is here speaking is a present and preliminary judgment. 'He +that _judgeth_ me'--not, 'will judge,' but _now_, at this very +moment. That is to say, whilst people round us are passing their +superficial estimates upon me, and whilst my conscience is excusing, +or else accusing me--and in neither case with absolute +infallibility--there is another judgment, running concurrently with +them, and going on in silence. That calm eye is fixed upon me, and +sifting me, and knowing me. _That_ judgment is not fallible, because +before Him 'the hidden things' that the darkness shelters, those +creeping things in the cellars that I was speaking about, are all +manifest; and to Him the 'counsels of the heart,' that is, the +motives from which the actions flow, are all transparent and legible. +So His judgment, the continual estimate of me which Jesus Christ, in +His supreme knowledge of me, has, at every moment of my life--_that_ +is uttering the final word about me and my character. + +His estimate will dwindle the sentences of the other two tribunals +into nothingness. What matter what his fellow-servants say about the +steward's accounts, and distribution of provisions, and management of +the household? He has to render his books, and to give account of his +stewardship, only to his lord. + +The governor of a Crown Colony may attach some importance to colonial +opinion, but he reports home; and it is what the people in Downing +Street will say that he thinks about. We have to report home; and it +is the King whom we serve, to whom we have to give an account. The +gladiator, down in the arena, did not much mind whether the thumbs of +the populace were up or down, though the one was the signal for his +life and the other for his death. He looked to the place where, +between the purple curtains and the flashing axes of the lictors, the +emperor sate. Our Emperor once was down on the sand Himself, and +although we are 'compassed about with a cloud of witnesses,' we look +to the Christ, the supreme Arbiter, and take acquittal or +condemnation, life or death, from Him. + +That judgment, persistent all through each of our lives, is +preliminary to the future tribunal and sentence. The Apostle employs +in this context two distinct words, both of which are translated in +our version 'judge.' The one which is used in these three clauses, on +which I have been commenting, means a preliminary examination, and +the one which is used in the next verse means a final decisive trial +and sentence. So, dear brethren, Christ is gathering materials for +His final sentence; and you and I are writing the depositions which +will be adduced in evidence. Oh! how little all that the world may +have said about a man will matter then! Think of a man standing +before that great white throne, and saying, 'I held a very high place +in the estimation of my neighbours. The newspapers and the reviews +blew my trumpet assiduously. My name was carved upon the plinth of a +marble statue, that my fellow-citizens set up in honour of my +many virtues,'--and the name was illegible centuries before the +statue was burned in the last fire! + +Brother! seek for the praise from Him, which is praise indeed. If He +says, 'Well done, good and faithful servant,' it matters little what +censures men may pass on us. If He says, 'I never knew you,' all +their praises will not avail. 'Wherefore we labour that, whether +present or absent, we may be well-pleasing to Him.' + + + + +THE FESTAL LIFE + + 'Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old + leaven ... but with the unleavened bread of + sincerity and truth.'--1 COR. v. 8. + + +There had been hideous immorality in the Corinthian Church. Paul had +struck at it with heat and force, sternly commanding the exclusion of +the sinner. He did so on the ground of the diabolical power of +infection possessed by evil, and illustrated that by the very obvious +metaphor of leaven, a morsel of which, as he says, 'will leaven the +whole lump,' or, as we say, 'batch.' But the word 'leaven' drew up +from the depths of his memory a host of sacred associations connected +with the Jewish Passover. He remembered the sedulous hunting in every +Jewish house for every scrap of leavened matter; the slaying of the +Paschal Lamb, and the following feast. Carried away by these +associations, he forgets the sin in the Corinthian Church for a +moment, and turns to set forth, in the words of the text, a very deep +and penetrating view of what the Christian life is, how it is +sustained, and what it demands. 'Wherefore,' says he, 'let us keep +the feast ... with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.' +That 'wherefore' takes us back to the words before it, And what are +these? 'Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us'; therefore--because +of that sacrifice, to us is granted the power, and on us is laid +imperatively the obligation, to make life a festival and to purge +ourselves. Now, in the notion of a feast, there are two things +included--joy and plentiful sustenance. So there are three points +here, which I have already indicated--what the Christian life is, a +festival; on what it is sustained, the Paschal Sacrifice; what it +demands, scrupulous purging out of the old leaven. + +I. The Christian life ought to be a continual festival. + +The Christian life a feast? It is more usually represented as a +fight, a wrestle, a race; and such metaphors correspond, as it would +appear, far more closely to the facts of our environment, and to the +experiences of our hearts, than does such a metaphor as this. But the +metaphor of the festival goes deeper than that of the fight or race, +and it does not ignore the strenuous and militant side of the +Christian life. No man ever lived a more strenuous life than Paul; no +man had heavier tasks, and did them more cheerily; no man had a +sterner fight and fought it more bravely. There is nothing soft, +Epicurean, or oblivious of the patent sad facts of humanity in the +declaration that after all, beneath all, above all, central to all, +the Christian life is a glad festival, when it is the life that it +ought to be. + +But you say, 'Ah! it is all very well to call it so; but in the first +place, continual joy is impossible in the presence of the +difficulties, and often sadnesses, that meet us on our life's path; +and, in the second place, it is folly to tell us to pump up emotions, +or to ignore the occasions for much heaviness and sorrow of heart.' +True; but, still, it is possible to cultivate such a temper as makes +life habitually joyful. We can choose the aspect under which we by +preference and habitually regard our lives. All emotion follows upon +a preceding thought, or sensible experience, and we can pick the +objects of our thoughts, and determine what aspect of our lives to +look at most. + +The sky is often piled with stormy, heaped-up masses of blackness, +but between them are lakes of calm blue. We can choose whether we +look at the clouds or at the blue. _These_ are in the lower +ranges; _that_ fills infinite spaces, upwards and out to the +horizon. These are transient, eating themselves away even whilst we +look, and black and thunderous as they may be, they are there but for +a moment--that is perennial. If we are wise, we shall fix our gaze +much rather on the blue than on the ugly cloud-rack that hides it, +and thus shall minister to ourselves occasions for the noble kind of +joy which is not noisy and boisterous, 'like the crackling of thorns +under a pot,' and does not foam itself away by its very ebullience, +but is calm like the grounds of it; still, like the heaven to which +it looks; eternal, like the God on whom it is fastened. If we would +only steadfastly remember that the one source of worthy and enduring +joy is God Himself, and listen to the command, 'Rejoice in the Lord,' +we should find it possible to 'rejoice always.' For that thought of +Him, His sufficiency, His nearness, His encompassing presence, His +prospering eye, His aiding hand, His gentle consolation, His enabling +help will take the sting out of even the bitterest of our sorrows, +and will brace us to sustain the heaviest, otherwise crushing +burdens, and greatly to 'rejoice, though now for a season we are in +heaviness through manifold temptations.' The Gulf Stream rushes into +the northern hemisphere, melts the icebergs and warms the Polar seas, +and so the joy of the Lord, if we set it before us as we can and +should do, will minister to us a gladness which will make our lives a +perpetual feast. + +But there is another thing that we can do; that is, we can clearly +recognise the occasions for sorrow in our experience, and yet +interpret them by the truths of the Christian faith. That is to say, +we can think of them, not so much as they tend to make us sad or +glad, but as they tend to make us more assured of our possession of, +more ardent in our love towards, and more submissive in our attitude +to, the all-ordering Love which is God. Brethren, if we thought of +life, and all its incidents, even when these are darkest and most +threatening, as being what it and they indeed are, His training of us +into capacity for fuller blessedness, because fuller possession of +Himself, we should be less startled at the commandment, 'Rejoice in +the Lord always,' and should feel that it was possible, though the +figtree did not blossom, and there was no fruit in the vine, though +the flocks were cut off from the pastures, and the herds from the +stall, yet to rejoice in the God of our salvation. Rightly understood +and pondered on, all the darkest passages of life are but like the +cloud whose blackness determines the brightness of the rainbow on its +front. Rightly understood and reflected on, these will teach us that +the paradoxical commandment, 'Count it all joy that ye fall into +divers temptations,' is, after all, the voice of true wisdom speaking +at the dictation of a clear-eyed faith. + +This text, since it is a commandment, implies that obedience to it, +and therefore the realisation of this continual festal aspect of +life, is very largely in our own power. Dispositions differ, some of +us are constitutionally inclined to look at the blacker, and some at +the brighter, side of our experiences. But our Christianity is worth +little unless it can modify, and to some extent change, our natural +tendencies. The joy of the Lord being our strength, the cultivation +of joy in the Lord is largely our duty. Christian people do not +sufficiently recognise that it is as incumbent on them to seek after +this continual fountain of calm and heavenly joy flowing through +their lives, as it is to cultivate some of the more recognised +virtues and graces of Christian conduct and character. + +Secondly, we have here-- + +II. The Christian life is a continual feeding on a sacrifice. + +'Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us. Wherefore let us keep the +feast.' It is very remarkable that this is the only place in Paul's +writings where he articulately pronounces that the Paschal Lamb is a +type of Jesus Christ. There is only one other instance in the New +Testament where that is stated with equal clearness and emphasis, and +that is in John's account of the Crucifixion, where he recognises the +fact that Christ died with limbs unbroken, as being a fulfilment, in +the New Testament sense of that word, of what was enjoined in regard +to the antitype, 'a bone of him shall not be broken.' + +But whilst the definite statement which precedes my text that Christ +is 'our Passover,' and 'sacrificed for us' as such, is unique in +Paul's writings, the thought to which it gives clear and crystallised +expression runs through the whole of the New Testament. It underlies +the Lord's Supper. Did you ever think of how great was the +self-assertion of Jesus Christ when He laid His hand on that +sacredest of Jewish rites, which had been established, as the words +of the institution of it say, to be 'a perpetual memorial through all +generations,' brushed it on one side, and in effect, said: 'You do +not need to remember the Passover any more. I am the true Paschal +Lamb, whose blood sprinkled on the doorposts averts the sword of the +destroying Angel, whose flesh, partaken of, gives immortal life. +Remember Me, and this do in remembrance of Me.' The Lord's Supper +witnesses that Jesus thought Himself to be what Paul tells the +Corinthians that He is, even our Passover, sacrificed for us. But the +point to be observed is this, that just as in that ancient ritual, +the lamb slain became the food of the Israelites, so with us the +Christ who has died is to be the sustenance of our souls, and of our +Christian life. 'Therefore let us keep the feast.' + +Feed upon Him; that is the essential central requirement for all +Christian life, and what does feeding on Him mean? 'How can this man +give us his flesh to eat?' said the Jews, and the answer is plain +now, though so obscure then. The flesh which He gave for the life of +the world in His death, must by us be taken for the very nourishment +of our souls, by the simple act of faith in Him. That is the feeding +which brings not only sustenance but life. Christ's death for us is +the basis, but it is only the basis, of Christ's living in us, and +His death for me is of no use at all to me unless He that died for me +lives in me. We feed on Him by faith, which not only trusts to the +Sacrifice as atoning for sin, but feeds on it as communicating and +sustaining eternal life--'Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us, +wherefore let us keep the Feast.' + +Again, we keep the feast when our minds feed upon Christ by +contemplation of what He is, what He has done, what He is doing, what +He will do; when we take Him as 'the Master-light of all our seeing,' +and in Him, His words and works, His Passion, Resurrection, +Ascension, Session as Sovereign at the right hand of God, find the +perfect revelation of what God is, the perfect discovery of what man +is, the perfect disclosure of what sin is, the perfect prophecy of +what man may become, the Light of light, the answer to every question +that our spirits can put about the loftiest verities of God and man, +the universe and the future. We feed on Christ when, with lowly +submission, we habitually subject thoughts, purposes, desires, to His +authority, and when we let His will flow into, and make plastic and +supple, our wills. We nourish our wills by submitting them to Jesus, +and we feed on Him when we not only say 'Lord! Lord!' but when we do +the things that He says. We feed on Christ, when we let His great, +sacred, all-wise, all-giving, all satisfying love flow into our +restless hearts and make them still, enter into our vagrant +affections and fix them on Himself. Thus when mind and conscience and +will and heart all turn to Jesus, and in Him find their sustenance, +we shall be filled with the feast of fat things which He has prepared +for all people. With that bread we shall be satisfied, and with it +only, for the husks of the swine are no food for the Father's son, +and we 'spend our money for that which is not bread, and our labour +for that which satisfieth not,' if we look anywhere else than to the +Paschal Lamb slain for us for the food of our souls. + +III. The Christian life is a continual purging out of the old leaven. + +I need not remind you how vivid and profoundly significant that +emblem of leaven, as applied to all manner of evil, is. But let me +remind you how, just as in the Jewish Ritual, the cleansing from all +that was leavened was the essential pre-requisite to the +participation in the feast, feeding on Jesus Christ, as I have tried +to describe it, is absolutely impossible unless our leaven is +cleansed away. Children spoil their appetites for wholesome food by +eating sweetmeats. Men destroy their capacity for feeding on Christ +by hungry desires, and gluttonous satisfying of those desires with +the delusive sweets of this passing world. But, my brother, your +experience, if you are a Christian man at all, will tell you that in +the direct measure in which you have been drawn away into paltering +with evil, your appetite for Christ and your capacity for gazing upon +Him, contemplating Him, feeding on Him, has died out. There comes a +kind of constriction in a man's throat when he is hungering after +lesser good, especially when there is a tinge of evil in the supposed +good that he is hungering after, which incapacitates Him from eating +the bread of God, which is Jesus Christ. + +But let us remember that absolute cleansing from all sin is not +essential, in order to have real participation in Jesus Christ. The +Jew had to take every scrap of leaven out of his house before he +began the Passover. If that were the condition for us, alas! for us +all; but the effort after purity, though it has not entirely attained +its aim, is enough. Sin abhorred does not prevent a man from +participating in the Bread that came down from heaven. + +Then observe, too, that for this power to cleanse ourselves, we must +have had some participation in Christ, by which there is given to us +that new life that conquers evil. In the words immediately preceding +my text, the Apostle bases his injunction to purge out the old leaven +on the fact that 'ye are unleavened.' Ideally, in so far as the power +possessed by them was concerned, these Corinthians were unleavened, +even whilst they were bid to purge out the leaven. That is to say, be +what you are; realise your ideal, utilise the power you possess, and +since by your faith there has been given to you a new life that can +conquer all corruption and sin, see that you use the life that is +given. Purge out the old leaven because ye are unleavened. + +One last word--this stringent exhortation, which makes Christian +effort after absolute purity a Christian duty, and the condition of +participation in the Paschal Lamb, is based upon that thought to +which I have already referred, of the diabolical power of infection +which Evil possesses. Either you must cast it out, or it will choke +the better thing in you. It spreads and grows, and propagates itself, +and works underground through and through the whole mass. A +water-weed got into some of our canals years ago, and it has all but +choked some of them. The slime on a pond spreads its green mantle +over the whole surface with rapidity. If we do not eject Evil it will +eject the good from us. Use the implanted power to cast out this +creeping, advancing evil. Sometimes a wine-grower has gone into his +cellars, and found in a cask no wine, but a monstrous fungus into +which all the wine had, in the darkness, passed unnoticed. I fear +some Christian people, though they do not know it, have something +like that going on in them. + +It is possible for us all to keep this perpetual festival. To live +in, on, for, Jesus Christ will give us victory over enemies, burdens, +sorrows, sins. We may, if we will, dwell in a calm zone where no +tempests rage, hear a perpetual strain of sweet music persisting +through thunder peals of sorrow and suffering, and find a table +spread for us in the presence of our enemies, at which we shall renew +our strength for conflict, and whence we shall rise to fight the good +fight a little longer, till we sit with Him at His table in His +Kingdom, and 'eat, and live for ever.' + + + + +FORMS _VERSUS_ CHARACTER + + 'Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, + but the keeping of the commandments of God.'--1 COR. vii. 19. + + 'For in Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth anything, + nor uncircumcision, but faith which worketh by love.'--GAL. v. 6. + + 'For neither is circumcision anything, nor uncircumcision, + but a new creature.'--GAL. vi. 16 (R.V.). + + +The great controversy which embittered so much of Paul's life, and +marred so much of his activity, turned upon the question whether a +heathen man could come into the Church simply by the door of faith, +or whether he must also go through the gate of circumcision. We all +know how Paul answered the question. Time, which settles all +controversies, has settled that one so thoroughly that it is +impossible to revive any kind of interest in it; and it may seem to +be a pure waste of time to talk about it. But the principles that +fought then are eternal, though the forms in which they manifest +themselves vary with every varying age. + +The Ritualist--using that word in its broadest sense--on the one +hand, and the Puritan on the other, represent permanent tendencies of +human nature; and we find to-day the old foes with new faces. These +three passages, which I have read, are Paul's deliverance on the +question of the comparative value of external rites and spiritual +character. They are remarkable both for the identity in the former +part of each and for the variety in the latter. In all the three +cases he affirms, almost in the same language, that 'circumcision is +nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing,' that the Ritualist's rite +and the Puritan's protest are equally insignificant in comparison +with higher things. And then he varies the statement of what the +higher things are, in a very remarkable and instructive fashion. The +'keeping of the commandments of God,' says one of the texts, is the +all-important matter. Then, as it were, he pierces deeper, and in +another of the texts (I take the liberty of varying their order) +pronounces that 'a new creature' is the all-important thing. And then +he pierces still deeper to the bottom of all, in the third text, and +says the all-important thing is 'faith which worketh by love.' + +I think I shall best bring out the force of these words by dealing +first with that emphatic threefold proclamation of the nullity of all +externalism; and then with the singular variations in the triple +statement of what is essential, viz. spiritual conduct and character. + +I. First, the emphatic proclamation of the nullity of outward rites. + +'Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing,' say two +texts. 'Circumcision availeth nothing, and uncircumcision availeth +nothing,' says the other. It neither is anything nor does anything. +Did Paul say that because circumcision was a Jewish rite? No. As I +believe, he said it because it was _a rite_; and because he had +learned that the one thing needful was spiritual character, and that +no external ceremonial of any sort could produce that. I think we are +perfectly warranted in taking this principle of my text, and in +extending it beyond the limits of the Jewish rite about which Paul +was speaking. For if you remember, he speaks about baptism, in the +first chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians, in a precisely +similar tone and for precisely the same reason, when he says, in +effect, 'I baptized Crispus and Gaius and the household of Stephanas, +and I think these are all. I am not quite sure. I do not keep any +kind of record of such things; God did not send me to baptize, He +sent me to preach the Gospel.' + +The thing that produced the spiritual result was not the rite, but +the truth, and therefore he felt that his function was to preach the +truth and leave the rite to be administered by others. Therefore we +can extend the principle here to all externalisms of worship, in all +forms, in all churches, and say that in comparison with the +essentials of an inward Christianity they are nothing and they do +nothing. + +They have their value. As long as we are here on earth, living in the +flesh, we must have outward forms and symbolical rites. It is in +Heaven that the seer 'saw no temple.' Our sense-bound nature +requires, and thankfully avails itself of, the help of external rites +and ceremonials to lift us up towards the Object of our devotion. A +man prays all the better if he bow his head, shut his eyes, and bend +his knees. Forms do help us to the realisation of the realities, and +the truths which they express and embody. Music may waft our souls to +the heavens, and pictures may stir deep thoughts. That is the simple +principle on which the value of all external aids to devotion +depends. They may be helps towards the appreciation of divine truth, +and to the suffusing of the heart with devout emotions which may lead +to building up a holy character. + +There is a worth, therefore--an auxiliary and subordinate worth--in +these things, and in that respect they are _not_ nothing, nor do +they 'avail nothing.' But then all external rites tend to usurp more +than belongs to them, and in our weakness we are apt to cleave to +them, and instead of using them as means to lift us higher, to stay +in them, and as a great many of us do, to mistake the mere +gratification of taste and the excitement of the sensibilities for +worship. A bit of stained glass may be glowing with angel-forms and +pictured saints, but it always keeps some of the light out, and it +always hinders us from seeing through it. And all external worship +and form have so strong a tendency to usurp more than belongs to +them, and to drag us down to their own level, even whilst we think +that we are praying, that I believe the wisest man will try to pare +down the externals of his worship to the lowest possible point. If +there be as much body as will keep a soul in, as much form as will +embody the spirit, that is all that we want. What is more is +dangerous. + +All form in worship is like fire, it is a good servant but it is a +bad master, and it needs to be kept very rigidly in subordination, or +else the spirituality of Christian worship vanishes before men know; +and they are left with their dead forms which are only +evils--crutches that make people limp by the very act of using them. + +Now, my dear friends, when that has happened, when men begin to say, +as the people in Paul's time were saying about circumcision, and as +people are saying in this day about Christian rites, that they are +necessary, then it is needful to take up Paul's ground and to say, +'No! they are nothing!' They are useful in a certain place, but if +you make them obligatory, if you make them essential, if you say that +grace is miraculously conveyed through them, then it is needful that +we should raise a strong note of protestation, and declare their +absolute nullity for the highest purpose, that of making that +spiritual character which alone is essential. + +And I believe that this strange recrudescence--to use a modern +word--of ceremonialism and aesthetic worship which we see all round +about us, not only in the ranks of the Episcopal Church, but amongst +Nonconformists, who are sighing for a less bare service, and here and +there are turning their chapels into concert-rooms, and instead of +preaching the Gospel are having 'Services of Song' and the like--that +all this makes it as needful to-day as ever it was to say to men: +'Forms are not worship. Rites may crush the spirit. Men may yield to +the sensuous impressions which they produce, and be lapped in an +atmosphere of aesthetic emotion, without any real devotion.' + +Such externals are only worth anything if they make us grasp more +firmly with our understandings and feel more profoundly with our +hearts, the great truths of the Gospel. If they do that, they help; +if they are not doing that, they hinder, and are to be fought +against. And so we have again to proclaim to-day, as Paul did, +'Circumcision is nothing,' 'but the keeping of the commandments of +God.' + +Then notice with what remarkable fairness and boldness and breadth +the Apostle here adds that other clause: 'and uncircumcision is +nothing.' It is a very hard thing for a man whose life has been spent +in fighting against an error, not to exaggerate the value of his +protest. It is a very hard thing for a man who has been delivered +from the dependence upon forms, not to fancy that his formlessness is +what the other people think that their forms are. The Puritan who +does not believe that a man can be a good man because he is a +Ritualist or a Roman Catholic, is committing the very same error as +the Ritualist or the Roman Catholic who does not believe that the +Puritan can be a Christian unless he has been 'christened.' The two +people are exactly the same, only the one has hold of the stick at +one end, and the other at the other. There may be as much idolatry in +superstitious reliance upon the bare worship as in the advocacy of +the ornate; and many a Nonconformist who fancies that he has 'never +bowed the knee to Baal' is as true an idol-worshipper in his +superstitious abhorrence of the ritualism that he sees in other +communities, as are the men who trust in it the most. + +It is a large attainment in Christian character to be able to say +with Paul, 'Circumcision is nothing, and my own favourite point of +uncircumcision is nothing either. Neither the one side nor the other +touches the essentials.' + +II. Now let us look at the threefold variety of the designation of +these essentials here. + +In our first text from the Epistle to the Corinthians we read, +'Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but the +keeping of the commandments of God.' If we finished the sentence it +would be, 'but the keeping of the commandments of God is everything.' + +And by that 'keeping the commandments,' of course, the Apostle does +not mean merely external obedience. He means something far deeper +than that, which I put into this plain word, that the one essential +of a Christian life is the conformity of the will with God's--not +the external obedience merely, but the entire surrender and the +submission of my will to the will of my Father in Heaven. That is the +all-important thing; that is what God wants; that is the end of all +rites and ceremonies; that is the end of all revelation and of all +utterances of the divine heart. The Bible, Christ's mission, His +passion and death, the gift of His Divine Spirit, and every part of +the divine dealings in providence, all converge upon this one aim and +goal. For this purpose the Father worketh hitherto, and Christ works, +that man's will may yield and bow itself wholly and happily and +lovingly to the great infinite will of the Father in heaven. + +Brethren! that is the perfection of a man's nature, when his will +fits on to God's like one of Euclid's triangles superimposed upon +another, and line for line coincides. When his will allows a free +passage to the will of God, without resistance or deflection, as +light travels through transparent glass; when his will responds to +the touch of God's finger upon the keys, like the telegraphic needle +to the operator's hand, then man has attained all that God and +religion can do for him, all that his nature is capable of; and far +beneath his feet may be the ladders of ceremonies and forms and +outward acts, by which he climbed to that serene and blessed height, +'Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but the +keeping of God's commandments is everything.' + +That submission of will is the sum and the test of your Christianity. +Your Christianity does not consist only in a mere something which you +call faith in Jesus Christ. It does not consist in emotions, however +deep and blessed and genuine they may be. It does not consist in the +acceptance of a creed. All these are means to an end. They are meant +to drive the wheel of life, to build up character, to make your +deepest wish to be, 'Father! not my will, but Thine, be done.' In the +measure in which that is your heart's desire, and not one +hair's-breadth further, have you a right to call yourself a +Christian. + +But, then, I can fancy a man saying: 'It is all very well to talk +about bowing the will in this fashion; how can I do that?' Well, let +us take our second text--the third in the order of their +occurrence--'For neither circumcision is anything, nor +uncircumcision, but a new creature.' That is to say, if we are ever +to keep the will of God we must be made over again. Ay! we must! Our +own consciences tell us that; the history of all the efforts that +ever we have made--and I suppose all of us have made some now and +then, more or less earnest and more or less persistent--tells us that +there needs to be a stronger hand than ours to come into the fight if +it is ever to be won by us. There is nothing more heartless and more +impotent than to preach, 'Bow your wills to God, and then you will be +happy; bow your wills to God, and then you will be good.' If that is +all the preacher has to say, his powerless words will but provoke the +answer, 'We cannot. Tell the leopard to change his spots, or the +Ethiopian his skin, as soon as tell a man to reduce this revolted +kingdom within him to obedience, and to bow his will to the will of +God. We cannot do it.' But, brethren, in that word, 'a new creature,' +lies a promise from God; for a creature implies a creator. 'It is He +that hath made us, and not we ourselves.' The very heart of what +Christ has to offer us is the gift of His own life to dwell in our +hearts, and by its mighty energy to make us free from the law of sin +and death which binds our wills. We may have our spirits moulded into +His likeness, and new tastes, and new desires, and new capacities +infused into us, so as that we shall not be left with our own poor +powers to try and force ourselves into obedience to God's will, but +that submission and holiness and love that keeps the commandments of +God, will spring up in our renewed spirits as their natural product +and growth. Oh! you men and women who have been honestly trying, half +your lifetime, to make yourselves what you know God wants you to be, +and who are obliged to confess that you have failed, hearken to the +message: 'If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature, old things +are passed away.' The one thing needful is keeping the commandments +of God, and the only way by which we can keep the commandments of God +is that we should be formed again into the likeness of Him of whom +alone it is true that 'He did always the things that pleased' God. + +And so we come to the last of these great texts: 'In Christ Jesus, +neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith +which worketh by love.' That is to say, if we are to be made over +again, we must have faith in Christ Jesus. We have got to the root +now, so far as we are concerned. We must keep the commandments of +God; if we are to keep the commandments we must be made over again, +and if our hearts ask how can we receive that new creating power into +our lives, the answer is, by 'faith which worketh by love.' + +Paul did not believe that external rites could make men partakers of +a new nature, but he believed that if a man would trust in Jesus +Christ, the life of that Christ would flow into his opened heart, and +a new spirit and nature would be born in him. And, therefore, his +triple requirements come all down to this one, so far as we are +concerned, as the beginning and the condition of the other two. +'Neither circumcision does anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith +which worketh by love,' does everything. He that trusts Christ opens +his heart to Christ, who comes with His new-creating Spirit, and +makes us willing in the day of His power to keep His commandments. + +But faith leads us to obedience in yet another fashion, than this +opening of the door of the heart for the entrance of the new-creating +Spirit. It leads to it in the manner which is expressed by the words +of our text, 'worketh by love.' Faith shows itself living, because it +leads us to love, and through love it produces its effects upon +conduct. + +Two things are implied in this designation of faith. If you trust +Christ you will love Him. That is plain enough. And you will not love +Him unless you trust Him. Though it lies wide of my present purpose, +let us take this lesson in passing. You cannot work yourself up into +a spasm or paroxysm of religious emotion and love by resolution or by +effort. All that you can do is to go and look at the Master and get +near Him, and that will warm you up. You can love if you trust. Your +trust will make you love; unless you trust you will never love Him. + +The second thing implied is, that if you love you will obey. That is +plain enough. The keeping of the commandments will be easy where +there is love in the heart. The will will bow where there is love in +the heart. Love is the only fire that is hot enough to melt the iron +obstinacy of a creature's will. The will cannot be driven. Strike it +with violence and it stiffens; touch it gently and it yields. If you +try to put an iron collar upon the will, like the demoniac in the +Gospels, the touch of the apparent restraint drives it into fury, and +it breaks the bands asunder. Fasten it with the silken leash of love, +and a 'little child' can lead it. So faith works by love, because +whom we trust we shall love, and whom we love we shall obey. + +Therefore we have got to the root now, and nothing is needful but an +operative faith, out of which will come all the blessed possession of +a transforming Spirit, and all sublimities and noblenesses of an +obedient and submissive will. + +My brother! Paul and James shake hands here. There is a 'faith' so +called, which does not work. It is dead! Let me beseech you, none of +you to rely upon what you choose to call your faith in Jesus Christ, +but examine it. Does it do anything? Does it help you to be like Him? +Does it open your hearts for His Spirit to come in? Does it fill them +with love to that Master, a love which proves itself by obedience? +Plain questions, questions that any man can answer; questions that go +to the root of the whole matter. If your faith does that, it is +genuine; if it does not, it is not. + +And do not trust either to forms, or to your freedom from forms. They +will not save your souls, they will not make you more Christ-like. +They will not help you to pardon, purity, holiness, blessedness. In +these respects neither if we have them are we the better, nor if we +have them not are we the worse. If you are trusting to Christ, and by +that faith are having your hearts moulded and made over again into +all holy obedience, then you have all that you need. Unless you have, +though you partook of all Christian rites, though you believed all +Christian truth, though you fought against superstitious reliance on +forms, you have not the one thing needful, for 'in Christ Jesus +neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith +which worketh by love.' + + + + +SLAVES AND FREE + + 'He that is called in the Lord, being a servant, is the + Lord's free man: likewise also he that is called, being + free, is Christ's servant.'--1 COR. vii. 22. + + +This remarkable saying occurs in a remarkable connection, and is used +for a remarkable purpose. The Apostle has been laying down the +principle, that the effect of true Christianity is greatly to +diminish the importance of outward circumstance. And on that +principle he bases an advice, dead in the teeth of all the maxims +recognised by worldly prudence. He says, in effect, 'Mind very little +about getting on and getting up. Do God's will wherever you are, and +let the rest take care of itself.' Now, the world says, 'Struggle, +wriggle, fight, do anything to better yourself.' Paul says, 'You will +better yourself by getting nearer God, and if you secure that--art +thou a slave? care not for it; if thou mayest be free, use it rather; +art thou bound to a wife? seek not to be loosed; art thou loosed? +seek not to be bound; art thou circumcised? seek not to be +uncircumcised; art thou a Gentile? seek not to become in outward form +a Jew.' Never mind about externals: the main thing is our relation to +Jesus Christ, because in that there is what will be compensation for +all the disadvantages of any disadvantageous circumstances, and in +that there is what will take the gilt off the gingerbread of any +superficial and fleeting good, and will bring a deep-seated and +permanent blessing. + +Now, I am not going to deal in this sermon with that general +principle, nor even to be drawn aside to speak of the tone in which +the Apostle here treats the great abomination of slavery, and the +singular advice that he gives to its victims; though the +consideration of the tone of Christianity to that master-evil of the +old world might yield a great many thoughts very relevant to pressing +questions of to-day. But my one object is to fix upon the combination +which he here brings out in regard to the essence of the Christian +life; how that in itself it contains both members of the antithesis, +servitude and freedom; so that the Christian man who is free +externally is Christ's slave, and the Christian man who is outwardly +in bondage is emancipated by his union with Jesus Christ. + +There are two thoughts here, the application in diverse directions of +the same central idea--viz. the slavery of Christ's free men, and the +freedom of Christ's slaves. And I deal briefly with these two now. + +I. First, then, note how, according to the one-half of the +antithesis, Christ's freed men are slaves. + +Now, the way in which the New Testament deals with that awful +wickedness of a man held in bondage by a man is extremely remarkable. +It might seem as if such a hideous piece of immorality were +altogether incapable of yielding any lessons of good. But the +Apostles have no hesitation whatever in taking slavery as a clear +picture of the relation in which all Christian people stand to Jesus +Christ their Lord. He is the owner and we are the slaves. For you +must remember that the word most inadequately rendered here, +'servant' does not mean a hired man who has, of his own volition, +given himself for a time to do specific work and get wages for it; +but it means 'a bond-slave,' a chattel owned by another. All the ugly +associations which gather round the word are transported bodily into +the Christian region, and there, instead of being hideous, take on a +shape of beauty, and become expressions of the deepest and most +blessed truths, in reference to Christian men's dependence upon, and +submission to, and place in the household and the heart of, Jesus +Christ, their Owner. + +And what is the centre idea that lies in this metaphor, if you like +to call it so? It is this: absolute authority, which has for its +correlative--for the thing in us that answers to it--unconditional +submission. Jesus Christ has the perfect right to command each of us, +and we are bound to bow ourselves, unreluctant, unmurmuring, +unhesitating, with complete submission at His feet. His authority, +and our submission, go far, far deeper than the most despotic sway of +the most tyrannous master, or than the most abject submission of the +most downtrodden slave. For no man can coerce another man's will, and +no man can require more, or can ever get more, than that outward +obedience which may be rendered with the most sullen and fixed +rebellion of a hating heart and an obstinate will. But Jesus Christ +demands that if we call ourselves Christians we shall bring, not our +members only as instruments to Him, in outward surrender and service, +but that we shall yield ourselves, with our capacities of willing and +desiring, utterly, absolutely, constantly to Him. + +The founder of the Jesuits laid it down as a rule for his Order that +each member of it was to be at the master's disposal like a corpse, +or a staff in the hand of a blind man. That was horrible. But the +absolute putting of myself at the disposal of another's will, which +is expressed so tyrannously in Loyola's demand, is the simple duty of +every Christian, and as long as we have recalcitrating wills, which +recoil at anything which Christ commands or appoints, and perk up +their own inclinations in the face of His solemn commandment, or that +shrink from doing and suffering whatsoever He imposes and enjoins, we +have still to learn what it means to be Christ's disciples. + +Dear brethren, absolute submission is not all that makes a disciple, +but, depend upon it, there is no discipleship worth calling by the +name without it. So I come to each of you with His message to +you:--Down on your faces before Him! Bow your obstinate will, +surrender yourselves and accept Him as absolute, dominant Lord over +your whole being! Are you Christians after that pattern? Being +freemen, are you Christ's slaves? + +It does not matter what sort of work the owner sets his household of +slaves to do. One man is picked out to be his pipe-bearer, or his +shoe-cleaner; and, if the master is a sovereign, another one is sent +off, perhaps, to be governor of a province, or one of his council. +They are all slaves; and the service that each does is equally +important. + + 'All service ranks the same with God: + There is no last nor first.' + +What does it matter what you and I are set to do? Nothing. And, so, +why need we struggle and wear our hearts out to get into conspicuous +places, or to do work that shall bring some revenue of praise said +glory to ourselves? 'Play well thy part; there all the honour lies,' +the world can say. Serve Christ in anything, and all His servants are +alike in His sight. + +The slave-owner had absolute power of life and death over his +dependants. He could split up families; he could sell away dear ones; +he could part husband and wife, parent and child. The slave was his, +and he could do what he liked with his own, according to the cruel +logic of ancient law. And Jesus Christ, the Lord of the household, +the Lord of providence, can say to this one, 'Go!' and he goes into +the mists and the shadows of death. And He can say to those who are +most closely united, 'Loose your hands! I have need of one of you +yonder. I have need of the other one here.' And if we are wise, if we +are His servants in any real deep sense, we shall not kick against +the appointments of His supreme, autocratic, and yet most loving +Providence, but be content to leave the arbitrament of life and +death, of love united or of love parted, in His hands, and say, +'Whether we live we are the Lord's, or whether we die we are the +Lord's; living or dying we are His.' + +The slave-owner owned all that the slave owned. He gave him a little +cottage, with some humble sticks of furniture in it; and a bit of +ground on which to grow his vegetables for his family. But he to whom +the owner of the vegetables and the stools belonged owned them too. +And if we are Christ's servants, our banker's book is Christ's, and +our purse is Christ's, and our investments are Christ's; and our +mills, and our warehouses, and our shops and our businesses are His. +We are not His slaves, if we arrogate to ourselves the right of doing +what we like with His possessions. + +And, then, still further, there comes into our Apostle's picture here +yet another point of resemblance between slaves and the disciples of +Jesus. For the hideous abominations of the slave-market are +transferred to the Christian relation, and defecated and cleansed of +all their abominations and cruelty thereby. For what immediately +follows my text is, 'Ye are bought with a price.' Jesus Christ has +won us for Himself. There is only one price that can buy a heart, and +that is a heart. There is only one way of getting a man to be mine, +and that is by giving myself to be his. So we come to the very vital, +palpitating centre of all Christianity when we say, 'He gave Himself +for us, that He might acquire to Himself a people for His +possession.' Thus His purchase of His slave, when we remember that it +is the buying of a man in his inmost personality, changes all that +might seem harsh in the requirement of absolute submission into the +most gracious and blessed privilege. For when I am won by another, +because that other has given him or her whole self to me, then the +language of love is submission, and the conformity of the two wills +is the delight of each loving will. Whoever has truly been wooed into +relationship with Jesus, by reflection upon the love with which Jesus +grapples him to His heart, finds that there is nothing so blessed as +to yield one's self utterly and for ever to His service. + +The one bright point in the hideous institution of slavery was, that +it bound the master to provide for the slave, and though that was +degrading to the inferior, it made his life a careless, child-like, +merry life, even amidst the many cruelties and abominations of the +system. But what was a good, dashed with a great deal of evil, in +that relation of man to man, comes to be a pure blessing and good in +our relation to Him. If I am Christ's slave, it is His business to +take care of His own property, and I do not need to trouble myself +much about it. If I am His slave, He will be quite sure to find me in +food and necessaries enough to get His tale of work out of me; and I +may cast all my care upon Him, for He careth for me. So, brethren, +absolute submission and the devolution of all anxiety on the Master +are what is laid upon us, if we are Christ's slaves. + +II. Then there is the other side, about which I must say, secondly, a +word or two; and that is, the freedom of Christ's slaves. + +As the text puts it, 'He that is called, being a servant, is the +Lord's freedman.' A freedman was one who was emancipated, and who +therefore stood in a relation of gratitude to his emancipator and +patron. So in the very word 'freedman' there is contained the idea of +submission to Him who has struck off the fetters. + +But, apart from that, let me just remind you, in a sentence or two, +that whilst there are many other ways by which men have sought, and +have partially attained, deliverance from the many fetters and +bondages that attach to our earthly life, the one perfect way by +which a man can be truly, in the deepest sense of the word and in his +inmost being, a free man is by faith in Jesus Christ. + +I do not for a moment forget how wisdom and truth, and noble aims and +high purposes, and culture of various kinds have, in lower degrees +and partially, emancipated men from self and flesh and sin and the +world, and all the other fetters that bind us. But sure I am that +the process is never so completely and so assuredly effected as by the +simple way of absolute submission to Jesus Christ, taking Him for the +supreme and unconditional Arbiter and Sovereign of a life. + +If we do that, brethren, if we really yield ourselves to Him, in +heart and will, in life and conduct, submitting our understanding to +His infallible Word, and our wills to His authority, regulating our +conduct by His perfect pattern, and in all things seeking to serve +Him and to realise His presence, then be sure of this, that we shall +be set free from the one real bondage, and that is the bondage of our +own wicked selves. There is no such tyranny as mob tyranny; and there +is no such slavery as to be ruled by the mob of our own passions and +lusts and inclinations and other meannesses that yelp and clamour +within us, and seek to get hold of us and to sway. There is only one +way by which the brute domination of the lower part of our nature can +be surely and thoroughly put down, and that is by turning to Jesus +Christ and saying to Him, 'Lord! do Thou rule this anarchic kingdom +within me, for I cannot govern it myself. Do Thou guide and direct +and subdue.' You can only govern yourself and be free from the +compulsion of your own evil nature when you surrender the control to +the Master, and say ever, 'Speak, Lord! for Thy slave hears. Here am +I, send me.' + +And that is the only way by which a man can be delivered from the +bondage of dependence upon outward things. I said at the beginning of +these remarks that my text occurred in the course of a discussion in +which the Apostle was illustrating the tendency of true Christian +faith to set man free from, and to make him largely independent of, +the varieties in external circumstances. Christian faith does so, +because it brings into a life a sufficient compensation for all +losses, limitations, and sorrows, and a good which is the reality of +which all earthly goods are but shadows. So the slave may be free in +Christ, and the poor man may be rich in Him, and the sad man may be +joyful, and the joyful man may be delivered from excess of gladness, +and the rich man be kept from the temptations and sins of wealth, and +the free man be taught to surrender his liberty to the Lord who makes +him free. Thus, if we have the all-sufficient compensation which +there is in Jesus Christ, the satisfaction for all our needs and +desires, we do not need to trouble ourselves so much as we sometimes +do about these changing things round about us. Let them come, let +them go; let the darkness veil the light, and the light illuminate +the darkness; let summer and winter alternate; let tribulation and +prosperity succeed each other; we have a source of blessedness +unaffected by these. Ice may skin the surface of the lake, but deep +beneath, the water is at the same temperature in winter and in +summer. Storms may sweep the face of the deep, but in the abyss there +is calm which is not stagnation. So he that cleaves to Christ is +delivered from the slavery that binds men to the details and +accidents of outward life. + +And if we are the servants of Christ, we shall be set free, in the +measure in which we are His, from the slavery which daily becomes +more oppressive as the means of communication become more complete, +the slavery to popular opinion and to men round us. Dare to be +singular; take your beliefs at first hand from the Master. Never mind +what fellow-slaves say. It is His smile or frown that is of +importance. 'Ye are bought with a price; be not servants of men.' +And so, brethren, 'choose you this day whom ye will serve.' You are +not made to be independent. You must serve some thing or person. +Recognise the narrow limitations within which your choice lies, and +the issues which depend upon it. It is not whether you will serve +Christ or whether you will be free. It is whether you will serve +Christ or your own worst self, the world, men, and I was going to +add, the flesh and the devil. Make your choice. He has bought you. +You belong to Him by His death. Yield yourselves to Him, it is the +only way of breaking your chains. He that doeth sin is the servant of +sin. 'If the Son make you free, ye shall be free indeed,' and not +only free; for the King's slaves are princes and nobles, and 'all +things are yours, and ye are Christ's.' They who say to Him 'O Lord! +truly I am Thy servant,' receive from Him the rank of kings and +priests to God, and shall reign with Him for ever. + + + + +THE CHRISTIAN LIFE + + 'Brethren, let every man, wherein he is called, therein + abide with God.'--1 COR. vii. 24. + + +You find that three times within the compass of a very few verses +this injunction is repeated. 'As God hath distributed to every man,' +says the Apostle in the seventeenth verse, 'as the Lord hath called +every one, so let him walk. And so ordain I in all the churches.' +Then again in the twentieth verse, 'Let every man abide in the same +calling wherein he is called.' And then finally in our text. + +The reason for this emphatic reiteration is not difficult to +ascertain. There were strong temptations to restlessness besetting +the early Christians. The great change from heathenism to +Christianity would seem to loosen the joints of all life, and having +been swept from their anchorage in religion, all external things +would appear to be adrift. It was most natural that a man should seek +to alter even the circumstances of his outward life, when such a +revolution had separated him from his ancient self. Hence would tend +to come the rupture of family ties, the separation of husband and +wife, the Jewish convert seeking to become like a Gentile, the +Gentile seeking to become like a Jew; the slave trying to be free, +the freeman, in some paroxysm of disgust at his former condition, +trying to become a slave. These three cases are all referred to in +the context--marriage, circumcision, slavery. And for all three the +Apostle has the same advice to give--'Stop where you are.' In +whatever condition you were when God's invitation drew you to +Himself--for that, and not being set to a 'vocation' in life, is the +meaning of the word 'called' here--remain in it. + +And then, on the other hand, there was every reason why the Apostle +and his co-workers should set themselves, by all means in their +power, to oppose this restlessness. For, if Christianity in those +early days had once degenerated into the mere instrument of social +revolution, its development would have been thrown back for +centuries, and the whole worth and power of it, for those who first +apprehended it, would have been lost. So you know Paul never said a +word to encourage any precipitate attempts to change externals. He +let slavery--he let war alone; he let the tyranny of the Roman Empire +alone--not because he was a coward, not because he thought that +these things were not worth meddling with, but because he, like all +wise men, believed in making the tree good and then its fruit good. +He believed in the diffusion of the principles which he proclaimed, +and the mighty Name which he served, as able to girdle the +poison-tree, and to take the bark off it, and the rest, the slow +dying, might be left to the work of time. And the same general idea +underlies the words of my text. 'Do not try to change,' he says, 'do +not trouble about external conditions; keep to your Christian +profession; let those alone, they will right themselves. Art thou a +slave? Seek not to be freed. Art thou circumcised? Seek not to be +uncircumcised. Get hold of the central, vivifying, transmuting +influence, and all the rest is a question of time.' + +But, besides this more especial application of the words of my text +to the primitive times, it carries with it, dear brethren, a large +general principle that applies to all times--a principle, I may say, +dead in the teeth of the maxims upon which life is being ordered by +the most of us. _Our_ maxim is, 'Get on!' Paul's is, 'Never mind +about getting _on_, get _up_!' Our notion is--'Try to make the +circumstances what I would like to have them.' Paul's is--'Leave +circumstances to take care of themselves, or rather leave God to take +care of the circumstances. You get close to Him, and hold His hand, +and everything else will right itself.' Only he is not preaching +stolid acquiescence. His previous injunctions were--'Let every man +abide in the same calling wherein he was called.' He sees that that +may be misconceived and abused, and so, in his third reiteration of +the precept, he puts in a word which throws a flood of light upon the +whole thing--'Let every man wherein he is called therein abide.' Yes, +but that is not all--'therein abide _with God_!' Ay, that is it! not +an impossible stoicism; not hypocritical, fanatical contempt of the +external. But whilst that gets its due force and weight, whilst a +man yields himself in a measure to the natural tastes and +inclinations which God has given him, and with the intention that he +should find there subordinate guidance and impulse for his life, +still let him abide where he is called with God, and seek to increase +his fellowship with Him, as the main thing that he has to do. + +I. Thus we are led from the words before us first to the thought that +our chief effort in life ought to be union with God. + +'Abide with God,' which, being put into other words, means, I think, +mainly two things--constant communion, the occupation of all our +nature with Him, and, consequently, the recognition of His will in +all circumstances. + +As to the former, we have the mind and heart and will of God revealed +to us for the light, the love, the obedience of our will and heart +and mind; and our Apostle's precept is, first, that we should try, +moment by moment, in all the bustle and stir of our daily life, to +have our whole being consciously directed to and engaged with, +fertilised and calmed by contact with, the perfect and infinite +nature of our Father in heaven. + +As we go to our work again to-morrow morning, what difference would +obedience to this precept make upon my life and yours? Before all +else, and in the midst of all else, we should think of that Divine +Mind that in the heavens is waiting to illumine our darkness; we +should feel the glow of that uncreated and perfect Love, which, in +the midst of change and treachery, of coldness and of 'greetings +where no kindness is,' in the midst of masterful authority and +unloving command, is ready to fill our hearts with tenderness and +tranquillity: we should bow before that Will which is absolute and +supreme indeed, but neither arbitrary nor harsh, which is 'the +eternal purpose that He hath purposed in Himself' indeed, but is also +'the good pleasure of His goodness and the counsel of His grace.' + +And with such a God near to us ever in our faithful thoughts, in our +thankful love, in our lowly obedience, with such a mind revealing +itself to us, and such a heart opening its hidden storehouses for us +as we approach, like some star that, as one gets nearer to it, +expands its disc and glows into rich colour, which at a distance was +but pallid silver, and such a will sovereign above all, energising, +even through opposition, and making obedience a delight, what room, +brethren, would there be in our lives for agitations, and +distractions, and regrets, and cares, and fears--what room for +earthly hopes or for sad remembrances? They die in the fruition of a +present God all-sufficient for mind, and heart, and will--even as the +sun when it is risen with a burning heat may scorch and wither the +weeds that grow about the base of the fruitful tree, whose deeper +roots are but warmed by the rays that ripen the rich clusters which +it bears. 'Let every man, wherein he is called, therein abide _with +God_.' + +And then, as a consequence of such an occupation of the whole being +with God, there will follow that second element which is included in +the precept, namely, the recognition of God's will as operating in +and determining all circumstances. When our whole soul is occupied +with Him, we shall see Him everywhere. And this ought to be our +honest effort--to connect everything which befalls ourselves and the +world with Him. We should see that Omnipotent Will, the silent energy +which flows through all being, asserting itself through all secondary +causes, marching on towards its destined and certain goal, amidst all +the whirl and perturbation of events, bending even the antagonism of +rebels and the unconsciousness of godless men, as well as the play of +material instruments, to its own purposes, and swinging and swaying +the whole set and motion of things according to its own impulse and +by the touch of its own fingers. + +Such a faith does not require us to overlook the visible occasions +for the things which befall us, nor to deny the stable laws according +to which that mighty will operates in men's lives. Secondary causes? +Yes. Men's opposition and crime? Yes. Our own follies and sins? No +doubt. Blessings and sorrows falling indiscriminately on a whole +community or a whole world? Certainly. And yet the visible agents are +not the sources, but only the vehicles of the power, the belting and +shafting which transmit a mighty impulse which they had nothing to do +in creating. And the antagonism subserves the purposes of the rule +which it opposes, as the blow of the surf may consolidate the +sea-wall that it breaks against. And our own follies and sins may +indeed sorrowfully shadow our lives, and bring on us pains of body +and disasters in fortune, and stings in spirit for which we alone are +responsible, and which we have no right to regard as inscrutable +judgments--yet even these bitter plants of which our own hands have +sowed the seed, spring by His merciful will, and _are_ to be regarded +as His loving, fatherly chastisements--sent before to warn us by a +premonitory experience that 'the wages of sin is death.' As a rule, +God does not interpose to pick a man out of the mud into which he has +been plunged by his own faults and follies, until he has learned the +lessons which he can find in plenty down in the slough, if he will +only look for them! And the fact that some great calamity or some +great joy affects a wide circle of people, does not make its having a +special lesson and meaning for each of them at all doubtful. _There_ +is one of the great depths of all-moving wisdom and providence, that +in the very self-same act it is in one aspect universal, and in +another special and individual. The ordinary notion of a special +providence goes perilously near the belief that God's will is less +concerned in some parts of a man's life than in others. It is very +much like desecrating and secularising a whole land by the very act +of focussing the sanctity in some single consecrated shrine. But the +true belief is that the whole sweep of a life is under the will of +God, and that when, for instance, war ravages a nation, though the +sufferers be involved in a common ruin occasioned by murderous +ambition and measureless pride, yet for each of the sufferers the +common disaster has a special message. Let us believe in a divine +will which regards each individual caught up in the skirts of the +horrible storm, even as it regards each individual on whom the equal +rays of His universal sunshine fall. Let us believe that every single +soul has a place in the heart, and is taken into account in the +purposes of Him who moves the tempest, and makes His sun to shine +upon the unthankful and on the good. Let us, in accordance with the +counsel of the Apostle here, first of all try to anchor and rest our +own souls fast and firm in God all the day long, that, grasping His +hand, we may look out upon all the confused dance of fleeting +circumstances and say, 'Thy will is done on earth'--if not yet 'as it +is done in heaven,' still done in the issues and events of all--and +done with my cheerful obedience and thankful acceptance of its +commands and allotments in my own life. + +II. The second idea which comes out of these words is this--Such +union with God will lead to contented continuance in our place, +whatever it be. + +Our text is as if Paul had said, 'You have been "called" in such and +such worldly circumstances. The fact proves that these circumstances +do not obstruct the highest and richest blessings. The light of God +can shine on your souls through them. Since then you have such sacred +memorials associated with them, and know by experience that +fellowship with God is possible in them, do you remain where you are, +and keep hold of the God who has visited you in them.' + +If once, in accordance with the thoughts already suggested, our minds +have, by God's help, been brought into something like real, living +fellowship with Him, and we have attained the wisdom that pierces +through the external to the Almighty will that underlies all its mazy +whirl, then why should we care about shifting our place? Why should +we trouble ourselves about altering these varying events, since each +in its turn is a manifestation of His mind and will; each in its turn +is a means of discipline for us; and through all their variety a +single purpose works, which tends to a single end--'that we should be +partakers of His holiness'? + +And that is the one point of view from which we can bear to look upon +the world and not be utterly bewildered and over-mastered by it. +Calmness and central peace are ours; a true appreciation of all +outward good and a charm against the bitterest sting of outward evils +are ours; a patient continuance in the place where He has set us is +ours--when by fellowship with Him we have learned to look upon our +work as primarily doing His will, and upon all our possessions and +conditions primarily as means for making us like Himself. Most men +seem to think that they have gone to the very bottom of the thing +when they have classified the gifts of fortune as good or evil, +according as they produce pleasure or pain. But that is a poor, +superficial classification. It is like taking and arranging books by +their bindings and flowers by their colours. Instead of saying, 'We +divide life into two halves, and we put there all the joyful, and +here all the sad, for that is the ruling distinction'--let us rather +say, 'The whole is one, because it all comes from one purpose, and it +all tends towards one end. The only question worth asking in regard +to the externals of our life is--How far does each thing help me to +be a good man? how far does it open my understanding to apprehend +Him? how far does it make my spirit pliable and plastic under His +touch? how far does it make me capable of larger reception of greater +gifts from Himself? what is its effect in preparing me for that world +beyond?' Is there any other greater, more satisfying, more majestic +thought of life than this--the scaffolding by which souls are built +up into the temple of God? And to care whether a thing is painful or +pleasant is as absurd as to care whether the bricklayer's trowel is +knocking the sharp corner off a brick, or plastering mortar on the +one below it before he lays it carefully on its course. Is the +_building_ getting on? That is the one question that is worth +thinking about. + +You and I write our lives as if on one of those manifold writers +which you use. A thin filmy sheet _here_, a bit of black paper +below it; but the writing goes through upon the next page, and when +the blackness that divides two worlds is swept away _there_, the +history of each life written by ourselves remains legible in +eternity. And the question is--What sort of autobiography are we +writing for the revelation of that day, and how far do our +circumstances help us to transcribe fair in our lives the will of our +God and the image of our Redeemer? + +If, then, we have once got hold of that principle that all which +is--summer and winter, storm and sunshine, possession and loss, +memory and hope, work and rest, and all the other antitheses of +life--is equally the product of His will, equally the manifestation +of His mind, equally His means for our discipline, then we have the +amulet and talisman which will preserve us from the fever of desire +and the shivering fits of anxiety as to things which perish. And, as +they tell of a Christian father who, riding by one of the great lakes +of Switzerland all day long, on his journey to the Church Council +that was absorbing his thoughts, said towards evening to the deacon +who was pacing beside him, 'Where is the lake?' so you and I, +journeying along by the margin of this great flood of things when +wild storms sweep across it, or when the sunbeams glint upon its blue +waters, 'and birds of peace sit brooding on the charmed wave,' will +be careless of the changeful sea, if the eye looks beyond the visible +and beholds the unseen, the unchanging real presences that make glory +in the darkest lives, and 'sunshine in the shady place.' 'Let every +man, wherein he is called, therein abide with God.' + +III. Still further, another thought may be suggested from these +words, or rather from the connection in which they occur, and that +is--Such contented continuance in our place is the dictate of the +truest wisdom. + +There are two or three collateral topics, partly suggested by the +various connections in which this commandment occurs in the chapter, +from which I draw the few remarks I have to make now. + +And the first point I would suggest is that very old commonplace one, +so often forgotten, that after all, though you may change about as +much as you like, there is a pretty substantial equipoise and +identity in the amount of pain and pleasure in all external +conditions. The total length of day and night all the year round is +the same at the North Pole and at the Equator--half and half. Only, +in the one place, it is half and half for four-and-twenty hours at a +time, and in the other, the night lasts through gloomy months of +winter, and the day is bright for unbroken weeks of summer. But, when +you come to add them up at the year's end, the man who shivers in the +ice, and the man who pants beneath the beams from the zenith, have +had the same length of sunshine and of darkness. It does not matter +much at what degrees between the Equator and the Pole you and I live; +when the thing comes to be made up we shall be all pretty much upon +an equality. You do not get the happiness of the rich man over the +poor one by multiplying twenty shillings a week by as many figures as +will suffice to make it up to £10,000 a year. What is the use of such +eager desires to change our condition, when every condition has +disadvantages attending its advantages as certainly as a shadow; and +when all have pretty nearly the same quantity of the raw material of +pain and pleasure, and when the amount of either actually experienced +by us depends not on where we are, but on _what_ we are? + +Then, still further, there is another consideration to be kept in +mind upon which I do not enlarge, as what I have already said +involves it--namely, that whilst the portion of external pain and +pleasure summed up comes pretty much to the same in everybody's life, +any condition may yield the fruit of devout fellowship with God. + +Another very remarkable idea suggested by a part of the context +is--What is the need for my troubling myself about outward changes +when _in Christ_ I can get all the peculiarities which make any +given position desirable to me? For instance, hear how Paul talks to +slaves eager to be set free: 'For he that is called in the Lord, +_being_ a servant, is the Lord's freeman: likewise also he that +is called, _being_ free, is Christ's servant.' If you generalise +that principle it comes to this, that in union with Jesus Christ we +possess, by our fellowship with Him, the peculiar excellences and +blessings that are derivable from external relations of every sort. +To take concrete examples--if a man is a slave, he may be free in +Christ. If free, he may have the joy of utter submission to an +absolute master in Christ. If you and I are lonely, we may feel all +the delights of society by union with Him. If surrounded and +distracted by companionship, and seeking for seclusion, we may get +all the peace of perfect privacy in fellowship with Him. If we are +rich, and sometimes think that we were in a position of less +temptation if we were poorer, we may find all the blessings for which +we sometimes covet poverty in communion with Him. If we are poor, and +fancy that, if we had a little more just to lift us above the +grinding, carking care of to-day and the anxiety of to-morrow, we +should be happier, we may find all tranquillity in Him. And so you +may run through all the variety of human conditions, and say to +yourself--What is the use of looking for blessings flowing from these +from without? Enough for us if we grasp that Lord who is all in all, +and will give us in peace the joy of conflict, in conflict the calm +of peace, in health the refinement of sickness, in sickness the +vigour and glow of health, in memory the brightness of undying hope, +in hope the calming of holy memory, in wealth the lowliness of +poverty, in poverty the ease of wealth; in life and in death being +all and more than all that dazzles us by the false gleam of created +brightness! + +And so, finally--a remark which has no connection with the text +itself, but which I cannot avoid inserting here--I want you to think, +and think seriously, of the antagonism and diametrical opposition +between these principles of my text and the maxims current in the +world, and nowhere more so than in this city. Our text is a +revolutionary one. It is dead against the watchwords that you fathers +give your children--'push,' 'energy,' 'advancement,' 'get on, +whatever you do.' You have made a philosophy of it, and you say that +this restless discontent with a man's present position and eager +desire to get a little farther ahead in the scramble, underlies much +modern civilisation and progress, and leads to the diffusion of +wealth and to employment for the working classes, and to mechanical +inventions, and domestic comforts, and I don't know what besides. You +have made a religion of it; and it is thought to be blasphemy for a +man to stand up and say--'It is idolatry!' My dear brethren, I +declare I solemnly believe that, if I were to go on to the Manchester +Exchange next Tuesday, and stand up and say--'There is no God,' I +should not be thought half such a fool as if I were to go and +say--'Poverty is not an evil _per se_, and men do not come into +this world to get _on_ but to get _up_--nearer and liker to +God.' If you, by God's grace, lay hold of this principle of my text, +and honestly resolve to work it out, trusting in that dear Lord who +'though He was rich yet for our sakes became poor,' in ninety-nine +cases out of a hundred you will have to make up your minds to let the +big prizes of your trade go into other people's hands, and be +contented to say--'I live by peaceful, high, pure, Christ-like +thoughts.' 'He that needs least,' said an old heathen, 'is nearest +the gods'; but I would rather modify the statement into, 'He that +needs most, and knows it, is nearest the gods.' For surely Christ is +more than mammon; and a spirit nourished by calm desires and holy +thoughts into growing virtues and increasing Christlikeness is better +than circumstances ordered to our will, in the whirl of which we have +lost our God. 'In everything by prayer and supplication, with +thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God, and the peace +of God and the God of peace shall keep your hearts and minds in +Christ Jesus.' + + + + +'LOVE BUILDETH UP' + + 'Now, as touching things offered unto idols, we know that + we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffeth up, but charity + edifieth. 2. And if any man think that he knoweth any + thing, he knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know. 3. But + if any man love God, the same is known of him. 4. As + concerning therefore the eating of those things that + are offered in sacrifice unto idols, we know that an + idol is nothing in the world, and that there is none + other God but one. 5. For though there be that are called + gods, whether in heaven or in earth, (as there be gods + many, and lords many,) 6. But to us there is but one God, + the Father, of whom are all things, and we in Him; and + one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we + by Him. 7. Howbeit there is not in every man that + knowledge: for some, with conscience of the idol unto + this hour, eat it as a thing offered unto an idol; and + their conscience being weak is defiled. 8. But meat + commendeth us not to God: for neither, if we eat, are + we the better; neither, if we eat not, are we the worse. + 9. But take heed, lest by any means this liberty of + yours become a stumblingblock to them that are weak. + 10. For if any man see thee which hast knowledge sit + at meat in the idol's temple, shall not the conscience + of him which is weak be emboldened to eat those things + which are offered to idols; 11. And through thy knowledge + shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died? + 12. But when ye sin so against the brethren, and wound + their weak conscience, ye sin against Christ. + 13. Wherefore, if meat make my brother to offend, + I will eat no flesh while the world standeth, + lest I make my brother to offend.'--1 COR. viii. 1-13. + + +It is difficult for us to realise the close connection which existed +between idol-worship and daily life. Something of the same sort is +found in all mission fields. It was almost impossible for Christians +to take any part in society and not seem to sanction idolatry. Would +that Christianity were as completely interwoven with our lives as +heathen religions are into those of their devotees! Paul seems to +have had referred to him a pressing case of conscience, which divided +the Corinthian Church, as to whether a Christian could join in the +usual feasts or sacrifices. His answer is in this passage. + +The longest way round is sometimes the shortest way home. The Apostle +begins far away from the subject in hand by running a contrast +between knowledge and love, and setting the latter first. But his +contrast is very relevant to his purpose. Small questions should be +solved on great principles. + +The first principle laid down by Paul is the superiority of love over +knowledge, the bearing of which on the question in hand will appear +presently. We note that there is first a distinct admission of the +Corinthians' intelligence, though there is probably a tinge of irony +in the language 'We know that we all have knowledge.' 'You +Corinthians are fully aware that you are very superior people. +Whatever else you know, you know that, and I fully recognise it.' + +The admission is followed by a sudden, sharp comment, to which the +Corinthians' knowledge that they knew laid them open. Swift as the +thrust of a spear comes flashing 'Knowledge puffeth up.' Puffed-up +things are swollen by wind only, and the more they are inflated the +hollower and emptier they are; and such a sharp point as Paul's +saying shrivels them. The statement is not meant as the assertion of +a necessary or uniform result of knowledge, but it does put plainly a +very usual result of it, if it is unaccompanied by love. It is +a strange, sad result of superior intelligence or acquirements, that +it so often leads to conceit, to a false estimate of the worth and +power of knowing, to a ridiculous over-valuing of certain +acquirements, and to an insolent contempt and cruel disregard of +those who have them not. Paul's dictum has been only too well +confirmed by experience. + +'Love builds up,' or 'edifies.' Probably the main direction in which +that building up is conceived of as taking effect, is in aiding the +progress of our neighbours, especially in the religious life. But the +tendency of love to rear a fair fabric of personal character is not +to be overlooked. In regard to effect on character, the palm must be +given to love, which produces solid excellence far beyond what mere +knowledge can effect. Further, that pluming one's self on knowledge +is a sure proof of ignorance. The more real our acquirements, the +more they disclose our deficiencies. All self-conceit hinders us from +growing intellectually or morally, and intellectual conceit is the +worst kind of it. + +Very significantly, love to God, and not the simple emotion of love +without reference to its object, is opposed to knowledge; for love so +directed is the foundation of all excellence, and of all real love to +men. Love to God is not the antithesis of true knowledge, but it is +the only victorious antagonist of the conceit of knowing. Very +significantly, too, does Paul vary his conclusion in verse 3 by +saying that the man who loves God 'is known of Him,' instead of, as +we might have expected, 'knows Him.' The latter is true, but the +statement in the verse puts more strongly the thought of the man's +being an object of God's care. In regard, then, to their effects on +character, in producing consideration and helpfulness to others, and +in securing God's protection, love stands first, and knowledge +second. + +What has all this to do with the question in hand? This, that if +looked at from the standpoint of knowledge, it may be solved in one +way, but if from that of love, it will be answered in another. So, in +verses 4-6, Paul treats the matter on the ground of knowledge. The +fundamental truth of Christianity, that there is one God, who is +revealed and works through Jesus Christ, was accepted by all the +Corinthians. Paul states it here broadly, denying that there were any +objective realities answering to the popular conceptions or poetic +fancies or fair artistic presentments of the many gods and lords of +the Greek pantheon, and asserting that all Christians recognise one +God, the Father, from whom the universe of worlds and living things +has origin, and to whom we as Christians specially belong, and one +Lord, the channel through whom all divine operations of creation, +providence, and grace flow, and by whose redeeming work we Christians +are endowed with our best life. If a believer was fully convinced of +these truths, he could partake of sacrificial feasts without danger +to himself, and without either sanctioning idolatry or being tempted +to return to it. + +No doubt it was on this ground that an idol was nothing that the +laxer party defended their action in eating meat offered to idols; +and Paul fully recognises that they had a strong case, and that, if +there were no other considerations to come in, the answer to the +question of conscience submitted to him would be wholly in favour of +the less scrupulous section. But there is something better than +knowledge; namely, love. And its decision must be taken before the +whole material for a judgment is in evidence. + +Therefore, in the remainder of the chapter, Paul dwells on loving +regard for brethren. In verse 7, he reminds the 'knowing' Corinthians +that new convictions do not obliterate the power of old associations. +The awful fascination of early belief still exercises influence. The +chains are not wholly broken off. Every mission field shows examples +of this. Every man knows that habits are not so suddenly overcome, +that there is no hankering after them or liability to relapse. It +would be a dangerous thing for a weak believer to risk sharing in an +idol feast; for he would be very likely to slide down to his old +level of belief, and Zeus or Pallas to seem to him real powers once +more. + +The considerations in verse 7 would naturally be followed by the +further thoughts in verse 9, etc. But, before dealing with these, +Paul interposes another thought in verse 8, to the effect that +partaking of or abstinence from any kind of food will not, in itself, +either help or hinder the religious life. The bearing of that +principle on his argument seems to be to reduce the importance of the +whole question, and to suggest that, since eating of idol sacrifices +could not be called a duty or a means of spiritual progress, the way +was open to take account of others' weakness as determining our +action in regard to it. A modern application may illustrate the +point. Suppose that a Christian does not see total abstinence from +intoxicants to be obligatory on him. Well, he cannot say that +drinking is so, or that it is a religious duty, and so the way is +clear for urging regard to others' weakness as an element in the +case. + +That being premised, Paul comes to his final point; namely, that +Christian men are bound to restrict their liberty so that they shall +not tempt weaker brethren on to a path on which they cannot walk +without stumbling. He has just shown the danger to such of partaking +of the sacrificial feasts. He now completes his position by showing, +in verse 10, that the stronger man's example may lead the weaker to +do what he cannot do innocently. What is harmless to us may be fatal +to others, and, if we have led them to it, their blood is on our +heads. + +The terrible discordance of such conduct with our Lord's example, +which should be our law, is forcibly set forth in verse 11, which has +three strongly emphasised thoughts--the man's fate--he perishes; his +relation to his slayer--a brother; what Christ did for the man whom a +Christian has sent to destruction--died for him. These solemn +thoughts are deepened in verse 12, which reminds us of the intimate +union between the weakest and Christ, by which He so identifies +Himself with them that any blow struck on them touches Him. + +There is no greater sin than to tempt weak or ignorant Christians to +thoughts or acts which their ignorance or weakness cannot entertain +or do without damage to their religion. There is much need for laying +that truth to heart in these days. Both in the field of speculation +and of conduct, Christians, who think that they know so much better +than ignorant believers, need to be reminded of it. + +So Paul, in verse 13, at last answers the question. His sudden +turning to his own conduct is beautiful. He will not so much command +others, as proclaim his own determination. He does so with +characteristic vehemence and hyperbole. No doubt the liberal party in +Corinth were ready to complain against the proposal to restrict their +freedom because of others' weakness; and they would be disarmed, or +at least silenced, and might be stimulated to like noble resolution, +by Paul's example. + +The principle plainly laid down here is as distinctly applicable to +the modern question of abstinence from intoxicants. No one can doubt +that 'moderation' in their use by some tempts others to use which +soon becomes fatally immoderate. The Church has been robbed of +promising members thereby, over and over again. How can a Christian +man cling to a 'moderate' use of these things, and run the risk of +destroying by his example a brother for whom Christ died? + + + + +THE SIN OF SILENCE + + 'For though I preach the Gospel, I have nothing to glory + of: for necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe is unto me, + if I preach not the Gospel! 17. For if I do this thing + willingly, I have a reward.'--1 COR. ix. 16, 17. + + +The original reference of these words is to the Apostle's principle +and practice of not receiving for his support money from the +churches. Gifts he did accept; pay he did not. The exposition of his +reason is interesting, ingenuous, and chivalrous. He strongly asserts +his right, even while he as strongly declares that he will waive it. +The reason for his waiving it is that he desires to have somewhat in +his service beyond the strict line of his duty. His preaching itself, +with all its toils and miseries, was but part of his day's work, +which he was bidden to do, and for doing which he deserved no thanks +nor praise. But he would like to have a little bit of glad service +over and above what he is ordered to do, that, as he ingenuously +says, he may have 'somewhat to boast of.' + +In this exposition of motives we have two great principles actuating +the Apostle--one, his profound sense of obligation, and the other his +desire, if it might be, to do more than he was bound to do, because +he loved his work so much. And though he is speaking here as an +apostle, and his example is not to be unconditionally transferred to +us, yet I think that the motives which actuated his conduct are +capable of unconditional application to ourselves. + +There are three things here. There is the obligation of speech, there +is the penalty of silence, and there is the glad obedience which +transcends obligation. + +I. First, mark the obligation of speech. + +No doubt the Apostle had, in a special sense, a 'necessity laid upon' +him, which was first laid upon him on that road to Damascus, and +repeated many a time in his life. But though he differs from us in +the direct supernatural commission which was given to him, in the +width of the sphere in which he had to work, and in the splendour of +the gifts which were entrusted to his stewardship, he does not differ +from us in the reality of the obligation which was laid upon him. +Every Christian man is as truly bound as was Paul to preach the +Gospel. The commission does not depend upon apostolic dignity. Jesus +Christ, when He said, 'Go ye into all the world, and preach the +Gospel to every creature,' was not speaking to the eleven, but to all +generations of His Church. And whilst there are many other motives on +which we may rest the Christian duty of propagating the Christian +faith, I think that we shall be all the better if we bottom it upon +this, the distinct and definite commandment of Jesus Christ, the grip +of which encloses all who for themselves have found that the Lord is +gracious. + +For that commandment is permanent. It is exactly contemporaneous with +the duration of the promise which is appended to it, and whosoever +suns himself in the light of the latter is bound by the precept of +the former. 'Lo! I am with you alway, even to the end of the world,' +defines the duration of the promise, and it defines also the duration +of the duty. Nay, even the promise is made conditional upon the +discharge of the duty enjoined. For it is to the Church 'going into +all the world, and preaching the Gospel to every creature,' that the +promise of an abiding presence is made. + +Let us remember, too, that, just because this commission is given to +the whole Church, it is binding on every individual member of the +Church. There is a very common fallacy, not confined to this subject, +but extending over the whole field of Christian duty, by which things +that are obligatory on the community are shuffled off the shoulders +of the individual. But we have to remember that the whole Church is +nothing more than the sum total of all its members, and that nothing +is incumbent upon it which is not in their measure incumbent upon +each of them. Whatsoever Christ says to all, He says to each, and the +community has no duties which you and I have not. + +Of course, there are diversities of forms of obedience to this +commandment; of course, the restrictions of locality and the other +obligations of life, come in to modify it; and it is not every man's +duty to wander over the whole world doing this work. But the direct +work of communicating to others who know it not the sweetness and the +power of Jesus Christ belongs to every Christian man. You cannot buy +yourselves out of the ranks, as they used to be able to do out of the +militia, by paying for a substitute. Both forms of service are +obligatory upon each of us. We all, if we know anything of Christ and +His love and His power, are bound, by the fact that we do know it, to +tell it to those whom we can reach. You have all got congregations if +you would look for them. There is not a Christian man or woman in +this world who has not somebody that he or she can speak to more +efficiently than anybody else can. You have your friends, your +relations, the people with whom you are brought into daily contact, +if you have no wider congregations. You cannot all stand up and +preach in the sense in which I do so. But this is not the meaning of +the word in the New Testament. It does not imply a pulpit, nor a set +discourse, nor a gathered multitude; it simply implies a herald's +task of proclaiming. Everybody who has found Jesus Christ can say, 'I +have found the Messiah,' and everybody who knows Him can say, 'Come +and hear, and I will tell what the Lord hath done for my soul.' Since +you can do it you are bound to do it; and if you are one of 'the dumb +dogs, lying down and loving to slumber,' of whom there are such +crowds paralysing the energies and weakening the witness of every +Church upon earth, then you are criminally and suicidally oblivious +of an obligation which is a joy and a privilege as much as a duty. + +Oh, brethren! I do want to lay on the consciences of all you +Christian people this, that nothing can absolve you from the +obligation of personal, direct speech to some one of Christ and His +salvation. Unless you can say, 'I have not refrained my lips, O Lord! +Thou knowest,' there frowns over against you an unfulfilled duty, the +neglect of which is laming your spiritual activity, and drying up the +sources of your spiritual strength. + +But, then, besides this direct effort, there are the other indirect +methods in which this commandment can be discharged, by sympathy and +help of all sorts, about which I need say no more here. + +Jesus Christ's ideal of His Church was an active propaganda, an army +in which there were no non-combatants, even although some of the +combatants might be detailed to remain in the camp and look after the +stuff, and others of them might be in the forefront of the battle. +But is that ideal ever fulfilled in any of our churches? How many +amongst us there are who do absolutely nothing in the shape of +Christian work! Some of us seem to think that the voluntary principle +on which our Nonconformist churches are largely organised means, 'I +do not need to do anything unless I like. Inclination is the guide of +duty, and if I do not care to take any active part in the work of our +church, nobody has anything to say.' No man can force me, but if +Jesus Christ says to me, 'Go!' and I say, 'I had rather not,' Jesus +Christ and I have to settle accounts between us. The less _men_ +control, the more stringent ought to be the control of Christ. And if +the principle of Christian obedience is a willing heart, then the +duty of a Christian is to see that the heart is willing. + +A stringent obligation, not to be shuffled off by any of the excuses +that we make, is laid upon us all. It makes very short work of a +number of excuses. There is a great deal in the tone of this +generation which tends to chill the missionary spirit. We know more +about the heathen world, and familiarity diminishes horror. We have +taken up, many of us, milder and more merciful ideas about the +condition of those who die without knowing the name of Jesus Christ. +We have taken to the study of comparative religion as a science, +forgetting sometimes that the thing that we are studying as a science +is spreading a dark cloud of ignorance and apathy over millions of +men. And all these reasons somewhat sap the strength and cool the +fervour of a good many Christian people nowadays. Jesus Christ's +commandment remains just as it was. + +Then some of us say, 'I prefer working at home!' Well, if you are +doing all that you can there, and really are enthusiastically devoted +to one phase of Christian service, the great principle of division of +labour comes in to warrant your not entering upon other fields which +others cultivate. But unless you are thus casting all your energies +into the work which you say that you prefer, there is no reason in it +why you should do nothing in the other direction. Jesus Christ still +says, 'Go ye into all the world.' + +Then some of you say, 'Well, I do not much believe in your missionary +societies. There is a great deal of waste of money about them. A +number of things there are that one does not approve of. I have heard +stories about missionaries being very idle, very luxurious, and +taking too much pay, and doing too little work.' Well, be it so! Very +probably it is partly true; though I do not know that the people +whose testimony is so willingly accepted, to the detriment of our +brethren in foreign lands, are precisely the kind of people that +should talk much about self-sacrifice and luxurious living, or whose +estimate of Christian work is to be relied upon. I fancy many of +them, if they walked about the streets of an English town, would have +a somewhat similar report to give, as they have when they walk about +the streets of an Indian one. But be that as it may, does that +indictment draw a wet sponge across the commandment of Jesus Christ? +or can you chisel out of the stones of Sinai one of the words +written there, by reason of the imperfections of those who are +seeking to obey them? Surely not! Christ still says, 'Go ye into all +the world!' + +I sometimes venture to think that the day will come when the +condition of being received into, and retained in, the communion of a +Christian church will be obedience to that commandment. Why, even +bees have the sense at a given time of the year to turn the drones +out of the hives, and sting them to death. I do not recommend the +last part of the process, but I am not sure but that it would be a +benefit to us all, both to those ejected and to those retained, that +we should get rid of that added weight that clogs every organised +community in this and other lands--the dead weight of idlers who say +that they are Christ's disciples. Whether it is a condition of church +membership or not, sure I am that it is a condition of fellowship +with Jesus Christ, and a condition, therefore, of health in the +Christian life, that it should be a life of active obedience to this +plain, imperative, permanent, and universal command. + +II. Secondly, a word as to the penalty of silence. + +'Woe is me if I preach not the Gospel.' I suppose Paul is thinking +mainly of a future issue, but not exclusively of that. At all events, +let me point you, in a word or two, to the plain penalties of silence +here, and to the awful penalties of silence hereafter. + +'Woe is me if I preach not the Gospel.' If you are a dumb and idle +professor of Christ's truth, depend upon it that your dumb idleness +will rob you of much communion with Jesus Christ. There are many +Christians who would be ever so much happier, more joyous, and more +assured Christians if they would go and talk about Christ to other +people. Because they have locked up God's word in their hearts it +melts away unknown, and they lose more than they suspect of the +sweetness and buoyancy and assured confidence that might mark them, +for no other reason than because they seek to keep their morsel to +themselves. Like that mist that lies white and dull over the ground +on a winter's morning, which will be blown away with the least puff +of fresh air, there lie doleful dampnesses, in their sooty folds, +over many a Christian heart, shutting out the sun from the earth, and +a little whiff of wholesome activity in Christ's cause would clear +them all away, and the sun would shine down upon men again. If you +want to be a happy Christian, work for Jesus Christ. I do not lay +that down as a specific by itself. There are other things to be taken +in conjunction with it, but yet it remains true that the woe of a +languid Christianity attaches to the men who, being professing +Christians, are silent when they should speak, and idle when they +should work. + +There is, further, the woe of the loss of sympathies, and the gain of +all the discomforts and miseries of a self-absorbed life. And there +is, further, the woe of the loss of one of the best ways of +confirming one's own faith in the truth--viz. that of seeking to +impart it to others. If you want to learn a thing, teach it. If you +want to grasp the principles of any science, try to explain it to +somebody who does not understand it. If you want to know where, in +these days of jangling and controversy, the true, vital centre of the +Gospel is, and what is the essential part of the revelation of God, +go and tell sinful men about Jesus Christ who died for them; and you +will find out that it is the Cross, and Him who died thereon, as +dying for the world, that is the power which can move men's hearts. +And so you will cleave with a closer grasp, in days of difficulty and +unsettlement, to that which is able to bring light into darkness and +to harmonise the discord of a troubled and sinful soul. And, further, +there is the woe of having none that can look to you and say, 'I owe +myself to thee.' Oh, brethren! there is no greater joy accessible to +a man than that of feeling that through his poor words Christ has +entered into a brother's heart. And you are throwing away all this +because you shut your mouths and neglect the plain commandment of +your Lord. + +Ay! but that is not all. There is a future to be taken into account, +and I think that Christian people do far too little realise the +solemn truth that it is not all the same _then_ whether a man +has kept his Master's commandments or neglected them. I believe that +whilst a very imperfect faith saves a man, there is such a thing as +being 'saved, yet so as through fire,' and that there is such a thing +as having 'an abundant entrance ministered unto us into the +everlasting kingdom.' He whose life has been very slightly influenced +by Christian principle, and who has neglected plain, imperative +duties, will not stand on the same level of blessedness as the man +who has more completely yielded himself in life to the constraining +power of Christ's love, and has sought to keep all His commandments. + +Heaven is not a dead level. Every man there will receive as much +blessedness as he is capable of, but capacities will vary, and the +principal factor in determining the capacity, which capacity +determines the blessedness, will be the thoroughness of obedience to +all the ordinances of Christ in the course of the life upon earth. +So, though we know, and therefore dare say, little about that future, +I do beseech you to take this to heart, that he who there can stand +before God, and say, 'Behold! I and the children whom God hath given +me' will wear a crown brighter than the starless ones of those who +saved themselves, and have brought none with them. + +'Some on boards, and some on broken pieces of the ship, they all came +safe to land.' But the place where they stand depends on their +Christian life, and of that Christian life one main element is +obedience to the commandment which makes them the apostles and +missionaries of their Lord. + +III. Lastly, note the glad obedience which transcends the limits of +obligation. + +'If I do this thing willingly I have a reward.' Paul desired to bring +a little more than was required, in token of his love to his Master, +and of his thankful acceptance of the obligation. The artist who +loves his work will put more work into his picture than is absolutely +needed, and will linger over it, lavishing diligence and care upon +it, because he is in love with his task. The servant who seeks to do +as little as he can scrape through with without rebuke is actuated by +no high motives. The trader who barely puts as much into the scale as +will balance the weight in the other is grudging in his dealings; but +he who, with liberal hand, gives 'shaken down, pressed together, and +running over' measure, gives because he delights in the giving. + +And so it is in the Christian life. There are many of us whose +question seems to be, 'How little can I get off with? how much can I +retain?'--many of us whose effort is to find out how much of the +world is consistent with the profession of Christianity, and to find +the minimum of effort, of love, of service, of gifts which may free +us from obligation. + +And what does that mean? It means that we are slaves. It means that +if we durst we would give nothing, and do nothing. And what does that +mean? It means that we do not care for the Lord, and have no joy in +our work. And what does that mean? It means that our work deserves no +praise, and will get no reward. If we love Christ we shall be +anxious, if it were possible, to do more than He commands us, in +token of our loyalty to the King, and of our delight in the service. +Of course, in the highest view, nothing can be more than necessary. +Of course He has the right to all our work; but yet there are heights +of Christian consecration and self-sacrifice which a man will not be +blamed if he has not climbed, and will be praised if he has. What we +want, if I might venture to say so, is extravagance of service. Judas +may say, 'To what purpose is this waste?' but Jesus will say, He +'hath wrought a good work on Me,' and the fragrance of the ointment +will smell sweet through the centuries. + +So, dear brethren, the upshot of the whole thing is, Do not let us do +our Christian work reluctantly, else it is only slave's work, and +there is no blessing in it, and no reward will come to us from it. Do +not let us ask, 'How little may I do?' but 'How much can I do?' Thus, +asking, we shall not offer as burnt offering to the Lord that which +doth cost us nothing. On His part He has given the commandment as a +sign of His love. The stewardship is a token that He trusts us, the +duty is an honour, the burden is a grace. On our parts let us seek +for the joy of service which is not contented with the bare amount of +the tribute that is demanded, but gives something over, if it were +possible, because of our love to Him. They who thus give to Jesus +Christ their all of love and effort and service will receive it all +back a hundredfold, for the Master is not going to be in debt to any +of His servants, and He says to them all, 'I will repay it, howbeit I +say not unto thee how thou owest unto Me even thine own self +besides.' + + + + +A SERVANT OF MEN + + 'For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself + servant unto all, that I might gain the more. 20. And unto + the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to + them that are under the law, as under the law, that I might + gain them that are under the law; 21. To them that are + without law, as without law, (being not without law to + God, but under the law to Christ,) that I might gain them + that are without law. 22. To the weak became I as weak, + that I might gain the weak: I am made all things to all + men, that I might by all means save some. 23. And this I + do for the gospel's sake, that I might be partaker thereof + with you.'--1 COR. ix. 19-23. + + +Paul speaks much of himself, but he is not an egotist. When he says, +'I do so and so,' it is a gracious way of enjoining the same conduct +on his readers. He will lay no burden on them which he does not +himself carry. The leader who can say 'Come' is not likely to want +followers. So, in this section, the Apostle is really enjoining on +the Corinthians the conduct which he declares is his own. + +The great principle incumbent on all Christians, with a view to the +salvation of others, is to go as far as one can without +untruthfulness in the direction of finding points of resemblance and +contact with those to whom we would commend the Gospel. There is a +base counterfeit of this apostolic example, which slurs over +distinctive beliefs, and weakly tries to please everybody by +differing from nobody. That trimming to catch all winds never gains +any. Mr. Facing-both-ways is not a powerful evangelist. The motive of +becoming all things to all men must be plainly disinterested, and the +assimilation must have love for the souls concerned and eagerness to +bring the truth to them, and them to the truth, legibly stamped upon +it, or it will be regarded, and rightly so, as mere cowardice or +dishonesty. And there must be no stretching the assimilation to the +length of either concealing truth or fraternising in evil. Love to my +neighbour can never lead to my joining him in wrongdoing. + +But, while the limits of this assumption of the colour of our +surroundings are plainly marked, there is ample space within these +for the exercise of this eminently Christian grace. We must get near +people if we would help them. Especially must we identify ourselves +with them in sympathy, and seek to multiply points of assimilation, +if we would draw them to Jesus Christ. He Himself had to become man +that He might gain men, and His servants have to do likewise, in +their degree. The old story of the Christian teacher who voluntarily +became a slave, that he might tell of Christ to slaves, has in spirit +to be repeated by us all. + +We can do no good by standing aloof on a height and flinging down the +Gospel to the people below. They must feel that we enter into their +circumstances, prejudices, ways of thinking, and the like, if our +words are to have power. That is true about all Christian teachers, +whether of old or young. You must be a boy among boys, and try to +show that you enter into the boy's nature, or you may lecture till +doomsday and do no good. + +Paul instances three cases in which he had acted, and still continued +to do so, on this principle. He was a Jew, but after his conversion +he had to 'become a Jew' by a distinct act; that is, he had receded +so far from his old self, that he, if he had had only himself to +think of, would have given up all Jewish observances. But he felt it +his duty to conciliate prejudice as far as he could, and so, though +he would have fought to the death rather than given countenance to +the belief that circumcision was necessary, he had no scruple about +circumcising Timothy; and, though he believed that for Christians the +whole ancient ritual was abolished, he was quite willing, if it would +smooth away the prejudices of the 'many thousands of Jews who +believed,' to show, by his participation in the temple worship, that +he 'walked orderly, keeping the law.' If he was told 'You must,' his +answer could only be 'I will not'; but if it was a question of +conciliating, he was ready to go all lengths for that. + +The category which he names next is not composed of different persons +from the first, but of the same persons regarded from a somewhat +different point of view. 'Them that are under the law' describes +Jews, not by their race, but by their religion; and Paul was willing +to take his place among them, as we have just observed. But he will +not do that so as to be misunderstood, wherefore he protests that in +doing so he is voluntarily abridging his freedom for a specific +purpose. He is not 'under the law'; for the very pith of his view of +the Christian's position is that he has nothing to do with that +Mosaic law in any of its parts, because Christ has made him free. + +The second class to whom in his wide sympathies he is able to +assimilate himself, is the opposite of the former--the Gentiles who +are 'without law.' He did not preach on Mars' Hill as he did in the +synagogues. The many-sided Gospel had aspects fitted for the Gentiles +who had never heard of Moses, and the many-sided Apostle had links of +likeness to the Greek and the barbarian. But here, too, his +assimilation of himself to those whom he seeks to win is voluntary; +wherefore he protests that he is not without law, though he +recognises no longer the obligations of Moses' law, for he is 'under +[or, rather, "in"] law to Christ.' + +'The weak' are those too scrupulous-conscienced Christians of whom he +has been speaking in chapter viii. and whose narrow views he exhorted +stronger brethren to respect, and to refrain from doing what they +could do without harming their own consciences, lest by doing it they +should induce a brother to do the same, whose conscience would prick +him for it. That is a lesson needed to-day as much as, or more than, +in Paul's time, for the widely different degrees of culture and +diversities of condition, training, and associations among Christians +now necessarily result in very diverse views of Christian conduct in +many matters. The grand principle laid down here should guide us all, +both in regard to fellow-Christians and others. Make yourself as like +them as you honestly can; restrict yourself of allowable acts, in +deference to even narrow prejudices; but let the motive of your +assimilating yourself to others be clearly their highest good, that +you may 'gain' them, not for yourself but for your Master. + +Verse 23 lays down Paul's ruling principle, which both impelled him +to become all things to all men, with a view to their salvation, as +he has been saying, and urged him to effort and self-discipline, with +a view to his own, as he goes on to say. 'For the Gospel's sake' +seems to point backward; 'that I may be a joint partaker thereof +points forward. We have not only to preach the Gospel to others, but +to live on it and be saved by it ourselves. + + + + +HOW THE VICTOR RUNS + + 'So run, that ye may obtain.'--1 COR. ix. 24. + + +'_So_ run.' Does that mean 'Run so that ye obtain?' Most people, +I suppose, superficially reading the words, attach that significance +to them, but the 'so' here carries a much greater weight of meaning +than that. It is a word of comparison. The Apostle would have the +Corinthians recall the picture which he has been putting before +them--a picture of a scene that was very familiar to them; for, as +most of us know, one of the most important of the Grecian games was +celebrated at intervals in the immediate neighbourhood of Corinth. +Many of the Corinthian converts had, no doubt, seen, or even taken +part in them. The previous portion of the verse in which our text +occurs appeals to the Corinthians' familiar knowledge of the arena +and the competitors, 'Know ye not that they which run in a race run +all, but one receiveth the prize?' He would have them picture the +eager racers, with every muscle strained, and the one victor starting +to the front; and then he says, 'Look at that panting conqueror. That +is how you should run. _So_ run--'meaning thereby not, 'Run so that +you may obtain the prize,' but 'Run so' as the victor does, 'in order +that you may obtain.' So, then, this victor is to be a lesson to us, +and we are to take a leaf out of his book. Let us see what he teaches +us. + +I. The first thing is, the utmost tension and energy and strenuous +effort. + +It is very remarkable that Paul should pick out these Grecian games +as containing for Christian people any lesson, for they were +honeycombed, through and through, with idolatry and all sorts of +immorality, so that no Jew ventured to go near them, and it was part +of the discipline of the early Christian Church that professing +Christians should have nothing to do with them in any shape. + +And yet here, as in many other parts of his letters, Paul takes these +foul things as patterns for Christians. 'There is a soul of goodness +in things evil, if we would observantly distil it out.' It is very +much as if English preachers were to refer their people to a +racecourse, and say, 'Even there you may pick out lessons, and learn +something of the way in which Christian people ought to live.' + +On the same principle the New Testament deals with that diabolical +business of fighting. It is taken as an emblem for the Christian +soldier, because, with all its devilishness, there is in it this, at +least, that men give themselves up absolutely to the will of their +commander, and are ready to fling away their lives if he lifts his +finger. That at least is grand and noble, and to be imitated on a +higher plane. + +In like manner Paul takes these poor racers as teaching us a lesson. +Though the thing be all full of sin, we can get one valuable thought +out of it, and it is this--If people would work half as hard to gain +the highest object that a man can set before him, as hundreds of +people are ready to do in order to gain trivial and paltry objects, +there would be fewer stunted and half-dead Christians amongst us. +'That is the way to run,' says Paul, 'if you want to obtain.' + +Look at the contrast that he hints at, between the prize that stirs +these racers' energies into such tremendous operation and the prize +which Christians profess to be pursuing. 'They do it to obtain a +corruptible crown'--a twist of pine branch out of the neighbouring +grove, worth half-a-farthing, and a little passing glory not worth +much more. They do it to obtain a corruptible crown; we do _not_ do +it, though we professedly have an incorruptible one as our aim and +object. If we contrast the relative values of the objects that men +pursue so eagerly, and the objects of the Christian course, surely we +ought to be smitten down with penitent consciousness of our own +unworthiness, if not of our own hypocrisy. + +It is not even there that the lesson stops, because we Christian +people may be patterns and rebukes to ourselves. For, on the one side +of our nature we show what we can do when we are really in earnest +about getting something; and on the other side we show with how +little work we can be contented, when, at bottom, we do not much care +whether we get the prize or not. If you and I really believed that +that crown of glory which Paul speaks about might be ours, and would +be all sufficing for us if it were ours, as truly as we believe that +money is a good thing, there would not be such a difference between +the way in which we clutch at the one and the apathy which scarcely +cares to put out a hand for the other. The things that are seen and +temporal do get the larger portion of the energies and thoughts of +the average Christian man, and the things that are unseen and eternal +get only what is left. Sometimes ninety per cent. of the water of a +stream is taken away to drive a milldam or do work, and only ten per +cent. can be spared to trickle down the half-dry channel and do +nothing but reflect the bright sun and help the little flowers and +the grass to grow. So, the larger portion of most lives goes to drive +the mill-wheels, and there is very little left, in the case of many +of us, in order to help us towards God, and bring us closer into +communion with our Lord. 'Run' for the crown as eagerly as you 'run' +for your incomes, or for anything that you really, in your deepest +desires, want. Take yourselves for your own patterns and your own +rebukes. Your own lives may show you how you _can_ love, hope, work, +and deny yourselves when you have sufficient inducement, and their +flame should put to shame their frost, for the warmth is directed +towards trifles and the coldness towards the crown. If you would run +for the incorruptible prize of effort in the fashion in which others +and yourselves run for the corruptible, your whole lives would be +changed. Why! if Christian people in general really took half--half? +ay! a tenth part of--the honest, persistent pains to improve their +Christian character, and become more like Jesus Christ, which a +violinist will take to master his instrument, there would be a new +life for most of our Christian communities. Hours and hours of +patient practice are not too much for the one; how many moments do we +give to the other? 'So run, that ye obtain.' + +II. The victorious runner sets Christians an example of rigid +self-control. + +Every man that is striving for the mastery is 'temperate in all +things.' The discipline for runners and athletes was rigid. They had +ten months of spare diet--no wine--hard gymnastic exercises every +day, until not an ounce of superfluous flesh was upon their muscles, +before they were allowed to run in the arena. And, says Paul, that is +the example for us. They practise this rigid discipline and +abstinence by way of preparation for the race, and after it was run +they might dispense with the training. You and I have to practise +rigid abstinence as part of the race, as a continuous necessity. +_They_ did not abstain only from bad things, they did not only +avoid criminal acts of sensuous indulgence; but they abstained from +many perfectly legitimate things. So for us it is not enough to say, +'I draw the line there, at this or that vice, and I will have nothing +to do with these.' You will never make a growing Christian if +abstinence from palpable sins only is your standard. You must 'lay +aside' every sin, of course, but also 'every _weight_' Many +things are 'weights' that are not 'sins'; and if we are to run fast +we must run light, and if we are to do any good in this world we have +to live by rigid control and abstain from much that is perfectly +legitimate, because, if we do not, we shall fail in accomplishing the +highest purposes for which we are here. Not only in regard to the +gross sensual indulgences which these men had to avoid, but in regard +to a great deal of the outgoings of our interests and our hearts, we +have to apply the knife very closely and cut to the quick, if we +would have leisure and sympathy and affection left for loftier +objects. It is a very easy thing to be a Christian in one aspect, +inasmuch as a Christian at bottom is a man that is trusting to Jesus +Christ, and that is not hard to do. It is a very hard thing to be a +Christian in another aspect, because a real Christian is a man who, +by reason of his trusting Jesus Christ, has set his heel upon the +neck of the animal that is in him, and keeps the flesh well down, and +not only the flesh, but the desires of the mind as well as of the +flesh, and subordinates them all to the one aim of pleasing Him. 'No +man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life' if +his object is to please Him that has called him to be a soldier. +Unless we cut off a great many of the thorns, so to speak, by which +things catch hold of us as we pass them, we shall not make much +advance in the Christian life. Rigid self-control and abstinence from +else legitimate things that draw us away from Him are needful, if we +are so to run as the poor heathen racer teaches us. + +III. The last grace that is suggested here, the last leaf to take out +of these racers' book, is definiteness and concentration of aim. + +'I, therefore,' says the Apostle, 'so run not as uncertainly.' If the +runner is now heading that way and now this, making all manner of +loops upon his path, of course he will be left hopelessly in the +rear. It is the old fable of the Grecian mythology transplanted into +Christian soil. The runner who turned aside to pick up the golden +apple was disappointed of his hopes of the radiant fair. The ship, at +the helm of which is a steersman who has either a feeble hand or does +not understand his business, and which therefore keeps yawing from +side to side, with the bows pointing now this way and now that, is +not holding a course that will make the harbour first in the race. +The people that to-day are marching with their faces towards Zion, +and to-morrow making a loop-line to the world, will be a long time +before they reach their terminus. I believe there are few things more +lacking in the average Christian life of to-day than resolute, +conscious concentration upon an aim which is clearly and always +before us. Do you know what you are aiming at? That is the first +question. Have you a distinct theory of life's purpose that you can +put into half a dozen words, or have you not? In the one case, there +is some chance of attaining your object; in the other one, none. +Alas! we find many Christian people who do not set before themselves, +with emphasis and constancy, as their aim the doing of God's will, +and so sometimes they do it, when it happens to be easy, and +sometimes, when temptations are strong, they do not. It needs a +strong hand on the tiller to keep it steady when the wind is blowing +in puffs and gusts, and sometimes the sail bellies full and sometimes +it is almost empty. The various strengths of the temptations that +blow us out of our course are such that we shall never keep a +straight line of direction, which is the shortest line, and the only +one on which we shall 'obtain,' unless we know very distinctly where +we want to go, and have a good strong will that has learned to say +'No!' when the temptations come. 'Whom resist steadfast in the +faith.' 'I therefore so run, not as uncertainly,' taking one course +one day and another the next. + +Now, that definite aim is one that can be equally pursued in all +varieties of life. 'This one thing I do' said one who did about as +many things as most people, but the different kinds of things that +Paul did were all, at bottom, one thing. And we, in all the varieties +of our circumstances, may keep this one clear aim before us, and +whether it be in this way or in that, we may be equally and at all +times seeking the better country, and bending all circumstances and +all duty to make us more like our Master and bring us closer to Him. + +The Psalmist did not offer an impossible prayer when he said: 'One +thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after, that I may +dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the +beauty of the Lord and to enquire in His temple.' Was David in 'the +house of the Lord' when he was with his sheep in the wilderness, and +when he was in Saul's palace, and when he was living with wild beasts +in dens and caves of the earth, and when he was a fugitive, hunted +like a partridge upon the mountains? Was he always in the Lord's +house? Yes! At any rate he could be. All that we do may be doing His +will, and over a life, crowded with varying circumstances and yet +simplified and made blessed by unvarying obedience, we may write, +'This one thing I do.' + +But we shall not keep this one aim clear before our eyes, unless we +habituate ourselves to the contemplation of the end. The runner, +according to Paul's vivid picture in another of his letters, forgets +the things that are behind, and stretches out towards the things that +are before. And just as a man runs with his body inclining forward, +and his eager hand nearer the prize than his body, and his eyesight +and his heart travelling ahead of them both to grasp it, so if we +want to live with the one worthy aim for ours, and to put all our +effort and faith into what deserves it all--the Christian race--we +must bring clear before us continually, or at least with the utmost +frequency, the prize of our high calling, the crown of righteousness. +Then we shall run so that we may, at the last, be able to finish our +course with joy, and dying to hope with all humility that there is +laid up for us a crown of righteousness. + + + + +'CONCERNING THE CROWN' + + 'They do it to obtain a corruptible crown, but + we are incorruptible.'--1 COR. ix. 25. + + +One of the most famous of the Greek athletic festivals was held close +by Corinth. Its prize was a pine-wreath from the neighbouring sacred +grove. The painful abstinence and training of ten months, and the +fierce struggle of ten minutes, had for their result a twist of green +leaves, that withered in a week, and a little fading fame that was +worth scarcely more, and lasted scarcely longer. The struggle and the +discipline were noble; the end was contemptible. And so it is with +all lives whose aims are lower than the highest. They are greater in +the powers they put forth than in the objects they compass, and the +question, 'What is it for?' is like a douche of cold water from the +cart that lays the clouds of dust in the ways. + +So, says Paul, praising the effort and contemning the prize, 'They do +it to obtain a corruptible crown.' And yet there was a soul of +goodness in this evil thing. Though these festivals were indissolubly +intertwined with idolatry, and besmirched with much sensuous evil, +yet he deals with them as he does with war and with slavery; points +to the disguised nobility that lay beneath the hideousness, and holds +up even these low things as a pattern for Christian men. + +But I do not mean here to speak so much about the general bearing of +this text as rather to deal with its designation of the aim and +reward of Christian energy, that 'incorruptible crown' of which my +text speaks. And in doing so I desire to take into account likewise +other places in Scripture in which the same metaphor occurs. + +I. The crown. + +Let me recall the other places where the same metaphor is employed. +We find the Apostle, in the immediate prospect of death, rising into +a calm rapture in which imprisonment and martyrdom lose their +terrors, as he thinks of the 'crown of righteousness' which the Lord +will give to him. The Epistle of James, again, assures the man who +endures temptation that 'the Lord will give him the crown of life +which He has promised to all them that love Him.' The Lord Himself +from heaven repeats that promise to the persecuted Church at Smyrna: +'Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.' +The elders cast their crowns before the feet of Him that sitteth upon +the throne. The Apostle Peter, in his letter, stimulates the elders +upon earth to faithful discharge of their duty, by the hope that +thereby they shall 'receive a crown of righteousness that fadeth not +away.' So all these instances taken together with this of my text +enable us to gather two or three lessons. + +It is extremely unlikely that all these instances of the occurrence +of the emblem carry with them reference, such as that in my text, to +the prize at the athletic festivals. For Peter and James, intense +Jews as they were, had probably never seen, and possibly never heard +of, the struggles at the Isthmus and at Olympus and elsewhere. The +Book of the Revelation draws its metaphors almost exclusively from +the circle of Jewish practices and things. So that we have to look in +other directions than the arena or the racecourse to explain these +other uses of the image. It is also extremely unlikely that in these +other passages the reference is to a crown as the emblem of +sovereignty, for that idea is expressed, as a rule, by another word +in Scripture, which we have Anglicised as 'diadem.' The 'crown' in +all these passages is a garland twisted out of some growth of the +field. In ancient usage roses were twined for revellers; pine-shoots +or olive branches for the victors in the games; while the laurel was +'the meed of mighty conquerors'; and plaited oak leaves were laid +upon the brows of citizens who had deserved well of their country, +and myrtle sprays crowned the fair locks of the bride. + +And thus in these directions, and not towards the wrestling ground or +the throne of the monarch, must we look for the ideas suggested by +the emblem. + +Now, if we gather together all these various uses of the word, there +emerge two broad ideas, that the 'crown' which is the Christian's aim +symbolises a state of triumphant repose and of festal enjoyment. +There are other aspects of that great and dim future which correspond +to other necessities of our nature, and I suppose some harm has been +done and some misconceptions have been induced, and some unreality +imported into the idea of the Christian future, by the too exclusive +prominence given to these two ideas--victorious rest after the +struggle, and abundant satisfaction of all desires. That future is +other and more than a festival; it is other and more than repose. +There are larger fields there for the operation of powers that have +been trained and evolved here. The faithfulness of the steward is +exchanged, according to Christ's great words, for the authority of +the ruler over many cities. But still, do we not all know enough of +the worry and turbulence and strained effort of the conflict here +below, to feel that to some of our deepest and not ignoble needs and +desires that image appeals? The helmet that pressed upon the brow +even whilst it protected the brain, and wore away the hair even +whilst it was a defence, is lifted off, and on unruffled locks the +garland is intertwined that speaks victory and befits a festival. One +of the old prophets puts the same metaphor in words imperfectly +represented by the English translation, when he promises 'a crown' or +a garland 'for ashes'--instead of the symbol of mourning, strewed +grey and gritty upon the dishevelled hair of the weepers, flowers +twined into a wreath--'the oil of joy for mourning,' and the festival +'garment of praise' to dress the once heavy spirit. So the +satisfaction of all desires, the accompaniments of a feast, in +abundance, rejoicing and companionship, and conclusive conquest over +all foes, are promised us in this great symbol. + +But let us look at the passages separately, and we shall find that +they present the one thought with differences, and that if we combine +these, as in a stereoscope, the picture gains solidity. + +The crown is described in three ways. It is the crown of 'life,' of +'glory' and of 'righteousness.' And I venture to think that these +three epithets describe the material, so to speak, of which the +wreath is composed. The everlasting flower of life, the radiant +blossoms of glory, the white flower of righteousness; these are its +components. + +I need not enlarge upon them, nor will your time allow that I should. +Here we have the promise of life, that fuller life which men want, +'the life of which our veins are scant,' even in the fullest tide and +heyday of earthly existence. The promise sets that future over +against the present, as if then first should men know what it means +to live: so buoyant, elastic, unwearied shall be their energies, so +manifold the new outlets for activity, and the new inlets for the +surrounding glory and beauty; so incorruptible and glorious shall be +their new being. Here we live a living death; there we shall live +indeed; and that will be the crown, not only in regard to physical, +but in regard to spiritual, powers and consciousness. + +But remember that all this full tide of life is Christ's gift. There +is no such thing as natural immortality; there is no such thing as +independent life. All Being, from the lowest creature up to the +loftiest created spirit, exists by one law, the continual impartation +to it of life from the fountain of life, according to its capacities. +And unless Jesus Christ, all through the eternal ages of the future, +imparted to the happy souls that sit garlanded at His board the life +by which they live, the wreaths would wither on their brows, and the +brows would melt away, and dissolve from beneath the wreaths. 'I will +give him a crown of life.' + +It is a crown of 'glory,' and that means a lustrousness of character +imparted by radiation and reflection from the central light of the +glory of God. 'Then shall the righteous blaze out like the sun in the +Kingdom of My Father.' Our eyes are dim, but we can at least divine +the far-off flashing of that great light, and may ponder upon what +hidden depths and miracles of transformed perfectness and unimagined +lustre wait for us, dark and limited as we are here, in the assurance +that we all shall be changed into the 'likeness of the body of His +glory.' + +It is a crown of 'righteousness.' Though that phrase may mean the +wreath that rewards righteousness, it seems more in accordance with +the other similar expressions to which I have referred to regard it, +too, as the material of which the crown is composed. It is not enough +that there should be festal gladness, not enough that there should be +calm repose, not enough that there should be flashing glory, not +enough that there should be fulness of life. To accord with the +intense moral earnestness of the Christian system there must be, +emphatically, in the Christian hope, cessation of all sin and +investiture with all purity. The word means the same thing as the +ancient promise, 'Thy people shall be all righteous.' It means the +same thing as the latest promise of the ascended Christ, 'They shall +walk with Me in white.' And it sets, I was going to say, the very +climax and culmination on the other hopes, declaring that absolute, +stainless, infallible righteousness which one day shall belong to our +weak and sinful spirits. + +These, then, are the elements, and on them all is stamped the +signature of perpetuity. The victor's wreath is tossed on the ashen +heap, the reveller's flowers droop as he sits in the heat of the +banqueting-hall; the bride's myrtle blossom fades though she lay it +away in a safe place. The crown of life is incorruptible. It is +twined of amaranth, ever blossoming into new beauty and never fading. + +II. Now look, secondly, at the discipline by which the crown is won. + +Observe, first of all, that in more than one of the passages to which +we have already referred great emphasis is laid upon Christ as +_giving_ the crown. That is to say, that blessed future is not +won by effort, but is bestowed as a free gift. It is given from the +hands which have procured it, and, as I may say, twined it for us. +Unless His brows had been pierced with the crown of thorns, ours +would never have worn the garland of victory. Jesus provides the sole +means, by His work, by which any man can enter into that inheritance; +and Jesus, as the righteous Judge who bestows the rewards, which are +likewise the results, of our life here, gives the crown. It remains +for ever the gift of His love. 'The wages of sin is death,' but we +rise above the region of retribution and desert when we pass to the +next clause--'the gift of God is eternal life,' and that 'through +Jesus Christ.' + +Whilst, then, this must be laid as the basis of all, there must also, +with equal earnestness and clearness, be set forth the other thought +that Christ's gift has conditions, which conditions these passages +plainly set forth. In the one, which I have read as a text, we have +these conditions declared as being twofold--protracted discipline and +continuous effort. The same metaphor employed by the same Apostle, in +his last dying utterance, associates his consciousness that he had +fought the good fight and run his race, like the pugilists and +runners of the arena, with the hope that he shall receive the crown +of righteousness. James declares that it is given to the man who +_endures_ temptation, not only in the sense of bearing, but of +so bearing as not thereby to be injured in Christian character and +growth in Christian life. Peter asserts that it is the reward of +self-denying discharge of duty. And the Lord from heaven lays down +the condition of faithfulness unto death as the necessary +pre-requisite of His gift of the crown of life. In two of the +passages there is included, though not precisely on the level of +these other requirements, the love of Him and the love of 'His +appearing,' as the necessary qualifications for the gift of the +crown. + +So, to begin with, unless a man has such a love to Jesus Christ as +that he is happy in His presence, and longs to have Him near, as +parted loving souls do; and, especially, is looking forward to that +great judicial coming, and feeling that there is no tremor in his +heart at the prospect of meeting the Judge, but an outgoing of desire +and love at the hope of seeing his Saviour and his Friend, what right +has he to expect the crown? None. And he will never get it. There is +a test for us which may well make some of us ask ourselves, Are we +Christians, then, at all? + +And then, beyond that, there are all these other conditions which I +have pointed out, which may be gathered into one--strenuous discharge +of daily duty and continual effort after following in Christ's +footsteps. + +This needs to be as fully and emphatically preached as the other +doctrine that eternal life is the gift of God. All manner of +mischiefs may come, and have come, from either of these twin +thoughts, wrenched apart. But let us weave them as closely together +as the stems of the flowers that make the garlands are twined, and +feel that there is a perfect consistency of both in theory, and that +there must be a continual union of both, in our belief and in our +practice. Eternal life is the gift of God, on condition of our +diligence and earnestness. It is not all the same whether you are a +lazy Christian or not. It does make an eternal difference in our +condition whether here we 'run with patience the race that is set +before us, looking unto Jesus.' We have to receive the crown as a +gift; we have to wrestle and run, as contending for a prize. + +III. And now, lastly, note the power of the reward as motive for +life. + +Paul says roundly in our text that the desire to obtain the +incorruptible crown is a legitimate spring of Christian action. Now, +I do not need to waste your time and my own in defending Christian +morality from the fantastic objection that it is low and selfish, +because it encourages itself to efforts by the prospect of the crown. +If there are any men who are Christians--if such a contradiction can +be even stated in words--only because of what they hope to gain +thereby in another world, they will not get what they hope for; and +they would not like it if they did. I do not believe that there are +any such; and sure I am, if there are, that it is not Christianity +that has made them so. But a thought that we must not take as a +supreme motive, we may rightly accept as a subsidiary encouragement. +We are not Christians unless the dominant motive of our lives be the +love of the Lord Jesus Christ; and unless we feel a necessity, +because of loving Him, to aim to be like Him. But, that being so, who +shall hinder me from quickening my flagging energies, and stimulating +my torpid faith, and encouraging my cowardice, by the thought that +yonder there remain rest, victory, the fulness of life, the flashing +of glory, and the purity of perfect righteousness? If such hopes are +low and selfish as motives, would God that more of us were obedient +to such low and selfish motives! + +Now it seems to me, that this spring of action is not as strong in +the Christians of this day as it used to be, and as it should be. You +do not hear much about heaven in ordinary preaching. I do not think +it occupies a very large place in the average Christian man's mind. +We have all got such a notion nowadays of the great good that the +Gospel does in society and in the present, and some of us have been +so frightened by the nonsense that has been talked about the +'other-worldliness' of Christianity--as if that was a disgrace to +it--that it seems to me that the future of glory and blessedness has +very largely faded away, as a motive for Christian men's energies, +like the fresco off a neglected convent wall. + +And I want to say, dear brethren, that I believe, for my part, that +we suffer terribly by the comparative neglect into which this side of +Christian truth has fallen. Do you not think that it would make a +difference to you if you really believed, and carried always with you +in your thoughts, the thrilling consciousness that every act of the +present was registered, and would tell on the far side yonder? We do +not know much of that future, and these days are intolerant of mere +unverifiable hypotheses. But accuracy of knowledge and definiteness +of impression do not always go together, nor is there the fulness of +the one wanted for the clearness and force of the other. Though the +thread which we throw across the abyss is very slender, it is strong +enough, like the string of a boy's kite, to bear the messengers of +hope and desire that we may send up by it, and strong enough to bear +the gifts of grace that will surely come down along it. + +We cannot understand to-day unless we look at it with eternity for a +background. The landscape lacks its explanation, until the mists lift +and we see the white summits of the Himalayas lying behind and +glorifying the low sandy plain. Would your life not be different; +would not the things in it that look great be wholesomely dwindled +and yet be magnified; would not sorrow be calmed, and life become 'a +solemn scorn of ills,' and energies be stimulated, and all be +different, if you really 'did it to obtain an incorruptible crown?' + +Brethren, let us try to keep more clearly before us, as solemn and +blessed encouragement in our lives, these great thoughts. The garland +hangs on the goal, but 'a man is not crowned unless he strive +according to the laws' of the arena. The laws are two--No man can +enter for the conflict but by faith in Christ; no man can win in the +struggle but by faithful effort. So the first law is, 'Believe on the +Lord Jesus Christ,' and the second is, 'Hold fast that thou hast; let +no man take thy crown.' + + + + +THE LIMITS OF LIBERTY + + 'All things are lawful for me, but all things are not + expedient: all things are lawful for me, but all things + edify not. 24. Let no man seek his own, but every man + another's wealth. 25. Whatsoever is sold in the shambles, + that eat, asking no question for conscience sake. + 26. For the earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof. + 27. If any of them that believe not bid you to a feast, + and ye be disposed togo, whatsoever is set before you + eat, asking no question for conscience sake. 28. But + if any man say unto you, This is offered in sacrifice + unto idols, eat not for his sake that shewed it, and + for conscience sake: for the earth is the Lord's and + the fulness thereof: 29. Conscience, I say, not thine + own, but of the other: for why is my liberty judged + of another man's conscience? 30. For if I by grace be + a partaker, why am I evil spoken of for that for which + I give thanks? 31. Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, + or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God. + 32. Give none offence, neither to the Jews, nor to the + Gentiles, nor to the church of God: 33. Even as I + please all men in all things, not seeking mine own + profit, but the profit of many, that they may be + saved.'--1 COR. x. 23-33. + + +This passage strikingly illustrates Paul's constant habit of solving +questions as to conduct by the largest principles. He did not keep +his 'theology' and his ethics in separate water-tight compartments, +having no communication with each other. The greatest truths were +used to regulate the smallest duties. Like the star that guided the +Magi, they burned high in the heavens, but yet directed to the house +in Bethlehem. + +The question here in hand was one that pressed on the Corinthian +Christians, and is very far away from our experience. Idolatry had so +inextricably intertwined itself with daily life that it was hard to +keep up any intercourse with non-Christians without falling into +constructive idolatry; and one very constantly obtruding difficulty +was that much of the animal food served on private tables had been +slaughtered as sacrifices or with certain sacrificial rites. What was +a Christian to do in such a case? To eat or not to eat? Both views +had their vehement supporters in the Corinthian church, and the +importance of the question is manifest from the large space devoted +to it in this letter. + +In chapter viii. we have a weighty paragraph, in which one phase of +the difficulty is dealt with--the question whether a Christian ought +to attend a feast in an idol temple, where, of course, the viands had +been offered as sacrifices. But in chapter x. Paul deals with the +case in which the meat had been bought in the flesh-market, and so +was not necessarily sacrificial. Paul's manner of handling the point +is very instructive. He envelops, as it were, the practical solution +in a wrapping of large principles; verses 23, 24 precede the specific +answer, and are general principles; verses 25-30 contain the +practical answer; verses 31-33 and verse 1 of the next chapter are +again general principles, wide and imperative enough to mould all +conduct, as well as to settle the matter immediately in hand, which, +important as it was at Corinth, has become entirely uninteresting to +us. + +We need not spend time in elucidating the specific directions given +as to the particular question in hand further than to note the +immense gift of saving common-sense which Paul had, and how sanely +and moderately he dealt with his problem. His advice was--'Don't ask +where the joint set before you came from. If you do not know that it +was offered, your eating of it does not commit you to idol worship.' +No doubt there were Corinthian Christians with inflamed consciences +who did ask such questions, and rather prided themselves on their +strictness and rigidity; but Paul would have them let sleeping dogs +lie. If, however, the meat is known to have been offered to an idol, +then Paul is as rigid and strict as they are. That combination of +willingness to go as far as possible, and inflexible determination +not to go one step farther, of yieldingness wherever principle does +not come in, and of iron fixedness wherever it does, is rare indeed, +but should be aimed at by all Christians. The morality of the Gospel +would make more way in the world if its advocates always copied the +'sweet reasonableness' of Paul, which, as he tells us in this +passage, he learned from Jesus. + +As to the wrapping of general principles, they may all be reduced to +one--the duty of limiting Christian liberty by consideration for +others. In the two verses preceding the practical precepts, that duty +is stated with reference entirely to the obligations flowing from our +relationship to others. We are all bound together by a mystical chain +of solidarity. Since every man is my neighbour, I am bound to think +of him and not only of myself in deciding what I may do or refrain +from doing. I must abstain from lawful things if, by doing them, I +should be likely to harm my neighbour's building up of a strong +character. I can, or I believe that I can, pursue some course of +conduct, engage in some enterprise, follow some line of life, without +damage to myself, either in regard to worldly position, or in regard +to my religious life. Be it so, but I have to take some one else into +account. Will my example call out imitation in others, to whom it may +be harmful or fatal to do as I can do with real or supposed impunity? +If so, I am guilty of something very like murder if I do not abstain. + +'What harm is there in betting a shilling? I can well afford to lose +it, and I can keep myself from the feverish wish to risk more.' Yes, +and you are thereby helping to hold up that gambling habit which is +ruining thousands. + +'I can take alcohol in moderation, and it does me no harm, and I can +go to a prayer-meeting after my dinner and temperate glass, and I am +within my Christian liberty in doing so.' Yes, and you take part +thereby in the greatest curse that besets our country, and are, by +countenancing the drink habit, guilty of the blood of souls. How any +Christian man can read these two verses and not abstain from all +intoxicants is a mystery. They cut clean through all the pleas for +moderate drinking, and bring into play another set of principles +which limit liberty by regard to others' good. Surely, if there was +ever a subject to which these words apply, it is the use of alcohol, +the proved cause of almost all the crime and poverty on both sides of +the Atlantic. To the Christians who plead their 'liberty' we can only +say, 'Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that thing which he +alloweth.' + +The same general considerations reappear in the verses following the +specific precept, but with a difference. The neighbour's profit is +still put forth as the limiting consideration, but it is elevated to +a higher sacredness of obligation by being set in connection with the +'glory of God' and the example of Christ. 'Do all to the glory of +God.' To put the thought here into modern English--Could you ask a +blessing over a glass of spirits when you think that, though it +should do you no harm, your taking it may, as it were, tip some weak +brother over the precipice? Can you drink to God's glory when you +know that drink is slaying thousands body and soul, and that hopeless +drunkards are made by wholesale out of moderate drinkers? 'Give no +occasion of stumbling'; do not by your example tempt others into +risky courses. And remember that 'neighbour' (verse 24) resolves +itself into 'Jews' and 'Greeks' and the 'Church of God'--that is, +substantially to your own race and other races--to men with whom you +have affinities, and to men with whom you have none. + +A Christian man is bound to shape his life so that no man shall be +able to say of him that he was the occasion of that one's fall. He is +so bound because every man is his neighbour. He is so bound because +he is bound to live to the glory of God, which can never be advanced +by laying stumbling-blocks in the way for feeble feet. He is so bound +because, unless Christ had limited Himself within the bound of +manhood, and had sought not His own profit or pleasure, we should +have had neither life nor hope. For all these reasons, the duty of +thinking of others, and of abstaining, for their sakes, from what one +might do, is laid on all Christians. How do they discharge that duty +who will not forswear alcohol for their neighbour's sake? + + + + +'IN REMEMBRANCE OF ME' + + 'This do in remembrance of Me.'--1 COR. xi. 24. + + +The account of the institution of the Lord's Supper, contained in +this context, is very much the oldest extant narrative of that event. +It dates long before any of the Gospels, and goes up, probably, to +somewhere about five and twenty years after the Crucifixion. It +presupposes a previous narrative which had been orally delivered to +the Corinthians, and, as the Apostle alleges, was derived by him from +Christ Himself. It is intended to correct corruptions in the +administration of the rite which must have taken some time to develop +themselves. And so we are carried back to a period very close indeed +to the first institution of the rite, by the words before us. + +No reasonable doubt can exist, then, that within a very few years of +our Lord's death, the whole body of Christian people believed that +Jesus Christ Himself appointed the Lord's Supper. I do not stay to +dwell upon the value of a rite contemporaneous with the fact which it +commemorates, and continuously lasting throughout the ages, as a +witness of the historical veracity of the alleged fact; but I want to +fix upon this thought, that Jesus Christ, who cared very little for +rites, who came to establish a religion singularly independent of any +outward form, did establish two rites, one of them to be done once in +a Christian lifetime, one of them to be repeated with indefinite +frequency, and, as it appears, at first repeated daily by the early +believers. The reason why these two, and only these two, external +ordinances were appointed by Jesus Christ was, that, taken together, +they cover the whole ground of revealed fact, and they also cover the +whole ground of Christian experience. There is no room for any other +rites, because these two, the rite of initiation, which is baptism, +and the rite of commemoration, which is the Lord's Supper, say +everything about Christianity as a revelation, and about Christianity +as a living experience. + +Not only so, but in the simple primitive form of the Lord's Supper +there is contained a reference to the past, the present and the +future. It covers all time as well as all revelation and all +Christian experience. For the past, as the text shows us, it is a +memorial of one Person, and one fact in that Person's life. For the +present, it is the symbol of the Christian life, as that great sixth +chapter in John's gospel sets forth; and for the future, it is a +prophecy, as our Lord Himself said on that night in the upper +chamber, 'Till I drink it new with you in My Father's kingdom,' and +as the Apostle in this context says, 'Till He come.' It is to these +three aspects of this ordinance, as the embodiment of all essential +Christian truth, and as the embodiment of all deep Christian +experience, covering the past, the present, and the future, that I +wish to turn now. I do not deal so much with the mere words of my +text as with this threefold significance of the rite which it +appoints. + +I. So then, first, we have to think of it as a memorial of the past. + +'Do this,' is the true meaning of the words, not 'in remembrance of +Me,' but something far more sweet and pathetic--'do this for the +_remembering_ of Me.' The former expression is equal to 'Do this +because you remember.' The real meaning of the words is, 'Do this in +case you forget'; do this in order that you may recall to memory what +the slippery memory is so apt to lose--the impression of even the +sweetest sweetness, of the most loving love, and the most +self-abnegating sacrifice, which He offered for us. + +There is something to me infinitely pathetic and beautiful in looking +at the words not only as the commandment of the Lord, but as the +appeal of the Friend, who wished, as we all do, not to be utterly +forgotten by those whom He cared for and loved; and who, not only +because their remembrance was their salvation, but because their +forgetfulness pained His human heart, brings to their hearts the +plaintive appeal: 'Do not forget Me when I am gone away from you; and +even if you have no better way of remembering Me, take these poor +symbols, to which I am not too proud to entrust the care of My +memory, and do this, lest you forget Me.' + +But, dear brethren, there are deeper thoughts than this, on which I +must dwell briefly. 'In remembrance of Me'--Jesus Christ, then, takes +up an altogether unique and solitary position here, and into the +sacredest hours of devotion and the loftiest moments of communion +with God, intrudes His personality, and says, 'When you are most +religious, remember Me; and let the highest act of your devout life +be a thought turned to Myself.' + +Now, I want you to ask, is that thought diverted from God? And if it +is not, how comes it not to be? I want you honestly to ask yourselves +this question--what did _He_ think about Himself who, at that +moment, when all illusions were vanishing, and life was almost at its +last ebb, took the most solemn rite of His nation and laid it +solemnly aside and said: 'A greater than Moses is here; a greater +deliverance is being wrought': 'Remember Me.' Is that insisting on +His own personality, and making the remembrance of it the very apex +and shining summit of all religious aspiration--is that the work of +one about whom all that we have to say is, He was the noblest of men? +If so, then I want to know how Jesus Christ, in that upper chamber, +founding the sole continuous rite of the religion which He +established, and making its heart and centre the remembrance of His +own personality, can be cleared from the charge of diverting to +Himself what belongs to God only, and how you and I, if we obey His +commands, escape the crime of idolatry and man-worship? 'Do this in +remembrance,'--not of God--'in remembrance of Me,' 'and let memory, +with all its tendrils, clasp and cleave to My person.' What an +extraordinary demand! It is obscuring God, unless the 'Me' _is_ God +manifest in the flesh. + +Then, still further, let me remind you that in the appointment of +this solitary rite as His memorial to all generations, Jesus Christ +Himself designates one part of His whole manifestation as the part +into which all its pathos, significance, and power are concentrated. +We who believe that the death of Christ is the life of the world, are +told that one formidable objection to our belief is that Jesus Christ +Himself said so little during His life about His death. I believe His +reticence upon that question is much exaggerated, but apart +altogether from that, I believe also that there was a necessity in +the order of the evolution of divine truth, for the reticence, such +as it is, because, whatsoever might be possible to Moses and Elias, +on the Mount of Transfiguration, 'His decease which He should +accomplish at Jerusalem,' could not be much spoken about in the plain +till it had been accomplished. But, apart from both of these +considerations, reflect, that whether He said much about His death or +not, He said something very much to the purpose about it when He said +'Do this in remembrance of Me.' + +It is not His personality only that we are to remember. The whole of +the language of the institution of the ritual, as well as the form of +the rite, and its connection with the ancient passover, and its +connection with the new covenant into connection with which Christ +Himself brings it, all point to the significance in His eyes of His +death as the Sacrifice for the world's sin. Wherefore 'the body' and +'the blood' separately remembered, except to indicate death by +violence? Wherefore the language 'the body _broken_ for you'; +'the blood _shed_ for many for the remission of sins?' Wherefore the +association with the Passover sacrifice? Wherefore the declaration +that 'this is the blood of the Covenant,' unless all tended to the +one thought--His death is the foundation of all loving relationships +possible to us with God; and the condition of the remission of +sins--the Sacrifice for the whole world?' + +This is the point that He desires us to remember; this is that which +He would have live for ever in our grateful hearts. + +I say nothing about the absolute exclusion of any other purpose of +this memorial rite. If it was the mysterious thing that the +superstition of later ages has made of it, how, in the name of +common-sense, does it come that not one syllable, looking in that +direction, dropped from His lips when He established it? Surely He, +in that upper chamber, knew best what He meant, and what He was doing +when He established the rite; and I, for my part, am contented to be +told that I believe in a poor, bald Zwinglianism, when I say with my +Master, that the purpose of the Lord's Supper is simply the +commemoration, and therein the proclamation, of His death. There is +no magic, no mystery, no 'sacrament' about it. It blesses us when it +makes us remember Him. It does the same thing for us which any other +means of bringing Him to mind does. It does that through a different +vehicle. A sermon does it by words, the Communion does it by symbols. +That is the difference to be found between them. And away goes the +whole fabric of superstitious Christianity, and all its mischiefs and +evils, when once you accept the simple 'Remember.' Christ told us +what He meant by the rite when He said 'Do this in remembrance of +Me.' + +II. And now one word or two more about the other particulars which I +have suggested. The past, however sweet and precious, is not enough +for any soul to live upon. And so this memorial rite, just because it +is memorial, is a symbol for the present. + +That is taught us in the great chapter--the sixth of John's +Gospel--which was spoken long before the institution of the Lord's +Supper, but expresses in words the same ideas which it expresses by +material forms. The Christ who died is the Christ who lives, and must +be lived upon by the Christian. If our relation to Jesus Christ were +only that 'Once in the end of the ages He appeared to put away sin by +the sacrifice of Himself'; and if we had to look back through +lengthening vistas of distance and thickening folds of oblivion, +simply to a historical past, in which He was once offered, the +retrospect would not have the sweetness in it which it now has. But +when we come to this thought that the Christ who was for us is also +the Christ in us, and that He is not the Christ for us unless He is +the Christ in us; and His death will never wash away our sins unless +we feed upon Him, here and now, by faith and meditation, then the +retrospect becomes blessedness. The Christian life is not merely the +remembrance of a historical Christ in the past, but it is the present +participation in a living Christ, with us now. + +He is near each of us that we may make Him the very food of our +spirits. We are to live upon Him. He is to be incorporated within us +by our own act. This is no mysticism, it is a piece of simple +reality. There is no Christian life without it. The true life of the +believer is just the feeding of our souls upon Him,--our minds +accepting, meditating upon, digesting the truths which are incarnated +in Jesus; our hearts feeding upon the love which is so tender, warm, +stooping, and close; our wills feeding upon and nourished by the +utterance of His will in commandments which to know is joy and to +keep is liberty; our hopes feeding upon Him who is our Hope, and in +whom they find no chaff and husks of peradventures, but the pure +wheat of 'Verily! verily I say unto you'; the whole nature thus +finding its nourishment in Jesus Christ. You are Christians in the +measure in which the very strength of your spirits, and sustenance of +all your faculties, are found in loving communion with the living +Lord. + +Remember, too, that all this communion, intimate, sweet, sacred, is +possible only, or at all events is in its highest forms and most +blessed reality, possible only, to those who approach Him through the +gate of His death. The feeding upon the living Christ which will be +the strength of our hearts and our portion for ever, must be a +feeding upon the whole Christ. We must not only nourish our spirits +on the fact that He was incarnated for our salvation, but also on the +truth that He was crucified for our acceptance with God. 'He that +eateth Me, even he shall live by Me,' has for its deepest +explanation, 'He that eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood hath +eternal life.' + +My friends, what about the hunger of your souls? Where is it +satisfied? With the swine's husks, or with the 'Bread of God which +came down from Heaven?' + +III. Now, lastly, that rite which is a memorial and a symbol is also +a prophecy. + +In the original words of the institution our Lord Himself makes +reference to the future; 'till I drink it new with you in My Father's +kingdom.' And in the context here, the Apostle provides for the +perpetual continuance, and emphasises the prophetic aspect, of +the rite, by that word, 'till He come.' His death necessarily implies +His coming again. The Cross and the Throne are linked together by an +indissoluble bond. Being what it is, the death cannot be the end. +Being what He is, if He has once been offered to bear the sins of +many, so He must come the second time without sin unto salvation. The +rite, just because it is a rite, is the prophecy of a time when the +need for it, arising from weak flesh and an intrusive world, shall +cease. 'They shall say no more, The ark of the covenant of the Lord; +at that time they shall call Jerusalem the throne of the Lord.' There +shall be no temple in that great city, because the Lord God Almighty +and the Lamb are the Temple thereof. So all external worship is a +prophecy of the coming of the perfect time, when that which is +perfect being come, the external helps and ladders to climb to the +loftiest shall be done away. + +But more than that, the memorial and symbol is a prophecy. That upper +chamber, with its troubled thoughts, its unbidden tears, starting to +the eyes of the half-understanding listeners, who only felt that He +was going away and the sweet companionship was dissolved, may seem to +be but a blurred and a poor image of the better communion of heaven. +But though on that sad night the Master bore a burdened heart, and +the servants had but partial apprehension and a more partial love; +though He went forth to agonise and to die, and they went forth to +deny and to betray, and to leave Him alone, still it was a prophecy +of Christ's table in His kingdom. Heaven is to be a feast. That +representation promises society to the solitary, rest to the toilers, +the oil of joy for mourning, and the full satisfaction of all +desires. That heavenly feast surpasses indeed the antitype in the +upper chamber, in that there the Master Himself partook not, and +yonder we shall sup with Him and He with us, but is prophetic in +that, as there He took a towel and girded Himself and washed the +disciples' feet, so yonder He will come forth Himself and serve them. +The future is unlike the prophetic past in that 'we shall go no more +out'; there shall be no sequences of sorrow, and struggle, and +distance and ignorance; but like it in that we shall feast on Christ, +for through eternity the glorified Jesus will be the Bread of our +spirits, and the fact of His past sacrifice the foundation of our +hopes. + +So, dear brethren, though our external celebration of this rite be +dashed, as it always is, with much ignorance and with feeble faith; +and though we gather round this table as the first generation of +Israelites did round the passover, of which it is the successor, with +staff in hand and loins girded, and have to eat it often with bitter +herbs mingled, and though there be at our sides empty places, yet even +in our clouded and partial apprehension, and in the imperfections of +this outward type, we may see a gracious shadow of what is waiting +for us when we shall go no more out, and all empty places shall be +filled, and the bitter herbs shall be changed for the asphodel of +Heaven and the sweet flowerage round the throne of God, and we shall +feast upon the Christ, and in the loftiest experience of the utmost +glories of the Heavens, shall remember the bitter Cross and agony as +that which has bought it all. 'This do in remembrance of Me.' May it +be a symbol of our inmost life, and the prophecy of the Heaven to +which we each shall come! + + + + +THE UNIVERSAL GIFT + + 'The manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man + to profit withal.'--1 COR. xii. 7. + + +The great fact which to-day[1] commemorates is too often regarded as +if it were a transient gift, limited to those on whom it was first +bestowed. We sometimes hear it said that the great need of the +Christian world is a second Pentecost, a fresh outpouring of the +Spirit of God and the like. Such a way of thinking and speaking +misconceives the nature and significance of the first Pentecost, +which had a transient element in it, but in essence was permanent. +The rushing mighty wind and the cloven tongues of fire, and the +strange speech in many languages, were all equally transient. The +rushing wind swept on, and the house was no more filled with it. The +tongues flickered into invisibility and disappeared from the heads. +The hubbub of many languages was quickly silent. But that which these +things but symbolised is permanent; and we are not to think of +Pentecost as if it were a sudden gush from a great reservoir, and the +sluice was let down again after it, but as if it were the entrance +into a dry bed, of a rushing stream, whose first outgush was attended +with noise, but which thereafter flows continuous and unbroken. If +churches or individuals are scant of that gift, it is not because it +has not been bestowed, but because it has not been accepted. + +My text tells us two things: it unconditionally and broadly asserts +that every Christian possesses this great gift--the manifestation is +given to every man; and then it asserts that the gift of each is +meant to be utilised for the good of all. 'The manifestation is given +to every man to profit withal.' + +I. Let me, then, say a word or two, to begin with, about the +universality of this gift. + +Now, that is implied in our Lord's own language, as commented upon by +the Evangelist. For Jesus Christ declared that this was the standing +law of His kingdom, to be universally applied to all its members, +that 'He that believeth on Him, out of him shall flow rivers of +living water'; and the Evangelist's comment goes on to say, 'This +spake He of the Spirit which they that believe on Him should +receive.' _There_ is the condition and the qualification. Wherever +there is faith, there the Spirit of God is bestowed, and bestowed in +the measure in which faith is exercised. So, then, in full accordance +with such fundamental principles in reference to the gift of the +Spirit of God, comes the language of my text, and of many another +text to which I cannot do more than refer. But let me just quote one +or two of them, in order that I may make more emphatic what I believe +a great many Christian people do not realise as they ought--viz. that +the gift of God's Holy Spirit is not a thing to be desired, as if it +were not possessed or confined to select individuals, or manifested +by exceptional and lofty attainments, but is the universal heritage +of the whole Christian Church. 'Know ye not that ye are the temple of +the Holy Ghost?' 'We have all been made to drink into one Spirit,' +says Paul again, in the immediate context. 'If any man have not the +Spirit of Christ, he is none of His,' says he, unconditionally. And +in many other places the same principle is laid down, a principle +which I believe the Christian Church to-day needs to have recalled to +its consciousness, that it may be quickened to realise it in its +experience far more than is the case at present. + +Let me remind you, too, that that universality of the gifts of the +Divine Spirit is implied in the very conception of what Christ's +work, in its deepest and most precious aspects to us, is. For we are +not to limit, as a great many so-called earnest evangelical teachers +and believers do--we are not to limit His work to that which is +effected when a man first becomes a Christian--viz. pardon and +acceptance with God. God forbid that I should ever seem to underrate +that great initial gift on which everything else must be built. But I +am not underrating it when I say, 'Let us prophesy according to the +proportion of faith,' and the 'proportion of faith' has been +violated, and the perspective and completeness of Christian truth, +and of Christ's gifts, have been, alas! to a very large extent +distorted because Christian people, trained in what we call the +evangelical school, have laid far too little emphasis on the fact +that the essential gift of Christ to His people is not pardon, nor +acceptance, nor justification, but _life_; and that forgiveness, +and altered relationship to God, and assurance of acceptance with +Him, are all preliminaries. They are, if I may recur to a figure that +I have already employed, the preparing of the channel, and the taking +away of the obstacles that block its mouth, in order to the inrush of +the flood of the river of the water of life. + +This life that Christ gives is the result of the gift of the Spirit. +So 'If any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of His.' The +life is the gift considered from our side, and the Spirit is the gift +considered from the divine side. 'Every man that hath the Son hath +life'; because the law of the Spirit of life in Christ has made him +free from the law of sin and death. So you see if that is true--and I +for my part am sure that it is--then all that vulgar way of looking +at the influences of the Holy Spirit upon men, as if they were +confined to certain exceptional people, or certain abnormal and +extraordinary and elevated acts, is swept away. It is not the +spasmodic, the exceptional, the rare, not the lofty or +transcendentally Christlike acts or characters that are alone the +manifestation of the Spirit. + +Nor is this gift a thing that a man can discover as distinct from his +own consciousness. The point where the river of the water of life +comes into the channel of our spirits lies away far up, near the +sources, and long before the stream comes into sight in our own +consciousness, the blended waters have been inseparably mingled, and +flow on peacefully together. 'The Spirit beareth witness _with_ +our spirits'; and you are not to expect that you can hear two voices +speaking, but it is one voice and one only. + +Now, that universality of this divine gift underlies the very +constitution of the Christian Church. 'Where the Spirit of the Lord +is there is liberty,' said Paul. It is because each Christian man +has access to the one Source of illumination and of truth and +righteousness and holiness, that no Christian man is to become +subject to the dominion of a brother. And it is because on the +servants and on the handmaidens has been poured out, in these +days, God's Spirit and they prophesy, that all domination of classes +or individuals, and all stiffening of the free life of God's Church +by man-made creeds, are contrary to the very basis of its existence, +and an attack on the dignity of each individual member of the Church. +'Ye have an unction from the Holy One' is said to all Christian +people--and 'ye need not that any man teach you,' still less that any +man, or body of men, or document framed by men, should be set up as +normal and authoritative over Christ's free people. + +Still further, and only one word--Let me remind you of what I have +already said, and what is only too sadly true, that this grand +universality of the Spirit's gift to all Christian people does not +fill, in the mind of the ordinary Christian man, the place that it +ought, and it does not fill it, therefore, in his experience. I say +no more upon that point. + +II. And now let me say a word, secondly, about the many-sidedness of +this universal gift. + +One of the reasons why Christian people as a whole do not realise the +universality as they ought is, as I have already suggested in a +somewhat different connection, because they limit their notions far +too much of what the gift of God's Spirit is to do to men. We must +take a wider view of what that Spirit is meant to effect than we +ordinarily take, before we understand how real and how visible its +universal manifestations are. Take a leaf out of the Old Testament. +The man who made the brass-work for the Tabernacle was 'full of the +Spirit of God.' The poets who sung the Psalms, in more than one +place, declare of themselves that they, too, were but the harps upon +which the divine finger played. Samson was capable of his rude feats +of physical strength, because 'the Spirit of God was upon him.' Art, +song, counsel, statesmanlike adaptation of means to ends, and +discernment of proper courses for a nation, such as were exemplified +in Joseph and in Daniel, are, in the Old Testament, ascribed to the +Spirit of God, and even the rude physical strength of the +simple-natured and sensuous athlete is traced up to the same source. + +But again, we see another sphere of the Spirit's working in the +manifestations of it in the experience of the primitive Church. These +are, as we all know, accompanied with miracles, speaking with tongues +and working wonders. The signs of that Spirit in those days were +visible and audible. As I said, when the river first came into its +bed, it came like the tide in Morecambe Bay, breast-high, with a +roar and a rush. But it was quiet after that. In the context we have a +whole series of manifestations of this Divine Spirit, some of them +miraculous and some being natural faculties heightened, but all +concerned with the Church as a society, and being for the benefit of +the community. + +But there is another class. If you turn to the Epistle to the +Galatians, you will find a wonderful list there of what the Apostle +calls 'the fruit of the Spirit,' beginning with 'love, joy, peace.' +These are all moral and religious, bearing upon personal experience +and the completeness of the individual character. + +Now, let us include all these aspects in our conception of the fruit +of the Spirit's working on men--the secular, if we may use that word, +as exhibited in the Old Testament; the miraculous, as seen in the +first days of the Church; the ecclesiastical, if we may so designate +the endowments mentioned in the context, and the purely personal, +moral, and religious emotions and acts. The plain fact is that +everything in a Christian's life, except his sin, is the +manifestation of that Divine Spirit, from whom all good thoughts, +counsels, and works do proceed. He is the 'Spirit of adoption,' and +whenever in my heart there rises warm and blessed the aspiration +'Abba! Father!' it is not my voice only, but the voice of that Divine +Spirit. He is the Spirit of intercession; and whenever in my soul +there move yearning desires after infinite good, child-like longings +to be knit more closely to Him, that, too, is the voice of God's +Spirit; and our prayers are then 'sweet, indeed, when He the Spirit +gives by which we pray.' In like manner, all the variety of Christian +emotions and experiences is to be traced to the conjoint operation of +that Divine Spirit as the source, and my own spirit as influenced by, +and the organ of, the Spirit of God. If I may take a very rough +illustration, there is a story in the Old Testament about a king, to +whom were given a bow and arrow, with the command to shoot. The +prophet's hand was laid on the king's weak hand, and the weak hand +was strengthened by the touch of the other; and with one common pull +they drew back the string and the arrow sped. The king drew the bow, +but it was the prophet's hand grasping his wrist that gave him +strength to do it. And that is how the Spirit of God will work with +us if we will. + +III. Finally, consider the purpose of all the diverse manifestations +of the one universal gift. + +'To profit withal'--for his own good who possesses it, and for the +good of all the rest of his brethren. + +Now, that involves two plain things. There have been people in the +Christian Church who have said, 'We have all the Spirit, and +therefore we do not need one another.' There may be isolation, and +self-sufficiency, and a host of other evils coming in, if we only +grasp the thought, 'The manifestation of the Spirit is given to every +man,' but they are all corrected if we go on and say, 'to profit +withal.' For every one of us has something, and no one of us has +everything; so, on the one hand, we want each other, and, on the +other hand, we are responsible for the use of what we have. + +You get the life, not in order that you may plume yourself on its +possession, nor in order that you may ostentatiously display it, +still less in order that you may shut it up and do nothing with it; +but you get the life in order that it may spread through you to +others. + + 'The least flower with a brimming cup may stand, + And share its dew-drop with another near.' + +We each have the life that God's grace may fructify through us to +all. Power is duty; endowment is obligation; capacity prescribes +work. 'The manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to +profit withal.' + +You can regulate the flow. You have the sluice; you can shut it or +open it. I have said that the condition, and the only condition, of +possessing the fulness of God's Spirit is faith in Jesus Christ. +Therefore, the more you trust the more you have, and the less your +faith the less the gift. You can get much or little, according to the +greatness or the smallness, the fixity or the transiency, of your +desires. If you hold the empty cup with a tremulous hand, the +precious liquid will not be poured into it--for some of it will be +spilt--in the same fulness as it would be if you held it steadily. It +is the old story--the miraculous flow of the oil stopped when the +widow had no more pots and vessels to bring. The reason why some of +us have so little of that Divine Spirit is because we have not held +out our vessels to be filled. You can diminish the flow by ignoring +it, and that is what a host of so-called Christian people do +nowadays. You can diminish it by neglecting to use the little that +you have for the purpose for which it was given you. Does anybody +profit by your spiritual life? Do you profit much by it yourselves? +Has it ever been of the least good to anybody else in the world? 'The +manifestation of the Spirit is given to' you, if you are a Christian +man or woman, more or less. And if you shut it up, and do never an +atom of good with it, either to yourselves or to anybody else, of +course it will slip away; and, sometime or other, to your +astonishment, you will find that the vessels are empty, and that the +Spirit of the Lord has departed from you. 'Grieve not the Holy Spirit +of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.' + +[Footnote 1: Whitsunday.] + + + + +WHAT LASTS + + 'Whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether + there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be + knowledge, it shall vanish away. 13. And now abideth + faith, hope, charity, these three....'--1 COR. xiii. 8, 13. + + +We discern the run of the Apostle's thought best by thus omitting the +intervening verses and connecting these two. The part omitted is but +a buttress of what has been stated in the former of our two verses; +and when we thus unite them there is disclosed plainly the Apostle's +intention of contrasting two sets of things, three in each set. The +one set is 'prophecies, tongues, knowledge'; the other, 'faith, hope, +charity.' There also comes out distinctly that the point mainly +intended by the contrast is the transiency of the one and the +permanence of the other. Now, that contrast has been obscured and +weakened by two mistakes, about which I must say a word. + +With regard to the former statement, 'Whether there be prophecies, +they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease,' that +has been misunderstood as if it amounted to a declaration that the +miraculous gifts in the early Church were intended to be of brief +duration. However true that may be, it is not what Paul means here. +The cessation to which he refers is their cessation in the light of +the perfect Future. With regard to the other statement, the abiding +of faith, hope, charity, that, too, has been misapprehended as if it +indicated that faith and hope belonged to this state of things only, +and that love was the greatest of the three, because it was +permanent. The reason for that misconception has mainly lain in the +misunderstanding of the force of '_Now_,' which has been taken to +mean 'for the present,' as an implied contrast to an unspoken 'then'; +just as in the previous verse we have, '_Now_ we see through a glass, +_then_ face to face.' But the 'now' in this text is not, as the +grammarians say, temporal, but logical. That is, it does not refer to +time, but to the sequence of the Apostle's thought, and is equivalent +to 'so then.' 'So then abideth faith, hope, charity.' + +The scope of the whole, then, is to contrast the transient with the +permanent, in Christian experience. If we firmly grasped the truth +involved, our estimates would be rectified and our practice +revolutionised. + +I. I ask this question--What will drop away? + +Paul answers, 'prophecies, tongues, knowledge.' Now these three were +all extraordinary gifts belonging to the present phase of the +Christian life. But inasmuch as these gifts were the heightening of +natural capacities and faculties, it is perfectly legitimate to +enlarge the declaration and to use these three words in their widest +signification. So understood, they come to this, that all our present +modes of apprehension and of utterance are transient, and will be +left behind. + +'Knowledge, it shall cease,' and as the Apostle goes on to explain, +in the verses which I have passed over for my present purpose, it +shall cease because the perfect will absorb into itself the +imperfect, as the inrushing tide will obliterate the little pools in +the rocks on the seashore. For another reason, the knowledge, the +mode of apprehension belonging to the present, will pass--because +here it is indirect, and there it will be immediate. 'We shall know +face to face,' which is what philosophers mean by intuition. Here our +knowledge 'creeps from point to point,' painfully amassing facts, and +thence, with many hesitations and errors, groping its way towards +principles and laws. Here it is imperfect, with many a gap in the +circumference; or like the thin red line on a map which shows the +traveller's route across a prairie, or like the spider's thread in +the telescope, stretched athwart the blazing disc of the sun--'but +then face to face.' Incomplete knowledge shall be done away; and many +of its objects will drop, and much of what makes the science of earth +will be antiquated and effete. What would the hand-loom weaver's +knowledge of how to throw his shuttle be worth in a weaving-shed with +a thousand looms? Just so much will the knowledges of earth be when +we get yonder. + +Modes of utterance will cease. With new experiences will come new +methods of communication. As a man can speak, and a beast can only +growl or bark, so a man in heaven, with new experiences, will have +new methods of communication. The comparison between that mode of +utterance which we now have, and that which we shall then possess, +will be like the difference between the old-fashioned semaphore, that +used to wave about clumsy wooden arms in order to convey +intelligence, and the telegraph. + +Think, then, of a man going into that future life, and saying 'I knew +more about Sanscrit than anybody that ever lived in Europe'; 'I sang +sweet songs'; 'I was a past master in philology, grammars, and +lexicons'; 'I was a great orator.' 'Tongues shall cease'; and the +modes of utterance that belonged to earth, and all that holds of +them, will drop away, and be of no more use. + +If these things are true, brethren, with regard even to the highest +form of these high and noble things, how much more and more solemnly +true are they with regard to the aims and objects which most of us +have in view? They will all drop away, and we shall be left, stripped +of what, for most of us, has made the whole interest and activity of +our lives. + +II. What will last? + +'So then, abideth these three, faith, hope, love.' When Paul takes +three nouns and couples them with a verb in the singular, he is not +making a slip of the pen, or committing a grammatical blunder which a +child could correct. But there is a great truth in that piece of +apparent grammatical irregularity; for the faith, the hope, and the +love, for which he can only afford a singular verb, are thereby +declared to be in their depth and essence one thing, and it, the +triple star, abides, and continues to shine. The three primitive +colours are unified in the white beam of light. Do not correct the +grammar, and spoil the sense, but discern what he means when he says, +'Now, abid_eth_ faith, hope, love.' For this is what he means, +that the two latter come out of the former, and that without it they +are nought, and that it without them is dead. + +Faith breeds Hope. _There_ is the difference between earthly hopes +and Christian people's hopes. Our hopes, apart from the revelation of +God in Jesus Christ, are but the balancing of probabilities, and the +scale is often dragged down by the clutch of eager desires. But all +is baseless and uncertain, unless our hopes are the outcome of our +faith. Which, being translated into other words, is just this, that +the one basis on which men can rest--ay! even for the immediate +future, and the contingencies of life, as well as for the solemnities +and certainties of heaven--any legitimate and substantial hope is +trust in Jesus Christ, His word, His love, His power, and for the +heavenly future, in His Resurrection and present glory. A man who +believes these things, and only that man, has a rock foundation on +which he can build his hope. + +Faith, in like manner, is the parent of Love. Paul and John, diverse +as they are in the whole cast of their minds, the one being +speculative and the other mystical, the one argumentative and the +other simply gazing and telling what he sees, are precisely agreed in +regard to this matter. For, to the Apostle of Love, the foundation of +all human love towards God is, 'We have known and believed the love +that God hath to us,' and 'We love Him because He first loved us,' +and to Paul the first step is the trusting reception of the love of +God, 'commended to us' by the fact that 'whilst we were yet sinners +Christ died for us,' and from that necessarily flows, if the faith be +genuine, the love that answers the sacrifice and obeys the Beloved. +So faith, hope, love, these three are a trinity in unity, and it +abideth. That is the main point of our last text. Let me say a word +or two about it. + +I have said that the words have often been misunderstood as if the +'now' referred only to the present order of things, in which faith +and hope are supposed to find their only appropriate sphere. But that +is clearly not the Apostle's meaning here, for many reasons with +which I need not trouble you. The abiding of all three is eternal +abiding, and there is a heavenly as well as an earthly form of faith +and hope as well as of love. Just look at these points for a moment. + +'Faith abides,' says Paul, yonder, as here. Now, there is a common +saying, which I suppose ninety out of a hundred people think comes +out of the Bible, about faith being lost in sight. There is no such +teaching in Scripture. True, in one aspect, faith is the antithesis +of sight. True, Paul does say 'We walk by faith, not by sight.' But +that antithesis refers only to part of faith's significance. In so +far as it is the opposite of sight, of course it will cease to be in +operation when 'we shall know even as we are known' and 'see Him as +He is.' But the essence of faith is not in the absence of the person +trusted, but the emotion of trust which goes out to the person, +present or absent. And in its deepest meaning of absolute dependence +and happy confidence, faith abides through all the glories and the +lustres of the heavens, as it burns amidst the dimnesses and the +darknesses of earth. For ever and ever, on through the irrevoluble +ages of eternity, dependence on God in Christ will be the life of the +glorified, as it was the life of the militant, Church. No millenniums +of possession, and no imaginable increases in beauty and perfectness +and enrichment with the wealth of God, will bring us one inch nearer +to casting off the state of filial dependence which is, and ever will +be, the condition of our receiving them all. Faith 'abides.' + +Hope 'abides.' For it is no more a Scriptural idea that hope is lost +in fruition, than it is that faith is lost in sight. Rather that +Future presents itself to us as the continual communication of an +inexhaustible God to our progressively capacious and capable spirits. +In that continual communication there is continual progress. Wherever +there is progress there must be hope. And thus the fair form, which +has so often danced before us elusive, and has led us into bogs and +miry places and then faded away, will move before us through all the +long avenues of an endless progress, and will ever and anon come back +to tell us of the unseen glories that lie beyond the next turn, and +to woo us further into the depths of heaven and the fulness of God. +Hope 'abides.' + +Love 'abides.' I need not, I suppose, enlarge upon that thought which +nobody denies, that love is the eternal form of the human relation to +God. It, too, like the mercy which it clasps, 'endureth for ever.' + +But I may remind you of what the Apostle does not explain in our +text, that it is greater than its linked sisters, because whilst +faith and hope belong only to a creature, and are dependent and +expectant of some good to come to themselves, and correspond to +something which is in God in Christ, the love which springs from +faith and hope not only corresponds to, but resembles, that from +which it comes and by which it lives. The fire kindled is cognate +with the fire that kindles; and the love that is in man is like the +love that is in God. It is the climax of his nature; it is the +fulfilling of all duty; it is the crown and jewelled clasp of all +perfection. And so 'abideth faith, hope, love, and the greatest of +these is love.' + +III. Lastly, what follows from all this? + +First, let us be quite sure that we understand what this abiding love +is. I dare say you have heard people say 'Ah! I do not care much +about Paul's theology. Give me the thirteenth chapter of the first +Epistle to the Corinthians. That is beautiful; that praise of Love; +_that_ comes home to men.' Yes, very beautiful. Are you quite sure +that you know what Paul means by 'love'? I do not use the word +charity, because that lovely word, like a glistening meteor that +falls upon the earth, has a rust, as it were, upon its surface that +dims its brightness very quickly. Charity has come to mean an +indulgent estimate of other people's faults; or, still more +degradingly, the giving of money out of your pockets to other +people's necessities. These are what the people who do not care much +about Paul's theology generally suppose that he means here. But these +do not exhaust his meaning. Paul's notion of love is the response of +the human love to the divine, which divine is received into the heart +by simple faith in Jesus Christ. And his notion of love which never +faileth, and endureth all things, and hopeth all things, is love to +men, which is but one stream of the great river of love to God. If we +rightly understand what he means by love, we shall find that his +praise of love is as theological as anything that he ever wrote. We +shall never get further than barren admiration of a beautiful piece +of writing, unless our love to men has the source and root to which +Paul points us. + +Again, let us take this great thought of the permanence of faith, +hope, and love as being the highest conception that we can form of +our future condition. It is very easy to bewilder ourselves with +speculations and theories of another life. I do not care much about +them. The great gates keep their secret well. Few stray beams of +light find their way through their crevices. The less we say the less +likely we are to err. It is easy to let ourselves be led away, by +turning rhetoric into revelation, and accepting the symbols of the +New Testament as if they carried anything more than images of the +realities. But far beyond golden pavements, and harps, and crowns, +and white robes, lies this one great thought that the elements of the +imperfect, Christlike life of earth are the essence of the perfect, +Godlike life in heaven. 'Now abide these three, faith, hope, love.' + +Last of all, let us shape our lives in accordance with these +certainties. The dropping away of the transient things is no argument +for neglecting or despising them; for our handling of them makes our +characters, and our characters abide. But it is a very excellent +argument for shaping our lives so as to seek first the first things, +and to secure the permanent qualities, and so to use the transient as +that it shall all help us towards that which does not pass. + +What will a Manchester man that knows nothing except goods and office +work, and knows these only in their superficial aspect, and not as +related to God, what, in the name of common-sense, will he do with +himself when he gets into a world where there is not a single ledger, +nor a desk, nor a yard of cloth of any sort? What will some of us do +when, in like manner, we are stripped of all the things that we have +cared about, and worked for, and have made our aims down here? +Suppose that you knew that you were under sailing orders to go +somewhere or other, and that at any moment a breathless messenger +might appear and say, 'Come along! we are all waiting for you'; and +suppose that you never did a single thing towards getting your outfit +ready, or preparing yourself in any way for that which might come at +any moment, and could not but come before very long. Would you be a +wise man? But that is what a great many of us are doing; doing every +day, and all day long, and doing that only. 'He shall leave them in +the midst of his days,' says a grim text, 'and at his latter end +shall be a fool.' + +What will drop? Modes of apprehension, modes of utterance, +occupations, duties, relationships, loves; and we shall be left +standing naked, stripped, as it were, to the very quick, and only as +much left as will keep our souls alive. But if we are clothed with +faith, hope, love, we shall not be found naked. Cultivate the high +things, the permanent things; then death will not wrench you +violently from all that you have been and cared for; but it will +usher you into the perfect form of all that you have been and done +upon earth. All these things will pass, but faith, hope, love, 'stay +not behind nor in the grave are trod,' but will last as long as +Christ, their Object, lives, and as long as we in Him live also. + + + + +THE POWER OF THE RESURRECTION + + 'I delivered unto you first of all that which I + also received, how that Christ died for our sins + according to the Scriptures; 4. And that He was + buried, and that He rose again the third day + according to the Scriptures.'--1 COR. xv. 3, 4. + +Christmas day is probably not the true anniversary of the Nativity, +but Easter is certainly that of the Resurrection. The season is +appropriate. In the climate of Palestine the first fruits of the +harvest were ready at the Passover for presentation in the Temple. It +was an agricultural as well as a historical festival; and the +connection between that aspect of the feast and the Resurrection of +our Lord is in the Apostle's mind when he says, in a subsequent part +of this chapter, that Christ is 'risen from the dead and become the +first fruits of them that slept.' + +In our colder climate the season is no less appropriate. The 'life +re-orient out of dust' which shows itself to-day in every bursting +leaf-bud and springing flower is Nature's parable of the spring that +awaits man after the winter of death. No doubt, apart from the +Resurrection of Jesus, the yearly miracle kindles sad thoughts in +mourning hearts, and suggests bitter contrasts to those who sorrow, +having no hope, but the grave in the garden has turned every blossom +into a smiling prophet of the Resurrection. + +And so the season, illuminated by the event, teaches us lessons of +hope that 'we shall not all die.' Let us turn, then, to the thoughts +naturally suggested by the day, and the great fact which it brings to +each mind, and confirmed thereafter by the miracle that is being +wrought round about us. + +I. First, then, in my text, I would have you note the facts of Paul's +gospel. + +'First of all ... I delivered' these things. And the 'first' not only +points to the order of time in the proclamation, but to the order of +importance as well. For these initial facts are the fundamental +facts, on which all that may follow thereafter is certainly built. +Now the first thing that strikes me here is that, whatever else the +system unfolded in the New Testament is, it is to begin with a simple +record of historical fact. It becomes a philosophy, it becomes a +religious system; it is a revelation of God; it is an unveiling of +man; it is a body of ethical precepts. It is morals and philosophy +and religion all in one; but it is first of all a story of something +that took place in the world. + +If that be so, there is a lesson for men whose work it is to preach +it. Let them never forget that their business is to insist upon the +truth of these great, supernatural, all-important, and fundamental +facts, the death and the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. They must +evolve all the deep meanings that lie in them; and the deeper they +dig for their meanings the better. They must open out the endless +treasures of consolation and enforce the omnipotent motives of action +which are wrapped up in the facts; but howsoever far they may carry +their evolving and their application of them, they will neither be +faithful to their Lord nor true stewards of their message unless, +clear above all other aspects of their work, and underlying all other +forms of their ministry, there be the unfaltering +proclamation--'first of all,' midst of all, last of all--'how that +Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,' and 'that He +was raised again according to the Scriptures.' + +Note, too, how this fundamental and original character of the gospel +which Paul preached, as a record of facts, makes short work of a +great deal that calls itself 'liberal Christianity' in these days. We +are told that it is quite possible to be a very good Christian man, +and reject the supernatural, and turn away with incredulity from the +story of the Resurrection. It may be so, but I confess that it +puzzles me to understand how, if the fundamental character of +Christian teaching be the proclamation of certain facts, a man who +does not believe those facts has the right to call himself a +Christian. + +Note, further, how there is an element of explanation involved in the +proclamation of the facts which turns them into a gospel. Mark how +'that _Christ_ died,' not _Jesus_. It is a great truth, that the man, +our Brother, Jesus, passed through the common lot, but that is not +what Paul says here, though he often says it. What he says is that +'_Christ_ died.' Christ is the name of an office, into which is +condensed a whole system of truth, declaring that it is He who is the +Apex, the Seal, and ultimate Word of all divine revelation. It was +the _Christ_ who died; unless it was so, the death of Jesus is no +gospel. + +'He died for our sins.' Now, if the Apostle had only said 'He died +for us,' that might conceivably have meant that, in a multitude of +different ways of example, appeal to our pity and compassion and the +like, His death was of use to mankind. But when he says 'He died +_for our sins_,' I take leave to think that that expression has +no meaning, unless it means that He died as the expiation and +sacrifice for men's sins. I ask you, in what intelligible sense could +Christ 'die for our sins' unless He died as bearing their punishment +and as bearing it for us? And then, finally, 'He died and rose ... +according to the Scriptures,' and so fulfilled the divine purposes +revealed from of old. + +To the fact that a man was crucified outside the gates of Jerusalem, +'and rose again the third day,' which is the narrative, there are +added these three things--the dignity of the Person, the purpose of +His death, the fulfilment of the divine intention manifested from of +old. And these three things, as I said, turn the narrative into a +Gospel. + +So, brethren, let us remember that, without all three of them, the +death of Jesus Christ is nothing to us, any more than the death of +thousands of sweet and saintly men in the past has been, who may have +seen a little more of the supreme goodness and greatness than their +fellows, and tried in vain to make purblind eyes participate in their +vision. Do you think that these twelve fishermen would ever have +shaken the world if they had gone out with the story of the Cross, +unless they had carried along with it the commentary which is +included in the words which I have emphasised? And do you suppose +that the type of Christianity which slurs over the explanation, and +so does not know what to do with the facts, will ever do much in the +world, or will ever touch men? Let us liberalise our Christianity by +all means, but do not let us evaporate it; and evaporate it we surely +shall if we falter in saying with Paul, 'I declare, first of all, +that which received,' how that the death and resurrection were the +death and resurrection of the Christ, 'for our sins, according to the +Scriptures.' These are the facts which make Paul's gospel. + +II. Now I ask you to look, in the second place, at what establishes +the facts. + +We have here, in this chapter, a statement very much older than our +existing written gospels. This epistle is one of the four letters of +Paul which nobody that I know of--with some quite insignificant +exceptions in modern times--has ever ventured to dispute. It is +admittedly the writing of the Apostle, written before the gospels, +and in all probability within five-and-twenty years of the date of +the Crucifixion. And what do we find alleged by it as the state of +things at its date? That the belief in the Resurrection of Jesus +Christ was the subject of universal Christian teaching, and was +accepted by all the Christian communities. Its evidence to that fact +is undeniable; because there was in the early Christian Church a very +formidable and large body of bitter antagonists of Paul's, who would +have been only too glad to have convicted him, if they could, of any +misrepresentation of the usual notions, or divergence from the usual +type of teaching. So we may take it as undeniable that the +representation of this chapter is historically true; and that within +five-and-twenty years of the death of Jesus Christ every Christian +community and every Christian teacher believed in and proclaimed the +fact of the Resurrection. + +But if that be so, we necessarily are carried a great deal nearer the +Cross than five-and-twenty years; and, in fact, there is not, between +the moment when Paul penned these words and the day of Pentecost, a +single chink in the history where you can insert such a tremendous +innovation as the full-fledged belief in a resurrection coming in as +something new. + +I do not need to dwell at all upon this other thought, that, unless +the belief that Jesus Christ had risen from the dead originated at +the time of His death, there would never have been a Church at all. +Why was it that they did not tumble to pieces? Take the nave out of +the wheel and what becomes of the spokes? A dead Christ could never +have been the basis of a living Church. If He had not risen from the +dead, the story of His disciples would have been the same as that +which Gamaliel told the Sanhedrim was the story of all former +pseudo-Messiahs such as that man Theudas. 'He was slain, and as many +as followed him were dispersed and came to naught.' Of course! The +existence of the Church demands, as a pre-requisite, the initial +belief in the Resurrection. I think, then, that the +contemporaneousness of the evidence is sufficiently established. + +What about its good faith? I suppose that nobody, nowadays, doubts +the veracity of these witnesses. Anybody that knows an honest man +when he sees him, anybody that has the least ear for the tone of +sincerity and the accent of conviction, must say that they may have +been fanatics, they may have been mistaken, but one thing is clear as +sunlight, they were not false witnesses for God. + +What, then, about their competency? Their simplicity, their +ignorance, their slowness to believe, their stupor of surprise when +the fact first dawned upon them, which they tell not with any idea of +manufacturing evidence in their own favour, but simply as a piece of +history, all tend to make us certain that there was no play of a +morbid imagination, no hysterical turning of a wish into a fact, on +the part of these men. The sort of things which they say that they +saw and experienced are such as to make any such supposition +altogether absurd. There are long conversations, appearances +appealing to more than one sense, appearances followed by +withdrawals, sometimes in the morning, sometimes in the evening, +sometimes at a distance, as on the mountain, sometimes close by, as +in the chamber, to single souls and to multitudes. Fancy five hundred +people all at once smitten with the same mistake, imagining that they +saw what they did not see! Miracles may be difficult to believe, they +are not half so difficult to believe as absurdities. And this modern +explanation of the faith in the Resurrection I venture respectfully +to designate as absurd. + +But there is one other point to which I would like to turn for a +moment; and that is that little clause in my text that 'He was +buried.' Why does Paul introduce that amongst his facts? Possibly in +order to affirm the reality of Christ's death; but I think for +another reason. If it be true that Jesus Christ was laid in that +sepulchre, a stone's throw outside the city gate, do you not see what +a difficulty that fact puts in the way of disbelief or denial of His +Resurrection? If the grave--and it was not a grave, remember, like +ours, but a cave, with a stone at the door of it, that anybody could +roll away for entrance--if the grave was there, why, in the name of +common-sense, did not the rulers put an end to the pestilent heresy +by saying, 'Let us go and see if the body is there'? + +Modern deniers of the Resurrection may fairly be asked to front this +thought--If Jesus Christ's body was in the sepulchre, how was it +possible for belief in the Resurrection to have been originated, or +maintained? If His body was not in the grave, what had become of it? +If His friends stole it away then they were deceivers of the worst +type in preaching a resurrection; and we have already seen that that +hypothesis is ridiculous. If His enemies took it away, for which they +had no motive, why did they not produce it and say, 'There is an +answer to your nonsense. There is the dead man. Let us hear no more +of this absurdity of His having risen from the dead'? + +'He died ... according to the Scriptures, and He was buried.' And the +angels' word carries the only explanation of the fact which it +proclaims, 'He is not here--He is risen.' + +I take leave to say that the Resurrection of Jesus Christ is +established by evidence which nobody would ever have thought of +doubting unless for the theory that miracles were impossible. The +reason for disbelief is not the deficiency of the evidence, but the +bias of the judge. + +III. And now I have no time to do more than touch the last thought. I +have tried to show what establishes the facts. Let me remind you, in +a sentence or two, what the facts establish. + +I by no means desire to suspend the whole of the evidence for +Christianity on the testimony of the eyewitnesses to the +Resurrection. There are a great many other ways of establishing the +truth of the Gospel besides that, upon which I do not need to dwell +now. But, taking this one specific ground which my text suggests, +what do the facts thus established prove? + +Well, the first point to which I would refer, and on which I should +like to enlarge, if I had time, is the bearing of Christ's +Resurrection on the acceptance of the miraculous. We hear a great +deal about the impossibility of miracle and the like. It upsets the +certainty and fixedness of the order of things, and so forth, and so +forth. Jesus Christ has risen from the dead; and that opens a door +wide enough to admit all the rest of the Gospel miracles. It is of no +use paring down the supernatural in Christianity, in order to meet +the prejudices of a quasi-scientific scepticism, unless you are +prepared to go the whole length, and give up the Resurrection. There +is the turning point. The question is, Do you believe that Jesus +Christ rose from the dead, or do you not? If your objections to the +supernatural are valid, then Christ is not risen from the dead; and +you must face the consequences of that. If He is risen from the dead, +then you must cease all your talk about the impossibility of miracle, +and be willing to accept a supernatural revelation as God's way of +making Himself known to man. + +But, further, let me remind you of the bearing of the Resurrection +upon Christ's work and claims. If He be lying in some forgotten +grave, and if all that fair thought of His having burst the bands of +death is a blunder, then there was nothing in His death that had the +least bearing upon men's sin, and it is no more to me than the deaths +of thousands in the past. But if He is risen from the dead, then the +Resurrection casts back a light upon the Cross, and we understand +that His death is the life of the world, and that 'by His stripes we +are healed.' + +But, further, remember what He said about Himself when He was in the +world--how He claimed to be the Son of God; how He demanded absolute +obedience, implicit trust, supreme love, how He identified faith in +Himself with faith in God--and consider the Resurrection as bearing +on the reception or rejection of these tremendous claims. It seems to +me that we are brought sharp up to this alternative--Jesus Christ +rose from the dead, and was declared by the Resurrection to be the +Son of God with power; or Jesus Christ has _not_ risen from the +dead--and what then? Then He was either deceiver or deceived, and in +either case has no right to my reverence and my love. We may be +thankful that men are illogical, and that many who reject the +Resurrection retain reverence, genuine and deep, for Jesus Christ. +But whether they have any right to do so is another matter. I confess +for myself that, if I did not believe that Jesus Christ had risen +from the dead, I should find it very hard to accept, as an example of +conduct, or as religious teacher, a man who had made such great +claims as He did, and had asked from me what He asked. It seems to me +that He is either a great deal more, or a great deal less, than a +beautiful saintly soul. If He rose from the dead He is much more; if +He did not, I am afraid to say how much less He is. + +And, finally, the bearing of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ upon +our own hopes of the future may be suggested. It teaches us that life +has nothing to do with organisation, but persists apart from the +body. It teaches us that a man may pass from death and be unaltered in +the substance of his being; and it teaches us that the earthly +house of our tabernacle may be fashioned like unto the glorious house +in which He dwells now at the right hand of God. There is no other +absolute proof of immortality than the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. + +If we accept with all our hearts and minds Paul's Gospel in its +fundamental facts, we need not fear to die, because He has died, and +by dying has been the death of death. We need not doubt that we shall +live again, because He was dead and is alive for ever more. This +Samson has carried away the gates on His strong shoulders, and death +is no more a dungeon but a passage. If we rest ourselves upon Him, +then we can take up, for ourselves and for all that are dear to us +and have gone before us, the triumphant song, 'O Death, where is thy +sting?' 'Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our +Lord Jesus Christ.' + + + + +REMAINING AND FALLING ASLEEP + + 'After that He was seen of above five hundred brethren + at once; of whom the greater part remain unto this + present, but some are fallen asleep.'--1 COR. xv. 6. + + +There were, then, some five-and-twenty years after the Resurrection, +several hundred disciples who were known amongst the churches as +having been eyewitnesses of the risen Saviour. The greater part +survived; some, evidently a very few, had died. The proportion of the +living to the dead, after five-and-twenty years, is generally the +opposite. The greater part have 'fallen asleep'; some, a +comparatively few, remain 'unto this present.' Possibly there was +some divine intervention which supernaturally prolonged the lives of +these witnesses, in order that their testimony might be the more +lasting. But, be that as it may, they evidently were men of mark, and +some kind of honour and observance surrounded them, as was very +natural, and as appears from the fact that Paul here knows so +accurately (and can appeal to His fellow-Christians' accurate +knowledge) the proportion between the survivors and the departed. We +read of one of them in the Acts of the Apostles at a later date than +this, one Mnason, an 'original disciple.' + +So we get a glimpse into the conditions of life in the early Church, +interesting and of value in an evidential point of view. But my +purpose at present is to draw your attention to the remarkable +language in which the Apostle here speaks of the living and the dead +amongst these witnesses. In neither case does he use the simple, +common words 'living' or 'dead'; but in the one clause he speaks of +their 'remaining,' and in the other of their 'falling asleep'; both +phrases being significant, and, as I take it, both being traced up to +the fact of their having seen the risen Lord as the cause why their +life could be described as a 'remaining,' and their death as a +'falling asleep.' In other words, we have here brought before us, by +these two striking expressions, the transforming effect upon life and +upon death of the faith in a risen Lord, whether grounded on sight or +not. And it is simply to these two points that I desire to turn now. + +I. First, then, we have to consider what life may become to those who +see the risen Christ. + +'The greater part remain until this present.' Now the word _remain_ +is no mere synonym for living or surviving. It not only tells us the +fact that the survivors were living, but the kind of life that they +did live. It is very significant that it is the same expression as +our Lord used in the profound prophetic words, 'If I will that he +tarry till I come, what is that to thee?' Now we are told in John's +Gospel that 'that saying went abroad amongst the brethren,' and +inasmuch as it was a matter of common notoriety in the early Church, +it is by no means a violent supposition that it may be floating in +Paul's memory here, and may determine his selection of this +remarkable expression 'they remain,' or 'they tarry,' and they were +tarrying till the Master came. So, then, I think if we give due +weight to the significance of the phrase, we get two or three +thoughts worth pondering. + +One of them is that the sight of a risen Christ will make life calm +and tranquil. Fancy one of these 500 brethren, after that vision, +going back to his quiet rural home in some little village amongst the +hills of Galilee. How small and remote from Him, and unworthy to +ruffle or disturb the heart in which the memory of that vision was +burning, would seem the things that otherwise would have been +important and distracting! The faith which we have in the risen +Christ ought to do the same thing for us, and will do it in the +measure in which there shines clearly before that inward eye, which +is our true means of apprehending Him, the vision which shone before +the outward gaze of that company of wondering witnesses. If we build +our nests amidst the tossing branches of the world's trees, they will +sway with every wind, and perhaps be blown from their hold altogether +by such a storm as we all have sometimes to meet. But we may build +our nests in the clefts of the rock, like the doves, and be quiet, as +they are. Distractions will cease to distract, and troubles will +cease to agitate, and across the heaving surface of the great ocean +there will come a Form beneath whose feet the waves smooth +themselves, and at whose voice the winds are still. They who see +Christ need not be troubled. The ship that is empty is tossed upon +the ocean, that which is well laden is steady. The heart that has +Christ for a passenger need not fear being rocked by any storm. +Calmness will come with the vision of the Lord, and we shall abide or +'remain,' for there will be no need for us to flee from this Refuge +to that, nor shall we be driven from our secure abode by any +contingencies. 'He that believeth shall not make haste.' + +It is a good thing to cultivate the disposition that says about most +of the trifles of this life, 'It does not much matter'; but the only +way to prevent wholesome contempt of the world's trivialities from +degenerating into supercilious indifference is, to base it upon +Christ, discerned as near us and bestowing upon us the calmness of +His risen life. Make Him your scale of importance, and nothing will +be too small to demand and be worthy of the best efforts of your +work, but nothing will be too great to sweep you away from the +serenity of your faith. + +Again, the vision of the risen Christ will also lead to patient +persistence in duty. If we have Him before us, the distasteful duty +which He sets us will not be distasteful, and the small tasks, in +which great faithfulness may be manifested, will cease to be small. +If we have Him before us we have in that risen Christ the great and +lasting Example of how patient continuance in well-doing triumphs +over the sorrows that it bears, by and in patiently bearing them, and +is crowned at last with glory and honour. The risen Christ is the +Pattern for the men who will not be turned aside from the path of +duty by any obstacles, dangers, or threats. The risen Christ is the +signal Example of glory following upon faithfulness, and of the crown +being the result of the Cross. The risen Christ is the manifest +Helper of them that put their trust in Him; and one of the plainest +lessons and of the most imperative commands which come from the +believing gaze upon that Lord who died because He would do the will +of the Father, and is throned and crowned in the heavens because He +died, is--By patient continuance in well-doing let us commit the +keeping of our souls to Him: and abide in the calling wherewith we +are called. + +And, again, the sight of the risen Christ leads to a life of calm +expectancy. 'If I will that He _tarry_ till I come' conveys that +shade of meaning. The Apostle was to wait for the Lord from Heaven, +and that vision which was given to these 500 men sent them home to +their abodes to make all the rest of their lives one calm aspiration +for, and patient expectation of, the return of the Lord. These +primitive Christians expected that Jesus Christ would come speedily. +That expectation was disappointed in so far as the date was +concerned, but after nineteen centuries it still remains true that +all vigorous and vital Christian life must have in it, as a very +important element of its vitality, the onward look which ever is +anticipating, which often is desiring, and which constantly is +confident of, the coming of the Lord from Heaven. The Resurrection +has for its consequences, its sequel and corollary, first the +Ascension; then the long tract of time during which Jesus Christ is +absent, but still in divine presence rules the world; and, finally, +His coming again in that same body in which the disciples saw Him +depart from them. And no Christian life is up to the level of its +privileges, nor has any Christian faith grasped the whole articles of +its creed, except that which sets in the very centre of all its +visions of the future that great thought--He shall come again. + +Questions of chronology have nothing to do with that. It stands there +before us, the certain fact, made certain and inevitable by the past +facts of the Cross and the Grave and Olivet. He has come, He will +come; He has gone, He will come back. And for us the life that we +live in the flesh ought to be a life of waiting for God's Son from +Heaven, and of patient, confident expectancy that when He shall be +manifested we also shall be manifested with Him in glory. + +So much, then, for life--calm, persistent in every duty, and animated +by that blessed and far-off, but certain, hope, and all of these +founded upon the vision and the faith of a risen Lord. What have +fears and cares and distractions and faint-heartedness and gloomy +sorrow to do with the eyes that have beheld the Christ, and with the +lives that are based on faith in the risen Lord? + +II. So, secondly, consider what death becomes to those who have seen +Christ risen from the dead. + +'Some are fallen asleep.' Now that most natural and obvious metaphor +for death is not only a Christian idea, but is found, as would be +expected, in many tongues, but yet with a great and significant +difference. The Christian reason for calling death a sleep embraces a +great deal more than the heathen reason for doing so, and in some +respects is precisely the opposite of that, inasmuch as to most +others who have used the word, death has been a sleep that knew no +waking, whereas the very pith and centre of the Christian reason for +employing the symbol are that it makes our waking sure. We have here +what the act of dying and the condition of the dead become by virtue +of faith in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. + +They have 'fallen asleep.' The act of dying is but a laying one's +self down to rest, and a dropping out of consciousness of the +surrounding world. It is very remarkable and very beautiful that the +new Testament scarcely ever employs the words _dying_ and _death_ for +the act of separating body and spirit, or for the condition either of +the spirit parted from the body, or of the body parted from the +spirit. It keeps those grim words for the reality, the separation of +the soul from God; and it only exceptionally uses them for the shadow +and the symbol, the physical fact of the parting of the man from the +house which here he has dwelt in. But the reason why Christianity +uses these periphrases or metaphors, these euphemisms for death, is +the opposite of the reason why the world uses them. The world is so +afraid of dying that it durst not name the grim, ugly thing. The +Christian, or at least the Christian faith, is so little afraid of +death that it does not think such a trivial matter worth calling by +the name, but only names it 'falling asleep.' + +Even when the circumstances of that dropping off to slumber are +painful and violent, the Bible still employs the term. Is it not +striking that the first martyr, kneeling outside the city, bruised by +stones and dying a bloody death, should have been said to fall +asleep? If ever there was an instance in which the gentle metaphor +seemed all inappropriate it was that cruel death, amidst a howling +crowd, and with fatal bruises, and bleeding limbs mangled by the +heavy rocks that lay upon them. But yet, 'when he had said this he +fell asleep.' If that be true of such a death, no physical pains of +any kind make the sweet word inappropriate for any. + +We have here not only the designation of the act of dying, but that +of the condition of the dead. They are fallen asleep, and they +continue asleep. How many great thoughts gather round that metaphor +on which it is needless for me to try to dilate! They will suggest +themselves without many words to you all. + +There lies in it the idea of repose. 'They rest from their labours.' +Sleep restores strength, and withdraws a man at once from effort on +the outer world, and from communication from it. We may carry the +analogy into that unseen world. We know nothing about the relations +to an external universe of the departed who sleep in Jesus. It may be +that, if they sleep in Him, since He knows all, they, through Him, +may know, too, something--so much as He pleases to impart to them--of +what is happening here. And it may even be that, if they sleep in +Him, and He wields the energies of Omnipotence, they, through Him, +may have some service to do, even while they wait for their house +which is from heaven. But there is no need for, nor profit in, such +speculations. It is enough that the sweet emblem suggests repose, and +that in that sleep there are folded around the sleepers the arms of +the Christ on whose bosom they rest, as an infant does on its first +and happiest home--its mother's breast. + +But then, besides that, the emblem suggests the idea of continuous +and conscious existence. A man asleep does not cease to be a man; a +dead man does not cease to live. It has often been argued from this +metaphor that we are to conceive of the space between death and the +resurrection as being a period of unconsciousness, but the analogies +seem to me to be in the opposite direction. A sleeping man does not +cease to know himself to be, and he does not cease to know himself to +be himself. That mysterious consciousness of personal identity +survives the passage from waking to sleep, as dreams sufficiently +show us. And, therefore, they that sleep know themselves to be. + +And, finally, the emblem suggests the idea of waking. Sleep is a +parenthesis. If the night comes, the morning comes. 'If winter comes, +can spring be far behind?' They that sleep will awake, and be +satisfied when they 'awake with Thy likeness.' And so these three +things--repose, conscious, continuous existence, and the certainty of +awaking--all lie in that metaphor. + +Now, then, the risen Christ is the only ground of such hope, and +faith in Him is the only state of mind which is entitled to cherish +it. Nothing proves immortality except that open grave. Every other +foundation is too weak to bear the weight of such a superstructure. +The current of present opinion shows, I think, that neither +metaphysical nor ethical arguments for the future life will stand the +force of the disintegrating criticism which is brought to bear upon +that hope by the fashionable materialism of this generation. There is +one barrier that will resist that force, and only one, and that is +the historical facts that Jesus Christ died, and that Jesus Christ +has risen again. He rose; therefore death is not the end of +individual existence. He rose; therefore life beyond the grave is +possible for humanity. He rose; therefore His sacrifice for the +world's sin is accepted, and I may be delivered from my guilt and my +burden. He rose; therefore He is declared to be the Son of God with +power. He rose; therefore we, if we trust Him, may partake in His +Resurrection and in some reflection of His glory. The old Greek +architects were often careless of the solidity of the soil on which +they built their temples, and so, many of them have fallen in ruins. +The Temple of Immortality can be built only upon the rock of that +proclamation--Jesus Christ is risen from the dead. And we, dear +brethren, should have all our hopes founded upon that one fact. + +So then, for us, the calm, peaceful passage from life into what else +is the great darkness is possible on condition of our having beheld +the risen Lord. These witnesses of whom my text speaks, Paul would +suggest to us, laid themselves quietly down to sleep, because before +them there still hovered the memory of the vision which they had +beheld. Faith in the risen Christ is the anchor of the soul in death, +and there is nothing else by which we can hold then. + +As the same Apostle, in one of his other letters, puts it, the belief +that Christ is risen is not only the irrefragable ground of our hope +that we, too, shall rise, but has the power to change the whole +aspect of our death. Did you ever observe the emphasis with which He +says, 'If we believe that Jesus _died_ and rose again, even so +them also which _sleep_ in Jesus will God bring with Him?' His +death was death indeed, and faith in it softens ours to sleep. He +bore the reality that we might never need to know it, and if our poor +hearts are resting upon that dear Lord, then the flames are but +painted ones and will not burn, and we shall pass through them, and +no smell of fire will be upon us, and all that will be consumed will +be the bonds which bind us. He has abolished death. The physical fact +remains, but all which to men makes the idea of death is gone if we +trust the risen Lord. So that, between two men dying under precisely +the same circumstances, of the same disease, in adjacent beds in the +same hospital, there may be such a difference as that the same word +cannot be applied to the experiences of both. + +My dear friends, we have each of us to pass through that last +struggle; but we may make it either a quiet going to sleep with a +loved Face bending over our closing eyes, like a mother's over her +child's cradle, and the same Face meeting us when we open them in the +morning of heaven; or we may make it a reluctant departure from all +that we care for, and a trembling advance into all from which +conscience and heart shrink. + +Which is it going to be to you? The answer depends upon that to +another question. Are you looking to that Christ that died and is +alive for evermore as your life and your salvation? Do you hold fast +that Gospel which Paul preached, 'how that Christ died for our sins +according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose +again the third day, according to the Scriptures'? If you do, life +will be a calm, persevering, expectant waiting upon Him, and death +will be nothing more terrible than falling asleep. + + + + +PAUL'S ESTIMATE OF HIMSELF + + 'By the grace of God I am what I am: and His grace + which was bestowed upon me was not in vain.'--1 COR. xv. 10. + + +The Apostle was, all his life, under the hateful necessity of +vindicating his character and Apostleship. Thus here, though his main +purpose in the context is simply to declare the Gospel which he +preached, he is obliged to turn aside in order to assert, and to back +up his assertion, that there was no sort of difference between him +and the other recognised teachers of Christian truth. He was forced +to do this by persistent endeavours in the Corinthian Church to deny +his Apostleship, and the faithfulness of his representation of the +Christian verities. The way in which he does it is eminently +beautiful and remarkable. He fires up in vindication of himself; and +then he checks himself. 'By the grace of God I am'--and he is going +to say what he is, but he bethinks himself, as if he had reflected; +'No! I will leave other people to say what that is. By the grace of +God I am--what I am, whatever that be. And all that I have to say is +that God made me, and that I helped Him. For the grace of God which +was bestowed upon me was not in vain. You Corinthians may judge what +the product is. I tell you how it has come about.' So there are +thoughts here, I think, well worth our pondering and taking into our +hearts and lives. + +I. First, as to the one power that makes men. + +'By the grace of God I am what I am.' Now that word 'grace' has got +to be worn threadbare, and to mean next door to nothing, in the ears +and minds of a great many continual hearers of the Gospel. But +Paul had a very definite idea of what he meant by it; and what he +meant by it was a very large thing, which we may well ponder for a +moment as being the only thing which will transform and ennoble +character and will produce fruit that a man need not be ashamed of. +The grace of God, in Paul's use of the words, which is the scriptural +use of them generally, implies these two things which are connected +as root and product--the active love of God, in exercise towards us +low and sinful creatures, and the gifts with which that love comes +full charged to men. These two things, which at bottom are one, love +and its gifts, are all, in the Apostle's judgment, gathered up and +stored, as in a great storehouse, in Jesus Christ Himself, and +through Him are made accessible to us, and brought to bear upon us +for the ennobling of our natures, and the investing of us with graces +and beauties of character, all strange to us apart from these. + +Now it seems to me that these two things, which come from one root, +are the precise things which you and I need in order to make us +nobler and purer and more Godlike men than otherwise we could ever +become. For what is it that men need most for noble and pure living? +These two things precisely--motive and power to carry out the +dictates of conscience. + +Every man in the world knows enough of duty and of right to be a far +nobler man than any man in the world is. And it is not for want of +clear convictions of duty, it is not for want of recognised models +and patterns of life, that men go wrong; but it is because there are +these two things lacking, motives for nobler service, and power to do +and be what they know they ought to be. And precisely here Paul's +gospel comes in, 'By the grace of God I am what I am.' That grace, +considered in its two sides of love and of giving, supplies all that +we want. + +It supplies motives. There is nothing that will bend a man's will +like the recognition of divine love which it is blessedness to come +in contact with, and to obey. You may try to sway him by motives of +advantage and self-interest, and to thunder into his ears the pealing +words of duty and right and 'ought,' and there is no adequate +response. You cannot soften a heart by the hammers of the law. You +cannot force a man to do right by brandishing before him the whip +that punishes doing wrong. You cannot sway the will by anything but +the heart; and when you can touch the deepest spring it moves the +whole mass. + +You have seen some ponderous piece of machinery, which resists all +attempts of a puny hand laid upon it to make it revolve. But down in +one corner is a little hidden spring. Touch that and with majestic +slowness and certainty the mighty mass turns. You know those +rocking-stones down in the south of England; tons of weight poised +upon a pin point, and so exquisitely balanced that a child's finger +rightly applied may move the mass. So the whole man is made mobile +only by the touch of love; and the grace that comes to us, and says, +'If ye love Me, keep My commandments'--is, as I believe, the sole +motive which will continuously and adequately sway the rebellious, +self-centred wills of men, to obedience resulting in nobility of +life. + +The other aspect of this same great word is, in like manner, that +which we need. What men want is, first of all, the will to be noble +and good; and, second, the power to carry out the will. It is God +that worketh in us both the willing and the doing. I venture to +affirm that there is no power known, either to thinkers, or +philanthropists, or doctrinaires, or strivers after excellence in the +world--no power known and available which will lift a life to such +heights of beauty and self-sacrificing nobility, as will the power +that comes to us by communication of the grace that is in Jesus +Christ. + +I am perpetually trying to insist, dear brethren, upon this one +thought, that the communication of actual new life is the central +gift of the Gospel; and this new life it is, this nature endowed with +new desires, hopes, aims, capacities, which alone will lift the whole +man into unwonted heights of beauty and serenity. It is the grace of +God, the gift of His Divine Spirit who will dwell with all of us, if +we will, which alone can be trusted to make men good. + +And now, if that be true, what follows? Surely this, that for all you +who have, in any measure, caught a glimpse of what you ought to be, +and have been more or less vainly trying to realise your ideal, and +reach your goal, there is a better way than the way of self-centred +and self-derived and self-dependent effort. There is the way of +opening your hearts and spirits to the entrance and access of that +great power, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, which will do in us +and for us all that we know we ought to do, and yet feel hampered and +hindered in performing. + +Oh, dear friends! there are many of you, I believe, who have more or +less spasmodically and interruptedly, but with a continual recurrence +to the effort, sought to plant your feet firmly in the paths of +righteousness, and have more or less failed. Listen to this Gospel, +and accept it, and put it to the proof. The love of God which is in +Christ Jesus, and the life which that love brings in its hands, for +all of us who will trust it, will dwell in you if you will, and mould +you into His own likeness, and the law of the spirit of life which +was in Christ Jesus will make us free from the law of sin and death. + +All noble living is a battle. Can you and I, with our ten thousand, +meet him that cometh against us with his twenty, the temptations of +the world and of its Prince? Send for the reinforcements, and Jesus +Christ will come and teach your hands to war and your fingers to +fight. All noble life is self-denial, coercion, restraint; and can my +poor, feeble hands apply muscular force enough to the brake to keep +the wheels clogged, and prevent them from whirling me downhill into +ruin? Let Him come and put His great gentle hand on the top of yours, +and that will enable you to scotch the wheels, and make self-denial +possible. All noble life is a building up by slow degrees from the +foundation. And can you and I complete the task with our own limited +resources, and our own feeble strengths? Will not 'all that pass by +begin to mock' us and say, 'This man began to build and was not able +to finish'? That is the epitaph written over all moralities and over +all lives which, catching some glimpse of the good and the true and +the noble, have tried, apart from Christ, to reproduce them in +themselves. Frightful gaps, and an unfinished, however fair structure +end them all. Go to Him. 'His hand hath laid the foundation of the +house, His hand shall also finish it.' He who is Himself the +foundation-stone is also the headstone of the corner, which is +brought forth with shouting of 'Grace! Grace unto it!' + +I need not, I suppose, linger to remind you what important and large +lessons these thoughts carry, not only for men who are trying to work +at the task of mending and making their own characters, but on the +larger scale, for all who seek to benefit and elevate their fellows. +Brethren, it is not for me to depreciate any workers who, in any +department, and by any methods, seek, and partially effect, the +elevation of humanity. But I should be untrue to my own deepest +convictions, and unfaithful to the message which God's providence has +given it to me as my life's task to proclaim, if I did not declare +that nothing will truly _re-form_ humanity, society, the nation, the +city, except that which re-creates the individual: 'the grace of our +Lord Jesus Christ' entering into their midst. + +II. And so, secondly, and very briefly, notice the lesson we get here +as to how we should think of our own attainments. + +I have already pointed out that there are two beautiful touches in my +text. The Apostle traces everything that he is, in his character and +in his Christian standing and in his Apostolic work and success, to +that grace that has come down upon him, and clothed his nakedness +with so glorious a garment. And then, in addition to that, he +modestly, and with a fine sense of dignity, refrains from parading +his attainments or his achievements, and says, 'It is not for me to +estimate what I am; it is for you to do it.' True, indeed, in the +next verse he does set forth, in very lofty language, his claims to +be in nothing behind the very chiefest of the Apostles, and 'to have +laboured more abundantly than they all.' But still the spirit of that +humble and yet dignified silence runs through the whole context. 'By +the grace of God I am--what I am.' + +Well, then, it is not necessary for a man to be ignorant, or to +pretend that he is ignorant, of what he can do. We hear a great deal +about the unconsciousness of genius. There is a partial truth in it; +and possibly the highest examples of power and success, in any +department of mental or intellectual effort, are unaware of their +achievements and stature. But if a man can do a certain kind of +service there is no harm whatever in his recognising the fact that he +can do it. The only harm is in his thinking that because he can, he is +a very fine fellow, and that the work itself is a great work; and +so setting himself up above his brethren. There is a vast deal of +hypocrisy in what is called unconsciousness of power. Most men who +have been chosen and empowered to do a great work for God or for men, +in any department, have been aware that they could do it. But the +less we think about ourselves, in any way, the better. The more +entire our recognition of the influx of grace on which we depend for +keeping our reservoir full, the less likelihood there will be of +touchy self-assertion, the less likelihood of the misuse of the +powers that we have. If we are to do much for God, if we are to keep +what we have already attained, if we are to make our own lives sweet +and beautiful, if we are to be invested with any increase of +capacity, or led to any higher heights of nobleness and +Christlikeness, we must copy, and make a conscious effort to copy, +these two things, which marked the Apostle's estimate of himself--a +distinct recognition that we are only reservoirs and nothing +more--'What hast thou that thou hast not received? Why then dost thou +glory as if thou hadst not received it?'--and a humble waiving aside +of the attempt to determine what it is that we are. For however +clearly a man may know his own powers and achievements, it is hard +for him to estimate the relations of these to his whole character. + +So, dear brethren, although it is a very homely piece of advice, and +may seem to be beneath the so-called dignity of the pulpit, let me +venture just to remind you that self-conceit is no disease peculiar +to the ten-talented people, but is quite as rife, if not a good deal +rifer, among those with one talent. They are very humble when it +comes to work, and are quite contented to wrap the one talent up in a +napkin then; but when it comes to self-assertion, or what they expect +to receive of recognition from others, they need to be reminded quite +as much as their betters in endowment--'By the grace of God I am what +I am.' + +III. And so, lastly, one word about the responsibility for our +co-operation with the grace, in order to the accomplishment of its +results. + +'The grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain,' says Paul. +'Not I, but the grace of God which was with me, and so I laboured +more abundantly than they all.' That is to say, God in His giving +love; Christ with His ever out-flowing Spirit, move round our hearts, +and desire to enter. But the grace, the love, the gifts of the love +may all be put away by our unfaithfulness, by our non-receptivity, by +our misuse, and by our negligence. Paul yielded himself to the grace +that was brought to work upon him. Have you yielded yourselves? + +Paul said, 'By the grace of God I am what I am.' He could not have +said that, could he, if he had known that the most part of what he +was was dead against God's will and purpose? Has God anything to do +with making you what you are, or has it been the devil that has had +the greater share in it? This man, because he knew that he had +submitted himself to the often painful, searching, crucifying, +self-restraining and stimulating influences of the Gospel and Spirit +of Christ, could say, 'God's grace has made me what I am, and I +helped Him to make me.' And can you say anything like that? + +Take your life. In how many of its deeds has there been present the +consciousness of God and His love? Take your character. How much of +it has been shot through and through, so to speak, by the fiery darts +of that cleansing, warming, consuming grace of God? Are you daily +being baptized in that Spirit, searched by that Spirit, condemned by +that grace? Is it the grace of God, or nature and self and the world +and the flesh that have made you what you are? + +Oh, brethren I let us cultivate the sense of our need of this divine +help, for it does not come where men do not know how weak they are, +and how much they want it. The mountain tops are high,--yes! and they +are dry; there is no water there. The rivers run in the green valleys +deep down. 'God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble.' +Let us see that we open our hearts to the reception of these +quickening and cleansing influences, for it is possible for us to +cover ourselves over with such an impenetrable covering that that +grace cannot pass through it. Let us see to it that we keep ourselves +in close contact with the foundation of all this grace, even Jesus +Christ Himself, by desire, by faith, by love, by communion, by +meditation, by approximation, by sympathy, by service. And let us see +that we use the grace that we possess. 'For to him that hath shall be +given, and from him that hath not'--not possessing in any real sense +because not utilising for its appointed purpose--'shall be taken away +even that he hath.' Wherefore, brethren, I 'beseech you that ye +receive not the grace of God in vain.' + + + + +THE UNITY OF APOSTOLIC TEACHING + + 'Whether it were I or they, so we preach, + and so ye believed.'--1 COR. xv. 11. + + +Party spirit and faction were the curses of Greek civic life, and +they had crept into at least one of the Greek churches--that in the +luxurious and powerful city of Corinth. We know that there was a very +considerable body of antagonists to Paul, who ranked themselves under +the banner of Apollos or of Cephas _i.e._ Peter. Therefore, Paul, +keenly conscious that he was speaking to some unfriendly critics, +hastens in the context to remove the possible objection which might +be made, that the Gospel which he preached was peculiar to himself, +and proceeds to assert that the whole substance of what he had to say +to men, was held with unbroken unanimity by the other apostles. +'They' means all of _them_; and 'so' means the summary of the Gospel +teaching in the preceding verses. + +Now, Paul would not have ventured to make that assertion, in the face +of men whom he knew to be eager to pick holes in anything that he +said, unless he had been perfectly sure of his ground. There were +broad differences between him and the others. But their partisans +might squabble, as is often the case, and the men, whose partisans +they were, be unanimous. There were differences of individual +character, of temper, and of views about certain points of Christian +truth. But there was an unbroken front of unanimity in regard to all +that lies within the compass of that little word which covers so much +ground--'_So_ we preach.' + +Now, I wish to turn to that outstanding fact--which does not always +attract the attention which it deserves--of the absolute identity of +the message which all the apostles and primitive teachers delivered, +and to seek to enforce some of the considerations and lessons which +seem to me naturally to flow from it. + +I. First, then, I ask you to think of the fact itself--the unbroken +unanimity of the whole body of Apostolic teachers. + +As I have said, there were wide differences of characteristics +between them, but there was a broad tract of teaching wherein they +all agreed. Let me briefly gather up the points of unanimity, the +contents of the one Gospel, which every man of them felt was his +message to the world. I may take it all from the two clauses in the +preceding context, 'how that Christ died for our sins according to +the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the +third day according to the Scriptures.' These are the things about +which, as Paul declares, there was not the whisper of a dissentient +voice. There is the vital centre which he declares every Christian +teacher grasped as being the essential of his message, and in various +tones and manners, but in substantial identity of content, declared +to the world. + +Now, what lies in it? The Person spoken of--the Christ, and all that +that word involves of reference to the ancient and incomplete +Revelation in the past, its shadows and types, its prophecies and +ceremonies, its priesthood and its sacrifices; with all that it +involves of reference to the ancient hopes on which a thousand +generations had lived, and which either are baseless delusions, or +are realised in Jesus--the Person whom all the Apostles proclaimed +was One anointed from God as Prophet, Priest, and King; who had come +into the world to fulfil all that the ancient system had shadowed by +sacrifice, temple, and priest, and was the Monarch of Israel and of +the world. + +And not only were they absolutely unanimous in regard to the Person, +but they were unbrokenly consentient in regard to the facts of His +life, His death, and His Resurrection. But the proclamation of the +external fact is no gospel. You must add the clause 'for our sins,' +and then the record, which is a mere piece of history, with no more +good news in it than the record of the death of any other martyr, +hero, or saint, starts into being truly the good news for the world. +The least part of a historical fact is the fact; the greatest part of +it is the explanation of the fact, and the setting it in its place in +regard to other facts, the exhibition of the principles which it +expresses, and of the conclusions to which it leads. So the bare +historical declaration of a death and a resurrection is transmuted +into a gospel, by that which is the most important part of the +Gospel, the explanation of the meaning of the fact--'He died for our +sins.' + +If redemption from sin through the death of a Person is the +fundamental conception of the Gospel for the world, then it is clear +that, for such a purpose, a divine nature in the Person is wanted. +Your notion of what Christ came to do will determine your notion of +who He is. If you only recognise that His work is to teach, +or to show in exercise a fair human character, then you may rest +content with the lower notion of His nature which sees in Him but the +foremost of the sons of men. But if we grasp 'died for our sins,' +then for such a task the incarnation of the Eternal Son of God is the +absolute pre-requisite. + +Still further, our text brings out the contents of this gospel as +being the declaration of the Resurrection. On that I need not here +and now dwell at any length. But these are the points, the Person, +the two facts, death and resurrection, and the great meaning of the +death--viz. the expiation for the world's sins: these are the things +on which the whole of the primitive teachers of the Apostolic Church +had one voice and one message. + +Now, I do not suppose that I need spend any time in showing to you +how the extant records bear out, absolutely, this contention of the +Apostle's. I need only remind you how the opposition that was waged +against him--and it was a very vigorous and a very bitter +opposition--from a section of the Church, had no bearing at all upon +the question of what he taught, but only upon the question of to whom +it was to be taught. The only objection that the so-called Judaising +party in the early Church had against Paul and his preaching, was not +the Gospel that he declared, but his assertion that the Gentile +nations might enter into the Church through faith in Jesus Christ, +without passing through the gate of circumcision. Depend upon it, if +there had been any, even the most microscopic, divergence on his part +from the general, broad stream of Christian teaching, the sleepless, +keen-eyed, unscrupulous enemies that dogged him all his days would +have pounced upon it eagerly, and would never have ceased talking +about it. But not one of them ever said a word of the sort, but +allowed his teaching to pass, because it was the teaching of every +one of the apostles. + +If I had time, or if it were necessary, it would be easy to point you +to the records that we have left of the Apostolic teaching, in order +to confirm this unbroken unanimity. I do not need to spend time on +that. Proof-texts are not worth so much as the fact that these +doctrines are interwoven into the whole structure of the New +Testament as a whole--just as they are into Paul's letters. But I may +gather one or two sayings, in which the substance of each writer's +teaching has been concentrated by himself. For instance, Peter speaks +about being 'redeemed by the precious blood of Christ as of a Lamb +without blemish and without spot,' and declares that 'He Himself bare +our sins in His own body on the tree.' John comes in with his +doxology: 'Unto Him that loved us, and loosed us from our sins in His +own blood'; and it is his pen that records how in the heavens there +echoed 'glory and honour and thanks and blessing, for ever and ever, +to the Lamb that was slain, and has redeemed us unto God by His +blood.' The writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews, steeped as he is in +ceremonial and sacrificial ideas, and having for his one purpose to +work out the thought that Jesus Christ is all that the ancient +ritual, sacerdotal and sacrificial system shadows and foretells, sums +up his teaching in the statement that Christ having come, a high +priest of good things to come, 'through His own blood, entered in, +once for all, into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption +for us.' + +There were limits to the unanimity, as I have already said. Paul and +Peter had a great quarrel about circumcision and related subjects. +The Apostolic writings are wondrously diverse from one another. Peter +is far less constructive and profound than Paul. Paul and Peter are +both untouched with the mystic wisdom of the Apostle John. But, in +regard to the facts that I have signalised, the divinity, the person +of Jesus Christ, His death and Resurrection, and the significance to +be attached to that death, they are absolutely one. The instruments +in the orchestra are various, the tender flute, the ringing trumpet, +and many another, but the note they strike is the same. 'Whether it +were I or they, so we preach.' + +II. Now, let me ask you to consider the only explanation of this +unanimity. + +Time was when the people, who did not believe in Christ's divinity +and sacrificial death, tortured themselves to try and make out +meanings for these epistles, which should not include the obnoxious +doctrines. That is nearly antiquated. I suppose that there is nobody +now, or next to nobody, who does not admit that, right or wrong, +Paul, Peter, John--all of them--teach these two things, that Christ +is the Eternal Son of the Father, and that His death is the Sacrifice +for the world's sin. But they say that that is not the primitive, +simple teaching of the Man of Nazareth; and that the unanimity is a +unanimity of misapprehension of, and addition to, His words and to +the drift of His teaching. + +Now, just think what a huge--I was going to say--inconceivability +that supposition is. For there is no point, say from the time at +which the Apostle who wrote the words of my text, which was somewhere +about the year 56 or 57 A.D.,--there is no point between that period, +working backwards through the history of the Church to the +Crucifixion, where you can insert such a tremendous revolution of +teaching as this. There is no trace of such a change. Peter's +earliest speeches, as recorded in Acts, are in some important +respects less developed doctrinally than are the epistles, but +Christ's Messiahship, death, and Resurrection, with which is +connected the remission of sins, are as clearly and emphatically +proclaimed as at any later time. So these points of the Apostolic +testimony were preached from the first, and, if in preaching them, +the witnesses perverted the simple teaching of the Carpenter of +Nazareth, and ascribed to Him a character which He had not claimed, +and to His death a power of which He had not dreamed, they did so at +the very time when the impressions of His personality and teaching +were most recent and strong. It seems to me, apart altogether from +other considerations, that such a right-about-face movement on the +part of the early teachers of Christianity, is an absolute +impossibility, regard being had to the facts of the case, even if you +make much allowance for possible errors in the record. + +But I would make another remark. If misapprehension came in, if these +men, in their unanimous declaration of Christ's death as the +Sacrifice for sin, were not fairly representing the conclusions +inevitable from the facts of Christ's life and death, and from His +own words, is it not an odd thing that the same misapprehension +affected them all? When people misconceive a teacher's doctrine, they +generally differ in the nature of their misconceptions, and split +into sections and parties. But here you have to account for the fact +that every man of them, with all their diversity of idiosyncrasy and +character, tumbled into the same pit of error, and that there was not +one of them left sane enough to protest. Does that seem to be a +likely thing? + +And what about the worth of the teacher's teaching, that did not +guard its receivers from such absolute misapprehension as that? If +the whole Church unanimously mistook everything that Jesus Christ had +said to them, and unwarrantably made out of Him what they did, on +this hypothesis, I do not think that there is much left to honour or +admire in a teacher, whose teaching was so ambiguous, as that it led +all that received it into such an error as that into which, by the +supposition, they fell. + +No, brethren; they were one, because their Gospel was the only +possible statement of the principles that underlay, and the +conclusions that flowed from, the plain facts of the life and the +teaching of Jesus Christ. I am not going to spend time in quoting His +own words. I can only refer to one or two of them very succinctly. +'Destroy this Temple, and in three days I will raise it up.' 'As +Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son +of Man be lifted up.' 'My flesh is the bread which I will give for +the life of the world.' 'The Son of Man came not to be ministered +unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many.' 'This +is My body broken for you; take, eat, in remembrance of Me.' 'This is +My blood, shed for many for the remission of sins; this do ye, as +often as ye drink it, in remembrance of Me.' What possible +explanation, doing justice to these words, is there, except 'Jesus +Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures'? And how could +men who had heard them with their own ears, and with their own eyes +had seen Him risen from the dead and ascending into heaven, do +otherwise than eagerly, enthusiastically, at the cost of all, and +with unhesitating voice of unbroken unanimity, 'so preach'? + +I quite admit that in Christ's teaching in the gospels you will not +find the articulate drawing out into doctrinal statement of the +principles that underlay, and the conclusions that flow from, the +historical fact of Christ's propitiatory death. I do not wonder at +that, nor do I admit that it is any argument against the truth of the +divine revelation which is made in these doctrinal statements, to +allege that we find nothing corresponding to them in Jesus Christ's +own words. The silence is not as absolute as is alleged, as the +quotations which I have made, and which might have been multiplied, +do distinctly enough show. Even if it were more absolute than it is, +the silence is by no means unintelligible. Christ had to offer the +Sacrifice before the Sacrifice could be preached. He Himself warned +His disciples against accepting His own words prior to the Cross, as +the conclusive and ultimate revelation. 'I have many things to say +unto you, but you cannot carry them now.' There was need that the +Cross should be a fact before it was evolved into a doctrine. And so +I venture to say that the unanimity of the preaching is only +explicable on the ground of that preaching in both its parts--its +assertion of Jesus' Messiahship and of His propitiatory death--being +the repetition on the housetop of the lessons which they had heard in +the ear from Him. + +III. Note, briefly, the lesson from this unanimity. + +Let us distinctly apprehend where is the living heart of the +Gospel--that it is the message of redemption by the incarnation and +sacrifice of the Son of God. There follows from that incarnation and +sacrifice all the great teaching about the work of the Divine Spirit +in men, dwelling in them for evermore. But the beginning of all is, +'Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures.' And, +brethren, that message meets, as nothing else meets, the deepest +needs of every human soul. It is able, as nothing else is able, to +open out into a whole encyclopædia and universe of wisdom and truth +and power. If we strike it out of our conception of Christianity, or +if we obscure it as being the very palpitating centre of the whole, +then feebleness will creep over the Christianity that is _minus_ a +Cross, or does not see in it the Sacrifice for the world's sin. You +may cast overboard the sails to lighten the ship. If you do, she lies +a log on the waters. And if, for the sake of meeting new phases of +thought, Christian churches tamper with this central truth, they have +flung away their means of progress and of power. + +Let me say again, and in a word only, that the considerations that I +have been trying to submit to you in this sermon, show us the limits +within which the modern cry of 'Back to the Christ of the Gospels,' +is right, and where it may be wrong. I believe that in former days, +and to some extent in the present day, we evangelical teachers have +too much sometimes talked rather about the doctrines than about the +Person who is the doctrines. And if the cry of 'Back to the Christ' +means, 'Do not talk so much about the Atonement and Propitiation; +talk about the Christ who atones,' then, with all my heart, I say, +'Amen!' But put the Person in the foreground, the living-loving, the +dying-loving, the risen-loving Christ, put Him in the foreground. But +if it is implied, as I am afraid it is often implied, that the Christ +of the Gospels is one and the Christ of the epistles is another, and +that to go back to the Christ of the gospels means to drop 'died for +our sins according to the Scriptures,' and to retain only the +non-miraculous, moral and religious teachings that are recorded in +the three first gospels, then I say that it is fatal for the Church, +and it is false to the facts, for the Christ of the epistles is the +Christ of the gospels: the difference only being that in the one you +have the facts, and in the other you have their meaning and their +power. + +So, lastly, let this text teach us what we ourselves have to do with +this unanimous testimony. 'So we preach, and so ye believed.' +Brother! Do you believe _so_? That is to say, is your conception +of the Gospel the mighty redemptive agency which is wrought by the +Incarnate Son of God, who was crucified for our offences, and rose +that we might live, and is glorified that we, too, may share His +glory? Is that your Gospel? But do not be content with an +intellectual grasp of the thing. 'So ye believed' means a great deal +more than 'I believe that Christ died for our sins.' It means 'I +believe in the Christ who did die for my sins.' You must cast +yourself as a sinful man on Him; and, so casting, you will find that +it is no vain story which is commended to us by all these august +voices from the past, but you will have in your own experience the +verification of the fact that He died for our sins, in your own +consciousness of sins forgiven, and new love bestowed; and so may +turn round to Paul, the leader of the chorus, and to all the +apostolic band, and say to them, 'Now I believe, not because of thy +saying, but because I have seen Him, and myself heard Him.' + + + + +THE CERTAINTY AND JOY OF THE RESURRECTION + + 'But now is Christ risen from the dead ... the first + fruits of them that slept.'--1 COR. xv. 20. + + +The Apostle has been contemplating the long train of dismal +consequences which he sees would arise if we only had a dead Christ. +He thinks that he, the Apostle, would have nothing to preach, and we, +nothing to believe. He thinks that all hope of deliverance from sin +would fade away. He thinks that the one fact which gives assurance of +immortality having vanished, the dead who had nurtured the assurance +have perished. And he thinks that if things were so, then Christian +men, who had believed a false gospel, and nourished an empty faith, +and died clinging to a baseless hope, were far more to be pitied than +men who had had less splendid dreams and less utter illusions. + +Then, with a swift revulsion of feeling, he turns away from that +dreary picture, and with a change of key, which the dullest ear can +appreciate, from the wailing minors of the preceding verses, he +breaks into this burst of triumph. 'Now'--things being as they are, +for it is the logical 'now,' and not the temporal one--things being +as they are, 'Christ is risen from the dead, and that as the first +fruits of them that slept.' + +Part of the ceremonial of the Passover was the presentation in the +Temple of a barley sheaf, the first of the harvest, waved before the +Lord in dedication to Him, and in sign of thankful confidence that +all the fields would be reaped and their blessing gathered. +There may be some allusion to that ceremony, which coincided in time +with the Resurrection of our Lord, in the words here, which regard +that one solitary Resurrection as the early ripe and early reaped +sheaf, the pledge and the prophecy of the whole ingathering. + +Now there seem to me, in these words, to ring out mainly two +things--an expression of absolute certainty in the fact, and an +expression of unbounded triumph in the certainty of the fact. + +And if we look at these two things, I think we shall get the main +thoughts that the Apostle would impress upon our minds. + +I. The certainty of Christ's Resurrection. + +'Now _is_ Christ risen,' says he, defying, as it were, doubt and +negation, and basing himself upon the firm assurance which he +possesses of that historical fact. 'Ah!' you say, 'seeing is +believing; and he had evidence such as we can never have.' Well! let +us see. Is it possible for us, nineteen centuries nearly after that +day, to catch some echo of this assured confidence, and in the face +of modern doubts and disbeliefs, to reiterate with as unfaltering +assurance as that with which they came from his glowing lips, the +great words of my text? Can we, logically and reasonably, as men who +are guided by evidence and not by feeling, stand up before the world, +and take for ours the ancient confession: 'I believe in Jesus Christ, +His only Son, our Lord, who suffered under Pontius Pilate, was +crucified, dead, and buried. The third day He rose again from the +dead'? I think we can. + +The way to prove a fact is by the evidence of witnesses. You cannot +argue that it would be very convenient, if such and such a thing +should be true; that great moral effects would follow if we believed +it was true, and so on. The way to do is to put people who have seen +it into the witness-box, and to make sure that their evidence is +worth accepting. + +And at the beginning of my remarks I wish to protest, in a sentence, +against confusing the issues about this question of the Resurrection +of Jesus Christ in that fashion which is popular nowadays, when we +are told that miracle is impossible, and _therefore_ there has +been no Resurrection, or that death is the end of human existence, +and that _therefore_ there has been no Resurrection. That is not +the way to go about ascertaining the truth as to asserted facts. Let +us hear the evidence. The men who brush aside the testimony of the +New Testament writers, in obedience to a theory, either about the +impossibility of the supernatural, or about the fatal and final +issues of human death, are victims of prejudice, in the strictest +meaning of the word; and are no more logical than the well-known and +proverbial reasoner who, when told that facts were against him, with +sublime confidence in his own infallibility, is reported to have +said, 'So much the worse for the facts.' Let us deal with evidence, +and not with theory, when we are talking about alleged facts of +history. + +So then, let me remind you that, in this chapter from which my text +is taken, we have a record of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, older +than, and altogether independent of, the records contained in +the gospels, which are all subsequent in date to it; that this Epistle +to the Corinthians is one of the four undisputed Epistles of the +Apostle, which not the most advanced school of modern criticism has a +word to say against; that, therefore, this chapter, written, at the +latest, some seven and twenty years after the date of the +Crucifixion, carries us up very close to that event; that it shows +that the Resurrection was _universally_ believed all over the Church, +and therefore must have then been long believed; that it enables us +to trace the same belief as universal, and in undisputed possession +of the field among the churches, at the time of Paul's conversion, +which cannot be put down at much more than five or six years after +the Crucifixion, and that so we are standing in the presence of +absolutely contemporaneous testimony. This is not a case in which a +belief slowly and gradually grew up. Whether we accept the evidence +or not, we are bound to admit that it is strictly contemporaneous +testimony to the fact of Christ's Resurrection. + +And the witnesses are reliable and competent, as well as +contemporaneous. The old belief that their testimony was imposture is +dead long ago; as, indeed, how could it live? It would be an anomaly, +far greater than the Resurrection, to believe that these people, +Mary, Peter, John, Paul, and all the rest of them, were conspirators +in a lie, and that the fairest system of morality and the noblest +consecration that the world has ever seen, grew up out of a fraud, +like flowers upon a dunghill. That theory will not hold water; and +even those who will not accept the testimony have long since +confessed that it will not. But the Apostle, in my context, seems to +think that that is the only tenable alternative to the other theory +that the witnesses were veracious, and I am disposed to believe that +he is right. He says, 'If Christ be not risen, then, are we' the +utterly impossible thing of 'false witnesses to God,' devout +perjurers, as the phrase might be paraphrased: men who are lying to +please God. If Christ be not risen, they have sworn to a thing that +they know to be untrue, in order to advance His cause and His +kingdom. If that theory be not accepted, there is no other about +these men and their message that will hold water for a minute, except +the admission of its truth. + +The fashionable modern one, that it was hallucination, is +preposterous. Hallucinations that five hundred people at once shared! +Hallucinations that lasted all through long talks, spread at +intervals over more than a month! Hallucinations that included eating +and drinking, speech and answer; the clasp of the hand and the +feeling of the breath! Hallucinations that brought instruction! +Hallucinations that culminated in the fancy that a gathered multitude +of them saw Him going up into heaven! The hallucination is on the +other side, I think. They have got the saddle on the wrong horse when +they talk about the Apostolic witnesses being the victims of +hallucination. It is the people who believe it possible that they +should be who are so. The old argument against miracles used to say +that it is more consonant with experience that testimony should be +false, than that a miracle should be true. I venture to say it is a +much greater strain on a man's credulity, to believe that _such_ +evidence is false than that _such_ a miracle, _so_ attested, is true. +And I, for my part, venture to think that the reasonable men are the +men who listen to these eye-witnesses when they say, 'We saw Him +rise'; and echo back in answer the triumphant certitude, 'Christ is +risen indeed!' + +There is another consideration that I might put briefly. A very +valuable way of establishing facts is to point to the existence of +other facts, which indispensably require the previous ones for their +explanation. Let me give you an illustration of what I mean. I +believe in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, amongst other reasons, +because I do not understand how it was possible for the Church to +exist for a week after the Crucifixion, unless Jesus Christ rose +again. Why was it that they did not all scatter? Why was it that the +spirit of despondency and the tendency to separation, which were +beginning to creep over them when they were saying: 'Ah! it is all +up! We _trusted_ that this had been He,' did not go on to their +natural issue? How came it that these people, with their Master taken +away from the midst of them, and the bond of union between them +removed, and all their hopes crushed did not say: 'We have made a +mistake, let us go back to Gennesareth and take to our fishing again, +and try and forget our bright illusions'? That is what John the +Baptist's followers did when he died. Why did not Christ's do the +same? Because Christ rose again and re-knit them together. When the +Shepherd was smitten, the flock would have been scattered, and never +drawn together any more, unless there had been just such a thing as +the Resurrection asserts there was, to reunite the dispersed and to +encourage the depressed. And so I say, Christianity with a _dead_ +Christ, and a Church gathered round a grave from which the stone has +_not_ been rolled away, is more unbelievable than the miracle, for it +is an absurdity. + +Then there is another thing that I would say in a word. Let me put an +illustration to explain what I mean. Suppose, after the execution of +King Charles I., in some corner of the country a Pretender had sprung +up and said, 'I am the King!' the way to end that would have been for +the Puritan leaders to have taken people to St. George's Chapel, and +said, 'Look! there is the coffin, there is the body, is that the +king, or is it not?' Jesus Christ was said to have risen again, +within a week of the time of His death. The rulers of the nation had +the grave, the watch, the stone, the seal. They could have put an end +to the pestilent nonsense in two minutes, if it had been nonsense, by +the simple process of saying, 'Go and look at the tomb, and you will +see Him there.' But this question has never been answered, and never +will be--What became of that sacred corpse if Jesus Christ did not +rise again from the dead? The clumsy lie that the rulers told, that +the disciples had stolen away the body, was only their acknowledgment +that the grave was empty. If the grave were empty, either His +servants were impostors, which we have seen it is incredible that +they were, or the Christ was risen again. + +And so, dear brethren, for many other reasons besides this handful +that I have ventured to gather and put before you, and in spite of +the prejudices of modern theories, I lift up here once more, with +unfaltering certitude, the glad message which I beseech you to +accept: 'Christ is risen, the first fruits of them that slept.' + +II. So much, then, for the first point in this passage. A word or two +about the second--the triumph in the certitude of that Resurrection. + +As I remarked at a previous point of this discourse, the Apostle has +been speaking about the consequences which would follow from the fact +that Christ was not raised. If we take all these consequences and +reverse them, we get the glad issues of His Resurrection, and +understand why it was that this great burst of triumph comes from the +Apostle's lips. And though I must necessarily treat this part of my +subject very inadequately, let me try to gather together the various +points on which, as I think, our Easter gladness ought to be built. + +First, then, I say, the risen Christ gives us a complete Gospel. A +dead Christ annihilates the Gospel. 'If Christ be not risen,' says +the Apostle, 'our preaching,' by which he means not the act but the +substance of his preaching, 'is vain.' Or, as the word might be more +accurately rendered, 'empty.' There is nothing in it; no contents. It +is a blown bladder; nothing in it but wind. + +What was Paul's 'preaching'? It all turned upon these points--that +Jesus Christ was the Son of God; that He was Incarnate in the flesh +for us men; that He died on the Cross for our offences; that He was +raised again, and had ascended into Heaven, ruling the world and +breathing His presence into believing hearts; and that He would come +again to be our Judge. These were the elements of what Paul called +'his Gospel.' He faces the supposition of a dead Christ, and he says, +'It is all gone! It is all vanished into thin air. I have nothing to +preach if I have not a Cross to preach which is man's deliverance +from sin, because on it the Son of God hath died, and I only know +that Jesus Christ's sacrifice is accepted and sufficient, because I +have it attested to me in His rising again from the dead.' + +Dear brethren, on the fact of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ is +suspended everything which makes the Gospel a gospel. Strike that +out, and what have you left? Some beautiful bits of moral teaching, a +lovely life, marred by tremendous mistakes about Himself and His own +importance and His relation to men and to God; but you have got +nothing left that is worth calling a gospel. You have the cross +rising there, gaunt, black, solitary; but, unless on the other side +of the river you have the Resurrection, no bridge will ever be thrown +across the black gulf, and the Cross remains 'dead, being alone.' You +must have a Resurrection to explain the Cross, and then the Life and +the Death tower up into the manifestation of God in the flesh and the +propitiation for our sins. Without it we have nothing to preach which +is worth calling a gospel. + +Again, a living Christ gives faith something to lay hold of. The +Apostle here in the context twice says, according to the Authorised +Version, that a dead Christ makes our faith 'vain.' But he really +uses two different words, the former of which is applied to +'preaching,' and means literally 'empty,' while the latter means 'of +none effect' or 'powerless.' So there are two ideas suggested here +which I can only touch with the lightest hand. + +The risen Christ puts some contents, so to speak, into my faith; He +gives me something for it to lay hold of. + +Who can trust a _dead_ Christ, or who can trust a _human_ Christ? +That would be as much a blasphemy as trusting any other man. It is +only when we recognise Him as declared to be the Son of God, and that +by the Resurrection from the dead, that our faith has anything round +which it can twine, and to which it can cleave. That living Saviour +will stretch out His hand to us if we look to Him, and if I put my +poor, trembling little hand up towards Him, He will bend to me and +clasp it. You cannot exercise faith unless you have a risen Saviour, +and unless you exercise faith in Him your lives are marred and sad. + +Again, if Christ be dead, our faith, if it could exist, would be as +devoid of effect as it would be empty of substance. For such a faith +would be like an infant seeking nourishment at a dead mother's +breast, or men trying to kindle their torches at an extinguished +lamp. And chiefly would it fail to bring the first blessing which the +believing soul receives through and from a risen Christ, namely, +deliverance from sin. If He whom we believed to be our sacrifice by +His death and our sanctification by His life has not risen, then, as +we have seen, all which makes His death other than a martyr's +vanishes, and with it vanish forgiveness and purifying. Only when we +recognise that in His Cross explained by His Resurrection, we have +redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins, and by +the communication of the risen life from the risen Lord possess that +new nature which sets us free from the dominion of our evil, is faith +operative in setting us free from our sins. + +So, dear friends, the risen Christ gives us something for faith to +lay hold of, and will make it the hand by which we grasp His strong +hand, which lifts us 'out of the horrible pit and the miry clay, and +sets our feet upon a rock.' But if He lie dead in the grave your +faith is vain, because it grasps nothing but a shadow; and it is vain +as being purposeless; you are yet in your sins. + +The last thought is that the risen Christ gives us the certitude of +our Resurrection. I do not for a moment mean to say that, apart from +the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, the thought, be it a wish or a +dread, of immortality, has not been found in men, but there is all +the difference in the world between forebodings, aspirations, wishes +it were so, fears that it might be so, and the calm certitude that it +is so. Many men talked about a western continent, but Columbus went +there and came back again, and that ended doubt. Many men before, and +apart from Jesus, have cherished thoughts of an immortal life beyond +the grave, but He has been there and returned. And that, and, as I +believe, that only puts the doctrine of immortality upon an +irrefragable foundation; and we can say, 'Now, I know that there is +that land beyond.' They tell us that death ends everything. Modern +materialism, in all its forms, asserts that it is the extinction of +the personality. Jesus Christ died, and went through it, and came out +of it the same, and I will trust Him. Brethren, the set of opinion +amongst the educated and cultured classes in England, and all over +Europe, at this moment, proves to anybody who has eyes to see, that +for this generation, rejection of immortality will follow certainly +on the rejection of Jesus Christ. And for England to-day, as for +Greece when Paul sent his letter to Corinth, the one light of +certitude in the great darkness is the fact that Jesus Christ hath +died, and is risen again. + +If you will let Him, He will make you partakers of His own immortal +life. 'The first fruits of them that slept' is the pledge and the +prophecy of all the waving abundance of golden grain that shall be +gathered into the great husbandman's barns. The Apostle goes on to +represent the resurrection of 'them that are Christ's' as a +consequence of their union to Jesus. He has conquered for us all. He +has entered the prison-house and come forth bearing its iron gates on +His shoulders, and henceforth it is not possible that we should be +holden of it. There are two resurrections--one, that of Christ's +servants, one that of others. They are not the same in +principle--and, alas, they are awfully different in issue. 'Some +shall wake to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting +contempt.' + +Let me beseech you to make Jesus Christ the life of your dead souls, +by humble, penitent trust in Him. And then, in due time, He will be +the life of your transformed bodies, changing these into the likeness +of the body of His glory, 'according to the working whereby He is +able even to subdue all things unto Himself.' + + + + +THE DEATH OF DEATH + + 'But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the + first-fruits of them that slept. 21. For since by man + came death, by man came also the resurrection of the + dead.... 50. Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and + blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth + corruption inherit incorruption. 51. Behold, I shew + you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall + all be changed, 52. In a moment, in the twinkling of + an eye, at the last trump, (for the trumpet shall + sound;) and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, + and we shall be changed. 53. For this corruptible + must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put + on immortality. 54. So when this corruptible shall + have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have + put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the + saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in + victory. 55. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, + where is thy victory? 56. The sting of death is sin; + and the strength of sin is the law. 57. But thanks be + to God, which giveth us the victory, through our Lord + Jesus Christ. 58. Therefore, my beloved brethren, + be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in + the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your + labour is not in vain in the Lord.'--1 COR. xv. 20, 21; 50-58. + + +This passage begins with the triumphant ringing out of the great fact +which changes all the darkness of an earthly life without a heavenly +hope into a blaze of light. All the dreariness for humanity, and all +the vanity for Christian faith and preaching, vanish, like ghosts at +cock-crow, when the Resurrection of Jesus rises sun-like on the +world's night. It is a historical fact, established by the evidence +proper for such,--namely, the credible testimony of eye-witnesses. +They could attest His rising, but the knowledge of the worldwide +significance of it comes, not from testimony, but from revelation. +Those who saw Him risen join to declare: 'Now is Christ risen from +the dead,' but it is a higher Voice that goes on to say, 'and become +the first-fruits of them that slept.' + +That one Man risen from the grave was like the solitary sheaf of +paschal first-fruits, prophesying of many more, a gathered harvest +that will fill the great Husbandman's barns. The Resurrection of +Jesus is not only a prophecy, showing, as it and it alone does, that +death is not the end of man, but that life persists through death and +emerges from it, like a buried river coming again flashing into the +light of day, but it is the source or cause of the Christian's +resurrection. The oneness of the race necessitated the diffusion +through all its members of sin and of its consequence--physical +death. If the fountain is poisoned, all the stream will be tainted. +If men are to be redeemed from the power of the grave, there must be +a new personal centre of life; and union with Him, which can only be +effected by faith, is the condition of receiving life from Him, which +gradually conquers the death of sin now, and will triumph over bodily +death in the final resurrection. It is the resurrection of Christians +that Paul is dealing with. Others are to be raised, but on a +different principle, and to sadly different issues. Since Christ's +Resurrection assures us of the future waking, it changes death into +'sleep,' and that sleep does not mean unconsciousness any more than +natural sleep does, but only rest from toil, and cessation of +intercourse with the external world. + +In the part of the passage, verses 50 to 58, the Apostle becomes, not +the witness or the reasoner, as in the earlier parts of the chapter, +but the revealer of a 'mystery.' That word, so tragically +misunderstood, has here its uniform scriptural sense of truth, +otherwise unknown, made known by revelation. But before he unveils +the mystery, Paul states with the utmost force a difficulty which +might seem to crush all hope,--namely, that corporeity, as we know +it, is clearly incapable of living in such a world as that future one +must be. To use modern terms, organism and environment must be +adapted to each other. A fish must have the water, the creatures that +flourish at the poles would not survive at the equator. A man with +his gross earthly body, so thoroughly adapted to his earthly abode, +would be all out of harmony with his surroundings in that higher +world, and its rarified air would be too thin and pure for his lungs. +Can there be any possibility of making him fit to live in a spiritual +world? Apart from revelation, the dreary answer must be 'No.' But the +'mystery' answers with 'Yes.' The change from physical to spiritual +is clearly necessary, if there is to be a blessed life hereafter. + +That necessary change is assured to all Christians, whether they die +or 'remain till the coming of the Lord.' Paul varies in his +anticipations as to whether he and his contemporaries will belong to +the one class or the other; but he is quite sure that in either case +the indwelling Spirit of Jesus will effect on living and dead the +needful change. The grand description in verse 52, like the parallel +in 1 Thessalonians iv. 16, is modelled on the account of the +theophany on Sinai. The trumpet was the signal of the Divine +Presence. That last manifestation will be sudden, and its startling +breaking in on daily commonplace is intensified by the reduplication: +'In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye.' With sudden crash that +awful blare of 'loud, uplifted angel trumpet' will silence all +other sounds, and hush the world. The stages of what follows are +distinctly marked. First, the rising of the dead changed in passing +through death, so as to rise in incorruptible bodies, and then the +change of the bodies of the living into like incorruption. The former +will not be found naked, but will be clothed with their white +garments; the latter will, as it were, put on the glorious robes +above the 'muddy vesture of decay,' or, more truly, will see the +miracle of these being transfigured till they shine 'so as no fuller +on earth could white them.' The living will witness the resurrection +of the dead; the risen dead will witness the transformation of the +living. Then both hosts will be united, and, through all eternity, +'live together,' and that 'with Him.' Paul evidently expects that he +and the Corinthians will be in the latter class, as appears by the +'we' in verse 52. He, as it were, points to his own body when he +says, recurring to his former thought of the necessity of harmony +between organism and environment, '_this_ corruptible must put on +incorruption.' Here 'corruption' is used in its physical application, +though the ethical meaning may be in the background. + +The Apostle closes his long argument and revelation with a burst, +almost a shout, of triumph. Glowing words of old prophets rush into +his mind, and he breathes a new, grander meaning into them. Isaiah +had sung of a time when the veil over all nations should be destroyed +'in this mountain,' and when death should be swallowed up for ever; +and Paul grasps the words and says that the prophet's loftiest +anticipations will be fulfilled when that monster, whose insatiable +maw swallows down youth, beauty, strength, wisdom, will himself be +swallowed up. Hosea had prophesied of Israel's restoration under +figure of a resurrection, and Paul grasps _his_ words and fills them +with a larger meaning. He modifies them, in a manner on which we need +not enlarge, to express the great Christian thought that death has +conquered man but that man in Christ will conquer the conqueror. With +swift change of metaphor he represents death as a serpent, armed with +a poisoned sting, and that suggests to him the thought, never far +away in his view of man, that death's power to slay is derived +from--or, so to say, concentrated in--sin; and that at once raises +the other equally characteristic and familiar thought that law +stimulates sin, since to know a thing to be forbidden creates in +perverse humanity an itching to do it, and law reveals sin by setting +up the ideal from which sin is the departure. But just as the tracks +in Paul's mind were well worn, by which the thought of death brought +in that of sin, and that of sin drew after it that of law, so with +equal closeness of established association, that of law condemnatory +and slaying, brought up that of Christ the all-sufficient refuge from +that gloomy triad--Death Sin, Law. Through union with Him each of us +may possess His immortal risen life, in which Death, the engulfer, is +himself engulfed; Death, the conqueror, is conquered utterly and for +ever; Death, the serpent, has his sting drawn, and is harmless. That +participation in Christ's life is begun even here, and God 'giveth us +the victory' now, even while we live outward lives that must end in +death, and will give it perfectly in the resurrection, when 'they +cannot die any more,' and death itself is dead. + +The loftiest Christian hopes have close relation to the lowliest +Christian duties, and Paul's triumphant song ends with plain, +practical, prose exhortations to steadfastness, unmovable tenacity, +and abundant fruitfulness, the motive and power of which will be +found in the assurance that, since there is a life beyond, all labour +here, however it may fail in the eyes of men, will not be in vain, +but will tell on character and therefore on condition through +eternity. If our peace does not rest where we would fain see it +settle, it will not be wasted, but will return to us again, like the +dove to the ark, and we shall 'self-enfold the large results of' +labour that seemed to have been thrown away. + + + + +STRONG AND LOVING + + 'Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like + men, be strong. 14. Let all your things be done + with charity.'--1 COR. xvi. 13, 14. + + +There is a singular contrast between the first four of these +exhortations and the last. The former ring sharp and short like +pistol-shots; the last is of gentler mould. The former sound like the +word of command shouted from an officer along the ranks; and there is +a military metaphor running all through them. The foe threatens to +advance; let the guards keep their eyes open. He comes nearer; +prepare for the charge, stand firm in your ranks. The battle is +joined; 'quit you like men'--strike a man's stroke--'be strong.' + +And then all the apparatus of warfare is put away out of sight, and +the captain's word of command is softened into the Christian +teacher's exhortation: 'Let all your deeds be done in charity.' For +love is better than fighting, and is stronger than swords. And yet, +although there is a contrast here, there is also a sequence and +connection. No doubt these exhortations, which are Paul's last word +to that Corinthian Church on whom he had lavished in turn the +treasures of his manifold eloquence, indignation, argumentation, and +tenderness, reflected the deficiencies of the people to whom he was +speaking. They were schismatic and factious to the very core, and so +they needed the exhortation to be left last in their ears, as it +were, that everything should be done in love. They were ill-grounded +in regard to the very fundamental doctrines of the faith, as all +Paul's argumentation about the resurrection proves, and so they +needed to be bidden to 'stand fast in the faith.' Their slothful +carelessness as to the discipline of the Christian life, and their +consequent feebleness of grasp of the Christian verities, made them +loose-braced and weak in all respects, and incapacitated them for +vigorous warfare. Thus, we see a picture in these injunctions of the +sort of community that Paul had to deal with in Corinth, which yet he +called a Church of saints, and for which he loved and laboured. Let +me then run over and try to bring out the importance and mutual +connection of what I may call this drill-book for the Christian +warfare, which is the Christian life. + +'Watch ye.' That means one of two things certainly, probably +both--Keep awake, and keep your eyes open. Our Lord used the same +metaphor, you remember, very frequently, but with a special +significance. On His lips it generally referred to the attitude of +expectation of His coming in judgment. Paul uses sometimes the figure +with the same application, but here, distinctly, it has another. As I +said, there is the military idea underlying it. What will become of +an army if the sentries go to sleep? And what chance will a Christian +man have of doing his _devoir_ against his enemy, unless he +keeps himself awake, and keeps himself alert? Watchfulness, in the +sense of always having eyes open for the possible rush down upon us +of temptation and evil, is no small part of the discipline and the +duty of the Christian life. One part of that watchfulness consists in +exercising a very rigid and a very constant and comprehensive +scrutiny of our motives. For there is no way by which evil creeps +upon us so unobserved, as when it slips in at the back door of a +specious motive. Many a man contents himself with the avoidance of +actual evil actions, and lets any kind of motives come in and out of +his mind unexamined. It is all right to look after our _doings_, but +'as a man _thinketh_ in his heart, so is he.' The good or the evil of +anything that I do is determined wholly by the motive with which I do +it. And we are a great deal too apt to palm off deceptions on +ourselves to make sure that our motives are right, unless we give +them a very careful and minute scrutiny. One side of this +watchfulness, then, is a habitual inspection of our motives and +reasons for action. 'What am I doing this for?' is a question that +would stop dead an enormous proportion of our activity, as if you had +turned the steam off from an engine. If you will use a very fine +sieve through which to strain your motives, you will go a long way to +keeping your actions right. We should establish a rigid examination +for applicants for entrance, and make quite sure that each that +presents itself is not a wolf in sheep's clothing. Make them all +bring out their passports. Let every vessel that comes into your +harbour remain isolated from all communication with the shore, until +the health officer has been on board and given a clean bill. 'Watch +ye,' for yonder, away in the dark, in the shadow of the trees, the +black masses of the enemy are gathered, and a midnight attack is but +too likely to bring a bloody awakening to a camp full of sleepers. + +My text goes on to bring the enemy nearer and nearer and nearer. +'Watch ye'--and if, not unnoticed, they come down on you, 'stand fast +in the faith.' There will be no keeping our ranks, or keeping our +feet--or at least, it is not nearly so likely that there will +be--unless there has been the preceding watchfulness. If the first +command has not been obeyed, there is small chance of the second's +being so. If there has not been any watchfulness, it is not at all +likely that there will be much steadfastness. Just as with a man +going along a crowded pavement, a little touch from a passer-by will +throw him off his balance, whereas if he had known it was coming, and +had adjusted his poise rightly, he would have stood against thrice as +violent a shock, so, in order that we may stand fast, we must watch. +A sudden assault will be a great deal less formidable when it is a +foreseen assault. + +'Stand fast _in the faith_.' I take it that this does not mean +'the thing that we believe,' which use of the word 'faith' is the +ecclesiastical, but not the New Testament meaning. In Scripture, +faith means not the body of truths that we believe, but the act of +believing them. This further command tells us that, in addition to +our watchfulness, and as the basis of our steadfastness, confidence +in the revelation of God in Jesus Christ will enable us to keep our +feet whatever comes against us, and to hold our ground, whoever may +assault us. + +But remember that it is not because I have faith that I stand fast, +but because of that in which I have faith. My feet may be well +shod--and it used to be said that a soldier's shoes were of as much +importance in the battle as his musket--my feet may be well shod, but +if they are not well planted upon firm ground I never shall be able +to stand the collision of the foe. So then, it is not my grasp of the +blessed truth, God in Christ my Friend and Helper, but it is that +truth which I grasp at, that makes me strong. Or, to put it into +other words, it is the foothold, and not the foot that holds it, that +ensures our standing firm. Only there is no steadfastness +communicated to us from the source of all stability, except by way of +our faith, which brings Christ into us. 'Watch ye; stand fast in the +faith.' + +The next two words of command are very closely connected, though not +quite identical. 'Quit you like men.' Play a man's part in the +battle; strike with all the force of your muscles. But the Apostle +adds, 'be strong.' You cannot play a man's part unless you are. 'Be +strong'--the original would rather bear 'become strong.' What is the +use of telling men to '_be_ strong'? It is a waste of words, in +nine cases out of ten, to say to a weak man, 'Pluck up your courage, +and show strength.' But the Apostle uses a very uncommon word here, +at least uncommon in the New Testament, and another place where he +uses it will throw light upon what he means: 'Strengthened with might +by His Spirit in the inner man.' Then is it so vain a mockery to tell +a poor, weak creature like me to become strong, when you can point me +to the source of all strength, in that 'Spirit of power and of love +and of a sound mind'? We have only to take our weakness there to have +it stiffened into strength; as people put bits of wood into what are +called 'petrifying wells' which infiltrate into them mineral +particles, that do not turn the wood into stone, but make the wood as +strong as stone. So my manhood, with all its weakness, may have +filtered into it divine strength, which will brace me for all needful +duty, and make me 'more than conqueror through Him that loved us.' +Then, it is not mockery and cruelty, vanity and surplusage to preach +'Quit you like men; be strong, and be a man'; because if we will +observe the plain and not hard conditions, strength will come to us +according to our day, in fulfilment of the great promises: 'My grace +is sufficient for thee; and My strength is made perfect in weakness.' + +And now we have done with the fighting words of command, and come to +the gentler exhortation: 'Let all your things be done in charity.' + +That was a hard lesson for these Corinthians who were splitting +themselves into factions and sects, and tearing each other's eyes out +in their partisanship for various Christian teachers. But the advice +has a much wider application than to the suppression of squabbles in +Christian communities. It is the sum of all commandments of the +Christian life, if you will take love in its widest sense, in the +sense, that is, in which it is always used in Paul's writings. We cut +it into two halves, and think of it as sometimes meaning love to God, +and sometimes love to man. The two are inseparably inter-penetrated +in the New Testament writings; and so we have to interpret this +supreme commandment in the whole breadth and meaning of that great +word _Love_. And then it just comes to this, that love is the +victor in all the Christian warfare. If we love God, at any given +moment, consciously having our affection engaged with Him, and our +heart going out to Him, do you think that any evil or temptation +would have power over us? Should we not see them as they are, to be +devils in disguise? In the proportion in which I love God I conquer +all sin. And at the moment in which that great, sweet, all-satisfying +light floods into my soul, I see through the hollowness and the +shams, and detect the ugliness and the filth of the things that +otherwise would be temptations. If you desire to be conquerors in the +Christian fight, remember that the true way of conquest is, as +another Apostle says, 'Keep yourselves in the love of God.' 'Let all +your things be done in charity.' + +And, further, how beautifully the Apostle here puts the great truth +that we are all apt to forget, that the strongest type of human +character is the gentlest and most loving, and that the mighty man is +not the man of intellectual or material force, such as the world +idolises, but the man who is much because he loves much. If we would +come to supreme beauty of Christian character, there must be +inseparably manifested in our lives, and lived in our hearts, +strength and love, might and gentleness. That is the perfect man, +and that was the union which was set before us, in the highest form, +in the 'Strong Son of God, Immortal Love,' whom we call our Saviour, +and whom we are bound to follow. His soldiers conquer as the Captain +of their salvation has conquered, when watchfulness and steadfastness +and courage and strength are all baptized in love and perfected +thereby. + + + + +ANATHEMA AND GRACE + + 'The salutation of me Paul with mine own hand. 22. If + any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be + Anathema Maran-atha. 23. The grace of our Lord Jesus + Christ be with you. 24. My love be with you all + in Christ Jesus.'--1 COR. xvi. 21-24. + + +Terror and tenderness are strangely mingled in this parting +salutation, which was added in the great characters shaped by Paul's +own hand, to the letter written by an amanuensis. He has been +obliged, throughout the whole epistle, to assume a tone of +remonstrance abundantly mingled with irony and sarcasm and +indignation. He has had to rebuke the Corinthians for many faults, +party spirit, lax morality, toleration of foul sins, grave abuses in +their worship even at the Lord's Supper, gross errors in opinion in +the denial of the Resurrection. And in this last solemn warning he +traces all these vices to their fountainhead--the defect of love to +Jesus Christ--and warns of their fatal issue. 'Let him be Anathema.' + +But he will not leave these terrible words for his last. The thunder +is followed by gentle rain, and the sun glistens on the drops; 'The +grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.' Nor for himself will +he let the last impression be one of rebuke or even of warning. He +desires to show that his heart yearns over them all; so he gathers +them all--the partisans; the poor brother that has fallen into sin; +the lax ones who, in their misplaced tenderness, had left him in his +sin; the misguided reasoners who had struck the Resurrection out of +the articles of the Christian creed--he gathers them all into his +final salutation, and he says, 'Take and share my love--though I have +had to rebuke--amongst the whole of you.' + +Is not that beautiful? And does not the juxtaposition of such +messages in this farewell go deeper than the revelation of Paul's +character? May we not see, in these terrible and tender thoughts thus +inextricably intertwined and braided together, a revelation of the +true nature both of the terror and the tenderness of the Gospel which +Paul preached? It is from that point of view that I wish to look at +them now. + +I. I take first that thought--the terror of the fate of the unloving. + +Now, I must ask you for a moment's attention in regard to these two +untranslated words. _Anathema Maran-atha_. The first thing to be +noticed is that the latter of them stands independently of the +former, and forms a sentence by itself, as I shall have to show you +presently. 'Anathema' means an offering, or a thing devoted; and its +use in the New Testament arises from its use in the Greek translation +of the Old Testament, where it is employed for persons and things +that, in a peculiar sense, were set apart and devoted to God. In the +story of the conquest of Canaan, for instance, we read of Jericho and +other places, persons, or things that were, as our version somewhat +unfortunately renders it, 'accursed,' or as it ought rather to be +rendered, 'devoted,' or 'put under a ban.' And this 'devotion' was of +such a sort as that the things or persons devoted were doomed to +destruction. All the dreadful things that were done in the Conquest +were the consequences of the persons that endured them being thus +'consecrated,' in a very dreadful sense, or set apart for God. The +underlying idea was that evil things brought into contact with Him +were necessarily destroyed with a swift destruction. That being the +meaning of the word, it is clear that its use in my text is +distinctly metaphorical, and that it suggests to us that the +unloving, like those cities full of uncleanness, when they are +brought into contact with the infinite love of the coming Judge, +shrivel up and are destroyed. + +The other word 'Maran-atha,' as I said, is to be taken as a separate +sentence. It belongs to the dialect, which was probably the +vernacular of Palestine in the time of Paul, and to which belong, for +the most part, the other untranslated words that are scattered up and +down the Gospels, such as 'Aceldama,' 'Ephphatha,' and the like. It +means 'our Lord comes.' Why Paul chose to use that untranslated scrap +of another tongue in a letter to a Gentile Church we cannot tell. +Perhaps it had come to be a kind of watchword amongst the early +Jewish Christians, which came naturally to his lips. But, at any +rate, the use of it here is distinctly to confirm the warning of the +previous clause, by pointing to the time at which that warning shall +be fulfilled. 'If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be +devoted and destroyed. Our Lord comes.' The only other thing to be +noticed by way of introduction is that this first clause is not an +imprecation, nor any wish on the part of the Apostle, but is a solemn +prophetic warning (acquiesced in by every righteous heart) of that +which will certainly come. The significance of the whole may be +gathered into one simple sentence--The coming of the Lord of Love is +the destruction of the unloving. + +'Our Lord comes.' Paul's Christianity gathered round two facts and +moments--one in the past, Christ has come; one in the future, Christ +will come. For memory, the coming by the cradle and the Cross; for +hope, the coming on His throne in glory; and between these two +moments, like the solid piers of a suspension bridge, the frail +structure of the Present hangs swinging. In this day men have lost +their expectation of the one, and to a large extent their faith in +the other. But we shall not understand Scripture unless we seek to +make as prominent in our thoughts as on its pages that second coming +as the complement and necessary issue of the first. It stands stamped +on every line. It colours all the New Testament views of life. It is +used as a motive for every duty, and as a magnet to draw men to Jesus +Christ by salutary dread. There is no hint in my text about the time +of the Lord's coming, no disturbing of the solemnity of the thought +by non-essential details of chronology, so we may dismiss these from +our minds. The fact is the same, and has the same force as a motive +for life, whether it is to be fulfilled in the next moment or +thousands of years hence, provided only that you and I are to be +there when He comes. + +There have been many comings in the past, besides the comings in the +flesh. The days of the Lord that have already appeared in the history +of the world are not few. One characteristic is stamped upon them +all, and that is the swift annihilation of what is opposed to Him. +The Bible has a set of standing metaphors by which to illustrate this +thought of the Coming of the Lord--a flood, a harvest when the ears +are ripe for the sickle, the waking of God from slumber, and the +like; all suggesting similar thoughts. _The_ day of the Lord, +_the_ coming of the Lord, will include and surpass all the +characteristics which these lesser and premonitory judgment days +presented in miniature. I do not enlarge on this theme. I would not +play the orator about it if I could; but I appeal to your +consciences, which, in the case of most of us, not only testify of +right and wrong, but of responsibility, and suggest a judge to whom +we are responsible. And I urge on each, and on myself, this simple +question: Have I allowed its due weight on my life and character to +that watchword of the ancient church--_Maran-atha_, 'our Lord +cometh'? + +Now, the coming of the Lord of Love is the annihilation of the +unloving. The destruction implied in Anathema does not mean the +cessation of Being, but a death which is worse than death, because it +is a death in life. Suppose a man with all his past annihilated, +with all its effort foiled and crushed, with all its possessions +evaporated and disappeared, and with his memory and his conscience +stung into clear-sighted activity, so that he looks back upon his +former self and into his present self, and feels that it is all waste +and chaos, would not that fulfil the word of my text--'Let him be +Anathema'? And suppose that such a man, in addition to these +thoughts, and as the root and the source of them, had ever the +quivering consciousness that he was and must be in the presence of an +unloved Judge; have you not there the naked bones of a very dreadful +thing, which does not need any tawdry eloquence of man to make it +more solemn and more real? The unloving heart is always ill at ease +in the presence of Him whom it does not love. The unloving heart does +not love, because it does not trust, nor see the love. Therefore, the +unloving heart is a heart that is only capable of apprehending the +wrathful side of Christ's character. It is a heart devoid of the +fruits of love which are likeness and righteousness, 'without which +no man shall see the Lord,' nor stand the flash of the brightness of +His coming. So there is no cruelty nor arbitrariness in the decree +that the heart that loves not, when brought into contact with the +infinite Lord of Love, must find in the touch death and not life, +darkness and not light, terror and not hope. Notice that Paul's +negation _is_ a negation and not an affirmation. He does not say +'he that hateth,' but 'he that doth not love.' The absence of the +active emotion of love, which is the child of faith, the parent of +righteousness, the condition of joy in His presence, is sufficient to +ensure that this fate shall fall upon a man. I durst not enlarge. I +leave the truth on your hearts. + +II. Secondly, notice the present grace of the coming Lord. 'Our Lord +cometh. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.' These +two things are not contradictory, but we often deal with them as if +they were. And some men lay hold of the one side of the antithesis, +and some men lay hold of the other, and rend them apart, and make +antagonistic theories of Christianity out of them. But the real +doctrine puts the two together and says there is no terror without +tenderness, and there is no tenderness without terror. If we +sacrifice the aspects of the divine nature, as revealed to us in the +gentle Christ, which kindle a wholesome dread, we have, all +unwittingly, robbed the aspects of the divine nature, which warm in +us a gracious love, of their power to inflame and to illuminate. You +cannot have love which is anything nobler than facile good nature +and unrighteous indifference, unless you have along with it aspects of +God's character and government which ought to make some men afraid. +And you cannot keep these latter aspects from being exaggerated and +darkened into a Moloch of cruelty, unless you remember that, side by +side with them, or rather underlying them and determining them, are +aspects of the divine nature to which only child-like confidence and +calm beatific returns of love do rightly respond. The terror of the +Lord is a garb which our sins force upon the love of the Lord, and +when the one is presented it brings with it the other. Never should +they be parted in our thoughts or in our teaching. + +Note what that present grace is. It is a tenderness which gathers +into its embrace all these imperfect, immoral, lax, heretical people +in Corinth, as well as everywhere else--'The grace of our Lord Jesus +Christ be with _you all_.' There were men in that church that said, +'I am of Paul, I of Apollos, I of Cephas, I of Christ.' There were +men in that church that had defiled their souls and their flesh, and +corrupted the community, and blasphemed the name of Christ by such +foul, sensual sin as was 'not even named among the Gentiles.' There +were men in that church so dead to all the sanctities even of the +communion-table as that, with the bread between their teeth and the +wine-cup in their hands, one was hungry and another drunken. There +were men in that church, whose Christianity was so anomalous and +singularly fragmentary that they did not believe in the resurrection +of the dead. And yet Paul flings the great rainbow, as it were, of +Christ's enclosing love over them all. And surely the love which +gathers in such people leaves none outside its sweep; and the +tenderness which stoops from heaven to pity, to pardon, to cleanse +such is a tenderness to which the weakest, saddest, sinfullest, +foulest of the sons of men may confidently resort. Let nothing rob +you of this assurance, that Christ, the coming Lord, is present with +us all, and with all our weak and wicked brethren, in the full +condescension of His all-embracing, all-hoping, all-forgetting, and +all-restoring love. All that we need, in order to get its full +sunshine into our hearts, is that we trust Him utterly, and, so +trusting, love Him back again with that love which is the fulfilling +of the Law and the crown of the Gospel. + +III. And now, lastly, note the tenderness, caught from the Master +Himself, of the servant who rebukes. + +This last message of love from the Apostle himself, in verse 24, is +quite anomalous. There is no other instance in his letters where he +introduces himself and his own love at the end, after he has +pronounced solemn benediction commending to Christ's grace. But here, +as if he had felt that he must leave an impression of himself on +their minds, which corresponded to the impression of his Master that +he desired to leave, he deviates from his ordinary habit, and makes +his last word a personal word--'_My love_ be with you all in Christ +Jesus.' Rebuke is the sign of love. Sharp condemnation may be the +language of love. Plain warning of possible evils is the simple duty +of love. So Paul folds all whom he has been rebuking in the warm +embrace of his proffered love, which was the very cause of his +rebuke. The healing balm of this closing message was to be applied to +the wounds which his keen edged words had made, and to show that they +were wounds by a surgeon, not by a foe. In effect, this parting smile +of love says, 'I am not become your enemy because I tell you the +truth; I show my love to you by the plainness and roughness of my +words.' Generalise that, free it from its personal reference, and it +just comes to this: There never was a shallower sneer than the sneer +which is cast at Christianity, as if it were harsh, 'ferocious,' or +unloving, when it preaches the terror of the Lord. No! rather, +because the Gospel _is_ a Gospel, it must speak plainly about death +and destruction to the unloving. The danger signal is not to be +blamed for a collision, which it is hoisted to avert; and it is a +strange sign of an unfeeling and unsympathetic, or of a harsh and +gloomy system, that it should tell men where they are driving, in +order that they may never reach the miserable goal. 'Knowing, +therefore, the terror of the Lord, we persuade men.' And when people +say to us preachers, 'Is that your Gospel, a Gospel that talks about +everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord at the glory of +His coming--is that your Gospel?' We can only answer, 'Yes, it is! +Because, so to talk, may by God's mercy, secure that some who hear +shall never know anything of the wrath, save the hearing of it with +the ear, and may, by the warning of it, be drawn to the Rock of Ages +for safety and shelter from the storm.' + +Therefore, dear friends, the upshot of all that I have been feebly +trying to say is just this; let us lay hold with all our hearts, and +by simple faith, of the present grace of the coming, loving Lord and +Judge. You can do it. It is your only hope to do it. _Have_ you +done it? If so, then you may lift up your heads to the throne, and be +glad, as those who know that their Friend and Deliverer will come at +last, to help, to bless, to save. If not, dear friend, take the +warning, that not to love is to be shrivelled like a leaf in the +flame, at that coming which is life to them that love, and +destruction to all besides. 'Herein is our love made perfect, that we +may have boldness before Him in the day of judgment.' + + + + +II. CORINTHIANS + + +GOD'S YEA; MAN'S AMEN + + 'For how many soever be the promises of God, + in Him is the yea: wherefore also through + Him is the Amen.'--2 COR. i. 20 (R.V.). + + +This is one of the many passages the force and beauty of which are, +for the first time, brought within the reach of an English reader by +the alterations in the Revised Version. These are partly dependent +upon the reading of the text and partly upon the translation. As the +words stand in the Authorised Version, 'yea' and 'amen' seem to be +very nearly synonymous expressions, and to point substantially to the +same thing--viz. that Jesus Christ is, as it were, the confirmation +and seal of God's promises. But in the Revised Version the +alterations, especially in the pronouns, indicate more distinctly +that the Apostle means two different things by the 'yea' and the +'amen'. The one is God's voice, the other is man's. The one has to do +with the certainty of the divine revelation, the other has to do with +the certitude of our faith in the revelation. When God speaks in +Christ, He confirms everything that He has said before, and when we +listen to God speaking in Christ, our lips are, through Christ, +opened to utter our assenting 'Amen' to His great promises. So, then, +we have the double form of our Lord's work, covering the whole ground +of His relations to man, set forth in these two clauses, in the one +of which God's confirmation of His past revelations by Jesus Christ +is treated of, and in the other of which the full and confident +assent which men may give to that revelation is set before us. I +deal, then, with these two points--God's certainties in Christ, and +man's certitudes through Christ. + +Now these two things do not always go together. We may be very +certain, as far as our persuasion is concerned, of a very doubtful +fact, or we may be very doubtful, as far as our persuasion is +concerned, of a very certain fact. We speak about truths or facts as +being certain, and we ought to mean by that, not how we think about +them, but what they are in the evidence on which they rest. A certain +truth is a truth which has its evidence irrefragable; and the only +fitting attitude for men, in the presence of a certain truth, is to +have a certitude of the truth. And these two things are, our Apostle +tells us, both given to us in and through Jesus Christ. Let me deal, +then, with these two sides. + +I. First, God's certainties in Christ. + +Of course the original reference of the text is to the whole series +of great promises given in the Old Testament. These, says Paul, are +sealed and confirmed to men by the revelation and work of Jesus +Christ, but it is obvious that the principle which is good in +reference to them is good on a wider field. I venture to take that +extension, and to ask you to think briefly about some of the things +that are made for us indubitably certain in Jesus Christ. + +And, first of all, there is the certainty about God's heart. +Everywhere else we have only peradventures, hopes, fears, guesses +more or less doubtful, and roundabout inferences as to His +disposition and attitude towards us. As one of the old divines says +somewhere, 'All other ways of knowing God are like the bended bow, +Christ is the straight string.' The only means by which, indubitably, +as a matter of demonstration, men can be sure that God in the heavens +has a heart of love towards them is by Jesus Christ. For consider +what will make us sure of that. Nothing but facts; words are of +little use, arguments are of little use. A revelation, however +precious, which simply says to us, 'God is Love' is not sufficient +for our need. We want to see love in operation if we are to be sure +of it, and the only demonstration of the love of God is to witness +the love of God in actual working. And you get it--where? On the +Cross of Jesus Christ. I do not believe that anything else +irrefragably establishes the fact for the yearning hearts of us poor +men who want love, and yet cannot grope our way in amidst the +mysteries and the clouds in providence and nature, except +this--'Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, +and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.' + +The question may arise in some minds, Is there any need for proving +God's love? The question never arose except within the limits of +Christianity. It is only men who have lived all their lives in an +atmosphere saturated by Christian sentiment and conviction that ever +come to the point of saying, 'We do not want historical revelation to +prove to us the fact of a loving God.' They would never have fancied +that they did not need the revelation unless, unconsciously to +themselves, and indirectly, all their thoughts had been coloured and +illuminated by the revelation that they profess they reject. God as +Love is 'our dearest faith, our ghastliest doubt,' and the only way +to make absolutely certain of the fact that His heart is full of +mercy to us is to look upon Him as He stands revealed to us, not +merely in the words of Christ, for, precious as they are, these are +the smallest part of His revelation, but in the life and in the death +which open for us the heart of God. Remember what He said Himself, +_not_ 'He who hath listened to Me, doth understand the Father,' but +'He that hath _seen_ Me hath seen the Father.' 'In Him is yea,' and +the hopes and shadowy fore-revelations of the loving heart of God are +confirmed by the fact of His life and death. God _establishes_, +not 'commends' as our translation has it, 'His love towards us in +that whilst we were yet sinners Christ died for us.' + +Further, in Him we have the certainty of pardon. Every deep +heart-experience amongst men has felt the necessity of having a clear +certainty and knowledge about forgiveness. Men do not feel it always. +A man can skate over the surface of the great deeps that lie beneath +the most frivolous life, and may suppose, in his superficial way of +looking at things, that there is no need for any definite teaching +about sin and the mode of dealing with it. But once bring that man +face to face, in a quiet hour, with the facts of his life and of a +divine law, and all that superficial ignoring of evil in himself and +of the dread of punishment and consequences, passes away. I am sure +of this, that no religion will ever go far and last long and work +mightily, and lay a sovereign hand upon human life, which has not a +most plain and decisive message to preach in reference to pardon. And +I am sure of this, that one reason for the comparative feebleness of +much so-called Christian teaching in this generation is just that the +deepest needs of a man's conscience are not met by it. In a religion +on which the whole spirit of a man may rest itself, there must be a +very plain message about what is to be done with sin. The only +message which answers to the needs of an awakened conscience and an +alarmed heart is the old-fashioned message that Jesus Christ the +Righteous has died for us sinful men. All other religions have felt +after a clear doctrine of forgiveness, and all have failed to find +it. Here is the divine 'Yea!' And on it alone we can suspend the +whole weight of our soul's salvation. The rope that is to haul us out +of the horrible pit and the miry clay had much need to be tested +before we commit ourselves to it. There are plenty of easygoing +superficial theories about forgiveness predominant in the world +to-day. Except the one that says, 'In whom we have redemption through +His blood, even the forgiveness of sin,' they are all like the rope +let down into the dark mine to lift the captives beneath, half of the +strands of which have been cut on the sharp edge above, and when the +weight hangs on to it, it will snap. There is nothing on which a man +who has once learned the tragical meaning and awful reality and depth +of the fact of his transgression can suspend his forgiveness, except +this, that 'Christ has died, the just for the unjust, to bring us +unto God.' 'In Him the promise is yea.' + +And, again, we have in Christ divine certainties in regard to life. +We have in Him the absolutely perfect pattern to which we are to +conform our whole doings. And so, notwithstanding that there may, and +will still be many uncertainties and much perplexity, we have the +great broad lines of morals and of duty traced with a firm hand, and +all that we need to know of obligation and of perfectness lies in +this--Be like Jesus Christ! So the solemn commandments of the ethical +side of Divine Revelation, as well as the promises of it, get their +'yea' in Jesus Christ, and He stands the Law of our lives. + +We have certainties for life, in the matter of protection, guidance, +supply of all necessity, and the like, treasured and garnered in +Jesus Christ. For He not only confirms, but fulfils, the promises +which God has made. If we have that dear Lord for our very own, and +He belongs to us as He does belong to them who love Him and trust +Him, then in Him we have in actual possession these promises, how +many soever they be, which are given by God's other words. + +Christ is Protean, and becomes everything to each man that each man +requires. He is, as it were, 'a box where sweets compacted lie.' 'In +Him are hid all the treasures,' not only of wisdom and knowledge, but +of divine gifts, and we have but to go to Him in order to have that +which at each moment as it emerges, we most require. As in some of +those sunny islands of the Southern Pacific, one tree supplies the +people with all that they need for their simple wants, fruit for +their food, leaves for their houses, staves, thread, needles, +clothing, drink, everything--so Jesus Christ, this Tree of Life, is +Himself the sum of all the promises, and, having Him, we have +everything that we need. + +And, lastly, in Christ we have the divine certainties as to the +Future over which, apart from Him, lie cloud and darkness. As I said +about the revelation of the heart of God, so I say about the +revelation of a future life--a verbal revelation is not enough. We +have enough of arguments; what we want is facts. We have enough of +man's peradventures about a future life, enough of evidence more or +less valid to show that it is 'probable,' or 'not inconceivable,' or +'more likely than not,' and so on and so on. What we want is that +somebody shall cross the gulf and come back again, and so we get in +the Resurrection of Christ the one fact on which men may safely rest +their convictions of immortality, and I do not think that there is a +second anywhere. On it alone, as I believe, hinges the whole answer +to the question--'If a man die, shall he live again?' This generation +is brought, in my reading of it, right up to this +alternative--Christ's Resurrection,--or we die like the brutes that +perish. 'All the promises of God in Him are yea.' + +II. And now a word as to the second portion of my text--viz. man's +certitudes, which answer to God's certainties. + +The latter are _in_ Christ, the former are _through_ Christ. Now it +is clear that the only fitting attitude for professing Christians in +reference to these certainties of God is the attitude of unhesitating +affirmation and joyful assent. Certitude is the fitting response to +certainty. + +There should be some kind of correspondence between the firmness with +which we grasp, the tenacity with which we hold, the assurance with +which we believe, these great truths, and the rock-like firmness and +immovableness of the evidence upon which they rest. It is a poor +compliment to God to come to His most veracious affirmations, sealed +with the broad seal of His Son's life and death, and to answer with a +hesitating 'Amen,' that falters and almost sticks in our throat. +Build rock upon rock. Be sure of the certain things. Grasp with a +firm hand the firm stay. Immovably cling to the immovable foundation; +and though you be but like the limpet on the rock hold fast by the +Rock, as the limpet does; for it is an insult to the certainty of the +revelation, when there is hesitation in the believer. + +I need not dwell for more than a moment upon the lamentable contrast +which is presented between this certitude, which is our only fitting +attitude, and the hesitating assent and half belief in which so many +professing Christians pass their lives. The reasons for that are +partly moral, partly intellectual. This is not a day which is +favourable to the unhesitating avowal of convictions in reference to +an unseen world, and many of us are afraid of being called narrow, or +dogmatisers, and think it looks like breadth, and liberality, and +culture, and I know not what, to say 'Well! perhaps it is, but I am +not quite sure; I think it is, but I will not commit myself.' All the +promises of God, which in Him are yea, ought through Him to get from +us an 'Amen.' + +There is a great deal that will always be uncertain. The firmer our +convictions, the fewer will be the things that they grasp; but, if +they be few, they will be large, and enough for us. These truths +certified in Christ concerning the heart of God, the message of +pardon, the law for life, the gifts of guidance, defence, and +sanctifying, the sure and certain hope of immortality--these things +we ought to be sure about, whatever borderland of uncertainty may lie +beyond them. The Christian verb is 'we _know_,' not 'we hope, we +calculate, we infer, we think,' but 'we _know_.' And it becomes +us to apprehend for ourselves the full blessedness and power of the +certitude which Christ has given to us by the certainties which he +has brought us. + +I need not speak about the blessedness of such a calm assurance, +about the need of it for power, for peace, for effort, for fixedness +in the midst of a world and age of change. But I must, before I +close, point you to the only path by which that certitude is +attainable. '_Through_ Him is the amen.' He is the Door. The truths +which He confirms are so inextricably intertwined with Himself that +you cannot get them and put away Him. Christ's relation to Christ's +Gospel is not the relation of other teachers to their words. You may +accept the words of a Plato, whatever you think of the Plato who +spoke the words. But you cannot separate Christ and His teaching in +that fashion, and you must have _Him_ if you are to get _it_. So, +faith in Him, the intellectual acceptance of Him, as the +authoritative and infallible Revealer, the bowing down of heart and +will to Him as our Commander and our Lord, the absolute trust in Him +as the foundation of all our hope and the source of all our +blessedness--that is the way to certitude, and there is no other road +that we can take. + +If thus we keep near Him, our faith will bring us the present +experience and fulfilment of the promises, and we shall be sure of +them, because we have them already. And whilst men are asking, 'Do we +know anything about God? Is there a God at all? Is there such a thing +as forgiveness? Can anybody find anywhere absolute rules for his +life? Is there anything beyond the grave but mist and darkness?' we +can say, 'One thing I know, Jesus Christ is my Saviour, and in Him I +know God, and pardon, and duty, and sanctifying, and safety, and +immortality; and whatever is dark, this, at least, is sun-clear.' Get +high enough up and you will be above the fog; and while the men down +in it are squabbling as to whether there is anything outside the +mist, you, from your sunny station, will see the far-off coasts, and +haply catch some whiff of perfume from their shore, and see some +glinting of a glory upon the shining turrets of 'the city that hath +foundations.' We have a present possession of all the promises of +God; and whoever doubts their certitude, the man who knows himself a +son of God by faith, and has experience of forgiveness and guidance +and answered prayer and hopes whose 'sweetness yieldeth proof that +they were born for immortality,' _knows_ the things which others +question and doubt. + +So live near Jesus Christ, and, holding fast by His hand, you may +lift up your joyful 'Amen' to every one of God's 'Yeas.' For in Him +we know the Father, in Him we know that we have the forgiveness of +sins, in Him we know that God is near to bless and succour and guide, +and in Him 'we know that, though our earthly house were dissolved, we +have a building of God.' Wherefore we are always confident; and when +the Voice from Heaven says 'Yea!' our choral shout may go up 'Amen! +Thou art the faithful and true witness.' + + + + +ANOINTED AND STABLISHED + + 'Now He which stablisheth us with you in Christ, + and hath anointed us, is God.'--2 COR. i. 21. + + +The connection in which these words occur is a remarkable +illustration of the Apostle's habit of looking at the most trivial +things in the light of the highest truths. He had been obliged, as +the context informs us, to abandon an intended visit to Corinth. The +miserable crew of antagonists, who yelped at his heels all his life, +seized this change of purpose as the occasion for a double-barrelled +charge. They said he was either fickle and infirm of purpose, or +insincere, and saying 'Yea' with one side of his mouth and 'Nay' with +the other. He rebuts this accusation with apparently quite +disproportionate vehemence and great solemnity. He points in the +context to the faithfulness of God, to the firm Gospel which he had +preached, to God's great 'Yea!' as his answer. He says in effect, +'How could I, with such a word burning in my heart, move in a region +of equivocation and double-dealing; or how could I, whose whole being +is saturated with so firm and stable a Gospel, be unreliable and +fickle? The message must make the messenger like itself. Communion +with a faithful God must make faith-keeping men; the certainties of +God's "Yea," and the certitudes of our "Amen," must influence our +characters.' And so to suppose that a man, influenced by +Christianity, is a weak, double-dealing, unsteadfast man is a +contradiction in terms. In the text he carries his argument a step +further, and points, not only to the power of the Gospel to steady +and confirm, but also to the fact that God Himself communicates to +the believing soul Christian stability by the anointing which He +bestows. + +So, then, we have in these words the declaration that inflexible, +immovable steadfastness is a mark of a Christian, and that this +Christian steadfastness, without which there is no Christianity worth +the naming, is a direct gift from God Himself by means of that great +anointing which He confers upon men. To that thought, in one or two +of its aspects, I ask your attention. + +I. Notice the deep source of this Christian steadfastness. + +The language of the original, carefully considered, seems to me to +bear this interpretation, that the 'anointing' of the second clause +is the means of the 'establishing' of the first--that is to say, that +God confers Christian steadfastness of character by the bestowment of +the unction of His Divine Spirit. + +Now notice how deep Paul digs in order to get a foundation for a +common virtue. There are many ways by which men may cultivate the +tenacity and steadfastness of purpose which ought to mark us all. +Much discipline may be brought to bear in order to secure that; but +the text says that the deepest ground upon which it can be rested is +nothing less divine and solemn than this, the actual communication to +men, to feeble, vacillating, fluctuating wills, and treacherous, +wayward, wandering hearts, of the strength and fixedness which are +given by God's own Spirit. + +I suppose I need not remind you that from beginning to end of +Scripture, 'anointing' is taken as the symbol of the communication of +a true divine influence. The oil poured on the head of prophet, +priest, and king was but the expression of the communication to the +recipient of a divine influence which fitted him as well as +designated him, for the office that he filled. And although it is +aside from my present purpose, I may just, in a sentence, point to +the felicity of the emblem. The flowing oil smoothes the surface upon +which it is spread, supples the limbs, and is nutritive and +illuminating; thus giving an appropriate emblem of the secret, +silent, quickening, nourishing, enlightening influences of that +Spirit which God gives to all His sons. + +And inasmuch as here this oil of the Divine Spirit is stated as being +the true ground and basis of Christian steadfastness, it is obvious +that the anointing intended cannot be that of mere designation to, +and inspiration for, apostolic or other office, but must be the +universal possession of all Christian men and women. 'Ye,' says +another Apostle, speaking to the whole democracy of the Christian +Church, and not to any little group of selected aristocrats +therein--'ye have an unction from the Holy One,' and every man and +woman who has a living grasp of the living Christ, receives from Him +this great gift. + +Then, notice further that this anointing by a Divine Spirit, which is +a true source of life to those that possess it, is derived from, and +parallel with, Christ's anointing. We use the word 'Christ' as a +proper name, and forget what it means. The 'Christ' is _the Anointed +One_. And do you think that it was a mere accident, or the result of +a scanty vocabulary, which compelled the Apostle, in these two +contiguous clauses, to use cognate words when he said:--'He that +establisheth us with you in the _Anointed_, and hath _anointed_ us, +is God'? Did he not mean to say thereby, 'Each of you in a very true +sense, if you are a Christian, is a _Christ_'? You, too, are +anointed; you, too, are God's Messiahs. On you in a measure the same +Spirit rests which dwelt without measure in Him. The chief of +Christ's gifts to the Church is the gift of His own life. All His +brethren are anointed with the oil that was poured upon His head, +even as the oil upon Aaron's locks percolated to the very skirts of +his garments. Being anointed with the anointing which was on Him, all +His people may claim an identity of nature, may hope for an identity +of destiny, and are bound to a prolongation of part of His function +and a similarity of character. If He by that anointing was made +Prophet, Priest, and King for the world, all His children partake of +these offices in subordinate but real fashion, and are prophets to +make God known to men, priests to offer up spiritual sacrifices, and +kings at least over themselves, and, if they will, over a world which +obeys and serves those that serve and love God. Ye are +anointed--'Messiahs' and 'Christs,' by derivation of the life of +Jesus Christ. + +And if these things be true, it is plain enough how this divine +unction, which is granted to all Christians, lies at the root of +steadfastness. + +We talk a great deal about the gentleness of Christ; we cannot +celebrate it too much, but we may forget that it is the gentleness of +strength. We do not sufficiently mark the masculine features in that +character, the tremendous tenacity of will, the inflexible fixedness +of purpose, the irremovable constancy of obedience in the face of all +temptations to the contrary. The figure that rises before us is that +of the Christ yearning over weaklings far oftener than it is that of +the Christ with knitted brow, and tightened lips, and far-off gazing +eye, 'steadfastly setting His face to go to Jerusalem,' and followed +as He pressed up the rocky road from Jericho, by that wondering +group, astonished at the rigidity of purpose that was stamped on His +features. That Christ gives us His Spirit to make us tenacious, +constant, righteously obstinate, inflexible in the pursuit of all +that is lovely and of good report, like Himself. That Divine Spirit +will cure the fickleness of our natures; for our wills are never +fixed till they are fixed in obedience, and never free until they +elect to serve Him. That Divine Spirit will cure the wandering of our +hearts and bind us to Himself. It will lift us above the selfish and +cowardly dependence on externals and surroundings, men and things, in +which we are all tempted to live. We are all too like aneroid +barometers, that go up and down with every variation of a foot or two +in our level, but if we have the Spirit of Christ dwelling in us, it +will cut the bonds that bind us to the world, and give us possession +of a deeper love than can be sustained by, or is derived from, these +superficial sources. The true possession of the Divine Spirit, if I +might use such a metaphor, sets a man on an insulating stool, and all +the currents that move round about him are powerless to reach him. If +we have that Divine Spirit within us, it will give us an experience +of the preciousness and the truth, the certitude and the sweetness, +of Christ's Gospel, which will make it impossible that we should ever +cast away the confidence which has such 'recompense of reward.' No +man will be surely bound to the truth and person of Christ with bonds +that cannot be snapped, except he who in his heart has the knowledge +of Him which is possession, and by the gift of the Divine Spirit is +knit to Jesus Christ. + +So, dear friends, whilst the world is full of wise words about +steadfastness, and exalts determination of character and fixity of +purpose, rightly, as the basis of much good, our Gospel comes to us +poor, light, thistledown creatures, and lets us see how we can be +steadfast and settled by being fastened to a steadfast and settled +Christ. When storms are raging they lash light articles on deck to +holdfasts. Let us lash ourselves to the abiding Christ, and we, too, +shall abide. + +II. In the next place, notice the aim or purpose of this Christian +steadfastness. + +'He stablisheth us with you in Christ,' or as the original has it +even more significantly, _into_ or '_unto_ Christ.' Now that seems to +me to imply two things--first, that our steadfastness, made possible +by our possession of that Divine Spirit, is steadfastness in our +relations to Jesus Christ. We are established in reference or in +regard to Him. In other words, what Paul here means is, first, a +fixed conviction of the truth that He is the Christ, the Son of God, +the Saviour of the world, and my Saviour. That is the first step. Men +who are steadfast without their intellect guiding and settling the +steadfastness are not steadfast, but obstinate and pigheaded. We are +meant to be guided by our understandings, and no fixity is anything +better than the immobility of a stone, unless it be based upon a +distinct and whole-brained intellectual acceptance of Jesus Christ as +the All-in-all for us, for life and death, for inward and outward +being. + +Paul means, next, a steadfastness in regard to Christ in our trust +and love. Surely if from Him there is for ever streaming out an +unbroken flow of tenderness, there should be ever on our sides an +equally unbroken opening of our hearts for the reception of His love, +and an equally uninterrupted response to it in our grateful +affection. There can be no more damning condemnation of the +vacillations and fluctuations of Christian men's affections than the +steadfastness of Christ's love to them. He loves ever; He is +unalterable in the communication and effluence of His heart. Surely +it is most fitting that we should be steadfast in our devotion and +answering love to Him. And Paul means not only fixedness of +intellectual conviction and continuity of loving response, but also +habitual obedience, which is always ready to do His will. + +So we should answer His 'Yea!' with our 'Amen!' and having an +unchanging Christ to rest upon, we should rest upon Him unchanging. +The broken, fluctuating affections and trusts and obediences which +mark so much of the average Christian life of this day are only too +sad proofs of how scant our possession of that Spirit of +steadfastness must be supposed to be. God's 'Yea' is answered by our +faltering 'Amen'; God's truth is hesitatingly accepted; God's love is +partially returned; God's work is slothfully and negligently done. +'Be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the +Lord.' + +Another thought is suggested by these words--viz. that such +steadfastness as we have been trying to describe has for its result a +deeper penetration into Jesus Christ and a fuller possession of Him. +The only way by which we can grow nearer and nearer to our Lord is by +steadfastly keeping beside Him. You cannot get the spirit of a +landscape unless you sit down and gaze, and let it soak into you. The +cheap tripper never sees the lake. You cannot get to know a man until +you summer and winter with him. No subject worth studying opens +itself to the hasty glance. Was it not Sir Isaac Newton who used to +say, 'I have no genius, but I keep a subject before me'? 'Abide in +Me; as the branch cannot bear fruit except it abide in the vine, no +more can ye except ye abide in Me.' Continuous, steadfast adhesion to +Him is the condition of growing up into His likeness, and receiving +more and more of His beauty into our waiting hearts. 'Wait on the +Lord; wait, I say, on the Lord.' + +III. Lastly, notice the very humble and commonplace sphere in which +the Christian steadfastness manifests itself. + +It was nothing of more importance than that Paul had said he was +going to Corinth, and did not, on which he brings all this array of +great principles to bear. From which I gather just this thought, that +the highest gifts of God's grace and the greatest truths of God's +Word are meant to regulate the tiniest things in our daily life. It +is no degradation to the lightning to have to carry messages. It is +no profanation of the sun to gather its rays into a burning glass to +light a kitchen fire with. And it is no unworthy use of the Divine +Spirit that God gives to His children, to say it will keep a man from +hasty and precipitate decisions as to little things in life, and from +chopping and changing about, with a levity of purpose and without a +sufficient reason. If our religion is not going to influence the +trifles, what is it going to influence? Our life is made up of +trifles, and if these are not its field, where is its field? You may +be quite sure that, if your religion does not influence the little +things, it will never influence the great ones. If it has not power +enough to guide the horses when they are at a slow, sober walk, what +do you think it will do when they are at a gallop and plunging? 'He +that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much.' So +let us see to two things--first, that all our religion is worked into +our life, for only so much of it as is so inwrought is our +religion--and, second, that all our life is brought under the sway of +motives derived from our religion: for only in proportion as it is, +will it be pure and good. + +And as regards this special virtue and prime quality of steadfastness +and fixedness of purpose, you can do no good in the world without it. +Unless a man can hold his own, and turn an obstinate negative to the +temptations that lie thick about him, he will never come to any good +at all, either in this life or in the next. The basis of all +excellence is a wholesome disregard of externals, and the cultivation +of a strong self-reliant and self-centred, because God-trusting and +Christ-centred, will. And I tell you, especially you young men and +women, if you want to do or be anything worth doing or being, you +must try to get your natures hardened into being 'steadfast, +unmovable.' There is only one infallible way of doing it, and that is +to let the 'strong Son of God' live in you, and in Him to find your +strength for resistance, your strength for obedience, your strength +for submission. 'I have set the Lord always before me; because He is +at my right hand, I shall not be moved.' + +There are two types of men in the world. The one has his emblem in +the chaff, rootless, with no hold, swept out of the threshing-floor +by every gust of wind. That the picture of many whose principles lie +at the mercy of the babble of tongues round about them, whose +rectitude goes at a puff of temptation, like the smoke out of a +chimney when the wind blows; who have no will for what is good, but +live as it happens. The other type of man has his emblem in the tree, +rooted deep, and therefore rising high, with its roots going as far +underground as its branches spread in the blue, and therefore green +of leaf and rich of fruit 'We are made partakers of Christ if we hold +fast the beginning of our confidence, steadfast until the end.' + + + + +SEAL AND EARNEST + + 'Who hath also sealed us, and given the earnest of + the Spirit in our hearts.'--2 COR. i. 23. + + +There are three strong metaphors in this and the preceding +verse--'anointing,' 'sealing,' and 'giving the earnest'--all of which +find their reality in the same divine act. These three metaphors all +refer to the same subject, and what that subject is is sufficiently +explained in the last of them. The 'earnest' consists of 'the Spirit +in our hearts,' and the same explanation might have been appended to +both the preceding clauses, for the 'anointing' is the anointing of +the Spirit, and the 'seal' is the seal of the Spirit. Further, these +three metaphors all refer to one and the same act. They are not three +things, but three aspects of one thing, just as a sunbeam might be +regarded either as the source of warmth, or of light, or of chemical +action. So the one gift of the one Spirit, 'anoints,' 'seals,' and is +the 'earnest.' Further, these three metaphors all declare a universal +prerogative of Christians. Every man that loves Jesus Christ has the +Spirit in the measure of his faith,' and if any man have not the +Spirit of Christ he is none of His.' + +I. Note the first metaphor in the text--the 'seal' of the Spirit. + +A seal is impressed upon a recipient material made soft by warmth, in +order to leave there a copy of itself. Now it is not fanciful, nor +riding a metaphor to death, when I dwell upon these features of the +emblem in order to suggest their analogies in Christian life. The +Spirit of God comes into our spirits, and by gentle contact impresses +upon the material, which was intractable until it was melted by the +genial warmth of faith and love, the likeness of Himself, but yet so +as that prominences correspond to the hollows, and what is in relief +in the one is sunk in the other. Expand that general statement for a +moment or two. + +The effect of all the divine indwelling, which is the characteristic +gift of Christ to every Christian soul, is to mould the recipient +into the image of the divine inhabitant. There is in the human +spirit--such are its dignity amidst its ruins, and its nobility +shining through its degradation--a capacity of receiving that image +of God which consists not only in voluntary and intelligent action +and the consciousness of personal being, but in the love of the +things that are fair, and in righteousness, and true holiness. His +Spirit, entering into a heart, will make that heart wise with its own +wisdom, strong with some infusion of its own strength, gracious with +some drops of its own grace, gentle with some softening from its own +gentleness, holy with some purity reflected from its own transcendent +whiteness. The Spirit, which is life, moulds the heart into which it +enters to a kindred, and, therefore, similar life. + +There are, however, characteristics in this 'seal' of the Spirit +which are not so much copies as correspondences. That is to say, just +as what is convex in the seal is concave in the impression, and +_vice versâ_, so, when that Divine Spirit comes into our spirits, its +promises will excite faith, its gifts will breed desire; to every +bestowment there will answer an opening receptivity. Recipient love +will correspond to the love that longs to dispense, the sense of need +to the divine fulness and sufficiency, emptiness to abundance, +prayers to promises; the cry 'Abba! Father'! the yearning +consciousness of sonship, to the word 'Thou art My Son'; and the +upward eye of aspiration and petition, and necessity, and waiting, to +the downward glance of love bestowing itself. The open heart answers +to the extended hand, and the seal which God's Spirit impresses upon +the heart that is submitted to it, has the two-fold character of +resemblance in moral nature and righteousness, and of correspondence +as regards the mysteries of the converse between the recipient man +and the giving God. + +Then, mark that the material is made capable of receiving the stamp, +because it is warmed and softened. That is to say, faith must prepare +the heart for the sanctifying indwelling of that Divine Spirit. The +hard wax may be struck with the seal, but it leaves no trace. God +does not do with man as the coiner does with his blanks, put them +cold into a press, and by violence from without stamp an image upon +them, but He does as men do with a seal, warms the wax first, and +then, with a gentle, firm touch, leaves the likeness there. So, +brother! learn this lesson: if you wish to be good, lie under the +contact of the Spirit of righteousness, and see that your heart is +warm. + +Still further, note that this aggregate of Christian character, in +likeness and correspondence, is the true sign that we belong to God. +The seal is the mark of ownership, is it not? Where the broad arrow +has been impressed, everybody knows that that is royal property. And +so this seal of God's Divine Spirit, in its effects upon my +character, is the one token to myself and to other people that I +belong to God, and that He belongs to me. Or, to put it into plain +English, the best reason for any man's being regarded as a Christian +is his possession of the likeness and correspondence to God which +that Divine Spirit gives. Likeness and correspondence, I say, for the +one class of results is the more open for the observation of the +world, and the other class is of the more value for ourselves. I +believe that Christian people ought to have, and are meant by that +Divine Spirit dwelling in them to have, a consciousness that they are +Christians and God's children, for their own peace and rest and joy. +But you cannot use that in demonstration to other people; you may be +as sure of it as you will, in your inmost hearts, but it is no sign +to anybody else. And, on the other hand, there may be much of outward +virtue and beauty of character which may lead other people to say +about a man: '_That_ is a good Christian man, at any rate,' and yet +there may be in the heart an all but absolute absence of any joyful +assurance that we are Christ's, and that He belongs to us. So the two +facts must go together. Correspondence, the spirit of sonship which +meets His taking us as sons, the faith which clasps the promise, the +reception which welcomes bestowment, must be stamped upon the inward +life. For the outward life there must be the manifest impress of +righteousness upon my actions, if there is to be any real seal and +token that I belong to Him. God writes His own name upon the men that +are His. All their goodness, their gentleness, patience, hatred of +evil, energy and strenuousness in service, submission in suffering, +with whatsoever other radiance of human virtue may belong to them, +are really 'His mark!' + +There is no other worth talking about, and to you Christian men I +come and say, Be very sure that your professions of inward communion +and happy consciousness that you are Christ's are verified to +yourself and to others by a plain outward life of righteousness like +the Lord's. Have you got that seal stamped upon your lives, like the +hall-mark that says, 'This is genuine silver, and no plated Brummagem +stuff'? Have you got that seal of a visible righteousness and +every-day purity to confirm your assertion that you belong to Christ? +Is it woven into the whole length of your being, like the scarlet +thread that is spun into every Admiralty cable as a sign that it is +Crown property? God's seal, visible to me and to nobody else, is my +consciousness that I am His; but that consciousness is vindicated and +delivered from the possibility of illusion or hypocrisy, only when it +is checked and fortified by the outward evidence of the holy life +which the Spirit of God has wrought. + +Further, this sealing, which is thus the token of God's ownership, is +also the pledge of security. A seal is stamped in order that there +may be no tampering with what it seals; that it may be kept safe from +all assaults, thieves, and violence. And in the metaphor of our text +there is included this thought, too, which is also of an intensely +practical nature. For it just comes to this--our true guarantee that +we shall come at last into the sweet security and safety of the +perfect state is present likeness to the indwelling Spirit and +present reception of divine grace. The seal is the pledge of +security, just because it is the mark of ownership. When, by God's +Spirit dwelling in us, we are led to love the things that are fair, +and to long after more possession of whatever things are of good +report, that is like God's hoisting His flag upon a newly-annexed +territory. And is He going to be so careless in the preservation of +His property as that He will allow that which is thus acquired to +slip away from Him? Does He account us as of so small value as to +hold us with so slack a hand? But no man has a right to rest on the +assurance of God's saving him into the heavenly kingdom, unless He is +saving him at this moment from the devil and his own evil heart. And, +therefore, I say the Christian character, in its outward +manifestations and in its sweet inward secrets of communion, is the +guarantee that we shall not fall. Rest upon Him, and He will hold you +up. We are 'kept by the power of God unto salvation,' and that power +keeps us and that final salvation becomes ours, 'through faith.' + +II. Now, secondly, turn to the other emblem, that 'earnest' which +consists in like manner 'of the Spirit.' + +The 'earnest,' of course, is a small portion of purchase-money, or +wages, or contract-money, which is given at the making of a bargain, +as an assurance that the whole amount will be paid in due time. And, +says the Apostle, this seal is also an earnest. It not only makes +certain God's ownership and guarantees the security of those on whom +it is impressed, but it also points onwards to the future, and at +once guarantees that, and to a large extent reveals the nature of it. +So, then, we have here two thoughts on which I touch. + +The Christian character and experience are the earnest of the +inheritance, in the sense of being its guarantee, inasmuch as the +experiences of the Christian life here are plainly immortal. The +Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead is the objective and +external proof of a future life. The facts of the Christian life, its +aspirations, its communion, its clasp of God as its very own, are the +subjective and inward proofs of a future life. As a matter of fact, +if you will take the Old Testament, you will see that the highest +summits in it, to which the hope of immortality soared, spring +directly from the experience of deep and blessed communion with the +living God. When the Psalmist said 'Thou wilt not leave my soul in +_Sheol_; neither wilt Thou suffer Thy Holy One to see corruption,' he +was speaking a conviction that had been floated into his mind on the +crest of a great wave of religious enjoyment and communion. And, in +like manner, when the other Psalmist said, 'Thou art the strength of +my heart, and my portion for ever,' he was speaking of the glimpse +that he had got of the land that was very far off, from the height +which he had climbed on the Mount of fellowship with God. And for us, +I suppose that the same experience holds good. Howsoever much we may +say that we believe in a future life and in a heaven, we really grasp +them as facts that will be true about ourselves, in the proportion in +which we are living here in direct contact and communion with God. +The conviction of immortality is the distinct and direct result of +the present enjoyment of communion with Him, and it is a reasonable +result. No man who has known what it is to turn himself to God with a +glow of humble love, and to feel that he is not turning his face to +vacuity, but to a Face that looks on him with love, can believe that +anything can ever come to destroy that communion. What have faith, +love, aspiration, resignation, fellowship with God, to do with death? +They cannot be cut through with the stroke that destroys physical +life, any more than you can divide a sunbeam with a sword. It unites +again, and the impotent edge passes through and has effected nothing. +Death can shear asunder many bonds, but that invisible bond that +unites the soul to God is of adamant, against which his scythe is in +vain. Death is the grim porter that opens the door of a dark hole and +herds us into it as sheep are driven into a slaughter-house. But to +those who have learned what it is to lay a trusting hand in God's +hand, the grim porter is turned into the gentle damsel, who keeps the +door, and opens it for light and warmth and safety to the hunted +prisoner that has escaped from the dungeon of life. Death cannot +touch communion, and the consciousness of communion with God is the +earnest of the inheritance. + +It is so for another reason also. All the results of the Divine +Spirit's sealing of the soul are manifestly incomplete, and as +manifestly tend towards completeness. The engine is clearly working +now at half-speed. It is obviously capable of much higher pressure +than it is going at now. Those powers in the Christian man can +plainly do a great deal more than they ever have done here, and are +meant to do a great deal more. Is this imperfect Christianity of +ours, our little faith so soon shattered, our little love so quickly +disproved, our faltering resolutions, our lame performances, our +earthward cleavings--are these things all that Jesus Christ's bitter +agony was for, and all that a Divine Spirit is able to make of us? +Manifestly, here is but a segment of the circle, in heaven is the +perfect round; and the imperfections, so far as life is concerned, in +the work of so obviously divine an Agent, cry aloud for a region +where tendency shall become result, and all that it was possible for +Him to make us we shall become. The road evidently leads upwards, and +round that sharp corner where the black rocks come so near each other +and our eyesight cannot travel, we may be sure it goes steadily up +still to the top of the pass, until it reaches 'the shining +table-lands whereof our God Himself is Sun and Moon,' and brings us +all to the city set on a hill. + +And, further, that divine seal is the earnest, inasmuch as itself is +part of the whole. The truest and the loftiest conception that we can +form of heaven is as being the perfecting of the religious experience +of earth. The shilling or two, given to the servant in old-fashioned +days, when he was hired, is of the same currency as the balance that +he is to get when the year's work is done. The small payment to-day +comes out of the same purse, and is coined out of the same specie, +and is part of the same currency of the same kingdom, as what we get +when we go yonder and count the endless riches to which we have +fallen heirs at last. You have but to take the faith, the love, the +obedience, the communion of the highest moments of the Christian life +on earth, and free them from all their limitations, subtract from +them all their imperfections, multiply them to their superlative +possibility, and endow them with a continual power of growth, and +stretch them out to absolute eternity, and you get heaven. The +earnest is of a piece with the inheritance. + +So, dear brethren, here is a gift offered for us all, a gift which +our feebleness sorely needs, a gift for every timid nature, for every +weak will, for every man, woman, and child beset with snares and +fighting with heavy tasks, the offer of a reinforcement as real and +as sure to bring victory as when, on that day when the fate of Europe +was determined, after long hours of conflict, the Prussian bugles +blew, and the English commander knew that (with the fresh troops that +came on the field) victory was made certain. So you and I may have in +our hearts the Spirit of God, the spirit of strength, the spirit of +love and of a sound mind, the spirit of adoption, the spirit of +wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him, to enlighten our +darkness, to bind our hearts to Him, to quicken and energise our +souls, to make the weakest among us strong, and the strong as an +angel of God. And the condition on which we may get it is this simple +one which the Apostle lays down; '_After that ye believed_, ye were +sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our +inheritance.' The Christ, who is the Lord and Giver of the Spirit, +has shown us how its blessed influences may be ours when, on the +great day of the feast, He stood and cried with a voice that echoes +across the centuries, and is meant for each of us, 'If any man +thirsts, let him come unto Me and drink. He that believeth in Me, out +of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. This spake He of the +Spirit which they that believe or Him should receive.' + + + + +THE TRIUMPHAL PROCESSION + + 'Thanks be unto God, which always leadeth us in triumph + in Christ and maketh manifest through us the savour of + His knowledge in every place.'--2 COR. ii. 14 (R.V.) + + +I suppose most of us have some knowledge of what a Roman Triumph was, +and can picture to ourselves the long procession, the victorious +general in his chariot with its white horses, the laurelled soldiers, +the sullen captives, with suppressed hate flashing in their sunken +eyes, the wreathing clouds of incense that went up into the blue sky, +and the shouting multitude of spectators. That is the picture in the +Apostle's mind here. The Revised Version correctly alters the +translation into 'Thanks unto God which always _leadeth us in_ +triumph in Christ.' + +Paul thinks of himself and of his coadjutors in Christian work as +being conquered captives, made to follow their Conqueror and to swell +His triumph. He is thankful to be so overcome. What was deepest +degradation is to him supreme honour. Curses in many a strange tongue +would break from the lips of the prisoners who had to follow the +general's victorious chariot. But from Paul's lips comes +irrepressible praise; he joins in the shout of acclamation to the +Conqueror. + +And then he passes on to another of the parts of the ceremonial. As +the wreathing incense appealed at once to two senses, and was visible +in its curling clouds of smoke, and likewise fragrant to the +nostrils, so says Paul, with a singular combination of expression, +'He maketh _manifest_,' that is visible, the _savour_ of +His knowledge. From a heart kindled by the flame of the divine love +there will go up the odour of a holy life visible and fragrant, sweet +and fair. + +And thus all Christians, and not Christian workers only in the +narrower sense of the word, who may be doing evangelistic work, have +set before them in these great words the very ideal and secret of +their lives. + +There are three things here, on each of which I touch as belonging to +the true notion of a Christian life--the conquered captive; that +captive partaking in the triumph of his Conqueror; and the conquered +captive led as a trophy and a witness to the Conqueror's power. These +three things, I think, explain the Apostle's thoughts here. Let me +deal with them now. + +I. First then, let us look at that thought of all Christians being in +the truest sense conquered captives, bound to the chariot wheels of +One who has overcome them. + +The image implies a prior state of hostility and alienation. Now, do +not let us exaggerate, let us take Paul's own experience. He is +speaking about himself here; he is not talking doctrine, he is giving +us autobiography, and he says, 'I was an enemy, and I have been +conquered.' + +What sort of an enemy was he? Well! He says that before he became a +Christian he lived a pure, virtuous, respectable life. He was a man +'as touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless.' +Observant of all relative duties, sober, temperate, chaste; no man +could say a word against him; he knew nothing against himself. His +conscience acquitted him of wrong: 'I thought I ought to do many +things,' as I did them. And yet, looking back from his present point +of view upon a life thus adorned with many virtues, pure from all +manifest corruption, to a large extent regulated by conscientious and +religious motives of a kind, he says, 'Notwithstanding all that, I +was an enemy.' Why? Because the retrospect let him see that his life +was barren of the deepest faith and the purest love. And so I come to +some of my friends here now, and I say to you, 'Change the name, and +the story is true about you,' respectable people, who are trying to +live pure and righteous lives, doing all duties that present +themselves to you with a very tolerable measure of completeness and +abominating and trying to keep yourselves from the things that your +consciences tell you are wrong, yet needing to be conquered, in the +deepest recesses of your wills and your hearts, before you become +the true subjects of the true King. I do not want to exaggerate, nor +to say of the ordinary run of people who listen to us preachers, that +they commit manifest sins, 'gross as a mountain, open, palpable.' +Some of you do, no doubt, for, in every hundred people, there are +always some whose lives are foul and whose memories are stained and +horrible; but the run of you are not like that. And yet I ask you, +has your will been bowed and broken, and your heart overcome and +conquered by this mighty Prince, the Prince of Peace, the Prince of +Life? Unless it has, for all your righteousness and respectability, +for all your outward religion and real religiousness of a sort, you +are still hostile and rebellious, in your inmost hearts. That is the +basis of the representation of my text. + +What else does it suggest? It suggests the wonderful struggle and +victory of weaponless love. As was said about the first Christian +emperor, so it may be said about the great Emperor in the heavens, +'_In hoc signo vinces!_' By this sign thou shalt conquer. For +His only weapon is the Cross of His Son, and He fights only by the +manifestation of infinite love, sacrifice, suffering, and pity. He +conquers as the sun conquers the thick-ribbed ice by raying down its +heat upon it, and melting it into sweet water. So God in Christ +fights against the mountains of man's cold, hard sinfulness and +alienation, and by the warmth of His own radiation turns them all +into rivers that flow in love and praise. He conquers simply by +forbearance and pity and love. + +And what more does this first part of my text say to us? It tells us, +too, of the true submission of the conquered captive; how we are +conquered when we perceive and receive His love; how there is nothing +else needed to win us all for Him except only that we shall recognise +His great love to us. + +This picture of the triumph comes with a solemn appeal and +commandment to every one of us professing Christians. Think of these +men, dragged at the conqueror's chariot-wheels, abject, with their +weapons broken, with their resistance quelled, chained, yoked, +haled away from their own land, dependant for life or death on the +caprice of the general who rode before them there. It is a picture of +what you Christian men and women are bound to be if you believe that +God in Christ has loved you as we have been saying that He does. For +abject submission, unconditional surrender, the yielding up of our +whole will to Him, the yielding of all our possessions as His +vassals--these are the duties that are correspondent to the facts of +the case. + +If we are thus won by infinite love, and not our own, but bought with +a price, no conquered king, dragged at an emperor's chariot-wheels, +was ever half as absolutely and abjectly bound to be his slave, and +to live or die by his breath, as you are bound to your Master. You +are Christians in the measure in which you are the captives of His +spear and of His bow; in the measure in which you hold your +territories as vassal kings, in the measure in which you say, +stretching out your willing hands for the fetters, 'Lord! here am I, +do with me as Thou wilt.' 'I am not mine own; be Thou my will, my +Emperor, my Commander, my all.' Loyola used to say, as the law of his +order, that every man that became a member of the Society of Jesus +was to be like as a staff in a man's hand, or like as a corpse. It +was a blasphemous and wicked claim, but it is but a poor fragmentary +statement of the truth about those of us who enter the real Society +of Jesus, and put ourselves in His hands to be wielded as His staff +and His rod, and submit ourselves to Him, not as a corpse, but yield +yourselves to our Christ 'as those that are alive from the dead.' + +II. Now we have here, as part of the ideal of the Christian life, the +conquered captives partaking in the triumph of their general. + +Two groups made up the triumphal procession--the one that of the +soldiers who had fought for, the other that of the prisoners who had +fought against, the leader. And some commentators are inclined to +believe that the Apostle is here thinking of himself and his fellows +as belonging to the conquering army, and not to the conquered enemy. +That seems to me to be less probable and in accordance with the whole +image than the explanation which I have adopted. But be that as it +may, it suggests to us this thought, that in the deepest reality in +that Christian life of which all this metaphor is but the expression, +they who are conquered foes become conquering allies. Or, to put it +into other words--to be triumphed over by Christ is to triumph with +Christ. And the praise which breaks from the Apostle's lips suggests +the same idea. He pours out his thanks for that which he recognises +as being no degradation but an honour, and a participation in his +Conqueror's triumph. + +We may illustrate that thought, that to be triumphed over by Christ +is to triumph with Christ, by such considerations as these. This +submission of which I have been speaking, abject and unconditional, +extending to life and death, this submission and captivity is but +another name for liberty. The man who is absolutely dependent upon +Jesus Christ is absolutely independent of everything and everybody +besides, himself included. That is to say, to be His slave is to be +everybody else's master, and when we bow ourselves to Him, and take +upon us the chains of glad obedience, and life-deep as well as +life-long consecration, then He breaks off all other chains from our +hands, and will not suffer that any others should have a share with +Him in the possession of His servant. If you are His servants you are +free from all besides; if you give yourselves up to Jesus Christ, in +the measure in which you give yourselves up to Him, you will be set +at liberty from the worst of all slaveries, that is the slavery of +your own will and your own weakness, and your own tastes and fancies. +You will be set at liberty from dependence upon men, from thinking +about their opinion. You will be set at liberty from your dependence +upon externals, from feeling as if you could not live unless you had +this, that, or the other person or thing. You will be emancipated +from fears and hopes which torture the men who strike their roots no +deeper than this visible film of time which floats upon the surface +of the great, invisible abyss of Eternity. If you have Christ for +your Master you will be the masters of the world, and of time and +sense and men and all besides; and so, being triumphed over by Him, +you will share in His triumph. + +And again, we may illustrate the same principle in yet another way. +Such absolute and entire submission of will and love as I have been +speaking about is the highest honour of a man. It was a degradation +to be dragged at the chariot-wheels of conquering general, emperor, +or consul--it broke the heart of many a barbarian king, and led some +of them to suicide rather than face the degradation. It is a +degradation to submit ourselves, even as much as many of us do, to +the domination of human authorities, or to depend upon men as much as +many of us do for our completeness and our satisfaction. But it is +the highest ennobling of humanity that it shall lay itself down at +Christ's feet, and let Him put His foot upon its neck. It is the +exaltation of human nature to submit to Christ. The true nobility are +those that 'come over with the Conqueror.' When we yield ourselves to +Him, and let Him be our King, then the patent of nobility is given to +us, and we are lifted in the scale of being. All our powers and +faculties are heightened in their exercise, and made more blessed in +their employment, because we have bowed ourselves to His control. And +so to be triumphed over by Christ is to triumph with Christ. + +And the same thought may be yet further illustrated. That submission +which I have been speaking about so unites us to our Lord that we +share in all that belongs to Him and thus partake in His triumph. If +in will and heart we have yielded ourselves to Him, he that is thus +joined to the Lord is one spirit, and all 'mine is Thine, and all +Thine is mine.' He is the Heir of all things, and all things of which +He is the Heir are our possession. 'All things are yours, and ye are +Christ's.' Thus His dominion is the dominion of all that love Him, +and His heritage is the heritage of all those that have joined +themselves to Him; and no sparkle of the glory that falls upon His +head but is reflected on the heads of His servants. The 'many crowns' +that He wears are the crowns with which He crowns His followers. + +Thus, my brother, to be overcome by God is to overcome the world, to +be triumphed over by Christ is to share in His triumph; and he over +whom Incarnate Love wins the victory, like the patriarch of old in +his mystical struggle, conquers in the hour of surrender; and to him +it is said: 'As a prince thou hast power with God and hast +prevailed.' + +III. Lastly, a further picture of the ideal of the Christian life is +set before us here in the thought of these conquered captives being +led as the trophies and the witnesses of His overcoming power. + +That idea is suggested by both halves of our verse. Both the emblem +of the Apostle as marching in the triumphal procession, and the +emblem of the Apostle as yielding from his burning heart the fragrant +visible odour of the ascending incense, convey the same idea, viz. +that one great purpose which Jesus Christ has in conquering men for +Himself, and binding them to His chariot wheels, is that from them +may go forth the witness of His power and the knowledge of His name. + +That opens very wide subjects for our consideration which I can only +very briefly touch upon. Let me just for an instant dwell upon some +of them. First, the fact that Jesus Christ, by His Cross and Passion, +is able to conquer men's wills, and to bind men's hearts to Him, is +the highest proof of His power. It is an entirely unique thing in the +history of the world. There is nothing the least like it anywhere +else. The passionate attachment which this dead Galilean peasant is +able to evoke in the hearts of people all these centuries after His +death, is an unheard of and an unparalleled thing. All other teachers +'serve their generations by the will of God,' and then their names +become speedily less and less powerful, and thicker and thicker mists +of oblivion wrap them round until they disappear. But time has no +power over Christ's influence. The bond which binds you and me to Him +nineteen centuries after His death is the very same in quality as, +and in degree is often far deeper and stronger than, the bond which +united to Him the men that had seen Him. It stands as an unique fact +in the history of the world, that from Christ of Nazareth there rays +out through all the ages the spiritual power which absolutely takes +possession of men, dominates them and turns them into His organs and +instruments. This generation prides itself upon testing all things by +an utilitarian test, and about every system says:--'Well, let us see +it working.' And I do not think that Christianity need shrink from +the test. With all its imperfections, the long procession of holy men +and women who, for nineteen centuries, have been marching through +history, owning Christ as their Conqueror, and ascribing all their +goodness to Him, is a witness to His power to sway and to satisfy +men, the force of whose testimony it is hard to overthrow. And I +would like to ask the simple question: Will any system of belief or +of no belief, except the faith in Christ's atoning sacrifice, do the +like for men? He leads through the world the train of His captives, +the evidence of His conquests. + +And then, further, let me remind you that out of this representation +there comes a very stimulating and solemn suggestion of duty for us +Christian people. We are bound to live, setting forth whose we are, +and what He has done for us. Just as the triumphal procession took +its path up the Appian Way and along the side of the Forum to the +altar of the Capitol, wreathed about by curling clouds of fragrant +incense, so we should march through the world encompassed by the +sweet and fragrant odour of His name, witnessing for Him by word, +witnessing for Him by character, speaking for Him and living like +Him, showing in our life that He rules us, and professing by our +words that He does; and so should manifest His power. + +Still further, Paul's thanksgiving teaches us that we should be +thankful for all opportunities of doing such work. Christian men and +women often grudge their services and grudge their money, and feel as +if the necessities for doing Christian work in the world were +rather a burden than an honour. This man's generous heart was so full +of love to his Prince that it glowed with thankfulness at the thought +that Christ had let him do such things for Him. And He lets you do +them if you will. + +So, dear friends, it comes to be a very solemn question for us. What +part are we playing in that great triumphal procession? We are all of +us marching at His chariot wheels, whether we know it or not. But +there were two sets of people in the old triumph. There were those +who were conquered by force and unconquered in heart, and out of +their eyes gleamed unquenchable malice and hatred, though their +weapons were broken and their arms fettered. And there were those +who, having shared in the commander's fight, shared in his triumph +and rejoiced in his rule. And when the procession reached the gate of +the temple, some, at any rate, of the former class were put to death +before the gates. I pray you to remember that if we are dragged after +Him reluctantly, the word will come: 'These, mine enemies, which +would not that I should reign over them, bring hither and slay them +before Me.' Whereas, on the other hand, for those who have yielded +heart and soul to Him in love and submission born of the reception of +His great love, the blessed word will come: 'He that overcometh shall +inherit all things.' Which of the two parts of the procession do you +belong to, my friend? Make your choice where you shall march, and +whether you will be His loyal allies and soldiers who share in His +triumph, or His enemies, who, overcome by His power, are not melted +by His love. The one live, the other perish. + + + + +TRANSFORMATION BY BEHOLDING + + 'We all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory + of the Lord, are changed into the same image.'--2 COR. iii. 18. + + +This whole section of the Epistle in which our text occurs is a +remarkable instance of the fervid richness of the Apostle's mind, +which acquires force by motion, and, like a chariot-wheel, catches +fire as it revolves. One of the most obvious peculiarities of his +style is his habit of 'going off at a word.' Each thought is, as it +were, barbed all round, and catches and draws into sight a multitude +of others, but slightly related to the main purpose in hand. And this +characteristic gives at first sight an appearance of confusion to his +writings. But it is not confusion, it is richness. The luxuriant +underwood which this fertile soil bears, as some tropical forest, +does not choke the great trees, though it drapes them. + +Paul's immediate purpose seems to be to illustrate the frank openness +which ought to mark the ministry of Christianity. He does this by +reference to the veil which Moses wore when he came forth from +talking with God. There, he says in effect, we have a picture of the +Old Dispensation--a partial revelation, gleaming through a veil, +flashing through symbols, expressed here in a rite, there in a type, +there again in an obscure prophecy, but never or scarcely ever +fronting the world with an unveiled face and the light of God shining +clear from it. Christianity is, and Christian teachers ought to be, +the opposite of all this. It has, and they are to have, no esoteric +doctrines, no hints where plain speech is possible, no reserve, no +use of symbols and ceremonies to overlay truth, but an intelligible +revelation in words and deeds, to men's understandings. It and they +are plentifully to declare the thing as it is. + +But he gets far beyond this point in his uses of his illustration. It +opens out into a series of contrasts between the two revelations. The +veiled Moses represents the clouded revelation of old. The vanishing +gleam on his face recalls the fading glories of that which was +abolished; and then, by a quick turn of association, Paul thinks of +the veiled readers in the synagogues, copies, as it were, of the +lawgiver with the shrouded countenance; only too significant images +of the souls obscured by prejudice and obstinate unbelief, with which +Israel trifles over the uncomprehended letter of the old law. + +The contrast to all this lies in our text. Judaism had the one +lawgiver who beheld God, while the people tarried below. Christianity +leads us all, to the mount of vision, and lets the lowliest pass +through the fences, and go up where the blazing glory is seen. Moses +veiled the face that shone with the irradiation of Deity. We with +unveiled face are to shine among men. He had a momentary gleam, a +transient brightness; we have a perpetual light. Moses' face shone, +but the lustre was but skin deep. But the light that we have is +inward, and works transformation into its own likeness. + +So there is here set forth the very loftiest conception of the +Christian life as direct vision, universal, manifest to men, +permanent, transforming. + +I. Note then, first, that the Christian life is a life of +contemplating and reflecting Christ. + +It is a question whether the single word rendered in our version +'beholding as in a glass,' means that, or 'reflecting as a glass +does.' The latter seems more in accordance with the requirements of +the context, and with the truth of the matter in hand. Unless we +bring in the notion of reflected lustre, we do not get any parallel +with the case of Moses. Looking into a glass does not in the least +correspond with the allusion, which gave occasion to the whole +section, to the glory of God smiting him on the face, till the +reflected lustre with which it glowed became dazzling, and needed to +be hid. And again, if Paul is here describing Christian vision of God +as only indirect, as in a mirror, then that would be a point of +inferiority in us as compared with Moses, who saw Him face to face. +But the whole tone of the context prepares us to expect a setting +forth of the particulars in which the Christian attitude towards the +manifested God is above the Jewish. So, on the whole, it seems better +to suppose that Paul meant 'mirroring,' than 'seeing in a mirror.' + +But, whatever be the exact force of the word, the thing intended +includes both acts. There is no reflection of the light without a +previous reception of the light. In bodily sight, the eye is a +mirror, and there is no sight without an image of the thing perceived +being formed in the perceiving eye. In spiritual sight, the soul +which beholds is a mirror, and at once beholds and reflects. Thus, +then, we may say that we have in our text the Christian life +described as one of contemplation and manifestation of the light of +God. +The great truth of a direct, unimpeded vision, as belonging to +Christian men on earth, sounds strange to many of us. 'That cannot +be,' you say; 'does not Paul himself teach that we see through a +glass darkly? Do we not walk by faith and not by sight? "No man hath +seen God at any time, nor can see Him"; and besides that absolute +impossibility, have we not veils of flesh and sense, to say nothing +of the covering of sin "spread over the face of all nations," which +hide from us even so much of the eternal light as His servants above +behold, who see His face and bear His name on their foreheads?' + +But these apparent difficulties drop away when we take into account +two things--first, the object of vision, and second, the real nature +of the vision itself. + +As to the former, who is the Lord whose glory we receive on our +unveiled faces? He is Jesus Christ. Here, as in the overwhelming +majority of instances where _Lord_ occurs in the New Testament, +it is the name of the manifested God our brother. The glory which we +behold and give back is not the incomprehensible, incommunicable +lustre of the absolute divine perfectness, but that glory which, as +John says, we beheld in Him who tabernacled with us, full of grace +and truth; the glory which was manifested in loving, pitying words +and loveliness of perfect deeds; the glory of the will resigned to +God, and of God dwelling in and working through the will; the glory +of faultless and complete manhood, and therein of the express image +of God. + +And as for the vision itself, that seeing which is denied to be +possible is the bodily perception and the full comprehension of the +Infinite God; that seeing which is affirmed to be possible, and +actually bestowed in Christ, is the beholding of Him with the soul by +faith; the immediate direct consciousness of His presence the +perception of Him in His truth by the mind, the feeling of Him in His +love by the heart, the contact with His gracious energy in our +recipient and opening spirits. Faith is made the antithesis of sight. +It is so, in certain respects. But faith is also paralleled with and +exalted above the mere bodily perception. He who believing grasps the +living Lord has a contact with Him as immediate and as real as that +of the eyeball with light, and knows Him with a certitude as reliable +as that which sight gives. 'Seeing is believing,' says sense; +'Believing is seeing' says the spirit which clings to the Lord, 'whom +having not seen' it loves. A bridge of perishable flesh, which is not +myself but my tool, connects me with the outward world. _It_ never +touches myself at all, and I know it only by trust in my senses. But +nothing intervenes between my Lord and me, when I love and trust. +Then Spirit is joined to spirit, and of His presence I have the +witness in myself. He is the light, which proves its own existence by +revealing itself, which strikes with quickening impulse on the eye of +the spirit that beholds by faith. Believing we see, and, seeing, we +have that light in our souls to be 'the master light of all our +seeing.' We need not think that to know by the consciousness of our +trusting souls is less than to know by the vision of our fallible +eyes; and though flesh hides from us the spiritual world in which we +float, yet the only veil which really dims God to us--the veil of +sin, the one separating principle--is done away in Christ, for all +who love Him; so as that he who has not seen and yet has believed, +has but the perfecting of his present vision to expect, when flesh +drops away and the apocalypse of the heaven comes. True, in one view, +'We see through a glass darkly'; but also true, 'We all, with +unveiled face, behold and reflect the glory of the Lord.' + +Then note still further Paul's emphasis on the universality of this +prerogative--'We all.' This vision does not belong to any select +handful; does not depend upon special powers or gifts, which in the +nature of things can only belong to a few. The spiritual aristocracy +of God's Church is not the distinction of the law-giver, the priest +or the prophet. There is none of us so weak, so low, so ignorant, so +compassed about with sin, but that upon our happy faces that light +may rest, and into our darkened hearts that sunshine may steal. + +In that Old Dispensation, the light that broke through clouds was but +that of the rising morning. It touched the mountain tops of the +loftiest spirits: a Moses, a David, an Elijah caught the early +gleams; while all the valleys slept in the pale shadow, and the mist +clung in white folds to the plains. But the noon has come, and, from +its steadfast throne in the very zenith, the sun, which never sets, +pours down its rays into the deep recesses of the narrowest gorge, +and every little daisy and hidden flower catches its brightness, and +there is nothing hid from the heat thereof. We have no privileged +class or caste now; no fences to keep out the mob from the place of +vision, while lawgiver and priest gaze upon God. Christ reveals +Himself to all His servants in the measure of their desire after Him. +Whatsoever special gifts may belong to a few in His Church, the +greatest gift belongs to all. The servants and the handmaidens have +the Spirit, the children prophesy, the youths see visions, the old +men dream dreams. 'The mobs,' 'the masses,' 'the plebs,' or whatever +other contemptuous name the heathen aristocratic spirit has for the +bulk of men, makes good its standing within the Church, as possessor +of Christ's chiefest gifts. Redeemed by Him, it can behold His face +and be glorified into His likeness. Not as Judaism with its ignorant +mass, and its enlightened and inspired few--we _all_ behold the glory +of the Lord. + +Again, this contemplation involves reflection, or giving forth the +light which we behold. + +They who behold Christ have Christ formed in them, as will appear in +my subsequent remarks. But apart from such considerations, which +belong rather to the next part of this sermon, I touch on this +thought here for one purpose--to bring out this idea--that what we +_see_ we shall certainly _show_. That will be the inevitable result +of all true possession of the glory of Christ. The necessary +accompaniment of vision is reflecting the thing beheld. Why, if you +look closely enough into a man's eye, you will see in it little +pictures of what he beholds at the moment; and if our hearts are +beholding Christ, Christ will be mirrored and manifested on our +hearts. Our characters will show what we are looking at, and ought, +in the case of Christian people, to bear His image so plainly, that +men cannot but take knowledge of us that we have been with Jesus. + +This ought to lead all of us who say that we have seen the Lord, to +serious self-questioning. Do beholding and reflecting go together in +our cases? Are our characters like those transparent clocks, where +you can see not only the figures and hands, but the wheels and works? +Remember that, consciously and unconsciously, by direct efforts and +by insensible influences on our lives, the true secret of our being +ought to come, and will come, forth to light. The convictions which +we hold, the emotions that are dominant in our hearts, will mould and +shape our lives. If we have any deep, living perception of Christ, +bystanders looking into our faces will be able to tell what it is up +yonder that is making them like the faces of the angels--even vision +of the opened heavens and of the exalted Lord. These two things are +inseparable--the one describes the attitude and action of the +Christian man towards Christ; the other the very same attitude and +action in relation to men. And you may be quite sure that, if little +light comes from a Christian character, little light comes into it; +and if it be swathed in thick veils from men, there must be no less +thick veils between it and God. + +Nor is it only that our fellowship with Christ will, as a matter of +course, show itself in our characters, and beauty born of that +communion 'shall pass into our face,' but we are also called on, as +Paul puts it here, to make direct conscious efforts for the +communication of the light which we behold. As the context has it, +God hath shined in our hearts, that we might give the light of the +knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ Jesus. Away with +all veils! No reserve, no fear of the consequences of plain speaking, +no diplomatic prudence regulating our frank utterance, no secret +doctrines for the initiated! We are to 'renounce the hidden things of +dishonesty.' Our power and our duty lie in the full exhibition of the +truth. We are only clear from the blood of men when we, for our +parts, make sure that if any light be hid, it is hid not by reason of +obscurity or silence on our parts, but only by reason of the blind +eyes, before which the full-orbed radiance gleams in vain. All this +is as true for every one possessing that universal prerogative of +seeing the glory of Christ, as it is for an Apostle. The business of +all such is to make known the name of Jesus, and if from idleness, or +carelessness, or selfishness, they shirk that plain duty, they are +counteracting God's very purpose in shining on their hearts, and +going far to quench the light which they darken. + +Take this, then, Christian men and women, as a plain practical lesson +from this text. You are bound to manifest what you believe, and to +make the secret of your lives, in so far as possible, an open secret. +Not that you are to drag into light before men the sacred depths of +your own soul's experience. Let these lie hid. The world will be none +the better for your confessions, but it needs your Lord. Show Him +forth, not your own emotions about Him. What does the Apostle say +close by my text? 'We preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the +Lord.' Self-respect and reverence for the sanctities of our deepest +emotions forbid our proclaiming these from the house-tops. Let these +be curtained, if you will, from all eyes but God's, but let no folds +hang before the picture of your Saviour that is drawn on your heart. +See to it that you have the unveiled face turned towards Christ to be +irradiated by His brightness, and the unveiled face turned towards +men, from which shall shine every beam of the light which you have +caught from your Lord. 'Arise! shine, for thy light is come, and the +glory of the Lord is risen upon thee!' + +II. Notice, secondly, that this life of contemplation is therefore a +life of gradual transformation. + +The brightness on the face of Moses was only skin-deep. It faded +away, and left no trace. It effaced none of the marks of sorrow and +care, and changed none of the lines of that strong, stern face. But, +says Paul, the glory which we behold sinks inward, and changes us as +we look, into its own image. Thus the superficial lustre, that had +neither permanence nor transforming power, becomes an illustration of +the powerlessness of law to change the moral character into the +likeness of the fair ideal which it sets forth. And, in opposition to +its weakness, the Apostle proclaims the great principle of Christian +progress, that the beholding of Christ leads to the assimilation to +Him. + +The metaphor of a mirror does not wholly serve us here. When the +sunbeams fall upon it, it flashes in the light, just because they do +not enter its cold surface. It is a mirror, because it does not drink +them up, but flings them back. The contrary is the case with these +sentient mirrors of our spirits. In them the light must first sink in +before it can ray out. They must first be filled with the glory, +before the glory can stream forth. They are not so much like a +reflecting surface as like a bar of iron, which needs to be heated +right down to its obstinate black core, before its outer skin glows +with the whiteness of a heat that is too hot to sparkle. The sunshine +must fall on us, not as it does on some lonely hill-side, lighting up +the grey stones with a passing gleam that changes nothing, and fades +away, leaving the solitude to its sadness; but as it does on some +cloud cradled near its setting, which it drenches and saturates with +fire till its cold heart burns, and all its wreaths of vapour are +brightness palpable, glorified by the light which lives amidst its +mists. So must we have the glory sink into us before it can be +reflected from us. In deep inward beholding we must have Christ in +our hearts, that He may shine forth from our lives. + +And this contemplation will be gradual transformation. There is the +great principle of Christian morals. 'We all beholding ... are +changed.' The power to which is committed the perfecting of our +characters lies in looking upon Jesus. It is not the mere beholding, +but the gaze of love and trust that moulds us by silent sympathy into +the likeness of His wondrous beauty, who is fairer than the children +of men. It was a deep, true thought which the old painters had, when +they drew John as likest to his Lord. Love makes us like. We learn +_that_ even in our earthly relationships, where habitual familiarity +with parents and dear ones stamps some tone of voice or look, or +little peculiarity of gesture, on a whole house. And when the +infinite reverence and aspiration which the Christian soul cherishes +to its Lord are superadded, the transforming power of loving +contemplation of Him becomes mighty beyond all analogies in human +friendship, though one in principle with these. What a marvellous +thing that a block of rude sandstone, laid down before a perfect +marble, should become a copy of its serene loveliness just by lying +there! Lay your hearts down before Christ. Contemplate Him. Love Him. +Think about Him. Let that pure face shine upon heart and spirit, and +as the sun photographs itself on the sensitive plate exposed to its +light, and you get a likeness of the sun by simply laying the thing +in the sun, so He will 'be formed in, you.' Iron near a magnet +becomes magnetic. Spirits that dwell with Christ become Christ-like. +The Roman Catholic legends put this truth in a coarse way, when they +tell of saints who have gazed on some ghastly crucifix till they have +received, in their tortured flesh, the copy of the wounds of Jesus, +and have thus borne in their body the marks of the Lord. The story is +hideous and gross, the idea beneath is ever true. Set your faces +towards the Cross with loving, reverent gaze, and you will 'be +conformed unto His death,' that in due time you may 'be also in the +likeness of His Resurrection.' + +Dear friends, surely this message--'Behold and be like'--ought to be +very joyful and enlightening to many of us, who are wearied with +painful struggles after isolated pieces of goodness, that elude our +grasp. You have been trying, and trying, and trying half your +lifetime to cure faults and make yourselves better and stronger. Try +this other plan. Let love draw you, instead of duty driving you. Let +fellowship with Christ elevate you, instead of seeking to struggle up +the steeps on hands and knees. Live in sight of your Lord, and catch +His Spirit. The man who travels with his face northwards has it grey +and cold. Let him turn to the warm south, where the midday sun +dwells, and his face will glow with the brightness that he sees. +'Looking unto Jesus' is the sovereign cure for all our ills and sins. +It is the one condition of running with patience 'the race that is +set before us.' Efforts after self-improvement which do not rest on +it will not go deep enough, nor end in victory. But from that gaze +will flow into our lives a power which will at once reveal the true +goal, and brace every sinew for the struggle to reach it. Therefore, +let us cease from self, and fix our eyes on our Saviour till His +image imprints itself on our whole nature. + +Such transformation, it must be remembered, comes gradually. The +language of the text regards it as a lifelong process. 'We _are_ +changed'; that is a continuous operation. 'From glory to glory'; that +is a course which has well-marked transitions and degrees. Be not +impatient if it be slow. It will take a lifetime. Do not fancy that +it is finished with you. Life is not long enough for it. Do not be +complacent over the partial transformation which you have felt. There +is but a fragment of the great image yet reproduced in your soul, a +faint outline dimly traced, with many a feature wrongly drawn, with +many a line still needed, before it can be called even approximately +complete. See to it that you neither turn away your gaze, nor relax +your efforts till all that you have beheld in Him is repeated in you. + +Likeness to Christ is the aim of all religion. To it conversion is +introductory; doctrines, devout emotion, worship and ceremonies, +churches and organisations are valuable as auxiliary. Let that +wondrous issue of God's mercy be the purpose of our lives, and the +end as well as the test of all the things which we call our +Christianity. Prize and use them as helps towards it, and remember +that they are helps only in proportion as they show us that Saviour, +the image of whom is our perfection, the beholding of whom is our +transformation. + +III. Notice, lastly, that the life of contemplation finally becomes a +life of complete assimilation. + +'Changed into the same image, from glory to glory.' The lustrous +light which falls upon Christian hearts from the face of their Lord +is permanent, and it is progressive. The likeness extends, becomes +deeper, truer, every way perfecter, comprehends more and more of the +faculties of the man; soaks into him, if I may say so, until he is +saturated with the glory; and in all the extent of his being, and in +all the depth possible to each part of that whole extent, is like his +Lord. That is the hope for heaven, towards which we may indefinitely +approximate here, and at which we shall absolutely arrive there. +There we expect changes which are impossible here, while compassed +with this body of sinful flesh. We look for the merciful exercise of +His mighty working to 'change the body of our lowliness, that it may +be fashioned like unto the body of His glory'; and that physical +change in the resurrection of the just rightly bulks very large in +good men's expectations. But we are somewhat apt to think of the +perfect likeness of Christ too much in connection with that +transformation that begins only after death, and to forget that the +main transformation must begin here. The glorious, corporeal life +like our Lord's, which is promised for heaven, is great and +wonderful, but it is only the issue and last result of the far +greater change in the spiritual nature, which by faith and love +begins here. It is good to be clothed with the immortal vesture of +the resurrection, and in that to be like Christ. It is better to be +like Him in our hearts. His true image is that we should feel as He +does, should think as He does, should will as He does; that we should +have the same sympathies, the same loves, the same attitude towards +God, and the same attitude towards men. It is that His heart and ours +should beat in full accord, as with one pulse, and possessing one +life. Wherever there is the beginning of that oneness and likeness of +spirit, all the rest will come in due time. As the spirit, so the +body. The whole nature must be transformed and made like Christ's, +and the process will not stop till that end be accomplished in all +who love Him. But the beginning here is the main thing which draws +all the rest after it as of course. 'If the Spirit of Him that raised +up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He that raised up Christ from +the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies, by His Spirit that +dwelleth in you.' + +And, while this complete assimilation in body and spirit to our Lord +is the end of the process which begins here by love and faith, my +text, carefully considered, adds a further very remarkable idea. 'We +are all changed,' says Paul, 'into the _same_ image.' Same as what? +Possibly the same as we behold; but more probably the phrase, +especially 'image' in the singular, is employed to convey the thought +of the blessed likeness of all who become perfectly like Him. As if +he had said, 'Various as we are in disposition and character, unlike +in the histories of our lives, and all the influences that these have +had upon us, differing in everything but the common relation to Jesus +Christ, we are all growing like the same image, and we shall come to +be perfectly like it, and yet each retain his own distinct +individuality.' 'We being many are one, for we are all partakers of +one.' + +Perhaps, too, we may connect with this another idea which occurs more +than once in Paul's Epistles. In that to the Ephesians, for instance, +he says that the Christian ministry is to continue, till a certain +point of progress has been reached, which he describes as our +_all_ coming to 'a perfect _man_.' The whole of us together +make a perfect man--the whole make one image. That is to say, perhaps +the Apostle's idea is, that it takes the aggregated perfectness of +the whole Catholic Church, one throughout all ages, and containing a +multitude that no man can number, to set worthily forth anything like +a complete image of the fulness of Christ. No one man, even raised to +the highest pitch of perfection, and though his nature be widened out +to perfect development, can be the full image of that infinite sum of +all beauty; but the whole of us taken together, with all the +diversities of natural character retained and consecrated, being +collectively His body which He vitalises, may, on the whole, be a not +wholly inadequate representation of our perfect Lord. Just as we +set round a central light sparkling prisms, each of which catches the +glow at its own angle, and flashes it back of its own colour, while +the sovereign completeness of the perfect white radiance comes from +the blending of all their separate rays, so they who stand round +about the starry throne receive each the light in his own measure and +manner, and give forth each a true and perfect, and altogether a +complete, image of Him who enlightens them all, and is above them +all. + +And whilst thus all bear the same image, there is no monotony; and +while there is endless diversity, there is no discord. Like the +serene choirs of angels in the old monk's pictures, each one with the +same tongue of fire on the brow, with the same robe flowing in the +same folds to the feet, with the same golden hair, yet each a +separate self, with his own gladness, and a different instrument for +praise in his hand, and his own part in that 'undisturbed song of +pure content,' we shall all be changed into the same image, and yet +each heart shall grow great with its own blessedness, and each spirit +bright with its own proper lustre of individual and characteristic +perfection. + +The law of the transformation is the same for earth and for heaven. +Here we see Him in part, and beholding grow like. There we shall see +Him as He is, and the likeness will be complete. That Transfiguration +of our Lord (which is described by the same word as occurs in this +text) may become for us the symbol and the prophecy of what we look +for. As with Him, so with us; the indwelling glory shall come to the +surface, and the countenance shall shine as the light, and the +garments shall be 'white as no fuller on earth can white them.' Nor +shall that be a fading splendour, nor shall we fear as we enter into +the cloud, nor, looking on Him, shall flesh bend beneath the burden, +and the eyes become drowsy, but we shall be as the Lawgiver and the +Prophet who stood by Him in the lambent lustre, and shone with a +brightness above that which had once been veiled on Sinai. We shall +never vanish from His side, but dwell with Him in the abiding temple +which He has built, and there, looking upon Him for ever, our happy +souls shall change as they gaze, and behold Him more perfectly as +they change, for 'we know that when He shall appear we shall be like +Him, for we shall see Him as He is.' + + + + +LOOKING AT THE UNSEEN + + 'While we look not at the things which are seen, but + at the things which are not seen.'--2 COR. iv. 18. + + +Men may be said to be divided into two classes, materialists and +idealists, in the widest sense of those two words. The mass care for, +and are occupied by, and regard as really solid good, those goods +which can be touched and enjoyed by sense. The minority--students, +thinkers, men of ideas, moralists, and the like--believe in, and care +for, impalpable spiritual riches. Everybody admits that the latter +class is distinctly the higher. Now it is from no disregard to the +importance and reality of that broad distinction that I insist, to +begin with, that it is not the antithesis which is in the Apostle's +mind here. His notion of 'the things that are seen' and 'the things +that are not seen' is a much grander and wider one than that. By 'the +things that are seen' he means the whole of this visible world, with +all its circumstances and relations, and by 'the things that are not +seen' he means the realities beyond the stars. + +He means the same thing that we mean when we talk in a much less true +and impressive contrast about the present and the future. To him the +'things that are not seen' are present instead of being, as we weakly +and foolishly christen them, 'the future state.' And it makes all the +difference whether we think of that august realm as lying far away +ahead of us, or whether we feel that it is, as it is, in very deed, +all round about us, and pressing in upon us, only that 'the +veil'--that is to say, our 'flesh'--has come between us and it. Do +not habitually think of these two sets of objects according to that +misleading distinction 'present' and 'future,' but think of them +rather as 'the things that are seen,' and 'the things that are not +seen.' + +I. Now, first, I wish to say a word or two about what such a look +will do for us. + +Paul's notion is, as you will see if you look at the context, that if +we want to understand the visible, or to get the highest good out of +the things that are seen, we must bring into the field of vision 'the +things that are not seen.' The case with which he is dealing is that +of a man in trouble. He talks about light affliction which is but for +a moment, working out a far more exceeding and eternal weight of +glory, 'while we look at the things which are not seen.' But the +principle on which that statement is made, of course, has its widest +application to all sorts and conditions of human life. + +And the thought that emerges from it directly is that only when we +take the 'things that are not seen' into account, and make them the +standard and the scale by which we judge all things, do we understand +'the things that are seen.' That triumphant paradox of the Apostle's +about the heavy burdens that pressed upon him and his brethren, +lifelong as these burdens were, which yet he calls 'light' and 'but +for a moment' is possible only when we open the shutter of the +dungeon which we fancied was the whole universe, and look out on to +the fair land that stretches beyond. A man who has seen the Himalayas +will not be much overwhelmed by the height of Helvellyn. They who +look out into the eternities have the true measuring rod and standard +by which to estimate the duration and intensity of the things that +are present. We are all tempted to do as villagers in some little +hamlet do--think that their small local affairs are the world's +affairs, and mighty, until they have been up to London and seen the +scale of things there. If you and I would let the steady light of +Eternity, and the sustaining pressure of the 'exceeding weight of +glory' pour into our minds, we should carry with us a standard which +would bring down the greatness, dwindle the duration, lighten the +pressure, of the most crushing sorrow, and would set in its true +dimensions everything that is here. It is for want of that that we go +on as we do, calculating wrongly what are the great things and what +are the small things. When, like some of those prisoners in the +Inquisition, the heavy iron weights are laid upon our half-crushed +hearts, we are tempted to shriek, 'Oh, these will be my death!' +instead of taking in that great vision which, as it makes all earthly +riches dross, so it makes all crushing burdens and blows of sorrow +light as a feather. + +But, on the other hand, do not let us forget that this same standard +which thus dwindles, also magnifies the small, and in a very solemn +sense, makes eternal the else fleeting things of this life. For there +is nothing that makes this present existence of ours so utterly +contemptible, insignificant, and transitory, as to block out of our +sight its connection with Eternity. And there is nothing which so +lifts the commonplace into the solemn, and invests with everlasting +and tremendous importance everything that a man does here, as to feel +that it all tells on his condition away beyond there. The shafting is +on this side of the wall, but the work that it does is through the +wall there, in the other chamber; and you do not understand the +cranks and the wheels here unless you know that they go through the +partition and are doing something there beyond. If you shut out +Eternity from our life in time, then it is an inexplicable riddle; +and I, for my part, would venture to say that in that case, the men +who answer the question, 'Is life worth living?' with a distinct +negative, are wise. It is a tale told by an idiot, 'full of sound and +fury, signifying nothing,' unless the light of 'the things not seen' +flashes and flares in upon it. + +Further, this look of which my text speaks is the condition on which +Time prepares for Eternity. + +The Apostle is speaking about the effect of affliction in making +ready for us an eternal weight of glory, and he says that is done +while, or on condition that during the suffering, we are looking +steadfastly towards the 'things that are not seen.' But no outward +circumstances or events can prepare a weight of glory for us +hereafter, unless they prepare us for the glory. Affliction works for +us that blessed result, in the measure in which it fits us for that +result. And so you will find that, only a verse or two after my text, +Paul, using the same very significant and emphatic verb, writes +inverting the order of things, and says 'He that hath wrought _us +for_ the self-same thing is God.' So that working the thing for us, +and working us for the thing, are one and the same process. Or, to +put it into plain English, our various duties and circumstances here +will prepare the glory of Eternity for us if they prepare us for the +glory of Eternity. But only in the measure in which these outward +things do thus shape and mould our characters do they work out for us +'an exceeding weight of glory.' + +It is often thought that a man has been so miserable here that God is +sure to give him future blessedness to recompense him. Well! 'that +depends.' If he has used his miserableness as he will use it when he +lets the light of 'the things not seen' in upon it, then, certainly, +it will work out for him the blessed results. But if he does not, +then, as certainly, it will not. Whilst there are many ways by which +character is hammered and moulded and shaped into that which is fit +to be clothed upon with the glory that is yonder, one of the foremost +of these is the passing through things temporal with a continual +regard to the things that are eternal. If you want to understand +to-day you must bring Eternity into the account, and if you want to +use to-day you must use it with the light of the eternal world full +upon it. The sum of it all is, brethren, that the things seen cannot +be estimated in their true character, unless they are regarded in +immediate connection with the things that are unseen; and that the +things seen will only prepare an eternal weight of glory for us when +they prepare us for an eternal weight of glory. + +II. And so, I note that this look at the things not seen is only +possible through Jesus Christ. + +He is the only window which opens out and gives the vision of that +far-off land. I, for my part, believe that, if I might use such a +metaphor, He is the Columbus of the New World. Men believed, and +argued, and doubted about the existence of it across the seas there, +until a man went, and came back again, and then went to found a new +city yonder. And men hoped for immortality, and believed after a +fashion--some of them--in a future life, and dreaded that it might be +true, and discussed and debated whether it was, but doubt clouded all +minds, until One, our Brother, went away into the darkness, and came +back again, in most respects as He had gone, and then departed once +more to make ready a city in which all who love Him should finally +dwell, and to which you and I may be sure that we shall emigrate. It +is only in Jesus Christ that the look which my text enjoins is +possible. + +For not only has He given a certitude so that we need now not to say +'We think, we hope, we fear, we are pretty well sure, that there must +be a life beyond,' but we can say 'We know.' Not only has He done +this, but also in Him and His life of glory at God's right hand in +heaven, is summed up all that we really can know about that future. +We look into the darkness in vain; we look at Him, and, our +knowledge, though limited, is blessed. All other adumbrations of a +life beyond must necessarily be cast into the metaphorical forms or +the negative symbols in which the New Testament abounds. We may speak +of golden pavements, and thrones, and harps, and the like. We may +say: 'No night there, no sighing, nor weeping, no burdened hearts, no +toil, no pain, for the former things are passed away.' But a future +life which is all described in metaphors, and a future life of which +we know only that it is the negation of the disagreeables and +limitations of the present, is but a poor affair. Here is the positive +truth, 'To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with Me on My +throne.' 'We shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.' And +beyond that nearness to Christ, blessed communion with Christ, +likeness to Christ, royalty derived from Christ, I think we neither +know nor need to know anything about that life. + +Not only is He our sole medium of knowledge and Himself the +revelation of our heaven, but it is only by Him that man's thoughts +and desires are drawn to, and find themselves at home in, that +tremendous thought of immortality. I know not how it may be with you, +but I am not ashamed to confess that to me the idea of eternal +continuance of my conscious being is an awful thought, rather +depressing and bewildering than delighting and attractive. I, for my +part, do not believe that men generally do grapple to their hearts, +with any gratitude or joy, that solemn belief of immortal life unless +they feel that it is life with, and in, and like, Jesus Christ. 'To +depart' is dreary, and it is only when we can say 'and to be with +Christ' that it becomes distinctly 'far better.' He is, if I may so +say, at once telescope and star. By Him we see Him; we see, seeing +Him, that the things that are unseen all cluster round Himself and +become blessed. + +III. And now, lastly, this look should be habitual with all Christian +people. + +Paul takes it for granted that every Christian man is, as the +habitual direction of his thoughts, looking towards those 'things +that are not seen.' The original shows that even more distinctly than +our translation, but our translation shows it plainly enough. He does +not say 'works for us an exceeding weight of glory _for_,' but +_'while'_ we look, as if it were a matter of course. He took it for +granted as to these Corinthians. I wonder if he would be warranted in +taking it for granted about us? + +Note what sort of a look it is which produces these blessed effects. +The word which the Apostle employs here is a more pointed one than +the ordinary one for 'seeing.' It is translated in other places in +the New Testament, _'Mark'_ them which walk so as ye have us for +an ensample, and the like. And it implies a concentrated, protracted +effort and interested gaze. A man, standing on the deck of a ship, +casts a languid eye for a moment out on to the horizon, and sees +nothing. A keen-eyed sailor by his side shades his eyes with his +hand, and shuts out cross-lights, and looks, and peers, and keeps his +eyes steady, and he sees the filmy outline of the mountain land. If +you look for a minute, not much caring whether you see anything or +not, and then turn away, and get your eye dazzled with all those +vulgar, crude, high colours round about you here on earth, it is very +little that you will see of 'the things that are not seen.' +Concentrated attention, and a steadfast look, are wanted to make the +invisible visible. You have to alter the focus of your eye if you are +to see the thing that is afar off. + +There has to be a positive shutting out of all other things, as is +emphatically taught in the text by putting first the not looking at +'the things that are seen.' Here they are pressing in upon our +eyeballs, all round us, insisting on being looked at, and unless +we resolutely avert our eyes, we shall not see anything else. They +monopolise us unless we resist the intrusive appeals that they make +to us. We are like men down in some fertile valley, surrounded by +rich vegetation, but seeing nothing beyond the green sides of the +glen. We have to go up to the hill-top if we are to look out over the +flashing ocean, and behold afar off the towers of the mother city +across the restless waves. Brethren, unless you shut out the world +you will never see the things that are not seen. + +Now, as I have said, the Apostle regards this conscious effort at +bringing ourselves into touch, in mind and heart and faith, with 'the +things that are not seen' as being a habitual characteristic of +Christian men. I am very much afraid that the present generation of +Christian people do not, in anything like the degree in which they +should, recreate and strengthen themselves with the contemplation +which he here recommends. It seems to me, for instance, that we do +not hear nearly as much in pulpits about the life beyond the grave as +we used to do when I was a boy. And, though I confess I speak from +limited knowledge, it seems to me that these great motives which lie +in the thought of Eternity and our place there, are by no means as +prominent in the minds of the Christian people of this generation as +they used to be. Partly, I suppose, that arises from the wholesome +emphasis which has been given of late years to the present day, and +this-side-the grave effects of Christianity, upon character and life. +Partly it arises, I think, from the half-consciousness of being +surrounded by an atmosphere of scepticism and unbelief as to a future +life, and from the most unwise, inexpedient, and cowardly yielding to +the temptation to say very little about the distinctive features of +Christianity, and to dwell rather upon those which are sure to be +recognised by even unbelieving people. And it comes, too, from the +lack of faith, which, again, it tends mightily to increase. + +Oh, dear brethren! our consciences tell us what different people we +should be if habitually there shone before us that great, solemn +issue to which we are all tending. Variations in the atmosphere there +will always be, and sometimes the distant outlines will be clearer +and sharper than at others, and the colours will shine out more +distinctly. But surely it should not be that our vision of the +Eternal should be like the vision that dwellers amongst the mountains +have of the summits. They say that some of the great peaks of the +world are swathed in mist all day long, and that only for a few +moments in the morning, or for a brief space in the evening, does the +solemn summit gleam rosy in the light. And that, I am afraid, is very +much like the degree in which most of us look at 'the things that are +not seen' and so we are feeble, and we do not understand 'the things +that are not seen'; and we do not get the good out of them. + +Dear brethren, let us turn away our eyes from the gauds that we can +see, and open the eyes of our spirits on the things that are, the +things where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Surely, +surely, it is madness that when two sets of objects are before us, +the one lasting for a moment, and then dying down into black +nothingness, and the other shining on for ever; and when our 'look' +settles whether we shall share the fate of the one or of the other, +we should choose to gaze with all our eyes and hearts at the +perishable and turn away from the permanent. Surely, if it is true +that the things which are seen are temporal, common-sense, and a +reasonable regard for our own well-being, bid us look at the eternal +'things which are not seen,' since only so can the light and the +momentary afflictions, joys, sorrows, or circumstances, work out for +us, and work us for 'a far more exceeding and eternal weight of +glory.' + + + + +TENT AND BUILDING + + 'For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle + be dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made + with hands, eternal in the heavens.'--2 COR. v. 1. + + +Knowledge and ignorance, doubt and certitude, are remarkably blended +in these words. The Apostle knows what many men are not certain of; +the Apostle doubts as to what all men now are certain of. '_If_ our +earthly house of this tabernacle be dissolved'--there is surely no if +about that. But we must remember that the first Christians, and the +Apostles with them, did not know whether they might not survive till +the coming of Christ; and so not die, but 'be changed.' And this +possibility, as appears from the context, is clearly before the +Apostle's mind. Such a limitation of his knowledge is in entire +accordance with our Lord's own words, 'It is not for you to know the +times and the seasons,' and does not in the smallest degree derogate +from his authority as an inspired teacher. But his certitude is as +remarkable as his hesitation. He knows--and he modestly and calmly +affirms the confidence, as possessed by all believers--that, in the +event of death coming to him or them, he and they have a mansion +waiting for their entrance; a body of glory like to that which Jesus +already wears. + +I. So my text mainly sets before us very strikingly the Christian +certitude as to the final future. + +I need not dwell, I suppose, upon that familiar metaphor by which the +relation of man to his bodily environment is described as that of a +man to his dwelling-place. Only I would desire, in a word, to +emphasise this as being the first of the elements of the blessed +certitude in which Christian people may expatiate--the clear, broad +distinction between me and my physical frame. There is no more +connection, says Paul, between us and the organisation in which we at +present dwell than there is between a man and the house that he +inhabits. 'The foolish senses crown' Death and call him lord; but the +Christian's certitude firmly draws the line, and declares that the +man, the whole personality, is undisturbed by anything that befalls +his residence; and that he may pass unimpaired from one house to +another, being in both the self-same person. And that is something to +keep firm hold of in these days when we are being told that life and +consciousness are but a function of organisation, and that if the one +be annihilated the other cannot persist. No; though all illustrations +and metaphors must necessarily fail, the two which lie side by side +here in my text and its context are far truer than that +pseudo-science--which is not science at all, but only inference from +science--which denies that the man is one thing and his house +altogether another. + +Then again, note, as part of the elements of this Christian +certitude, the blessed thought that a body is part of the perfection +of manhood. No mere dim, ghostly future, where consciousness somehow +persists, without environment or tools to act upon an outer world, +completes the idea of God in reference to man. But the old trinity is +the eternal trinity for humanity, body, soul, and spirit. Corporeity, +with all that it means of definiteness, with all that it means of +relation to an external universe, is the perfection of manhood. To +dwell naked, as the Apostle says in the context, is a thing from +which man shudderingly recoils; and it is not to be his final fate. +Let us take this as no small gain in reference to our conceptions of +a future--the emphatic drawing into light of that thought that for +his perfection man requires body, soul, and spirit. And now, if we +turn for a moment to the characteristics of the two conditions with +which my text deals, we get some familiar enough but yet great and +strengthening thoughts. The 'earthly house of this tabernacle is +dissolved,' or, more correctly, retaining the metaphor of the house, +is to be pulled down--and in its place there comes a building of God, +a 'house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.' + +Now the contrast that is drawn here, whilst it would run out into a +great many other particulars, about which we know nothing, and +therefore had better say nothing, revolves in the Apostle's mind +mainly round these two 'earthly' as contrasted with 'in the heavens'; +and 'tabernacle,' or tent, as contrasted, first of all with a +'building,' and then with the predicate 'eternal.' + +That is to say, the first outstanding difference which arises before +the Apostle as blessed and glorious, is the contrast between the +fragile dwelling-place, with its thin canvas, its bending poles, its +certain removal some day, and the permanence of that which is not a +'tent,' but a 'building' which is 'eternal.' Involved in that is +the thought that all the limitations and weaknesses which are +necessarily associated with the perishableness of the present +abode are at an end for ever. No more fatigue, no more working beyond +the measure of power, no more need for recuperation and repose; no +more dread of sickness and weakness; no more possibility of decay, +'It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption'--neither +'_can_ they die any more.' Whether that be by reason of any inherent +immortality, or by reason of the uninterrupted flow into the creature +of the immortal life of Christ, to whom he is joined, is a question +that need not trouble us now. Enough for us that the contrast between +the Bedouin tent--which is folded up and carried away, and nothing +left but the black circle where the cheerful hearth once glinted +amidst the sands of the desert--and the stately mansion reared for +eternity, is the contrast between the organ of the spirit in which we +now dwell and that which shall be ours. + +And the other contrast is no less glorious and wonderful. 'The +_earthly_ house of this tent' does not merely define the composition, +but also the whole relations and capacities of that to which it +refers. The 'tent' is 'earthly', not merely because, to use a kindred +metaphor, it is a 'building of clay,' but because, by all its +capacities, it belongs to, corresponds with, and is fitted only for, +this lower order of things, the seen and the perishable. And, on the +other hand, the 'mansion' is in 'the heavens,' even whilst the future +tenant is a nomad in his tent. That is so, because the power which +can create that future abode is 'in the heavens.' It is so called in +order to express the security in which it is kept for those who shall +one day enter upon it. And it is so, further, to express the order of +things with which it brings its dwellers into contact. 'Flesh and +blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God; neither doth corruption +inherit incorruption.' That future home of the spirit will be +congruous with the region in which it dwells; fitted for the heavens +in which it is now preserved. And thus the two contrasts--adapted to +the perishable, and itself perishable, belonging to the eternal and +itself incorruptible--are the two which loom largest before the +Apostle's mind. + +Let no man say that such ideas of a possible future bodily frame are +altogether inconsistent with all that we know of the limitations and +characteristics of what we call matter. 'There is one flesh of beasts +and another of birds,' says Paul; 'there is one glory of the sun and +another of the moon.' And his old-fashioned argument is perfectly +sound to-day. + +Do you know so fully all the possibilities of creation as that you +are warranted in asserting that such a thing as a body which is the +fit organ of the spirit, and is incorruptible like the heavens in +which it dwells, is an impossibility? Surely the forms of matter are +sufficiently varied to make us chary in asserting that other forms +are impossible, to which there may belong, as characteristics, even +these glorious ones of my text. The old story of the king in the +tropics, who laughed to scorn some one who told him that water could +be turned into a solid, may well be quoted in this connection. Let us +be less confident that we know all that is to be known in regard to +the sweep of God's creative power; and let us thankfully accept the +teaching by which we, too, in all our ignorance, may be able to say, +'We know that ... we have a building of God ... eternal in the +heavens.' + +Now there is only one more remark that I wish to make about this part +of my subject; and it is this, that the teaching of my text and its +context casts great light--and I think by many people much-needed +light--on what the resurrection of the dead means. That doctrine has +been weighted with a great many incredibilities and I venture to say +absurdities, by well-meaning misconceptions and exaggerations. We +have heard grand platitudes about 'the scattered dust being gathered +from the four winds of heaven,' and so on, but the teaching of my +text is that the contrast between the present physical frame and the +future bodily environment is utter and complete; and that +resurrection does not mean the assuming again of the body that is +left behind and done with, but the reinvestiture of the man with +another body. And so the Scriptural phrase is, not 'the resurrection +of the body,' but 'the resurrection of the dead.' It is a house 'in +the heavens.' It comes 'from heaven.' + +We leave the tent. Life and thought + + ... have gone away, side by side, + Leaving doors and windows wide; + Careless tenants they! + +And they may well be careless, because in the heavens they have +another mansion, incorruptible and glorious. + +We leave the 'tent'; we enter the 'building.' There is nothing here +of some germ of immortality being somehow extricated from the ruins, +and fostered into glorious growth. Or, to take another metaphor of +the context, we strip off the garment and are naked; and then we are +clothed with another garment and are not found naked. The +resurrection of the dead is the clothing of the spirit with the house +which is from heaven. And there is as much difference between the two +habitations as there is between the grim, solid architecture +of northern peoples, amidst snow and ice, needed to resist the +blasts, and to keep the life within in an ungenial climate, and the +light, graceful dwellings of those who walk in an atmosphere of +perpetual sunshine in the tropics, as there is between the close-knit +and narrow-windowed and narrow-doored abode in which we now have to +pass our days, and that large house, with broad windows that take in +a mightier sweep and new senses that have relation with new qualities +in the world then around us. Therefore let us, whilst we grope in the +dark here, and live in a narrow hovel in a back street, look forward +to the time when we shall dwell on the sunny heights in the great +pavilion which God prepares for them that love Him. + +II. And now note, again, how we come to this certitude. + +My text is very significantly followed by a 'for,' which gives the +reason of the knowledge in a very remarkable manner. 'We know, ... +for in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our +house, which is from heaven.' Now that singular collocation of ideas +may be set forth thus--whatever longing there is in a Christian, +God-inspired soul, that longing is a prophecy of its own fulfilment. +We know that there is a house, because of the yearning, which is +deepest and strongest when we are nearest God, and likest what He +would have us to be--the yearning to be 'clothed upon with our house +which is from heaven.' That is a truth that goes a long way; though +to enlarge on it is irrelevant to our present purpose. It has its +limitations, as is obvious from the context, in which are human +elements which are not destined to be gratified, mingled with the +yearning, which is of God, and which is destined to be satisfied. But +this at least we may firmly hold by, that just because God will not +put men to confusion intellectually, and does not let them entertain +uncherished--still less Himself foster and excite--longings which He +does not mean to gratify, a Christian yearning for immortality is, to +the man who feels it, a declaration that immortality is sure for him. +'Delight thyself in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of +thine heart.' Whatsoever, in touching Him, we do deeply long for may +have blended with it human elements, which will be dispersed +unsatisfied, but the substance of it is a prophecy of its own +fulfilment. And as surely as the stork in the heavens, flying +southward, will reach the sunny lands which draw it from the grim +northern winter, so surely may a man say, 'I know that I have a house +in heaven, because I long for it, and shrink from being found naked.' + +Of course such longing, such aspiration and revulsion are no proofs +of a fact except there be some fact which changes them, from mere +vague desires, and makes these solid certainties. And such a fact we +have in that which is the only proof that the world has received, of +the persistence of life through death and the continuance of personal +identity unchanged by the grave, and that is the Resurrection of +Jesus Christ from the dead. Our faith in immortality does not depend +merely on our own subjective desires and longings, but these desires +and longings are quickened, confirmed, and certified by this great +fact that Jesus Christ has risen from the dead; and therefore we know +that the yearnings in us are not in vain. So we come to this +certitude, first, by reason of his experience; and, second, by reason +of the longings which that experience fosters if it does not kindle, +within our hearts. + +And let no man take exception to the Apostle's word here, 'we know,' +or tell us that 'Knowledge is of the things we see.' That is true, +and not true. It is true in regard to what arrogates to itself the +name of science. And we are willing to admit the limitation if the +men who insist upon it will, on their sides, admit that there are +other sources of certitude than so-called 'facts,' by which they mean +merely material facts. If it is meant to assert that we are less sure +of the love of God, of immortality, than we are of the existence of +this piece of wood, or that flame of gas; then I humbly venture to +say that there is another region of facts than those which are +appreciable by sense; that the evidence upon which we rest our +certitude of immortal blessedness is quite as valid, quite as true, +quite as able to bear the weight of a leaning heart as anything that +can be produced, in the nature of evidence, for the things round us. +It is not, 'We fancy, we believe, we hope, we are pretty nearly +sure,' but it is 'We _know_ ... that we have a building of God.' + +III. Lastly, note what this certitude does. + +The Apostle tells us by the 'for' which lies at the beginning of my +text, and makes it a reason for something that has preceded, and what +has preceded is this, 'We look not at the things which are seen, but +at the things which are not seen.' + +That is to say, such a joyous, calm certitude draws men's thoughts +away from this shabby and transitory present, and fixes them on the +solemn majesties of that eternal future. Yes! and nothing else will. +Take away the idea of resurrection, and the remaining idea of +immortality is a poor, shadowy, impotent thing. There is no force in +it; there is no blessedness in it; there is nothing in it for a man +to lay hold of. And, as a matter of fact, there is no vivid faith in +a future life without belief in the resurrection and bodily existence +of the perfected dead. + +And we shall not let our thoughts willingly go out thither unless our +own personal wellbeing there is very sure to us. When we know that +for us individually there is that house waiting for us to enter into +it, when the Lord comes, then we shall not be unwilling to turn our +hearts and our desires thither. We look at the things which are not +seen, for we know that we have a house eternal. + +And such a certitude will also make a man willing to accept the else +unwelcome necessity of leaving the tent, and for a while doing +without the mansion. It is that which the Apostle is speaking of in +subsequent verses, on which I cannot enter now. He says--and therein +speaks a universal experience--that men recoil from the idea of +having to lay aside this earthly body and be 'naked.' But we know +that we have that glorious mansion waiting for us, and that till the +day comes when we enter upon it we may be lapt in Christ instead, +and, in that so-called intermediate state, may have Him to surround +us, Him to be to us the medium by which we come into connection with +anything external, and so can contentedly go away from our home in +the body; and go to our home in Christ. 'Wherefore, we are always +confident, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be +at home with the Lord.' + +Oh, brethren! do we think of our future thus? If we do, then let us +lay to heart the final words of our teacher in this part of his +letter: 'Wherefore we make it our aim, whether at home or absent, to +be well-pleasing unto Him.' + + + + +THE PATIENT WORKMAN + + 'Now He that hath wrought us for the self-same thing + is God.'--2 COR. v. 5. + + +These words penetrate deep into the secrets of God. They assume to +have read the riddle of life. To Paul everything which we experience, +outwardly or inwardly, is from the divine working. Life is to him no +mere blind whirl, or unintelligent play of accidental forces, nor is +it the unguided result of our own or of others' wills, but is the +slow operation of the great Workman. Paul assumes to know the meaning +of this protracted process, that it all has one design which we may +know and grasp and further. And he believes that the clear perception +of the divine purpose, and the habit of looking at everything as +contributing thereto, will be a magic charm against all sorrow, +doubt, despondency, or fear, for he adds, 'Therefore we are always +confident.' So let us try to follow the course of thought which +issues in such a blessed gift as that of a continual, courageous +outlook, and buoyant though grave lightheartedness, because we +discern what He means 'Who worketh all things according to the +counsel of His own will.' + +I. The first thought here is, God's purpose in all His working; 'He +that hath wrought us for the self-same thing is God.' + +What is that 'self-same thing'? To understand it we must look back +for a moment to the previous context. The Apostle has been speaking +about the instinctive reluctance which even good men feel at prospect +of dying and 'putting off the earthly house of this tabernacle.' He +distinguishes between three different conditions in which the human +spirit may be--dwelling in the earthly body, stripped of that, and +'clothed with the house which is from Heaven,' and to this last and +highest state he sees that for him and for his brethren there were +two possible roads. They might reach it either through losing the +present body, in the act of death, and passing through a period of +what he calls nakedness; or they might attain it by being +'superinvested,' as it were, with the glorious body which was to come +to saints with Christ when He came; and so slip on, as it were, the +wedding garment over their old clothes, without having to denude +themselves of these. And he says that deep in the Christian heart +there lay reluctance to take the former road and the preference for +the latter. His longing was that that which is mortal might be +'swallowed up of life,' as some sand-bank in the tide-way may be +gradually covered and absorbed by the rejoicing waters. And then he +says, 'Now He that hath wrought us for this very thing, is God.' + +Of course it is impossible that he can mean by this 'very thing' the +second of the roads by which it was possible to reach the ultimate +issue, because he did not know whether his brethren and he were to +die or to be changed. He speaks in the context about death as a +possible contingency for himself and for them,--'_If_ our earthly +house of this tabernacle were dissolved,' and so on. Therefore we +must suppose that 'the self-same thing' of which he is thinking as +the divine purpose in all His dealings with us, is not the manner in +which we may attain that ultimate condition, but the condition itself +which, by one road or another, God's children shall attain. Or, in +other words, the highest aim of the divine love in all its dealings +with us Christian men, is not merely a blessed spiritual life, but +the completion of our humanity in a perfect spirit dwelling in a +glorified body. Corporeity--the dwelling in a body by which the pure +spirit moves amidst pure universes--is the highest end of God's will +concerning us. + +That glorified body is described in our context in wonderful words, +which it would take me far too long to do more than just touch upon. +Here we dwell in a tent, there we shall dwell in a building. Here in +a house made with hands, a corporeal frame derived from parents by +material transmission and intervention; there we shall dwell in a +building of which God is the maker. Here we dwell in a crumbling clay +tenement, which rains dissolve, which lightning strikes, and winds +overthrow, and which finally lies on the ground a heap of tumbled +ruin. There we dwell in a building, God's direct work, eternal, and +knowing no corruption nor change. Here we dwell in a body congruous +with, and part of, the perishable earthly world in which it abides, +and with which it stands in relation; there we dwell in a house +partaking of the nature of the heavens in which it moves, a body that +is the fit organ of a perfect spirit. + +And so, says Paul, the end of what God means with us is not stated in +all its wonderfulness, when we speak of spirits imbued with His +wisdom and surcharged with His light and perfectness, but when we add +to that the thought of a fitting organ in which these spirits dwell, +whereby they can come into contact with an external universe, +incorruptible, and so reach the summit of their destined +completeness. 'The house not made with hands,' eternal, the building +of God in the Heavens, is the end that God has in view for all His +children. + +II. So, then, secondly, note the slow process of the Divine Workman. + +The Apostle employs here a very emphatic compound term for 'hath +wrought.' It conveys not only the idea of operation, but the idea of +continuous and somewhat toilsome and effortful work, as if against +the resistance of something that did not yield itself naturally to +the impulse that He would bestow. Like some sculptor with a hard bit +of marble, or some metallurgist who has to work the rough ore till it +becomes tractable, so the loving, patient, Divine Artificer is here +represented as labouring long and earnestly with a somewhat obstinate +material which can and does resist His loving touch, and yet going on +with imperturbable and patient hope, by manifold touches, here a +little and there a little, all through life preparing a man for His +purpose. The great Artificer toils at His task, 'rising early' and +working long, and not discouraged when He comes upon a black vein in +the white marble, nor when the hard stone turns the edge of His +chisels. + +Now I would have you notice that there lies in this conception a very +important thought, viz. God cannot make you fit for heaven all at a +jump, or by a simple act of will. That is not His way of working. He +can make a world so, He cannot make a saint so. He can speak and it +is done when it is only a universe that has to be brought into being; +or He can say, 'Let there be light,' and light springs at His word. +But He cannot say, and He does not say, Let there be holiness, and it +comes. Not so can God make man meet for the 'inheritance of the +saints in light.' And it takes Him all His energies, for all a +lifetime, to prepare His child for what He wants to make of him. + +There is another thought here, which I can only touch, and that is +that God cannot give a man that glorified body of which I have been +speaking, unless the man's spirit is Christlike. He cannot raise a +bad man at the resurrection with the body of His glory. By the +necessities of the case it is confined to the purified, because it +corresponds to their inward spiritual being. It is only a perfect +spirit that can dwell in a perfect body. You could not put a bad man, +Godless and Christless, into the body which will be fit for them whom +Christ has changed first of all in heart and spirit into His own +likeness. He would be like those hermit crabs that you see on the +beach who run into any kind of a shell, whether it fits them or not, +in order to get a house. + +There are two principles at work in the resurrection of the dead. The +glorified body is not the physical outcome of the material body here, +but is the issue and manifestation, in visible form, of the perfect +and Christlike spirit. Some shall rise to glory and immortality, some +to shame and everlasting contempt. If we are to stand at the last +with the body of our humiliation changed into a body of glory, we +must begin by being changed in the spirit of our mind. As the mind +is, so will the body be one day. But, passing from such thoughts as +these, and remembering that the Apostle here is speaking only about +Christian people, and the divine operations upon them, we may still +extend the meaning of this significant word 'wrought' somewhat +further, and ask you just to consider, and that very briefly, the +three-fold processes which, in the divine working, terminate in, and +contemplate, this great issue. + +God has wrought us for it in the very act of making us what we are. +Human nature is an insoluble enigma, if this world is its only field. +Amidst all the waste, the mysterious waste, of creation, there is no +more profligate expenditure of powers than that which is involved in +giving a man such faculties and capacities, if this be the only field +on which they are to be exercised. If you think of what most of us do +in this world, and of what it is in us to be, and to do, it is almost +ludicrous to consider the disproportion. All other creatures fit +their circumstances; nothing in them is bigger than their +environment. They find in life a field for every power. You and I do +not. 'The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have +roosting-places.' They all correspond to their circumstances, but we +have an infinitude of faculty lying half dormant in each of us, which +finds no work at all in this present world. And so, looking at men as +they are with eternity in their hearts, with natures that go reaching +out towards infinity, the question comes up: 'Wherefore hast Thou +made all men in vain? What is the use of us, and why should we be +what we are, if there is nothing for us except this poor present?' +God, or whoever made us, has made a mistake; and strangely enough, if +we were not made, but evolved, evolution has worked out faculties +which have no correspondence with the things around them. + +Life and man are an insoluble enigma except on one hypothesis, and +that is that this is a nursery-ground, and that the plants will be +pricked out some day, and planted where they are meant to grow. The +hearts that feel after absolute and perfect love, the spirits +that can conceive the idea of an infinite goodness, the dumb desires, +the blank misgivings that wander homeless amidst the narrowness of +this poor earth, all these things proclaim that there is a region +where they will find their nutriment and expatiate, and when we look +at a man we can only say, He that hath wrought him for an infinite +world, and an endless communion with a perfect good, is God. + +Still further, another field of the divine operation to this end is +in what we roughly call 'providences.' What is the meaning of all +this discipline through which we are passed, if there is nothing to +be disciplined for? What is the good of an apprenticeship if there is +no journeyman's life to come after it, where the powers that have +been slowly acquired shall be nobly exercised upon broader fields? +Why should men be taken, as it were, and, like the rough iron from +the ground, + + 'Be heated hot with hopes and fears, + And plunged in baths of hissing tears, + And battered with the shocks of doom,' + +if, after all the process, the polished shaft is to be broken in two, +and tossed away as rubbish? If death ends faculty, it is a pity that +the faculty was so patiently developed. If God is educating us all in +His school, and then means that, like some wastrel boys, we should +lose all our education as soon as we leave its benches, there is +little use in the rod, and little meaning in the training. Brethren! +life is an insoluble riddle unless the purpose of it lie yonder, and +unless all this patient training of our sorrows and our gladnesses, +the warmth that expands and the cold that contracts the heart, the +light that gladdens and the darkness that saddens the eye and the +spirit, are equally meant for training us for the perfect life of a +perfect soul moving a perfect body in a perfect universe. Here is a +pillar in some ancient hall that has fallen into poor hands, and has +had a low roof thrown across the centre of the chamber at half its +height. In the lower half there is part of a pillar that means +nothing; ugly, bare, evidently climbing, and passing through the +aperture, and away above yonder is the carved capital and the great +entablature that it carries. Who could understand the shaft unless he +could look up through the aperture, and see the summit? And who can +think of life as anything but a wretched fragment unless he knows +that all which begins here runs upwards into the room above, and +there finds its explanation and its completion? + +But there is the third sphere of the divine operation. As in creation +and in providence, so in all the work and mystery of our redemption, +this is the goal that God has in view. It was not worth Christ's +while to come and die, if nothing more was to come of it than the +imperfect reception of His blessings and gifts which the noblest +Christian life in this world presents. The meaning and purpose of the +Cross, the meaning and purpose of all the patient dealings of His +whispering Spirit, are that we shall be like our Divine Lord in +spirit first, and in body afterwards. + +And everything about the experiences of a true Christian spirit is +charged with a prophecy of immortality. I have not time to dwell upon +one point gathered from the context, that I intended to have insisted +upon, viz. that the very desires which God's good Spirit works in a +believing soul are themselves confirmations of their own fulfilment. +But if you notice at your leisure the verses that precede my text, +you will find that the Apostle adduces the groanings of 'earnest +desire to be clothed with our house which is from Heaven,' as a proof +that we _have_ 'a building of God, a house not made with hands.' +That is to say, every longing in a Christian heart when it is most +filled with that Spirit, and most in contact with God, and which is +the answer of that heart to a promise of Christ--every such longing +carries with it the assurance of its own fulfilment. He that hath +wrought it has wrought it in order that the desire may fit us for its +answer, and that the open mouth may be ready for the abundant filling +which His grace designs. He works upon us, therefore, by making us +desire a gift, and then He gives that which He desires. So let us +cherish these longings, not for the accident of escaping death, nor +as choosing the path by which we shall reach the blessed issue, but +longing for that great issue itself; and try to keep more distinct +and clear before all our minds this thought, 'God means for me the +participation in Christ's glorified Manhood, and my attaining of that +Manhood is the end that He has in view in all that He does with me.' + +III. So I must say one word about the last thought that is here, and +that is the certainty and the confidence. 'Therefore we are always +confident,' says the Apostle. + +'He that hath wrought us for the self-same thing is God.' Then we may +be sure that as far as He is concerned, the work will not be +suspended nor vain. _This_ man does not begin to build and is +unable to finish. This workman has infinite resources, an unchanging +purpose, and infinite long-suffering. He will complete His task. + +In the quarries of Egypt you will find gigantic stones, half-dressed, +and intended to have been transported to some great temple. But there +they lie, the work incomplete, and they never carried to their place. +There are no half-polished stones in God's quarries. They are all +finished where they lie, and then borne across the sea, like Hiram's +from Lebanon, to the Temple on the hill. It is a certainty that God +will finish His work; and since 'He that hath wrought us is God,' we +may be sure that He will not stop till He has done. + +But it is a certainty that you can thwart. It is an operation that +you can counterwork. The potter in Jeremiah's parable was making a +vessel upon his wheel, and the vessel was marred in his hand, and did +not turn out what he wanted it. The meaning of the metaphor, which +has often been twisted to express the very opposite, is that the +potter's work may fail, that the artificer may be balked, that you +can counterwork the divine dealing, and that all His purpose in your +creation, in His providence and in His gift of His Son for your +redemption, may come to nought as far as you are concerned. 'I +beseech you that ye receive not the grace of God in vain.' 'In vain +have I smitten your children,' wailed the Divine Love; 'they have +received no correction.' In vain God lavishes upon some of us His +mercies, in vain for some of us has Christ toiled and suffered and +died. Oh, brother! do not let all God's work on you come to nought, +but yield yourselves to it. Rejoice in the confidence that He is +moulding your character, cheerfully welcome and accept the +providences, painful as they may be, by which He prepares you for +heaven. The chisel is sharp that strikes off the superfluous pieces +of marble, and when the chisel cuts, not into marble, but into a +heart, there is a pang. Bear it, bear it! and understand the meaning +of the blow of the sculptor's mallet, and see in all life the divine +hand working towards the accomplishment of His own loving purpose. +Then if we turn to Him, amid the pains of His discipline and the joys +of His gifts of grace, with recognition and acceptance of His meaning +in them all, and cry to Him, 'Thy mercy, O Lord, endureth for ever, +forsake not the work of Thine own hands,' we may be always confident, +as knowing that 'the Lord will perfect that which concerneth us.' + + + + +THE OLD HOUSE AND THE NEW + + 'We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent + from the body, and to be present with the Lord.'--2 COR. v. 8. + + +There lie in the words of my text simply these two things; the +Christian view of what death is, and the Christian temper in which to +anticipate it. + +I. First, the Christian view of what death is. + +Now it is to be observed that, properly speaking, the Apostle is not +here referring to the state of the dead, but to the act of dying. The +language would more literally and accurately be rendered 'willing to +_go from_ home, from the body, and to _go_ home, to the Lord.' The +moment of transition of course leads to a permanent state, but it is +the moment of transition which is in view in the words. I need not +remind you, I suppose, that the metaphor of the home is one which has +already been dwelt upon in the early part of the chapter, where the +contrast is drawn between the transitory house of 'this tent,' and +the 'building of God,' the body of incorruption and glory which the +saints at the Resurrection day shall receive. So, then, the Christian +view of the act of death is that it is simply a change of abode. + +Very clearly and firmly does Paul draw the line between the man and +his dwelling-place. Life is more than a result of organisation. +Consciousness, thought, feeling, are more than functions of matter. +No materialist philosopher has ever been, or ever will be, able to +explain within the limits of his system the strange difference +between the cause and the effect; how it comes to pass that at the +one end of the chain there is an impression upon a nerve, and at the +other there is pain; how at the one end there is the throb of an inch +of matter in a man's skull, and at the other end there are thoughts +that breathe and words that burn, and that live for ever. That brings +us up to the edge of a gulf over which no materialist philosopher has +ever been able to cast a bridge. The scalpel cannot cut deep enough +to solve this mystery. Conscience as well as instinct cry out against +the theory that the worker and the tools are inseparable. For such a +theory reduces human actions to mechanical results, and shatters all +responsibility. Man is more than his dwelling-place. You crush a +shell on the beach with your heel, and you slay its tiny inhabitant. +But you can pull down the tent, and pluck up its pegs, and roll up +its canvas, and put it away in a dark corner, and the tenant is +untouched. The foolish senses crown Death as last, and lord of all. +But wisdom says, 'Life and thought have gone away side by side, +leaving doors and windows wide,' and that is all that has happened. + +Still further, my text suggests that to the Christian soul the +departure from the one house is the entrance into the other. The home +has been the body; the home is now to be Jesus Christ. And very +beautiful and significant with meanings, which only experience will +fully unfold, is the representation that the Lord Christ Himself +assumes the place which the bodily environment has hitherto held. + +That teaches us, at all events, that there is a new depth and +closeness of union with Jesus waiting the Christian soul, when it +lays aside the separating film of flesh. Here the bodily +organisation, with its limitations, necessarily shuts us off from the +closeness of intercourse which is possible for a naked soul. We know +not how much separation may depend upon the immersing of the spirit +in the fleshly tabernacle, but this we know, that, though here and +now, by faith which dominates sense, souls can live in Christ even +whilst they live in the body; yet there shall come a form of union so +much more close, intimate, all-pervading, and all-encircling, as that +the present union with Him by faith, precious as it is, shall be, as +the Apostle calls it in our context, 'absence from the Lord.' 'We +have to be discharged,' says an old thinker, 'of a great deal of what +we call body, and then we shall be more truly ourselves,' and more +truly united to Him who, if we are Christian people at all, is the +self of ourselves and the life of our lives. No man knows how close +he can nestle to the bosom of Christ when the film of flesh is rent +away. Just as when in some crowded street of a great city some grimy +building is pulled down, a sudden daylight fills the vacant space, +and all the site that had been shut out from the sky for many years +is drenched in sunshine, so when 'the earthly house of this +tabernacle' is ruinated and falls, the light will flood the place +where it stood, and to be 'absent from the body' shall be to be +'present with the Lord.' + +May we go a step further and suggest that, perhaps, in the bold +metaphor of my text, there is an answer to the questions which so +often rack loving and parted hearts? 'Do the dead know aught of what +affects us here? and can they do aught but gaze on Him, and love, and +rest?' If it be that there is any such analogy as seems to be dimly +shadowed in my text, between the relation of the body on earth to the +spirit that inhabits it, and that of Jesus Christ to him who dwells +in Him, and is clothed by Him, then it may be that, as the flesh, so +the Christ transmits to the spirit that has Him for its home +impressions from the outside world, and affords a means of action +upon that world. Christ may be, if I might so say, the sensorium of +the disembodied spirit; and Christ may be the hand of the man who +hath no other instrument by which to express himself. But all that is +fancy perhaps, speculation certainly; and yet there seems to be a +shadow of a foundation for at least entertaining the possibility of +such a thought as that Jesus is the means of knowing and the means of +acting to those who rest from their labours in Him, and dwell in +peace in His arms. But be that as it may, the reality of a close +communion and encircling by the felt presence of Jesus Christ, which, +in its blessed closeness, will make the closest communion here seem +to be obscure, is certainly declared in the words before us. + +Then this transition is regarded in my text as being the work of a +moment. It is not a long journey of which the beginning is 'to go +_from_ home, from the body,' and the end is 'to _go_ home, to the +Lord.' But it is one and the same motion which, looked at from the +one side, is departure, and looked at from the other is arrival. The +old saying has it, 'there is but a step between me and death.' The +truth is, there is but a step between me and _life_. The mighty angel +in the Apocalypse, that stood with one foot on the firm land and the +other on the boundless ocean, is but the type of the spirit in the +brief moment of transition, when the consciousness of two worlds +blends, and it is clothed upon with the house which is from heaven, +in the very act of stripping off the earthly house of this +tabernacle. + +Nor need I remind you, I suppose, in more than a sentence, that this +transition obviously leads into a state of conscious communion with +Jesus Christ. The dreary figment of an unconscious interval for the +disembodied spirit has no foundation, either in what we know of +spirit, or in what is revealed to us in Scripture. For the one thing +that seems to make it probable--the use of that metaphor of 'sleeping +in Jesus'--is quite sufficiently accounted for by the notions of +repose, and cessation of outward activity, and withdrawal of capacity +of being influenced by the so-called realities of this lower world, +without dragging in the unfounded notion of unconsciousness. My text +is incompatible with it, for it is absurd to say of an unconscious +spirit, clear of a bodily environment, that it is anywhere; and there +is no intelligible sense in which the condition of such a spirit can +be called being 'with the Lord.' + +So, then, I think a momentary transition, with uninterrupted +consciousness, which leads to a far deeper and more wonderful and +blessed sense of unity with Jesus Christ than is possible here on +earth, is the true shape in which the act of death presents itself to +the Christian thinker. + +And remember, dear brethren, that is all we know. Nothing else is +certain--nothing but this, 'with the Lord,' and the resulting +certainty that therefore it is well with them. It is enough for our +faith, for our comfort, for our patient waiting. They live in Christ, +'and there we find them worthier to be loved,' and certainly lapped +in a deeper rest. 'Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord.' + +II. In the next place, note the Christian temper in which to +anticipate the transition. + +'We are always courageous, and willing rather to leave our home in +the body, and to go home to the Lord.' Now I must briefly remind you +of how the Apostle comes to this state of feeling. He has been +speaking about the natural shrinking, which belongs to all humanity, +from the act of dissolution, considered as being the stripping off of +the garment of the flesh. And he has declared, on behalf of himself +and the early Christian Church, his own and their personal desire +that they might escape from that trial by the path which seemed +possible to the early Christians--viz. that of surviving until the +return of Jesus Christ from Heaven, when they would be 'clothed upon +with the house which is from Heaven,' without the necessity of +stripping off that with which at present they are invested. Then he +says--and this is a very remarkable thought--that just because this +instinctive shrinking from death and yearning for the glorified body +is so strong in the Christian heart, that is a sign that there is +such a glorified body waiting for us. He says, 'we know that if our +house ... were dissolved, we have a building of God.' And his reason +for knowing it is this, '_for_ in this we groan.' That is a bold +position to say that a yearning in the Christian consciousness +prophesies its own fulfilment. Our desires are the prophecies of His +gifts. Then, on this certainty--which he deduces from the fact of the +longing for it--on this certainty of the glorious, ultimate body of +the Resurrection he bases his willingness expressed in the text, to +go through the unwelcome process of leaving the old house, although +he shrinks from it. + +So, then, Christian faith does not destroy the natural reluctance to +put aside the old companion of our lives. The old house, though it be +smoky, dimly lighted, and, by our own careless keeping, sluttish and +grimy in many a corner, yet is the only house we have ever known, and +to be absent from it is untried and strange. There is nothing wrong +in saying 'we would not be unclothed but clothed upon.' Nature speaks +there. We may reverently entertain the same feelings which our +Pattern acknowledged, when He said, 'I have a baptism to be baptized +with, and how am I straitened until it be accomplished.' And there +would be nothing sinful in repeating His prayer with His conditions, +'If it be possible, let this cup pass from Me.' + +But then the text suggests to us the large Christian possessions and +hope which counterwork this reluctance, in the measure in which we +live lives of faith. There is the assurance of that ultimate home in +which all the transiency of the present material organisation is +exchanged for the enduring permanence which knows no corruption. The +'tent' is swept away to make room for the 'building.' The earthly +house is dissolved in order that there may be reared round the +homeless tenant the house eternal, 'not made with hands,' God's own +work, which is waiting in the heavens; because the power that shall +frame it is there. Not only that great hope of the 'body of His +glory,' with which at the last all true souls shall be invested, but +furthermore, 'the earnest of the spirit,' and the blessed experiences +therefrom, resulting even here, ought to make the unwelcome necessity +less unwelcome. If the firstfruits be righteousness and peace and joy +of the Holy Ghost, what shall the harvest be? If the 'earnest,' the +shilling given in advance, be so precious, what will the whole wealth +of the inheritance which it heralds be when it is received? + +For such reasons the transitory passage becomes less painful and +unwelcome. Who is there that would hesitate to dip his foot into the +ice-cold brook if he knew that it would not reach above his ankles, +and that a step would land him in blessedness unimagined till +experienced? + +Therefore the Christian temper is that of quiet willingness and +constant courage. There is nothing hysterical here, nothing morbid, +nothing overstrained, nothing artificial. The Apostle says: 'I would +rather not. I should like if I could escape it. It is an unwelcome +necessity; but when I see what I do see beyond,' I am ready. Since so +it must be, I will go, not reluctantly, nor dragged away from life, +nor clinging desperately to it as it slips from my hands, nor +dreading anything that may happen beyond; but always courageous, and +prepared to go whithersoever the path may take me, since I am sure +that it ends in His bosom. He is willing to go from the home of the +body, because to do that is to go home to Christ. + +There are other references of our Apostle's, substantially of the +same tone as that of my text, but with very beautiful and encouraging +differences. When he was nearer his end, when it seemed to him as if +the headsman's block was not very far off, his _willingness_ had +intensified into 'having a _desire_ to depart and to be with +Christ, which is far better.' And when the end was all but reached, +and he knew that death was waiting just round the next turn in the +road, he said, with the confidence that in the midst of the struggle +would have been vainglory, but at the end of it was a foretaste of +the calm of Heaven, 'I have finished my course, I have kept the +faith; henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness.' +That is our model, dear brethren,--'always courageous,' afraid of +nothing in life, in death, or beyond, and therefore willing to go +from home from the body and to go home to the Lord. + +Think of this man thus fronting the inevitable, with no excitement +and with no delusions. Remember what Paul believed about death, about +sin, about his own sin, about judgment, about hell. And then think of +how to him death had made its darkness beautiful with the light of +Christ's face, and all the terror was gone out of it. Do you think so +about death? Do you shrink from it? Why? Why do you not take Paul's +cure for the shrinking? If you can say, 'To me to live is Christ,' +you will have no difficulty in saying, 'and to die is gain.' That is +the only way by which you can come to such a temper, and then you +will be willing to move from the cottage to the palace, and to wait +in peace till you are shifted again into 'the building of God, the +house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.' + + + + +PLEASING CHRIST + + 'We labour that whether present or absent we may be + accepted of Him.'--2 COR. v. 2. + + +We do not usually care very much for, or very much trust, a man's own +statement of the motives of his life, especially if in the statement +he takes credit for lofty and noble ones. And it would be rather a +dangerous experiment for the ordinary run of so-called Christian +people to stand up and say what Paul says here, that the supreme +design and aim towards which all their lives are directed is to +please Jesus Christ. In his case the tree was known by its fruits. +Certainly there never was a life of more noble self-abnegation, of +more continuous heroism, of loftier aspiration and lowlier service +than the life of which we see the very pulse in these words. + +But Paul is not only professing his own faith, he is speaking in the +name of all his brethren. 'We,' ought to include every man and woman +who calls himself or herself a Christian. It is this setting of the +will of Jesus Christ high up above all other commandments, and +proposing to one's self as the aim that swallows up all other aims, +that I may please Him--it is this, and not creeds, forms, opinions, +professions, or even a faith that simply trusts in Him for salvation, +that makes a true Christian. You are a Christian in the precise +measure in which Christ's will is uppermost and exclusive in your +life, and for all your professions and your orthodoxy and your +worship and your faith, not one hair's-breadth further. Here is the +signature and the common characteristic of all real Christians, 'We +labour that whether present or absent we may be well-pleasing to +Him.' + +So then in looking together at these words now, I take three points, +the supreme aim of the Christian life; the concentration of effort +which that aim demands; and the insignificance to which it reduces +all external things. + +I. First, then, let me deal with that supreme aim of the Christian +life. + +The word which is, correctly enough, rendered 'accepted,' may more +literally, and perhaps with a closer correspondence to the Apostle's +meaning, be translated 'well-pleasing,' and the aim is this, not +merely that we may be accepted, but that we may bring a smile into +His face, and some joy and complacent delight in us into His heart, +when He looks upon our doings. That pleasure of Jesus Christ in them +that 'fear Him, and in them that hope in His mercy' and do His will +is a present emotion that fills His heart in looking upon His +followers, and it will be especially declared in the solemn, final +judgment. We must keep in view both of these periods, if we would +rightly understand the sweep of the aim which ought to be uppermost +in all Christian people. Here and now in our present acts, we should +so live as to occasion a present sentiment of complacent delight in +us, in the heart of the Christ who sees us here and now and always. +We should so live as that at that far-off future day when we shall +'all be manifested before the Judgment-seat of Christ,' the Judge may +bend from His tribunal, and welcome us into His presence with a word +of congratulation and an outstretched hand of loving reception. Set +that two-fold aim before you, Christian men and women, else you will +fail to experience the full stimulus of this thought. + +Now such an aim as this implies a very wonderful conception of Jesus +Christ's present relations to us. It is a truth that we may minister +to His joy. It is a truth that just as really as you mothers are glad +when you hear from a far-off land that your boy is doing well, and +getting on, so Jesus Christ's heart fills with gladness when He sees +you and me walking in the paths in which He would have us go. We +often think about our dear dead that they cannot know of us and +our doings here, because the sorrow that would sometimes come from +the contemplation of our evil, or of our misfortunes, would trouble +them in their serene rest. We know not how that may be, but this at +least we do know, that the Man Jesus Christ, who, like those dear +ones, 'was dead, and is alive for evermore,' in His human nature has +knowledge of all His children's failures, as well as successes, and +is affected with some shadow of regret, or with some reality of +delight, according as they follow or stray from the paths in which He +would have them walk. If it be so with Him it may be so with them; +and though it be not so with them it must be so with Him. So this +strange, sweet, tender, and powerful thought is a piece of plain +prose, that Christ is glad when you and I are good. + +Does it need any word to emphasise the force of that motive to a +Christian heart that loves the Master? Surely this is the great and +blessed peculiarity of all the morality of Christianity that it has +all a personal bearing and aspect, and that just as the sum of all +our duty is gathered up in the one command, 'Imitate Christ,' so the +motive for all our duty lies in 'If you love Me, keep My +commandments,' and the reward which ought to stimulate more than +anything besides is the one thought, not, of what I shall get because +I am good, but of what I shall give Him by my obedience, a joy in the +heart that was stabbed through and through by sorrow for my sake. +That we may please Him 'who pleased not Himself,' is surely the +grandest motive on which the pursuit of holiness, and the imitation +of Jesus Christ can ever be made to rest. Oh! how different, and how +much more blessed such a motive and aim is than all the lower reasons +for which men are sometimes exhorted and encouraged to be good! What +a difference it is when we say, 'Do that thing because it is right,' +and when we say, 'Do that thing because you will be happier if you +do,' or when we say, 'Do it because He would like you to do it.' The +one is all cold and abstract. To stand before a man and simply say: +'Now go and do your duty,' is a poor way of setting his feet upon a +rock and establishing his goings. Duty is not a word that stirs men's +hearts, however it may awe their consciences. It rises up before us +like some goddess statuesque and serene, with purity, indeed, in her +deep and solemn eyes, but with nothing appealing to our affections in +her stern lineaments. But when the thought of 'You ought' melts into +'For my sake,' and through the dissolving face of the cold marble +goddess there shine the beloved lineaments of Him who 'wears the +Godhead's most benignant grace,' the smile upon His face becomes a +motive that touches all hearts. Transmute obligation into gratitude, +and in front of duty and appeals to self put Christ, and all the +harshness and difficulty and burden and self-sacrifice of obedience +becomes easy and a joy. + +Then let me remind you that this one supreme aim of pleasing Jesus +Christ can be carried on through all life in every varying form, +great or small. A blessed unity is given to our whole being when the +little things and the big things, the easy things and the hard +things, deeds which are conspicuous and deeds which no eye sees, are +all brought under the influence of the one motive and made co-operant +to the one end. Drive that one steadfast aim through your lives like +a bar of iron, and it will give the lives strength and +consistency--not rigidity, because they may still be flexible. +Nothing will be too small to be consecrated by that motive; nothing +too great to own its power. You can please Him everywhere and always. +The only thing that is inconsistent with pleasing Him is the thing +which, alas! we do at all times and should do at no time, and that is +to sin against Him. If we bear with us this as a conscious motive in +every part of our day's work it will give us a quick discernment as +to what is evil, which I believe nothing else will so surely give. If +you desire life to be noble, uniform, dignified, great in its +minutest acts and solemn in its very trifles, and if you would have +some continual test and standard by which you can detect all +spurious, apparent virtues, and discover lurking and masked +temptations, carry this one aim clear and high above all else, and +make it the purpose of the whole life, to be well-pleasing unto Him. + +II. Now, in the next place, notice the concentrated effort which this +aim requires. + +The word rendered in my text 'labour' is a peculiar one, very seldom +employed in Scripture. It means, in its most literal signification, +to be fond of honour, or to be actuated by a love of honour; and +hence it comes, by a very natural transition, to mean to strive to +gain something for the sake of the honour connected with it. That is +to say, it not only expresses the notion of diligent, strenuous +effort, but it reveals the reason for that diligence and +strenuousness in what I may call (for the word might almost be so +rendered) the _ambition_ of being honoured by pleasing Christ. +So that the 'labour' of my text covers the whole ground, not only of +the act but of its motive. The concentration of effort which such an +aim requires may be enforced by one or two simple exhortations. + +First, let me say that we ought, as Christian people, to cultivate +this noble ambition of pleasing Jesus Christ. Men have all got the +love of approbation deep in them. God put it there for a good +purpose, not that we might shape our lives so as to get others to pat +us on the back, and say, 'Well done!' but that, in addition to the +other solemn and sovereign motives for following the paths of +righteousness, we might have this highest ambition to impel us on the +road. And it is the duty of all Christians to see to it that they +discipline themselves so as, in their own feelings, to put high above +all the approbation or censure of their fellows the approbation or +censure of Jesus Christ. That will take some cultivation. It is a +great deal easier to shape our courses so as to get one another's +praise. I remember a quaint saying in a German book. 'An old +schoolmaster tried to please this one and that one, and it failed. +"Well, then," said he, "I will try to please Christ." And that +succeeded.' + +And let me remind you that a second part of the concentration of +effort which this aim requires is to strive with the utmost energy in +the accomplishment of it. Paul did not believe that anybody could +please Jesus Christ without a fight for it. His notion of acceptable +service was service which a man suppressed much to render, and +overcame much to bring. And I urge upon you this, dear brethren, that +with all the mob of faces round about us which shut out Christ's +face, and with all the temptations to follow other aims, and with the +weaknesses of our own characters, it never was, is not, nor ever will +be, an easy thing, or a thing to be done without a struggle and a +dead lift, to live so as to be well-pleasing to Him. + +Look at Paul's metaphors with which he sets forth the Christian +life--a warfare, a race, a struggle, a building up of some great +temple structure, and the like--all suggesting at the least the idea +of patient, persistent, continuous toil, and most of them suggesting +also the idea of struggle with antagonistic forces and difficulties, +either within or without. So we must set our shoulders to the wheel, +put our backs into our work. Do not think that you are going to be +carried into the condition of conformity with Jesus Christ in a +dream, or that the road to heaven is a primrose path, to be trodden +in silver slippers. 'I will not offer unto the Lord that which doth +cost me nothing,' and if you do, it will be worth exactly what it +costs. There must be concentration of effort if we are to be +well-pleasing to Him. + +But then do not forget, on the other hand, that deeper than all +effort, and the very spring and life of it, there must be the opening +of our hearts for the entrance of His life and spirit, by the +presence of which only are we well-pleasing to Christ. That which +pleases Him in you and me is our likeness to Him. According to the +old Puritan illustration, the refiner sat by the furnace until he +could see in the molten metal his own face mirrored, and then he knew +it was pure. So what pleases Christ in us is the reflection of +Himself. And how can we get that likeness to Himself except by +receiving into our hearts the Spirit that was in Christ Jesus, and +will dwell in us, and will produce in us in our measure the same +image that it formed in Him? 'Work _out_ your own salvation,' +because 'it is God that worketh _in_ you.' Labour, concentrate +effort, and above all open the heart to the entrance of that +transforming power. + +III. Lastly, let me suggest the utter insignificance to which this +aim reduces all externals. + +'We labour,' says Paul, 'that whether present or absent, we may be +accepted.' What differences of condition are covered by that +parenthetical phrase--'present or absent!' He talks about it as if it +was a very small matter, does he not? And what is included in it? +Whether a man shall be in the body or out of it; that is to say, +whether he be alive or dead. Here is an aim then, so great, so lofty, +so all-comprehensive that it reduces the difference between living in +the world and being out of it, to a trifle. And if we stand so high +up that these two varieties of condition dwindle into insignificance +and seem to have melted into one, do you think that there is anything +else that will be very big? If the difference between life and death +is dwindled and dwarfed, what else do you suppose will remain? +Nothing, I should think. + +So if we only, by God's help, which will be given to us if we want +it, keep this clear before us as the motive of all our life, then all +the possible alternatives of human condition and circumstance will +sink into insignificance, and from that lofty summit will 'show +scarce so gross as beetles' in the air beneath our lofty station. + +Whether we be rich or poor, solitary or beset by friends, happy or +sad, hopeful or despairing, young or old, wearied or buoyant, learned +or foolish, it matters not. The one aim lifts itself before us, and +they in whose eyes shine the light of that great issue are careless +of the road along which they pass. Do you enlist yourselves in the +company that fires at the long range, and all those that take aim at +the shorter ones will seem to be very pitifully limiting their +powers. + +Then remember that this same aim, and this same result may be equally +pursued and attained whether here or yonder. It is something to have +a course of life which runs straight along, unbent aside, and not cut +short off, by the change from earth to Heaven. And this felicity he +only has who, amidst things temporal and insignificant, sees and +seeks the eternal smile on the face of his unchanging Saviour. On +earth, in death, through eternity, such a life will be homogeneous +and of a piece; and when all other aims are hull down below the +horizon, forgotten and out of sight, then still this will be the +purpose, and yonder it will be the accomplished purpose, of each, to +please the Lord Jesus Christ. + +My dear friend, remember that in its full meaning this aim regards +the future, and points onward to that great judgment-seat where you +and I will certainly each of us give account of himself. Do you think +that you will please Christ then? Do you think that when that day +dawns, a smile of welcome will come into His eyes, and a glow of +gladness at the meeting into yours? Or have you cause to fear that +you will 'call on the rocks and the hills to cover you from the face +of Him that sitteth on the Throne?' + +We are all close by one another; our voices are very audible to each +other. Do you learn, Christian people, that the first,--or at least a +prime--condition of all Christian and Christ-pleasing life, is a +wholesome disregard of what anybody says but Himself. The old +Lacedæmonians used to stir themselves to heroism by the thought: +'What will they say of us in Sparta?' The governor of some outlying +English colony minds very little what the people that he is set to +rule think about him. He reports to Downing Street, and it is the +opinion of the Home Government that influences him. You report to +headquarters. Never mind what anybody else thinks of you. Your +business is to please Christ, and the less you trouble yourselves +about pleasing men the more you will succeed in doing it. Be deaf to +the tittle tattle of your fellow soldiers in the ranks. It is your +Commander's smile that will be your highest reward. + + 'Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil, + But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyes, + And perfect witness of all-judging Jove; + As he pronounces lastly on each deed, + Of so much fame in heaven expect thy meed.' + + + + +THE LOVE THAT CONSTRAINS + + 'The love of Christ constraineth us.'--2 COR. v. 14. + + +It is a dangerous thing to be unlike other people. It is still more +dangerous to be better than other people. The world has a little heap +of depreciatory terms which it flings, age after age, at all men who +have a higher standard and nobler aims than their fellows. A +favourite term is 'mad.' So, long ago they said, 'The prophet is a +fool; the spiritual man is mad,' and, in His turn, Jesus was said to +be 'beside Himself,' and Festus shouted from the judgment-seat to +Paul that he was mad. A great many people had said the same thing +about him before, as the context shows. For the verse before my text +is: 'Whether we be beside ourselves, it is to God: or whether we be +sober, it is for your cause.' Now the former clause can only refer to +other people's estimate of the Apostle. No doubt there were many +things about him that gave colour to it. He said that a dead Man had +appeared to him and spoken with him. He said that he had been carried +up into the third heaven. He had a very strange creed in the judgment +of the times. He had abandoned a brilliant career for a very poor +one. He was obviously utterly indifferent to the ordinary aims of +men. He had a consuming enthusiasm. And so the world explained him +satisfactorily to itself by the short and easy method of saying, +'Insane.' And Paul explained himself by the great word of my text, +'The love of Christ constraineth us.' Wherever there is a life +adequately under the influence of Christ's love the results will be +such as an unsympathising world may call madness, but which are the +perfection of sober-mindedness. Would there were more such madmen! I +wish to try to make one or two of them now, by getting some of you to +take for your motto, 'The love of Christ constraineth us.' + +I. Now the first thing to notice is this constraining love. + +I need not spend time in showing that when Paul says here 'The love +of Christ,' he means Christ's love to him, not his to Christ. That is +in accordance with his continual usage of the expression; and it is +in accordance with facts. For it is not my love to Jesus, but His +love to me, that brings the real moulding power into my life, and my +love to Him is only the condition on which the true power acts upon +me. To get the fulcrum and the lever which will heave a life up to +the heights you have to get out of yourselves. + +Now Paul never saw Jesus Christ in this earthly life. Timothy, who is +associated with him in this letter, and perhaps is one of the 'us,' +never saw Him either. The Corinthian believers whom he is addressing +had, of course, never seen Him. And yet the Apostle has not the +slightest hesitation in taking that great benediction of Christ's +love and spreading it over them all. That love is independent of time +and of space; it includes humanity, and is co-extensive with it. +Unturned away by unworthiness, unrepelled by non-responsiveness, +undisgusted by any sin, unwearied by any, however numerous, foiling +of its attempts, the love of Christ, like the great heavens that bend +above us, wraps us all in its sweetness, and showers upon us all its +light and its dew. + +And yet, brethren, I would have you remember that whilst we thus try +to paint, in poor, poor words, the universality of that love, we have +to remember that it does not partake of the weakness that infects all +human affections, which are only strong when they are narrow, and as +the river expands it becomes shallow, and loses the force in its flow +which it had when it was gathered between straiter banks, so as that +a universal charity is almost akin to a universal indifference. But +this love that grasps us all, this river that 'proceedeth from the +Throne of God and of the Lamb,' flows in its widest reaches as deep +and as impetuous in its career as if it were held within the +narrowest of gorges. For Christ's universal love is universal only +because it is individualising and particular. We love our nation by +generalising and losing sight of the individuals. Christ loves the +world because He loves every man and woman in it, and His grace +enwraps all because His grace hovers over each. + + 'The sun whose beams most glorious are + Despiseth no beholder,' + +but the rays come straight to each eyeball. Be sure of this: that He +who, when the multitude thronged Him and pressed Him, felt the +tremulous, timid, scarcely perceptible touch of one woman's wasted +finger on the hem of His garment, holds each of us in the grasp of +His love, which is universal, because it applies to each. You and I +have each the whole radiance of it pouring down on our heads, and +none intercepts the beams from any other. So, brethren, let us each +feel not only the love that grasps the world, but the love that +empties itself on me. + +But there is one more remark that I wish to make in reference to this +constraining love of Jesus Christ, and that is, that in order to see +and feel it we must take the point of view that this Apostle takes in +my text. For hearken how he goes on. 'The love of Christ constraineth +us, because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then all died, +and that He died for all,' etc. That is to say, the death of Christ +for all, which is equivalent to the death of Christ for each, is the +great solvent by which the love of God melts men's hearts, and is the +great proof that Jesus Christ loves me, and thee, and all of us. If +you strike out that conception you have struck out from your +Christianity the vindication of the belief that Christ loves the +world. What possible meaning is there in the expression, 'He died for +all?' How can the fact of His death on a 'green hill' outside the +gates of a little city in Syria have world-wide issues, unless in +that death He bore, and bore away, the sins of the whole world? I +know that there have been many--and there are many to-day--who not +accepting what seems to me to be the very vital heart of +Christianity--viz. the death of Christ for the world's sin, do yet +cherish--as I think illogically--yet do cherish a regard for Him, +which puts some of us who call ourselves 'orthodox,' and are tepid, +to the blush. Thank God! men are often better than their creeds, as +well as worse than them. But that fact does not affect what I am +saying now, and what I beg you to take for what you find it to be +worth, that unless we believe that Jesus Christ died for all, I do +not know what claim He has on the love of the world. We shall admire +Him, we shall bow before Him, as the very realised ideal of humanity, +though how this one Man has managed to escape the taint of the +all-pervading evil remains, upon that hypothesis, very obscure. But +love Him? No! Why should I? But if I feel that His death had +world-wide issues, and that He went down into the darkness in order +that He might bring the world into the light, then--and I am sure, +on the wide scale and in the long-run only then--will men turn to +Him and say, 'Thou hast died for me, help me to live for Thee.' +Brethren, I beseech you, take care of emptying the death of Christ +of its deepest meaning, lest you should thereby rob His character of +its chiefest charm, and His name of its mightiest soul-melting power. +The love that constraineth is the love that died, and died for all, +because it died for each. + +II. Now let me ask you to consider the echo of this constraining +love. + +I said a moment or two ago that Christ's love to us is the +constraining power, and that ours to Him is but the condition on +which that power works. But between the two there comes something +which brings that constraining love to bear upon our hearts. And so +notice what my text goes on to adduce as needful for Christ's love to +have its effect--namely, 'because we thus judge,' etc. Then my +estimate, my apprehension of the love of Christ must come in between +its manifestation and its power to grip, to restrain, to impel me. If +I may use such a figure, He stands, as it were, bugle in hand, and +blows the sweet strains that are meant to set the echoes flying. But +the rock must receive the impact of the vibrations ere it can throw +back the thinned echo of the music. Love must be believed and known +ere it can be responded to. + +Now the only answer and echo that hearts desire is the love of the +beloved heart. We all know that in our earthly life. Love is as much +a hunger to be loved as the outgoing of my own affection. The two +things are inseparable, and there is nothing that repays love but +love. Jesus Christ wishes each of us to love Him. If it is true that +He loves me, then, intertwisted with the outgoing of His heart +towards me is the yearning that my heart may go out towards Him. Dear +brethren, this is no pulpit rhetoric, it is a plain, simple fact, +inseparable from the belief in Christ's love--that He wishes you and +every soul of man to love Him, and that, whatever else you bring, lip +reverence, orthodox belief, apparent surrender, in the assay shop of +His great mint all these are rejected, and the only metal that passes +the fire is the pure gold of an answering love. Brethren! is that +what you bring to Jesus Christ? + +Love seeks for love, and our love can only be an echo of His. He +takes the beginning in everything. If I am to love Him back again, I +must have faith in His love to me. And if that be so, then the true +way by which you, imperfect Christian people, can deepen and +strengthen your love to Jesus Christ is not so much by efforts to +work up a certain warmth of sentiment and glow of affection, as by +gazing, with believing eyes of the heart, upon that which kindles +your love to Him. If you want ice to melt, put it out into the +sunshine, If you want the mirror to gleam, do not spend all your time +in polishing it. Carry it where it can catch the ray, and it will +flash it back in glory. 'We love Him because He first loved us.' Our +love is an echo; be sure that you listen for the parent note, and +link yourselves by faith with that great love which has come down +from Heaven for us all. + +But how can I speak about echoes and responses when I know that there +are scores of men and women whom a preacher's words reach who would +be ashamed of themselves, and rightly, if they exhibited the same +callousness of heart and selfishness of ingratitude to some human, +partial benefactor as they are not ashamed to have exhibited all +their lives to Jesus Christ. Echo? Yes! your heartstrings are set +vibrating fast enough whenever, in the adjoining apartment, an +instrument is touched which is tuned to the same key as your heart. +Pleasures, earthly aims, worldly gifts, the sweetnesses of human +life, all these things set them thrilling, and you can hear the +music, but your hearts are not tuned to answer to the note that is +struck in 'He loved me and gave Himself for me.' The bugle is blown, +and there is silence, and no echo, faint and far, comes whispering +back. Brethren, we use no one else, in whose love we have any belief, +a thousandth part so ill as we use Jesus Christ. + +III. Now, lastly, let me say a word about the constraining influence +of this echoed love. + +Its first effect, if it has any real power in our hearts and lives, +will be to change their centre, to decentralise. Look what the +Apostle goes on to say: 'We thus judge that He ... died for all, that +they which live should not live henceforth unto themselves.' That is +the great transformation. Secure that, and all nobleness will follow, +and 'whatsoever things are lovely and of good report' will come, like +doves to their windows, flocking into the soul that has ceased to +find its centre in its poor rebellious self. All love derives its +power to elevate, refine, beautify, ennoble, conquer, from the fact +that, in lower degree, all love makes the beloved the centre, and not +the self. Hence the mother's self-sacrifice, hence the sweet +reciprocity of wedded life, hence everything in humanity that is +noble and good. Love is the antagonist of selfishness, and the +highest type of love should be, and in the measure in which we are +under the influence of Christ's love will be, the self-surrendering +life of a Christian man. I know that in saying so I am condemning +myself and my brethren. All the same, it is true. The one power that +rescues a man from the tyranny of living for self, which is the +mother of all sin and ignobleness, is when a man can say 'Christ is +my aim,' 'Christ is my object.' 'The life that I live in the flesh I +live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself +for me.' There is no secret of self-annihilation, which is +self-transfiguration, and, I was going to say, deification, like that +of loving Christ with all my heart because He has loved me so. + +Again, let me remind you that, on its lower reaches and levels, we +find that all true affection has in it a strange power of +assimilating its objects to one another. Just as a man and woman who +have lived together for half a century in wedded life come to have +the same notions, the same prejudices, the same tastes, and sometimes +you can see their very faces being moulded into likeness, so, if I +love Jesus Christ, I shall by degrees grow liker and liker to Him, +and be 'changed into the same image, from glory to glory.' + +Again, the love constrains, and not only constrains but impels, +because it becomes a joy to divine and to do the will of the beloved +Christ. 'My yoke is easy.' Is it? It is very hard to be a Christian. +His requirements are a great deal sterner than others. His yoke is +easy, not because it is a lighter yoke, but because it is padded with +love. And that makes all service a sacrament, and the surrender of my +own will, which is the essence of obedience, a joy. + +So, dear friends, we come here in sight of the unique and blessed +characteristic of all Christian morality, and of all its practical +exhortations, and the Gospel stands alone as the mightiest moulding +power in the world, just because its word is 'love, and do as thou +wilt.' For in the measure of thy love will thy will coincide with the +will of Christ. There is nothing else that has anything like that +power. We do not want to be told what is right. We know it a great +deal better than we practise it. A revelation from heaven that simply +told me my duty would be surplusage. 'If there had been a law that +could have given life, righteousness had been by the law.' We want a +life, not a law, and the love of Christ brings the life to us. + +And so, dear friends, that life, restrained and impelled by the love +to which it is being assimilated, is a life of liberty and a life of +blessedness. In the measure in which the love of Christ constrains +any man, it makes for him difficulties easy, the impossible possible, +the crooked things straight, and the rough places plain. The duty +becomes a delight, and self ceases to disturb. If the love of God is +shed abroad in a heart, and in the measure in which it is, that heart +will be at rest, and a great peace will brood over it. Then the will +bows in glad submission, and all the powers arise to joyous service. +We are lords of the world and ourselves when we are Christ's servants +for love's sake; and earth and its good are never so good as when the +power of His echoed love rules our lives. Do you know and believe +that Christ loves you? Do you know and believe that you had a place +in His heart when He hung on the Cross for the salvation of the +world? Have you answered that love with yours, kindled by your faith +in, and experience of, His? Is His love the overmastering impulse +which urges you to all good, the mighty constraint that keeps you +back from all evil, the magnet that draws, the anchor that steadies, +the fortress that defends, the light that illumines, the treasure +that enriches? Is it the law that commands, and the power that +enables? Then you are blessed, though people will perhaps say that +you are mad, whilst here; and you will be blessed for ever and ever. + + + + +THE ENTREATIES OF GOD + + 'Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God + did beseech ... by us: we pray ... in Christ's stead, + be ye reconciled to God.'--2 COR. v. 20. + + +These are wonderful and bold words, not so much because of what they +claim for the servants as because of what they reveal of the Lord. +That thought, 'as though God did beseech,' seems to me to be the one +deserving of our attention now, far rather than any inferences which +may be drawn from the words as to the relation of preachers of the +Gospel to man and to God. I wish, therefore, to try to set forth the +wonderfulness of this mystery of a beseeching God, and to put by the +side of it the other wonder and mystery of men refusing the divine +beseechings. + +Before doing so, however, I remark that the supplement which stands +in our Authorised Version in this text is a misleading and +unfortunate one. 'As though God did beseech _you_' and 'we pray +_you_' unduly narrow the scope of the Apostolic message, and confuse +the whole course of the Apostolic reasoning here. For he has been +speaking of a world which is reconciled to God, and he finds a +consequence of that reconciliation of the world in the fact that he +and his fellow-preachers are entrusted with the word of +reconciliation. The scope of their message, then, can be no narrower +than the scope of the reconciliation; and inasmuch as that is +world-wide the beseeching must be co-extensive therewith, and must +cover the whole ground of humanity. It is a universal message that +is set forth here. The Corinthians, to whom Paul was speaking, are, +by his hypothesis, already reconciled to God, and the message which +he has in trust for them is given in the subsequent words: 'We then, +as workers together with God, beseech you also that ye receive not +the grace of God in vain.' But the message, the pleading of the +divine heart, 'be ye reconciled to God,' is a pleading that reaches +over the whole range of a reconciled world. I take then, just these +two thoughts, God beseeching man, and man refusing God. + +I. God beseeching man. + +Now notice how, in my text, there alternates, as if substantially the +same idea, the thoughts that Christ and that God pray men to be +reconciled. 'We are ambassadors on _Christ's_ behalf, as though +_God_ did beseech you by us, we pray on _Christ's_ behalf.' +So you see, first, Christ the Pleader, then God beseeching, then +Christ again entreating and praying. Could any man have so spoken, +passing instinctively from the one thought to the other, unless he +had believed that whatsoever things the Father doeth, these also +doeth the Son likewise; and that Jesus Christ is the Representative +of the whole Deity for mankind, so as that when He pleads God pleads, +and God pleads through Him. I do not dwell upon this, but I simply +wish to mark it in passing as one of the innumerable strong and +irrefragable testimonies to the familiarity and firmness with which +that thought of the divinity of Jesus Christ, and the full revelation +of the Father by Him, was grasped by the Apostle, and was believed by +the people to whom he spoke. God pleads, therefore Christ pleads, +Christ pleads, therefore God pleads; and these Two are One in their +beseechings, and the voice of the Father echoes to us in the +tenderness of the Son. + +So, then, let us think of that pleading. To sue for love, to beg that +an enemy will put away his enmity is the part of the inferior rather +than of the superior; is the part of the offender rather than of the +offended; is the part of the vanquished rather than of the victor; is +the part surely not of the king but of the rebel. And yet here, in +the sublime transcending of all human precedent and pattern which +characterises the divine dealing, we have the place of the suppliant +and of the supplicated inverted, and Love upon the Throne bends down +to ask of the rebel that lies powerless and sullen at His feet, and +yet is not conquered until his heart be won, though his limbs be +manacled, that he would put away all the bitterness out of his heart, +and come back to the love and the grace which are ready to pour over +him. 'He that might the vengeance best have taken, finds out the +remedy.' He against whom we have transgressed prays us to be +reconciled; and the Infinite Love lowers Himself in that lowering +which is, in another aspect, the climax of His exaltation, to pray +the rebels to accept His amnesty. + +Oh, dear brethren! this is no mere piece of rhetoric. What facts in +the divine heart does it represent? What facts in the divine conduct +does it represent? It represents these facts in the divine heart, +that there is in it an infinite longing for the creature's love, an +infinite desire for unity between Him and us. + +There are wonderful significance and beauty in the language of my +text which are lost in the Authorised Version; but are preserved in +the Revised. 'We are ambassadors' not only '_for_ Christ,' but +'_on Christ's behalf_.' And the same proposition is repeated in +the subsequent clause. 'We pray you,' not merely 'in Christ's stead,' +though that is much, but '_on His account_,' which is more--as +if it lay very near His heart that we should put away our enmity; and +as if in some transcendent and wonderful manner the all-perfect, +self-sufficing God was made glad, and the Master, who is His image +for us, 'saw of the travail of His soul, and,' in regard to one man, +'was satisfied,' when the man lets the warmth of God's love in Christ +thaw away the coldness out of his heart, and kindle there an +answering flame. An old divine says, 'We cannot do God a greater +pleasure or more oblige His very heart, than to trust in Him as a God +of love.' He is ready to stoop to any humiliation to effect that +purpose. So intense is the divine desire to win the world to His +love, that He will stoop to sue for it rather than lose it. Such is +at least part of the fact in the divine heart, which is shadowed +forth for us by that wonderful thought of the beseeching God. + +And what facts in the divine conduct does this great word represent? +A God that beseeches. Well, think of the tears of imploring love +which fell from Christ's eyes as He looked across the valley from +Olivet, and saw the Temple glittering in the early sunshine. Think of +'O Jerusalem! Jerusalem! ... how often would I have gathered thy +children together ... and ye would not.' And are we not to see in the +Christ who wept in the earnestness of His desire, and in the pain of +its disappointment, the very revelation of the Father's heart and the +very action of the Father's arm? 'Come unto me, all ye that labour, +and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.' That is Christ +beseeching and God beseeching in Him. Need I quote other words, +gentle, winning, loving? Do we not feel, when looking upon Christ, as +if the secret of His whole life was the stretching out imploring and +welcoming hands to men, and praying them to grasp His hands, and be +saved? But, oh, brethren! the fact that towers above all others, +which explains the whole procedure of divinity, and is the keystone +of the whole arch of revelation; the fact which reveals in one triple +beam of light, God, man, and sin in the clearest illumination, is the +Cross of Jesus Christ. And if that be not the very sublime of +entreaty; and if any voice can be conceived, human or divine, that +shall reach men's hearts with a more piercing note of pathetic +invitation than sounds from that Cross, I know not where it is. +Christ that dies, in His dying breath calls to us, and 'the blood of +sprinkling speaketh better things than that of Abel'; inasmuch as its +voice is, 'Come unto Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.' + +Not only in the divine facts of the life and death of Jesus Christ, +but in all the appeals of that great revelation which lies before us +in Scripture; and may I say, in the poor, broken utterances of men +whose harsh, thin voices try to set themselves, in some measure, to +the sweetness and the fulness of His beseeching tones--does +God call upon you to draw close to Him, and put away your enmity. And +not only by His Word written or ministered from human lips, but also +by the patient providences of His love He calls and prays you to +come. A mother will sometimes, in foolish fondness, coax her sullen +child by injudicious kindness, or, in wise patience, will seek to +draw the little heart away from the faults that she desires not to +notice, by redoubled ingenuity of tenderness and of care. And so God +does with us. When you and I, who deserve--oh! so different +treatment--get, as we do get, daily care and providential blessings +from Him, is not that His saying to us, 'I beseech you to cherish no +alienation, enmity, indifference, but to come back and live in the +love'? When He draws near to us in these outward gifts of His mercy, +is He not doing Himself what He has bid us to do; and what He never +could have bid us to do, nor our hearts have recognised to be the +highest strain of human virtue to do, unless He Himself were doing it +first? 'If thine enemy hunger, feed him. If he thirst, give him +drink; for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head.' + +Not only by the great demonstration of His stooping and infinite +desire for our love which lies in the life and death of Jesus Christ, +nor only by His outward work, nor by His providence, but by many an +inward touch on our spirits, by many a prick of conscience, by many a +strange longing that has swept across our souls, sudden as some +perfumed air in the scentless atmosphere; by many an inward voice, +coming we know not whence, that has spoken to us of Him, of His love, +of our duty; by many a drawing which has brought us nearer to the +Cross of Jesus Christ, only, alas! in some cases that we might recoil +further from it,--has He been beseeching, beseeching us all. + +Brethren! God pleads with you. He pleads with you because there is +nothing in His heart to any of you but love, and a desire to bless +you; He pleads with you because, unless you will let Him, He cannot +lavish upon you His richest gifts and His highest blessings. He +pleads with you, bowing to the level, and beneath the level, of your +alienation and reluctance. And the sum and substance of all His +dealings with every soul is, 'My son! give Me thy heart.' 'Be ye +reconciled to God.' + +II. And now turn, very briefly, to the next suggestion arising from +this text, the terrible obverse, so to speak, of the coin: Man +refusing a beseeching God. + +That is the great paradox and mystery. Nobody has ever fathomed that +yet, and nobody will. How it comes, how it is possible, there is no +need for us to inquire. It is an awful and a solemn power that every +poor little speck of humanity has, to lift itself up in God's face, +and say, in answer to all His pleadings, 'I will not!' as if the +dwellers in some little island, a mere pin-point of black, barren +rock, jutting up at sea, were to declare war against a kingdom that +stretched through twenty degrees of longitude on the mainland. So we, +on our little bit of island, our pin-point of rock in the great waste +ocean, we can separate ourselves from the great Continent; or, +rather, God has, in a fashion, made us separate in order that we may +either unite ourselves with Him, by our willing yielding, or wrench +ourselves away from Him by our antagonism and rebellion. God +beseeches because God has so settled the relations between Him and +us, that that is what He has to do in order to get men to love Him. +He cannot force them. He cannot prise open a man's heart with a +crowbar, as it were, and force Himself inside. The door opens from +within. 'Behold! I stand at the door and knock.' There is an 'if.' +'If any man open I will come in.' Hence the beseeching, hence the +wail of wisdom that cries aloud and no man regards it; of love that +stands at the entering in of the city, and pleads in vain, and says, +'I have called, and ye have refused.... How often would I have +gathered ... and ye would not.' Oh, brethren! it is an awful +responsibility, a mysterious prerogative, which each one of us, +whether consciously or no, has to exercise, to accept or to refuse +the pleadings of an entreating Christ. + +And let me remind you that the act of refusal is a very simple one. +Not to accept is to reject; not to yield is to rebel. You have only +to do nothing, to do it all. There are dozens of people in our +churches and chapels listening with self-satisfied unconcern, who +have all their lives been refusing a beseeching God. And they do not +know that they ever did it! They say, 'Oh! I will be a Christian +sometime or other.' They cherish vague ideas that, somehow or other, +they are so already. They have done nothing at all, they have simply +been absolutely indifferent and passive. Some of you have heard +sermons like this so often that they produce no effect. 'It is the +right kind of thing to say. It is the thing we have heard a hundred +times.' Perhaps you wonder why I should be so much in earnest about +the matter, and then you go outside, and discuss me or the weather, +and forget all about the sermon. And thus, once more, you reject +Christ. It is done without knowing it; done simply by doing nothing. +My brother! do not stop your ears any more against that tender, +imploring love. + +Then let me remind you that this refusing the beseeching of God is +the climax of all folly. For consider what it is,--a man refusing his +highest good and choosing his certain ruin. I am afraid that people +have been arguing and fighting so much of late years over disputable +points in reference to the doctrine of future retribution that the +indisputable fact of such retribution has lost much of its solemn +power. + +I pray you, brethren, to ask yourselves one question: Is there +anything, in the present or in the future condition of a man that is +not reconciled to God, which explains God's beseeching urgency? Why +this energy and intensity of divine desire? Why this which, if it +were human only, would be called _passionate_ entreaty? Why was +it needful for Jesus Christ to die? Why was it worth His while to +bear the punishment of man's sin? Why should God and Christ, through +all the ages, plead with unintermittent voice? There must be some +explanation of it all, and here is the explanation, 'They that hate +Me love _death_.' 'Be ye reconciled to God,' for enmity is ruin +and destruction. + +And finally, dear friends, this turning away from Him that speaketh +from Heaven, of which some of you have all your lives been guilty, is +not only supreme folly, but it is the climax of all guilt. For there +can be nothing worse, darker, arguing a nature more averse or +indifferent to the highest good, than that God should plead, and I +should steel my heart and deafen mine ear against His voice. The +crown of a man's sin, because it is the disclosure of the secrets of +his deepest heart as loving darkness rather than light, is turning +away from the divine voice that woos us to love and to God. + +Oh! there are some of you that have heard that Voice too often to be +much touched by it. There are some of you too busy to attend to it, +who hear it not because of the clatter of the streets and the whir of +the spindles. There are some of you that are seeking to drown it in +the shouts of mirth and revelry. There are some of you to whom it +comes muffled in the mists of doubt; but I beseech you all, look at +the Cross, _look at the Cross!_ and hear Him that hangs there +pleading with you. + +Before the battle there comes out the captain of the twenty thousand +to the King with the ten thousand, who in His loftiness is not afraid +to stoop to sue for peace from the weaker power. My brother! the +moment is precious; the white flag may never be waved before your +eyes again. Do not; do not refuse! or the next instant the clarion of +the assault may sound, and where will you be then? + +It is vain for thee to rush against the thick bosses of the Almighty +buckler. 'We beseech, in Christ's behalf, be ye reconciled with God.' + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans +Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. 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