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Title: The Good News of God

Author: Charles Kingsley

Release Date: December, 2004  [EBook #7051]
[This file was first posted on March 2, 2003]

Edition: 10

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE GOOD NEWS OF GOD ***




Transcribed from the 1887 Macmillan and Co. edition by David Price,
email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk




THE GOOD NEWS OF GOD




SERMON I.  THE BEATIFIC VISION



MATTHEW xxii. 27.

Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy
soul, and with all thy mind.

These words often puzzle and pain really good people, because they
seem to put the hardest duty first.  It seems, at times, so much more
easy to love one's neighbour than to love God.  And strange as it may
seem, that is partly true.  St. John tells us so--'He that loves not
his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not
seen?'  Therefore many good people, who really do love God, are
unhappy at times because they feel that they do not love him enough.
They say in their hearts--'I wish to do right, and I try to do it:
but I am afraid I do not do it from love to God.'

I think that they are often too hard upon themselves.  I believe that
they are very often loving God with their whole hearts, when they
think that they are not doing so.  But still, it is well to be afraid
of oneself, and dissatisfied with oneself.

I think, too--nay, I am certain--that many good people do not love
God as they ought, and as they would wish to do, because they have
not been rightly taught who God is, and what He is like.  They have
not been taught that God is loveable; they have been taught that God
feels feelings, and does deeds, which if a man felt, or did, we
should call him arbitrary, proud, revengeful, cruel:  and yet they
are told to love him; and they do not know how to love such a being
as that.  Nor do I either, my friends.

Let us therefore think over to-day for ourselves why we ought to love
God; and why both Bible and Catechism bid child as well as man to
love the Lord our God with all our hearts, souls, and minds, before
they bid us love our neighbours.  And keep this in mind all through,
that the reason why we are to love God must depend upon what God's
character is.  For you cannot love any one because you are told to
love them.  You can only love them because they are loveable and
worthy of your love.  And that they will not be, unless they are
loving themselves; as it is written, we love God because he first
loved us.

Now, friends, look at this one thing first.  When we see any man do a
just action, or a kind action, do we not like to see it?  Do we not
like the man the better for doing it?  A man must be sunk very low in
stupidity and ill-feeling--dead in tresspasses and sins, as the Bible
calls it--if he does not.  Indeed, I never saw the man yet, however
bad he was himself, who did not, in his better moments, admire what
was right and good; and say, 'Bad as I may be, that man is a good
man, and I wish I could do as he does.'

One sees the same, but far more strongly, in little children.  From
their earliest years, as far as I have ever seen, children like and
admire what is good, even though they be naughty themselves; and if
you tell them of any very loving, generous, or brave action, their
hearts leap up in answer to it.  They feel at once how beautiful
goodness is.

But why?

St. John tells us.  That feeling comes, he tells us, from Christ, the
light who is the life of men, and lights every man who comes into the
world; and that light in our hearts, which makes us see, and admire,
and love what is good, is none other than Christ himself shining in
our hearts, and showing to us his own likeness, and the beauty
thereof.

But if we stop there; if we only admire what is good, without trying
to copy it, we shall lose that light.  Our corrupt and diseased
nature (and corrupt and diseased it is, as we shall surely find, as
soon as we begin to try to do right) will quench that heavenly spark
in us more and more, till it dies out--as God forbid that it should
die out in any of us.  For if it did die out, we should care no more
for what is good.  We should see nothing beautiful, and noble, and
glorious, in being just, and loving, and merciful.  And then, indeed,
we should see nothing worth loving in God himself:- and it were
better for us that we had never been born.

But none of us, I trust, are fallen as low as that.  We all, surely,
admire a good action, and love a good man.  Surely we do.  Then I
will go on, to ask you one question more.

Did it ever strike you, that goodness is not merely A beautiful
thing, but THE beautiful thing--by far the most beautiful thing in
the world; and that badness is not merely AN ugly thing, but the
ugliest thing in the world?--So that nothing is to be compared for
value with goodness; that riches, honour, power, pleasure, learning,
the whole world and all in it, are not worth having, in comparison
with being good; and the utterly best thing for a man is to be good,
even though he were never to be rewarded for it:  and the utterly
worst thing for a man is to be bad, even though he were never to be
punished for it; and, in a word, goodness is the only thing worth
loving, and badness the only thing worth hating.

Did you ever feel this, my friends?  Happy are those among you who
have felt it; for of you the Lord says, Blessed are they that hunger
and thirst after righteousness; for they shall be filled.  Ay, happy
are you who have felt it; for it is the sign, the very and true sign,
that the Holy Spirit of God, who is the Spirit of goodness, is
working in your hearts with power, revealing to you the exceeding
beauty of holiness, and the exceeding sinfulness of sin.

But did it never strike you besides, that goodness was one, and
everlasting?  Let me explain what I mean.

Did you never see, that all good men show their goodness in the same
way, by doing the same kind of good actions?  Let them be English or
French, black or white, if they be good, there is the same honesty,
the same truthfulness, the same love, the same mercy in all; and what
is right and good for you and me, now and here, is right and good for
every man, everywhere, and at all times for ever.  Surely, surely,
what is noble, and loveable, and admirable now, was so five thousand
years ago, and will be five thousand years hence.  What is honourable
for us here, would be equally honourable for us in America or
Australia--ay, or in the farthest star in the skies.

But, some of you may say, men at different times and in different
countries have had very different notions--indeed quite opposite
notions, of what men ought to be.

I know that some people say so.  I can only answer that I differ from
them.  True, some men have had less light than others, and, God
knows, have made fearful mistakes enough, and fancied that they could
please God by behaving like devils:  but on the first principles of
goodness, all the world has been pretty well agreed all along; for
wherever men have been taught what is really right, there have been
plenty of hearts to answer, 'Yes, this is good! this is what we have
wanted all along, though we knew it not.'  And all the wisest men
among the heathen--the men who have been honoured, and even
worshipped as blessings to their fellow men, have agreed, one and
all, in the great and golden rule, 'Thou shalt love God, with all thy
heart and soul, and thy neighbour as thyself.'

Believe about this as you may, my friends, still I believe, and will
believe; I preach, and will preach, this, and nought else but this:-
That there is but one everlasting goodness, which is good in men,
good in all rational beings--yea, good in God himself.

These last are solemn words, but they are true; and the more you
think over them, the more, I tell you, will you find them true.  And
to them I have been trying to lead you; and will try once more.

For, did it never strike you, again--as it has me--and all the world
has looked different to me since I found it out--that there must be
ONE, in whom all goodness is gathered together; ONE, who must be
perfectly and absolutely good?  And did it never strike you, that all
the goodness in the world must, in some way or other, come from HIM?
I believe that our hearts and reasons, if we will listen fairly to
them, tell us that it must be so; and I am certain that the Bible
tells us so, from beginning to end.  When we see the million rain-
drops of the shower, we say, with reason, there must be one great sea
from which all these drops have come.  When we see the countless rays
of light, we say, with reason, there must be one great central sun
from which all these are shed forth.  And when we see, as it were,
countless drops, and countless rays of goodness scattered about in
the world, a little good in this man, and a little good in that,
shall we not say, there must be one great sea, one central sun of
goodness, from whence all human goodness comes?  And where can that
centre of goodness be, but in the very character of God himself?

Yes, my friends; if you would know what God is, think of all the
noble, beautiful, loveable actions, tempers, feelings, which you ever
saw or heard of.  Think of all the good, and admirable, and loveable
people whom you ever met; and fancy to yourselves all that goodness,
nobleness, admirableness, loveableness, and millions of times more,
gathered together in one, to make one perfectly good character--and
then you have some faint notion of God, some dim sight of God, who is
the eternal and perfect Goodness.

It is but a faint notion, no doubt, that the best man can have of
God's goodness, so dull has sin made our hearts and brains:  but let
us comfort ourselves with this thought--That the more we learn to
love what is good, the more we accustom ourselves to think of good
people and good things, and to ask ourselves why and how this action
and that is good, the more shall we be able to see the goodness of
God.  And to see that, even for a moment, is worth all sights in
earth or heaven.

Worth all sights, indeed.  No wonder that the saints of old called it
the 'Beatific Vision,' that is, the sight which makes a man utterly
blessed; namely, to see, if but for a moment, with his mind's eye
what God is like, and behold he is utterly good!

No wonder that they said (and I doubt not that they spoke honestly
and simply what they felt) that while that thought was before them,
this world was utterly nothing to them; that they were as men in a
dream, or dead, not caring to eat or to move, for fear of losing that
glorious thought; but felt as if they were (as they were most really
and truly) caught up into heaven, and taken utterly out of themselves
by the beauty and glory of God's perfect goodness.  No wonder that
they cried out with David, 'Whom have I in heaven, O Lord, but Thee?
and there is none on earth whom I desire in comparison of Thee.'  No
wonder that they said with St. Peter when he saw our Lord's glory,
'Lord, it is good for us to be here,' and felt like men gazing upon
some glorious picture or magnificent show, off which they cannot take
their eyes; and which makes them forget for the time all beside in
heaven and earth.

And it was good for them to be there:  but not too long.  Man was
sent into this world not merely to see, but to do; and the more he
sees, the more he is bound to go and do accordingly.  St. Peter had
to come down from the mount, and preach the Gospel wearily for many a
year, and die at last upon the cross.  St. Augustine, in like wise,
though he would gladly have lived and died doing nothing but fixing
his soul's eye steadily on the glory of God's goodness, had to come
down from the mount likewise, and work, and preach, and teach, and
wear himself out in daily drudgery for that God whom he learnt to
serve, even when he could not adore Him in the press of business, and
the bustle of a rotten and dying world.

But see, my dear friends, and consider it well--Before a man can come
to that state of mind, or anything like it, he must have begun by
loving goodness wherever he saw it; and have settled in his heart
that to be good, and therefore to do good, is the most beautiful
thing in the world.  So he will begin by loving his brother whom he
has seen, and by taking delight in good people, and in all honest,
true, loving, merciful, generous words and actions, and in those who
say and do them.  And so he will be fit to love God, whom he has not
seen, when he finds out (as God grant that you may all find out) that
all goodness of which we can conceive, and far, far more, is gathered
together in God, and flows out from him eternally over his whole
creation, by that Holy Spirit who proceeds from the Father and the
Son, and is the Lord and Giver of life, and therefore of goodness.
For goodness is nothing else, if you will receive it, but the eternal
life of God, which he has lived, and lives now, and will live for
evermore, God blessed for ever.  Amen.

So, my dear friends, it will not be so difficult for you to love God,
if you will only begin by loving goodness, which is God's likeness,
and the inspiration of God's Holy Spirit.  For you will be like a man
who has long admired a beautiful picture of some one whom he does not
know, and at last meets the person for whom the picture was meant--
and behold the living face is a thousand times more fair and noble
than the painted one.  You will be like a child which has been
brought up from its birth in a room into which the sun never shone;
and then goes out for the first time, and sees the sun in all his
splendour bathing the earth with glory.  If that child had loved to
watch the dim narrow rays of light which shone into his dark room,
what will he not feel at the sight of that sun from which all those
rays had come Just so will they feel who, having loved goodness for
its own sake, and loved their neighbours for the sake of what little
goodness is in them, have their eyes opened at last to see all
goodness, without flaw or failing, bound or end, in the character of
God, which he has shown forth in Jesus Christ our Lord, who is the
likeness of his Father's glory, and the express image of his person;
to whom be glory and honour for ever.  Amen.



SERMON II.  THE GLORY OF THE CROSS



JOHN xvii. 1.

Father, the hour is come.  Glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may
glorify thee.  I spoke to you lately of the beatific vision of God.
I will speak of it again to-day; and say this.

If any man wishes to see God, truly and fully, with the eyes of his
soul:  if any man wishes for that beatific vision of God; that
perfect sight of God's perfect goodness; then must that man go, and
sit down at the foot of Christ's cross, and look steadfastly upon him
who hangs thereon.  And there he will see, what the wisest and best
among the heathen, among the Mussulmans, among all who are not
Christian men, never have seen, and cannot see unto this day, however
much they may feel (and some of them, thank God, do feel) that God is
the Eternal Goodness, and must be loved accordingly.

And what shall we see upon the cross?

Many things, friends, and more than I, or all the preachers in the
world, will be able to explain to you, though we preached till the
end of the world.  But one thing we shall see, if we will, which we
have forgotten sadly, Christians though we be, in these very days;
forgotten it, most of us, so utterly, that in order to bring you back
to it, I must take a seemingly roundabout road.

Does it seem, or does it not seem, to you, that the finest thing in a
man is magnanimity--what we call in plain English, greatness of soul?
And if it does seem to you to be so, what do you mean by greatness of
soul?  When you speak of a great soul, and of a great man, what
manner of man do you mean?

Do you mean a very clever man, a very far-sighted man, a very
determined man, a very powerful man, and therefore a very successful
man?  A man who can manage everything, and every person whom he comes
across, and turn and use them for his own ends, till he rises to be
great and glorious--a ruler, king, or what you will?

Well--he is a great man:  but I know a greater, and nobler, and more
glorious stamp of man; and you do also.  Let us try again, and think
if we can find his likeness, and draw it for ourselves.  Would he not
be somewhat like this pattern?--A man who was aware that he had vast
power, and yet used that power not for himself but for others; not
for ambition, but for doing good?  Surely the man who used his power
for other people would be the greater-souled man, would he not?  Let
us go on, then, to find out more of his likeness.  Would he be stern,
or would he be tender?  Would he be patient, or would he be fretful?
Would he be a man who stands fiercely on his own rights, or would he
be very careful of other men's rights, and very ready to waive his
own rights gracefully and generously?  Would he be extreme to mark
what was done amiss against him, or would he be very patient when he
was wronged himself, though indignant enough if he saw others
wronged?  Would he be one who easily lost his temper, and lost his
head, and could be thrown off his balance by one foolish man?  Surely
not.  He would be a man whom no fool, nor all fools together could
throw off his balance; a man who could not lose his temper, could not
lose his self-respect; a man who could bear with those who are
peevish, make allowances for those who are weak and ignorant, forgive
those who are insolent, and conquer those who are ungrateful, not by
punishment, but by fresh kindness, overcoming their evil by his
good.--A man, in short, whom no ill-usage without, and no ill-temper
within, could shake out of his even path of generosity and
benevolence.  Is not that the truly magnanimous man; the great and
royal soul?  Is not that the stamp of man whom we should admire, if
we met him on earth?  Should we not reverence that man; esteem it an
honour and a pleasure to work under that man, to take him for our
teacher, our leader, in hopes that, by copying his example, our souls
might become great like his?

Is it so, my friends?  Then know this, that in admiring that man, you
admire the likeness of God.  In wishing to be like that man, you wish
to be like God.

For this is God's true greatness; this is God's true glory; this is
God's true royalty; the greatness, glory, and royalty of loving,
forgiving, generous power, which pours itself out, untiring and
undisgusted, in help and mercy to all which he has made; the glory of
a Father who is perfect in this, that he causeth his rain to fall on
the evil and on the good, and his sun to shine upon the just and on
the unjust, and is good to the unthankful and the evil; a Father who
has not dealt with us after our sins, or rewarded us after our
iniquities:  a Father who is not extreme to mark what is done amiss,
but whom it is worth while to fear, for with him is mercy and
plenteous redemption;--all this, and more--a Father who so loved a
world which had forgotten him, a world whose sins must have been
disgusting to him, that he spared not his only begotten Son, but
freely gave him for us, and will with him freely give us all things;
a Father, in one word, whose name and essence is love, even as it is
the name and essence of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.

This, my friends, is the glory of God:  but this glory never shone
out in its full splendour till it shone upon the cross.

For--that we may go back again, to that great-souled man, of whom I
spoke just now--did we not leave out one thing in his character? or
at least, one thing by which his character might be proved and tried?
We said that he should be generous and forgiving; we said that he
should bear patiently folly, peevishness, ingratitude:  but what if
we asked of him, that he should sacrifice himself utterly for the
peevish, ungrateful men for whose good he was toiling?  What if we
asked him to give up, for them, not only all which made life worth
having, but to give up life itself?  To die for them; and, what is
bitterest of all, to die by their hands--to receive as their reward
for all his goodness to them a shameful death?  If he dare submit to
that, then we should call his greatness of soul perfect.
Magnanimity, we should say, could rise no higher; in that would be
the perfection of goodness.

Surely your hearts answer, that this is true.  When you hear of a
father sacrificing his own life for his children; when you hear of a
soldier dying for his country; when you hear of a clergyman or a
physician killing himself by his work, while he is labouring to save
the souls or the bodies of his fellow-creatures; then you feel--There
is goodness in its highest shape.  To give up our lives for others is
one of the most beautiful, and noble, and glorious things on earth.
But to give up our lives, willingly, joyfully for men who
misunderstand us, hate us, despise us, is, if possible, a more
glorious action still, and the very perfection of perfect virtue.
Then, looking at Christ's cross, we see that, and even more--ay, far
more than that.  The cross was the perfect token of the perfect
greatness of God, and of the perfect glory of God.

So on the cross, the Father justified himself to man; yea, glorified
himself in the glory of his crucified Son.  On the cross God proved
himself to be perfectly just, perfectly good, perfectly generous,
perfectly glorious, beyond all that man could ever have dared to
conceive or dream.  That God must be good, the wise heathens knew;
but that God was so utterly good that he could stoop to suffer, to
die, for men, and by men--that they never dreamed.  That was the
mystery of God's love, which was hid in Christ from the foundation of
the world, and which was revealed at last upon the cross of Calvary
by him who prayed for his murderers--'Father, forgive them, for they
know not what they do.'  That truly blessed sight of a Saviour-God,
who did not disdain to die the meanest and the most fearful of
deaths--that, that came home at once, and has come home ever since,
to all hearts which had left in them any love and respect for
goodness, and melted them with the fire of divine love; as God grant
it may melt yours, this day, and henceforth for ever.

I can say no more, my friends.  If this good news does not come home
to your hearts by its own power, it will never be brought home to you
by any words of mine.



SERMON III.  THE LIFE OF GOD



1 JOHN i. 2.

For the Life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness,
and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father and
was manifested unto us!

What do we mean, when we speak of the Life everlasting?

Do we mean that men's souls are immortal, and will live for ever
after death, either in happiness or misery?

We must mean more than that.  At least we ought to mean more than
that, if we be Christian men.  For the Bible tells us, that Christ
brought life and immortality to light.  Therefore they must have been
in darkness before Christ's coming; and men did not know as much
about life and immortality before Christ's coming as they know--or
ought to know--now.

But if we need only believe that we shall live for ever after death
in happiness or misery, then Christ has not brought life and
immortality to light.  He has thrown no fresh light upon the matter.

And why?  For this simple reason, that the old heathen knew as much
as that before Christ came.

The old Greeks and Romans, and Persians, and our own forefathers
before they became Christians, believed that men's souls would live
for ever happy or miserable.  The Mussulmans, Mahommedans, Turks as
they are called in the Prayer-book, believe as much as that now.
They believe that men's souls live for ever after death, and go to
'heaven' or 'hell.'

So those words 'everlasting Life' must needs mean something more than
that.  What do they mean?

First.  What does everlasting mean?

It means exactly the same as eternal.  The two words are the same:
only everlasting is English, and eternal Latin.  But they have the
same sense.

Now everlasting and eternal mean something which has neither
beginning nor end.  That is certain.  The wisest of the heathen knew
that:  but we are apt to forget it.  We are apt to think a thing may
be everlasting, because it has no end, though it has a beginning.  We
are careless thinkers, if we fancy that.  God is eternal because he
has neither beginning nor end.

But here come two puzzles.

First.  The Athanasian Creed says that there is but one Eternal, that
is, God; and never were truer words written.

But do we not make out two Eternals?  For God is one Eternal; and
eternal life is another Eternal.  Now which is right; we, or the
Athanasian Creed?  I shall hold by the Athanasian Creed, my friends,
and ask you to think again over the matter:  thus--If there be but
one Eternal, there is but one way of escaping out of our puzzle,
which makes two Eternals; and that is, to go back to the old doctrine
of St. Paul, and St. John, and the wisest of the Fathers, and say--
There is but one Eternal; and therefore eternal life is in the
Eternal God.  And it is eternal Life because it is God's life; the
life which God lives; and it is eternal just because, and only
because, it is the life of God; and eternal death is nothing but the
want of God's eternal life.

Certainly, whether you think this true or not, St. John thought it
true; for he says so most positively in the text.  He says that the
Life was manifested--showed plainly upon earth, and that he had seen
it.  And he says that he saw it in a man, whom his eyes had seen, and
his hands had handled.  How could that be?

My friends, how else could it be?  How can you see life, but by
seeing some one live it?  You cannot see a man's life, unless you see
him live such and such a life, or hear of his living such and such a
life, and so knowing what his life, manners, character, are.  And so
no one could have seen God's life, or known what life God lived, and
what character God's was, had it not been for the incarnation of our
Lord Jesus Christ, who was made flesh, and dwelt among us, that by
seeing him, the Son, we might see the Father, whose likeness he was,
and is, and ever will be.

But now, says St. John, we know what God's eternal life is; for we
know what Christ's life was on earth.  And more, we know that it is a
life which men may live; for Christ lived it perfectly and utterly,
though He was a man.

What sort of life, then, is everlasting life?

Who can tell altogether and completely?  And yet who cannot tell in
part?  Use the common sense, my friends, which God has given to you,
and think;--If eternal life be the life of God, it must be a good
life; for God is good.  That is the first, and the most certain thing
which we can say of it.  It must be a righteous and just life; a
loving and merciful life; for God is righteous, just, loving,
merciful; and more, it must be an useful life, a life of good works;
for God is eternally useful, doing good to all his creatures, working
for ever for the benefit of all which he has made.

Yes--a life of good works.  There is no good life without good works.
When you talk of a man's life, you mean not only what he feels and
thinks, but what he does.  What is in his heart goes for nothing,
unless he brings it out in his actions, as far as he can.

Therefore St. James says, 'Thou hast faith, and I have works.  Shew
me thy faith WITHOUT thy works,' (and who can do that?) 'and I will
shew thee my faith by my works.'

And St. John says, there is no use SAYING you love.  'Let us love not
in word and in tongue, but in deed and in truth;' and again--and
would to God that most people who talk so glibly about heaven and
hell, and the ways of getting thither, would recollect this one plain
text--'Little children, let no man deceive you.  He that DOETH
righteousness is righteous, even as God is righteous.'  And therefore
it is that St. Paul bids rich men 'be rich also in noble deeds,'
generous and liberal of their money to all who want, that they may
'lay hold of that which is really life,' namely, the eternal life of
goodness.

And therefore also, my friends, we may be sure that God loves in deed
and in truth:  because it is written that God is love.

For if a man loves, he longs to help those whom he loves.  It is the
very essence of love, that it cannot be still, cannot be idle, cannot
be satisfied with itself, cannot contain itself, but must go out to
do good to those whom it loves, to seek and to save that which is
lost.  And therefore God is perfect love, and his eternal life a life
of eternal love, because he sends his Son eternally to seek and to
save that which is lost.

This, then, is eternal life; a life of everlasting love showing
itself in everlasting good works; and whosoever lives that life, he
lives the life of God, and hath eternal life.

What I have just said will help you, I think, to understand another
royal text about eternal life.

For now' we may understand why it is written, that this is life
eternal, to know the true and only God, and Jesus Christ whom he has
sent.  For if eternal life be God's life, we must know God, and God's
character, to know what eternal life is like:  and if no man has seen
God at any time, and God's life can only be seen in the life of
Christ, then we must know Christ, and Christ's life, to know God and
God's life; that the saying may be fulfilled in us, God hath given to
us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.

One other royal text, did I say?  We may understand many, perhaps
all, the texts which speak of life, and eternal life, if we will look
at them in this way.  We may see why St. Paul says that to be
spiritually minded is life; and that the life of Jesus may be
manifested in men:  and how the sin of the old heathen lay in this,
that they were alienated from the life of God.  We may understand how
Christ's commandment is everlasting life; how the water which he
gives, can spring up within a man's heart to everlasting life--all
such texts we may, and shall, understand more and more, if we will
bear in mind that everlasting life is the life of God and of Christ,
a life of love; a life of perfect, active, self-sacrificing goodness,
which is the one only true life for all rational beings, whether on
earth or in heaven.

In heaven, my friends, as well as on earth.  Form your own notions,
as you will, about angels, and saints in heaven, for every one must
have some notions about them, and try to picture to himself what the
souls of those whom he has loved and lost are doing in the other
world:  but bear this in mind:  that if the saints in heaven live the
everlasting life, they must be living a life of usefulness, of love
and of good works.

And here I must say, friends, that however much the Roman Catholics
may be wrong on many points, they have remembered one thing about the
life everlasting, which we are too apt to forget; and that is, that
everlasting life cannot be a selfish, idle life, spent only in being
happy oneself.  They believe that the saints in heaven are NOT idle;
that they are eternally helping mankind; doing all sorts of good
offices for those souls who need them; that, as St. Paul says of the
angels, they are ministering spirits, sent forth to minister to those
who are heirs of salvation.  And I cannot see why they should not be
right.  For if the saints' delight was to do good on earth, much more
will it be to do good in heaven.  If they helped poor sufferers, if
they taught the ignorant, if they comforted the afflicted, here on
earth, much more will they be able, much more will they be willing,
to help, comfort, teach them, now that they are in the full power,
the full freedom, the full love and zeal of the everlasting life.  If
their hearts were warmed and softened by the fire of God's love here,
how much more there!  If they lived God's life of love here, how much
more there, before the throne of God, and the face of Christ!

But if any one shall say, that the souls of good men in heaven cannot
help us who are here on earth, I answer, When did they ascend into
heaven, to find out that?  If they had ever been there, friends, be
sure they would have had better news to bring home than this--that
those whom we have honoured and loved on earth have lost the power
which they used to have, of comforting us who are struggling here
below.  That notion springs altogether out of a superstitious fancy
that heaven is a great many millions of miles away from this earth--
which fancy, wherever men get it from, they certainly do not get it
from the Bible.  Moreover it seems to me, that if the saints in
heaven cannot help men, then they cannot be happy in heaven.  Cannot
be happy?  Ay, must be miserable.  For what greater misery for really
good men, than to see things going wrong, and not to be able to mend
them; to see poor creatures suffering, and not to be able to comfort
them?  No, my friends, we will believe--what every one who loves a
beloved friend comes sooner or later to believe--that those whom we
have honoured and loved, though taken from our eyes, are near to our
spirits; that they still fight for us, under the banner of their
Master Christ, and still work for us, by virtue of his life of love,
which they live in him and by him for ever.

Pray to them, indeed, we need not, as if they would help us out of
any self-will of their own.  There, I think, the Roman Catholics are
wrong.  They pray to the saints as if the saints had wills of their
own, and fancies of their own, and were respecters of persons; and
could have favourites, and grant private favours to those who
especially admired and (I fear I must say it) flattered them.  But
why should we do that?  That is to lower God's saints in our own
eyes.  For if we believe that they are made perfect, and like
perfectly the everlasting life, then we must believe that there is no
self-will in them:  but that they do God's will, and not their own,
and go on God's errands, and not their own; that he, and not their
own liking, sends them whithersoever he wills; and that if we ask of
HIM--of God our Father himself, that is enough for us.

And what shall we ask?

Ask--'Father, thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.'

For in asking that, we ask for the best of all things.  We ask for
the happiness, the power, the glory of saints and angels.  We ask to
be put into tune with God's whole universe, from the meanest flower
beneath our feet, to the most glorious spirit whom God ever created.
We ask for the one everlasting life which can never die, fail,
change, or disappoint:  yea, for the everlasting life which Christ
the only begotten Son lives from eternity to eternity, for ever
saying to his Father, 'Thy will be done.'

Yes--when we ask God to make us do his will, then indeed we ask for
everlasting life.

Does that seem little?  Would you rather ask for all manner of
pleasant things, if not in this life, at least in the life to come?

Oh, my friends, consider this.  We were not put into this world to
get pleasant things; and we shall not be put into the next world, as
it seems to me, to get pleasant things.  We were put into this world
to do God's will.  And we shall be put (I believe) into the next
world for the very same purpose--to do God's will; and if we do that,
we shall find pleasure enough in doing it.  I do not doubt that in
the next world all manner of harmless pleasure will come to us
likewise; because that will be, we hope, a perfect and a just world,
not a piecemeal, confused, often unjust world, like this:  but
pleasant things will come to us in the next life, only in proportion
as we shall be doing God's will in the next life; and we shall be
happy and blessed, only because we shall be living that eternal life
of which I have been preaching to you all along, the life which
Christ lives and has lived and will live for ever, saying to the
Eternal Father--I come to do thy will--not my will but thine be done.

Oh! may God give to us all his Spirit; the Spirit by which Christ did
his Father's will, and lived his Father's life in the soul and body
of a mortal man, that we may live here a life of obedience and of
good works, which is the only true and living life of faith; and that
when we die it may be said of us--'Blessed are the dead who die in
the Lord; for they rest from their labours, and their works do follow
them.'

They rest from their labours.  All their struggles, disappointments,
failures, backslidings, which made them unhappy here, because they
could not perfectly do the will of God, are past and over for ever.
But their works follow them.  The good which they did on earth--that
is not past and over.  It cannot die.  It lives and grows for ever,
following on in their path long after they are dead, and bearing
fruit unto everlasting life, not only in them, but in men whom they
never saw, and in generations yet unborn.



SERMON IV.  THE SONG OF THE THREE CHILDREN



DANIEL iii. 16, 17, 18.

O Nebuchadnezzar, we are not careful to answer thee in this matter.
If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the
burning fiery furnace; and He will deliver us out of thine hand, O
king.  But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not
serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up.

We read this morning, instead of the Te Deum, the Song of the Three
Children, beginning, 'Oh all ye works of the Lord, bless ye the Lord:
praise him, and magnify him for ever.'  It was proper to do so:
because the Ananias, Azarias, and Misael mentioned in it, are the
same as the Shadrach, Meshech, and Abednego, whose story we heard in
the first lesson; and because some of the old Jews held that this
noble hymn was composed by them, and sung by them in the burning
fiery furnace, wherefore it has been called 'The Song of the Three
Children;' for child, in old English, meant a young man.

Be that as it may, it is a glorious hymn, worthy of the Church of
God, worthy of those three young men, worthy of all the noble army of
martyrs; and if the three young men did not actually use the very
words of it, still it was what they believed; and, because they
believed it, they had courage to tell Nebuchadnezzar that they were
not careful to answer him--had no manner of doubt or anxiety
whatsoever as to what they were to say, when he called on them to
worship his gods.  For his gods, we know, were the sun, moon, and
planets, and the angels who (as the Chaldeans believed) ruled over
the heavenly bodies; and that image of gold is supposed, by some
learned men, to have been probably a sign or picture of the wondrous
power of life and growth which there is in all earthly things--and
that a sign of which I need not speak, or you hear.  So that the
meaning of this Song of the Three Children is simply this:

'You bid us worship the things about us, which we see with our bodily
eyes.  We answer, that we know the one true God, who made all these
things; and that, therefore, instead of worshipping THEM, we will bid
them to worship HIM.'

Now let us spend a few minutes in looking into this hymn, and seeing
what it teaches us.

You see at once, that it says that the one God, and not many gods,
made all things:  much more, that things did not make themselves, or
grow up of their own accord, by any virtue or life of their own.

But it says more.  It calls upon all things which God has made, to
bless him, praise him, and magnify him for ever.  This is much more
than merely saying, 'One God made the world.'  For this is saying
something about God's character; declaring what this one God is like.

For when you bless a person--(I do not mean when you pray God to
bless him--that is a different thing)--when you bless any one, I say,
you bless him because he is blessed, and has done blessed things:
because he has shown himself good, generous, merciful, useful.  You
praise a person because he is praiseworthy, noble, and admirable.
You magnify a person--that is, speak of him to every one, and
everywhere, in the highest terms--because you think that every one
ought to know how good and great he is.  And, therefore, when the
hymn says, 'Bless God, praise him, and magnify him for ever,' it does
not merely confess God's power.  No.  It confesses, too, God's
wisdom, goodness, beauty, love, and calls on all heaven and earth to
admire him, the alone admirable, and adore him, the alone adorable.

For this is really to believe in God.  Not merely to believe that
there is a God, but to know what God is like, and to know that He is
worthy to be believed in; worthy to be trusted, honoured, loved with
heart and mind and soul, because we know that He is worthy of our
love.

And this, we have a right to say, these three young men did, or
whosoever wrote this hymn; and that as a reward for their faith in
God, there was granted to them that deep insight into the meaning of
the world about them, which shines out through every verse of this
hymn.

Deep?  I tell you, my friends, that this hymn is so deep, that it is
too deep for the shallow brains of which the world is full now-a-
days, who fancy that they know all about heaven and earth, just
because they happen to have been born now, and not two hundred years
ago.  To such this old hymn means nothing; it is in their eyes merely
an old-fashioned figure of speech to call on sun and stars, green
herb and creeping thing, to praise and bless God.  Nevertheless, the
old hymn stands in our prayer-books, as a precious heir-loom to our
children; and long may it stand.  Though we may forget its meaning,
yet perhaps our children after us will recollect it once more, and
say with their hearts, what we now, I fear, only say with our lips
and should not say at all, if it was not put into our months by the
Prayer-book.

Do you not understand what I mean?  Then think of this:-

If we were writing a hymn about God, should we dare to say to the
things about us--to the cattle feeding in the fields--much less to
the clouds over our heads, and to the wells of which we drink, 'Bless
ye the Lord, praise him, and magnify him for ever?'

We should not dare; and for two reasons.

First--There is a notion abroad, borrowed from the old monks, that
this earth is in some way bad, and cursed; that a curse is on it
still for man's sake:  but a notion which is contrary to plain fact;
for if we till the ground, it does NOT bring forth thorns and
thistles to us, as the Scripture says it was to do for Adam, but
wholesome food, and rich returns for our labour:  and which in the
next place is flatly contrary to Scripture:  for we read in Genesis
viii. 21, how the Lord said, 'I will not again curse the ground any
more for man's sake;' and the Psalms always speak of this earth, and
of all created things, as if there was no curse at all on them;
saying that 'all things serve God, and continue as they were at the
beginning,' and that 'He has given them a law which cannot be
broken;' and in the face of those words, let who will talk of the
earth being cursed, I will not; and you shall not, if I can help it.

Another reason why we dare not talk of this earth as this hymn does
is, that we have got into the habit of saying, 'Cattle and creeping
things--they are not rational beings.  How can they praise God?
Clouds and wells--they are not even living things.  How can they
praise God?  Why speak of them in a hymn; much less speak to them?'

Yet this hymn does speak to them; and so do the Psalms and the
Prophets again and again.  And so will men do hereafter, when the
fashions and the fancies of these days are past, and men have their
eyes opened once more to see the glory which is around them from
their cradle to their grave, and hear once more 'The Word of the Lord
walking among the trees of the garden.'

But how can this be?  How can not only dumb things, but even dead
things, praise God?

My friends, this is a great mystery, of which the wisest men as yet
know but little, and confess freely how little they know.  But this
at least we know already, and can say boldly--all things praise God,
by fulfilling the law which our Lord himself declared, when he said
'Not every one who saith to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the
kingdom of heaven:  but he that doeth the will of my Father who is in
heaven.'

By doing the will of the heavenly Father.  By obeying the laws which
God has given them.  By taking the shape which he has appointed for
them.  By being of the use for which he intended them.  By
multiplying each after their kind, by laws and means a thousand times
more strange than any signs and wonders of which man can fancy for
himself; and by thus showing forth God's boundless wisdom, goodness,
love, and tender care of all which he has made.

Yes, my friends, in this sense (and this is the true sense) all
things can serve and praise God, and all things do serve and praise
Him.  Not a cloud which fleets across the sky, not a clod of earth
which crumbles under the frost, not a blade of grass which breaks
through the snow in spring, not a dead leaf which falls to the earth
in autumn, but is doing God's work, and showing forth God's glory.
Not a tiny insect, too small to be seen by human eyes without the
help of a microscope, but is as fearfully and wonderfully made as you
and me, and has its proper food, habitation, work, appointed for it,
and not in vain.  Nothing is idle, nothing is wasted, nothing goes
wrong, in this wondrous world of God.  The very scum upon the
standing pool, which seems mere dirt and dust, is all alive, peopled
by millions of creatures, each full of beauty, full of use, obeying
laws of God too deep for us to do aught but dimly guess at them; and
as men see deeper and deeper into the mystery of God's creation, they
find in the commonest things about them wonder and glory, such as eye
hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it entered into the heart of
man to conceive; and can only say with the Psalmist, 'Oh Lord, thy
ways are infinite, thy thoughts are very deep;' and confess that the
grass beneath their feet, the clouds above their heads--ay, every
worm beneath the sod and bird upon the bough, do, in very deed and
truth, bless the Lord who made them, praise him, and magnify him for
ever, not with words indeed, but with works; and say to man all day
long, 'Go thou, and do likewise.'

Yes, my friends, let us go and do likewise.  If we wish really to
obey the lesson of the Hymn of the Three Children, let us do the will
of God:  and so worship him in spirit and in truth.  Do not fancy, as
too many do, that thou canst praise God by singing hymns to him in
church once a week, and disobeying him all the week long, crying to
him 'Lord, Lord,' and then living as if he were not thy Lord, but
thou wast thine own Lord, and hadst a right to do thine own will, and
not his.  If thou wilt really bless God, then try to live his blessed
life of Goodness.  If thou wilt truly praise God, then behave as if
God was praiseworthy, good, and right in what he bids thee do.  If
thou wouldest really magnify God, and declare his greatness, then
behave as if he were indeed the Great God, who ought to be obeyed--
ay, who MUST be obeyed; for his commandment is life, and it alone, to
thee, as well as to all which He has made.  Dost thou fancy as the
heathen do, that God needs to be flattered with fine words? or that
thou wilt be heard for thy much speaking, and thy vain repetitions?
He asks of thee works, as well as words; and more, He asks of thee
works first, and words after.  And better it is to praise him truly
by works without words, than falsely by words without works.

Cry, if thou wilt, 'Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of hosts;' but show
that thou believest him to be holy, by being holy thyself.  Sing, if
Thou wilt, of 'The Father of an Infinite Majesty:' but show that thou
believest his majesty to be infinite, by obeying his commandments,
like those Three Children, let them cost thee what they may.  Join,
and join freely, in the songs of the heavenly host; for God has given
thee reason and speech, after the likeness of his only begotten Son,
and thou mayest use them, as well as every other gift, in the service
of thy Father.  But take care lest, while thou art trying to copy the
angels, thou art not even as righteous as the beasts of the field.
For they bless and praise God by obeying his laws; and till thou dost
that, and obeyest God's laws likewise, thou art not as good as the
grass beneath thy feet.

For after all has been said and sung, my friends, the sum and
substance of true religion remains what it was, and what it will be
for ever; and lies in this one word, 'If ye love me, keep my
commandments.'



SERMON V.  THE ETERNAL GOODNESS



MATTHEW xxii. 39.

Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

Why are wrong things wrong?  Why, for instance, is it wrong to steal?

Because God has forbidden it, you may answer.  But is it so?
Whatsoever God forbids must be wrong.  But, is it wrong because God
forbids it, or does God forbid it because it is wrong?

For instance, suppose that God had not forbidden us to steal, would
it be right then to steal, or at least, not wrong?

We must really think of this.  It is no mere question of words, it is
a solemn practical question, which has to do with our every-day
conduct, and yet which goes down to the deepest of all matters, even
to the depths of God himself.

The question is simply this.  Did God, who made all things, make
right and wrong?  Many people think so.  They think that God made
goodness.  But how can that be?  For if God made goodness, there
could have been no goodness before God made it.  That is clear.  But
God was always good, good from all eternity.  But how could that be?
How could God be good, before there was any goodness made?  That
notion will not do then.  And all we can say is that goodness is
eternal and everlasting, just as God is:  because God was and is and
ever will be eternally and always good.

But is eternal goodness one thing, and the eternal God, another?
That cannot be, again; for as the Athanasian Creed tells us so wisely
and well, there are not many Eternals, but one Eternal.  Therefore
goodness must be the Spirit of God; and God must be the Spirit of
goodness; and right is nothing else but the character of the
everlasting God, and of those who are inspired by God.

What is wrong, then?  Whatever is unlike right; whatever is unlike
goodness; whatever is unlike God; that is wrong.  And why does God
forbid us to do wrong?  Simply because wrong is unlike himself.  He
is perfectly beautiful, perfectly blest and happy, because he is
perfectly good; and he wishes to see all his creatures beautiful,
blest, and happy:  but they can only be so by being perfectly good;
and they can only be perfectly good by being perfectly like God their
Father; and they can only be perfectly like God the Father by being
full of love, loving their neighbour as themselves.

For what do we mean when we talk of right, righteousness, goodness?

Many answers have been given to that question.

The old Romans, who were a stern, legal-minded people, used to say
that righteousness meant to hurt no man, and to give every man his
own.  The Eastern people had a better answer still, which our blessed
Lord used in one place, when he told them that righteousness was to
do to other people as we would they should do to us:  but the best
answer, the perfect answer, is our Lord's in the text, 'Thou shalt
love thy neighbour as thyself.'  This is the true, eternal
righteousness.  Not a legal righteousness, not a righteousness made
up of forms and ceremonies, of keeping days holy, and abstaining from
meats, or any other arbitrary commands, whether of God or of man.
This is God's goodness, God's righteousness, Christ's own goodness
and righteousness.  Do you not see what I mean?  Remember only one
word of St. John's.  God is love.  Love is the goodness of God.  God
is perfectly good, because he is perfect love.  Then if you are full
of love, you are good with the same goodness with which God is good,
and righteous with Christ's righteousness.  That as what St. Paul
wished to be, when he wished to be found in Christ, not having his
own righteousness, but the righteousness which is by faith in Christ.
His own righteousness was the selfish and self-conceited
righteousness which he had before his conversion, made up of forms,
and ceremonies, and doctrines, which made him narrow-hearted,
bigoted, self-conceited, fierce, cruel, a persecutor; the
righteousness which made him stand by in cold blood to see St.
Stephen stoned.  But the righteousness which is by faith in Christ is
a loving heart, and a loving life, which every man will long to lead
who believes really in Jesus Christ.  For when he looks at Christ,
Christ's humiliation, Christ's work, Christ's agony, Christ's death,
and sees in it nothing but utter and perfect LOVE to poor sinful,
undeserving man, then his heart makes answer, Yes, I believe in that!
I believe and am sure that that is the most beautiful character in
the world; that that is the utterly noble and right sort of person to
be--full of love as Christ was.  I ought to be like that.  My
conscience tells me that I ought.  And I can be like that.  Christ,
who was so good himself, must wish to make me good like himself, and
I can trust him to do it.  I can have faith in him, that he will make
me like himself, full of the Spirit of love, without which I shall be
only useless and miserable.  And I trust him enough to be sure that,
good as he is, he cannot mean to leave me useless or miserable.  So,
by true faith in Christ, the man comes to have Christ's
righteousness--that is, to be loving as Christ was.  He believes that
Christ's loving character is perfect beauty; that he must be the Son
of God, if his character be like that.  He believes that Christ can
and will fill him with the same spirit of love; and as he believes,
so is it with him, and in him those words are fulfilled, 'Whosoever
shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and
he in God;' and that 'If a man love me,' says the Lord, 'I and my
Father will come to him, and take up our abode with him.'  Those are
wonderful words:  but if you will recollect what I have just said,
you may understand a little of them.  St. John puts the same thing
very simply, but very boldly.  'God is Love,' he says, 'and he that
dwelleth in love, dwelleth in God, and God in him.'  Strange as it
may seem, it must be so if God be love.  Let us thank God that it is
true, and keep in mind what awful and wonderful creatures we are,
that God should dwell in us; what blessed and glorious creatures we
may become in time, if we will only listen to the voice of God who
speaks within our hearts.

And what does that voice say?  The old commandment, my friends, which
was from the beginning, 'Love one another.'  Whatever thoughts or
feeling in your hearts contradict that; whatever tempts you to
despise your neighbour, to be angry with him, to suspect him, to
fancy him shut out from God's love, that is not of God.  No voice in
our hearts is God's voice, but what says in some shape or other,
'Love thy neighbour as thyself.  Care for him, bear with him long,
and try to do him good.'

For love is of God, and every one that loveth is born of God, and
knoweth God.  He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love.
Still less can he who is not loving fulfil the law; for the law of
God is the very pattern and picture of God's character; and if a man
does not know what God is like, he will never know what God's law is
like; and though he may read his Bible all day long, he will learn no
more from it than a dumb animal will, unless his heart is full of
love.  For love is the light by which we see God, by which we
understand his Bible; by which we understand our duty, and God's
dealings, in the world.  Love is the light by which we understand our
own hearts; by which we understand our neighbours' hearts.  So it is.
If you hate any man, or have a spite against him, you will never know
what is in that man's heart, never be able to form a just opinion of
his character.  If you want to understand human beings, or to do
justice to their feelings, you must begin by loving them heartily and
freely, and the more you like them the better you will understand
them, and in general the better you will find them to be at heart,
the more worthy of your trust, at least the more worthy of your
compassion.

At least, so St. John says, 'He that saith he is in the light, and
hates his brother, is in darkness even till now, and knoweth not
whither he goeth.  But he that loveth his brother abideth in the
light, and there is no occasion of stumbling in him.'

No occasion of stumbling.  That is of making mistakes in our
behaviour to our neighbours, which cause scandal, drive them from us,
and make them suspect us, dislike us--and perhaps with too good
reason.  Just think for yourselves.  What does half the misery, and
all the quarrelling in the world come from, but from people's loving
themselves better than their neighbours?  Would children be
disobedient and neglectful to their parents, if they did not love
themselves better than their parents?  Why does a man kill, commit
adultery, steal, bear false witness, covet his neighbour's goods, his
neighbour's custom, his neighbour's rights, but because he loves his
own pleasure or interest better than his neighbour's, loves himself
better than the man whom he wrongs?  Would a man take advantage of
his neighbour if he loved him as well as himself?  Would he be hard
on his neighbour, and say, Pay me the uttermost farthing, if he loved
him as he loves himself?  Would he speak evil of his neighbour behind
his back, if he loved him as himself?  Would he cross his neighbour's
temper, just because he WILL have his own way, right or wrong, if he
loved him as himself?  Judge for yourselves.  What would the world
become like this moment if every man loved his neighbour as himself,
thought of his neighbour as much as he thinks of himself?  Would it
not become heaven on earth at once?  There would be no need then for
soldiers and policemen, lawyers, rates and taxes, my friends, and all
the expensive and heavy machinery which is now needed to force people
into keeping something of God's law.  Ay, there would be no need of
sermons, preachers and prophets to tell men of God's law, and warn
them of the misery of breaking it.  They would keep the law of their
own free-will, by love.  For love is the fulfilling of the law; and
as St. Augustine says, 'Love you neighbour, and then do what you
will--because you will be sure to will what is right.'  So truly did
our Lord say, that on this one commandment hung all the law and the
prophets.

But though that blessed state of things will not come to the whole
world till the day when Christ shall reign in that new heaven and new
earth, in which Righteousness shall dwell, still it may come here,
now, on earth, to each and every one of us, if we will but ask from
God the blessed gift; to love our neighbour as we love ourselves.

And then, my friends, whether we be rich or poor, fortunate or
unfortunate, still that spirit of Love which is the Spirit of God,
will be its exceeding great reward.

I say, its own reward.

For what is to be our reward, if we do our duty earnestly, however
imperfectly?  'Well done, thou good and faithful servant, enter thou
into the joy of thy Lord.'

And what is the joy of our Lord?  What is the joy of Christ?  The joy
and delight which springs for ever in his great heart, from feeling
that he is for ever doing good; from loving all, and living for all;
from knowing that if not all, yet millions on millions are grateful
to him, and will be for ever.

My friends, if you have ever done a kind action; if you have ever
helped any one in distress, or given up a pleasure for the sake of
others--do you not know that that deed gave you a peace, a self-
content, a joy for the moment at least, which nothing in this world
could give, or take away?  And if the person whom you helped thanked
you; if you felt that you had made that man your friend; that he
trusted you now, looked on you now as a brother--did not that double
the pleasure?  I ask you, is there any pleasure in the world like
that of doing good, and being thanked for it?  Then that is the joy
of your Lord.  That is the joy of Christ rising up in you, as often
as you do good; the love which is in you rejoicing in itself, because
it has found a loving thing to do, and has called out the love of a
human being in return.

Yes, if you will receive it, that is the joy of Christ--the glorious
knowledge that he is doing endless good, and calling out endless love
to himself and to the Father, till the day when he shall give up to
his Father the kingdom which he has won back from sin and death, and
God shall be all in all.

That is the joy of your Lord.  If you wish for any different sort of
joy after you die, you must not ask me to tell you of it; for I know
nothing about the matter save what I find written in the Holy
Scripture.



SERMON VI.  WORSHIP



ISAIAH i. 12, 13.

When ye come to appear before me, who hath required this at your
hand, to tread my courts?  Bring no more vain oblations; incense is
an abomination unto me; the new moons and sabbaths, the calling of
assemblies, I cannot away with; it is iniquity, even the solemn
meeting.

This is a very awful text; one of those which terrify us--or at least
ought to terrify us--and set us on asking ourselves seriously and
honestly--'What do I believe after all?  What manner of man am I
after all?  What sort of show should I make after all, if the people
round me knew my heart and all my secret thoughts?  What sort of
show, then, do I already make, in the sight of Almighty God, who sees
every man exactly as he is?'

I say, such texts as this ought to terrify us.  It is good to be
terrified now and then; to be startled, and called to account, and
set thinking, and sobered, as it were, now and then, that we may look
at ourselves honestly anti bravely, and see, if we can, what sort of
men we are.

And therefore, perhaps, it is that this chapter is chosen for the
first Advent Lesson; to prepare us for Christmas; to frighten us
somewhat; at least to set us thinking seriously, and to make us fit
to keep Christmas in spirit and in truth.

For whom does this text speak of?

It speaks of religious people, and of a religious nation; and of a
fearful mistake which they were making, and a fearful danger into
which they had fallen.  Now we are religious people, and England is a
religious nation; and therefore we may possibly make the same
mistake, and fall into the same danger, as these old Jews.

I do not say that we have done so; but we may; for human nature is
just the same now as it was then; and therefore it is as well for us
to look round--at least once now and then, and see whether we too are
in danger of falling, while we think that we are standing safe.

What does Isaiah, then, tell the religious Jews of his day?

That their worship of God, their church-going, their sabbaths, and
their appointed feasts were a weariness and an abomination to him.
That God loathed them, and would not listen to the prayers which were
made in them.  That the whole matter was a mockery and a lie in his
sight.

These are awful words enough--that God should hate and loathe what he
himself had appointed; that what would be, one would think, one of
the most natural and most pleasant sights to a loving Father in
heaven--namely, his own children worshipping, blessing, and praising
him--should be horrible in his sight.  There is something very
shocking in that; at least to Church people like us.  If we were
Dissenters, who go to chapel chiefly to hear sermons, it would be
easy for us to say--'Of course, forms and ceremonies and appointed
feasts are nothing to begin with; they are man's invention at best,
and may therefore be easily enough an abomination to God.'  But we
know that they are not so; that forms and ceremonies and appointed
feasts are good things as long as they have spirit and truth in them;
that whether or not they be of man's invention, they spring out of
the most simple, wholesome wants of our human nature, which is a good
thing and not a bad one, for God made it in his own likeness, and
bestowed it on us.  We know, or ought to know, that appointed feast
days, like Christmas, are good and comfortable ordinances, which
cheer our hearts on our way through this world, and give us something
noble and lovely to look forward to month after month; that they are
like landmarks along the road of life, reminding us of what God has
done, and is doing, for us and all mankind.  And if you do not know,
I know, that people who throw away ordinances and festivals end, at
least in a generation or two, in throwing away the Gospel truth which
that ordinance or festival reminds us of; just as too many who have
thrown away Good Friday have thrown away the Good Friday good news,
that Christ died for all mankind; and too many who have thrown away
Christmas are throwing away--often without meaning to do so--the
Christmas good news, that Christ really took on himself the whole of
our human nature, and took the manhood into God.

So it is, my friends, and so it will be.  For these forms and
festivals are the old landmarks and beacons of the Gospel; and if a
man will not look at the landmarks, then he will lose his way.

Therefore, to Church people like us, it ought to be a shocking thing
even to suspect that God may be saying to us, 'Your appointed feasts
my soul hateth;' and it ought to set them seriously thinking how such
a thing may happen, that they may guard against it.  For if God be
not pleased with our coming to his house, what right have we in his
house at all?

But recollect this, my dear friends, that we are not to use this text
to search and judge others' faults, but to search and judge our own.

For if a man, hearing this sermon, looks at his neighbour across the
church, and says in his heart, 'Ay, such a bad one as he is--what
right has he in church?'--then God answers that man, 'Who art thou
who judgest another?  To his own master he standeth or falleth.'
Yes, my friends, recollect what the old tomb-stone outside says--(and
right good doctrine it is)--and fit it to this sermon.


When this you see, pray judge not me
   For sin enough I own.
Judge yourselves; mend your lives;
   Leave other folks alone.


But if a man, hearing this sermon, begins to say to himself, Such a
man as I am--so full of faults as I am--what right have I in church?
So selfish--so uncharitable--so worldly--so useless--so unfair (or
whatever other faults the man may feel guilty of)--in one word, so
unlike what I ought to be--so unlike Christ--so unlike God whom I
come to worship.  How little I act up to what I believe! how little I
really believe what I have learnt! what right have I in church?  What
if God were saying the same of me as he said of those old Jews, 'Thy
church-going, thy coming to communion, thy Christmas-day, my soul
hateth; I am weary to bear it.  Who hath required this at thy hands,
to tread my courts?'  People round me may think me good enough as men
go now; but I know myself too well; and I know that instead of saying
with the Pharisee to any man here, 'I thank God that I am not as this
man or that,' I ought rather to stand afar off like the publican, and
not lift up so much as my eyes toward heaven, crying only 'God, be
merciful to me a sinner.'

If a man should think thus, my friends, his thoughts may make him
very serious for awhile; nay, very sad.  But they need not make him
miserable:  need still less make him despair.

They ought to set him on thinking--Why do I come to church?

Because it is the fashion?

Because I want to hear the preacher?

No--to worship God.

But what is worshipping God?

That must depend entirely my friends, upon who God is.

As I often tell you, most questions--ay, if you will receive it, all
questions--depend upon this one root question, who is God?

But certainly this question of worshipping God must depend upon who
God is.  For how he ought to be worshipped depends on what will
please him.  And what will please him, depends on what his character
is.

If God be, as some fancy, hard and arbitrary, then you must worship
him in a way in which a hard arbitrary person would like to be
addressed; with all crouching, and cringing, and slavish terror.

If God be again, as some fancy, cold, and hard of hearing, then you
must worship him accordingly.  You must cry aloud as Baal's priests
did to catch his notice, and put yourselves to torment (as they did,
and as many a Christian has done since) to move his pity; and you
must use repetitions as the heathen do, and believe that you will be
heard for your much speaking.  The Lord Jesus called all such
repetitions vain, and much speaking a fancy:  but then, the Lord
Jesus spoke to men of a Father in heaven, a very different God from
such as I speak of--and, alas! some Christian people believe in.

But, my friends, if you believe in your heavenly Father, the good God
whom your Lord Jesus Christ has revealed to you; and if you will
consider that he is good, and consider what that word good means,
then you will not have far to seek before you find what worship
means, and how you can worship him in spirit and in truth.

For if God be good, worshipping him must mean praising and admiring
him--adoring him, as we call it--for being good.

And nothing more?

Certainly much more.  Also to ask him to make us good.  That, too,
must be a part of worshipping a good God.  For the very property of
goodness is, that it wishes to make others good.  And if God be good,
he must wish to make us good also.

To adore God, then, for his goodness, and to pray to him to make us
good, is the sum and substance of all wholesome worship.

And for that purpose a man may come to church, and worship God in
spirit and in truth, though he be dissatisfied with himself, and
ashamed of himself; and knows that he is wrong in many things:-
provided always that he wishes to be set right, and made good.

For he may come saying, 'O God, thou art good, and I am bad; and for
that very reason I come.  I come to be made good.  I admire thy
goodness, and I long to copy it; but I cannot unless thou help me.
Purge me; make me clean.  Cleanse thou me from my secret faults, and
give me truth in the inward parts.  Do what thou wilt with me.  Train
me as thou wilt.  Punish me if it be necessary.  Only make me good.'

Then is the man fit indeed to come to church, sins and all:- if he
carry his sins into church not to carry them out again safely and
carefully, as we are all too apt to do, but to cast them down at the
foot of Christ's cross, in the hope (and no man ever hoped that hope
in vain)--that he will be lightened of that burden, and leave some of
them at least behind him.  Ay, no man, I say, ever hoped that in
vain.  No man ever yet felt the burden of his sins really intolerable
and unbearable, but what the burden of his sins was taken off him
before all was over, and Christ's righteousness given to him instead.

Then a man is fit, not only to come to church, but to come to Holy
Communion on Christmas-day, and all days.  For then and there he will
find put into words for him the very deepest sorrows and longings of
his heart.  There he may say as heartily as he can (and the more
heartily the better), 'I acknowledge and bewail my manifold sins and
wickedness.  The remembrance of them is grievous unto me; the burden
of them is intolerable:' but there he will hear Christ promising in
return to pardon and deliver him from all his sins, to confirm and
strengthen him in all goodness.  That last is what he ought to want;
and if he wants it, he will surely find it.

He may join there with the whole universe of God in crying, 'Holy,
holy, holy, Lord God of Hosts, heaven and earth are full of Thy
glory:' and still in the same breath he may confess again his
unworthiness so much as to gather up the crumbs under God's table,
and cast himself simply and utterly upon the eternal property of
God's eternal essence, which is--always to have mercy.  But he will
hear forthwith Christ's own answer--'If thou art bad, I can and will
make thee good.  My blood shall wash away thy sin:  my body shall
preserve thee, body, soul, and spirit, to the everlasting life of
goodness.'

And so God will bless that man's communion to him; and bless to him
his keeping of Christmas-day; because out of a true penitent heart
and lively faith he will be offering to the good God the sacrifice of
his own bad self, that God may take it, and make it good; and so will
be worshipping the everlasting and infinite Goodness, in spirit and
in truth.



SERMON VII.  GOD'S INHERITANCE



GAL. iv. 6, 7.

Because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into
your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.  Wherefore thou art no more a
servant, but a son; and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.

This is the second good news of Christmas-day.

The first is, that the Son of God became man.

The second is, why he became man.  That men might become the sons of
God through him.

Therefore St. Paul says, You are the sons of God.  Not--you may be,
if you are very good:  but you are, in order that you may become very
good.  Your being good does not tell you that you are the sons of
God:  your baptism tells you so.  Your baptism gives you a right to
say, I am the child of God.  How shall I behave then?  What ought a
child of God to be like?  Now St. Paul, you see, knew well that we
could not make ourselves God's children by any feelings, fancies, or
experiences of our own.  But he knew just as well that we cannot make
ourselves behave as God's children should, by any thoughts and trying
of our own.

God alone made us His children; God alone can make us behave like his
children.

And therefore St. Paul says, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into
our hearts:  by which we cry to God, Our Father.

But some will say, Have we that Spirit?

St. Paul says that you have:  and surely he speaks truth.

Let us search, then, and see where that Spirit is in us.  It is a
great and awful honour for sinful men:  but I do believe that if we
seek, we shall find that He is not far from any one of us, for in Him
we live and move, and have our being; and all in us which is not
ignorance, falsehood, folly, and filth, comes from Him.

Now the Bible says that this Spirit is the Spirit of God's Son, the
Spirit of Christ:- and what sort of Spirit is that?

We may see by remembering what sort of a Spirit Christ had when on
earth; for He certainly has the same Spirit now--the Spirit which
proceedeth everlastingly from the Father and from the Son.

And what was that Like?  What was Christ Like?  What was his Spirit
Like?  It was a Spirit of Love, mercy, pity, generosity, usefulness,
unselfishness.  A spirit of truth, honour, fearless love of what was
right:  a spirit of duty and willing obedience, which made Him
rejoice in doing His Father's will.  In all things the spirit of a
perfect SON, in all things a lovely, noble, holy spirit.

And now, my dear friends, is there nothing in you like that?  You may
forget it at times, you may disobey it very often:  but is there not
something in all your hearts more or less, which makes you love and
admire what is right?

When you hear of a noble action, is there nothing in you which makes
you approve and admire it?  Is there nothing in your hearts which
makes you pity those who are in sorrow and long to help them?
Nothing which stirs your heart up when you hear of a man's nobly
doing his duty, and dying rather than desert his post, or do a wrong
or mean thing?  Surely there is--surely there is.

Then, O my dear friends, when those feelings come into your hearts,
rejoice with trembling, as men to whom God has given a great and
precious gift.  For they are none other than the Spirit of the Son of
God, striving with your hearts that He may form Christ in you, and
raise up your hearts to cry with full faith to God, 'My Father which
art in heaven!'

'Ah but,' you will say, 'we like what is right, but we do not always
do it.  We like to see pity and mercy:  but we are very often proud
and selfish and tyrannical.  We like to see justice and honour:  but
we are too apt to be mean and unjust ourselves.  We like to see other
people doing their duty:  but we very often do not do ours.'

Well, my dear friends, perhaps that is true.  If it be, confess your
sins like honest men, and they shall be forgiven you.  If you can so
complain of yourselves, I am sure I can of myself, ten times more.

But do you not see that this very thing is a sign to you that the
good and noble thoughts in you are not your own but God's?  If they
came out of your own spirits, then you would have no difficulty in
obeying them.  But they came out of God's Spirit; and our sinful and
self-willed spirits are striving against his, and trying to turn away
from God's light.  What can we do then?  We can cherish those noble
thoughts, those pure and higher feelings, when they arise.  We can
welcome them as heavenly medicine from our heavenly Father.  We can
resolve not to turn away from them, even though they make us ashamed.
Not to grieve the Spirit of the Son of God, even though he grieves us
(as he ought to do and will do more and more), by showing us our own
weakness and meanness, and how unlike we are to Christ, the only
begotten Son.

If we shut our hearts to those good feelings, they will go away and
leave us.  And if they do, we shall neither respect our neighbours,
nor respect ourselves.  We shall see no good in our neighbours, but
become scornful and suspicious to them; and if we do that, we shall
soon see no good in ourselves.  We shall become discontented with
ourselves, more and more given up to angry thoughts and mean ways,
which we hate and despise, all the while that we go on in them.

And then--mark my words--we shall lose all real feeling of God being
our Father, and we his sons.  We shall begin to fancy ourselves his
slaves, and not his children; and God our taskmaster, and not our
Father.  We shall dislike the thought of God.  We shall long to hide
from God.  We shall fall back into slavish terror, and a fearful
looking forward to of judgment and fiery indignation, because we have
trampled under foot the grace of God, the noble, pure, tender, and
truly graceful feelings which God's Spirit bestowed on us, to fill us
with the grace of Christ.

Therefore, my dear friends, never check any good or right feelings in
yourselves, or in your children; for they come from the spirit of the
Son of God himself.  But, as St. Paul says, Phil. iv. 3, 'Finally,
brethren, whatsoever things are honourable, whatsoever things are
just, what soever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely,
whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if
there be any praise, think on these things', . . . 'and the God of
peace shall be with you.'  Avoid all which can make you mean, low,
selfish, cruel.  Cling to all which can fill your mind with lofty,
kindly, generous, loyal thoughts; and so, in God's good time, you
will enter into the meaning of those great words--Abba, Father.  The
more you give up your hearts to such good feelings, the more you will
understand of God; the more nobleness there is in you, the more you
will see God's nobleness, God's justice, God's love, God's true
glory.  The more you become like God's Son, the more you will
understand how God can stoop to call himself your Father; and the
more you will understand what a Father, what a perfect Father God is.
And in the world to come, I trust, you will enter into the glorious
liberty of the sons of God--that liberty which comes, as I told you
last Sunday, not from doing your own will, but the will of God; that
glory which comes, not from having anything of your own to pride
yourselves upon, but from being filled with the Spirit of God, the
Spirit of Jesus Christ, by which you shall for ever look up freely,
and yet reverently, to the Almighty God of heaven and earth, and say,
'Impossible as the honour seems for man, yet thou, O God, hast said
it, and it is true.  Thou, even thou art my Father, and I thy son in
Jesus Christ, who became awhile the Son of man on earth, that I might
become for ever the son of God in heaven.'

And so will come true to us St. Paul's great words: --If we be sons,
then heirs of God, joint heirs with Christ.

Heirs of God:  but what is our inheritance?  The same as Christ's.

And what is Christ's inheritance?  What but God himself?--The
knowledge of our Father in heaven, of his love to us, and of his
eternal beauty and glory, which fills all heavens and all worlds with
light and life.



SERMON VIII.  'DE PROFUNDIS'



PSALM cxxx. 1.

Out of the deep have I cried unto thee, O Lord.  Lord, hear my voice.

What is this deep of which David speaks so often?  He knew it well,
for he had been in it often and long.  He was just the sort of man to
be in it often.  A man with great good in him, and great evil; with
very strong passions and feelings, dragging him down into the deep,
and great light and understanding to show him the dark secrets of
that horrible pit when he was in it; and with great love of God too,
and of order, and justice, and of all good and beautiful things, to
make him feel the horribleness of that pit where he ought not to be,
all the more from its difference, its contrast, with the beautiful
world of light, and order, and righteousness where he ought to be.
Therefore he knew that deep well, and abhorred it, and he heaps
together every ugly name, to try and express what no man can express,
the horror of that place.  It is a horrible pit, mire and clay, where
he can find no footing, but sinks all the deeper for his struggling.
It is a place of darkness and of storms, a shoreless and bottomless
sea, where he is drowning, and drowning, while all God's waves and
billows go over him.  It is a place of utter loneliness, where he
sits like a sparrow on the housetop, or a doleful bird in the desert,
while God has put his lovers and friends away from him, and hid his
acquaintance out of his sight, and no man cares for his soul, and all
men seem to him liars, and God himself seems to have forgotten him
and forgotten all the world.  It is a dreadful net which has
entangled his feet, a dark prison in which he is set so fast that he
cannot get forth.  It is a torturing disgusting disease, which gives
his flesh no health, and his bones no rest, and his wounds are putrid
and corrupt.  It is a battle-field after the fight, where he seems to
lie stript among the dead, like those who are wounded and cut away
from God's hand, and lies groaning in the dust of death, seeing
nothing round him but doleful shapes of destruction and misery, alone
in the outer darkness, while a horrible dread overwhelms him.  Yea,
it is hell itself, the pit of hell, the nethermost hell, he says,
where God's wrath burns like fire, till his tongue cleaves to his
gums, and his bones are burnt up like a firebrand, till he is weary
of crying; his throat is dry, his heart fails him for waiting so long
upon his God.

Yes.  A dark and strange place is that same deep pit of God--if,
indeed, it be God's and God made it.  Perhaps God did not make it.
For God saw everything that he had made, and behold it was very good:
and that pit cannot be very good; for all good things are orderly,
and in shape; and in that pit is no shape, no order, nothing but
contradiction and confusion.  When a man is in that pit, it will seem
to him as if he were alone in the world, and longing above all things
for company; and yet he will hate to have any one to speak to him,
and wrap himself up in himself to brood over his own misery.  When he
is in that pit he shall be so blind that he can see nothing, though
his eyes be open in broad noon-day.  When he is in that pit he will
hate the thing which he loves most, and love the thing which he hates
most.  When he is in that pit he will long to die, and yet cling to
life desperately, and be horribly afraid of dying.  When he is in
that pit it will seem to him that God is awfully, horribly near him,
and he will try to hide from God, try to escape from under God's
hand:  and yet all the while that God seems so dreadfully near him,
God will seem further off from him than ever, millions and millions
of miles away, parted from him by walls of iron, and a great gulf
which he can never pass.  There is nothing but contradiction in that
pit:  the man who is in it is of two minds about himself, and his kin
and neighbours, and all heaven and earth; and knows not where to
turn, or what to think, or even where he is at all.

For the food which he gets in that deep pit is very hunger of soul,
and rage, and vain desires.  And the ground which he stands on in
that deep is a bottomless quagmire, and doubt, and change, and
shapeless dread.  And the air which he breathes in that deep is the
very fire of God, which burns up everlastingly all the chalk and
dross of the world.

I said that that deep was not merely the deep of affliction.  No:
for you may see men with every comfort which wealth and home can
give, who are tormented day and night in that deep pit in the midst
of all their prosperity, calling for a drop of water to cool their
tongue, and finding none.  And you may see poor creatures dying in
agony on lonely sick beds, who are not in that pit at all, but in
that better place whereof it is written, 'Blessed are they who, going
through the vale of misery, use it for a well, and the pools are
filled with water;' and again, 'If any man thirst, let him come to
me, and drink;' and 'the water that I shall give him shall be in him
a well of water, springing up to everlasting life.'

No--that deep pit is a far worse place; an utterly bad place; and yet
it may be good for a man to have fallen into it; and, strangely
enough, if he do fall in, the lower he sinks in it, the better for
him at last.  That is another strange contradiction in that pit,
which David found, that though it was a bottomless pit, the deeper he
sank in it, the more likely he was to find his feet set on a rock;
the further down in the nethermost hell he was, the nearer he was to
being delivered from the nethermost hell.

Of course, if he had staid in that pit, he must have died, body and
soul.  No mortal man, or immortal soul could endure it long.  No
immortal soul could; for he would lose all hope, all faith in God,
all feeling of there being anything like justice and order in the
world, all hope for himself, or for mankind, lying so in that living
grave where no man can see God's righteousness, or his faithfulness
in that land where all things are forgotten.

And his mere mortal body could not stand it.  The misery and terror
and confusion of his soul would soon wear out his body, and he would
die, as I have seen men actually die, when their souls have been left
in that deep somewhat too long; shrink together into dark melancholy,
and pine away, and die.  And I have seen sweet young creatures too,
whom God for some purpose of his own (which must be good and loving,
for HE did it) has let fall awhile into that deep of darkness; and
then in compassion to their youth, and tenderness, and innocence, has
lifted them gently out again, and set their weary feet upon the
everlasting Rock, which is Christ; and has filled them with the light
of his countenance, and joy and peace in believing; and has led them
by green pastures and made them rest by the waters of comfort; and
yet, though their souls were healed, their bodies were not.  That
fearful struggle has been too much for frail humanity, and they have
drooped, and faded, and gone peacefully after a while home to their
God, as a fair flower withers if the fire has but once past over it.

But some I have seen, men and women, who have arisen, like David, out
of that strange deep, all the stronger for their fall; and have found
out another strange contradiction about that deep, and the fire of
God which burns below in it.  For that fire hardens a man and softens
him at the same time; and he comes out of it hardened to that
hardness of which it is written, 'Do thou endure hardness like a good
soldier of Jesus Christ;' and again, 'I have fought a good fight, I
have kept the faith, I have finished my course:' yet softened to that
softness of which it is written, 'Be ye tenderhearted, compassionate,
forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake has forgiven
you;'--and again, 'We have a High Priest who can be touched with the
feeling of our infirmities, seeing that he has been tempted in all
things like as we are, yet without sin.'

Happy, thrice happy are they who have thus walked through the valley
of the shadow of death, and found it the path which leads to
everlasting life.  Happy are they who have thus writhed awhile in the
fierce fire of God, and have had burnt out of them the chaff and
dross, and all which offends, and makes them vain, light, and yet
makes them dull, drags them down at the same time; till only the pure
gold of God's righteousness is left, seven times tried in the fire,
incorruptible, and precious in the sight of God and man.  Such people
need not regret--they will not regret--all that they have gone
through.  It has made them brave, made them sober, made them patient.
It has given them


The reason firm, the temperate will,
Endurance, foresight, strength and skill;


and so has shaped them into the likeness of Christ, who was made
perfect by suffering; and though he were a Son, yet in the days of
his flesh, made strong supplication and crying with tears to his
Father, and was heard in that he feared; and so, though he died on
the cross and descended into hell, yet triumphed over death and hell,
by dying and by descending; and conquered them by submitting to them.
And yet they have been softened in that fierce furnace of God's
wrath, into another likeness of Christ--which after all is still the
same; the character which he showed when he wept by the grave of
Lazarus, and over the sinful city of Jerusalem; which he showed when
his heart yearned over the perishing multitude, and over the leper,
and the palsied man, and the maniac possessed with devils; the
character which he showed when he said to the woman taken in
adultery, 'Neither do I condemn thee; go and sin no more;' which he
showed when he said to the sinful Magdalene, who washed his feet with
tears, and wiped them with her hair, 'her sins, which are many, are
forgiven; for she loved much;' the likeness which he showed in his
very death agony upon the torturing cross, when he prayed for his
murderers, 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.'
This is the character which man may get in that dark deep.--To feel
for all, and feel with all; to rejoice with those who rejoice, and
weep with those who weep; to understand people's trials, and make
allowances for their temptations; to put oneself in their place, till
we see with their eyes, and feel with their hearts, till we judge no
man, and have hope for all; to be fair, and patient, and tender with
every one we meet; to despise no one, despair of no one, because
Christ despises none, and despairs of none; to look upon every one we
meet with love, almost with pity, as people who either have been down
into the deep of horror, or may go down into it any day; to see our
own sins in other people's sins, and know that we might do what they
do, and feel as they feel, any moment, did God desert us; to give and
forgive, to live and let live, even as Christ gives to us, and
forgives us, and lives for us, and lets us live, in spite of all our
sins.

And how shall we learn this?  How shall the bottomless pit, if we
fall into it, be but a pathway to the everlasting rock?

David tells us:

'Out of the deep have I cried unto thee, O Lord.'

He cried to God.

Not to himself, his own learning, talents, wealth, prudence, to pull
him out of that pit.  Not to princes, nobles, and great men.  Not to
doctrines, books, church-goings.  Not to the dearest friend he had on
earth; for they had forsaken him, could not understand him, thought
him perhaps beside himself.  Not to his own good works, almsgivings,
church-goings, church-buildings.  Not to his own experiences, faith's
assurances, frames or feelings.  The matter was too terrible to be
plastered over in that way, or in any way.  He was face to face with
God alone, in utter weakness, in utter nakedness of soul, He cried to
God himself.  There was the lesson.

God took away from him all things, that he might have no one to cry
to but God.

God took him up, and cast him down:  and there he sat all alone,
astonished and confounded, like Rizpah, the daughter of Aiah, when
she sat alone upon the parching rock.  Like Rizpah, he watched the
dead corpses of all his hopes and plans, all for which he had lived,
and which made life worth having, withering away there by his side.
But it was told David what Rizpah, the daughter of Aiah, had done.
And it is told to one greater than David, even to Jesus Christ, the
Son of David, what the poor soul does when it sits alone in its
despair.  Or rather it need not be told him; for he sees all, weeps
over all, will comfort all:  and it shall be to that poor soul as it
was to poor deserted Hagar in the sandy desert, when the water was
spent in the bottle, and she cast her child--the only thing she had
left--under one of the shrubs and hurried away; for she said, 'Let me
not see the child die.'  And the angel of the Lord called to her out
of heaven, saying, 'The Lord hath heard the voice of the lad where he
is;' and God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water.

It shall be with that poor soul as it was with Moses, when he went up
alone into the mount of God, and fasted forty days and forty nights
amid the earthquake and the thunderstorm, and the rocks which melted
before the Lord.  And behold, when it was past, he talked face to
face with God, as a man talketh with his friend, and his countenance
shone with heavenly light, when he came down triumphant out of the
mount of God.

So shall it be with every soul of man who, being in the deep, cries
out of that deep to God, whether in bloody India or in peaceful
England.  For He with whom we have to do is not a tyrant, but a
Father; not a taskmaster, but a Giver and a Redeemer.  We may ask him
freely, as David does, to consider our complaint, because he will
consider it well, and understand it, and do it justice.  He is not
extreme to mark what is done amiss, and therefore we can abide his
judgments.  There is mercy with him, and therefore it is worth while
to fear him.  He waits for us year after year, with patience which
cannot tire; therefore it is but fair that we should wait a while for
him.  With him is plenteous redemption, and therefore redemption
enough for us, and for those likewise whom we love.  He will redeem
us from all our sins:  and what do we need more?  He will make us
perfect, even as our Father in heaven is perfect.  Let him then, if
he must, make us perfect by sufferings.  By sufferings Christ was
made perfect; and what was the best path for Jesus Christ is surely
good enough for us, even though it be a rough and a thorny one.  Let
us lie still beneath God's hand; for though his hand be heavy upon
us, it is strong and safe beneath us too; and none can pluck us out
of his hand, for in him we live and move and have our being; and
though we go down into hell with David, with David we shall find God
there, and find, with David, that he will not leave our souls in
hell, or suffer his holy ones to see corruption.  Yes; have faith in
God.  Nothing in thee which he has made shall see corruption; for it
is a thought of God's, and no thought of his can perish.  Nothing
shall be purged out of thee but thy disease; nothing shall be burnt
out of thee but thy dross; and that in thee shall be saved, and live
to all eternity, of which God said at the beginning, Let us make man
in our own image.  Yes.  Have faith in God; and say to him once for
all, 'Though thou slay me, yet will I love thee; for thou lovedst me
in Jesus Christ before the foundation of the world.'



SERMON IX.  THE LOVE OF GOD ITS OWN REWARD



DEUT. xxx. 19, 20.

I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have
set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose
life that both thou and thy seed may live; that thou mayest love the
Lord thy God, and that thou mayest cleave unto him, for he is thy
life and the length of thy days, that thou mayest dwell in the land
which the Lord God sware unto thy fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
to give them.

I spoke to you last Sunday on this text.  But there is something more
in it, which I had not time to speak of then.

Moses here tells the Israelites what will happen to them if they keep
God's law.

They will love God.  That was to be their reward.  They were to have
other rewards beside.  Beside loving God, it would be well with them
and their children, and they would live long in the land which God
had given them.  But their first reward, their great reward, would be
that they would love God.

If they obeyed God, they would have reason to love him.

Now we commonly put this differently.

We say, If you love God, you will obey him; which is quite true.  But
what Moses says is truer still, and deeper still.  Moses says, If you
obey God, you will love him.

Again we say, If you love God, God will reward you; which is true;
though not always true in this life.  But Moses says a truer and
deeper thing.  Moses says that loving God is our reward; that the
greatest reward, the greatest blessing which a man can have, is this-
-that the man should love God.  Now does this seem strange?  It is
not strange, nevertheless.

For there are two sorts of faith; and one must always, I sometimes
think, come before the other.

The first is implicit faith--blind faith--the sort of faith a child
has in what its parents tell it.  A child, we know, believes its
parents blindly, even though it does not understand what they tell
it.  It takes for granted that they are right.

The second is experimental faith--the faith which comes from
experience and reason, when a man looks back upon his life, and on
God's dealings with him; and then sees from experience what reason he
has for trusting and loving God, who has helped him onward through so
many chances and changes for so many years.

Now some people cry out against blind implicit faith, as if it was
childish and unreasonable.  But I cannot.  I think every one learns
to love his neighbour, very much as Moses told the Jews they would
learn to love God; namely, by trusting them somewhat blindly at
first.

Is it not so?  Is it not so always with young people, when they begin
to be fond of each other?  They trust each other, they do not know
why, or how.  Before they are married, they have little or no
experience of each other; of each other's tempers and characters:
and yet they trust each other, and say in their hearts, 'He can never
be false to me;' and are ready to put their honour and fortunes into
each other's hands, to live together for better for worse, till death
them part.  It is a blind faith in each other, that, and those who
will may laugh at it, and call it the folly and rashness of youth.  I
do not believe that God laughs at it:  that God calls it folly and
rashness.  It surely comes from God.

For there is something in each of them worth trusting, worth loving.
True, they may be disappointed in each other; but they need not be.
If they are true to themselves; if they will listen to the better
voice within, and be true to their own better feelings, all will be
well, and they will find after marriage that they did not do a rash
and a foolish thing, when they gave up themselves to each other, and
cast in their lot together blindly to live and die.

And then, after that first blind faith and love in each other which
they had before marriage, will come, as the years roll by, a deeper,
sounder faith and love from experience.--An experience of which I
shall not talk here; for those who have not felt it for themselves
would not know what I mean; and those who have felt it need no clumsy
words of mine to describe it to them.

Now, my dear friends, this is one of the things by which marriage is
consecrated to an excellent mystery, as the Prayer-book says.  This
is one of the things in which marriage is a pattern and picture of
the spiritual union which is between Christ and his Church.

First, as I said, comes blind faith.  A young person, setting out in
life, has little experience of God's love; he has little to make him
sure that the way of life, and honour, and peace, is to obey God's
laws.  But he is told so.  His Bible tells him so.  Wiser and older
people than he tell him so, and God himself tells him so.  God
himself makes up in the young person's heart a desire after goodness.

Then he takes it for granted blindly.  He says to himself, I can but
try.  They tell me to taste and see whether the Lord is gracious.  I
will taste.  They tell me that the way of his commandments is the way
to make life worth loving, and to see good days.  I will try.  And so
the years go by.  The young person has grown middle-aged, old.  He or
she has been through many trials, many disappointments; perhaps more
than one bitter loss.  But if they have held fast by God; if they
have tried, however clumsily, to keep God's law, and walk in God's
way, then there will have grown up in them a trust in God, and a love
for God, deeper and broader far than any which they had in youth; a
love grounded on experience.  They can point back to so many
blessings which the Lord gave them unexpectedly; to so many sorrows
which the Lord gave them strength to bear, though they seemed at
first sight past bearing; to so many disappointments which seemed ill
luck at the time, and yet which turned out good for them in the end.
And so comes a deep, reasonable love to their Heavenly Father.  Now
they have TASTED that the Lord is gracious.  Now they can say, with
the Samaritans, 'Now we believe, not because of thy saying, but
because we have heard him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the
Christ, the Saviour of the world.'  And when sadness and affliction
come on them, as it must come, they can look back, and so get
strength to look forward.  They can say with David, 'I will go on in
the strength of the Lord God.  I will make mention only of his
righteousness.  Oh my God, thou hast taught me from my youth up until
now; hitherto have I declared thy wondrous works.  Now also, when I
am old and grey-headed, oh Lord, forsake me not, till I have showed
thy strength unto this generation, and thy power to those whom I
leave behind me.'

And so, by remembering what God HAS been to them, they can face what
is coming.  'They will not be afraid of evil tidings,' as David says;
'for their heart is fixed, trusting in the Lord.'

And when old age comes, and brings weakness and sickness, and low
spirits, still they have comfort.  They can say with David again, 'I
have been young, and now am old, but never saw I the righteous
forsaken, nor his seed begging their bread.'

Oh my dear friends, young people especially--there are many things
which you may long for which you cannot have:  much happiness which
is NOT within your reach.  But THIS you can have, if you will but
long for it:  this happiness IS within your reach, if you will but
put out your hand and take it.--The everlasting unfailing comfort of
loving God, and of knowing that God loves you.  Oh choose that now at
once.  Choose God's ways which are pleasantness, and God's paths
which are peace; and then in your old age, whether you become rich or
poor, whether you are left alone, or go down to your grave in peace
with children and grandchildren to close your eyes, you will still
have the one great reward, the true reward, the everlasting reward
which Moses promised the old Israelites.  You will have reason to
love God, who has carried you safe through life, and will carry you
safe through death, and to say with all his saints and martyrs, 'Many
things I know not; and many things I have lost:  but this I know.--I
know in whom I have believed; and this I cannot lose; even God
himself, whose name is faithful and true.'



SERMON X.  THE RACE OF LIFE



JOHN i. 26.

There standeth one among you whom ye know not.

This is a solemn text.  It warns us, and yet it comforts us.  It
tells us that there is a person standing among us so great, that John
the Baptist, the greatest of the prophets, was not worthy to unloose
his shoes' latchet.

Some of you know who he is.  Some of you, perhaps, do not.  If you
know him, you will be glad to be reminded of him to-day.  If you do
not know him, I will tell you who he is.

Only bear this in mind, that whether you know him or not, he is
standing among us.  We have not driven him away, and cannot drive him
away.  Our not seeing him will not prevent his seeing us.  He is
always near us; ready, if we ask him, as the Collect bids us, to
'come among us, and with great might succour us.'

For, my friends, this is the meaning of the text, as far as it has to
do with us.  The noble Collect for to-day tells this, and explains to
us what we are to think of the Epistle and the Gospel.

The Epistle tells us that the Lord Jesus Christ is at hand, and that
therefore we are to fret about nothing, but make our requests known
to him.  The Gospel tells us that he stands among us.  The Collect
tells us what we are to do, because he is at hand, because he stands
among us.

And what are we to do?

Recollect my friends, what John the Baptist said, according to St.
Matthew, after the words in the text--'He shall baptize you with the
Holy Ghost, and with fire.'

The Collect asks him to do that--the first half of it at least.  To
baptize us with the Holy Ghost, lest he should need to baptize us
with fire.

For the Collect says, we have all a race to run.  We have all a
journey to make through life.  We have all so to get through this
world, that we shall inherit the world to come; so to pass through
the things of time (as one of the Collects says) that we finally lose
not the things eternal.  God has given each of us our powers and
character, marked out for each of us our path in life, set each of us
our duty to do.

But how shall we make the proper use of our powers?

How shall we keep to our path in life?

How shall we do our duty faithfully?

In short, so as St. Paul puts it--How shall we run our race, so as
not to lose, but to win it?

For the Collect says--and we ought to have found it out for ourselves
before now--Our sins and wickedness hinder us sorely in running the
race which is set before us.

Our sins and wickedness.  The Collect speaks of these as two
different things; and I believe rightly, for the New Testament speaks
of them as two different things.  Sin, in the New Testament, means
strictly what we call "failings," "defects" a missing the mark, a
falling short; as it is written--All have sinned, and come short of
the glory of God, that is, of the likeness of a perfect man.  {75}

Thus, stupidity, laziness, cowardice, bad temper, greediness after
pleasure--these are strictly speaking what the New Testament calls
sins.  Wickedness--iniquity--seem to be harder words, and to mean
worse offences.  They mean the evil things which a man does, not out
of the weakness of his mortal nature, but out of his own wicked will,
and what the Bible calls the naughtiness of his heart.  So wickedness
means, not merely open crimes which are punishable by the law, but
all which comes out of a man's own wilfulness and perverseness--
injustice (which is the first meaning of iniquity), cunning,
falsehood, covetousness, pride, self-conceit, tyranny, cruelty--these
seem to be what the Scripture calls wickedness.  Of course one cannot
draw the line exactly, in any matters so puzzling as questions about
our own souls must always be:  but on the whole.  I think you will
find this rule not far wrong -

That all which comes from the weakness of a man's soul, is sin:  all
which comes from abusing its strength, is wickedness.  All which
drags a man down, and makes him more like a brute animal, is sin:
all which puffs him up, and makes him more like a devil, is
wickedness.  It is as well to bear this in mind, because a man may
have a great horror of sin, and be hard enough, and too hard upon
poor sinners; and yet all the time he may be thoroughly, and to his
heart's core, a wicked man.  The Pharisees of old were so.  So they
are now.  Take you care that you be not like to them.  Keep clear of
sin:  but keep clear of wickedness likewise.

For, says the Collect, both will hinder you in your race:  perhaps
cause you to break down in it, and never reach the goal at all.

Sin will hinder you, by dragging you back.

Wickedness will hinder you, by putting you altogether out of the
right road.

If a man be laden with sins; stupid, lazy, careless, over fond of
pleasure;--much more, if he be given up to enjoying himself in bad
ways, about which we all know too well--then he is like a man who
starts in a race, weak, crippled, over-weighted, or not caring
whether he wins or loses; and who therefore lags behind, or grows
tired, or looks round, and wants to stop and amuse himself, instead
of pushing on stoutly and bravely.  And therefore St. Paul bids us
lay aside every weight (that is every bad habit which makes us lazy
and careless), and the sin which does so easily beset us, and run
with patience our appointed race, looking to Jesus, the author of our
faith--who stands by to give us faith, confidence, courage to go on--
Jesus, who has compassion on those who are ignorant, and out of the
way by no wilfulness of their own; who can be touched with the
feeling of our infirmities; who can help us, can deliver us, and who
will do what he can, and do all he can.

He can and will strengthen us, freshen us, encourage us, inspirit us,
by giving us his Holy Spirit, that we may have spirit and power to
run our race, day by day, and tide by tide.  And so, if he sees us
weak and fainting over our work, he will baptize us with the Holy
Ghost.

And yet there are times when he will baptize a sinner not only with
the Holy Ghost, but with fire--I am still speaking, mind, of a
sinner, not of a wicked man.

And when?  When he sees the man sitting down by the roadside to play,
with no intention of moving on.  I do not say--if he sees the man
sitting down to play at all.  God forbid!  How can a man run his
life-long race--how can he even keep up for a week, a day, at doing
his best at the full stretch of his power, without stopping to take
breath?  I cannot, God knows.  If any man can--be it so.  Some are
stronger than others:  but be sure of this; that God counts it no sin
in a man to stop and take breath.  'Press forward toward the mark of
your high calling,' St. Paul says:  but he does not forbid a man to
refresh and amuse himself harmlessly and rationally, from time to
time, with all the pleasant things which God has put into this world.
They do refresh us, and they do amuse us, these pleasant things.  And
God made them, and put them here.  Surely he put them here to refresh
and amuse us.  He did not surely put them here to trap us, and snare
us, and tempt us not to run the very race which he himself has set
before us?  No, no, my friends.  He made pleasant things to please
us, amusing things to amuse us.  Every good gift comes from him.

But if a man thinks of nothing but amusing himself, he is like a
horse who stands still in the middle of a journey, and begins
feeding.  Let him do his day's journey, and feed afterwards; and so
get strength for his next day's work.  But if he will stand still,
and feed; if he will forget that he has any work at all to do; then
we shall punish him, to make him go on.  And so will God do with us.
He will strike us then; and sharply too.  Much more, if a man gives
himself up to sinful pleasure; if he gives himself up to a loose and
profligate life, and, like many a young man, wastes his substance in
riotous living, and devours his heavenly Father's gifts with harlots-
-then God will strike that man; and all the more sharply the more
worth and power there is in the man.  The more God has given the man,
the sharper will be God's stroke, if he deserves it.

And why?

Ask yourselves.  Suppose that your horse had plunged into a deep
ditch, and was lying there in mire and thorns; would you not strike
him, and sharply too, to make him put out his whole strength, and
rise, and by one great struggle clear himself?

Of course you would:  and the more spirited, the more powerful the
animal was, the sharper you would be with him, because the more sure
you would be that he could answer to your call if he chose.

Even so does God with us.  If he sees us lying down; forgetting
utterly that we have any work or duty to do; and wallowing in the
mire of fleshly lusts, and thorns of worldly cares, then he will
strike; and all the more sharply, the more real worth or power there
is in us; that he may rouse us, and force us to exert ourselves and
by one great struggle, like the mired horse, clear ourselves out of
the sin which besets us, and holds us down, and leap, as it were,
once and for all, out of the death of sin, into the life of
righteousness.

But much more if there be not merely sin in us, but wickedness; self-
will, self-conceit, and rebellion.

For see, my friends.  If we were training a young animal, how should
we treat it?  If it were merely weak, we should strengthen and
exercise it.  If it were merely ignorant, we should teach it.  If it
were lazy, we should begin to punish it; but gently, that it might
still have confidence, faith in us, and pleasure in its work.

But if we found wickedness in it--vice, as we rightly call it--if it
became restive, that is, rebellious and self-willed, then we should
punish it indeed.  Seldom, perhaps, but very sharply; that it might
see clearly that we were the stronger, and that rebellion was of no
use at all.

And so does the Lord with us, my friends.  If we will not go his way
by kindness, he will make us go by severity.

First, when we are christened, and after that day by day, if we ask
him--and often when we ask him not--he gives us the gentle baptism of
his Holy Spirit, freshening, strengthening, encouraging, inspiriting.
But if we will not go on well for that; if we will rebel, and try our
own way, and rush out of God's road after this and that, in pride and
self-will, as if we were our own masters; then, my friends--then will
God baptize us with fire, and strike with a blow which goes nigh to
cut a man in two.  Very seldom he strikes; for he is pitiful, and of
tender mercy:  but with a rod as of fire, of which it is written,
that it is sharper than a two-edged sword, and pierces through the
joints and marrow.  Very seldom:  but very sharply, that there may be
no mistake about what the blow means, and that the man may know,
however cunning, or proud, or self-righteous he may be, that God is
the Lord, God is his Master, and will be obeyed; and woe to him, if
he obey him not.  And what can a man do then, but writhe in the
bitterness of his soul, and get back into God's highway as fast as he
can, in fear and trembling lest the next blow cut him in asunder?
And so, by the bitterness of disappointment, or bereavement, or
sickness, or poverty, or worst of all, of shame, will the Lord
baptize the man with fire.

But all in love, my friends; and all for the man's good.  Does God
LIKE to punish his creatures? LIKE to torment them?  Some think that
he does, and say that he finds what they call 'satisfaction' in
punishing.  I think that they mistake the devil for God.  No, my
friends; what does he say himself?  'Have I any pleasure in the death
of the wicked; and not rather that he should turn from his ways, and
live?'  Surely he has not.  If he had, do you think that he would
have sent us into this world at all?  I do not.  And I trust and hope
that you will not.  Believe that even when he cuts us to the heart's
core, and baptizes us with fire, he does it only out of his eternal
love, that he may help and deliver us all the more speedily.

For God's sake--for Christ's sake--for your own sake--keep that in
mind, that Christ's will, and therefore God's will, is to help and
deliver us; that he stands by us, and comes among us, for that very
purpose.  Consider St. Paul's parable, in which he talks of us as men
running a race, and of Christ as the judge who looks on to see how we
run.  But for what purpose does Christ look on?  To catch us out, as
we say?  To mark down every fault of ours, and punish wherever he has
an opportunity or a reason?  Does he stand there spying, frowning,
fault-finding, accusing every man in his turn, extreme to watch what
is done amiss?  If an earthly judge did that, we should call him--
what he would be--an ill-conditioned man.  But dare we fancy anything
ill-conditioned in God?  God forbid!  His conditions are altogether
good, and his will a good will to men; and therefore, say the Epistle
and the Collect, we ought not to be terrified, but to rejoice, at the
thought that the Lord is looking on.  However badly we are running
our race, yet if we are trying to move forward at all, we ought to
rejoice that God in Christ is looking on.

And why?

Why?  Because he is looking on, not to torment, but to help.  Because
he loves us better than we love ourselves.  Because he is more
anxious for us to get safely through this world than we are
ourselves.

Will you understand that, and believe that, once for all, my
friends?--That God is not AGAINST you, but FOR you, in the struggles
of life; that he WANTS you to get through safe; WANTS you to succeed;
WANTS you to win; and that therefore he will help you, and hear your
cry.

And therefore when you find yourselves wrong, utterly wrong, do not
cry to this man or that man, 'Do YOU help me; do you set me a little
more right, before God comes and finds me in the wrong, and punishes
me.'  Cry to God himself, to Christ himself; ask HIM to lift you up,
ask him to set you right.  Do not be like St. Peter before his
conversion, and cry, 'Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord;
wait a little, till I have risen up, and washed off my stains, and
made myself somewhat fit to be seen.'--No.  Cry, 'Come quickly, O
Lord--at once, just because I am a sinful man; just because I am sore
let and hindered in running my race by my own sins and wickedness;
because I am lazy and stupid; because I am perverse and vicious,
THEREFORE raise up thy power, and come to me, thy miserable creature,
thy lost child, and with thy great might succour me.  Lift me up for
I have fallen very low; deliver me, for I have plunged out of thy
sound and safe highway into deep mire, where no ground is.  Help
myself I cannot, and if thou help me not, I am undone.'

Do so.  Pray so.  Let your sins and wickedness be to you not a reason
for hiding from Christ who stands by; but a reason, the reason of all
reasons, for crying to Christ who stands by.

And then, whether he deliver you by kind means or by sharp ones,
deliver you he will; and set your feet on firm ground, and order your
goings, that you may run with patience the race which is set before
you along the road of life, and the pathway of God's commandments,
wherein there is no death.

This, my friends, is one of the meanings of Advent.  This is the
meaning of the Collect, the Epistle, and the Gospel.--That God in
Christ stands by us, ready to help and deliver us; and that if we cry
to him even out of the lowest depth, he will hear our voice.  And
that then, when he has once put us into the right road again, and
sees us going bravely along it to the best of the power which he has
given us, he will fulfil to us his eternal promise, 'Thy sins--and
not only thy sins, but thine iniquities--I will remember no more.'



SERMON XI.  SELF-RESPECT AND SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS



PSALM vii. 8.

Give sentence for me, O Lord, according to my righteousness; and
according to the innocency that is in me.

Is this speech self-righteous?  If so, it is a bad speech; for self-
righteousness is a bad temper of mind; there are few worse.  If we
say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not
in us.  If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive
us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.  If we say
that we have not sinned, we make him a liar.

This is plain enough; and true as God is true.  But there is another
temper of mind which is right in its way; and which is not self-
righteousness, though it may look like it at first sight.  I mean the
temper of Job, when his friends were trying to prove to him that he
must be a bad man, and to make him accuse himself of all sorts of
sins which he had not committed; and he answered that he would utter
no deceit, and tell no lies about himself.  'Till I die I will not
remove mine integrity from me; my righteousness I will hold fast, and
will not let it go; my heart shall not reproach me as long as I
live.'  I have, on the whole, tried to be a good man, and I will not
make myself out a bad one.

For, my friends, with the Bible as with everything else, we must hear
both sides of the question, lest we understand neither side.

We may misuse St. John's doctrine, that if we say we have no sin, we
deceive ourselves.  We may deceive ourselves in the very opposite
way.

In the first place, some people, having learnt that it is right to
confess their sins, try to have as many sins as possible to confess.
I do not mean that they commit the sins, but that they try to fancy
they have committed them.  This is very common now, and has been for
many hundred years, especially among young women and lads who are of
a weakly melancholy temper, or who have suffered some great
disappointment.  They are fond of accusing themselves; of making
little faults into great ones; of racking their memories to find
themselves out in the wrong; of taking the darkest possible view of
themselves, and of what is going to happen to them.  They forget that
Solomon, the wise, when he says, 'Be not over-much wicked; neither be
thou foolish--why shouldst thou die before thy time?'--says also, 'Be
not righteous over-much; neither make thyself over-wise.  Why
shouldst thou destroy thyself?'

For such people do destroy themselves.  I have seen them kill their
own bodies, and die early, by this folly.  And I have seen them kill
their own souls, too, and enter into strong delusions, till they
believe a lie, and many lies, from which one had hoped that the Bible
would have delivered any and every man.

One cannot be angry with such people.  One can only pity them, and
pity them all the more, when one finds them generally the most
innocent, the very persons who have least to confess.  One can but
pity them, when one sees them applying to themselves God's warnings
against sins of which they never even heard the names, and fancying
that God speaks to them, as St. Paul says that he did to the old
heathen Romans, when they were steeped up to the lips in every crime.

No--one can do more than pity them.  One can pray for them that they
may learn to know God, and who he is:  and by knowing him, may be
delivered out of the hands of cunning and cruel teachers, who make a
market of their melancholy, and hide from them the truth about God,
lest the truth should make them free, while their teachers wish to
keep them slaves.

This is one misuse of St. John's doctrine.  There is another and a
far worse misuse of it.

A man may be proud of confessing his sins; may become self-righteous
and conceited, according to the number of the sins which he
confesses.

So deceitful is this same human heart of ours, that so it is I have
seen people quite proud of calling themselves miserable sinners.  I
say, proud of it.  For if they had really felt themselves miserable
sinners, they would have said less about their own feelings.  If a
man really feels what sin is--if he feels what a miserable, pitiful,
mean thing it is to be doing wrong when one knows better, to be the
slave of one's own tempers, passions, appetites--oh, if man or woman
ever knew the exceeding sinfulness of sin, he would hide his own
shame in the depths of his heart, and tell it to God alone, or at
most to none on earth save the holiest, the wisest, the trustiest,
the nearest and the dearest.

But when one hears a man always talking about his own sinfulness, one
suspects--and from experience one has only too much reason to
suspect--that he is simply saying in a civil way, 'I am a better man
than you; for I talk about my sinfulness, and you do not.'

For if you answer such a man, as old Job or David would have done, 'I
will not confess what I have not felt.  I have tried and am trying to
be an upright, respectable, sober, right-living man.  Let God judge
me according to the innocency that is in me.  I know that I am not
perfect:  no man is that:  but I will not cant; I will not be a
hypocrite; and if I accuse myself of sins which I have not committed,
it seems to me that I shall be mocking God, and deceiving myself.  I
will trust to God to judge me fairly, to balance between the good and
the evil which is in me, and deal with me accordingly.'

If you speak in that way, the other man will answer you plainly
enough, 'Ah! you are utterly benighted.  You are building on legality
and morality.  You have not yet learnt the first principles of the
Gospel.'  And with these, and other words, will give you to
understand this--That he thinks he is going to heaven, and you are
going to hell.

Now, my dear friends, you are partly right, and he is partly right.
St. Paul will show you where you are right and where he is right.  He
does so, I think, in a certain noble text of his in which he says, 'I
judge not mine own self; for I know nothing against myself, yet am I
not hereby justified:  but he that judgeth me is the Lord.'

Now remember that no man was less self-righteous than St. Paul.  No
man ever saw more clearly the sinfulness of sin.  No man ever put
into words so strongly the struggle between good and evil which goes
on in the human heart.  In one place, even, when speaking of his
former life, he calls himself the chief of sinners.  Yet St. Paul,
when he had done his duty, knew that he had done it, and was not
afraid to say--as no honest and upright man need be afraid to say--'I
know nothing against myself.'  For if you have done right, my friend,
it is God who has helped you to do it; and it is difficult to see how
you can honour God, by pretending instead that he has left you to do
wrong.

This, then, seems to be the rule.  If you have done wrong, be not
afraid to confess it.  If you have done right, be not afraid to
confess that either.  And meanwhile keep up your self-respect.  Try
to do your duty.  Try to keep your honour bright.  Let no man be able
to say that he is the worse for you.  Still more let no woman be able
to say that she is the worse for you; for if you treat another man's
daughter as you would not let him treat yours, where is your honour
then, or your clear conscience?  What cares man, what cares God, for
your professions of uprightness and respectability, if you take good
care to behave well to men, who can defend themselves, and take no
care to behave well to a poor girl, who cannot defend herself?
Recollect that when Job stood up for his own integrity, and would not
give up his belief that he was a righteous man, he took care to
justify himself in this matter, as well as on others.  'I made a
covenant with mine eyes,' he says; 'why then should I think upon a
maid?  If mine heart have been deceived by a woman; or if I have laid
wait at my neighbour's door;' 'Then,' he says in words too strong for
me to repeat, 'let others do to my wife as I have done to theirs.'

Avoid this sin, and all sins.  Let no man be able to say that you
have defrauded him, that you have tyrannized over him; that you have
neglected to do your duty by him.  Let no man be able to say that you
have rewarded him evil for evil.  If possible, let him not be able to
say that you have even lost your temper with him.  Be generous; be
forgiving.  If you have an opportunity, be like David, and help him
who without a cause is your enemy; and then you will have a right to
say, like David, 'Give sentence with me, O Lord, according to my
righteousness, and according to the cleanness of my hands in thy
sight.'

True--that will not justify you.  In God's sight shall no man living
be justified, if justification is to come by having no faults.  What
man is there who lives, and sins not?  Who is there among us, but
knows that he is not the man he might be?  Who does not know, that
even if he seldom does what he ought not, he too often leaves undone
what he ought?  And more than that--none of us but does many a really
wrong thing of which he never knows, at least in this life.  None of
us but are blind, more or less, to our own faults; and often blind--
God forgive us!--to our very worst faults.

Then let us remember, that he who judges us IS THE LORD.

Now is that a thought to be afraid of?

David did not think so, when he had done right.  For he says, in this
Psalm, 'Judge me, O Lord!'

And when he has done wrong, he thinks so still less; for then he asks
God all the more earnestly, not only to judge him, but to correct him
likewise.  'Purge me,' he says, 'and I shall be clean.  Cleanse thou
me from my secret faults, and make me to understand wisdom secretly.
For thou requirest truth in the inward parts.'

That is bravely spoken, and worthy of an honest man, who wishes above
all things to be right, whatsoever it may cost him.

But how did David get courage to ask that?

By knowing God, and who God was.

For this, my friends, is the key to the whole matter--as it is to all
matters--Who is God?

If you believe God to be a hard task-master, and a cruel being,
extreme to mark what is done amiss, an accuser like the devil,
instead of a forgiver and a Saviour, as he really is;--then you will
begin judging yourself wrongly and clumsily, instead of asking God to
judge you wisely and well.

You will break both of the golden rules which St. Anthony, the famous
hermit, used to give to his scholars.--'Regret not that which is
past; and trust not in thine own righteousness.'  For you will lose
time, and lose heart, in fretting over old sins and follies, instead
of confessing them once and for all to God, and going boldly to his
throne of grace to find mercy and grace to help you in the time of
need; that you may try again and do better for the future.  And so it
will be true of you--I am sure I have seen it come true of many a
poor soul--what David found, before he found out the goodness of
God's free pardon:- 'While I held my tongue, my bones waxed old
through my daily complaining.  For thy hand was heavy upon me night
and day; my moisture was like the drought in summer.'

And all that while (such contradictory creatures are we all), you may
be breaking St. Anthony's other golden rule, and trusting in your own
righteousness.

You will begin trying to cleanse yourself from little outside faults,
and fancying that that is all you have to do, instead of asking God
to cleanse you from your secret faults, from the deep inward faults
which he alone can see; forgetting that they are the root, and the
outside faults only the fruit.  And so you will be like a foolish
sick man, who is afraid of the doctor, and therefore tries to physic
himself.  But what does he do?  Only tamper and peddle with the
outside symptoms of his complaint, instead of going to the physician,
that he may find out and cure the complaint itself.  Many a man has
killed his own body in that way; and many a man more, I fear, has
killed his own soul, because he was afraid of going to the Great
Physician.

But if you will believe that God is good, and not evil; if you will
believe that the heavenly Father is indeed YOUR Father; if you will
believe that the Lord Jesus Christ really loves you, really died to
save you, really wishes to deliver you from your sins, and make you
what you ought to be, and what you can be:  then you will have heart
to do your duty; because you will be sure that God helps you to do
your duty.  You will have heart to fight bravely against your bad
habits, instead of fretting cowardly over them; because you know that
God is fighting against them for you.  You will not, on the other
hand, trust in your own righteousness; because you will soon learn
that you have no righteousness of your own:  but that all the good in
you comes from God, who works in you to will and to do of his good
pleasure.

And when you examine yourself, and think over your own life and
character, as every man ought to do, especially in Advent and Lent,
you will have heart to say, 'O God, thou knowest how far I am right,
and how far wrong.  I leave myself in thy hand, certain that thou
wilt deal fairly, justly, lovingly with me, as a Father with his son.
I do not pretend to be better than I am:  neither will I pretend to
be worse than I am.  Truly, I know nothing about it.  I, ignorant
human being that I am, can never fully know how far I am right, and
how far wrong.  I find light and darkness fighting together in my
heart, and I cannot divide between them.  But thou canst.  Thou
knowest.  Thou hast made me; thou lovest me; thou hast sent thy Son
into the world to make me what I ought to be; and therefore I believe
that he will make me what I ought to be.  Thou willest not that I
should perish, but come to the knowledge of the truth:  and therefore
I believe that I shall not perish, but come to the knowledge of the
truth about thee, about my own character, my own duty, about
everything which it is needful for me to know.  And therefore I will
go boldly on, doing my duty as well as I can, though not perfectly,
day by day; and asking thee day by day to feed my soul with its daily
bread.  Thou feedest my soul with ITS daily bread.  How much more
then wilt thou feed my mind and my heart, more precious by far than
my body?  Yes, I will trust thee for soul and for body alike; and if
I need correcting for my sins, I am sure at least of this, that the
worst thing that can happen to me or any man, is to do wrong and NOT
to be corrected; and the best thing is to be set right, even by hard
blows, as often as I stray out of the way.  And therefore I will take
my punishment quietly and manfully, and try to thank thee for it, as
I ought; for I know that thou wilt not punish me beyond what I
deserve, but far below what I deserve; and that thou wilt punish me
only to bring me to myself, and to correct me, and purge me, and
strengthen me.  For this I believe--on the warrant of thine own word
I believe it--undeserved as the honour is, that thou art my Father,
and lovest me; and dost not afflict any man willingly, or grieve the
children of men out of passion or out of spite; and that thou willest
not that I should be damned, nor any man; but willest have all men
saved, and come to the knowledge of the truth.



SERMON XII.  TRUE REPENTANCE



EZEKIEL xviii. 27.

When the wicked man turneth away from his wickedness which he hath
committed, and doeth that which is lawful and right, he shall save
his soul alive.

We hear a great deal about repentance, and how necessary it is for a
man to repent of his sins; for unless a man repent, he cannot be
forgiven.  But do we all of us really know what repentance means?

I sometimes fear not.  I sometimes fear, that though this text stands
at the opening of the Church service, and though people hear it as
often as any text in the whole Bible, yet they have not really learnt
the lesson which God sends them by it.

What, then, does repentance mean?

'Being sorry for what we have done wrong,' say some.

But is that all?  I suppose there are few wicked things done upon
earth, for which the doers of them are not sorry, sooner or later.  A
man does a wrong thing, and his conscience pricks him, and makes him
uneasy, and he says in his heart, 'I wish after all I had left that
alone.'  But the next time he is tempted to do the same thing, he
does it, and is ashamed of himself afterwards again:  but that is not
repentance.  I suppose that there have been few murders committed in
the world, after which sooner or later the murderer did not say in
his heart--'Ah, that that man were alive and well again!'  But that
is not repentance.

For aught I can tell, the very devil is sorry for his sin;--
discontented, angry with himself, ashamed of himself for being a
devil.  He may be so to all eternity, and yet never repent.  For the
dark uneasy feeling which comes over every man sooner or later, after
doing wrong, is not repentance; it is remorse; the most horrible and
miserable of all feelings, when it comes upon a man in its full
strength; the feeling of hating oneself, being at war with oneself,
and with all the world, and with God who made it.

But that will save no man's soul alive.  Repentance will save any and
every soul alive, then and there:  but remorse will not.  Remorse may
only kill him.  Kill his body, by making him, as many a poor creature
has done, put an end to himself in sheer despair:  and kill his soul
at least, by making him say in his heart, 'Well, if bad I am, bad I
must be.  I hate myself, and God hates me also.  All I can do is, to
forget my unhappiness if I can, in business, in pleasure, in drink,
and drive remorse out of my head;' and often a man succeeds in so
doing.  The first time he does a wrong thing, he feels sorry and
ashamed after it.  Then he takes courage after awhile, and does it
again; and feels less sorrow and shame; and so again and again, till
the sin becomes easier and easier to him, and his conscience grows
more and more dull; till at last perhaps, the feeling of its being
wrong quite dies within--and that is the death of his soul.

But of true repentance, it is written, that he who repents shall save
his soul ALIVE.  And how?

The word for repentance in Scripture means simply a change of mind.
To change one's mind is, in Scripture words, to repent.

Now if a man changes his mind, he changes his conduct also.  If you
set out to go to a place and change your mind, then you do not go
there.  If as you go on, you begin to have doubts about its being
right to go, or to be sorry that you are going, and still walk on in
the same road, however slowly or unwillingly, that is not changing
your mind about going.  If you do change your mind, you will change
your steps.  You will turn back, or turn off, and go some other road.

This may seem too simple to talk of.  But if it be, why do not people
act upon it?  If a man finds that in his way through life be is on
the wrong road, the road which leads to shame, and sorrow, and death
and hell, why will he confess that he is on the wrong road, and say
that he is very sorry (as perhaps he really may be) that he is going
wrong, and yet go on, and persevere on the wrong path?  At least, as
long as he keeps on the road which leads to ruin, he has not changed
his mind, or repented at all.  He may find the road unpleasant, full
of thorns, and briars, and pit-falls; for believe me, however broad
the road is which leads to destruction, it is only the GATE of it
which is easy and comfortable; it soon gets darker and rougher, that
road of sin; and the further you walk along it, the uglier and more
wretched a road it is:  but all the misery which it gives to a man is
only useless remorse, unless he fairly repents, and turns out of that
road into the path which leads to life.

Now the one great business of foolish man in all times has been to
save his soul (as he calls it) without doing right; to go to heaven
(as he calls it) without walking the road which leads to heaven.  It
is a folly and a dream.  For no man can get to heaven, unless he be
heavenly; and being heavenly is simply being good, and neither more
or less.  And sin is death, and no man can save his soul alive, while
it is dead in sin.  Still men have been trying to do it in all ages
and countries; and as soon as one plan has failed, they have tried
some new one; and have invented some false repentance which was to
serve instead of the true one.  The old Jews seem to have thought
that the repentance which God required was burnt-offerings and
sacrifices:  that if they could only offer bullocks and goats enough
on God's altar, he would forgive them their sins.  But David, and
Isaiah after him, and Ezekiel after him, found out that THAT was but
a dream; that that sort of repentance would save no man's soul; that
God did not require burnt-offerings and sacrifice for sin:  but
simply that a man should do right and not wrong.  'When ye come
before me,' saith the Lord, 'who has required this at your hand, to
tread my courts?'  They were to bring no more vain offerings:  but to
put away the evil of their doings; to cease to do evil, to learn to
do well; to seek justice, relieve the oppressed, judge the
fatherless, plead for the widow; and then, and then only, though
their sins were as scarlet, they should be white as snow.  For God
would take them for what they were--as good, if they were good; as
bad, if they were bad.  And this agrees exactly with the text.  'When
the wicked man turneth away from his wickedness which he hath
committed, and doeth that which is lawful and right, he shall save
his soul alive.'

The Papists again, thought that the repentance which God required,
was for a man to punish himself bitterly for his sins; to starve and
torture himself, to give up all that makes life pleasant, and so to
atone.  And good and pious men and women, with a real hatred and
horror of sin, tried this:  but they found that making themselves
miserable took away their sins no more than burnt-offerings and
sacrifices would do it.  Their consciences were not relieved; they
gained no feeling of comfort, no assurance of God's love.  Then they
said, 'I have not punished myself enough.  I have not made myself
miserable enough.  I will try whether more torture and misery will
not wipe out my sins.'  And so they tried again, and failed again,
and then tried harder still, till many a noble man and woman in old
times killed themselves piecemeal by slow torments, in trying to
atone for their sins, and wash out in their own blood what was
already washed out in the blood of Jesus Christ.  But on the whole,
that was found to be a failure.  And now the great mass of the
Papists have fallen back on the wretched notion that repentance
merely means confessing their sins to a priest, and receiving
absolution from him, and doing some little penance too childish to
speak of here.

But is there no false repentance among us English, too, my friends?
No paltry substitute for the only true repentance which God will
accept, which is, turning round and doing right?  How many there are,
who feel--'I am very wrong.  I am very sinful.  I am on the road to
hell.  I am quarrelling and losing my temper, and using bad
language.--Or--I am cheating my neighbour.  Or--I am living in
adultery and drunkenness:  I must repent before it is too late.'  But
what do they mean by repenting?  Coming as often as they can to
church or chapel, and reading all the religious books which they can
get hold of:  till they come, from often reading and hearing about
the Gospel promises, to some confused notion that their sins are
washed away in Christ's blood; or perhaps, on the strength of some
violent feelings, believe that they are converted all on a sudden,
and clothed with the robe of Christ's righteousness, and renewed by
God's Spirit, and that now they belong to the number of believers,
and are among God's elect.

Now, my dear friends, I complain of no one going to hear all the good
they can; I complain of no one reading all the religious books they
can:  but I think--and more, I know--that hearing sermons and reading
tracts may be, and is often, turned into a complete snare of the
devil by people who do not wish to give up their sins and do right,
but only want to be comfortable in their sins.

Hear sermons if you will; read good books if you will:  but bear in
mind, that you know already quite enough to lead you to REPENTANCE.
You need neither book nor sermon to teach you those ten commandments
which hang here over the communion table:  all that books and tracts
and sermons can do is to teach you how to KEEP those commandments in
spirit and in truth:  but I am sure I have seen people read books,
and run about to sermons, in order to enable them to forget those ten
commandments; in order to find excuses for not keeping them; and to
find doctrines which tell them, that because Christ has done all,
they need do nothing;--only FEEL a little thankfulness, and a little
sorrow for sin, and a little liking to hear about religion:  and call
that repentance, and conversion, and the renewal of the Holy Spirit.

Now, my dear friends, let me ask you as reasonable beings, Do you
think that hearing me or any man preach, can save your souls alive?
Do you think that sitting over a book for an hour a day, or all day
long, will save your souls alive?  Do you think that your sins are
washed away in Christ's blood, when they are there still, and you are
committing them?  Would they be here, and you doing them, if they
were put away?  Do you think that your sins can be put away out of
God's sight, if they are not even put out of your own sight?  If you
are doing wrong, do you think that God will treat you as if you were
doing right?  Cannot God see in you what you see in yourselves?  Do
you think a man can be clothed in Christ's righteousness at the very
same time that he is clothed in his own unrighteousness?  Can he be
good and bad at once?  Do you think a man can be converted--that is
turned round--when he is going on his old road the whole week?  Do
you think that a man has repented--that is, changed his mind--when he
is in just the same mind as ever as to how he shall behave to his
family, his customers, and everybody with whom he has to do?  Do you
think that a man is renewed by God's Spirit, when except for a few
religious phrases, and a little more outside respectability, he is
just the old man, the same character at heart he ever was?  Do you
think that there is any use in a man's belonging to the number of
believers, if he does not do what he believes; or any use in thinking
that God has elected and chosen him, when he chooses not to do what
God has chosen that every man must do, or die?

Be not deceived.  God is not mocked.  What a man sows, that shall he
reap.  Let no man deceive you.  He that doeth righteousness is
righteous, even as Christ is righteous, and no one else.

He who tries to do as Christ did, and he only, has Christ's
righteousness imputed to him, because he is trying to do what Christ
did, that which is lawful and right.  He who does righteousness, and
he only, has truly repented, changed his mind about what he should
do, and turned away from his wickedness which he has committed, and
is now doing that which is lawful and right.  He who does
righteousness, and he only, shall save his soul alive:  not by
feeling this thing, or believing about that thing, but by doing that
which is lawful and right.

We must face it, my dear friends.  We cannot deceive God:  and God
will certainly not deceive himself.  He sees us as we are, and takes
us for what we are.  What is right in us, he accepts for the
salvation of Jesus Christ, in whom we are created unto good works.
What is wrong in us, he will assuredly punish, and give us the exact
reward of the deeds done in the body, whether they be good or evil.
Every work of ours shall come into judgment, unless it be repented
of, and put away by the only true repentance--not doing the thing any
more.

God, I say, will judge righteous judgment, and take us as we are.

For the sake of Jesus the Lamb slain from the foundation of the
world, there is full, free, and perfect forgiveness for every sin,
when we give it up.  As soon as a man turns round, and, instead of
doing wrong, tries to do right, he need be under no manner of fear or
terror any more.  He is taken back into his Father's house as freely
and graciously as the prodigal son in the parable was.  Whatsoever
dark score there was against him in God's books is wiped out there
and then, and he starts clear, a new man, with a fresh chance of
life.  And whosoever tells him that the score is not wiped out, lies,
and contradicts flatly God's holy word.  But as long as a man does
NOT give up his sins, the dark score DOES stand against him in God's
books; and no praying, reading, devoutness of any kind will wipe it
out; and as long as he sins, he is still in his sins, and his sins
will be his ruin.  Whosoever tells him that they are wiped out, he
too lies, and contradicts flatly God's holy word.

For God is just, and true; and therefore God takes us for what we
are, and will do so to all eternity; and you will find it so, my
dearest friends.  In spite of all doctrines which men have invented,
and then pretended to find in the Bible, to drug men's consciences,
and confuse God's clear light in their hearts, you will find, now and
for ever, that if you do right you will be happy even in the midst of
sorrow; if you do wrong, you will be miserable even in the midst of
pleasure.  Oh believe this, my dear friends, and do not rashly count
on some sudden magical change happening to you as soon as you die to
make you fit for heaven.  There is not one word in the Bible which
gives us reason to suppose that we shall not be in the next world the
same persons which we have made ourselves in this world.  If we are
unjust here, we shall, for aught we know, or can know, try to be
unjust there; if we be filthy here, we shall be so there; if we be
proud here, we shall be so there; if we be selfish here, we shall be
so there.  What we sow here, we shall reap there.  And it is good for
us to know this, and face this.  Anything is good for us, however
unpleasant it may be, which drives us from the only real misery,
which is sin and selfishness, to the only true happiness, which is
the everlasting life of Christ; a pure, loving, just, generous,
useful life of goodness, which is the righteousness of Christ, and
the glory of Christ, and which will be our righteousness and our
glory also for ever:  but only if we live it; only if we be useful as
Christ was, generous as Christ was, just as Christ was, gentle as
Christ was, pure as Christ was, loving as Christ was, and so put on
Christ, not in name and in word, but in spirit and in truth, that
having worn Christ's likeness in this world, we may share his victory
over all evil in the life to come.



SERMON XIII.  THE LETTER AND THE SPIRIT



(Twelfth Sunday after Trinity.)

II COR. iii. 6.

God, who hath made us able ministers of the New Testament; not of the
letter, but of the Spirit:  for the letter killeth, but the Spirit
giveth life.

When we look at the Collect, Epistle, and Gospel for to-day one after
the other, we do not see, perhaps, what they have to do with each
other.  But they have to do with each other.  They agree with each
other.  They explain each other.  They all three tell us what God is
like, and what we are to believe about God, and why we are to have
faith in God.

The Collect tells of a God who is more ready to hear than we are to
pray; and is 'wont to give'--that is, usually, and as a matter of
course, every day and all day long, gives us--'more than either we
desire or deserve,' of a God who gives and forgives, abundant in
mercy.  It bids us, when we pray to God, remember that we are praying
to a perfectly bountiful, perfectly generous God.

Some people worship quite a different God to that.  They fancy that
God is hard; that he sits judging each man by the letter of the law;
watching and marking down every little fault which they commit;
extreme to mark what is done amiss; and that in the very face of
Scripture, which says that God is NOT extreme to mark what is done
amiss; for if he were, who could abide it?

Their notion of God is, that he is very like themselves; proud,
grudging, hard to be entreated, expecting everything from men, but
not willing to give without a great deal of continued asking and
begging, and outward reverence, and scrupulous fear lest he should be
offended unexpectedly at the least mistake; and they fancy, like the
heathen, that they shall be heard for their much speaking.  They
forget altogether that God is their Father, and knows what they need
before they ask, and their ignorance in asking, and has (as any
father fit to be called a father would have) compassion on their
infirmities.

There is a great deal of this lip-service, and superstitious
devoutness, creeping in now-a-days; a spirit of bondage unto fear.
St. Paul warns us against it, and calls it will-worship, and
voluntary humility.  And I tell you of it, that it is not Christian
at all, but heathen; and I say to you, as St. Paul bids me say, God,
who made the world, and all therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven
and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands; neither is
worshipped with men's hands, as though he needed anything, seeing
that he giveth to all life and breath, and all things.  For in him we
live and move, and have our being, and are the offspring--the
children--of God.

Away, then, with this miserable spirit of bondage and fear, which
insults that good God which it pretends to honour; and in spirit and
in truth, not with slavish crouchings and cringings, copied from the
old heathen, let us worship THE FATHER.

But this leads us to the Epistle.

St. Paul tells us how it is that God is wont to give us more than we
either desire or deserve:  because he is the Lord and Giver of life,
in whom all created things live and move and have their being.
Therefore in the Epistle he tells us of a Spirit which gives life.

But some may ask, 'What life?'

The Gospel answers that, and says, 'All life.'

It tells us that our Lord Christ cared not merely for the life of
men's souls, but for the life of their bodies.  That wherever he went
he brought with him, not merely health for men's souls by his
teaching, but health for their bodies by his miracles.  That when he
saw a man who was deaf and had an impediment in his speech, he sighed
over him in compassion; and did not think it beneath him to cure that
poor man of his infirmity, though it was no such very great one.

For he wished to show men that his heavenly Father cared for them
altogether, body as well as soul; that all health and strength
whatsoever came from him.

When we hear, therefore, of the Spirit giving life, we are not to
fancy that means only some high devout spiritual life, or that God's
Spirit has to do only with a few elect saints.  That may be a very
pleasant fancy for those who believe themselves to be the elect
saints; but the message of the Gospel is far wider and deeper than
that, or any other of vain man's narrow notions.  It tells us that
life--all life which we can see; all health, strength, beauty, order,
use, power of doing good work in God's earthly world, come from the
Spirit of God, just as much as the spiritual life which we cannot
see--goodness, amiableness, purity, justice, virtue, power of doing
work in God's heavenly world.  This latter is the higher life:  and
the former the lower, though good and necessary in its place:  but
the lower, as well as the higher, is life; and comes from the Spirit
of God, who gives life and breath to all things.

And now, perhaps, we may see what St. Paul meant, by his being a
minister 'not of the letter, but of the Spirit; for the letter
killeth, but the Spirit giveth life.'

Do you not see yet, my friends?  Then I will tell you.

If I were to get up in this pulpit, and preach the terrors of the
law, and the wrath of God, and hell fire:  if I tried to bind heavy
burdens on you, and grievous to be borne, crying--You MUST do this,
you MUST feel that, you MUST believe the other--while I having fewer
temptations and more education than you, touched not those burdens
with one of my fingers; if I tried to make out as many sins as I
could against you, crying continually, this was wrong, and that was
wrong, making you believe that God is always on the watch to catch
you tripping, and telling you that the least of your sins deserved
endless torment--things which neither I nor any man can find in the
Bible, nor in common justice, nor common humanity, nor elsewhere,
save in the lying mouth of the great devil himself;--or if I put into
your hands books of self-examination (as they are called) full of
long lists of sins, frightening poor innocents, and defiling their
thoughts and consciences, and making the heart of the righteous sad,
whom God has not made sad;--if I, in plain English, had my mouth full
of cursing and bitterness, threatening and fault-finding, and
distrustful, and disrespectful, and insolent language about you my
parishioners:  why then I might fancy myself a Christian priest, and
a minister of the Gospel, and a very able, and eloquent, and earnest
one; and might perhaps gain for myself the credit of being a
'searching preacher,' by speaking evil of people who are most of them
as good and better than I, and by taking a low, mean, false view of
that human nature which God made in his own image, and Christ
justified in his own man's flesh, and soul, and spirit; but instead
of being an able minister of the New Covenant, or of the Spirit of
God, I should be no such man, but the very opposite.

No.  I should be one of those of whom the Psalmist says, 'Their
mouths are full of cursing and bitterness'--and also, 'Their feet are
swift to shed blood.'

To shed blood; to kill with the letter which killeth; and your blood,
if I did succeed in killing your souls, would be upon my foolish
head.

For such preaching as that does kill.

It kills three things.

1.  It kills the Gospel.  It turns the good news of God into the very
worst news possible, and the ministration of righteousness into the
ministration of condemnation.

2.  It kills the souls of the congregation--or would kill them, if
God's wisdom and love were not stronger than his minister's folly and
hardness.  For it kills in them self-respect and hope, and makes them
say to themselves, 'God has made me bad, and bad I must be.  Let me
eat and drink, for to-morrow I die.  God requires all this of me, and
I cannot do it.  I shall not try to do it.  I shall take my chance of
being saved at last, I know not how.'  It frightens people away from
church, from religion, from the very thought of God.  It sets people
on spying out their neighbours' faults, on judging and condemning, on
fancying themselves righteous and despising others; and so kills in
them faith, hope, and charity, which are the very life of their
spirits.

3.  And by a just judgment, it kills the soul of the preacher also.
It makes him forget who he is, what God has set him to do; and at
last, even who God is.  It makes him fancy that he is doing God's
work, while he is simply doing the work of the devil, the slanderer
and accuser of the brethren; judging and condemning his congregation,
when God has said, 'Judge not and ye shall not be judged, condemn not
and ye shall not be condemned.'  It makes him at last like the false
God whom he has been preaching (for every man at last copies the God
in whom he believes), dark and deceiving, proud and cruel;--and may
the Lord have mercy upon his soul!

But I will tell you how I can be an able minister of the New
Testament, and of the Spirit who gives life.

If I say to you--and I do say it now, and will say it as long as I am
here--Trust God, because God is good; obey God, because God is good.

I preach to you the good God of the Collect, even your heavenly
Father; who needs not be won over or appeased by anything which you
can do, for he loves you already for the sake of his dear Son, whose
members you are.  He will not hear you the more for your much
speaking, for he knows your necessities before you ask, and your
ignorance in asking.  He will not judge you according to the letter
of Moses' law, or any other law whatsoever, but according to the
spirit of your longings and struggles after what is right.  He will
not be extreme to mark what you do amiss, but will help you to mend
it, if you desire to mend; setting you straight when you go wrong,
and helping you up when you fall, if only your spirit is struggling
after what is right.

This all-good heavenly Father I preach to you, and I say to you,
Trust HIM.

I preach to you a Spirit who is the Lord and Giver of life; who hates
death, and therefore wills not that you should die; who has given you
all the life you have, all health and strength of body, all wit and
power of mind, all right, pure, loving, noble feelings of heart and
spirit, and who is both able and willing to keep them alive and
healthy in you for ever.

This all-good Spirit of life I preach to you; and I say to you, Trust
HIM.

I preach to you a Son of God, who is the likeness of his Father's
glory, and the express image of his person; in order that by seeing
him and how good he is, you may see your heavenly Father, and how
good he is likewise; a Son of God who is your Saviour and your Judge;
who judges you that he may save you, and saves you by judging you;
who has all power given to him in heaven and earth, and declares that
almighty power most chiefly by showing mercy and pity; who, when he
was upon earth, made the deaf to hear, the lame to walk, the blind to
see; who ate and drank with publicans and sinners, and was the friend
of all mankind; a Son of God who has declared everlasting war against
disease, ignorance, sin, death, and all which makes men miserable.
Those are his enemies; and he reigns, and will reign, till he has put
all enemies under his feet, and there is nothing left in God's
universe but order and usefulness, health and beauty, knowledge and
virtue, in the day when God shall be all in all.

This all-good Son of God I preach to you, and I say to you, Trust
HIM, and obey him.  Obey him, not lest he should become angry and
harm you, like the false gods of the heathen, but because his
commandments are life; because he has made them for your good.

Oh! when will people understand that--that God has not made laws out
of any arbitrariness, but for our good?--That his commandments are
LIFE?  David of old knew as much as that.  Why do not we know more,
instead of knowing, most of us, much less?  It is simple enough, if
you will but look at it with simple minds.  God has made us; and if
he had not loved us, he would not have made us at all.  God has sent
us into the world; and if he had not loved us, he would not have sent
us into the world at all.  In him we live, and move, and have our
being, and are the offspring and children of God.  And therefore God
alone knows what is good for us; what is the good life, the
wholesome, the safe, the right, the everlasting life for us.  And he
sends his Son to tell us--This is the right life; a life like
Christ's; a life according to God's Spirit; and if you do not live
that life you will die, not only body but soul also, because you are
not living the life which God meant for you when he made you.  Just
as if you eat the wrong food, you will kill your bodies; so if you
think the wrong thoughts, and feel the wrong feelings, and therefore
do the wrong things, you will kill your own souls.  God will not kill
you; you will kill yourselves.  God grudges you nothing.  God does
not wish to hurt you, wish to punish you.  He wishes you to live and
be happy; to live for ever, and be happy for ever.  But as your body
cannot live unless it be healthy, so your soul cannot live unless it
be healthy.  And it cannot be healthy unless it live the right life.
And it cannot live the right life without the right spirit.  And the
only right spirit is the Spirit of God himself the Spirit of your
Father in heaven, who will make you, as children should be, like your
Father.

But that Spirit is not far from any of you.  In him you live, and
move, and have your being already.  Were he to leave you for a moment
you would die, and be turned again to your dust.  From him comes all
the good of body and soul which you have already.  Trust him for
more.  Ask him for more.  Go boldly to the throne of his grace,
remembering that it is a throne of GRACE, of kindness, tenderness,
patience, bountiful love, and wealth without end.  Do not think that
he is hard of hearing, or hard of giving.  How can he be?  For he is
the Spirit of the all-generous Father and of the all-generous Son,
and has given, and gives now; and delights to give, and delights to
be asked.  He is the charity of God; the boundless love by which all
things consist; and, like all love, becomes more rich by spending,
and glorifies himself by giving himself away; and has sworn by
himself--that is, by his own eternal and necessary character, which
he cannot alter or unmake--'This is the new covenant which I will
make with my people.  I will write my laws in their hearts, and in
their minds will I write them; and I will dwell with them, and be
their God.'

Oh, my friends, take these words to yourselves; and trust in that
good Father in heaven, whose love sent you into this world, and gave
you the priceless blessing of life; whose love sent his Son to show
you the pattern of life, and to redeem you freely from all your sins;
whose love sends his Spirit to give you the power of leading the
everlasting life, and will raise you up again, body and soul, to that
same everlasting life after death.  Trust him, for he is your Father.
Whatever else he is, he is that.  He has bid you call him that, and
he will hear you.  If you forget that he is your Father, you forget
him, and worship a false God of your own invention.  And whenever you
doubt; whenever the devil, or ignorant preachers, or superstitious
books, make you afraid, and tempt you to fancy that God hates you,
and watches to catch you tripping, take refuge in that blessed name,
and say, 'Satan, I defy thee; for the Almighty God of heaven is my
Father.'



SERMON XIV.  HEROES AND HEROINES
(Whitsunday.)



PSALM xxxii. 8.

I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go:
I will guide thee with mine eye.

This is God's promise; which he fulfilled at sundry times and in
different manners to all the men of the old world who trusted in him.
He informed them; that is, he put them into right form, right shape,
right character, and made them the men which they were meant to be.
He taught them in the way in which they ought to go.  He guided them
where they could not guide themselves.

But God fulfilled this promise utterly and completely on the first
Whitsuntide, when the Holy Spirit came down on the apostles.

That was an extraordinary and special gift; because the apostles had
to do an extraordinary and special work.  They had to preach the
Gospel to all nations, and therefore they wanted tongues with which
to speak to all nations; at least to those of their countrymen who
came from foreign parts, and spoke foreign tongues, that they might
carry home the good news of Christ into all lands.  And they wanted
tongues of fire, too, to set their own hearts on fire with divine
zeal and earnestness, and to set on fire the hearts of those who
heard them.

But that was an extraordinary gift.  There was never anything like it
before; nor has been, as far as we know, since; because it has not
been needed.

It is enough for us to know, that the apostles had what they needed.
God called and sent them to do a great work:  and therefore, being
just and merciful, he gave them the power which was wanted for that
great work.

But if that is a special case; if there has been nothing like it
since, what has Whitsuntide to do with us?  We need no tongues of
fire, and we shall have none on this Whitsunday or any Whitsunday.
Has Whitsunday then no blessing for us?  Do we get nothing by it?
God forbid, my friends.

We get what the apostles got, and neither more nor less; though not
in the same shape as they did.

God called them to do a work:  God calls us, each of us, to do some
work.

God gave them the Holy Spirit to make them able to do their work.
God gives US the Holy Spirit, to make us able to do OUR work,
whatsoever that may be.

As their day, so their strength was:  as our day is, so our strength
shall be.

For instance. -

How often one sees a person--a woman, say--easy and comfortable,
enjoying life, and taking little trouble about anything, because she
has no need.  And when one looks at such a woman, one is apt to say
hastily in one's heart, 'Ah, she does not know what sorrow is--and
well for her she does not; for she would make but a poor fight if
trouble came on her; she would make but a poor nurse if she had to
sit months by a sick bed.  She would become down-hearted, and
peevish, and useless.  There is no strength in her to stand in the
evil day.'

And perhaps that woman would say so of herself.  She might be
painfully afraid of the thought of affliction; she might shrink from
the notion of having to nurse any one; from having to give up her own
pleasure and ease for the sake of others; and she would say of
herself, as you say of her, 'What would become of me if sorrow came?
_I_ have no strength to stand in the evil day.'

Yes, my friends, and you say true, and she says true.  And yet not
true either.  She has no strength to stand:  but she will stand
nevertheless, for God is able to make her stand.  As her day, so her
strength shall be.  A day of suffering, anxiety, weariness, all but
despair may come to her.  But in that day she shall be baptized with
the Holy Spirit and with fire; and then you shall be astonished, and
she shall be astonished, at what she can do, and what she can endure;
because God's Spirit will give her a right judgment in all things,
and enable her, even in the midst of her sorrow, to rejoice in his
holy comfort.  And people will call her--those at least who know her-
-a 'heroine.'  And they speak truly and well, and give her the right
and true name.  Why, I will tell you presently.

Or how often it happens to a man to be thrown into circumstances
which he never expected.  An officer, perhaps, in war time in a
foreign land--in India now.  He has a work to do:  a heavy,
dangerous, difficult, almost hopeless work.  He does not like it.  He
is afraid of it.  He wishes himself anywhere but where he is.  He has
little or no hope of succeeding; and if he fails, he fears that he
will be blamed, misunderstood, slandered.  But he feels he must go
through with it.  He cannot turn back; he cannot escape.  As the
saying is, the bull is brought to the stake, and he must bide the
baiting.

At first, perhaps, he tries to buoy himself up.  He begins his work
in a little pride and self-conceit, and notion of his own courage and
cunning.  He tries to fancy himself strong enough for anything.  He
feeds himself up with the thought of what people will say of him; the
hope of gaining honour and praise:  and that is not altogether a
wrong feeling--God forbid!

But the further the man gets into his work, the more difficult it
grows, and the more hopeless he grows.  He finds himself weak, when
he expected to be strong; puzzled when he thought himself cunning.
He is not sure whether he is doing right.  He is afraid of
responsibility.  It is a heavy burden on him, too heavy to bear.  His
own honour and good name may depend upon a single word which he
speaks.  The comfort, the fortune, the lives of human beings may
depend on his making up his mind at an hour's notice to do exactly
the right thing at the right time.  People round him may be mistaking
him, slandering him, plotting against him, rebelling against him,
even while he is trying to do them all the good he can.  Little
comfort does he get then from the thought of what people at home may
say of him.  He is set in the snare, and he cannot find his way out.
He is at his own wits' end; and from whence shall he get fresh wits?
Who will give him a right judgment in all things?  Who will give him
a holy comfort in which he can rejoice?--a comfort which will make
him cheerful, because he knows it is a right comfort, and that he is
doing right?  His heart is sinking within him, getting chill and cold
with despair.  Who will put fresh fire and spirit into it?

God will.  When he has learnt how weak he is in himself, how stupid
he is in himself;--ay, bitter as it is to a brave man to have to
confess it, how cowardly he is in himself--then, when he has learnt
the golden lesson, God will baptize him with the Holy Ghost and with
fire.

A time will come to that man, when, finding no help in himself, no
help in man, he will go for help to God.

Old words which he learnt at his mother's knee come back to him--old
words that he almost forgot, perhaps, in the strength and gaiety of
his youth and prosperity.  And he prays.  He prays clumsily enough,
perhaps.  He is not accustomed to praying; and he hardly knows what
to ask for, or how to ask for it.  Be it so.  In that he is not so
very much worse off than others.  What did St. Paul say, even of
himself?  'We know not how to ask for anything as we ought:  but the
Spirit maketh intercession for us with groanings that cannot be
uttered'--too deep for words.  Yes, in every honest heart there are
longings too deep for words.  A man knows he wants something:  but
knows not what he wants.  He cannot find the right words to say to
God.  Let him take comfort.  What he does not know, the Holy Spirit
of Whitsuntide--the Spirit of Jesus Christ--does know.  Christ knows
what we want, and offers our clumsy prayers up to our heavenly
Father, not in the shape in which we put them, but as they ought to
be, as we should like them to be; and our Father hears them.

Yes.  Our Father hears the man who cries to him, however clumsily,
for light and strength to do his duty.  So it is; so it has been
always; so it will be to the end.  And then as the man's day, so his
strength will be.  He may be utterly puzzled, utterly down-hearted,
utterly hopeless:  but the day comes to him in which he is baptized
with the Holy Ghost and with fire.  He begins to have a right
judgment; to see clearly what he ought to do, and how to do it.  He
grows more shrewd, more prompt, more steady than he ever has been
before.  And there comes a fire into his heart, such as there never
was before; a spirit and a determination which nothing can daunt or
break, which makes him bold, cheerful, earnest, in the face of the
anxiety and danger which would have, at any other time, broken his
heart.  The man is lifted up above himself, and carried on through
his work, he hardly knows how, till he succeeds nobly, or if he
fails, fails nobly; and be the end as it may, he gets the work done
which God has given him to do.

And then when he looks back, he is astonished at himself.  He wonders
how he could dare so much; wonders how he could endure so much;
wonders how the right thought came into his head at the right moment.
He hardly knows himself again.  It seems to him, when he thinks over
it all, like a grand and awful dream.  And the world is astonished at
him likewise.  They cry, 'Who would have thought there was so much in
this man? who would have expected such things of him?'  And they call
him a hero--and so he is.

Yes, the world is right, more right than it thinks in both sayings.
Who would have expected there was so much in the man?  For there was
not so much in him, till God put it there.

And again they are right, too; more right than they think in calling
that man a hero, or that woman a heroine.

For what is the old meaning, the true meaning of a hero or a heroine?

It meant--and ought to mean--one who is a son or a daughter of God,
and whom God informs and strengthens, and sends out to do noble work,
teaching them the way wherein they should go.  That was the right
meaning of a hero and of a heroine even among the old heathens.  Let
it mean the same among us Christians, when we talk of a hero; and let
us give God the glory, and say--There is a man who has entered, even
if it be but for one day's danger and trial, into the blessings of
Whitsuntide and the power of God's Spirit; a man whom God has
informed and taught in the way wherein he should go.  May that same
God give him grace to abide herein all the days of his life!

Yes, my friends, may God give us all grace to under stand
Whitsuntide, and feed on the blessings of Whitsuntide; not merely
once in a way, in some great sorrow, great danger, great struggle,
great striving point of our lives; but every day and all day long,
and to rejoice in the power of his Spirit, till it becomes to us--
would that it could to-day become to us;--like the air we breathe;
till having got our life's work done, if not done perfectly, yet
still done, we may go hence to receive the due reward of our deeds.



SERMON XV.  THE MEASURE OF THE CROSS



EPHESIANS iii. 18, 19.

That ye may be able to comprehend with all saints, what is the
breadth and length and depth and height, and to know the love of
Christ, which passeth knowledge.

These words are very deep, and difficult to understand; for St. Paul
does not tell us exactly of what he is speaking.  He does not say
what it is, the breadth and length, and depth, and height of which we
are to comprehend and take in.  Only he tells us afterwards what will
come of our taking it in; we shall know the love of Christ.

And therefore many great fathers and divines, whose names there is no
need for me to tell you, but whose opinions we must always respect,
have said that what St. Paul is speaking of is, the Cross of Christ.

Of course they do not mean the wood of which the actual cross was
made.  They mean the thing of which the cross was a sign and token.

Now of what is the cross a token?

Of the love of Christ, which is the love of God.

But of what kind of love?

Not the love which is satisfied with sitting still and enjoying
itself, as long as nothing puts it out, and turns its love to anger--
what we call mere good nature and good temper; not that, not that, my
friends:  but love which will dare, and do, and yearn, and mourn;
love which cannot rest; love which sacrifices itself; love which will
suffer, love which will die, for what it loves;--such love as a
father has, who perishes himself to save his drowning child.

Now the cross of Christ is a token to us, that God's love to us is
like that:  a love which will dare anything, and suffer anything, for
the sake of saving sinful man.

And therefore it is, that from the earliest times the cross has been
the special sign of Christians.  We keep it up still, when we make
the sign of the cross on children's foreheads in baptism:  but we
have given up using the sign of the cross commonly, because it was
perverted, in old times, into a superstitious charm.  Men worshipped
the cross like an idol, or bits of wood which they fancied were
pieces of the actual cross, while they were forgetting what the cross
meant.  So the use of the cross fell into disrepute, and was put down
in England.

But that is no reason why we should forget what the cross meant, and
means now, and will mean for ever.  Indeed, the better Christians,
the better men we are, the more will Christ's cross fill us with
thoughts which nothing else can give us; thoughts which we are glad
enough, often, to forget and put away; so bitterly do they remind us
of our own laziness, selfishness, and love of pleasure.

But still, the cross is our sign.  It is God's everlasting token to
us, that he has told us Christians something about himself which none
of the wisest among the heathen knew; which infidels now do not know;
which nothing but the cross can teach to men.

There were men among the old heathens who believed in one God; and
some of them saw that he must be, on the whole, a good and a just
God.  But they could not help thinking of God (with very rare
exceptions) as a respecter of persons, a God who had favourites; and
at least, that he was a God who loved his friends, and hated his
enemies.  So the Mussulmans believe now.  So do the Jews; indeed, so
they did all along, though they ought to have known better; for their
prophets in the Old Testament told them a very different tale about
God's love.

But that was all they could believe--in a God who was not unjust or
wicked, but was at least hard, proud, unbending:  while the notion
that God could love his enemies, and bless those who used him
despitefully and persecuted him--much less die for his enemies--that
would have seemed to them impossible and absurd.  They stumbled at
the stumbling-block of the cross.  God, they thought, would do to men
as they did to him.  If they loved him, he would love them.  If they
neglected him, he would hate and destroy them.

But when the apostles preached the Gospel, the good news of Christ
crucified, they preached a very different tale; a tale quite new;
utterly different from any that mankind had ever heard before.

St. Paul calls it a mystery--a secret--which had been hidden from the
foundation of the world till then, and was then revealed by God's
Spirit; namely, this boundless love of God, shown by Christ's dying
on the cross.

And, he says, his great hope, his great business, the thing on which
his heart was set, and which God had sent him into the world to do,
was this--to make people know the love of Christ; to look at Christ's
cross, and take in its breadth, and length, and depth, and height.
It passes knowledge, he says.  We shall never know the whole of it--
never know all that God's love has done, and will do:  but the more
we know of it, the more blessed and hopeful, the more strong and
earnest, the more good and righteous we shall become.

And what is the breadth of Christ's cross?  My friends, it is as
broad as the whole world; for he died for the whole world, as it is
written, 'He is a propitiation not for our sins only, but for the
sins of the whole world;' and again, 'God willeth that none should
perish;' and again, 'As by the offence judgment came on all men to
condemnation, even so by the righteousness of one, the gift came upon
all men to justification of life.'

And that is the breadth of Christ's cross.

And what is the length of Christ's cross?  The length thereof, says
an old father, signifies the time during which its virtue will last.

How long, then, is the cross of Christ?  Long enough to last through
all time.  As long as there is a sinner to be saved; as long as there
is ignorance, sorrow, pain, death, or anything else which is contrary
to God and hurtful to man, in the universe of God, so long will
Christ's cross last.  For it is written, he must reign till he hath
put all enemies under his feet; and God is all in all.  And that is
the length of the cross of Christ.

And how high is Christ's cross?  As high as the highest heaven, and
the throne of God, and the bosom of the Father--that bosom out of
which for ever proceed all created things.  Ay, as high as the
highest heaven; for--if you will receive it--when Christ hung upon
the cross, heaven came down on earth, and earth ascended into heaven.
Christ never showed forth his Father's glory so perfectly as when,
hanging upon the cross, he cried in his death-agony, 'Father, forgive
them, for they know not what they do.'  Those words showed the true
height of the cross; and caused St. John to know that his vision was
true, and no dream, when he saw afterwards in the midst of the throne
of God a lamb as it had been slain.

And that is the height of the cross of Christ.

And how deep is the cross of Christ?

This is a great mystery, and one which people in these days are
afraid to look at; and darken it of their own will, because they will
neither believe their Bibles, nor the voice of their own hearts.

But if the cross of Christ be as high as heaven, then, it seems to
me, it must also be as deep as hell, deep enough to reach the deepest
sinner in the deepest pit to which he may fall.  We know that Christ
descended into hell.  We know that he preached to the spirits in
prison.  We know that it is written, 'As in Adam all die, even so in
Christ shall all be made alive.'  We know that when the wicked man
turns from his wickedness, and does what is lawful and right, he will
save his soul alive.  We know that in the very same chapter God tells
us that his ways are not unequal--that he has not one law for one
man, and another for another, or one law for one year, and another
for another.  It is possible, therefore, that he has not one law for
this life, and another for the life to come.  Let us hope, then, that
David's words may be true after all, when speaking by the Spirit of
God, he says, not only, 'if I ascend up to heaven, thou art there;'
but 'if I go down to hell, thou art there also;' and let us hope that
THAT is the depth of the cross of Christ.

At all events, my friends, I believe that we shall find St. Paul's
words true, when he says, that Christ's love passes knowledge; and
therefore that we shall find this also;--that however broad we may
think Christ's cross, it is broader still.  However long, it is
longer still.  However high, it is higher still.  However deep, it is
deeper still.  Yes, we shall find that St. Paul spoke solemn truth
when he said, that Christ had ascended on high that he might fill all
things; that Christ filled all in all; and that he must reign till
the day when he shall give up the kingdom to God, even the Father,
that God may be all in all.

And now do you take all this about the breadth and length of Christ's
cross to be only ingenious fancies, and a pretty play of words?

Ah, my friends, the day will come when you will find that the measure
of Christ's cross is the most important question upon earth.

In the hour of death, and in the day of judgment; then the one thing
which you will care to think of (if you can think at all then, as too
many poor souls cannot, and therefore had best think of it now before
their wits fail them)--the one thing which you will care to think of,
I say, will be--not, how clever you have been, how successful you
have been, how much admired you have been, how much money you have
made:- 'Of course not,' you answer; 'I shall be thinking of the state
of my soul; whether I am fit to die; whether I have faith enough to
meet God; whether I have good works enough to meet God.'

Will you, my friend?  Then you will soon grow tired of thinking of
that likewise, at least I hope and trust that you will.  For, however
much faith you may have had, you will find that you have not had
enough.  However so many good works you may have done, you will find
that you have not done enough.  The better man you are, the more you
will be dissatisfied with yourself; the more you will be ashamed of
yourself; till with all saints, Romanist or Protestant, or other, who
have been worthy of the name of saints, you will be driven--if you
are in earnest about your own soul--to give up thinking of yourself,
and to think only of the cross of Christ, and of the love of Christ
which shines thereon; and ask--Is it great enough to cover my sins?
to save one as utterly unworthy to be saved as I.  And so, after all,
you will be forced to throw yourself--where you ought to have thrown
yourself at the outset--at the foot of Christ's cross; and say in
spirit and in truth -


Nothing in my hand I bring,
Simply to the cross I cling -


In plain words, I throw myself, with all my sins, upon that absolute
and boundless love of God which made all things, and me among them,
and hateth nothing that he hath made; who redeemed all mankind, and
me among them, and hath said by the mouth of his only-begotten Son,
'Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.'



SERMON XVI.  THE PURE IN HEART



TITUS i. 15.

Unto the pure all things are pure:  but unto them that are defiled
and unbelieving is nothing pure:  but even their mind and conscience
is defiled.

This seems at first a strange and startling saying:  but it is a true
one; and the more we think over it, the more we shall find it true.

All things are pure in themselves; good in themselves; because God
made them.  Is it not written, 'God saw all that he had made, and
behold, it was very good?'  Therefore St. Paul says, that all things
are ours; and that Christ gives us all things richly to enjoy.  All
we need is, to use things in the right way; that is, in the way in
which God intended them to be used.

For God is a God of truth; a true, a faithful, and--if I may so
speak--an honest and honourable, and fair God:  not a deceiving or
unfair God, who lays snares for his creatures, or leads them into
temptation.  That would be a bad God, a cruel God, very unlike the
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.  He has put us into a good world,
and not a wilderness, as some people call it.  If any part of this
world be a wilderness, it is because men have made it so, or left it
so, by their own wilfulness, ignorance, cowardice, laziness,
violence.  No:  God, I say, has put us into a good world, and given
us pure and harmless appetites, feelings, relations.  Therefore all
the relations of life are holy.  To be a husband, a father, a
brother, a son, is pure and good.  To have property and to use it:
to enjoy ourselves in this life as far as we can, without hurting
ourselves or our neighbours; all this is pure, and good, and holy.
God does not grudge or upbraid.  He does not frown upon innocent
pleasure.  For God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.
Therefore he rejoices in seeing his creatures healthy and happy.
Therefore, as I believe, Christ smiles out of heaven upon the little
children at their play; and the laugh of a babe is heavenly music in
his ears.

All things are pure which God has given to man.  And therefore, if a
man be pure in heart, all which God has given him will not only do
him no harm, but do him good.  All the comforts and blessings of this
life will help to make him a better man.  They will teach him about
his own character; about human nature, and the people with whom he
has to do; ay--about God himself, as it is written, 'Blessed are the
pure in heart, for they shall see God.'

All the blessings and comforts of this life, my friends (as well as
the anxieties which must come to those who have a family, or
property, even if he do not meet with losses and afflictions), ought
to help to improve a man's temper, to call out in him right feelings,
to teach him more and more of the likeness of God.

If he be a married man, marriage ought to teach him not to live for
himself only, but to sacrifice his own fancies, his own ease, his own
will, for the sake of the woman whom God has given him; as Christ
sacrificed himself, and his own life, for mankind.  And so, by the
feelings of a husband, he may enter into the mystery of the love of
Christ, and of the cross of Christ; and so, if only he be pure in
heart, he will see God.

If he have parents, he may learn by being a son how blessed it is to
obey, how useful to a man's character to submit:  ay, he will find
out more still.  He will find out that not by being self-willed and
independent does the finest and noblest parts of his character come
out, but by copying his Father in everything; that going where his
Father sends him; being jealous of his Father's honour; doing not his
own will, but his Father's; that all this, I say, is its own reward;
for instead of lowering a man, it raises him, and calls out in him
all that is purest, tenderest, soberest, bravest.  I tell you this
day--Just as far as you are good sons to your parents, so far will
you be able to understand the mystery of the co-equal and co-eternal
Son of God; who though he were in the form of God, did not snatch
greedily at being on the same footing with his Father, but emptied
himself, and took on him the form of a slave, that he might do his
Father's will, and reveal his Father's glory.  And so, if you be only
pure in heart, you will see God.

If, again, a man have children--how they ought to teach him, to train
him;--teach him to restrain his own temper, lest he provoke them to
anger; to be calm and moderate with them, lest he frighten them into
lying; to avoid bad language, gluttony, drunkenness, and every coarse
sin, lest he tempt them to follow his example.  I tell you, friends,
that you will find, if you choose, all the noblest, most generous,
most Godlike parts of your character called out to your children; and
by having the feelings of a father to your children, learn what
feelings our Father in heaven has toward us, his human offspring.
And so, if only you be pure in heart, you will see God.

If again, a man has money, money can teach him (as it teaches
hundreds of pure-hearted men) that charity and generosity are not
only a duty, but an honour and a joy; that 'mercy is twice blest; it
blesses him that gives, and him that takes;' that giving is the
highest pleasure upon earth, because it is God's own pleasure;
because the blessedness of God, and the glory of God is this, that he
giveth to all liberally, and upbraideth not.  And so in his wealth--
if only he be pure in heart, a man will see God.

If, again, a man has health, and strength, and high spirits, they too
will teach him, if his heart be pure.  He will learn from them to
look up to God as the Lord and Giver of life, health, strength; of
the power to work, and the power to delight in working:  because God
himself is ever full of life, ever busy, ever rejoicing to put forth
his almighty power for the good of the whole universe, as it is
written, 'My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.'  And so--in every
relation of life--if only a man's heart be pure, he will see God.

How, then, can we get the pure heart which will make all things pure
to us?  By asking for the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, the Pure
Spirit, in whom is no selfishness.

For if our hearts be selfish, they cannot be pure.  The pure in
heart, is the same as the man whose eye is single, and that is the
man who is not caring for himself, thinking of himself.  If a man be
thinking of himself, he will never enjoy life.  The pure blessings
which God has given him will be no blessings to him; as it is
written, 'He that saveth his life shall lose it.'

Do you not know that that is true?  Do not the miseries of life (I do
not mean the afflictions, like loss of friends or kin), but the
miseries of life which make a man dark, and fretful, and prevent his
enjoying God's gifts--do they not come, nineteen-twentieths of them,
from thinking about oneself; from lusting and longing after this and
that; from spite, vanity, bad temper, wounded pride, disappointed
covetousness?  'I cannot get this or that; that money, that place;
this or that fine thing or the other:  and how can I be contented?'
There is a man whose heart is not pure.  'That man has used me ill,
and I cannot help thinking of it, brooding over it.  I cannot forgive
him.  How can I be expected to forgive him?'  There is a man whose
heart is not pure; and more, there is a man who is making himself
miserable.

See again, how a man may make marriage a curse to him instead of a
blessing, without being unfaithful to his wife (which we all know to
be simply abominable and unmanly, and far below anything of which I
am talking now).  And how?  Simply by bad temper, vanity, greediness,
and selfish love of his own dignity, his own pleasure, his own this,
that, and the other.  So, too, he may make his children a torment to
him, instead of letting them be God's lesson-book to him, in which he
may see the likeness of the angels in heaven.

He may make his wealth a continual anxiety to him:  ay, he may make
it, by ambition, covetousness, and wild speculation, the cause of his
shame and ruin; if only his heart be not pure.

Ay, there is not a blessing on earth which a man may not turn into a
curse.  There is not a good gift of God out of which a man may not
get harm, if only his heart be not pure; as it is written, 'To those
who are defiled and unbelieving nothing is pure:  but even their mind
and conscience are defiled.'

But defiled with what?  Fouled with what?  There is the question.
Many answers have been invented by people who did not believe in that
faithful and true God of whom I told you just now; people who fancied
that this world was a bad world, and that God laid snares for his
creatures and tempted his creatures.  But the true answer is only to
be got, like most true answers, by observing; by using our eyes and
ears, and seeing what really makes people turn blessings into curses,
and suck poison out of every flower.

And that is, simply, self.

If you want to spoil all that God gives you; if you want to be
miserable yourself, and a maker of misery to others, the way is easy
enough.  Only be selfish, and it is done at once.  Be defiled and
unbelieving.  Defile and foul God's good gifts by self, and by loving
yourself more than what is right.  Do not believe that the good God
knows your needs before you ask, and will give you whatsoever is good
for you.  Think about yourself; about what YOU want, what YOU like,
what respect people ought to pay YOU, what people think of YOU:  and
then to you nothing will be pure.  You will spoil everything you
touch; you will make sin and misery for yourself out of everything
which God sends you; you will be as wretched as you choose on earth,
or in heaven either.

In heaven either, I say.  For that proud, greedy, selfish, self-
seeking spirit would turn heaven into hell.  It did turn heaven into
hell, for the great devil himself.  It was by pride, by seeking his
own glory--(so, at least, wise men say)--that he fell from heaven to
hell.  He was not content to give up his own will and do God's will,
like the other angels.  He was not content to serve God, and rejoice
in God's glory.  He would be a master himself, and set up for
himself, and rejoice in his own glory; and so, when he wanted to make
a private heaven of his own, he found that he had made a hell.  When
he wanted to be a little God for himself, he lost the life of the
true God, to lose which is eternal death.  And why?  Because his
heart was not pure, clean, honest, simple, unselfish.  Therefore he
saw God no more, and learnt to hate him whose name is love.

May God keep our hearts pure from that selfishness which is the root
of all sin; from selfishness, out of which alone spring adultery,
foul living, drunkenness, evil speaking, lying, slandering,
injustice, oppression, cruelty, and all which makes man worse than
the beasts.  May God give us those pure hearts of which it is
written, that the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-
suffering, gentleness, goodness, meekness, temperance.  Against such,
St. Paul says, there is no law.  And why?  Because no law is needed.
For, as a wise father says--'Love, and do what thou wilt;' for then
thou wilt be sure to will what is right; and, as St. Paul says, If
your heart be pure, all things will be pure to you.



SERMON XVII.  MUSIC
(Christmas Day.)



LUKE ii. 13, 14.

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly
host, praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on
earth peace, good will toward men.

You have been just singing Christmas hymns; and my text speaks of the
first Christmas hymn.  Now what the words of that hymn meant; what
Peace on earth and good-will towards man meant, I have often told
you.  To-day I want you, for once, to think of this--that it was a
hymn; that these angels were singing, even as human beings sing.

Music.--There is something very wonderful in music.  Words are
wonderful enough:  but music is even more wonderful.  It speaks not
to our thoughts as words do:  it speaks straight to our hearts and
spirits, to the very core and root of our souls.  Music soothes us,
stirs us up; it puts noble feelings into us; it melts us to tears, we
know not how:- it is a language by itself, just as perfect, in its
way, as speech, as words; just as divine, just as blessed.

Music has been called the speech of angels; I will go further, and
call it the speech of God himself--and I will, with God's help, show
you a little what I mean this Christmas day.

Music, I say, without words, is wonderful and blessed; one of God's
best gifts to men.  But in singing you have both the wonders
together, music and words.  Singing speaks at once to the head and to
the heart, to our understanding and to our feelings; and therefore,
perhaps, the most beautiful way in which the reasonable soul of man
can show itself (except, of course, doing RIGHT, which always is, and
always will be, the most beautiful thing) is singing.

Now, why do we all enjoy music?  Because it sounds sweet.  But WHY
does it sound sweet?

That is a mystery known only to God.

Two things I may make you understand--two things which help to make
music--melody and harmony.  Now, as most of you know, there is melody
in music when the different sounds of the same tune follow each
other, so as to give us pleasure; there is harmony in music when
different sounds, instead of following each other, come at the same
time, so as to give us pleasure.

But why do they please us? and what is more, why do they please
angels? and more still, why do they please God?  Why is there music
in heaven?  Consider St. John's visions in the Revelations.  Why did
St. John hear therein harpers with their harps, and the mystic
beasts, and the elders, singing a new song to God and to the Lamb;
and the voices of many angels round about them, whose number was ten
thousand times ten thousand?

In this is a great mystery.  I will try to explain what little of it
I seem to see.

First--There is music in heaven, because in music there is no self-
will.  Music goes on certain laws and rules.  Man did not make those
laws of music; he has only found them out:  and if he be self-willed
and break them, there is an end of his music instantly; all he brings
out is discord and ugly sounds.  The greatest musician in the world
is as much bound by those laws as the learner in the school; and the
greatest musician is the one who, instead of fancying that, because
he is clever, he may throw aside the laws of music, knows the laws of
music best, and observes them most reverently.  And therefore it was
that the old Greeks, the wisest of all the heathens, made a point of
teaching their children MUSIC; because, they said, it taught them not
to be self-willed and fanciful, but to see the beauty of order, the
usefulness of rule, the divineness of law.

And therefore music is fit for heaven; therefore music is a pattern
and type of heaven, and of the everlasting life of God, which perfect
spirits live in heaven; a life of melody and order in themselves; a
life of harmony with each other and with God.  Music, I say, is a
pattern of the everlasting life of heaven; because in heaven, as in
music, is perfect freedom and perfect pleasure; and yet that freedom
comes not from throwing away law, but from obeying God's law
perfectly; and that pleasure comes, not from self-will, and doing
each what he likes, but from perfectly doing the will of the Father
who is in heaven.

And that in itself would be sweet music, even if there were neither
voice nor sound in heaven.  For wherever there is order and
obedience, there is sweet music for the ears of Christ.  Whatsoever
does its duty, according to its kind which Christ has given it, makes
melody in the ears of Christ.  Whatsoever is useful to the things
around it, makes harmony in the ears of Christ.  Therefore those wise
old Greeks used to talk of the music of the spheres.  They said that
sun, moon, and stars, going round each in its appointed path, made as
they rolled along across the heavens everlasting music before the
throne of God.  And so, too, the old Psalms say.  Do you not
recollect that noble verse, which speaks of the stars of heaven, and
says -


What though no human voice or sound
Amid their radiant orbs be found?
To Reason's ear they all rejoice,
And utter forth a glorious voice;
For ever singing as they shine,
The hand that made us is divine.


And therefore it is, that that noble Song of the Three Children calls
upon sun and moon, and stars of heaven, to bless the Lord, praise
him, and magnify him for ever:  and not only upon them, but on the
smallest things on earth;--on mountains and hills, green herbs and
springs, cattle and feathered fowl; they too, he says, can bless the
Lord, and magnify him for ever.  And how?  By fulfilling the law
which God has given them; and by living each after their kind,
according to the wisdom wherewith Christ the Word of God created
them, when he beheld all that he had made, and behold, it was very
good.

And so can we, my friends; so can we.  Some of us may not be able to
make music with our voices:  but we can make it with our hearts, and
join in the angels' song this day, if not with our lips, yet in our
lives.

If thou fulfillest the law which God has given thee, the law of love
and liberty, then thou makest music before God, and thy life is a
hymn of praise to God.

If thou art in love and charity with thy neighbours, thou art making
sweeter harmony in the ears of the Lord Jesus Christ, than psaltery,
dulcimer, and all kinds of music.

If thou art living a righteous and a useful life, doing thy duty
orderly and cheerfully where God has put thee, then thou art making
sweeter melody in the ears of the Lord Jesus Christ, than if thou
hadst the throat of a nightingale; for then thou in thy humble place
art humbly copying the everlasting harmony and melody which is in
heaven; the everlasting harmony and melody by which God made the
world and all that therein is, and behold it was very good, in the
day when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God
shouted for joy over the new-created earth, which God had made to be
a pattern of his own perfection.

For this is that mystery of which I spoke just now, when I said that
music was as it were the voice of God himself.  Yes, I say it with
all reverence:  but I do say it.  There is music in God.  Not the
music of voice or sound; a music which no ears can hear, but only the
spirit of a man, when awakened by the Holy Spirit, and taught to know
God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

There is one everlasting melody in heaven, which Christ, the Word of
God, makes for ever, when he does all things perfectly and wisely,
and righteously and gloriously, full of grace and truth:  and from
that all melody comes, and is a dim pattern thereof here; and is
beautiful only because it is a dim pattern thereof.

And there is an everlasting harmony in God; which is the harmony
between the Father and the Son; who though he be co-equal and co-
eternal with his Father, does nothing of himself, but only what he
seeth his Father do; saying for ever, 'Not my will, but thine be
done,' and hears his Father answer for ever, 'Thou art my Son, this
day have I begotten thee.'

Therefore, all melody and all harmony upon earth, whether in the song
of birds, the whisper of the wind, the concourse of voices, or the
sounds of those cunning instruments which man has learnt to create,
because he is made in the image of Christ, the Word of God, who
creates all things; all music upon earth, I say, is beautiful in as
far as it is a pattern and type of the everlasting music which is in
heaven; which was before all worlds, and shall be after them; for by
its rules all worlds were made, and will be made for ever, even the
everlasting melody of the wise and loving will of God, and the
everlasting harmony of the Father toward the Son, and of the Son
toward the Father, in one Holy Spirit who proceeds from them both, to
give melody and harmony, order and beauty, life and light, to all
which God has made.

Therefore music is a sacred, a divine, a Godlike thing, and was given
to man by Christ to lift our hearts up to God, and make us feel
something of the glory and beauty of God and of all which God has
made.

Therefore, too, music is most fit for Christmas day, of all days in
the year.  Christmas has always been a day of songs, of carols and of
hymns; and so let it be for ever.  If we had no music all the rest of
the year in church or out of church, let us have it at least on
Christmas day.

For on Christmas day most of all days (if I may talk of eternal
things according to the laws of time) was manifested on earth the
everlasting music which is in heaven.

On Christmas day was fulfilled in time and space the everlasting
harmony of God, when the Father sent the Son into the world, that the
world through him might be saved; and the Son refused not, neither
shrank back, though he knew that sorrow, shame, and death awaited
him, but answered, 'A body hast thou prepared me   I come to do thy
will, oh God!' and so emptied himself, and took on himself the form
of a slave, and was found in fashion as a man, that he might fulfil
not his own will, but the will of the Father who sent him.

On this day began that perfect melody of the Son's life on earth; one
song and poem, as it were, of wise words, good deeds, spotless
purity, and untiring love, which he perfected when he died, and rose
again, and ascended on high for ever to make intercession for us with
music sweeter than the song of angels and archangels, and all the
heavenly host.

Go home, then, remembering how divine and holy a thing music is, and
rejoice before the Lord this day with psalms and hymns, and spiritual
songs (by which last I think the apostle means not merely church
music--for that he calls psalms and hymns--but songs which have a
good and wholesome spirit in them); and remembering, too, that music,
like marriage, and all other beautiful things which God has given to
man, is not to be taken in hand unadvisedly, lightly, or wantonly;
but, even when it is most cheerful and joyful (as marriage is),
reverently, discreetly, soberly, and in the fear of God.  Amen.



SERMON XVIII.  THE CHRIST CHILD
(Christmas Day.)



LUKE ii. 7.

And she brought forth her first-born Son, and wrapt him in swaddling
clothes, and laid him in a manger.

Mother and child.--Think of it, my friends, on Christmas day.  What
more beautiful sight is there in the world?  What more beautiful
sight, and what more wonderful sight?

What more beautiful?  That man must be very far from the kingdom of
God--he is not worthy to be called a man at all--whose heart has not
been touched by the sight of his first child in its mother's bosom.

The greatest painters who have ever lived have tried to paint the
beauty of that simple thing--a mother with her babe:  and have
failed.  One of them, Rafaelle by name, to whom God gave the spirit
of beauty in a measure in which he never gave it, perhaps, to any
other man, tried again and again, for years, painting over and over
that simple subject--the mother and her babe--and could not satisfy
himself.  Each of his pictures is most beautiful--each in a different
way; and yet none of them is perfect.  There is more beauty in that
simple every-day sight than he or any man could express by his pencil
and his colours.  And yet it is a sight which we see every day.

And as for the wonder of that sight--the mystery of it--I tell you
this.  That physicians, and the wise men who look into the laws of
nature, of flesh and blood, say that the mystery is past their
finding out; that if they could find out the whole meaning, and the
true meaning of those two words, mother and child, they could get the
key to the deepest wonders of the world:  but they cannot.

And philosophers, who look into the laws of soul and spirit, say the
same.  The wiser men they are, the more they find in the soul of
every new-born babe, and its kindred to its mother, wonders and
puzzles past man's understanding.

I will say boldly, my friends, that if one could find out the full
meaning of those two words, mother and child, one would be the wisest
philosopher on earth, and see deeper than all who have ever yet
lived, into the secrets of this world of time which we can see, and
of the eternal world, which no man can see, save with the eyes of his
reasonable soul.

And yet it is the most common, every-day sight.  That only shows once
more what I so often try to show you, that the most common, every-day
things are the most wonderful.  It shows us how we are to despise
nothing which God has made; above all, to despise nothing which
belongs to human nature, which is the likeness and image of God.

Above all, upon this Christmas day it is not merely ignorant and
foolish, but quite sinful and heretical, to despise anything which
belongs to human nature.  For on this day God appeared in human
nature, and in the first and lowest shape of it--in the form of a
new-born babe, that by beginning at the beginning, he might end at
the end; and being made in all things like as his brethren, might
perfectly and utterly take the manhood into God.

This, then, we are to think of, at least on Christmas day--God
revealed, and shown to men, as a babe upon his mother's bosom.

Men had pictured God to themselves already in many shapes--some
foolish, foul, brutal--God forgive them;--some noble and majestic.
Sometimes they thought of him as a mighty Lawgiver, sitting upon his
throne in the heavens, with solemn face and awful eyes, looking down
upon all the earth.  That fancy was not a false one.  St. John saw
the Lord so.

'And in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of
man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps
with a golden girdle.  His head and his hairs were white like wool,
as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire; and his feet
like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and his voice
as the sound of many waters.  And he had in his right hand seven
stars; and out of his mouth went a sharp two-edged sword; and his
countenance was as the sun shining in his strength.'

Sometimes, again, they thought of him as the terrible warrior, going
forth to conquer and destroy all which opposed him; to kill wicked
tyrants, and devils, and all who rebelled against him, and who hurt
human beings.

And that was not a false fancy either.  St. John saw the Lord so.

'And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and he that sat
upon him was called Faithful and True; and in righteousness he doth
judge and make war.  His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his
head were many crowns; and he had a name written, that no man knew
but he himself:  and he was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood;
and his name is called, The Word of God.  And the armies which were
in heaven followed him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen,
white and clean.  And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with
it he should smite the nations; and he shall rule them with a rod of
iron:  and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of
Almighty God.'

But all these were only, as it were, fancies about one side of God's
character.  It was only in the Babe of Bethlehem that the WHOLE of
God's character shone forth, that men might not merely fear him and
bow before him, but trust in him and love him, as one who could be
touched with the feeling of their infirmities. {151}

It was on Christmas day that God appeared among men as a child upon a
mother's bosom.  And why?  Surely for this reason, among a thousand
more, that he might teach men to feel for him and with him, and to be
sure that he felt for them and with them.  To teach them to feel for
him and with him, he took the shape of a little child, to draw out
all their love, all their tenderness, and, if I may so say, all their
pity.

A God in need!  A God weak!  God fed by mortal woman!  A God wrapt in
swaddling clothes, and laid in a manger!--If that sight will not
touch our hearts, what will?

And by that same sight he has taught men that he feels with them and
for them.  God has been through the pains of infancy.  God has
hungered.  God has wept.  God has been ignorant.  God has grown, and
increased in stature and in wisdom, and in favour both with God and
man.

And why?  That he might take on him our human nature.  Not merely the
nature of a great man, of a wise man, of a grown up man only:  but
ALL human nature, from the nature of the babe on its mother's bosom,
to the nature of the full-grown and full-souled man, fighting with
all his powers against the evil of the world.  All this is his, and
he is all; that no human being, from the strongest to the weakest,
from the eldest to the youngest, but may be able to say, 'What I am,
Christ has been.'

Take home with you, then, this thought, on this Christmas day, among
all the rest which Christmas ought to put into your minds.  Respect
your own children.  Look on them as the likeness of Christ, and the
image of God; and when you go home this day, believe that Christ is
in them, the hope of glory to them hereafter.  Draw them round you,
and say to them-- each in your own fashion--'My children, God was
made like to you this day, that you might be made like God.
Children, this is your day, for on this day God became a child; that
God gives you leave to think of him as a child, that you may be sure
he loves children, sure he understands children, sure that a little
child is as near and as dear to God as kings, nobles, scholars, and
divines.'

Yes, my dear children, you may think of God as a child, now and
always.  For you Christ is always the Babe of Bethlehem.  Do not say
to yourselves, 'Christ is grown up long ago; he is a full-grown man.'
He is, and yet he is not.  His life is eternal in the heavens, above
all change of time and space; for time and space are but his
creatures and his tools.  Therefore he can be all things to all men,
because he is the Son of man.

Yes; all things to all men.  Hearken to me, you children, and you
grown-up children also, if there be any in this church--for if you
will receive it, such is the sacred heart of Jesus--all things to
all; and wherever there is the true heart of a true human being,
there, beating in perfect answer to it, is the heart of Christ.

To the strong he can be strongest; and to the weak, weakest of all.
With the mighty he can be the King of kings; and yet with the poor he
can wander, not having where to lay his head.  With quiet Jacob he
goes round the farm, among the quiet sheep; and yet he ranges with
wild Esau over battle-field, and desert, and far unknown seas.  With
the mourner he weeps for ever; and yet he will sit as of old--if he
be but invited--and bless the marriage-feast.  For the penitent he
hangs for ever on the cross; and yet with the man who works for God
his Father he stands for ever in his glory, his eyes like a flame of
fire, and out of his mouth a two-edged sword, judging the nations of
the earth.  With the aged and the dying he goes down for ever into
the grave; and yet with you, children, Christ lies for ever on his
mother's bosom, and looks up for ever into his mother's face, full of
young life, and happiness, and innocence, the everlasting Christ-
child in whom you must believe, whom you must love, to whom you must
offer up your childish prayers.

The day will come when you can no longer think as a child, or pray as
a child, but put away childish things.  I do not know whether you
will be the happier for that change.  God grant that you may be the
better for it.  Meanwhile, go home, and think of the baby Jesus, YOUR
Lord, YOUR pattern, YOUR Saviour; and ask him to make you such good
children to your mothers, as the little Jesus was to the Blessed
Virgin, when he increased in knowledge and in stature, and in favour
both with God and man.



SERMON XIX.  CHRIST'S BOYHOOD



LUKE ii. 52.

And Jesus increased in wisdom, and in stature, and in favour both
with God and man.

I do not pretend to understand these words.  I preach on them because
the Church has appointed them for this day.  And most fitly.  At
Christmas we think of our Lord's birth.  What more reasonable, than
that we should go on to think of our Lord's boyhood?  To think of
this aright, even if we do not altogether understand it, ought to
help us to understand rightly the incarnation of our Lord Jesus
Christ; the right faith about which is, that he was very man, of the
substance of his mother.  Now, if he were very and real man, he must
have been also very and real babe, very and real boy, very and real
youth, and then very and real full-grown man.

Now it is not so easy to believe that as it may seem.  It is not so
easy to believe.

I have heard many preachers preach (without knowing it), what used to
be called the Apollinarian Heresy, which held that our Lord had not a
real human soul, but only a human body; and that his Godhead served
him instead of a human soul, and a man's reason, man's feelings.

About that the old fathers had great difficulty, before they could
make people understand that our Lord had been a real babe.  It seemed
to people's unclean fancies something shocking that our Lord should
have been born, as other children are born.  They stumbled at the
stumbling-block of the manger in Bethlehem, as they did at the
stumbling-block of the cross on Calvary; and they wanted to make out
that our Lord was born into the world in some strange way--I know not
how;--I do not choose to talk of it here:- but they would fancy and
invent anything, rather than believe that Jesus was really born of
the Virgin Mary, made of the substance of his mother.  So that it was
hundreds of years before the fathers of the Church set people's minds
thoroughly at rest about that.

In the same way, though not so much, people found it very hard to
believe that our Lord grew up as a real human child.  They would not
believe that he went down to Nazareth, and was subject to his father
and mother.  People believe generally now--the Roman Catholics as
well as we--that our Lord worked at his father's trade--that he
himself handled the carpenter's tools.  We have no certain proof of
it:  but it is so beautiful a thought, that one hopes it is true.  At
least our believing it is a sign that we do believe the incarnation
of our Lord Jesus Christ more rightly than most people did fifteen
hundred years ago.  For then, too many of them would have been
shocked at the notion.

They stumbled at the carpenter's shop, even as they did at the manger
and at the cross.  And they invented false gospels--one of which
especially, had strange and fanciful stories about our Lord's
childhood--which tried to make him out.

Most of these stories are so childish I do not like to repeat them.
One of them may serve as a sample.  Our Lord, it says, was playing
with other children of his own age, and making little birds out of
clay:  but those which our Lord made became alive, and moved, and
sang like real birds.--Stories put together just to give our Lord
some magical power, different from other children, and pretending
that he worked signs and wonders:  which were just what he refused to
work.

But the old fathers rejected these false gospels and their childish
tales, and commanded Christian men only to believe what the Bible
tells us about our Lord's childhood; for that is enough for us, and
that will help us better than any magical stories and childish fairy
tales of man's invention, to believe rightly that God was made man,
and dwelt among us.

And what does the Bible tell us?  Very little indeed.  And it tells
us very little, because we were meant to know very little.  Trust
your Bibles always, my friends, and be sure, if you were meant to
know more, the Bible would tell you more.

It tells us that Jesus grew just as a human child grows, in body,
soul, and spirit.

Then it tells us of one case--only one--in which he seemed to act
without his parents' leave.  And as the saying is, the exception
proves the rule.  It is plain that his rule was to obey, except in
this case; that he was always subject to his parents, as other
children are, except on this one occasion.  And even in this case, he
WENT back with them, it is expressly said, and was subject to them.

Now, I do not pretend to explain WHY our Lord stayed behind in the
temple.

I cannot explain (who can?) the why and wherefore of what I see
people do in common daily life.

How much less can one explain why our Lord did this and that, who was
both man and God.

But one reason, and one which seems to me to be plain, on the very
face of St. Luke's words--he stayed behind to learn; to learn all he
could from the Scribes and Pharisees, the doctors of the law.

He told the people after, when grown up, 'The Scribes and Pharisees
sit in Moses' seat.  All therefore which they command you, that
observe and do.'  And he was a Jew himself, and came to fulfil all
righteousness; and therefore he fulfilled such righteousness as was
customary among Jews according to their law and religion.

Therefore I do not like at all a great many pictures which I see in
children's Sunday books, which set the child Jesus in the midst, as
on a throne, holding up his hand as if HE were laying down the law,
and the Scribes and Pharisees looking angry and confounded.  The
Bible says not that they heard him, but that he heard them; that they
were astonished at his understanding, not that they were confounded
and angry.  No.  I must believe that even those hard, proud
Pharisees, looked with wonder and admiration on the glorious Child;
that they perhaps felt for the moment that a prophet, another Samuel,
had risen up among them.  And surely that is much more like the right
notion of the child Jesus, full of meekness and humility; of Jesus,
who, though 'he were a Son, learnt obedience by the things which he
suffered;' of Jesus, who, while he increased in stature, increased in
favour with MAN, as well as with God:  and surely no child can
increase in favour either with God or man, if he sets down his
elders, and contradicts and despises the teachers whom God has set
over him.  No let us believe that when he said, 'Know ye not that I
must be about my Father's business?' that a child's way of doing the
work of his Father in heaven is to learn all that he can understand
from his teachers, spiritual pastors, and masters, whom God the
Father has set over him.

Therefore--and do listen to this, children and young people--if you
wish really to think what Christ has to do with YOU, you must
remember that he was once a real human child--not different outwardly
from other children, except in being a perfectly good child, in all
things like as you are, but without sin.

Then, whatever happens to you, you will have the comfort of feeling--
Christ understands this; Christ has been through this.  Child though
I am, Christ can be touched with the feeling of my weakness, for he
was once a child like me.

And then, if trouble, or sickness, or death come among you--and you
all know how sickness and death HAVE come among you of late--you may
be cheerful and joyful still, if you will only try to be such
children as Jesus was.  Obey your parents, and be subject to them, as
he was; try to learn from your teachers, pastors, and masters, as he
did; try and pray to increase daily in favour both with God and man,
as he did:  and then, even if death should come and take you before
your time, you need not be afraid, for Jesus Christ is with you.

Your childish faults shall be forgiven you for Jesus' sake; your
childish good conduct shall be accepted for Jesus Christ's sake; and
if you be trying to be good children, doing your little work well
where God has put you, humble, obedient, and teachable, winning love
from the people round you, and from God your Father in heaven, then,
I say, you need not be afraid of sickness, not even afraid of death,
for whenever it takes you, it will find you about your Father's
business.



SERMON XX.  THE LOCUST-SWARMS



JOEL ii. 12, 13.

Therefore also now, saith the Lord, Turn ye even to me with all your
heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning; and
rend your heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the Lord your
God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great
kindness, and repenteth him of the evil.

This is one of the grandest chapters in the whole Old Testament, and
one which may teach us a great deal; and, above all, teach us to be
thankful to God for the blessings which we have.

I think I can explain what it means best by going back to the chapter
before it.

Joel begins his prophecy by bitter lamentation over the mischief
which the swarms of insects had done; such as had never been in his
days, nor in the days of his fathers.  What the palmer worm had left,
the locust had eaten; what the locust had left, the cankerworm had
eaten; and what the cankerworm had left, the caterpillar had eaten.
Whether these names are rightly rendered, or whether they mean
different sorts of locusts, or the locusts in their different stages
of growth, crawling at first and flying at last, matters little.
What mischief they had done was plain enough.  They had come up 'a
nation strong and without number, whose teeth were like the teeth of
a lion, and his cheek-teeth like those of a strong lion.  They had
laid his vines waste, and barked his fig-tree, and made its branches
white; and all drunkards were howling and lamenting, for the wine
crop was utterly destroyed:  and all other crops, it seems likewise;
the corn was wasted, the olives destroyed; the seed was rotten under
the clods, the granaries empty, the barns broken down, for the corn
was withered; the vine and fig, pomegranate, palm, and apple, were
all gone; the green grass was all gone; the beasts groaned, the herds
were perplexed, because they had no pasture; the flocks of sheep were
desolate.'  There seems to have been a dry season also, to make
matters worse; for Joel says the rivers of waters were dried up--
likely enough, if then, as now, it is the dry seasons which bring the
locust-swarms.  Still the locusts had done the chief mischief.  They
came just as they come now (only in smaller strength, thank God) in
many parts of the East and of Southern Russia, darkening the sky, and
shutting out the very light of the sun; the noise of their
innumerable jaws like the noise of flame devouring the stubble, as
they settled upon every green thing, and gnawed away leaf and bark;
and a fire devoured before them, and behind them a flame burned; the
land was as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a
desolate wilderness; {162} till there was not enough left to supply
the daily sacrifices, and the meat offering and the drink offering
were withheld from the house of God.

But what has all this to do with us?  There have never, as far as we
know, been any locusts in England.

And what has this to do with God?  Why does Joel tell these Jews that
God sent the locusts, and bid them cry to God to take them away?  For
these locusts are natural things, and come by natural laws.  And
there is no need that there should be locusts anywhere.  For where
the wild grass plains are broken up and properly cultivated, there
the locusts, which lay their countless eggs in the old turf,
disappear, and must disappear.  We know that now.  We know that when
the East is tilled (as God grant it may be some day) as thoroughly as
England is, locusts will be as unknown there as here; and that is
another comfortable proof to us that there is no real curse upon
God's earth:  but that just as far as man fulfils God's command to
replenish the earth and subdue it, so far he gets rid of all manner
of terrible scourges and curses, which seemed to him in the days of
his ignorance, necessary and supernatural.

How, then, was Joel right in saying that God sent the locusts?

In this way, my friends.

Suppose you or I took cholera or fever.  We know that cholera or
fever is preventible; that man has no right to have these pestilences
in a country, because they can be kept out and destroyed.  But if you
or I caught cholera or fever by no fault or folly of our own, we are
bound to say, God sent me this sickness.  It has some private lesson
for ME.  It is part of my education, my schooling in God's school-
house.  It is meant to make me a wiser and better man; and that he
can only do by teaching me more about himself.  So with these
locusts, and still more so; for Joel did not know, could not know,
that these locusts could be prevented.  But even if he had known
that, it was not his fault or folly, or his countrymen's which had
brought the locusts.  Most probably they were tilling the ground to
the best of their knowledge.  Most probably, too, these locusts were
not bred in Palestine at all; but came down upon the north-wind (as
they are said to do now), from some land hundreds of miles away; and
therefore Joel could say--Whatever I do not know about these locusts,
this I know; that God, whose providence orders all things in heaven
and earth, has sent them; that he means to teach you a lesson by
them; that they are part of his schooling to us Jews; that he intends
to make us wiser and better men by them:  AND THAT HE CAN ONLY DO BY
TEACHING US MORE ABOUT HIMSELF.

What, then, does Joel say about the locusts, which he might say to
you or me, if we were laid down by cholera or fever?  He does not
say, these troubles have come upon you from devils, or evil spirits,
or by any blind chance of the world about you.  He says, they have
come on you from THE LORD; from the same good, loving, merciful Lord
who brought your fathers out of Egypt, and made a great nation of
you, and has preserved you to this day.  And do not fancy that he is
changed.  Do not fancy that he has forgotten you, or hates you, or
has become cruel, or proud, or unlike himself.  It is you who have
forgotten him, and have shown that by living bad lives; and all he
wishes is, to drive you back to him, that you may live good lives.
Turn to him; and you will find him unchanged; the same loving,
forgiving Lord as ever.  He requires no sacrifices, no great
offerings on your part to win him round.  All he asks is, that you
should confess yourselves in the wrong, and turn and repent.  Turn
therefore to the Lord with all your heart, and with weeping, and with
fasting, and with mourning--(which was, and is still the Eastern
fashion); and rend your heart, and not your garments.  And why?
Because the Lord is very dreadful, angry and dark, and has determined
to destroy you all?  Not so:  but because he is gracious and
merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth him of
the evil.

Yes, my friends:  and this, you will find, is at the bottom of all
true repentance and turning to God.  If you believe that God is dark,
and hard, and cruel, you may be afraid of him:  but you cannot
repent, cannot turn to him.  The more you think of him the more you
will be terrified at him, and turn from him.  But if you believe that
God is gracious and merciful, then you can turn to him; then you can
repent with a true repentance, and a godly sorrow which breeds joy
and peace of mind.

So Joel thought, at least; for he tells them, that if they will but
turn to God, if they will but confess themselves in the wrong, all
shall be well again, and better than before.

Now, if Joel had been a heathen, worshipping the false gods of the
Canaanites, he would have spoken very differently; he would have
said, perhaps--Baal, the true God, is angry with you, and he has sent
the drought.

Or, Ashtoreth, the Queen of Heaven, by whose power all seeds grow and
all creatures breed, is angry with you, and she has destroyed the
seeds, and sent the locusts.

Or, Ammon, the Lord of the sheep, is angry, and he has destroyed your
flocks and herds.

But one thing we know he would have said--These angry gods want
BLOOD.  You cannot pacify them without human blood.  You must give
them the most dear and precious things you have--the most beautiful
and pure.  You must sacrifice boys and girls to them; and then,
perhaps, they will be appeased.

We KNOW this.  We know that the heathen, whenever they were in
trouble, took to human sacrifices.

The Canaanites--and the Jews when they fell into idolatry--used to
burn their children in the fire to Moloch.

We know that the Carthaginians, who were of the same blood and
language as the Canaanites, used human sacrifices; and that once when
their city was in great danger, they sacrificed at one time two
hundred boys of their highest families.

We know that the Greeks and Romans, who had much more humane and
rational notions about their gods, were tempted, in times of great
distress, to sacrifice human beings.  It has always been so.  The old
Mexicans in America used to sacrifice many thousands of men and women
every year to their idols; and when the Spaniards came and destroyed
them off the face of the earth in the name of the Lord--as Joshua did
the Canaanites of old--they found the walls of the idol temples
crusted inches thick with human blood.  Even to this day, the wild
Khonds in the Indian mountains, and the Red men of America, sacrifice
human beings at times, and, I fear, very often indeed; and believe
that the gods will be the more pleased, and more certain to turn away
their anger, the more horrible and lingering tortures they inflict
upon their wretched victims.  I say, these things were; and were it
not for the light of the Gospel, these things would be still; and
when we hear of them, we ought to bow our heads to our Father in
heaven in thankfulness, and say--what Joel the prophet taught the
Jews to say dimly and in part--what our Lord Jesus and his apostles
taught us to say fully and perfectly -

It is very meet, right, and our bounden duty, at all times and in all
places--whether in joy or sorrow, in wealth or in want, to give
thanks to thee, O Lord, Holy Father, Almighty, Everlasting God.

Through Jesus Christ our Lord, according to whose most true promise
the Holy Ghost came down from heaven upon the apostles, to teach them
and to lead them into all truth, and give them fervent zeal,
constantly to preach the Gospel to all nations, by which we have been
brought out of darkness and error into the clear light and true
knowledge of thee and of thy Son Jesus Christ.

Yes, my friends, this is the lesson which we have to learn from
Joel's prophecy, and from all prophecies.  This lesson the old
prophets learnt for themselves, slowly and dimly, through many
temptations and sorrows.  This lesson our Lord Jesus Christ revealed
fully, and left behind him to his apostles.  This lesson men have
been learning slowly but surely in all the hundreds of years which
have past since; to know that there is one Father in heaven, of whom
are all things, and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things;
that they may, in all the chances and changes of this mortal life, in
weal and in woe, in light and in darkness, in plenty and in want,
look up to that heavenly Father who so loved them that he spared not
his only begotten Son, but freely gave him for them, and say,
'Father, not our will but thine be done.  All things come from thy
hand, and therefore all things come from thy love.  We have received
good from thy hand, and shall we not receive evil?  Though thou slay
us, yet will we trust in thee.  For thou art gracious and merciful,
long-suffering and of great goodness.  Thou art loving to every man,
and thy mercy is over all thy works.  Thou art righteous in all thy
ways, and holy in all thy doings.  Thou art nigh to all that call on
thee; thou wilt hear their cry, and wilt help them.  For all thou
desirest, when thou sendest trouble on them, is to make them wiser
and better men.  AND THAT THOU CANST ONLY MAKE THEM BY TEACHING THEM
MORE ABOUT THYSELF.'



SERMON XXI.  SALVATION



ISAIAH lix. 15, 16.

And the Lord saw it, and it displeased him that there was no
judgment.  And he saw that there was no man, and wondered that there
was no intercessor:  therefore his arm brought salvation unto him,
and his righteousness it sustained him.

This text is often held to be a prophecy of the coming of our Lord
Jesus Christ.  I certainly believe that it is a prophecy of his
coming, and of something better still; namely, his continual
presence; and a very noble and deep one, and one from which we may
learn a great deal.

We may learn from it what 'salvation' really is.  What Christ came to
save men from, and how he saves them.

The common notion of salvation now-a-days is this.  That salvation is
some arrangement or plan, by which people are to escape hell-fire by
having Christ's righteousness imputed to them without their being
righteous themselves.

Now, I have nothing to say about that this morning.  It may be so;
or, again, it may not; I read a good many things in books every week
the sense of which I cannot understand.  At all events it is not the
salvation of which Isaiah speaks here.

For Isaiah tells us very plainly, from WHAT God was going to save
these Jews.  Not from hell-fire--nothing is said about it:  but
simply from their SINS.  As it is written, 'Thou shalt call his name
Jesus, for he shall save his people from THEIR SINS.'

The case is very simple, if you will look at Isaiah's own words.
These Jews had become thoroughly bad men.  They were not ungodly men.
They were very religious, orthodox, devout men.  They 'sought God
daily, and delighted to know his ways, like a nation that did
righteousness, and forsook not the ordinances of their God:  they
asked of him the ordinances of justice; they took delight in
approaching unto God.'

But unfortunately for them, and for all with whom they had to do,
after they had asked of God the ordinances of justice, they never
thought of doing them; and in spite of all their religion, they were,
Isaiah tells them plainly, rogues and scoundrels, none of whom stood
up for justice, or pleaded for truth, but trusted in vanity, and
spoke lies.  Their feet ran to evil, and they made haste to shed
innocent blood; the way of peace they knew not, and they had made
themselves crooked paths, speaking oppression and revolt, and
conceiving and uttering words of falsehood; so that judgment was
turned away backward, and justice stood afar off, for truth was
fallen in the street, and equity could not enter.  Yea, truth failed;
and he that departed from evil made himself a prey (or as some render
it) was accounted mad.

And this is in the face of all their religion and their church-going.
Verily, my friends, fallen human beings were much the same then as
now; and there are too many in England and elsewhere now who might
sit for that portrait.

But how was the Lord going to save these hypocritical, false, unjust
men?  Was he going to say to them, Believe certain doctrines about
me, and you shall escape all punishment for your sins, and my
righteousness shall be imputed to you?  We do not read a word of
that.  We read--not that the Lord's righteousness was imputed to
these bad men, but that it sustained the Lord himself.--Ah! there is
a depth, if you will receive it--a depth of hope and comfort--a well-
spring of salvation for us and all mankind.

You may be false and dishonest, saith the Lord, but I am honest and
true.  Unjust, but I am just; unrighteous, but I am righteous.  If
men will not set the world right, then I will, saith the Lord.  My
righteousness shall sustain me, and keep me up to my duty, though man
may forget his.  To me all power is given in heaven and earth, and I
will use my power aright.

If men are bringing themselves and their country, their religion,
their church to ruin by hypocrisy, falsehood, and injustice, as those
Jews were, then the Lord's arm will bring salvation.  He will save
them from their sins by the only possible way--namely, by taking
their sins away, and making those of them who will take his lesson
good and righteous men instead.  It may be a very terrible lesson of
vengeance and fury, as Isaiah says.  It may unmask many a hypocrite,
confound many a politic, and frustrate many a knavish trick, till the
Lord's salvation may look at first sight much more like destruction
and misery; for his fan is in his hand, and he will thoroughly purge
his floor, and gather the wheat into his garner:  but the chaff he
will burn up with unquenchable fire.

But his purpose is, to SAVE--to save his people from their sins, to
purge out of them all hypocrisy, falsehood, injustice, and make of
them honest men, true men, just men--men created anew after his
likeness.  And this is the meaning of his salvation; and is the only
salvation worth having, for this life or the life to come.

Oh my friends, let us pray to God, whatsoever else he does for us, to
make honest men of us.  For if we be not honest men, we shall surely
come to ruin, and bring all we touch to ruin, past hope of salvation.
Whatsoever denomination or church we belong to, it will be all the
same:  we may call ourselves children of Abraham, of the Holy
Catholic Church (which God preserve), or what we will:  but when the
axe is laid to the root of the tree, every tree that brings not forth
good fruit is hewn down, and is cast into the fire; and woe to the
foolish fowl who have taken shelter under the branches of it.

And we who are coming to the holy communion this day--let us ask
ourselves, What do we want there?  Do we want to be made good men,
true, honest, just?  Do we want to be saved from our sins? or merely
from the punishment of them after we die?  Do we want to be made
sharers in that everlasting righteousness of Christ, which sustains
him, and sustains the whole world too, and prevents it from becoming
a cage of wild beasts, tearing each other to pieces by war and
oppression, falsehood and injustice?  THEN we shall get what we want;
and more.  But if not, then we shall not get what we want, not
discerning that the Lord's body is a righteous and just and good
body; and his blood a purifying blood, which purifies not merely from
the punishment of our sins, but from our sins themselves.

And bear in mind, my friends, when times grow evil, and rogues and
hypocrites abound, and all the world seems going wrong, there is one
arm to fall back upon, and one righteousness to fall back upon, which
can never fail you, or the world. -

The arm of the Lord, which brings salvation to him, that he may give
it to all who are faithful and true; which cannot weaken or grow
weary, till it has cast out of his kingdom all which offends, and
whosoever loveth or maketh a lie. -

And the eternal righteousness of the Lord, which will do justice by
every living soul of man, and which will never fail or fade away,
because it is his own property, belonging to his own essence, which
if he gave up for a moment he would give up being God.  Yes, God is
good, though every man were bad; God is just, though every man were a
rogue; God is true, though every man were a liar; and as long as that
is so, all is safe for you and me, and the whole world:- IF WE WILL.



SERMON XXII.  THE BEGINNING AND END OF WISDOM



PROVERBS ii. 2, 3, 5.

If thou incline thine ear to wisdom, and apply thine heart to
understanding; yea, if thou criest after wisdom, and liftest up thy
voice for understanding; then shalt thou understand the fear of the
Lord, and find the knowledge of God.

We shall see something curious in the last of these verses, when we
compare it with one in the chapter before.  The chapter before says,
that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.  That if we
wish to be wise at all, we must BEGIN by fearing God.  But this
chapter says, that the fear of the Lord is the END of wisdom too; for
it says, that if we seek earnestly after knowledge and understanding,
THEN we shall understand the fear of the Lord, and find the knowledge
of God.

So, according to Solomon, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of
wisdom, and the end likewise.  It is the starting point from which we
are to set out, and the goal toward which we are to run.

How can that be?

If by wisdom Solomon meant high doctrines, what we call theology and
divinity, it would seem more easy to understand:  but he does not
mean that, at least in our sense; for his rules and proverbs about
wisdom are not about divinity and high doctrines, but about plain
practical every-day life; shrewd maxims as to how to behave in this
life, so as to thrive and prosper in it.

And yet again they must be about divinity and theology in some sense.
For what does he say about wisdom in the text?  'If thou search after
wisdom, thou shalt understand the fear of the Lord;' and is that all?
No.  He says more than that.  Thou shalt find, he says, the knowledge
of God.  To know God.--What higher theology can there be than that?
It is the end of all divinity, of all religion.  It is eternal life
itself, to know God.  If a man knows God, he is in heaven there and
then, though he be walking in flesh and blood upon this mortal earth.

How can all this be?

Let us consider the words once again.

Solomon does not say, To understand the fear of the Lord is the
beginning of wisdom, but simply the fear of the Lord is the beginning
of it.  But the end of wisdom, he says, is not merely to fear the
Lord, but to understand the fear of the Lord.

This then, I suppose, is his meaning:  We are to begin life by
fearing God, without understanding it:  as a child obeys his parents
without understanding the reason of their commands.

Therefore, says Solomon to the young man, begin with that--with the
solemn, earnest, industrious, God-fearing frame of mind--without that
you will gain no wisdom.  You may be as clever as you will, but if
you are reckless and wild, you will gain no wisdom.  If you are
violent and impatient; if you are selfish and self-conceited; if you
are weak and self-indulgent, given up to your own pleasures, your
cleverness will be of no use to you.  It will be only hurtful to you
and to others.  A clever fool is common enough, and dangerous enough.
For he is one who never sees things as they really are, but as he
would like them to be.  A bad man, let him be as clever as he may, is
like one in a fever, whose mind is wandering, who is continually
seeing figures and visions, and mistaking them for actual and real
things; and so with all his cleverness, he lives in a dream, and
makes mistake upon mistake, because he knows not things as they are,
and sees nothing by the light of Christ, who is the light of the
world, from whom alone all true understanding comes.

Begin then with the fear of the Lord.  Make up your mind to do what
you are told is right, whether you know the reason of it or not.
Take for granted that your elders know better than you, and have
faith in them, in your teachers, in your Bible, in the words of wise
men who have gone before you:  and do right, whatever it costs you.

If you do not always know the reason at first, you will know it in
due time, and get, so Solomon says, to UNDERSTAND the fear of the
Lord.  In due time you will see from experience that you are in the
path of life.  You will be able to say with St. Paul, I KNOW in whom
I have believed; and with Job, 'Before I heard of thee, O Lord, with
the hearing of the ear:  but now mine eye seeth thee.'

And why?  Because, says Solomon, God himself will show you, and teach
you by his Holy Spirit.  As our Lord says, 'The Holy Spirit shall
take of mine, and show it unto you, and lead you into all truth.'
And therefore Solomon talks of wisdom, who is the Holy Ghost the
Comforter, as a person who teaches men, whose delight is with the
sons of men.  He speaks of wisdom as calling to men.  He speaks of
her as a being who is seeking for those that seek her, who will teach
those who seek after her.

Yes, this, my friends, is, I believe, the secret of life.  At least
it is the secret both of Solomon's teaching, and our Lord's, and St.
Paul's, and St. John's, that true wisdom is not a thing which man
finds out for himself, but which God teaches him.  This is the secret
of life--to believe that God is your Father, schooling and training
you from your cradle to your grave; and then to please him and obey
him in all things, lifting up daily your hands and thankful heart,
entreating him to purge the eyes of your soul, and give you the true
wisdom, which is to see all things as they really are, and as God
himself sees them.  If you do that, you may believe that God will
teach you more and more how to do, in all the affairs of life, that
which is right in his sight, and therefore good for you.  He will
teach you more and more to see in all which happens to you, all which
goes on around you, his fatherly love, his patient mercy, his
providential care for all his creatures.  He will reward you by
making you more and more partaker of his Holy Spirit and of truth, by
which, seeing everything as it really is, you will at last--if not in
this life, still in the life to come--grow to see God himself, who
has made all things according to his own eternal mind, that they may
be a pattern of his unspeakable glory; and beyond that, who needs to
see?  For to know God, and to see God, is eternal life itself.

And this true wisdom, which lies in knowing God, and understanding
his laws, is within the reach of the simplest person here.  As I told
you, cleverness without godliness will not give it you; but godliness
without cleverness may.

Therefore let no one say, 'We are no scholars, nor philosophers, and
we never can be.  Are we, then, shut out from this heavenly wisdom?'
God forbid, my friends.  God is no respecter of persons.  Only
remember one thing; and by it you, too, may attain to the heavenly
wisdom.  I said that the fear of the Lord was the beginning of
wisdom.  I said that the fear of the Lord was the end of wisdom.  Now
let the fear of the Lord be the middle of wisdom also, and walk in it
from youth to old age, and all will be well.

That is the short way, the royal road to wisdom.  To be good and to
do good.  To keep the single eye--the eye which does not look two
ways at once, and want to go two ways at once, as too many do who
want to serve God and mammon, and to be good people and bad people
too both at once.  But the single eye of the man, who looks
straightforward at everything, and has made up his mind what it ought
to do, and will do, so help him God.  As stout old Joshua said,
'Choose ye whom ye will serve:  but as for me and my house, we will
serve the Lord.'  That is the single eye, which wants simply to know
what is right, and do what is right.

And if a man has that he may be a very wise man indeed, though he can
neither read nor write.

It is good for a man, of course, to be able to read, that he may know
what wiser men than he have said:  above all, that he may know what
his Bible says.  But, even if he cannot read, let him fear God, and
set his heart earnestly to know and do his duty.  Let him keep his
soul pure, and his body also (for nothing hinders that heavenly
wisdom like loose living), and he will be wise enough for this world,
and for the world to come likewise.

I tell you, my friends, I have known women, who were neither clever
women, nor learned women, nor anything except good women, whose souls
were pure and full of the Holy Spirit, and who lived lives of prayer,
and sat all day long with Mary at the feet of Jesus.--I have known
such women to have at times a wisdom which all books and all sciences
on earth cannot give.  I have known them give opinions on deep
matters which learned and experienced men were glad enough to take.
I have known them have, in a wonderful degree, that wisdom which the
Scripture calls discerning of spirits, being able to see into
people's hearts; knowing at a glance what they were thinking of, what
made them unhappy, how to manage and comfort them; knowing at a
glance whether they were honest or not, pure-minded or not--a
precious and heavenly wisdom, which comes, as I believe, from none
other than the inspiration of the Spirit of Christ, who is the
discerner of the secret thoughts of all hearts:  and when I have seen
such people, altogether simple and humble, and yet most wise and
prudent, because they were full of the fear of the Lord, and of the
knowledge of God, I could not but ask--Why should we not be all like
them?

My friends, I believe that we may all be more or less like them, if
we will make the fear of the Lord the beginning of our wisdom, and
the middle of our wisdom, and the end of our wisdom.

Nine-tenths of the mistakes we make in life come from forgetting the
fear of God and the law of God, and saying not, I will do what is
right:  but--I will do what will profit me; I will do what I like.
If we would say to ourselves manfully instead all our lives through,
I will learn the will of God, and do it, whatsoever it cost me; we
should find in our old age that God's Holy Spirit was indeed a guide
and a comforter, able and willing to lead us into all truth which was
needful for us.  We should find St. Paul had spoken truth, when he
said that godliness has the promise of THIS life, as well as of that
which is to come.



SERMON XXIII.  HUMAN NATURE
(Septuagesima Sunday.)



GENESIS i. 27.

So God created man in his own image; in the image of God created he
him; male and female created he them.

On this Sunday the Church bids us to begin to read the book of
Genesis, and hear how the world was made, and how man was made, and
what the world is, and who man is.

And why?

To prepare us, I think, for Lent, and Passion week, Good Friday, and
Easter day.

For you must know what a thing ought to be, before you can know what
it ought not to be; you must know what health is, before you can know
what disease is; you must know how and why a good man is good, before
you can know how and why a bad man is bad.  You must know what man
fell from, before you can know what man has fallen to; and so you
must hear of man's creation, before you can understand man's fall.

Now in Lent we lament and humble ourselves for man's fall.  In
Passion week we remember the death and suffering of our blessed Lord,
by which he redeemed us from the fall.  On Easter day we give him
thanks and glory for having conquered death and sin, and rising up as
the new Adam, of whom St. Paul writes, 'As in Adam all died, even so
in Christ shall all be made alive.'

And therefore to prepare us for Lent and Passion week, and Easter
day, we begin this Sunday to read who the first man was, and what he
was like when he came into the world.

Now we all say that man was created good, righteous, innocent, holy.
But do you fancy that man had any goodness or righteousness of his
own, so that he could stand up and say, I am good; I can take care of
myself; I can do what is right in my own strength?

If you fancy so, you fancy wrong.  The book of Genesis, and the text,
tell us that it was not so.  It tells us that man could not be good
by himself; that the Lord God had to tell him what to do, and what
not to do; that the Lord God visited him and spoke to him:  so that
he could only do right by faith:  by trusting the Lord, and believing
him, and believing that what the Lord told him was the right thing
for him; and it tells us that he fell for want of faith, by not
believing the Lord and not believing that what the Lord told him was
right for him.  So he was holy, and stood safe, only as long as he
did not stand alone:  but the moment that he tried to stand alone he
fell.  So that it was with Adam as it is with you and me.  The just
man can only live by faith.

And St. John explains this more fully, when he tells us that the
voice of the Lord, the Word of God whom Adam heard walking among the
trees of the garden, was our blessed Lord Jesus Christ, who was the
life of Adam and all men, and the light of Adam and all men.  All
death and misery, and all ignorance and darkness, come at first from
forgetting the Lord Jesus Christ, and forgetting that he is about our
path and about our bed, and spying out all our ways; as St. John
says, that Christ's light is always shining in the darkness of this
world, but the darkness comprehendeth it not; that he came to his
own, but his own received him not; but as many as received him, to
them gave he power to become the sons of God, as he gave to man at
first; for St. Luke says, that Adam was the Son of God.  But a son
must depend on his father; and therefore man was sent into the world
to depend on God.  So do not fancy that man before he fell could do
without God's grace, though he cannot now.  If man had never fallen,
he would have been just as much in need of God's grace to keep him
from falling.  To deny that is the root of what is called the
Pelagian heresy.  Therefore the Church has generally said, and said
most truly, that 'Adam stood by grace in Paradise;' and had a
'supernatural gift;' and that as long as he used that gift, he was
safe, and only so long.

Now what does supernatural mean?

It means 'above nature.'

Adam had a human nature:  but he wanted something to keep him above
that nature, lest he should die, as all natural things on earth must.
Trees and flowers, birds and beasts, yea, the great earth itself must
die, and have an end in time, because it has had a beginning.

Man had and has still a human nature; the most beautiful, noble, and
perfect nature in the world; high above the highest animals in rank,
beauty, understanding, and feelings.  Human nature is made, so the
Bible tells us, in some mysterious way, after the likeness of God; of
Christ, the eternal Son of man, who is in heaven; for the Bible
speaks of the Word or Voice of God as appearing to man in something
of a human voice:  reasoning with him as man reasons with man; and
feeling toward him human feelings.  That is the doctrine of the
Bible; of David and the prophets, just as much as of Genesis or of
St. Paul.

That is a great mystery and a great glory:  but that alone could not
make man good, could not even keep him alive.

For God made man for something more noble and blessed than to follow
even his own lofty human nature.  God made the animals to follow
their natures each after its kind, and to do each what it liked,
without sin.  But he made man to do more than that; to do more than
what he LIKES; namely, to do what he OUGHT.  God made man to love
him, to obey him, to copy him, by doing God's will, and living God's
life, lovingly, joyfully, and of his own free will, as a son follows
the father whose will he delights to do.

All animals God made to live and multiply, each after their kind:
and man likewise:  but the animals he made to die again, and fresh
generations, ay, and fresh kinds of animals to take their place, and
do their work, as we know has happened again and again, both before
and since man came upon the earth.  But of man the Bible says, that
he was not meant to die:  that into him God breathed the breath, or
spirit, of life:  of that life of men who is Jesus Christ the Lord;
that in Christ man might be the Son of God.  To man he gave the life
of the soul, the moral and spiritual life, which is--to do justly,
and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with his God; the life which is
always tending upward to the source from which it came, and longing
to return to God who gave it, and to find rest in him.  For in God
alone, in the assurance of God's love to us, and in the knowledge
that we are living the life of God, can a man's spirit find rest.  So
St. Augustine found, through so many bitter experiences, when (as he
tells us) he tried to find rest and comfort in all God's creatures
one after another, and yet never found them till he found God, or
rather was found by God, and illuminated (so he says himself) with
that grace which by the fall he lost.

What then does holy baptism mean?  It means that God lifts us up
again to that honour from whence Adam fell.  That as Adam lost the
honour of being God's son, so Jesus Christ restores to us that
honour.  That as Adam lost the supernatural grace in which he stood,
so God for Christ's sake freely gives us back that grace, that we may
stand by faith in that Christ, the Word of God, whom Adam disbelieved
and fell away.

Baptism says, You are not true and right men by nature; you are only
fallen men--men in your wrong place:  but by grace you become men
indeed, true men; men living as man was meant to live, by faith,
which is the gift of God.  For without grace man is like a stream
when the fountain head is stopped; it stops too--lies in foul
puddles, decays, and at last dries up:  to keep the stream pure and
living and flowing, the fountain above must flow, and feed it for
ever.

And so it is with man.  Man is the stream, Christ is the fountain of
life.  Parted from him mankind becomes foul and stagnant in sin and
ignorance, and at last dries up and perishes, because there is no
life in them.  Joined to him in holy baptism, mankind lives, spreads,
grows, becomes stronger, better, wiser year by year, each generation
of his church teaching the one which comes after, as our Lord says,
not only, 'If any man thirst, let him come to me and drink;' but
also, 'He that believeth in me, out of him shall flow rivers of
living water.'

Yes, my brethren, if you want to see what man is, you must not look
at the heathens, who are in a state of fallen and corrupt nature, but
at Christians, who are in a state of grace; for they only (those of
them, I mean, who are true to God and themselves), give us any true
notion of what man can be and should be.

Heathendom is the foul and stagnant pool, parted from Christ, the
Fount of life.  Christendom, in spite of all its sins and short-
comings, is the stream always fed from the heavenly Fountain.  And
holy baptism is the river of the water of life, which St. John saw in
the Revelations, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of
God and of the Lamb, the trees of which are for the healing of the
nations.  And when that river shall have spread over the world, there
shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall
be in the city of God; and the nations of them that are saved shall
grow to glory and blessedness, such as eye hath not seen, nor ear
heard, nor hath entered into the heart of man to conceive, but God
hath prepared for those who love him.

Oh, may God hasten that day!  May he accomplish the number of his
elect and hasten his kingdom, and the day when there shall not be a
heathen soul on earth, but all shall know him from the least to the
greatest, and the knowledge of the Lord shall cover the earth, as the
waters cover the sea!

Then--when all men are brought into the fold of Christ's holy Church-
-then will they be men indeed; men not after nature, but after grace,
and the likeness of Christ, and the stature of perfect men:  and then
what shall happen to this earth matters little; no, not if the earth
and all the works therein, beautiful though they be, be burned up;
for though this world perish, man would still have his portion sure
in the city of God which is eternal in the heavens, and before the
face of the Son of man who is in heaven.

Oh, my friends, think of this.  Think of what you say when you say,
'I am a man.'  Remember that you are claiming for yourselves the very
highest honour--an honour too great to make you proud; an honour so
great that, if you understand it rightly, it must fill you with awe,
and trembling, and the spirit of godly fear, lest, when God has put
you up so high, you should fall shamefully again.  For the higher the
place, the deeper the fall; and the greater the honour, the greater
the shame of losing it.  But be sure that it was an honour before
Adam fell.  That ever since Christ has taken the manhood into God, it
is an honour now to be a man.  Do not let the devil or bad men ever
tempt you to say, I am only a man, and therefore you cannot expect me
to do right.  I am but a man, and therefore I cannot help being mean,
and sinful, and covetous, and quarrelsome, and foul:  for that is the
devil's doctrine, though it is common enough.  I have heard a story
of a man in America--where very few, I am sorry to say, have heard
the true doctrine of the Catholic Church, and therefore do not know
really that God made man in his own image, and redeemed him again
into his own image by Jesus Christ--and this man was rebuked for
being a drunkard; and what do you fancy his excuse was?  'Ah,' he
said, 'you should remember that there is a great deal of human nature
in a man.'  That was his excuse.  He had been so ill-taught by his
Calvinist preachers, that he had learnt to look on human nature as
actually a bad thing; as if the devil, and not God, had made human
nature, and as if Christ had not redeemed human nature.  Because he
was a man, he thought he was excused in being a bad man; because he
had a human nature in him, he was to be a drunkard and a brute.

My friends, I trust that you have not so learned Christ.  And if you
have, it is from no teaching of your Bible, of your Catechism, or
your Prayer-book; and, I say boldly, from no teaching of mine.  The
Church bids you say, Yes; I have a human nature in me; and what
nature is that but the nature which the Son of God took on himself,
and redeemed, and justified it, and glorified it, sitting for ever
now in his human nature at the right hand of God, the Son of man who
is in heaven?  Yes, I am a man; and what is it to be a man, but to be
the image and glory of God?  What is it to be a man?  To belong to
that race whose Head is the co-equal and co-eternal Son of God.
True, it is not enough to have only a human nature which may sin,
will sin, must sin, if left to itself a moment.  But you have, unless
the Holy Spirit has left you, and your baptism is of none effect,
more than human nature in you:  you have divine grace--that
supernatural grace and Spirit of God by which man stood in Paradise,
and by neglecting which he fell.

Obey that Spirit; from him comes every right judgment of your minds,
every good desire of your hearts, every thought and feeling in you
which raises you up, instead of dragging you down; which bids you do
your duty, and live the life of God and Christ, instead of living the
mere death-in-life of selfish pleasure and covetousness.  Obey that
Spirit, and be men:  men indeed, that you may not come to shame in
the day when Christ the Son of Man shall take account of you, how you
have used your manhood, body, soul, and spirit.



SERMON XXIV.  THE CHARITY OF GOD



(Quinquagesima Sunday.)

LUKE xviii. 31, 32, 33.

All things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of man
shall be accomplished.  For he shall be delivered unto the Gentiles,
and shall be mocked, and spitefully entreated, and spitted on:  and
they shall scourge him and put him to death; and the third day he
shall rise again.

This is a solemn text, a solemn Gospel; but it is not its solemnity
which I wish to speak of this morning, but this--What has it to do
with the Epistle, and with the Collect?  The Epistle speaks of
Charity; the Collect bids us pray for the Holy Spirit of Charity.
What have they to do with the Gospel?

Let me try to show you.

The Epistle speaks of God's eternal charity.  The Gospel tells us how
that eternal charity was revealed, and shown plainly in flesh and
blood on earth, in the life and death of Jesus Christ our Lord.

But you may ask, How does the Epistle talk of God's charity?  It bids
men be charitable; but the name of God is never mentioned in it.  Not
so, my friends.  Look again at the Epistle, and you will see one word
which shows us that this charity, which St. Paul says we must have,
is God's charity.

For, he says, Charity never faileth; that though prophecies shall
fail, tongues cease, knowledge vanish away, charity shall never fail.
Now, if a thing never fail, it must be eternal.  And if it be
eternal, it must be in God.  For, as I have reminded you before about
other things, the Athanasian Creed tells us (and never was truer or
wiser word written) there is but one eternal.

But if charity be not in God, there must be two eternals; God must be
one eternal, and charity another eternal; which cannot be.  Therefore
charity must be in God, and of God, part of God's essence and being;
and not only God's saints, but God himself--suffereth long, and is
kind; envieth not, is not puffed up, seeketh not his own, is not
easily provoked, thinketh no evil, rejoiceth not in iniquity, but in
the truth; beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all
things, endureth all things.

So St. Augustine believed, and the greatest fathers of old time.
They believed, and they have taught us to believe, that before all
things, above all things, beneath all things, is the divine charity,
the love of God, infinite as God is infinite, everlasting as God is
everlasting; the charity by which God made all worlds, all men, and
all things, that they might be blest as he is blest, perfect as he is
perfect, useful as he is useful; the charity which is God's essence
and Holy Spirit, which might be content in itself, because it is
perfectly at peace in itself; and yet CANNOT be content in itself,
just because it is charity and love, and therefore must be going
forth and proceeding everlastingly from the Father and the Son, upon
errands of charity, love, and mercy, rewarding those whom it finds
doing their work in their proper place, and seeking and saving those
who are lost, and out of their proper place.

But what has this to do with the Gospel?  Surely, my friends, it is
not difficult to see.  In Jesus Christ our Lord, the eternal charity
of God was fully revealed.  The veil was taken off it once for all,
that men might see the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, and
know that the glory of God is charity, and the Spirit of God is love.

There was a veil over that in old times; and the veil comes over it
often enough now.  It was difficult in old times to believe that God
was charity; it is difficult sometimes now.

Sad and terrible things happen--Plague and famine, earthquake and
war.  All these things have happened in our times.  Not two months
ago, in Italy, an earthquake destroyed many thousands of people; and
in India, this summer, things have happened of which I dare not
speak, which have turned the hearts of women to water, and the hearts
of men to fire:  and when such things happen, it is difficult for the
moment to believe that God is love, and that he is full of eternal,
boundless, untiring charity toward the creatures whom he has made,
and who yet perish so terribly, suddenly, strangely.

Well, then, we must fall back on the Gospel.  We must not be afraid
of the terror of such awful events, but sanctify the Lord God, in our
hearts, and say, Whatever may happen I know that God is love; I know
that his glory is charity; I know that his mercy is over all his
works; for I know that Jesus Christ, who was full of perfect charity,
is the express image of his Father's person, and the brightness of
his Father's glory.  I know (for the Gospel tells me), that he dared
all things, endured all things, in the depth of his great love, for
the sake of sinful men.  I know that when he knew what was going to
happen to him; when he knew that he should be mocked, scourged,
crucified, he deliberately, calmly, faced all that shame, horror,
agony, and went up willingly to Jerusalem to suffer and to die there;
because he was full of the Spirit of God, the spirit of charity and
love.  I know that he was SO full of it, that as he went up on his
fatal journey, with a horrible death staring him in the face, still,
instead of thinking of himself, he was thinking of others, and could
find time to stop and heal the poor blind man by the way side, who
called 'Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy on me.'  And in him and
his love will I trust, when there seems nothing else left to trust on
earth.

Oh, my friends, believe this with your whole heart.  Whatever happens
to you or to your friends, happens out of the eternal charity of God,
who cannot change, who cannot hate, who can be nothing but what he is
and was, and ever will be--love.

And when St. Paul tells you, as he told you in the Epistle to-day, to
have charity, to try for charity, because it is the most excellent
way to please God, and the eternal virtue, which will abide for ever
in heaven, when all wisdom and learning, even about spiritual things,
which men have had on earth, shall seem to us when we look back such
as a child's lessons do to a grown man;--when, I say, St. Paul tells
you to try after charity, he tells you to be like God himself; to be
perfect even as your Father in heaven is perfect; to bear and forbear
because God does so:  to give and forgive because God does so; to
love all because God loves all, and willeth that none should perish,
but that all should come to the knowledge of the truth.

How he will fulfil that; how he fulfilled it last summer with those
poor souls in India, we know not, and never shall know in this life.
Let it be enough for us that known unto God are all his works from
the foundation of the world, and that his charity embraces the whole
universe.



SERMON XXV.  THE DAYS OF THE WEEK



JAMES i. 17.

Every good gift, and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh
down from the Father of lights, with whom is neither variableness,
nor shadow of turning.

It seems an easy thing for us here to say, 'I believe in God.'  We
have learnt from our childhood that there is but one God.  It seems
to us strange and ridiculous that people anywhere should believe in
more gods than one.  We never heard of any other doctrine, except in
books about the heathen; and there are perhaps not three people in
this church who ever saw a heathen man, or talked to him.

Yet it is not so easy to learn that there is but one God.  Were it
not for the church, and the missionaries who were sent into this part
of the world by the church, now 1200 years ago, we should not know it
now.  Our forefathers once worshipped many gods, and not one only
God.  I do not mean when they were savages; for I do not believe that
they ever were savages at all:  but after they were settled here in
England, living in a simple way, very much as country people live
now, and dressing very much as country people do now, they worshipped
many gods.

Now what put that mistake into their minds?  It seems so ridiculous
to us now, that we cannot understand at first how it ever arose.

But if we will consider the names of their old gods, we shall
understand it a little better.  Now the names of the old English gods
you all know.  They are in your mouths every day.  The days of the
week are named after them.  The old English kept time by weeks, as
the old Jews did, and they named their days after their gods.  Why,
would take me too much time to tell:  but so it is.

Why, then, did they worship these gods?

First, because man must worship something.  Before man fell, he was
created in Christ the image and likeness of God the Father; and
therefore he was created that he might hear his Father's voice, and
do his Father's will, as Christ does everlastingly; and after man
fell, and lost Christ and Christ's likeness, still there was left in
his heart some remembrance of the child's feeling which the first man
had; he felt that he ought to look up to some one greater than
himself, obey some one greater than himself; that some one greater
than himself was watching over him, doing him good, and perhaps, too,
doing him harm and punishing him.

Then these simple men looked up to the heaven above, and round on the
earth beneath, and asked, Who is it who is calling for us?  Who is it
we ought to obey and please; who gives us good things?  Who may hurt
us if we make him angry?

Then the first thing they saw was the sun.  What more beautiful than
the sun?  What more beneficent?  From the sun came light and heat,
the growth of all living things, ay, the growth of life itself.

The sun, they thought, must surely be a god; so they worshipped the
sun, and called the first day of the week after him--Sunday.

Next the moon.  Nothing, except the sun, seemed so grand and
beautiful to them as the moon, and she was their next god, and Monday
was named after her.

Then the wind--what a mysterious, awful, miraculous thing the wind
seemed, always moving, yet no one knew how; with immense power and
force, and yet not to be seen; as our blessed Lord himself said, 'The
wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof,
but canst not tell whence it cometh or whither it goeth.'  Then--and
this is very curious--they fancied that the wind was a sort of
pattern, or type of the spirit of man.  With them, as with the old
Jews and Greeks, the same word which meant wind, meant also a man's
soul, his spirit; and so they grew to think that the wind was
inhabited by some great spirit, who gave men spirit, and inspired
them to be brave, and to prophesy, and say and do noble things; and
they called him Wodin the Mover, the Inspirer; and named Wednesday
after him.

Next the thunder--what more awful and terrible, and yet so full of
good, than the summer heat and the thunder cloud?  So they fancied
that the thunder was a god, and called him Thor--and the dark thunder
cloud was Thor's frowning eyebrow; and the lightning flash Thor's
hammer, with which he split the rocks, and melted the winter-ice and
drove away the cold of winter, and made the land ready for tillage.
So they worshipped Thor, and loved him; for they fancied him a brave,
kindly, useful god, who loved to see men working in their fields, and
tilling the land honestly.

Then the spring.  That was a wonder to them again--and is it not a
wonder to see all things grow fresh and fair, after the dreary winter
cold?  So the spring was a goddess, and they called her Freya, the
Free One, the Cheerful One, and named Friday after her; and she it
was, they thought, who gave them the pleasant spring time, and youth,
and love, and cheerfulness, and rejoiced to see the flowers blossom,
and the birds build their nests, and all young creatures enjoy the
life which God had given them in the pleasant days of spring.  And
after her Friday is named.

Then the harvest.  The ripening of the grain, that too was a wonder
to them--and should it not be to us?--how the corn and wheat which is
put into the ground and dies should rise again, and then ripen into
golden corn?  That too must be the work of some kindly spirit, who
loved men; and they called him Seator, the Setter, the Planter, the
God of the seed field and the harvest, and after him Saturday is
named.

And so, instead of worshipping him who made all heaven and earth,
they turned to worship the heaven and the earth itself, like the
foolish Canaanites.

But some may say, 'This was all very mistaken and foolish:  but what
harm was there in it?  How did it make them worse men?'

My friends, among these very woodlands here, some thirteen hundred
years ago, you might have come upon one of the places where your
forefathers worshipped Thor and Odin, the thunder and the wind,
beneath the shade of ancient oaks, in the darkest heart of the
forest.  And there you would have seen an ugly sight enough.

There was an altar there, with an everlasting fire burning on it; but
why should that altar, and all the ground around be crusted and black
with blood; why should that dark place be like a charnel house or a
butcher's shambles; why, from all the trees around, should there be
hanging the rotting carcases, not of goats and horses merely, but of
MEN, sacrificed to Thor and Odin, the thunder and the wind?  Why that
butchery, why those works of darkness in the dark places of the
world?

Because that was the way of pleasing Thor and Odin.  To that our
forefathers came.  To that all heathens have come, sooner or later.
They fancy gods in their own likeness; and then they make out those
gods no better than, and at last as bad as themselves.

The old English and Danes were fond of Thor and Odin; they fancied
them, as I told you, brave gods, very like themselves:  but they
themselves were not always what they ought to be; they had fierce
passions, were proud, revengeful, blood-thirsty; and they thought
Thor and Odin must be so too.

And when they looked round them, that seemed too true.  The thunder
storm did not merely melt the snow, cool the air, bring refreshing
rain; it sometimes blasted trees, houses, men; that they thought was
Thor's anger.

So of the wind.  Sometimes it blew down trees and buildings, sank
ships in the sea.  That was Odin's anger.  Sometimes, too, they were
not brave enough; or they were defeated in battle.  That was because
Thor and Odin were angry with them, and would not give them courage.
How were they to appease Thor and Odin, and put them into good humour
again?  By giving them their revenge, by letting them taste blood; by
offering them sheep, goats, horses in sacrifice:  and if that would
not do, by offering them something more precious still, living men.

And so, too often, when the weather was unfavourable, and crops were
blasted by tempest or they were defeated in battle by their enemies,
Thor's and Odin's altars were turned into slaughter-places for
wretched human beings--captives taken in war, and sometimes, if the
need was very great, their own children.  That was what came of
worshipping the heaven above and the earth around, instead of the
true God.  Human sacrifices, butchery, and murder.

English and Danes alike.  It went on among them both; across the seas
in their old country, and here in England, till they were made
Christians.  There is no doubt about it.  I could give you tale on
tale which would make your blood run cold.  Then they learnt to throw
away those false gods who quarrelled among themselves, and quarrelled
with mankind; gods who were proud, revengeful, changeable, spiteful;
who had variableness in them, and turned round as their passions led
them.  Then they learnt to believe in the one true God, the Father of
lights, in whom is neither variableness nor shadow of turning.  Then
they learnt that from one God came every good and perfect gift; that
God filled the sun with light; that God guided the changes of the
moon; that God, and not Thor, gave to men industry and courage; God,
and not Wodin, inspired them with the spirit which bloweth where it
listeth, and raised them up above themselves to speak noble words and
do noble deeds; that God, and not Friga, sent spring time and
cheerfulness, and youth and love, and all that makes earth pleasant;
that God, and not Satur, sent the yearly wonder of the harvest crops,
sent rain and fruitful seasons, filling the earth with food and
gladness.

But what was there about this new God, even the true God, which the
old missionaries preached, which won the hearts of our forefathers?

This, my friends, not merely that he was one God and not many, but
that he was a Father of lights, from whom came good gifts, in whom
was neither variableness nor shadow of turning.

Not merely a master, but a Father, who gave good gifts, because he
was good himself; a God whom they could love, because he loved them;
a God whom they could trust and depend on, because there was no
variableness in him, and he could not lose his temper as Thor and
Odin did.  That was the God whom their wild, passionate hearts
wanted, and they believed in him.

And when they doubted, and asked, 'How can we be sure that God is
altogether good?--how can we be sure that he is always trustworthy,
always the same?'--Then the missionaries used to point them to the
crucifix, the image of Christ upon his cross, and say, 'There is the
token; there is what God is to you, what God suffered for you; there
is the everlasting sign that he gives good gifts, even to the best of
all gifts, even to his own self, when it was needed; there is the
everlasting sign that in him is neither darkness, passion, nor
change, but that he wills all men to be saved from their own darkness
and passions, and from the ruin which they bring, and to come to the
knowledge of the truth, that they have a Father in heaven.'



SERMON XXVI.  THE HEAVENLY FATHER



ACTS xvi. 24-28.

God that made the world, and all that therein is, seeing that he is
Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands . .
. For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also
of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.

I told you last Sunday of the meaning of the days of the week; but
one day I left out--namely, Tuesday.  I did so on purpose.  I wish to
speak of that day by itself in this sermon.

I told you how our forefathers worshipped many gods, by fancying that
various things in the world round them were gods--sun and moon, wind
and thunder, spring and harvest.

But if that seems to you at times wrong and absurd, it seemed so to
them also.  They, like all heathens, had at times dreams of one God.

They thought to themselves--All heaven and earth must have had a
beginning, and they cannot have grown out of nothing, for out of
nothing nothing comes.  They must have been made in some way.
Perhaps they were made by some ONE.

The more they saw of this wonderful world, and all the order and
contrivance in it, the more sure they were that one mind must have
planned it, one will created it.

But men--they thought--persons, living souls--are not merely made;
they are begotten; they must have a Father, whose sons they are.
Perhaps, they thought, there is somewhere a great Father; a Father of
all persons, from whom all souls come, who was before all things, and
all persons, however great, however ancient they may be.  And so,
like the Greeks and Romans, and many other heathen nations, they had
dim thoughts of an All-Father, as they called him; Father of gods and
men; the Father of spirits.

They looked round them too, in this world, and saw that everything in
it must die.  The tree, though it stood for a thousand years, must
decay at last; the very rocks and mountains crumbled to dust at last:
and so they thought--truly and wisely enough--Everything which we see
near us, perishes at last:  why should not everything which we can
see, however far off, however great, perish?  Why should not this
earth come to an end?  Why should not sun and moon, wind and thunder,
spring and harvest, end at last?  And then will not these gods, who
are mixed up with the world, and live in it, and govern it, die too?
If the sun perishes, the sun-god will perish too.  If the thunder
ceases for ever, then there will be no more thunder-god.  Yes, they
thought--and wisely and truly too--everything which has a beginning
must have an end.  Everything which is born, must die.  The sun and
the earth, wind and thunder, will perish some day; the gods of sun
and earth, wind and thunder, will die some day.  And then what will
be left?  Will there be nothing and nowhere?  That thought was too
horrible.  God's voice in their hearts, the word of the Lord Jesus
Christ, who lights every man who comes into the world, made them feel
that it was horrible, unreasonable; that it could not be.

But it was all dim to them, and uncertain.  Of one thing only they
were certain, that death reigned, and that death had passed upon all
men, and things, and even gods.  Evil beasts, evil gods, evil
passions, were gnawing at the root of all things.  A time would come
of nothing but rage and wickedness, fury and destruction; the gods
would fight and be slain, and earth and heaven would be sent back
again into shapeless ruin:  and after that they knew no more, though
they longed to know.  They dreamed, I say, at moments of a new and a
better world, new men, new gods:  but how were they to come?  Who
would live when all things died?  Was there not somewhere an All-
Father, who had eternal life?

Then they looked round upon the earth, those simple-hearted
forefathers of ours, and said within themselves, Where is the All-
Father, if All-Father there be?  Not in this earth; for it will
perish.  Not in the sun, moon, or stars, for they will perish too.
Where is He who abideth for ever?

Then they lifted up their eyes and saw, as they thought, beyond sun,
and moon, and stars and all which changes and will change, the clear
blue sky, the boundless firmament of heaven.

That never changed; that was always the same.  The clouds and storms
rolled far below it, and all the bustle of this noisy world; but
there the sky was still, as bright and calm as ever.  The All-Father
must be there, unchangeable in the unchanging heaven; bright, and
pure, and boundless like the heavens; and like the heavens too,
silent, and afar off.

So they named him after the heaven, Tuith, Tuisco, Divisco--The God
who lives in the clear heaven; and after him Tuesday is called:  the
day of Tuisco, the heavenly Father.  He was the Father of gods and
men; and man was the son of Tuisco and Hertha--heaven and earth.

That was all they knew; and even that they did not know; they
contradicted themselves and each other about it.  After a time they
began to think that Odin, and not Tuisco, was the All-Father; all was
dim and far off to them.  They were feeling after him, as St. Paul
says he had intended them to do:  but they did not find him.  They
did not know the Father, because they did not know Jesus Christ the
Son; as it is written, 'No man cometh to the Father, but through me;'
and, 'No man hath seen God at any time; only the only-begotten Son,
who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.'

Many other heathens had the same thought and the same word; the old
Greeks and Romans, for instance, who many thousand years ago spoke
the same tongue as we did then, called him Zeus or Deus Pater;
Jupiter; the heavenly Father, Father of gods and men; using the same
word as our Tuisco, a little altered.  And that same word, changed
slightly, means God now, in Welsh, French, and Italian, and many
languages in Europe and in Asia; and will do so till the end of time.

That, I say, was all they knew of their Father in heaven, till
missionaries came and preached the Gospel to them, and told them what
St. Paul told the Greeks in my text.

Now, what did St. Paul tell the Greeks?  He came, we read, to Athens
in Greece, and found the city wholly given to idolatry, worshipping
all manner of false gods, and images of them.  And yet they were not
content with their false gods.  They felt, as our forefathers felt,
that there must be a greater, better, more mighty, more faithful God
than all:  and they thought, 'We will worship him too:  for we are
sure that he is, though we know nothing about him.'  So they set up,
beside all the altars and temples of the false gods 'To the Unknown
God.'  And St. Paul passed by and saw it; and his heart was stirred
within him with pity and compassion; and he rose up and preached them
a sermon--the first and the best missionary sermon which ever was
preached on earth, the model of all missionary sermons; and said,
'That God whom you ignorantly worship, Him I will declare unto you.'

Now, here was a Gospel; here was good news.  St. Paul told them--as
the missionaries afterwards told our forefathers--that one, at least,
of their heathen fancies was not wrong.  There was a heavenly Father.
Mankind was not an orphan, come into the world he knew not whence,
and going, when he died, he knew not whither.  No, man was not an
orphan.  From God he came; to God, if he chose, he might return.  The
heathen poet had spoken truth when he said, 'For we are the offspring
of God.'

But where was the heavenly Father?  Far away in the clear sky, in the
highest heaven beyond all suns and stars?  Silent and idle, caring
for no one on earth, content in himself, and leaving sinful man to
himself to go to ruin as he chose?

'No,' says St. Paul, 'He is not far off from any one of us; for in
him we live, and move, and have our being.'

Wonderful words!  Eighteen hundred years have past since then, and we
have not spelt out half the meaning of them.  It is such good news,
such blessed news, and yet such awful news, that we are afraid to
believe it fully.  That the Almighty God should be so near us, sinful
men; that we, in spite of all our sins, should live, and move, and
have our being in God.  How can it be true?

My friends, it would not be true, if something more was not true.  We
should have no right to say, 'I believe in God the Father Almighty,'
unless we said also, 'I believe in Jesus Christ,. his only Son, our
Lord.'  St. Paul, after he had told them of a Father in heaven, went
on to tell them of A MAN whom that Father had sent to judge the
world, having raised him from the dead.--And there his sermon
stopped.  Those foolish Greeks laughed at him; they would not receive
the news of Jesus Christ the Son; and therefore they lost the good
news of their Father in heaven.  We can guess from St. Paul's Epistle
what he was going on to tell them.  How, by believing in Jesus Christ
the Son, and claiming their share in him, and being baptized into his
name, they might become once more God's children, and take their
place again as new men and true men in Jesus Christ.  But they would
not hear his message.

Our forefathers did hear that message, and believed it; they had been
feeling after the heavenly Father, and at last they found him, and
claimed their share in Christ as sons of the heavenly Father; and
therefore we are Christian men this day, baptized into God's family,
and thriving as God's family must thrive, as long as it remembers
that God dwelleth not in temples made with hands, and needs nothing
from man, seeing that he gives to all life and breath and all things;
and is not far from any one of us, seeing that in him we live, and
move, and have our being, and are the offspring, the children of God.

Bear that in mind.  Bear it in mind, I say, that in God you live, and
move, and have your being.  Day and night, going out and coming in,
say to yourselves, 'I am with God my Father, and God my Father is
with me.  There is not a good feeling in my heart, but my heavenly
Father has put it there:  ay, I have not a power which he has not
given, a thought which he does not know; even the very hairs of my
head are all numbered.  Whither shall I go then from his presence?
Whither shall I flee from his Spirit?  For he filleth all things.  If
my eyes were opened, I should see at every moment God's love, God's
power, God's wisdom, working alike in sun and moon, in every growing
blade and ripening grain, and in the training and schooling of every
human being, and every nation, to whom he has appointed their times,
and the bounds of their habitation, if haply they may seek after the
Lord, and find him in whom they live, and move, and have their being.
Everywhere I should see life going forth to all created things from
God the Father, of whom are all things, and God the Son, by whom are
all things, and God the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of that
life.'

A little of that glorious sight we may see in this life, if our
hearts and reasons are purified by the Spirit of God, to see God in
all things, and all things in God:  and more in that life whereof it
is written, 'Beloved, we are now the sons of God; and it doth not yet
appear what we shall be:  but this we know, that when he appears, we
shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.'  To that life may
he in his mercy bring us all.  Amen.



SERMON XXVII.  THE GOOD SHEPHERD



JOHN x. 11.

I am the good shepherd.

Here are blessed words.  They are not new words.  You find words like
these often in the Bible, and even in ancient heathen books.  Kings,
priests, prophets, judges, are called shepherds of the people.  David
is called the shepherd of Israel.  A prophet complains of the
shepherds of Israel who feed themselves, and will not feed the flock.

But the old Hebrew prophets had a vision of a greater and better
shepherd than David, or any earthly king or priest--of a heavenly and
almighty shepherd.  'The Lord is my shepherd,' says one; 'therefore I
shall not want.'  And another says, 'He shall feed his flock like a
shepherd.  He shall gather his lambs in his arms, and carry them in
his bosom, and shall gently lead those who are with young.'

This was blessed news; good news for all mankind, if there had been
no more than this.  But there is more blessed news still in the text.
In the text, the Lord of whom those old prophets spoke, spoke for
himself, with human voice, upon this earth of ours; and declared that
all they had said was true; and that more still was true.

I am the good shepherd, he says.  And then he adds, The good shepherd
giveth his life for the sheep.

Oh, my friends, consider these words.  Think what endless depths of
wonder there are in them.  Is it not wonderful enough that God should
care for men; should lead them, guide them, feed them, condescend to
call himself their shepherd?  Wonderful, indeed; so wonderful, that
the old prophets would never have found it out but by the inspiration
of Almighty God.  But what a wider, deeper, nobler, more wonderful
blessing, and more blessed wonder, that the shepherd should give his
life for the sheep;--that the master should give his life for the
servant, the good for the bad, the wise one for the fools, the pure
one for the foul, the loving one for the spiteful, the king for those
who had rebelled against him, the Creator for his creatures.  That
God should give his life for man!  Truly, says St. John, 'Herein is
love.  Not that we loved him:  but that he loved us.'  Herein,
indeed, is love.  Herein is the beauty of God, and the glory of God;
that he spared nothing, shrank from nothing, that he might save man.
Because the sheep were lost, the good shepherd would go forth into
the rough and dark places of the earth to seek and to save that which
was lost.  That was enough.  That was a thousand times more than we
had a right to expect.  Had he done only that he would have been for
ever glorious, for ever adorable, for ever worthy of the praises and
thanks of heaven and earth, and all that therein is.  But that seemed
little in the eyes of Jesus, little to the greatness of his divine
love.  He would understand the weakness of his sheep by being weak
himself; understand the sorrows of his sheep, by sorrowing himself;
understand the sins of his sheep, by bearing all their sins; the
temptations of his sheep, by conquering them himself; and lastly, he
would understand and conquer the death of his sheep, by dying
himself.  Because the sheep must die, he would die too, that in all
things, and to the uttermost, he might show himself the good
shepherd, who shared all sorrow, danger and misery with his sheep, as
if they had been his children, bone of his bone and flesh of his
flesh.  In all things he would show himself the good shepherd, and no
hireling, who cared for himself and his own wages.  If the wolf came,
he would face the wolf, and though the wolf killed him, yet would he
kill the wolf, that by his death he might destroy death, and him who
had the power of death, that is, the devil.  He would go where the
sheep went.  He would enter into the sheepfold by the same gate as
they did, and not climb over into the fold some other way, like a
thief and a robber.  He would lead them into the fold by the same
gate.  They had to go into God's fold through the gate of death; and
therefore he would go in through it also, and die with his sheep;
that he might claim the gate of death for his own, and declare that
it did not belong to the devil, but to him and his heavenly Father;
and then having led his sheep in through the gate of death, he would
lead them out again by the gate of resurrection, that they might find
pasture in the redeemed land of everlasting life, where can enter
neither devil, nor wolf, nor robber, evil spirit, evil man, or evil
thing.  This, and more than this, he would do in the greatness of his
love.  He would become in all things like his sheep, that he might
show himself the good shepherd.  Because they died, he would die;
that so, because he rose, they might rise also.

Oh, my friends, who is sufficient for these things?  Not men, not
saints, not angels or archangels can comprehend the love of Christ.
How can they?  For Christ is God, and God is love; the root and
fountain of all love which is in you and me, and angels, and all
created beings.  And therefore his love is as much greater than ours,
or than the love of angels and archangels, as the whole sun is
greater than one ray of sun-light.  Say rather, as much greater and
more glorious as the sun is greater and more glorious than the light
which sparkles in the dew-drop on the grass.  The love and goodness
and holiness of a saint or an angel is the light in that dew-drop,
borrowed from the sun.  The love of God is the sun himself, which
shineth from one part of heaven to the other, and there is nothing
hid from the life-giving heat and light thereof.  When the dew-drop
can take in the sun, then can we take in the love of God, which fills
all heaven and earth.

But there is, if possible, better news still behind--'I am the good
shepherd; and know my sheep, and am known of mine.'

'I know my sheep.'  Surely some of the words which I have just spoken
may help to explain that to you.  'I know my sheep.'  Not merely, I
know who are my sheep, and who are not.  Of course, the Lord does
that.  We might have guessed that for ourselves.  What comfort is
there in that?  No, he does not say merely, 'I know WHO my sheep are;
but I know WHAT my sheep are.  I know them; their inmost hearts.  I
know their sins and their follies:  but I know, too, their longing
after good.  I know their temptations, their excuses, their natural
weaknesses, their infirmities, which they brought into the world with
them.  I know their inmost hearts for good and for evil.  True, I
think some of them often miserable, and poor, and blind, when they
fancy themselves strong, and wise, and rich in grace, and having need
of nothing.  But I know some of them, too, to be longing after what
is good, to be hungering and thirsting after righteousness, when they
can see nothing but their own sin and weakness, and are utterly
ashamed and tired of themselves, and are ready to lie down in
despair, and give up all struggling after God.  I know their
weakness--and of me it is written, 'I will carry the lambs in mine
arms.'  Those who are innocent and inexperienced in the ways of this
world, I will see that they are not led into temptation; and I will
gently lead those that are with young:  those who are weary with the
burden of their own thoughts, those who are yearning and labouring
after some higher, better, more free, more orderly, more useful life;
those who long to find out the truth, and to speak it, and give birth
to the noble thoughts and the good plans which they have conceived:
I have inspired their good desires, and I will bring them to good
effect; I will gently lead them,' says the Lord, 'for I know them
better than they know themselves.'

Yes.  Christ knows us better than we know ourselves:  and better,
too, than we know him.  Thanks be to God that it is so.  Or the last
words of the text would crush us into despair--'I know my sheep, and
am known of mine.'

Is it so?  We trust that we are Christ's sheep.  We trust that he
knows us:  but do we know him?  What answer shall we make to that
question, Do you know Christ?  I do not mean, Do you know ABOUT
Christ?  You may know ABOUT a person without knowing the person
himself when you see him.  I do not mean, Do you know doctrines about
Christ? though that is good and necessary.  Nor, Do you know what
Christ has done for your soul? though that is good and necessary
also.  But, Do you know Christ himself?  You have never seen him.
True:  but have you never seen any one like him--even in part?  Do
you know his likeness when you see it in any of your neighbours?
That is a question worth thinking over.  Again--Do you know what
Christ is like?  What his character is--what his way of dealing with
your soul, and all souls, is?  Are you accustomed to speak to him in
your prayers as to one who can and will hear you; and do you know his
voice when he speaks to you, and puts into your heart good desires,
and longings after what is right and true, and fair and noble, and
loving and patient, as he himself is?  Do you know Christ?

Alas! my friends, what a poor answer we can make to that question?
How little do we know Christ?

What would become of us, if he were like us?--If he were one who
bargained with us, and said--'Unless you know me, I will not take the
trouble to know you.  Unless you care for me, you cannot expect me to
care for you.'  What would become of us, if God said, 'As you do to
me, so will I do to you?'

But our only hope lies in this, that in Christ the Lord is no spirit
of bargaining, no pride, no spite, no rendering evil for evil.  In
this is our hope; that he is the likeness of his Father's glory, and
the express image of his person; perfect as his Father is perfect;
that like his Father, he causeth his rain to fall on the evil and the
good; and his sun to shine on the just and on the unjust; and is good
to the unthankful and the evil--to you and me--and knows us, though
we know him not; and cares for us, though we care not for him; and
leads us his way, like a good shepherd, when we fancy in our conceit
that we are going in our own way.  This is our hope, that his love is
greater than our stupidity; that he will not tire of us, and our
fancies, and our self-will, and our laziness, in spite of all our
peevish tempers, and our mean and fruitless suspicions of his
goodness.  No!  He will not tire of us, but will seek us, and save us
when we go astray.  And some day, somewhere, somehow, he will open
our eyes, and let us see him as he is, and thank him as he deserves.
Some day, when the veil is taken off our eyes, we shall see like
those disciples at Emmaus, that Jesus has been walking with us, and
breaking our bread for us, and blessing us, all our lives long; and
that when our hearts burned within us at noble thoughts, and stories
of noble and righteous men and women, and at the hope that some day
good would conquer evil, and heaven come down on earth, then--so we
shall find--God had been dwelling among men all along--even Jesus,
who was dead, and is alive for evermore, and has the keys of death
and hell, and knows his sheep in this world, and in all worlds, past,
present, and to come, and leads them, and will lead them for ever,
and none can pluck them out of his hand.  Amen.



SERMON XXVIII.  DARK TIMES



1 JOHN iv. 16-18.

We have known and believed the love that God hath to us.  God is
love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.
Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day
of judgment; because as he is, so are we in this world.  There is no
fear in love but perfect love casteth out fear; because fear hath
torment.  He that feareth is not made perfect in love.

Have we learnt this lesson?  Our reading, and thinking, and praying,
have been in vain, unless they have helped us to believe and know the
love which God has to us.  But, indeed, no reading, or thinking, or
praying will teach us that perfectly.  God must teach it us himself.
It is easy to say that God is love; easy to say that Christ died for
us; easy to say that God's Spirit is with us; easy to say all manner
of true doctrines, and run them off our tongues at second-hand; easy
for me to stand up here and preach them to you, just as I find them
written in a book.  But do I believe what I say?  Do you believe what
you say?  There is an awful question.  We believe it all now, or
think we believe it, while we are easy and comfortable:  but should
we have boldness in the day of judgment?--Should we believe it all,
if God visited us, to judge us, and try us, and pierce asunder the
very joints and marrow of our heart with fearful sorrow and
temptation?  O Lord, who shall stand in that day?

Suppose, for instance, God were to take away the desire of our eyes,
with a stroke.  Suppose we were to lose a wife, a darling child;
suppose we were struck blind, or paralytic; suppose some unspeakable,
unbearable shame fell on us to-morrow:  could we say then, God is
love, and this horrible misery is a sign of it?  He loves me, for he
chastens me?  Or should we say, like Job's wife, and one of the
foolish women, 'Curse God and die?'  God knows.

Ah, when that dark day seems coming on us, and bringing some misery
which looks to us beforehand quite unbearable--then how our lip-
belief and book-faith is tried, and burnt up in the fire of God, and
in the fire of our own proud, angry hearts, too!  How we struggle and
rage at first at the very thought of the coming misery; and are ready
to say, God will not do this!  He cannot--cannot be so unjust, so
cruel, as to bring this misery on me.  What have I done to deserve
it?  Or, if I have deserved it, what have these innocents done?  Why
should they be punished for my sins?  After all my prayers, too, and
my church-goings, and my tryings to be good.  Is this God's reward
for all my trouble to please him?  Then how vain all our old prayers
seem; how empty and dry all ordinances.  We cry, I have cleansed my
hands in vain, and in vain washed my heart in innocency.  We have no
heart to pray to God.  If he has not heard our past prayers, why
should we pray anymore?  Let us lie down and die; let us bear his
heavy hand, if we must bear it, sullenly, desperately:  but, as for
saying that God is love, or to say that we know the love which God
has for us, we say in our hearts, Let the clergyman talk of that; it
is his business to speak about it; or comfortable, easy people, who
are not watering their pillow with bitter tears all night long.  But
if they were in my place (says the unhappy man), they would know a
little more of what poor souls have to go through:  they would talk
somewhat less freely about its being a sin to doubt God's love.  He
has sent this great misery on me.  How can I tell what more he may
not send?  How can I help being afraid of God, and looking up to him
with tormenting fear?

Yes, my friends.  These are very terrible thoughts--very wrong
thoughts some of them, very foolish thoughts some of them, though
pardonable enough; for God pardons them, as we shall see.  But they
are real thoughts.  They are what really come into people's minds
every day; and I am here to talk to you about what is really going on
in your soul, and mine; not to repeat to you doctrines at second-hand
out of a book, and say, There, that is what you have to believe and
do; and, if you do not, you will go to hell:  but to speak to you as
men of like passions with myself; as sinning, sorrowing, doubting,
struggling human beings; and to talk to you of what is in my own
heart, and will be in your hearts too, some day, if it has not been
already.  This is the experience of all REAL men, all honest men, who
ever struggled to know and to do what is right.  David felt it all.
You find it all through those glorious Psalms of his.  He was no
comfortable, book-read, second-hand Christian, who had an answer
ready for every trouble, because he had never had any real trouble at
all.  David was not one of them.  He had to go through a very rough
training--very terrible and fiery trials, year after year; and had to
say, again and again, 'I am weary of crying; my heart is dry; my
heart faileth me for waiting so long upon my God.  All thy billows
and storms are gone over me.  Thou hast laid me in a place of
darkness, and in the lowest deep.' -

Not by sitting comfortably reading his book, but by such terrible
trials as that, was David taught to trust God to the uttermost; and
to learn that God's love was so perfect that he need never dread him,
or torment himself with anxiety lest God should leave him to perish.

Hezekiah felt it, too, good man as he was, when he was sick, and like
to die.  And it was not for many a day that he found out the truth
about these dark hours of misery, that by all these things men live,
and in all these things is the life of the Spirit.

And this was Jacob's experience, too, on that most fearful night of
all his life, when he waited by the ford of Jabbok, expecting that
with the morning light the punishment of his past sins would come on
him; and not only on him, but on all his family, and his innocent
children; when he stood there alone by the dark river, not knowing
whether Esau and his wild Arabs would not sweep off the earth all he
had and all he loved; and knowing, too, that it was his own fault,
that he had brought it all upon them by his own deceit and treachery.
Then, when his sins stared him in the face, and God rose up to
judgment against him, he learnt to pray as he had never prayed
before--a prayer too deep for words.

'And Jacob was left alone:  and there wrestled a man with him till
the breaking of the day.  And when he saw that he prevailed not
against him, he touched the hollow of Jacob's thigh; and the hollow
of his thigh was out of joint as he wrestled with him.  And he said,
Let me go, for the day breaketh.  And he said, I will not let thee
go, till thou bless me.  And he blessed him there.  And Jacob called
the name of that place Peniel:  for I have seen God face to face, and
my life is preserved.'

So it may be with us.  So it must be with us, in the dark day when
our faith is really tried by terrible affliction.

We must begin as Jacob did.  Plead God's promises, confess the
mercies we have received already.  'I am not worthy of the least of
all the mercies which thou hast showed to thy servant.'

Ask for God's help, as Jacob did:  'Deliver me, I pray thee, out of
the hand of Esau my brother.'  Plead his written promises, and the
covenant of our baptism, which tell us that we are God's children,
and God our Father, as Jacob did according to his light--'And thou
saidst, I will surely do thee good.'

So the proud angry heart will perhaps pass out of us, and we shall
set ourselves more calmly to face the worst, and to try if God's
promises be indeed true, and God be indeed as he has said, 'Love.'

But do not be astonished, do not be disheartened, if, when the
trouble comes, there comes with it, as to Jacob, a more terrible
struggle far, a struggle too deep for words; if you find out that
fine words and set prayers are nothing in the hour of need, and that
you will not be heard for your much speaking.  Ah! the darkness of
that time, which perhaps goes on for days, for months, all alone
between you and God himself.  Clergymen and good people may come in
with kind words and true words:  but they give no comfort; your heart
is still dark, still full of doubt; you want God himself to speak to
your heart, and tell you that he is love.  And you have no words to
pray with at last; you have used them all up; and you can only cling
humbly to God, and hold fast.  One moment you feel like a poor slave
clinging to his stern master's arm, and entreating him not to kill
him outright.  The next you feel like a child clinging to its father,
and entreating him to save him from some horrible monster which is
going to devour it:  but you have no words to pray with, only sighs,
and tears, and groans; you feel that you know not what to pray for as
you ought, know not what is good for you; dare ask for nothing, lest
it should be the wrong thing.  And the longer you struggle, the
weaker you become, as Jacob did, till your very bones seem out of
joint, your very heart broken within you, and life seems not worth
having, or death either.

Only hold fast by God.  Only do not despair.  Only be sure that God
cannot lie; be sure that he who cared for you from your birth hour
cares for you still; that he who loved you enough to give his own Son
for you hundreds of years before you were born, cannot but love you
still; do not despair, I say; and at last, when you are fallen so low
that you can fall no lower, and so weak that you are past struggling,
you may hear through the darkness of your heart the still small voice
of God.  Only hold fast, and let him not go until he bless you, and
you shall find with Jacob of old, that as a prince you have power
with God and with man, and have prevailed.  And so God will answer
you, as he answered Elijah, at first out of the whirlwind and the
blinding storm:  but at last, doubt it not, with the still small
voice which cannot be mistaken, which no earthly ear can hear, but
which is more precious to the broken heart than all which this world
gives, the peace which passes understanding, and yet is the surest
and the only lasting peace.

But what is the secret of this strange awful struggle?  Can you or I
change God's will by any prayers of ours?  God forbid that we should,
my friends, even if we could; for his will is a good will to us, and
his name is Love.

Do not be afraid of him.  If you do, you are not made perfect in
love; you have not yet learnt perfect the lesson of his great love to
you.  But what is the secret of this struggle?  Why has any poor soul
to wrestle thus with God who made him, before he can get peace and
hope?  Why is the trouble sent him at all?  It looks at first sight a
strange sort of token of God's love, to bring the creatures whom he
has made into utter misery.

My friends, these are deep questions.  There are plenty of answers
for them ready written:  but no answers like the Bible ones, which
tell us that 'whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth; that these sorrows
come on us, and heaviness, and manifold temptations, in order that
the trial of our faith, being much more precious than that of gold,
which perishes though it be tried with fire, may be found to praise,
and honour, and glory at the appearance of Jesus Christ.'  This is
the only answer but it does not explain the reason.  It only gives us
hope under it.  We do not know that these dreadful troubles come from
God.  The Bible tells us 'that God tempts no man; that he does not
afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men.'  The Bible speaks
at times as if these dark troubles came from the devil himself; and
as if God turned them into good for us by making them part of our
training, part of our education; and so making some devil's attempt
to ruin us only a great means of our improvement.  I do not know:
but this I do know, the troubles are here, and God is love.  At least
this is comfortable, that God will let no man be tempted beyond what
he is able:  but will with the temptation make a way for us to
escape, that we may be able to bear it.  At least this is
comfortable, that our prayers are not needed to change God's will,
because his will is already that we should be saved; because we are
on his side in the battle against the devil, or the flesh, or the
world, or whatever it is which makes poor souls and bodies miserable,
and he on ours:  and all we have to do in our prayers, is to ask
advice and orders and strength and courage from the great Captain of
our salvation; that we may fight his battle and ours aright and to
the end.  And, my friends, if you be in trouble, if your heart be
brought low within you, remember, only remember, who the Captain of
our salvation is.  Who but Jesus who died on the cross--Jesus who was
made perfect by sufferings, Jesus who cried out, 'My God! my God! why
hast thou forsaken me?'

If Christ had to be made perfect by sufferings, much more must we.
If he needed to learn obedience by sorrow, much more must we.  If he
needed in the days of his flesh, to make supplication to God his
Father with strong crying and tears, so do we.  And if he was heard
in that he feared, so, I trust, we shall be heard likewise.  If he
needed to taste even the most horrible misery of all; to feel for a
moment that God had forsaken him; surely we must expect, if we are to
be made like him, to have to drink at least one drop out of his
bitter cup.  It is very wonderful:  but yet it is full of hope and
comfort.  Full of hope and comfort to be able, in our darkest and
bitterest sorrow, to look up to heaven, and say, At least there is
one who has been through all this.  As Christ was, so are we in this
world; and the disciple cannot be above his master.  Yes, we are in
this world as he was, and he was once in this world as we are, he has
been through all this, and more.  He knows all this and more.  'We
have a High Priest above us who can be touched with the feeling of
our infirmities, because he has been tempted in all things like as we
are. yet without sin.'

Yes, my friends.  Nothing like one honest look, one honest thought,
of Christ upon his cross.  That tells us how much he has been
through, how much he endured, how much he conquered, how much God
loved us, who spared not his only-begotten Son, but freely gave him
for us.  Dare we doubt such a God?  Dare we murmur against such a
God?  Dare we lay the blame of our sorrows on such a God--our Father?
No; let us believe the blessed message of our confirmation, which
tells us that it is his Fatherly hand which is ever over us, and that
even though that hand may seem heavy for awhile, it is the hand of
him whose very being and substance is love, who made the world by
love, by love redeemed man, by love sustains him still.  Though we
went down into hell, says David, he is there; though we took the
wings of the morning, and fled into the uttermost part of the sea,
yet there his hand would hold us, and his right hand guide us still.
It is holding and guiding every one of us now, through storm as well
as through sunshine, through grief as well as through joy; let us
humble ourselves under that mighty hand, and it will exalt us in due
time.  He knows, and must know, when that due time is, and, till
then, he is still love, and his mercy is over all his works.



SERMON XXIX.  GOD'S CREATION



GENESIS i. 31.

And God saw everything that he had made, and behold it was very good.

This is good news, and a gospel.  The Bible was written to bring good
news, and therefore with good news it begins, and with good news it
ends.

But it is not so easy to believe.  We want faith to believe; and that
faith will be sometimes sorely tried.

Yes; we want faith.  As St. Paul says:  'Through faith we understand
that the worlds were framed by the word of God; so that things which
are seen were not made of things which appear.'

No one can prove to us that God made the world; yet we must believe
it; and what is more, we DO believe it, and are certain of it.  But
all the proving and arguments in the world will not make us CERTAIN
that God made the world; they will only make us feel that it is
probable, that it is reasonable to think so.  What, then, does make
us CERTAIN that God made the world?--as certain as if we had seen him
make it?  FAITH, which is stronger than all arguments.  Faith, which
comes down from heaven to our hearts, and is the gift of God.  Faith,
which is the light with which Jesus Christ lights us.  Faith, which
comes by the inspiration of God's Holy Spirit.

So, again, when we have to believe not only that God made the world,
but that all things which he has made are very good.

So it is, and you must believe it.  God is good, the absolute and
perfect good; and from good nothing can come but good:  and therefore
all which God has made is good, as he is; and therefore if anything
in the world seems to be bad, one of two things must be true of it.

1.  Either it is NOT bad, though it seems so to us; and God will
bring good out of it in his good time, and justify himself to men,
and show us that he is holy in all his works, and righteous in all
his ways.

Or else--If the thing be really bad, then God did not make it.  It
must be a disease, a mistake, a failure, of man's making, or some
person's making, but not of God's making.  For all that he has made
he sees eternally; and behold, it is very good.

Now, I can say that; and I believe it; and God grant I may never say
anything else.  And yet I cannot prove it to you by any argument.
But I believe it; and I dare say many of you believe it (you all must
believe it, before all is over), by something better than any
argument.  By faith--faith, which speaks to the very core and root of
a man's heart and reason, and teaches him things surer and deeper
than all sermons and books, all proofs and arguments.

May God, our Heavenly Father, fill our hearts with his Holy Spirit of
faith, that we may believe utterly in his goodness, and therefore
believe in the goodness of all that he has made.

For at times we shall need that faith very much indeed, not only
about our neighbours, but about ourselves.  We shall find it hard to
believe that there is goodness in some of our neighbours; and the
better we know ourselves, we shall find it very difficult to believe
that there is goodness in us.

For surely this is a great puzzle.

'God saw everything that he had made, and behold it was very good.'
And God made you and me.  Are we therefore very good?  Or were we
ever very good?  Here is a great mystery.  It would seem as if we
must have been very good if God made us.  For God can make nothing
bad.  Surely not.  For he who makes bad things is a bad maker; he who
makes bad houses is a bad builder; and he who makes bad men is a bad
maker of men.  But God cannot be a bad maker; for he is perfect and
without fault in all his works.  Yet men are bad.

Yet, on the other hand, if God made us, and the Bible be true, there
must be good in us.  When God said, Let that man be; when God first
thought of us, if I may so speak, before the foundation of the world-
-he thought of us as good.  He created each of us good in his own
mind, else he would not have created us at all.  But why were we not
good when we came on earth?  Why do we come into this world sinful?
Why does God's thought of us, God's purpose about us, seem to have
failed?  We do not know, and we need not know.  St. Paul tells us
that it came by Adam's fall; that by Adam's fall sin entered into the
world, and each man, as he came into it, became sinful.  How that was
we cannot understand--we need not understand.  Let us believe, and be
silent; but let us believe this also, that St. Paul speaks truth not
in this only but in that blessed and glorious news with which he
follows up his sad and bad news.  'As by the offence of one, judgment
came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of
one, the free gift came upon all men to justification of life.'

Yes; we may say boldly now, Whatever has been; whatever sin I
inherited from Adam; however sinful I came into this world, God looks
on me now, not as I am in Adam, but as I am in Christ.  I am in
Christ now, baptized into Christ, a new creature in Christ; to Christ
I belong, and not to Adam at all; and God looks now, not on the old
corrupt nature which I inherited from Adam, but on the new and good
grace which God meant for me from all eternity, which Christ has
given me now.  It is that good and new grace in me which God cares
for; it is that good and new grace which God is working on, to
strengthen and perfect it, that I may grow in grace, and in the
likeness of Christ, and become at last what God intended me to be,
when he thought of me first before the foundation of all worlds, and
said, 'Let us make man [not one man, but all men, male and female] in
our image, after our likeness.'

This, again, is a great mystery.  Yet our own hearts will tell us, if
we will look at them, that it is true.  Are there not, as it were,
two different persons in us, fighting for the mastery?  Are we not so
different at different times, that we seem to ourselves, and to our
neighbours, perhaps, to be two different people, according as we give
way to the better nature or to the worse?  Even as David--one year
living a heroic and noble life by faith in God, writing Psalms which
will live to the world's end, and the next committing adultery and
murder.  Were those two Davids the same David?  Yes; and yet No.  The
good and noble David was David when he obeyed the grace of God.  The
base and foul David was David when he gave way to his fallen and
corrupt nature.

Even so might we be.  Even so, in a less degree, are we sometimes so
unlike ourselves, so ashamed of ourselves, so torn asunder with
passions and lusts, delighting in God's law and all that is good in
our hearts, and yet finding another law in us which makes us slaves
at moments to our basest passions--to anger, fear, spite,
covetousness--that when we think of it we are ready to cry with St.
Paul, 'Oh, wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body
of this death?'

Who?  Who but he of whom St. Paul tells us, gives the answer in the
very next verse, 'I thank God, that God himself will, through Jesus
Christ our Lord.'

Oh, my friends, whosoever of you have ever felt angry with
yourselves, discontented with yourselves, ashamed of yourselves (and
he that has not felt so knows no more about himself than a dumb
animal does)--you that have felt so, listen to St. Paul's glorious
news and take comfort.  Do you wish to be right?  Do you wish to be
what God intended you to be before all worlds?  Do you wish that of
you the glorious words may come true, 'And God saw all that he had
made, and behold it was very good?'

Then believe this.  That all which is good in you God has made; and
that he will take care of what he has made, for he loves it; that all
which is bad in you, God has NOT made, and therefore he will destroy
it; for he hates all that he has not made, and will not suffer it in
his world; and that if you, your heart, your will, are enlisted on
the good side, if you are wishing and trying that the good nature in
you should conquer the bad, then you are on the side of God himself,
and God himself is on your side; and 'if God be for you, who shall be
against you?'  Before all worlds, from eternity itself, God said,
'Let us make man in our own likeness;' and nothing can hinder God's
word but the man himself.  The word of God comes down, says the
prophet, as the rain and the dew from heaven, and, like the rain and
dew, returns not to him void, but prospers in the thing whereto he
sends it; only if the ground be hard and barren, and determined to
bring forth thorns and briars, rather than corn and fruit, is it
cursed, and near to burning; and only if a man loves his fallen
nature better than the noble, just, loving, generous grace of God,
and gives himself willingly up to the likeness of the beasts which
perish, can God's purpose towards him become of none effect.

Take courage, then.  If thou dislikest thy sins, so does God.  If
thou art fighting against thy worse feelings, so is God.  On thy side
is God who made all, and Christ who died for all, and the Holy Spirit
who alone gives wisdom, purity, nobleness.  How canst thou fail when
he is on thy side?  On thy side are all spirits of just men made
perfect, all wise and good souls and persons in earth and heaven, all
good and wholesome influences, whether of nature or of grace, of
matter or of mind.  How canst thou fail if they are on thy side?
God, I say, and all that God has made, are working together to bring
true of thee the word of God--'And God saw all that he had made, and
behold it was very good.'  Believe, and endure to the end, and thou
shalt be found in Christ at the last day; and, being in Christ, have
thy share at last in the blessing which the Father pronounces
everlastingly on Christ, and on the members of Christ, 'This is my
beloved son, in whom I am well pleased.'  Amen.



SERMON XXX.  TRUE PRUDENCE



MATTHEW vi. 34.

Take, therefore, no thought for the morrow:  for the morrow shall
take thought for the things of itself.  Sufficient unto the day is
the evil thereof.

Let me say a few words to you on this text.  Be not anxious, it tells
you.  And why?  Because you have to be prudent.  In practice,
fretting and anxiety help no man towards prudence.  We must all be as
prudent and industrious as we can; agreed.  But does fretting make us
the least more prudent?  Does anxiety make us the least more
industrious?  On the contrary, I know nothing which cripples a man
more, and hinders him working manfully, than anxiety.  Look at the
worst case of all--at a man who is melancholy, and fancies that all
is going wrong with him, and that he must be ruined, and has a mind
full of all sorts of dark, hopeless, fancies.  Does he work any the
more, or try to escape one of these dangers which he fancies are
hanging over him?  So far from it, he gives himself up to them
without a struggle; he sits moping, helpless, and useless, and says,
'There is no use in struggling.  If it will come, it must come.'  He
has lost spirit for work, and lost the mind for work, too.  His mind
is so full of these dark fears that he cannot turn it to laying any
prudent plan to escape from the very things which he dreads.

And so, in a less degree, with people who fret and are anxious.  They
may be in a great bustle, but they do not get their work done.  They
run hither and thither, trying this and that, but leaving everything
half done, to fly off to something else.  Or else they spend time
unprofitably in dreaming, and expecting, and complaining, which might
be spent profitably in working.  And they are always apt to lose
their heads, and their tempers, just when they need them most; to do
in their hurry the very last things which they ought to have done; to
try so many roads that they choose the wrong road after all, from
mere confusion, and run with open eyes into the very pit which they
have been afraid of falling into.  As we say here, they will go all
through the wood to cut a straight stick, and bring out a crooked one
at last.  My friends, even in a mere worldly way, the men whom I have
seen succeed best in life have always been cheerful and hopeful men,
who went about their business with a smile on their faces, and took
the changes and chances of this mortal life like men, facing rough
and smooth alike as it came, and so found the truth of the old
proverb, that 'Good times, and bad times, and all times pass over.'
Of all men, perhaps, who have lived in our days, the most truly
successful was the great Duke of Wellington; and one thing, I
believe, which helped him most to become great, was that he was so
wonderfully free from vain fretting and complaining, free from
useless regrets about the past, from useless anxieties for the
future.  Though he had for years on his shoulders a responsibility
which might have well broken down the spirit of any man; though the
lives of thousands of brave men, and the welfare of great kingdoms--
ay, humanly speaking, the fate of all Europe--depended on his using
his wisdom in the right place, and one mistake might have brought
ruin and shame on him and on tens of thousands; yet no one ever saw
him anxious, confused, terrified.  Though for many years he was much
tried and hampered, and unjustly and foolishly kept from doing his
work as he knew it ought to be down, yet when the time came for work,
his head was always clear, his spirit was always ready; and therefore
he succeeded in the most marvellous way.  Solomon says, 'Better is he
that ruleth his spirit, than he that taketh a city.'  Now the Great
Duke had learnt in most things to rule his spirit, and therefore he
was able not only to take cities, but to do better still, to deliver
cities,--ay, and whole countries--out of the hand of armies often far
stronger, humanly speaking, than his own.

And for an example of what I mean I will tell you a story of him
which I know to be true.  Some one once asked him what his secret was
for winning battles.  And he said that he had no secret; that he did
not know how to win battles, and that no man knew.  For all, he said,
that man could do, was to look beforehand steadily at all the
chances, and lay all possible plans beforehand:  but from the moment
the battle began, he said, no mortal prudence was of use, and no
mortal man could know what the end would be.  A thousand new
accidents might spring up every hour, and scatter all his plaits to
the winds; and all that man could do was to comfort himself with the
thought that he had done his best, and to trust in God.

Now, my friends, learn a lesson from this, a lesson for the battle of
life, which every one of us has to fight from our cradle to our
grave--the battle against misery, poverty, misfortune, sickness; the
battle against worse enemies even than they--the battle against our
own weak hearts, and the sins which so easily beset us against
laziness, dishonesty, profligacy, bad tempers, hard-heartedness,
deserved disgrace, the contempt of our neighbours, and just
punishment from Almighty God.  Take a lesson, I say, from the Great
Duke for the battle of life.  Be not fretful and anxious about the
morrow.  Face things like men; count the chances like men; lay your
plans like men:  but remember, like men, that a fresh chance may any
moment spoil all your plans; remember that there are thousand dangers
round you from which your prudence cannot save you.  Do your best;
and then like the Great Duke, comfort yourselves with the thought
that you have done your best; and like him, trust in God.  Remember
that God is really and in very truth your Father, and that without
him not a sparrow falls to the ground; and are ye not of more value
than many sparrows, O ye of little faith?  Remember that he knows
what you have need of before you ask him; that he gives you all day
long of his own free generosity a thousand things for which you never
dream of asking him; and believe that in all the chances and changes
of this life, in bad luck as well as in good, in failure as well as
success, in poverty as well as wealth, in sickness as well as health,
he is giving you and me, and all mankind good gifts, which we in our
ignorance, and our natural dread of what is unpleasant, should never
dream of asking him for:  but which are good for us nevertheless;
like him from whom they come, the Father of lights, from whom comes
every good and perfect gift; who is neither neglectful, capricious,
or spiteful, for in him is neither variableness, nor shadow of
turning, but who is always loving unto every man, and his mercy is
over all his works.

Bear this in mind, my friends, in all the troubles of life--that you
have a Father in heaven who knows what you have need of before you
ask him, and your infirmity in asking, and who is wont--is regularly
accustomed all day long--to give you more than either you desire or
deserve.  And bear it in mind even more carefully, if you ever become
anxious and troubled about your own soul, and the life to come.

Many people are troubled with such anxieties, and are continually
asking, 'Shall I be saved or not?'  In some this anxiety comes from
bad teaching, and the hearing of false, cruel, and superstitious
doctrine.  In others it seems to be mere bodily disease,
constitutional weakness and fearfulness, which prevents their
fighting against dark and sad thoughts when they arise; but in both
cases I think that it is the devil himself who tempts them, the devil
himself who takes advantage of their bodily weakness, or of the false
doctrines which they have heard, and begins whispering in their ears,
'You have no Father in heaven.  God does not love you.  His promises
are not meant for you.  He does not will your salvation, but your
damnation, and there is no hope for you;' till the poor soul falls
into what is called religious melancholy, and moping madness, and
despair, and dread of the devil; and often believes that the devil
has got complete power over him, and that he is the slave of Satan
for ever, till, in some cases, the man is even driven to kill himself
in the agony of his despair.

Now, my friends, the true answer to all such dark thoughts is, 'Your
Heavenly Father knows what you have need of before you ask him;
therefore be not anxious about the morrow, for the morrow shall take
care for the things of itself; sufficient for the day is the evil
thereof.'

For in the first place, my friends, the devil was a liar from the
beginning, and therefore the chances are a million to one against his
speaking the truth in any case; and if he tells you that you are
going to be damned, I should take that for a fair sign that you were
NOT going to be damned, simply because the devil says it, and
therefore it CANNOT be true.  No, my friends, the people who have
real reason to be afraid are just those who are not afraid--the self-
conceited, self-satisfied souls; for the devil attacks them too, as
he does every one, by their weakest point, and has his lie ready for
them, and whispers, 'You are all right; you are safe; you cannot
fall; your salvation is sure.'  Or else, 'You hold the right
doctrine; you are orthodox, and perfectly right, and whoever differs
from you must be wrong;' and so tempts them to vain confidence and
unclean living, or else into pride, hardness of heart, self-willed
and self-conceited quarrelling and slandering and lying for the sake
of their own party in the Church.  It is the self-confident ones who
have reason to fear and tremble; for after pride comes a fall.  They
have reason to fear, lest while they are crying peace and safety, and
thanking God that they are not as other men are, sudden destruction
come on them; but you anxious, trembling souls, who are terrified at
the sight of your own sins you who feel how weak you are, and
ignorant, and confused, and unworthy to do aught but cry, 'God be
merciful to me a sinner!' you are the very ones who have least reason
to be afraid, just because you are most afraid:  you are the true
penitents over whom your Father in heaven rejoices; you are those of
whom he has said, 'I am the High and Holy One who inhabiteth
eternity; yet I dwell with him that is of an humble and contrite
heart, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to comfort the soul of
the contrite ones;' as he will revive and comfort you, if you will
only have faith in God, and take your stand on your baptism, and from
that safe ground defy the devil and all his dark imaginations,
saying, 'I am God's child, and God is my father, and Christ's blood
was shed for me, and the Holy Spirit of God is with me; and in the
strength of my baptism, I will hope against hope; I trust in the Lord
my God, who has called me into this state of salvation, that he will
keep to the end the soul which I have committed to him through Jesus
Christ my Lord.'

Yes.  Be not anxious for the morrow, and much more, be not anxious
for the life to come.  Your Heavenly Father knew that you had need of
salvation long before you asked him.  Eighteen hundred years before
you were born, he sent his Son into the world to die for you; when
you were but an infant he called you to be baptized into his Church,
and receive your share of his Spirit.  Long before you thought of
him, he thought of you; long before you loved him, he loved you; and
if he so loved you, that he spared not his only begotten Son, but
freely gave him for you, will he not with that Son freely give you
all things?  Therefore, fear not, little flock; it is your Father's
good pleasure to give you the kingdom.

And be not anxious about the morrow; for the morrow shall be anxious
about the things of itself.  Be anxious about to-day, if you will;
and 'work out your salvation with fear and trembling;' for it is God
who works in you to will and to do of his good pleasure; and
therefore you can do right; and therefore, again, it is your own
fault if you do not do right.  And yet, for that very reason, be not
over anxious; for 'if God be with you, who can be against you?'  If
God, who is so mighty that he made all heaven and earth, be on our
side, surely stronger is he that is with you than he that is against
you.  If God, who so loved you that he gave his only begotten Son for
you, be on your side, surely you have a friend whom you can trust.
'What can part you from his love?'  St. Paul asks you; from God's
love, which is as boundless and eternal as God himself; nothing can
part you from it, but your own sin.

'But I do sin,' you say, 'again and again, and that is what makes me
fearful.  I try to do better, but I fall and I fail all day long.  I
try not to be covetous and worldly, but poverty tempts me, and I
fall; I try to keep my temper, but people upset me, and I say things
of which I am bitterly ashamed the next minute.  Can God love such a
one as me?'  My answer is, If God loved the whole world when it was
dead in trespasses and sins, and NOT trying to be better, much more
will he love you who are not dead in trespasses and sins, and are
trying to be better.  If he were not still helping you; if his Spirit
were not with you, you would care no more to become better than a dog
or an ox cares.  And if you fall--why, arise again.  Get up, and go
on.  You may be sorely bruised, and soiled with your fall, but is
that any reason for lying still, and giving up the struggle cowardly?
In the name of Jesus Christ, arise and walk.  He will wash you, and
you shall be clean.  He will heal you, and you shall be strong again.
What else can a traveller expect who is going over rough ground in
the dark, but to fall and bruise himself, and to miss his way too
many a time:  but is that any reason for his sitting down in the
middle of the moor, and saying, 'I shall never get to my journey's
end?'  What else can a soldier expect, but wounds, and defeat, too,
often; but is that any reason for his running away, and crying, 'We
shall never take the place?'  If our brave men at Sebastopol had done
so, and lost heart each time they were beaten back, not only would
they have never taken the place, but the Russians would have driven
them long ago into the sea, and perhaps not a man of them would have
escaped.  And, be sure of it, your battle is like theirs.  Every one
of us has to fight for the everlasting life of his soul against all
the devils of hell, and there is no use in running away from them;
they will come after us stronger than ever, unless we go to face
them.  As with our men at Sebastopol, unless we beat the enemy, the
enemy will destroy us; and our only hope is to fight to-day's battle
like men, in the strength which God gives us, and trust him to give
us strength to fight to-morrow's battle too, when it comes.  For here
again, as it was at Sebastopol, so it is with our souls.  Let our men
be as prudent as they might, they never knew what to-morrow's battle
would be like, or where the enemy might come upon them; and no more
do we.  They in general could not see the very enemy who was close on
them; and no more can we see our enemy, near to us though he is.  To-
morrow's temptations may be quite different from to-day's.  To-day we
may be tempted to be dishonest, to-morrow to lose our tempers, the
day afterwards to be vain and conceited, and a hundred other things.
Let the morrow be anxious about the things of itself, then; and face
to-day's enemy, and do the duty which lies nearest you.  Our brave
men did so.  They kept themselves watchful, and took all the
precautions they could in a general way, just as we ought to do each
in his own habits and temper; but the great business was, to go
steadily on at their work, and do each day what they could do,
instead of giving way to vain fears and fancies about what they might
have to do some day, which would have only put them out of heart, and
confused and distracted them.  And so it came to pass, that as their
day so their strength was; that each day they got forward somewhat,
and had strength and courage left besides to drive back each new
assault as it came; and so at last, after many mistakes and many
failures, through sickness and weakness, thirst and hunger, and every
misery except fear which can fall on man, they conquered suddenly,
and beyond their highest hopes:- as every one will conquer suddenly,
and beyond his highest hope, who fights on manfully under Christ's
banner against sin; against the sin in himself, and in his
neighbours, and in his parish, and faces the devil and his works
wheresoever he may meet them, sure that the devil and his works must
be conquered at the last, because God's wrath is gone out against
them, and Christ, who executes God's wrath, will never sheath his
sword till he has put all enemies under his feet, and death be
swallowed up in victory.

Therefore be not anxious about the morrow.  Do to-day's duty, fight
to-day's temptation; and do not weaken and distract yourself by
looking forward to things which you cannot see, and could not
understand if you saw them.  Enough for you that your Saviour for
whom you fight is just and merciful; for he rewardeth every man
according to his work.  Enough for you that he has said, 'He that is
faithful unto death, I will give him a crown of life.'  Enough for
you that if you be faithful over a few things, he will make you ruler
over many things, and bring you into his joy for evermore.

But as for vain fears, leave them to those who will not believe God's
message concerning himself--that he is love, and his mercy over all
his works.  Leave them for those who deny God's righteousness, by
denying that he has had pity on this poor fallen world, but has left
it to itself and its sins, without sending any one to save it.  And
for real fears, leave them for those who have no fears; for those who
think they see, and yet are blind; who think themselves orthodox and
infallible, and beyond making a mistake, every man his own Pope; who
say that they see, and therefore their sin remaineth; for those who
thank God that they are not as other men are, and who will find the
publicans and harlots entering into the kingdom of heaven before
them; and for those who continue in sin that grace may abound, and
call themselves Christians, while they bring shame on the name of
Christ by their own evil lives, by their worldliness and profligacy,
or by their bitterness and quarrelsomeness; who make religious
profession a by-word and a mockery in the mouths of the ungodly, and
cause Christ's little ones to stumble.  Let them be afraid, if they
will; for it were better for them that a millstone were hanged about
their neck, and they were drowned in the midst of the sea.  But those
who hate their sins, and long to leave their sins behind; those who
distrust themselves--let them not be anxious about the morrow; for
to-morrow, and to-day, and for ever, the Almighty Father is watching
over them, the Lord Jesus guiding them wisely and tenderly, and the
Holy Spirit inspiring them more and more to do all those good works
which God has prepared for them to walk in, and to conquer in the
life-long battle against sin, the world, and the devil.



SERMON XXXI.  THE PENITENT THIEF



LUKE xxiii. 42, 43.

And he said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy
kingdom.  And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, To-day
shalt thou be with me in paradise.

The story of the penitent thief is a most beautiful and affecting
one.  Christians' hearts, in all times, have clung to it for comfort,
not only for themselves, but for those whom they loved.  Indeed, some
people think that we are likely to be too fond of the story.  They
have been afraid lest people should build too much on it; lest they
should fancy that it gives them licence to sin, and lead bad lives,
all their days, provided only they repent at last; lest it should
countenance too much what is called a death-bed repentance.

Now, God forbid that I should try to narrow Christ's Gospel.  Who am
I, to settle who shall be saved, and who shall not?  When the
disciples asked the Lord Jesus, 'Are there few that be saved?' he
would not tell them.  And what Christ did not choose to tell, I am
not likely to know.

But I must say openly, that I cannot see what the story of the
penitent thief has to do with a death-bed repentance; and for this
plain reason, that the penitent thief did not die in his bed.

On the contrary, he received the due reward of his deeds.  He was
crucified; publicly executed, by the most shameful, painful, and
lingering torture; and confessed that it was no more than he
deserved.

Therefore, if any man say to himself--and I am afraid that some do
say to themselves--'I know I am leading a bad life; and I have no
mind to mend it yet; the penitent thief repented at the last, and was
forgiven; so I dare say that I shall be;' one has a right to answer
him--'Very well; but you must first put yourself in the penitent
thief's place.  Are you willing to be hanged, or worse than hanged,
as a punishment for your sins in this world?  For, till then, the
penitent thief would certainly not be on the same footing as you.'

If a man says to himself, I will go on sinning now, on the chance of
repenting at last, and 'making my peace with God,' he is not like the
penitent thief, he is much more like a famous Emperor of Rome, who,
though a Christian in name, put off his baptism till his death-bed,
fancying that by it his sins would be washed away, once and for all,
and made use of the meantime in murdering his eldest son and his
nephew, and committing a thousand follies and cruelties.  Whether his
death-bed repentance, purposely put off in order to give him time to
sin, was of any use to him, let your own consciences judge.

Has, then, this story of the penitent thief no comfort for us?  God
forbid!  Why else was it put into Christ's Gospel of good news?
Surely, there is comfort in it.

Only let us take the story honestly, and word for word as it stands.
So we may hope to be taught by it what it was meant to teach us.

He was a robber.  The word means, not a petty thief, but a robber;
and his being put to such a terrible death shows the same thing.
Most probably he had belonged to one of the bands of robbers which
haunted the mountains of Judea in those days, as they used in old
times to haunt the forests in England, and as they do now in Italy
and Spain, and other waste and wild countries.  Some of these robbers
would, of course, be shameless and hardened ruffians; as that robber
seems to have been who insulted our Lord upon the very cross.  Others
among them would not be lost to all sense of good.  Young men who got
into trouble ran away from home, and joined these robber-bands, and
found pleasure in the wild and dangerous life.

There is a beautiful story told of such a young robber in the life of
the blessed Apostle St. John.  A young man at Ephesus who had become
a Christian, and of whom St. John was very fond, got into trouble
while St. John was away, and had to flee for his life into the
mountains.  There he joined a band of robbers, and was so daring and
desperate that they soon chose him as their captain.  St. John came
back, and found the poor lad gone.  St. John had stood at the foot of
the cross years before, and heard his Lord pardon the penitent thief;
and he knew how to deal with such wild souls.  And what did he do?
Give him up for lost?  No!  He set off, old as he was, by himself,
straight for the mountains, in spite of the warnings of his friends
that he would be murdered, and that this young man was the most
desperate and bloodthirsty of all the robbers.  At last he found the
young robber.  And what did the robber do?  As soon as he saw St.
John coming--before St. John could speak a word to him, he turned,
and ran away for shame; and old St. John followed him, never saying a
harsh word to him, but only crying after him, 'My son, my son, come
back to your father!' and at last he found him, where he was hidden,
and held him by his clothes, and embraced him, and pleaded with him
so, that the poor fellow burst into tears, and let St. John lead him
away; and so that blessed St. John went down again to Ephesus in joy
and triumph, bringing his lost lamb with him.

Now, such a man one can well believe this penitent thief to have
been.  A man who, however bad he had been, had never lost the feeling
that he was meant for better things; whose conscience had never died
out in him.  He may have been such a man.  He MUST have been such a
man.  For such faith as he showed on the cross does not grow up in an
hour or a day.  I do not mean the feeling that he deserved his
punishment (that might come to a man very suddenly) but the feeling
that Christ was the Lord, and the King of the Jews.  He must have
bought that by terrible struggles of mind, by bitter shame and self-
reproach.  He had heard, I suppose, of Christ's miracles and mercy,
of his teaching, of his being the friend of publicans and sinners,
had admired the Lord Jesus, and thought him excellent and noble.  But
he could not have done that without the Holy Spirit of God.  It was
the Holy Spirit striving with his sinful heart, which convinced him
of Christ's righteousness.  But the Holy Spirit would have convinced
him, too, of his own sin.  The more he admired our Lord, the more he
must have despised himself for being unlike our Lord; and, doubt it
not, he had passed many bitter hours, perhaps bitter years, seeing
what was right, and yet doing what was wrong from bad habits or bad
company, before he came to his end upon the gallows-tree.  And there
while he hung in torture on the cross, the whole truth came to him at
last.  God's Spirit shone truly on him at last, and divided the light
from the darkness in his poor wretched heart.  All the good which had
been in him came out once and for all.  Christ's light had been
shining in the darkness of his heart, and the darkness had been
trying to take it in, and close over it, but it could not; and now
the light had conquered the darkness, and all was clear to him at
last.  He never despised himself so much, he never admired Christ so
much, as when they hung side by side in the same condemnation.  Side
by side they hung, scorned alike, crucified alike, seemingly come
alike to open shame and ruin.  And yet he could see that though he
deserved all his misery, that the man who hung by him not only did
not deserve it, but was his Lord, the Lord, the King of the Jews, and
that--of course he knew not how--the cross would not destroy him;
that he would come in his kingdom.  How he found out that, no man can
tell; the Spirit of God taught him, the Spirit of God alone, to see
in that crucified man the Lord of glory, and to cast himself humbly
before his love and power, in hope that there might be mercy even for
him--'Lord, remember me when thou comest to thy kingdom.'  There was
faith indeed, and humility indeed; royal faith and royal humility
coming out in that dying robber.  And so, if you ask--How was that
robber justified by his works?  How could his going into Paradise be
the receiving of the due reward of the deeds done in his body whether
they be good or evil.  I say he WAS justified by his works.  He DID
receive the due reward of his deeds.  One great and noble deed, even
that saying of his in his dying agony,--that showed that whatever his
heart had been, it was now right with God.  He could not only confess
God's justice against sin in his own punishment, but he could see
God's beauty, God's glory, yea, God himself in that man who hung by
him, helpless like himself, scourged like himself, crucified like
himself, like himself a scorn to men.  He could know that Christ was
Christ, even on the cross, and know that Christ would conquer yet,
and come to his kingdom.  That was indeed a faith in the merits of
Christ enough to justify him or any man alive.

Now what has all this to do with you or me living an easy,
comfortable life in sin here, and hoping to die an easy, comfortable
death after all, and get to heaven by having in a clergyman to read
and pray a little with us; and saying a few words of formal
repentance, when perhaps our body and our mind are so worn out and
dulled by illness that we hardly know what we say?  No, my friends,
if our hearts be right, we shall not think of the penitent thief to
give us comfort about our own souls; but we shall think of it and
love it, to give us comfort about the souls of many a man or woman
for whom we care.

How many men there are who are going wrong, very wrong; and yet whom
we cannot help liking, even loving!  In the midst of all their sins,
there is something in them which will not let us give them up.
Perhaps, kind-heartedness.  Perhaps, an honest respect for good men,
and for good and right conduct; loving the better, while they choose
the worse.  Perhaps, a real shame and sorrow when they have broken
out and done wrong; and even though we know that they will go and do
wrong again, we cannot help liking them, cannot give them up.  Then
let us believe that God will not give them up, any more than he gave
up the penitent thief.  If there be something in them that we love,
let us believe that God loves it also; and what is more, that God put
it into them, as he did into the penitent thief; and let us hope (we
cannot of course be certain, but we may hope) that God will take care
of it, and make it conquer, as he did in the penitent thief.  Let us
hope that God's light will conquer their darkness; God's strength
conquer their weakness; God's peace, their violence; God's heavenly
grace their earthly passions.  Let us hope for them, I say.

When we hear, as we often hear, people say, 'What a noble-hearted man
that is after all, and yet he is going to the devil!' let us remember
the penitent thief and have hope.  Who would have seemed to have gone
to the devil more hopelessly than that poor thief when he hung upon
the cross?  And yet the devil did not have him.  There was in him a
seed of good, and of eternal life, which the devil had not trampled
out; and that seed flowered and bore fruit upon the very cross in
noble thoughts and words and deeds.  Why may it not be so with
others?  True, they may receive the due reward of their deeds.  They
may end in shame and misery, like the penitent thief.  Perhaps it may
be good for them to do so.  If a man will sow the wind, it may be
good for him to reap the whirlwind, and so find out that sowing the
wind will not prosper.  The penitent thief did so.  As the proverb
is, he sowed the gallows-acorn, poor wretch, and he reaped the
gallows-tree; but that gallows-tree taught him to confess God's
justice, and his own sin, and so it may teach others.

Yes, let us hope; and when we see some one whom we love, and cannot
help loving, bringing misery on himself by his own folly, let us hope
and pray that the day may come to him when, in the midst of his
misery, all that better nature in him shall come out once and for
all, and he shall cry out of the deep to Christ, 'I only receive the
due reward of my deeds; I have earned my shame; I have earned my
sorrow.  Lord, I have deserved it all.  I look back on wasted time
and wasted powers.  I look round on ruined health, ruined fortune,
ruined hopes, and confess that I deserve it all.  But thou hast
endured more than this for me, though thou hast deserved nothing, and
hast done nothing amiss.  Thou hast done nothing amiss by me.  Thou
hast been fair to me, and given me a fair chance; and more than that,
thou hast endured all for me.  For me thou didst suffer; for me thou
hast been crucified; and me thou hast been trying to seek and to save
all through the years of my vanity.  Perhaps I have not wearied out
thy love; perhaps I have not conquered thy patience.  I will take the
blessed chance.  I will still cast myself upon thy love.  Lord, I
have deserved all my misery; yet, Lord, remember me when thou comest
into thy kingdom.

Oh, my friends, let us hope that that prayer will go up, even out of
the wildest heart, in God's good time; and that it will not go up in
vain.



SERMON XXXII.  THE TEMPER OF CHRIST



PHILIPPIANS ii. 4.

Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.

What mind?  What sort of mind and temper ought to be in us?  St. Paul
tells us in this chapter, very plainly and at length, what sort of
temper he means; and how it showed itself in Christ; and how it ought
to show itself in us.

'All of you,' he tells us, 'be like-minded, having the same love;
being of one accord, of one mind.  Let nothing be done through strife
or vain-glory:  but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others
better than himself.  Look not every man on his own things, but every
man also on the things of others.'

First, be like-minded, having the same love.  Men cannot all be of
exactly the same opinion on every point, simply because their
characters are different; and the old proverb, 'Many men, many
minds,' will stand true in one sense to the end of the world.  But in
another sense it need not.  People may differ in little matters of
opinion, without hating and despising, and speaking ill of each other
on these points; they may agree to differ, and yet keep the same love
toward God and toward each other; they may keep up a kindly feeling
toward each other; and they will do so, if they have in their hearts
the same love of God.  If we really love God, and long to do good,
and to work for God; if we really love our neighbours, and wish to
help them, then we shall have no heart to quarrel--indeed, we shall
have no time to quarrel--about HOW the good is to be done, provided
IT IS done; and we shall remember our Lord's own words to St. John,
when St. John said, 'Master, we saw one casting out devils in thy
name, and he followeth not us:  wilt thou therefore that we forbid
him?'

And Jesus said, 'Forbid him NOT.'

'Forbid him not,' said Jesus himself.  He that hath ears to hear his
Saviour's words, let him hear.

'Therefore,' St. Paul says, 'let nothing be done through strife or
vain-glory.'  It is a very sad thing to think that the human heart is
so corrupt, that we should be tempted to do good, and to show our
piety, through strife or vain-glory.  But so it is.  Party spirit,
pride, the wish to show the world how pious we are, the wish to make
ourselves out better and more reverent than our neighbours, too often
creep into our prayers and our worship, and turn our feasts of
charity into feasts of uncharitableness, vanity, ambition.

So it was in St. Paul's time.  Some, he says, preached Christ out of
contention, hoping to add affliction to his bonds.  Not that he hated
them for it, or tried to stop them.  Any way, he said, Christ was
preached, whether out of party-spirit against him, or out of love to
Christ; any way Christ was preached:  and he would and did rejoice in
that thought.  Again I say, 'He that hath ears to hear, let him
hear.'

'Esteem others better than ourselves?'  God forgive us! which of us
does that?  Is not one's first feeling not 'Others are better than
me,' but 'I am as good as my neighbour, and perhaps better too?'
People say it, and act up to it also, every day.  If we would but
take St. Paul's advice, and be humble; if we would take more for
granted that our neighbours have common sense as well as we,
experience as well as we, the wish to do right as well as we--and
perhaps more than we have; and therefore listen HUMBLY (that is St.
Paul's word, bitter though it may be to our carnal pride), listen
humbly to every one who is in earnest, or speaks of what he knows and
feels!  People are better than we fancy, and have more in them than
we fancy; and if they do not show that they have, it is three times
out of four our own fault.  Instead of esteeming them better than
ourselves, and asking their advice, and calling out their experience,
we are too in such a hurry to show them that we are better than they,
and to thrust our advice upon them, that we give them no
encouragement to speak, often no time to speak; and so they are
silent and think the more, and remain shut up in themselves, and
often pass for stupider people and worse people than they really are.
Because we will not begin by doing justice to our neighbours, we
prevent them doing justice to themselves.

Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the
things of others.  Ah, my friends, if we could but do that heartily
and always, what a different world it would be, and what different
people we should be!  If, instead of saying to ourselves, as one is
so apt to do, 'Will this suit my interest? will this help me?' we
would recollect to say too, 'Will this suit my neighbours' interest?
Will this harm my neighbours, though it may help me?  For if it hurts
them, I will have nothing to do with it.'

If, again, instead of saying to ourselves, as we are too apt to do,
'This is what I like, and done it shall be,' we would generously and
courteously think more of what other people like; what will please
them, instruct them, comfort them, soften for them the cares of life,
and lighten the burden of mortality--how much happier would not only
they be, but we also!

For this, my friends, is the very likeness of Christ, who pleased not
himself; the very likeness of Christ, who sacrificed himself.

And for this very reason St. Paul puts it the last of all his
advices, because it is the greatest; the summing up of all; the
fulfilment of the whole law, which says, 'Thou shalt love thy
neighbour as thyself;' and therefore after it he can give no more
advice, for there is none better left to give:  but he goes on at
once to speak of Christ, who fulfilled that whole law of love, and
more than fulfilled it; for instead of merely loving his neighbours
AS he loved himself (which is all God asks of us), Christ loved his
enemies better than himself, and died for them.

So says St. Paul.--'Look not every man on his own things, but on
other people's interest and comfort also.  Let this mind be in you,
which was also in Christ Jesus.'  What mind?  The mind which looks
not merely on its own things, its own interest, its own reputation,
its own opinions, likes, and dislikes, but on those of others, and
has learnt to live and let live.

Yes, this, he says, is the mind of Christ.  And this mind, and
spirit, and temper, he showed before all heaven and earth, when,
though he was in the form of God, and therefore, (as some interpret
the text) would have done no robbery, no injustice, by remaining for
ever equal with God (that is, in the co-equal and co-eternal glory
which he had with the Father), yet made himself of no reputation, and
took on him the form of a slave, and was obedient to death, even the
death of the cross.

My friends, I beseech you, young and old, rich and poor, remember the
full meaning of these glorious words, and of those which follow them.

'Wherefore God hath highly exalted him.'  Why?  What was it in Christ
which was so precious, so glorious, in the eyes of the Almighty
Father, that no reward seemed too great for him?  What but this very
spirit of fellow-feeling and tenderness, charity, self-sacrifice--
even the Holy Spirit of God himself, with which Christ was filled
without measure?

Because Christ utterly and perfectly looked not on his own things,
but on the things of others:  because he was pity itself, patience
itself, love itself, in the soul and body of a human being; therefore
his Father declared of him, 'This, this is my well-beloved Son, in
whom I am well pleased.'  Therefore it was that he highly exalted
him; therefore it was that he proclaimed him to be worthy of all
honour and worship, the most perfect, lovely, admirable, and adorable
of all beings in heaven and earth; not merely because he showed
himself to be light of light, or wisdom of wisdom, or power of power;
but because he showed himself to be love of love, and therefore very
God of very God begotten, whom men and angels could not reverence,
admire, adore, imitate too much, but were to see in him the
perfection of all beauty, all virtue, all greatness, the likeness of
his Father's glory, and the express image of his person.

And therefore it is a very good and beautiful old custom to bow when
the name of Jesus is mentioned; at least, when it is mentioned for
the first time, or under any very solemn circumstances.  It helps to
remind us that he is really our King and Lord.  It helps, too, to
remind us that he is actually and really near us, standing by us,
looking at us face to face, though we see him not; and I am willing
to say for myself that whenever I recollect that he is looking at me
(alas! that is not a hundredth part often enough), I cannot help
bowing almost without any will of my own.  But, remember, there is no
commandment for it.  It is just one of those things on which a
Christian is free to do what he likes, and for which every Christian
is forbidden to judge or blame another, according to St. Paul's rule,
He that observeth the day, to the Lord he observeth it; and he that
observeth it not, to the Lord he observeth it not.  Who art thou that
judgest another?  To his own master he standeth or falleth.  Yea, and
he shall stand, for God is able to make him stand.  Beside, the text
says, if we are to take it literally, as we always ought with
Scripture, not that every HEAD shall bow at the name of Jesus, but
every knee.  And to kneel down every time we repeat that holy name
would be impossible.  While, on the other hand, we DO bow our knees,
literally and in earnest, at the name of Jesus every time we kneel
down in church, every time we kneel down to say our prayers.  And if
any man is content with that, no one has the least right to blame
him.

Besides, my friends, there is, I know too well, a great danger in
making too much of these little outward ceremonies, especially with
children and young people.  For the heart of man is just as fond as
it ever was of idolatry, and superstition, and will-worship, and
voluntary humility, and paying tithe of mint, anise, and cummin,
while it neglects the weightier matters of the law, justice, mercy,
and judgment:  and, therefore, there is very great danger, if we make
too much of these ceremonies, harmless and even good as many of them
may be, of getting to rest in them, and thinking that God is pleased
with them themselves.  Whereas, what God looks at is the heart, the
spirit, the soul; and whether it is right or wrong, proud or humble,
hard or loving:  and if we think so much of the outward and visible
form, that we forget the inward and spiritual grace, for which it
ought to stand, then we lay a snare for our own souls to turn them
away from the worship of the living God, and break the second
commandment.  Much more, if we pride ourselves on being more reverent
than our neighbours in these outward forms, and look down on, and
grudge at, those who do not practise them; for then we turn our
humility into pride, and our reverence to Christ into an insult to
him; for the true way to honour Christ is to copy Christ.  No one
really honours and admires Christ's character who does not copy him;
and to esteem ourselves better than others, to say in our hearts,
'Stand by, for I am holier than thou,' to offend and drive away
Christ's little ones, and wound the consciences of weak brethren by
insisting on things against which they have a prejudice, is to run
exactly counter to Christ and the mind of Christ, and to be more like
the Pharisees than the Lord Jesus.  That is not surely esteeming
others better than ourselves:  that is not surely looking not merely
on our own things, but also on the things of others; that is not
fulfilling the law of love; that is not following St. Paul's example,
who gave up, he says, doing many things which he thought right,
because they offended weaker spirits than his own.  'All things,' he
says, 'are lawful to me, but all things are not expedient.'  'Ay,'
says he, 'I would eat no meat while the world standeth, if it cause
my brother to offend.'

No, my dear friends, let us rather, in this coming Passion week, take
the lesson which the services of the Church give us in this Epistle.
Let us keep Passion week really and in spirit, by remembering that it
means the week of suffering, in which Christ, instead of pleasing
himself, conquered himself, and gave up himself, and let wicked men
do with him whatsoever they would.  Let us honour the holy name of
Jesus in spirit and in truth, and bend not merely our necks or our
knees, when we hear his name, but bend those stiff necks of our
souls, and those stubborn knees of our hearts; let us conquer our
self-will, self-opinion, self-conceit, self-interest, and take his
yoke upon us, for he is meek and lowly of heart.  This is the Passion
week which he has chosen;--to distrust ourselves, and our own
opinions, likings and fancies.  This is the repentance, and this is
the humiliation which he has chosen;--to entreat him (now and at
once, lest by pride we give place to the devil, and fall while we
think we stand) to forgive us every hard, and proud, and conceited,
and self-willed thought, and word, and deed, to which we have given
way since we were born; to pray to him for really new hearts, really
tender hearts, really humble hearts, really broken and contrite
hearts; to look at his beautiful tenderness, patience, sympathy,
understanding, generosity, self-sacrifice; and then to look at
ourselves, and be shocked, and ashamed, and confounded, at the
difference between ourselves and him; and so really to honour the
name of Jesus, who humbled himself, even to the death upon the cross.

I am not judging you, my friends; I am judging myself lest God judge
me; and telling you how to judge yourselves, lest God judge you.
Believe me, if you will but take his yoke on you, you will find it an
easy yoke and a light burden; you will find yourselves happier, your
duty simpler, your prospects clearer, your path through life
smoother, your character higher and more amiable in the eyes of all,
and you yourselves holy and fit to share on Easter day in the
precious body and blood of him who gave himself up to death that he
might draw all men to himself; and so draw them all to each other, as
children of one common Father, and brothers of Jesus Christ your
Lord.



SERMON XXXIII.  THE FRIEND OF SINNERS



(Preached in London.)

MARK ii. 15, 16.

And it came to pass, that, as Jesus sat at meat in his house, many
publicans and sinners sat also together with Jesus and his disciples:
for there were many, and they followed him.  And when the scribes and
Pharisees saw him eat with publicans and sinners they said onto his
disciples, How is it that he eateth and drinketh with publicans and
sinners?

We cannot wonder at the scribes and Pharisees asking this question.
I think that we should most of us ask the same question now, if we
saw the Lord Jesus, or even if we saw any very good or venerable man,
going out of his way to eat and drink with publicans and sinners.  We
should be inclined to say, as the scribes and Pharisees no doubt
said, Why go out of his way to make fellowship with them? to eat and
drink with them?  He might have taught them, preached to them, warned
them of God's wrath against their sins when he could find them out in
the street.  Or, even if he could not do that, if he could not find
them all together without going into their house, why sit down and
eat and drink?  Why not say, No--I am not going to join with you in
that?  I am come on a much more solemn and important errand than
eating.  I have no time to eat.  I must preach to you, ere it be too
late.  And you would have no appetite to eat, if you knew the
terrible danger in which your souls are.  Besides, however anxious
for your souls I am, you cannot expect me to treat you as friends, to
make companions of you, and accept your hospitality, while you are
living these bad lives.  I shall always feel pity and sorrow for you:
but I cannot be a table companion with you, till you begin to lead
very different lives.

Now if the scribes and Pharisees had said that, should we have
thought them very unreasonable?  For whatsoever kinds of sinners the
sinners were, these publicans were the very worst and lowest of
company.  They were not innkeepers, as the word means now; they were
a kind of tax-gatherers:  but not like ours in England.  For first,
these taxes were not taken by the Jewish government, but by the
Romans--heathen foreigners who had conquered them, and kept them down
by soldiery quartered in their country.  So that these publicans, who
gathered taxes and tribute for the heathen Caesar of Rome from their
own countrymen, were traitors to their country, in league with their
foreign tyrants, as it were devouring their own flesh and blood; and
all the Jews looked on them (and really no wonder) with hatred and
contempt.  Beside, these publicans did not merely gather the taxes,
as they do in free England; they farmed them, compounded for them
with the Roman emperor; that is, they had each to bring in to the
Romans a stated sum of money, each out of his own district, and to
make their own profit out of the bargain by grinding out of the poor
Jews all they could over and above; and most probably calling in the
soldiery to help them if people would not pay.  So this was a trade,
as you may easily see, which could only prosper by all kinds of petty
extortion, cruelty, and meanness; and, no doubt, these publicans were
devourers of the poor, and as unjust and hard-hearted men as one
could be.  As for those 'sinners' who are so often mentioned with
them, I suppose this is what the word means.  These publicans making
their money ill, spent it ill also, in a low profligate way, with the
worst of women and of men.  Moreover, all the other Jews shunned
them, and would not eat or keep company with them; so they hung all
together, and made company for themselves with bad people, who were
fallen too low to be ashamed of them.  The publicans and harlots are
often mentioned together; and, I doubt not, they were often eating
and drinking together, God help them!

And God did help them.  The Son of God came and ate and drank with
them.  No doubt, he heard many words among them which pained his
ears, saw many faces which shocked his eyes; faces of women who had
lost all shame; faces of men hardened by cruelty, and greediness, and
cunning, till God's image had been changed into the likeness of the
fox and the serpent; and, worst of all, the greatest pain to him of
all, he could see into their hearts, their immortal souls, and see
all the foulness within them, all the meanness, all the hardness, all
the unbelief in anything good or true.  And yet he ate and drank with
them.  Make merry with them he could not:  who could be merry in such
company? but he certainly so behaved to them that they were glad to
have him among them, though he was so unlike them in thought, and
word, and look, and action.

And why?  Because, though he was so unlike them in many things, he
was like them at least in one thing.  If he could do nothing else in
common with them, he could at least eat and drink as they did, and
eat and drink with them too.  Yes.  He was the Son of man, the man of
all men, and what he wanted to make them understand was, that, fallen
as low as they were, they were men and women still, who were made at
first in God's likeness, and who could be redeemed back into God's
likeness again.

The only way to do that was to begin with them in the very simplest
way; to meet them on common human ground; to make them feel that,
simply because they were men and women, he felt for them; that,
simply because they were men and women, he loved them; that, simply
because they were men and women, he could not turn his back upon
them, for the sake of his Father and their Father in heaven.  If he
had left those poor wretches to themselves; if he had even merely
kept apart from their common every-day life, and preached to them,
they would never have felt that there was still hope for them, simply
because they were men and women.  They would have said in their
hearts, 'See; he will talk to us:  but he looks down on us all the
time.  We are fallen so low, we cannot rise; we cannot mend.  What is
there in us that can mend?  We are nothing but brutes, perhaps; then
brutes we must remain.  Heaven is for people like him, perhaps; but
not for such as us.  We are cut off from men.  We have no brothers
upon earth, no Father in heaven.'  'Let us eat and drink, for to-
morrow we die.'

Yes; they would have said this; for people like them will say it too
often now, here in Christian England.

But when our Lord came to them, ate and drank with them, talked with
them in a homely and simple way (for our Lord's words are always
simple and homely, grand and deep and wonderful as they are), then do
you not see how SELF-RESPECT would begin to rise in those poor
sinners' hearts?  Not that they would say, 'We are better men than we
thought we were.'  No; perhaps his kindness would make them all the
more ashamed of themselves, and convince them of sin all the more
deeply; for nothing, nothing melts the sinner's hard, proud heart,
like a few unexpected words of kindness--ay, even a cordial shake of
the hand from any one who he fancies looks down on him.  To find a
loving brother, where he expected only a threatening schoolmaster--
that breaks the sinner's heart; and most of all when he finds that
brother in Jesus his Saviour.  That--the sight of God's boundless
love to sinners, as it is revealed in the loving face of Jesus Christ
our Lord--that, and that alone, breeds in the sinner the broken and
the contrite heart which is in the sight of God of great price.  And
so, those publicans and sinners would not have begun to say, We are
better than we thought:  but, We can become better than we thought.
He must see something in us which makes him care for us.  Perhaps God
may see something in us to care for.  He does not turn his back on
us.  Perhaps God may not.  He must have some hope of us.  May we not
have hope of ourselves?  Surely there is a chance for us yet.  Oh! if
there were!  We are miserable now in the midst of our drunkenness,
and our covetousness, and our riotous pleasures.  We are ashamed of
ourselves:  and our countrymen are ashamed of us:  and though we try
to brazen it off by impudence, we carry heavy hearts under bold
foreheads.  Oh, that we could be different!  Oh, that we could be
even like what we were when we were little children!  Perhaps we may
be yet.  For he treats us as if we were men and women still, his
brothers and sisters still.  He thinks that we are not quite brute
animals yet, it seems.  Perhaps we are not; perhaps there is life in
us yet, which may grow up to a new and better way of living.  What
shall we do to be saved?

O blessed charity, bond of peace and of all virtues; of brotherhood
and fellow-feeling between man and man, as children of one common
Father.  Ay, bond of all virtues--of generosity and of justice, of
counsel and of understanding.  Charity, unknown on earth before the
coming of the Son of man, who was content to be called gluttonous and
a wine-bibber, because he was the friend of publicans and sinners!

My friends, let us try to follow his steps; let us remember all day
long what it is to be MEN; that it is to have every one whom we meet
for our brother in the sight of God; that it is this, never to meet
any one, however bad he may be, for whom we cannot say, 'Christ died
for that man, and Christ cares for him still.  He is precious in
God's eyes; he shall be precious in mine also.'  Let us take the
counsel of the Gospel for this day, and love one another, not in word
merely--in doctrine, but in deed and in truth, really and actually;
in our every-day lives and behaviour, words, looks--in all of them
let us be cordial, feeling, pitiful, patient, courteous.  Masters
with your workmen, teachers with your pupils, parents with your
children, be cordial, and kind, and patient; respect every one,
whether below you or not in the world's eyes.  Never do a thing to
any human being which may lessen his self-respect; which may make him
think that you look down upon him, and so make him look down upon
himself in awkwardness and shyness; or else may make him start off
from you, angry and proud, saying, 'I am as good as you; and if you
keep apart from me, I will from you; if you can do without me, I can
do without you.  I want none of your condescension.'  It is NOT so.
You cannot do without each other.  We can none of us do without the
other; do not let us make any one fancy that he can, and tempt him to
wrap himself up in pride and surliness, cutting himself off from the
communion of saints, and the blessing of being a man among men.

And if any of you have a neighbour, or a relation fallen into sin,
even into utter shame;--oh, for the sake of Him who ate and drank
with publicans and sinners, never cast them off, never trample on
them, never turn your back upon them.  They are miserable enough
already, doubt it not.  Do not add one drop to their cup of
bitterness.  They are ashamed of themselves already, doubt it not.
Do not you destroy in them what small grain of self-respect still
remains.  You fancy they are not so.  They seem to you brazen-faced,
proud, impenitent.  So did the publicans and harlots seem to those
proud, blind Pharisees.  Those pompous, self-righteous fools did not
know what terrible struggles were going on in those poor sin-
tormented hearts.  Their pride had blinded them, while they were
saying all along, 'It is we alone who see.  This people, which
knoweth not the law, is accursed.'  Then came the Lord Jesus, the Son
of man, who knew what was in man; and he spoke to them gently,
cordially, humanly; and they heard him, and justified God, and were
baptized, confessing their sins; and so, as he said himself, the
publicans and harlots went into the kingdom of God before those
proud, self-conceited Pharisees.

Therefore, I say, never hurt any one's self-respect.  Never trample
on any soul, though it may be lying in the veriest mire; for that
last spark of self-respect is as its only hope, its only chance; the
last seed of a new and better life; the voice of God which still
whispers to it, 'You are not what you ought to be, and you are not
what you can be.  You are still God's child, still an immortal soul:
you may rise yet, and fight a good fight yet, and conquer yet, and be
a man once more, after the likeness of God who made you, and Christ
who died for you!'  Oh, why crush that voice in any heart?  If you
do, the poor creature is lost, and lies where he or she falls, and
never tries to rise again.  Rather bear and forbear; hope all things,
believe all things, endure all things; so you will, as St. John tells
you in the Epistle, know that you are of the truth, in the true and
right road, and will assure your hearts before God.  For this is his
commandment, that we should believe in the name of his Son Jesus
Christ, and believe really that he is now what he always was, the
friend of publicans and sinners, and love one another as he gave us
commandment.  That was Christ's spirit; the fairest, the noblest
spirit upon earth; the spirit of God whose mercy is over all his
works; and hereby shall we know that Christ abideth in us, by his
having given us the same spirit of pity, charity, fellow-feeling and
love for every human being round us.

And now, I will also give you one lesson to carry home with you--a
lesson which if we all could really believe and obey, the world would
begin to mend from to-morrow, and every other good work on earth
would prosper and multiply tenfold, a hundredfold--ay, beyond all our
fairest dreams.  And my lesson is this.  When you go out from this
church into those crowded streets, remember that there is not a soul
in them who is not as precious in God's eyes as you are; not a little
dirty ragged child whom Jesus, were he again on earth, would not take
up in his arms and bless; not a publican or a harlot with whom, if
they but asked him, he would not eat and drink--now, here, in London
on this Sunday, the 8th of June, 1856, as certainly as he did in
Jewry beyond the seas, eighteen hundred years ago.  Therefore do to
all who are in want of your help as Jesus would do to them if he were
here; as Jesus is doing to them already:  for he is here among us
now, and for ever seeking and saving that which was lost; and all we
have to do is to believe that, and work on, sure that he is working
at our head, and that though we cannot see him, he sees us; and then
all will prosper at last, for this brave old earth whereon we are
living now, and for that far braver new heaven and new earth whereon
we shall live hereafter.



SERMON XXXIV.  THE SEA OF GLASS



(Trinity Sunday.)

REVELATION iv. 9, 10, 11.

And when those beasts give glory, and honour, and thanks to him that
sat on the throne, who liveth for ever and ever, the four and twenty
elders fall down before him that sat on the throne, and worship him
that liveth for ever and ever, and cast their crowns before the
throne, saying, Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and
honour, and power:  for thou hast created all things, and for thy
pleasure they are and were created.

The Church bids us read this morning the first chapter of Genesis,
which tells us of the creation of the world.  Not merely on account
of that most important text, which, according to some divines, seems
to speak of the ever-blessed Trinity, and brings in God as saying,
'Let US make man in OUR image;' not, Let me make man in my image;
but, Let US, in OUR image.--Not merely for this reason is Gen. i. a
fit lesson for Trinity Sunday:  but because it tells us of the whole
world, and all that is therein, and who made it, and how.  It does
not tell us why God made the world; but the Revelations do, and the
text does.  And therefore perhaps it is a good thing for us that
Trinity Sunday comes always in the sweet spring time, when all nature
is breaking out into new life, when leaves are budding, flowers
blossoming, birds building, and countless insects springing up to
their short and happy life.  This wonderful world in which we live
has awakened again from its winter's sleep.  How are we to think of
it, and of all the strange and beautiful things in it?  Trinity
Sunday tells us; for Trinity Sunday bids us think of and believe a
matter which we cannot understand--a glorious and unspeakable God,
who is at the same time One and Three.  We cannot understand that.
No more can we understand anything else.  We cannot understand how
the grass grows beneath our feet.  We cannot understand how the egg
becomes a bird.  We cannot understand how the butterfly is the very
same creature which last autumn was a crawling caterpillar.  We
cannot understand how an atom of our food is changed within our
bodies into a drop of living blood.  We cannot understand how this
mortal life of ours depends on that same blood.  We do not know even
what life is.  We do not know what our own souls are.  We do not know
what our own bodies are.  We know nothing.  We know no more about
ourselves and this wonderful world than we do of the mystery of the
ever-blessed Trinity.  That, of course, is the greatest wonder of
all.  For, as I shall try to show you presently, God himself must be
more wonderful than all things which he has made.  But all that he
has made is wonderful; and all that we can say of it is, to take up
the heavenly hymn which this chapter in the Revelations puts into our
mouths, and join with the elders of heaven, and all the powers of
nature, in saying, 'Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and
honour, and power; for thou hast created all things, and for thy
pleasure they are and were created.'

Let us do this.  Let us open our eyes, and see honestly what a
wonderful world we live in; and go about all our days in wonder and
humbleness of heart, confessing that we know nothing, and that we
cannot know; confessing that we are fearfully and wonderfully made,
and that our soul knows right well; but that beyond we know nothing;
though God knows all; for in his book were all our members written,
which day by day were fashioned, while as yet there were none of
them.  'How great are thy counsels, O God! they are more than I am
able to express,' said David of old, who knew not a tenth part of the
natural wonders which we know; 'more in number than the hairs of my
head, if I were to speak of them.'

This will keep us from that proud and yet shallow temper of mind
which people are apt to fall into, especially young men who are
clever and self-educated, and those who live in great towns, and so
lose the sight of the wonderful works of God in the fields and woods,
and see hardly anything but what man has made; and therefore forget
how weak and ignorant even the wisest man is, and how little he
understands of this great and glorious world.

Such people are apt to fancy men are clever enough to understand
anything.  Then they say, 'Why am I to believe anything I cannot
understand?'  And then they laugh at the mysteries of faith, and say,
'Three Persons in one God!  I cannot understand that!  Why am I
expected to believe it?'

Now, here is the plain answer to such unwise speech (for unwise it
is, let it be dressed up in all fine long words, and show of wisdom),
whether the doctrine be true or not, your not understanding the
matter is no reason against it.  Here is the answer:  'You DO believe
all day long a hundred things which you do not understand; which
quite surpass your reason.  You believe that you are alive:  but you
do not understand how you live.  You believe that, though you are
made up of so many different faculties and powers, you are one
person:  but you cannot understand how.  You believe that though your
body and your mind too have gone through so many changes since you
were born, yet you are still one and the same person, and nobody else
but yourself; but you cannot understand that either.  You know it is
so; but how and why it is so, you cannot explain; and the greatest
philosopher would not be foolish enough to try to explain; because,
if he is a really great scholar, he knows that it cannot be
explained.  You lift your hand to your head:  but how you do it,
neither you nor any mortal man knows; and true philosophers tell you
that we shall probably never know.  True philosophers tell you that
in the simplest movement of your body, in the growth of the meanest
blade of grass, let them examine it with the microscope, let them
think over it till their brains are weary, there is always some
mystery, some wonder over and above, which neither their glasses nor
their brains can explain, or even find and see, much less give a name
to.  They know that there is more in the matter, in the simplest
matter, than man can find out; and they are content to leave the
wonder in the hands of God who made it; and when they have found out
all they can, confess, that the more they know, the less they find
they know.

I tell you frankly, my friends, if you were to see through the
microscope a few of the wonderful things which are going on round you
now in every leaf, and every gnat which dances in the sunbeam; if you
were to learn even the very little which is known about them, you
would see wonders which would surpass your powers of reasoning, just
as much as that far greater wonder of the ever-blessed Trinity;
things which you would not believe, if your own eyes did not show
them you.

And what if it be strange?  What is there to surprise us in that?  If
the world be so wonderful, how much more wonderful must that great
God be who made the world, and keeps it always living?  If the
smallest blade of grass be past our understanding, how much more past
our understanding must be the Absolute, Eternal, Almighty God?  Do
you not see that common sense and reason lead us to expect that God
should be the most wonderful of all beings and things; that there
must be some mystery and wonder in him which is greater than all
mysteries and wonders upon earth, just as much as HE is greater than
all heaven and earth?  Which must be most wonderful, the maker or the
thing made?  Thou art man, made in the likeness of God.  Thou canst
not understand thyself.  How much less canst thou understand God, in
whose likeness thou art made!

For my part, instead of keeping people from learning, lest they
should grow proud, and despise the mysteries of faith, I would make
them learn, and entreat them to learn, and look seriously and
patiently at all the wonderful things which are going on round them
all day long; for I am sure that they would be so much astonished
with what they saw on earth, that they would not be astonished, much
less staggered, at anything they heard of in heaven; and least of all
astonished at being told that the name of Almighty God was too deep
for the little brain of mortal man; and that they would learn more
and more to take humbly, like little children, every hint which the
experience of wise and good men of old time gives us of the
everlasting mystery of mysteries, the glory of the Triune God, which
St. John saw in the spirit.

And what did St. John see?  Something beyond even an apostle's
understanding.  Something which he could only see himself dimly, and
describe to us in figures and pictures, as it were, to help us to
imagine that great wonder.

He was in the spirit, he says, when he saw it.  That is, he did not
see it with his bodily eyes, but with his soul, his heart and mind.
Not with his bodily eyes (for no man hath seen God at any time), but
with his mind's eye, which God had enlightened by his Holy Spirit.

He sees a throne in heaven, and one sitting on it, bright and pure as
richest precious stone; and round his throne a rainbow like an
emerald, the sign to us of hope, and faithfulness, mercy and truth,
which he himself appointed after the flood, to comfort the fearful
hearts of men.  Around him are elders crowned; men like ourselves,
but men who have fought the good fight, and conquered, and are now at
rest; pure, as their white garments tell us; and victorious, as their
golden crowns tell us.  And from the throne come thunderings, and
lightnings, and voices, as they did when he spoke to the Jews of old-
-signs of his terrible power, as judge, and lawgiver, and avenger of
all the wrong which is done on earth.  And there are there, too,
seven burning lamps, the seven spirits of God, which give light and
life to all created things, and most of all to righteous hearts.  And
before the throne is a sea of glass; the same sea which St. John saw
in another vision, with us human beings standing on it, and behold it
was mingled with fire;--the sea of time, and space, and mortal life,
on which we all have our little day; the brittle and dangerous sea of
earthly life; for it may crack any moment beneath our feet, and drop
us into eternity, and the nether fire, unless we have his hand
holding us, who conquered time, and life, and death, and hell itself.

It seems to us to be a great thing now, time, and space, and the
world; and yet it looked small enough to St. John, as it lies in
heaven, before the throne of Christ; and he passes it by in a few
words.  For what are all suns and stars, and what are all ages and
generations, and millions and millions of years, compared with
eternity; with God's eternal heaven, and God whom not even heaven can
contain?--One drop of water in comparison with all the rain clouds of
the western sea.

But there is one comfort for us in St. John's vision; that brittle,
and uncertain, and dangerous as life may be, yet it is before the
throne of God, and before the feet of Christ.  St. John saw it lying
there in heaven, for a sign that in God we live, and move, and have
our being.  Let us be content, and hope on, and trust on; for God is
with us, and we with God.

But St. John saw another wonder.  Four beasts--one like a man, one
like a calf, one like an eagle, one like a lion, with six wings each.

What those living creatures mean, I can hardly tell you.  Some wise
and learned men say they mean the four Evangelists:  but, though
there is much to be said for it, I hardly think that; for St. John,
who saw them, was one of the four Evangelists himself.  Others think
they mean great and glorious archangels; and that may be so.  But
certainly the Bible always speaks of angels as shaped like men, like
human beings, only more beautiful and glorious.  The two angels, for
instance, who appeared to the three men at our Lord's tomb, are
plainly called in one place, young men.  I think, rather, that these
four living creatures mean the powers and talents which God has given
to men, that they may replenish the earth, and subdue it.  For we
read of these same living creatures in the book of the prophet
Ezekiel; and we see them also on those ancient Assyrian sculptures
which are now in the British Museum; and we have good reason to think
that is what they mean there.  The creature with the man's head means
reason; the beast with the lion's head, kingly power and government;
with the eagle's head, and his piercing eye, prudence and foresight;
with the ox's head, labour, and cultivation of the earth, and
successful industry.  But whatsoever those living creatures mean, it
is more important to see what they do.  They give glory, and honour,
and thanks to him who sits upon the throne.  They confess that all
power, all wisdom, all prudence, all success in men or angels, in
earth or heaven, comes from God, and is God's gift, of which he will
require a strict account; for he is Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God
Almighty; and all things are of him, and by him, and for him, for
ever and ever.

But who is he who sits upon the throne?  Who but the Lord Jesus
Christ?  Who but the Babe of Bethlehem?  Who but the Friend of
publicans and sinners?  Who but he who went about doing good to
suffering mortal man?  Who but he who died on the cross?  Who but he
on whose bosom St. John leaned at supper, and now saw him highly
exalted, having a name above every name?

Oh, blest St. John, to see that sight!  To see his dear Master in his
glory, after having seen him in his humiliation!  God grant us so to
follow in St. John's steps, that we may see the same sight, unworthy
though we are, in God's good time.

And where is God the Father?  Yes, where?  The heaven, and the heaven
of heavens, cannot contain him, whom no man hath seen, or can see;
who dwells in the light, whom no man can approach unto.  Only the
only begotten Son, who dwells in the bosom of the Father, he hath
declared him, and shown to men in his own perfect loveliness and
goodness, what their heavenly Father is.  That was enough for St.
John; let it be enough for us.  He who has seen Christ has seen the
Father, as far as any created being can see him.  The Son Christ is
merciful:  therefore the Father is merciful.  The Son is just:
therefore the Father is just.  The Son is faithful and true:
therefore the Father is faithful and true.  The Son is almighty to
save:  therefore the Father is almighty to save.  Let that be enough
for you and me.

But where is the Holy Spirit?  There is no WHERE for spirits.  All
that we can say is, that the Holy Spirit is proceeding for ever from
the Father and the Son; going forth for ever, to bring light and
life, righteousness and love, to all worlds, and to all hearts who
will receive him.  The lamps of fire which St. John saw, the dove
which came down at Christ's baptism, the cloven tongues of fire which
sat on the Apostles--these were signs and tokens of the Spirit; but
they were not the Spirit itself.  Of him it is written, 'He bloweth
where he listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not
tell whence he cometh or whither he goeth.'

It is enough for us that he is the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the
Holy Father, and of the Holy Son; like them eternal, like them
incomprehensible, like them almighty, like them all-wise, all-just,
all-loving, merciful, faithful, and true for ever.

This is what St. John saw--Christ the crucified, Christ the Babe of
Bethlehem, in the glory which he had before all worlds, and shall
have for ever; with all the powers of this wondrous world crying to
him for ever, 'Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and
is, and is to come; and the souls of just men made perfect answering
those mystic animals, and joining their hymns of praise to the hymn
which goes up for ever from sun and stars, from earth and sea,--when
they find out the deepest of all wisdom--the lesson which all the
wonders of this earth, and all which ever has happened, or will
happen, in space and time, is meant to teach us

'Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and honour, and power;
for Thou hast created all things, and for Thy pleasure they are and
were created.'

This is all that I can tell you.  It may be a very little:  but is it
not enough?  What says Solomon the wise?  'Knowest thou how the bones
grow in the womb?'  Not thou.  How, then, wilt thou know God, who
made all things?  Thou art fearfully and wonderfully made, though
thou art but a poor mortal man.  And is not God more fearfully and
wonderfully made than thou art?  It is a strange thing, and a
mystery, how we ever got into this world:  a stranger thing still to
me, how we shall ever get out of this world again.  Yet they are
common things enough--birth and death.  'Every moment dies a man,
every moment one is born:' and yet you do not know what is the
meaning of birth or death either:  and I do not know; and no man
knows.  How, then, can we know the mystery of God, in whose hand are
the issues of life and death?--God to whom all live for ever, living
and dead, born and unborn, in heaven and in hell?

So it is in small things as well as great, in great as well as small;
and so it ever will be.  'All things begin in some wonder, and in
some wonder all things end,' said Saint Augustine, wisest in his day
of all mortal men; and all that great scholars have discovered since
prove more and more that Saint Augustine's words were true, and that
the wisest are only, as a great philosopher once said, and one, too,
who discovered more of God's works than any man for many a hundred
years, even Sir Isaac Newton himself:  'The wisest of us is but like
a child picking up a few shells and pebbles on the shore of a
boundless sea.'

The shells and pebbles are the little scraps of knowledge which God
vouchsafes to us, his sinful children; knowledge, of which at best
St. Paul says, that we know only in part, and prophesy in part, and
think as children; and that knowledge shall vanish away, and tongues
shall cease, and prophecies shall fail.

And the boundless sea is the great ocean of time--of God's created
universe, above which his Spirit broods over, perfect in love, and
wisdom, and almighty power, as at the beginning, moving above the
face of the waters of time, giving life to all things, for ever
blessing, and for ever blest.

God grant us all to see the day when we shall have passed safely
across that sea of time, up to the sure land of eternity; and shall
no more think as children, or know in part; but shall see God face to
face, and know him even as we are known; and find him, the nearer we
draw to him, more wonderful, and more glorious, and more good than
ever;--'Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and
is to come.'  And meanwhile, take comfort, and recollect however
little you and I may know, God knows:  he knows himself, and you, and
me, and all things; and his mercy is over all his works.



SERMON XXXV.  A GOD IN PAIN



(Good Friday.)

HEBREWS ii. 9, 50.

But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the
suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the
grace of God should taste death for every man.  For it became him,
for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many
sons unto glory, to make the Captain of their salvation perfect
through sufferings.

What are we met together to think of this day?  God in pain:  God
sorrowing; God dying for man, as far as God could die.  Now it is
this;--the blessed news that God suffered pain, God sorrowed, God
died, as far as God could die--which makes the Gospel different from
all other religions in the world; and it is this, too, which makes
the Gospel so strong to conquer men's hearts, and soften them, and
bring them back to God and righteousness in a way no other religion
ever has done.  It is the good news of this good day, well called
Good Friday, which wins souls to Christ, and will win them as long as
men are men.

The heathen, you will find, always thought of their gods as happy.
The gods, they thought, always abide in bliss, far above all the
chances and changes of mortal life; always young, strong, beautiful,
needing no help, needing no pity; and therefore, my friends, never
calling out our love.  The heathens never LOVED their gods:  they
admired them, thanked them when they thought they helped them; or
they were afraid of them when they thought they were offended.

But as far as I can find, they never really loved their gods.  Love
to God was a new feeling, which first came into the world with the
good news that God had suffered and that God had died upon the cross.
That was a God to be loved, indeed; and all good hearts loved him,
and will love him still.

For you cannot really love any one who is quite different from you;
who has never been through what you have.  You do not think that he
can understand you; you expect him to despise you, laugh at you.  You
say, as I have heard a poor woman say of a rich one, 'How can she
feel for me?  She does not know what poor people go through.'

Now it is just that feeling which mankind had about God till Christ
died.

God, or the gods, were beautiful, strong, happy, self-sufficient, up
in the skies; and men on earth were full of sorrow and trouble,
disease, accidents, death; and sin, too; quarrelling and killing,
hateful and hating each other.  How could the gods love men?  And
then men had a sense of sin; they felt they were doing wrong.  Surely
the gods hated them for doing wrong.  Surely all the sorrows and
troubles which came on them were punishments for doing wrong.  How
miserable they were!  But the gods sat happy up in heaven, and cared
not for them.  Or, if the gods did care, they cared only for special
favourites.  If any man was very good, or strong, or handsome, or
clever, or rich, or prosperous, the gods cared for him--he was a
favourite.  But what did they care for poor, ugly, deformed,
unfortunate, foolish wretches?  Surely the gods despised them, and
had sent them into the world to be miserable.  There was no sympathy,
no fellow-feeling between gods and men.  The gods did not love men as
men.  Why should men love them?  And so men did not love them.

And as there was no love to God before Good Friday, so there was no
love to men.

If God despised the poor, the deformed, the helpless, the ignorant,
the crazy, why should not man?  If God was hard on them, why should
not man oppress and ill-use them?  And so you will find that there
was no charity in the world.

Among some of the Eastern nations--the Hindoos, for instance--when
they were much better men than now, charity did spring up for a while
here and there, in a very beautiful shape; but among Greeks and
Romans there was simply no charity; and you will find little or none
among the Jews themselves.

The Pharisees gave alms to save their own souls, and feed their own
pride of being good; but had no charity--'This people, who knoweth
not the law, is accursed.'  As for poor, diseased people, they were
born in sin:  either they or their parents had sinned.  We may see
that the poor of Judea, as well as Galilee, were in a miserable,
neglected, despised state; and the worst thing that the Pharisees
could say of our Lord Jesus was, that he ate and drank with publicans
and sinners.  Because there was no love to God, there was no love to
man.  There was a great gulf fixed between every man and his
neighbour.

But Christ came; God came; and became man.  And with the blood of his
cross was bridged over for ever the gulf between God and man, and the
gulf between man and man.

Good Friday showed that there was sympathy, there was fellow-feeling
between God and man; that God would do all for man, endure all for
man; that God so desired to make man like God, that he would stoop to
be made like man.  There was nothing God would not do to justify
himself to man, to show men that he did care for them, that he did
love the creatures whom he had made.  Yes; God had not forgotten man;
God had not made man in vain.  God had not sent man into the world to
be wicked and miserable here, and to perish for ever hereafter.
Wickedness and misery were here; but God had not put them here, and
he would not leave them here.  He would conquer them by enduring
them.  Sin and misery tormented men; then they should torment the Son
of God too.  Sin and misery killed men; then they should kill the Son
of God, too:  he would taste death for every man, that men might live
by him.  He would be made perfect by sufferings:  not made perfectly
good (for that he was already), but perfectly able to feel for men,
to understand them, to help them; because he had been tempted in all
things like as they.

And so on Good Friday did God bridge over the gulf between God and
men.  No man can say now, Why has God sent man into the world to be
miserable, while he is happy?  For God in Christ was miserable once.
No man can say, God makes me go through pain, and torture, and death,
while he goes through none of such things:  for God in Christ endured
pain, torture, death, to the uttermost.  And so God is a being which
man can love, admire, have fellow-feeling for; cling to God with all
the noble feelings of his heart, with admiration, gratitude, and
tenderness, even on this day with pity.--As Christ himself said,
'When I am lifted up, I will draw all men to me.'

And no man can say now, What has God to do with sufferers--sick,
weak, deformed wretches?  If he had cared for them, would he have
made them thus?  For we can answer, However sick, or weak they may
be, God in Christ has been as weak as they.  God has shared their
sufferings, and has been made perfect by sufferings, that they might
be made perfect also.  God has sanctified suffering, pain, and sorrow
upon his cross, and made them holy; as holy as health, and strength,
and happiness are.  And so on Good Friday God bridged over the gulf
between man and man.  He has shown that God is charity and love; and
that the way to live for ever in God is to live for ever in that
charity and love to all mankind which God showed this day upon the
cross.

And, therefore, all CHARITY is rightly called CHRISTIAN charity; for
it is Christ, and the news of Good Friday, which first taught men to
have charity; to look on the poor, the afflicted, the weak, the
orphan, with love, pity, respect.  By the sight of a suffering and
dying God, God has touched the hearts of men, that they might learn
to love and respect suffering and dying men; and in the face of every
mourner, see the face of Christ, who died for them.  Because Christ
the sufferer is their elder brother, all sufferers are their brothers
likewise.  Because Christ tasted pain, shame, misery, death for all
men, therefore we are bound this day to pray for all men, that they
may have their share in the blessings of Christ's death; not to look
on them any longer as aliens, strangers, enemies, parted from us and
each other and God; but whether wise or foolish, sick or well, happy
or unhappy, alive or dead, as brothers.  We are bound to pray for his
Holy Church as one family of brothers; for all ranks of men in it,
that each of them may learn to give up their own will and pleasure
for the sake of doing their duty in their calling, as Christ did; to
pray for Jews, Turks, Heathens, and Infidels; as for God's lost
children, and our lost brothers, that God would bring them home to
his flock, and touch their hearts by the news of his sufferings for
them; that they may taste the inestimable comfort of knowing that God
so loved them as to suffer, to groan, to die for them and all
mankind.



SERMON XXXVI.  ON THE FALL



(Sexagesima Sunday.)

GENESIS iii. 12.

And the man said, The woman, whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave
me of the tree, and I did eat.

This morning we read the history of Adam's fall in the first Lesson.
Now does this story seem strange to you, my friends?  Do you say to
yourselves, If I had been in Adam's place, I should never have been
so foolish as Adam was?  If you do say so, you cannot have looked at
the story carefully enough.  For if you do look at it carefully, I
believe you will find enough in it to show you that it is a very
NATURAL story, that we have the same nature in us that Adam had; that
we are indeed Adam's children; and that the Bible speaks truth when
it says, 'Adam begat a son after his own likeness.'

Now, let us see how Adam fell, and what he did when he fell.

Adam, we find, was not content to be in the image of God.  He wanted,
he and his wife, to be as gods, knowing good and evil.  Now do, I
beseech you, think a moment carefully, and see what that means.

Adam was not content to be in the likeness of God; to copy God by
obeying God.  He wanted to be a little god himself; to know what was
good for him, and what was evil for him; whereas God had told him, as
it were, You do NOT know what is good for you, and what is evil for
you.  I know; and I tell you to obey me; not to eat of a certain tree
in the garden.

But pride and self-will rose up in Adam's heart.  He wanted to show
that he DID know what was good for him.  He wanted to be independent,
and show that he could do what he liked, and take care of himself;
and so he ate the fruit which he was forbidden to eat, partly because
it was fair and well-tasted, but still more to show his own
independence.

Now, surely this is natural enough.  Have we not all done the very
same thing in our time, nay, over and over again?  When we were
children, were we never forbidden to do something which we wished to
do?  Were we never forbidden, just as Adam was, to take an apple--
something pleasant to the eye, and good for food?  And did we not
long for it, and determine to have it all the more, because it was
forbidden, just as Adam and Eve did; so that we wished for it much
more than we should if our parents had given it to us?  Did we not in
our hearts accuse our parents of grudging it to us, and listen to the
voice of the tempter, as Eve did, when the serpent tried to make out
that God was niggardly to her, and envious of her, and did not want
her to be wise, lest she should be too like God?

Have we not said in our heart, Why should my father grudge me that
nice thing when he takes it himself?

He wants to keep it all to himself.  Why should not I have a share of
it?  He says it will hurt me.  How does he know that?  It does not
hurt him.  I must be the best judge of whether it will hurt me.  I do
not believe that it will:  but at least it is but fair that I should
try.  I will try for myself.  I will run the chance.  Why should I be
kept like a baby, as if I had no sense or will of my own?  I will
know the right and the wrong of it for myself.  I will know the good
and evil of it myself.

Have we not said that, every one of us, in our hearts, when we were
young?--And is not that just what the Bible says Adam and Eve said?

And then, because we were Adam's children, with his fallen nature in
us, and original sin, which we inherited from him, we could not help
longing more and more after what our parents had forbidden; we could
think, perhaps, of nothing else; cared for no pleasure, no pay,
because we could not get that one thing which our parents had told us
not to touch.  And at last we fell, and sinned, and took the thing on
the sly.

And then?

Did it not happen to us, as it did to Adam, that a feeling of shame
and guiltiness came over us at once?  Yes; of shame.  We intended to
feed our own pride:  but instead of pride came shame and fear too; so
instead of rising, we had fallen and felt that we had fallen.  Just
so it was with Adam.  Instead of feeling all the prouder and grander
when he had sinned, he became ashamed of himself at once, he hardly
knew why.  We had intended to set ourselves up against our parents;
but instead, we became afraid of them.  We were always fancying that
they would find us out.  We were afraid of looking them in the face.
Just so it was with Adam.  He heard the word of the Lord God, Jesus
Christ, walking in the garden.  Did he go to meet him; thank him for
that pleasant life, pleasant earth, for the mere blessing of
existence?  No.  He hid himself among the trees of the garden.  But
why hide himself?  Even if he had given up being thankful to God;
even if he had learned from the devil to believe that God grudged
him, envied him, had deceived him, about that fruit, why run away and
hide?  He wanted to be as God, wise, knowing good and evil for
himself.  Why did he not stand out boldly when he heard the voice of
the Lord God and say, I am wise now; I am as a God now, knowing good
and evil; I am no longer to be led like a child, and kept strictly by
rules which I do not understand; I have a right to judge for myself,
and choose for myself; and I have done it, and you have no right to
complain of me?

Perhaps Adam had intended, when he ate the fruit, to stand up for
himself, with some such fine words; as children intend when they
disobey.

But when it came to the point, away went all Adam's self-confidence,
all Adam's pride, all Adam's fine notions of what he had a right to
do; and he hides himself miserably, like a naughty and disobedient
child.  And then, like a mean and cowardly one, when he is called out
and forced to answer for himself, he begins to make pitiful excuses.
He has not a word to say for himself.  He throws the blame on his
wife; it was all the woman's fault now--indeed, God's fault.  'The
woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I
did eat.'

My dear friends, if we want a proof that the Bible is a true, divine,
inspired book, we need go no further than this one story.  For, my
friends, have we never said the same?  When we felt that we had done
wrong; when the voice of God and of Christ in our hearts was rebuking
us and convincing us of sin, have we never tried to shift the blame
off our own shoulders, and lay it on God himself, and the blessings
which he has given us? on one's wife--on one's family--on money--on
one's youth, and health, and high spirits?--in a word, on the good
things which God has given us?

Ah, my friends, we are indeed Adam's children; and have learned his
lesson, and inherited his nature only too fearfully well.  For what
Adam did but once, we have done a hundred times; and the mean excuse
which Adam made but once, we make again and again.

But the loving Lord has patience with us, as he had with Adam, and
does not take us at our word.  He did not say to Adam, You lay the
blame upon your wife; then I will take her from you, and you shall
see then where the blame lies.  Ungrateful to me! you shall live
henceforth alone.  And he does not say to us, You make all the
blessings which I have given you an excuse for sinning!  Then I will
take them from you, and leave you miserable, and pour out my wrath
upon you to the uttermost!

Not so.  Our God is not such a God as that.  He is full of compassion
and long-suffering, and of tender mercy.  He knows our frame, and
remembers that we are but dust.  He sends us out into the world, as
he sent Adam, to learn experience by hard lessons; to eat our bread
in the sweat of our brow, till we have found out our own weakness and
ignorance, and have learned that we cannot stand alone, that pride
and self-dependence will only lead us to guilt, and misery, and
shame, and meanness; and that there is no other name under heaven by
which we can be saved from them, but only the name of our Lord Jesus
Christ.

He is the woman's seed, who, so God promised, was to bruise the head
of the serpent.  And he has bruised it.  He is the woman's seed--a
man, as we are men, with a human nature, but one without spot of sin,
to make us free from sin.

Let us look up to him as often as we find our nature dragging us
down, making us proud and self-willed, greedy and discontented,
longing after this and that.  Let us trust in him, ask him, for his
grace day by day; ask him to shape and change us into his likeness,
that we may become daily more and more free; free from sin; free from
this miserable longing after one thing and another; free from our bad
habits, and the sin which does so easily beset us; free from guilty
fear, and coward dread of God.  Let us ask him, I say, to change, and
purify, and renew us day by day, till we come to his likeness; to the
stature of perfect men, free men, men who are not slaves to their own
nature, slaves to their own pride, slaves to their own vanity, slaves
of their own bad tempers, slaves to their own greediness and foul
lusts:  but free, as the Lord Christ was free; able to keep their
bodies in subjection, and rise above nature by the eternal grace of
God; able to use this world without abusing it; able to thank God for
all the BLESSINGS of this life, and learn from them precious lessons;
able to thank God for all the SORROWS of this life, and learn from
them wholesome discipline:  but yet able to rise above them all, and
say, 'As long as I hold fast to Christ the King of men, this world
cannot harm me.  My life, my real human life, does not depend on my
being comfortable or uncomfortable here below for a few short years.
My real life is hid in God with Jesus Christ, who, after he had
redeemed human nature by his perfect obedience, and washed it pure
again in the blood of his cross, for ever sat down on the right hand
of the Majesty on high; that so, being lifted up, he might draw all
men unto himself--even as many as will come to him, that they may
have eternal life.



SERMON XXXVII.  THE WORTHY COMMUNICANT



LUKE xviii. 14.

I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the
other.

Which of these two men was the more fit to come to the Communion?
Most of you will answer, The publican:  for he was more justified,
our Lord himself says, than the Pharisee.  True:  but would you have
said so of your own accord, if the Lord had not said so?  Which of
the two men do you really think was the better man, the Pharisee or
the publican?  Which of the two do you think had his soul in the
safer state?  Which of the two would you rather be, if you were going
to die?  Which of the two would you rather be, if you were going to
the Communion?  For mind, one could not have REFUSED the Pharisee, if
he had come to the Communion.  He was in no open sin:  I may say, no
outward sin at all.  You must not fancy that he was a hypocrite, in
the sense in which we usually employ that word.  I mean, he was not a
man who was leading a wicked life secretly, while he kept up a show
of religion.  He was really a religious man in his own way,
scrupulous, and over-scrupulous to perform every duty to the letter.
He went to his church to worship; and he was no lip-worshipper,
repeating a form of words by rote, but prayed there honestly,
concerning the things which were in his heart.  He did not say,
either, that he had made himself good.  If he was wrong on some
points, he was not on that.  He knew where his goodness, such as it
was, came from.  'God, I thank thee,' he says, 'that I am what I am.'
What have we in this man? one would ask at first sight.  What reason
for him to stay away from the Sacrament?  He would not have thought
himself that there was any reason.  He would, probably, have thought-
-'If I am not fit, who is?  Repent me truly of my former sins?
Certainly.  If I have done the least harm to any one, I shall be
happy to restore it fourfold.  If I have neglected one, the least of
God's services, I shall be only too glad to keep it all the more
strictly for the future.

'Intend to lead a new life?  I am leading one, and trying to lead one
more and more every day.  I shall be thankful to any one who will
show me any new service which I can offer to God, any new act of
reverence, any new duty.

'I must go in love and charity with all men?  I do so.  I have not a
grudge against any human being.  Of course, I know the world too well
to be satisfied with it.  I cannot shut my eyes to the fact that
millions are living very sinful, shocking lives--extortioners,
unjust, adulterers; and that three people out of four are going
straight to hell.  I pity them, and forgive them any wrong which they
have done to me.  What more can I do?'

This is what the Pharisee would have said.  Is this man fit to come
to the Communion?  At least he himself thinks so.

On the other hand, was the publican fit?  That is a serious question;
one which we cannot answer, without knowing more about him than our
Lord has chosen to tell us.  Many a person is ready enough, in these
days, to cry 'God be merciful to me a sinner!' who is fit, I fear,
neither to come to the Communion, nor to stay away either.

It was not so, I suppose, with the old Jews in our Lord's time.  The
Pharisees then were hard legalists, who stood all on works; and,
therefore, if a man broke off from them, and threw himself on God's
grace and mercy, he did it in a simple, honest, effectual way, like
this publican.

But now, I am sorry to say, our Pharisees have contrived to make
themselves as proud and self-righteous about their own faith and
repentance, as the Jewish Pharisees did about their own works and
observances; and there has risen up in England and elsewhere a very
ugly new hypocrisy.  People now-a-days are too apt to pride
themselves on their own convictions of sin, and their own repentance,
till they trust in their repentance to save them, and not in Christ,
just as the Pharisee trusted in his works to save him, and not in
Christ; and when they pray, I cannot help fearing (for I am sure many
of their religious books teach them it) that they pray very much like
that Pharisee, 'God, I thank thee that I am not as other men are,
carnal, unconverted, unconvinced of sin, nor even as that plain,
moral, respectable man.  I am convinced of sin; I am converted; I
have the right frames, and the right feelings, and the right
experiences.'  Oh, of all the cunning snares of the devil, that I
think is the cunningest.  Well says the old proverb--'The devil is
old, and therefore he knows many things.'

In old times he made men trust in their own righteousness:  and that
was snare enough; now he has learnt how to make men actually trust in
their own sinfulness, and so turn the grace of God into a cloak of
pride, and contempt of their fellow-creatures

My friends, do you think that if the publican, after he had said,
'God be merciful to me a sinner!' had said to himself, 'There--how
beautifully I have repented--how honest I have been to God--I am all
right now'--he would have gone down to his house justified at all?
Not he.  No more will you and I, my friends.  If we have sinned, what
should we be but ashamed of it?  Ay, utterly ashamed.  And if we
really know what sin is--if we really see the sinfulness of sin--if
we really see ourselves as God sees us--we shall be too much shocked
at the sight of our own hearts to have time to boast of our being
able to see our own hearts.  We shall be too full of loathing and
hatred for our sins, too full of longing to get rid of our sins, and
to become righteous and holy, even as God is righteous and holy, to
give way to any pride in our own frames and feelings; and, instead of
thinking ourselves better men than our neighbours because we see our
sins, and fancy they do not see theirs, we shall be almost ready to
think ourselves worse than our neighbours, to think that they cannot
have so much to repent of as we; and as we grow in grace, we shall
see more and more sin in ourselves, till we actually fancy at times
that no one can be as bad as we are, and in lowliness of mind esteem
others better than ourselves.  We may carry that too far, too.
Certainly there is no use in accusing ourselves of sins which we have
not committed; we have all quite enough real sins to answer for
without inventing more.  But still that is a better frame of mind
than the other; for no man can be too humble, while any man can be
too proud.

But let us all ask God to open our eyes, that we may see ourselves
just as we are, let our sins be many or few.  Let us ask God to
convince us really of sin by his Holy Spirit, and show us what sin
is, and its exceeding sinfulness; how ugly and foul sin is, how
foolish and absurd, how mean and ungrateful toward that good God who
wishes us nothing but good, and wishes us, therefore, to be good,
because goodness is the only path to life and happiness; and then we
shall be so ashamed of ourselves, so afraid of our own weakness, so
shocked at the difference between ourselves and the spotless Lord
Jesus, that we shall have no time to despise others, no time to
admire our own frames, and feelings, and repentances.  All we shall
think of is our own sinfulness, and God's mercy; and we shall come
eagerly, if not boldly, to the throne of grace, to find grace and
mercy to help us in the time of need; crying, 'Purge thou me, O Lord,
or I shall never be pure; wash thou me, and then alone shall I be
clean.  For thou requirest, not frames or feelings, not pride and
self-conceit, but truth in the inward parts; and wilt make me to
understand wisdom secretly.'

Then, indeed, we shall be fit to come to the Holy Communion; for then
we shall be so ashamed of ourselves that we shall truly repent of our
sins--so ashamed of ourselves that we shall long and determine to
lead a new life--so ashamed of ourselves that we shall have no heart
to look down on any of our neighbours, or pass hard judgments on
them, but be in love and charity with all men; and so, in spite of
all our past sins, come to partake worthily of the body and blood of
Him who died for our sins, whose blood will wash them out of our
hearts, whose body will strengthen and refresh us, body and soul, to
a new and everlasting life of humbleness and thankfulness, honesty
and justice, usefulness and love.



SERMON XXXVIII.  OUR DESERTS



LUKE vi. 36-38.

Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful.  Judge
not, and ye shall not be judged:  condemn not, and ye shall not be
condemned:  forgive, and ye shall be forgiven.  Give, and it shall be
given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and
running over, shall men give into your bosom.  For with the same
measure that ye mete withal, it shall be measured to you again.

One often hears complaints against this world, and against mankind;
one hears it said that people are unjust, unfair, cruel; that in this
world no man can expect to get what he deserves.  And, of course,
there are great excuses for saying so.  There are bad men in the
world in plenty, who do villanous and cruel things enough; and
besides, there is a great deal of dreadful misery in the world, which
does not seem to come through any fault of the poor creatures who
suffer it; misery of which we can only say, 'Neither did this man
sin, nor his parents:  but that the glory of God may be made manifest
in him.'

But still our Lord tells us in the text, that, on the whole, there is
order lying under all the disorder, justice under all the injustice,
right under all the wrong; and that on the whole we get what we
deserve.  'Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful.
Judge not, and ye shall not be judged:  condemn not, and ye shall not
be condemned:  forgive, and ye shall be forgiven.  Give, and it shall
be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together,
and running over, shall men give into your bosom.  For with the same
measure that ye mete withal, it shall be measured to you again.'

Of course, as I said just now, it is not always so.  None knew that
better than the blessed Lord:  else why did he come to seek and save
that which was lost?  But still the more we look into our own lives,
the more we shall find our Lord's words true; the more we shall find
that on the whole, in the long run, men will be just and fair to us,
and give us, sooner or later, what we deserve.

Now, to deserve a thing, properly means to serve for it, to work for
it and earn it, as a natural consequence.  If a man puts his hand
into the fire, he DESERVES to burn it, because it is the nature of
fire to burn, and therefore it burns him, and so he gets his deserts;
and if a man does wrong, he deserves to be unhappy, because it is the
nature of sin to make the sinner unhappy, and so he gets his deserts.
God has not to go out of his way to punish sin; sin punishes itself;
and so if a man does right, he becomes in the long run happy.  God
has not to go out of his way to reward him and make him happy; his
own good deeds make him happy; he earns happiness in the comfort of a
good conscience, and the love and respect of those about him; and so
he gets his deserts.  For our Lord says, 'People in the long run will
treat you as you treat them.  If they feel and see by experience that
you are loving and kind to them, they will be loving and kind to you;
as you do to them, they will, in the long run, do to you.'  They may
mistake you at first, even dislike you at first.  Did they not
mistake, hate, crucify the Lord himself? and yet his own rule came
true of him.  A few crucified him; but now all civilized nations
worship him as God.  Be sure, then, that his rule will come true of
you, though not at first, yet in God's good time.  Therefore hold
still in the Lord, and abide patiently; and he shall make thy
righteousness as clear as the light, and thy just dealing as the
noon-day.

Now this is a very blessed and comfortable thought.  Would to God
that all of us, young people especially, would lay it to heart.  How
are we to get comfortably through this life?  Or, if we are to have
sorrows (as we all must), how can we make those sorrows as light as
possible?  How can we make friends who will comfort us in those
sorrows, instead of leaving us to bear our burden alone, and turning
their backs on us just when our poor hearts are longing for a kind
look and a kind word from our neighbours?  Our Lord tells us now.
The same measure that you mete withal, it shall be measured to you
again.

There is his plan.  It is a very simple one.  It goes on the same
principle as 'He that saveth his life shall lose it, and he that
loseth his life shall save it.'  If we are selfish, and take care
only of ourselves, the day will come when our neighbours will leave
us alone in our selfishness to shift for ourselves.  If we set out
determining through life to care about other people rather than
ourselves, then they will care for themselves more than for us, and
measure their love to us by our measure of love to them.  But if we
care for others, they will learn to care for us; if we befriend
others, they will befriend us.  If we show forth the Spirit of God to
them, in kindliness, generosity, patience, self-sacrifice, the day
will surely come when we shall find that the Spirit of God is in our
neighbours as well as in ourselves; that on the whole they will be
just to us, and pay us what we have deserved and earned.  Blessed and
comfortable thought, that no kind word, kind action, not even the cup
of cold water given in Christ's name, can lose its reward.  Blessed
thought, that after all our neighbours are our brothers, and that if
we remember that steadily, and treat them as brothers now, they will
recollect it too some day, and treat us as brothers in return.
Blessed thought, that there is in the heart of every man a spark of
God's light, a grain of God's justice, which may grow up in him
hereafter, and bear good fruit to eternal life.

Yes; it is a pleasant thing to find men better than we fancied them.
A pleasant thing; for first, it makes us love them the more, and
there is nothing so pleasant as loving.  And more; it does this--it
makes us more inclined to trust God's justice.  We say to ourselves,
Men are, we find, really more just and fair than they seem to us at
times; surely God must be more just and fair than he seems to us at
times.  For there are times when it does seem a hard thing to believe
that God is just; times when the devil tempts poor suffering
creatures sorely, and tries to make them doubt their heavenly Father,
and say with David, What am I the better for having done right?
Surely in vain have I cleansed my heart; in vain have I washed my
hands in innocency.  All the day long have I been punished, and
chastened every morning.  Yes; when some poor woman, working in the
field, with all the cares of a family on her, looks up at great
people in their carriages, she is tempted, she must be tempted to say
at times, 'Why am I to be so much worse off than they?  Is God just
in making me so poor and them so rich?'  It is a foolish thought.  I
do believe it is a temptation of the devil, a deceit of the devil;
for rich people are not really one whit happier or lighter-hearted
than poor ones, and all the devil wishes is to make poor people envy
their neighbours, and mistrust God.  But still one cannot wonder at
their faith failing them at times.  I do not judge them, still less
condemn them; for the text forbids me.  Or again, when some poor
creature, crippled from his youth, looks upon others strong and
active, cheerful and happy.  Think of a deformed child watching
healthy children at play; and then think, must it not be hard at
times for that child not to repine, and cry to God, 'Why hast thou
made me thus?'

Yes.  I will not go on giving fresh instances.  The world is but too
full of them.

But when such thoughts trouble us, here is one comfort--ay, here is
our only comfort--God must be more just than man.  Whatsoever
appearances may seem to make against it, he must be.  For where did
all the justice in the world come from, but from God?  Who put the
feeling of justice into every man's heart, but God himself?  He is
the glorious sun, perfectly bright, perfectly pure; and all the other
goodness in the world is but rays and beams of light sent forth from
his great light.  So we may be certain that God is not only as just
as man, but millions of times MORE just; more just, and righteous,
and good than all the just men on earth put together.  We can believe
that.  We must believe it.  Thousands have believed it already.
Thousands of holy sufferers, in prisons and on scaffolds, in poverty
and destitution, on sick-beds of lingering torture, have believed
still that God was just and righteous in all his dealings with them;
and have cried in the hour of their bitterest agony, 'Though thou
slay me, O Lord, yet will I trust in thee!'

Yes.  God is just.  He has revealed that in the person of his Son
Jesus Christ.  There is God's likeness.  There is proof enough that
God is not one who afflicts willingly, or grieves the children of men
out of any neglect or spite, or respecteth one person more than
another.  It may seem hard to be sure of that:  unless we believe
that Jesus is the Christ, the co-equal and co-eternal Son of the
Father, we never shall be sure of it.  Believing in the message of
the ever-blessed Trinity, we shall be sure; for we shall be sure
that, 'Such as the Father is, such is the Son, and such is the Holy
Ghost'--perfect love, perfect justice, perfect mercy; and therefore
we can be sure that in the world beyond the grave the balance will be
made even, again, and for ever; and every mourner be comforted, and
every sufferer be refreshed, and every one receive his due reward--if
they will only now in this life take the lesson of the text, 'Judge
not, and you shall not be judged:  condemn not, and you shall not be
condemned:  forgive, and you shall be forgiven; for if you forgive
every one his brother their trespasses, in like wise will your
heavenly Father forgive you.'  Do that; and then you will get your
DESERTS in the life to come, and by forgiving, and helping, and
blessing others, DESERVE to be forgiven, and comforted, and blessed
yourselves, for the sake of that Saviour who is day and night
presenting all your good works to his Father and your Father, as a
precious and fragrant offering--a sacrifice with which the God of
love is well pleased, because it is, like himself, made up of love.



SERMON XXXIX.  THE LOFTINESS OF GOD



ISAIAH lvii. 15.

For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose
name is Holy, I dwell in the high and holy place; with him also that
is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the
humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.

This is a grand text; one of the grandest in the whole Old Testament;
one of those the nearest to the spirit of the New.  It is full of
Gospel--of good news:  but it is not the whole Gospel.  It does not
tell us the whole character of God.  We can only get that in the New.
We can get it there; we can get it in that most awful and glorious
chapter which we read for the second lesson--the twenty-seventh
chapter of St. Matthew.  Seen in the light of that--seen in the light
of Christ's cross and what it tells us, all is clear, and all is
bright, and all is full of good news--at least to those who are
humble and contrite, crushed down by sorrow, and by the feeling of
their own infirmities.

But what does the text tell us?

Of a high and lofty One, who inhabits eternity.

Of a lofty God, Almighty, incomprehensible; so far above us, so
different from us, that we cannot picture him to ourselves; of a
glory and majesty utterly beyond all human fancy or imagination.

Of a holy God, in whom is no sin, nor taint of sin; who is of purer
eyes than to behold iniquity; who is so perfect, that he cannot be
content with anything which is not as perfect as himself; who looks
with horror and disgust on evil of every shape; who cannot endure it,
will at last destroy it.

Of a God who abides in eternity--who cannot change--cannot alter his
own decrees and laws, because his decrees and laws are right and
necessary, and proceed out of his own character.  If he has said a
thing, that thing must be; because it is the thing which ought to be.

How, then, shall we think of this lofty, holy, unchangeable God--we
who are low, unholy, changing with every wind that blows?

Shall we say, 'He is so far above us, that he cannot feel for us?  He
is so holy that he must hate us, and will our punishment, and our
damnation for all our sins?'

'He is eternal, and cannot change his will; and, therefore, if he
wills us to perish, perish we must.'

We may think so of God, and dread God, and cry 'Whither shall I flee
from thy Spirit, and whither shall I go from thy presence?'  We may
call to the mountains to fall on us, and to the hills to cover us,
till we try to forget at all risks the thought of God:  and if we do
not, there are plenty who will do it for us.  The devil, who slanders
and curses God to men, and men to God, and to each other--he will
talk to us of God in this way.

And men who preach the devil's doctrine, will talk to us likewise,
and say, 'Yes, God is very dreadful, and very angry with you.  God
certainly intends to damn you.  But _I_ have a plan for delivering
you out of God's hands; _I_ know what you must do to be saved from
God--join MY sect or party, and believe and work with me, and then
you will escape God.'

But, after all, would it not be wiser, my friends, to hold your own
tongues, and let God himself speak?

If he had not spoken in the first place, what should we have known of
him?  Can man by searching find out God?  We should not have known
that there was a high and lofty One, who inhabits eternity, if he had
not told us.  Had we not better hear the rest of his message, and let
God finish his own character of himself?

And what does he say?

'I dwell--I, the high and lofty One, who inhabit eternity--with him
also, who is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of
the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.'

Oh, my friends, is not this news? good news and unexpected news,
perhaps, but still as true as what went before it?  God hath said the
one, and we believe it:  and now he says the other; and shall we not
believe it too?

Come, then, thou humble soul; thou crushed and contrite soul; thou
who fearest that thou art not worthy of God's care; thou from whom
God has taken so much, that thou fearest that he will take all--come
and hear the Lord's message to thee--God's own message; no devil's
message, or man's message, but God's own.

'I will not contend for ever, neither will I be always wroth; for
then the spirit would fail before me, and the souls which I have
made.  I have seen thy ways, and will heal thee.  I will lead thee,
also, and restore comforts to thee and to thy mourners.  I create the
fruit of the lips.  I give men cause to thank me, and delight in
giving.  Peace, peace to him that is near, and to him that is far
off, saith the Lord.  If thou art near me, thou art safe; for if I
were to take all else from thee, I should not take myself from thee.
Though thou walkest through the valley of the shadow of death, I will
be with thee.  And if thou art far off from me, wandering in folly
and sin, I cry peace to thee still.  Why should I wish to be at war
with any of my creatures? saith the Lord.  My will is, that thou
shouldst be at peace.  I am at peace myself, and I wish to make all
my creatures at peace also, and thee among the rest.  I am whole and
perfect myself, and I wish to heal all my creatures, and make them
whole and perfect also, and thee among the rest.

'But the wicked?  Ay, this is their very misery, that there is no
peace to them.  I want them to enter into my peace, and they will
not.  I am at peace with them, saith the Lord.  I owe them no grudge,
poor wretches.  But they will not be at peace with themselves.  They
are like the troubled sea, which casts up mire and dirt, and fouls
itself.  I cast up no mire nor dirt.  I foul nothing.  I tempt no
man.  I, the good God, create no evil.  If the troubled sea fouls
itself, so do the wicked make themselves miserable, and punish
themselves by their own lusts, which war in their members.  But they
cannot alter ME, saith the Lord; they cannot change my temper, my
character, my everlasting name.  I am that I am, who inhabit
eternity; and no creature, and no creature's sin, can make me other
than I am.

And what is that?  What is the name, what is the character, what is
the temper of him who inhabits eternity?  Look on the cross, and see.

The cross, at least, will tell you what kind of a God your God is.  A
good God; a God of love; a God of boundless forbearance and long-
suffering.  Good God!  The folly and madness of men's hearts, who
look on God dying on the cross for them, and begin forthwith puzzling
their brains as to HOW he died for them; how Christ's blood washes
away their sins; how it is applied, and to whom; puzzling their
brains with theories of the atonement, and with predestination, and
satisfaction, and forensic justification, and particular redemption,
and long words which (four out of five of them) are not in the Bible,
but are spun out of men's own minds, as spiders' webs are from
spiders--and, like them, mostly fit to hamper poor harmless flies.

How Christ's death takes away thy sins, thou wilt never know on
earth--perhaps not in heaven.  It is a mystery which thou must
believe and adore.  But why he died, thou canst see at the first
glance--if thou hast a human heart, and wilt look at what God means
thee to look at--Christ upon his cross.  He died because he was LOVE-
-love itself--love boundless, unconquerable, unchangeable--love which
inhabits eternity, and therefore could not be hardened or foiled by
any sin or rebellion of man, but must love men still; must go out to
seek and save them; must dare, suffer any misery, shame, death
itself, for their sake; just because it is absolute and perfect love,
which inhabits eternity.

Look at that--look at the sight of God's character, which the cross
gives thee; and then, instead of being terrified at God's will and
decree being unchangeable and eternal, it will be the greatest
possible comfort to thee that God's will is unchangeable and eternal,
because thou wilt see from the cross that it is a GOOD will--a will
of mercy, forbearance, long-suffering towards thee and all mankind,
eternal in the heavens as God himself.

Then let those be afraid who are not afraid; and let those who are
afraid, take heart.  Let those who think they stand, take heed lest
they fall.  Let those who think they see, take care that they be not
blind.  Let those be afraid who fancy themselves right and above all
mistakes, lest they should be full of ugly sins when they fancy
themselves most religious and devout.  Let those be afraid who are
fond of advising others, lest they should be in more need of their
own medicine than their patients are.  Let those fear who pride
themselves on their cunning, lest with all their cunning they only
lead themselves into their own trap.

But those who are afraid, let them take heart.  For what says the
high and holy One, who inhabits eternity?  'I dwell with him that is
of a humble and contrite heart, to revive the spirit of the humble,
and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.'

Let them take heart.  Do you feel that you have lost your way in
life?  Then God himself will show you your way.  Are you utterly
helpless, worn out, body and soul?  Then God's eternal love is ready
and willing to help you up, and revive you.  Are you wearied with
doubts and terrors?  Then God's eternal light is ready to show you
your way; God's eternal peace ready to give you peace.  Do you feel
yourself full of sins and faults?  Then take heart; for God's
unchangeable will is, to take away those sins and purge you from
those faults.

Are you tormented as Job was, over and above all your sorrows, by
mistaken kindness, and comforters in whom is no comfort; who break
the bruised reed and quench the smoking flax; who tell you that you
must be wicked, and God must be angry with you, or all this would not
have come upon you?  Job's comforters did so, and spoke very
righteous-sounding words, and took great pains to justify God and to
break poor Job's heart, and made him say many wild and foolish words
in answer, for which he was sorry afterwards; but after all, the
Lord's answer was, 'My wrath is kindled against you three, for you
have not spoken of me the thing which was right, as my servant Job
hath.  Therefore my servant Job shall pray for you, for him will I
accept;' as he will accept every humble and contrite soul who clings,
amid all its doubts, and fears, and sorrows, to the faith that God is
just and not unjust, merciful and not cruel, condescending and not
proud--that his will is a good will, and not a bad will--that he
hateth nothing that he hath made, and willeth the death of no man;
and in that faith casts itself down like Job, in dust and ashes
before the majesty of God, content not to understand his ways and its
own sorrows; but simply submitting itself and resigning itself to the
good will of that God who so loved the world that he spared not his
only begotten Son, but freely gave him for us.



Footnotes:

{75}  Compare Rom. iii. 23 with I Cor. xi. 7.  Let me entreat all
young students to consider carefully and honestly the radical meaning
of the words [Greek text] and [Greek text].  It will explain to them
many seemingly dark passages of St. Paul, and perhaps deliver them
from more than one really dark superstition.

{151}  I do not quote the Crishna Legends, because they seem to be of
post-Christian date; and also worthless from the notion of a real
human babe being utterly lost in the ascription to Crishna of
unlimited magical powers.

{162}  See, as a counterpart to every detail of Joel's, the admirable
description of locust-swarms in Kohl's RUSSIA.




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