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 Scs 1M310 
 
THE 
 
 CHRISTIAN'S SACRIFICE AND 
 SERVICE OF PRAISE 
 
 OR 
 
 THE TWO GEEAT COMMANDMENTS 
 
 BEING AN EXPOSITION OF THE TWELFTH CHAPTER OF 
 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS 
 
 By ROBERT S. CANDLISH, D.D. 
 
 PRINCIPAL OF THE NEW COLLEGE, EDINBURGH 
 
 EDINBURGH 
 ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK 
 
 1867 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 ff «rf /trst. 
 
 THE CHRISTIAN IN HIS RELATION TO GOD. 
 
 I. Consecration to God, 
 A Sacrifice— 
 
 1. Its Nature, ... 
 
 2. Its Conditions, 
 
 3. Its Qualities, 
 
 4. Its Matter, ... 
 
 5. Its Motive, ... 
 
 II. Separation from the World, ... 
 
 1. Nonconformity to the World, 
 
 2. The Renewing of the Mind, 
 
 3. Proving the Will of God, 
 
 
 P«g« 
 
 sel), 
 
 ... 11 
 
 ... 
 
 ... 15 
 
 ... 
 
 ... 18 
 
 ... 
 
 ... 23 
 
 
 ... 2a 
 
 ... 
 
 ... 33 
 
 » 2), 
 
 ... 40 
 
 
 40 
 
 
 5S 
 
 
 ... 70 
 
 fart hint 
 
 THE CHRISTIAN IN HIS RELATION TO HIS FELLOW- CHRISTIANS- 
 THE CHURCH, OR COLLECTIVE BODY OF BELIEVERS. 
 
 I. Qualification for Membership — Self Estimation, 
 IL Diversity of Gifts and Offices among the Members, 
 
 III. Distribution of Offices and Works among the Member: 
 Characteristics of Active Membership— 
 
 IV. „ Love and Brotherly Love, ... 
 V. „ Diligence— Fervour— Sendee, 
 
 VI. „ Hope— Patience— Prayer, ... 
 VII. „ Mutual Beneficence and Hospitality, ... 
 
 (Verse 3), 
 
 .. 91 
 
 ( „ 6), 
 
 .. 101 
 
 ( « 6-8), . 
 
 .. 114 
 
 ( „ 3,10), . 
 
 .. 127 
 
 ( „ 11), . 
 
 .. 151 
 
 ( „ 12), . 
 
 .. 183 
 
 ( „ 13), . 
 
 .. 203 
 
IV CONTENTS. 
 
 THE CHEISTIAN IN HIS RELATION TO A HOSTILE WOELD. 
 
 L The Alternative of Blessing or Cursing, 
 II. The Charm of the Blessing— Sympathy, 
 
 III. The Charm of Sympathy— Mind Accommodating itself to 
 
 Mind, 
 
 IV. The Essential Conditions— Generosity and Hononr, 
 V. The End Sought— Peace, ... 
 
 VI. Redress and Retribution— Abdicated by Man and left to 
 
 God, ... ... ... ... ... ( „ 1!>), 
 
 VII. Good Overcoming Evil — The Solemn Issue of Weal or 
 
 Woe, ... ... ... ... ... ( „ 20, 21,) 
 
 VIII. Force of the Appeal— "Dearly Beloved," ... ... ( „ 19), 
 
 
 Page 
 
 (Verse 14), 
 
 ... 223 
 
 ( ,, 15), 
 
 ... 239 
 
 ( r, 16), 
 
 ... 251 
 
 ( „ 17), 
 
 ... 2C9 
 
 ( „ 18), 
 
 ... 2S9 
 
 302 
 
 . 323 
 . 339 
 
INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 The Twelfth Chapter of Paul's Epistle to the Romans is 
 usually regarded as a section complete in itself. The 
 thirteenth chapter, or at least the first ten verses of it, 
 might perhaps be taken in as part of the section. The topic 
 there discussed, — which is, the duty of Christians as mem- 
 bers of civil society — the obedience which they owe to 
 their civil rulers and the obligations under which they lie 
 to their fellow-subjects, — fits in well enough to those which 
 occupy the twelfth chapter. And the pithy and emphatic 
 maxim about charity or love, — " Love worketh no ill to 
 his neighbour; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law," 
 — would form a not unsuitable close to a series of prac- 
 tical lessons which all turn on the cultivation of that 
 grace or virtue of love, in the different forms or modifiS 
 cations of it which different relations and circumstances 
 require. I am inclined, however, to adhere to what seems 
 to be the ordinary opinion. The thirteenth and subsequent 
 chapters embrace several questions of a somewhat casuis- 
 tical nature, and of rather difficult solution, apt to arise 
 in particular states of the Church and the world, The 
 
VI INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 twelfth is quite general and comprehensive. It is not of 
 course to be disconnected from the preceding and follow- 
 ing portions of the Epistle, — especially from the preced- 
 ing. But as a summary of Christian ethics, it is, when 
 taken by itself, an entire whole ; — having, if I may so say, 
 its own beginning, middle, and end. 
 
 Considered in that light, the summary has always com- 
 manded the warm admiration, not of divines only, but of 
 moralists also ; — and is, indeed, rather a favourite with a 
 class of persons who are fond of praising the preceptive 
 part of Christianity at the expense of those peculiar dogmas 
 which they regard as hard and mystical. Even Christian 
 readers themselves, perhaps, have been apt to feel as if 
 the moral beauty and simplicity of the exhortations of this 
 chapter were a relief, after the more abstruse matters of 
 doctrine which have strained and taxed their attention so 
 severely in what goes before. 
 
 One object of the present volume is to modify any such 
 impression, and to show how thoroughly the ethics of the 
 Gospel are impregnated with the spirit of its theology. 
 Not merely does the word of connection or inference in 
 the first verse, — " therefore/' — warrant the general con- 
 clusion, that it is upon the views given in the previous 
 chapters of the Divine Sovereignty, first in the grace of 
 justification, and then in the grace of election, that the 
 precepts of the present chapter all hang ; — but when 
 these precepts come to be examined in detail, they are 
 found, one and all of them, to embody the principle, that 
 man's right conduct, in all the relations in which he is 
 placed, consists essentially in his knowing, and believing, 
 
INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. Vll 
 
 and sympathizing with what may be called the conduct 
 of God ; insomuch that, in every instance, man feels and 
 acts rightly just in proportion as he understands, by 
 divine teaching, how God himself feels and acts in his 
 great plan of saving mercy. I believe that what is re- 
 quired of me, in every department of duty, is, that, 
 on the one hand, I apprehend God's sovereign grace, 
 in his justification of the unrighteous through faith in 
 the righteousness of his Son, and in his choice and call- 
 ing of the unworthy and the unwilling according to his 
 own mere good pleasure ; and then, on the other hand, 
 that apprehending this sovereign grace in its imme- 
 diate personal application to me, and as ruling God's 
 treatment of me, I enter into the spirit of it, and apply 
 it myself to all with whom I have anything to do, for 
 the ruling of my treatment of them. Now these are the 
 two themes which occupy the whole doctrinal part of the 
 Epistle ; — the sovereignty of God's grace in justification, 
 and the sovereignty of his grace in election and vocation ; 
 — the one being discussed in the first eight chapters, and 
 the other in the ninth, tenth, and eleventh. I assume 
 the teaching of these chapters upon both of these views 
 of God's grace ; and I endeavour, with reference to the 
 twelfth chapter as a whole, and with reference to its pre- 
 cepts in detail, to bring out the amazing harmony and 
 identity that there are between that grace of God and 
 every duty which, on the ground of it, he requires of them 
 that believe. 
 
 The plan which I have adopted, dividing the chapter 
 into three parts, is explained and vindicated as I proceed 
 
Vlll INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 from verse to verse in my exposition. 1 It is not necessary 
 to enter upon a formal defence of it beforehand; I trust 
 to its approving itself in the course of its detailed develop- 
 ment I may observe, however, that down to the end 
 of the eighth verse, there is little or no room for doubt. 
 Believers are in the first place (ver. 1, 2), summoned to a 
 personal dealing, each for himself, directly and immediately 
 with God. They are to consecrate themselves to God, 
 and separate themselves from the world, for the proving 
 of the will of God ; and this they are to do as individuals, 
 — not jointly, but severally. Then, in the second place, 
 (ver. 3-8,) they form themselves, or find themselves 
 formed, into a collective body, in which they have all 
 their separate gifts, and functions, and offices ; while yet 
 such order and mutual subordination reign that they all 
 act in harmony, — not only severally, but jointly also. 
 Thus far, the arrangement is clear enough. After the 
 eighth verse, however, there might at first sight seem to 
 be a mere miscellaneous string of good advices, some 
 having reference to the Christian's duty in the Church, 
 others to his duty towards the world, and others again 
 partly to both, but all mingled together, as one would 
 say, very much at random. Thus the ninth verse brings 
 in the duty of universal charity, or love, in the midst of 
 precepts evidently bearing upon the fellowship of Chris- 
 
 1 It is proper to explain that the Discourses on the first eight verses of the 
 chapter, occupying rather more than a hundred pages of the present volume 
 (pp. 11-126), appeared some years ago in a small volume, now out of print, 
 under the title of " The Christian's Sacrifice." They have been carefully revised, 
 and adapted to their position as part of the larger treatise, which I had then in 
 progress, and which, such as it is, I have now completed. 
 
INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. IX 
 
 tians as such ; whereas again in the fifteenth and six- 
 teenth verses, or at all events in the latter, we have 
 what looks like a counsel of Christian brotherhood, while 
 both before and after the teaching refers to the treatment 
 of persecutors. Hence I believe the notion has come to 
 prevail, that beyond the first eight verses there is no 
 exact order to be traced in the chapter. I am persuaded 
 that this is a mistake, and that it has led to an inade- 
 quate interpretation, to say the least, of some of the 
 verses in question. I have endeavoured to show how 
 the introduction of the general commandment of love 
 (ver. 9) qualifies the special commandment of brotherly 
 love (ver. 10) ; and also how the enjoining of sympathy 
 (ver. 15), and even apparently of unanimity (ver. 16), is 
 very much to the purpose in considering how a hostile 
 world is to be treated. I look at those precepts which 
 appear to be out of their place, and inquire what, sup- 
 posing that they are in their place, is their bearing in 
 the connection in which they actually stand ; and in doing 
 so, I begin to find in them a force and point not other- 
 wise observed. I trace an orderly sequence in the whole 
 train of thought, as the writer would lead believers in 
 Jesus to apprehend what they are to God, as his peculiar 
 people ; what they are in respect of their union among 
 themselves, and their organization into one body, for the 
 purposes of fellowship and of work ; and what they are 
 in respect of their position in a hostile world, and the 
 duties which they owe to " them that are without." 
 
 It is this view that has reconciled me to the Title 
 suggested by a friend for my treatise. I do not profess 
 
X INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 formally to discuss the " two great commandments" in 
 connection with my theme. But having sought to enter 
 into the meaning of Paul's ethical directory, without 
 any immediate reference to the Lord's summary, I have 
 noticed with much interest how the law or principle of 
 love, given forth as a pure ray of light from the Sun of 
 Righteousness, is as it were broken up in its application 
 to the details of duty ; — how, as if he were giving a 
 practical commentary on his Master's saying, the Apostle 
 brings out the working of supreme love to our God in 
 self-consecration, transformation, and obedience ; and brings 
 out also the working of equal love to our neighbour, — 
 our loving him as ourselves, — in Christian brotherhood 
 among believers, and Christian humanity towards all men. 
 
 There is no attempt in this work to deal with the 
 chapter critically, or even, in the strict sense, exegeti- 
 cally. If that had been my aim, I must have discussed 
 some questions of interpretation which I have not even 
 raised, and dwelt upon some sentences and clauses on 
 which I have only slightly touched. It is to be remem- 
 bered, however, that there are not any considerable criti- 
 cal or exegetical difficulties in the passage. 
 
 Of the various readings, two only are noticeable, not for 
 any force of external evidence in their favour, — the weight 
 of manuscript authority, both in quantity and in quality, 
 being decidedly against them ; — but because they illustrate 
 the way in which alterations of the text have sometimes 
 crept in, through the prejudice or erroneous judgment of 
 transcribers. Thus in the thirteenth verse, some copies 
 have, instead of distributing or ministering to the " neces- 
 
INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. XI 
 
 sities" of saints, ministering to their "memories'' (ju,ve«us for 
 X/aetats) ; — an alteration evidently savouring of that undue 
 reverence for the departed which early began to prevail in 
 the Church, and ultimately became worship. Again at verse 
 eleventh, the clause, serving "the Lord," is in a considerable 
 number of manuscripts, serving "the time," or "season" (ica«/><3 
 for Kvpiu). The copyist apparently thought that the idea 
 of "serving the Lord" was too general to come in among 
 the specific directions with which it is joined, and there- 
 fore he made it "serving the time," — that is, acting in con- 
 formity or in obedience to the time or season ; an injunc- 
 tion not very appropriate or emphatic, and not very much 
 in accordance with what Paul elsewhere says about being 
 diligent in season and out of season. That the received 
 text, as it stands, has a relevant meaning, I have endea- 
 voured to show. 
 
 Much has been made, in former times, by theologians, 
 both Romanist and Protestant, of the expression in the 
 sixth verse, "the proportion" or the analogy "of faith." 
 It has been used, in fact, as a sort of proof text to sup- 
 port a principle of interpretation of very wide application, 
 and requiring somewhat delicate handling. The principle 
 is this, — that in fixing the meaning of any particular 
 passage, regard is to be had to the general strain of the 
 teaching of Scripture, and of the system of truth as 
 understood and held by the Church Catholic. However 
 sound the principle may be, within due limits, it derives 
 no support from the passage now in question ; in which 
 it cannot be an objective measure or standard of faith 
 that is intended, but rather the inward, subjective kind, 
 
xii INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 or amount of conviction which a man has in himself. 
 Having formed that opinion, I have not deemed it needful 
 to dwell on the phrase, " the proportion of faith," or to 
 discuss the principle of interpretation which it has been 
 supposed to countenance ; since I take it to mean simply 
 that he who prophesies should in doing so go to the full 
 extent of the faith wrought in him, or, as I have expressed 
 it, should prophesy — " believing all that he says, and say- 
 ing all that he believes' 5 (see page 119). I am glad to 
 find that I may appeal in support of my opinion to so 
 high an authority as Alford. 1 
 
 Had my plan been different from what it is, I must 
 have gone much more fully into the consideration of the 
 topic treated of in the fourth and following verses, 
 taken in connection with Paul's teaching in his First 
 Epistle to the Corinthians, (ch. xii.,) where the same sub- 
 ject is handled at greater length. I am aware that I 
 have thus been led to omit some topics of interest regard- 
 ing the constitution and organization of the Church, 
 whether viewed as an unseen, spiritual fellowship, or as 
 an outstanding society in the world. But the discussion 
 of these topics would have drawn me away from the 
 more immediate design of the Apostle's discourse ; which 
 is not to lay down an ecclesiastical platform, but to en- 
 force personal obligations. 
 
 For much the same reason, I have dealt somewhat 
 summarily with the phrase in the twentieth verse, " coals 
 of fire," or "burning coals;" contenting myself with a 
 
 1 Greek Testament, in loco, vol. ii. page 416, third edition. 
 
INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. Xlll 
 
 single reference to the passage in the Old Testament 
 which the Apostle manifestly has in view (Prov. xxv. 
 21, 22). Several other Old Testament texts 1 might have 
 been exegetically examined, and might have been found 
 very much to the purpose. An inquiry of deepest interest 
 would thus have been opened up, into the harmony of 
 the teaching of both Testaments, not only as to the penal 
 justice of God, but as to the sentiments with which his 
 saints regard the execution of its righteous awards. The 
 inquiry, however, would demand, and deserve, a separate 
 treatise. It would demolish, I am persuaded, the notion 
 of there being any real difference between the Christian 
 dispensation and those which preceded it, on the subject 
 of God's treatment of his enemies and "his people's acqui- 
 escence and sympathy therein ; and would make it clear, 
 that, with all the fuller discoveries of his love which we 
 have in the Gospel, we are called all the more on that 
 account to realize, for ourselves and for others, the dark, 
 overhanging cloud of ultimate retribution. But any such 
 discussion as that would have led me away from the line 
 I had prescribed to myself. Of the texts indicated, it is 
 enough to say, that since they, one and all of them, apply 
 the phrase exclusively to the infliction of judicial venge- 
 ance, for the vindication of the righteous and the punish- 
 ment of the ungodly, they confirm the opinion that we 
 cannot interpret the Apostle's precept (ver. 20) as if it 
 contemplated only a good issue of kindness shown to an 
 enemy ; that its meaning is not exhausted unless we hold 
 
 1 Deut. xxxii. 24 (marginal reading) ; Ps. xviii. 12, 13 ; cxx. 4; cxl. 10 ; Ezek. 
 x. 2 ; Hab. iii. 5. 
 
XIV INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 it to have fully in view the possibility of the issue being 
 exactly the reverse. 
 
 What I wish to be understood, in short, is, that the 
 present treatise is entirely practical. The Discourses 
 when preached were meant to be practical ; and they are 
 published nearly as they were delivered. When I call 
 them practical, however, I mean practical in an evangeli- 
 cal point of view. I endeavour, throughout, to carry the 
 stream of sound doctrine through all the departments of 
 duty that I have to survey. In particular, as the 
 chapter begins with a pointed reference to Sacrifice, and 
 ends with a very solemn appeal to Judgment, so I think 
 there is a propriety in viewing the whole of this brief 
 code of Christian ethics, as well as every part of it, in 
 the light of those high attributes of the Divine character, 
 and those great principles of the Divine government, of 
 which the first and second advents of Christ may be said 
 to be the exponents. I start with the assumption of the 
 Atonement made by Christ at his first coming being a 
 real satisfaction to Divine justice, through his real substi- 
 tution of himself in the room of the guilty who are ob- 
 noxious to justice. And I can find no meaning in the 
 very solemn closing verses of the chapter unless they in- 
 volve the reality of wrath and retribution, to be consum- 
 mated when the Lord cometh again. I solicit special 
 attention, in this view, to the last two or three Discourses 
 in the volume. For, however modern theological refine- 
 ment may shrink from any notion of righteousness that is 
 not remedial, and any notion of punishment that is not 
 resolvable into correction, I am fully persuaded that it is 
 
INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. XV 
 
 fatal, not less to the high and healthy tone of Christian 
 morals than to the living power and influence of Christian 
 faith, to repudiate or keep in the back-ground the doc- 
 trine or fact of judicial retribution. That doctrine, or 
 fact, I take to be the essence of law and government. 
 Without it, neither the Divine sovereignty nor human 
 responsibility, — neither the sovereignty which is God's 
 prerogative as a moral ruler, nor the responsibility which 
 is man's dignity as a free moral agent, — can, in my 
 opinion, be safe. On any system which excludes that 
 element, God is dishonoured, and man must in the long 
 run be degraded. I recognise it alike in the theology and 
 
 in the ethics of Paul. 
 
 R. S. C. 
 
 Edinburgh, February 1860. 
 
PART FIRST. 
 
 THE CHRISTIAN IM HIS RELATION TO GOD. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN IN HIS RELATION TO GOD. 
 
 CONSECRATION TO GOD. 
 
 " I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your 
 bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable 
 service."— Rom. xii. 1. 
 
 Believers in Christ are consecrated to God. This is the 
 first element in their relation to him ; the second being 
 separation from the world. They are addressed as priests ; 
 called to execute a priestly ofiice, — to "present a sacrifice." 
 And this implies consecration to God. 
 
 In one view, it is a high calling. "Ye are a ro} 7 al 
 priesthood," is the testimony of the Apostle Peter. " Thou 
 hast redeemed us to God by thy blood," is the new song 
 of the saved, " and hast made us unto our God kings and 
 priests." In another view, it is a humble position. A 
 priest is ordained to minister and serve at the altar. In 
 this passage, it is not so much the high dignity of the 
 priestly ofiice as its humble ministry, that is brought out. 
 Still it is, in every view of it, a sacred position ; a posi- 
 tion of consecration to God. 
 
 Paul has been touching some of those deep, dread mys- 
 teries which shroud in impenetrable gloom the eternal 
 
1 2 CONSECRATION TO GOD. 
 
 throne and the eternal world ; mysteries which only thicken 
 into darker midnight the more we try to pierce them. For 
 the sovereignty of God, in its bearing on the ultimate issues 
 of his providence, and on the final destinies of the crea- 
 tures whom he has made intelligent and free, must ever 
 be inscrutable. Paul, accordingly, closes the great argu- 
 ment which he has been maintaining for the Divine prero- 
 gative, with a solemn ejaculation, implying utter impotency 
 and prostration : " the depth of the riches both of the 
 wisdom and knowledge of God ! how unsearchable are 
 his judgments, and his ways past finding out !" (xi. 33). 
 
 To silence, however, where he cannot satisfy, he appeals 
 abruptly to any who would still raise questions. 
 
 By what right, he asks, do you presume to judge 
 or to interrogate the Supreme ? Have you been in his 
 confidence from the first ? Or must he advise with 
 you? Or have you any such claim on him as to 
 lay him under an obligation to give you satisfaction? 
 " For who hath known the mind of the Lord ? or 
 who hath been his counsellor ? or who hath first 
 given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him 
 again ?" (34, 35.) Are you the Lord's confidants? Are 
 you the Lord's councillors? Are you the Lord's creditors? 
 If not, how are you entitled to pry into those " secret 
 things" which " belong to the Lord your God ?" " The 
 things which are revealed belong to you and to your chil- 
 dren." But as to the secret things which belong to him, 
 he is not in any way bound to you ; nor with refer- 
 ence to them can you demand that he should discover 
 more of his plans to you than he sees fit ; " For of him, 
 
A PRIESTHOOD AND SACRIFICE. 13 
 
 and through him, and to him, are all things : to whom 
 be glory for ever. Amen/' (36.) 
 
 Your becoming attitude is that of the Psalmist : 
 " Lord, my heart is not haughty, nor mine eyes lofty : 
 neither do I exercise myself in great matters, or in 
 things too high for me. Surely I have behaved and 
 quieted myself, as a child that is weaned of his mother : 
 my soul is even as a weaned child. Let Israel hope 
 in the Lord from henceforth and for ever" (Psalm 
 cxxxi.) 
 
 We are then in our right place, when, instead of aspir- 
 ing to master, as critics, the whole mind and will of God, 
 we thankfully consent to learn, as children, what it is 
 his pleasure to teach. He is not dependent on us : he 
 is not indebted to us. The dependence and the debt 
 of obligation are all on our side. We are not competent 
 to dictate or give lessons to him. We are children and 
 scholars under his training. 
 
 And the training is for service. We are to be, not 
 advisers or judges, but ministers, servants, priests. " I 
 beseech you, therefore, brethren/' instead of aspiring to 
 be the confidants, or the councillors, or the creditors of the 
 Lord, to assume the office and discharge the functions 
 of the priesthood. 
 
 For the priesthood is to be considered as a ministry 
 and service. It was so to Him with whom we are 
 associated in its exercise. "The Son of man came not 
 to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his 
 life a ransom for many." So he came to do the busi- 
 ness of his priesthood. So we are summoned to do the 
 
14 CONSECRATION TO GOD A SACRIFICE: 
 
 business of our priesthood. The business of his priest- 
 hood was to "give his life a ransom for many/' The 
 business of our priesthood is to "present our bodies a 
 living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is our 
 reasonable service." 
 
 From this general account of what Christians have to 
 do, as consecrated to God, in the character of priests, the 
 following particulars may be drawn out in detail: — 
 
 I. There is to be a sacrifice : " I beseech you, brethren, 
 that ye present a sacrifice/'' 
 
 II. It must be a sacrifice that fulfils two conditions : 
 it must be such as may righteously find acceptance in 
 the sight of God, and such as may reasonably be required 
 and expected at the hands of man : " I beseech you 
 that ye present a sacrifice;" such as shall, on the one 
 hand, be "acceptable to God;" and such as shall, on 
 the other hand, and on your part, be " a reasonable 
 service." 
 
 III. If it is to fulfil these two conditions, the sacrifice 
 must possess the two qualities of life and holiness : " I 
 beseech you that ye present a living sacrifice, holy ; " — for 
 such a sacrifice alone can be acceptable to God ; such a 
 sacrifice alone can be your reasonable service. 
 
 IV. The substance or matter of the sacrifice is indi- 
 cated ; it is to consist of " your bodies," your persons, 
 yourselves : " I beseech you that ye present your bodies." 
 
 V. The motive also is indicated which is to prompt 
 the sacrifice : " I beseech you, brethren, by the mercies 
 of God." 
 
ITS NATURE. 15 
 
 Under these heads, the sacrifice which as Christians, 
 bearing the character of priests, we have to present to 
 God may be considered ; and the connection and corre- 
 spondence, as well as the difference, between it and the 
 sacrifice of Christ may be traced. The connection and 
 correspondence will be found, if we rightly apprehend the 
 Spirit's teaching, to be very close. 
 
 I.— THE SACRIFICE : ITS NATURE. 
 " I beseech you that ye present a sacrifice." — Rom. xii. 1. 
 
 There is to be a sacrifice. Priests are not to approach 
 to God empty handed. " Bring an offering and come 
 into his courts ; " so runs their summons. 
 
 This law applies to the High Priest as well as to 
 ordinary priests. It applies pre-eminently to the High 
 Priest. " Every high priest is ordained to offer gifts 
 and sacrifices ; wherefore it is of necessity that this one," 
 our great High Priest, Christ, " have somewhat also to 
 offer " (Heb. viii. 3). So far, Christians who are priests, 
 and Christ who alone is the High Priest, have this in 
 common, that they as well as he have to present a sacri- 
 fice. 
 
 But there is a wide and essential distinction. Any 
 sacrifice which we as priests can present, must be of an 
 entirely different nature from what Christ, the High 
 Priest, presents. His sacrifice is, in the strict and proper 
 sense of the term, a sacrifice of atonement. His sacrifice 
 alone can be so. Our sacrifice is a sacrifice of thanks- 
 giving and praise. 
 
16 CONSECRATION TO GOD A SACRIFICE: 
 
 This is a distinction recognised in the Levitical economy. 
 In that economy, there were atoning sacrifices, designed 
 to be effectual for the expiation of guilt and the recon- 
 ciliation of offenders to God Of this kind, in particular, 
 were the sacrifices appointed for the great annual day of 
 atonement, when the high priest entered within the veil 
 with the blood of bulls and of goats, " which he offered 
 for himself and for the errors of the people." The sacri- 
 fice of Christ is represented in the New Testament as 
 exactly of the same character with these sacrifices, only 
 infinitely more efficacious. Thus the Apostle writing to 
 the Hebrews reasons : " If the blood of bulls and of 
 goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, 
 sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh : how much more 
 shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit 
 offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience 
 from dead works to serve the living God?" (ix. 13, 14.) 
 In the offering of a sacrifice of this kind, Christ, our 
 High Priest, stands alone. Into his ministry of atone- 
 ment, his propitiatory work, we may not, as priests, 
 intrude. But there were sacrifices of another kind under 
 the law ; sacrifices of praise and thanksgiving, offered in 
 acknowledgment of the sovereignty and bounty of Go J, and 
 as pledges of dependence and gratitude. These sacrifices 
 had nothing to do with the cancelling of guilt and the 
 restoration of the guilty party to favour. They did not 
 make peace. They proceeded on the faith of peace being 
 otherwise made, by a previous sacrifice of atonement. 
 They were, in fact, expressions of thankfulness on that 
 account. 
 
ITS NATURE. 17 
 
 The sacrifice of Cain was a sacrifice of thanksgiving. 
 And as a sacrifice of thanksgiving, it would have been 
 legitimate and right, if it had been preceded by the 
 ordained sacrifice of atonement. The sacrifice of Abel 
 was a sacrifice of atonement. And undoubtedly, if his 
 life had been spared, it would have been followed up by 
 an appropriate sacrifice of praise. Having offered " of 
 the firstlings of hisfr flock and of the fat thereof/' and 
 having evidence of the acceptance of his offering, in the 
 " light of God's reconciled countenance lifted up upon 
 him,' ' and " the love of God shed abroad in his heart by 
 the Holy Ghost being given to him;" he would gladly 
 and gratefully have "brought of the fruit of the 
 ground an offering" of thanksgiving and praise "to 
 the Lord." 
 
 And this now is our ministry as priests. This is all 
 our ministry. The ministry of atonement is not ours, 
 either for others or for ourselves. That ministry Christ 
 alone exercises. " He treads the wine-press alone," in 
 his work of bloody propitiation, as well as in his work of 
 bloody judgment, " and of the people there is none with, 
 him." All the more may the ministry of thankoffering 
 be ours. For our pardon and peace, our acceptance and 
 justification, we have nothing to offer, we have nothing 
 to give. The Apostle calls for no sacrifice at our hands 
 for the purpose of cleansing us from sin and restoring us 
 to favour. So far as that matter is concerned, he 
 uniformly points our view exclusively to the one only 
 sacrifice of the one only High Priest : " We are am- 
 bassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by 
 B 
 
18 CONSECRATION TO GOD A SACRIFICE: 
 
 us : we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to 
 God. For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew 
 no sin ; that we might be made the righteousness of God 
 in him'' (2 Cor. v. 20, 21). But now, upon the supposi- 
 tion that we are reconciled, freely, effectually, thoroughly 
 reconciled, through faith in the great Atonement, the 
 Apostle calls for some suitable offering of praise. He 
 tells us that the atoning ministryjpf the High Priest, 
 thus available on our behalf, opens the way for a graceful 
 and grateful ministry of thanksgiving: "I beseech you, 
 brethren, that ye present a sacrifice." 
 
 II.— THE SACRIFICE : ITS CONDITIONS. 
 
 " I beseech you, brethren, that ye present a sacrifice, acceptable to God, which 
 
 is your reasonable service." — Rom. xii. 1. 
 
 . 
 
 The nature of the sacrifice which, as priests, Chris- 
 tians are called to present, having been ascertained, the 
 next point is to consider the general principles which 
 ought to determine the character of the matter, or material, 
 .to be used in the sacrifice, or of which the sacrifice is to 
 consist. 
 
 If there is to be a sacrifice of thanksgiving and praise, 
 proceeding upon the faith of a sacrifice of atonement 
 having been offered and accepted, let it be a suitable 
 sacrifice. Let it be a sacrifice that fulfils these two indis- 
 pensable conditions: let it be, as regards him to whom 
 it is presented, " acceptable to God;" let it also be, as 
 regards you who present it, "your reasonable service." 
 
 Of the sacrifice of atonement which our great High 
 
ITS CONDITIONS. 19 
 
 Priest has to present, it may with equal justice be said 
 that it must fulfil these two conditions. To that sacrifice 
 also — to that sacrifice primarily^they apply, as condi- 
 tions. When a ransom was to be found for sinful man, 
 it was necessary on the one hand, that it should be such a 
 ransom as it might be worthy of God to accept ; and on 
 the other hand, that it should be such a ransom as it 
 might be reasonable to expect should be offered on be- 
 half of reasonable creatures. 
 
 The character and nature of the offended party, God, 
 the holy lawgiver and righteous judge ; the character and 
 nature of the offending party, man, a free and intelligent 
 being, made in the image of God ; and the relation be- 
 tween the parties, implying just condemnation on the one 
 side and guilty enmity on the other ; all must be taken 
 into account. The sacrifice must bear some adequate 
 proportion, or suitable relation, to the majesty of violated 
 law and the unforced responsibility of its violators. It 
 must have in it worth and value enough to meet the 
 case of God's sovereign authority having been outraged, 
 and to meet also the case of man's conscience having 
 become burdened and defiled. It must be sufficient to 
 satisfy Divine justice ; and sufficient also to assuage the 
 anguish of genuine remorse and shame. 
 
 Tried by this test, it is easy to see how the blood 
 of bulls and of goats can never take away sin. The 
 substitution of a senseless, unconsenting animal, as 
 a victim or ransom, in the room and stead of a race 
 which has intelligently and wilfully sinned, is felt to 
 be, upon every principle of common sense and reason, 
 
20 CONSECRATION TO GOD A SACRIFICE: 
 
 as well as of right religious feeling, an utterly 
 inadequate atonement. There is no propriety or suit- 
 ableness in the idea of the death of such a substitute 
 being accepted as an equivalent for the execution 
 of the sentence upon the guilty. The law cannot 
 in that way be vindicated. The Lawgiver cannot on 
 that ground be warranted in treating offenders as if 
 they had never sinned ; or as if they had themselves 
 suffered the penalty, and come out from the suffering of 
 it, pure and upright. Nor can such a vicarious endurance 
 of my punishment, by a bull, or goat, or ram, or lamb, 
 held to represent me, satisfy my own conviction of right 
 and my own consciousness of wrong. Whatever may 
 come of my controversy with my Maker, I instinctively 
 feel that these animal sacrifices cannot avail for its settle- 
 ment ; — no ; nor any formal observances I may be 
 inclined to put in their place. " The blood of bulls 
 and of goats cannot take away sin." "None T;an by 
 any means redeem his brother," or ransom his own 
 soul. 
 
 The conditions which it was necessary that the High 
 Priest's sacrifice of atonement should fulfil must be ful- 
 filled also by the sacrifice of praise which believers, as 
 priests, are to present. This sacrifice of theirs must be 
 in accordance with what God is, and with what they 
 are. In particular, it must be in accordance with what 
 God is to them, and with what they are to God. 
 
 Let it be remembered that we present our sacrifice of 
 praise, as priests, on the footing of the High Priest's sac- 
 rifice of atonement being; on our behalf offered and ac- 
 
ITS CONDITIONS. 21 
 
 cepted ; on the footing of our personal interest by faith 
 in its efficacy and fruit. 
 
 Upon that footing, what is the idea which we are 
 called to entertain of the God to whom we have to pre- 
 sent our thank- offering ? " God is a spirit ; and they 
 that worship him must worship him in spirit and in 
 truth. The Father seeketh such to worship him." He 
 is weary and impatient of all other worship. " My son, 
 give me thy heart/' is his demand. That we may be in 
 a condition, and may be made willing, to give him our 
 heart, — he redeems us to himself by the blood of Christ, 
 and renews us by the power of the Holy Ghost. He, 
 therefore, to whom we are to present our sacrifice is a 
 spirit, requiring spiritual worship. And we, who are 
 to present the sacrifice, are spiritual men. "Now he 
 that is spiritual judgeth all things" (1 Cor. ii. 15). 
 We can judge, therefore, what may be fairly regarded as 
 our "reasonable service;" what is the sort of service that 
 may be reasonably expected and required, as a sacrifice 
 of praise, at our hands, if God is a spirit and we are 
 spiritual men. 
 
 And this we may the rather do, when we consider the 
 relation now subsisting — the relation which ought to 
 subsist — between our God, who is a spirit, and ourselves 
 who are spiritual men. Through that one sacrifice of 
 propitiation presented by the High Priest on our behalf, 
 there is peace, friendship, reconciliation. All our guilt is 
 expiated : all our sin is purged. We are no longer 
 treated as guilty criminals under a respite. We are ac- 
 cepted as righteous in the sight of God. We are adopted 
 
22 CONSECRATION TO GOD A SACRIFICE: 
 
 as children in his Son : we receive " the Spirit of his 
 Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father " (Gal. iv. 6). 
 
 Now it is as thus knowing God, who is a spirit ; 
 knowing thus, also, ourselves as spiritual men ; and know- 
 ing, above all, the footing on which we stand with our 
 God and Father ; — that we are called, as priests, to present 
 a sacrifice of praise. May we not decide and determine 
 for ourselves, according to these considerations, what sort 
 of sacrifice is suitable and appropriate? what is worthy 
 of God ? what is worthy of ourselves ? What sort of 
 sacrifice may God be expected to accept? What sort of 
 sacrifice, in the full view of all the circumstances, may be 
 regarded as our "reasonable service?" 
 
 At all events, tried by such a test, how miserably 
 will many a sacrifice and service that we are apt to pre- 
 sent to God fail and be found wanting ! Form, cere- 
 mony, routine ; heartless prayers, however long ; ostenta- 
 tious alms, however large ; bodily exercise, whether in 
 the way of easy compliance with outward rites, or in 
 the way of painful inward self-mortification ; enforced 
 obedience ; reluctant abstinence from pleasure ; the cold 
 and cheerless performance of duty; all or any of these 
 kinds of worship — all similar methods of serving God — 
 we can bring to this criterion. Is it such a sacrifice of 
 praise and thanksgiving that a reconciled God and Father 
 should in fairness be asked to accept? Is it such a sacrifice 
 of praise and thanksgiving that we, his reconciled children, 
 may be reasonably asked to offer? Is it such a sacrifice of 
 praise and thanksgiving that should signalize and seal so 
 thorough a repairing of the breach caused by sin between 
 
ITS QUALITIES. 23 
 
 our God and us, as that which the High Priest's sacrifice of 
 atonement effects? Surely, if it is felt by the universal 
 moral instinct of all men to be true, that the blood of 
 bulls and of goats cannot take away sin, — it must be felt 
 also by the universal spiritual instinct of all those whose 
 sins are taken away, by the blood of a better ransom, to 
 be not less true, that formal worship, or obedience ren- 
 dered in the spirit of bondage, is not the sacrifice which 
 a redeeming God can worthily accept, and is not a " rea- 
 sonable service" on the part of the people whom he 
 redeems. 
 
 III. — THE SACRIFICE : ITS QUALITIES. 
 
 " I beseech you that ye present a living sacrifice, holy." — Rom. xii. 1. 
 
 The sacrifice which Christians present, as priests, 
 must possess two qualities which formal worship, or 
 obedience rendered in the spirit of bondage, is sure to 
 want. It must possess the qualities of life and holiness. 
 Without these qualities it cannot fulfil the two indispen- 
 sable conditions ; it cannot be either an acceptable offering 
 to God, or, on our part, a reasonable service. The sacrifice 
 must be living and holy: " I beseech you that ye pre- 
 sent a living sacrifice, holy. ,; 
 
 It was necessary that the sacrifice of atonement which 
 our High Priest was ordained to present should possess 
 these two qualities. It must be living and holy. It 
 must have in it life and holiness. 
 
 Life must belong to it. And what life ? Not merely 
 animal life, the life that is common to all sentient and 
 
24 CONSECRATION TO GOD A SACRIFICE: 
 
 moving creatures ; not merely, in addition to that, in- 
 telligent life, the life that characterizes all beings capable 
 of thought and voluntary choice ; but spiritual life : life in 
 the highest sense ; the very life which those on whose be- 
 half the sacrifice of atonement is presented lost, when 
 they fell into that state which makes a sacrifice of atone- 
 ment necessary. If a ransom is to be found, — an adequate 
 and suitable substitute for those who have ceased to live, 
 as they were originally made and meant to live, in the 
 favour and loving-kindness of God, and have become 
 dead under his sentence of righteous condemnation, — it 
 must be a ransom, a substitute, having the life which 
 they once had ; exempt and free from the death which 
 they have incurred. A living sacrifice of atonement alone 
 can suffice ; a sacrifice of atonement having the quality 
 of life ; of that life which consists in a right standing 
 with God ; in complete exemption from his condemna- 
 tion, and the complete enjoyment of his favour and 
 loving-kindness. 
 
 And the sacrifice must be holy also. As it must have 
 life forfeited by no guilt, liable to no sentence of death; 
 so it must have holiness tainted by no corruption. Let 
 either guilt or corruption — let either death or sin — be- 
 long, by whatever tenure, hereditary or personal, to the 
 ransom or victim that is to be the atoning sacrifice pre- 
 sented by the High Priest on behalf of guilty sinners ; — 
 it is not such a sacrifice as God, the Lawgiver, can be 
 justified in accepting as a compensation for the breaking 
 of his law; it is not such a sacrifice as can be considered 
 a reasonable service on behalf of the breakers of that 
 
ITS QUALITIES. 25 
 
 law, — if it is to exempt them from the penalty which 
 they have incurred, through the vicarious endurance of that 
 penalty by a worthy substitute in their stead. The dead and 
 unholy cannot be ransomed or redeemed, if the only sacri- 
 fice provided for that end is itself involved in their death 
 and unholiness. " Behold the Lamb of God that taketh 
 away the sin of the world," is a welcome call to sinners, 
 and to me, the chief of sinners. But if that very Lamb 
 of God that is to take away the sin of the world, is in- 
 volved in that very sin of the world which is to be taken 
 away, where, alas ! is my hope? 
 
 Thus the sacrifice of atonement presented by the High 
 Priest for us must be free alike from the condemnation 
 and from the corruption, from the death and from the 
 defilement, of our sin. It must be " a living sacrifice, 
 holy." 
 
 And so, also, must be the sacrifice of praise and thanks- 
 giving which, as priests, we are to be always presenting ; it 
 must be " a living sacrifice, holy." It must partake of 
 the character of the sacrifice of atonement, in immediate 
 connection with which it is presented. It is by faith in 
 the sacrifice of atonement that we present the sacrifice of 
 praise. This last sacrifice is the fruit of the first; and 
 indeed, in some sense, a continuation of it. We enter into 
 the spirit, while we appropriate the efficacy, of our great 
 High Priest's sacrifice of atonement, as a living sacrifice 
 and holy. We become one, as priests, with him who, as 
 High Priest, presents it. We become one with him in his 
 presenting of it. And being one with him who is the 
 High Priest, we go on, as priests, to present our sacrifice 
 
26 CONSECRATION TO GOD A SACRIFICE: 
 
 of praise. We cannot, in such circumstances, think of pre- 
 senting any sacrifice of praise that is not in keeping and 
 in harmony with the High Priest's sacrifice of atonement. 
 We cannot ask God to accept, we cannot offer as our 
 reasonable service, any tribute of gratitude, any sacrifice 
 of thanksgiving, that does not possess the qualities which 
 impart worth and efficacy to the High Priest's great pro- 
 pitiation. Ours, like his, must be a sacrifice, living and 
 holy. 
 
 IV. THE SACRIFICE : ITS MATTER. 
 
 " I beseech you that ye present your bodies a sacrifice."— Rom. xii. 1. 
 
 The nature of the sacrifice as a sacrifice of praise, as 
 well as the indispensable conditions and qualities of it, 
 having been considered, the next inquiry relates to the 
 substance or matter of the sacrifice. What shall it be ? 
 Our bodies: " I beseech you that ye present your bodies 
 a sacrifice." 
 
 The same phraseology is used when it is the High 
 Priest's sacrifice of atonement that is in question. " We 
 are sanctified/' it is said, we are cleansed from the guilt 
 of sin, " through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ 
 once for all" (Heb. x. 10). It is the entire person of 
 Christ that is there meant. He offered himself. That 
 was his sacrifice of atonement The offering of ourselves 
 is our sacrifice of thanksgiving. 
 
 But how can there be any parallel or analogy here ? 
 How can there be any correspondence, in respect of life 
 and holiness, between Christ's person, offered as a sacrifice 
 of atonement, — and mine, offered as a sacrifice of praise ? 
 
ITS MATTER. 27 
 
 That Christ, the High Priest, may offer his body, or 
 present himself, as a sacrifice of atonement, living and 
 holy, I can understand. 
 
 As to his life, I read what his beloved disciple records 
 as part of his teaching in his humiliation : " Therefore 
 doth my Father love me, because I lay down my 
 life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from 
 me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay 
 it down, and I have power to take it again. This com- 
 mandment have I received of my Father" (John x. 
 17, 18). I read also what that same beloved disciple 
 records as a voice from his beloved Master in his exalta- 
 tion : "I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, be- 
 hold, I am alive for evermore, Amen " (Rev. i. 1 8). 
 He has life; life forfeited by no guilt, liable to no con- 
 demnation or death. When he offers, or presents, him- 
 self as a substitute for the dead, the guilty, the condemned, 
 he offers, or presents, himself a living sacrifice. His life; 
 his right to live, according to the highest idea of life ; his 
 prerogative of life in the favour of God, in the bosom of 
 the Father; — cannot be challenged or impugned. He is 
 not under any sentence of condemnation, he is not doomed 
 to die a penal death on his own account. No fault, 
 therefore, can be found with him on that score, when 
 he offers himself as willing to be the substitute of the 
 guilty. 
 
 Nor can any objection be taken on the score of his 
 being one of our race, as if that involved any compromise 
 or surrender of his essential holiness, or any participa- 
 tion in our sin. His holiness is still as untarnished, 
 
28 CONSECRATION TO GOD A SACRIFICE: 
 
 as his life is unforfeited and uncondemned. It was 
 needful that he should become one of us, that he 
 should become one with us, if he was to present 
 himself as a sacrifice of atonement in our stead. And, 
 without a miracle, there might be difficulty in his taking 
 our nature, without taking also our corruption and crimi- 
 nality ; — which if he had taken, his offering of himself in 
 our stead would have been in vain. But it is miraculously 
 otherwise arranged. He is essentially the living one, 
 the holy one, in respect of his divine nature. And even 
 when he associates the human nature with that divine 
 nature, so as to constitute one person, Emmanuel, God 
 with us, — the Word made flesh, — Jesus, saving his 
 people from their sins, — he is still the living one and the 
 holy one. A sacrifice of atonement is needed, a ransom 
 to deliver from going down to the pit. The sacrifice or 
 ransom, in order to fulfil the twofold condition of its 
 being such as God may accept and such as may be a suit 
 able and reasonable service of propitiation for man's sin, 
 must be living and holy. It must possess the qualities 
 of life and holiness; fife in God's favour forfeited by no 
 guilt; holiness unstained by any taint of pollution. Such 
 a sacrifice of atonement is found in Christ. He is the 
 living one. He " lays down his life of himself." He is 
 "holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners." 
 " He offers himself without spot to God " (John x. 1 8 ; 
 Heb. vii. 26; ix. 14). 
 
 Now our sacrifice of praise must partake of the quali- 
 ties of his sacrifice of atonement. It must be living 
 and holy. 
 
ITS MATTER. 29 
 
 But how may that be, if it is our bodies, our persons, 
 ourselves, that we are to present as the sacrifice ? 
 
 1 Woe is me!' some poor soul may be heard to cry 
 out, ■ I am asked to present a thank-offering and sacrifice 
 of praise. It is a just demand ; a gracious invitation. 
 Fain would I comply with it. — But the sacrifice, I am 
 told, must be living and holy/ — 'Certainly,' I answer, 'it 
 is most right and fitting that it should be so/ — • But I 
 am further told that it must be myself; myself bodily ; 
 my very self. — Alas! alas! are life and holiness in me, 
 that I should furnish in my own person the material of 
 this sacrifice ? — Life and holiness in me ! — I am lost and 
 dead in sin ; I am carnal, sold under sin. In me, that 
 is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing ; — nothing but guilt 
 weighing me down to utter destruction, and corruption 
 defiling the whole inner man. For me, undone, unclean, 
 to present myself a living and holy sacrifice! — it can- 
 not be/ 
 
 Nay but, my brother, it must be. It is thyself that 
 thy God will have thee to present as a thank-offering. 
 He will accept no other thank-offering at thy hands : it 
 is not reasonable that he should. Say not that there 
 is no life in thee. Is not Christ in thee ? " Thou 
 art crucified with Christ, nevertheless thou livest ; yet 
 not thou ; but Christ liveth in thee" (Gal. ii. 20). And 
 for thine uncleanness — " what God hath cleansed, that call 
 not thou common or unclean" (Acts x. 15). 
 
 Believers in Christ, called to be priests, present your- 
 selves a sacrifice, as the great High Priest presents himself 
 a sacrifice. Let your ministry and his be one. Are not 
 
SO CONSECRATION TO GOD A SACRIFICE: 
 
 you and he now one, — intimately, inseparably one ? When 
 you present yourselves a sacrifice, are you not presenting 
 him? Even as when he presents himself a sacrifice, is he not 
 presenting you ? He presents himself as crucified for you ; 
 he presents you as crucified with him. You now present 
 yourselves ; yet not yourselves ; it is Christ in you that 
 you present. The Spirit making you one with Christ by 
 faith, makes you partakers of Christ's life ; the life which 
 he laid down that he might take it again, — the life which 
 he has as no more bearing guilt, but justified, accepted, 
 raised and glorified. The same Spirit, making you one 
 with Christ in nature, by the renewing of your mind, 
 makes you partakers of Christ's holiness. The Spirit 
 takes of what is Christ's, and shows it to you. And 
 when, through the Spirit, you present yourselves a sacri- 
 fice, he takes of what is Christ's in you, and shows it to 
 God. May not this be an acceptable thank-offering? Is 
 not this, ye redeemed and regenerated saints of God, — is 
 not this your reasonable service? 
 
 w I beseech you therefore, brethren, that ye present 
 yourselves a sacrifice." And let it be yourselves in 
 Christ; let it be Christ in you. For thus only can it be 
 a sacrifice " living and holy." When Christ presents 
 himself a sacrifice of atonement, be you one with him in 
 his doing so. When you present yourselves a sacrifice of 
 praise, let him be one with you in your doing so. Let 
 the two presentations be ever going on together, simulta- 
 neously, unitedly. The presentation by Christ of himself 
 as the sacrifice of atonement is always going on in the 
 sanctuary above. There, in the true holy place, he is 
 
ITS MATTER. 31 
 
 always ministering as your great High Priest, having his 
 own blood to offer, ever freshly flowing, and freshly effi- 
 cacious to cleanse from all sin. Enter, be always enter- 
 ing, within the veil, that you may associate and identify 
 yourselves by faith, through the Spirit, with Christ, in 
 what is there transacted for your peace. In a corre- 
 sponding manner, let your presentation of yourselves, as a 
 sacrifice of thanksgiving, be always going on in the 
 sanctuary here below ; the only sanctuary now owned on 
 earth, — the deep and sacred shrine of a believing heart. 
 And oh! let Christ be always entering in there, within the 
 veil, and dwelling there, that he may associate and 
 identify himself with you, in w T hat is there transacted for 
 God's praise. Thus it will be always Christ, and Christ 
 alone ; yet always you in Christ, and Christ in you. In 
 the sacrifice of atonement, it is Christ crucified for you, 
 and you crucified with him. In the sacrifice of thank- 
 fulness, it is Christ living in you, and you become par- 
 takers of his holiness. It is the sacrifice of propitia- 
 tion, living and holy, prolonging itself, in a manner 
 most acceptable to God and most reasonable on your 
 part, into a living and holy sacrifice of praise. There is 
 the sin-offering of the living and holy body of Christ 
 once for all ; and there is the thank-offering of the living 
 and holy Church, "which is his" mystical "body, the 
 fulness of him who filleth all in all" (Eph. i. 23). 
 
32 CONSECRATION TO GOD A SACRIFICE: 
 
 V.— THE SACRIFICE : ITS MOTIVE. 
 " I beseech you, by the mercies of God."— Rom. xii. 1. 
 
 It now only remains for us to advert a little to the 
 motive by which Christians are to be animated in their 
 discharge of the office of their priesthood, for which they 
 are consecrated to God. As it is a sacrifice of praise 
 and gratitude that they are to present, they are fitly 
 adjured and implored to do so " by the mercies of God." 
 
 The adjuration, the entreaty, is very earnest. "I beseech 
 you," says the Apostle. I make it a matter of personal 
 request, as if I were asking you to do me a personal 
 favour. I may well thus appeal to you; for the motive 
 which I have to urge is one which I have had good 
 reason myself personally to feel. " The mercies of God " 
 have been very abundant towards me. But it is not 
 from myself, or for myself, that I speak. I speak as an 
 ambassador of Christ. I call to mind what these mercies 
 of God were to Christ, — what they were in his eyes and 
 in his esteem, — when, as the great High Priest, he went 
 about the business of presenting his sacrifice of atone- 
 ment. 
 
 What were they to him ? What were they in his eyes 
 and in his esteem ? — These mercies of God ? 
 
 Go back in imagination, to the unfathomed depths of 
 that unbroken eternity, before the world was, wherein 
 the Son is alone, with the Spirit, in the bosom of the 
 Father. There are mercies in that bosom, throes of pity, 
 yearnings of kindness and love unquenchable. A guilty, 
 
ITS MOTIVE. 33 
 
 lost and ruined race is before him ; a race of beings who 
 are miserably, to fall, under the temptation of an evil 
 spirit more powerful and more knowing than themselves. 
 The great Father's heart is moved ; his bowels of com- 
 passion are stirred : his mercies are overflowing. But 
 alas ! there is a barrier ; a great rampart of righteous- 
 ness ; a holy law ; a righteous rule of government ; — that 
 keeps these mercies back ; pent up, barred, restrained ; 
 so that they can find no vent or channel through which 
 they may reach their miserable objects. Is the Father's 
 heart to hold these mercies in, through reverence of 
 sacred justice, until, if we may dare to say so, it shall 
 burst or break ? 
 
 Lo ! the Son, moved by these mercies thus struggling 
 to find a vent, comes forth, and by his own sacrifice of 
 himself, becomes himself their vent, the outlet and chan- 
 nel for their effusion. He opens a door, a door of right- 
 eousness, through which these floods of richest love may 
 freely flow, till they reach and revive and renovate even 
 the guiltiest of the guilty, the chief of sinners. 
 
 Now by these mercies, no longer pent up in the bosom 
 of the Father, but gushing in full stream through the 
 rent veil, — the veil rent by that offering of his body once 
 for all which the great High Priest makes, — and coming 
 in, through the Spirit opening the door of your hearts, 
 into the deepest recesses of your souls, and pouring life 
 and gladness, peace and hope, through your whole inner 
 man ; — by these mercies of God, thus issuiug from the 
 bosom of the Father, thus coming home to your bosoms, 
 as you believe on Him who is the way, the truth, and 
 c 
 
34 CONSECRATION TO GOD A SACRIFICE: 
 
 the life, " I beseech you, brethren, that ye present your 
 bodies a living sacrifice, and holy, acceptable to God, 
 which is your reasonable service. " 
 
 Some practical applications of the views which have 
 been given on the subject of the Christian's sacrifice of 
 praise may be briefly stated : — 
 
 I. If any of you who are called to be priests feel that 
 there is something vague and shadowy about the sacrifice 
 of praise which you are here called to present, and that 
 you would like to have materials more tangible to offer, — 
 or at least to have some more definite instruction as to 
 what is meant by offering yourselves, — will such scrip- 
 tural intimations as these afford you any help ? 
 
 First, hear what David says (Psalm li.), in the depths 
 of his sorrow for his grievous sin, after he has sought an 
 interest anew in the sacrifice of atonement, offering the 
 prayer of faith, " Purge me with hyssop and I shall be 
 clean," " Create in me a clean heart, God." He looks 
 about for a fitting sacrifice of praise, to seal and witness 
 his appropriation of the sacrifice of atonement. And he 
 finds it, not in any external acts of worship, but in 
 his own sense and experience of the evil of his sin ; — 
 " For thou desirest not sacrifice ; else would I give it : 
 thou delightest not in burnt-offering. The sacrifices of 
 God are a broken spirit : a broken and a contrite heart, 
 God, thou wilt not despise." Next, hear what the 
 Lord himself testifies (Ps. 1.) when he pleads with M his 
 people, who have made a covenant with him by sacri- 
 fice," — by faith in the sacrifice of atonement; — hear 
 
CONCLUSION. 35 
 
 what sort of sacrifice of praise the Lord desires ; — 
 " If I were hungry, I would not tell thee : for the world 
 is mine, and the fulness thereof. Will I eat the flesh of 
 bulls, or drink the blood of goats ? Offer unto God 
 thanksgiving ; and pay thy vows unto the most High : 
 and call upon me in the day of trouble : I will deliver 
 thee, and thou shalt glorify me." Or again, hear the 
 words which the Lord so graciously puts into the mouth 
 of penitent Israel (Hosea xiv.) ; — " Take away all iniquity, 
 and receive us graciously : so will we render the calves 
 of our lips." Or once more, hear the exhortation of the 
 Apostle writing to the Hebrews (ch. xiii.), when, having 
 spoken of Jesus, who, that he might sanctify or cleanse 
 the people by his own blood, suffered without the gate, 
 he adds ; — " By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of 
 praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips 
 giving thanks to his name. But to do good and to com- 
 municate forget not : for with such sacrifices God is well 
 pleased." 
 
 Here is a choice of materials for a thank-offering ; a 
 broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart ; the pay- 
 ment of your vows, calling upon God in the time of trou- 
 ble ; the calves of } T our lips, the fruit of your lips, con- 
 fessing and praising the name of Jesus ; good deeds, good 
 gifts ; all or any of these things may be sacrifices of praise. 
 And in fact, are they not all comprehended in your pre- 
 senting yourselves a sacrifice ? 
 
 So Paul seems to teach when writing to the Corin- 
 thians (2 Cor. viii.), he stimulates their zeal by quoting 
 the example of the churches of Macedonia ; — " How that 
 
36 CONSECRATION TO GOD A SACRIFICE: 
 
 in a great trial of affliction the abundance of their joy 
 and their deep poverty abounded unto the riches of their 
 liberality. For to their power, I bear record, yea, and 
 beyond their power they were willing of themselves ; 
 praying us with much entreaty that we would receive 
 the gift, and take upon us the fellowship of the minister- 
 ing to the saints." A fact like this — such abundance of 
 joy in great affliction, such abundance of liberality in 
 deep poverty, requires explanation. The Apostle feels 
 this, and accordingly he furnishes the explanation when 
 he adds, " And this they did, not as we hoped ; but first 
 gave their own selves to the Lord." 
 
 They first gave their own selves to the Lord. 
 Ah ! this solves the riddle : this accounts for the mys- 
 tery. No wonder their joy abounded in a great trial of 
 affliction ; no wonder the riches of their liberality 
 abounded in deep poverty. And no wonder your joy in 
 your religion is marred by gloom, and your liberality 
 straitened by selfishness, if you do not first give your 
 own selves to the Lord. That you may rejoice right 
 heartily in God your Saviour, that you may be always 
 abounding in the work of the Lord, " I beseech you, 
 brethren," that you first give your own selves to the Lord ; 
 "that ye present your bodies, a living sacrifice, and holy." 
 
 II. And let the deed of gift, the act of presentation, 
 be thorough and unreserved. There is no reserve on the 
 part of Christ, when he presents himself a sacrifice of 
 atonement. Let there be no reserve on your part, when 
 you present yourselves a sacrifice of praise. Let your 
 surrender of yourselves be as complete as Christ's surren- 
 
CONCLUSION. 37 
 
 der of himself was. Through the Eternal Spirit, he 
 offered himself to God ; his whole self : himself whole 
 and entire. Through the same Eternal Spirit, offer ye 
 also yourselves to God ; your whole selves : yourselves 
 whole and entire : mind and body, heart and soul. That 
 is what as Christians you profess to do : let it be what 
 you really do. Sin not as Ananias and Sapphira sinned ; 
 when wishing it to be understood that they were giving 
 their all, they kept back a part. Remember how it was 
 not the amount withheld that was the measure of their 
 guilt. Even their offering of what they gave was vitiated. 
 They lied to the Holy Ghost. Grieve not thus the 
 Spirit. Let no portion whatever of yourselves, — none of 
 your affections, faculties, powers, energies, resources, — be 
 held back from God. Be it ever so little, the holding 
 back of anything mars your whole sacrifice ; its life and 
 holiness are gone ; it is dead and dull ; it is hollow and 
 insincere ; it is a cheerless, joyless, routine of duty ; not 
 a glad service of love. If that be your religion, it may 
 well weary you and repel others : you neither glorify 
 God, nor do good to man ; no, nor even gain content- 
 ment for yourselves. Follow the Lord wholly ; give your 
 all to him ; if you would be really Christians, and happy, 
 as well as useful, in your Christianity. 
 
 III. Finally, let it be always by the mercies of God 
 that you are moved to present yourselves a sacrifice of 
 thanksgiving to him. 
 
 " The mercies of God ! " How precious is the very 
 phrase ! How sweet its sound ! " The mercies of God ! " 
 How great is their multitude ! How manifold are they! 
 
38 CONSECRATION TO GOD A SACRIFICE: 
 
 New every morning, fresh every moment, coming down 
 as rain upon the mown grass, as showers that water the 
 earth ! Only let your eye be open to see them ; your hand 
 to take them ; your mouth to sing of them all the day long; 
 above all, your heart to keep them in its inmost shrine. 
 Thy mercies, Lord, in Christ, flowing in upon me 
 through Christ, — if I would declare and speak of them, 
 they are more than can be numbered. First and chief- 
 est of them all is Christ himself, whom thou, Father, 
 givest to be mine ; my Saviour, brother, friend. And in 
 his train what troops of mercies ! — mercies of all sorts, 
 for soul, body, spirit : if I am weary, rest ; if I sin, for- 
 giveness ; if I have sorrow, comfort ; if I am weak, 
 strength ; if I am wayward, chastening ; if I am dying, 
 hope ! — mercies for all times and places ; songs in the 
 night ; a table spread in the wilderness ; bread and water 
 sure ; oil to anoint the head ; a cup running over ! — 
 mercies always, mercies everywhere ! Thy tender mer- 
 cies, Lord, are great : thou crownest me with loving- 
 kindness and tender mercies. What shall I render to 
 thee for them all? Wilt thou take myself, Lord? 
 Wilt thou suffer me to give myself to thee ? Wilt thou 
 enable me to give myself to thee ? Wilt thou make me 
 thine ? thine alone, thine altogether, thine for ever ? 
 
 But what if thou art disqualified, sinner, for pre- 
 senting a sacrifice of praise at all? And art thou not 
 disqualified if thou hast not embraced the appointed sacri- 
 fice of propitiation ? In such a state, unbelieving, unfor- 
 given, think not that any offering of thine can avail thee 
 
CONCLUSION. 39 
 
 with God. I move, for thee, the previous question. I 
 beseech thee, brother, to let Christ wash thee in his blood, 
 and present thee to his Father. Think not that whilst 
 thou continuest in thy present state, thou canst bring 
 into God's house any offering that he will accept as thy 
 reasonable service. Thou art dead ; thou art unclean. 
 Thou canst not present any service or sacrifice that will 
 at all avail thee for averting the Divine wrath or win- 
 ning the Divine favour. But see, Sinner, there is a 
 sin-offering lying at thy door. And it is thine, if thou 
 wilt but have it to be thine. Why shouldst thou con- 
 tinue in so sad a condition as to be debarred from offer- 
 ing songs of praise to thy God ? Nay, it is a condition 
 which, if thou continuest in it, must extort from thee, 
 ere long, instead of songs of praise, weeping and wailing 
 and gnashing of teeth ! But thou needst not continue in 
 it, no, not for an hour. Accept now in faith the sacrifice 
 of atonement, and thereupon present the sacrifice of praise. 
 First, be reconciled to thy God ; then come and offer thy 
 gift. 
 
40 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 II. 
 
 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD. 
 
 "And be not conformed to this world; but be transformed by the renewine of 
 your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect 
 will of God." — Rom. xii. 2, 
 
 The change which takes place in our relation to God, 
 when, through faith in the High Priest's sacrifice of pro- 
 pitiation, we, as priests, present ourselves a sacrifice of 
 praise, implies a corresponding change in our relation to 
 that system of things — that course and current of thought 
 and feeling — which, in scriptural language, is the world. 
 It implies, — and this is the second element in the Chris- 
 tian's relation to God, — separation from the world. 
 
 That separation is described in this verse as a trans 
 formation. And it may be viewed in three practical 
 lights — with reference, I. To what it puts off ; — " Be 
 not conformed to this world/' II. To what it is in 
 itself ; — " Be ye transformed by the renewing of your 
 mind." And III. To what it aims at accomplishing ; — 
 " That ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, 
 and perfect will of God/' 
 
 I.— NONCONFORMITY— " BE NOT CONFORMED TO THIS 
 WORLD." 
 
 The antagonism or opposition between God and the 
 world is strongly asserted in the word. Thus John, the be- 
 
NONCONFORMITY. 4 1 
 
 loved disciple, speaks, "Love not the world, neither the 
 things that are in the world. If any man love the world, 
 the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in 
 the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eves, 
 and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of 
 the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust 
 thereof : but he that doeth the will of God abideth for 
 ever/' 
 
 John, it will be observed, fastens upon one feature as 
 characteristic of the world, whose friendship, as another 
 Apostle testifies (James iv. 4), is "enmity with God:" 
 " The world passeth away, and the lust thereof." The 
 Apostle Paul, also, singles out the same feature, in sum- 
 ming up his argument as to the bearing of Christian faith 
 on the relations and arrangements of the world : " But 
 this I say, brethren, the time is short : it remaineth, that 
 both they that have wives be as though they had none ; 
 and they that weep, as though they wept not ; and they 
 that rejoice, as though they rejoiced not ; and they that 
 buy, as though they possessed not ; and they that use 
 this world, as not abusing it : for the fkshion of this 
 world passeth away" (1 Cor. vii. 29-31). 
 
 " The fashion of this world passeth away ;" — " Be not 
 conformed to this world;" — the statement and the ex- 
 hortation are intimately connected. The verb, " be not 
 conformed/' is a derivative of the noun, " the fashion." 
 The admonition literally is, — Be not co-fashioned with 
 this world ; take not the fashion of this world ; the 
 fashion which passeth away. 
 
 In this view, the warnings of the Divine word, as 
 
4 2 SEPARATION FROM TH E WORLD : 
 
 to nonconformity with the world, may be regarded as 
 having a distinctness and definite precision not always 
 apprehended. 
 
 Whatever passeth away, is the fashion of this world. 
 Whatever is permanently abiding, and always the same, 
 is not the fashion of this world. In so far as our hearts 
 and minds take the character, the stamp or impress, the 
 form or fashion, of what is transitory in this present 
 state of things, we are conformed to this world And 
 in so far as we are in that sense conformed to this world, 
 we are unfitted and disabled for presenting ourselves a 
 sacrifice of praise to God. 
 
 Plainly therefore, in reference to every institution, 
 every pursuit, every work, every pleasure, every com- 
 pany or companionship, of which this world is the 
 scene, the question arises, Is there in it and about it 
 anything, — and, if so, what is there in it and about it, — 
 that is not fleeting and fickle, but lasting and unchanging? 
 Has it, in short, a fashion, — and if so, what fashion has 
 it, — that does not pass away ? 
 
 If it has nothing in it or about it that can fairly be 
 held entitled to that character, — if it has no fashion that 
 does not pass away, — there is no practical difficulty in 
 deciding how you are to deal with it, if you would not 
 be conformed to this world, but would present yourselves 
 a sacrifice, living and holy. 
 
 But there is scarcely anything in this world, not 
 in itself sinful, which can be said to partake exclusively 
 of the fashion which passes away ; scarcely anything 
 which has in it no germ or element of what is abiding^ 
 
NONCONFORMITY. 43 
 
 what is permanent and unchanging. In so far as what 
 you come in contact with in this world has in it any 
 such germ or element, conformity of spirit with it is not 
 forbidden. It is only in so far as its fashion is a fashion 
 which passeth away, that you can apply with reference 
 to it the maxim, "Be not conformed to this world." 
 
 Perhaps I may best illustrate what I mean by taking 
 the particular instances which the Apostle, writing to the 
 Corinthians, specifies, in the passage already quoted. 
 
 He names two social institutions — marriage, and trade 
 or business ; — he names also two social affections, weeping 
 and rejoicing ; — as proper to our social state. He speci- 
 fies those who marry and those who buy ; he specifies 
 also those who rejoice and those who mourn; — and so he 
 suggests a double lesson of nonconformity to the world ; 
 1 . In its institutions ; and 2. In its events. 
 
 1. NONCONFORMITY TO THE WORLD'S INSTITUTIONS. 
 
 Let us, in the first place, take the two social institutions, 
 marriage and commerce. Let us ask what it is, with a 
 special application to them, not to be conformed to this 
 world, in respect of the fashion of this world which 
 passeth away ? " It remaineth that both they who have 
 
 wives be as though they had none, and they who 
 
 buy as though they possessed not/' 
 
 I. Marriage, and the relations of which marriage is 
 the source and centre, are not permanent ordinances of 
 God. They are, when considered in the light of eternity, 
 temporary and provisional arrangements. In heaven 
 
44 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 they " neither marry nor are given in marriage ; neither 
 can they die any more ; for they are equal unto the 
 angels ; and are the children of God, being the children of 
 the resurrection. " And in heaven there will be realized 
 among the redeemed that equal fellowship, superseding 
 all family distinctions, which the Lord Jesus recognised 
 on earth when he stretched forth his hand toward his 
 disciples and said, " Behold my mother and my brethren ; 
 for whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in 
 heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother." 
 
 It might seem, therefore, that marriage, and its atten- 
 dant and accompanying relationships in this world, have 
 stamped upon them essentially the brand of that fashion 
 of this world which passeth away. This world's fleeting 
 fashion is theirs. It is but a little while, and there shall 
 be but one family ; the family of which the Apostle speaks 
 when he says, " I bow the knee to the Father of our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven 
 and earth is named." 
 
 But is there nothing in these relationships, or about 
 them, that will abide, even when the fashion of them 
 passes away? Is there not a living spirit enshrined 
 and embodied in every one of them, which will survive 
 when its mere outward earthly tabernacle is dissolved ? 
 Conformity to that living and abiding spirit is not for- 
 bidden, but only conformity to the passing form or 
 fashion in which, as in a husk, for a season it lives and 
 grows. 
 
 A searching practical question may here be raised and 
 pressed home with a special application to every one of 
 
NONCONFORMITY. 45 
 
 the institutions of domestic and social life — every relation 
 which any one of us occupies, as spouse, parent, child, 
 brother, neighbour, citizen, friend, lover. What, with 
 reference to that particular relation, — what is it for 
 me to be conformed to this world ? 
 
 The answer may be found in the putting of another 
 question — What is it, in that particular relation, that I 
 chiefly regard \ What is it that I have habitually at 
 heart ? Is it what pertains to the form or fashion of it 
 which passes away ? Or is it what breathes, or may 
 breathe, into it a living and, therefore, an abiding spirit? 
 
 Try by this test your walk at home, in your family, 
 among your kinsmen and familiars. You form no alliance 
 or connection that can be called sinful. All your fellow- 
 ships are in themselves lawful and light. And you are 
 faithful, upright, and exemplary in them all. No wilful 
 or customary breaking of any of these ties or relations of 
 private life can be laid to your charge. So far good. 
 But what, after all, is it in these relations that you feel 
 to be congenial? What is there in common between 
 them and you ? 
 
 Is it their adaptation to your mere animal desires and 
 wants, whether of a higher or of a lower sort? Is it 
 their fitness to minister to your bodily or mental con- 
 tentment, and make the time you have to spend in this 
 world pass the more easily and the more pleasantly ? Is 
 it for their convenience to you in your journey of life, 
 their advantageous bearing on your comfort, your credit, 
 your advancement and success, that you use and value 
 them? Or is it for their capacity of being turned to 
 
46 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 far higher and more lasting account that you prize them? 
 Do you, as with a spiritual instinct, seize that in them 
 which can be made available for eternity ; — that which 
 will live and fructify when the fashion of them, with the 
 fashion of this world, passeth away? 
 
 As husbands and wives, are you walking together as 
 heirs of the grace of life, that your prayers may not be 
 hindered ? Are you helpers of one another's faith, hope, 
 love and labour, as well as sharers of one another's joy and 
 grief ? As parents, are you training your children in the 
 Lord ? Are you training them for the Lord ? — not provok- 
 ing them to anger by caprice or passion : not making mere 
 playthings of them, or slaves, or helps and conveniences in 
 your business, or in your idleness, or in your pleasure, or in 
 your sin ; but treating them reasonably, reverentially, affec- 
 tionately, as belonging to the Lord, and placed under your 
 guardianship by the Lord? As children, are you obeying 
 your parents in the Lord, and through obedience to them, 
 exercising yourselves in obedience to the Lord ? As brothers 
 and friends, are you not merely amusing one another, 
 instructing one another, showing kindness to one another; 
 — but praying for one another, praying with one another, 
 seeking the Lord and serving the Lord together ? As 
 masters and servants, are you owning a common Master 
 in heaven, and a common service to him on earth ? And 
 generally, in all the cares and crosses, as well as in ail 
 the endearments, joys and comforts of society and of 
 home, — what tastes are you cultivating by means of 
 them ? What affections are you* cherishing ? What 
 habits are you forming ? Are they tastes, affections, 
 
NONCONFORMITY. 47 
 
 habits of regardless selfishness, as if you had a right to 
 consult for your own ease alone, and to expect that all 
 around you should minister to your pleasure or your 
 peace ? That surely is the fashion of this world. When 
 you use these blessed institutions and arrangements for 
 ends and purposes thus transitory and fleeting, are you 
 not conformed to this world in the using of them ? But on 
 the other hand, are they tastes, affections, habits of an- 
 other kind altogether that you are exercising ? Are they 
 tastes, affections, habits of unselfish, disinterested, gen- 
 erous, and self-denying kindness, — mutual forbearance, — 
 mutual tenderness and truth ? Are they tastes, affections, 
 habits of pure and benign, Christ-like and God-like, 
 charity? These will bear to be transplanted into the 
 soil of heaven. They do not partake of any fashion of 
 this world that passeth away. They will live and thrive 
 in the new heavens and the new earth wherein dwelleth 
 righteousness ; — in the recovered and regained paradise 
 of God ; — where all is light and all is love. 
 
 Thus with reference to the social institutions, the 
 domestic and social relationships of life, represented by 
 marriage, — the origin at once and cement of them all, — 
 and thus only, — we comply with the precept, " Be not 
 conformed to this world ; " not by disparaging or disown- 
 ing them ; not by withdrawing from them and evading 
 them ; but by seeing to it, and making conscience of it, 
 that it is not in what about them is fleeting and transient 
 that we rest with complacenc}^, but in the more abiding 
 good which they may be made to minister to us as pil- 
 grims, declaring plainly that " we seek a country." 
 
48 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 II. So also with reference to the other class of insti- 
 tutions, or operations, specified by the Apostle — those 
 connected with property and the transfer of property, re- 
 presented by the instance of buying — exactly the same 
 principle may be applied. 
 
 We may speak here comprehensively of the whole busi- 
 ness of life ; the transactions of the farm, the counting- 
 house, the market-place, the exchange, the bar, the court, 
 the senate, the camp ; whatever work a man has to do, 
 whatever bargain he has to make, in any lawful calling, 
 any honest trade, any honourable profession, or in the 
 preparation for any of them. These surely are things of 
 which the fashion wholly passeth away, with the passing 
 fashion of this world. What room in heaven for money- 
 changing, for buying and selling, any more than for 
 marrying and giving in marriage ? Is not my strenuous 
 application to such pursuits as these, necessarily, so far as 
 it goes, conformity to this world ? 
 
 Yes, if I contemplate merely what in them and about 
 them is temporary and passeth away ; whether it be the 
 mere pleasure of present occupation and excitement, or the 
 chance of speedy gain ; whether it be the daily pittance 
 that I get for myself and those whom I love, with such 
 weary, drudging toil, or the wealth which I am beginning 
 to accumulate and lay up, or the character for sober in- 
 dustry that I am so steadily maintaining. If these, and 
 such as these, are the considerations connected with my 
 calling, which alone come home to me — which alone have 
 power to touch me, and move me to discontent or to hope 
 — too plainly the point of contact, the bond of sympathy, 
 
NONCONFORMITY. 49 
 
 between them and me, partakes exclusively of that 
 fashion of the world which passeth away. This is to be 
 conformed to the world in these things. 
 
 But I do not mend the matter by ceasing to buy, to 
 sell, to work. While the hands are idle, the heart may 
 all the more be drawn to what is of most fugitive 
 interest in the pursuits and affairs of time. And so on 
 the other hand, attention, diligence, activity, and if you 
 will, ambition, in all the laudable pursuits of busy life, may 
 be entirely compatible with a state of mind quite other- 
 wise fashioned than according to the passing fashion of this 
 world. What binds me to them, what moves me in them, 
 may be no mere delight or complacency in what is mani- 
 festly transitory and fleeting about them, but a view of some- 
 thing, nay, of much, in every one of them, that for myself or 
 for my fellow-mortals may be made available for eternity. 
 
 Art thou condemned to tread the incessant round of 
 never- varying, never-advancing routine ; paying thy 
 day's task for thy day's food ; paying often, not only in 
 the sweat of thy brow, but almost in the blood of thy 
 heart; and getting less than thou wouldst call thy daily 
 bread for what thou payest ? Be n$t conformed to this 
 world. Fasten not, in thy musings, on those incidents of 
 thy hard fate of which the fashion will pass away with 
 the fashion of this world. Grasp, as a Christian man, 
 what, even in thy dreary monotony of thankless toil, 
 may ally thee, and those dear to thee, to eternity and the 
 Eternal ; its lesson of obedience in suffering, of faith 
 hoping against hope, of love not to be quenched even by 
 the waters of despair. 
 
 D 
 
50 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 Art thou chained, like a galley-slave, to thy desk, all 
 the live-long day, and often also through the sleepless 
 hours of the night ? Is thy business anxious, engrossing, 
 uninterruptedly importunate in its demands ? Give thy 
 mind to it, brother ; but be not conformed to this world in 
 it. Only be sure, by God's grace, that what fastens thee to 
 thy work is no mere regard to any fruit of it that must 
 pass away with the fashion of this world, but some sight, 
 such as faith can give thee, of its bearing on eternity, and 
 on thy relation to the Eternal. 
 
 Art thou plunged into the conduct of a hot and bloody 
 war, — immersed in the calculations of an inextricable 
 campaign, — or rushing up the heights to storm the ram- 
 parts of the foe ? Let there be no misgiving, no shrink- 
 ing from thine occupation, dark and bloody as it is. But 
 be not conformed to this world in it. Ask the Lord to 
 give thee his Spirit, that what nerves thee for the strife 
 of death, may be no sympathy with the fierce passions 
 which rage furiously for an hour of battle, and pass away 
 when the stern crisis is over, — nor any mere lust of 
 plunder or of fame, — but some insight into the mind of 
 that great God and Saviour, who maketh the wrath of 
 man to praise him, and who still, in all the march and 
 movements of time, is consulting for the issues of 
 eternity. 
 
 Thus human society, in its mutual relations and in its 
 necessary avocations, is consistent with divine Christi- 
 anity. Thus it is possible for a man to marry and to 
 buy — to be a father or member of a family, and a trader 
 in the business of life — yet not conformed to this world. 
 
NONCONFORMITY. 5 1 
 
 The secret lies in that faith which, wherever it is, and 
 whatever it is doing, looks " not to the things which are 
 seen, but to the things which are not seen ; for the things 
 which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not 
 seen are eternal." 
 
 2. NONCONFORMITY TO THE WORLD'S EVENTS. 
 
 From the institutions of society and the occupations of 
 busy life, — from marriage and merchandise, let us now 
 turn to the events and occasions in the world which cause 
 either weeping or joy; as these two affections are named 
 by the Apostle, — "And they that weep, as though they 
 wept not; and they that rejoice, as though they rejoiced 
 not." 
 
 Now the events and occasions in the world which 
 cause either weeping or rejoicing may be of two kinds; 
 either such as in the providence of God seek and find us ; 
 or such as we, at our discretion, seek and find for our- 
 selves. Let us consider both kinds. 
 
 I. The dealings and dispensations of providence move 
 us to tears or to gladness ; and with reference to them 
 and their effects, the exhortation is to be applied, " Be 
 not conformed to this world." 
 
 And here again the same test as before may be used. 
 Whatever befalls us, whether joyous or grievous, has a 
 double character, a double aspect or bearing. It partakes 
 of the fleeting and shadowy nature of the world whose 
 " fashion passeth away." But it has in it and about it 
 that also which touches eternity, and may be turned to 
 
52 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 account for eternity. After which of these two forms or 
 moulds into which it may be cast is our mind, when we 
 come in contact with it, fashioned ? 
 
 Do we take to what is merely transient and temporary 
 in the occurrence ? Is that the bent and bias of our 
 mind ? Is it exclusively or chiefly in that direction that 
 we find ourselves moved ? Or is it rather in the light of 
 eternity that what has happened presents itself to us ? 
 Is it there, in the light of eternity, that the point of 
 assimilation, if I may so speak, between the event and 
 us, is to be discerned ? Do we, not as by an effort, but as 
 it were instinctively, seize it, and make it our own, on that 
 side of it which looks towards eternity ? That, I would 
 say, is, in reference to that matter, not being conformed to 
 this world. 
 
 You weep, for some calamity has overtaken you. You 
 have lost some cherished comfort, some favourite posses- 
 sion, some beloved friend. You are in poverty, in distress, 
 in pain, in bitter grief. That you are so, does not neces- 
 sarily imply that you are conformed to this world. It 
 did not in the case of Jesus. "Jesus groaned." " Jesus 
 wept." And he surely was not conformed to this world. 
 Nor need you, in your groanings, in your weeping, be so 
 either. 
 
 But your sorrow and its cause are in themselves 
 transitory ; the fashion of them passes away. The 
 calamity presses sore upon you for a season. You feel as 
 if you did well, as if you had a right, to be angry be- 
 cause your pleasant gourd is withered. There is fond 
 complaining, peevish melancholy, wailing lamentation. 
 
NONCONFORMITY. 53 
 
 Gradually, however, your passion expends itself. The 
 trial is over. And you resume your activity as if nothing 
 had been afflicting you. Or, if you do carry with you, as 
 you may ever after, a settled despondency and gloom, it 
 is because to your apprehension there is a fixed dark cloud 
 over your path and your prospects, and the world is be- 
 come to you all dark and dreary. 
 
 Such effects and fruits of your suffering too plainly in- 
 dicate that you are conformed to this world ; that your 
 minds are fashioned according to that fashion of the world 
 which passes away. It is in its aspect towards what is 
 transient and fleeting in time that the suffering affects 
 you, not in its aspect towards what is permanent and un- 
 changing in eternity. 
 
 For if it were so, your grief in your suffering, your con- 
 solation in your grief, and the issue of all the three — your 
 suffering, your grief, your consolation — in a calm and trust- 
 ful peace, would all possess a character harmonizing with 
 the solemn realities of eternity. Your grief would be 
 neither discontent, nor despondency, nor defiance, nor 
 despair, but the humbling of yourselves under the hands of 
 the Eternal God. Your consolation would be neither apathy 
 nor oblivion, but your taking to yourselves the sure and 
 free love of the Eternal Father. And the issue would be 
 the peaceable fruit of righteousness to the praise of the 
 Eternal Father's glory, in the Eternal Son, and by the 
 Eternal Spirit. 
 
 Again, you rejoice. You have good cause to rejoice. 
 You eat your pleasant food. You live in a quiet habita- 
 tion. You dwell among your own people. You have 
 
54 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 quiet nights and comfortable days : loving children, troops 
 of friends. And from time to time events occur to cheer 
 you. Good news reaches you from a far country. Your 
 lost and banished ones are restored to you. Unlooked- 
 for prosperity comes to you. Surely you do well to re- 
 joice for these things, and such things as these : to be 
 grateful, to be cheerful. 
 
 But be not conformed to this world in them. These 
 benefits and blessings partake very largely of the fashion 
 of this world which passes away. And there is a strong 
 tendency in your hearts to rest in them and rejoice in 
 them under that aspect. In their immediate bearing on 
 this transitory scene, they are but too congenial to you. 
 Learn to regard them in another light. View them as 
 fitted to feed and cherish gracious, loving, kindly feelings 
 ■ — benignant and benevolent affections — feelings and 
 affections not tainted with the vice of the world's transi- 
 toriness, but destined and fitted to endure for ever. And 
 above all, unite with your enjoyment of them all, that 
 submission to the will of the Eternal God, which animated 
 the bosom of the Eternal Son when he " rejoiced in the 
 Spirit," and said, " Even so, Father, for so it seemed good 
 in thy sight." They who thus rejoice, in the same Spirit 
 in whom he rejoiced — the babes to whom is revealed 
 what is hid from the wise and prudent — they who echo 
 the Saviour's own words, whether the Lord gives or takes 
 away, " Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in 
 thy sight/' — they assuredly are not conformed to this 
 world in their joy. They enter into the joy of their 
 Lord 
 
NONCONFORMITY. 55 
 
 II. There is another class of events and occasions pro- 
 ductive of weeping or of joy, with reference to which the 
 exhortation is to be applied, — " Be not conformed to this 
 world." These are not such as in the providence of God 
 seek and find us, but such as we, at our discretion, seek 
 and find for ourselves. In regard to them, we have evi- 
 dently much more liberty and power of choice, and there- 
 fore, of course, a much more immediate and direct respon- 
 sibility. 
 
 Our voluntary pursuits and pleasures ; our studies, 
 our relaxations, our amusements ; our places of resort, 
 our companionships and associations ; — these are all to a 
 large extent under our own control. And two questions 
 evidently present themselves here: Are they such as I 
 ought to countenance and frequent at all ? And if so, 
 how am I to use them, if in the using of them I would 
 not be conformed to this world ? 
 
 As to the first question, let it be honestly and fairly 
 met, in the spirit of the Apostle's test or criterion, honestly 
 and fairly understood. And there will be an end of not 
 a little special pleading and partial counsel. 
 
 May I go into a certain company ? May I attend a 
 certain spectacle or show ? May I read a certain kind 
 of literature ? That is the question. In reply, let it be 
 asked — What is the fashion of it ? Is its fashion the 
 passing fashion of this world, and nothing more ? Is it 
 altogether cast into the mould of what is as fleeting and 
 transitory as is the present state of things ? Are the 
 feelings which it moves, the emotions which it calls forth, 
 the impulses which it prompts, the principles which it en- 
 
56 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 forces, such as will pass away with the fashion of this 
 world — the fashion of its lust, the fashion of its sentiment, 
 the fashion of its romance, the fashion of its vain pomp and 
 pride ? Should not that, if it be so, be enough to decide 
 your judgment, and determine your conduct ? On that 
 supposition, is not the line of duty clear ? 
 
 Or, since we are now in the region of what is matter of 
 discretion and voluntary choice, let the determination turn 
 on the influence actually exercised, and the effect actually 
 produced upon yourselves. Does the practice in question 
 tend to move you rather according to the fashion of the 
 world, which passes away, than according to the fashion of 
 the heavenly state, which endures for ever? Are you 
 conscious that when you are engrossed in the gay party, 
 or entranced by the sweet music, or absorbed in the fasci- 
 nating scene, or possessed by the spell of the resistless 
 eloquence or pathos of the book, — there steals over you 
 a disposition to rest with fond complacency on the sha- 
 dows of time, and to recoil from the realities of eternity ; 
 insomuch that when you are interrupted in your grief or 
 joy, or when the exciting cause is over, you have more 
 difficulty than before in adjusting your thoughts and 
 affections for the fellowships of eternity, and more ease 
 than before in squaring them with the conversations of 
 time ? Should not this be enough for you ? 
 
 Judge not others. Judge not by others. Judge not 
 for others. Judge and act for yourselves. And if there 
 be a pursuit or a pleasure which you find from sad ex- 
 perience has a tendency to unfit you for the closet or the 
 sanctuary, to make you weary of the Bible and heartless 
 
NONCONFORMITY. 57 
 
 in secret prayer, to mould you, in short, after the fashion 
 of things seen and temporal, rather than after the fashion 
 of things unseen and eternal, — for your soul's sake, be 
 firm. Let there be no wavering. " Be not conformed 
 to this world/' 
 
 And then, secondly, as to the other question — How, if 
 you do find the pursuit or the pleasure to be one which 
 you may countenance, — how you are to be safe in coun- 
 tenancing it? — let the same principle be scrupulously 
 applied Let it be applied with peculiar delicacy, with 
 peculiar and very sensitive jealousy. For the danger is 
 peculiarly great when you are satisfied that you may, — 
 when you are convinced even that you should, — take a 
 part in studies and occupations and recreations, which 
 have in themselves scarcely anything of the element of 
 heaven's perpetuity ; being of the earth, earthy ; fashioned 
 after the fashion of the world which passeth away. It 
 may be that you are right in what you are doing : that 
 you can do it safely ; that you could scarcely do other- 
 wise. But it can do no harm to suggest, in the first 
 place, that your warrant should be very clear, that your 
 call should be very strong ; and above all, that your con- 
 science should be void of offence in regard to it. What 
 you do with a misgiving ; what you allow yourself with 
 hesitation ; however lawful it may be, is not expedient. 
 Be fully persuaded in your own minds. Then, secondly, 
 go into the scene, or company, or occupation, with prayer 
 and pains ; prayer that God may show you — pains that 
 you may discover — some way of glorifying him in it. 
 Not that you are to do so artificially : as if by a forced 
 
58 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 effort, felt out of place, out of keeping, out of season. If 
 it is only by outraging the proprieties of any meeting, 
 that you can do good, is not that a hint to you to be 
 away from it ? If your Christianity is not at home and 
 at ease in it, surely you had better be elsewhere. But 
 with all simplicity, with the gracefulness and graciousness 
 which singleness of eye bestows, move freely among the 
 elements of time, with a heart still full of eternity. And 
 you will find none of them altogether barren of what 
 may be turned to account for something better than the 
 fashion of this world which passe th away ; — none cf 
 them that may not be made to minister to that habit 
 of obedience which the Apostle John commends, when 
 he says : " The world passeth away, and the lust 
 thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for 
 ever/' This doing of the will of God is not the 
 fashion of this world ; neither is it a fashion that passeth 
 away. 
 
 II.— THE RENEWING OF THE MIND. 
 " Be ye transformed, by the renewing of your mind." — Rom. xii. 2. 
 
 The Christian's sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving is to 
 be himself. It is to be himself living and holy : living, 
 yet not himself living, but Christ living in him : holy, 
 as being a partaker of Christ's holiness. If he is to be in 
 a position to present his body thus, " a living sacrifice, 
 holy," he must not only cast off the fashion of this world; 
 he must assume a fashion of an entirely opposite charac- 
 ter. The negative prohibition, accordingly, " Be not con- 
 
THE RENEWING OF THE MIND. 59 
 
 formed," is followed up by the positive commandment, " Ee 
 ye transformed. " 
 
 This word — transform — occurs elsewhere in the New 
 Testament on two occasions. It is the word used to de- 
 note the Lord's transfiguration (Matt. xvii. 2 ; Mark 
 ix. 2). And it is the word employed by Paul to describe 
 that growing conformity to the likeness of the Lord, 
 which results from the contemplation of his excellency : 
 " We ail, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory 
 of the Lord, are changed" — transformed or transfigured 
 ■ — "into the same image from glory to glory, even as by 
 the Spirit of the Lord" (2 Cor. iii. 18). 
 
 In his transfiguration, the Lord s mortal body was seen 
 invested with the glory in which he is to appear at his 
 second coming. So the Apostle Peter expressly testifies, 
 when he says concerning himself and the other apostles 
 present at that scene, " We were eye-witnesses of his 
 majesty" — the very majesty which is to mark his coming 
 in power (2 Peter i. 16). They saw him then trans- 
 figured, or transformed. But it was only in appearance, 
 and only for a few moments. His real transfiguration, 
 his actual transformation, did not take place till that 
 mortal body of his passed through death, and the resur- 
 rection from the dead, into the heavenly glory. We are 
 to see him thus really transfigured, thus actually trans- 
 formed. And we are to be partakers of the transforma- 
 tion: "For our conversation is in heaven; from whence 
 also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ; who 
 shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned" — 
 formed, figured — " like unto his glorious body, according 
 
60 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all 
 things unto himself" (Phil. iii. 20, 21). 
 
 That transformation is for the life to come. But there 
 is a transformation in the life that now is. This also is a 
 transformation into the image or likeness of the Lord. 
 And therefore it is a transformation into glory, — " from 
 glory to glory." The glory, however, is not what was 
 seen on the mount of transfiguration, but what was seen 
 in the manger at Bethlehem, in the wilderness of Judea, 
 beside the lake of Galilee, along the streets of Jerusalem, 
 in the garden of Gethsemane, and on the cross. Behold- 
 ing that glory we are changed into the same image ; — 
 not suddenly and completely, all at once, as beholding the 
 other glory, we shall be changed into the same image with 
 it, when this corruptible shall put on incorruption, and 
 this mortal shall put on immortality — but by a gradual 
 and ever brightening progress, "from glory to glory." 
 And not as it will be then, without our concurrence and 
 co-operation, is the transformation to be effected, but by 
 means of it. For while in that Second Epistle to the 
 Corinthians it is announced as a natural consequence, or a 
 gracious promise, or both, that beholding the glory of the 
 Lord we are transformed into the same image — here, the 
 matter is put upon the footing of a peremptory command, 
 "Be ye transformed." 
 
 The manner of this transformation is indicated ; it is 
 by "the renewing of your mind." And the end of it 
 also is indicated ; it is " that ye may prove what is that 
 good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God." You are 
 to prove this, as the Lord himself did. You are to be 
 
THE RENEWING OF THE MIND. 61 
 
 changed into his likeness as proving it. For this is his 
 glory in his humiliation, — and it is into his glory in his 
 humiliation, and into that alone, that you are now to be 
 transfigured and transformed, — he " proves what is that 
 good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God." 
 
 For this end there was needed in his case a previous 
 transformation ; a transformation, as to the manner of it, 
 analogous to ours ; not indeed by the renewing of his 
 mind, but by what may be viewed as the type and model 
 of the renewing of our mind, his receiving a new nature 
 and entering into a new state. His transformation, in the 
 sense now indicated, — as being not his ultimate transforma- 
 tion, upon his work being finished, but his preliminary 
 transformation, for the doing of his work, — is his being 
 made of a woman, made under the law. He is trans- 
 formed, when, being the Son of God, he becomes man, in 
 order that in his experience, as a man, he may " prove 
 what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God." 
 " The renewing of our mind," our being born again, our 
 being created anew, is our corresponding transformation. 
 And in our case as in his, the transformation is in order 
 that "we may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and 
 perfect will of God." 
 
 Thus, as to the manner of it, our transformation con- 
 sists in " the renewing of our mind." And as to the end 
 or design of it, it is developed and unfolded, it grows and 
 makes progress, in our " proving what is that good, and 
 acceptable, and perfect will of God." In both of these 
 points of view we are to be transformed into the image of 
 Christ. 
 
62 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 The end of this transformation will afterwards be con- 
 sidered. Let us meanwhile advert to the manner of it. 
 
 The source and essence of the transformation in our 
 case is the renewing of our mind. In the case of Christ, 
 it was his receiving a new nature. He was transformed 
 by becoming man. We are transformed by becoming 
 new men in him. The renewing of our mind, when we 
 become new men, is our being brought to have the same 
 mind which Christ had when he became man. And 
 what mind was that ? Let Christ himself reply, speaking 
 by the mouth of the Psalmist (Ps. xL 7, 8 ; Heb. 
 x. 5), " Then said I, Lo I come ; in the volume of the 
 book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will, my 
 God ; yea, thy law is within my heart." To be renewed 
 in the spirit of our mind, is to have " the same mind in 
 us which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form 
 of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but 
 made himself of no reputation and took upon him the 
 form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men." 
 (Phil. ii. 5-7.) 
 
 "I come, to do thy will, God," is the language 
 of the Saviour, in the very act of taking the new nature, 
 the new position, of a creature and servant. The renew- 
 ing of our mind is, our making that language our own. 
 There is a new nature, there is a new position, in our case 
 also, when we do so. For we are made partakers of the 
 Divine nature ; and we receive the adoption of sons. 
 
 How close the analogy is, how intimate and vital the 
 connection, between Christ's being transformed by a body 
 
THE RENEWING OF THE MIND. 63 
 
 being prepared for him, a new and holy human frame, and 
 our being transformed by the renewing of our mind, — the 
 consideration of a few particular points of resemblance 
 may suffice to show. 
 
 In the first place, the agency is the same — the agency 
 of the Holy Ghost. It is he alone who can make the 
 Son partaker of our human nature, really, — and yet with- 
 out making him to be as fallen man. It is he alone who 
 can make us partakers of the Son's divine nature, really, — 
 and yet without making us to be as God. Born of the 
 Spirit, the Son comes into the world, one with us indeed 
 in nature, yet not involved in our natural vileness. Born 
 again of the same Spirit, we enter into the kingdom of 
 God, one with the Son indeed in nature, yet not exalted 
 or aspiring to his essential majesty. When our human 
 nature and condition was to become his, could this be, 
 without its radical vice becoming his also ? When his 
 divine nature and condition, as the Son, is to become ours, 
 can this be, without its incommunicable sovereignty be- 
 coming ours also ? Could he become what we are, as the 
 fallen children of men, without being a sharer in our 
 apostasy and rebellion ? Can we become what he is, as 
 the beloved Son of God, without being sharers in his 
 everlasting Godhead itself? These are questions to 
 which, in both instances, the fact of the agency of the 
 Holy Ghost furnishes an answer — a satisfactory answer 
 — and it may be confidently said, the only possible 
 answer. 
 
 Thus, on the part of Christ, his supernatural birth, by 
 the power of the Holy Ghost, secures his exemption and 
 
64 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 immunity from all participation in what sinks and de- 
 grades our nature to the level of that which the fallen 
 angels now own. And so also our being supernaturally 
 born of the Spirit, provides for our being partakers of the 
 divine nature of the Son, without intruding into that 
 essential divinity which is indefeasibly the prerogative of 
 the one only God, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. It is 
 the same Spirit who enables the Son to become a servant, 
 as we are, without prejudice to his holy character and 
 high standing as the Son, — who also enables us to become 
 sons, as he is, without any abandonment of our place and 
 position as servants. 
 
 In the second place, these two operations of the Spirit 
 admirably fit into one another : the one effecting that 
 supernatural birth by which the Son becomes a servant ; 
 the other, that supernatural new birth by which the ser- 
 vants become sons. The new creation by which the Son 
 becomes partaker of our human nature, has for its 
 counterpart the new creation by which we become 
 partakers of his divine nature. The one transforma- 
 tion is the cause of the other. It is so, not only as 
 being that without which the other could not have 
 been, but also as being that by means of which the other 
 is wrought. 
 
 But for the Son being transformed into our likeness, 
 we could never have been transformed into his. And it 
 is through our believing, apprehending, laying hold of, 
 and appropriating, his transformation, that we are our- 
 selves transformed. For the transformation, in either case, 
 is a union. His being transformed, is his being united, 
 
THE RENEWING OF THE MIND. 65 
 
 by a new creation, to us. Our being transformed, is our 
 being united, by a new creation, to him. The Spirit 
 makes him one, in his birth, with us. The same Spirit 
 also makes us one, in our new birth, with him. This, in 
 point of fact, is the renewing of our mind. It is our 
 being one with the Son, really and intimately one with 
 the Son, in his entrance, through a new and unprecedented 
 birth, into a state of subjection, as a servant, but still the 
 Son, to the Father. 
 
 In the third place, it is a transformation " by the re- 
 newing of our mind." To the Son himself, his being 
 born of the Spirit brought a new mind. It was a 
 new thing for him to have the mind of a servant ; 
 to be minded, as the Father's servant, to say, — " I 
 come to do thy will, my God; yea, thy law is within 
 my heart." This was to him, the Eternal Son, a new 
 mind. 
 
 And is it not a new mind in us, when we are minded, 
 as sons, to say the same ? Truly this is a great change, 
 a thorough transformation. Naturally, self-will is the 
 ruling principle of our mind. We aspire to a liberty of 
 independence. We would fain be our own masters. 
 " Our lips are our own, who is lord over us ? " " Who 
 is the Almighty that we should serve him ? Or what 
 profit shall we have if we bow down to him % " Insub- 
 ordination to God is the characteristic of fallen man ; the 
 setting of his own will against the will of God. This is 
 that fashion of this world which passeth away. It must 
 pass away. For there is nothing stable, nothing perma- 
 nent in the world, but the will of God. What the 
 E 
 
66 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 creature wills, — what the world wills, — the works it wills 
 to have done, — the customs it wills to have established, 
 — the conventional rules of convenience and expediency 
 it wills to have observed, — can endure but for a season. 
 It is what the will of God ordains that alone can stand. 
 Therefore " be not conformed to this world, but be ye 
 transformed by the renewing of your mind." Be 
 changed into the same image with the Lord, " from 
 glory to glory." For it was his glory as well as his 
 meat to do the will of Him that sent him. There 
 was glory in his saying, " I come to do thy will, 
 my God." 
 
 Finally, in the fourth place, observe the imperative 
 way in which this transformation is enjoined : " Be ye 
 transformed by the renewing of your mind." It is a com- 
 mand addressed to us. And it is rightly so. For the 
 transformation, by the renewing of our mind, is with our 
 own consent. Otherwise it could have no worth or value 
 in the sight of God. It could not really be a renewing 
 of the mind 
 
 The transformation in the case of Christ, when he 
 humbled himself to do the will of God, was voluntary on 
 his part ; he himself consented to it. Otherwise his 
 humiliation, with all his subsequent obedience unto death, 
 could have had no efficacy, either as satisfactory to God 
 or as available for us. Equally voluntary — as thoroughly 
 an act of our own will — must be the transformation on 
 our part. We are not passive, but active, when we are 
 transformed into the same image with the Lord, and say, 
 with renewed minds, entering into his mind, " I come to 
 
THE RENEWING OF THE MIND. 67 
 
 do thy will, O my God." It is true, that in order to our 
 thus acting, we must be acted upon by the Holy Ghost. 
 In that sense we may be said to be passive in our renewal 
 or regeneration, and in that sense only, — that we are 
 acted upon. But we are not acted upon as inert matter, 
 or as an unintelligent living creature, may be acted upon. 
 We are acted upon as being3 who, strictly speaking, 
 never can be passive, whose wills ever are, and ever must 
 be, active. We are so acted upon that our own active 
 consent is ultimately and effectually secured. And there- 
 fore, in entire consistency with the statement of the great 
 fact or doctrine that we are saved by the renewing of 
 the Holy Ghost, the peremptory command is to be urged, 
 " Be ye renewed in the spirit of your mind/' It is by 
 the Spirit of the Lord that we are changed into the same 
 image with the Lord. All the more on that account does 
 the exhortation apply to us, " Be ye transformed by the 
 renewing of your mind ; " — -just as the Apostle puts the 
 matter, with reference to our sanctification, " Work out 
 your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is 
 God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his 
 good pleasure " (Phil. ii. 1 2, 1 3). 
 
 Such is the manner of our transformation. It is by 
 the renewing of our mind ; that renewal being exactly 
 analogous to the new creation that there was when the 
 Eternal Son was transformed into the condition, and took 
 the character, of a servant. 
 
 Two practical applications here suggest themselves as 
 appropriate. 
 
 I. If it be so — if the transformation in us is thus 
 
68 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 like the transformation in Him — let the transforma- 
 tion be complete ; let the renewal be thorough. It 
 was so in the case of Christ. It must be so in our 
 case. 
 
 Let us meditate on the humiliation of our Lord, in the 
 very first act or instance of it, his assuming our nature 
 and condition, being made of a woman, made under the 
 law, with this language on his lips, or rather in his heart, 
 H I come to do thy will, my God." What an unquali- 
 fied surrender of himself ! What a transformation ! 
 What a change ! He who, as the Son, is frdm everlasting 
 the heir of all things — he who claims the homage and 
 obedience of all creation — he whose will is the law of the 
 universe, — becomes the servant of the Father; — subject to 
 him as the holy Lawgiver and righteous Judge; — bound 
 to do his will, whatever to him in that character his will 
 may be ; — consenting, ah ! how willingly, how cordially, 
 how absolutely and without reserve, to do it ! And let 
 us remember, that this transformation, and nothing short 
 of it, is to be the type, and model, and standard of ours. 
 " Be ye " thus " transformed." 
 
 Be ye transformed, by the renewing of your mind, into 
 the attitude and frame of mind in which the Son con- 
 sented so unreservedly to do the will of God. He made 
 himself of no reputation. He emptied himself. Do you 
 also empty yourselves. He laid aside his natural position 
 of equality with God ; he did not eagerly retain it ; 
 when he was willing to take upon himself the form of a 
 servant. Do you lay aside your assumed and usurped 
 position, — alas ! now your natural position, — of seeking 
 
THE RENEWING OF THE MIND. 69 
 
 to be equal with God, presuming to make terms with 
 God, venturing either to set him at defiance, or to think 
 that you may capitulate upon conditions. Grasp not, 
 retain not, a position in your case so impious. Empty 
 yourselves. Empty yourselves of all self-complacency, 
 self-confidence, self-will. Take at once, and out and out, 
 the form of a servant. Say, as Christ the Son says, " I 
 come to do thy will, my God." "Be ye" thus "trans- 
 formed by the renewing of your mind." 
 
 II. That it may be so, — that you may be thus 
 thoroughly transformed into the image of your Lord, — 
 apprehend and appropriate, as available for you, your 
 Lord's transformation into your image, into your likeness. 
 It was for your sakes, it was in your stead and on your 
 behalf, that he humbled himself to become obedient. All 
 the benefit of his being transformed, — from his being the 
 Son only, to his becoming the servant also, — is yours. 
 It is the beginning, it is the essence, of his offering 
 himself for you. Consider it in that light. Behold him 
 thus transformed for you. And be ye, after a corre 
 sponding manner, transformed in him. 
 
 The correspondence, the mutual adaptation, between 
 his being transformed for you, and your being transformed 
 in him, is very gracious, nay, very glorious. The Eter- 
 nal Son, the Father's fellow, becomes one of you, one 
 with you, taking your place under the law of God, to 
 fulfil all its obligations, — nay, to meet all its responsi- 
 bilities and all its threatenings, — in your stead and on 
 your account, as you were bound to do, but could not. 
 All this is implied in his being transformed, by his taking 
 
TO SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 what to him was the new nature of man, and the new 
 position of a servant. Receive him, welcome him, 
 embrace him, cleave to him, be one with him, in this 
 surrender of himself, — this giving of himself up to do the 
 will of God for you. Then will you be transformed by 
 the renewing of your mind. You will find yourselves, 
 being one w T ith him, already surrendered, already given 
 up, to do the will of God in him. You will apprehend 
 your being so. You will consent to your being so. Let 
 Christ, in his being transformed, become yours ; and you 
 are in him yourselves transformed, by the renewing of 
 your mind. 
 
 You are transformed into his position, as he is trans- 
 formed into yours. He becomes a servant for you, con- 
 tinuing still to be the Son. You become sons in him, 
 feeling yourselves now more than ever, — now for the first 
 time, — to be really servants. He, being the Son, comes 
 to do the will of God as a servant. You, being servants, 
 come to do the will of God as sons. You become one 
 with Christ in the filial love and filial submission with 
 which he said — u I come to do thy will, my God." 
 
 III.— PROVING THE WILL OF GOD. 
 
 " That ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will 
 of God." — Rom. xii. 2. 
 
 The believer's transformation, by the renewing of his 
 mind, is not the ultimate end which the Holy Spirit seeks 
 in his regenerating and renovating work. It is the 
 immediate and primary design of that work, in one 
 
PROVING THE WILL OF GOD. 7'1 
 
 sense. We are created anew in Christ Jesus. That new 
 creation is what the Holy Spirit first aims at and effects. 
 But " we are created in Christ Jesus unto good works, 
 which God hath before ordained that we should walk in 
 them " (Eph. ii. 10). The essence of a good work is the 
 doing of the will of God. The proving of the will of 
 God, therefore, is a fitting sequel of our " being trans- 
 formed by the renewing of our mind/' 
 
 Now here, in the first place, let it be noted that the 
 will of God requires to be proved. It can be known 
 only by trial. Its nature and qualities can be discovered 
 and ascertained only by experiment. 
 
 This, it would seem, is a universal law or principle of 
 created intelligence ; a truth applicable to every order of 
 mind in the universe which God has made. No one who 
 is partaker of a finite nature, and who occupies the 
 position of a subject or servant, under the authority of 
 God, — under his law, — can understand what, or of what 
 sort, the will of God is, otherwise than through actual 
 experience. You cannot explain to him beforehand what 
 the will of God is, and what are its attributes or character- 
 istics. He must learn this for himself. And he must 
 learn it experimentally. He must prove, in his own 
 person, and in his own personal history, what is the w r ill 
 of God — " that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of 
 God." 
 
 How it should be so, — why it should be necessary for 
 created beings thus to learn the will of their Creator by 
 reducing it to practice, and impossible for them really to 
 
72 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 apprehend or appreciate it in any other way, — is a 
 question which might open up a field of thought deeply 
 and richly valuable. The nature of God, and the authority 
 of God, — the one, the nature of God, as determining the 
 essence of his will ; the other, the authority of God, as 
 determining the form of it, — would need to be considered. 
 Essentially, the will of God is and must be the expression 
 of his nature. Formally, it is the assertion of his autho- 
 rity. Whatever God wills, he wills in accordance with 
 what he is in himself. He wills it authoritatively, 
 because he reigns supremely. But the nature of God far 
 transcends the comprehension of finite minds ; and there- 
 fore his will, as the expression of his nature, may well 
 be expected to be incomprehensible too. God himself 
 cannot be grasped in the understanding ; and therefore 
 neither can his will. Hence, in its first announcement 
 to the creature, antecedently to experience, the will of 
 the Creator presents itself rather in its formal aspect, as 
 the assertion of his authority, than in its essential char- 
 acter, as the expression of his nature. But in that formal 
 aspect of it, as the assertion of the authority of God, let 
 his will be put to the test of actual trial. Then will its 
 real character, as the expression of his nature, come out. 
 For while neither God himself, nor his will, can be grasped 
 in the speculative understanding, — both he and it can 
 be grasped in the obedient and loving heart. 
 
 But apart from any inquiry into the reason of it, the 
 fact may be assumed to be as it has been stated. And 
 it is a fact pregnant with not a few important doctrinal 
 and practical consequences. 
 
PROVING THE WILL OF GOD. 73 
 
 For one thing, it may be noted, in the second place, 
 this fact, — that the will of God needs thus to be proved, 
 — partly explains the economy of probation. It makes 
 it cease, at all events, to appear very startling or sur- 
 prising that every new order of free and intelligent minds, 
 called into existence by the Creator, should have to stand 
 a trial. Nay more, it tends to show how the trial, in every 
 instance, must be both summary and decisive. It must 
 be summary ; — that it may be ascertained at once, and 
 once for all, whether the authority of God, which his will 
 formally asserts, is to be acknowledged or disowned. 
 And it must be decisive ; — for if his will, as the assertion 
 of his authority, is acknowledged, the way is open for 
 proving it, as the expression of his nature, to be good, 
 and acceptable, and perfect ; — whereas, if, in its form of 
 an assertion of his authority, the will of God is disowned, 
 all opportunity of testing and knowing its real character, 
 as the expression of his nature, is hopelessly and for ever 
 cut off. 
 
 Let actual instances of probation be contemplated in 
 this light. 
 
 I. The probation of the angels is a fact revealed in 
 Scripture, though the manner of it is not fully explained. 
 These bright and blessed spirits had to stand a trial. 
 The will of God was revealed to them in an authoritative 
 form. What precise commandment issued from the eter- 
 nal throne, is not expressly said. It may have been — ■ 
 in all likelihood it was — the command to worship the 
 Son. " When he bringeth in the First-begotten into the 
 
74 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship 
 him" (Heb. i. 6) ; — " Worship him all ye gods" (Ps. 
 xcvii. 7). 
 
 But whatever it was, the will of God, as communi- 
 cated to them, did not beforehand commend itself to 
 them as in itself, in its nature — in the matter or sub- 
 stance of it — good, and acceptable, and perfect. On the 
 contrary, too many of their number took exceptions to 
 it, deemed it unreasonable, if not unrighteous ; unwel- 
 come, if not unfair ; and were on that account offended. 
 Even those who willingly complied, did so most probably 
 very much in the dark. They acted under a just sense 
 of the Almighty Father's sovereignty ; — but certainly 
 with very little apprehension of all the beauty, all the 
 glory, all the joy, to be found in that worship of the 
 Son, which it was the will of God to demand. This they 
 have been learning ever since. This they are learning 
 still. For they have not yet half proved — no, nor 
 throughout eternity will they ever have fully proved — 
 " what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of 
 God;"— that wiU of God the Father that his Son 
 should be worshipped ; — that all created intelligences 
 should "honour the Son even as they honour the 
 Father!" 
 
 Alas ! alas ! for those who missed the first step in this 
 high training of the sons of God. 
 
 II. The probation of man, in the temptation of the 
 first Adam, is more circumstantially recorded than that of 
 the blessed angels. But it is substantially of the same 
 
PROVING THE WILL OF GOD. 7o 
 
 kind. He too was tried upon this very point, — his will- 
 ingness to put the will of God to the proof. 
 
 Without actual trial and proof, the will of God, as it 
 was barely, and without explanation, announced in para- 
 dise, was not such as to command either approbation, or 
 consent, or satisfied acquiescence and rest, on the part cf 
 our first parents. On the contrary, it was capable of 
 being insidiously misrepresented to them, and fatally mis- 
 apprehended by them. The, command, not to eat of the 
 fruit of the tree, — which was to them, as they were then 
 situated, the testing will of God, — did not naturally and 
 obviously commend itself as good, and acceptable, and 
 perfect. 
 
 Doubtless, if they had kept it, they would have proved 
 it to be so. In the first place, they would have found by 
 experience that what God announced to them as his will 
 was really in itself, as the seal of his previous covenant 
 of life, and as the preparation for the unfolding of his 
 higher providence, fair, reasonable, good. Secondly, they 
 would have learned experimentally that it was suited to 
 their case and circumstances ; deserving of their accept- 
 ance ; sure to become more and more well pleasing, as 
 they entered more and more into its spirit, and became 
 more and more thoroughly reconciled to the quiet simpli- 
 city of submission which it fostered. And thirdly, they 
 would have ascertained by time that it was the only sort 
 of formal expression of his will that could consistently up- 
 hold the perfection of the Creator, and ultimately secure 
 the perfection of the creature. For it would have been 
 made clear to them that thus only could the perfection 
 
76 SEPAEATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 of the Creator be vindicated : — the perfection of his 
 character and authority, the perfection of his intolerance 
 of evil, the perfection and completeness of his sovereign 
 right to rule ; and also, that thus only could the per- 
 fection of the creature be wrought out, in an onward and 
 upward path of confidence, loyalty, and love. 
 
 All this, and far more, our first parents would have 
 learned concerning the will of God, if they had consented 
 to prove it. 
 
 But they would not prove it. They formed an opinion 
 of it, they passed judgment upon it, unproved. They 
 refused to give it a fair trial. They chose to make the 
 opposite experiment. And they have left that sad ex- 
 periment, with its issue, as their legacy and inheritance to 
 all the race. 
 
 For how, ever since, have men, left to themselves, been 
 occupied? Not in proving what is that will of God; how 
 good, how acceptable, how perfect ; — but in proving what 
 is the fashion of this world, and how they may be so 
 conformed to it as to make the most of it ; — proving, in 
 short, what is the will of this world, and of this world's 
 god ! (Eph. ii. 2.) 
 
 III. The probation of Christ, the second Adam, the 
 second representative of mankind, proceeds also upon this 
 principle. In consenting to do the will of God, he un- 
 dertook to prove it. 
 
 That will of God, in his case, had little in it at any 
 time that, in the anticipation of it, could be attractive or 
 well-pleasing to him. 
 
PROVING THE WILL OF GOD. 77 
 
 Behold him, the man Christ Jesus, come in the flesh to 
 do the will of God ! 
 
 First, see him in the wilderness, tempted by the Devil. 
 He is there tried as the first Adam was tried. And he 
 is tried upon the same issue, — his willingness to prove 
 the will of God. In his case also, as in Adam's, the will 
 of God which he has to do may be so presented to his 
 human soul as to appear neither reasonable, nor expedi- 
 ent, nor desirable, but the very opposite. In such a light, 
 accordingly, Satan tries to put it before him. The priva- 
 tions and pains ; the shame and obloquy ; the protracted 
 service of toil, and weariness, and blood ; awaiting him 
 in the course he has to finish, if he is to do the will of 
 God ; — all these hard conditions the tempter contrasts 
 with the simpler, brighter, shorter road to glory which he 
 would have him to take. But the second Adam will not, 
 like the first, accept Satan's representation of the will of 
 God. He will prove it for himself. And so he goes on 
 to do. u He ] earns obedience by the things which he 
 suffers" (Heb. v. 8). 
 
 Behold him thus learning obedience ! See him prov- 
 ing the will of God in his own experience ; proving 
 what and of what sort it is to him ; to him, the surety of 
 the guilty ! 
 
 All throughout he needed to prove it. It was only 
 by proving it that he could find it to be good, and ac- 
 ceptable, and perfect. It was not so to him beforehand. 
 It did not so commend itself to him beforehand. He 
 must prove it to be so. 
 
 Look at him as he sits at the well of Samaria. He is 
 
78 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 weary, hungry, faint. To his human frame, what could 
 be more welcome, what more necessary, than repose ; the 
 repose of an hour's solitary meditation, while his disciples 
 are gone into the city to buy bread. The interruption 
 may well be felt to be irksome and vexatious, when the 
 woman comes to draw water ; all the more when, as it 
 appears, he has to deal with the perversity of an unintel- 
 ligent, and apparently impracticable, mind. It may be 
 the will of God that his rest should be thus broken, and 
 that his spirit should be chafed by the necessity of what 
 might seem an unseasonable and unprofitable conversa- 
 tion. Flesh and blood may feel it to be hard. But he 
 proves the will of God in this instance, — to see what it 
 is. He makes trial of it. And in the proving and 
 actual trial of it, he finds it to be good, and acceptable, 
 and perfect. His soul is refreshed by seeing the pleasure 
 of the Lord prospering in his hands. The opening of the 
 woman's understanding, the softening of her heart, her 
 going to bring her countrymen, are his immediate and 
 present reward. This will of God, that might seem at 
 first anything but reasonable or agreeable, turns out to 
 be like a savoury banquet to him. " My meat," he cries, 
 " is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his 
 work." 
 
 Ah ! there was much in that will of God which he had 
 to do on earth that might have made the Holy Jesus 
 shrink back from it at every step. The acute and ten- 
 der sensibilities of his bodily frame, the pure tastes and 
 heavenly affections of his spotless soul, must have re- 
 coiled with poignant and nervous sensitiveness from the 
 
PROVING THE WILL OF GOD. 79 
 
 rude shocks and collisions which the will of God required 
 him to be ever sustaining, as he went on enduring such 
 contradiction of sinners against himself. It must have 
 been, it often was, with him, a struggle — an effort — to do 
 the will of God. It was not easy, it was not pleasant. 
 It was self-denial, self-sacrifice, self-crucifixion through- 
 out. It was repulsive to the highest and holiest instincts 
 of his pure humanity. It laid upon him most oppressive 
 burdens ; it brought him into most distressing scenes ; it 
 involved him in ceaseless, often thankless, toil ; it exposed 
 him to all sorts of uncongenial encounters with evil men 
 and evil angels. But he proved it. And in the proving 
 of it, and as he was proving it, he found it to be good, 
 and acceptable, and perfect. 
 
 Yes ! he was reconciled to the will of God in the doing 
 of it. He tasted the delight of obedience, as " he learned 
 obedience by the things which he suffered/' He " re- 
 joiced in spirit" as he found the work advancing, and the 
 meek, and poor, and guilty, receiving gladly what the 
 rich and righteous cast away. He rejoiced in proving 
 what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of 
 God, when he said, " I thank thee, O Father, Lord of 
 heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things from 
 the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes. 
 Even so, Father ; for so it seemed good in thy sight." 
 
 Need I point to that crowning instance of his willing- 
 ness to prove the will of God, — his unknown agony in 
 the garden of Gethsemane ? What then presented itself 
 to him as the will of God ? The cup to be drunk, — the 
 cross to be borne, — the Father's sword of justice to be 
 
80 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 sheathed in his bosom, — the shame, the sting, the curse 
 of death, — the endurance of the law's awful sentence of 
 condemnation, — the hiding of his Father's countenance 
 from him as he was to be made ski for us. The will of 
 God then, in that garden, wore a dark and terrible aspect 
 before the soul of Jesus ; — witness the bloody sweat, and 
 the cry of bitter anguish, " Father, if it be possible, let 
 this cup pass from me." " Nevertheless," he adds, " not 
 as I will, but as thou wilt." He consents to prove this 
 will of God, all dark and terrible as it is. And he does 
 prove it. And in the very proving of it, he finds it to 
 be good, and acceptable, and perfect. Yes ! In the very 
 proving of it. For does not the penitent's prayer, " Lord, 
 remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom," pour 
 into his spirit some sweet, consoling balm, in the very 
 moment of his utmost pain ; — making him feel that the 
 will of God which he is so fearfully proving, is indeed 
 good, and acceptable, and perfect ; — causing him already 
 to " see of the travail of his soul and be satisfied ? " And 
 is not his latest utterance the expression of that satis- 
 faction, — " Father, into thy hands I commend my 
 spirit?" 
 
 IY. Now it is into this image, — into the image and 
 likeness of Jesus, thus proving what is that good, and 
 acceptable, and perfect will of God, — that you are to be 
 transformed, by the renewing of your mind. This is 
 that glory of the Lord which you are to " behold as in 
 a glass, that you may be changed into the same image, 
 from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord." 
 
PROVING THE WILL OF GOD. 81 
 
 You are to prove for yourselves, as Christ did, " what is 
 that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God." You 
 are to put it fairly to the test. You are honestly to give 
 it a trial 
 
 In the first place, You are to prove for yourselves what 
 is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God, — in 
 what must always be the first act of your obedience ; — 
 your believing on Him whom God has sent. For this is 
 his commandment, " that you should believe on the name 
 of the Lord Jesus Christ." This is his wilL It is de- 
 clared to you authoritatively and peremptorily. And as 
 an assertion of his authority, it binds you to instant com- 
 pliance with it. What this will of God is, as an expres- 
 sion of his nature, you cannot really or fully know until 
 you prove it. How good, and acceptable, and perfect it 
 is, you can find out only experimentally, by actual per- 
 sonal trial. You must " taste and see that God is good, 
 and that the man is blessed that trusteth in him." You 
 must put the gospel to the proof of actual trial. This is 
 the inexorable law of the obedience of faith. 
 
 You would fain have it otherwise. You would fain 
 have all made clear to you ; you would have all made 
 bright and satisfying to you ; you would have a perfect 
 and complete understanding of the whole matter; — before 
 you surrender yourself to the call of the Gospel, and con- 
 sent to be reconciled to your God. Not only so. You 
 stand aloof, and start objections, and raise difficulties. 
 You do not see how this aspect of the gospel system may 
 be compatible with that. You cannot harmonize its 
 sovereignty and its freeness ; the secret decree of election 
 F 
 
82 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 and the open proclamation of mercy. You cannot see 
 how an extreme case such as yours is to be met. You 
 cannot get rid of doubts and misgivings besetting you 
 on every side. 
 
 Nay, but, is it not enough for you that this is the will 
 of God, that you should believe and embrace Christ as 
 your Saviour ? Will you not prove it ? Be very sure 
 that in the proving of it, and not before, all about it will 
 be cleared up, and it will be found by you to be good, 
 and acceptable, and perfect. Try this dipping in the 
 Jordan seven times. It may seem an unlikely mode of 
 cure ; it does not commend itself to you ; you have grave 
 scruples about it. But at anyrate try it. Prove it and 
 see if it will not turn out to be the good, and acceptable, 
 and perfect will of God 
 
 Yes ! You will have cause to exclaim, The saying 
 which I have heard is good. " It is a faithful saying, 
 and worthy of all acceptation, that Jesus Christ came 
 into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief." 
 Yes ! " The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the 
 soul/' "As for God, his way is perfect. The word of the 
 Lord is tried. He is a buckler to all them that trust in 
 him." 
 
 So also, in the next place, all along the path of your 
 new obedience, you are to be proving what is that good, 
 and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. At every step 
 it will be a trial to you ; often a trial most severe. It 
 may be very hard sometimes to believe that the will 
 of God concerning you is good, and acceptable, and per- 
 fect; — very hard even in little matters ; when you have 
 
PKOVING THE WILL OF GOD. 83 
 
 to bear the disappointment of an anticipated pleasure, 
 or to yield your own way to the unreasonable pertinacity 
 of a companion, or to suffer some wrong you may not 
 resent, or to return good for evil, kindness for injury ; — 
 very hard, when you have to forego some indulgence you 
 can scarcely see to be wrong, or to go through some task 
 and toil that seems to be quite unprofitable ; — very hard, 
 when you have to deny yourself, and take up your cross, 
 and brave the frowns of the world, and the estrangement 
 of friends, the ridicule of singularity, the coldness of sus- 
 picion, the imputation of insincerity ; — very hard, when 
 you have to cultivate unwonted tastes and overcome be- 
 setting sins ; — very hard, when you have to endure the 
 loss of all things, to bear suffering, sorrow, bereavement, 
 death. But prove what the will of God is in every such 
 instance ; give it a trial. Make full proof of it. Let it 
 have a fair trial. Accommodate yourselves to the will 
 of God in it. Accommodate yourselves to God him- 
 self in it. Go through with whatever may be the 
 will of God, in whatever circumstances you may be 
 placed. And assuredly you will find, that in the very 
 keeping of his commandments there is a great re- 
 ward. 
 
 The waters of Marah may be bitter. But the Lord 
 shows you a tree, which when you have cast into the 
 waters, they are made sweet. There he makes with you 
 a statute and an ordinance, and there he proves you, and 
 says, — " If thou wilt diligently hearken to the voice of 
 the Lord thy God, and wilt do that which is right in his 
 sight, and will give ear to his commandments, and keep 
 
84 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 all his statutes, I will put none of these diseases upon thee 
 which I have brought upon the Egyptians ; for I am the 
 Lord that healeth thee." 
 
 May not this word sweeten any waters ; — " I am the 
 Lord that healeth thee?" 
 
 Let a brief practical appeal be suffered, upon this whole 
 subject of nonconformity to the world, transformation by 
 the renewing of the mind, and proving what is that good 
 and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. 
 
 I. Mark how opposite to one another are the two 
 habits, or frames of mind, indicated ; the one, in the pro- 
 hibition, "Be not conformed to this world;" and the 
 other in the command, " Be ye transformed by the re- 
 newing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that 
 good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God." 
 
 There are here two types, of one or other of which you 
 must take the fashion : the world — and the will of God. 
 You must either be conformed to the one, — or trans- 
 formed into the proving of the other. The fashion of 
 the world : the fashion of the Divine will : one or other 
 of these you must adopt. To adopt the fashion of the 
 world — to be conformed to the world, is to take things 
 as they are and make the best of them ; to consider what 
 is, and accommodate yourself to what is. The opposite 
 habit is to try things as they should be : to ascertain what 
 ought to be, and put that to the proof. There is all the 
 difference between floating down the current and making 
 head against it ; between acquiescence and resistance ; 
 between a surrender of yourselves to the ungodly spirit 
 
CONCLUSION. 85 
 
 of earth, and an emphatic protest against it, in the name 
 and on behalf of the God of heaven 
 
 II. Mark how complete the transformation by the re- 
 newing of your mind must be, if you are to acquire and 
 cultivate this latter habit ; if, instead of being conformed 
 to this world, you are to prove what is that good, and 
 acceptable, and perfect will of God. For the trial must 
 be a fair one. And in order to its being so, your com- 
 pliance with the will of God must be sincere, willing, 
 cordial. You must make full proof of it. But that you 
 cannot do, if you give merely a grudging, reluctant, and 
 enforced submission. A son, yielding obedience to his 
 father's will in such an ungracious spirit, never will, he 
 never can, become acquainted with its true character and 
 blessedness. But let him throw himself heart and soul 
 into the doing of it. Then, and then only, will he prove 
 it, — of what sort it is. So you must prove the will of 
 God. And to have the mind so to prove it ; — to be 
 willing so to prove it ; — in the way of a cheerful, ready, 
 honest, out and out conformity to it ; — this implies a 
 great change, a new creation, a new heart, the renewing 
 of the mind. 
 
 III. Mark also how, so long as the fashion of this 
 world lasts, and so long as that second transformation 
 which awaits you is postponed, this proving of the will 
 of God must all throughout be more or less an effort ; 
 often an effort both difficult and painful. But take 
 courage. The fashion of this world is not to last always. 
 It passes away. You look for new heavens and a new 
 earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. And you your- 
 
86 SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD: 
 
 selves are to be changed at the coming of the Lord. For 
 " as you have borne the image of the earthy, you are to 
 bear the image of the heavenly/' 
 
 Ah ! well may you long for that coming of the Lord ! 
 — for the time of the restitution of all things ! Then 
 the fashion of that new world, and the fashion of the 
 will of God, will no more be opposed to one another. 
 They coincide ; they are in harmony. The proving of 
 the will of God then, in that world, with body as well as 
 soul renovated and transformed, — your whole nature 
 changed into the image of the heavenly ; — ah ! what a 
 joyous exercise of liberty and love will it be ! No 
 more complaining of " the law in your members war- 
 ring against the law of your mind " — " the flesh lust- 
 ing against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh.' 1 
 No more, — " I would do good ; but evil is present with 
 me." Well may you long for the appearing of the Lord, 
 which is to harmonize all, within and without, in you 
 and around you ; — and to bring about a state of things 
 in which God shall be all in all 
 
 IV. Meanwhile mark the encouragement which you 
 have to struggle on, here and now. Mark in parti- 
 cular one point of contrast between the two types, or 
 fashions, to one or other of which you must be conformed. 
 
 Of the fashion of the world, it may be truly said that 
 the more you try it, the less you find it to be satisfying. 
 It looks well, it looks fair, at first. But who that has 
 lived long has not found it to be vanity at last ? 
 
 It is altogether otherwise with the will of God. That 
 often looks worst at the beginning. It seems hard and 
 
CONCLUSION. 87 
 
 dark. But on. On with you in the proving of it. 
 Prove it patiently, perseveringly, with prayer and pains. 
 And you will get growing clearness, light, enlargement, 
 joy. You will more and more find that " the path of 
 the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and 
 more unto the perfect day." For " Wisdom's ways are 
 ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace." 
 " The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous alto- 
 gether. More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than 
 much fine gold ; sweeter also than honey, and the "honey- 
 comb. Moreover by them is thy servant warned ; and 
 in keeping of them there is great reward." 
 
PART SECOND. 
 
 THE CHRISTIAN IN HIS RELATION TO HIS FELLOW 
 
 CHRISTIANS; THE CHURCH, OR COLLECTIVE 
 
 BODY OF BELIEVERS. 
 
THE BROTHERHOOD OF CHRISTIANS- 
 THE ONE BODY OF CHRIST. 
 
 SELF-ESTIMATION. 
 
 " For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, 
 not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think ; but to think 
 soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith. 
 For as we have many members in one body, and aU members have not the 
 same office ; so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one 
 members one of another." — Rom. xii. 3-5. 
 
 The form of this exhortation to think soberly is re- 
 markable. The Apostle gives it veiy authoritatively. 
 And those to whom it is addressed are singled out in- 
 dividually, one by one, to receive it : "I say, through 
 the grace given to me — to every man that is among you." 
 The Apostle assumes a high tone : " I say, through 
 the grace given unto me/' He speaks as one entitled to 
 issue an order and insist on its being obeyed. He takes 
 his stand upon the grace given unto him. That grace, 
 in his case, reached not merely to his being converted, 
 and united to Christ for his own personal salvation, but 
 
92 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 to his being invested with the apostolic office, and called, 
 as an apostle, to rule in the Church. Thus, elsewhere, 
 he speaks of his having "received grace and apostleship" 
 (Rom. i. 5), and of his being made a minister of the 
 gospel, " according to the gift of the grace of God given 
 unto him, by the effectual working of his power " (Eph. 
 iii. 7 ; see also Rom. xv. 3 5, 16). 
 
 " Through the grace thus given to me," — the grace, or 
 favour, or mere good pleasure of God, to which I owe it 
 that I am myself a believer, and to which I also owe it 
 that I have a commission to speak and act as an apostle, 
 — " I say unto you" 
 
 Evidently this manner of introducing the exhortation 
 which he is about to give, must have a meaning. It 
 indicates the importance which he attaches to it. But it in- 
 dicates, also, that he applies it and takes it home to himself. 
 He would have all the members of the Church to know, 
 each his proper gift or calling, his proper place, his pro- 
 per work ; and he sets the example by showing that he 
 knows this himself. He is not now dealing with 
 Christians generally and indiscriminately, in the mass, 
 considered simply as converted and believing men, 
 having a common character, and lying under a com- 
 mon obligation to give themselves up to God, to 
 separate themselves from the world, to be transformed 
 by the renewing of their minds, to prove what is 
 that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God. He 
 is proceeding to deal with them as associated together 
 in a community or organized body, and to enforce the 
 essential principles and conditions of good order and good 
 
SELF- ESTIMATION. 9 3 
 
 working in such a fellowship. Of these the very first 13, 
 that every member shall fall into his right rank, — as I, the 
 Apostle virtually says, fall into mine when I say, 
 " through the grace given unto me, to every man that is 
 among you, not to think of himself more highly than he 
 ought to think ; but to think soberly, according as God 
 hath dealt to every man the measure of faith." 
 
 I say this " to every man who is among you." For 
 manifestly in this matter every man must judge for him- 
 self. In fact he has to judge himself. He has to form 
 an opinion, to make an estimate, of what he is, what he 
 is fit for, what he is intended for. This he must do in 
 the exercise of his own individual discretion ; and, there- 
 fore, what I have now to say, I say, not to your society 
 as a whole, but to every man who is among you, indi- 
 vidually. 
 
 The exhortation itself, thus authoritatively introduced, 
 and thus individually addressed, is connected with what 
 goes before, as well as with what follows. 
 
 Its connection with what goes before is indicated by 
 the particle " For." It is brought in, apparently, as a 
 reason for your " not being conformed to the world, but 
 transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may 
 prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will 
 of God." It is doubly so. You need to be no longer con- 
 formed to this world, but transformed by the renewing of 
 your mind, because the injunction which I have to give 
 as to your thinking soberly is one which you cannot 
 otherwise obey; — that sobriety of thought which I enjoin, 
 
94 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 being a habit very foreign to the world's way of think- 
 ing, and very characteristic of the new mind. Again, you 
 may well hope and expect, being transformed by the re- 
 newing of your mind, to prove what is that good, and 
 acceptable, and perfect will of God, because the state of 
 mind which I desire you to cultivate is peculiarly favour- 
 able to your doing so; your thinking soberly of your- 
 selves being the best preparation for your practically and 
 experimentally learning the nature and the excellency of 
 the will of God which you have to prove. Thus the 
 exhortation is connected with what goes before. 
 
 Its connection with what follows appears in the fourth 
 and fifth verses. There the duty of thinking soberly is 
 enforced by the consideration of the great law or principle 
 of unity in diversity, which prevails in the Church as the 
 body of Christ ; — " For as we have many members in one 
 body, and all members have not the same office : — so we, 
 being many, are one body in Christ, and every one mem- 
 bers one of another." 
 
 Such being the manner in which the exhortation is 
 introduced, and such the connection in which it stands, a 
 few words may suffice to illustrate its meaning. 
 
 In itself, the Apostle's command or counsel would be 
 very vague and indefinite, but for the concluding clause — 
 " According as God hath dealt to every man the measure 
 of faith." A general advice, to the effect that you should 
 not think too highly of yourselves, but should think 
 soberly, might be very edifying as a commonplace, or trite 
 topic, in morals. It rebukes self-conceit. It commends 
 
SELF-ESTIMATION. 95 
 
 modesty. But as addressed to the members of a body 
 which ought to be intensely active, — it is desirable that 
 it should be made more specific. 
 
 There is a spurious sort of modesty, of a negative or 
 passive character, which hinders combined effort, and 
 paralyzes activity. It takes the form of shyness, bash- 
 fulness, diffidence, reserve. It interprets an admonition 
 of this sort against self-conceit, — a mere general exhorta- 
 tion to think soberly, — as if it were a reason for evading 
 responsibility, — an excuse and apology for indolence or 
 sloth, for indifference or unconcern, for cowardice or 
 treachery. It settles down, under the cover of meek 
 self-distrust, into tame pusillanimity. But all pretence 
 for thus construing the precept is obviated and done 
 away, when there is given, not a negative warning merely, 
 but a positive command : — to think soberly — " according 
 as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith." 
 
 Now the measure of faith, as the phrase is here used, 
 must mean the measure of faith considered as working ; — 
 using the gifts, and employing the talents, conferred by 
 the Great Head of the Church upon its several members. 
 For faith has a double function ; it has two offices to 
 discharge. On the one hand, it is receptive of Christ. 
 On the other hand, it is energetic from Christ and for 
 Christ. When the question of one's acceptance in the 
 sight of God is raised, faith is receiving and resting upon 
 Christ, embracing Christ, coming to Christ, closing with 
 Christ, feeding upon Christ, abiding in Christ, being shut 
 up into Christ, and growing up more and more into 
 Christ. But the question of acceptance being settled, 
 
96 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 and in a sense set aside, another question arises as to 
 what follows and flows from acceptance. And then faith 
 takes the character of an impulse, a power, a principle 
 of activity. As a lost and guilty sinner, I am moved 
 by the Holy Ghost, and under his movement constrained 
 by the sense of my own need, and drawn by the sight of 
 Christ's glorious excellency and gracious suitableness and 
 sufficiency, to receive and welcome him, for the saving of 
 my soul. He is the Saviour of sinners, and, the Lord, 
 the Spirit, enabling me, I take him to be my Saviour. 
 I acquiesce in, I approve of, the whole arrangement ac- 
 cording to which God " sent forth his Son, made of a 
 woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were 
 under the law, that we might receive the adoption of 
 sons." Thus believing, I live in and with Christ: 
 " Christ liveth in me." And now, believing, I live for 
 Christ, and to Christ. " The life which I now live in 
 the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who 
 loved me, and gave himself for me" (Gal. ii. 20). "I 
 live, not unto myself, but unto him who died for me, 
 and rose again" (2 Cor. v. 15). 
 
 Faith makes me one with Christ, as to my personal 
 standing before God. It does so, as the hand laying 
 hold of Christ. Faith makes me, as being one with 
 Christ, a fellow-labourer with him. It does so, as the 
 hand not now withered, but heaJed with his own health, 
 strengthened with his own strength, nerved with his own 
 life, and therefore fitted for working in his name and on 
 his behalf. 
 
 In both of these aspects of it, faith admits of degrees ; 
 
SELF-ESTIMATION. 97 
 
 and we may speak of the measure or degree of faith. 
 There are different degrees, or measures, or proportions of 
 faith, considered as appropriating Christ. There are also 
 different degrees, or measures, or proportions of faith, 
 considered as acting and working for Christ, and with 
 Christ, and in Christ. 
 
 But the measure of faith which the Apostle has in 
 view when he issues the precept to think soberly, can 
 scarcely be understood as having reference to the degree 
 or amount of faith which each man has subjectively in 
 himself. It rather points to an objective standard of faith. 
 
 In this view, the precept is applicable only to that 
 exercise of faith which wields and w T orks the power of 
 Christ, for usefulness in his Church and in the world. It 
 cannot apply to the other act or exercise of faith, which 
 appropriates the grace of Christ for one's own salvation. 
 For, in this last case, there is no thinking of one's self at 
 all ; there is thinking of Christ alone. When I believe 
 on Christ for the pardon of my sin, for my peace with 
 God, for reconciliation and renewal, I go out of myself. 
 I lose myself in him. I am nothing, He is all in all. 
 There is no occasion, therefore, — there is no room, for the 
 adjustment of any measure or proportion of faith here. 
 The object of my faith is without measure. It is the 
 Father's measureless love ; — it is the Son's measureless 
 fulness of grace and truth. To speak of a measure of 
 faith with reference to such an object, as if different sorts 
 of minds were to acquiesce in different proportions of 
 faith, is neither reasonable nor safe. The measure ot 
 faith equally for all alike, — the one standard to which 
 
98 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 all alike should reach, " is the fulness of the blessing of 
 the gospel of Christ/' 
 
 But it is otherwise when faith is summoned to the 
 exercise, not of appropriating Christ for one's own salva- 
 tion, but of working with Christ and for Christ, in the 
 discipline of new obedience, — in the labour of love. 
 Here faith has to deal, not, if I may so speak, with a 
 fixed quantity, the same for all; but with what is variable, 
 and different in different believers. For it has to use 
 the powers, the gifts and endowments, the means, occa- 
 sions, and opportunities, which Christ distributes to every 
 man, severally as he will. 
 
 When, therefore, I am called to this exercise of faith, 
 I must form my judgment as to the measure of it, upon 
 a right estimate of the spiritual capacity or ability which 
 Christ is pleased to bestow upon me. My gift, whatever 
 it may be, is to me the measure of faith. It may be the 
 gift of prophecy, or the gift of ministering, or teaching, 
 or exhorting, or giving, or ruling, or showing mercy. 
 Whatever it may be, let me ascertain the gift that I 
 have, according to the grace of God that is given to me ; 
 and let me " think soberly, according as God hath dealt 
 to me that measure of faith." Such, generally, is the 
 import of the exhortation. 
 
 It is an exhortation which receives its best practical 
 illustration and application in the directory for work in 
 the Church which the Apostle gives in the verses that 
 follow. In the meantime, two brief observations, sug- 
 gested by the place which it occupies in the chapter, may 
 suffice to show its importance. 
 
SELF-ESTIMATION. 99 
 
 In the first place, the relation in which we stand to 
 God, to whom we present ourselves a sacrifice, enforces 
 the admonition, both in its negative and in its positive 
 form. If we present ourselves a sacrifice of praise, on 
 the footing and in the spirit of Christ's presenting of 
 himself a sacrifice of propitiation, we can scarcely be in 
 much danger of thinking more highly of ourselves than 
 we ought to think. We present ourselves, indeed. And 
 in one view that might seem to afford ground for self- 
 complacency. But it is ourselves in Christ, it is Christ 
 in us, that we present. What a death-blow to all in- 
 ordinate self-esteem ! And yet, on the other hand, a fair 
 and sober self-estimate cannot be evaded. If it is our- 
 selves in Christ, — if it is Christ in us, — that we present, 
 we cannot get rid of the obligation and responsibility of 
 ascertaining, or doing our best to ascertain, what it is 
 that we have to present. We must think, soberly, indeed, 
 but still we must think, we must consider, what is fairly 
 implied in our giving ourselves to God as a sacrifice of 
 praise, — what it is precisely that we have to give. For 
 this end, we must know ourselves. In a high and holy 
 sense, for a high and holy purpose, we must seek to 
 attain to this sober self-knowledge. 
 
 And, secondly, the relation in which we stand to one 
 another, in consequence of our presenting our bodies a 
 living and holy sacrifice to God, precludes all undue 
 magnifying of ourselves, in rivalry with one another. 
 In presenting our bodies, we present ourselves jointly as 
 well as severally — we collectively present ourselves as 
 
100 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 the one mystical body of Christ. In such an act, there 
 is no room for anything like our having separate interests, 
 or advancing antagonist claims to superiority. Nor is 
 there room for anything like our shrinking from the 
 recognition of what is to every one of us the measure of 
 faith. The gifts severally bestowed on us by the sove- 
 reign grace of our common Head, are for our mutual 
 edification in Christ, and our unitedly growing up to the 
 measure of the stature of perfect manhood in him. They 
 are not, therefore, the ministers of strife and vain-glory ; 
 although they may afford fitting occasions for our " con- 
 sidering one another, to provoke unto love and to good 
 works." For we must ever remember, as a motive at 
 once to humility, to charity, and to activity, that " as we 
 have many members in one body, and all members have 
 not the same office ; so we, being many, are one body in 
 Christ, and every one members one of another." We 
 must needs, therefore, in the view of our being all 
 members of one body, and members of one another in 
 that one body, — if the body is to thrive well and work 
 usefully, — ascertain our several faculties and functions, 
 and take our several offices accordingly ; none of us think- 
 ing more highly of himself than he ought to think ; every 
 one of us thinking soberly, according as God hath dealt 
 to him the measure of faith. Otherwise there must 
 ensue disorder and disunion, — and ultimately, if grace 
 prevent not, the dissolution of the body. 
 
DIVERSITY OF GIFTS AND OFFICES. 101 
 
 II. 
 
 DIVERSITY OF GIFTS AND OFFICES. 
 
 " Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, whether 
 prophecy, let us prophesy," kc. &c. — Rom. xii. 6. 
 
 Let us use our several gifts in their appropriate offices. 
 Such, in a general sense, is the import of the Apostle's 
 words in the sixth and two following verses, whether we 
 understand him as giving a description or as issuing an 
 order. For there is room for doubt. The italics used in 
 our translation show that the imperative mood, or form of 
 command, into which the discourse is here thrown, has not 
 the express warrant of the original. In fact, this whole 
 passage, down to the thirteenth verse, might be viewed 
 as descriptive, rather than hortator}^ ; forming a con- 
 tinuation or enlargement of the brief picture given in the 
 fourth and fifth verses. 
 
 The Christian society or congregation is represented 
 as one body, with many limbs or members, discharging 
 different offices or functions. The figure is expanded 
 and applied. The diversity is first illustrated, and then 
 the unity : " We, being many, are one body in Christ, 
 and every one members one of another ; but having gifts 
 differing according to the grace that is given to us ; such 
 as either the gift of prophecy, for our prophesying accord- 
 
102 Christians one body in chkist. 
 
 ing to the proportion of faith ; or the gift of ministering 
 or serving, for service ; the teaching brother occupied in 
 his vocation of teaching, the exhorting brother in his 
 vocation of exhortation ; he who gives, doing so in sim- 
 plicity ; he who rules or presides, using diligence ; he who 
 shows mercy, being cheerful." We are members one of 
 another, having thus different gifts and offices ; and yet 
 really all one ; of one mind and of one heart : " our love 
 unfeigned ; all alike abhorring evil and cleaving to good ; 
 kindly affectioned one to another with brotherly love ; in 
 honour preferring one another ; not slothful in business ; 
 fervent in spirit ; serving the Lord ; rejoicing in hope ; 
 patient in tribulation ; continuing instant in prayer ; dis- 
 tributing to the necessity of saints ; given to hospitality." 
 
 The difference is not material between such a render- 
 ing of the passage and that preferred by our translators. 
 Whether it be the descriptive or the imperative form 
 that is adopted is of little consequence. What was true, 
 as a matter of fact, of the early Christians ; of those, for 
 example, who after the day of Pentecost lived together 
 so harmoniously and so holily in Jerusalem ; — is binding 
 as a matter of obligation on all societies gathered into 
 one in the name of Jesus. The diversities among the 
 members are to be observed, and turned to account; 
 while the essential principles of the unity are to be 
 sacredly fostered. 
 
 It is with the diversities, as indicated in the sixth 
 and two following verses, that we are now, in the first 
 instance, specially concerned. 
 
 There are several different works specified. They are 
 
DIVERSITY OF GIFTS AND OFFICES. 103 
 
 all of them necessary works in the Church of Christ ;— 
 in every branch and in every section of it. They must 
 all be done, if there are to be health and vigour, life and 
 energy, in the Christian body. No society or congregation, 
 formed and organized in the name of Christ, can be com- 
 plete, unless it has in it the means, the agency, the instru- 
 mentality, for doing all these works. There must be 
 found among its members persons fitted, qualified, and 
 inclined, to do them. 
 
 This implies, however, a division of the labour, and an 
 orderly distribution of it. For the works differ widely 
 from one another in their character, and in the kind of 
 qualification required for the doing of them. And in 
 regard to every one of them, whatever the qualification 
 may be that is required, it is the gift of the Lord. 
 
 The division of the labour, therefore, the distribution 
 of the works among the members of the body, belongs 
 properly to the Lord alone. It is his grace — free, sove- 
 reign, and discretionary, — which imparts, as a gift, to 
 any one, the qualification needed for any work. And 
 whatever qualification any one has got, for whatever 
 work, it must be understood to be the mind of the Lord 
 that he should undertake that work. It is the work 
 assigned to him. It belongs to him. It becomes his 
 proper function, his office. Therefore says the Apostle, 
 " Having gifts, differing according to the grace that is 
 given to us," let us be about the several works for which 
 our several gift3 are bestowed. 
 
 This rule applies, this exhortation is addressed, to all 
 the members of the body ; to all alike and indiscriminately, 
 
104 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 and to every one in particular. It is not intended for 
 officials, as such. It does not concern any one class in a 
 Christian community more than another ; the man more 
 than the woman; the scholar more than the peasant ; 
 the eloquent and elegant orator more than him who is 
 slow of speech and of feeble presence ; the rich and in- 
 fluential more than the humble poor. The call is to one 
 and all of you, to stir up the gift that is in you, whatever 
 that gift may be. 
 
 For this end you must first ascertain what gift you 
 have, and within what sphere it may be best exercised. 
 And then, secondly, you must make conscience of occupy- 
 ing the place, and doing the work, whatever it may be, 
 which the gift points oat as yours. 
 
 I. The gift which you have, according to the grace 
 that is given to you, is the index of the function or office 
 which He who bestows it would have you to undertake. 
 How important, therefore, how indispensable is it, that 
 you know what the gift is ! 
 
 And here, you are required to be very faithful. You 
 are to be very jealous over yourselves ; and very con- 
 scientious as regards Him whose servants and stewards 
 you are ; " not thinking of yourselves more highly than 
 you ought to think/' as regards your gifts ; but yet 
 " thinking soberly" and seriously; forming a just estimate 
 of what you are and what you can do, " according as 
 God hath dealt to every one of you the measure of faith/' 
 or " according to the grace that is given unto you." 
 
 Observe particularly what sort of gift is here meant. 
 
DIVERSITY OF GIFTS AND OFFICES. 105 
 
 It is the gift which you have for the Church's work. 
 There are gifts of another kind which you must possess, 
 and ascertain that you possess : — gifts, the possession 
 of which must be admitted to be even of prior urgency 
 and necessity, in comparison with this gift of which I 
 now speak. 
 
 Thus, in the first place, there is the gift whereby you 
 are enabled to believe to the saving of your own souls. 
 For "by grace are ye saved through faith ; and that not 
 of yourselves, it is the gift of God/' The question about 
 your possessing that gift must always be first and para- 
 mount with you. The inquiry, " What must I do to be 
 saved ? " can never, at any time, be evaded or postponed. 
 Always, and above all things else, let it be your chief 
 concern to have the answer to that inquiry fulfilled in 
 your experience and consciousness; — " Believe on the Lord 
 Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." 
 
 To receive the gift of saving faith : to be ever freshly 
 and anew receiving it : to have grace given you to lay 
 hold of Christ, to keep hold of Christ, to recover hold of 
 Christ : to have the Holy Spirit ever shutting you up 
 into Christ : to have an assured confidence that he, the 
 only and all-sufficient Saviour, saves you the chief of 
 sinners : that he firmly holds you : that none is able to 
 pluck you out of his hands : — that is the gift to which 
 you must ever give your first and most earnest heed. 
 
 Again, secondly, there is the gift whereby you are 
 enabled to " grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our 
 Lord Jesus Christ." Your progressive personal sanctifi- 
 cation is the gift of God. Faith working by love, faith 
 
106 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 purifying the heart, faith overcoming the world, is as 
 much the gift of God as faith apprehending and appro- 
 priating pardon, peace, righteousness, and the love of 
 God in Christ Jesus your Lord. About your receiving 
 and possessing this gift also, you are ever to be above 
 all things anxious. You are to " work out your own 
 salvation with fear and trembling, because it is God who 
 worketh in you both to will and to do." You are to 
 " give diligence to make your calling and election sure." 
 You are to give earnest heed that " the God of peace, 
 who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus Christ, 
 that great Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of 
 the everlasting covenant, may make you perfect in every 
 good work to do his will ; working in you that which is 
 well-pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom 
 be glory for ever and ever, Amen." 
 
 Once more, in the third place, there is the gift whereby 
 you are enabled to behave yourselves wisely in a perfect 
 way : to keep yourselves unspotted from the world : to 
 guide your affairs with discretion : to steer a safe, prudent, 
 consistent, and honourable course, through the manifold 
 temptations and snares of ordinary social life : amid the 
 entanglements of business, the allurements of pleasure, 
 the worrying, petty cares and irksome provocations of 
 your common household drudgery and routine. It is a 
 gift, and a great gift, to have your minds rightly exer- 
 cised amid these distracting and disturbing influences, in 
 patience, meekness, charity : tempering zeal with know- 
 ledge ; decision with sympathy ; opposition to sin with 
 kindness to sinners ; being wise as serpents and harmless 
 
DIVERSITY OF GIFTS AND OFFICES. 107 
 
 as doves. You do well to seek and covet, to prize and 
 cultivate, this most excellent gift, that you may put on 
 " the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which in the 
 sight of God is of great price." 
 
 But, in the fourth place, the gift to which Paul here 
 refers is something different from all these : it is some- 
 thing to be superadded, over and above them all. It is 
 the qualification or endowment, whatever it may be, 
 that fits you for taking a part, and being useful, in 
 one or other of the Church's proper works. What 
 these are, will be considered presently. In tne mean- 
 time it is enough to say that they are works im- 
 plying direct personal exertion and sacrifice in the 
 line of Christian usefulness. They are essays or efforts 
 to do good. 
 
 Have }^ou a gift for any of these works ? For which 
 of them is it that you have a gift ? Is there any depart- 
 ment of the Church's business, whether connected with 
 her own edification or with the discharge of her duty as 
 Christ's witness in the world and Christ's missionary to 
 the world, for which you have a taste — a turn — a faculty ? 
 
 Have you considered such questions as these, seriously, 
 soberly? Have you put them to your own conscience? 
 Have you put them conscientiously to your God ? Or 
 do you think it enough if you taks heed to yourselves, 
 to your own interest in Christ, tLo sanctifying of your 
 own hearts, and your safe preservation from the evil 
 that is in the world ? 
 
 It is as much as you can do, you say, to look after the 
 welfare of your own souls. As to your being expected to 
 
108 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 take an active share in managing the affairs of the Church, 
 or to offer yourselves as agents in the carrying out of her 
 plans — it is not your province, it is not what you are 
 cut out for. You leave all that to others who have the 
 time, the talent, the inclination. For yourselves, it is 
 enough if, in your own poor way, you are enabled, in 
 such a world as you have to live in, to mind the things 
 which belong to your peace, and give no occasion to the 
 enemy to speak reproachfully. 
 
 But think for a moment, before you acquiesce in such 
 a timid policy, or make a merit of such false modesty as 
 that. Consider first your position, as members of a body 
 organized for work. What right have you, as one of a 
 band of brothers, to decline your share of the business 
 for the transacting of which the brotherhood exists ? 
 Consider next the account which you have to give of 
 every talent your Lord bestows. You may hide your 
 one talent in a napkin. Will you venture, with the 
 hidden talent in your hand, to meet your Lord? Con- 
 sider, again, the wrong that you do to Him whose gift you 
 refuse to stir up. Your capacity, your opportunity, what- 
 ever it may be, is the gift of God — of the Lord the Spirit. 
 It is not your own power or ability that you are trifling 
 with, but the gift of God. And once more, consider the 
 wrong which you dc to yourselves. You hinder your 
 own souls from prospering ; for it is mere idle folly to 
 imagine that your own faith, and hope, and love, can be 
 strong and healthy, while the common weal, and the 
 common woe, and the common work, are disregarded. 
 The arm cannot thrive, let it be held ever so devoutly 
 
DIVERSITY OF GIFTS AND OFFICES. 109 
 
 high, that refuses to do its office in the body; it shrinks, 
 and shrivels, and dies. You miss also a great recompense 
 of reward. You deny yourself a present pleasure. You 
 run the risk of coming short of much glory in that day 
 when " they that are wise shall shine as the brightness 
 of the firmament ; and they that turn many to righteous- 
 ness as the stars for ever and ever." 
 
 And be not in haste to conclude that you have no 
 gift, or scarcely any, that may be available for the 
 Church's work, — or rather for the work of the Church's 
 Lord. Every one has something in his power ; and if 
 he will but begin to try, he will discover that he can do 
 a good deal more than he thought. Every one, if once 
 he sets himself seriously to look out for business of this 
 sort, will find his proper business laid to his hand. 
 
 Only let him not go in search of it to the ends of the 
 earth. Let him not fancy that the gift which he has, 
 according to the grace that is given to him, is a gift 
 which he could exercise in some other sphere than that 
 which he now occupies. Look not abroad, look not 
 above, for the office you ought to fill, and the function 
 you ought to discharge. Look at home : look at your 
 own very door. Look within. Form a just and sober 
 estimate of yourselves as you now are, and your position 
 as it now is, " according to the grace that is" now " given 
 to you." 
 
 Is there nothing that, — being what you now are, by 
 the mercy of God, and placed where you now are, in 
 the providence of God, — you can now be doing for his 
 beloved Son, your beloved Lord, of whose living body 
 
110 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 you are called to be the living members ? Is there 
 nothing the Lord would have you to do for him ? Is 
 there no walk of Christian usefulness inviting you to 
 enter on it ? Is there no department of Christian charity 
 waiting for you to undertake it ? Is there no vacant 
 place for you among any of the regiments of Christ's 
 army that go to fight against ignorance, and ungodliness, 
 and crime, and disease, and misery, and death ? Oh ! 
 surely, if only you are willing to use any gift, however 
 poor, in any sphere, however low ; if — all false pride, 
 false shame, false delicacy, false modesty and humility 
 apart — you are ready, whatsoever your hand findeth to 
 do, to do it with your might ; — " not thinking of yourself 
 more highly than you ought to think, but thinking 
 soberly, according as God has given to you the measure 
 of faith;" — you will not be long at a loss to know what 
 is your gift, what your calling, what your office, what 
 your work : not at least if yours is the experience, if 
 yours is the heart of him, the deeply abased and graciously 
 revived prophet of the Lord, who heard a voice saying, 
 " Whom shall I send, and who will go for us ? " and 
 lost not a moment in sending heavenwards the un- 
 reserved and unambitious and unconditional reply, " Here 
 am I, send me." 
 
 II. But this is not all. Not only must you thus 
 ascertain the gift which you have, and the work to which 
 it points, — you are also to make conscience of the work, 
 as being your work. It is your business ; it is your 
 office. Whatever you undertake, you are to make con- 
 
DIVERSITY OF GIFTS AND OFFICES. Ill 
 
 ecience of undertaking it, with as deep a feeling of obli- 
 gation and responsibility, as if you were solemnly ordained 
 to it by the laying on of hands. This is plainly implied 
 in what the Apostle says : " Having then gifts differing 
 according to the grace that is given unto us," let us take 
 our several places, let us assume our several offices, let us 
 discharge our several functions, accordingly. 
 
 In this view, most truly and emphatically, all the 
 members of Christ's Church are office-bearers. All be- 
 longing to the communion of any Christian society are 
 virtually and really office-bearers in that society. You, 
 my friend, whoever you are, who come to worship with 
 us from Sabbath to Sabbath, — you who sit with us at 
 the table of the Lord, — you become one of us ; a mem- 
 ber of our body : and for accomplishing the ends and ful- 
 filling the purposes of its organization, the body has a 
 right, the Lord who made the body and is its head has a 
 right, to the services of every member. 
 
 What, then, is your gift, Brother ? What can you do, 
 as one of us, for advancing our common cause, — the cause 
 of our common Lord ? What will you become ? To 
 which of our different staffs of labourers will you join 
 yourself ? Which of our various plans of usefulness will 
 you patronize ? Will you be a teacher of the young on 
 the Sabbath? or a week-day visitor from house to house % 
 or a collector of two or three together for prayer ? A 
 fighter ? or a holder up of the hands of those who fight ? 
 An active agent in the field ? or, if so the Lord will, a 
 sympathizing sufferer, looking on from a sick-bed and 
 interceding for a blessing ? Use your discretion. Make 
 
112 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 vour election. Judge for vourself what is your calling. 
 Only be something. Undertake something. You must 
 have an office ; the office that best suits your gift : but 
 an office of some sort you must have. 
 
 And you must regard it as an office. You must make 
 conscience of so regarding it. You must go about it with 
 the same preparation, the same punctuality, the same 
 prayerfulness, that you would feel to be incumbent upon 
 you, if the gift that is in you had been given you " by 
 prophecy with the laying on of the hands of the presby- 
 tery" (1 Tim. iv. 14). Beware of the notion which is 
 apt to insinuate itself into the minds of some workers in 
 the Lord's cause, that because the task or duty you have 
 got on hand is one which you assume spontaneously, and 
 discharge gratuitously, therefore you may take it, some- 
 times, somewhat more easily than you would consider 
 yourselves entitled to do, if it were the life-business to 
 -which you had been set apart by a special call, and for 
 which you received stipend, wages, or pay. True, you 
 offer yourselves willingly at first for the service ; it is of 
 your own mere good pleasure ; and it is of your own 
 good pleasure that you continue to render the service. 
 But while in the service, you are to regard yourselves 
 as ordained to it, and bound to it : ordained to it as 
 solemnly as I am ordained to the ministry of the word 
 and the cure of souls ; bound to it as sacredly as the 
 enlisted recruit is bound to his Queen's and his country's 
 work of arms when he has sworn the military oath. 
 
 The Lord, the King, delights in volunteers. His 
 people are to be all volunteers in the day of his power. 
 
DIVERSITY OF GIFTS AND OFFICES. 1 1 3 
 
 He holds out a flag of invitation for volunteers. Who 
 is on the Lord's side — who ? Who will go up to the 
 battle ? Whom shall I send on my errand ? Choose 
 your rank, take your place, anywhere you please, so as 
 only it be where you have some work to do that you may 
 fairly think the Spirit has given you ability to do. And 
 once in your place, remember that you are there by ap- 
 pointment of the Holy Ghost. For it is " according to the 
 grace given to you" that you have the gift which you are 
 now called to use. Use it faithfully, in prayer, persever- 
 ance, patience. Stir up the gift that is in you. It is 
 the gift of God. 
 
 li 
 
1 J 4 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 III. 
 
 DISTRIBUTION OF OFFICES AND WORKS. 
 
 " Whether prophecy, let us prophesy according to the proportion of faith ; 01 
 ministry, let us wait on our ministering : or he that teacheth, on teaching ; 
 or he that exhorteth, on exhortation : he that giveth, let him do it with sim- 
 plicity ; he that ruleth, with diligence ; he that showeth mercy, with cheer- 
 fulness." — Rom. xii. 6-8. 
 
 The general principle upon which the distribution of the 
 Church's necessary works among the members is to pro- 
 ceed, is, that every man, " not thinking of himself more 
 highly than he ought to think, but thinking soberly, ac- 
 cording as God hath dealt to every man the measure of 
 faith," should form an estimate of the gift, whatever it 
 may be, which he has received, " according to the grace 
 that is given to him," and should take the place, and 
 hold himself responsible for the service, for which his 
 gift may seem best to qualify him. In illustration of 
 this general principle, and with a view to its application, 
 the Apostle enters somewhat into detail. 
 
 The works to be undertaken are enumerated. They 
 are seven. They may be miscellaneous specimens merely, 
 strung together at random ; or they may be exhaustive 
 heads, embracing the classes to which all Christian enter- 
 prises and movements may ultimately be reduced. This 
 last is the more probable view. 
 
DISTRIBUTION OF OFFICES AND WORKS. 115 
 
 For one thing, the bringing together of the first two 
 of these seven works is remarkable. The second is un- 
 like the first. Ministry differs from prophecy. And it 
 comes in between the first, — prophecy, — and the third and 
 fourth, — teaching and exhorting, — which are congenial 
 to the first. The fifth, sixth, and seventh, again, — ruling, 
 giving, showing mercy, — are evidently more akin to the 
 second, — ministry, than to the first, — prophecy. They 
 partake of the nature of a ministry or service, more than 
 of the nature of prophesying. 
 
 No doubt all the functions mentioned after the second 
 may fall under the general category of ministering, or 
 serving ; for to teach, or to exhort, is a ministry, or ser- 
 vice, in the Christian Church, in which there are no lords 
 over men's consciences ; — in which even Apostles must 
 say, " We preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the 
 Lord, and ourselves, your servants, for Jesus' sake/' But 
 then, for the same reason, prophesying also must come 
 under the head of ministering, or serving. 
 
 On the whole, it seems to be the most natural conclu- 
 sion as to this enumeration, that here, as elsewhere 
 (1 Cor. xii. 4), Paul adopts an orderly arrangement, and, 
 in particular, that he puts first his general heads, and 
 then brings in the particulars into which they respec- 
 tively branch out. 
 
 The works, then, are twofold ; prophesying and minis- 
 tering ; prophetical and diaconal. And both of them 
 admit of expansion or sub-division. Prophesying includes 
 teaching and exhorting. Ministering includes giving, 
 ruling, and showing mercy. 
 
116 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 T. There is a grand general division. To prophesy, to 
 minister ; these are the two great functions of the 
 Church of Christ on earth, of all its branches, and of all 
 its members. 
 
 They were the two great functions of her Head when 
 he was on earth. He prophesied. He ministered. He 
 prophesied ; not merely in the sense of foretelling future 
 events, but in the sense of revealing the whole counsel of 
 God. He ministered ; for " the Son of man came not to 
 be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life 
 a ransom for many." He was a prophet, opening up and 
 unfolding the heart of God. He was a deacon, minis- 
 tering to the service of man. 
 
 His Church is like himself. It is, in fact, himself. It 
 has the same double office that he has. It prophesies, 
 and it ministers. It is at once a seer and a servant ; 
 God's seer and man's servant. It is God's seer, as hav- 
 ing, by revelation, an insight into the mind of God, and, 
 by express authority, a commission to declare that mind. 
 It is man's servant, as ordained for his good, appointed to be 
 the instrument, the means and minister of his salvation. 
 
 For both of these offices the Church, which is Christ's 
 body, needs and calls for the agency of her members. 
 Whatever gifts they have, according to the grace that is 
 given to them, they are to bring to the Church's help, or 
 rather to the help of her Lord against the mighty, under 
 one or other of these two departments of labour, pro- 
 phesying or ministering. 
 
 Even the extraordinary and miraculous endowments of 
 apostolic times fell under these two heads. The most 
 
DISTRIBUTION OF OFFICES AND WORKS. 1 1 7 
 
 gifted man was either a prophet, having in greater or less 
 perfection the faculty of understanding God, and helping 
 others to understand God ; or else he was a minister, ser- 
 vant, deacon, dispensing manifold relief and comfort, to 
 meet the manifold wants and woes of suffering men. 
 
 AU the supernatural manifestations of wisdom and 
 power in the early Church might be thus classed. The 
 highest inspiration, by which men spoke and wrote as 
 the oracles of God, and the gift of tongues, by which 
 men found access to their fellows of all nations ; — the 
 faculty of supernatural insight, and the faculty of super- 
 natural utterance ; — belonged to the function of prophesy- 
 ing. The miraculous healing of the sick, the raising of 
 the dead, the casting out of devils, were acts of ministry 
 or service. They were the extraordinary signs and 
 tokens of the honour of the deaconship. 
 
 And so still, — whatever gifts we severally have, as 
 members of Christ and of his Church, we may exercise 
 in one or other of these two ways. Does our gift lie in the 
 direction of insight or of utterance? Is it spiritual dis- 
 cernment, or enlargement and liberty of speech ? Is 
 either of these attainments our forte, if I may so call 
 it, or our faculty? Then our call is to prophesying. 
 But failing that, we have another resource. " Whether 
 prophecy, let us prophesy;" — or if " ministry," rather 
 than prophecy, be our function, for which we are fitted, 
 let us be content and thankful to have it so ; " let us 
 wait on our ministering." 
 
 II. Under this general division of all the Church's 
 
118 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 work into the two great heads of prophesying and minis- 
 tering, there are particulars specified. 
 
 1. Thus belonging to prophecy, we have teaching and 
 exhorting. If you cannot prophesy, in the highest sense 
 of that term; — which we may now, in the absence of 
 miraculous endowments, be warranted in applying to the 
 preaching of the word ; — if you have not the leisure, the 
 learning, the cultivated talent and fluency of speech, the 
 sanctified genius and eloquence, which — instead of inspira- 
 tion and the gift of tongues — might qualify you for being 
 a prophet of the Lord, a herald of the cross ; — you may 
 yet have it in your power to do something in that line. 
 
 You may be apt to " teach/' You may have a facility 
 in so dealing with the understandings of men or of chil- 
 dren, as to get them to open to the apprehension of the 
 truth. With no pretension to the gift of discovering new 
 truth, or even to the gift of presenting old truth in a new 
 light, and enforcing it with new strength, — you may be 
 skilful in carefully breaking up the truth, and affection- 
 ately training the raw and rude intellect for its reception. 
 
 Or you may have a power of direct appeal to the 
 conscience and the heart. Yours may be the gift which 
 many prophets and preachers have coveted in vain, and 
 in which many plain and simple believers have excelled, 
 — the gift of speakiDg right home to the convictions 
 and feelings of your neighbours. 
 
 To "exhort;" — to warn, entreat, invite; to use all the 
 weapons of direct, straight-forward expostulation and per- 
 suasion ; to tell a neighbour in a kindly way, that as a 
 fellow-sinner he is lost, as you were : to bid him repent 
 
DISTRIBUTION OF OFFICES AND WORKS. 119 
 
 and believe, that he may be saved by the same grace by 
 which you hope to be saved yourselves ; simply to reason 
 with him, as you would reason with a drowning man 
 when you held out to him a rope to rescue him ; — that 
 may be your province ; that may be your gift and calling. 
 And when you go, in the exercise of that gift and calling, 
 to remonstrate with an ungodly family ; to plead with a 
 backsliding professor ; to speak a word in season to a 
 weary soul : — brother ! you are doing a prophet's office ; 
 brother ! you are winning a prophet's reward. 
 
 Only see to it that when you thus " prophesy, or teach, 
 or exhort/' — and so far as you thus " prophesy, or teach, 
 or exhort," — you make conscience of doing so, strictly, and 
 out and out, " according to the proportion of faith." Speak 
 because you believe. Speak as you believe. Whether 
 in the higher office of prophetic preaching, or in the 
 lower, or at least humbler, departments of teaching and 
 exhorting, be sure that you speak out clearly, fulty, 
 unreservedly, all that you have to say of God, all that 
 you have to say for God, to your fellow-man, — to this 
 your brother whom you are teaching and exhorting in 
 particular, — according to the full measure of your own 
 light and your own convictions. Shun not to declare 
 the whole counsel of God. Prophesy, teach, exhort ; 
 believing all that you say, and saying all that you 
 believe. That I take to be in substance and spirit, and to 
 all practical intents and purposes, what Paul means by 
 prophesying " according to the proportion of faith." 
 
 2. And if you cannot prophesy, you can minister. If 
 you cannot preach, or teach, or exhort, as a seer, you 
 
120 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 can serve as a deacon. And the diaconate in Christ's 
 Church is very honourable. There is variety enough in 
 it also. There is room for the exercise of gifts, differing 
 according to the grace that is given to you. 
 
 There are the three departments of giving, ruling, 
 showing mercy. There is the ministry of giving ; whether 
 of your own substance, or as gathering in and applying 
 the gifts of others. There is the ministry of ruling ; 
 superintending and directing plans of usefulness ; presiding 
 over holy and charitable movements; helping to manage 
 the Church's affairs, and to carry on her government. 
 There is the ministry of showing mercy ; the blessed 
 task and office of manifesting the divine compassion, as 
 it flows from the heart of God, through the hearts of his 
 believing and sympathizing people, into all the channels 
 of human experience, and all the chequered vicissitudes 
 of human affairs. 
 
 Have you means at your disposal, your own means or 
 the means of others, so that you may go forth, full- 
 handed, a giver of good things to those who need them? 
 It is a good and grateful ministry, if only you go about 
 it "in simplicity ;" with singleness of eye ; not seeking 
 applause, or even thanks ; not yielding to caprice or 
 impulse ; but with large mind and loving heart, devising 
 liberal things, that by liberal things you may stand. 
 
 But perhaps it is not yours to give. You may have 
 to say, with Peter at the Beautiful gate of the Temple, 
 " Silver and gold have I none :" and to say it, alas ! 
 without having that to bestow which he had when he 
 added, " Such as I have give I thee." You may have 
 
DISTRIBUTION OF OFFICES AND WORKS. 121 
 
 no alms or offeriDgs, your own or the Church's, to dis- 
 pense. But may you not lend a helping hand in 
 managing some one or other of her pious and charitable 
 undertakings? May you not assist in ruling, directing, 
 actively conducting and carrying out some one or other 
 of her practical plans and measures for glorifying God 
 and doing good to men ? Your " diligence " in any such 
 business will surely not be in vain. 
 
 And even if you are shut out both from the ministry 
 of giving and from the ministry of ruling ; even if you 
 can neither be an almoner nor a manager : if you have 
 no bounty in your hand for charitable distribution, and 
 no counsel in your head for the conduct of affairs, — you 
 have mercy, pity, love in your heart. And with a hand 
 empty of gifts, and a head incapable of ruling, if only 
 you have a heart that is merciful, that pities, that loves, 
 you have a ministry which you may exercise " cheerfully." 
 
 Cheerfully — oh ! how cheerfully ! For it is a ministry 
 void of risk, and void of care. He who giveth, let him 
 give ever so "simply/' ever so disinterestedly, ever so 
 unselfishly, has yet an anxious task upon his hands. 
 He must be cautious, he must discriminate, he must 
 suspect, he must inquire, he must often pause and restrain 
 himself, and do violence to the best feelings of his nature, 
 if he would not be the instrument of evil rather than 
 good. He who rules, he who manages, he who takes a 
 responsible part in any work or business of the Church, 
 be he ever so "diligent/' may have an anxious time of it 
 also. Many things occur to embarrass and disconcert 
 him. He is often perplexed, wearied, vexed, under a 
 
122 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 sense of the load he has to bear, and the difficulties he 
 has to meet. But with light heart and open brow may 
 the merciful man pay his welcome visits of mere kind- 
 ness and goodwill among the families around his dwelling. 
 With a smile for the glad, a sigh and a tear for the 
 afflicted, a patient ear for the complaint of injury, an eye 
 of quick intelligence for the mute glance of unutterable 
 woe, a hand to lift the fallen, feet swift to run to the 
 relief of the poor, and a word in season to all that are 
 weary; — he goes about showing mercy, like his Master; 
 and like his Master also, he " showeth mercy with cheer- 
 fulness." 
 
 Now if this is the divine ideal of the Church as the 
 body of Christ; — if the picture which this inspired apostle 
 draws, whether by description or by exhortation, is the 
 picture of a rightly organized Christian society ; — what a 
 melancholy shortcoming must be noted in the actual 
 Christianity both of past and of present times ! 
 
 .How influential might a congregation be if, in terms 
 of the Apostle's representation, all its members were found 
 exercising their several gifts in appropriate offices of zeal 
 and love ! What a hive would it be of busy bees! flying 
 all abroad, over the waste wilderness as well as the 
 garden enclosed ! kissing into life and pure love many a 
 wild or wanton flower ! and bringing back to the central 
 hive, and for all its inmates, loads of sweetest blessings ! 
 Such a flock would scarcely need pastor, or elders, or 
 deacons. It might almost dispense with office-bearers, 
 whether for teaching or for ruling, for prophesying or 
 
DISTRIBUTION OF OFFICES AND WORKS. 123 
 
 for ministering. In point of fact it is the necessity, and 
 not the glory, of the Church on earth, that she must have 
 her office-bearers. The Friends, the Plymouth Brethren, 
 are so far in the right. That system of theirs which sets 
 aside official distinctions, were it only practicable, would 
 be the beau-ideal, the perfection, of Christian association 
 and organization. " I would that all the Lord's people 
 were prophets," must be the longing of every earnest 
 heart, as it was the longing of the heart of Moses. But 
 the Lord, as we believe, has not judged it safe to rely al- 
 together on such a general and spontaneous alacrity and 
 ability as that arrangement would imply; and we admire 
 his wisdom, as well as his grace and condescension, in the 
 setting apart of special functionaries, that so these neces- 
 sary works may be laid as a special charge on parties 
 specially responsible. In this very passage, accordingly, 
 we are accustomed to trace the outline of the directory 
 which the Lord would have his Church to observe in the 
 appointment of her officers, as well as in the distribution 
 or division of the labour among them. 
 
 Surely, however, it is an ungrateful abuse of this pro- 
 vision, if the members leave all to their officials. It was 
 not so of old. Paul speaks of " Phoebe, our sister, who 
 has been a succourer of many, and of myself also :" of 
 " Priscilla and Aquila, my helpers in Christ Jesus :" of 
 " Mary, who bestowed much labour upon us : " of " Ur- 
 bane, our helper in Christ:" of "Tryphena and Tryphosa, 
 who labour in the Lord : " of " Persis, which laboured 
 much in the Lord : " and again, " of those women which 
 laboured with me in the gospel, with Clement also, and 
 
124j CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 other my fellow-labourers, whose names are written in the 
 Lamb's book of Life/' (Rom. xvi. ; Phil, iv.) 
 
 Why may it not now be as it has been ? 
 
 It is a step, at least, in the right direction, when a 
 congregation throws itself heart and hand into some one 
 definite undertaking, — some enterprise having for its 
 object the social and Christian amelioration of a neigh- 
 bourhood affording scope for its liberality and activity. 
 To a congregation so engaged, who would not heartily 
 bid God- speed ? who would not rejoice in the opportunity 
 of giving, not merely encouraging words of sympathy, but 
 substantial aid ? Let its members be thus stirred up and 
 stimulated, one and all of them, to direct personal effort, 
 with prayer and pains, in the good work to which as a 
 congregation they stand pledged. 
 
 And now, in fine, let the honest language of every soul 
 be, " Lord, what wouldst thou have me to do V 
 
 Art thou on the way to Damascus ? Art thou going 
 on in sin ? Art thou wounding Christ, in his cause, his 
 people, his gospel? Seest thou not that bright light from 
 heaven ? Hearest thou not that voice, — " Saul, Saul, 
 why persecutest thou me ? It is hard for thee to kick 
 against the pricks." Me thou canst not hurt : my pur- 
 pose thou canst not hinder. But tl^self — ah ! what ruin 
 is before thee ! At this sight, at this voice, be humbled. 
 Fall on thy face before Him whom thou art piercing, 
 and cry to him, " Lord, what wouldst thou have me to 
 do ?" And be sure to go where he bids thee ; to wait on 
 hLs guidance. Go, guided by his Word and Spirit; follow 
 
DISTRIBUTION OF OFFICES AND WORKS. 125 
 
 on to know him and his will. Resist not. Delay not. 
 Be up and doing. " Now in the day of thy merciful 
 visitation, mind the things that belong to thy peace, ere 
 they be for ever hid from thine eyes." " Seek the Lord 
 while he may be found." 
 
 Art thou trembling like that Philippian gaoler of old ! 
 Is there an earthquake, if not in thy prison-house, yet in 
 thy heart? Is thy sin finding thee out ? And as thou 
 hearest songs of praise rising from the cell where some 
 saint of God is pining, does thy heart misgive thee lest 
 soon thou shouldst be hearing only weeping, and wailing, 
 and gnashing of teeth ? " Lord, what wouldst thou have 
 me to do ?" " What must I do to be saved V Let that 
 be thy cry, thine earnest cry, now. And hark ! Hear 
 the gracious, welcome response : " Believe — only believe 
 — on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." 
 Hear this, thou anxious, sin-stricken soul ! Hear thy 
 Lord himself, — " If thou canst believe ; all things are 
 possible to him that believeth." Hear ; and let thy 
 prompt and eager appropriation of this wonderful word 
 be, — " Lord, I believe ; help thou mine unbelief." 
 
 Art thou hesitating, halting, miserably at fault and at 
 a loss for the way of peace and holiness and joy ? Art 
 thou ill at ease, not seeing thy signs, — before thee a 
 pathless ocean, behind thee a frowning foe ? Still let thy 
 cry be, "Lord, what wouldst thou have me to do ?" And 
 hark, again I Listen to the stirring message which God 
 gives through Moses : " Speak unto the children of Israel 
 that they go forward." On, on : " My grace is sufficient 
 for thee ; for my strength is made perfect in weakness." 
 
126 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 And thou, whosoever thou art, who hast found grace in 
 the Lord's sight, does thy warm heart move thee to long 
 for some way of proving thy love to Him who has first 
 loved thee ? Ask himself, and keep on asking himself, 
 " Lord, what wouldst thou have me to do ? " Confer not 
 with flesh and blood. Go always to himself. He, if 
 thou wilt hear his voice in his word, and see his hand in 
 providence — and if thou grieve not his Spirit moving 
 thee, — he will open to thee a door. He will show thee a 
 way ; he will prepare for thee a way. He who leadeth 
 the blind by a way that they know not, — he who went 
 before his people, as they marched through the wilderness, 
 guiding them by the glorious symbol of his presence, — 
 will make a plain path for thy feet. He will cause 
 thee to know when he would have thee to move and 
 when to rest. He will assign to thee thy task, thy toil, 
 thy work and warfare ; thy seasons also of stillness, and 
 intervals of repose ; and at last thy bright recompense of 
 reward in the land whither thou art going to possess it. 
 
LOVE AND BROTHERLY LOVE. 127 
 
 IV. 
 LOVE AND BKOTHERLY LOVE. 
 
 " Let love be without dissimulation. Abhor that which is evil ; cleave to that 
 which is good. Be kindly affectioned one to another with brotherly love ; in 
 fionour preferring one another." — Rom. xii. 9, 10. 
 
 Of the two virtues, or graces, spoken of in these verses, 
 love and brotherly love, the one, love, is more general, 
 having for its objects all sentient and intelligent beings 
 within the range of our acquaintance; the other again, 
 brotherly love, is more limited, embracing those only who 
 are one with us in Christ. In the connection in which 
 they here stand, love, the wider affection, is to be con- 
 sidered chiefly in its relation to the more particular 
 affection of brotherly love. It is brotherly love that 
 properly fits into the Apostle's line of thought. 
 
 He is still, at this stage, addressing you as believers ; 
 organized into one body, having one common Head, but 
 differing from one another, in respect of gifts, offices and 
 functions, as the members of the natural body do. He is 
 speaking to you on the subject of your internal relations 
 to God and to one another. It is not till the thirteenth 
 verse that he comes to speak of your relations to them that 
 are without — outside of the Church or kingdom of Christ. 
 
128 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 Up to that point, his exhortations seem to be, all of 
 them, meant to bear upon your standing and your duties 
 within its pale. It is, if we may so speak, the home 
 administration of the kingdom that is here discussed. 
 Its foreign policy does not come up till afterwards. 
 
 You have been marshalled, you have been endeavouring 
 to marshal yourselves, as officers and officials in the king- 
 dom, according to the general order: — " Having then gifts 
 differing according to the grace that is given to us, whether 
 prophecy, let us prophesy according to the proportion of 
 faith ; or ministry, let us wait on our ministering : or he 
 that teacheth, on teaching ; or he that exhorteth, on ex- 
 hortation : he that giveth, let him do it with simplicity; 
 he that ruleth, with diligence; he that sheweth mercy, 
 with cheerfulness." You are all now, it is to be presumed, 
 in your proper places ; the right men, and the right 
 women too, in the right places. You have your several 
 works assigned to you. You go about your several call- 
 ings, you separate to ply your several tasks, in the one 
 household of faith of which you are all members. 
 
 Is not the house then divided ? Practically is not this 
 the upshot ? True, you tell us that, " as we have many 
 members in one body, and all the members have not the 
 same office ; so we, being many, are one body in Christ, 
 and every one members one of another.'* And this ideal 
 of unity in diversity may be a fine theory. But in point 
 of fact, we find ourselves, in the actual business of the 
 church, in congregational arrangements — even in the 
 labours of love to which we are set, wide as the poles 
 asunder. We scarcely ever come in contact with one an- 
 
LOVE AND BROTHERLY LOVE. 129 
 
 other, or cross one another's path. Is not our oneness, 
 then, as a body, a mere name ? To all intents and pur- 
 poses, in our outer Christian walk and work, as well as 
 in our inner Christian life, are we not isolated, indi- 
 vidualized ; each doing the best he can for himself, feel- 
 ing very much as if he were left alone, and must get on 
 as he best may alone ? Or if I am thrown into closer 
 fellowship with some one or two stray followers of Christ, 
 is it not, as I may say, by accident, by force of circum- 
 stances, congeniality of temper, similarity of situation, or 
 some cause, at all events, quite independent of this fair 
 vision of the one body with the many members — the 
 many members in the one body? 
 
 It may be so. To a large extent perhaps it is so. 
 Alas ! that it should be so. The church-tie, the congre-. 
 gational-tie, the closer spiritual tie of a common interest 
 in Christ and a common call to work for Christ, — potent 
 as they are in theory, — are all apt at all times, and now 
 probably as much as ever, to be practically weak ; too 
 weak to resist the influences at work, even within their 
 range, to occasion separation and disunion. The moving 
 bodies around the central Sun are ever tending, in their 
 movements, to fly off from him and from one another. 
 The attractive power must be strong that is to resist and 
 overcome the tendency. And so it is. For it is love ; 
 and what is stronger than love, especially if it be true 
 and holy? " Let love be without dissimulation. Abhor 
 that which is evil; cleave to that which is good." Nay 
 more, it is not love in general merely, but brotherly 
 love ; and what closer bond of union can there be than 
 r 
 
130 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 the genial and simple-hearted sympathy of a common 
 home ? "Be kindly affect ioned one to another with 
 brotherly love ; in honour preferring one another." 
 
 Taking this view of the connection in which these 
 two verses stand, we may, in the first place, consider 
 generally the relation of love to brotherly love. And 
 then, secondly, we may examine the particular attributes 
 or features which they must have respectively, if they 
 are to serve the purpose contemplated : the purpose, 
 namely, of keeping the unity of the Spirit in the bond 
 of peace. The love must be, on the one hand, unfeigned, 
 — " without dissimulation ;" and, on the other hand, dis- 
 criminating, — " abhor that which is evil, cleave to that 
 which is good/' The brotherly love again must be, 
 on the one hand, hearty, — " be kindly affectioned one to 
 another ;" and it must be, on the other hand, humble,- — 
 " in honour preferring one another." 
 
 I. Let us consider generally, in view of the connection 
 in which they stand in the passage before us, the relation 
 of love to brotherly love. 
 
 Charity, or love, in its widest sense, has been defined 
 the love of being, of being as such, of all being. Or lest 
 that should seem too abstract and transcendental a notion, 
 it has been said to be the love of living, sentient, intelli- 
 gences ; the love of beings possessed of proper personality. 
 In a believer's heart, this love is sympathy with God. 
 " Love is of God ; and every one that loveth is born of 
 God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not, knoweth 
 not God j for God is love " (1 John iv. 7, 8). The af- 
 
LOVE iND BKOTHEKLY LOVE. 131 
 
 fection of love, as it exists in the mind or heart of God, 
 and is indeed the essential characteristic of his nature, is 
 transferred or transplanted into your bosom, when you be- 
 lieve. For your believing is your grasping this love of 
 God ; apprehending and appropriating it ; — not the fruit 
 or effect of this love, but the love itself. " We have 
 known and believed the love that God hath to us" (1 
 John iv. 1 6); the love which is manifested in "the send- 
 ing of his only-begotten Son into the world, that we 
 might live through him." " Herein is love, not that we 
 loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be 
 the propitiation for our sins." This love, this God who 
 thus is love, you lay hold of as your own, when you re- 
 ceive his testimony concerning his Son. The Holy Spirit 
 gives you an eye to perceive and a heart to welcome this 
 very love, this very God who is love, as your own. And now 
 you love him because he first loved you. You love, be- 
 cause you know and believe his love. His love to you 
 reproduces, as it were, itself in you. Hence there results 
 a certain harmony of sentiment, a certain union of nature, 
 very imperfect indeed, but yet real so far as it goes, in virtue 
 of which you see as God sees, and feel as God feels. Thus 
 love, known and believed, begets love, in its own likeness. 
 
 Now this love, thus begotten in you, through your 
 knowing and believing the love that God has to you, is 
 not only an affection of a wider range, as to its objects, 
 than brotherly love ; — it is of a higher nature, a more 
 heavenly origin. It has its seat in the bosom of God, 
 where there is, where there can be, no room for the other. 
 
 Brotherly love is essentially the affection of a creature ; 
 
132 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 it is an affection of which a creature alone is capable. 
 The Creator is incapable of it ; he cannot exercise or feel 
 it. There may be brotherly love among the angels. 
 There may be brotherly love among men. Ultimately, 
 there may be brotherly love among angels and men in- 
 discriminately. But there can be no brotherly love in 
 God. For there can be no brotherhood between him and 
 any other. Love alone is of God. For God is love alone. 
 Hence love, divine love, because it is divine or God-like, 
 must take precedence, in your hearts, of brotherly love, 
 which is an affection simply human. And indeed, if it 
 is to be of the right sort, brotherly love must itself be a 
 mode, or modification, of that higher love. It must be 
 founded on that love ; it must flow from it. 
 
 For, apart from love, brotherly love in itself and by 
 itself is not necessarily a virtue. Nay, it may be sin. 
 It degenerates into sectarianism, partisanship, and the 
 poor esprit de corps of a school, a class, a clan, a coterie. 
 It worships idols of the tribe, the palace, the theatre, the 
 cave. You love as brethren those who happen to agree 
 with you in holding certain opinions, cultivating certain 
 tastes, pursuing certain ends. You love them as brethren 
 merely on the ground of that agreement. You draw to- 
 gether ; you club together ; you frequent one another's 
 company; you take pleasure in associating with one an- 
 other, in helping one another, and in serving one another. 
 This is quite natural, and so far, all right. Congeniality 
 of disposition, similarity of pursuits, obviously tend to 
 create intimacy ; and within due limits, that tendency is 
 safe and good. But if that is all — if the bond of 
 
LOVE AND BROTHERLY LOVE. 133 
 
 brotherhood is thus merely natural and human — if your 
 unity is simply the result of your unanimity — if it springs 
 out of yourselves, and, as it is almost sure to do, centres 
 in yourselves ; it may make you strong as an ecclesiasti- 
 cal corporation ; it may make you proud and happy as a 
 more choice and select spiritual company, dwelling apart, 
 nearer the throne than many. But it does not enlarge 
 or elevate the heart. Nor does it free the soul from the 
 yoke of self. It is itself, in fact, little better than a sort 
 of enlarged selfishness. It does not ascend heavenward. 
 It draws down earthward what is heavenly. It is of the 
 earth, earthy. It breeds earthly passions, — censoriousness, 
 superciliousness, moroseness ; — the fanatic's heroic rage, 
 the bigot's mean intolerance. Such brotherly love has 
 been the bane and curse of the Church in all ages, the 
 scandal of Christianity, the fruitful mother of strife 
 among its professors, the world's too plausible apology 
 for not knowing and not believing the love which God 
 hath to us. 
 
 Yery different was the brotherly love of Christ as it 
 was manifested when he lived among men. As God he 
 was capable of love alone. But as man, the man Christ 
 Jesus, he was capable of brotherly love as well. 
 
 And oh ! what brotherly love was his ! He loved his 
 own which were in the world ; he loved them well ; he 
 loved them to the end. Never heart beat, true and ten- 
 der, with a brother's love, as did the heart of Jesus 
 towards his chosen friends. He had them always with 
 him. He told them all that he was doing. He had no 
 reserve in talking to them. He was never weary of 
 
134 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 talking with them. He could have talked on without 
 limit, without end, if only they could have followed him. 
 " I have many things to say unto you, but you cannot 
 bear them now.'' He would fain have said more and 
 more, but he will not speak to them too soon of what 
 could only vex and sadden, without really doing them good. 
 It is a brother's frank and open candour, only tempered 
 by a brother's tender concern. He was their Master and 
 Lord. But he was their brother too ; their elder brother. 
 They lived with him on terms of intimate brotherly 
 familiarity. He had a brother's patience for their way- 
 wardness ; a brother's pity for their weakness ; a brother's 
 tears for their sorrow. It was on a brother's breast that 
 John leaned at supper (John xiii. 23). It was a brother's 
 eye that looked on Peter (Luke xxii. 61). It was a brother's 
 voice that so affectionately commended to the Father's love 
 the little ones whom the Father had given him, and whom 
 he was leaving desolate in a hostile world, (John xvii.) 
 
 And yet special and peculiar as was his brotherly love 
 to bis own, how free, how entirely free, was it from any 
 element that could make it appear to be a love to them 
 merely because they were his own ; because they be- 
 longed to him ; because they followed him ! It was with 
 no selfish love that he loved them ; no love of selfish 
 complacency, or as some might call it, just pride ; such 
 love as one might feel when he looked round on a circle 
 of devoted men whom he had won to be his sworn com- 
 rades and his brethren in council or in arms. The 
 brotherly love of Jesus was of a higher tone ; it was of a 
 more heavenly type. It was brotherly love indeed, such 
 
LOVE AND BROTHERLY LOVE. 135 
 
 as man feels. It was real human brotherly love ; the 
 brotherly love of a genuine human heart, true to all the 
 instincts and all the sympathies of humanity. But it 
 was welded into that other love which is of God. It 
 took the character of that love which is in God ; that 
 love, which God is. 
 
 Take as an instance the farewell prayer, and espe- 
 cially the close of it : " Father, I will that they also whom 
 thou hast given me be with me where I am ; that they 
 may behold my glory, which thou hast given me : for 
 thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world. 
 righteous Father, the world hath not known thee : but 
 I have known thee, and these have known that thou hast 
 sent me. And I have declared unto them thy name, 
 and will declare it ; that the love wherewith thou hast 
 loved me may be in them, and I in them" (John xvii. 
 24-26). 
 
 Here truly is brotherly love. The Elder Brother is 
 presenting to his Father and theirs, the children, the little 
 ones, whom the Father hath given him to be his brethren. 
 But what a constant reference has he to the Father ! What 
 love to God the Father pervades, and animates, and ele- 
 vates, this brotherly love of Jesus ! 
 
 Why, let us ask, according to these wondrous words 
 of his, does the Lord Jesus specially love his own ? Foi 
 what reasons, and on what grounds ? In the first place, 
 they are given to him by the Father. And, secondly, 
 they receive him as sent by the Father ; and while 
 the world knows not the Father, they receive the know- 
 ledge of the Father which the Son imparts, and the love 
 
186 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 of the Father which the Son conveys. Then again, 
 let us further ask, for what end does the Elder Brother, 
 with such tender importunity of brotherly love, commend 
 his own to the Father ? That the Father may love them 
 as he loveth him, and glorify them as he glorifies him : 
 that he and they may be one in the Father, 
 
 Thus all this love is of God. Jesus, the Elder Brother, 
 regards the little ones whom he loves as brethren, from the 
 Father's point of view in heaven, as well as from his own 
 point of view on earth. The love of Jesus to his own is 
 sympathy with the Father in his love to them. It is 
 sympathy with them as the objects of the Fathers love. 
 And so, in virtue of that twofold sympathy, it is welded 
 into the Father's love itself. 
 
 Thus brotherly love is lifted up, from being a human, 
 into becoming a divine affection. It is not now a self- 
 originated, closet combination ; as when men come to- 
 gether, and finding themselves of one mind, resolve to 
 act together. It is an integral part and portion of that 
 great fountain of love which is in the bosom of God. 
 Absorbed into this higher love, purified and hallowed by 
 it, brotherly love issues forth anew. It selects its conge- 
 nial company of believing friends. It finds itself at home 
 among them. Yet still always it retains its identity and 
 sympathy with that love in God, so wide, free, generous, 
 unselfish, which embodies and expresses itself in the gra- 
 cious mission of his Son. 
 
 My love to the brethren is thus like my Father's love 
 to them. He loves them with a peculiar affection. And 
 so do I. But it is an affection in him, and through his 
 
LOVE AND BROTHERLY LOVE. 137 
 
 grace, in me also, altogether beyond the imputation or sus- 
 picion of anything like mere favouritism, or partiality, or 
 party spirit. It is not respect of persons. It is not mere 
 selfish reciprocity; the owning of those who own me. It 
 is genuine love ; the love of the true, the good, for the 
 sake of their truth and goodness. My love to the breth- 
 ren is thus, like God's love to them, not merely the love of 
 natural, human fellow-feeling, — but the love of divine be- 
 nevolence ; of that divine benevolence which looks on all 
 out of itself with an equal eye, and has pity, mercy, com- 
 placency, for all ; — pity, mercy, on the one hand, for all alike 
 of the lost family of man ; and on the other hand, holy 
 complacency for all alike who, in the Son, are created 
 anew unto holiness. 
 
 To love the brethren thus, is not to shut myself up 
 among a knot of devotees, in the cells and cloisters of an 
 exclusive monasticism. Nor is it to bind myself hand 
 and foot to a party organization like that of Loyola. 
 The brotherly love of the friar's convent, or of the Jesuit's 
 college, is not for me, if I am to be like-minded, like- 
 hearted, with Christ. No. Nor the brotherly love of 
 the sect, the party, the conclave, or the inner circle of 
 those who, hugging themselves in their own self-satisfac- 
 tion, bid all others stand aside. Let mine be the bro- 
 therly love of Him who was meek and lowly in heart ; 
 who did not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be 
 heard in the streets ; who did not break the bruised reed 
 nor quench the smoking flax ; — -of Him whose advent 
 the angels hailed, when they sang, "Glory to God in the 
 highest, on earth peace, good-will toward men." 
 
138 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 There, in that good- will toward men, is love ; the love 
 of God, wide, universal, free. It is goodwill to men ; to 
 men as such ; to all men. This is the love of Him who 
 would have all men to be saved, and to come to the 
 knowledge of the truth. Let this love be in } T our hearts, 
 as it was in the heart of Christ. Be ye philanthropists 
 as he was. Be ye, like him, first and primarily, lovers 
 of men. This Christ-like, God-like philanthropy, and 
 this alone, will make your brotherly love Christ-like and 
 God-like too. 
 
 II. Such generally being the nature of love and of 
 brotherly love, and such their right relation to one 
 another, let us now inquire what are the particular 
 attributes or features which they must possess respec- 
 tively, if they are to serve the purpose contemplated ; the 
 purpose, namely, of keeping the unity of the Spirit in 
 the bond of peace. 
 
 In the first place, Love, if it is to inspire brotherly love 
 of the right sort, must be of the right sort itself ; — " Let 
 love be without dissimulation ; abhor that which is evil ; 
 cleave to that which is good." And, secondly, Brotherly 
 love, if it is to claim kindred with such love as that, must 
 make good its claim by its character ; — " Be kindly affec- 
 tioned one to another with brotherly love ; in honour pre- 
 ferring one another." The love, and the brotherly love, 
 must be of genuine quality. 
 
 1. The love must be unfeigned; "without dissimu- 
 lation." And it must be discriminating ; " abhor that 
 which is evil; cleave to that which is good." In fact 
 
LOVE TRUE AND HOLY. 139 
 
 it must be discriminating that it may be unfeigned. The 
 love that does not discriminate, will invariably be found 
 to be a love that dissembles. 
 
 Look, for example, at the easy sort of good-nature 
 which passes current largely in the world for that good- 
 will towards men which the angels welcomed in the 
 birth of Christ. It is not certainly very discriminating. 
 Is it very sincere ? Are those who practise it remarkable 
 for their freedom from dissimulation ? Do they say the 
 same things of one another that they say to one another ? 
 They are lax and easy enough in drawing the line be- 
 tween good and eviL There is not with them any very indig- 
 nant or very repugnant abhorrence of what is evil ; no very 
 keen resentment of wrong ; no vehement recoil from sin. 
 Nor is there much of a " cleaving to that which is good." 
 They may have good movements, and good impressions, 
 by fits and starts, as it were, or upon random impulses. 
 And if it comes to their hand naturally, and easily, they 
 may have no objection to do good. They will them- 
 selves, however, be the first to confess that they are not 
 too scrupulous or sensitive on that head. They are sin- 
 cere so far as they go, but they are not straitlaced. 
 
 But are they really sincere ? They say so. That is 
 their boast. And they venture to think that this their 
 sincerity may avail them before God as well as before 
 men. They may not be altogether such as they should 
 be ; abhorring as they ought that which is evil, and 
 cleaving as they ought to that which is good. They 
 acknowledge that they do not always draw the line very 
 carefully. But they are at any rate no dissemblers. 
 
140 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 Is it so ? Is it not on the contrary notorious, that 
 those who are the least fastidious in open intercourse 
 with doubtful company, are the most unscrupulous in 
 their comments and commentaries behind backs? It has 
 been happily and wittily said of those once famous Letters 
 in which a worldly-wise father 1 sought to make his son 
 as perfect in the world's wisdom and in the world's 
 wickedness as himself, that whereas Paul's maxim is — Love 
 without dissimulation, in his hands it might be read the 
 reverse way — Dissimulation without love. This witness 
 is true. The peace, and decency, and good order, of 
 worldly society to a large extent depend on there being 
 a common understanding on all sides, that what might 
 be unpleasant shall be coloured, or shall be covered ; and 
 that many things bordering on vice or folly shall be al- 
 lowed to pass under some plausible disguise. 
 
 Would that we could limit this charge exclusively to 
 worldly men ! to those who make no profession of evan- 
 gelical holiness or evangelical love ! But alas ! even 
 you who may be presumed to know something of that 
 love of God to which your love ought to be conformed, 
 are apt practically to lose sight of the unfeigned truth 
 and the uncompromising holiness that it demands. 
 
 When you go among your fellow-men, when you mingle 
 in society, you do not adopt the world's good-natured 
 fashion of toying with what is evil and making light of 
 what is good. You do not practise the world's conve- 
 nient art of keeping up appearances with bright smiles 
 
 1 Lord Chesterfield's Letters to his Son. 
 
LOVE TRUE AND HOLY. 141 
 
 and honeyed words of feigned courtesy, covering and 
 dissembling the real passions of the heart. In your 
 presence, what is evil may not be obtruded offensively ; 
 what is good may not be openly disparaged. So far your 
 love may seem to be, and may really be, discriminating. 
 
 Again, when you speak, you do not actually say what 
 you do not think ; you do not wilfully profess more than 
 you feel, or anything else than you feel. So far your love 
 may be allowed to be without dissimulation. 
 
 But as regards the first of these admissions, might 
 it not be sometimes asked — When you return home 
 from a social meeting, whether for business or for 
 pleasure, would those you have been dealing or con- 
 versing with, gather from your demeanour while you 
 were with them, that you abhor that which is evil, and 
 cleave to that which is good ? Nay, might not their im- 
 pression on the contrary be, that your abhorrence of 
 evil is not very vehement, and your cleaving to good 
 not very earnest ? There may be nothing tangible to 
 which they can point. They cannot charge you with any 
 one decided instance of compromise. They may even be 
 forced to own that your presence did impose a restraint 
 upon the company and the conversation ; that every ap- 
 proach to impropriety was checked and frowned down ; 
 that much of what went on was even fitted to be useful. 
 Still somehow, from your whole way of conducting 
 yourself, they have taken up the idea, that while you 
 must, for consistency's sake, be somewhat strict and grave, 
 yet after all, you do not take things quite so seriously as 
 they thought. 
 
142 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 All ! my Christian friends, beware of that facile and false 
 kindness which is apt to usurp the place of love in your 
 intercourse with the immortal beings around you. Yes ; it 
 is a false kindness, if when you go among them, you suffer 
 them to get the notion that the difference between a state 
 of sin and a state of grace is not so very decided as you 
 would have them to believe ; that you do not think so 
 badly of their case ; that the ways of godliness are not 
 so very good, nor the ways of the ungodly world so very 
 evil, even in your judgment, as they once imagined. 
 
 You may disguise your weakness under many plausible 
 pleas. You would not take too much upon you. You 
 do not like to be always thrusting forward your own pecu- 
 liar views. It is harsh and unfeeling to be for ever finding 
 fault. You must occasionally shut your eyes to some things, 
 if you would get through the world peaceably. You cannot 
 bear to be for ever damping gaiety and marring mirth. 
 You need not be always wearing a solemn face, and ut- 
 tering weighty sentences of wisdom. You may surely 
 sometimes unbend, and be simply a man among your fel- 
 low-men, not everlastingly on your guard, but as it were 
 standing at ease, and letting your Christian principles and 
 punctilios for a season take care of themselves. 
 
 But will these, and such poor platitudes and truisms 
 as these, avail to undo the evil influence that in a single 
 instance may flow from your trumpet giving an uncertain 
 sound? If your love is of such a sort as this, is it — let 
 me now further ask — is it indeed without dissimulation ? 
 
 "Without dissimulation ! — Are you not dissembling 
 your Christianity ? Are you not dissembling your fixed 
 
LOVE TRUE AND HOLY. 143 
 
 moral convictions, your deep religious faith ? Are you 
 not dissembling your belief that the wages of sin is 
 death ; that sin is an abomination in the sight of God ; 
 that the world lieth in wickedness; that the wicked 
 shall be turned into hell ; that men must be born again ; 
 that if any man be in Christ he is a new creature ; that 
 without holiness no man can see the Lord ; that every 
 unconverted man is on the way to inevitable and eternal 
 ruin ; that for every idle word that men speak they must 
 give an account ; that it is a fearful thing to fall into 
 the hands of the living God ; — but that, on the other 
 hand, grace is sweet ; and God's favour is good ; and his 
 service is freedom ; and wisdom's ways alone are ways 
 of pleasantness, and her paths alone are peace ; — are 
 you not, I say, dissembling your belief of these things, 
 when you so live with your fellow-men, as to lead them 
 to ask, Would you live so if you believed them ? 
 
 And is that love ? If the tender mercies of the wicked 
 are cruel, what shall we say of love like that in one call- 
 ing himself a child of God ? 
 
 A child of God ! Is your Father's love of such a sort as 
 yours? Can any one doubt what He thinks of evil? 
 what He thinks of good? Can any one charge Him with 
 dissembling the truth, out of weak facility or false ten- 
 derness to the objects of his love ? Ah ! His love is love 
 indeed, because it is so holy, and so true. A love indif- 
 ferent to the interests of holiness, a love keeping back 
 or compromising truth, would not be love at all. God 
 is love, because God is light. The light of inviolable 
 holiness, the light of eternal truth, sheds its highest glory 
 
144 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 on the love of God ; chiefly in that manifestation of 
 it through the faith of which you learn to love as 
 He loves. Behold the Father giving up his Son to die ! 
 What abhorrence of evil is revealed in that act ! what 
 cleaving to that which is good ! How intolerable is sin 
 seen to be ! and how inflexible righteousness ! There is 
 no mincing of the matter in that Cross, no prophesying of 
 smooth things, no soft shading of realities too stern. That 
 Cross speaks very plainly. It dissembles nothing. It tells 
 the whole truth. And if on that account ifc be an offence 
 it is not so intended. For it tells the truth in love. 
 
 And you, brethren, have the same truth to tell ; and in 
 the same love. This, which is the characteristic of the love 
 of God, must be the characteristic of your love too. Your 
 lips, your life, like that Cross, must reveal abhorrence of 
 evil, and a fast cleaving to that which is good. Your lips, 
 your life, like that Cross, must vindicate the claims of 
 righteousness, and stamp with righteous reprobation the 
 dark malignity of sin. Your lips, your life, like that Cross, 
 must be to all men an open exhibition of the truth. Your 
 lips, your life, like that Cross, must speak, and speak 
 plainly, of guilt and wrath, as well as of peace and joy. 
 Otherwise your love is false and wicked. It is man's 
 love ; — such love as may visit the breast of fallen man, 
 who cares little for truth, and less, if possible, for holi- 
 ness. It is not the love that dwells in the bosom of the 
 true and holy God ; — of him who, when truth and holiness 
 seemed to be opposed to love, that he might blend the 
 three in one, spared not his only-begotten Son, but gave 
 him up to the death for us all ! 
 
BROTHERLY LOVE KIND AND LOWLY. 145 
 
 2. Love, a love thus undissembled and undissembling, 
 abhorring evil and cleaving to good, is the fit mother of a 
 brotherly love, at once affectionate and humble, kind to 
 others, lowly in its own esteem ; — " Be kindly afFectioned 
 one to another with brotherly love ; in honour preferring 
 one another" (ver. 10). 
 
 Observe how such love as I have been attempting to 
 describe may be traced as it passes into brotherly 
 love. It goes forth, this love, honest and true, hating 
 evil, cleaving to good ; or you, possessed by this love, go 
 forth among your fellow-men. Your love embraces them 
 all ; it longs for a response of sympathy from them all 
 But, alas ! too generally, it longs in vain. You come in 
 contact, however, with some whom that love possesses, 
 as it possesses you. They and you compare notes. You 
 exchange with one another your thoughts and feelings. 
 A new emotion springs up within you ; a new affection 
 is generated. It is not an emotion of admiration merely, 
 or of sudden surprise, as when a bright form of beauty 
 first meets the eye. It is like that deep sense of home 
 which fills the hearts of the children of one household, 
 when, after long years spent apart, they find themselves 
 together again in a foreign land. The thought of a home 
 of love, and of a loving father there, whose image they 
 all bear, whose love they all share, is freshly present to 
 their minds. They feel themselves at home once more. 
 This home-feeling, in a far country, among you who are 
 the children of God, is brotherly love. The spirit of your 
 home of love, which is heaven; the spirit of your loving 
 Father, who dwells there ; is in you alL 
 
 K 
 
146 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 Is it needful, let me ask in the first place, — is it not, 
 on the contrary, almost a work of supererogation to 
 exhort you, in such brotherly love as that, to be kindly 
 affectioned one to another? 
 
 The brethren of Joseph were in a conspiracy of evil, held 
 together by the tie, not of a common love, but of a common 
 hatred. There was nothing in the feeling which made 
 them one, fitted to soften or melt their hearts into any 
 genial flow of kindness. For jealousy or envy is a cold, 
 hard passion. It shuts up the bowels of compassion. To 
 those who have been thus united, the admonition is far from 
 being superfluous : " See that ye fall not out by the way." 
 And if your Christian brotherhood is of this sort; if 
 it is a union cemented rather by the spirit of human 
 rivalry or resentment, than by the spirit of divine love ; 
 the chances are that you will find yourselves agreeing 
 better in the feelings which you indulge towards others, 
 than in the feelings which you cherish among your- 
 selves. 
 
 But your fellowship is not thus one of malice or ill-will, 
 or a harsh judging of your neighbours. It is a fellowship 
 of love in the Lord. And therefore you are called to put 
 on bowels of mercies and kindness to one another. For 
 the home feeling in a far country makes the children's 
 hearts very tender ; so tender, that neither memory of 
 old grudges, nor apprehension of new offences, can be 
 suffered to part love again. It has a marvellous power 
 to pull out every old root of bitterness, and to keep out 
 every new one, — every new seed of irritation or estrange- 
 ment. Cherish, then, ye children of your Father in 
 
BROTHERLY LOVE KIND AND LOWLY. 1 47 
 
 heaven, this home feeling, that ye may be " kindly affec- 
 tioned one to another in brotherly love." 
 
 And that you may make sure of this, let me say to 
 you further, in the second place, see to it that your 
 brotherly love be as humble as it is kindly affectioned. 
 With bowels of mercies and kindness to one another, put 
 on also meekness; "in honour preferring one another." 
 " Let nothing be done through strife or vain-glory ; but, in 
 lowliness of mind, let each esteem others better than him- 
 self" (Phil. ii. 3). 
 
 There was strife once in the little company of the 
 twelve as they followed Jesus on the earth. They 
 disputed among themselves who should be the greatest. 
 This was at the time when they knew and believed 
 comparatively little of the love of God ; when their 
 brotherly love, such as it was, had little or nothing in 
 common with that divine love ; but was, in fact, simply 
 earthly and human ; springing wholly out of the feeling 
 of their being pledged to a common Master and a common 
 cause; engaged in a common enterprise. So long as that 
 is their only bond of union, it is quite natural that, on 
 the one hand, they should rebuke those, however worthy, 
 who follow not with them ; and, on the other hand, that 
 they should dispute among themselves who should be the 
 greatest. Accordingly, it has been always found that all 
 ecclesiastical combinations, whether churches, or sects, or 
 religious orders, formed upon this principle, have in them 
 the elements of these two sore evils, intolerance and am- 
 bition. In any society of men, brought together and kept 
 together thus, as partisans, embodied to serve a purpose, 
 
148 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 to gain an end. there must necessarily be the feeling that 
 all who are not with them are against them ; and the honour 
 of taking the lead will be coveted and grasped as a lawful 
 prize. 
 
 It will not be so, when the Christian brotherhood is 
 felt to be, not an artificial organization of earth, but the 
 living spirh? of love coming down from heaven ; the love 
 which dwells in the heart of God, reproduced in the heart 
 of a believing man, and recognising itself as reproduced 
 also in the hearts of other believers. 
 
 In a brotherhood thus created and born ; — for it is a 
 new creation, and a new birth ; a birth from above ; a 
 birth of the Spirit ; — in such a brotherhood there can be 
 no room, no place, for such merely human feelings as either 
 hostile suspicion of all who follow not with us, or eager 
 egotistic questioning as to who shall be the greatest. That 
 home feeling in the far country gives the death-blow to 
 self. We are all one. Which of us is above the rest, or 
 which beneath, is a small matter. We love one another as 
 brethren, for our Father's love that is in us, and our 
 Fathers likeness that is upon us. 
 
 And for my part, each will say, I see more of that love 
 and of that likeness in my brethren, in the very least of 
 them, than in my best state I can find in myself. 
 I care not what his place and function, in the body, 
 may be ; or what mine may be, as contrasted with his. 
 He may be the door-keeper; I the priest. He may serve, 
 and I may rule. He may be a mere minister ; I, a 
 teacher and exhorter. Still, if he is a child of God, and 
 if I am one ; conscious as I am of sad shortcomings and 
 
BROTHERLY LOVE KIND AND LOWLY. 149 
 
 sins, I see my Father's love and my Father's likeness in 
 him, more than in myself. — As doubtless he, on the other 
 hand, having experience of his own infirmities, and not 
 of mine, giving me credit also — alas ! how often too 
 credulously — for all that my office implies, thinks of me 
 far more highly than he ought ; and emptying himself, is 
 disposed to sit at my feet, who, alas ! have too good 
 reason to feel, that in respect of many a lesson of meek- 
 ness and obedience, I ought rather to be learning of him. 
 Thus, being kindly affectioned one to another, with 
 brotherly love, in honour we prefer one another; each 
 esteeming others better than himself. 
 
 Now, it is in this spirit of blended love and brotherly love; 
 love, pure and true as is the love that dwells in the heart of 
 God ; brotherly love, kind and meek as that home feeling 
 which makes an unselfish household one ; that you are to 
 enter on the duties of your several callings in the Church 
 of Christ, — to prophesy, to minister, to teach, to exhort, to 
 rule, to give, to show mercy ; full of love to all, of 
 brotherly love among yourselves. These are the elements 
 or component parts of that living stream which is to set 
 in motion, and ever freshly keep in motion, all the acti- 
 vities of your Christian life ; the one element divine, the 
 other human ; together, by the electric spark of heavenly 
 grace, forming a pure river of the water of life, proceeding 
 from the throne of God, and of the Lamb. Whatever, as 
 members of the Church of Christ, you undertake and do, 
 it is thus that you are to undertake and do it ; loving all 
 men, as God in Christ loves them, with a love that like 
 
150 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 his condemns all sin, while it yearns to embrace every 
 sinner ; loving one another, as Christ loved his own, for 
 the Father's sake, who gave him them, and for their 
 sympathy with him as the Father's Son ; loving one 
 another, therefore, with a love, like his, of warmest fel- 
 low-feeling and of lowliest self-abasement. Animated by 
 this double love, you will find every yoke easy, every 
 burden light. It will be your meat to do the will of Him 
 who sends you, to finish his work, — to go about doing 
 good It will be your joy to aid in every good work. 
 It will be your special joy to aid in the good work of 
 sending everywhere, and among all men, the glorious 
 gospel of the grace of God, which proclaims the large 
 and free benevolence of the Everlasting Father, and by 
 means of which the Eternal Spirit is to gather into one 
 brotherhood, in Christ the Son, the great multitude of all 
 nations and kindreds, and peoples and tongues, who are 
 to stand together before the throne of God and of the 
 Lamb, clothed with white robes and palms in their hands, 
 and to cry together, with loud voice, " Salvation to our 
 God, which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb." 
 
NOT SLOTHFUL IN BUSINESS. 151 
 
 DILIGENCE— FERVOUR— SERVICE. 
 
 " Not slothful in business : fervent in spirit ; serving the Lord." — Rom. xii. 11. 
 
 There is no reference here to what men call the business 
 of life. The verse i3 misinterpreted and misapplied 
 "when it is made, as it were, the priest or minister to 
 celebrate a marriage-union between secular duty and 
 spiritual devotion. Doubtless it is most desirable that 
 such an alliance should be effected. In the case of a 
 true Christian, there will be no divorce or separation 
 between the ordinary every-day work of his worldly call- 
 ing, and the worship of his closet and his heart. He may 
 not, indeed, be willing to identify the two, or to speak as 
 if he could fall in with the favourite formula of some, that 
 work is worship. But he will not forbid the banns when 
 it is proposed to join them in a holy and happy matri- 
 mony. He will have the twain to be one spirit. That 
 diligence in the common business of life should be joined 
 to fervency of spirit in religion, is a proposition, there- 
 fore, which he will admit and maintain. But if he is 
 intelligent, he will look somewhere else than to this verse 
 for his proof-text in support of it. 
 
 The word " business " here, is the same in the original 
 
152 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 as the word " diligence " in the eighth verse of the 
 chapter ; — " He that ruleth, with diligence." So here : 
 " Not slothful as regards diligence." The term indicates, 
 not the kind of work to be done, but simply the manner 
 of doing it. It does not point to men's ordinary worldly 
 callings and occupations, as in contradistinction to their 
 spiritual exercises or spiritual frames. It is not the 
 Apostle's present object to harmonize, and reconcile, and 
 blend the two in one. The expression " business " charac- 
 terizes, not the work, but the worker ; not the action, but 
 the agent. The real meaning is, that in respect of diligence, 
 or activity, in the matter to which this whole passage 
 refers, you are to be not slothful. It is very much the 
 wise man's maxim : " Whatsoever thy hand findeth to 
 do, do it with thy might" (Eccles. ix. 10). 
 
 The Apostle is still, let it be remembered, speaking of the 
 different offices and functions which fall to be distributed 
 among believers, as the many members of one body. He 
 has in view, not what you have to do in your common char- 
 acter and capacity, as members of society in general, but 
 what you have to do in your special calling, as members of 
 the Christian society. No doubt, in a sense, the whole of 
 your work, in the ordinary business of life, may be com- 
 prehended under that head. " Whether you eat or drink, 
 or whatever you do, you are to do all to the glory of 
 God." " Whatever you do, in word or deed, you are to do 
 in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks unto God, 
 even the Father, by him." Every occupation of yours, 
 like every creature of God, is to be " sanctified by the word 
 of God and by prayer." You are not to separate what you 
 
NOT SLOTHFUL IN BUSINESS. 153 
 
 do as men from what you do as Christians. You cannot 
 thus divide yourself. It is the life which you live in the 
 flesh that you are to live by faith. All that is true. 
 But, on the other hand, it is no less true that your believ- 
 ing, your becoming members of Christ and of his Church, 
 not only invests old works and duties with a new charac- 
 ter, but imposes new ones. It calls you to work for 
 yourselves and for society in a new spirit. It does more. 
 It calls you to work directly for Christ. You may say 
 that your working for yourselves and for society, in a new 
 spirit, is your working for Christ. It may be so. But 
 in any sense relevant to the Apostle's present appeal, it 
 can be so only when, in your so working for yourselves 
 and for society, you not merely cherish devout Christian 
 feelings in your own heart, but expressly aim at a 
 Christian object ; the Christian object, namely, of com- 
 mending Christ to others, and shutting them up into 
 him. It is in working with that aim, and for that 
 object, that you are to be, — I. Not slothful in business ; 
 II. Fervent in spirit ; III. Serving the Lord. 
 
 I. The word rendered " business," or " diligence," — 
 denotes originally haste or speed. It conveys the idea of 
 eagerness, zeal, intense and earnest effort ; the doing of 
 what is to be done, as one would say, in a business-like 
 way, — with a will ; making a real business of it ; taking 
 it up in earnest, as a business that admits of no remiss- 
 ness, no slackness, no sloth. 1 
 
 1 Under the explanation already given, tbe practical idea involved in our 
 English word " business," — that of real work as opposed to dilettante trifling— ■ 
 
154 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 You all know what this means in any worldly 
 calling ; and you know also how in every worldly 
 calling, it is an indispensable condition of eminence and 
 success. There must be industry; strenuous, unremitting, 
 untiring industry; willing to forego the-luxury of ease, " to 
 scorn delights, and live laborious days." For the most 
 part, this is a faculty to be acquired ; a habit to be cul- 
 tivated. It is a faculty which cannot be acquired too 
 early ; a habit that cannot be cultivated too assiduously. 
 It may cost you an effort ; nay, many an effort. Indo- 
 lence is natural to you. Carelessness is natural to you. 
 To fix and sustain the attention, to persevere in irksome 
 toil, is a lesson which you must learn. You must learn 
 it patiently and with much pains. 
 
 It is good advice, and advice which cannot be too 
 often or too emphatically repeated, especiallj 7 ' to the 
 young ; — Learn this lesson soon, and learn it well. Ac- 
 custom yourself, train yourself to this " diligence in busi- 
 ness." Do this systematically in whatever you undertake. 
 
 may be turned to good account in enforcing the Apostle's maxim. In further 
 confirmation of the view which I have adopted, it may be interesting to observe 
 the harmony of our English versions. I subjoin, accordingly, the entire verse as 
 it stands in the five translations preceding our present authorized one. Two of 
 them, it will be seen, prefer the various reading in the last clause, of «aipw, time 
 or season, for Kvptw, the Lord. The others abide by the text as it standi : — 
 " Not slowe in bisynesse, feruent in spirit, seruynge to the Lord." — Wiclif, 1388. 
 " Let not the busynes which ye have in honde be tedious to you. Be feruent 
 in the sprite. Applye youre selves to thetyme." — Tyndale, 1534. "Be not 
 slouthfull in the busynes whych ye haue in hande. Be feruent in the sprite. 
 Applye youre selues to the tyme." — Cranmcr, 1539. "Not slothful to do 
 seruice. Feruent in sprite. Seruing the Lord." — Geneva, 1557. "In careful- 
 ness not slouthful. In spirit feruent. Seruing our Lord." — Rheims, 1582. 
 " Not slothfull in busines : feruent in spirit. Seruing the Lord."— Authorized, 
 1611. 
 
NOT SLOTHFUL IN BUSINESS. 155 
 
 Act upon the principle, that whatever it is worth while 
 to acquire, it is worthwhile to acquire thoroughly; what- 
 ever it is worth while to do at all, it is worth while to 
 do well. Let it not be your object merely to get through 
 your task or work with as little trouble to yourself as 
 possible. Beware of a perfunctory, or a desultory, dis- 
 charge of duty. Whatever you have on hand, give your 
 mind to it as if it were the business of your life. It is 
 so for the time. Let it be felt by you to be so. Sloth 
 nmy raise difficulties ; " There is a lion in the way." Or 
 there may be whispered in your ear that most dispiriting 
 of all questions ; — Cui bono ? What is the use ? Resist that 
 devil. Whatever you are about, trouble not yourself by 
 asking what good may hereafter come of it. Give your- 
 self to it wholly and heartily now. It is your calling 
 now. As such, look it fairly in the face, and go up to 
 it resolutely like a man. This way of doing business, 
 and this alone, is worthy of your manhood. This is real 
 work, earnest life. And it is this that the Apostle desires 
 to see exemplified in the Church of Christ, and among 
 you who are its members. It is thus that he would have 
 you to undertake and prosecute the work of your Chris- 
 tian calling, to perforin the functions of whatever you 
 may find to be your office in the Church, the body of 
 Christ, of which you are members. 
 
 Here, let it be observed, there is a peculiar difficulty, 
 arising out of the nature of that work and these functions. 
 They are essentially spiritual. They make a demand upon 
 your spiritual tendencies and tastes. In any circumstances, 
 the faculty or habit which is desiderated is of difficult 
 
156 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 acquisition. But the difficulty is less when the objects 
 about which it is to be occupied are congenial to your 
 temperament and inclinations. Nay, in such a case the 
 difficulty is often scarcely felt at all. 
 
 Absorbed and wrapt in his favourite theme, the ripe 
 scholar, the enthusiastic student, fastens on it, as if instinc- 
 tively, the whole energy of his soul. The diligence, the 
 earnestness, the systematic and persevering industry, which 
 is such a forced effort to his less ardent comrade, is spon- 
 taneous and almost unconscious with him. He knows not 
 what it is to grow weary of his work. In his way of doing 
 business there is no sloth. So, also, any ruling passion, 
 as the thirst of glory, or of riches, or of power, will keep 
 the man whom it possesses always eager and on the 
 stretch ; intent on what is his one great end in life. In 
 the pursuit of that end he knows well what he is about. 
 Nothing diverts his eye ; nothing slackens his speed. 
 You need not preach attention and industry to him. No ! nor 
 need you preach it to that other man whom a higher motive 
 sways, whom a more generous impulse prompts. To him, 
 his patriotism, his philanthropy, or whatever noble senti- 
 ment inspires his breast, is business-habit enough, and 
 business-talent too. There is no risk of slovenliness or 
 supineness marring any enterprise of his. He is sure to 
 do his work, like a true workman, in thorough business- 
 like style and fashion ; for it is the work which his heart 
 identifies with himself. His work is his life. Read the 
 biographies of scholars, of ambitious generals, of statesmen, 
 of philanthropists ; and see their manner of doing the work 
 of their several callings ! What untiring assiduity and 
 
NOT SLOTHFUL IN BUSINESS. 157 
 
 perseverance, — what careful diligence, — is theirs! Truly 
 there is no slotlifulness in business with them ! 
 
 It is apt to be otherwise when the work you have on 
 hand is the Church's work ; the work of Christ, the 
 Church's Head. That work is not according to the 
 natural bent and bias of your minds. You do not take 
 naturally to it. Even when you are renewed and 
 quickened by the Spirit, and become spiritual men, it is 
 not a work in which you can trust to the spontaneous 
 working of your new affections, however warm, as if 
 these were of themselves sufficient to secure its due per- 
 formance. 
 
 This is a consideration of which you are all too apt 
 to lose sight. And from not attending to it, you are 
 liable to suffer loss and damage, as regards both the 
 work of your own personal sanctification, on the one 
 hand, and on the other, the work of whatever ministry 
 may be yours in the Church of God. 
 
 1. Thus, as to the first of these great concerns, how 
 often are you inclined, when serious impressions are made 
 upon you, to imagine that your spiritual life is to 
 go on, through all its stages of purification from evil 
 and ripening for glory, very much as a life of feeling, 
 and warm emotion, and strong affection ! You are 
 weary of routine. You have had enough of that. The 
 very custom of bowing the knee at night and in the 
 morning, familiar from your earliest childhood, is felt to 
 be grievous, because it is so formal. You would now 
 dispense with all forms and all formality. You are to 
 be moved by an impulse from within, not regulated by 
 
158 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 rules and restrictions from without. The new life in you 
 will work itself out freely, spontaneously, if left to itself 
 and its own natural development. To systematize or for- 
 malize it again, is simply, as you imagine, to kill it. To 
 bring it at all under business rules, to turn it in any degree 
 into a matter of business ; — thus to treat that new, free, 
 fresh, living and loving faith, and living and loving fellow- 
 ship, of which you have got some sense and taste ; — is to 
 bind the old, servile chains of constraint and ceremony 
 round your emancipated souL You will not make a mere 
 business of your religion any more. It is not to be a 
 martinet's drill or a field-day's parade. It is to be all, 
 at each successive moment, freshly and freely extemporized. 
 So you think and feel, under the impulse of a spiritual 
 awakening. You are impatient and intolerant of all that 
 might give anything like a business air and aspect to your 
 Christian life. You would have it to be not a practical, 
 and perhaps painful, business-like realization, — but, as it 
 were, an elevating ideal, — of good. 
 
 But if you are in earnest, you soon find that this will 
 not do. You must, if you are to keep your ground and 
 make progress, be methodistic. You must lay down a 
 plan, you must adopt a method, and adhere to it. You 
 must adjust your arrangements, and methodize your 
 whole conduct, as you would do in a secular profession 
 in which your worldly interests were embarked and 
 your worldly all was at stake. 
 
 Do you at all know experimentally the power of that 
 slothfulness which is so apt to creep over you in your reli- 
 gious experience ? How lifeless do you become, under its 
 
NOT SLOTHFUL IN BUSINESS. 159 
 
 influence, and how drowsy ! You cannot stir yourself up 
 to think or to feel. Neither sin's exceeding sinfulness, 
 nor the loving Saviour's exceeding beauty, moves you. 
 There is a strange insensibility creeping over you. And 
 it is the more distressing when you call to mind the 
 livelier emotions of your first love. You were not then 
 so dull and dead. You had gracious impulses and 
 heavenly inspirations then, in which you thought you 
 could place a life-long confidence. Your heart burned 
 within you. Oh ! but did you not make an idol of these 
 movements of the Spirit ? Did you not at all events 
 begin to reckon and rely on them ? You thought that they 
 would naturally, easily, spontaneously, without effort or 
 trouble on your part, work on till they worked out in 
 you the character that was to fit you for glory. It seemed 
 as if there was no occasion now for strict rules and severe 
 habits of application. Your new-born spiritual life would 
 unfold itself better untrammelled, untutored and un- 
 schooled. Alas ! you forgot how slow and sluggish even 
 the renewed soul is in that new spiritual course on which 
 it enters, when it is awakened out of the sleep of death, 
 to receive the light of life ! You thought all would go 
 on well, when once you came under Christian impressions 
 and Christian influences. It seemed as if you were trans- 
 lated into a higher region, in which all must be left to 
 free, spontaneous impulse ; in which pains-taking, busi- 
 ness-like, hard-working, and plodding industry is out of 
 place. Thus you start in the race, anticipating only 
 accelerated speed as you rush on impetuously. But it is 
 an up-hill race, as you soon discover. The old nature in 
 
160 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 you, strained and thwarted, pleads for a little ease, a 
 little rest. You flag and faint. You feel as if your first 
 impressions were all effaced, and your first love all gone. 
 It is a sad discovery. But count it not strange. 
 Rather learn from it the lesson, that even in the spiritual 
 life, free and fresh as it should ever be, you cannot 
 dispense with discipline and rule. Your sanctiflcation 
 must be made a matter of business. It must be cared 
 for and prosecuted in a business-like way ; not indolently 
 and slothfully, as if it were a process that might be left 
 to itself, but industriously, sedulously, diligently, with 
 regularity and punctuality, as you would manage a 
 worldly concern, on the common principles of worldly 
 energy, and worldly care, and worldly zeal. 
 
 Oh ! that in this work of your soul's growth in grace 
 and preparation for glory you were thus "not slothful in 
 business \" "Would that you brought to bear upon it the 
 same systematic industry and attention that you would 
 devote to the business of a secular calling on which your 
 welfare in this world depended ! You would not then, as 
 regards the best interests of your soul, live so loosely, — 
 so much at random, and, as it were, by chance, as you are 
 now but too apt to do. You would not be so ready as you 
 are now to dispense with stated times and fixed rules and 
 methods of devotion. You would task yourself, and have 
 your self-imposed and self-enforced discipline of study, 
 meditation and prayer. You would not disdain the help 
 of means, and methods, and arrangements by which you 
 might force yourself to take an interest in holy exercises 
 and duties, which, without such strict rule, sloth might 
 
NOT SLOTHFUL IN BUSINESS. 161 
 
 tempt you to evade. You would lay down the plan of 
 your spiritual life, and suffer no interruptions to inter- 
 fere with it. You would make conscience of your daily 
 walk with God, in faith and love, being at least as 
 systematically and strenuously attended to as your daily 
 work in the world. You would methodize the one as 
 you methodize the other. In the one, as in the other, 
 you would be " not slothful in business/' 
 
 2. In the work to which you are called, as it were 
 officially, in the Church of Christ, as well as in the work 
 of your personal growth in grace and in the knowledge 
 of Christ, this faculty or habit of business-like energy 
 and order is indispensable. Here, too, you are apt at 
 first to fancy that mere feeling will carry you through. 
 Under the impulse of your own fresh experience of the 
 grace of Christ, — your first love, — you are moved to enlist 
 under his banner. Yours is the fervour of new recruits, 
 of ardent volunteers. "What place will you not occupy, 
 — what danger will you not face, — what will you not 
 do and dare, in the ranks you have so eagerly joined, 
 in the cause you have so warmly espoused ? You spurn 
 the drill and discipline of martinet routine. Your soul 
 is all on fire for action You will go forth at once on 
 your work and office of " teaching transgressors the ways 
 of the Lord, that sinners may be converted to him." You 
 are impetuous and impatient. It is not stern duty with 
 you, but strong excitement. 
 
 But, alas ! may not all this be only, as it were, the 
 undisciplined valour of enthusiasts, taking up arms 
 hastily on the spur of the occasion ? And is that to be 
 
 L 
 
162 CHRISTIANS (XNE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 preferred to the trained skill and hardihood of the 
 regular soldiery, marshalled regularly for the battle ? Be 
 sure that it is this last kind of force that in the long run 
 will win the day. If you would fight for Christ, you must 
 fight deliberately, with cool head as well as warm heart ; 
 with fixed and resolute determination, upon principle 
 rather than upon impulse. If you would work for Christ, 
 you must work systematically, and you must work on 
 with patient and persevering energy, with firm purpose 
 not to give up or to give in. 
 
 There is the utmost danger of fitfulness and remissness 
 here. You take up your position, you enter on your office, 
 you begin your labour of love, whatever it may be, high 
 in hope, sanguine and confident in your bright anticipa- 
 tions of success. There is even a sort of charm and halo 
 of romance about your undertaking. How delightful to 
 have something to do for Christ ; to be able, to be called, 
 to make yourself useful in some way in his Church and 
 for his cause ! Yes, } 7 ou will be up and doing ; you will 
 run to and fro on errands of divine love and affectionate 
 brotherly kindness. You will instruct the ignorant ; you 
 will warn the unruly ; you will reclaim the backslider ; 
 you will train the young ; you will be a helper to the 
 old ; you will visit the sick ; you will minister to the 
 poor ; you will comfort the mourner ; you will speak a 
 word in season to the weary. It will be no drudgery, 
 no task. It will be your privilege, your pleasure, your 
 chief happiness and joy. 
 
 Do I speak to any beloved brother or sister, any 
 young Christian, whose bosom burns with such generous 
 
NOT SLOTHFUL IN BUSINESS. 163 
 
 sentiments, and such gracious feelings as these? Far be it 
 from me to damp the glowing ardour of your souL It is 
 a right and good affection. Keep it, cherish it ; let it 
 grow and increase more and more. But let me remind 
 you that " you have need of patience if you would so do 
 the will of God as to inherit the promise." For, alas ! 
 who that has ever fairly tried the work; — to live for Christ, 
 to speak for Christ, to come to close quarters with men, 
 or women, or children, on Christ's behalf, to discharge a 
 Christian's duty, and do a Christian's office, among the 
 families around his dwelling, or among the members even 
 of his own family ; — will not tell you that it is a work in 
 which pre-eminently you have need of patience ? 
 
 Ah ! my young friend, he will say, it looks all very easy 
 and pleasant beforehand ; it presents a fascinating picture 
 of days of usefulness, rewarded by nights of calm rejoicing 
 over much good done and many grateful thanks received. 
 But once get immersed and involved in it. You will 
 soon find that the picture has its dark side. The labour 
 even of love is not all light. You witness disagreeable 
 scenes. You come in contact with uncongenial manners. 
 Rough usage often awaits you. You have to encounter 
 stubbornness, stupidity, perverseness ; the opposition of 
 anger; or the still more provoking opposition of stolid 
 insensibility. And then your spirit flags ; your nerves 
 give way ; you get discouraged, disheartened, weak, and 
 weary ; and it is often all you can do to drag your aching 
 limbs along the walk of customary duty ; the very walk 
 which, as the walk of joyous love, your feet once trod so 
 lightly. 
 
164 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 Do I hear any advanced servant of the Lord complain- 
 ing thus ? Ah, my brother ! you too I must remind 
 that you have need of patience. You especially I 
 must exhort to be " not slothful in business/' Surely 
 you laid your account with such annoyances as these 
 when you consented to follow Christ. He who called 
 you to follow him bade you count the cost. He told 
 you what you had to expect when, as the Father sent 
 him into the world, so he sent you into the world. Is 
 the disciple above his Master ? Is the servant above his 
 Lord ? Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving 
 against sin. Consider Him who endured such contradic- 
 tion of sinners against himself, lest ye be weary and faint 
 in your mind. And that ye may not be weary, that ye 
 may not faint in your mind, consider how he endured it ; in 
 what spirit, and after what manner. "Wot ye not that I 
 must be about my Fathers business?" — that was his motto 
 throughout. Let it be yours. I must be about my Fathers 
 business. It is not my pleasure, but my Father's busi- 
 ness. I must be about it as my Father's business, what- 
 ever my own frames and feelings may be. It is my 
 Father's business, and it must be done, not for my grati- 
 fication, but for his glory. 
 
 This then is the meaning of the Apostle's maxim, or 
 precept, in both the practical applications of which it is 
 susceptible. 
 
 In the first place, make a business of your personal 
 Christianity ; the cultivation of your Christian char- 
 acter ; your progressive sanctification ; your walk with 
 God ; your walk before God in the world. Make 
 
NOT SLOTHFUL IN BUSINESS. 165 
 
 this your business. Go about it ; keep at it ; in a 
 business-like way. Be diligent in it and about it as a 
 business ; as the business of your lives. Make it your 
 business to be holy, to sanctify yourselves. Read, pray, 
 study, meditate, not as idlers obeying an impulse, but as 
 earnest men, diligently doing business. " Give diligence 
 to make your calling and election sure/' " Giving all dili- 
 gence, add to your faith, virtue; and to virtue, knowledge; 
 and to knowledge, temperance ; and to temperance, patience ; 
 and to patience, godliness ; and to godliness, brotherly-kind- 
 ness; and to brotherly-kindness, charity. For if these 
 things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye 
 shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of 
 our Lord Jesus Christ " (2 Peter i. 5-8). 
 
 And do all this as earnest men, diligently doing busi- 
 ness. Force yourselves often, when you are not inclined, 
 to engage in religious exercises and duties, or to perform 
 acts of self-denial, even when it is, so to speak, against 
 the grain. Be regular, systematic, pains-taking, persever- 
 ing ; fixed in your adherence to some well-considered and 
 well-ordered plan of self- discipline and godly study. No 
 matter though it may be sometimes irksome. Hold on, 
 as earnest men, not slothful in business. Your diligence 
 will have its reward. The Lord will enlarge your hearts. 
 Your toil, even if it be a toil, will become a pleasure. 
 Your path being the path of the just, will be as the shin- 
 ing light, which shineth more and more unto the perfect 
 day. And oh, how blessed, to be secured by such a habit 
 against the self-indulgence and self-seeking, against the 
 fitfulnesses and inconsistencies, that are so apt to charac- 
 
166 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 terize an indolent and uncertain Christianity; and so to be 
 enabled to " adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour by a 
 life and conversation in all things becoming the gospel !" 
 And, secondly, as workers for Christ, having offices to 
 fill and functions to discharge, in your capacity of members 
 of his body, make a business of whatever your hand findeth 
 to do, and be diligent in it and about it as a business. 
 Put yourselves as it were in harness. Set about doing 
 good, not upon impulse, but after a business-like fashion, 
 diligently. Lay your account with meeting what will 
 be but too likely to cool the ardour of your fitful enthu- 
 siasm, if that be your only or your chief motive. The 
 business of doing good as you have opportunity may 
 often weary you. It sometimes wearied Christ. Still he 
 remembered, and do you remember, that it is his Father's 
 business ; his Father's and your Father's. Regarding it 
 in that light, you will not suffer yourselves to " grow 
 weary in well-doing." You will resist all such tendencies. 
 You will hold on ; and as you hold on, you will more 
 and more find your growing insight into the character of 
 him whose business it is, and your growing sympathy 
 with him in his business, turning all into a labour of love 
 indeed. You will become more and more engrossed in it, 
 as a labour of love. It will be to you, this business of 
 your Father, which is the doing of good and the saving 
 of souls, as little of a drudgery, and as much of a delight, 
 as ever the high toil of learning was to the most ardent 
 student, or the sleepless care of empire to ambition's most 
 aspiring votary. It will be your meat to do your Father's 
 will. 
 
FERVENT IN SPIRIT. 167 
 
 IT. As in respect of the diligence with which the Lord's 
 work is to be done, you are to be not slothful; so in respect 
 of the spirit in which it is to be done, you are to be 
 " fervent." 
 
 The idea suggested by the word "fervent," is that of water 
 heated to the boiling point. The figure is common in poetry 
 and rhetoric. We speak of a man boiling with resentment; 
 boiling over with rage. And the more generous and gentle 
 affections, as well as the fiercer passions, are represented 
 as working in this way. A patriot's soul boils over with 
 indignation at his country's wrongs. A kind heart boils 
 over with compassion when it sees a brother's woe. 
 Warmth, enthusiasm, zeal; amounting even, if there be 
 occasion, to passionate grief, or pity, or anger ; such is the 
 frame or temperament here commended or enjoined. 
 
 The fervency, however, is to be spiritual. It is not 
 animal excitement. It is not the natural fire or fer- 
 vency of a hot and heady temper; or of keen, nervous 
 sensibility and susceptibility ; or of vehement personal 
 feeling, unaccustomed to self-control. Fervency of one or 
 other of these, or the like kinds, has often taken posses- 
 sion of Christian men, in their devotions and their doings, 
 with little credit or profit to the cause of Christianity. 
 Many a season of revival has been thus marred; many 
 scandals, and even crimes, have had a sacred halo shed 
 in this way over the bad motives that prompted them. 
 The wrath of man has thus sought to work the righteous- 
 ness of God. Worship has got to be a frenzy, and work 
 a riot or a fight, through nature's boilings and boilings 
 over being mistaken for those of grace and of the Spirit. 
 
168 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 For it is in the Spirit that you are to be fervent. So 
 the clause may be understood: and probably so it ought 
 to be understood. The expression indeed must be ad- 
 mitted to be ambiguous or doubtful. " Fervent in spirit," 
 is a fair enough way of putting it. And the meaning may 
 be, that you are to be fervent in your spirit; fervent in 
 the spiritual part of your nature ; fervent in that new 
 spiritual life and being of yours into which, as members 
 of Christ and of his body, you enter. You are spiritual 
 men. It is as spiritual men, and not merely as busi- 
 ness men, that you are called to undertake offices and 
 functions in the Church, — to work in, and with, and 
 for, Christ. See that in your spirituality you are fervent. 
 Let yours be not a cold or lukewarm spirituality, but a 
 spirituality that is hot and boiling. On the other hand, 
 it may with at least equal propriety be maintained, that 
 it is the Holy Spirit, as personally dwelling in you, that 
 is meant. " Fervent in the Spirit" is an exact rendering 
 of the original. But in fact the two renderings are at one : 
 fervent in spirit ; fervent in the Spirit. The fervency is, 
 in every view of it, spiritual. It is so, inasmuch as it is 
 fervency, not in the natural, but in the spiritual part of 
 you : fervency working in you, not as carnal, but as 
 spiritual. And it is so also because it is fervency wrought 
 in you by the Holy Spirit. The last clause of this triune 
 verse undoubtedly refers to Christ personally; — " serving 
 the Lord." There is a congruity or suitableness in there 
 being a reference also in the second clause to the Holy 
 Spirit personally. And the three clauses thus hang well 
 together. Do your work — or rather, be about your 
 
FERVENT IN SPIRIT. 169 
 
 Father's business — diligently ; let there be no slackness 
 or sloth in your diligence. Do it as those who are warmed 
 by the Holy Ghost. Do it as those who serve the Lord 
 Christ. 
 
 This fervency, then, is to be spiritual. It is to have its 
 seat in the heart's core of your spiritual life; it is to be 
 the direct fruit of the Spirit there. 
 
 1. Observe, in the first place, generally, that to be 
 fervent in spirit is something more than mere earnest- 
 ness. Doing the work simply as a matter of business, 
 you may do it very earnestly; taking a real interest in 
 it, throwing your whole soul into it. But the interest 
 which you take in it may be such as you might take in 
 any employment that stimulated your activity and gave 
 scope for the exercise of your natural sensibility. You 
 may throw your soul into it, as into some heroic enter- 
 prise or sentimental scheme, that had power to charm by 
 its novelty or fascinate by its romance. "But the essential 
 element of real spirituality may be wanting; and with 
 much bustling stir and much boiling enthusiasm in what 
 you take to be religious work and duty, you may still 
 need to be affectionately warned, that " to be carnally - 
 minded is death, but to be spiritually-minded is life and 
 peace." 
 
 For genuine spirituality is faith ; intelligent and loving 
 faith; not feeling, but faith ; the faith which understands, 
 embraces, loves the Saviour Jesus Christ. It reposes on 
 a calm sense of the love of God in his Son. It is the 
 peace of God which passeth understanding, keeping your 
 hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. 
 
170 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 2. Hence, let it be observed, in the second place, more 
 particularly, as to what it is to be fervent in spirit, — that 
 it is a frame or habit of mind opposed to that turbulence 
 which invariably marks, more or less, the religious striv- 
 ings of those whose consciences are uneasy and unsettled 
 on the great question of their personal standing before 
 God; their acceptance in his sight. Look at such a one 
 as Paul, while he was yet a Pharisee. He was no tame, 
 self-righteous formalist. He was no dull plodder, pacing 
 with unflagging diligence the incessant round of pious 
 observances, working hard as any dray-horse at his 
 appointed task or self-imposed toil. There was fire in his 
 eye, and boiling passion in his bosom. He was zealous, 
 even to slaying. He would compass sea and land to 
 make proselytes. Fervent he was : and one would say 
 his fervency was surely spiritual. It all related to 
 spiritual matters. It was all expended on spiritual 
 movements and spiritual objects. But it bore the impress 
 of an unquiet conscience and a mind ill at ease. The 
 man was working, often in hot haste and with a sort of 
 fierce energy; lacerating himself, persecuting others. 
 But it was the haste and energy of one unhappy, and 
 struggling almost with despair. Or if in another mood 
 of mind, he came forth from his devotions in the temple 
 exulting, and went abroad on his service of duty, even 
 joyous, there might be seen in his conscious look and air 
 of complacency and defiance, the working of a soul rather 
 for the moment on good terms with itself, than per- 
 manently reconciled and habitually submissive to its God. 
 Thus to vibrate or alternate between the desperate vehe- 
 
FERVENT IN SPIRIT. 1 71 
 
 mence of one who battles for his very life, and battles, 
 alas! in the dark, and the heady impetuosity of one 
 whom a fit of self-assurance has elated, — this is a state 
 or habit of soul not allied, but opposed, to that genial, 
 perennial glow of warm affection, which alone is worthy 
 to be called fervency of spirit, such fervency as the Holy 
 Spirit inspires. For that is a frame of mind peculiarly 
 and pre-eminently unselfish ; free alike from the feverish 
 agitation of selfish fear, and from the fitful excitement 
 of selfish confidence. 
 
 3. Hence again, let it be observed, still more particu- 
 larly, in the third place, that the very first condition of this 
 spiritual fervency is that clear insight into the divine 
 method of peace, or that belief of the truth as it is in 
 Jesus, which casts out self -righteousness, self-seeking, and 
 self-esteem. " It is a good thing that the heart be estab- 
 lished with grace, not with meats, which have not profited 
 them that have been exercised therein" (Heb. xiii. 9). 
 It is so on many accounts and for many reasons; among 
 others for this, that the grace which establishes the heart, 
 while it quenches one fire there, kindles another and a 
 better ; — brighter, purer, warmer by far. 
 
 The fire which it quenches is the fire of merely natural 
 feeling in religion : the natural feeling of selfish anxiety 
 and alarm on the one hand, or the natural feeling of 
 selfish elation on the other. That fire may burn very 
 strongly, causing the swelling tide in your agitated 
 bosom to boil fiercely over. Your natural feelings, stirred 
 and quickened by some spiritual movement, — some 
 work of the Spirit in you, — may raise a violent tumult in 
 
172 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 your bosom. Remorse of conscience, an awful sense of 
 sin, a terrible fear of wrath, the horror as of an open 
 vision of heaven all but lost and hell already near, may 
 possess you; and under that impulse you may apply 
 yourselves hastily, and oh, how vehemently and warmly, 
 to whatever your hand findeth to do that may " the 
 tempest of your boiling blood becalm." Relieved per- 
 haps by some desperate expedients of self-righteous zeal, 
 with a rebound from that dark agony, you rush to the 
 very opposite extreme. Your heated soul now swells 
 with latent pride ; the pride of conscious merit, disguising 
 itself under the mask of fervent and even passionate 
 devotion ; such devotion as might light the flame of a 
 new crusade, or send another Jesuit Zavier to convert the 
 Indies. These feelings of either kind, are real and genuine. 
 They often prevail, more or less, wherever religious earnest- 
 ness is revived. But they are simply natural. They 
 are occupied, no doubt, about spiritual things, conversant 
 with spiritual thoughts and experiences, occasioned and 
 caused by spiritual movements. It may even be a work 
 of the Holy Spirit in the inner man that gives rise to 
 them ; a work of conviction and awakening. Still they are 
 not the proper fruit of the Spirit. If His work is arrested 
 when such feelings merely are produced ; if from any cause 
 it stops short there; it is not saving: nor is the fervour 
 that may spring out of it spiritual fervour. It is, on the 
 contrary, essentially carnal. It is of the flesh. And the 
 works it does are works of the flesh. It is the fervour, 
 not of the Spirit, but of nature : of nature put in agita- 
 tion by contact with the Spirit's fire, but still of nature 
 
FERVENT IN SPIRIT. ] 73 
 
 only. It is nature, or the natural feelings, worked upon 
 by the things of the Spirit of God. 
 
 But now let grace prevail, the grace by which the heart 
 is established ; the free, rich, sovereign grace, which the glo- 
 rious gospel proclaims; the grace, gratuitous, unconditional, 
 unreserved, which the Father holds out to you in the Son, 
 and which the Spirit moves you to accept. Be ye under 
 grace ; let grace reign in you, through righteousness, unto 
 eternal life. Let the work of the Spirit in you be, not in- 
 itial merely, but conclusive — not partial, but complete and 
 thorough. Let Him thoroughly and completely unite you 
 to Christ, and show you how thoroughly you are complete 
 in Christ. Let there be no more attempts on your part 
 to right yourselves with God, or even any wish to right 
 yourselves with God, by any painful discipline of self- 
 imposed penance, or any great doings, such as excited 
 feelings of contrition and fear might prompt you to aim 
 at. Nor let there be any more of the sort of high- wrought 
 complacency which the idea of your righting yourselves 
 with God is sure to foster. Let God put you right with 
 himself. Believe that he does so, and trust him accord- 
 ingly. Receive his love as his own gift, his present gift, 
 absolutely and out and out his gift, his gift to you. 
 Accept at his hands free pardon and peace; full rardon, 
 perfect peace. Upon the credit of his own word, believe 
 and be sure, that " he hath given to us eternal life, and 
 that this life is in his Son," (1 John v. 11.) 
 
 Plainly now, in the first place, those old natural 
 fires, which, when fanned by winds from the spiritual 
 region, made the heart and bosom burn, are extin- 
 
174 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 guished and die out. There is no room now for the feel- 
 ings of keen self-torture, or hot and heady self-elation, 
 which once by turns inflamed the unsteadfast soul. 
 And then, secondly, new fires are kindled; feelings of 
 an entirely new kind come in to occupy the place of the 
 expelled. Ah ! how far more gentle are they, and how 
 far more calm! and withaJ, how warm, how steadily and 
 uniformly warm ! Not spasmodic bursts of flame, but a 
 quiet and constant glow, now keeps the heart aboil. 
 They fluctuate, it is true, these feelings. Their new fire 
 too often flickers. Alas! the more the pity. There is 
 nothing in them or about them that should make them 
 fluctuate or flicker; nothing like the exciting and ex- 
 hausting fury of those passions which may rend the 
 untamed and unsubdued spirit of a proud and guilty man 
 in pieces. The feelings which are to warm you for work, 
 and to keep you warm in working, are of a character to 
 continue with you; — and to continue with you substan- 
 tially always the same. For the source of them continues 
 always the same. That source is Christ; Christ living 
 in you; Christ in you, the hope of glory. Let his word 
 dwell in you richly. Let the love of God in Christ be shed 
 abroad in your hearts by the Holy Ghost, which is given 
 to you. Go to work now; keep at work now; under the 
 influence of that love, known, believed, felt by you to be 
 all freely yours. Will not this make you not only dili- 
 gent in business, but fervent in spirit, at your work ? 
 
 Oh, with what fervour should your bosom glow, ye who 
 are thus debtors to grace, when you go about your Father's 
 business, counting it your meat to do the will of Him that 
 
FERVENT IN SPIRIT. 175 
 
 sends you, and to finish his work ! You go about it all 
 as his children, accepted in the Beloved. Of every one of 
 you, as of him, the Father says, " This is my beloved son, 
 in whom I am well pleased." On every one of you, as 
 on him, the Holy Ghost descends like a dove. In every 
 one of you, as in him, the Spirit, crying " Abba, Father," 
 dwells. How can you work coldly, hardly ; — as if it were 
 upon mere compulsion ; as if you were driven to it by 
 dire necessity, by the lash ; as if you could only make a 
 toil and drudgery of it ? How can you work thus at the 
 business of such a Father, of one who deals with you so 
 graciously, receives you so fondly, loves you so freely? 
 Surely, if at any time you find his business, any business 
 of his that he would have you to go about, hanging heavy 
 on your hearts; if ever, when he says, " Son, go work in 
 my vineyard," you are tempted to say, "I will not;" or 
 if you go, to go with a grudge and as to a task ; — surely it 
 is a sign that your faith is failing. Surely, when you 
 love little, you forget how much you are forgiven. 
 
 Is it so? Is it because you feel sin less than you once 
 did, — that you feel the love shown in its forgiveness less 
 than you once did also? Is that the reason why, in 
 your religious duties, in working the work of Him that 
 sends you, you are less fervent in spirit than you would 
 desire to be, — perhaps than you were wont to be? 
 
 Then read and ponder that wondrous passage in which 
 the prophet Isaiah records the manner of his preparation for 
 the office he was to fill, and the work he was to accomplish. 1 
 
 1 " In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a 
 throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Above it stood the 
 
176 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 Let the Spirit carry you where he carried the prophet 
 of old. Let Him place you where he placed him ; within 
 the veil. Let Him show you what he showed him ; 
 the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, his 
 train filling the temple ; — seraphim standing above ; one 
 crying to another, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of 
 hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory/' Then, in 
 that awful presence, let the Spirit smite you, as he smote 
 the prophet, and lay you flat upon your face before the 
 Holy One. Let him bring your own sin, that you have 
 been ceasing to feel, and the world's sin, that you have 
 been beginning to tolerate, vividly before your startled eye. 
 Let him move you as he moved the prophet, under a new 
 discovery of the Lord's holiness and sin's exceeding sinful- 
 ness, to exclaim, " Woe is me ! for I am undone ; because I 
 am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell among a people of 
 unclean lips : for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord 
 of hosts." Then let the Spirit minister to you, as he minis- 
 tered to the prophet's prostrate, stricken soul. Let a live 
 coal from off the altar touch your mouth. Hark ! what 
 words are these? <4 Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine 
 iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged." Yes, if you 
 
 seraphims: each one Lad six wings ; with twain lie covered his face, and with 
 twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And one cried unto 
 another, and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts : the whole earth is full 
 of his glory. And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, 
 and the house was filled with smoke. Then said I, Woe is me ! for I am un- 
 done ; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people 
 of unclean lips ; for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. Then 
 flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had 
 taken with the tongs from off" the altar : and he laid it upon my mouth, and said, 
 Lo, this hath touched thy lips ; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin 
 purged. Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and 
 who will go for us 1 Then said I, Here am I ; send me " (Isa. vi. 1-8). 
 
SERVING THE LORD. 1 77 
 
 are forgetting your first love, repent and do the first 
 works. Get anew much forgiveness for your much sin. 
 Then, when you hear, as the prophet heard, the voice of 
 the Lord, saying, " Whom shall I send, and who will go 
 for us?" — it will be with no cold sense of irksome duty, 
 but with much love, springing out of much forgiveness, 
 that, fervent in spirit, you will join the prophet in his 
 prompt and eager reply, "Then said I, Here am I ; send me." 
 
 III. As in any and in every work you have to do, you 
 are to be diligent in business and fervent in spirit, so you 
 are to do it always as " serving the Lord." You are to do 
 it, not as a work voluntarily undertaken, but as a service 
 imposed and required by a master. 
 
 It is true that, as in Isaiah's case, the Lord may seem 
 to put it to yourselves to come forward for his service of 
 your own accord. In great kindness and condescension, 
 he allows you the satisfaction of offering yourselves as 
 volunteers. Your engagement with him is to have the 
 grace, or graceful aspect, of being not so much a stern 
 command on his part, leaving you no alternative but to 
 enlist ; but rather, in the first instance, a spontaneous act 
 on your part, hastening to place yourselves and your 
 services at his disposal. 
 
 Let it be observed, however, in the first place, that to 
 one exercised as the prophet has been exercised, to one 
 dealt with as he has been dealt with, the very hearing, 
 or as it were overhearing by accident, that voice of the 
 Lord, " Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" has 
 all the force of a command. He must feel that the very 
 at 
 
178 CHRISTIANS ONE EODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 idea of that Holy One, by whom he has been so wonder- 
 fully humbled first, and then lifted up, having work to 
 be done, errands to be executed, lays him under an obli- 
 gation to say, " Here am I." He has absolutely no alterna- 
 tive here, any more than if the most peremptory order had 
 been issued. He is very thankful for the generous con- 
 sideration which allows him to have the pleasure of volun- 
 teering ; but he cannot on that account for a moment 
 imagine that he has really any discretion in the matter, 
 or any right to hesitate or hang back. 
 
 And then, secondly, at all events, when he is enlisted 
 and engaged; when his offer is accepted, and he is taken 
 at his word ; he is clearly now a servant under the yoke. 
 He is not at liberty to decline any work that may be 
 assigned to him, however difficult and laborious ; however 
 perilous and painful to flesh and blood. It may be dif- 
 ferent from what he anticipated; not so pleasant, not so 
 honourable. But what of that? When he offered him- 
 self, he asked no questions; he had no right to ask any. 
 He stipulated for no conditions; it would have been 
 unbelief to do so. Unreservedly he said, " Whatever be 
 the errand, here am I ; send me. n And he cannot qualify 
 his offer, or attempt to make terms, now. Nor is this all. 
 Not only must he undertake, as a servant, whatever work 
 the Lord appoints; but he must go through with it as a 
 servant. He must feel himself to be a servant, bound to 
 do the work, be it what it may. He must feel himself 
 to be a servant, from first to last, in the doing of it. 
 
 This is a most important point, a most material ele- 
 ment, as regards the manner in which the Lord's work 
 
SERVING THE LORD. 179 
 
 • 
 
 is to be done. It is essential to harmonize and temper 
 the other two qualities : diligence in business, and fervency 
 in spirit. The three agree in one. You may do the 
 Lord's work with untiring business-like industry and 
 attention. You may do it with lively interest, with 
 warm, affectionate enthusiasm. You may be busy about 
 it, and fervent about it ; throwing into it your whole 
 heart, as well as your whole mind and soul. And yet 
 there is a risk of it being ill done after all, if you forget 
 that you are to do it as the Lord's servants, and as all 
 throughout apprehending and realizing yourselves, in the 
 doing of it, to be the Lord's servants. 
 
 But is not this, you may ask, a lowering of the 
 whole tone and style of my intercourse with the Lord, 
 and my engagement for his work? After all seemed to 
 be placed on the footing of a large and free commerce 
 of love and confidence ; — when the adjustment of the 
 whole question of my standing with God, and my re- 
 lation to him, had been taken out of the hands of law, 
 and out of the category of legal bargaining, and trans- 
 ferred to a higher region, in which grace and honour 
 reign ; — am I again to come down to the level of a menial 
 condition, and own myself to be a servant? Yes, brother ; 
 and if you please, a hired servant too. And why should 
 this offend you? It did not offend Christ when he was 
 doing his Father's work on earth. He did it as a servant; 
 yes, even as a hired servant ; when, " for the joy that was 
 set before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame." 
 Would you be better or higher than he? Nay, for that 
 matter, would you choose to be like the ungodly? They 
 
180 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 are impatient of the position of a servant. " Our lips are 
 our own ; who is lord over us?" " Who is the Almighty, 
 that we should serve him V — that is the language of 
 their hearts. Let us be our own masters. By all 
 means let us show our respect and do our duty to our 
 Maker. But let it be at our own discretion. We shall 
 take our own time and our own way of doing it. That 
 such should be their feelings need not appear surprising ; 
 but that any of you who believe, and believing, are the 
 Lord's children, should in any measure sympathize with 
 them in such feelings, is surely passing strange and sad. 
 
 And yet you are sometimes tempted almost to wish 
 that you were left more to yourselves in your religion. 
 It seems a poor way of manifesting the fervency of love, 
 to be merely obedient servants, keeping the command- 
 ments of a master. You would do some greater thing. 
 You would devise some more excellent way. You would 
 work unbidden; you would run unsent. Trust us, you 
 are tempted inwardly to say to your Lord and Saviour ; 
 let us be put upon our honour. Instead of always 
 reminding us that we are thy servants, and thou our 
 Lord, confide in our good faith, and see if the generous 
 impulse of warm affection, seizing spontaneously on the 
 best means and methods of pleasing him who is its object, 
 will not go further than the most scrupulous sense of duty, 
 executing, as a servant, the orders even of the very best of 
 masters. 
 
 So you may be apt to feel, when your soul boils over 
 with love to Him who first loved you, and your heart 
 burns within you. But beware lest in all this there 
 
SERVING THE LORD. 181 
 
 be something like a lurking inclination to evade the idea 
 of obligation and responsibility. That idea is not natu- 
 rally a welcome one ; — no, not even always to you who 
 are no more servants merely, but friends and sons as well. 
 But why should it not be welcome? Obligation and 
 responsibility are not badges of degradation. On the 
 contrary, for intelligent creatures, on a right footing with 
 their Creator, they are elements and conditions of highest 
 glory and purest joy. Angels in heaven now work as 
 servants ; nay, as hired servants ; for He whom they 
 serve will never accept service unrequited. They work 
 as servants, under obligation; upon their responsibility. 
 It is in that character and capacity that they are sum- 
 moned to join in the universal song of praise ; — " Bless the 
 Lord, ye his angels, that excel in strength, that do his 
 commandments, hearkening unto the voice of his word. 
 Bless ye the Lord, all ye his hosts; ye ministers of his, that 
 do his pleasure" (Ps. ciii. 20, 21). Saints in heaven here- 
 after will work in like manner ; in fact, one chief element 
 of heaven's blessedness and glory is this, that there " His 
 servants shall serve him" (Rev. xxii. 3). And be sure 
 that as to all your work here on earth, you will do it all 
 the better if you do it, not as at your own hand, but as 
 " serving the Lord." It is thus only that your diligence in 
 business will be conscientious, and your fervency in spirit 
 constant and consistent. Your whole religion, personal 
 and official ; — personal, as bearing on your own sane tin" - 
 cation and salvation ; and official, as it relates to the doing 
 of the Lord's will in the world, and the executing of 
 your mission from the Lord into the world ; — your 
 
182 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 whole religion will possess a strong and stable character ; 
 it will have all the stability and strength of a threefold 
 cord that is not quickly broken. It will be your life- 
 business, to which, as your life-business, you will not 
 slothfully, but sedulously and systematically, devote your 
 energy. It will be your life-joy, your labour of love, 
 in which your fervent soul delights to give scope and 
 vent to the grateful and gracious feelings that the Spirit 
 causes to rise up and boil over in your bosom. And it 
 will be your life -business and your life-joy, because it is 
 your life-service; — your life-service, of which you calmly 
 and steadily at all times make conscience. For you work 
 and watch as servants, looking for the coming of Him 
 who is to call you to account ; who is bountifully, liberally, 
 generously to recompense the very giving of a cup of cold 
 water in his name ; and from whose gracious hands they 
 who are faithful unto death are to receive the crown of 
 life. 
 
REJOICING IN HOPE. 183 
 
 VI. 
 HOPE— PATIENCE— PRAYER. 
 
 Rejoicing in hope ; patient in tribulation ; continuing instant in prayer."— 
 Rom. xii. 12. 
 
 These three features of character, or habits of the inner 
 life, are intimately connected. They are qualities most 
 important to all who work in the Church and in the 
 cause of Christ, as members of the one body of Christ ; 
 having different gifts and offices ; animated by a love 
 that is genuine and discriminating, true and pure, and a 
 brotherly love that is affectionate and humble ; diligent 
 in the work as a matter of business ; fervent and zealous 
 about it as a spiritual concern ; and conscientious in it 
 as the service of the Lord. 
 
 Believing in Jesus, and called as believers to be fellow- 
 labourers with him, you have need of a temper or frame 
 of mind equal to either fortune; not insensible to the joy 
 of hope, yet capable of endurance when trouble comes ; 
 and finding at once the outlet of its joy, and the stay and 
 strength of its endurance, in that prayer of faith in which 
 it continues instant evermore. For it is this last habit 
 of the inner life that firmly binds and knits together the 
 other two ; and imparts to the feeblest member of 
 
3 84 CHEISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 Christ's body, working with fear and trembling the 
 Lord's work, a character of serene inward equanimity, 
 whatever the outward aspect of affairs may be ; such a 
 character of equanimity as, in philosophic schools, is wont 
 to be considered the highest and rarest attainment of 
 human wisdom. To rise above the influence of things 
 without, — things over which the mind has no control ; to 
 steel the heart, in stern insensibility, as in a panoply of 
 triple brass, against feelings of pleasure or pain, of weal or 
 woe ; is the idle boast of stoical virtue or stoical pride. 
 To be praying always; holding on and continuing instant 
 and incessant in prayer ; is your far better specific for 
 preserving an equal mind, whatever may befall you ; 
 preserving it, not at the cost of a warm, loving, feeling 
 heart, that may be moved to tears and gladness ; but by 
 means of that heart's communion, in its gladness and in its 
 tears, with its God. Your joy in hope, and your patience 
 in tribulation, are sustained and sanctified by your con- 
 tinuing instant in prayer. 
 
 I. You are to be found at your appointed post, and in 
 your allotted labour, " rejoicing in hope." This is not 
 your privilege merely, but your duty. It is the way in 
 which the Lord would have you to go about his work, 
 whatever your department of that work may be. He 
 would have you to go about it hopefully, and therefore 
 joyfully ; — in a hopeful, and therefore a joyful, spirit ; — 
 1. In hope ; and, 2. Rejoicing in hope. 
 
 1. You work in hope. You ought to see, and feel, and 
 acknowledge that you do so. 
 
REJOICING IN HOPE. 185 
 
 The word " hope," as here used, refers, it must be ad- 
 mitted, not so much to the inward sentiment as to the 
 outward occasion of it. The idea is that of your rejoicing 
 when there is ground of hope — when matters look hope- 
 ful ; just as the corresponding idea is that of your being 
 patient when there is cause of trouble. But you all know 
 how much the state of things around you, — the crowd of 
 circumstances in the midst of which you are placed, — takes 
 its colour from the mood of the mind within. A sanguine 
 temperament will see brightest promise of dawning day 
 where, to one apt to despond, there is nothing but the 
 gloom of night. You are to rejoice in hope, in whatever 
 is hopeful, in connection with the work given you to do. 
 Plainly, if that is your duty, you must note what is hope- 
 ful. You must look out for it and recognise it. To let 
 any hopeful sign or symptom escape your observation, is 
 not only folly, but ingratitude and sin. 
 
 Almost all things on this side of the grave have their 
 fair side as well as their foul. The blackest cloud has 
 some lining of silvery white. " In everything give 
 thanks/' says the Apostle ; " for this is the will of God in 
 Christ Jesus concerning you." If that be the will of 
 God, he must be understood as undertaking for it, that 
 in everything you shall have some cause of thanksgiving. 
 Let it be yours to seize thankfully some germ of hope, 
 in every work and in every way of the Lord. 
 
 For yourselves, never despair. While there is life 
 there is hope. In the worst straits of temporal dis- 
 tress ; steeped in poverty ; worn with sickness ; heart- 
 broken under the pressure of family sorrow, or family 
 
186 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 sin ; threatened with the loss of all earthly goods ; ready 
 to say with Jacob, " All these things are against me ;" — 
 still search, be ever searching, for some gleam of hope. 
 Let your heart be cheered by the twilight of better 
 days that may be coming. And in spiritual trials ; 
 when you see not your signs ; and there is none to tell 
 you how long ; when your sin finds you out, and you 
 feel as if you could not find out your Saviour; still 
 never despair. Watch and wait for something hopeful. 
 Lay hold of what is hopeful in your most desperate plight. 
 For there is always something hopeful in your most 
 desperate plight here below. There is some word of God 
 borne in upon your mind. There is some stirring of soul 
 within you ; some moving of the Spirit upon its dark 
 and troubled waters. There is some memory of Christ, 
 the sinner's Friend. Lay hold of that. Be sure that 
 there is hope for you still. Catch, as a drowning man 
 would catch, at any straw. If you are in earnest ; if it 
 is really with you an affair of eternity, and of your soul's 
 salvation in eternity; what you catch at, in trembling 
 faith, will prove no straw, no shadow, but "a hope that 
 maketh not ashamed." 
 
 And in serving the Lord, as well as in seeking the 
 Lord, never despair. It may be little that you can do for 
 him ; and what little you can do, may seem to bear little 
 fruit. What means have you, in your humble sphere, of 
 either glorifying God or doing good to men ? Situated as 
 you are, destitute of advantages which others have, — 
 wealth, leisure, talent, influence — what opportunities of 
 usefulness can you find ? Of what avail would it be for 
 
REJOICING IN HOPE. 187 
 
 you to offer yourself for any ministry in the Lord's cause, 
 or to take up any marked position on the Lord's side ? 
 What hope could 3'ou have of being listened to, and at- 
 tended to, in anything you might say ? What hope of 
 anything you could do making any impression on Satan's 
 kingdom, or winning any trophy or triumph for the King 
 in Zion? Think not thus; feel not thus. It is a tempta- 
 tion. It is the suggestion of sloth, of selfishness, of un- 
 belief. It is not true humility, but false pride. Rather 
 learn to take a hopeful view of your position, and of the 
 facilities which it affords for labours of love, as well as for 
 growth in grace. Think of what many, not so well off 
 by far as you, with tenfold more discouragements than you 
 have to contend with, have been enabled to become, and 
 have been honoured to accomplish ; children far younger 
 than you ; men far poorer than you ; women far weaker 
 than you ; merchants, artisans, lawyers, physicians, far 
 busier than any of you ; plain, simple Christians, of far 
 meaner capacity, and more slender endowments, than the 
 least gifted among you, in your most self-depreciating 
 mood, can pretend to be. Take courage then. Be decided. 
 Set about the work of living, testifying, acting for the 
 Lord, in all that you say and do. It is a hopeful work, 
 even for you. Set about it hopefully. Nor let the first 
 or second difficulty or disappointment you may meet 
 with — no, nor the hundredth, disconcert you, or drive 
 you to despair. Look out still always for hopeful 
 symptoms, hopeful signs. Do you stumble or fall? 
 Ask the Lord to raise you up again. Do you fail once, 
 or twice, or ten times? Ask the Lord to give you 
 
188 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 grace that you may try again. Let the subject you 
 would operate upon be ever so impracticable, and let the 
 case you have to deal with be apparently ever so unman- 
 ageable, do not give him up, do not give it up as desper- 
 ate. Continue to operate upon the impracticable subject, 
 and to deal with the unmanageable case, " against hope, 
 believing in hope" (Rom. iv. 18). 
 
 Christian father, Christian mother, despair not of thy 
 poor prodigal child ! Thou hast laid hold of the covenant 
 for him ; thou hast dedicated him to the Lord when he 
 was but a babe. Thou hast sown good seed in his soul, 
 and sought a blessing from the Lord on thy sowing of it. 
 Hold on hopefully in faith. All is not lost. There are 
 promises on which thy faith may fasten. There is ground 
 of hope in the faithfulness and pity of Him whose promises 
 thy faith grasps. Plead, then, with the child of thy love ; 
 pray for him. Plead with him and pray for him, con- 
 tinuing still hopeful. Child of God, little child, forced in 
 that dreary home of thine to recognise, in sister, brother, 
 father, mother, one whom Satan is leading captive ; when 
 thy tender heart is all but breaking ; pierced with many 
 a bitter pang ; as all thy earnest, plaintive entreaties, re- 
 monstrances and tears, are met only with rude and sinful 
 scoffing ; be not altogether cast down. The wretched victim 
 and slave of vice, — whom still thou lovest so dearly, — 
 for the welfare of whose soul and body thou art so affec 
 tionately anxious, — for whose salvation thou wouldest lay 
 down thy life, — sees thee bending thy knee to God: hears 
 thee singing thy simple, holy hymn, or pouring out thy 
 heart in cries and supplications for mercy to the lost. 
 
REJOICING IN HOPE. 189 
 
 Be hopeful still The meekness and gentleness of Christ 
 shown in thee may, — shall I say, must? — by his own 
 gracious blessing, prevail at last. Thy prayers and pains, 
 thou mayest hope, will in the end win the day. 
 
 In every walk of common life, as well as in every 
 enterprise of piety or philanthropy, the believer does 
 well to cultivate a hopeful spirit, in serving the Lord. 
 Accustom yourself, in all circumstances, to discover and 
 dwell upon what is fitted, not to dishearten, but to 
 cheer and encourage you, in fighting the good fight, 
 and persevering in the right way. If it is the Lord's 
 work that you are engaged in, — and whatever work you 
 do, doing it unto the Lord, and for the Lord, becomes 
 his, — it must be more or less hopeful. The Lord must 
 see to it that in one way or another good shall come 
 out of it. To think otherwise, would be ungrateful and 
 ungracious. Learn, therefore, more and more, the lesson 
 of anticipating good rather than evil, when you are doing 
 good. Remember that true charity, genuine love, 
 " hopeth all things." 
 
 2. Working thus in hope, you rejoice in the hope in 
 which you work. It is a hope in which you may rejoice. 
 For it is a hope " that maketh not ashamed." 
 
 It is of Christian hope alone that this can be said. 
 All other hope is proverbially fallacious, and puts to 
 shame those whom it misleads. 
 
 " Condemned to hope's delusive mine, 
 We onward toil from day to day ; " 
 
 — and still, as we toil on, thinking at every moment that 
 we have the precious ore of happiness and full contentment 
 
190 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 in our grasp ; succeeding, and disappointed in our very 
 success ; the mine of hope in which we are condemned to 
 toil is felt, the longer we toil in it, to be more and more 
 delusive. The joy of such a hope as that is like the 
 " laughter of fools, which is as the crackling of thorns under 
 a pot." It is like the joy of the belated wanderer in the 
 dark and dreary wilderness, when his eye catches the 
 dazzling meteor that is shining only to plunge him in 
 the fatal bog. 
 
 But your hope, believers, is one in which you may 
 confidently rejoice. 
 
 For, in the first place, its object is sure and satisfying; 
 — sure of being attained ; satisfying when attained. For 
 yourselves personally, it is the glory of God ; the ap- 
 proving smile and gracious reward of your reconciled 
 Father, who is " not unrighteous to forget your work 
 and labour of love." And beyond yourselves, apart 
 from your own personal interest and concern, which 
 is your complete salvation, you have a great and 
 certain object of hope, in the final, glorious, and ever- 
 lasting triumph of Christ and his righteous kingdom of 
 peace. It is upon nothing doubtful, either as regards 
 its being fulfilled at all, or as regards its giving con- 
 tentment when fulfilled, that your expectation is set. 
 Yours is a hope, sure of its object being got, — and sure 
 also of its object, when got, being found to yield full 
 and lasting bliss. For it is a hope bound up with the 
 hope held out to your Redeemer and Lord himself, in that 
 promise of the Father to him : " He shall see of the travail 
 of his soul, and shall be satisfied." 
 
REJOICING IN HOPE. 191 
 
 Then, secondly, the ground or warrant of your hope is 
 sure ; it is the divine faithfulness ; the faithfulness of the 
 divine word. You set your hope in God. Your hope is 
 in the Lord your God. 
 
 And, in the third place, the source of this hope in you 
 may give you assurance of it. It is a hope wrought in you 
 by the Lord himself. It is the fruit of the Spirit. You 
 may appeal, therefore, to God and say, "Remember thy word 
 unto thy servant, upon which thou hast caused me to hope" 
 (Ps. cxix. 49). He will not make void the word which 
 is his own. The hope which his own Spirit has caused 
 you to place upon that word will not make you ashamed. 
 
 You may well, therefore, in every view of it, rejoice 
 in hope, as you wait for the salvation of the Lord. And 
 not only with reference to what is the end of your faith, 
 as regards yourselves, which is the salvation of your souls ; 
 and with reference to what is the end of jovlv desire and 
 expectation, as regards the kingdom of God, which is the 
 final overthrow of evil and the eternal victory of good ; — 
 not only with reference to these ultimate results, may 
 you rejoice in hope ; but with reference also to whatever 
 is promising and encouraging, in the meanwhile, in your 
 present experience ; — as, on the one hand, you work out 
 in detail your own salvation ; and as, on the other hand, 
 you are busy in the particular labour which the Lord, 
 from time to time, is giving you to do. 
 
 Whatever hopeful feature you discover in your own 
 character, as by the Spirit's help you are seeking to 
 mould and fashion it more and more according to the 
 image of Christ; or in the character of any sinner with 
 
192 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 whom, relying on the Spirit's help, you are dealing to 
 convert him; or in the character of any brother in the 
 Lord whom you would fain lead further away from sin 
 and further on in holiness ; — whatever favourable indica- 
 tion, — whatever hopeful appearance, — you discern in 
 yourselves or in others, of a change for the better, — of 
 progress, — of advancement ; — rejoice in it. Whatever 
 hopeful circumstance shows itself in any department of 
 the Lord's service in which you are engaged ; in any mis- 
 sion-field, home or foreign, which has had enlisted on its 
 behalf your sympathies, your prayers, your abundant 
 liberalities, your scanty alms, or your personal ministra- 
 tions of any kind ; — if anything hopeful meets your eye, 
 or reaches your ear, concerning the Sabbath class you 
 are teaching, or the families you are visiting, or the 
 society you are managing, or the tracts and Bibles you 
 are circulating, or whatever your labour of love may be ; — 
 should there be any really hopeful promise of good, 
 among the hungry, the naked, the sick, the prisoners, to 
 whom in the Lord's name and for the Lord's sake you 
 minister ; — rejoice in it. Be sure that it is a legitimate 
 and trustworthy occasion of joy. Wherever, and in what- 
 ever, there is good hope through grace, — there, and in 
 that, there is cause of joy. It may be a fearful joy that 
 you snatch. There may be too good reason why you 
 should rejoice with trembling. Experience may have made 
 you cautious. Your sadly acquired knowledge of human 
 nature, alike in the young and in the old whom you have 
 been trying to guard or to reclaim; and the memory of 
 too many instances in which you have been mistaken or 
 
REJOICING IN HOPE. 103 
 
 deceived, — when those who seemed to run well have 
 broken down, or turned aside ; may cause you to be 
 suspicious and incredulous when new cases of good done, 
 or of good got, come before you. Beware of such a 
 temper ; beware of such a tendency growing upon you. 
 It fits too well and too easily into your natural love of 
 ease, and your inclination to excuse yourself from self- 
 denying toil and trouble, by the plea of its being all in vain. 
 Do not hesitate, — be not afraid, — freely and heartily 
 to rejoice in hope. It is a miserable thing to have the 
 warm and living spirit of love chilled and deadened by 
 that sort of universal scepticism, which will believe 
 neither God nor man; which will give credit to no pro- 
 mise of God, and no profession of man. Better far to 
 be the dupe of a whole host of hypocrites and impostors ; 
 to trust and trust again ; and again and again to 
 have my trust belied and betrayed ; to be a very 
 proverb and byword for facility in believing all things, 
 and thinking evil of no man ; than to settle down into a 
 universal questioner and doubter ; labouring to do good, 
 perhaps, out of a constraining sense of duty; but in utter 
 hopelessness of almost any good being done ; taking 
 always the worst view of things ; refusing to be cheered 
 by any tokens or any tidings of success. The service of 
 the Lord, the loving service of the God of love, is not 
 thus joyless and heartless. It is the service of the 
 heart ; of a heart that is hopeful ; of a heart that 
 rejoices in hope, 
 
 II. But while thus you work in hope, and rejoice 
 
194 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 in the hope in which you work, you have need of 
 patience ; you are required and commanded to be " patient 
 in tribulation." 
 
 " You are saved by hope ; but hope that is seen is 
 not hope ; for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope 
 for ? But if you hope for that you see not, then do you 
 with patience wait for it" (Rom. viii. 24, 25). And you 
 wait, prepared to be " patient in tribulation." 
 
 For however quick you are to discern, and sanguine 
 to grasp, whatever is hopeful in the Lord's dealings with 
 yourself, or with those whose good you seek, you are 
 not blind or insensible to what is of an opposite 
 character. Your rejoicing in hope is not the fond 
 conceit and fool's paradise of one who shuts his eyes 
 to the anno}^ances of his real position, and laps himself 
 in some dream of ideal conquest, and rest, and glory. 
 It is a sober habit of mind. It is the habit of a mind 
 accustoming itself to make the best of everything ; 
 to put the best construction possible on every promise 
 of good in any one's character and conduct ; to see every 
 object and every event in the best light. But still, it is 
 the habit of a mind sensible and sensitive ; all the more 
 apt to be vexed and troubled by adverse circumstances 
 and influences, the more simple and confident it is in its 
 belief and anticipation of good ; and therefore all the 
 more having need of patience. 
 
 Yes. Your sanguine man is often apt to be impatient. 
 He seizes eagerly on whatever is hopeful. He is in- 
 tolerant of what hurts or hinders the cause to which lie 
 is committed, or the enterprise on which his heart is set. 
 
PATIENT IN TEIBULATION. 195 
 
 Tribulation, therefore, is to him hard to bear ; harder 
 to him than to those who are less inclined, or less 
 accustomed, to rejoice in hope. 
 
 Is the tribulation a personal one ? Are you person- 
 ally disabled for the work in which it has been your 
 joy hopefully to abound? Is it your sad lot to lie 
 wounded and helpless on your weary couch, while the 
 battle in which you love to have a part is raging 
 at your very door ? It is indeed a trial of your 
 patience ; a trial severe and sore, in proportion to the 
 joyous hope with which, were it possible, you would cast 
 yourself into the thickest of the fight. Paul, in his 
 Roman dungeon, had that trial to endure. Bonds and 
 imprisonment laid an arrest on his indefatigable activity 
 in preaching the gospel of Christ. To his ardent spirit, 
 it was a trial more severe than, to a colder soul, sickness, 
 loss of fortune, death of friends, or any other earthly 
 calamity, can well be. For him to be patient in such a 
 tribulation is indeed a triumph of faith ; and a proof 
 that his sanguine zeal, his joyous hope, in serving the 
 Lord, is of the right sort. It is not the "rejoicing in hope," 
 of successful ambition, or gratified vanity ; of self-glorifica- 
 tion or self-aggrandizement. If it were, he could but ill 
 endure the evil chance that cuts his career short in the 
 hour of its brightest promise. But his "rejoicing in hope," 
 while he is free to labour, is of a godly sort. It is 
 rejoicing in hope, not of his own glory, but of the Lord's. 
 And therefore he is patient in the tribulation that inter- 
 rupts his labour, however prematurely and however pain- 
 fully. He is willing that " Christ should be magnified in 
 
196 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 Lis body, whether it be by life, or by death" (Phil. 
 i. 20). 
 
 To be patient in tribulation ! — it is a great attainment ! 
 Many are the afflictions of the righteous. He is in 
 trouble, not only like other men, but more than other 
 men. As members of Christ's body; having to bear your 
 part, according to the grace that is given to you, in the 
 offices and functions of the body ; you are liable to be 
 troubled on every side. The ordinary evils of life beset you ; 
 and other evils besides, to which your Christian calling and 
 profession lay you open. Tribulation comes to you ; not 
 only in the form of personal suffering and domestic dis- 
 tress, but in the form also of persecution for righteous- 
 ness' sake. You share the common lot of man. You 
 sicken, or are hurt. Your family is smitten. You are 
 bereaved of your beloved. And you share also, more- 
 over, the lot of Christ; for you are members of his 
 body. You are treated as he was treated. It should 
 be so ; it must be so, if you are his. And all this 
 may come upon you in the midst of most hopeful and 
 well-grounded anticipations of good. It may look as 
 if the wettest of all blankets were thrown over your 
 burning zeal ; as if the crudest of all arrests were put, 
 — and that too in the very crisis of their success, — upon 
 your best and most benevolent undertakings. Truly, 
 in such circumstances, you have need of patience. The 
 tribulation in which you have to be patient, is not merely 
 and and sorrowful in itself; as all tribulation must be 
 whether to a selfish or to a sympathizing sufferer ; to "the 
 tender groaning for another's pain/' or " to the unfeeling 
 
PRAYER. 197 
 
 groaning for his own." It is aggravated, in your case, by 
 the interruption which it causes in your joy ; the joy of 
 your hopeful industry in the service of the Lord. 
 
 Physical, bodily, pain is hard to bear. Pain in the 
 affections, — the lacerating, not of material ligaments, but 
 of the tissues of the heart, — is harder still to bear. But 
 hardest to be borne of all, to a soul that in serving the 
 Lord rejoices in hope, is the pain of being laid aside, or 
 cut off, from that most loved and hopeful and joyous 
 service ; laid aside by God ; c;it off by man ; doomed to 
 pine in helpless inactivity, when all within is on fire 
 for the Lord's glory and the salvation of souls. To be 
 patient in tribulation, thus viewed ; to combine patience 
 in tribulation with rejoicing in hope ; patient endurance 
 of what in agony hinders work, with the joyous buoyancy 
 of hope in work, when work is possible ; — this is the test 
 of godliness ; this is the function and the fruit of prayer. 
 
 III. For it is the habit of prayer which harmonizes 
 these two other habits of mind ; the cheerful joy of 
 hope in serving the Lord, and patience, meekness, sub- 
 mission, in enduring tribulation. 
 
 It may not be the same sort of prayer in both instances; 
 when you have reason to rejoice in hope, and when you 
 are called to be patient in tribulation. Your prayer will 
 naturally and fitly assume different characters, according 
 to the varying circumstances of your outward position, 
 and the varying moods of your spirit within you. " Is 
 any merry? Let him sing psalms. Is any afflicted? 
 Let him pray." In a bright day of hope, when the heart 
 
198 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 is merry, your prayer may be very much thanksgiving ; 
 the offering of praise ; the singing of psalms. In the hour 
 of sorrow, when the heart is sad, it will be " supplications, 
 with strong crying and tears" (Heb. v. 7). It will be 
 " groanings which cannot be uttered" (Rom. viii. 26). 
 
 Still praj^er of some sort will be always seasonable ; 
 and you, serving the Lord equally in sunshine and in 
 gloom, — whether rejoicing in hope, or patient in tribula- 
 tion, — will be found always praying ; — continuing instant, 
 unwearied, without intermission, in prayer. So will your 
 joy in hope be chastened. So will your patience in tribu- 
 lation be sustained. 
 
 Jesus, on one occasion, rejoiced. It was when the seventy 
 returned from their evangelistic mission with joy, saying, 
 " Lord, even the devils are subject unto us through thy 
 name." Yes! the Lord replies; and you may hail that 
 as a sign of the serpent's overthrow ; — " I beheld Satan 
 as lightning fall from heaven." And therefore you may 
 expect triumphs more illustrious than the one in which 
 now you rejoice ; — " Behold, I give' unto you power to 
 tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power 
 of the enemy; and nothing shall by any means hurt you." 
 Does this give you new and additional joy: this prospect 
 of a safe and sure victory over the powers of darkness? 
 It is well. "Notwithstanding, in this rejoice not;" in 
 this alone, in this chiefly, " that the spirits are subject 
 unto you ; but rather rejoice, because your names are 
 written in heaven" (Luke x. 17-20). 
 
 "In that hour Jesus " himself " rej oiced in spirit ! " The 
 Man of Sorrows for once appears rejoicing. He is rejoic- 
 
PRAYER. 199 
 
 ing in hope. In the fall of Satan ; in the salvation of 
 these little ones ; a salvation secured by the recorded decree 
 of Heaven ; he sees by anticipation " of the travail of his 
 soul, and is satisfied." Yes ! in spite of all delays, and 
 disappointments, and discouragements ; in spite of all the 
 contradiction of sinners against himself that he has to 
 endure; in spite of all the unbelief of earth, and all the 
 rage and wrath of hell ; it is a hopeful enterprise in 
 which he is embarked And he may rejoice in the hope- 
 fulness of it. For his joy is not self- glorifying ; it is not 
 self-seeking. It is the joy of filial gratitude to the Father, 
 and filial submission to the Father ; — of filial acknowledg- 
 ment of the Father's sovereignty, and filial acquiescence 
 in the Father's will. And accordingly, when he is seen 
 " rejoicing in hope/' he is seen at the same time " continu- 
 ing instant in prayer." He gives utterance to his hope- 
 ful joy in prayer, — in a psalm of praise ; — " In that hour 
 Jesus rejoiced in spirit, and said, I thank thee, Father, 
 Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things 
 from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto 
 babes: even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight" 
 (Luke x. 21). 
 
 So let it be with you. When you rejoice in hope, let it 
 be the instinct, the impulse, the instant and urgent 
 passion of your soul, to give vent to your joy in thank- 
 ful prayer. Carry your feelings to the bosom of the 
 Eternal " Father, Lord of heaven and earth." Link on any 
 success, or any prospect of success, that cheers you, to 
 the throne of his sovereignty; his sovereign will ; his 
 sovereign grace. Enter, as prayer alone can enable you 
 
200 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 to enter, into the wide and vast sweep of his eternal 
 counsels. Recognise the tie that binds your little hope, 
 in your limited sphere, to the great hope of the Everlasting 
 Father, that ranges over heaven and earth, and embraces 
 the interests of his universal and everlasting empire. 
 Such prayer, unflagging and unwearied, will raise you 
 above all the poor and low self-congratulations of that 
 self-complacency which might tempt you to feel as if your 
 small measure of good got, or of good gained, were worthy 
 of a world's gaze ; or as if "your own sword got the land, 
 and your own right hand wrought out the salvation." 
 Your prayer, your instant and unwearied prayer, will 
 be your giving to God all the glory; owning your de- 
 pendence on him for all, your submission to him in all. 
 It will merge also past and present satisfaction in new 
 aspirings for the future. It carries you on to new efforts ; 
 new labours ; new successes. Thus prayer, your con- 
 tinuing instant and unwearied in prayer, will chasten, ele- 
 vate, and hallow, your "rejoicing in hope/' 
 
 Nor is it less effectual to sustain your " patience in 
 tribulation." It was through his " continuing instant 
 in prayer" that Jesus was able to be patient in his 
 tribulation. Prayer was his refuge amid the trials and 
 troubles of his active and working life, when he was 
 about his Father's business ; not slothful in it ; fervent 
 in spirit ; serving the Lord Ever in the midst of his 
 laborious ministry, beset as it was with tribulation of 
 every sort, he continued instant in prayer. He spent 
 whole nights in prayer to God. He went often into a 
 mountain apart to pray. He was ever appealing to his 
 
PRAYER. 201 
 
 Father, calling upon his Father, confiding in his Father, 
 in all the experiences and exigencies of the troubled course 
 through which he had to pass, as he was doing his Father's 
 will and finishing his Father's work. And when the 
 time came for suffering, and not for doing ; when the 
 tribulation appointed for him was not that incident to 
 his active service of the Father, but that connected with 
 his endurance of the chastisement of our peace ; the judg- 
 ment of our sins, laid upon him by the Father's hand ; 
 oh ! how did he turn, in his distress, to that very Father 
 who was smiting him ; continuing still instant in prayer ; 
 in prayer under the agony of the garden ; "Father, if it 
 be possible, let the cup pass;" — in the threefold prayer, the 
 threefold cry, of desolation, of compassion, and of faith 
 upon the cross : " My God, my God, why hast thou for- 
 saken me?" " Father, forgive them ; for they know not 
 what they do;" " Father, into thy hands I commend my 
 spirit." 
 
 Be ye, like Christ, unwearied and persevering, always 
 " continuing instant in prayer;" that so, like him, you may 
 rejoice in spirit, in the assured hope of the things which 
 are hidden from the wise and prudent, being revealed unto 
 babes ; and that so, like him also, amid whatever tribu- 
 lation you have to meet, in your active service of the 
 Lord, or in your suffering under his hand, you may possess 
 your souls in patience, waiting for his salvation. In all 
 things, whether as regards your own personal welfare 
 here and hereafter, or as regards your work and warfare 
 in the Church and cause of Christ, let prayer, your con- 
 tinuing instant in prayer, sustain you in cheerful hope, 
 
202 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 as you seize upon every hopeful sign, and make the most 
 of it. And let it sustain you in cheerful submission also, 
 as you accept every seemingly adverse token and make 
 the best of it. In a word, act always upon the maxim, 
 " Be careful for nothing ; but in everything by prayer 
 and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests 
 be made known unto God;" and appropriate the promise 
 that is annexed to that maxim, and associated with it : 
 " And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, 
 shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus " 
 (Phil. iv. 6, 7). This peace of God, thus keeping your 
 hearts and minds, is the source and perennial spring of 
 that joyous hope with which you throw yourselves, heart 
 and soul, into "whatever your hand findeth to do," for 
 the saving of your own soul and the advancement of the 
 good cause. The same inward peace imparts calmness 
 and serenity amid whatever tribulation tries and taxes 
 your power of patient endurance, your principle of patient 
 obedience. And it is a peace which only prayer can pre- 
 serve and perpetuate, — your continuing instant in the 
 prayer and supplication by which, without carefulness and 
 with thankfulness, you make known your requests unto 
 God. 
 
CHRISTIAN BENEFICENCE. 203 
 
 VII. 
 
 MUTUAL BENEFICENCE AND HOSPITALITY. 
 
 Distributing to the necessity of saints ; given to hospitality. ' 
 Rom. xii. 13. 
 
 The two duties here enjoined are obviously of the same 
 nature. The members of Christ's Church, self-devoted to 
 the Lord ; separated from the world ; united in one body, 
 but having different offices and different functions ; full of 
 true and holy love, inspiring a brotherly love kind and 
 lowly ; working in their several spheres of Christian duty 
 and activity, with business-like diligence, with spiritual 
 fervour, with conscience towards the Lord whom they 
 serve ; working also hopefully, patiently, prayerfully ; are 
 called to consider the case of those among themselves who 
 may stand in need of special sympathy and help. These 
 may be either permanent residenters in any place, — tarriers 
 at home ; or they may be casual and occasional visitors, 
 — travellers abroad. Both classes have claims on their 
 brethren, and each its own claim. Hence the double 
 precept : I. " Distributing to the necessity of saints ; 
 II. given to hospitality." 
 
 I. The case of suffering brethren generally is to be first 
 
204 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 met. Apart from the peculiar title to assistance which 
 those of them have who journey — especially when they 
 journey in the Lord's cause, — the wants of all who love 
 the Lord anywhere, everywhere, demand relief. The 
 general duty, accordingly, of " distributing to the necessity 
 of saints," takes precedence of what is a particular in- 
 stance of it, — the exercise of hospitality. 
 
 The " necessity " here meant is plainly of an outward 
 and temporal, not an inward and spiritual sort. It is 
 not the necessity of an awakened conscience, or an in- 
 quiring spirit, or an anxious soul. With that necessity 
 also, — with that necessity pre-eminently, — you are bound, 
 as members of Christ's body, discharging offices of trust 
 and love in his Church, to be ever making common 
 cause. But it is another kind of necessity that is now 
 in view ; the necessity of distressed or straitened circum- 
 stances ; the hard necessity of poverty, of pain, of perse- 
 cution. 
 
 And how is such " necessity M of saints to be treated ? 
 You are to make common cause with it ; to be joint par- 
 takers of it ; to have the communion of it with them ; to 
 be communicants in it with them. Such is the real im- 
 port of the word used by the Apostle, and somewhat 
 feebly and inadequately rendered in our translatioa It 
 is not a mere distribution of alms from your purse, or 
 crumbs from your table. It is not a mere conveyance of 
 charitable gifts and offerings, on however large a scale. 
 It is that, no doubt ; it is that at the very least. But 
 it is something more than that, and something better. 
 It is communion; fellowship; joint participation. 
 
CHRISTIAN BENEFICENCE. 205 
 
 The same expression is used elsewhere to denote sub- 
 stantially the same idea. 
 
 Thus, writing to the Romans (xv. 25-27), and referring 
 to the commission which he had received from certain 
 Gentile churches, "to go to Jerusalem, to minister unto 
 the saints," the Apostle first speaks approvingly of their 
 liberality, — "It hath pleased them of Macedonia and Achaia 
 to make a certain contribution for the poor saints which 
 are at Jerusalem ;" and then he goes on at once to indi- 
 cate the reasonableness, and to explain the nature, of this 
 liberality on the part of these Gentile churches : " It hath 
 pleased them verily ; and their debtors they are. For 
 if the Gentiles have been made partakers of their spiritual 
 things, their duty is also to minister unto them in car- 
 nal things." The ministry in carnal things must un- 
 doubtedly be of the same sort with the communion in 
 spiritual things which it reciprocates and requites. It 
 implies, not the mere transference of a benefit from one 
 party to another, but the mutual association of one with 
 the other in the benefit. The Gentiles are associated 
 with the Jews in the spiritual benefit ; and in a corre- 
 sponding manner, the Jews are to be associated with the 
 Gentiles in the temporal benefit. So also, writing to the 
 Philippians (iv. 15-18), Paul gratefully acknowledges 
 their care of himself and mindfulness of his wants ; 
 theirs being the only church which, when he left Mace- 
 donia, "communicated with him as concerning giving 
 and receiving/' And he intimates that he values their 
 gift, not for itself, but chiefly as a proof and instance 
 of their making common cause with him, or having 
 
206 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 communion and joint participation with him, in his 
 necessity. 
 
 The practice of the early Christians, associated in the 
 Pentecostal church, realized the ideal of this communion. 
 Among them the stream of love and liberality flowed so 
 copiously, so freshly and so freely, from the warm source 
 and fountain of sympathizing hearts, that it was not 
 merely a distribution of needful things, on the part of 
 those who had them, among those who had them not, but 
 such an identification of the whole in one, as amounted 
 virtually and practically to a community of goods (Acts 
 ii. 44 ; iv. 32-34). The brethren made common cause 
 with one another, as regarded the real use and usufruct of 
 all their possessions. 
 
 The grace enjoined in the passage now before us is the 
 converse and the complement of that described as charac- 
 terizing the Pentecostal church. It is, in fact, the same 
 grace, only viewed, as it were, from the opposite side. 
 There, it is a communion, or community, of goods, between 
 him who has and him who has not. Here, it is a com- 
 munion, or community, of necessity, between him who 
 needs and him who does not need. In either view, the 
 principle is the same. The saints, — "all that believe, 
 being together," — one in Christ, have all things in 
 common. Their possessions and goods are common. 
 Their necessity is common. My possessions and goods 
 are common to my necessitous brother and myself. 
 His necessity is common to me and him. Thus, 
 really and effectively, though not by express or formal 
 compact, he and I have all things in common. My means, 
 
CHRISTIAN BENEFICENCE. 207 
 
 and his needs, are common to both. This is, so far as the 
 things of this world are concerned, the practical expression, 
 the substantial proof, of our oneness in Christ. It is our 
 making common cause with one another ; holding our 
 resources to be available for one another, as if they were 
 a common stock ; entering into one another's necessities, 
 as if they were a common calamity. The Christian 
 brotherhood, the fellowship of the saints, is thus practi- 
 cally exemplified and proved. 
 
 In the department of the inner spiritual life, that com- 
 munion is very close ; and the closeness of it is declared 
 and sealed in the sacrament of communion; — "The cup of 
 blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the 
 blood of Christ ? The bread which we break, is it not the 
 communion of the body of Christ ? For we, being many, 
 are one bread, and one body : for we are all partakers of 
 that one bread" (1 Cor. x. 16, 17). We are joint par- 
 takers of the one bread of life ; of the life of which He is 
 the bread. We are jointly incorporated into him ; being 
 " members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones" 
 (Eph. v. 30). As his mystical body, we, jointly as well 
 as severally, are consecrated by his sacrifice of atonement, 
 and consecrate ourselves, to be a sacrifice of praise to " his 
 Father and our Father, his God and our God." As being 
 " many members in one body, yet all members not having 
 the same office," we have communion, or joint participation, 
 each according to the grace held to be given to him, upon 
 a sober estimate of himself, in the offices and works which 
 the Church, as Christ's body, has to discharge and do ; — 
 as well as also in the spirit or frame of mind in which 
 
208 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 they are to be discharged and done. And now it is inti- 
 mated that we are to have communion, or joint participa- 
 tion, in the varieties of outward fortune to which the body, 
 or its several members, may be exposed. The living body 
 is organized for originating action from within, and for 
 receiving impressions and meeting influences from with- 
 out ; it works, and it is worked upon. And as in the 
 life, so also in both these forms or phases of the life — the 
 active and the receptive — the members have communion, 
 or joint participation. All among them is in common. 
 
 It is, therefore, upon a very high and holy footing that 
 the duty of "distributing to the necessity of saints" may be 
 seen to rest. The claim which the very least of Christ's 
 little ones has on all the members of his body, and on each 
 one in particular, is peculiarly sacred. You, my brother, as 
 a member of Christ's body, are bound to see to it, so far 
 as in you lies, that no necessitous member of the same 
 body, within the reach of your means of discovery and of 
 deliverance, remains for a single hour unhelped and un- 
 relieved. It is your part to visit him without delay; or 
 if that may not be, to make sure that he is visited, in 
 your name, and on your behalf. Nor let any light 
 hinderance interfere with your visit being paid in person. 
 Communion by proxy, or at second hand, is a cold affair 
 at the best. The obligation lies upon you personally. 
 Let it, if there be no insuperable obstacle, physical or 
 moral, be personally fulfilled. And that it may be ful- 
 filled faithfully, be not content to sit at home and wait 
 till tidings of needy cases happen to reach your ears. Go 
 forth in search of poor or suffering saints of God, where- 
 
CHRISTIAN BENEFICENCE. 209 
 
 ever there is, I say not a likelihood, but a chance or pos- 
 sibility, of any, of a single one, being found. Search, as 
 with a candle, the dark places near your dwelling. Cause 
 the dark places further off to be searched for you. Then, 
 when you are brought into contact with a child of God, 
 — born of the Spirit long ago, or it may be now, through 
 God's blessing on your very search for him, — make his 
 case your own. Lay yourself out to ascertain and to 
 understand his necessity. Your own insight often, if it 
 be the insight of genuine Christian and human sympathy, 
 will help you to see it, without your questioning him, or 
 his telling you. What makes his lot hard and heavy to 
 bear, and his Christian profession very difficult to main- 
 tain, you will be quick- sighted to discern. And you will 
 be prompt to succour him ; and in doing so, to make him 
 feel that he is not to consider himself a pensioner de- 
 pendent on your bounty, or a mendicant accepting your 
 alms ; but that he and you, being one in Christ, have but 
 one common interest, — you in his necessity, and he in your 
 means of meeting it. Thus, while " as you have oppor- 
 tunity, you do good unto all men/' you do good " espe- 
 cially to them who are of the household of faith " (Gal. 
 vi. 10). You recognise their special claim upon you, as 
 being fellow-members with you of the body of Christ. In 
 ministering to them you minister to Christ's body — nay, 
 rather, you minister to Christ himself. And you humbly 
 hope for his gracious acknowledgment of your ministry 
 in the day when he shall utter these wonderful words : 
 " Inasmuch as ye did it to the least of these my brethren, 
 ye did it unto me." For you thus most truly and fully 
 o 
 
210 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 carry out the idea of his own parable : " When thou 
 makest a dinner or a supper, call not thy friends, nor thy 
 brethren, neither thy kinsmen, nor thy rich neighbours ; 
 lest they also bid thee again, and a recompence be made 
 thee. But when thou makest a feast, call the poor, the 
 maimed, the lame, the blind : and thou shalt be blessed ; 
 for they cannot recompense thee : for thou shalt be recom- 
 pensed at the resurrection of the just" (Luke xiv. 1 2-14). 
 
 II. Under the general head of " distributing to the neces- 
 sity of saints," the Apostle specifies one particular branch 
 of that virtue ; — " given to hospitality/' 
 
 Now, the hospitality here commended is not that of 
 promiscuous benevolence and general good-will, as if one 
 should throw open his house, and spread his table, and 
 prepare the couch of rest, for all and sundry to enter in, 
 and eat and sleep. Nor is it the hospitality of private 
 acquaintanceship, as when one entertains a single friend, 
 or a party of friends, on the ground of ties or relations in 
 ordinary life connecting them together and suggesting 
 social intercourse. Both of these kinds of hospitality are 
 lawful, and, within due bounds, commendable. To re- 
 ceive strangers and travellers, who are in need of accom- 
 modation — to treat them kindly and minister to their 
 wants, whoever they may be, and whatever their creed or 
 calling or condition, — is an obvious duty of humanity. To 
 share with those whom we esteem and love the temperate 
 repast and genial fireside fellowship of home, is a welcome 
 solace amid the carking cares of this working world. But 
 the hospitality which Paul is now speaking of is some- 
 
CHRISTIAN HOSPITALITY. 2 1 1 
 
 thing different from both of these. It is hospitality to 
 the children of God. It is a particular branch or depart- 
 ment of the general obligation to distribute to the neces- 
 sity of saints. It contemplates the case of believers 
 away from their ordinary abodes ; specially of believers 
 in exile, or on a journey. In this view, the grace or 
 virtue in question was more largely and constantly called 
 into exercise in the early Church than it ordinarily is now. 
 The circumstances then were peculiar. Christians were 
 to a large extent literally "strangers scattered throughout 
 Pont us, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia," — in fact 
 throughout all provinces and countries of the world. As 
 preachers of the truth, or as persecuted for the truth's 
 sake, they went abroad everywhere ; and wherever they 
 went they were dependent mainly on the hospitality of 
 their brethren in the common faith. 
 
 It was much the same in the patriarchal times. The 
 remnant of the godly, in the unsettled state of society 
 which then prevailed, were often wanderers on the face of 
 the earth ; going hither and thither, bearing witness on 
 behalf of the primeval and traditionary religion amid the 
 growing degeneracy of mankind ; or seeking refuge, as 
 fugitives, from the rage and wrath which their testimony 
 provoked. Hence the pious practice was seasonable which 
 righteous men like Abraham and Lot adopted, of sitting 
 at the door of their tents, at noonday or at eventide, to 
 arrest any passers-by who might seem to need their kind 
 offices, and bid them welcome to bed and board (Gen. 
 xviii. 1 ; xix. 1). 
 
 The circumstances of the early Christians were such a3 
 
212 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 to recall the memory of these old days, and give point to 
 the allusion which Paul makes to them when he says, 
 " Be not forgetful to entertain strangers : for thereby 
 some have entertained angels unawares " (Heb. xiii. 2). 
 A still higher motive is suggested in anticipation by our 
 Lord ; — " He that receiveth you, receiveth me ; and he 
 that receiveth me, receiveth him that sent me. He that 
 receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet, shall re- 
 ceive a prophet's reward ; and he that receiveth a right- 
 eous man in the name of a righteous man, shall receive a 
 righteous man's reward. And whosoever shall give to 
 drink unto one of these little ones a cup of cold water 
 only in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto you, he 
 shall in no wise lose his reward" (Matt. x. 40-42). 
 
 Hence the practice in the early Church of sending let- 
 ters of introduction, or of commendation, by the hands of 
 persons moving from one place to another. To this prac- 
 tice Paul refers when he boasts, as it were, of his own in- 
 dependence of such letters ; — " Do we begin again to com- 
 mend ourselves ? or need we, as some others, epistles of 
 commendation to you, or letters of commendation from 
 you ? " (2 Cor. iii. 1). And we have instances of the 
 practice among the salutations with which the epistles 
 usually close ; as in this Epistle to the Romans (xvi. 1, 2), 
 — * I commend unto you Phebe our sister, which is a ser- 
 vant of the church which is at Cenchrea ; that ye receive 
 her in the Lord, as becometh saints, and that ye assist her 
 in whatsoever business she hath need of you : for she 
 hath been a succourer of many, and of myself also;" and 
 in the First Epistle to the Corinthians (xvi. 1 7, 1 8), — " I 
 
CHRISTIAN HOSPITALITY. 213 
 
 am glad of the coming of Stephanas, and Fortunatus, 
 and Achaicus : for that which was lacking on your part 
 they have supplied. For they have refreshed my spirit 
 and yours : therefore acknowledge ye them that are such/' 
 
 The Second and Third Epistles of the beloved Apostle 
 John seem to be such letters of introduction. At all 
 events they treat of the subject of these letters. And, by 
 contrast with one another, they bring out the duty in its 
 twofold aspect ; as requiring true believers on the one 
 hand to abstain from exercising brotherly hospitality to- 
 wards false teachers; and as requiring them on the other 
 hand to exercise such hospitality towards all true mem- 
 bers of the body of Christ. 
 
 For the principle might be violated in two ways ; 
 either by hospitably entertaining, as a true brother, one 
 who was heretical, in doctrine or in practice ; or by 
 refusing to entertain hospitably, as a brother, one who 
 was sound in faith, — in that faith which worketh by love. 
 And these two epistles of John have respect to these two 
 ways of violating the principle. The second contains a 
 strong exhortation against receiving false professors ; — the 
 third, again, contains an equally strong approval of the re- 
 ceiving of such as are true. 
 
 1. Thus in the former of these epistles (2 John), "the 
 elder," writing to " the elect lady and her children," — after 
 warmly commending her own and her household's stead- 
 fast adherence to the truth, and enforcing the new, and 
 yet old, commandment, that " we love one another/' — 
 lays down the test or criterion of the genuineness of that 
 
214 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 holy affection ; — " And this is love, that we walk after 
 his commandments. This is the commandment, That, as 
 ye have heard from the beginning, ye should walk in it" 
 (ver. 6). For, as is here manifestly implied, that is not 
 real love, which, in its eagerness to enlarge the circle of 
 the Christian brotherhood, would relax the authority of 
 Christ, the head, over his body, the Church ; or wander 
 from the old paths in which the footsteps of the flock are 
 to be traced. All the rather is it needful to beware of 
 that plausible snare, because, as the Apostle testifies, 
 " many deceivers are entered into the world, who confess 
 not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. This is a 
 deceiver and an antichrist" (ver. 7). For your own sakes, 
 therefore, and for the truth's sake, be on your guard 
 against countenancing " transgressors who abide not in 
 the doctrine of Christ " (ver. 9). And especially, in the 
 exercise of hospitality towards those who roam over the 
 world in the character of the Lord's servants and wit- 
 nesses, — persecuted, perhaps, and persecuted apparently 
 on account of their Christian profession, — use a careful 
 discrimination. "He," and he only, "that abideth in the 
 doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son" 
 (ver. 9). Therefore, "if there come any unto you, and 
 bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, 
 neither bid him God speed: for he that biddeth him God 
 speed is partaker of his evil deeds" (ver. 10, 11). 
 
 Such is the rule laid down by the Apostle of love to 
 regulate our treatment of all whose testimony, or whose 
 teaching, is away from the truth. Hospitality to them, 
 as brethren, is expressly and very peremptorily forbidden. 
 
CHRISTIAN HOSPITALITY. 2 1 5 
 
 I say, hospitality towards them as brethren. For it need 
 scarcely be remarked that the Apostle cannot be under- 
 stood as condemning the benevolence which would open 
 its house as a house of refuge for the weary wanderer, 
 without question as to creed, or character, or colour, or 
 country, and provide shelter, food, and comfort for all alike 
 and indiscriminately who are in want. Nay, he does not 
 and cannot mean to prohibit the extension of such sort 
 of hospitality even to those whom he denounces so strongly 
 as deceivers. To entertain them kindly when they ap- 
 peal to your generosity and pity, simply as your fellow- 
 men, in destitution and distress, is unquestionably lawful 
 and right But let them not be owned by you as dis- 
 ciples or apostles of the Lord. Let them not be welcomed 
 and embraced as your brethren in Christ. Let it not be 
 in that character that you receive them into your house 
 and speed them on their way. Let it never be forgotten 
 that, as Christian love is always based on Christian truth, 
 so every manifestation of mutual love, in the body of Christ, 
 must proceed avowedly and unequivocally upon the mutual 
 recognition of " the truth as it is in Jesus." Those whom 
 I love, after the model and example of John the beloved, 
 " I love in the truth : and not I only, but also all they 
 that have known the truth ; for the truth's sake, which 
 dwelleth in us, and shall be with us for ever " (ver. 1). 
 
 2. In the other epistle (3 John) a the elder" manifests 
 the same anxiety that all love among Christians should 
 be grounded on the truth. He salutes Gaius, "whom," he 
 adds, " I love in the truth " (ver. 1). He expresses the 
 
216 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 joy he felt when he found the brethren who came from 
 Gams all testifying, as he writes to his friend, " of the 
 truth that is in thee, even as thou walkest in the truth" 
 (ver. 3). His cordial delight in those who hold by the 
 truth is quite equal to his holy dread and dislike of such 
 as wander themselves, and lead others to wander, into 
 error. " I have no greater joy," he exclaims with trans- 
 port, " than to hear that my children walk in truth ! " 
 (ver. 4). And having no occasion, as it would seem, to 
 put his present correspondent on his guard against that 
 ultra-liberal stretch of Christian hospitality of which it 
 had been necessary to bid the " elect lady" beware, — he 
 makes it very plain that it is no mere cold and cautious 
 negative concern to avoid the risk of countenancing evil 
 that will content his loving soul. For it is with no or- 
 dinary fervour that he pronounces his commendation of 
 the open house and open heart of Gaius ; — " Beloved, thou 
 doest faithfully whatsoever thou doest to the brethren, 
 and to strangers ; which have borne witness of thy charity 
 before the church : whom if thou bring forward on their 
 journey after a godly sort, thou shalt do well : because 
 that for his name's sake they went forth, taking nothing 
 of the Gentiles. We therefore ought to receive such, that 
 we might be fellow-helpers to the truth" (ver. 5-8). 
 
 Thus the beloved Apostle, full of his own favourite theme 
 of love in the truth, enforces in both aspects of it, the pro- 
 hibitive and the enactive, the virtue of which Paul speaks 
 when he describes the members of Christ's body as " dis- 
 tributing to the necessity of saints ; given to hospitality." 
 
CHRISTIAN HOSPITALITY. 217 
 
 It is a virtue, as I have already observed, specially 
 called into exercise in such times as cause exile or flight 
 among the professed followers of Christ ; and in such 
 times, I would now add, it is peculiarly tried and tested. 
 Two instances occur for illustration here. 
 
 When the first French Revolution began to convulse 
 society, multitudes of priests, and other members of the 
 Church of Rome, sought and found refuge on our country's 
 hospitable shores. Their coming amongst us kindled an 
 enthusiasm of religious resentment against the cruel 
 oppression of which they were the victims. Everywhere, 
 and by all classes, they were welcomed; — not merely as 
 men suffering wrongfully, and in that character entitled 
 to sympathy and help to the very uttermost ; — but as con- 
 fessors, and all but martyrs, in the cause of Christianity, 
 and on that account having a claim to be entertained on 
 the footing of a common brotherhood with us in our 
 common Lord. Now it might be so far true that they 
 were persecuted for their Christianity, such as it was. 
 It was their religion that made them odious in revolu- 
 tionary eyes, and obnoxious to revolutionary fury ; 
 although, making due allowance for the sincerity and 
 piety of not a few, it should never have been forgotten 
 that it was that very religion of theirs that had sowed 
 the seeds of the very anarchy and crime from which 
 they were now constrained to flee, — in the dissolution of 
 manners among the great, the oppression of the masses, 
 the universal corruption of morals, and the spread of 
 both a lettered and a vulgar infidelity among all classes of 
 the community. Still it was not unnatural, nor, to some 
 
218 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHKIST. 
 
 extent, unwarrantable, to regard with somewhat more than 
 ordinary interest these fugitives from the violence of law- 
 less atheism. It cannot be denied, however, that this interest 
 led to a fraternization far too close with themselves, and 
 an estimation far too indulgent of their creed and their 
 confession. The antichristian character of their prin- 
 ciples and their practices was lost sight of, in admiration 
 of the Christian meekness and magnanimity with which 
 so many of them bore their sufferings ; the hospitality 
 even of sound Protestants towards their Popish visitors 
 ceased to be the hospitality of Christian humanity, and be- 
 came the hospitality of Christian brotherhood; and hence, 
 at least in part, may have arisen that latitudinarian indif- 
 ference to the distinction between Christ and Antichrist, 
 between truth and error, between a pure and an idola- 
 trous worship of the living God, which has since pre- 
 vailed so largely and so disastrously in the councils of 
 statesmen and the opinions of society. Certainly the 
 caution addressed by " the elder " to the " elect lady " 
 would have been seasonable at that crisis, if the men of 
 that generation had had ears to hear. 
 
 Long before, in the history of the same great nation, 
 events of which the reign of terror may fairly be regarded 
 as the avenger, had sent the best of her children, by 
 hundreds, beyond her borders. The massacre of St. 
 Bartholomew, in one century, and still more, the revoca- 
 tion of the Edict of Nantes in that which followed, — 
 fatal blunders as well as crimes of Popery, — emptied 
 France of many of the Lord's faithful people. The Pro- 
 testant states, and conspicuously among them our own 
 
CHRISTIAN HOSPITALITY. 219 
 
 free country, welcomed the refugees. There could be no 
 hesitation, in that instance, as to the sort of hospitality 
 that was due. These persecuted saints were to be enter- 
 tained as brethren, in the Lord's name and for the Lord's 
 sake. That they were largely so entertained is matter of 
 history; and in so far as they were so entertained, our 
 Christian hospitality was, even in a temporal point of 
 view, richly blessed and amply rewarded. But perhaps 
 a richer blessing still, and an ampler reward, might have 
 been ours, had the spirit which John commends in 
 Gaius been then, and always, more uniformly and un- 
 equivocally characteristic of that ready protection which 
 our country extends to exiles of all sorts and from all 
 quarters. It is our just boast that the homeless and 
 houseless wanderer finds a safe asylum within our borders ; 
 no questions asked ; no condition imposed, beyond that of 
 living peaceably. But while all are thus free to seek 
 shelter under the shade of our constitutional liberty and 
 independence, let it never be lost sight of that the Lord's 
 own people, when" driven to our shores, have a sacred 
 right to far more than toleration and charitable help, at 
 the hands of all who love the Lord himself, and are, in 
 his behalf, " given to hospitality." 
 
 And now, in fine, whether we view these virtues of 
 brotherly communion and hospitality as more particularly 
 called into exercise in troublous times, such as often 
 already have made, and may yet again make, — sooner, 
 perhaps, than we think, — many preachers and professors 
 of the pure gospel of Christ impoverished sufferers and 
 
220 CHRISTIANS ONE BODY IN CHRIST. 
 
 persecuted wanderers on the face of the earth ; or con- 
 sider them as virtues which are ever more or less in 
 demand; — let us make conscience of feeling and appre- 
 hending fully our common brotherhood with all who are 
 fellow-members with us of the one body of Christ. Let 
 this gracious bond of union ever be considered paramount 
 over all other distinctions, of whatever nature. Let us be 
 of one mind and of one heart, in our consecration of our- 
 selves to God and our separation of ourselves from the 
 world ; in our earnest working for the Lord, according 
 to our different gifts and graces, and in our different 
 spheres and offices ; and in our generous and unselfish 
 willingness to make common cause with one another, alike 
 in weal and in woe. Let the exhortation of another 
 inspired Apostle be ever faithfully earned out in prac- 
 tice; — "Above all things, have fervent charity among 
 yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins. 
 Use hospitality one to another without grudging. As 
 every man hath received the gift, even so minister the 
 same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold 
 grace of God" (1 Pet. iv. 8-10). 
 
PART THIRD. 
 
 THE CHRISTIAN IN HIS RELATION TO A HOSTILE 
 WORLD. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN IN HIS RELATION TO 
 A HOSTILE WORLD. 
 
 i. 
 
 THE ALTERNATIVE OF BLESSING OR CURSING. 
 
 " Bless them which persecute you : bless, and curse not."— Rom. xii. 14. 
 
 This verse evidently has respect, — as indeed the entire 
 remainder of the chapter has respect, — to the position 
 which Christians occupy in the midst of an evil world. 
 Their position is one of liability and exposure to perse- 
 cution. So the Lord himself taught them beforehand to 
 regard it. The law of his kingdom, — the normal state 
 of his Church, — according to his own faithful warning, 
 is that it is apt to be persecuted, nay, that it is sure to 
 be persecuted. It must be so. His followers, making 
 common cause with him, must lay their account with 
 having a common lot with him. " If the world hate 
 you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. If 
 ye were of the world, the world would love his own : but 
 because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you 
 
22 4 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. 
 Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is 
 not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, 
 they will also persecute you ; if they have kept my 
 saying, they will keep yours also" (John xv. 18-20). 
 The mode and measure of the persecution may vary. 
 There are different ways of persecuting, with different 
 degrees of intensity, in different ages of the world and 
 different conditions of society. But the ordinary prin- 
 ciple and rule of the Christian profession, and the invari- 
 able experience of those who truly adopt it is, that, in 
 one way or another, "all who will live godly in Christ 
 Jesus shall suffer persecution" (2 Tim. iii. 12). 
 
 Hence the precept, " Bless them which persecute you," 
 is always applicable ; and the practical illustration and 
 enforcement of it must be always seasonable. 
 
 Generally, the precept is identical with that of our 
 Lord in the sermon on the mount ; — " Ye have heard 
 that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, 
 and hate thine enemy : but I say unto you, Love your 
 enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that 
 hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, 
 and persecute you." Thus the great Lawgiver interprets 
 his own law. And he enforces the command by an appeal 
 to the highest of all examples, that of God himself; — 
 " That ye may be the children of your Father which is in 
 heaven : for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on 
 the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. 
 .... Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which 
 is in heaven is perfect" (Matt. v. 43-45, 48). 
 
BLESS THEM WHICH PERSECUTE YOU. 225 
 
 This is a high and animating motive. Cherishing and 
 manifesting the spirit that is enjoined, you prove your- 
 selves, by your family likeness, to be the children of your 
 Father in heaven. To yourselves, in your own happy con- 
 sciousness ; to others, through your gracious conduct and 
 demeanour ; your claim of filial relationship to God is 
 verified, attested, and made good. You feel yourselves, 
 and others see, that you are, in this matter, of the same 
 mind and character with your Father in heaven ; par- 
 takers of his divine nature ; perfect as he is perfect, in 
 the divine accomplishment of loving } T our enemies, and 
 doing them good ; — his children, therefore, in nature as 
 well as in name ; not in word only, but in deed and in 
 truth. 
 
 This motive is not expressly urged by the Apostle in 
 the verse now before us, — although doubtless he had it in 
 his mind. The command or exhortation, he may be under- 
 stood to sa}r, is not mine, but the Lord's. In the spirit 
 which he recommends, and after the pattern to which he 
 points, " Bless them which persecute you." 
 
 "Bless, and curse not," the Apostle adds. Why? To 
 what effect ? Is not the addition rather a weakening of 
 the sense and import of the precept? What need of 
 telling you, who are bound to bless your persecutors, 
 that you are to take care not to curse them ? Is not that 
 something like an anticlimax, a figure of the bathos ; — a 
 coming down from the enjoining of what is a noble 
 positive attainment of divine perfection, to a mere and 
 poor negative prohibition of what one animated by the 
 ambition of being thus godlike could never be supposed 
 P 
 
226 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 to dream of? First you are exhorted to bless them 
 that persecute you ; and then not to curse them. 
 
 That is not the manner of Paul. He does not think 
 or write so inconsequentially and so loosely as such a tame 
 construction of his language would imply. There is a 
 special force and point in his words, " Bless, and curse not." 
 A vitally important principle of morality is in them, 
 Bless, that you may not curse. Bless, if you would not 
 curse. As you would keep yourselves safe and free from 
 the risk of committing the great sin of cursing, see to it 
 that you are always blessing. Bless, be ever blessing, 
 lest you should curse. For you must be either blessing 
 or cursing. One or other of these attitudes you must 
 be adopting ; one or other of these frames of mind you 
 must be cherishing, at every moment. There is no in- 
 termediate position or posture. " Bless, and curse not." 
 
 I. And here, let it be observed, in the first place, the 
 risk and danger of your being tempted to curse them that 
 persecute you is strong ; stronger than you might at first 
 be prepared to allow. It is the tendency of human nature. 
 And it is a tendency which continues to exist, and is apt 
 to prevail, even when nature is sanctified by grace. Nay, 
 there is in that case a new and peculiar temptation. 
 
 You identify yourselves, and rightly, with Christ and 
 his cause. The persecution which you have to encounter 
 is not merely a personal affront and injury to you. It 
 is opposition to the Lord and his Anointed. Your selfish 
 resentment of the wrong done to yourselves is, as it 
 might seem, merged in the generous indignation with 
 
CURSE NOT. 227 
 
 which your bosom burns against the outrage offered to 
 your Master. It is the zeal of his house that hath eaten 
 you up. Ah ! what room is there here for self-deception ; 
 for the wrath of man, which worketh not the righteous- 
 ness of God, putting on the guise of a holy and disin- 
 terested concern for the kingdom of God and his right- 
 eousness ! 
 
 And the danger is the greater in proportion as your 
 Christianity is of a decided sort, and of an impulsive and 
 aggressive character, and is on that account calculated to 
 provoke and stimulate, among those with whom you come 
 in contact, the principle of hostility to the truth as it is in 
 Jesus, — the enmity of the carnal mind against God and 
 against his holy law. 
 
 There is, indeed, a kind of Christianity which leaves 
 those who profess and practise it sufficiently secure, in all 
 conscience, as regards the danger now in question. There 
 is the quiescent piety, not insincere, in its way, so far as 
 it goes ; nay, deeply spiritual perhaps, after a fashion ; 
 which almost makes a merit of not obtruding itself, or 
 thrusting itself forward, so as materially to interfere with 
 the customary ungodliness of the world lying in wicked- 
 ness. And, what is far more common, there is the 
 nominal and formal piety, which comes to a virtual 
 understanding that, if it is itself let alone, it will let the 
 world alone. If your religion is of such a nature as 
 either of these ; if you keep it, as you say, to yourselves, 
 as a matter entirely private, between you and your God ; 
 if you keep it exclusively for the closet and the church — 
 for the hour of secret devotion and the day of social 
 
228 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 worship ; if, when you go among your fellow-men, you 
 go to be very much what they are, and to live very much 
 as they live, — not troubling them with any very high 
 testimony, any very holy example, any very close dealing 
 with their consciences and hearts ; — you can have little or 
 no experience, either of the personal irritation which the 
 truth, when faithfully urged home by faithful witnesses, 
 causes in the minds of men who will not embrace it ; or 
 of the trial to which the witnesses of the truth are sub- 
 jected, when they have to overcome their proneness to 
 be personally irritated in their turn. Your Christianity 
 the world will tolerate, and not persecute. You have no 
 need to be warned against cherishing vindictive feelings 
 towards any persecutors. Yours is a very mild and 
 bland protest on the subject of the world's alienation 
 from God. The world's temper is not seriously ruffled 
 by it against you ; nor is there anything in the treat- 
 ment you meet with at its hands to ruffle very seriously 
 your temper against the world. 
 
 It will be otherwise if you are more in earnest and 
 more decided in your separation from the world, and 
 your self-consecration to God ; more unsparing and 
 uncompromising in your condemnation of all unright- 
 eousness ; more thoroughly under the influence of zea] 
 for the glory of God, love to Jesus Christ, and desire of 
 saving souls. You will not, indeed, even when such high 
 motives animate you, omit or neglect any fair method of 
 conciliation. You will not needlessly, by any peculiarity 
 or any infirmity of yours, give offence, or cause vexation 
 and annoyance. You will be " wise as serpents and harm- 
 
CURSE NOT. 229 
 
 less as doves." You will not court reproach, or obloquy, 
 or ill-usage, as if that were to be the seal of your 
 fidelity, — the proof and evidence of pre-eminent sanctity 
 or of surpassing consistency. You will not be in haste 
 to ascribe to hatred of the gospel manifestations of feel- 
 ing that, your humble esteem of yourselves may suggest, 
 are occasioned possibly by your imperfect or unworthy 
 manner of commending it. You will do all that in you 
 lies to disarm suspicion, and distrust, and jealous fear. 
 You will make all possible allowance for the natural 
 disposition of men to assert independence, and to dislike 
 any intermeddling with their notions and ways. You 
 will watch for, and be ready to welcome kindly, such relent- 
 ings, such tender softenings of heart, as your affectionate 
 and friendly dealings may be expected to call forth 
 among not a few, even of the most obdurate, on whom 
 you bring the appliances of your Christian influence to 
 bear. Still, with all that, you must lay your account, as 
 Christ's witnesses and Christ's workers, discharging offices 
 of love in his Church, with having persecution, real per- 
 secution, to bear. You will meet with not a little that 
 will be real persecution to you ; persecution of the nature 
 that fell to the lot of Him who " endured such contradic- 
 tion of sinners against himself. " You may not have to 
 " resist unto blood, striving against sin." You may not be 
 stoned, or imprisoned, or scourged. You may not suffer 
 loss of goods, or loss of standing. But there may be 
 those among the objects of your most earnest solicitude 
 who but ill requite your care and kindness. You come 
 in contact with coarse and hard minds, suspicious souls, 
 
230 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 obdurate hearts. In proportion to the decision of your 
 protest and testimony, and the aggressiveness of your 
 Christian zeal and love, you meet with opposition in 
 quarters in which to meet with it is very trying. And 
 the kind of opposition may be hard to bear. Your good 
 is evil spoken of; your frailties are exposed and mag- 
 nified ; your motives are misconstrued ; your manners 
 ridiculed or criticised. Or, all credit being given you for 
 good intentions, } T our well-meant efforts are received with 
 the cold smile of politeness, or the suppressed sneer of 
 contempt. Your most faithful and affectionate advances 
 are repelled. And those for whose salvation your very 
 bowels are yearning are among the first to hint that you 
 are troublesome, or that you are mad. 
 
 Is there no temptation besetting you, in circumstances 
 like these, to let angry passions rise ? Is the old nature 
 not stirred within you? Do you not find that it 
 costs you an effort, often difficult and painful, to keep 
 down the deep feelings of disappointment and vexation 
 that are swelling your bosom to suffocation, and dimming 
 your eye with bitter tears ; yes ! and to suppress the 
 indignant remonstrance of self-defence, or the keen retort 
 of justly-merited defiance, that is already trembling upon 
 your lips ? 
 
 Ah S there is a struggle in your hearts. You take 
 yourselves to task. You search and try your ways ; your 
 wavs of witnessing for God and seeking to win souls to 
 Christ. Alas! you discover that the ill success which 
 distresses you, and the opposition which vexes you, may 
 be partly ONving to yourselves, to your own fault : your 
 
CURSE NOT. 231 
 
 faulty manner of testifying and working ; your want of 
 tact, or of temper, or of patience, or of prudence, or of for- 
 bearance, or of kindness. Be it so. The discovery, or the 
 suspicion, humbles you ; but it does not allay the fever or 
 still the tempest of your bosom. You feel as if, notwith- 
 standing such shortcoming on your part, you were still 
 harshly judged and hardly used ; that allowances might be 
 made for you, in consideration of your good faith and 
 good will ; and that, after all, it is too bad that you should, 
 on such slight grounds as these, be so cruelly misunder- 
 stood, and " persecuted without a cause." 
 
 Yes ; and it may be that you fix upon some one or 
 two among your circle of acquaintance, or within the 
 range and round of your walks of Christian philanthropy, 
 of whom you might have expected, and did once expect, 
 and had a good right and good reason to expect, better 
 things. That they too should turn against you, and, on 
 some frivolous pretence, or for some petty provocation, begin 
 to thwart you in your work of faith and labour of love; 
 taking part with those who reproach and suspect you ; 
 fomenting whatever hostility there may be in men's minds 
 toward you ; — that surely is intolerable. Can flesh and 
 blood stand it ? Can you abstain, in your hearts, from 
 venting what is but too near akin to a malediction or a 
 curse ? Can you help yourselves from partly giving way 
 to what may seem fully justifiable emotions of personal 
 resentment, and a personal sense of unprovoked and unde- 
 served wrong? 
 
 No ! not unless you make conscience of blessing those 
 whom you are thus tempted to curse. It is not a merely 
 
232 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 negative exercise of moral principle, the putting of an 
 enforced restraint upon such natural tendencies, that will 
 suffice. They are not to be curbed, or checked, or kept 
 in, "by bit and bridle." The outward expression of them, 
 by word or sign, may be thus suppressed. But inwardly 
 they chafe and fret the more for being stifled and pent 
 up. The house will not long remain " empty, swept, and 
 garnished." A seven-fold worse possession than the first 
 may befall it. A vexed and soured temper, — a certain 
 dark brooding over inevitable evil, — a sort of universal 
 scepticism, that will do its duty doggedly, but always in 
 despair of any other return than ingratitude and misre- 
 presentation, — these and such like brooding harpies prey 
 upon your spirits. " Woe is me that I dwell among such 
 people;" " Woe is unto them that I dwell among them in 
 vain ;" — is apt to become the secret burden of your pro- 
 phesying and your ministering. If it is not a malignant 
 wishing of evil, it is at least a gloomy acquiescence in evil. 
 It lies in the direction of cursing, if it does not actually 
 reach so far. If I am to be safe from so sad a frame of 
 mind, I must have something more than a " curse not" for 
 my motto. My watchword, — or rather my Master's word of 
 command, — must ring true with an element, not of passive 
 suppression, but of active power. " Bless, and curse not," 
 is my rallying cry. Let me bless ; let me be always 
 blessing, wherever there is the slightest risk of my being 
 tempted, — almost, if not altogether, — to curse. Let me 
 single out the parties whose ill-reception and ill-requital of 
 my kind Christian advances I find to be most irritating 
 and trying. Let me make them especially and by name 
 
BLESS, AND CURSE NOT. 233 
 
 the objects of my special good- will. Let me be in heart 
 and soul blessing them ; blessing, and not cursing. 
 
 II. For now, in the second place, let it be noted, this 
 blending of the positive and negative in one command, 
 — " Bless, and curse not," — involves a principle of wide 
 application in the department of morals and religion, — 
 in the ethical and spiritual sphere of human sensibility and 
 activity. The principle is this, that neutrality is impos- 
 sible. When any object is presented soliciting regard, the 
 heart cannot remain in equipoise or in equilibrio. One 
 way or other it must be affected, and must decide. It 
 must either approve or disapprove, like or dislike, love or 
 hate. It cannot occupy a position of indifference. 
 
 It is upon this principle that our Lord's two correlative 
 and corresponding maxims are based ; — " He that is not 
 against us is for us " (Luke ix. 50) ; and, " He that is not 
 with me is against me " (Matt. xii. 30). Every man 
 who comes in contact with Christ and his gospel, — every 
 man to whom Christ, in his gospel and by his Spirit, is 
 brought near, — must of necessity take a side, and, in point 
 of fact, does take a side. There can be no evasion or 
 compromise. Either Christ is precious to him, as " to 
 them that believe ; " or else he is a stumbling-block and 
 an offence, and is disesteemed and disliked. When at any 
 moment Christ is presented to me, I must, at that mo- 
 ment, be either accepting or rejecting him ; I must in my 
 heart's affections be either a friend or a foe ; no inter- 
 mediate frame of mind is, if I may so say, realizeable ; that 
 is the only alternative. And upon that, as the only possible 
 
234 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD' S ENMITY. 
 
 alternative, I am to proceed, in my judgment of charity, 
 as regards my neighbour; and in my judgment of faithful- 
 ness, as regards myself. 
 
 On the one hand, as regards my neighbour, do I see 
 in his character and conduct something that is plainly 
 irreconcilable with his being against Christ? Is there 
 enough, in the temper he manifests and the works he 
 does, to satisfy me, upon a fair view of it, that he cannot be 
 an enemy ? Does he show a spirit, and follow a course, 
 that clearly cannot be explained in consistency with any 
 such supposition as that ? Then let me unhesitatingly re- 
 cognise him as one who not merely is not against us, but is 
 for us. He cannot, I am sure, be the one ; and therefore 
 he must be the other. Difficulties may present themselves 
 to me in the way of coming to such a conclusion. From 
 my stand-point, or point of view, I may be at a loss to 
 account for sundry differences of opinion, and even of 
 practice, between him and me. " He follows not with 
 us." He has ways of his own. Still, if he is casting 
 out devils in the name of Christ ; if even in some one single 
 unequivocal instance he is found feeling and acting in a 
 manner that is incompatible with the very notion of his 
 being against Christ ; let me give him the full benefit of 
 that evidence. And on the strength of the principle, that 
 neutrality with regard to Christ and his cause is impos- 
 sible, let me cheerfully acquiesce in the judgment of 
 charity, that since I cannot but be satisfied that he is 
 not against us, he must be, and must be held to be, vir- 
 tually and truly on our side. 
 
 But on the other hand, as regards myself always, — and 
 
BLESS, AND CURSE NOT. 235 
 
 sometimes, when necessary, as regards my neighbour also, 
 — let me wield in another and opposite direction this two- 
 edged sword. Let me not indulge, either a free and easy 
 laxity in judging of myself, or a mawkish, exaggerated, 
 and sentimental affectation of liberality in judging of my 
 neighbour. Let me be faithful as well as charitable. 
 And when I discover or detect a line of action, or habit 
 of thought, that no sophistry or casuistry can harmonize 
 with real attachment to my Lord and Saviour, — when I 
 see another doing, or find myself doing, or desiring to do, 
 anything palpably at variance with the essential character 
 of a disciple, — let me not for an instant entangle myself 
 in the meshes of special pleading. Let me at once boldly 
 face the actual state of the case. One who does such a 
 thing, or has pleasure in those who do it, cannot, by any 
 stretch of charitable construction, be believed to be on the 
 Lord's side. It is not possible that such a one can be for 
 Christ. He must therefore be against Christ. Let me 
 open my eyes to the truth. Let me hear the faithful 
 word of Peter to Simon Magus, and faithfully obey it ; — 
 " Repent therefore of this thy wickedness, and pray God, 
 if perhaps the thought of thine heart may be forgiven 
 thee. For I perceive that thou art in the gall of 
 bitterness, and in the bond of iniquity" (Acts viii. 
 22, 23). 
 
 The same principle is to be applied as a rule of conduct 
 as well as a rule of judgment. You are to remember 
 that, since neutrality is impossible, your only security 
 against the risk of an evil affection prevailing over you, 
 is the strenuous cultivation and exercise of its opposite. 
 
236 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 If you would make sure of not wishing or not doing evil 
 to any one, you must make conscience of wishing him well 
 and doing him good. 
 
 So the Apostle teaches, in this epistle, with reference to 
 the general duty of benevolence ; — " Love worketh no ill 
 to his neighbour : therefore love is the fulfilling of the 
 law" (Rom. xiii. 10). It may seem a poor commendation 
 of charity, or love, to say of it merely negatively that " it 
 worketh no ill to his neighbour ;" and to make that the 
 ground of the high place assigned to it, as " fulfilling the 
 law," may at first sight be felt to be somewhat strange. 
 Is it really so, — that the working of no ill to my neighbour 
 is the fulfilling of the law ? Is my simply abstaining from 
 inflicting injury, and doing actual harm, all that is required 
 to meet and satisfy the second of the two great command- 
 ments, — which is like unto the first, — " Thou shalt love 
 thy neighbour as thyself?" No. But the Apostle would 
 enforce the lesson that there is no intermediate state of 
 mind or of heart between working ill to your neighbour 
 and loving him. The positive affection of love is the 
 source and the only safeguard of the negative virtue of 
 harmlessness. If love, active love, is absent from your 
 bosom, there must be present in it that " hating of one 
 another" which is characteristic of the natural man; — and 
 which, though in the absence of provocation it may seem 
 to lie dormant, is sure to manifest itself at any moment 
 when your path is crossed or your wish is thwarted. 
 
 Now if this be so when it is your neighbour generally 
 — any one of your fellow-men — with whom you have to 
 do, how much more must it be so when it is one who 
 
BLESS, AND CURSE NOT. 237 
 
 "persecutes'' you ! In that case, the alternative is to be 
 very stringently insisted upon. Either you must be 
 blessing or you must be cursing. Bless, therefore, that 
 you may not curse. Smarting under the sting of some 
 petty annoyance, some poor sarcasm against your faith, 
 some senseless taunt, or some cruel perversion of your 
 Christian offices of kindness, — pause and think, what are 
 the two states of feeling between which, and between 
 which alone, you have to choose. 
 
 The persecution, whatever it may be, and of whatever 
 sort, may be viewed in one or other of two lights. You may 
 fix your thoughts on those features of the persecutor's con- 
 duct which make it peculiarly offensive. You may dwell on 
 all the aggravating circumstances connected with it; — how 
 entirely and absolutely it is without cause on your part, 
 and therefore inexcusable on his part ; how sadly it dis- 
 appoints your hopes and damps your zeal ; what insensi- 
 bility and hard-hearted unthankfulness it indicates ; how 
 seriously it is fitted to mar your usefulness in the sphere 
 of influence in which you move. These and other elements 
 of all but intolerable bitterness you may so brood over as 
 to nurse into increasing strength your sense of ill-usage, 
 and make you feel as if you did well to be angry. You 
 may put a restraint on yourself, and abstain from show- 
 ing how deeply you are wounded. You may even secretly 
 take credit for continuing to treat the offender as if 
 nothing painful had occurred. But in heart, alas ! may 
 you not be in danger of cursing him? — giving him up, and 
 giving him over, almost contentedly and with compla- 
 cency, as one upon whom your most dutiful efforts are 
 
238 
 
 lost, — who must be, and you are almost tempted to add 
 — who deserves to be, a castaway ? 
 
 Yield not to this temptation. Rather when you 
 suffer wrong, call to mind the considerations which should 
 bring the wrong-doer before you in a very different light. 
 Look at his case rather than your own. Ah ! if you put 
 yourself in his place, you will see much, \ery much, that 
 should charm all your resentment away, and turn it into 
 tenderest pity and concern. A thousand pleas will occur 
 to you, which, if they do not excuse, at least explain, his 
 aversion to the truth and his dislike of its witness. You 
 picture to yourself his whole history, with its scanty means 
 of good and its myriad influences of evil ; you ask your- 
 self what, if his history had been yours, you would have 
 been ; — how you, if his lot were yours, — his training, his 
 habits, his companions, — would be inclined to think, and 
 feel, and act. You cease to wonder at his obtuseness 
 and his opposition. You are drawn, and not repelled, by 
 that too easily accounted for infatuation of his, which 
 really hurts not you, but, alas ! is ruining his own 
 benighted soul. No thought of self can find h arbour 
 within you. All your thought is of him. Your bowels 
 yearn over him the more for the very blindness and mad- 
 ness which make him a persecutor. And so you bless, 
 and do not curse. 
 
SYMPATHY AS A NATURAL PRINCIPLE. 239 
 
 II. 
 
 THE CHARM OF THE BLESSING— SYMPATHY. 
 
 Rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with thenrthat weep." — 
 Rom. xii. 15. 
 
 This precept I hold to be closely connected with the 
 preceding. "Whatever wider application it may have, it 
 very specially includes " them which persecute you." It 
 refers to your manner of dealing with the world, and 
 with those in the world whom you are apt, it may be 
 with too good reason, to regard as antagonistic and 
 hostile to your Lord and his cause ; — and to yourselves as 
 your Lord's witnesses, and the advocates and promoters 
 of his cause. What is enjoined is a certain genial " milk 
 of human kindness," such as will move you to feel for, 
 and feel with, your fellow-men, simply as your fellow- 
 men, altogether apart from any more special or particular 
 relation in which they may stand to you, or you may 
 stand to them. The generous, wide, and unrestricted 
 tide of genuine human sympathy is to have its full and 
 free course, amid whatever lines of distinction and 
 demarcation other considerations may render necessary. 
 Christianity itself is not to supersede humanity. I am a 
 Christian ; and nothing that touches Christ and Christi- 
 
240 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 anity can be matter of indifference in my esteem. But I 
 am also a man, and nothing that touches man is of 
 foreign concern to me. 
 
 As a Christian, I must discriminate and divide men 
 into classes. I cannot look with equal eye on the friends 
 and foes of Him " whom having not seen I love ; and in 
 whom, though now I see him not, yet believing, I rejoice 
 with joy unspeakable and full of glory." I love both ; — 
 but it is with a difference. Those who love Christ and 
 his cause and his people, I love with a brotherly affection 
 true and tender, kind and meek ; embracing them and 
 clasping them to my heart ; giving them all honour above 
 myself, for the Lord's sake. Those that are still opposing 
 themselves to my Lord, and to me his servant on his 
 account, I also love ; with a love that restrains every 
 bitter feeling which their opposition might awaken, and 
 moves me to bless them, to wish them well, to do them 
 good. 
 
 But just as that former particular affection of brotherly 
 love would be apt to become narrow, selfish, sectarian; the 
 love merely of those who agree with me, because they 
 agree with me ; unless it were allied to the higher, wider, 
 universal and divine principle of love ; the love which is 
 of God ; — so, the particular modification of love called into 
 exercise when I contemplate them that persecute me as the 
 enemies of my Lord, and therefore mine ; prompting, as 
 it does, forbearance, forgiveness, the returning of good for 
 evil, blessing for cursing ; would be apt to assume the 
 character of a sort of supercilious, patronizing pity, — to 
 give itself the air of a superior condescending to be 
 
SYMPATHY AS A NATURAL PRINCIPLE. 2-il 
 
 benevolent to one beneath him, — were it not tempered by 
 the infusion of that natural human sympathy and fellow- 
 feeling, which inclines me, irrespectively of all other 
 thoughts, whenever I see a fellow-creature rejoicing, to 
 rejoice with him ; or weeping, to weep with him. 
 
 The precept, then, in this view, may be considered, — 
 I., generally ; and IT., in its more particular connection 
 with your " blessing them which persecute you." 
 
 I. The general import of the precept is plain enough. 
 You are to make your neighbour's case your own, and 
 suffer what befalls him to affect you, as it affects him. 
 Nor is it difficult to see how this special duty of sympathy 
 comes under, and forms part of, the great and broad law 
 of charit}^ ; — " Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself/' 
 As this law is originally given in the Old Testament 
 (Lev. xix. 18), it stands conspicuous among command- 
 ments enforcing such mutual good offices as imply this 
 putting of yourself in your neighbour' , place and realizing 
 his joy or sorrow as your own ; while in the New Testa- 
 ment that same law is illustrated both by the teaching 
 and the example of the Lord ; — by his teaching, in such 
 parables as that of the good Samaritan ; and by his 
 example, in such scenes as those of Cana and of Bethany; 
 — and always in such a manner as to enforce the obliga- 
 tion, not of fellow-helping only, if one may use such a 
 phrase, but of fellow-feeling also. 
 
 There is a foundation for this virtue in the constitution 
 of our nature. There is a natural instinct or principle of 
 sympathy, which moves us, by an irresistible impulse, to 
 Q 
 
242 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 enter into the pathos or the passion of any scene that is 
 presented to us, or any tale that we are told. It is, in 
 the main, a genuine instinct and trustworthy principle, 
 fitted to be of much practical use, both as a motive to 
 right conduct, and as a help, at any rate, towards the 
 forming of right moral judgments. 
 
 But if it is to be a safe guide, it must itself be guided ; 
 it must be trained and educated. If it is left undis- 
 ciplined, and more especially if it is allowed to choose 
 its own objects, and set them in whatever light it pleases, 
 — it becomes a dazzling and bewildering earthly meteor, 
 rather than a fixed heavenly star. For in that case this 
 natural sympathy is apt to create or to seek a world for 
 itself ; — a world, whose incidents of varied interest may 
 be moulded and fashioned to suit its own fastidiousness 
 or its own caprice. 
 
 Hence the zest with which it revels in story and 
 romance, and finds congenial food, delicious but dangerous, 
 in works of fancy and of fiction. Such works make their 
 appeal to your social and sympathetic sensibility ; they 
 stir the deep fountains of emotion within you ; they cast 
 you by turns into all those moods of mind which, in their 
 almost infinitely varied compass, only smiles and tears 
 can express. The excessive study of them, — and any 
 study of them, unless very carefully guarded, tends to 
 become excessive, — may cause such a strain on this 
 sensitive part of your nature as shall render it either 
 impotent or morbid. The faculty of self-control is lost, 
 and a sickly, soft, and sentimental tenderness relaxes and 
 unnerves the soul. It must be so. For the sphere in 
 
SYMPATHY AS A NATURAL PRINCIPLE. 243 
 
 which you are accustoming yourselves sympathizingly 
 to rejoice and to weep, is purely ideal ; its scenes and 
 incidents are altogether imaginary. They carry you 
 away from the stern realities of life, which call for sober 
 action as well as strong passion, into regions of fairyland 
 in which, with nothing practical to chasten or subdue 
 your spirits, the thrilling pathos of pity and fierce power 
 of terror may be intensified to any pitch to which 
 inventive genius can aspire ; and the burning tear and 
 the wild laugh may alternate with each other, as the 
 vivid page presents the picture, by turns, of unheard of 
 woe and unnatural mirth, with which the heated and 
 fantastic brain is expected to throb in unison. 
 
 This may look like exaggeration ; or it may be 
 thought that I am putting an extreme case. Be that as 
 it may, the root and real source of the evil is in every 
 human bosom. It is that inveterate egotistic leaning 
 which is ever apt to turn sympathy from being a social, 
 into becoming a selfish, affection. I go forth into the 
 world, whether of fiction or of fact, in which I feel 
 myself most at home. Let it be a world of the latter sort; 
 let it be real life, and not ideal. I mingle with my 
 fellow-men, and have my circle of interest and influence 
 among them. I come in contact with people of different 
 classes and different characters. I have my friendships 
 and companionships, my intimacies and familiarities, 
 among the households of my acquaintance. I take my 
 part in the incidents and ongoings of the caste to which 
 I belong, and the department of society in the midst of 
 which I move, as well as in the comments and conversa- 
 
244 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 tions to which these give rise. I enter into the pursuits 
 and pleasures of the passing day. I am open to the 
 impression of its changes and chances. And in addition, 
 perhaps I have, outside of my own proper social sphere, 
 my chosen or appointed walk of duty among my fellow- 
 men of another grade. I have my round of visits among 
 the poor, or at least I am accessible to applications on 
 their behalf. My ear is open to the complaints of want 
 and misery. I take an interest in what I see and hear, 
 and give the tribute of a sincere look, or word, or grasp 
 of sensibility when a suffering brother, or one exulting 
 in sudden relief from suffering, is before me. 
 
 Yes ; but all the while it may be a merely natural 
 sensibility that I am indulging ; and I may be indulg- 
 ing it after a merely natural and selfish fashion. It may 
 still be in a world of its own that my sympathy is really 
 exercising itself ; selecting its own congenial materials, or 
 investing with its own colour the materials presented to 
 it ; so as to suit them to its refinement and delicacy of 
 taste, and insure that nothing too coarse shall come " be- 
 twixt the wind and its nobility." My " rejoicing with 
 them that rejoice, and weeping with them that weep," 
 may thus, after all, be little better than the sort of senti- 
 mental susceptibility that is called forth by romantic re- 
 presentations of interesting scenes and attractive objects 
 of regard ; — and therefore as unfit as that is, for standing 
 the wear and tear of actual contact and collision with 
 the stern realities which present themselves in the un- 
 varnished experience of common life. 
 
 But now let the merely natural instinct of sympathy 
 
SYMPATHY AS A CHRISTIAN DUTY. 245 
 
 become, through grace, a Christian virtue ; let it be the 
 discharge of a Christian duty; and what a change is 
 wrought ! Now, all is real. I deal with a real world, 
 and with real men and women in it. I have to do with 
 things as they are, and take people as I find them. 
 
 Ah ! how much am I sure to meet with, that, so far 
 from attracting my fellow-feeling, is fitted to disgust and 
 to repel ! The persons to whom that fellow-feeling is to 
 be extended are often those with whom I can have little 
 or nothing in common; their characters being uncongenial ; 
 their manners distasteful ; their very air and appearance 
 perhaps intolerably offensive. And then, the places where 
 I have to seek them ; the circumstances with which they 
 are surrounded ; the companions with whom they are as- 
 sociated, — all about them, in short, may be such as to 
 make a delicately nurtured mental and moral frame shrink 
 back in pain or horror. 
 
 To overcome obstacles like these, or rather to cease 
 from regarding them as obstacles at all ; to get through 
 the barrier which a coarse, forbidding derangement or 
 deformity may interpose ; to open the door which gives 
 vent only to sounds that shock the ear and odours loath- 
 some and stifling to the breath ; to enter the sordid 
 hovel where, not the elegant refinement of reduced gen- 
 tility, but the rudest, barest, and most squalid degradation 
 of poverty reigns ; to face disorder and disease, quarrel- 
 ling and strife ; and in the midst of all that, to sit down 
 beside the bed on which some poor sufferer is groaning, 
 or listen to the news which some gladdened soul is burn- 
 ing to tell ; and, losing all thought of the disagreeable 
 
246 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 features of the scene, and the distastefulness of the things 
 and persons belonging to it, — simply and naturally to 
 weep with the weeping, and rejoice with the rejoicing, — 
 that is an attainment, a habit, which nature never owned, 
 — which only grace can reach and sustain. Nor is it only 
 when you sound the lowest depths of the social fabric 
 that your sympathy, if it is of the right sort, will be tried. 
 Wherever you go on your errands of kindness and good 
 will, — in whatever circles you move and mingle, — you 
 will have to encounter influences most unfavourable to 
 the genial flow of feeling. The very forms and usages of 
 common-place routine and conventional etiquette are 
 chilling. You inhale an atmosphere of indifference and 
 frivolity ; or you are all but stifled by the vapour of 
 mean jealousies and angry passions. The gladness and 
 the grief which appeal to your sensibility exhibit them- 
 selves in a strange, uncouth guise, to which you cannot 
 get reconciled. The scene, in spite of all its truth and 
 reality, its actual power or pathos, has become so be- 
 clouded with the mists of exaggeration and false senti- 
 ment, — the din and clamour grow so confusing, — and 
 the parties most concerned seem so unamiable and unin- 
 viting, — that you are fain to make your escape, as best 
 you may, from a circle in winch you are so little at 
 home, and seek for more congenial fellowship elsewhere. 
 But no ! Your Christian faith and love forbid. You 
 call to mind that it is not left to your own discretion 
 to say when and where, — in what circumstances and to- 
 wards what persons, — you shall exercise your sympathy. 
 It is not a matter of taste or of sentiment, but of con- 
 
SYMPATHY TOWARDS PERSECUTORS. 247 
 
 science. The command is universal and unconditional ; 
 laying you under an obligation to get the better of all 
 obstacles and embarrassments, all annoyances and dislikes ; 
 and requiring you, not for your own pleasure or relief, but 
 for your divine Master's sake, and after his example, 
 always and everywhere to be ready to " rejoice with 
 them that do rejoice, and weep with them that weep." 
 
 II. This conscientious and Christian exercise of sym- 
 pathy is called for very specially towards " them which 
 persecute you." Here, in addition to all the other general 
 difficulties with which the grace or virtue in question 
 may have to contend, there is the one particular con- 
 sideration, that they who are to be its objects are your 
 enemies, because they are the enemies of your Lord. 
 That consideration, however, is to be lost sight of ; all 
 thought of it is to be extinguished. The very point of 
 the precept, indeed, is this ; — I must altogether cease to 
 regard these persons as my persecutors ; I must come to 
 regard them exclusively as my neighbours and my fellow- 
 men. The precept bids me recognise the essential man- 
 hood, or humanity, of every individual with whom I have 
 anything to do, — his possession of a common nature 
 with myself ; it bids me recognise that alone ; it bids me 
 ignore, and mentally annihilate, everything else about 
 him. He is to me simply a man ; a human being ; 
 nothing more, nothing less, nothing else. I must strip 
 off from him all adventitious trappings. I must pull 
 down his dwelling, whether it be a palace or a filthy hut. 
 I must disperse his companions, whether I like them or 
 
248 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 not. Nay more. I must divest him of his habits, his 
 manners, his works and ways, — no matter what these are 
 or have been. I must extricate him out of the entangle- 
 ments of events and circumstances. To me, he has no 
 history ; no character, I would almost say. He is before 
 me bare and naked as a man, that I may feel for him as 
 a man, — that I may feel with him as a man. In par- 
 ticular, if he is known to me as my persecutor, I know 
 him in that character no more. I know him only as 
 a man. And knowing him only in the character of a 
 man, I, being myself a man, rejoice in his joy and mingle 
 my tears with his. 
 
 Hence the propriety and admirable grace of this com- 
 mandment respecting sympathy being made immediately 
 to follow the injunction, " Bless them which persecute 
 you." In obeying that injunction, you recognise the 
 persons in view as persecutors. The fact of their being 
 persecutors is before you ; and is, in truth, expressly and 
 consciously the ground of your treatment of them. It is 
 as persecutors that you refuse to curse them. It is as 
 persecutors that you resolve to bless them. But now 
 that fact is to be out of sight and out of mind. Now 
 they are not persecutors, but simply men ; men of like 
 passions and sensibilities with yourselves. You have 
 now no thought of the different positions which they and 
 you occupy with reference to one another. The nature 
 you have in common is all that is in your mind. As 
 man to man you draw near to visit every one of them ; 
 as man with man you commune with him in his joy and 
 in his sorrow; as fellow-men you laugh and weep together. 
 
SYMPATHY TOWARDS PERSECUTORS. 249 
 
 This genuine, equal, human sympathy, is indispensable, if 
 you would so bless them who persecute you as not to vex 
 them but to win them. For there is a style and manner 
 of blessing " them which persecute you/' — there is a way 
 of dealing with those who oppose themselves, — which, 
 while it looks like, and may pass for, a strict compliance 
 with the precept, is wholly at variance with its spirit ; — as 
 when one stands aloof and apart, and from some emi- 
 nence of serene and unruffled equanimity, — some height 
 of transcendental spirituality and heavenly-mindedness, — 
 seems to be ever saying, by look and gesture, — or to be 
 ever thinking in his heart, — Lo ! you there who, out of 
 the depths of your ungodliness and unbelief, try to shoot 
 at me for my attachment to my Lord, see how impotent 
 are all your shafts ; they touch me not ; I stand un- 
 scathed. And looking down upon your miserable infatua- 
 tion, I can afford to dismiss from my mind every feeling 
 of resentment ; nay, I cannot find it in my heart to curse 
 you. Rather, as you see, I lift up my hands and bless 
 you. I pardon you, and pity you, and wish you well. 
 And if you will allow me, I will come among you. to give 
 my benediction in the form of good offices and good ad- 
 vices ; for, unmoved by your ingratitude, and having 
 patience with your perverseness, I am still ready to be 
 your benefactor and your friend. 
 
 Is it any wonder that even an honest desire to do 
 good, if it be clothed in the garb, and affect the airs, of 
 such supercilious condescension, should find doors and 
 hearts shut against it when it goes round among the 
 families of the working men of this working world? The 
 
250 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 deep craving, the earnest yearning, for the equal inter- 
 change of sympathy, that lies, as a sealed spring, in every 
 human bosom, however sunken, is not thus to be reached 
 and opened. But go, child of God, among your neigh- 
 bours round your dwelling. Show them, quite naturally, 
 that you care not what else they may be, knowing them 
 only as your fellow-men. Ah ! there is a charm, as you 
 will find, altogether resistless in its power to cause genial 
 streams to flow from flinty rocks, in your knowing how, 
 with artless and guileless fellow-feeling, to " rejoice 
 with them that do rejoice, and to weep with them that 
 weep/' 
 
SYMPATHY OF MIND WITH MIND. 251 
 
 III. 
 
 THE CHARM OF SYMPATHY— MIND ACCOMMO- 
 DATING ITSELF TO MIND. 
 
 " Be of the same mind one toward another. Mind not high things, but conde- 
 scend to men of low estate. Be not wise in your own conceits." — Rom. xii. 16. 
 
 The three clauses of this verse are more closely connected, 
 in point of phraseology, in the original than in our trans- 
 lation. In them all, some form or modification of the 
 word rendered "mind" occurs. And the word must be 
 understood as used in its old sense, to denote purpose or 
 inclination ; the bent and bias of one's character, 
 temperament, or will ; — as when it is said of him that he 
 is so and so minded ; thus minded and not otherwise. 
 In this view, three different faults, or faulty tendencies, 
 of the mind are here pointed out and condemned ; and 
 yet the three are so intimately associated that they may 
 almost be said to be really one. A perverse mind, prone 
 to differ ; a partial mind, preferring what is high, and 
 passing by the lowly ; a proud mind, self-confident and 
 self-conceited ; — these three characteristics ; first, wrong- 
 headedness or pertinacity; secondly, sycophancy or respect 
 of persons ; thirdly, vanity or self-complacency ; mark, or 
 make up, a spirit or habit of mind fatal to the genial 
 flow of natural human sympathy, and such as must 
 
252 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 impart an air of stiffness, and artificial patronizing con- 
 descension, to that grace in the exercise of which you 
 study, like your Lord, amid whatever contradiction of 
 sinners against yourself you may have to endure, to 
 '* rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with 
 them that weep." Thus the precepts in this sixteenth 
 verse fit into and supplement those of the fourteenth 
 and fifteenth. 
 
 For surely this is the connection in which the verse is 
 to be taken. The entire passage in the midst of which 
 it occurs refers, not to the sentiments and affections which 
 Christians are to cherish among themselves, or towards 
 one another as Christians, but to the way in which they 
 are to feel and act towards them that are without. We 
 cannot imagine that the Apostle means abruptly to return 
 to the former topic, which has been occupying the pre- 
 ceding part of the chapter ; and that he does so merely 
 to thrust in for the use of believers an additional exhor- 
 tation to brotherly unanimity and humility, not certainly 
 in harmony or in keeping either with what goes before 
 or with what comes after. This is scarcely doing justice 
 to the Apostle's line of thought. And it is the less likely 
 that he should intend thus awkwardly to resume that 
 subject, because he has already sufficiently handled it, in 
 the verse in which he has been exhorting the members of 
 Christ's body to be " kindly affectioned one to another 
 with brotherly love ; in honour preferring one another ; ,: 
 and especially in that earnest appeal, " I say, through the 
 grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, 
 not to think of himself more highly than he ought to 
 
SYMPATHY OF MIND WITH MIND. 253 
 
 think ; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt 
 to every man the measure of faith." There the very 
 term upon which the precept in the text turns is used ; — 
 not to be high-minded ; to be soberly-minded. 
 
 Among yourselves, the Apostle has been saying, in 
 your church arrangements, in your Christian fellowship, 
 be not minded to exalt yourselves ; be not minded to 
 cause rivalry or jealousy among yourselves ; be minded 
 rather to form a sober estimate of your own gifts and 
 claims, and to do full justice to your brother's. And now 
 he widens and extends the range of the exhortation. He 
 applies it to the relation in which you stand to the world ; 
 even to the world at whose hands you may expect persecu- 
 tion. With reference to that world he has been laying 
 down the law of charity and fellow-feeling ; — " Bless 
 them which persecute you: bless, and curse not. Rejoice 
 with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that 
 weep." And now, still with reference to these apparently 
 unworthy objects of your blessing and your sympathy, he 
 exhorts you to be minded rather to agree than to differ ; 
 — " Be of the same mind one toward another. Mind 
 not high things, but condescend to men of low estate. 
 Be not wise in your own conceits. " 
 
 It is not easy, in any translation, to bring out the 
 verbal link of connection running through the three 
 clauses of this verse ; but a sort of expository comment 
 or paraphrase may be attempted. 
 
 " Be ye minding the same thing among one another ; 
 let there be a disposition, on your part, when you 
 come in contact with your fellow-men, in their gladness 
 
254 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 and in their grief, so to identify yourselves with them, 
 that there shall be, between you and them, a common 
 mind, or a community of mind or sentiment, as regards 
 the matter which is agitating them. In order to this, 
 see to it, on the one hand, that you do not so exclu- 
 sively mind, or regard, high things, — even the things of 
 highest moment to you as Christians, — but that you may 
 suffer yourselves to be led along the more humble walk 
 of ordinary human experience, so as to take an interest 
 in those lower matters about which your fellow-men, 
 simply as men, are occupied. 1 And on the other hand, 
 see to it also that you are not selfishly -minded, — apt to 
 hug j^ourselves in your own opinion of your superior wis- 
 dom, intelligence, and spirituality, — as if }^ou alone, or you 
 especially, were right-minded, and those around you were 
 to be looked down upon as mindless and aimless triflers." 
 By some such explanatory rendering as this, the mean- 
 ing which, so far as I can judge, ought to be attached 
 to this verse, may be in some measure indicated. And 
 so the way may be prepared for considering, — I. What 
 that community of mind is which is recommended in 
 the first clause ; — and, II. What are those two other 
 habits of mind which are condemned in the other two 
 clauses as being incompatible with what is recommended 
 in the first. 
 
 1 The clause, " Condescend to men of low degree," is of doubtful interpretation. 
 The word " men" is not in the original ; " things" may be equally well supplied. 
 And "condescend " is perhaps too strong a rendering. The idea seems to be that 
 which I have endeavoured to express in the paraphrase. Or it may be put thus : 
 " Mind not high things, but accommodate yourselves to the lowly. Be not in your 
 mind self-conceited, or self-sufficient." 
 
SYMPATHY OF MIND WITH MIND. 255 
 
 I. " Be of the same mind one toward another." This 
 cannot mean, if the precept is of as wide an application 
 as I take it to be, agreement of opinion. Those with 
 reference to whom you are to cultivate the spirit here 
 enjoined, may be persons with whom you have little in 
 common ; from whom, indeed, you are wide as the 
 poles asunder, as regards the views which you and they 
 respectively hold on questions of most vital interest. It 
 must be so, if you are of God, as his little children, and they 
 are still of the world which lieth in wickedness. The 
 rule, in that case, is clear ; — " Be ye not unequally yoked 
 together with unbelievers : for what fellowship hath right- 
 eousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath 
 light with darkness? and what concord hath Christ with 
 Belial ? or what part hath he that believeth with an 
 infidel? and what agreement hath the temple of God 
 with idols ? for ye are the temple of the living God ; as 
 God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them : 
 and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. 
 Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye sepa- 
 rate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing ; 
 and I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, 
 and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord 
 Almighty" (2 Cor. vi. 14-18). 
 
 But while you come out from among them, and are 
 separate from their worldly ways, touching not the unclean 
 thing ; you go among them, sent by your Lord into the 
 world, as he was sent by the Father into the world, — on 
 the same errand and mission of self-denying, self-sacrificing 
 love. You are not taken out of the world, though you 
 
256 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 are kept from the evil. You mix with your fellow-men, 
 on lawful occasions, simply as your fellow-men. You 
 visit them, and seek them out, and converse and deal 
 with them ; going about to do them good. You come 
 in contact with them. You see what the things are 
 about which they are engaged and interested. You learn 
 what causes their rejoicing, what occasions their weep- 
 ing. Their cause of joy may not be such as you think 
 would win a smile from you. The occasion of their grief 
 may seem to you unworthy of a tear. But what then ? 
 Do you check the flow of your genial fellow-feeling ? 
 No. You try to put yourselves in their place. You look 
 at the things which so affect them from their stand- 
 point, or point of view, and not from your own. And so 
 you come to be, and they come to see that you are, of 
 the same mind with them ; minding these things as they 
 mind them ; noticing and appreciating them as they are 
 noticed and appreciated by them. 
 
 This is the heart of genuine human sympathy, its heart 
 of hearts. It is something more than " rejoicing with 
 them that do rejoice, and weeping with them that weep." 
 That may be, after all, as we have seen, a mere instinct 
 of sensibility ; scarcely anything else than an affection of 
 the nerves. Laughter is contagious, and so is weeping. 
 The simple sight of the outward manifestations or signs 
 of joy and grief, especially when strongly indulged and 
 unrestrainedly and vehemently expressed, moves you who 
 are spectators beyond control. What may be the matter, 
 you do not know. Before you can hear the tale that is 
 to be told to account for what you see, your countenance 
 
SYMPATHY OF MIND WITH MIXD. 2o7 
 
 catches the look of his on whose face you gaze, and your 
 eyes are as full as his. 
 
 So far the man is pleased or soothed. But he wishes 
 to explain, to open up his mind. He would have you 
 to understand what it is that is agitating him so much. 
 You listen. But he perceives that you listen impatiently. 
 He becomes painfully sensible that things do not strike 
 you as they strike him. Your mind does not go along 
 with what he opens up to you of his mind. Embarrass- 
 ment ensues, on both sides ; and disappointment. There 
 is an interruption, or an end, of sympathy. He is morti- 
 fied when he discovers that you can so little enter into 
 the grounds of that emotion on his part of which the 
 outward sign, whether cheerful or sad, seemed to find so 
 prompt an echo in your bosom. And you are vexed, 
 ready to be angry with yourself as well as with him, 
 because you cannot see the matter in question in the 
 same light in which it presents itself to him. 
 
 What is it that is here wanting % The very essence 
 and reality of sympathy. For sympathy is not merely 
 the irresistible impulse to laugh when you see laughter, 
 and to weep when you see tears. It is the communion of 
 mind with mind, alike in laughter and in tears. 
 
 I speak of mind, not in any high, transcendental and 
 spiritual sense of the word, — as if it were only in the 
 region of pure reason and divine intuition that sympathy 
 could exist. No doubt it is there only that it can exist 
 in full perfection ; when enlightened and holy souls 
 thoroughly comprehend and approve of one another. I 
 speak of mind in the ordinary and common-place use of 
 R 
 
258 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 the phrase, — the mind which, as regards the things that 
 touch you as sentient and social beings, you can have in 
 common with the whole, or with any one, of the human 
 family. Only this community of mind must be genuine. 
 It cannot be either forced or feigned. 
 
 A good test or illustration may be found in your inter- 
 course with children. We may experiment with them, 
 because they are so natural. A laughing child, a crying 
 child, who can withstand ? The clear, bright ring of the 
 laugh ; the sad, wailing cry ; go straight to your heart. You 
 are irresistibly attracted. You draw near. The little one 
 notices your radiant face, or your clouded brow. He too is 
 irresistibly attracted. He welcomes your advances. He 
 runs to meet you. He seats himself on your knee and nestles 
 in your bosom. He is ready and eager to tell you all 
 his story. He has a budget of news to open up to you. 
 The triumph he has won ; or the dire mishap and griev- 
 ance he has met with ; you must hear it all. On he goes 
 fluently and freely. But he watches your eye. He feels 
 your embrace. And soon, in your listless or averted 
 look ; in your slackened hold of him ; in your drowsy 
 apathy, or ill-concealed weariness and disgust ; he catches 
 evidence enough that your mind is not with his mind. 
 The charm is speedily broken ; the spell is dissolved. You 
 and he are soon strangers again ; strangers even more 
 than you ever were before. In vain you try to put a 
 constraint upon yourself, and compel yourself to feel or 
 show an interest in the little fellow's recital of his suc- 
 cesses or his wrongs. He is a quick observer of the 
 countenance and shrewd reader of the heart ; too shrewd 
 
SYMPATHY OF MIND WITH MIND. 259 
 
 to be easily imposed upon. Anything artificial he soon 
 detects. If you would keep him after you have won 
 him, you must be natural. Spontaneously, in genuine 
 fellow-feeling, you must be moved to lay your mind 
 alongside of his mind. 
 
 Be it so. You enter into his childhood and are a 
 child with him. You enter with him into childhood's 
 way of viewing things, and feeling things, and talking 
 about things. In and with him, you speak as a child, 
 you understand as a child, you think as a child. And 
 you do so without an effort. It is your disposition and 
 your delight to do so. And doing so thus, you make 
 your prattling friend your own ; you get him to trust 
 and love you. Nay more, you get him to sympathize 
 with you, as you sympathize with him. You draw him 
 up to look at things from your stand-point, or point of 
 view, through your being so willing and able to look at 
 them from his. And if he has had any grudge or sus- 
 picion against you when you first began to deal with 
 him, your unaffected cordiality in overlooking his petty 
 offences, and provocations, and outbreaks of mischief; your 
 kindness to him in spite of them; your ready smile and 
 tear when he is glad or sorry; and above all, your 
 cheerful patience in listening to what he has to say, and 
 your prompt intelligence in taking up and taking in 
 details and experiences which he cannot always get his 
 seniors to comprehend, — these manifestations of real good- 
 will and a hearty good understanding may go far to 
 make a conquest of him for the only purpose you care to 
 have in view, — his learning to be of the same mind with 
 
260 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 you, and being brought to sit as a meek and quiet dis- 
 ciple at your feet and at your Master's. 
 
 That is the object, and the sole object, which you really 
 contemplate in all your intercourse with "them which 
 persecute you." Your heart's desire and prayer is, that 
 they should be of the same mind with you, like-minded 
 with you as regards all that concerns the glory of God 
 and the salvation of souls ; the divine honour and their 
 own true interests in time and for eternity. That is the 
 way in which you would have your " being of the same 
 mind," you and they together, "one toward another," ulti- 
 mately brought about. With an eye to that you seek 
 them and their fellows, in the intercourse of ordinary 
 life, or in special endeavours to do them good. 
 
 But they thwart and oppose you. And their oppo- 
 sition often takes a form and character peculiarly fitted 
 to irritate and annoy. You have some difficulty in 
 curbing your sorely-tried temper, and suppressing your 
 rising indignation. There is a swelling of righteous 
 anger in your bosom, if not even something almost 
 approaching to a half-smothered malediction on your 
 lips. But you curse not ; no, not in your bed-chamber, 
 not in your inmost soul. And that you may be sure 
 not to curse, — safe against the risk of the slightest 
 approach to cursing, even in a passing thought, you 
 make a point, you make conscience, of blessing. You 
 select and single out the very individual toward whom, 
 for his sore and ceaseless troublesomeness and pertinacity 
 of opposition, you might be most tempted to indulge a 
 slight feeling of vindictiveness. He is to be the special 
 
SYMPATHY OF MIND WITH MIND. 261 
 
 object of your good wishes and good offices, your fervent 
 prayers and pious assiduities. Nor is it as if you were 
 a superior and isolated being, dropping a compliment or 
 an alms down from above to one far beneath and away 
 from you. Not thus supercilious and arrogantly con- 
 descending, or cold and distant, is your benediction to be. 
 He is to you a man and a brother. Though not yet a 
 fellow-Christian, he is a fellow-man ; one who, like your- 
 self, when tickled must laugh, and when smitten is fain 
 to cry. As a fellow-man, you feel for him and with 
 him. His rejoicing and his weeping may not be alto- 
 gether such as yours now are. Your rejoicing in God, 
 your weeping for sin, he cannot understand or appreciate. 
 And his joy for some worldly success, his grief for some 
 worldly loss, may not be altogether such as your chastened 
 spirit in the like circumstances would feel But they are 
 human and natural, at all events ; and as human and 
 natural, they make an appeal to that human and natural 
 sensibility in you, which your new Christian principle of 
 godlike philanthropy, so far from quenching, only quickens 
 and refines and intensifies tenfold. 
 
 For you will not, you cannot, so separate yourself 
 from your worst enemy, or the worst enemy of your 
 Lord, as to be able to school your mind into the habit of 
 looking on unmoved while his whole frame is quivering 
 with rapture or with agony. The agents and servile 
 ministers of a cold and bloody superstition may be some- 
 how trained to some such custom of insensibility. When 
 the opposers of her proud Antichristian pretensions are 
 helplessly in her hands, as the victims of her lawless 
 
262 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 power, Rome can get her priests and satellites to bless 
 those whom she teaches them to regard as offenders and 
 persecutors. Yes S It is with a blessing pronounced 
 over their heads ; it is as their well-wishers, consulting 
 for their good ; that Rome's inquisitors consign her 
 enemies to the devouring fire ; — not certainly rejoicing 
 with them when they rejoice, or weeping with them when 
 they weep ; but heartlessly mocking their song of praise, 
 and exulting with fiendish delight over the cries and 
 groans which intolerable torture wrings reluctantly from 
 flesh and blood. 
 
 It is not so, however, that you have learned Christ. 
 It is not thus that you bless them which persecute you. 
 Nor is it stiffly and half contemptuously, as if from a 
 distance or from an eminence, standing upon a pinnacle 
 where you may exult in your independence of all their 
 assaults. No. You are among them as men of like pas- 
 sions, like susceptibilities and sensibilities, with themselves. 
 They see that you can smile, and laugh, and weep, as 
 they do ; that you joy in their joy, and mix your tears 
 with theirs. Nor is this a mere transient, superficial 
 emotion on your part ; all traces of it passing away when 
 their grief or gladness is out of sight, or when they try 
 to draw you into their confidence, and open to you their 
 minds. No. They find that you can readily enter into 
 their views and wishes ; sit beside them and listen to all 
 that they have to say, not only without weariness, but 
 with a quick apprehension of their meaning and a warm 
 interest in their tale. 
 
 Meet your fellow-men thus ; simply, unostentatiously, 
 
SYMPATHY OF MIND WITH MIND. 263 
 
 naturally. Watch for opportunities of access to their 
 homes and hearts in seasons when these hearts are 
 opened by some mere}', or softened by some sore stroke 
 •of Providence. They may have been accustomed to 
 conceive of you as censors and monitors, frowning on 
 their pleasures, fatiguing them with common-place 
 discourse. Let them see, in some hour of deep move- 
 ment of soul, that, not as if you were making an effort, 
 or had a purpose to serve, but spontaneously, on the 
 impulse of genuine human feeling, you are with them on 
 the first tidings of their weal or woe ; to congratulate, 
 to condole, to be one of themselves ; — not thrusting upon 
 them some high-flown spiritual view of your own, which, 
 you think, they ought to be taking of their case ; but 
 unaffectedly ready to take simply their natural view of 
 it, and for the time to make it yours. 
 
 They thought, if you visited them at all, it would be 
 to lecture them ; to reprove and scold them ; to find 
 fault with their way of looking at the matter, as nature 
 bids them look at it, in its aspect of natural joy or grief; 
 and to insist upon their looking at it through your eyes; 
 eyes so rapt in the contemplation of the supernatural and 
 the heavenly as to leave no room for the sight and sense 
 of homely household cares. But now they find that you 
 are really one of themselves ; thinking, feeling, joying, 
 sorrowing, like them. 
 
 May not their hearts be thus touched? Ah ! they 
 begin to be ashamed of the injustice they have been 
 doing you. The roughest and hardest begin to under- 
 stand and know you. They relent towards you. As 
 
264? CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 they see how you enter, intelligently as well as sympa- 
 thizingly, into their joys and sorrows, they come to have 
 some idea of yours, and to think on their part of entering 
 into yours. They now can imagine how you feel, and 
 how you are minded, amid the opposition, the suspicion, 
 the reproach, which they have been inflicting on you. They 
 are seriously inclined to be of the same mind now with 
 you, and to sympathize with you. In spite of them- 
 selves, almost, they are led to do so. For thus simply 
 meeting them, as men meeting men, you throw yourselves 
 upon them, when you throw yourselves among them. 
 Freely, frankly, unreservedly, you let them know your 
 case, as you show them that you know their case. They 
 learn to understand you, as they see that you can under- 
 stand them. Suspicion of you gradually gives place to 
 sympathy with you. They were jealous of you as 
 intruders ; they perceive that you are friends, — that you 
 not only feel for them and with them, but are desirous 
 that they should feel for you and with you. Win them 
 thus, in matters of common humanity, to apprehend how 
 much you and they have in common ; and you open up 
 a way for still further winning them, by divine grace, to 
 understand those higher matters of God and of eternity, 
 in respect of which ultimately your aim is that they and 
 you should be of the same mind, in the Lord. 
 
 II. Such being the import of the positive command, 
 "Be of the same mind one toward another," the propriety 
 of the two negative or prohibitive injunctions which follow 
 will readily appear. 
 
SYMPATHY OF MIND WITH MIND. 265 
 
 1. " Mind not high things, but condescend to men" or 
 things " of low estate." That obviously is a necessary con- 
 dition of your cultivating the sort of genial and natural com- 
 munity of mind which is required. You have undoubtedly 
 high things to mind ; but you are not so to mind them 
 as to be above accommodating yourselves to men and 
 things that may seem to you to be of inferior moment. 
 For there is a temptation here. You may be apt to regard, 
 if not your fellow- men themselves, at least many of the 
 matters about which they are occupied, and about which, 
 for the most part, they rejoice and are sad, as frivolous 
 or mean ; unworthy of the serious regard of one whose 
 ''conversation is in heaven." The importance which they 
 attach to such things, the work they make about them, 
 and the keenness of their feelings, too often neither very 
 amiable nor very respectable, in connection with them, all 
 tend to awaken in you a certain impatient and intolerant 
 sentiment of disgust. You see trifles exaggerated, moun- 
 tains made of molehills, — extravagant excitement for the 
 most flimsy cause, or no cause at all ; — your sensitive soul 
 revolts and recoils ; you cannot force yourselves to descend 
 into scenes so far beneath the usual height of the spiritual 
 atmosphere in which you live ; you cannot really bring 
 your mind to be on a level with what passes there. 
 
 But see ! while you are hesitating, yonder follower of 
 Jesus, — certainly, as you must own, as well entitled and as 
 much accustomed to mind high things as you can be. No 
 scruples trouble him ; no awkward reserve or false shame 
 embarrasses him. Away he goes, and down he plunges, 
 among the lowest concerns of the lowest class of his 
 
266 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 neighbours. Without affectation, without an effort, with- 
 out seeming to condescend or to stoop ; — naturally, simply, 
 spontaneously, he puts himself alongside of that rejoicing 
 or weeping household ; he sets his mind alongside of 
 theirs. He is one of them. Their interests are his. No 
 matter how much there may be of what is poor and base 
 about the people he is among, and about the things they 
 care for. He is at home with them ; he makes them 
 perceive that he is so ; he is with them on equal terms ; 
 and he can so understand and feel how they are minded, 
 and how in their circumstances they cannot but be minded, 
 as to become similarly minded himself. Thus, not arti- 
 ficially, or to serve a purpose, but out of the genuine sim- 
 plicity of an honest and good heart, he literally, and in a 
 good sense, stoops to conquer. He thus, while your fas- 
 tidious minding of high things may be keeping you aloof, 
 wins access into many a house and many a heart, — first 
 for his words of simple fellow-feeling, and then for words 
 of heavenly wisdom ; following the example of the Apostle, 
 who was willing to " become all things to all men that he 
 might win some ;* walking in the steps of the Saviour, 
 who did not " break the bruised reed or quench the smok- 
 ing flax ;" and earning for himself a share in that blessed 
 promise, of which you may be in danger of coming short ; 
 — "They that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the 
 firmament ; and they that turn many to righteousness as 
 the stars for ever and ever" (Dan. xii. 3). 
 
 2. " Be not wise in your own conceits/' is the other 
 warning given in connection with the precept, "Be of the 
 same mind one toward another." It is the fitting sup- 
 
SYMPATHY OF MIND WITH MIND. 267 
 
 plement or counterpart of that previous warning, " Mind 
 not high things." Beware lest there be at the root of 
 your inability to unbend, something of the noxious ele- 
 ment of spiritual pride or spiritual conceit. May it not 
 be the " high things" of self that you are minding, and 
 not the "high things" of God ? And while you seem to 
 be repelled by the contrast between the low and trivial 
 affairs of earth with which your neighbours are taken up, 
 and the heavenly pursuits in which you are engaged, — 
 may not the repelling cause be in truth a contrast far 
 more personal ? In the judgment of your superior spiri- 
 tual wisdom they may be fools ; and their works and 
 ways may be foolish. Self-esteem, after all,- — or an undue 
 opinion or conceit of yourself in your own mind, — may 
 be the real hinderance to your having that genial and 
 frank community of mind which otherwise you might be 
 delighted to have with your fellow-men, simply as your 
 fellow-men, whatever may be their character, whatever 
 their relation to you, and whatever the difference be- 
 tween your ways and theirs. Therefore take this second 
 warning as a necessary addition to the former one. And 
 let neither the minding of high things, nor the minding 
 of self, come in the way of your accommodating your 
 mind to theirs, in the matters that interest them, — 
 always in the hope that you may thus, by God's blessing, 
 bring them in time to accommodate their minds to yours 
 in respect of the things which belong alike to their peace 
 and to yours. 
 
 And now, in fine, let it be ever borne in mind, that 
 
268 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 the sovereign remedy for all such tendencies as those 
 against which the Apostle warns you, is a right appre- 
 ciation of the worth and value of every human being, — 
 every member of the family of man. Be he who he 
 may, and what he may, — be he ever so degraded and 
 vile in your eyes and the eyes of others, — be he ever so 
 unamiable, ever so uncongenial, ever so unfriendly, — still 
 let him be to you what he is to God, and Christ, and the 
 Holy Spirit — and holy angels too. Look at him, not in 
 the light of earth's partial distinctions, but in the light 
 of heaven's common and universal estimate ; — the esti- 
 mate of Him who is " no respecter of persons " — before 
 whom all alike are "concluded under sin" (Gal. iii. 22), 
 and who " will have all men to be saved and to come 
 unto the knowledge of the truth" (1 Tim. ii. 4). Recog- 
 nise the dignity of every man ; let man, simply as man, 
 be sacred in your eyes. Count no man beneath your 
 regard ; nor anything about which any man may be natu- 
 rally and honestly interested. Let him on whom Phari- 
 sees in the church, and the vulgar proud in society, affect 
 to look down, see that you respect him, and that you 
 would have him to respect himself. Be followers, in this 
 way, of Him who was reproached as the " friend of pub- 
 licans and sinners," and of whom it is testified that " the 
 common people heard him gladly." 
 
GENEROSITY. 269 
 
 IY. 
 
 THE ESSENTIAL CONDITIONS— GENEROSITY 
 AND HONOUR. 
 
 " Recompense to no man evil for evil. Provide things honest in the sight 
 of all men." — Rom. xii. 17. 
 
 These two precepts are to be viewed in the light of those 
 that go before (ver. 1 4-1 6). The Apostle is laying down 
 rules for your guidance as Christians, not in your special 
 brotherly intercourse with one another, but in your 
 general charitable intercourse with mankind. 
 
 You come in contact with the world ; and you meet 
 with persecution in the world. Instead of cursing them 
 which persecute you, it is your duty to bless them. That 
 you may be safe from the risk of cursing them, wishing 
 them ill, or cherishing a grudge against them, as you might 
 be tempted to do, when they thwart and hinder you in 
 your Master's work, you are to make them very particu- 
 larly the objects of your solicitude, in your prayers and 
 pious efforts. Bless them. And see that you do so, and let 
 them see that you do so, not with that air of superiority, 
 that sort of supercilious, patronizing condescension, which 
 is sure to irritate rather than win them ; as if, separating 
 yourself from them, and looking at their impotent rage or 
 malice, or their still more provoking callousness and in- 
 
270 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 difference, from a distance or from an eminence, you 
 graciously vouchsafed, not to curse, but to bless. Show 
 them that you have a real, hearty, human fellow-feeling 
 with them as your fellow-men ; that they have your 
 honest sympathy in their concerns (ver. ] 5). Let this 
 sympathy, moreover, be intelligent and patient. Let it 
 not be the mere fleeting tribute of a sentimental smile or 
 sigh ; the evanescent emotion of one who is so far touched 
 by the outward signs of grief or of gladness as to have 
 a kindly word, or look, or gift, to bestow in passing, 
 but who cares not to be troubled further about the case. 
 There are few things so disappointing and chilling to a 
 warm heart ; so likely to widen the breach between you 
 and those to whom, in spite of their opposition to you and 
 to Christianity, you would fain extend your good offices 
 and good will ; as when they perceive, on their beginning 
 to open their mind to you about the joy or sorrow with 
 which you have seemed to be sympathizing, that you cannot 
 spare the time, or take the pains, or open your mind, to 
 let their story in. Let not this be the manner of your 
 sympathy. Show them, not artificially and stiffly, but 
 naturally, that you can lay your mind alongside of theirs, 
 and can be at the trouble to understand what they think 
 and feel ; that you do not " mock their useful toil, their 
 homely joys and destiny obscure,'' or " hear with a dis- 
 dainful smile the short and simple annals of the poor ;" 
 that you are not so raised and elevated into a transcen- 
 dental region of high and heaven!} 7 musing as to be above 
 taking a human interest in " those trifles which make the 
 sum of human bliss and woe ; " and more than all, that 
 
GENEROSITY. 271 
 
 you are not so wrapt up in the notion of your own 
 spiritual superiority as to count it a degradation or an 
 effort to condescend to them and their affairs (ver. 1 6). 
 Be ye thus " gentle unto all, apt to teach, patient ; in 
 meekness instructing those that oppose themselves/ ' 
 
 It is at this stage, and in this connection, that the two 
 precepts enjoining, — the one, forbearance or abstaining 
 from retaliation towards any man, and the other, honesty 
 or being upon honour with all men, — are introduced ; 
 and as thus introduced, they will be found to harmonize 
 well with the general lesson the Apostle is enforcing ; — 
 the lesson of what I would call — Christianized humanity. 
 
 I. As to the first of these precepts, — one might be 
 inclined to ask, — is it needful, after all that has been 
 already said, to add the warning, — "Recompense to no 
 man evil for evil 1 " What risk is there of your doing 
 so, if you go among your fellow-men in the spirit and 
 manner already described ? Is it not, at any rate, a kind 
 of work of supererogation, if it be not even like casting 
 doubt on the simplicity and sincerity of that Christian 
 and human habit of sympathy which you may be sup- 
 posed now to be cultivating, to bid you, who are thus 
 minded among yourselves and towards all men, beware 
 of so obvious a fault, and one so manifestly and flagrantly 
 incompatible with your being thus minded, as that of 
 retaliation? To the inspired Apostle, to the inspiring 
 Spirit, it does not appear to be so. 
 
 Let it be remembered that the principle of retaliation 
 has in it a certain element of righteousness. To a large 
 
272 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY, 
 
 extent it commends itself to our natural sense of justice. 
 " With what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to 
 you again," is a sort of treatment which men feel to be 
 fair. The law of Moses expressly recognised and sanc- 
 tioned the principle of retaliation as the rule of punish- 
 ment in public criminal procedure ; — although it gave 
 no countenance to the Pharisaic gloss, condemned by 
 our Lord, which extended the application of the prin- 
 ciple to the intercourse of private life. Even there, 
 however, in a modified form, the principle may be apt to 
 solicit occasional approval, and to solicit too the approval 
 of men who are far from being destitute of Christian 
 charity and Christian sympathy. 
 
 For the question may be raised in some such way as 
 this : How am I to treat one who injures me ; and not 
 merely injures myself personally, but in and through me, 
 injures my Lord and his cause ? It may be put upon 
 grounds and considerations altogether apart from any 
 personal feeling of mine. And it may be put very 
 plausibly in an extreme case. 
 
 Thus, personally, and so far as my own feelings are con- 
 cerned, I am conscious of no ill-will. I can truly say 
 that there is not in my bosom the slightest inclination to 
 curse. On the contrary, I am certain that I wish the 
 man well. It is in my heart to bless him, to pray for 
 him, — to do him all the good in my power. But is it 
 right to let his injurious conduct pass as if I did not 
 notice it, or did not disapprove of it ? For the sake of 
 the great interests involved, for the sake of the offender 
 himself, should he not be mads to feel to what he has 
 
GENEROSITY. 273 
 
 justly exposed himself? It is not that I care for the 
 wrong done to me, however ill he may be using me. 
 All that I could bear ; I could consent to lose all that I 
 have, — fortune, and character, and life itself, if I alone 
 and mine were the sufferers. But the cruel shaft strikes 
 deeper and higher. Christ himself is wounded. The 
 reproach falls on Him. And the assailant is very per- 
 tinacious. He will listen to no reason. All the re- 
 sources of friendly and kindly dealing with him have 
 been tried, and tried in vain. The case is really despe- 
 rate. What is to be done ? Of course, I would not for 
 a moment dream of retaliating, in the way of inflicting 
 upon him the very same kind of injury that he is in- 
 flicting upon me. But does not justice require that he 
 should be made to suffer somehow ? Is it not right that 
 he should be visited with some recompense or requital for 
 the evil he is doing ? If it is in my power to expose 
 him in certain quarters in which he is rendering me and 
 my religion no good service ; to show what sort of person 
 he is, and how he is acting towards me and others like 
 me ; to vindicate and right myself, though at the expense 
 of letting some of the legitimate consequences of his 
 behaviour come down upon him ; — am I not warranted 
 in doing so ? May it not be my duty to do so ? Do I 
 not owe it to myself and to him, to Christianity, to 
 common honesty and justice, to do so? I may be instru- 
 mental in doing him some evil. But what of that ? 
 Can I help it ? Is it not deserved ? 
 
 Is there not room here for self-deception ? Is there 
 no danger of your gliding thus unconsciously into the 
 
274 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 false position of those of old time who said, " An eye for 
 an eye, and a tooth for a tooth ?" Insensibly you bring 
 a judicial maxim, which may be right and good when 
 punishment or retribution is to be awarded judicially, in 
 terms of public law, to bear upon the regulation of your 
 personal and private conduct as an individual You 
 make yourself a judge, and a judge in your own case. 
 
 This is the very subtlety of the snara The evil done 
 to you, as you dwell upon it with a natural tendency 
 to exaggeration, so swells, and gradually grows in your 
 estimate of it, that it comes to be lifted out of the class 
 or category of personal and private wrongs, and assumes 
 the aspect and character of a public offence, such as 
 requires to be dealt with according to the principles of 
 equity, and truth, and right. This is your danger. You 
 quit the floor and usurp the bench. You forget that 
 you are a party ; you assume to be the judge. Meeting 
 the evil-doer, as man meeting man, on the common arena 
 of ordinary life, you overlook the injury ; you have not 
 a word to say about it ; you treat him as if it had never 
 had an existence. But it has other than merely per- 
 sonal bearings. These bulk in your eye. They seem to 
 3'ou to demand consideration. How, in the view of these 
 other bearings, the matter is to be disposed of, is a 
 question that falls to be determined. Are you to deter- 
 mine that question? Do you set yourself to determine 
 it? Are you the fittest person to determine it? May 
 it be safely left to you to say, in what so nearly concerns 
 yourself, how far reasons of a general nature, irrespective 
 of what is personal to you, may require that the evil 
 
GENEROSITY. 275 
 
 should be noticed, even at the risk or to the effect of its 
 being recompensed with evil? Is not that really a 
 judicial question ? And are you a competent, or an im- 
 partial judge ? Safer for you is the maxim of the text, 
 " Recompense to no man evil for eviL" 
 
 Or, as I may now put it, safer for you is the maxim 
 of the Lord ; — " Judge not." For in part, at least, that 
 maxim corresponds with the maxim of the Apostle, as I 
 have been trying to explain it. And in that view the 
 whole force of the motive which the Lord suggests may 
 be brought to bear on the enforcing of it ; — " Judge not, 
 that ye be not judged." Consider the manner in which 
 you are now warranted to hope and believe that God 
 deals with you, as regards the evil which you do to Him ; 
 and deal ye in like manner with your fellow-men, in 
 regard to the evil which they do to you. 
 
 How does God deal with you now for the evil which 
 you have done to Him ? Does he recompense evil for 
 evil ? Does he judge ? 
 
 Assuredly, if he does judge, it must be to the effect of 
 recompensing evil for evil. That is the fixed, unchange- 
 able law of his moral administration. And it is a law 
 founded, not on any consideration of the evil as affecting 
 himself personally, but on a view of it infinitely broader, 
 deeper, higher. Your evil, sinner, extendeth not to 
 him personally, any more than does the goodness of the 
 holiest of his saints. But it tarnishes the glory of his 
 eternal name; it touches the foundation of his everlasting 
 throne ; it puts to hazard the well-being of his whole 
 intelligent creation ; it saps the pillars of law and justice 
 
276 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 which uphold the universe. On grounds like these must 
 he proceed when, as a judge, he deals with you for the 
 evil you have done ; and, proceeding upon such grounds, 
 he must needs, in a terrible sense and to a terrible effect, 
 recompense evil for evil. 
 
 Is it so that you now, believing brethren, conceive 
 of God as dealing with you ? Why is it not so ? Has 
 God abdicated his functions as judge ? Has he aban- 
 doned the seat of judgment? Ah ! 3^ou well know that 
 he has not. But one has been found,— —the Judge himself 
 has found him, the very God against whom and in whose 
 sight your evil has been done ; one has been found, 
 able and willing to stand for you, and to answer for you 
 in the judgment. With him God has dealt for your 
 evil ; judicially he has dealt with him ; in the fullest 
 measure of justice, to the utmost extent of the require- 
 ments of law, recompensing evil for evil. And you, led 
 by the Spirit, have been brought into such a relation of 
 oneness and identity with this chosen one, that, virtually 
 and truly, God's judicial dealing with him for your evil 
 has become a judicial dealing personally with you. For 
 you are crucified with Christ. With Christ for you, 
 with you in Christ, God has dealt, as judge ; recom- 
 pensing evil for evil. This you have believed, realized 
 and felt, in your being ingrafted into Christ ; and so 
 ingrafted into him as to be partakers of his death ; 
 the death which he died when the recompense, or retri- 
 bution, of your evil came upon him. And now, as 
 there is no more recompensing of evil for evil, — evil 
 deserved for evil done, — in his case, as your represen- 
 
GENEROSITY. 277 
 
 tative ; so neither is there any more of that mode of 
 dealing on the part of God in your case, as represented 
 by Christ. The footing on which you now are with God 
 is such as to preclude, — as to any judicial application of 
 it, — the lex talionis, or principle of retaliation. There is 
 no more any judicial recompensing of evil for evil. That 
 is over and done, in Christ for you, and therefore to you 
 in Christ. It is not in that way, nor by that rule, that 
 God now deals with you. No. He does not in that sense 
 judge ; recompensing evil for evil. His treatment of you 
 now is altogether gracious ; good, and only good. 
 
 When you consider this ; and when you consider at 
 what a cost, and by what a sacrifice, your God and Father 
 has, if we may dare so to speak, freed himself from the 
 necessity of dealing with you judicially, and recompensing 
 to you personally evil for evil, — even at the cost, and by 
 the sacrifice, of his laying upon his own beloved Son the 
 inflicted evil, in recompense for your committed evil, 
 which otherwise must have come upon you, and crushed 
 you everlastingly; — how can you ever think of introducing 
 again into your treatment of your fellow-men anything 
 like that element of judicial retaliation which your God 
 has thus, so marvellously and graciously, provided for 
 and disposed of, in his treatment of you ? Ah ! will you 
 not rather lean to the side of being willing almost, 
 yourself, like Christ, to be the victim in a case like this ? 
 He consented to suffer, the just for the unjust, that he 
 might bring you to God. When your evil, the evil of 
 your sin against his Father and himself, was upon him, 
 lie had no thought of recompensing evil for evil to you. 
 
278 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 Are you called to suffer iu this respect with him ? Be 
 content to suffer as he did. Be willing to bear all the 
 scath. Let him who does you the evil escape ; and be 
 you, in a sense, the victim and the scapegoat, bearing the 
 evil, and not resenting it. So you manifest your oneness 
 of spirit with Christ, as he manifested his oneness of 
 spirit with the Father. And so you go forth into a 
 hostile world, as he did, meek and lowly in heart, never 
 allowing any sense of wrong or apprehension of ill-usage 
 to interfere with the full flow of your warm and generous 
 humanity. The man who needs your blessing, whose joy 
 or sorrow calls for your sympathy, you learn to regard 
 simply as a man. You refuse to look at him in any 
 other light. You cast out of view all considerations of 
 his position, or his associations, or his habits and ways. 
 And if he has done, or is doing you, evil, you cast out of 
 view that consideration also. He is human and you are 
 human. The sole bond between him and you is your 
 common human fellow-feeling ; — intensified and hallowed, 
 on your part, by your longing desire to have him as a 
 fellow-partaker with yourself in the divine fellow-feeling 
 of " the man Christ Jesus." 
 
 II. The positive command, " Provide things honest in 
 the sight of all men," is a fitting sequel or supplement of 
 the preceding prohibition, " Recompense to no man evil 
 for evil." 
 
 The meaning of the expression, "Provide things honest," 
 is not at first sight very clear. It might seem to point 
 to the duty of Christians making an honest and honour- 
 
HONOUR. 271) 
 
 able provision for themselves and their households, by 
 such habits of industry and economy as men generally 
 approve of. No doubt that is a duty ; and it is urged 
 as such upon Christians elsewhere. But the introduc- 
 tion of it here would not be to the purpose. Nor does 
 the language in the original require, — some would say, 
 it does not even suggest, — that meaning. The phrase is 
 wide and general. " Keep an honourable look-out ;" or, 
 "Be honourably on your guard;" or simply, "Be upon 
 honour," before all men, as to the matter on hand ; — that 
 may fairly be said to be the import of the Apostle's re- 
 commendation. 
 
 But perhaps the meaning of the phrase generally, and 
 as it is used here, may be best gathered from a passage 
 in the Second Epistle to the Corinthians. 1 
 
 Paul is there speaking of the collection which was in 
 course of being made by the Gentile churches on behalf 
 of the poor and persecuted saints in Jerusalem and through- 
 out Judea. Among other arguments which he urges to 
 encourage the liberality of the Corinthians, he adverts to 
 the security which they had for the right and faithful man- 
 agement and administration of the fund to which they 
 were asked to contribute. And in doing so, he lets them 
 see, in a remarkable manner, his practical good sense, his 
 
 1 Having spoken of Titus as being forward to visit Corinth, on the business of 
 the collection, Paul adds ; — " And we have sent with him the brother, whose 
 praise is in the gospel throughout all the churches ; and not that only, but who 
 was also chosen of the churches to travel with us with this grace, which is 
 administered by us to the glory of the same Lord, and declaration of your ready 
 mind : avoiding this, that no man should blame us in this abundance which is 
 administered by us; providing for honest things, not only in the sight of the 
 Lord, but also in the sight of men "—(2 Cor. viii. 17-21). 
 
280 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 business-like wisdom and sagacity. Surely, in so far as 
 the gathering in, and safe custody, and ultimate disposal of 
 this money were concerned, he might have asked a vote of 
 implicit confidence ; he might have stood upon his character 
 and credit. What need, with such a man as Paul, of 
 witnesses, and checks, and auditors ? Is not his word as 
 good as his bond ? Are not his hands as trustworthy as 
 the Imperial Treasury ? But no. See how careful he is 
 to guard against the risk of his good being evil spoken 
 of. He will have associated with himself in this business 
 persons whose concurrence and co-operation shall prevent 
 the possibility of suspicion. He is not content with one, 
 however unexceptionable. He must have two witnesses 
 at least. There must be joined to himself and Titus, 
 another accredited agent of undoubted and well-known 
 reputation for trustworthiness. And the reason which 
 the Apostle gives for such precaution is, that, on the 
 one hand, he may not be liable to even a whisper 
 that might be prejudicial to his good name ; — " Avoid- 
 ing this, that no man should blame us in this abundance 
 which is administered by us ;" — but that, on the contrary, 
 and on the other hand, his scrupulous integrity and cor- 
 rectness may be clear before all eyes ; — " Providing for 
 honest things, not only in the sight of the Lord, but also 
 in the sight of men." 
 
 Thus even in a pecuniary transaction, in the keeping 
 of an account, Paul's sense of honour was keen. He was 
 sensitively alive to the maintenance of his character as a 
 man of honour in the opinion of his fellow-men. It was 
 not enough for him to have the testimony of his own 
 
HONOUR. 281 
 
 conscience before God. He desires to stand well, as an 
 honourable man, with his fellow-men. He takes pains 
 to secure that he shalL 
 
 No doubt, with him, this regard for his own honour 
 was subservient to a higher end. He sought to turn 
 it to account for the greater glory of Him whose 
 servant he was, and for the higher good of those with 
 whom he desired to stand well. Still the material fact 
 is, that he attaches value and importance to the opinion 
 which men may form of him and of his conduct. He 
 will see to it that, in any trust he may undertake, his 
 honour shall not be open to question. 
 
 Now it is the same phraseology that the same Apostle 
 uses, in his exhortation here addressed to the Romans, as 
 in his protestation there to the Corinthians. He exhorts 
 the Romans, — he exhorts you, believers, to be as sensitive 
 on the point of honour as he tells you, in his Epistle 
 to the Church at Corinth, that he was himself. 
 
 There is a difference as regards the matter at issue; 
 but it is a difference which makes the exhortation all 
 the stronger. Paul himself was sensitive as to his own 
 honour, in a matter of mere pecuniary adjustment, in 
 which he might have defied all assailants, and scorned to 
 lead proof, or refer to any witnesses as associated for 
 that purpose with himself. He would have you to be 
 as sensitive as he was ; but in a higher region or depart- 
 ment of duty. For it is here not a special, and as one 
 might say, financial, question ; the auditing and settling of 
 the accounts connected with a collection of alms. It is 
 a question of far higher Christian duty. 
 
282 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 It is virtually the question, as put by all men ; Are 
 you in good faith ; are you upon honour, in your inter- 
 course with us ? — with the world in which you and we 
 meet ? Do you mean what you profess ? what you say ? 
 Do you really "recompense to no man evil for evil?" 
 
 It is a very searching question ; and a question of very 
 wide reach, — not to be restricted to one single particular, 
 but of general application. It is nothing short of this 
 question, addressed to Christians, as consecrated to God, 
 bound in a holy fellowship among themselves, and called to 
 exercise towards the world in which they live, the forbear- 
 ance, the toleration, the unresisting and uncomplaining 
 meekness of Christ himself ; Are you in earnest ? — in 
 good faith ? — upon honour ? And are you so in earnest 
 that you may appeal, not only as men of piety to God, 
 but as men of honour to the world itself? Can you stand 
 confidently upon your honour, before the world, as you 
 stand confidently upon your consciousness and your con- 
 science before God? 
 
 That is the appeal. And it is a right and relevant 
 appeal, when the matter to which it relates is not your 
 intercourse with your God, — you alone with him alone, 
 — but your intercourse with your fellow-men. 
 
 Nor is the appeal, alas ! by any means, unnecessary. 
 For there certainly is an impression, even in quarters en- 
 titled to some respect, that a high profession of Christianity, 
 — of Christian holiness or Christian meekness, — is some- 
 times regarded by those who make it as somehow setting 
 them above, or setting them free from, some of the rules and 
 considerations of truth and courtesy upon which honour- 
 
HONOUR. 283 
 
 able and high-minded men of the world consider them- 
 selves bound to act. No doubt the impression is often 
 erroneous, the result of ignorance or prejudice. " The 
 natural man" cannot fully understand " the spiritual" 
 man. The spiritual man, being himself one of "the 
 things of the Spirit of God/' can be only " spiritually dis- 
 cerned" (1 Cor. ii. 14, 15). There may, therefore, be not 
 a little in his demeanour and walk fitted to perplex 
 onlookers, who have no insight into the character of his 
 inner life of faith, and no sympathy with its motives. 
 There may be anomalies of conduct, apparent deviations 
 from the line that approves itself to their eyes as the 
 straightest, which they may be at a loss to account for, 
 in such a one as he is ; and which he himself, if called 
 upon, would be at a loss to explain intelligibly to them. 
 Still, admitting all that, it is to be feared that the blame 
 is not always on one side. Beyond all question, your 
 decided Christian and evangelical profession may so far, in 
 this particular, be a snare to you. You may be apt to feel 
 as if the higher and more heavenly principles upon which 
 you are called to act, did to some extent supersede the 
 ordinary and trite common-places of a lower and more 
 earthly code of morals. It is human nature ; the nature 
 of the human heart, which " is deceitful above all things, 
 and desperately wicked." 
 
 You may not be conscious of this lurking antinomian 
 tendencv. But beware of it. Much scandal to religion 
 may come of it ; and that in many ways. 
 
 Take, for instance, the case of a man of high religious 
 profession, on whose Christian integrity in all his business 
 
28-i CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 transactions, business men have been accustomed implicitly 
 to rely. Suddenly it is discovered that he has been pur- 
 suing a course which common, vulgar, worldly honesty 
 condemns. Perhaps the man is not a wilful hypocrite ; 
 deliberately trading on his Christian character, and mak- 
 ing a gain of godliness. Very probably his decline and 
 fall may be traced, as to their source or commencement, to 
 some sort of idea like this getting secret entrance into his 
 mind ; — f I am a Christian. I must, as a Christian, con- 
 duct my business upon high Christian principles. I mean 
 to do so. ^Ly establishment is to be one that is sancti- 
 fied by the word of God and by prayer. So far as in me 
 lies, its atmosphere is to be pure and pious, spiritual 
 and heavenly. I do not intend to be contented with the 
 mere conforming of my practice to the letter of the law, 
 and such a routine of plain dealing as mav satisfy those 
 who know no higher standard than that of the world's 
 conventional morality. I, for my part, aim at something 
 more. I draw my rules and motives from above/ 
 
 So far welL But as things move on, he comes into 
 contact with parties willing to be his instruments and 
 agents ; themselves not over-scrupulous as regards ad- 
 herence to the rules of fair trading and fair play, and 
 ready enough to cover their laxity under the cloak of an 
 appeal to a sort of transcendental spirituality. He gets 
 into difficulties. He needs and accepts the help of such 
 allies. Insensibly he sullies his bright shield, and lets 
 mists gather on " the eye" which, " even turned on empty 
 space,'' should " beam keen with honour." His notions of 
 right and wrong are warped He becomes a practical 
 
HONOUR. 285 
 
 Jesuit, — a subtile schoolman, — a sophist, — a casuist. Nice 
 points about the lawful and the expedient perplex him. 
 Vague purposes of restitution, dreamy prospects of extri- 
 cation, lead him, like a meteor, deeper and deeper into 
 the bog. All the while, shedding a general halo and 
 odour of sanctity over his whole proceedings, and merging 
 questions of detail in the one grand end contemplated, 
 there is his Christian desire and intention of making 
 all ultimately subservient to the glory of God, the cause 
 of Christ, and the good of souls. So he bewilders him- 
 self in a spiritual ideal, while his real business life is be- 
 coming one practically of not only most unspiritual, but 
 most unrighteous management, and most unscrupulous 
 manoeuvring, — on which all people of probity cry shame. 
 
 Oh ! to save himself from the yawning pit of fraud, 
 and from a bankruptcy worse than that of fortune ! And 
 what is needed to save him ? What, by God's help, will 
 save him ? Let him borrow for a moment the world's 
 eyes : yes ; the eyes of the unconverted, but yet unso- 
 phisticated world. Let him look upright men in the face, 
 and judge after their upright judgment. Let him "pro- 
 vide things honest in the sight of all men." 
 
 As it stands in the passage now before us, this precept, 
 or warning, is given in connection with the course of con- 
 duct which you are called to pursue, and the demeanour you 
 have to observe, as members of Christ's body, in your inter- 
 course with the world, considered as a system of things and 
 state of society sure to be adverse, and apt to be persecut- 
 ing. Here, too, there is room for the operating of the 
 temptation now in question. There is a risk,- — those of 
 
286 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 you who best know yourselves, and have been most tried 
 by being brought into close personal contact with scenes 
 and persons uncongenial to you as spiritual men, will be 
 the first to acknowledge that there is a serious risk, — of 
 your becoming, if not spiritually proud, yet, at all events, 
 spiritually sensitive, and spiritually selfish. You practise 
 meekness, no doubt, and exercise forbearance ; you bless, 
 and curse not ; you do good, moreover, as you have op- 
 portunity; you are not unkind ; you do not retaliate. 
 But somehow you draw off, and separate, and isolate 
 yourself. On the faith of that very patience and gentle- 
 ness under evil treatment which you are enabled to exhibit, 
 you feel almost as if you were entitled to take your own 
 way, and pursue your own path, apart. Your fellows, with 
 whom you are associated, feel as if, while you bore with 
 them, you shunned them. You let them perceive how 
 much it costs you to bear with them, and how little you 
 and they have in common. They perceive that you are 
 determined to do your duty to them. But they perceive 
 also that it is to a large extent without the eye of honour, 
 and without the heart of sympathy and love. 
 
 To guard against so unhappy a result or tendency, the 
 Apostle would have you to recognise, not only your 
 fellow-men generally, but even those among them from 
 whom, on account of their opposition to you, or their 
 personal qualities, or any other cause, you may be most 
 inclined to keep your distance, as entitled nevertheless, 
 or rather all the more on that account, to your respect 
 and deference. It is an old maxim, that " the greatest 
 reverence is due to children," — (maxima debetur pueria 
 
HONOUR. 287 
 
 reverentia). If you would win them and have influence 
 over them, you must respect them, and be upon honour with 
 them ; they must be made, moreover, to feel that you do 
 respect them, and really are upon honour with them. 
 To treat them, however kindly, as if' you were not 
 in any sense or to any extent amenable to their judg- 
 ment, — as if you could set at nought their criticism, — 
 as if it mattered not to you what they thought of you, — 
 as if they were incompetent to form any opinion of 
 you or of your proceedings at all deserving of regard, — 
 is to commit a fatal error, and to forfeit your moral 
 hold over them. There is, there must be, some measure 
 of awe in your conduct towards them. You must prac- 
 tically show them that you wish them to understand 
 you, — that you value their approval, and desire to stand 
 well with them, — that you do justice to them, and would 
 have them to do justice to you, — if you would have them 
 to take in good part the advances which you make to 
 them in good faith, and to give to these advances a frank 
 and cordial response. 
 
 In the same way you must deal with those in the 
 world around you whose suspicious hostility you would 
 disarm, and whose confidence you desire to conciliate. 
 They must not be to you, or imagine that they are to 
 you, a separate caste, — or a set of outcasts, — to whom 
 you may extend, as over a gulf, the hand of benevo- 
 lence, and some sign also of a common sympathy, — while 
 between them and you there are no relations of equal 
 and mutual responsibility recognised. Let them not 
 suppose that you undervalue either themselves or their 
 
288 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 thoughts of you, — that, contented with the verdict of 
 your conscience and your God, you care little for what 
 their impression or their feeling may be, as to your actions 
 and dispositions towards them. Let it be in their sight, 
 as in the sight of all men, that you " provide things 
 honest," — that you desire to be honourably approved. 
 Then they will apprehend that they are treated by you 
 really as your fellow-men. Their just and reasonable 
 self-esteem will not be wounded, but satisfied and grati- 
 fied. All painful sense of inferiority will be extin- 
 guished. The scowling brow will unbend ; the closed 
 hand will relax and open ; the jealous spirit will relent ; 
 the cold heart will warm ; — and the man who may have 
 been accustomed to shut his door against the visitor who 
 came only to act the part of a benefactor, a well-wisher, 
 a sympathizer, a patron, will welcome you who come to 
 him as man to man. Instinctively perceiving that you 
 respect his manhood and desire him to respect yours, he 
 will with open arms receive you as his own and his 
 children's friend, and lend a ready ear, — the Spirit 
 making him willing, — to all that you have to say as 
 to that higher platform of divine as well as human 
 fellowship, on which you would fain find yourself in a 
 position honourably to respect his Christianity, as you 
 ask him honourably to respect yours. 
 
,c FOLLOW PEACE WITH ALL MEN." 289 
 
 THE END SOUGHT— PEACE. 
 
 " If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men." — 
 Rom. xii. 18. 
 
 The qualifications or conditions attached to the precept, 
 " Live peaceably with all men/' instead of weakening its 
 force, render it all the more emphatic. They are more- 
 over, at all events, demanded by the nature of the case. 
 They are not deemed necessary when the precept occurs, 
 as it does occur, elsewhere in the New Testament, and in 
 a different connection from that of our present text ; — 
 as when the Lord says, " Salt is good ; but if the salt 
 have lost his saltness, wherewith will ye season it? 
 Have salt in yourselves, and have peace one with 
 another" (Mark ix. 50); — or the Apostle Paul, " Finally, 
 brethren, farewell. Be perfect, be of good comfort, be 
 of one mind, live in peace; and the God of love and 
 peace shall be with you" (2 Cor. xiii. 11); — or again, 
 " We beseech you, brethren, to know them which labour 
 among you, and are over you in the Lord, and admonish 
 you ; and to esteem them very highly in love for their 
 work's sake. And be at peace among yourselves" (1 
 Thess. v. 1 2, 1 3). In these passages the command refers 
 
290 CHEISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 to your intercourse and fellowship with one another as 
 believers. The command, in that case, is absolute. 
 
 It must be so. To assume, or admit, that the main- 
 tenance of peace within the Church may be impossible, 
 is out of the question. The Church is Christ's body. 
 Its constituents, however many and diverse in office 
 and function, are one body in Christ, and every one 
 members one of another. To provide beforehand for a 
 breach of the peace, as if it could be at any time, or in any 
 circumstances, inevitable, would plainly be a suicidal and 
 self-contradictory arrangement. It would be a surrender 
 of the very principle on which the doctrine of your union 
 and communion in Christ is based. The ideal of the one 
 body with manymembers, or of the many members making 
 up one body, implies that there always ought to be, and 
 that there always may be, peace among themselves. 
 Provision, indeed, is made for offences coming even into 
 the Church, or body of Christ. In an alternative way 
 this is done. Provision is made for the case in which I 
 am in fault ; — " If thou bring thy gift to the altar, and 
 there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against 
 thee; leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy 
 way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come 
 and offer thy gift" (Matt. v. 23, 24). Provision is 
 also made for the case of my brother being in fault, 
 walking disorderly, or giving just cause of offence to 
 a fellow-disciple. But in the very law laid down for 
 the treating of this, as of the other case, the principle, 
 or ideal, of the Church's corporate unity is assumed. A 
 Church member gratuitously and wilfully breaks the peace, 
 
"FOLLOW PEACE WITH ALL MEN." 291 
 
 and will not suffer himself to be amenable either to pri- 
 vate remonstrance or to more formal dealing. In these 
 circumstances, his conduct is to be viewed as so incom- 
 patible with his Christian character and standing, that to 
 the party offended, at least, — to me, if I am the party 
 offended, — he is to be "as an heathen man and a publican/' 
 Henceforth my duty towards him, so far as his breach of 
 the peace is concerned, comes under the category of what 
 I owe, not to a Christian brother, but to one of the unbe- 
 lieving ; — with whom, as with all men, I am commanded 
 indeed to live peaceably, — with the proviso, however, 
 " if it be possible." 
 
 Clearly, then, on every ground of consistency and 
 common sense, when the rule is given for the internal 
 pacification of the Church, and the guidance of its 
 members in their mutual relations among themselves, it 
 must be given unconditionally. The notion of its being 
 ever impossible to comply with the rule to live peace- 
 ably must be scouted as wholly inadmissible. 
 
 It is otherwise, however, when the precept is announced 
 universally, or with a more immediate and special refer- 
 ence to your connection with them that are without, and 
 your conduct towards them. Now, that is the case here. 
 It is your way of feeling and acting as regards the world, 
 or mankind generally, — the very world in which you are 
 to lay your account with being persecuted and evil-en- 
 treated, — that is to be regulated and ruled. The com- 
 mand, as applicable here, and in such a case, must obviously 
 be qualified. They with whom you have now to do are 
 not, or at least may not be, your brethren in the Lord 
 
292 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 You and they are not at one, and may have little or 
 nothing in common. The principles and maxims which 
 you hold sacred they do not acknowledge; and, indeed, 
 cannot understand. Of the Spirit which worketh in yoti 
 " the peaceable fruit of righteousness," they have no expe- 
 rience. Peace, which is, or ought to be, the element in 
 which your soul moves and dwells, is a strange dream to 
 them ; for " there is no peace, saith my God, to the 
 wicked." " The peace of God " does not " keep their 
 hearts and minds." They are " like the troubled sea, 
 when it cannot rest." With such unquiet neighbours 
 you cannot always, if you would, live peaceably. Rather, 
 you must be constrained often to bewail your hard lot, 
 as did the Psalmist ; — " Woe is me, that I sojourn in 
 Mesech, that I dwell in the tents of Kedar ! My soul hath 
 long dwelt with him that hateth peace. I am for peace ; 
 but when I speak, they are for war" (Ps. cxx. 5-7). 
 
 Nor is this all. This earth, on which you are to live 
 peaceably, is the very earth of which the Lord himself 
 so emphatically said, — " Think not that I am come to 
 send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a 
 sword" (Matt. x. 34). 
 
 To keep the peace, then, upon a field of battle ; to 
 live peaceably, sword in hand; peaceably to wage war, 
 and that a war which knows no truce or compro- 
 mise; — such is the practical problem given you to solve. 
 That the solution of it should be ever possible, might 
 seem to be the wonder; not that it should sometimes not 
 be so. You, moreover, are the aggressors in this contest. 
 You, as it were, give the challenge; you provoke the 
 
"FOLLOW PEACE WITH ALL MEN." 293 
 
 hostilities. You disturb the world's peace, such as it is. 
 Your preaching of Christ, your witnessing for Christ, your 
 living for Christ, all tend to break up mens repose, and 
 make them uneasy, and therefore angry. The more faith- 
 ful you are to Christ, and to them, the more must you run 
 the risk of irritating their pride, and rousing their pas- 
 sions. The spirit that worketh among them, as the chil- 
 dren of disobedience, is the serpent ; between whose seed 
 and the seed of the woman the Lord hath put irreconcil- 
 able enmity. You go among them as men that would 
 turn the world upside down. How can you expect them 
 to live peaceably with you? How can you hope to be 
 allowed to live peaceably with them? 
 
 How but by entering into the spirit of that " Christian- 
 ized humanity" which the Apostle has been commending ? 
 Let all men see that, underlying the spiritual and heavenly 
 brotherhood into which you enter with Christ and all 
 that are his, and hallowed and intensified by it, there 
 beats strong in your bosom the pulse of a real human 
 brotherhood with all who bear the human name. You 
 and they may be on opposite sides in the great battle 
 between light and darkness, between Christ and Belial, 
 for which earth finds the arena, and heaven and hell fur- 
 nish the witnesses and onlookers. In that battle, kind- 
 ness to them, as well as fidelity to yourselves and to 
 the Captain of your salvation, will not suffer you to give 
 them any rest, or to give their principles any quarter. 
 You must be ever assailing them, and ever pursuing them. 
 Then, moreover, as to the whole of that inner life which 
 is the real life of a man, you and they are wide as the 
 
294 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 poles asunder. You cannot enter into their secret, or 
 admit them into yours. They and you are, and must 
 be, in the hidden life of your souls and theirs, strangers 
 and adversaries; without common sympathies; dwelling 
 apart ; — as it were, in different worlds. 
 
 Ah ! but on that very account try all the more to live 
 peaceably with them all. And for that end, make it clear 
 and palpable to them, that while you have no common 
 sympathies with them as fellow-believers, you have all 
 common sympathies with them as fellow-men. You have, 
 and will have, no quarrel with them in that character. 
 You do not, on the ground of your Christianity and their 
 opposition to it, elevate yourselves above them ; keeping 
 them at a distance ; looking upon them with a sort of 
 stern, supercilious pity, and from the height of your own 
 serene composure, sending down your blessing in exchange 
 for that cursing of theirs which, as you take care to let 
 them know, does not reach you. They, for their part, 
 are very apt to conceive of you as occupying such a 
 position towards them ; and so conceiving of you, it is 
 not wonderful that they should imagine that the con- 
 troversy between you and them is a personal one, and 
 that you hold them personally to be your enemies or 
 your inferiors, and the objects of your dislike or your 
 contempt accordingly. The imagination, you feel in 
 your inmost soul, is groundless. See that you so act 
 towards them as to make them also feel that it is ground- 
 less. Disarm their suspicion of there being any other 
 sentiments in your bosom towards them than sentiments 
 of warm friendship and entire good-wilL You are not 
 
" FOLLOW PEACE WITH ALL MEN." 295 
 
 their enemies because you tell them the truth. You re- 
 cognise them as entitled not only to your good offices 
 but to your smiles when they rejoice, and your tears when 
 they weep. There is no such cold distance, or jealous 
 dread, or stem defiance on your side, as they think. You 
 love and would live peaceably with them all 
 
 Still there is need of the precept being qualified by 
 the conditional clauses, — " If it be possible, as much as 
 lieth in you, live peaceably with all men." You may not 
 succeed in disarming worldly men's hostility of its bitter- 
 ness, and conciliating their confidence in your personally 
 kind dispositions towards them. They may persist in 
 believing, or affecting to believe, that you mean to treat 
 them as enemies ; and they may be bent on treating 3'ou as 
 enemies. They will not accept your advances in good part ; 
 believing, or affecting to believe, that they are not made 
 in good faith. They w T ill pick a quarrel with you if they 
 can; and if they will, they can. They will misunderstand, 
 or misconstrue, something, no matter what, in whatever 
 you say or do. They will listen to no explanations. There 
 can and shall be no mistake. They will not suffer you 
 to live on even civil and courteous terms with them. 
 
 The fault then is not yours. You take the benefit of 
 the limitations of the statute. They into whose house 
 you enter, bearing good tidings, will not receive you, or 
 so much as give you a cup of cold water. You shake 
 the dust of their threshold from off your feet, as you leave 
 them with the solemn warning, — "Notwithstanding be 
 ye sure of this, that the kingdom of God is come nigh 
 unto you" (Luke x. 11). 
 
296 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 But remember ; if these limitations and qualifications 
 of the statute are, in one view, a necessary abatement of 
 its strictness ; in another view, they deepen the solein- 
 nity of its obligation, and they enhance and increase your 
 responsibility under it. For the words are very strong ; — 
 " If it be possible, as much as lieth in you." They make 
 a very urgent appeal to your conscience and good faith, 
 as in the sight, not of man, but of God. They throw 
 upon you the burden of saying, in every case in which 
 you would apply them, — I cannot keep the peace as my 
 Lord would have me keep it. It is absolutely impossible. 
 
 Will any of you venture lightly to say that, at any 
 time, or with reference to any man ? If you are forced 
 to say it, will you say it with a feeling of relief, or with 
 a deep pang of regret ; with a contented mind, or in 
 brokenness of spirit ? Ah ! is it a conclusion in which 
 you can easily and calmly acquiesce, to find a single 
 human being resolutely determined to be on such terms 
 with you, that you cannot hope to be allowed to do him 
 an office of kindness, or speak to him a word in season ? 
 
 Ah ! my friends, you will weigh the matter well before 
 you rest in such a consummation as that. You will not 
 be in haste to give over your fellow-man as inaccessible 
 to j^our overtures of peace. And if things seem tending 
 in that direction, knowing your own heart, and its deceit- 
 fulness, you will be in far less haste to acquit yourself 
 of responsibility and throw all the blame on him. 
 
 Only think what your finding it impossible to live 
 peaceably with any individual man implies. It shuts 
 you out, as far as that individual man is concerned, from 
 
"FOLLOW PEACE WITH ALL MEN." 297 
 
 all hope of participation in that most gracious beatitude, 
 " Blessed are the peacemakers : for they shall be called 
 the children of God" (Matt. v. 9). 
 
 For, why would you live peaceably with any man ? 
 What makes it worth while to try to live peaceably with 
 any man ? Why should you bear injuries unavenged, 
 and confer kindness undeserved, and take an infinite deal 
 of trouble to have all needless causes of offence removed, 
 with a view to your living peaceably with any man ? Is 
 it merely for his pleasure, or for your own pleasure ? Is 
 it because you feel it to be painful, and you think he 
 may feel it to be painful too, to be on bad terms with a 
 fellow-creature ? Is it because to live peaceably with 
 your neighbour is decent and seemly, and to quarrel is 
 a shame and scandal ? Surely that is not all. 
 
 No, you say, that is not all ; nay, it is not that at all. 
 If that were all, I would give myself little concern com- 
 paratively about what he thinks of me, or how he feels 
 towards me. That there should be a decent measure of 
 good understanding between him and me, is so far well. 
 But that is not the end I seek. I long to be a peace- 
 maker, not only between him and me, but between him 
 and my God. Ah ! what matters it that he is willing to 
 accept my proposals of peace ? I would that through my 
 instrumentality he were made willing, in the day of the 
 Lord's power, to accept the proposals of peace which come 
 from the Prince of Peace himself ! Why is it that I am 
 anxious, and take pains, to remove and obviate any pre- 
 judice he has taken up against me ? Why do I go about 
 so earnestly to explain what has offended him ? Why 
 
298 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 am I so eager that everything personal between him and 
 me should be cleared up ? Is it that my peace may visit 
 his soul ? No. But that, — my peace, if it please God, 
 pioneering the way, — his soul may be visited by that 
 " peace of God, passing understanding, which keeps the 
 heart and mind, through Christ Jesus" (Phil. iv. 7). 
 
 Now if it be thus, in this spirit and for this end, that 
 you make it your business, as it is your duty, at least 
 honestly to attempt to live peaceably with all' men, can 
 you contemplate without grief the failure of your attempt, 
 even in a single instance ? Can you easily make up your 
 mind to say, or to think, There is a man, one man at 
 least, in regard to whom I must now give up the hope of 
 ever being useful to his soul ? The state of things between 
 us has now come to be such, that I can never expect him 
 to listen to my voice, or yield to my influence, or profit 
 by my example. He will regard me always with a 
 jaundiced eye. He will look askant at any approach I 
 make to him. He will judge unfavourably of everything 
 I say or do. He will give me no credit for a sincere 
 profession or a consistent walk. He will suspect me as 
 a self-seeker, and brand me as a hypocrite. Ah ! how 
 can I win the blessedness of a true peacemaker in con- 
 nection with him ? That privilege I may have in con- 
 nection with others ; and some other brother may have 
 it even in connection with him ; but oh ! it is sad to 
 lose even a single opportunity of winning so honourable a 
 privilege, so godlike a blessedness, — in connection even 
 with a single soul. 
 
 And then when I reflect how his dislike of me, or sus- 
 
"FOLLOW PEACE WITH ALL MEN." 299 
 
 picion of me, or prejudice against me, may prejudice him 
 against other witnesses for Christ, and even against 
 Christ himself ; and how his report of me, or the rumour 
 of our disagreement, may so work in the minds and 
 hearts of many as to set them in hostility to true religion 
 and its professors altogether ; — when I thus realize to my- 
 self the evil which my not finding myself able to live 
 peaceably with that one man, may do to him and to 
 multitudes besides, and to the cause I love and the name 
 in which I glory ; I will pause, and re-try the cause, as 
 between him and me, in the secret chamber of my own 
 broken heart, and before the tribunal of my quickened 
 conscience. Yes, I will ask if I have really exhausted all 
 the legitimate means of pacification ? Have I in veiy 
 truth done all I could do for the preventing or the heal- 
 ing of this breach ? Is there no concession which pride, 
 under the subtle guise of self-esteem, has hindered me 
 from making ? Is there no point which I have mistaken 
 for a principle ; no punctilio on which I have been stand- 
 ing as if it were the very pillar of the truth ? While 
 not neglecting the things that make for peace, has there 
 been no lack of peace and love in my bosom, no coldness, 
 no mere perfunctory performance of what I considered 
 my duty towards him, with a view rather to the exoner- 
 ating of myself than to the winning of him ; no restrain- 
 ing, for him and for myself, of the effectual fervent prayer 
 of uprightness, which availeth much ? 
 
 Is it not thus, my friends, that you will feel and act 
 in every case in which your efforts as peacemakers seem 
 to be hindered ? Is it not thus that you will deprecate 
 
300 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 such a result as a sore evil, in which only after much 
 searching of heart, and deep communing with God, you 
 can ever bring yourselves sorrowfully to acquiesce ? Is it 
 not thus that, " if it be possible, as much as lieth in you, 
 you will live peaceably with all men?" 
 
 The view which I have given of the import and 
 bearing of this precept about peace, may serve to show 
 how fitting a close and climax it is to those precepts 
 which go before. It is in the light of this last com- 
 mandment that these are all to be regarded. Your great 
 object and aim, in all your dealings with " them which 
 persecute you," — with men generally in the world, — is 
 to be peace ; — peace, as far as possible, between you and 
 them, — and that in order to peace between them and 
 your God. This is the end which you seek, — the end 
 to which all your good offices of blessing, and sympathy, 
 and a ready mind, and generosity, and honour, are but 
 means. And you are to seek this end hopefully. You 
 may with all confidence seek it. For in seeking it you 
 may plead a special promise, and one which you may 
 now see to be invested with a special and very precious 
 significancy ; — " When a man's ways please the Lord, he 
 maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him " 
 (Prov. xvi. 7). 
 
 What a motive does this promise, in the connection in 
 which you must now take it, suggest ! How should it 
 inspire you with a determination to give good heed to it 
 that, by his grace helping you, your ways shall please the 
 Lord ! You know what those ways are towards his 
 
" FOLLOW PEACE WITH ALL MEN." 301 
 
 adversaries and yours that are sure to please him. They 
 are ways, not of compromise, indeed, but of conciliation ; 
 and of conciliation carried to the utmost length to which, 
 without compromise, it can be made to go. Let such be 
 your ways. You need have no apprehension of their 
 being ways of which you shall ever have cause to be 
 ashamed ; for you adopt them and make them yours, not 
 in any mean and ignoble spirit of selfishness, — for the sake 
 of your own personal safety, or ease, or reputation ; but 
 with most honourable, high and heavenly aspirations ; — 
 first, that the Lord whom you love may be pleased ; 
 next, that, in token of his good pleasure, he may make 
 your enemies to be at peace with you ; and lastly, that 
 you, finding it possible, because the Lord makes it 
 possible, to live peaceably with them, may find it 
 possible ere long, — the Lord making that too possible, — 
 to persuade them to come along with you to your Father's 
 home of peace, and to taste with you the blessedness of 
 living peaceably with Him. 
 
302 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 VI. 
 
 REDRESS AND RETRIBUTION— ABDICATED BY 
 MAN AND LEFT TO GOD. 
 
 " Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath : for it 
 is written, Vengeance is mine : I will repay, saith the Lord." — Rom. xii. 19. 
 
 The affectionate appeal with which this verse opens — * 
 "Dearly beloved" — is surely very significant as well as 
 very emphatic. Its full force and propriety may be 
 better seen when the command which it introduces, and 
 especially the reason of the command, have been con- 
 sidered, as brought out in the three closing verses of the 
 chapter. Evidently it points to something more than 
 ordinarily solemn, if not awful, in the position which, 
 according to the representation about to be given, you 
 occupy, as Christians, in the face of a hostile and perse- 
 cuting world. It marks the relation in which you now 
 stand to those who are your enemies, because they are 
 the enemies of the Lord, as a relation of very peculiar 
 delicacy and difficulty, in which you have need of all the 
 aid and support that the most vivid sense of the love 
 of which you are the objects can afford. 
 
 It is assumed that you have exhausted all the means 
 and measures of conciliation that are consistent with 
 fidelity. You have gone as far as you can in the way 
 
REDRESS AND RETRIBUTION. 303 
 
 of manifesting forbearance, and sympathy, and genuine 
 human fellow-feeling, towards all, even the most opposed, 
 to whom you have access. You have felt yourselves and 
 shown yourselves to be upon honour, and have done your 
 best to secure peace. But although some may have been 
 thus won, others continue obdurate. Their enmity is even 
 imbittered by coming in contact with that charity of 
 yours which fails to charm it away. You must make up 
 your mind to this sad result, — that in spite of all your 
 efforts to the contrary, there will be those who relentlessly 
 and remorselessly stand out against you, and do you 
 wrong. How are you to feel and act towards such 
 persons ? What frame of mind are you to cherish ? 
 What course of conduct are you to pursue ? That is the 
 question which, at this stage, is to be met. 
 
 It is met, in the first place, by an implied recognition 
 of the reality and the righteousness of the law or prin- 
 ciple of retribution ; in the second place, by the inti- 
 mation that it is a law or principle which you are not 
 yourselves to administer or apply ; and in the third 
 place, by the assurance that the Lord himself will give 
 effect to it. 
 
 I. The law or principle of retribution is recognised as 
 one which, in the last resort, must be brought into 
 operation. It is not obscurely indicated that neither you 
 who suffer wrong, nor He to whom you commit your 
 cause, could in the long run be otherwise satisfied. 
 
 There are three different expressions used in this verse 
 to denote the manner of dealing with offenders which is 
 
30-i CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 intended. In the first clause it is, " Avenge not your- 
 selves," — or more literally and exactly, " Right not your- 
 selves," In the second, the word is " wrath," — " rather 
 give place unto wrath," — a word unequivocally expressing 
 the sentiment or passion of anger or indignation. In the 
 third, we have at the beginning, the same form of ex- 
 pression as in the first clause, — "vengeance," or say 
 rather, the righting of the injured, "belongeth to me;" — 
 and then, we have a new idea, — " I will repay," or 
 retaliate, or give back to the wrong-doer what he has 
 done. In the first place, there would seem to be an 
 admission that you who suffer injury are entitled to 
 redress, — that you must be righted, — that a just venge- 
 ance, or righteous retribution, must on your behalf be 
 executed upon your adversary, — that you must be vindi- 
 cated by his being punished. But then you are told, 
 secondly, not to take the matter into your own hands and 
 seek to light yourselves, but rather to " give place unto 
 wrath." This may mean either that you are to yield and 
 allow your adversary's wrath to expend itself, — or that you 
 are to stand back and let an angry God take up the case. 
 The last is now generally held to be the most accurate 
 sense ; and it is both very relevant and very affecting. 
 You are wronged ; you feel that redress is due ; you are 
 inclined to be your own avenger, — the redresser of your 
 own wrong. Nay, but rather give place, — withdraw, — 
 be still. Know that there is One in whose bosom the 
 wrong done to you awakens holy anger, righteous indig- 
 nation and wrath. When His anger is kindled on your 
 behalf, you may well be dumb and silent. To that wrath 
 
REDRESS AND RETRIBUTION. SO 5 
 
 you may well give place. For, in the third place, do you 
 not hear his voice, commanding you to leave all to him ? 
 The righting of wrong, — the avenging of the injured upon 
 his adversary, — " belongeth to me." And be sure that in 
 his hands the redress, — the vengeance, — will be complete. 
 " I will repay." I will execute retributive and penal 
 judgment. I will reward and recompense the wrong- 
 doer. And he, and you, and all shall know that " it is a 
 fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God." 
 
 All throughout it is taken for granted that, if there 
 be no relenting on the part of the offender, retribution, 
 pure and simple, is at last inevitable ; — retribution, I say ; 
 not salutary chastisement or corrective discipline, but mere 
 punishment — the penal infliction of suffering for sin. 
 And a threefold ground for such judicial and retributive 
 procedure is found to lie deep down in the essential 
 nature, not of man only, but even of God himself. A 
 sense of equity, a sentiment of irrepressible holy anger, 
 and the demand of legal justice, conspire to establish its 
 necessity. Wrong must be redressed ; righteous anger 
 must be appeased ; and law must be vindicated, and 
 government by law. No intelligent being, of whose 
 moral constitution it is characteristic that, in the first 
 place, he recognises the existence of personal rights ; that, 
 secondly, he has emotional sympathies which throb and 
 thrill in harmony with truth and justice ; and that, in 
 the third place, he owns the majesty of law, purely as 
 law, promulgated by sovereign authority and enforced 
 by absolute power ; — in other words, no rightly balanced 
 mind, true to its own ethical intuitions, — can dispense 
 u 
 
306 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 with the principle of retributive judgment, as a vital 
 element in the administration of the universe. 
 
 Partial views, indeed, of benevolence, or of expediency, 
 may incline those who resolve all government into in- 
 fluence, to frame a theory of both worlds, — the present 
 and the future, — that shall have no dark cloud of penal 
 wrath hanging over it, but shall glow with the bright 
 ideal, or pleasing imagination, of evil being always dealt 
 with, now and hereafter, in the interest, as it were, of 
 the evil-doer himself; the very worst severities inflicted 
 on him, however deservedly, being in reality and in the 
 long run visitations for his benefit ; and the Divine rule 
 over responsible agents being thus nothing more than 
 the unfolding of a plan, or method, or agency, — adminis- 
 tered by a Divine person, — which, by its own pressure 
 upon men and things, is gradually to work sin and misery 
 out of the system, so as ultimately to leave nothing but 
 pure and placid peace everywhere and evermore. 
 
 No countenance, however, is given by the Apostle to 
 such a vague and dreamy notion of law and government. 
 Nor is it a notion which commends itself to the unsophisti- 
 cated moral instinct of mankind. There is in the human 
 bosom a stern and robust sense of justice, which, irre- 
 spectively of ail calculations of consequences, — and, indeed, 
 of all collateral considerations, of whatever sort, — will not 
 be satisfied unless, by a judicial procedure and in terms 
 of law, injured right is seen to triumph, and the inflicter 
 of wrong is doomed. It insists upon a trial and a 
 verdict. That sense of justice maybe deadened and per- 
 verted by plausible sophistries, while a man is living con- 
 
REDRESS LEFT TO GOD. 307 
 
 tentedly in disregard of the authority and commandment 
 of God. But when the conscience is awakened and the 
 divine law asserts its supremacy, the innate and in- 
 eradicable feeling, or rather faith, as to a righteous 
 government, is quickened into new life. And it is found 
 practically that no plan of saving mercy, and no precept 
 of new obedience, can win acquiescence and approval, 
 which does not recognise and satisfy that principle of 
 mere and simple retribution upon which all righteous 
 government must ultimately rest 
 
 II. But while thus you are permitted and taught to hold 
 fast, — and to hold fast as applicable to your own case, — 
 that sense of wrong and craving for redress, — that con- 
 viction of the reality and the righteousness of retribution, — 
 which is no sinful excrescence upon your human nature, 
 or sinful corruption of it, — but is of the essence of its 
 original constitution, being part and parcel of the very 
 image of God in which man was made ; you are at the 
 same time interdicted from administering or applying it 
 yourselves. You are not to avenge or right yourselves. 
 Rather you are to give place, and, so far as any move- 
 ment of yours is concerned, simply to suffer the wrong. 
 And you are required to act thus, for this most relevant 
 and sufficient reason,' — because your case is taken up 
 by another, to whom you may safely leave it. 
 
 But for that reason, it might be almost too much to 
 expect that you should not avenge or vindicate yourselves. 
 In a rude and unsettled state of society, when the autho- 
 rity of law is weak and the administration of it precari- 
 
308 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 otis, men will not easily be persuaded to surrender the 
 light or privilege of private justice and personal revenge. 
 Individuals and families will hold themselves entitled to 
 take by force what they consider their due, and to inflict 
 violent retribution and retaliation on any who hurt or 
 injure them. But when the ruler comes to be one whom 
 they can trust, and when he undertakes their cause, they 
 are willing to give place, and to resign the function of 
 executing judgment to him and to his ministers. On a 
 somewhat similar ground you are asked to abstain from 
 avenging yourselves ; — because you know that the Lord, 
 who is your God, reigneth in righteousness. 
 
 More particularly, you are commanded to " give place 
 unto wrath." Your wrath is to retire, and to make way for 
 his wrath. For in your righting or avenging yourselves, 
 there is apt to be wrath ; not merely a calm sense or desire 
 of justice, but an impulse of anger. It may be a holy 
 anger, a justifiable resentment, a feeling of righteous in- 
 dignation. Still it is a passion which, even at the very 
 best, you must admit to be in you an unsafe motive and 
 guide of conduct. Restrain and regulate it as you may, 
 you cannot trust it, especially in your own cause. There- 
 fore let it retire, and do you, instead of righting yourselves, 
 as your own anger might prompt, rather give place to the 
 anger or wrath of God. In his bosom, and there alone, 
 anger is perfectly pure. He, and he alone, in the strictest 
 and most literal sense, can be angry and not sin. 
 Therefore, leave anger and wrath to him. 
 
 Certainly there is something wonderfully fitted to arrest 
 the flow of angry feeling, in this brief and startling sum- 
 
REDRESS LEFT TO GOD. 309 
 
 mons : — give place to the wrath of God. If his wrath is 
 kindled but a little against the men who hate you for the 
 love you bear to his Son, — what room can there be for 
 yours ? You may well stand back,- — yourself, and all who 
 have a fellow-feeling with you, in your rising indignation 
 against the " workers of iniquity," who " eat up the Lord's 
 people as they eat bread." Do you look upon them as 
 deserving of your resentment ? Ah ! that is nothing. See ! 
 they are exposed to the wrath of God ! Contemplate 
 them in that light ; and are you not irresistibly impelled 
 to give place, even with fear and trembling ? Is not all 
 your wrath changed into solemn awe ? 
 
 Nay, when you contemplate these men in that light, if 
 you yourselves know " the power of that anger of God" to 
 which you leave them, will not a sort of terrible compassion 
 begin to possess your souls ? The wrath to which you give 
 place is the wrath of the Holy One, the Unchangeable, 
 the Eternal. It is that same wrath which you have felt 
 to be lying upon you ; which you have seen to be laid on 
 Christ for you. When you were made to know your- 
 selves as sinners in the hands of an angry God, you were 
 consumed, and became as dead before him. Everything 
 else, — your own anger, as in revenge of your guilt and 
 folly, you were even ready to do execution upon yourselves, 
 — the anger of all saints, and of all the world, — everything 
 gave place to that wrath of God The one, solitary thought 
 in your spiritual consciousness was that of an angry God. 
 ' Give place to wrath, real and righteous, inevitable and 
 inexorable ; ' that was still the cry. Then again, as you 
 heard that cry re-echoed, you looked and saw that it was 
 
310 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITT. 
 
 not now you that was pointed at. but another in your 
 stead ' Give place,' is the voice from heaven, when men 
 and devils have done their worst, and vented all their 
 rage against the Christ of God. — 'give place unto wrath. 
 Let wrath. — the holy judicial anger of offended Deity, — 
 have its way. Let all in heaven and earth and hell stand 
 apart. Room ! Room for wrath ! B.oom for the wrath 
 of the righteous Father to pour its fu.l and fiery flood 
 upon the bleeding head of Him who beareth sin ! ; 
 
 Do I understand this ? Do I really know the power 
 of the anger or wrath of God. in ray own miserable i 
 as a sinner, and in the marvellous grace of my Saviour's 
 substitution in my stead ? And do I now hear that same 
 voice of awe and terror uttered concerning any poor fel- 
 low-sinner who may have wronged me, but not more 
 than I have wronged my Lord, — who may have wronged 
 my Lord even less than I once did, — ' Give place unto 
 wrath, — leave him to the anger of God V Can that voice 
 reach my ear, quickened by the Spirit, without sending a 
 thrill of mingled fear and pity through my whole frame ? 
 All my longing for redress, — all my resentment. — all 
 selfish passion, — is gone. The man is to me no longer 
 my adversary or my persecutor ; but simply what I once 
 was myself, and but for grace must still have been. — a 
 sinner in the hands of an angry God ! As such he is 
 object of no other feeling on my part but that of earnest 
 sorrow of heart, and intense solicitude for his salvation. 
 
 III. The purpose for which the wrath of God is to 
 have place given to it, as it is brought out in the third 
 
RETRIBUTION THE PREROGATIVE OF GOD. 3 1 1 
 
 and last portion of the verse, will be found to enforce the 
 practical lessons already suggested. That purpose is, that 
 the word which is written may be fulfilled ; — " Venge- 
 ance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord." 
 
 It is not needful to advert to the connection in which 
 this saying stands in the two passages of the Old Testa- 
 ment, — two at least, — in which it occurs (Deut. xxxii. 35 ; 
 Ps. xciv. 1), or to compare the Apostle's present use of it 
 with his application of it in writing to the Hebrews 
 (x. 30). It is enough to consider it as assigning the ulti- 
 mate reason of the command, "Avenge not yourselves, 
 but rather give place unto wrath." 
 
 The Lord takes vengeance and recompense, — the right- 
 ing of the injured and retribution upon the wrong-doer, — 
 into his own hands; and keeps it in his own hands. It 
 is a right or prerogative which he claims and challenges 
 as exclusively his own, — to avenge and to repay; to 
 avenge wrong, and to repay, or requite, the wrong-doer. 
 He never delegates it to any creatura He may, indeed, 
 employ, and he does employ, the agency or instrument- 
 ality of the creature in carrying his purpose of vengeance 
 into effect. He may ask and require the sympathy of 
 the creature in the carrying of his purpose of vengeance 
 into effect. But the vengeance itself he never delegates, 
 or hands over to another. He reserves it to himself, as 
 an incommunicable attribute of his divine nature and 
 sovereignty. 
 
 That he should, when he sees fit, employ his people as 
 the executioners of his vengeance ; and that he should 
 expect them, when called to act in that canacity, not only 
 
SI 2 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 to obey, but to enter into his mind in obeying ; need not 
 surely startle or surprise any who know and believe that 
 the highest perfection of man's nature is to be of one 
 mind with his Maker. Whatever vengeance it may be 
 that is his, I must learn to make mine ; as an onlooker, 
 approving and concurring; as an actor, if need be, zealous 
 even to slaying. Still, in the first instance, vengeance is 
 his. It is his vengeance that I must make mine; not 
 my vengeance that I dare ask him to make his. 
 
 This last, however, is my natural instinct. I suffer 
 injury in a righteous cause, and for my maintenance of 
 its righteousness. I am vexed, irritated, provoked. It 
 seems to me that I have a right to redress, even at the 
 expense of the injurious party suffering loss and punish- 
 ment. I do not lift my hand ; but I would have God 
 to put forth his hand, and make my vengeance his. 
 
 Now there is doubtless a sense in which I may ask 
 and expect God to enter into my cause, arid to take it up 
 as his own. The Lord Jesus in that sense " committed 
 himself to Him that judgeth righteously" (1 Peter ii. 23). 
 In the same sense you are commanded to give place unto 
 wrath. But what is that sense ? What does it imply ? 
 
 Does it mean that you ask or expect God to be the 
 executioner of your wrath, or vengeance, or judgment ? 
 Taking "wrath" and "vengeance," as the terms here occur, 
 to denote, not angry passion, but a calm sense of wrong, 
 and of the necessity of redress, are you first to make up 
 your mind upon your own case ; and then, having come 
 to the conclusion that you ought to be righted and to 
 be avenged, to call a halt, and say within yourself: ' No ! 
 
RETRIBUTION THE PKEKOGATIVE OF GOD. 313 
 
 I will take no step, I will guard against even the desire 
 to take any step, in the way of righting or avenging 
 myself. I will leave all to Him who says, " Vengeance 
 is mine?" ' Is it not plain that in so saying, or so feel- 
 ing, I do not really hand over to God, and leave in God's 
 hands, the vengeance ; but only the execution of it ? The 
 vengeance is still mine ; what is to be God's is simply 
 the fixing of the time when, and the manner how, the 
 vengeance is to be carried into effect. 
 
 Such an interpretation, or application, of the saying, 
 — "Vengeance is mine, I will repay," — is by no means 
 contrary to nature. It is rather, in truth, but too 
 natural, — by far too natural. 
 
 You may see it to be so, if you listen to the impreca- 
 tions, the horrid and blasphemous curses, in which the 
 madness of anger is too often vented. What is that 
 coarse and ribald malediction which, coming from these 
 infuriated lips, sends a thrill of horror through your 
 frame ? Is it not, on thy part, thou wretched and 
 profane taker of God's name in vain, — in so far as it is 
 anything at all, — is it not a prayer, a wish, that God 
 would follow out thy vengeance, to the end and to the 
 extent which thou desirest ? The vengeance is thine. 
 Thou huggest it to thy bosom, all burning as it is with 
 self-destroying venom. What thou askest God to do is 
 to act for thee, as thou wouldst act thyself, if, having a 
 devil's malignity, thou hadst a God's omnipotence to 
 work it out. 
 
 That, of course, is an extreme case. But it may serve 
 to illustrate the distinction between these two states of 
 
314 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 mind; the consenting, on the one hand, that the venge- 
 ance itself should be the Lord's; and the mere desire, 
 on the other hand, that the Lord would make the 
 injured man's own vengeance practically effectual, — or, 
 which perhaps he would like still better, give him the 
 means of making it practically effectual himself. 
 
 In a much more subtle form, there is room for self-de- 
 ception. When I am crossed and thwarted in my lawful 
 calling ; when I am injured and insulted in my neigh- 
 bourly and friendly approaches to my fellow-men; when 
 I am opposed and persecuted in my efforts to do good ; I 
 do not curse or swear ; I do not call down fire from 
 heaven No. I am silent. I keep my mouth with a 
 bridle. I am meek and uncomplaining. And yet behind, 
 or within, this quiet demeanour, there may lurk, almost 
 unconsciously, a sense or persuasion of my having a claim 
 on God for reparation and redress ; ay, all the more on 
 account of my own forbearance. The vengeance is in me 
 still. It is mine. It may affect to be, — it may really, in 
 some measure, be, — vengeance of the right, even of the 
 righteous sort ; not the mere animal instinct of revenge, 
 but the longing which eveiy rightly constituted mind has 
 to see justice done and injustice punished. I take it to 
 be so. And, taking it to be so, I cherish it all the more 
 readily. And still it is mine. It is my own judgment in 
 my own cause. I think that it is sound ; that God will 
 ratify it, and will ere long show and give significant 
 proof that he ratifies it. But it is, after all, my act, 
 my decision, my wish or will. God is to set his seal to 
 my verdict, and practically carry out my volition. In his 
 
RETRIBUTION THE PREROGATIVE OF GOD. 315 
 
 own way, and at his own time, no doubt, lie is to do so. 
 Thus far I leave the matter to him. But really no 
 further. As to the actual essence and inner spirit of the 
 transaction, the vengeance is not his, but mine. 
 
 Alas ! how readily do I deceive myself here ! How apt 
 am I, when I suffer wrong, and abstain from vindicating 
 my own cause, to take to myself a secret compensation and 
 reward in the thought that God will do me justice and 
 avenge me ! And how insidiously, under such a cover, do 
 feelings of self-righteous complacency in my own meek- 
 ness and forbearance, — and feelings also of vindictiveness 
 or uncharitableness towards my offending neighbour, — 
 continue to find harbour in my bosom ! 
 
 And if I can but advance a step beyond this, and 
 persuade myself that God, making my vengeance his, 
 means me to be the agent in giving effect to it, now 
 that it has become his, — am I not ripe and ready for the 
 holy office of the Inquisition? Could a Philip, or a 
 Dominic, desire a fitter instrument or tool ? 
 
 It cannot surely be in any such spirit as this that the 
 souls under the altar cry, " How long, Lord, holy and 
 true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them 
 that dwell on the earth?" (Rev. vi. 10.) That cer- 
 tainly is the complaint, the ejaculatory prayer, not of the 
 martyrs in the agony of their trial, asking the Lord to 
 make their natural and human vengeance his ; but of 
 the spirits of the martyrs, their trial being over, wait- 
 ing and intensely desiring to know and see what that 
 vengeance is which the Lord says is his. No doubt 
 they are themselves personally concerned. It is with 
 
31 6 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 immediate reference to themselves, and their own earthly 
 history, that they desire to know and see what that 
 vengeance is. But it is as the Lord's vengeance, and 
 not their own, that they desire to see and know it. 
 For themselves they have abdicated ; they have wholly 
 surrendered and given over to God ; not the executing 
 merely of the vengeance, but the vengeance itsel£ They 
 learned that lesson long before they came to be "souls 
 under the altar." They learned it in the fiery furnace ; 
 in the lions' den ; under the tyrant's sword ; amid 
 the shower of stones; upon the rack, and at the stake. 
 All their own vengeance went out of them. Not in 
 thought or in heart, any more than in act, did they 
 avenge themselves. Not for a moment did they dream 
 of ascribing to the Lord anything in the least analogous 
 to their own vengeance, — the vengeance natural to them 
 as fallen men. Nay, take vengeance in its highest and 
 purest sense; as it may dwell in the breast of men re- 
 deemed and renewed ; purged of all malice and personal 
 thirst for revenge ; become the holy instinct of a just 
 nature, that hates wrong in itself and on its own account, 
 and not selfishly, but in the interests of everlasting truth 
 and righteousness, demands redress. Still I say, these 
 men, of whom the world was not worthy, did not dare or 
 venture, — they did not wish, — they absolutely refused, — 
 to make the Lord the executioner of their vengeance, even 
 in that view of this vengeance. They shrunk from the 
 very idea of judging for the Lord. He must judge for 
 himself. The whole of the vengeance is entirely and 
 exclusively his. It belongs to him alone to repay. 
 
RETRIBUTION THE PREROGATIVE OF GOD. 317 
 
 Is there, then, no natural human feeling in that cry of 
 the souls under the altar ? Am I not to be honestly in- 
 dignant when I read the Book of Martyrs ? May I not 
 espouse warmly the cause of injured innocence ? Shall I 
 learn to be passive and unmoved when a brother beloved 
 of the Lord suffers wrong ; or when I myself even, because 
 I am a brother beloved of the Lord, suffer wrong ? 
 
 Not so. I would not empty my soul of that feeling 
 which the sight, or the sense, of wrong done is fitted to 
 awaken. Only, in the first place, I would have the feel- 
 ing in my soul to be the same that it is in the bosom of 
 my God. And, secondly, instead of planning for myself, 
 even in idea, any way, in any instance, of giving the feel- 
 ing vent, I would wait always to see how God will satisfy 
 it. Let me mark well these two conditions : — 
 
 1 . Vengeance in me is to be what it is in God. It is 
 not my vengeance that I am to ask God to make his ; it 
 is God's vengeance that is to become mine. I am to 
 ascend into heaven, and enter into the mind and heart of 
 the great Father, the righteous Judge of all ; and there 
 and thus learn what, and of what sort, that vengeance 
 is which, as he says himself, belongeth to him. 
 
 Or if I may not ascend into heaven, I may betake my- 
 self to Him who came down from heaven. I may ask that 
 patient sufferer, that bleeding Lamb -of God, what this 
 vengeance is. I may get the answer in his cross ! 
 
 It is real; it is terrible. It is real and terrible resent- 
 ment of wrong. It is real and terrible judicial wrath, 
 against every one personally, against any one, upon whom 
 wrong is chargeable. Yes ! against every one ; against 
 
318 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 any one. Even when it is his own beloved Son upon 
 whom the guilt of wrong-doing is chargeable, — vengeance 
 is even then real and terrible ; all the more so, because 
 he who is the object of it is so dear to him whose venge- 
 ance it is. Personal vindictiveness it cannot be. No 
 element of selfish irritation or passion, — the irritation or 
 passion of wounded self-esteem, — can be in it. On that 
 very account it is unappeasable. Wounded self-esteem 
 may be soothed by concession, and the irritation or 
 passion which it causes may pass away. But the venge- 
 ance of which Calvary witnessed the execution knows no 
 relenting. It is the unalterable demand of justice in the 
 bosom of the everlasting God, that wrong done in his 
 universe shall be redressed; and that the doer of it shall, 
 either in his own person, or in the person of a worthy 
 substitute whom he voluntarily accepts in that character, 
 give full and adequate satisfaction. 
 
 That is the vengeance which the Lord says is his. 
 And I must make it mine. I must be brought to 
 sympathize with him, and be of the same mind with him, 
 in that very vengeance of his. 
 
 First, for the saving of my own soul I must do so. I 
 must apprehend that vengeance, — that sort of vengeance, 
 — as directed against me, and lying upon me. I must 
 know and feel that the God with whom I have to do is 
 the God to whom, in that sense, vengeance belongeth. 
 
 To know and feel this, is very terrible. I might be far 
 more easy if I had to deal with a vindictive Deity ; with 
 one whose vengeance was of the nature of a sudden im- 
 pulse, or even of a settled purpose of deliberate personal 
 
RETRIBUTION THE PREROGATIVE OF GOD. 319 
 
 revenge. But it is law and justice, the Lawgiver and 
 the Judge, that I have to meet. That is the vengeance. 
 Can I face that ? Do I understand the nature of it ? Am 
 I reconciled to the necessity of it ? Am I saved, — do I 
 look for salvation, — not through any compromise or 
 surrender of it, which is impossible, but through the 
 great Atonement which has been made in terms of it ? 
 If not, let me fairly face the only other issue. Can I 
 " dwell with the devouring fire ? " Can I " dwell with 
 everlasting burnings ? " (Isa. xxxiii. 14.) 
 
 Then, secondly, if I am thus exercised, as regards my 
 own case ; my being exposed to this vengeance ; accepting 
 of it; accepting of it as, — in so wonderful and terrible a 
 way, — made to be consistent with my being saved even 
 in terms of it ; — can there be room in my mind for any 
 other sort of vengeance, towards any one, than I now see 
 that God challenges as his own? I must have sympathy 
 with him in that. I cannot be more tolerant of wrong, 
 or more indulgent to the wrong-doer, than He is who 
 says, " Vengeance is mine ; I will repay/* But I dare 
 not cherish a feeling in my breast that I would shrink 
 from ascribing to my God. No vengeance can be mine 
 that is not first his. I must needs learn to regard 
 offences as he regards them; and to regard also the 
 punishment of them as he regards it ; — if I accept the 
 punishment of my offences in Christ suffering for me; — 
 and if I believe, further, that, when he sitteth in judg- 
 ment, I am to sit on his throne along with him. 
 
 2. But there is a second condition that must be ful- 
 filled in order to my full acquiescence in the Lord's 
 
320 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 saying, " Vengeance is mine." Even supposing that the 
 feeling or moral instinct of vengeance in me is now of 
 the same nature and character with the attribute of venge- 
 ance which is in God, — I am to leave, not in act only, 
 but in wish or desire, the execution of it, or its practical 
 accomplishment, to him. Here, I would again say, is my 
 chief temptation. I try to get into the mind of God. I 
 begin to think that I have got into it. I resent injury 
 as done, not to me, but to God. I am angry ; not be- 
 cause I personally am wronged ; but because wrong is 
 done against him, and done in his sight. And this very 
 freedom of mine, real or supposed, from selfish passion, 
 may prove a snare to me. I am not now, as I think, 
 judging in my own cause, but in the interests of my 
 Master, when, in righteous indignation and holy wrath, 
 I would call down fire upon the Samaritans, who will 
 not give him and me passage, on our journey of heavenly 
 love towards Jerusalem. 
 
 Alas ! I know not what spirit I am of. The vengeance 
 which makes my soul thus burn within me, and my hand 
 as if instinctively grasp the sword, is not really of the same 
 sort as the vengeance which belongeth to God. For if it 
 were, I would be but too happy to leave the objects 
 of it altogether in his hands, and to let him determine 
 when and how he is to repay. 
 
 Ah ! let me repeat, — if I enter into the meaning of 
 that vengeance of God which hangs over the enemies of 
 his people and of himself ; if with any measure of insight 
 and sympathy I grasp that truth, " God is angry with the 
 wicked every day ;" if from my own experience I know 
 
RETRIBUTION THE PREROGATIVE OF GOD. 321 
 
 the terror of the Lord ; if I have felt what it is to have 
 his anger kindled against me, — and then turned away 
 from me, because turned in upon the head of my gracious 
 Surety on the cross ; — if I realize the fact that it is this 
 anger that is upon the crucifiers of the Lord of glory ; 
 how will my heart bleed, even when the sense of right- 
 eousness within me most loudly calls for redress and 
 retribution ! " Lord, how long ? How long, Lord ?" I 
 may be constrained to cry, when I see wrong and tyranny, 
 and Antichristian falsehood and profane ungodliness, tri- 
 umphant ; and the Lord's cause oppressed ; and his poor 
 ones trodden under foot. "Arise, Lord; let not man pre- 
 vail ;" — " It is time, Lord, for thee to work ; for men have 
 made void th}^ law;" — so I must often, if I am on the 
 Lord's side, and on the side of his law, feel and pray. 
 Yes ! And my soul, if it is righteous, if it is in the 
 interests of righteousness, cannot but rest with com- 
 placency on the prospect of that day when all the Lord's 
 ways shall be vindicated and justified, and it shall be 
 made clear that however long he waiteth to be gracious, 
 he is at the last a God who judges righteously. With- 
 out that prospect, I could not reverence and fear, I could 
 not trust and love, the God of my salvation. I know 
 that vengeance belongeth unto him, and he will repay ; 
 and that knowledge stills my bosom when it swells with 
 indignation at the sight of wrong. 
 
 I wait thy time, Lord ; most willingly I wait thy 
 
 time ; content meanwhile to be assured that there shall 
 
 not be impunity always ; that there shall not be impunity 
 
 long. And I ask thee, O Lord, to help me to be more 
 
 x 
 
322 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 and more of one mind, of one heart, with thyself, who, 
 while the impunity of forbearance lasts, " wouldst have 
 all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of 
 the truth" (1 Tim. ii. 4). 
 
 Let me remember also, always, that as regards these 
 thine enemies and mine, a twofold vengeance belongeth 
 to thee : in a twofold sense thou canst repay. If they 
 will but look now on Him whom they are piercing, — 
 his blood is the vengeance ; in the answer to his prayer 
 on their behalf, " Father, forgive them ; for they know 
 not what they do," thou wilt repay. Lord, do thou thus 
 avenge me of my adversary. Let him be one of those on 
 whom thy vengeance falls innocuous ; falling upon him 
 in Christ ; upon Christ for him. Avenge me, by making 
 him who holds my clothes when I am stoned the very 
 chiefest of thine apostles. 
 
 Let me ever have this spirit within me as I mourn 
 for them that oppose themselves. And when I think 
 of the doom of the ungodly, let it be as Jesus beheld 
 the city, and wept over it, and cried, — " Jerusalem, 
 Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest 
 them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have 
 gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth 
 her chickens under her wings ; and ye would not ! n 
 (Matt, xxiii. 37.) 
 
TIIE SOLEMN ISSUE. 323 
 
 VII. 
 
 GOOD OVERCOMING EVIL— THE SOLEMN ISSUE 
 OF WEAL OR WOE. 
 
 " Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him ; if he thirst, give him drink : for 
 in so doing thou shalt heap coals of lire on his head. Be not overcome of 
 evil, but overcome evil with good." — Rom. xii. 20, 21. 
 
 The precept here, — "If fclnne enemy hunger, feed him; 
 if he thirst, give him drink/' — is plain enough. It is the 
 opposite of " avenging yourselves." And it is a fair 
 inference from your not avenging yourselves, that you are 
 to do what is the reverse of avenging yourselves. You are 
 not to treat those who are opposed to you and to your 
 Lord as they deserve to be treated. " Therefore," you are 
 to treat them in a way exactly the contrary of that. 
 
 The precept has annexed to it first, a reason, — " For in 
 30 doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head ;" and 
 secondly, an explanation of the reason, in the form of a 
 higher and more generalized commandment, — " Be not 
 overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good." 
 
 As to the reason assigned for the precept, — there is an 
 ambiguity, giving room for a serious doubt or question. 
 The heaping of coals of fire upon any one's head may be 
 for one or other of two opposite ends, and may produce 
 one or other of two opposite effects. It may be meant 
 
324 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 and fitted to melt, to subdue, to assimilate or incorporate ; 
 as when, in the language of the poet, — 
 
 " — Artists melt the sullen ore of lead, 
 By heaping coals of fire upon its head. " 
 
 Or it may be meant and fitted to burn and consume ; as 
 when wood or stubble is subjected to the process. Coals 
 of fire, heaped on the head of any object, will do one or 
 other of these two things ; they will either soften or 
 destroy. Which of these two results are you to have in 
 view, when you load your enemy with benefits ? Are 
 you to be influenced, in showing him kindness, by the 
 hope that he may be moved to relent ? Or are you to 
 be reconciled to your so treating him by the consideration 
 that, failing to melt, your gifts will burn ; — that if not 
 in a way of grace, then in a way of judgment, it will 
 turn out in the long run that, in his history and expe- 
 rience, your conduct has had fruit ? 
 
 No ristfit minded and ri^ht hearted follower of Christ 
 will for a moment hesitate as to his reply ; — it is solely 
 for the purpose of melting my poor fellow-sinner, if that 
 be possible, that I heap coals of fire upon his head. And lie 
 will rejoice to find, that as it stands in that passage of the 
 Old Testament which the Apostle is quoting, the proverb, 
 or proverbial saying, naturally bears this interpretation; — 
 " If thine enemy be hungry, give him bread to eat ; and 
 if he be thirsty, give him water to drink : for thou shalt 
 heap coals of fire upon his head, and the Lord shall 
 reward thee" (Prov. xxv. 21, 22). The addition there 
 of the promise, " And the Lord shall reward thee," would 
 seem plainly enough to indicate that it can be with no 
 
THE SOLEMN ISSUE. 325 
 
 ill design, — with no wish to aggravate your enemy's 
 guilt and doom, — no complacency in that being possibly 
 the effect of your generosity, — that you are to relieve 
 and feed him. Anything approaching to a vindictive 
 spirit, — the doing of good, as the misanthropist may 
 affect to do good, because he anticipates that they to 
 whom he does it will only abuse it, and be the worse for 
 it ; — such a temper never can meet with acceptance or 
 gracious recompense at the hands of the God of love. 
 
 At the same time, even as it occurs in the Book of Pro- 
 verbs, the statement does not imply that in showing kind- 
 ness to an evil-doer you exclude from your view what 
 may possibly be the result or issue of your doing so, — 
 its being ultimately not for his benefit, but for his hurt. 
 The promise is a general encouragement. Grudge not to 
 expend your resources on those who may prove them- 
 selves to be not only undeserving of them, but incapable 
 of being affected by them to any good purpose. Suppose 
 even that all your benefactions are apparently in vain, 
 and, instead of saving your enemy, only tend to his 
 destruction, — still you have no cause of regret. These 
 benefactions are not lost ; they will redound to your 
 advantage ; — " The Lord shall reward thee." 
 
 It would seem, therefore, that while, in heaping coals 
 of fire upon your enemy's head, your " heart's desire and 
 prayer" for him must be that they may melt him, you 
 are not to shut your eyes, — as indeed you cannot shut 
 your eyes, — to the other side of the alternative, — that so 
 far from melting, they may only tend to burn and to 
 consume him. You must face either issue, if you would 
 
32 G CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S E>,MITY-. 
 
 be iii a condition to comply with the comprehensive com- 
 mandment which closes this high argument. 
 
 It is a fitting close. The commandment brings out a 
 vital principle, and one which, if rightly apprehended, 
 makes your " heaping of coals upon your enemy's head " 
 truly Godlike ; — " Be not overcome of evil, but over- 
 come evil with good." Either evil overcomes you, or 
 3*ou overcome evil ; which you can do only with good ; 
 — for good alone can overcome evil. It is a great 
 antithesis ; an awful choice. You and evil ; — the evil 
 that thwarts and mars the good ; Satan's evil, as an- 
 tagonistic to God's good ; you and this evil are close 
 grappled, in a hand-to-hand fight. It is a mortal strife, 
 — a deadly duel. Either this evil overcomes you, or 
 you overcome it. How ? With good ; with the good ; 
 by becoming yourself one with the good ; with Him 
 whose is the good, — who is himself the good ; — for 
 " there is none good but God." Not otherwise can you 
 overcome the evil, or escape being overcome by it. 
 
 The position, therefore, which you are now seen to 
 occupy with reference to a hostile world, — with special 
 reference to those who, in spite of all your earnest 
 advances of benevolence and sympathy, on the one hand, 
 and in spite of all your anxious and persevering endea- 
 vours, on the other hand, to avoid or obviate offence 
 and live peaceably with them, still insist on being your 
 enemies, — is a very high and holy one. You are to 
 identify yourselves and make common cause with Him 
 whose good is pitted, if I may so say, against Satan's 
 evil. In this view, let us consider, in the first place, 
 
GOD OVERCOMING EVIL WITH GOOD. 327 
 
 what His procedure is, as here virtually described ; and 
 then, secondly, what ought to be your procedure, as 
 moulded and directed after the model of his. 
 
 I. It is the prerogative of God to overcome evil. It 
 is the special prerogative of God in Christ to overcome 
 evil with good. God, absolutely considered, must over- 
 come evil. He cannot be overcome of evil. So far from 
 that, evil cannot touch him. It cannot mar the pure 
 peace and joy of his holy nature. It cannot arrest the 
 flow of that stream of holy love which would diffuse 
 everywhere, and always, the joy of his own holy nature 
 among all beings capable of holy fellowship with himself. 
 Evil, however it may be introduced into his created uni- 
 verse, cannot frustrate the tendency of his nature and 
 the purpose of his wilL Whatever may happen among 
 the different orders of free and responsible intelligences 
 whom he calls into being ; — and in whatever manner, 
 whether by spontaneous impulse from within, or by 
 temptation from without, evil, the evil of insubordina- 
 tion and a refusal to be subject to his law, comes in 
 and unfolds itself; — still he is master over it, not it over 
 him. He is not taken aback. He is not overtaken by 
 surprise. The evil, however it may come in, does not 
 reduce him to the necessity of any accommodation, on 
 his part, to its force or to its wiles. It does not dictate 
 to him any terms of surrender or of compromise. That 
 would be equivalent to- a confession of defeat ; and 
 therefore it cannot be. He is not, and cannot be, as 
 regards either his character or his government, overcome 
 
328 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 of evil. On the contrary, it is a necessity of his very 
 nature that he should, and that he must, overcome evil. 
 
 But a question occurs. Is it always with good? 
 Can evil be always overcome with good ? What is the 
 good meant ? Is it that indicated in the text, — "If thine 
 enemy hunger, feed him ; if he thirst, give him drink?" 
 Is that the way in which, when the matter is in the 
 hands of God himself, evil is always overcome with good? 
 
 Nay, the overcoming of evil with such good as that, 
 on the part even of God himself, is a more serious, and, 
 if one may so say, a more difficult matter than may at 
 first sight appear. 
 
 For one thing, it implies the recognition of voluntary 
 choice. The evil to be overcome is, on the part of 
 those responsible for it, voluntary. It should seem, 
 therefore, that the overcoming of it with good must be 
 voluntary too. Hence the necessity of all plans for thus 
 overcoming this evil being based upon an appeal to the 
 free will of those who are under its influence. And 
 hence also the necessity of reckoning upon some reject- 
 ing, while others' comply with the appeal. Even on the 
 part of God, therefore, and as regards his dealings with 
 free intelligences, this overcoming of evil with good 
 must be a movement of moral persuasion ; not merely of 
 physical power. It must, of necessity, contemplate the 
 possibility of failure. Evil, after all, may remain. Nay, 
 we are certainly taught to believe that, as one result of 
 such a movement, evil will remain. For there is a decree 
 of election ; there is a sovereign work of the Spirit. Were 
 there not both, nothing but evil after all would remain. 
 
GOD OVERCOMING EVIL WITH GOOD. 329 
 
 How the evil which remains is to be overcome, — how 
 it is to be overcome with good, and with what sort of 
 good, — that is a dark and dismal problem. The good 
 now revealed and working, the good of the gospel of 
 Jesus Christ, overcomes evil, in terms of the election of 
 grace and by the sovereign agency of the Spirit of grace, 
 by making a people willing in the day of the Lord's power. 
 But there is, alas ! a large remainder or remnant of evil 
 to be otherwise overcome. That it will be overcome, and 
 overcome with good, — that the final and everlasting over- 
 coming of the evil that is not overcome by the means 
 and agencies of good now at work, will still be an over- 
 coming of evil with good, — is most certain. It will be 
 the triumph of good over evil; the vindication of good 
 against evil. It will be good overcoming evil ; — in a dis- 
 pensation, however, not of mercy, but of judgment. 
 
 Meanwhile the immediate practical question for us 
 is, How is God overcoming evil with good now ? 
 
 Even thus put, it must be observed, the question is still 
 too wide. For, even in this world, and in his present 
 dealings with this world, God is, at least upon some occa- 
 sions, seen and felt to be overcoming evil with good 
 judicially. His judgments are abroad on the earth. Nay, 
 it may be said that everywhere, and always, he is over- 
 coming evil with good judicially, by judgments more or 
 less apparent, — of which not a few signal instances are 
 recorded in history, both sacred and profane. And these 
 are only specimens. The great day will disclose many 
 more, and will make it plain that even the present 
 providence of God is, to a large extent, retributive. 
 
330 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD *S ENMITY. 
 
 But it is not in the retributive aspect of it that the 
 providence of God is a rule or an example of duty to us. 
 In that view, " vengeance belongeth to God ; — he will 
 repay." We are not judges; we are ourselves obnoxious or 
 liable to judgment. We are not ministers or instruments 
 of justice, unless it be in the same sense in which all the 
 powers and elements of nature are so. As regards our 
 own free choice, our voluntary and spontaneous action, 
 we have nothing to do with the pronouncing, or with 
 the executing, of judicial sentences. The Lord alone is 
 judge. We may, indeed, and must, be called to look on 
 and acquiesce when God inflicts his righteous judgments, 
 — possibly through our agency. But the judgments are 
 his. We are simply asked to behold, and wonder, and 
 adore ; to " be still, and know that he is God." 
 
 Nevertheless, if our manner of overcoming evil with 
 good is to be analogous to that of God, it must have in 
 it the element, if not of judgment, at least of acquiescence 
 in judgment. I must have sympathy with God. I 
 must enter into his mind. And therefore I must clearly 
 understand and feel, that every act of kindness which I 
 do in his name carries in it a possible sting and curse for 
 him who is the object of it. I must do the act of 
 kindness under this terrible impression. 
 
 How, let me ask, with special reference to myself and 
 my own case, — how does God heap coals of fire on my 
 head, in order to overcome my evil with his good ? 
 
 That in any way, and in any sense, and to any effect 
 he may do so, he first, in more than a literal meaning of 
 these fiery words, heaps coals of fire on the head of his Son 
 
GOD OVERCOMING EVIL WITH GOOD. S31 
 
 as my surety. Thus far there is no room for any milder 
 interpretation of the figure. The coals of fire to which 
 he must be subjected, for me, are of a burning heat, to 
 destroy, to consume. Into the thrice hotly heated 
 furnace of judicial wrath my Saviour is cast. Blessed 
 be God that thus it becomes possible for him, the just 
 and holy one, as the God of love, to heap coals of fire 
 on my head, with the other side of the alternative open ; 
 namely this, — that, in virtue of my union with Christ, all 
 the scorching and scathing fierceness being exhausted on 
 the head of Christ, as my substitute, the melting, mollify- 
 ing, moulding influence alone shall remain behind for me ! 
 Still it is but an alternative. It is coals of fire, after 
 all, that God heaps on my head. His mercies, which are 
 " new to me every morning, and fresh every moment of 
 my life ;" his benefits, with which " he loads me as the God 
 of my salvation ; " — all the means, and influences, and 
 opportunities of grace, — are coals of fire. They have a use 
 of terror as well as a use of tenderness. If they fail to 
 subdue me in mercy now, they will silence and slay 
 me in judgment hereafter. So the Apostle emphatically 
 testifies when he puts the solemn question, — " Despisest 
 thou the riches of his goodness, and forbearance, and 
 long-suffering ; not knowing that the goodness of God 
 leadeth thee to repentance ? But, after thy hardness and 
 impenitent heart, treasurest up unto thyself wrath against 
 the day of wrath, and revelation of the righteous judg- 
 ment of God" (Rom. ii. 4, 5). So the Lord himself 
 taught in burning words when he " began to upbraid the 
 cities wherein most of his mighty works were done, be- 
 
cause they repented not. Woe unto thee, Chorazin ! woe 
 unto thee, Bethsaida! for if the mighty works, which were 
 done in you, had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would 
 have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I 
 
 md y ;. It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon 
 at the day of judgment, than for you. And thou, Caper- 
 naum, which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought 
 down to hell : for if the mighty works, which have been 
 done in thee, had been done in Sodom, it would have 
 remained until this day. But I say unto you, That it 
 
 D be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day 
 of judgment than for thee" (Matt. xL 20-24). And so 
 again, with a most solemn and affecting reference to 
 his own evangelistic ministry, and its momentous issues, 
 aftle announces the law or principle upon which 
 the whole divine economy of forbearance and grace is 
 now conducted ; — ■ We are unto God a sweet savour of 
 Christ, in them that are saved, and in them that perish. 
 
 ::ie one we are the savour of death unto death ; and 
 to the other the savour of life unto life : and who is 
 sufficient for these thing- I Oar. ii 15, 16). 
 
 EL Now form 1 alter into this plan and purpose of 
 
 ' in his present dispensation of forbearance and of 
 
 nd in the full view of its alternative issue of life 
 
 or c rial; for us to be, in this way, ''heaping coals 
 
 of fire on the heads" of evil-doers, in order to the over- 
 
 ril with good, — not always, or necessarily, in 
 
 the turning of the evil-doers to good, — but often, alas ! 
 
 io the igg .ivation of their guilt, and in their heavier 
 
CHRISTIAN BENEFITS — COALS OF FIRE. 333 
 
 doom; — this, surely, is a very holy calling. It is a very 
 awful calling. We may well ask, " Who is sufficient for 
 these things?" And we can be sustained only when we 
 are enabled to add, " Our sufficiency is of God ; " — of 
 that God who has so dealt with us as he would have us 
 to deal with our fellow-men and fellow-sinners. 
 
 We must therefore always remember that the good 
 with which we have to overcome evil consists of " coals 
 of fire/' It is a solemn thought ; but we cannot, we 
 dare not, put it aside. We must keep it always before 
 us, when we feed the hungry and give drink to the thirsty. 
 Whatever office of courtesy or kindness we are discharging 
 towards any one of those who oppose themselves, not to us 
 merely, but to our Lord and his cause; — whether it be a 
 common household service; or, along with that, a more 
 direct and express Christian benefit, such as an attempt 
 to speak a word in season; — we must have full in view 
 the consideration that it is a new " heaping of coals of 
 fire upon his head." 
 
 What a consideration is this! In what a light does it 
 present to you the person, however hostile, however 
 estranged, however vile, who is the object of your bene- 
 volence and beneficence! In what a relation do you now 
 feel that you stand to him ! He is to you what you are 
 to God; nay more, — he is to you what he is to God. You 
 deal with him, in a real and important sense, as God deals 
 with you ; as God deals with him. But that dealing is 
 of a very serious and critical nature. It is the "heaping 
 of coals of fire upon his head," under the inexorable con- 
 dition of a most momentous alternative of life or death. 
 
334 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S EXMITT. 
 
 Bring your enemy, whoever he may be, and for what- 
 ever cause your enemy, face to face, before you. Go 
 visit, or summon into your presence, any one of your 
 neighbours or acquaintances whom, with all your charity, 
 you cannot but regard as unfriendly to your Lord. Let 
 him be one also at whose hands, when you would fain 
 be doing him good, and have been tiying to do him 
 good, you have experienced cruel discouragement and dis- 
 appointment ; perhaps, also, ill-usage or contempt. You 
 cannot get rid of him ; you cannot be neutral to him. 
 How are you to treat him ? 
 
 Harshly, severely, vindictively? In that case you heap 
 coals of fire, in no ambiguous or alternative sense, not on 
 his head, but on your own: for "with what judgment ye 
 judge, ye shall be judged; and with what measure ye 
 mete, it shall be measured to you again" (Matt. vii. 2). 
 
 But it is not so that you deal with him. On the 
 contrary, you load him with benefits. You lavish 
 favours and kindnesses upon him. So far good. But 
 do you feel, all the while, that these favours and kind- 
 nesses are coals of fire ? — that in lavishing them upon 
 him, and loading him with them, you are heaping coals of 
 fire upon his head ? Do you look on him as a patient 
 whom your physic must either kill or cure? Do you lay 
 to heart the thought that your treatment of him must 
 tell, as God's treatment of him, as well as of you, must 
 tell, either for his weal or for his woe, eternally ? 
 
 Ah ! there is room again for self-deception here ! I 
 may practise forbearance and meekness ; forgiveness of 
 injuries, and a large and liberal bountifulness in returning 
 
CHRISTIAN BENEFITS COALS OF FIRE. 335 
 
 good for evil. But it may be altogether out of a sense 
 of what I owe to myself personally, and to the relation 
 in which I stand personally to my God. I feel that 
 it would be most unseemly and unbecoming in me, — 
 a monstrous and unnatural inconsistency, — to refuse to 
 show such mercy to my enemy as I trust God is show- 
 ing to me. I count it unworthy of my prayer to be 
 forgiven, to withhold forgiveness from my adversary. 
 I consider myself bound, on the contrary, to prove 
 the sincerity of my forgiveness of him by doing him 
 all the good I can. Still it may be to myself that I 
 am really looking, all the while ; to my own character 
 and standing; to my own duty merely; to what may 
 be expected or required of me. The probable bearing 
 of my treatment of him upon the object of my forgive- 
 ness and my liberality, may not be before my mind at 
 all ; or it may be a very subordinate and inoperative 
 consideration. To acquit myself, to clear my own 
 conscience, to purge my soul of malice, may be with me 
 the main thing. To feed my enemy, if hungry ; to give 
 him drink, if thirsty; may thus be with me very much a 
 sort of opus operatum ; — a good work done and finished, 
 and complete in itself ; a duty discharged ; a load taken 
 off my mind ; and little if anything more. 
 
 But all such insidious self-righteousness or self-com- 
 placency, in reference to this great command of love to 
 my enemy, is wholly shut out, when I am called to con- 
 sider, not how my treatment of him may become me, 
 but how it may tell on him ! Especially when I am called 
 to face the terrible alternative of its telling upon him, 
 
S36 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 either as coals of fire tell on the precious metal which they 
 melt, or as they tell on the stubble which they consume ! 
 
 Ah ! when this alternative is before me ; when I see 
 my poor brother, — for he is my brother, be his suspicious 
 dislike of me ever so strong, and the offence he has given 
 me ever so aggravated ; when I see him going on to the 
 eternal world, as I cannot but fear, unprepared for its 
 eternal awards ; when I feel the very wrong he has done 
 me, not so much as an injury or insult to me, but as a 
 sad, sore proof of his unbelief in God, and his unfitness 
 to die ; and when, with heart thus full of concern, not 
 for myself, but for him, I think how the word I speak to 
 him, or the bread with which I feed him, or the cup of 
 cold water I give him, may prove to him, — nay, must 
 prove to him, — either a blessing or a curse ; there is in- 
 deed an end of self, — of every selfish thought or feeling. 
 To me personally, what I do is nothing. How it may 
 tell on him — that is everything. 
 
 Thus, and only thus, do you overcome evil with good 
 after the manner of God ; when, in dealing with an enemy, 
 you not merely return good for evil, but do so with a clear 
 and full recognition of the position which you are called 
 to occupy with regard to him, — the position, namely, of 
 one "heaping coals of fire upon his head/' Otherwise the 
 evil overcomes you. For you may be overcome of evil 
 in more ways than one ; — not merely when the evil 
 moves you to resentment, retaliation, and revenge ; but 
 even when, your angry passions being restrained, policy, 
 or decency, or fear, or a sense of honour, or supercilious 
 indifference, or a sort of contemptuous pity and affecta- 
 
CHRISTIAN BENEFITS COALS OF FIRE. 337 
 
 tion of superior dignity, may prompt some measure of 
 forbearance and some offices of beneficence. The evil over- 
 comes you when you feel and act under its influence at 
 all, as bearing upon yourself ; when you suffer it to affect 
 you in any manner ; whether you give way to its pres- 
 sure, or aim at rising above it. 
 
 You overcome the evil with good only when you cease 
 altogether from contemplating the evil in a personal 
 point of view ; when you shut out of your mind and 
 keep out of sight the personal offence and injury to 
 yourself ; when the wrong-doer stands before you simply 
 as a fellow-immortal, on whom you are to bring to bear 
 a ministry of faithfulness, and kindness, and love ; — a 
 ministry which, as you have ever before your eyes, must 
 have issues for him, for weal or for woe, reaching through- 
 out the ages of eternity. 
 
 Look at him in that light. It is the light in which 
 God looks at you, when he would overcome your evil 
 with his good. You are in his sight, not an enemy, 
 giving him personal offence, and affording him an oppor- 
 tunity of displaying magnanimity and generosity by doing 
 you good notwithstanding. He sees in you a poor, lost, 
 sinful soul. He deals with you most graciously, most 
 liberally, most bountifully. He plies you with all 
 agencies and influences of good, and pleads with you to 
 let them move and melt you. And oh ! how earnestly 
 does he plead with you ! because he knows that they are 
 indeed " coals of fire " which he is " heaping on your 
 head ;" coals that, if they melt not, must burn ; for " even 
 our God is a consuming fire" (Heb. xii. 29). 
 Y 
 
S38 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 So God regards and treats you, who are his enemy. 
 So he would have you to regard and treat your enemy. 
 Every human being before you, every son and every 
 daughter of Adam, every member of the human family, 
 be his conduct to you what it may, is to you an immor- 
 tal spirit, to whom you are called to apply a discipline of 
 Christian kindness, and gospel truth and love, that cannot 
 leave him as it finds him ; — that must either move and 
 melt, or consume and burn. 
 
 How solemn the thought ! With what a sacredness 
 does it invest every individual man ! How is it fitted 
 to empty your soul of every selfish consideration, either 
 of resentment or, if I may say so, of non-resentment! 
 How Godlike does your position become ! And what a 
 responsibility is yours! 
 
 Surely it is with good meaning and effect that the 
 Apostle thus sums up his teaching on the subject of your 
 intercourse with those who are the Lord's enemies and 
 yours ; — " Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil 
 with good." Even as the Lord himself closes his great 
 lesson on the same theme ; "Be ye therefore merciful, 
 as your Father also is merciful" (Luke vi. 36) ; "Be ye 
 therefore," as regards this whole matter of doing good, 
 as God does good, to the evil and the unthankful, — " Be 
 ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is iu 
 heaven is perfect" (Matt. v. 48). 
 
CONCLUSION " DEARLY BELOVED." S3 9 
 
 VIII. 
 
 FORCE OF THE APPEAL—" DEARLY BELOVED." 
 
 " Dearly beloved.'*— Rom. xii. 19. 
 
 This mode of address — " Beloved," or " Dearly be- 
 loved," — may seem to have in it nothing very worthy of 
 note. It may be simply a matter-of-course and common- 
 place sort of interjection or invocation, such as a speaker 
 or writer is apt occasionally to use when he warms with 
 his subject, without any special meaning, for the most part, 
 beyond a kind and complimentary acknowledgment of 
 the " brethren " or " friends " whom he has in his eye. 
 I am persuaded, however, that it is not thus at random, 
 and as a mere customary and formal usage, that the 
 expression occurs in the Apostolic Epistles. I find it 
 generally where some difficult duty, or high attainment, 
 or precious privilege, of Christian faith or Christian 
 fellowship, is the subject of discourse; and where, as I 
 think most readers will feel, so tender and affectionate 
 an appellation is fitted to have a spirit-stirring and 
 heart-stirring effect. 
 
 1 I speak to you,' the writer may be supposed to say, 
 ' as " beloved " ones, " dearly beloved ;" — not beloved of 
 me only, or my beloved, as the phrase is sometimes 
 
340 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 qualified ; — but without any term of limitation, — be- 
 loved ; — I say not of whom beloved ; — you know that 
 right well yourselves ; — you are conscious who they are 
 that dearly love you. I appeal to you as dearly beloved 
 ones ; I appeal to that dear love of which you are the 
 objects ; and by that love I beseech you to give heed 
 to what I say, as they who are the objects of such 
 dear love may be fairly asked and expected to do/ 
 
 Is there not a touching emphasis in a call like that ? 
 Is it not fitted powerfully to carry home any lesson to 
 which it refers to the best affections of the soul ? 
 
 In the present instance, the precise place at which it 
 is introduced in the series of precepts regulating your 
 treatment .of offenders, as well as the nature of these 
 precepts themselves, may be regarded as contributing to 
 make the appeal at once seasonable and significant ; and 
 accordingly it will fall to be considered, for practical 
 purposes, in both of these points of view. 
 
 I. The address or appeal — " Dearly beloved " — breaks 
 in two the series of precepts in the midst of which it 
 stands; it separates the five preceding verses (14-18) 
 from the three which close the chapter (19-21). And 
 the division is a true and right one ; not forced or 
 fanciful, suggested by an incidental phrase, but sub- 
 stantial and of real practical importance. 
 
 Run your eye over the successive commandments of 
 the first part, and observe how the first four, — to bless, 
 to sympathize, to lay mind alongside of mind, to be 
 generously forbearing, and tender of your neighbour's 
 
CONCLUSION " DEAKLY BELOVED." 341 
 
 honour and your own, — are all in the line of the fifth, 
 and fitted to make the keeping of it hopeful ; — " If it be 
 possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all 
 men/' If you fairly carry out the course of conduct 
 sketched, you may warrantably look for some consider- 
 able success in your vocation of peacemakers. At all 
 events, it is in that character that you are acting ; it is 
 peace, in the highest and best sense, that you keep 
 steadily in view as the end at which you aim in your 
 dealings with mankind. It is in the capacity of peace- 
 makers that you go among the most hostile, seeking to 
 disarm their jealousy and conciliate their confidence, if 
 by any means they may be persuaded to accept, not only 
 your peace, but your Master's. 
 
 It is this consideration, indeed, which ennobles and 
 hallows the sort of treatment of your persecutors and 
 adversaries which is here recommended ; elevating it 
 immeasurably above the tame patience of a mean spirit, 
 and the plausible patience of a worldly spirit, both of 
 which are sometimes confounded with it. For mere 
 cowardice on the one hand, or policy on the other, may 
 move a man to go great lengths in the way of truckling 
 to pride and power, and so to study the arts of accom- 
 modating flattery and feigned courtesy, as to become a 
 proficient in what may pass with many for Christian 
 meekness and good- will. But the genuine grace is to be 
 distinguished from all spurious counterfeits by the stamp 
 upon it of Heaven's mint, — the divine seal of unselfish- 
 ness and disinterestedness. If, as the Psalmist counsels 
 (xxxiv. 1 4), " departing from evil and doing good, you 
 
342 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 seek peace and pursue it," you make it plain that it is 
 not for your own sakes only or chiefly, but for the sake 
 of those, the unquiet restlessness of whose troubled spirits, 
 at universal war with, you, and with themselves, and with 
 all things in earth and heaven, you cannot contemplate 
 unmoved. It is the pacifying of the uproar of their 
 dark souls, over whose stormy waves you would fain 
 invoke the spell of the Divine word, " Peace, be still/' 
 that you desire and seek. It is with a view to that 
 result that you make advances to them ; and are willing 
 to concede and ready to be accommodating ; and careful 
 not to irritate any resentful, or wound any honourable, 
 feeling ; and with the reservation only of principle, which 
 you cannot compromise, anxious to be yourselves nothing, 
 and to consult simply for them, — if by any means you 
 may so live peaceably with them as not to hinder, but to 
 help, their coming to have peace with God. 
 
 Thus far the task or work assigned to you should be 
 felt to be in itself not unpleasant ; and, as regards the en- 
 couragement you have to look for success, not unpromising. 
 They with whom you have to do are persecutors, no 
 doubt, more or less ; opposed to the truth, and not slow 
 to injure its champions. But as yet you are not required 
 to regard the case of any of them as desperate. You are 
 at liberty to look, not upon the dark and gloomy, but 
 upon the bright and hopeful side of the picture. Nay, it 
 is your duty to do so. You do not exaggerate their 
 perverseness. Rather you make allowances, and search 
 for what may be pleaded in palliation, and what may be 
 turned to account for good. What they do they do 
 
CONCLUSION " DEARLY BELOVED." 343 
 
 ignorantly, misled by prejudice, or blinded by unbelief. 
 But they are not utterly hardened, or given over by the 
 Spirit as reprobate. You may, therefore, go about the 
 business of dealing with them cheerfully; not anticipating 
 failure or defeat, but rather cherishing a good assurance 
 that, with a goodly number, your following after peace 
 will, by God's blessing on your prayers and pains, not be 
 in vain. It is in this buoyant and sanguine frame of 
 mind that you are to bless, and not curse ; that you are 
 . to rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with them 
 that weep ; that, being neither high-minded nor selfishly- 
 minded, you are to let your mind frankly meet with 
 other minds ; that, not rendering evil for evil to any, you 
 are to feel and show yourselves to be upon honour with 
 all ; and that, finally, you are to live with all men as 
 peaceably as they will let you. Such a temperament of 
 charity, thinking no evil, hoping all things, is the only 
 habit of soul that is in harmony with those broad and 
 genial sentiments of natural humanity, genuine human 
 kindness, the simple kindness of man to man, which 
 alone, divesting your benevolence of whatever might give 
 it a stiff or studied air of artificial condescension, will win 
 for it confidential access into the warm recesses of many 
 a thankful and many a broken heart. 
 
 But there comes to be a point, — a stage, — in the 
 course of your dealings with your fellow-men, at which 
 you cannot but apprehend that your position is changed. 
 You are forced to look the sad fact of failure in the face, 
 and see too many upon whom all your charity is ex- 
 pended in vain. Your conciliatory efforts are exhausted 
 
344 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 upon them, and, as it would appear, to no purpose ; you 
 are for peace, but they are for war. You are forced, 
 therefore, now to contemplate an issue or result of your 
 kindly dealing less favourable than that the prospect 
 of which has hitherto cheered you. 
 
 It is not that even yet you abandon all hope, and 
 acquiesce in the conclusion that all of those with whom, 
 in spite of all your endeavours, you have found it im- 
 possible to live peaceably, must be given over as im- 
 practicable subjects, on whom no gracious impression can 
 be made. So far from that, you continue to ply them 
 with all Christian and gentle influences, and will rather 
 redouble your exertions than contentedly abandon them 
 to their fate. You remember well how, in the Lord's 
 dealings with yourself, there was a crisis, — nay, more 
 than one, — at which, according to all ordinary calcula- 
 tions of probability, your case might have been pronounced 
 irremediable, and the Spirit might have ceased to strive 
 W T ith you, and the awful sentence might have gone forth 
 against you, "Ephraim is joined to idols; let him alone/' 
 But instead of that, the Lord's language concerning you was 
 the language, not only of most patient long-suffering, but 
 of most affectionate relenting ; — " How shall I give thee 
 up, Ephraim ? how shall I deliver thee, Israel ? How shall 
 I make thee as Admah ? how shall I set thee as Zeboim ? 
 Mine heart is turned within me, my repentings are 
 kindled together. I will not execute the fierceness of 
 mine anger, I will not return to destroy Ephraim ; for I 
 am God, and not man" (Hos. xi. 8, 9). So the Lord 
 persevered in loading you with his benefits, and bringing 
 
CONCLUSION " DEARLY BELOVED." 345 
 
 to bear upon you the means, and overtures, and influences 
 of his grace, even when your carnal enmity of mind and 
 evil heart of unbelief, having resisted advances fitted to 
 break in pieces the very stones, might have been held to 
 be beyond the reach of cure. In the same long-suffering 
 spirit you will persist, in the face of all discouragements, 
 in discharging the blessed office of peacemaker, even 
 towards those who are most obstinately and inveterately 
 set against your good offices. 
 
 Nevertheless, you cannot help feeling that you occupy 
 a position towards them very considerably different from 
 that in which you were when you began the work of recon- 
 cilement. You cannot shut your eyes now to the dread 
 alternative under the pressure of which you labour. You 
 are forced to face the law which is the inexorable con- 
 dition of whatever kindness you show to an enemy; — 
 that it must either melt or burn. 
 
 Doubtless that law is in full force all along, as a law 
 universally applicable. Your blessing them which perse- 
 cute you; sympathizing with them when they rejoice or 
 weep ; being of one mind with them ; demeaning yourself 
 courteously and honourably towards them ; seeking peace 
 and pursuing it; — all these methods of amiable and 
 friendly approach fall under the same stern and inexorable 
 rule. In every instance of your acting according to any 
 of these methods, your conciliatory conduct tells for evil 
 on the object of it, if it does not work him good ; you 
 are to him either " a savour of life unto life or of death 
 unto death." That is a responsibility of which you 
 cannot get rid. Still, it is when the limit is reached of 
 
3i6 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 that conditional command, " If it be possible, as much 
 as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men ; " — it is 
 when you apprehend and realize the failure of your 
 attempts to make peace ; — it is then chiefly, — then for 
 the first time fully, — that you apprehend and realize also 
 the nature of the weapon which you are wielding ; the 
 double power of the coals of fire which you are heaping 
 on the enemy's head. Then it is that you are called to 
 quit the merely human platform from which you have 
 been moving towards him, and to plant your foot on one 
 that is divine. Hitherto, you have felt yourself to be 
 dealing with him simply as man with man ; now you 
 feel that you deal with him even as God himself does. 
 Hitherto, you have been holding out to him the olive 
 branch, just as one who has himself found safety in the 
 Ark would desire to have a fellow-sinner and fellow- 
 sufferer brought into the same blessed refuge ; — now you 
 sit with God who is over all, as the Avenger as well as 
 the Deliverer ; and there is present to your mind, what is 
 ever present to his, the solemn and awful truth, that 
 what you are doing, — that the holding out of the olive- 
 branch, — may kill as well as cure ; may destroy, as well 
 as save ; nay, in the long-run, must destroy and kill, if it 
 do not save and cure. 
 
 Now it is at the precise point, or stage, at which you 
 pass from the simple doing of good with a view to peace, 
 to the clear and vivid realization of the terrible fact that 
 if it does not make for peace, the good you do is as a 
 consuming fire ; it is when, renouncing all idea of righting 
 or avenging yourself, you stand back, and give way 
 
CONCLUSION "DEARLY BELOVED." 347 
 
 before the burning wrath of God, — and are called to feed 
 your enemy with this dread issue full in view, that, by 
 the judgment of that God of vengeance, the food you 
 give, if it does not heal him, must prove his bane and 
 poison ; — it is at such a crisis that the affectionate ap- 
 peal comes in so very opportunely, — "Dearly beloved." 
 
 Yes ! it is most opportune, and you will own it to be so, 
 if you have any sympathy with the Apostle in the cry 
 that was wrung from him, under an overwhelming sense 
 of his preaching being, to every one of his hearers, a 
 savour either of death or of life, — " Who is sufficient for 
 these things ? " You would need to be as God himself, 
 to be able calmly to contemplate this alternative issue of 
 whatever good he does to his enemy, and whatever good 
 lie moves you to do to yours. That doing of good now 
 becomes, in your eye, an infinitely more serious and awful 
 affair than you may have been apt to imagine, when you 
 knew not thoroughly the terror of the Lord and the power 
 of his anger. You see your enemy, — one who is your 
 enemy for Christ's sake, — not in your own hands, in which 
 case you might have some discretion as to what should 
 come of your kind treatment of him and his ill requital 
 of it ; but you see him in the hands of an angry God, — 
 to whose wrath you give place ; and you have to feed 
 him and give him drink with this awful handwriting of 
 God himself on the wall before you, — that, not by your 
 choice, but by his ordinance, the food and the drink are 
 coals of fire heaped on the man's unsheltered head, either 
 to melt his heart or to scath and slay his soul. Surely for 
 such a momentous ministry as that, — if you really take in 
 
348 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 the great fact on which it rests, and the meaning of it, — ■ 
 you need to be nerved and braced with no common 
 strength ; you must have some firm and yet tender stay 
 on which you may fall back and lean. And have you 
 not such a stay in the deeply-rooted memory, or sense, of 
 all the divine affection, and all the intimate, endearing, 
 and confidential divine fellowship, to which the Apostle, 
 or rather the Lord himself, emphatically appeals, when he 
 hails you and salutes you with the simple address of 
 home-familiarity — " Beloved," — " Dearly beloved ?" 
 
 II. What there is in the address itself, as coming in at 
 this stage and in this connection, to give it point and 
 power, is to be felt rather than described. If one does 
 not, as by a sort of spiritual and yet natural instinct, dis- 
 cern and grasp the charm of it, there is great difficulty 
 in making it plain and palpable. Perhaps an illustration 
 may best bring out what I take to be the charm of it, — 
 the spell lying in this one little word of endearment, 
 " Dearly beloved." 
 
 Let me suppose that I go out from a loving household, 
 of which I have been a loved and cherished member. 
 My home is all perfect harmony and pure peace ; and I 
 have been a favourite at home. Father, mother, brothers, 
 sisters, friends, companions, all have loved me dearly. 
 From such a quiet nest I suddenly pass into a very 
 different world. Sin and strife are rampant all around 
 me. Idleness, frivolity, jealousy, and envy, — or else sordid 
 covetousness, selfishness, and mean ambition, — reign 
 everywhere paramount. The men and women I meet 
 
CONCLUSION " DEARLY BELOVED. " 349 
 
 are wearying themselves and one another with their vain 
 rivalries and angry passions. And yet my business is 
 with them. I am sent to tell them of my home, and my 
 Father, and my Elder Brother, and all the inmates who 
 conspire to make it happy, — if by any means these men 
 and women may be persuaded to come with me that I 
 may show them good. Alas ! they will not understand 
 or give heed to what I say. They are irritated, and 
 resolved to pick a quarrel with me. They study how 
 they may best wound and vex me, by maligning the Head 
 and members of the family I belong to, and treating all 
 that I have to testify concerning it with indifference, or 
 incredulity, or scorn. I find it hard to keep my temper, 
 and to persevere in treating them courteously and kindly. 
 And when I see that all my courtesy and kindness is not 
 only lost upon so many of them, but is, in fact, only 
 putting them so much more in the wrong, and inten- 
 sifying the bitterness of their opposition, and increasing 
 their hard-heartedness, and aggravating their guilt ; — 
 ah ! I exclaim, why must I continue to be buffeted by so 
 perverse a crew, to whom my well-intended good offices 
 are at least as likely to prove a curse as a blessing ; or 
 rather, indeed, far more so ? It is a position too trying 
 for me ; I cannot stand it. 
 
 But what is that sound which I hear ; wafted as on the 
 wings of some soft spice-laden gale ; " redolent of joy and 
 youth;" fresh from my Father's dwelling ; — "Beloved; 
 dearly beloved ! " It "gives me pause." What! shall I, 
 the child of love, and of such love as is mine in my 
 Father's dwelling, shrink from the post at which that 
 
350 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 Father has placed me ! Is it for me, who bask in the 
 sunshine of a home full of love, to dream of lea vino: these 
 unloved and unloving ones alone ? Rather let my heart 
 yearn over them the more, the more their sad enmity 
 frets and rages. Let the thought of what they are, 
 forlorn and lost, and of the risk of their case becoming 
 daily worse, under the daily ministry of kindness with 
 which they are plied, stir in me a new intensity of deep 
 concern for their distress and keen desire for their deliver- 
 ance. And let the very love of which I am the object, 
 brought so vividly to mind by that startling word of 
 awakening appeal as well as of endearing tenderness, — 
 1 early beloved one, — put me once more on the alert, as 
 I feel myself adjured by all the love that is mine so 
 richly, to be true to my loving Father, and true to those 
 poor outcasts whom, if they will but be persuaded, even 
 at the eleventh hour, my loving Father would fain have 
 to be partakers of that very love of his which he 
 delights to lavish upon me. 
 
 Some such force and emphasis, I apprehend, you are 
 to recognise and appreciate when, in the midst of your 
 close conflict with evil, and your earnest striving to 
 overcome it with good, you hear yourselves affectionately 
 saluted, as by a familiar voice from home, — " Dearly 
 beloved.'"' It is a voice that not only falls gently and 
 sweetly, like an evening hymn, on your soul disquieted 
 with vexing thoughts, but rings, like a trumpet call sum- 
 moning you to work and war. And all the more is it 
 thus powerful, because it reminds you of all that your 
 being thus saluted implies. It carries your thoughts back 
 
CONCLUSION " DEARLY BELOVED. " 351 
 
 to what your sad case was, when you were yourselves 
 wanderers and outcasts in that far country, in which so 
 many are still wasting their substance in riotous living, 
 or else perishing with hunger. Who has made you to 
 differ now ? In what manner, and L y what means ? Ye, 
 believers, were but yesterday what they are to-day. 
 Now you are beloved, dearly beloved. Love, divine 
 love, is the air you breathe. You dwell in love, because 
 you dwell in God. How has this blessedness become 
 yours ? It is not that you have loved ; but that you 
 have been and are beloved. The love which is of God, 
 the love wherewith the Father loveth the Son, has, by 
 the power of the Spirit, reached you. The Father loveth 
 you even as he loveth the Son. You are well-beloved, 
 as the Son is well-beloved. And you are the beloved of 
 all of whom the Son is the beloved. You therefore are in 
 the world as the Son was in the world. The voice which 
 hails you from heaven, — for it is a voice from heaven com- 
 ing through the mouth or pen of one moved by the Holy 
 Ghost, — the voice hailing you as "beloved/' is the very 
 voice which hailed him when he was in Jordan's stream ; 
 — " This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased ! " 
 It is as hearing still evermore that voice from heaven, 
 that you now, like Him who heard it then, " go about 
 doing good " on the earth. It is the echo of that voice 
 in your bosom that not only stills the rising sense of ill- 
 usage when the good you do is ill-requited, but enables 
 you to accept, as he did, the solemn alternative and condi- 
 tion on which alone good can be done to any one here be- 
 low, — that it is the "heaping of coals of fire upon his head." 
 
352 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 For, let me be allowed to say, in drawing the dis- 
 cussion of this whole subject to a close, nothing can be 
 more mistaken than the view on which a certain class of 
 writers delight to expatiate, — grave theologians some 
 of them, as well as authors of light literature catching 
 and spreading the strain, — as to the frame of spirit in 
 which, they think, one humbly confident of his own sal- 
 vation by grace, must look abroad upon a world, of 
 whose inhabitants, alas ! but too many may be doomed 
 ultimately to perish. Of course, every fair reasoner will 
 protest against such a consideration being allowed any 
 weight whatever, in the argument respecting the future 
 and eternal condition of mankind. Whether all the 
 race, or only a portion, is to be ultimately rescued 
 from perdition, is a question to be determined upon its 
 own proper evidence, by an appeal to Scriptural state- 
 ments and representations. It is illogical to infer, from 
 the supposed effect upon certain minds of a particular 
 doctrine concerning the future state, that the doctrine 
 must be false. And it is alike unfair and uncharitable 
 to impute odious sentiments to those who conscientiously 
 hold that a particular doctrine on this subject is a part 
 of revelation, merely because one who denies or doubts 
 it chooses to think that, if he believed the doctrine, 
 it would awaken such sentiments in him. Let the truth 
 be sought and ascertained, without regard at all to 
 considerations such as these. Let the inquiry be 
 impartially prosecuted, upon this issue ; — Does God so 
 deal with men as absolutely to insure that all shall in 
 the end be saved ? — or does he deal with them in such 
 
CONCLUSION " DEARLY BELOVED." 3 5 3 
 
 a way as to raise the dread alternative, that either they 
 are saved, or are, by his very method of dealing with 
 them, the more irretrievably lost ? If this last idea of 
 the divine government shall appear to be the only one 
 warranted either by the providence or by the word of 
 God ; — if it shall turn out to be a great and awful fact, 
 that light having come into the world, men may still to 
 the last persevere in loving darkness rather than the 
 light, and that they who do so must on that account 
 fall under the heavier condemnation ; — of what avail is 
 it to say that this may tempt me, as one of the saved, to 
 exult over my perishing neighbour, — hugging myself in 
 my own security, and coolly consigning him to his doom ? 
 Rebuke my pride and malice by all means. But let God 
 be true ; charge not him foolishly. 
 
 I protest, however, for my part, — so will every child 
 of God most energetically say, having in him the Spirit 
 of Christ, — I protest against the imputation. With one 
 voice we all unite in protesting against the imputation. 
 You who make it little understand us. Because we 
 realize, as it is our duty to do, our own blessed position 
 as the Lord's friends, on the one hand; and the precarious 
 and perilous position of all who are not his friends, on 
 the other hand ; you imagine that we must be ever 
 dwelling on the contrast with mingled emotions of self- 
 complacent exultation and either gratified vindictiveness 
 or contemptuous pity. In the first place, you do our faith 
 more than justice when you conceive of it as so easy a 
 thing for us, or so much a matter of course, to take in 
 the fact of so many of the men and women around us 
 z 
 
354 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 who are living without God, being so miserably without 
 hope as they are. We have acquaintances and friends 
 among them, of whom and of whose prospects we would 
 fain think favourably ; and even strangers and enemies, 
 our indolence is ever prompting us to fancy, may not be 
 in such danger that we must put ourselves very much 
 about to help them. The real and actual difficulty with 
 ns is all on the side of our being sufficiently alive to the 
 terrible risk which they among whom we dwell are 
 running. And then you do less than justice to the love 
 by which faith works. For we can confidently assure 
 you, that just in proportion as our faith is strong and 
 vivid in Him who " is set for the fall and rising again of 
 many in Israel" (Luke ii. 34) ; who " unto them which 
 believe is precious, but unto the disobedient a stone of 
 stumbling and a rock of offence" (1 Peter ii. 7, 8); — in 
 the same proportion does our love burn ; both as a love 
 of most self-abasing gratitude to Him who makes us to 
 differ; and as a love also of such self-sacrificing anxiety 
 as that which breaks out in these utterances of Paul ; — 
 " I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also 
 bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost, that I have great 
 heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart. For I 
 could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for 
 my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh" (Kom. 
 ix. 1-3) ; " Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to 
 God for Israel is, that they might be saved" (Rom. x. 1). 
 " We know that we are of God, and the whole world 
 lieth in wickedness;" — such assured faith, apprehending 
 the sharp line which severs us in Christ from our fellow- 
 
CONCLUSION "DEARLY BELOVED. " 355 
 
 sinners who are out of Christ, the beloved Apostle John 
 would have us to cherish ; — " We know that we are of 
 God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness" (1 John 
 v. 1 9). He is not speaking of the world to come, — the 
 state in which the line is unchangeably determined. 
 How the blessed ones who, like Lazarus in Abraham's 
 bosom, behold the torments of the condemned in hell, 
 between whom and them there is a great gulf fixed, im- 
 passable, everlasting ; how they behold the terrible sight 
 and give glory to God while beholding it, we may not 
 now inquire. It is to this present world that John is 
 pointing. And in this present world the line is not de- 
 termined, the gulf is not fixed. 
 
 This, indeed, is the very consideration that stamps 
 upon our treatment of those we meet with in the world 
 a character of deepest interest. They are " lying in 
 wickedness ; " — not, however, hopelessly ; for there is 
 brought to bear upon them, on the part of God, a 
 ministry of forbearance, and kindness, and mercy, that is 
 designed and fitted to deliver them. In that ministry 
 we are called to be fellow-workers with God. Our acts 
 and expressions of good-will form a part of that ministry 
 of his. We regard our acts and expressions of good- 
 will in that light, and therefore we seek to abound in 
 them. But we know the condition which is attached 
 to the ministry as a whole, and to every particular in- 
 stance of it. If not graciously effectual to save, it is 
 infallibly powerful to destroy. 
 
 And who am I, each one of us is ready to exclaim, that 
 I should be in this way, in any sense and to any extent, 
 
35 6 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 instrumental, however -unintentionally, and even uncon- 
 sciously, in influencing or determining another's destiny, 
 not in time merely, but perhaps for eternity? And who 
 is he ? Let me isolate myself and him together. Here 
 am I, like Daniel — shall I say? — "a man greatlv 
 beloved/' There is he, — a man who, as I cannot but 
 apprehend, is still u in the gall of bitterness and the 
 bond of iniquity. " My home, how blessed ! His exile, 
 how dreary ! And why is my case not his, and his case 
 not mine ; his the blessed home, mine the dreary exile ? 
 Can I regard him with cold indifference, can I ever dream 
 of avenging any wrong he may do me in his blindness, 
 with that question ringing in my ears continually ? Can 
 I nestle in my own warm nest, under affection's wing, 
 when he is starving outside ? "When I am hailed by a 
 whole chorus of harmonious, heavenly voices, — " Beloved," 
 " Dearly beloved," — is he to be left shivering in the cold 
 blast of earth's unkindness, and on the verge of the 
 fathomless pit of despair ? I must be ministering to 
 him. I do minister to him. It is an anxious service. 
 My neighbour, my friend, whom I would fain have for 
 my brother, is in a critical position. It is, as I may 
 say, life or death with him ; now or never. I see his 
 fate trembling in the balance. How is he taking my 
 advances and assiduities ? What impression is my word or 
 deed of Christian solicitude making ; my word in season, 
 my well-intended deed of kindness and good- will? I watch 
 with intense concern. Is he relenting ? Are there signs 
 of jealousy allayed, suspicion lulled, some spark of con- 
 fidence kindled ? Is there some faint indication of the 
 
CONCLUSION " DEARLY BELOVED.'' 357 
 
 hard heart becoming soft, and the sealed fountain of 
 gracious tears being opened ? Is there anything like the 
 bruised reed, or the smoking flax ? Or, alas ! is there only- 
 increasing sullenness and gloom ; the impatience that will 
 not let its wound be probed, the anger that will not have 
 its misery interfered with ? How eagerly do I note 
 every sign ! Now, it seems as if my dealing were doing 
 him good. Again, I shudder to see that it is only irri- 
 tating and vexing him. All the while I have full in 
 view the issue that may be more or less dependent on 
 my movement. I am handling coals of fire. I cannot 
 help it. Through me, through my agency and instrumen- 
 tality, he is undergoing a process that cannot leave him 
 as it finds him. He is the better or the worse for it. 
 And it is I who am at this moment practically shutting 
 the question up to this issue. I cannot be calm, as if I 
 were conducting a common experiment upon unconscious 
 matter. If I know anything of Heaven's love, and of 
 Heaven's wrath, — the love of which I, once a child of 
 wrath, am now the object, — the wrath hanging in sus- 
 pense over him ; — so hanging over him that the very next 
 step he takes, in consequence of my interposition, may, 
 for anything I can tell, decide whether its winged and 
 fiery thunderbolt is to give place to the same love that 
 has reached me, or to fall on his head for ever ; — if, I 
 repeat, I know anything of Heaven's love, and of 
 Heaven's wrath ; — then by all that love, — the love with 
 which Christ dying for me loveth me ; the love with 
 which the Holy Ghost, shutting me up into Christ, loveth 
 me ; the love with which the Father, giving me his dear 
 
358 CHRISTIAN TREATMENT OF THE WORLD'S ENMITY. 
 
 Son and all things else in him, loveth me ; the love with 
 which all saints and holy angels love me ; — by the dear 
 love of my Father's house where now I dwell ; — I 
 cannot but be moved with most thrilling intensity, as I 
 hang over yonder yawning gulf, — and hold out my hand 
 to catch, to feed, to rescue, my poor famished brother 
 sinking in the pit, — and with tearful eagerness strain my 
 eyes to see if he will let me help him ; — since, if he will 
 not, full well I know, and it is full terrible to know, that 
 all that I am doing on his behalf must make his case the 
 worse ! Knowing this, — feeling that it may be for him 
 salvation or destruction, — I dare not draw back ; I must 
 hold on and persevere. No ingratitude can cool me ; 
 no injury provoke me ; no obstinacy weary me. Tasting 
 for myself the free and full love of my Father in heaven, 
 and of all his heavenly household, I cannot but persist 
 in heaping coals of fire on the head of every foe, if by 
 any means, — I would it were not in a way of judgment, 
 but in a way of grace, — I may have a share in my 
 Father's great and glorious work of " overcoming evil 
 with good." 
 
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