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Horatius Bonar
It was this grace or free love which first began with you, and with which you began. It
was this which you at first 'apprehended,' or rather, which 'apprehended' you; and your
special character is that of men who 'know the grace of God' (Col 1:6); who have 'tasted
that the Lord is gracious' (1 Pet 2:3); men on whom God has had compassion (Rom 9:15); men
to whom He has shown His forgiving love. Such is your name.
This grace of God is your strength, as it is your joy; and it is only by abiding in it
that you can really live the life of the redeemed. Be strong, then, in this grace; draw
your joy out of it; and beware how you turn to anything else for refreshment, or comfort,
or holiness. Though a believing man, you are still a sinner; a sinner to the last; and, as
such, nothing can suit you but the free love of God. Be strong in it. Remember that you
are saved by believing, not by doubting. Be not then a doubter, but a believer. Draw
continually on Christ and His fulness for this grace. If at any time you are beguiled away
from it, return to it without delay; and betake yourself to it again just as you did at
the first. To recover lost peace, go back to where you got it at first; begin your
spiritual life all over again: get at once to the resting-place. Where sin has abounded,
let grace much more abound. Do not go back to your feelings, or experiences, or evidences,
in order to extract from them a renewal of your lost peace. Go straight back to the free
love of God. You found peace in it at first; you will find peace in it to the last. This
was the beginning of your confidence; let it be both last and first.
This abounding grace, rightly understood, will not make you sin; it will not relax
morality or make inconsistency a trifle. It will magnify sin and enhance its evil in your
eyes. Your footing or 'standing' in grace (Rom 5:2) will be the strongest, as well as most
blessed, that you can ever occupy. If your feet be 'shod with the preparation of the
gospel of peace' (Eph 6:15), you will be able to 'stand' and to 'withstand'; not
otherwise. Remember how Paul and Barnabas urged this upon the Jews of Antioch, 'persuading
them to continue in the grace of God' (Acts 13:43; Gal 5:4; Titus 2:11; 1 Peter
5:12).
When you first saw the cross, and understood the meaning of the blood, you
got your conscience 'purged from dead works' (Heb 9:14); and it was this cleansing of the
conscience that gave you peace. It was not that you ceased to be a sinner, or lost the consciousness
of being one, but you had found something which pacified your conscience in a righteous
way, and made you feel towards the law and the Lawgiver just as if you had never been
guilty.
It is by keeping constantly before your eyes this blood of propitiation that you will keep
your conscience clean and your soul at peace. It is this blood alone that can wipe off the
continual sins that are coming across your conscience, and which, if not wiped off immediately,
will effectually stain it, and cloud your peace. You know how the steel of the finest
sword may be rusted by a drop of water. Yet if the water is not allowed to remain, but is
wiped away as soon as it falls, it harms not the steel, and no rust ensues. If, however,
through neglect or otherwise, the water is allowed to remain, rust will follow, destroying
both the edge and brightness of the weapon. So it is with sin. The moment it falls upon
the conscience, the blood must be applied; else dimness and doubting will be the
consequence. Remember it is the blood, the blood alone; that can remove
these.
If, when you sin, you do not go at once to this and be washed and pardoned, but betake
yourself to anything else first, you will only make bad worse. If you shrink from going directly
to Christ and His blood; if you try to slip gradually near in some roundabout way, as if
you hoped, by the time you reach the fountain, to get quit of part of the sin, so as not
to be quite so bad as at the moment when you committed it, you will not cleanse the
conscience, but leave the burden and the stain just where they were. If you say, 'But I am
so ruffled with the sin, so cast down and ashamed at the thought of what I have done, that
I dare not go at once to the blood; I must pray or read myself into a better frame,
and then I will go and be washed'; you are denying God's method of purging the
conscience; you are undervaluing the blood; you are reverting to your old ways of
self-righteousness; and you are preventing the restoration of lost peace; for you are
putting something between your conscience and the blood.
Keep, then, the conscience clean by continual application to the blood; and you will find
that this, instead of encouraging you to sin, will make you more ashamed and afraid of it,
than if you had got quit of it in some self-righteous way of your own. What more likely to
make you fear and hate it than being compelled to go with it constantly to God, and deal
with Him directly about its pardon?
Cultivate a tender conscience; but beware of a diseased and morbid
one. The former takes an honest, straightforward view of truth or duty, and acts
accordingly. The latter, overlooking what is broad and great, is always on the hunt for
trifles, quibbling and questioning about things of no importance. Thus a stiff
Christianity is produced, an artificial religion, very unlike the erect but easy walk of
one who possesses the liberty of Christ. Be natural, be simple, be easy in word and
manner, lest you seem as one acting a part. Cherish a free spirit, a large heart, and a
clear conscience, like the apostle, who, though he pitied the 'weaker brethren' (1 Cor
8:9-13), refused to allow his liberty in Christ to be narrowed by another man's morbid
conscience. Certainly beware of little sins; but be sure that they are sins. Omit
no little duties; but see that they are duties. A tender and tranquil conscience
does not make a man crotchety or troublesome, far less morose and supercilious; it makes
him frank, cheerful, brotherly, and obliging, in the family, in the shop, in the
congregation, in the market-place, whether he be poor or rich; so that others cannot help
seeing how pleasantly he goes out and comes in, 'eating his meat with gladness and
singleness of heart' (Acts 2:46), and so 'adorning the doctrine of God his Saviour in all
things' (Titus 2:10).
Intimacy with God is the very essence of religion, and the foundation of discipleship.
It is in intercourse with Father, Son, and Spirit that the most real parts of our lives
are lived; and all parts that are not lived in fellowship with Him, 'in whom we live, and
move, and have our being,' are unreal, untrue, unsuccessful, and unsatisfying. The
understanding of doctrine is one thing, and intimacy with God is another. They ought
always to go together; but they are often seen asunder; and, when there is the former
without the latter, there is a hard, proud, hollow religion. Get your teaching from God
(Job 36:22; Jer 23:30); take your doctrine from His lips; learn truth upon your knees.
Beware of opinions and speculations: they become idols, and nourish pride of intellect;
they furnish no food to the soul; they make you sapless and heartless; they are like
winter frostwork on your windowpane, shutting out the warm sun.
Let God be your companion, your bosom-friend, your instructor, your counselor. Take Him
into the closet with you, into the study, into the shop, into the marketplace, into the
railway carriage, into the boat. When you make a feast and call guests, invite Him as one
of them. He is always willing to come; and there is no company like His. When you are in
perplexity, and are taking advice from friends, let Him be one of your 'friends in
counsel.' When you feel lonely, make Him the 'companion of your solitude.' And if you are
known to be one given to the divine companionship, you will be saved from much idle and
wasteful society and conversation. You will not feel at home with worldly men, nor they
with you. You will not choose the half-and-half Christian, or the formalist, or the
servant of two masters, for your friend; nor will any of these seek your fellowship. When
thrown into worldly society, from your business or your relationships, as you may
sometimes be, do not cease to be the Christian; nor try to make excuses for the
worldliness of those with whom you are obliged to associate; for that is just making
excuses for yourself in associating with them. Do not try to make yourself or them believe
that they are religious when they are not; but show them whose disciples you are; not
necessarily in words, but by a line of conduct more expressive and efficacious than words.
Do not conform to the world in order to please men or to save yourself from their taunt or
jest. Be not afraid to ask a blessing at meals, or to have family worship, or to enter
into religious conversation, because a worldly man is present. Keep constant company with
the great God of heaven and earth; and let every other companionship be regulated by His.
Go where you please, if you can take Him with you; go nowhere if He cannot be admitted, or
if you are obliged for the time to conceal or disguise your divine discipleship. When
Joseph went down to Egypt, he took the young child with him (Matt 2:21); so, wherever you
go, take the young child with you.
Beware of declension in prayer. --Whenever you feel the closet becoming a dull
place, you may be sure something is wrong. Backsliding has begun. Go straight to God that
He may 'heal it' (Hosea 14:4). Do not trifle with it; nor resort to other expedients to
relieve the dullness, such as shortening the time, or getting some lively religious books
to take off the weariness; go at once to the Great Quickener with the cry, 'Quicken us,
and we will call on Thy name' (Psa 80:18). Beware of going through prayer in a careless or
perfunctory way, like a hireling doing his work in order to get done with it. 'Pray in the
Holy Ghost' (Jude 20). 'Pray without ceasing.' Pray with honest fervour and simple faith,
as men who really want what they ask for, and expect to get it all. Few things tend more
to deaden the soul, to harden the heart, to drive out spirituality, than cold, formal
prayer. It will eat as doth a canker. Dread it and shun it. Do not mock God by asking what
you don't want, or by pretending to desire what you don't care for. 'The end of all things
is at hand; be ye therefore sober, and watch unto prayer' (1 Peter 4:7).
Be much alone with God. Do not put Him off with a quarter of an hour morning and evening.
Take time to get thoroughly acquainted. Converse over everything with Him. Unbosom
yourself wholly--every thought, feeling, wish, plan, doubt--to Him. He wants converse with
His creatures; shall His creatures not want converse with Him? He wants, not merely to be
on 'good terms' with you, if one may use man's phrase, but to be intimate; shall
you decline the intimacy, and be satisfied with mere acquaintance? What! intimate with the
world, with friends, with neighbours, with politicians, with philosophers, with
naturalists, or with poets; but not with God! That would look ill indeed. Folly, to prefer
the clay to the potter, the marble to the sculptor, this little earth and its lesser
creatures to the mighty Maker of the universe, the great 'All and in all!'
Do not shrink from being alone. Much of a true man's true life must be so spent. David
Brainerd thus writes:--'My state of solitude does not make the hours hang heavy upon my
hands. Oh, what reason of thankfulness have I on account of this retirement! I find that I
do not, and it seems I cannot, lead a Christian life when I am abroad, and cannot spend
time in devotion, in conversation, and serious meditation, as I should do. These weeks
that I am obliged now to be from home, in order to learn the Indian tongue, are mostly
spent in perplexity and barrenness, without much relish of divine things; and I feel
myself a stranger at the throne of grace for want of a more frequent and continued
retirement.' Do not suppose that such retirement for divine converse will hinder work. It
will greatly help it. Much private fellowship with God will give you sevenfold success.
Pray much if you would work much; and if you want to work more, pray more. Luther used to
say, when an unusual press of business came upon him, 'I must pray more today.' Be
like him in the day of work or trial. Do not think that mere working will keep you
right or set you right. The watch won't go till the spring is mended. Work will do
nothing for you till you have gone to God for a working heart. Trying to work
yourself into a better frame of feeling is not only hopeless, but injurious. You say, I
want to feel more and to love more. It is well. But you can't work yourself into these. I
do not say to any one who feels his coldness, 'Go and work.' Work, if done
heartlessly, will only make you colder. You must go straight to Jesus with that cold
heart, and warm it at His cross; then work will be at once a necessity, a delight, and a
success.
Beware, not merely of falling, but of stumbling. 'Walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as
wise'; like men in an enemy's country, or like travellers climbing a hill, slippery with
ice, and terrible with precipices, where every step may be a fall, and every fall a plunge
into a chasm. Beware of little slips, slight inconsistencies, as they are called; they are
the beginning of all backsliding, and they are in themselves evil, as well as hateful to
God. Keep your garments undefiled (Rev 3:4); beware of small spots as well as larger
stains or rents; and the moment you discover any speck, however small, go wash in the
fountain, that your 'garments may be always white,' and so pleasing in the eyes of Him,
whose you are, and whom you serve. 'Crucify the flesh, with its affections and lusts' (Gal
5:24). 'Mortify your members which are upon the earth' (Col 3:5).
Remember the Lord's words to His Church, 'Thou hast a few names, even in Sardis, which
have not defiled their garments, and they shall walk with me in white, for they are
worthy.' Stand aloof from the world's gaiety, and be jealous of what are called 'harmless
amusements.' I do not condemn all amusements, but I ask that they should be useful
and profitable, not merely harmless. Dancing and card playing are the world's devices
for killing time. They are bits of the world and the world's ways which will ensnare your
feet and lead you away from the cross. Let them alone. Keep away from the ballroom, the
opera, the oratorio, the theatre. Dress, finery, and display, are deadly snares. Put away
levity and frivolity; all silly conversation, or gossip; remembering the apostle's words,
'Neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting which are not convenient'
(Eph 5:4); and, 'Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is
good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace to the hearers; and grieve not the
Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption' (Eph 4:29,30).
'Flee youthful lusts,' if you be young men or women; flee all lusts, whether
you be young or old. Shun light company, and take no pleasure in the conversation of 'vain
persons.' 'Abstain from all appearance of evil.' Be thou a Christian in little things as
well as great. Dread little sins, little errors, little omissions of duty. Beware of false
steps; and if betrayed into one, retrace it soon as discovered. If persevered in, the
consequences may be months of sorrow.
That cherished sin, 'twill cost thee dear.
Remember, as a French writer remarks, that, sooner or later, 'every crown of flowers
becomes a crown of thorns.'
Redeem the time: much of your progress depends on this. Be men of 'method and
punctuality'; waste no moments; have always something to do, and do it; use up the little
spaces of life, the little intervals between engagements. I knew a friend who, one winter,
read through some five or six octavo volumes, by making use of the brief interval between
family worship and breakfast. Pack up your life well; your trunk will contain twice as
much if well packed; attend, then, to the packing of each day and hour. You may save years
by this. How many have 'slipped' and 'fallen' through idleness! How many begin a
score of things and end nothing, 'dawdle' away their morning or their evening hours, sleep
longer than is needful, trifle through their duties, hurrying about from work to work, or
from book to book, or from meeting to meeting, instead of being calm, methodical,
energetic! Thus life is loitered away, and each sun sets upon twelve wasted hours, and an
uneasy, dissatisfied conscience. Be punctual and regular in all duties and
engagements. Keep no man waiting. Be honest as to time, both with yourselves and others,
lest you get into a state of chronic flurry and excitement; so destructive of peace and
progress; so grieving to the Spirit, whose very nature is calmness and rest.
These may seem small things, but they are the roots of great. Resist beginnings. 'Seize
time by the forelock.' Live while you live. Watch your steps; count your minutes; live as
men who are pressing on to a kingdom, and who fear, not only open apostasy, but the
smallest measure of coming short, the slightest stain upon the garment of a saint, the
faintest slur upon the name of a disciple (Heb 4:1; Jude 23).
Watch against special sins; or things that have 'the appearance of evil'; or things that
lead into evil, and discredit 'that worthy name by which you are called' (1 Thess 5:22;
James 2:7). If you have a bad temper, watch against that. If you have a rude way of
speech, a cold, distant, repulsive manner, or are ill to please, look well to these, and
'be courteous' (1 Peter 3:8). If you are covetous in disposition, or shabby in your
dwellings, or niggardly in your givings, take care; 'the love of money is the root of all
evil.' If you are slovenly in your dress, or untidy in your person, or unpolite in your
demeanour, set yourself to rectify these blemishes. If you are lazy, luxurious, given to
the good things of this life, or selfish, disobliging, unneighbourly, rude, blunt,
unbrotherly, look to your Pattern, and see if these things were in Him. If you are fickle,
and frivolous, and flippant, greedy of jokes, carried away with immoderate laughter, be
upon your guard. If you are romantic and sentimental, take care lest the indulgence of
such a temperament should land you in peevishness, self pity, and a cowardly avoidance of
the common duties of life. If you are censorious, captious, fault finding, proud,
domineering, supercilious, and sulky, get the unclean spirit cast out forthwith. If you be
a gossip, or a gadabout, or a busybody in other men's matters, take care, for at such
crevices Satan creeps in. If you be secretive and cunning, with a certain littleness or
slyness in your nature, which never lets you forget your own interests, beware! Christ was
not such; Paul was not such. Be frank, open, manly. Remember the summing up of David's
picture of the blessed man, 'in whose spirit there is no guile' (Psa 32:2). Be not
'Jacob,' a man of guile; but Israel, a noble prince--'an Israelite indeed,
in whom is no guile' (John 1:48).
Walk 'straight up,' along the path of life, like a forgiven man, with God at your side
(Gen 5:24, 6:9), and with the joy of the Lord for your strength (Neh 8:9; Eccl 9:7); doing
heartily your daily work, whether sacred or common, with an unshaded brow and an earnest
but cheerful face. In short, watch against your old self at every point.
Do not evade these remarks by saying that some of the things spoken of are trifles, and
beneath notice. Nothing should be too small for a Christian to notice, either of right or
wrong. Remember the Master's words about denying self--every part of self; be not a
servant of self, or a worshipper of self, or a 'lover of self' (2 Tim 3:1,2) in any form.
Take up your cross, and follow your Lord (Matt 16:24); as it is written, 'Even Christ
pleased not Himself' (Rom 15:3).
God's aim in all His doings of grace is to 'hide pride from man'; to hinder boasting; to
keep the sinner humble. All that the old Christian can say is, 'By the grace of God I am
what I am'; and the youngest has no other confidence or boast. All 'confidence in the
flesh' (Phil 3:1,3), all trust in self, all reliance on the creature, are set aside by
that great work of the Divine Substitute, who did all for us, and left us nothing to do,
out of which it would be possible to extract a boast (2 Cor 12:9; Gal 6:14; Isa 41:16;
45:25).
The sinner's first act of believing is his consenting to be treated as a sinner, and
simply as such; indebted for nothing to himself, in any shape or in any sense, but wholly
to God and to His free love, in Christ Jesus our Lord. This was the laying down of all
pride and boastfulness. Then he knew the meaning of the words, 'Glory ye in His holy name'
(1 Chron 16:10); for the name in which he then began to glory was the name revealed in
Exodus (Exo 34:6); the name that assured him of the love of that God with whom he
had to do.
Self was set aside, and Christ came in, to do and to be all that self had hitherto been
supposed to be and to do. What things before were gain to us, these we then counted
loss for Christ; and we ceased for ever to glory in the flesh, or to be debtors to
anything but the blood and righteousness of the Son of God. We learned to say, 'God forbid
that we should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ' (Gal 6:14).
We ceased to work for salvation, for we had got it without working; and we had got it, not
in order that we might indulge in sin because grace abounded, but in order that, having
our legal bonds all loosed and our prison opened, we might henceforth serve God with our
whole heart and soul. We thus became debtors, 'not to the flesh, to live after the
flesh' (Rom 8:12);--for the flesh had done nothing for us, and we owed it nothing;-- but
debtors to God and to His love: not to self or the old man, for these had brought
us only sin and evil; but to Jesus Christ and His precious blood: not to law, for it only
condemned us, and held us in bondage; but to that 'free Spirit' (Psa 51:12), that 'good
Spirit' (Neh 9:20), that 'Spirit of life which makes us free from the law of sin and
death' (Rom 8:2). Thus everything that could cause pride was swept away at the outset; and
that not by law, but by the very necessity of the case, by the very nature of that
salvation which was brought to us; not through anything which we either could or could not
do, but through the love, and work, and blood of another. Let us fling away
self-esteem and high-mindedness, for it is the very essence of unbelief, as the prophet
told Israel, 'Hear ye, and give ear; be not proud, for the Lord hath spoken' (Jer
13:15). Be meek, be poor in spirit, be humble; be teachable, be gentle, and easy to be
entreated; putting away all high thoughts and lofty imaginations, either about what we are
or what we can do; content to take the obscurest corner and the lowest seat; and this, not
to indulge in a false lowliness, or in 'the pride that apes humility,' feeding our vanity
with the thought that we are martyrs, and puffing up our fleshly mind with the idea of our
wonderful condescension, or by brooding over our supposed wrongs and trials. Let us be
truly humble, as was the Son of God: content to live unknown, and to do our work
unnoticed, as a work not for the eye of man, but of God.
Put away all envy, and jealousy of others, as well as all malice and evil-speaking (Eph
4:31). Love to hear of a brother's prosperity. Don't grudge him a few words of honest
praise; nor try maliciously to turn the edge of it, by an envious 'but,' or a grave
silence, or a wise shake of the head; unless you have very special reasons for disallowing
the eulogy. Remember that Solomon's 'wicked man' is one that 'winketh with his eyes, and
speaketh with his feet, and teacheth with his fingers' (Prov 6:13; 10:10). Have a care of
detraction and backbiting; speak of a person's faults only to himself and to God. Be not
censorious or uncharitable, in thought or word.. Inconsistent Christians are often more
censorious than the world; for they need to apologize to themselves for their
inconsistencies by detracting from the excellencies of those who are more consistent than
themselves, and by trying to believe that good men are no better than others.
Some love to speak; and show their pride in this way, both in private and in public. If
you are young, and newly led out of your former ignorance, beware of this snare. Remember
Paul's advice--'Not a novice [that is, one newly converted], lest being lifted up with
pride, he fall into condemnation and the snare of the devil' (1 Tim 3:6). If you have
gifts, use them quietly and modestly, not ostentatiously. Do not be forward to tell your
experience, or give your opinion, or to take rank above your seniors. Do not think that
all zeal or wisdom is confined to you and a few about you. Do not condemn others because
they don't go quite along with you in all things; nor speak of them as cold, and dead, and
unspiritual. Do not think that no one cares for souls but yourselves; that no one can
state the gospel or pray like you; or that God is not likely to bless any one so much as
you. Be lowly; and show this, not by always speaking evil of yourselves to others, or by
using the conceited phrase 'in my humble opinion' (as some do in order to show their
humility), but by not speaking of yourselves at all. Keep self in the background,
and don't say or do anything that looks like baiting your hook for a little praise.
Some love to rule and manage. So did Diotrephes (3 John 9). They are not happy,
unless they are at the head of everything--the originators of all plans, the presidents of
societies, the speakers at meetings. Beware of this love of pre-eminence, as ruinous to
your own soul and injurious to the Church of God. If God puts work into your hands, do it;
and do it faithfully, through good report or bad report. Bear to be contradicted and
spoken against. Do not fret when things go wrong with you or your schemes; nor get
'petted' like a spoilt child when you don't get your own way; nor fling up everything in
disgust when you happen to be thwarted. Do not take yourself for Solomon, or suppose that
wisdom will die with you (Job 12:2). If called to preside or manage, do it; and do it with
energy and authority, as one who has a trust to fulfil. 'But mind not high things' (Rom
12:16); 'Seek not great things for thyself' (Jer 45:5); 'He that is greatest among you,
let him be as the younger; and he that is chief, as he that doth serve' (Luke 22:26); 'All
of you be subject one to another' (I Peter 5:5); 'In honour preferring one another' (Rom
12:10).
Yet be discriminating. Do not call error truth for the sake of charity. Do not
praise earnest men merely because they are earnest. To be earnest in truth is one thing;
to be earnest in error is another. The first is blessed, not so much because of the
earnestness, but because of the truth; the second is hateful to God, and ought to be
shunned by you. Remember how the Lord Jesus from heaven spoke concerning error: 'which
thing I hate' (Rev 2:6-15; 1 Tim 6:4,5). True spiritual discernment is much
lost sight of as a real Christian grace; discernment between the evil and the good, the
false and the true. 'Beloved, believe not every spirit; but try the spirits whether they
are of God; because many false prophets are gone out into the world' (1 John 4:1). This
'discernment,' which belongs to every one who is taught of God, is the very opposite of
that which is called in our day by the boastful name of 'liberality.' Spiritual
discernment and 'liberal thought' have little in common with each other. 'Abhor that which
is evil, cleave to that which is good' (Rom 12:9). The 'liberality which puts bitter for
sweet, and sweet for bitter' (Isa 5:20), is a very different thing from the 'charity which
thinketh no evil' (1 Cor 13:5). Truth is a mighty thing in the eyes of God, whatever it
may be in those of men. All error is, more or less, whether directly or indirectly, a
misrepresentation of God's character, and a subversion of His revelation (Rev 22:18,19).
He is above all others your enemy; he, the 'old serpent,' the 'dragon,' the 'liar and
murderer' from the beginning. It is with him that you are to fight. 'For we wrestle not
against flesh and blood [that is, earthly foes, men like ourselves], but against
principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against
spiritual wickedness in high places' (Eph 6:12). The world tries to bewitch and beguile
us; but it is the 'god of this world,' the 'prince of this world,' the 'prince of the
power of the air,' that so especially lays snares for us, making use of the world's
beauty, and pleasure, and vanity for leading us captive at his will. 'O how [as one has
written] are thou entrenched, O Satan--how art thou entrenched in thy beautiful
deceptions; thou hast played thy part well in these last days; thou art all but the Holy
One, thou consummate deceiver!' It is this that gives to the ballroom, and the dance, and
the theatre, and the voluptuous music their special power to harm; for these are Satan's
baits and nets, by means of which he allures the unwary, and leads back the believer to
unbelieving ground, disarming our watchfulness, dazzling our vision, reviving our
worldliness, and perhaps, for a season, lulling us wholly asleep. We know that through his
successful wiles, perilous times are to come, when many, while lovers of self, traitors,
heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasure, are still to have the 'form of godliness' (2 Tim
3:1-4); and we know that the last days are to be like the days of Noah and Lot (Luke
17:26-32), days of revelling, and banqueting, and luxury. Let us be wary, lest, standing
as we do on the edge of these days, we be drawn away into the sins of an age led captive
by Satan at his will.
Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Fight the good fight of faith against him and
his hosts. Watch unto prayer. 'Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary, the devil,
as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour' (1 Peter 5:8). In these last
days he will lay his snares more cunningly than ever, to deceive, if it were possible, the
very elect. He is coming down, having great wrath, because he knoweth he hath but a short
time (Rev 12:12).
There are few things more dangerous or more likely to lead into open error. Take care, for
instance, of misunderstanding what the Scripture says about the old man and the new man,
the flesh and the spirit, and so making void your own personal responsibility for all you
say and do, and also setting aside the necessity for the blood of Christ, as daily needed
for our whole person, and the power of the Spirit, as needed constantly for our whole
being, as long as we live.
Our Lord and His apostles use many figures to show the greatness of the change produced by
being begotten again. They speak of this change as being an actual indwelling of Christ
Himself personally. 'Christ in you, the hope of glory' (Col 1:27); 'Christ liveth in me'
(Gal 2:20); that 'Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith' (Eph 3:17). But this living
and indwelling of Christ does not make us the same as Christ, or Christ the same as we;
nor does it make the blood and the Spirit less necessary. It does not make Christ
responsible for our sins, nor does it make us sinless. It does not lead us to say: You
need not care what you do, for Christ dwells in you, and all you do is His doing.
Again, on the other hand, Scripture speaks of our 'being in Christ' (2 Cor 5:17; 1 Cor
1:30). But our being in Christ does not mean that we (that is, our whole man, body, soul,
and spirit) are actually put into Christ as water is put into a vessel. This would destroy
the sense; and besides, it would either make us sinless, or it would make Christ the
author of our sins, and the doer of all that we do. These figures do mean that there is
such a wonderful nearness between Christ and us, such a living connection, that we receive
His power and fulness; but they do not mean that we and Christ are no longer two persons,
but one,--no longer two bodies, but one--no longer two souls, but one.
Again, in the Old Testament the Holy Spirit says, 'A new heart also will I give you, and a
new spirit will I put within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh,
and I will give you a heart of flesh' (Ezek 36:26). This does not mean that an actual
stone, whether of granite or marble, is taken out of us, and an actual piece of flesh
(created in heaven) is inserted instead. Nor does it mean that the whole of our old
nature is at once taken out of us, leaving no part behind, and that a complete new nature
is substituted, so that there shall be absolutely nothing in us but what is perfect and
divine. If this be the meaning of the figure, then every conversion must be the passing
into instantaneous perfection, no fragment of the old nature being left behind, and no
feature of the new nature being left unperfected or undeveloped. Thus there could be no
conflict, no difficulty, no declension, no possibility of backsliding. The change
thus figured to us is certainly a very great one, but it cannot mean the changing of one
person into another, nor the transformation of a man into an angel.
Again, our Lord says to Nicodemus, 'Except a man be born again, he cannot see the
kingdom of God' (John 3:3). Nicodemus took Him literally, and so destroyed the whole
meaning of this divine symbol. Those in our day who maintain that actually and literally a
new created thing is dropped into us at conversion, which they call the new man, are
saying exactly what Nicodemus said, 'Can a man enter the second time into his mother's
womb and be born?' The new birth does not mean a new person. Christ did not mean
that Nicodemus was no longer to be Nicodemus, or that Peter was no longer to be Peter,
after conversion; but that such a spiritual work was to take place as to change their
whole spiritual nature and character, while leaving them still Nicodemus and Peter, with
all their original and proper personalities and humanities. Our Lord does not say, Except a
part of a man is born again; but, Except a man is born again. The change may
not be perfect at first, but it affects the whole man: so that he cannot say of himself, A
part of me is born again, and a part of me is not born again; but, I am born again.
Connected with this there are the statements regarding the new creature: 'If any man be in
Christ, he is a new creature' (or, 'there is a new creation'): 'old things are passed
away; behold, all things are become new' (2 Cor 5:17). It is not that a new creature has
been put into a man, like new wine into old vessels; but the whole man is the new
creature, and is regarded as such by God from the day of his being born again. That
the transformation is perfect and complete from the outset, the figure does not
imply; that it will one day be all that is thus symbolized, it assures us beyond a doubt.
So with regard to the flesh and the spirit, the old man and the new. The flesh is the man
(call him Peter or Paul), with the remnants of his former self about him; the spirit
is the same man (it may be Peter or Paul), with the new life unfolding itself within him.
The figure names two men, the old and the new; but we are not, like
Nicodemus, to take the words in a carnal or ultraliteral sense; for, after all, the man
is but one all the while.
For thus the apostle speaks: 'I am dead to the law, that I might live unto
God. I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I but
Christ liveth in me' (Gal 2:19,20). He does not say here, My old man is dead, but, I
myself am dead; not, My old man is crucified, but, I myself am crucified; and this same
person (I myself) who is dead and crucified still liveth. He does not say, one section of
me is dead, and another is living; but, I myself am dead, and I myself am living: I, the
same person, am both a dead and a living man. This is the real sense of the figure. This
conflict, not between two persons, but between two parts (or conditions) of one person, is
that which the apostle brings out in the 7th of the Romans: 'I was alive...I died...I am
carnal, sold under sin...That which I do I allow not...what I would, that do I not...what
I hate, that do I...In me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing...to will is
present with me; how to perform I find not...The good that I would I do not: the evil
which I would not, that I do...It is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in
me...When I would do good, evil is present with me...I delight in the law of God after the
inward man: but I see another law in my members...Who shall deliver me from the body of
this death?' It is Paul himself, speaking for himself, speaking as one delighting in the
law of God, that utters these strange things, these seeming contradictions. It is not a
perfect part of Paul fighting against an imperfect part of Paul; but it is Paul himself
fighting against Paul himself. The one Paul, the one person, has two conflicting elements
within him, each striving for the mastery. 'The inward man,' says he, 'is renewed day by
day' (2 Cor 4:16). This process of daily renewal is that which goes on within him. The
light and the darkness struggle together, but the light conquers, and shines more and more
unto the perfect day.
Beware specially of this one-sidedness in everything connected with Christ Himself. Faith
connects us with the Person of Christ in all its parts and aspects. It connects us with
the whole work of Christ from the cradle to the throne, from Bethlehem to the
heaven of heavens. It connects us with His birth, His life, His death, His burial, His
resurrection, His ascension and glory. Out of all these it draws life and strength. Life
in a crucified Christ, life in a risen Christ, life in a glorified Christ,-- this is the
heritage of faith. Out of death, the death of that cross where He was crucified through
weakness, come life and power to us; and down from the throne on which He now sits, the
possessor and dispenser of that Spirit of promise, these same blessings come. In the cross
is power. In the resurrection is power. In the throne of that glory there is power. It is
as the glorified Christ (John 7:39) that He has received for us the Spirit with all
His gifts (Psa 68:18; Eph 4:7-13). It is with the glorified Christ that we are
linked by faith, for blessing, for power, for life, for consolation. 'Because I live, ye
shall live also.'
You were neither born nor reborn for yourselves alone. You may not be able to do much, but
do something; work while it is day. You may not be able to give much, but give something;
according to your ability, remembering that the Lord loveth a cheerful giver. Take heed,
and beware of covetousness; for the love of money is the root of all evil. Whenever
worldliness comes in, in any shape, whether it be love of money or love of pleasure, you
cease to be faithful to Christ, and are trying to serve both God and mammon.
Do something, then, for God, while time lasts. It may not be long; for the day goeth away,
and the shadows of evening are stretched out. Do something every day. Work, and throw your
heart into the work. Work joyfully and with a right good will, as men who love both their
work and their master. Be not weary in well-doing. Work, and work in faith. Work in love,
and patience, and hope. Don't shrink from hard labour or disagreeable duties, or a post
trying to flesh and blood. 'Endure hardness, as a good soldier in Jesus Christ' (2 Tim
2:3). Be steadfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord (1 Cor 15:58).
Don't fold your hands, or lay aside your staff, or sheathe your sword. Don't give way to
slothfulness and flesh-pleasing, saying to yourselves, 'I can get to heaven without
working.'
Your gifts may be small, your time not much, your opportunities few; but work, and do it
quietly, without bustle, or self-importance, not as pleasing men, but God; not seeking the
honour that cometh from men, but that which cometh from God. The day of honour is coming,
and the Master's 'Well done' will make up for all hardship and labour here. When the Son
of man shall come in His glory, with all His holy angels, and when He shall sit upon the
throne of His glory, it will be blessed to be set upon His right hand, and acknowledged as
those who have fed Him, and clothed and visited Him in prison; and it would be a bitter
thing, indeed, to be 'saved so as by fire,' namely: barely saved, and no more; saved (if
such a thing can be thought of) without doing anything for Him that saved us; having given
Him no water when He was thirsty, no food when He was hungry, no clothes when He was
naked, and when in prison having never once come nigh Him.
He that loves Christ will long to see Him, and will not be content with the interviews
which faith gives. The lover seeks the absent loved one, the wife the husband, the child
the mother; so do you your Lord. It is not enough that you can communicate with Him daily
by the epistles which faith brings and carries; you must see Him face to face, otherwise
there is a blank in your life, a void in your existence, a cloud over your love, and a
faltering in your song. The saved one desires to meet his Saviour, and feels that his joy
must be imperfect till then. It is the mark of a disciple that he 'waits for the Son of
God from heaven' (1 Thess 1:10); that he loves, looks for, longs for the appearance of
Christ. Let this mark be seen on you; and be like the Corinthian saints, of whom it was
told by their apostle, 'Ye come behind in no gift, waiting for the coming of our Lord
Jesus Christ' (1 Cor 1:7). 'Gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end
for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ' (1 Peter
1:13).
'I am the Lord your God,' was God's greeting of love to Israel (Lev 11:44); it is no less
now His salutation of grace to every one who has believed on the name of His Son, Christ
Jesus. God becomes our God the moment that we receive His testimony of His beloved Son.
This new relationship between God and us, in virtue of which He calls us His, and
we call Him ours, is the simple result of a believed gospel.
If any one reading these lines is led to ask, How may I become a son? We answer in the
words of truth, 'He that believeth that Jesus is the Christ, is born of God.' Nothing less
than believing can bring about this sonship; and nothing more is needed. The joy, and the
peace, and the love, and the warmth, these are the effects of faith, but they are
not faith; they are the fruits of a conscious sonship which has been formed by the belief
of the divine testimony to Jesus as the Son of God and the Saviour of the lost. 'As many
as received Him, to them gave He the right of being sons of God, even to them that
believed on His name' (John 1:12). God's simple message of grace contains peace for the
sinner; and the sinner extracts the peace therein contained, not by effort or feeling, but
by the simple belief of the true sayings of God. Good news makes glad by being believed,
and they refuse to yield up their precious treasure to anything but to simple faith.
Believe the tidings of peace from God, and the peace is all your own.
It is not to him that worketh, or feeleth, or loveth, but to him that believeth that God
says, 'I am the Lord your God.' And when God used the word believing, He just meant
what He said, and intended nothing else than what man means by that word. Had He meant
anything else, He would have told us, and not suffered us to be misled or deceived by our
misunderstanding of a word of which the Bible is full. Had He meant working, or feeling,
or loving, He would have said so, and not allowed us to suppose that believing was really
all. What a book of deception and mystery the Bible would be, if 'believing' does not mean
'believing,' but something less or something more! To make it something less, would be to
take from God's word as truly as if we had struck out a book from the Bible. To make it
something more, would be to add to God's word, as truly and as sinfully as if we had
forged another Gospel or another Epistle, or accepted the Apocrypha as part of the
inspired record. We make God a liar when we refuse to take Him at His word, or give Him
credit for speaking that simple truth, in believing which we are saved; but let us
remember the other side of his statement, namely, our being found liars by reason of our
adding to His word. 'Every word of God is pure' (Prov 30:5); can we make it purer, or more
transparent, or more simple? We add to it, lest it should be too simple, too childlike,
too blessed; we put something of our own into it to make it more substantial and
complete; and that something (call it feeling, or realizing, or loving) destroys the
divine simplicity and transparency of faith. Add thou not unto His words, lest He
reprove thee, and thou be found a liar (Prov 30:6). Does casting dust upon the sunbeam
improve its quality or make it more like the sun from which it came? Would pouring filth
into a cup of pure spring water make it more lucid and refreshing? Whatever we add to believing,
tends to destroy its real nature and to mar its effects. If God had said that we are
to be saved by believing that the deluge overflowed the earth, and that the sun once stood
still in the heavens, we should have understood what He meant by the word. And is there
any more difficulty in understanding Him when He says, 'He that believeth is
justified from all things'? Does believing mean one thing in Genesis and another in
Romans? Does it mean one thing to Abraham and another to us? Does it mean one thing today
and another tomorrow? Or is not the formula of salvation, 'Believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ, and thou shalt be saved,' meant to be the simplest and most intelligible of all
declarations ever made to man?
We believe the Holy Spirit's testimony, that Jesus died and rose again, 'the Just for the
unjust.' That saves. We believe the divine promise annexed to this testimony, that life is
the possession of every man who believeth this heavenly testimony; and this belief of
the promise (which some call appropriation) assures us, on God's word, that
life is ours personally. We do not get life by believing that life is ours; nor do we get
Christ by believing that Christ is ours. This is as absurd as the idea of getting our
debts paid by believing that they are paid. But we get life and Christ by believing God's
glad tidings concerning Jesus and His finished work upon the cross. There is enough in
Christ to pay every man's debt; but no man's debt is actually paid until he has taken God
at His word, and believed the record which God has given of His Son.
It is the blood that pacifies my conscience. The sight of it is all I need to remove fear
and impart confidence. It is not my 'seeing that I see it' that gives me boldness, but my
direct and simple sight of it. My guilt passes away from me so soon as I believe; and I
don't need to wait till I believe in my own act of believing before becoming
conscious of this deliverance. The blood contains my pardon and my peace; and by looking
at it I extract the pardon and the peace. I don't need to look at my looking; I need only
to look at the blood. If I cannot extract from it pardon and peace, I never shall be able
to extract them from my own act of seeing. I am to believe in Jesus; not in my own faith,
nor in my own feelings. I am to look to the cross, not to my own convictions or
repentance. The well of peace is not within me; and to let down my bucket into my own
heart for the purpose of drawing up the water of peace, is mockery as well as foolishness.
I do not fill the cup of peace out of anything that is in myself. Christ has filled that
cup already,--long, long ago--and in love He presses it to my parched lips. Let me drink
at once of it, for all the peace of God, the peace of heaven is there.
When God said to Israel, 'I am the Lord your God,' He added this, 'Ye shall therefore sanctify
yourselves; and ye shall be holy, for I am holy' (Lev 11:44); and He added this
also, 'I am the Lord that bringeth you up out of the land of Egypt to be your God: ye
shall therefore be holy, for I am holy' (Lev 11:45).
God calls us to be holy. He becomes our God to make us like Himself. 'He
calls us to be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in
the world through lust.' He expects that we should represent Him among our fellow-men by
our resemblance to Himself.
The carrying out of this holiness is His own work,--the operation of His Spirit. Whether
our perfection in holiness is to be wrought gradually or instantaneously, is a question to
be determined solely by His word, and not by any theories of our own. That God could make
each soul perfect the moment he believes, we admit;--that He may have wise reasons for not
doing this, wise reasons for gradual growth, --will not be denied. He has given us
no instance in the Bible of any one made instantaneously sinless, either at his conversion
or during his after life. All the men of faith and holiness, the men 'full of the Holy
Ghost,' which He presents to us as our models, are imperfect men to the end of their days,
needing forgiveness and cleansing constantly. He glorifies Himself in our imperfect
bodies; in an imperfect Church, on an imperfect earth. His object here is to glorify
Himself in imperfection and growth, as He is hereafter to glorify Himself in
perfection and completeness of every kind. Gradual growth is the law of all things
here,--man, beasts, trees, and flowers,--so that unless we had some very notable example
in Scripture of a sinless man, or of miraculous and instantaneous perfection by an act of
faith, we are not disposed to accept the theory of instantaneous sinlessness, as that to
which we are called in believing; even though that be veled under the specious name of
'entire consecration,' or accompanied with the profession of personal unworthiness,--a
'personal unworthiness' which, however, does not seem to require any actual confession of
sin.
Yet God calls us to be holy. He expects us to grow in unlikeness to this world, and
in likeness to that world which is to come. He expects us to follow Him who did no sin,
even though the attainment of perfection should not be in a day or a year, but the growth
of a lifetime. It is for want of daily growth, not for want of complete and
constant sinlessness, that God so often challenges His own.
Let us grow. Let us bring forth fruit. Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not
provision for the flesh to fulfil the lusts thereof. What is the use of taking so long
to make us sinless?--some may say. I answer, Go and ask God. What was the use of taking
six days to bring creation to perfection? Why did He let sin enter our world when He could
have kept it out? What was the use of not making the whole Church perfect at once? Why did
He not make Abraham or David or Paul perfect at once? He could have done so. Why did He
not?
Let us study soberly and truly the word of God in regard to the past history of His
saints, lest it be said to some in our day who think themselves on a far 'higher
platform' than others,--more perfect than Paul or John,--'Nay but, O man, who art thou
that repliest against God? shall the thing formed say to Him that formed it, Why hast Thou
made me thus?' Let us grow. The impatience that demands instantaneous perfection is
unbelief, refusing to recognize God's spiritual laws in the new creation. The
gradual evolution of the heavenly life in a lifelong course of conflict and imperfection,
is the way in which sin is unfolded, the human heart exposed to view, the power of the
cross tested, the efficacy of the blood manifested, and the power as well as the love of
Father, Son, and Spirit magnified. God's purpose is not simply to reveal Himself, but to
reveal man,--not simply man dead in trespasses and sin, but man after he has been made
alive unto righteousness, to exhibit, step by step, and day by day, that most solemn and
humbling of all processes, namely, that by which 'the inward man is renewed day by day' (2
Cor 4:16): while the strength of the human will for evil is manifested, the awful tenacity
of sin shown forth, and the absolute hopelessness of any sinner's salvation demonstrated,
save by the omnipotence of God Himself.
Let us grow daily and hourly. Let us grow down; let us grow up. Let us strike our roots
deeper; let us spread out our branches more widely. Let us not only 'blossom and bud,' but
let us bring forth fruit, ripe and plentiful, on every bough. 'Herein is my Father
glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples' (John 15:8).
Many things can hinder growth and fruit-bearing. Mark the following:
Unbelief
'So we see they could not enter in because of unbelief' (Heb 3:19). This poisons the tree
at its very root. Christ can do no mighty works in us, or for us, because of unbelief
(Matt 13:58). 'Only believe' (Mark 5:36). 'Have faith in God' (Mark 11:22). 'He that
believeth' (Mark 9:23). 'He that believeth on me, out of his belly shall flow rivers of
living water' (John 7:38).
Want of love
No love, no fruit; much love, much fruit (Heb 10:24). 'Labour of love' means the labour
which love produces, to which love stimulates (1 Thess 1:3). Love is by its very nature fruit-bearing.
When 'love waxes cold' (Matt 24:12), when we 'leave our first love' (Rev 2:4), then
everything that deserves the name of fruit dies away. If there be fruit at all, it is poor
and unripe. Our zeal is the zeal of Jehu (2 Kings 10:16); our warmth is false fire; our
energy is the vigour of the flesh; our work is the work of men urged on by a false
stimulus; our words, however earnest, are the words of excited self. If any one
ask, How am I to get love? I answer, Look to Jesus, deal with Him about it, learn anew to
love by learning anew His love to you. I do not say, 'Work, and that will stimulate you to
love.' No. It is not first work, and then love; but first love, and then work. Get more
love by dealing more with Jesus personally, and then love will set you all on fire. You
will work unbidden; you will work in the liberty of fellowship and in the joy of love (1
Thess 3:12; Gal 5:6; 2 Cor 5:14).
Selfishness
Self in all its forms is a hindrance to our growth (Rom 14:7). Self-will,
self-sufficiency, self-indulgence, self-importance, self-glory, self-seeking,
self-brooding,--all these mar fruitfulness. Denying self is the beginning, the middle, and
the end of our course here, as followers of Christ. Selfishness takes the form of
covetousness, or love of money; of luxury, or love of meats and drinks, and the good
things of this life; of religious dissipation, or love of excitement; of spiritual
restlessness, or running from meeting to meeting, or book to book, or opinion to opinion,
or minister to minister; of craving for religious stimulants and spices, with loathing of
what is tame or common, however good and true. These are some of the forms of selfishness
which destroy both growth and fruitfulness. How can a man grow when he is pampering self
instead of crucifying the flesh; when he is indulging and fondling the old man instead of
nailing him to the cross; when he is enjoying all softness and ease and worldly comfort,
instead of enduring hardness, and taking up his cross and mortifying his members which are
upon the earth (Rom 8:13; Gal 5:24; Col 3:5)?
Covetousness
'The love of money is the root of all evil' (1 Tim 6:10). Few things are more hateful in a
Christian man than this; few things more completely destroy his influence; and few things
more sadly or more justly make him the scorn of the world than eagerness for money, or
niggardliness in parting with it. The covetous man cannot grow. He must ever remain a
stunted Christian. 'Filthy lucre' is poison to the soul. If we do not 'make friends of the
mammon of unrighteousness' by laying out our substance for God, it will become the blight
of spirituality, the destruction of our religious life (Prov 30:8; 1 Tim 6:6-10). Be
generous, be large-hearted, be open-handed, be loving, be free in giving, if you would
grow.
Pride
Self-satisfaction in any shape, or self-admiration of any kind, in regard to person, or
property, or accomplishments, or position; these are immensely hurtful to spiritual life.
True godliness prospers only in the lowly heart; the heart which, in proportion as it
becomes more and more satisfied with Christ, becomes more and more dissatisfied with
itself. If the Master was meek and lowly, shall the disciple be anything else?
Easy-mindedness
To take things easy is by some reckoned a great virtue; and not to get warm or excited or
zealous, is regarded as proof of a noble and well-balanced mind. We might admit this to be
the case, were it confined to worldly matters. To lose a fortune, and yet be calm, is
well. To endure provocation and be unruffled is also well. But to take religion easy is
not so to be commended. Easy-going religionists are strangers to the fervour of John or
Paul. To be contented while uncertain of our salvation is something very awful. To be
contented while making no progress, or perhaps going back, is nearly as awful. Easy-minded
religion is just the same as lifeless coldness, though perhaps not so repulsive to others.
The good natured formality of thousands is just the hateful lukewarmness of Laodicea.
But let these hints suffice. They will help a little, and guide a little, and teach a
little, and warn a little. In reading them, let there be much self-questioning and
self-applying. 'Is it I, Lord, is it I?'
A revival time is one of blessing, but it is one of peril. The running well and the
going back, the flocking to the cross and the turning away from it, the warm confession
and the subsequent silence,--these are things which have been witnessed in other times,
and may be witnessed again. Hence our anxiety to give all the guidance and the counsel
that we can. Let the young listen. Let them humble themselves to Christian counsel. Let
them take heed and watch narrowly their own footsteps.
But still we would not dishearten any. Be not discouraged, we say; but be of good cheer.
Faint not, though you may often be weary. Though we bid you count the cost, yet we say to
you, as God said to Israel, 'Behold, the Lord your God hath set the land before thee: go
up and possess it, as the Lord God of thy fathers hath said unto thee; fear not,
neither be discouraged' (Deut 1:21). We would not be of those to whom God spoke, and
said, 'Why discourage ye the hearts of the people?' (Num 32:7). We remember it is
said that 'the soul of the people was much discouraged because of the way' (Num 21:4); and
that this discouragement led to sin. We would not discourage the weakest; for we
call to mind Him who 'breaks not the bruised reed, nor quenches the smoking flax' (Isa
42:3); who 'gathers the lambs with His arms, who carries them in His bosom, and who gently
leads those that are with young' (Isa 40:11). We say to 'those who are of a fearful heart,
Be strong, fear not' (Isa 35:4); and we would 'strengthen the weak hands, and confirm the
feeble knees' (Isa 35:3). You say the 'fearful' are among those who are cast into the lake
of fire, and you fear you are one of them. Not so. The 'fearful' specified in the Book of
Revelation (Rev 21:8), are the cowards who have refused to confess to Christ, who
have turned their back on Christ; and they are very different from the 'fearful' spoken of
in Isaiah.
Be of good courage. You have God upon your side. You have Christ to fight for you. You
have the Holy Spirit to sustain and comfort you. You have more encouragements than
discouragements. You have the example of millions that have gone before you. You have
exceeding great and precious promises (2 Pet 1:4). You have many fellow-travellers and
fellow-soldiers on the right hand and on the left. You have a bright kingdom in view which
will compensate for all triaI and conflict here. And then, the way is short. The toil will
soon be over. The battle will not last for ever. Greater is He that is with you than all
that can be against you. Be strong in the Lord. Be strong in His love and in His power.
Take to you the whole armour of God (Eph 6:10,11).
Do you say that you are in Christ, and that you are abiding in Him? Then you ought
to walk as He walked. You are bound to follow His footsteps; and if you say that
you are not bound to do so, you set aside the divine teaching of the apostle here
given us.
The man who says, 'I am Christ's,' is under obligations to imitate Him. Duty and
love alike constrain him to do so; not duty without love, nor yet love without duty. Duty
without love would mean reluctance and compulsion; love without duty would mean love fixed
upon an unlawful object, whom it was not right to love. Duty and love going together mean
that our love is fixed upon a worthy and lawful object; in loving whom we are feeling
what is right, and in obeying whom we are doing what is right.
If I love that which it is not my duty to love, I sin. If I love that which it is my duty
to love, I am doing the right thing,--the thing which God delights in. If I honour my
parents, I do so for two reasons: (1) Because God has said, 'Honour thy father and thy
mother'; (2) Because I love them. The two things, the duty and the love, are in perfect
harmony with each other. It is a dutiful thing to love, and it is a loving thing to be
dutiful. Suppose you have a mother in Scotland and a father in India. You love both of
them as truly as a son can love. But the question may arise as to which of them you are to
visit or to stay with. Are you to remain in Scotland or go to India? Love cannot
determine this question, for you love both equally. How is it to be decided? By duty. You
ask, Is it my duty to go to my father, or to remain with my mother? If you decided
to leave your mother, from a sense of duty, would she doubt your love, and say, I want
none of your professions of it? And when you went to India, and told your father that it
was a sense of duty that brought you to him, would he scorn you, and say, I want none of
your duty, give me your love? Duty is a right and proper motive. It is again and
again referred to in Scripture, as the words 'ought,' 'are bound,' 'must,' 'debtor,'
'owe,' and the like abundantly show. 'He that saith he abideth in Him, ought himself so to
walk even as He walked' (1 John 2:6).
We read such passages as the following:--'Ye also ought to wash one another's feet'
(John 13:14); 'We have done that which was our duty to do' (Luke 17:10);--'We that are
strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak' (Rom 15:1);--'So ought men
to love their wives' (Eph 5:28);--'We are bound to thank God' (2 Thess 1:3);--'We
are bound to give thanks' (2 Thess 2:13);--'We ought to lay down our lives
for the brethren' (1 John 3:16);-- 'We ought to love one another' (1 John 4:11).
These are a few out of many passages in which duty is spoken of in very plain
terms. That duty and love should go together, is no proof that there is no such thing as duty,
or that a Christian should rise above it into the region of 'pure love,' as Romish
mystics have held. Duty means the thing that is due; are we not to do it
because it is due, because it is the right and proper thing? Let us
exercise our common sense, and understand the meaning of words, whether Greek or English,
before soaring into transcendental regions, into which neither prophets nor apostles have
gone before us.
There is a danger of running to excess in our day, of attempting the superfine in
religion; of soaring too high, of getting away from both Scripture and common sense; of
indulging in a sentimentalism, which looks very spiritual, but which, when
analysed, is simply absurdity, or, at best, a one-sided exaggeration of some isolated
truth. There is great danger, in a time of spiritual quickening, of being carried about
with diverse and strange doctrines. Let us cleave to the word. Only thus can we find
steadfastness and sobriety. Only by feeding on it, and being guided by it, can we maintain
a manly and healthy religion,--free from error, yet devoid of effeminacy, following out
the old paths of reformers, apostles, prophets, and patriarchs, unshaken by novelties, yet
unfettered by bigotry or self-will.
'He that is dead,' says the apostle, 'is freed from sin' (Rom 6:7); or more exactly, 'He
that has died is justified from sin.' Death was the penalty, and he who has paid the
penalty is legally justified. There is no further claim against him. We pay the penalty
when we take the death of the Substitute as ours, and God reckons the penalty paid when He
obtains our consent to the exchange. It is the thought of having paid the penalty that
pacifies the conscience; and it is the thought of God reckoning it paid that gives us
peace with Him. When we come to understand the meaning and value of the work upon the
cross; when we accept what God has declared concerning all who believe His testimony to
that work, the burden drops, and we enter into liberty.
With that liberty comes holiness. We seek henceforth conformity to Him who has set us
free, and who bids us follow Him in the path of conformity to the Father's will.
With that liberty comes love,--love to Him who hath brought our souls out of prison by
going into prison for us.
With that love comes zeal,--the zeal of Him who followed after His lost ones till He had
recovered them,--of Him it is said, 'The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up.'
With this love and zeal there comes self-denial, the self-denial of Him who 'pleased not
Himself,' who lived on earth solely for others; though rich, for our sakes becoming poor.
Of all this be it ever remembered, that the root is 'peace with God through our Lord Jesus
Christ'; and that this peace comes from the knowledge of the peace-making blood, the blood
of the one divine peace offering, whom to know is peace! It is out of the sacrificial
blood that we extract the peace which is the beginning of all service, all religion, all
uprightness of walk. 'No condemnation' commences the life of freedom and self-denial and
zeal. We cease to know the law as our enemy, and begin to know it as our friend; for that
which is 'holy, and just, and good' must ever be our delight, our joy, our guide. 'I delight
in the law of God after the inner man' (Rom 7:22) is one of our truest watchwords;
for we were set free from the law just in order that we might delight in the law
and in order that 'the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us'
(Rom 8:4). With law satisfied,--nay, transformed into a friend, and speaking not
condemnation, but pardon, not wrath, but love, we walk onwards and upwards, realizing in
that blessed law what David did when he said, 'The statutes of the Lord are right,
rejoicing the heart. More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold:
sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. (Psa 19:8-10).