great virtue; and not to get warm or excited or zealous, is regarded as
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.)
4. 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 openhanded, be loving, be free in giving, if you would grow.
5. 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?
6. 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 to be calm, is well. To endure provocation and be unruffled is also well. But to take religion easy is not so to be commended. Easygoing 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 goodnatured 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 arm, 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 (chap. 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 fellowtravellers and fellow-soldiers on the right hand and on the left. You have a bright kingdom in view which will compensate for all trial 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 the 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 stedfastness 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 who 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 honey-comb' (Ps. 19:8–10).
LET US GO FORTH
HEB. 13:13.
SILENT, like men in solemn haste,
Girded wayfarers of the waste,
We pass out at the world's wide gate,
Turning our back on all its state;
We press along the narrow road
That leads to life, to bliss, to God.
We cannot, and we would not stay;
We dread the snares that throng the way;
We fling aside the weight and sin,
Resolved the victory to win;
We know the peril, but our eyes
Rest on the splendour of the prize.
No idling now, no wasteful sleep,
From Christian toil our limbs to keep;
No shrinking from the desperate fight,
No thought of yielding or of flight;
No love of present gain or ease,
No seeking man nor self to please.
No sorrow for the loss of fame,
No dread of scandal on our name;
No terror for the world's sharp scorn,
No wish that taunting to return;
No hatred can our hatred move,
And enmity but kindles love.
No sigh for laughter left behind,
Or pleasures scattered to the wind;
No looking back on Sodom's plains,
No listening still to Babel's strains;
No tears for Egypt's song and smile,
No thirsting for its flowing Nile.
No vanity nor folly now,
No fading garland round our brow;
No moody musings in the grove,
No pang of disappointed love;
With the brave heart and steady eye,
We onward march to victory.
What though with weariness oppressed?
'Tis but a little, and we rest;
This throbbing heart and burning brain
Will soon be calm and cool again.
Night is far spent, and morn is near,—
Morn of the cloudless and the clear!
'Tis but a little, and we come
To our reward, our crown, our home.
Another year, it may be less,
And we have crossed the wilderness,
Finished the toil, the rest begun,
The battle fought, the triumph won!
We grudge not, then, the toil, the way;
Its ending is the endless day!
We shrink not from these tempests keen,
With little of the calm between;
We welcome each descending sun;
Ere morn our joy may be begun.
THOU BELIEVEST? WHAT THEN?
ART thou a saint? and doth
Thy God thee own?
Call thee a child, an heir, a chosen one,
One with Himself and His beloved Son,
Heir of His crown?
Hast thou the love of Christ
Thy Saviour known?
The love that passeth knowledge, the rich grace
That stooped to poverty and death, to place
Thee on His throne?
Know'st thou the Christ of God,
His cross and love?
Then art thou severed from this drossy earth,
Linked to the city of thy better birth,
The land above!
Dead, yet alive, thou art,
Alive, yet dead;
Thy old life buried in thy Surety's tomb,
Thy new life hid in God 'bove death and doom
With Christ thy Head!
Thy life is not below,
'Tis all on high!
The Living One now lives for thee above,
The Loving One now pleads for thee in love:
Thou canst not die!
Live then the life of faith,
The life divine!
Live in and on this ever-living One,
Who bears thee on His heart before the throne:
His life is thine!
Pass on from strength to strength,
Faint not, nor yield;
With girded loins press on, the goal is near;
With ready sword fight God's great battle here:
Win thou the field!
Nor rest nor slumber now,
Watch and be strong!
Love is the smoother of the rugged way,
And hope, at midnight, as in brightest day,
Breaks forth in song!
TO THE COMFORTER
MIGHTY Comforter, to Thee
In our feebleness we flee;
Oh, unveil Thy gracious face,
Spread out all Thy wondrous grace!
Strengthener of the poor and weak,
To Thy power for strength we seek;
Heavenly fulness, from above,
Oh descend in blessed love!
Patient teacher of the blind,
Opener of the sin-sealed mind,
Fix in us Thy sure abode,
And reveal the Christ of God.
Guider of the erring feet,
In the waste or busy street,
Lead us thro' life's Babel-crowds,
Through its pathless solitudes.
True Enricher of the poor,
Enter Thou our lowly door;
Let Thy liberal hand impart
Heavenly riches to our heart.
Looser of the bonds of sin,
Oh make haste and enter in;
Break each link, till there remains
Not one fragment of our chains.
Loving Spirit, come, oh come!
Find in us Thy endless home;
Find in this our world below
A dwelling for Thy glory now.
Holy Light, upon us shine
With Thy energy divine;
Heavenly Brightness, break Thou forth
Over this benighted earth.
With the eternal Father one,
One with the eternal Son;
Eternal Spirit, Thee we praise,
Now and through eternal days.
USE ME
MAKE use of me, my God!
Let me not be forgot;
A broken vessel cast aside,
One whom Thou needest not.
I am Thy creature, Lord,
And made by hands divine;
And I am part, however mean,
Of this great world of Thine.
Thou usest all Thy works,
The weakest things that be;
Each has a service of its own,
For all things wait on Thee.
Thou usest the high stars,
The tiny drops of dew,
The giant peak and little hill:
My God, oh use me too!
Thou usest tree and flower,
The rivers vast and small,
The eagle great, the little bird
That sings upon the wall.
Thou usest the wide sea,
The little hidden lake,
The pine upon the Alpine cliff,
The lily in the brake,
The huge rock in the vale,
The sand-grain by the sea,
The thunder of the rolling cloud,
The murmur of the bee.
All things do serve Thee here,
All creatures great and small;
Make use of me, of me, my God,
The meanest of them all!
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MONERGISM BOOKS
Follow the Lamb by Horatius Bonar, Copyright © 2020
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