614. LUK 2:32. THE LIGHT OF THE GENTILES
Luk_2:32. The Light of the Gentiles
By Rev. W. B. Collyer, D. D.
"A light to lighten the Gentiles."’97Luk_2:32.
We shall endeavor to explain the import of the text, and to apply its testimony to missionary exertions. In explaining its import, we shall discover that the character of Jesus is represented under the image of "Light;" that the subjects of his influences are "the Gentiles;" and that the result of these things taken together, or, in other words, his manifestation to the world, is universal illumination’97for he rises upon the nations to lighten them. In applying this testimony to missionary exertions, we shall find that it explains the principles upon which they are founded; and evinces that they proceed from nature, reason, humanity, patriotism, and religion. We shall be induced to examine the encouragements which this testimony affords; and shall find that they arise from revelation, from experience, and from existing circumstances. This is the ground on which we wish to prove that missionary societies are worthy your countenance and support, by showing that the work is of God, and that the heart and the understanding alike pay homage to its excellence.
I. We shall endeavor to explain the import of the text, "A light to lighten the Gentiles." Observe,
1. The character of Jesus is exhibited under the image of "light." A more appropriate and more beautiful symbol could not have been selected, whether it be applied to the Saviour himself, or to his influence on the world. In both these cases it is employed in the text, and in both of them it will be necessary to examine the figure. Light is the most glorious of all the creatures of God; and is, therefore, a singularly appropriate image in reference to the uncreated glory of the Son of God. If, therefore, light convey to the mind an idea of glory, it is a fit emblem of Him, "by whom all things were created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: and he is before all things, and by him all things consist," Col_1:16.
(1.) Among the properties of light, are penetration and universality. It is said of the sun, "His going forth is from the end of the heaven, and his circuit unto the ends of it: and there is nothing hid from the heat thereof," Psa_19:6. Light would have been an inappropriate image, in reference to Christ, had he not intended to illuminate the world. Not to a district, nor to an empire, nor to one quarter of the globe, does that glorious boon of heaven’97light’97confine its influences. It visits all in their turn’97it burns within the torrid zone, and reaches the dark and distant poles: it proceeds with gradual, yet inconceivable speed, in its restless career, till it has enlightened the whole.
(2.) Light is a source of comfort. "Truly the light is sweet, and a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun," Ecc_11:7.
(3.) Another quality of light is purity. It is this which renders it a fit emblem of Deity; and which induced the apostle John to say, "God is light, and in him is no darkness at all," 1Jn_1:5.
2. The subjects of his influences, "The Gentiles." The original word signifies no more than nations, literally, both in the Old and New Testaments. The confinement of the oracles of truth to the Jewish people, caused nations and heathen, or people who knew not the true God, to be considered synonymous. Our English word heathen, is derived from the word employed in the text: so that the object of missionary societies is one of the express objects of the incarnation of our Lord; and the subjects of his influences, promised in the text, are those who have excited, at this time, your Christian sympathy.
3. The result of the manifestation of Christ to the world, will be universal illumination. He rises upon the nations "to lighten" them. The state of mankind, considered as destitute of this light, is a state of most deplorable darkness. We include in this figurative expression, the absence of knowledge and of comfort. They that live "without God," of necessity live "without hope." The text proposes a remedy as wide as the disease, and promises deliverance from this state of darkness and misery, while it preaches Christ as "a light to lighten the Gentiles."
II. To apply its testimony to missionary exertions, of which we have not entirely lost sight in the exposition.
1. Let us examine the principles on which they are founded. These are of the highest order; and from them the great effects may be anticipated.
(1.) They are founded in nature. As man is a compound being, his actions are generally the result of many principles, bearing, at the same time, upon one point. This is the fact relative to the exertions this day examined; and it is at present our business to analyze and to arrange these, that by viewing them separately we may be able to appreciate them as a whole. It is a principle of nature, that the same cause should produce the same effects. Whoever sincerely loves the Saviour, will feel a proportionate attachment to his laws, his people, and his interests. He cannot sit down indifferent to the last, any more than he can consent to break the first.
(2.) Missionary exertions are founded on the purest principles of reason. It is consistent with right reason to connect means with the end. This society has been charged with enthusiasm in what? That they expect the universal diffusion of religious knowledge? No such thing! This point is so generally admitted, that it appears impossible to hold the Bible, and to doubt the fact. In what, then, consists their enthusiasm? That they have embodied their faith in the adoption of those means which have received the sanction of all ages; and, having done so, that they wait not without hope, but with patient and chastened expectation, the success of their labors, and the fulfilment of the Divine promise. But, it is objected, that light reason always employs means proportionate to the end. What means could be deemed proportionate to such an end? Nothing less than Omniscience could draw a plan completely adequate to such a design; and nothing less than Omnipotence could execute it. The first has been done, and the last is gradually performing by the Deity himself. In the mean while he employs, for the execution of all his purposes, human instruments; and we shall hereafter prove, that the means adopted by this society are of his own ordination.
(3.) Missionary exertions are founded on the purest principles of humanity. We have described the world as in a state of deplorable ignorance and pollution. The consequences are bitter and inevitable. The empire of sin, must be an empire broken up by the ploughshare of calamity. The tyranny of moral evil is felt in the riot of wide-wasting sorrow, and the victories of unsparing death.
(4.) Missionary exertions are founded on the purest principles of patriotism. What lover of his country does not desire to see her the leader of this great work’97the reformation of mankind, and the subversion of depravity? When God gave Jerusalem to desolation, it was not while she was "very zealous," or, in modern language, very enthusiastic "for the Lord of hosts;" but when she ceased to feel an interest in his cause, and when she sunk into the most criminal indifference. Religious lethargy precedes national ruin; patriotism, therefore, calls for the support of religious zeal.
(5.) Missionary exertions are founded on the purest principles of religion. Religion adopts and influences all the springs of action which we have named, and all the properties of the human mind of every description. Religion directs the will, mollifies the passions, regulates the affections. Religion fosters the feelings of nature, guides the researches of reason, elicits the charities of humanity, kindles the fire of patriotism, while her own honor is singularly concerned in this great cause. As her name has been borrowed by ambition and superstition, it is time for her to discover herself in her native majesty. When the Druid slew a man and a brother in the consecrated circle, he called his murderous act a religious rite. The wretched Indian, who lays himself down to be crushed to death under the car of some idol, thinks he is paying homage to religion. But real religion urges the use of all the means which reason points out, and stimulates all the sympathies which nature, or humanity, or patriotism acknowledge.
2. The considerations by which we are encouraged.
(1.) Missionary exertions are encouraged by revelation. We will not at this time, in making our appeal "to the law and to the testimony," recapitulate those sublime predictions, and those numerous promises, which relate to the final triumph of Jesus over all his adversaries, and the universal extension of his kingdom’97passages which have been so largely produced, and so ably discussed on these occasions. One shall suffice: "The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign forever and ever." Rev_11:15.
(2.) Missionary exertions are encouraged by experience. The lapse of years lays the adversaries of Christianity dead at its foot; while it has acquired vigor from that which impairs every thing earthly, and received evidences from the destroying hand which sweeps into oblivion every record of this world.
(3.) Missionary exertions are encouraged, further, by existing circumstances,’97by the existing circumstances of the society. We are not ashamed to appeal to its influence at home and abroad; and to call upon its adversaries to examine what it has actually effected. But what have you done abroad? Is there occasion to ask this question? Look at our reports, and the publication of our transactions. Is it nothing to maintain missionaries in so many remote parts of the world? Is it nothing to acquire languages, not reduced to any grammatical standard, so as to address the heathen in their own tongues? Is it nothing to have their children catechized weekly, and instructed in the fundamental principles of Christianity? Is it nothing to receive Hottentots into Christian Britain, to instruct professors in their own principles? Is it nothing to translate the scriptures into languages which never before conveyed the word of truth to those who speak them? This, and more than this, the society has effected.
(4.) Missionary exertions are further encouraged by the existing circumstances of the world. If we feel the curse in a more sensible degree, the more vigorous should be our exertions to disseminate that which shall destroy the curse. In this single quarter of the globe, amidst the ruin that has marked the progress of ambition, and the calamities attending a state of warfare, protracted almost beyond precedent in any age, the spirit of religion is cultivated, the worship of God is maintained, and peace finds a refuge still from the persecutions of overweening power, and of cruel oppression.
While England is spared, Europe cherishes the fond hope of future deliverance from her present chains; and, with still more animated expectation, fixes her eyes upon this country, as the storehouse of spiritual communications, whence her future supplies are to be drawn. Support missionary exertions, and realize her dream of approaching happiness! Moreover, the awful and impressive features of the present times, correspond with those which distinguished the appearance of our Lord. "For thus saith the Lord of hosts: Yet once, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land; and I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come," Hag_2:6. If this prophecy was partially fulfilled at the birth of Christ, it remains to be more completely accomplished now: for he is not as yet revealed as "the Desire of all nations;" and we hope, not without reason, that these dreadful convulsions announce his approach.
Application
1. Such are the encouragements to missionary exertions. Nor ought we to be disheartened at the narrowness of our means, when contrasted with the immensity of our design.
2. Let the disciple of the tender and compassionate Jesus, in this assembly, calmly behold the progress of moral evil, the parent of calamity, without making one effort to arrest it in its furious and malignant course, if he can. Let him exult in his personal advantages, and see others perishing for want of them unmoved! Let him say, with benevolent John, "We know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness;" but not in his compassionate tone, and with his bowels of tenderness’97if he can. Let him, with selfish appetite, sit down to a board covered with religious plenty’97to the elements, the pledges of his Master’s death’97without sending one morsel to the poor heathen, or affording them the crumbs which fall from this table’97if he can. Let him contemplate the spirit and purpose of his Master, and withhold his hand from the work’97if he can. And then will we, at the second appearance of our Lord, tell, before heaven and earth, that we pleaded a cause for which Jesus shed the last drop of his heart’s blood’97and pleaded in vain!
Autor: JABEZ BURNS