Rom 12:11: Outward, Inward, Christward
In diligence not slothful; fervent in spirit; serving the Lord.'97Rom_12:11.
The position that the portion of Holy Scripture from which these words are taken occupies, gives to the words special significance. In the Epistle to the Romans they come as presenting the practical aspect of that truth which in the first eleven chapters the Apostle sets forth in all the depth and breadth and height of the great mystery of godliness.
In the first eleven chapters of the Epistle he seeks to justify the ways of God to man. It is a vindication of the righteousness of God seen through man's failures; and so he traces the fall of man from his original righteousness, the corruption of the world, the debasement of its idolatries, the seeming failure of God's purpose, even of the law that was given by Moses, and in the election of God's people Israel. He does not flinch from facing any one of the great problems of God's government of the world'97its anomalies, its disappointments, its frustrations of the grace of God; the creature made subject to vanity, man losing the image of God in which he was created; Israel outcast and rejected'97but he shows through all these ruins the increasing purpose of the Divine mercy as well as of the Divine righteousness. The ways of God are inscrutable and past finding out, but they are the ways of a boundless compassion and of a perfect justice. So it will be seen at last (that is the conclusion to which he comes) that the purpose of God shall not fail; that evil shall not triumph over good; that love and not hatred is the law of God's universe; that God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all.
Then the Apostle passes from that high mystery of doctrine to the practical aspect of the Christian life. Good is to prevail in man's life, in the life of each individual Christian whom God has called; and in spite of the problems which beset the intellect, it is to be a life of holiness and peace and purity. Justification by faith is not to lead to an Antinomian carelessness about obedience, and righteousness, and truth, and purity, and honesty; it does not set aside the law, yea it establishes the law.
The text is a short summary of the Christian life. That life has three relationships: to the world around us, to our own heart within us, to Christ above us; and here there is a word for each. '93In diligence not slothful'94'97that is the duty we owe to the world; '93fervent in spirit'94'97that is the duty we owe to ourselves; '93serving the Lord'94'97that is what we owe to Christ. We might paraphrase the text: '93Do good diligently; be good enthusiastically; and let all service, outward and inward, be for the Lord.'94
I
Outward
'93In diligence not slothful.'94
The language of the Authorized Version is '93Not slothful in business'94; and it comes to most of us as an exhortation to be industrious in our earthly callings. It is the word for a prosperous banker, an enterprising merchant, a tradesman who tries to make the most of his capital or his labour, a labouring man whose task is humble, but who has to earn his bread by the sweat of his brow, and seeks to gain a fair day's wages for a fair day's labour. Well, doubtless, that lies within the scope and compass of the text; but if our thoughts are limited to that interpretation of it, we take altogether a poor, unsatisfying estimate of what the Apostle means, we lose more than one-half at least of the instruction and guidance it may give us. For the business of which the Apostle speaks is not the thing which a man does, but the temper, the motive, the character which accompany the doing of it. It is the temper of activity, of earnestness, and of thoroughness which a man may carry into his outward work.
The Authorized Version receives much credit for the melody of its words, but perhaps less than it deserves for their accuracy. Here the word '93business'94 is taken in the modern sense of trade, and when it is found that that is not the meaning of the Greek, the Authorized Version is credited with a mistranslation. But in the sixteenth century '93business'94 was used in the sense of '93busyness,'94 that is, activity or diligence in whatever one is engaged in'97just the meaning of the Greek word.
The word translated '93business'94 in the Authorized Version is the same in the original as the word '93diligence'94 in the eighth verse of the chapter: '93He that ruleth, with diligence.'94 So here: '93Not slothful as regards diligence.'94 The term indicates, not the kind of work to be done, but simply the manner of doing it. It does not point to men's ordinary worldly callings and occupations, as distinguished from their spiritual exercises or spiritual frames. It is not the Apostle's present object to harmonize, and reconcile, and blend the two in one. The expression '93business'94 characterizes, not the work but the worker, not the action but the agent. The real meaning is, that in respect of diligence, or activity, in the matter to which this whole passage refers, you are to be not slothful. It is very much the wise man's maxim: '93Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might'94 (Ecc_9:10).
Looking to the whole context of the verse, looking to the whole tenor and life of the Apostle, we may be sure that he meant those to whom he wrote to think chiefly of the spheres of Christian activity which were open to them, to each of them according to the gift that he had received'97the gift of prophecy, ministration, helps and governments, diversities of tongues, gifts of healing, and the like. Spiritual activity, rather than secular activity, was what was in the Apostle's thoughts. Primarily, at least, the words are addressed to those who are engaged in the sphere of Christian activity. But it will be serviceable to give the words a wider range and let them refer to our work in the world, and describe the manner in which our duty should be done: '93As for our diligence in doing our duty, let us not be slothful'97let us really do it diligently.'94
1. We all know what this means in any worldly calling; and we know also that in every worldly calling it is an indispensable condition of eminence and success. There must be industry; strenuous, unremitting, untiring industry; willingness to forgo the luxury of ease, '93to scorn delights, and live laborious days.'94 For the most part, this is a faculty to be acquired; a habit to be cultivated. It is a faculty which cannot be acquired too early; a habit which cannot be cultivated too assiduously. It is good advice, and advice which cannot be too often or too emphatically repeated, especially to the young: Learn this lesson soon, and learn it well. Accustom yourself, train yourself to this '93diligence in business.'94 Do this systematically in whatever you undertake. Act upon the principle that whatever it is worth while to acquire, it is worth while to acquire thoroughly; whatever it is worth while to do at all, it is worth while to do well.
This text is in perfect harmony with other parts of Scripture. St. Paul in writing his second letter to the Thessalonians (Rom_3:10) says, '93For even when we were with you, this we commanded you, that if any would not work, neither should he eat.'94 The evil complained of here began to show itself even while the Apostle was with the Church. Some were idlers, and they needed the earnest words of St. Paul to rebuke them and incite them to labour. He was himself a remarkable example of industry. Often did he spend the day in preaching and teaching, and then labour far into the night at his '93craft'94 for support, rather than be dependent on the bounty of others. He becomes righteously indignant at the Thessalonian idlers, and he declares that neither should they eat. They were not to be supported by the charity of others, unless they had done all they could for their own support. This was a common maxim among the Jews; and the same sentiment is often found in the writings of Greek poets, orators, and philosophers. The maxim is in harmony with strict justice. At the very dawn of human history we are taught that man was to earn his bread in the sweat of his face. A man who will not work ought to starve. You ought not to help him. Aid given to a lazy man is a premium on vice.
'93Africa is the land of the unemployed,'94 Henry Drummond says in his Tropical Africa. This saying is true only regarding the men. '93What is the first commandment?'94 a Lovedale boy was asked. '93Thou shalt do no work,'94 was the reply.1 [Note: Stewart of Lovedale, 207.]
Not often did Watts take subjects for his paintings from the stern realities of everyday life. But there is a small group of pictures in which the sorrows and privations of those who have been worsted in the battle of life, or have been less fortunate than their fellows, are portrayed with unusual power, and show how wide is the range of his sympathies. Nothing human is alien to him. The pencil that could give a glow of vivid colour to the mystic visions of fancy could paint in sombre hues the painful experiences of the poor. He has combined, as it were, the two capacities in the humorous picture entitled, '93When Poverty comes in at the door, Love flies out at the window.'94 To this popular proverb he has given a realistic and yet an imaginative charm. The picture at once impresses the mind and makes its meaning plain. One side of it is illumined with a bright light emblematical of the happiness that has been but is now passing away. The room is poorly furnished, and yet exhibits traces of former abundance that redeem its squalidness. The secret of the change of circumstances in the household is revealed in the laziness and slovenliness of the mistress. Instead of diligently attending to her domestic affairs, she is absorbed in caressing a pet dove, and lounging on a bed, whose disordered clothes exhibit the careless housekeeping of many days. Her work-basket is overturned on the floor, and its contents are scattered. Doves make their nests in pigeon-holes above the bed, with all their litter of confusion, and from the open window the untended sprays of roses, returning to their wild condition through neglect, creep in. The housewife is young and beautiful; but whatever pleasing impression she produces is at once removed by the contradictory character of her slovenly habits. She cannot make a happy home; and therefore the door of the room on one side is represented as opening, admitting the sordid figure of Poverty, dressed in rags, and accompanied by the gaunt wolf of Hunger, and letting in at the same time the cold inclement wind outside, which blows before it a drift of withered autumn leaves that strew the floor, and speak eloquently of the hostile forces of nature which inevitably work havoc where there is no principle of order and industry to keep them in check; while through the wide-open window the winged Cupid, no longer a boy but a grown-up mature youth, is in the act of taking flight over the sill. Every detail of the picture tells, and enhances the effect of the whole; and no one can gaze upon the startling contrast between the dark forbidding figure of Poverty, and the bright affrighted look of Love, without reading the moral which it so forcibly teaches. Watts could not possibly have taught a more impressive lesson to all who are inclined to act the part of the young woman whose own improvident ways have made her the subject of experiment by two such antagonistic powers, Poverty approaching to overwhelm her, and Love abandoning her to its horrors.1 [Note: Hugh Macmillan, G. F. Watts, 214.]
Life without industry is guilt; and industry without art is brutality.2 [Note: Ruskin.]
There is no cure for the despair and the nervous misery from which so many among us are suffering like a long and steady piece of hard work. Work reacts on the worker. If it is slovenly it makes him slovenly, even in his outward appearance. If he does it, not with any love, but merely as drudgery, it gives him the careless look of drudgery. '93To scamp your work will make you a scamp.'94 On the contrary, when work is well done it yields its reward long before pay-day comes round, because it communicates solidity and dignity to the character. I do not know any man who is more to be envied than the man who has an eye
That winces at false work, and loves the true;
With hand and arm that play upon the toil
As willingly as any singing-bird
Sets him to sing his morning roundelay,
Because he likes to sing, and likes the Song of Solomon 3 [Note: J. Stalker.]
2. It is this real work, this earnest life, that the Apostle desires to see exemplified in the Church of Christ, and among its members. It is thus that He would have them to undertake and prosecute the work of their Christian calling, to perform the functions of whatever they may find to be their office in the Church, the body of Christ, of which they are members. No doubt there is here a peculiar difficulty, arising out of the nature of that work and these functions. They are essentially spiritual. They make a demand upon the spiritual tendencies and tastes. In any circumstances, the faculty or habit which is required is difficult of acquisition. Still, there are certain qualities which are essential to worldly success, and if we carry them over into the life of the spirit we shall find that they are there also the secrets of progress in Christian usefulness.
(1) Here is a quality which is greatly esteemed in the ways of the world'97the quality of alertness. It is characteristic of every successful merchant. If we listen to the ordinary speech of the man of the world, we find how great is the value which he places upon this gift. '93A man must have all his wits about him.'94 '93It is the early bird that catches the worm.'94 These are recognized maxims in the way of success, and they point to the commanding necessity of an alert spirit. A merchant must be alert for the detection of hidden perils. He must be alert for the perception of equally hidden opportunity. He must be alert for the recognition of failing methods. His eyes must clearly see where old roads are played out, and where new ground may be broken. Let us carry the suggestion over into the affairs of the Kingdom. The Scriptures abound in counsel to alertness. '93Awake, awake!'94 '93Watch ye!'94 '93Let us watch and be sober!'94 '93Watching unto prayer.'94 It is an all-essential ingredient in the life of the progressive saint.
The watchfulness which Jesus Christ commands is a faithful care to love always and to fulfil the will of God at the present moment, according to the indications we have of it; it does not consist in worrying ourselves, in putting ourselves to torture, and in being ceaselessly occupied with ourselves, but rather in lifting our eyes to God, from whence comes our only help against ourselves.1 [Note: F'e9nelon.]
'93Buy up the opportunity.'94 We are especially to look at things that appear to be useless, lest they turn out to be the raw material of the garments of heaven. Sir Titus Salt, walking along the quay of Liverpool, saw a pile of unclean waste. He saw it with very original eyes, and had the vision of a perfected and beautified product. He saw the possibilities in discarded refuse, and he bought the opportunity. That is perhaps the main business of the successful citizen of the Kingdom'97the conversion of waste. This disappointment which I have had to-day, what can I make out of it? What an eye it wants to see the ultimate gain in checked and chilled ambition'97
To stretch a hand through time, and catch
The far-off interest of tears.
This grief of mine, what can I make of it? Must I leave it as waste in the track of the years, or can it be turned into treasure? This pain of mine, is it only a lumbering burden, or does the ungainly vehicle carry heavenly gold? It is in conditions of this kind that the spiritual expert reveals himself. He is all '93alive unto God,'94 and seeing the opportunity he seizes it like a successful merchant.2 [Note: J. H. Jowett.]
(2) Again, we hear one man say of another who has risen to fortune: '93Everything about him goes like clockwork.'94 Of another man whose days witness a gradual degeneracy quite another word is spoken: '93He has no system, no method; everything goes by the rule of chance.'94 So the quality of method appears to be one of the essentials of a successful man of affairs. Is this equally true in the things of the Kingdom? How many there are of us who, in our religious life, are loose, slipshod, unmethodical! How unsystematic we are in our worship and our prayers! Our worldly business would speedily drop into ruin if we applied to it the inconsiderate ways with which we discharge the duties of our religion.
William Law, in A Serious Call, has instructed us in methodical devotion. He systematically divides the day, devoting to certain hours and certain seasons special kinds of praises and prayers. This was the early glory of the Methodist denomination. Their distinctiveness consisted in the systematic ordering of the Christian life. I know that too much method may become a bondage, but too little may become a rout. Too much red tape is creative of servitude, but to have no red tape at all is to be the victim of disorder.
Without method memory is useless. Detached facts are practically valueless. All public speakers know the value of method. Persons not accustomed to it imagine that a speech is learnt by heart. Knowing a little about the matter, I will venture to say that if any one attempted that plan, either he must have a marvellous memory, or else he would break down three times out of five. It simply depends upon correct arrangement. The words and sentences are left to the moment; the thoughts are methodized beforehand; and the words, if the thoughts are rightly arranged, will place themselves.1 [Note: F. W. Robertson, Life and Letters, 389.]
In order to do the most we are capable of, the first rule is that every day should see its own work done. Let the task for each day be resolved and arranged for deliberately the night before, and let nothing interfere with its performance. It is a secret which we learn slowly'97the secret of living by days. I am convinced that there are very few so precious. What confuses work, what mars life and makes it feverish, is the postponing of the task which ought to be done now. The word which John Ruskin had on his seal was '93To-day.'942 [Note: Claudius Clear, Letters on Life, 163.]
(3) Go once more into the realm of business. Here is a sentence that encounters us from one who knows the road: '93The habit of firm decision is indispensable to a man of business.'94 The real business man waits till the hour is come, and then acts decisively. He strikes while the iron is hot. An undecisive business man lives in perpetual insecurity. He meanders along in wavering uncertainty until his business house has to be closed. Is not this element of decision needful in the light of the Spirit? Religious life is too apt to be full of '93ifs'94 and '93buts'94 and '93perhapses'94 and '93peradventures.'94 Am I experiencing at this moment a fervent holy spiritual impulse? In what consists my salvation? To strike while the iron is hot! '93Suffer me first to go to bid them farewell.'94 No, the iron will speedily grow cold. While the holy thing glows before you, strongly decide and concentrate your energies in supporting your decision. '93I am resolved what to do.'94 That was said by a man of the world. Let it be the speech of the man of the Kingdom of God.
'93We must think again,'94 says Hazlitt, '93before we determine, and thus the opportunity for action is lost. While we are considering the very best possible mode of gaining an object, we find that it has slipped through our fingers, or that others have laid rude, fearless hands upon it.'94
A man can learn but what he can:
Who hits the moment is the man.
Lord Bacon has noticed, says the author of Friends in Council, that the men whom powerful persons love to have about them are ready men'97men of resource. The reason is obvious. A man in power has perhaps thirty or forty decisions to make in a day. This is very fatiguing and perplexing to the mind. Any one, therefore, who can assist him with ready resource and prompt means of execution, even in the trifling matters of the day, soon becomes an invaluable subordinate, worthy of all favour.1 [Note: A. Helps, Friends in Council.]
(4) And once more we find that in business life it is essential that a man must run risks and make ventures. He must be daring, and he must have the element of courage. What says the man of the world? '93Nothing venture, nothing win.'94 '93Faint heart never won fair lady.'94 Faint heart never wins anything. John Bunyan's Faintheart had repeatedly to be carried. Has the citizen of the Kingdom to risk anything? Indeed he has. He must risk the truth. A lie might appear to offer him a bargain, but he must risk the truth. Let him sow the truth, even though the threatened harvest may be tears. Let him venture the truth, even though great and staggering loss seems to be drawn to his door. '93He that goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed, shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him.'94 A man has again and again to make his choice between Christ and thirty pieces of silver. Let him make the venture, let the silver go; risk the loss! If it means putting up the shutters he will go out with Christ! '93He that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.'94
The Christian belief that all is in God's hands, and all things work together for good, throws a new light on all the trivialities of life. All our petty occupations may be affected by the ultimate hope which we are taught to cherish. '93Labour,'94 says Bishop Andrewes (Sermons, ii. 206), '93of itself is a harsh, unpleasant thing unless it be seasoned with hope.'85 '91He that plows must plow in hope,' his plough shall not go deep else, his furrows will be but shallow. Sever hope from labour and you must look for labour and labourers accordingly, slight and shallow, God knoweth.'941 [Note: W. Cunningham, The Gospel of Work, 71.]
Passage, immediate passage! the blood burns in my veins!
Away, O soul! hoist instantly the anchor!
Cut the hawsers'97haul out'97shake out every sail!
Have we not stood here like trees in the ground long enough?
Have we not grovell'd here long enough eating and drinking like mere brutes?
Have we not darken'd and dazed ourselves with books long enough?
Sail forth'97steer for the deep waters only,
Reckless, O soul, exploring, I with thee, and thou with me,
For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go,
And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all.
O my brave soul!
O farther, farther sail!
O daring joy, but safe! are they not all the seas of God?
O farther, farther, farther sail!2 [Note: Walt Whitman, The Sea of Faith.]
II
Inward
'93Fervent in spirit'94
We pass from the outward activity of life to the inward spring, to the motive power, out of which this outward activity must flow, and without which it flags and falls.
'93Fervent in spirit'94'97What is it but to be glowing, boiling, we might almost say boiling over, with a strong purpose, with a perfect love, with a twofold love'97the love of God who has made, redeemed, and sanctified us, and the love of men, our brothers, because they are children of the same Father in Heaven? It is hardly more than a paraphrase of St. Paul's words to say that what he bids us do is, in homely phrase, to keep the steam up; that steam of the Divine love which moves the whole machine of our spiritual life, without which it may be in perfect outward order, but will not go, will not work, will not do that for which the great Work-master designed the machine. Here, then, is another golden rule of life, that outward activity must be sustained by the inward fervour, by the glow of emotion, by the life of prayer.
What man can live denying his own soul?
Hast thou not learned that noble uncontrol
Is virtue's right, the breath by which she lives?
O sure, if any angel ever grieves,
'Tis when the living soul hath learnt to chide
Its passionate indignations, and to hide
The sudden flows of rapture, the quick birth
Of overwhelming loves, that balance the worth
Of the wide world against one loving act,
As less than a sped dream; shall the cataract
Stop, pause, and palter, ere it plunge towards
The vale unseen? Our fate hath its own lords,
Which if we follow truly, there can come
No harm unto us.1 [Note: Langdon Elwyn Mitchell.]
1. There are two forms which this Divine enthusiasm has assumed in religious souls'97the enthusiasm for humanity, and the enthusiasm for individual salvation. The latter, which is the narrower and more selfish, which indeed is often '93selfishness expanded to infinitude,'94 has led to many errors. Men, ready to sacrifice everything to secure their own personal deliverance from what they had dreamed of hell, have lived as hermits in deserts or on mountains, or have shut themselves up in monastic cells, or have subjected their bodies to cruel torments. The beliefs that have led to such lives are natural to men. They are found in every age and in every country and in all religions; and deeply as they are intermingled with error, yet so sovereign are the virtues of self-denial that without doubt they shall have their reward. And sometimes, on the other hand, the enthusiasm for humanity has been dissevered from deep personal religion. We may be sure that God will still bless the sincere lovers of their brethren, and that Christ will never be hard on any man who has lived and died for men. But when the two have been combined, when the sense of devotion has been united with the exaltation of charity, then such men have ever been the most glorious and the most blessed of the benefactors of mankind. What was Christianity itself but such an enthusiasm learnt from the example, caught from the Spirit, of Christ our Lord? The same love, even for the guilty and wretched, which brought the Lord Jesus step by step from that celestial glory to the lowest depth of the infinite descent, has been kindled by His Spirit in the hearts of His noblest sons. Forgiven, they have longed that others should share the same forgiveness.
Jesus of Nazareth is constantly kindling and keeping alive an enthusiastic personal devotion in the hearts of countless men, women, and children who have never seen Him'97an enthusiasm which burns on steadily, century after century, with ever-increasing splendour. Let those who deny that He is still alive explain that marvellous Fact'97if they can! It is unique in the history of our race. Could a man, dead for nearly two thousand years, rule so royally over the souls and bodies of the noblest and most unselfish of every age? NO! JESUS LIVES! and is ever pressing close to His Heart the heart of each individual disciple, pouring in the strengthening oil of the Holy Spirit and the new wine of a high enthusiasm which must find room for service.
Come, my beloved! we will haste and go
To those pale faces of our fellow-men!
Our loving hearts, burning with summer fire,
Will cast a glow upon their pallidness;
Our hands will help them, far as servants may;
Hands are apostles still to saviour-hearts.
2. Enthusiasm is indispensable; there is nothing which the devil dreads so much, there is nothing which the world denounces so continuously. To call a man an enthusiast has often been regarded as the sneer most likely to thwart his plans. Like the words '93Utopian,'94 '93Quixotic,'94 '93unpractical,'94 it is one of the mud-banks reared by the world to oppose the swelling tide of moral convictions. The famous saying of Prince Talleyrand, '93Above all, no enthusiasm!'94 concentrates the expression of the dislike felt by cold, calculating, selfish natures for those who are swept away by the force of mighty and ennobling aspirations.
For what is enthusiasm? It is a Greek word which means the fulness of Divine inspiration. It implies absorbing and passionate devotion for some good cause. It means the state of those whom St. Paul has described as '93fervent (literally, '91boiling') in spirit.'94 It describes the soul of man no longer mean and earthy, but transfigured, uplifted, dilated by the Spirit of God. When a man is an enthusiast for good, he is so because a Spirit greater than his own has swept over him, as the breeze wanders over the dead strings of some 'c6olian harp, and sweeps the music, which slumbers upon them, now into Divine murmurings, and now into stormy sobs. A man becomes an enthusiast when God has flashed into his conscience the conviction of right and truth; has made him magnetic to multitudes; has made him as a flame of fire which leaps out of dying embers; as a wind of God which breathes over the slain that they may live. Without enthusiasm of some noble kind a man is dead; without enthusiasts a nation perishes. Of each man it is true that in proportion to the fire of his enthusiasm is the grandeur of his life; of each nation it is true that without enthusiasm it never has the will, much less the power, to undo the heavy burden or to atone for the intolerable wrong.
Let us think sometimes of the great invisible ship that carries our human destinies upon eternity. Like the vessels of our confined oceans, she has her sails and her ballast. The fear that she may pitch or roll on leaving the roadstead is no reason for increasing the weight of the ballast by stowing the fair, white sails in the depths of the hold. They were not woven to moulder side by side with cobble-stones in the dark. Ballast exists everywhere: all the pebbles of the harbour, all the sand on the beach will serve for it. But sails are rare and precious things: their place is not in the murk of the well, but amid the light of the tall masts, where they will collect the winds of space.1 [Note: Maurice Maeterlinck, Life and Flowers, 76.]
(1) Think what enthusiasm has done even in spheres not immediately religious. The enthusiasm of the student, of the artist, of the discoverer, of the man of science'97what else could have inspired their infinite patience, their unlimited self-sacrifice? Men cannot without effort render great services to mankind. '93The progress of mankind,'94 it has been truly said, '93has been from scaffold to scaffold and from stake to stake'94; but men animated by a fine enthusiasm have braved the penalty. It plunged Roger Bacon into torture and imprisonment. It made Columbus face the sickly cruelty of ignorant priesthoods and the stormy hurricanes of unknown seas. It caused years of poverty, of suffering, of persecution, of calumnious denunciation to Galileo, to Kepler, to Newton, to the early geologists, to Charles Darwin. They gave to mankind a toil intense and infinite. And if in these days man has been enabled to
put forth
His pomp, his power, his skill,
And arts that make fire, flood, and air,
The vassals of his will,
it is only because his more gifted brethren have toiled for his good.
(2) Again, there is the enthusiasm of the reformer. Think how low the nations might have sunk if their decadence had not been again and again arrested, and their criminalities again and again rebuked. Think what Italy was fast becoming when Savonarola'97until they choked his voice in blood'97thundered in the Duomo of Florence against her corruptions and her apostasy! Think how the cramp of an intolerable tyranny might still have been torturing the souls of men had not Wyclif braved death to give the Bible to the English people! Think once more what truths would have been drowned in the deep seas of oblivion if John Hus had not calmly gone to the stake to which he was condemned by the bishops who surrounded the perjured Sigismund! Imagine what a sink of loathly abominations the nominal Church of God might now have been if the voice of Luther had never shaken the world.
(3) Again, there is the enthusiasm of the missionary. In the first centuries the world was full of missionaries. In those days every Christian felt that he was not a Christian if he were not in some form or other God's missionary. And for centuries the Church produced many a noble missionary; men like Ulfilas, men like Boniface, men like Columba. Then began the ages of neglect, and darkness, and superstition, and for whole centuries there was found only here and there a man like St. Louis of France, or St. Francis of Assisi, with a mission spirit strong within him. In modern days it is to Count Zinzendorf and the Moravians, to William Carey and the Baptists that we owe the revival of missionary zeal. In the last century missions were regarded as foolish, rash'97one knows not what; for the devil has a large vocabulary of words to quench the spirit which is so dangerous to his domain. Yet men despised and defied the devil, and the world which is his minion. Think of John Eliot, the lion-hearted apostle of the Indians, and his motto, '93Prayer and painstaking can accomplish anything.'94 Think of the young and sickly David Brainerd, going alone into the silent forests of America, and among their yet wilder denizens, with the words, '93Not from necessity, but from choice; for it seemed to me God's dealings towards me had fitted me for a life of solitariness and hardness.'94 Think of Adoniram Judson and the tortures he bore so cheerfully in his Burmese prison.
(4) Then, once more, think of the glowing and beautiful enthusiasm of our social philanthropists. What man has done more for a multitude of souls than John Pounds, the poor Portsmouth cobbler, who, in the simple enthusiasm of ignorant love for the poor ragged children of the streets, became the ultimate founder of Ragged Schools! What a light from heaven was shed upon countless wanderers by the Gloucestershire printer, Robert Raikes, who saw the children wasting their Sundays idly in the streets. On the Embankment in London you see his statue and read the inscription: '93As I asked, '91Can nothing be done?' a voice answered '91Try'; I did try, and lo! what God hath wrought.'94 Who can judge the amount of misery rolled off the despairing heart of the world by the reformers of prisons, John Howard and Elizabeth Fry'97Elizabeth Fry entering the foul wards for women in Newgate Prison, protected only by the beauty of her holiness; and John Howard traversing Europe, as Edmund Burke said, '93to dive into the depths of dungeons, to plunge into the infections of hospitals, to take the gauge and dimensions of misery, depression, and contempt'94?
All I am anxious for is that sympathy should be felt, or rather candour extended, towards the exaggerations of generous and unselfish men like Kingsley, whose warmth, even when wrong, is a higher thing than the correctness of cold hearts. It is so rare to find a clergyman who can forget the drill and pipeclay of the profession, and speak with a living heart for the suffering classes, not as a policeman established to lecture them into proprieties, but as one of the same flesh and blood vindicating a common humanity.1 [Note: F. W. Robertson, Life and Letters, 292.]
3. The idea suggested by the word '93fervent'94 is that of water heated to the boiling point. The figure is common in poetry and rhetoric. We speak of a man boiling with resentment; boiling over with rage. And the more generous and gentle affections, as well as the fiercer passions, are represented as working in this way. A patriot's soul boils over with indignation at his country's wrongs. A kind heart boils over with compassion when it sees a brother's woe. Warmth, enthusiasm, zeal; amounting even, if there be occasion, to passionate grief, or pity, or anger'97such is the frame or temperament here commended. The fervency, however, is to be spiritual. It is not animal excitement. It is not the natural fire of fervency of a hot and heady temper; or of keen, nervous sensibility and susceptibility; or of vehement personal feeling, unaccustomed to self-control.
(1) The meaning may be, that we are to be fervent in our spirit; fervent in the spiritual part of our nature; fervent in that new spiritual life and being of ours into which, as members of Christ and of His body, we enter. We are spiritual men. It is as spiritual men, and not merely as business men, that we are called to undertake offices and functions in the Church'97to work in, and with, and for Christ. Let ours be not a cold or lukewarm spirituality, but a spirituality that is hot and boiling.
(2) On the other hand, it may be maintained that it is the Holy Spirit, as personally dwelling in us, that is meant. '93Fervent in the Spirit'94 is an exact rendering of the original. But in fact the two renderings are at one: fervent in spirit; fervent in the Spirit. The fervency is, in every view of it, spiritual. It is so, inasmuch as it is fervency, not in the natural, but in the spiritual part of us; fervency working in us, not as carnal, but as spiritual. And it is so also because it is fervency wrought in us by the Holy Spirit.
4. The fervency, then, is to be spiritual. It is to have its seat in the heart's core of our spiritual life; it is to be the direct fruit of the Spirit there.
(1) To be fervent in spirit is something more than mere earnestness. Doing the work simply as a matter of business, we may do it very earnestly, taking a real interest in it, throwing our whole soul into it. But the interest which we take in it may be such as we might take in any employment that stimulated our activity and gave scope for the exercise of our natural sensibility. We may throw our soul into it, as into some heroic enterprise or sentimental scheme that has power to charm by its novelty or fascinate by its romance. But the essential element of real spirituality may be wanting; and with much bustling stir and much boiling enthusiasm in what we take to be religious work and duty, we may still need to be affectionately warned that '93to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.'94
It is not by becoming like Him that men will approach towards incorporation with Him; but by result of incorporation with Him, received in faith as a gift, and in faith adored, and used, that they will become like Him. It is by the imparted gift, itself far more than natural, of literal membership in Him; by the indwelling presence, the gradually disciplining and dominating influence, of His Spirit, which is His very Self within us, the inmost breath of our most secret being; that the power of His atoning life and death, which is the power of divinely victorious holiness, can grow to be the very deepest reality of ourselves.1 [Note: R. C. Moberly.]
A distinction must be drawn between the gifts of God and the gift of God. The gifts are natural endowments, energy, strength, sagacity, powers of body, mind, and character, all of them bestowed upon man without his asking. The gift is the Divine fire, the Spirit of God Himself, the gift of life, which is bestowed only on such as ask for it. Without the gift, the gifts may be put to the very worst uses. They may be a curse to him who has them and to his fellows. But if the gift be added to the gifts, then the gifts, as St. Paul would say, become the arms of righteousness wielded in God's cause. The more abundant the gifts, the richer the gift. The gift cannot create the gifts, it can only sanctify them. St. Peter had always been confident, vigorous, intrepid, fervid, and clear-sighted; St. Paul always logical, original, fiery, indomitable. They were both in nature leaders of men. When to these gifts the gift was added, St. Peter could not become a zealot, St. Paul could no longer remain a persecutor. They must work for God; they could not work against God.1 [Note: W. G. Rutherford.]
The man of the last generation who of all men did most to reinvigorate the life of the English Church, although he died outside her communion, lets out the secret of his fertile and lasting influence when he relates how the thought grew upon him and possessed him, '93that deliverance is wrought, not by the many, but by the few, not by bodies, but by persons,'94 and how from his schooldays onwards he loved and prized more every day the motto he had chosen as his own'97'93Exoriare aliquis.'94
(2) The very first condition of this spiritual fervency is that clear insight into the Divine method of peace, or that belief of the truth as it is in Jesus, which casts out self-righteousness, self-seeking, and self-esteem. Then those old natural fires, which, when fanned by winds from the spiritual region, make the heart and bosom burn, are extinguished and die out. There is no room now for the feelings of keen self-torture, or hot and heady self-elation, which once by turns inflamed the unsteadfast soul. New fires are kindled; feelings of an entirely new kind come in to occupy the place of the expelled. Far more gentle are they, far more calm! and yet how warm, how steadily and uniformly warm! For the source of them continues always the same. That source is Christ; Christ living in us'97'93Christ in us, the hope of glory.'94
I took this cutting from a newspaper the other day. '93A vicar tried last winter, in his attempt to win the man in the street, twelve concerts, twenty dances, six lectures, three Christmas-trees, and several other things, and all in vain.'94 I think that parish might try a real novelty'97the Gospel. I am persuaded of this, that the energy the Lord is going to use is the energy of the Spirit.1 [Note: Harrington Lees.]
III
Christward
'93Serving the Lord.'94
'93Serving the Lord'94'97this is the supreme motive of the Christian life. Some think that the word '93Spirit'94 may have suggested '93Lord,'94 which here refers not to the Father, but to Christ. There is another reading, '93serving the opportunity,'94 as the Greek words for '93Lord'94 and '93time'94 (or season, opportunity) are very much alike. But a great balance of manuscript authority is in favour of the reading '93Lord.'94 And, apart from the weight of authority on the side of the accepted text, the other reading seems to give a very incomplete climax to the Apostle's thought, while it breaks entirely the sequence which is discernible in it. In this, the closing member of the triplet, St. Paul suggests a thought which will be stimulus to the diligence and fuel to the fire that makes the spirit boil. In effect he says, '93Think, when your hands begin to droop, and when your spirits begin to be cold and indifferent, and languor to steal over you, and the paralysing influences of the commonplace and the familiar and the small begin to assert themselves, think that you are serving the Lord.'94 Will that not freshen you up? Will that not set you boiling again? Will it not be easy to be diligent when you feel that you are '93ever in the great Taskmaster's eye'94?
1. But what is meant by '93serving the Lord'94? It means in the first place that our work for Christ is not work that is voluntarily undertaken by us, but work that is imposed on us by a Master.
It is true that, as in Isaiah's case, the Lord may seem to put it to ourselves to come forward for His service of our own accord. In great kindness and condescension He allows us the satisfaction of offering ourselves as volunteers. Our engagement with Him is to have the grace, or graceful aspect, of being not so much a stern command on His part, leaving us no alternative but to enlist, but, rather, in the first instance, a spontaneous act on our part, hastening to place ourselves and our services at His disposal. But let us notice two things.
(1) To one dealt with as Isaiah was dealt with, the very hearing, or as it were the overhearing by accident, of that voice of the Lord, '93Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?'94 has all the force of a command. He must feel that the very idea of that Holy One, by whom he has first been so wonderfully humbled, and then lifted up, having work to be done, errands to be executed, lays him under an obligation to say, '93Here am I.'94 He has absolutely no alternative here, any more than if the most peremptory order had been issued. He is very thankful for the generous consideration which allows him to have the pleasure of volunteering; but he cannot on that account imagine for a moment that he has really any discretion in the matter, or any right to hesitate or hang back.
The right Christians are those who fear God, and work with a light joyful heart; because they recognize God's command and will. A good Christian peasant sees inscribed on his waggon and plough'97a shoemaker on his leather and awl, a smith and carpenter on his wood and iron'97this verse, '93Happy art thou. It is well with thee.'94 The world reverses this, and says, '93Wretched art thou, it is evil with thee, for thou must ever bear and carry; but happy are those who live in idleness, and have what they want, without labour.'941 [Note: Luther.]
What can God do for a lazy Christian, who is disloyal to His purposes and the needs of the perishing? While thus treating God and men there can be no deep personal spiritual life or growth in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ. Such people often say to me, '93Each time you come to us you seem to be mightily enjoying the religion you preach to us.'94 '93Yes,'94 I reply, '93I do enjoy my religion, twenty-four hours per day and three hundred and sixty-five days per year.'94 '93Well,'94 they say, '93I am often so cold and dead that I hardly know whether or not I have any religion at all.'94 When I ask them if they do any work for Christ and the saving and blessing of men, they usually answer me with a long-drawn-out '93Well no.'94 '93Then,'94 I always say, '93you deserve to starve.'941 [Note: T. Waugh, Twenty-Three years a Missioner, 194.]
Come weary-eyed from seeking in the night
Thy wanderers strayed upon the pathless wold,
Who wounded, dying, cry to Thee for light,
And cannot find their fold.
And deign, O Watcher with the sleepless brow,
Pathetic in its yearning'97deign reply:
Is there, O is there aught that such as Thou
Wouldst take from such as I?
Are there no briars across Thy pathway thrust?
Are there no thorns that compass it about?
Nor any stones that Thou wilt deign to trust
My hands to gather out?
O, if Thou wilt, and if such bliss might be,
It were a cure for doubt, regret, delay'97
Let my lost pathway go'97what aileth me?'97
There is a better way.2 [Note: Jean Ingelow.]
(2) And then, secondly, when his offer is accepted, and he is taken at his word, he is clearly now a servant under the yoke. He is not at liberty to decline any work that may be assigned to him, however difficult and laborious, however perilous and painful to flesh and blood. It may be different from what he anticipated; not so pleasant, not so honourable. But what of that? When he offered himself, he asked no questions; he had no right to ask any. He stipulated for no conditions; it would have been unbelief to do so. Unreservedly he said, '93Whatsoever be the errand, here am I; send me.'94 And he cannot qualify his offer, or attempt to make terms, now. Nor is this all. Not only must he undertake, as a servant, whatever work the Lord appoints; he must go through with it as a servant. He must feel himself to be a servant, bound to do the work, be it what it may. He must feel himself to be a servant, from first to last, in the doing of it.
I asked Thee for a larger life:
Thou gavedst me
A larger measure of the strife
Men wage for Thee;
And willed that where grey cares are rife
My place should be.
I asked Thee for the things that are
More excellent;
And prayed that nought on earth might mar
My heart's content:
And lo! a toilsome way and far
My feet were sent.
I asked Thee for a clearer view
To make me wise:
Thou saidst, '93It is enough for you
To recognize
My voice'94'97and then the darkness grew
Before my eyes.
I asked that I might understand
The way of pain:
Thine answer was to take my hand
In Thine again;
Nor aught of all Thy love had planned
Didst Thou explain.
I asked Thee once that I might fill
A higher place:
Thine answer was, '93O heart, be still,
And I will grace
Thy patience with some gift of skill
To serve the race.'94
And now I thank Thee for the prayer
Thou didst not hear;
And for the ministry of care,
The hour of fear,
For skies o'ercast, and places where
The way was drear.
For now I know that life is great
Not by the things
That make for peace, and all that Fate
Or Fortune flings
Down at my feet'97for soon or late
These all take wings.
I do not ask what joys or woes
Time holds for me:
I simply seek a love that goes
Out unto Thee,
As surely as the river flows
To meet the sea.1 [Note: Percy C. Ainsworth, Poems and Sonnets, 53.]
2. Is not this a lowering of the whole tone and style of our intercourse with the Lord, and our engagement for His work? After all seemed to be placed on the footing of a large and free commerce of love and confidence; when the adjustment of the whole question of our standing with God, and our relation to Him, had been taken out of the hands of law, and out of the category of legal bargaining, and transferred to a higher region, in which grace and honour reign; are we again to come down to the level of servants? Yes, and hired servants too. And why should this offend us? It did not offend Christ when He was doing His Father's work on earth. He did it as a servant, even as a hired servant, when He '93for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame.'94
Our Master all the work hath done
He asks of us to-day;
Sharing his service, every one
Share too his sonship may.
Lord, I would serve and be a son;
Dismiss me not, I pray.2 [Note: T. T. Lynch, The Rivulet, 4.]
3. Finally, obligation and responsibility are not badges of degradation. On the contrary, for intelligent creatures, on a right footing with their Creator, they are elements and conditions of highest glory and purest joy. Angels in heaven now work as servants; nay, as hired servants; for He whom they serve will never accept service unrequited. They work as servants, under obligation; upon their responsibility. It is in that character and capacity that they are summoned to join in the universal song of praise: '93Bless the Lord, ye his angels, that excel in strength, that do his commandments, hearkening unto the voice of his word. Bless ye the Lord, all ye his hosts; ye ministers of his, that do his pleasure'94 (Psa_103:20-21). Saints in heaven hereafter will work in like manner; in fact, one chief element of heaven's blessedness and glory is this, that there '93his servants shall serve him'94 (Rev_22:3). And all our work here on earth, we will do the better if we do it, not as at our own hand, but as '93serving the Lord.'94
If I knew it now, how strange it would seem,
To think, to know, ere another day
I should have passed over the silent way,
And my present life become as a dream;
But what if that step should usher me
Right into the sinless company
Of the saints in heaven.
I'll carefully watch the door of my lips
As I talk with my comrades to-day,
And think a little before I say,
To see that no careless expression slips,
Which I should find would so ill compare
With the holy converse uttered there,
By the saints in heaven.
If they let me in'97Oh, how sweet, how strange,
The thought that before a new day dawn,
I may put the incorruptible on,'97
That beautiful garment, the robe of change!
And walk and talk with that happy throng,
Perhaps join my voice in the '93new, new song,'94
With the saints in heaven.
But I fear I should be poorly meet
To mingle much with the saints at all;
My earthly service would seem so small'97
Just going of errands on tired feet;
But, oh! how blest, if it were my share
To be the trusted messenger there,
For the saints in heaven!
With holy missives to take and bring,
Sometime, perhaps, it would come to be
That some pure saint would commission me
To carry his message straight to the King
And the King His answer would defer,
To turn and smile on the messenger
Of His saints in heaven!1 [Note: Anna Jane Granniss.]
Outward, Inward, Christward
Literature
Brooke (S. A.), The Unity of God and Man, 155.
Burrell (D. J.), A Quiver of Arrows, 158.
Candlish (R. S.), The Two Great Commandments, 151.
Farrar (F. W.), Sin and its Conquerors, 38.
Jerdan (C.), Messages to the Children, 187.
Jowett (J. H.), Thirsting for the Springs, 152.
MacArthur (R. S.), The Calvary Pulpit, 43.
Maclaren (A.), Expositions: Romans, 267.
Maclaren (A.), Leaves from the Tree of Life, 63.
Percival (J.), Some Helps for School Life, 11.
Rutherford (W. G.), The Key of Knowledge, 218.
Spurgeon (C. H.), Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, xv. (1869), No. 885.
Vaughan (C. J.), Doncaster Sermons, 186.
Vaughan (D. J.), Questions of the Day, 144.
Vaughan (J.), Sermons (Brighton Pulpit), xi. No. 870.
Christian World Pulpit, xix. 5 (Beecher); xxx. 185 (Horder); lv. 72 (Stalker).
Contemporary Pulpit, 1st Ser., vii. 129.
Keswick Week (1908), 190 (Lees).
Autor: JAMES HASTINGS