Part 11 (2/2)

As He said on the Sermon on the Mount, 'Whoso shall do and teach one of the least of these commandments shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.' The higher we are, the more we are bound to punctilious obedience to the smallest injunction. The more we are obedient to the lightest of His commandments, the greater we become. Thus the least in the kingdom may become the greatest there, if only, cleaving close to Christ, he forgets himself, and lives for others, and does the Father's will.

III. Lastly, I travel for a moment beyond my text, and note the perfect greatness of all in the perfected kingdom.

The very notion of a kingdom of G.o.d established in reality, however imperfectly here on earth, demands that somewhere, and some time, and somehow, there should be an adequate, a universal and an eternal manifestation and establishment of it. If, here and now, dotted about over the world, there are men who, with much hindrance and many breaks in their obedience, are still the subjects of that realm, and trying to do the will of G.o.d, unless we are reduced to utter bewilderment intellectually, there must be a region in which that will shall be perfectly done, shall be continually done, shall be universally done. The obedience that we render to Him, just because it is broken by so much rebellion, slackened by so much indifference, hindered by so many clogs, hampered by so many limitations, points, by its attainments and its imperfections alike, to a region where the clogs and limitations and interruptions shall have all vanished, and the will of the Lord shall be the life and the light thereof.

So there rises up before us the fair prospect of that heavenly kingdom, in which all that here is interrupted and thwarted tendency shall have become realised effect.

That state must necessarily be a state of continual advance. For if greatness consists in apprehension and appropriation of Christ and His work, there are no limits to the possible expansion and a.s.similation of a human heart to Him, and the wealth of His glory is absolutely boundless. An infinite Christ to be a.s.similated, and an indefinite capacity of a.s.similation in us, make the guarantee that eternity shall see the growing progress of the subjects of the kingdom, in resemblance to the King.

If there is this endless progress, which is the only notion of heaven that clothes with joy and peace the awful thought of unending existence, then there will be degrees there too, and the old distinction of 'least' and 'greatest' in the kingdom will subsist to the end. The army marches onwards, but they are not all abreast.

They that are in front do not intercept any of the blessings or of the light that come to the rearmost files; and they that are behind are advancing and envy not those who lead the march.

Only let us remember, brother, that the distinction of least and great in the kingdom, in its imperfect forms on earth, is carried onwards into the kingdom in its perfect form into heaven. The highest point of our attainment here is the starting-point of our progress yonder. 'An entrance shall be ministered'; it may be 'ministered abundantly,' or we may be 'saved yet so as by fire.' Let us see to it that, being least in our own eyes, we belong to the greatest in the kingdom. And that we may, let us hold fast by the Source of all greatness, Christ Himself, and so we shall be launched on a career of growing greatness, through the ages of eternity. To be joined to Him is greatness, however small the world may think us.

To be separate from Him is to be small, though the hosannas of the world may misname us great.

THWARTING G.o.d'S PURPOSE

'The Pharisees and lawyers rejected the counsel of G.o.d against themselves, being not baptized of Him.'

--LUKE vii. 30.

Our Lord has just been pouring unstinted praise on the head of John the Baptist. The eulogium was tenderly timed, for it followed, and was occasioned by the expression, through messengers, of John's doubts of Christ's Messiahs.h.i.+p. Lest these should shake the people's confidence in the Forerunner, and make them think of him as weak and s.h.i.+fting, Christ speaks of him in the glowing words which precede my text, and declares that he is no 'reed shaken with the wind.'

But what John was was of less moment to Christ's listeners than was what they had done with John's message. So our Lord swiftly pa.s.ses from His eulogium upon John to the sharp thrust of the personal application to His hearers. In the context He describes the twofold treatment which that message had received; and so describes it as, in the description, to lay bare the inmost characteristics of the reception or rejection of the message. As to the former, He says that the ma.s.s of the common people, and the outcast publicans, 'justified G.o.d'; by which remarkable expression seems to be meant that their reception of John's message and baptism acknowledged G.o.d's righteousness in accusing them of sin and demanding from them penitence.

On the other hand, the official cla.s.s, the cultivated people, the orthodox respectable people--that is to say, the dead formalists--'rejected the counsel of G.o.d against themselves.'

Now the word 'rejected' would be more adequately rendered '_frustrated,_' thwarted, made void, or some such expression, as indeed it is employed in other places of Scripture, where it is translated 'disannulled,' 'made void,' and the like. And if we take that meaning, there emerge from this great word of the Master's two thoughts, that to disbelieve G.o.d's word is to thwart G.o.d's purpose, and that to thwart His purpose is to harm ourselves.

I. And I remark, first, that the sole purpose which G.o.d has in view in speaking to us men is our blessing.

I suppose I need not point out to you that 'counsel' here does not mean _advice_, but _intention_. In regard to the matter immediately in hand, G.o.d's purpose or _counsel_ in sending the Forerunner was, first of all, to produce in the minds of the people a true consciousness of their own sinfulness and need of cleansing; and so to prepare the way for the coming of the Messiah, who should bring the inward gift which they needed, and so secure their salvation. The intention was, first, to bring to repentance, but that was a preparation for bringing to them full forgiveness and cleansing. And so we may fairly widen the thought into the far greater and n.o.bler one which applies especially to the message of G.o.d in Jesus Christ, and say that the only design which G.o.d has in view, in the gospel of His Son, is the highest blessing--that is, the salvation--of every man to whom it is spoken.

Now, by the gospel, which, as I say, has thus one single design in the divine mind, I mean, what I think the New Testament means, the whole body of truths which underlie and flow from the fact of Christ's Death, Resurrection, and Ascension, which in brief are these--man's sin, man's helplessness, the Incarnation of the Son of G.o.d, the Death of Christ as the sacrifice for the world's sin; Faith, as the one hand by which we grasp the blessing, and the gift of a Divine Spirit which follows upon our faith, and bestows upon us sons.h.i.+p and likeness to G.o.d, purity of life and character, and heaven at last. That, as I take it, is in the barest outline what is meant by the gospel of Jesus Christ.

And now I want to press upon you, dear friends, that that great and sublime body of truths made known to us, as I believe, from G.o.d Himself, has one sole object in view and none beside--viz. that every man who hears it may partake of the salvation and the hope which it brings. It has a twofold effect, alas! but the twofold effect does not imply a twofold purpose. There have been schemes of so-called Christian theology which have darkened the divine character in this respect, and have obscured the great thought that G.o.d has one end in view, and one only, when He speaks to us in all good faith, desiring nothing else but only that we shall be gathered into His heart, and made partakers of His love. He is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to the knowledge of the truth.

If so, the question comes very sharp and direct to each of us, Is that gospel fulfilling its purpose in me? There are many subordinate good things flowing from the Christian revelation, such as blessings for social outward life, which are as flowers that spring up in its path; but unless it has effected its one purpose in regard to you and me, it has failed altogether. G.o.d meant His word to save your soul. Has it done so? It is a question that any man can answer if he--will be honest with himself.

Further, this single purpose of the divine speech embraces in its intention each of the hearers of that message. I want to gather the wide-flowing generality, 'G.o.d so loved the world that He sent His Son that whosoever believeth,' into this sharp point, 'G.o.d so loved _me_, that He sent His Son that _I_, believing, might have life eternal.' We shall never understand the universality of Christianity until we have appreciated the personality and the individuality of its message to each of us. G.o.d does not lose thee in the crowd, do not thou lose thyself in it, nor fail to apprehend that _thou_ art personally meant by His broadest declarations. It is _thy_ salvation that Christ had in view when He became man and died on the Cross; and it is thy salvation that He had in view when He said to His servants, 'Go into _all_ the world'--there is universality--'and preach the Gospel to _every_ creature'--there is individuality.

Then, further, G.o.d is verily seeking to accomplish this purpose even now, by my lips, in so far as I am true to my Master and my message.

The outward appearance of what we are about now is that I am trying, lamely enough, to speak to you. You may judge this service by rules of rhetoric, or anything else you like. But you have not got to the bottom of things unless you feel, as I am praying that every one of you may feel, that even with all my imperfections on my head--and I know them better than you can tell me them--I, like all true men who are repeating G.o.d's message as they have caught it, neither more nor less, and have sunk themselves in it, may venture to say, as the Apostle said: 'Now, then, we are amba.s.sadors for G.o.d, as though G.o.d did beseech by us, we pray in Christ's stead.' John's voice was a revelation of G.o.d's purpose, and the voice of every true preacher of Jesus Christ is no less so.

II. Secondly, this single divine purpose, or 'counsel,' may be thwarted.

'They frustrated the counsel of G.o.d.' Of all the mysteries of this inexplicable world, the deepest, the mother-mystery of all, is, that given an infinite will and a creature, the creature can thwart the infinite. I said that was the mystery of mysteries: 'Our wills are ours we know not how,'--No! indeed we don't!--'Our wills are ours to make them Thine.' But that purpose necessarily requires the possibility of the alternative that our wills are ours, and we _refuse_ 'to make them Thine.' The possibility is mysterious; the reality of the fact is tragic and bewildering. We need no proof except our own consciousness; and if that were silenced we should have the same fact abundantly verified in the condition of the world around us, which sadly shows that not yet is G.o.d's 'will' done 'on earth as it is in heaven,' but that men can and do lift themselves up against G.o.d and set themselves in antagonism to His most gracious purposes. And whosoever refuses to accept G.o.d's message in Christ and G.o.d's salvation revealed in that message is thus setting himself in battle array against the infinite, and so far as in him lies (that is to say, in regard to his own personal condition and character) is thwarting G.o.d's most holy will.

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