Part 14 (1/2)

In one word, he believed in a living G.o.d. If anyone had said to the Psalmist, as I have heard men say now-a-days--Of course we believe, with you, in a general Providence of G.o.d over the whole universe. But you do not surely believe in special Providences? That would be superst.i.tion.

G.o.d governs the world by law, and not by special Providences. Then I believe that the Psalmist would have answered--Laws? I believe in them as much as you, and perhaps more than you. But as for special Providences, I believe in them so much, that I believe that the whole universe, and all that has ever happened in it from the beginning, has happened by special Providences; that not an organic being has a.s.sumed its present form, after long ages and generations, save by a continuous series of special Providences; that not a weed grows in a particular spot, without a special Providence of G.o.d that it should grow there, and nowhere else; then, and nowhen else. I believe that every step I take, every person I meet, every thought which comes into my mind--which is not sinful--comes and happens by the perpetual special Providence of G.o.d, watching for ever with Fatherly care over me, and each separate thing that He has made.

And if a modern philosopher--or one so called--had said to him,--'This is unthinkable and inconceivable, and therefore cannot be. I cannot ”think of”--I cannot conceive a mind--or as I call it--”a series of states of consciousness,” as antecedent to the infinity of processes simultaneously going on in all the plants that cover the globe, from scattered polar lichens to crowded tropical palms, and in all the millions of animals which roam among them, and the millions of millions of insects which buzz among them:'--Then the Psalmist would have answered him, I believe,--'If you cannot, my friend, I can. And you must not make your power of thought and conception the measure of the universe, or even of other men's intellects; or say--”Because I cannot conceive a thing, therefore no man can conceive it, and therefore it does not exist.” But pray, O philosopher, if you cannot think and conceive of the omnipresence and omnipotence of G.o.d, what can you think and conceive?'

Then if that philosopher had answered him--as some would now-a-days--'I can conceive that the properties of very different elements,--and therefore the infinite variety and richness of nature which I cannot conceive as caused by a G.o.d--that the properties--I say--of different elements result from differences of arrangement arising by the compounding and recompounding of ultimate h.o.m.ogeneous units'--Then, I think, the Psalmist would have replied, as soon as he had--like Socrates of old in a like case--recovered from the 'dizziness' caused by an eloquence so unlike his own--'Why, this proposition is far more ”unthinkable” to me, and will be to 999 of 1000 of the human race, than mine about a G.o.d and a Providence. Alas! for the vagaries of the mind of man. When it wants to prove a pet theory of its own, it will strain at any gnat, and swallow any camel.'

But again--if a philosopher of more reasonable mood had said to him--as he very likely would say--'This is a grand conception of G.o.d: but what proof have you of it? How do you know that G.o.d does interfere, by special Providences, in the world around us; not only, as you say, perpetually: but even now and then, and at all?'

Then the Psalmist, like all true Jews, would have gone back to a certain old story which is to me the most precious story, save one, that ever was written on earth; and have taken his stand on that. He would have gone back--as the Scripture always goes back--to the story of Moses and the Israelites in Egypt, and have said--'Whatever I know or do not know about the Laws of nature, this I know--That G.o.d can use them as He chooses, to punish the wicked, and to help the miserable. For He did so by my forefathers. When we Jews were a poor, small, despised tribe of slaves in Egypt, The G.o.d who made heaven and earth shewed Himself at once the G.o.d of nature, and the G.o.d of grace. For He took the powers of nature; and fought with them against proud Pharaoh and all his hosts; and shewed that they belonged to Him; and that He could handle them all to do His work. He shewed that He was Lord, not only of the powers of nature which give life and health, but of those which give death and disease. Nothing was too grand, nor too mean, for Him to use. He took the lightning and the hail, and the pestilence, and the darkness, and the East wind, and the springtides of the Red sea; and He took also the locust-swarms, and the frogs, and the lice, and the loathsome skin-diseases of Egypt, and the microscopic atomies which turn whole rivers into blood, and kill the fish; and with them He fought against Pharaoh the man-G.o.d, the tyrant ruling at his own will in the name of his father the sun-G.o.d and of the powers of nature; till Egypt was destroyed, and Pharaoh's host drowned in the sea; And He brought out my forefathers with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, because He had heard their cry in Egypt, and saw their oppression under cruel taskmasters, and pitied them, and had mercy on them in their slavery and degradation.' That is my G.o.d--the old Psalmist would have said. Not merely a strong G.o.d, or a wise G.o.d; but a good G.o.d, and a gracious G.o.d, and a just G.o.d likewise; a G.o.d who not only made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that therein is, but who keepeth His promise for ever; who helpeth them to right who suffer wrong, and feedeth the hungry.

Yes, my friends, it is this magnificent conception of G.o.d's living and actual goodness and justice, which the Psalmist had, which made him trust G.o.d about all the strange and painful things which he saw in the world--about, for instance, the suffering and death of animals; and say--'If the lion roaring after his prey seeks his meat, he seeks his meat from G.o.d: and therefore he ought to seek it, and he will find it. It is all well: I know not why: but well it is, for it is the law and will of the good and righteous and gracious G.o.d, who brought His people out of the land of Egypt. And that is enough for me.'

Enough for him? and should it not be enough for us, and more than enough?--We know what the Psalmist knew not. We know G.o.d to be more good, more righteous, more gracious than any Prophet or Psalmist could know. We know that G.o.d so loved the world, that He spared not His only- begotten Son, but freely gave Him for us. We know that the only-begotten Son Jesus Christ so loved the world that He stooped to be born and suffer as mortal man, and to die on the cross, even while He was telling men that not a sparrow fell to the ground without the knowledge of their heavenly Father, and bidding them see how G.o.d fed the birds and clothed the lilies of the field. Ah, my friends, in this case, as in all cases, rest and comfort for our doubts and fears is to be found in one and the same place--at the foot of the Cross of Christ. If we believe that He who hung upon that Cross is--as He is--the maker and ruler of the universe, the same from day to day and for ever: then we can trust Him in darkness as well as in light; in doubt as well as in certainty; in the face of pain, disease, and death, as well as in the face of joy, health, and life; and say--Lord, we know not, but Thou knowest. Lord, we believe, help Thou our unbelief. Make us sure that Thou, Lord, shalt save both man and beast. For great are Thy mercies, O Lord; and the children of men shall put their trust under the shadow of Thy wings.

Yes, my friends, this is, after all, a strange world, a solemn world, a world full of sad mysteries, past our understanding. As was said once by the holiest of modern Englishmen, now gone home to his rest--whose bust stands worthily in yonder chapel--This is a world in which men must be sometimes sad who love G.o.d, and care for their fellow-men.

But it is not over the dumb animals that we must mourn. For they fulfil the laws of their being; and whatever meat they seek, they seek their meat from G.o.d.

Rather must we mourn over those human beings who, being made in the likeness of G.o.d, and redeemed again into that likeness by our Lord Jesus Christ, and baptized into that likeness by the Holy Spirit, put on again of their own will the likeness of the beasts which perish; and find too often, alas! too late, that the wages of sin are death.

Rather must we mourn for those human beings who do not fulfil the laws of their being: but break those laws by sin; till they are ground by them to powder.

Rather must we mourn for those who seek their meat, not from G.o.d, but from the world and the flesh; and neglect the bread which cometh down from heaven, and the meat which endureth to eternal life, whereof the Lord who gives it said--Seek ye first the kingdom of G.o.d, and His righteousness, and all other things shall be added unto you.

Rather must we pray for ourselves, and for all we love, that G.o.d's Spirit of eternal life would raise us up, more and more day by day, out of the likeness of the old Adam, who was of the earth, earthy; of whom it is written that--like the animals--dust he was, and unto dust he must return; and would mould us into the likeness of the new Adam, who is the Lord from heaven, into the likeness of which it is written, that it is created after G.o.d's image, in righteousness and true holiness; the end of which is not death, but everlasting life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

And so will be fulfilled in us the saying of the Psalmist; and the Lord shall rejoice in His works: for we too, not only body and soul, but spirit also, shall be the work of G.o.d; and G.o.d will rejoice in us, and we in G.o.d.

SERMON XIX. SIGNS AND WONDERS.

JOHN IV. 48-50.

Then said Jesus unto him, Except ye see signs and wonders, ye will not believe. The n.o.bleman saith unto him, Sir, come down ere my child die. Jesus saith unto him, Go thy way; thy son liveth.

These words of our Lord are found in the Gospel for this day. They are a rebuke, though a gentle one. He reproved the n.o.bleman, seemingly, for his want of faith: but He worked the miracle, and saved the life of the child.

We do not know enough of the circ.u.mstances of this case, to know exactly why our Lord reproved the n.o.bleman; and what want of faith He saw in him.

Some think that the man's fault was his mean notion of our Lord's power; his wish that He should come down the hills to Capernaum, and see the boy Himself, in order to cure him; whereas he ought to have known that our Lord could cure him--as He did--at a distance, and by a mere wish, which was no less than a command to nature, and to that universe which He had made.

I cannot tell how this may be: but of one thing I think we may be sure--That this saying of our Lord's is very deep, and very wide; and applies to many people, in many times--perhaps to us in these modern times.

We must recollect one thing--That our Lord did not put forward the mere power of His miracles as the chief sign of His being the Son of G.o.d. Not so: He declared His almighty power most chiefly by shewing mercy and pity. Twice He refused to give the Scribes and Pharisees a sign from heaven. ”An evil and adulterous generation,” He said, ”seeketh after a sign: but there shall be no sign given them, but the sign of the prophet Jonas.” And what was that,--but a warning to repent, and mend their ways, ere it was too late?

Now the slightest use of our common sense must tell us, that our Lord could have given a sign of His almighty power if He had chosen; and such a sign as no man, even the dullest, could have mistaken. What prodigy could He not have performed, before Scribes and Pharisees, Herod, and Pontius Pilate? ”Thinkest thou,” He said Himself, ”that I cannot now pray to My Father, and He will send Me presently more than twelve legions of angels?” Yet how did our Lord use that miraculous and almighty power of His? Sparingly, and secretly. Sparingly; for He used it almost entirely in curing the diseases of poor people; and secretly; for He used it almost entirely in remote places. Jerusalem itself, recollect, was at best a remote city compared with any of the great cities of the Roman empire. And even there He refused to cast Himself down from a pinnacle of the temple, for a sign and wonder to the Jews. If He, the Lord of the world, had meant to convert the world by prodigious miracles, He would surely have gone to Rome itself, the very heart and centre of the civilized world, and have shewn such signs and wonders therein, as would have made the Caesar himself come down from his throne, and wors.h.i.+p Him, the Lord of all.

But no. Our Lord wished for the obedience, not of men's lips, but of their hearts. It was their hearts which He wished to win, that they might love Him--and be loyal to Him--for the sake of His goodness; and not fear and tremble before Him for the sake of His power. And therefore He kept, so to speak, His power in the background, and put His goodness foremost; only shewing His power in miracles of healing and mercy; that so poor neglected, oppressed, hardworked souls might understand that whoever did not care for them, Christ their Lord did; and that their disease and misery were not His will; nor the will of His Father and their Father in heaven.