Part 13 (1/2)
If there is any failure, it is with ourselves. We have not believed in the mighty power and presence of G.o.d, because we have missed the outward and visible sign of his working. We have thought that He was not here, because He has not been in the fire, the earthquake, or the mighty wind which rends the mountains. We have become so accustomed to a.s.sociate the startling and spectacular with the Divine, that we fail to discover G.o.d, when the heaven is begemmed with stars, and the earth carpeted with flowers: as though the lightning were more to us than starlight, and the destructive than the peaceful and patient constructive forces, which are ever at work building up and repairing the fabric of the universe.
Do not look back on the Incarnation, or forward to the Second Advent, as though there were more of G.o.d in either one or the other than is within our reach. G.o.d is; G.o.d is here; G.o.d is indivisible: all of G.o.d is present at any given point of time or place. He may choose to manifest Himself in outward signs, which impress the imagination more at one time than another; the faith of the Church maybe quicker to apprehend and receive in one century than the next: but all time is great--every age is equally his workmans.h.i.+p, and equally full of his wonder-working power. Alas for us, that our eyes are holden!
_Let us not disparage the ordinary and commonplace_. We are all taught to run after the startling and extraordinary--the statesman who accomplishes the _coup d'etat_; the painter who covers a large canvas with a view to scenic effects; the preacher who indulges in superficial and showy rhetoric, the musician whose execution is brilliant and astonis.h.i.+ng. We like miracles! Whatever appeals to our love for the sensational and unexpected is likely enough to displace our appreciation of the simple and ordinary. When the sun is eclipsed, we all look heavenward; but the golden summer days may be filled with sunlight, which is dismissed with a commonplace remark about the weather. A whole city will turn out to see the illuminations, whilst the stars hardly attract a pa.s.sing notice. Let there be a show of curiously-shaped orchids, and society is stirred; but who will travel far to see a woodland glade blue with wild hyacinths, or a meadow-lawn besprent with daisies. Thus our tastes are vitiated and blinded.
It is good to cultivate simple tastes. The pure and childlike heart will find unspeakable enjoyment in all that G.o.d has made, though it be as familiar as a lawn sparkling with dewdrops, a hay-field scented by clover-blooms, a streamlet murmuring over the pebbles, or the drawl of the s.h.i.+ngle after a retreating wave. It is a symptom of a weak and unstable nature to be always in search for some new thing, for some greater sensation, for some more startling sign. ”Show us a sign from heaven,” is the incessant cry of the Pharisee and Scribe: and when the appet.i.te has been once created, it can never be appeased, but is always set on some novelty more marvellous and startling than anything which has preceded. Be content with a holy ministry which does not dazzle by its fireworks, but sheds a steady suns.h.i.+ne on the sacred page.
Cultivate familiarity with the grand, solid works of our English literature. Avoid the use of extravagant adjectives. Take an interest in the games of children; in the common round and daily task of servants and employes; in the toils and tears of working-girls; in the struggling lot of the charwoman who scrubs your floors, and the lad who cleans your boots. Do not be always gaping at the window for bands to come down the street; but be on the pavement before your house with a helping-hand and kindly word for the ordinary folk that labour and are heavy-laden. It is remarkable that in all these there are tragedies and comedies; the raw material for novels and romances; the characters which fill the pages of a Shakespeare or George Eliot. All life is so interesting; but we need eyes to see, and hearts to understand. There has been no age greater than this; there is no part of the world more full of G.o.d than yours; there is no reason why you should not see Madonnas in the ordinary women, and Last Suppers in the ordinary meals, and Holy Families in the ordinary groups around you--if only you have the anointed eyes of a Raffaelle or a Leonardo de Vinci. If the world seems common or unclean to you, the fault lies in your eyes that have made it so.
_Let us not disparage ourselves_. We know our limitations; we are not capable of working miracles--our best friends are well acquainted with this, for no eyes are quicker than Love's. We are sparrows, not larks; clay, not alabaster; deal, not mahogany. But if we cannot work miracles, we can speak true, strong words about Jesus Christ; we can bear witness to Him as the Lamb of G.o.d; we can urge men to repent and believe the Gospel. The world would have been in a sorry plight if it had depended entirely on its geniuses and miracle-workers. Probably it owes less to them than to the untold myriads of simple, humble, obscure, and commonplace people, whose names will never be recorded in its roll-call, but whose lives have laid the foundations on which the superstructure of good order, and government, and prosperity, has been reared.
Remember that G.o.d made you what you are, and placed you. Dare to be yourself--a simple, humble, sincere follower of Jesus. Do not seek to imitate this or the other great speaker or leader. Be content to find out what G.o.d made you for, and be that at its best. You will be a bad copy, but a unique original; for the Almighty always breaks the pattern from which He has made one vase. Above all, speak out the truth, as G.o.d has revealed it to you, distorting, exaggerating, omitting nothing; and long after you have pa.s.sed away, those who remember you will gather at your grave and say, ”he did no miracle--there was nothing sensational or phenomenal in his life-work; but he spake true things about Jesus Christ, which we have tested for ourselves, and are undeniable. Indeed, they led us to believe in Him for ourselves.”
II. THE WAYS IN WHICH WE MAY BEAR TESTIMONY TO THE LORD JESUS.--There is no miracle in your life, my reader. You are no genius; you do not know what it is to have the rush of thought, the power of brilliant speech, the burst of song. You have no wealth, only just enough for your bare sustenance, and nothing to spare. You have no rich blood in your veins, come of a line of heroes or saints. As you look daily into the common routine of your lot, it seems ordinary enough. Be it so; there is at least one thing you can do, as we have seen--like the Baptist, you may witness for Jesus.
_Speak to others privately_. When only two disciples were standing beside him, John preached the same sermon as he had delivered to the crowd the day before, and both of them went to the frail lodging where Jesus was making his abode. There is nothing that more deeply searches a man than the habit of speaking to individuals about the love of G.o.d.
We cannot do it unless we are in living union with Himself. Nothing so tests the soul. It is easy to preach a sermon, when the inner life is out of fellows.h.i.+p with G.o.d, because you can preach your ideals, or avenge on others the sins of which you are inwardly conscious; but to speak to another about Christ involves that there should be an absolutely clear sky between the speaker and the Lord of whom he speaks. But as this practice is the most difficult, it is the most blessed in its reflex influence. To lead another to Jesus is to get nearer Him. To chafe the limbs of some frozen companion is to send the warm blood rus.h.i.+ng through your own veins. To go after one lost sheep is to share the shepherd's joy. Whether by letters addressed to relatives or companions, or by personal and direct appeal, let each one of us adopt the sacred practice, which Mr. Moody followed and commended, of allowing no day to pa.s.s without seeking to use some opportunity given by G.o.d for definite, personal dealings with others.
The apostle Andrew seems to have specially consecrated his life to this. On each of the occasions he is referred to in the Gospels he is dealing with individuals. He brought his own brother; was the first to seek after a boy to bring to the Saviour's presence; and at the close of our Lord's ministry he brings the seeking Greeks. Did he not learn this blessed art from his master, the Baptist?
It is requisite that there should be the deliberate resolution to pursue this holy habit; definite prayer for guidance as one issues from the morning hour of prayer; abiding fellows.h.i.+p with the Son of G.o.d, that He may give the right word at the right moment; and a willingness to open the conversation by some manifestation of the humble, loving disposition begotten by the Holy Spirit, which is infinitely attractive and beautiful to the most casual pa.s.ser-by.
_Speak experimentally_. ”I saw and bare record.” John spoke of what he had seen, and tasted, and handled. Be content to say, ”I was lost, but Jesus found me, blind, and He gave me sight; unclean, and He cleansed my heart.” Nothing goes so far to convince another as to hear the accent of conviction on the lips of one whose eyes survey the landscape of truth to which he allures, and whose ears are open to the eternal harmonies which he describes.
_Speak from a full heart_. The lover cannot but speak about his love; the painter can do no other than transfer to canvas the conceptions that entrance his soul; the musician is constrained to give utterance to the chords that pa.s.s in mighty procession through his brain. ”We cannot but speak the things that we have seen and heard.”
Does it seem difficult to have always a full heart? Verily, it is difficult, and impossible, unless the secret has been acquired of abiding always in the love of G.o.d, of keeping the entire nature open to the Holy Spirit, and of nouris.h.i.+ng the inward strength by daily meditation on the truth. We must close our senses to the sounds and sights around us, that our soul may open to the unseen and eternal. We must have deep and personal fellows.h.i.+p with the Father and the Son by the Holy Ghost. We must live at first-hand on the great essentials of our faith. Then, as the vine-sap arises from the root, its throb and pulse will be irresistible in our behaviour and testimony. We shall speak true things about Jesus Christ. Our theme will be evermore the inexhaustible one of Christ--Christ, only Christ--not primarily the doctrine about Him, or the benefits accruing from fellows.h.i.+p with Him, but Himself.
Thus, some day, at your burying, as men turn homewards from the new-made grave, and speak those final words of the departed, which contain the most unerring verdict and summing-up of the life, they will say, ”He will be greatly missed. He was no genius, not eloquent nor profound; but he used to speak about Christ in such a way that he led me to know Him for myself: I owe everything to him. He did no miracle; but whatever he said of Jesus was true.”
III. THE POWER OF POSTHUMOUS INFLUENCE.--John had been dead for many months, but the stream he had set flowing continued to flow; the harvests he sowed sprang into mature and abundant fruitage; the wavelets of tremulous motion which he had started circled out and on.
How many voices are speaking still in our lives--voices from the grave!
voices from dying beds! voices from books and sermons! voices from heaven! ”Being dead, they yet speak.” Let us live so that, when we are gone, our influence shall tell, and the accents of our voice linger. No one lives or dies to himself. Each grain on the ocean-sh.o.r.e affects the position of every other. Each star is needed for the perfect balance of the spheres. Each of us is affecting the lives of all that are now existing with us in the world, or will exist.
To untold ages, what we have been and said will affect all other beings for good or ill. We may be forgiven for having missed our opportunities, or started streams of poison instead of life; but the ill effect can never be undone.
Parents, put your hands on those young childish heads, and say pure, sweet words of Christ, which will return to memory and heart long after you have gone to your reward! Ministers of religion, and Sunday school teachers, remember your tremendous responsibility to use to the uttermost the opportunity of saying words which will never die!
Friend, be true and faithful with your friend; he may turn away in apparent thoughtlessness or contempt, but no right word spoken for Christ can ever really die. It will live in the long after years, and bear fruit, as the seeds hidden in the old Egyptian mummy-cases are bearing fruit to-day in English soil.
XVII.
The Spirit and Power of Elias.
(LUKE I. 17.)
”Oh, may I join the choir invisible Of those immortal dead who live again In minds made better by their presence: live In pulses stirred to generosity; In deeds of daring rect.i.tude; in scorn For miserable aims that end with self; In thoughts sublime that pierce the night like stars, And with their mild persistence urge man's search To vaster issues.”