How often one sees a person—a woman, say—easy and comfortable, enjoying
life, and taking little trouble about anything, because she has no need.
And when one looks at such a woman, one is apt to say hastily in one’s
heart, ‘Ah, she does not know what sorrow is—and well for her she does
not; for she would make but a poor fight if trouble came on her; she
would make but a poor nurse if she had to sit months by a sick bed. She
would become down-hearted, and peevish, and useless. There is no
strength in her to stand in the evil day.’
And perhaps that woman would say so of herself. She might be painfully
afraid of the thought of affliction; she might shrink from the notion of
having to nurse any one; from having to give up her own pleasure and ease
for the sake of others; and she would say of herself, as you say of her,
‘What would become of me if sorrow came? _I_ have no strength to stand
in the evil day.’
Yes, my friends, and you say true, and she says true. And yet not true
either. She has no strength to stand: but she will stand nevertheless,
for God is able to make her stand. As her day, so her strength shall be.
A day of suffering, anxiety, weariness, all but despair may come to her.
But in that day she shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit and with fire;
and then you shall be astonished, and she shall be astonished, at what
she can do, and what she can endure; because God’s Spirit will give her a
right judgment in all things, and enable her, even in the midst of her
sorrow, to rejoice in his holy comfort. And people will call her—those
at least who know her—a ‘heroine.’ And they speak truly and well, and
give her the right and true name. Why, I will tell you presently.
Or how often it happens to a man to be thrown into circumstances which he
never expected. An officer, perhaps, in war time in a foreign land—in
India now. He has a work to do: a heavy, dangerous, difficult, almost
hopeless work. He does not like it. He is afraid of it. He wishes
himself anywhere but where he is. He has little or no hope of
succeeding; and if he fails, he fears that he will be blamed,
misunderstood, slandered. But he feels he must go through with it. He
cannot turn back; he cannot escape. As the saying is, the bull is
brought to the stake, and he must bide the baiting.
At first, perhaps, he tries to buoy himself up. He begins his work in a
little pride and self-conceit, and notion of his own courage and cunning.
He tries to fancy himself strong enough for anything. He feeds himself
up with the thought of what people will say of him; the hope of gaining
honour and praise: and that is not altogether a wrong feeling—God forbid!
But the further the man gets into his work, the more difficult it grows,
and the more hopeless he grows. He finds himself weak, when he expected
to be strong; puzzled when he thought himself cunning. He is not sure
whether he is doing right. He is afraid of responsibility. It is a
heavy burden on him, too heavy to bear. His own honour and good name may
depend upon a single word which he speaks. The comfort, the fortune, the
lives of human beings may depend on his making up his mind at an hour’s
notice to do exactly the right thing at the right time. People round him
may be mistaking him, slandering him, plotting against him, rebelling
against him, even while he is trying to do them all the good he can.
Little comfort does he get then from the thought of what people at home
may say of him. He is set in the snare, and he cannot find his way out.
He is at his own wits’ end; and from whence shall he get fresh wits? Who
will give him a right judgment in all things? Who will give him a holy
comfort in which he can rejoice?—a comfort which will make him cheerful,
because he knows it is a right comfort, and that he is doing right? His
heart is sinking within him, getting chill and cold with despair. Who
will put fresh fire and spirit into it?
God will. When he has learnt how weak he is in himself, how stupid he is
in himself;—ay, bitter as it is to a brave man to have to confess it, how
cowardly he is in himself—then, when he has learnt the golden lesson, God
will baptize him with the Holy Ghost and with fire.
A time will come to that man, when, finding no help in himself, no help
in man, he will go for help to God.
Old words which he learnt at his mother’s knee come back to him—old words
that he almost forgot, perhaps, in the strength and gaiety of his youth
and prosperity. And he prays. He prays clumsily enough, perhaps. He is
not accustomed to praying; and he hardly knows what to ask for, or how to
ask for it. Be it so. In that he is not so very much worse off than
others. What did St. Paul say, even of himself? ‘We know not how to ask
for anything as we ought: but the Spirit maketh intercession for us with
groanings that cannot be uttered’—too deep for words. Yes, in every
honest heart there are longings too deep for words. A man knows he wants
something: but knows not what he wants. He cannot find the right words
to say to God. Let him take comfort. What he does not know, the Holy
Spirit of Whitsuntide—the Spirit of Jesus Christ—does know. Christ knows
what we want, and offers our clumsy prayers up to our heavenly Father,
not in the shape in which we put them, but as they ought to be, as we
should like them to be; and our Father hears them.
Yes. Our Father hears the man who cries to him, however clumsily, for
light and strength to do his duty. So it is; so it has been always; so
it will be to the end. And then as the man’s day, so his strength will
be. He may be utterly puzzled, utterly down-hearted, utterly hopeless:
but the day comes to him in which he is baptized with the Holy Ghost and
with fire. He begins to have a right judgment; to see clearly what he
ought to do, and how to do it. He grows more shrewd, more prompt, more
steady than he ever has been before. And there comes a fire into his
heart, such as there never was before; a spirit and a determination which
nothing can daunt or break, which makes him bold, cheerful, earnest, in
the face of the anxiety and danger which would have, at any other time,
broken his heart. The man is lifted up above himself, and carried on
through his work, he hardly knows how, till he succeeds nobly, or if he
fails, fails nobly; and be the end as it may, he gets the work done which
God has given him to do.
And then when he looks back, he is astonished at himself. He wonders how
he could dare so much; wonders how he could endure so much; wonders how
the right thought came into his head at the right moment. He hardly
knows himself again. It seems to him, when he thinks over it all, like a
grand and awful dream. And the world is astonished at him likewise.
They cry, ‘Who would have thought there was so much in this man? who
would have expected such things of him?’ And they call him a hero—and so
he is.
Yes, the world is right, more right than it thinks in both sayings. Who
would have expected there was so much in the man? For there was not so
much in him, till God put it there.
And again they are right, too; more right than they think in calling that
man a hero, or that woman a heroine.
For what is the old meaning, the true meaning of a hero or a heroine?
It meant—and ought to mean—one who is a son or a daughter of God, and
whom God informs and strengthens, and sends out to do noble work,
teaching them the way wherein they should go. That was the right meaning
of a hero and of a heroine even among the old heathens. Let it mean the
same among us Christians, when we talk of a hero; and let us give God the
glory, and say—There is a man who has entered, even if it be but for one
day’s danger and trial, into the blessings of Whitsuntide and the power
of God’s Spirit; a man whom God has informed and taught in the way
wherein he should go. May that same God give him grace to abide herein
all the days of his life!
Yes, my friends, may God give us all grace to under stand Whitsuntide,
and feed on the blessings of Whitsuntide; not merely once in a way, in
some great sorrow, great danger, great struggle, great striving point of
our lives; but every day and all day long, and to rejoice in the power of
his Spirit, till it becomes to us—would that it could to-day become to
us;—like the air we breathe; till having got our life’s work done, if not
done perfectly, yet still done, we may go hence to receive the due reward
of our deeds.
SERMON XV.
THE MEASURE OF THE CROSS.
EPHESIANS iii. 18, 19.
That ye may be able to comprehend with all saints, what is the
breadth and length and depth and height, and to know the love of
Christ, which passeth knowledge.
THESE words are very deep, and difficult to understand; for St. Paul does
not tell us exactly of what he is speaking. He does not say what it is,
the breadth and length, and depth, and height of which we are to
comprehend and take in. Only he tells us afterwards what will come of
our taking it in; we shall know the love of Christ.
And therefore many great fathers and divines, whose names there is no
need for me to tell you, but whose opinions we must always respect, have
said that what St. Paul is speaking of is, the Cross of Christ.
Of course they do not mean the wood of which the actual cross was made.
They mean the thing of which the cross was a sign and token.
Now of what is the cross a token?
Of the love of Christ, which is the love of God.
But of what kind of love?
Not the love which is satisfied with sitting still and enjoying itself,
as long as nothing puts it out, and turns its love to anger—what we call
mere good nature and good temper; not that, not that, my friends: but
love which will dare, and do, and yearn, and mourn; love which cannot
rest; love which sacrifices itself; love which will suffer, love which
will die, for what it loves;—such love as a father has, who perishes
himself to save his drowning child.
Now the cross of Christ is a token to us, that God’s love to us is like
that: a love which will dare anything, and suffer anything, for the sake
of saving sinful man.
And therefore it is, that from the earliest times the cross has been the
special sign of Christians. We keep it up still, when we make the sign
of the cross on children’s foreheads in baptism: but we have given up
using the sign of the cross commonly, because it was perverted, in old
times, into a superstitious charm. Men worshipped the cross like an
idol, or bits of wood which they fancied were pieces of the actual cross,
while they were forgetting what the cross meant. So the use of the cross
fell into disrepute, and was put down in England.
But that is no reason why we should forget what the cross meant, and
means now, and will mean for ever. Indeed, the better Christians, the
better men we are, the more will Christ’s cross fill us with thoughts
which nothing else can give us; thoughts which we are glad enough, often,
to forget and put away; so bitterly do they remind us of our own
laziness, selfishness, and love of pleasure.
But still, the cross is our sign. It is God’s everlasting token to us,
that he has told us Christians something about himself which none of the
wisest among the heathen knew; which infidels now do not know; which
nothing but the cross can teach to men.
There were men among the old heathens who believed in one God; and some
of them saw that he must be, on the whole, a good and a just God. But
they could not help thinking of God (with very rare exceptions) as a
respecter of persons, a God who had favourites; and at least, that he was
a God who loved his friends, and hated his enemies. So the Mussulmans
believe now. So do the Jews; indeed, so they did all along, though they
ought to have known better; for their prophets in the Old Testament told
them a very different tale about God’s love.
But that was all they could believe—in a God who was not unjust or
wicked, but was at least hard, proud, unbending: while the notion that
God could love his enemies, and bless those who used him despitefully and
persecuted him—much less die for his enemies—that would have seemed to
them impossible and absurd. They stumbled at the stumbling-block of the
cross. God, they thought, would do to men as they did to him. If they
loved him, he would love them. If they neglected him, he would hate and
destroy them.
But when the apostles preached the Gospel, the good news of Christ
crucified, they preached a very different tale; a tale quite new; utterly
different from any that mankind had ever heard before.
St. Paul calls it a mystery—a secret—which had been hidden from the
foundation of the world till then, and was then revealed by God’s Spirit;
namely, this boundless love of God, shown by Christ’s dying on the cross.
And, he says, his great hope, his great business, the thing on which his
heart was set, and which God had sent him into the world to do, was
this—to make people know the love of Christ; to look at Christ’s cross,
and take in its breadth, and length, and depth, and height. It passes
knowledge, he says. We shall never know the whole of it—never know all
that God’s love has done, and will do: but the more we know of it, the
more blessed and hopeful, the more strong and earnest, the more good and
righteous we shall become.
And what is the breadth of Christ’s cross? My friends, it is as broad as
the whole world; for he died for the whole world, as it is written, ‘He
is a propitiation not for our sins only, but for the sins of the whole
world;’ and again, ‘God willeth that none should perish;’ and again, ‘As
by the offence judgment came on all men to condemnation, even so by the
righteousness of one, the gift came upon all men to justification of
life.’
And that is the breadth of Christ’s cross.
And what is the length of Christ’s cross? The length thereof, says an
old father, signifies the time during which its virtue will last.
How long, then, is the cross of Christ? Long enough to last through all
time. As long as there is a sinner to be saved; as long as there is
ignorance, sorrow, pain, death, or anything else which is contrary to God
and hurtful to man, in the universe of God, so long will Christ’s cross
last. For it is written, he must reign till he hath put all enemies
under his feet; and God is all in all. And that is the length of the
cross of Christ.
And how high is Christ’s cross? As high as the highest heaven, and the
throne of God, and the bosom of the Father—that bosom out of which for
ever proceed all created things. Ay, as high as the highest heaven;
for—if you will receive it—when Christ hung upon the cross, heaven came
down on earth, and earth ascended into heaven. Christ never showed forth
his Father’s glory so perfectly as when, hanging upon the cross, he cried
in his death-agony, ‘Father, forgive them, for they know not what they
do.’ Those words showed the true height of the cross; and caused St.
John to know that his vision was true, and no dream, when he saw
afterwards in the midst of the throne of God a lamb as it had been slain.
And that is the height of the cross of Christ.
And how deep is the cross of Christ?
This is a great mystery, and one which people in these days are afraid to
look at; and darken it of their own will, because they will neither
believe their Bibles, nor the voice of their own hearts.
But if the cross of Christ be as high as heaven, then, it seems to me, it
must also be as deep as hell, deep enough to reach the deepest sinner in
the deepest pit to which he may fall. We know that Christ descended into
hell. We know that he preached to the spirits in prison. We know that
it is written, ‘As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made
alive.’ We know that when the wicked man turns from his wickedness, and
does what is lawful and right, he will save his soul alive. We know that
in the very same chapter God tells us that his ways are not unequal—that
he has not one law for one man, and another for another, or one law for
one year, and another for another. It is possible, therefore, that he
has not one law for this life, and another for the life to come. Let us
hope, then, that David’s words may be true after all, when speaking by
the Spirit of God, he says, not only, ‘if I ascend up to heaven, thou art
there;’ but ‘if I go down to hell, thou art there also;’ and let us hope
that _that_ is the depth of the cross of Christ.
At all events, my friends, I believe that we shall find St. Paul’s words
true, when he says, that Christ’s love passes knowledge; and therefore
that we shall find this also;—that however broad we may think Christ’s
cross, it is broader still. However long, it is longer still. However
high, it is higher still. However deep, it is deeper still. Yes, we
shall find that St. Paul spoke solemn truth when he said, that Christ had
ascended on high that he might fill all things; that Christ filled all in
all; and that he must reign till the day when he shall give up the
kingdom to God, even the Father, that God may be all in all.
And now do you take all this about the breadth and length of Christ’s
cross to be only ingenious fancies, and a pretty play of words?
Ah, my friends, the day will come when you will find that the measure of
Christ’s cross is the most important question upon earth.
In the hour of death, and in the day of judgment; then the one thing
which you will care to think of (if you can think at all then, as too
many poor souls cannot, and therefore had best think of it now before
their wits fail them)—the one thing which you will care to think of, I
say, will be—not, how clever you have been, how successful you have been,
how much admired you have been, how much money you have made:—‘Of course
not,’ you answer; ‘I shall be thinking of the state of my soul; whether I
am fit to die; whether I have faith enough to meet God; whether I have
good works enough to meet God.’
Will you, my friend? Then you will soon grow tired of thinking of that
likewise, at least I hope and trust that you will. For, however much
faith you may have had, you will find that you have not had enough.
However so many good works you may have done, you will find that you have
not done enough. The better man you are, the more you will be
dissatisfied with yourself; the more you will be ashamed of yourself;
till with all saints, Romanist or Protestant, or other, who have been
worthy of the name of saints, you will be driven—if you are in earnest
about your own soul—to give up thinking of yourself, and to think only of
the cross of Christ, and of the love of Christ which shines thereon; and
ask—Is it great enough to cover my sins? to save one as utterly unworthy
to be saved as I. And so, after all, you will be forced to throw
yourself—where you ought to have thrown yourself at the outset—at the
foot of Christ’s cross; and say in spirit and in truth—
Nothing in my hand I bring,
Simply to the cross I cling—
In plain words, I throw myself, with all my sins, upon that absolute and
boundless love of God which made all things, and me among them, and
hateth nothing that he hath made; who redeemed all mankind, and me among
them, and hath said by the mouth of his only-begotten Son, ‘Him that
cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.’
SERMON XVI.
THE PURE IN HEART.
TITUS i. 15.
Unto the pure all things are pure: but unto them that are defiled and
unbelieving is nothing pure: but even their mind and conscience is
defiled.
THIS seems at first a strange and startling saying: but it is a true one;
and the more we think over it, the more we shall find it true.
All things are pure in themselves; good in themselves; because God made
them. Is it not written, ‘God saw all that he had made, and behold, it
was very good?’ Therefore St. Paul says, that all things are ours; and
that Christ gives us all things richly to enjoy. All we need is, to use
things in the right way; that is, in the way in which God intended them
to be used.
For God is a God of truth; a true, a faithful, and—if I may so speak—an
honest and honourable, and fair God: not a deceiving or unfair God, who
lays snares for his creatures, or leads them into temptation. That would
be a bad God, a cruel God, very unlike the Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ. He has put us into a good world, and not a wilderness, as some
people call it. If any part of this world be a wilderness, it is because
men have made it so, or left it so, by their own wilfulness, ignorance,
cowardice, laziness, violence. No: God, I say, has put us into a good
world, and given us pure and harmless appetites, feelings, relations.
Therefore all the relations of life are holy. To be a husband, a father,
a brother, a son, is pure and good. To have property and to use it: to
enjoy ourselves in this life as far as we can, without hurting ourselves
or our neighbours; all this is pure, and good, and holy. God does not
grudge or upbraid. He does not frown upon innocent pleasure. For God is
light, and in him is no darkness at all. Therefore he rejoices in seeing
his creatures healthy and happy. Therefore, as I believe, Christ smiles
out of heaven upon the little children at their play; and the laugh of a
babe is heavenly music in his ears.
All things are pure which God has given to man. And therefore, if a man
be pure in heart, all which God has given him will not only do him no
harm, but do him good. All the comforts and blessings of this life will
help to make him a better man. They will teach him about his own
character; about human nature, and the people with whom he has to do;
ay—about God himself, as it is written, ‘Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they shall see God.’
All the blessings and comforts of this life, my friends (as well as the
anxieties which must come to those who have a family, or property, even
if he do not meet with losses and afflictions), ought to help to improve
a man’s temper, to call out in him right feelings, to teach him more and
more of the likeness of God.
If he be a married man, marriage ought to teach him not to live for
himself only, but to sacrifice his own fancies, his own ease, his own
will, for the sake of the woman whom God has given him; as Christ
sacrificed himself, and his own life, for mankind. And so, by the
feelings of a husband, he may enter into the mystery of the love of
Christ, and of the cross of Christ; and so, if only he be pure in heart,
he will see God.
If he have parents, he may learn by being a son how blessed it is to
obey, how useful to a man’s character to submit: ay, he will find out
more still. He will find out that not by being self-willed and
independent does the finest and noblest parts of his character come out,
but by copying his Father in everything; that going where his Father
sends him; being jealous of his Father’s honour; doing not his own will,
but his Father’s; that all this, I say, is its own reward; for instead of
lowering a man, it raises him, and calls out in him all that is purest,
tenderest, soberest, bravest. I tell you this day—Just as far as you are
good sons to your parents, so far will you be able to understand the
mystery of the co-equal and co-eternal Son of God; who though he were in
the form of God, did not snatch greedily at being on the same footing
with his Father, but emptied himself, and took on him the form of a
slave, that he might do his Father’s will, and reveal his Father’s glory.
And so, if you be only pure in heart, you will see God.
If, again, a man have children—how they ought to teach him, to train
him;—teach him to restrain his own temper, lest he provoke them to anger;
to be calm and moderate with them, lest he frighten them into lying; to
avoid bad language, gluttony, drunkenness, and every coarse sin, lest he
tempt them to follow his example. I tell you, friends, that you will
find, if you choose, all the noblest, most generous, most Godlike parts
of your character called out to your children; and by having the feelings
of a father to your children, learn what feelings our Father in heaven
has toward us, his human offspring. And so, if only you be pure in
heart, you will see God.
If again, a man has money, money can teach him (as it teaches hundreds of
pure-hearted men) that charity and generosity are not only a duty, but an
honour and a joy; that ‘mercy is twice blest; it blesses him that gives,
and him that takes;’ that giving is the highest pleasure upon earth,
because it is God’s own pleasure; because the blessedness of God, and the
glory of God is this, that he giveth to all liberally, and upbraideth
not. And so in his wealth—if only he be pure in heart, a man will see
God.
If, again, a man has health, and strength, and high spirits, they too
will teach him, if his heart be pure. He will learn from them to look up
to God as the Lord and Giver of life, health, strength; of the power to
work, and the power to delight in working: because God himself is ever
full of life, ever busy, ever rejoicing to put forth his almighty power
for the good of the whole universe, as it is written, ‘My Father worketh
hitherto, and I work.’ And so—in every relation of life—if only a man’s
heart be pure, he will see God.
How, then, can we get the pure heart which will make all things pure to
us? By asking for the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, the Pure Spirit,
in whom is no selfishness.
For if our hearts be selfish, they cannot be pure. The pure in heart, is
the same as the man whose eye is single, and that is the man who is not
caring for himself, thinking of himself. If a man be thinking of
himself, he will never enjoy life. The pure blessings which God has
given him will be no blessings to him; as it is written, ‘He that saveth
his life shall lose it.’
Do you not know that that is true? Do not the miseries of life (I do not
mean the afflictions, like loss of friends or kin), but the miseries of
life which make a man dark, and fretful, and prevent his enjoying God’s
gifts—do they not come, nineteen-twentieths of them, from thinking about
oneself; from lusting and longing after this and that; from spite,
vanity, bad temper, wounded pride, disappointed covetousness? ‘I cannot
get this or that; that money, that place; this or that fine thing or the
other: and how can I be contented?’ There is a man whose heart is not
pure. ‘That man has used me ill, and I cannot help thinking of it,
brooding over it. I cannot forgive him. How can I be expected to
forgive him?’ There is a man whose heart is not pure; and more, there is
a man who is making himself miserable.
See again, how a man may make marriage a curse to him instead of a
blessing, without being unfaithful to his wife (which we all know to be
simply abominable and unmanly, and far below anything of which I am
talking now). And how? Simply by bad temper, vanity, greediness, and
selfish love of his own dignity, his own pleasure, his own this, that,
and the other. So, too, he may make his children a torment to him,
instead of letting them be God’s lesson-book to him, in which he may see
the likeness of the angels in heaven.
He may make his wealth a continual anxiety to him: ay, he may make it, by
ambition, covetousness, and wild speculation, the cause of his shame and
ruin; if only his heart be not pure.
Ay, there is not a blessing on earth which a man may not turn into a
curse. There is not a good gift of God out of which a man may not get
harm, if only his heart be not pure; as it is written, ‘To those who are
defiled and unbelieving nothing is pure: but even their mind and
conscience are defiled.’
But defiled with what? Fouled with what? There is the question. Many
answers have been invented by people who did not believe in that faithful
and true God of whom I told you just now; people who fancied that this
world was a bad world, and that God laid snares for his creatures and
tempted his creatures. But the true answer is only to be got, like most
true answers, by observing; by using our eyes and ears, and seeing what
really makes people turn blessings into curses, and suck poison out of
every flower.
And that is, simply, self.
If you want to spoil all that God gives you; if you want to be miserable
yourself, and a maker of misery to others, the way is easy enough. Only
be selfish, and it is done at once. Be defiled and unbelieving. Defile
and foul God’s good gifts by self, and by loving yourself more than what
is right. Do not believe that the good God knows your needs before you
ask, and will give you whatsoever is good for you. Think about yourself;
about what _you_ want, what _you_ like, what respect people ought to pay
_you_, what people think of _you_: and then to you nothing will be pure.
You will spoil everything you touch; you will make sin and misery for
yourself out of everything which God sends you; you will be as wretched
as you choose on earth, or in heaven either.
In heaven either, I say. For that proud, greedy, selfish, self-seeking
spirit would turn heaven into hell. It did turn heaven into hell, for
the great devil himself. It was by pride, by seeking his own glory—(so,
at least, wise men say)—that he fell from heaven to hell. He was not
content to give up his own will and do God’s will, like the other angels.
He was not content to serve God, and rejoice in God’s glory. He would be
a master himself, and set up for himself, and rejoice in his own glory;
and so, when he wanted to make a private heaven of his own, he found that
he had made a hell. When he wanted to be a little God for himself, he
lost the life of the true God, to lose which is eternal death. And why?
Because his heart was not pure, clean, honest, simple, unselfish.
Therefore he saw God no more, and learnt to hate him whose name is love.
May God keep our hearts pure from that selfishness which is the root of
all sin; from selfishness, out of which alone spring adultery, foul
living, drunkenness, evil speaking, lying, slandering, injustice,
oppression, cruelty, and all which makes man worse than the beasts. May
God give us those pure hearts of which it is written, that the fruit of
the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness,
meekness, temperance. Against such, St. Paul says, there is no law. And
why? Because no law is needed. For, as a wise father says—‘Love, and do
what thou wilt;’ for then thou wilt be sure to will what is right; and,
as St. Paul says, If your heart be pure, all things will be pure to you.
SERMON XVII.
MUSIC.
(_Christmas Day_.)
LUKE ii. 13, 14.
And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly
host, praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on
earth peace, good will toward men.
YOU have been just singing Christmas hymns; and my text speaks of the
first Christmas hymn. Now what the words of that hymn meant; what Peace
on earth and good-will towards man meant, I have often told you. To-day
I want you, for once, to think of this—that it was a hymn; that these
angels were singing, even as human beings sing.
Music.—There is something very wonderful in music. Words are wonderful
enough: but music is even more wonderful. It speaks not to our thoughts
as words do: it speaks straight to our hearts and spirits, to the very
core and root of our souls. Music soothes us, stirs us up; it puts noble
feelings into us; it melts us to tears, we know not how:—it is a language
by itself, just as perfect, in its way, as speech, as words; just as
divine, just as blessed.
Music has been called the speech of angels; I will go further, and call
it the speech of God himself—and I will, with God’s help, show you a
little what I mean this Christmas day.
Music, I say, without words, is wonderful and blessed; one of God’s best
gifts to men. But in singing you have both the wonders together, music
and words. Singing speaks at once to the head and to the heart, to our
understanding and to our feelings; and therefore, perhaps, the most
beautiful way in which the reasonable soul of man can show itself
(except, of course, doing _right_, which always is, and always will be,
the most beautiful thing) is singing.
Now, why do we all enjoy music? Because it sounds sweet. But _why_ does
it sound sweet?
That is a mystery known only to God.
Two things I may make you understand—two things which help to make
music—melody and harmony. Now, as most of you know, there is melody in
music when the different sounds of the same tune follow each other, so as
to give us pleasure; there is harmony in music when different sounds,
instead of following each other, come at the same time, so as to give us
pleasure.
But why do they please us? and what is more, why do they please angels?
and more still, why do they please God? Why is there music in heaven?
Consider St. John’s visions in the Revelations. Why did St. John hear
therein harpers with their harps, and the mystic beasts, and the elders,
singing a new song to God and to the Lamb; and the voices of many angels
round about them, whose number was ten thousand times ten thousand?
In this is a great mystery. I will try to explain what little of it I
seem to see.
First—There is music in heaven, because in music there is no self-will.
Music goes on certain laws and rules. Man did not make those laws of
music; he has only found them out: and if he be self-willed and break
them, there is an end of his music instantly; all he brings out is
discord and ugly sounds. The greatest musician in the world is as much
bound by those laws as the learner in the school; and the greatest
musician is the one who, instead of fancying that, because he is clever,
he may throw aside the laws of music, knows the laws of music best, and
observes them most reverently. And therefore it was that the old Greeks,
the wisest of all the heathens, made a point of teaching their children
_music_; because, they said, it taught them not to be self-willed and
fanciful, but to see the beauty of order, the usefulness of rule, the
divineness of law.
And therefore music is fit for heaven; therefore music is a pattern and
type of heaven, and of the everlasting life of God, which perfect spirits
live in heaven; a life of melody and order in themselves; a life of
harmony with each other and with God. Music, I say, is a pattern of the
everlasting life of heaven; because in heaven, as in music, is perfect
freedom and perfect pleasure; and yet that freedom comes not from
throwing away law, but from obeying God’s law perfectly; and that
pleasure comes, not from self-will, and doing each what he likes, but
from perfectly doing the will of the Father who is in heaven.
And that in itself would be sweet music, even if there were neither voice
nor sound in heaven. For wherever there is order and obedience, there is
sweet music for the ears of Christ. Whatsoever does its duty, according
to its kind which Christ has given it, makes melody in the ears of
Christ. Whatsoever is useful to the things around it, makes harmony in
the ears of Christ. Therefore those wise old Greeks used to talk of the
music of the spheres. They said that sun, moon, and stars, going round
each in its appointed path, made as they rolled along across the heavens
everlasting music before the throne of God. And so, too, the old Psalms
say. Do you not recollect that noble verse, which speaks of the stars of
heaven, and says—
What though no human voice or sound
Amid their radiant orbs be found?
To Reason’s ear they all rejoice,
And utter forth a glorious voice;
For ever singing as they shine,
The hand that made us is divine.
And therefore it is, that that noble Song of the Three Children calls
upon sun and moon, and stars of heaven, to bless the Lord, praise him,
and magnify him for ever: and not only upon them, but on the smallest
things on earth;—on mountains and hills, green herbs and springs, cattle
and feathered fowl; they too, he says, can bless the Lord, and magnify
him for ever. And how? By fulfilling the law which God has given them;
and by living each after their kind, according to the wisdom wherewith
Christ the Word of God created them, when he beheld all that he had made,
and behold, it was very good.
And so can we, my friends; so can we. Some of us may not be able to make
music with our voices: but we can make it with our hearts, and join in
the angels’ song this day, if not with our lips, yet in our lives.
If thou fulfillest the law which God has given thee, the law of love and
liberty, then thou makest music before God, and thy life is a hymn of
praise to God.
If thou art in love and charity with thy neighbours, thou art making
sweeter harmony in the ears of the Lord Jesus Christ, than psaltery,
dulcimer, and all kinds of music.
If thou art living a righteous and a useful life, doing thy duty orderly
and cheerfully where God has put thee, then thou art making sweeter
melody in the ears of the Lord Jesus Christ, than if thou hadst the
throat of a nightingale; for then thou in thy humble place art humbly
copying the everlasting harmony and melody which is in heaven; the
everlasting harmony and melody by which God made the world and all that
therein is, and behold it was very good, in the day when the morning
stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy over the
new-created earth, which God had made to be a pattern of his own
perfection.
For this is that mystery of which I spoke just now, when I said that
music was as it were the voice of God himself. Yes, I say it with all
reverence: but I do say it. There is music in God. Not the music of
voice or sound; a music which no ears can hear, but only the spirit of a
man, when awakened by the Holy Spirit, and taught to know God, Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit.
There is one everlasting melody in heaven, which Christ, the Word of God,
makes for ever, when he does all things perfectly and wisely, and
righteously and gloriously, full of grace and truth: and from that all
melody comes, and is a dim pattern thereof here; and is beautiful only
because it is a dim pattern thereof.
And there is an everlasting harmony in God; which is the harmony between
the Father and the Son; who though he be co-equal and co-eternal with his
Father, does nothing of himself, but only what he seeth his Father do;
saying for ever, ‘Not my will, but thine be done,’ and hears his Father
answer for ever, ‘Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee.’
Therefore, all melody and all harmony upon earth, whether in the song of
birds, the whisper of the wind, the concourse of voices, or the sounds of
those cunning instruments which man has learnt to create, because he is
made in the image of Christ, the Word of God, who creates all things; all
music upon earth, I say, is beautiful in as far as it is a pattern and
type of the everlasting music which is in heaven; which was before all
worlds, and shall be after them; for by its rules all worlds were made,
and will be made for ever, even the everlasting melody of the wise and
loving will of God, and the everlasting harmony of the Father toward the
Son, and of the Son toward the Father, in one Holy Spirit who proceeds
from them both, to give melody and harmony, order and beauty, life and
light, to all which God has made.
Therefore music is a sacred, a divine, a Godlike thing, and was given to
man by Christ to lift our hearts up to God, and make us feel something of
the glory and beauty of God and of all which God has made.
Therefore, too, music is most fit for Christmas day, of all days in the
year. Christmas has always been a day of songs, of carols and of hymns;
and so let it be for ever. If we had no music all the rest of the year
in church or out of church, let us have it at least on Christmas day.
For on Christmas day most of all days (if I may talk of eternal things
according to the laws of time) was manifested on earth the everlasting
music which is in heaven.
On Christmas day was fulfilled in time and space the everlasting harmony
of God, when the Father sent the Son into the world, that the world
through him might be saved; and the Son refused not, neither shrank back,
though he knew that sorrow, shame, and death awaited him, but answered,
‘A body hast thou prepared me . . . I come to do thy will, oh God!’ and
so emptied himself, and took on himself the form of a slave, and was
found in fashion as a man, that he might fulfil not his own will, but the
will of the Father who sent him.
On this day began that perfect melody of the Son’s life on earth; one
song and poem, as it were, of wise words, good deeds, spotless purity,
and untiring love, which he perfected when he died, and rose again, and
ascended on high for ever to make intercession for us with music sweeter
than the song of angels and archangels, and all the heavenly host.
Go home, then, remembering how divine and holy a thing music is, and
rejoice before the Lord this day with psalms and hymns, and spiritual
songs (by which last I think the apostle means not merely church
music—for that he calls psalms and hymns—but songs which have a good and
wholesome spirit in them); and remembering, too, that music, like
marriage, and all other beautiful things which God has given to man, is
not to be taken in hand unadvisedly, lightly, or wantonly; but, even when
it is most cheerful and joyful (as marriage is), reverently, discreetly,
soberly, and in the fear of God. Amen.
SERMON XVIII.
THE CHRIST CHILD.
(_Christmas Day_.)
LUKE ii. 7.
And she brought forth her first-born Son, and wrapt him in swaddling
clothes, and laid him in a manger.
MOTHER and child.—Think of it, my friends, on Christmas day. What more
beautiful sight is there in the world? What more beautiful sight, and
what more wonderful sight?
What more beautiful? That man must be very far from the kingdom of
God—he is not worthy to be called a man at all—whose heart has not been
touched by the sight of his first child in its mother’s bosom.
The greatest painters who have ever lived have tried to paint the beauty
of that simple thing—a mother with her babe: and have failed. One of
them, Rafaelle by name, to whom God gave the spirit of beauty in a
measure in which he never gave it, perhaps, to any other man, tried again
and again, for years, painting over and over that simple subject—the
mother and her babe—and could not satisfy himself. Each of his pictures
is most beautiful—each in a different way; and yet none of them is
perfect. There is more beauty in that simple every-day sight than he or
any man could express by his pencil and his colours. And yet it is a
sight which we see every day.
And as for the wonder of that sight—the mystery of it—I tell you this.
That physicians, and the wise men who look into the laws of nature, of
flesh and blood, say that the mystery is past their finding out; that if
they could find out the whole meaning, and the true meaning of those two
words, mother and child, they could get the key to the deepest wonders of
the world: but they cannot.
And philosophers, who look into the laws of soul and spirit, say the
same. The wiser men they are, the more they find in the soul of every
new-born babe, and its kindred to its mother, wonders and puzzles past
man’s understanding.
I will say boldly, my friends, that if one could find out the full
meaning of those two words, mother and child, one would be the wisest
philosopher on earth, and see deeper than all who have ever yet lived,
into the secrets of this world of time which we can see, and of the
eternal world, which no man can see, save with the eyes of his reasonable
soul.
And yet it is the most common, every-day sight. That only shows once
more what I so often try to show you, that the most common, every-day
things are the most wonderful. It shows us how we are to despise nothing
which God has made; above all, to despise nothing which belongs to human
nature, which is the likeness and image of God.
Above all, upon this Christmas day it is not merely ignorant and foolish,
but quite sinful and heretical, to despise anything which belongs to
human nature. For on this day God appeared in human nature, and in the
first and lowest shape of it—in the form of a new-born babe, that by
beginning at the beginning, he might end at the end; and being made in
all things like as his brethren, might perfectly and utterly take the
manhood into God.
This, then, we are to think of, at least on Christmas day—God revealed,
and shown to men, as a babe upon his mother’s bosom.
Men had pictured God to themselves already in many shapes—some foolish,
foul, brutal—God forgive them;—some noble and majestic. Sometimes they
thought of him as a mighty Lawgiver, sitting upon his throne in the
heavens, with solemn face and awful eyes, looking down upon all the
earth. That fancy was not a false one. St. John saw the Lord so.
‘And in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of man,
clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a
golden girdle. His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as
snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire; and his feet like unto fine
brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and his voice as the sound of many
waters. And he had in his right hand seven stars; and out of his mouth
went a sharp two-edged sword; and his countenance was as the sun shining
in his strength.’
Sometimes, again, they thought of him as the terrible warrior, going
forth to conquer and destroy all which opposed him; to kill wicked
tyrants, and devils, and all who rebelled against him, and who hurt human
beings.
And that was not a false fancy either. St. John saw the Lord so.
‘And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and he that sat upon
him was called Faithful and True; and in righteousness he doth judge and
make war. His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head were many
crowns; and he had a name written, that no man knew but he himself: and
he was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood; and his name is called,
The Word of God. And the armies which were in heaven followed him upon
white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean. And out of his
mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations; and
he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of
the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God.’
But all these were only, as it were, fancies about one side of God’s
character. It was only in the Babe of Bethlehem that the _whole_ of
God’s character shone forth, that men might not merely fear him and bow
before him, but trust in him and love him, as one who could be touched
with the feeling of their infirmities. {151}
It was on Christmas day that God appeared among men as a child upon a
mother’s bosom. And why? Surely for this reason, among a thousand more,
that he might teach men to feel for him and with him, and to be sure that
he felt for them and with them. To teach them to feel for him and with
him, he took the shape of a little child, to draw out all their love, all
their tenderness, and, if I may so say, all their pity.
A God in need! A God weak! God fed by mortal woman! A God wrapt in
swaddling clothes, and laid in a manger!—If that sight will not touch our
hearts, what will?
And by that same sight he has taught men that he feels with them and for
them. God has been through the pains of infancy. God has hungered. God
has wept. God has been ignorant. God has grown, and increased in
stature and in wisdom, and in favour both with God and man.
And why? That he might take on him our human nature. Not merely the
nature of a great man, of a wise man, of a grown up man only: but _all_
human nature, from the nature of the babe on its mother’s bosom, to the
nature of the full-grown and full-souled man, fighting with all his
powers against the evil of the world. All this is his, and he is all;
that no human being, from the strongest to the weakest, from the eldest
to the youngest, but may be able to say, ‘What I am, Christ has been.’
Take home with you, then, this thought, on this Christmas day, among all
the rest which Christmas ought to put into your minds. Respect your own
children. Look on them as the likeness of Christ, and the image of God;
and when you go home this day, believe that Christ is in them, the hope
of glory to them hereafter. Draw them round you, and say to them—each in
your own fashion—‘My children, God was made like to you this day, that
you might be made like God. Children, this is your day, for on this day
God became a child; that God gives you leave to think of him as a child,
that you may be sure he loves children, sure he understands children,
sure that a little child is as near and as dear to God as kings, nobles,
scholars, and divines.’
Yes, my dear children, you may think of God as a child, now and always.
For you Christ is always the Babe of Bethlehem. Do not say to
yourselves, ‘Christ is grown up long ago; he is a full-grown man.’ He
is, and yet he is not. His life is eternal in the heavens, above all
change of time and space; for time and space are but his creatures and
his tools. Therefore he can be all things to all men, because he is the
Son of man.
Yes; all things to all men. Hearken to me, you children, and you
grown-up children also, if there be any in this church—for if you will
receive it, such is the sacred heart of Jesus—all things to all; and
wherever there is the true heart of a true human being, there, beating in
perfect answer to it, is the heart of Christ.
To the strong he can be strongest; and to the weak, weakest of all. With
the mighty he can be the King of kings; and yet with the poor he can
wander, not having where to lay his head. With quiet Jacob he goes round
the farm, among the quiet sheep; and yet he ranges with wild Esau over
battle-field, and desert, and far unknown seas. With the mourner he
weeps for ever; and yet he will sit as of old—if he be but invited—and
bless the marriage-feast. For the penitent he hangs for ever on the
cross; and yet with the man who works for God his Father he stands for
ever in his glory, his eyes like a flame of fire, and out of his mouth a
two-edged sword, judging the nations of the earth. With the aged and the
dying he goes down for ever into the grave; and yet with you, children,
Christ lies for ever on his mother’s bosom, and looks up for ever into
his mother’s face, full of young life, and happiness, and innocence, the
everlasting Christ-child in whom you must believe, whom you must love, to
whom you must offer up your childish prayers.
The day will come when you can no longer think as a child, or pray as a
child, but put away childish things. I do not know whether you will be
the happier for that change. God grant that you may be the better for
it. Meanwhile, go home, and think of the baby Jesus, _your_ Lord, _your_
pattern, _your_ Saviour; and ask him to make you such good children to
your mothers, as the little Jesus was to the Blessed Virgin, when he
increased in knowledge and in stature, and in favour both with God and
man.
SERMON XIX.
CHRIST’S BOYHOOD.
LUKE ii. 52.
And Jesus increased in wisdom, and in stature, and in favour both
with God and man.
I DO not pretend to understand these words. I preach on them because the
Church has appointed them for this day. And most fitly. At Christmas we
think of our Lord’s birth. What more reasonable, than that we should go
on to think of our Lord’s boyhood? To think of this aright, even if we
do not altogether understand it, ought to help us to understand rightly
the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ; the right faith about which is,
that he was very man, of the substance of his mother. Now, if he were
very and real man, he must have been also very and real babe, very and
real boy, very and real youth, and then very and real full-grown man.
Now it is not so easy to believe that as it may seem. It is not so easy
to believe.
I have heard many preachers preach (without knowing it), what used to be
called the Apollinarian Heresy, which held that our Lord had not a real
human soul, but only a human body; and that his Godhead served him
instead of a human soul, and a man’s reason, man’s feelings.
About that the old fathers had great difficulty, before they could make
people understand that our Lord had been a real babe. It seemed to
people’s unclean fancies something shocking that our Lord should have
been born, as other children are born. They stumbled at the
stumbling-block of the manger in Bethlehem, as they did at the
stumbling-block of the cross on Calvary; and they wanted to make out that
our Lord was born into the world in some strange way—I know not how;—I do
not choose to talk of it here:—but they would fancy and invent anything,
rather than believe that Jesus was really born of the Virgin Mary, made
of the substance of his mother. So that it was hundreds of years before
the fathers of the Church set people’s minds thoroughly at rest about
that.
In the same way, though not so much, people found it very hard to believe
that our Lord grew up as a real human child. They would not believe that
he went down to Nazareth, and was subject to his father and mother.
People believe generally now—the Roman Catholics as well as we—that our
Lord worked at his father’s trade—that he himself handled the carpenter’s
tools. We have no certain proof of it: but it is so beautiful a thought,
that one hopes it is true. At least our believing it is a sign that we
do believe the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ more rightly than
most people did fifteen hundred years ago. For then, too many of them
would have been shocked at the notion.
They stumbled at the carpenter’s shop, even as they did at the manger and
at the cross. And they invented false gospels—one of which especially,
had strange and fanciful stories about our Lord’s childhood—which tried
to make him out.
Most of these stories are so childish I do not like to repeat them. One
of them may serve as a sample. Our Lord, it says, was playing with other
children of his own age, and making little birds out of clay: but those
which our Lord made became alive, and moved, and sang like real
birds.—Stories put together just to give our Lord some magical power,
different from other children, and pretending that he worked signs and
wonders: which were just what he refused to work.
But the old fathers rejected these false gospels and their childish
tales, and commanded Christian men only to believe what the Bible tells
us about our Lord’s childhood; for that is enough for us, and that will
help us better than any magical stories and childish fairy tales of man’s
invention, to believe rightly that God was made man, and dwelt among us.
And what does the Bible tell us? Very little indeed. And it tells us
very little, because we were meant to know very little. Trust your
Bibles always, my friends, and be sure, if you were meant to know more,
the Bible would tell you more.
It tells us that Jesus grew just as a human child grows, in body, soul,
and spirit.
Then it tells us of one case—only one—in which he seemed to act without
his parents’ leave. And as the saying is, the exception proves the rule.
It is plain that his rule was to obey, except in this case; that he was
always subject to his parents, as other children are, except on this one
occasion. And even in this case, he _went_ back with them, it is
expressly said, and was subject to them.
Now, I do not pretend to explain _why_ our Lord stayed behind in the
temple.
I cannot explain (who can?) the why and wherefore of what I see people do
in common daily life.
How much less can one explain why our Lord did this and that, who was
both man and God.
But one reason, and one which seems to me to be plain, on the very face
of St. Luke’s words—he stayed behind to learn; to learn all he could from
the Scribes and Pharisees, the doctors of the law.
He told the people after, when grown up, ‘The Scribes and Pharisees sit
in Moses’ seat. All therefore which they command you, that observe and
do.’ And he was a Jew himself, and came to fulfil all righteousness; and
therefore he fulfilled such righteousness as was customary among Jews
according to their law and religion.
Therefore I do not like at all a great many pictures which I see in
children’s Sunday books, which set the child Jesus in the midst, as on a
throne, holding up his hand as if _he_ were laying down the law, and the
Scribes and Pharisees looking angry and confounded. The Bible says not
that they heard him, but that he heard them; that they were astonished at
his understanding, not that they were confounded and angry. No. I must
believe that even those hard, proud Pharisees, looked with wonder and
admiration on the glorious Child; that they perhaps felt for the moment
that a prophet, another Samuel, had risen up among them. And surely that
is much more like the right notion of the child Jesus, full of meekness
and humility; of Jesus, who, though ‘he were a Son, learnt obedience by
the things which he suffered;’ of Jesus, who, while he increased in
stature, increased in favour with _man_, as well as with God: and surely
no child can increase in favour either with God or man, if he sets down
his elders, and contradicts and despises the teachers whom God has set
over him. No let us believe that when he said, ‘Know ye not that I must
be about my Father’s business?’ that a child’s way of doing the work of
his Father in heaven is to learn all that he can understand from his
teachers, spiritual pastors, and masters, whom God the Father has set
over him.
Therefore—and do listen to this, children and young people—if you wish
really to think what Christ has to do with _you_, you must remember that
he was once a real human child—not different outwardly from other
children, except in being a perfectly good child, in all things like as
you are, but without sin.
Then, whatever happens to you, you will have the comfort of
feeling—Christ understands this; Christ has been through this. Child
though I am, Christ can be touched with the feeling of my weakness, for
he was once a child like me.
And then, if trouble, or sickness, or death come among you—and you all
know how sickness and death _have_ come among you of late—you may be
cheerful and joyful still, if you will only try to be such children as
Jesus was. Obey your parents, and be subject to them, as he was; try to
learn from your teachers, pastors, and masters, as he did; try and pray
to increase daily in favour both with God and man, as he did: and then,
even if death should come and take you before your time, you need not be
afraid, for Jesus Christ is with you.
Your childish faults shall be forgiven you for Jesus’ sake; your childish
good conduct shall be accepted for Jesus Christ’s sake; and if you be
trying to be good children, doing your little work well where God has put
you, humble, obedient, and teachable, winning love from the people round
you, and from God your Father in heaven, then, I say, you need not be
afraid of sickness, not even afraid of death, for whenever it takes you,
it will find you about your Father’s business.
SERMON XX.
THE LOCUST-SWARMS.
JOEL ii. 12, 13.
Therefore also now, saith the Lord, Turn ye even to me with all your
heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning; and
rend your heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the Lord your
God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great
kindness, and repenteth him of the evil.
THIS is one of the grandest chapters in the whole Old Testament, and one
which may teach us a great deal; and, above all, teach us to be thankful
to God for the blessings which we have.
I think I can explain what it means best by going back to the chapter
before it.
Joel begins his prophecy by bitter lamentation over the mischief which
the swarms of insects had done; such as had never been in his days, nor
in the days of his fathers. What the palmer worm had left, the locust
had eaten; what the locust had left, the cankerworm had eaten; and what
the cankerworm had left, the caterpillar had eaten. Whether these names
are rightly rendered, or whether they mean different sorts of locusts, or
the locusts in their different stages of growth, crawling at first and
flying at last, matters little. What mischief they had done was plain
enough. They had come up ‘a nation strong and without number, whose
teeth were like the teeth of a lion, and his cheek-teeth like those of a
strong lion. They had laid his vines waste, and barked his fig-tree, and
made its branches white; and all drunkards were howling and lamenting,
for the wine crop was utterly destroyed: and all other crops, it seems
likewise; the corn was wasted, the olives destroyed; the seed was rotten
under the clods, the granaries empty, the barns broken down, for the corn
was withered; the vine and fig, pomegranate, palm, and apple, were all
gone; the green grass was all gone; the beasts groaned, the herds were
perplexed, because they had no pasture; the flocks of sheep were
desolate.’ There seems to have been a dry season also, to make matters
worse; for Joel says the rivers of waters were dried up—likely enough, if
then, as now, it is the dry seasons which bring the locust-swarms. Still
the locusts had done the chief mischief. They came just as they come now
(only in smaller strength, thank God) in many parts of the East and of
Southern Russia, darkening the sky, and shutting out the very light of
the sun; the noise of their innumerable jaws like the noise of flame
devouring the stubble, as they settled upon every green thing, and gnawed
away leaf and bark; and a fire devoured before them, and behind them a
flame burned; the land was as the garden of Eden before them, and behind
them a desolate wilderness; {162} till there was not enough left to
supply the daily sacrifices, and the meat offering and the drink offering
were withheld from the house of God.
But what has all this to do with us? There have never, as far as we
know, been any locusts in England.
And what has this to do with God? Why does Joel tell these Jews that God
sent the locusts, and bid them cry to God to take them away? For these
locusts are natural things, and come by natural laws. And there is no
need that there should be locusts anywhere. For where the wild grass
plains are broken up and properly cultivated, there the locusts, which
lay their countless eggs in the old turf, disappear, and must disappear.
We know that now. We know that when the East is tilled (as God grant it
may be some day) as thoroughly as England is, locusts will be as unknown
there as here; and that is another comfortable proof to us that there is
no real curse upon God’s earth: but that just as far as man fulfils God’s
command to replenish the earth and subdue it, so far he gets rid of all
manner of terrible scourges and curses, which seemed to him in the days
of his ignorance, necessary and supernatural.
How, then, was Joel right in saying that God sent the locusts?
In this way, my friends.
Suppose you or I took cholera or fever. We know that cholera or fever is
preventible; that man has no right to have these pestilences in a
country, because they can be kept out and destroyed. But if you or I
caught cholera or fever by no fault or folly of our own, we are bound to
say, God sent me this sickness. It has some private lesson for _me_. It
is part of my education, my schooling in God’s school-house. It is meant
to make me a wiser and better man; and that he can only do by teaching me
more about himself. So with these locusts, and still more so; for Joel
did not know, could not know, that these locusts could be prevented. But
even if he had known that, it was not his fault or folly, or his
countrymen’s which had brought the locusts. Most probably they were
tilling the ground to the best of their knowledge. Most probably, too,
these locusts were not bred in Palestine at all; but came down upon the
north-wind (as they are said to do now), from some land hundreds of miles
away; and therefore Joel could say—Whatever I do not know about these
locusts, this I know; that God, whose providence orders all things in
heaven and earth, has sent them; that he means to teach you a lesson by
them; that they are part of his schooling to us Jews; that he intends to
make us wiser and better men by them: _and that he can only do by
teaching us more about himself_.