Transcribed from the 1849 John W. Parker edition by David Price, email
ccx074@pglaf.org
TWENTY-FIVE
VILLAGE SERMONS.
* * * * *
BY
CHARLES KINGSLEY, JUN.,
RECTOR OF EVERSLEY, HANTS, AND CANON OF MIDDLEHAM, YORKSHIRE.
* * * * *
LONDON:
JOHN W. PARKER, WEST STRAND.
* * * * *
MDCCCXLIX.
* * * * *
LONDON:
Printed by G. BARCLAY, Castle St Leicester Sq.
CONTENTS.
Page
SERMON I.
GOD’S WORLD.
PSALM civ. 24.
O Lord, how manifold are Thy works! in wisdom hast Thou 1
made them all: the earth is full of Thy riches
SERMON II.
RELIGION NOT GODLINESS.
PSALM civ. 13–15.
He watereth the hills from his chambers: the earth is 13
satisfied with the fruit of thy works. He causeth the
grass to grow for the cattle, and herb for the service of
man: that he may bring forth food out of the earth; and
wine that maketh glad the heart of man, and oil to make his
face to shine, and bread which strengtheneth man’s heart
SERMON III.
LIFE AND DEATH.
PSALM civ. 24, 28–30.
O Lord, how manifold are Thy works! in wisdom hast Thou 25
made them all: the earth is full of Thy riches. That Thou
givest them they gather: Thou openest Thine hand, they are
filled with good. Thou hidest Thy face, they are troubled:
Thou takest away their breath, they die, and return to
their dust. Thou sendest forth Thy spirit, they are
created: and Thou renewest the face of the earth
SERMON IV.
THE WORK OF GOD’S SPIRIT.
JAMES, i. 16, 17.
Do not err, my beloved brethren; every good gift and every 35
perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father
of lights
SERMON V.
FAITH.
HABAKKUK, ii. 4.
The just shall live by faith 47
SERMON VI.
THE SPIRIT AND THE FLESH.
GALATIANS, v. 16.
I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the 60
lusts of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the
Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh, and these are
contrary the one to the other
SERMON VII.
RETRIBUTION.
NUMBERS, xxxii. 23.
Be sure your sin will find you out 72
SERMON VIII.
SELF-DESTRUCTION.
1 KINGS, xxii. 23.
The Lord hath put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these 82
thy prophets
SERMON IX.
HELL ON EARTH.
MATTHEW, viii. 29.
And behold the evil spirits cried out, saying, What have we 91
to do with Thee, Jesus, Thou Son of God? Art Thou come
hither to torment us before the time?
SERMON X.
NOAH’S JUSTICE.
GENESIS, vi. 9.
Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and 104
Noah walked with God
SERMON XI.
THE NOACHIC COVENANT.
GEN. ix. 8, 9.
And God spake unto Noah, and his sons with him, saying, And 116
I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your
seed after you
SERMON XII.
ABRAHAM’S FAITH.
HEBREWS, xi. 9, 10.
By faith Abraham sojourned in the land of promise as in a 125
strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and
Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise. For he
looked for a city, which hath foundations, whose builder
and maker is God
SERMON XIII.
ABRAHAM’S OBEDIENCE.
HEBREWS, xi. 17–19.
By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac; and 141
he that had received the promises offered up his
only-begotten son, of whom it was said, That in Isaac shall
thy seed be called: accounting that God was able to raise
him up, even from the dead; from whence also he received
him in a figure
SERMON XIV.
OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN.
1 JOHN, ii. 13.
I write unto you, little children, because ye have known 149
the Father
SERMON XV.
THE TRANSFIGURATION.
MARK, ix. 2.
Jesus taketh Peter, and James, and John, and leadeth them 160
up into a high mountain apart, and was transfigured before
them
SERMON XVI.
THE CRUCIFIXION.
ISAIAH, liii. 7.
He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter 173
SERMON XVII.
THE RESURRECTION.
LUKE, xxiv. 6.
He is not here—He is risen 179
SERMON XVIII.
IMPROVEMENT.
PSALM xcii. 12.
The righteous shall flourish like the palm-tree: he shall 191
grow like the cedar in Lebanon. Those that be planted in
the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our
God. They shall still bring forth fruit in old age; they
shall be fat and flourishing
SERMON XIX.
MAN’S WORKING DAY.
JOHN, xi. 9, 10.
Jesus answered, Are there not twelve hours in the day? If 200
any man walk in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth
the light of this world. But if a man walk in the night he
stumbleth, because there is no light in him
SERMON XX.
ASSOCIATION.
GALATIANS, vi. 2.
Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of 210
Christ
SERMON XXI.
HEAVEN ON EARTH.
1 COR. x. 31.
Whether ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to 219
the glory of God
SERMON XXII.
NATIONAL PRIVILEGES.
LUKE, x. 23.
Blessed are the eyes which see the things which ye see: for 228
I tell you, that many prophets and kings have desired to
see those things which ye see, and have not seen them; and
to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them
SERMON XXIII.
LENTEN THOUGHTS.
HAGGAI, i. 5.
Now, therefore, thus saith the Lord of Hosts, consider your 239
ways
SERMON XXIV.
ON BOOKS.
JOHN, i. 1.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, 248
and the Word was God
SERMON XXV.
THE COURAGE OF THE SAVIOUR.
JOHN, xi. 7, 8.
Then after that saith He to His disciples, Let us go into 259
Judea again. His disciples say to Him, Master, the Jews of
late sought to stone thee, and goest thou thither again?
SERMON I.
GOD’S WORLD.
PSALM civ. 24.
“O Lord, how manifold are Thy works! in wisdom hast Thou made them
all: the earth is full of Thy riches.”
WHEN we read such psalms as the one from which this verse is taken, we
cannot help, if we consider, feeling at once a great difference between
them and any hymns or religious poetry which is commonly written or read
in these days. The hymns which are most liked now, and the psalms which
people most willingly choose out of the Bible, are those which speak, or
seem to speak, about God’s dealings with people’s own souls, while such
psalms as this are overlooked. People do not care really about psalms of
this kind when they find them in the Bible, and they do not expect or
wish nowadays any one to write poetry like them. For these psalms of
which I speak praise and honour God, not for what He has done to our
souls, but for what He has done and is doing in the world around us.
This very 104th psalm, for instance, speaks entirely about things which
we hardly care or even think proper to mention in church now. It speaks
of this earth entirely, and the things on it. Of the light, the clouds,
and wind—of hills and valleys, and the springs on the hill-sides—of wild
beasts and birds—of grass and corn, and wine and oil—of the sun and moon,
night and day—the great sea, the ships, and the fishes, and all the
wonderful and nameless creatures which people the waters—the very birds’
nests in the high trees, and the rabbits burrowing among the
rocks,—nothing on the earth but this psalm thinks it worth mentioning.
And all this, which one would expect to find only in a book of natural
history, is in the Bible, in one of the psalms, written to be sung in the
temple at Jerusalem, before the throne of the living God and His glory
which used to be seen in that temple,—inspired, as we all believe, by
God’s Spirit,—God’s own word, in short: that is worth thinking of.
Surely the man who wrote this must have thought very differently about
this world, with its fields and woods, and beasts and birds, from what we
think. Suppose, now, that we had been old Jews in the temple, standing
before the holy house, and that we believed, as the Jews believed, that
there was only one thin wall and one curtain of linen between us and the
glory of the living God, that unspeakable brightness and majesty which no
one could look at for fear of instant death, except the high-priest in
fear and trembling once a-year—that inside that small holy house, He, God
Almighty, appeared visibly—God who made heaven and earth. Suppose we had
been there in the temple, and known all this, should we have liked to be
singing about beasts and birds, with God Himself close to us? We should
not have liked it—we should have been terrified, thinking perhaps about
our own sinfulness, perhaps about that wonderful majesty which dwelt
inside. We should have wished to say or sing something spiritual, as we
call it; at all events, something very different from the 104th psalm
about woods, and rivers, and dumb beasts. We do not like the thought of
such a thing: it seems almost irreverent, almost impertinent to God to be
talking of such things in His presence. Now does this shew us that we
think about this earth, and the things in it, in a very different way
from those old Jews? They thought it a fit and proper thing to talk
about corn and wine and oil, and cattle and fishes, in the presence of
Almighty God, and we do not think it fit and proper. We read this psalm
when it comes in the Church-service as a matter of course, mainly because
we do not believe that God is here among us. We should not be so ready
to read it if we thought that Almighty God was so near us.
That is a great difference between us and the old Jews. Whether it shews
that we are better or not than they were in the main, I cannot tell;
perhaps some of them had such thoughts too, and said, ‘It is not
respectful to God to talk about such commonplace earthly things in His
presence;’ perhaps some of them thought themselves spiritual and
pure-minded for looking down on this psalm, and on David for writing it.
Very likely, for men have had such thoughts in all ages, and will have
them. But the man who wrote this psalm had no such thoughts. He said
himself, in this same psalm, that his words would please God. Nay, he is
not speaking and preaching _about_ God in this psalm, as I am now in my
sermon, but he is doing more; he is speaking _to_ God—a much more solemn
thing if you will think of it. He says, “O Lord my God, _Thou_ art
become exceeding glorious. Thou deckest Thyself with light as with a
garment. All the beasts wait on Thee; when Thou givest them meat they
gather it. Thou renewest the face of the earth.” When he turns and
speaks of God as “He,” saying, “He appointed the moon,” and so on, he
cannot help going back to God, and pouring out his wonder, and delight,
and awe, to God Himself, as we would sooner speak _to_ any one we love
and honour than merely speak _about_ them. He cannot take his mind off
God. And just at the last, when he does turn and speak to himself, it is
to say, “Praise thou the Lord, O my soul, praise the Lord,” as if
rebuking and stirring up himself for being too cold-hearted and slow, for
not admiring and honouring enough the infinite wisdom, and power, and
love, and glorious majesty of God, which to him shines out in every
hedge-side bird and every blade of grass. Truly I said that man had a
very different way of looking at God’s earth from what we have!
Now, in what did that difference lie? What was it? We need not look far
to see. It was this,—David looked on the earth as God’s earth; we look
on it as man’s earth, or nobody’s earth. We know that we are here, with
trees and grass, and beasts and birds, round us. And we know that we did
not put them here; and that, after we are dead and gone, they will go on
just as they went on before we were born,—each tree, and flower, and
animal, after its kind, but we know nothing more. The earth is here, and
we on it; but who put it there, and why it is there, and why we are on
it, instead of being anywhere else, few ever think. But to David the
earth looked very different; it had quite another meaning; it spoke to
him of God who made it. By seeing what this earth is like, he saw what
God who made it is like: and we see no such thing. The earth?—we can eat
the corn and cattle on it, we can earn money by farming it, and ploughing
and digging it; and that is all most men know about it. But David knew
something more—something which made him feel himself very weak, and yet
very safe; very ignorant and stupid, and yet honoured with glorious
knowledge from God,—something which made him feel that he belonged to
this world, and must not forget it or neglect it, that this earth was his
lesson-book—this earth was his work-field; and yet those same thoughts
which shewed him how he was made for the land round him, and the land
round him was made for him, shewed him also that he belonged to another
world—a spirit-world; shewed him that when this world passed away, he
should live for ever; shewed him that while he had a mortal body, he had
an immortal soul too; shewed him that though his home and business were
here on earth, yet that, for that very reason, his home and business were
in heaven, with God who made the earth, with that blessed One of whom he
said, “Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the
earth, and the heavens are the work of thy hands. They shall perish, but
Thou shalt endure; they all shall fade as a garment, and like a vesture
shalt Thou change them, and they shall be changed; but Thou art the same,
and _Thy_ years shall not fail. The children of Thy servants shall
continue, and their seed shall stand fast in Thy sight.” “As a garment
shalt Thou change them,”—ay, there was David’s secret! He saw that this
earth and skies are God’s garment—the garment by which we see God; and
that is what our forefathers saw too, and just what we have forgotten;
but David had not forgotten it. Look at this very 104th psalm again, how
he refers every thing to God. We say, ‘The light shines:’ David says
something more; he says, “Thou, O God, adornest Thyself with light as
with a curtain.” Light is a picture of God. “God,” says St. John, “is
light, and in Him is no darkness at all.” We say, ‘The clouds fly and
the wind blows,’ as if they went of themselves; David says, “God makes
the clouds His chariot, and walks upon the wings of the wind.” We talk
of the rich airs of spring, of the flashing lightning of summer, as dead
things; and men who call themselves wise say, that lightning is only
matter,—‘We can grind the like of it out of glass and silk, and make
lightning for ourselves in a small way;’ and so they can in a small way,
and in a very small one: David does not deny that, but he puts us in mind
of something in that lightning and those breezes which we cannot make.
He says, God makes the winds His angels, and flaming fire his ministers;
and St. Paul takes the same text, and turns it round to suit his purpose,
when he is talking of the blessed angels, saying, ‘That text in the 104th
Psalm means something more; it means that God makes His angels spirits,
(that is winds) and His ministers a flaming fire.’ So shewing us that in
those breezes there are living spirits, that God’s angels guide those
thunder-clouds; that the roaring thunderclap is a shock in the air truly,
but that it is something more—that it is the voice of God, which shakes
the cedar-trees of Lebanon, and tears down the thick bushes, and makes
the wild deer slip their young. So we read in the psalms in church; that
is David’s account of the thunder. I take it for a true account; you may
or not as you like. See again. Those springs in the hill-sides, how do
they come there? ‘Rain-water soaking and flowing out,’ we say. True,
but David says something more; he says, God sends the springs, and He
sends them into the rivers too. You may say, ‘Why, water must run
down-hill, what need of God?’ But suppose God had chosen that water
should run _up_-hill and not down, how would it have been then?—Very
different, I think. No; He sends them; He sends all things. Wherever
there is any thing useful, His Spirit has settled it. The help that is
done on earth He doeth it all Himself.—Loving and merciful,—caring for
the poor dumb beasts!—He sends the springs, and David says, “All the
beasts of the field drink thereof.” The wild animals in the night, He
cares for them too,—He, the Almighty God. We hear the foxes bark by
night, and we think the fox is hungry, and there it ends with us; but not
with David: he says, “The lions roaring after their prey do seek their
meat from God,”—God, who feedeth the young ravens who call upon Him. He
is a God! “He did not make the world,” says a wise man, “and then let it
spin round His finger,” as we wind up a watch, and then leave it to go of
itself. No; “His mercy is over all His works.” Loving and merciful, the
God of nature is the God of grace. The same love which chose us and our
forefathers for His people while we were yet dead in trespasses and sins;
the same only-begotten Son, who came down on earth to die for us poor
wretches on the cross,—that same love, that same power, that same Word of
God, who made heaven and earth, looks after the poor gnats in the winter
time, that they may have a chance of coming out of the ground when the
day stirs the little life in them, and dance in the sunbeam for a short
hour of gay life, before they return to the dust whence they were made,
to feed creatures nobler and more precious than themselves. That is all
God’s doing, all the doing of Christ, the King of the earth. “They wait
on Him,” says David. The beasts, and birds, and insects, the strange
fish, and shells, and the nameless corals too, in the deep, deep sea, who
build and build below the water for years and thousands of years, every
little, tiny creature bringing his atom of lime to add to the great heap,
till their heap stands out of the water and becomes dry land; and seeds
float thither over the wide waste sea, and trees grow up, and birds are
driven thither by storms; and men come by accident in stray ships, and
build, and sow, and multiply, and raise churches, and worship the God of
heaven, and Christ, the blessed One,—on that new land which the little
coral worms have built up from the deep. Consider that. Who sent them
there? Who contrived that those particular men should light on that new
island at that especial time? Who guided thither those seeds—those
birds? Who gave those insects that strange longing and power to build
and build on continually?—Christ, by whom all things are made, to whom
all power is given in heaven and earth; He and His Spirit, and none else.
It is when _He_ opens His hand, they are filled with good. It is when
_He_ takes away their breath, they die, and turn again to their dust.
_He_ lets His breath, His spirit, go forth, and out of that dead dust
grow plants and herbs afresh for man and beast, and He renews the face of
the earth. For, says the wise man, “all things are God’s
garment”—outward and visible signs of His unseen and unapproachable
glory; and when they are worn out, He changes them, says the Psalmist, as
a garment, and they shall be changed.
The old order changes, giving place to the new,
And God fulfils Himself in many ways.
But He is the same. He is there all the time. All things are His work.
In all things we may see Him, if our souls have eyes. All things, be
they what they may, which live and grow on this earth, or happen on land
or in the sky, will tell us a tale of God,—shew forth some one feature,
at least, of our blessed Saviour’s countenance and character,—either His
foresight, or His wisdom, or His order, or His power, or His love, or His
condescension, or His long-suffering, or His slow, sure vengeance on
those who break His laws. It is all written there outside in the great
green book, which God has given to labouring men, and which neither taxes
nor tyrants can take from them. The man who is no scholar in letters may
read of God as he follows the plough, for the earth he ploughs is his
Father’s: there is God’s mark and seal on it,—His name, which though it
is written on the dust, yet neither man nor fiend can wipe it out!
The poor, solitary, untaught boy, who keeps the sheep, or minds the
birds, long lonely days, far from his mother and his playmates, may keep
alive in him all purifying thoughts, if he will but open his eyes and
look at the green earth around him.
Think now, my boys, when you are at your work, how all things may put you
in mind of God, if you do but choose. The trees which shelter you from
the wind, God planted them there for your sakes, in His love.—There is a
lesson about God. The birds which you drive off the corn, who gave them
the sense to keep together and profit by each other’s wit and keen
eyesight? Who but God, who feeds the young birds when they call on
Him?—There is another lesson about God. The sheep whom you follow, who
ordered the warm wool to grow on them, from which your clothes are made?
Who but the Spirit of God above, who clothes the grass of the field, the
silly sheep, and who clothes you, too, and thinks of you when you don’t
think of yourselves?—There is another lesson about God. The feeble lambs
in spring, they ought to remind you surely of your blessed Saviour, the
Lamb of God, who died for you upon the cruel cross, who was led as a lamb
to the slaughter; and like a sheep that lies dumb and patient under the
shearer’s hand, so he opened not his mouth. Are not these lambs, then, a
lesson from God? And these are but one or two examples out of thousands
and thousands. Oh, that I could make you, young and old, all feel these
things! Oh, that I could make you see God in every thing, and every
thing in God! Oh, that I could make you look on this earth, not as a
mere dull, dreary prison, and workhouse for your mortal bodies, but as a
living book, to speak to you at every time of the living God, Father,
Son, and Holy Ghost! Sure I am that that would be a heavenly life for
you,—sure I am that it would keep you from many a sin, and stir you up to
many a holy thought and deed, if you could learn to find in every thing
around you, however small or mean, the work of God’s hand, the likeness
of God’s countenance, the shadow of God’s glory.
SERMON II.
RELIGION NOT GODLINESS.
PSALM civ. 13–15.
“He watereth the hills from his chambers: the earth is satisfied with
the fruit of thy works. He causeth the grass to grow for the cattle,
and herb for the service of man: that he may bring forth food out of
the earth; and wine that maketh glad the heart of man, and oil to
make his face to shine, and bread which strengtheneth man’s heart.”
DID you ever remark, my friends, that the Bible says hardly any thing
about religion—that it never praises religious people? This is very
curious. Would to God we would all remember it! The Bible speaks of a
religious man only once, and of religion only twice, except where it
speaks of the Jews’ religion to condemn it, and shews what an empty,
blind, useless thing it was.
What does this Bible talk of, then? It talks of God; not of religion,
but of God. It tells us not to be religious, but to be godly. You may
think there is no difference, or that it is but a difference of words. I
tell you that a difference in words is a very awful, important
difference. A difference in words is a difference in things. Words are
very awful and wonderful things, for they come from the most awful and
wonderful of all beings, Jesus Christ, the Word. He puts words into
men’s minds—He made all things, and He makes all words to express those
things with. And woe to those who use the wrong words about things!—For
if a man calls any thing by its wrong name, it is a sure sign that he
understands that thing wrongly, or feels about it wrongly; and therefore
a man’s words are oftener honester than he thinks; for as a man’s words
are, so is a man’s heart; out of the abundance of our hearts our mouths
speak; and, therefore, by right words, by the right names which we call
things, we shall be justified, and by our words, by the wrong names we
call things, we shall be condemned.
Therefore a difference in words is a difference in the things which those
words mean, and there is a difference between religion and godliness; and
we shew it by our words. Now these are religious times, but they are
very ungodly times; and we shew that also by our words. Because we think
that people ought to be religious, we talk a great deal about religion;
because we hardly think at all that a man ought to be godly, we talk very
little about God, and that good old Bible word “godliness” does not pass
our lips once a-month. For a man may be very religious, my friends, and
yet very ungodly. The heathens were very religious at the very time
that, as St. Paul tells us, they would not keep God in their knowledge.
The Jews were the most religious people on the earth, they hardly talked
or thought about anything but religion, at the very time that they knew
so little of God that they crucified Him when He came down among them.
St. Paul says that he was living after the strictest sect of the Jews’
religion, at the very time that he was fighting against God, persecuting
God’s people and God’s Son, and dead in trespasses and sins. These are
ugly facts, my friends, but they are true, and well worth our laying to
heart in these religious, ungodly days. I am afraid if Jesus Christ came
down into England this day as a carpenter’s son, He would get—a better
hearing, perhaps, than the Jews gave him, but still a very bad
hearing—one dare hardly think of it.
And yet I believe we ought to think of it, and, by God’s help, I will one
day preach you a sermon, asking you all round this fair question:—If
Jesus Christ came to you in the shape of a poor man, whom nobody knew,
should _you_ know him? should you admire him, fall at his feet and give
yourself up to him body and soul? I am afraid that I, for one, should
not—I am afraid that too many of us here would not. That comes of
thinking more of religion than we do of godliness—in plain words, more of
our own souls than we do of Jesus Christ. But you will want to know what
is, after all, the difference between religion and godliness? Just the
difference, my friends, that there is between always thinking of self and
always forgetting self—between the terror of a slave and the affection of
a child—between the fear of hell and the love of God. For, tell me, what
you mean by being religious? Do you not mean thinking a great deal about
your own souls, and praying and reading about your own souls, and trying
by all possible means to get your own souls saved? Is not that the
meaning of religion? And yet I have never mentioned God’s name in
describing it! This sort of religion must have very little to do with
God. You may be surprised at my words, and say in your hearts almost
angrily, ‘Why who saves our souls but God? therefore religion must have
to do with God.’ But, my friends, for your souls’ sake, and for God’s
sake, ask yourselves this question on your knees this day:—If you could
get your souls saved without God’s help, would it make much difference to
you? Suppose an angel from heaven, as they say, was to come down and
prove to you clearly that there was no God, no blessed Jesus in heaven,
that the world made itself, and went on of itself, and that the Bible was
all a mistake, but that you need not mind, for your gardens and crops
would grow just as well, and your souls be saved just as well when you
died.
To how many of you would it make any difference? To some of you, thank
God, I believe it would make a difference. Here are some here, I
believe, who would feel that news the worst news they ever heard,—worse
than if they were told that their souls were lost for ever; there are
some here, I do believe, who, at that news, would cry aloud in agony,
like little children who had lost their father, and say, ‘No Father in
heaven to love? No blessed Jesus in heaven to work for, and die for, and
glory and delight in? No God to rule and manage this poor, miserable,
quarrelsome world, bringing good out of evil, blessing and guiding all
things and people on earth? What do I care what becomes of my soul if
there is no God for my soul to glory in? What is heaven worth without
God? God is Heaven!’
Yes, indeed, what would heaven be worth without God? But how many people
feel that the curse of this day is, that most people have forgotten
_that_? They are selfishly anxious enough about their own souls, but
they have forgotten God. They are religious, for fear of hell; but they
are not godly, for they do not love God, or see God’s hand in every
thing. They forget that they have a Father in heaven; that He sends
rain, and sunshine, and fruitful seasons; that He gives them all things
richly to enjoy in spite of all their sins. His mercies are far above,
out of their sight, and therefore His judgments are far away out of their
sight too; and so they talk of the “Visitation of God,” as if it was
something that was very extraordinary, and happened very seldom; and when
it came, only brought evil, harm, and sorrow. If a man lives on in
health, they say he lives by the strength of his own constitution; if he
drops down dead, they say he died by “the visitation of God.” If the
corn-crops go on all right and safe, they think _that_ quite natural—the
effect of the soil, and the weather, and their own skill in farming and
gardening. But if there comes a hailstorm or a blight, and spoils it
all, and brings on a famine, they call it at once “a visitation of God.”
My friends! do you think God “visits” the earth or you only to harm you?
I tell you that every blade of grass grows by “the visitation of God.” I
tell you that every healthy breath you ever drew, every cheerful hour you
ever spent, every good crop you ever housed safely, came to you by “the
visitation of God.” I tell you that every sensible thought or plan that
ever came into your heads,—every loving, honest, manly, womanly feeling
that ever rose in your hearts, God “visited” you to put it there. If
God’s Spirit had not given it you, you would never have got it of
yourselves.
But people forget this, and therefore they have so little real love to
God—so little real, loyal, childlike trust in God. They do not think
much about God, because they find no pleasure in thinking about Him; they
look on God as a task-master, gathering where He has not strewed, reaping
where He has not sown,—a task-master who has put them, very miserable,
sinful creatures, to struggle on in a very miserable, sinful world, and,
though He tells them in His Bible that they _cannot_ keep His
commandments, expects them to keep them just the same, and will at the
last send them all into everlasting fire, unless they take a great deal
of care, and give up a great many natural and pleasant things, and
beseech and entreat Him very hard to excuse them, after all. This is the
thought which most people have of God, even religious people; they look
on God as a stern tyrant, who, when man sinned and fell, could not
satisfy His own justice—His own vengeance in plain words, without killing
some one, and who would have certainly killed all mankind, if Jesus
Christ had not interfered, and said, “If Thou must slay some one, slay
me, though I am innocent!”
Oh, my friends, does not this all sound horrible and irreverent? And yet
if you will but look into your own hearts, will you not find some such
thoughts there? I am sure you will. I believe every man finds such
thoughts in his heart now and then. I find them in my own heart: I know
that they must be in the hearts of others, because I see them producing
their natural fruits in people’s actions—a selfish, slavish view of
religion, with little or no real love to God, or real trust in Him; but a
great deal of uneasy dread of Him: for this is just the dark, false view
of God, and of the good news of salvation and the kingdom of heaven,
which the devil is always trying to make men take. The Evil One tries to
make us forget that God is love; he tries to make us forget that God
gives us all things richly to enjoy; he tries to make us forget that God
gives at all, and to make us think that we take, not that He gives; to
make us look at God as a task-master, not as a father; in one word, to
make us mistake the devil for God, and God for the devil.
And, therefore, it is that we ought to bless God for such Scriptures as
this 104th Psalm, which He seems to have preserved in the Bible just to
contradict these dark, slavish notions,—just to testify that God is a
_giver_, and knows our necessities before we ask and gives us all things,
even as He gave us His Blessed Son—freely, long before we wanted
them,—from the foundation of all things, before ever the earth and the
world was made—from all eternity, perpetual love, perpetual bounty.
What does this text teach us? To look at God as Him who gives to all
freely and upbraideth not. It says to us,—Do not suppose that your crops
grow of themselves. God waters the hills from above. He causes the
grass to grow for the cattle, and the green herb for the service of man.
Do not suppose that He cares nothing about seeing you comfortable and
happy. It is He, He only who sends all which strengthens man’s body, and
makes glad his heart, and makes him of a cheerful countenance. His will
is that you should be cheerful. Ah, my friends, if we would but believe
all this!—we are too apt to say to ourselves, ‘Our earthly comforts here
have nothing to do with godliness or God, God must save our souls, but
our bodies we must save ourselves. God gives us spiritual blessings, but
earthly blessings, the good things of this life, for them we must
scramble and drudge ourselves, and get as much of them as we can without
offending God;’—as if God grudged us our comforts! as if godliness had
not the promise of this life as well as the life to come! If we would
but believe that God knows our necessities before we ask—that He gives us
daily more than we can ever get by working for it!—if we would but seek
first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, all other things would be
added to us; and we should find that he who loses his life should save
it. And this way of looking at God’s earth would not make us idle; it
would not tempt us to sit with folded hands for God’s blessings to drop
into our mouths. No! I believe it would make men far more industrious
than ever mere self-interest can make them; they would say, ‘God is our
Father, He gave us His own Son, He gives us all things freely, we owe Him
not slavish service, but a boundless debt of cheerful gratitude.
Therefore we must do His will, and we are sure His will must be our
happiness and comfort—therefore we must do His will, and His will is that
we should _work_, and therefore we _must_ work. He has bidden us labour
on this earth—He has bidden us dress it and keep it, conquer it and fill
it for Him. We are His stewards here on earth, and therefore it is a
glory and an honour to be allowed to work here in God’s own land—in our
loving Father’s own garden. We do not know why He wishes us to labour
and till the ground, for He could have fed us with manna from heaven if
He liked, as He fed the Jews of old, without our working at all. But His
will is that we should work; and work we will, not for our own sakes
merely, but for His sake, because we know He likes it, and for the sake
of our brothers, our countrymen, for whom Christ died.’
Oh, my friends, why is it that so many till the ground industriously, and
yet grow poorer and poorer for all their drudging and working? It is
their own fault. They till the ground for their own sakes, and not for
God’s sake and for their countrymen’s sake; and so, as the Prophet says,
they sow much and bring in little, and he who earns wages earns them to
put in a bag full of holes. Suppose you try the opposite plan. Suppose
you say to yourself, ‘I will work henceforward because God wishes me to
work. I will work henceforward for my country’s sake, because I feel
that God has given me a noble and a holy calling when He set me to grow
food for His children, the people of England. As for my wages and my
profit, God will take care of them if they are just; and if they are
unjust, He will take care of them too. He, at all events, makes the
garden and the field grow, and not I. My land is filled, not with the
fruit of my work, but with the fruit of His work. He will see that I
lose nothing by my labour. If I till the soil for God and for God’s
children, I may trust God to pay me my wages.’ Oh, my friends, He who
feeds the young birds when they call upon Him; and far, far more, He who
gave you His only-begotten Son, will He not with Him freely give you all
things? For, after all done, He must give to you, or you will not get.
You may fret and stint, and scrape and puzzle; one man may sow, and
another man may water; but, after all, who can give the increase but God?
Can you make a load of hay, unless He has first grown it for you, and
then dried it for you? If you would but think a little more about Him,
if you would believe that your crops were His gifts, and in your hearts
offer them up to Him as thank-offerings, see if He would not help you to
sell your crops as well as to house them. He would put you in the way of
an honest profit for your labour, just as surely as He only put you in
the way of labouring at all. “Trust in the Lord, and be doing good;
dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed;” for “without me,” says
our Lord, “you can do nothing.” No: these are His own words—nothing. To
Him all power is given in heaven and earth; He knows every root and every
leaf, and feeds it. Will He not much more feed you, oh ye of little
faith? Do you think that He has made His world so ill that a man cannot
get on in it unless he is a rogue? No. Cast all your care on Him, and
see if you do not find out ere long that He cares for you, and has cared
for you from all eternity.
SERMON III.
LIFE AND DEATH.
PSALM civ. 24, 28–30.
“O Lord, how manifold are Thy works! in wisdom hast Thou made them
all: the earth is full of Thy riches. That Thou givest them they
gather: Thou openest Thine hand, they are filled with good. Thou
hidest Thy face, they are troubled: Thou takest away their breath,
they die, and return to their dust. Thou sendest forth Thy spirit,
they are created: and Thou renewest the face of the earth.”
I HAD intended to go through this psalm with you in regular order; but
things have happened this parish, awful and sad, during the last week,
which I was bound not to let slip without trying to bring them home to
your hearts, if by any means I could persuade the thoughtless ones among
you to be wise and consider your latter end:—I mean the sad deaths of
various of our acquaintances. The death-bell has been tolled in this
parish three times, I believe, in one day—a thing which has seldom
happened before, and which God grant may never happen again. Within two
miles of this church there are now five lying dead. Five human beings,
young as well as old, to whom the awful words of the text have been
fulfilled: “Thou takest away their breath, they die, and return to their
dust.” And the very day on which three of these deaths happened was
Ascension-day—the day on which Jesus, the Lord of life, the Conqueror of
death, ascended upon high, having led captivity captive, and became the
first-fruits of the grave, to send down from the heaven of eternal life
the Spirit who is the Giver of life. That was a strange mixture, death
seemingly triumphant over Christ’s people on the very day on which life
triumphed in Jesus Christ Himself. Let us see, though, whether death has
not something to do with Ascension-day. Let us see whether a sermon
about death is not a fit sermon for the Sunday after Ascension-day. Let
us see whether the text has not a message about life and death too—a
message which may make us feel that in the midst of life we are in death,
and that yet in the midst of death we are in life; that however things
may _seem_, yet death has not conquered life, but life has conquered and
_will_ conquer death, and conquer it most completely at the very moment
that we die, and our bodies return to their dust.
Do I speak riddles? I think the text will explain my riddles, for it
tells us how life comes, how death comes. Life comes from God: He sends
forth His spirit, and things are made, and He renews the face of the
earth. We read in the very two verses of the book of Genesis how the
Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters the creation, and woke
all things into life. Therefore the Creed well calls the Holy Ghost, the
Spirit of God, that is—the Lord and Giver of life. And the text tells us
that He gives life, not only to us who have immortal souls, but to every
thing on the face of the earth; for the psalm has been talking all
through, not only of men, but of beasts, fishes, trees, and rivers, and
rocks, sun and moon. Now, all these things have a life in them. Not a
life like ours; but still you speak rightly and wisely when you say,
‘That tree is alive, and, That tree is dead. That running water is live
water—it is sweet and fresh, but if it is kept standing it begins to
putrefy, its life is gone from it, and a sort of death comes over it, and
makes it foul, and unwholesome, and unfit to drink.’ This is a deep
matter, this, how there is a sort of life in every thing, even to the
stones under our feet. I do not mean, of course, that stones can think
as our life makes us do, or feel as the beasts’ life makes them do, or
even grow as the trees’ life makes them do; but I mean that their life
keeps them as they are, without changing or decaying. You hear miners
and quarrymen talk very truly of the live rock. That stone, they say,
was cut out of the live rock, meaning the rock as it is under ground,
sound and hard—as it would be, for aught we know, to the end of time,
unless it was taken out of the ground, out of the place where God’s
Spirit meant it to be, and brought up to the open air and the rain, in
which it is not its nature to be. And then you will see that the life of
the stone begins to pass from it bit by bit, that it crumbles and peels
away, and, in short, decays and is turned again to its dust. Its
organisation, as it is called, or life, ends, and then—what? does the
stone lie for ever useless? No! And there is the great blessed mystery
of how God’s Spirit is always bringing life out of death. When the stone
is decayed and crumbled down to dust and clay, it makes _soil_—this very
soil here, which you plough, is the decayed ruins of ancient hills; the
clay which you dig up in the fields was once part of some slate or
granite mountains, which were worn away by weather and water, that they
might become fruitful earth. Wonderful! but any one who has studied
these things can tell you they are true. Any one who has ever lived in
mountainous countries ought to have seen the thing happen, ought to know
that the land in the mountain valleys is made at first, and kept rich
year by year, by the washings from the hills above; and this is the
reason why land left dry by rivers and by the sea is generally so rich.
Then what becomes of the soil? It begins a new life. The roots of the
plants take it up; the salts which they find in it—the staple, as we call
them—go to make leaves and seed; the very sand has its use, it feeds the
stalks of corn and grass, and makes them stiff. The corn-stalks would
never stand upright if they could not get sand from the soil. So what a
thousand years ago made part of a mountain, now makes part of a
wheat-plant; and in a year more the wheat grain will have been eaten, and
the wheat straw perhaps eaten too, and they will have _died_—decayed in
the bodies of the animals who have eaten them, and then they will begin a
third new life—they will be turned into parts of the animal’s body—of a
man’s body. So that what is now your bone and flesh, may have been once
a rock on some hillside a hundred miles away.
Strange, but true! all learned men know that it is true. You, if you
think over my words, may see that they are at least reasonable. But
still most wonderful! This world works right well, surely. It obeys
God’s Spirit. Oh, my friends, if we fulfilled our life and our duty as
well as the clay which we tread on does,—if we obeyed God’s Spirit as
surely as the flint does, we should have many a heartache spared us, and
many a headache too! To be what God wants us!—to be _men_, to be
_women_, and therefore to live as children of God, members of Christ,
fulfilling our duty in that state to which God has called us, that would
be our bliss and glory. Nothing can live in a state in which God did not
intend it to live. Suppose a tree could move itself about like an
animal, and chose to do so, the tree would wither and die; it would be
trying to act contrary to the law which God has given it. Suppose the ox
chose to eat meat like the lion, it would fall sick and die; for it would
be acting contrary to the law which God’s Spirit had made for it—going
out of the calling to which God’s Word has called it, to eat grass and
not flesh, and live thereby. And so with us: if we will do wickedly,
when the will of God, as the Scripture tells us, is our sanctification,
our holiness; if we will speak lies, when God’s law for us is that we
should speak truth; if we will bear hatred and ill-will, when God’s law
for us is, Love as brothers,—you all sprang from one father, Adam,—you
were all redeemed by one brother, Jesus Christ; if we will try to live as
if there was no God, when God’s law for us is, that a man can live like a
man only by faith and trust in God;—then we shall _die_, if we break
God’s laws according to which he intended man to live. Thus it was with
Adam; God intended him to obey God, to learn every thing from God. He
chose to disobey God, to try and know something of himself, by getting
the knowledge of good and evil; and so death passed on him. He became an
unnatural man, a _bad_ man, more or less, and so he became a dead man;
and death came into the world, that time at least, by sin, by breaking
the law by which man was meant to be a man. As the beasts will die if
you give them unnatural food, or in any way prevent their following the
laws which God has made for them, so man dies, of necessity. All the
world cannot help his dying, because he breaks the laws which God has
made for him.
And how does he die? The text tells us, God takes away his breath, and
turns His face from him. In His presence, it is written, is life. The
moment He withdraws his Spirit, the Spirit of life, from any thing, body
or soul, then it dies. It was by _sin_ came death—by man’s becoming
unfit for the Spirit of God.
Therefore the body is dead because of sin, says St. Paul, doomed to die,
carrying about in it the seeds of death from the very moment it is born.
Death has truly passed upon all men!
Most sad; and yet there is hope, and more than hope, there is certain
assurance, for us, that though we die, yet shall we live! I have shewn
you, in the beginning of my sermon, how nothing that dies perishes to
nothing, but begins a new and a higher life. How the stone becomes a
plant,—something better and more useful than it was before; the plant
passes into an animal—a step higher still. And, therefore, we may be
sure that the same rule will hold good about us men and women, that when
we die, we shall begin a new and a nobler life, that is, if we have been
true _men_; if we have lived fulfilling the law of our kind. St. Paul
tells us so positively. He says that nothing comes to life except it
first die, then God gives it a new body. He says that even so is the
resurrection of the dead,—that we gain a step by dying; that we are sown
in corruption, and are raised in incorruption; we are sown in dishonour,
and are raised in glory; we are sown in weakness, and are raised in
power; we are sown a natural body, and are raised a spiritual body; that
as we now are of the earth earthy, after death and the resurrection our
new and nobler body will be of the heavens heavenly; so that “when this
corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have
put on immortality, then death shall be swallowed up in victory.”
Therefore, I say, Sorrow not for those who sleep as if you had no hope
for the dead; for “Christ is risen from the dead, and become the
first-fruits of them that slept. For as in Adam all die, even so in
Christ shall all be made alive.”