"I am not of the world."--John, xvii. 14.
In one sense it was _not_ so. Jesus did not seek to maintain His
holiness intact and unspotted by avoiding contact with the world. He
mingled familiarly in its busy crowds. He frowned on none of its
innocent enjoyments; He fostered, by His example, no love of seclusion;
He gave no warrant or encouragement to mortified pride, or disappointed
hopes, to rush from its duties; yet, with all this, what a halo of
heavenliness encircled His pathway through it! "I am from above," was
breathed in His every look, and word, and action, from the time when He
lay in the slumbers of guileless infancy in His Bethlehem cradle, until
He said, "I leave the world, and go to my Father!" He had moved
uncontaminated through its varied scenes, like the sunbeam, which,
whatever it touches, remains as unsullied, as when it issues from its
great fountain.
But though Himself in His sinless nature "unconquerable" by
temptation--immutably secure from the world's malignant influences, it
is all worthy of note, as an example to us, that He never unnecessarily
braved these. He knew the seducing spell that same world would exercise
on His people, of whom, with touching sympathy, He says, "_These_ are in
the world!" He knew the _many_ who would be involved and ensnared in its
subtle worship, who, "minding earthly things, would seek to slake their
thirst at polluted streams!"
Reader! the great problem you have to solve, Jesus has solved for
you--to be "_in_ the world, and yet not _of_ it." To abandon it, would
be a dereliction of duty. It would be servants deserting their work;
soldiers flying from the battle-field. _Live_ in it, that while you
live, the world, may feel the better for you. _Die_, that _when_ you
die, the world, the _Church_, may feel your loss, and cherish your
example! On its cares and duties, its trusts and responsibilities, its
employments and enjoyments, inscribe the motto, "The world passeth
away!" Beware of every thing in it that would tend to deaden
spirituality of heart; unfitting the mind for serious thought, lowering
the standard of Christian duty, and inducing a perilous conformity to
its false manners, habits, tastes, and principles. As the best antidote
to the love of the world, let the inner _vacuum_ of the heart be filled
with the love of God. Seek to feel the nobility of your regenerated
nature; that you have a nobler heritage to care for than the transitory
glories which encircle "an indivisible point, a fugitive atom." How can
I mix with the potsherds of the earth? Once, "I lay among the pots;"
now, I am "like a dove, whose wings are covered with silver, and her
feathers with yellow gold!" "Stranger--pilgrim--sojourner" "my
_citizenship_ is in heaven!" Why covet tinsel honors and glories? Why be
solicitous about the smiles of that which knew not (nay, which frowned
on) its Lord? "Paul calls it," says an old writer, "_schema_ (a
mathematical figure), which is a mere _notion_, and nothing in
substance."--(_Thomas Brooks._)
Live above its corroding cares and anxieties; remembering the
description Jesus gives of His own true people; "They are not of the
world, even as I am not of the world!"
"ARM YOURSELVES LIKEWISE WITH THE SAME MIND."
Thirty-first Day.