Christ, King of kings, and King, too, of every nation and man on earth,
whether they know it or not, governs mankind, that is what you have to
seek, because it is there already. You are in Christ's kingdom. If you
wish to prosper in it, find out what its laws are. That will be true
wisdom. For in keeping the commandments of God, and in obeying His laws;
in that alone is life; life for body and soul; life for time and for
eternity.
And the righteousness of God, which is the righteousness of Christ;--find
out what that is, and pray to Christ to give it to you; for so alone will
you be what a man should be, created after God in righteousness and true
holiness, and renewed into the image and likeness of God. You will find
plenty of persons now, as in all times, who will tell you that you need
not do that; that all you need, for this world or the world to come, is
some righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees; calling that--oh shame
that such a glorious and eternal truth should be so caricatured and
degraded by man--justification by faith: while all they mean is,
justification not by faith, but by mere assent; assenting to certain
doctrines; keeping certain religious watch-words in your mouth, and, over
and above, leading a tolerably respectable life. But what says our Lord?
"Except your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and
Pharisees, ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven." Not
merely--not dwell in it for ever, but not even enter it, not even get
through the very gate, and cross the very threshold, of it. The merely
assenting, merely respectable, even the so-called religious and orthodox
life will not let you into the kingdom of heaven, either in this life or
the life to come. No. That requires the noble life, the pure life, the
just life, the gentle life, the generous life, the heroic life, the
Godlike life, which is perfect even as our Father in heaven is perfect,
because He lets His sun shine on the evil and on the good, and His rain
fall on the just and on the unjust. But how will this help you to rise
in life? Our Lord Himself answers--and our Lord should surely know--"Seek
ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things
shall be added to you." Have faith in God, and in His promise; and your
faith in God shall be rewarded. You shall find that your heavenly Father
knows that you have need of all these things; and has arranged His
kingdom, and the whole universe, accordingly. The very good things of
this world--wealth, honour, power, and the rest, for the sake of which
worldly men quarrel, and envy, and slander, and bully, and cringe, and
commit all basenesses and crimes--all these shall come to you of their
own accord by the providence of your Father in heaven and by His
everlasting Laws, if you will but learn and do God's will, and lead the
Christlike and the Godlike life. Honour and power, wealth and
prosperity, as much of them as is justly good for you, and as much of
them as you deserve--that is, earn and merit by your own ability and self-
control--shall come to you by the very laws of the universe and by the
very providence of God. You shall find that godliness hath the promise
of this life, as well as of the life which is to come. You shall find
that God's kingdom is a well-made and well-ordered kingdom; and that His
laws are life, and are far more worth trusting in than the maxims of that
ill-made and ill-ordered world of man, which you all renounced at your
baptism. You shall find that the promises of Scripture are no dreams,
but actual practical living truths, which come true, and fulfil
themselves, in the lives and histories of men.
Choose, young men; choose now; and make up your minds which way you will
rise in life; by merely getting money; or by getting wisdom and honour
and virtue. The Psalmists of old, yea our Lord Himself, tell you what
will happen in each case. If you want only to be rich, why then be rich;
if you are clever enough. The Lord may give you what you want, in this
evil world. He may give you your portion in this life, and fill you with
His hid treasure. He may let you heap up money which you do not know how
to spend, and be a laughing-stock to others while you live; and after you
die, your children will probably squander what you have hoarded; while
you will carry away nothing when you die, neither will your pomp follow
you: and take care lest you wake, after all, like Dives in the torment,
to hear the fearful but most reasonable words--"Son, thou in thy lifetime
receivedst thy good things, and therefore thou art tormented." Those
words too, I fear, will come true, in this very generation, of many a
wretched soul who while he lived counted himself a happy man; and had all
men speaking well of him, because he did well unto himself. On whose
souls may God have mercy.
Choose, young men: choose; now in the golden days of youth, and strength,
and honour, ere you have laid a yoke on your own shoulders--even the yoke
of money-worship;--not light and easy, like the yoke of Christ, but
heavier and heavier as the years roll on, while you, with fading
intellect, fading hopes, and it may be fading credit, and certainly
fading power of any rational enjoyment, have still, like the doomed souls
in Dante's Inferno, to roll up hill the money-bags which are perpetually
slipping back. I have seen that, and more than once or twice; and it is,
I think, the saddest sight on earth--save one. Choose, I say again,
then, young men, before you have spread a net round your own feet, which,
as in disturbed dreams, grows and tangles more and more each time you
move--even the net of greed and craft, which men set for their
neighbours; and are but too apt, ere all is done, to be taken in
themselves; the net of truly bad society, of the society of men who have
set their hearts on making money, somehow or other; and with whom, if you
cast in your lot, you may descend--O God, I know full well what I am
saying--to depths from which your young spirits now would shrink; till
your higher nature be subdued to the element in which it works; and the
poet's curse on all who bind themselves to natures lower than their own
come true of you--
Thou shall lower to their level, day by day,
All that once was fine within thee growing coarse to sympathize with
clay.
Or you may choose--God grant that you may choose--the other path; the
path of the law of Christ, and of the Spirit of Christ; the kingdom of
God and His righteousness. And then shall come true of you, as far as
God shall see good for your immortal soul, those other promises--
"Come, ye children, and hearken unto me, and I will teach you the fear of
the Lord. What man is he that loves life, and would fain see good days?
Let him keep his tongue from evil, and his lips that they speak no
deceit. Let him eschew evil and do good; let him seek peace and pursue
it. For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and His ears are
open to their prayers. . . For the Lord ordereth a good man's going, and
maketh his way acceptable to Himself. Though he fall he shall not be
cast away, for the Lord upholdeth him with His hand . . . I have been
young, and now am old, and yet never saw I the righteous forsaken, nor
his seed begging their bread. Flee from evil, and do the thing that is
good, and dwell for evermore. For the Lord loveth the thing that is
righteous. He forsaketh not His that be godly, but they are preserved
for ever."
Choose that; the better part which shall not be taken from you; for it is
according to the true laws of political and social economy, which are the
laws of the Maker of the Universe, and of the Redeemer of Mankind. And
then, whether or not you leave your children wealth, you will, at all
events, leave them an example by which they, and their children's
children, must prosper to the world's end. And your prayer will be, more
and more, as you grow old and weary with the hard work of life--
"I will go forth in the strength of the Lord God, and make mention of His
righteousness only. Thou, O God, hast taught me from my youth up until
now. Therefore will I tell of Thy wondrous works. Forsake me not, O
Lord, in my old age, when I am grey-headed, till I have shewn Thy
strength unto this generation; and Thy power unto those that are yet to
come."
To which end may Christ bring us all, of His infinite mercy. Amen.
SERMON XXVII. THE BEATIFIC VISION.
PSALM LVII.
_A Psalm of David when he fled from Saul in the cave_.
Be merciful unto me, O God, be merciful unto me, for my soul trusteth
in Thee, and under the shadow of Thy wings shall be my refuge, until
this tyranny be over-past. I will call unto the most high God, even
unto the God that shall perform the cause which I have in hand. He
shall send from heaven, and save me from the reproof of him that would
eat me up. God shall send forth His mercy and truth: my soul is among
lions. And I lie even among the children of men, that are set on
fire, whose teeth are spears and arrows, and their tongue a sharp
sword. Set up Thyself, O God, above the heavens, and Thy glory above
all the earth. They have laid a net for my feet, and pressed down my
soul: they have digged a pit before me, and are fallen into the midst
of it themselves. My heart is fixed, O God, my heart is fixed: I will
sing, and give praise. Awake up, my glory; awake, lute and harp: I
myself will awake right early. I will give thanks unto Thee, O Lord,
among the people, and I will sing unto Thee among the nations. For
the greatness of Thy mercy reacheth unto the heavens, and Thy truth
unto the clouds. Set up Thyself, O God, above the heavens, and Thy
glory above all the earth.
Some people now-a-days would call this poetry; and so it is. But what
poetry! They would call it a Hebrew song, a Hebrew lyric; and so it is.
But what a song! There is something in us, if we be truly delicate and
high-minded people, which will surely make us feel a deep difference
between it and common poetry, or common songs; which made our forefathers
read or chant it in church, and use it, as many a pious soul has ere now,
in private devotion.
David did not compose it in church or in temple. He never meant it,
perhaps, to be sung in public worship. He little dreamed that we, and
millions more, in lands of which he had never heard, should be repeating
his words in a foreign tongue in our most sacred acts of worship. He was
thinking, when he composed it, mainly of himself and his own sorrows and
dangers. He intends, he says, to awake early, and sing it to lute and
harp. Perhaps he had composed it in the night, as he lay either in the
cave of Adullam or Engedi, hiding from Saul among the cliffs of the wild
goats; and meant to go forth to the cave's mouth, and there, before the
sun rose over the downs, he would, to translate his words exactly, "awake
the dawning" with his song in the free air and the clear sky, singing to
his little band of men.
And to some one more than man, my friends. For his poetry was poetry
concerning God. His song was a song to God. He does not sing of his own
sorrows to himself, as too many poets have done ere now. He does not
sing to his men; though he no doubt wished them to hear him, and learn
from him, and gain faith and comfort and courage from his song. He sings
of his sorrows to God Himself; to the God who made heaven and earth; the
God who is above the heavens, and His glory above all the earth.
This is the secret, the virtue, the charm of the song; that it sings to
God. This is why it has passed into many lands, into many languages,
through hundreds and hundreds of years, and is as fresh, and mighty, and
full of meaning and of power, now, here, to us in England, as it was to
David, when he was a poor outlaw, wandering in the hills of the little
country of Judaea, more than 2000 years ago.
The poet says,
A thing of beauty is a joy for ever,
and this psalm is most beautiful, and a joy for ever to delicate and
noble intellects. But more, a thing of truth is a help for ever. And
this psalm is most true, and a help for ever to all sorrowing and weary
hearts. For the Spirit of truth it was, who put this psalm into David's
heart and brain; and taught him to know and say what was true for him,
and true for all men; what was true then, and will be true for ever.
And what in it is true for ever? The very figures, the metaphors of the
psalm are true for ever. "Under the shadow of Thy wings shall be my
refuge"--that is a noble figure; can we not feel its beauty? And more.
Do none of us know that it is true? David did not believe any more than
we do, that God had actual wings. But David knew--and it may be some of
us know too--that God does at times strangely and lovingly hide us; keep
us out of temptation; keep us out of harm's way; as it is written, "Thou
shall hide them privately in Thy presence from the provoking of all men.
Thou shall keep them in Thy tabernacle from the strife of tongues." Ah,
my dear friends, in such a time as this, when the strife of tongues is
only too loud, have you never had reason to thank God for being, by some
seemingly mere accident, kept out of the strife of tongues and out of
your chance of striving too, and of making a fool of yourself like too
many others? The image of the mother bird, hiding her brood under her
wings, seemed to David just to express that act of God's fatherly love,
in words which will be true for ever, as long as a brooding bird is left
on the earth, to remind us of David's song; and of One greater than
David, too, who said--"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have
gathered thy children, as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings,
and thou wouldest not." God grant that we all may do, when our time
comes, that which those violent conceited Jews would not do; and
therefore paid the awful penalty of their folly.
And the darker and more painful figures of the psalm: are they not true
still? Is not a man's soul, even in this just and peaceful land, and far
oftener in lands which are still neither just nor peaceful--Is not a
man's soul, I say, sometimes among lions?--among greedy, violent,
tyrannous persons, who are ready to entangle him in a quarrel, shout him
down, ay, or shoot him down; literally ready to eat him up? Are not the
children of men still too often set on fire; on fire with wild party
cries, with superstitions which they do not half understand, with brute
excitements which pander to their basest passions, running like fire from
head to head, and heart to heart, till whole classes, whole nations
sometimes, are on fire, ready like fire to consume and destroy all they
touch; and like fire, to consume and destroy themselves likewise?
Are there none now, too, whose teeth are spears and arrows, and their
tongue a sharp sword? Such use the pen now, rather than the tongue: but
they know, as well as those whom David met, how to handle the spears and
arrows of slander, and the sharp sword of insult. Are there none left,
who set nets for their neighbours' feet, by gambling, swindling, puffing,
by tricks of trade and tricks of party?--none who, like the Scribes of
old, try to entangle men in their talk, and make them offenders for a
word; and who, like David's enemies, fall now and then into the very pit
which they have digged, and ruin themselves in trying to ruin others?
My friends, such men will be, as long as there is sin upon the earth.
Their weapons are very different now from what they were in David's time:
but their hearts are the same as they were then. "The works of the flesh
they do, which are manifest;" and a very ugly list they make; as all who
read St Paul's Epistles know full well.
But such men have their wages. God is merciful in this; that He rewards
every man according to his work. And He is merciful to the whole human
race, in rewarding such men according to their work. To the flesh they
sow, and of the flesh they shall reap corruption. Of old it was
written--"The wages of sin are death;" and that, like all God's words, is
a Gospel and good news to poor human beings. For if the wages of sin
were not death, what end could there be to sin, and therefore to misery?
But while such men exist, how shall a man escape them? How shall he
defend himself from them? Not by craft and falsehood, not by angry
replies, not by fighting them with their own weapons. The honest man is
no match for them with those. The man who has a conscience is no match
for the man who has none. The man who has no conscience does what he
wills; everything is fair to him in war; and there--in his
unscrupulousness--lies his evil strength. The man who has a conscience
dares not do what he likes. His scruples--in plain words, his fear of
God--hamper him, and put him at a disadvantage, which will always defeat
him, as often as he borrows the devil's tools to do God's work withal.
He must give up those weapons, as David threw off Saul's armour, when he
went to fight the giant. It was strong enough, doubt not: but he could
not go in it, he said; he was not accustomed to it. He would take
simpler weapons, to which he was accustomed; and fight his battle with
them, trusting not in armour, but in the name of the living God.
In the name of the living God. That is the only sure weapon, and the
only sure defence. In that David trusted, when he went to fight the
giant. In that he trusted, when he was hid in the cave. And because he
trusted in God, he prayed to God. He spoke to God. Remember that, and
understand how much it means. David, the simple yeoman's son, the
outlaw, the wanderer, despised and rejected by men, one who was no
scholar either, who very probably could neither read nor write, and knew
neither sciences nor arts, save how to play, in some simple way, upon his
harp--this man found out that, however oppressed, miserable, ignorant he
was in many respects, he had a right to speak face to face with the
Almighty and Infinite God, who had made heaven and earth. He found out
that that great God cared for him, protected him, and would be true to
him, if only he would be true to God and to himself. What a discovery
was that! Worth all the wealth and power, ay, worth all the learning and
science in the world.--To have found the pearl of great price, the secret
of all secrets; I, David, may speak to God.
Ah, my friends, consider the meaning of that. Consider it, I say. For
when that great thought has once flashed across a man's mind, he is a new
creature thenceforth. He need speak to no father-confessor or director;
to no saints or angels; to no sages or philosophers. For he can speak to
God Himself, and he need speak to no one else. Nay, at times he dare
speak to no one else. If he can tell his story to God, why tell it to
any of God's creatures?
He is in the presence of God Himself, God his Father, God his Saviour,
God his Comforter; Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. God is listening to him.
To God he can tell all his sorrows, all his wrongs, all his doubts, all
his sins, all his weaknesses, as David told his; and God will hear him;
and instead of striking him dead for his presumption or for his
sinfulness, will comfort him; comfort him with a feeling of peace, of
freedom, of being right, and of being safe, such as he never had before;
till all the troubles and dangers of this life shall seem light to him.
Let the world rage. Let the foolish people deal foolishly, and the
treacherous ones treacherously. For if God be with a man, who can be
against him? He has no fears left now. He has nothing to do, save to
thank God for his boundless condescension; and to trust on. To trust on.
If he has set his heart on the Lord, he need not fear what man will do to
him. If his heart is fixed; if he is sure that God cares for him, he
will, as it were by instinct, sing and give praise to God, as the bird
sings when the rain is past, and the sun shines out once more.
But I think that when a man has reached that state of mind, as David
reached it, he will rise, as David rose, to a higher state of mind still.
He will rise, as David rises in this psalm, from thoughts about his own
soul, to thoughts about God. In one word, he will rise from religion to
that which is above even religion, namely theology.
His first cry to God was somewhat selfish. He went to God about himself;
about his own sorrows and troubles. That is natural and harmless. The
child in pain and terror cries to its mother selfishly to be helped out
of its own little woes. But when it is helped, and comforted, and safe
in its mother's bosom, and its sobbing is over, then it forgets itself,
and looks up into its mother's face, and thinks of her, and her alone.
And so it should be with the man whom God has comforted. When the
deliverance has come; when the peace of mind has come; then surely, if he
be worthy of the name of man, he will forget himself, and his own petty
sorrows; and look up to God, to God Himself, and say within his
heart--This great awful Being, eternal, infinite, omnipotent, who yet
condescends to take care of a tiny creature like me, who am, in
comparison with Him, less than the worm which crawls upon the ground,
less than the fly which lives but for an hour--This God, so mighty and
yet so merciful: who is He? What is He like? He is good to me. Is He
not good to all? He is merciful to me. Is not His mercy over all His
works? Nay, is he not good in Himself? The One Good? Must not God be
The One Good, who is the cause and the fountain of all other goodness in
man, in angels, in all heaven and earth? But if so--what a glorious
Being He must be. Not merely a powerful, not merely a wise, but a
glorious, because perfect, God. Then will he cry, as David cries in this
very psalm--"Oh that men could see that. Oh that men could understand
that. Oh that they would do God justice; and confess His glorious Name.
Oh that He would teach them His Name, and shew them His glory, that they
might be dazzled by the beauty of it, awed by the splendour of it. Oh
that He would gladden their souls by the beatific vision of Himself, till
they loved Him, worshipped Him, obeyed Him, for His own sake; not for
anything which they might obtain from Him, but solely because He is The
perfectly Good. Oh that God would set up Himself above the heavens, and
His glory above all the earth; and that men would lift up their eyes
above the earth, and above the heavens likewise, to God who made heaven
and earth; and would cry--Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and
honour and power; for Thou hast made all things, and for Thy pleasure
they are and were created; and Thy pleasure is, Peace on Earth, and
Goodwill toward men. Thou art the High and Holy One, who inhabitest
eternity. Yet Thou dwellest with him that is of a contrite spirit, to
revive the heart of the feeble, and to comfort the heart of the contrite.
We adore the glory of Thy power; we adore the glory of Thy wisdom: but
most of all we adore the glory of Thy justice, the glory of Thy
condescension, the glory of Thy love."
And now, friends--almost all friends unknown--and alas! never to be known
by me--you who are to me as people floating down a river; while I the
preacher stand upon the bank, and call, in hope that some of you may
catch some word of mine, ere the great stream shall bear you out of
sight--oh catch, at least, catch this one word--the last which I shall
speak here for many months, and which sums up all which I have been
trying to say to you of late.
Fix in your minds--or rather, ask God to fix in your minds--this one idea
of an absolutely good God; good with all forms of goodness which you
respect and love in man; good as you, and I, and every honest man,
understand the plain word good. Slowly you will acquire that grand and
all-illuminating idea; slowly, and most imperfectly at best: for who is
mortal man that he should conceive and comprehend the goodness of the
infinitely good God? But see then whether, in the light of that one
idea, all the old-fashioned Christian ideas about the relations of God to
man; whether a Providence, Prayer, Inspiration, Revelation; the
Incarnation, the Passion, and the final triumph, of the Son of
God--whether all these, I say, do not begin to seem to you, not merely
beautiful, not merely probable; but rational, and logical, and necessary,
moral consequences from the one idea of An Absolute and Eternal Goodness,
the Living Parent of the Universe.
And so I leave you to the Grace of God.
Footnotes:
{0a} Second edition, pp. 78, 79.
{39} J. P. Richter.
CAMBRIDGE. PRINTED BY C. J. CLAY, M.A. AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.