the limit of your demands? Already you require more from God than He
has accorded to angels; for these eternal mysteries which trouble
you, the harmony of the divine prescience with human freedom, the
origin of evil and its ineffable remedy, the incarnation of the
eternal Word--the relations of the God-man with His Father--the
atoning virtue of His sacrifice, the regenerating efficacy of the
Spirit-comforter, all these things are secrets, the knowledge of
which is hidden from angels themselves, who, according to the word
of the Apostle, stoop to explore their depths, and can not.
If you reproach the Eternal for having kept the knowledge of
these divine mysteries to Himself, why do you not reproach Him
for the thousand other limits He has prescribed for you? Why not
reproach Him for not having given you wings like a bird, to visit
the regions, which, till now, have been scanned only by your eyes?
Why not reproach Him for not giving you, besides the five senses
with which you are provided, ten other senses which He has perhaps
granted to other creatures, and which procure for them perceptions
of which you have no idea? Why not, in fine, reproach Him for having
caused the darkness of night to succeed the brightness of day
invariably on the earth? Ah! you do not reproach Him for that. You
love that night which brings rest to so many fatigued bodies and
weary spirits; which suspends in so many wretches, the feeling of
grief; that night, during which orphans, slaves, and criminals cease
to be, because over all their misfortunes and sufferings it spreads,
with the opiate of sleep, the thick veil of oblivion; you love that
night which, peopling the deserts of the heavens with ten thousand
stars, not known to the day, reveals the infinite to our ravished
imagination.
Well, then, why do you not, for a similar reason, love the night
of divine mysteries, night, gracious and salutary, in which reason
humbles itself, and finds refreshment and repose; where the darkness
even is a revelation; where one of the principal attributes of God,
immensity, discovers itself much more fully to our mind; where, in
fine, the tender relations He has permitted us to form with Himself,
are guarded from all admixture of familiarity by the thought that
the Being who has humbled Himself to us, is, at the same time,
the inconceivable God who reigns before all time, who includes in
Himself all existences and all conditions of existence, the center
of all thought, the law of all law, the supreme and final reason
of every thing! So that, if you are just, instead of reproaching
Him for the secrets of religion, you will bless Him that He has
enveloped you in mysteries.
2. But this claim is not only unjust toward God; it is also in
itself exceedingly unreasonable.
What is religion? It is God putting Himself in communication with
man; the Creator with the creature, the infinite with the finite.
There already, without going further, is a mystery; a mystery
common to all religions, impenetrable in all religions. If, then,
every thing which is a mystery offends you, you are arrested on the
threshold, I will not say of Christianity, but of every religion;
I say, even of that religion which is called natural, because it
rejects revelation and miracles; for it necessarily implies, at
the very least, a connection, a communication of some sort between
God and man--the contrary being equivalent to atheism. Your claim
prevents you from having any belief; and because you have not been
willing to be Christians, it will not allow you to be deists.
"It is of no consequence," you say, "we pass over that difficulty;
we suppose between God and us connections we can not conceive; we
admit them because they are necessary to us. But this is the only
step we are willing to take: we have already yielded too much to
yield more." Say more, say you have granted too much not to grant
much more, not to grant all! You have consented to admit, without
comprehending it, that there may be communications from God to you,
and from you to God. But consider well what is implied in such a
supposition. It implies that you are dependent, and yet free: this
you do not comprehend; it implies that the Spirit of God can make
itself understood by your spirit: this you do not comprehend; it
implies that your prayers may exert an influence on the will of
God: this you do not comprehend. It is necessary you should receive
all these mysteries, in order to establish with God connections the
most vague and superficial, and by the very side of which atheism
is placed. And when, by a powerful effort with yourselves you have
done so much as to admit these mysteries, you recoil from those
of Christianity! You have accepted the foundation, and refuse the
superstructure! You have accepted the principle and refuse the
details! You are right, no doubt, so soon as it is proved to you,
that the religion which contains these mysteries does not come from
God; or rather, that these mysteries contain contradictory ideas.
But you are not justified in denying them, for the sole reason that
you do not understand them; and the reception you have given to the
first kind of mysteries compels you, by the same rule, to receive
the others.
This is not all. Not only are mysteries an inseparable part, nay,
the very substance of all religion, but it is absolutely impossible
that a true religion should not present a great number of mysteries.
If it is true, it ought to teach more truths respecting God and
divine things than any other, than all others together; but each
of these truths has a relation to the infinite, and by consequence
borders on a mystery. How should it be otherwise in religion, when
it is thus in nature itself? Behold God in nature! The more He
gives us to contemplate, the more He gives to astonish us. To each
creature is attached some mystery. A grain of sand is an abyss!
Now, if the manifestations which God has made of Himself in nature
suggest to the observer a thousand questions which can not be
answered, how will it be, when to that first revelation, another
is added; when God the Creator and Preserver reveals Himself under
new aspects as God the Reconciler and Savior? Shall not mysteries
multiply with discoveries? With each new day shall we not see
associated a new night? And shall we not purchase each increase of
knowledge with an increase of ignorance? Has not the doctrine of
grace, so necessary, so consoling, alone opened a profound abyss,
into which, for eighteen centuries, rash and restless spirits have
been constantly plunging?
It is, then, clearly necessary that Christianity should, more
than any other religion, be mysterious, simply because it is
true. Like mountains, which, the higher they are, cast the larger
shadows, the gospel is the more obscure and mysterious on account
of its sublimity. After this, will you be indignant that you do
not comprehend every thing in the gospel? It would, forsooth, be
a truly surprising thing if the ocean could not be held in the
hollow of your hand, or uncreated wisdom within the limits of your
intelligence! It would be truly unfortunate if a finite being could
not embrace the infinite, and that, in the vast assemblage of things
there should be some idea beyond its grasp! In other words, it would
be truly unfortunate if God Himself should know something which man
does not know!
Let us acknowledge, then, how insensate is such a claim when it is
made with reference to religion.
But let us also recollect how much, in making such a claim, we
shall be in opposition to ourselves; for the submission we dislike
in religion, we cherish in a thousand other things. It happens to us
every day to admit things we do not understand, and to do so without
the least repugnance. The things, the knowledge of which is refused
us, are much more numerous than we perhaps think. Few diamonds are
perfectly pure; still fewer truths are perfectly clear. The union
of our soul with our body is a mystery--our most familiar emotions
and affections are a mystery--the action of thought and of will is
a mystery--our very existence is a mystery. Why do we admit these
various facts? Is it because we understand them? No, certainly, but
because they are self-evident, and because they are truths by which
we live. In religion we have no other course to take. We ought to
know whether it is true and necessary; and once convinced of these
two points, we ought, like the angels, to submit to the necessity of
being ignorant of some things. And why do we not submit cheerfully
to a privation which, after all, is not one?
3. To desire the knowledge of mysteries is to desire what is utterly
useless; it is to raise, as I have said before, a claim the most
vain and idle. What in reference to us is the object of the gospel?
Evidently to regenerate and save us. But it attains this end wholly
by the things it reveals. Of what use would it be to know those it
conceals from us? We possess the knowledge which can enlighten our
consciences, rectify our inclinations, renew our hearts; what should
we gain if we possest other knowledge? It infinitely concerns us to
know that the Bible is the Word of God; does it equally concern us
to know in what way the holy men that wrote it were moved by the
Holy Ghost? It is of infinite moment to us to know that Jesus Christ
is the Son of God; need we know precisely in what way the divine and
human natures are united in His adorable person? It is of infinite
importance for us to know that unless we are born again we can not
enter the kingdom of God, and that the Holy Spirit is the author of
the new birth; shall we be further advanced if we know the divine
process by which that wonder is performed? Is it not enough for us
to know the truths that save? Of what use, then, would it be to know
those which have not the slightest bearing on our salvation? "Tho
I know all mysteries," says St. Paul, "and have not charity, I am
nothing." St. Paul was content not to know, provided he had charity;
shall not we, following his example, be content also without
knowledge, provided that, like him, we have charity, that is to say,
life?
But some one will say "If the knowledge of mysteries is really
without influence on our salvation, why have they been indicated to
us at all?" What if it should be to teach us not to be too prodigal
of our "wherefores!" if it should be to serve as an exercise of our
faith, a test of our submission! But we will not stop with such a
reply.
Observe, I pray you, in what manner the mysteries of which you
complain have taken their part in religion. You readily perceive
they are not by themselves, but associated with truths which have
a direct bearing on your salvation. They contain them, they serve
to develop them; but they are not themselves the truths that save.
It is with these mysteries as it is with the vessel that contains
a medicinal draft--it is not the vessel that cures, but the draft;
yet the draft could not be presented without the vessel. Thus each
truth that saves is contained in a mystery, which, in itself, has
no power to save. So the great work of expiation is necessarily
attached to the incarnation of the Son of God, which is a mystery;
so the sanctifying graces of the new covenant are necessarily
connected with the effluence of the Holy Spirit, which is a mystery;
so, too, the divinity of religion finds a seal and an attestation
in the miracles, which are mysteries. Everywhere the light is born
from darkness, and darkness accompanies the light. These two orders
of truths are so united, so interlinked, that you can not remove
the one without the other, and each of the mysteries you attempt to
tear from religion would carry with it one of the truths which bear
directly on your regeneration and salvation. Accept the mysteries,
then, not as truths that can save you, but as the necessary
conditions of the merciful work of the Lord in your behalf.
The true point at issue in reference to religion is this:--Does
the religion which is proposed to us change the heart, unite to
God, prepare for heaven? If Christianity produces these effects,
we will leave the enemies of the cross free to revolt against its
mysteries, and tax them with absurdity. The gospel, we will say to
them, is then an absurdity; you have discovered it. But behold what
a new species of absurdity that certainly is which attaches man to
all his duties, regulates human life better than all the doctrines
of sages, plants in his bosom harmony, order, and peace, causes
him joyfully to fulfil all the offices of civil life, renders him
better fitted to live, better fitted to die, and which, were it
generally received, would be the support and safeguard of society!
Cite to us, among all human absurdities, a single one which produces
such effects. If that "foolishness" we preach produces effects like
these, is it not natural to conclude that it is truth itself? And if
these things have not entered the heart of man, it is not because
they are absurd, but because they are divine.
Make but a single reflection. You are obliged to confess that none
of the religions which man may invent can satisfy his wants, or
save his soul. Thereupon you have a choice to make. You will either
reject them all as insufficient and false, and seek for nothing
better, since man can not invent better, and then you will abandon
to chance, to caprice of temperament or of opinion, your moral life
and future destiny; or you will adopt that other religion which some
treat as folly, and it will render you holy and pure, blameless in
the midst of a perverse generation, united to God by love, and to
your brethren by charity, indefatigable in doing good, happy in
life, happy in death. Suppose, after all this, you shall be told
that this religion is false; but meanwhile, it has restored in you
the image of God, reestablished your primitive connections with
that great Being, and put you in a condition to enjoy life and the
happiness of heaven. By means of it you have become such that at the
last day, it is impossible that God should not receive you as His
children and make you partakers of His glory. You are made fit for
paradise, nay, paradise has commenced for you even here, because you
love. This religion has done for you what all religions propose, and
what no other has realized. Nevertheless, by the supposition, it is
false! And what more could it do, were it true? Rather do you not
see that this is a splendid proof of its truth? Do you not see that
it is impossible that a religion which leads to God should not come
from God, and that the absurdity is precisely that of supposing that
you can be regenerated by a falsehood?
Suppose that afterward, as at the first, you do not comprehend. It
seems necessary, then, you should be saved by the things you do not
comprehend. Is that a misfortune? Are you the less saved? Does it
become you to demand from God an explanation of an obscurity which
does not injure you, when, with reference to every thing essential,
He has been prodigal of light? The first disciples of Jesus, men
without culture and learning, received truths which they did not
comprehend, and spread them through the world. A crowd of sages and
men of genius have received, from the hands of these poor people,
truths which they comprehended no more than they. The ignorance of
the one, and the science of the other, have been equally docile.
Do, then, as the ignorant and the wise have done. Embrace with
affection those truths which have never entered into your heart,
and which will save you. Do not lose, in vain discussions, the time
which is gliding away, and which is bearing you into the cheering
or appalling light of eternity. Hasten to be saved. Love now; one
day you will know. May the Lord Jesus prepare you for that period of
light, of repose, and of happiness!
SUMMERFIELD
THE HEAVENLY INHERITANCE
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
JOHN SUMMERFIELD was born in England in 1798, and came to New York
in 1821, where he soon became one of the most popular and eloquent
preachers of that day. He belonged to the Methodist Communion
and his name is still perpetuated in the names of many Methodist
churches. He was unusually simple and modest in his tastes and
habits, but when he spoke from the pulpit he produced a great
impression by the force and daring of his style. He gave promise
of equaling Whitefield as a pulpit orator, but he was subject to
delicate health and prematurely died in 1825, twenty-seven years of
age.
SUMMERFIELD
1798-1825
THE HEAVENLY INHERITANCE
_For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the
everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ._--2 Peter
i., 11.
Of all the causes which may be adduced to account for the
indifference which is so generally manifested toward those great
concerns of eternity, in which men are so awfully interested, none
appears to me so likely to resolve the mystery, as that unbelief
which lies at the core of every heart, hindering repentance, and
so making faith impossible. Men hear that there is a hell to shun,
a heaven to win; and, though they give their assent to both these
truths, they never impress them on their mind. It is plain that,
whatever their lips may confess, they never believed with the
heart, otherwise some effect would have been produced in the life.
The germ of unbelief lies within, and discovers itself in all that
indifference which is displayed, in the majority of that class of
beings whose existence is to be perpetuated throughout eternity.
If these thoughts do sometimes obtrude themselves on their serious
attention, they are immediately banished from their minds; and the
dying exclamation of Moses may be taken up with tears by every lover
of perishing sinners: "O! that they were wise, that they understood
this, that they would consider their latter end!" When God, by His
prophet Isaiah, called the Israelites to a sense of their awful
departure from Him, His language was, "My people do not know: My
people do not consider." How few are there like Mary, who "ponder
those things in their heart," who are willing to look at themselves,
to pry into eternity, to put the question home,
"Shall I be with the damn'd cast out,
Or numbered with the bless'd?"
This question must sooner or later have a place in your minds, or
awful will be your state indeed; let it reach your hearts to-day;
and if you pray to the Father of light, you will soon be enabled in
His light to discern so much of yourselves as will cause you to cry,
"What shall I do to be saved?" While we shall this morning attempt
to point out some of the privileges of the sons of God, oh! may your
hearts catch the strong desire to be conformed to the living Head,
that so an abundant entrance may be administered unto you also, into
the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
The privilege to which our text leads us, is exclusively applicable
to those to whom that question has been solved by the Spirit of
God; those who have believed to the saving of their souls; who have
experienced redemption through His blood, and the forgiveness of
sins; and who are walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort
of the Holy Ghost.
I. The state to which we look forward: the "everlasting kingdom of
our Lord and Savior."
1. It is a kingdom. By this figurative expression our Lord has
described the state of grace here and of glory hereafter; our
happiness in time and our happiness in eternity. They were wisely so
called: Jesus has said, as well as done, all things well; for these
two states differ not in kind, but in degree; the one is merely a
preparative for the other, and he who has been a subject of the
former kingdom will be a subject of the latter. Grace is but the
seed of glory, glory is the maturity of grace; grace is but the bud
of glory, glory is grace full blown; grace is but the blossom of
glory, glory is the ripe fruit of grace; grace is but the infant of
glory, glory is the perfection of grace. Hence our hymn beautifully
says, "The men of grace have found glory begun below," agreeing with
our Lord's own words, "He that believeth hath everlasting life"; he
feels even here its glories beginning--a foretaste of its bliss.
Now the propriety with which these two states are called kingdoms
is manifest from the analogy which might be traced between them and
the model of a human sovereignty. Two or three of the outlines of
this model will be sufficient.
In the idea of a kingdom it is implied that in some part of its
extent there is the residence of a sovereign; for this is essential
to constitute it. Now in the kingdom of grace the heart of the
believer is made the residence of the King invisible! "Know ye not
that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you?"
Such know what that promise means, "I will dwell in them, and they
shall be my people." St. Paul exultingly cries, "Christ liveth in
me."
Again, it is essential that the inhabitants of a kingdom be under
the government of its laws. An empire without laws is no sovereignty
at all; it ceases to be such, for every inhabitant has an equal
right to do that which seems good in his own eyes. Now the subjects
of Christ's kingdom of grace are "not without law, but are under a
law to Christ"; they do His righteous will!
Lastly, it is essential that the subjects of a kingdom be under the
protection of the presiding monarch, and that they repose their
confidence in him. To the subjects of the kingdom of grace, Christ
imparts His kingly protection; this is their heritage: "No weapon
formed against them shall prosper"; nay, He imparts to them of His
royal bounty, and they enjoy all the blessings of an inward heaven.
But how great the perfection of the kingdom of glory mentioned in
our text! Does He make these vile bodies His residence here? How
much more glorious is His temple above! how splendid the court of
heaven! There, indeed, he fixes His throne, and they see Him as He
is. Does He exercise His authority here and rule His happy subjects
by the law, the perfect law of love? How much more in heaven! He
reigns there forever over them; His government is there wholly by
Himself; He knows nothing of a rival there; His rule is sole and
perfect: there they serve Him day and night. Are His subjects here
partakers of His kingly bounty? Much more in heaven! He calls them
to a participation of all the joys, the spiritual joys which are at
His right hand, and the pleasures which are there forevermore. Yet,
after all our descriptions of that glory, it is not yet revealed,
and, therefore, inconceivable. But who would not hail such a Son of
David? who would not desire to be swayed by such a Prince of Peace?
Whose heart would not ascend with the affections of our poet, "O!
that with yonder sacred throng, we at His feet may fall"?
2. But it is an everlasting kingdom! Here it rises in the scale of
comparison. Weigh the kingdoms of this world in this balance, and
they are found wanting; for on many we read their fatal history,
and ere long we shall see them all branded with the writing of the
invisible Agent, "The kingdom is taken from thee, and given to a
nation bringing forth the fruits thereof"; "For the kingdoms of
this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ";
they will be absorbed and swallowed up in the fulness of eternity,
and leave not a wrack behind! Every thing here is perishable! The
towering diadem of Caesar has fallen from his head and crumbled
into dust; and that kingdom whose scepter once swayed the world,
betwixt whose colossal stride all nations were glad to creep to
find themselves dishonored graves, is now forgotten, or, if its
recollection be preserved, its history is emphatically called "The
Decline and Fall."