HALF-AND-HALF CHURCHES.
There is a verse in Revelation that presents a nauseated Christ: "Because
thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my
mouth."
After we have been taking a long walk on a summer day, or been on a hunting
chase, a draught of cold water exhilarates. On the other hand, after
standing or walking in the cold air and being chilled, hot water, mingled
with some beverage, brings life and comfort to the whole body; but tepid
water, neither hot nor cold, is nauseating.
Now, Christ says that a church of that temperature acts on him as an
emetic: I will spew thee out of my mouth.
The church that is red hot with religious emotion, praying, singing,
working, Christ having taken full possession of the membership, must be to
God satisfactory.
On the other hand, a frozen church may have its uses. The minister reads
elegant essays, and improves the session or the vestry in rhetorical
composition. The music is artistic and improves the ear of the people, so
that they can better appreciate concert and opera.
The position of such a church is profitable to the book-binder who
furnishes the covers to the liturgy, and the dry-goods merchants who supply
the silks, and the clothiers who furnish the broadcloth. Such a church is
good for the business world, makes trade lively and increases the demand
for fineries of all sorts, for a luxurious religion demands furs and coats,
and gaiters to match. Christ says he gets along with a church, cold or
hot.
But an unmitigated nuisance to God and man is a half-and-half church, with
piety tepid. The pulpit in such a church makes more of orthodoxy than it
does of Christ. It is immense on definitions. It treats of justification
and sanctification as though they were two corpses to be dissected. Its
sermons all have a black morocco cover, which some affectionate sister gave
the pastor before he was married, to wrap his discourse in, lest it get
mussed in the dust of the pulpit. Its gestures are methodical, as though
the man were ever conscious that they had been decreed from all eternity,
and he were afraid of interfering with the decree by his own free agency.
Such a pulpit never startles the people with the horrors of an undone
eternity. No strong meat, but only pap, flour and water, mostly water. The
church prayer-meeting is attended only by a few gray heads who have been in
the habit of going there for twenty years, not because they expect any
arousing time or rapturous experiences, but because they feel only a few
will be there, and they ought to go.
The minister is sound. The membership sound. The music sound. If, standing
in a city of a hundred thousand people, there are five or ten conversions
in a year, everything is thought to be "encouraging." But Christ says that
such a church is an emetic. "Because thou art neither cold nor hot, I will
spew thee out of my mouth."
My friends, you had better warm up or freeze over. Better set the kettle
outside in the atmosphere at zero, or put it on the altar of God and stir
up the coals into a blaze. If we do not, God will remove us.
Christian men are not always taken to heaven as a reward, but sometimes to
get them out of the way on earth. They go to join the tenth-rate saints in
glory; for if such persons think they will stand with Paul, and Harlan
Page, and Charlotte Elizabeth, they are much mistaken.
When God takes them up, the church here is better off. We mourn slightly to
have them go, because we have got used to having them around, and at the
funeral the minister says all the good things about the man that can well
be thought of, because we want to make the funeral as respectable as
possible. I never feel so much tempted to lie as when an inconsistent and
useless Christian has died, and I want in my final remarks to make a good
case out for the poor fellow. Still, it is an advantage to have such a man
get out of the way. He is opposed to all new enterprises. He puts back
everything he tries to help. His digestion of religious things is impaired,
and his circulation is so poor that no amount of friction can arouse him.
Now, it is dangerous for any of you to stay in that condition. If you
cannot be moved, God will kill you, and He will put in your place those who
will do the work you are neglecting.
My friends, let all arouse! The nearness of our last account, the greatness
of the work to be done, and the calls of God's word and providence, ought
to stir our souls. After having been in the harvest field so long it would
be a shame in the nightfall of death to go home empty-handed. Gather up a
few gleanings from the field, and beat them out, that it may be found that
Ruth had at least "one ephah of barley."