(Preached at the opening of the Winona Lake Bible Conference.)
TEXT: "_Where there is no vision, the people perish._"--Proverbs 29:18.
It is not altogether an easy matter to secure a text for such an
occasion as this; not because the texts are so few in number but rather
because they are so many, for one has only to turn over the pages of
the Bible in the most casual way to find them facing him at every
reading.
Feeling the need of advice for such a time as this, I asked a number of
my friends who knew me intimately and knew the occasion which was
before me to suggest what in their minds would be an appropriate
Scripture, and in their suggestions I have had the most singular
indication of the leading of Providence.
One said, "Use Hosea 5:4, where God in speaking concerning his people
Israel says, 'They will not frame their doings,'" which means that his
people would not set before themselves the way in which they were
going; or it might mean that they would not set up a plan for their
lives which would be according to his will and which he might bring on
to completion.
Another said, "Use Genesis 26:18," where we are told that Isaac digged
again the wells of his father Abraham. This is a suggestive incident
and has in it a message for to-day, for if there is one thing needed
more than another it is that the old wells at which our fathers drank
and were refreshed and which, alas! in these modern times have been
filled in, at least to a certain extent, should be opened and men be
summoned once again to drink of their living waters.
Another said, "Use Jeremiah 6:16, 'Ask for the old paths;'" for as a
matter of fact we cannot improve upon the ways in which our fathers
walked, so far as the revelation of God is concerned or the doing of
his will.
Still another suggested that I should use Isaiah 62:10, "Gather out the
stones, lift up a standard for the people," in which the description is
of a great prince coming and all hindrances should be removed that the
journey might be robbed of its difficulties and dangers.
You will notice if you have watched the suggestions of these Christian
workers that the texts are practically all the same, and then when I
tell you that the line of thought they have indicated was the very line
which God suggested to me weeks and months before the conference you
will be impressed as I have been that this subject is not of my own
choosing, and therefore must be a message from God. Neither is the
text one of my own choosing, for God pressed it in upon me again and
again and from it I was afraid to turn away.
I like the text because it is in the book of Proverbs. This book is
not simply a collection of wise sayings and affectionate exhortations,
for you will remember that the Proverbs were put down after the event
and not before its occurrence. This being true, Proverbs presents an
established fact: here we find what the wise men in all the ages have
learned to be truth. If they speak of sin and its penalty they do it
in the light of their own experience; if they say the fear of the Lord
is the beginning of knowledge they mean that they have tried other
sources of wisdom and all have failed but this. All this makes the
text exceedingly valuable, for the wise men of other days must have
tried to walk without the vision and not only failed themselves but
have set the people astray.
By a vision we do not mean simply an imagination or dream which might
come to some person who had little practical understanding of the ways
of life, but we mean an appreciation of God's thought and approximate
understanding of his plan and a desire to know his will.
The word "perish," does not mean destruction, but rather the idea is to
"run wild"; so the literal rendering of the text is, "Where there is no
revelation the people run wild"--that is to say, if God is put out of
thought every man is a law unto himself and therefore is dangerous to
the community in which he lives. He is like a ship sailing for a
harbor without chart or compass and with utter indifference to the pole
star. Whatever your impressions, convictions or purposes, they should
always be squared by reverent, careful and profound study of God's will
and word.
The first sentence of the Bible is this, "In the beginning God," and it
must be the first sentence of every plan and of every purpose of the
individual and the community or there is danger ahead.
I
There ought never to be an age without a vision, indeed without
repeated visions. If there should be such a time it might be a time of
prosperity, but inevitably souls would be neglected. There ought not
to be an individual without a vision. If there should be such an one
he is missing the best of his life. If there be no vision the horizon
of man may be bounded by his office, his store, his home, his own city
or his native land, while as a matter of fact this is only a part of
what God meant him to do and to be. God's plans are from everlasting
to everlasting. The wonderful work he is doing in this world is only a
part of the plan, for in the ages to come he expects to show forth the
manysidedness of his grace and reveal to us the depth of his love to us
in Christ.
John McNeill's friend had an eagle which he had reared in the farm yard
with the ordinary fowl that lived there. This friend sold his property
and determined to move to another part of Scotland. He could dispose
of his horses and sell his chickens but no one wanted the eagle. What
should he do with it? He determined to teach it to fly, and threw it
up in the air only to have it come down with a thud upon the ground.
Then he lifted it and placed it upon the barn yard fence and was
holding it for a moment when suddenly the eagle lifted its eyes and
caught a glimpse of the sun. It stretched forth its head as far as it
could, threw out one wing, then another, and with a scream and a bound
was away flying upward until it was lost in the face of the sun. This
is what we are needing to-day--namely, to lift up our eyes and see
God's plan and try to understand his purposes. The eagle so long had
held its head down that it had lost the vision of the sun; the first
glimpse of it set him free. What we mean by a vision, therefore, is an
appreciation of God's purposes and plans and a hearty yielding to him
for service in the accomplishment of the same.
Joseph Cook when he was making a plea for China's millions said one
day, "Put your ear down to the ground and listen and you will hear the
tramp, tramp, tramp of four hundred millions of weary feet." I have to
say this morning, Lift up your eyes and look, open your ears and listen
and you will both see and hear that God has a great plan for us which
he will reveal to all if only we will permit him to do so. In
proportion as a people loses its faith in a revelation from God it
falls into decay. The student of history recalls vividly the story of
the French Revolution, which is a proof of this statement.
God has always spoken concerning his plans and it has been to living
men and women that he has granted visions. He came to Abraham and he
saw Christ's day and was glad: he visited Moses and he endured as
seeing him who is invisible: he was lifted up before Isaiah and he
first confessed his sin and shame, then cried, "Here am I, send me."
He granted Saul of Tarsus a vision of himself as he approached Damascus
until he cried, "Who art thou?" and then began to walk in fellowship
with him until like the hero that he was he mounted from the Eternal
City to that City which has foundations whose Builder and Maker is God.
He stood before John as in apocalyptic vision he saw him with his head
and his hair, white like wool, as white as snow and his eyes as a flame
of fire.
But if you should say, "Oh, yes, but this is in Bible times and we are
living in a different age," then hear me when I say that he has come to
living men and women in our own day with a revelation of his will. He
spoke to Zinzendorf and we have a mighty work among the Moravians. He
revealed himself to the Wesleys and we have the mighty movement of
Methodism. He talked with Edwards and we have the great Revival of New
England. He revealed himself to Finney and we have the great
manifestation of power in the state of New York. He walked and talked
with Moody and we have the greatest evangelistic work of his day and
generation with Moody as his instrument. These were all men with
visions. He has come to great missionaries like Paton who saw the New
Hebrides Islands evangelized while yet they sat in darkness, because he
saw God. He has spoken to our own Fulton in China, who writes that the
people are flocking to Christ. To him it is no surprise, for he knew
that they would do it while others were still skeptical. He knew it
because he knew God.
Let us remember that, however true it may be that God speaks in
conscience, providence, through the church and by the preaching of his
Word, his supreme revelation is in his own Word. This Book contains
the revealed will of God and this Book is his Word.