_PRECEPTS FOR THE INNERMOST AND OUTERMOST LIFE._
"Continue stedfastly in prayer, watching therein with thanksgiving;
withal praying for us also, that God may open unto us a door for the
word, to speak the mystery of Christ, for which I am also in bonds;
that I may make it manifest, as I ought to speak. Walk in wisdom
toward them that are without, redeeming the time. Let your speech be
always with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how ye ought
to answer each one."--COL. iv. 2-6 (Rev. Ver.).
So ends the ethical portion of the Epistle. A glance over the series of
practical exhortations, from the beginning of the preceding chapter
onwards, will show that, in general terms we may say that they deal
successively with a Christian's duties to himself, the Church, and the
family. And now, these last advices touch the two extremes of life, the
first of them having reference to the hidden life of prayer, and the
second and third to the outward, busy life of the market-place and the
street. That bringing together of the extremes seems to be the link of
connection here. The Christian life is first regarded as gathered into
itself--coiled as it were on its centre, like some strong spring. Next,
it is regarded as it operates in the world, and, like the uncoiling
spring, gives motion to wheels and pinions. These two sides of
experience and duty are often hard to blend harmoniously. The conflict
between busy Martha, who serves, and quiet Mary, who only sits and
gazes, goes on in every age and in every heart. Here we may find, in
some measure, the principle of reconciliation between their antagonistic
claims. Here is, at all events, the protest against allowing either to
oust the other. Continual prayer is to blend with unwearied action. We
are so to walk the dusty ways of life as to be ever in the secret place
of the Most High. "Continue stedfastly in prayer," and withal let there
be no unwholesome withdrawal from the duties and relationships of the
outer world, but let the prayer pass into, first, a wise walk, and
second, an ever-gracious speech.
I. So we have here, first, an exhortation to a hidden life of constant
prayer.
The word rendered "continue" in the Authorised Version, and more fully
in the Revised Version by "continue stedfastly," is frequently found in
reference to prayer, as well as in other connections. A mere enumeration
of some of these instances may help to illustrate its full meaning. "We
_will give ourselves_ to prayer," said the apostles in proposing the
creation of the office of deacon. "_Continuing instant_ in prayer" says
Paul to the Roman Church. "They _continuing_ daily with one accord in
the Temple" is the description of the early believers after Pentecost.
Simon Magus is said to have "continued with Philip," where there is
evidently the idea of close adherence as well as of uninterrupted
companionship. These examples seem to show that the word implies both
earnestness and continuity; so that this injunction not only covers the
ground of Paul's other exhortation, "Pray without ceasing," but includes
fervour also.
The Christian life, then, ought to be one of unbroken prayer.
What manner of prayer can that be which is to be continuous through a
life that must needs be full of toil on outward things? How can such a
precept be obeyed? Surely there is no need for paring down its
comprehensiveness, and saying that it merely means--a very frequent
recurrence to devout exercises, as often as the pressure of daily duties
will permit. That is not the direction in which the harmonising of such
a precept with the obvious necessities of our position is to be sought.
We must seek it in a more inward and spiritual notion of prayer. We must
separate between the form and the substance, the treasure and the
earthen vessel which carries it. What is prayer? Not the utterance of
words--they are but the vehicle; but the attitude of the spirit.
Communion, aspiration, and submission, these three are the elements of
prayer--and these three may be diffused through a life. It is possible,
though difficult. There may be unbroken communion, a constant
consciousness of God's presence, and of our contact with Him, thrilling
through our souls and freshening them, like some breath of spring
reaching the toilers in choky factories and busy streets; or even if the
communion do not run like an absolutely unbroken line of light through
our lives, the points may be so near together as all but to touch. In
such communion words are needless. When spirits draw closest together
there is no need for speech. Silently the heart may be kept fragrant
with God's felt presence, and sunny with the light of His face. There
are towns nestling beneath the Alps, every narrow filthy alley of which
looks to the great solemn snow-peaks, and the inhabitants, amid all the
squalor of their surroundings, have that apocalypse of wonder ever
before them, if they would only lift their eyes. So we, if we will, may
live with the majesties and beauties of the great white throne and of
Him that sat on it closing every vista and filling the end of every
commonplace passage in our lives.
In like manner, there may be a continual, unspoken and unbroken presence
of the second element of prayer, which is aspiration, or desire after
God. All circumstances, whether duty, sorrow or joy, should and may be
used to stamp more deeply on my consciousness the sense of my weakness
and need; and every moment, with its experience of God's swift and
punctual grace, and all my communion with Him which unveils to me His
beauty--should combine to move longings for Him, for more of Him. The
very deepest cry of the heart which understands its own yearnings, is
for the living God; and perpetual as the hunger of the spirit for the
food which will stay its profound desires, will be the prayer, though it
may often be voiceless, of the soul which knows where alone that food
is.
Continual too may be our submission to His will, which is an essential
of all prayer. Many people's notion is that our prayer is urging our
wishes on God, and that His answer is giving us what we desire. But true
prayer is the meeting in harmony of God's will and man's, and its
deepest expression is not, Do this, because I desire it, O Lord; but, I
do this because Thou desirest it, O Lord. That submission may be the
very spring of all life, and whatsoever work is done in such spirit,
however "secular" and however small it be, were it making buttons, is
truly prayer.
So there should run all through our lives the music of that continual
prayer, heard beneath all our varying occupations like some prolonged
deep bass note, that bears up and gives dignity to the lighter melody
that rises and falls and changes above it, like the spray on the crest
of a great wave. Our lives will then be noble and grave, and woven into
a harmonious unity, when they are based upon continual communion with,
continual desire after, and continual submission to, God. If they are
not, they will be worth nothing and will come to nothing.
But such continuity of prayer is not to be attained without effort;
therefore Paul goes on to say, "Watching therein." We are apt to do
drowsily whatever we do constantly. Men fall asleep at any continuous
work. There is also the constant influence of externals, drawing our
thoughts away from their true home in God, so that if we are to keep up
continuous devotion, we shall have to rouse ourselves often when in the
very act of dropping off to sleep. "Awake up, my glory!" we shall often
have to say to our souls. Do we not all know that subtly approaching
languor? and have we not often caught ourselves in the very act of
falling asleep at our prayers? We must make distinct and resolute
efforts to rouse ourselves--we must concentrate our attention and apply
the needed stimulants, and bring the interest and activity of our whole
nature to bear on this work of continual prayer, else it will become
drowsy mumbling as of a man but half awake. The world has strong
opiates for the soul, and we must stedfastly resist their influence, if
we are to "continue in prayer."
One way of so watching is to have and to observe definite times of
spoken prayer. We hear much now-a-days about the small value of times
and forms of prayer, and how, as I have been saying, true prayer is
independent of these, and needs no words. All that, of course, is true;
but when the practical conclusion is drawn that therefore we can do
without the outward form, a grave mistake, full of mischief, is
committed. I do not, for my part, believe in a devotion diffused through
a life and never concentrated and coming to the surface in visible
outward acts or audible words; and, as far as I have seen, the men whose
religion is spread all through their lives most really are the men who
keep the central reservoir full, if I may so say, by regular and
frequent hours and words of prayer. The Christ, whose whole life was
devotion and communion with the Father, had His nights on the mountains,
and rising up a great while before day, He watched unto prayer. We must
do the like.
One more word has still to be said. This continual prayer is to be "with
thanksgiving"--again the injunction so frequent in this letter, in such
various connections. Every prayer should be blended with gratitude,
without the perfume of which, the incense of devotion lacks one element
of fragrance. The sense of need, or the consciousness of sin, may evoke
"strong crying and tears," but the completest prayer rises confident
from a grateful heart, which weaves memory into hope, and asks much
because it has received much. A true recognition of the lovingkindness
of the past has much to do with making our communion sweet, our desires
believing, our submission cheerful. Thankfulness is the feather that
wings the arrow of prayer--the height from which our souls rise most
easily to the sky.
And now the Apostle's tone softens from exhortation to entreaty, and
with very sweet and touching humility he begs a supplemental corner in
their prayers. "Withal praying also for us." The "withal" and "also"
have a tone of lowliness in them, while the "us," including as it does
Timothy, who is associated with him in the superscription of the letter,
and possibly others also, increases the impression of modesty. The
subject of their prayers for Paul and the others is to be that "God may
open unto us a door for the word." That phrase apparently means an
unhindered opportunity of preaching the gospel, for the consequence of
the door's being opened is added--"to speak (so that I may speak) the
mystery of Christ." The special reason for this prayer is, "for which I
am also (in addition to my other sufferings) in bonds."
He was a prisoner. He cared little about that or about the fetters on
his wrists, so far as his own comfort was concerned; but his spirit
chafed at the restraint laid upon him in spreading the good news of
Christ, though he had been able to do much in his prison, both among the
Praetorian guard, and throughout the whole population of Rome. Therefore
he would engage his friends to ask God to open the prison doors, as He
had done for Peter, not that Paul might come out, but that the gospel
might. The personal was swallowed up; all that he cared for was to do
his work.
But he wants their prayers for more than that--"that I may make it
manifest as I ought to speak." This is probably explained most naturally
as meaning his endowment with power to set forth the message in a manner
adequate to its greatness. When he thought of what it was that he,
unworthy, had to preach, its majesty and wonderfulness brought a kind of
awe over his spirit; and endowed, as he was, with apostolic functions
and apostolic grace; conscious, as he was, of being anointed and
inspired by God, he yet felt that the richness of the treasure made the
earthen vessel seem terribly unworthy to bear it. His utterances seemed
to himself poor and unmelodious beside the majestic harmonies of the
gospel. He could not soften his voice to breathe tenderly enough a
message of such love, nor give it strength enough to peal forth a
message of such tremendous import and world-wide destination.
If Paul felt his conception of the greatness of the gospel dwarfing into
nothing _his_ words when he tried to preach it, what must every other
true minister of Christ feel? If he, in the fulness of his inspiration,
besought a place in his brethren's prayers, how much more must they need
it, who try with stammering tongues to preach the truth that made his
fiery words seem ice? Every such man must turn to those who love him and
listen to his poor presentment of the riches of Christ, with Paul's
entreaty. His friends cannot do a kinder thing to him than to bear him
on their hearts in their prayers to God.
II. We have here next, a couple of precepts, which spring at a bound
from the inmost secret of the Christian life to its circumference, and
refer to the outward life in regard to the non-Christian world,
enjoining, in view of it, a wise walk and gracious speech.
"Walk in wisdom towards them that are without." Those that are within
are those who have "fled for refuge" to Christ, and are within the fold,
the fortress, the ark. Men who sit safe within while the storm howls,
may simply think with selfish complacency of the poor wretches exposed
to its fierceness. The phrase may express spiritual pride and even
contempt. All close corporations tend to generate dislike and scorn of
outsiders, and the Church has had its own share of such feeling; but
there is no trace of anything of the sort here. Rather is there pathos
and pity in the word, and a recognition that their sad condition gives
these outsiders a claim on Christian men, who are bound to go out to
their help and bring them in. Precisely because they are "without" do
those within owe them a wise walk, that "if any will not hear the word,
they may without the word be won." The thought is in some measure
parallel to our Lord's words, of which perhaps it is a reminiscence.
"Behold I send you forth"--a strange thing for a careful shepherd to
do--"as sheep in the midst of wolves; be ye therefore wise as serpents."
Think of that picture--the handful of cowering frightened creatures
huddled against each other, and ringed round by that yelping,
white-toothed crowd, ready to tear them to pieces! So are Christ's
followers in the world. Of course, things have changed in many respects
since those days; partly because persecution has gone out of fashion,
and partly because "the world" has been largely influenced by Christian
morality, and partly because the Church has been largely secularized.
The temperature of the two has become nearly equalized over a large
tract of professing Christendom. So a tolerably good understanding and a
brisk trade has sprung up between the sheep and the wolves. But for all
that, there is fundamental discord, however changed may be its
exhibition, and if we are true to our Master and insist on shaping our
lives by His rules, we shall find out that there is.
We need, therefore, to "walk in wisdom" towards the non-Christian world;
that is, to let practical prudence shape all our conduct. If we are
Christians, we have to live under the eyes of vigilant and not
altogether friendly observers, who derive satisfaction and harm from any
inconsistency of ours. A plainly Christian life that needs no commentary
to exhibit its harmony with Christ's commandments is the first duty we
owe to them.
And the wisdom which is to mould our lives in view of these outsiders
will "discern both time and judgment," will try to take the measure of
men and act accordingly. Common sense and practical sagacity are
important accompaniments of Christian zeal. What a singularly complex
character, in this respect, was Paul's--enthusiastic and yet capable of
such diplomatic adaptation; and withal never dropping to cunning, nor
sacrificing truth! Enthusiasts who despise worldly wisdom, and therefore
often dash themselves against stone walls, are not rare; cool
calculators who abhor all generous glow of feeling and have ever a
pailful of cold water for any project which shows it, are only too
common--but fire and ice together, like a volcano with glaciers
streaming down its cone, are rare. Fervour married to tact, common
sense which keeps close to earth and enthusiasm which flames heaven
high, are a rare combination. It is not often that the same voice can
say, "I count not my life dear to myself," and "I became all things to
all men."
A dangerous principle that last, a very slippery piece of ground to get
upon!--say people, and quite truly. It _is_ dangerous, and one thing
only will keep a man's feet when on it, and that is, that his wise
adaptation shall be perfectly unselfish, and that he shall ever keep
clear before him the great object to be gained, which is nothing
personal, but "that I might by all means save some." If that end is held
in view, we shall be saved from the temptation of hiding or maiming the
very truth which we desire should be received, and our wise adaptation
of ourselves and of our message to the needs and weaknesses and
peculiarities of those "who are without," will not degenerate into
handling the word of God deceitfully. Paul advised "walking in wisdom;"
he abhorred "walking in craftiness."
We owe them that are without such a walk as may tend to bring them in.
Our life is to a large extent their Bible. They know a great deal more
about Christianity, as they see it in us, than as it is revealed in
Christ, or recorded in Scripture--and if, as seen in us, it does not
strike them as very attractive, small wonder if they still prefer to
remain where they are. Let us take care lest instead of being
doorkeepers to the house of the Lord, to beckon passers-by and draw them
in, we block the doorway, and keep them from seeing the wonders within.
The Apostle adds a special way in which this wisdom shows
itself--namely, "redeeming the time." The last word here does not denote
time in general, but a definite season, or _opportunity_. The lesson,
then, is not that of making the best use of all the moments as they fly,
precious as that lesson is, but that of discerning and eagerly using
appropriate opportunities for Christian service. The figure is simple
enough; to "buy up" means to make one's own. "Make much of time, let not
advantage slip," is an advice in exactly the same spirit. Two things are
included in it; the watchful study of characters, so as to know the
right times to bring influences to bear on them, and an earnest
diligence in utilizing these for the highest purposes. We have not acted
wisely towards those who are without unless we have used every
opportunity to draw them in.
But besides a wise walk, there is to be "gracious speech." "Let your
speech be always with grace." A similar juxtaposition of "wisdom" and
"grace" occurred in chapter iii. 16. "Let the word of Christ dwell in
you richly in all wisdom ... singing with grace in your hearts"; and
there as here, "grace" may be taken either in its lower aesthetic sense,
or in its higher spiritual. It may mean either favour, agreeableness, or
the Divine gift, bestowed by the indwelling Spirit. The former is
supposed by many good expositors to be the meaning here. But is it a
Christian's duty to make his speech always agreeable? Sometimes it is
his plain duty to make it very disagreeable indeed. If our speech is to
be true, and wholesome, it must sometimes rasp and go against the grain.
Its pleasantness depends on the inclinations of the hearers rather than
on the will of the honest speaker. If he is to "redeem the time" and
"walk wisely to them that are without," his speech cannot be always with
such grace. The advice to make our words always pleasing may be a very
good maxim for worldly success, but it smacks of Chesterfield's Letters
rather than of Paul's Epistles.
We must go much deeper for the true import of this exhortation. It is
substantially this--whether you can speak smooth things or no, and
whether your talk is always directly religious or no--and it need not
and cannot always be that--let there ever be in it the manifest
influence of God's Spirit, Who dwells in the Christian heart, and will
mould and sanctify your speech. Of you, as of your Master, let it be
true, "Grace is poured into thy lips." He in whose spirit the Divine
Spirit abides will be truly "Golden-mouthed"; his speech shall distil as
the dew, and whether his grave and lofty words please frivolous and
prurient ears or no, they will be beautiful in the truest sense, and
show the Divine life pulsing through them, as some transparent skin
shows the throbbing of the blue veins. Men who feed their souls on great
authors catch their style, as some of our great living orators, who are
eager students of English poetry. So if we converse much with God,
listening to His voice in our hearts, our speech will have in it a tone
that will echo that deep music. Our accent will betray our country. Then
our speech will be with grace in the lower sense of pleasingness. The
truest gracefulness, both of words and conduct, comes from heavenly
grace. The beauty caught from God, the fountain of all things lovely, is
the highest.
The speech is to be "seasoned with salt." That does not mean the "Attic
salt" of wit. There is nothing more wearisome than the talk of men who
are always trying to be piquant and brilliant. Such speech is like a
"pillar of salt"--it sparkles, but is cold, and has points that wound,
and it tastes bitter. That is not what Paul recommends. Salt was used in
sacrifice--let the sacrificial salt be applied to all our words; that
is, let all we say be offered up to God, "a sacrifice of praise to God
continually." Salt preserves. Put into your speech what will keep it
from rotting, or, as the parallel passage in Ephesians has it, "let no
_corrupt_ communication proceed out of your mouth." Frivolous talk,
dreary gossip, ill-natured talk, idle talk, to say nothing of foul and
wicked words, will be silenced when your speech is seasoned with salt.
The following words make it probable that salt here is used also with
some allusion to its power of giving savour to food. Do not deal in
insipid generalities, but suit your words to your hearers, "that ye may
know how ye ought to answer each one." Speech that fits close to the
characteristics and wants of the people to whom it is spoken is sure to
be interesting, and that which does not will for them be insipid.
Commonplaces that hit full against the hearer will be no commonplaces to
him, and the most brilliant words that do not meet his mind or needs
will to him be tasteless "as the white of an egg."
Individual peculiarities, then, must determine the wise way of approach
to each man, and there will be wide variety in the methods. Paul's
language to the wild hill tribes of Lycaonia was not the same as to the
cultivated, curious crowd on Mars' Hill, and his sermons in the
synagogues have a different tone from his reasonings of judgment to come
before Felix.
All that is too plain to need illustration. But one word may be added.
The Apostle here regards it as the task of every Christian man to speak
for Christ. Further, he recommends dealing with individuals rather than
masses, as being within the scope of each Christian, and as being much
more efficacious. Salt has to be rubbed in, if it is to do any good. It
is better for most of us to fish with the rod than with the net, to
angle for single souls, rather than to try and enclose a multitude at
once. Preaching to a congregation has its own place and value; but
private and personal talk, honestly and wisely done, will effect more
than the most eloquent preaching. Better to drill in the seeds, dropping
them one by one into the little pits made for their reception, than to
sow them broadcast.
And what shall we say of Christian men and women, who can talk
animatedly and interestingly of anything but of their Saviour and His
kingdom? Timidity, misplaced reverence, a dread of seeming to be
self-righteous, a regard for conventional proprieties, and the national
reserve account for much of the lamentable fact that there are so many
such. But all these barriers would be floated away like straws, if a
great stream of Christian feeling were pouring from the heart. What
fills the heart will overflow by the floodgates of speech. So that the
real reason for the unbroken silence in which many Christian people
conceal their faith is mainly the small quantity of it which there is to
conceal.
A solemn ideal is set before us in these parting injunctions--a higher
righteousness than was thundered from Sinai. When we think of our
hurried, formal devotion, our prayers forced from us sometimes by the
pressure of calamity, and so often suspended when the weight is lifted;
of the occasional glimpses that we get of God--as sailors may catch
sight of a guiding star for a moment through driving fog, and of the
long tracts of life which would be precisely the same, as far as our
thoughts are concerned, if there were no God at all, or He had nothing
to do with us--what an awful command that seems, "Continue stedfastly in
prayer"!
When we think of our selfish disregard of the woes and dangers of the
poor wanderers without, exposed to the storm, while we think ourselves
safe in the fold, and of how little we have meditated on and still less
discharged our obligations to them, and of how we have let precious
opportunities slip through our slack hands, we may well bow rebuked
before the exhortation, "Walk in wisdom toward them that are without."
When we think of the stream of words ever flowing from our lips, and how
few grains of gold that stream has brought down amid all its sand, and
how seldom Christ's name has been spoken by us to hearts that heed Him
not nor know Him, the exhortation, "Let your speech be always with
grace," becomes an indictment as truly as a command.
There is but one place for us, the foot of the cross, that there we may
obtain forgiveness for all the faulty past and thence may draw
consecration and strength for the future, to enable us to keep that
lofty law of Christian morality, which is high and hard if we think only
of its precepts, but becomes light and easy when we open our hearts to
receive the power for obedience, "which," as this great Epistle
manifoldly teaches, "is Christ in you, the hope of glory."