again set before us in Holy Scripture. Thus the Prophet Isaiah speaks
of the "feast of fat things, a feast of wines on the lees; of fat
things full of marrow, of wines on the lees well refined[3]." And
again, under images of another kind: "He hath sent Me . . . to
give . . . beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment
of praise for the spirit of heaviness, that they may be called Trees of
Righteousness[4]." Or again, the Prophet Hosea: "I will be as the dew
unto Israel: he shall grow as the lily, and cast forth his roots as
Lebanon. His branches shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the
olive-tree, and his smell as Lebanon. They that dwell under his shadow
shall return; they shall revive as the corn, and grow as the vine: the
scent thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon[5]." And the Psalmist:
"O that My people would have hearkened unto Me . . . the haters of the
Lord should have been found liars, but their time should have endured
for ever. He should have fed them also with the finest wheat flour,
and with honey out of the stony rock should I have satisfied thee[6]."
You see all images of what is pleasant and sweet in nature are brought
together to describe the pleasantness and sweetness of the gifts which
God gives us in grace. As wine enlivens, and bread strengthens, and
oil is rich, and honey is sweet, and flowers are fragrant, and dew is
refreshing, and foliage is beautiful; so, and much more, are God's
gifts in the Gospel enlivening, and strengthening, and rich, and sweet,
and fragrant, and refreshing, and excellent. And as it is natural to
feel satisfaction and comfort in these gifts of the visible world, so
it is but natural and necessary to be delighted and transported with
the gifts of the world invisible; and as the visible gifts are objects
of desire and search, so much more is it, I do not merely say a duty,
but a privilege and blessedness to "taste and see how gracious the Lord
is."
Other passages in the Psalms speak of this blessedness, besides the
text. "Thou hast put gladness in my heart," says the Psalmist, "since
the time that their corn and wine and oil increased[7]." "The lot is
fallen unto me in a fair ground, yea, I have a goodly heritage[8]."
Again, "The statutes of the Lord are right, and rejoice the
heart, . . . more to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine
gold, sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb[9]." "My heart trusted
in Him, and I am helped; therefore my heart danceth for joy, and in my
song will I praise Him[10]." Once more: "Blessed is the man whom Thou
choosest and receivest unto Thee: he shall dwell in Thy courts, and
shall be satisfied with the pleasures of Thy house, even of Thy holy
temple[11]."
I wish it were possible, my brethren, to lead men to greater holiness
and more faithful obedience by setting before them the high and
abundant joys which they have who serve God: "In His presence is
fulness of joy," "the well of life," and they are satisfied with "the
plenteousness of His house," and "drink of His pleasures as out of a
river," but this is, I know, just what most persons will not believe.
They think that it is very right and proper to be religious, they think
that it would be better for themselves in the world to come if they
were religious now. They do not at all deny either the duty or the
expedience of leading a new and holy life, but they cannot understand
how it can be pleasant: they cannot believe or admit that it is more
pleasant than a life of liberty, laxity, and enjoyment. They, as it
were, say, "Keep within bounds, speak within probability, and we will
believe you; but do not shock our reason. We will admit that we
_ought_ to be religious, and that, when we come to die, we shall be
very glad to have led religious lives: but to tell us that it is a
_pleasant_ thing to be religious, this is too much: it is not true; we
feel that it is not true, all the world knows and feels it is not true;
religion is something unpleasant, gloomy, sad, and troublesome. It
imposes a number of restraints on us; it keeps us from doing what we
would; it will not let us have our own way; it abridges our liberty; it
interferes with our enjoyments; it has fewer, far fewer, joys at
present than a worldly life, though it gains for us more joys
hereafter." This is what men say, or would say, if they understood
what they feel, and spoke their minds freely.
Alas! I cannot deny that this _is_ true in the case of most men. Most
men do not like the service of God, though it be perfect freedom; they
like to follow their own ways, and they are only religious so far as
their conscience obliges them; they are like Balaam, desirous of "the
death of the righteous," not of his life. Indeed, this is the very
thing I am lamenting and deploring. I lament, my brethren, that so
many men, nay, I may say, that so many of you, do _not_ like religious
service. I do not deny it; but I lament it. I do not deny it: far
from it. I know quite well how many there are who do not like coming
to Church, and who make excuses for keeping away at times when they
might come. I know how many there are who do not come to the Most Holy
Sacrament. I know that there are numbers who do not say their prayers
in private morning and evening. I know how many there are who are
ashamed to be thought religious, who take God's name in vain, and live
like the world. Alas! this is the very thing I lament,--that God's
service is not pleasant to you. It is not pleasant to those who do not
like it: true; but it is pleasant to those who _do_. Observe, this is
what I say; not that it is pleasant to those who like it not, but that
it is pleasant to those who like it. Nay, what I say is, that it is
much _more_ pleasant to those who like it, than any thing of this world
is pleasant to those who do not like it. This is the point. I do not
say that it is pleasant to most men; but I say that it is in itself the
most pleasant thing in the world. Nothing is so pleasant as God's
service to those _to whom_ it is pleasant. The pleasures of sin are
not to be compared in fulness and intensity to the pleasures of holy
living. The pleasures of holiness are far more pleasant to the holy,
than the pleasures of sin to the sinner. O that I could get you to
believe this! O that you had a heart to feel it and know it! O that
you had a heart to taste God's pleasures and to make proof of them; to
taste and see how gracious the Lord is!
None can know, however, the joys of being holy and pure but the holy.
If an Angel were to come down from heaven, even he could not explain
them to you, nor could he in turn understand what the pleasures of sin
are. Do you think that an Angel could be made to understand what are
the pleasures of sin? I trow not. You might as well attempt to
persuade him that there was pleasure in feasting on dust and ashes.
There are brute animals who wallow in the mire and eat corruption.
This seems strange to us: much stranger to an Angel is it how any one
can take pleasure in any thing so filthy, so odious, so loathsome as
sin. Many men, as I have been saying, wonder what possible pleasure
there can be in any thing so melancholy as religion. Well: be sure of
this,--it is _more_ wonderful to an Angel, what possible pleasure there
can be in sinning. It is _more_ wonderful, I say. He would turn away
with horror and disgust, both because sin is so base a thing in itself,
and because it is so hateful in God's sight.
Let no persons then be surprised that religious obedience should really
be so pleasant in itself, when it seems to them so distasteful. Let
them not be surprised that _what_ the pleasure is cannot be explained
to _them_. It is a secret till they try to be religious. Men know
what sin is, by experience. They do not know what holiness is; and
they cannot obtain the knowledge of its secret pleasure, till they join
themselves truly and heartily to Christ, and devote themselves to His
service,--till they "taste," and thereby try. This pleasure is as
hidden from them, as the pleasures of sin are hidden from the Angels.
The Angels have never eaten the forbidden fruit, and their eyes are not
open to know good and evil. And we _have_ eaten the forbidden
fruit,--at least Adam did, and we are his descendants,--and our eyes
_are_ open to know evil. And, alas! on the other hand, they have
become blinded to good; they require opening to see, to know, to
understand good. And till our eyes _are_ opened spiritually, we
_shall_ ever think religion distasteful and unpleasant, and shall
wonder how any one can like it. Such is our miserable state,--we are
blind to the highest and truest glories, and dead to the most lively
and wonderful of all pleasures;--and no one can describe them to us.
None other than God the Holy Spirit can help us in this matter, by
enlightening and changing our hearts. So it is; and yet I will say one
thing, by way of suggesting to you how great and piercing the joys of
religion are. Think of this. Is there any one who does not know how
very painful the feeling of a bad conscience is? Do not you recollect,
my Brethren, some time or other, having done something you knew to be
wrong? and do you not remember afterwards what a piercing bitter
feeling came on you? Is not the feeling of a bad conscience different
from any other feeling, and more distressing than any other, till we
have accustomed ourselves to it? Persons do accustom themselves and
lose this feeling; but till we blunt our conscience, it is very
painful. And why? It is the feeling of God's displeasure, and
therefore it is so painful. Consider then: if God's displeasure is so
distressing to us, must not God's approval and favour be just the
reverse; like life from the dead, most exceedingly joyful and
transporting? And this is what it is to be holy and religious. It is
to have God's favour. And, as it is a great misery to be under God's
wrath, so it is a great and wonderful joy to be in God's favour, and
those who know what a misery the former is, may fancy, though they do
not know, how high a blessing the latter is. From what you know, then,
judge of what you do not know. From the miseries of guilt, which,
alas! you have experienced, conjecture the blessedness of holiness and
purity which you have not experienced. From the pain of a bad
conscience, believe in the unspeakable joy and gladness of a good
conscience.
I have been addressing those who do not know what religious peace and
Divine pleasures are, but there are those present, I hope, who in a
measure are not strangers to them. I know that none of us gain all the
pleasure from God's service which it might afford us; still some of us,
I hope, gain some pleasure. I hope there are some of those who hear
me, who take a pleasure in coming to Church, in saying their prayers,
in thinking of God, in singing Psalms, in blessing Him for the mercies
of the Gospel, and in celebrating Christ's death and resurrection, as
at this season of the year[12]. These persons have "tasted" and tried.
I trust they find the taste so heavenly, that _they_ will not need any
proof that religion is a pleasant thing; nay, more pleasant than any
thing else, worth the following above all other things, and unpleasant
only to those who are not religious.
Let such persons then think of this, that if a religious life is
pleasant here, in spite of the old Adam interrupting the pleasure and
defiling them, what a glorious day it will be, if it is granted to us
hereafter to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! None of us, even the
holiest, can guess _how_ happy we shall be; for St. John says, "We know
not what we shall be[13];" and St. Paul, "Now we see in a glass darkly,
but then face to face." Yet in proportion to our present holiness and
virtue, we have some faint ideas of what will then be our blessedness.
And in Scripture various descriptions of heaven are given us, in order
to arrest, encourage, and humble us. We are told that the Angels of
God are very bright, and clad in white robes. The Saints and Martyrs
too are clad in white robes, with palms in their hands; and they sing
praises unto Him that sitteth upon the Throne, and to the Lamb. When
our Lord was transfigured, He showed us what Heaven is. His raiment
became white as snow, white and glistening. Again, at one time He
appeared to St. John, and then, "His head and His hairs were white like
wool, as white as snow; and His eyes were as a flame of fire; and His
feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and His
countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength[14]." And what
Christ is, such do His Saints become hereafter. Here below they are
clad in a garment of sinful flesh; but when the end comes, and they
rise from the grave, they shall inherit glory, and shall be ever young
and ever shining. In that day, all men will see and be convinced, even
bad men, that God's servants are really happy, and only they. In that
day, even lost souls, though they will not be able to understand the
blessedness of religion, will have no doubt at all of what they now
doubt, or pretend to doubt, that religion _is_ blessed. They laugh at
religion, think strictness to be narrowness of mind, and regularity to
be dulness; and give bad names to religious men. They will not be able
to do so then. They think themselves the great men of the earth now,
and look down upon the religious; but then, who would not have been a
religious man, to have so great a reward? who will then have any heart
to speak against religion, even though he has not "a heart to fear God
and keep all His commandments always?" In that day, they will look
upon the righteous man, and "be amazed at the strangeness of his
salvation, so far beyond all that they looked for. And they, repenting
and groaning for anguish of spirit, shall say within themselves, This
was he, whom we had sometimes in derision, and a proverb of reproach.
We fools accounted his life madness, and his end to be without honour;
how is he numbered among the children of God, and his lot is among the
saints[15]!"
Think of all this, my Brethren, and rouse yourselves, and run forward
with a good courage on your way towards heaven. Be not weary in
well-doing, for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not. Strive
to enter in at the strait gate. Strive to get holier and holier every
day, that you may be worthy to stand before the Son of Man. Pray God
to teach you His will, and to lead you forth in the right way, because
of your enemies. Submit yourselves to His guidance, and you will have
comfort given you, according to your day, and peace at the last.
[1] Ezek. xxxiii. 11. Isa. v. 4.
[2] Eccles. xxiv. 21.
[3] Isa. xxv. 6.
[4] Isa. lxi. 1-3.
[5] Hos. xiv. 5-7.
[6] Ps. lxxxi. 13-16.
[7] Ps. iv. 7.
[8] Ps. xvi. 6.
[9] Ps. xix. 10.
[10] Ps. xxviii. 7.
[11] Ps. lxv. 4.
[12] Easter.
[13] 1 John iii. 2.
[14] Rev. i. 14-16.
[15] Wisd. v. 2-5.
SERMON XV.
Mental Prayer.
"_Pray without ceasing._"--1 Thess. v. 17.
There are two modes of praying mentioned in Scripture; the one is
prayer at set times and places, and in set forms; the other is what the
text speaks of,--continual or habitual prayer. The former of these is
what is commonly called prayer, whether it be public or private. The
other kind of praying may also be called holding communion with God, or
living in God's sight, and this may be done all through the day,
wherever we are, and is commanded us as the duty, or rather the
characteristic, of those who are really servants and friends of Jesus
Christ.
These two kinds of praying are also natural duties. I mean, we should
in a way be bound to attend to them, even if we were born in a heathen
country and had never heard of the Bible. For our conscience and
reason would lead us to practise them, if we did but attend to these
divinely-given informants. I shall here confine myself to the
consideration of the latter of the two, habitual or inward prayer,
which is enjoined in the text, with the view of showing what it is, and
how we are to practise it; and I shall speak of it, first, as a natural
duty, and then as the characteristic of a Christian.
1. At first sight, it may be difficult to some persons to understand
what is meant by praying always. Now consider it as a natural duty,
that is, a duty taught us by natural reason and religious feeling, and
you will soon see what it consists in.
What does nature teach us about ourselves, even before opening the
Bible?--that we are creatures of the Great God, the Maker of heaven and
earth; and that, as His creatures, we are bound to serve Him and give
Him our hearts; in a word, to be religious beings. And next, what is
religion but a habit? and what is a habit but a state of mind which is
always upon us, as a sort of ordinary dress or inseparable garment of
the soul? A man cannot really be religious one hour, and not religious
the next. We might as well say he could be in a state of good health
one hour, and in bad health the next. A man who is religious, is
religious morning, noon, and night; his religion is a certain
character, a mould in which his thoughts, words, and actions are cast,
all forming parts of one and the same whole. He sees God in all
things; every course of action he directs towards those spiritual
objects which God has revealed to him; every occurrence of the day,
every event, every person met with, all news which he hears, he
measures by the standard of God's will. And a person who does this may
be said almost literally to pray without ceasing; for, knowing himself
to be in God's presence, he is continually led to address Him
reverently, whom he sets always before him, in the inward language of
prayer and praise, of humble confession and joyful trust.
All this, I say, any thoughtful man acknowledges from mere natural
reason. To be religious is, in other words, to have the habit of
prayer, or to pray always. This is what Scripture means by doing all
things to God's glory; that is, so placing God's presence and will
before us, and so consistently acting with a reference to Him, that all
we do becomes one body and course of obedience, witnessing without
ceasing to Him who made us, and whose servants we are; and in its
separate parts promoting more or less directly His glory, according as
each particular thing we happen to be doing admits more or less of a
religious character. Thus religious obedience is, as it were, a spirit
dwelling in us, extending its influence to every motion of the soul;
and just as healthy men and strong men show their health and strength
in all they do (not indeed equally in all things, but in some things
more than in others, because all actions do not require or betoken the
presence of that health and strength, and yet even in their step, and
their voice, and their gestures, and their countenance, showing in due
measure their vigour of body), so they who have the true health and
strength of the soul, a clear, sober, and deep faith in Him in whom
they have their being, will in all they do, nay (as St. Paul says),
even whether they "eat or drink[1]," be living in God's sight, or, in
the words of the same Apostle in the text, live in ceaseless prayer.
If it be said that no man on earth does thus continually and perfectly
glorify and worship God, this we all know too well; this is only saying
that none of us has reached perfection. We know, alas! that in many
things all of us offend. But I am speaking not of what we _do_, but of
what we _ought to do_, and must aim at doing,--of _our duty_; and, for
the sake of impressing our duty on our hearts, it is of use to draw the
picture of a man perfectly obedient, as a pattern for us to aim at. In
proportion as we grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Saviour, so
shall we approximate to Him in obedience, who is our great example, and
who alone of all the sons of Adam lived in the perfection of unceasing
prayer.
Thus the meaning and reasonableness of the command in the text is shown
by considering it as a natural duty, religion being no accident which
comes and goes by fits and starts, but a certain spirit or life.
2. Now, secondly, I will state all this in the language of Scripture;
that is, I will confirm this view of our duty, which natural reason
might suggest, by that other and far clearer voice of God, His inspired
word.
How is religious obedience described in Scripture? Surely as a certain
kind of life. We know what life of the body is; it is a state of the
body: the pulse beats; all things are in motion. The hidden principle
of life, though we know not how or what it is, is seen in these outward
signs of it. And so of the life of the soul. The soul, indeed, was
not possessed of this life of God when first born into the world. We
are born with dead souls; that is, dead as regards religious obedience.
If left to ourselves we should grow up haters of God, and tend nearer
and nearer, the longer we had existence, to utter spiritual death, that
inward fire of hell torments, maturing in evil through a long eternity.
Such is the course we are beginning to run when born into the world;
and were it not for the gospel promise, what a miserable event would
the birth of children be! Who could take pleasure at the sight of such
poor beings, unconscious as yet of their wretchedness, but containing
in their hearts that fearful root of sin which is sure in the event of
reigning and triumphing unto everlasting woe? But God has given us
all, even the little children, a good promise through Christ; and our
prospects are changed. And He has given not only a promise of future
happiness, but through His Holy Spirit He implants here and at once a
new principle within us, a new spiritual life, a life of the soul, as
it is called. St. Paul tells us, that "God hath quickened us," made us
_live_, "together with Christ, . . . and hath raised us up together"
from the death of sin, "and made us sit together in heavenly places in
Christ Jesus[2]." Now how God quickens our souls we do not know, as
little as how He quickens our bodies. Our spiritual "life" (as St.
Paul says) "is _hid_ with Christ in God[3]." But as our bodily life
discovers itself by its activity, so is the presence of the Holy Spirit
in us discovered by a spiritual activity; and this activity is the
spirit of continual prayer. Prayer is to spiritual life what the
beating of the pulse and the drawing of the breath are to the life of
the body. It would be as absurd to suppose that life could last when
the body was cold and motionless and senseless, as to call a soul alive
which does not pray. The state or habit of spiritual life exerts
itself, consists, in the continual activity of prayer.
Do you ask, where does Scripture say this? Where? In all it tells us
of the connexion between the new birth and faith; for what is prayer
but the expression, the voice, of faith? For instance, St. Paul says
to the Galatians, "The _life_ which I now live in the flesh" (i.e. the
new and spiritual life), "I live by the _faith_ of the Son of God, who
loved me[4]." For what, I say, is faith, but the looking to God and
thinking of Him continually, holding habitual fellowship with Him, that
is, speaking to Him in our hearts all through the day, praying without
ceasing? Afterwards, in the same Epistle, he tells us first that
nothing avails but faith working by love; but soon after, he calls this
same availing principle a new creature: so that the new birth and a
living faith are inseparable. Never, indeed, must it be supposed, as
we are indolently apt to suppose, that the gift of grace which we
receive at baptism is a mere outward privilege, a mere outward pardon,
in which the heart is not concerned; or as if it were some mere mark
put on the soul, distinguishing it indeed from souls unregenerate, as
if by a colour or seal, but not connected with the thoughts, mind, and
heart of a Christian. This would be a gross and false view of the
nature of God's mercy given us in Christ. For the new birth of the
Holy Spirit sets the soul in motion in a heavenly way: it gives us good
thoughts and desires, enlightens and purifies us, and prompts us to
seek God. In a word (as I have said), it gives a spiritual _life_; it
opens the eyes of our mind, so that we begin to see God in all things
by faith, and hold continual intercourse with Him by prayer, and if we
cherish these gracious influences, we shall become holier and wiser and
more heavenly, year by year, our hearts being ever in a course of
change from darkness to light, from the ways and works of Satan to the
perfection of Divine obedience.
These considerations may serve to impress upon our minds the meaning of
the precept in the text, and others like it which are found in St.
Paul's Epistles. For instance, he enjoins the Ephesians to "pray
always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit." To the
Philippians he says, "Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by
prayer and supplication let your requests be made known unto God[5]."
To the Colossians, "Continue in prayer, and watch in the same with
thanksgiving." To the Romans, "Continue instant in prayer[6]."
Thus the true Christian pierces through the veil of this world and sees
the next. He holds intercourse with it; he addresses God, as a child
might address his parent, with as clear a view of Him, and with as
unmixed a confidence in Him; with deep reverence indeed, and godly fear
and awe, but still with certainty and exactness: as St. Paul says, "I
know whom I have believed[7]," with the prospect of judgment to come to
sober him, and the assurance of present grace to cheer him.