1. They are very numerous, and we can only find space to say a few words
on each. There was _guiltiness_. Eve believed the devil instead of God,
and took the forbidden fruit, making herself a sinner. Her excuse was,
"The serpent beguiled me." But she coveted that which God kept back. How
many Edens are lost because we desire that which is forbidden! Is not
this the spring of the so-called social evil? We may say what we like
against seduction, and our words cannot be too strong, but the woman
desiring when God had said, "Thou shalt not," is the true reason of many
falls.
2. The next step downwards is the tempting of another and a loved one.
Sometimes we have found ourselves wishing Eve had died with the fruit in
her mouth, instead of living to do the devil's work, and lure her loved
husband to the same ruin. Let me say here and with all emphasis, _Never
fear so much as when the hand of affection offers you that which God
forbids_.
3. Now comes Death. The parents of the human race were separated from
God. Environment is a condition of life. They have learned to do evil,
they have to share the lot of those who had not kept their first estate.
Heaven was an impossible climate to the apostate angels, and Eden was
only possible to those who obey. It is easy to see that the garden was
not now Paradise. Adam and his wife hid themselves among the trees from
the presence of the Lord! Those trees were not created for that purpose.
Alas for sin! it poisons food and taints air. We cannot insist upon this
with too much force. It was true then as now. "He that believeth not
shall not see life." Adam and Eve were poisoned by the forbidden fruit.
Is it not yet true that Innocence, Chastity, Modesty, are dead in some
who are thought to live? We wonder afterwards to see them cast out, but
it is, after all, the separation of the dead from the living.
4. And now comes Suffering. They must hear the curse pronounced, and
then depart into the world which has begun to grow thorns for them. Yes,
sufferings after death. What is history but the story of punishment?
When men scoff at what is called eternal punishment they forget, or,
perhaps, have never given it a thought, that the punishment of the first
crime is going on at the present moment. Thorns and briars are but
parables. They are real, it is true. Man must wrestle with his mother
earth for every bit he eats. She does not feed him willingly; she
produces that which he cannot eat. He must lacerate her bosom with his
spade ere she will yield him bread, and he must sweat with toil before
she will give him his crust!
Yet this is but the shadow of something terribly worse. The non-producer
will live, whatever becomes of those who toil. What is war but one of
the many things which rob man of his bread? The soldier is a consumer,
not a producer. I do not say he is not a necessity. He is all that, but
he must be fed. What matters it to him what is the price of meat; he
will have his three-quarters of a pound of meat every day. Aye, and he
earns it too! Who would grudge the brave fellows in Egypt the stores we
send out? None of us. Yet we cannot but feel that the sword and
bayonet, like the thorn hedge, take up soil which might grow corn, and
the higher it grows the greater the shadow, and therefore the poorer the
crops which are nighest to it. It is a necessity, but it is an expense.
What are the so called dangerous classes? They live, they do not starve;
they live on honest people. Judges, police, and jailers are fed by those
who never trouble them. Crime is like a leech on the body, it will have
blood. The wrongdoers are not the thorn hedge which we need for our
protection, but the thistle, which has rare powers of reproduction, and
uses the wind as its chariot to ride to other lands. Is it any wonder
that wickedness is so difficult to eradicate? Those of us who have tried
to keep our gardens free have sorrowed many a time when we have thought
that the rain, so welcome to our newly-born flowers, will call into
vigour the enemy that tries to strangle them. And this is but a figure
of the terrible truth that prosperity to a nation always means a growth
of crime, and that any event, even a public holiday, which should refresh
and recuperate, means the resurrection of violence and an increase of
suffering.
5. The first lie dug the first grave, and has never ceased to dig
others. We have often imagined the scene when Abel was missed--when his
mother questioned his murderer as to where he had last seen his brother.
How they would listen for his step, until suspense could be no longer
borne, and the father would go out, only to find the corpse of his
beloved child! Can we not hear the mother cry out, as she touches the
cold clay--"Would to God I had died the day I believed the lie!" What a
picture for a painter like Rembrandt would that first funeral be! And
what are churchyards and cemeteries but the proofs that the devil lied?
Have you a grave? Does the clay cover the form once dearer than life to
you? Let it plead with you to believe God and his word, rather than to
trust to the old serpent.
Let us be thankful that the seed of the woman is the Saviour of Men. Eden
is not all shadow, even after the loss of purity. There is a promise yet
to be fulfilled. "'Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,' saith the Lord."
The devil is to be cast into the bottomless pit, and even those whom he
has deceived may go to a paradise where the trail of the serpent shall be
no more seen. "The Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the
works of the devil," and the time is coming when war, slavery, ignorance,
tyranny, hunger, and sin shall be among the dark clouds that roll away,
as the sun which shall never set rises above the horizon to make glad the
children of men. Then shall the prophecy of the poet become history--
"In Him the tribes of Adam boast
More blessings than their father lost."
LIX. WHAT WAS LEARNED IN GOD'S HOUSE.
ISAIAH vi.
NOT SEEN BY EVERYONE THERE.--Isaiah had his eyes opened. The same awful
Person had been present before, but had not been seen, and He is still
there, but how few of us are conscious of His presence. How differently
the church and chapel-goers would look next Sunday morning as they come
home, if only they realised what had been going on in the place where
they had spent the last hour.
I. A LESSON FROM HISTORY.--"In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the
Lord." The King of Judah was dead, but the King of Saints lives for
ever. Whatever changes go on, whatever crown shifts to another head, GOD
remains the same. In no battle is our General slain. In no national
disgrace is He humbled. Uzziah had died a leper, his brilliant history
ended in disgrace. Not so with Him whom we delight to honour. Of Him it
is more true than of anyone else, "The path of THE JUST shineth more and
more unto the perfect day."
II. A LESSON IN WORSHIP.--We see how the angels behave when in God's
house. "Covered his face." Contrast this with the way the average
church-goer acts. To look at the listless faces, the slovenly way in
which men and women pray, the want of reverence, often in choirs, and
sometimes in pulpits, makes us think there must be either a want of
intellect or a lack of faith. If these people believe there is a God,
how limited their power to conceive what He is like! But, knowing many
of them to be shrewd in business or personal matters, we are led to think
there is often more infidelity in places of worship than is thought for.
The conduct of the Seraphims makes us blush for many services we have
attended. If the thoughts of our hearts were spoken during our prayers,
what a revelation there would be! Let us not forget that they are taken
down, and are already in print, ready for the day of trial, when the
books shall be opened!
III. A LESSON IN MORALS.--Words defile us! "I am a man of unclean
lips." And it is a question if even swearing defiles a man's mouth more
than words of prayer which are not meant. Would not any one of us rather
be abused than cajoled? Who likes to think that men are lying when they
praise us? Must we not pray for a watch to be set on our lips? If there
could be a physical effect caused, as there is a moral, would not there
be a sad disfigurement? Men and women with lips blacker than coal! It
is a wise prayer, "Let the words of my mouth be acceptable in Thy sight,
O Lord." Deceit, flattery, formalism in prayer are abominable to God. It
would be well if, when in church or chapel, we could see it in plain
letters, "The Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh His Name in
vain."
IV.--A LESSON IN GRACE.--Sin may be forgiven and guilt removed, and this
to the certain knowledge of the penitent. One of the devil's lies is
that either you are too wicked to be saved, or, if saved, you cannot hope
to know it in this life; the one drives men to despair, the other
prevents enjoyment of salvation. Isaiah knew that his sins were
forgiven, and we have yet to learn that the cross of Jesus has made it
less possible for us. It was from the altar the coal came that touched
the lips. It is still true that it is sacrifice that takes away guilt.
We have an altar, a sacrifice, a benediction such as Isaiah never knew
for himself; we understand his sayings as he could not. "By His stripes
we are healed." Reader, do you long for pardon, for conscious
forgiveness? Wait on the Lord! Think of what He suffered, and why He
suffered, and you shall sing with joyous lips--
My pardon I claim,
For a sinner I am,
A sinner believing in Jesu's name.
He purchased the grace,
Which now I embrace;
O Father, thou knowest He hath died in my place.
V.--A LESSON IN THEOLOGY.--"I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, 'Whom
shall I send? Who will go for us?' What does this mean? Is it bad
grammar or good theology? It sounds like "And God said, Let Us make man
in our image?" "And the Lord God said, Behold the man is become as one
of Us." In John xii, 40, 41, we find that the Son of God, Jesus of
Nazareth, was the Lord who spoke the words we read in verses 9 and 10. In
Acts xxviii. 25 we are told it was the Holy Ghost who spake by Isaiah.
What does this mean but that the Divine Three in One and One in Three was
the Lord whom the prophet saw?
VI.--A LESSON TO WORKERS.--When iniquity is purged away there is a
willingness to be sent on God's errands. The lips that had been touched
said, "Here am I, send me." If we are not willing to go, it is because
there is still need of cleansing. Let those of us who find our feet slow
to move on God's errands come again to the place of burning. We shall do
well to say with Charles Wesley, in one of his less known poems--
Ah! woe is me, immerst in sin,
A man of lips and life unclean!
How shall I with Thy message run,
Or preach the pardoning God unknown?
Unless my God vouchsafe to cheer
His guilty, trembling messenger,
My fears disperse, my sins remove,
And purge me by the fire of love!
O wouldst Thou teach my lips once more,
The comfort of Thy grace restore;
Assure me, Lord, that mine Thou art,
And stamp forgiveness on my heart;
Then should I, in my Jesu's name,
Glad tidings of great joy proclaim:
Of grace, which every soul may find,
And glory, bought for all mankind.
CHRISTIAN, YOUR GREATEST DIFFICULTIES
WILL COME FROM YOUR OWN
SIDE. IT WAS NOT PHAROAH WHO
KEPT MOSES OUT OF CANAAN.
LX. PAUL AT SEA.
ACTS xxvii. 22-25.
"There's no hope," said the captain, "the ship cannot live in such a
storm." "There's no hope," said the military officer, "we shall never
see Rome." "There's no hope," said the prisoners, "we shall die at sea
instead of on the scaffold." One prisoner, however, had hope, and in the
long run made all his companions to hope. Paul cried out,
"BE OF GOOD CHEER, FOR THERE STOOD BY ME THIS NIGHT THE ANGEL OF GOD,
WHOSE I AM, AND WHOM I SERVE, SAYING, FEAR NOT, PAUL, THOU MUST BE
BROUGHT BEFORE CAESAR, AND LO, GOD HATH GIVEN THEE ALL THEM THAT SAIL
WITH THEE."
What a ring there is in the words, "Whose I am, and whom I serve." How
Paul delighted in the fact that he was the servant of God. Often he used
to say, "Paul, a servant of God," or rather "Slave of God," for that is
what it means. And is it not still true that