'Therefore, my brethren, dearly beloved and longed
for, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord,
my dearly beloved.'--PHIL. iv. 1.
The words I have chosen set forth very simply and beautifully the bond
which knit Paul and these Philippian Christians together, and the chief
desire which his Apostolic love had for them. I venture to apply them to
ourselves, and I speak now especially to the members of my own church
and congregation.
I. Let us note, then, first, the personal bond which gives force to the
teacher's words.
That Church at Philippi was, if Paul had any favourites amongst his
children, his favourite child. The circumstances of its formation may
have had something to do with that. It was planted by himself; it was
the first Church in Europe; perhaps the Philippian gaoler and Lydia were
amongst the 'beloved' and 'longed for' ones who were 'his joy and
crown.' But be that as it may, all through the letter we can feel the
throbbing of a very loving heart, and the tenderness of a strong man,
which is the most tender of all things.
Note how he addresses them. There is no assumption of Apostolic
authority, but he puts himself on their level, and speaks to them as
brethren. Then he lets his heart out, and tells them how they lived in
his love, and how, of course, when he was parted from them, he had
desired to be with them. And then he touches a deeper and a sacreder
chord when he contemplates the results of the relation between them, if
he on his side, and they on theirs, were faithful to it. It says much
for the teacher, and for the taught, if he can truly say 'My joy,'--'I
have no greater joy than to know that my children walk in the truth.'
And not only were they his joy, but they who, by their faithfulness,
have become his joy, will on that one day in the far future, be his
'crown.' That metaphor carries on the thoughts to the great Judgment
Day, and introduces a solemn element, which is as truly present, dear
friends, in our relation to one another, little of an Apostle as I am,
as it was in the relation between Paul and the Philippians. They who
'turn many to righteousness shine as the brightness of the firmament,'
because those whom they have turned, 'shine as lights in the world.' And
at that last august and awful tribunal, where you will have to give an
account for your listening, as I for my speaking, the crown of victory
laid on the locks of a faithful teacher is the characters of those whom
he has taught. 'Who is my joy and hope, and crown of rejoicing?' Are not
even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus at his coming?
Now, notice, further, how such mutual affection is needed to give force
to the teacher's exhortation. Preaching from unloved lips never does any
good. It irritates, or leaves untouched. Affection melts and opens the
heart to the entrance of the word. And preaching from unloving lips does
very little good either. So speaking, I condemn myself. There are men
who handle God's great, throbbing message of love so coldly as that they
ice even the Gospel. There are men who have a strange gift of taking all
the sap and the fervour out of the word that they proclaim, making the
very grapes of Eshcol into dried raisins. And I feel for myself that my
ministry may well have failed in this respect. For who is there that can
modulate his voice so as to reproduce the music of that great message,
or who can soften and open his heart so as that it shall be a worthy
vehicle of the infinite love of God?
But, dear brethren, though conscious of many failures in this respect, I
yet thank God that here, at the end of nearly forty years of a ministry,
I can look you in the face and believe that your look responds to mine,
and that I can take these words as the feathers for my arrow, as that
which will make words otherwise weak go further, and may help to write
the precepts upon hearts, and to bring them to bear in practice--'My
beloved and longed for'; 'my joy and my crown.'
Such feelings do not need to be always spoken. There is very little
chance of us Northerners erring on the side of letting our hearts speak
too fully and frequently. Perhaps we should be all the better if we were
a little less reticent, but at any rate you and I can surely trust each
other after so many years, and now and then, as to-day, let our hearts
speak.
II. Secondly, notice the all-sufficient precept which such love gives.
'So stand fast in the Lord.'
That is a very favourite figure of Paul's, as those of you who have any
reasonable degree of familiarity with his letters will know. Here it
carries with it, as it generally does, the idea of resistance against
antagonistic force. But the main thought of it is that of continuous
steadfastness in our union with Jesus Christ. It applies, of course, to
the intellect, but not mainly, and certainly not exclusively to
intellectual adherence to the truths spoken in the Gospel. It covers
the whole ground of the whole man; will, conscience, heart, practical
effort, as well as understanding. And it is really Paul's version, with
a characteristic dash of pugnacity in it, of our Lord's yet deeper and
calmer words, 'Abide in Me and I in you.' It is the same exhortation as
Barnabas gave to the infantile church at Antioch, when, to these men
just rescued from heathenism and profoundly ignorant of much which we
suppose it absolutely necessary that Christians should know, he had only
one thing to say, exhorting them all, that 'with purpose of heart they
should cleave to the Lord.'
Steadfast continuance of personal union with Jesus Christ, extending
through all the faculties of our nature, and into every corner of our
lives, is the kernel of this great exhortation. And he who fulfils it
has little left unfulfilled. Of course, as I said, there is a very
strong suggestion that such 'standing' is by no means an easy thing, or
accomplished without much antagonism; and it may help us if, just for a
moment, we run over the various forms of resistance which they have to
overcome who stand fast. Nothing stands where it is without effort. That
is true in the moral world, although in the physical world the law of
motion is that nothing moves without force being applied to it.
What are the things that would shake our steadfastness, and sweep us
away? Well, there are, first, the tiny, continuously acting, and
therefore all but omnipotent forces of daily life--duties, occupations,
distractions of various kinds--which tend to move us imperceptibly away,
as by the slow sliding of a glacier, from the hope of the Gospel. There
is nothing so strong as a gentle pressure, equably and unintermittently
applied. It is far mightier than thrusts and hammerings and sudden
assaults. I stood some time ago looking at the Sphinx. The hard
stone--so hard that it turns the edge of a sculptor's chisel--has been
worn away, and the solemn features all but obliterated. What by? The
continual attrition of multitudinous grains of sand from the desert. The
little things that are always at work upon us are the things that have
most power to sweep us away from our steadfastness in Jesus Christ.
Then there are, besides, the sudden assaults of strong temptations, of
sense and flesh, or of a more subtle and refined character. If a man is
standing loosely, in some careless _dégagé_ attitude, and a sudden
impact comes upon him, over he goes. The boat upon a mountain-locked
lake encounters a sudden gust when opposite the opening of a glen, and
unless there be a very strong hand and a watchful eye at the helm, is
sure to be upset. Upon us there come, in addition to that silent
continuity of imperceptible but most real pressure, sudden gusts of
temptation which are sure to throw us over, unless we are well and
always on our guard against them.
In addition to all these, there are ups and downs of our own nature, the
fluctuations which are sure to occur in any human heart, when faith
seems to ebb and falter, and love to die down almost into cold ashes.
But, dear brethren, whilst we shall always be liable to these
fluctuations of feeling, it is possible for us to have, deep down below
these, a central core of our personality, in which unchanging continuity
may abide. The depths of the ocean know nothing of the tides on the
surface that are due to the mutable moon. We can have in our inmost
hearts steadfastness, immovableness, even though the surface may be
ruffled. Make your spirits like one of those great cathedrals whose
thick walls keep out the noises of the world, and in whose still
equability there is neither excessive heat nor excessive cold, but an
approximately uniform temperature, at midsummer and at midwinter. 'Stand
fast in the Lord.'
Now, my text not only gives an exhortation, but, in the very act of
giving it, suggests how it is to be fulfilled. For that phrase 'in the
Lord' not only indicates _where_ we are to stand, but also _how_. That
is to say--it is only in proportion as we keep ourselves in union with
Christ, in heart and mind, and will, and work, that we shall stand
steadfast. The lightest substances may be made stable, if they are glued
on to something stable. You can mortice a bit of thin stone into the
living rock, and then it will stand 'four-square to every wind that
blows.' So it is only on condition of our keeping ourselves in Jesus
Christ, that we are able to keep ourselves steadfast, and to present a
front of resistance that does not yield one foot, either to
imperceptible continuous pressure, to sudden assaults, or to the
fluctuations of our own changeful dispositions and tempers. The ground
on which a man stands has a great deal to do with the firmness of his
footing. You cannot stand fast upon a bed of slime, or upon a sand-bank
which is being undermined by the tides. And if we, changeful creatures,
are to be steadfast in any region, our surest way of being so is to knit
ourselves to Him 'who is the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever,'
and from whose immortality will flow some copy and reflection of itself
into our else changeful natures.
Still further, in regard to this commandment, I would pray you to notice
that very eloquent little word which stands at the beginning of it.
'_So_ stand fast in the Lord.' 'So.' How? That throws us back to what
the Apostle has been saying in the previous context. And what has he
been saying there? The keynote of the previous chapter is progress--'I
follow after; I press toward the mark, forgetting the things that are
behind, and reaching forth to the things that are before.' To these
exhortations to progress he appends this remarkable exhortation:
'So'--that is, by progress--'stand fast in the Lord,' which being turned
into other words is just this--if you stand still, you will not stand
fast. There can be no steadfastness without advancement. If a man is not
going forward, he is going backward. The only way to ensure stability is
'pressing toward the mark.' Why, a child's top only stands straight up
as long as it is revolving. If a man on a bicycle stops, he tumbles. And
so, in the depths of a Christian life, as in all science, and all walks
of human activity, the condition of steadfastness is advance. Therefore,
dear brethren, let no man deceive himself with the notion that he can
keep at the same point of religious experience and of Christian
character. You are either more of a Christian, or less of one, than you
were at a past time. '_So_, stand fast,' and remember that to stand
_still_ is _not_ to stand _fast_.
Now, whilst all these things that I have been trying to say have
reference to Christian people at all stages of their spiritual history,
they have a very especial reference to those in the earlier part of
Christian life.
And I want to say to those who have only just begun to run the Christian
life, very lovingly and very earnestly, that this is a text for them.
For, alas! there is nothing more frequent than that, after the first
dawnings of a Christian life in a heart, there should come a period of
overclouding; or that, as John Bunyan has taught us, when Christian has
gone through the wicket-gate, he should fall very soon into the Slough
of Despond. One looks round, and sees how many professing Christians
there are who, perhaps, were nearer Jesus Christ on the day of their
conversion than they have ever been since, and how many cases of
arrested development there are amongst professing and real Christians;
so that when for the 'time they ought to be teachers, they have need' to
be taught again; and when, after the number of years that have passed,
they ought to be full-grown men, they are but babes yet. And so I say to
you, dear young friends, stand fast. Do not let the world attract you
again. Keep near to Jesus. 'Hold fast that thou hast; let no man take
thy crown.'
III. Lastly, we have here a great motive which encourages obedience to
this command.
People generally pass over that 'Therefore' which begins my text, but it
is full of significance and of importance. It links the precept which we
have been considering with the immediately preceding hope which the
Apostle has so triumphantly proclaimed, when he says that 'we look for
the Saviour from heaven, the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change the
body of our humiliation that it may be fashioned like unto the body of
His glory, according to the working whereby He is able even to subdue
all things to Himself.'
So there rises before us that twofold great hope; that the Master
Himself is coming to the succour of His servants, and that when He
comes, He will perfect the incomplete work which has been begun in them
by their faith and steadfastness, and will change their whole humanity
so that it shall become participant of, and conformed to, the glory of
His own triumphant manhood.
That hope is presented by the Apostle as having its natural sequel in
the 'steadfastness' of my text, and that 'steadfastness' is regarded by
the Apostle as drawing its most animating motives from the contemplation
of that great hope. Blessed be God! The effort of the Christian life is
not one which is extorted by fear, or by the cold sense of duty. There
are no taskmasters with whips to stand over the heart that responds to
Christ and to His love. But hope and joy, as well as love, are the
animating motives which make sacrifices easy, soften the yoke that is
laid upon our shoulders, and turn labour into joy and delight.
So, dear brethren, we have to set before us this great hope, that Jesus
Christ is coming, and that, therefore, our labour on ourselves is sure
not to be in vain. Work that is done hopelessly is not done long, and
there is no heart in it whilst it is being done. But if we know that
Christ will appear, 'and that when He who is our life shall appear, we
also shall appear with Him in glory,' then we may go to work in keeping
ourselves steadfast in Him, with cheery hearts, and with full assurance
that what we have been doing will have a great result.
You have read, no doubt, about some little force in North-West India,
hemmed in by enemies. They may well hold out resolutely and hopefully
when they know that three relieving armies are converging upon their
stronghold. And we, too, know that our Emperor is coming to raise the
siege. We may well stand fast with such a prospect. We may well work at
our own sanctifying when we know that our Lord Himself--like some
master-sculptor who comes to his pupil's imperfectly blocked-out work,
and takes his chisel in his hand, and with a touch or two completes
it--will come and finish what we, by His grace, imperfectly began. 'So
stand fast in the Lord,' because you have hope that the Lord is about to
come, and that when He comes you will be like Him.
One last word. That steadfastness is the condition without which we have
no right to entertain that hope.
If we keep ourselves near Christ, and if by keeping ourselves near Him,
we are becoming day by day liker Him, then we may have calm confidence
that He will perfect that which concerns us. But I, for my part, can
find nothing, either in Scripture or in the analogy of God's moral
dealings with us in the world, to warrant the holding out of the
expectation to a man that, if he has kept himself apart from Jesus
Christ and his quickening and cleansing power all his life long, Jesus
Christ will take him in hand after he dies, and change him into His
likeness. Don't you risk it! Begin by 'standing fast in the Lord.' He
will do the rest then, not else. The cloth must be dipped into the
dyer's vat, and lie there, if it is to be tinged with the colour. The
sensitive plate must be patiently kept in position for many hours, if
invisible stars are to photograph themselves upon it. The vase must be
held with a steady hand beneath the fountain, if it is to be filled.
Keep yourselves in Jesus Christ. Then here you will begin to be changed
into the same image, and when He comes He will come as your Saviour, and
complete your uncompleted work, and make you altogether like Himself.
'Therefore, my brethren, dearly beloved and longed for, my joy and
crown, so stand fast in the Lord, dearly beloved.'