XXIV. THE ESSENTIAL ELEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE.
"Blessed are they who
hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled."-Matt. v.
6.
THERE are a great many things in the experience of Christians,
which, traced out in their natural history, are exceeding interesting. I have
been struck to notice how very commonly what is peculiar to Christian
experience drops out of the mind; while that which is merely incidental
remains, and constitutes the mind's entire coception of what religion is. Their
way of talking of their experience leaves you quite in the dark as to its
genuineness, even when they propose to give you especially the reasons of their
hope.
My design is first to state some of the facts which belong to
the life of God in the soul.
1. Hunger and thirst are states of mind, and do not belong to
the body. They are of two kinds, natural and spiritual. The objects on which
the natural terminates are food and drink. By our very constitution these are
necessary to our well-being in the present world. These appetites are natural
and terminate on their appropriate objects.
There are also spiritual hunger and spiritual thirst, which are
as truly natural as the former. It is no more a figure of speech to use these
terms in this case than in the other.
The appetites that demand food and drink are facts and
experiences. Everybody knows what it is to have them, and everybody knows in
general what those things are which are so related to the human constitution as
to meet those demands.
So also the spiritual appetites are not less things of fact and
experience, and stand in like manner related to the objects which are adapted
to the demand.
2. Sin is a fact in the natural history of our race. That it is
so, must be attributed to the fall of our first parents. Yet whatever
explanation be given of the introduction of sin into the human family, it now
exists as an undeniable fact.
Some attention to the manner in which sin is first developed,
may serve to show its relations to what I have called the natural history of
the race.
We all know it to be a fact that the natural appetites commence
their development immediately after the natural birth. The first awakening to a
conscious existence in this world seems to be, if not occasioned by, yet
closely connected with, a constitutional demand for food. The alternations of
demand and supply commence and go on while health continues -- all the time
developing the strength of this class of appetites. Commonly the natural make
their development far in advance of the spiritual.
Not much is said in the Bible as to the mode in which sin
entered our world and acquired such relations to the human soul, but it is
distinctly referred to Adam's first sin, and is asserted to be in some way
connected with that event. Facts show that sin has become in a most significant
sense natural to the race, so that they all spontaneously, not of
necessity, yet spontaneously, if no special grace interpose, begin to sin as
soon as they begin to act morally, or in other words, as soon as they become
capable of moral action. Not that men are born sinners, not that they
sin before they an born, not that sin is born in them, nor that they are beyond
their control born into sin; but yet the constitution of the man -- body
and mind -- is such, and the law of develop. ment is such, that men sin
naturally (none the less voluntarily, responsibly, and guiltily), but they all
sin of free choice; the temptations to sin being developed in advance of those
intellectual and moral powers which should counteract the excessive demands of
the sensibility. Mark the developments of the new-born child. Some pain or some
appetite awakens its consciousness of existence, and thus is created a demand
for the things it perceives itself to need. Then the little infant begins to
struggle for good -- for that particular good which its new-developed
sensibility demands. Want, the struggling demand for supply, and the
gratification, form a process of development which gives such Rower to the
sensibility as generates ere long an intense selfishness; and before the
conscience and the reason are perceptibly developed, have laid the foundation
for spiritual death. If the Spirit of God does not excite spiritual wants and
arouse the mind to efforts in obtaining them, the mind becomes so engrossed and
its sensibilities acquire such habits of control over the will, that when the
idea of right and wrong is first developed the mind remains dead to its
demands. The appetites have already secured the ascendancy. The mind seems to
act as if scarcely aware that it has a soul or any spiritual wants. The
spiritual consciousness is at first not developed at all. The mind seems not to
know its spiritual relations. When this knowledge first forces itself upon the
mind, it finds the ground pre-occupied, the habits fixed, the soul too much
engaged for earthly good to be called off. The tendency of this law of
development is altogether downward; the appetites become more and more despotic
and imperious; the mind has less and less regard for God. The mind comes into a
state in which spiritual truth frets and chafes it, and of course it thoroughly
inclines to spiritual apathy -- choosing apathy, though not unaware of its
danger before the perpetual annoyance of unwelcome truths. This tends toward a
state of dead insensibility to spiritual want.
The first symptom of change is the soul's awaking to spiritual
consequences. Sometimes this is feeble at first, or sometimes it may be more
strongly aroused to its spiritual relations, position, and wants. This brings
on anxiety, desire, a deed sense of what the soul truly needs. From this arises
an influence which begins to counteract the power of appetite. It begins to
operate as a balance and check to those long unrestrained demands.
Here you may notice that just in proportion as the spiritual
consciousness is developed, the mind becomes wretched, for in this proportion
the struggle becomes intense and violent. Before, the man was dead. He was like
an animal as to the unchecked indulgence of appetite -- above the mere animal
in some things, but below in others. He goes on without that counteracting
influence which arises from the spiritual consciousness. You see some who live
a giddy, aimless life. They seem not at all aware that they have a spiritual
nature or any spiritual wants. When they awake to spiritual consciousness and
reflection, conviction produces remorse and agony. This spiritual struggle, at
whatever age it may occur, is in its general character the same as occurs in
the infant when its spiritual consciousness is first awakened.
It is but natural that when the spiritual faculties are aroused,
men will begin to pray and struggle under a deep sense of being wrong and
guilty. At first this may be entirely selfish. But before conversion takes
place, there will be a point in which the counter influences of the selfish
against the spiritual will balance each other, and then the spiritual will gain
the ascendancy. The animal and the selfish must relatively decline and the
spiritual gain strength, till victory turns on the side of the spiritual
powers. How commonly do you observe that when the mind becomes convicted of
sin, the attractions of the world fade away; all it can give looks small;
sinners can no longer take the pleasure in worldly things they once had.
Indeed, this is a most curious and singular struggle. How rapid and great are
the changes through which the sinner passes! Today, he quenches the light of
God in his soul, and gropes on in darkness; tomorrow the light may return and
reveal yet greater sin; one day he relapses back to worldliness, and gives up
his soul to his own thoughts and pleasures; but ere another has passed, there
is bitterness in this cup and he loathes it, and from his soul cries out: This
can never satisfy an immortal mind! Now he begins to practice upon external
reformation; but anon he finds that this utterly fails to bring peace to his
soul. He is full of trouble and anxiety for salvation, yet all his struggles
thus far have been entirely selfish, and ere he is converted he must see this
to be the case. He is in a horrible pit of miry clay. The more he struggles the
deeper he sinks and the more desperate his case becomes. Selfish efforts for
spiritual relief are just like a quagmire of thick clay. Each struggle plunges
the sinking man the deeper in the pit. The convicted man is ready to put
himself to hard labor and mighty effort. At first he works with great hope of
success, for he does not readily understand why selfish efforts will not be
successful. He prays, but all in a selfish spirit. By this I mean that he
thinks only of himself. He has no thought of honoring or pleasing God --
no thought of any benefit to his fellow-beings. He does not inquire whether his
course of life and state of heart are such that God can bless him without
detriment to the rest of His great family. In fact, he does not think of caring
for the rest of that family nor for the honor of its great Father. Of course,
such selfish praying brings no answer; and when he finds this to be the case,
he frets and struggles more than ever. Now he goes on to add to his works and
efforts. He attends more meetings, and reads his Bible more, and tries new
forms of prayer, All is in vain. His heart is selfish still. What can I do? he
cries Out in agony; if I pray I am selfish, and if I desist from prayer, this
too is selfish; if I read my Bible or neglect to read it, each alike is
selfish, and what can I do? How can I help being selfish?
Alas, he has no idea of acting from any other or higher motive
than his own interests. It is his darkness on this very point that makes the
sinner's struggle so long and so unprofitable. This is the reason why he can
not be converted at once, and why he must needs sink and flounder so much
longer in the quagmire of unavailing and despairing works. It is only when he
comes at last to see that all this avails nothing, that he begins to take some
right views of his case and of his relations. When he learns that indeed he can
not work out his own salvation by working at it on this wise he bethinks
himself to inquire whether he be not all wrong, at bottom -- whether his
motives of heart are not radically corrupt. Looking round and abroad, he begins
to ask whether God may not have some interests and some rights as well as
himself. Who is God and where is He? Who is Jesus Christ and what has He done?
What did He die for? Is God a great King over all the earth, and should He not
have due honor and homage? Was it this great God who so loved the world
as to give His Son to die for it? O, I see I have quite neglected to think of
God's interests and honor! Now I see how infinitely mean and wicked I have
been! Plainly enough, I can not live so. No wonder God did not hear my selfish
prayers. There was no hope in that sort of effort, for I had, as I plainly see,
no regard to God in anything I was doing then. How reasonable it is that God
should ask me to desist from all my selfish endeavors and to put away this
selfishness itself, and yield myself entirely and forever to do or suffer all
His blessed will!
It is done; and now this long-troubled soul sinks into deep
repose. It settles itself down at Jesus' feet, content if only Christ be
honored and God's throne made glorious. The final result -- whether saved or
lost -- seems to give him no longer that agonizing solicitude; the case is
submitted to the Great Disposer in trustful humility. God will do all things
well. If He takes due care of His own interests and glory, there will be no
complaining -nothing but deep and
peaceful satisfaction.
In the case of most young converts, this state of peaceful trust
in God is subject to interruptions. The natural appetites have been denied --
their dominion over the will disowned; but they are not dead. By and by they
rise to assert their sway. They clamor for indulgence, and sometimes they get
it. Alas, the young convert has fallen into sin! His soul is again in bondage
and sorrow. O, how deeply is he mortified to think that he has again given away
to temptation, and pierced the bosom on which he loved to recline! He had
promised himself he should never sin, but he has sinned, and well for
him if he finds no heart to evade or deny the fact. Better admit it all, and
most freely, although it wounds his heart more than all his former sins. Mark
his agony of spirit! His tears of repentance were never before so bitter! He
feels disappointed, and it almost seems to him that this failure must blast all
his plans and hopes of leading a Christian life. It does not work as he thought
it would. He feels shy of God; for he says, How can God ever trust me again
after such developments of unfaithfulness. He can hardly get himself to say a
word to God or to Christ. He is almost sure that be has been deceived. But
finally he bethinks himself of the Cross of Calvary, and catches a faint ray of
light -- a beam of the light of love. He says, There may be mercy for me yet! I
will at least go to Jesus and see, Again he goes, and again he falls into those
arms of love and is made consciously welcome. The light of God shines on his
soul again, and he find himself once more an accepted son in his Father's
presence.
But here a new form of desire is awakened. He has learned
something of his own weakness and has tasted the bitterness of sin. With an
agony of interest never known before, he asks, Can I ever become established
in holiness? Can I have righteousness enough to make me stand in the evil
day? This is a new form of spiritual desire, such as our text expresses in the
words "hunger and thirst after righteousness."
These extended remarks are only an introduction to my general
subject. designed to get before your mind the true idea of hungering and
thirsting after righteousness. This state of mind is not merely conviction; it
is not remorse, nor sorrow, nor a struggle to obtain a hope or to get out of
danger. All these feelings may have preceded, but the hungering after
righteousness is none of these. It is a longing desire to realize the idea of
spiritual and moral purity. He has in some measure appreciated the purity of
heaven, and the necessity of being himself as pure as the holy there, in order
to enjoy their bliss and breathe freely in their atmosphere.
This state of mind is not often developed by writers, and it
seems rarely to have engaged the attention of the Church as its importance
demands.
When the mind gets a right view of the atmosphere of heaven, it
sees plainly it can not breathe there, but must be suffocated, unless its own
spirit is congenial to the purity of that world. I remember the case of a man
who, after living a Christian life for a season, relapsed into sin. At length
God reclaimed His wandering child. When I next saw him, and heard him speak of
his state of relapse, he turned suddenly away and burst into tears, saying,
"I have been living in sin, almost choked to death in its atmosphere; it
seemed as if I could not breathe in it. It almost choked the breath of
spiritual life from my system."
Have not some of you known what this means? You could not bear
the infernal atmosphere of sin -- so like the very smoke of the pit! After you
get out of it, you say, Let me never be there again! Your soul agonizes and
struggles to find some refuge against this awful relapsing into sin. O, you
long for a pure atmosphere and a pure heart, that will never hold
fellowship with darkness or its works again.
The young convert, like the infant child, may not at first
distinctly apprehend its own condition and wants; but such experience as I have
been detailing develops the idea of perfect purity, and then the soul longs for
it with longings irrepressible. I must, says the now enlightened convert, I must
be drawn into living union with God as revealed in Jesus Christ. I can not rest
till I find God, and have Him revealed to me as my everlasting refuge and
strength.
Some years since, I preached a sermon for the purpose of
developing the idea of the spiritual life. The minister for whom I preached
said to me, I want to show you a letter written many years ago by a lady now in
advanced age, and detailing her remarkable experience on this subject. After
her conversion she found herself exceedingly weak, and often wondered if this
was all the stability and strength she could hope for from Christ in His
Gospel. Is this, she said, all that God can do for me? Long time and with much
prayer she examined her Bible. At last she found, that below what she had ever
read and examined before, there lay a class of passages which revealed the real
Gospel -- salvation from sinning. She saw the provisions of the Gospel
in full relief. Then she shut herself up, determined to seek this blessing till
she should find. Her soul went forth after God, seeking communion with Him, and
the great blessing which she so deeply felt that she needed. She had found the
needed promises in God's Word, and now she held on upon them as if she could
not let them go until they had all been fulfilled in her own joyful experience.
She cried mightily to God. She said, "If Thou dost not give me this
blessing, I can never believe Thee again." In the issue the Lord showed
her that the provisions were already made, and were just as full and as
glorious as they needed to be or could be, and that she might receive them by
faith if she would. In fact, it was plain that the Spirit of the Lord was
pressing upon her acceptance, so that she had only to believe -- to open
wide her mouth that it might be filled. She saw and obeyed: then she became firm
and strong. Christ had made her free. She was no longer in bondage; her
Lord had absolutely enlarged her soul in faith and love, and triumphantly she
could exclaim: Glory be to god! Christ hath made me free.
The state of mind expressed by hungering and thirsting is a real
hunger and thirst, and terminates for its object upon the bread and water of
life, These figures (if indeed they are to be regarded as figures at all) are
kept up fully throughout the Bible, and all true Christians can testify to the
fitness of the language to express the idea.
I have said that this state of mind implies conversion; for
although the awakened sinner may have agonies and convictions, yet he has no
clear conceptions of what this union with Christ is, nor does he clearly
apprehend the need of a perfectly cleansed heart. He needs some experience of
what holiness is, and often he seems also to need to have tasted some of the
exceeding bitterness of sin as felt by one who has been near the Lord, before
he shall fully apprehend this great spiritual want of being made a partaker
indeed of Christ's own perfect righteousness. By righteousness here, we are not
to understand something imputed, but something real. It is imparted, not
imputed, Christ draws the souls of His people into such union with Himself,
that they become "partakers of the divine nature," or as elsewhere
expressed, "partakers of His holiness." For this the tried Christian
pants. Having had a little taste of it, and then having tasted the bitterness
of a relapse into sin, his soul is roused to most intense struggles to realize
this blessed union with Christ.
A few words should now
be said on what is implied in being filled with this righteousness.
Worldly men incessantly hunger and thirst after worldly good.
But attainment never outstrips desire. Hence, they are never filled. There is
always a conscious want which no acquisition of this sort of good can satisfy.
It is most remarkable that worldly men can never be filled with the things they
seek. Well do the Scriptures say -- This desire enlarges itself as hell, and is
never satisfied. They really hunger and thirst the more by how much the more
they obtain.
Let it be especially remarked that this being filled with
righteousness is not perfection in the highest sense of this term. Men
often use the term perfection, of that which is absolutely complete -- a state
which precludes improvement and beyond which there can be no progress. There
can be no such Perfection among Christians in any world -- earth or heaven. It
can pertain to no being but God. He, and He alone, is perfect beyond
possibility of progress. All else but God are making progress -- the wicked
from bad to worse, the righteous from good to better. Instead of making no more
progress in heaven, as some suppose, probably the law of progress is in a
geometrical ratio; the more they have, the farther they will advance. I have
often queried whether this law which seems to prevail here will operate there,
viz., of what I may call impulsive progression. Here we notice that the mind
from time to time gives itself to most intense exertion to make attainments in
holiness. The attainment having been made, the mind for a season reposes, as if
it had taken its meal and awaited the natural return of appetite before it
should put forth its next great effort. May it not be that the same law of
progress obtains even in heaven?
Here we see the operations of this law in the usual Christian
progress. Intense longing and desire beget great struggling and earnest prayer;
at length the special blessing sought is found, and for the time the soul seems
to be filled to overflowing. It seems to be fully satisfied and to have
received all it supposed possible and perhaps even more than was ever asked or
thought. The soul cries out before the Lord, I did not know there was such
fullness in store for Thy people. How wonderful that God should grant it to
such an one as myself! The soul finds itself swallowed up and lost in the great
depths and riches of such a blessing.
Oh, how the heart pours itself out in the one most expressive
petition: "Thy will be done on earth as in heaven!" All prayer is
swallowed up in this. And then the praise, the FULLNESS OF PRAISE! All
struggle and agony are suspended: the soul seems to demand a rest from prayer
that it may Dour itself out in one mighty tide of praise. Some suppose that
persons in this state will never again experience those longings after a new
baptism; but in this they mistake. The meal they have had may last them a
considerable time -longer, perhaps,
than Elijah's meal, on the strength of which he went forty days; but the time
of comparative hunger will come round again, and they will gird themselves for
a new struggle.
This is what is sometimes expressed as a baptism, an anointing,
an unction, an ensealing of the Spirit, an earnest of the Spirit. All these
terms are pertinent and beautiful to denote this special work of the Divine
Spirit in the heart.
They who experience it, know how well and aptly it is described
as eating the flesh and drinking the blood of the Lord Jesus, so really does
the soul seem to live on Christ. It, is also the bread and the water of life
which are promised freely to him that is athirst. These terms may seem very
mystical and unmeaning to those who have had no experience, but they are all
plain to him who has known in his own soul what they mean. If you ask why
figures of speech are used at all to denote spiritual things, you have the
answer in the exigencies of the human mind in regard to apprehending spiritual
things. Christ's language must have seemed very mystical to His hearers, yet
was it the best He could employ for His purpose. If any man will do His will,
he shall know of His doctrine; but how can a selfish, debased, besotted, and
withal disobedient mind expect to enter into the spiritual meaning of this
language How strangely must Christ's words have sounded on the ears of Jewish
priests: "God in us;" "The Holy Ghost dwelling in you;"
"Ye shall abide in Me." How could they understand these things?
" The bread that came down from heaven," what could this mean to
them? They thought they understood about the manna from heaver, and they
idolized Moses; but how to understand what this Nazarene said about giving them
the true bread from heaven which should be for the life of the world, they
could not see. No wonder they were confounded, having only legal ideas of
religion, and having not even the most remote approximation to the idea of a
living union with the Messiah for the purposes of spiritual life.
What are the conditions of receiving this
fullness?
That the soul hunger and thirst for it, is the only condition
specified in this passage. But we know it is very common to have promises made
in the Bible, and yet not have all the conditions of the promise stated in the
same connection. If we find them elsewhere, we are to regard them as fixed
conditions, and they are to be understood as implied where they are not
expressed.
Elsewhere we are told that faith is a fundamental
condition. Men must believe for it and receive it by faith. This is as
naturally necessary as receiving and eating wheat bread is for the sustenance
of the body. Ordinary food must be taken into the system by our own voluntary
act. We take and eat; then the system appropriates. So faith, receives and
appropriates the bread of life.
In general it is found
true that before Christians will sufficiently apprehend the relations of this
supply to their wants and to the means of supplying them, this hunger and
thirst becomes very intense, so as to overpower and cast into insignificance
all their other appetites and desires. As by a general law one master passion
throws all minor ones into the shade, and may sometimes suspend them for a
season entirely, so we find in this case a soul intensely hungering and
thirsting after righteousness almost forgets to hunger and thirst even after
its common food and drinks. Place before him his study-books, he can not bring
his mind to relish them now. Invite him to a singing-concert, he has no taste
that way at present. Ask him into company, his mind is pressing in another
direction. He longs to find God, and can take but little. interest in any other
friend at present. Offer him worldly society, and you will find he takes the
Least possible interest in it. He knows such companions will not understand
what his soul so intensely craves, and of course it were vain to look for
sympathy in that quarter.
It is an important condition that the mind should have somewhat
clear apprehensions of the thing needed and of the means of obtaining it.
Effort can not be well directed unless the subject be in some good measure
understood. What is that ensealing of the Spirit? What is this baptism? I must
by all means see what this is before I can intelligently seek it and hope to gain
it. True, no man can know before experience is he can and will know afterwards;
but he can learn something before and often much more after the light of
experience shines in upon his soul. There is no more mystification than there
is in hungering for a good dinner, and being refreshed by it after you have
eaten it.
Again, if we would have this fullness, we must be sure to
believe this promise and all this class of promises. We must regard them as truly
promises of God -- all yea and amen in Christ Jesus, and as good for our
souls to rely upon as the promise of pardon to the penitent and believing
Yet again we must ask and insist upon their fulfillment to our
souls. We are authorized to expect it in answer to out faith. We should be
first certain that we ask in sincerity, and then should expect the blessing
just as we always expect God to be faithful to His word. Why not? Has He said
and shall He not do it? Has He promised and shall He not perform?
We must believe that the promise implies a full supply. Our
faith must not limit the power or the grace of Christ. The Christian is not
straitened in God. Let him take care, therefore, that he do not straiten
himself by his narrow conceptions of what God can do and loves to do for His
hungering and thirsting children. Often there is need of great perseverance in
the search for this blessing. Because of the darkness of the mind and the
smallness of its faith the way may not for a long time be prepared for the full
bestowment of this great blessing.
REMARKS.
1. The Antinomian Perfectionists mistook the meaning of this and
of similar passages. They supposed that whoever believes gets so filled as
never to thirst any more. But the fact is, the mind may rise higher and higher,
making still richer attainments in holiness at each rising grade of progress.
It may indeed find many resting-places, as Bunyan gives to his pilgrim -- here
at the top of the hill Difficulty, there on the Delectable Mountains, where he
passes through scenes of great triumph, great faith and great joy in God.
Subsequently to these scenes will occur other periods of intense desire for new
baptisms of the Spirit and for a new ascent upon the heights of the divine
life. This is to be the course of things so long at least as we remain in the flesh,
and perhaps forever. Perhaps the blest spirits in heaven will never reach a
point beyond which there shall not be the same experience -- new developments
of God made to the mind, and by this means new stages of progress and growth in
holiness. With what amazement shall we then study these stages of progress, and
admire to look abroad over the new fields of knowledge successively opened, and
the corresponding developments of mental power and of a holy character, all
which stand related to these manifestations of God as effects to their cause.
What new and glorious views have been bursting upon us, fast as we could bear
them, for myriads of ages! Looking back over the past, we shall say -- Oh, this
everlasting progress -- this is indeed the blessedness of heaven! How
far does this transcend our highest thought when we looked forward to heaven
from the dim distance of our earthly pilgrimage! Here there is no end to the
disclosures to be made, nor to the truths to be learned.
If there was to no more food, how could there be any more
spiritual thirst and spiritual hunger? How, indeed, could there be more
spiritual joy? Suppose that somewhere in the lapse of heaven's eternal ages, we
should reach a point where nothing more remains to be learned -- not another
thing to be inquired after -- not another fact to be investigated, or truth to
be known. Alas, what a blow to the bliss of heaven!
We are told that the angels are desiring to look into the things
of salvation. Oh, yes; when they saw our Messiah born they were, allowed to
come so near us with their joyous outbursts of praise that even mortals could
hear. Do you not suppose those angels too are growing in grace, and advancing
in knowledge? No doubt they are, most wonderfully, and have been ever since they
came into being.
How much more they must know of God now than they did before our
world was created! And how much more they have yet to learn from God's
government over our race Think you they have no more desires after the
knowledge of God? And have they no more desire to rise to yet higher conformity
of heart and character to the great Model of Heaven?
If so with angels, surely not less so with their younger
brethren -- the holy who are redeemed from among men.
You might suppose, that by studying in this school for a few
days, you would learn all human science. This were a great mistake. You might
master many sciences and still have other heights to ascend -- other vast
fields of knowledge to explore. You might have the best of human teachers and
the best possible opportunities for learning, yet still it would be enough to
occupy you the length of many lives to master all there is in even human
science. The mind is not made to be so filled to satiety that it craves no more
-- can receive no more. Like the trees planted on the rivers of the waters of
life, which bring forth twelve manner of fruits and whose roots go deep and
drink largely of those blessed waters-so is the mind which God has endowed with
the functions of immortal progress.
As our ideal becomes elevated, and we see higher points to which
we may arise, we shall have more enkindlings of desire, and more intense
struggles to advance. What Christian does not find, as he reads the Bible over,
new and deeper strata of meaning never seen before -- new truths revealed and
new beauties displayed. Old father O. used to say, "I am reading the Word
of God. It is deep and rich, like the great heart of its Author. I have read
now two hours and have not got over but two verses. It will take me to all
eternity to read it through." So it was. He really found more in the Bible
than other men did. He went deeper, and the deeper he went, the richer did he
find its precious ores of gold and silver.
So the Psalmist says,
"Open Thou mine eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of Thy
law." Have you not been so ravished with love to this blessed book that
you wanted to clasp it to your bosom and become purified with its spirit? As
you go down into its depths and find in each successive stratum of its deep
thoughts new beauties and new fields of truth to explore, have you not been
filled with intense desire to live long enough and have time and strength
enough to see, to learn, and to enjoy it all? Like the successive landscapes as
you ascend the lofty mountain's side, at each stage you see them spreading out
in grander beauty and broader range -- so, as you really study into the great
and rich things of God's spiritual kingdom, there is no limit to this sweep of
the knowledge of God; for the fields only become the broader and the more
enchanting as you ascend. Do you not think that his soul must be truly blessed
who eats and drinks and fills his soul with divine righteousness?
2. I am strongly impressed with the conviction that some of you
need a new development of the spiritual life. You need to go deeper into the
knowledge of God as revealed in the soul; you need to hunger and thirst more
intensely, and be by this means filled as you have not often been as yet. Even
though you may have tasted that the Lord is gracious, you yet need to eat and
drink largely at His table. It will not avail you to live on those old dinners,
long past and long since digested You want a fresh meal. It is time for you to
say, "I must know more about this being filled with righteousness. My soul
languishes for this heavenly food. I must come again into this banqueting house
to be feasted again with His love."
3. The full soul can not be satisfied to enjoy its rich spiritual
provisions alone. if well fed himself, he will be only more exercised to see
others also fed and blessed. The Spirit of Christ in his heart is a spirit of
love, and this can never rest except as it sees others reaching the same
standard of attainment and enjoyment which is so delightful to itself. 4. Real
Christians should be, and in the main they will be, growing better and holier
as they come nearer heaven. On the other hand, how great and fearful is the
contrast between an aged growing Christian and an aged sinner growing in
depravity and guilt! The one is ripening for heaven, the other for hell. The
one goes on praising and loving, laboring and suffering for God and for his
generation according to the will of God; but the other goes on his downward course,
scolding and cursing as he goes, abhorred of men and disowned of his Maker. You
have seen the awful contrast. You could hardly believe that two men so unlike
were both raised in the same township, taught at the same school, instructed in
the same religious assembly, and presented with the same Gospel; and yet see
how manifestly the one is saved and the other damned. Each bears the sign
beforehand -- the palpable, unmistakable evidence of the destiny that awaits
him.
5. Is it not full time that each one of you who has any
spiritual life should stand out before the world and put on your beautiful
garments? Let all the world see that there is a power and a glory in the
Gospel, such as human philosophy never has even approached. Show that the
Gospel begets purity and peace. Show that it enlarges the heart and opens the
hand for the good of all human kind. Show that it conquers selfishness and
transforms the soul from hate to love.
Sinners, ye who have earthly hunger and thirst enough, let your
ears be opened to hear the glad tidings of real salvation. Ye whose hearts have
never known solid peace -- ye who are forever desiring, yet never satisfied --
ye who cry in your inmost souls; O for office! O for honor! O for wealth!
See, here is that which
is better far than all you seek. Here are durable riches and righteousness.
Here are the first installments of pleasures that flow forever at God's right
hand. Here is heaven proffered and even pressed upon your regard and your
choice. Choose life before death, as you would be wise for your eternal
well-being.