Chapter V
The Testing of Friendship
Of course, friendship with God must be tried. Not only can true friendship stand any strain to which it may be put, but it even needs to be thus tested in order to be solidly set. It is like the knot that becomes more fixed and firm at each new pull of the cord. The faith and affection which will cling to a friend when all the forces of disunion seem combined to bring about a separation, are so tempered by the experience involved as to defy every conceivable enemy, and to discover new depths of love and service in the fellowship that has been thus put to the test. To enter upon just why this should be, is not to the purpose. It is a fact and law of the life of fellowship between man and man, and man and God. The force that threatens to break up the connection between God and man, but by means of which that union may be consummated, is temptation.
§ 1. Temptation is always an opportunity.—There are two kinds of testing—that which proves a thing to discover whether it is what it professes to be, and that which aims to bring out latent possibilities in the thing tested. With the former there goes a sort of lurking suspicion that all may not be right, as when a bit of metal is tried by acid, or a big gun is proved by an excessive charge. When a test of this kind is over the thing that is tried is just what it was before, neither more nor less. No new quality is in the gift of the test. With the latter, on the other hand, the result is different, as when the silver "from the earth is tried, and purified seven times in the fire." The quartz goes into the furnace and a stream of unalloyed metal flows out; or to seek still another illustration,—the process by which steel is tempered. Here new qualities are given by means of the testing; to the silver, purity, and to the steel, hardness and elasticity. To this second form of testing belongs the element of trust rather than that of suspicion. The material is so good, that the workman has no doubt about its coming through the fire purer and more valuable than ever.
It is this kind of testing which the friends of God must undergo, the kind of testing which affords friends the very opportunity they need to become better friends. It is not too much to say that man being what he is, there is no conceivable means excepting temptation, which would give to him just those elements which are necessary for his progress toward God. Jesus was "in all points tempted like as we are," primarily that His manhood might reach its full measure, and this entailed such sympathy with the race as ensues upon a common experience. Atonement means a unity with God which has been achieved, not by a divine fiat, but by a choice of the human will that has repelled the last attack of God's greatest enemy.
It is always so that in scanning the harsh features of a refining process, the happy result of the process is blurred and forgotten. Temptation is surely an assault to be withstood, but at the same time it is an opportunity to be seized. Viewed in this light life becomes inspiring, not in spite but because of its struggles, and we are able to greet the unseen with a cheer, counting it unmixed joy when we fall into the many temptations which, varied in form, dog our steps from the cradle to the grave. The soldier who is called to the front is stimulated, not depressed; the officer who is bidden by his general to a post of great responsibility, and so of hardship and peril, is thrilled with the joy of his task. An opportunity has been given him to prove himself worthy of great trust, which can be done only at the cost of great trouble.
This is a true picture of temptation. And the result of it all is a nature invigorated and refined, a character made capable of close friendship with God, to say nothing of the unmeasured joy that is the attendant of nobility of soul and stalwart Christian manhood.
§ 2. The majesty of conflict with temptation.—One is often depressed by the seemingly inglorious character of our temptations. They are so mean, petty and commonplace. If they had in them something to rouse in the heart that love of romance, that is a saving element in human nature, one could fight better. Now temptation has this very element. But spiritual eyes are needed to discern the glory of the commonplace, the romance of the inglorious. God has been trying with divine patience to convince men of this from the very beginning. The story of the first temptation of the first human beings, in its poetic dress points to the romance of life's struggle. Jacob's wrestling bout with the mysterious being by the river's brink, is a view of the underside of any struggle against temptation, as God sees it, when the tempted one fights to win.
Above all in the narrative of the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness, is the majesty of conflict with evil made plain. It is a record which exceeds in dramatic splendour the story of "Faust," or the realism of "Pilgrim's Progress." And in it we arrive at the paradoxical truth that the temptations of Jesus were just as commonplace as ours, and that ours are just as glorious as His,—His, of course, having a completeness which none others could have, for the most complete temptation is the temptation of the most complete.
Looking beneath the surface of the story, we find ourselves face to face with the well-known temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil. Wrapped in contemplation upon what His Divine sonship involved, He was driven into solitude, and tempted, as He worked out His life's plan, to substitute evil independence for good dependence, then to flee to the opposite extreme and substitute evil dependence for good independence, and finally to disregard the means in His zeal for a righteous end. These temptations are as common as humanity and as uninspiring as night. Could one have stood by when Jesus was struggling with them, doubtless nothing more would have been seen than is visible to-day when some man in loneliness, with his eyes lifted toward the hills, wins the mastery over himself and his unseen tempters. Yes, the Master's temptations were just as commonplace as ours. Why, then, this fine dressing up of the commonplace? Because, when in after days Jesus told His companions of His conflict and victory, He saw with the illumination of retrospect what at the moment of the struggle He could not see, the glory of it all. The story is not a fiction of the imagination. It is a true picture of what occurred, a revelation of the splendour that lies at the foundation of every spiritual contest, a record of literal truth not perceived at the time, but clear to the vision after all was over.
"After all was over"—the mean and commonplace incidents of to-day, form the raw material out of which is woven the romance of to-morrow. The ugliest facts make the choicest romance after they have been tempered in the crucible of time. Ask a soldier how much romance there was when the fight was hot. The sublime in battle is visible only from the vantage ground of victory. Often when the life of some humble and afflicted child of God comes to a close, we see what was hidden from our eyes during his days on earth—the heroism of his career. At first we esteem him "stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted." Afterward we admire the grandeur and largeness of the life that once seemed so narrow and lame. Before death the character of the affliction claims our attention; afterward the character of the afflicted; now the ugly fact and then the glory; "first that which is natural and afterward that which is spiritual." Consequently there are two methods of recording human history—bare fact, concrete, grim, commonplace; its romance, abstract, majestic and just as real. We need both kinds of description—Gethsemane with its agony and gouts of blood, and the wilderness with its dramatic imagery. Neither one is more real than the other. If the wilderness had its grim side, Gethsemane had its romantic side. The ideal is realized, when the real is idealized.
Grant the truth of this—and who will gainsay it?—and it follows that while the temptations of Jesus were as commonplace as ours, ours are as glorious as His. S. Paul saw it all quite plainly, when in radiant language he rolled out to his Ephesian friends that superb call to battle. "Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world-rulers of this darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places." There is nothing in the whole of Scripture that makes life seem more splendid and glowing, and yet the occasion is one of extreme peril and hardship—the moment of temptation. It is not so that the scientific character of our age, with its darting electricity and whirring wheels, forbids romance to lift its head. Glory of the highest type will live as long as dauntless human souls aspire to God, let the world be as matter of fact or as evil as it chooses. The only thing that can dim glory is the domination of sin in man.
§ 3. So much for the splendid opportunity which temptation affords. How to meet it is what the story of the life of the Son of Man makes manifest.
(a) It is noticeable that neither by precept nor example are we encouraged to pray for the removal of temptation. Once, it is true, Jesus expressed it as His desire that a cup of pain might pass from Him, but He conditioned His prayer—"not My will, but Thine, be done." God did not remove the cup, but what was better still He gave Him strength to drink it. A prayer of S. Paul's was treated in like manner. The thorn in the flesh was not withdrawn, but it was transformed into a means of imparting spiritual vigour—"My grace is sufficient for thee." It is said of Pascal, whose last years were full of agony, that his malady became a new quality of his genius and helped to perfect it. Christian character as well as great genius "has the power of elevating, transmuting, serving itself by the accidental conditions about it, however unpromising."[11]
This being so, even Gethsemane is an encouragement to the man who is sore tried, to pray for power to transcend his trial rather than that it may be swept out of his life by the hand of God.
'Tis life whereof our nerves are scant,
More life and fuller that I want,
and not exemption from trial.
The lingering on in life of a temptation, which, if not born of past sin, at any rate has been intensified by self-indulgence, affords us our only chance of expressing penitence to God for failure in loyalty to Him in this respect or that. How can the man, in whom the fires of passion are dead, express before God his sorrow for sins against purity in days that are gone? It is easy to conceive of such a person entreating God to give him back his temptation, that, by a reversal of former decisions, he may prove the reality of his penitence. So far as we can see, the one chance a man has of regaining a lost virtue, is through the very temptation by means of which he was robbed of it. Excessive resistance wins back, slowly but surely, what was lost by excessive indulgence. What is needed is not freedom from but freedom in temptation. This latter is possible for every Christian.
(b) Freedom in the life of temptation is achieved by meeting every enticement to sin with an upward rise toward virtue. It is quite inadequate to beat off temptation. We must spoil the strong man and possess ourselves of his goods. One sad feature of life is that we always undershoot the mark, and for the most part perfection in purpose results in nothing better than mediocrity in achievement. It is the sure fate of the man that is contented to view temptation merely as an invitation to hell which must be declined, that he will yield at least occasionally to the sin to which he is tempted. Only he who flings himself upward when the pull comes to drag him down, can hope to break the force of temptation. Temptation may be an invitation to hell, but much more is it an opportunity to reach heaven. At the moment of temptation sin and righteousness are both very near the Christian; but of the two the latter is the nearer.
Walk in the spirit and you put yourself in such a position as to be unable to fulfil the lusts of the flesh. Meet the negation of sin with the affirmation of righteousness. When Satan challenges you to wrestle with him, turn about and wrestle with God for a blessing.
(c) There is no reason to be afraid of temptation, that is to say if it is not a temptation into which we have entered unnecessarily, but one that is consequent upon the fulfilment of duty. God does not allow us to be tempted beyond our powers. But this is not all. Our fearlessness should show itself in our attitude. We must meet our temptations face to the foe. The temptations of Jesus never struck Him from behind but always smote Him in the face. There is only one kind of temptation which we are advised to run from, and that is the temptation to fleshly lust. Evasion is for the most part a sign of defeat, not of victory. The man who would gain freedom in temptation must be
One who never turned his back, but marched breast forward.
With this thought we leave the subject of temptation, that strange mystery which proves man and makes him less unworthy of friendship with God, which is at once an opportunity and a snare, glorious and commonplace.
FOOTNOTES:
[11] Walter Pater.