It may be said, “What do we know of the spiritual world? And how can we be conformed to a world of which we know nothing?” The answer is, that our very Christianity supposes the change which sets this objection aside. Our love to this present world can only be subdued by its being superseded by another, or subordinated to another. Our love to Christ is the great secret of our attachment to heaven and to heavenly things. Given a soul under the influence of love to God, and loyalty to God must follow.
In order to this, however, there must be self-knowledge. We must see our “differences.” There must be the study of the character of Christ. There must also be earnest prayer for, and trust in, the help of the Holy Spirit. The work before us is more than an occasional outburst of religious sentiment; more than spasmodic, self-denying charity under the influence of suddenly awakened emotion; more than scrupulosity about small matters of pleasure or pursuit. It is a life; and as such it has spontaneity, freedom, and blessedness. In many an instance it attains wonderful maturity on earth; it is perfected in heaven.
Is this life ours? Oh, accept the one and only Saviour—exclusive in His claims, yet offering His mercy to all. You are conscious of sin, and this makes you feel (if you reflect) your need of salvation. Take it from Him. All He asks is that you should turn from the sin that made Him bleed, and trust the love which for you was stronger than death. Strait as is the gate through which you must enter into “life,” that life is in itself one of holy freedom and holy joy. The “gate” opens into broad fields of exhaustless treasure. Whoever may represent the Christian life as monotonous and poor, we say it is not so. It is quietness of heart, loftiness of feeling, sweet submission, trust, loyalty to the highest, aspiration after the best, the abnegation of self in blessing others and in glorifying the God and Father of all; such is the life to which the Christian is called. We challenge the world to produce a single case of a Christian regretting his consecration, or confessing that he made a sorry exchange, when he left the world’s delusive hopes for pardon, peace, the Father’s smile, the way of holiness, and the assurance of heaven. The wholly consecrated Christian is the wholly happy one.
Fling wide the portals of your heart;
Make it a temple set apart
From earthly use, for heaven’s employ,
Adorn’d with prayer and love and joy:
So shall your sovereign enter in,
And new and nobler life begin.
Redeemer, come! I open wide
My heart to Thee; here, Lord, abide!
Let me Thine inner presence feel,
Thy grace and love in me reveal;
Thy Holy Spirit guide me on,
Until the glorious crown be won!
VIII.
CHRISTIANITY IN OUR DAILY LIFE.
“Whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus.”—Colossians iii. 17.
One of the most striking characteristics of the Christian religion is what I may term its universality. I mean that its obligations and privileges cover the whole ground of human life—present and to come. This fact, which is abundantly illustrated and enforced in the New Testament, is also clearly hinted at in the Old. It seems to have been present to the Psalmist’s mind in the parallel he draws in the nineteenth Psalm between the sun, whose going forth is from the end of heaven, whose circuit is unto the ends of it, and from whose heat nothing is hid; and “the law of the Lord” which, in its perfectness, comes into satisfying contact with all human need. It converts the soul, turning it towards itself, the source of light. It makes wise the simple, who unreservedly yield to its influence. It rejoices the heart, anxious to be right, as it is itself perfect. It enlightens the eyes with a purity of truth which has no admixture of error. It cleanses from secret faults. It keeps back the servant of the Lord from presumptuous sins.
This universality gives to Christianity its grand ideal character. It teaches that, morally considered, sin is the condition of all men; that condemnation is the result of sin to all men; and that the love of the Father, the sacrifice of the Son, and the regenerating and sanctifying power of the Holy Spirit have direct bearings on the spiritual wants of all men. Christianity meets an absolute ruin by an absolute restoration; so that, as there is nothing in man and in his relations to the universe which sin has not defiled and degraded, so there is nothing in man and in his relations to the universe which Christianity is not designed and destined to uplift and to purify.