This is all seductive from the principle of faith--this is corruption of the mind from the simplicity that is in Christ. The Gospel addresses itself to man, not only as a guilty but as a religious creature. It finds him under the power of superstition or religiousness, as well as of sin. It is as natural for man to refuse to go into the judgment-hall lest he should be defiled, as it is, in very enmity to God, to cry out, "Crucify Him, crucify Him." And the Gospel gets as stern a refusal from the religious man as from the lustful man. As the Divine Teacher tells us, the harlot goes into the kingdom before the Pharisee.
Religious vanities are deeply playing their part in our day, and fascinating many souls. What answer, beloved, do you and I give them? Is Jesus so precious that no allurement has power? Is the virgin purity of the mind still kept? and as chaste ones are we still betrothed to Christ only? Like the newly-formed Eve, are we in our place of earliest, freshest presentation to our Lord? or have we, apart from His side, opened our ear to the serpent?
The kingdom of heaven is as a supper, a royal, joyous feast got ready for sinners, that they might taste and see that the Lord is good, and that blessed is the man that trusteth in Him. It does not put God in the place of a receiver, for man to bring Him His due; but it puts Him in the place of a giver, and man is called to value His blessing. But the question is, Who listens, with desirous heart, to the bidding? Who wears "the wedding garment"? Who prizes Christ? Who triumphs in His salvation? Who longs for the day of His espousals? John had this garment on him, knowing, as he did, the joy of being the Bridegroom's friend. It was flowing at liberty on Mary's shoulders, as she sat at her Lord's feet and heard His words. Paul tucked it tight about him when he said, "God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ." The eunuch had just put it on as "he went his way rejoicing" in the faith of the name of Jesus. Every sinner adorns himself with it the moment his heart values Christ. And what joy is it thus to know that when we put on Christ it is not "sackcloth" we put on, nor is it "the spirit of heaviness" we enter into, but "a wedding garment" has clothed us, and with "the garment of praise" we array our spirits!
Have we thus learned "the kingdom of heaven"? Have we, in spirit, entered it as a banqueting-hall where both magnificence and joy welcome us? Are we, consciously, guests at the marriage of a King's Son? Have we learnt the mysteries of the faith? Have we gazed at them? Has the musing over them kindled a fire in the heart to burn up the chaff of worldly rudiments? Paul had this element in his soul as he travelled through Greece. And how did the glow of these mysteries address itself to "the princes of the world" there? It consumed them all. "Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world?" Precious ardour of the Spirit! What a pile was thus fired in the famed cities of the learned and the wise! and how were all the thoughts of men thrown as rubbish into it!
And how did he treat the rudiments of the religious world? He bore the same fervent sense of Christ with him into their regions, to test what chaff and dross were there. In Galatia he found much of it; but he spared none of it. Though an angel from heaven gather such rubbish; though Peter himself help in the work; though the Galatians, who once would have plucked out their eyes for him, be enticed, nothing should stand before the heat of the Spirit that bore him onward. "O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you?... Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years. I am afraid of you."
Could he do less? Could he carry Jesus in his heart, and calmly stand and measure his light with the lights of Greece, or God's great ordinance with man's traditions?
It is to make much of Christ we want, beloved--much of Himself, and His glorious achievements for sinners. We want simplicity in that sense of the word--the breathings of a soul content with Him, and the peace of a conscience for ever at rest in His sufficiency. "What think ye of Christ?" is the test, as a dear hymn well known among us has it--
"Some call Him a Saviour, in word,
But mix their own works with His plan,
And hope He His help will afford,
When they have done all that they can:
If doing prove rather too light
(A little they own they may fail),
They purpose to make up full weight
By casting His name in the scale.
"Some style Him the pearl of great price,
And say He's the fountain of joys,
Yet feed upon folly and vice,
And cleave to the world and its toys--
Like Judas, the Saviour they kiss,
And, while they salute Him, betray--
Ah, what will profession like this
Avail in His terrible day!
"If asked what of Jesus I think,
Though all my best thoughts are but poor,
I say, He's my meat and my drink,
My life, and my strength, and my store;
My Shepherd, my Husband, my Friend,
My Saviour from sin and from thrall,
My hope from beginning to end,
My portion, my Lord, and my all."
May these thoughts and affections be ours. They are the sweet witness of the one faith, the one Lord, the one Spirit (Eph. iv.), for they express the leading, ruling mind of the Canticles. There the soul in kindred affection has but one object, but that one is enough. It is satisfied, and never for a moment looks for a second. It has the "Beloved," and cares for nothing else. If it grieve, it is over the want of capacity to enjoy Him. It seeks for nothing but Jesus, lamenting only that it is not more fully and altogether with Him. And this is the experience we have to desire--to find in the Lord a satisfying object, a cure for the wanderings of the poor heart, which, till it fix on Him, will go about and still say, "Who will show us any good?" "The labour of the foolish wearieth every one of them, because he knoweth not how to go to the city."
"That unsatisfiedness with transitory fruitions which men deplore as the unhappiness of their nature is indeed the privilege of it." Just indeed, and truly to be prized, is such a sentiment. For this thirsting again, this spending of "labour for that which satisfieth not," casts the heart on Jesus, As this has ever been, so is it now. The building of palaces, the planting of vineyards, the getting of singing-men and singing-women, the multiplying of the delights of the children of men, all these efforts and travails of the heart take their course and have their way still. Eccles. ii. But Jesus revealed to the heart, as in this book, commands these thoughts and purposes away. It speaks the language of the blessed Lord Himself; and the experience in it is the experience of the poor woman who was able to leave her pitcher at the well--"Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life."