Plain Sermons, preached at Archbishop Tenison's Chapel, Regent Street. Second Series

by James Galloway Cowan

Be sure that there are none so busy but, in the midst of their business, they can think of what they like better; none so pressed for time, but they can spare some of it, if they have a mind to; none so poor as to have nothing to spend on what they covet. So use the world, and, in using it, you will work the works of God, because you will often take from it, and often come out from it, for the direct and more purely spiritual works of God.

But Christ, our pattern, said not merely “I must work the works of God,” but I must do them “while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.” We know what that meant in His case. He had taken human nature in its weakness, and He had to bring it to its full strength, to fit it for glory and exaltation to the throne of God. He had in His life to speak the word of God to many people, and in many places, and each opportunity must be seized, or others would be forfeited. He had to relieve present sufferings, and to supply present wants; to meet necessities while they were pressing. Soon the time would come for Him to go to the Father: then He must be perfect; then He would have no more opportunity in the flesh for benefitting man and glorifying God; then He could make no more preparation for the setting up of His Church.

The words have a similar meaning with regard to us; but in our cases the necessity is more urgent, the delay more awful, because we have no fixed time allotted us—“to-day, and to-morrow, and the third day I must be perfected.” Our life is to be taken from us without our consent, and may be taken at any moment; we have not power to lay it down when we will, and power to keep it as long as we will. And, besides, we have not been using each year, each day, each hour, to the best advantage. We have left undone much which we ought to have done, we have done much which we ought not to have done. We have all this to correct, and yet to give full attention to the works yet remaining.

Look we in at ourselves, brethren, and see what requires to be done in us before we are fit for heaven. Listen to the cries of spiritual distress, and consider what has to be supplied. Think of the souls that are dying, and will soon be dead, if we do not revive them. Remember we what frail, short-continuing, dying creatures we are; how soon at the latest, how suddenly, it may be abruptly, without a moment’s warning, we may be called to present ourselves, to be dealt with according to our fitness, to give account of our works for God.

Let the arrival of a new year set us reviewing the past year, with its catalogue of offences, of neglects, of things to be wiped out, debts to be paid, progress to be quickened. Let us heed well its injunction and its warning, “Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might, for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom in the grave whither thou goest.” Let us look up for the opening clouds and listen for the Advent voice, “Behold, I come quickly, and My reward is with Me to give to every man according as his works shall be;” and let us instantly resolve and instantly begin to perform our resolution and persevere in it, nor dare to forget it: “I must work the works of Him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.”

SERMON IX.
CHRIST’S TRUEST MANIFESTATION.

St. John, xiv., 22.

Lord, how is it that Thou wilt manifest Thyself unto us, and not unto the world.

On the festival of the Epiphany, and on several Sundays afterwards, we commemorate what are called manifestations of Christ; revelations and exhibitions of Him, in His nature, His person, His might, His wisdom, His various offices. In one sense, Christ’s whole life, from the manger in Bethlehem to the Mount of the Ascension, was a manifestation. It was not possible to see or hear Him, without becoming convinced—if open to conviction—that He was different from all other men, and superior to them. His every deed, His every word, His every look, designedly or undesignedly proclaimed “This is God manifest in the flesh!” Still, there were some particular exhibitions of Himself, which, from the special circumstances attending them, the preparation made for them, their peculiar importance, their wonderful effects, or their relations to certain classes or individuals, are entitled to be distinguished from the rest of that life-long Epiphany, and to be called par excellence the manifestations of Christ.

Of this kind, was the exhibition to the shepherds, and again, that to the wise men of the East—prefiguring, commencing the manifestation to the Gentiles; the declaration that He must be about His Father’s business, the baptism by John, the show of His power in converting water into wine, in cleansing the leper, in calming the troubled sea, in casting out devils; the unfolding of His wisdom in speaking parables, the preaching of judgment by the Son of Man—all of which are in turn commemorated at this season. Of this kind, again, were the teaching on the Mount, all the miracles, the Transfiguration, the appearances after the Resurrection, the Ascension, the wonders of Pentecost, the light that shone from heaven on Saul journeying to Damascus, and the voice that said “I am Jesus whom thou persecutest.” These were all pre-eminent manifestations, as being designedly full of significance, making special revelations to special persons; displaying, so to speak, the chief features of Christ, and teaching most important lessons. Nevertheless, they were rather preludes and signs of Christ’s truest manifestation, than that manifestation itself—faint glimmers of coming light, rustlings, warning movements, scarcely upliftings of the curtain that hung between things spiritual and the would-be spectators of them—parables, and prophecies. They left not those who saw them where they were, but they carried them not whither they would be or should be. They bade them look and listen; but they revealed not the sight, nor spake the word. Strange as it may seem, Christ was not truly manifested till the clouds of heaven hid Him, and, in the flesh, He ceased to appear and speak till judgment-time. The truth was, as yet, not taught, but only hinted at, and men were not yet ready for it, and could not receive it. It is not in what we call the Gospels, but in the Epistles, that the truth as it is in Jesus is revealed. It is not in the miracles of His earthly ministry, but in the spiritual wonders which, after Pentecost, the Apostles wrought in His name; that the real power of Christ, the power to bless, is seen and felt. All before was but a type, a shadow, a dream. The antitype, the reality, the waking vision, belong to apostolic days, and to the days after them. Then was the Gospel revealed, which before was only brought nigh. Then was the kingdom of Heaven opened. Then did Jesus, through the Spirit, begin to speak and show Himself openly and plainly to Jews and Gentiles, and to draw all men to Him. Then did spiritual wisdom begin to enlighten, and spiritual power begin to enable the hitherto blind and helpless. Then first, even to the Apostles, and then, by them, to the world, began to be displayed God manifest in the flesh. Up to that time, though He was in the world, the world knew Him not. He stood among them, but they did not see Him; He spoke, but they did not hear: yea, though He had come to His own, they did not receive Him, till the Pentecostal light made all clear, and the voice of the Spirit declared “This is the beloved Son of the Father,” and the power of Divine grace, enabled and constrained to believe on His name, to receive Him intelligently and heartily, and through Him, and in a measure like Him, to become sons of God.

Then and thus was Christ truly manifested, as it were in these last times.