And when he hears men, whose ignorance of God has caused them to be puffed up with the idea of their own importance and purity, evidently filled with pride, as though they could teach God a more holy government, attempting to exhort and teach them a different doctrine, he feels, he knows that such are not only evil and bad men, but ignorant ones, such as dote about questions, and strifes of words, which have no other tendency than to fill the mind with envy, strife, railing, and evil surmises, such as are among men of corrupt minds, among men who are destitute of the truth, and among men who suppose that gain is godliness. He will view such men, however thoughtless they may be of their true position or sincere in their belief, as standing in the position of the serpent in Eden. Their lessons to him are disobedience to God. From such he will withdraw himself; yea, he will fly from them as from a deadly poison, because disobedience to God for ever ends in ruin and death. But from Timothy he learns contentment, for, as he brought nothing into the world with him, and as he can most certainly carry nothing out, so, having food and raiment, he will be content, and especially so as contentment and godliness are great gain.
And finally he hears as it were a trumpet sounding from the very gates of heaven, and looking, he beholds Peter standing there; he hears a still small voice, the voice of Jesus Christ, saying, “Thou art Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it, and I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven.” Matt. xvi. 18, 19. And then Peter, raising his arm in the direction of the Gentile nations, says to the slaves: “Be subject to your masters with all fear; not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward: for this is thank-worthy, if a man for conscience towards God endure grief, suffering wrongfully. For what glory is it, if, when ye be buffeted for your faults, ye take it patiently? But if, when ye do well, and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable to God. For even hereunto were ye called; because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps, who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth; who when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered he threatened not, but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously; who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed. For ye were as sheep gone astray, but are now returned unto the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls.”
LESSON XV.
From the immense disproportion between our finite minds and the infinite objects of future hope, our conceptions of the disimbodied spirit must necessarily be feeble. But while we anticipate the promised freedom of the celestial world, the disenthralment of our intellectual faculties, and the deliverance of our moral powers from all corruption, the mind becomes more and more habituated to the scenes thus disclosed, and even reaches to prospects of resplendent beauty; to visions of unclouded truth; to the solution of the little difficulties of our own earthly trials; to the evolutions of the Divine character in connection with our little planet, and even to that infinitude that mocks the bounds of time and space.
Thus the pious Christian, who meditates upon God and the heavens, the work of his hand, feels a divine influence spread over his soul, while the active and the retired, the ardent and the timid, the philosopher whose mind is illumined by the varied lights of science, and the pious slave, whose researches are confined to the sayings of some unlettered expositor, will each cherish anticipations congenial to his peculiar state of mind. Yet all will grow in grace; all will rise above the level of temporal delights; and all will embrace in their expanding conceptions the mighty import of that glorious promise, that “eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, the things that God hath prepared for them that love him,” 1 Cor. ii. 9, till elevated so far above earthly associations, that each can say, “I shall be satisfied when I awake in thy likeness.” Ps. xvii. 15.
What degree of moral likeness will gradually be produced by a near contemplation of unveiled perfection is reserved for eternity to disclose. But the time will at length come when to every sincere Christian and true disciple, dazzled by the refulgence that will break upon his astonished sight, Jesus Christ will address the language of affection, as he did to Martha: “Said I not unto thee that if thou wouldst believe thou shouldst see the glory of God?” John xi. 40.
“Then we all, with open face, beholding, as in a glass, the glory of God, are changed into the same image, from glory to glory.” 2 Cor. iii. 18.
Such, then, is the picture and such the prospect of the Christian character; and well may Christians, even the slave, “Reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed.” Rom. viii. 18.
From the monarch down, viewed from the distance of eternity, man occupies but a point. All earthly distinctions become so small that nothing short of the eye of omnipotence can see them. The same language describes, and the same God will prepare their rest.