This is not all. Even the stoutest and strongest trees, such as the oak, the ash, and the sycamore, do best in company. Plant those trees in groves, and guard them from the crushing steps and greedy maws of cattle, and they grow up tall, and straight, and smooth. They shield each other from the stormy winds, and they show a sort of silent emulation, each raising its head as high as possible, to catch the freshest air and the fullest streams of light. But plant one of those trees alone in the open field, and leave it unfenced and unguarded, and the probability is, it will perish. If it should escape destruction, its growth will be retarded, and its form will be disfigured. It will have neither size nor comeliness. It will be cropped by the cattle, and bent and twisted by the winds; it will be stunted and dwarfed, crooked and mis-shapen, knotted and gnarled, neither pleasant to the eye, nor good for timber. Not one in a thousand would ever become a tall, a straight, and a majestic tree.
Mr. Darwin says, that on some large tracts on which, while they were unenclosed and unprotected, there was not a tree to be seen, there soon appeared, after the land was enclosed by a fence, a countless multitude of fine Scotch firs. The seeds of these trees had been sown by some means, and they had germinated, and the embryo trees had sprung up; but the cattle had cropped the tender shoots, or crushed and trampled them down, and not one had been able to raise its head above the grass or heather. On looking down and searching carefully among the heather, he found in one square yard of ground, no fewer than thirty-two small trees, one of which had been vainly trying to raise its head above the heather for six and twenty years. After this tract of land had been enclosed for awhile, it was covered thick with a countless multitude of fine young trees. And so it is with Christians. Leave them in the open common of the world, and they gradually come down to a level with the tastes and manners of the world. Place them within the guarded enclosures of the Church, and they rise to the dignity and glory of saints. "He that walketh with wise men shall be wise; but a companion of fools shall be destroyed." Hence "the Lord added to the Church daily such as should be saved."
When you get into the Church, stay there as long as you honestly can; and honor it by a truly Christian life; and aid it by your labors; and support it liberally with your money. The best spent money in the world is that which is employed in promoting the spread of Christianity. And try to live in peace both with your pastor and your fellow-members. Obey the rules. Do not dream of unlimited liberty; you cannot have it; and it would do you no good if you could, but harm. And unlimited liberty for one, would be slavery or martyrdom for the rest. Judge the Church and your pastors charitably, as you would like to be judged yourself. Expect to find imperfections in them, and make as much allowance for them as you can, that they may be led to make allowances for the imperfections they find in you. Look more at the good that is in your brethren than at the evil; it will cause you to love them the more, and make you feel happier in their company. If any of them be overtaken in a fault, try to restore them, in the spirit of meekness. And let the mishaps of your brethren remind you that you too are exposed to temptation.
Calculate on meeting with trials or unpleasantnesses in the Church occasionally; for offences are sure to come. Churches are made up of men, and men are full of imperfections, so that misunderstandings, and even misdoings at times, are inevitable. You may be misjudged or undervalued. There will be differences of tastes and opinions, and even clashings of interest, between you and your brethren. And trials may come from quarters from which you could never have expected them, and of a kind that you could not possibly anticipate. But make up your minds, by the help of God, to bear all patiently. Remember how God has borne with you; and consider what Jesus suffered from the weaknesses, the errors, and the sins of men; and how meekly and patiently He endured.
And understand that others may have to bear with as many unpleasantnesses from you, as you have to bear with from them. You may misunderstand or undervalue others, as much as they misunderstand or undervalue you. And others may be as much disappointed in you, as you are in them. And you may try their patience, as much as they try yours. We know when we are hurt by others, but we do not always know when others are hurt by us. And we can see the defects of others, when we cannot see our own. And we should consider, that they will know when they are hurt by us, when they may not know that we are hurt by them; and that they will be able to see our imperfections, when they will be quite unconscious of their own. And if we would not have them to make too much of our defects and blunders, we must not make too much of theirs. If they can bear with us, we must learn to bear with them, and think ourselves well off to have things settled so. If we could see ourselves as God sees us, we might be more astonished that others should be able to bear with us, than that we should be required to bear with them.
And the trials we meet with in the Church will do us good, if we look at them in a proper light, and receive them in a proper spirit. They will reveal to us the defects of our brethren, and draw us to labor for their improvement. And in laboring for the improvement of others, we shall improve ourselves.
And the unpleasant friction which takes place between us and our brethren, will only tend to smoothe the ruggedness of our temper, and rub off the unevennesses of our character, provided we can keep ourselves from impatience and resentment. In going along the course of a brook or a river, you sometimes come upon a bend, where you find a heap of smooth and nicely rounded pebble stones thrown up. Did you ever ask yourselves how these pebbles came to be so round and smooth? When broken off from their respective rocks, they were as irregular in form, they had as sharp corners, and as rough, and ragged, and jagged edges, and were altogether as ugly and unsightly things as any fragments of rocks you ever looked upon. But they got into the water, and the stream rolled them along, and rubbed them gently one against another, and this was the way they came to be so round and smooth. There is no doubt, that if the stones could have talked, and if they had had no more sense than we have, whenever they found that their neighbor stones were rubbing them, they would have screamed out, "Oh! how you scratch;" never dreaming that they were scratching the other stones just as much at the same time. But fortunately the stones could not talk; and though they had not so much sense as we have, they had less nonsense, and that served them as well—so they took their rubbing quietly; and hence the smoothness of their surface, and the beauty of their shape. Now here we are, living stones in the great stream of time, tumbled about and rubbed one against another. Let us take our rubbing patiently, and give ourselves a chance of getting rid of our unevennesses, and of being brought to a comely shape. Have patience, my friends. The trouble will not continue long. When we have got our proper shape, God will remove us to our proper places in that living temple which He is building in the heavens, and our rubbing will be at an end for ever.
When I was first invited by the Primitive Methodists of Tunstall to preach in their chapel, one of the class-leaders and local preachers in the circuit threw up his plan, and sent in his class-book, saying he would not belong to a society that would allow Joseph Barker to preach in their pulpits. He was under a wrong impression with regard to my views. One of the Tunstall travelling preachers went to see him, and told him that he was laboring under a mistake, and advised him to take back his class-book and plan. "Come," said he, "and have a little talk with Mr. Barker." He came, and found he had been mistaken. "Forgive me," said he. "I cannot," said I; "you have committed no offence. I will save my pardons till you do something really wicked." "Then let us pray," said he; and we knelt down, and prayed for one another, and we all felt better. He came that night to hear me lecture. The subject was The Church. I spoke of the unpleasantnesses with which we sometimes meet from our brethren, and while exhorting my hearers to take their trials patiently, I used the illustration I have given here. The old man sat on my left in the front of the gallery, and was much excited. He wept. At length, unable any longer to restrain his feelings, he cried aloud, "Glory; Hallelujah; I'll stop and be rubbed." He did stop. But he had not much more rubbing to endure. In less than twelve months, on retiring one night to rest, in his usual health, he passed away suddenly, and peacefully, to his rest in heaven. Let us "stop and be rubbed." Better be rubbed in the Church, than thrown out into the broad highway of the world, and broken with the strong man's hammer.
11. And now with regard to reform. It is right that we should be reformers. There are plenty of evils both in the Church and the State, as well as in individuals, and it is our duty to do what we can to abate or cure them. But there is a right and a wrong way of going about the business, and if we would avoid doing mischief while we are trying to do good, we must proceed with care.
Reformers must learn to wait as well as to work. You cannot make churches, or states, or even individuals, all that you would like them to be, in a moment. You cannot make yourselves what you would like to be as quickly as you would wish. If you are like a man that I know, you will find the improvement of your own habits, and tempers, and manners, a task for life. And if the change for the better is so slow in yourselves, whom you have in your hands continually, and with whom you can take what liberties you please, what can you expect it to be in others? It is the law of God that things shall pass from bad to good, and from better to best, by slow and almost imperceptible gradations.