Just thus it is in the dispensation of the word. We apply ourselves, first and principally, to relieve the more importunate demands of our hearers; and, not being able, at the same time, to provide for all, we prefer the case of those who are starving for the want of necessary instruction, to that of others who are in a condition to subsist on what hath already been imparted to them.
Hence it is, that we are most frequent in pressing the fundamental truths of the Gospel: as well knowing, that very many have yet to learn, or at least to digest, the first principles of their religion; and that few, in comparison, are either prepared, or enough disposed, to go on to perfection.
There are those, perhaps, who expect us to clear up some nice point of casuistry, or to lay open to them the grounds and reasons of some obnoxious article in the Christian Creed: in a word, they would take it kindly of us, if, dropping the common topics, which have been long and much worn in the service of religion, we provided some fresh ones, for their entertainment; and instead of the stale fragments, which are always at hand, and lie open to all the family, we served up to them something of better taste from the inner rooms of our store-house, where our choicest viands are laid up. All this is extremely well: and in due season, so far as is fitting, the charitable dispenser of God’s word will not be wanting to their expectations; for he has gathered nothing, however rare or exquisite, in the course of his household industry, of which he does not wish them to partake. But, for the present, he finds this indulgence to be out of place: he sees, that the plainest duties of life, and the most unquestioned articles of the faith, are, first of all, to be inculcated: he perceives, that numbers want to be put in mind of old practical truths; and perhaps he understands, that even those, who are the most forward to call out for novelties in speculation, do not make this demand with the best grace. He could amuse them, it may be, with a curious theological Lecture: but what if their sense of divine things be dead? what if they want to have their minds stimulated by the admonitions, and their consciences alarmed with the terrors, of the Gospel?
The question is not put at hazard. For so, the Roman Governor was impatient to hear St. Paul concerning the faith in Christ; when yet the Apostle chose to reason with him of righteousness, temperance, and judgement to come: plain moral topics, such as had often been discussed before him in the schools of philosophy, but were now resumed to good purpose; for in the end, we are told, Felix trembled.
Even, in the case of those, who may be decent in their lives, who are enough instructed in what is called morality, nay, and would take it ill to be thought wanting in a competent share of religious knowledge, a discourse on the elements of the faith may not be, altogether, unseasonable. For there are, of these, who exclude Religion, from their scheme of morality; or Christianity, from their scheme of religion; or who, professing Christianity, scarce know what Redemption means: who are yet to learn with what awful, yet filial piety, they are to look up to God the Father; who reflect not, what transcendant honour is due from them to God the Son; and who have scarce, perhaps, heared, or have little regarded, whether there be any Holy Ghost.
If any such attend our assemblies, think not much that we are ready to impart to them the plainest, the commonest, because the most necessary, instruction: and, though we would consult the wants of all, you are not to be surprized, or disgusted, if we run to the relief of those first, who want our assistance most; and, like the good householder, bestow our old things on the needy and indigent, before we expend our new on the curious and delicate; who might, we will say, be better accommodated with them, but are not, in the mean time, destitute of what is needful to their spiritual life. But
III. This care is more especially required of the Christian Scribe, when his charge is exposed, in certain conjunctures, to new and extraordinary wants, which, if not relieved in the instant, may grow to be ruinous, and absolutely fatal: then, above all, he is to consider, not what instruction is most acceptable to his hearers, but what their critical situation demands.
For, here again, the example of the watchful and beneficent householder, is our direction. The season may be uncommonly severe and inclement: or, a dangerous, perhaps a contagious disease, afflicts his family; and then the warmest, although the coarsest, clothing must be sought out for the naked; and not the most palatable, but the most wholesome food, must be administered to the sick.
Disasters, like these, sometimes befall the household of Christ. A cold atheistic spirit prevails, and chills the vital principles of all virtue, as well as religion: or a pestilent heresy spreads its venom through the church, and turns the medicine of life itself, the salutary instruction of God’s word, unless prepared and applied by skilful hands, into a deadly poison. Then it is that the well-appointed Scribe emulates the generous care and pains of the good householder; and whatever he has in store, of ancient or modern collection, whether of philosophy or criticism, whether of eloquent persuasion or sound logic, all must be brought forth, to warm the piety, or to purify the faith, of his hearers.
We, of this nation, have not been so happy as to want examples of such distresses.