Young men and boys are generally, we know, not fond of reading for its own sake; and when they do read for their own pleasure, they naturally read something that interests them. Now, what are called serious books, including certainly the Bible, do not interest them, and therefore they are not commonly read. What shall we say, then? Are they not interested in becoming good, in learning to do the things which, they would? If they are not, if they care not for the bondage of sin and death, there is, of course, nothing to be said; then they are condemned already; they are not the children of God. But one says, "I wish I could find interest in a serious book, but I cannot." Observe again, "Ye cannot do the things that ye would," because the flesh and the Spirit are contrary to one another. However, to return to him who says this, the answer to him is this,--"The interest cannot come without the reading; it may and will come with it." For interest in a subject depends very much on our knowledge of it; and so it is with, the things of Christ. As long as the life and death of Christ are strange to us, how can we be interested about them? but read them, thinking of what they were, and what were their ends, and who can help being interested about them? Read them carefully, and read them often, and they will bring before our minds the very thoughts which we need, and which the world keeps continually from us, the thoughts which naturally feed our prayers; thoughts not of self, nor selfishness, nor pleasure, nor passion, nor folly, but of such things as are truly God's--love, and self-denial, and purity, and wisdom. These thoughts come by reading the Scriptures; and strangely do they mingle at first with the common evil thoughts of our evil nature. But they soon find a home within us, and more good thoughts gather round them, and there comes a time when daily life with its various business, which, once seemed to shut them out altogether, now ministers to their nourishment.
Wherefore, in conclusion, walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh; but do even the things which ye would. And ye can walk in the Spirit, if ye seek for the Spirit; if ye seek him by prayer, and by reading of Christ, and the things of Christ. If we will do neither, then most assuredly we are not seeking him; if we seek him not, we shall never find him. If we find him not, we shall never be able to do the things that we would; we shall never be redeemed, never made free, but our souls shall be overcome by their evil nature, as surely as our bodies by their diseased nature; till one death shall possess us wholly, a death of body and of soul, the death of eternal misery.
LECTURE IX.
LUKE xiv. 33.
Whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath,
he cannot be my disciple.
In order to show that these words were not spoken to the apostles alone, but to all Christians, we have only to turn to the 25th and 26th verses, which run thus:--"And there went great multitudes with him, and he turned and said unto them, If any man come to me, and hate not his father and mother, and wife and children, and brethren and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple." The words were not, then, spoken to the twelve apostles only, as if they contained merely some rule of extraordinary piety, which was not to be required of common Christians; they were spoken to a great multitude; they were spoken to warn all persons in that multitude that not one of them could become a Christian, unless he gave himself up to Christ body and soul. Thus declaring that there is but one rule for all; a rule which the highest Christian can never go beyond; and which the lowest, if he would be a Christian at all, must make the foundation of his whole life.
Now take the words, either of the text or of the 26th verse, and is it possible to avoid seeing that, on the very lowest interpretation, they do insist upon a very high standard; that they do require a very entire and devoted obedience? Is it possible for any one who believes what Christ has said, to rest contented, either for himself or for others, with that very low and very unchristian standard which he sees and knows to prevail generally in the world? Is it possible for him not to wish, for himself and for all in whose welfare he is interested, that they may belong to the small minority in matters of principle and practice, rather than to the large majority?
And because he so wishes, one who endeavours to follow Christ sincerely can never be satisfied with the excuse that he acts and thinks quite as well as the mass of persons about him; it can never give him comfort, with regard to any judgment or practice, to be told, in common language, "Everybody thinks so; everybody does so." If, indeed, this expression "everybody" might be taken literally; if it were quite true, without any exception, that "everybody thought or did so;" then I grant that it would have a very great authority; so great that it would be almost a mark of madness to run counter to it. For what all men, all without a single exception, were to agree in, must be some truth which the human mind could not reject without insanity,--like the axioms of science, or some action which if we did not we could not live, as sleeping and eating; or if there be any moral point so universally agreed upon, then it must be something exceedingly general: as, for instance, that truth is in itself to be preferred to falsehood; which to dispute would be monstrous. But, once admit a single exception, and the infallible virtue of the rule ceases. I can conceive one single good and wise man's judgment and practice, requiring, at any rate, to be carefully attended to, and his reasons examined, although millions upon millions stood against him. But go on with the number of exceptions, and bring the expression "everybody," to its real meaning, which is only "most persons," "the great majority of the world;" then the rule becomes of no virtue at all, but very often the contrary. If in matters of morals many are on one side and some on the other, it is impossible to pronounce at once which are most likely to be right: it depends on the sort of case on which the difference exists; for the victories of truth and of good are but partial. It is not all truth that triumphs in the world, nor all good; but only truth and good up to a certain point. Let them once pass this point, and their progress pauses. Their followers, in the mass, cannot keep up with them thus far: fewer and fewer are those who still press on in their company, till at last even these fail; and there is a perfection at which they are deserted by all men, and are in the presence of God and of Christ alone.