Professor W. G. Elmslie, D.D.: Memoir and Sermons

by William Gray Elmslie

Preached in Willesden Presbyterian Church,
September 24th, 1882.

"O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord."—1 Cor. xv. 55-8.

"Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I have given order to the churches of Galatia, even so do ye. Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come. And when I come, whomsoever ye shall approve by your letters, them will I send to bring your liberality unto Jerusalem."—1 Cor. xvi. 1-3.

I HAVE read this passage for one single purpose; it is to draw your attention to the singular way in which St. Paul passes from the doctrine of the Resurrection to the practical duty of Christian giving. It almost startles us, who have not quite St. Paul's way of thinking about collections, to hear him pass from that triumphant apostrophe of death, "O death, where is thy sting?" to "Now concerning the collection."

This seeming incongruity in the Epistle, and in the Church's work, is not confined to the Bible or to the Church; it runs all through life. Man has a poor, fleshly body, needing food, and drink, and sleep, and nursing; and he has an immortal soul. Say what you will, we cannot deny that the body is there; and I do not think we shall ever come to deny that the soul is there too, and will live, so long as goodness, tenderness, and devotion, and truth, and being last. Life has got into it; and the material framework which carries that soul-man's life corresponds to himself. In our homes, in our national life, in our business life there is the strangest intermingling of tragedy and comedy, of what is reverent and sacred, and what is most secular, and common, and mean. You cannot divorce the two. You may dislike the commonplace, and the mean, and the material; but if you hope to preserve the region of the spiritual and the sympathy of the good, that you can only do by preserving the body; they are gone when you forget the body.

What is it that is the brightest, heavenliest thing in the whole earth? It is love. No amount of mere common propriety, in the humblest action, will make up for the absence of that which comes out in a sudden tear or looks out in a sweet smile. We all know it, however earthly and material we are. But what I have to say is this: Look at that sacred thing, that love, which is almost too refined to put its hands on the soiling things of earth; what do you find it doing? Nursing at the sick bed, doing tasks that are repulsive, planning, with all kinds of material medicaments, and helps, and reliefs, to ease bodily pain. Now, it is easily possible for a coarse heart and poor bodily eyes to be in the midst of all that is sacred, and secular too, and to call it all common, and poor, and mean. It needs a quick, warm heart, and it needs almost, I may say, some imagination, some touch of a fine fancy, something of that Divine power which comes of tender affection and love, to do such acts for God.

In the life of Christ's spiritual family, which we call "the Church" (and by calling it "the Church" so often put it clean away out of all control of common sense and of affection), the very same law holds. The Church is worth nothing if it is not lit up and warmed with heavenly devotion to Jesus Christ. It may look solemn at the Communion-table; but it is not worth having if it does not reach men's hearts with fingers which squeeze out their hardness, and make them penitent for their sins; it is not worth having if it has not God, and Christ, and the life of the soul all throbbing through it. And yet it has a body, and material buildings, and expenses to maintain its earthly fabric and framework; and the spiritual life and the spiritual love that will have nought to do with these "cares of all the Churches," which Paul, the greatest preacher and Apostle, carried, or with collections and planning for the maintenance of preachers, thereby destroy themselves. If we try to put away that, and say, "It is not spiritual," or "It is a low thing," we are simply committing suicide of the religious life. It cannot live without that. Christ Himself had to plan how His preachers were to be maintained; and He spoke a great word when He said that they were to go and live on those who could not preach; not taking it as charity—never!—but taking it as a helpful service, which, combined with their searching of the Divine Word, should make it triumph in the world. "He that receiveth" into his house—maintaining him, that he may preach—"a preacher" (that is the meaning of "a prophet"), "in the name of a preacher"—not because he brings honour to the house, and because he is a great man, but because he is a man who is converting souls, a man that takes God at His word, and prays, and preaches unto men—will have the same "reward" in heaven, Christ providing for the spiritual wants and for the bodily wants of the preacher, and for his maintenance. And so, if once we lived in good earnest into that real, loving, great, broad thought of the actual life of Christ, we should not feel any surprise when we read how St. Paul passes from the great triumph of the doctrine of the Resurrection to the enforcement of Christian liberality.

Now I am going to spend the time at my disposal this morning in a very practical way. I hardly think that it needed that introduction to justify this use of the time at a Sunday morning's service; still, possibly, what has been said may be of use, not so much as a justification, but just as a preparation. I think that these things are for you. The subject is not a mere question of Church business; it is not a mere question, either, of interest to the men whose minds have a little of the statesman in them, and who consider the problems of Church government and Church management, as well as of national government and management; but I will say that it is a subject which ought to have a thorough interest to every one of you. I have been led to take it as my subject this morning because I was sent, a fortnight ago, by our Synod, as a deputy to one of our largest Presbyteries in the North, in order that I might interest congregations there in our Church's financial system of maintaining the preaching of the Gospel throughout this country; and I had the feeling, when I was doing it, and I had the assurance from those whom I visited, that it did them good. I have thought, therefore, that it might do my people good. Moreover, I had this feeling about the very strong and plain things that I said to them, that I should hardly be an honest man if I did not care openly to say the same things to my own people. Nay, I was led in some things to speak of my congregation, and what they had done not only for their minister, but for all the schemes of the Church, as an example; and therefore I feel my honour somewhat pledged that our congregation should not only do well, as it has done, but should do better. I say these things that I may have your sympathy in what I am going on to explain and to say to you.

The special subject, in our Church's government and economy, of which I want to make you understand a little is what is called the "Sustentation Fund." I wish to be short and to be simple. Let me begin in this fashion: We believe that wherever there are Christian congregations who have the love of their Master in them, and some spiritual life, all these are blessed spots and centres, wherever they stand. We know how sorrows are soothed away by that Christian brotherhood and friendship, by those common prayers and praises, and by those words of truth which are read out of the Bible and often spoken by preachers. We believe that, or we do not believe in Christ at all. That is how Christ comes to men and women, and boys and girls, and little children, on earth. Oh, He does nothing for them like that! Well, now, it is a very practical question, that comes to all Christian men and women who are gathered together into any section of Christ's Church, how they can make their ministers, and their managers, and their elders, and their deacons, and their office-bearers (by whatever name you call them), and all their members, most useful and effective for good. It is the first question that their Master puts to them. He says, "Do your best." It is the duty of every Church in England just now to do everything in its power, by business methods as well as by spiritual methods, to make every congregation have a happy, harmonious, earnest, liberal, joyful, successful Christian life.