Chapter 4

"Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God." That, I suppose, is the highest and deepest proposition which ever fell from human lips. Without the least argument or reasoning about it, as a thing which is perfectly self-evident, Jesus announces that purity of heart leads to the knowledge of God. Your character clarifies your creed. A theologian who wants to be profound must be pure. Consecration brings with it insight. The perfect knowledge of God is to be attained only by the perfectly consecrated life. The human soul is a mirror on which the light of God shines, and only the pure mirror reflects the perfect image. What a word is this to drop into the midst of the conflicting theologies and philosophies of the time, of the disputes between the people who think they know all about God, and the people who think they cannot know Him at all! Do you want to be {70} sure that God is directing and supporting you in all your perplexing experiences of life? You cannot see God in these things except through a perfectly purified heart. Clarify the medium of vision, and truth undiscerned before breaks on the observer's sight. A mile or two from here skilful artisans make those great object-glasses with which the mysteries of the stars are disclosed. The slightest speck or flaw blurs the image, but with the perfect glass stars unseen by any eye throughout the history of the world are to be in our days discovered. It is a parable of the soul. Each film on the object-glass of character obscures the heavenly vision, but to the prepared and translucent life truth undiscernible by others breaks upon the reverent gaze, and the beatific vision is revealed to the pure in heart.

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XXVIII

THE TWO BAPTISMS

_Luke_ iii. 16.

THE WEEK BEFORE CHRISTMAS.

Among the persons who group themselves about Jesus, the most dramatic and picturesque figure is certainly that of John the Baptist. There is in him a most extraordinary combination of audacity and humility. He is bold, denunciatory, confident; but at the same time he is self-effacing and preparatory in his work. He never thinks of his service as final; after him is to come a man who is preferred before him. There is always the larger work than his to follow. There are in him the most beautiful humility and the most absolute bravery, and this makes perhaps the rarest combination of traits which a character can show. It is all summed up in his doctrine of the two baptisms: the baptism by water, which John is to bring, and the baptism by the Holy Ghost and by fire, which is to be brought by Jesus. Water is, of course, the symbol of cleansing, the washing away of {72} one's old sins, an expulsive, negative work. Fire is the symbol of passion, enthusiasm, flame. It is illuminating, kindling, the work of the Holy Ghost. One of these baptisms prepares for the other. First a man must be clean and then he may be passionate. First, the fire of his base affections must be washed away and then the fire of a new enthusiasm may be lighted. And only that second step makes one a Christian. It is a great thing to have life cleansed, and its conceits and follies washed away. But that is not safety. The cleansing is for the moment only. It is like that house which was swept and garnished, but because it was empty was invaded by tenants worse than the first. The only salvation of the soul lies in the kindling of a new passion, the lighting of the fire of a new intention, the expulsive power, as it has been called, of a new affection.

So it is in our associated life. We need, God knows, the baptism of John, the purifying of conduct, the washing away of follies and sins; but what we need much more is the fire of a moral enthusiasm to burn up the refuse that lies in the malarious corners of our college life, and light up the whole of it {73} with moral earnestness and passionate desire for good. That is to pass from the discipleship of John to the discipleship of Jesus, from the baptism by water to the baptism by fire, from the spirit of the Advent season to the spirit of the Christmas time.

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XXIX

THE WISE MEN AND THE SHEPHERDS

_Matthew_ ii. 1-11; _Luke_ ii. 8-10.

One Gospel tells of one kind of people who saw a star in the East and followed it; and another Gospel tells the same story of quite an opposite kind of people. Matthew says that the wise men of the time were the first to appreciate the coming of Christ. Luke says that it was the plainest sort of people, the shepherds, who first greeted that coming. There is the same variety of impression still. Many people now write as if religion were for the magi only. They make of it a mystery, a philosophy, an opinion, a doctrine, which only the scholars of the time can appreciate, and which plain people can obey, but cannot understand. Many people, on the other hand, think that religion is for plain people only; good for shepherds, but outgrown by magi; a star that invites the superstitious and ignorant to worship, but which suggests to scholars only a new phenomenon for science to explore.

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But the Christmas legend calls both, the wise and the humble, to discipleship. Religion has both these aspects, and offers both these invitations. Religion is not theology. There are many things which are hidden from the magi, and are revealed to simple shepherds. But religion, on the other hand, is not all for the simple. The man who wrote that there were many things hidden from the wise and prudent, was himself a scholar. It was like that dramatic day, when Wendell Phillips arraigned the graduates of this college for indifference to moral issues, while he who made the indictment was a graduate himself. The central subject of the highest wisdom to-day is, as it always has been, the relation of the mind of man to the universe of God.

Thus both these types of followers are called. Never before was the fundamental simplicity of religion so clear as it is now; and never before was scholarship in religion so needed. Some of the secrets of faith are open to any receptive heart, and some must be explored by the trained and disciplined mind. The scholar and the peasant are both called to this comprehensive service. The magi and the shepherd meet at the cradle of the Christ.

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XXX

THE SONG OF THE ANGELS

_Luke_ ii. 8-14.

We are beginning to feel already the sweep of life that hurries us all along to the keeping of the Christmas season; our music already takes on a Christmas tone, and we begin to hear the song of the angels, which seemed to the Evangelists to give the human birth of Jesus a fit accompaniment in the harmonies of heaven.

This song of the angels, as we have been used to reading it, was a threefold message; of glory to God, peace on earth, and good-will among men; but the better scholarship of the Revised Version now reads in the verse a twofold message. First, there is glory to God, and then there is peace on earth to the men of good-will. Those, that is to say, who have the good-will in themselves are the ones who will find peace on earth. Their unselfishness brings them their personal happiness. They give themselves in good-will, and so they obtain peace. That is the true spirit {77} of the Christmas season. It is the good-will which brings the peace. Over and over again in these months of feverish scrambling for personal gain, men have sought for peace and have not found it; and now, when they turn to this generous good-will, the peace they sought comes of itself. Many a man in the past year has had his misunderstandings or grudges or quarrels rob him of his own peace; but now, as he puts away these differences as unfit for the season of good-will, the peace arrives. That is the paradox of Christianity. He who seeks peace does not find it. He who gives peace finds it returning to him again. He who hoards his life loses it, and he who speeds it finds it:--

"Not what we give, but what we share, For the gift without the giver is bare; Who gives himself with his alms feeds three,-- Himself, his hungering neighbor, and me."

That is the sweet and lingering echo of the angels' song.

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XXXI

THE SECRET OF HEARTS REVEALED

_Luke_ ii. 30-35.

The prophecy of the aged Simeon for the infant Christ was this,--that through him the secrets of many hearts should be revealed. Jesus, that is to say, was not only to read the secrets of others' hearts, but he was to enable people to read their own hearts. They were to come into self-recognition as they came to him. They were to be disclosed to themselves. You know how that happens in some degree when you fall in with other exceptional lives. You meet a person of purity or self-control or force, and there waken in you kindred impulses, and you become aware of your own capacity to be better than you are. The touch of the heroic discovers to you something of heroism in yourself. The contagion of nobleness finds a susceptibility for that contagion in yourself.

So it was that this disclosure of their hearts to themselves came to the people who met with {79} Jesus Christ. One after another they come up, as it were, before him, and he looks on them and reads them like an open book; and they pass on, thinking not so much of what Jesus was, as of the revelation of their own hearts to themselves. Nathanael comes, and Jesus reads him, and he answers: "Whence knowest thou me?" Peter comes, and Jesus beholds him and says: "Thou shalt be called Cephas, a stone." Nicodemus, Pilate, the woman of Samaria, and the woman who was a sinner, pass before him, and the secrets of their different hearts are revealed to themselves. It is so now. If you want to know yourself, get nearer to this personality, in whose presence that which hid you from yourself falls away, and you know yourself as you are. The most immediate effect of Christian discipleship is this,--not that the mysteries of heaven are revealed, but that you yourself are revealed to yourself. Your follies and weaknesses, and all the insignificant efforts of your better self as well, come into recognition, and you stand at once humbled and strengthened in the presence of a soul which understands you, and believes in you, and stirs you to do and to be what you have hitherto only dreamed.

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XXXII

THE GRACE OF JESUS CHRIST

These are the last words of most of the Epistles of the New Testament. They are the last words of the New Testament itself. They are commonly heard as the last words of Christian worship; the most familiar form of Christian benediction. But what is the grace of Jesus Christ? Grace is that which acts not for duty's sake, but for sheer love and kindness. What is the grace of God? It is just this overflowing benevolence. Who is the gracious man? It is he who gives beyond his obligations, and seeks opportunities of thoughtful kindliness. What is the grace of Christ? It is just this superadded and unexpected generosity.

So the life of duty and the life of grace stand contrasted with each other. The duty-doer thinks of justice, honesty, the reputable way of life. But grace goes beyond duty. Duty asks, What ought I to do? Grace asks, What can I do? Where duty halts, grace begins. It touches duty with beauty, and makes it fair instead of stern. Grace is not looking {81} for great things to do, but for gracious ways to do little things. In many spheres of life it is much if it can be said of you that you do your duty. But think of a home of which all that you could say was that its members did their duty. That would be as much as to say that it was a just home, but a severe one; decorous, but unloving; a home where there was fair dealing, but where there was little of the grace of Jesus Christ.

Thus it is that the grace of Jesus Christ sums up the finest beauty of the Christian spirit, and offers the best benediction with which Christians should desire to part. As we separate for a time from our worship, I do not then ask that we may be led in the coming year to do our duty, I ask for more. I pray for the grace of Jesus Christ; that in our homes there may be more of considerateness, that in our college there may be a natural and spontaneous self-forgetfulness, a free and generous offering of uncalled-for kindness. Some of us are able to do much for others, to give, to teach, to govern, to employ. There is a way of doing this which doubles its effect. It is the way of grace. Some of us must be for the most part receivers of instruction or {82} kindness. There is a way of receiving kindness which is among the most beautiful traits of life. It is the way of grace. No one of us, if he be permitted to live on in this coming year, can escape this choice between obligation and opportunity, between the way of life which is discreet and prudent and the way of life which is simply beautiful. When these inevitable issues come, then the prayer, which may lead us to the higher choice, must be the prayer with which the Bible ends; the benediction of the Christian spirit; even this,--that the grace of Jesus Christ may be with us all.

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XXXIII

THE EVERLASTING ARMS

_Deuteronomy_ xxxiii. 27.

"Underneath are the everlasting arms,"--that was the repeated burden of the great men of Israel. They lived in the midst of national calamities and distresses. They were defeated, puzzled, baffled. The way looked dark. Then they fall back on the one great re-establishing thought: after all, it is God's world. It is not going to ruin. Changes which seemed tremendous are not fatal or final. Israel dwells in safety, for God holds us in his arms.

We need some such broad, deep confidence as we enter a new year. We get involved in small issues and engrossed in personal problems, and people sometimes seem so malicious, and things seem to be going so wrong that it is as if we heard the noise of some approaching Niagara. Then we fall back on the truth that after all it is not our world. We can blight it or help it, but we do not {84} decide its issues. In the midst of such a time of social distress, Mr. Lowell in one of his lectures wrote: "I take great comfort in God. I think He is considerably amused sometimes, but on the whole loves us and would not let us get at the matchbox if He did not know that the frame of the universe was fireproof." That is the modern statement of the underlying faith and self-control and patience which come of confessing that in this world it is not we alone who do it all. "Why so hot, little man?" says Mr. Emerson. "I take great comfort in God," says Mr. Lowell; and the Old Testament, with a much tenderer note repeats: "Underneath are the everlasting arms."

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XXXIV

THE COMFORT OF THE TRUTH

_John_ xiv. 14, 16.

Jesus says that he will send a Comforter, and that it will be the spirit of the truth. Many people say just the opposite of this. If you want comfort, they think that you must not have truth. Is not the truth often an uncomforting and uncomfortable thing? Too much truth seems dangerous. The spirit of the truth is a hard, cold spirit. Should not a comforter shade and soften the truth? But Jesus answers there is nothing so permanently comforting as the truth. Why, for instance, is it that we judge people so severely? It is not as a rule that we know the whole truth about them, but that we know only a fragment of the truth. The more we know, the gentler grow our judgments. Would it not be so if people who judge you should know all your secret hopes and conflicts and dreams? Why is it again that people are so despondent about their own times, their community, the tendency of things? It is because {86} they have not entered deeply enough into the truth of the times. The more they know, the more they hope. And why is it that God is all-merciful? It is because He is also all-wise. He knows all about us, our desires and our repentances, and so in the midst of our wrong-doing He continues merciful. His Holy Spirit bears in one hand comfort and in the other truth. How does a student get peace of mind? He finds it when he gets hold of some stable truth. It may not be a large truth, but it is a real truth, and therefore it is a comfort. How does a man in his moral struggles get comfort? He gets it not by swerving, or dodging, or compromising, but by being true. The only permanent comfort is in the sense of fidelity. You are like a sailor in the storm; it is dark about you, the wind howls, the stars vanish. What gives you comfort? It is the knowledge that one thing is true. Thank God, you have your compass, and the tremulous little needle can be trusted. You bend over it with your lantern in the dark and know where you are going, and that renews your courage. You have the spirit of the truth, and it is your comforter.

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XXXV

THE SWORD OF THE SPIRIT

_Ephesians_ vi. 14-17.

In this passage the apostle is thinking of the Christian life as full of conflict and warfare. It needs what he calls the good soldier of Jesus Christ, and for the moment St. Paul is considering how such a soldier should be armed for such a war. He is like some knight of the Middle Ages, standing in his castle-yard and serving out to his vassals the weapons they need for the battle which is near at hand. "Take all your armor," he says. "This is no holiday affair, no dress parade. You are to fight against principalities and powers. So take the whole armor of God." And then he puts it into their hands. There is, however, one curious thing about this armor. It has but one offensive weapon. The soldier of Jesus Christ is given, to defend himself from his enemies, the shield of faith, the tunic of truth, the helmet of salvation; but to fight, to overcome, to disarm, he has but one weapon,--the {88} sword of the spirit. Is it possible, then, that the Spirit of God entering into a man can be to him a sword; that a man's character has this aggressive quality; that a man fights just by what he is? Yes, that seems to be the apostle's argument. Looking at all the conflicts and collisions of life, its differences of opinion, its causes to be won, he thinks that the best fighting weapon is the spirit of a man's life. Behind all argument and persuasion the only absolute argument, the final persuasion, is the simple witness of the spirit. When a man wants to make a cause he believes in win, his aggressive force lies not in what he says about that cause, but in what that cause has made of him. He wins his victory without striking a blow when he wields the sword of the Spirit. He comes like the soft, fresh morning among us, and we simply open our windows and yield to it, greeting it with joy. It is the air we want to breathe, and we accept it as our own.

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XXXVI

LIFE IS AN ARROW

_John_ xiv. 6.

When Jesus says: "I am the way, and the truth, and the life," he names the three things which a man must have in order to lead a straight life. Such a man must have first a way to go, and then a truth to reach, and then life enough to get there. He needs first a direction, and then an end, and then a force. Some lives have no path to go by, and some no end to go to, and some no force to make them go. Now Jesus says that the Christian life has all three. It has intention, the decision which way to go; it has determination, the finding of a truth to reach; it has power, the inner dynamic of the life of Christ. Life, as has been lately said by one of our own preachers, is like an arrow. It must have its course, it must have its mark, and it must have the power to go.

"Life is an arrow, therefore you must know What mark to aim at, how to bend the bow, Then draw it to its head, and let it go." [1]

[1] Henry van Dyke, D. D., in the _Outlook_ for Feb. 23, 1895.

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XXXVII

THE DECLINE OF ENTHUSIASM

_Revelation_ ii. 1-7.

I do not propose to consider the character or intention of this mystical Book of Revelation. However it may be regarded, it is first of all a series of messages written in the name of the risen Christ to the churches of Asia, singling out each in turn, pointing out its special defects, and exhorting it to its special mission; and there is something so modern, or rather so universal about these messages to the churches that in spite of their strange language and figures of speech they often seem like messages to the churches of America to-day. First the word comes to the chief church of the region, at Ephesus. It was a great capital city, with much prosperity and splendor, and the church there abounded in good works. The writer appreciates all this: "I know thy works, and thy toil and patience, and that thou canst not bear evil men." It was a substantial, busy city church. What was lacking in the church {91} of Ephesus? It had fallen away, says the message, from its first enthusiasm. It had "lost its first love." The eagerness of its first conversion had gone out of it. It had settled down into the ways of an established church, with plenty of good works and good people, but with the loss of that first spontaneous, passionate loyalty; and unless it recovered this enthusiasm "its candlestick would be removed out of its place," and its light would go out.

How modern that sounds! How precisely it is like some large church in some large city to-day, a respectable and respected and useful church, a Sunday club, a self-satisfied circle; and how it explains that mysterious way in which, in many such a large church, a sort of dry-rot seems to set in, and even where the church seems to prosper it is declining, and some day it dies! It has lost its first love, and its candle first flickers and then goes out.

Indeed, how true the same story is of many an individual inside or outside the church, perfectly respectable and entirely respected, but outgrowing his enthusiasms. He becomes, by degrees, first self-repressed and unemotional, then a cynical dilettante. How you wish he {92} would do something impulsive, impetuous, even foolish! How you would like to detect him in an enthusiasm! His life has moved on like the river Rhine, which has its boisterous Alpine youth, and then runs more and more slowly, until in Holland we can hardly detect whether it has any current.

"It drags its slow length through the hot, dry land, And dies away in the monotonous strand."

That is the church of Ephesus, and that is the man from Ephesus, and unless they repent and regain their power of enthusiasm their light goes out. Ephesus lies there, a cluster of huts beside a heap of ruins, and the future of the world is with the nations and churches and people who view the world with fresh, unspoiled, appreciative hope.

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XXXVIII

THE CROWN OF LIFE

_Revelation_ ii. 8-10.

The Church of Ephesus needed a rebuke; the Church at Smyrna needed an encouragement. The first was a prosperous, busy church, without spiritual vitality, and the prophecy was that its light should go out. The second was a persecuted church, with much tribulation and poverty, and the promise was that for its faithfulness it should have a crown of life. And if the traveller, as he stands among the ruins of Ephesus, cannot help thinking how its candle-stick has been removed, so he must think of the reward of fidelity, as he stands among the busy docks and bustling life of Smyrna.