Part 4

"Look, FATHER, look on His anointed Face, And only look on us as found in Him; Look not on our misusings of Thy grace, Our prayer so languid and our faith so dim: For, lo! between our sins and their reward We set the Passion of Thy SON our LORD."

How constantly the faith of our fellow-countrymen amounts to little more than a vague Deism, instead of a living faith in an Incarnate CHRIST. They are learning more than that in the trenches, and I hope also that the same truth is being revealed to those who remain in the broad sea. These beautiful lines, entitled "CHRIST in Flanders," the Editor of the _Spectator_ gave me leave to reproduce in the diocesan magazine:

"We had forgotten You, or very nearly-- You did not seem to touch us very nearly. Of course we thought about You now and then, Especially in any time of trouble: We knew that You were good in time of trouble-- But we are very ordinary men.

"And there were always other things to think of-- There's lots of things a man has got to think of-- His work, his home, his pleasure, and his wife; And so we only thought of You on Sunday-- Sometimes, perhaps, not even on a Sunday-- Because there's always lots to fill one's life.

"And, all the while, in street or lane or byway-- In country lane, in city street or byway-- You walked among us, and we did not see. Your feet were bleeding as You walked our pavements-- How _did_ we miss Your footprints on our pavements-- Can there be other folk as blind as we?

"_Now_ we remember, over here in Flanders-- (It isn't strange to think of You in Flanders)-- This hideous warfare seems to make things clear. We never thought about You much in England-- But now that we are far away from England, We have no doubts, we know that You are here.

"You helped us pass the jest along the trenches-- Where, in cold blood, we waited in the trenches-- You touched its ribaldry and made it fine. You stood beside us in our pain and weakness-- We're glad to think You understood our weakness; Somehow it seems to help us not to whine.

"We think about You kneeling in the Garden-- Ah, GOD! the agony of that dread Garden-- We know You prayed for us upon the Cross. If anything could make us glad to bear it, 'Twould be the knowledge that You willed to bear it-- Pain--death--the uttermost of human loss.

"Though we forgot You, You will not forget us-- We feel so sure that You will not forget us-- But stay with us until this dream is past. And so we ask for courage, strength, and pardon-- Especially, I think, we ask for pardon-- And that You'll stand beside us to the last."

What it comes to is the old truth which we have learnt from Foreign Missions--the centre must be converted by the circumference; it is the self-sacrifice of its Mission work abroad which has saved the Church from "fatty degeneration of the heart" at home; it is the growing change of mind among the defenders of our country which must permeate and ennoble the country itself.

Do I look to GOD? But I could only see Him in CHRIST, for He says Himself--and it is either the greatest blasphemy or the greatest truth in the world--"I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life: no man cometh unto the FATHER but by Me."

Trafalgar Day, 1915, then, should be not only the turning-point of the world's history, but the inauguration of a new Britain. If the war stopped at this moment, should we really be a changed nation?--would not the old miserable internal disputes break out again?--might we not again be as we were in July, 1914, on the verge of civil war in Ireland, of a revolution among women, and of the greatest industrial strike of modern times? I come back at the end of so many months of the war to the picture which I tried to hold up to London in its first week--"Facing the war is drinking the cup"--"The cup which My FATHER hath given me, shall I not drink it?" We have to repeat the very words of our LORD Himself.

Have we drunk the cup, and drunk it to its dregs? Only then will the angels come and strengthen us for victory; we shall deserve victory then, and we shall be ready for it, for the cup which we shall drink will be the cup to which the SON of GOD Himself put His lips, and the courage and fortitude of Gethsemane leads on to the overwhelming victory of Easter Day.

It is then "Our Day" in an even deeper sense than those mean who so rightly ask our alms to-day for those splendid sister societies of St. John and the Red Cross. Of course we shall pour out into their lap, for the sake of our wounded heroes at the Front, all that we can; but it is "Our Day" because it is the day when the nation is tested to the roots of its being. "If thou hadst known, even thou, in the midst of this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace, but now they are hid from thine eyes." They are not hid from our eyes yet; it is still Our Day; but let it pass, and it has gone for ever.

VI

THE KNOCKING AT THE DOOR[11]

[11] Preached at St. Mary's, Bryanston Square, at a service for the Church-workers of the Deanery.

"Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If any man hear My voice and open the door, I will come and sup with him, and he with Me."--REV. iii. 20.

I will come unto him and sup with him, and he with Me. I think sometimes that we dwell in our Advent meditation too exclusively on the thought of the coming Judgment. Of course we have to dwell on it. "Behold, the Judge standeth before the door." A tremendous truth that is. "Behold, the Judge standeth before the door." There is going to come a time when the door will come down with a crash, and we shall be face to face with the Judge. And this affects every single period of our lives. We sometimes imagine that we are going--dare I say the word?--to _dodge_ the Judgment. Not at all; we are going to look into those Eyes like a Flame of Fire, and every man will give an account of himself before GOD. And every day is making up the Judgment. Every thought, every word, every act, every service, every decision we make, it all goes into the judgment, it all goes into the verdict. And when the Judge who stands before the door comes inside, He registers the verdict and the sentence we have been preparing all our lives. We go to our own place--the place that we have prepared for ourselves.

Now that is a tremendous thought, and it is one that we cannot possibly ignore. What is a person, what is a Church-worker, to do who realises that the Judge standeth before the door? What am I to do when I realise that He stands before the door of my heart? The answer can only be: Ask Him in as the SAVIOUR, before He comes as the Judge that is to be.

I want now to take with you another kind of Advent--may I say a more delightful kind of Advent?--that is, the Advent of JESUS CHRIST Himself into the soul. "Behold, I stand at the door and knock, and if any man will hear My voice and open the door, I will come in to him and sup with him, and he with Me." It seems at first sight too good to be true, when you think who JESUS CHRIST was--the LORD of Angels, the SON of GOD, the supreme Captain of the heavenly host, the most perfect beautiful Character that ever lived--that He is going Himself to come. Think of it--that He is going to come within me, within you, to live there, to dominate your consciousness, dominate your mind, your life, so that you will speak with His words, think with His thoughts, judge with His judgment; that He will live in you. It seems almost too much to believe; and yet this is precisely the thing which, when we study the New Testament, we find is promised, not only in this passage, but in St. John's Gospel. "My FATHER and I, We will come unto him and make Our abode with him." St. Paul's favourite motto is: "CHRIST in you the hope of glory." CHRIST in you, through the HOLY SPIRIT. He, of course, brings JESUS with Him. It is said in St. John's Gospel: "He is with you, but He shall be _in_ you." And when I speak to a number of Confirmation candidates, I believe it is perfectly true to say before the Confirmation: "He is _with_ you, but He shall be _in_ you." For that is the great gift of Confirmation, the falling of the HOLY GHOST. "Then laid they their hands on them, and the HOLY GHOST came upon them, for as yet He had fallen on none of them."

There is no doubt that this tremendous gift is the special promise given by Christianity. CHRIST wants to live in me. He wants to come inside. He stands outside the door, but if I ask Him He will come inside. And notice, secondly, that this tremendous promise is not made to a few selected people. You might suppose that it was meant for a few Sisters of Mercy, very devoted, who live their lives among the poor, or to a few particular saints among the clergy. But you all have this promise. This tremendous promise comes in the midst of the message to the Church in Laodicea, the people who were neither cold nor hot, the people who were uplifted when they ought to have been humble, the people who had to be chastened and rebuked that they might be made humble, the people who had not a chance of overcoming in their own strength--in fact, people just like you and me. And it is just because we know this, that I have to give this message of love to you. It is just because we know that we are neither cold nor hot, but lukewarm--the churchwardens, workers, sidesmen, Sunday-School teachers--it is just because we are conscious, and because we know that we do want chastening, that we may be perfected and purified; in fact, it is just because we are like the people to whom that message was given that we need to pay heed to the warning of the message. CHRIST says: "I stand at the door and knock, and if any of you will open the door and hear My voice, I will come in and sup with you, and you with Me."

And, therefore, you see, that sets us thinking, does it not? as to what this knocking at the door can mean. Is it possible, you say, that CHRIST has been knocking at the door, and I never knew it was He who was knocking? The whole thing is wonderfully symbolised at the consecration of a church. Perhaps you have not seen the consecration of a church. The Bishop, representing JESUS CHRIST, knocks three times at the door, and says: "Lift up your heads, O ye gates, and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors; and the King of Glory shall come in." The churchwardens and sidesmen say: "Who is the King of Glory?" And the Bishop outside replies: "The LORD of Hosts. He is the King of Glory." Then the doors are flung open, and the Bishop enters, symbolising the entrance of CHRIST into His Church. That happens every time a new church is consecrated in the diocese of London or anywhere else. Who is the King of Glory? Who is He? Is it possible that He has been knocking at my heart and I have never known?

How does He knock? 1. First of all, and perhaps most commonly, by what we call _smiting the conscience_. You notice we use the very words in our popular language which represents knocking--smiting the conscience. Is it possible, for instance, that even now some of you have been conscious that you are not what you ought to be, that your life is not what it ought to be, that there is something wrong with you? People sometimes come to me and say: "Bishop, I want to see you. I am not right. There is something not right with me; something tells me I have not done my work as I ought. There seems to be something between me and GOD." Well, you must cherish that smiting of the conscience. Do not ignore it or despise it. It is the knocking, knocking at the door, of JESUS CHRIST Himself. There is not a doubt about it. Sometimes He knocks the door very loudly. Sometimes His knocks are soft, just like taps. When some pure-hearted boys or girls are going to be confirmed, it is a very gentle knock that CHRIST makes at the door of their young hearts. He feels sure they will attend. He does not have to rouse them by loud thundering knocks. He comes quietly because that heart is made for JESUS CHRIST, and JESUS CHRIST is made for that heart. And therefore at a Confirmation of well-prepared candidates it is lovely to think how He comes up and knocks at the young soul, and the soul recognises the knock, and says: "Come in." No loud knock is wanted. We were meant to grow up with "our days bound each to each by natural piety." CHRIST, who has taken us up in His arms at Baptism, is made to come gently, quietly, and happily, into the young soul at Confirmation. There is not meant to be some great break in our lives. We are meant to grow in grace and in the knowledge of our LORD and SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST. But if there comes this knocking, a smiting of the conscience, I do pray you to remember that it is meant in love, that it is CHRIST who wants to come within us.

2. Sometimes the knock is a very heavy one, the heavy dull knocking of a _great sorrow_. I have seen a great deal of it, when people have lost their dear ones in this Great War. One who had lost the light of her eyes said to me the other day: "I somehow feel nearer GOD in spite of it all." No doubt in that heavy, sad knock at the door you can hear JESUS CHRIST'S own knocking. He may come into the soul through the sorrow in a way in which He has never come when all is right and bright and happy. If some of you have heard that heavy knocking at the door, do not think GOD has forgotten you and forsaken you. Rise and open the door, and CHRIST will come into your soul in a way in which He has never come before in all your life.

3. Sometimes it is the quick happy _knocking of joy_. Someone wrote to me the other day that he had had a great joy. All the darkness seemed now to have cleared away. He said: "I see my path in the light of GOD'S love." There was the quick knocking of joy, and CHRIST came in with the joy. The clearer knock of joy was the knocking of JESUS CHRIST.

4. Sometimes it is _some friend_ who comes into the life, some influence, perhaps a parish priest, who knocks at the door. Perhaps only too unwillingly at first you open the door, and you find that in the parish priest who comes you have found your best friend on earth, and he by his coming in brings CHRIST to you; he brings Him with him, and he leaves Him with you, if he is a faithful steward. If the parish priest is a faithful steward, he leads you to the Master. Then, perhaps, the sudden call comes. I have seen this happen to many young soldiers. I lately spent two months with those who were just going out--they are now in the trenches. They crowded in every evening to have a talk or they lay down on the ground and drank in every word at some Church Parade service. I could see, as I watched their faces, that they were hearing the call of their country to risk their lives, their all. It brought them near to JESUS CHRIST. In the knocking of their country's call JESUS CHRIST knocked, and I believe there are many fighting in the trenches now every day borne up by a faith they did not have until this summer--a belief in the immediate presence of their SAVIOUR with them. It would not have happened but for this sudden necessity of facing the ordeal of their lives.

Is it possible that all these things, or some of them, have been happening to you--or something different that I have not mentioned--and you have never recognised it as yet as being what it is, JESUS CHRIST knocking at the door? Now what are you to do? What are any of us to do, for I am just one among you? It seems clear there are three things that we are bound to do, if this great miracle (and it is nothing else) is to take place. The first thing is to listen for and recognise the voice of JESUS CHRIST outside the door, that we may be ready and prepared to open the door. And do you not think that the reason that many of us never hear JESUS CHRIST'S voice is that we never listen for it, that we have no quiet time, that we have provided no time for meditation and prayer? We are too busy. We get up in the morning just in time to start off for our work; we never have this quiet time, or only a very few moments to think, in which the voice will be heard.

Now, I cannot tell you how much I believe in what I call _listening to the voice of God_. We pray, indeed--we all of us pray. But it is the ten minutes after prayer that matters, it is the ten minutes' listening to what He is going to say back, and often we do not give that time at all, and so we never get the answer. Is it not fair to say that some of you Church-workers just kneel down for a few hurried moments, and then are up again from your knees, off to some duty on earth, and that possibly a few minutes each day would constitute all the time we devote to listening to the voice of GOD? If that is all, can you wonder when you take your Sunday-School lesson that it is rather dry, or that your mission sermons do not seem to have much inspiration about them, and gradually the voice of JESUS CHRIST fades away and becomes very vague? You do not give time. Do not tell me that in the twenty-four hours you cannot find time for the most vital thing in this world. We are only here for a few passing years. Five minutes after death it matters more than I can say--these quiet times in our lives, they are worth more than gold, quiet times when we listen to the voice of GOD. After death how still it is!

"I hear no more the busy beat of time, Nor in me feel the fluttering pulse nor faltering breath."

One moment will not be different from the next in the stillness and quiet of Paradise. And in the quiet of the other world how much we shall regret having had so few quiet times on earth! Why, one of the very busiest merchants in the City used to be very regular at a daily service. I said to him once: "How can you find time, you, one of the very busiest merchants in the City, to attend daily service?" He said: "I am so busy I must go to the daily service." He felt his business would simply sweep him away if he did not get a quiet time. And Mr. Gladstone, you will remember, kept his Sundays in unbroken quiet, waiting upon GOD during the very busiest period of his life. Without it he would have lost the quiet and strength of his soul. Therefore make your first resolution. "I will listen to what the LORD GOD will say concerning my soul." "Speak, LORD, for Thy servant heareth." If you want to have strength and happiness in your spiritual work, wait upon God. And in the silence you will hear the voice of JESUS CHRIST; you will hear His knock.

Then, when we have heard the voice and recognised the knock, the next thing to do is to open the door. How simple that sounds, does it not? and how difficult it often is! Picture some who have had the door of their souls closed tightly for years. You have to prise the door open, and you have to break down the fixed habits of the man who has never prayed except for a few moments or two in his life; how hard he finds it to reverse the habits of a lifetime! Someone who has an old quarrel, through jealousy or something else, with another worker--how hard it is to forgive and begin all over again! But it has got to be done, the door has to be prised or forced, because if CHRIST is to come in we have to open the door--that is our part in it--and CHRIST _will_ come in. And if only we realised how eager He is to come in, and what a power He has to change the heart and control the thoughts and purify the conscience, we should all want Him to come, and we should not spare any time and trouble to get the door open.

And when He has come in, notice this wonderful phrase: "I will sup with him, and he with Me." He does not come in as a transient guest to stay for a little while, and go away, but He comes on a permanent visit, to take up His permanent residence. And although we should not have dared to use the words ourselves, the words "I will sup with him, and he with Me," describe the most delightful friendship. Do you desire His presence? How often do you come to Holy Communion, how carefully do you prepare for the great gift of the presence of JESUS CHRIST in your soul? Why, I would press this on you, that the supping with JESUS CHRIST and He with you which takes place in the Holy Communion is the most glorious moment of your whole day. The first Christians never thought of spending Sunday without going first to Holy Communion. It was the special service on the Lord's Day. It may be that some of you who used to be regular have drifted away from this way of receiving the presence of CHRIST into the soul. We know no better way for cherishing the presence of CHRIST in the soul than being regular at Communion. The humblest communicant comes away from his Communion with the thought: "CHRIST lives in me; I live, yet not I, but CHRIST liveth in me."

Will you, then, take from me these three thoughts, Listening, Opening, and Cherishing the Presence: Devotion, Consecration, Communion? And if you do, I tell you what will happen to your deanery. It will gradually become the most Christian fellowship in London. You will be drawn to one another in a way in which you never have been before. We want more unity in every deanery, so that the parishes may take an interest in one another, and that all Church gatherings may be keen and well attended as by a band of brothers and sisters.

This service now may be the beginning of a new life for the deanery, not only of a new fellowship, and of far greater devotion in your work, and of a joy which you never had before. Christmas in war time is not going to be a merry Christmas for any of us. But there is no reason, if we understand what happiness means, why it should not be a happy one. If these three lessons are taken home, you will as a deanery and individually and as parishes have a joy which the world can neither give nor take away.

VII

IMMORTALITY[12]

[12] Preached at the Parish Church, Camden Town.

"JESUS said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in Me shall never die."--ST. JOHN xi. 25, 26.

"Whosoever liveth and believeth in Me shall never die." If a man die, shall he live again? There is no time in our history when that has been a more pressing question than it is to-day. Men are dying in hundreds. I can think myself of some as dear to me as if they were my own sons, whose bodies are lying to-day in some Belgian or French grave. And I spend much of my time in going to comfort the widows and the mothers. If a man die, shall he live again? I wonder whether you have ever read or heard read this little poem called "The Army of the Dead":[13]

[13] By Barry Pain. Published in the _Westminster Gazette_.

"I dreamt that overhead I saw in twilight grey The Army of the Dead Marching upon its way, So still and passionless, With faces so serene, That scarcely could one guess Such men in war had been.

"No mark of hurt they bore, Nor smoke, nor bloody stain; Nor suffered any more Famine, fatigue, or pain; Nor any lust of hate Now lingered in their eyes-- Who have fulfilled their fate, Have lost all enmities.

"A new and greater pride So quenched the pride of race That foes marched side by side Who once fought face to face. That ghostly army's plan Knows but one race, one rod-- All nations there are Man, And the one King is God.

"No longer on their ears The bugle's summons falls; Beyond these tangled spheres The Archangel's trumpet calls; And by that trumpet led Far up the exalted sky, The Army of the Dead Goes by, and still goes by.

"Look upward, standing mute; Salute!"