... Christ's service of love

Front matter

fej lii I m&i

'fii^^m m m^ mm:

PRINCETON • NEW JERSEY

II

The Lord Jesus the same night in which He was betrayed took bread, and when He had given thanks He brake it. — 1 Corinthians xi. 23.

Ill THE CURE FOR CARE 42

In the multitude of my thoughts within me, Thy comforts delight my soul. — Psalm xciv. 19.

IV THE SOURCE AND ISSUE OF COMFORT . . 52

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort ; who comforteth us in all our aflBiction, that we may be able to comfort them that are in any affliction, through the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God. — 2 Corinthians i. 3-4.

V

I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance. — 2 Peter iii. 1.

VI THE SACRAMENTAL COMMITTAL .... 75 That which I have committed unto Him. — 2 Timothy i. 13.

12 CONTENTS

VII

TAGB

A FURTHER SACRAMENTAL COMMITTAL . . 85

That good thing which was committed unto thee. — 2 Timothy i. 14.

VIII THE PURSUING SOUL: AN EXPOSITION OF

PSALM LXIII 92

My soul followeth hard after Thee.— Pbalm Ixiil. 8.

IX

With desire I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. — Luke xxii. 15.

X

I drew them with cords of a man, with bands of love. — HosEA xi. 4.

XI HEART-DIRECTION ....... 119

The Lord direct your hearts into the love of God. — 2 Thessaloniaks iii. 5.

XII THE PATIENCE OF CHRIST 129

The Lord direct your hearts into the patience of Christ — 2 Thessalonians iii. 5.

XIII SELF-EXAMINATION . . . . . . .137

Let a man examine himself. — 1 Corinthians xi. 28.

XIV SELF-JUDGMENT 145

Thou art the man. — 2 Samuel xii. 7.

XV DIVINE SCRUTINY AND GUIDANCE . . .157 Search me, O God, and lead me. — Psalm cxxxix. 23.

CONTENTS 13

XVI

FASE

In all things showing thyself a pattern of good works. — Titus ii. 7,

XVII

Master, we would see a sign from Thee.— St. Matthew xii. 38.

XVIII LOVE TO THE END 191

Having loved His own which were in the world, He loved them unto the end. — St. John xiii. 1.

XIX

If we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of our hope firm unto the end. —Hebrews iii. 6.

XX

Thou preventest him with the blessings of goodness. — Psalm xxi. 3,

XXI HUMILITY 220

Who am I, and what is my house, that Thou hast brought me hitherto ? — 2 Samuel vii. 18.

XXII FEAR AND LOVE 230

There is no fear in love ; but perfect love casteth out fear. — 1 John iv. 18.

XXIII THE FILIAL RELATION : CONFIRMATION SERV- ICE 243

As many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God. — St. John i. 12.

14 CONTENTS

XXIV

PAGE

THE SUBJECT OF MEDITATION . . . .253 We have thought on Thy lovingkindness, O God, in the midst of Thy Temple. — Psalm xlviii. 9.

XXV CHRIST'S CHOSEN 261

Ye have not chosen Me, but I have chosen you. — St. John xv. 16,

XXVI

Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He was come from God and goeth unto God . . . began to wash the disciples' feet.— St. John xiii. 3.

XXVII THE CONSEQUENCES OF FAITH . . . .280 Joy and peace in believing, that ye abound in hope. — Romans xv. 13.

XXVIII THE PEOPLE OF THE COVENANT . . . .291 The Lord our God made a covenant with us in Horeb. — Deutekonomy v. 2.

XXIX THE TERMS OF THE COVENANT . . . .803 I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. Thou shalt have none other gods before Me. — Deuteronomy v. 6, 7.

XXX

Thus saith the Lord: I remember for thee the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals, when thou wentest after Me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown. Israel was holiness unto the Lord. — Jeremiah ii. 2.

Introduction

The sermons in this book are designed for devotional reading, with some suitable lines of thought in keeping with the great occasion of Communion. I have purposely left out doctrinal discussion and controversial themes. The celebration of the Lord's Supper should be a centre of union to all Christian hearts, instead of being, as it often is, the very symbol of exclusion. In utter perversity we even use the word to represent what separates Churches from each other instead of what should really unite them; we speak of the Roman Communion, the Episcopal or Presbyterian or Baptist Communion. It is an offence. We seem to think it quite natural for a Church to draw the line here, to be willing to have other Christians worship with them and work together with them for common Christian purposes, but not to unite here where, if we truly think of it, we can alone have true union.

We have allowed the word to be used as a synonym for sectarianism, and we speak of "our Communion," meaning not the fellowship of the Christian faith but the sectional fellowship of a particular denomination. Rather, wherever else there may be division or at least separate life, it ought not to be here at the common feast which stands for the heart of hearts of our faith. Even to make the Sacrament an opportunity for pressing doctrinal distinctions, for insisting on a theory of atonement, is to endanger the true spiritual catholicity that the very rite ought to breathe. There is a place for specific teaching on this subject, but it ought to be somewhere else than at the Table of Remembrance. A Church may have its own particular testimony to utter, and if it likes can insist on credal affirmation, but it is unfortunate that the common meal which is the symbol of the common fellowship should be made the separating test.

Partly as a result of our false view of Communion the Sacrament has lost its true place in the Church. At any rate it is a fact that in many Churches in America and England it has become merely an occasional appendage to public worship, where a few faithful people remain behind to do this in remembrance of Jesus. The ordinary service is conducted and a sermon preached with no reference to what is to follow, the congregation is dismissed, and often only a tithe of the worshippers is left for a few minutes to break the bread and pass the cup. ISTo doubt it is to some extent the swing of the pendulum from the false solemnity and even the superstitious celebration of the old Communion season, but it is at least a pity that the Church to-day should lose the great instrument this Sacrament may be for the deepening of spiritual life and for giving a tone to all our religious service. i^ What Communion represents to the Church is.

after all, the source of devotion and the inspiration of the OSristianlite. Teaching on this subject shouM rather precede the actual celebration than accompany it. Atthe Tahle itself we want merely to have the right note struck and to have our hearts directed into the love of God. In my own early ministry I used to preach doctrinal sermons about the sacrifice of Christ on Communion occasions, but I have come to see that this is not the place for such. Indeed elaborate sermons of any sort are not needed at such times ; for a Christian congregation is never"! more responsive and more susceptible to spiritual j impression than when it comes to keep the feast.

Of course it is possible to exaggerate the place of this rite and to assume that some magical virtue lies in partaking. There^is nothing here that is not in the Gospel itself, nothing new added to the Gospel, nothing exceptional, nothing surprising beyond the ever-new surprise of the Father's love. It expresses in simple action what the pulpit declares in words. At the same time if we minimise the occasion of Communion, we are throwing away a great opportunity for recalling ourselves to the central truths, and are also depriving ourselves of the comfort and strength which come from realising our union with the Communion of the Saints.

There are various aspects of the Sacrament worth emphasising and in the due proportion of these lies safety. First of all it is a Celebration, a memorial rite, "this do in remembrance of Me." [We are accustomed to this thought of recalling a man or event to memory. The world has its anniversaries and centenaries, its memorial celebrations when we call to recollection things in the past which the world would be poorer to have missed and be poorer even to forget. Similarly, the Church had the natural and useful custom which produced the Saints' Days, begun as anniversaries of their death, till the whole Christian year was portioned out in memory of those who had lived in God's faith and fear. This Sacrament in this particular aspect is specially a memorial of Christ's death. It is a significant dramatic representation to our own hearts "that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures." The symbolic actions are specially designed for this end, to call to memory and to vivid consciousness this particular thing — the broken bread, the poured out wine. Some Churches by their methods of celebrating have emphasised this aspect, making it solemn by its very infrequency. So the season became a time for self-examination, for renewing of vows, for repentance and endeavour after new obedience. In Scotland until recently this aspect of Celebration was the one almost exclusively emphasised. A season of Communion was observed once or twice every year extending about a week, with Fast-days and Services of Preparation. The custom in the time of its vitality was very useful in deepening religious impression in the whole community, and to some extent served a similar function to that of Lent in some other countries. This aspect of Celebration was in many cases exaggerated to the detriment of some deeper things, but we ought not to neglect it. The very symbols suggest it and make it an object-lesson, a miniature drama of salvation presented to the eye. These symbols are outward and visible signs, mutely preaching to us the eternal love of God our Father.

The next great thought, which undue considera-'- '

tion of the first sometimes obscured, is the simple thought of Communion. This is the inward and spiritual grace signified in the rite. It is no formal ceremony this that we do in memory of Jesus. It is more than a memorial rite, more than Celebration, it is Communion. It is not merely going back in memory to historical fact, but also it is personal appropriation of the real spiritual presence, entering into the real mystical union, accepting humbly for our soul's life the love of God in Christ. Thus the Sacrament may truly be a means of grace. The Father's love is not only set before us as an object of history for admiration and example, but it is offered to us in this simple dramatic way. It is presented to ) us, to be taken by us and applied to our own sorrows I and sins and needs. We come not only to remember ' Him but to be blessed by Him, to bathe our hearts in His love, to nourish our souls, to taste forgiveness and reconcilement and peace with God, to be nr^cd) strengthened in our pilgrim life, to grow in grace in ^^JL — ' the sunshine of His presence, and to plight our troth to Him, once more renew our vows to follow and serve

Ilim and keep His commandments, and love Him f mm ana Keep jc^ I who so loved us.

It is further a great act of Thanksgiving, Eucharist, a sacrifice of praise which we offer. In all the paccounts of the institution of the Sacrament in the LNew Testament there is a blessing or thanksgiving. The term Eucharist was the earliest name used by the Church, not merely because Christ gave thanks at the last Supper, but because the Church felt that in the rite were symbolised all the benefits for which we ought to give thanks. It is the culmination of all the goodness and lovingkindness of the Lord. We thank God for His unspeakable gift, the crowning gift of His love, typical of all the good gifts of our Heavenly Father. In neglecting or minimising the Sacrament we are cutting ourselves off from participating in what has ever been the great act of the Church's thanksgiving.

N In this function of common praise there is ex- I pressed also a note of the Church, which the Sacrament itself represents, namely. Unity amid all diversity of operation, of gifts, of function, and place. The sign and seal of the Communion of the Saints is this Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. This has ever Vunited the Church of all ages, an unbroken chain of \ memorial rite, pointing to the Source of this union. lit is because we have one Lord that we have one iChurch. United to Him, we are united to all His. He is the centre of the circle, and all within the sweep of His love are in Him and in each other. We sigh for unity — we have it, if we would live in the-i thought and power of Communion, the unity of the Spirit. This simple thought brings comfort and strength, that we are not isolated in our endeavours . after the Christian life, not exceptional in our strug- J gle or sorrow or joy, but that there is a great cloud! of witnesses. It is for inspiration, for example, for emulation, to realise the bond of discipleship, and toy feel that we are treading where the saints have trod.

A further aspect of Communion is that it means! renewed Consecration; for in the very act we give J ourselves once more to the Christian obedience and the Christian service. The word Sacrament implies this, taken as it was from a Latin word "Sacramentum," which meant something sacred, and which afterwards was the word used for the oath of allegiance the Eoman soldier took. In partaking of Communion we are dedicating all we have and are to God. It means not only consecrating what we have, but ourselves. What we are is of more ultimate importance ^ than what^we'doT'since the value of our~action3 is / conditioned by what we are in heart and spirit. Con- Vf secration is the one and only way of serving our gen- \ eVation; for it uses the whole life. The consecration.;/ of gifts is involved in the consecration of self. It is the leaven that leavens the whole lump of life. We cannot afford to lose the opportunity offered by this Sacrament for confessing our discipleship of Jesus, and for consecrating ourselves to the service of His kingdom on earth.

Love bade rae welcome ; yet my soul drew back,

Guilty of dust and sin.

But quick-eyed Love, observing me grow slack

From my first entrance in, Drew nearer to me, sweetly questiouing

If I lack'd anything.

" A guest," I answered, " worthy to be here."

Love said, " You shall be he."

"I, the unkind, ungrateful ? Ah, my dear,

I cannot look on Thee."

Love took my hand, and smiling did reply,

" Who made the eyes but I ?"

" Truth, Lord ; but I have marred them : let my shame

Go where it doth deserve."

"And know you not," says Love, " who bore the blame ? ".

" My dear, then I will serve."

" You must sit down," says Love, " and taste my meat."

So I did sit and eat.

— George Herbkkt.

CHRIST'S SERVICE OF LOVE: A MEDITA- TION BEFORE COMMUNION

TTie Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister. — St. Matthew xx. 28.

This is usually, and rightly, taken as a lesson to us to follow our Lord's example, to judge our own lives by the amount of service they contain. The disciples were indignant at what they thought the presumption of two of their number who had advanced special claims to honour in the Kingdom. The imagination of them all was heated by the thought of sitting on thrones and bearing sway of some kind and attaining to honour. The Master taught them the profound lesson that the way to real spiritual greatness is by service. It seemed an inversion of the ordinary rule by which princes exercise dominion, and the world's great men exercise authority. For here it is the opposite, "whosoever will be great among you let him be your minister, and whosoever will be chief among you let him be your servant." He takes Himself as an illustration of the law, for even the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto but to minister. The lesson is that we should follow in His steps, and make our religion not merely a getting but a giving, the service of Christ and of the brethren.

But there is another side of religion, suggested even by these words of our text, though not on the surface. It is that the Son of Man came not that we might minister to Him, but that He might minister to us, and this should be in our minds as we come to keep the feast. There is much that we can do for Christ ; and the Christian life in its practical aspect is much concerned with Christian duty and Christian service. We have to carry on His work, commend His Gospel, fill up even His sufferings as St. Paul declared. We have to show His love by the love of our lives. When on earth He submitted to be ministered unto. Men and women loved Him in the days of His pilgrimage and tended Him. Martha and other holy women sometimes cumbered themselves with much serving of Him, and found delight in doing it. He accepted hospitality, went out to the little home in Bethany, where He would rest and be served. Peter would be proud to wash His feet. The disciples would minister to Him when and where they could. Loving women went to His sepulchre to anoint His body, and give it the last sweet ministrations. But He did not come for all this — not to be ministered unto, but Himself to minister.

We also in our measure can minister to Him. He said that a cup of cold water to one of His little ones was given to Him. Whatever we do in His spirit for men is done for Him. Many a ministry of the Lord is possible to us. If we are His disciples we will seek to serve Him in the ways that He loved to serve. Inevitable as this is and needful as it is both for our own sake and for the sake of others, yet He did not come that we might do this for Him. He came to do something for us. It is possible for us to be so taken up with all our religious activities that we may forget to wait to let Christ do His work upon ourselves. Our Communion season comes to us, calling a halt, reminding us that it is true for us also, as for the disciples of old, that the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto but to minister. It is good to cease from serving sometimes, and let Christ serve us.

This is one of the chief lessons of our holy Communion. We are not hosts here at all, taking charge and dispensing benefits. We come as guests simply. We bring nothing to the feast except need, nothing except hunger and thirst after righteousness. We do not make the provision : we only come to partake. He is the Giver and the Gift. He prepares the feast, invites us all unworthy, omits not one gracious act of courtesy, breaks the bread, gives us the wine of His love. The Son of Man came to minister, let Him minister. It is His pleasure to serve, let Him serve. It is His joy to give, let Him give. We, perhaps, would like to be always serving like Martha, bustling about our little activities. There was a better part than even serving Jesus, a better part which Mary chose. After all we come to His Table not because we are worthy, not because our faith or love or strength or service gives us a warrant, but just because He asks us, and offers us His love and strength. To some it is hard to make this submission, to own this complete dependence ; as in daily life it is hard for some active men to let others do work which they themselves like doing. To some this is the hardest thing to bear in times of illness and weakness. They hate being laid aside, and instead of ministering to others, having others ministering to tliera. To be useless, to be dependent, is the sorest item in their trouble. It is partly pride, and partly their active habits, the unusualness of having others do for them what they used to do for themselves and for others. People who are always well, always strong, always active, have sometimes a certain hardness; and this is often one of the sweet ministries of sickness, that it teaches dependence and willingness to give up and let others bear the burden. That is why sickness so often aids faith ; for faith means to be broken of our self-sufficiency and to know our need and our poverty of soul ; faith is just to accept humbly and gratefully. It is to submit to the Son of Man who came not to be ministered unto but to minister. It is to confess our absolute need of Him, to depend utterly on Him, to let Him take us and feed us and save us and keep us. It is to be willing to take grace as a gift not of merit, to take peace as a gift not an attainment ("My peace I give unto you"), to take everything as a gift, to be humble and receptive and accept the ministry of the Son of Man.

There is a true Quietism, which is the heart of all Mysticism, in which a man is quiet, submissive, empty of self-will, realising that the perfect spiritual state is reached not by struggle but by submission, not by the active exercise of will but by waiting on God, that the soul is fed by constant meditation on divine things, and Communion is just opening the heart to let Christ in to sup with us and to sen^e us. 'Not our will but His will : not our way but His way : not our work but His work: we cannot spread a feast for the Master but He furnishes our table for us, and we are content to have it so. It says in sweet humility with the Psalmist: "Surely I have behaved and quieted myself as a child that is weaned of his mother : my soul is even as a weaned child."

Is not this humble receptiveness the true mood and attitude for us at the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper ? It is His Supper. We have no place there, except as those who need and who come at His gracious invitation to accept. In Communion we celebrate nothing in us, but all in Him. We are not celebrating our faith or constancy or love, but His. Christ's love does not depend on our faith, but our faith depends on His love. Our service depends on His love, also. We need to feed our faith there if we are to serve Him at all. "If any man serve Me, let him follow Me." The way to serve is to be a disciple: to sit at His feet, to learn of Him, to submit to Him. Before we can do His work we must drink of His spirit and let Him teach us His secret. Before we can serve Him we must be humble enough to let Him serve us. "Behold," said Thomas a Kempis, "all things are Thine which I have and whereby I serve

Thee. And yet contrariwise Thou rather servest me than I Thee."

This is the root of our faith, the source of our strength, and the very heart of our Communion: namely, that the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto but to minister. There are other aspects of religion, the fight of faith, the witness to the truth, Christian duties, Christian service, and the whole issue in practice of Christian love, but this first, and this last also, and this all the time, that our spiritual life depends utterly on Christ. The bread and the wine are symbols of this dependence ; for they are symbols of His love. Creep close to the warmth of His love: get near to the source of all your peace and joy and service. Let the Son of Man minister to you, serve you with His own sweet courtesy.

There will not

One loving usage be forgot

By Thee; Thy kiss will greet

Us entering; Thou wilt not disdain

To wash away each guilty stain

From off our soilM feet.

We enter ; from this time to prove

Thy hospitality and love

Shewn towards the meanest guest.

n f' The Lord Jesus the same night in which He was betrayed took bread, and when He had given thanks He brake it. — 1 Corinthians xi. 23.

That night in which Jesus was betrayed seems the climax of human sin, the cuhnination of all the evil in the world and in man. It reads like the absolute and irrevocable condemnation of human nature. What have we to say about ourselves when such a situation was possible? If ever good entered the world in the unearthly beauty of holiness and the aublTTTie_ten(lerness of love, it Hid so in the pi^esence of Jesusjimong men. His life could be summed up in the sentence, "He went about doing good": His words were full of heavenly music: by speech and deed He revealed God as One whose desire was towards men. The gentleness and compassion and sweet grace and stainless purity of this Man might well give others who saw Him new hope for humanity ; and, as a matter of fact, true hearts were drawm out to Him in love and hope. I^ever man spake like this Man ; never man lived like Him. And this was the end ! Malice and hatred and evil passion inflamed the men in authority: only indifference, or the light regard that is easily swayed either for or against, marked the attitude of the mass of the people; and in the inner circle of friends there were weakness and cowardice and treachery.

It was the night of the betrayal, when enemies without and the false friend within found their MD'^ victim, when love and truth and goodness were engulfed by evil, when hell had its highest triumph^ Human sin seemed too strong for divine goodness. If goodness is here thus utterly overthrown, what hope for it elsewhere ? It was a pitched battle between the forces of moral good and evil, and there seemed no doubt as to which side could claim the victory. Is it that good is in essential nature weaker than evil, as the prophet's prevision of such a case implies: "He made his grave with the wicked and with the rich in His death, because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in His mouth" ? Must good be ever thus defeated, prematurely cut off out of the land of the living? Are they that be against such a life more than they that be for it ?

It is no idle speculation this. It concerns us vitally. It affects our whole view of God and the universe and life and human nature itself. What are we to think of our prospects as a race, if this triumph of evLl represents history and destiny ? Must we despair that good can ever be the final goal of ill ? The whole complexion of thought and character and life will ultimately be determined by the answer we give; and it is unworthy of us to give a blind answer, a conclusion that has no grounds of fact on which it can securely rest. The blind answer is common enough, the conclusion which refuses to consider all the facts. Such answers have even been elevated into rival systems of philosophy.

On the one side there is a shallow optimism which gaily goes on its way both in theorising and in living, shutting its eyes to the existence of this dread conflict between good and evil. It ignores sin altogether. It arrives at a pleasant conclusion by eliminating the dark facts of history and experience. In all the varied forms of theory in which this mood clothes itself, the one thing found in them all is that it treats sin not as a reality, but if it is anything at all it is only as the shadow cast by light. In writers like Emerson, and sometimes even Browning, in their cheerful optimism we feel this lack of reality, we feel that their hopefulness has most of its being from their own happy temperament. When Emerson says that "the carrion in the sun will convert itself to grass and flowers, and man though in brothels or gaols or on gibbets is on his way to all that is good and true," or in another Essay, that "the league between virtue and nature engages all things to assume a hostile front to vice"; or when Browning sings, "The evil is null, is naught, is silence implying sound," or that "All's right with the world" ; while we acknowledge with gratitude the strength and comfort such brave words sometimes give us, we feel that they are glossing over the evidence on the other side, and are not taking a serious view enough of the deadly fact of sin.