The quest of life

Front matter

Class J^X-*L233

BookJB-13ii4

Copyright N°.

Contents

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I The Quest of Life 3

II Where Do You Live? 21

II Where Do You Live?

"Rabbi, where dwellest Thou?

He saith unto them, Come and see" — John" i, 38, 39,

II

WHERE DO YOU LIVE?

YOU are frequently asked, especially if you happen to be away from home, " Where do you live? " Some one is trying to locate you. He feels that he might understand your life better if he had you related to some set of facts with which he is already familiar.

You name some city, New York, Chicago, San Francisco, as the case may be. You have not answered the man's question. It may be that was all he wanted to know, but his question suggests a great deal more than that. Now as a matter of fact, where do you really live? Two men may reside in the same city and yet live as far apart as the North Pole and the South Pole. Two men may reside on the same street or in the same house and yet have a whole continent between. It is not a question of geography. You cannot tell where any man lives by looking at the map or in the city directory. You must examine the contents of the man. It is a question of his own dominant interest. In that deeper sense, where do you really live? Where are you at home? Where may I address you and be sure of reaching [21]

you? It is a vital question. If every one would stand up and tell us exactly where he lives it would be more interesting and more profitable than any sermon ever preached.

You said a moment ago that you lived in Chicago. What is Chicago? A place on the map? A collection of buildings there on the west shore of Lake Michigan? That is not Chicago — that is where you will find Chicago. But Chicago itself is a vast array of human interests, a bewildering complexity of hopes and fears, longings and yearnings, aspirations and resolves. There are ten thousand different Chicagos, some of them high and fine, some of them low and mean. In what particular Chicago are you at home? Where in all that mass of interest and activity are you rooted, grounded, naturalized, domiciled? You see how this question " Where do you live? " goes down to the root of the matter. It finds every man, as we say in the common phrase, " right where he lives."

It was so when the question was first asked there in my text. John the Baptist saw a majestic figure coming down from the north. He saw Jesus of Nazareth taking his first steps in that service which has changed the moral history of the world. And when he saw him approach he said in reverent tones, " Behold, the Lamb of God! He is taking away the sin of the world! "

Two of John's disciples heard him speak and they followed Jesus. And as they saw in his [22]

Where Do You Live?

face the glory of the Eternal, as they heard the accents of power fall from his lips, as they felt a strange, mysterious influence stealing in upon their hearts while they companied with him, they began to wonder where he lived. They wanted to locate him in this whirling complexity of interest. They wanted to relate him in definite fashion to that world of experience which they knew. And they said, " Eabbi, where dwellest thou? " It was the same familiar question — " Where do you live? "

Where did the Son of man live? In what part of the world; in how much of the world? In what part of the world and in how much of the world does any man live? The philosophers tell us that each man's impression or perception of the world is the only reality there is in the case for him. The only world that exists for me is the world that I personally can see and hear and feel, the system of reality with which I stand related, to which I make response. There may be ten thousand other worlds, but if they do not enter into my personal consciousness they do not exist for me. Things only become real to me as they enter into my own immediate experience.

When we view it in this light what an endless variety of worlds there are! What different impressions are made upon individuals by this system of reality around us and above us and beneath us! The beauty of form and color is not in the blind man's world — rainbows and sunsets do not exist for him. It is [23]

all as though they were not. Melody and harmony are not in the deaf man's world. He lives in a world of unbroken silence. The overture to Tannhauser or the fifth . symphony of Beethoven, the songs of the birds and the laughter of little children have no meaning and no existence for him. They are not in his world. The spiritual values, forces and activities do not exist for the man who is dead or indifferent to them all. They are not in his world. In every case the presence or the absence of a certain faculty determines the range of reality for that particular man — it determines whether his world shall be large or small, rich in content or meager.

What sort of a world do you live in? How much of the world do you live in? It depends not so much upon what is outside of you as upon what is inside of you. What are your powers of perception and appreciation? What is the range of reality to which you stand related? To how many different forms of stimulus do you make response? At how many points, on how many levels do you react ? This is what determines the real content of each man's world. Some man may reside, so far as his postoffice address is concerned, in the most favored spot on earth and yet live all his days in a place as uninteresting as Jersey City. :

Let me illustrate in homely fashion: I take my dog with me into the Dresden gallery. He sees all that I see, physically speaking. He [24]

Where Do You Live ?

probably sees a great deal more, for his eyesight is better than mine: he has never had to succumb to the indignity of glasses. But when we come out, after visiting every room, the Sistine Madonna is not in the dog's world. It is in my world. It has been in my world ever since I saw it for the first time twenty years ago. I see it, I feel it, I rejoice in the inspiration of it even as I stand here. But the dog might live out all his days in the Dresden gallery and never see it. The Sistine Madonna would not enter his world. It is not a question of eyesight but of insight. It is the mind that sees more than the eyes.

It is only six feet, more or less, for any of us from one world to the other. Here we are with our feet on the ground, of the earth, earthy. Here we are dust of its dust and destined to make return. Here we are with our heads among the stars, in a world of vision, aspiration and high resolve. And this world where our minds go is as real as the streets and the lanes where our feet go. In which world are you most at home? Where does your mind go when it is free to do not what it must but what it likes? Where does your heart go in its prevailing moods and desires?

You have cellars in your homes, stored with coal an I provisions, but you do not live down there. You have kitchens where food is prepared, and dining-rooms where it is tastefully served, but you do not live there, I trust. You have living-rooms, as we say, and libraries, [25]

with opportunities innumerable for intellectual and social enjoyment, but you cannot live by these alone. Unless you have in your home and in your life an upper room facing squarely upon the sky, looking out upon a horizon bounded by nothing nearer than the stars and the being of God, you are not living in the world for which you were intended. Give me then your full address — and by your definition of the world you live in, I shall know the quality of your life.

How many different worlds there are for the men we meet in daily life! Here are four men! The first man lives in a stream of commodities. His world is a river of things to be bought and sold. Now it flows this way and now it flows that way, but always in such a way as to turn the wheels of his mill and grind him out a grist of profits. He lives in that stream of commodities as a trout lives in the brook. He eats in it, sleeps in it, dreams in it, works in it, seven days in the week. He is never out of it for an hour, from Monday morning to Sunday night. Talk to him on ?,ny other topic than that of trade and you find him as dull as a pine stump. He feels sure that a man's life does consist in the abundance of the things he can buy, a certain eminent authority to the contrary notwithstanding. And this is the world he lives in: it is the only world he knows.

Here is another man who lives in a world of books, ideas, judgments. He is interested in [26]

Where Do You Live?

outlooks, insights and discriminations. He knows ten times as much about Plato and Aristotle, who have been dead two thousand years, as he does about Mr. John D. Rockefeller, who is very much alive. In his world the quotations and transactions have to do with the truth, and particularly with that form of truth which sets men free from blindness and evil. He strives to keep his credit good by keeping his eye single, that his whole moral nature may be full of light. He feels that wisdom is the principal thing, that its value is above rubies; and he strives with all his getting to get understanding. And that is the sort of world he lives in.

Here is a third man who lives in a world of distrust, suspicion and insinuation. He rejoices in iniquity more than in the truth. He smacks his lips over any fresh bit of it which comes his way. He prides himself on his freedom from all illusions and enthusiasms. < ' They are all devils," he says; " they all have horns and hoofs hidden away under their clothes and conventionalities." He feels that he is simply a smarter devil than the rest. He says with a sneer, " Every man has his price,' ' knowing that he has his price. He is cold, cynical, dis- . agreeable, untouched by those generous enthusiasms which fire the hearts of his fellows. He Jives in that world which Dante saw when he wrote the ' * Inferno. ' ' This man could write a description of the Inferno himself as accurate as a Baedeker. And this world of cynical [27]

distrust is the only world where he feels at home.

Here is another man whose head is full of visions and dreams of better things. He lives in a world where everybody is kind and good, hopeful and helpful. He is all that: he thinks people generally are, as indeed many of them are when he is present. He carries with him an atmosphere which stimulates the best in every life. He carries the atmosphere which Forbes Eobertson carried into the boarding house in Bloomsbury in " The Passing of the Third Floor Back. ' ' It is an atmosphere which has a wholesome effect upon the selfish and the sluggish, encouraging them to be kind and good, hopeful and helpful. This man appraises everything in terms of spiritual value. To him it is all property, real and personal, possessed of worth unspeakable. He has religion, not as a history of something that happened a long time ago, not as a remote theory about things, not as a piece of stately ritual. He has religion as an experience, as a life. He lives in a world where God the Father is above all and in all and through all things. And this is his world.

How far apart these four men seem when we look at them! Yet they may all reside in the same town and on the same street. Now and then they may meet for an hour at the baseball game or in the theater or at church. They seem for the moment to have a common interest. But the meeting breaks up and each [28]

Where Do You Live?

man goes his way. Each one returns to his own particular world and goes sailing along through space like the earth on its orbit.

The sky is a roomy place ; the sun, the moon and all the stars are there, each one moving on its appointed way without touching any of the rest. The world of human life is a great, wide, roomy place; there is a chance for every conceivable type. And each man builds up his own particular planet of being, his own sphere of action, by the relations he sustains, by the values on which he sets his heart, by the forms of action into which he enters. He builds his own planet of life and then moves with it on his own selected orbit through this universe of interest. Where in all that world of infinite variety do you dwell? How much of that world of reality, seen and unseen, has become real to you!

But let me return again to the original setting of the text. The two men asked Christ where he lived. " Rabbi, where dwellest thou? " Speaking after the manner of men, he did not live in much of a world. He was born in the manger of a stable. He was brought up in the home of a carpenter at Nazareth. When I was in Nazareth a few years ago they showed me the house. It may not have been the identical house — I have no idea that it was — but it was some such humble affair, for his people were poor. When he grew up and entered upon his active service going about doing good, there were times when he had [29]

nowhere to lay his head. He accepted hospitality when it was offered, sometimes by rich men like Zacchaeus, sometimes by the fairly well-to-do, like Mary and Martha, and sometimes by those who were as poor as himself. When nothing offered, he slept out and ate the raw wheat which his disciples plucked in the fields. When he came to die he did not die in a bed — he died on a cross and his body was laid in a borrowed tomb. When you study the record of his life it seems to lack any worthy setting. It was a rough world for him to live in. The foxes had holes and the birds of the air had nests, but the Son of man was without worthy residence.

But where did he actually live during all that time? I wish I could tell you. It would make this sermon forever memorable. I could not possibly put it in words. No man could. He who spoke as never man spake could not put it in words. He would not even try. When men undertook to locate him in this complexity of interest and activity, you remember his reply. He did not name a certain city or town. " Eabbi, where dwellest thou? " Jesus answered, " Come and see." Come and live in my world! Come and live in it for a day, for an hour, and then you will know! It was the only way they could know. The greatest things in life cannot be described — they must be seen and felt and experienced at first hand.

He did not undertake to describe the world he lived in but he gave us several significant [30]

Where Do You Live?

hints. He lived in a world where he could say at any moment, " I am not alone, the Father is with me." He had unbrokenly the sense of divine companionship. He felt that he was allied with the Infinite. He claimed kinship with the Eternal. He might be walking through a crowded street, the people thronging him; he might be asleep in the hinder part of a boat ; he might be addressing a multitude from the hillside; he might be alone at prayer on the mountain top. It mattered not — he was not alone; the Father was with him. He had unbrokenly that sense of an exalted fellowship.

He lived in a world where he could say, " I come not to do mine own will but the will of him that sent me." He had the sense of mission. He did not live by mood or whim. He did not dash aimlessly here or there on any passing impulse. He was building his life finely and steadily into a far-reaching, divine plan. He was shaping his course with reference to a purpose which reached from the hour when the morning stars sang together on to the day when a victorious host shall stand before the throne singing the song of moral achievement. He was making himself at home in those great moral processes which are to bring the city of God, the ideal social order, down out of heaven and set it up in active operation on this common earth. He had a plan, a purpose, a goal, and he steadfastly set his face toward the great fulfillment. " I come not to do mine own will but the will of him who sent me. ' ' He [31]

lived in a world where he had the sense of mission.

He lived in a world where he could say to all the lives he met, ' ' I am among you as one who serves." He was ready and able to do good to every life that came within the length of his cable tow. It mattered not whether the life was rich or poor, cultured or simple, sinful or saintly, he was there as one who served. Out among the Gentiles it was not so. There the great ones exercised lordship and dominion. But in Christ's world, if any man would be great he must serve; and the greatest of all must be the servant of all. He once took a towel and girded himself that he might wash the disciples' feet. He prepared himself for that particular act of service. But the spirit of service he never put on because he never took it off — it was always there, as much a part of him as his own right hand. It was as much a part of his world as the power of gravitation. He took upon himself the form and the spirit of a servant becoming obedient to the exacting demands of an exalted usefulness.

What a world for the Son of man to live in ! What a world for all the sons of men to live in ! Take those three sides of the triangle and think of what they enclose! The sense of divine companionship, the sense of mission, and the spirit of service! And this does not exhaust the content of the world where he dwelt. I have only pointed to the sun, the moon and one of the principal stars. If we should undertake [32]

Where Do You Live?

to indicate the entire glory of that world which he saw around him in the unrealized capacity of this human nature for spiritual advance and in the fullness of that divine help upon which he relied, we should need all the angels in heaven singing at once and all the wise men on earth speaking at once and every created thing become vocal to bring out the full content of that world which Jesus saw. He had nowhere to lay his head, but he lived in a world of surpassing beauty and of glory unspeakable.

Words fail us in the face of that prospect! It was because he felt himself unable to describe what he saw and felt and enjoyed that Jesus said to his questioners, " Come and see." We can easily repeat those three sentences — " The Father is with me; I come to do the will of him who sent me; I am among you as one who serves ' ' — but if we would know the world to which they point we must live in it. We must climb its mountains of spiritual aspiration. We must traverse its valleys of spiritual peace. We must eat the ripe fruit which grows on the tree of life and drink the water which flows clear as crystal from the throne of God. Come and see! Then you will know! Live in the mood and after the method of Christ and you will know where he lived.

How much of a world did his most illustrious disciple inhabit? " I am a citizen of no mean city," Paul said. Did he mean Tarsus? That was where he came from — ' l Saul of Tarsus. ' ' Yes, he meant Tarsus — his own Tarsus. There [33]

were as many different cities of Tarsus as there are cities of Chicago. There were thieves and harlots in Tarsus — Paul was not a citizen of their city. There were mean men in Tarsus, men who were unkindly and ungodly — Paul was not a citizen of their city. He was a citizen of his own Tarsus, and that city was not mean.

His ultimate citizenship, however, was not in Tarsus but in a realm of moral purpose and spiritual ideals. " Our citizenship is in heaven." And that city of moral purpose and spiritual ideals to which he owed his final allegiance is a city which can be set up anywhere, at Tarsus or Ephesus, in Corinth or in Rome, in New York or in Shanghai. And it is for every man to build for himself that city to which he gives his final allegiance. He frames it up out of the principles by which he lives, from the values upon which he sets his heart, from the realities to which he stands intimately related. And when that city is well built it is " no mean city," it matters not on what spot of earth it may happen to stand.

The outward setting of any man's life is of small moment. When Oliver Goldsmith was so poor that he could scarcely get bread to put in his mouth he had a room below the level of the street. He was taunted with it on one occasion. Some brute said to him, " You lodge in a basement." Instantly came the stinging retort, " Your soul must lodge in a basement."

You cannot tell where a man lodges by watch- [34]

Where Do You Live?

ing the outside of him. The body may be born in the manger of a stable. It may issue forth from some provincial town like Tarsus. It may see the day when it can afford no better place of residence than a basement. What of it? The inner life may, in the hour of its strength, stand forth like a king in his kingdom. The inner life may claim and hold its citizenship in heaven. The inner life may open its lips and make the world its debtor by the sweetness of its song. The question as to what place on the map you hail from does not interest me. I do not care whether you have two rooms in your house or twenty, or twice that. But where do you, as a child of the Eternal, find yourself at home? That question is fundamental.

How splendid it is that it is always possible for us to move ! In this outer world it may not be so. You may not like the city you live in or the street you are on or the house you occupy, yet you may be powerless to change it. Your whole environment may be distasteful to you, but you are compelled to settle down and make the best of it. But when we come to the dwelling-place of that inner life we are all pilgrims and sojourners as our fathers were. We can always move.

It may be done right here, without dust or noise. You need not send out for the furniture van. You can do it yourself by your own choice and resolve. If you have an uneasy feeling that the world you have been living in for [35]

months, for years it may be, has not the breadth or depth or height suitable for the residence and growth of a soul, then move. Move ont! Move up where you belong ! Move into a world where the best that is in you can stand up straight because the ceiling is high! Move where you can strike out and not come at once into contact with some restraining wall ! Move up where you can breathe your native air as a child of the Eternal.

The world where the religious man lives is a large world, but the religious life is not easy. It is the most difficult life there is, and the most rewarding. There is an upper level of spiritual privilege which towers above the common grind as the Matterhorn towers above the valley of the Rhone. But to reach it involves a stiff climb. You can do it if you will. No weight of years or bodily infirmity need detain you here. No long remove from such vantage grounds as are found in the Alps, the Andes and the Sierras need hinder you — the path of spiritual ascent is not far from any one of us.

But if you would go aloft you must go in marching order. Lay aside every weight. Lay aside the sin which doth so easily beset us. Strip off every evil purpose and intent, every shred of spite or bitterness or ill will. Then by your own personal faith, rope yourself in with the Guide and Helper of man's life, the Lord Jesus, and climb! And when you stand on that higher level breathing the air you were [36]

Where Do You Live?

meant to breathe and lifting your eyes to the heights whence cometh help, you can say to every man who asks your residence, " I live in a city that hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God."

Ill

I have seen God.'* — Genesis xxxii, 30.

Ill

THIS is a tremendous statement! Who makes it? Some ripened saint dwelling apart from the world, unstained by its evil? Some wise philosopher long accustomed to think hard upon that which is fundamental and absolute? Some noble woman, with her keener spiritual intuitions, her moral nature alert and sensitive? Who is it that ventures upon this bold statement — " I have seen God! "

It was none of these — it was a practical, hard-headed business man. You will easily recall the scene described in that passage where the text stands. A man named Jacob had been wrestling all night at Jabbok Ford with a mysterious antagonist. He was a man of affairs and practical to the thirty-third and last degree. He had been living with his feet and his eyes very much upon the ground. He had begun his career by trading off a cheap mess of pottage for a valuable birthright. He played a clever trick on his aged father to obtain a blessing which carried with it the rights of primogeniture. He manipulated the flocks of his employer Laban so skillfully that at the termina- [41]

tion of their contract Jacob had the larger part of the flocks and Laban a period of very instructive experience. Jacob was nothing if not practical. And he had been so successful that now he was returning to his old home with oxen and asses, with flocks and herds, with manservants and maidservants, and a very great household. ' ' With my staff I passed over this Jordan and now I am become two bands." And this practical man of affairs stood there at daybreak saying, " I have seen God! "

The place where he gained this vision is also suggestive. It was not in some noble temple where lofty arches, stained glass windows and religious music woo the mind into an attitude of reverence. It was not at some point of great natural beauty like Glacier Point in the Yosemite or Inspiration Point in the Yellowstone, like Zermatt looking toward the Matterhorn, or Darjeeling facing upon the Himalayas. In these situations the sheer magnificence of the outlook lifts the mind toward the Infinite. Jacob had his vision on the banks of an insignificant stream at a lonely spot called Jabbok Ford. The situation was entirely commonplace — there was nothing in the setting to assist religious sentiment. Yet there on the dead level, with his flocks and his herds about him, this practical man felt moved to say, " I have seen God."