The new creation

Preface

It is hoped that this little book may help young persons to understand, at least to some extent, the Truth on which the whole Christian Faith rests — the Incarnation of the Eternal Word. Perhaps it may arouse in some a desire to study further this inexhaustable subject, as they grow older, by the aid of such works as Wilberforce's "Doctrine of the Incarnation," and "Doctrine of the Holy Eucharist;" Dr. Ewer's "Operation of the Holy Spirit;" Bishop Moberley's "Great Forty Days," and others of similar character, to which the writer has been much indebted in the preparation of these chapters.

S. Leo's famous Tome on the Incarnation, it is hardly necessary to mention. His beautiful sermons, of which Canon Bright has given us a translation, will be found most salutary in their devotional spirit.

It will be noticed that certain important aspects of the Sacraments have not been touched upon; but a consideration of them did not fall within the especial line of thought taken, and to have introduced them would have confused and probably wearied the minds of youthful readers.

The Scotist view, so commonly held, that the Son of God would have become Incarnate even if Adam had not

Preface.

sinned, has not been alluded to. The form which the Incarnation took was in any case determined by the Fall ; and the relation between the Fall of man and his Restoration is all with which the following pages are concerned.

(House of the Holy Nativity, J Providence, R. I.

"OUR FAMILY WAYS."

The "Family" is the Church, and this book tells about the "ways" of the family. In other words, it tells what the Church is, its Creed, its Ministry, Liturgy and Sacraments. It is a book for young people to read, and read over again. It is full of instruction, and is so interestingly written, that any earnest reader will be charmed with the pleasant way in which the whole subject is treated,

Tlie Churchman (N. Y.) says of it : This is a very excellent little volume to be put into the hands of the young, especially when preparing for confirmation. It gives concisely and precisely just the information which pastors and teachers do not always know how to convey in an attractive form.

The Church Tear says : An excellent book to put in the hands of any young person, and one which might edify even an older one. It gives an account of the Churchly ways of the Church— the family ways of that very large family scattered abroad.

Price, 50 cents, net.

THE YOUNG CHURCHMAN CO., Publishers.

THE NEW CEEATION.

Chapter I

"In the Image of God created He him." — Gen. i, 27.

WE all of us know the story of the Old Creation; it is so familiar that we could probably tell it almost in the very words of the Bible ; but it is a continued story, and I feel sure that to some of you the continuation is not nearly so well known as the beginning.

Let us read the story together and see if we do not find the Second Part even more interesting and beautiful than the First.

Although we are so well acquainted with the scene in the Garden of Eden, we will look back to it for a few moments.

There, all about us, we see "every moving creature that hath life," u cattle and creeping things, and beasts of the earth," and "winged fowl," and all in great numbers, for they were "brought forth abundantly." Each one has many companions of its own kind. But amidst all these, we see one living creature that resembles none of them ; search as we may, we can find no other like him, not one that shares his nature — he is the sole specimen of humanity.

Of course, we have been told from childhood that all men are descended from Adam, but I want you to think about it a little, and try to realize how all human nature was contained in that one man, and was to flow from him, as a stream from its source, and spread itself over the whole earth. Keep this in mind, because it has a great deal to do — indeed, it has everything to do — with the New Creation.

Now we know that this human nature, as created and established by God, was perfect — that is, it was everything that God intended it to be. Adam was good, pure, and holy, and he was united to God by a supernatural gift of grace, to enable him to do His Will, and to attain to the

The New Cbeatiox. 11

end He had designed for him when this life was over — that is, to the Beatific Vision. Thus Adam was fit to be in direct communion with his Creator, Who, we are told, walked and talked with His creature in the Garden.

But before any child was born to Adam, before he had transmitted this pure nature to a single human being, he lost it ! For God had given him a free will — the power, that is, of choosing between good and evil — and Adam chose evil. He obeyed the voice of the Tempter instead of the Voice of God ; he sinned, and thus cast away and lost that supernatural gift of grace which united him to God, and would have preserved his nature in its first estate. Having lost that, his nature became disordered, weak, inclined to sin, and utterly unable to attain the end designed for it. Its perfection was gone beyond all his powers of recall.

After that (because one can give only what one has) Adam could give to his children only the corrupt nature which he now had, instead of the perfect one which God had given him ; and so we read that Adam "begat a son in his own likeness, after his image," not in that image of God in which he had himself been created. His sons, of course, could hand on to their children only the nature they had received from their father ; and they, in their turn, could do no better for their offspring ; and so it continued from generation to generation ; and from that time to this, the fallen nature of Adam has been the inheritance of all men.

But — and here begins the most interesting part of the story of the Pall — at the very moment when Adam and Eve w 7 ere expelled from Eden, and deprived of that familiar intercourse with God which had made the Garden a paradise to them, the gracious promise was given them that the human nature which they had so greatly injured should one day be restored to its original purity, and that as man had been overcome by Satan, Satan should in his turn be overcome by man. "The Seed of the woman, 1 ' God declared, "should bruise the serpent's head."

What consolation, in their exile, Adam and Eve must have found in that promise ! No doubt they expected it to be soon fulfilled.

When their first son was born, Eve said, "I have gotten the man from the Lord," and it seems probable that they hoped this was the promised Seed Who was to destroy the Destroyer, and restore them to holiness, without which they could not see the Lord.

They were mistaken, and hundreds of years passed and still the promise was not fulfilled. Yet it was never entirely forgotten. Men became unspeakably wicked; they cared nothing for God, and finally, with the exception of one pious man and his family, "all in whose nostrils was the breath of life, died" in the deluge ; but Noah carried the remembrance of the promise with him through the Flood, and bequeathed it to his descendants who were to people the earth afresh.

For two thousand years the tale of the Fall and the promised restoration was handed down from one generation to another, and at the end of that time, God took further means to ensure its being remembered. From among all the families of the earth, He chose one — that of Abraham — to be a continual witness to it. He revealed to the Patriarch that it was among his descendants that the hope, which had ever been the comfort of the godly, would be fulfilled.

u In thy seed," God said, u shall all the nations of the earth be blessed. 1 '

He afterwards renewed this promise to Abraham's son, Isaac, and grandson, Jacob ; and as time went on, from among the twelve tribes which sprang from Jacob, He declared the tribe of Judah to be that in which the Deliverer should arise, and the family of David the one in which He should be born.

To His coming the Jews, or Israelites — the descendants of Abraham, through his grandson Jacob, whose name God changed to Israel — were ever looking forward. The greatest grief to an Israelite was to have no children, because he was thus without hope of being an ancestor of the Messiah.

At last, after another two thousand years, the time drew near when the promise was to be fulfilled — so near that God told the pious Simeon he should not die until he had seen the Lord's Christ.

We do not know what expectations Simeon may have formed of the advent of 'the Messiah ; he may very probably have thought it would be ushered in with great pomp and splendour ; but we do know that when the Holy Spirit showed him the Hope of Israel in a little Infant, brought by poor parents into the Temple, his faith did not fail, and, taking the Child in his arms, he uttered that exquisite song of thanksgiving which the Church has ever repeated, and in which you have so often joined :

"Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace, according to Thy Word ; for mine eyes have seen Thy Salvation."

The Deliverer, then, had come, and you know Who He was. You know that because human nature could not, by its own efforts, recover its lost holiness, God resolved to do what man could not do for himself, and so the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity — The Word, as S. John calls Him — "was made Flesh and dwelt among us." He became Man — took to Himself, that is, human nature, and by uniting it, in His Own Person, with the Divine Nature, restored it to perfect holiness.

This is the great mystery which is the very foundation of the Christian Faith, and which is balled the Incarnation.

Those of yon who have studied Latin can trace the word to its root — caro, carnis, flesh — and see that it expresses our Lord's being clothed in flesh.

If you stop and think of this wonderful mystery, this amazing act of God, and the incomprehensible love for His sinful creatures which led Him to so humble Himself, you will understand why it has been the wide-spread custom among Christians to bow the knee in the Creed at the mention of the Incarnation. As we repeat the words : "And was Incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, and was made Man," what is more natural than that the flesh which He deigned to unite unto Himself should make its lowly acknowledgment of His marvellous condescension ?

But to return to our Lord's coming into this world as man.

Looking at Him, we see once more, standing upon the earth, one single specimen of sinless

The New Creatiox. 17

humanity, as there had stood one in the Garden of Eden — a Second Adam. That is one of our Lord's titles, you know, and as we go on you will see how true a name it is. And as Satan tempted the first Adam, so he tried all his wiles on the Second Adam, but in vain.

We follow our Lord through His earthly life and see Him — the Seed of the woman — bruising the serpent's head, as God had promised. And after being victorious in every encounter with the Enemy of mankind, and making full satisfaction for sin, we see the Perfect Humanity received up into Heaven and placed at the right hand of God.

So far, all is plain to you, I think. Human nature, which fell in Adam, recovered from its fall in Christ. But perhaps the question is already arising in your mind — how is this to help the human race, after all ? Since the Incarnation, men are, by natural birth, exactly what they were before — descendants of Adam, and inheritors of his corrupt nature. What advantage is it to you and to me, for instance, that human nature was once more perfect in One Man, if it be still sinful in us ?

If, indeed, there were any way in which we might share Christ's perfect Humanity, if He could be, in reality, a Second Adam to us, if men could be born of Him as truly as they are born of the first Adam, then we could understand that in Him, the Seed of Abraham, all nations of the world would be blessed.

But can such a thing be ?

Chapter II

u Created in Christ Jesus — Who is the Image of the Invisible God." — Eph. ii, 10 ; Col. i, 15.

TURN to the third chapter of S. John's Gospel and read the account of our Lord's conversation with Nicodemus, the Pharisee and ruler of the Jews, who, attracted to Christ, and believing that God was with Him, yet lacking courage to come to Him openly, came at night to inquire about the heavenly message which he felt this new prophet must have to deliver.

The interview took place at the very commencement of our Lord's public ministry, and what do we find was the message which He began at once to proclaim? Why, precisely this need of a new birth which we have just been thinking of.

Nicodemus, you notice, salutes our Lord as a a teacher come from God." Jesus shows him at once that it would not be enough to receive and submit to His teaching ; much more than that was necessary :

" Except a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God.""

And when He says, in answer to the perplexed Nicodemus, "Art thou a master of Israel," one, that is, well acquainted with the Scriptures and Jewish learning, "and knowest not these things?" He seems to mean that Nicodemus, knowing how sin had entered into the world, and that it was now an inheritance and came with one's birth, ought to have been quicker to understand and to welcome the idea of an entirely fresh beginning for the human race, a new birth by which men would inherit a better nature.

Our Lord says, u Ye must be born again." The mischief which had been done by the Fall was so great that it could be repaired only by the Creator, and man must be " created anew " — "born again."

Nicodemus asks how this birth is to take place, and Christ tells him men are to be new-born in Baptism. "Except a man be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God."

Now, after this interview with Nicodetnus, there is no record in the Gospels of any further teaching of our Lord on this subject, nor have we any written details of the instructions He gave to the Apostles during the forty days after His Resurrection (Acts i, 3). But just before His Ascension, we find Him directing the Apostles to baptize all nations ; and that He had, at some time, fully instructed them about the nature and effect of Baptism is evident from the unhesitating confidence with which they immediately began to teach of it as a New Birth, by which, through the power of the Holy Ghost, each separate child of the old Adam is united to the Humanity of the Second Adam, so that it has a new nature from that moment, and belongs to a new race, of which the Head is the Man Christ Jesus, Who is the "Beginning of the Creation of God" (Rev. iii, 14), the First-born of every creature (Col. i, 15), and the First-born among many brethren (Rom. viii, 29).

These titles refer, of course, to the Humanity of our Lord — for as God He is neither a Creature. nor our Brother — and they express very clearly and beautifully His relation to us as the New Adam, the Head of the New Creation.

If you look at S. Paul's Epistles you can see how full his thoughts were of this subject. He was constantly comparing the two Adams, one as head of the Old, the Other as Head of the New Creation, and reminding those to whom he wrote that what they lost through their connection with the one they regained through their union with the Other. He says :

u As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive" (I Cor. xv, 22).

u For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of One shall many be made righteous" (Rom. v, 19).

"As by the offence of one, judgment came upon all men to condemnation, even so by the righteousness of One the free gift came upon all men unto justification (Rom. v, 18).

u The first Adam was made a living soul ; the Last Adam was made a quickening Spirit" (I Cor. xv, 45).

u The first man is of the earth, earthv ; the

Second Man is the Lord from Heaven" (I Cor. xv, 47).

And the way in which we are to be united to this Second Man, S, Paul tells us, is by Baptism. He calls the baptismal font the Font of Regeneration — new birth, that is. He says that as many as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. He writes to the baptised as in Christ, and says that if any man be in Christ he is a new creature — or, a new creation.

S. Peter, too, says : "Baptism doth now save us," as we can easily see that it does, if it is the means by which we are united to Him Who is our Saviour ; and he addresses the Christians to whom he writes as being "bom again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by The Word of God" (I Pet. i, 23), and calls them "new born babes" (I Pet. ii, 2).

You must not think of this New Birth as a mere figure of speech. Oar union with Christ is so real and so close that S. Paul dares say : "We are members of His Body, of His Flesh and of His Bones" (Eph. v, 30). He adds, with humility, "This is a great mystery ;" but he holds fast to it by faith, and all through his Epistles the one great reproach which he makes to those who are not living as they ought, is that they are sinning against this great grace, this gift of a new nature which has been bestowed upon them, and living as if they were mere children of the old Adam, instead of being new-born in Christ.

Will you think of this when you are present at Holy Baptism ? There will be much to make you inattentive, perhaps ; the crying of the children, or some other little confusion, will be apt to draw your thoughts from the service ; but try to recall them at once and to keep your mind fixed on the great mystery which is being accomplished. Think how those who are there for Holy Baptism have come possessing only the sad inheritance they received from Adam — a corrupt nature — and how, after the water has been poured upon them and the words spoken, the inward grace has accompanied the outward sign, and they are born again and have received a new nature, for by the power of the Holy Ghost they have been united to the Humanity of Christ.

Perhaps you have noticed that it is the custom of many of our priests to use two stoles at Baptism — one purple, the other white. Purple is the colour of mourning, you know ; white, of rejoicing. The priest wears the purple one, which reminds us of our sorrowful condition as children of Adam, until the moment for the actual baptism of the candidates ; then, laying aside the purple and putting on the joyful white, he performs the Sacramental act, and immediately calls upon the congregation 5 to give thanks to Almighty God u because these children are regenerate."

This use of the two colours is very helpful in reminding us of what Baptism does for us.

And now we come to a practical question. God has revealed to us the truth that we receive a new nature in Baptism, and w T e believe it. But God's revelations are never merely to be believed, they are to be acted upon. How are we to act in this matter ? What is there for us to do ?

It is not difficult to find that out. We are new-born, indeed, but birth is only the beginning of life ; the life must be fed, strengthened and developed, and here we must work together with God.

The Christ-life is a free gift from God. We cannot obtain it by our own efforts ; but once given, our co-operation becomes necessary to enable it to grow. God provides the nourishment, as we shall see presently, but we must accept and use it. If we were to lay aside a child at its birth, give it no care, or perhaps bestow a little attention and food upon it when it happened to be convenient, we know it would pine away. It must have proper food and care. • So we must tend and feed the Christ-life in us, that it may grow and develop and be continually thrusting out and taking the place of the old life derived from Adam.

For the old nature is not at once cast out by the entrance of the new — that we can all of us feel. And there is plenty of food all about us for developing that old nature ; plenty on which the tendency to pride, anger, covetousness, sloth and all other sins may grow and flourish. Such food is offered us on every side, and alas ! how eagerly we receive it.

But those of us who have had any Christian training, have had from childhood up, God-given food for the New Life also. We were all of us taught some little prayer, all learned something of the Written Word of God, were all probably taken to some place of worship. Cannot you remember how the New Life began to grow when such food was given it ; how, even when you were very little, something would stir within you at the sound of solemn words which you yet did not half understand ; how you dimly felt that the roll of the organ and the burst of sacred song had to do with something very glorious and very beautiful — with Heaven and with God, of Whom you knew hardly more than the Name ?

Yes, the young soul responds quickly to the means of grace, and I wish those of you who have younger brothers and sisters to take to church, would consider this. Remember that they have received the New Life as well as you, and that it needs its nourishment. Do not think that they are too young to take part in the service, that they do not know what prayer and praise mean. They will know if you take the trouble to tell them. If they are taught why they must be very quiet and reverent, why they are to kneel or stand or sit, as the case may be, I believe that if they cannot comprehend all the words of the prayers, or follow all that is read and sung, there will yet be a spirit of devotion in many of those young souls which God may be vainly looking for in some of the older members of the congregation. So tell the little ones, will you not, Whose House the church is, and why we go there — to praise Him, to speak to Him and to hear what He has to say to us. Do not shirk the trouble this will* give you, and lazily think that you are at least doing something by taking them at all. Do not say to yourself that even if they do not understand anything about it, it is u good for them to get used to being there." That is what many elders seem to think, and experience shows that the perfectly natural result is that the children get so well used to being there and taking no part in the service that many keep up the custom in later years, and neither pray, nor praise, nor listen, although they may in the course of time adopt the attitudes suited to such acts.

No, if we are not taught, when we are little, to receive, according to our capacity, the spiritual food provided for us, we often actually do not know how to take it later.

And how is it with you, yourselves ?

When you go to church, do you realize what you are going for — or rather, what you should be going for — to worship God ?

Is your mouth really "praising Him with joyful lips" when you join in chant or hymn ?

Do you really speak to Him in the prayers ?

Do you listen to His Voice when His Word is read ?

During the Eucharistic Service, do you truly "offer Him an Oblation with great gladness" ?

When you find your thoughts wandering, do you recall them at once, or do you allow them to stray here, there and everywhere ?

Does the incense of prayer go up to Heaven bearing no petition from you, though your lips may have followed the words ; and is your heart absent from the tribute of praise which rises to mingle with the Holy, Holy, Holy, of the Angelic Host?

And if your conscience reproaches you when you leave the church after such a miserably spent hour, do you try to quiet it by saying that it is very difficult to keep one's thoughts fixed for so long, and that it is only natural that they should wander ?

Natural, do you say ? And according to whose nature is it natural ?

Ah ! we do not realize what nature it is we are so ready to bring forward, as an excuse for all sorts of weaknesses and faults. Our indulgent friends plead it in our favour, too, when they cannot really approve our conduct, and say deprecatingly, "Well, it is only natural ;" quite unconscious that their kindly meant apology is far from complimentary.

Natural ! Well, it is true that Adam seems to have been easily overcome by Satan, and we inherit his nature, but are we really going to take that for a consoling thought ?

When our higher nature struggles to get the supremacy and we feel uncomfortable over what we have been doing or saying, are we really going to cheer ourselves up by the thought that we are children of the old Adam, after all ? God forbid.

And it is not true, either. We, children of

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the old Adam, after all ? What ! After we have been united to the Second Adam ? No ! After Baptism, evil is no longer rightly to be called natural to us. It is the fruits of the Spirit — love, joy, peace, long-suffering and the rest — which may correctly be said to be natural to us ; while the works of the flesh — envy, hatred, strife ; and all the others — are unnatural. For we have S. Paul's authority for considering our old nature as dead and buried. "Reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin," he says (Rom. vi, 11), and tells us that we are buried with Christ in Baptism (Rom. vi, 4).

Perhaps this seems incomprehensible to you, and you ask why, if our old nature is dead and buried, we feel it stirring so constantly within us. It is because although the sentence of death was passed upon it when we received the New Life, the actual death itself is gradual ; the old nature u dies hard," as the saying is, and will not wholly die until the separation of soul and body. But we are to "reckon" it as dead, because God has, if we may say so, signed its death warrant, and so long as we are striving to live according to the

New Nature which is in us, He graciously reckons the old as dead. He regards in us only the Nature of His Beloved Son, and His Death unto sin is reckoned as ours.

Which of our works, then, are natural in God's sight ?

Can we ever plead before Him that our sins are natural ?

If we do, if we ask God to look away from Christ and regard us as in Adam still, we cut from under our feet the only ground on which we can claim His forgiveness at all ; for we are accepted in Christ, not in Adam.