In His steps, a book for young Christians

Preface To New Edition

THE object of this little book is to help young Christians as they begin their new life. It contains merely a few suggestions and counsels by an older brother who has gone a little farther on the way, who has experienced some of the difficulties and dangers and learned a little of the help Christ is ready to give to those who will accept it.

This book has been prepared specially to meet the desire of pastors and sessions who wish to give to those whom they receive into the Church a suitable manual of instruction and help. Thousands of copies of the former edition have been given in this way. The book may be found suitable also for teachers to put into the hands of young people in their classes who wish to begin the Christian life.

This new edition contains much new matter, and the whole book has been carefully revised.

J. R. M.

Philadelphia.

Contents

CHAP. PAGE

I. — Uniting with the Church . . 7

II. — Beginning Well 14

CHAPTER I. Uniting with the Church

XO unite with the church is to take one's place among the followers of the Master. It is a public act. It is a confession of Christ before men. It is not a profession of superior saintliness ; on the other hand, it is a distinct avowal of personal sinfulness and unworthiness. Those who seek admission into the church come as sinners, needing and accepting the mercy of God and depending upon the atonement of Christ for the forgiveness of their sins.

They come confessing Christ. They have heard his call, " Follow me," and have responded. Uniting with the church is taking a place among the friends of Christ ; it is coming out from the world to be on Christ's side. There are but two parties among men. " He that is not with me is against me," said Jesus. The church consists of those who

In His Steps.

are with Christ. This suggests one of the reasons why those who love Christ should take their place in the church. By so doing they declare to all the world where they stand and cast all the influence of their life and example on Christ's side.

Secret discipleship fails at this point. However much we may love Christ, however intimate our fellowship with him may be, however sincere our friendship for him, he misses in us the outspoken loyalty of a true confession which proclaims his name in its every breath. Secret discipleship hides its light and fails to honor Christ before men.

Uniting with the church is a declaration that one has joined the company of Christ's disciples. Disciples are learners. Young Christians have entered the school of Christ — have only entered it. They do not profess to have attained perfection ; they profess only to have begun the Christian life.

Jesus took his first disciples into his school and for three years taught and trained them. He made known to them the great truths of Christianity which he had come to reveal — truths about God, about his kingdom on the earth, about duty. Then he taught them how to live.

In like manner the disciples of Christ who enter his church now become his scholars. They may be very ignorant, but this is no

Uniting with the Church.

reason why they should not be admitted to the school of the great Teacher. They should not wait to increase their knowledge before they become his disciples. The very purpose of a school is to take those who are ignorant and teach them.

But one condition of admittance as a scholar is, a desire to learn and a readiness to be taught. Of the first Christians, after the day of Pentecost, it is given as one of the marks of new life in them, that they continued steadfastly in the apostles' teaching. They were eager to learn all they could hear about Jesus, and therefore they lost no opportunity of listening to the teaching of the apostles, who had been with Jesus for three years. Young Christians should always be eager to learn. This is one of the objects of church membership.

In different ways is this instruction given. A Christian home should be a school of Christ. The Christian mother is Christ's first apostle to her children who should learn from her lips the great lessons of life. Home teachings come first when the mind is open and the heart is tender and sensitive to impressions. The Sabbath-school is designed to do an important work in teaching the young the truths of Christianity. The pastor is a teacher. He has been trained to be an instructor of others in knowledge of God

In His Steps.

and in the way of life. He expounds the vital truths of the Scriptures and also interprets them for daily life. The private reading of the Bible is another way of learning the things we need to know to make us wise unto salvation.

But knowledge is not all. Even Bible knowledge is not all, does not alone make one a good Christian. One might know all the great facts and doctrines of the word of God, might be a profound Bible scholar and a wise theologian, and yet not be an advanced or even a growing Christian. We are to learn to live Christ as well as to know the truths about Christ. Jesus in his teachings makes a great deal of obedience. We are his friends if we do whatsoever he commands us. We are to learn to be patient, meek, gentle, long-suffering, compassionate. We are to learn to be humble, kindly-affectioned, unselfish, truthful, sincere.

Young Christians enter Christ's school to be trained in all the qualities which make up the true Christian life. Jesus is not only the teacher, — his life is the text-book which we are to study. Part of his mission to this world was to show us in himself what a true and complete human life is. He was sinless, and he realized the full beauty of obedience to the divine will. We are to look to his life to learn just how to live, the kind of charac-

I

Uniting with the Church.

ter we are to seek to have, the meaning of the lessons which his words set for us. We are in the school of Christ to be trained in all Christian life and duty.

The lessons the Bible sets for us we are to learn to live out in common life. Every word of Christ sets a copy for us, as it were, and we are to learn to write it in fair and beautiful lines. For example, it is not enough to learn from the Beatitudes that certain qualities are praised by the great Teacher ; we are to get the Beatitudes into our own life as quickly and as perfectly as we can. So of all the teachings of Christ — they are not for knowing merely, as one learns the fine sayings of favorite literary writers ; they are for living. They are to become lamps to our feet and lights to our path, and they are to be wrought into the web of our character. The object of the church in this training of disciples is well expressed in the words of St. Paul, — " for the perfecting of the saints, unto the work of ministering, unto the building up of the body of Christ : till we all attain unto the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a fullgrown man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ."

This thought of the church as the school of Christ and of young Christians as enter-

In His Steps.

ing the school, is very suggestive. We are not to expect perfection, but we have a right to expect an increasing knowledge of spiritual things and also spiritual growth in all the qualities which belong to Christian character. We should become more patient, more loving, more unselfish, more helpful, more faithful in all duty, more like Christ.

Uniting with the church brings its duties. It allies us with Christ and makes us coworkers with him. We are not to think merely of what the church may do for us, but also of what we may do for the church. Church loyalty is a mark of true and wholesome Christian life. One need not be a narrow sectarian to be a good church member ; but one will always be the better Christian for being entirely devoted to his own church and enthusiastic in all its life and work. Anything that weakens a man's loyalty to his own particular church hurts his spiritual life and lessens his usefulness as a Christian.

In many ways church members may serve their church. They should be interested in all its work of saving souls and promoting the cause of Christ. They should regularly attend its services. They should contribute for its support. They should study its interests and seek in every way to extend its influence. They should keep the church in

Uniting with the Church.

their prayers, daily making supplication for it. They should bring to it always the best they have to bring, not of gifts and service only, but also of love and personal helpfulness.

It is a high privilege to be a church member, and one who has such honor should seek to be worthy of it, as the church is the body of Christ in this world.

CHAPTER II. Beginning Well

A GOOD beginning is half. Many people spend the latter part of their years in correcting the errors of the earlier part, and by the time they are ready to live the end has come. A good beginning at once turns all the energies into the right channels. No golden years need then be wasted in unlearning false lessons, in revising unwise or impracticable plans or in retracing one's steps. Many a career of brilliant possibilities is marred by a wrong beginning. There are mistakes of early life which men never get over. A bad foundation has caused the wreck of many a noble building. Inadequate preparation for a business or a calling leads, at the best, to impaired success, and most frequently results, in the end, in utter failure.

These principles apply in Christian life. It is of the utmost importance that we start well. Many Christians walk in doubt and shadow all their days, never entering into rich joy and peace, because at the beginning 14

Beginning Well.

they failed to realize the blessedness of the privileges to which, as children of God, they are entitled. Many others never attain anything noble and beautiful in Christian life and character because at the beginning they did not wholly disentangle themselves from their old life and fully consecrate themselves to Christ.

A good beginning, therefore, involves two things — clearness and definiteness of aim, with intelligent views of the nature and meaning of the Christian life; and completeness of consecration.

Many men fail in life because they have no settled purpose, no well-defined plan. They have no goal set before them which with all their energies they strive to reach. There is in their mind no clear and distinct idea toward which they struggle. They merely drift on the current, and are borne by it whithersoever it flows. They are not masters in life, but poor slaves. They conquer nothing, but are the mere creatures of circumstance. Such lives, however, are unworthy of intelligent beings endowed with immortal powers, and they never reach any high degree of nobleness or success.

No sculptor touches the marble until he

has in his mind a definite conception of his

work as it will appear when it has been

finished. He sees a vision before him of a

i5

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very lovely form, and then sets to work to fashion the vision in the stone. No builder begins to erect a house until a complete plan embracing every detail has been adopted. Before he strikes a stroke he knows precisely what the finished structure will be. No one would cut into a web of rich and costly cloth until he had before him the pattern of the garment he would make. In all work on material things men have definite aims before they begin their work, and know precisely what they intend to produce.

But in life itself and in living, in character-building, in destiny-shaping, many fail to exercise such wisdom. Multitudes never give one earnest thought to such questions as these: "What is my life? For what purpose is it intrusted to me ? What ought I to do with it ? What should be the great aim of my existence ? What should I strive to be and to do?" Thousands live aimlessly, having no true sense of the responsibility of living, never forming an earnest, resolute purpose to rise to any noble height or to achieve any worthy thing. An immortal life should have its aim ever shining before it bright and clear as a star in the heavens. To grow up as a plant — without thought or purpose — is well enough for a plant, and God clothes it and shapes it into marvelous beauty; but men with undying souls and measureless 16

Beginning Well.

possibilities should have a purpose worthy of their immortality, and should strive with heroic energy to attain it.

In entering the Christian life there should be a clear aim. We should know definitely what this new life is which we have now to live. With but vague ideas of the meaning of a Christian life — its ideal, its requirements, its privileges, the duties which belong to it — no one can begin well. All is vague and misty, and while it is so we cannot put any purpose or energy into our life. We need to understand the new relations into which we come as children of God, in order that we may realize the privileges of our position. We need to have a clear conception of the final aim of all Christian attainment and aspiration, in order that we may strive toward it. We need to know what is required of a Christian toward his God and toward his fellow men, in order that we may faithfully and intelligently perform all our duties. We need to know the conditions of Christian life — its needs, its dangers — in order that we may avail ourselves of the necessary helps provided for us. Thus a clear and intelligent aim is essential in beginning well as a Christian.

The other essential thing in beginning well is the devotion and consecration of ourselves to the new life we have chosen. A good 2 17

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ideal is not enough. One may aim an arrow with perfect accuracy, but the bow must also be drawn and the cord let fly if the arrow is to reach the mark. A vision in the brain is not enough for the sculptor : he must hew and chisel the marble into the form of his vision. The architect's plan is only a picture, and there must be toil and cost until the building stands complete in its noble beauty.

A good aim is not all of a Christian life. It is nothing more than an empty dream unless it be wrought out in Godlike character and Christlike ministry. Every earnest Christian looks much at the glorious Master, and, as he looks, visions of wondrous beauty fill his soul — glimpses of the loveliness of Christ ; and he must then seek with patient yet intense purpose to reproduce these heavenly visions in his own life.

Many people have sublimest aspirations and wishes — and even form their aspirations and wishes into intentions and resolves — who yet never take a step toward realizing them. Mere knowing what it is to be a Christian makes no one a Christian ; many perish with the glorious ideal shining full and clear before their eyes. Merely seeing the beauty of Christ, as it is held before us for our copying, will never fashion us into that beauty. Our knowledge must be wrought into life. 18

Beginning Well.

The image our souls see must be fashioned into character. Our good intentions must take form in daily deeds. Knowing God's will, we must do it with willing heart and diligent hand.

" Make my mortal dreams come true With the work I fain would do ; Clothe with life the weak intent : Let me be the thing I meant ; Let me find in thy employ Peace that dearer is than joy ; Out of self to love be led, And to heaven acclimated, Until all things sweet and good Seem my natural habitude."

CHAPTER III. The Christian Life: The Ideal

Y^HAT is it to be a Christian ? What is that change which, wrought in a natural man, makes him a Christian man ? What are a Christian's new relations to God and to his fellow men ? What is Christian character ? How should a Christian live ? What is the pattern on which his life should be fashioned ? If we would make our Christian life what it ought to be, we must find plain, clear answers to these questions.

A Christian is one who believes on Christ. He has intrusted his whole life, with its sin, its guilt, its ruin, its need its security for eternity, its redemption, cleansing and transformation, to the hands of the mighty Saviour, the strong Son of God. A Christian is therefore a saved one, a redeemed one — saved, redeemed, by Christ. He is no longer guilty and condemned : he is acquitted, justified, restored to such relations before God that he is as if he had never sinned, so fully are his sins put away. He is God's lost and wander-

The Christian Life: The Ideal.

ing child brought home, received, reconciled, restored to all a child's privileges.

But this is not all ; it is not merely a change of relations. Those who believe on Christ are born again, the Scriptures say — born from above, born of God ; that is, there is a new, a divine, life in the regenerated soul. Christ speaks of it as a well of water in the believer springing up into everlasting life. The result is shown in new affections, new desires, new hopes, new aims. Forgiveness of sins is not enough. A man's lies and dishonesties may be forgiven ; but, if that is all, he is still a liar and dishonest. God's forgiveness regenerates. A Christian life is the setting up of the kingdom of God in a human heart.

A child was troubled at the thought that heaven was so far away, and was perplexed to know how he could ever get up to that bright home. His mother explained to him that heaven must first come down to him — must first enter his heart. A Christian is one into whose heart the spirit of heaven has entered. The new life is like that they live in heaven. We are taught to pray, " Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven." The one place in all the earth in which it most concerns each Christian to see that God's will is done as it is in heaven is in his own individual heart.

If we are truly born again, the life of

In His Steps.

heaven has really begun within us. It maybe very feeble in its beginning, like one little seed only, planted in a garden ; but the one seed is from heaven, and the new life in us has truly begun. " That which is born of the Spirit," said the Master, <4 is spirit." It is the life of the Spirit in a human soul. Paul put this truth in a very striking way when he said, "I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." Our Lord said a Christian is "a branch " of the true Vine. -This suggests what Christian life and character should be before the world. Every true Christian is a new incarnation. Christ showed the world in his own person the life of the invisible God. No human eye ever saw God in his glory ; no one could ever have seen him had not Christ come down and in a plain, simple, and real, human life which men could see and understand, lived out the divine life which in its glory men could neither see nor understand. He interpreted the invisible things of God in act and phrase which the common people could read. He said, when he was asked about God, " Look at me and see God. I and my Father are one. He that hath seen me hath seen the Father."

In like manner, in his own small measure, every one truly a Christian is an incarnation of God, and should be able in humility to say, " Look at me, and you will see a dim

The Christian Life: The Ideal.

but faithful representation of God." This puts a very solemn responsibility on every Christian. He represents God in this world, and is to live in such a way that from his life men shall learn the truth about God. If Christ lives in us, men must see Christ in our faces and hear him in our words and learn of him in our acts.

The ideal of Christian life is therefore the likeness of Christ. That is the pattern shown in the mount after which we are to strive to fashion our life.

As we study Christ in the Gospels there rises up before us the vision of his matchless beauty. We go over the chapters, and we find one fragment of his loveliness here and another there ; and as we read the story through to the end beauty after beauty appears, until at length we see a full vision of the Christ which, though imperfect by reason of the imperfectness of our nature, yet truly represents to us the image of our blessed Redeemer. This is the pattern we are to follow in fashioning our lives. This is the vision we are to seek to carve into reality in our own character. All our acts we are to bring to the example of Christ, testing each one by that infallible standard.

The Gospels should be studied by the young Christian as a builder studies the architect's drawings, that every minutest detail may be 23

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exactly reproduced so far as in a faulty and sinful human life the character and conduct of the faultless and sinless Jesus can be reproduced. The perfect pattern is ever to be held before us for imitation, and as we look at it glowing in all its marvelous beauty, yet far above us and beyond our present reach, we are to comfort ourselves and stir our hearts to the noblest efforts and highest attainments by the thought, " That is what some time I am going to be." However slow may be our progress toward that perfect ideal ; however sore the struggles with weakness and sin ; however often we fail, — we are never to lose sight of the distant goal nor cease to strive and press toward the mark. Some day, if we are faithful to the end and faint not, we shall emerge out of all failure and struggle, and, seeing Jesus as he is, shall be fully transformed into his blessed image.

Such is the aim of the Christian life. " We shall be like him " — that is the final destiny of every redeemed life. This should be inspiration enough to arouse in the dullest soul every sluggish hope and every slumbering energy, and to impel to the highest effort and the most heroic struggle. This assurance should perpetually shine like a bright star beyond the fields of toil and battle, forbidding discouragement in any temporary failure or defeat and cheering all faintness and 24

The Christian Life: The Ideal.

weariness into buoyant strength and enthusiasm.

This goal of blessedness is not to be reached at one bound : it is the work of long and painful years, and the progress is slow and the transformation gradual and almost imperceptible.

" Heaven is not gained by a single bound, But we build the ladder by which we rise From the lowly earth to the vaulted skies, And we mount to its summit round by round."

It will help us, in striving after the perfected beauty, to remember that we can best attain it by carving each moment's line with care. God gives us life by days and hours, not by months and years. The way to have his purpose for us fulfilled in us is to fill each minute with simple faithfulness. Doing God's will for one moment not only lights the path for the next, but prepares us for its responsibility. Charles Kingsley said, " Do to-day's duty, fight to-day's temptation, and do not weaken or distract yourself by looking forward to things which you cannot see, and could not understand if you saw them."

Character is a mosaic in which each day has its little stone to set ; we need but to look well to the days as they come, and to print on each its record of beauty, and the whole will be beautiful in the end. This living sim-

In His Steps.

ply by the day is one of the royal secrets of a beautiful life which every young Christian should learn.

A life thus lived, each day made beautiful with the beauty of holiness and of usefulness, will in the end give a record of duty well done, of work completed, of blessings left behind at each step, and a character transfigured by the indwelling divine Spirit and the outworking of love until it shines in the full likeness of Christ himself.

CHAPTER IV. Living for God : Consecration

IT is not enough to cut loose from the old life : the young Christian must enter the new life. Leaving the service of one master, he must enlist in that of another. Withdrawing his heart's affections from one class of objects, he must fix them upon another class. Ceasing to do evil, he must also learn to do well. No longer a servant of sin, he must become a servant of righteousness. Mere repentance is not enough ; giving up one's wicked ways is but half of conversion : there must also be a devotement of the life to Christ. The heart cannot be left empty.

"When St. Boniface had hewn down the sacred oak worshiped by the savages in the tangled forests of Germany, he did not stop with destroying it, but when it was felled built out of its fallen and splintered fragments the chapel of St. Peter, and in the room of the worship of Thor the Thunderer left the worship of Christ the crucified. ■ To replace is to conquer ;' and the theology of

In His Steps.

the forests fled back abashed before the theology of the cross."

When we break with the world, we must straightway bow before Christ ; indeed, we can be freed from the dominion of the old master only by the coming into our hearts of the new. The only way we can turn from sin is by turning to Christ. He then becomes, first, Deliverer and Saviour; afterwards, King and Lord. As such he must be accepted, and the whole allegiance of the life should instantly be transferred to him.

This is conversion ; it is going over to Christ fully, wholly, freely and for ever. It is not merely attaching ourselves to the church : it is attaching ourselves to Christ. It is not merely entering upon a good moral life — pure, honest, clean ; not merely engaging in active Christian work : it is the acceptance of Christ, first as a personal Saviour, then as a personal Lord. It is coming to Christ himself, believing on him, following him, loving him, obeying him.

It is important that the young Christian shall understand this, and that his devotion to his Lord shall be real and complete. No man can serve two masters. It will not do to try a divided allegiance. True consecration carries all over to Christ.

For one thing, this means holiness : " Ye are not your own, for ye are bought with a 28

Living for God : Consecration.

price: therefore glorify God." Holiness means separation for God. The life which belongs to Christ must be kept from sin. The hands which are held up in prayer and that take the sacramental emblems must not touch any unclean thing. The lips which speak to God, sing his praise and pronounce his name must not be stained by any sinful or bitter words. The heart which is the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit must not open to any thought or affection that would defile God's temple. The feet which Christ's pierced hands have washed must not walk in any of sin's unhallowed paths. A consecrated life must be holy.

Unholiness is very subtle. It creeps in when we are not aware. It begins in the heart. At first it is but a thought, a moment's imagination, a passing emotion, or a desire. Hence the heart should be kept with unremitting diligence. Only pure and good thoughts should be entertained. It is in the thoughts that all life begins. All acts are thoughts first. Our thoughts build up our character as the coral insects build up the great reefs. As a man thinketh in his heart so is he. If we are to keep ourselves unspotted from the world as we pass through its foul streets, we must see to it that no unholy thing is for a moment tolerated in our heart. A crime stains one's name before 29