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SERMON XXXIII. THE UNCHANGEABLE ONE

Psalm cxix. 89-96.  For ever, O Lord, thy word is settled in heaven.  Thy faithfulness is unto all generations: thou hast established the earth, and it abideth.  They continue this day according to thine ordinances: for all are thy servants.  Unless thy law had been my delight, I should then have perished in mine affliction.  I will never forget thy precepts: for with them thou hast quickened me.  I am thine, save me; for I have sought thy precepts.  The wicked have waited for me to destroy me: but I will consider thy testimonies.  I have seen an end of all perfection; but thy commandment is exceeding broad.

The Psalmist is in great trouble.  He does not know whom to trust, what to expect next, whom to look to.  Everything seems failing and changing round him.  His psalm was most probably written during the Babylonish captivity, at a time when all the countries and kingdoms of the east were being destroyed by the Chaldean armies.

Then, he says, Be it so.  If everything else changes, God cannot.  If everything else fails, God’s plans cannot.  He can rest on the thought of God; of his goodness, his faithfulness, order, providence.  God is governing the world righteously and orderly.  Whatever disorder there is on earth, there is none in heaven.  God’s word endures for ever there.

Then he looks on the world round him; all is well ordered—seasons, animals, sun, and stars abide.  They continue this day according to God’s ordinances.  The unchangeableness of nature is a comfort to him; for it is a token of the unchangeablenes of God who made it.

Now, I do beg you to think carefully over this verse; because it is quite against the very common notion that, because the earth was cursed for Adam’s sake, therefore it is cursed now; that because it was said to him, Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee, therefore that holds good now.  It is not so, my friends; neither is there, as far as I know, in any part whatsoever of Scripture, any mention of Adam’s curse continuing to our day.  St. John, in the Revelations, certainly says, ‘And there shall be no more curse.’  But if you will read the Revelation, you will find that what he plainly refers to is to the fearful curses, the plagues, the vials of wrath, as he calls them, which were to be poured out on the earth; and then to cease when the New Jerusalem came down from heaven.

St. Paul, again, knows nothing about any such curse upon the earth.  He says that death came into the world by Adam’s sin: but that must be understood only of man, and the world of man; and for this simple reason, that we know, without the possibility of doubt, that animals died in this world just as they do now, not only thousands, but hundreds of thousands of years before man appeared on earth.

What St. Paul says of the creation, in one of his most glorious passages, is this—not that it is cursed, but that it groans and travails continually in the pangs of labour, trying to bring forth; trying to bring forth something better than itself; to develop, and rise from good to better, and from that to better still; till all things become perfect in a way which we cannot conceive, but which God has ordained before the foundation of the world.

Besides, as a fact, the earth does not bring forth thorns and thistles to us, but good grain, and fruitful crops, and an abundant return for our labour, if we choose to till the ground.

And wise men, who study God’s works, can find no curse at all upon the earth, nor sign of a curse, neither in plants nor beasts, no, nor in the smallest gnat in the air.  The more they look into the wonders of God’s world, the more they find it true that there is order everywhere, beauty everywhere, fruitfulness everywhere, usefulness everywhere—that all things continue as at the beginning; that, as the psalmist says in another place, God has made them fast for ever and ever, and given them a law which cannot be broken.  And if you will look at Genesis viii. 21, 22, you will find from the plain words of Scripture itself, that Adam’s curse, whatever it was, was taken off after the flood, ‘And the Lord smelled a sweet savour: and the Lord said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake; for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more everything living, as I have done.  While the earth remaineth, seed-time and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.’

Therefore, my friends, open your eyes and your hearts freely to the message which God is sending you, in summer and winter, in seed-time and in harvest, in sunshine and in storm; that God is not a hard God, a revengeful God, a God of curses, who is extreme to mark what is done amiss, and keepeth his anger for ever.  No: but that he is your Father in heaven, who hateth nothing that he has made, and whose mercy is over all his works; who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that therein is; who keepeth truth for ever; who helpeth them to right that suffer wrong; who feedeth the hungry; a God who feeds the birds of the air, though they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; and who clothes the grass of the field, which toils not, neither doth it spin; and who will much much more clothe and feed you, to whom he has given reason, understanding, and the power of learning his laws, the rules by which this world of his is made and works, and of turning them to your own profit in rational and honest labour.

And think, my friends, if the old Psalmist, before Christ came, could believe all this, and find comfort in it, much more ought we.  Shame to us if we do not.  I had almost said, we deny Christ, if we do not.  For who said those last words concerning the birds of the air, and the grass of the field?  Who told us that we have not merely a Master or a Judge in heaven, but a Father in heaven?  Who but that very Word of God, whom the Psalmist saw dimly and afar off?  He knew that the Word of God abode for ever in heaven: but he knew not, as far as we can tell, that that same Word would condescend to be made flesh, and dwell among men that we might see his glory, full of grace and truth.  The old Psalmist knew that God’s word was full of truth, and that gave him comfort in the wild and sad times in which he lived; but he did not know—none of the Old Testament prophets knew,—how full God’s word was of grace also.  That he was so full of love, condescension, pity, generosity, so full of longing to seek and save all that was lost, to set right all that was wrong, in one word again, so full of grace, that he would condescend to be born of the Virgin Mary, suffer under Pontius Pilate, to be crucified, dead and buried, that he might become a faithful High Priest for us, full of understanding, fellow-feeling, pity, love, because he has been tempted in all things like as we are, yet without sin.

My friends, was not the old Psalmist a Jew, and are not we Christian men?  Then, if the old Psalmist could trust God, how much more should we?  If he could find comfort in the thought of God’s order, how much more should we?  If he could find comfort in the thought of his justice, how much more should we?  If he could find comfort in the thought of his love, how much more should we?  Yes; let us be full of troubles, doubts, sorrows; let times be uncertain, dark, and dangerous; let strange new truths be discovered, which we cannot, at first sight, fit into what we know to be true already: we can still say, ‘I will not fear, though the earth be moved, and the hills be carried into the midst of the sea.’  For the word of God abideth for ever in heaven, even Jesus Christ, who is the Light of the world and the Life of men.  To him all power is given in heaven and earth.  He is set on the throne, judging right, and ministering true judgment among the people.  All things, as the Psalmist says, come to an end.  All men’s plans, men’s notions, men’s systems, men’s doctrines, grow old, wear out, and perish.

 
The old order changes, giving place to the new:
But God fulfils himself in many ways.
 

For men are not ruling the world.  Christ is ruling the world, and his commandment is exceeding broad.  His laws are broad enough for all people, all countries, all ages; and strangely as they may seem to work, in the eyes of us short-sighted timorous human beings, still all is going well, and all will go well; for Christ reigns, and will reign, till he has put all enemies under his feet, and God be all in all.

SERMON XXXIV. ΕΝ ΤΟΥΤΩ ΝΙΚΑ

(Good Friday, 1860.)

1 Corinthians i. 23-25.  But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling-block, and unto the Greeks foolishness; but unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.  Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

The foolishness of God?  The weakness of God?  These are strange words.  But they are St. Paul’s words, not mine.  If he had not said them first, I should not dare to say them now.

But what do they mean?  Can God be weak?  Can God be foolish?  No, says St. Paul.  Nothing less.  For so strong is God, that his very weakness, if he seems weak, is stronger than all mankind.  So wise is God, that his very foolishness, if he seems foolish, is wiser than all mankind.

Why then talk of the weakness of God, of the foolishness of God, if he be neither weak nor foolish?  Why use words which seem blasphemous, if they are not true?

I do not say these ugly words for myself.  St. Paul did not say these ugly words for himself.  But men have said them; too many men, and too often.  The Jews, who sought after a sign, said them in St. Paul’s time.  The Corinthian Greeks, who sought after wisdom, said them also.  There are men who say them now.  We all are tempted at times to say them in our hearts.  As often as we forget Good Friday, and what Good Friday means, and what Good Friday brought to all mankind, we do say them in our hearts; and charge God—though we should not like to confess it even to ourselves—with weakness and with folly.

Now, how is this?  Let us consider, first, how it was with these Jews and Greeks.

Why did the cross of Christ, and the message of Good Friday, seem to them weakness and folly?  Why did they answer St. Paul, ‘Your Christ cannot be God, or he would never have allowed himself to be crucified?’

The Jews required a sign; a sign from heaven; a sign of God’s power.  Thunder and earthquakes, armies of angels, taking vengeance on the heathen; these were the signs of Christ which they expected.  A Christ who came in such awful glory as that, they would accept, and follow, and look to him to lead them against the Romans, that they might conquer them, and all the nations upon earth.  And all that St. Paul gave them, was a sign of Christ’s weakness.  ‘He was despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief. . . . He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.  He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth.’  Then said the Jews—This is no Christ for us, this weak, despised, crucified Christ.  Then answered St. Paul—Weak?  I tell you that what seems to you weakness, is the very power of God.  You Jews wish to conquer all mankind: and behold, instead, you yourselves are rushing to ruin and destruction: but what you cannot do, Christ on his cross can do.  Weak, shamed, despised, dying man as he seemed, he is still conqueror; and he will conquer all mankind at last, and draw all men to himself.  Know that what seems to you weakness, is the very power of God; the power of doing good, and of suffering all things, that he may do good: and that that will conquer the world, when riches and glory, and armies, aye, the very thunder and the earthquake, have failed utterly.

The Greeks, again, sought after wisdom.  If St. Paul was (as he said) the apostle of God, then they expected him to argue with them on cunning points of philosophy; about the being of God, the nature of the world and of the soul; about finite and infinite, cause and effect, being and not being, and all those dark questions with which they astonished simple people, and gained power over them, and set up for wise men and teachers to their own profit and glory, pampering their own luxury and self-conceit.  And all St. Paul gave them, seemed to them mere foolishness.  He could have argued with these Greeks on those deep matters; for he was a great scholar, and a true philosopher, and could speak wisdom among those who were perfect: but he would not.  He determined to know nothing among them but Jesus Christ, and him crucified; and he told them, You disputers of this world, while you are deceiving simple souls with enticing words of man’s wisdom and philosophy, falsely so called, you are trifling away your own souls and your hearers’ into hell.  What you need, and what they need, is not philosophy, but a new heart and a right spirit.  Sin is your disease; and you know that it is so, in the depth of your hearts.  Then know this, that God so loved you, sinners as you are, that he condescended to become mortal man, and to give himself up to death, even the shameful and horrible death of the cross, that he might save you from your sins; and he that would be saved now, let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow him.  And to that, those proud Greeks answered,—That is a tale unworthy of philosophers.  The Cross?  It is a death of shame—the death of slaves and wretches.  Tell your tale to slaves, not to us.  To give himself up to the death of the cross is foolishness, and not the wisdom which we want.  Then answered St. Paul and said,—True.  The cross is a slave’s and a wretch’s death; and therefore slaves and wretches will hear me, though you will not.  ‘For you see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; and base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are: that no flesh should glory in his presence.’  For the foolishness of God is wiser than all the wisdom of men.  You Greeks, with all your philosophy and your wisdom, have been trying, for hundreds of years, to find out the laws of heaven and earth, and to set the world right by them; and you have not done it.  You have not found out the secrets of the world.  You have not set the world right.  You have not even set your own hearts and lives right.  But what your seeming wisdom cannot do, the seeming foolishness of Christ on his cross will do.  Does it seem to you foolish of him, to believe that he could save the world, by giving himself up to a horrible and shameful death?  Does it seem to you foolishness in me, to preach nothing but him crucified, and to say, Behold God dying for men?  Then know, that what seems to you foolishness, is the very wisdom of God.  That God knows the secret of touching, convincing, and converting the hearts of men, though you do not.  That God knows how the world is made, and how to set it right, though you do not.  That God knows the law which keeps all heaven and earth in order, though you do not; and that that law is charity,—self-sacrificing love, which shines out from the cross of Christ.  Know, that when all your arguments and philosophies have failed to teach men what they ought to do, one earnest penitent look at Christ upon his cross will teach them.  That their hearts will leap up in answer, and cry, If this be God, I can believe in him.  If this be God, I can trust him.  If this be God, I can obey him.  That one look at Christ upon his cross will make them—what you could never make them—new men, filled with a new thought; the thought that God is love, and that he who dwelleth in love, dwelleth in God, and God in him; and that the poor slaves and wretches, whom you despise, will look unto the cross and be saved, and become new men, and lead new lives, and rise to be saints and martyrs to God and to his Christ, giving themselves up to torments and death, as Christ did before them; and that out of them shall spring that church of Christ, which shall reign over all the world, when you and your philosophies have crumbled into dust.

My friends, let us look, earnestly, humbly, and solemnly this day, at Christ upon his cross.  Let us learn that love, the utter self-sacrificing love which Christ shewed on his cross, is stronger than all pomp and might, all armies, riches, governments; aye, that it is the very power of God, by which all things consist, which holds together heaven and earth and all that is therein.

Let us learn that love, the utter self-sacrificing love which Christ shewed on his cross, is wiser than all arguments, doctrines, philosophies, whether they be true or false; aye, that it is the very wisdom of God, by which he convinces and converts all hearts and souls; and let us look to the cross, and see there the wisdom of God, and the power of God, mighty to save to the uttermost all who come through Christ to him.

And let us remember this, that whenever we fancy ourselves to be strong and powerful, and think to aggrandize ourselves at our neighbour’s expense, and to crush those who are weaker than ourselves, then we are forgetting the lesson of Good Friday; that whenever we fancy that the way to be wise is, to use our wit and our knowledge for our own glory, and by them to manage our fellow-men, and make them admire us and bow down to us, then we forget the lesson of Good Friday.  For whosoever gives himself up to selfish ambition, or to selfish cunning, charges Christ upon his cross with weakness and with foolishness, and denies the Lord who bought him with his blood.

My friends, I have no more to say.  Much more I might say.  For Good Friday has many other meanings, and all the sermons of a lifetime would not exhaust them all.

But one thing seemed to me fit to be said, and I say it again, and entreat you to carry it home with you, and live by the light of it all the year round.

Do you wish to be powerful?  Then look at Christ upon his cross; at what seems to men his weakness; and learn from him how to be strong.  Do you wish to be wise?  Then look at Christ upon the cross; and at what seemed to men his folly; and learn from him how to be wise.  For sooner or later, I hope and trust, you will find that true, which St. Buonaventura (wise and strong himself) used to say,—That all the learning in the world had never taught him so much as the sight of Christ upon the cross.

SERMON XXXV. THE ETERNAL MANHOOD

(First Sunday after Easter.)

John xx. 29.  Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed; blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.

The eighth day after the Lord Jesus rose from the dead, he appeared a second time to his disciples.  On this day he strengthened St. Thomas’s weak faith, by giving him proof, sensible proof, that he was indeed and really the very same person who had been crucified, wearing the very same human nature, the very same man’s body.

‘Blessed are they who have not seen, and yet have believed.’  You have not seen.  You have never beheld with your bodily eyes, or touched with your bodily hand, as St. Thomas did, the Lord Jesus Christ.  And yet you may be more blessed now, this day, than St. Thomas was then.  We are too apt to fancy, that, to have seen the Lord with our eyes, to have walked with him, and talked with him, as the apostles did, was the greatest honour and blessing which could happen to man.  We fancy, perhaps, at times, that if the Lord Jesus were to come visibly among us now, we should want nothing more to make us good: that we could not help listening to him, obeying him, loving him.

But the Scriptures prove to us that it was not so.  The Scribes and Pharisees saw him and talked with him; yet they hated him.  Judas Iscariot, yet he betrayed him.  Pilate, yet he condemned him.  The word preached profited them nothing, not being mixed with faith in those who heard him.  Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, came and preached himself to them; declared to them who he was, proved who he was by his mighty works of love and mercy, and by fulfilling all the prophecies of Scripture which spoke of him; and yet they did not believe him, they hated him, they crucified him; because they had no faith.

You see, therefore, that something more than seeing him with our bodily eyes is wanted to make us believe in the Lord Jesus Christ; something more than seeing him with our bodily eyes is wanted to make us blessed.  St. Thomas saw him; St. Thomas was allowed, by the boundless condescension and mercy of the Lord Jesus, to put his hand into his side.  And yet the Lord does not say to him,—See how blessed thou art; see how honoured thou art, by being allowed to touch me.  No; our Lord rather rebukes him for requiring such a proof.

There are those who will not believe without seeing; who say, I must have proof.  What I hear in church is too much for me to believe without many more reasons than are given for it all.  Many people, for instance, stumble at the stumbling-block of the cross, and cannot bring themselves to believe that God would condescend to suffer and to die for men.  Others cannot make up their minds about the resurrection.  It seems to them a strange and impossible thing that Jesus’ body should have risen from the grave and ascended to heaven, and that our bodies should rise also.  That was the great puzzle to the Greeks, who thought themselves very learned and cunning, and were great arguers and disputers about all deep matters in heaven and earth.  When St. Paul preached to them on Mars’ Hill, they heard him patiently enough, till he spoke of Jesus rising from the dead; and then they mocked; laughed at the notion as absurd.  And we find that the Corinthians, even after they were converted and baptised Christians, were puzzled about this same matter.  They could not understand how the dead were raised, and with what body they would come.

With such the Lord is not angry.  If they really wish to know what is true, and to do what is right; if they really are, as St. Paul says, ‘feeling after the Lord, if haply they may find him;’ then the Lord will give them light in due time, and shew them what they ought to believe, and give them the sort of proof which they want.  All such he treats as he did Thomas, when he said, in his great condescension, ‘Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands, and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side, and be not faithless but believing.’

So the Lord sent to those Corinthians the very sort of proof which they wanted, by the hand of the learned apostle, St. Paul.  They were great observers of the works of nature, of the strange movement and change, birth and death, which goes on in beasts, and in plants, and in the clouds, and the rivers, and the very stones under our feet.  And they said, We cannot believe in the resurrection of the dead, because we see nothing like it in the world around us.  And St. Paul was sent to tell them.  No: you do see something like it.  If you will look deeper into the working of the world around you, you will see that the rising again of the dead, instead of being an unnatural or an absurd thing, is the most reasonable and natural thing, the perfect fulfilment, and crowning wonder of wonderful laws which are working round you in every seed which you sow; in the flesh of beasts and fishes; in bodies celestial and bodies terrestrial: and so in that glorious chapter which we read in the Burial Service, St. Paul tells the Corinthians, who went altogether by sense, and reasoning about the things which they could see and handle, that sense and reasoning were on his side, on God’s side; and that the mysteries of faith, like the resurrection of the body, were not contrary to reason, but agreed with it.

So does the Lord clear up the doubts of his people, in the way which is best for them.  But he does not call them as blessed as others.  There is a higher faith than that.  There is a better part.  The same part which Mary chose.  The same faith of which our Lord says,—‘Blessed are they who have not seen, and yet have believed.’  The faith of the heart; the childlike, undoubting, ready, willing faith, which welcomes the news of the Lord; which runs to meet it, and is not astonished at it; and, if it ever doubts for a moment, only doubts for very joy and delight; and feeling that the news of the gospel is good news, cannot help feeling now and then that it is too good news to be true; shewing its love and its faith in its very hesitation.  This is the childlike heart, whereof it is written, ‘Except ye be converted and become as little children, ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven.’

The hearts of little children; the hearts which begin by faith and love toward God himself; the hearts which know God; the hearts to whom God has revealed himself, and taught them, they know not how, that he is love.  They are so sure of God’s goodness, so sure of his power, so sure of his love, his willingness to have mercy, and to deliver poor creatures, that they find nothing strange, nothing difficult, in the mysteries of faith.  To them it is not a thing incredible, that God should have come down and died upon the cross.  When they hear the good news of him who gave his own life for them, it seems a natural thing to them, a reasonable thing: not of course a thing which they could have expected; but yet not a thing to doubt of or to be astonished at.  For they know that God is love.

And now some of you may say, ‘Then are we more blessed than Thomas?  We have not seen, and yet we have believed.  We never doubted.  We never wanted any arguments, or learned books, or special inward assurances.  From the moment that we began to learn our catechisms at school we believed it, of course, every word of it.  Do we not say the Creed every Sunday; I believe in—and so forth?’  O my friends, do you believe indeed?  If you do, blessed are you.  But are you sure that you speak truth?

You may believe it.  But do you believe in it?  Have you faith in it?  Do you put your trust in it?  Is your heart in it?  Is it in your heart?  Do you love it, rejoice in it, delight to think over it; to look forward to it, to make yourselves ready and fit for it.  Do you believe in it, in short, or do you only believe it, as you believe that there is an Emperor of China, or that there is a country called America, or any other matter with which you have nothing to do, for which you care nothing, and which would make no difference at all to you, if you found out to-morrow that it was not so.  That is mere dead belief; faith without works, which is dead, the belief of the brains, not the faith of the heart and spirit.

Oh, do you really believe the good news of this text, in which the Son of God himself said to mortal men like ourselves, ‘Handle me and see that it is I, indeed; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have.’  Do you believe that there is a Man evermore on the right hand of God?  That now as we speak a man is offering up before the Father his perfect and all-cleansing sacrifice?  That, in the midst of the throne of God, is he himself who was born of the Virgin Mary, and crucified under Pontius Pilate?  Do you wish to find out whether you believe that or not?  Then look at your own hearts.  Look at your own prayers.  Do you think of the Lord Jesus Christ, do you pray to the Lord Jesus Christ, as a man, very man, born of woman?  Do you pray to him as to one who can be touched with the feeling of your infirmities, because he has been tempted in all things like as you are, yet without sin?  When you are sad, perplexed, do you take all your sorrows and doubts and troubles to the Lord Jesus, and speak them all out to him honestly and frankly, however reverently, as a man speaketh to his friend?  Do you really cast all your care on him, because you believe that he careth for you?  If you do, then indeed you believe in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ; and you will surely have your reward in a peace of mind, amid all the chances and changes of this mortal life, which passes man’s understanding.  That blessed knowledge that the Lord knows all, cares for all, condescends to all—That thought of a loving human face smiling upon your joys, sorrowing over your sorrows, watching you, educating you from youth to manhood, from manhood to the grave, from the grave to eternities of eternities—Whosoever has felt that, has indeed found the pearl of great price, for which, if need be, he would give up all else in earth or heaven.

Or do you say to yourselves at times, I must not think too much about the Lord Jesus’s being man, lest I should forget that he is God?  Do you shrink from opening your heart to him?  Do you say within yourself, He is too great, too awful, to condescend to listen to my little mean troubles and anxieties?  Besides, how can I expect him to feel for them; I, a mean, sinful man, and he the Almighty God?  How do I know that he will not despise my meanness and paltriness?  How do I know that he will not be angry with me?  I must be more reverent to him, than to trouble him with very petty matters.  He was a man once when he was upon earth: but now that he is ascended up on high, Very God of Very God, in the glory which he had with the Father before the worlds were made, I must have more awful and solemn thoughts about him, and keep at a more humble distance from him.