Inward, penetrating, by contact; but mainly the great peculiarity of Christian ethics is that the inner life is dealt with first, the will and the heart, and afterwards the outward conduct.
II. The part which we have to take in this cleansing process.
"Have salt" is a command; and this implies that while all the cleansing energy comes from G.o.d, the working of it on our souls depends on ourselves.
(a) Its original reception depends on our faith.
The "salt" is here, but our contact with it is established by our acceptance of it. There is no magical cleansing; but it must be received within if we would share in its operation.
(b) Its continuous energy is not secured without our effort.
Let us just recall the principle already referred to, that the "salt"
implies the whole cleansing divine energies, and ask what are these?
The Bible variously speaks of men as being cleansed by the "blood of Christ," by the "truth," by the "Spirit." Now, it is not difficult to bring all these into one focus, viz., that the Spirit of G.o.d cleanses us by bringing the truth concerning Christ to bear on our understandings and hearts.
We are sanctified in proportion as we are coming under the influence of Christian truth, which, believed by our understandings and our hearts, supplies motives to our wills which lead us to holiness by copying the example of Christ.
Hence the main principle is that the cleansing energy operates on us in proportion as we are influenced by the truths of the Gospel.
Again, it works in proportion as we seek for, and submit to, the guidance of G.o.d"s Holy Spirit.
In proportion as we are living in communion with Christ.
In proportion as we seek to deny ourselves and put away those evil things which "quench the Spirit."
This great grace, then, is not ours without our own effort. No original endowment is enough to keep us right. There must be the daily contact with, and constant renewing of the Holy Ghost. Hence arises a solemn appeal to all Christians.
Note the independence of the Christian character.
"In yourselves." "The water that I shall give him shall be in him a fountain," etc. Not, therefore, derived from the world, nor at second-hand from other men, but you have access to it for yourselves.
See that you use the gift. "Hold fast that which thou hast," for there are enemies to withstand--carelessness, slothfulness, and self-confidence, etc.
III. The relation to one another of those who possess this energy.
In proportion as Christians have salt in themselves, they will be at peace with one another. Remember that all sin is selfishness; therefore if we are cleansed from it, that which leads to war, alienation, and coldness will be removed. Even in this world there will be an antic.i.p.atory picture of the perfect peace which will abound when all are holy. Even now this great hope should make our mutual Christian relations very sweet and helpful.
Thus emerges the great principle that the foundation of the only real love among men must be laid in holiness of heart and life. Where the Spirit of G.o.d is working on a heart, there the seeds of evil pa.s.sions are stricken out. The causes of enmity and disturbance are being removed. Men quarrel with each other because their pride is offended, or because their pa.s.sionate desires after earthly things are crossed by a successful rival, or because they deem themselves not sufficiently respected by others. The root of all strife is self-love.
It is the root of all sin. The cleansing which takes away the root removes in the same proportion the strife which grows from it. We should not be so ready to stand on our rights if we remembered how we come to have any hopes at all. We should not be so ready to take offence if we thought more of Him who is not soon angry. All the train of alienations, suspicions, earthly pa.s.sions, which exist in our minds and are sure to issue in quarrels or bad blood, will be put down if we have "salt in ourselves."
This makes a very solemn appeal to Christian men. The Church is the garden where this peace should flourish. The disgrace of the Church is its envyings, jealousies, ill-natured scandal, idle gossip, love of preeminence, willingness to impute the worst possible motives to one another, sharp eyes for our brother"s failings and none for our own. I am not pleading for any mawkish sentimentality, but for a manly peacefulness which comes from holiness. The holiest natures are always the most generous.
What a contrast the Church ought to present to the prevailing tone in the world! Does it? Why not? Because we do not possess the "salt." The dove flees from the cawing of rooks and the squabbling of kites and hawks.
The same principle applies to all our human affections. Our loves of all sorts are safe only when they are pure. Contrast the society based on common possession of the one Spirit with the companionships which repose on sin, or only on custom or neighbourhood. In all these there are possibilities of moral peril.
The same principle intensified gives us a picture of heaven and of h.e.l.l. In the one are the "solemn troops and sweet societies"; in the other, no peace, no confidence, no bonds, only isolation, because sin which is selfishness lies at the foundation of the awful condition.
Friends, without that salt our souls are dead and rotting. Here is the great cure. Make it your own. So purified, you will be preserved, but, on the other hand, unchecked sin leads to quick destruction.
The dead, putrefying carca.s.s--what a picture of a soul abandoned to evil and fit only for Gehenna!
CHILDREN AND CHILDLIKE MEN
"And they brought young children to Him, that He should touch them: and His disciples rebuked those that brought them. 14. But when Jesus saw it, He was much displeased, and said unto them, Suffer the little children to come unto Me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of G.o.d. 15. Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of G.o.d as a little child, he shall not enter therein."
--Mark x. 13-15.
It was natural that the parents should have wanted Christ"s blessing, so that they might tell their children in later days that His hand had been laid on their heads, and that He had prayed for them. And Christ did not think of it as a mere superst.i.tion. The disciples were not so akin to the children as He was, and they were a great deal more tender of His dignity than He. They thought of this as an interruption disturbing their high intercourse with Christ. "These children are always in the way, this is tiresome," etc.
I. Christ blessing children.
It is a beautiful picture: the great Messiah with a child in His arms.
We could not think of Moses or of Paul in such an att.i.tude. Without it, we should have wanted one of the sweetest, gentlest, most human traits in His character; and how world-wide in its effect that act has been! How many a mother has bent over her child with deeper love; how many a parent has felt the sacredness of the trust more vividly; how many a mother has been drawn nearer to Christ; and how many a little child has had childlike love to Him awakened by it; how much of practical benevolence and of n.o.ble sacrifice for children"s welfare, how many great inst.i.tutions, have really sprung from this one deed!
And, if we turn from its effects to its meaning, it reveals Christ"s love for children:--in its human side, as part of His character as man; in its deeper aspect as a revelation of the divine nature. It corrects dogmatic errors by making plain that, prior to all ceremonies or to repentance and faith, little children are loved and blessed by Him. Unconscious infants as these were folded in His arms and love. It puts away all gloomy and horrible thoughts which men have had about the standing of little children.
This is an act of Christ to infants expressive of His love to them, His care over them, their share in His salvation. Baptism is an act of man"s, a symbol of his repentance and dying to sin and rising to a new life in Christ, a profession of his faith, an act of obedience to his Lord. It teaches nothing as to the relation of infants to the love of Jesus or to salvation. It does not follow that because that love is most sure and precious, baptism must needs be a sign of it. The question, what does baptism mean, must be determined by examination of texts which speak about baptism; not by a side-light from a text which speaks about something else. There is no more reason for making baptism proclaim that Jesus Christ loves children than for making it proclaim that two and two make four.
II. The child"s nearness to Christ.
"Of such is the kingdom." "Except ye be converted and become like little children," etc. Now this does not refer to innocence; for, as a matter of fact, children are not innocent, as all schoolmasters and nurses know, whatever sentimental poets may say. Innocence is not a qualification for admission to the kingdom. And yet it is true that "heaven lies about us in our infancy," and that we are further off from it than when we were children. Nor does it mean that children are naturally the subjects of the kingdom, but only that the characteristics of the child are those which the man must have, in order to enter the kingdom; that their natural disposition is such as Christ requires to be directed to Him; or, in other words, that childhood has a special adaptation to Christianity. For instance, take dependence, trust, simplicity, unconsciousness, and docility.
These are the very characteristics of childhood, and these are the very emotions of mind and heart which Christianity requires. Add the child"s strong faculty of imagination and its implicit belief; making the form of Christianity as the story of a life so easy to them. And we may add too: the absence of intellectual pride; the absence of the habit of dallying with moral truth. Everybody is to the child either a "good" man or a "bad." They have an intense realisation of the unseen; an absence of developed vices and hard worldliness; a faculty of living in the present, free from anxious care and worldly hearts. But while thus they have special adaptation for receiving, they too need to come to Christ. These characteristics do not make Christians. They are to be directed to Christ. "Suffer them to come unto Me," the youngest child needs to, can, ought to, come to Christ. And how beautiful their piety is, "Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings Thou hast perfected praise." Their fresh, unworn trebles struck on Christ"s ear. Children ought to grow up in Christian households, "innocent from much transgression." We ought to expect them to grow up Christian.
III. The child and the Church.
The child is a pattern to us men. We are to learn of them as well as teach them; what they are naturally, we are to strive to become, not childish but childlike. "Even as a weaned child" (see Psalm cx.x.xi.).
The child-spirit is glorified in manhood. It is possible for us to retain it, and lose none of the manhood. "In malice be ye children, but in understanding be men." The spirit of the kingdom is that of immortal youth.
The children are committed to our care.
The end of all training and care is that they should by voluntary act draw near to Him. This should be the aim in Sunday schools, for instance, and in families, and in all that we do for the poor around us.
See that we do not hinder their coming. This is a wide principle, viz., not to do anything which may interfere with those who are weaker and lower than we are finding their way to Jesus. The Church, and we as individual Christians, too often hinder this "coming."
Do not hinder by the presentation of the Gospel in a repellent form, either hardly dogmatic or sour.
Do not hinder by the requirement of such piety as is unnatural to a child.
Do not hinder by inconsistencies. This is a warning for Christian parents in particular.
Do not hinder by neglect. "_Despise_ not one of these little ones."
ALMOST A DISCIPLE