What more need I add but this--test the method by experiment. Do not imagine that you have got these things because you know how to get them. As well try to feed upon a cookery book. But I think I can promise that if you try in this simple and natural way, you will not fail. Spend the time you have spent in sighing for fruits in fulfilling the conditions of their growth. The fruits will come, must come. We have hitherto paid immense attention to _effects_, to the mere experiences themselves; we have described them, extolled them, advised them, prayed for them--done everything but find out what _caused_ them. Henceforth
LET US DEAL WITH CAUSES.
"To be," says Lotze, "is to be in relations." About every other method of living the Christian life there is an uncertainty. About every other method of acquiring the Christian experiences there is a "perhaps." But in so far as this method is the way of nature, it cannot fail. Its guarantee is the laws of the universe--and these are "the Hands of the Living G.o.d."
THE TRUE VINE.
"I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away; and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me. I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing. If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.
If ye abide in me, and my word abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so ye shall be my disciples. As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you: continue ye in my love. If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father"s commandments, and abide in his love. These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full."
"FIRST!"
AN ADDRESS TO BOYS.
I have three heads to give you. The first is "Geography," the second is "Arithmetic," and the third is "Grammar."
I.
First. Geography tells us where to find places.
Where is the Kingdom of G.o.d? It is said that when a Prussian officer was killed in the Franco-Prussian war, a map of France was very often found in his pocket. When we wish to occupy a country, we ought to know its geography. Now, _where_ is the Kingdom of G.o.d? A boy over there says, "It is in heaven." No; it is not in heaven. Another boy says, "It is in the Bible." No; it is not in the Bible. Another boy says, "It must be in the Church," No; it is not in the Church. Heaven is only the capital of the Kingdom of G.o.d; the Bible is the guide-book to it; the Church is the weekly parade of those who belong to it. If you turn to the seventeenth chapter of Luke you will find out where the Kingdom of G.o.d really is: "The Kingdom of G.o.d is within you"--within _you_. The Kingdom of G.o.d is _inside people_.
I remember once taking a walk by the river near where the Falls of Niagara are, and I noticed a remarkable figure walking along the river bank. I had been some time in America. I had seen black men, and red men, and yellow men, and white men; black men, the Negroes; red men, the Indians; yellow men, the Chinese; white men, the Americans. But this man looked quite different in his dress from anything I had ever seen. When he came a little closer, I saw he was wearing a kilt; when he came a little nearer still, I saw that he was dressed exactly like a Highland soldier. When he came quiet near, I said to him:
"What are you doing here?"
"Why should I not be here?" he replied; "don"t you know this is British soil? When you cross the river you come into Canada."
This soldier was thousands of miles from England, and yet he was in the Kingdom of England. Wherever there is an English heart beating loyal to the Queen of Britain, there is England. Wherever there is a boy whose heart is loyal to the Kingdom of G.o.d, the Kingdom of G.o.d is within him.
What is the Kingdom of G.o.d? Every Kingdom has its exports, its products. Go down the river here and you will find ships coming in with cotton; you know they come from America. You will find ships with tea; you know they are from China. Ships with wool; you know they come from Australia. Ships with sugar; you know they come from Java.
What comes from the Kingdom of G.o.d? Again we must refer to our Guide-book. Turn to Romans, and we shall find what the Kingdom of G.o.d is. I will read it: "The Kingdom of G.o.d is righteousness, peace, joy"--three things. "The Kingdom of G.o.d is righteousness, peace, joy."
Righteousness, of course, is just doing what is right. Any boy who does what is _right_ has the Kingdom of G.o.d within him. Any boy who, instead of being quarrelsome, lives at peace with the other boys, has the Kingdom of G.o.d within him. Any boy whose heart is filled with joy because he does what is right, has the Kingdom of G.o.d within him. The Kingdom of G.o.d is not going to religious meetings, and hearing strange religious experiences; the Kingdom of G.o.d is doing what is right--living at peace with all men, being filled with joy in the Holy Ghost.
Boys, if you are going to be Christians, be Christians as boys, and not as your grandmothers. A grandmother has to be a Christian as a grandmother, and that is the right and the beautiful thing for her; but if you cannot read your Bible by the hour as your grandmother can, or delight in meetings as she can, don"t think you are necessarily a bad boy. When you are your grandmother"s age you will have your grandmother"s kind of religion. Meantime, be a Christian as a boy.
Live a boy"s life. Do the straight thing; seek the kingdom of righteousness and honor and truth. Keep the peace with the boys about you, and be filled with the joy of being a loyal, and simple, and natural, and boy-like servant of Christ.
You can very easily tell a house, or a workshop, or an office where the Kingdom of G.o.d is _not_. The first thing you see in that place is that the "straight thing" is not always done. Customers do not get fair play. You are in danger of learning to cheat and to lie. Better a thousand times to starve than to stay in a place where you cannot do what is right.
Or, when you go into your workshop, you find everybody sulky, touchy, and ill-tempered, everybody at daggers-drawn with everybody else, some of the men not on speaking terms with some of the others, and the whole _feel_ of the place miserable and unhappy. The Kingdom of G.o.d is not there, for _it_ is peace. It is the Kingdom of the Devil that is anger, and wrath and malice.
If you want to get the Kingdom of G.o.d into your workshop, or into your home, let the quarreling be stopped. Live in peace and harmony and brotherliness with everyone. For the Kingdom of G.o.d is a kingdom of brothers. It is a great Society, founded by Jesus Christ, of all the people who try to live like Him, and to make the world better and sweeter and happier. Wherever a boy is trying to do that, in the house or on the street, in the workshop or on the baseball field, there is the Kingdom of G.o.d. And every boy, however small or obscure or poor, who is seeking that, is a member of it. You see now, I hope, what the Kingdom is.
II.
I pa.s.s, therefore, to the second head; What was it? Arithmetic. Are there any arithmetic words in this text? "Added." What other arithmetic words? "First."
Now, don"t you think you could not have anything better to seek "first" than the things I have named to do what is right, to live at peace, and be always making those about you happy? You see at once why Christ tells us to seek these things first--because they are
THE BEST WORTH SEEKING.
Do you know anything better than these three things, anything happier, purer, n.o.bler? If you do, seek them first. But if you do not, seek first the Kingdom of G.o.d. I do not tell you to be religious. You know that. I do not tell you to seek the Kingdom of G.o.d. I tell you to seek the Kingdom of G.o.d _first_. _First._ Not many people do that. They put a little religion into their life--once a week, perhaps. They might just as well let it alone. It is not worth seeking the Kingdom of G.o.d unless we seek it _first_.
Suppose you take the helm out of a ship and hang it over the bow, and send that ship to sea, will it ever reach the other side? Certainly not. It will drift about anyhow. Keep religion in its place, and it will take you straight through life and straight to your Father in heaven when life is over. But if you do not put it in its place, you may just as well have nothing to do with it. Religion out of its place in a human life is the most miserable thing in the world. There is nothing that requires so much to be kept in its place as religion, and its place is what? second? third? "First." Boys, _first_ the Kingdom of G.o.d; make it so that it will be natural to you to think about that the very first thing.
There was a boy in Glasgow apprenticed to a gentleman who made telegraphs. (The gentleman told me this himself.) One day this boy was up on the top of a four-story house with a number of men fixing up a telegraph wire. The work was all but done. It was getting late, and the men said they were going away home, and the boy was to nip off the ends of the wire himself. Before going down they told him to be sure to go back to the workshop, when he was finished, with his master"s tools.
"Do not leave any of them lying about, whatever you do," said the foreman.
The boy climbed up the pole and began to nip off the ends of the wire.
It was a very cold winter night, and the dusk was gathering. He lost his hold and fell upon the slates, slid down, and then over and over to the ground below. A clothes-rope stretched across the "green" on to which he was just about to fall, caught him on the chest and broke his fall; but the shock was terrible, and he lay unconscious among some clothes upon the green.
An old woman came out; seeing her rope broken and the clothes all soiled, thought the boy was drunk, shook him, scolded him, and went for the policeman. The boy with the shaking came back to consciousness, rubbed his eyes, and got upon his feet. What do you think he did? He staggered, half-blind, up the stairs. He climbed the ladder. He got on to the roof of the house. He gathered up his tools, put them into his basket, took them down, and when he got to the ground again fainted dead away.
Just then the policeman came, saw there was something seriously wrong, and carried him away to the hospital, where he lay for some time. I am glad to say he got better.
What was his first thought at that terrible moment? His duty. He was not thinking of himself; he was thinking about his master. First, the Kingdom of G.o.d.
But there is another arithmetic word. What is it? "Added."
You know the difference between _addition_ and _subtraction_. Now, that is
A VERY IMPORTANT DIFFERENCE
in religion, because--and it is a very strange thing--very few people know the difference when they begin to talk about religion. They often tell boys that if they seek the Kingdom of G.o.d, everything else is going to be _subtracted_ from them. They tell them that they are going to become gloomy, miserable, and will lose everything that makes a boy"s life worth living--that they will have to stop baseball and story-books, and become little old men, and spend all their time in going to meetings and in singing hymns.
Now, that is not true. Christ never said anything like that. Christ said we are to "Seek first the Kingdom of G.o.d," and
EVERYTHING ELSE WORTH HAVING
is to be _added_ unto us. If there is anything I would like you to remember, it is these two arithmetic words--"first" and "added."
I do not mean by "added" that if you become religious you are all going to become _rich_. Here is a boy, who, in sweeping out the shop tomorrow, finds a quarter lying among the orange boxes. Well, n.o.body has missed it. He puts it in his pocket, and it begins to burn a hole there. By breakfast time he wishes that money were in his master"s pocket. And by-and-by he goes to his master. He says (to _himself_, and not to his master), "I was at the Boys" Brigade yesterday, and I was told to seek _first_ that which was right." Then he says to his master:
"Please, sir, here is a quarter that I found upon the floor."
The master puts it in the till. What has the boy got in his pocket?
Nothing; _but he has got the Kingdom of G.o.d in his heart_. He has laid up treasure in heaven, which is of infinitely more worth than the quarter.
Now, that boy does not find a dollar on his way home. I have known that happen, but that is not what is meant by "adding." It does not mean that G.o.d is going to pay him in his own coin, for He pays in better coin.
Yet I remember once hearing of a boy who was paid in both ways. He was very, very poor. He lived in a foreign country, and his mother said to him one day that he must go into the great city and start in business, and she took his coat and cut it open and sewed between the lining and the coat forty golden dinars, which she had saved up for many years to start him in life. She told him to take care of robbers as he went across the desert; and as he was going out of the door she said: