Sermons on National Subjects

You see that God’s mercy to them would not make them conceited or careless.  It would increase their shame and confusion when they found out what sort of a Lord He was against whom they had been rebellious; long-suffering and of tender mercy, returning good for evil to His disobedient children.  That feeling would awake in them more shame and more confusion than ever: but it would be a noble shame, a happy confusion, and tears of joy and gratitude, not of bitterness.  Such a shame, such a confusion, such tears, as the blessed Magdalene’s when she knelt at the Lord’s feet, and found that, instead of bating her and thrusting her away for all her sins, He told her to go in peace, pardoned and happy.  Then she knew the Lord; she found out His character—His name; for she found out that His name was love.  Oh, my friends, this is the great secret; the only knowledge worth living for, because it is the only knowledge which will enable you to live worthily—to know the Lord.  That knowledge will enable you to live a life which will last, and grow, and prosper for ever, beyond the grave, and death, and judgment, and eternities of eternities.  As the Lord Himself said, when He was upon earth, “This is eternal life, to know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.”  Therefore there is no use my warning you against sin, and telling you, do not do this, and do not do that, unless I tell you at the same time who is the Lord.  For till you know that The Good God is the Lord, you will have no real, sound, heartfelt reason for giving up your sins; and what is more, you will not be able to give them up.  You may alter your sort of sins from fear of this and that; but the root of sin will be there still; and if it cannot bear one sort of fruit it will bear another.  If you dare not drink or riot, you may become covetous and griping; if you dare not give way to young men’s sins, you will take to old men’s sins instead; if you dare not commit open sins you will commit secret ones in your thoughts.  Sin is much too stout a plant to be kept from bearing some sort of fruit.  As long as it is not rooted up the root will breed death in you of some sort or other; and the only feeling which can root up sin is to know that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is your Lord, and that your Lord condescended to die upon the cross for you; that you must be the Lord’s, and are not your own, but bought with the price of His most precious blood, that you may glorify God with your body and your soul, which are His.

Just so, the blessed St. Augustine found that he could never conquer his own sins by arguing with himself, or by any other means, till he got to know God, and to see that God was the Lord.  And when his spirit was utterly broken; when he saw himself, in spite of all his wonderful cleverness and learning, to have been a fool and blind all along, though people round him were flattering him, and running after him to hear his learning; then the old words which he learnt at his mother’s knee came up in his mind, and he knew that God was the Lord after all, and that God had been watching him, guiding him, letting him go wrong only to show him the folly of going wrong, caring for him even when He left him to himself and his sins, and the sad ways of his sins; bearing with him, pleading with his conscience, alluring him back to the only true happiness, as a loving father with a rebellious and self-willed child.  And then, when St. Augustine had found out at last that God was his Lord, who had been taking the charge of him all through his heathen youth, he became a changed man.  He was able to conquer his sins; for God conquered them for him.  He was able to give up the profligate life which he had been leading; not from fear of punishment, but from the Spirit of God—the spirit of gratitude, honour, trust, and love toward God, which made him abide in God, and God abide in him.  To that blessed state may God of His great mercy bring us all.  To it He will bring us all unless we rebel and set up our foolish and selfish will against His loving and wise will.  And if He does bring us to it, it is little matter whether He brings us to it through joy or through sorrow, through honour or through shame, through the garden of Eden, or through the valley of the shadow of death.  For, my dear friends, what matter how bitter the medicine is, if it does but save our lives?

XLVII.

THE MARRIAGE AT CANA

There was a marriage in Cana of Galilee; and the mother of Jesus was there.  And both Jesus was called, and His disciples, to the marriage.—John ii. 1, 2.

It is, I think, in the first place, an important, as well as a pleasant thing, to know that the Lord’s glory, as St. Paul says, was first shown forth at a wedding, at a feast.  Not at a time of sorrow, but of joy.  Not about some strange affliction or disease, such as is the lot of very few, but about a marriage, that which happens in the ordinary lot of all mankind.  Not in any fearful judgment or destruction of sinners, but in blessing wedlock, by which, whether among saints or sinners, mankind is increased.  Not by helping some great philosopher to think more deeply, or some great saint to perform more wonderful acts of holiness, but in giving the simple pleasure of wine to simple commonplace people, of whom we neither read that they were rich or righteous.  We do not even read whether the master of the feast ever found out that Jesus had worked a miracle, or whether any of the company ever believed in Him, on the strength of that miracle, except His mother and the disciples, and the servants, who were probably the poor slaves of people in a low or middling class of life.  But that is the way of the Lord.  He is no respecter of persons.  Rich and poor are alike in His sight; and the poor need Him most, and therefore He began his work with the poor in Cana, as He did in St. James’s time, when the poor of this world were rich in faith, and the rich of this world were oppressors and taskmasters.  So He does in every age.  Though no one else cares for the poor, He cares for them.  With their hearts He begins His work, even as He did in England sixty years ago, by the preaching of Whitfield and Wesley.  Do you wish to know if anything is the Lord’s work?  See if it is a work among the poor.  Do you wish to know whether any preaching is the true gospel of the Lord?  See whether it is a gospel, a good news to the poor.  I know no other test than that.  By doing that, by preaching the gospel to the poor, by working miracles for the poor, He has showed forth His glory, and proved Himself the true, and just, and loving Lord of all.

But again, the Lord is a giver, and not a taskmaster.  He does not demand from us: He gives to us.  He had been giving from the foundation of the world.  Corn and wine, rain and sunshine, and fruitful seasons had been his sending.  And now He was come to show it.  He was come to show men who it was who had been filling their heart with joy and gladness; who had been bringing out of the earth and air, by His unseen chemistry, the wine which maketh glad the heart of man.  In every grape that hangs upon the vine, water is changed into wine, as the sap ripens into rich juice.  He had been doing that all along in every vineyard and orchard; and that was His glory.  Now He was come to prove that; to draw back the veil of custom and carnal sense, and manifest Himself.  Men had seen the grapes ripen on the tree; and they were tempted to say, as every one of us is tempted now: “It is the sun and the air, the nature of the vine, and the nature of the climate, which makes the wine.”  Jesus comes and answers: “Not so.  I make the wine; I have been making it all along.  The vines, the sun, the weather, are only my tools wherewith I worked, turning rain and sap into wine; and I am greater than they; I made them; I do not depend on them; I can make wine from water without vines or sunshine.  Behold, and drink, and see my glory without the vineyard, since you had forgotten how to see it in the vineyard!  For I am now, even as I was in Paradise, The Word of the Lord God; and now, even as in Paradise, I walk among the trees of the garden, and they know me and obey me, though the world knows me not.  I have been all along in the world, and the world knows me not.  Know me now, lest you lose the knowledge of me for ever!”

Those of the Jews who received that message, as the disciples did, found out their ancient Lord, and clung to Him, and know now, in the world of spirits, that His message was indeed a true one.  Those who did not, lost sight of Him; to this day their eyes are blinded; to this day they have utterly forgotten that they have a Lord and Ruler, who is the Word and Son of God.  Their faith is no more like the faith of David than their understanding of the Scriptures is like his.  The Bible is a dead letter to them.  The kingdom and government of God is forgotten by them.  Of all God-worshipping people in the world, the Jews are the least godly, the most given up to the worship of this world, and the things which they can see, and taste, and handle, and, therefore, to covetousness, cheating, lying, tyranny, and all the sins which spring from forgetting that this world belongs to the Lord and that He rules and guides it, that its blessings are His gifts, and we His stewards, to use them for the good of all.  May God help, and forgive, and convert them!  Doubt not that He will do so in His good time.  But let us beware, my friends, lest we fall into the same sin.  Do not fancy that we are not in just the same danger.  It would be a cowardly thing of a preacher to call Jews, or heathens, or any other absent persons hard names, unless their mistakes and their sins were such as his own people wanted warnings against, ay, perhaps, had the very root of them in their hearts already.  And we have the root of the Jews’ sin in our own hearts.  Why is this one miracle read in our churches to this day, if we do not stand just as much in need of the lesson as those for whom it was first worked?  We, as well as they, are in danger of forgetting who it is that sends us corn and wine, and fruitful seasons, love and marriage, and all the blessings of this life.  We, as well as the Jews, are continually fancying that these outward earthly things, as we call them in our shallow carnal conceits, have nothing to do with Jesus or His kingdom, but that we may compete, and scrape, even cheat and lie to get them, and when we have them, misuse them selfishly, as if they belonged to no one but ourselves, as if we had no duty to perform about them, as if we owed God no service for them.

And again, we are, just as much as the Jews were, in danger of spiritual pride; in danger of fancying that because we are religious, and have, or fancy we have, deep experiences and beautiful thoughts about God and Christ and our own souls, therefore we can afford to despise those who do not know as much as ourselves; to despise the common pleasures and petty sorrows of poor creatures, whose souls and bodies are grovelling in the dust, busied with the cares of this world, at their wits’ end to get their daily bread; to despise the merriment of young people, the play of children, and all those everyday happinesses which, though we may turn from them with a sneer, are precious in the sight of Him who made heaven and earth.  All such proud thoughts, all such contempt of those who do not seem as spiritual as we fancy ourselves, is evil.  It is from the devil, and not from God.  It is the same vile spirit which made the Pharisees of old say: “This people—these poor worldly drudging wretches—who know not the law, are accursed.”  And mind, this is not a sin of rich, and learned, and highborn men only.  They may be more tempted to it than others; but poor men, when they become, by the grace of God, wiser, more spiritual, more holy than others, are tempted, just as much as the rich, to despise their poor neighbours to whom God has not given the same light as themselves; and surely in them it shows ugliest of all.  A learned and high-born man may be excused for looking down upon the sinful poor, because he does not understand their temptations, because he never has been ignorant and struggling as they are.  But a poor man who despises the poor—he has no excuse.  He ought above all men to feel for them, for he has been tempted even as they are.  He knows their sorrows; he has been through their dark valley of bad food, bad lodging, want of work, want of teaching, low cares which drag the soul to earth.  Surely a poor man who has tasted God’s love and Christ’s light, ought, above all others, instead of turning his back on his class, to pity them, to make common cause with them, to teach them, guide them, comfort them, in a way no rich man can.  Yes; after all, it is the poor must help the poor; the poor must comfort the poor; the poor must teach and convert the poor.

See, in the epistle for this day, St. Paul makes no distinction between rich and poor.  This epistle is joined with the gospel for the day, to show us what ought to be the conduct of Christians, who believe in the miracle of Cana; what men should do who believe that they have a Lord in heaven, by whose command suns shine, fruits ripen, men enjoy the blessings of harvest, of marriage, of the comforts which the heathen and the savage, as well as the Christian man, partake; what men should do who believe that they have a Lord in heaven who entered into the common joys and sorrows of lowly men, who was once Himself a poor villager, who ate with publicans and sinners, who condescended to join in a wedding feast, and increase the mere animal enjoyment of the guests.  And what is St. Paul’s command to poor as well as rich?  Read the epistle for this day and see.

You see at once that this epistle is written in the same spirit as our Lord’s words: by God’s Spirit, in short; the Spirit which brought the Lord Jesus so condescendingly to the wedding feast; the Spirit which made Him care so heartily for the common pleasures of those around Him.  My friends, these are not commands to one class, but to all.  Poor as well as rich may show mercy with cheerfulness, and love without dissimulation.  Poor as well as rich may minister to others with earnestness, and condescend to those of low estate.  Not a word in this whole epistle which does not apply equally to every rank, and sex, and age.

Neither are these commands to each of us by ourselves, but to all of us together, as members of a family.  If you will look through them they are not things to be done to ourselves, but to our neighbours; not experiences to be felt about our own souls: but rules of conduct to our fellow-men.  They are all different branches and flowers from that one root: “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.”

Do we live thus, rich or poor?  Can we look each other in the face this afternoon and say, each man to his neighbour: “I have behaved like a brother to you.  I have rejoiced at your good fortune, and grieved at your sorrow.  I have preferred you to myself.  I have loved you without dissimulation.  I have been earnest in my place and duty in the parish for the sake of the common good of all.  I have condescended to those of lower rank than myself.  I have—”  Ah, my dear friends, I had better not go on with the list.  God forgive us all!  The less we try to justify ourselves on this score the better.  Some of us do indeed try to behave like brothers and sisters to their neighbours; but how few of us; and those few how little!  And yet we are brothers.  We are members of one family, sons of one Father, joint-heirs with one Lord, the poor Man who sat eating and drinking at the wedding feast in Cana of Galilee, and mixed freely in the joys and the sorrows of the poorest and meanest.  Joint-heirs with Christ; yet how unlike Him!  My friends, we need to repent and amend our ways; we need to confess, every one of us, rich and poor, the pride, the selfishness, the carelessness about each other, which keeps us so much apart, knowing so little of each other, feeling so little for each other.  Oh confess this sin to God, every one of you.  Those who have behaved most like brothers, will be most ready to confess how little they have behaved like brothers.  Confess: “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son, for I have not loved, cared for, helped my brothers and sisters round, who are just as much thy children as I am.”  Pray for the spirit of Jesus, the spirit of condescension, love, fellow-feeling; that spirit which rejoices simply and heartily with those who are happy, and feels for another’s sorrows as if they were its own.  Pray for it; for till it comes, there will be no peace on earth.  Pray for it; for when it comes and takes possession of your hearts, and you all really love and live like brothers, children of one Father, the kingdom of God will be come indeed, and His will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

XLVIII.

PARABLE OF THE LOWEST PLACE

And He put forth a parable to those which were bidden, when He marked how they chose out the chief rooms; saying unto them, when thou art bidden of any man to a wedding, sit not down in the highest room, lest a more honourable man than thou be bidden of him; and he that bade thee and him come and say to thee, Give this man place; and thou begin with shame to take the lowest room.  But when thou art bidden, go and sit down in the lowest room; that when he that bade thee cometh, he may say unto thee, Friend, go up higher: then shalt thou have worship in the presence of them that sit at meat with thee.  For whosoever exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.—Luke xiv. 7–11.

We heard in the gospel for to-day how the Lord Jesus put forth a parable to those who were invited to a dinner with Him at the Pharisee’s house.  A parable means an example of any rules or laws; a story about some rule, by hearing which people may see how the rule works in practice, and understand it.  Now, our Lord’s parables were about the kingdom of God.  They were examples of the rules and laws by which the kingdom of God is governed and carried on.  Therefore He begins many of His parables by saying, The kingdom of God is like something—something which people see daily, and understand more or less.  “The kingdom of God is like a field;” “The kingdom of God is like a net;” “The kingdom of God is like a grain of mustard seed;” and so forth.  And even where He did not begin one of His parables by speaking of the kingdom of God, we may be still certain that it has to do with the kingdom of God.  For the one great reason why the Lord was made flesh and dwelt among us, was to preach the kingdom of God, His Father and our Father, and to prove to men that God was their King, even at the price of his most precious blood.  And, therefore, everything which He ever did, and everything which He ever spoke, had to do with this one great work of His.  This parable, therefore, which you heard read in the gospel for to-day, has to do with the kingdom of God, and is an example of the laws of it.

Now, what is the kingdom of God?  It is worth our while to consider.  For at baptism we were declared members of the kingdom of God; we were to renounce the world, and to live according to the kingdom of God.  The kingdom of God is simply the way in which God governs men; and the world is the way in which men try to manage without God’s help or leave.  That is the difference between them; and a most awful difference it is.  Men fancy that they can get on well enough without God; that the ways of the world are very reasonable, and useful, and profitable, and quite good enough to live by, if not to die by.  But all the while God is King, let them fancy what they like; and this earth, and everything on it, from the king on his throne to the gnat in the sunbeam, is under His government, and must obey His laws or die.  We are in God’s kingdom, my good friends, every one of us, whether we like it or not, and we shall be there for ever and ever.  And our business is, therefore, simply to find out what are the laws of that kingdom, and obey those laws as speedily as possible, and live for ever thereby, lest, if we break them, and get in their way, they should grind us to powder.

Now, here is one of the laws of God’s kingdom: “Whosoever exalteth himself shall be abased; and whosoever abaseth himself shall be exalted.”  That is, whosoever, in any way whatsoever, sets himself up, will be pulled down again: while he who is contented to keep low, and think little of himself, will be raised up and set on high.  Now the world’s rule is the exact opposite of this.  The world says, Every man for himself.  The way of the world is to struggle and strive for the highest place; to be a pushing man, and a rising man, and a man who will stand stiffly by his rights, and give his enemy as good as he brings, and beat his neighbour out of the market, and show off himself to the best advantage, and try to make the most of whatever wit or money he has to look well in the world, that people may look up to him and flatter him and obey him; and so the world has no objection to people’s pretending to be better than they are.  Every man must do the best he can for himself, the world says, and never mind his neighbours: they must take care of themselves; and if they are foolish enough to be taken in, so much the worse for them.  So the world thinks that there is no harm in a man, when he has anything to sell, making it out better than it really is, and hiding the fault in it as far as he can.  When a tradesman or manufacturer sends about “puffs” of his goods, and pretends that they are better and cheaper than other people’s, just to get custom by it, the world does not call that what it is—boasting and lying.  It says: “Of course a man must do the best he can for himself.  If a man does not praise himself, nobody else will praise him; he cannot expect his neighbours to take him for better than his own words.”  So again, if a man wants a place or situation, the world thinks it no harm if he gives the most showy character of himself, and gets his friends to say all the good of him they can, and a great deal more, and to say none of the harm—in short, to make himself out a much better, or shrewder, or worthier man than he really is.  The world does not call that either what it is—boasting, and lying, and thrusting oneself into callings to which God has not called us.  The world says: “Of course a man must turn his best side outwards.  You cannot expect a man to tell tales on himself.”

And, my friends, the world would be quite right, and reasonable, and prudent, in telling us to push, and boast, and lie, and puff ourselves and our goods, if it were not for one thing which the foolish blind world is always forgetting, and that is, that there is a God who judges the earth.  If God were not our King; if He took no care of us men and our doings; if mankind had it all their own way on earth, and were forced to shift for themselves without any laws of God to guide them, then the best thing every man could do would be to fight for himself; to get all he could for himself, and leave as little as he could for his neighbours; to make himself out as great, and wise, and strong, as he could, and try to make his neighbours buy him at his own price.  That would be the best plan for every man, if God was not King; and therefore the world says that that is the best plan for every man, because the world does not believe that God is King, and hates the notion that God is King, and laughs at and persecutes, as Jesus Christ said it would, those who preach the kingdom of God, and tell men, as I tell you in God’s name: “You were not made to be selfish; you were not meant to rise in the world by boasting and pushing down and deceiving your neighbours.  For you are subjects of God’s kingdom; and to do so is to break his laws, and to put yourselves under His curse; and however worldly-wise all this selfishness and boasting may seem, it is sin, whose wages are death and ruin.”

For, my friends, let the world try to forget God as it will, He does not forget the world.  Let men try to make rules and laws for themselves, rules about religion, rules about government, rules about trade, rules about morals and what they fancy is just and fair; let them make as many rules as they like, they are only wasting their time; for God has made His rules already, and revealed them to us in the Bible, and told us that the earth and mankind are governed in His way, and not in ours, and that He will not alter His everlasting rules to suit our new ones.  As David says: “Let the people be never so unquiet, still the Lord is King.”