Westminster Sermons

They say—“We believe firmly enough in moral retribution.  How can we help believing in it, while we see it working around us, in many a fearful shape, here, now, in this life?  And we believe that it may work on, in still more fearful shapes, in the life to come.  We believe that as long as a sinner is impenitent, he must be miserable; that if he goes on impenitent for ever, he must go on making himself miserable—ay, it may be more and more miserable for ever.  Only do not tell us that he must go on.  That his impenitence, and therefore his punishment, is irremediable, necessary, endless; and thereby destroy the whole purpose, and we should say, the whole morality, of his punishment.  If that punishment be corrective, our moral sense is not shocked by any severity, by any duration: but if it is irremediable, it cannot be corrective; and then, what it is, or why it is, we cannot—or rather dare not—say.  We, too, believe in an eternal fire.  But because we believe also the Athanasian Creed, which tells us that there is but One Eternal, we believe that that fire must be the fire of God, and therefore, like all that is in God and of God, good and not evil, a blessing and not a curse.  We believe that that fire is for ever burning, though men are for ever trying to quench it all day long; and that it has been and will be in every age burning up all the chaff and stubble of man’s inventions; the folly, the falsehood, the ignorance, the vice of this sinful world; and we praise God for it; and give thanks to Him for His great glory, that He is the everlasting and triumphant foe of evil and misery, of whom it is written, that our God is a consuming fire.”  Such words are being spoken, right or wrong.

Such words will bear their fruit, for good or evil.  I do not pronounce how much of them is true or false.  It is not my place to dogmatize and define, where the Church of England, as by law established, has declined to do so.  Neither is it for you to settle these questions.  It is rather a matter for your children.  A generation more, it may be, of earnest thought will be required, ere the true answer has been found.  But it is your duty, if you be educated and thoughtful persons, to face these questions; to consider seriously what these men would have you consider—whether you are believing the exact words of the Bible, and the conclusions of your own reason and moral sense; or whether you are merely believing that cosmogony elaborated in the cloister, that theory of moral retribution pardonable in the middle age, which Dante and Milton sang.

But this I do not hesitate to say—That if we of the clergy can find no other answers to these doubts than those which were reasonable and popular in an age when men racked women, burned heretics, and believed that every Mussulman killed in a crusade went straight to Tartarus—then very serious times are at hand, both for the Christian clergy and for Christianity itself.

What, then, are we to believe and do?  Shall we degenerate into a lazy scepticism, which believes that everything is a little true, and everything a little false—in plain words, believes nothing at all?  Or shall we degenerate into faithless fears, and unmanly wailings that the flood of infidelity is irresistible, and that Christ has left His Church?

We shall do neither, if we believe the text.  That tells us of a firm standing-ground amid the wreck of fashions and opinions.  Of a kingdom which cannot be moved, though the heavens pass away like a scroll, and the earth be burnt up with fervent heat.

And it tells us that the King of that kingdom is He, who is called Jesus Christ—the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever.

An eternal and changeless kingdom, and an eternal and changeless King.  These the Epistle to the Hebrews preaches to all generations.

It does not say that we have an unchangeable cosmogony, an unchangeable eschatology, an unchangeable theory of moral retribution, an unchangeable dogmatic system: not to these does it point the Jews, while their own nation and worship were in their very death-agony, and the world was rocking and reeling round them, decay and birth going on side by side, in a chaos such as man had never seen before.  Not to these does the Epistle point the Hebrews: but to the changeless kingdom and to the changeless King.

My friends, do you really believe in that kingdom, and in that King?  Do you believe that you are now actually in a kingdom of heaven, which cannot be moved; and that the living, acting, guiding, practical, real King thereof is Christ who died on the Cross?

These are days in which a preacher is bound to ask his congregation—and still more to ask himself—whether he really believes in that kingdom, and in that King; and to bid himself and them, if they have not believed earnestly enough therein, to repent, in this time of Lent, of that at least; to repent of having neglected that most cardinal doctrine of Scripture and of the Christian faith.

But if we really believe in that changeless kingdom and in that changeless King, shall we not—considering who Christ is, the co-equal and co-eternal Son of God—believe also, that if the heavens and the earth are being shaken, then Christ Himself may be shaking them?  That if opinions be changing, then Christ Himself may be changing them?  That if new truths are being discovered, Christ Himself may be revealing them?  That if some of those truths seem to contradict those which He has revealed already, they do not really contradict them?  That, as in the sixteenth century, Christ is burning up the wood and stubble with which men have built on His foundation, that the pure gold of His truth may alone be left?  It is at least possible; it is probable, if we believe that Christ is a living, acting King, to whom all power is given in heaven and earth, and who is actually exercising that power; and educating Christendom, and through Christendom the whole human race, to a knowledge of Himself, and through Himself of God their Father in heaven.

Should we not say—We know that Christ has been so doing, for centuries and for ages?  Through Abraham, through Moses, through the prophets, through the Greeks, through the Romans, and at last through Himself, He gave men juster and wider views of themselves, of the universe, and of God.  And even then He did not stop.  How could He, who said of Himself, “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work”?  How could He, if He be the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever?  Through the Apostles, and specially through St Paul, He enlarged, while He confirmed, His own teaching.  And did He not do the same in the sixteenth century?  Did He not then sweep from the minds and hearts of half Christendom beliefs which had been held sacred and indubitable for a thousand years?  Why should He not be doing so now?  If it be answered, that the Reformation of the sixteenth century was only a return to simpler and purer Apostolic truth—why, again, should it not be so now?  Why should He not be perfecting His work one step more, and sweeping away more of man’s inventions, which are not integral and necessary elements of the one Catholic faith, but have been left behind, in pardonable human weakness, by our great Reformers?  Great they were, and good: giants on the earth, while we are but as dwarfs beside them.  But, as the hackneyed proverb says, the dwarf on the giant’s shoulders may see further than the giant himself: and so may we.

Oh! that men would approach new truth in something of that spirit; in the spirit of reverence and Godly fear, which springs from a living belief in Christ the living King, which is—as the text tells us—the spirit in which we can serve God acceptably.  Oh! that they would serve God; waiting reverently and anxiously, as servants standing in the presence of their Lord, for the slightest sign or hint of His will.  Then they would have grace; by which they would receive new thought with grace; gracefully, courteously, fairly, charitably, reverently; believing that, however strange or startling, it may come from Him whose ways are not as our ways, nor His thoughts as our thoughts; and that he who fights against it, may haply be fighting against God.

True, they would receive all new thought with caution, that conservative spirit, which is the duty of every Christian; which is the peculiar strength of the Englishman, because it enables him calmly and slowly to take in the new, without losing the old which his forefathers have already won for him.  So they would be cautious, even anxious, lest in grasping too greedily at seeming improvements, they let go some precious knowledge which they had already attained: but they would be on the look out for improvements; because they would consider themselves, and their generation, as under a divine education.  They would prove all things fairly and boldly, and hold fast that which is good; all that which is beautiful, noble, improving and elevating to human souls, minds, or bodies; all that increases the amount of justice, mercy, knowledge, refinement; all that lessens the amount of vice, cruelty, ignorance, barbarism.  That at least must come from Christ.  That at least must be the inspiration of the Spirit of God: unless the Pharisees were right after all when they said, that evil spirits could be cast out by the prince of the devils.

Be these things as they may, one comfort it will give us, to believe firmly and actively in the changeless kingdom, and in the changeless King.  It will give us calm, patience, faith and hope, though the heavens and the earth be shaken around us.  For then we shall see that the Kingdom, of which we are citizens, is a kingdom of light, and not of darkness; of truth, and not of falsehood; of freedom, and not of slavery; of bounty and mercy, and not of wrath and fear; that we live and move and have our being not in a “Deus quidam deceptor” who grudges his children wisdom, but in a Father of Light, from whom comes every good and perfect gift; who willeth that all men should be saved, and come to the knowledge of the truth.  In His kingdom we are; and in the King whom He has set over it we can have the most perfect trust.  For us that King stooped from heaven to earth; for us He was born, for us He toiled, for us He suffered, for us He died, for us He rose, for us He sits for ever at God’s right hand.  And can we not trust Him?  Let Him do what He will.  Let Him lead us whither He will.  Wheresoever He leads must be the way of truth and life.  Whatsoever He does, must be in harmony with that infinite love which He displayed for us upon the Cross.  Whatsoever He does, must be in harmony with that eternal purpose by which He reveals to men God their Father.  Therefore, though the heaven and the earth be shaken around us, we will trust in Him.  For we know that He is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever; and that His will and promise is, to lead those who trust in Him into all truth.

SERMON IX.  THE KINGDOM OF GOD

Luke xxi. 29-33

And Jesus spake to them a parable; Behold the fig tree, and all the trees; when they now shoot forth, ye see and know of your own selves that summer is now nigh at hand.  So likewise ye, when ye see these things come to pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand.  Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass away, till all be fulfilled.  Heaven and earth shall pass away: but my words shall not pass away.

The question which naturally suggests itself when we hear these words, is—When were these things to take place?

If we heard one whom we regarded as at least a person of perfect virtue, truthfulness, and earnestness, foretell that the city in which we now stand should be destroyed.  If he told us, that when we saw it encompassed with armies, we were to know that its desolation was at hand.  If he told us that then those who were in the surrounding country were to flee to the mountains, and those in the city to come out of it.  If he pronounced woe in that day on mothers and weak women who could not escape.  If he told us, nevertheless, that when these things came to pass we were to rejoice and lift up our heads, for our redemption was drawing nigh.  If he told us to look at the trees in spring; for, as surely as their budding was a sign that summer was nigh, so was the coming to pass of these terrible woes a sign that something was nigh, which he called the Kingdom of God.  If he told us, with a solemn asseveration, that this generation should not pass away till all had happened.  If he went on to warn us against profligacy, frivolity, worldliness, lest that day should come upon us unaware.  If he bade us keep awake always, that we might be found worthy to escape all that was coming, and to stand before Him, The Son of Man.  If he used throughout his address the second person, speaking to us, but never mentioning our descendants; giving the signs, the warnings, the counsels to us only, should we not, even if he had not solemnly told us that the present generation should not pass away till all was fulfilled—should we not, I say, suppose naturally that he spoke of events which in his opinion our own eyes would see; which would, in his opinion, occur during our lifetime?

Whether he were right in his expectation, or wrong, still it would be clear that such was his expectation; that he considered the danger as imminent, the warning as addressed personally to us who heard him speak.

We should leave his presence with that impression, in fear and anxiety.  But if we afterwards discovered that our fear and anxiety were superfluous; that the events of which he spoke—the most awful and wonderful of them at least—were not to occur for many centuries to come; that, even if some calamity were imminent, the immediate future and the very distant future were so intermingled in his discourse, that it would require the labours of commentator after commentator, for many hundred years, to disentangle them, and that their labours would be in vain; that the coming of the Son of Man, and of the Kingdom of God, of which he had spoken, were to be referred to a time thousands of years hence; though we were told in the same breath to look to the fig-tree and all the trees as a sign that it was coming immediately, and that our own generation would not pass away before all had taken place:—would not such a discovery raise in us thoughts and feelings neither wholesome for us nor honourable to the prophet?

I cannot think otherwise.  We may be aware of the difficulties which beset this, and any other, interpretation of our Lord’s prophecies in Matthew, Mark, and Luke: we may have the deepest respect for those learned and pious divines who from time to time have tried to part the prophecies relating to the fall of Jerusalem from those relating to the end of the world and the day of Judgment.  Yet, in the face of such a passage as the text, especially when we cannot agree with those who would make this “generation” mean this “race” or “nation,” we may—we have a right to—decline to separate the two sets of passages.  We have a right to say,—He who spake as man never spake, and therefore knew the force of words; He who knew what was in man—and therefore what effect His words would produce on His hearers—did deliver a discourse—indeed, many discourses—which asserted, as far as plain words could be understood by plain men, that the Kingdom of God was at hand; and that the coming of the Son of Man would take place before that generation passed away.

And that all His disciples, and St Paul as much as any, put that meaning upon His words, is a matter of fact and of history, to be seen plainly in Holy Scripture.

But, while the text compels us to believe that the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans was a coming of the Son of Man—a manifestation of the Kingdom of God—a day of Judgment, in the strictest and most awful sense; yet we are not compelled to limit the meaning of the text to the destruction of Jerusalem.

No prophecy of Scripture is of private interpretation.  Prophets, apostles—how much more our Lord Himself—do not merely indulge in presages; they lay down laws—laws moral, spiritual, eternal—which have been fulfilling themselves from the beginning; which are fulfilling themselves now; which will go on fulfilling themselves to the end of time.

So said our Lord Jesus of His own prophecies concerning the destruction of Jerusalem.  It was but one example—a most awful one—of the laws of His kingdom.  Not in Judæa only, but wherever the carcase was, there would the eagles be gathered together.  In the moral, as in the physical word, there were beasts of prey—the scavengers of God—ready to devour out of His kingdom nations, institutions, opinions, which had become dead, and decayed, and ready to infect the air.  Many a time since the Roman eagles flocked to Jerusalem has that prophecy been fulfilled; and many a time will it be fulfilled once more, and yet once more.

And what else, if we look at them carefully and reverently, is the meaning of the words in this my text, “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but My words shall not pass away”?

Shall we translate this,—Heaven and earth shall not come true: but My words shall come true?  By so doing we may put some little meaning into the latter half of the verse; but none into the former.  Surely there is a deeper meaning in the words than that of merely coming true.  Surely they mean that His words are eternal, perpetual; for ever present, possible, imminent; for ever coming true.  So, indeed, they would not pass away.  So they would be like the heavens and the earth, and the laws thereof; like heat, gravitation, electricity, what not—always here, always working, always asserting themselves—with this difference, that when the physical laws of the heavens and the earth, which began in time, in time have perished, the spiritual laws of God’s kingdom, of Christ’s moral government of moral beings, shall endure for ever and for ever, eternal as that God whose essence they reflect.

Therefore I mean nothing less than that the great and final day of Judgment is past; or that we are not to look for that second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ which, as our forefathers taught us to hope, shall set right all the wrong of this diseased world.

God forbid!  For most miserable were the world, most miserable were mankind, if all that our Lord prophesied had happened, once and for all, at the destruction of Jerusalem by the Roman armies.  But most miserable, also, would this world be, and most miserable would be mankind, if these words were not to be fulfilled till some future Last Day, and day of Judgment, for which the Church has now been waiting for more than eighteen centuries—and, as far as we can judge, may wait for as many centuries more.  Most miserable, if the Son of Man has never come since He ascended into heaven from Olivet.  Most miserable, if the kingdom of God has never been at hand, since He gave that one short gleam of hope to men in Judæa long ago.  Most miserable, if there be no kingdom of God among us even now: in one word, if God and Christ be not our King; but the devil, as some fancy; or Man himself, as others fancy, be the only king of this world and of its destinies; if there be no order in this mad world, save what man invents; no justice, save what he executes; no law, save what he finds convenient to lay upon himself for the protection of his person and property.  Most miserable, if the human race have no guide, save its own instincts and tendencies; no history, save that of its own greed, ignorance and crime, varied only by fruitless struggles after a happiness to which it never attains.  Most miserable world, and miserable man, if that be true after all which to the old Hebrew prophet seemed incredible and horrible—if God does look on while men deal treacherously, and does hold His peace when the wicked devours the man who is more righteous than he; and has made men as the fishes of the sea, as the creeping things that have no ruler over them.

I said—Most miserable, in that case, was the world and man.  I did not say that they would consider themselves miserable.  I did not say that they would think it a Gospel, and good news, that Christ was their King, and that His Kingdom was always at hand.  They never thought that good news.  When the prophets told them of it, they stoned them.  When the Lord Himself told them, they crucified Him.  Worldly men dislike the message now, probably, as much as they ever did.  But they escape from it, either by treating it as a self-evident commonplace which no Christian denies, and therefore no Christian need think of; or by smiling at it as an exploded superstition, at least as a “Semitic” form of thought, with which we have nothing to do.  They confound it, often I fear purposely, with those fancied miraculous interpositions, those paltry special providences, which fanatics in all ages have believed to be worked for their own special behoof.  Altogether they dislike, and express very openly their dislike, of the least allusion to a Divine Providence “interfering,” as they strangely term it, with them and their affairs.

And they are wise, doubtless, in their generation.  The news that Christ is the King of men and of the world must be unpleasant, even offensive, to too many, both of those who fancy that they are managing this world, and of those who fancy that they could manage the world still better, if they only had their rights.  It must be unpleasant to be told that they are not managing the world, and cannot manage it: that it is being managed and ruled by an unseen King, whose ways are far above their ways, and His thoughts above their thoughts.

For then: Prudence might demand of them, that they should find out what are that King’s ways, thoughts and laws, and obey them—an enquiry so troublesome, that many very highly educated persons consider it, now-a-days, quite impossible; and tell us that, for practical purposes, God’s laws can neither be discovered, nor obeyed.

Moreover, their scheme of this world is one which would work—so they fancy—just as well if there was no God.  Unpleasant therefore it must be for them to hear, not merely that there is a God, but that He has His own scheme of the world; and that it is working, whether they like or not; that God, and not they, is making history; God, and not they, appointing the bounds and the times of nations; God, and not they, or any man or men, distributing good and evil among mankind.

They do not object, of course, to the existence of a God.  They only object to His being what the Hebrew prophets called Him—a living God; a God who executes justice and judgment by His Son Jesus Christ, to whom He has committed all power both in heaven and earth.  They are ready sometimes to allow even that, provided they may relegate it into the past, or into the future.  They are ready to allow that God and Christ exerted power over men at the first Advent 1800 years ago, and that they will exert power over men at the second Advent—none knows how long hence.  But that God and Christ are exerting power now—in an ever-present and perpetual Advent—in this nineteenth century just as much as in any century before or since—that they had rather not believe.  Their creed is, that though heaven and earth have not passed away; though the laws of nature are working for ever as at the beginning: yet Christ’s words have passed away, and fallen into abeyance for many centuries past, to remain in abeyance for many centuries to come.

In one word—while they believe more or less in a past God, and a future God, yet as to the existence of a present God, in any practical and real sense—they believe—how little, I dare not say.

Whether this generation will awaken out of that sleep of practical Atheism, which is creeping on them more and more, who can tell?  That they are uneasy in the sleep, there are many signs.  For in their sleep dreams come of another world, of which their five senses tell them nought.  Then do some fly to mediæval superstitions, which give them at least elaborate and agreeable substitutes for a living God.  Some fly to impostors, who pretend by juggling tricks to put them in communication with that unseen world which they have so long denied.  Some, again, play with unfulfilled prophecy; and fancy that it is for them, though it was not for the apostles, to know the times and seasons which the Father has put in His own power, and the day and hour of which no man knoweth, no not the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only.

Better that, than that they should believe that there is nothing, and never will be anything, in the world, beyond what their five senses can apprehend.

But whether they awake or not out of their sleep, their blindness does not alter the eternal fact, whether men believe it or not.  That is true what the Psalmist said of old: “The Lord is King, be the people never so impatient.  He sitteth upon His throne, though the earth be never so unquiet.”

The utterances of the old Psalmists and prophets concerning the ever-present kingdom of God are facts, not dreams.  Whether men believe it or not, it is true that the power, glory, and righteousness of His kingdom may be known unto men; that His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and His dominion endureth throughout all ages; that The Lord upholds all such as fall, and lifts up those that are down; that the eyes of all wait on Him, that He may give them their meat in due season; that He opens His hand, and filleth all things living with plenteousness; that the Lord is righteous in all His ways, and holy in all His works; that He is nigh to them that call upon Him, yea to all who call upon Him faithfully.  He that planted the ear, shall He not hear?  He that made the eye, shall He not see?  He that chastiseth the nations; it is He that teacheth man knowledge: shall He not punish?

Whether men believe it or not, that is true which the Psalmist said—Whither shall I flee from His Spirit, or whither shall I go from His presence?  If I climb up to heaven, He is there; if I go down to hell, He is there also.  If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost part of the sea, even there shall His hand lead me, His right hand hold me still.

Whether men believe it or not, that is true which Christ spake on earth—That the Father hath committed all judgment to Him, because He is the Son of man; that to Him is given all power in heaven and earth; and that He is with us, even to the end of the world.

Whether men believe it or not, that is true which S. Paul spake on Mars’ hill, saying that the Lord is not far from any one of us, for in Him we live and move and have our being; and that He hath appointed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness, by that Man whom He hath ordained, and raised from the dead.

Whether men believe it or not, that is true which Christ spake—Heaven and earth shall pass away; but My words shall not pass away; at least till He has put down all rule and all authority and power, and delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father, that God may be all in all.

“That one far-off divine event, toward which the whole creation moves,” will be, not the resumption, but the triumph, of Christ’s rule; of a rule which began before the world, which has endured through all the ages, which endures now, punishing or rewarding each and every one of us, and of our children’s children, as long as there shall be a man upon the earth.  For by Christ’s will alone the world of man consists; in Christ’s laws alone is true life, health, wealth, possible for any man, family or nation; out of His kingdom He casts, sooner or later, all things which offend, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.  He said of Himself—Whosoever falleth on this rock shall be broken; but on whomsoever it shall fall, it shall grind him to powder.

SERMON X.  THE LAW OF THE LORD

Psalm i. 1,2

Blessed is the man who hath not walked in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stood in the path of sinners, nor sat in the seat of the scornful.  But his delight is in the law of the Lord; and in his law will he exercise himself day and night.

The first and second Psalms, taken together, are the key to all the Psalms; I may almost say to the whole Bible.  I will say a few words on them this morning, especially to those who are coming to the Holy Communion, to shew their allegiance to that Lord, in whose law alone is life, and who sits on the throne of the universe, King of kings, and Lord of lords: but I say it to the whole congregation likewise; nay, if there were an infidel or a heathen in the Church, I should say it to them.  For in this case what is true of one man is true of every man, whether he knows it or not.