Is it not seasonable, in these days of growing religiousness and worldliness, to warn one another, beloved, to keep our minds uncorrupt in the simplicity that is in Christ? In the preparation season, which the present age is, and which the Canticles contemplate, Eve was getting ready, under the forming hand of God., for Adam, and for Adam only. Adam slept for Eve, and Eve was made for Adam. So with Christ and the Church. He slept in death for us, and we are preparing, under the Holy Ghost, for Him. “I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.” As he says also in another place, “My little children, of whom I travail in birth again till Christ be formed in you,” Christ, and Christ only; Christ in His precious sufficiency for a sinner, in answer to the Hagar or Galatian thought of “days and months, and times, and years”—that other gospel which yet is not another.
But this is assailed. The gospel, in its claim on the sinner to give his undivided confidence to Christ, has been abroad on the lips of a thousand witnesses, to the gladdening of thousands of souls. The enemy has watched and hated this. Working in the scene, in which he goes “to and fro” and “up and down,” (Job 1:7,7And the Lord said unto Satan, Whence comest thou? Then Satan answered the Lord, and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it. (Job 1:7)) he is busy to seduce the heart from this gospel. And is not his success far beyond the measure of the fears of any of us? The religion of fleshly confidences or of ordinances is giving extended character to this hour among us. It admits of worldliness; and worldliness is, at this same hour, flourishing in company with it. There is the erection of temples for worship, and of palaces for the worshippers. Stricter care to observe, in its season, due attendance in the sanctuary, together with unparalleled skill and energy and enterprise in advancing the indulgence and elegance of human life, so as to make the world a desirable and yet a safe place to live in—a place where religion may now be seen to be observed and honored.
This is all seductive from the principle of faith—this is corruption of the mind from the simplicity that is in Christ. The gospel addresses itself to man, not only as a guilty but as a religious creature. It finds him under the power of superstition or religiousness, as well as of sin. It is as natural for man to refuse to go into “the judgment-hall lest he should be defiled,” as it is, in very enmity to God, to cry out, “Crucify him, crucify him.” And the gospel gets as stern a refusal from the religious man as from the lustful man. As the divine teacher tells us, the harlot goes into the kingdom before the Pharisee.
Religious vanities are deeply playing their part in this hour, and seeking to fascinate souls. What answer, beloved, do you and I give them? Is Jesus so precious that no allurement has power? Is the virgin purity of the mind still kept, and as chaste ones are we still betrothed to Christ only? Like the newly-formed Eve, are we in our place of earliest, freshest presentation to our Lord; or have we, apart from His side, opened our ear to the serpent?
The kingdom of heaven is as a supper, a royal joyous; feast got ready for sinners, that they might taste and see that the Lord is good, and that blessed is the man that trusteth in Him. It does not put God in the place of a receiver, for man to bring Him His due: but it puts Him in the place of a giver, and man is called to value His blessing. But the question is, Who listens, with desirous heart, to the bidding? Who wears “the wedding garment?” Who prizes Christ? Who triumphs in His salvation? Who longs for the day of His espousals? John had this garment on him, knowing, as he did, the joy of being the Bridegroom’s friend. It was flowing at liberty on Mary’s shoulders, as she sat at her Lord’s feet and heard His words. Paul tucked it tight about him, when he said, “God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.” The eunuch had just put it on, as “he went his way rejoicing” under the faith of the name of Jesus. Every poor sinner adorns himself with it the moment his heart values Christ. And what joy is it, thus to know, that when we put on Christ, it is not “sackcloth” we put on, nor is it “the spirit of heaviness” we enter into, but “a wedding garment” has clothed us, and with “the garment of praise” we array our spirits!
Have we thus learned, “the kingdom of heaven?” Have we, in spirit, entered it as a banqueting-hall, where both magnificence and joy welcome us? Are we, consciously, guests at the marriage of a King’s Son? Have we learned the mysteries of the faith? Have we gazed at them? Has the musing over them kindled a, fire in the heart, to burn up the chaff of worldly rudiments? Paul had this element in his soul as he traveled through Greece. And how did the glow of these mysteries address itself to “the princes of the world” there? It consumed them all. “Where is the scribe, where is the wise, where is the disputer of the world?” Precious ardor of the Spirit? What a pile was thus fired in the famed cities of the learned and the wise, and how were all the thoughts of men thrown, as rubbish, into it!
And how did he treat the rudiments of the religious world? He bore the same fervent sense of Christ with him into their regions, to test what chaff and dross was there. In Galatia he found much of it; but he spared none of it. Though an angel from heaven gather such rubbish; though Peter himself help in the work; though the Galatians, who once would have plucked out their eyes for him, be enticed, nothing should stand before the heat of the Spirit that bore him onward. “O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you?” “Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years; I am afraid of you.”
Could he do less? Could he carry Jesus in his heart, and calmly stand and measure his light with the lights of Greece, or God’s great ordinance with man’s traditions?
It is to make much of Christ we want, beloved—much of Himself and His glorious achievements for poor sinners. We want simplicity in that sense of the word—the breathings of a soul content with Him, and the peace of a conscience forever at rest in His unaided sufficiency. “What think ye of Christ?” is the test, as a dear hymn, well known among us, has it—
“Some call Him a Saviour, in word,
But mix their own works with His plan,
And hope He His help will afford,
When they have done all that they can.
If doings prove rather too light,
(A little they own they may fail),
They purpose to make up full weight
By casting His name in the scale.
“Some style Him the pearl of great price,
And say He’s the fountain of joys,
Yet feed upon folly and vice,
And cleave to the world and its toys:
Like Judas, the Saviour they kiss,
And, while they salute Him, betray!
Ah! what will profession like this
Avail in His terrible day!
“If asked what of Jesus I think,
Though all my best thoughts are but poor,
I say He’s my meat and my drink,
My life, and my strength, and my store;
My Shepherd, my Husband, my Friend,
My Saviour from sin and from thrall,
My hope from beginning to end,
My portion, my Lord, and my all.”