תמונות בעמוד
PDF
ePub
[blocks in formation]

A SERMON.

II. THESS. III. 1.

BRETHREN, PRAY FOR US, THAT THE WORD OF THE LORD MAY HAVE FREE COURSE, AND BE GLORIFIED.

F

Of all the many and blessed effects, which the reception of the gospel has upon the heart, there is none more lovely than the interest it awakens in the welfare of the whole of the human family. Immediately that a penitent sinner has himself" tasted that the Lord is gracious," there is opened in his bosom a fountain of benevolence-of pure, disinterested benevolence-which never fails to pour forth a gradually increasing stream. He is no longer satisfied, as aforetime, with ministering to the happiness of the home where he dwells,-tho' there assuredly will be spent his first, his best, his most constant efforts,—but in the remotest corners of the globe he feels that he has a neighbour, and a brother, and thither, therefore, would he extend, with a cheerful heart, and a liberal hand, those precious waters of salvation which have so greatly enriched himself. He desires, and prays, that the word of the Lord may spread abroad; may have free course ;* and be glori

*

Literally may run as in the margin of our Bibles.

fied in the salvation of souls, whose praises shall eternally glorify God. Uniformly will this be found to be the fruit of genuine piety.

In the case of the eminent Apostle, whose language is the text of our discourse, this expansive charity of the gospel is exhibited in all its fulness. It were impossible to view him, beaten with rods, stoned, and shipwrecked; in journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by his own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils, in a word, of every description;-it were impossible to look on these things, remembering wherefore they were incurred and endured, without being filled with admiration of his ardent and overflowing love. His was, indeed, gospel charity. Like his divine and beloved Master, he went about doing good. Reproaches, contempt, derision, and cruelty, seemed but to render him doubly zealous: they could not extinguish his affection: they were but as fuel, which, thrown upon a flame, checks it for a moment, to rise the brighter. To save the immortal souls of men, he would, as he himself declares, in language of surpassing beauty, "very gladly spend, and be spent; though the more abundantly he loved them, the less he were loved."

I wish you to notice this especially-to ponder it well-and then to remark, how this love affected his preaching. You will find, that whilst with unsparing hand he sowed the precious seed of the gospel, never was mortal more resolute than he, in tearing up weeds and tares by the roots. He was not content with publishing truth: he struggled and combated with error. The one he diffused, "gentle as a nurse, fondly cherishing her children:" the other he took in his giant

grasp, and loosed not till he had crushed to atoms. Of the spurious charity, which would leave men to die in ignorance and delusion, rather than disturb them, or of that which regards all creeds, as alike sufficient to save the soul, so that they be held in sincerity, Paul the Apostle knew just as little as Luther, or Calvin, or Melancthon: nay, he would have surpassed them all, as one star differeth from another star in glory, in the abhorrence with which he would have regarded such an unsound, and ruinous principle.

For the truth of this, we appeal with confidence to the record of his conduct bequeathed to us in Scripture. In the book of the Acts of the Apostles, as well as in his own Epistles, many and various are the instances of his determinate zeal in contending with error. Take an example or two from both. In the xvii ch. of the Acts, St. Paul is related to have gone to Athens, and there to have witnessed the gross idolatry, which deformed and debased that illustrious city. He perceived that in all things they were too superstitious; for, as he passed by, and beheld their devotions, he found an altar with this inscription; "To the unknown God." And how does he look on such an abomination? His spirit, we read, was stirred within him, when he saw the city wholly given to idolatry. And how does he act, under such an emotion? Does he content himself with preaching the truth, and confide in the truth for the subversion of error? or is he restrained and satisfied by the reflection that ignorance and delusion would in mercy be pardoned? No; but at the peril of his life, and with the certainty of mockery and derision from many of his benighted hearers, he "disputed in the synagogue with the Jews, and with the devout persons, and in the

market daily with them that met with him:" and, when encountered by certain philosophers of the Epicureans and of the Stoicks, who, desiring to hear what this babbler would say, took him and brought him to Mars' Hill, he boldly stood before them, and declared that the Godhead was not a senseless idol, graven by art and mans' device; but that the Lord of heaven and earth, who made the world and all things therein, was present in every portion of immensity, and was not far from every one of us; for in him we live and move and have our being. And then, at the close of his address, he solemnly warns them to repent, reminding them of that day, when God shall judge the world in righteousness by that man whom He hath ordained.

Similar was his conduct at Ephesus: he preached the truth, and conflicted with error." He went, we are told, into the Synagogue, and spake boldly for the space of three months, disputing and persuading the things concerning the kingdom of God. But, when divers were hardened, and believed not; but spake evil of that way before the multitude, he departed from them, and separated the disciples, disputing daily in the school of one Tyrannus."

[ocr errors]

To adduce but once instance more, look at the whole of his Epistle to the Galatians. Some heretical teachers had endeavoured to "entangle again" the Galatian Converts with that yoke of bondage, the Mosaic law; and, especially, had urged upon them the importance and necessity of circumcision. To eradicate this pernicious doctrine, St. Paul addresses them by letter; and never did writer more strongly evince his anxious concern for immortal souls, united with a dread and detestation of all that would beguile them to ruin.

« הקודםהמשך »